Akun

"Don't you guys have phones?" 😆 Sorry. I had to, especially in a conversation about PC vs. mobile, when Blizzard screwed PC gamers over in a convention largely made up of PC gamers by selling them a mobile game. Sure, they have a PC port now of Diablo: Immoral, but man, that meme still kills me. I definitely prefer my PC for all the reasons Shagger already said, including better quality games and having better graphics AAA next-gen games no mobile phone could ever hope to contain within their limited hardware. Mobile phones to have their perks, but as a gaming device, even other platforms that offer handheld options are far superior, including the Steam Deck.

Alright, I'll give you that one. The meme is still hilarious though because it's so understandable why people just immediately took that line personally, considering how popular Persona games were and ending up overshadowing the mainline franchise they spun off from, with many Persona fans and SMT fans still bitterly arguing with each other till this day on the Internet over which is the superior franchise despite both coming from the same franchise. So you can see why people took it to heart, because it's like a Digimon fan calling a Pokémon game "Digimon without the emotional story" or a similarly pointed comment about a Digimon game. People will react instinctively, especially with how easy it is to cast your opinion online. Based on your remark about not reading the full review, I'd say you're in the right, but honestly, I'm kinda tired of debating whom is in the right anymore, especially on the Internet. I know it sounds like I'm contradicting myself when I was the one who called out IGN for being in the wrong, but they're a million dollar company whose profit won't be hurt by a few petty comments I made based on my feelings, so it's not really the same thing when IGN's editors and CEOs won't be spending hours writing a thesis on why the other person is wrong on the Internet like what I'm doing right now with my life. Appropriately, it reminds me of IGN's forums where people mock each other for the wrong opinions all the time. It's like, what are people like them and myself doing with our lives? I'll probably forget this conversation in a few days anyway and going back to distrusting IGN again no matter how right you might be because that's how trust works - it needs to be earned, and emotions play into trust more often than logic. You can't logic your way into getting someone to trust you (not to mention how insignificant which review publisher I trust matters in the big picture). But sure, I'll bite and try to address your concerns about my opinions. I don't really see the point in this statement other than saying IGN was right about Digimon Survive - they're not IMO. Digimon Survive isn't really the terrible game you seem to be implying with this statement by adding "subjectively" in that context, as if those outlets' high scores for Survive were untrustworthy, and therefore their status of being "major" outlets is subjective with how untrustworthy they are. I might be reading too much into it, but your statement was rather vague for me to understand what you're actually implying. I don't agree with IGN's score, but I do think that Nintendo Life gave it too high; my score after finishing the game rests around 7.5/10. I'd say that's a fairer score than IGN's 6/10. And here's the thing about fairness - it can be subjective to people's emotions, even if you might not think that is fair in itself. I grew up as a Digimon fan more than a Pokémon fan, so I know more than my share of Digimon-bashing in a world where Pokémon's the dominant franchise. Just like the people who instinctively dismissed IGN's statement that associated an SMT title with Persona games, I instinctively disliked their review as a Digimon fan, especially after having played it and confirming it's not really a 6/10 game IMO. Not the article. The YouTube video IGN published on their official channel. It's probably a minute into the video. A number of people in the YouTube comment section called out on this too, but that's how YouTube comments sections work, so I digress. And I think when people criticize IGN, they don't really take into account the editors or individuals writing/filming the review anyway; they're just bashing on the faceless corporation itself, not the editors. Besides, god knows if their editors have to follow a corporate mandate. I don't have that trust in faceless corporations because I don't work for publishers like that, which is why I place my trust in individuals, not IGN YouTube videos where the reviewer doesn't even show their face. Sorry if I'm wrong about their review, but I'm still biased. lol Really? Then please accept my skepticism of the faceless company you're defending so passionately. I think I at least have the right to be skeptical of a faceless corporation based on my personal feelings, so I don't know why you're calling me out like this when my vocal remarks would hardly matter to anyone anyway, considering I'm just some schmuck in Singapore who's "productively" spending my time replying to an essay-length response on an Internet forum. And are we really going to talk about skepticism when you're calling out people for being skeptics of IGN? Please accept people's skepticisms then for not placing their trust in a company that has a history of yellow journalism. But I did say that? lol You literally quoted me saying that, that I don't trust them because of their takes on JRPGs. I think things are blown out of proportions in all matters of discourse on the Internet, not just video games, like how certain casual remarks made online are taken to task, even though those remarks were based on personal feelings and not some thesis I spent hours researching on. This whole conversation is blown out of proportion IMO. I have a feeling I'll be spending days "debating" again on whom is right on the Internet after I submit this post because that's such a fun and productive thing to do. lol I'm not interested tbh, and if I'm wrong, then I'm wrong. I'll let you have the win.

I believe it's subjective, but then again, I feel like words are fickle human inventions that could be open to interpretation over time. Many words have different meanings today from what they were originally defined as. I do see what you're getting at with Stray's scenario, and I guess by its purest definition, it might not be a "puzzle game" in the most obvious sense, but you do still have to figure out the proper mechanism to interact with in the game, and that's what a puzzle is like to me, figuring out things and solving problems. Just because it's an easy puzzle game doesn't make it any less of a puzzle game IMO.

Honestly, I'd prefer relying on user reviews than some publisher review following corporate mandates anyway, especially from what I've seen of companies manipulating review scores these days. Hell, I'll take a YouTuber's review any day as there's at least a face I could trust, even if many YouTubers are paid shills of some form too.

I think that with the advent of the Internet and walkthroughs, it's hard to miss any important gameplay features unless you actively avoid walkthroughs. The only time I've really missed a functionality for years would probably be Pokémon, and that was when I was a kid when I wasn't aware what Ditto-breeding and effort value were. Discovering that really changed the way I play Pokémon games ever since.

