PixlBit

I actually liked Secret of Evermore.  But then, when I played it, I was a super big Square fanboy.  Of course, with their track record at the time (FF4, FF6, Secret of Mana, Chrono Trigger, etc.), can you blame me?  I don't know if I'd like it much now, but I will say I still think it was a good first try by Square USA. 

A lot of people bash on this game, saying they should've released the true Secret of Mana sequel: Trials of Mana, instead.  But after playing Trials of Mana on the Mana Collection, I'd have to say Trials is a hot mess and Square USA made the right decision.

The game uses the exact same engine as Secret of Mana, that's why they're so similar.  I was really impressed with the text in this game.  Since it was made in the US and had no translations to go through, it really flows well.  I think it's one of the stepping stones to having better text in games.  The music is really unique and ambient, and Jeremy Soule would later go on to do music for popular PC games.  

I think I remember getting stuck in a forest maze, but figuring out that there are birds in the trees that help you figure out which way to go.  But if you think the mazes in this game are bad, you should try playing one of the early Ys games!

Cirqus Voltaire is my favorite pinball table in real life, so I'm glad they put it on Pinball FX3.

http://www.gamerdad.com/blog/2019/12/30/pinball-fx3-williams-pinball-volume-5-ps4-switch-xbox-one-pc/

I'm OK with it.  The newer ones have a colorful, cartoony look and I like that.

I never finished Tales of Vesperia.  Just got too long and meandering.  My favorite characters in it were Repede and Judith.  Maybe someday you can play my favorite Tales game: Tales of Legendia.  It's only on the PS2, though.  My favorite character in that was Grune.  The music in it was so good, as it was done by my favorite game composer: Go Shiina.

The orginal Ratchet and Clank is good, but I really like the two PS2 sequels that came after it.  They improved so much!  

I watched a lot of the Pokemon anime when it first aired since I was being paid to know everything about Pokemon.  You know what's weird is that at that time, I was living in Austin for college, and the rest of my family was in Dallas.  But for the first few months, an Austin TV station was showing the Pokemon anime, but not in Dallas!  You'd think it would be the other way around.  So what I did for a while was record every episode, then bring the VHS tapes home so my brothers could watch them when I came home to visit!

Another funny story about the Pokemon anime is that when I was in college, after a couple of weeks they showed a repeat of the first episode.  I was about to turn it off since i had already seen it, but then my roommate yelled out, "Wait, turn it back on, I want to see how it all began!"  Which surprised me that he'd say that, since most of the time he wanted nothing to do with the dumb cartoons I'd watch, and would often make fun of them.  He was still a good friend, though, so don't think less of him for that.

I have all those gold cards from Burger King and the Pokeballs they came in.  While Burger King is most famous for Pokemon promotions, thanks to the plastic Pokeball recalls, did you know that the first fast food restaurant to do Pokemon promos was actualy KFC?  Through them you could buy four different Pokemon plushes: Zubat, Vulpix, Seel, and Dratini.  I still have them.

Considering the last mainline Pokemon games I played were Black and White, I've definitely played more spin off games.  But I do find them more interesting.  The mainline games are competent RPGs, but the battle system is very rudimentary compared to other RPGs.

I played the original SaGa Frontier back on the PSOne.  It was a hot mess.

The 3DS Pokemon games that have a Hawaiian theme are Pokemon Sun and Moon.  Speaking of Pokemon, I just posted a blog about it in honor of the upcoming release of New Pokemon Snap.  I encourage you to read it if you get a chance.

I reviewed 80's Overdrive on Switch last year!  I enjoyed it way more than I should have.  It's basically just OutRun, but not as good.  I still had fun with it, though.

http://www.gamerdad.com/blog/2020/06/08/80s-overdrive-switch/

I usually write these big blogs in pieces.  I do a few paragraphs each day until I'm done.

Namco is my favorite video game company.  Not so much for what they do now, but for what they've done in the past.  I can still play many of their arcade classics and still have fun to this very day.  I think Namco was at their best in 80s arcades and 90s PlayStation era.

I've kind of fallen off the Tales game loop lately, though.  Last one I played was Zestiria and lost interest in it pretty quickly.  My favorite Tales game is Legendia, which is the one most people say is the 'black sheep' of the series, and is the one most people don't like.  But I like it!  Go Shiina did the music.  My favorite character in it is Grune. :)

Sometimes I forget which amiibos I have, especially Fire Emblem ones!