Game Quicky: Forager (Switch) ~ Collecting the Mining

Official website

A few days ago, I wrote an article about a few of my favorite pieces of music in games. In that article, I talked about Forager. A game that recently got ported to the Nintendo Switch. Because the game looked quite interesting to me, I decided to give it a try and now that I have almost finished the game, I decided that it’s high time that I write an article about it. So, in this game quicky, you will find my opinions on the game and feel free to leave a comment in the comment section with your opinion on the content of this article and/or the game itself. A little side note, this review is written when the original version came out on Switch, it’s possible that things from this review can become irrelevant when new content comes out.

Positives

In this game, you play as a sort of nameless somebody that’s stranded on an island. Your goal is to expand the islands and survive. Now, there are a lot of game mechanics and there is a lot of crafting that will need to be done. The pacing of the game is something special. Depending on your playstyle and what you unlock, the game can go quickly or slowly.

The gameplay is quite unique. You start off on one lonely island. I was unsure at first what I needed to do. I was able to mine away from the resources on the island and after a while they randomly respawned. So, where a flower spawned first, a tree was now standing. I always got small bits of experience. When I leveled up, I was able to unlock new skills and buildings. These skills and buildings allowed to me gather even more types of resources and sometimes even more efficiently.

It didn’t take long before I had a ton of farms and factories setup that helped me in automating certain parts of the crafting process. Now, it would be lovely if they expanded a bit more on this process in future updates, like for example, a certain furnace always smelting a certain ore when it got below a certain point.

Besides crafting and grinding for resources, you also have enemies to worry about. Depending on the strength of your weapons and gear, these enemies can range from major treats or pushovers. I found it extremely enjoyable to improve my gear and then to take revenge on some annoying enemies by defeating them in one swipe of my sword.

On top of that, there are various dungeons, quests, and secrets to find throughout the game. Almost every island has something to do or to discover it. Some islands have even more than one thing. So, it’s a great idea to try out different things. If you watch closely to each island and try out things, you might discover some secret treasures and upgrades.

I found the visual presentation of this game quite nicely. The pixel art of this game is excellent and fits the style of this game quite well. The animations aren’t too special or flashy, but that isn’t too big of a deal. The goofy writing and humor of the characters more than make up for it. Speaking about that, the characters in this game can be quite amusing and entertaining.

Now, if you talk about the presentation you can’t forget about the music and sound effects. These are excellent as well. The soundtrack of this game is a joy to listen too. I’m even considering adding the soundtrack to my playlist for when I’m writing or just relaxing. The soundtrack is in general quite relaxing but can be quite tense when it needs to be.

The controls of this game are quite responsive and easy to get the hang of. It didn’t take long for me to get used to the controls and do some advanced moves. The inventory management is a bit basic, but more on that later.

So, you have to purchase land, find secrets, unlock achievements and so much more. Whenever you finish a quest line or finish an achievement, you get special costumes that give you special abilities. These special abilities can range from taking less damage or certain enemies ignoring you. And some of these costumes are great easter eggs or references to other series. One thing to know is that once you unlock the effect of a costume, it’s always active. Even when you are not wearing it, it’s active.

Negatives

Certain building mechanics are quite underdeveloped. When I wanted to place another oil pumping station, I had an extremely difficult time removing all the wood I had placed in the ocean. Also, I was unable to remove any land tiles that were blocking the pumping station.

The vaults are quite handy and aid you in stocking up resources. The issue I have with the vaults is that you are unable to choose where which item goes when your inventory overflows. At the end of my playthrough, I had several vaults and I didn’t know which item was where. It was always a find expedition when I needed to find one item or check if there weren’t item stacks that could be combined.

In an extension of that, the inventory management is too basic. You can’t move items in your inventory, you can’t change the order of the items in the hot bar. Also, when I was catching things with bottles, the hot bar sometimes switched to the caught item and I accidentally released the fairy.

The randomness and luck-based drops nearing the end can get extremely frustrating. There are two artifacts that I still have to get to complete the museum but the random drop rates of the remaining treasures are so low that after 5 hours of trying, I was unable to get even one of those drops.

There are some minor game-breaking bugs in the game. For example, there are some puzzles where the required items don’t always spawn. These bugs are fixed in the Steam version of the game, but I still experience them on the Nintendo Switch. The one that affected me is the bug with the mushroom puzzle on the rainbow island.

When you bought all the islands and crafted almost every upgrade, the game gets a bit boring. Not only is one of the final upgrades quite repetitive and slow to get, but there is also nothing to do after you bought all the islands. Now, this might change in the future, since additional content is being developed. Recently a new content pack has been released for the Steam version.

In most cases, the frame rate is quite stable. But, whenever you enter or exit a building or when there is a lot happening on screen… The framerate can drop drastically. For example, I noticed a lot of frame drops whenever I had some special buffs applied to me and I was digging all over the place. Speaking of the frame rate, there is one dungeon where you have to guide a beam towards certain obstacles to open the doors. How the longer the beam was, the worse the framerate got.

Conclusion

This game is quite a lot of fun, I enjoyed myself with this game quite a lot. But, the game can be a bit rough around the edges. There are some parts of the game that are still a bit underdeveloped and could some expanding.

The tricky thing about reviewing this game is that there are a few major updates planned and I have no idea what they will change or add to the game. I don’t even know if I have to restart or if I’m able to continue on the same save file when the updates come out. While some of them already got released on Steam, I don’t know if and when they come to the Nintendo Switch.

Yet, I still recommend this game to people who enjoy games like Terraria, Zelda or Minecraft. This game is a lot of fun and quite addictive as well. When I started playing this game, I had a very hard time putting the game down and playing other games. I’m very excited to see what the next updates will bring and which improvements it will bring to the game. Since if they polish the mechanics that I talked about in the negatives section of this game, the game can become even more enjoyable.

And with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game. Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed right it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in a future article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 70/100

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Publishing: The world of Dfusing Mechanical Keyboards

As the years have progressed, technology has come a long way. It has brought a change in lifestyle and we cannot possibly think of living without technology right now. Computers are a great example of this changing technology. The bulky desktops have given way for more sleeker versions and feature-packed laptops. One of the most used input devices on a computer is the keyboard. It has also changed along with the computers. While laptops have their own integrated keyboards, some people prefer using an external keyboard.

NekoJonez’s personal note: This article is written by DFusing and minor edits by me. I want to thank DFusing for writing this extremely interesting article and the amazing communication. I’m actually in the market myself for a new keyboard and after reading this article, I’m considering a mechanical keyboard.

The tactile satisfaction of the mechanical keyboards is often missing in membrane keyboards. It mimics the feel of writing on an old school typewriter, like in the past. Now, this doesn’t mean that the modern mechanical keyboards are missing features. They are packed with the things that the customer needs for everyday use and even in most cases for gaming as well.

The gaming community is very passionate about the technology that they use. They often customize their computers, and this includes a gaming keyboard that gives them ultimate satisfaction and comfort while playing games. Because of the different types of keys used in mechanical keyboards, they have better sensitivity. Writers buy mechanical keyboards as well because they need their keyboard to type a lot. So, let us take a closer look at one of the companies that creates these mechanical keyboards.

What is Dfusing?

Dfusing is a company that specializes in developing mechanical keyboards especially those that are meant for gaming. They are motivated towards solving the usual struggles that a gamer generally has while using normal keyboards.

Customer service and satisfaction are two things that are quite important for DFusing. Together with the best minds, DFusing has included the best technology in their keyboards that gamers will find interesting and quite useful. They have great options for the budget lovers and for high-end products in their technology.

Why does DFusing make mechanical keyboards?

In most cases, people don’t check which type of keyboard we purchase. They most likely get a normal keyboard, even while they could be interested in buying a mechanical keyboard. Here are a few reasons why a company could start making mechanical keyboards.

