DEREK EX MACHINA, created by author and editor Derek L.H., is a blog dedicated to exploring the effect that video games and film have on people.
Especially in an era where RPGs are leaning towards telling more complex, adult stories, it was incredibly refreshing to visit the world of Grandia. The battle mechanics are satisfying and strategic, but the true magic of Grandia lies in its ostensible charm in its storytelling, worldbuilding, and characters. Grandia invites players to give in to their natural senses of adventure, wonder, and curiosity, and it gloriously succeeds in doing so.
The JRPG genre is not as hard to get into as some may think. The games discussed here are proof that the genre is capable of being welcoming to newcomers. Regardless of which JRPG you start with, know that the genre is beloved for a reason. They transport players to other worlds to explore, offer various characters to talk to, and deliver gameplay experiences that can be strategic, stylish, and satisfying.
Overall, Strikers’ combat is incredibly satisfying and feels like it accurately captures the spirit of the original game’s combat. In fact, that statement can be applied to the entirety of Strikers - it’s a game that convincingly captures the spirit of Persona 5 while offering a new scenario for the Phantom Thieves to go through.
Ys IX is an Action RPG that I can easily recommend to just about anyone interested in the genre, as it effectively nails almost everything it tries to do. From the game’s fast-paced, exciting combat that has a high skill ceiling for players to master to the game’s wonderfully told story and its engaging, rewarding side content, Ys IX: Monstrum Nox stands as one of the genuinely best Action RPGs in recent memory.
Breath of the Wild offers an unprecedented amount of adventure to the player - so much so that, even after four years, there are still many more adventures that the game invites players to embark upon. Breath of the Wild is ruthless in its devotion to keep players coming back to learn more and make more discoveries about it. That, above all, is what makes the game so unique and so magical, no matter how much time passes.
Recommending Cyberpunk 2077 is tricky. While it has some significant issues in its gameplay and content, I truly feel that it’s worth experiencing just for the story missions that exemplify some of the best storytelling and worldbuilding that the cyberpunk genre has to offer. It’s truly rare to see a game that so well realizes its story, characters, lore, and world. It’s just a shame that so many gameplay systems and mechanics aren’t nearly as well-realized.
There is no one-size-fits-all strategy to announcing a project, nor is there a one-size-fits-all strategy for promoting a game pre-release. However, the differences in CD Projekt Red and Square Enix’s approach to marketing their biggest titles of 2020 do highlight that some strategies are more healthy and responsible than others. In an age where hype culture is so prevalent in the realm of gaming and in a year where two games suffered significantly different fates in large part due to how they were hyped and presented to the public, the term “hype responsibly” rings ever true.
There’s very much a strong core to Yakuza 3. There’s nothing explicitly bad or unenjoyable at the game - it just feels like a victim of a series that naturally improved its execution of its ideas over time. Later games refining what Yakuza 3 brings to the table isn’t the fault of Yakuza 3, but it does highlight how unpolished and unrefined Yakuza 3 is as a result.
[V]ideo games deserve to be commended for the comfort that they provided to hundreds of millions around the world in ways that no other medium could possibly replicate. This piece will be a reflection on the relationship between 2020 and video games, specifically the video games that provided an opportunity for us to cope and survive through a year of unprecedented anxiety and uncertainty for so many.
Link’s Awakening is but one example of how smaller-scale design can nevertheless make a world feel as believable and immersive as it is tightly constructed and uninterested in wasting the player’s time. Through its tight design and consideration for making an experience that provides a consistent feeling of progression and gradually expanding sense of freedom and exploration, Link’s Awakening ended up provides an adventure that I recall very fondly - an assessment that is in large thanks to the title’s size.
Nioh is a reminder that games do indeed still offer challenge to players, and through that challenge, it crafts players into becoming more attentive, more empowered through overcoming hardship, and more confident that they can learn any skill and conquer any challenge if given perseverance, adaptation, and the will to continue learning and mastering what’s available to them.
Resonance of Fate can only truly be appreciated by RPG faithful - and even then, I can’t guarantee that they’ll enjoy the plot nor the inevitable spike in difficulty in the late game. All others wanting to play something unique should unfortunately look elsewhere.
Through its dark humor and brilliantly realized characters, The Art of Self-Defense manages to say a lot about violence and masculinity without every coming across as full of itself or preachy. Self-Defense is a film that very much understands what it is and the kind of story it’s trying to tell, and doesn’t attempt to be anything that it isn’t. What results is a film that is tightly focused, funny, and intelligent.
Gravity Rush 2 settles with being a modest sequel. It doesn’t make big advancements upon the original, but merely expands on what the original already did well. With its new additions showing flaws and not being too substantial, Gravity Rush 2 ultimately stands as a sequel that, while solid, lacks the same “Wow” factor that its predecessor had.
Axiom Verge brings some of the best of what the Metroidvania genre has to offer: satisfying exploration, tons of collectibles, and an immersive world dripping with atmosphere. Unfortunately, Axiom Verge also brings with it some clunky combat mechanics and an inability to implement all of its tools as effectively as other standouts in this genre. But its weaknesses shouldn’t take away from what Axiom Verge is - a satisfying, intriguing adventure that is enhanced by its excellently realized world and intelligent story.
Everyone who plays Celeste will learn about how to learn and and get through hardship, which, in so doing, teaches its audience about mental health and illness, a topic that many pieces of media struggle to effectively talk about, and how it can be coped with. It is for teaching that lesson to its players that Celeste’s management of its difficulty and narrative serves can only be considered as masterful.
In a time where open world games are becoming more and more common, I feel that now is as an important a time as ever to bring into question when an open world enhances a game, and when it drags the entire game down. If this genre is to have a healthy future moving forward, it needs to be known when an open world game has mechanics that makes use of its open world and when it lacks mechanics that can cause much of its world to go ignored and uninhabited by players.
Whenever we judge any kind of experience - a movie, for example - we judge its value off of the core experience of watching that film, but with video games, it’s not as easy to do so. While many certainly do judge a game purely off of what it offers in its core gameplay (i.e. the story in a narrative-driven game, a combat system in an RPG, etc.), the side content of a game is something that I feel deserves more attention and credit. And when side content is delivered in a way that is as well-executed as Super Smash Bros. Ultimate’s offerings, it’s hard not to stop and appreciate the smaller, side-experiences that help elevate a good game into a phenomenal one.
What makes Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse so special to me is that a begets its audience to rethink what animation is capable of. This film could have easily adopted a live-action counterpart, or used a more traditional CG art style - but it didn’t. Why was this? Why, in this instance, did Sony choose to take a riskier and more stylistic approach when a safer, more often-used presentation would have been easier (and likely more profitable)? The answer to that…is passion.
Widows - while certainly having some excellently realized commentary on modern western culture and the increasing spread of apathy - doesn’t manage to do much you haven’t seen before in a heist film […] It’s certainly flawed, but it’s clear that this film was a product of smart and lovingly-crafted writing and direction, which alone makes it worth a watch.
