Join Vivian Winn On Her Odyssey Of Game Game She Didn't Play | Winter Spectacular 2024

There’s something cathartic about being a contrarian. It doesn’t come from a sense of smug righteousness, standing rigorously against the unending waves of thoughtless masses battering down my resolve. It’s nothing to do with clamouring for attention, desperately throwing myself within the purview of everyone and everything with eyes and ears. At worst, a sense of grandiose indignance could be the source, but I like to think of it more as being comfortable trying to spark conversations with my inferences and thoughts. That’s an incredibly pretentious premise to theme an article around, but I dunno, I’m always in the learning process (i.e. trying to make the BS I wallow in smell a little nicer) and I haven’t come up with much better at the moment.

Around this time of year, as conversations move towards the usual discussions of the games from the past year, retrospectives and reminiscing of the past 12 months, it’s hard for me to comfortably go with the flow. The easy route’s right there; I could have quickly compiled a list of my favourite games played this year and called it a day. But, that’s just not my flavour. For what it’s worth, my mind loves to wander around while the rest of me stays focused, so sometimes it’s hard to follow the path set out ahead of me, as it were. It’s easy to call it a need to be creative, to stand out, but in my head, there’s a disconnect between how pathetic it makes me sound, and in which direction I exist from that comparison in reality. Also, since I’m still learning how to keep track of my thoughts and opinions while writing and reviewing, I’m not yet comfortable enough with what I’ve compiled that I find worth talking about, let alone remembering what I want to say about them. So, let’s go for a stroll and see where we end up. Here’s a list of the Top 10 Games I Can’t Wait To Not Write About, I suppose.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

I haven’t played FF7 Rebirth yet, and it’s fine that I never will. I had zero interest in playing Remake before the wild meta-narrative stuff that it does was well-known. It only caught my attention once I knew to expect some delicious grade-A bull-pucky, and I inhaled that feast without chewing. After hearing numerous discussions about the way that Rebirth refutes that premise, offering a bloated package (their words, not mine) that retreads the same content from the original game (their words) with very little impact on the overall story, I knew it was not for me (my words). In fact, I’m pretty sure that I’m enjoying the experience of not playing Rebirth more than I would have if I had played it. That’s not to be facetious about it. By distancing myself from the player's perspective, there’s a lot more of the overall meta-narrative structure of what the remake series is going for that I've more easily been able to observe. The way that Rebirth’s refusal to go wildly off-script when given the opportunity from Remake’s ending and play it too straight and boring oddly reflects the same portion of the narrative in the original PS1 story, where nothing impactful happens to the world as the newly-allied eco-fighters go town-hopping fruitlessly behind Sephiroth’s trail, coming across the fallout of things from the past without witnessing or heavily influencing any major events of the present. I think I’m doing this writing thing correctly by using a bunch of big words to say “lots of world-building without any world-moving” i.e. what I found to be the dullest part of the original.

After finally succumbing to curiosity and watching the final ending sequence of FF7 Rebirth to understand the frustrations and reluctances to fully discuss it, I’m comforted in knowing that I managed to catch about 95% of what I should know of this reinterpretation as it continues into the third entry. And I’m giddy with anticipation for what the third game will bring, no matter whether it follows the original Disks 2 and 3 a little too closely, or goes so off the rails that even Gackt is popping his head through the door to tell the team to chill out.

