"Take the World"

Simply a place for a twenty-something who enjoys losing himself in virtual worlds to share his personal thoughts, experiences and opinions on video games.

[unboundedworlds]

[12/10/17] Couple new pages added. Persona 5 trophy list & October's releases. (also cute new SAO stickers for the book covers)

[unboundedworlds]

-Persona 5- [11.10.17]

Also currently playing: Stardew Valley, Dragon Quest VIII, Destiny 2

[For the most part this will be spoiler free, though I will be talking a little about the end-game and ending but I’ll make sure to stick up a spoiler warning in advance.]

It took me way too long but I finally got around to finishing this game, and I’m so glad I did. I’m a huge fan of the Persona series (from 3 onward - I’m yet to play SMT Persona or fully complete Innocent Sin), first playing Persona 4 Golden in 2014 before going back and playing Persona 3 Portable, and now Persona 5. While I’ve played a fair share of them now, I’m still reasonably new to JRPGs so I’m by no means good at the games, but even so I was able to beat and get an incredible amount of enjoyment out of all three entries. This wont be a review of the game, just a basic overview and my thoughts and feelings about my time with the game. 

Persona 5′s fundamental mechanics are similar to what you’d be used to from Persona 3 and 4. Like the previous two games, you’ll be spending half your time in modern day reality, meeting new people and forming bonds, working part-time jobs and attending school etc., and the other half of your time you’ll spend raiding Palaces (this game’s dungeons) where you’ll need to fight Shadows and levelling up your party members and Personas. That’s a very (very) basic summary of the gameplay. One of the biggest reasons you’ll pick up a Persona game is for it’s story and the connections you as the player/protagonist make with the people you meet in this world.

I absolutely loved this game’s world and all of the characters you get to meet and bond with throughout the game. All the characters are unique, interesting, memorable and all have very distinct personalities, storylines and troubles that the player can assist them in overcoming should you choose to. This game took me roughly 131 hours on a completely blind playthrough to reach the true ending, and in that time you find yourself truly connecting with these characters and genuinely caring about them and how their stories are going to turn out. As with all Persona games, there’s degree of sadness to be had from finishing the games as you’ll no longer be able to go into that world and continue bonding with and helping these characters you’d spent so long getting to know. However, since it’s very tricky to max out all Confidants (known as Social-Links in the previous games) in your first blind run, this adds a lot of replayability to the game as in a second or third playthrough you can spend time with people you perhaps didn’t have time to in your first playthrough.

I wont talk too much about the gameplay as I’ve already briefly covered how the game plays, but I have to mention about how polished and great the game feels to play, both in the RPG parts and the real world parts. Navigating the real world has convenient ways of quickly getting to all the various locations, while exploring dungeons both in and out of combat feels smooth and brilliantly made. Movement, the (simple but effective) stealth system and combat all feel better than they ever have before, and flow seamlessly between one-another, making both dungeon exploration and fighting Shadows extremely enjoyable. I can’t talk for the prior games, but combat from Persona 3 onward has always been extremely satisfying, intense and just damn fun, and that doesn’t change here. In fact it’s only enhanced with the addition of the newly introduced Gun, Psychic and Nuclear damage types, alongside a vast new selection of moves and skills your Personas can learn, and the reintroduced Demon/Shadow negotiation system from Persona 2 (and possibly 1?). All in all, Persona 5′s gameplay is seriously incredible and such a blast to play. I never once found myself getting burnt out from playing this game, and that has a tendency to happen to me with RPGs.

This is getting pretty long so I’ll quickly cover just a couple more areas. I especially want to talk about Persona 5′s presentation because, even after finishing the game and putting 131 hours into it, everything about it still blows me away. The 3D modelling, animations and locations all look incredible, the game’s art style is (in my opinion) damn near flawless, and following the Persona trend it has an absolutely wonderful soundtrack. While in general I think I still prefer P4′s OST, this game’s soundtrack definitely comes very close, especially with certain tracks. (That final boss theme though. ‘Rivers in the Desert’, if you’re interested in giving it a listen.)

