materwelonz
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September 2023 Channel Update – Chaos Begins
🕑 Added 2023-09-26 03:40:37 +0000 UTCHey everyone,
Hope you’ve been well!!
We’re starting to get into the crazy busy times, so tbh I’m very much sitting here thinking UGHHH let’s hurry up and write this out so I can get back to other work lol. I’ll try to keep this one to the point!
TL;DR
- Finished: Telltale Expanse
- Ongoing: DAI, RE4 Separate Ways
- Upcoming: CP2077: Phantom Liberty, October releases
Finished Stuff
The Expanse: A Telltale Series (5 parts): New Telltale’s first game set in the The Expanse sci-fi universe. What’s here is good, but it’s a short story further fractured by the episode-released-every-other-week structure. The whole thing is fine as a bingeable 6-hour thing, but could do with far more character detail and meaningful choices.
We had some first looks as well (maybe a few more than usual b/c I was afraid of overcommitting before Sep/Oct):
Sea of Stars: Inspired by the classics, a 2D JRPG of two children who inherit powers of the sun and moon, destined to destroy the evil forces of the world. It looks gorgeous and there are some fun parry mechanics within the turn-based combat system, but the first hour of character introductions was a little thin for me to feel out how the rest will go. The game seems to be very well-regarded by those with experience of and nostalgia for JRPGs back in the 90s though.
Starfield: It’s clear there are many intermingling gameplay systems at play, but the plot & characters in the first 2 hours is standard and didn’t really provide a mega compelling hook. With shorter games I might be more “lenient”, but if a game is going to be 100+ hours long, I think I really need something more on the narrative front to sustain my interest. (I’ve never finished Skyrim and Fallout 3 either - now with Starfield, I get the sense the Bethesda RPG formula might just not mesh well with me.)
Chants of Senaar: A puzzle game inspired by the Tower of Babel myth where we decipher languages based off visual & contextual clues to communicate with the local peoples. Similar to 7 Days To End With You, another game I checked out earlier on this year, except it has a puzzle solution verification system a la Return to Obra Dinn to give player feedback & assurance. I think this is a fun one for puzzle lovers!
Witchfire (early access): A roguelite FPS set in a dark fantasy witch-hunting world. Not normally my genre but I checked it out on the basis of it being from The Astronauts, the team behind The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. The focus here is absolutely on the gameplay, and I could tell there’s tons of little combat nuances that just a first look wasn’t able to fully dig out. It’s hard to tell what the difficulty curve is like but I did get the sense that it’s not easy. Enjoyed my time with it!
Current Stuff
Dragon Age: Inquisition: It’s a little difficult to tell how far along I am but I am in Act 2 of 3 right now. Despite the filler collectathon stuff, I’ve still been continuing to enjoy the main story lots.
Schedule-wise: I mentioned that I’ve been trying to make DAI videos longer (~1 hour vs ~40 min with DAO/DA2) so we can get through it faster, but it does make fitting in a second video for the day noticeably more difficult. I expect this to be an ongoing challenge especially with the heavy hitters coming out soon…
Resident Evil 4 Remake Separate Ways DLC: The RE4R story from the perspective of Ada. Thanks Capcom for adding to the craziness of September and October by announcing this one week before release 🙃 That aside, it’s been great fun to return to RE4 shooty shooty zombie gameplay. It’s 7 chapters long, and I’m on the 3rd atm – it shouldn’t be a big long thing.
Upcoming Stuff
After Separate Ways I think I’ll likely move straight into Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty - I have to spend a little bit of time to reacclimate myself with the 2.0 Update too. (I know there are some discussions online around starting a brand new playthrough to weave the DLC in, but considering how slow of a player I am I don’t think that’s realistically feasible.) I’ll see what it looks like after that, but it’ll likely be Spider-Man 2 and Alan Wake 2 next on my radar.
It’s a crazy period and I’d love to get to everything right at release, but I’m trying my best to be mindful about taking on too much too. Videos are eternal, and I want to avoid firing out a bunch of subpar ones just to meet an imaginary deadline (who's even here because I’m a fast video game player.... 🗿). If it's good, I will get to All The Games, eventually...!
Hoping your schedule looks a little less chaotic than mine! Thanks for your support as always, stay safe and healthy, and I’ll see you in thick of the September/October release onslaught! (Feel free to let me know any questions/comments/suggestions below – I check back throughout the month regularly so no worries even if it’s “late”.)
Cheers,
Welonz
Comments
Mikey S
The game over screen literally jumpscares you. I think that says it all really — have a good time with it! I'm just going to hide in the corner over here and play some Cyberpunk instead ;-; Thanks for responding!
Materwelonz
Thanks for the support Mikey! Yeah, everyone is busy busy and time is money so I hope the text summaries help! 1. Atlus has had strict restrictions on Persona 5 banning entire portions of the game from being streamed ever since the launch of the original, so P5 has just never been on the table. (I've heard this has finally been lifted this year on the Japan side, but there's been zero communication on the English side about it.) I don't have concrete plans after Dragon Age yet - if it's not a busy release season I'd probably bring it to a poll here. Personally I normally lean more towards Western games - I like a lot of Japanese stuff but sometimes I find myself allergic to tropey anime stuff lol. 2. Hyped about Alan Wake II and Spider-Man 2!! I actually haven't looked into any of the Alan Wake info at all, not sure if if I should be scared or be looking forward to it now 😭
Riku
thank u for ur hard work queen, always.
Mikey S
I should have done this a long time ago, but I’m glad I got to donate to your Patreon! These lists are really cool, they really sun up what you’re playing quite succinctly. I also love hearing your thoughts on video games in these and the videos, as most youtubers are afraid to be critical or introspective and you being analytical allows you to be both! You clearly love playing games for us, and I love seeing you go through them. Two questions, a recommendation and some curiosity: 1. I’m not sure how you’ll respond, but would you want to play any of the Persona games? I think those would be really up your alley (and they are mostly voice-acted, thank god). I just mainly ask because I played a lot of Persona 5 when it came out and mostly loved it for the narrative, etc… but I don’t really expect you to any time soon, especially now — for obvious reasons. Really the big question (as I type this) is what kind of long-form series you’re planning on doing next after Dragon Age, and whether you see yourself playing going to play Japanese or Western games. I’m really interested to know! 2. What upcoming game are you really looking forward to playing? I can’t believe it, but everything coming out this month seems even better than the last one! Personally, I’m really looking forward to Alan Wake II. It looks really promising to and absolutely terrifying — did you see the game over screen??? It’s the most wild that Remedy has ever been. It seems like the perfect game for Halloween! Ok lol that may have been more than two questions :P
captain carrot
The RE4 DLC was a nice surprise, I somehow completely missed that it was coming out already...not that I have time to play it myself now with BG 3 and Phantom Liberty, but watching your playthrough is just as much fun. This sounds like a first world problem, but I'm actually a little stressed about not finishing BG3 before Phantom Liberty (despite playing literally every single day from the premiere and putting over 120 hours into it already), because I don't have that much time to play, so I usually stick to one game at a time, but I just couldn't wait in this case. I can only imagine how stressful such busy periods must be for you. That being said, I can't wait to see the return of Velonz and Spider-Man 2 and Alan Wake 2...wow so many cool games to look forward to. I also hope you will decide to play BG3 at some point, it's the kind of a game that really lends itself well to your play style.
Materwelonz
Hi Liam, glad to hear you've been well! I know we are all here because of video games blahblahblah, but you're right, there's so much more to living than that, and I'm so happy to hear you can do all the things you want to now. Thanks again for your scripts with helping me find all the videos that were missing endscreens! Take care and enjoy life!!!
Materwelonz
So glad to hear re: games more accessibility!! From my end I see that the first party PS5 games all seem to be really great about this too!
Materwelonz
A few others have brought this one up, I'll keep it in mind, thanks!
Materwelonz
who's secretly glad the Xbox Twitter account was wrong about the release date!? no, no, that can't be me....
Liam McDermott (JeevesBond)
Hey Welonz. I'm posting this partly for myself, parasocial relationship and all that. I'm sure you wouldn't know anything about those with various Japanese idols, but if you did, and you were in my position maybe you would want to do the same. In February I was diagnosed with ADHD, and I haven't watched a video of yours since; the medication I'm on makes me able to focus and part of that is a strong desire to remove anything from my environment that might be distracting. For years you helped me get through the day, I would put on your videos whenever I had boring ass work to do (which was a lot). You're like a (parasocial) little sister to me, absolutely one of my favourite people on the whole planet. Possibly even the whole universe. Wait, no, in the multiverse, out of all the possible Welonzes, I reckon you are the best one. However, being able to focus meant I don't have to give up on the things I wanted to do with my life. But that means I can't follow along on your gaming adventures anymore, I'm 42 and had given up on being able to do so much, there's serious catching up to do! I hope the channel continues to grow, that your work isn't too busy, and may there always be a cat for you to pet! Don't feel you should respond to this, I just wanted to say goodbye and wish you all the best.
naoxmon
I actually wanted to say this on the last month update (lol) but when there's a lot of good games releasing at once, personally I don't expect you to play them all instantly and am fine with whatever you decide to skip or play later. I'd rather you play what you really want or what's best for you regarding the channel. Especially since for some I want to play them myself first so I won't be able to watch along if you play them on release day anyway. Currently also thinking about replaying Cyberpunk 2077 from the start, to really appreciate all the changes from 2.0. It's probably worth it, given enough free time to do so though :P Either way I'm looking forward to all the games you mentioned, whenever they end up as playthroughs on the channel :)
Megamusic
I agree with now replaying cyperpunk , I don't think you have time and I don't think it's really necessary. I am looking forward to allthe upcoming games .
Wim Van Eynde
Going to say this nice and simple ... Play BG3 already :-P Would love to hear your unsalted comments while playing the game (which BTW is simply astonishing).
Ruocaled
Ya, definitely no need to replay 2077 with 2.0. I tried a bit, most improvement are on gameplay (skill trees and what not), but we're here for the story! And hope you don't get annoyed by 20 more bg3 comments coming haha, it's a bit like the Undertale situation, people experienced something magical and really want to share, sometime they get a bit pushy :)
Blue72
Despite being a huge fan of Bethesda games, I have to agree with you about Starfield. It's been pretty disappointing overall. At some point I'll get back into it and maybe even grow to like it, but right now it's going on the back burner. There's so much more interesting stuff coming out right now, like Phantom Liberty.
Calmmo
BG3 > DA:O threfore welonz should check out BG3 once done with DA:I wink wink nudge nudge
Lord Atrexia
Not that it’s been a quiet year for games or anything, but it’s genuinely wild how busy the last few months of the year is for releases, and January- March of next year doesn’t seem to slow down either 🥲 it’s been a really good time for blind accessibility lately, with the release of the new Mortal Kombat & Forza Motorsport next month all being fully playable which has been great 🙏 Take care of yourself Welonz, and thanks for the update ^^
Captain Kashup
I honestly thought that you were going to wait a while before doing Separate Ways, due to the absolute madness that's incoming, but I've been pleasantly surprised ! Resident Welonz will always be my favorite Welonz 🙏
WallHammer
Starfield's plot is not thrilling, especially for people who like plot in games or books. Compared to sci-fi novels of recent years, it even falls short. Perhaps the worst thing is that virtually all the characters are one-dimensional and shallow. Even the bad guys are spoken to as if they were gentlemen, there is a lack of characters there who are assholes to interact with. And the most politely put-down characters are the companions, who talk a lot, but rarely have anything interesting to say. On top of that, after missions you have to do inventory order, especially since the first ship has a low cargo capacity limit, and considering the companion's inventory, you have to run around the merchants and manage it all, at least at the beginning, which would be best cut from the footage, but that would be an extra waste of time from a YouTuber's point of view. So in my opinion, it's the right decision to not have a series from Starfield. Phantom Liberty, on the other hand, does not have these problems, the action wraps up quickly and is much more engaging story-wise, this game seems perfect as a series for the channel. From the opinions I've encountered, you can safely start with an existing save, only I think you need to go back to a save before the final mission. You will also need a moment to assign skill points from scratch. I'm looking forward to this series on your channel! :)
Jeffrey Hardy Quah
Man it’s been stressful trying to finish Baldur’s Gate 3 before Spider-Man 2 comes out, and I don’t even do this for a living!
Matt G
hey Welonz, I know you probably get a lot of suggestions but if you're interested in another translation game that also has an intriguing story I would recommend Heaven's Vault. I just started playing it myself
Thomas Mc
I am just going to type the word 'Silksong' to make people panic 👀