• Mechanical keyboards use specialized keys that aid in doing the job that they want to do. The keys like the Cherry MX Black, Blue, Brown, etc. More information can be found in our latest blog post on our website. All will help you, in some way or the other. There are types of gaming and writing. There are mainly three different models of key types: linear, tactile and clicky. It’s highly advised that a customer should try out the different types and armed with that research buys the keyboard with the keys that suit them best.

• Mechanical keyboards are far more durable than another type of keyboards. Gamers can use these keyboards for several hours a day and writers can write on them quite easily. The materials that are used in mechanical keyboards are designed to easily withstand years and years of heavy use. Most mechanical keyboards do specify their lifespan when you buy them.

• Mechanical keyboards, especially those made for the gamers, will often have specific features. For example: anti-slip so they don’t move on your desk. In most cases, they will be heavier so that it stays put while you work on it. Dfusing keyboards do maintain their quality. Other features are backlights for gaming, writing in the dark, special keys which are programmable for the gamers, etc. Customers will often look for these features whenever they are buying a keyboard.

• The feedback given by the mechanical keyboard is one of the reasons for gamers vouching for them. The click made by the key actually helps the person to type or press the next key without having to wait for it responds. This also increases the precision and speed provided by the keyboard.

These are the main reasons why DFusing makes mechanical keyboards. Along with the above-mentioned reasons, DFusing makes sure that these features are present in the keyboards they are launching in the market.

Mechanical Keyboards by Dfusing

We have already talked about the company and its market for mechanical keyboards. We think that this is the time to talk about the products that they have in the current market. So, here are some the keyboards that you can get from Dfusing:

1. Backtech is one of the most loved products. Your attention is immediately caught by the great design of the keyboard. Your hands won’t get easily tired due to the ergonomic rest, even when you use the keyboard for a long time. The keyboard keys have a lifespan of 60 million keys which is quite durable. Along with that, the reaction of the keys is super-fast and are comfortable to touch.

Another focal point of this Backtech must be its high-quality LED backlight. The bright light will never go dim on you. There are 15 different settings for the backlight. It is a USB wired keyboard that you can attach to your desktop or laptop for easy usage. The Backtech has an affordable price of just $49.99 (€44,25) which is just a steal.

2. Enterprise is the dream come true for every lover of mechanical keyboards. The best part is the 16.8 million possible settings for the LED backlights and they look astonishingly beautiful. A lot of things can be created with the backlights, anything from a rainbow to a disco. The Enterprise is durable because its upper cover is completely made from metal and not cheap plastic. Like the Backtech, the Enterprise also has a great ergonomic design.

DFusing has made sure that not only the Enterprise has the highest comfort possible but that it also is extremely useful. The keyboard has the necessary multimedia keys. So, the writers can also use this keyboard to get their job done. The keyboard will cost you $79.99 (€70,81) and it is totally worth it for the quality that you are getting out of it.

3. Solardream – If you are a person who is into high-end gaming keyboards, then this one is perfect for you. The design is quite unique with the RGB strips on either side of the SolarDream. The backlight has different light modes that let you customize your time with this keyboard. It also has 5 programmable keys which are a must-have for gamers. The programmable keys are on the left side of the board. A lot of people also find a lot of use out of the 12 media and function keys present in this model.

The keyboard sports Outemu keys which are known for their quality. They are tactile and comfortable to use. This keyboard got a lot of praise from professionals. A lot of gamers use this keyboard to play their games thanks to the amazing RGB features. The SolarDream is sold for $109,99 (€97,37).

4. Frostflux – Dfusing really knows the right way to be creative with their keyboards. Frostflux is an example of this due to its unique and comfortable design. It boasts clear design which lets you have a look underneath the keycaps. The blue frosty color of the keyboard along with the RGB backlights looks amazing. With the help of a laser, the optic switches have very fast responses. Because this keyboard doesn’t have a lot of flex, the keyboard is quite sturdy and will last for a long time so the chances of it breaking on you are slim.

The backlights are something that everyone should appreciate and they are customizable! If you are in the market for a good looking and great performing keyboard, the FrostFlux is for you! The FrostFlux can be yours for $89.99 (€79,66).

Competitive companies

An industry wouldn’t be complete without the competition! There are some great and strong brands out there besides DFusing.

Razer

Their slogan says it all. “For Gamers, By Gamers.” They’ve proven that the gaming industry can be a great and heart-warming community. They bring a lot of gamers together to enjoy their products and content!

Corsair

At first sight, people would associate Corsair more with power supplies and computer cases. But Corsair has a pretty strong line of keyboards (and mice) as well. One of their most famous products is the K70 series which makes them a big competitor in the keyboard market.

Logitech

Logitech might not always be the brand that gamers think about first but Logitech does make some very good products for a very reasonable price. Logitech isn’t completely focused on gamers alone. They’re what you would call: in between. Offering products for both the gaming scene and for the office/casual scene.

All of these brands have a very respectable reputation. There are different brands in the keyboard market, but the three we mentioned above are the biggest competitors.

Why would you buy from Dfusing?

From the start, DFusing had a clear goal and vision in mind. Everybody at DFusing is a hardcore gamer and with this passion, it was clear what the company wanted to develop and create. So, why would a consumer buy from Dfusing?

While it is not that odd that mechanical keyboards are a tad more expensive than membrane keyboards, a lot of brands have extremely high prices. We mean no critique on them, but we have our own strategy.

We want to give the customer the utmost value for their buck. That’s why we ensure to complete analyses for every product that we put on the market and discuss a fair and honest price for said product. We don’t go overboard, we want to be the go-to place for every type of gamer.

• Great customer service means a lot to us! When a company grows larger and larger, it becomes quite challenging and sometimes even impossible to provide great customer service to every single customer. We absolutely do not want to be that kind of company. We believe in treating the customer with the utmost respect and support. This translates into a healthy relationship with the industry and our consumers. Basically, we value our customers, and naturally, the customer values us back. And let me tell you, that is worth all the trouble (of keeping the support level at the best quality while the company grows)!
• The journey does not end when the product arrives at your doorstep. We want to build a community to come back to, and discuss your adventures online! That’s why we’d love to keep interacting with you on any of our social media, blogs and our future forum. Links can be found at the bottom of this article. Basically, we want to show customers that they mean more than just someone who buys from us, we want to greet them into our family. The heart of gaming lies in its community.
• DFusing values the feedback of the community quite a lot. There is quite a lot that can be learned for the experiences of the customers. Sadly enough, there are a lot of companies that choose to ignore the feedback. But DFusing wants to do actually do something with it. We believe in quality and the people.

In conclusion, we can say that Dfusing is a reliable company when it comes to mechanical gaming keyboards. We have a lot of experience in developing and creating mechanical keyboards. So, thank you for reading our pitch and we hope that you have derived with some helpful information for your next keyboard purchase. We are hope to the world of mechanical keyboards as the demands are rising day by day.

Social media of DFusing

https://twitter.com/dfusingg

https://www.facebook.com/DfusingInc/

https://www.facebook.com/groups/dfusing/

https://www.instagram.com/dfusingg/

 https://www.dfusing.com/

 

 

Review: Atelier Rorona -The Alchemist of Arland- DX (Switch) ~ Crafting The Adventure With Alchemy.

Wikipedia page

On my top 10 games list of 2018, I talked about Atelier Rorona. I talked about how this game got me interested in playing the Atelier series. Now, it’s time to give my full opinion on the game. Why did I place this game on my top ten list and why wasn’t it higher on the list? I think it’s time to talk about crafting and exploring. Adventuring and RPG’ing. And as usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article in the comment section down below.

