Fallout 4's Strengths and Weaknesses as a Fallout Game

Warning: This rant is long, and it is filled with Fallout fanaticism. Like, really long, really filled. If you don’t love this series passionately, then do not expect to care a lot.



The Fallout series is, overall, a highly loved and appreciated one by gamers far and wide. And for good reason! Every (canon) installment of the series to date has been fantastic, and 3 of its 5 installments are on my list of the Greatest RPGs, with the other 2 titles very close to making said list. Every time I update that rant, they very nearly make it on there; in fact, if I were to extend it even a single spot more than its current 25, Fallout 1 would be on it to join 3, 4, and New Vegas.

Funnily enough, though, as uniformly excellent as the series is, there are still a lot of hardcore fans who will insist that a certain installment isn’t up to code, and, in fact, sucks. Some of the oldest fans hate Fallout 3 and point to New Vegas as a ‘true’ successor to the legacy Fallout 1 and 2 created. Others eschew Fallout: New Vegas for similar reasons, insisting that its feel and aesthetic is overrated, inferior to the new vision that Bethesda had for the series with Fallout 3. Others insist that the games never should have lost the turn-based grid style of the first 2 installments. And so on and so forth.

Such hotly contested debates seem wholly ridiculous to me. I mean, honestly? The quality of the Fallout series is so consistent that the differences from 1 title to the next (with the exception of the transition from 2 to 3, I guess) in terms of aesthetic, characters, and storytelling style are so small that it seems like a bunch of people screaming at each other not about whether apples are better than oranges, but rather whether red delicious apples are better than honeycrisp apples. Fallout 3 has a more epic story with more moments of greater emotional weight, Fallout: New Vegas has better characters and more meaningful choices to be made, Fallout 3 has a wider and more significant view of humanity and American culture, Fallout: New Vegas has more thoughtful themes of culture and historical metaphors, both of them lack the lonely post-apocalyptic creativity of the first Fallout, yet the true aesthetic and soul of the setting is only achieved by the later games, Fallout 2 is the one that established some of the most fundamentally essential parts of the series’s historical lore...and on, and on. But while each installment has certain aspects that it does best, what’s really important, what really makes each Fallout title excellent, remains present and powerful: the setting’s hold over us, the engaging characters and situations, the creative plots and lore, the ambient storytelling, and most importantly, the examination of American culture, and humanity as a whole. Regardless of how crisp and sweet/sour you like your apple, they’re all tasty regardless, and they all make great desserts.

So, naturally, Fallout 4 has its set of fan detractors. I work with one, in fact. The guy has logged something like 500 hours on the game, and insists that it’s the weakest installment yet. His reasons for thinking this are valid, although I disagree with him that they’re enough to put it at the bottom of the list. But while I do see some folks who say that Fallout 4 is the worst of the series for such-and-such reason, as I see folks say about every Fallout offering, I don’t actually see many people who say the opposite. Usually there’s some balance--about as many people who say Fallout 3 is the best as there are who say Fallout: New Vegas is better and that 3 was trash, about as many people who insist that the original Fallouts were the only true ones as people who say they weren’t any good, etc. But while lots of people obviously loved Fallout 4, there don’t seem to be all that many staunchly defending it or noting what it does better than its peers. Well, maybe they have better things to do with their time.

I obviously don’t.

So, what I want to do today--yes, the real rant is only now starting, a full page after you started reading it, and yes, I am a bastard--is to speak on what I think Fallout 4 does really well, and where it’s weaker than its peers. It’s been done by many for the rest of the series, so why not put something out there to give it a similar treatment? But I do this with the understanding that Fallout, every (canon) Fallout, is excellent. Fallout 4 here is not the only excellent one just because it has certain traits below that it does better than the rest. And it is not the only bad one because it has certain characteristics below that the others do better. These, to me, are just its special qualities.

Alright, so, first of all, I think Fallout 4 really raised the bar in terms of ambient storytelling. Now, ambient storytelling--as in, letting the settings and supporting data and lore tell tales as you explore, creating a litany of stories of life against which the main plot is stitched onto--is a feature of the Fallout series already, and damn if Fallout 3 and New Vegas don’t do a great job with it. But Fallout 4’s ambient storytelling is...well, it’s just frankly amazing! So much careful thought and detail went into the Commonwealth and its history in this game that it’s staggering once you start piecing it all together. And I daresay most players won’t even realize half of it as they go along, simply because it’s so subtly in the background that it’s sort of like the details of life itself--like passing a person on the street and thinking nothing of the fact that they have an entire lifetime of history propelling them forward, intersecting with your own for just a single, thoughtless moment.

It’s like...you can gather stories of the people of the Commonwealth from the computer entries they’ve made, the vocal records they’ve left, even just their skeletal remains’ location and surroundings. That’s true of any Fallout. But this game ratchets up just how much of that occurs, and it begins to carefully interconnect the many, many tales of the Commonwealth together far more than the ambient storytelling of the Capital Wasteland or the New Vegas area did. For an example...Nick Valentine has a quest in which you track down Eddie Winters, an infamous prewar mob boss, right? And, understandably, traces of Eddie’s influence on the prewar Commonwealth can be found here and there through the game where appropriate; you don’t just encounter stuff about him for Nick’s quest and nothing else. Well, 1 of the connections Winters has to other parts of the Commonwealth is Wicked Shipping, a local shipping company whose warehouse HQ you can find as you roam around. Now, it was established (prewar, remember; this is all in the past) that Winters had an arrangement with Wicked Shipping in which they’d secretly deliver some of the radioactive waste that they were paid to transport to him, instead of where it was supposed to go. This is because, as discovered through Nick’s personal quest, Eddie figured out how to become a ghoul long before the nukes made the creatures common.

So here’s the thing: at the Wicked Shipping warehouse, you can find a manifest for the shipments they were making the morning that the bombs dropped, involving 4 trucks. And if you follow up on this manifest, you will find, indeed, that 3 of those trucks are near the areas of the Commonwealth that they were supposed to be making deliveries to, and you can loot them using the key you find in the warehouse. But, 1 of those trucks is not where it should be--it’s nowhere even near its manifest’s destination. Instead, you find this missing Wicked Shipping truck near a location in the Commonwealth that was a part of Eddie Winters’s operations! This, then, is the truck that secretly delivered the radioactive materials to him, instead of where they were supposed to go (as indicated by the manifest). No tape, document, or computer entry spells this out for you, and unless you’re familiar both with every tiny detail of Eddie Winters from Nick’s sidequest AND the details of Wicked Shipping’s manifests and history--which you have no game-given reason to be, as it’s not part of any quest--you’d never think twice about this truck’s location. And yet, here this tiny, background connection between a quest and a small part of prewar lore sits, its placement unassuming, unobtrusive, and yet carefully considered by the writers.

That’s the sort of thing I mean when I say that Fallout 4’s ambient storytelling is off-the-charts excellent. There is so much subtle detail and thought put into the stories of its locations and the way all their histories and events interconnect across this huge chunk of Massachusetts that you can explore. It’s humbling to know that the writers could keep track of themselves this thoughtfully. And the sad thing is that unless you’re looking for it--really, really looking for it--most of this care and attention to details will pass you by. Who would look upon that Wicked Shipping truck with anything more than a glance for loot upon finding it? Who would remember the missing truck on this manifest--if they bothered to search for the trucks it lists to begin with--strongly enough to realize, finding it perhaps dozens of hours later, that there is a purpose to its seeming misplacement?

And that’s just 1 connection made through Wicked Shipping! The fact that they’re transporting radioactive waste also connects to a whole branch of lore points regarding the companies that were polluting the Commonwealth before the bombs dropped. By no means is Eddie Winters the only substantial part of Fallout 4’s lore interconnected with this small company whose warehouse looks for all the world to be a one-and-done explorable location.

I’d also like to note that the thoughtful detail of the ambient storytelling of Fallout 4 isn’t just limited to side content and exploration--it does also affect and enhance the main story’s components, too, often so subtly that one might not realize it. Take, for example, the terminology of the Institute. It doesn’t take too sharp an eye and ear to realize, after listening around the Institute for a while, that these self-important dickwads use terminology as a weapon of oppression. By absolutely always insisting on referring to Synths as machines, by calling changes to their personality ‘debugging’ rather than ‘brainwashing’ and procedures to fix or better physical attributes of the Synths ‘upgrades’ rather than ‘surgeries,’ the Institute uses vocabulary to distance themselves from their creations in order to keep their members away from considering the ethical implications of their new slave race. After all, saying that a Synth’s growing wish for freedom is a bug in his code is much more palatable and less likely to raise moral red flags than expressing the exact same idea as a flaw in his personality.

Now, here’s the thing: this is an important characteristic of the Institute faction that you can easily glean from talks with Father and other Institute members, overheard conversations between Institute scientists, and journal entries you read. But there are actually a lot of small details nearby and around this specific subject that strengthen this point and support your suspicion that the Institute’s using the same trick as dirty politicians and totalitarian communities. One small, easily missed, but exceptionally significant detail relating to this idea, for example, is found in the recording of Kellogg’s operation to put the implant in his head. During the procedure, an Institute scientist mentions how pleased the group is with him for having brought them the ‘genetic material.’ Kellogg, either unsure of what they mean or, more likely, not impressed with their use of vocabulary to evade self-awareness, clarifies that what they mean is the child he kidnapped from the protagonist (Nora/Nate’s son, Shaun). The Institute scientist acknowledges that Kellogg is right, but still refers (now pointedly, I think) to Shaun only as the ‘DNA sample.’

