As one story ends another begins. This is what brings us to Crossbell. A city state sandwiched between two political superpowers seemingly hanging on by a thread to stay afloat of outside influences. However not everything is what it seems on the surface. Crossbell is corrupt and is very limited on what it can do to fix its own issues. And only the SSS can change Crossbell's wrongdoings from within.

I love the SSS man. Every member is so fun to see and their interactions are priceless. The squad is so diverse in personality and yet they mesh so well. Even their battle styles are different. Seeing the SSS slowly get the recognition they deserve is such a payoff. They aren't just a copy of the bracer guild and made their own identity.

I find the setting of Crossbell to be very engaging especially since the state is small enough to where you are able to get to know every character including the npcs and really connect with the characters when shit hits the fan. It also isn't small to the point where you get tired of the same locations. This can also be implied due to how well this game uses its map. Like it just makes sense that you have to go all over Crossbell to retrieve an overdue book or partake in a fishing contest at the sandbar.

As always Trails and of course Falcom delivers on its soundtrack. Like every time this track played I was on the edge of my seat because I knew I had to lock in. Another great soundtrack that the music is all it takes to change your mood in an instant.

Can't talk about Zero without a certain character's journey that has spanned over 3 games now. Definetly one of the best character journeys I have seen in a video game. Every time they are on screen I always get emotional. There is just something about how its handled that it's truly special.

From what this game concludes off of, I really wonder how Azure will start off because Zero had a pretty conclusive ending but definetly has questions that needs to be answered. Just like us as the player, the SSS still doesn't know all of the answers on the why of how Crossbell functions but if we just get over the barrier only then we can seek the truth and justice be served.

"But what we need right now is the experience of overcoming these kinds of obstacles. Think about it, clear the small barriers one by one… If we do that, then someday, we’ll have the power to get over the taller barriers, too. "

positive wildlife conservation themes and pretty wholesome.

the gameplay isn't anything too insane. most of it is just taking pictures and pressing A until you've interacted with everything in a given area, but it's clearly created for a younger audience and so i don't think its fair for me to say "wow gameplay chugs" or anything like that. definitely the best part is trying to get all of the animals scanned on your phone, as you can listen to the sounds they make in the wildlife guide and then recognize that sound in game to figure out where they are if you can't easily see them.

unfortunately, i feel like so many birds look like each other (lmao) and that's kinda just a fault of reality, i guess, but when they're flying in the air and such it's very difficult to actually tell what a bird is unless you're pointing the camera at it. as such, a large portion of this game is spent looking at birds with your camera that you already have logged, which ends up feeling a little silly. totally could be a me problem though for sure. also, the wildlife guide is disappointingly bare. it has all of the creatures, what they look like, their scientific name, and their sound, but that's it. there's no fun fact or diet or wingspan or anything listed about the creatures, and that ends up making them feel more like checks on a checklist as opposed to creatures that you should strive to conserve, which i feel reduces the effect of this game overall.

there is a website called Ecologi that supports reforestation, and the creators of Alba, Ustwo Games, commits one tree to that mission for every game downloaded or sold. as of my time of writing, they're currently in place 5th on the leaderboard for businesses with just over 1 million trees funded, which i think is pretty neat. to conclude: Alba: A Wildlife Adventure is a cute and simple game without much mechanical depth, but one for a good cause. i think it's pretty easy to get behind, and definitely deserves to exist.

Penny's Big Breakaway commits to its vision very hard that it might push people away from it. Which I don't see as inherently bad, a game for everyone is a game for no one. I clicked with this game, I love how relatively demanding to chain moves while maintaining momentum and especially combos. I'm not saying that this game is some insurmountable cliff to play, but the learning curve is higher than what someone who just wants a casual jaunt through a cutesy world would expect. However, if you do get the hang of things, you will see how much this move set shines and how awesome you'll feel when maintaining a high combo. It's also a quite small set of moves but they flow into each and have purpose without making each other redundant.

I also really enjoyed the levels, nothing stood out to me as mind-blowingly memorably but nothing was bad. Although I did get frustrated during the space-looking world. Looked cool but my hairline went back a couple inches. Perhaps just a case of "mad-cuz-bad" but this was when I started encountering the jank. This game, at least at the time I played it, (patches seem to have tackled my problems), had a notable bugginess. Bugs weren’t common but they happened frequently enough to put a damper on things. I would fall into weird tumbles that would defy the laws of gravity and take away my control. I would have times where I don't ledge grab when I feel I should've and, on the flipside, I would grapple onto ledges but Penny would fail to pull herself up. A lot little issues that kept building up that took my enjoyment down a notch towards the ends of the game. I haven't jumped back into the game but I saw a patch note or two that mentioned fixes for the specific problems I ran into so you'll probably fare better than I did.

The aesthetics are very much up my alley. It gives me the same vibes of a Sega Saturn or Dreamcast game but with polished up visuals. It all feels like something Sega would make back in the day, which I guess makes sense since the devs are the Sonic Mania team. Although, I do have one major issue...

PENNY FOR GOD'S SAKE, KEEP THE DAMN HAT ON! No one wants to see your Founding Father looking-ass hair. Or maybe it's a wig, then that would change quite a lot. She would be one of three things, she's either high status, balding, or suffering from syphilis. Penny clearly isn't high status, she's just some nobody shlub street performer so that leaves us with the final two, balding or syphilis. Women typically don't go fully bald when suffering hair loss. Female pattern baldness is fairly common though. Penny isn't given an age but aesthetics and impressive acrobatic ability would suggest she is fairly young so age likely isn't a factor. The other two culprits of female pattern baldness would be issues regarding a particular hormone, dihydrotestosterone, and genetics. However, these are both things we can't really answer without more information on Penny herself.

That leaves us with one final possibility, syphilis. One symptom of syphilis when left untreated is baldness. During the late 16th century, syphilis became one of worst epidemics to strike Europe. Being bald during these times were considered "hella cringe" by the people of the era so wigs became the "solution" to hiding your syphilis since proper treatment didn't exist at the time. The wigs were also powdered to hide the stench of one's effectively decaying head. Powdered wigs became a sign of status during the mid-17th century when then King of France, Louis XIV, suffered from baldness. Louis wanted a bougie-ass wig and hired 48 wigmakers to save him from being considered some bald loser. Other nobility also followed in Louis XIV's footsteps and got themselves fancy powdered wigs to hide their decaying smelly heads. This led to an increase in wig prices making wigs a way to flaunt wealth and show status which is where the term bigwig originates from. Wigs also happened to be good for dealing with lice since it's easier to take off and boil a wig than delousing from hair attached to your head.

So, my theory is that Penny has severe syphilis which is why she wears both a wig and a hat to serve as a dual-layered shield against the eyes of the masses. She also probably purchased this style of wig with the pittance of money she makes being some no-name street-performer to appear as high class, to appear as a somebody...

Or maybe she just has a terrible taste in hairstyles.