This Week’s Topics:

• Rundown Preamble Ramble: First Place, Second Place, Third Place, THE VOID!!!
• TSF Showcase 2024-08 Okitsune-sama de Chu♥ by Sumino Yuji
• Nintendo Direct 2024 – 1 of ??? (A Spoonful of Sugar To Numb The Mind)
• Monster Hunter Stories… Retold (Capcom Announces Monster Hunter Stories Remaster)
• Epic Disappointment Remastered (Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed Announced)
• SMT is BACK! …With A Vengeance! (Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Announced)
• Back to the Banana-Rama Again! (Super Monkey Ball: Banana Rumble Announced)
• Explore The Sea… With Friends! (Endless Ocean Luminous Announced)
• Pokémon Radical Insanity (First Impressions of Pokémon Radical Red v4.0)

---

Rundown Preamble Ramble:
First Place, Second Place, Third Place, THE VOID!!!

Lately, I’ve been thinking about urban design, cities, and how the places that people live within construct their behavior. Which is to say I’ve watched videos on the subject while working or eating. After doing this on and off for months, something finally drilled down into my thick melon-flavored skull. A lot of discussion about urban design centers around how American cities, suburbs, and general settlements have evolved away from having a ‘third place.’ A place that people go to other than their workplace and home. A public place where people can gather, be social, and foster a community. 

I would argue that the internet is the third place for many people, as it allows them to engage with others, via text, audio, or video, from the comfort of their own home. It allows people together in a virtual third space that comes in near countless forms. However, most who I’ve heard discuss this concept to large audiences and on large platforms brush aside the digital angle and emphasize the physical space. They attribute the loss of the third space to a lot of unrest, a lot of alienation, and the loneliness epidemic that has been going on since… the COVID-19 pandemic. And it is an attractive opinion to voice third places as being not only a good, but a necessity for humans, a social animal. 

This is something that I have always taken some umbrage with. Not because I disagree that some people highly benefit from social space. But because the advocates for third places in cities and public areas where people can congregate have a skewed view of the world. They are online creators whose relationships with digital spaces are highly different than 90% of people’s, and they do not view the internet the same way as other people. Digital spaces are one of anxiety for them, they communicate with people online as part of their jobs, and often do isolating work as they write, edit, and copyright check videos. Someone like that would probably view being around others in a physical space as refreshing, rewarding, and a glimpse at sunshine after being locked in a cave. Yet, they don’t address this perspective, as I guess it goes without saying.

Furthermore, their theory, this claim that third spaces have died… has never really added up to me. Bars, restaurants, shops, libraries, parks, religious organizations, pools, community centers, and so forth are still around. If someone wants to go somewhere to hang out with friends and other people, they can. Yes, it might cost money, but going out to a bar or café has always cost money. The only difference is that fewer people can afford to go out regularly due to wage stagnation and the ongoing cost of living crisis. To me, that is the real issue, and what should be the focal point, not how it forces many people who prefer physical connection to stay at home all the time. …But maybe this is just a recruitment effort or something. You gotta cast a wide net if you want people to awaken to class consciousness and see what the world could be if we try, try, try.

Akumako: “…Natalie, you are one of the last people who should be doling out hot takes on this shit. When have you last left your condo unit?”

Um… like a week and a half? I work from home, my mother does the shopping, and I have not had an IRL friend for about a decade. So I don’t need to have more than one place. I work, write, and play games all within the same two square meters.

Akumako: “Yep, you primo defo sound like some freak whose opinion shouldn’t be trusted!”

Freaks are people too, buddy. Besides, I know there are plenty of people like me, easily tens of millions, who live like this and are at least mostly content. While it is true that many people are socially dependent and derive joy from being around others, that is not everyone. Some people prefer to be alone and isolated, just like how some people prefer to spend time around others. They are just different ways people can go about living their life, and I view any judgment toward that to be… stupid. 

Akumako: “Uh… are you sure you understand what these people were actually saying? They aren’t saying that third places are gone, they are noticing a declining trend, in people just not going out and being around others. They aren’t actually saying that it’s not okay to be a homebody who just keeps to themselves. The whole point is to make third places better, more plentiful, and create spaces that people like being in. Because a lot of places in this world are just badly designed, ugly, and locked behind a price tag. It makes it harder for people to go shopping and for local businesses to grow, and isolates people into their own little bubble, leading to rapid onset radicalization.”

