then vs now

you’ve come a long way my friend ,,,

is it just me or can he still ,,like,,, get it 👀

ホスのトーントーンに騎乗してる時の表情が特に嬉しそうで可愛い

Din Djarin and Grogu ┃Lego Star Wars : The Skywalker Saga

please credit me if you use!

2022 Gaming Wrap-Up

   What a year, huh? 2022 has had everything from international invasions and stubborn diseases to countless celebrities making a joke of themselves and more superhero shows than anyone asked for. It was basically impossible to predict what was coming next, but if one thing is for sure, the world of video game culture had an absolute banger of a year - long-anticipated sequels, several film and TV adaptations, and what seems to be the hundredth GTA 5 re-release. As we gear up for an exciting new year with plenty of promising upcoming releases, let’s take a moment to look back at 2022 and figure out just what was going on in that mess.

JANUARY-MARCH    The year was off to a rocky start, with the announcement that E3 would once again be cancelled due to COVID concerns. These last three years have been rough for the world’s biggest gaming convention; 2020 saw the first-ever cancellation in 25 years, 2021 featured an online-only version of the event, and now it’s been cancelled for the second time. Thankfully, the Entertainment Software Association that hosts E3 stated that they planned to re-open the event for 2023, but time will tell if that remains possible by then.   In brighter news, the Steam Deck was released in February, a handheld platform for on-the-go access to Steam’s entire gaming library. Just keep an eye on the battery life - you’ll likely get only an hour or two of God of War before it hits the red. The first three months of the year also featured the release of some highly-anticipated new games: Horizon: Forbidden West continued the award-winning story of Zero Dawn, Kirby and the Forgotten Land brought a return to the cute and occasionally terrifying Dream Land, and the long-awaited Elden Ring dominated sales as the year’s best-selling title.

APRIL-JUNE    After a hectic start to the year, things slowed down a little in the second quarter. A handful of smaller events were held in lieu of E3, starting with the Summer Games Fest, including announcements for The Callisto Protocol and Goat Simulator 3. The second Sonic the Hedgehog film was also released to positive reception, while the Halo series on Paramount+ was released to…much less positivity. It appears that video game adaptations are still hit-or-miss, but at least we’ve improved since the old 1993 live-action Super Mario Bros. movie. We don’t talk about that one.   Back to the actual games, Diablo Immortal was released in June; while it was a passably decent mobile game, it also serves as an early example of the worrying trend of microtransactions coming from Blizzard Entertainment. With extremely predatory (and concerningly effective) pay-to-win mechanics, Immortal continues to push Blizzard into their downward spiral that began last year. They’ve come a long way since the days where they were once at the height of the respected developers list, and their chances of clawing their way back up seem grim. At least LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga and The Quarry brought some much-appreciated quality to this month’s games library.

JULY-SEPTEMBER    Video game history was made at the start of the year’s second half, with the biggest leak ever: Grand Theft Auto 6. That’s right, after 9 whole years since the original release of GTA 5, we finally have concrete confirmed proof of a sequel, all thanks to a devastating leak revealing a massive new open-world map and over an hour of early gameplay. Rockstar Games confirmed the validity of the 90+ leaked videos, and went on to say that while it would not impact the game’s development, they were extremely disappointed by their hard work being revealed by some random hacker. Leaks may be fun and exciting for the fans, but developers keep things under wraps for a reason!   Back beyond the controllers, another game adaptation was started in September: Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, a Netflix anime series based on Cyberpunk 2077. It was met with near-universal praise, exploring the dangerous streets of Night City in a way that the game never did with unique characters and a compelling new story. It’s a bright sign for video game adaptations, and here’s hoping it opens the way for more high-quality game series. For those that prefer the games themselves, the adorably demonic Cult of the Lamp took the roguelike genre by storm, Stray told a fascinating story through the eyes of a cute little kitty, and Splatoon 3 quickly jumped to the top of millions of Switch players’ libraries within days of release.

OCTOBER-DECEMBER    Things always seem to ramp up in the gaming community towards the end of the year, with plenty of major new releases on top of the Game Awards that were held in early December. Two of the year’s biggest releases came out around this time; God of War: Ragnarok, the climactic follow-up to Kratos’ 2018 Norse adventure, and Pokémon Scarlet and Violet bringing one of the world’s largest franchises to its’ next generation. The massive RPG Elden Ring managed to topple the competition as 2023’s Game of the Year, while Splatoon 3 won a well-deserved Best Multiplayer Game.   Additionally, October saw the release of DC’s open-world RPG Gotham Knights, bringing co-op to the beloved Arkham series but falling short on matching its’ iconic combat mechanics. Meanwhile, Overwatch 2 launched with fun new gameplay held back by yet more of Blizzard’s monetization schemes. The bizarre combination of Super Mario with the chaotic Rabbids returned with Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope, and the hair-raising survival horror of The Callisto Protocol hit the best-selling list within a week of release. Overall, the end of the year looks to be full of all kinds of exciting games, a perfect way to spend the holidays as 2022 draws to a close.

