Detective Pikachu thoughts!

So, as many people may know, I am been anticipating this game since it was announced in Japan over 2 years ago. I watched playthroughs of the first part and had been praying it’d come over, or even the next part in Japanese for me to watch, just something because I was absolutely captivated by the entire concept.

I absolutely adore side-Pokemon games. I really love the World of Pokemon in general. Pokemon Snap is one of my all-time favorite games and for Pokemon Colosseum is another one up there and features my all-time favorite town–Phenac City.

The main place in this game is Ryme City which I genuinely want to see more of. I really loved the small bit of it we got to explore and even some of the surrounding areas. And one of the neat things was getting to just… talk to people and Pokemon and hear their thoughts and it was a lot of fun. It’s a lot different than how Mystery Dungeon works where it almost feels like its own AU/timeline with how their Pokemon World works.

And honestly, after waiting over two years, the game really didn’t disappoint. I loved it a lot and I found every case tons of fun. All the characters were interesting and I never found myself bored. In fact, I would say the only thing that even made me feel a little disappointed was the very end, but we’ll get to that!

For myself, I’m pretty good at detective games. I can usually figure things out pretty quickly (If you’re familiar with my Lady Layton playthrough, I had mentioned how I usually managed to figure out the culprit by the first clue or some idea of what was going to happen), but not always how that conclusion happens. While most of the time I figured it out, the way Detective Pikachu has you put the clues together to get to the conclusion can be a bit awkward at times. I had a lot of trouble during Case 4 with this because even though I knew Crawdaunt was clearly brought to the island somehow, I didn’t understand how they wanted me to show it. While part of it was missing the box (which… in my defense, I didn’t realize I could walk that far out on the water towards the front), even after finding it, I didn’t fully realize they wanted me to show the tree and the box because of the “matching claw marks” because while they mentioned scratches and claw marks, we didn’t actually get to SEE the inside of the box ones…

I had mixed feelings on the QTEs as well. That said, I actually managed to do fine with most of them, but they stressed me out! Thankfully, there weren’t tons and most aren’t too bad. I think the only ones I really got close to screwing up were in Chapter 7’s.

I also wish the Pika Prompts were actually forced cutscenes rather than activated by the player. I generally tried to explore every single area as much as I could–tapping everything I could, trying to talk to Pikachu, making sure I got all the clues, etc. And yet I still missed some things–usually because I didn’t realize doing a certain thing would force me ahead or because Pikachu forced me ahead. Speaking of Pikachu, just one “Hey, listen!” would’ve been enough–I know to talk to him once I finish reading over all the case files and him still blinking was more than enough without him constantly calling out until I checked with him.

Going back to the Pika Prompts, they’re super cute and really add more to the story and I would’ve loved if they were forced because it’s so easy to miss them. Besides some only being in certain locations, you can actually get certain random prompts as well that are always available or a few general ones. Sometimes I stopped checking because nothing was popping up only to realize, yes, I still missed one because I wasn’t lucky enough to get it to show up. While you can unlock them all with the Detective Pikachu amiibo, it’s not really the same to watch them all after? Without the context, it lacks some of the fun I guess.

I also wish it was possible to re-watch cutscenes or even go back to old cases without saving over your own file or in a new file, but oh well.

Regardless, I really loved the a lot even with those few issues. I’m not sure if I could pick my favorite case or character–all the cases were a lot of fun and I found myself really enjoying every character. I’ll say the Chapter that hit me hardest would probably be Chapter 5 though with Fine Park. It made me cry and just completely broke my heart.

I’m so happy Charizard got to come back in the end. I really hope Fine Park can be refurbished or something now that the truth is out about what happened. I’m just sad we didn’t see a picture of Charizard with everyone–only Buneary.

As mentioned, the only thing I found kind of disappointing was the end. While I got really hyped up at the beginning seeing the parade (I wish we could’ve seen the other two… It would’ve been nice to end the final chapter with the full parade), the case itself was actually really short. I wouldn’t say it was the shortest, but it was the shortest of some of the bigger cases and especially after how hyped up Chapter 8 was with the Cruise Ship and everything (I wish we could have kept the Detective Cape! I also want to see some of the recipes…), it felt almost like a let-down? There really wasn’t much of a Climax and the final confrontation scene felt small as well (though, the music was great–the game definitely had great music).

I also had kind of calling that it’d been someone from GNN from the start so my detective princess skills continue. Anyway, I don’t know, I guess I just wanted more? I don’t know how they could have extended it though. Oh wait, yes I do, actually finding Tim’s dad. While it’s heavily hinted at multiple times that he’s currently fused (or maybe even switched with) Pikachu right now, I just want to know more on all of that? I also just… don’t really care for that kind of twist. I kind of like the idea of an actual talking Pikachu that someone can talk to (and from Episode 0, which I totally would have liked to actually play, it sounds like Harry could hear the Pikachu too so maybe even once it no longer has some of Harry as part of him, he’ll still be a talking Pikachu to the Goodman family) and is being detective and stuff so I hope that’s not completely gone even if Harry is back.

I wish we got to know fully what Pikachu and Mewtwo were talking about too. I’m guessing we’ll hear more about that and how it involves Harry in the next game and/or the movie. All I know is I hope the next part of Detective Pikachu comes out much sooner and they continue with this kind of series. I would absolutely love if they did more detective-style Pokemon games–both in and outside Ryme City. Let me experience all kinds of other careers in the Pokemon world. It’s never not been interesting and there’s just so much more to explore in the Pokemon World.

While I find myself losing interest in “main” Pokemon games for a lot of reasons, Detective Pikachu reminded me of how much I really do love Pokemon still and the world of it.

But yes, if you like mysteries and Pokemon, I’d really recommend it. It is a bit on the simple side, but it genuinely has a lot of charm. If you’d rather watch the series instead, I have an entire playthrough up over on my Youtube channel <3

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp – Leif’s Event & ACPC’s Main problem

So, before I get into recent happenings, the beauty of canals, and Leif’s event, I want to talk about Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp in general and just bring up one very important thing: It entirely misses the point of Animal Crossing. Sure, your favorite villagers and special villagers are here and you can customize with familiar options, but the nice thing about Animal Crossing? It’s supposed to be relaxing. And Pocket Camp with its 3 hour timers and constant events has not been relaxing in the slightest since it officially launched. In fact, not counting friend events or the brief stretch goals with new villagers, only ~12 days have been free from events and new events usually come in directly after the last (Such as the upcoming Mario event which will be on the 10th–right after Leif’s event ends on the 9th. And we have new villagers coming tomorrow). It’s so constant.