‘Rapid onset radicalization’ sounds like a disease from a Japanese adventure game…

Akumako: “…Yeah, this Natalie’s broken. I’ll have her do this week’s hot ish and then it’s off to the VOID with her!”

Also known as address 0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000!

Akumako: “Eugh! Now she’s talking about crypto shit again…”

East side, west side, north side, Japan! Doing everything I can do, doing all that I can!

Akumako: “…Where’d I put my smegma TF apparatus?”

---

TSF Showcase 2024-08
Okitsune-sama de Chu♥ by Sumino Yuji

Well, this was a blast from the past. I distinctly remember reading this comic back in 2009 or 2010 after learning about it on the old Farhad TG manga site. I only read the first chapter or two though, as it was too sexual for me. I know that’s rich coming from me, but we all have our journeys, and mine was to erotic madness. As such, this isn’t really a nostalgic manga for me. Though, I kinda wish it was.

Okitsune-sama de Chu♥ is the story of Shimeta Moji, a high school student who wants to get into a romantic relationship with his childhood friend and alleged school idol Yuuko Ishikawa. Unfortunately for Shimeta, his face is no good, his head is bad, character is shady, he gets into perverted situations at least two times a day, and he has no redeeming features whatsoever to attract a girl. That sounds like I’m dunking on him, but the comic repeats these points several times. With nowhere else to turn, Shimeta goes to the local temple to pray for a divine intervention, and all he gets for his troubles is a spirit by the name of Osaki. A chibi fox… person sent by God, or Kami-sama, who promises to grant Shimeta’s wish for love if he cleanses this unnamed town of evil yo-kai wandering about.

As one might expect of evil spirits, they possess people, giving them supernatural abilities and screwing with their emotions. By people, I mean women, as this comic knows its target demographic. And by supernatural abilities, I mostly mean fantastical fetish shenanigans, more on that later.

To combat these spirits, Shimeta must transform to fight them, which is achieved by Osaki headbutting Shimeta, causing them to fuse into Supernatural Beauty Youko. A busty fox girl whose body Shitema is in full control of and has enhanced physical capabilities, allowing them to squirm their way to the backside of every girl and say the magic words to banish them. Ikutama Tarutama Tamatometama! Also, yes, one of the main characters is Yuuko, and the other is Youko. I don’t know how that flies, even in Japanese, so for the sanity of my readers, I’m going to refer to Youko as Yoko, which might be an alternate spelling.

As for the actual story of the manga, I would divide it into three parts. Initial shenanigans, set-up and cast expansion, and the climactic follow-through. Roughly the first third of Okitsune is spent going through these fetish of the week encounters, with every chapter following a strict formula. Shimeta is going through his life, a new girl shows up, he gets involved in something perverted, and this new girl does something weird. Then it turns out this new girl is being manipulated by an evil spirit, and Yoko sends them to the next dimension with an Ikutama Tarutama Tamatometama.

It is a sufficient formula, and the writer promptly uses it as a vessel for his myriad bizarre fantasies. Just the first three chapters feature breast enlargement bathtime shenanigans, mind control lingerie made by a caterpillar woman, and a naked 50-foot-tall loli who eats clothes with her hair. Starting out, it seems like a bottomless well of creative, and occasionally scummy, TF shenanigans. Okitsune knows neither the words shame nor restraint and is gloriously indulgent in what it does. It is confident, creative, and manages to bombard the reader with idea after idea to the point where I was wishing that I had read these comics when I was younger. Because this is the type of energetic TF story that I adore. …Sans all the naked child crap that I’ve come to just tolerate as part of being into this stuff.

Yet, as the story goes on and these bottle 25 to 35 word chapters keep coming, they stop feeling as eccentric or unique. Not bad, yet not really contributing much to the story beyond another fetish and archetype. This is partially due to how these girls are often disposed of after the initial chapter, rather than being added to a rotating roster. It makes it feel like less of a series and that can make the comic less engaging when bundled together in a volume.

