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.

A message from Thorbahn:

Our CAG Japanese Niche Games Thread also has a community on PS4, where you can interact and game with other members of the thread.

Our moderators are: Draekon, Las_Hole, and Waffleswanton

You can basically friend any of our members, or any moderator, and you will be able to request to join the community under "Communities friends are in" tab, and a mod will approve your request.

You can also leave your PSN ID in the thread, saying you want to join, and we can invite you directly as well.

As always, have fun and enjoy your stay!

 
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My experience with the other daunting series, that I started instead of trails, Yakuza. I had played yakuza 0 followed by Kiwami 1 almost 7 years ago, can’t believe it’s been that long. I liked 0, and I really liked the carryover from that they shoehorned in to the remake of yakuza 1. The bones of yakuza 1 were still a rough base to build on though, my least favorite of the games so far. I’ve now blasted through Kiwami 2 - yakuza 4. Kiwami 2 was fun, pretty much playing 0 again though, for better or worse. Yakuza 3 and 4, the original combat is pretty bad, the graphics are ps3, but they still held up. I did about 1/2 the side content in each didn’t care about mastering any of it. The substory and main story continuation between games was nice. The main story of 3 and 4 had some low points, usually towards the end, but kept me engaged. You’d think after the 5th time leaving the big bad guy you just vanquished with their loaded gun, they’d learn to take care of that before starting their reflections on the victory and story up to that point. I’m not sure if I would have rather just watched a summary or not, but I wanted a shenmue like, so this was it, and I’ve enjoyed it enough to keep going. Mostly due to the humor, and it does have heart. Taking a break before doing 5 and 6, possibly 7 since it will be a big change of pace. I think 5 is going to be the low point, heard it drags a lot and is a lot longer than 3 and 4, but sounds all good from there.
 
Xenogears said:
My experience with the other daunting series, that I started instead of trails, Yakuza. I had played yakuza 0 followed by Kiwami 1 almost 7 years ago, can’t believe it’s been that long. I liked 0, and I really liked the carryover from that they shoehorned in to the remake of yakuza 1. The bones of yakuza 1 were still a rough base to build on though, my least favorite of the games so far. I’ve now blasted through Kiwami 2 - yakuza 4. Kiwami 2 was fun, pretty much playing 0 again though, for better or worse. Yakuza 3 and 4, the original combat is pretty bad, the graphics are ps3, but they still held up. I did about 1/2 the side content in each didn’t care about mastering any of it. The substory and main story continuation between games was nice. The main story of 3 and 4 had some low points, usually towards the end, but kept me engaged. You’d think after the 5th time leaving the big bad guy you just vanquished with their loaded gun, they’d learn to take care of that before starting their reflections on the victory and story up to that point. I’m not sure if I would have rather just watched a summary or not, but I wanted a shenmue like, so this was it, and I’ve enjoyed it enough to keep going. Mostly due to the humor, and it does have heart. Taking a break before doing 5 and 6, possibly 7 since it will be a big change of pace. I think 5 is going to be the low point, heard it drags a lot and is a lot longer than 3 and 4, but sounds all good from there.
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I played the OG series in order by release- 1 & 2 on PS2, 3-5 on PS3, 0 & 6 on PS4 (Pro, but don't think either game was Pro enhanced). I can never decide whether I like Yakuza 0 or Yakuza 6 more but those two are easily the best. 0 was the more fun game thanks to the variety of mini-games and better story, but 6 was first use the Dragon Engine and actually felt like a modern game, which made the game so much more enjoyable even if it didn't have the variety or story/characters/heart (as great as they all were) of 0. 3-5 were just ok and only enjoy due to the characters (Taiga!) but I dunno if I would have enjoyed them more if I played the remasters (PS3 versions were like PS2 level in terms of performance and presentation). I don't think I could have enjoyed the series if I started with 0 and then went to Kiwami, which I did play and man, is it rough- no clue how I enjoyed the PS2 game so much back in the day.


Anyway, haven't done much gaming myself, I'm about 20 hours into Fantasian and... my initial wonder and joy from the demo hours kinda died off around 10 hours. There's lots of good in here but also lots of... meh. Very surprised by the music... nothing really caught my ear yet.
 
Checking the back of the boxes, 6 is Pro enhanced, but 0 is not.

I'm working my way through Infinite Wealth right now. There seems to be more to do in this game than any of the prior, which is saying something, and the substories seem much longer with more parts to them than past games too. Otherwise I'm loving it!
 
There's $15 off $100 in the Woot app today. Link to games

I grabbed that $60 Rain Code LE along with the $40 8bitdo Ultimate controller and a $.50 usb-c cable as a filler to exceed $100.

There will also be a flat 10% off in app in 3/1, but it's a gamble to hold out on a specific item that might go oos during today's promo.
 
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I have been marathoning the Xenoblade Chronicles series back-to-back-to-back and am now in XC3. It is not only the best in the series for me, but shows me they really learned what did and didn't work with the previous entries. The characters, art, voice acting, world-building; all exceptional. This series is one that really demands playing the previous entries and rewards you for doing so. I put in 90hrs in XCDE, 10hrs Future Connected, 120hrs XC2, 20hrs Torna. I'd say Torna was the hardest for me to get through having just finished XC2 and knowing the outcome of the story.

XC3 is swoon worthy good and if you are on the fence, play it. If you don't want to put in the effort to see all the essential story that leads up to it, YouTube it.

What are your thoughts on the series and on XC3?
 
I've only played XC1 on Wii and XC3. I loved both. I have XCDE and Torna too, and will get XCX.

It really is the characters for me. Not just the way they are written, but they way the English voice actors portray them. I don't think there are many other actual Japanese developed RPGs that can match the fluidity and sincerity Monolith gets out of their characters. I also like the active battles (and it's a reason I like the battles in Like a Dragon / Infinite Wealth). They keep the player engaged so much more.

Definitely the devs learn with each entry and make a better game for it. XC3 is easily the best of the series.
 
Earendil_aod said:
What are your thoughts on the series and on XC3?
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Solid games. One issue that holds the series back for me is how they make beautiful open 3d worlds with no options aside from extremely low performance hardware. That measure of distraction never leaves my mind when I play them. Mehmehmeh.

I've played them all except xc3. For a while I was waiting to see if they would release a complete edition cartridge. Maybe there's a slight chance of a switch 2 version or at least an unlikely performance update.
 
I think I'm in the minority on XC3; it was good but didn't care for it as much as most people. Story stopped being interesting about half-way through, I think the final 1/4 of the was a bit too sappy) and the whole learning skills from having various teammates thing got tiring after a while. Gameplay wise Torna remains my favorite (though maybe I'd say XCX if it wasn't so grindy/tedious). Story/world setting-wise, the original remains my fave.
 
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Earendil_aod said:
I have been marathoning the Xenoblade Chronicles series back-to-back-to-back and am now in XC3. It is not only the best in the series for me, but shows me they really learned what did and didn't work with the previous entries. The characters, art, voice acting, world-building; all exceptional. This series is one that really demands playing the previous entries and rewards you for doing so. I put in 90hrs in XCDE, 10hrs Future Connected, 120hrs XC2, 20hrs Torna. I'd say Torna was the hardest for me to get through having just finished XC2 and knowing the outcome of the story.

XC3 is swoon worthy good and if you are on the fence, play it. If you don't want to put in the effort to see all the essential story that leads up to it, YouTube it.

What are your thoughts on the series and on XC3?
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That's the other series that has me stuck. 😲 I've got my 60-hour save file from XC1 from like 5 years ago and I just.....can't get through it. It's enjoyable, but boy is it a lot of running around. It's been kind of relegated as this game I play while staying at my sister's house or on vacation. This is the type of game that used to blow my mind around 2004-2007ish, which I would dub the "single-player, offline MMO" after lots of experience on Final Fantasy 11 and World of Warcraft. Final Fantasy 12 epitomized this game type. I absolutely loved it at the time. But I don't play many of them now and not sure how I feel about them anymore. They can feel...very timesink-y.

I've been trying to get to XC2 for years. have a 5 hour save file from 2018. I will get there later this year. XC2 has my interest piqued bc I've heard so many conflicting, and polarized extreme opinions on it, and I tend to like those niche games that a certain subset of fans can be very passionate about.

Can you believe the Switch is coming up on 8 years old in a month?? man the time flies.

I had a 40 hour save file for XCX on Wii U too. That one will be tough to go back to again, too. because I didn't finish it, but I've seen most of it already. I WILL get through most of this series, in order. XC3 is the goal, and the motivator to complete the others.
 
It's a double-edged sword. A great, longstanding series which we can all respect. But the wide breadth and scope of the catalogue makes for a very unapproachable barrier-to-entry. I'm not the type of person to just jump into the latest, highly review-scored entry. I'm going to play them all in order; so therefore, that makes it more difficult to tackle. You also can't do it while feeling rushed or when it feels insurmountable. Takes a certain mindset.

There's a reason why most people don't play these games (100-hour jrpgs). and I don't want to get to that level. You can only take them when you're in the acceptable mood.

It's a lot like considering starting One Piece. I haven't done that, and likely never will. It's 1000+ episodes and if I do that it's going to be from the very beginning. Perhaps someone else can jump in at some period of time and get some enjoyment out of it. But I start from square one.
 
Some games IMHO become a nightmare to complete after a while. I know I struggled through the last third of Persona 5 just wishing it would end already. I haven't played Royal (got it for $20 though so eventually I'll get to it when I want to replay P5), but I hope it's a bit better in that aspect. While I do feel way too short games are okay for the most part but frankly fleeting, I also feel super long games can bring a lot of fleetingness as well. I like the mid point where I feel the game was long enough and told its story or whatever, or just was fun those hours, over slogfests of super long games.

I do play a lot of indie games between my RPGS/Visual Novels, which can take me a while, so I get the best of all the worlds, plus I like smaller developer games quite a bit.
 
Xenoblade shouldn’t be considered too daunting yet, compared to trails. Xenoblade X is its own thing, you can skip that and just play later if you want. Really just 3 main games, which are fairly distinct from each other. I definitely recommend the series, though I have not played torna dlc or 3 yet. If you don’t like the slower exploration gameplay, with lots of running around big areas, thats kind of that though. But Trails, we are talking 1000+ hours now, and even if it’s very good, it’s also somewhat low budget, and the games have a lot of similarities and carryover? Like yakuza using the same map over and over, they are shorter games at least, I can’t do that for 1000 hours.
 
Xenogears said:
Xenoblade.....I definitely recommend the series,
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bh187-family-guy.gif
 
In my defense, other than some similar themes and developer background, Xenogears and Xenoblade biggest connection is if you just like games with Xeno in the name.
 
Last year I fired up Xenogears 1 on my phat PS3. That was a lot of fun, tho I didn't continue with it after a few hours.

SNES --> PS1 is still my favorite era.
someone should make a Chrono Trigger pop culture game where we go back and forth in time to visit different video game console eras.
Until it all blows up in the year 2020X to the serivce-games CEO megaboss. That keeps getting reincarnated, as the head of new companies, on the timeline.

I really need to get a NiB working PS2 (plays PS1 discs) at some point in the near future. :unsure:
 
nightc1 said:
If it's for playing PS1 discs, then I think every PS3 also plays them. I know my slim ps3's do. Well, at least every one of them I tried.
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Underrated comment. PS1 games on any PS3 is easily the best way to play PS1 games... Faster loading, smoothed out graphics, hard drive memory cards, wireless controller.

Yes, I realize PC emulators can do fancy stuff but I was never able to get any of them working right without a lot of time and tweaking.
 
Just noticed an interesting Easter egg in episode 50 of the original City Hunter. There is a cargo ship that randomly has the name Ys - Falcom painted on the side. That has to be intentional, must of been fans. Ys 1 was released the same year.
 
