Dynamax Adventures and the journey of the endless grind

 Baby needs a new Black-scaled Rayquaza!

So now that the Crown Tundra is finally out there and the vast majority of folk have already embarked on their anime-esque adventure with the bodysnatching legendary Calyrex, it's time to talk about the real star of this final DLC; The Dynamax Adventures. Sure, the journey along the way and the hang-outs with all the different Legendary Pokemon, both old and new, get's people through the door, but it's the Dynamax Adventures which get us all to come back time after time again for that promise of the real reward; shiny Legendries. And yes I did touch on this when I spoke about the DLC as a whole, but trust me when I say that a week of constantly grinding these dungeons has painted a whole new perspective on the affair, so I shall share. Never before has there been an actual tangible Pokemon Endgame for me to sink my teeth into so fully, (Although the Isle of Armor's Watts trial did have be hooked for a bit) so forgive me if I go a little off the deep end ranting about this.

So firstly, 'Dynamax Adventures' is the name given to the new feature added practically the second you start this DLC which builds upon the Dynamax dens into 'rouge-lite'-esque dungeons. Dynamax dens being the special battles from the main game wherein you duel an inflated version of a regular Pokemon with an extended healthbar and powerful 'G-max' moves alongside three other trainers. (Either real-life other players or AI stand-ins) 'Dynamax Adventures' extends these battles into entire dungeons that are randomly generated and can be run over and over in perpetuity. (And I get the feeling that they are meant to be.) Each Adventure consists of four fights made up of three normal Pokémon and capped off with a boss battle against a Legendary from a past game, and for that entire Battle-Royale the players have but four possible knockdowns before they are knocked out of the dungeon for good. Strategy comes in the choose-your-own-route minigame between fights wherein players can vote on which Pokemon to take on next based only on a vague shadow of the Pokemon and report on it's type. (Hope you paid attention during all of those 'who's that Pokemon?' cutaways from back in the Anime days)

What makes this most interesting is that players aren't allowed into these dens with the Pokemon that they've carefully built and trained to deal with any and all situations, but with randomly generated 'rental' Pokemon that are gifted due to some lore bit about how Dynamax energy overdose would drive normal Mons insane or something. This means that the Pokemon you'll be battling with all own zero Effort Values and thus are on the same playing field as the enemy. (Whatsmore, they're all levelled to 60 except for the boss legendary who is 70, making the final fight always that bit more tougher) On top of that, Pokemon Status' are carried on through each fight, meaning HP, PP and even status effects need to be carefully managed in order to make it through all four fights without four knockouts. Right there you've got a fine set-up for some quick and repeatable Rogue-lite fun.

Of course there are some extra little quirks thrown in there to add a little more strategy, like the way that any Pokemon you defeat along the journey can be captured (With 100% rates, it's worth mentioning) and replaced with your current Pokemon is they're becoming a little worn down. There's also some randomly placed bonuses along the path that can influence the Party's choice of direction such as Scientists who have quick replace Pokemon for you, Backpackers who give every Pokemon in the party an item (Which has the potential to be an incredibly powerful boon depending on the randomly selected bonus on offer) And for those that don't want to gamble there are also the Berries which just give everyone a health boost.

Now these are just the ingredients that makeup the 'Dynamax Adventures' and ensure that they are as replayable as they are, but what about the incentives? Well for one there is the Dynite Ore which you receive for every Adventure. Every single successful expedition will net player's about 10 and the rewards which can be reclaimed from them are absolutely insane. We're talking rewards ranging from an incredibly rare Beast Ball to the brand new Ability Patch; an item with the ability to give any Pokemon it's hidden ability, something that has been impossible to do before in any fashion. Previously you just had to be given a Pokemon with it already selected through a special event or you'd have to get incredibly lucky in Dens, this marks the first time they've been so accessible. (Although as they retail for 200 Dynite each, maybe 'so accessible' is being a little strong.)

But even there we're talking about the sort of rewards that only the Hardcore players will really appreciate, you want to know about the universal appeal, huh. Well for that you have the promise that within the Adventures none of the Pokemon are shiny locked. Yep, that means any Pokemon you capture in them (You can pick one at the end to keep) has the possibility of being Shiny, even the legendaries! The rates are incredible too, with the Shiny Charm making them as high as 1/100 for every single captured Pokemon. Technically meaning that there's a 1/25 chance of getting a shiny for every adventure provided you capture all four Pokemon along the way, with a possibility of that Shiny being a Legendary. Now seeing as how previously the only way to get a shiny legendary (given the recent advent of Shiny locking) has been to attend a notoriously rare and elusive Pokemon event, this is a godsend for any Grind-happy player out there. (Finally, a Shiny Rayquaza might one day be mine!) You are only allowed to keep each Legendary once, so the pressure is on to make sure that Pokemon-to-keep is the rarest of them all.

Now this is enough to ensure that a steady stream of players are ready to tackle these dungeons practically night and day, all in the hopes that they might one day be the lucky ones. Whatsmore, the promise of Dynite Ore ensures that folk needn't worry about those who don't want go up against this specific Legendary suddenly rage quitting, and to eliminate that possibility almost completely Gamefreak have even made it so that these Pokemon aren't Shiny during the battles but only when you go to check them out at the end of the adventure, so everyone is incentivised to stick it out through the battling. Of course, with random chance being what it is, even with a 1/25 chance of getting a shiny Pokemon there's a possibility of being as unlucky as me and going a full week of grinding without getting a single pull; that's just the way things go sometimes. (I'm not bitter) In fact, I've been so unlucky that maybe I'll end up concluding that Shiny Pokemon don't even exist and that this all been a farce to convince me to play more. Yep, that's my conclusion and the hill I'm ready to die o- oh wait...

Gulp. Well I guess I'm in for the long haul then. As far as endgame activities with the promise of making players come back time and time again it can hardly be disputed, Dynamax Adventures is one of the most fun ideas that Gamefreak have ever conjured up. And in terms of ways to shiny hunt that elusive legendary goes, this is tons more fun and productive than soft-reseting in perpetuity for that one promised roll which may never come. There's also the cherry on top being the way that these Dungeons are sometimes scattered with rare Pokemon from other Gens which never made it into Sword and Shield's Pokedex, and you just have a mode brimming with reasons to come back to for months. So without further ado, I'm going right back to hunting the Shiny Weather trio.

Alex is my spirit animal

 Give this man 'Person of the Year' Time Magazine, you cowards!

I have been freaking out for the last few hours as I write this, and when you read this in a week's time I will still be freaking out. I cannot get over this, I will not get over this. In the year 2020; this is the single most beautiful thing that I've seen in the history of mankind, I simply must share this with someone, anyone! You know those times when everything seems to just be the worst? When everything from the rain practically drowning you one day to timezones messing with a hotly anticipated release on the other, all of which just conspires to truly ruin your good day? And then, like an avenging angel, you see that one thing that just makes you smile despite it all; or giggle uncontrollably like your the victim of Joker's laughing gas, as you try to wrap your head around the absolute pure smooth-brain idiocy you've just read and try to make it work on any remote level? You're there racking your brain, turning over every scenario in your head, and all the while you keep coming back to the same few thoughts. "This can't be real", "This isn't real", "There's no way we live on an world with comedic timing this good!", well I'm here to tell you that it is and you do. May every celestial being have mercy on our pitiful existences.

Ever heard of my new personal lord and saviour, Alex Hutchinson? Me neither, in fact it seems like one of those aggressively generic names that tries just hard enough to seem unique but hasn't quite got there to the point where I feel like I might have heard his name, though in reality I've probably just seen a hundred similar ones. (Either that or this is an elaborate hoax! Oh please, let it be real!) So Alex here just happens to the Creative Director over at Google's struggling attempt to break into the hugely profitable gaming market, Google Stadia. (Oh yeah, you know you're in for an absolute treat whenever we mention their name!) This is the type of of fellow who takes the time out of his way to have in the bio of his Twitter, in all caps, "All opinions are my own!"  (I didn't replicate that here because it's sad and obnoxious) So you know this is the sort of fellow who has his hot takes at 9:00 pm whilst sitting on the toilet. This man, to borrow the parlance of a favoured creator of mine, is the hero of this story.