This lasts until the end of the second of four volumes, when the second part— set-up and cast expansion— starts and the comic becomes more serialized. An antagonist is introduced, there is a status quo change at school, new characters stick around for more than one chapter, the works. It seems as if the writer finally decided on a story to tell, rather than getting down with his personal perversions. …Except not really.

New characters who seem like they might join the ensemble vanish in the next chapter. New concepts like an alternate form of Yoko are tested and dropped. And there are still plenty of episodic chapters thrown in that… do offer something new, but never add anything permanent. There’s nothing wrong with the rural training or pretty ‘boy’ chapters, other than their lack of purpose or context in a larger story. They can be skipped without losing any part of the overarching story.

Shimeta is a character who, by design, cannot grow. The yo-kai premise does not confer any new power to the Yoko form, so there is nothing truly gained by defeating them. And the antagonist, Yukino Tomoe, is not particularly good at her job, mostly being relegated to a background element and the owner of Himeko Sakurabashi, the robot maid who falls in love with Shimeta. There is a clear effort here to do something more, yet the story lacks the focus or commitment to really explore much. …Until we get to the last nine or so chapters, when things start picking up!

In the final third of the story, the supporting cast start interacting more, their personalities clashing as they compete and the story pursues more interesting avenues. There’s a sports competition between a nun girl with an army of spirits at her disposal and robot maid Himeko, this time equipped with a jetpack. While the next chapter sees Shimeta assume the Yoko form for longer and go on a date with Yuuko where they run into a bunch of other minor characters from the series. And, finally, last but certainly not least, we have the first and final story arc of this series! 

Envious of Yoko’s skills, Yuuko goes to a shrine to pray for power, where she meets up with a rival animal spirit named Iku, who promises to give Yuuko power… but with a catch. In the second half of the series, it is established that Yuuko carries the soul of a god within her, making her a regular target to be saved. Iku, naturally, knows this, and uses Yuuko’s trust to take control of her body, molding her into someone else. Someone dark, twisted, and sinister beyond comparison. The doggy dominatrix Queen Pomera!

Queen Pomera is brutal, aggressive, vulgar and looks like someone’s Klonoa fetish OC. Not Sonic OC, Klonoa OC. The real shit! She is the first threat to truly give Yoko trouble in the entire series, not only taking Yuuko hostage as this evil influence gains greater control of her body, but using her seductive powers to enslave others. Initially, I thought that the penis was a little much at first, yet the more I saw her the more I realized it really puts her design together. It shows how aggressive and shameless she is more than her leathery limbs. It is the source of her power and has its own name— the magical chinpou, which I just think is adorable. And… let’s just say she uses it in a way that left me beside myself with laughter.

When she starts showing up, the comic enters its stride— except for chapter 27, which just feels like the writer was shoving in his pig (cop) fetish in before the finale. Tensions are high, things start changing, all the warriors come back (or about half of them, which is still a lot), and the story simply has a drive it just lacked before this. As for the ending itself… It doesn’t nail it— the chapter title got my hopes up in the worst way— but it’s also fine at worst.

Oh, and I should address how the story functions as a TSF story, and the answer is… not all that much, really. While Shimeta does transform into a supernatural beauty, he is not really interested in using it for his own perverted desires. He is a one girl kinda guy and after some initial shock and discomfort, gets pretty comfortable with this form, and whips it out whenever he’s in danger. There is some dual identity stuff with Shimeta and Yoko being seen as different people by other characters, but because Shimeta only comes out to fight, it never goes too deeply. There’s no boy/girl Ranma balance to maintain. No lust or discomfort with their femme form. And not even much in the way of mind melding despite Shimeta’s fusing. If anything, Osaki reserves tormenting him for when they aren’t fused. Or in other words, Okitsune does not really succeed as a TSF comic.

However, the comic definitely makes up for this lack of TSF with general TF shenanigans. The comic goes pretty hard with it from chapter one, and when you think it’s moved on to less fantastical routes, it throws around an inflation TF, then cloning, then invisible, with a lot of personality changes throughout. I’d say it is a good TF comic, and not really a good TSF comic. It might not always be to my preference, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t appreciate the heck outta it.