Usually with most events in New Leaf and/or previous Animal Crossing games, you can poke in at various times of the day. Sure, it may only last one day, but you can usually slowly work towards it that day or even prepare in advance. You can also get help from friends which, while yes, the garden events do have that (though, the crafting ones don’t), it doesn’t really count when it’s heavily RNG and there’s a chance you could literally fail every chance despite your friend’s help.

And like, New Leaf fixed some issues with the beautiful ordinance lessening the issue with flowers, but the moving mechanic was still kind of busted–meanwhile, I can turn on Wild World and all my villagers are still there even if all my flowers are gone (besides golden ones). But Animal Crossing’s always supposed to be a relaxing simulation game and it feels everytime they step closer to completely doing that, other things take two steps back.

Pocket Camp is cute and I can understand things needing to rotate as much as they do, but at least let people have time to take a break and recoup. Because right now it’s just super tiring and it’s hard not to get burnt out on it.

With that said, let’s move onto Leif’s event. While the first part mostly went well, I had awful luck with the second half. I did, thankfully, manage to complete it though:

But even the cutscene felt a bit underwhelming. I liked the music, but that’s really it…

(also why can they put the cute path over the canals and we can’t T__T)

I will say the ladybugs were cute at least:

Regardless, I am really happy about the canals:

And you’ll probably see I messed with my camp… again:


I still don’t know what I want to do. I don’t feel particularly inspired no matter what I try.

The Event also brought new foregrounds and backgrounds for the camp environment and… I have mixed feelings on them.

I adore the Cherry Blossom trees and little flowers on the grass, but I’m not fond of the flowers actually used in the background and foreground otherwise. I kind of wish I could add some more trees too… and change what flowers are shown.

Finally, as you probably noticed, it’s finally Spring now:

I can’t wait until it’s Cherry blossom season.

Let’s make Chiharu’s Rare Cheesecake!

So, this is something I’ve wanted to do for a loooong time. Since the manga release, but there wasn’t… quite enough information to properly do so and being a huge perfectionist, I decided to hold off hoping the Anime would expand on it, or at least, show enough that between the two, we’d have enough information and to my delight, it did. I had wanted to do it since the episode over a month ago, but a lot of things made it a bit difficult sadly (so for those of you who keep asking me where the next episode of Miitopia is, that also goes under this… Seriously, I’m doing my best, please be patient).

I actually am incredibly picky with cheesecake. The usual “New York-style cheesecake” is actually a type that I… kind of… hate. I found I generally prefer European style cheesecakes and well, I’ve never really had a Japanese cheesecake before which makes this an adventure in itself.

Cardcaptor Sakura is a pretty special show to me for a lot of reasons. For one: It’s the first anime I had ever seen subbed and kind of opened up that whole “anime is from Japan” door for me. While Animal Crossing got me more interested in Japan’s culture, Cardcaptor Sakura got me interested in Japan in the first place and, especially, Japanese food. It’s not that I hadn’t had Japanese food before, but mainly just “staples” in a way–in fact, my absolute favorite Japanese dish is something I only first saw in Cardcaptor Sakura: Takoyaki.

Even though Cardcaptor Sakura is not in any way a “food” Anime, they definitely have the habit of showing a lot of dishes that look incredibly tasty. And if CLAMP ever made a recipe book, I’d get it. But yes, onto what this entry is all about…

For the most part, I doubled all the ingredients from this recipe as Japan generally uses smaller pan sizes. On average, there’s is about 6 inches. We have a 9 inch spring form and doubling helped it fit perfectly so… The only things I didn’t double are the Lemon Juice and the Gelatin which use the same amounts as the 6 inch.

Ingredients for the Cheesecake

  • 1/3 cup butter, melted
  • 100 grams of Graham crackers (About 1 and 1/4th cup ground)
  • 2 cups Heavy Cream
  • 80 grams Sugar (roughly 2/3 cup–a little over, or do 1/2 cup and a little under 1/3 a cup)
  • 160 grams Honey (roughly 1/2 cup)
  • 2 tablespoons of Lemon Juice (2 tablespoons) – Not doubled
  • 400 grams of Cream Cheese, softened (Roughly 2 cups)
  • 10 Grams Powdered Gelatin (3 1/4 tsp)
  • 1/4 cup Lukewarm Water

Ingredients for Whipped Cream

  • 2 tablespoons sugar
  • 1 cup heavy cream

Cheesecake Instructions

1. Crush graham crackers with a rolling pin or just… smacking them in a ziplock or something. Just crush them to pieces. I did find the rolling pin the best method though.

2. Microwave the butter to melt it. Combine it with the graham crackers.

If the graham crackers seem a bit too dry, feel free to add a bit more melted butter. Similarly, if they seem too wet, try adding some more crushed graham crackers. It’s a small enough amount that it shouldn’t be too huge a difference and I find the kind of graham crackers and butter used can cause some variance.

3. Line a 9-inch springform pan with parchment paper on the bottom. Press crust down evenly against the bottom of the pan.

Put in Fridge to harden. You can also do the freezer if you’d like it to harden faster, though, I found the fridge fine.

4. Sprinkle gelatin in 1/4th a cup of water. After the gelatin has absorbed some of the water, microwave about 10 seconds and stir to smooth it out and break up chunks.

5. In a bowl, mix the softened cream cheese a bit. You can also add the lemon juice here or at the end of the next step.

6. In a different bowl than above, whip the heavy cream a bit. Add in the sugar and honey. When the mixture begins to have soft peaks, add in the softened cream cheese and lemon juice.

7. Make sure the gelatin is no longer hot and stir it again to make sure it hasn’t reclumped together. Then add the melted gelatin to the mixture and stir.

8. Pour the mixture through a sieve into another bowl.

9. Then pour the mixture into the springform pan on top of the crust.

Set it in the fridge for at least 2-3 hours. It is definitely the most firm overnight though!