Get off your lazy bum

The story of this game has a simple premise. You play as Rorona, a young girl who is an apprentice at a local alchemy shop in the Arland Kingdom. Her master Astrid is so lazy that business isn’t going well at all. As a matter of fact, she didn’t get off her lazy bum for so long, the kingdom is considering to close down the shop. Rorona doesn’t want this to happen so she takes on the challenges provided by the kingdom. She gets a deadline of three years. During these three years, she has to prove that she can run the alchemy shop and make a profit. If she fails one of these challenges, the shop will be closed without any further questions.

On the surface, the story of this game isn’t anything special. It’s one that has been done various times before. Yet, the story actually changes a lot in your actions. It depends on who you take with you on your journey, how good you craft your items, how you interact with the characters and how you run your alchemy shop. The one that lazy Astrid sort of gave to you because she wanted more sleep but didn’t want the shop to be closed.

This makes the story quite a lot of fun to play through. Because each and every playthrough is going to be different, you will have a different story. This game has various endings that all depend on how good you did during your missions provided by the kingdom. When I had beaten the game for the first time, I got a very generic ending that didn’t give the closure I felt that the story deserved. Because of that, I feel motivated to replay this game with so I can get an even better ending.

The writing of this game makes replaying this game even more enjoyable. While I was playing this game, I posted a short clip on my Twitter showing off the voice acting. The game has a lot of funny and charming moments. I actually fell in love with the characters of this game. Now, depending on how good you play this game, the characters you interact with getting more character development.

Now, during my playthrough, the story was quite enjoyable. While it didn’t have a lot of moments where I sat on the edge of my seat, it was quite relaxing. Maybe the other endings have more thrilling moments, but overall I enjoyed the story quite a lot. The writing, the pacing, and the voice acting make for an enjoyable experience. I can’t wait to see how the game plays out on my next playthrough.

With that said, how do you actually go about saving the shop? For that, Rorona needs to gather ingredients from various locations and craft various items. Depending on the quality of the items, you get better items. Now, I do have one thing I felt mixed about in terms of the gameplay.

Running that shop

Yes, this is a screenshot from the PS3 version, but the Switch version looks the same apart from the different buttons.

While the story pacing is quite good, the pacing of the game is … let’s just say, strange. Because the game gives off a relaxing and casual vibe, the game can feel extremely slow. But this is very misleading. Because you have a strict time limit; you shouldn’t waste time at all. You have to play every move extremely carefully. The more mistakes you make, the worse your ending gets. The depth in this game is crazy. You do get an assistant at the middle point of the game. This mechanic saved me various times. You can assign this assistant to go and explore for you or craft items for you.

Be warned, the tutorials of this game only scratch the surface of the mechanics of this game. Something I recommend is that you use the save system to your advantage. I had various saves at various points. So, I can go back when I felt I was able to finish the missions with better results.

Talking about the save system, the fact that this game got ported from a PlayStation system really shows in the UI. If you have played a game on a PlayStation you will recognize the typical save and load UI easily. The only thing that annoys me is that I’m unable to name my saves. This would have helped quite a lot.

So, you have to explore, fight monster and craft items. This sounds like your typical RPG fare. You do have side quests that can help you to get a better relationship with a certain character. Some of these side quests have the potential to improve the reputation of the shop which also has a big influence on the ending of the story.

All in all, the biggest challenge of this game is time management. Use your time wisely and try to waste as few days as you can. I always tried to finish the assignment of the kingdom as fast as I could. When I finished that, I used the remaining days to explore new areas and improve my relationship with the other characters.

The gameplay immersed me quite a lot. I really felt like a shop owner trying to find the best strategy to get my shop up and running and to try to get as many customers as I can. While the game isn’t too difficult to get the most basic ending, the challenge for this game hides in trying to get the best endings.

A normal playthrough of this game will take you somewhere around 20 hours. But, if you want to see all the endings, you will get a lot more out of this game. On howlongtobeat.com, there are reports of players taking 60 to 100 hours to fully complete this game. Now, this is for the PlayStation 3 version. At the time of writing this review, the website has no listing for the Nintendo Switch version.

Now, the meat of this game is in exploration and crafting. First of all, let’s go a bit more in-depth about the exploration. During your exploration, you can take two allies with you. Certain allies require a certain price to hire. This price needs to be paid upfront. So, make sure you have enough gold in the bank to hire them.

During the exploration, you can go to various locations. Each location has several areas you can explore that provide different items. These items aren’t randomized, so if you find herbs in a certain area, you will be able to find those herbs every time there.

One thing you need to keep in mind is that you have an inventory limit. If you reach that limit, you have to throw out items. Also, you need to keep in mind that certain items can lose their freshness. For example, if you collect berries and don’t put them in your storage in the chest in the shop, the quality will drop.

During your exploration, you can see certain spots where items can be gathered. In the meantime, you see the enemies roaming around. When you interact with them, you can start a fight with them. The battles are turn-based. It’s the system you see in a million other RPG’s. But there are a few differences.

One difference is that only an alchemist can use items. So, only Rorona can use healing items during the battle. Another difference is that you can use certain characters to defend you and make combo attacks. In each battle, a meter builds up. When that meter is full, you can use the shoulder buttons to defend Rorona. A similar mechanic counts for the combo attacks.

One thing you need to keep in mind during the exploration is that moving between locations and areas takes valuable time. So, make sure you know which items you need and where you can find them and plan accordingly. Otherwise, you might get into trouble and you aren’t able to craft certain items.

In addition to that, keep in mind that you have a limited amount of MP. MP is also used to craft items. And this brings me on the second part of the gameplay I want to focus on, the crafting. This is something I didn’t always pay attention too. Each item can have certain properties that make a huge difference during crafting. Each item has also a quality level that changes the outcome quite a lot as well.

Something I found extremely tricky was looking for high-quality items. For some reason, I always found a mid tear or low tier quality items. I’m quite sure that this was one of the reasons that resulted in me having a mediocre ending. Now that I know that, I know what I should look for in a second playthrough.

Anyways, the crafting system itself is a bit basic. You can select various ingredients to craft an item. If you don’t have a certain sub ingredient that is craftable, you get forwarded to the crafting menu of that item. One thing that I found really annoying was that it wasn’t always clear which ingredients were missing. For example, the icon of the missing ingredient was a flame. But I had a few ores that looked extremely similar. Yet that wasn’t the ingredient I needed. It turns out I needed oil.

Something I really liked was that in the crafting list, you were able to sort ingredients in terms of quality or rarity. Also, you had various symbols that gave information if you were or weren’t able to craft a certain item. For example, a triangle means that you are able to craft the item but you have to craft a sub-item first.

One thing that I would like to mention is that this game can be repetitive. It’s quite easy to fall in a loop for every assignment or mission. Explore, craft, rest. Explore, craft, rest. Explore, craft, rest. And repeat. Each assignment has a different theme like preparing for a festival or helping to craft medicine.

I didn’t mind too much, but I feel that a bit more variation in the gameplay would do the game some good. For example, a bit more assignments where you needed to defeat a certain number of monsters or collect a certain amount of ingredients would do the trick.

Arland is saved

Let’s talk about the visuals. This game looks quite nice in my opinion. While the game could have benefited from a free camera, I actually didn’t mind too much since the camera allowed me to watch the nice city and fun dungeons in great detail. Some enemies suffer from the recolor syndrome, like the slime enemies. There are at least 3 variants and only the color has been changed. I wish those games added a few extra details. Oh well. At least I never had slowdowns during gameplay and I was able to play the game at a decent frame rate.

In terms of animation, this game is good. While the cut scenes would have benefited from some more character animation instead of gorgeous looking 2D artwork. Now, if the game came out in a previous generation, I would excuse this…. oh, wait… that’s right, this game is a port of a PS3 game. Then again, the PS3 is capable of so much more. Oh well.

Now, something that bugged me a bit is the rather awkward jumping animation. I think it’s missing a few frames near the end where Rorona’s feet almost snap into place. It also looks strange when you adjust your jump in midair. Since Rorona sort of floats awkwardly. It’s hard to put into words but while the jump works great, it feels off and looks a bit off.