The wildest part is, that I’ve developed a fascination with this topsy-turvy existence I’ve found myself in regard to the 7 Re[blank] series. I will definitely never play Rebirth, I will absolutely play the third entry on day 1, and in retrospect, I believe this is the optimal way to experience this series. That’s such an alien feeling that must come off as even more alien to anybody hearing this claim. This must be the same feeling as those Star Wars fans who say to watch the first six films in a jumbled order like “Episode 4 > Episode 5 > Episode 2 > Episode 3 > “The Saga Begins” by Weird Al > Episode 6. I really cannot think of a reasonable situation for *any* media property to function like this for any person, and yet here I am espousing this dark truth. It does not happen this way; it’s not supposed to. There are plenty of mid-series entries that are easily skippable with only a minor few plot points worth knowing about (see: Yakuzas 4-6, Twilight: whatever-that-middle-book-was, school grades 6-9 for most people, etc), but the unnecessariness of those entries doesn’t become the focal point. I’m relishing actual enjoyment from being absent in this process. It’s not like a manifestation of Fear Of Missing Out, rather, it’s closer to a Fear Of Getting In. As if Rebirth was designed in a way that I’m supposed to avoid the middle chapter. Absolute madness. I love this sensation, even when I don’t like that this sensation exists in the first place. I don’t get it, but I absolutely get it.

Any Of The Other Thousand Worthwhile Games Released This Year

FF7 Rebirth was not the only major release this year worth writing about (or not). The number of role-playing games that have hit the market in 2024 has been staggering and intimidating, let alone the number of them that are being praised, let alone the number of those that have been heavily mused over and discussed over the past eleven months. Being a fan of the genre leaves me with a dilemma: overflow the backlog with even more content I will never have the time to ingest and relish, or be satisfied in my ignorance and divert those 2000+ hours saved into something else? Like flushing out the current backlog. Or practising an old skill I’ve lost over the years. Or exercising. Or picking up Metaphor Re:Fantazio or Astro Bot. Or playing the entirety of the Like A Dragon series so I can understand every tiny little nuance in Infinite Wealth that I’ve heard floods that game. Or buying several Atelier series bundles while they’re on a good sale on Steam and believing there’ll be time in the future to set aside for a dozen RPGs. Or exercising. Or mocking Randy Pitchford, did he do anything stupid this year? Not really? Ah well, there’s always David Zaslav or Yves Guillemot, for the time being, I suppose. Anyway, while I’ve put my hands on like a hundred games this year, only a few of them have been from this year, and there’s always so much more to look forward to playing that it’s hard to keep focused on specific things. It’s always an exciting time in that regard no matter the year, for as much time writing about them can take.

Final Fantasy VII (PS One)

Major releases were not the only games worth playing this year (or not). The number of games that are unpurchasable and emulatable on a micro-PC, a Steam Deck, or a busted Switch to fiddle around with modding is staggering and intimidating, let alone the number of them that have been called “genre-defining,” let alone the number of those that have been heavily mused over and discussed over the past four decades. Being a fan of the medium leaves me with a dilemma: play the hundreds of games that physically exist on my shelves that I’ve no means of playing natively, or Yohoho the wild stuff that’s been long forgotten or never available for gits and shiggles? Some may say “Why not both?” I will defer to the previous topic. I did replay the entirety of the original FF7 for a refresher after a decades-long separation from my last playthrough. That was a fun learning experience after burning through FF7 Remake. I did load up Dr. Slump for the PS1, touching poop to level up and running down cop cars because the player character is a manic 10-year-old robot girl. That was a grand few hours spent. I did install Ar Tonelico: Melody of Elemia and Legaia 2. That’s a fair excuse to grouse about how they’re never coming back and there’s way too much history sitting on disks in my old family home that I’ll never be able to experience compared to my siblings because life sucks and holy crap I’m literally six months older than the NES and how do the younger generations manage to keep abreast with anything and god my knees hurt what I have been doing with my life I swear that transitioning genders wasn’t a mid life crisis but what if it really was and I’m only fooling myself and now I’m spiraling spiraling spiraling spiraling spiraling……

OK, I’m good now, I’m safe and you can ignore that last sentence. Well, minus the part about how Legaia and Ar Tonelico should make a comeback; the former had very cool and unique combat for the time and the latter has some banger-ass music on top of doing the same kind of crazy stuff that FF7 Re[blank] series and Star Ocean series (do but probably a lot better). Heck, there are a lot of things that should come back. They don’t necessarily have to come back with new entries, or even as remasters or upgrades. Just follow the Wii Classics model and put every ROM up for sale in emulated form for current platforms. Except, this time, do it right and don’t let them get console-locked.

