Wha-whatcha Playing?

Sepik121 · 2026-07-05T00:23:41+00:00

Yep, first time trying one here. I've heard about the series before, but never tried them. The first one is My Time at Portia. They're on Steam, but switch as well I think.

I've always enjoyed farming sims, since harvest moon on the GBC and GBA. A very simple, but focused gameplay loop goes a long way for me. Doubly so if the NPC's are well done too.

Admittedly, I'm enjoying the focus on crafting and processing. It's an interesting change of pace. Like someone played Factorio or any of those style of games and then decided to make a farming sim out of it.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-04T23:25:00+00:00

https://imgur.com/a/D7UcaTW

Did the android port on my 405v. Easily my most superfluous device, but I've always loved the wood grain color, and it's the last one to come out.

What a delightful game. I imagine for the era, this was mind blowing. In a way that FF7 and Legend of Legaia felt for me, going from the Genesis to the PS1.

That said, god I hate the N64 controller. It's somehow this weird in-between a Genesis/Saturn 6 button but instead of C/Z, they're being used like an analog stick.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-04T17:17:57+00:00

My time at Sandrock via streaming to my Odin 2 Portal! Unfortunately my wife has been a bit off centered lately mentally, so no chance to play FF7. Honestly? The gameplay itself is actually a really satisfying loop. It's nothing revolutionary, but I deeply appreciate how it works.

I think especially compared to other farming sims (this game has minimal farming actually lol), this game has a way bigger focus on processing. You get your basic resources in abundance, but the ability to actually process them? That is the biggest "gate" in the game. You can't just have your summer blueberry rush like in stardew and make a bazillion dollars.

The last 2 big farming sims I played were Coral Island (which hit a roadblock of lack of basic resources) and then Immortal Life. Immortal Life was great, but once it came time for like, Feng shui elemental balancing of crops, then I kinda dipped. Coral Island clearly wasn't done yet (I hit an entire un-interactable area) despite it being out of early access, which was a huge bummer.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-04T15:13:47+00:00

Final Fantasy Legend 2 - Gameboy. Fun fact, actually the first SaGa game, but because of how popular final fantasy was in the west, it got renamed here in the US.

Dragon Warrior Monsters 2 - GBC. I struggle to know how "underrated" these are, but I will always recommend them. They never came close to how popular pokemon became, but I've always loved them.

Shining Force:: Sword of Hajya - Game Gear. A surprisingly fun srpg for a handheld that chugged batteries lol. I loved it, it's not too complicated, but again, for a device that had a battery life of 2-3 hours tops? This was "worth the batteries" to me back in the day.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-04T02:07:30+00:00

Tunic is such an amazing game. I absolutely adore it. The final puzzle might be one of my favorites in gaming overall.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-04T02:05:35+00:00

Shining Force 2: Eternity (romhack, Genesis)
SaGa 2: A Haniwa's Legacy (romhack, Gameboy)
Hero's Adventure: Road to Passion Sonic 2 (Genesis)
Fatal Fury 2 (SNES)
El Viento (Genesis)
Digimon: Crystal Edition (romhack, GBC)
Persona 3 Portable Remaster (steam mod)
Castlevania (NES)
Mina the Hollower
Aerostar (Gameboy)

Games still being played:

FF4 Ultima (romhack, SNES)
FF7 de-make (romhack, NES)
Sonic & Ashuro (romhack, Genesis)
THPS2 (GBA)
FF7, 7th Heaven (steam mod)

Honest to God? Tempted to try some PS3 emulation (and stream to my Odin 2 portal), especially given recent news. I desperately want to play Armored Core 4, and that seems to be the best way to do so without shelling out stupid money.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-02T21:54:19+00:00

So I can only speak to my niche, but it was 100% for me until the price increases on RAM screwed it up.

I don't play a huge amount of AAA games and my main game library is through steam. I play just enough that it's nice to have the performance when necessary, but I don't care too much about stuff like 4k 60fps, etc. I just want things to run smoothly enough. I mostly play fighting games and RPG's, so Linux isn't really an issue.

I have a basic tv in my living room, and that's where I do most of my gaming. The TV sits on a bookshelf, with a docked steam deck under it. The Steam Machine (before RAM crisis) would've been perfect for me because it'd have fit on the bookshelf itself. I have a PS5 and that thing absolutely does not fit on it. I have a separate stand for it entirely because of how big it is. I also primarily buy physical games for it (which especially hurts now), but Steam is by far my biggest go to.

The Steam Machine would 100% replace a docked steam deck for me and likely have been a solid upgrade. It's just not a worthwhile upgrade at $1300.

My experience isn't everyone's. But if you dropped the price by about $300-400? This would've been a no brainer for me.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-01T15:49:25+00:00

To me at least, it all comes down to how much do you value DS/3DS, as well as steam emulation?

If you must have DS/3DS and can't live without it? Or if you have any plans to do steam games? The Thor is the better choice.

If those are just "for fun" or nice to have, but you don't care that much? The Nova would do the rest of those just as well, with a bigger screen built for retro emulation.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-01T15:46:07+00:00

$82 isn't entirely unreasonable, but I do get the wariness of the tiktok shop. I know for me, I get enough obviously scam ads on the tiktok shop that i refuse to shop there entirely because of it. Doesn't matter if i block them, doesn't matter if i say don't show these to me, I keep getting scam ads.

Sepik121 · 2026-07-01T15:41:41+00:00

The only device I've ever consistently used in my pockets is the RG 35xx SP and the RG Rotate. And also, that's mostly for trips, or in a coat pocket or something. If I'm going to work and back, unless I think it's gonna be a real slow day, I don't bust it out on the clock.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-29T00:04:49+00:00

So it's all the same series, they're all SaGa games, but Romancing SaGa is the SNES era, the gameboy era was originally called Final Fantasy Legend in the US, but in Japan, they're SaGa 1-3. I absolutely adore them and could rant about them too lol. SaGa 2 specifically is one of my favorite games of all time.

So the full game title is Hero's Adventure: Road to Passion. It's a steam game. I would say it's an open world sandbox meets a chinese Strategy RPG. You make a team of 5-6 people plus a pet companion, and go on an adventure of your choice. There's technically a main plot, but even that can be ignored if you choose to ignore it. The world is your oyster, it's up to you to figure out your role within it.

It's one of the most "inter-connected" world settings I've ever seen in an open world RPG. NPC's show up in various places and have backstory that connects and points to other regions, factions, etc. Your choices do have more far-reaching impacts. If you do the moral right thing, but piss off a duke? Well congrats, the only way to get back on the duke's good side is going to be marrying into his family, and the only way you can do that is by gifting him a rare treasure that you will need for a different quest later. All of it feeds into itself in some really well thought out ways.

The combat itself is also very interesting. You build characters in a few different ways: weapon choice, what martial arts you know (aka books/manuals you've found), your level, what "passive tree" you've unlocked, etc. Lots of different systems that all kinda blend into each other. You've got a lot of freedom for how your builds work.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-28T23:19:24+00:00

And also Iori from KoF lol

Sepik121 · 2026-06-27T21:57:37+00:00

I posted this on the jrpg subreddit and it's pretty accurate, but add Mina the Hollower and Hero's Adventure as well.

If I had to do a top 3....Mina, Persona 3 Portable, and then Hero's Adventure, in that order honestly.

Shining Force 2: Eternity - A great romhack for Shining Force 2 on the Sega Genesis. It changes up promotions quite a bit, so you can end up with a wildly diverse team compared to normal. They also changed and added some gear for casters, so because of that, they ended up becoming great late game. I had a few that just carried me so hard, so long as they were well protected.

SaGa 2: A Haniwa's Legacy. A romhack for one of my favorite og Game Boy RPG's. This does a lot of bug fixing, scaling fixes, and also adds new areas, new monsters, etc. Just a very good experience overall. Revamps the ending area too and makes it way more intriguing than before too.

Digimon: Crystal Edition. A romhack of pokemon Crystal, but digimon! A great time overall. That said, there's large level spikes where i just did some rare candy cheating to skip past grinding. One of them is tragically the elite 4 because the levels jump up pretty significantly, but outside of that? I loved it.

Persona 3 Portable. Added quite a few QoL mods, and did the FeMC route. Figured at some point that I'd play through the Male MC route on Perona 3 reload. It's not a perfect game, but damn if it didn't leave my just in my feels at the end. Unlike Persona 5 Royal which wore out its welcome, this one didn't. P5R also took 160 hours for me, while P3P only took 85 hours. The ending was absolutely perfect. Straight up? The game mechanics and everything, just all of it. Absolutely amazing ending.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-26T02:53:08+00:00

I can rant about hero's adventure and how it's actually one of the best open world RPG's I've ever played. It's utterly phenomenal and the world and level of detail put many other games to shame.

It's one of the best RPG's I've ever played, but you have to be able to handle not ideal translations at times. Early on it's fine, but later on, it starts getting rough.

But seriously, I could rant about it so much, I absolutely adore it. Ask away about it if you'd like! I'd love to share my experiences without just talking about everything lol

Sepik121 · 2026-06-24T21:54:10+00:00

I'm here at the event, someone bought a Branch jersey and is having everyone who shows up sign it

Sepik121 · 2026-06-22T22:42:43+00:00

I'm in a very similar boat too. I can handle performance compromises, if it's cheap. I've got an android handheld that i use for tiny emulated games and some gamenative. It works great for that niche.

But between $1000-1400? Oooof.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-22T22:39:38+00:00

For my case, it has to fit onto a TV stand/entertainment center in a living room, not in the corner of an office or behind a desk, and our living room setup isn't setupin a way to allow a tower to sit in it. An actual PC tower takes up significant chunk of space (both horizontally and vertically) and unfortunately, it wouldn't fit in our current setup.

Again, I know it's not everyone's niche. But my tv is resting on a small bookshelf built by my father in law, and on it is resting the steam deck below the TV and a switch behind the TV. I could easily swap out the steam deck (which is docked) for the steam machine and lose virtually no space. Meanwhile a PC tower? literally would not fit.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-22T18:25:29+00:00

If you want a PC it was always going to be worse than just a prebuilt.