Jumping in itself is easy to do and control. You just press the jump button and voila. I don’t have any complaints about the controls. I really like how there is a dedicated button to cycle through Rorona’s animations. The game controls great and I didn’t have the need to spend time getting used to them. The UI explains it so well, I got the hang of it right away. One minor nitpick is that the prompt for running is a tad confusing. When the UI shows a button for “running ON” and you press that button, Rorona actually starts walking. So, that prompt in the UI actually shows the status if you are running or not.

Now, the UI has some amazing things I really liked. Like how easy it is to sort items or the great and easy to use crafting system. But I have a few complaints. First of all, I wish I was able to see which ingredients were at a certain location before I actually traveled there. I would have been able to save so many days…

Secondly, while I totally understand why the developers did this; I wish I was able to see how many days it would take to go to a newly discovered gathering area. The reason why they don’t tell you this is most likely for immersion reasons.

And my final and third complaint is when you buy armor, you can’t see if it would increase somebody’s stats or not. This was quite annoying, especially when the armor shop rarely has new items because the game really wants that you craft it yourself.

The music and sound effects for this game are good. The soundtrack really fits the mood of the story quite well. It’s relaxing and rather melodic. It helps to get immersed in the game. I even added the soundtrack to my playlist for when I want to relax. Now, the sound effects are great but I wish there were a bit more of them. For the whole crafting system, the use the same effects and I would love some different ones for food or bombs. Also, one for days passing, while the clock ticked over, would be the cherry on the cake.

Oh, and here is something nice, you can totally change the whole soundtrack. Yes, while interacting with the book in the atelier, you can change each and every track to another track. You can choose between a pretty long list of other games in the series. Now, this is an amazing feature but it could have used some additional features. Like a reset to default option and one where you easily see which song you have selected since in that menu there is a lot of unused screen space. And the biggest missing feature is, in my opinion, a preview of what song is currently playing. Oh dear, they were so close.

In that same menu, you can access the different costumes for Rorona. As far as I know, these are only cosmetic. You can do save file management and decorate the atelier to a certain degree. You can also access the options menu where you can adjust the sound mix to your liking. Here, you can also change the language of the voice acting to Japanese or English. So, if you want Rorona to greet you in Japanese on the main menu, you can do that.

After you have finished the game, there is a post-game chapter. I won’t spoil what the chapter is about but it adds some additional story. But after this post-game, there is no free-roaming. So, you can’t experiment with the game… This is a real missed opportunity since I would have loved to try and experiment with the game to learn and have a better run next time. Yet, on the other hand, I totally understand why they did this. Because the game has so many different endings in which different characters aren’t present, it would have been a hell to program.

Interestingly, during my writing this review and posting it; the game got a small update. I have no clue what has been added, but I wanted to mention it, just in case something in my review doesn’t make sense anymore.

With that said, I have said almost everything I wanted to say about this game. I did leave some things out for you as a surprise if you decide to play this game. But, it’s time for the conclusion of this review and my final thoughts.

Conclusion

The bad:

• The jump animation looks awkward.
• The game can be repetitive.
• There is no free play in the post content.

The good:

+ Enjoyable story, writing and voice acting.

+ Amazing charm.

+ Great UI.

+ High replay value due to the different endings.

+ Relaxing soundtrack and you can change it to your liking!

+ ….

Final thoughts:

I don’t know exactly how this game compares to other games in the Atelier series. Since this game is the first game in the series I have played. Nevertheless, I did enjoy my time with this game quite a lot. The game is on the surface of a relaxing game with a lot of charm. But, don’t get fooled, this game can become quite hectic in a good way.

The game is quite enjoyable to play but difficult to master. You really need to plan every single move to make sure to you get yourself in a difficult situation.

This game is perfect for everybody who is looking for an RPG with a crafting system or somebody who is looking for a shop simulator. While I can totally understand why some people won’t enjoy this game too much, it did click with me.

But the game is far from perfect. Don’t get me wrong, this game is quite good but it has some flaws that hinder the gameplay in my opinion. Like the strict deadlines and the repetitive nature of the game.

Personally, I recommend that you give this game a try. If only there was a demo of this game you could try out and judge for yourself if this game is for you are not. I bought this game because the screenshots and descriptions looked interesting on the Nintendo eShop and I wasn’t disappointed.

Now, I can’t wait to play the other games in this trilogy to see if they improved the mechanics in the other games. Maybe they crafted an even better adventure while they kept everything that worked quite well in this game.

Do keep in mind that I’m not saying that this is a bad game. It’s a good game with some flaws. It’s up to you to decide if these flaws would hinder your enjoyment of the game or not. Since this game has a lot of depth so you will be able to have a lot of fun with this game.

With that said, I want to thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in a different article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 70/100

Gamer’s Thoughts: General tips to start collecting

Ah, game collecting. It’s one of my biggest hobbies and I love doing it. Thanks to my video game collection, I’m able to talk about so many games on my blog and have so many different experiences. While I’m not the most hardcore of collectors, I do want to share some stories and advice if you want to start collecting retro and modern games. If you have any questions or you have advice yourself, feel free to leave a comment down below, I’ll do my best to help and love to hear the advice of other collectors as well. Also, know that this is some general advice. If you want to start to get really into collecting, then this article can serve as a nice base but videos like this one from MetalRockJesus are a great help as well. 

You will need space!

Do realize that you will need some shelving space when you want to start collecting. Personally, I wish I had more room in my room to build more cabinets and shelves to store my collection.

There are various interesting cabinets that game collectors use. If you look at various pictures of people showing off their collection, you get a great general idea of what sort of space you can use for your cabinets.

Something I personally do is, storing my cartridges in plastic containers. This is to avoid dust and other damage to them. I also sort my games per system. So, I have a PSP shelf, a GBA/GBC shelf, Wii (U) shelf… This makes it easier to find a game when I’m looking for them.

I can speak out of the experience of collecting games all my life, you will need a lot of storage space. Better workout a good storage system before you start collecting. Otherwise, you will regret it extremely fast.

My budget & thrifting.

If you are worried about the cost of collecting, well, know that thrift stores and garage sales exist.

Here are some tips at garage sales. I personally trained myself in the ability to spot games by just scanning the stalls. It can really help if you are able to recognize the shape and color of the system you are collecting for. For example, I know that most PS2 boxes have are blue and/or have the name “Playstation 2” on top.

Another helpful thing to know is that resellers are a plague at garage sales. Here in Belgium, they arrive at the crack of dawn to buy every game they can get their hands on, while meanwhile, another person is setting up their stall.

The best way to do deals is to buy from people who sell from their garage or don’t have a lot of gaming items. Those people really want to get rid of the games and will let them go for a really cheap price. I have bought a ton of games for a really cheap price. For example, I was able to buy GTA 1 (PS1) for 1€ or Outlaws (PC) for 2€.

While you can haggle, don’t overdo it. For example, if they sell PSP games for 3€ a piece, I usually say, what if I buy 5 of them and pay you 12€. Try to check if they are willing to go below their asking price before you continue to haggle.

I ran the risk of looking around for a cheaper version of various times at garage sales. Sometimes I get lucky, other times, I got unlucky and saw some nice games get sold before my eyes.

Since I personally collect Gameboy games, I always have a Gameboy Advance in my pocket with me. Do test your games, if possible, before you buy them. To avoid regretting buying a game.

If you are buying PC games and such, check if all discs are there and if they don’t have a lot of scratches. I always check the games for any damage or missing parts before I buy them. I haven’t done this in the past and had missing discs and discs that weren’t able to be read.

Also, keep an eye out on people trying to sell their physical copies of Steam games. Or any other online distribution platform for that matter. Since you need that key to be able to activate the game, but if you buy it in a thrift store or in a garage sale; you have high risks that the game is already activated and the disc will be worthless. Unless you bought it digitally and you want a physical copy to add to your collection.

