I got my Anbernic RG351V today, and after just a few minutes of play with it I'm very much on board. It took a bit of fiddling to get it up and running — primarily because it demands SD cards be in FAT32 format and Windows doesn't like formatting large cards in FAT32 by default, so you have to use a third-party format utility — but now that it's working it's going to be a wonderful little retro device to have on hand… at all times, basically.

I haven't done a lot with it as yet, but I already like some of the features it has enabled by default. Of particular note is its simulated Game Boy screen — I'm not normally a fan of fake scanlines at all because I tend to think they look tacky and, well, fake… but the "dot matrix" effect this thing applies to Game Boy titles by default looks incredibly authentic. Except for the fact you can actually see the thing in low light, of course.

It claims to support N64 games but I tried one earlier and it really doesn't… I mean, it loads them up and all, but performance is dogshit. I'm not too bothered, though — what this device does offer is the ability to play a whole load of excellent retro titles from over the years (up to about PS1 and PSP comfortably) with minimal fuss, with a nice screen, good controls, all in a pleasingly nostalgic Game Boy-style form factor.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not abandoning the Evercade or anything — hell, most of the Evercade devs and testers have something along the lines of one of these things — but having a huge library of retro stuff (much of which is in licensing hell, and thus unlikely to ever hit Evercade) is going to be an immensely valuable, wonderful thing, particularly if and when we all start going out and about a bit more.

I'll be doing a more substantial writeup on the device for Retrounite in the week, but suffice to say for now if you've been considering one of these things, it's definitely worth it — so long as you don't mind a little bit of faffing around when you're first getting it set up. But let's be honest; most of us here are retro gamers, and faffing around comes with the territory, whether you're working with original hardware or emulators!

Right, I'm off to play Alleyway in bed.

Remember what I talked about yesterday, where things just disappear from your memory and you're occasionally reminded of what a seemingly "major" (relatively speaking) part of your overall life experience they were at the time? Well, today I had what kind of feels like the "opposite" experience to that, for want of a better word.

For years now, I've had this sort of ideal "first level music" for a shoot 'em up in my head. I knew it was from something I played relatively briefly back in the day, but I could not for the life of me remember what it was from. For the longest time, I was absolutely convinced it was the music from Thunder Force IV's watery level, but while that is also a cool piece of music, it wasn't that.

I was convinced it was a Mega Drive piece, though. Was it Arrow Flash? Nope. Was it Burning Force? Nope, 'cause I never played that one back in the day — though I've discovered an undying love for it (and its first level music) ever since. Was it Thunder Force III? Nope.

Turns out it was Gynoug. And the reason I discovered this? Completely accidentally. I got a review code for the new Switch port of Gynoug this week and fired it up for the first time. As soon as the first level's music started my brain went "hang on a minute", and once the main theme kicked in… yep, that was it. That was absolutely the piece of music that's been stuck in my head for 20+ years, with absolutely no clue prior to today as to what it might have been.

I don't even really remember playing Gynoug that much as a kid. I didn't have my own Mega Drive — the only time I got to play one was either when I was visiting my friend Ed or when my brother came home from his games magazine jobs with a Mega Drive and/or Super NES in his backpack. So I would have only had the chance to play this game for a bit over the course of a single weekend at most. And yet that single piece of music stuck with me for all this time.

Well, I mean, the music stuck with me, even if the game didn't. Funny how the brain works, isn't it?

I find that when you're "in the moment", you tend to assume that you're going to remember pretty much everything, no matter how inconsequential it might seem. I mean, hell, I vividly remember all sorts of stupid and completely pointless shit that dates right back to fairly early childhood, so it is true to a certain extent.

But occasionally it's a pleasant surprise to rediscover something that you had forgotten about the existence of. In this case, it's something from not all that long ago — 2009, to be exact — but I had completely erased it from my memory. Perhaps with good reason.

I'm talking about Microsoft Songsmith, an experimental piece of tech from Microsoft's Research department that allowed you, in the words of its legendary promotional video, to "sing into the microphone while the drummer plays along" and then get the software to analyse the tune you'd sung and come up with a cheesy MIDI backing for your melody with what was, theoretically, some appropriate chords to use for the accompaniment.

