Trivial Trivia: Tomba! and Tomba! 2

Tomba! is one of my fondest gaming memories from childhood. It was a quirky action-adventure platformer with RPG elements, set in a 2.5D world. It was such a unique gaming experience that I've yet to experience anything like it outside of it's own franchise (I know... two games hardly counts as a franchise). 

It's common for game developers to cut content due to time, size or budget constraints. When I discovered that Tomba met this same fate, I became obsessed with sniffing out this missing content. Little did I know of the treasures Whoopee Camp left behind, waiting to be discovered...

Data Mine: Video Games in 2016

While reading the January 2016 issue of GameInformer, I stumbled on its Top 50 Games of 2015. As I skimmed the list, I found I hadn't played many games released in 2015... which made me realize I've become one of those old people who "don't have time for video games anymore".

Once I shook that ugly realization, it was evident that most games listed were sequels, collections, remakes, reboots, re-releases, etc. Which wouldn't be a problem if there wasn't an increasing trend of re-purposed content over the past few years. With great concern for the future state of video games, most of which I probably won't play, I put on my miner's hat to dive head first into the data of Wikipedia's video games releases in 2016. 

Please excuse the click bait but the results may shock you!

Final Fantasy 7 Remake: Everything We Know

It's hard to believe that a Final Fantasy 7 Remake is finally happening. Given the current age of HD-Remaster-Reboot-Collection-Definitive-GOTY-ReRelease-2.8, it was only a matter of time before Square Enix bellied up to the bar so we could give them all of our goddamned money.

News of the remake has come in the form of a steady, slow trickle (likely so Square Enix may herd everyone aboard the hype train) but it's becoming exhausting wading through the reposted news stories from various big-wig game journalism sites. As of today, here is a comprehensive list of changes/features announced for the new Final Fantasy 7 Remake:

Wytches: Volume 1 - Spoiler Free Review

Confession: I use Amazon when looking for new comics before buying at a comic store.  It's great since I can read reviews to whittle out bad purchases and then get what I want quickly without waiting on shipping. I know I could buy digital comics, but I want physical media and I want it now ...ish. This is how I stumbled onto Wytches. Now I plan on more research before future purchases.

5 Heroes Characters I Want in Heroes Reborn

When Heroes came out in 2006, it quickly become one of my favorite shows. Despite it's long, drawn out story lines, I was immediately hooked by its stories of ordinary people discovering their extraordinary powers and destinies. Even as the show was cancelled, I remained glued to my seat waiting for some form of "more" Heroes. I felt like I was watching a Marvel movie, waiting for the "secret movie" after the end credits. After waiting through 9 years worth of end credits, I finally saw the secret movie!  

A few Heroes Reborn trailers have surfaced, showing many faces new and old. The return of Noah Bennett, Angela Petrelli, Matt Parkman, Micah Sanders, and Hiro Nakamura made me smile (while Mohinder and The Haitain were both met with a resounding "meh, mkay"). This roster is impressive, but I hope that Tim Kring has a few surprise guests up his very loose, wizard sleeves. Here are 5 characters I'd love to see in Heroes Reborn.

Odin Sphere: Leifprasir

(Norse) God-fucking-dammit.

Odin Sphere is next in line to receive an HD remake, which excites and frustrates me all the same! I picked up Odin Sphere when it first dropped on the PS2, admittedly because of it's beautiful art. The hand drawn environments and sprites were so alluring on the pages of my GameInformer magazine and even turned out to surpass this beauty in motion. I didn't have too much experience with side-scrolling dungeon crawlers but as a fan of action-RPGs I grew to love the battle system and absolutely loved the alchemy system (I'm actually a huge sucker for games that allow me to channel my inner potion-brewing witch). But the battle system's sudden and sharp increases of difficulty (leading to many-a cheap kill) turned me away from the game...