sarantine

every time i play pillars of eternity ii: deadfire at some point i ask myself ‘is this my favourite video game?’ and the answer is yeah it might well be. there’s like four things i’d cite for that title depending on the day (shadowbringers*, deadfire, dragon age: origins** and wind waker***).

*it feels weird to like, cite ffxiv wholesale because it’s this thing i log into multiple times a week rather than a single discrete object I revisit once in a while. also there are parts of it I think suck ass. but shadowbringers as a text is very definitely one of my favourite games. that makes sense to me, in the same way that i’d cite tehanu as one of my favourite books, but not wizard of earthsea even though i read them both in an omnibus edition.

** i feel like i’ve not played dragon age origins in like, a lifetime even though actually i played it iirc sometime in 2020. i’ve played it some like, absurd number of times (25ish?) and i kinda reached the point where i felt like there was no more blood to wring from the stone (makes sense since i played it like once a year for a decade). i’ve kind of been feeling the itch to go back to it. the older i’ve gotten the more i’ve soured on bioware writing but the first two dragon ages are the ones that still hit for me.

*** is sailing the thing?? am i a boat head? because wind waker and deadfire are both games about sailing (among other things). oh god. this is occurring to me right now as i write this.

why do all the npcs in twilight princess look Like That

tears of the kingdom has understandably set off a Zelda kick around these parts. my gf played wind waker which i’ve called my favourite game for years and it still whips (except the wind temple where they clearly ran out of time). i think in terms of style and presentation it’s second to none. it’s probably still number 1 contender for being my favourite; honestly still have boundless enthusiasm for it.

we also tried ocarina of time but my gf just didn’t like playing it very much and i wasn’t super into the idea of replaying it for the millionth time myself so we dropped it. doesn’t help that i think the 3ds version is the way to go unless you’re consciously going out of your way to do some digital archaeology and that version isn’t conducive to two people playing on a sofa.

i’ve fired up twilight princess, which i haven’t played since it was pretty new (contrasting the other two i’ve mentioned which i’ve returned to a bunch of times over the years). i really loved it when i was 13 but i’ve soured on it in the years since. it’s kinda what i expected, which is a whole lot of edgy garbage layered on top of some really solid Zelda fundamentals. obviously the dungeons are cool; arbiters grounds is still an all timer, but the idea that they made a whole other 3d Zelda before they realised it needed a serious rethink is kinda wild because the formula already feels super tired in twilight princess.

i will say i like the chunk post-master sword when it opens up more than the first like, 10 hours, which are kinda just a super linear string of middling set pieces. it’s like you pull out the master sword and the game remembers it’s the legend of Zelda and let’s you have fun.

anyway, i also grabbed a copy of the switch re-release of skyward sword. i’ve never played it! by the time it came out the cables for the wii had vanished. i know it’s pretty divisive, but i’m super curious about it. hoping i don’t get burned out before i get around to it.