Cribbage Ribbage

Lately Ive been interested in Roguetype games.  Games which have no set structure, where items, levels, enemies, and anything else you might think of, may be randomised for your experience.  All of them have the same goal of "start from the beginning and reach the end."  Run the Race.  Conquer the marathon.  If you fail, you start again.

    Generally Roguetypes come in two genres: Rogue Like, and Rogue Lite.

    Rogue Like games start your character with the same basic setup, like a Sword and Shield.  Generally like you've made no progress at all when you start again.  Often games like this will expand on itself, letting you find unlocks through the game which vary your play and style every time you start a new run, sometimes even offering up a different starting weapon if you want.

    Rogue Lite games don't just expand, but improve.  Every run can gather you resources or improvements that can roll over onto subsequent runs, improving stats or equipment, forming a sense of progress into your character.

The only Roguetype game I ever played before the genre boom was Dragon Crystal, a Sega Master System game about someone who found a dragons egg that follows them up thirty randomised floors to the top of a tower.  You progress slowly but surely, collecting potions and scrolls, cursing yourself with unknown armour and jewellery, fighting the wildest enemies like a flaming tree that chucks fire at you from across the room while a floating blinking eyeball... just... kinda... blinks more furiously at you.

Since the boom there are hundreds of Roguetype games, harkening their own genre tags on Steam, streamers with the ability to chat away during their runs able to gain popularity, and something of a cult following causing hundreds more of clones with interesting spins.

One of which that has gained popularity over the last year is Balatro, a Roguelike game based off the idea of Poker.  You face a target Chip score that you have to reach using a standard deck of cards and playing different hands that give you different or better scores and bonuses based on the hand.  A two pair might give you 100 chips, but a Ace High straight might give you 150 chips.  You draw 8 random cards from your deck and form your plays from there.  Simple.

Between each hand you stop by the shop where things get interesting.  The game from then on works as a Deckbuilding game allowing you to improve your standing using Card Collecting tropes, offering card packs with consumables, some of which come in the form of Tarot Cards, or special Joker Cards that add to your play style.  The Joker cards are gorgeous, especially in that they all look like the effect they apply.  The Vagrant Joker looks like a Vagrant Clown; the Misprint joker is misaligned and cut wrong; The Credit Card is exactly what it sounds like for "Bank Gold"; The Loyalty Card for Jokers Deli offers you bonuses for every 6th Hand; The Business Card, the Golden Ticket, the Ride the Bus, the Hanging Chad, the Drivers License, the Certificate, the To-Do List... I think you get the idea.

Jokers will often give you mulitipliers for what you play, turning that 100 for a pair by putting a x2 on the end, upped to x4 because theyre both diamonds, up to x6 because it's the first hand and you have a face card in there, oh make it x10 because they're all evens, oh and get a tarot card because you have less than $4 in your pocket.   Multiply and improve and now you have over 1,000 chips

I've been watching a lot of Balatro get played since the new Demo came out and all I can think is "Why doesn't Cribbage have this?"

I've been playing a lot of Cribbage lately, just passively on my phone when I'm feeling dissociative and fidgety, and while I've learnt a few things playing it over and over, I've reasserted something in my head: Computers tend to cheat.  And I will believe that even through a wealth of evidence countering that belief, and my biggest cheating opponent is the game of Cribbage.

It's one thing if I'm having my arse handed to me by an actual opponent like my Mum, seeing how she reached her points and choices for the flop, but you cant read computers so there's always a chance that they just happen to have the right cards hiding up their metaphorical sleeve.

I want to see is some variety.  The app I play with mum is just the standard rules but one day I'd like to change things up and play things like Negative Crib where you aim to get the least number of points, or maybe even Crib Wars where you try and get to 363 points through what I can only assume is a Snakes and Ladders gauntlet.

Balatro has gotten me into extra mind, trying to think about how it would go in that style.  You get similar hand plays, your Pairs, Three and Four-of-a-kinds, but you also get to count 15's, and Straights can start at 3 cards but get more points if you can combo it out.

I.e. a 3, 4, 5 will get three points, but a 3, 4, 4, 5 will net eight because you can form two straights and a pair.  A 3, 4, 4, 4, 5 will net fifteen because of 3 runs of 3, and a 3-of-a-kind which is 3 pairs making six points.  If you consider the chance of getting 15's in there then your points start to skyrocket.

Thinking more about it, it would probably be easy to implement it.  You still get your 8 cards, you just draw an extra card that has to be in hand.  You play up to four cards to add to it and garner your chips from a slightly different pool that accounts for 15's and combo straights.  Bonus if the turn is a Jack, and/or if a Jack being played is the same suit as the turn.  Plus a special 19 Joker that gives you a multiplier if you play a hand that doesn't score any points.

Might have to see if I can't doodle up a 19 Joker.  Or not, it could just be a blank card.

Aside: There was a Truck at the shop that was Truck 19.  It was a dreadful vehicle.  But it was a big Red Chevy truck, and now I want to get a classic Red Chevy Truck and put a Ace and 9 of Diamonds on it and call it my Truck 19.

Additional Aside: I also learnt some new obsolete terms going down a small wiki hole.  A Prial is a Three of a Kind, and a Mournival is a Four of a Kind.  The Elder is the person who is first after the dealer.

Also, any excuse to use this gorgeous board that I got for my Birthday.

