I get what you’re saying about fandoms being insufferable - anime, Star Wars, video games, Radiohead (all things I enjoy, btw) - but I still find it far-fetched to claim that a relatively small group of people destroyed this show. If it was actually good and/or appealed to a large audience, I strongly doubt Netflix…

FFT is awesome...if you’ve never played Shining Force, Vandal Hearts, Tactics Ogre, Advance Wars or Fire Emblem.  I’d say it’s my favorite game with “Final Fantasy” in the title on PlayStation, but as far as SRPGs go, it’s kinda middle of the road.

This is a great pick, both because the music is really well-composed and programmed, and because the game itself is great, neither of which needed to be true for this project.  Treasure could have phoned this in but they didn’t, and the fact that they somehow developed this at the same time as Gunstar Heroes, which is…

I’d heard of Firewatch but had no idea what kind of game it was. Looks pretty cool, will definitely be picking it up at some point. And to find out about the hidden platformer and its awesome music - what an awesome bonus feature! Thanks again for putting me up on amazing game stuff!

This is the best thing I’ve read in years, and totally necessary.  Thank you.

“Still, I’d rather have messy, imperfect personal art—the multimillion dollar hubris of a man that nobody could say no to—over the “let’s just hit the reset button and make it up as we go” sequel trilogy any day of the week.”

I feel the same way but for a different reason: I couldn’t get into Bastion or Transistor.  I’ve literally heard nothing but good things about Hades, but I have serious doubts about whether or not I’ll enjoy it because I can’t seem to get on Supergiant’s wavelength.

Wow, I completely forgot that even existed. Thanks for re-activating those long dormant brain cells; might have to redownload this one and give it a go.

I think it looks like Once Upon A Time in Mexico, so I’d say we’re better off.

Somehow I didn’t know about this, but my life is much better off because of it.  Thank you.

I know I’m late to the party (as usual), but I was digging around in the crates at a semi-local record store a while back and found this really cool-looking LP from a band called Starcastle. I decided to buy it since it was only like six bucks and it turned out to be pretty good ‘70s-era progressive rock from a band…

Yeah, can definitely see how this “inspired” Zelda’s music, haha.  But also this is a phenomenal track, so thanks for putting me up on it.

I remember wanting a NUON-enabled DVD player specifically to play this game but I think the format was still new and the machines a little too pricey back then so I never ended up getting one.  Very cool to come across someone who actually played T3K on that format.

Thanks for the recommendation, will definitely check it out!

Thanks for turning me on to oprainfall, had never heard of them before and I’d been looking for something like this for a while.

Xenogears, along with Final Fantasy Tactics, really changed my idea of what video game narratives could achieve. I’ve never played anything else by Monolith, but now I’m amped to check out their stuff, even Disaster: Day of Crisis. Thanks for this excellent piece, hope to see more of this kind of writing in the future.

Starred for “Freudian philosophy and 90's-ass anime art style.”  I feel like this needs to be come a JRPG subgenre like right now.

Another great selection and write-up. I love Silpheed despite being fully aware of its mediocrity, and the music is probably a big part of that. Really dig all the technical info in these articles, too. Ever considered doing a Game Music 101-type piece that explains some of the basic concepts, like FM, PCM and…

I still have my copy of the Ninja Gaiden entry in the Worlds of Power series!  I vaguely remember the Blaster Master and Castlevania II books, and apparently they also did ones for Metal Gear and Wizards and Warriors.

This might be the coolest story I have ever heard.