text:
Tag Archives: retrospective
Gamer's Thoughts: The 10 games I want to play in 2021
2020, what a strange year it has been. I think everybody will agree that this is an understatement and a half. Of course there is still this world pandemic which is causing all sorts of havoc. But let's not forget the events that also happened this year like the Australian bushfires, a new American president, the UK royal family growing smaller, a Brexit agreement… In terms of 2020 being an historic year, I think we delivered in spades. In my personal life, a lot of things happened as well. From me starting my dream job full time to living on my own, it has been a crazy year to say the least. While 2020 was filled with a lot of positives for me, there were also some things that I wish turned out in another way. Anyways, that's enough rambling about 2020. This blog is a gaming blog and you are all here for me talking about video games. So, I think it's high time to start talking about 10 games I'm looking forward to be playing in 2021. Feel free to leave a comment with your list of games you want to play next year and if you agree or disagree with my list and/or some of the games on it. Ready? Let's go and take a look at my personal list in a random order.
#10 – Persona 5 Strikers (PC/PS4/Switch – Feb 23th)
In the past we started to see various franchises cross over with Lego and I think we'll now see cross overs with Dynasty Warrior cross overs next. We have seen cross overs with series like Fire Emblem, Zelda, Dragon Quest, One Piece and now we are getting a cross over with Persona.
It was a big surprise when Joker got added to Smash last year, but this year we got the announcement that for the worldwide release of Persona 5 Strikers, we are getting a port to the Nintendo Switch alongside with a PS4 and PC version.
I really enjoyed playing Fire Emblem Warriors and Hyrule Warriors on the Switch so I'm quite hyped for playing this cross-over. I haven't played a lot of the Persona series but from what I have played through Persona 3 Golden and Persona Q, I'm extremely interested in seeing how they tackled the franchise and this cross-over. Maybe one day I might have to invest in getting the Persona games on other platforms if I enjoy them enough.
#9 – World's End Club (was Death March Club – Switch, Spring 2021)
Last year, I told you all about Death March Club. A game that's written by the creator of the Zero Escape franchise. Now, color me surprised when the game released this year under another name exclusively on the Apple Arcade this September.
Currently, this game is a timed exclusive on the Apple Arcade and it's coming in Spring of 2021 to the Nintendo Switch where you can be sure that I'm going to play it. I'm currently having a lot of trouble trying to avoid spoilers by not watching gameplay, teasers or anything of the sort. I'm even avoiding reading reviews of the game since I really want to experience it for myself.
The only thing I know is that it's going to be a death game where you have to work together to win all the while you need to sacrifice your class mates to avoid bad things in the world above. You can be damn sure that I'm keeping an eye on this game to get a final release date on the Nintendo Switch so I can start playing it and write an article about it!
#8 – Age of Empires IV (PC, TBA)
The new entry in the amazing RTS Age of Empires franchise got announced late 2019. The original rumors where that this game was going to release in 2020. In hindsight, I should have known better since the teaser we got barely showed any gameplay so it would be way to optimistic to see this game release in 2020. Now, the rumors are that this game is going to release in 2021. Somehow, I highly doubt that. We do know a few things about the game already which you can read in this helpful article by "Windows Central".
As a fan of the series, it's amazing to see that this series never died. It had some low points but ever since the Age Of Empires II HD version released in 2013, we got a steady stream of upgrades. Granted, apart from 3 new expansion packs we barely saw any new content since 2007. But hey, in the last three years we got definitive editions of the whole franchise (apart from Age of Mythology, oh well) so I have high hopes that Age Of Empires IV will be an amazing game since the team has a lot of experience with the franchise now.
#7 – Lord Winklebottom Investigates (Switch, Q1 2021)
But, hey! This game has already released in the PC back in 2019. So, why is this on the list of games you want to play in 2021? You have a good point there and I'm going to explain myself.
When I'm preparing to write this list, I always look around for games releasing in the upcoming year that I want to play. I go over huge lists created by other news outlets and check various games if they could be interesting or not. When I found out that this game was coming to the Nintendo Switch in 2021, I added it to my list.
Since this game is a port from the 2019 version of the game, the team will have the chance to also iron out some bugs and things for the Switch port so we might get more or better content. Now, why am I excited for this game? Well, doesn't the logo remind you of the Professor Layton series?
Because we got only one new game in the past seven years and three ports to mobile platforms, I don't have high hopes we are going to get any new Professor Layton content real soon. But, in comes this game. A game that looks to be a sort of Layton's Mystery Journey game but in an animal universe. Do I have to say more? The potential and all those things. Yeah.
#6 – Haven (PS4/Switch, Q1 2021)
Yes, yes, I know. This game has been released earlier this December. But, I only discovered this game this week and now I'm quite hyped to play it on my Nintendo Switch.
The story and concept is what drew me into this game. A world where you have to survive with two people all the while being an RPG… Sign me up! The only thing that has me slightly worried is that this game has some rhythm game elements, which is one of my least favorite genres. But we will see, maybe it isn't that bad and it might be even quite enjoyable. So yeah, let's wait and see what the Nintendo Switch version is going to bring in the first few months of 2021.
#5 – Mystiqa (PC, Switch – Q1 2021)
Man, do I miss the old school 2D topdown Zelda games. I wish there were still games developed in that style where you have a whole big adventure in big world. Like the Link's Awakening remake last year.
But, wait, what is this? A game that's inspired by the old school Zelda games, Final Fantasy Adventure, Dragon Quest amongst other amazing games? And it's even a rouge like so the replay value is through the roof? Plus, this game is coming out in 2021 on Steam and Switch?
When I followed this indie developer on Twitter, I found out that there are several of these games in development! Well, well, well. I think my dream came true. More content in the style of the old school 2D-Zelda games. I simply can't wait to play them and you can be sure I'm going to write an article about them!
#4 – Bravely Default II (Switch, 26th February)
I have played Bravely Default back when it got released on the 3DS. I still have to play the 3DS sequel Bravely Second but from what I have seen from the demo, I think I'm going to have a great time with that. I have also played the demo of Bravely Default II and I'm also quite hyped for that game.
I can't put my finger on exactly why I enjoy playing the Bravely Default games but something is really drawing me in. Maybe it's the unique battle mechanic where you can skip turns to use stronger attacks or the whole class system. Yet, I do know full well that these mechanics are also present in other RPG games but something just clicked for me with Bravely Default. Maybe I'll be able to answer that question when I have played Bravely Default II.
One thing I know is that my birthday month is going to be extremely busy with two games releasing I want to play. Not even that, a few games are releasing in Q1 2021, which can be in February as well. And I have the Pokémon collab to finish as well. Wish me luck!
#3 – Re:Zero – Staring Life in Another World: The Prophecy of the Throne (PS4/PC/Switch, 5th February)
I love the setup of the Re:Zero story. When Subaru, our main character, got transported to another world he discovered that he has a special ability which he can't speak about. Whenever he gets killed in the new world, the whole world gets reset. As if he is part of a game that gets reset whenever he dies. He does remember everything but nobody in that world is able to remember the reset.
Now, this unique story mechanic is getting worked into a game. It's going to be a visual novel but it's also going to be a tactical RPG/adventure game. So, this is going to be quite enjoyable if the "Return by Death" is implemented well and might set up various twists up extremely well.
For some reason, the USA is getting this game a week earlier than we over here in Europe. Oh well, that means I'll have to dodge spoilers for a week which won't be too big of an issue since it's a work week and also working on the final stages of the Pokémon collab by then.
#2 – Shin Megami Tensei V (Switch, Early 2021)
This series is one of the biggest RPG series ever created. I think I don't have to explain more by simply saying that Persona is a spin-off of this series. Yes, you read this correctly, the popular Persona series is actually a spin off of this franchise.
I have played some Shin Megami Tensei games over the years but everytime it was in between waiting for other games to release. But, I decided that in 2021, I want to fully play through a Shin Megami Tensei game. I quite enjoyed my time with the series so far playing the (3)DS entries and the cross over Tokyo Mirrage Sessions #FE. So, it's a good thing then that a new game is going to be released on the Switch in the near future.
You might argue that it's not a great idea to jump into the series with the 5th main entry but then again, it might make it more interesting to me to play the other games to connect the dots and to answer all the unanswered questions in the 5th entry.
#1 – Axiom Verge 2 (Switch, Early 2021)
I honestly have a weakspot when it comes to MetroidVania games. When I learned about Axiom Verge and the unique mechanics that the game brought the genre, I was hooked. I haven't finished the game yet but it's one of those games that I pop into my Nintendo Switch or start up on my Wii U once in a while to wind down and relax. Maybe I should continue the game on only one of the two platforms instead of two. But, I own the collectors edition on Switch…
At first, this game was going to be released in the fall of this year. Sadly enough, due to a delay, this game has been pushed to early next year. For now, I think this game will be an exclusive or a timed exclusive to the Nintendo Switch. And looking at the screenshots, oh wow.. Is this game going to be fun! Maybe I should finish Axiom Verge and Axiom Verge 2 back to back… That might be fun.
I have to say that it's getting more difficult by the year to create these lists. Mostly because most of the announced games are scheduled in Q1/Q2 of the upcoming year and a lot of them are sequels or entries in a long running series. On top of that, we lately get more remakes/remasters and ports in the last few years.
Another big reason is that I'm more and more focusing on my collection and collecting games instead of playing the upcoming and new games. So, that means I'm not going to buy a PS5 or the new XBOX or even upgrading my computer to play the newest games. I'm quite enjoying myself by playing games on my consoles.