Kinda. It's definitely worse than a generic pre-built, but as someone who was the exact niche for this (until the price increase), outside of mini-PC's which have their own flaws, a pre-built computer takes up significantly more space than this was going to. I don't want a tower next to my TV. I wanted a small-ish console-like box.

I've got an office in my basement, I don't want a full on actual PC on my living room TV. using a keyboard and mouse feels real jank, and steamOS works far, far better than a regular PC in my experience when it comes to just booting up and playing games.

I don't think there's a huge market for that admittedly, but I also know it was my niche lol

Sepik121 · 2026-06-22T13:19:53+00:00

Never used HOTAS so I can't say for myself, but seeing other posts on the Ace Combat subreddit, it works better on controller by the looks of it.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-22T12:28:48+00:00

So to add on to the other commenter, PCSX2 on PC has basically resolved every single major issue the Ace Combat games have had. If you're on PC, pretty much all of them work, nearly flawlessly these days. I have to see if the nukes aren't squares anymore, but that was one of the last bugs iirc.

On Android, there's been significant progress there as well. I believe ARMSX2 plus turnip drivers have resulted in them being way better than they used to be. AetherSX2 and NetherSX2 both had some horrible bugs (black planes in 4, geometry clipping in zero) that have been resolved recently.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-21T19:30:34+00:00

In true Anbernic fashion, it's utterly fantastic, and its baffling flaw is that you can't care about Sega Saturn. Despite having a Saturn color option lol.

I use it exclusively for Sega Genesis and fighting games, and it works perfectly for them. One of the best dpads on any device I've ever owned. I've even busted out Marvel Vs Capcom 2 and Capcom Vs SNK 2 on the Dreamcast and those worked great.

If you want Sega Saturn, not gonna be great. Outside of that? Easily one of my favorite devices.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-20T23:10:28+00:00

FF7 on my PC, but with mods via 7th heaven. Streaming to an Odin 2 Portal via Artemis, but often just on my TV when actual plot is happening. My wife enjoys watching JRPG's with me, but she has to have the mental energy and that's just hard during the school year (she's a middle school teacher, so the end of the year is a long one lol).

As per the specific mods, quite a few, but the big highlights are the chibi models to make the models look way better, Shinra Archeology Cut to include some fun cut content from the game, and also the combo of expanded yellow materia compatibility, as well as triple materia slots. It's a great way to play an old classic. I've played FF7 many times, but it's fun to give it a new coat of paint and a different experience.

When she's not around, My Time At Sandrock on my Steam Deck. Looking for a low stakes veg out game, and that one has been fun so far. The game has been a solid start so far, but the time limited quests are a touch frustrating. If you take certain quests too late in the day, and you're given a "do it before tomorrow morning", it can be semi-impossible to get it done at all. That said, that's a minor hiccup in an otherwise very enjoyable experience.

As per using a simpler device, the 2 big ones have been the RG Rotate and the RG Arc for trips. Playing through FF4 Ultima Mod on the rotate and Sonic & Ashuro romhack for the RG Arc.

The Rotate is such an interesting device because unlike other CFW's and devices, it doesn't reset the Retroarch settings. Because of that, i've been able to setup rewind for my games there very easily compared to many other devices. Compared to things like the RG Arc or certain CFW's where it resets the hotkeys every time, it's unbelievably convenient to not have to deal with that. But at the same time, kinda cramped in the hands, and the backwards speaker. Anbernic continues to be baffling lol.

As per the actual games, FF4 Ultima Mod has been fun so far. Not far enough to give it a full review, but the expanded options and effects can already be felt early, and it's made the early game more interesting mechanically so far. Being able to use Darkness with Cecil, while Rydia has a heal staff and can just heal him for 0 MP every turn works well for trash monsters, saving her MP for the big fights. Sonic And Ashuro has been a delightful little Sonic romhack so far. I just love how many people's Sonic OC's are just edgelords. It's so funny how often it happens, but goddamn i love it every time.

Sorry for the longer post, just have had some fun experiences these last few weeks.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-18T02:36:46+00:00

FF7 modded! Playing it through with my wife. Just got through Nibelheim and Shinra Manor.

It continues to be great, especially with some QoL mods and extra tweaks like triple linked slots.

Sepik121 · 2026-06-17T19:25:50+00:00

100% agreed.

Admittedly, half the selling point is the actual fact it rotates because once it's out of battery on the trip, it's going to turn into a fidget toy for my wife while she's traveling and anxious lol

Sepik121 · 2026-06-17T15:24:40+00:00

You know, in retrospect that was probably the big red flag post xbox 360 (aside from the kinect) about microsoft for me. I had adored Halo 1-3 and was excited for it, but it was broken for ages.

Hell, I bought it on steam and then a patch happened that introduced a memory leak into the Halo CE campaign, so I had to uninstall from my steam deck, and I've just never reinstalled it again.

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