Publishers of Stray Made Something CRAZY

Clair Obscue: Expedition 33 is a magnum opus of a turn-based JRPG that still holds a lot of players today. But what if I told you that the publishers of Stray has brought on a small team that has developed a charming turn-based JRPG that is similar to the critically acclaimed PS2 turn-based JRPG, but has a musical twist? Let's jump right in.

I'm back with a brand new post regarding a game that I came across that I heard it became so dang gorgeous. And no, I'm not talking about Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Expedition 33 has quite a dedicated fan base. it sold 8 million copies today and won Game of the Year at the Game Awards last year. Many people see Expedition 33 as an indie or AA game that draws inspiration from the turn-based era of Final Fantasy games. However, if you're a fan of Expedition 33 or any other turn-based RPG, there is good news for you.

Annapurna Interactive, the publisher of Stray, has brought on Iridium Studios and made something that is gorgeous. Iridium got to work on their project. And what they made is an absolutely groundbreaking masterpiece of a turn-based JRPG. Picture this; a turn-based JRPG that is a combination of Expedition 33, Honkai: Star Rail, Grandia Xtreme and Ar Tonelico. Seems like a weird and uncanny creation of combining together four turn-based RPGs into one, don't you think?

Well, ladies and gentlemen, this is People of Note. People of Note is a turn-based JRPG where musical performances meet thrilling combat. The game's female protagonist is Cadence, a pop singer who realizes that playing solo is not enough to make the judges impressed since she was shut out by the Noteworthy Song Contest, so Cadence travels across the world of Note in search of her new friends to form a band. However, corruption is brewing in the distance. The Harmonic Convergence is set to wreak, or play havoc, with the world's musical energies and the forces of musical evil are working behind the scenes to bring disruption to Note's natural harmonies. That's where Cadence and her musical allies come in to stop the vile forces of music evil and ensure music itself has a brighter future.

People of Note's turn-based combat has a glorious twist that never before seen in any other turn-based RPGs: each battle is an interactive musical performance with evolving combat conditions and genre-bending mashup attacks, akin to the mashup attacks in Grandia Xtreme and Wild Arms 4 and 5. Each character has their own arsenal of abilities that involve the timing of attacks like in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Time it right and you'll deal appropriate damage to enemies. Each enemy has a weakness, so exploit it to deal even more damage. There is a cresendo gauge that fills up as enemies grow stronger and battles get more intense. That's where music increases its tempo and things heat up.

The game had a demo that had to be taken out upon its full release in a way to focus on post-launch patches. And maybe they can bring the demo back one day. It was listed as a musical turn-based JRPG. Well, yes, but the combat is like a mix of Honkai Star Rail and Ar Tonelico. The big selling point of Honkai Star Rail and Ar Tonelico is turn-based combat of four characters with a musical twist.

People of Note is now available on PC and consoles, so go check it out.

I've Been Granted to Submit Logo Requests

So, I have expressed my interest in submitting logo requests to the YouTube channel that is known for covering logos of all media. Then I was given the ability to submit requests and there are two videos that have fulfiled my requests. Let's jump right in.

I'm back with a post that I felt obligated doing. Did you like the last post about 2XKO in 2026? What was so special about that one is because of a long-awaited roadmap. What's the next thing I want to post? Well, there's a backstory in the works that can make gamers understand the true meaning of the game industry. I am even working on a post that talks about a turn-based JRPG and its nuances, which is probably what I'll post next.

But what I want to mention now, though, is a bit of a shoutout about a YouTube channel called Broken Saw. This is a logo-based channel and I know you loved them. They are known for covering logos from TV shows, video games, movies, bumpers and movie and game trailers. The logos I'm into are the ones from video games. There are a lot of videos that cover video games, including the one form I like the most; logos that are deep. And by deep, I mean logos that don't take place in game or refer to what game and can also refer to silent logos.

Why I'm telling you about this is because I was given and granted permission to drop submissions in a document that contains links/requests for logos after expressing my interest in submitting requests for logos from video games. The section has requests, with new ones being at the bottom. If you scroll through them, you'll see my requests that has the signature of my screen name "KnockDownJoe." If you see my signature, they are my logo requests. However, there is a limit of 10 submissions, so I have to wait a little while because they need to focus on what is front of them. It's called patience, you know.

I'll be using MobyGames for citation of older games. It is a video game database that collects data from older and current titles. This is the data I can find when it comes to older titles. However, I am also using IGDB for modern games that are released on modern generations and games that aren't in MobyGames. The separate document currently has a lot of requests that I have planned to submit, so here's the link to the document below.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Oz1SBk0_8juuRYsofhf0HF0xpg52rU1jBfbDoU16ogE/edit?tab=t.0

Broken Saw has fulfilled my requests of two videos that I'm going to show you here.

From Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi:

From WWE SmackDown vs. RAW 2008 (PS3 version):

But this is just the beginning. The future document updates over time as I add more of them or put them in the main document. But I look specifically at games with the deep logo flows, cinematic and plain logo flows that take place before and after the copyright and trademark notice screens with logos on them. And nothing can compare with one of the games that has the best logo flow.

From 50 Cent: Bulletproof:

50 Cent: Bulletproof has the best logo flow that contains not just game logos, but also logos of American record labels. It takes place after the notice screen you won't see. There's a two-second pause between the logo flow and the game's intro. However, if you're planning on posting gameplay videos, be sure to turn the music off to avoid getting a copyright strike. I never played Bulletproof because it's an M-rated game and I was too young to play M-rated games on that time when the sixth generation consoles came out.

There are a lot of requests, so I decided to list several games with the best logo flows I have planned to submit to Broken Saw.

Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe:

I have to make this the first thing to talk about because on the post about video game violence, I talked about this game and its nuances that led to getting a T rating. This game has the best logo flow of Midway, WB Interactive Elements, DC Comics, Unreal Technology. Beast, Turtle, DivX and GameSpy. However, it would be the final Mortal Kombat game of the franchise under the Midway umbrella before their liquidation allowed the franchise to be published under the Warner Bros. umbrella in development partnership with NetherRealm Studios with the inception of their first game aptly called Mortal Kombat.

Super Dragon Ball Z:

For those of you who don't know what Super Dragon Ball Z is, it's a cel-shaded fighting game that features a handful of Dragon Ball Z characters and unique movesets for each character. Now, I remember playing this game back in the day when the games were in the golden age of Atari. Plus, this is among one of the Dragon Ball games to have the best logo flow of Atari, Funimation, Okra Tron 5000, Bandai Namco, Craft & Meister, Sofdec and ADX. If this game comes to PlayStation Plus, it'll make the FGC who played this game back in the day happy.

Ultra Street Fighter IV:

I'll be the first to say that I played any of the Street Fighter IV games, but never played the Ultra release. But it does have the best logo flow, but different by version. How it goes is the order of Capcom, Dolby Digital, Criware and Autodesk Gameware Scaleform. The console version has the Other Ocean logo while the PC version has the NVIDIA logo. Both versions have the best logo flows overall.

007: Tomorrow Never Dies:

This is a game that I remember playing back in the day when I was a kid. A Nintendo 64 version was planned, but it was scrapped due to memory limits, which is why the logos in the N64 version of third-party games lacked animation, rendering it exclusive to the PS1. There's the logo flow of Killer Game, Black Ops Enterainment, MGM Interactive and Tommy Tallarico Studios. This has the best logo flow. We never had a James Bond game on PlayStation Plus yet, but I think we can see it come to light one day in preparation of the upcoming new game to welcome James Bond back into the gaming realm after his 14-year hiatus since Legends came out.

Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3:

Currently, logos for Budokai 1 and 2 are on there, but not Budokai 3 yet because I'm submitting this to fill in the database with the best logo of Atari, Funimation Productions, Ltd., Bandai, Dimps, Sofdec and ADX. The difference is the Bandai logo not seen on the previous two entries.

Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric:

So far, I have requests for games that never released on Nintendo consoles, but this is the only game that was exclusively released on the WiiU to be one of the games I'm submitting. I pretty much enjoyed the game. It was alright, but not the best. However, it has the best logo flow of SEGA, Big Red Button Entertainment, IllFonic, CryEngine, Bink Video, Autodesk Gameware Scaleform and Criware. The game's copyright and trademark notice screen has the last three logos together.

These are the games with the best logo flows that I have planned to submit. If you're willing to submit logo requests to Broken Saw, the channel's about section has the steps to follow. Here's the link to Broken Saw's channel.

https://www.youtube.com/@BrokenSaw1

HUGE News for 2XKO in 2026

We got some huge news for 2XKO in 2026 that I did not see coming. Riot Games has just released a roadmap of everything coming to 2XKO in 2026 and there are several things that come with a big holy crap. Let's jump right in.