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Holy hell the Suikoden I & II remake is coming in two weeks on Mar 10. Is that really something we are going to wait until it is < $25? Or are we going to secure our copies and support Konami for putting out a great game?

It's going to be another huge year for jrpgs. Suikoden and Lunar remasters. In addition to all the Nintendo NSW2 stuff they are hiding up their sleeves. and that's just in Q2. People still have recent releases Romancing Saga 2, Tales of Graces f, Fantasian Neo Dimension, and Ys Memoire they might want to buy.

Right now I've just been really enjoying all the Capcom, Konami, SquareSoft, Sega collections and HD rereleases they are putting out. There's been a lot of fun stuff to collect and play. While I also now mostly consider my PS5 an offline single-player device.

I really do hate how we're getting all these awesome JP budget releases and it feels like the market isn't showing up to buy them. It's no wonder why the industry has dived fully into fooling people with f2p and service games.

Amazon has nearly put all other retailers out of the video game business entirely. It's a really weird time for consoles. But sad how SquareEnix and Capcom are doing God's work and yet it feels like no one is supporting them.
 
I'm personally being EXTRA picky this year about what I add to my collection. So it's a skip for me on Suikoden. I can always play the psn ps1 digital versions I bought. XCX is next for me then probably waiting for Switch 2 news.

Over the past couple days I've started to box up my overflow of games... also other collections. Trying to separate games into more medium and small storage boxes by platform so it's easier pull a box and start making decisions on what to get rid of. It's going to be a slog to get through but I'm determined this is the year I slim my collection way down to the core of what I want it to be... and eventually get to the point that a purchase of a game is to immediately plan to play it.
 
Konami and Capcom been pushing their catalog collection hard the last few years. I mean right now there are no more Mega Man or Ace Attorney games to port so maybe it is time for something new? This wave of collection will have to last as we will get to a point where there is nothing else to port.

As for Suikoen I never played it so I will pick it up at the first price drop.
 
62t said:
Konami and Capcom been pushing their catalog collection hard the last few years. I mean right now there are no more Mega Man or Ace Attorney games to port so maybe it is time for something new? This wave of collection will have to last as we will get to a point where there is nothing else to port.

As for Suikoen I never played it so I will pick it up at the first price drop.
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I'm feeling this more and more every day. I don't mind rebuying these games since they're still enjoyable to me and having some modern conveniences is nice, but... yeah, it's also $50 for games that are 2+ decades old. Especially with Konami who stopped making games is just seems to be milking nostalgia (at least Capcom still makes new games).
 
I wish Bandai-Namco would follow suit. Tales, Xenosaga, .hack, etc. I never thought we'd get Lunar on modern consoles before Tales of Phantasia.
 
Tothoro said:
I wish Bandai-Namco would follow suit. Tales, Xenosaga, .hack, etc. I never thought we'd get Lunar on modern consoles before Tales of Phantasia.
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They did a few... Symphonia got a PS3 release and PS4 release, both of which were terrible. I never played Verperia or .hack GU so can't speak on those. I don't really know anything about the .hack series/it's popularity but It's odd .hack GU got a HD release but the original 4 games didn't.
 
Vinny said:
They did a few... Symphonia got a PS3 release and PS4 release, both of which were terrible. I never played Verperia or .hack GU so can't speak on those. I don't really know anything about the .hack series/it's popularity but It's odd .hack GU got a HD release but the original 4 games didn't.
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Bamco seems generally extremely averse to rereleasing anything that doesn’t have the words “Man” and “Pac” in the title. My guess is that since the original four .hack// games are pretty rough visually, even by the standards of early PS2 games, it would have taken them a lot of effort to polish up. Comparatively, GU already has relatively sharp, cel-shaded anime-style graphics, which they had to do very little to in order to make them look relatively presentable to a modern audience. I really think they just chose the series that would be cheapest to get looking visually attractive to newcomers.
 
