SystemsReady

Man, I've never even come close to beating Zelda 2. The part I consistently quit at was the first dungeon actually because of the platforming, with instant death pits?? With how stiff the jumping and handling is?? I would actually kinda kill for a good, still 2D, remake of Zelda 2. It's this fascinating mix of stuff that got majorly used in later games (village names used as sage names in OoT, some bosses also show up in OoT), and out-there stuff just thrown by the wayside (the entire level up system). I'd love to experience its historical value as a game that I'd actually want to play without wanting to throw my controller through my TV.

I'm down for it. My life isn't so damn hectic anymore so I should be able to go through them in a timely manner.

ahahahah fuck Sousa. My high school band director was a tuba player so he loved that stuff...

Not say "Clarinets don't play in jazz band"

It was fucking cloudy where I live lmao...but the decrease in light was substantial. The times where there were breaks in the clouds, there was this eerie lighting, where you can clearly see the shadows cast by the sunlight but it was just way too dim. It kept messing with my head, it was reminding me quite a bit of winter actually.

Serebii's anticipating that it'll be next gen that'll be on the Switch and not the ones directly after US/UM, as Pokemon gens have never been split by console and Game Freak has two teams. But they could skip the anticipated Diamond/Pearl remakes in favor of jumping straight to Gen 8, a la Gen 5 -> Gen 6. The pattern matches up even more when you consider that US/UM might be sequel games like B2/W2.

Apparently the Boost Guardian was so difficult that one of the QA testers had to turn on debug to beat it! I think maybe the biggest problem is miscommunication? A lot of people I've mentioned the boss to were shocked that you can bomb it while it's in puddle mode to force it back to solid mode. I've actually beaten the entirety of Prime 2 on Hard...

The final boss of Sonic 2. Every time I start a playthrough I'm like "okay, I'll play through the game over and over until I finally beat this damn thing". But after losing all my lives and accumulated continues to the game's cheap-ass no-ring final boss, I put the controller down after the Game Over screen. I just can't be bothered to play through the entire game again - special stages + Metropolis Zone + Wing Fortress Zone especially - after being subjected to something so dumb. Sonic 3 & Knuckles kinda pulled that too but at least it had a save system, so you wouldn't have to go through like 10 stages + 14 special stages if Death Egg's final boss kicked your ass too many times (which would be difficult given that the game throws extra lives at you like candy). And Sonic 1's final boss is hilariously easy.

Depends on the developer too. Apparently Sonic Team used .ADX format all the way through Sonic Heroes.

I preordered Moon from Amazon, with release-day delivery. Sitting at work on Friday and then going to my weekly appointments is going to be SO HARD. I literally went with Moon because I thought Lunaala looked cooler...though Solgaleo seems to have the better design animation-wise now that they've put out more art and promos. Lunaala looks so flat by comparison...eh. Oh well, Bayonetta Noivern is cool too, and having the game be night during the day actually works out for me as I tend to play video games after work now.

Honestly I think that's the point - they're kids trying so hard to be "cool". That + them referring to their admin like a family member really makes me think that Team Skull are actually going to be the small fry this time around that you may or may not team up with later in the game to stop the real villains. The final evos are actually really good. Interesting that the grass one's type combo changes, and that means I don't have to have a 4x ice weakness in my party to boot... The fire one being wrestling-related really made the design a whole lot better for me (I caught a glimpse of it when it was originally leaked and thought it was just utterly forgettable). It's even the Heel Pokemon!