What do I do when I go thrifting and/or to a garage sale? Well, I take a bag or two with my handhelds (charged of course) to be able to test the games, I bottle of water, my wallet with the budget I want to spend, something to eat and my smartphone. I also try to not wear many game-related items on me. To avoid giving away that I know what I’m buying. I have seen too many items that people raise their prices because a gamer needs to pay a more fair price for their games…

I like to leave in the morning to do one round and I do another round around midday or in the afternoon. Why in the morning? The earlier you leave, the more chance you have to be before the resellers. Also, you will have the biggest selection of them all. Yet, you do miss a big advantage of something you have in the afternoon.

In the afternoon, some people are getting tired and sick of standing with their stall at the garage sale and start lowering their prices. Most of them are happy if they are able to leave the garage sale with less stuff then they started. So, take that into consideration.

Index your collection & how to collect?

While I have quite a good memory in which games I have in my collection already, it’s always a great idea to have an index. This way you can easily look up if you already have the game or not.

Do put this index file in an easily editable file somewhere in online storage. Personally, I have the games I really want to find in a text document stored in my Dropbox. This way I can easily check while I’m walking at the garage sale which games I’m looking for.

Something I still have to do is make a huge list of all the games that are in my collection. Since I actually want to know how many games I own and how many games I own for each platform. It’s something that is on my bucket list for 2018. This will take quite a lot of time since I have big plans in mind.

Besides physical games, I do collect the merchandise. mostly figurines, clothing and various other pieces of merch. I have one big glass cabinet for all my figurines. I actually enjoy from time to time figuring out how to display them.

So, how can you start collecting? Besides going to garage sales and thrift stores, you can look at 2nd hand websites for people selling their games. Sometimes I buy “a lot”. This means that I buy a bundle of games that somebody doesn’t need anymore. In various cases, I buy games that I already own but I use these games to sell again or to trade.

Trading can be a great way to get rid of your duplicates and get new games into your collection. This is why networking is so important to collectors. I’m in a group of retro game collectors on Facebook and I follow various retro game reviewers on Twitter and YouTube. This way I learn from their experience and stories.

Do network! For real, almost all my coworkers know that I collect games and I have gotten so many games from coworkers who cleaned up their attic or their kids didn’t want their games anymore. One time, I actually was called up by a store that somebody brought in a lot of big boxed PC games and this way I was able to buy a game I always wanted to have.

Anyways, that’s all the general advice I want to give for now. I hope that you learned something about the art of collecting games. While I can tell and teach you a lot more, I’m going to close off the article right here. Maybe I write a follow-up article to this one with more advice and some stories of garage sales.

In any case, thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day!

Creative Christmas #7: Present Time

And we are back with the Creative Christmas series, a collab I’m doing with LaterLevels. To be honest, during the past two days I was too busy with family parties. So, I was unable to think of a theme for this series. Okay, I have to admit that I thought about it, but I wasn’t able to implement. I thought of one where each article was a page in Santa’s diary, but then I wouldn’t answer for myself. Another idea would be where I would talk about if my answer would be in the naughty or kid side of Santa’s book. Well, maybe with the help of a present I can think of a theme. I got a new Mario shirt and a new compressor to blow out electronic material. But what’s this? Another question about presents for me to answer, let’s take a look! 

Your help must have worked, because it’s now Christmas morning and presents are under the tree! There’s a fancy box with your name on it; which gaming-related item are you hoping is inside?

If I would ever be able to get a certain gaming related item, I would have to divide my answer into two parts. First of all, real existing items. Which game-related items would I want that truly exist?

Besides a boatload of games that I want in my collection and a few consoles I want to have and start collecting for, let say which piece of merchandise do I really want to have?

For me personally, I would love to have some more merchandise of the Bioshock series. I know that there are some nice looking t-shirts and bags out there.

If you would give me some merch from the Bioshock series, even when I already have it, I would always be happy. The Bioshock series is such a great series that is near and dear to my heart.

The same counts for merch from the Zelda series. I’m in love with the Zelda series and I would love to own a bit more shirts and merch of it. Oh, or the mangas that I don’t own of “the Zelda series” yet would also be a nice gift to get.

Now, there are a few games I know that there is barely any or no official merchandise on the market. But I would love some merch for it anyways. These games include Ace Attorney, Monster Tale, Stella Glow and the Zero Escape series.

Actually, if you ever need to give a gift to me; anything game related merch would do the trick for me. Because I’m a game collector I enjoy getting something game-related. You would make me even happier if you relate it to a game series I like. And you know those series if you read my blog or talk to me.

Now we come to part 2 of my answer. What if I’m able to get a fictional game item in the real world. This is going to be interesting.

You know what would be nuts? If I would be able to get any of the transformation masks for The Legend Of Zelda Majora’s Mask into the real world. Then again, what practical use would it have besides the cool factor? Besides, it wouldn’t be that much fun since I would have to use these while nobody sees me or I would be used for experiments and all that jazz.

Then I thought about getting the Harp of Ages or the Rod Of Seasons from The Legend Of Zelda Oracle of Ages/Seasons. It would be so close to reverse the flow of time or change the seasons at will.

While messing with time presents a whole different host of problems, the same can be said for the Rod Of Seasons. If I would be able to change the seasons at will, I might destroy the planet with it. So, that’s not a good idea either. Besides, the rod only seems to work on sawn-off tree trumps and those aren’t around too often in my area.

The notebook from Scribblenauts would be pretty interesting to own as well. I would be able to summon what I want and when I want it. Then again, if this would fall into the wrong hands, dangerous things can happen and we would live in a strange world.

While it would be amazing to have any video game item in the real world, I think it would cause a whole host of other problems that might bring me into greater trouble. If the problems are solvable, you would have to put the practicality into question. Since not everything from the land of video games would have a use in the real world.

So, if I would be able to avoid any trouble, I would love to have the items I listed above these paragraphs. Yet, I think that the answer that was expected in the questions was more the 1st part of this article. I see the second part of this article more as a fun thought expirement.

That’s my answer for today. I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

You can find other bloggers their answers here.

Review: Little Kite (PC) ~ Daddy…

Steam store page

Today, I want to take you on a journey. A journey that tells the story of an unsuccessful family of three. Beware, this game handles have themes that might trigger some people. This game contains family violence and alcoholism. So, if you are sensitive to that, I highly recommend that you proceed with caution since this game doesn’t back away from using these themes. Thanks to the developer, I got a review code for this game. This doesn’t mean that the developer censored anything about this article. This article is completely my opinion. As usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article in the comment section down below!

The intro is strong in this one.

When I was playing this game and when I was taking notes, one of the first things I wrote down was that this game has a strong intro.

The game doesn’t have any voice acting, but the voice samples used in the introduction and the cutscenes between chapters make the game even more powerful.

For real, the game drew me in with the introduction alone. I’m quite a big fan of point-and-click games and this game doesn’t disappoint. The story takes some interesting turns and I really got interested in the characters.

The story is pretty well written and the pacing is good. The only thing that I would change is the fact that in almost all dialogue boxes, the final “.” or “!” is missing. It just something I found annoying while I was playing this game. Sometimes the “End” option to exit out of a dialogue tree was written in “end” instead of “End”. It’s those little details that can annoy me but I think a patch can fix.

Something that I really liked in the launcher was the fact it recognized that I had two monitors running and I was able to choose which one I was going to play the game on. One thing I didn’t like was that the game doesn’t pause when it loses focus. I was writing the article while I was playing the game and taking notes, and the game didn’t pause when I clicked on my word document on the other screen.

In some cases, I was also under the impression that the text automatically went to the next dialogue instead of waiting for a click. While I have seen it happening here and there, I wasn’t able to recreate it.

