Instead of writing about a bunch of games across several posts I'm gonna do a little round-up of things I've been playing lately. This is because I haven't actually finished any of them so I can't give full thoughts, and/or I've experienced enough of the game's loop that I can comfortably give my thoughts without worrying that they'll get upended in the future. So without further adieu! ## Visions of Mana I'm a certified *Trials of Mana*-lover[^1], so when the remake came out I was unbelievably excited. What I didn't expect, though, was for the *Mana* series to actually get a new mainline title - the first since *Dawn of Mana* in **2006**. Yes you read that correctly. *Visions of Mana* feels like a natural extension of everything that's come before as far as *Mana* goes. If you're not already a fan of these games I doubt this'll convince you to hop on the bandwagon, but if you *are*, it's all here: gorgeous art design, a job system, class strikes, adorable monster designs that you'll probably feel a little bad about obliterating, and a charming-but-simplistic little story about a band of JRPG characters that go on a journey and *probably* kill God by the end of it. It's an absolute 7/10 of a game, but that's my bread-and-butter at this point. The combat is simple but effective. The plot is simple but effective. The RPG mechanics are simple but-do you see what I'm getting at here? One thing that did catch me off-guard is how much of a platformer *Visions of Mana* is though. I was not expecting to be doing so much jumping, which is neat! As the number one *Crystal Project* fan, I say more JRPG-Platformers please. My biggest issues with the game aren't that big overall: the job system isn't as exciting as I had hoped. Whilst there's a ton of options - 5 party members and 8 classes each mean 40 total - they don't have that much variability among them. I would have rather they keep to the way *Trials of Mana* did it - each character had fewer class options, but they had a lot more depth to them that individualized their playstyles. But *Visions of Mana* isn't that difficult compared to *Trials* anyways, so that's only going to bother min-maxers. The bigger issue is how bad the PC port is. The options are limited and it kinda runs like trash unless you mod it. I'd highly recommend just sticking to the PS5 version if you can swing it. Other than that: woo! New *Mana*! See y'all in 2042 when we get the next mainline title! ## Gundam Breaker 4 ^f08054 I'm not that much of a Gundam fan sorry. But I do like cool robots. *Gundam Breaker* is a series for me because it also only cares about the cool robots. Is it one giant Bandai Namco advertisement to sell Gunpla kits? Yes. Does it let me jump-cancel into mid-air suplexing a robot? Also yes! So who's to say if it's bad or not. The loop of *GB4* is extremely simple: destroy Gundam[^2] to get their parts. Take those parts and use them to make your Gundam stronger. Go out and do it again. That's it. Except it isn't, because where *GB4* shines is its customization. It's such a blast to create your cool little robot guy in the garage, and the newest game in the *Breaker* series has more customization options than ever. You can pick the different body parts, add accessories, resize parts, add decals, color each individual section of each individual part, set how weathered or damaged each part is, and more. The devs know that's half of the appeal of the game, because they have an entire diorama mode where you can pose your various creations just like you can with real-life Gunpla. It's the same sort of thing, but rather than spend a bunch on various kits, you can just buy one game! What a steal! Jokes aside, I'm so happy that *Gundam Breaker 4* exists - after the dismal critical and commercial performance of *New Gundam Breaker*, I was worried the series was over. But not only is it back, and not only is it better than ever, it's also officially localized in the West! I didn't have to order my copy off of CD Japan! Let's go!!! One final note: this game works *great* on Steam Deck, and is perfect for the handheld. ## AstroBot Don't have much to say about this other than that it's the best game Sony has put out since *Gravity Rush 2*. Not that that's a high bar to clear. Instead I'll just say this: *AstroBot* is delightful and a blast and everyone is going to love it and call it one of the best games of the year, and that's great. But it's so embarrassing for Sony to have this game come out right after *Concord* released and then died in the span of about two weeks. It's almost like the game industry would do better to actually make video games and not money-printing machines disguised as video games. This industry fell apart as soon as 3D platformers stopped being the tent-pole releases for publishers. We have a chance to bring that energy back. Take it. ## Magicus I was searching for a good Match-3 puzzle game to play that wasn't a horrible gacha and stumbled across *Magicus*. This is a problem for me. *Magicus* is the game that KEIZO made before he went on to make *ASTLIBRA - Revision*. If you know me, you'll probably know that [[Mint's Games of the Year 2023#ASTLIBRA Revision (2022)|I'm a bit of an ASTLIBRA fan]]. So why is it a problem for me? Because I put **77 hours** into *ASTLIBRA* in the course of like, a week. I've already put **10** into *Magicus*, and I downloaded it two days ago. That's more time than I've spent playing any phone game ever. *Magicus* carries the same energy as *ASTLIBRA* in that it has an unbelievably enticing gameplay loop. I'm not far in, but I can feel so much of what makes *ASTLIBRA* so special pumping through it - system mechanics that overlay on top of each other to keep you coming back for more, banging music, and a plot that seems pretty generic on the surface but will almost certainly open up as I progress through it. Unlike *ASTLIBRA*, it's definitely less polished - the English translation is, to put it frankly, dogwater, and there's a lot more obfuscation than in KEIZO's masterpiece. And the game is so unknown that there isn't much in the way of documentation to learn about the game, unless you know Japanese. But like hell that's gonna stop me. I'll be grinding my way through this game no matter what. --- That's everything! If you're playing anything you should tell me about it! Catch ya later! [^1]: *Seiken Densetsu 3* if you're a real sicko (also like me) [^2]: Is Gundam singular-plural? I don't know and I'm too lazy to check