Having just stumbled across a mention of it by chance while perusing back through ancient entries of my old blog, everything came flooding back. I'm pretty sure I was still working at the Apple Store when the monstrosity that is Songsmith was first unleashed on the world, and we all found it absolutely hilarious — even more so when it became apparent that people were using it as God intended: to take a cappella versions of classic songs and run them through Songsmith in order to create some of the most horrendous "remixes" imaginable.

I remember laughter and good times with friends. It was just 12 years ago — not a long time in the grand scheme of things — but it kind of feels a lifetime away right now. Fond memories, for sure, but also a tad bittersweet given the world we live in today.

Cancelled my Steam Deck reservation today — I actually cancelled it before the delay was announced, but said announcement just made it feel even more like the right thing to do for the moment.

I've been looking around a bit, and for the main purpose I want it for — on-the-go visual novels — there are much cheaper Windows tablet options. Sure, I won't be able to play Euro Truck Simulator in bed, but how much was I really going to do that anyway?

Instead, I've retrieved some of the money I'd set aside to pay for the Steam Deck and ordered one of those Anbernic emulation handhelds — specifically the one that looks like a wooden Game Boy. I've primarily done this so I can write about it over on Retrounite — one of the things we've talked about doing is more about hardware — but I'm also intrigued to give it a go, since I know a few people who have them and love them.

It's not going to replace the Evercade or Switch as a retro gaming solution by any means, but as an easily portable system it's going to be a nice thing to have loaded up with a bunch of cool stuff — particularly stuff for which licensing on Evercade or Switch rereleases will never, ever happen for one reason or another.

Not sure when it's going to arrive as when I ordered it today Amazon said it would arrive tomorrow, but I just had a dispatch notification that said it would actually be here on Sunday. I'm in no rush, but I am quite eager to have a play with it. There will, of course, be full reports to follow both here and on Retrounite!

Anyway. Bed now. Much as I would love to spend the night playing more Blue Reflection, I do still have to get up in the morning.

Adding to my Arcade Archives collection on Switch, I picked up a copy of Moon Cresta earlier. This is a game I was broadly familiar with but I don't think I'd ever actually played it — rather, I had a game on Atari 8-bit called Space Eggs which, in retrospect, is a complete ripoff of Moon Cresta, right down to the "stacking" ships.

Anyway, one of the things I've discovered I absolutely love about Moon Cresta is that it has some of the absolute best retro game noises I think I've ever heard. I can also say with confidence that I've found the source that Jeff Minter has pinched most of his sound effects from — the ones which aren't from Defender, that is.

Moon Cresta is interesting in that it occupies a space that is clearly at the tail end of the "fixed shooter" and trying, trying so desperately to push on into being a vertical scroller and just not quite getting there. It's good fun, though — it reminds me of some other early shooters like SNK's Ozma Wars, but with slightly more fair-feeling balance.

I'm interested to try Terra Cresta, too — and I'll have a good familiarity with them both by the time that new Platinum shmup comes out, whenever that shows up. (checks) Oh, apparently December 9. Good timing, I guess?

Anyway. Play retro games. And Blue Reflection: Second Light. That is all. Good night!

This weekend passed by all too quickly for my liking, but in retrospect it was because I was enjoying myself, so that's good!

Looking forward to writing about Blue Reflection this week. There's lots to say, for sure, and I'm making good progress through the story. I definitely will not have beaten it by the time embargo lifts, but that just means more opportunity to write stuff! At the very least I'll have something up on release day, and then something more when I've beaten it.

Got some fun videos coming up too. Been enjoying exploring the Arcade Archives games, so there's definitely going to be more of those — particularly some of the lesser known ones. This week we're looking at a little known and very early racer from Irem that I've come to like a whole lot. Please look forward to that on Friday!

Anyway, after a productive weekend it's time to get a good night's sleep and be ready for another week of work. Hope you've all had a good weekend, and I hope you enjoy what I have in store for you this week!

Played Blue Reflection: Second Light for approximately seven hours in total today. I'm in love. More on that… on Tuesday, probably. I doubt I will have finished it by then, but I'm going to have something up in time for the game's release, then likely follow that up with something more substantial once I've actually beaten it.