IRL Treasure Hunting

Does it show that I believe the All Digital Future is a load of hock? Or at least, the All Digital Future in its current iterations are a demonstration of intentional failure by design. The abandoning of hardware capable of accessing thousands of games distributed physically is an abandonment of the past; the licensing and reprogramming struggles required for porting old games is too costly or low-profit for most publishers to find worthwhile; DRM and always-online games (between both the single-player focused and the multiplayer-only ends of variety) consistently diminish play experience and often fail to provide extended access to their content in whole or in part once the hosting company decides to pull their constant support; the means for public preservation of media is constantly challenged by companies that would prefer to hold old games hostage for “potential future profit” and never follow through; the inability of many storefronts to allow their customers the ability to freely trade or resell their digital game licenses as should be their right as owners of those licenses. These are some of the factors that weaken the methods of distribution digitally and are many of the reasons why I still like the continued existence of physical media. And why I get to tell you about a pair of fantastic scores that I’ve come across this year that beat any ol’ Steam seasonal sale.

Story, the first: the local Storage Warrior

In a town near my family home, there’s a person who purchases auctioned lots of storage lockers with the intent of sifting through for valuables and flipping over whatever’s found for a profit. Most of the stuff that ends up in their possession are non-collectable items of relatively low resale value - old tools, dirty framed posters, busted furniture, a bag of LEGO pieces in a single colour, a half-ton of military rations, and so on. Every spring, they hold a large tag sale for all the things that couldn’t be easily pawned, and whatever doesn’t sell there hits the dumpster. Oftentimes, that merchandise does include old consoles and video games. In the past, my family members and I have come across some proper gems hidden away at these events. A sealed copy of ExtremeG III, a handful of Pokémon games including rarities like Conquest and Rumble Blast, yet another copy of Sneak King to donate to that one guy who’s making a house or something with the thousands he already owns, etc. Wild stuff that you never know when you’ll come across, and usually at a very good price compared to the commercial used games market. (P.S. Most tag sale hosts value the free space created by getting rid of things more than the money they’re getting for selling them, and don’t have the time or patience to invest in learning the market value of everything in their wares; don’t be afraid of capitalizing on a good deal, as long as you can agree that the initial price is fair enough (unless the Thrill Of The Haggle is what gets you going, then do as you will on things that aren’t that valuable, please (like glass soda bottles or Precious Memories figurines (the original Funko POPs for white grandmas)))).

This May, the collection of found goods included a lot more than the standard mid-2000s era annual sports games and shooters. Not only were there copies of Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4 (both of which don’t exist in my collection), but also some very well-kept empty cases that the host was willing to give away for free. This was quite the bonus since the brick-and-mortar store I frequent happily takes cases for recycling, so if none of them were worth anything on the collector’s market, they would still be less likely to end up in landfills. Turns out, the four cases I saved were worth a decent amount, and the value of those cases helped subsidize the payment for that broken Switch mentioned earlier. Plus, there was a kickass papier-machè Majora’s Mask I found at the tag sale that I loaned to the store for display. That was pretty rad. Game-wise, though, it doesn’t compare to the autumn discovery.

Story, the second: the Thrift Store Surprise

Most weeks, my mother visits the local charity thrift store while on errands. It’s hard to say what she’s looking for specifically since we are all plenty good on clothes and bric-a-brac, but it seems to be the only form of window shopping she enjoys so it’s not worth complaining about. Especially when news of a large donation of games catches her ear and she passes along the message. Out of curiosity, my brother and I swung by a couple of days later to discover three large totes organized and filled to the brim with PS3, PS4, and Xbox 360 games that had just hit the store floor and were sitting behind the counter! Again, this wasn’t a collection of annual releases in mass quantities, this was a Legitimate Pile Of Games. All at a tenth of their original New Condition cost when released!