That means I have an even smaller pool of games to pick from. And when I notice that a game that looks interesting to me requires to either upgrade my PC or get a new console, I dismiss it. For now, there aren't enough games that I really want to play that validate the purchase of a new console or a stronger computer in my mind.
I rather spend my money on games I actually want to play or add to my collection instead of having the "latest and strongest" gaming hardware. I know that this might be just me or my collecting hobby but maybe this year a lot of games will release that validate the purchase of a better computer.
Besides all that, it looks like my Nintendo Switch will be quite busy in the upcoming year. Which is a good thing, since I love playing my Switch on the train to and from work. I just a great way to spend the long train journey creating memories and something starting to talk to other gamers on the train about various games. And I wish to be able to do that in 2021 and make new friends. That would create some sunshine in these strange times.
But with all that said, I think it's high time to wrap up this article and thank you for reading this one. I hope you enjoyed reading this article and as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.
This entry was posted in Articles, Gamer's Thoughts and tagged 001, 10, 2020, 2021, 4, 5, altus, another, arpegi, atlus, awakening, axiom, binge, bravely, buttonsmashers, capcom, club, deat, death, default, dragon, empires, end, enix, entertainment, entry, games, Haven, II, in, info, information, investigates, iv, jea, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, later, layton, levels, life, link's, long, lord, mage, march, megami, more, my, mystiqa, mystiqua, neko, NekoJonez, Nintendo, Of, one, pc, persona, play, pokemon, professor, prophecy, ps5, quest, re:zero, reboot, relic, remake, retrospective, running, scramble, Second, series, shin, simply, starting, strikers, tensei, The, throne, To, top, verge, well, world, world's, x, Xbox, Zelda on December 29, 2020 by NekoJonez.
The 5th Retrospective Blogger / Creator collab is going to be about.. (Writer/YT'er call-out!)
In 2017, I came up with the idea of doing a retrospective in a special way. I gathered several writers and I created the "The Legend Of Zelda Retrospective – A Bloggers Journey". The year after that, in 2018, one of the writers of Zelda retrospective took on another series in the same style. That series was Final Fantasy and that was bundled in the "Final Fantasy: A Crystal Compendium". Later that year, it was my turn again. So I gathered writers for a series near and dear to my heart and that's the Tomb Raider series. So, "Tomb Raider – Writer's Raid" was born. Oh, and in 2019 the madlad Well Red Mage did another one… about, all. the. Mario. Games. Yes, including spin-offs. The "Super Mario Multiverse: Compilation" is the 4th one in this style. And now, it's time for the announcement of the 5th one.
How does this retrospective works?
How does this retrospective work? Well, the idea is quite simple. The first thing that happens is that somebody decides on a series to take a look at and lists all the games that should be included in the collab. In that case, the organizer knows how many writers are needed to at least look at the main games and how many additional writers are needed for the spin-offs.
Depending on the amount of writers, the idea of this collab is that each writer takes as few games to write about as possible. The writer publishes their piece on their own blog/channel/page… Unless they don't have one, then the organizer looks for a place to publish it. Each piece links back to the hub article that's published on the organizer's blog/channel/page.
The hub and each article are published at the same time. That way, you can go to the hub article and read about your favorite game or about the game you always wanted to know about. And there are a few benefits as well. The creator community comes closer together and meets the fellow creators and opens doors for future collaborations. And for the readers, you might discover new content creators to follow and enjoy.
Now, what are these articles about? Well, when I organize these collabs I always give the full freedom to the writers to write a piece to their liking. The only "rules" I have is that the article links back to the hub article, uses the art piece made for the collab and that it's at least 1,000 words long. The article can be a review, a personal story about the game, the development history, interesting facts about the title, comparison between original & remake… As long as it focuses on the chosen title by the content creator, it's all fine.
The freedom I give to the writers means that it's not a retrospective by definition. Since not every article will talk about the development history of the series. This isn't a bad thing in my eyes, since the main idea of the retrospective is to promote other writers and celebrate a certain series and talk about personal stories and create something unique. My end goal is to create a group of friends that works together to create this celebration of this series.
This seems like a long and complicated explanation but if you take a look at the finished works, I think it paints a clear picture of the end product. It's up to the organizer to choose the publish date for each & every article and which writer gets which game. I personally advise against two or more writers taking the same game, but if you want to do it differently in your collab, I'm not stopping you… It's your collab after all.
The tease
So, a few days ago, I put out a tease that I was doing one of these collabs again. Yet, I kept the series a secret. The reason for that is because I recorded a podcast together with Alex Sigsworth about gaming music. At the end of the recording, I teased that I was in the final planning stages of this sort of collab but I refused to reveal the subject.
At first, he was going to be able to publish it today but sadly some editing issues popped up and he has to delay it to next week Sunday. I wanted to avoid him uploading a podcast where I tell that this collab is still a secret while I fully reveal it later before he uploaded it.
Yet, we came both to an agreement that it's fine for me to reveal the series while he will see what he can do in editing. I'm going to leave that fully onto him. So, it's possible that he cuts everything out about that or he puts in a disclaimer that it's recorded before this reveal… It's all fine in my book. But yeah, I wanted to tell this "behind the scenes" story in case if there is some misunderstanding when the podcast does goes live. I'm quite looking forward to the podcast since his previous ones were amazing and it was a lot of fun to record with him.
The reveal and such
A few writers jumped in blind already. So far: Andrew Fisher, Eric Fellner, TriformTrinity and Gaming Omnivore signed up. That you so much for that. Now, of course with 5 writers we aren't going to be able to tackle a series that's extremely close to a lot of childhood's hearts… I want to catch more writers for this collab. I want to catch 'em all to have enough writers for this journey/adventure… And if it hasn't clicked yet… It's going to be about:
Yes! It's going to be about Pokémon!
So, if you want to help out in this collab, what do you have to do and have?
I would love it if you have your own blog or YouTube channel. I wouldn't mind publishing one or two articles if you don't have your own space but I would prefer it if you have your own space.
If you are interested, feel free to contact me over mail, Twitter or Discord. (My handle is NekoJonez#5471). Give me a link to your own site/page and if everything checks out, I add you to the group.
For this collab, all the articles will be in English. So, if you decide to write an article or make a video, it should be in understandably English. It doesn't need to be in perfect English, but remember that it's going to be a sort of "ad" for your blog/channel to possibly interest new readers/watchers.
At the moment, there is no real name or publishing date planned for this project. When I have enough content creators, I'll look for a date and time when everything can be published. We will look for a date that works for almost everybody.
Keep in mind that I'm trying to get as many content creators as possible. So, that means that I'm not going to allow content creators picking too many games. And also, when a game is taken by a content creator, it's taken by that content creator. If you want to trade, it should be agreed upon with both content creators and me.
When you want to write an article, it has to be at least 1,000 words. If you want to create a video, I expect a video that's at least 5-10 minutes long.
If you want to read/watch the final product, well keep a look out on my blog and Twitter. More information will appear on there. But for now, I'm quite interested in who is going to sign up for this collab and I'm rather curious for the end result. So, who is going to join us on this adventure?
With that said, thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!
This entry was posted in Collabs, Gaming Nostalgia, Personal and tagged 001, andrew, arpegi, article, binge, bloggers, buttonsmashers, collab, compendium, compilation, creatures, crystal, eric, Fantasy, fellner, Final, fisher, freak, game, gaming, hub, inc, information, jea, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, journey, later, levels, mage, mario, more, multi, multiverse, neko, NekoJonez, Of, omniverse, Pokémon, raid, retro, retrospective, simply, spective, super, The, triformtrinity, verse, well, writer, writers, writing, Zelda on November 8, 2020 by NekoJonez.
Gaming Nostalgia: Mario & Luigi – Bowser Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey (3DS) ~ It's inside me, Mario!
Wikipedia entry – Nintendo Microsite
Remember the Zelda project, Final Fantasy project, and the Tomb Raider project? Well, today a new project drops all about Mario! The mad man, The Well-Red Mage found over 100 bloggers to write about the Mario series in the style that I found several bloggers for talking about the Zelda series and the Tomb Raider series. In any case, of course, I'm a part of this collaboration of fine bloggers! Now, you can find the hub article where you can find links to all the other articles here: [LINK TO ZE HUB BABY!] And in this article I'll talk about my adventures and thoughts of Mario & Luigi's Inside Story + Browsers Jr.'s Journey. So, let's go with this Mario RPG!
It's a me, a remake!
This game tells the same story as the original Nintendo DS game released in late 2009. From what I can see, most of the changes in the game are focused on the graphics. While the original game has a more 2D look to it, the remake has a more 3D look to the visuals. You can see a great comparison in the video created by aWiibo where both versions are set side by side.
On top of that, this game has an additional story mode telling a story about Bowser Jr. This mode adds 7-ish hours of playtime if I compare the times on howlongtobeat.com. But, the game almost doubled in playtime for people who want to play the game to its full completion.
There is another writer taking a look at the DS version of this game, but I'm focusing on the remake of the game. While I haven't finished the game for this article due to time constraints, I did some research to make this article interesting in another way.
Some random facts
So, did you know that this game is one of the final games released by Nintendo for the Nintendo 3DS? It wasn't the last Nintendo published game on the 3DS however, that honor goes to another remake: Kirby's Epic Yarn a bit later in March of 2019.
The title of this game in development was Mario & Luigi RPG 3!!!. Since it was the 3rd Mario & Luigi game. Before this game, we got Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga on the Gameboy Advance and Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time on the Nintendo DS. So the title makes a lot of sense since it's the 3rd game in the series.