10. Once finished, cut yourself a piece and top it with what you desire. While the recipe does recommend fresh fruit, fruit sauce, or mint on the top, I decided to go with whipped cream as I’m super picky with fruit sauces and I’m allergic to mint so! But really, just do whatever topping you want.

Whipped Cream instructions

1. Place a metal mixing bowl and metal whisk into the freezer for 10 to 15 minutes (Optional, but helps a lot). You could also sit the metal bowl on some ice while doing the whipping.

2. Put sugar and heavy cream into a mixing bowl. Whisk until stiff peaks are formed and then it’s done! Top your cheesecake with as much as you’d like.

And with that, the cheesecake has been completed:

:D

I really liked it–it’s definitely more a creamy cheesecake which I prefer. It is VERY sweet so if you’d prefer things less sweet, maybe add a little more lemon juice and lessen the honey (which is actually optional), but I think the honey gives it a nice taste and I do like things pretty sweet so….

Similarly, it was a bit soft and fluffy like I mentioned so maybe doing a bit more gelatin (as we only used the original amount mentioned in the show’s/manga’s recipe list which is for about 6 inches) would’ve made it more firm, but I really like it at this consistency personally.

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp – I’d really appreciate a break

While I know a lot of people don’t play Pocket Camp anymore, I still keep playing it. Besides just enjoying Animal Crossing as a series, when the mobile game was officially announced, it also mentioned having connectivity to a “main” Animal Crossing game so whenever we do get a new one, I want to be ready for it.

But right now, it just feels kind of an endless struggle. One of the things I really appreciate from games, and maybe I am the only one who does, is the ability to just have a moment to breathe.

I’m so happy I started playing Pocket Camp when it released early in Australia because I think I would’ve given up otherwise. Being able to play that month and just get familiar with the game without tons of limited things happening and more and more new villagers being added constantly was so relaxing and that’s the one thing Pocket Camp is really missing to me. It’s not relaxing in the slightest. In the same way that New Leaf stopped being relaxing for me due to the broken moving mechanic. It’s not fun to load up a game and be dreading if someone moved or not.

In the same vein, I feel like I’m constantly watching the clock when I play this because, oh look the villagers are switching again in a few minutes. Time to rush to try and get what I can done.

While the gardening event was incredibly improved with Lottie, it still felt stressful. And I just do not really care for gardening. I’m struggling enough trying to get those flower trade items only to have to rip up my garden again for another gardening event. I also have a lot of feelings on the new slot machine at OK Motors, but we’ll get to that.

For now, let’s just go in order since my last update and take one thing at a time. There’s been quite a few new villagers including a new essence type–Hip. I don’t really get it. The villagers don’t really seem to fit it and the icon for it is a mushroom and the amenities are even weirder… In Japanese, it’s “Pop” so I would suppose they are going for “Popular” but it still seems kind of odd to me? The whole theme seems odd. Regardless, I made sure to get them all moved in quickly:

I was especially excited about Merengue:

I also completed all the Hip Amenities and finished off the Rustic ones as well:


I absolutely love the waving from the balloon:

And while the capture feature is cute, I wish I could also take pictures of the whole screen versus just a square.

I also finally started working on my RV and camp site a bit more, but honestly, I’m still not particularly happy with either:

I’m really struggling trying to figure out what to do. I just don’t feel very inspired :/ While also feeling too overwhelmed at the same time.

As mentioned, we had the second garden event with Lottie:



While I still had a little more trouble than I would’ve liked with the final bats, the rates were SO much better with this event and I’m glad they listened to feedback. I think the only disappointing thing for me is I wasn’t really fond of most of the items. Pretty much everything I would’ve preferred in other colors (please give me a Sweet Lolita version, Nintendo). I liked the red roses a lot though.

I also ADORED Lottie’s dress.

I would love if they made a pink version instead of black that we could wear.

I will admit I didn’t expect this for the end scene with our character playing guitar though”

This time, I made sure to record the end cutscene at least:

I ALSO FINALLY GOT THIS DRESS:

Which means I can stop checking the shops until they get new stock as now I’ve bought everything from them at least once. This took waaaay too long.

Speaking of clothes, the Villager customization finally came out. It’s cute, but I don’t think I’ll use it much. I did like giving Merengue a tiara though:

I’d like to do this with all my favorite villagers. When you don’t get the twin animation thing though, you get to see the villager model by themselves:

And speaking of villagers, with the more recent updates, they also can ask for flowers now. It seems to be pretty rare when they do, but I’m not super fond of it as I struggle with gardening enough as it is. Not to mention if you don’t have any onhand, it’ll take too long to grow a flower before they leave. Sure, you can skip them now, but it’s still disheartening. They at least only ask for the ones that can be bought though and the bonus events are cute (and seem guaranteed if they ask for flowers).

I just wish we could buy flowers from people because I’d love to never garden again.

So, I’ve spoken about my hate for gardening enough, but lets talk about my issues with this “lovely” Slot Machine now:

I actually tend to find slot machines pretty fun. This one works on a timing mechanic which means if you tend to be good at timing games, you can win pretty easily. While the reward is usually rather small, you randomly can get one of the bigger bonuses to give you 30 or 50 tokens instead for winning.

The thing is, to get all 5 unique items from this minigame, it costs 15,750 tokens. I have plenty of Flower Powder (The one good thing about the Garden events honestly), I’m great at timing events, but the minigame is so boring that I’ve genuinely found myself dozing off to it after a while :/ I’m generally the type of person who likes to knock things out in one go so I don’t really want to portion it off, but it sucks. I wish I could buy tokens with Leaf Tickets or something because the game just feels exhausting. I don’t know when I’ll find the time to get enough, but between this and the gardening, I’m wondering if I should give up on my catalog dreams.

Other new features that are slightly more fun are dropped items being in the game. You can find them while out and about or a villager could prompt you to go find it:


For the record, the funniest part about this is Pietro is right–he didn’t tell me. At the time, I didn’t even know they COULD tell you. And I found it completely by accident. I saw a tiny fish in the ocean and was very confused as the smallest size there right now is just a small fish and I thought maybe new fish had been added–but nope! Just a bottle. I’ve had fun collecting items though.

