No problem.

Have fun! I missed the series more than I thought I did, myself. I'm pumped to keep playing it.

tl;dr: If this is where we keep going, and we maybe get more Legends titles, or the newly-unveiled Scarlet and Violet manage to balance the new Legends mechanics with a Gym/Elite 4 challenge-type story, I'm on board.

Just uh. Really weird how choppy the framerate can be, and how gross stuff can look, when you have stuff like Breath of the Wild on this system.

Before this, I had ALSO abandoned Pokémon, so this speaks a lot in its favour, I assure you.

Well, for starters...

This ENTIRE game is about catching them all, no strings attached. There is no Gyms. No Trials. You're a member of a research unit set out to catch and study every Pokémon in ancient Sinnoh, aka, Hisui.

There IS an overarching plot, but it's not invasive and imo, honestly quite interesting: This is a time when most of the Eastern Regions (the ones based on Japanese regions) all fear Pokémon and can't even fathom living with them. To top it off, a big bundle of them grouped up in search of new land to live on, which ended up being Hisui, but waaaait, there's already cultures living here that worship their own visions of-

And I'm gonna stop there because that's an interesting thing to see for yourself. The idea is a tasteful sort of like... I wanna say it's a colonization story but they're tactful about it and try to make it clear that the new people (your people) are interested in sharing Sinnoh with them, if they'll have them, no kind of violent bullshittery like our real world history.

The actual gameplay HAS Pokémon battles as an option, plus a few Trainer battles here and there (since most people don't want anything to do with Pokémon), but the focus is stealthily studying the behaviour of wild Pokémon through Research Tasks, which start with things like "catch 25 of them" to "see them use this Move in battle ??? many times", to even some unique ones that unfold as sidequests, as you slowly teach the people of Hisui that Pokémon are friggin' cool.

Also Pokémon can make YOU faint. You have to dodge them in the overworld when you're not in battle, and you'll mostly be in said overworld, because catching Pokémon is easier outside of battle with well-timed Pokéball throws.

It's so easy to get lost on a research expedition, forget about the main story, and find a rare Pokémon that wants to kick your ass, but that YOU can manage to catch if you're tactical.

It's basically everything I ever wanted.

About Returnal: I'm really enjoying the arcade feel in it. It reminds me of the old times, wasting quarters and progressing a little each time. I took it as a shoot 'em up and I'm having a blast. The last update brings a checkpoint so now i'ts more enjoyable for everyone.

Give it a try, I think it will click on you.

New Years Gaming Resolution! With the exception of some limited physical releases and birthday and Christmas gifts, I will be attempting to buy NO new games this year! I have a lot on my shelf to be excited about already, so I think this will be good for me.

Thanks for adding me too buddy!

Let's rock this backlog!

Psychonauts 2 really is something special, isn't it? It pokes fun at mental illness without punching down. It's lost a bit of the edge of the first game, which I suppose is a "bad" thing, but I dunno... I didn't really care. The game worlds are so creative and the characters and their relationships are really well done.

I think the most widely accepted starting point for the series is 0, but I started with 3 followed by 1 and 2 on PS2 (I started 10 years ago, so 0 wasn't even a concept then), so I probably have no room to judge, nevermind I hate telling people how to play their games.

1 PS2 has an English dub with Hamill as Majima, though he's probably the only high point of that game. The dub is otherwise pretty bad and filled with f bombs. 2 has a Japanese dub with English subs, as do all the other games (Like a Dragon and the two Judgment games have an English dub as as option, which I've heard is actually pretty good, but I can't not play Yakuza games in Japanese)

1 and 2 also have a poor localization, translating certain character's names incorrectly and such. I think though that with the Kiwamis and the Remastered collection, the PS2 games should be the only ones with that localization.

1 is pretty rough technically, but it's playable. The load times in it are a bit...excessive, though pretty manageable. Every screen of Kamurocho is a loading zone, as opposed to the newer games where the whole city is a single load zone. 1 also has an issue with enemies with guns being annoying to fight.

Don't see many people on here (or really anywhere online) with Series Xs instead of PS5s.

Yakuza is super good.
I've been replaying 0-6 and Judgment on my Series X, near the end of 4 right now

Woodfall and Snowhead are doable enough. Great Bay is where the dungeons start to overstay their welcome and somehow be even worse than OoT's Water Temple. Stone Tower just SUCKS and is completely not fun.

I keep getting the itch to replay Majora's Mask...but the recent LP I watched really showed how not fun and tedious the dungeons are compared to Ocarina of Time. Shame, cause I like the feeling and atmosphere of MM a lot more.

I also hate how short MM feels in comparison to OoT. Far less dungeons, but they feel longer...and I dunno...tend to drag on.

It took 5 weeks but I recovered from COVID at the end of April. just got my 2nd shot Wednesday.

Is there anyone in my multitap who is artistically inclined? I am looking to commission a new avatar.

I finally feel better and have tested negative, but I was sick for 5 weeks so it's gonna take some time to recovery my stamina.

Bart: Okay, Homeboy, here's how you drive this thing. ( "crap box" in the other versions.)

Homer: Two, four, six, eight, you suck, I'm great, dah nah, dah nah, you are the one... I... hate!

Hope you enjoy Persona 2! I know 4 and 5 are the most recognizable, but P2 is really a good game with tons of things to do and a really cool story. And when you get to THAT part, you'll love this game. You'll know which part I'm talking about.

Couple of thangs:

1. Following along walkthroughs. Some RPGs are rahther linear and unless ya juss really wanna follow along the dialogue, ya can learn to get around the language barrier. Sometimes you'll get lucky, and there'll be transcripts. Shinin' Force Central has 'em and that's what I used to read along fer the Shinin' james.

2. Familiarity. I know the Phantasy Star games and Grandia 'nuff where I'd really no issue. I still had to follow along a walkthrough fer crucial parts (or somethin' like the shops in the Phantasy Stars), but most of the time it was no Biggie fries.

Truss me, it was much cheaper to get Shinin' Force III Scenarios 1-3 than the U.S. version of Scenario 1, pluss two extra scenarios! That's what inspired me to go fer it in the first place.

I dunno Japanese. I barely know basic katakana, but you can use that to understand nouns. It's also how you can know how things are pronounced, like Kine in Kirby being the symbols Ka-i-n, as an example.

Of course, if ya know how to do it, ya can save yerself the trubble and use translation patches. Nobody would blame ya, really.

[Butts in] Diiiid some body ask fer Saturn recommendations?!

I purdy much second what Lilith and Rarity said, but there are some others. Check me Saturn collection fer what ya can get, but be forewarned: they're all JP copies. Hey, it's much cheaper than US versions, possiblye still.