For some reason, Nintendo skipped over remaking Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time and remade this game. Partners in Time is the only one of the three first games that didn't get a remake on the 3DS.
Something that I found quite strange is that there are a lot of leftover sound effects from Yoshi's Story and Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time in the rom for the original DS version. This isn't the case in the 3DS version.
This game got two updates. The first update fixed an issue where you could soft-lock yourself with Luigi. In the second patch, a sound issue was fixed in the Music menu under records.
According to the TCRF (The Cutting Room Floor), there are various test rooms left in the final version. You can read about them in more detail on the page of this game.
After releasing this game, the developer AlphaDream filed for bankruptcy protection. Which is a shame since we might not see a Mario & Luigi RPG on the Switch. Maybe Nintendo can get the IP to another developer?
So, apart from those interesting facts about the development of this game; let's give my opinion on this game. I won't give my full opinion on this game just yet since I haven't finished the game and I'm planning to write a review about this game in the future anyway.
Now, the tricky thing is that I had almost finished the DS version. I was close to reaching the final area. But then disaster struck. I lost my save file and I felt a bit too discouraged to restart the whole game to get to the point I was at.
It's a darn shame since the game is quite a lot of fun to play. If you have played the two previous games, you know what to expect here in terms of gameplay. It's an RPG where you play as Mario & Luigi, where the A button controls Mario and the B button controls Luigi. This is also the case in the battle mechanics where you have to rhythmically time your button presses to do more effective attacks.
The annoying thing is that I'm anything but rhythmic. So some battles took longer for me since I wasn't able to do all the attacks at full damage. I did improve the more I played the game, but I rarely got consistent.
Yet, I did enjoy the game for silly and unique storytelling. In this game, something strange happens with the toads. They swell up like a balloon getting the nickname "The Blorbs". After some investigation, all the affected toads act a strange mushroom created by the mad scientist Fawful. So, Princess Peach orders Mario & Luigi to set out and try and find a solution. But, then Bowser tries to kidnap Princess Peach. When this fails, Fawful lets Bowser eat a vacuum mushroom and this sucks Mario, Luigi and various other characters from the mushroom kingdom inside Bowser. Mario & Luigi have to help Bowser to regain his strength in order to escape and find a cure for the Blorbs.
The multiple layers of the story are something I truly love. The writing is rather humorous and lightweight. There isn't a lot of voice acting, but the voice clips that are used help a lot to understand which emotion is in that certain part of the dialogue.
Bowser Jr.'s story takes place during the events of the main game. So, the additional story is a bit of a side story. Currently, I'm playing through it and I'm going to keep my opinions and this quite interesting side story a secret.
Now, I much prefer the visual upgrade from the remake over the original. I have looked at various screenshots and video comparisons of the original game and the remake. I think that the remake's visuals feel more alive and pop that much more. It makes the original look more like a sort of Saturday morning cartoon from a decade ago.
Anyways, I think I'm going to end off this short look back at Mario & Luigi's Bowser Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey. That's a mouthful. That said, I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!
Wahoo! You are a Super Reader! But the adventure doesn't stop here… There's more of this project in another castle! This article is just one level in an entire Super Mario Multiverse, a galactic collaboration between writers around the world sharing a bit of our hearts and memories about our favorite Mario games. Visit the Center of the Multiverse to see more:
https://thewellredmage.com/2020/03/10/center-of-the-mario-multiverse/
This entry was posted in Articles, Collabs and tagged 001, 3DS, about, advice, all, alphadream, and, announcement, apple, arpegi, art, article, bankrupt, beat, better, blogging, browser, buttonsmashers, by, changes, collab, compared, computer, content, cool, cutting, design, development, ds, facts, fans, Fantasy, feedback, Final, floor, fun, game, games, gaming, general, generic, Google, hidden, history, honest, how, hub, information, inside, inspiration, internet, is, it, jea, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, journey, jr, life, long, luigi, mage, mario, me, media, minion, mobile, more, multiverse, music, myself, neko, NekoJonez, news, nostalgia, not, opinion, play, preformance, Preview, project, Raider, random, rant, red, remake, retrospective, review, room, school, story, super, switch, test, than, then, To, told, Tomb, version, walkthrough, well, what, word, WordPress, work, worth, writers, Zelda on March 10, 2020 by NekoJonez.
NekoJonez's August 2019 Update
Hello there, it has been a long time since I spoke to my readers directly. It has been since April that I have written an update article. So, yeah, it's time to talk about the rest of 2019 and what that means for my blog. Now, if you are wondering who these two people are on the picture. The right guy is me. And the girl in the picture is my girlfriend who already wrote two articles here. Soon, she will write another article here too. If you want to follow her, you can do so over on her Twitter. Without further ado, let's get into the updates because there is quite a lot to talk about!
Personal things
I think that 2019 will be the strongest year so far. A lot has been changing in my personal life making my schedule and day to day life quite unpredictable.
In the past four months, my work schedule changed. I had to work on Saturdays, but I had Thursdays off. I spent most of these Thursdays with my girlfriend.
For those who don't know yet, since late March 2019, I met NotThatAlice and it didn't take long before we became a couple. I mean, two retro gamers who are into waiting YouTube, exploring cities and nature, working on creative things… It's a match made in heaven.
Now, starting from next week, something quite big is happening in my professional career. I signed a contract to work as an administrative and IT guy in one of my local schools. This is a personal dream of mine. A lot of people in my family have worked or are working in the education sector. From science teachers to mentoring of new teachers. I'm 5 generations in succession. Now, yes, I'm the first who isn't going to be teaching… But, I'm honestly considering to start those evening classes again to get my teaching degree. But, that's something I'm considering. If I'm going to start classes again, I'll surely update you, readers.
You might have noticed that since late 2018 the number of articles that I'm writing and publishing is dropping. Usually, I write 4 articles each month, but lately, it's only three articles a month or even fewer. This has a few reasons. Earlier I said that for the past 4 months, I have been working on Saturdays and spending time with my girlfriend on my day off. That meant that I only had Sunday to write and publish an article. This didn't always work out.
On top of that, I'm still recovering from my bad mental health that started last year. A side effect of that bad mental health is that I actually had a writing burn-out making it even more difficult for me to focus on my writing. I have scrapped quite a lot of articles because they didn't turn out quite right or weren't up to the quality I wanted them to be.
While I could take a break from writing, I don't think that's the right solution for me. I just love writing a bit too much. Thankfully, I think I have a solution. You might have noticed that in the last few articles that I have written, that my writing style has changed a bit and that I'm experimenting with a few unique ideas to change things up. This is having a great effect on me and I'm getting back into writing.
Anyways, before I start talking about the blog updates, I want to mention that a lot has changed to my personal set-up in the past few months. I have upgraded my personal gaming rig with a new graphics card. I upgraded my GeForce 660 to a GeForce 1050. So, I now have a 4GB graphics card in my gaming rig. I also use a newer monitor that supports a newer standard of HDMI and things of that nature. Apart from that, I have bought myself a mouse mat and a wrist rest. This helps me to not have RSI issues while I'm writing or while I'm gaming.
In terms of my old retro computers, I have outfitted my Windows XP machine with an old WiFi card, so I now can mess around with those titles and get the latest version of all the drivers without having to use some sort of crazy setup. I also refurbished an old computer to a spare Windows XP machine. On top of that, I busted out all my computers and consoles to make them run more quite and have a longer life.
Before I get into the updates to my blog, I want to mention something about collabs. If you are interested in being a part of a big collab like my Zelda and Tomb Raider retrospective, I have good news. My friend, the Well-Red Mage, who organized the Final Fantasy retrospective together with OverThinkery is organizing a new one. It's almost like Red and I take turns in doing one big retrospective. I guess that it's my turn at the end of next year.
In all seriousness, the reason I'm talking about this is that I'm actually going to be a part of this big collab. It's going to be about Mario and we are still looking for writers. More information can be found in the linked article. But this time, I'll be helping Red with the admin and behind the scenes work in this whole collab. So, yeah.
Speaking off collabs, I'm also going to be a part of NormalHappenings' Characters That Define Us. I'm going to write a special article about my love for the character of Lara Croft. While I have sort of done that already with the Tomb Raider retrospective… I have an idea to make the article still quite interesting to read. More information can be read here.
More information about both of these collabs will come in the future. Because these two things are still in the works and are subject to change, I don't want to say things that might not even happen to avoid disappointment.
So, we are entering the final 4 months of 2019. As said earlier in this article, this year has been quite crazy for me. But, I still have a plan for the ending of 2019. Now, before I talk about that I want to mention like in every update article that the best way to keep up-to-date with me is to follow my Twitter feed.
With that said, here is a preview of the things I have been planning for the ending of 2019. For this week, I'm going to publish two reviews on two developers who requested my feedback. I have a couple of games I want to talk about in the final four months of 2019. As usual, I'll end the year with my top 10 games of the year and the games I'm looking forward to playing in 2020.
My girlfriend also has a few articles she wants to write. From what she told me, they are going to be extremely interesting to read. It's going to be a very different look at how games are played. I'm quite excited to read it actually.
So, I'm planning to use the remainder of 2019 to write about games I love to reference but of which I haven't written an article yet. While also talking about a whole boatload of amazing new games I have been playing this year, it's going to be challenging.
Still, due to me still recovering from a writers' burn-out and my bad mental health, it's possible that I'm going to write and publish 3 articles each month, excluding guest posts or press kits. Yet, if I'm in the mood and when I have the time, it's possible that I'm going to publish more than 3 in a month. It all depends on the time and energy that I have. Yet, I'll be writing a minimum of 3 articles each month.