Now I can't say exactly what it was that set off this godly-fuelled rant into celestial bliss, although given the topic I suspect it was a reaction to the general distress that Twitch users have been expressing over a recent second wave of DMCA claims they've been receiving. Essentially a lot of these streamers use incidental music in the background of their streams, or simply just view content that may have some copyrighted content in it, and then the current copyright laws allow these big companies to aggressively pursue these folk as though hearing a brief snippet of a song in the background of a stream is capable of any remote financial harm to the song itself. Yeah, I'm about to go "Huh, is that The Beatles? Well I heard them in a Stream so I guess that means I never have to buy any of their albums or listen to Spotify ever again." (I could literally write an entire blog about how modern copyright laws are skewered into gross corporate-friendly perversions of what they were meant to protect, but that's beside the point.) So how does Alex fit into all this? Just wait...

Whilst squatting over his porcelain throne, Alex decided to shoot his first hot take right out into the Internet over the marketplace of all the worst discourse in the world, Twitter; and our hero hath proclaimed; "Streamers worried about getting their content pulled because they used music they didn't pay for should be more worried by the fact that they're streaming games they didn't pay for as well. It's all gone as soon as publisher's decide to enforce it." What? My man, what? It was then that I knew we were in for something truly divine. (Oh, and I think he's referring to licencing agreements here, and not trying to imply that every Streamer in the world pirates their games. Although with the level of intelligent discourse displayed by Alex here, maybe he believes that too.) There's literally a mountain of things to get into here, but let me implore that you don't explode with questions just yet as we try to address things one at a time.

Alex isn't trying to be Nostradamus and warm folk about a potential (if dumb) threat to their way of life, like I foolishly gave him the doubt about, he replied to his own Tweet on the matter. "The real truth is the Streamers should be paying developers and publishers of the games they stream. They should be buying a licence like any real business and paying for the content they use." (Gotta love some of that "real truth"; can't stand all that 'fake truth') So the basic thing seems to be this; Alex is somewhat of an old soul who can't reconcile how markets of today differs from markets he thinks he's familiar with. He looks at one thing and notices that it doesn't function like the other thing does, and instead of taking the time to think why that is, he stumbles into a hair-brained solution that everything should function exactly the same because context is stupid and it hurts his brain. (As I live in England, it might help to throw an 'Allegedly' over this entire blog; just to be safe)

So where do we start? Yes, our man is legally right; buying games does not give the purchaser the right to stream said game, only the right to access the software which can be revoked at any time. (Really needs to be an update to that policy but that's a case for another time.) And yet inexplicably games companies most commonly decide not to enforce their rights superiorities over people's streams of their games, (Unless they are some crappy studio who received bad coverage of this terrible game or Nintendo. Although even Nintendo learnt their lesson eventually.) let's explore why that is. Well for one there is this little nagging issue called 'Fair use' which would imply that footage in which streamers react to the content would be transformative and thus protected. In fact, under that provision it would be practically impossible for any online streaming content to break copyright law. However these little tidbits are often overlooked and I'd imagine that if they really wanted to the studios would have the edge in court. So maybe there's something more going on here.

How about, oh I dunno, the fact that going after Streamers for playing your game to an audience of thousands would literally be attacking free marketing? In the modern world where people are inundated and attacked by marketing so much that we're literally taught in school how to ignore it; in such situations it's invaluable to have a source of grass routes marketing where apparent-trusted sources spread the news of your product to those who will listen to them. The popular streamers of Youtube and Twitch perfectly form that sort of ecosystem and thus create an environment wherein game marketing can spread to people who will appreciate it, no matter how niche the game itself. Ever since Pewdiepie this has been the relationship between streamers and publishers, so no-one seeks to make a few bucks out of licences because it's far more profitable not to. Gaming has become the most profitable entertainment medium in the world right now, and their unique stance towards marketing has been a huge contributing factor to that. It's part of the reason why even with all the corrupt and greedy moves that some of these bigger studios pull, they've never gone after streaming; that would literally be shooting oneself in the foot with a freakin' Sawn-off levels of stupid.

And trust me when I say, this a universal rule. Even games which are typically not effected by backlash and dissent would be breaking their own legs to go after their streaming audience. Call of Duty culture was built on the back of  'skillshot compilation' videos back in the day, and the personalities who shared this content would go on to become unofficial, or even official in some cases, spokepeople for these games. Even Football games and the like are supported by fans who love streamers that specialise in that content. And as I mentioned earlier, even Nintendo had to wake up and realise they were being stupid by enforcing their licenses; so Alex is even behind Nintendo mentally. (Think about how much of a relic that makes this poor man.) Whatsmore, Alex seems to think that this move would allow the developers to make more money, (Because any injustice is good as long as it funds artists, right?) when he seems to have completely overlooked the fact that copyright rulings never funnel back to the artists but the studio who owns the licence. Developers wouldn't make bank off of this, Publishers would. (Though not much money, because people would simply just stop covering their games and move onto another game company who isn't run by idiots, same as what they did with Nintendo.)

Now all of this would be embarrassing, but understandable, to have to explain to a nobody who's never played a game before; but Alex boy here is a creative director! And creative director for Stadia, no less! So when you find yourself wondering how it is that everything Stadia does seems stupid and ill conceived, just remember that this is the intellectual calibre of those in charge, then wonder no more. What makes this especially funny, is that Stadia itself touted a feature that would take advantage of game streamers by allowing audience members to watch their content and then launch directly into the game (Something which I believe still hasn't come to the system yet) meaning Mr Creative Director doesn't even understand the creative decisions of the system he's working with! I just- fail to grasp how insane all this is with every layer. How can you work in the game's industry and be this freakin' clueless? My only thought is that this must be a joke, but he seems to have dug his heels in so far that he's become a joke online. I've already seen Streamers mocking him in their titles, so his reputation has been jettisoned in order to make this gaffe, if that's what it is.

As if to put that little perfect cherry on top of the cake, Alex-the-numbskull decided to sign off from the backlash he was receiving with a meme gif (ever the tool of the intellectual) and the message that he was going to play Fall Guys for a while. Oh, 'Fall Guys' is it, Alex? You mean that game that owes it's runaway success due to it's release strategy that took advantage of streamers in order to create demand before the game was out? That's right, 'Fall Guys' was released in a beta format to streamers so that they could play it and create an aura of exclusivity around the game which got people excited for the wider release. This is the game Alex is playing. And he doesn't seem to know it's history. (And don't even get me started on how 'Amnesia' was made popular by Streaming, or 'Doom 2016', or 'Among Us', 'Fortnite', 'Minecraft', 'Mario Maker', the list is unending) It's just too perfect, isn't it? This must be a joke. Never have I seen such a stupid take from someone who really should know better. I could write until my fingers disintegrate into bloody pulps about how wrong every online breath this man took was, but I'll relent. It is his opinion afterall, and some people think that alone makes anything you say right. I guess it just goes to show that Stadia is that platform of mediocrity that keeps on giving; so ride on, you doomed venture, on your inevitable journey to join Quibi in the graveyard of dumb ideas that were destined for damnation. (Congrats on outliving them, though.) 

You may be wondering, given the extraordinary nature of this all, whether or not this story was real. Well in the words of 'Johnathon Frakes' in Beyond Belief: Yes it is. You're right. It's fact. Yes. Yes, a similar event did take place. You're right. You were right. Our research found a published report of a similar story. Yes, it was. A similar story happened to a young man in the pacific northwest about twenty years ago. It happened. A similar event took place. You're right again. You're right. A similar event happened to a teacher in the Florida area. It happened. You were correct, it's fact. It happened. This one took place. A similar event occurred in the state of New Jersey about twenty years ago.

