Keep The Home Fires Burning

This mobile strap comes with first edition copies of Devil May Cry 3 JP Edition

The Devil and Bayo series shares this weird symbiotic relationship. They obviously have the same fanbase (me being one) but coincidentally the games never competed head on. 

The Devil series did their thing and faded away for a bit then the Bayo games came and kept the fires burning. I don't think it would be too far to say that if it wasn't for Bayonetta, DMC4SE would never have happened. 

One man that has a hand on both series is action director Yuji Shimomura. He crafted the cutscenes in both the series, making the games just as fun to watch as it is to play. Yuji started in this genre with DMC3 which is probably still his best work if you asked me. His work on the Bayonetta series has been less impressive perhaps because the Devil work were so outstanding.

I can't pick out a single impressive scene from Bayonetta 2. That creative energy that I expect from Yuji just isn't there, not sure if the story and characters just didn't suit his strengths. Bayonetta 2 felt like a lower budget game to me and considering how hard Platinum fought to make that game, I believe that to be the case. The cutscenes felt just as long as the first Bayo but less impactful, there isn't much scenes of showing off that you come to expect. 

DMC4SE new scenes looked very promising, I can't wait to see what Yuji has cooked up as it certainly looked like he found his vigor again. 

The inside of the strap has a different color depending on which character

This is for Vergil. There is also one for Dante and Lady

The Waiting Game

These days, games get released not once, not twice.... you get the drill. Lebron knows what I'm saying.

I'm talking about Game of The Year Edition, never mind the remastered and HD edition this time. 

I waited a really long time for Red Dead Redemption GOTY edition almost to the point where I forget why I wanted the game at the first place. Looking back, I wasn't very eager about this game until the Undead Nightmare DLC came about. Being a fan of all things horror, I was probably more interested in the DLC than the actual game itself so it made sense to wait it out for a complete edition. Sure I could have gotten the standalone DLC first but I always find DLC pricing too absurd for my liking. For the record, I did actually play the original Red Dead first before getting into the Undead Nightmare. 

Most of the time it's almost impossible to wait for a Complete edition if you are really eager on the game since day one. Quality DLC takes time to develop, unless it's some cheap tactic employed by a publisher to withheld finished content to release down the line. Most of the good DLC like Left Behind and RE5 felt like genuine afterthought made due to positive feedback of the original game. By the time those DLC came out, the original games were aging in dog years by gamer's standards.

I had no idea that The Evil Within was going to have DLC story content when I picked up the original game. I don't keep track of every game out there to point where I even know about games I have no intention of playing. Thankfully the main game was satisfying and pretty meaty content for a single player game. Mikami isn't one to cut back, I always thought RE4 was probably a tad bit too long for its own good. The Evil Within never overstayed its welcome, it's long but never felt draggy. The DLC added more to what was already a pretty strong content for a survival horror game. Probably good enough for me to consider double-dipping on a complete edition for The Evil Within PS4/Xbone version.

It's nice to own the complete edition of a game, having all that content in one convenient package. However, there is something cool about owning the first edition of the game. You can denied that, it's almost like a badge of honour among your geek friends.

Playing for Fun

Playing games should always be about having fun. I remember reading that the worst thing a game can do is to make you feel like you wasted your time.

I totally agree with that but unfortunately that sometimes means achievements. Or in this case, trophies.

A game can be fun but in the end if I failed to make any progress during that time I would feel like I wasted my time. Like when I’m about to power down the console and realized I didn’t make a new save file, the feeling of wasted effort comes creeping in. It could be a brutally hard action game or an adventure game with a devilish puzzle (Cing).

It could also be a second play through when I need to locate every emblem (RE) or collectible (TLoU) in the game. By then, I would need the help of a guide because I obviously couldn’t locate every bit in my first play through. The problem is the more dependent I’m on the guide, the less fun the experience becomes. I don’t play by my normal instincts anymore and the constant need to check the guide breaks any mood the game creates.

In the end, I don’t feel like I wasted my time because I achieved something. Did I have fun? Probably not as much as I would like to.