According to the clerk on duty, those totes were part of a donation from someone who attempted to start their own used games business, in a town that was barely large enough to support the one game store that already existed, and never bothered to replace the replacement covers said existing game store had put on their caseless copies of games after accepting them! Presumably a misguided-yet-well-meaning heart. There is a small sense of shame and guilt for taking advantage of the situation that this person fell into, especially for someone who prefers to support local small businesses. Considering the small difference in price these games would have commanded from them compared to the price at the thrift store, I’m at least thankful that the money could still be put towards charity.

Thirty minutes or rummaging later, the two of us walk out with a collection of 10 games and one very clean Xbox 360 Rock Band guitar controller. There were so many games that deserved to be loved by someone and put on their shelf, and we couldn’t take all of them, but we did decide to purchase some that would have had difficulty finding a proper home. My family can easily give proper love to such classics as Kingdom Hearts 3, Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), Venetica, and Dead or Alive Xtreme 2. Even if we never play them, they can stand proudly in our collections alongside Solstice, Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven, Yu-Gi-Oh: Destiny Board Traveler, Dragon Quest Swords, Conception 2: Children of the Seven Stars, Chaos Wars, Puchi Puchi Virus, Megaman and Bass (GBA), Made in Abyss: Binary Star Falling Into Darkness, Rock Band AC/DC Track Pack…

Wings of Seduction (Steam demo)

For as much as I enjoy Vampire Survivors and HoloCure: Save the Fans!, I've never gotten around to exploring more of the hentai genre; every once in a while, I get a scholarly curiosity about the state of auto-shoot survivals and if the genre has improved over the past few decades. This year's Steam Next Fest offered a perfect opportunity to observe both with the demo for Wings Of Seduction, and I couldn't be more disappointed in my findings.

Let's get the more obvious question out of the way: no, hentai games still haven’t figured out how to work well as a concept. Gameplay still tends to waffle between being mostly uninterested with being unique or deep to be interesting (yet still demands more work than I'm willing to put in while working it or putting out), and saucy material that's too poorly paced out and mildly tantalizing to be worth engaging or paying for. The combination continues to make both parts feel lacking, making something significantly a lesser whole than the two parts combined. It's the perfect example of the ways hentai games continue to have little interest in providing more than a stale joke and a cheap (though expensive in the grand scheme of things) thrill. Wings of Seduction does at least attempt to expand on the basic mechanics of the auto-shoot survival standards. Keyword: “attempt”. Crisp Live2D graphics, particle effects, and location-based objectives are the biggest contributions WoS adds to the genre, which ironically diminishes the experience.

Over the hours I've had in Vampire Survivors and HoloCure, I've recognized that for me, the perfect essence of the genre lies somewhere between irreverence, simplicity, and honesty. They both acknowledge the basicness of their gameplay, up to the point of confidently becoming idle games as the player chooses to accept the encouragement. Their condensed GBA-style sprite work embellishes as a fair callback to the more limited mechanics of game feel. And the ways that both of these games utilize a sense of humour that’s self-deprecating and referential enough to undermine any sense of importance without becoming obnoxious or wallowing perfectly suits their stance as games whose focus is purely dedicated to providing fun. Wings of Seduction completely disregards this cohesion by attempting a more active engagement with the player in both mechanics and visual flair. Adding visual clutter, awkwardly complicating gameplay, presenting levels of artistic quality that don’t mesh properly... it took more than just watching the trailer for WoS to realize this and has retroactively helped me understand why no other auto-shoot survival games have ever caught my attention. All of them tend to be too much in their trailers or provide the exact same things that I already have enough of in VS and HC. Any auto-shoot survivor that matches those two are probably an acceptable substitution, but the margin of customer preference couldn’t handle more than any two of those games. Find whatever two catch your attention the most, and you’ll never need more.

Wings of Seduction does not entice me at all, and it likely wouldn’t entice 99.5% of Steam’s player base. For as much as this ass game is a pretty A.S.S., it sure is an A.S.S. game that's pretty ass.