Suikoden 1/2, Lunar, Xenoblade are my early buys for sure. I'm way to behind on Atelier games, and honestly I don't find them like super amazing overall (I haven't played all of them). I'm sure there is an otome game there as well, but I just get those as they come and if they interest me. I'm mainly skipping other things as I just don't like some of them (Monster Hunter is not my type of game) or just saving money in these uncertain times.
 
Bamco said back in December they were planning to release remastered Tales games pretty consistently going forward.

mynintendonews.com

Bandai Namco says it will release Tales of remasters “fairly consistently”

Bandai Namco says it is full steam ahead for its long-awaited lineup of Tales of game remasters. The news was announced today by Tales of series producer Yusuke Tomizawa during the 30th Anniversary…
mynintendonews.com mynintendonews.com

Last month they renewed the Trademark for Tales of the Abyss. Companies do that from time to time anyway, but it's very likely that's the next title getting ported.

Vinny said:
I never played Verperia
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The port (at least to switch) was good. The game itself, pretty dang great with a fantastic set of characters. The characters and story alone made me want to finish it, but the battle system just didn't click with me. Even on easy, some mid dungeon or path way bosses would just take too many retries even though I was beating major bosses without any issue. I think I made it around 1/3 of the way through before walking away from it. Ultimately, I'm not sure the tales series is for me. I've never finished one of the games even though I've tried several of them on different platforms through the years.
 
I am pretty sure Namco will port the rest of the English Tales game. They also remake/remaster games like Freedom Wars, Katamari, and Klonoa. They just need to translate and bring some of the Japanese only Tales game to modern system.
 
nitrosmob said:
Suikoden 1/2, Lunar, Xenoblade are my early buys for sure. I'm way to behind on Atelier games, and honestly I don't find them like super amazing overall (I haven't played all of them). I'm sure there is an otome game there as well, but I just get those as they come and if they interest me. I'm mainly skipping other things as I just don't like some of them (Monster Hunter is not my type of game) or just saving money in these uncertain times.
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Same here. I only played Atelier Ryza. It is not a bad game but nothing amazing that I need to play Ryza 2 or other Atelier games. Monster Hunter World just did not click with me, but for some reason I enjoyed Monster Hunter clone like Toukiden and Gundam Breaker.
 
They released Symphonia five different times (GC, PS2, PS3, PC, PS4/Switch/Xbox) and weirdly they make it worse most of the time. The PS2 version got bumped from 60 FPS to 30 FPS, the PS3 version had Dawn of the New World included (a rare step forward), and both the PC and modern console releases were plagued with bugs on launch (and didn't come with DotNW for some reason).

They've been saying they'll re-release more Tales games for about a decade. Does anyone else remember the infamous "not that one" tweet from BNEU in 2015?


Ironically, the game they were saying no to is the only new Tales localization that's happened in the past decade and that was just the expanded version of Vesperia (previously on 360, but with some new JP PS3-exclusive content) released for modern consoles. I hope they actually fulfill it this time, but we've only gotten ports of the 360/PS3-era games (Vesperia, Symphonia, now Graces) this gen. The stuff that would take effort to port/localize is the stuff that they won't revisit.

I think a lot of it is probably that they just have more lucrative opportunities since they co-develop Smash and publish Dark Souls/Elden Ring, but it's sad to see the other Japanese Devs finally coming around with their old games while Bandai-Namco's picking their nose in the backroom.
 
Tothoro said:
I wish Bandai-Namco would follow suit. Tales, Xenosaga, .hack, etc. I never thought we'd get Lunar on modern consoles before Tales of Phantasia.
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Ironic given that they ported top as much as ff ported ff4. It even had that free version on the iPad (that they took save points out sporadically to charge for as dlc) then later removed for whatever reason.

It has been probably close to a decade since top had its last port.

Vinny said:
They did a few... Symphonia got a PS3 release and PS4 release, both of which were terrible. I never played Verperia or .hack GU so can't speak on those. I don't really know anything about the .hack series/it's popularity but It's odd .hack GU got a HD release but the original 4 games didn't.
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That's because it's a crappy port of the ps2 port. The og game cube version is the definitive one despite being significantly older on inferior hardware to today's tech. They couldn't even get it to run past half the framerate of the original version. If they'd actually put some effort into reusing one of the other games engines for a symphonia semi remake (vesperia would be preferable) then maybe it'd be good.


