Byleth: Ace Attorney (a 3 Houses/Phoenix Wright - Crossover)

I'd plead the fifth, if ever asked about it, but in a fit of procrastination I jotted down some outline for a Ace Attorney/3 Houses crossover:

(Warning: Includes a few spoilers for both Fire Emblem: 3 Houses and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

It follows the classic 5 case structure of most Ace Attorney games:

1st case:

Ace Attorney Byleth' father, Jeralt is murdered, and they have to run their law firm overnight alone. Also your father has hired two assistants, Caspar and lazy, narcoleptic but talented Linhardt.

In their first case, former teacher Seteth orders you to defend Flayn, his daughter, who he has never mentioned before and who - so he claims repeatedly - would only harm a fish.

Arriving at court with no time to prepare, you learn, that Flayn is suspected to have killed Jeralt.

The first case usually serves as some sort of tutorial, and has an comical prosecutor, so: Alois (or Ralph or Hanneman).

Murderer: Kronya/Monica

2nd case

Hilda, a rich heiress, tricks you to defend Claude for free.

He behaves very suspicious, but it turns out he willingly became the defendant to lure out the real murderer.

Prosecutor: Lorenz

(needs victim and murderer)  

3rd case

Edelgard is supected of murdering a corrupt, high ranking clergy man, who did very bad things to kids. She insists, he deserved to die, but she did not do it, but has no alibi. Prosecutor: Ferdinand von Aegir

Murderer: Hubert (He did it, because he knew El would murder the victim eventually herself, so he saved her from that fate)  

4th case

Dedue sells everything he has to have you defend Dimitri, who appears quite insane.

Prosecutor: Constance (alternatively Ingrid or Felix)

Murderer: Cornelia (?)

Victim: the tragedy of Duscur(?)  

5th case

Defendant: Rhea, who clearly has several secrets

In the end TWSITD are uncovered, but you decide to keep Rheas secrets.

Cyril and Catherine: admit to the crime to protect Rhea

Prosecutor: Solon/Thales (as with the first Ace Attorney game, the Prosecutor is also the murderer)  

Also appearing:

Leonie: Your estranged stepsister, a talented policewoman, who in the end helps you.

Ralph: bumbling policeman (compare Dick Gumshoe, alternatively: Alois)

Manuela: Drunk witness (compare Wendy Oldbag)

Sothis: Judge & Jury

 

Smash Kart - we are almost there already

Recently, there have been more and more crossover-titles, the most famous still is Smash Bros.

Somewhere I found a discussion, about whether Nintendo should make a crossover racing game, which was called there "Smash Kart".

I never played Diddy Kong Racing, so I cannot speak to the necessety of a sequel of this game, however I played and enoyed 1080° and Wave Race an N64 and NGC, but I am unsure if sequels could succeed in the current market. This probably is also, what Nintendo is thinking, because I do not even remember talks about possible sequels in the last years, if not decade.

But back to Smash Kart.
We more or less have it with Mario Kart.
While it is called Mario Kart, and in the first Mario Kart Game on the SNES there were only Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Peach, Bowser, Donkey Kong, Koopa and Toad to choose as drivers, with Mario Kart 8 Deluxe were are almost there already.

A few characters might have started in Mario games, Wario and Donkey Kong most prominently, but they have not been in a core Mario game for quite some time.
Besides them we have drivers from completely different franchises: Splatoon, Animal Crossing, Zelda and the Miis.
We have tracks from different franchises: Again Animal Crossing and Zelda, but also Excite Bike and F-Zero, two other relevent Nintendo racing franchises.
And again with the cars: Besides the franchises already mentioned, we have a car named Steel Driver, which references Steel Diver.

Yes, Mario Kart is mostly Mario, but Smash Bros Ultimate is mostly Mario and Fire Emblem these days.

But I do like and support the idea of more crossovers in Mario Kart:

There are already tracks with snow, ice, water, beaches and such, so it would be easy to somehow incorporate 1080° and Wave Race.
Both Metroid and Star Fox could be made into cars based an Samus' ship and a Star Wing, like F-Zero's Blue Falcon.
Fire Emblem is a little trickier, because a FE-track would likely be similar to either the Hyrule track or Bowser's Castle.
Pokémon is still a sore spot for me, but could be done easily.
Ice Climbers was my first ever videogame, so I would love them as drivers or with their own track, but from Nintendo's point of view, there is not much reason to do so. Similar with many other, older franchises which are discontinued like Earth Bound  or Kid Icarus (or long time hibernating at best).
The most easy way to include a franchise is of course with the soundtrack, as Smash Bros shows.

And, if there will be no Diddy Kong Racing sequel, he at least should become a driver in Mario Kart 9.

Hindsight is always 2020 - what I played 2019

Years ago I have started to write down all video games I beat, usually with a few remarks and sometimes if I think they are suited for kids.