Now, this part of the conversation accomplishes a direct purpose in giving you an idea of the time period in which the recording was made. But it also establishes very clearly that the Institute likes to morally distance itself from the things it does that are ethically questionable. Instead of admitting that they stole a child, the way Kellogg does (he, at least, is honest with himself about his monstrosity), they insist on only referring to Shaun at that time by his value, scientifically, to Kellogg. They distance themselves from the unethical actions they’ve taken, by using terms that lack humanity. It’s telling about their character overall, but it is also a very strong confirmation of any suspicion you might have that the way they refer to and regard Synths is more propaganda than it is fact. If they refused to acknowledge the humanity of the child they kidnapped in order to keep themselves from questioning their actions, they’d certainly do the same of the people they’d created to be slaves. A few little lines, contained within a different part of the lore of the Institute, provides a wealth of information and understanding to a major faction of the game, and puts the entirety of that faction’s dialogue into question, opening new avenues of understanding to us as the audience about the Synth question. Again, very skillful ambient storytelling, subtle but substantial, small enough that you might not notice it, large enough that it’s a damning piece of evidence against any theory for taking the Institute’s terminology as legitimate.

If you would like to get to know some more of Fallout 4’s unparalleled ambient storytelling excellence, I reluctantly recommend Oxhorn’s Youtube channel, particularly his playlist for Fallout 4 lore. Although you'll find if you do a little digging that Oxhorn is not a great human being on a personal level, there's no denying that the guy has put an amazing amount of time, observation, and thought into this game and series, and even though I pride myself on being meticulous in my explorations of these games, there are a few occasions in which he makes me look like a bumbling doofus with his ability to suss out details and connections, extrapolate likely theories, and even explore the ethical ramifications of the game’s decisions and cast. I know his video lists look daunting, but if you love this series and want to truly know and appreciate the painstaking effort its creators put into crafting its every detail, you will want to check this guy’s channel out.

So, another thing I really appreciate about Fallout 4 is its cast. Now, I’ll definitely give Fallout: New Vegas full credit for having the best companions with the most depth and originality--almost no one in any other Fallout compares to Veronica, Boone, Raul, or the whole Dead Money bunch--but to be fair, party members are not the only part of the character equation. They’re the most important, yes, and in most games, they’re all that really matters with the cast...but in the case of Fallout, the size and importance of the Fallout world means that the NPCs who inhabit it are actually very important parts of its storytelling. And in that sense, I think that Fallout 4 is very on-point. The plot-relevant people of the Commonwealth stand out and have memorable and engaging personalities, to an extent more than any Fallout game before this. Every Fallout’s full of singular entities you meet along your travels, but it just feels like more of them are more personable and memorable in this game.

And hey, maybe Fallout: New Vegas has the best companions of the series, but Fallout 4 is actually pretty close behind. A good half of its party members are nuanced, interesting characters, and I have to say, as far as unique appeal, they’ve got all the other games put together beat. Piper, Codsworth, Hancock, and Curie are all terrifically likable individuals, and Deacon is (heresy incoming) even more appealing than Veronica was. And then there’s Nick Valentine, who is just the fucking best dude ever, and the 1 other Fallout companion who stands at the same level of quality as a character as the best that New Vegas can offer. And as far as villains...Fallout 4 has the best of the series. I’d weigh Elder Maxson against Presidents Eden and Richardson any day, Kellogg makes for a much more threatening and interesting personal antagonist than Autumn or Horrigan, and Father easily outperforms Caesar. Only The Master from the first game is as compelling as any of the Fallout 4 villains.

1 more quality to Fallout 4 that I think it stands out especially well on: the protagonist. Look, I know everyone’s got it in their heads that player choice is something inalienable and ultimately important, and everyone gets all in a tizzy the moment they don’t have a dozen different ways for their character to approach the problem of wiping his or her own ass, but...I’m sorry, it needs to be said: player choice isn’t that fucking important. In the grand scheme of things, it really isn’t! It’s great if you can have a lot of choice for who your character is and what they do, but if it gets in the way of a smooth, functional story and purpose, then it isn’t worth it!

There are plenty of RPGs which can pull off a lot of player choice without sacrificing the narrative too strongly (like Fallout: New Vegas, in fact), and that’s great. Some RPGs really bend over backward to make player choice a huge thing but still function as a coherent plot, like The Witcher 2, which is almost 2 games in 1 for allowing the plot to grow around how the player wants to play Geralt. And some RPGs actually manage to make complete player choice a core element of their story and themes, perfectly blending them together, like Undertale. Awesome. But in general, it’s easier to tell the story you want to tell when the protagonist isn’t a completely unknown element in it. That’s why even though we have some simply astonishingly excellent RPGs in the west, the lion’s share of quality RPGs are Japanese in origin (or, in recent years, indie RPGs following JRPG formulas)--because the Japanese aren’t fucking handicapping themselves to give the player the choice to play as serial killers, bigots, and tyrants in every damn title.

So yeah, in Fallout 4, you have considerably less control over what the protagonist says and does. Nowhere NEAR a lack of control, mind you; she/he can still have many different values and usually has at least 2 different ways to respond to stuff, but still, that’s a lot less than the many dialogue trees previous Fallout games have allowed for. Well, frankly...it’s an improvement. Because this more concrete protagonist of Fallout 4 has actual personality traits, regardless of whether she/he is a saint or a monster, and an overall character that comes through thanks to either a great performance by Brian Delaney, or an excellent performance by Courtenay Taylor. The story tailored around the protagonist is more personal and emotionally substantial than any Fallout before, and knowing the protagonist’s history and motivations means that as we explore with her/him through the post-apocalyptic Commonwealth, the events and places we encounter have greater meaning, for we see the tragedy and relief, the regret and the joy, that they cause the protagonist, and understand why they do so. A concrete protagonist also means more compelling friendships and romances with party members, and greater substance for important supporting characters in the story that connect to her/him (notably Kellogg and Father). Whatever personal enmity there was between the Chosen One and Frank Horrigan, or the Lone Wanderer and Colonel Autumn, it had to be largely imagined, for the games were unequipped to really create any sort of emotional relationship between hero and villain. Even the Lone Wanderer’s relationship with James, though present and significant, is largely one-sided, with Liam Neeson’s character doing all the heavy lifting for establishing and selling the father-child relationship. Not the case for the enmity between the Sole Survivor and Kellogg, or the bond between Nora/Nate and Shaun. They’re real and visible from both sides.

You’d never get the tension and anger of Nora/Nate’s confrontation with Kellogg from a variable hero like the Vault Dweller. You’d never get the sweet, warm fuzzies of Piper’s confession of love for Nora or Nate with a malleable main character like the Chosen One. You’d never get the anguish and sorrow of Nora/Nate telling Shaun how disappointed they are with him atop the Cambridge rooftop out of a pliable protagonist like the Lone Wanderer. You’d never get the wistful reminiscing of Nora and Nate about the world as it was from an unknown leading figure like the Courier. Nora and Nate being distinct characters creates atmosphere, injects feeling into the game and the characters that interact with them.*

And hey, maybe it does take away some amount of the player’s ability to choose everything about his/her main character...but even if you count that as a major, core part of Fallout, there’s still a positive to this tradeoff. By establishing Nora and Nate’s personalities and history as prewar citizens, another core aspect of Fallout is enhanced--the comparison it draws between prewar and post-apocalyptic humanity. The unchangeable evil and virtue of humanity is a major part of the Fallout series, particularly its later installments, as its ambient and direct storytelling strive to show us a mirror between prewar and post-apocalyptic--how the idealized, surface-level-perfect 1950s-style society before the war was only a varnish on the darkness in humanity, and how the brutal, violent, twisted world after the apocalypse nonetheless cannot stamp out humanity’s light. Nora/Nate, having come from one and now become instrumental in the other, provides an opportunity to sell this theme of “War (Humanity). War (Humanity) never changes” better than ever before, and the game capitalizes on this quite well, with Nora/Nate having many opportunities to note the similarities and contrasts between both the evils and the virtues of the current world and the one from before.

Now, those are some of Fallout 4’s most important virtues, the ones which make it shine compared to its other family members (not necessarily shine more or less, just differently). I’d also like to point out a couple of its weaknesses, ones which the others of the series don’t suffer from.

First of all, the Synth thing. The defining conflict of Fallout 4 revolves around Synths; you can’t get away from it. Synths are a monumentally important part of the main story, the side stories, and even the ambient storytelling of the game, the heart of its conflicts--the Institute wants to base itself around them, the Minutemen oppose the Institute because of what it does with Synths, the Railroad seeks to rescue Synths, and the Brotherhood’s presence is solely motivated by a desire to destroy the Synths. Even the excellent Far Harbor DLC involves Synths almost as heavily as the main story does (although to excellent ends, creating an engaging and ethically complex story that explores the concept of truth quite interestingly). And, well, don’t get me wrong, this works just fine, but...Synths just don’t feel quite right as a part of the Fallout universe, or at least, as such a big part. It’s just a tiny bit too much of a dose of science fiction, to me, perhaps simply because the plot point of Synths so thoroughly saturates the game. I mean, obviously Super Mutants are a strong sci-fi element, and they’re essential parts of Fallout 1 and 3’s plots, but they’re not absolutely everywhere you look in terms of Fallout 1 and 3’s stories. They were something of a shocking reveal in Fallout 1, and while the main story revolved around them, the majority of the rest of the game’s storytelling did not. In Fallout 3, they’re an important part of the lore of the Capital Wasteland, but important though they are, the game eventually becomes more focused on the Enclave as an enemy. The Super Mutants don’t just inundate every storytelling angle those games had, the way Synths do in Fallout 4.

And don’t get me wrong, I understand that the Synths are useful metaphors for various aspects and themes of American culture that the game explores.** And the game does very well with them in this sense. They just feel a step removed from what’s appropriate for the series’s lore, to me. I suppose that’s subjective, though.

The other thing I think is a weakness for Fallout 4, as a part of its series, is its ties to its setting. Look, Fallout 4 does a great job with portraying and exploring Massachusetts and its people. It does. And I say that as a guy who lives in, and has always lived in, MA. They reference and use a lot of our state’s history and culture--there’s a whole faction called the Minutemen, there’s a sidequest named The Big Dig, Eddie Winters is almost surely based off of Whitey Bulger, plenty of Boston landmarks like Fenway and the Freedom Trail are prominent parts of the story, they've got location references to stuff like Filene's and Cheers, 1 of the most important characters in the game is named Shaun (although if they were really going for authenticity, it’d be more like 15% of all the game’s characters would share the name across at least 3 different spellings), and guards armor themselves in protective baseball gear and grouse about people asking them to park the car in Harvard Yard. The game does an awesome job with the Massachusetts setting.