Rose Tinted Something Or Other

Rose Tinted Glasses, I said, thinking back to games of times passed and having fond memories of defeating dragons, and taking down polutant despots and their floaty machines.

So when these old games get rereleased as "Remasters", I get hopeful.  I'll get to replay games from my childhood that I really enjoyed, and it'll feel like a new game even if I hit all the same beats.

Wonder Boy: The Dragons Trap is a perfect example of that.  A Master System game that continues the story of Wonder Boy and his ventures across Monster Land and how he was completely upended by the antagonist of the last game.

You start off with top tier gear, running through the Dragons Labyrinth, searching for it's lair to stop it's tyrannical rule.  You defeat the dragon, whapping its face over and over between flinging fireballs and frantic trampling before the robotic dragon (plot twist!) explodes in a whirl of stars and cash starts raining across the room, and a blue wisp starts chasing you, desperate to catch you and fulfill the dragons purpose: to curse you and turn you into a dragon.

The game then drops you off at the nearby village and your venture fords from there.  It's a good time tracking down other Dragons and not only cursing yourself more by getting polymorphed into other creatures but clearing the world of other tyrants who would dare to rise up.

It was a great game when I was a kid so I was excited when I saw the kickstarter running for a massive Remaster hand drawing everything about the game and filling in negative space with anything and everything, for example a colossal centrepiece to an unknown warrior amongst a smattering of headstones which only asks questions that you can't go find the answer for because you're a Wonderkid with a plan.

The strange thing though is that everything there felt like it was there when I was a kid.  That I was playing the same game again and little has changed aside from the console itself.  This clearly was not true, as with a click of a button it reverts back to the original graphics and music at your leisure.

The game is great, and the guys who gussied this baby up did a fantastic job and I hope one day to see more.  I really wish others would follow this example.  There have been more and more remasters and rereleases coming out that have been aesthetically disappointing.

Take Advance Wars.  Fantastic game with many an hour spent spamming medium tanks and artillery over the gridded battlefield.  Can't espouse how good a game it was, especially for a Gameboy Advance game.

Recently it has seen a remaster bringing it to the modern Nintendo console with some modern amenities such as online play and spruced up graphics, and that last point is where I find my contention.

The Gameboy Advance has a limited amount of real estate on it's screen.  The resolution and colour palette are limiting, but the developers used every bit of it with gusto, making it rather distinct with the tools available.

So I get why you would decide to bump that up to 3D and perhaps redraw a lot of the assets.  What I didn't expect was a lack of effort in unit models.

Here we have a side by side comparison of the unit GBA sprites and their updated models.  They're bland and uninteresting, and what's more disappointing is that these vehicles are based on actual vehicles <Insert Link to Advance Wars Trivia>.  Almost would have rathered they did a 2.5d mode and just used the same sprites and had then standing on little notches to move across a game board.

This is an example of missed opportunity.  Yeah, sure, the models are fine if the game is great, but I would rather not be looking at it and wish it was more interesting to the eye.  These units are all based on actual vehicles, so why don't they look more like them?  I would like to see this reboot game also adapt the Gameboy <i>Wars</i> games as well, the progenitors to Advance Wars, and see them update the visuals and units to match the Advance Wars motif.

Which brings me over to Sonic Origins, a new release of the Sonic the Hedgehog Mega Drive and CD collection which now comes with a DLC containing Sonic the Hedgehog games from the Sega Game Gear in their original Glory.

That's where I have my problem, and I blame The Dragons Trap.  These games were good for their time, making the best with the limited tools they have.  But we can build it better.  Prettier.  We have the technology.  There's a guy who is remastering the Sonic Chaos and Triple Trouble games into Mega Drive versions, using similar sprites and animation direction with some liberties on unique levels, but making it a convincing remaster.

These games deserve that at least.  They were fun games in their time, Sonic 1's Jungle Zone still makes me scared of rising floor levels; the Hang Glider in Sonic 2 still annoys me to think about that one emerald stuck in the sky.  The majority of them all had Sega Master System releases as well, so why wouldn't you release those instead of the dinky game gear versions?

It's another case of missed opportunity.  They could have remastered these games in gorgeous fashion, put some love and effort into a glow up, and you would be praised to the ends of the earth for showing some love for one of the biggest video game icons of the 20th and 21st centuries, yet it's squandered for the sake of ease.

Christian Whitehead, in the name of Sonic Mania, would you please help us.  Get involved more and remaster everything properly.  Make Sonic Pretty Again.  You're our only hope.

Twenty Two Token Nutshell

Well it's time for my one and only post for the year, the one time I even try to attempt some sort of writing and keep my blog alive.

Actually its kinda funny, one of the podcasts I've been listeining to have been talking about how, with the implosion of twitter and his typical outsource of creative talk, he has decided to return back to his blog and revive it there.

It's part of what got me jumping back this year, and then the numerous other posts I've half written up and drafted because I can't seem to keep my own subject focus. i'm barely able to keep my own sentences here going, having to backspace every few words just to make it sound "right". i just deleted the word unquote becaue I couldn't be fuckin arsed going back and typing quote.

anyway, I want to talk about video games. there's been a bunch I've played and I've had thoughts galore that are just drivels on epiphanys and just wanting to rave about games Ive had fun with.