2019 I have beaten about 50 games on the PC.
These numbers are only possible, because there are a lot of short indie games in there.

A shoutout to Yoku's Island Express, Shadow Tactics (not short!), Slay the Spire (also not short, but roguelike), Neon Chrome and Guacamelee 2 (normal length for an indie).
Worth a mention are Hellblade and The Sexy Brutale - I did not enjoy them that much, but I can appreciate quality when I see it.

On Nintendo Switch I have beaten around 10 games, my favorite was Valkyria Chronicles 4, my kid's favorite Luigi's Mansion 3 (closely followed by Yoshi's Crafted World). Lots of ' in this sentence.

At the start of last year I also beat Beyond: Two Souls on the PS3. My last game on PS3, I sold game and console afterward.

On the 3DS I beat 4 games, including Pokemon Ultra Moon in January, which will be the last Pokémon game for some time. (Much more on that later).
Also Sushi Striker, which I got for 5€ but did enjoy surprisingly a lot.

The games I played most in 2019 are Fire Emblem Three Houses (not beaten yet, I have only 2,5 of 4 routes completed, more on that later), Smash Ultimate Bros (almost beaten) and My Time at Portia (clearly very long, but hard to say yet how long). I probably also played a lot of Witcher 3.
Also I played a lot of Assassin's Creed Origins (because it is long and grindy, but besides that it is decent), Valkyria Chronicles 4 (because I did everything on higher difficulty, unlocked all extra scenes etc) and Slay the Spire (because it is great and I beat the secret boss with all 3 characters). And now there is a fourth character!

What is in my backlog?
Besides beating those games mentioned I already started, I have also started Soul Calibur VI and Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
I might beat Yakuza Kiwami (not sure if I will get into it), Cross Code and Undertale  (started, but took a long break), I will start Kingdom Come after beating Witcher (not sure if I will like it).
On the switch there are Astral Chain and Tales of Vesperia waiting, and Bloodstained to finish.
On 3DS there is Yokai Watch and SMT: Strange journey to finish and Dragon Quest VII to start. I do not plan to get any more 3DS games.

What am I planing to get in 2020?
Well, if I beat most of those games now mentioned, I am looking forward to eventually play NieR, Outer Worlds and Mega Man 11.

Have these numbers declines since I have kids?
Yes. But due to the rise of indies, bundles and DLC which inlclude only a few short levels not that much.
Also I have stopped to replay really good games one or two years later as I used to.

Hindsight is always 2020 - This blog and the New Year

Have I been writing much? And has anybody been reading much?

The answers are the same.

As kind of New Year's resolution, I have decided to write more in my blog (and kortz.at).

About a new post a week is the plan for the next few months - if I get feedback (or that sweet, sweet ad money) I might try to keep that up.

The topics will be as before - Videogames and gaming in general, with a focus on Nintendo and a few of its big IPs like Pokemon and Fire Emblem, with a sidestep here or there. There will also be posts with the "homestory" label, where I write about personal gamer habits, gaming as a parent and such.

Isn't a blog sooo last decade?

Yes, but the only social media I use is twitter. And just opening an account to post on Instagram or Facebook or whatever is new and cool, will not really bring in the masses. So I stick with the classic.

For starters, an Amiibo picture:

"They grow up so fast" ((c) The Purple Pantywaist, 2019)

PS: I accidently retracted this post, so I had to republish it.

After the Pokemon-Controversy, shall I cancel my preorder? - YES!

edit: This controversy is already over - you can ignore older posts and just read the most recent one.


The new Pokémon Game is disappointing long-time fans of the series and the makers could not care less (for a quick summary see here), and YES, you should cancel your preorder. Why didn't you already?

But ask yourself, why do you even pre-order?

You buy something, which quality you can not yet judge, but pay full price.
Obviously you do not believe in capitalism, because for capitalism requires both parties to be informed.

Games are not scarce at launch anymore, because you can get everything via download now.
"Special editions" are usually overpriced and add nothing of worth.

There is no advantage for you, as a consumer, for preordering.

And if you want support Indiegames and small studios, use crowdfunding.

#pokemondeservebetter - and we consumers deserve better as well

edit: This controversy is already over - you can ignore older posts and just read the most recent one. 

Just a quick recap:
2 new Pokemon Games, titled Sword and Shield will be launching later this year on Nintendo Switch.
A presentation of the game so far at E3 was disappointing at best:
The game does not look much better than previous entries an the 3DS (eg here), the Pokémon animations look bland, all in all there was no kind of progress or improvement recognizable. The straw, that broke the Camerupts back was, that the game will not include all Pokémon - you cannot transfer many Pokémon. It is unclear, how many are affected, but it will be clearly a considerable number.

The outcry in the interwebs was impressive, and Gamefreak, the company that makes this game (and owns part of the IP) even responded, but as the game appears to be it was uninspired and not very helpful, basically saying "Thanks for your feedback, cut Pokémon might appear eventually in future games, and we will not change anything".

Many have summed up the problems quite eloquently (eg this Reddit-post), and I will only repeat some parts of it:

They obviously do not care about making a great game. They just put some new "flavor-of-the-month"-gimmick into it (Dynamaxing in this case), which they will drop at the next convenience. And a bunch of new Pokemon they can market.
Besides that, they recycle everything and without any effort to improve it.
And it has been like that for several generations. That might be tolearable for portable games for some time - each game costs like 35 €. But now they want 60 € on the Switch.

They blatantly overcharged for Pokémon Let's Go, especially the Pokéball-Controller (which likely will not be usuable for this game). I confess, I paid almost 90€ for both (already a discount!), and I liked it but even then I wanted improvements for a sequel,

Some people have defended them, again I will just pick a few arguments (but the others are not more convincing).

- There are so many Pokémon, eventually there will be too many.
Maybe. But not yet and not soon. (The repeated mistake is adding too many new Pokémon instead using the many that they have already, so they should limit themselves to about 50 per generation.) There is no reason to start culling Pokémon now or in the technically foreseeable future (see here for details).

- But they will be good games.
I suppose so, because they will be more or less the same as before. But not more, not better, not great, and they do not even try to be. Good games, we have played already several times. Good games, for which we paid at most 40€. Now they want to sell us a good game with slightly improved 3DS graphics for 60€.

- It is their IP. They can do, what they want. You are entitled.
 They can do with their IP, what they want. Disney was allowed to ruin Star Wars, Marvel was allowed to ruin their comics (at least for me they did), and EA was allowed to ruin many IPs and studios.
They are allowed to ruin Pokèmon with low effort, overpriced releases and mobile releases which rely on gambling mechanics.
But they actually want something from me and many people like me - cold, hard cash.

Why do the producers of the Pokémon games do not care? - Because it will sell anyway.

This is capitalism. They want to sell us something. They should give us our money's worth.
But they do not

What now?
Do you want great Pokémon games?

Then vote with your wallet!

- cancel your preorder and do not buy the games
- convince people you know, to not buy overpriced games for their kids (unless they are really rich)
- do not spend money on gambling mechanics in games (not only Pokémon, but especially there)



I for my part will further
- do not buy any Pokémon-Amiibos anymore
- do not buy Pokémon-themed cloth or toys for my kids
- continue to not watch Anime or the movies in the cinema or spend money otherwise on Pokémon stuff.

Luckily there are many other, great games out there.
I for my part always enjoyed the Shin Megami Tensei Series and will try Yokai Watch and Fossil Frontier (they cost like 10€ each) and maybe even Digimon.

Nintendo, Gamefreak and The Pokémon Company can easily fix this - Pokémon makes absurd amounts of money.

Best of der letzten 15 Jahre Videospielgeschichte - vulgo Switch

Es ist wohl schon vielen aufgefallen, aber der Switch wird immer mehr zu einer Art Best of der letzten ca 15 Jahre Videospielgeschichte.

Ich nenne jetzt nur mal die ersten paar Titel, die mir gleich einfallen:

Skyrim
The World Ends with you
Meat Boy
Doom
Owlboy
Bayonetta (auch wenn ich es schrecklich finde)
Outlast (auch wenn das nichts für zartbeseitete Hüfthosen wie mich ist)
Tales of Vesperia


Es sind ja sogar schon einige Wii U Remakes erschienen, zumindest die folgenden habe ich geistig griffbereit:
Pokemon Tekken, Mario Kart 8, Hyrule Warriors, Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze.

Die neuen, exklusiven Titel sind dafür rar gesät - für mich und wohl auch viele andere, wie die Verkaufszahlen zeigen, ist das aber optimal, denn ich habe leider nicht mehr so viel Zeit zu spielen wie früher und habe aber so die Möglichkeit ein paar der Spiele nachzuholen, die ich verpasst habe.

PS: Dies ist einer der am meisten gelesenen Artikel der letzten Zeit - es war auch einer mit besonders vielen Tippfehlern. Jetzt sollten es zumindest ein paar weniger sein...

Überwachungsspiel überwacht dich

#Ubisoft ist mir in letzter Zeit weder besonders positiv noch negativ aufgefallen - habe AC: Unity und Far Cry 4 gespielt, dazu schreibe ich bei anderer Gelegenheit vielleicht etwas mehr. Vor einiger Zeit brachten sie das Hackerspiel #Watchdogs raus, wo der Spielercharakter binnen Sekunden alle möglichen Geräte hacken kann, zB Ampeln umschalten, Straßenbarrieren ausfahren, Kameras, sogar Handgranaten.