The final thing I want to talk about is something that also always returns in these articles. And that's the reorganization of my blog. I have been thinking about a lot of different things. From merging series into one to moving to a self-hosted website and changing the URL. Now, I have decided that the blog rework will be a focus of mine in 2020. This year has been so rough, I think it's best that I'm first going to settle in my new job and make a great plan of action so that I don't make mistakes if I decide to make major upgrades.
So, with that said, I think you guys and girls are up to date with the latest happenings in my life and the future for this blog. A lot of fun things are going to come to this blog and I'm already working on a few projects for 2020. It's going to be so much fun and I can't wait to see what you will think about it. Anyways, it's time for my usual last words to close off this article.
I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.
This entry was posted in Articles, Personal and tagged 001, 2019, about, advice, announcement, apple, august, blog, blogger, blogging, burn, buttonsmashers, card, changes, characters, collab, computer, content, cool, crazy, define, design, developers, dutch, Education, entertainment, facts, family, feedback, for, freelance, fun, games, Gear, general, generic, gf, girlfriend, Google, gpu, graphics, happy, health, idea's, information, inspiration, internet, jea, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, life, looking, Lost, mage, mario, me, measures, media, mental, mobile, more, music, myself, neko, NekoJonez, new, news, notthatalice, opinion, out, party, patch, personal, plan, puzzle, question, Raider, random, rant, red, request, retrospective, Reviews, rough, rsi, school, stuff, sun, Television, test, thanks, that, Tomb, update, us, video, well, WiFi, windows98, word, WordPress, work, writers, writing, Xbox, year, Zelda on August 28, 2019 by NekoJonez.
Tomb Raider – Writer's Raid
The logo for this project is created by The Well-Red Mage
The Legend of Zelda and Final Fantasy are series that have a lot of loving fans. Now, besides the Legend of Zelda series, there is another series that had a strong presence in my childhood. As a child, I fell in love with the Indiana Jones franchise. I played the various Indiana Jones games until either the cartridge or the CD gave up. Now, I wanted more. Because of that lust for more, I discovered the Tomb Raider franchise. The first Tomb Raider game I ever played was Tomb Raider 5 – Chronicles. That was enough for me to decide to hunt down all Tomb Raider games and play them from start to finish. And I'm not the only one who enjoys Tomb Raider and let me prove that to you, I'm going to raider the various tombs this franchise throws at us together with some amazing befriended bloggers. I hope you are ready since various treasures of articles will await you in these tombs. Let's. Get. Raiding.
1996 – Tomb Raider
Games With Coffee takes us through Lara's adventure to help Natla.
Grab yourself a cup of coffee, since we are taking a journey through the good old first entry of Tomb Raider.
Together with Games With Coffee we take a nostalgic look to Tomb Raider and discover how it "holds up" today. Depending on who you ask of course.
The analysis of this game is extremely well done and made me remember various stories of the first time I played Tomb Raider. Seriously, give it a read!
1997 – Tomb Raider II Featuring Lara Croft
ABXY Game Reviews is following Lara through her journey to find a Dragon's dagger!
ABXY Game Reviews really wanted to play an old school Tomb Raider game. And I was looking for writers. A match made in heaven I think.
In heaven, that's where the object Lara is after in her second adventure. A mythological Chinese dagger can came from the heavens that can turn mere mortals into dragons.
Did ABXY Game Reviews enjoy his journey through old school Tomb Raider or do fans of this game get blinded by nostalgia? You have to read this article to find out.
1998 – Tomb Raider III – The Adventures of Lara Croft
NekoJonez helps us find four artifacts.
I love telling this story. When I first played Tomb Raider III, I thought I was playing Tomb Raider IV. The reason for that, well, I explained that in my nostalgic look-back of Tomb Raider III.
I tried to avoid writing a review for this game and give some retrospective facts. But it was great fun playing through this game again for this project.
So please, feel free to give one of my entries in this project a read.
1999 – Tomb Raider IV – The Last Revelation
SarahsGameCollection is going to take us on a journey to raid the Egyptian tombs!
I discovered Sarah's website through this project. And I haven't regretted it at all. Her website is a joy to browse through and read.
Her unique writing style is something I love most about her website. While she writes, she adds personal comments like if she is telling a story to you and it's great fun to read.
I think that this article came together quite well since it made me want to replay Tomb Raider IV for myself.
2000 – Tomb Raider V – Chronicles
TriformTrinity is taking us to Lara's funeral…?
If you want to know if you should play Tomb Raider Chronicles, you shouldn't look further. Triform Trinity wrote a short review of the game.
I wrote an article on this game last year, and it shows how people can differ in opinion.
Anyways, I highly recommend you reading this article. It was a joy to work with TriformTrinity and reading his through his website is such a great and fun time. Since I can assure you that I always have a fun time when I visit his website.
2000 – Tomb Raider Level Editor
NekoJonez took a look at Tomb Raider fan's levels.
I have to admit that I was planning to write an article about the level editor for Tomb Raider for quite a while.
To be honest, this game is one of the reasons why I organized this collaboration in the first place. Since it's a creative platform that brings a community together. And this project is the perfect "excuse" to talk about something unique like this.
So, if you are curious about what the level editor can do, feel free to read it on my blog and I hope you like it.
2003 – Tomb Raider – Angel of Darkness
Sarah's Game Collection is helping to solve this murder mystery…
If there is one Tomb Raider game I haven't fully played it, it has to be Tomb Raider – Angel of Darkness.
I heard so many things about it. From it being a bad game to being a decent game. After reading the review that Sarah wrote for this game I got even more interested in finishing this game.
Now, I invite you to read along with me this amazing analysis of the final game that Core worked on in the series.
2006 – Tomb Raider Legend
Liana takes us on the legendary journey for a sword.
In this retrospective collaboration project, I always give freedom to the writers. This resulted in Liana writing an amazing piece where she analyzed the game very deeply.
Not only that, she talks about the history and development of this game. And she even took a deeper look at who Lara Croft actually is.
I can highly recommend that you give this article by Liana a read. And if you are interested in more of her work, you can also visit her YouTube channel, which I HIGHLY recommend as well.
And allow me to slip some personal advertisement in as well since I reviewed this game last year myself.
2007 – Tomb Raider – Anniversary
Games with Coffee takes us, again, on Lara's adventure to help Natla…
Now, I hope your coffee didn't go cold since we are going to take a look at the remake of Tomb Raider I.
Games with Coffee brings you a very in-depth review and look at this game. He played it on Steam. I played this game on my PC as well and I have to agree with a lot he said in the article.
This game was one of the games that really drew me into the whole Tomb Raider franchise and it hasn't let go since.
2008 – Tomb Raider Underworld
Liana takes us on a journey through the underworld.
Now, Liana takes a look at Tomb Raider Underworld in a very interesting way. You won't find a review of the game in this article but a very interesting in-depth analysis of the game's story.
Reading the article was extremely interesting. It helped me to connect some dots I didn't even realize that there were before.
She also analyses Lara's character and how it all fits in the lore of the series. Seriously, what are you waiting for? Go read Liana's article!
2010 – Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light
LaterLevels is going to battle for the light.
After I finished Tomb Raider Underworld, I was waiting on the next entry in the Tomb Raider series. To my surprise, we had to wait 5 years on a new entry in the main series.
Yet, during this wait, we got Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light. A game that's on my endless backlog list.
When I talked to Kim from LaterLevels and asked her if she wanted to be part of the Tomb Raider project, she suggested playing this game on stream together with her other half. She didn't stream this game but the other spin-off. More on that later.
Now, what did she think of this game? You can read it in Kim's article. Enjoy!
OverThinkerY takes us to a Japanese island…
"A famous explorer once said, that the extraordinary is in what we do, not who we are. I'd finally set out to make my mark; to find adventure. But instead adventure found me. In our darkest moments, when life flashes before us, we find something; Something that keeps us going. Something that pushes us."
That was one of the best quotes out the reboot of Tomb Raider in 2013. In this article, my good friend OverThinkerY took a look at the game. His analysis is great and I loved reading his article. I think you will enjoy it as well.
Also, this game has a special place for me on my blog since it's the first game I reviewed since I started my English blog in 2013. You can read it here.
2014 – Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris
LaterLevels takes us on a journey through the Temple of Osiris.
So, Kim didn't know that there were two spin-off games. When I told that to Kim, she didn't hesitate for a second and decided that she wanted to also write about the 2nd spin-off game.
Kim did a stream of this game together with her other half. You can watch Twitch.TV archive in case you missed it: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/310930370
But I also highly recommend to check out her review of this game. Since I loved reading it.
2015 – Lara Croft: GO! & Lara Croft Relic Run
TriformTrinity puzzles his way through various tombs…
…and runs for relics.
Now, in this Writer's Raid, we also took a look at two Lara Croft mobile games. These are Lara Croft Go and Lara Croft Relic Run. Honestly, I have played a bit of Lara Croft GO myself, but I haven't played a lot of Lara Croft Relic Run.
So, if you are curious if these games are something for you and worth buying on your Android or iOS device, I think you will enjoy these two articles that TriformTrinity wrote. Have a great read!
2015 – Rise of the Tomb Raider
OverThinkerY looks at Lara's rise in Lara Croft.
Of course, had Tomb Raider (2013) to end with a cliff hanger. So, the story could continue in Rise of the Tomb Raider.