Really digging the demo. Things I noticed/have thoughts about: - First off, PLAY IT MULTIPLE TIMES. I almost made the mistake of going "well, that was a good hour" after initially beating it, until I went through the spoiler tag on Serebii and found stuff I hadn't come across yet. Stuff opens up after you initially clear it. - Walking speed is a lot faster, which I guess I'll owe to the models not being chibi with stubby little legs anymore. lol - D-pad no longer used for overworld movement AT ALL. This also means that grid-based movement is now completely gone. It can be used for the menus though. - I like the item menus and main menus, but I'm not a huge fan of the initial battle menu, because the center with the PC sprites of the two Pokemon takes up so much space. It seems like a weird UI decision for me to not have the Fight! button front and center, given that's where you're going to be going most of the time. - Really dig the game showing what moves are effective and which are not after a species is defeated in battle once. I have a great memory, but with 800+(!!) of these guys, I can imagine it gets really hard for other people. - Animation quality is aces. The devs finally made NPCs turning not look so damn ugly this time around, and I really like the battle transitions vs trainers, as well as the fact that you can actually see trainers in battle. - Totally mixed about the music. I really dig the instrumentation, but I don't find the music as catchy. ORAS had killer battle themes, but I guess that could be owed to them being based off of older music. - Really dig the art direction. The areas in the demo really do have personality and it feels like a good, fleshed-out hybrid of Hoenn and Kalos, which is apt because IIRC the director of Sun/Moon was the director of ORAS as well. - If I had to hazard a guess, judging by its mapping to the Y button* (unsure if this will be so in the final?) and the messages the game gives you when you click on rocks blocking paths**, it really does seem like Ride Pokemon will be replacing HMs. To which I say: HALLE-FREAKING-LUJAH. FINALLY I can have a main party of just...esoteric types. I don't need to have a Flying type or a Water type in my party anymore. I can go freaking crazy and not have to waste slots for projected HM slaves. *Which indicates it being intended to be used very often. **The messages are very similar to ones in previous games about boulders that needed to be moved by Strength or rocks that needed to have Rock Smash used on them, in terms of diction. - Pokefinder framerate is garbage (and I'm playing on a New 3DS) and I have no idea why. It's really strange how Game Freak is amazing at coding some things (model + animation + rigging compression) and awful at others (framerate performance in certain seemingly arbitrary situations, such as split-screen shots in 6th gen). Though, I've noted fewer instances of framerate drops in battles this time around - which could be owed to how apparently Sun/Moon uses a new model compression format. - Related, after playing a lot of Majora's Mask 3DS, I found myself actually sorely wanting a gyroscope-controlled option for the Pokefinder alongside the circle pad option, despite the fact that the gyroscope makes that stupidly difficult when you're on moving things such as buses. Given the UI the Pokefinder has, it would just seem natural. - Serebii says that EVs can finally be checked in the Summary screen, which means that keeping an eye on EVs no longer takes up your entire bottom screen in the overworld, which I thought was one of the more boneheaded design decisions in Gen 6. Also says that maxed EVs will visibly sparkle, which takes out the guesswork (which in Gen 6 I solved via attempting to use a punching bag in that stat to see if the game will tell me I couldn't use it). - The fact that the game keeps handing me stuff that can be sold for money (Nuggets, Star Pieces, etc) makes me think that Sun/Moon will be like X/Y and Black 2/White 2 in that there will be copious money sinks. The return of Join Aven--er, Festival Plaza would suggest this too, as Join Avenue was pretty much THE biggest money sink in B2W2.

No, the JP (actual intended) name of Arceus is A-ru-se-u-su (アルセウス). Or "Ar-se-us". If Arceus was meant to be pronounced "Ar-Key-Us", it'd be spelled A-ru-ke-u-su, which it's not.

I am pretty sure that the Ultra Beasts are in fact alt forms of the Aether Foundation admins. That's the only explanation I can really think of. It'd be super strange to have, say, these Ultra Beasts actually turn out to be Pokemon when Pokemon like Mewtwo and Porygon don't have any distinction like "Ultra Beasts" from normal "natural" ones.

I'm not sure if it's because the most I've played the original was like...20 minutes, before I quit because it plays like it's underwater, but I personally really dig the MZM soundtrack...especially compared to Fusion. The arrangement in MZM is head and tails above Fusion's, and the easiest way to notice is in Samus' fanfare between the two games (Fusion's rendition of the fanfare is literally closer to the Prime demo's unfinished rendition than it is to MZM's). The mixing is better IMO than in Super, which sounds very muddied. Actually, thematically....I think MZM's soundtrack is very similar to Prime 2's, which had more driving themes such as Temple Grounds and more usage of vox than Prime 1. And I love Prime 2's soundtrack. So more bias on my part ahahaha...