All the PlayStation Plus Monthly Games I’m Giving up

It was worrisome back in 2016 when Sony decided to increase the price of PlayStation Plus from $50 USD to $60 USD. Last year, Sony felt the need to further future-proof its profits for the next decade by increasing the cost of their base subscription plan in the US by another 33% from $60 to $80. In lieu of hounding around storefronts looking to snag subscription gift cards as was possible years ago, I did the next most sensible move of accepting that my backlog is way too big as it is. Realizing that I’ve never been much of an online player, I knew it was time to hang up the mantle of PS+ Subscriber I had nonchalantly been clinging on to for the past decade. Though there are plenty of games I have picked up through the service and enjoyed that I will personally miss having access to, there are tons more that I've accepted I will have to miss the boat on. Forever. And boy howdy have there been a consistent stream of certified bangers on offer over the past 14 and a half years! So, in recognition of those lost soldiers, let's look back at some of the best months Sony has presented us with, once for each year. 

Here are the top 15 months of PS+ Monthly Games, ranked in no particular order from bottom to top:

15) Sept 2023 - Black Desert - Traveler Edition PS4 / Generation Zero PS4 / Saints Row (2022) PS4/5

14) Apr 2017 - Drawn to Death PS4 / Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime PS4 / Curses ’n Chaos PS4/Vita / 10 Second Ninja X PS4/Vita / Alien Rage PS3 / Invizimals: The Lost Kingdom PS3

13) Apr 2021 - Days Gone PS4/5 / Zombie Army 4: Dead War PS4/5 / Oddworld: Soulstorm PS5

12) August 2013 - Mafia II PS3 / Need For Speed: Most Wanted PS3 / Spec Ops: The Line PS3 / Lego Lord of the Rings PS Vita / When Vikings Attack! Vita

13) Dec 2010 - Cuboid PS3 / Sack-Boy’s Prehistoric Moves PS3 / A Space Shooter For 2 Bucks PSP / Bubble Trouble PSP / Dracula: Undead Awakening PSP / Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus PS One / Little Big Planet PSP Turbo Pack DLC / PlayStation Home Content DLC

12) Aug 2022 - Little Nightmares PS4 / THPS 1 + 2 PS4/5 / Yakuza: Like A Dragon PS4/5

13) Feb 2024 - Foamstars PS4/5 / Rollerdrome PS4/5 / Steelrising PS5

14) April 2016  - Dead Star PS4 / Zombi PS4 / Shutshimi PS4/Vita / A Virus Named Tom Vita / Savage Moon PS3 / I Am Alive PS3

15) March 2022  - ARK Survival Evolved PS4/5 / Ghost of Tsushima Legends PS4/5 / Team Sonic Racing PS4/5 / Ghostrunner PS5

16) Oct 2016  - Resident Evil PS4 / Transformers: Devastation PS4 / Actual Sunlight Vita / Code: Realize -Guardian of Rebirth- Vita / From Dust PS3 / Mad Riders PS3

10) July 2015 - Styx Masters of Shadow PS4 / DriveClub: PS Plus Edition PS4 / Rocket League PS4 / Entwined PS4/Vita / Mousecraft PS3/4/Vita / Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions Evolved Vita / rain PS3

9) Dec 2020 - Just Cause 4 PS4 / Rocket Arena PS4 / Worms Rumble PS4/5

8) January 2014 - Don’t Starve PS4 / Borderlands 2 PS3 / DmC Devil May Cry PS3 / BlazBlue Continuum Shift Extend PS Vita / Soul Sacrifice Vita

7) October 2012 - Bulletstorm PS3 /  Hell Yeah! Wrath Of the Dead Rabbit PS3 / Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition PS3

6) Jan 2019 - Amplitude PS3/4 / Fallen Legion: Flames of Rebellion PS4/Vita / Portal Knights PS4 / Steep PS4 / Zone of the Enders HD Collection PS3 / Super Mutant Alien Assault Vita

