Author Archives: The Gaming Journal

Look how the time flies, or so the saying goes. And it definitely… well, goes.

Once again I’ve shirked my duties of keeping up with this blog. The last post was in December of 2022 for goodness sakes!

But here we are. So let’s get to it.

2023 was a crazy good year for me in terms of gaming. Finishing up titles like Mass Effect 3, Klonoa, Radiant Historia, Trails in the Sky & Trails from Zero, Suikoden II, Shenmue, and BioShock to name a few. Playing random games that, much to my surprise, really stood out to me like R4: Ridge Racer Type 4. And so much more. Oh and, Suikoden II? Yeah. It only became my #1 favorite JRPG of all time… so… you know.. no big deal or anything. Seriously, I loved everything about it. Can that HD remaster please come out soon, Konami?… please???

With the start of 2024, I’ve managed to already finish up two titles: Spider-man: Miles Morales (PS5) and Kowloon’s Curse: Lost Report – Definitive Edition (Steam Deck), the former being an excellent sequel to Insomniac’s incredible first outing on the PS4, and the latter being another surprise hit for me that left me in awe of its mysterious depth, tantalizing lore, and surprisingly impacted by its obscure-yet-effective storytelling.

*The developer, after listening to the retrospective I put up (on Kowloon’s Curse), responded with the following, “Just finished listening, that was great! Something about the way you described the game made even me think “I’d really like that play that”, if that makes sense. Thank you for taking the time to record this!” That was very encouraging feedback!

Furthermore, in terms of growth of the podcast, it seems the overall listener base has increased, a new 5 star rating was given (by an anonymous listener), and my podcast is now showing up in the search engine on Apple Podcasts when you type in “The Gaming” which is a big step from where I first started. In other words, the podcast isn’t buried anymore and it finally feels like all the work, energy, and passion over these last several years is paying off. ***Don’t get me wrong – it’s always been, in part, for my sake to serve as a means to share my voice on the hobby we all love – but there’s still an aspect to content creation that says, “Man, I hope people want to hear and interact with me on this”, too.

I’ll throw this in here before I sign out (who knows when I’ll be back, heh) but I spent about 6 or so hours this past Friday attempting to put together and publish a personally long-anticipated idea I’d had — an episode entirely dedicated to sharing my top favorite video game songs wherein I’d provide brief-yet-concise information before playing each track (in full) including the song title, album, and composer. I completed the episode, was wholly satisfied with the end result post-editing, and hit publish. And then…. the episode disappeared. I was exasperated to say the least. I couldn’t figure out why it had happened and I couldn’t deal with the reality that all those hours had amounted to nothing, ESPECIALLY because I had finished it (it was published??? What in the world happened??). So I spent another hour or so piecing and ordering the episode back together (it was a huge painstaking process), hit publish, and all seemed fine until it wasn’t. The episode disappeared AGAIN. —- Long story short, I received notification emails after the fact that my episode had violated content restriction due to me sharing full audio tracks of 16 songs. I had no idea this was not allowed.

So that was that. And then, determined to not let the days efforts go to waste, I decided to record my next collection episode – focusing on the manageable 10-game Xbox collection. The problem, though, was that the result was a rushed, unsatisfactory episode that held numerous issues (editing problems, sound issues, and the content itself being lacking compared to what I WANTED it to end up being). I published, then unpublished, then published the episode several times over before deciding to leave it up. It achieved about 8 listens over several days but upon re-listening a few times, I ultimately decided to unpublish and scrap my work in favor of trying again another day.

So here we are. I’m currently playing Mass Effect: Andromeda, rapidly approaching the 20 hour mark, and having a very good time with it. Is it the original Trilogy level of good? Not quite. But unlike the majority of voices, I’d have to say I don’t think it ever had to be. It still feels and plays, in large part, like Mass Effect. I still care about this world. The lore, aliens, and goings-ons is all fascinating. The gameplay is fun. The OST, art design, and tone still feels true to the originals. So yeah. It’s good and I’m set on finishing it out. Oh, and Paragon Lost was a decent, fun side story that definitely made me care about/respect (in hindsight) James Vega’s character a heck of a lot more than I did when I played 3. And that ending! Dude. What the heck. I did not see that coming. It hit hard. Waaaay harder than I would have ever thought it would (or could for that matter).