[This paragraph will contain brief spoilers] I wont talk about this game’s story itself as it’s huge and long and great but I’m v lazy. I did really, really enjoy the story of this game though, and as you approach the end it only gets better and better. A slight worry I had for the first portion of the game was that I didn’t feel like a whole lot was at stake, unlike in Persona 3 and 4. It didn’t feel like the work the Phantom Thieves (your team) were doing really had any large scale impact. That worry subsided the more I played the game though. As you progress the team will start to tackle bigger and bigger tasks, and start making much more of an impact to society and the world around them. ESPECIALLY at the end. While your first job is to tackle a corrupt teacher, the finalé has you fight through a twisted, distorted reality in which you end up fighting a literal God. And it was SO great. So yeah, I think my early game worries definitely got resolved. Also, some of the scenes after the final boss had me crying my eyes out for hours, so if you get emotional over fictional stories like me then be prepared. (Still not quite as bad as Persona 3′s ending hit me, though. *tears up*) [Spoilers stop here]

I’ve gone on way long enough already so I’ll wrap up here.

This and the previous two Persona games are very, very special to me for many reasons, and I’m so glad Persona 5 was able to live up to the incredibly high standards Persona 3 and especially 4 had set. I’m yet to grab the platinum trophy for Persona 4 Golden, but I have full intentions to go back to Persona 5 one day for another playthough or two to see if I can get myself this game’s platinum too. I’d recommend this game to anyone, it’s such a blast to experience. This isn’t something I’d usually do or plan to continue doing, but if I had to give Persona 5 a rating it would definitely hit 9.5/10, as with Persona 3 and 4. These games are great. Real great.

[unboundedworlds]

-The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (3D)- [09.06.17] Also currently playing: Final Fantasy IV, Ace Attorney, Infamous: Second Son Within the past year or so I finally got around to playing Zelda: Ocarina of Time and more recently Majora's Mask. While I'm a huge fan of the series, the first Nintendo console I ever owned was an original DS, followed by the Wii, so I was never able to play OoT, MM, Wind Waker etc. for the older systems. Because of this, my introduction to the Zelda series was Twilight Princess for Wii and since then I've tried to grab and play as many games from the series as possible. I've made myself a checklist as I intend to play every main-title Zelda game eventually, when I do I'll probably write about my favourite and least titles were and why. For now though I want to talk a little about Majora's Mask as, what started off as a game I really struggled to get into eventually hooked me until I'd cleared the game 100%. If you've played MM you'll know that this game differs from most other entries in the series in many ways, from the theme, setting and the overall formula and structure of the game. For a start Link isn't even exploring Hyrule in this game, but a new land called Termina. Following this, neither Zelda nor Ganon have any part in this story whatsoever (bar a tiny flashback of Zelda right at the start of the game), and in fact I'm not entirely sure the Triforce was mentioned even once through this story. Instead of saving Hyrule/the world from Ganon, Link must save Termina(/the world) from the Moon that is but 72 hours from crashing into the planet. A Moon that has a giant evil face. Because uh... reasons, I guess? This Moon is being controlled by Majora's Mask which is possessing and using the Skull Kid as it's puppet (a cute little character you may recognise from a side quest in Oot). The story is deeper than that but that's a brief overview. I love the classic and more formulaic Zelda games, but one of the reasons I love this game so much is because it wasn't afraid to break away from a large portion of that formula. One of the biggest pulls for me was its sinister, horror-esque and downright creepy themes and undertones. The game may be creepy enough with its presentation, but look a little deeper into the lore and theories and this game seems to just keep getting darker, especially for a Zelda/Nintendo game. Most of the game will have you transforming into different races/beings using Masks that... pretty much contain the soul of a recently deceased member of that race? Yeah. Dark. Creepy. COOL. Unlike almost every other Zelda game, Majora's Mask's main story actually takes a huge backseat for the majority of the game about an hour or two in. Sure you can boot up the game and play beginning to end focusing pretty much purely on the main quest and ignoring everything else, but everything else is really where the bulk of the game lies. Thus game is full of side-quests and all kinds of mini events, and for the most part this is where the main mechanic of travelling back in time to reset the 3 day cycle comes into play. Almost every NPC has their own schedule and will be doing different things depending on the day and time, and most of the side quests revolve around meeting the right person or doing the right thing at the right place at the right time. Personally these side quests and collecting all 24 of the various masks in the game were what really made this game stand out to me. Mechanically the game plays and feels like a Zelda game, but it's so much more than that. Everything from the visual style, to the characters, to the masks and their unique mechanics to the games incredible soundtrack make this definitely one of my favourite Zelda games I've played to date. As mentioned before it did take me a fair amount of time to actually get into the game, this was because of the initially intimidating and daunting 'time limit' mechanic, but once you've spent enough time figuring out how it all works, the game becomes an absolute joy to experience. Considering I unfortunately wasn't the biggest fan of Ocarina of Time, I'm super glad I was able to enjoy this title as much as I did.