I'm here with a new post that has some huge and crazy news for us 2XKO fans. Today, we have been given a glimpse of everything coming to 2XKO in 2026.

Riot Games has just posted a roadmap containing everything coming to 2XKO in 2026. I did not save the roadmap and put it on my files. Instead, I used Bandicam to screen capture the whole thing at a bigger size for better quality. I'm not gonna go over everything in the roadmap, but I'm gonna go over the things I screencapped that are big and exciting.

First off, the character roadmap. Here's a look at the first three characters in the character roadmap containing Caitlyn, Akali and Senna, our upcoming character. While it says that Senna is coming in 2026, we know for sure that looking at the Season 1 countdown, she is coming out on May 12 with the launch of Season 2. The first three characters revealed so far are all female and that's not a problem to me. I am excited for Senna and she's pretty darn dope like Akali is.

We know we have the last two unannounced characters on the roadmap. But something's not right. Why is the NEW! label on Character 4? Well, if we look at the very right side...

Lo and behold, an extra sixth character has been added to the schedule. There are now three unannounced characters on the character roadmap.

The character roadmap now contains a total of SIX new characters coming this year. That's right, six new characters. The first half contains Caitlyn, Akali and Senna, and the second half has three unannounced characters. This is due to learning how we play in Early Access, whereas each season will have two new characters, following MultiVersus' footsteps. Season 0 saw the introduction of Teemo and Warwick, and Caitlyn and Akali fell within Season 1, meaning that Senna and Character 4 will fall within Season 2, and Characters 5 and 6 will fall within Season 3. This year will expand the roster to 17 characters. Having six new characters this year is perfect. This could actually work for 2027 and beyond.

Speaking of which, this brings me to my point. Back at Evo 2024, they dropped the MultiVersus Season 2 trailer featuring Samurai Jack and Beetlejuice before Mortal Kombat 1 Top 6, so in a spirit of things, I think we're gonna see the 2XKO Season 2 trailer featuring Senna and Character 4 to be announced drop before 2XKO Top 8 at Evo Japan since Evo Japan is approaching and we're getting two new characters on each season.

Now, remember what I said that neither Kennen nor Miss Fortune are gonna come out in 2026? I have good news for you. Since we're getting an extra sixth character this year to fall with the fifth character in Season 3, I am coming to a conclusion to believe that Character 6 is either Kennen or Miss Fortune. However, since we already have Spirit Hills, an Ionia-themed stage and Akali, it leaves me to predict that Miss Fortune would be Character 6 to fall with Character 5 in Season 3 and that is because of the Brazen Hydra having wanted posters of Gangplank and Tahm Kench on the right side of the stage. My prediction of Katarina being Character 4 to fall with Senna within Season 2 remains unchanged.

Honorable mentions:

Gangplank
Ashe
Riven
Garen

I'm gonna take the four honorable mentions I went over on the last post where I stated which of the five characters I think could potentially launch in 2026, but the last one standing could potentially be Character 5. Since we already have a Noxus-themed stage and I am speculating that Miss Fortune can be Character 6 because of the Brazen Hydra having wanted posters of Gangplank and Tahm Kench, I'm scratching out Riven and Gangplank. That leaves Garen and Ashe remaining. Currently, we never had a Demacian character in 2XKO yet and Braum is currently the only Freljordian in the roster. These characters will come with a new stage in Season 3, but one of them is Character 5 while the other is scratched out. I am scratching Garen out for next year, so that leaves me to predict that Ashe is potentially Character 5 to come with a never-before-had Freljord-themed stage in Season 3.

That said, I'm going to postulate the character release schedule. Now, before I begin, here's the definition of the word.

The definition of postulate is something I need you to understand because the character release schedule and the characters I'm stating are hypothetical. Let's begin.

The Caitlyn trailer came out January 13 and she came out on January 20 with Season 1, Ferros Promenade and the console launch. The Akali trailer dropped March 31 and she came out on April 7 within Season 1 with Caitlyn. The Senna trailer drops May 5 and releases in May 12 along with Season 2 and a new stage, which what we know for sure. The Katarina trailer dropped in July 7 and releases July 14, my father's birthday, within Season 2 with Senna. The Ashe trailer drops early September and comes out one week after her trailer dropped with the launch of Season 3 and a Freljord-themed stage. And finally, the Miss Fortune trailer drops early November and came out a week in November after her trailer dropped within Season 3 with Ashe to round out 2026 and its 17-character roster.