Next, let’s talk about the artwork! Maybe this is just latent impressionable nostalgia, but I love the style that Sumino Yuji brought to this comic. It’s ultimately a sex comedy action story released in the early 2000s that goes for a more deformed, blobbish, and generally cartoon style. While characters have generally human proportions, hands and feet can be big and exaggerated, and expressions do wonders to sell the emotion and tone of any given scene and make characters endearing through visuals alone. While I’m pretty sure that this is the author’s debut work, part of me finds that hard to believe considering how strong the art is here. It all looks clean, professional, has a good flow and energy to it, it doles out new character designs at a rapid pace, and effortlessly shifts between the deformed and the semi-realistic. 

Actually, I found myself surprisingly attached to the designs of the characters. I think Yuuko is a surprisingly distinctive heroine due to how her green hair is presented in black and white. With her ends being shaded black while roots look blonde. It is an unconventional approach that looks like she’s growing out of a dye job, helps make her distinct from all the other girls and… I think it just looks cool in general. Most of the supporting cast have at least something cute or endearing about them and the way they look, barring certain one-off girls who are just… a girl with black hair and a spiffy outfit. But my favorite design (after Queen Pomera) of them all is easily Yoko.

Yoko’s design is both simple and extravagant. She’s got a tight underbust top that’s more bra than shirt. A skimpy leather skirt so short it’s always flashing something. A thick white belt just to bring attention to the waist and hips. Fat stylish all-American sneakers straight from Thailand, ‘cos that’s what was poppin’ in the early aughts. Spiritual beads, I think they’re called nenju, for that hometown flavor. Fox girl ears and blonde hair that goes past the ass and down to the knees. Like Queen Pomera, she looks like someone’s fetish OC, because she is, and I love it.

Just based on this comic, I can tell that Sumino Yuji is a strong artist, and even twenty years later, with the man at the ripe age of 54, he’s still making more erotic comics! I would love to say that I’ll check them out, particularly his other TSF works, TS Majo Rie x Norun and Minori Scandal. Unfortunately, neither have been fully translated into English meaning I can’t cover them… unless they miraculously receive a translation.

If I had to describe my thoughts on Okitsune in a succinct way— which is kind of my job here, I would say that it’s great… except for when it’s repetitive. The comic is a marvelous vessel of ideas, with every chapter offering at least something fun, interesting, or endearingly zany. The series is impressively competent in its execution and carries with it both a strong ambition and a love for what concepts it is bringing to life. However, at the end of volume three, in a post-volume skit, a character says that Sumino Yuji only had three ideas when he started this comic. While he definitely found more, it’s evident that he struggled to give them the right form and didn’t know where to go with the whole serialized story thing until a good year into its publication. 

I wish that I could justify going through the story chapter by chapter, as I am glossing over a lot of really great stuff, but I cannot justify that approach for a 30 chapter comic. So take this as a call to check this comic out for yourself if it perked up your interest. It’s messy, but the good kind of messy.

---

Nintendo Direct 2024 – 1 of ???
(A Spoonful of Sugar To Numb The Mind)

As I discussed last week, I am not looking forward to viewing Nintendo discourse this year. There was a lot of buzz about Nintendo releasing the Switch 2 this year. That this would be the last major Nintendo Direct before the system was revealed. And that we could finally say goodbye to the shackles and limitations of this fervently loved system. Instead, insiders declared that plans changed, and this was revealed to be the… sixth Partner Showcase Nintendo Direct. But not a Nintendo Direct Mini, despite only being 23 minutes long. …Even though the Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase in June 2022 was 26 minutes long. Yeah, I don’t think Nintendo cares about the naming schemes as much as fans do. The only things Nintendo cares about more than fans are the worst things.

Before getting into the main stories, let me go over the tiny dribs and drabs that do not warrant a full section. 