Das Spiel hat eine ziemlich schwache Story und war bis auf die Hackingfunktion ein bestenfalls durchschnittliches 3rd-Person-Openworld-Spiel. (Außerdem wurde die PC-Graphik downgegradet, damit die Konsolenversionen nicht im Vergleich zu hässlich werden).
Trotz aller Mängel und Schwächen hat es eines gut geschafft: Den vernetzten Überwachungsstaat anschaulich dargestellt und als Instrument einsetzbar gemacht (natürlich etwas überspitzt, vereinfacht und übertrieben und aus Tätersicht, aber immerhin).

Trotz eher durchwachsenen Erfolgs gab es jetzt ein zweiten Teil, der besser in den Kritiken davon kam, sich aber weil der erste Teil spielerisch enttäuscht hat, schlecht verkauft.

Dieses Überwachungsspiel aber überwacht die Spieler, wie ua der Standard berichtet.
http://ift.tt/2fZGO4B ... ware-am-PC
http://ift.tt/2gHh3EI ... ts-modding

And when there is a semblance of multiplayer, there must also be an anti-cheating mechanism. Watch Dogs 2 makes use of EasyAntiCheat, which has, embedded in its TOS - and even on its features page - a field that claims "Client data analysis to identify anomalies in the game process runtime" is used to enforce it anti-cheat detection mechanisms. What it basically means is that EasyAntiCheat installs a driver in kernel mode and a service that monitors your systems' operating files (when Watch Dogs 2 is running). This mechanism is also running even when you're in single-player-only - and even offline - modes, meaning that you're not getting out of its crosshairs no matter how you are playing the game. The addition of file-integrity checks at the start of the game, so as to detect any changes to the games' files also precludes modding, with some injection-type modding also finding troubles in being able to access the game, due to it checking game memory and system memory as well.

It needs to be said EasyAntiCheat is a legit anti-hacking, anti-cheating Software[...]But it seems that this anti-cheat mechanism is operating even in single-player offline mode, which simply removes from the player the ability to maintain his desired privacy. There should always be an option not to agree with the installation of this kind of applications, even if that were to mean no access to multi-player modes. I, for one, would make that trade willingly.
This looks like a possible way for Ubisoft to protect its monetizing programs with in-game purchases, which abound in Watch Dogs 2 - a way to prevent players from using exploits in the game that could harm the sales of in-game items.

Kaufbare In-Game Items - das haben wir ja schon bei AC: Unity gesehen und ist eine in Vollpreisspielen relativ neue und besonders widerliche Form der Monetisierung:
Dieses Vollpreisspiel (mit Season Pass) versucht dir dauernd für echtes Geld noch irgendwelche Power-Ups zu verkaufen. Würde man als Einzelspieler modden/schummeln können, dann würde niemand solche unsinnigen Items kaufen.

So aber sollte niemand das Spiel kaufen.


Statistics: Posted by ThePurplePantywaist — 02 Dec 2016, 12:32

---

in Kooperation mit Kortz.at: http://forum.kortz.at/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=500&p=8533#p8533
Dieser Post wurde erstellt durch Unterstützung von IFTTT

Können Spiele die Welt verändern?

Ich mach's heute extra unspannend:
Nein.

Wer sowieso meiner Meinung ist, braucht jetzt gar nicht weiter lesen. Ich begründe es trotzdem.

Zunächst ist die Frage, wollen Spiele überhaupt die Welt verändern?

Serious games (wie man educational games halt heute nennt) reissen uns nicht raus - die sind zum Einen zu wenig verbreitet, zum Anderen beschäftigten sich überwiegend Leute damit, die sich für die Thematik eh schon interessieren - Veganer & Spiel über Schlachthof.

In den meisten Spielen, die irgendwie Gut und Böse zum Inhalt haben, spielt man überwiegend die Guten. Ab und an gibt es Spiele, bei denen man entweder als die Bösen spielt (selten) oder wählen kann (etwas weniger selten), aber trotzdem, meistens muss man holde Maiden retten, aggressive Invasoren abwehren oder sich sonst wie beliebt machen, um einen Spielfortschritt zu erzielen.
Nun ist die Welt in den letzten Jahren kaum besser geworden - für die meisten zum Glück auch nicht schlechter, aber eine Verbesserung der Welt durch die Zunahme und Verbreitung von Gaming hat sich nicht bemerkbar gemacht.
Wem das als Argument nicht reicht, der soll mal einige Zeit lang auf Twitter oder in einschlägigen Foren lesen, und zwar Beiträge von Gamern - #Gamergate, sei genannt, einfach weil es einen Namen hat - da verliert man dann sehr schnell den Glauben an das Gute im Gamer.