Oh, Bob, you have no idea.

Finally, currently there is the Crystal Event which will be ending in a few days. I really adore the items from it a lot:

I’d like to do more with it, honestly. I just wish the outfit was pink instead of blue. It’s a really pretty dress.

The Camp Scenery update also happened and…I wish I liked it more.

Besides just not being too fond of the options right now, it feels really expensive :/ And nearly all the options are Leaf Tickets rather than feeling more balanced. I hope a lot of nice ones get added in the future.

SPEAKING OF THE FUTURE… I’ll be talking a bit about the recent datamines, so if you’d like to stay spoiler-free, don’t read below :P

It seems we’ll be having another Event–a third Garden event no less (though, it was already hinted officially)–shortly after the Crystal Event ends. And I’m just… so frustrated. A break would be so nice. A little over halfway between, we’ll get more villagers AND a new essence type (Harmonious) and then right after this gardening event ends, a Mario collaboration event will start (I’m guessing we may also see Animal Crossing items in Super Mario Run). And I just. It sucks. I want a break so badly and sure, I could just take a break, but I also know me and I know if I miss anything I want, I won’t play anymore. And depending on the connectivity, that could even mean any Animal Crossing game permanently.

I wish we could sell anything to each other. I wish we could help each other more. I wish the game didn’t feel like such a chore.

I think the worst part is I’m REALLY excited for some of the items. The Harmonious essence brings the Lotus Pond–one of my favorite Public Work projects from New Leaf + favorite item to use in most of the Zen houses in Happy Home Designer. It also has a gorgeous fountain amenity and I really need to decide which Amenity I’ll be switching out for it… The Cute Tent or the Natural Picnic Table? (Seriously though, if anyone has opinions or suggestions about this, I am opened to them)

I’m going to guess the “sub-essence” for the final tier will either be Rustic again, like the Hip items, ooor Natural. Which after Hip, are the two I’m lowest on. Balancing is getting harder in the game too.

We’ll also be getting another special NPC item with Celeste’s Telescope and Celeste is one of my favorite NPCs so really excited for that too. I hope I will have enough Leaf Tickets for it.

Meanwhile, Leif’s Garden Event not only has some adorable flowers, but new pathways, a lovely swing, AND WATERWAYS. YOU CAN MAKE MOATS. I AM SO EXCITED TO SEE THOSE AS ACTUAL ITEMS. I WILL USE THOSE LIKE CRAZY IN A MAIN ANIMAL CROSSING GAME.

I just hope I can get a lot of them because anyone who knows me well knows how excited I am for those kind of things.

But despite how much I adore those items, part of me just wishes we had a break more than anything. I’m trying so hard not to get burnt out, but I don’t know how much more I can stand this. I have enough things I have to do without feeling like I need to check this app 24-7.

On game events…

I spoke about it briefly on my Twitter, but I really wanted to talk about it a lot more.

One of the things I’ve noticed a lot of games will do, especially mobile games, is essentially barring things off to a later time. You can only do so much a day and need to wait another day to be able to continue. And I… kind of hate this. A lot of people chock it up to impatience, but personally it’s more about the general stress of constantly feeling like I’m going to run out of time and that is not a feeling I enjoy. Most of my stress and anxiety comes from the idea that there is only so much time to accomplish anything. And especially with recent events in games, it’s a lot more highlighted.

I’ll talk about a few recent games I’ve played that have brought up this system in a few different ways. For starters, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp (I promise an entry about Lottie’s Event and the new villagers + essence will be coming soon). The game works almost entirely on timers which isn’t necessarily terrible for the most part, but it is a large difference from a more traditional Animal Crossing game where you essentially have the full day to work towards things rather than worrying about missing out because you didn’t check every 3 hours.

While I’ve gotten a bit more used to the requests and quarry and rarely use my tickets to speed up much there beyond getting newer villagers in, I still tend to freak out a bit with amenities as if I don’t manage to build a tier fast enough, I could end up maxing out a villagers’ level too quickly and lose out on getting them up.

Those who know me know I kind of hate games where I need to balance resources a lot. It’s very tiring to me as it’s just too repetitive gathering the same stuff over and over. And while I wouldn’t mind as much if there wasn’t a limit so times where I DO feel like roaming around and catching as much as I can could work out, constantly running into inventory limits (and yes, I maxed out my space with Leaf Tickets too….) is pretty discouraging and means once I’ve done my requests for that time table, I don’t have much of a reason to keep playing.

With the events especially, there’s a lot of waiting around. Waiting for things to craft, waiting for new requests, waiting for flowers to grow… And then the RNG plays a part in those latter two activities to see if you even manage to get what you need. And the problem here is that the only way to really speed things up is paying. While the Gardening events have been kind enough to give a good amount of Flower food, I can say that not only have I completely used up all the flower food I had, but I also ended up using Leaf Tickets as well due to that same feeling of worrying I wouldn’t have enough time.

Even if I calculate the entire probability of everything, it doesn’t always lessen that same worried feeling and when it comes down to it, some times even if I know how much I can do a day, I can’t always manage that. Some days maybe I can go 18 hours with no breaks dedicated into something, but other times I’m lucky if I can even log in for the day. This also makes things like with the Gardening Event where half the event is locked until a few days before the event ends especially frustrating. There’s no guarantee I’ll be up to it and there’s less time to hope to be.

Things happen. Whether it be an issue with other things I was working on or something more personal, I can’t guarantee I can put work in every single day of an event which is my other big issue with barring things off. When I was still in school, I missed roughly 35 days a year. That is a lot of absences–7 weeks of school. This was due to a combination of my own health (Allergies can vary anywhere between a mild cold to a severe flu in just how bad they are) and my own family’s with sometimes, nobody feeling up to actually being able to take me.

Despite this, I always made up my work and I always got straight A’s on my tests. I had perfect grades outside my attendance and always completed my homework. I’m a quick learner and a quick reader so despite being absent, it was very easy for me to take care of. While this wasn’t as big of an issue in Elementary School, Middle School was a bit harsher about absences, and High School flat out didn’t want to let people graduate if they didn’t have a certain amount of attendance–despite my grades, which lead me to do homeschooling and take my GED instead. Because I was smart enough, I just couldn’t always make it there.

