Put it this way, if you though Toriyama couldn't handle writing a simple linear narrative to save his life in Final Fantasy XIII, just wait till you see him try throwing in some -time travel- on top of that in XIII-2. He is a blight on the industry and will turn any project he is placed in charge of into ash.

So are Japanese game companies run by old men stuck in the past where the young cannot advance, or are they being headed by young men making games full of magical misogyny?

Story is (supposedly) as bad or worse than FF XIII, if you can believe that. Keep that in mind if that's important to you in a game.

A prequel might be easier to fit into everything, considering Mass Effect has virtually the same origin point for all players (give or take Shepard's childhood).

It's a dumb thing to even notice, but I like how Kaidan gets to be the one to stand closest to Shepard out of all of them.

Only when there is no Ashley are things ever truly complete.

I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you've been Toriyama'd, fella.

;_; I'm not crying, my eyes are simply bleeding from the raw beauty.

Us LGBTQ put up with straight couples constantly holding hands, making out, and having sex on the kitchen table in everything from movies and books to viral videos and TV commercials.

Square-Enix are a bunch of wusses. It's somehow worse that they choose to hide behind a completely obvious lie that they can't shuffle a few "true" and "false" values around to make low-key, barebones equality and inclusiveness happen.

Just because we're 3% of the population doesn't mean our issues are only 3% as important as yours.

If the Wii U lets me play Gameboy Advance games and Gamecube games I already own (and they aren't more than about three or four each) through its Virtual Console service, then I will be more inclined to upgrade.

I can't seem to use the app on my PC to type a simple message to another player. What am I doing wrong here?

Yes, "QHY"?

I actually got a Gamecube for Christmas myself one year, back around 2003 I think. It was a black model and flat out stopped working a few days after playing it. It wouldn't display anything upon powering it up, cables still working fine as they had been.

I had only thought of the GamePad as copying the design philosophy of the Nintendo DS. But when Stephen used the word "emulate", I just realized that theoretically there shouldn't be that many hurdles to offering full blown Nintendo DS games via the Virtual Console service! Anyone else thinking the same thing, or that…

So many tiny typos, but an informative review all the same. Thanks Mr. Totilo.

I'm with you on that. Not enough Japanese developers seem to bother with creating female characters that actually act like people. Instead we too often see companies like Square, NIS, and Idea Factory going their usual route by making their stock female characters act like bi-polar blow-up dolls and saddle them with…

That was surprisingly slick. I'm sure it's a common practice as it is, but more artists taking a sabbatical to recharge their creative batteries would be great to see (and hear).

I would get carpal tunnel thrice as fast playing on a Keyboard and mouse, moving only in four direction with the mouse turning me and all that. I'm actually pretty darn good with my 360 controller in an FPS, I like to think.