Welcoem to posts!!
in the future - u will be able to do some more stuff here,,,!! like pat catgirl- i mean um yeah... for now u can only see others's posts :c
Good day, all --- After many years of working on Gaming Sanctuary, one of us has call it quits to pursue other avenues in life. It has actually been like this for a while, but I'm making a public statement about it now. While it is not widely known, Gaming Sanctuary was co-owned, and now the founder is stepping down and now the co-founder is the owner. The channel will still be known as Vysethedetermined2 (or whatever it becomes in the future) and you'll still get the great content you've been experiencing. Bel Cain the Eternal, a name a few may know, will officially take the mantel as Vysethedetermined2, as he has been doing so for years now.
As for me, I felt tethered to Gaming Sanctuary, and stopped some time ago because I felt that Gaming Sanctuary was not "all that I was", and through self-discovery and just change since I was a young lad posting sometimes passionate, though not always great, content. I enjoy watching people find their childhood memories in the channel and seeing people moved positively by gaming, and have considered so many times to come back, but if I have not done so after all this time, there had to be reasons. There are some things that are going to change during this exit, but in changing hands, what you have will be more concrete as time goes on, and streamlined --- there are lots of accounts tangled up with me, even though I haven't done much in the last few years, so that sort of stuff will be sorted out. Regarding GS, I just got tired of looking at the website I started with never get updates with changing life priorities and growth as an individual, and also, there are things like website hosting that, while I can afford it, with nothing of merit done in over a decade, I had to ask myself: "Why?"
This is not to blame the co-founder, but to assess how invested I am as I move forward. I also felt like there were artificial obligations to keep up with something I increasingly was moving away from. I also lost passion a while back, for a lot of different reasons, but ultimately, I enjoyed finding the good that would pop up in the space and for that reason alone, I paid to host the website and periodically put in work for nearly two decades in different spaces, because I believe gaming is an art form that comes in many forms and I see how it resonates with people. I can still enjoy said good from the sidelines though. That said, continue to game and prosper!
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Had to square away the New Year, new videos coming soon!
-Vtd-
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Gaming Sanctuary 2024 Brief Recap -- Year in Review:
Happy Holidays viewers and gamers. Another year, another recap and brief overview of things to come. A lot of things happened for me, good and bad (mostly good) and I'm in a much stronger position this year than prior years to maintain the page (time willing). I gotta say though; 2024 has been a GREAT year for gaming and JRPG fans - I've admittedly set aside a lot of my free time the last few months diving into "Unicorn Overlord", "Granblue Fantasy: Relink", "SaGa Emerald Beyond", "Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes", "Final Fantasy" (just gonna leave it at that), "Dragon's Dogma 2" and "Card-en-Ciel", and that's just games from this year (and barely even a fraction of the games I've collected or acquired on sale... haven't even touched P3R or Metaphor). Lots of gems, big and small, have been released this year and it's been one of the best years for gaming overall in a while.
2024 saw 52 videos for the channel (one is private and will go out before the day is out... one a week) which is a decent increase from the 40 or so videos of last year. 2025 is slated to be the year full of remakes, remasters and upgrades according to a lot of gaming journalists, which is fine by me as I can focus on specific projects that are near and dear while dipping into my backlog and hunting for more retro gems and Doujin. Having gotten a promotion this year at work, I think I'm still going to get a secondary gig to maximize my finances, but I haven't decided yet. My health has improved and there's some big-ticket items I want to pickup without breaking the bank... decisions, decisions. 2025 is going to be interesting, to put it mildly. Speaking of which, for those of you who had a less than stellar year, do me a favor: before the clock strikes midnight on the 31st, make sure you're standing and raise your left leg. That way, you will start the year off on the right foot.
I know that was a little corny, but I wish you all the best. Stay safe, stay warm, and game on everybody!
-Vtd-
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Happy Holidays to you and yours from the Gaming Sanctuary. Stay classy.