Pretty mess

Visually, this game is amazing. I really like the art-style in the game and the comic book cut scenes are just eye candy. If you enjoyed the games like Hotel Dusk or Trace Memory, you will love the artwork and gameplay of this game.

The UI is extremely handy too. The cursor turns red when you hover over something that is interactive. For some puzzles, you will have to pick some objects that are in the background. But don’t worry, you are able to click on the eye-icon in the bottom left corner to show all hot spots.

Speaking about the puzzles, they are all set in reality. Something I found really strange is the fact you can still interact with objects of puzzles that are already solved. For example, you need to trade something for an action figure. When you found the right toy and trade it with him, you can still trade toys you find with him later. I found this pretty strange. This could be fixed with either changing the dialogue to adjust the fact that the puzzle is already solved or make those objects not being able to be clicked. But let’s be honest here, this is a nitpick.

Something that could be disappointing to some players is that this game is rather short. If you know what you are doing, this game is only about an hour long. Personally, I don’t mind it. Since the story that’s being told is told in a pretty strong way and the message it brought is really memorable.

You would think that this game would be pretty easy since it’s over in an hour, but you would be mistaken. The puzzles are pretty clever and for some, you will need to use your point-and-click skills to the max. Thankfully, there aren’t any puzzles that require moon logic. Some puzzles also have an explanation on what you need to do to solve them, but they don’t tell you the solution outright. This is a good thing.

There isn’t a hint-system in this game as far as I can tell. But if you keep focusing on what you need to do and what’s stopping you from achieving said goal, you won’t get stuck too soon.

For the people who are interested, this game has Steam Trading Cards. You will need 7 of them to craft the badge and you get 4 cards dropped during gameplay.

Some minor tweaking

To be honest, I feel pretty mixed about the saving system of this game. While I’m glad that this game has an autosave feature; I’m pretty sad that I can’t save just after solving a puzzle.

But that’s a minor issue again since the game automatically saves when you start a new chapter and that happens frequently enough.

Speaking of saving, something I think would be nice is that when there is a save file present, that the default option is “load” when you enter the main menu. In the current version I played, v1.09 is the default selection “new game”.

This game has the same problem that Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant has.  In some cases, when you double-click on an item that is on the other side of the room, your character teleports to that location, skipping the walking animation. This caught me off guard on several occasions. It just feels so unnatural since the animation in the game is pretty well made.

The soundtrack and sound design of this game are pretty good. The soundtrack of this game really fits the mood that has been set by the game. While there is nothing memorable, the soundtrack really helps the atmosphere of the game. Also, you can buy the soundtrack on Steam. You can be sure that I bought that directly when I saw it!

Something pretty strange I found is that the Steam Overlay bugs out when you play the game in full screen but not in the full resolution of your screen. My laptop has such an awkward resolution… But, this is another nitpick since when you play it at full resolution, this issue isn’t present.

Something I don’t like to say is that this game is made in Unity. I know that Unity has a bad reputation since a lot of bad games were created in it, but I think that this game is a perfect example of a good game created in Unity. So, please, don’t let this be a factor that makes you not want to play this game.

The game is also translated into various different languages. They are Russian, Ukrainian and Dutch. So, if you want to play this game in your own language, you can. Personally, I think it’s a strange selection of languages, but I’m under the impression that more languages are coming in the future.

Currently, this game is 7€ on Steam. To be honest, this is a rather cheap price. For real, this game is a steal for that price! And let me summarize why.

Conclusion

The bad:

-Some minor typo’s at the end of the sentences.

-No manual saving.

-The default option in the main menu is new game.

 The good:

+ Amazing story.

+ Great visuals.

+ Great puzzles.

+ …

Final thoughts:

I really enjoyed myself with Little Kite. I was a game I’m glad that I experienced and reached out to the developer to cover. Thank you so much for giving me a code for this amazing experience.

I bought myself the soundtrack and I hope that thanks to this article, other people are convinced to give this game a go.

While it handles some heavy subjects, that can be very sensitive to some people; I think it’s handled in a respectable manner.

You would think that this game would be bad if you look at the price of the game, but this is only another reason why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover or a game by its price.

Score: 80/100.

Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to see you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Gamer’s Thoughts: Advice to buy a gaming desktop/laptop

As the techy in my family, I’m often asked for advice when somebody wants to buy a new laptop or desktop. So, in this article, I’m going to share the advice I often provide to my friends and family when they are looking for a new computer. An interesting place to start is the new HP Omen laptops. Here is a good link to find more information about that. Also, I invite other techies to provide their tips in the comment section. Since, I don’t know everything that there is to know about computers, sharing information is so important. It’s better than starting a discussion about who is right or wrong. I’ll do my best to reply to every question to have to the best of my abilities, so feel free to ask that too in the comments. Enough introduction, so lets’s get into it.

Before you start.

Before I start looking for a good laptop or desktop to suggest to the person looking for a new computer, you need an answer on a few things.

First of all, pin down what your computer should be capable to do. How much horse power do you actually need? Take a look at what you do on the computer and try to decide if your current computer is strong enough or not. When you are deciding this, also take a look at the future. Especially when you play a lot of games on your computer, keeping in mind that games will require more demanding hardware in the future.

Secondly, decide if you want to go with a brand or build your own device. In my opinion, I think it’s best to go for a desktop if you don’t travel a lot. If you play a lot of games, I wouldn’t recommend an Apple computer then. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that Apple computers are bad for gaming. The thing is that you can’t easily upgrade an existing Mac computer to have newer components compared to non-Apple products.

I’m convinced that a lot of techies will say that you need to build your own computer if you want to play games on it. While you can certainly consider this option, I would only recommend that to more experienced computer users. The big difference is that you have better support when you buy a branded computer. Since then you can return it to a shop. Thankfully, there are some computer shops out there that help a customer build their own computer and have a warranty on it.

And the 3^rd thing is something I already touched on earlier, which brand should you take. While I have put my own gaming desktop together now, I have some experiences with some brands in the past. I have good experiences with Asus, Lenovo and HP devices. I didn’t have the best experiences with Dell laptops. But, do your own research. Look up reviews for various devices from that brand before you make a decision.

Before we continue, the advice I’m going to give in the remainder of this article are things that I say out of my personal experience. If you are looking for a new computer, ask for a 2^nd opinion when possible. Having two or more opinions can be helpful to make a wise decision.

Personally, I think it’s not always the best idea to buy the latest of the latest computer that is out on the market. My reason for that is because there isn’t always support out there. When a product has been on the market for a few months, the most common problems have been fixed and various troubleshooting steps can be found on tech forums and various other sources.

Before we start talking about the parts, I have one more general thing to say. Always make your computer somewhat future proof. If you have the budget, don’t settle with just strong enough specs. Take a bit higher specs than you need. This makes your computer future proof and this way you don’t need to upgrade or replace your computer after a while when it’s not strong enough for the latest games you want to play.

Paying attention to the parts

Let’s talk about parts. In the section, I tried to make the advice as general as possible, but some things will only apply to people who decide to build their own computer.

Which is the most important part in the computer? In my opinion, I think that the CPU is one of the most important parts of your computer. The faster and the more cores a CPU has, the better in my opinion. If you play games, I would recommend an i7-processor at least. The reason why you need to invest in a good processor is simple. You can have a powerful graphics card or really fast RAM if the CPU can’t process your requests fast enough, the bottleneck is real. If you can overspend on a part, do it for your CPU.

When you decide on which motherboard to take, check if it has enough features to power all the ports you want. Do it have enough expansion slots? Since you might need it when you want to put in more graphics cards or a high-end audio card. Personally, I’m a fan of ASRock and ASUS motherboards.