• Grounded and Pentiment were announced for Nintendo Switch, explaining why this showcase was delayed. Also, Hi-Fi Rush and Sea of Thieves were announced for PS5.
• Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection looks to be the definitive Battlefront experience, released for all major platforms with new locations and heroes. It’s no Free Radical’s Battlefront 3, but I’m sure it will be a rousing time for people who crave a more sophisticated age of multiplayer games.
• World of Goo 2 was announced as a Switch console exclusive, which makes sense as World of Goo was a breakout WiiWare title, and warrants a revisit as the original game out 15 years ago.
• Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time was delayed from 2023 to October 10, 2024 because Level-5 still has problems. Or maybe Nintendo wanted it to be a holiday game. Who knows!
• Game Freak’s Apple Arcade remake of their horse solitaire game, Pocket Card Jockey: Ride On!, was released on Switch, for those who like gambling.

---

Monster Hunter Stories… Retold
(Capcom Announces Monster Hunter Stories Remaster)

2016’s Monster Hunter Stories is a game that I heard a decent amount of buzz about prior to its launch, namely through favorable comparisons to Pokémon. Unfortunately, as a 3DS game that hit the west in September 2017, it was in a rough spot. It came out six months after the Switch, and four months before Monster Hunter World made the series something palatable to the western mainstream. As such it kinda got lost in the shuffle and did not sell all too well. It got good reviews, but it only really made a splash in Japan, where it did well enough for Capcom to invest in 2021’s Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin. That game also did pretty well as far as I can tell, so it’s no surprise that Capcom decided to greenlight a remaster.

Simply entitled Monster Hunter Stories, this version of the game’s big claims to fame are as follows:

• The introduction of full English and Japanese voice acting.
• HD graphics, though you can tell the game was still originally a 3DS game, from the textures to the lip flaps to the lighting. That’s not a bad thing, it’s just a description.
• A museum mode where you can look at concept art and listen to the soundtrack which… is fine. I would just release all that on an archive site but, sure, put it in the game itself.
• And a title update that was never brought to the international release, for some reason, meaning previously unseen monsters and content will be available without the use of hacks or mods.

It, overall, looks pretty solid, if modest in its goals. It is great that this game will no longer be tethered to the 3DS, and I like seeing developers both get to enhance something already done, and be upfront about what it is. Yeah, it’s a remaster… but its just the original game for a new platform. Monster Hunter Stories will be released for PS4, Switch, and PC via Steam in summer 2024.

---

Epic Disappointment Remastered
(Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed Announced)

Wow, it’s been about a year since I heard rumblings of this game. Disney Epic Mickey was a very… curious title. A 3D platformer released exclusively for the Wii whose release was hyped up by leaked artwork for the game. It is actually a bit misgiving to call it ‘concept art.’ It was more like ‘help us identify the line’ art. The game wasn’t super well received, with many critics finding it to be a passable yet unremarkable romp. And despite featuring The Michael McMouse as a protagonist it took the game over half a year to hit two million units sold.

The game was not a classic, yet has some weird retroactive nostalgia layer applied to it, as people played this game when they were small and its follow up was… a bloody mess. I forget if the poor reception of Disney Epic Mickey 2 was the reason the developer, Junction Point, was shut down, or if that was just Disney getting spooked by mobile gaming and shuttering their development studios.

Anyway, Embracer Group saw this game as a remaster candidate, so they got the license, somehow, and put Purple Lamp, the folks behind the SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom remaster, on it. Because they did such a good job with that one. (I never played the original, or the remaster, I just heard many people say they prefer the original on Dolphin, and I agree, as it just looks more consistent.) 

Did they do a good job with this game? They are claiming that Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed is a ‘remake’ despite clearly being a remaster. And looking at it side by side with gameplay of the original, up-ressed in Dolphin, it looks… brighter? I am not too familiar with this game’s art direction, but it does not look favorable. It looks like they went in to change some stuff willy-nilly, though we are talking about seconds-long comparisons here. Also, the screenshots included in articles after this announcement do look better than the footage so… maybe the Switch version just looks bad?

Regardless, Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed will be released sometime in 2024 for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Switch, and PC via TBD distributor.

---

SMT is BACK! …With A Vengeance!
(Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Announced)

FINALLY! Shin Megami Tensei V was featured in the infamous GeForce Now leak of 2021, and a fair few people skipped out on the Switch version after learning that a PC version was almost certainly coming. Unfortunately, that was 2.5 years ago, and there has not been a peep about the game coming to new platforms. …Because Atlus wanted to create an expanded definitive version and then port that to every system!

Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance was announced with a pretty vague trailer that made it unclear what this game was. If it was another Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse scenario, where it is just a different game, or an enhanced version a la Persona 5 Royal. The answer is… kinda both! Per an official spotlight video, it is effectively a remaster of the original game, but with an additional scenario. At the start of the game, players can choose between the Canon of Creation route, which is the original story of SMT V, or they could play the new scenario, Canon of Vengeance. With Canon of Vengeance featuring “significant changes in the middle and later stages of the story.”

This means the game will offer returning players an incentive to go through the game again with a new story and new characters, while also keeping the original experience, but with various tweaks and rebalances. I am a bit surprised this is being done with a re-release rather than DLC, as people are not fond of this approach when it comes to a 50+ hour RPG. But I’m guessing this was a corporate mandate of some sort, as they did the math and realized this would make more money given the time between this update. Also, less dev time would need to go to testing compatibility…

Bickering aside, it’s great to see this game get more love from the developers and come to more platforms. Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance will be released for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Switch, and PC via Steam on June 21, 2024.

---

Back to the Banana-Rama Again!
(Super Monkey Ball: Banana Rumble Announced)

…I don’t get what the Super Monkey Ball fandom wants at this point. They got Banana Blitz HD in 2019 and were none too happy about that— rightfully so as that game was not very good. Then they tried to fulfill fan desires with a full remake of the first two games with Super Monkey Ball Banana Mania. However, Monkey Ball is a physics driven game, and if the physics are off even slightly, the game can feel wrong. And seeing as how this remake was made using a new physics engine, they did feel wrong to many players, who claim that precise movements are harder than in the originals. This did not bother some people, but vocal fans, or South-Style Monkey Ballers as I call ’em, still regard the GameCube titles as ‘the only good ones.’ Others love the originals and think Banana Mania is mostly superior.

So, what should Sega do here? Give up after reviving the series and creating something that, presumably, sells well enough to offset the development costs? No, ya dumb pea! They’re gonna try a new game, of course! Super Monkey Ball: Banana Rumble is a brand new game featuring 200 stages, a new spin-dash move, and some party game modes. Most notably four-player co-op, which sounds like Dokapon Kingdom levels of friend ruining hell. And a Fall Guys inspired online 16 player battle race mode.

Is this what fans want? Honestly, I have no clue, fans of early aughts IPs like this are insatiable because they grew up in a broken world with no means of changing it. 

Super Monkey Ball: Banana Rumble will launch exclusively for Nintendo Switch on June 25, 2024.

---

Explore The Sea… With Friends!
(Endless Ocean Luminous Announced)

Endless Ocean is a series that I never registered so much as existed during the Wii generation, despite getting some coverage in Nintendo Power. During the following years, I only knew it as a Nintendo published game that Nintendo fans begrudgingly acknowledged. In actuality though, it really is not even a Nintendo series. It is a series from fighting game developer and long-time Nintendo partner Arika. I mostly think of them as the Fighting Layer EX guys (that is the correct name), but in the 2000s, they made four scuba diving exploration games. EverBlue, EverBlue 2, Endless Ocean, and Endless Ocean 2: Adventures of the Deep – Call of the Blue World.

The last game came out in 2009 for the Wii, the series was put on the backburner, and the studio has been diligently developing games like Tetris 99, Super Mario Bros. 35, and Pac-Man 99. Nintendo took notice of their loyal and quality results, which through some corporate machinations led to another Endless Ocean game, Endless Ocean Luminous. Another scuba exploration game, but this time rendered in gorgeous HD visuals, enhanced by the low draw distance of the sea, and with a bold new feature that drastically changes the game! 30 player online multiplayer!

That is a shockingly ambitious aim for a Switch game, one that turns an isolated experience into a gosh darn party, and full of 500 cool sea monsters to find! From boring fishies to sharks to mythical creatures and water dinosaurs! I have no idea what the ‘fans’ of this series want, but this seems like an ambitious revival of this series that should fulfill both camps. Offering both a moody atmospheric experience for the single-player, and being a good underwater screw around game.