-Vtd
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Currently looking for a reliable place to get this game before I look into dumping it (there's a torrent around... I won't say where it is, but if you know of it, can you you let me know if it's reliable). Was collecting particular X68000 games and got this "BEEP" re-issue but I don't know all the details surrounding the game. Seems like it was released in 1992 but wasn't exactly released properly in 1992??? It was made with some form of "Shooting 68K" software and may not necessarily be found under its official name of "Valist Leznalt"? Would love to put some more X68K content up here but haven't done so since I found "Be Rain". Lemme know folks, we're still around, lol. Life is just life-ing right now. Cool little L.E. of sorts though.
EDIT: After a few hours, I did find a decent stash of info buried on the game's origins. Neat.
-Vtd
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Game Highlights 50:
The War of Genesis: Remnants of Gray [창세기전 : 회색의 잔영] - I could have done any number of games for our 50th entry in this Community Series, and I mulled it over for quite some time, but when everything was said and done, I chose this one. Why not some niche or obscure Western or Japanese release which the channel is mostly known for? No real reason, but I will say that this title encapsulates a lot of what has ultimately shifted in the gaming industry from beginning to end and merely having good intentions is not always enough to avert disaster. Let's take a look at the current state of one of Korea's most celebrated franchises through the release of its latest (perhaps final) console and mainline offering. This might get a little long and is not intended as an end-all, be-all analysis, so bear with me as I haven't had much time to sit down and record lately.
To be clear, I have played several Korean, Chinese, Taiwanese titles and games from the East that are otherwise "Not Japanese", but I am not as proficient in these languages. Without the power of machine translations, I can confidently say that if English was my main language and Japanese was my secondary language and Spanish was a tertiary language, Korean would still be behind Chinese, Filipino (and Tagalog) and French; in other words, my comprehension is minimal. However, this hasn't stopped me from consulting books, dictionaries and brute-forcing a basic understanding as it pertains to gaming, and it doesn't take an expert or deep dive to understand how special the "War of Genesis" series was, serving as the equivalent to China's "Sword and Fairy", Japan's "Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest" or influential Western classics such as "Wizardry" or "Ultima" even though it doesn't have the tenure or number of entries as any of them. It was also originally created by "SoftMax", a company we've covered in fair detail through different titles over many years, but I will reiterate some key talking points about them.
Formed originally in 1993 and officially founded in 1994, SoftMax was one of the premier South Korean development outlets and one of the most famous game studios in South Korea's history (it was also founded by a woman, Jeong Younghee / Jeong Youngwon, struggling in an industry dominated by men, making her one of the field's visionaries). Softmax created many fine games on a variety of platforms from MS-DOS like Lychnis, Sky & Rica, The War of Genesis (a strategy series that was essentially their bread and butter), Aimpoint and more to their migration to Windows with Panthalassa: The Alternative NOAH (a wonderfully weird aquatic TRPG), Tempest (a WoG spinoff), Rhapsody of Zephyr (another WoG spinoff inspired by "The Count of Monte Cristo") and the original Magna Carta (MC: The Phantom of Avalanche, NOT the PS2 follow-up) to their introduction to mobile and MMOs (with "Talesweaver" being a breakaway success and one of the most enduring MMOs in Korea, it's based on the fantasy novel "Children of the Rune") to really trying to break into console development and publishing (MC: Tears of Blood / MC2, the fun Golf Shiyouyo games, etc.). The company had mounted plenty of controversy among gamers and consumers over the years, but they were still an important cornerstone of the industry.
That brings us to "LINE Games" and "Studio ReG" revival game. WoG:RoG had essentially been drafted, started, canceled, restarted, delayed, paused, resumed, passed around and eventually shadow-dropped towards the end of 2023 and spent more than half a decade in purgatory (it's not even properly listed on GameFAQs as it's TBA as of 11/16/2024). Essentially serving as a remake and revision of the first two WoG games with various elements of WoG3 and series spin-offs making its way into the mix (the main scenario writer who created this was a scenario writer from Genesis 3, Part 2), it was essentially advertised as a proper reboot of the series that would endear longtime fans, embrace modern gamers and set the stage for the nearly 20 year old franchise to start anew. It was ultimately... not that, but a confusing "mess" that blew up into a critical flop that many outlets say has sullied its legacy as the last (non-mobile) effort since 2016. It doesn't help that the game was essentially set up for failure by a mobile entry released immediately after it (The Play of Genesis Mobile: Asura Project) which served to make WoG:RoG's flaws more apparent.