Like Metroidvanias. so I've had little experience with them growing up. i didn't have a Nintendo so Metroid and the like weren't in my pervue. So when I started playing Hollow Knight and having the time of my life, which is fair because it's a beautifully crafted piece of work, I wanted to delve more into the genre.

I now have a Switch Lite, combined with a relatively cheap comfort grip, I grabbed a few of the popular and interesting Metroidvanias available: axiom verge (1 & 2), Blasphemous, and Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom.

I'll start with axiom verge because they are the most like the original metroid game, literally taking the 8 bit style and going gangbusters with it. the black backgrounds with weird tiled platform environments; tunnels circling about and confusing me until I happen to find one tile that isn't quite right and either shoot it or use a weird wave gun that changes a bunch of walls and floors because everything seems to be a biological but digitally real. It's a weird kinda game, where your character is thrown into a weird dimension of gigantic automaton trying to save themselves from another human who killed almost every other living creature. naturally you're tasked with fixing the issue, while also futzing about killing off minibosses that dont do an easy job of dying.

I havent said anything about the plot twist, because frankly that is something I was really confused and surprised about, and you should too.

Axiom Verge 2 is much the same, but jumps up to 16 bit era, and really pares down on faff. the first game had like 16 weapons, whereas now you've about 4 to work with, and maybe a few more tools after that. But again, the plot twist and the surprises, the fascinating levels and designs, just kept me going until I finished it off and moved on to the biggin.

Blasphemous is a fascinating game. It's a hard 15+ game because throughout the game, including the first few scenes, are very gorey. After you kill the first boss, you cut open his belly, pour the blood into your helmet, and put it on as the red pours down your bit-art body.

the appeal in it is that it's an interesting take on religion, and this in particular is a very old and spanish catholic art style, doused with literal examples of what are called miracles, like a boy the size of a building having the face of an old man growing in his chest, and as the game progresses the old man grows more and climbs from his chest until the one are two and they both die In The Name Of The Lord.

Weird and strange and horrific things that people and creatures allow to have happen to them because their faith demands they do it. Its a heavy theme and because it's so obscene in how it goes, it's fascinating to discover and learn, to read stories found by collecting bones of different saints across the world, to speak to different characters who are dumbstruck by everything out of the ordinary. It's a curious and gorgeous world to explore. genuinely, the art is phenomenal for something that could have been on a sega 32x.

Then there's Monster Boy. I actually haven't played much of this, truly about 3 or 4 hours in? Even that feels optimistic. And the reason is incredibly petty: I'm jaded by a related title.

So one of my favourite games from my Sega days is Wonder Boy III: The Dragons Trap. It's a fun game that has you changing forms to solve puzzles and reach different dragon bosses to return your character to normal. It's really the closest thing to a Metroidvania style game that I can attest to playing, because it has a hub area and a bunch of regions you can branch out to explore from there. It's more like a star than a series of infinity loops, but you get the idea. I'm going to have to find a name of that type of loop now, a magnus loop or something?

Anyway, a few years ago a company made a remaster of it and I fucking loved it. The core game is exactly the same, I could play the game on both a Sega Master system and whatever modern consoles side by side and I would literally have the same results. What's changed is the visuals and the soundtrack, all perfectly crafted for the game, adding so much more character to levels that weren't much more than plain blue backgrounds, but all the while making them feel like they were always there. Like they had built rose tinted glasses for this game, to make it feel in every essence the same game I played when i was a kid.

as such, Monster Boy is related in that it has the same ideas as The Dragons Trap, but sets it in the future of the characters life and allows him to change into different monsters on the fly, and having a whole new world to explore and delve into.

And my petty problem is that it's just not a similar game except by name. The controls and feel are different, the art is more of an anime cartoon style than the slightly gritty style of The Dragons Trap, and the soundtrack is just... so yeah, it's really surface level things that I don't like, and nothing I can really do about because it was all made by a different company.

All it really makes me wish is that The Dragons Trap gets a DLC addition to tell a story they want to tell, but after so many years I assume they're onto bigger and better things.

there's been a lot of that lately, last year brought in a good handful of blockbuster games that I was keen to get my hands on except for a few, and for the most part i was left disappointed early on.

Halo Infinite is really the biggest heartbreak. It's my own fault, I set up expectations that it was going to be a lot like Destiny, with having an open world that becomes incredibly deep and complex and interconnecting and having secrets in any nook and cranny you care to gawk at.

it wasn't that. it felt like a halo game, don't get me wrong, and it was super pretty in a lot of places, but... it really just felt flat.

part of that I blame on the grappling hook. that's been a big gimmick of late, to launch a grappling hook and traverse levels and encounters constantly. And it's a good thing in combat, you spot a vehicle running past and you grapple hook yourself to it and board it with ease. or you can pull an explosive barrel to you and launch it away into an enemy pile just to see them scatter.

But if you can use it to travel about, you're about to find that everything is easy to reach and youre going to spend a fair chunck of time just ninja roping your way around town.

But knowing that, you work around that. there's a bunch of different collectibles across the world and good handful of them are designed for that consideration. One type of collectible that didn't is the High Value Target (HVT), an individual enemy that carries a specially designed weapon you can pick up and use. So when Im about to cross a Jackal who carries an alien sniper rifle, standing at the top of a long slope littered with cover, brutes, shield jackals, and grunts, I would expect to run the gauntlet while he's spamming shots at me and driving me mad with each headache. Not reverse abseiling behind him and clocking him with the scifi equivalent of a boxing glove with nails in it and calling it good.