Endless Ocean Luminous will be released for Switch on May 2, 2024.

---

Pokémon Radical Insanity
(First Impressions of Pokémon Radical Red v4.0)

Okay, I know I’m not supposed to talk about Pokémon stuff this week, I’m supposed to do that next week. But I’ve been bored with all this writing and tax stuff, so I wanted to play a Pokémon ROM hack. I decided to go with Radical Red, as it is one of the go-to ‘best’ ones and seemed like a very polished title. However, based on playing up to the first gym, this game is absolutely insane.

Rather than just being an expanded and enhanced version of FireRed, Radical Red features myriad quality of life improvements and other changes, while being considerably more difficult. It is a game that, from the outset, wants players to use the mechanics of Pokémon to its fullest. I actually really appreciate the effort that has gone into rebalancing and expanding a lot of FireRed and think that many of the changes are… pretty cool. 

• The UI is very sleek and readable, even if it is mostly lifted from Black and White. 
• Some of the character and Pokémon sprites have been changed and look nice. 
• It has a mode that disabled EVs and maximizes IVs which… YES. Just YES. 
• It has the ability to change a Pokémon’s nature free of charge. 
• It has Estus Flasks to limit how often you need to go to the Pokémon Center. 
• There are no canned pleasantries for using the Pokémon Center, and the game automatically turns the player around so they don’t initiate the same conversation twice.
• It adds more areas for Pokémon encounters with little patches of grass within cities. 
• It gives the player the old rod in Viridian City and gives them ample access to good water Pokémon. Like a huge power Maril! 
• There are various boss battles where the player needs to engage with unique mechanics that barely come up in official Pokémon games. …Except the challenge modes in Gale of Darkness.
• A lot of movesets have been reworked and rebalanced so Pokémon hit hard right from the start. 
• It brings back DexNav. A feature that is arguably better than roaming Pokémon… so long as you know what can be found where and when. (Which you can with a cheat code.)

The sheer amount of improvements, revisions, and general clean-ness of the hack is very impressive. It is the culmination of some very smart people dedicating years of work into something that, itself, is built upon a hacking community over 15 years in the making.

However, the developers of this project also chose to put basically every Pokémon into this game. An idea that could work in, say, the hypothetical multi-region Pokémon game that takes place all across Japan— like the 97 Pokémon Gold beta, but without GameBoy limitations. If you took that premise, combined it with the structure of an open-ended hack like Crystal Clear, you’d have basically the Pokémon dream game for the GBA purist camp.

Unfortunately, Radical Red is firmly a Kanto experience, and… I don’t need to explain how Kanto, a region made to house 150 Pokémon, cannot fit over 1,000 Pokémon. …But boy do the folks behind Radical Red TRY to make it work. As a result, there are about 12 to 25 Pokémon available per environment, spread across land and water, and divided into day and night. Because people just love that mechanic, right? At least they give you a time machine to help out…

In other words, the player can obtain over 100 different Pokémon species before their battle with the first gym leader. …While adhering to the level 15 cap in place. I was not entirely sure on the number but, per my save file, the number is 116 obtainable Pokémon. …Wait. Ah crud! There was an expansion of Viridian Forest with 6 more Pokémon? I missed that as there was no transition! So… 122 Pokémon. Goldarn!

That is an obscene level of choice, all hidden and obfuscated behind experimenting and searching, all for… what exactly? Well, that’s something I asked myself while playing. I’m one of those freaks who like to catch ’em all, and… this is just too much. Catching them all is an insane goal that would just lead to madness. (Yet I know some freak pulled a Professor Oak’s challenge of this game.)

So, why have all these choices? Well, I have a few theories. One, to achieve the dream of a Pokémon game with nearly every Pokémon in it, barring certain legendaries, as there are like a hundred of them. Two, to make nuzlocke, monotype, or other challenge playthroughs of this game more interesting and varied. Three, to give players access to an obscene level of strategy and options when fighting the bosses in this game. And this game does some extra chunky bullcrap with its bosses with curated teams that require experimentation, moxie, and planning. 