It's one of those games where you have a wonderful sense of companionship and camaraderie with the characters; it's a really close-knit group of characters, and you really feel them supporting one another as the game goes on — both in battle and during their periods of downtime hanging around the school. But again, I probably shouldn't be saying too much about that just yet.

I will say, however, that I've been looking forward to this game for most of the year and so far it is very much delivering — no, definitely exceeding my expectations. I'd go so far as to say those who passed by the first one for whatever reason should consider checking this one out — it has such satisfying mechanics (particularly for combat) that it's just an absolute joy to play.

Anyway. Much as I would happily continue playing this for several more hours this evening, I do have some videos I want to record tomorrow, so I suspect sleep is probably a wiser option.

S-Rank Patrons, I'll have a new wallpaper coming for you in the next couple of days. Everyone, regardless of tier: thank you for your continued support! It is, as always, very much appreciated — and helps keep all my creative projects up and running, even if the day job means I don't have quite as much time for some of them as I used to! At least that's a good problem to have, though; since my day job is covering the same ground as my creative projects, I don't really feel like I'm "losing out" on much — and hopefully you're all following what I'm up to as well!

Anyway. Naps. Good night!

I feel like I've had a productive week. My visit to the day job earlier in the week went well and gave me some good ideas on how to move forwards on various things I'm working on, and I've already managed to get started on some of those things. I have, of course, been enjoying the day job a great deal — hopefully that's already abundantly clear — but some of the things that came out of the discussions on Tuesday made me excited for the future. You may not necessarily see obvious results of these yourself, but rest assured I'm pleased with what's going on!

Blue Reflection: Second Light is also proving to be a delight so far. I've played a chapter beyond what I played for the demo a while back now, and it's definitely a huge improvement over the original — which I already liked a whole lot. The mechanics this time around are really satisfying — combat in particular is really fresh and dynamic — and, of course, it's all held together with some excellent characters and a strong narrative.

And, of course, it's almost certainly going to be completely ignored by 90% of the games press. Which is unfortunate, because as with so many games like this, it's exactly the sort of thing that a lot of critics should be falling over themselves to praise — but outside of the biggest names and the indie darling of the hour (Unpacking right now) most writers don't seem willing to look particularly far afield.

Speaking of Unpacking, I thought I'd elaborate a bit on some vague comments I made in my article about it the other day in the name of not spoiling anything (at the publisher's request). I'm beholden to no such embargoes here, of course — but if you're at all interested in playing the game and don't wish to be spoiled, please feel free to stop reading now; this will be the last thing today!

Basically, I wanted to like Unpacking a whole lot, and I do like Unpacking a whole lot — but I also feel it fell massively short of what it could have accomplished with its storytelling. And, to be honest, I'm finding it mildly frustrating that it's being showered with such uncritical praise because the aforementioned 90% of the games press have never played a game that made them feel emotions before.

I don't like feeling like this, 'cause I like the Witch Beam guys a lot and want them to succeed — Unpacking's success will, among other things, determine whether or not they get an opportunity to make a follow-up to Assault Android Cactus, which I'd love to see — but I also kind of feel like people are oddly hesitant to critique Unpacking properly, simply because it's a charming and progressive indie game.

Anyway, I have two real issues with Unpacking. One is that "this story about a female protagonist concludes with them being revealed to be gay and/or trans" (just gay in this case) is an artsy indie game cliché at this point. Obviously it's good for representation and positive LGBT+ blah blah blah… but it's also an incredibly unimaginative "twist" that I saw coming a mile off, particularly with how bleak the sequence where she moves in with the boyfriend is.

That whole sequence is, without a doubt, effective — you're given a really strong sense that you're invading someone's space rather than coming to live alongside them, and it's all muted colours rather than the vibrant pastels the game has been depicted in up until that point — but for it to go down the "well, men are terrible, guess I like girls now" route, which is what it felt like to me, just felt a bit… I don't know… off. Obvious.

I'll reiterate I have no problem whatsoever with LGBT+ relationships in games — hell, the aforementioned Blue Reflection is more explicit about them than pretty much any other semi-mainstream Japanese game I've seen for a long time — but in Unpacking, as I say, it felt clichéd and I guess tokenistic is one way to put it.