5) Nov 2020 - Bugsnax PS5 / Resident Evil 7 PS5 / Batman: Arkham Knight PS5 / Battlefield 1 PS5 / Bloodborne PS5 / Call of Duty: Black Ops III - Zombie Chronicles Edition PS5 / Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy PS5 / Days Gone PS5 / Detroit: Become Human PS5 / Fallout 4 PS5 / Final Fantasy XV PS5 / God Of War (2018) PS5 / inFamous: Second Son PS5 / Monster Hunter World PS5 / Mortal Kombat X PS5 / Persona 5 PS5 / Ratchet and Clank PS5 / The Last Guardian PS5 / The Last Of Us Remastered PS5 / Uncharted 4 PS5 / Until Dawn PS5 / Hollow Knight: Voidheart Edition PS4 / Middle-Earth: Shadow of War PS4

4) Feb 2018 - Knack PS4 / RiME PS4 / Grand Kingdom PS4/Vita / Exiles End Vita / Mugen Souls Z PS3 / Spelunker HD PS3

3)  Nov 2017 - Bound PS4/VR / Until Dawn PS4/VR / Worms Battleground PS4 / Dungeon Punks PS4/Vita / Broken Sword 5: The Serpent’s Curse [Ep. 1 & 2] Vita / R-Type Dimensions PS3 / Rag Doll Kung Fu: Fists Of Plastic Vita

2)  Aug 2023 - Dreams PS4 / Death’s Door PS4/5 / PGA Tour 2K23 PS4/5

1) November 2011 - Hydrophobia: Prophesy PS3 / Rumble Trucks PSP / Where Is My Heart PSP / Crash Bandicoot PS One / Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back PS One / Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped PS One / Crash Team Racing PS One

Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip (Review Will Be Posted On The Site Soon… We Swear)

Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip has been on my part of the startmenu review pile for half a year, and it's been such a struggle to properly give words to my thoughts since playing through it over a week during the summer. Not that my thoughts are weak, quite the opposite; that’s what makes it a struggle for the playwright-adjacent style my writing was trained in. I am not a journalist, nor do I have any real journalism education. It’s probably very noticeable, not only through my writings on startmenu, as well as the one startmenu stream I did a guest spot on where I was comfortable speaking with startmenu community members for the first time in front of an audience and playing my role as the group clown while Lexi suffered her way through a couple hours of Sonic The Hedgehog (2006). I’m much more a performer than a writer, and that’s what led me to wanting to do some compositional work for startmenu in the first place.

Even though the largest goal I have in working with startmenu was to work on my written communication skills, there are duties and responsibilities that I’m very willing to accept professionally. And so I did accept those duties and responsibilities willingly, and I’m failing. It's guilt-inducing to not be able to complete the assignment I willingly took on. Lexi has generously granted opportunities with free codes for games, and it's hard to not feel like I'm letting her and the rest of the startmenu team down. Despite the premise of this list, I do genuinely want to write about Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip. Yet, every single complex observation and feeling that's spouted from my mind has been too easy to fold into one single small phrase, and the game deserves so much more than what I'm currently able to say. The way that the world has this gleeful cheekiness to it, all of the - wait, wait, I think a clog has been plunged, I'll be right back.

Ok, there, I'm back. What were we talking about? The Keighleys? Really? Um… sure. I mean, the only worthwhile thing I can point out is that there are so many more avenues of content creation than just streaming that I wish the overall gaming industry gave more attention to. Well, let’s be fair off the bat: The Game Awards are not determined by us, the crowd. At all. We as a collective contribute only 10% of the final voting bloc, and none of the nominating power that leads into it. It matters very little how many fans YouTube channels could have until enough of those fans overlap with members of game news outlets, developers, and publishers to make the first call on those nominations. Unfortunately, the variety of content usually found on YouTube completely outweighs the site’s ability to push gaming content on the main page in the same way Twitch can for their streamers. Channels that focus on documentary (NoClip, Summoning Salt, People Make Games), media analysis (Design Doc, Core-A Gaming, Game Maker’s Toolkit), art and other non-gaming media (TerminalMontage, 8-Bit Music Theory, Dunkey), or routine events (Games Done Quick, Twitch Rivals, Desert Bus For Hope), there’s just not enough word of mouth to cover the level or promotion that streamers can get, and it shows in the nominations year after year. Heck, it could be argued that 2024 was a bigger year for Pekora’s mom than Pekora herself! Even if it wasn’t her biggest and best year to date, 2024 happened to be the year Pekora pinged on enough radars for those in control. It’s deflating that “Content Creator” hasn’t yet been renamed to “Best Streamer” and at least all the other means of content creation be condensed into an “Other” category where they won’t have to be so comprehensively overshadowed, in the same way that the E-Sports section has opened up to include different categories over the years for Team, Player, Coach, and so on.