Still reading/playing Witch on the Holy Night on the side as well – currently at about chapter 3 and it’s been a super cozy, sometimes eerie, and low-key very tense read. Overall very enjoyable. Now just to find the time to get back to Extra and Samurai Remnant to continue the Fate series binge I’ve been on ever since finishing Fate/Zero!

But that’s all for now. Lots of gaming to do. Need to get back to The Adventure of Dai (that episode where Popp finally (and in dramatic fashion) discovers he represents Courage was hands-down, flat-out incredible. Goodness I love this show. And yeah, so much more amazing content to continue consuming. A Game in the Life by Jordan Rudek finally arrived!!! Several chapters in and it’s fanTASTIC as I knew it would be.

Okay. Okay. For real. That’s all for now!

– Daniel

The last time I updated this blog I had left off trying to decide what I would play next — Grandia II? Dragon Quest VIII? Would I jump back into 13 Sentinels?

The silence was deafening. Leaving all my non-existent readers in suspense, the question remained and the follow-up post never arrived. (Well, I updated my podcast not long after with a few episodes, but that takes away from my shtick here so let’s pretend that didn’t happen shall we?)

Here’s the list of games I played and have finished since that last post:

10. Grandia II – 31 hours⭐️

11. Panzer Dragoon Remake – 1.5 hours

12. Crysis Remastered – 6.5 hours

13. 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim – 26:05 hours

14. Radiata Stories – 31:20 hours⭐️

15. Mass Effect 2 – 37:45 hours⭐️

16. Muv-luv Extra – ??? hours

17. Muv-luv Unlimited – ??? hours

18. Team Sonic Racing – ??? hours

*The games with the star next to them are contenders for my top 10 favorite games played in 2022.

I did play Grandia II, if you didn’t notice, and I loved it. The pacing was some of the best I’ve seen in a JRPG, the characters and their interactions (reminiscent of Persona bonding events and Tales of skits) were thoroughly enjoyable and endeared me to the main cast, and the combat… my goodness the combat was easily some of the best and most fun turn-based combat I’ve ever experienced.

Radiata Stories was a surprise pick-up and play through this year. One moment I’m listening to a video from the Revive Radiata YouTube page and the next I’m ordering and then subsequently playing a physical copy on my PS2 — and I couldn’t be happier that I did. Jack Russell was one of the funniest protagonists I’ve ever played as and I absolutely loved his plucky leader Ganz Rothschild and his romantic interest Ridley Silverlake. While the combat was fairly average, the soundtrack, art style, environments, story and world, and dead-pan comedy and, at times, surprisingly poignant, heartfelt moments throughout were all top notch. Why this game has not received a modern port or remaster already I will never know.

