• 14 Posts
  • 683 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
cake
Cake day: June 28th, 2024

help-circle




  • In Slay the Spire 1, clearing the True Ending with each character unlocks beta art for their card pool, and then clearing it with all characters unlocks beta art for all the colorless cards too. You can freely toggle each card individually, pick and choose your favorites. This was especially fun for Watcher, because during her development period they got the community involved to submit their own beta art.

    I’m a little sad that StS2 doesn’t have this, but maybe that’s just because we don’t have the True Ending yet (and we do know that one is coming).


  • Here’s my whole library if you want to see everything I like. Some notable exclusives:

    • Super Mario Odyssey - IMO, this is right up there with 64. The game is absolutely packed, biggest in the series, and I love everything they’ve done with new movement techniques.
    • Splatoon 3 - And 2, but not like there’s any reason to back to S2 now. I’ve never really been into shooters much, Splatoon, Kid Icarus Uprising, and TF2 are the only ones I’ve really liked. But I do love this game because it’s so unlike ordinary shooters.
    • Metroid Dread - Hits all the same highs as Super, but with significantly better combat and bosses. Yes, I’m saying that makes it better than Super.
    • Puyo Puyo Champions - Not actually exclusive, but if you want to play this game online, JP players are all on Switch. So functionally, it might as well be exclusive.
    • Kirby Air Riders - I waited 22 years for this sequel. I bought a Switch 2 just to play this. And it was worth it. I’m actually blown away by how much higher this game raised the bar from the original.

  • Co-op is the major new selling point. Beyond that, the core formula hasn’t changed too much, they’ve mostly just expanded on it with new characters, cards, enemies, etc.

    But for anyone who’s put a lot of time into the original, I think you’ll really appreciate all the littler elements that really add up. They’ve had a lot of time to rethink some nitpicks with the original and learn some lessons from it.

    For example, a lot of events in the first game were a binary choice of either taking something or taking nothing, in which case the event becomes an empty floor. Act 1 events in particular were often a trap. MegaCrit has talked about how StS2’s events are being designed so that simply doing nothing is never an option, and I really really really like this! Just exploring all the new events is great, I’m suddenly prioritizing ?s on my paths just to see them all.

    Boss relics have been replaced by a new system called Ancients. Part of me is still not sure how I feel about this, part of me is kind of excited by the fact that I don’t know how to feel. The game feels very different without energy relics (mostly, there actually are a few but many runs will not see them), and that’s definitely something that makes for a new and different challenge to get used to.

    There’s also a new mechanic where cards can receive Enchantments, either permanently or just for the duration of combat. You can come up with some very cool combos to experiment with using this system, and on the flipside the enemies that are able to negatively mess with your cards are super interesting to me.


  • When Slay the Spire 2 was announced, I was honestly skeptical of how they’d top the original. StS is the game that ruined all other roguelikes for me just for how damn polished it is.

    I can confidently say StS2 has raised the bar. It’s actually the smaller details that have impressed me most, like the way doing nothing is never an option at events. And enchantments are such a cool mechanic, gears are spinning in my head looking for fun things I can do with them. Equally cool when enemies can negatively enchant my cards too, new kinds of combat challenges.

    I still don’t know how I feel about Ancients, it’s weird not having energy relics anymore. But part of me kind of likes that this is weird and different, it is by far the biggest change that makes for a totally new meta to explore. I can already tell that mastering this game will be a journey.







  • Every position that claims to be entry level inevitably sends me back an email that says “We received many qualified applicants and have decided to move ahead with another candidate whose work experience is a closer match for this particular role.”

    My bachelor’s degree isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on anymore. Experience is all that matters, but I can’t get experience because I don’t have experience.