I was lurking through console speculations during 2012, Microsoft shooting themselves in the foot in 2013, and Project Beast in 2014. Reading through threads was quite the fun time sink as it is now. I had a college account already, but it's better to let it die with the old Neogaf and start anew with GAF 2.0. I respect logic and reason above all else, so when GamerGate happened, I immediately saw this place go full retard with political correctness and moral condemnation to the point of religious zealotry. I left and didn't have any interest coming back. Eventually everyone on the Internet was talking about the drama with Evilore and the inevitable cannibalism that led to ResetEra. I figured this place was a skeleton with no purpose and still ignored it. However, my curiosity led me back two or three months ago since people on Reddit and YouTube comments said it wasn't as unbearable as it used to be. I'm glad it's gotten a little more humble and modest compared to those previous years. Forgive the long rambling, but you won't have to hear from me often.
I grew up on Japanese games and anime. After finishing Code Geass R2, I pretty much fell out of anime/manga when I realized there was a major shift in the target demographic. Unlike the 80s to early 2000s, everything now has to be about kids or kids in school. Older stuff has kids being protagonists as well, but there was much more variety and options. It's horribly limiting to the creative writing process, and it has stagnated the industry. Adults can still enjoy them, but Japanese kids are the main customers first and foremost while adults are wage slaves sleeping on streets or jumping in front of trains. Long gone are the days of Wolf's Rain, Perfect Blue, Paranoia Agent, and Cowboy Bebop. I checked out My Hero Academia because I heard so much praise, but it's a mediocre disappointment that the writer/artist himself admitted was inspired by the MCU/superhero popularity wave (it's also the reason why it's so popular in the west). You can tell because all the corny character designs look like DC/Marvel rejects from a "create-a-character" contest and the writing quality matches the designs. The narrative has numerous problems, but I won't ramble about it here. However, I will say the song "You Say Run" is high quality under any context. One exception though: I also saw "A Silent Voice" after the KyoAni fire incident, and regret not seeing their products sooner. This movie was amazing, and it showed the great writing that was still possible in Japan but covered up by lolis.
In terms of games, I grew up on Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, and Devil May Cry. They've generally fallen out of favor for different reasons. FF, a B-tier franchise with A-tier production value, is a shadow of its former self with no identity just like the company; there's a reason why they broke the emergency glass and pulled out FFVII Remake nostalgia, which I don't particularly care for. KH has stagnated; the story is a never-ending joke and Utada's main song is nowhere near as memorable and unique as the previous two. I appreciate the great art direction in 3, though; it retained its good looking aesthetic style after a ten plus year hiatus from its previous mainline installment, which is something DMC5 could've learned from, looking at its ugly ass art direction. RE Engine is a highly detailed but ugly engine, and I see people conflate the two too many times on the Internet; graphical fidelity is not the same thing as graphical aesthetic. I absolutely respect the software engineers who created this highly proficient engine. It runs so much better than anything else on the market and has a great amount of setting options, but there are some things Capcom needs to fix. The color palette is too dark, bland, and limiting. It may fit RE games, but I don't think it fits an over the top, anime style action like DMC. DMC1 was the darkest in atmosphere because of its RE roots, but look at how varied the colors are from the marionettes to the frosts and to Dante and the HUD itself. Everything pops. Same goes for photorealism. Face-scanning is now an excuse for developers to take shortcuts. Why spend extra time and money carefully sculpting a beautiful character and environment when you can just copy-paste them into the game? I'd say Ada is an exception to the rule. Being aesthetically pleasing is important because you have to look at the screen 100% of the time. That is why having good looking if not sexy characters is a worthwhile endeavor in fiction. It is not a crime or sin to be entertained in an entertainment medium. It's annoying to look at Nero who looks like he took Ryu's Shin Shoryuken to the chin one too many times. I have problems with gameplay for the latest games in these franchises, but again, I won't ramble in detail since this isn't the place to do so. Just to be clear, I still enjoyed RE2 and DMC5 (they're still better than the Western games that have come out this year) and respect Japanese companies for focusing on gameplay while Western devs flounder for miscellaneous reasons.
My favorite company right now is FromSoft. Their approach to game design is a step in the right direction for the industry while many other companies are chasing the shadow of the other, more established medium out of insecurity. They know how to make a well-rounded product and they don't abuse DLC/microtransactions. However, I will wag my finger at the multiple forced and needless walking areas/tutorials/pop-ups in Sekiro. They slow down the game for no reason like speed bumps on the freeway. There's a lot of things Sekiro can do better, but it's currently my game of the year, and I don't see it being dethroned. It's a great package all around with engaging level design and bosses that increase heart rate while being way more fun to look at than both RE2 and DMC5. Sekiro is a beautiful game in spite of not being as technically competent as the other two. I also respect FromSoft's desire to keep things fresh by making new IPs. Sekiro being a new IP also gives it an edge over RE2 and DMC5, which are very good but disappointing games because they were very safe and unambitious. I feel like both of them could have and should have been much better. It says a lot to me that I just finished playing through Sekiro four times straight to NG+3 to get all achievements (only bother with achievements if I like the game enough to do everything in it) while I've taken a break from DMC5 in the middle of Son of Sparda. I'll come back to RE2/DMC5 eventually because again, I really do like them overall.
Speaking of FromSoft, my avatar is Lewdwig. Bloodborne is my favorite game of this generation and Ludwig is my favorite boss out of FromSoft. People obviously know of the Berserk inspirations including the rape horse. I just thought it was a funny imagery to see Ludwig being perverted like the Berserk horse. It also mirrors my stance to defend the inherently innocuous nature of fiction no matter the content.
Favorite games: RE HD Remaster, Bloodborne, Dark Souls 1, Sekiro, Demon's Souls, DMC1/3, Borderlands 2 (a guilty pleasure with mods that basically fix the game), FFX/VII/VI/IV/IX/Fran's bunny butt, shoutouts to Chrono Trigger, Cross/KH's OST
General stuff, I like RPGs, hack'n'slash, and fighting games generally even though it's been a while since I played one. I had an NES/N64 and grew up on Playstation (PS2 is my favorite console), but the many problems of PS4 and Sony has finally pushed me to play on PC this generation. For PC gaming, I only have a laptop (which is a great compromise between console and PC. Only problem is the price for portability), but I'll probably build a desktop one day. If there's another FromSoft exclusive on future PS systems, then I'll consider it on sale. Otherwise, I enjoy many of the benefits from PC too much like mods. I find it ironic that I'm joining now when PC has its own platform wars. C'est la vie, mon ami.
I'm American and like pizza/hot wings. I'm more of a thinker than a speaker, so I like to lurk on the Internet most of the time. You won't have to worry about me getting in the way. If you're frustrated at how long this post is, then I brought a peace offering: some screenshots and my favorite moment in my first playthrough of Sekiro.
I have more here:
imgur.com/a/lNwGcbB