LOOKING FORWARDS    With 2022 almost over, it’s time to make those new year’s resolutions and set our sights on the future. 2023 already has quite a few exciting new releases planned, like Spider-Man 2 and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. On top of that, two games will be getting the silver screen adaptation treatment, including The Last of Us being turned into a HBO series starring the Mandalorion himself, Pedro Pascal, as Joel Miller. The animated Super Mario Bros. Movie also has a newly-revealed release date for April, with absolutely beautiful visuals that will faithfully bring all your favourite Mario levels straight to the big screen. If things go according to plan, we’ll also be back at E3 in 2023 after the convention’s spotty attendance in the last three years, so get ready to scramble for those tickets.

  2023 looks to be following the welcome trend of great singleplayer gaming still going strong - it’s not all about online multiplayer these days despite what it might seem, and I for one am very glad to keep playing solo all year long if I can. See you in the new year, everyone!   Happy Holidays!       - An Aussie Button-Masher

*echo chamber* my thighsssss

(Ran into a weird glitch (I think it’s a glitch anyway) where if I’m playing as an Extra Character class character it doesn’t let me switch back out of them? Like if I switch into them and try to switch out it puts a circle with a line through it over the character instead of letting me switch and does that for every character I try to switch into, it takes the character off the ‘playing as’ side of the bar and puts them into the other bit and I have to restart to switch out... such a weird thing to happen Anyone know what cause it or how to fix?)

Started Lego Star Wars: the Skywalker Saga last night bc my brother bought it for me and I am. So pleased and have so much joy.

It of course starts with the sort of montage of each of the leads and iconic scenes, starting and ending with Rey. And when I selected Episode 1, it did the whole intro thing with the scrolling text and the first shot of the ship was basically of the movie... I was so excited!!

I'm also really relieved that I can manage to play pretty well. I know its a game for 10+ and I'm double that so I "should" be able to, but... yeah. I'm just really pleased and excited to play this game and get to relive the stories.

I am interested to see if there's a way to play the plot of the shows, namely TCW, of course, but even if thats not a thing, playing the main movie storyline is also just. Incredible.

I'm really excited. Its such a big map, too, for each place. I'll have to go back and explore once I have stud magnet because otherwise its a pain, but. <3

We've come a long way from the original game with just the six movies. And the Clone Wars Lego game.

Idk. Lego games are superior. Because they're aimed at kids, so they have to make things a lil more comedic and chill on the violence, but still have the heart of the story, even if you add a few pieces and levels and stuff to do.

Let's not talk about how stressed I was about my first "quit and exit" moment though and navigating the pause screen, trying to get to the holomap. I'm used to a "quit" or "save and quit" option. No, it just. Is always saving. How wild is that????? Makes me anxious as hell. Its ok though. I figured it out.

COMPLETED: LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga

I did it, I beat the "story". While I had some fun, it ultimately felt like "work". I want to make a pass at grabbing all the collectables, but we'll see...

At this point I've played enough to ask the question: Is this a good game? Yes. Yes, it is. The graphics have a charmingly simplistic nature--which is the way of LEGO games--but the environments are very impressive: at times realistic. Besides the typical class system there's also the opportunity to buy class boosts which is an impressive addition. There's a story...from the movies. And while the voice acting is questionable at times, the movies were not well known for performances. There are tons of things to do, replay value, variety, and tons of extras. 

But then there's the other question: do I like it? Not...really. Being a good game isn't the issue. I just couldn't connect with this. The production was so focused on delivering a large galaxy of unique planets with movie-accurate aesthetics that it didn't have time to give much love to the main-line stories. I could respect this if there was hope that the side quests were going to be meaningful, but LEGO games have never been known for their meaningful side quests. They're fun and make a 12 hour game last 50 hours. But they're more interested in being silly than meaningful. 

This is why classic LEGO games worked. They took irreverent approach to retelling a familiar story. If you're familiar with the story, you don't need the story retold verbatim--instead you give some silly pantomime with LEGO-humor and people can laugh at the differences. Lord of the Rings succeeded with voice acting but cause it was taken from the film--so the story stayed true to its source. Skywalker Saga steps outside the story with unique voice acting. I was too distracted with how they got off track and what they left out to care about what they achieved. 

Anyway, some new observations: one, you can spam jump unlike what I thought earlier. I don't know why Hoth is screwed up. That's about it.

To my surprise, I enjoyed playing the original saga most. In the Complete Saga I prefer the Prequel Trilogy. The films tell a better, more epic story, and so the levels are more fun to me. because Skywalker Saga expands on the original stories with open-world gameplay, it actually makes the original stories a bit more epic themselves.