Character roadmap:

Caitlyn + Ferros Promenade - January 20, 2026
Akali - April 7, 2026
Senna + new stage - May 12, 2026
Katarina - July 14, 2026
Ashe + new Freljord-themed stage - September 2026
Miss Fortune - November 2026

And I'm sorry that it had to be all female because Darius, Illaoi and Braum are the sole characters from certain regions in the roster and they are related to the characters I'm predicting, and we never have characters that wield a bow, dual pistols or dual knives in the roster; the following things that are classified as the current roster's missing aesthetics and fighting styles. Like, we know that Katarina and Miss Fortune will be a Rushdown like Ahri, Akali, Vi and Warwick, and Ashe will be a Zoner like Jinx and Caitlyn, but Senna's fighting archetype remains a mystery.

2026 character roster:

Ahri
Akali
Ashe
Blitzcrank
Braum
Caitlyn
Darius
Ekko
Illaoi
Jinx
Katarina
Miss Fortune
Senna
Teemo
Vi
Warwick
Yasuo

Despite the fact that we're getting an odd-numbered character roster of 17 this year because of the extra sixth character coming this year, I'm still going to divide the hypothetical 2026 character roster into the SEGA and Capcom sides across the board and state the key points. Since 2026 is seeing the odd-numbered character roster of 17 thanks to the extra sixth upcoming character, the Capcom side will be one character behind the number of characters in the SEGA side until the 18th character to launch next year in 2027. Let's get to dividing the roster. We'll start with the SEGA side.

Ahri remains, but Braum, Darius, Illaoi, Vi and Yasuo move and Ashe, Katarina and Senna go with Ahri, Braum, Darius, Illaoi, Vi and Yasuo. The SEGA side has Ahri, Ashe, Braum, Darius, Illaoi, Katarina, Senna, Vi and Yasuo.

Akali, Teemo and Warwick remain, but Blitzcrank, Caitlyn, Ekko, Jinx move and Miss Fortune goes with Akali, Blitzcrank, Caitlyn, Ekko, Teemo, and Warwick. That puts Akali, Blitzcrank, Caitlyn, Ekko, Jinx, Miss Fortune, Teemo and Warwick on the Capcom side.

SEGA side:

Ahri
Ashe
Braum
Darius
Illaoi
Katarina
Senna
Vi
Yasuo

Capcom side:

Akali
Blitzcrank
Caitlyn
Ekko
Jinx
Miss Fortune
Teemo
Warwick

Key points:

Ahri on the SEGA side = NiGHTS
Ashe on the SEGA side = Skies of Arcadia
Darius on the SEGA side = Valkyria Chronicles
Illaoi on the SEGA side = Ooga Booga
Katarina on the SEGA side = Valkyria Chronicles
Yasuo on the SEGA side = Blood Will Tell: Tezuka Osamu's Dororo
Akali on the Capcom side = Onimusha
Blitzcrank on the Capcom side = Mega Man X
Caitlyn on the Capcom side = Alien vs. Predator (Arcade game)
Warwick on the Capcom side = Darkstalkers

So we now have nine characters on the SEGA side and eight characters on the Capcom side in 2026 and key points to highlight the following. I'm agreeing with Illaoi being on the SEGA side because of Ooga Booga, and Caitlyn on the Capcom side because of the Alien vs. Predator arcade game by Capcom. As I have said before, these are hypothetical. They don't confirm who they are. Please understand that.

Here's a look at the other things that are coming in 2026. We got 14 things coming in 2026. We know console launch, arcade skins, the launch celebration event, Ferros Promenade and local duos came out and we got the Spirit Blossom event coming tomorrow, so we can scratch them out.

Now, we're down to seven things on the docket for 2XKO in 2026.

We have two new direct-to-store stages coming out this year; the Blood Moon variant of Spirit Hills, which is coming out in the next patch, and a summer-themed stage coming out in June.

We have a summer event coming to have returning summer skins from Alpha Lab 2 and new ones coming in June's patch along with a new summer-themed stage I have already told you about.

There is one of the things that caught my interest.

That's right. A new Fuse is coming next month and this is something that we've been expecting. I am going to predict what this new Fuse would be. I think the new Fuse is gonna be Fever, originally Double Point.