Not always, unless it's a puzzle game or dungeon crawler. If it's an open-world exploration game like Stray, I tend to explore the mysterious and wondrous world on my own before seeking out "the right way to play." But if the game has a "right way to play" like puzzle games, then yeah, I would just go for a walkthrough because I'm lazy when it comes to "challenging games."

Undertale is the only one I could think of off the top of my head. Pacifism was literally a significant part of its story and gameplay.

I do agree that their QTEs are the ones that could be considered closest to the kind of "gameplay" most gamers would define when criticizing QTE games. It's just too bad their the story of their games are usually mediocre, especially The Quarry which I played recently. It has its charm, but man, it didn't feel like anything special, just a derivative take on '80s slasher movies that everyone and their granddad has done for the past few years.

They called SMT V "Persona without the heart." That was a game released last year. That tells me everything I need to know, how little research they did about their games. Persona games are a spin-off of SMT, not the other way around. Their "Persona without the heart" was so hilarious it easily became the "Too much water" meme of our modern generation. Plus, there's also the aforementioned Digimon Survive and Soul Hackers 2 reviews that I just found insulting and unfair. For Soul Hackers 2, IGN called turn-based combat dated. I mean, I get that a lot of gamers (particularly on Reddit) love to call turn-based combat "a dated gameplay," but I just find that to be a rather narrow-minded point of view because it's like calling platformers dated. It's a style of gameplay many gamers still enjoy today. Plus, FYI - Persona games are turn-based combat games and they gave P5 a high score. So no, it's not just "one or two reviews" that made me think that way, but a number of bad takes that were made even recently, particularly on JRPGs and visual novels.

I've rarely cried in video games, but two games come to mind: Mass Effect 3 and Spiritfarer. ME3 obviously has a lot of emotional moments, especially with Mordin considered, but I'd say Spiritfarer made me cry even more. By the end of it, I felt depressed, devastated, and just emotionally drained. It's a game I could never revisit again because it's just too depressing for me, even if its ending was meant to be bittersweet and meant to make you feel positive about a depressing topic.

You're doing great! It's a tough language to learn for sure. Even I am not particularly fluent in Mandarin despite being a Chinese since I haven't used it in such a long time, often being an English speaker myself. Just for the record, it's "bu-yao," not "pu-yao." 😉

"Fairy Tale" - Michael Wong For all the cynics out there who were once idealists, but crushed by the cruelty of life.

I was born in 1990, so NSYNC/Britney were my bob, plus late '90s/'00s MJ.

Not sure how many folks here understand Mandarin, but I've always enjoyed listening to this emotional song about regret without getting tired of it:

I love that Amazon, which owns IMDB btw, deleted the 1-5 star reviews on IMDB. Also love that House of the Dragon got low review scores as well for its "diversity"- oh wait, that didn't happen. HotD did well in spite of its diverse cast. Guess diversity was never really the issue, huh?

Casino Royale (2006) is currently sitting as my #1 film of all time on Letterboxd. It just has such a great balance of action, drama, romance, and even comedy. I also love how it literally gave us a shallow character the best character development since On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Casino Royale really changed the franchise in a big way, and Martin Campbell saved the franchise twice - the first time being Goldeneye. By the way, they did a James Bond vs. John Wick Death Battle recently: Unsurprised who won in this one tbh. Okay, I was a little surprised, but still, it made sense. lol

The Bride (2018) - 6/10

My insecurity and social awkwardness are traits I could live without and not proud of. My therapist keeps linking such traits to my parents' physical abuse, so these traits might not necessarily be "who I am," but what I was brought up to be. I might have been more popular and confident in another universe.

This song is just so hilarious with its satire I would often revisit it.

Agreed. IGN has an awful track-record when it comes to fair reviews for JRPGs. Their review of Digimon Survive and Soul Hackers 2 suck.

It's hard for me to criticize this despite understanding how dystopic it all feels, how it feels like a Black Mirror episode. But as someone with social anxiety, not close with my folks and don't have any offline friends... this feels like a blessing tbh. I get to escape from the tiresome interaction of reality and just be someone anonymous online, much like what I'm already doing on the Internet but with a virtual 3D avatar this time. Reality doesn't have much to offer me tbh. I'm seeing a therapist for my anxiety issues, and life gets lonely when I'm not on the Internet, so a virtual escape couldn't be more perfectly designed for someone like me.

Or visual novels for that matter, with how many VN adaptations there have been. lol The urge to not spoil what Steins;Gate was about when people got bored of the first-half must've been strong...

It's not odd at all, especially with the case of China. China bans everything that's against them, not just video games. This does remind me of the homphobic bans in Singapore though. https://www.singapore-samizdat.com/history-of-video-game-censorship-in-singapore/ Singapore was so homophobic in the past that we even had our own derogatory slang for homosexuals in Chinese Hokkien. It's still used sparingly around the late 2000s in a comedic fashion.

I know, right? It's like saying all American animations are for children when you have shows like Invincible. Animation is a tool and a medium, not a genre. There's plenty of Japanese animation that features non-sexual content and even serious philosophical topics like Monster and Mushishi.

I think runswithspatulas was talking about Switch ports of PC games though, instead of porting Nintendo games to the PC. 😄 I heard that Doom (2016) didn't port well on the Switch because of performance issues, which is hardly surprising considering graphics were never Nintendo's top priority with their games. I highly doubt they'd be able to port Call of Duty games with their ultra-realistic graphics to the Switch because of that. Nintendo's just gonna do its own thing of doing 3D platformers. It's made tons of money off the younger audiences that way.