These type of strategy games always ramp up my anxiety levels, so I'm equally dreading and excited for Fire Emblem next week. I hate losing characters and will be making liberal use of soft reset. Until then I'll be finishing up Metroid: Zero Mission. It's my first time with it and is a great example of what a…

I work at a college library where this book is a course reserve. I read it when I'm early to work. It's fascinating and makes me relieved that I'm no longer on the dating scene.

Metroid: Zero Mission Never played it before, but heard it was a great makeover of the original NES Metroid game. Which turned out to be true. It's fun, breezy and definitely less obtuse than I remember the original being.

A relative of mine made the writing team for Full Frontal with Samantha Bee and it's exciting to see the reviews for the premiere have been very positive. It's also surreal seeing someone you know on national television.

As long as either of those two elements are blended well into the game, I'm all for it.

Speaking of ignoring schoolwork. I love me some chore based games (i.e. Harvest Moon) and am wanting to delve back into the genre. Do the 3DS players out there have any strong feelings for/against the likes of Story of Seasons, Rune Factory 4, or Fantasy Life?

I am this close from being done with school and cannot wait to reach that Fluka state of mind. There is nothing worse than wanting to relax with a game but constantly feeling the guilty tug of homework obligations the whole time.

I made it about halfway through Lincoln, not far really. Those chase sequences? "Hold 'em off, Joel, while I unlock this thing"
I'd die 10 times attempting to take on everyone, only to realize the obstacle had been opened 5 seconds later. It's like I kept flubbing my lines in what was supposed to be a well…

I'll admit the fumbling aesthetic were a nice detail. But it's supposedly been 20 years since the outbreak. How is Joel not the Solid Snake of this world by now?

Speaking as someone who has only played the demo. Is Bravely Default worth the purchase with (from what sounds like) a long repetitious endgame fetch-quest?

That last SM3DW level? Brutal. It took me a Racoon-suited Peach run to accomplish, but it's firmly in the win column now. So let us never speak of it again.

Well, I tried with The Last Of Us, I really did. But I found I wasn't having any fun. The characters were engaging and the story certainly compelling. The controls and combat, however, were a never ending stream of me botching the stealth, flailing in close combat, and somehow equipping the bow during multi-enemy…

Hear, hear. My cousin is a writer on this show and I'd love nothing more than to see them knock it out of the park. Here's hoping they have an online viewing option so I can actually watch it.

Playing Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga. It's been a while, but I had forgotten the silly Italian MIDI gibberish the titular characters use throughout the game. Good fun.

Funny how that works. I remember doing the same thing. "Everyone must learn Drain, even though I never cast it and I only receive 1x exp (out of the 100 needed) per battle per person." But somehow Gau's list was never even a consideration for me.

A lot of great reminiscing about a great game here. My two cents:

My only (minor) gripe about SM3DW were the occassional semi-static camera angles during some of the more precise platforming levels. That being said I recently beat the last level of the game and it was the most challenging/rewarding experience I've had in a while.

I just finished a DQV run through for the first time on DS and I hear you on the sparse feeling throughout the game. It was hard to feel connected to the characters when you spend a large portion of time with monsters on your team.

12 days later…sorry missed your response. I think that Witcher and Transistor attempt that fine balance between micro-managed turn based decision making mixed with precisely timed action inputs. Those used to the reflexive fluidity of, say, Bloodborne might find the paused action jarring and vice-versa for RPG…

Out of sheer serendipity I discovered that Julien Baker (whose sparse, beautiful album Sprained Ankle I'd highly recommend) was playing within walking distance for cheap this weekend. She sounded as great live as she does on her album. I even got to speak with her in person at the merch table AND she signed my CD.