One nice feature I found was that, while the standard battles aren't tough (through Chapter 2 at least), some of the challenge battles have you lose if a single unit gets defeated. I've lost those a bunch, so it seems like it may be an implementation of Nintendo's classic "as hard as you'd like it to be" difficulty…

I'm shocked at how well TP aged. I had barely played any Zelda games before 2015, and played TPHD as though it was an entirely new game, as I'd skipped over it (excepting an hour or two of play) when it was originally released in 2006. I actually felt that TPHD could have been released in 2016 for how modern it felt.

I actually didn't take away a "realistic" vibe from it, though I could see people having that impression. As @DrFlimFlam:disqus points out, it's fairly surreal and humorous throughout. The biggest reason it got pegged as realistic is that the preceding game was an especially heightened visual style, so any return to…

I'll stand up for the Silent Realm over the Tears of Light. In the former, at least, there was this cool sense of dread and the requirement to complete your task in a timely manner or face nightmarish consequences (visually speaking; the actual mechanic, as you say, is just making the player replay that section).

Then enjoy this li'l webcomic: http://thepunchlineismachis…

Oh my goodness, enjoy yourself. I just caught up on Skyward Sword last… November, I think, and it's a marvel. There are very good reasons that it has a divisive reputation, but on balance I found it one of the strongest games in the series, narratively, aesthetically, and mechanically. Be sure to share your…

Pun upvote!

I love Adam Jensen in DEHR largely because of his painfully gruff, super white loner characteristics. He's a parody played straight. Don't get me wrong, I don't think this was intentional. I just can't help but crack up at his whole shtick.

WHAT?! They did that? But that was, like, the only defining feature of DEHR's aesthetic. Otherwise it's just generic-looking. Ugh, who could possibly have green-lit (ha ha) that idea?

I'm so on the fence about this. I thought I'd like smartphone gaming, but have never gotten into it. This is attributable to a couple of things, one of which you stated above - not wanting to zone out in public - and one of which is the input mechanism: a lack of buttons rather annoys me, but maybe I'm old. All of…

I'm sorry for your loss. That's so tough, and I'm glad you and your buddies will be gathering to cherish the memories this weekend.

I can barely contain how excited I am for that Switch. March can't come soon enough!

I like to think that the developers simulated realistic fishing, just the style of fishing that bears do rather than the style of fishing that humans do. Like, maybe they just let a bear design that portion of the game.

That'll be a problem, haha. It's something of a resource-hog, so I wouldn't recommend it without some fancy-pants machine anyway.

I'm curious too - it's always hard to tell at the beginning, by design. The game does offer the ability to continue a fight after you've lost, giving all of your characters full health and having the battle go on from the point your last person fell; this, of course, costs orbs. I tried it once last night.

Huh, that's promising. I do remember hearing that DeNA would be handling Nintendo mobile titles, but I don't remember the specifics. It would be impressive if they've so successfully interpreted a Nintendo property, much as Capcom did with Minish Cap in the 2000s.

Have you tried Ghost of a Tale? It's a PC Early Access game, but it's functionally finished with more content simply being added later. I loved it, as it's a combination of stealth gameplay with a Redwall-esque fairy tale aesthetic.

I've been holding out on it with the hope that the hard copy trilogy gets sold in the US. I had the original on my old 3DS (now my wife's 3DS), haven't played the second, and am excited for the third title in the series. Word is that a physical hard copy, with a BoxBoy Amiibo, is being published in Japan. That would…

As a matter of principle, I don't care for F2P games. I've played a couple that I've liked - Hearthstone, Pokemon GO, and now Fire Emblem - but I think the design philosophy is inherently broken.

Lucky you on Lyn - I summoned two characters who I've never seen before, so I assume they were either in non-Westernized Fire Emblem games, the one on DS that I never played, or are shrouded in the mists of my memories regarding the GBA Fire Emlbem titles. Or they were in a game I played and they died so fast that I…