OverThinkerY takes a great look at the game and gives his own honest opinion on it. (And I gave mine a few years ago)
Something I really liked in OverThinkerY's article is that he compared this game to what he likes in other games. And he played this game with the DLC included. So, give it a read, I can highly recommend it.
2018 – Shadow Of The Tomb Raider
NekoJonez is going to take us on Lara's latest journey.
While we were planning this project, the newest Tomb Raider game got released. To be honest, I claimed this game right away. I wanted to play this game anyways and I felt that it was a perfect way to close this collaboration.
So, what did I think of Lara's latest adventure? If you want to know that, you'll have to read my article on Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
And then this was the loot
I knew in advance that the group of writers for this project was going to be very different compared to my previous projects. I want to thank all the writers who helped me in this project, some even replayed games which didn't age too well.
I hope you enjoyed reading this collaboration between me and these lovely bloggers: Games With Coffee, ABXY Game Reviews, Sarah's Game Collection, Liana Kerzner, TriformTrinity, LaterLevels, and OverThinkerY.
Do check these people out! They are all amazing people and I have to thank all of them to make this become a reality. Besides The Legend of Zelda, Tomb Raider is one of the biggest series from my childhood and reading all these different pieces made me remember why I love the series.
I have to admit that the games didn't age all too well so it was quite interesting to see what everybody thought about the games they played.
I hope you enjoyed reading through these articles and enjoyed exploring the websites that made this unique project come to life. Feel free to be a Tomb Raider and explore these websites since they are all great sites that I can highly recommend.
If you want to read more articles like these, last year I did a similar project like this on the Zelda series. Also, my friend the Well-Red Mage did something similar to the Final Fantasy series. So, thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed creating it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!
This entry was posted in Articles, Collabs, Gamer's Thoughts, Personal, Reviews and tagged 001, 2013, about, abxy, advice, Angel, anniversairy, announcement, apple, arpegi, art, blog, blogger, blogging, changes, code, collab, computer, content, cool, croft, darkness, design, development, dutch, Edios, entertainment, facts, family, feedback, food, fun, games, Gear, general, generic, go, Google, graphics, guardian, happy, history, how, i, idea's, II, III, information, inspiration, interesting, internet, issues, italy, iv, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, kerzner, lara, laterlevels, Legend, liana, life, Light, linux, Lost, me, media, microsoft, mobile, montreal, Movies, music, myself, neko, NekoJonez, news, novel, Of, opinion, osiris, overthinkerY, party, people, project, psp, puzzle, question, questions, raid, Raider, random, rant, reboot, relic, retrospective, review, Reviews, rise, run, school, shadow, software, space, stuff, sucks, sun, Television, temple, test, thanks, The, thoughts, tired, Tomb, triform, trinity, tv, underworld, V, video, violence, word, WordPress, work, writers, writing, Xbox on November 15, 2018 by NekoJonez.
Game Review: Shadow of the Tomb Raider (PC) ~ Trinity Awaits You.
This post is a part of the Tomb Raider – Writers Raid collaborative project. In this project, various bloggers came together to take a critical look on the Tomb Raider series. Mixing nostalgia and a critical look at every game in the main series. You can read more in the hub article here.
Wikipedia entry – Steam Store page
I remember the day that the picture leaked of the guy working on a powerpoint presentation of Shadow of the Tomb Raider on the metro. I was so hyped for the 3rd Tomb Raider game. I quite enjoyed the reboot of the Tomb Raider franchise and I wanted to see how the trilogy ends. I pre-ordered the game as soon as I could. Of course, I pre-ordered the collector's edition and I was able to play this game 48 hours before the official release. Now that I finished the game, it's time to give my honest opinion on it. Is the game any good or should you skip it? Let's find out. Also, feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article.
Trinity awaits you
If you are planning to play this game, I highly recommend that you play Tomb Raider (2013) and Rise of the Tomb Raider before this game. The story in this game continues on the story of those two games. While you will be able to understand and follow the story in the game without any problems in this game, the impact of the story will be stronger if you played the first two games.
To avoid spoilers, I'll keep some parts a bit vague in my plot description. So, in this game, Lara and Jonah are exploring Cozumel in Mexico for a piece of the artifact that Lara's rival gang Trinity is after. It doesn't take long before the duo finds Trinity and they discover something huge about Trinity. This leads Lara to a nearby temple where she finds a dagger that sets off a chain of events that might spell the end of the world but this might help Trinity to succeed with their plans. Now, will Lara be able to stop Trinity and save the world? Since Trinity awaits you in this game…
The story of this game is your typical adventure movie story. Personally, I enjoyed the story in this game quite a lot. The writing is pretty well done. I grew attached to the characters in this arc and it kept me engaged. While I was able to predict some plot points and twists from a mile away, I was entertained by it. The pacing of the plot is so good, I was less distracted by side quests than in the previous two titles.
The story takes you to various locations in Mexico and Peru. There is one section of the game that will put a huge smile on veteran Tomb Raider players, but I won't spoil that one. While a lot of the game takes place in the jungle, the scenery never gets boring. I totally loved exploring the world after I had beaten the main story and I can't wait for the additional content that they are going to release in the upcoming months.
Something I would love to talk about is that this game had two different epilogues. In this article, I want to focus on reviewing the game in its current form but if you want to know more, Kotaku has a great write-up with developer commentary.
The writing and pacing of this game are excellent, but something I really liked in this game was the voice acting. I really felt that the actors were giving it their all while creating this game. When Lara gets mad, she really sounds mad. Something I think is amazing is that the NPC's can either speak English or speak in their native language. This setting in the options menu is such an amazing immersion feature. It really adds to the charm of the voice acting.
Now with the reboot plot wrapped up, I'm quite curious about where they are going to take Lara next. Which adventures will Lara have next? Will they create a new game when Lara is older or will they create a story that takes place right after this game? Only time will tell.
Take a jaw-dropping picture
When I saw the minimum requirements of this game, I became worried. In order to play this game, you need to have an i3-3220 Intel processor or something similar to AMD. You also need 8GB RAM and an Nvidia GeForce GTX 660/GTX 1050 or AMD Radeon HD 7770 at the minimum. My computer has an i7-4820K, 16GB of RAM and an Nvidia GeForce GTX 660. So, my computer fits the requirements of the recommend system requirements besides my graphics card. I was so afraid that I would be bottlenecked due to my graphics card. I was afraid that I had to put everything at the lowest settings to even get a playable framerate out of the game.
Surprisingly, that wasn't the case. I was able to play the game at medium visual settings at somewhere between 25FPS to 66FPS. The framerate was quite stable as well. While I was playing, I ran MSI Afterburner on my 2nd monitor to keep track of the temperatures of my GPU and the usage. Since that caused issues in Rise of the Tomb Raider for me. In this game, I only experienced three game crashes in that 48-hour pre-launch period but a quick restart of the game fixed the issue. And since the patch released on launch, I never had those crashes again.
25FPS might be too low in some people their opinion but I don't mind it that much. 30FPS is still an acceptable frame rate for me and I don't mind it that much, I understand that a lot of people prefer 60FPS, but I'm just glad that I have the game at a playable and stable frame rate.
I'm happy that my computer can run this game since this game takes you on an amazing journey. You come across gorgeous landscapes that are begging you to use the photography feature built in this game. This is even a small basic editor included. I only used the photography mode once, to test it out. If I ever replay this game, I have some spots that I totally want to use this feature on and create some amazing wallpapers.
While the visual presentation is amazing, I did experience some tearing issues and I saw some clipping. But, this happened so rarely and fixed themselves so fast, they weren't a big issue. Most of the tearing issues were just for a few seconds here and there is a cutscene. I have to admit that updating my graphics card to the latest driver made me have even less tearing issues. So, if you are experiencing them too, check if your graphics card is up-to-date.
Visually, this game is jaw-dropping. While exploring the packed jungle, hidden cities, and various tombs; you get even more eye candy with the animations in this game. From Lara jumping down to make a stealth kill to two characters speaking to each other in a cutscene, the animations are extremely well done. One minor complaint I have is that some death scenes felt a bit reused from the previous two games, but some look even better than before.
Yet, there are a few things about the visuals I thought weren't the best they could be. The first problem with the visuals is that sometimes when the game reloaded after I died, the visuals went to a lower setting. This happened to me 5 times out of nowhere. Yet, after a patch, I didn't experience this issue so I guess that might be fixed.
A 2nd complaint I have with the visuals is that the liquids in the death scenes became see-through. It might be a nitpicky complaint, but I felt that it was rather awkward. It didn't feel quite right. It would have looked a lot better if the camera zoomed out with Lara's scream fading away as if she drowned.
Now, let's talk about gameplay. Since the reboot, the gameplay of the Tomb Raider series changed quite a lot. There are more action sequences in between puzzle segments and the exploration of tombs. Lara has a few new abilities compared to the previous two games. Outside of the expanded moves with the grapple ax and the stealth mechanics, all these mechanics are underused.
For example, some enemies have heat goggles. These enemies appear so frequent, it's a gimmick. Another example is the underwater creatures, like eels and phirans. These can provide for some unique swimming puzzles but they are rarely used or are quite easy to avoid. Also, there are some tripwires that can activate traps. But, these traps are always the same trap and the same way of disabling them. It's sad to see these mechanics under used so much.