And that’s part of what makes barring off event progress so frustrating. While the idea is to get people to keep logging in, it’s honestly stressful to the point of completely contradicting the reason for mobile games–to relax and take it easy.

Abyssrium as well has done quite a poor job with their most recent event with it requiring you to check in every 3 hours along with spending 500 event currency OR spend $10 to check in every hour and deal with their huge RNG game in hopes to complete a special coral before time runs out. I think the Valentine’s Day Coralite is really beautiful and I do like the idea, but I think the execution is terrible. Trying to keep up as much as you can when even a minute can throw you off sucks. Similarly, the RNG is a pain. I have all the Valentine fish from last year already so it’s very frustrating when one comes up instead of, well, something I actually need. It’s tiring and very repetitive and incredibly expensive to speed up and you could still fail.

That said, as mentioned, this isn’t something entirely done on Mobile games, but also other games as well that may be considered more relaxing. One thing that’s happened more often with PC games are patches/updates that implement timed events. And I don’t mean things like Overwatch where sure, I can buy some, but I can also put in a lot of time playing to hopefully earn a bunch of boxes too, but things like Slime Rancher’s Christmas event. They had a different ornament each day that could be found in boxes. I’m… pretty directionally challenged in games, to say the least so whenever I play Slime Rancher, even with the new map system, I tend to get very lost.

I spent a few hours the first day where I could, but I wasn’t able to find a single box to even try. And I didn’t have time many other days as December is a pretty crazy month for me. In the end, I gave up without getting any ornaments and as someone who loves the Holidays and Christmas, it was pretty discouraging.

And the thing is, the more I miss because of the stress of events, the less likely I am to keep playing in the first place. There’s not really a good reason to bar people off. If someone wants to spend 10+ hours on your game working hard at the event, they should be allowed to without being punished for it or having to pay because they didn’t “wait”.

Some people just want to relax. It shouldn’t feel like a job they constantly have to check into.

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp – Event Complete… only for another to start?

So, somehow, this second part of the event managed to be even worse between the ridiculous low percentages and trying to get the new flowers while also sometimes getting the old. I have over 140 Blue Dahlia seeds now. It took me so long to even get some of my first White Dahlia Seeds and then adding on the bad catch percentages (Often, I failed every single one), I just want to thank everyone who kept giving me Butterflies because this would’ve been impossible otherwise.

I know there was still time left, but I’ve been so incredibly stressed because of this, it’ll be nice to just take a moment to breathe again.

I will say the scene for completing it is genuinely really cute:




If I wasn’t so frustrated and had been better prepared, I would have loved to record it. I’m glad I at least took lots of screenshots.

During this second part though, Clothing Crafting finally came! I finally have a dress I really like:

Can’t decide what shoes I like more. I need a cute hair accessory too. I also love the different boxes and how who you’re calling changes based on what you’re crafting.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much time to relax with it being announced that an event will be starting when Rover’s ends… And it’s… exhausting. I want a break. I’m so scared for this event. It sounds like it’s a more crafting focused one, but I’m just so tired. I expected Rover’s event to be sometime in Spring–like March… and this upcoming event, maybe late June, but more likely February.

Now I’m just expecting a Valentine’s Day event too and it’s just… it’s too much.

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp – Rover’s Event

So, the next part of the event starts in about 30 minutes, thus, I figured I’d finally get this entry done. I’d been planning to write it since the event started last week, but haven’t been… in the best mind space so to speak. Before we get into other Pocket Camp things, I just genuinely want to talk about the event for a bit first. And honestly, I kind of hate it.

Despite finishing the event about two days after it started, I’ve found it very stressful. Even ignoring my general hate of gardening features due to finding it waaaay too monotonous, I just constantly felt I wouldn’t hit the numbers. And honestly, without so many people who shared butterflies with me, I don’t think I would have as I had some awful luck with actually catching them, often being lucky if I caught even 25% of the butterflies that were given out (and yes, that includes when I had butterflies on all 20 flowers).

If you haven’t been playing or maybe just want a quick overview, this is how the event works:
-There are special Dahlia seeds that can be planted that may cause butterflies to show up when they bloom. You can buy blue ones from Lloid ooor you can earn them from doing requests from villagers. You will only get the Red/Diamond Butterflies from the Blue Dahlias. Red Dahlia seeds are gotten rarely from villager requests and mostly from helping friends (which I’ll get to shortly). You will only get Yellow/Topaz Butterflies from the Red Dahlias.
-There is no guarantee a butterfly will be on a Dahlia when it blooms (Unless it is a + seed which also grow faster. Thus far, there’s been no way to get them besides Rover’s initial tutorial).
-Similarly, there’s no guarantee you will catch the Butterfly in the first place. While sometimes I get super lucky (Which is getting a catch rate of about 50% or higher), I mostly found myself failing which just… sucks.
-To get the items, you need to catch a certain amount of each color of butterfly. You need 80 Diamond ones for all the Diamond Butterfly requests and 60 Topaz ones for all the Topaz Butterfly requests. If the datamine continues to be correct, you’ll need 40 each for all the requests for the Winter and Gold Winter Butterflies. I’m personally petrified of how they may be gotten and how to get White Dahlias in the first place. There is no cross breeding with Dahlias.
–The counter only counts Butterflies you catch. Giving them away does not make the counter go down. This is one of the few things I really like about the event and it means you can help your friends out with no worries. Share the butterflies with your friends. There is literally no purpose for keeping them otherwise as they will turn into bells at the end of the event. Butterflies can be placed on ANY bloomed flower–even if they aren’t Dahlias, so always keep some flowers blooming for friends.
-As mentioned, Butterflies will only show up when a flower initially blooms. They will not show up otherwise unless a friend shares with you, so harvest Dahlias as much as you can to trade in for some nice items.

I will say the rewards are pretty great though. Even if you’re not a huge fan of Rover, there’s great opportunities to earn lots of essences and materials thanks to the rewards along with some Potted Dahlias to remember the event as they are pretty nice flowers.

My main issue with it is, besides the monotony and RNG of it all, is that it’s super stressful for me. I find myself constantly wanting to check in to make sure I can get butterflies out as fast as I earn them to help others and also not miss a chance at earning more butterflies (though, at least now that I’m done, that’s sort of more relaxed) from people. Like when the event first started, I find myself checking at least every 3 hours at most and it’s really hard to relax and enjoy it when I just constantly am stressing out. And Animal Crossing is supposed to be a relaxing game so me feeling like I don’t have time to do anything else besides check in on Pocket Camp isn’t good. (If you’re wondering why there hasn’t been another Style Savvy part, this is why)

Besides my insane suffering for the event and dreading that the next part will start in 20 minutes and worrying how that may go, I still have been doing my best to accomplish things in my game.

Such as getting the four newest villagers in:


Sprinkle is one of my favorite penguins so I’m happy to see her in. I’m not too fond of any of their level 15 items, but I have them all in my camp site for now. I’ve gotten over 100 of each type of essence now and due to finishing the Rustic Amenities, I’m mostly just doing a combination of “villagers who aren’t level 15 yet” and “villagers close to level 20”. Once I have everyone maxed out, I’m probably going to organize it for the best chances to get a good amount of essence + materials and just change it up based on what essences I may need more of at the time.

I really like the Rustic Balloon a lot:

Another reason I wish we could place more amenities. The fact that villagers will wave to each other is my favorite part:

Going back to the event, I did my best to at least have fun with some of the Rover items (okay, so just the top but):

I really want to re-do my camp a bit, but I’m still working out what I want to do.

I also love the Rover RV:

I don’t think I’m going to get it (not really my colors), but the style of it is really cool and I hope we’ll see more uniquely shaped RVs in the future. Hopefully in colors as great as my pink lace-y one.

I also noticed the tree colors changed recently so I feel weather will be switching up again soon:

There’s a lot of great new features planned and while I’m still impatiently waiting for new clothes, I can’t wait to be able to change the background of my campsite especially.

Anyway, I’ll end this off with fun pictures I’ve taken from the event:


Now it’s time to suffer during part two of it…

Style Savvy: Styling Star – Final Thoughts & Mini-Review

This won’t really be like my normal reviews as this mainly will be talking about my final thoughts, but this will also compare it to the other games in the series and most importantly, address a question I’ve seen come up a lot–is this game better than Fashion Forward. And very simply, that answer can actually be boiled down to why you play the series.

I’m personally not a huge fashion person. I have a style I really like and dream of always dressing like a Princess, but I very much wear what I’m comfortable with and don’t care if something maybe doesn’t match or isn’t popular. Because of that, the main fun for me with the game is dressing up my character, shop, and room. Interior decorating and customization are my main focus and so for me, this game mostly exceeded in what I enjoyed.

I actually found the fashion shows of Fashion Forward to be tiring and too repetitive and I hated that you had the forced little notification about them every single time you sold enough tickets so I greatly preferred the concerts and their catchy songs. That said, if you enjoy more helping the town become fashionable and dressing up everyone nicely and not just trying to make as much money as you can to buy more clothes to dress-up in, the game takes out a lot of what made Fashion Forward really good for this type of game due to how much space the concerts take up.

While hair and Make-up does make a return, there’s not only less hairstyles (My lovely curly ponytail is gone… And there is no better high ponytail besides the normal one this game…), but a handful only unlock once you’ve finished the story. The bangs can still be mixed and matched though. Make-up, I genuinely swear there’s less shades (or at least different ones) for certain colors. There’s also not really make-up sets you can make yourself (or items you can find to make). It’s all pre-set ones that are sold.

You do not get any pay for helping out at the hair or make-up places. You just get Style Points for ranking up. You do, however, get pay for helping out at the Menswear Shop.

Some places take quite a while to unlock which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but can make the game feel a bit grindy. I personally beat the game around Rank 60, but I probably could’ve done it a bit sooner if I didn’t mess up so often. I feel it’s important to point out though, you will not always unlock things in the same order as someone else. Some things require a certain amount of days to pass since the last, others require a rank up, I’ve had some “side quests” pop up much sooner than others while also taking longer to get certain other quests. While there is a set number of events that will happen and you will need certain things done before the final story stuff, there isn’t really a guide to follow here.

Going back to Fashion Forward for the moment:
-The Chalet doesn’t return. The only room you even customize sort of like that is your shop. And while it’s fun to customize your shop, the item limit is quite small. There’s a lot I feel I could’ve done, especially with wall and shelf space, that I couldn’t do due to hitting the item limit very quickly.
—-Similarly, room customization is kind of awful. It’s a bit similar to Trendsetters where you can switch stuff out, but I swear that there’s genuinely less options in general and I don’t know why you can only place items on your vanity and dresser/shelf and that’s it :/ Why can’t I place something on my table? Like seriously. And just, after Fashion Forward’s rooms and the way the shop works, I find it kind of bizarre that your own apartment feels so… lazy in a way. I get that with the animations, that’s probably why they can’t let you place things all over the floor, but even wall items or being able to place things on your table or just genuinely more options to switch through for what you could change would be great.
—-Not to mention changes to items… None of the animal items are animated. They’re plushies. And honestly, they look kind of… odd.

It makes me sad as I really adored them in Fashion Forward.
—-Your shop’s exterior customization is better than Fashion Forward’s, but not as good as Trendsetter’s. There’s only a few options for what you can switch and one of the things I really wish they’d do is have the same styles in different colors. I’m still constantly split on the display backdrop because I don’t care for the color the one in the style I like is.

The music is a lot of fun and the concerts are always enjoyable to watch. The My Diva thing that will let you put in your character and/or some of your other favorites is a really neat feature and I’ve had a lot of fun with it.

While modeling does not make a re-appearance (Which does make me sad–it was one of my favorite jobs from Fashion Forward and I loved the special photos you could get where your character could hold something special for it), there is a photo feature you unlock that lets you take photoshoots at least–just… no fancy modeling for your character. Which is a shame as you kind of get offered as such and I think being a singer and a designer would’ve been fun, but oh well :(

^There’s tons of poses though and a good amount of backgrounds so the options are there.

