As much shit as I give Baldur’s Gate 3 for being a mess that is overly reliant on community testing efforts to produce a playable game rather than hiring enough staff to test it themselves, the person they’ve hired to write their patch notes does a great job. They’re clear, humorous without being distracting, and convey a great deal of information. A wonderful example of good software update communication, if you ask me. Still, as much as I enjoyed reading the notes for the latest patch and I REALLY want to get into the game again, the idea of slogging through a whole new pile of bugs and whatever is going to turn into the next community bug report meme fills me with dread. That said, the latest patch seems far more geared towards stabalization and pushing the mechanics closer toward the desire end-goal the developer has communicated than previous patches. And they even released a new class as well!
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I’m Tired and Sad, So Let’s Talk About The Legend of Zelda: Episode 9
One of my proudest accomplishments across the Legend of Zelda franchise is that I’ve managed to always be incredibly accurate with the bow and arrow in any of the games that have one. In some of them, I’ve been even more effective with the bow than I’ve been with the sword. To be fair, the main example I have is Skyward Sword and I’ve never been good at the motion controls used in the game’s sword fighting. I always wind up fighting the controller rather than my enemies. It isn’t hard to be better with the bow when that’s the case. The other instances are all top-down Legend of Zelda games, so that’s more of a movement prediction and zoning thing than an aiming accuracy and skill thing.
Continue readingI Miss Having An Infinite Backpack In Pokémon Legends: Arceus
I’ve been steadily working my way through Pokémon Legends: Arceus. Perhaps a bit slowly, given that I’m trying to avoid spend all of my free time doing just this one thing, but I can feel myself slowly making my way forward. At about a week in (I missed most of the first weekend thanks to being sick and wrote this a week ahead of it posting), I’ve got 8 stars, a fourth area unlocked, three fully complete Pokédex entries, and 95% seen-to-“complete” Pokédex ratio, and a party of level 60 Pokémon. I still have a great deal of content left to work through, between the plot and the Pokédex entries since there are a large number of rare Pokémon I’ve only gotten to Research level 10 because I’ve gotten a wide array of the easy-to-get research tasks. This isn’t a problem, though, because I’m still having fun, which is all that really matters.
Continue readingReturning To My Old Haunt In Animal Crossing: New Horizons
I have begun a slow return to playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons. I played it pretty heavily for most of 2020, kinda hit a wall of boredom in 2021, and have only played intermittently since then. The exact moment I knew I needed a break from the game was when I realized I wasn’t going to keep up my dailies because it meant I’d have to get up and change the cartridges in my Switch. That, plus my dislike for anything that makes me feel like I am obligated to play a game every day or else play at a disadvantage. I know it’s not a big deal to miss a day here or there in ACNH, which is why it lasted as long as it did, but eventually I felt tired of playing the game just to dig up a few fossils, pick some weeds, water some flowers, and talk to my island neighbors at least once.
Continue readingI Finally Figured Out My Biggest Issue With The Nintendo Switch
As much as I enjoy playing various games on the Switch in handheld mode, since it means I’m not chained to my couch and a particular sitting orientation, I’ve always struggled with how I can’t do that with any kind of action game. When it comes to any of those types of games, I quickly grow frustrated and annoyed. The reasons vary, but the result is always the same. I’m worse at any kind of game that requires precision or quick responses when I’m playing it on the Switch in handheld mode. After dealing with this for almost five years, I finally figured out why when I went to play Pokémon Legends: Arceus in handheld mode.
Continue readingOn A Mission From (Poké) God
Pokémon Legends: Arceus has been a blast. I may be a bit biased since all I really want out of a Pokémon game is the opportunity to catch more Pokémon and explore a newish world, but this game definitely delivers both of those things and more. The game’s basic plot is that you’ve fallen through a warp in space and time to the Hisui region, a place that would eventually become known as Sinnoh (where the Diamond and Pearl games take place), and are charged by Pokémon God with discovering all of the Pokémon in the region. You’re set up with an exploratory team meant to research the local Pokémon and protect the people who wish to live in the region from the aggressive local Pokémon, and you prove yourself as not only capable but highly skilled to the locals who treat the idea of encountering wild Pokémon with trepidation and fear.
Continue readingPokémon Type Changes in the Series Mean Pokémon Professors Suck at Their Jobs
A new Pokémon game came out today (as of writing this post, not when it goes up). I’ll probably write specifically about it once I’ve had some time to play it, but today I’m going to write about Pokémon types and the progression and change of that system over the past couple decades. There are plenty of posts and articles out there about why the types are effective or ineffective against each other, how type matchups play out, the balance of types, and all that mechanical crunchiness, so I’m going to mostly focus on the experience of watching that change happen.
Continue readingDorfromantik Is The Most Relaxing Game I’ve Ever Played
I don’t know if you have ever noticed, dear reader, but I have a difficult time cultivating peace. I am pretty much constantly stressed all the time and live most of my days in a state of (generally controlled) anxiety that keeps me on my grind and goal-oriented. Rare are the times when I can actually relax or unwind. Usually all I can manage is an adjustment of the tension that’s on me, not a decrease. There are a lot of reasons this is the case, many of which have to do with the difficulty of my life in general and the last three years especially, but I’ve also never really been good at it. I have a few things I can turn to for relaxation, depending on the scenario and how I’m feeling (puzzles, video games, and music), but they all typically wear out their welcome eventually.
Continue readingBaldur’s Gate 3 is Better But Still Not Worth Full Price for Early Access
I finally managed to get through a significant chunk of the Baldur’s Gate 3 early access game. There’s clearly still a lot more to go, based on the number of objectives that still remain in my to-do list, but I will admit that some of the fun I had while playing the game has vanished now that I’ve reached the maximum level for this early access version of the game and my power can’t grow ever greater. It’s not that I need to be more powerful to continue playing the game or to get through specific bits of content since I’ve absolutely wrecked every fight I’ve come across by abusing mechanics or stockpiling potions, I just want to keep accumulating experience points and right now I can’t. They just pop up on screen and then vanish into the ether.
Continue readingI’ve Never Actually Played 100% of a Pokémon Game
There is one activity is all of the recent (main version series) Pokémon games that I’ve never successfully done. The Battle Tower. It was introduced in the second generation of Pokémon games, in the Crystal version game, and has been a part of every game since. In some of the games, the name of the activity changed, but it was still largely the same thing. There have been changes over the years as the meta of Pokémon has shifted and evolved, but I only know this stuff because I looked it up to write this post. I’ve never actually participated.
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