I want to talk about power supplies. When you are building your own computer, make sure that your power supply is beefy enough. One time, my own computer had issues where it shut down on its own when running high demanding programs. After a lot of troubleshooting and research, I discovered that my power supply didn’t provide enough power to my devices to run properly. Make sure that your power supply has provided enough Watt. Personally, I recommend 100W more than what’s needed to power your computer. There are various tools that you can use to calculate how much power your computer needs. One I used is the one of CoolerMaster.

How much RAM do you need? That’s an interesting question. At the moment of writing this article, I think that a minimum of 8GB of DDR4 RAM should do the trick. Personally, I have more RAM on my main desktop because I use my desktop for virtualization and that requires a strong CPU and a lot of RAM.

In terms of graphics cards, I have experience with both AMD and NVidia cards. While talking about this could be a whole article on its own, but I think that this article from TechRadar is a great resource. Personally, I have a NVidia GeForce 660 in my main desktop. I have chosen for a weaker graphics card since I don’t mind lowering the graphics settings to play a game. I also play a lot of retro games, so I don’t need a strong graphics card for that.

If it’s possible, I think it’s a really wise idea to have an SSD and an HDD for storage. Install your operating system on the SSD and install your programs and store your data on the HDD. In my main desktop, I have a 256GB SSD and a 3TB HDD. I know that there are 1TB and higher out there. But, I was a bit on a budget and decided to save a bit of money on storage.  I installed my operating system, drivers and frequently used programs on my SSD. I can assure you that this runs quite fast. I barely have time to open my water bottle and take a drink before Windows loads.

Also, I have another reason why you should store your important data on an HDD. At this moment in time, data recovery from an SSD is very difficult. I have read some sources saying that it’s nearly impossible to do. So, keep that in mind when you decide to buy that 1TB SSD. An SSD is a fast hard drive, but if it goes bad, you might not be able to recover your data. Unless you pay a lot of money for it to let it be recovered at a professional data recovery center. If you want a comparison, here is another interesting article written by the people over at VersionDaily.

Another quite important thing to decide is the cooling. Do you choose for water cooling or not. So far, I don’t have experience with water cooling. I’m also somewhat paranoid with liquids close to my electronic devices. While I have heard a lot of great things about water cooling, I’m not really convinced about it. PCWorld wrote a good article about this.

Personally, I don’t know enough to give advice on sound cards. So, that’s why I provide a link to Lifewire to their article about sound cards.

The final part I want to talk about is the case. If you built a computer, deciding on the case is important. Since that is the thing you will look at the most when you buy/build your computer. Personally, I have only used cases from Corsair and I’m quite happy with them. Something I really like is that they provide parts like hard disk trays on their web shop for decent prices.

When you decide on parts, always read reviews about it. What are the most common problems and are the fixes for it! Always inform yourself, but don’t over-inform yourself. Having too much information isn’t good either. Another good resource is PCPartPicker.com. This is an amazing website that will help you when you are going to build your computer. There you also find various builds that can provide as an example.

Final thoughts

So, I think I said everything I wanted to say. When you are picking a new computer to play games on, first educate yourself and decide what you need before you go looking at computers. When you have a good idea of what you want, you can make better decisions.

If you have the technical know-how or know somebody (or some shop) that can help you build your own computer, I recommend that for playing games. But, keep in mind that repairing it will more troublesome compared to a computer you buy from a brand.

If you want to know more, watch some build videos from good tech channels. Personally, I can recommend Carey Holzman, Linus Tech Tips, JayzTwoCents, Bitwit and Austin Evans.

I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article on my blog but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Ukiyo-E Heroes – Documentary Premiere

Let’s talk about something very different this week. Tomorrow, on the 2nd of May, a documentary called Ukiyo-E Heroes goes in premiere at the Hot Docs movie festival in Toronto (buy tickets). Wow, wait NekoJonez, why are we talking about this on a gaming blog? Well, the reason for that is simple. The documentary is about somebody who crafts traditional Japanese woodcuts with a lot of Mario/Pokémon and various other pop-culture references.

What’s the documentary about?

A journey of discovery into how a Canadian craftsman and an American designer with a father and son generation gap who collaborate to revive the ancient Japanese woodcut (Ukiyo-e) using pop-culture icons: Super Mario and Pokémon. 

Here is the team that made the documentary.

A Rivertime Entertainment Production

Director:	Toru Tokikawa
Writers:	Min Hye Kim, Toru Tokikawa
Producers:	Toru Tokikawa, Yu-Fai Suen
Composer:	Alan Braxe
Music Supervisor:	Alexandre Escolier
Sound Mixer:	Danielle Adams
Advisor:	Ben Elliott

Follow this documentary

You can find a trailer on their Facebook page and you can follow them on Twitter and even more information can be found on their website. Well, the website of the production company that made the documentary called Rivertime Inc.

This is worth it!

I have watched every teaser and trailer they have put out on their Facebook page, and believe me, this documentary is going on my “to watch” list. I’m very interested in Japanese culture myself. My life long dream is actually going on a trip to Japan.

Since childhood, I have been fan of various Japanese game studios like Sony, Square, Capcom and various others. My favorite is Nintendo.

But, I’m getting off track here. From what I have seen, the documentary is filmed very good. There is a lot of imagery to see how everything came to be. Also, the documentary is filmed at various locations. I love when documentaries do this. That way we get a better view into the subject that the documentary is presenting. If you want to judge for yourself, go and take a look at the social media and the website I linked earlier.

Currently, the studio is working to get this documentary distributed in Europe. So, if you are a distributor in Europe and you are interested in this movie, feel free to get into contact with Rivertime Inc, since if you help to get this documentary into Europe and/or Belgium, I’ll be a customer!

So, if you are in Toronto this week, go to the Hot Docs festival and give this documentary a watch. They are also in the running for an audience award! And they deserve it, in my opinion.

That’s everything I wanted to say about this documentary, I want to thank Rivertime Entertainment for mail me about this. Otherwise I would have slipped under my radar and it would be a shame, since I’m quite interested in seeing the documentary myself.

Thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day.

First Impressions: RollerCoaster Tycoon (PC) ~ Build Those Parks

Link to Wikipedia entry

So, lately I have been playing Rollercoaster Tycoon on my old Windows 98 machine. This was one of the games I played as a kid over and over again. I couldn’t get enough of it. I remember that I didn’t have the patched version and I didn’t have the expansion packs. So, I didn’t get all the content and I got one nasty bug. I was unable to load save files. And to make matters worse, my sister and I were only allowed a limited time on the computer. We always asked our parents to not shut down our computer so the scenario was able to finish. Meanwhile we were hoping that nothing happened so we wouldn’t lose the scenario. Because everything can happen. While I was playing the game the other day, I was so close in winning a scenario… When just before the deadline, one of the most reliable and oldest rollercoasters crashes and I lose the scenario. Anyways, enough stalling. It’s time to take a look at this game. But for this article, I will take a look at the whole package. So, the two added expansion packs and patches are installed. “Loopy Landscapes” and “Added Attractions Pack”. As per usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on this game and/or the content of this article.

Build, build and build some more

So, in this game, there isn’t a story to speak off. Well, some missions provide some minor backstory to the park you are going to play. But it doesn’t go very in depth about it. This game is about building parks. You have to build the attractions, roads, stalls, manage staff and prices and etc.

In the original game, there were 20 missions. But, if you install the expansion packs, you more than double the amount of missions. Surprisingly, both expansion packs add a lot of content. Here in Europe, the first expansion pack is called: “Added Attractions Pack”. In the USA, you will know this game as: “Corkscrew Follies”. Which is a way better name in my opinion, since it doesn’t mislead the player. Since the “Added Attractions Pack” adds more then attractions alone.

In any case, each mission is more difficult than the last. I have currently finished 4 missions and I liked them. The first park is a nice small park to get used to the mechanics and the last park was a tiny beach side park I had to build. So far, each mission brings something unique to the table. I wonder how far they took this, since I fear that this might end up in similar ideas with different skins.