[unboundedworlds]

Sojiro: Fine, keep the damn cat, but don't let it in my sight.

Morgana: Nyan.

Sojiro: (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ KITTY

[unboundedworlds]

-Horizon Zero Dawn- [09.03.17]

Also currently playing: Final Fantasy XIII, Ace Attorney, Steins;Gate, Nioh

Surprise surprise, I’m still playing Horizon. I added a few extra pictures today as I meant to make another post before this but never got around to it, oop. I’ve played 37 hours of this game now and it’s still got me pretty hooked. I’m still loving the world, the exploration and discovery aspect and the combat in this game - almost 40 hours in and I’m not even starting to get tired of any of it.

So far the main story is still decent (though admittedly I’m still yet to progress in it much, maybe I’ll make a post focusing on the story in the future), but the side missions are still lacking in my opinion. Ashly Burch, the voice actress of the main character, Aloy, does an absolutely fantastic job with capturing Aloy’s personality and emotions throughout the game. The same can be said about some of the other important characters. However I’ve still been noticing that the voice acting of some of the less important npcs, such as side quest-givers, isn’t always so great. I’ve also personally found that some of the side quests themselves are pretty generic and predictable. However despite this I’m still enjoying the game as a whole enough that I’m currently planning on clearing the game 100%, so these issues aren’t taking away from the experience too much.

A lot of the enjoyment I get from this game comes from exploring and discovering the breathtaking views and locations in the world. One minute you can be wandering by the side of a small pond next to a cute little hut in the middle of the woods, and the next minute scrambling up the side of a mountain beside a waterfall, or standing atop a towering cliff overlooking the game world’s largest city - Meridian (see above images). The variety of environments make the world beautiful, and the constantly changing weather and day/night cycle make exploring this world an absolute joy. Oh… and, the whole giant robot slaying part of the game is fun too… I just thought I’d take a different look at the game this time… :3

Thats all I have to say on Horizon for the moment. The next post will almost certainly not be about Horizon, as tomorrow I -should- be receiving a Nintendo Switch through the post, so I expect I’ll throw up my first impressions of the console itself then. I’ll be grabbing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild for the console soon too, however that’s out of stock literally everywhere at the moment, so instead I’ll probably write a little about my experiences with Neir: Automata, as I should also be receiving a copy of that tomorrow too. c:

[unboundedworlds]

-Horizon Zero Dawn- [05.03.17]

Also currently playing: Final Fantasy XIII, Ace Attorney, Steins;Gate, Nioh

At this point I’ve sank a solid 23+ hours into this game so I feel like I’m able to give more of a solid opinion of this game now, despite still feeling as though I’ve only seen a speck of what the game has to offer. I’m still loving it. This game still has my full attention for many many reasons including its super engaging gameplay, (so far) pretty decent story and brilliantly thought out and interesting world. I’ll keep the graphics praise to a minimum this time since I spoke a lot about it in my last post, though the visuals still impress me to no end.