Something that really annoyed me is that when you used the explorer sense, Lara almost always gave the solution of the puzzle away immediately. She spells out what you have to move to where. Even this sense sometimes provided the solution to the puzzle. This made some puzzles in this game too easy. I preferred it when Lara didn't give the solution right away. It was especially frustrating when she talked over dialogue. In one tomb, Lara and Jonah were exploring. While they were talking about the room they were in, I pressed the explorer sense button. While Lara and Jonah were having their chat, Lara spoils the solution of the puzzle. That way I didn't hear what Lara and Jonah said. It would have been much more fun to solve the puzzles when Lara didn't give away the solution away so quickly. It should work like those special mushrooms in the latest Mario games, that it appears when the player keeps failing to solve the puzzle or is stuck in the room for some time.
It's a shame since the puzzles are very fun to solve. They are well crafted and I enjoyed solving them. Thankfully, the issue of Lara spoiling the solution doesn't happen with the platform sections. These were amazing to play through. I can't wait to see what the new challenge tombs will bring in the upcoming months. On the 14th of November, a new tomb will release. I can't wait to explore it.
Anyways, when I changed the puzzle difficulty to hard, Lara didn't do this. I wish I knew this earlier before I had beaten the game. Since I had chosen the "Rite of passage" difficulty. It would have solved one of my major gripes with this game. I did have to set it to the hard setting, and that took away a lot of things in the explorer sense as well… So, I'll stick to normal and just not use explorer sense only if I'm stuck.
Something I really love in this game as well is that you have more than one indicator on the map and in the explorer sense. You have the yellow marker that guides you to the next story point, the green one for the side quest you are doing and the blue one for the marker you set in the map mode. This is so handy and helped me to keep track of certain things. Great feature!
Orchestral exploration
This game has an orchestral soundtrack. The soundtrack has been composed by Brian D'Oliveira and he created something amazing. The soundtrack adds so much power to the cutscenes and the game.
I also added the soundtrack to my music library. It's a great soundtrack for when I'm writing various articles or when I'm playing other games like Minecraft or Europa Universalis IV.
It was especially tense during the stealth sections. I'm the type of player who usually goes all out and doesn't use a lot of stealth. In this game, I highly recommend that you are careful while you have enemy encounters. They can quite easily overwhelm you if you go out of hiding too quickly. Also, in this game, the traps like flaming bottles and smoke bombs are way more useful than in the previous games. They helped me quite a lot. The music is a great help in these combat sections since it's your guide if there are still enemies around or if you have defeated them all.
Together with the great soundtrack, the sound effects and sound design of this game are extremely well done. I played this game with headphones. If you play this game, I highly recommend that you use a decent pair of headphones or speakers. The sound effects and the music add so much to the experience and the immersion, it's essential in my opinion. It made my heart pound at certain moments and I felt so relieved when I was finally able to beat that section that gave me problems earlier.
The controls in the game are good. I do have one complaint and that is that I find the controls for the crafting system a bit awkward to use. I got used to it, but I preferred the crafting system in the previous game where you were able to map the crafting of (special) arrows or ammo to a single button. Now you need to use two for them. Then again, I see the benefits of the current system, so I think it's a personal complaint.
I never had any major issues with the controls. Maybe once or twice that Lara didn't grab a ledge, but these things happen in games all the time. The checkpoints in this game are frequent enough that you don't lose a lot of progress. The game also has an autosave so you never have to worry that you lose progress.
Earlier, I talked about the extended mechanics or the grapple ax. A grapple ax is an essential tool in Lara's arsenal in this game. She uses it as a sort of whip to swing across gaps, Indiana Jones style. She also uses is it for stealth killing, climbing almost vertical walls and using it as an anchor point when she needs to go down. There are certain moments when you hang on a wall right above the entrance of a tomb and Lara has to lower herself to either safe reach the ground or to swing back and forth to create enough momentum to jump to the platform that leads to the entrance of the tomb. Rappelling down was always a great joy to do.
Now, there is one mechanic that actually returns from a previous Tomb Raider game. In Tomb Raider Anniversary, there are certain sections while you use your grapple you run on walls. This mechanic returns in this game. It's used in combination with the lowering down mechanic I described in the previous paragraph.
These mechanics were fun to use. Slowing going down and seeing the big temple appear in the distance were my favorite moments in this game. It really made me feel like I was exploring the area. Paired with the amazing visuals and soundtrack, I enjoyed myself quite a lot. Speaking about those visuals, sometimes your path blended in with the environment so well, it was fun to explore. Trying to find the path you had to take to find your way back from a tomb. Also, in some platforming sections, especially when you are escaping from a crumbling building, the visuals make it even better to play through. You have rubble falling just past you or poles you bending the right way for you to continue. The adrenaline in these sections was amazing for me.
Now, this game took me 20 hours or so to beat. On Howlongtobeat.com, there are people who have beaten the story in 13 hours. I think I might complete this game, so I have a few additional hours in this game. The difficulty of this game really depends on the abilities and outfits you use. The fewer abilities you unlock and if you don't use the benefits of your outfits, the game gets a lot harder. But, I found this game not that difficult. There were a few moments that I had to redo, sometimes more than 3 or 4 times but each time I learned the patterns of the enemies or where I needed to go. The game provides some challenge but once you get the mechanics down, you breeze through this power fantasy.
Now, about the difficulty. There are a few different options. Something I really like is that you can set the difficulty for combat, exploration, and puzzle. So, if you find something too easy and you want more challenge, just change that in the gameplay section of the options menu. The only nitpick I have about the menu is that there should be a "confirm" button. Since it felt kind of strange that the changes happen right away to me. Then again, that might be just me.
Also, if you are quite nostalgic like me, there are outfits that even remodel Lara's character mode to look like in the earlier Tomb Raider games. I think that I'm going to use those outfits to complete the game now that I have beaten it.
Personally, I enjoyed the combat in this game quite a lot. Outsmarting your enemies and silently killing them before they can group up on you to overpower you was enjoyable. I felt my heart pounding when I was finally able to beat that one section I had to do over and over again. These sections made me consider playing other more stealth focused games in the future.
A big plus in this game is the in-game store. In the two previous titles, ammo could become a bit too rare to find in the post-game. This is solved by merchants in the villages you visit. There you can buy gear and ammo. You can also sell your materials for coins. This is a great mechanic since you really need to think about what you can sell if you want to complete this game.
The final fight in this game really took me back to the old school Tomb Raider boss fights. I only wish that it was a bit more challenging. I was able to beat the final fight with only dying twice. This time it felt like a proper final fight and not a gauntlet of enemies. It's the best final fight in this trilogy.
So, that was everything I wanted to say about this game. I think it's high time for the conclusion of my review.
+ Good story, pacing and voice acting.
+ Amazing visual presentation.
+ In-game store.
+ Great soundtrack & sound design.
+ Great final boss.
+ Nostalgic outfits.
-Some mechanics are underused.
-Sometimes some minor visual issues like tearing and clipping appear.
As a veteran Tomb Raider player, I wasn't disappointed in this game. While I completely understand that this game isn't for everybody, it did click with me. I enjoyed myself while playing this game and I think that this game turned out amazing. The biggest flaw of this game is that some fun mechanics go underused. Maybe these mechanics might be more used when I up the difficulty in my next playthrough.
I enjoyed playing through this game so much that I'm going to play through this game again for sure. The visuals are extremely well done, the animations, soundtrack, sound design… it all pulled me into this game. If you really enjoy playing adventure games like the 3D Indiana Jones games, Uncharted, Tomb Raider (2013), Rise of the Tomb Raider or games of that nature, you owe it to yourself to give this game a try.
In my opinion, this is one of the best Tomb Raider games I have played in recent years. It reminded me why I enjoy playing through this series so much. The adventure is just so much fun and it reminds me of watching Indiana Jones when I was younger.
I can't recommend this game enough. If you can, buy the season pass. I know that this makes the game more expensive but the additional costumes and the additional challenge tombs that will be released in the upcoming months will be more than worth it.
Thank you, Square Enix, Eidos Montreal and all the other companies who helped develop this trilogy. I hope you continue creating adventures for Lara Croft. The quality of this game is amazing and I can't wait to see what happens next. Thank you for the journey and I hope this won't be the last stop. You thanked your fans in the credits, allow me to thank you and your team for this amazing experience! Keep on creating those tombs and we shall keep raiding if it's this amazing of a game.
Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care. Also, be sure to check out the hub article where you can read more articles on the Tomb Raider series. More information is at the start of this article.
This entry was posted in Articles, Reviews and tagged 660, about, advice, amd, announcement, apple, arpegi, art, awaits, benchmark, blog, blogger, buttonsmashers, can, changes, collab, computer, croft, DLC, dutch, enix, entertainment, family, first, food, free, fun, gameplay, games, Gear, geforce, general, happy, how, idea's, impression, information, internet, issues, it, italy, jea, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, lara, linux, Lost, me, media, microsoft, Movies, music, neko, NekoJonez, novel, Of, opinion, party, playthrough, Preview, psp, puzzle, question, questions, raedon, raid, Raider, random, rant, requirements, retrospective, review, Reviews, run, shadow, software, space, spoiler, square, stuff, sucks, sun, system, teaser, test, thanks, The, thoughts, tired, Tomb, trinity, violence, walkthrough, word, WordPress, writers, writing, Xbox, you on November 15, 2018 by NekoJonez.
Publishing: The Evolution of AI in movies Infographic
If you want to read more and know more about the authors of this infographic, you can visit their site at https://enlightened-digital.com/ai-goes-to-the-movies-a-history-of-artificial-intelligence-in-film/
This entry was posted in Articles, Publishing and tagged about, advice, ai, announcement, art, artificial, avengers, blogging, centuries, changes, computer, content, cool, design, enlightened, feedback, fun, games, general, generic, Google, graphic, in, info, infographic, inspiration, intelligence, internet, Jonez, life, me, mobile, Movies, music, myself, neko, NekoJonez, news, random, rant, retrospective, school, space, test, The, tron, walle, word, WordPress, work on September 29, 2018 by NekoJonez.