Just...I dunno, not as awesome as it could be.

Look, this might just be home court bias here, but as great as Fallout 4 does, I still feel like some of its predecessors better capitalized on their settings. Part of Fallout 3’s great, epic feeling as a whole came from how well it utilized our nation’s capital to tell its tale. The culture and soul of Las Vegas was a present force throughout Fallout: New Vegas, and even was incorporated into much of its story’s aesthetics and themes...even the game’s plot eventually becomes an all-or-nothing gambit reminiscent of a tense card game! Fallout 4...it does so much, but there’s so much that feels like it’s missing. How can you have Salem in the game, without having anything of significance present there? College-intensive state that it is, how can MIT be the only university of importance in the game? Shouldn’t the world-famous Mass General Hospital be more than just a potential site for radiant quests and a few fetch missions?

And how in the WORLD do you make a Fallout game set in Massachusetts, and not include Plymouth?! First site and community of the pilgrims, Bethesda? You didn’t think that should be somewhere in the Massachusetts Fallout? Believe me, I appreciate that 1 of the 2 major DLCs for this game is set in Maine, since that was originally just part of Massachusetts, so it’s totally appropriate, but there really should have been a DLC that takes place in Plymouth. The thought of a theme park DLC was a great idea (even if it was executed terribly), but Plymouth really should have had precedence over a DLC concept that could have been added to any installment in the series.

Then again, I am, as I mentioned, probably biased. Anyway, that’s about it. Fallout 4 has its strengths and weaknesses as an RPG, but I thought it might be fun to recognize it for its strengths and weaknesses as a Fallout, too. And fun it was! For me, at least. You’re probably bored out of your mind. Well, sometimes a rant’s gotta be just that--a directionless collection of what’s on my mind. Thanks for bearing with me, at least, and maybe next time I’ll have something a little more solid and purposeful for you.












* This doesn’t really fit into the rant proper, but I’d like to note that the few times the Fallout series has dabbled into solidifying their protagonists at all, it’s always been a positive thing. My favorite part of Point Lookout in Fallout 3 was the fact that it actually allowed us to delve a little into the Lone Wanderer’s head, 1 of the many excellent qualities of Lonesome Road in Fallout: New Vegas was the fact that it actually gave some history to the Courier, and even just the moment in Fallout 2 where you read a plaque about the Vault Dweller on his statue is quite gratifying.


** Off the top of my head, prejudice towards and enslavement of others who are functionally and spiritually no different from you, nationalistic paranoia trends like the Red Scare, and the capacity to question our own existence, purpose, and physical identity.

Pokemon Generation 6 and 7's Traded Pokemon Obedience

The obedience level cap of traded Pokemon has always been stupid.

You know what I’m talking about: that strange gameplay limitation present in the Pokemon series since the first generation which dictates that if a Pokemon you got in a trade from someone else is at a high enough level, it won’t listen to your commands during battle unless you’ve gotten far enough in the game to earn a badge guaranteeing obedience up to an appropriate level.

Well, I think it’s stupid. What the hell does this achieve, really? Yeah, fine, it’s a balancing mechanic, making sure that anyone who gets a Level 99 Mewtwo in a trade doesn’t just sail all the way through the game without trying. Okay, sure, it works for this purpose, but, uh, who the fuck cares? Balancing mechanics are supposed to make the game more fun and properly challenging for those who want it to be. Well, for anyone who wants to keep their game properly balanced, they could just not use the damn overpowered Pokemon they got from the trade! Or is it that Nintendo doesn’t want you going from the beginning of the game to the end too fast? Because Bahamut knows you want to take the time to really savor those thoughtful, rewarding stories in the first 6 generations of Pokemon, right?

Good lord, I think I just gave myself heartburn from sarcasm overdose.

Yeah, sorry, but it’s just dumb. Trying to forcibly dictate how fast the player’s allowed to progress in the game seems pointless when it’s a 1-player venture like this, and it ain’t like the battle system of Pokemon is so complex and articulate that it would be a great loss to make it easier than it already is. Why would Nintendo want to limit the usefulness of the trading feature like this, anyway? From Day 1, the more trading goes on between Pokemon players the better, since it means more people are playing, and thus have purchased, the game.

It’s not even set up intelligently! Pokemon from trades gain more experience points from battles, so if any member of your team is going to hit a level limit earlier than they should, it’s them! The system is set up to make the traded Pokemon grow faster, and then punish them for it!

But you know what? As annoying as it might have always been, particularly for one such as myself, who attempts with each game to import his favorite Pokemon for a new adventure (it just isn’t a Pokemon game if I’m not leading the charge with Mewtwo, Gardevoir, and that wonderfully absurd flaming kung fu chicken), it’s always been a minor frustration, minor enough that even I never thought to rant about it before--and Alexander knows that says something; I've written rants complaining about stuff like the size of a game's treasure chests. It’s an unnecessary and unwelcome gameplay balance, but negligible overall.

Except now, in the sixth and seventh generations of Pokemon. Now, this mechanic is really stupid.

Regardless of all else about it, there was nothing in the games themselves that outright contradicted the concept of the disobedient trade Pokemon. The idea is just that once they get too strong, they don’t listen to you because you’re not a good enough trainer. Simple, if arbitrary.

But in Generation 6 and 7, see, Pokemon battles have been given a little more personality than ever before.* In Pokemon Moon and Sun, your Pokemon’s affection towards you has a direct influence on their combat capabilities--get them to love you enough, and they get more experience points, occasionally dodge attacks and survive otherwise lethal blows, snap out of status ailments more reliably, and so on. Along with these tangible battle benefits, there are various messages that occur during battle that give it some flavor, according to how your Pokemon feels about you. Messages like,

“Oranguru is relaxed. The sight of you might have made it feel more more secure.”
“You and Oranguru are breathing in perfect sync with one another!”
“Oranguru is looking at you with intense and determined eyes!”
“Oranguru puts on some Barry White!”
“Oranguru asks you if this is your first time...”

Maybe a higher critical hit rate ain’t the only benefit the trainer’s getting from their Affection-maxed Pokemon, know what I’m sayin’?

So here’s my question: how does it make any sense when the Pokemon you’ve brought up to the highest level of Affection by grooming and feeding it constantly suddenly decides, at the instant it passes an arbitrary boundary of experience points, that it no longer gives a rat’s ass about you? It’s not like the Affection level lowers at all, or anything. This Pokemon still absolutely worships you, even as it snubs you for the unworthy scrub you apparently are.

Hell, even the battle messages don’t change at all! I bring my traded, Affection-maxed, over-leveled Ninetales into combat, and every between-turn message is about how much she wants to make sweet disturbing Poke-love to me, while every actual turn she takes involves her pretending I don’t exist. Stop making my glorious ice fox into a subpar Tsundere, Nintendo!

So yeah. This mechanic, which was always stupid, nowadays makes no sense whatsoever. ‘Love is fickle’ doesn’t need to be a gameplay feature!












* I’m going on knowledge graced me by the esteemed Ecclesiastes in terms of Generation 6, as I didn’t play that one. But Ecc’s a pretty cool and reliable guy, so I’m assuming he’s correct on this.

Children of Zodiarcs

If playing Children of Zodiarcs, you should expect to find the following in this game:

- A simple, but engaging and worthwhile story about revenge, class divide, and the terrible consuming nature of hate.
- Emotionally charged characters whose personalities and directives are well-designed and expressed, as well as understandable to the audience.
- A final confrontation between heroine and villain that embodies the thematic shared essences of their character (those being hate and revenge), while also being symbolic of the all-important divorce between how they will choose to live with that shared emotion going forward.
- A deceptively easy-to-understand, but actually pleasantly complex battle system.

Conversely, you should not expect to find the following in this game:

- Joy.

Yeah, Children of Zodiarcs is a very good RPG, but I’m warning you up front: if you’re not prepared for a hell of a downer, then this is not the story and cast for you. I’m writing this 3 days after having finished the game, and there are elements of its tragedy that are still bothering me. Which is good, make no mistake! It means that the writers did their job really well. Just, if you play it, y’know, be aware that a lot of that job is to upset you. Not that it’s all depressing or hurtful; the game also leaves you with many strong elements of hope. But ultimately, this is a game about the terrible wake left by the wrongs of society, and by hatred and vengeance, and that kind of subject matter isn’t given to happy stories. So be warned.

Now, if you’re still interested in what Children of Zodiarcs can offer after that warning, I’ll say that I definitely recommend it. It’s a simple but honest tragedy that focuses on what atrocities can come from harmfully imbalanced society and unchecked upper classes, both directly, as we see the people crushed beneath the weight of a system that keeps the many in poverty and pain for the benefit of the few, and indirectly, as we see the protagonists and antagonist repay the suffering the world has caused them back, in the unfortunate, unfocused way that relentless anger tends to cause. Beyond that, CoZ is also focused on the concept of vengeance as a matter of its own, and provides a telling, yet somehow hands-off perspective on it. The message that vengeance is not worth what it costs you, costs paid by both your humanity and by the innocent around you, is clear, yet really never said, or even fully acknowledged. It’s done quite well. I mean, if I had to pick 1 RPG to recommend as an examination of and warning against vengeance, it would still be Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, whose excellent method is still clear in my mind even now...but Children of Zodiarcs is a damn fine second choice. And hey, one can never have too many interesting and emotionally-charged stories examining and cautioning against losing oneself to fury, right? So play them both!

Hm...Children of Zodiarcs, Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, and Final Fantasy Tactics...is it just me, or do tactical RPGs have a disproportionate trend of being hard, downer stories? I mean, they’re obviously not the only ones (the mere memory of Eternal Senia happening to drift through my consciousness has been known to make me tear up), but still, seems like this corner of the genre has an unusual predilection for this sort of thing.