This can't be happening; not again!

 Woe. WOE IS ME!

So there I was, indulging in the innately beautiful act of watching someone's first experience with 'Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines', fully immersed in the ironically outdated 2000's picture of 'cool vampiric nightlife' only to be struck. Like a diamond bullet to the head, shattering me into a thousand pieces. And no, Colonel Kurtz, this wasn't some sudden epiphany about the depths of human degeneracy or the hypocrisy of morality spurred on by watching yet another vampire wave their hands in apparent pain whilst calling it dancing, this was the bullet of cold, hard truth. The truth that despite all the promises, the words of consolation, the very heavens themselves singing their blessing upon the project, Cyberpunk 2077 is to be delayed once again. This time out of November and into December. In the words of the Cyberpunk 2077 official twitter; "Well Fu**".

I can't tell if this pain that I'm feeling right now is the dull ache of betrayal or just the deficit for the shock that I should have been hit with last night, because I was certainly not feeling this way when I heard about it. I was absolutely delirious, stumbling about like a drunk man, absolutely gobsmacked by a reality that simply couldn't be real. For at least a full 10 minutes there were no words uttered from my mouth except for "No", because this was surely an impossibility. We're talking about the third delay for this game, one which was set to release almost a full year previously, and has now been pushed back to the very last feasible moment of 2020. This is, of course, just a few weeks after being declared 'Gold' by the team. That's usually an indication that things are on track and that at this point a delay is out of the question, an assurance to consumers, employees and store owners who are desperate to get this future blockbuster out of the gate. An assurance made too early, it would seem, far too early.

As with every CDPR announcement, this news came with a whole in-depth message explaining themselves that reads a little like a primary school student who vastly overestimated their abilities in the group project. They try to tell us that we misunderstand exactly what it 'means' to go gold, and subtly imply that it's normal for projects to delay themselves in order to pave the way for a day zero patch. (Or is it for a day zero patch to become obsolete? I don't know anymore, cognitive reasoning fails me.) They offer their apologies and leave us all to flounder in the dirt, not even bothering to renew their, now-weightless, assurances that this time would be the one. No more delays now, right guys? Who the heck knows anymore, we were less than 30 days out, this is insane. I've been understanding in the past, and even a little bit angry, (it was going to be on my Birthday, I think I was justified) but now I'm just overwhelmingly sad.

Of course there will be those that are tripping over themselves to cheerlead for this game with their typical "The game will be ready when it's ready guys!" and "It'll be better for the extra time", and their usual condescending refrains. We get it, okay, of course the game will be ready when it's ready! The problem is the constant playing with expectations up until the last possible moment and then moving of the goalposts yet again. For pathetic beings like myself who allow ourselves to become excited and invested, it just starting to feel a little mocking at this point. (Remember how they pushed back the April date in freakin' February!) And with recent revelations we now know that we aren't the only one's who were blind sided with these tweets; recent exposés into the company have revealed how such delays are conveyed to the public simultaneously with the staff, so a lot of people just learnt they were getting 21 extra days of crunch out of nowhere; that's gotta suck even more.

I think if there's one prevailing takeaway for all this it's to really take a look at the sort of power that CDPR are wielding right now, and I'm talking supreme dominance over the entire industry, kind of power. These people know that the game in their hands is likely destined to be a best seller that will influence similar games for years at the very least; and the sort of game that these market owners are salivating for. Whatsmore, the new systems which are coming out in November desperately need a big title to rest their sales on, and if first parties can't be hammered down than Cyberpunk would have been the next best thing. CDPR are playing fickle with the heavy hitters and it has to be driving Microsoft and Sony absolutely insane right now. I wouldn't be surprised if they're even more more angry than the consumers, as they may have serious finical ramifications in store for such a last minute delay during a crucial sales period. (Luckily I think December still lands in the same financial quarter so perhaps passions haven't been too inflamed by CDPR's behaviour)

At least one funny takeaway from this all has been one of the most public consequences of this whole, let the staff know along with the fans, policy. The very sassy Cyberpunk 2077 Twitter which has been active since the second trailer for this game, had spent the past few months assuring the worried that the release date was immutable and that was a word they could take to the bank. Most famously was one Twitter user who literally inquired a day before this news about whether or not they could apply for time off at work in order to make the midnight launch. One day later and the Cyberpunk Twitter was looking very precariously at the amount of assurances it had made whilst jokingly musing about the possibility of deleting past tweets. Such is the reckoning for broken promises.

As for me, I'm upset. You mean have deduced a little about the sort of person that I am through these blogs, although even if you haven't there should be some things that are obvious; I'm not the most complicated person in the world. I get excited by the simple things in life and all I need is a promising release date to look forward to. I don't want no Call of Duty, I don't care about the new consoles, Ubisoft's latest tech-demo can wait until it's sufficiently discounted before I pick it up; all I wanted was Cyberpunk. At this point it feels like the team is just hauling ass to desperately get this game out before the end of 2020 so that they can make that joke about how they bought out the Cyberpunk 2020 adaptation in 2020. (Is that literally it? I bet it is.)

So yeah, Cyberpunk 2077 is going to be the ruination of us all. We'll be waiting until the Rapture for this game to come out, all the while CDPR will delight in pushing back the goal posts perpetually. Fair is foul and foul is fair, hell is empty and all the devils are here and goddamn it I just want to play this stupid game! To hell with another Night City Wire, or another hundred at this rate, just let me play the damn thing so I can move on with my meaningless and dull life in my march towards the grave. Is that too much to ask? To get to roleplay as a cool Cyberpunk man before death? Because I didn't think it was but now I'm wondering... and am I overreacting? Hell yeah I am, my patience is run out and I'm still delirious. Damn you CDPR, this game better be amazing... 

Watch Dogs can't catch a break

Leave Watch Dogs alone!

Watch Dogs is certainly carving out its time in the headlines now isn't it? And with the game a literal hairs-breadth away that makes sense, marketing in full swing baby! In fact, by the time this blog comes out the game itself with be a day away, whether that's a day forward or backwards is beyond me, I don't care enough to look it up. But whereas this franchise that I haven't really fallen in love with is making the media rounds, it's funny how none of the stories it's generating are particularly positive. In fact, I can't remember the last happy Watch Dogs headline I've read, just a couple that elicited some mixed opinions. So in the effort of sanitising the Watch Dogs marketing train, I'm going to talk about a few of them because they tickled me and I wanted to share that mirth, even if it's sort of at the expense of others. (I never said I was a good person.)

First of all, the ironic kicker. So Watch Dogs is a game that's ostensibly about hacking, until the second game came along and hijacked the aesthetic to tell one of the most unfocused 'anarchy-central' plots I've ever witnessed. (I mean, it started off about surveillance but then seemed to descend into general corporate vigilantism.) This time around the team have created an entire fanatical government over London in order to hopefully narrow the narrative lens a little bit, and in doing so further pushed the hacking elements of the game a little bit to the wayside. (Although they are still there and still a selling feature.) With all that in mind, isn't it just a little bit funny that the Ubisoft offices were hacked and the source code for Watch Dogs Legion is currently being held ransom? Okay, maybe not so funny for the folk involved, but there's some irony there that is just tangible, no?

 Now the reports I've heard on this little debacle are scattered at best. Some say it was the result of a little phishing (or a lot of phishing, seeing how much data they have) whilst more official sources seem to conclude that it's some plain old ransomware; maybe it's both, who knows? Either way we find ourselves in this curious position where the hacking game which makes the act of security breaching infinitely more glamourous, and easy, than it really is, has fallen victim to actual hackers. Mostly I like how this demonstrates that those Legions of White-hat visionaries who use their powers of technological wizardry in order to make the world a better place are entirely fictitious. The real hackers are mostly just grifters who pick on video game companies because is alleged 'easy money'. (Although that's one heck of a way to signal boost you activities in the exact wrong direction, these guys might not like the attention they are currently getting.)

So that's as much as there is to that quirky little situation. Perhaps Legion will get it's source code leaked, if so I am curious what sort of affect that'll have on the game, it's not as though it'll be exactly easy to replicate the arguably-revolutionary technicals at play for Legion so I can't imagine copy cats will start popping up in droves. It will certainly help pirating though, and it would be a huge invasion of privacy. So a net negative for Ubisoft. Although, to look at a little silver lining, this may help a potential modding community spring up around the game, and seeing as Legion appears to be setting itself up as more of a platform than a polished game in it's own right, maybe that'll end up being what this game needs. God knows the wider modding community have been needing a new putty-like game to mess around with.

The other story I've been hearing out of Watch Dogs is a lot more subjective, in that you can take it to be good news or worrying news depending on your opinion. That being how recently the recommendations for systems requirements shot up to the brand new RTX 3080 in order to run at max settings. Now we are talking about max settings here so it does make sense that they'd be a little demanding, but many have pointed out that Watch Dogs Legion isn't by any means the prettiest game on the market, not even close, so why the heck is it demanding such a nuts graphics card? I mean some of the lighting looks pretty cool, but a 3080? Seriously? Well when you consider how this game looked like it was held together by a shoestring last year, there are certainly some conclusions that people can, and have, draw(n).

Most prominently I've seen the poor optimisation accusation, and I've not experienced enough to be able to validate if such a claim would be accurate, either with the game itself or programming, so I defer to others' judgements. Although I will say that it did certainly seem like Ubisoft were biting off more than they could chew with this game when they revealed it. A whole game wherein any NPC was playable? Stats and packages could be generated for any rando off the street? I have no idea how flexible the engine that is working on Watch Dogs is, but Bethesda's Creation Kit practically shut down whenever attempting anything like that on a fraction of the amount of NPCS that this game has, so maybe that scale is proving taxing to systems?

That being said, the team have been able to get it up to 4k on next gen consoles so perhaps things aren't terribly dire inside the inner workings. 60 FPS is as elusive as ever, to the point where I'm standing to wonder if consoles will ever see such frames for new titles, but at least the slightly ugly face models will look just as plastic as they are meant to! I'll be honest, I'm not exactly in my comfort zone when talking about graphical requirements in the world of gaming, but I am poor enough to gawk when a game that looks this average tells me to fork over £800 for a graphics card. (Not that such a card would be helpful for my outdated box anyway.) It just sort of turns me off. Though I'd imagine some others out there are bolstered by that same news.

In but a weeks time we'll finally have Watch Dogs in the hands of the public and we'll be able to see if Ubisoft managed to knock it out the park or just deliver another, 'yeah, this is pretty fun I guess' style game. (Given their track record, I expect the latter) To their credit, I do recognise the genuinely creative and interesting mechanics here are aeons beyond their usual single-step-per-game model, but looking at this hardware requirements and seeing their presentations I can't help but get the nagging feeling that ambition might have outpaced ability in this one. But hey, maybe a bolder, more risk-taking, Ubisoft is exactly what the Industry needs right now, I don't know but I'm willing to be open-minded enough to find out. 

Didn't I just cover this?

 Deja Vu; i've just been in this place before

Here we are again. It's always such a pleasure. Remember when 2K tried to screw us over last? I do. In fact the whole affair is so fresh in my mind that I feel as though I could never forget the multiple heinous ways that 2K sought to definitively prove how poorly they could treat their consumer base. It's almost got to be a competition for them at this point, "How much can we abuse our position of power to milk folk before they stop coming back"? Of course that cannot be the case, because 2K make sports games and the answer to that query would be too obvious; sports fans will buy literally anything that you put in front of them. It's almost like watching a superhero turn bad before your very eyes and wondering idly if they were ever a good person to begin with. I mean, remember seeing the 2K logo pop up whenever I put in Bioshock, so there's some positive connection right there, but to be honest those games were probably more due to the work of Irrational Games than these doofuses. Is there anything positive left to say about 2K at this point?

A year back I was thinking the same thing when their NBA 20 game was struck with the latest in a long line of avaricious controversies; the forced ad drama. Basically, this was a situation in which 2K thought it entirely fair and in keeping with their rights as a publisher to forcibly load adverts in front of games that folk wanted to play. Basically, they were treating their full price sports game, which was already monetised to hell and back, like a free-to-play title chock-full of free ad space. People reacted as you would expect and the move was slowly faded out without any responsibility or public statement being made. To this day I don't know if they completely removed them or just limited the pool to those that didn't complain, but headlines stopped appearing so the problem vanished at least temporarily. For time there was even talk that 2K might have finally done the impossible and surpassed EA in terms of unlikability. (Until EA reclaimed that title just a week or so ago with Ads in their UFC game.)

But you can't keep a multimillion dollar conglomerate down, it would seem, because 2K have returned once again this year to throw back in their third party ads in this year's NBA 21; your welcome, Sports community! And though I hate to throw around comparisons in a practice as honestly vile as this, I'd go so far as to call this worse than EA's UFC implementation. Whereas in that game the ads were ancillary flashes representing 'The Boys' which would pop up just before replays or above the time bar (and the ring itself had some 'The Boys' branding) for NBA 2K21 the game will quite literally halt your loading time between menus in order to show off a full 20 second ad. And no, this isn't just filler to help you pass loading times, (not that it would be any better if it were) the loading itself will slow to a crawl in order to force you to watch the ad. (Very cool, guys. Except not.)

There have been actual outlets that have tried all kinds of tricks to make absolutely sure that these Ads are unskippable, but to be honest that doesn't even matter because the Ads are there at all. This is a full price game that is trying to monetise people's time even further than the core mechanics of the game are already designed to do. In fact, it's not even full price; it's over full! Because the next-gen versions of these sports games have all simultaneous upped their price by an extra 10 dollars for literally no reasons whatsoever. Perhaps they expect us to buy that crap about how development costs are outpacing their ability to produce, but with the lack of effort going into these yearly releases coupled with the incredible profits that these games make, it's hard not to wonder how these people haven't gotten careers in politics with their habitual lying.

And let me be even clearer than I feel I have been throughout this blog; there is absolutely no place in full priced gaming for third party ads. This is something I feel very strong about, on a personal level. Ads are a necessary part of our modern ecosystem that earns it place by worming into places where we consider our entertainment to be free, or at least inexpensive. But even then there are limits. Part of the reason that cord-cutting became so popular is because of the absolute deluge of Ads that folk were subject too on TV, even when paying through the nose for the service as it is. Some folk even download elaborate Ad blocking software on browsers in order to avoid them throughout the Internet. What I'm trying to say is that the balance between adverts and consumers is fragile at best, and with the premium prices that we pay in order to access the latest games, especially with sports games, 2K better know folk will have exactly no chill for their time being wasted in such a manner.

Sure, there is an argument to be made here, as folk always do, that this is a mild inconvenience and thus a non-issue. An extra 20 seconds to the loading time isn't going to make anyone's head fall off and it's only effecting sports games right now anyway. "I don't even play sports games". But as I must reinforce, over and over, this is only ever just the beginning. The reason that we see these stupidly greedy policies get instituted in sports games first is because these companies know how pliable the sports audience can be, and they know that if they can't pull a trick on them, there's no chance they could pull it over the rest of gaming. Therefore if there's ever something vile and unappealing that you see make it's way over to sports you have to call it out there, else it makes it's way to a franchise you love and care about. (And it will. Trust me it will.)