Now, I've perused A LOT of different articles on this game beforehand and read a lot of objective opinion pieces prior to buying the game, and while I don't have the same fond memories of playing this game since the 90s like other hardcore fans or abject resentment for this final product, I can only assume that much of the "butchering" of the game is high-expectations and / or hyperbole run amok. There are still a lot of quality of life features missing from the game that doesn't require any prior knowledge of the franchise to comprehend but, that said, I don't hate the game. In fact, as a current (and likely permanent) Switch exclusive, I think it brings a lot to the table when compared to similar games on offer for the system (with few in the genre reaching the heights or budget on display with this game). It would take TOO LONG to list the MANY facets of this game in a detailed way, but there are EXCELLENT sources that cover most of the game's ins and outs. Scientists set out on an interstellar journey to a planet 2 million light years away from "Arche". However, they soon realize that there is a problem due to the phenomenon of light reflecting off the surface of a black hole. The destination "Antaria" set as the route is actually "Arche" from 2 million years ago, reflected off a black hole 1 million light years away.
The 25 survivors, who thought they had traveled through space but had actually traveled through time, became immortal as a side effect. Unable to return to Arche due to the loss of power in their spaceship, they created the 'Antarian' who resembled themselves in "Antaria", and the Antarian called them the 12 Gods and 13 Dark Gods who were worshipped as "Real Gods". Meanwhile, Princess Iolin (Iyolin) of the fallen kingdom of Pendragon (Pandragon) on the continent of Antaria, Prince Rashid, and mercenary "GS" who lost his memory fight towards the goal of rebuilding the kingdom, revenge, and ending the war. The conflict intensifies around the twist that GS has hidden connections (spoiler redacted) that can unify or divide the world. While this is a thin outline of the story, the actual plot takes place over a lengthy (and padded) campaign that casually takes 50-80 hours to see to completion.
The game is quite attractive by Switch standards and utilizes the "Unreal Engine 4" as its foundation. It is not perfect, of course, as fancier attacks and later skirmishes regularly see framerate drops (nothing too egregious, but enough to serve as a distraction) but it's nothing that an over-clocked Switch or emulator couldn't iron out (which seems to be the running joke pertaining to most higher-end games as it struggles with its aging hardware). The game is almost completely voiced, features a relatively mundane fantasy soundtrack here and there with a little sci-fi thrown in for good measure, and while neither will blow you away (the voice cast in particular, while reputable, doesn't seem like the most passionate bunch for this work), it serves as a means to the ends and is still impressive given just how long the game is.
The gameplay has a smorgasbord of different elements and is both complex with its many statistics yet simplified compared to several of its predecessors in terms of overall depth and attempts to merge old and new while struggling to maintain a proper balance. In simple terms, the majority of the series are Strategy RPGs that have been compared to the "X-Com" series with overworld navigation reminiscent to the "Shining Force" series. This game more closely channels "Rhapsody of Zephyr" vibes with quicker battles and exploration in different zones, but without the detrimental weapon durability aspect and with a pretty stringent 9x9 or smaller grid in most cases which minimizes the level of strategy depending on obstacles and battle size. The game is consistently (and perhaps unfairly) compared to modern masterpieces like "Baldur's Gate 3" and "Divinity: Original Sin 2" but lacking much of the complexity of those games. It was produced by total amateurs with lofty goals and Studio ReG was disbanded less than 3 weeks after the game's release and they will remain in infamy, which is unfortunate.
