This Week in Games

Holiday Makeover

Hey folks. I want to talk about something that blew up over the past couple days. I think it's important.

I've made no secret here that I'm a big fan of Gematsu. I use them a lot as a primary info source when writing this column, and have incredible respect for the fact that the whole site is basically a one-man operation under Sal Romano. He does fantastic work in translating Japanese gaming news quickly and accurately, and also takes the time to translate lengthy pieces filled with info about big games like the Final Fantasy VII Remake and Project Sakura Wars.

So when I heard that Gematsu's writeups were being stolen wholesale by a site I won't name here (they and their editor have been publicly dragged all over Twitter and elsewhere plenty already), I got pretty pissed off.

A few jackasses have devalued Sal's work as “just translating press releases and tweets” to justify said unnamed other site stealing his work, and that's seriously not cool at all. Translation and fact-checking takes a lot of work, especially during times when you have a high volume of news coming the pipeline all at once. There's a terrible trend of folks online not realizing how much work goes into the media and reporting they consume, and this is just another example. It doesn't matter that these aren't reviews or editorials – work is work, and plagiarism is plagiarism no matter what the original content is.

I could really rant and rave about this for hours, but I'll just say: support Gematsu, because the site is great. Don't accept plagiarism, or crappy excuses for it. People like Sal deserve to be rewarded for their efforts.

Anyway, let's move on to the news for this week, starting with a very unexpected character return.

FIGHTING GAME NEWS ROUNDUP: SETH IS HERE TO CRUSH… YOUR CONCEPTIONS OF GENDER

Capcom Cup happened last weekend! It was pretty bad! Not the matches, those were kinda great, especially this epic timer-scam win:

No, I'm talking more about the organization. No streaming of the Last Chance Qualifiers, various production snafus, and players complaining about laggy setups left many wondering how Capcom could mess this up after doing these Capcom Cup events for years. Good Grand Finals, though!

Anyhow, with any major fighting game event usually comes announcements, and Capcom came prepared. Sadly, the Darkstalkers revival people pray for every year didn't happen, but we do have a new trailer for Street Fighter V Champion Edition's latest addition: Seth, Street Fighter IV's penultimate boss. Except, uh, Seth's looking a wee bit different than you might remember.

So… erm… yes, Seth is presenting as feminine now. Capcom went ahead and specified that Seth is technically genderless, so it totally makes sense! The reason for the femme look is because he's doing something with Juri's fighting data, and… look, don't make me go into Street Fighter lore here, it's kind of a mess. All you need to know is Seth is here, and Seth is fabulous.

(Also, it didn't take long for the LGBT fighting game community to claim Seth as a new icon. Mad props to all of you.)

Meanwhile, Granblue Versus had some major character announcements for its upcoming season passes. Chief among the characters set to appear is Narmaya, who was probably (definitely) the most requested addition to the roster. Of course, fans reacted with much glee, such as our wonderful Portland area fighting game icon/Blazblue X Tag Battle and Soul Calibur commentator EbonicPlague:

Also on the season one addition list: Djeeta (leaving me wondering why you'd ever want to play Gran), Chaos Bringer, and Soriz. Fujoshi favorite and flamboyant sex symbol Belial was showcased as the game's boss, but he'll also be playable starting with Season 2. Yes, they're already announcing Season 2 stuff.

Anyhow, look forward to hands-on impressions and a developer interview in the very near future! Sadly, Granblue Fantasy Re:Link was still demo-only, but hey, four-player online battles! Hopefully it makes it out before the console transition, because I don't want it to get lost in the whirlwind of new platform hype.

IT'S TIME TO PLAY THE TRADEMARK SPECULATION GAME!

Ah yes, trademarks, the foundation of intellectual property commerce. There are folks out there who watch for gaming-related trademark applications like hawks, and the moment something of interest pops up, speculation begins to blaze. Sometimes it turns out to be something new and awesome, like a franchise revival or spinoff. Other times, it's just something for a re-release or download. And often, it's just a company doing diligence to maintain copyright over properties they own without having any concrete plans.

Capcom renewed the trademarks for a whole mess of its series, including Vampire (the Japanese name of the Darkstalkers series), Moeru Justice Gakuen (Rival Schools) and Dino Crisis. This inspired some speculation that Capcom might be reviving these dormant series, but along with these trademarks were re-registrations for a whole mess of other Capcom games, ranging from Battle Circuit to Chiki Chiki Boys to Magic Sword. This is almost certainly one of those cases where Capcom want to maintain the trademarks for potential re-releases, as they make some pretty decent bank offering up older titles on services like PSN. (We don't speak of the Capcom Home Arcade.) If you're looking for Regina's return, you're probably going to have to chill for a bit longer, I'm sorry to say. Hey, is Dino Crisis 3 backwards compatible? Just curious.

Another intriguing trademark is Persona 5 Strikers from Sega. Speculation on this one is that it's the Western title for Persona 5 Scramble, which hasn't been 100% officially confirmed for an international release but come on, we know it's happening, it's friggin’ Persona. A mobile spinoff wouldn't be totally out of the question, either. What do you all think?

TYPE-MOON STUDIO BB OUTLINES ITS PLANS

The recently formed console-development-focused division of otaku favorite production house TYPE-MOON outlined its plans for three future titles. The studio, which is headed up by veteran RPG scenario writer Kazuya Niinou (whose most recent work was on the Dragon Quest Builders titles – they're great, go play them) and named after the mischievous entity from Fate:Extra CCC, outlined its future in a blog post by Niinou that Gematsu (woo!) translated.

We can look forward to:

• Something related to an existing TYPE-MOON title (99% likely to be Fate)
• A brand-new title set among the expanded Nasuverse
• A really, really vague “TYPE-MOON-style” title where “anything goes.”

Also, Niinou doesn't know anything about the release of the oft-promised Tsukihime remake. So stop asking.

The first thing on the list – something related to an existing TYPE-MOON title – will likely be the first to release. It's the least vague of anything here, but it's still open to a lot of speculation. My personal hope is a remake of Fate/Extra and CCC that makes the combat suck a lot less, because those games have great stories and worlds and are just not fun at all when you're doing anything besides partaking in the text. Plus, since CCC never released in the West, it'd be a nice opportunity for a hungry TYPE-MOON fanbase to finally play it and fill in some of the lore gaps from the Fate: Grand Order CCC event. We'll just have to wait and see.

Alrighty, I think that does it for this week. I'll be out next week for holidays and prepping for my MAGFest 2020 panels, so spend time with all of the new games you'll be getting under the tree. Also: ESPrade Psy is out now on Japanese PSN and the Switch eShop! It's a classic shooter and Christmas-themed, making it a perfect holiday game! Just my lil’ recommendation, that. See you again next year, and happy holidays!