As of right now the issue isn't widespread. In the conniving way that these companies do, 2K have saw it fit to shadow launch this new feature a month after launch (so that it wouldn't effect review scores) and to a limited amount of people. (To limit potential backlash.) But the news has already made it to the outlets so it's likely only a matter of time before the plug is pulled and the team slink back into the darkness, but make no mistake they'll be back again next year! This is the same crap that they pulled last time and you can bet they learnt nothing from it; they're just going to keep testing the waters until we grow too used to it in order to call them out, at which point it'll become a mainstay feature of every one of their games from that point forth. I may sound alarmist, but look at Season Passes, Lootboxes and low-effort Yearly recycle releases, then tell me I'm making mountains out of molehills.

So once again we do this dance of whack-a-mole, 2K pushes the envelope and we shout them down, no ground is made and we all convene again next year to do it again, but meanwhile other liberties get taken. The jacking up of sports game prices has gone over practically unchallenged and many believe this new $70 pricetag might be here to stay, which could start to have an effect on other AAA games in it's orbit. That's how people like this win, they dangle the small bait to rile everyone up whilst sneaking their policies through the backdoor, and time after time we just let them. It's a little galling to think that enriching the gaming space cannot be done in a manner that enriches the player as well, but I suppose this us-vs-them environment is exactly the one that companies like 2K have been trying to build all these years, we'll just see how long it persists before it starts to bring the industry down around our ears. (and I'm only being mostly sarcastic there)

Dungeons and Dragons

 The original RPG.

Of all the plethora of gaming experiences that I've never had the pleasure to partake in, one which I'm most bummed about is that most influential and long-running of games; Dungeons and Dragons. Now don't get me wrong, it's not as if I'm a stranger to that game, I've been watching games of it and reading about it for years now, but I've just never had the social circle to support a game. It sucks for me because I recognise D&D as just one of those ideas that will never get old no matter how many innovations are made in the realms of storytelling or technological leaps towards total fidelity. Because no matter how wild games get, they'll never rival that which can be dreamed up in the realms of one's own imagination, at most they can feed such a beast. now with the release of the Beta for Baldur's Gate 3, I thought it'd be fun to talk about the game to which it, and indirectly so many others, owes it's existence. Which, to be clear, doesn't mean I'll be talking about Baldur's Gate itself, if that's what you were expecting.

So what is Dungeon's and Dragons? Well, quite simply it is a pen-and-paper role playing game wherein players create fantastical characters and embark on journeys guided, narrated and sometimes even constructed by the person who assumes the role of 'Dungeon Master'. But more than that, D&D has become a culture that represents imagination driven role playing and high fantasy of all facets, drawing inspiration from all and going on to inspire so many others. Pick out your favourite fantasy property and chances are there'll be a bit of D&D DNA in there, and that's because it's a game that's touched so many hearts and stoked so many flames that entire worlds were spawned from it. There are now many different types of D&D games to the point where it's a genre now, including other legendary titles such as Warhammer and Cyberpunk; each with their own take on the concept and revolutions upon the formula. For the purposes of this blog, and because I know more about it, I'm going to focus on the D&D of old.

What makes D&D so appealing, at least in my eyes, is the breadth of freedom that it offers for every player who takes part. Whether you're a player or a dungeon master there's no end to the races, classes and stories you can dream up, particularly because the game keeps getting reiterated so that new things are added all the time. But for my money the most interesting games of D&D are those that don't necessarily take the texts and rules as gospel, but merely as guides from which to mount one's own, wholly unique, story and experience. The fun of the game is really how flexible it is, with the latest edition you could feasibly even get rid of the board and just play with character sheets if your management skills are good enough. (Although that'd be placing a lot of responsibility in the DM's hands.) Obviously that means even in this socially distanced Corona times people can still live out their medieval fantasies over the Internet with one another.

At it's most base level it's hard to deny that what most people seek out of D&D is probably a pure form of that escapism that fuels the entire role playing genre. The typical image of a D&D group is, afterall, a collection of middle-aged nerds with boring jobs who become heroes and villains in the Forgotten Realms or Night City. Cliché though it may be, there's still a truth to that image as vicarious living has practically always been an aspect of the human experience, this just represents a more imaginative, and more active, expression of that. Whilst it's likely not true that most D&D players are depressed loners who desire to spend more time in the world of the game than in real life, as the outdated perception insists, I wouldn't be surprised if someone out there is in that positions and uses the game as a relief. I could certainly imagine myself as a shade upon that stereotype if I'd ever got the chance to play.

Of all the many different campaigns that I've looked in on, all featuring vastly different folks of vastly differing familiarity with the game systems, there's one commonality that I've noted; humor. That is to say, a lot of people like to bring comedy to the fantasy worlds and oftentimes even expand that to an air of flippancy about the adventures. I find this curious as, for what I can read, there's a certain dryness to the material that spawns D&D which would make one wonder why so many express the game in the same way. I mean there are some jokes in the manuals and various informations, of course, but never is it a focal point of the game itself. The creators seem to want players to take the game at least subconsciously seriously, else it would be hard to appropriately immerse like one would hope. Now maybe that's just a natural side effect of performance, or maybe the modern day has enshrined a aura of ridiculousness upon the act of playing D&D itself which mirth helps dispel, I couldn't tell you, but it sure makes for entertaining viewing.

I've also begun to notice the difference between the types of players of DM's that partake, and I'm almost fascinated at the differences they can bring to the game. Some of the most dry, yet usually most dramatic, campaigns I've witnessed have come from the very mathematically driven players and DM's who agonise over min-maxing equipment and the purity of roles. These are the folk who'll put down hard limits for checks and will refuse to fluff a role for storytelling purposes, and thus when things come down to the wire these are the people who can really get invested up to those final moments. Though I think these sorts of games look restricting, I've never seen another type of game which had me counting damage points in my head to to keep up with the action. Boardless matches, on the otherhand, tend to be some of the most creative and funny to watch. In these game you can almost sitback and listen to the thing like a podcast, letting the world come to life in your head, and for a player that can really loosen up play potential. These are the sorts of games that birth actions you just wouldn't get otherwise, like circumventing an entire scary boss battle by barrelling into the room and accidentally knocking the enemy out the window. (if the rolls says it happened, then it happened.)

The biggest barrier to entry for D&D is, in my opinion, a fabrication. People tend to look at the stats and the sheets of paper and think there's some huge intellectual barrier to entry for the game, as if you have to read tones and tones of knowledge to comprehend the general concept, whilst in truth it's as simple as can be; you simply need to be pliable enough to immerse yourself. Even if it's just a little bit. Sure, in practice there's a lot of number juggling that goes into it but a good DM takes the brunt of that themselves, the player only has the responsibility to tell the story, nothing more. In all honestly it's actually quite easy to get into the game and that's what makes it so addictive, it is however, a huge time commitment. (There's one myth I can't dispel)

And that's my unsolicited crash course on Dungeon's and Dragons, a timeless game that spawned a thousand more. Even though I'm generally no fan of board games and their ilk, D&D remains one of my favourite things to observe and I hope one day I'll get the chance to give it a go myself. (Though I probably won't, I'm a single player for life sort of person, afterall.) Luckily for folk like me there is the medium of videogames to bridge that hole and thus Baldur's Gate 3 is already out and ready if you're the kind of person who like playing the first act over and over. (Full release is gonna be a while out.) Maybe later I'll go into specifics about D&D if the mood ever strikes me again, there's a lot to cover afterall.

The Crown Tundra

The frozen south? 

Here we are, after almost an entire year of waiting, the last past of the Pokémon Sword and Shield experience has finally released with The Crown Tundra, a winter themed romp through the frozen southern wastes of England-like Galar. (Note: Southern England is usually the last place to freeze over, but I guess we'll chalk this one up to creative licence on The Pokémon Company's end) Now as far as we are we aware this spells the end of the journey, (saving the surprise announcement of a second season pass, which might happen given the precedent set by Smash Bros.) so there's really a lot for this finale to live up to and achieve. As of right now I've actually played through a decent amount of it, enough to give a fairly decent account of how I think the DLC fairs with its strength and weaknesses, and that's because I think mastering this content is going to take a fair few months to truly do right.

So let me start by saying that I think narratively, I really quite enjoyed what was going on with the Crown Tundra slightly more than what we saw in The Isle of Armor. Armor was a rather straight forward story with no frills that took us through the act of 'training' to be good enough to take guardianship over that DLC's legendary Pokémon, not bad by any stretch of the imagination but not earth shattering either. Whilst I can say the same for The Crown Tundra's go at DLC, I will say that the story Gamefreak showed off felt much more in line with the more interesting and elucidating post-game chapters that we've been getting out of Pokémon of late. I don't want to get into specifics because I think this particular narrative has some surprisingly funny twists to it, but I will say that we really do get in close contact with this region's legendary in a manner that surpasses even what we saw in the Sword and Shield base game. (Maybe I'll dedicate a future blog in talking about the whole story and what we can learn from it.)

The basic structure of The Crown Tundra's story leans on what was established and well-received from the Isle of Armor; open ended exploration. This time around you are paired with the doting father of a rebellious teen known as Peony, who devised a number of 'expeditions' in order to get closer with his daughter, only for her to abandon him and go Dynamax hunting. We are left behind to play surrogate child in the father-daughter bonding time, meaning that the 'expeditions' into discovering the truth behind the various legendary Pokémon living in The Crown Tundra can commence with haste. Of this there are three branches of Pokémon Legendries that you can pursue in order to make up the basic plot of the DLC (with a fourth that's unrelated) and the player is free tackle them in whatever order they so desire, making for the freedom-angle in this plot.

I've said it before but let me reiterate; this really should be the direction that all Pokémon content begins to take in the future as it finally pushes this decades old franchise into the modern age just that little bit. The amount of out-dated design mechanics in Pokémon have been a distraction for too long, let the new wave take over! The new free-camera exploration spaces makes the world feel less segmented and thus the habitats more natural, and some of the legendaries introduced with The Crown Tundra really take advantage of this new space. I don't want to spoil too much but there are some roaming legendaries introduced with this new DLC that require you to explore much further than you might have expected from a Pokémon DLC. This is the sort of thing that should be encouraged in the future!

Not everything is sunshine and roses, however, and I feel that despite itself The Crown Tundra has slipped over in one crucial area; the engagement incentives. Don't get me wrong, exploring the Tundra is a reward all in of itself with the varied environments and Pokémon you can scout of all kinds, but there's no tangible in-game reward for coming back time and time again after the main story is completed. Once you've gathered all the legendaries and solved the mysteries there's a huge part of this gorgeous map that you'll just have no need to ever return to, and this sits in stark contrast to The Isle of Armor which seemed littered with such incentives. On Armor you had the daily max mushrooms which needed players to farm dens in order to spawn, alongside the collectible Ditto's and the Apricorn trees that you could then roll in the item converter to maybe get a super rare Pokéball. (Just got my first Safari Ball from it after 5 months, that's the sort of recurrent incentive I'm talking about.) Game Freak can learn from themselves there.

The real selling point of the DLC however, aside from the promise of new adventures, is the Dynamax Adventures that don't take up as much of the main story as I would have initially assumed. Essentially these are four-fight dungeons wherein the player is tasked with teaming up with a party and battling through three Dynamax Pokémon in order to get the chance of facing a legendary from the series at the end of it all. The twist comes in that none of your own Pokémon are allowed to be used in this battle, meaning you have to select from some randomly generated mons, and that you can only be knocked down three times across all four fights, (With HP and PP carrying over from each fight to the next) so working as a team is essential. The Adventure itself is rather straight-forward, with players deciding what route to take across a board of Pokémon wherein all you can see are faint shadows and Typing to help inform your path. It's actually a really fun and exciting way to push your Pokémon skills just that little bit further (although I'd argue 'Restricted battling' from Armor is much more challenging) and it's made all the sweeter from the fact that legendaries aren't shiny-locked in this adventure, if that's the sort of thing you look out for in Pokémon.

All I really was missing from the DLC, and again I haven't finished it all so I may be a little premature here, is the explanation behind the legendaries. Yeah, I know it's a nerdy point; but why exactly are there so many legendries showing up Galar when they are supposed to be one-of-a-kind? Previous games that have tried this sort of system have established some sort of 'parallel dimension' mumbo jumbo to explain it all away, but it seems that The Crown Tundra couldn't even be bothered to do that. There's some slight shade thrown towards a Cosmog that is found in the area, which would make sense given it's ability to open ultra-wormholes, but where did that Cosmog come from to begin with? But that's just nerd-talk at this point and for the most part I'd consider The Crown Tundra to be a decent send off for the Sword and Shield world, a piece of content that is just about worth the inexpensive asking price for what's on offer here. 

Sword and Shield has been an unexpectedly big part of my year and it's a little sad to see it's journey come to an end. Being a Brit, it was fun to explore this reimagination of my homeland and really get involved with the Pokémon community in ways that I simply haven't ever before. (I even check the Reddit often now, how positively bizarre!) I still think there's room for a little more should the company choose to tell it, but that's all their own prerogative, and I'm sure there's many more out there that just want them to take what they've learned in these DLCs and apply them to a new full game in the future. For my part I just want to say that I appreciate getting the chance to spend some much time in Galar and hope that future Pokémon adventures will only get better from here on in. Now without further ado I'm going to resume the desperate hunt for my shiny Rayquaza.

Blog 500

 

Well colour me surprised, I'm already at blog number 500 and for some reason am still going. This means that I'm going to get really, uncomfortably personal for this blog because it's the only outlet I have and I've never understood how people can keep a journal. (How do you keep writing something different about your day everyday?) So be forewarned that this isn't going to be a fun blog to read and that you should probably click off and come back tomorrow. 'Kay? Now with that out of the ay I have to be honest with you, I didn't think I'd make it this far by any metric and I've no idea what it has that has kept me active to write down the utter gibberish that I do here. This past year and a bit I've been very relaxed with how I've handled the blogs and haven't really gone out of my way to do any big posts because I'm not really sure that it's worth all the effort, I mean no one reads them anyway and it takes up near 8-10 hours to fully write, so I might as well just forget about it. Unfortunately that means other things have been left to the wayside like, the Resident Evil blogs which was annoying as I was so close to finishing the first game. Maybe I'll find a way to wrap them up with a finale, but the E3 season really came out of nowhere and wrapped me up when I least expected it. (Or rather, what remains of the E3 season.)

In that vein I think it must be said, gaming seems to have been hit with so many events over the past few months it seems insane to me. I've always been the kind of person who loves to pay attention to gaming trends and all the announcements and trailers that come from them, but perhaps I've just not seen how the months of April to October are packed with constant shows and reveals, or perhaps this year is different either due to the pandemic or because this is a new console year. Whatever the case it's all kept me amazing busy as of late because everytime I sit down with a somewhat clear idea of what it is I want to do for the week some new release comes out or a story drops and everything is thrown into disarray. To be clear, I don't bemoan these circumstances and rather enjoy them, but sometimes it gets to be a bit much to handle.

In terms of the actual act of gaming itself, I've found myself rather stunted on the console end due to the apparent death of my console's disk drive. That is to say that it works once in a blue moon, but the amount of restarts that my console needs in order to get there isn't really worth the effort which means that I've been really limited on a good many games from my library including Red Dead Redemption 2. (Which I've been meaning to replay.) Of course, this has meant that I have a lot more time to look over my PC games which got me to finally finish that masterpiece Yakuza 0, which you may have seen me mention a few times, and start Persona 4 which I'm about half-way through and I adore. (Really unique and well written) But there's been only so much of those few games I can take and I've really hit a bit of rut in terms of gaming, which in turn has hurt my favourite outlet of escapism.