The Legend Of Zelda Retrospective – A Bloggers Journey
The Legend Of Zelda series just got 30 years old in 2016. With almost 20 main games, several spin-offs and remakes under its belt, it's time that we look back at the series. We start from the very first NES game back in 1986-1987 and continue through the more recently released Breath Of The Wild in 2017. But, I won't do this alone. I think it would be more fun that we look at this series from different angles. That's why I won't go too much in depth on each game in this article but other bloggers will. This article will serve as a hub. So, you can go on an adventure through various interesting blogs and maybe discover new authors and blogs to follow! I hope you are ready since here we go!
The lovely logo for this project is created by ZoeF.
In case you have never played a Zelda game, let me explain what this game series is about. The Legend Of Zelda is a game series developed by Nintendo and is the brainchild of Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka.
In almost each Zelda game, you must go on a quest to save a kingdom from destruction. In your quest, you meet different characters and go through various dungeons to get stronger. Each Zelda game has its own gimmick that makes the game stand out on its own. For example, in one game you have transformation masks and in another game, you ride throughout the kingdom on a train.
Each Zelda game takes the player on a journey throughout a game filled with action, adventure, puzzles and much more. It's hard to explain what makes a Zelda game a Zelda game.
There are various elements that always return in almost each Zelda game. There is always a kingdom or kingdom to save. At the end of each game, you have a big boss battle against the big bad that is threatening the land. You go through dungeons to acquire new items and/or abilities to get stronger. You also go on a journey on your own, sometimes with a companion that helps you throughout the adventure.
If we would cover everything in this retrospective, we wouldn't be able to ever finish this series. Since there are comic books, tv-series, concerts and so much more. That's why we decided in this retrospective to focus only on the main series.
But hey, if we explained the Zelda series, we would be here all day. So, it's time to look at the first game! Let's get this retrospective started! Little note about the release years, I took the earliest release date, which is in most cases the Japanese release date.
Enough stalling, it's time to hear what other writers have to say about the Zelda games. Let's start with the beginning and let's start with the first Zelda game!
1986 – The Legend Of Zelda (NES)
Tim talks about the start of the Legend Of Zelda
The first game in the series! So, in this article, you can read the memories of Tim with the first Zelda game.
Something that is very special about the first game is that there were broadcasted sequels of this game. You can read more about it here, BS Zelda.
1987 – The Legend Of Zelda II: The Adventure Of Link (NES)
Jessica takes us through Link's adventure on the NES.
Creating a sequel isn't easy. You can go in two different routes. One route is to create something so similar to appeal to the old fans. The other route is to create something completely new to try to draw in new fans.
In this game, they chose the 2nd option. They tried something new with the Zelda formula, but how did it go? Well, Jess will tell you all about it in her article about Zelda II.
1991 – The Legend Of Zelda – A Link To The Past (SNES)
The Well Red Mage shares his wisdom of the tale of the Link to the Past.
In the article from the Well Red Mage, we learn about his experience with the Link to the Past games. He also talks about why the Zelda series has been able to survive for so long.
If you wonder if "A Link Between Worlds" was the first sequel to this game, well you are mistaken. The first sequel to this game is Zelda – The Ancient Stone Tables.
1993 – The Legend Of Zelda – Link's Awakening (GB) – The Legend Of Zelda – Links Awakening DX (GBC)
OverThinkerY talks about the first handheld Zelda game, where Link wakes up…?
At first, I played the version on the Gameboy. I only played the DX version a few years ago, when it got released on the Nintendo 3DS eShop.
In the DX version, you have one additional dungeon, playing around with the colors that the Gameboy Color provided. But, in the article that OverThinker wrote, you can read about some interesting facts about this game. Things I didn't even know. So, I'm quite sure you will learn a lot from this article!
1993 – 1994: Link: Faces of Evil / Zelda: Wand Of Gamelon & Zelda's Adventure (CDi)
Jessica takes you through the CDi games, the Zelda games made by Philips.
The CD-I is such a strange console. Due to a failed partnership, Philips acquired the rights to some famous Nintendo IP's. So, Philips created these three infamous games.
What happened? Are these games as bad as everyone says or do they have redeemable qualities? In Jess' article about these three games, you will find it out. In her article, she takes a more in-depth look at these three games.
While we decided to focus on the main series Zelda games, we decided that the CDi-games should be included in this retrospective.
1998 – The Legend Of Zelda – Ocarina Of Time (N64)
LaterLevels Kim write about her experience with the game and her stepson
Something I would love to add is the fact that this game got a port to Gamecube. In that version, we also got Master Quest. A more difficult version of the main quest. But the master quest was absent from the Wii, Wii U Virtual Console ports. Shame really.
On LaterLevels, you can read a very enjoyable article with a view of the experiences that Kim had with this game and her stepson. It's a very enjoyable read.
2000 – The Legend Of Zelda – Majora's Mask (N64)
Zach is going to take us through Termina and tell us about Majora's Mask.
As a kid, I didn't have an N64. I was so jealous of my friend who had one and was able to play this game. I had to emulate it back in the day.
Thankfully, I own the game now on Virtual Console and the 3DS remake. That's why I love reading stories like Zach wrote about his childhood experiences with the game.
It's a really heartfelt article and a great read. You wouldn't be met with a terrible fate if you read this! Seriously, I think it would be a shame if you didn't read this article.
2001 – The Legend Of Zelda – Oracle Of Ages / The Legend Of Zelda – Oracle of Seasons (GBC)
Adventure Rules takes us through Oracle of Ages and NekoJonez continues with a look at Oracle of Seasons
So, in 2001 we got the first Zelda games developed by Capcom. Did they do a good job or did they fail? Well, AdventureRules and NekoJonez will tell you in their articles. The work of taking a look at these two games is split right in two, just like how the Oracles games split the Zelda formula right into two games.
2002 – The Legend Of Zelda – Four Swords (GBA)
2004 – The Legend Of Zelda – Four Sword Adventures (GameCube)
Jessica is taking us on a journey through the adventures where Link splits in four.
Personally, I own a copy of the GBA cart with Four Swords, but never got the chance to play it. I have downloaded the DSi/3DS eShop edition of the game. So, it's quite interesting to read how these two titles play. Since these two titles are the only titles I haven't really beaten nor really played in the Zelda series. That's why I have to thank Jessica so much for writing this article. It combines the three games in the Four Sword subseries. Enjoy the read!
2004 – The Legend Of Zelda – The Minish Cap (GBA)
Here is OverThinkerY and he talks about Link's encounter with the Minish Cap.
The first time I played The Minish Cap was a rental. Today, I own the game twice. I have a boxed cartridge version and I got the game again on the 3DS with the ambassador's program.
OverThinkerY took a look at this game and talks about the history and impact of this game. It's a great read! For those who didn't know, this game is also made by Capcom just like the Oracle games.
So, I urge you to take a look at the article he wrote. Let's fuse those Kingstones!
2002 – The Legend Of Zelda – The Wind Waker (GameCube)
Lpgardian is talking about the tales of the vast ocean and the Wind Waker.
When the Gamecube got presented to us, we got a very interesting tech demo at SpaceWorld 2000. Yet, not too long after, the art style of the Wind Waker got revealed.
That's the story everybody knows about the development of the Wind Waker. So we shouldn't focus on things you already know.
Lpgardian created an article where he talks about why he thinks that the Wind Waker is one of the best Zelda games ever. He talks about why he loves this game and what exactly he loves and enjoys it.
There are more reasons why you should read this article. Besides talking about his experiences, it's also a nicely written review of the game.
So, go ahead and give it a read. It's a great article!
2006 – The Legend Of Zelda – Twilight Princess (Gamecube – Wii)
Now Jessica will be talking about the tales of the Twilight Princess
Reading about personal memories about a game is always fun to me. And this is what you can expect from the article that Jessica wrote about Twilight Princess.
In this article, she compares the place of this game in the timeline, how the game compares to other games.
What I love the most about her article is that she talks about how the game impacted her emotionally.
I have to admit myself, I haven't finished this game yet. But, I have to agree with a lot of things that Jessica mentioned in this article. The dungeons in this game are amazing. This game was one of the sole reasons I bought a Nintendo Wii.
So, what are you waiting for? Go and take a look at Jessica's article about Twilight Princess since it's a great read!
2007 – The Legend Of Zelda – Phantom Hourglass (DS)
Takuto sends us seaward once again in Phantom Hourglass.
So, 2007 came around and we got a sequel to the Wind Waker. Now, I have a lot of great memories with this game; I invited Takuto to tell his memories.
The memories he shares in his article are quite relatable. I remember another frustration with this game. There is this part where you need to stamp something on a map. You have to do something with your DS in order for it to work. I have spent too long to figure that out. In any case, I highly recommend that you read the article since Takuto shares his memories about the game in the first part…
2009 – The Legend Of Zelda – Spirit Tracks (DS)
And then Takuto traverses the Overworld, riding along the Spirit Tracks
… and in the 2nd part of the article, he takes you on another journey through Hyrule. When he wrote that this game has one of the best soundtracks in the series, I had to listen to the soundtrack again. To be fair, he makes a very good argument.
So, I hope you have your boarding passes ready since in the 2nd part that Takuto wrote is quite an enjoyable read. He compares it to Phantom Hourglass and talks about his own memories.
