This update makes a big change in the transmog system: all drops found will now be added to an account's collection, not just the ones equippable by the current character. A use case for the reputation and achievement changes is that they will save hours on obtaining the Legion druid forms (although they've said old reps aren't coming right away).
We don't have a lot of specific details yet, but a lot of it appears to be quality-of-life changes. There will be an account-wide reagent bank for professions; just that alone is a massive change. Unified flight paths is a QoL change that will also save people thousands of gold, designating "favorite" characters gets around realm swapping, etc.
I have multiple friends that are over the moon about this announcement. People love their alts.
The genre/publisher/series/individual game-oriented niche communities are generally still small but are growing. !baldurs_gate_3@lemmy.world has been active though.
What I'm seeing right now in the smaller communities is sufficient voter and comment engagement but not enough people making new posts to drive discussion.
Well, a bunch more talent just hit the job market with The Escapist melting down, too.
I encourage anyone that hasn't yet to try any subscription-based journalism for a month just to see how different the writing is when it's not beholden to advertising and SEO.
I suppose the key difference here is it's a parallel progression system that gears you up to Heroic raid level, whereas Visions and Torghast were the only way to upgrade your legendary. Solo/duo/trio players get a new way to gear, or it's an option to dip into if a given week's prefixes aren't friendly to their M+ group, for example.
For Chrono Trigger, that fight with Magus is a two-phase fight, and you're not underleveled unless you can't get through the second phase. Since you're pinning it on RNG, it sounds like you didn't make it to the second phase. The first phase is on the tactical (or puzzly) side and it'll punish mistakes, which catches some players off guard. A change in party could possibly help too, depending on who you're using. If Lucca's in the party and you're not using items, that fight's probably going to give you a bad time.
Anyway, my top recommendation based on these criteria is Terranigma. It's an ARPG with a very basic equipment system and you can go through the game only using HP restore items. The difficulty curve is fairly tight, with just a notorious level requirement later in the game. Try not to be put off by the script; it's messy in places due to a very small Western release, but the underlying story is great. You could also try its predecessor, Illusion of Gaia, which has fewer RPG mechanics (it's more like a Zelda game).
Other than that, I'd recommend trying to finish Trails in the Sky. Sky FC doesn't show its hand until late. That--still ongoing--series is doing something with its story that isn't being done elsewhere in RPGs, and it's very rewarding if you can successfully connect with it. You'll also probably enjoy the combat more later in the series.
If on your Ys journey you haven't made it to Oath in Felghana or Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana, those are very popular in the fandom, and Ys VIII was a little bit of a breakout hit for the series for newcomers. Celceta isn't very good.
This is good to hear. I started my Fediverse journey on kbin but eventually moved over because the spam was out of control. Hopefully this makes it easier on mods.
I think I just realized after reading this thread that I've posted more threads on here since I started a few months ago than in all my time on Reddit. Part of that is genuinely missing the niche communities I liked there and helping to build ones for people with similar interests here (and I'm finding new ones in the process).
Another part is my long-standing interest in decentralization in general. Ruthless efficiency has centralized everything, from where I shop to where I hang out. There's something civic lost in that somewhere. Things don't have to be as efficient as possible, and good jobs and honest opportunities for socializing are created when it's not all striving to place offerings at the altar of stock dividends. It's why I don't mind seeing the duplicate communities on the Fediverse. The sociologist in me is fascinated to see how it all shakes out in a place where the forces shaping these things aren't all sociopathic.
That said, I do wish development was more active. I imagine there's some hesitancy for users to literally buy in, but they really do need more funding for developers.
Same! I realized not long ago that I don't actually dread the notifications anymore. I used to get such anxiety over the red envelope that I had already started thinking I was due for a change before the blackout happened.
"The Big Cheese is the Dark Souls of poses" from the Destructoid review gave me a good chuckle. Unfortunately, The Big Cheese was also the Dark Souls of poses back in Smooth Moves, and it's not encouraging to hear this game might be just as fiddly.
This November isn't as stacked for me as last year's, but I think I'm still going to wait on this one a bit.
I just finished Atelier Totori. Third game in the series I've tried, second I've finished (after Rorona). I mostly nibbled at this one (did much the same with Rorona, especially early on) but I liked the story and characters a lot more here. I laughed, I cried. The progression system was much more interesting, too. Even with all that, the UI/UX is just plain brutal. I really hope the next game I play in the series is better about this. I'm also quite surprised that I did almost everything with months to spare, considering everything I heard about how strict the time limit is in Totori.
A friend and also just finished our Baldur's Gate 3 multiplayer campaign (her first run, I had a lot of hours in it before she started). Amazingly I still don't think I've fully gotten the game out of my system yet.
WarioWare: Move It! comes out in a few days and I'll likely be picking that up right away. Other than that, I'm not sure. Maybe I'll finally pick up Phantom Liberty.
It hasn't exactly been banger after banger for me personally this year, but I can still recognize how big 2023 has been and how much excitement there has been year-round, from Hi-Fi Rush's shadow drop to Alan Wake 2 right now.
It's also been a great mix of new properties and long-running franchises. Zelda, Resident Evil, Diablo, Final Fantasy, Street Fighter, Baldur's Gate, Mario, and even Armored Core all had well-reviewed, major releases this year.
I'm nowhere near calling 2023 the best ever--I think it'll take a complete paradigm shift in the industry to ever top 1998--but a lot of people have been eating very good this year.
It'd be nice, although Chris Roberts hasn't released a full game in 20 years (and I did rather enjoy Freelancer).
I was hoping Starfield was going to be a big hit to at least make the setting more attractive, but in this stacked year, I'm not even sure how many GotY nominations it's going to get.
Mostly the same for me. I've been poking around Bluesky too but I'm having trouble finding content/follows I like.