Perhaps you're decently aware, but gaming is quite literally my primary comping mechanism for just my general day to day. I'm rather ill-tempered , irritable and self-loathsome whenever left to my own devices and I always feel worthless when working towards something. Sending out applications, dealing with correspondence and even just looking in the mirror; all of these actions fill with with this sort of disgust that just makes me want to drop of the face of the earth. I don't think there's any two ways about it; I don't like myself and doubt that anything I see or experience is going to dramatically shift my views anytime soon. Or ever for that matter. Not that such stops me from doing the thinks I need to, but it makes it so much harder as I wrestle with the point of everything. If I'm never going to reach anything resembling contentment when why do I bother try?

Recently I've taken it upon myself to start exercising regularly in order to provide a little more structure to my day to day (Which is incidentally also why these blogs are daily) as well as maybe have the side effect of building something out of my body. I thought it might be fun. And of course once I've finally started to become comfortable I notice some of other, much-less-fixable, defect in the mirror which sends any self confidence I was building spiralling out of control. Today is a rest day but even then I'm starting to wonder if I can even bring myself to start back up tomorrow with the knowledge that the remote self acceptance I was originally looking for is a fantasy now. It really sucks the motivation out of everything.

This may be something of a running theme through these blogs, or indeed my entire life, but I'm just so lacking in purpose. The only time I've felt anything remotely similar to a direction was when I was young and told to pursue that which makes me happy, but more and more I've come to the realisation that nothing makes me happy and I'm the cause of all my own distress. It's becoming more and more evident that the only way to balance out everything would be removal of the common denominator in the equation, me. But despite how obvious that is I'm still here and that just make me feel even worse about it all. Even discussing this makes me feel even lower, as I'm bought to mind all manner of other folk who endure truly awful circumstances with a brave face and it makes me furious with myself about why I can't just be happy with the limbo I exist in. Sure, I'm directionless but I at least have basic amenities.

Whenever I get in my own head like this, these are the only times I ever feel strong emotions as I tug this way and that, torn by my desire to write my truths whilst wanting to write who I wish to appear as. (I suppose that's textbook Jungian psychology there, when you think about it.) If I give myself to either predilection too much I'll find myself either feeling like a deceitful worm guised as a decent person or a drive myself to the point of wanting to tie a noose around my neck and rid the world of my stain. There's no happy middle ground either, just more bitter hatred directed inwards. I feel like it's coming to a head soon, whatever that ends up meaning, but until then it feels like everything I do to keep my day together is slowly becoming less effectual, including these blogs. I already know I'm not going to make it to 1000.

So there it is, quite simply, all the nonsense that's been swirling around my head for the past 100 days or so. Whether that contextualises all these blogs I write in a positive sense (a balancing factor) or a negative (an obfuscation) is beyond me, but I'll keep them up until I find something better to do. Maybe one day I'll look back on these with enough distance to cringe about them and their twisted nonsensical threads of logic, or maybe I won't ever look back on them at all. I don't know. I feel like I don't know a lot of things lately. That's about it. Bye.

Monster Hunter The Movie

 If in doubt, stop making the movie!

Have I mentioned that I'm a Monster Hunter fan? Probably, but I can't claim that I'm a 'fan' in the same vein as I could for other series'. Usually when I use that word it is to imply that I am something of a series veteran with enough ancillary knowledge to at least answer a basic questionnaire if pressed, whereas for Monster Hunter I more mean it as, I've played one game in the franchise to death and am in extreme reverence to the care and dedication that went into crafting this franchise. The amount of detail and love that is clearly displayed in Monster Hunter World through the meticulous crafting of the natural ecosystem is truly unparalleled, and I'd be amazed if the creative minds behind these games weren't some sort of palaeontologists with the detail on these monsters. And that speaks nothing of the addictive gameplay loop and the mastery of 'David v Goliath'-style showdown moments. Quite simply, MHW is a gem that everyone should get to play at least once. But why make a movie out of it?

I get that when it comes to gaming there's a huge potential market to capitalize through exploitative ancillary content, trust me I know; but what in the world possessed anyone to think a Monster Hunter movie would even hold water? The games themselves are essentially built around the idea of grinding away at progressively stronger monsters in order to get crafting material to make better pieces of equipment, the story is vaguely strung along that premise and I'm left wondering why it is that this screamed 'narrative potential' to anyone. I understand that Capcom are rather lax when it comes to granting licenses for movie adaptations (They let that Yakuza movie happen afterall, and in that the creators somehow managed to put Majima's eyepatch on the wrong eye) but surely there were better Capcom properties to adapt. I mean you have the Reside- oh wait, he already did those. Ace Attor- wait, someone did that as well. Dead Rising? (Okay, maybe just don't make a movie at all then.)

Nevertheless, Paul W.S. Anderson decided he needed another vehicle for his wife, Milla Jokovich, so after stepping away from an entire Resident Evil franchise wherein he rewrote the stories so that an original character played by Milla could be the protagonist, he's taken aim at Monster Hunter. In which he appears to have reworked so that his wife Milla could be the protagonist. (Diabolical) I'm not saying that there should never be another movie adaptation of video games in the world, though I fundamentally do not understand why there are, I'm just saying that it really doesn't help for the film to strive so far from the source material. Practically universally the films turn out better and are more positively received when things try their darndest to stay faithful, but I guess every director out there thinks they know better than the Developers who made the game's popular to begin with. (Just see how that mentality has worked out for them so far)

So a good many moons back a screenshot and premise for this movie leaked and I know I wasn't the only person left their scratching their head. On one hand the person who wasn't Milla seemed to be wearing game-accurate armour, even if it did look a little better than cosplay, but on the otherhand the premise we were reading seemed almost lazily generic. I mean they could have done anything, but this seemed to rely on some of the weakest Hollywood tropes of all time there was no way that this would ever make it to the final dra- then we got a trailer last week. I'm not sure if it's that Hollywood holds a disdain for gamers or just the general movie going audience altogether, but they decided to roll with it and make it happen. So just in case you were lucky enough not to have seen the trailer, allow me to summarise: Milla Jokovich is a US military officer who's squad gets swept up in a mystical storm and they get Isekaied to the Monster Hunter world. Yes, this is the exact premise of 'G.I. Samurai' and a million other low-effort B-movies! 

Why, why, why can't Hollywood make a movie of characters who operate within their own damn worlds? Can't they see how much more interesting that makes the story and environment to the viewer? I mean for one it means that the entire plot can be literally anything other then "ooh wee, I've got to find a way back home!" How much more engaging was it to be introduced to 'Detective Pikachu's' Ryme City than to 'Sonic: The Hedgehogs' middle of nowhere America? And yes, at least they didn't go the wholly lazy route and bring the monsters into our world, but this way is only marginally better as it will not allow the world of MH to be the focus of the plot. And again, why not? We're talking about an entire ecosystem that's comprised of prehistoric monster-like beings who keep each other in line with a fragile balance that the Hunters have to help maintain, else risk disaster. That's enough material for a plot right there!

Instead we've got a trailer chock-full of things that no one wants in a Monster Hunter movie; military weaponry. Yep, instead of the crazy, silly weapons of the franchise, (Which are often scavenged from the bones of other monsters) we have impact-empty shots of military guns firing at CGI monsters. (Oh look, they even recreated that scene from Jurassic Park with the runaway car only this time the car has a gun on it and the scene is in the desert, thus lacking all the claustrophobia which make the JP scene so tense. Cool.) Even by the end of the movie, because this trailer clearly shows off the entire breadth of the movie, we can see that Milla dons some sort of armour, but nothing as garish or ostentatious as you'd actually find in the games; because that would run the fear of actually being passingly cool for half a minute. (Can't have that!)