Also, Takuto, I feel the same way about these games as you said at the end of your article buddy!
2011 – The Legend Of Zelda – Skyward Sword (Wii)
The AmbiGamer takes us skyward with Skyward Sword
Skyward Sword was a title that got a lot of praise and a lot of hate from the community. Personally, I enjoy the game to an extent. Thankfully, the AmbiGamer is here to tell her opinion of the game while having a great analysis of the game.
Something really interesting was that she also took a break from playing the game before finishing it. I did the same thing. Twice to be honest.
I still remember the first "leaked" images of this game. Like their one where you saw Link's back and mysterious blue creature in the foreground. That creature turned out to be Fi, a new version of Navi in my opinion.
But I have introduced this article enough, it's time for you to read the AmbiGamer's article about this game.
2013 – The Legend Of Zelda – A Link Between Worlds (3DS)
OverThinkerY takes us between worlds. Is the Link there?
In 2013, we got a spiritual successor to Link to the Past on the 3DS. It's called A Link Between Worlds. And in this title, OverThinker gives you a sort of review of the game while he points out the most interesting facts of this game.
The article he wrote is an interesting analysis of the game.
If you are curious what the opinion of OverThinkerY is about this game, you should take a look. But, you should take a look anyway, since he is a great writer.
2015 – The Legend Of Zelda – Triforce Heroes (3DS)
Sheikah Plate talks about the heroes of the Triforce.
Usually, you can find different recipes from Breath of The Wild on Sheikah Plate's blog, but she is a big Zelda fan, like me.
She wrote an excellent article on Triforce Heroes. In the article, you will be able to read her own opinion on the game, the development history and much more.
The article is written like she is having a presentation on a stage or talking to you about the game. That makes this article so enjoyable to read.
So, what are you waiting for! I urge you to read about one of the only multiplayer Zelda games!
2017 – The Legend Of Zelda – Breath Of The Wild (Wii U – Switch)
KillerRobotics takes us through the wild. The Breath of the Wild can be felt already.
I still remember how disappointed I was each time I heard that this game was delayed. Thankfully, in March 2017 we got the latest entry in the Zelda series.
The name is Breath of the Wild. At first, I was rather hesitant since it changed so many things about the Zelda formula. I can get quite attached to gameplay so I can get disappointed when a sequel changes too much.
But, that's enough about me. Now, I want to introduce you to my blogging friend Killer Robotics.
In his article, you will find his memories and experiences with the game. He also talks about how this game changed the Zelda formula and what stands out to him the most.
So, I highly recommend that you read KillerRobotics article to learn more about his opinion on the game. It's a worthwhile read!
Word of thanks and wrapping up
So, now that we reached the end of the hub article, I want to thank every blogger that helped in this project. This article was one of the biggest projects I have ever done.
This project was so much fun to do and I can't wait to hear what you think! Any feedback is welcome since we might do this project again with a different game series. But keep in mind, creating a series like this, is a huge undertaking and requires a lot of work.
I also want to thank you, the readers! Thank you for supporting us. Thanks to you, we get to do things like this and create more content to entertain you guys and girls. This wouldn't be possible if nobody read our articles. This made this project totally worth working on! I hope you discovered some new blogs for you to follow since everybody who helped in this project is all great writers and deserves more people following them!
Thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed working on this! I hope to be able to welcome you in another article on my blog but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!
Just to close off this article, these are the Twitter links of the people who helped to write an article or helped to make this project a reality! And in no particular order, I want to thank everybody.
NekoJonez, Tim Bledsoe, Jessica Allaweh Erin Brown, Chris (OverThinkerY), Adventure Rules, LaterLevels, The AmbiGamer, Zach The Darklegend Auld, Qudduws Lpgardian Campbell, Takuto Anime Cafe, Killer Robitics, The Well Red Mage & SheikahPlate
This entry was posted in Collabs, Gamer's Thoughts, Gaming Nostalgia, Personal, Reviews and tagged a, adventure, adventures, Ages, allahweh, ambi, arpegi, article, athena, awakening, back, blog, cap, capcom, CD-i, controller, development, DX, evil, faces, facts, four, free, gameboy, gamecube, gamer, gaming, history, hub, II, information, interesting, Jonez, killer, Legend, link, link's, lonely, look, lpgardian, mage, majora's, mask, memories, minish, more, neko, NekoJonez, NES, Nintendo, ocarina, Of, Oracle, overthinkerY, past, philips, plate, princess, project, red, retrospective, review, robotics, rules, seasons, sheikah, SNES, spoiler, swords, takuto, The, tim, time, To, Twilight, unique, waker, well, wind, zach, Zelda, zelda's on October 1, 2017 by NekoJonez.
Game Nostalgia #5: My Gameboy Retrospective
S o, in the last article of this series, I talked about my history with the DS and 3DS. So, I think that it's now time to talk about my memories with the gameboy series. While I'm supposed to talk only about the Gameboy Advance, since it's this month's theme, the article wouldn't be as long as it should be. That's why I decided to write a whole article about my memories of all the Gameboy's I got. That way you have an idea of my journey through the world of gaming, since I mostly only played on the gameboy. That and my hobby of writing was my childhood. So, prepare yourself for a personal story. Feel free to leave yours in the comments or your opinions on my story.
Exploding start
The first gameboy I played on wasn't actually mine. It was my aunt's. She only had Pac-Man and Tetris. Somehow my young mind didn't need anything more. It were my first real encounters with gaming, but I was hooked. I used to play games like DuckHunt or Mario Bros. at my nephew's place, but those moments were then far and few between.
One day, I was at my aunt's place and I stopped playing since the back of the gameboy started to feel hot. A few moments after I put it down, the batteries actually exploded, damaging the gameboy heavily. That was a big shocker. I didn't know what to do. My aunt wasn't even mad, since it wasn't my fault. It turned out that there was a flaw with the batteries we used, and it leaked battery acid into the system. Yeah.
That story was my earliest memory with a gameboy. A bit later, my aunt started to take me to her babysitting job. At that place, they also had a gameboy and more then one game. I remember it well, it were two girls, two sisters. While they were doing their girl things, I was allowed to play on the gameboy. My love grew and grew even stronger.
I already talked about how awesome my family is. When they saw that I was so much in love with the Gameboy, they actually got me a gameboy. Not only was it the latest model, they got it in my favorite color! To this day, I still own that very silver gameboy pocket. I was so happy, I had my own gameboy. I did jobs around the house to be able to buy new batteries for the gameboy. Then they got me rechargeable batteries, and my life was complete.
I never showed my latest garage sale loot here on my blog. Whoops.
In my childhood, we had this tradition to go to the sea on holiday. Man, always to the same house. I used to look forward to it every single year. Sadly enough, the owners of the house sold it, and the tradition is over now.
But back then, they used to take me to garage sales. So, as a young kid, they asked me to wake up early in the morning in the summer holidays. I honestly didn't care one bit. Since I was allowed to buy games.
My family didn't want that I bought a lot of games, now-a-days that's a very different story, since they were so expensive. A garage sale was such an easy solution. The best thing they did was that they let me roam the garage sales on my own with a notebook and a pen. They said that I could write down the games I wanted and then I had the difficult job to decide which one I wanted.
To this very day, I love to wake up early and go to a garage sale. Every year, I go to around 10 garage sales, if not more. I never go alone, since that would ruin part of the fun for me. The nostalgia of hunting down games, which were pretty rare on the garage sales I went too, is just amazing. The moment a family member bumped me in the arm and pointed to a game, I think they loved to see that sparkle in my eyes of happiness.
Typical me is typical
Garage sales memories are for another article. I was extremely attached to my games. I was always hard to pick games I had to sell. I had to sell a few games before I was allowed to buy new games. Now-a-days, I don't have that restriction anymore.
One time I forgot my gameboy at a restaurant and I begged my mother to turn back and get it. I even begged that they called the restaurant so that nobody could pick up my gameboy and claim it.
Later, my gameboy pocket became my sister's gameboy and I got a gameboy color. Then my sister got a purple gameboy advance and I got a silver gameboy advance SP, the one with the tattoo design on it.
To this very day, I still own most of the games I had back then. Of course, my library of games has grown quite a lot. If only I had the library I had back then, the nights I kept playing on my gameboy would be so much more fun. I remember that I had a lamp you needed to hit a button at the top in order to the lights go out. Since my room was at the end of a hallway, I could hear my parents and a simple slap on the lamp and putting the gameboy screen down, gave the illusion of my sleeping.
My parents knew that I was playing the gameboy under my sheets, but they were never able to catch my red handed. Okay, honestly, they were able a few times but usually, I was always able to dodge the bullet.
I could talk hours about my memories of the gameboy days, but I think I will end my article here. Since I have reached my usual length. I hope you enjoyed reading another special entry in the gameboy advance month. While it isn't fully about the GBA, I hope you don't mind that much.
Thanks again for reading and until another article. Also, don't shit your pants but it's Halloween.
This entry was posted in Gaming Nostalgia and tagged 001, advance, arpegi, buttonsmashers, color, colour, easter, egg, gameboy, garage, GB, GBA, gbc, information, jea, jealous, Jonez, jonez001, jonezjea, month, more, neko, NekoJonez, nostalgia, Of, past, retrospective, sales, Stories, The, young on October 31, 2014 by NekoJonez.


text:
Laterispora är ett släkte av svampar. Laterispora ingår i divisionen sporsäcksvampar och riket svampar.

Källor

Sporsäcksvampar
Laterispora

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia