My Black Friday and Winter Sale Pickups

Black Friday and the start of the winter season is a wonderful time of year if you are a gamer. You’ll find great deals on computers, consoles, games, accessories, and a whole lot more. It’s a time that you can splurge and get a lot in return for your investment. Even Nintendo will drop some of its first-party titles as much as $20. As I normally do each year, I made sure to take advantage of this and landed some games and DLC that I had on my radar for a long time but did not want to pay full price for. So what were some of the highlights?

Terminator Resistance is a game I had been eyeing for more than a year. But I was waiting for the price to go down to at least $20 before I would finally pull the trigger. That happened during Steam’s Black Friday Sale. What drew me to the game was seeing many reviews referring to it as the best Terminator game to date and a definite buy for fans of the first two Terminator films. As a person who believed the first two Terminator movies were the best in the series, that was enough to convince me. Being a first-person shooter definitely helps as well as I enjoy the genre. Developed by Teyon and published by Reef Entertainment, Terminator Resistance has a “Very Positive” rating on Steam with 92 percent of the 7,000 total reviews being complimentary towards the game. I have yet to play it as of this posting but it is one of the games I plan to get to in 2022.

Another big gaming highlight for me was the purchase of Fire Emblem Warriors for the Nintendo Switch. Amazon had a physical copy of it for under $40 and the $20 season pass made it the price of a normal game. This was the most expensive item I purchased during the holiday sales. Seeing Fire Emblem adapted into a “musuo” game is something that intrigued me as I am a huge fan of the Dynasty Warriors franchise. Musuo is the style of game made popular by Koei Tecmo’s longstanding Warriors series where you play as an ultra-powerful character and battle bundles of enemies at one time. You can literally have a hundred enemies surrounding you at certain points. The best part is sending groups of them flying with special attacks. This is Koei Tecmo’s specialty. 

Persona 5 Strikers, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, Fist of the North Star: Ken’s Rage, and Attack on Titan 2: Final Battle are examples of tremendous action-packed titles by Tecmo Koei in this regard. You don’t play these types of games for the story or an open-world experience. It’s all about the action. Fire Emblem Warriors brings together familiar characters from multiple Fire Emblem games to take on a threat that involves their realms. Eliminating a horde of enemies and then hearing the familiar Fire Emblem “Level Up” sound effect followed by the character making a statement about his/her improvement provides that little touch that while it is a Dynasty Warriors-type game, it is still is a Fire Emblem title.

My Nintendo Switch pickups did not end there. Combining a couple of gift cards I received for Christmas, I purchased Shin Megami Tensei V, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle. I have never played a Shin Megami Tensei game (other than the Persona games that fall within the series umbrella). Yet with so many gamers claiming it as a “Game of the Year” contender for 2021, I felt I owed it to myself to check it out. It didn’t hurt to see it on sale for $37, as was The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. This entry in The Legend of Zelda series is considered one of the greatest open-world games ever made. I’ve played it before on the CEMU (Wii U) emulator but never took the time to really dive into the game. But I felt Breath of the Wild would be a good addition to my Nintendo Switch library. Mario + Rabbids is probably the least expensive Mario game you’ll find on the Switch as it is $14.99 when on sale. It’s a strategy RPG with similar gameplay to titles such as X-Com, Desperados, and Wasteland. So if you’re expecting a platformer, you’ll be very disappointed. I’m thrilled I had a chance to fill out my Switch collection with some Nintendo exclusives this winter.

Ori and the Blind Forest, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, and Sunset Overdrive are Microsoft Studios’ published titles that I’ve wanted to own for quite a while. Sure I already had access to all three games through Xbox Game Pass on PC, but I’m glad to actually own the games. Altogether, the games were about $16. State of Decay 2: Juggernaut Edition was also on sale, so I picked that one up as well. It’s a shame that the Xbox is so far behind Nintendo and PlayStation in terms of popularity because Microsoft has published some really good gems over the years.

Feeling a bit of nostalgia as I came across the Square Enix sale on Steam, I ended up with PC versions of Chrono Trigger (my all-time favorite video game), Final Fantasy IX, and Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster. I’ve completed Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy X, but that wasn’t the case with Final Fantasy IX or X-2. Chrono Trigger is one of the few games that I would not hesitate to refer to as a masterpiece. Many gamers enjoyed Final Fantasy IX because it returned more to its fantasy-based roots and away from the more realistic world depictions in VII and VIII. Final Fantasy X was the first in the series to feature voiceovers, which was huge for the time. I’m looking forward to playing these games again.

Finishing off my purchase highlights were some oldies but goodies in the form of Borderlands Game of the Year Edition, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor Game of the Year Edition, Bully Scholarship Edition, Blade Runner, and Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. The great thing about falling behind on games over the years is that when you return to play them, the prices will be so low that you can then score a bunch of them at once well within the price of a brand new game. For me, Shadow of Mordor especially received plenty of screen time in December. For those who are familiar with The Lord of the Rings movies, this game is much more gritty and brutal than what you saw in the films. There is no Shire or hobbits to be found in Shadow of Mordor. This is a story of revenge and ultimately getting to the people responsible for killing the main character and his family. It features combat similar to the Batman Arkham series and dispatching of orcs in various ways just doesn’t get old. What a splendid experience Shadow of Mordor has turned out to be. It was my most played game in December.

The rest of my purchases were DLCs that were on sale for games I already had. I was delighted with everything that I bought. And the best thing about it all was that it didn’t cost as much as you would think. The average price for my purchased items was between $10 – $20. This was kind of a “Last Hurrah” for me as I plan to spend less money on games in 2022 and dedicate myself to working with the library I already have. I have more than enough to keep me busy for a while.

-LandoRigs (TVGA)
admin@videogamersadvocate.com

WHAT ARE GAMES THAT YOU PURCHASED THROUGH BLACK FRIDAY OR WINTER SALES?