As for Mass Effect 2 (and 3)… oh baby. I enjoyed Mass Effect 1, but I didn’t love it. I found myself mostly skipping side content and main-lining the story after the opening hours. The gameplay felt slow and clunky, load times frequent and long, and traversal a bit tedious. Fast forward to my play through of Mass Effect 2 (and 3) and you couldn’t have a more contrasting experience, however. Mass Effect 2 blew me away — it improved in nearly every way over its predecessor and then skyrocketed into the stratosphere and beyond. I found myself enraptured by the story and the characters with their specific, in depth side quests; the shooting and combat sections were a blast to play through (pun intended); the exploration felt vast; movement and traversal was snappy; the graphics and scenes overhauled; the soundtrack… well, as good as before; and the role playing aspects, while downplayed a bit, streamlined and all for the better. I FELT like Shepard now. And the carry over of my previous choices and consequences from Mass Effect to the sequel felt impactful. And man… that last mission, the suicide mission, was one of the most epic and downright exhilarating missions I’ve ever experienced in a video game. The world of Mass Effect truly felt alive and I fell in love. Not long after completing the sequel, I found myself starting a play through of the third entry. While the opening hours made me question the quality and changes, my doubts quickly faded into the stars and I found myself immediately re-captured and re-invested in the world, story, and characters of this fantastic trilogy. While I haven’t yet managed to finish the third title up just yet (having a second child born this year made playing games… difficult), I am hopeful that I’ll be able to wrap it up within the next several weeks. One thing is for certain though, I don’t want to rush the closing hours of this game. Mass Effect 2 and 3 have easily become some of my favorite Western RPGs of all time. There’s a certain melancholy to knowing I won’t ever quite get the same experience again as I did this year in playing each title for the first time. The Mass Effect universe is hands down my favorite sci-fi, space opera setting — easily besting the likes of Star Wars or Star Trek — and while I know Andromeda is there to provide… something more? I know for a fact that there will never be another game where I’ll get get to have Shepard hang out with Garris or Tali, run around the Normandy, explore the Galaxy, go on various missions, bond with lovable, endearing companions, and make impactful choices that will ripple through a huge cohesive narrative. I’m going to savor every last minute of this game and I guarantee, controversial ending or not, that I’ll never forget my time spent in this world and with these fantastic characters and stories.

In other news, I purchased a TON of games (mostly physical), received my Steam Deck (love it but haven’t had much time to play it), bought Stephen King’s The Dark Tower novels and finished the first book, The Gunslinger (it was really good and I’m committed to reading the rest… eventually), and even helped Aidan Moher, author of the newly released Fight, Magic, Items, promote his book by connecting him to one of my favorite podcasts, The Thirsty Mage, to be a guest on the show — while I regret not being able to review the Advanced Review Copy he sent my way, the podcast appearance more than made up for it (I even got a shout out, so that was cool).

There’s so many other games I want to play. So many pick-ups and additions to the collection I want to share about. Upcoming releases, big and small, I want to talk about. But for now, I think I’ve said enough. Until next time!

First off, I haven’t updated this… at all. My initial plan, when writing the first post on the Legend of Heroes series, was to provide frequent updates and entries on my gaming experiences and, well, I didn’t follow through with said plan.

With that said, a lot has happened since the time of that first post. And while I’m not certain which games I had finished at that time, I know the number of completed games for 2022 has since grown a great deal.

Games finished in 2022:

1. Trails of Cold Steel III – 64:17 hours

2. Mass Effect – 12 hours

3. Xenoblade Chronicles: DE – 37:24hrs

4. Triangle Strategy – 23:19 hours

5. Disco Elysium: TFC – 24 hours

6. Dragon Quest – 5 hours

7. Dragon Quest V – 31:48 hours

8. Light Fairytale Ep.1 – 2 hours

The list above says it all. There’s some heavy hitters there — Mass Effect, Xenoblade Chronicles, Disco Elysium, and even the newly released Triangle Strategy. Each of those particular games were a blast to play through, with unique worlds and characters, excellent soundtracks, and varied forms of combat (or lack thereof *see Disco Elysium). And while I’m certainly proud of having finally played through the long-beloved Xenoblade Chronicles, especially in preparation for the upcoming third entry, I don’t think any of them compare to how good it felt to play through and finish both Dragon Quest and Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride.

At the time of this writing, I’ve now finished four entries in the Dragon Quest series. Having completed both Dragon Quest XI:S Echoes of an Elusive Age and Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen last year and the aforementioned first and fifth entries this year. Out of the four, my favorite entry is easily V followed closely by IV, then XI:S, and lastly I. Despite having clear favorites already, none of them were bad experiences and, in fact, were rather all delightfully rewarding and enjoyable to play through. The Dragon Quest series has absolutely become one of my favorite in the genre. And while IV was my standout favorite last year, V has swiftly exceeded it in championing the coveted #1 spot in the series. Furthermore, it’s actually rivaled the #1 spot for my favorite JRPGs of all time — that’s how good it was.

