Heather Alexandra

It’s Time To Bring Back Suikoden

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is full of political intrigue, massive wars, and multiple perspectives on the same conflict. As the narrative unfolds, I can’t help being reminded of one of the best JRPG series: the fantastic and long-absent Suikoden. Suikoden is a series owned by Konami. The first game was released in 1995 on the Sony…

Nintendo 64 Super Smash Bros. Challenge Record Broken After 14 Years

The original Nintendo 64 Super Smash Bros. has a few challenge modes for players to test their skills. These include a mini-game to break small targets and a movement challenge to touch special platforms in a stage. The world record time for completing Pikachu’s platform challenge has stood since 2005—but after over a decade, it’s…

It’s patch day for Final Fantasy XIV! The latest update adds a new difficult tier to the Eden series of raids and applies some welcome buffs to Monks and Astrologians. Also: hey, Scholars get Energy Drain so they can do something other than spam Broil!

The Text In Fire Emblem: Three Houses Is Too Damn Small

Fire Emblem: Three Houses has some of the most rewarding tactics action and Hogwarts-simulating that you can get. There aren’t many flaws in the game, but there is something that badly needs to be fixed: For a game focused on navigating menus, that text size sure is tiny. Text size in modern games has been…

What To Know Before Choosing A House In Fire Emblem: Three Houses

Fire Emblem: Three Houses released last week, and if you haven’t joined one of the game’s three houses, it’s time to make a choice. Want to know which group has the most mages? Which is the most chill? Which will give you the most heartbreaking narrative experience? We have you covered with this nifty guide.…

Kingdom Hearts III, Six Months Later

Kingdom Hearts III had plenty of drama before launch thanks to a massive leak of physical copies that led director Tetsuya Nomura to ask fans not to share spoilers. Square Enix also delayed the game’s epilogue until after the game’s release. When release day finally came, Sora and his pals mostly ended up okay, save…

I’m teaching the Black Eagle House the basics of strategy warfare and trying to keep folks alive in Fire Emblem: Three House right now on Twitch! Come and join chat to talk Pegasus Knights, Hufflepuffs, and more! 

I Finally Understand The Appeal Of Escaping Into A Video Game To Cope With Stress

For most of my life, I never quite understood escapism. I knew how powerful video games could be, how seductive and wonderful their worlds were, but I never quite understood the idea of wanting to melt through the screen and leave the real world behind. After I’ve had string of rotten luck and high stress,…

Discord has added the ability to sort servers into folders. This is incredibly useful for organizing all your servers, especially if you’re a sneaky journalist lurking in over 80 community Discords. No, I will not tell you which ones.

A Game Where You Try To Prevent A Shakespearean Murder In Real Time

Aside from the Bible and other great religious works, it seems fair to say that William Shakespeare’s plays are among the most far-read stories in the world. Of those, Hamlet might be the most well-known. A murdered king, a brother who marries the widowed queen, a woe-stricken son who plots revenge and everyone dies. Or…

Bloodstained‘s Designers Had To Prove Bosses Could Be Beaten With Only A Dagger

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is as pure a throwback Metroidvania game as you can get. After all, Symphony of the Night direct Koji Igarashi was at the helm. Besides a great double-jump and strong adherence to the Castlevania form, Bloodstained also has some tricky bosses. Turns out that Igarashi had a few rules in…

Twitter Account Serves Up Perfect, Bite-Sized Samples Of Video Game Music

Video game music rules. Sometimes, it is legitimately great. Since the start of 2019, Twitter account 140 Seconds VGM has been breaking down game tunes into bite-sized chunks. Sometimes the songs are classics, sometimes they’re random oddities. But every new post brings a bright blast of music. 140 Seconds VGM posts a handful of times…

Defiant Development, the creators of the Hand of Fate games, is ceasing development of future games. “The games market has changed in ways both big and small in the 9 years we’ve been in business,” a post said on Twitter.“We’ve not been able to change quickly enough…”

Nintendo Doubles Super Mario Maker 2 Level Upload Limit

Super Mario Maker 2 has been out more than enough time for the most prolific creators to create tons of strange story missions, Kaizo deathtraps, and classic homages. It’s also been out for enough time to reach the course creation limit. Super Mario Maker 2 is doubling that limit, allowing players to make more courses.…

Oninaki‘s World Might Be Enough To Get Me Past The Repetitive Gameplay

Oninaki, an action role-playing game from the developers of I Am Setsuna and Lost Sphear, now has a free demo on Nintendo Switch, Steam, and Playstation 4. I entered into the play experience expecting something generic, and while the combat is a bit mindless, Oninaki’s world is a fascinating place. This short tease has left…

The Wind Waker is seeing faster speedruns thanks to the discovery of a way to perform the infamous “Barrier Skip” trick on the Gamecube version. The current Any% record is now a 1:48:38 by gymnast86, a time hours faster than runs which don’t use tricks to “unload” the impassable barrier in Hyrule.

Sigma vs. Sigma: The Comparison We Had To Make

A new hero is coming to Overwatch: the robot-suit wearing, evil scientist Sigma. His chunky robo-bod and nefarious allusions to power and control raise an important question: Is this the same Sigma from the Mega Man X series? Kotaku dives deeper in this very serious report. In order to determine if Sigma is that Sigma,…

Someone Made An Awesome Final Fantasy VII Remake Boss Fight In Dreams

After an exciting showing at this year’s E3, hype around the Final Fantasy VII remake could not be higher. Its mix of classic storytelling and revamped combat shows a lot of promise. However, there’s been no demo in sight. In the meantime, one intrepid Dreams player has crafted an intense Final Fantasy VII-based boss battle…

In Night Call, You’re A Taxi Driver Who Has To Find A Killer

There’s a serial killer on the loose in Paris. The taxi that you drive is running low on gas, the police detective in your back seat is strong-arming you into gathering information, and if you don’t make rent, you’re gonna end up on the streets. This is Night Call, a slice-of-life mystery game that mixes…

The Strange Guilt Of Changing Jobs In An MMO

As I continue to lose myself in the world of Final Fantasy XIV’s latest expansion, writing guides on how new folks can get started and fighting terrifying raid bosses, I’ve also taken the time to experiment with new jobs. I followed my co-worker Mike Fahey’s lead and started the new Dancer job. And oh my…