Return to Alola

Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon released last month. They're fun. They're Pokemon games. It's a good time.

Now, I'm going to sound like an old man yelling at youths to get off my lawn, but what happened to the third (or fourth) release in a Pokemon game set being a new adventure.

Pokemon Red and Blue: awesome games. Pokemon Yellow: FREAKING PIKACHU WALKS AROUND WITH YOU. You become Ash from the television show, except you don't suck.

Pokemon Gold and Silver: Again, really cool stuff. Pokemon Crystal: Suicune. You win, Crystal.

Pokemon Emerald added the awesome Battle Frontier to the already good Ruby and Sapphire, and Platinum and Black 2 and White 2 changed up its predecessors as well.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm at the point where replaying the same game (which I love, by the way) for nearly 30 hours just to get to the changes is not really my thing.

There's so many other games (on the 3DS alone I have to play Metroid: Samus Returns and Monster Hunter Stories) that asking me to play it twice is kind of a drag.

But you know I'll play it twice. I just probably won't enjoy it as much along the way.

So Many Games, So Little Time

October 27 is a ridiculous day for video games. Sometimes, entire months go by without a major release, but at some point this year, Nintendo, Ubisoft and Bethesda all got together and said, "Let's release our big seller on the same day!" Dumb idea. Not just dumb because it'll cost me an arm and a leg, but dumb because (at least) one of these poor games is going to be forgotten because of volume of releases. Let's take a look at all three:

Super Mario Odyssey
Not going to be forgotten. Reviews came out today and they are...uh...pretty good (see: nearly perfect). This is the one I'm definitely most excited for. It's Mario, but the new capture mechanic looks like a fun new twist on the formula. Also, it looks to sort of revolutionize the series, much like Nintendo did earlier with Breath of the Wild. That game turned out all right.

Assassin's Creed Origins
Never thought I'd say it, but I'm totally ready for a new Assassin's Creed game. I've played every game in the series, and like everyone else, I was getting burned out. The formula got too stale, so the new RPG mechanics and year off have me excited for this series fr the first time in a long time. The revamped combat system also means that when I have to fight people, it won't be mindlessly countering for instant kills, so that's already an improvement.

Wolfenstein: The New Colossus
Wolfenstein: The New Order and Wolfenstein: The Old Blood were great games, and The New Colossus looks no different. They are so over-the-top and really, who doesn't like killing Nazis? Taking the war to a Nazi-controlled America is a cool new way to allow us us to shoot Nazis. Also, it's one of a few modern games to let you duel wield weapons to mow down Nazis. Did I mention I don't like Nazis?

I know I complained about too may games, but really, having so many games come out at once is awesome. I'll always find the time to play great games, but there's just no way that all three games are going to kill it in sales, so some publisher might get angry. Hopefully it's a lesson to them to space these thins out a little better. For everyone's sake.

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Destiny 2 is out now, and it's flooding all the major gaming news outlets. Every time I open any news app, I'm shocked when the first four stories aren't about Destiny 2. Also, as any sports fan will tell you, the (really, really good) live action Destiny 2 trailer has been unavoidable. It's every other commercial during a football broadcast.

How do they afford this huge marketing campaign? At least part of it is microtransactions, apparently. First, everyone was u in arms over Middle-earth: Shadow of War's  policy that the developers had to release a video explaining what it's in-game purchases do. Now, it's Destiny 2. I heard about all of the nonsense going on with shaders, and I wonder why would anyone use any shader now, given how quickly you'll move on to the next piece of gear. Swapping gear is the main draw of Destiny, so why would they be consumable?

NBA 2K has always flirted with Virtual Currency (VC), but I always found enough by playing Play Now or NBA Today games and then stocking points for a while. Now you need VC basically every aspect of the game. What makes this worse is that the $150 version of NBA 2K18 gives players a massive amount of VC instantly, so I see players with huge stat boosts right at the beginning of MyCareer.

At this point, in-game purchases are unavoidable, but boycotting games or yelling at developers (whose publishers likely decided the business models) isn't going to make them go away.

Time to Ketchup

I don't know what to say. I'm at a loss for words. We had the greater numbers, superior training and (most importantly) God was on our side. 

Despite overwhelming odds, we failed. We, the last line of defense in the ongoing battle for condiment supremacy, let everyone down.

Ketchup lost the first official Splatoon 2 Splat Fest. To make matters worse, ketchup lost to mayonnaise. This news came as a shock to me, but imbalance of ketchup lovers to mayo fiends meant that more than half of my Splat Fest battles were ketchup against ketchup. Those skirmishes were rendered meaningless in the Splat Fest, so I can't say I was much help against the mayo army.