As for the actual monsters featured in the trailer, all we've really seen in detail are what looks to be a Rathalos and the Black Diablos from the poster. Solid picks, but there are a lot more varied and interesting monsters which would have made this trailer look a lot less generic. Heck, even a standard garden-variety Jagras would have been cool. What about the ever-popular Kirin? The deadly Odogaron? The saber-toothed Barioth? Heck, what about a Behemoth? I know they're technically a cameo from Final Fantasy but I just want to see a Behemoth rendered on the big screen, is that too much to ask? To their credit, at least no attempt was made to redesign the monsters from what I can tell, which is appreciated. I doubt the team have the creativity to design their own monster anyway, considering the distinct lack of such which is displayed in the basic plot of this movie, but I'll take what I can get.

So we have a Monster Hunter movie coming our way and it looks terrible. Are you really surprised? Honestly, 2020 has delivered every other kind of calamity so why not hit us with this finishing blow to truly end things with a whimper? Oh, and you can bet that Paul bent over backwards to make sure that this film made it into the end of the year so that it can be another 2020 garbage fire, it's tucked in there on the 30th of December. Does this movie have the chance to be good? I'm going to go ahead and say 'no' on that front, but it may just be dumb enough for mild entertainment value. (Although it could have been so much more) My utmost hope out of this is that Paul somehow manages to make this successful enough to worm a full adaptation of the Yakuza franchise out of Capcom, so that we can somehow watch him sneak Milla into it as the main character. ("Check out Kiryu's adoptive sister: Kira-Chan!")

Genshin: I've reached the endgame

"Ehe te Nandayo!"

Having literally just finished up my tasks for the day, I.E. using up all my Resin, doing my dalies and then stopping my Monstadt Katheryne in order to pick up my rewards before inevitably accidentally hitting the B button and swinging my ruddy huge greatsword at her face, (thank god for no friendly fire) I'm ready to talk about my time with Genshin. Because by the time you've reached the point where you're logging in for less than 30 minutes a day in order to maximize your effective time usage; you know you've pretty much hit the endgame. Story events stop becoming prevalent around the late 20's of your Adventure Rank, and by rank 36 you reach the end of such content until the next region is released. (Which as far as I'm aware is probably going to be this December at the earliest.) In the meantime all there is to do is to sit and grind the content that is here, and that's when you start coming across what everyone on the Internet is identifying as 'the Resin problem.'

Resin is a resource that you'll have since the beginning of your adventure, but like many of the early game currencies you'll likely completely forget about it. Just tuck it away to the back of your mind and focus on exploring this world of magic and waifus that has opened up before you, only for it to creep up on you as being the single most important resource in the game right now. Mora? Got plenty of it, have literally never come close to running out. (Good thing too, as I have literally no idea how someone is supposed to farm that in a dedicated fashion) Primogens? I'm waiting for the update next month with all the new characters before wasting that. Starglitter? I'm honestly too frugal to spend it. No, Resin is the currency that you'll be forever running out of and thus will forever need to get more of, and that's because of both it's utility and capacity limitations.

Resin is the resource that acts as energy would for any mobile game, basically it's the thing that stops you from perpetually grinding away at the tasks of the game until you've maxed out everyone and have no need to come back tomorrow. Call it the great habitualiser, because its main purpose is to instil a habit in the player until this game becomes part of their daily routine. Though just to be clear, unlike in other mobile games (I'm still shocked to think that this is a mobile game as well; how far things have come) Resin doesn't technically stop you from playing any of these endgame events. However Resin is required in order to collect the reward from these events, which is arguably the entire point of embarking on them to begin with, but at least you can still jump into those boss fights if you're simply just itching for the action. (It's also nice that you aren't being charged for the attempt, as is the case with some games.) So all in all I'm disgruntled, but okay with the Resin system, acknowledging that this is a free-to-play and thus we must dance at least a little to it's tune. My issue is with the limits.

So you have 120 Resin. That's a hard cap, you cannot stockpile anymore. There isn't even an option to expand that pool with premium currency, (not that such an option would be preferable, but it's the sort of thing you'd expect) so you'll be eyeing that number everytime you hit the map screen. But what does 120 mean exactly? Well, in order to get your rewards from beating a normal, run-of-the-mill world boss it's going to cost you 20 Resin. In order to get the reward from running crafting material dungeons, which already rotate their inventory on a week-long schedule, it's 40 resin. And in order to take on the impressive and fun weekly bosses, who are already limited to once a week, you need a eye-watering 60 Resin. So how do you get Resin back? Well you can spend the refill token, which only refills 60 and are rare to begin with; spend 50 Primogens, which it the same currency you use to buy Gacha spins, so that's not happening; or wait. You regen 1 Resin every 8 minutes. That means you'll get your full 120 in about... 16 hours. Yeah.

So my daily Genshin playtime would already be getting cut short if it wasn't for the fact that currently the very first Genshin event is running, Elemental Crucible, and guess what; it's requires 40 Resin in order to get your reward for each run! (And I do like the reward on offer; 25 'Adventurer's experience' certainly does look tasty) So I'm literally logging on to run the Elemental Crucible 3 times a day, with each run lasting anywhere from 3-5 minutes, before quickly scooping up my dalies and going back to Persona 4 or whatever else I have lined up. That's less than 30 minutes a day. I know I'm talking a lot about time investment in this blog, but it is a big deal. The more time I spend in the game a day, the more engaged that means I am and the longer I'm going to want to keep coming back. Now diminishing returns are obviously to be expected in this regard but you want that to be because I've become satisfied with the progression I've made and the exploration I've done, not because the game's mechanics are squeezing me out of the game.

In their utmost defence, miHoYo have actually acknowledged this issue and seem to be working on something to calm it down a little, which is so much more than they need to do. Genshin made back it's development investment in less than 2 weeks and I'm sure they could easily double that without listening to fan feedback and responding, but they clearly want this game to stick around and, you know what, so do I. Of course, what it is that they intend to do about it is anyone's guess, but the very fact it's being addressed at all marks the curious way in which this mobile game is challenging some of the norms of it's contemporaries. I've grown more and more attached to Genshin as I've played it over these past couple of weeks, to the point where I'm even starting to like some of the characters who at first came across as paper thin. (I still think Diluc's whole deal is a lot more obvious than the game thinks it is, but I'm enjoying him nonetheless) I genuinely want to see this game grow and develop with the times.

Will fixing the Resin alone pave the way for that? No, but it's a start. Having spent a lot of time in the Elemental Crucible I've also honed in on another, if lesser, problem that needs fixing; the co-op. Ignoring the bugs which sometimes lock me out of depositing elemental clots during the event, the actual makeup of Co-op itself seems oddly antithetical to the design of the game. Genshin seems to be about designing teams of colourful heroes with powers that can be laid down and switched between for the best combos and synergies, yet for some reason you can't make use of this in co-op. Or rather, it becomes a lot more difficult to. You see, for each player that joins your game, you'll be dedicating one of your party slots to their character, meaning if you have 3 players in your game you'll only have one hero to play as. This means no showing off your cool party and having to rely heavily on your teammates for synergy, which sort of becomes a problem when no one wants to play a healer.

But as I've stressed before these are early days for Genshin, and after no-lifing my way to the endgame within the first two weeks I was destined to bump into the title's teething problems. The game is still polished and fun enough to rival pretty much every other live service of the past two years, so I'm willing to let some questionable policy decisions slide so long as the team are prepared to address them. Honestly, this is the sort of game I can imagine sticking around in the public consciousness for a decent while if its growth is handled right, and that's a proposition which gets me excited to be on board. So good luck to miHoYo in the weeks to come; hope your success keeps up.