Dragon Quest V contained some of the most unique and deep features of any JRPG I’ve ever played. Everything from the generational structure that you play the game and experience the story from the hero’s perspective throughout his childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, to the seriously deep and impactful moments that occur throughout the surprisingly dark and trial-filled narrative. I won’t give up any spoilers here, in the off chance someone happens upon this post (if you’re here and reading this, and haven’t played the game, go do so, I implore you!) but needless to say, they struck me hard — there were multiple moments throughout my play through where I shed tears, allowing myself to feel the weight and impact of the events taking place before (or directly to) the hero. The world itself, brimming with unique towns and creative dungeons, charming NPCs, magical items, weapons, and forms of travel, to the amazingly implemented choice of marriage and subsequent raising and adventuring with the hero’s children were all so novel and engaging. The party chat feature blew me away with how many unique lines of dialogue each party member had in response to visiting new locations, before and after conversations with NPCs, etc — it made the hero and his bride and children, and other accompanying help feel alive and genuine. The emphasis in the story on the importance and strength of the nuclear family was something I have rarely, if ever, seen implemented in a video games narrative. It was wholesome and I loved every minute of it. And that’s not to mention the fantastic monster taming system, wherein the hero upon defeating monsters in battle, could sometimes happen upon a monster desiring to join the party — to which each had its own unique armor sets, weapons, and skills to upgrade as the player sees fit. My party at the end of the game contained several monsters I had gathered early on in my play through, the slime knight Goodian, the sabertooth cat Saber, and a recent addition to the party I had trained up in the last area (which had great EXP gains) Chromeo, the metal slime and the hero’s wife Nera (yes, I chose her over Bianca and I don’t regret it) and their children Rex and Sora. All of this and I didn’t even touch on the extremely easy to hate villains, the subversive twists and turns in the story that I didn’t see coming, and the satisfying victories experienced throughout. Dragon Quest V has it all — and I’m so thankful to have finally experienced it. As an aside, I enjoyed the movie Dragon Quest: Your Story which I thought recreated the story to the big screen in a fairly faithful manner that was a joy to watch — even if the twist ending undid some of the satisfaction it brought up to that point.

I’ve now finished Light Fairytale Ep. 1 (which was a very enjoyable, short, JRPG that reminded me of bits from the Tales of series, Final Fantasy VII, and The Alliance Alive) and I’m now currently finding myself in a state of “what now?” My previous plan was to go straight into Chrono Cross when I receive the Radical Dreamers Edition from Play-Asia, but it hasn’t come yet and my mind has already gone to other options: Grandia II or Dragon Quest VIII have long been on my mind these past several days and I honestly don’t think I could go wrong either way. There’s also 13 Sentinels, still sitting on my Switch with the 7 or so hours I put into it a week or so back, and plenty more on the backlog that I need to get to some day — Lunar, Wild Arms, Xenogears, Radiant Historia, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Torna, Golden Sun, Super Mario RPG, Sakura Wars: So Long My Love, .hack//G.U. Last Recode, Kid Icarus: Uprising, … I could keep going, but you get the point. There’s literally a hundred more games I could list. It’s almost endless.

It’ll probably be Grandia II or DQVIII. I’ll update this eventually and we’ll find out!

My history with the Legend of Heroes series is, admittedly, rather limited so far. The first entry I played was Trails in the Sky on the PS Vita, but I only ever progressed about 3 or so hours in before dropping it. It wasn’t for lack of enjoyment or interest in the game or series, but rather a prior knowledge of the herculean length and breadth of the series and each title in particular that held me back. This and finding out that the PSP version I was playing was actually the lesser version compared to the better version available on Steam. And, I might add, the initial slowness to the opening hours of the game didn’t help in terms of drawing me back in.