This perhaps would have been less of an issue were it not for my second beef with Unpacking, which is that it just fizzles out completely after its last stage. Our heroine and her partner have moved into a nice house and are preparing for a baby to arrive… and then that's it. Roll credits, the pair of them sit looking off into the sunset with the new baby, and there's nothing more.

Apparently I'm very much alone in this, but that didn't feel at all satisfying to me. There was no real "closure"; it was the beginning of a new chapter in the heroine's life and it didn't go anywhere.

What I would have liked to see was a few more stages that explored how the pair of them dealt with the child growing up and eventually moving out — and ultimately, after a number of further stages, taking a look at how one comes to terms with the inevitable passing of a life partner. Now that would have had me bawling my eyes out and declaring this game the absolute masterpiece that everyone else appears to think it is… but that's not what we got.

To be clear, I am very firmly disassociating myself from the people whining on Steam that it's "$20 for 3 hours of gameplay". No. Creative works cost money to produce and the creators of creative works have every right to charge what they feel it is worth. Judging "value for money" on an "hours to dollars" basis is stupid.

My objection to where Unpacking concluded is not about how long it lasted in a quantifiable sense. No; it's about the fact the narrative left me wanting more — and not in a good way. There was a ton of potential to do some interesting and deeply emotional things, and it didn't. So I was disappointed.

It's still worth playing, though. It's beautifully presented, and the ability for the player to be part of the game's creative process by simply playing it is inspired. I'm just not tripping over myself to declare it the most amazing game of the year or anything.

Blue Reflection, on the other hand… well, we'll have to see. Everyone has their own tastes, after all — and it most certainly isn't the first time I've been a lot more interested in something completely different to what the rest of the Internet is losing its mind over!

Just a heads up for those following primarily for MoeGamer stuff: this weekend will likely be one without an Atelier MegaFeature chapter, since I just got a review code for Blue Reflection Second Light in, and you better bloody believe that is taking priority right now.

The first Blue Reflection is absolutely one of my favourite games of all time, and I've been looking forward to the sequel all year. It's going to get plenty of coverage over on Rice Digital for sure — but I'm mostly just looking forward to spending some time with it. The preview build I played a little while back was great, and I want to see what happens next!

My review code is on PS4 while my preview copy was on PC, so I've had to play through the prologue again. I've done that this evening, so I will likely be spending most of Saturday glued to brand new stuff in the game, then recording stuff on Sunday as usual. Obviously I can't talk much about specifics as yet, but suffice to say for now that for those who enjoyed the first game, Blue Reflection Second Light is going to make you very happy indeed. And for those who were less of a fan — Blue Reflection Second Light has tweaked a lot of things that will likely make you very happy indeed also.

I mean, you still need to be on board with the idea of a video game about teenage girls talking about feelings and then using those feelings to fight monsters, but, well… come on. Even if that's not your bag I'd encourage you to check out the soundtrack — much like the first one, it's a gloriously peculiar mix of gentle plinkyplonky piano numbers and dubstep electronica that will burn your face off. I love it.

Anyway. Cute girls getting in touch with their emotions is very much on the agenda for the weekend. Just wanted to let you know!

Today was, of course, fine. I knew it would be, but even being safe in the knowledge that everything is almost certainly all going to be fine, one can still feel anxiety and unease about familiar situations. And that's what I was feeling.

Thankfully, I had a good time. It was good to meet some people I've only ever seen on Teams calls before, and good to meet people I've only ever talked to via email. I even did a presentation and the Big Head Boss Man commented how impressed he was with what I prepared, so that's nice. At 40 years of age, it still feels good when someone who is "above" you in the hierarchy praises you.

Anyway, I'm absolutely exhausted right now after a long day of having to be sociable followed by a really long drive home. Thankfully (for the sake of my own tiredness, not because I don't want to do it again!) I'm not expected to go into the office all that often — it's likely going to be once every 6-8 weeks or so, which is absolutely fine by me. I think I've more than proven that I can be trusted to work on things independently at home — and getting together with people today helped established some things I can do together with my colleagues, too.

All in all, a big success, then. Now I'm going to go and fall asleep. Hope you had a pleasant Tuesday!