Genshin Impact: Best Weapons For Thoma

To tackle the former comparison -- the reference to one of 2017's more lauded releases and a radical shift in series convention, to say the least -- it's not that such a descriptor is inherently untrue. It doesn't take long upon setting out into the fictional world of Teyvat to spot a fair number of similarities with Nintendo's work, some more blatant than others. But to come both into and away from Genshin Impact and proclaim this to be a clone and nothing else massively downplays the ways in which this game is presented. And above all else, does a great disservice to a developer that -- in all their imitation -- understand why the exploration, world and very level design itself of Breath of the Wild worked so wonderfully. There's even a case here that Genshin Impact actually builds atop the ideas Nintendo brought forth. Better still: masters them wholesale in carving out a game, a world, whose back-end monetization, brief technical frustrations and occasional grind can so easily be pushed aside.

Any game that's branded as a "free-to-play" title is almost immediately going to get inundated with any number of negative connotations and accusations alike. Long-winded, grind-inducing, predatory, a matter of luck over skill on the kind of content you’re granted outside of some voluntary, monetary investment. It may sound dismissive and pessimistic, but the number of such games whose priorities with maintaining a steady revenue stream doesn’t get in the way of the base game offered are few and far between. Enter genshin 6.0 Impact, developer miHoYo’s far from first rodeo on the F2P frontier -- itself thrown many a condescending remark on being a clone of this or imitation of that. The similarities are there to see of course and while admittedly a touch obvious in parts, what I’m most thankful for with Genshin Impact is the genuine effort and design miHoYo have placed in crafting an enjoyable action RPG to start. A live service, continually-expanding release this may be, Genshin Impact’s starting world, its gameplay, its sheer breadth of exploration put many similar open-world efforts, let alone F2P attempts, to shame. To state with hand on heart I’ve now clocked near to 40 hours and still not spent a single penny -- occasionally tempting it may be -- I’m grateful that Genshin Impact has taken a more sensible approach to F2P games: satisfying base game first, additional monetization second as an option.

Dragon's Bane offers a very specialized bonus where it increases the damage you inflict against any opponents affected by Hydro or Pyro by 20 percent. Since Thoma is a Pyro-user, this is an ideal weapon to equip him with, especially if you’re wanting to make him either a main DPS, or form a Vaporize Team around

The next generation is here and unfortunately with it comes few games that utilize the power they offer. If you were lucky enough to obtain a PlayStation 5, you would be met with only one major game that was truly exclusive to Sony’s next generation platform: Demon’s Souls. While there’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Sackboy: A Big Adventure, each incredibly well-designed games, both were also released on the PS4. It’s a sad state of affairs when the PlayStation 5’s only next-generation exclusive is a remake of a PlayStation 3 game, but at least Bluepoint was able to properly honor the original’s vision with adding and slightly refining it. While there are elements that do feel dated to later iterations in the Souls franchise, there’s nothing like revisiting the classic and experience where the award-winning franchise began. Beautiful visuals, a 60fps mode and excruciatingly-challenging scenarios, while FromSoftware was not at the helm, the remake shines as one of the best games this year. If there’s one game to get on the new platform in 2020, it’s this fifty-plus hour RPG with so much replayability. Without Demon’s Souls, the PlayStation 5’s launch would be just plain embarrassing, making me so very thankful of its existence.

When the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild launched in 2017 it was praised for its action, storyline, open-world and more. It has become the epitome of what a Zelda game could and should be. And while all that is terrific, some answers remained a mystery until the recent release of Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity. Here, we find out about the events that occurred leading up to Ganon's takeover of Hyrule. It bridges the gap between past and present. Plus, getting to play as some of the Champions, Zelda herself and others from the series, is a dream come true. It was a surprise when the game was announced since the first Hyrule Warriors came out in 2014 as its own original title. But basing this version off of pre-existing content adds tons of new tidbits for fans to enjoy. Plus, Age of Calamity gives us something to do before the release of Breath of the Wild's sequel. This is why I am thankful for the game; it satisfies the need and want for more Zelda.