On the subject of vesperia the newer ports are all based on the ps3 port which we never got. I played and beat the ps4 version and it's doable at least with only a few hiccups like on the secret missions. and frame rate dips but those were around all the way back to the 360 beta version when you have 4 full screen spells all going off at once on a linked encounter.

The secret missions were mostly easy enough to do in the original release. The only hard ones were stuff that requires specific party members or timing or both to activate. One requires getting a missable reusable healing item long before the boss battle it's used for. But the biggest pain in the ass is definitely the boss where you have to let the ai use all it's attacks and finisher on you. Just why?

But yeah I couldn't even get the first real one the golem who has it's Achilles as the marker even it glows iirc to trigger. So I have no idea what the hell they did to the ports to make them bug out like they did for those. Brightside it doesn't matter much unless you are a completionist.
 
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On the subject of symphonia ps3 it was plagued with issues as well. They somehow ruined the translation in places. Noishe monuments being the most common where it's spouting out lines about circumference of x and y. when all they had to do was reuse the gc version for the ones that became gibberish. And added in new bugs/returning.

Petrified bug battle victory stuff is still the most hilarious thing.
 
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62t said:
Worst Trophy list is Tales of Symphonia which requires 4 play though with tons of missables.
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I'm surprised that it's only 4. Given that you have the friendship stuff between Lloyd and the 8 other party members. Different story routes, dialog trees, ending scenes and character scenes depending on who you pick as besty/who you answered questions to the most favored. And at least Kratos zelos and Collette? Had key items they gave Lloyd based on that which are used during story scenes. Plus zelos being required for most sidequests and you can only get 3 of 7? costumes for the 3 characters you picked during some of zelos required sidequests. (swimsuits and nobility costumes iirc) While if you pick Kratos you're locked out of that content.
 
The trophies that require multiple playthroughs are mostly tied to titles and the Flanoir event in particular, so IIRC you just have to make specific decisions to influence affection and reload saves a few times. It's been a few years since I did it, though. One of the longer platinum trophies I've gone for, around 170 hours.
 
Finished the anime series (and movie) Anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day . Overall it did pull at the heart strings though I feel like it was more sad and depressing than uplifiting. I didn't fully believe the main character and the girl really loved each other until the movie covered their meeting and highlighted some key points to flesh that out. The generic version of Pokemon the kids all played was kind of cool. Still, glad I watched it... just kind of left me drained. I think next I'm probably going to watch Toradora! , though I'm going to probably finish Chaika the Coffin Princess first since I watched the first season last weekend and this weekend the second season airs, so i can DVR it. I'll have to track down the OVA for it though, since it doesn't seem they give you any of the extras beyond the core series on the hidive linear channel. There's also a change in the lineup on Hidive channel with a bunch of other series getting added to the linear loop... going to sample the ones I haven't seen and see if any of them click once I have time. One I have already sampled that I will give a full effort to is The Demon Girl Nextdoor. Seems like it might be something good between more serious series.

Tomorrow also is the finale for Dragon Ball Daima. It's been a good run and a nice bonding experience with my oldest son. We've enjoyed the whole thing and the opening song is great.

Game wise (and dvds and so on)... I'm making progress on my plans to downsize. I'm setting up a small extra bedroom as my Office and storage for everything. This includes cleaning out my attic of stuff that's already boxed. Other stuff, I'm boxing in cardboard boxes. Some stuff I'll put expiration dates on the box that maybe I should think more about... and other stuff I just need it all separated and organized and get on giving, selling, ...etc. Hopefully the box idea works out as I won't have to just do everything at once and can kind of pace myself so I don't get too overwhelmed. My final game collection is going to be very manageable. I'm not saying I won't have a backlog after this, of course i will, but it'll be like the cream of the crop... things I'm legit interested in playing... and maybe some games that are good for rare family game get togethers.
 
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