Its been a year and I havent really returned to it, partly because my Game Pass sub ran out and I havent renewed it, partly because I'm not even sure I want to yet. They have online coop implemented to the game, but I'm not finding it worth the time until they add something new or different to the game.

In the same vein, I keep thinking about Borderlands 3 and just came to the conclusion that they should just give in and become an RPG. They have all these characters, and these whole worlds they wanted to introduce, and all you're doing is just dakka dakka dakka. Which is cool, but for whatever reason it just isnt fun.

That's why I want a Tactics RPG, so you can get both hand in hand. Fix their writing, expand everyones story, have your Combat that you delve harder into to build stronger strategies than "this has big DPS", and have a god damned campaign the setting deserves that isn't just a bunch of popular memes strung together.

And while you're at it, take a look at the Mario and Rabbids games and build from that. They tackle, they slam, they shoot the shit out of stuff, all things you can do in the FPS, so why the fuck not?!

Tactics games have been pretty good of late. They re-remastered Tactics Ogre again and put them on every console available (actually I should check if it's only available on Playstation and Switch or not); Mario and Rabbids is actually pretty good, the sequel I'm playing has a LOT of improvements, especially in the free roaming where there are puzzles galore; I rebought Darkest Dungeon on my Switch so I can run that while something plays in the background on TV; Also rebought XCOM 2 when it came to the Switch because I do like a lot that it has to offer.

I did grab up Warsaw, the Darkest Dungeon-like rpg, and I've been bouncing pretty hard off it, mostly from information paralysis. It doesn't exactly ease you into the game very well and I want to learn more about the occupation of Warsaw more through this like i learnt about World War 1 from Valiant Hearts, which is getting a sequel on mobile through Netflix's service, which is a bit hurtful.

After that I have The Banner Saga which I hear is really good, it looks absolutely Captial-G-Gorgeous, but Im having trouble hitting that epiphany point with the combat. You have Armour and Strength, Strength Doubles as your Health, but the less Strength you have the less damage you deal, and you can counter it by having higher armour, which the enemies tend to have along with matching strength, so when I'm having my hard hitters get attacked first from either ranged enemies or just getting the first strike, I end up being on the back foot the whole match. I know the game is supposed to be a bit hardcore, but I just need that epiphany moment.

What I've learnt through the last few years though is that my Switch is an MVP. There's a lot of people ragging on about how it needs a hardware update and Nintendo should try to rival Playstation and Xbox in capability, but I don't really think so. It's become an Indie machine and it'll play just about any Indie that gets thrown at it.  

Speaking of Indies, Sega should let others get involved with the Sonic IP more. Sonic Mania when it came out was absolutely lourded for being a fantastic rendition of the Sega Mega Drive games made into one fun package.

i enjoyed it for the most part, some of the new levels felt a little too goofy and I didn't particularly like them, but that's a small complaint compared to the positive. Really, it's a fun game and I hope those teams dip into more of the Sonic games. Rather than the latest collection they put out.

So Sonic Origins is a bundle of the Sega Mega Drive games including Sonic 1, 2, 3 & Knuckles, and Sonic CD. Only Sonic CD I haven't actually played, but it's nice to have such a collection of games available. The problem is that they put out their purchasing options and they were Horrendous, items clearly for a cheap cash grab on top of an already fairly expensive game. Background menu Items? The option to move cosmetic things around? A Hard Mode sounded good but should have been part of the base purchase. Same with Remastered Music.

I had a plea written out that if you're going to release a remaster bundle and then offer up downloadable content, why don't you just keep remastering other games? Get the Sega Master System games and remaster them, use the Mega Drive Assets to zhush them up into something more interesting to the eye and tack it on! You'd get more than your moneys worth with remastering those underappreciated classics than you would trying to offer up the same fucking music played on a better synthesizer.

The only other big thought I had this year was of Elden Ring. It came out early 2022 to mass appraise, even got game of the year I think, and it kinda has me curious to get into it. It's a hardcore game and I can think that the only game I've played similar to it is Monster Hunter World, which I had a bunch of fun with. Next down would be God of War, but that is very much a Souls-lite, not to it's detriment though.

About a month or two later a Final Fantasy game came out called Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. A strange name for sure, pun not intended. It had a cool idea, a prequel to the first Final Fantasy game played out in an Action RPG, running around with your party and casting spells between whapping away with whatever weapon you had equipped. There seemed a pretty good variety of options at its core, some pretty environments as you would expect of its ilk. But it fell flat at it's writing. It was dreadful. Not because of the translation, but genuinely just... just terrible. I only watched a few hours of it in play, watched the scenes on youtube, and laughed with pity at the memes generated from it because it's really that bad it's not particularly funny.

Well, to circle back, quite a few of the reviewers I follow were comparing this game to Elden Ring, saying it's Square Enix's answer to Elden Ring because of the style and combat. I couldn't agree any less. Actual gameplay in hand might be different, but looking at it I was immediately thrown into thinking of Kingdom Hearts. It may not be as zippy and floaty as Kingdom Hearts is, but I would rather that comparison than with Elden Ring.

Thinking of a Final Fantasy Soulslike just puts Vagrant Story front and centre: A single character running around a labrynthian city; using different weapons and equipment against a variety of enemys, large and small; a dark mystery surrounding all characters involved in the world. It all adds up and falls short when the combat comes and you're showing the difference between a strange turn based game, and an action game.

