I would argue that offering fans a template goes miles towards to how… sandboxy the series becomes. (For want of a better term)
For Harry Potter, it was the whole academic experience. How you got admitted, the personality tests; things that enable a safe starting point and allow the fans to go in their own direction.
With Kingdom Hearts back in the day, it was Organization OCs with powers and weapons that followed a template. Similar with Steven Universe and minerals and weapons.
Dracula, I suppose?
I’m fond of some of the vampire lore the story created that pop culture has completely forgotten… but after Dracula goes on a cruise, the book becomes criminally repetitive and goes absolutely nowhere.
I’m mostly in the same boat.
Hogarts was interesting to me. Clearly a lot of thought went into the primary setting and all the fantasy and non-Euclidean elements.
But the titular protagonist himself was almost surgically devoid of character. Harry Potter was not special. His parents were special. And as dysfunctional as his foster family was, they still had drives and personality.
Harry Potter, in the books I read, was not important to the plot in the slightest. The plot just happened around him.
Normally I'd agree with you, but Another Code: R interprets the Hotel Dusk/Last Window split screen gimmick quite well, and they used it in the Switch game as well.
Hmm… The games are indeed wildly different, and there are some subtle story changes (mostly to fix retcons with R, but D gets a little more to do).
But regardless of if you think playing the same story on both hardware is worth it, the Switch game has 'Another Code: R' bundled in, which makes it a MUCH fuller experience than the DS title.
(That said, I do think all of CiNG's DS games (Hotel Dusk, Last Window, Again: Eye of Providence, and Trace Memory) are all worth playing at least once to experience the unprecedented creativity in puzzle design. Though I will admit that Again took a couple of chapters before it grew on me.)
TBH, I’m surprised they’re remade this game (Games?) for a couple of reasons.
My understanding is that Hotel Dusk is much more popular series, and Lost Window flunked because no one knew it was a Hotel Dusk sequel. Those games need the Recollections treatment.
Another Code: R was supposed to lead to a sequel starring the game’s deuteragonist, Matthew Crusoe. I feel like it would make more sense to make the third game in the saga than to remake the first two.
(But that said, there were significant changes in the first game on Switch—mostly to resolve retcons made in R—so maybe they added more to Matthew’s story in R’s remake? I haven’t gotten that far yet)
My gosh, I’ve loved this series since it was known as Trace Memory on the DS, and I modded my Wii explicitly so I could play the EU exclusive sequel.
So far, I’ve played to the opening bits of R.
Calling this game a remake, honestly, it doesn’t do it any justice.
The first game has been remade from the ground up.
As in, the mansion that is the game’s setting has been entirely redone with a new layout. It feels more like an actual mansion now, as opposed to something akin to an RPG dungeon where you keep exploring deeper and deeper.
The puzzles have also been redone from scratch. Honestly, this was probably very necessary as CiNG liked to incorporate hardware features into their puzzles. In the DS there was one puzzle where you had to look at the reflection on one screen onto the other… obviously that’s impossible on the Switch.
Actually, on that note, I didn’t recognize hardly any puzzles from the original game.
TBH… the Trace Memory bits feel like an entirely different game, that only used the same characters and, broadly, the same plot.
This is not a complaint, (well, aside from not being able to use the DS hardware creatively this time around), It’s very much a more polished experience this time around.
Does cruel and unusual punishment apply here?
My limited understanding of the topic is that ‘cruel but usual’ and ‘unusual but not cruel’ can invalidate the charge. And unfortunately, the mistreatment of the homeless could be seen as usual.
I’ve played the original. Graphics and puzzles were outstanding, especially for so early in the GBA’s life.
But I found the music and story to be underwhelming. (Except for the Venus Lighthouse theme, that was quite the banger)
Is the second game better in those regards?
I empathize, but that’s like boycotting word or acrobat.
How would it be split? Unless Trump is successfully removed from the ballot, Trump is the only candidate that republican voters actually want.
We probably get our best look at penal rehabilitation in Lower Decks' "A Few Badgeys More"
We learn that Daystrom Institute has a facility dedicated to evil robots, but through therapy, and exploration of art, sports, and other hobbies and psych-evaluations they may earn parole, and from there re-enter society.
Peanut Hamper made it to parole, initially as a ruse, but actually ended up taking it seriously.
Agimus is lagging behind her, but also shows signs of sincere reform.
Honestly, while a lot of it was played for laughs, I really appreciated how it really was Star Trek's optimism at its peak. People can be reformed, and are not sentenced to life in a cubical if they are capable of earning it.