Fast forward to a year or so later (sometime around 2012) and I had just finished playing through Persona 3 Portable and Persona 4: Golden on my Vita. I had adored these two games in large part for their stories, modern settings, soundtracks, turn-based combat, and characters — but most of all for their inclusion of social sim bonding gameplay with romantic options for the protagonist. Never had I played any other series that allowed me to choose who the main character would spend their time with, choosing dialogue options, and picking which love interest they would pursue. I loved it and I wanted more.

Several years passed, Persona 5 had not yet released in the States, and I was desperate to play another JRPG that would offer me similar social sim bonding gameplay. That’s when, upon searching on google for “similar games to Persona” I discovered that the Trails of Cold Steel series (I and II) included this very feature alongside heavy character interactions, story, and turn-based combat. Vita titles had yet to shoot up in price, but I had a feeling that these lesser known titles would eventually do just that, so I purchased both physically on Amazon and anxiously awaited their arrival.

That year, I believe in quarter 4 of 2017, I dived head first into Cold Steel I and immediately found myself immersed in Class VII, the world of Erebonia, the catchy soundtrack by Falcom JDK, the charming PS2-ish graphics, the main protagonist Rean and the unfolding of a grand sweeping story. I loved getting to spend time during free days choosing who I’d have Rean spend time bonding with — I struggled to choose his romantic interest between Towa, Laura, and Alisa. And I absolutely LOVED the ability to “retry and weaken enemies” when I’d hit insanely difficult boss fights in order to continue to progress the story at my own pace. I knew this series was for me, but towards the end of the game I had began to become a little burned out on the repetitious gameplay loop of field studies back to exploring the old school house. And despite taking the cliffhanger ending bait, hook, and sinker, I knew I needed a little time off before I continued my journey with the fledgling bracers, err… military academy students. Ultimately, I still put Cold Steel II in and played through the initial opening hours (because I couldn’t wait to see what happened to Rean and the rest of class VII) but other games won over and I set it aside, promising I’d pick it back up again at some point.

It’s the end of 2021. I’ve just completed my 25th game for the year with Persona 5 Strikers, and I’m thinking it may be best to spend the last several weeks of the year jumping in and out of whatever games *strike my mood. However, the discipline I’d been practicing all year in committing to playing through one game at a time (as opposed to juggling several titles and failing to see them through to the end) was strong and I couldn’t shake the idea of attempting to wrap up one more title before the years end. As I was contemplating several of the games I’d previously put some time into, I kept thinking about how much I wanted to play my physical copies or Cold Steel III and IV. I picked Cold Steel II back up and never looked back. After hitting the 10-15 hour mark, the game opened up and the gameplay loop felt fresh and exciting. I found myself entirely absorbed yet again in the meticulously crafted world, exploring the deepening bonds between the main and supporting cast, following Rean and the Divine Knight, Valimar on their quest to save the land from the threats of war and an ever looming darkness. Upon hitting the closing credits, 2 days before I would wake up to the year 2022, I knew which game I’d pick up next — Cold Steel III. And despite every elitist Trails of fan demanding everyone “play the Sky trilogy and Crossbell duology before playing Cold Steel III and IV” I chose to semi-respectfully ignore that and instead press on. And I couldn’t be more thankful I did. So far, 10 or so hours in, I’m loving Cold Steel III even more than II. And, if anything, to the contrary of the elitist demand, I’m actually finding myself more excited to eventually go back to play the Sky and Crossbell games and to discover, in retrospect, the events that led to where and when those characters make their appearance in the Cold Steel arc. This has been my journey with the the Legend of Heroes series so far. And I couldn’t be more thankful that I still have so many more games to play over the next several years before I’ll officially be caught up. With the officially announced western releases for the Crossbell duology later this year and in 2023 for Azure and Reverie, and my Steam Deck reservation stating I’ll get mine around quarter 3 (to play the Sky trilogy on handheld in their best versions) the future is looking very, very bright. One might even venture to say “Estelle Bright”…