Speaking of backgrounds… There aren’t places to travel in this game. Sure, sometimes you travel with characters, but you can’t explore or choose to do so yourself. It’s especially a shame as one place has a fountain and I would’ve liked to take a picture there :(

There’s a lot of new clothing options and many that I really like, but I’m genuinely still bummed about the hair. One of the really nice new features you can unlock is the VIP Booth which allows you to view everything for sale in the Exhibition Hall at once. This is incredibly helpful as time is a big factor in the game.

The game does time differently than the last three games. Trendsetters had it so the month was the same, even if the day changed, while the original game and Fashion Forward both worked in real time. Styling Star actually works the way I’ve always wanted the game to work. The day has its own timer and then when you go to sleep/decide to end the day, the day actually progresses. The start date is whenever you first start playing the game, so for me, that was on Christmas Day (December 25th). I ended up finishing the game in April.

The only thing is the game will force the day to end after a certain amount of time. Going in and out of places makes more time pass. And how long you spend somewhere DOES matter. It’s not like you go in somewhere and time is frozen. And this kind of sucks. I don’t mind certain amounts of time changing the time of day, but I don’t like being forced to the next day.

When I unlocked the designing option (which, you can only sell your designs online–you can’t in your shop), I spent a very long time on my Emblem so I could make my custom shopping bag. When I finished, I lost nearly two days–a whole day passed and when my character “woke up”, it was already night the next day. This also made me start Alina’s story a bit late because Sunday ended up being completely skipped for me. This wasn’t fun and it made me feel like I constantly needed to rush around in order to get things done.

Not to mention I usually liked saving the Exhibition Hall for last so I’d have a good amount of money and empty stock to fill up. One nice thing about the game is the stock system is great–it’s really easy to restock on things and stock space upgrades a lot to the point where you really don’t have to worry about it after a while. I had some issues early on once or twice, but now I have 16,000 slots free and I have tons of clothes and it’s beautiful.

Character-wise: I really love many of the characters in this game. I didn’t find myself too attached to most of the other shop owners (I do love the bakery couple and Florian, the flower shop owner though), but I loved all the singers (Rosie, Yolanda, Alina, and Angelique) and pretty much everyone at NIN10. Also Camilla, Melvin, and Yolanda’s bodyguard were all great too. Oliver was probably the only one I could shrug off a bit–I expected him to be around more from how he was at the demo and what he said at the beginning and he just seemed to be forgotten amongst everything else as I feel like we never saw him except a bit towards the very end. I feel like I loved more in this game than Fashion Forward though.

I also liked how even several of the non-main characters had some of their own stories you got to help with. I would say my only complaint is we didn’t fully get to experience them–like the metal singing or Camilla’s own singing career and things. I get that it probably would’ve been more work, but with such a focus on concerts, I still kind of expected it? I’m also surprised we never heard another song from Angelique besides the opening.

That said… On the subject of singing and voices, I do want to talk about some of my issues with the localization. I’ve said it before that this is a port and if the British slang wasn’t enough to convince you, there’s all the notions of “Style Boutique”–the PAL region name of the game and the use of Celsius (and let me tell you I was very concerned when someone was talking about their room being at like 24 degrees) among a handful of other things.

I’ve mentioned before that I’m still happy to have the game, but for us to be the only place to not get a physical edition and to have had to wait when it’s literally just a port and so all they had to do was… un-region lock it, I just… It just feels a bit lazy and it frustrates me because the series deserves more love than it gets.

I also want to talk about Rosie’s voice. I have no issues with the singer. The singer clearly has a great voice and I’d like to look up more of her music. But her voice doesn’t fit Rosie. It doesn’t fit her personality or attitude or appearance or anything. And especially when you compare it to her Japanese voice which is much more high pitched. She should’ve been somewhere between Alina and Yolanda with a little closer to Alina, but instead she’s quite close to Yolanda’s voice and it doesn’t work. It’s the same issue I have with Zelda’s voice in Breath of the Wild–I have nothing against the voice actress and think she does a fine job, but it doesn’t work for the character, especially when comparing to the voice in Japanese. It’s a generic Princess voice. It isn’t Zelda.

Rosie’s voice is a generic pop singer from a farm–it’s not really fitting for her and that’s the problem.

I also will just… continue to be baffled by Yolanda’s name pick because of all her moon references and her even saying her name means moon (As her original name is Tsukiko) and Yolanda… does not mean moon. There’s so many good choices that would’ve worked so I don’t know why they went with that.

Finally, two of Alina’s songs are actually still in Japanese. And I mean, I guess maybe they wanted her to be like an Otaku but it’s still kind of weird?

Anyway, the game took me roughly 43 hours to complete. I still have like two seasons of clothes to look at, some side stories I know I haven’t finished, and other things I want to do so I don’t consider myself done with it yet. That said, the game does feel almost like a spin-off to the series rather than a new Style Savvy game. With a third 3DS title, there isn’t much difference with graphics (so we still have oddly floating hair and other issues), but the music and choreography is a lot of fun. But it took away a lot of the aspects of a fashion game to do it and while I enjoy it a lot and actually am okay with most of the changes/things removed, I think it could work better as a side thing.

I will say the town felt more alive to me in a way–especially as posters changed based on what was going on in the story versus just whenever you did a model thing in Fashion Forward with a few exceptions.

There’s a lot I’d like to see them do better (And honestly, maybe if they did one on the Switch, we could have a game that has the best parts of all three 3DS games), but I had fun with it. I don’t think the game will be a huge hit with everyone who is a fan of the series though depending on what they mainly play it for.

(Also Make it Glow is the best song. Just saying.)

A few more items for sale [In Style Savvy :P]

So, I found the Mario Amiibo! :P Thus, a special update here and not through the videos, the new Mario shirts you can buy in the Design Center!:

And also this tote:

I’ve also noticed that all sales seem to be contained to either the Kirby tee I made ooooor the dress I made which are, coincidentally, the only two I’ve posted the Item ID for. I thought Owner ID would be better since people could look at everything, but it seems maybe that’s not the case?

Regardless, below, you can find all Item IDs for the items I have up for sale! Unexpectedly, everything is pink in some way so enjoy :P I’ll be adding this to Info Page and will continue to update it as I add more.