Should you give it a try? Well, the game was slated for an English release but since the game was deemed a commercial failure, any hopes for that may have been abandoned (the options menu even has a selection for multiple languages that could get patched in, but only Korean is available and the devs and publishers failed to honor many pre-release promises) almost a year after release. Based on its own merits, it's still relatively competent even and following the game is not too difficult for importers as its still rather linear. My efforts to get the game was actually an interesting experience as it was originally damaged when I imported it and the seller went above and beyond to work with me and customs to get a replacement, which also inspired me to write about it. Pictured below are just some of the contents of the Collector's Edition and it is indeed a gorgeous L.E. that feels inspired and well-intentioned even if the game didn't stick the landing. I want to believe there will be more "package" games coming out of Korea that don't get pushed as mobile gacha games, but it's looking less and less likely as even a historic franchise like WoG has fallen on hard times. As always, you have some food for thought, so now decide for yourself.
-Vtd
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Finally got the PS5 Pro (more for older titles and testing than anything) and don't even have time to do anything with it. Kinda wish I could be a kid again or win the lottery.
-Vtd
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Not sure how much people here follow the aftermarket / homebrew scene, but there's tons of games out there these days that are being made to play on old original hardware. While I won't begin to get into all of them, one group that you should keep an eye on is "Habit Soft" ("Habit!" and "Game Impact"); besides partnering on MANY little games with various gaming industry veterans, they are a small Japanese outlet that WANTS to deal with International sellers but is struggling to manage the various customs associated with business outside Japan (they have recently released some of their games in English, a few shown below). I should say that their games aren't exactly cheap... especially if you're going through a proxy, and they tend to release updates to their games fairly often (and sometimes without warning), but they have a fairly large body of works. MSX, Game Boy, Game Gear, Famicom (and "FCZERO" Software) and Mega Drive are their current platforms, but they could branch out to other platforms in the future. As someone who dabbles in a lot of this stuff, I figured I'd put others on to them.
Yes, we did mention them before (just last month actually), but we've acquired a few more of their titles with some cool flyers as well. I guess I should point out that many of their games have been leaked online if you look hard enough for them, but if you want to support them, please visit their site below.
www.gameimpact.info/
The games listed are:
Repair-chan no Shuuri Daisakusen [リペアちゃんの修理大作戦] - A Mega Drive game slightly similar to Atari's 1979 "Lunar Lander" and toropippi's Doujin work, "Fluid Lander". There are various gimmicks and mild physics (wind) at work. It has multiple endings.
Dracula no Shiro [ドラキュラの城, Dracula's Castle] - An improved Mega Drive version of the Game Gear and Game Boy title of the same name. It's a top-down Arcade-style action/puzzle game where the player goes through many rooms to find princess Saiko and rescue her from Dracula and his minions. The game has a good and bad ending.
-Vtd
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Another day, another batch of Doujin titles. A few of them are games we've already had digitally but now acquired physical copies, while others are pretty rare and I haven't come across them until now. I've been seeing what works and what doesn't or "kinda" works the last few days (ARC - Aim, Recover, Contact - had to be dumped with a disc recovery tool and crashes after selecting a character, but more testing is in order). A few of these games have been recorded recently and will probably go live within the next few hours... maybe. Hopefully.
-Vtd
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We got... several community posts coming up soon? Huh... that's weird.
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Welcome stranger. You have arrived at the Gaming Sanctuary. If you're looking for general gaming, lost gems and obscurities, rare collectibles, or just a gamer who knows his stuff, then you've come to the right place.
GS stems from various sources, ranging from Wikipedia entries to the YouTube channel where a wide assortment of gaming content is hosted. GS is the amalgamation of years of experience with games, a deep passion for gaming, and support from friends and peers. GS seeks to bring attention to the obscure, reinforce the mainstream, and provide a neutral outlook with the opinions presented.
If you're a curious individual who wants to sub/invite, feel free.
Memory Lane Ahoy!
Disclaimer: All content shown in GS belong to their respective owners for great justice.