Since I’ve played a fair bit more of the game now I’ve started to come across different types of landscapes, ranging from snowy mountains under constant snowfall and occasional blizzards, to giant sandy canyons and valleys, to lush green forests and fields scattered with ruins from the old, ‘metal world’. In the ¾ hours I played today I found that I barely progressed with any quests or side quests as most of the time I was enjoying myself enough just exploring different locations, finding collectibles, battling dozens of varied yet equally intimidating robotic beasts and speaking with all kinds of npcs and learning their stories. This game is full of lorebooks and data logs scattered around the world that do a great job of explaining all sorts of things you may want to know about the game world/history.

Though I’ve been doing nothing but praising this game so far (deservedly so), I have noticed a few things that aren’t quite so great. First of all, I’ve found that the voice acting can be a little hit and miss, at times, especially during specific side missions. Alongside this, character facial animations/body movements during dialogue can seem a little clunky and... robotic, for lack of a better word. These two factors can definitely break immersion when you’re playing as they can be pretty noticeable sometimes. For the most part it’s not too bad, though. The only other negative point that’s really stuck out to me so far is the occasional instance of glitched lighting. Most of the time the lighting is drop dead gorgeous, whether you’re travelling by moonlight, in the setting sun during the evening, or walking around a town at night, lit up only by torches and bonfires. However, the issue comes when you’re in wide open spaces with the shadows of distant mountains cast out in front of you by the setting/rising sun. Occasionally when you look around, or in the opposite direction, these shadows will vanish and the entire area will be lit up by the sun for a second, presumably because the mountains behind you aren’t being rendered (I hope I explained that well enough!). This again can be immersion breaking, however realistically it is just a nitpick, it’s just something I’ve noticed several times when out exploring.

That’s pretty much all I have to say on this game for the moment, though as I’m still diving head first into it I’m sure I’ll have more to say soon. I’ll definitely get into talking about other games soon, too. This game specifically just so happens to be eating all my time at the moment :). (no really it’s tied me down and is forcing me to play it constantly send hel- )

[unboundedworlds]

-Horizon Zero Dawn-

I’d been looking forward to this game ever since it was announced way back when, so I was super excited to go out and grab a copy two days ago when it released (March 1st ‘17). I’ve put around 10-12 hours into the game so far and dear god I’m enjoying it so so much.

For an open world sandboxy kinda game it doesn’t do a whole lot new, but what it does do it does brilliantly as far as I’m concerned. Exploration feels great, climbing/platforming segments feel smooth and not at all clunky, combat feels satisfying and intense even when taking on the most basic of enemies, and the game as a whole feels beautifully crafted and put together.

So far there are many things I love about this game and, while it doesn’t affect gameplay in any way, the graphics and visuals simply blow me away. Graphics don’t make a game, however a good, consistent art style can really improve the experience of playing a game. This game has exactly that. I’m playing on a base PS4, not a Pro, but even so the visuals are just stunning. The fact that the game runs at 30fps doesn’t take away from this at all, either. There’s even a ‘Photo Mode’ accessible through the pause menu at any time during gameplay, this allows you to angle the camera and play with all sorts of cool effects allowing for great looking screenshots. The photos above were taken using this feature.

Very very impressed by this game so far but as previously mentioned I’m only a few hours into the game, and I’ve only explored a tiny portion of its map, so I expect I’ll be finding new things and posting about this game more in the future!

[unboundedworlds]

New blog~

Here I’ll be posting various things all relating to games I’m currently playing or interested in. There won’t be any particular structure, rhyme or reason to anything, it’ll all be very casual and lighthearted, as I am in no way a reviewer or writer of any sort.

This is purely a place for me to share my experiences in the games I play and talk about anything and everything related to video games that peaks my interest. c: