Japanese Niche Games Deals & Discussion Thread 4.0

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shivan128

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Welcome to the Japanese niche games deals and discussion thread!  Feel free to talk about local and import Japanese games here.  Our goal is to maintain a thread dedicated to active deals on niche games including RPGs, Visual Novels (VN), Shoot'em ups (Shmups), Musou, etc.  Also maintained are pre-orders for standard, limited and collector's edition games with key release dates provided.

I've wikified the thread to make it more friendly and open to others that can actively update with important information. You can find the wiki post directly below this one.

NOTE:  Please, leave the censorship discussion away from this thread.  It's common for japanese games to have questionable content outside of the country.  We want to keep discussions to the game itself and not about cultural/societal tolerance.

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Nothing- said:
First initial impressions of Rebirth: wow this game has a really strong opening straight out of the gate. I've only played a few hours. But right away I can tell that you are getting really high quality and polished content. Graphics are excellent. The immediate foreground is impressive and dynamic, the environmental detail is great, and the draw distance and horizons are astonishing. The character models and their art direction and cinematic implementation are sooo enticing and Final Fantasy. It has all of your favorite elements: like the cartoony invitedness of FF9, the overworld exploration and farming of Xenoblade, and some of the most lovable character interactions and warm-hearted humor that just make you grin. I can't get over how well-shot, centered, and immersive the cinematics are. This game was practically made to showcase photography and taking screenshots. Much like the previous title, materia acquisition, use and implementation is very satisfying. The battle systems are robust; they've about doubled the weapon skill and character synergy unlocks from Remake. Queen's Gambit is addictive as hell. Non-linear world exploration is there in full force. Finally, the game looks astonishing in 4K HDR. They really delivered the complete package here.
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I like that there is enough to do in the open areas, but not too much like Far Cry. They keep the missions and activities varied between areas. So far at least.
 
TheKbob said:
I keep saying this'll be the year I stop buying and play what I have , but it doesn't happen.
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I don't plan on stopping, but I definitely am sticking with my more curated purchases so the backlog growth is minimal year to year and the quality of experience is as high as possible. That said, this year, I need this to be the year I finally get off my rear and finish pruning my collection back while people are nostalgic for a lot of this stuff that I'm really done with.

It does hit me that at 50 it's getting more common to find out people I knew at some point in my life have died including those my own age. So even more reason to be as purposeful as I can about the activities I do both in front of a screen and outdoors for my health and maximize my quality of life. Finding a good balance of life while also hedging my bets so I can financially survive a very long life (if that happens), is the key.
 
gospelman said:
Alright, I'm caving into the nostalgia pressue. I opened my Rebirth Deluxe and am installing now. I also watched a 1.5hr video of Intergrade to catch me up.

Question: Did the Intergrade release add to the ending of the main story at all? The "seven seconds" line seemed new to me, but perhaps I'm just not remembering correctly from my 2020 playthrough. TIA.
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Intergrade didn't change anything (the "seven seconds" line was in Remake on PS4), but an update SE pushed out last week to all versions of Remake updated two things:

-Tifa's outfit in the brief cut to the Nibelheim flashback early on in Remake is now consistent with what's in Rebirth
-The final line of the main game spoken by Aerith (in the last CG cutscene before the credits) was changed from (I'm paraphrasing here) "The steel sky...I miss it" to "...I don't like this sky".
 
62t said:
Rebirth took a lot of inspiration from Ghost of Tsushima, which is a good thing.
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There is the occasional animal guide, which seem pretty much pointless so far, not seeing what else is related or inspired by Ghost.

Also, I like that I can turn off map and tracker, but anyone know if I can turn off the button menu in bottom left while exploring. I know by now that X opens the command menu, annoying there does not seem to be anyway to remove that.
 
nightc1 said:
It does hit me that at 50 it's getting more common to find out people I knew at some point in my life have died including those my own age. So even more reason to be as purposeful as I can about the activities I do both in front of a screen and outdoors for my health and maximize my quality of life. Finding a good balance of life while also hedging my bets so I can financially survive a very long life (if that happens), is the key.
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I do attempt to remember that I'm more "free time" bound than "money" bound. Sort of. I definitely can't retire soon or anything, but I could buy a game I don't have time to play without much impact. Given that, I really should be putting little amounts here and there extra on that instead of games on sale. That's about the closest you can get to "buying more time" for yourself. It's boring, and all the usual counterpoints about treating yourself and enjoying your hobby apply. But as a correction to a compulsion (like it has been for me sometimes), it can work as a replacement goal/focus (not that you specifically need one, you seem to be sticking pretty well to your own philosophy so I'm just speaking generally, and about myself)

A shorter term one could be eliminating any debt someone has, or just having a small cushion to avoid a dip into debt for something. It is extremely unsexy, but if one is in my situation of "I enjoyed collecting at first, but now I just feel like a collector by default because I just want to play games and have a lot of them".. "Ay, you heard about this new monthly subscription game called an IRA?" lol
 
gmsick said:
For sure if you loved the original FFVII and have the time to put into it. What are you playing atm?
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I don't think you need to have loved the original to enjoy Remake. Remake was great game overall, only notably issues with it were probably the super long/unnecessarily padding to a lot of parts (long corridors, tedious/repetitive side-quests) and the unnecessary story elements (that red biker guy sucks but also things like the whispers, which might actually go somewhere).

But if you did play the original, this game definitely adds a lot to the experience with new parts (Jesse's) and old parts (seeing Aeris in her red dress).
 
Vinny said:
I don't think you need to have loved the original to enjoy Remake. Remake was great game overall, only notably issues with it were probably the super long/unnecessarily padding to a lot of parts (long corridors, tedious/repetitive side-quests) and the unnecessary story elements (that red biker guy sucks but also things like the whispers, which might actually go somewhere).

But if you did play the original, this game definitely adds a lot to the experience with new parts (Jesse's) and old parts (seeing Aeris in her red dress).
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For sure. Loving the original just enhances the playthrough of Remake. I liked the changes. I never got the platinum, because some of the side stuff I didn't want to go though, but I loved it as a straight story/main quest playthrough.
 
Oh man, open world maps littered with crap to do are kind of a guilty pleasure of mine (probably why I liked Forspoken so much), so I guess I should get to Rebirth soon. Last night, I finished both the main story and Olimar's Shipwreck Tale in Pikmin 4, but I'll probably continue the postgame before I move on to anything else. I'm seriously addicted to Pikmin 4 right now and I'm so happy I finally played it. It might replace Mario Wonder or FFXVI in my top 5 games of 2023. So once I've had my Pikmin fill, maybe Rebirth should take priority. But, I was kind of craving a calming farming sim game, hence why I was grabbing some Story of Seasons games, so we'll see what I end up actually doing. I've gotten to the point where I really can't play more than one game at a time because when I try to, I inevitably neglect one in favor of the other and end up dropping the neglected one completely.
gospelman said:
There's so many Story of Seasons games that I lose track. Is there one that's better than the others? I think I have the one with the buffalo plush.
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nitrosmob said:
On the 3DS my favorite was Trio of Towns especially as it had 2 hotties as sisters, plus the 3 towns was neat other than travel. I haven't played the remake type ones myself (mineral town, another wonderful life) but I did play Pioneers of Olive Town on the Switch for a bit, and it was decent (not great performance withstanding, with maybe a bit too many complications for my liking). My favorite Harvest Moon game period was Back to Nature on the PS1 and also the GBA remake, and I believe Mineral Town for the current generation systems is a remake of that with maybe not my favorite art style. People complain about the remakes, but who knows. Rune Factory 3/4 may be better buys overall this generation for these farming type games.
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I've played both Rune Factory 4 and Stardew Valley and loved them both, so I've been slowly collecting some other farming sim games that I've heard are great. I got Rune Factory 5 at launch but put it on the back burner after the meh reviews, and I avoided buying Rune Factory 3 until the half off sale recently since you can't play as a girl, though 3 is apparently very good besides. I also got Harvestella but didn't like its emphasis on its bland story and characters and its lack of dating, so I eventually sold it.

Since I'm more in the mood for straight farming/dating sim with a female option, I decided to grab A Wonderful Life and Friends of Mineral Town (the latter indeed being a remake of the GBA entry that was itself a remake of Back to Nature). I avoided Pioneers of Olive Town since I heard the characters are pretty soulless and I don't like the idea of littering my farm with makers like it's a factory. I also got Trio of Towns a while back when I managed to find a brand new Canadian copy for retail, despite all the USA copies beginning to spike in price, and I even grabbed its DLC before the eShop closed. I've definitely got plenty of options, so I'll just have to choose one, and we all know that starting a game is the hardest part lol
 
Word to the wise, if you buy the bundle just make the defender gear and speed run base Rise. It's really lacking and Sunbreak fixes most of the issues with it.
 
gmsick said:
For sure. Loving the original just enhances the playthrough of Remake. I liked the changes. I never got the platinum, because some of the side stuff I didn't want to go though, but I loved it as a straight story/main quest playthrough.
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Were you able to beat the game on the hard difficulty or whatever? I couldn't even get past the first boss on hard so I looked up some guides and realized, some people were playing with some crazy ass materia builds/pairs whereas I just beat the entire game with the basic as attack/healing materia.
 
Vinny said:
Were you able to beat the game on the hard difficulty or whatever? I couldn't even get past the first boss on hard so I looked up some guides and realized, some people were playing with some crazy ass materia builds/pairs whereas I just beat the entire game with the basic as attack/healing materia.
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If you get the accessory that lets you start battles with a full limit gauge in normal, you can use it on hard, and makes it a piece of cake.
 
Xenogears said:
If you get the accessory that lets you start battles with a full limit gauge in normal, you can use it on hard, and makes it a piece of cake.
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Stuff like this is part of it, the game was insanely deep, I think I just missed a lot during my playthrough. I just noticed that in InterMission, there's a Parry material installed by default and I was like "the fuck is this do?" and looked it up, and it was pretty crazy that this existed in Remake and never used it because it didn't seem useful.

blueweltall said:
I want to Platinum Remake but I still cannot beat the pull-up challenge to get that trophy.
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Now this, I'm pretty sure I got.
 
Vinny said:
Were you able to beat the game on the hard difficulty or whatever? I couldn't even get past the first boss on hard so I looked up some guides and realized, some people were playing with some crazy ass materia builds/pairs whereas I just beat the entire game with the basic as attack/healing materia.
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I never beat it on hard. Look up synergy materia build guides. You'll find some stuff that makes battles a breeze. I imagine the op nature of the build would carry over to hard mode. The trophies I didn't care to get were things like playing a certain chapter 3 times to see all costumes, the pull up challenge & the disc/intel collecting. Plus I skipped some of the mundane side missions.
 
Vinny said:
Were you able to beat the game on the hard difficulty or whatever? I couldn't even get past the first boss on hard so I looked up some guides and realized, some people were playing with some crazy ass materia builds/pairs whereas I just beat the entire game with the basic as attack/healing materia.
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blueweltall said:
I want to Platinum Remake but I still cannot beat the pull-up challenge to get that trophy.
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I got all the trophies for the squats and pull-up minigames, but I almost never have the patience to beat long games again on higher difficulties, so I never platinumed Remake. Same for Intermission, where I retried the final box busting minigame a million times to get all the materia, but noped right out of replaying on hard.
 
If I remember right, to get the accessory that gives basically unlimited limit break, you have to beat the hardest secret boss in the game, but if you make a team just for that, and manage, hard mode is easier than normal after. Thats what I did, and hard mode felt like a story mode recap.
 
IT BEGINS !!!


doctor-weird.gif


P3R $54.99
 
I'll pre-order if there's a steelbook (FF7 Rebirth), if I know I'll play immediately (Ghost Trick), or if it's from a smaller dev/publisher I'm trying to support. Unfortunately most of the third category has been going through LRG lately so I've either been skipping them or picking them up at VGP post-launch. Back in the days of 20% off pre-orders through Amazon and GCU I used to do it a lot more, but there's really just not much reason to anymore.
 
Mostly waiting for Target B2G1 free. It is funny that Square Enix of all people is having hard to find games with Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade. Crisis Core Reunion PS5 is also going up in value.

My prediction is Star Ocean The Second Story R will be the next rare game if they don't print more copies.
 
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Souffrir said:
There was a time Atlus games were basically the only ones I pre-ordered. Now I don’t pre-order anything anymore.
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atlus games used to have cool pre-order/collector's edition freebies and bonuses before the ps4/ps5 era. now all you get for pre-ordering an atlus game is ripped off vs just waiting for the $20 or less complete edition re-release with all the day 1 dlc included.
 
gaystation4 said:
atlus games used to have cool pre-order/collector's edition freebies and bonuses before the ps4/ps5 era. now all you get for pre-ordering an atlus game is ripped off vs just waiting for the $20 or less complete edition re-release with all the day 1 dlc included.
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A lot of them still get launch editions as SBs or with a soundtrack still.. I know the 3DS had a few and I think both P5 and P5R had SB launch editions? Aegis 13 had artcards or something. But yeah, those all ended up being on sale for way less...
 
Nothing- said:
First initial impressions of Rebirth: wow this game has a really strong opening straight out of the gate. I've only played a few hours. But right away I can tell that you are getting really high quality and polished content. Graphics are excellent. The immediate foreground is impressive and dynamic, the environmental detail is great, and the draw distance and horizons are astonishing. The character models and their art direction and cinematic implementation are sooo enticing and Final Fantasy. It has all of your favorite elements: like the cartoony invitedness of FF9, the overworld exploration and farming of Xenoblade, and some of the most lovable character interactions and warm-hearted humor that just make you grin. I can't get over how well-shot, centered, and immersive the cinematics are. This game was practically made to showcase photography and taking screenshots. Much like the previous title, materia acquisition, use and implementation is very satisfying. The battle systems are robust; they've about doubled the weapon skill and character synergy unlocks from Remake. Queen's Gambit is addictive as hell. Non-linear world exploration is there in full force. Finally, the game looks astonishing in 4K HDR. They really delivered the complete package here.
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Just finishing area 2, this continues to be a great summation, and I’m sure will hold for the rest of the game. The side content is such an improvement over Remake, I’m enjoying it just as much as the main story. I‘m still not a fan of running between open world dots, but the amount of it is balanced well with other content. My only small criticisms, let me turn off the button guide in bottom left, and they should make some kind of tweaks with how they handle Max materia. You work to get a Materia Max level, but then once that’s done, you are missing out on leveling other Materia if you continue to use it. So I usually don’t. I think every character should have 1 dedicated slot that is for max materia only, independent of weapon or armor, and maybe you could upgrade it to add a link at some point. So you could at least pick a few favorite Max materia to still use without negative repercussions. Minor refinements though, they really delivered otherwise. Fully justified breaking the game into 3 parts. This has to be the most ambitious videogame soundtrack ever as well, I heard it has over 400 tracks, and they are all great so far.
 
Xenogears said:
Just finishing area 2, this continues to be a great summation, and I’m sure will hold for the rest of the game. The side content is such an improvement over Remake, I’m enjoying it just as much as the main story. I‘m still not a fan of running between open world dots, but the amount of it is balanced well with other content. My only small criticisms, let me turn off the button guide in bottom left, and they should make some kind of tweaks with how they handle Max materia. You work to get a Materia Max level, but then once that’s done, you are missing out on leveling other Materia if you continue to use it. So I usually don’t. I think every character should have 1 dedicated slot that is for max materia only, independent of weapon or armor, and maybe you could upgrade it to add a link at some point. So you could at least pick a few favorite Max materia to still use without negative repercussions. Minor refinements though, they really delivered otherwise. Fully justified breaking the game into 3 parts. This has to be the most ambitious videogame soundtrack ever as well, I heard it has over 400 tracks, and they are all great so far.
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Sounds like we are in the same spot. I've been bingeing Rebirth for the last two days straight and I'm just finishing up exploration on the second map (chapter 4) at ~28hours on my save file clock. These are my impressions so far:

+
  • The soundtrack. There must be at least 15 different arrangements for the Chocobo track as well as all of the main themes. You are constantly hearing new orchestral or meledoic remixes of each world and dungeon theme. It's insane. I'll have to keep playing, but this is probably the best soundtrack and mixing I've ever experienced in an rpg.
  • Character designs and art direction. Especially the minor ones. So many memorable and attractive characters and I've just scratched the surface.
  • The world feels lived in. Much like the original game, you're constricted in corridors inside the oppressive city during Remake. Then as you leave Midgar, the world opens up into endless possibilities, exploration, sidequests, and mini-games. Inhabitants are living their free lives and you are free from Shinra's grasp. The world is your oyster and you get to tour it now.
  • Mini games. Probably the other most impressive feat of this game. The number of mini-games is astounding, and it will blow you mind. If you can manage to stay away from spoilers completely. Which I would absolutely recommend.
  • Boss Battles and Summon Materia. The boss battles are grandiose but are never unwelcome. They are short and to the point, and some assessment and leveling make most of them an easy one shot. The other huge plus is that unlike FF7R, you are fully charging your summon materia in almost every slightly longer battle and you get to use them all. the. time. You're getting WAY more summons and limit breaks, the way it should be.
  • Equipment. The equipment and materia management is near perfect. It's also a step up from the previous game. There are a ton of options but it never feels overwhelming. Crafting also serves its purpose.

-
  • fuck off Chadley.
  • I had no idea this was going to be an Ubisoft map vomit game. Map points to complete all over the place. The difference is that this time it is all much-welcome and I don't mind them one bit. This is the perfect 'Open-World game' in a Final Fantasy skin. It's also everything most fans are always clamoring for: a massive overworld to explore, and much less linearity. The exploration is fun and there are surprises and mini-games around every corner. Excellent pacing.
  • Along with all that comes the endless worthless resource gathering. I never like the minutiae of endless resource accumulation and micromanagement of ingredients which feel useless. But you can pretty much ignore it though. It's not so bad. I guess they serve the purpose of the carrot-on-a-stick which gets you to run to new spots on the grasslands.
  • The combat challenges are really annoying when you have to redo them, and they keep repeating the narration dialogue over the speaker.
  • Synergy Abilities. At this point of the game, this is the most obtuse part of the battle system. You unlock these duo attacks in your character upgrades that function like mini limit breaks, but it's very ambiguous and awkward how they are supposed to be implemented.

Rebirth has some flaws but it is a 10 / 10 in spite of them. The game is near-perfect and has everything you could ask for. I've never seen such jarringly uneven gameplay...but then the game is superbly well directed and excellently paced. I'm going to be spending a lot of time with this game, and I'm still in awe that we've received the best modern RPGs in Baldur's Gate III and FF7 Rebirth during the last year. In addition to other mind blowing releases like Zelda: TooK and Elden Ring. RPGs are peaking right now, and this generation of console games have really hit their stride.
 
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Vinny said:
Posting here too from the CE thread, but I got a Target Circle offer for 20% of video games, very limited selection like always but quite a few preorders worked/including some CEs and some niche games:
Guilty Gear Strive 25th PS5
Blasphemous 2 NS and PS5
Gundam Breaker 4 NS
Eiyuden Chroncile NS
Visions of Mana PS5/XB
Demon Slayer Kimetsu no Yaiba NS
Xuan Yuan Sword Mists Beyond the Mounts NS (no clue what this is, I just liked the cover)
Talos 2 Deluxe
Sea of Stars NS/PS5
Pokemon Scarlet/Violet + DLC bundles
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Stellar Blade has been added to Target and works for this offer if you have it:
www.target.com

Stellar Blade - PlayStation 5

Read reviews and buy Stellar Blade - PlayStation 5 at Target. Choose from contactless Same Day Delivery, Drive Up and more.
www.target.com www.target.com

If there is a B2G1 between now and launch that also applies to it, that'll end up being a slightly better deal (I think first party Sony is usually excluded now? I'm not completely sure of that)

The Pokemon Scarlet/Violet DLC bundles seem like decent picks for it too (the offer, if you have it, works on multiple games in one order). They're usually excluded from the B2G1 sales (I have seen them in some of the Best Buy Plus membership promotional sales in the past, but since you can't do the cancel and pro-rate thing at Best Buy you'd have to buy three of them (or $94.99 games) to maximize it.)

Bit of an aside on those since they're a little more complicated compared to the 'Pokemon Sword/Shield Plus Expansion Pass' physical copies (Those have all the DLC on cart, but there is a small patch after that that isn't on the cart):
The rights to the DLC are on cart and there isn't a code in the box (apart from the one for free Pokeballs).
The 1st DLC data is on the cart.
The 2nd has to download in like a patch.
It isn't ideal, but, at least download/patch servers stay up longer than transactional ones. So, if the Switch store is shut down but as long as it remains in a "you can still download your games" state, it seems like it should work since you don't have to 'buy' the DLC it just sees it as update data for that version.
 
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Beloved final chapter LOL. The Answer was OK for what I played, but it would be dry for most people. I like dungeon crawlers and even I got bored at times.
 
I’m pretty sure FeMC would sell better, but other than the director of P3P, the MegaTen team seems weirdly sexist about having female protagonists. The only other example was, what, SH2?
 
I'm really enjoying Rebirth so far. I'm about 45 hours in, in chapter 9. Nothing's write-up sums everything up well, but I would really emphasize the sheer volume of things there are to do and how great the main cast's chemistry and animations are. It's really a delight. I'm not as big of a fan of the materia system because it feels like some things that should just be under a "strategy" menu take up materia slots - i.e. letting your non-controlled characters use weapon abilities or unique abilities. But maybe I'm just spoiled by Tales.

SephirothWF said:
Synergy is not obtuse. Use 3 atb charges on 2 characters each, unleash synergy.
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My problem is that I end battles too quickly and I rarely get a chance to use Synergy outside of boss battles (same with Limits). Maybe that's intentional? But I do understand how to use them. Playing on normal, not trying to min/max, I feel like I'm playing pretty normally. It's possible they'll become more relevant on Hard or in the latter chapters. It'll be interesting to see how/if balance changes throughout the game; Hard mode on Remake was one of my favorite Hard modes so I am looking forward to that second playthrough too.
 
I never got the hype for this designs/styles, and I'm saying this as someone who's fave game of all time is CT and who also watched DBZ up to the Buu saga, you cannot deny that his syle is probably one of the most recognizable styles of our generation, right up there with Amano, the lady who did Castlevania starting from SotN, and MGS artist.
 
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