I was less impressed with the sequel trilogy. The Force Awakens is just goofy nonsense. That's JJ Abrams style. He likes to ask the questions but not answer them, which leads to a lot of wacky dramatic cliffhangers that are usually doomed to fail. Maybe I should blame his writers...doesn't matter. JJ Abrams makes disposable trash. It's entertaining, and connects with people, but it's like painting an ocean on the bottom of a kiddie pool. Anyway, Force Awakens is fun but it's a total retread and is more concerned with reintroducing you to your grandpa then breaking new Star Wars ground or significantly advancing the story and universe. Cause of that, many of the levels feel like retread: Oh I'm on a desert world, oh I'm in a Cantina, oh I'm blowing up a death star...

I was more looking forward to The Last Jedi--the best of the sequel trilogy and one of the best movies overall. But it doesn't translate well into a game. The opening works, obviously, but while following around Skywalker and facing one's nemesis across the galaxy is good cinematic storytelling it doesn't make for exciting gameplay. You mostly just walk around places. Oh well, still a great movie.

And then there's The Rise of Skywalker. Dumb. Just dumb. I feel like the goal of this film was to make as little sense as possible to prove Star Wars could make money whether it tried or not. It's really sad that this is how we end the "Skywalker Saga". There's a lot of great shows, like Andor, to help elevate the franchise. I'm hoping that this acts as the "end" of Star Wars' timeline so no one needs to watch it to make sense of any other media. But I don't know, Endgame made Thor 2 important--so there's that.

Because I didn't like the movie, there was no point in which Rise of Skywalker felt fun for me. It was just a final endurance boss preventing me from saying "I win". By the time the credits rolled I was already looking at my phone for random articles. 

So here I am, this is where I wanted to be. The story is "out of the way" and every class and planet is unlocked. Do I want to keep playing? Before I got here I thought yes, of course! I want to take this to the end! But now I'm just thinking of all the games I really want to play. I didn't love this enough to 100% it, and I didn't even 100% the Complete Saga (which I do love). 

My daughter wants to explore, so maybe I'll switch back to Oddworld for myself and then she and I can do bonus missions together.

--UPDATE--

Well good thing I didn't post this yet. I'm done with this game. Maybe if my daughter wants to play, we'll play. But for now I'm done. 

I tried to do side quests at Utapau and had not a great time. While the level seems to be pretty accurate to the film on which it's based, it wasn't very fun to get around. Sometimes I could only use a single ladder or other platformy way to climb to higher sections, but it wasn't fun to get up there and if you made a mistake hopping across rooftops, you had to do it all again. I ended up doing it alot. Also, there are missions that require you to travel to different planets to fulfill. I really wasn't interested. Maybe if this game was just "here's the Star Wars galaxy, have fun" I'd be ok with it. But having to go through the unexciting story aspects to unlock all the planets creates a barrier to that. 

I respect what they did and accomplished, but I'm not loving it.

[Top 10] Best LEGO Games for PC (Ranked Fun To Most Fun)

LEGO games have been around for a long time, and contrary to popular belief, they are not just for children. The majority of the games are usually tied to an IP, which is similar to reliving your favorite characters in LEGO form in a good way.

We've ranked the best LEGO games available on PC right now here: [Top 10] Best LEGO Games for PC (Ranked Fun To Most Fun) | GAMERS DECIDE

パルパティーンのオフィスに来たらモールで暴れることにしています

January in Review

The Site It was a bit of an erratic month.  For the past year or so I’ve been trucking along with about 500 page views per day with an occasional spike if somebody links an old post on Reddit or something.  I had a couple of those days this month, January 16th was amusing (I made a 666 reference in the last January in review as well.  This isn’t going to be a running bit.) However, as the month…

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Greetings gamers, how are you? Welcome to another casual gameplay on the channel! Check it out, in this video I present to you the beginning of gameplay of the game Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. The game was released on April 5, 2022 by Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment and developed by Traveller's Tales...

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga “Galactic Edition” out now

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga “Galactic Edition” is out now.

Yesterday, Fantha Tracks were fortunate enough to attend an invite-only Disney Christmas Market, which not only gave us the chance to meet Mickey, Minnie and Donald but also to view the latest Star Wars items hitting shelves over the festive period and to take the opportunity to have a blast through a level of LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga “Galactic Edition” which was rather awesome. The…

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LEGO Star Wars: Die Skywalker Saga - Neuer Trailer präsentiert die Charakterpakete

LEGO Star Wars: Die Skywalker Saga – Neuer Trailer präsentiert die Charakterpakete

Warner Bros. Games, TT Games, The LEGO Group und Lucasfilm Games veröffentlichen einen neuen Trailer für die ab 01. November digital erhältliche LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga Galactic Edition. Mit allen neun Filmen der Skywalker Saga und 13 spielbaren Charakterpaketen, ist es das bisher umfangreichste LEGO Star Wars Spiel. Der Trailer präsentiert sechs neue Charakterpakete, die 30 weitere…

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New "Character Collection 2" trailer shows what's coming to LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga Galactic Edition starting November 1st

New “Character Collection 2” trailer shows what’s coming to LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga Galactic Edition starting November 1st

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