Why are we on this, again? The TGA Game Awards are not worth paying that much attention to. It’s not even a game.

Guilty Gear Strive - Another Story

I guess technically this isn’t a game either. Well, Guilty Gear Strive is a game, but the side story added in the Season 1 DLC is only a long cinematic, similar to the base Story mode. It also came out a couple of years ago, so I guess that means it double-qualifies for this list?

For as disappointing as it is to see additional story content be forced as purchased content, it is heartwarming to see fighting games attempt to incorporate their ever-expanding rosters into the overarching plot that houses most (if not all) of its main roster. So much of a character can be inferred based on how designs change over the years (Faust being one of the more prominent examples in GGS), and to see the full picture of that evolution really dynamises the new version of those characters. Every player has their favourite character (and every character has their fan), and seeing those fans renew their joy when their characters get their moment in the spotlight is a wonderful thing to witness. At least it’s much better in this regard than the comparative monotony of the Tekken series, which feeds its storyline 95% of the time through the terrible relationship between these three assholes who constantly fail to murder each other in increasingly drastic means across 8 games (and two non-canon team games, I know, please don’t bother me I don’t care that much about it thank you and goodnight). This isn’t a trait exclusive to fighting games, but the trend has become most notable in that genre lately. I will always appreciate the effort, even when I can’t appreciate it financially.

Shantae Series

The word count is getting high on this and it would be a lie to say that’s not stressing me just a bit. That’s fine, since I really don’t have anything worth commenting on these games besides that I enjoyed them a lot. It’s a very digestible series that went through every game during lunch breaks at work this year. I don’t remember squat about any of them, but that’ll just make replaying them in the next decade all the better for it. And that’s fine. Not every game a reviewer, essayist, or analyst plays has to be for content. Shantae sits best for me as a casual game, and I’m sure everyone else has their own casual games, too.

Speaking of WayForward, I should get back into speedrunning River City Girls. That was a good game to learn, long enough to feel meaty and worthwhile without having complex tech or being too long to feel like I’m wasting time on bad runs. I don’t even have to worry about the Switch’s abysmal load times between screens compared to the Steamdeck version, so I should finally be able to get under an hour if I ever get a triple-length lunch break.

Iconoclasts

Stop reading this and go play Iconoclasts, whether you’ve played it before or not. It’s literally too much for me to write about, not here, not ever. The low impact of the search-action influences not weighing down the gameplay or story, what the writing has to say about the potential for traditions to become counter-productive or destructive, how unafraid the narrative is to be truly unfair to the characters even despite their flaws and favours, it’s all incredibly moving for something so bite-sized and easily completable. There is a lot to love in Iconoclasts, and in my recollections, there wasn’t much conversation around it when it was released in January 2018. Then again, that’s the shame of an early release. So if Iconoclasts has been sitting untouched in your library, or Iconoclasts is ever one sale, go pick up Iconoclasts and give it a go-around. Play it just because it sounds cool to say. Iconoclasts.

That’s the last of my ramblings for 2024. Any one of these topics could have easily been pulled out into its own article and expanded upon, but that’s something professionals would do to be professional for a professional article. I’m no professional writer on a professional assignment for a professional piece, yet. At least, that’s not quite what I think a Winter Spectacular article is supposed to be, even if it’s too big to have been just for fun.