  • Gown – 0005361107
  • Lace Sneakers – 0004031118
  • Ribbon Bag – 0004071118
  • Flower Tee – 0005351118
  • Splatee (Splatoon) – 0005431118
  • Yoshi Tee – 0005491118
  • Peach Tee – 000553118
  • Animal Crossing Tee – 0005551118
  • Link Tee – 0005581118
  • Kirby Tee – 0005621118
  • Lace Boots – 0005671118
  • Mario Tote – 0005711118
  • Cat Bag – 0005741118
  • Mario Tee – 00062721127
  • Mario Tee (Brick) – 0006791127
  • Ribbon Tote – 0006831127

Talking a bit about Style Savvy: Styling Star!

As per usual with the Style Savvy games, it’ll usually be a more video-based playthrough than a blogging one with most things I’ll update with centered to the Info page. It’s not so much that I don’t take too many pictures as much as I just don’t always have a lot to say.

It was a long wait until noon for the game to properly distribute though. It was my first time preloading a game (as I… really do not like downloading games digitally) and I expected it to be up at midnight as usually games only come out at noon on Thursday, but nooope. Regardless, I’ve had a lot of fun each time I’ve played it.

I’m hoping the make-up place will unlock soon as I’m assuming that’s when you’ll have other eye color options. While the color unlocking was fun in Fashion Forward, I definitely prefer having them all available from the start. I really hope I can unlock more customization features soon too–I know they showed a lot of different shop and room layouts in the trailers so I’m sure something will come along eventually. Just need to unlock it.

I really adore the songs in the game and honestly, I don’t really miss the fashion shows at all and much prefer the music stuff. I had fun sometimes with the fashion shows (Plus, it was a great way to get out specific types of stock), but I found it way too repetitive and I didn’t like how it was constantly forced upon you.

Translating-wise, it’s once again the PAL region port so those same fashion terms appear and thus, I always find myself constantly double-checking everything to make sure I don’t misinterpret something. Ignoring that, I’m mostly okay with most changes–the only big things that I think still bother me otherwise are the choice of Yolanda for Tsukiko (Yes, her last name being Artemisia still has ties to the moon, but it’s not what she’s referencing and considering the whole thing is doing this for herself and not her family, it makes the whole point of going with Lady Moon even weaker with the name choice they picked for her) and Rosie’s voice. I love Rosie’s songs and don’t think they’re bad or anything, but from the beginning I felt her voice surprising from her appearance/personality and it’s the only one that feels vastly different from the Japanese voice used. I really think they should’ve used a higher pitched singer to be closer to the original.

Anyway, going onto my own playthrough, I’ve been having fun and did my best to make my character the same as the Demo:

I still really adore the room animations.

And the Cafe is also really cute:

I haven’t been too fond of any of the gift outfits from the brands this time though. Babydoll is probably my favorite, even if not really my color scheme:



Regardless, I did eventually get the salon unlocked–I’m still hoping for better ponytails, but it’s something for now at least:

And I got a couple more brands unlocked:

It’s slow, but steady progress.

Speaking of slow, but steady progress… that is my biggest issue with the game at the moment. The game works on its own timer–I haven’t measured out the specifics, but after a certain amount of time (or certain events), the day will end even if you didn’t go to sleep. I hate this. A lot. I wish they just made it so at a certain time, less to no people show up eventually turning to none after a certain amount and you had to go to sleep to start the next day.

The issue is if you spend a lot of time maybe designing things or working on stuff, you can lose out on entire days. I lost out the entirety of Sunday (which also means Alina’s progress got pushed back for me) AND was already on Monday night due to how long I spent on remaking my Emblem from the last game for my shop’s bag:

It’s not a fast process. I couldn’t go much faster than I did and yet I lost out on a lot of game progress for doing something I was really excited for.

Similarly, I get really paranoid about leaving game events for later being scared I’ll miss them so going to them and forcing the day ahead once done is super frustrating. It’s made me feel really paranoid about being quick when I play rather than taking my time and enjoying things. I’d love to check my online shop and maybe browse it a bit, but I’m worried I’ll lose out on a day again and screw up my own recorded progress and it’s genuinely not a fun way to play.

Overall, I like how it works–that while the start date is your real date, it actually moves the date forward so you won’t be stuck in the terrible issue of beating the game in the same month because the month doesn’t change. But the fact that the day will be forced over is really stressful and it sucks because not everything is super quick in the game. I like taking my time and checking each area in the game and I feel like I’m being punished for that.

I mean, I just turned it on out of curiousity anyway (Thank you to those who have already been to my Design Center shop and bought things!) and apparently it’s already turned afternoon and that’s killing me :/ Regardless, you can find everything I designed up on the Designer Center at Owner ID: 0005121107. I have most of the Amiibo stuff (We sadly don’t have a Luigi Amiibo and while we do have a normal Mario Amiibo (the Smash one I believe plus the Wedding one), we need to refind it.) so I have items for all of those up (if people want some with one of the different patterns, just let me know!). Just a small sample of things:



That said, I wish I went through the Scrapbook sooner because… I would have priced things cheaper X__x Sadly, you can’t edit prices… but I guess I’ll make the Mario Shirt pretty cheap or something.

I do wish the names you used for the Scrapbook were the auto names though :/ And you could have the option to change them in the Design thing after. Due to my aforementioned feeling the need to rush, I didn’t name any of them (Though, I will admit partially because I expected it to just take the name I gave them and wasn’t paying much attention) and I find it a bit frustrating that now all of them have the default name for a design and it sucks.

Despite the stress, I am still enjoying the game a lot though, even if I constantly run into stock, time, and money issues. I’m really not great at resource management–I just like dress-up games :P

To end this off, I’ll talk about the three main sings–Tsuk–Yolanda, Rosie, and Alina. Yolanda genuinely has some of my favorite songs and I really can’t wait to hear them in my own game. I like her a lot.

I also really like Rosie and feel I have a good amount in common with her.

I think Rosie combined with Yolanda would be practically me. I really enjoy her songs as well, but not as many resonate with me as some of Yolanda’s.

Finally, there’s Alina who I’m still getting to know. Regardless, I don’t really care for… most of her songs which makes me feel kind of bad. Despite that, she did give me my favorite line in the game thus far:

So, she’s still pretty cool too :P

I kind of wish our character could sing too. It just looks like a lot of fun.