This game was originally released in 2000. Sixteen years later, this game still looks wonderful. It aged pretty well. The attractions looks colorful and bright. The only thing I would have changed is that some guests had a more female look.

When you aren’t happy with the colors of the attractions, you can choose from a pretty wide color pallet. Want to paint the supports white? Well, you can. And the best part is, it changes in real time. And you can change the color of almost everything. When you get the color drop down, you can make it the color at your heart’s content.

The animation in this game is top-notch. It makes the game come truly alive. The walking animation of the guests are really adorable in my opinion. The visual presentation and the animation of the rides and guests of your park give a certain charm to the game.

Learn on your own

While the missions have a set goal to reach like for example, have a rating of X and X amount of guests in your park before the end of month X. And then it’s up to you. This makes the replay value of this game extremely high. I’m quite sure, that no two parks are exactly the same. Every playthrough is different.

Here and there, there is some down time. When you are bored in the game. Mind you, that happened quite rarely with me. You can click the balloons the guests let fly to pop them or click the ducks to make them quack. Lovely attention to detail.

 

The most important thing you will need to play this game is a mouse. Everything is done in the UI. I really like how simple everything is set-up. The UI is so well designed, that I can pick up this game every time and I don’t have to look where everything was. There are a few keyboard shortcuts, but honestly, I rarely use them.

Play how you want

 

The game is can be unforgiving. When you fail your mission and you haven’t saved often, be ready to restart the whole mission. Some missions can take several hours to complete. A golden tip from me, save every few months. It will be easier when you need to roll back when you made a stupid mistake.

Something I really like is that even when your mission is finished, you are allowed to continue to play in the park.

I could talk for hours and hours about the gameplay of this game. Let’s just say that this game is pretty in-depth and has a lot of variety to offer. When you are bored with managing your staff, you can go build some attractions. Bored of managing the finances of your park, you can go and landscape your park. And so on and so forth.

But this game has a few problems in my opinion. The music is pretty nice to listen too, but I remember that when I played this game in the past without the expansion packs, I couldn’t let the rides play music. So, I ended up listing to my own music instead. The expansion packs added the feature to let any attraction pack a nice selection of music. Yet, some minor bugs stop me from enjoying it. When you let two rides play the same music, they play out of sync. And I had some music cut out on me when I just moved the attraction one pixel off screen.

Also, sometimes the game doesn’t save my settings or change them without asking me. Out of curiosity, I started up the tutorial and it changed the screen resolution. And I have to set the option: “Use real name of guests” each and every mission.

Oh, and there is not an easy way to go to the options from the main menu. You have to be in a mission before you are able to change any settings.

Something bugs me about the message to raise my entrance fee. When my entrance fee is already 30€, and some guests come only with 60€… Well, he spends more than half of his budget. Then, when I read the thoughts of my guests, I get complaints that rides and such are too expensive.

I also wished that there was a sign to stop my staff from entering an area. You have only a sign to stop from doing that.

Something I truly disliked was that, even when I put a security guard in the area; I still got broken benches.

In conclusion, I think that this is a very nice game is truly worth playing. I enjoy myself a lot while playing this game. It’s very well put together and challenging. There were a few things that could have been polished up a bit more. But the game we got is a real classic. This game is on Steam for 6€. It’s truly a steal for that price!

So, that’s everything I wanted to say about RollerCoaster Tycoon for now. When I ever finish all the missions or come close to it, I will write a review of the game.

I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing this article. I hope to be able to welcome you in the next article, but until then; have a great rest of your day and take care!

First Impression: Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon (3DS) ~ So Close…

Official site

I’m a big fan of the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series. I dare to say it’s one of my favorite Pokémon spin-offs ever made. A few weeks ago, Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon released here in Europe and I have played it, but not yet finished it. Is this is good or a bad sign? Well, it’s time to take a look at this game. Since this game gets a very mixed reception. Is it a mediocre game or is it more then that? And as usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article. 

Short game?

When I reviewed the previous 3DS entry, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon – Gates To Infinity, I first wrote a rather lengthy rant about it. It had added a lot of features while cutting a few amazing ones. But thankfully, most of those are back in this game.

Something I applaud Nintendo and ChunSoft for in this game is that the personality quiz is back, but it’s optional. This is the perfect way of making both worlds happy. I loved the personality quiz and love to roleplay in the game. Yet, I do understand that some people don’t like it and want to play as their favorite Pokémon. So, now they can do that more easily.

The story of this game is rather interesting. The main plot is that Pokémon are turning into stone. But there is a big problem with the story. While that is going on, the story you play is the story of the main character. The story is something I’m happy and disappointed with at the same time. The writing is solid and the characters are memorable, but at the other hand, I feel that some story arcs don’t receive enough attention.

The biggest issue I have is that I get the impression that this game is pretty short. Notice the word “impression” here. Like in previous titles, this game shows the already defeated bosses on your file before you load it. I have still to defeat two bosses and I have put 14 hours into it.

The game has 20 chapters, I’m now at chapter 14. But, I haven’t done every quest and mission that there is in this game. So, the main story is rather short but the actual game is pretty lengthy. I have seen 70 out of the 720 Pokémon in the game. This means that the story doesn’t have too much filler story. Which is a shame in my eyes, but I see it appeal to some people. Just keep that in mind.

Less cuts

This game is a hybrid between the DS and 3DS titles. The hunger system is back, but with a twist. When your belly is full and you eat perfect apples, you gain more health in that dungeon. Also, when you heal using a berry, your belly fills a little bit. Also, you can take multiple quests at once again. This was one of my biggest issues with the previous game.

But this game brings also some really nice features to the table. You can change your name mid game! Yes, when you named your ally, your ex-girlfriend’s name for example… You can change that.

Also, this game has a more expansive feel. In the middle of the game, you get access to Lapras. This Pokemon can take you to other islands. Each island is themed. Not only the dungeons, but the town accompanying it as well.

This game has the features the previous game should have had. I haven’t talked about every feature in this game, since that’s something you should discover yourself. I haven’t talked about the new party customization features or the special powerups you can have.

Anyways, the visuals in this game are pretty amazing. The world and the characters are quite colorful and the game gives off a happy and fun mood. But be warned, this game has a few moments that can pull at your emotional hart-strings. One of those moments happened on a pretty crowed public train. Yeah…

The worlds pop out and this game has pretty well done 3D effects. The animation is also pretty well done. I rarely encountered frame drops. This game runs pretty smooth alright.

Yet, so close…

The biggest flaw in this game are the controls. Don’t get me wrong, this game controls pretty amazingly but they made some pretty awkward decisions for this game.

Some buttons have multiple functions. When you aren’t used to the controls, be prepared to make a couple of wrong moves.

One thing I’m quite on the fence about is the pushing mechanic. While this helps you move allies over a wonder tile when their stats have dropped, you can do that with leader switching feature. I don’t see a lot of use for the pushing mechanic. Also, it drains your belly quickly.

This game has a an amazing soundtrack. Some boss themes are slowly becoming my favorites. The soundeffects are quite good as well. Only minor issue is that when you use a team attack, it overpowers the music.

At the other hand, the menu design is quite well done. When you use your attacks, you can easily see which ones are going to be effective and which ones not.

The last thing I want to talk about is the AI in this game. The AI of your allies has some nice improvements. When there is an item in the room you are in, your ally is going to get it for you. Also, when you are low on HP, your ally can use it’s turn to heal you. This tweak is one of the best additions to the game.

So, this game is a big improvement over the previous 3DS entry. While the main story is rather short and some controls could use some polish… This game is a must have for every Pokémon fan!

In any case, I think I’m going to wrap up this article here. while I haven’t said everything about this game I want to say… I have to leave something for the review. Otherwise, the review will sound like a copy paste of this article with some added parts.

I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I’m quite curious about your opinion of this game. Feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below. Have a great rest of your day and until the next time! Game on~!