Let this be a lesson to all my ketchup enthusiasts. Don't ever underestimate the ruthlessness of the enemy, even if we vastly outnumber them. Let this also be a lesson for Nintendo. Don't pick such ridiculous options. Half the people I know don't like mayonnaise. I think I've met, like, three people who dislike ketchup. And it's not even like they hated ketchup, they just didn't love it. I mean, they'd eat it with french fries or something, but there are people who hate mayo, so the choice was kinda easy for some folks.

However my fellow tomato and sugar loving friends, fear not. The battle may be lost, but these food wars are not over if the first Splat Fests are any indication (the Splatoon 2 beta was cake (the correct choice) against ice cream).

And as friend of the program* Edwin Starr once said, "War, huh, yeah. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing."

*Edwin Starr is not a friend of the program, but I wish he was. He is dead.

Not Squidding Around

The sequel to one of my favorite Wii U games ever made (there were only like, five ever made, right?), Splatoon, came out on Friday. And yes, Splatoon 2 is off the hook.

Let's start with the reason most people bought the game: the multiplayer. It's fin-tastic. Basically, for the uninitiated, the regular battle mode--Turf War--sees two teams of four try to cover the most ground with their teams ink. Making the emphasis on map coverage instead of splatting (see: killing) your opponents, allows you to feel like your helping out as long as you are inking SOMETHING.

Even as someone who doesn't get a lot of splats in the game, I usually end up Kraken the top two spots on my teams.

The story mode is also sea-cretly good. The boss battles are some of the best in any shooter, and the way you hop from region-to-region within a single stage makes the game feel a bit like Super Mario Galaxy, which is a great thing.

Salmon Run is a new horde mode that has up to four teammates collecting eggs and fighting bosses for up to three rounds. It's ink-credibly tough on higher difficulties and it's pretty dumb that you can't play it online whenever you want to, but it's awesome when it's available.

Is Splatoon 2 more of the same? Yes, definitely. But I don't think it's a problem when so few people ever played the first one.

Arms Has Legs

I'm not really into fighting games. Mortal Kombat is cool because I can rip people's spines out without being labeled as a murderer. Street Fighter is fun because I am undefeated in Street Fighter V with Balrog. You read that right. Undefeated, as in no loses. I'm 1-0 with him. Injustice is neat because it's Batman v Superman without being all mopey and lame.

But all of these games have super long combo lists for each character and ginormous character rosters. As I play, I realize I'll only pull off these combos once in a while through random button pressing.

Despite my aversion to fighting games, I bought Arms on launch day. When it was revealed in January, I'm pretty sure I rolled my eyes. Then I played the Arms Global Testpunch (stupid name, I know) and I enjoyed it so much. Even though I was getting wrecked online, I still found the game to be fun. I only won one game and that was because my opponent wasn't even playing. I'll take whatever wins I can get in that game.

Arms is super tough, but not because there's a high barrier to entry like most other fighting games. It's tough because the AI opponents are ridiculously brutal and have the ability to see into the future, which is frustrating. But when you find the right AI difficulty (like...2) the game is a lot of fun.

Even battling people online is fun, until grab-happy Ninjaras ruin the momentum. Having more than one game mode available in casual online makes the online a go-to destination for me.

Except the two-vs.-two fights are lame. Like, really lame. Hard pass.

Out of the Shadows

Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadow of Valentia has been out for a few weeks and it's been quite the departure from traditional Fire Emblem games. It's still the same concept: fight armies on a grid in turn-based battles, but without some of the stuff from the  most recent entries. You can't pair up your troops and make super-powered babies this time or partner up on the battlefield and wreak havoc.

Those features weren't in the original version of this game, so it makes sense they are absent in Echoes, because it is a nicer looking copy of that game, basically. The dungeons are unique to the game and I hope they return in newer Fire Emblem games.

However, keeping this game so true to the original has some setbacks.  The lack of enemy and class variety is a little disappointing, and because the map is more open, you-ll play in the same exact environments over and over again.

Overall, the game is really fun, but I have not seen such false hit chances since XCOM.

I can't tell you how many 80% chances I've missed. One level in particular saw me miss more than half of my attacks, despite having a 78% chance to land them. You don't need to be a math pro to realize that 78% does not equal 50%. An enemy archer also landed five of his six attacks despite having a 32% chance to hit on each one.

Frustrating, but fun. A sentence that can describe every Fire Emblem game at some point.