Anyway. The characters line up as excellent embodiments of what the story is trying to say, who the story is about. Admittedly, there aren’t many that I actually like on a personal level, but that isn’t necessarily the important thing, is it? I don’t personally like Kreia in Knights of the Old Republic 2, but damned if I don’t respect the hell out of her as a character and a mouthpiece of the game’s philosophy and musings. I may not have much affection for Nahmi, Brice, Zirchhoff, Argon, or Pester, but they do what they need to in the plot, and are interesting and complex characters whose perspective and feelings you can fully understand. Not much more to say than that; they’re solid characters who play their role in this game exactly as they should.

The music in this game is decent, and at times reminds one faintly of Final Fantasy Tactics (as does the overall story, for that matter), in a way that is pleasant, but never overbearing--Children of Zodiarcs is still clearly its own entity, not borrowing so much as paying homage to its inspirations through its sound. The gameplay is, as I said, quite good--there’s a lot of factors in combat and combat preparation to consider, but ultimately, combat in CoZ is a satisfying mix of skill and luck, and 1 of the few battle systems based around cards and dice that I don’t hate more than I hate RPG battle systems in general. I sort of feel like this is what Crimson Shroud’s battle system should have been.

I’d also like to mention that this game’s got a great example of Indie polish. Some indie RPGs are basic and kind of unimpressive in look, feel, and aesthetics...you know I like Celestian Tales 1 just fine, and recommend it to you as a good RPG, but at the same time, it has that look of an Indie RPG that is finished, but basic. Some RPGs, though, are like Dust: An Elysian Tail, or Bastion, in that they do definitely look like an Indie RPG, but one that’s been carefully polished to feel and look exactly the way it was envisioned, to be unquestionably its own, singular entity. Children of Zodiarcs belongs to that latter category--it’s got a visual aesthetic that’s glaring yet dark and subtly angry, simple in looks but in a carefully tailored way. And even if it doesn’t make a showing of it, the game pays attention to detail--I was impressed by the fact that this seemingly simple, direct gameplay system accounts for the surroundings and method of destruction in combat to the point that enemies actually, in their death animations, topple off raised standpoints, fall down stairs, get knocked against walls...it’s a very tiny and unimportant visual detail, but it’s telling when a game’s creators take the time to polish their product to even such a tiny level as that. To me, of course, Children of Zodiarcs would be exactly as solid and worthy an RPG even if none of these peripherals were any good, because its plot and characters are great...but the peripherals ARE good, and for those who do care about visuals, sound, and gameplay and whatnot, I think you’ll be pleased well enough with it.

Anyway, I think I’ll wrap things up with that. I go on too long in these rants already. Children of Zodiarcs is a poignant, well-crafted tale, and I recommend it, so long as you’re prepared for a game that punches your heart more often than warms it. This is an RPG that I’m proud to have helped make possible. Check it out!

Project X Zone 1

Hey, check it out--a game has gotten me peeved enough to just do an unfocused hate-dump rant! Haven’t had 1 of these for a while.



Doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results. This is the behavior of both the mentally insane, and players of Project X Zone 1. Although I would suspect that these 2 categories frequently overlap.

Just...what exactly happened, here? At what point did Project X Zone go wrong? How? Why? This is the Capcom vs. SNK of RPGs (it’s even canonically tied to the Capcom vs. line of games); how do you mess that up? How do you create a cast out of Street Fighter, Tales of, Sakura Wars, .hack, Resident Evil, and a whole gaggle of other franchises, and make it boring and repetitive? This is an RPG whose cast includes Dante from Devil May Cry, Megaman X and Zero, KOS-MOS from Xenosaga, and freakin’ Ulala from Space Channel 5...and it’s boring.

HOW

Well I’ll tell you how. Because that’s what I do. I complain.

I’ll tell you how you manage to fuck up the most interesting gaming crossover concept this side of Super Smash Brothers. You give it the worst pacing of all time. No, no, don’t roll your eyes--I actually think I mean that. I can’t think of an RPG with worse pacing. I mean, I’ve had to deal with some doozies, but nothing compares to Project X Zone 1. This is a game whose pacing manages to be agonizingly slow and accomplish nothing, while at the same time, a frenzied whirlwind of nonsense events that no sane person could possibly keep track of. It’s basically like the United States senate. For half the game’s 40+ chapters, all that happens is that the growing group of heroes get thrown from one game world to another with no control of where they’re going, and no idea of why this is happening, solely for the reason that this crossover is so damn bloated with characters that it takes half the game to recruit them. There’s no advancement of what passes for a plot for half the damn game, just a repeated flurry of changing scenery and exchanges that basically go down as,

“Who are you?”
“We’re heroes from different worlds! Look, a bad guy you know, and some you don’t! Let’s join forces!”
“I QUESTION VERY LITTLE ABOUT THIS AND CONSENT”

For over 20 damn chapters! And yet, even though this is a narrative dragging of heels that makes Dragon Ball Z’s pace look brisk and logical by comparison, it still manages to come with all the downsides of a jumbled plot clusterfuck, because even though nothing actually substantial is happening, the game playing musical chairs with dozens’ of franchises’ settings, terminology, and mentions of lore quickly makes you feel as discombobulated as the heroes themselves do, even though you, presumably, actually should have some familiarity with all these new worlds they’re being dropped in.

And the second half isn’t any better, either. It takes ages before the cast is given any sort of actual clue to what’s going on, and any time they make a plan to deal with all the nonsense happening around them, they inevitably get sidetracked, lost, and split up multiple times before getting where they’re going, at which point they just discover that they need to go somewhere else anyway. Villains just keep stringing you along with non-information and promises that they’ll eventually tell you what’s happening. Only at the finale do you learn anything, ANYTHING, of what’s going on and why. And all it is is that the bad guys of this game are parts of a magical plot thingy called the Portal Stone, and want to merge all universes into 1, which is something that the magical cheerleading girl that’s sort of the protagonist--I guess?--can stop from happening because of her family’s history with the thing. Jesus Christ, over 40 chapters of aimless dimension-hopping and ominous, non-specific villain mutterings for THAT? Reed Richards couldn’t fucking stretch as far as Project X Zone 1 stretches this bare rough draft of a plot

And yeah, that kind of takes care of my next point about this game already: the plot, if you’re the kind of saint who can even call this half-formed idea a ‘plot’, is boring and pointless. Just like the people who made this game, you will not care about the plot in the slightest. And yeah, I know it’s a giant crossover game, but that doesn’t mean you can just not give a rat’s ass about it. It’s still an RPG, not some fighting game; you still need to provide a story that has a basic appeal. In fact, it’s not even fair of me to rag on fighting games’ stories, because even crossover fighting games like Super Smash Brothers (the 3rd installment, that is) and that DC/Mortal Kombat thing had more coherent, engaging plots than this crap. And that’s saying something, considering that the SSB story mode was told entirely without words, and like 30% of the major characters of Mortal Kombat are palette swaps.

Another way you screw up a giant crossover RPG like this: half-ass the writing for the dialogue. Yeah, there are admittedly a few clever quips here and there in the game (mostly thanks to Xiaomu), and I’ll even give PXZ1 credit for opening a new angle to Ulala’s character by giving her a much stronger (and amusing) reporter gimmick than in the actual games she’s from. But past an early point in the game, the writing just gets stale and straightforward. Which, of course, is naturally going to happen when you’re trying to juggle literal dozens of characters from different games and give them all a say in talking about how little they know of what’s going on. Everyone becomes a 1-note character, if even that, and they all feel completely unnatural in their interactions with one another. Every straightman character sounds like the next, and every gag character only knows 1 joke, and feels like an awkward interruption every time they say something rather than a part of the group’s conversation.

That leads me into the cast, which is another major strike against this game--and that’s a really big problem, since the whole point of a crossover is the cast. Like I said, there’s not enough differentiation between many characters’ personality, and the humorous characters rarely feel like they’re actually involved in dialogue, instead just coming off as side punchlines that no one else pays attention to. This feels less like a bunch of heroes teaming up, than a bunch of heroes just repeatedly put into the same room and told to cooperate. But an additional problem here is that even by the game’s bland standards, some of these characters aren’t portrayed well. Toma and Cyrille, for example. Now, I’m pleasantly surprised to see the protagonists of Shining Force EXA here, since I was half convinced I was the only person who ever actually played that game, and I actually quite like Cyrille’s character and personality. Sadly, that’s missing here, and all we get is a vaguely unpleasant, standoffish duplicate of the real Cyrille.* And why the hell does KOS-MOS keep making cat noises? Right, no, I suppose that a perfect battle android struggling to awaken the soul dormant within her whose humanity shines as her creator’s impossibly dedicated guardian angel just isn’t quite enough on her own--she needs to make cute cat noises for no reason, too!

And I’m sorry, but some of the choices for who did and didn’t make this game’s roster seem idiotic. Why the hell Heihachi from Tekken, for example? I can understand including Juri from Street Fighter and Tron Bonne from Megaman Legends as party members even though they’re villains, because they’ve got personality, and large fanbases (relatively). Who the hell is it that has got such a massive boner for Heihachi’s Overwrought Martial Arts Villain Mastermind schtick that they just HAD to have him included in the heroes’ team? I admit, very happily, that I have very little knowledge of Tekken, but what little I’ve seen from people’s reviews of horrible anime adaptations have not painted Heihachi as the kind of villain that would grab any audience’s attention It’s not like he contributes to this game’s story, or helps Jin develop at all as a character, or anything like that. Even compared to the rest of the cast, Heihachi’s remarkably superfluous; all he ever does is occasionally chuckle about how interesting all the crap they run into is and how he could potentially use it for his own purposes. Uh-huh whatever nobody cares Heihachi.

For that matter, Project X Zone...You want to represent Sakura Wars 5, and you pick fucking Gemini, of all people? The sappy, dull-witted dipshit who can’t decide whether she wants to be a complete failure of a samurai or a complete failure of a cowboy? Instead of picking someone from Sakura Wars 5 who’s actually likeable--or even just picking the actual protagonist of the game--you picked Gemini. The only character to make me legitimately regret giving up the word “retard” as a pejorative! That’s who you pick.

And why the hell is T-ELOS the other representative of Xenosaga!? At least Gemini and Heihachi are actually significant, dynamic parts of their games’ plots and lore. T-ELOS has, what, an hour of screentime in the entire Xenosaga trilogy, tops? You can barely even call her a villain character; she’s more like a villain plot device! Instead of Shion, who’s the actual main character of the series, or anyone else in the series who has an actual fucking personality and was present for the entire trilogy, we get this loser? For fuck’s sake, I think THIS game actually gave T-ELOS more lines than Xenosaga 3 did!**

Oh, and the villains. The VILLAINS. Possibly the most tiresome part of this whole damn game! They’re all so goddamn boring! None of them are doing anything interesting! They’re either all just flitting about, figuring out what they can do to take advantage of this whole dimensions-merging thing, or they just plain don’t even have any damn motivation (I’m sure Skeith is supposed to be very intimidating, but if I ever watch .hack after playing this game, I’m never going to be impressed with this silent, boring hunk of stone that just wanders around purposelessly). And the same odd choices of casting I just went into seem have been applied to the bad guy roster, for that matter--unless the most intimidating, powerful villain of whatever Sakura Wars Erica’s from really is an overweight mean rabbit in a top hat who laughs strangely and pilots a large bunny robot.

But the real problem with the villains of the game is that the real, actual main villains are a trio of random bozos invented specifically for this game, who have no personality whatsoever. And on top of that, they’re completely unnecessary, as there’s already a trio of random bozos specifically invented for these crossovers, Ouma, who are in this game already! Oh, I’m sorry, not a trio, because there’s also the shadowy evil leader to the main villain trio who only reveals himself at the end of the game. He is also a random bozo invented specifically for this game, which makes the revelation of his involvement to the heroes somewhat anticlimactic. “Oh my GOD! The shadowy mastermind behind all of it was actually...SOMEONE WE DON’T KNOW! Gasp! I never saw it coming!”

I guess the game’s trying to do what Kingdom Hearts does, in having all the villains you’re familiar with be secondary to this new, original threat, but...well, frankly, Organization 13 and Xehanort are the worst parts of the KH series, the only aspects of it that are just flat-out bad. Definitely not the right part of the KH model to copy. The problem with having original villains be the ones ultimately responsible for all the trouble of the game is that you’re having to focus on characters who the player has no understanding of, meaning that they really need time and effort put into characterizing them, but have to split narrative attention between them and so many other villains that these original newcomers never end up having a damn personality to begin with. And then you’ve got these evil blocks of wood in direct competition with villains that the player IS familiar with, who have had entire games’ worth of time to cement their personalities and motivations, so the new original villains look flat by comparison, and the player is just left wondering why these idiots were given the spotlight instead of the villains who actually seem to deserve it. Like how Maleficent winds up being a second-rate foe whose contributions to the plot end halfway through Kingdom Hearts 2, yet has a more compelling personality than every member of Organization 13 put together.

And finally, what is the last thing you can do to make the ultimate crossover RPG totally unenjoyable? Well, the answer to that comes back to how I started this rant: just make everything repeat over and over and over again! Every damn chapter of the first half of the game is completely formulaic--heroes show up, wonder where they are, meet new people, deal with enemies, leave. Then it gets even MORE formulaic after that, since the “meet new people” part is taken out. It invariably goes as such: beat a few enemies, suddenly a ton more enemies show up along with 1 - 4 bosses, you beat them and the chapter ends. The bosses are all the same ones over and over again--even though you fight boss units like 90 times during the game’s course, they’re only taken from a pool of, I dunno, 15 villains or so. Those villains just happen to escape again, and again, and again, and AGAIN. You just keep slogging along, having to fight them over and over again, accomplishing nothing as each villain escapes yet again For 40 chapters. Even the way you play the game is oppressively repetitive. The battle system ain’t exactly nuanced, so it doesn’t take long for you to identify the simple, straightforward strategies that work, and the battle screen mechanics of juggling enemies look flashy and impressive, but the polish on them doesn’t last long, and you soon realize that every damn unit you control is almost indistinguishable from the next--and that is a HUGE problem since, again, the draw of a game like this is the hugely diverse cast of characters with different styles and strategies--and the actual act of playing is just a monotonous timed button-hitting minigame that you have to put up with for literal thousands of times.

Look. This is an RPG in which Street Fighter, Xenosaga, Space Channel 5, Ghosts’n’Goblins, Valkyria Chronicles, Megaman X, Resident Evil, Marvel Land, and a metric buttload of other games all come crashing together. I knew this going in. I wasn’t expecting some stirring epic of storytelling. I wasn't expecting some moving treatise on the nature and nuance of humanity. But I was expecting something that was actually FUN, and that wasn't an unreasonable expectation, and it is not something that I got. Fun is about the exact polar damn opposite of what Project X Zone 1 is. Boo on you, Bandai Namco! Boo on you, sir!







* Okay, Cyrille IS standoffish in SFEXA, but that’s not ALL she is, the way it is here.


** Lines which are actually coherent and generally straightforward, I might note. As unremarkable as Project X Zone 1’s writing is, I’ll give it credit as still being a step up from Xenosaga 3’s hot mess.

Tales of Zestiria's Downloadable Content

Hm. Should I do 1 of these add-on rants for a game when it’s only got a single DLC* to begin with? Of course I should! Because add-on rants are easy and I’m lazy. Uh, I mean, because I care about giving you as much knowledge as you can about how to spend your money! I am, you see, just a great fucking guy.™


Alisha’s Story: Hm. Should you buy this? Is it good overall? Uh...I’m not all that sure, really. In that sense, it’s sort of like Tales of Zestiria as a whole, actually.

On the 1 hand, this DLC does a lot of positive things. First of all, we get a little glimpse into what happens postgame with the characters we have (presumably) grown to care about, and that’s always nice. While not completely necessary, I guess, it’s nice that we get to see what happens when Alisha learns of Sorey’s fate, and it’s also nice to see a little of what life is like for Rose and the Seraphs after their adventure with Sorey is done. Who doesn’t appreciate some closure to their tale (of Zestiria)? Plus, it’s pretty rad that Rose is now a Shepherd in her own right! Possibly even a more qualified Shepherd than even Sorey, as she doesn’t even seem to be bothered by the burden of Alisha the way Sorey was. And hey, Alisha is an appealing character, and we get to see plenty more of Rose, who’s fucking awesome, so that’s a positive.

It’s also cool to see Alisha and Rose’s interactions. They didn’t really get a chance to have their personalities work off each other very much in-game, and it turns out that they have a pretty good chemistry together. Although Rose is the kind of character who just works well as a partner and pal to just about anyone, so that’s no surprise, I suppose. Still, their dynamic is fun to watch.

On the other hand...the DLC has its shortcomings, to be sure. First of all, its purpose is somewhat perplexing. What is the point, really? It starts out as being a small journey that Rose is going to take Alisha on to reveal what happened to Sorey--which seems unnecessary, honestly; sure, it’ll upset Alisha to know, but how is dragging her across national borders to see it a better way of educating her than just outright telling her? But then, as they’re going along, the purpose somehow and inexplicably shifts from discovering the truth of what happened to Sorey, to Alisha finding her “answer.” What question this answer is relating to, the game isn’t kind enough to tell you until Alisha actually determines what her answer is. But I’m a nice guy, so I’ll just spell it out for you ahead of time: it’s what part of Alisha is the true Alisha, and what she wants to be, going forward: the princess, the knight, the diplomat, the friend of Rose, the Shepherd’s squire, or the normal girl. I won’t spoil what her answer is, but I’ll give you a hint: it’s exactly what you think it is because this is anime goddammit.

How we get from a field trip to the Sorey Sacrifice museum, to a personal journey for self-verification, I haven’t the slightest idea. But that’s kind of Tales of Zestiria’s method, anyway, right? Its story, lore, and characters are like a guy who expresses all his ideas in a shy mumble--you’ll always get the gist and fully understand a few things, but a lot of the details are incoherent and lost.

There are a few other problems with this add-on. First of all, while I like the chemistry between Rose and Alisha, their relationship is, at the same time, kind of confusing and annoying, as Rose vacillates between being caring, considerate, and warm to Alisha, and being cold, mean, and uncaring to her, for reasons which are pretty damn vague. Like I said, they work well together as friends and comrades, so it gets frustrating to watch Rose play this little emotional back-and-forth game like a middle school girl experimenting with social dynamics, instead of just being forthright about the fact that they get along pretty well and like each other.

Also, the Seraph characters don’t get enough attention here. Lailah and Edna are present from the start, and contribute a few lines here and there, but ultimately they’re just not involved in the story of this DLC at all, and when Zaveed shows up 3/4ths of the way through, he also adds nothing. Mikleo is only seen at the very end, and likewise doesn’t really have a contribution to make, beyond saving the girls from a monster. I know this is primarily Alisha’s tale (of Zestiria), and that Rose is the central figure of making that story happen, but surely something more could have been done with the other 4 major characters of the game.

And lastly, the fact is that this just doesn’t boil down to a very compelling plotline. Ultimately, it’s just “Alisha and Rose travel through a dungeon, and Alisha learns something about herself.” It doesn’t have a lot going for it from the start. And hell, the most basically exciting part of this DLC is the fact that someone’s trying to have Alisha killed (spoiler: it’s just that annoying wolf guy again), which isn’t even resolved by the end! The attacks are stopped (I think), but the heroes don’t even find out who was behind them, and the villain exits with the threat that he’s gonna keep being a pest.

So in the end, is Alisha’s Story worth buying? I reluctantly contend that it is not. I want to like it, because it has its good points, and I like Alisha and think she could have used more time in the game proper, and I adore Rose and just want to see more of her overall, but...it’s just not all that good. It makes its purpose that of finding an answer to a question about Alisha’s character that I just don’t think any of us were asking, and there aren’t enough positives to outweigh the negatives when the final destination of the DLC’s story just isn’t all that compelling. It’s not awful, like some add-ons are; spending $10 on this wasn’t an outright mistake for me, the way purchasing Nukaworld for Fallout 4 or any of Shin Megami Tensei 4-2’s paid DLC was. And if you’re just a huge fan of Alisha, maybe this could be worth it for you, after all. But overall, until Alisha’s Story is packaged as a free part of Tales of Zestiria, I wouldn’t bother with it.









* Not counting the paid add-on equipment, fashion items, and...Evangelion costumes? The hell?

Pokemon Generation 7's Significance to the Series Theory

Today’s theory is different from my others. Usually, my theories are on aspects of storytelling, or potential other perspectives on characters, which are unlikely to ever be definitively proven right or wrong. But today’s theory is a little more grounded in tangibles. We’re going to see whether I’m right or wrong--probably the latter, I’m sorry to say--on the inevitable day that Pokemon Generation 8 is released. For the sake of Pokemon’s recent, utterly unexpected venture into quality storytelling, I hope today’s theory will, in at least some part, be vindicated. But I’m not betting on it. Time will tell, I suppose. On with the rant!



There’s just no 2 ways about it: against all expectations, Pokemon Generation 7 is a good RPG. No, that’s selling it short. It’s a great RPG. It’s got a story with depth that feels like it matters, with a well-written, complex, dynamic, and so gosh darn lovable main character, and a complex, well-written, skillfully executed villain who perfectly serves as the main character’s foil. Pokemon Generation 7 has a plot with a real purpose, that poses and explores actual questions and issues, and more than once invokes genuine emotion in the player.

And the interesting thing is, some of these more thoughtful parts of Pokemon Generation 7 may not just be significant in their own right, as moments in their own story, but also as a foundation to the themes and direction of future games in the Pokemon series. For, you see, within Pokemon Moon and Pokemon Sun are seeds that could lead to a complete shake-up of the imbalanced, illogical, and morally worrying way that the Pokemon world, and indeed even its narrative, views and treats its eponymous race of dogfighting servants.

The bulk of this potential is found within the game’s true main character, Lillie. Not surprising, of course, given that Lillie already does most of the heavy lifting when it comes to inserting purpose and depth into Pokemon Generation 7. Lillie has the potential to be a graceful, subtle first real step that Nintendo and Game Freak are taking toward recognizing Pokemon as being, and deserving to be, more than battling slavepets.

To see what I mean, we must first acknowledge a certain unstated narrative decision regarding Lillie: namely, that she is, symbolically, a Pokemon. In the literal sense, Lillie is, of course, as human as any other character in the game, but she nonetheless is clearly meant to be analogous to a Pokemon. Her initial design, of course, is the most obvious giveaway of this fact, as Lillie’s clothing and hairstyle when you first meet her intentionally make her visually similar to Nihilego, the Pokemon/Unknown Beast of greatest narrative importance to the game’s story (besides Nebbie, that is).* And this decision is not just a typical but unimportant artistic choice, the way Gym Leaders will often have color schemes and hairstyles evocative of the Pokemon Type that they specialize in. The game explicitly tells us that Lillie’s mother Lusamine has intentionally made Lillie’s appearance as close to Nihilego’s as possible, for reasons that are fascinating, thought-provoking, but also irrelevant to and just too darned time-consumingly complex for this rant.

Lillie also seems to unconsciously (and perhaps even consciously) parallel herself to Pokemon, as well. Even as she eventually casts aside her mother’s control over her and begins to dress as she wants to, Lillie keeps the comparison her mother drew between her and Pokemon alive--heck, she kind of makes the analogy stronger. Because even as she shows off her new look and determination, Lillie equates this evolution of her character with an advancement of a Pokemon, calling her new outlook and fashion her “Z-Powered Form.” This is, of course, in reference to the Z Moves that Generation 7 introduces to the Pokemon battle dynamic, single-use attacks of extreme power that’re all flashy and super special awesome and such.

Of course, what exactly a “Z-Powered Form” in fact is, I couldn’t say. It’s not actually a thing for Pokemon...seems like Lillie should have called her new look her Mega Evolution, but Mega Evolution is, like, so last Generation, so I guess they just had her go with the less technically accurate analogy for the benefit of tying in with this Generation’s Z-Move gimmick.**

Regardless, though, Lillie’s obviously referencing (if perhaps ineptly) a concept unique to Pokemon in the game to describe herself. So, yeah, even when she’s broken free of the clutches of her dominating mother’s after-influence, Lillie is still meant to represent a Pokemon, by her own words.

So here’s the thing: If we look at Lillie as representative of Pokemon, the story of Pokemon Generation 7 has some very interesting implications for the future of the series. The meat of this game’s story, after all, is that of Lillie stepping out of her mother’s domination, free to be her own person and seek her own destiny. In a touching display of compassion and genuine goodness, Lillie makes the choice to return to Lusamine and save her, not because she’s obligated to, but because she still loves her mother and won’t leave Lusamine to destroy herself. It’s a great coming-of-age story, particularly when it occurs alongside the journey of Alola’s first-Champion-to-be as the island region prepares to join the rest of the world in having a Pokemon League.***

But keeping the Lillie = Pokemon metaphor in mind, the story takes on a new tone. It starts to seem like it’s an allegory for a Pokemon, any given Pokemon, escaping from the dominating, self-concerned control of her trainer, a trainer that demands unconditional obedience from the Pokemon in every regard, and expects the poor creature to shape its behavior and physical existence to suit the trainer’s whims. Which, needless to say, is exactly what we do when we play these games, to varying degrees, and even in-universe seems to be the case for a substantial portion of the trainer population. And while I’d love to say I came up with this interpretation on my own and act all smart and thoughtful, the game basically just spells it out for you as Lillie confronts her mother at the Aether Foundation. She basically tells Lusamine off for taking advantage of Lillie’s love for her, declaring that children aren’t just toys to be played with and discarded...and in the same conversation, also denounces the way that Lusamine harmed Nebby (the Cosmog Pokemon that Lillie ran away with to save from her mother’s machinations). The parallel is drawn clearly between Lusamine’s abuse of Lillie and her abuse of her Pokemon.

This being the case, then, what does the rest of Lillie’s story tell us? Lillie goes on to find her confidence and discover herself, as well as encourage Nebby to grow in new ways without her (as the companion to Moon/Sun, rather than remaining in Lillie’s care), and her story concludes with a showdown against Lusamine, in which Lillie saves her mother from her own madness, and proves herself as an independent individual, both to herself and to Lusamine. As Lusamine murmurs in questioning wonder at how beautiful Lillie has now become, the girl has proven that her love for and devotion to her mother can exist--indeed, has never been greater--as a part of her as an independent person. Not only was Lusamine mistaken when, in her madness, she believed that the only way to guarantee the consistent love and devotion of her family was to control them completely, but the love and devotion that Lillie has now voluntarily shown for her mother is greater, more ‘beautiful’, than ever before. But beyond the surface level of a coming-of-age story that deals with our fear of losing those close to us as they mature into people of their own...this is a story with interesting implications. If Lillie is also meant to represent a Pokemon, and by extension Lusamine is clearly meant to represent that Pokemon’s trainer...then this is a story very different from that cowardly slop in Generation 5. This is a story which dares to criticize the foundation of the Pokemon world: that of a domineering trainer who, as shown through the options and nuances of gameplay, gets to casually acquire, use, and discard Pokemon in accordance to his/her whims alone. Through its protagonist Lillie, Pokemon Generation 7 says that the conventions we’re so used to in these games, which we in real life poke fun at and question the ethics of, actually are morally unsound.

Yes, we know that there are cases in the Pokemon world of trainers mistreating their Pokemon--the sad sack plot of Generation 5 hinged its whole message of “KEEP UP THE STATUS QUO AND DON’T THINK ABOUT THINGS TOO MUCH” around the idea that 1 guy mistook the supposed rarity of Pokemon abuse as the norm, as I mentioned in previously. Nonetheless, until now, the concept was used only as a rare contrast that highlighted how okay it was for the regular Pokemon-human dynamic to exist. Generation 7, on the other hand, actually stars the individual who questions the ethics of the world’s hierarchy. Stars, and glorifies her.

And that by itself is impressive. But what’s really interesting is that this game does more than just having Lillie question the norms of the Pokemon world, call attention to the fact that maybe thinking, feeling, reasoning creatures shouldn’t be kept as slave pets. Yes, Pokemon Generation 7 goes beyond simple critique of its own series: it also proposes an alternative. Criticism, after all, is an absolutely essential component to human society, but it’s the easier half of a whole--the other half is actually offering a solution for the problem being highlighted.**** In having Lillie return to save Lusamine from herself, in having Lillie show her devotion even when Lusamine has turned her back to her daughter, and in having Lusamine finally, at the end of the climactic showdown, realize just how amazing Lillie truly is as her own person, Pokemon Generation 7 poses the solution to the current inequitable and ethically uncomfortable status of Pokemon and their trainers. The solution is simply to have trainers give up their supposed authority and control of their Pokemon...release them, let them be their own free beings, and let their love and devotion to the humans keep them voluntarily by the trainers’ side. Lillie has proven that she can be Lusamine’s daughter and her equal at the same time, and by metaphorical extension, that a Pokemon can be its trainer’s companion and equal at the same time.

That’s what I’ve taken from this, at least: that Pokemon Generation 7 has stood up, and proclaimed, “Let equal beings share their love and friendship as equal beings.” To me, the moral and message of Lillie’s story, when viewed through the understanding that she represents Pokemon, holds a very real possibility that the series is ready to take itself in a new direction.

Now, Lillie is my biggest piece of evidence for my thoughts that the future of the Pokemon series might involve a revolutionary change in tone and interpersonal dynamics between trainer and Pokemon, but I do want to point out that there are a few minor details of Pokemon Generation 7 that corroborate this. First of all, there’s the Pokemon Pelago feature--a pleasant, physical location for your Pokemon to go to, instead of just being cooped up in a PC storage system. Could be, and probably is, meant as nothing more than a gameplay feature, but it does nonetheless carry with it an implication that perhaps Pokemon prefer being ‘free range,’ so to speak, than being compressed into a digital box.

There’s also the fact that Alola has a noticeably more equal attitude (though obviously nowhere near actual equality) towards Pokemon, a fact which is outright stated a couple times. Pokemon are implied to have jobs in the community as their own entities (rather than just being used by trainers to perform those jobs), such as independently providing transportation services to those taking the Alola Island Challenge.***** I mean, sure, these transportation Pokemon are still having to drop whatever they’re doing to assist the human being that calls on them, but they’re doing so on their own, without some preteen owner breathing down their necks a few feet away. As a result, it feels less like a slave pet kowtowing to their master, and more like a contracted entity voluntarily fulfilling a responsibility--that is, an employee just doing their job. A region (one which seems especially glorified; I can’t recall any previous installment in the series whose characters, NPCs, and overall tone had so much enthusiasm for its setting) in which Pokemon are viewed as slightly closer to peers than in any other region...it’s an interesting detail to call attention to.

So what does this all add up to? What’s my point? Well, it’s simply this: I theorize (and really, really hope) that Pokemon Generation 7 is intended to be a turning point in the series. Not just in the sense that we’ve finally seen a main series Pokemon RPG with a real story and well-written characters (though I am DEFINITELY down for this being the first of many quality plots and casts!). Rather, I think that this well-written, subtle story of shaking free from unfair bondage and rising up to prove the value of being free to be oneself and pursue relationships out of choice rather than obligation could be a turning point for how the Pokemon series views and implements its titular species. Born from the quiet but bold words and example of Lillie, future titles could finally begin truly exploring the questions of what’s right and just for Pokemon, the questions that have been glossed over, ignored, and at times even actively and ineptly sabotaged by the series until now. The future might hold new stories which further challenge the dynamics of the Pokemon world, even new game features that could revolutionize how Pokemon are acquired--maybe we could soon see a game in which “catching” a Pokemon is less about beating them within an inch of their life and trapping them in a tiny prison, and more about actually convincing them that you deserve their companionship and support, keeping them together as a group out of mutual respect and affection rather than an iron grip of control, as Lillie has taught us is better. I theorize that from here on, with Generation 7 as a foundation to build off of, the Pokemon series will, much as its eponymous beings do, evolve into something greater! Something of depth, that develops itself in a dynamic way with each new installment, moving toward a more worthwhile, wholesome world in which humans and Pokemon are the equals who grow as friends and family for real. A whole new series has been born with Generation 7!

Or, y’know, more likely the next games will be the same careless, uninteresting, shallow cash-grabs as always, and Nintendo will backtrack the hell away from the possibilities that Pokemon Moon and Sun opened to them. I suppose we’ll know for sure in a couple years. Even if that winds up being the case, though, I’ll always have Generation 7 much as I have Xenosaga 1: as a shining moment of glimpsed potential for something great.



EDIT FROM THE FUTURE: Yeah, it was the cash-grab scenario.













* Does anyone find it interesting, incidentally, that in the Pokemon Refresh thing, touching Nihilego in the spot where her face would be (if we use Lillie as a blueprint) provokes a strong reaction? I wonder whether there’re any implications to that.


** Speaking of Mega Evolutions, is anyone else annoyed that none of Alola’s new Pokemon got any? The Z Moves are cool and all, but I’d rather see some cool powered-up forms if I have to choose.

Also, way to drop the ball and still not have a Mega Evolution of Rapidash as a totally bitchin’ fire alicorn, Nintendo. It’s like you guys don’t even read this blog.


*** Come to think of it...why hasn’t the series tried something like this before? I mean, the basic premise of Pokemon is pretty much always the same thing: a kid going on a journey that’s a socially-encouraged rite of passage. That’s basically already the foundation of a coming-of-age story anyway, so why not make an actual, honest-to-Arceus story about growing up and out of the confines of youth? It seems so damn obvious! Sheesh, Generation 7 really is the first of the series where they gave the slightest crap about what they were writing.


**** Not, for the record, that there is anything wrong about offering sincere critique even when you don’t personally have a better solution available. It’s not the diner’s responsibility to know how to make their meal palatable, but the chef’s. It is simply the diner’s privilege to expect as much, and to call attention to a situation which prevents them from having a satisfactory experience.


***** CHRIST ALIVE, NO MORE HIDDEN MACHINES, WHAT A GLORIOUS TIME TO LIVE IN!

General RPGs' Collectathons' Bad Rewards

Who’s psyched for a short rant?



Okay, could we PLEASE get some sort of formal, written agreement across the board from RPG companies that if your game has a long and involved collectathon, the final reward for finding every single hidden little collectable object has to actually be, y’know, rewarding?

This is not fucking rocket science. If you have hidden 50 secret magical doodads throughout the game and given the player a sidequest to find them all, there should be an end reward that doesn’t make them feel like they wasted the extra hours of their time that it took to track them all down!

Most games can figure this out. Find every single Normin in Tales of Zestiria, including those rotten little bastards that are hidden in goddamn scenery? You get a final Normin with 1 of the best equipment blessing powers, AND you get him via an amusing scene that reveals a little bit of back lore for Edna, along with a couple of those delightful Tales of series skits. That’s a fairly decent reward. Go through the inordinate trouble of tracking down 4 separate sets of 8 eggs in Lufia 2? You get an ultimate boss fight with a grumpy and now overworked dragon, and then are rewarded with the best sword and accessory in the game (which honestly is not nearly worth the trouble, if you ask me, but it IS an actual reward). Find all 99 dalmatians in Kingdom Hearts 1, and your final reward is the best wind spell in the game, a grab bag of some of the best inventory stuff in the game, and a torn page (which unlocks a part of the Winnie the Pooh sidequest, which, I mean, is plot stuff, so I’m obligated to approve of it even though, as noted long ago, I can’t fucking stand that dopey, staggering heap of urine-colored lint). Oh, and a short little cutscene of all the dalmatians running around their now overcrowded home, which is either adorable and fulfilling to watch, or makes you shudder with rage and wonder if Cruella didn’t have the right idea, depending on how much trouble you had finding all the monochromatic little vermin. But, y’know, since most people are not quite as easily frustrated by small things as I am, nor quite so quick to jump to vengeful thoughts regarding puppies, Imma assume most people like the cutscene, and say that overall this collectathon has a good reward.

But, see, while most games can manage to come up with something actually fucking decent to reward a player’s detailed exploration to find all 80 fabled mystical hot dogs scattered about the land or whatever other crap the collectible mcguffin of the day happens to be, some apparently can’t be bothered. Illusion of Gaia, for example. 50 Red Gems there are, scattered throughout the course of Illusion of Gaia from start to finish. That’s a lot of hidden locations to find, and some are rather challengingly hidden. Not helping matters is the fact that a lot of these are permanently missable--there are a lot of locations in IoG which you cannot return to after certain points in the game. So you go to all this trouble, and what’s your reward? You get to run through a short and frankly pretty uninteresting bonus dungeon, learn that the Red Gem collector was secretly the first boss of Soulblazer all along, and then fight him. That’s fucking it. No actual reward for your effort, just a tiny extra dungeon that’s boring, a fight that’s just a remix of the first boss from a previous game, and, like, I dunno, 5 lines of dialogue? Is the reward just supposed to be the satisfaction of knowing the secret of the Red Gem guy, and the fate of Soulblazer’s first boss? Because I’m gonna be blunt: I didn’t give a damn about the former, and I hadn’t even realized I was supposed to give a damn about the latter.

Or, worse yet, what about The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time? Where was the vaunted Nintendo polish when it came to those fucking Gold Skulltulas, huh!? This massive (for its time; still sizable today) land of twisty dungeons and obscure hiding places, and you’re asked to search it for 100, that’s one-flippin’-hundred, giant spiders* peppered all throughout Hyrule. And if you do stay the course, put in the time and effort, and actually uncover every last damn Gold Skulltula? Your prize is 200 rupees. Now, granted, you can keep coming back and getting 200 more rupees each time, so it's actually infinite money, so this seems, on paper, like it's a pretty good reward. But tell me: what the hell is there, by the point that you can reach every Gold Skulltula, to even buy any more? 200 rupees or 2 billion, it means nothing at the point of the game where there's nothing substantial left to purchase! I'd wager most players' wallets are completely full by the time they even get this reward, having had nothing important to buy for hours and hours already! At least Illusion of Gaia’s programmers went to the trouble to whip up a little bonus dungeon and a rehashed boss fight. They might have been mistaken about what an adequate reward for their collectathon would be, but they TRIED. Nintendo just doesn’t even bother pretending that it didn’t just put you through hours of busywork to artificially inflate the length of the game.

And don’t even get me started on Energy Breaker’s Shiny Pebble situation. At least Illusion of Gaia and Ocarina of Time actually did give you something for finishing their collectathons, terrible though the rewards may have been. Energy Breaker rewards you periodically for finding enough of the Shiny Pebbles scattered throughout the game, but if you actually manage to find all 50, which is no small feat, what happens? NOTHING. I feel like I shouldn’t have to say this, but here should actually be a reward for the player completing the collection quest you asked of them!**

Look, bottom line, if any budding game developers ever happen across this: please, make sure that the game-long collectathon actually has a worthwhile reward for its conclusion. Don’t make the ‘reward’ an extra chore that answers a question no one was asking, don’t make it a condescending pat on the head and some money they don’t need, don’t just forego rewarding them altogether...the players have put effort into finding all that you’ve hidden, so reciprocate with some effort in thinking about and creating a reward they’ll feel satisfied with, yeah?













* Who was the genius at Nintendo that decided to make the collectibles for this quest a bunch of giant fucking spiders, anyway? Giant fucking spiders whose bodies are skulls? Other RPG collectathons have you searching for precious jewels, cute puppies or other mascots, ancient artifacts, special coins, collectible bottle caps...things that you want to find, or at least don’t mind doing so. What’s Nintendo have you scouring every inch of the world for? Abominations. It’s like they were determined that absolutely no part of this sidequest should be appealing.


** I admit that on this point, I’m going on other people’s reports, not personal experience. I didn’t find all 50 myself when I played through Energy Breaker. Nonetheless, multiple other players have reported getting nothing for going to the trouble of locating every single Shiny Pebble in the game, and no one has contradicted these statements, so I’m assuming they are correct.

Cosmic Star Heroine

You know the drill at this point: I play an Indie RPG, I make a rant about it...assuming it doesn’t suck, of course. Or even if it does suck, sometimes. Cosmic Star Heroine was the...I think third Kickstarter RPG I backed, so it was pretty rad to finally see it finished and play what I’d helped make a reality. Here’s what I think:

Cosmic Star Heroine is fun.

Honestly, that is what Cosmic Star Heroine ultimately boils down to. It’s a good time from the word go. If you want a recommendation but don’t want to have to wade through another long, meandering rant, that’s it right there: It’s fun, so go and play it.

For any among you who like hearing me blather on, for some reason, let’s look at the game with a little more detail. First of all, let’s start with an examination into what it’s promised, and what it delivers on. Cosmic Star Heroine proudly proclaimed itself to be an RPG created with 16-bit-era RPGs in mind, most notably Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star 4 (seriously, I don’t think there was a single promotional ad, article, video, or what have you for the game prior to release that didn’t name drop those 2 titles as its guiding influences). Well, in terms of drumming up interest among lifelong gamers for it, you sure can’t go wrong with dropping the names of the greatest SNES RPG* and the greatest Genesis RPG** every chance you can get. But, that does set a damn high bar for Cosmic Star Heroine to hit, too. Does it do so?

Well, not really, but also sort of yes.

Allow me to explain what I mean by this ambiguous standalone statement (I use those a lot, don’t I?). If you’re going to just compare the 3 titles together on total merit as RPGs, well, Cosmic Star Heroine doesn’t stand a fucking chance. It hasn’t got the emotional power nor the plot substance of Phantasy Star 4 alone, let alone Chrono Trigger. It lacks the narrative genius and creativity of Chrono Trigger, and much of CSH’s novelty in lore and world building is similar enough to Phantasy Star’s that it doesn’t seem especially unique when the comparison to PS has already been drawn. CSH’s cast in general doesn’t hold a candle to CT’s or PS4’s, and its villains are serviceable, but unimpressive when compared to Magus, Zio, Zeal, Dark Force, and Lavos. If you look at Cosmic Star Heroine’s frequent claims of a spiritual tie to Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star 4 as a promise to equal their quality, well, you’re gonna be disappointed.

From a different perspective, however, Cosmic Star Heroine does deliver on its claims. The setting and narrative methods of CSH emulate Phantasy Star very well, capturing the series’s core atmosphere and style in a way that’s enjoyable, nostalgic, authentic, and yet never uninterestingly derivative. It’s even got PS4-styled cutscene semi-animations (in fact, they’re better quality than PS4’s iconic ones, while seeming to be on the same technological level). Honestly, this game is far more true to Phantasy Star than the actual Phantasy Star series itself has been for many years. Heck, the protagonist’s first name is even Alyssa, which isn’t too far from the names of Phantasy Star 1 and 4’s main characters.*** There’s also a lot of the game’s style of play and dialogue/monologue interactions that feels...well, maybe not directly related to Chrono Trigger, but definitely like a cousin to it. There’s also various bits and pieces scattered throughout the game that are little nods at CT and PS, such as sentient talking multi-tailed cats showing up here and there (as a nod to Myau of PS1...and honestly, Random Cats was sort of a CT thing, too), and a festival in the middle of the first planet’s city that feels more than a little like CT’s iconic Millennial Fair. So while CSH doesn’t really compare to PS4 and CT, it does in some ways capture a lot of their feel, and I’d be surprised if, while playing it, there was anyone who didn’t have at least a single moment of nostalgia for those classics.

The thing with Cosmic Star Heroine is, though, that it’s very much its own entity, more than it’s an homage or spiritual successor, and I think that it should be judged as such first and foremost. And as its own entity, it’s...well, as I said, it’s fun. Sorry, but I don’t have a whole lot else I can really call it that makes sense. To say more of it wouldn’t be accurate, but to say less would also be wrong.

Now, you might think that just saying that Cosmic Star Heroine is “fun” doesn’t really mean much, and that it doesn’t highly recommend it. But I do want to clarify that, to me, this actually means that CSH is a rather rare RPG experience. Because, well, “fun” isn’t really something that the stories, characters, and atmospheres of RPGs actually reach for very often. That’s not to say anything against the genre, of course; if anything, it speaks well of it. RPGs, plot-based as they are meant to be, are almost always far more concerned with telling a story that conveys a message, or provokes thought and consideration, or analyzes an aspect of our consciousness, or evokes strong emotions. RPGs usually have a direction they want their story to go in, and simple, surface-level fun is rarely it. That’s not to say that one does not enjoy the games, that one does not have fun with this genre that comports itself somewhat more seriously than most...but that’s not the same thing as a game that’s just out strictly to be an enjoyable, light romp. Only a handful of RPGs successfully choose this latter course, titles like Super Mario RPG, Mark Leung: Revenge of the Bitch, Startropics, and Paper Mario 2. And hell, sometimes an RPG that seems like it’s meant to be a lighthearted bit of fun ends up ambushing you with meaning and strong emotion just when you think you’re safe, like Okage: Shadow King, Disgaea 1, Embric of Wulfhammer’s Castle, and Makai Kingdom.

And don’t get me wrong: I am extremely happy with this situation. I have no complaints whatsoever that RPGs almost always carry themselves with the intent to be serious, meaningful, and poignant.**** The result is a genre where the storytelling quality of, say, Final Fantasy 4, which is just a solidly well-written venture all around, is the average, rather than a high note. And I’m also extremely pleased when an RPG that has an approach that seems lighthearted turns out to be deep, meaningful, and/or emotionally complex, too. In fact, looking at Undertale, Okage: Shadow King, Disgaea 1, Embric of Wulfhammer’s Castle, Makai Kingdom, and Mother 3, it seems to be a remarkably consistent way to craft an excellent and compelling story. It seems in many cases that a lighthearted hook, premise, and/or cast can actually make the heavier content to come all the more gripping, somehow. I can only think immediately of 1 example where it failed (Disgaea 2), where it just seemed to be trying too damn hard on all fronts of humor and emotion.

With that said, though? We all need a little pure, basic levity, now and then. We cannot survive on drama and tragedy forever; every now and then we must sprinkle some comedy and simple, straightforward action and excitement into our mental diet. I don’t really advocate things that turn your brain off altogether, mind you, since the implication with that phrase is that the thing you’re watching or playing or whatever doesn’t have to try at all. But if not outright turning it off, we at least all need to give our brain a chance now and then to sit back on a comfortable recliner and take a load off its cerebellum for a bit.

And when that time comes, that even your RPG hobby could use a slight break to loosen up a bit and just have fun? Cosmic Star Heroine’s the game for you. It has a consistent, enjoyable undercurrent of tongue-in-cheek humor throughout its course. It’s got a fun, exciting feel to it. It’s paced very well so that any time it might start to feel a bit repetitive, it throws a quick new event your way (like a brief break to pilot a giant mech suit in a classic anime/monster movie battle, or a mission to infiltrate a social event held by a mobster) to break things up and keep them fresh. It’s funny, without having to actually be a comedy RPG. It has a generally exciting and engaging stride with a lot of action and adventure. It’s got a cast which may not be especially deep or dynamic, but is weird and creative in that classic Genesis RPG way--between psychic gun monks, giant ant cyborgs, and an alien ghost detective, you’re never wanting for a colorful and weird character to adventure with. And, well, I mean, it’s a game about a science fiction secret agent superstar going rogue to save her star system from a mysterious alien mind control device! What can I really say about the game that its own premise doesn’t effectively communicate?

In the end, Cosmic Star Heroine is a fun RPG. It’s made to be an exciting, enjoyable adventure from the start, and its writers know how to keep it that way through to its end. Do I encourage you to give it a try? Sure! I’ll of course more strongly advocate for other, more compelling Indie RPGs first, ones like Celestian Tales 1 or Dust: An Elysian Tail, but as a simple, fun break from the typical, serious approach of the genre, Cosmic Star Heroine can’t be beat. I’d be surprised if you didn’t find it an appealing, pleasing venture.














* Sorry, Shin Megami Tensei 1 and 2, Final Fantasy 6, and Lufia 2.


** Sorry, uh...Pier Solar and the Great Architects, I guess? Wow, the only competition Phantasy Star 4 has for the title of greatest Genesis RPG is a game that came out over a decade after the system was dead. 16-bit-era Sega really just didn’t have a whole lot going for it RPG-wise, did it?


*** Yeah, okay, Chaz turned out to be the protagonist of Phantasy Star 4, not Alys. Well, much like Hot Ice Hilda to Outlaw Star, Alys feels like the cooler potential hero whose story was stolen from her by a narrative mistake. I really feel like the game up until Alys’s death feels much more like the story was designed with her as the lead in mind. Hell, even afterwards, Chaz’s role as leader somehow feels off more than a few times, like the result of a script that’s been altered from its original, intended vision.

Not that I dislike Chaz, you understand. He’s fine. PS4 just never felt to me like it was supposed to have been his story, that’s all.


**** This intent does not always work out, of course. Still, I’m glad that misguided efforts like Xenosaga aimed high and missed, rather than missing while not trying to do anything meaningful. Hell, even complete fucking garbage like Wild Arms 4 and Shadow Hearts 3 acted like they had something say with their stories, even if they were gravely mistaken.