I think that's a wrap up. My 2022 thoughts that were half baked in the first place and just didn't have much more point than what they do here.

If Xzibit got a hold of my nightstand

I said I want to dock with my dock
so I can conga dock while I dock.  Clear?

My bedside table is a nightmare.  There is so much shit stuffed into three square feet and it's killing me ever so slightly.  It's all my necessities, the things needed for the high rollin' life I lead.

Glasses and phones, drink and then food;

Playstation and Xbones, and a Switch on a stool;

A drawer that's a bin, and a nosey canine to boot;

These are the things that some would call loot.

You're welcome for my bout of poetry.  The point though is that it's a heap of shit that takes up a bunch of real estate, and that's before you account for USB cords leading up and over everything.

The plan was to resolve this.  To find a way to get all the staple items arranged in a way that I may finally have my nightstand back, somewhere to throw my plates when I have finished dinner and am waiting for the episode of Richard Osman's House of Games to finish.

There's a lot of reasons to want a stand for my glasses and phone.  My glasses can be kept up and out of the way, avoiding spills and potential flattening or snapping.  The Solution?  Easter Island Noses.  Not only a good high place for your looking goggles, but also a snazzy way to look cool while you aren't wearing them.

My phone is longer term matter.

Having a direct USB connection bothers me.  Dozens of items in the past have been ruined from seating a charging device awkwardly and bending the connections.  Luckily we live in the future and through the SCIENTS of MAGIC you can get a Wireless Charging Device.  You place your phone down and centered on it's platform and Voila, your phone starts recharging.  Truly it's the gift that keeps on giving, since my phone hasn't met the floor for any other reason except my clumsiness.

Then there's my Game Stuff.

It's a comfy life being a gamer.  You seat up in bed or on your couch and reach over to the controller, hold down a button, hear a little chime, and sometimes your TV will turn on by itself because you have it set so.  Then play away to your hearts content.

Through all that you caress the controller.  Depressing buttons, stroking the triggers, fondling the sticks, caressing the device's form in the palms of your hands.

They live by your bidding.  Playstation has a built in battery, while Xbox needs AA Batteries due to a very long contract.  You get that rechargable battery though, because if nothing else you can charge it by cord.

The NYKO Solo Charging Blocks
AKA: The Conga Docks

Charging Docks are the future though.  With a little dongle, or a clever design, these devices can be placed on their own pedestals to await their next adventure, fully energised for you to pick up and play.

While these pedestals are a great investment, therein lies part of the problem.  Two competitive consoles, two worlds typically not welcome together.  While I personally went with two separate docks in the end there is a lot of regret in not picking up the NYKO Charging Blocks, also known by my own phrasing as the Conga Dock.  A wonderful union of design and consideration.

If only there was one for the Switch Lite.

This gadget is my favourite piece of kit.  With one reach and a button press, I can be playing Xcom 2 while the UFO series plays in the background.  Or Into The Breach while Voltron kicks ass.  Or Axiom Verge while listening to what makes Metroid so good.  Or Golf Story while... well I don't have a Golf Companion, but you get the point.

It's not without some age old problems found with the PSP back in the day [Link].  Pinky fingers are not a strong enough support to hold such a light device, and craning ones neck down farther so it may rest on ones abdomen only makes things worse.

The comfort grip was automatically the way to go.  I've used controllers for years and the ergonomics of them all is all so easy to fall into.  Having a grip on my Switch that tucks into the palms of my hands is incredibly satisfying after having all those pinky cramps creeping up towards the elbow.

The stand was a different matter.  At the moment the Switch rests on a tablet display stand, keeping it up and rested with a cheap charging dock that changes the angle needed for the charging cable, lifting it up and over and out of the way.  Personally, having something that plugs in and out is a wear and tear demanding losing the device sooner than later.

Thats the appeal in the controller docks.  They both have an electronic touch pad that, when rested on, charge the device without the worry of ruining their USB point.  The PS4 controller has a dongle they provide that hooks into the USB to provide that point, while the Xbox Controllers get a third party rechargable battery with a windowed casing solving two birds with one flung battery.

It's a feature I noticed on my PSP that was never utilised, and frankly should have been.  Given the knowledge and skill with electronics and a 3d Printer, a matching comfort grip and charging dock would be magnificent even as a simple display piece.  Same goes with my GBA SP, another device left to rot with a game of Pokemon Gold in it, the poor bugger.

Borderlands Legends 2, my Elevator Pitch

Borderlands Legends was a simple game.  You dragged and clicked/tapped your way through these static maps at enemies railing from the side of the screen, in between even more static menus that had a cockamaimy comparison to the original Borderlands and Borderlands today.

I come to you to propose, or even do myself if need be, as you did unto the Original Borderlands: by reincarnating it, rebuilding it from the ground up to celebrate everything there is to love about Borderlands.

Where did it go wrong?
It was slimmed down and simplified immensely, to the point of feeling like Borderlands as a Scouring Pad feels on your genitals on a dry day.  It didn't have the hectic panic while having all these unnecessary tapping bits. It didn't have enough depth to make a little kid want to think twice about wading in, let alone pee in it.  It was as insipid as making conversation at a party with that forty year old used car salesman still living his college football life.

It was cheap, if you're looking for the shorthand there.

So why BLL2?
Because I believe in trying again, and so do you.  Borderlands 2 was a reinvention.  Every little thing was improved upon to a point where you can only recognise the two from the details put down on paper, because it was evolved enough to be a mew identity.  NPC AI changing how they attack you making it an incredible pain in the arse without having to be a tank race; Weapon Characterisation making manufacturers incredibly unique; Conversation!  You don't get a text box blurb and a few lines from someone making a cheeky remark, you get several lines as you advance making every character you see a new friend of yours who has made an impact on you.

In saying that, why not do the same for Borderlands Legends?  We can improve or change it in two ways depending on what direction it's agreed to go.

Direction 1: True to the frantic gameplay of Borderlands.
You had the right idea at first.  Top down, enemies everywhere, doing everything you would normally do in a Borderlands game.  But the controls were janky, the scenes were stagnant, and frankly the whole thing reeked of inexpense.  The game was so pared down that saying it had RPG elements feels overblown.

So I propose a halfway point: Twin Stick Shooter.  Have your characters raid an old Dahl research base or arcology, explore and delve their way down through psychos and Dahl Automated systems; deviate through an adjacent Atlas station to uncover secret equipment; all along the way you unlock equipment and weapons for you to use.  Drop the levelling system, make all weapons and enemies static, and earn your new abilities and options with each and every run.

Direction 2: Frantic in a different fashion
Playing BL, you don't just sit and shoot.  It isn't Gears of War, where parking your arse in place as you suffer wave after wave of enemies.  It's more like Halo, where cover is only used while you're waiting for your shield to recharge, if you even need to do such a thing.  You spend your time dodging rifle fire from Hyperion, backtracking from Psychos, and trying to circle around Spiderants to shoot them up the clacker.

Since we're not creating another FPS, the closest one could come to similar style is a Side Scrolling Shooter.  One stick moves while the other aims, jumping about on platforms, again dodging rifle fire and attacks from whomever is around.  For an easy comparison, see Metal Slug.  Lets face it, that's a fun fukkin game.  Why not add in that little spin by adding more Customisation of characters, and the art style of Borderlands to it.

Direction 3: Where BL Legends probably should have gone by Taking Its Goddamned Time
This significantly changes Borderlands. Instead of a top down drag and click, why not a tactical rpg?  An opera, with a large cast of characters that you can not only interact with, but control on the battlefield.

This changes the game from the hectic style that epitomises Borderlands into the complete opposite, but that's where the first BL Legends probably should have headed with its pace.  You took cover to help defend from attacks.  You tried to take advantage of what pitiful terrain there was to gain any sort of Defence from oncoming baddies.

So send it on the right track and make it a tactical game.  Keep key features, like guns and elemental effects, action skills, and skill trees, and change them to suit the turn based environment.  Introduce an initiative system individual to characters and classes.

Atop that, rather than just leave it at just a progressive story line, throw in an MMO portion. Allow players to interact with each other, helping through story encounters, or challenging each other in an arena, whether it's live or a play by mail.  Maybe there is potential in choosing a faction in a gun corporation and then taking on opposing factions?

What do you want to keep in BLL2?

Vault Hunters, obviously
The first four characters should be Vault Hunters, new and/or old. All Characters will have Skill Trees each with their distinct styles.  In the case of Direction 2, there would be a number of additional characters that won't necessarily be Vault Hunters, but would have skill trees nonetheless.

Lasers and Cryo, and even Nuculear
While they may not have appeared in Borderlands 2, and it has been written in the reasons why, I'm sure it wouldn't be too difficult to have someone on Elpis to start their own moon cannon and shoot down the equipment for the vault hunters.  Shit, they could email it to them and it would digistruct at their whim.

Kickslides, Mantling, and Power Slams
Borderlands 3 introduced all of these together.  So why not add them with gameplay.  Kicksliding enemies as you move, finishing move/sprint with a devastating power slam. Couple all of that with elemental artifacts and melee weapons, and you have game changing effects.  To boot, use those abilities to create puzzles.  Slam on this, kickslide under that, mantle up on that and boom: access to the raid dungeon.

What additions or changes would or could be made?

The return of S&S Munitions/Accessories
In Borderlands 2, they had up and disappeared to be essentially replaced by Bandit guns.  And that's fair enough.  S&S weren't just characterised by large magazine sizes, though.  That was a benefit.  They were aftermarket gun manufacturers, pulling pieces from here, there and everywhere.  So how about a customisation station?  Dismantle the innumerable guns you pick up and make your own.  Alternatively: Return of the Grinder; or custom gun mod shop

Location, Location, Location
We've explored much of one side of Pandora, so much so that Borderlands Pre-sequel moved up to the moon.  Beating a dead horse is far from appropriate, so this is where the player is put on a new continent or, and this could be a better choice, a new planet.  There are many more vaults out there, so why not explore those locales?  And in addition to that, there would be new enemies and challenges to take that on.

More Action Skills
While it's nice to have an action skill to activate in the middle of a fight in Borderlands, only one is a terrible idea in a Turn Based Game. Sure, have an iconic action skill that can change the flow of battle, and improve upon that as well.  But have a little more variety.  Special attacks with certain guns, or general action abilities that could help but not change the game significantly.

New skill system
Fuck skill trees.  I know its a staple, but so is first person.  Lets start collecting skills like Baseball cards, or S&S Non Fungible Tokens, or echo carts and build a sega tower of power.  Why not all three?  Have different characters collect in different ways, with Sirens collecting Baseball Cards of their favourite siren characters, and the soldier doing a tower of power.

Go Medieval on their arse
It's been a thing since the start. Everyone has some sort of melee weapon on them, whether it's a weapon attachment or an actual weapon the character has.  So why not expand on that?  Swords, hammers, daggers, axes.  Exemplify them all in their own equipment addon, or even in their action skills.  Put in a series of Bows and crossbows as new weapon classes from certain manufacturers.  Shields are suddenly more powerful from a particular facing and become cover.

Then go Artillerist on their Arse
If theres one thing everyone loves, its heavy weapons.  Heavy machine guns, rocket pods, gauss cannons, grenade launchers.  Im sure Dahl has never stopped at just personal arms.  Bandits sure haven't, what with their barrel lobbers mounted on the back of off road utes, and their hulking goliaths slinging Chainguns at you.  Where would they get that aside from the underside of an abandoned Dahl Jet?  And why the hell can't I do the same goddamned thing?

“Siren Six”?
For the turn based game, the siren character can be the narrator, with the added bonus of being the rewind button, sending players back to the last turn (before everything went bad)

Or be Ava, fleshing out her own story leading into other games.

Monetary Value
Cash in the game is nigh useless.  I collect it, i sell weapons, i do this and that an end up with a phat bank account that literally can't tally how much I have.  Let's use it as an EXP gauge.  Bigger enemies drop bigger cash value and we can make the EXP bar a bit flashier.

Manufacturer HUDS
As the player cycles through their squad, each character has a different menu hud themed to their affiliation, or applied based on their shielding or echo device, and/or are individually customisable.

What stories would you involve your characters in?
The base story would follow our primary Vault Hunters, having them counter the next big threat on or from Pandora.  With the Siren Twins gone, and the Pandora Vault key permanently closed, there is always bound to be a new rival to rise up.  Maybe its something in the distance.  Maybe its a lot closer to home.  But enemies don't ever stop at one; Psychos may be an ever present problem but so are corporations: Atlas' Crimson Lance, Hyperion, Dahl Lost Legion, Maliwan Katagawa Family.  All big Corporation Armys that can be coming down to rain hell on Sanctuary at every angle when your rag tag squad of misfits aren't wrecking their plans from the inside out.  Or maybe supporting, depending on your diplomatic relationships.

Then when you aren't bringing down God from their Throne, every expansion has to have its own story arc involving unique characters that "need" to come along to tell their story.  And you know what, there is a lot of story that just isnt covered.  Take Commandant Steele.  She died without even a fight.  So lets do some time travelling to find out how she came to be.  Surely someone somewhere has found some sort of time travel.  Let's toy with that.

So whats the moral of my pitch?
Do more for your games.  Tell more stories in a world you love.  Play the tactics game you want to see in the world, a game that a portion of the world wants to explore.

To Resume or Restart, that is the question

Me, moving on to my next game

I was talking with my brother in law the last few days and while he's contemplating what game he wants to play next since hes done with Red Dead Redemption 2 and figuring out a game he wants to play, Im here watching the Playstation 5 reveal and debating what game to play next.

I have The Last of Us 2 coming in the next week, and Ive started a save but not followed through more than i had the other night.  But although Ive hardly started the game, Im wondering what Im going to play next based on the games coming for PS5 since most of them are Sequels.

To start, we have Horizon.  Zero Dawn I have largely played through but never finished.  One of those games that you put down and never pick it back up again, for no real reason.  I did have my problems with it, a lot of amateurish aspects to it which are offputting, but largely a rather good game.  Who doesnt like blowing up giant robot dinosaurs?!

In the same vein, there is God of War.  I have technically finished the game, but I havent started New Game +, where I keep all my gear and fight harder enemies.  Im also one fight from getting a Platinum award, but fighting Sigrun is not an easy venture.

Aiming for Platinum also meaI have to play out Ratchet and Clank.  I LOVE Ratchet and Clank and Im very keen on the next sequel coming so that gives me incentive to try and get that platinum.  That and Ted rubs my nose in it that he beat me to it, so I should get to that.

Theres also Hollow Knight.  I really REALLY enjoyed Hollow Knight, and the idea of playing a Steel Soul run sounds intimidating as fuck, but eith Silksong coming its definitely an option to couple with the Platinum run.

Same with Darkest Dungeon.  I am basically on the final stretch of the game and just need to defeat the actual Darkest Dungeon.  So I should do that and polish it off.  Or should I start a new campaign with the official setting instead of the Easy Mode that I began with?

The alternative us never bother and just play the games I havent even started, like Outer Worlds and Metro.  Hell, even Watch Dogs.

I just know that Im going to have to finish GTA4 before GTA6 is finally announced.  I bought the DLC specifically for the purpose of playing them, and Ive hardly dented the actual campaign.

Edit: Oh and i forgot Deathloop.  A cool crossover of Wolfenstein and Dishonoured. I should finish Dishonoured: Death of the Outsider.

Death waits for the slightest lapse in concentration

Tactical-o-banana-rama

"I Got a tactic for you.  It's called
a Rocket Propelled Grenade."

Lately Ive been watching clips for Gears Tactics and its gotten me super pumped for it.  There are so many things about it that are just Pro Gamer and just super fun about it.

I love Gears games, the simple fun of running between cover and snapping over to pummel someone with Lancer Rounds before rushing in to curbstomp them.  Even better is the satisfaction of using a Torque Bow and getting a headshot, which is an instant kill on most enemies, but then to penetrate and hit someone else with the explosive bolt is amazing.

For the longest time though I'm thinking to myself that this would make a great tactics game.  The movement between cover, the layouts of all the levels, the different methods of attack each enemy has... it's basically a tactics game in itself.

Gladly someone somewhere has the same mindset.  They've kept the majority of the game the same, giving you the same sort of feeling of overwhelming power and fear on equal measure.

The game is set 10 years before the first Gears game, throwing back to a point where the grubs are really getting a roll and bringing out their bigger and better monstrosities.  Urdak is the boss and he is making things like Brumaks mounted with gigantic machine guns and rocket salvos, and Corpsers with armour plating over their several limbs, both familiar enemies and big pains in the arses.

The interesting things come from their own innovations.  Compared to a game like XCOM, Gears Tactics changes things by dropping the "one shot a turn" for "shoot for each action you have".  Then you have an extra action to go with that which makes your options become exponential, especially if you want to run in for an execution which provides the whole squad an additional action.

Then quality of life improvements are great, particularly the Locust "practically instant turn", where they all kinda move and shoot at the same time, staggering out some actions just so that you can track what's happened and how it affects you.

After that, it sounds like a tonne of fun and I can't wait to get my hands on it once it comes to console.

"My Soldier has no nose."
"How does he smell?"
"Terrible."

Speaking of XCOM, they just announced their own spinoff game: Chimera Squad.

What's funny is that I've been brainstorming a very similar idea over the last few months, having a small cast of characters that the player can follow and fight with over the course of a series of story missions.

I had characters based on different classes, with cameos from all sources.  My favourite character was Damien Santiago, a character based on the survivor of the XCOM: Enemy Unknown Tutorial.  He would appear as a Heavy Soldier who lives out his days on a Resistance base and joins the main characters on their journey.  He would be wearing his old XCOM uniform, worn and torn after years of use, and his old squads Dog Tags sewn into the opposite breast, though he has to recollect the dog tags throughout the game.

He even had his own mission where he has a flashback of Operation Devils Moon, recreating that mission and then expanding it out into a longer term story, telling more of a canon experience of when his boots his the ground and started that fight in Germany, and how his team worked their way through town fending off aliens.

Chimera Squad is a bit more free form like the mainline games, having a more diverse cast of alien hybrid characters, and a gameplay more similar to a police raid than stealth ambush.  Largely the game seems to be a reboot of XCOM: Apocalypse, kinda the direction that they were leaning towards with the Multicultural Cityscape, just with a pared down cast of characters.  Though I thought I heard there was room for a Character Pool, so there may be room for my own characters as well.

A pig and a rock lady start walking out of a restaurant.
They turn to the duck and say "He's got the bill."

Part of my inspiration came from another game, Mutant Year Zero.  A very good game about a post apocalyptic setting where your main characters are Stalkers, soldier-like characters who traverse the local area to scavenge for materials, and cull down threats to the Ark, a society full of people trying to survive.

You play the Mutant Stalkers who learn all sorts of different abilities that the player can take advantage of, from sprouting wings to gain a height advantage, to being able to ram into someone and knocking them flat on their arse for a turn or two while everyone pumps ammunition into them.

The parts I really liked was the stealth mechanic.  You don't move everyone individually turn after turn.  You choose a leader and tell your team of 3 to follow you around the map as you explore, scavenge, and choose a starting point for your ambush.  You pick off enemies with your silenced weapon, and once you feel like you're down to a managable point you can go loud and hose down the boss of the level.  Given the different abilities you earn and the limited number of them that you can equip, you can have great fun just working your way through the game.

"I can't see my face when I'm with you"

The developers created a second game using the same mechanics with a different setting, telling a story about a divided United States and countering a group using highly Augmented Anonymous Soldiers, an aspect that kinda lets the game down.

Everything else about it was really good, using the same combat mechanics as Mutant Year Zero with a few minor tweaks allowing the troopers to be modified to the players preference and creating some good combinations for combat.

But aside from that, the story feels a little flat and your place in it is rather... inconsequential.  You perform all these missions, saving VIP's and Infiltrating outposts all over, while the story kinda happens around you and the consequences of your actions really affecting you.   So if the developers create an expansion for Corruption 2029, I'm hoping they really kick up the gears and focus on their story and motives.

That's neither here or there.  I'm talking inspiration here.  And with all these really good, really entertaining tactics games roaming about, I'm hoping that a certain other company with a video game based from their tabletop game actually take some notes and start making their own Video Game RPG.

I'm talking Iron Kingdoms here, guys.  I know they have a Warmachine Tactics Video game, but to see a story drawn out from that RPG with all that gorgeous art and styling, it'd be fantastic, especially with a Cameo or two here and there.

As it stands though, I'm very excited to see Gears Tactics and XCOM: Chimera Squad to come to consoles.  They're coming to PC at the end of the month but likely going to Console by the end of the year, and that's what I'm really keen on.  The only question is how long can I wait before I start watching playthroughs and spoiling the game for myself?

Can't wait, won't wait, probably ruining it for myself.