For example, the first true boss, Falkner, has a level 14 Wattrel with volt absorb, a held berry juice item, and access to air slash, roost, and a 60 base power electric move that decreases attack. Air slash is the second most powerful flying special move available to non-legendaries, right after hurricane, and it has a 30% chance of making the opponent flinch. I’d say you need to bring an ice or rock type instead, which you can get, but the Rufflet before the Wattrel has access to rock tomb and a buffed rock smash. So… you better keep them on reserve. Oh, and Brock not only has four Pokémon, all who have bulldoze, a ground-type move, but he also has a damn Varoom with toxic! And that is just the start.

You need some very strong type coverage for these fights, as they are designed to go against the casual player’s instincts. This, among other things, means catching and finding a lot of Pokémon, which means using Poké Balls. This might not be a problem if the game handed the player 30 Poké Balls from the outset, like in Luminescent Platinum, or if they halved their prices like in Let’s Go, but they didn’t. This means you only start with 21 Poké Balls given the starting cash, and most early trainers have measly pocket change.

So, how does one make extra pokédollars in Radical Red? Stealing! Or rather using the move thief, obtained via a TM after Viridian Forest, (or fairy-type covet) to steal wild items from Pokémon. Route 1 is now home to wild Meowths who always carry nuggets, which can be sold for 5,000 pokédollars, and with the DexNav, you can easily farm them, netting enough for 100 Poké Balls in about… 5 minutes. I understand that a goal here is to make use of and embrace various mechanical minutiae throughout Pokémon games but… why was this the best solution? Why go in this direction with this project? …WHY EVEN KEEP STEALING AS A MECHANIC WHEN POKÉMON COULD JUST DROP ITEMS LIKE IN A REGULAR RPG?!?!?!?!

I respect the HELL out of anyone trying to cram so much effort into a project like this, but… this game is simultaneously over-designed and under-designed. It has too much effort into certain things that it feels wrong to not praise it, but I also have no idea how one is supposed to play it without embracing insanity.

Maybe I should just check out a different hack… after doing all the other shit I gotta do.

---

Progress Report 2024-02-25

Cassie says Hiiiii~!

2024-02-18: I was supposed to write more today but… after putting in 4,500 words into VD2.0 CH 6-26, I just was not feeling it at the moment and stopped. This project is ultimately a fun hobby project, and if I don’t want to work on it at 23:00, I won’t. So I played some Pokémon Radical Red for fun, and turned that experience into a segment.

2024-02-19: Read this week’s TSF Showcase subject, while taking screenshots and notes.  I wanted to write it, but 800 page mangas take a few hours to read. Wrote 1,900 words for the Rundown, mostly by accident.

2024-02-20: Worked until like 19:00 today and spent too long confirming my assumptions in Pokémon Radical Red. Wrote a 2,200 word TSF Showcase. Added about 100 words to the Radical Red section.

2024-02-21: Wrote 1,900 words on Nintendo Direct stuff. Wrote 2,100 words for VD2.0 CH 6-26, finishing up the main part, but did not start the Posse Logs. Only three more of those freaking things to write…

2024-02-22: Wrote 3,300 words, finishing the Posse Logs for VD2.0 CH 6-26. Yes, they are THAT LONG and I also had to draft up ideas for all of them. I would have tried to do more, but my sister came over and I wound up talking to a Mexican trans girl about trans stuff for a good hour. Also, edited and got this Rundown ret-2-go.

2024-02-23: Next chapter of VD2.0 is a gosh darn sexual gymnasium, so I drafted a 3,700 word review of Palworld.

2024-02-24: Yeah… I wasn’t in the mood to work on anything writing related today, so I didn’t. I can take a weekend off if I feel like it, so I did.

---

Verde’s Doohickey 2.0: Sensational Summer Romp
Acts 1 and 2 Progress Report:

Current Word Count: 322,347

Estimated Word Count: ~350,000

Total Chapters: 33

Chapters Outlined: 33

Chapters Drafted: 30

Chapters Edited: 0

Header Images Made: 0 

Days Until Deadline: 94

Shit, only three months before this needs to go live… I still think I can do it.