How it can work is that it can make the assist character the second point character with everything the point character has. But there is no tagging or assists. However, this new Fuse is gonna be exclusive to Duos on both online and offline that if you have a duo partner, this Fuse would be available. In fact, what is really cool is that if both duos choose this Fuse, it'll become 2XKO Fever, hence the Fever Fuse.

And there is another thing that made me very excited as I am with the new Fuse coming out next month.

A Duo Finder is also officially coming to 2XKO next month. This is something that we have been wanting since Alpha Lab 1 and it's finally coming into fruition along with a new Fuse. Of course, by "we," I mean myself and the players who got an invite to Alpha Lab 1. They said that they're going make duos much easier to find and form, so here it is; the gold standard of finding duos, a Duo Finder. This will make duos much easier to find and form online, encouraging online duos more than online solos. But I don't think that the Casual and Ranked lobbies are gonna have the same treatment as private lobbies, with readying up for solo and waiting for a partner to duo before readying up. I think that the Duo Finder gonna work similarly to the matchmaker, but will find you a duo. Think of it as a duomaker.

Now, I am aware that a player wanting to duo up with someone is considered a scrub like using Pulse combos. Well, in a way, yes, but in a way, no. Duo Play is the gold standard of working together as a team without a trace of selfishness, so why would you think that duos can make them scrubs for the most basic of things? Well, I have news for you. We're not using the Duo Finder just to become Russian scrubs. We're using it for not just for purposes of grinding, but for fun also. Emphasis on "fun" because duos are more fun than solos, especially to duos-only tournaments.

Finally, we can no longer be forced to use rocks. This means we won't be forced to search for an online partner to duo with often, especially when new players are grinding the duo mission in First Steps to get the Champion Token and when they are missions pertaining to playing matches as a duo.

Since the roadmap has almost everything planned for 2026, there are more details to be announced and they're ironing out their upcoming patches for the rest of 2026. We can expect more things to come in the second half of 2026, beginning in July. Since there are more to come, there is not one, but two things that I want along with a new Fuse and a Duo Finder coming next month.

Custom Lobbies:

Currently, there are private lobbies and they are only for invited players and have a code for players to put in. But we can change that to custom lobbies. That way, they can be both public and private. A custom lobby being public is actually an open lobby, meaning that anyone can join without a code or an invite, especially when it comes to having a 2XKO Slapfest or someting.

An In Game Pulse Indicator:

Alpha Lab 2 introduced Pulse Combos in replacement of the Pulse Fuse because they want to use Pulse while being equipped with a different Fuse. In the character select screen, you see the icon when Pulse is on. But I think an in game Pulse Combo indicator can make things easy to tell. When they have Pulse on, it can be either the text of the character name colored purple or the Pulse Combo icon at the upper left hand corner of the in game character portrait. But I think the purple text of the character name would suffice for more clarity, like in BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma where the in game character name text is colored green to make it easy to tell if they're using the Stylish Layout, but colored yellow when they're not.

Bottom line, I love seeing those who use Pulse Combos get their chops busted by those who don't use Pulse Combos at all. Since a Duo Finder is coming next month, if it finds me a duo partner who uses Pulse, it's gonna be a one and done. Pulse Combos are indeed only for scrubs, like the Modern Controls in Street Fighter 6 and Fatal Fury and the Special Style in Tekken 8. They involve performing auto combos with one button and one button specials with directional influence like in Smash. And not just Smash, but other platform fighters that have the same control scheme like Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl and Brawlhalla.

Not to throw shade at Smash, though because really, I do love Smash in general. But if there was a player who is using Pulse, they will get busted by those who don't use Pulse. However, the scrubs term doesn't just refer to players who use auto combos. It also refers to anyone using cake mix, brownie mix and cookie dough rather than starting from scratch and even players using Dokuro in Dengeki Bunko: Fighting Climax.

2026 is set to be a huge year for 2XKO as they have a lot of things on the 2026 roadmap and I am already excited for it. We must not spare any of our energy if we don't want 2XKO to die early like MultiVersus did no matter how trash it is.

Joe's Monologues - 4/5/2026

I haven't did a Joe's Monologues for a while. And now, the series is back. Today, we're gonna go over a couple of topics, so without further ado, let's begin.

Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling

We're gonna start with the elephant in the room, Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling. I am in the middle of the game and I have gone this far. I have recorded my gameplay videos in the source of starting my own Let's Play series. The game just blew me away. It given me some serious Paper Mario vibes that the gameplay is similar to that of the first two games of the series that were critically acclaimed. As soon as I finish Bug Fables, it's off to Escape from Ever After and I'll record its gameplay too.

And dang, the Watcher fight almost given me a headache. I lost on my first and second attempts. My first attempt became a failure because I was running low on TP that I should've get to Venus to replinish it. The second attempt also became a failure that I forgot to restock on recovery items. The third attempt became a success because I addressed the flaws by getting Venus to replinish TP and stocking up on healing items at the shop. I guess third time's the charm is what they say.

Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds

Now let's go on to the next topic about a game that I haven't talked about, Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds. I have bought the game at a discounted price on the PS5 first. The game blew me away with the gameplay that involves switching courses through the CrossWorlds feature that was met with praise. There are non-Sonic characters that join the race. They got Joker from Persona 5, Hatsune Miku and a bunch of collaborations. They also have non-SEGA collaborations that are paid DLC. They are all great, but do you know what would I like to see in Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds? A Simpsons pack.

We have the SpongeBob SquarePants pack and the TMNT and Avatar packs are coming soon and Fortnite had a Simpsons mini season, so what we like to see is a Simpsons pack that contains Homer, Marge, Bart and Lisa as playable characters with voice acting and a lot of stuff like decals, effects and Springfield as a playable track.

Why am I suggesting the Simpsons pack to come to Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds comes with two reasons. The first reason is to forward Fortnite's Simpsons mini season. The mini season was met with buzz and excitement that they would petition to make it permanent and it's a sign of nostalgia that the series' games are stuck in retro consoles and never been remade for modern consoles.

The second reason is to convince developers to bring the Simpsons back into the gaming realm with the rumored remaster of the Simpsons Hit and Run and make new games. They can take from what they learned from the original developers and apply it to future Simpsons games. A Simpsons pack with Homer, Marge, Bart and Lisa as playable characters and Springfield as a playable track in Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds sounds like a good feat to me, especially  because of Road Rage. It can pave the way for a new kart racer based on the Simpsons. But SEGA requires permission from Fox for that.

But that's not the only thing to say in this matter. As soon as the Steam version goes on sale, I am buying it for free online multiplayer. PC versions of games offer free online multiplayer on both free and paid games. But console versions require you to pay a subscription to play online on paid games, not free-to-play games.

2XKO

And last but not least, 2XKO. This one is gonna be a doozy to talk about because we finally know when Akali is coming out; April 7, and it's not that long. Her moves are pretty insane. Development notes show that Akali is the fastest character in 2XKO, but her health pool is the lowest, deemed as risky and comes with Twilight Shroud, a unique mechanic Akali has to give her moves some buff.

Let me tell you; Akali is the character I wanted and theorized since they knew that Akali is the important character the roster needs and her theme is on point, deemed the best character theme that makes me wonder if she's like a pseudo Naruto character since she is actually getting her Naruto palette. See, Akali is Japanese like Yasuo, especially with Ionia known for fame.

We had to wait until April for Akali's release because they had to nerf Ekko and Yasuo enough to create a balanced and healthy competitive meta and fix screen tearing on console in 1.1.3. Now that they got all of that done, with black smoke galore, kunai and Kama, her portable scythe, Akali is ready for battle in 1.1.5.

But Akali is not the only thing that is coming in 1.1.5 because local duos is also coming. It allows a player to look for a partner to duo up with in real life and play on the same console against players online and it's something people wanted. Which is nice, but it's only just a taste of how would they usurp investing in Duo Play even more. I can't wait to find out what will 1.1.5 have in store for us besides Akali and local duos against online players.

After Akali, it's off to waiting for Senna, who will come out with a new stage in Season 2. Thankfully, we're not being in the Senna waiting room or having an odd number of characters any longer because it's April and she's coming out on May 12 and that's when Season 2 will launch looking at the Season 1 countdown. Like, we know that Senna will swing her projectile weapon like Caitlyn does since she's a Marksman, come with a unique resource that fills up when collecting Mist and transform into a Wraith when she collects enough Mist like Warwick does with his Bloodlust gauge that fills up with his S2 specials, but her archetype remains a mystery. Her full trailer will drop one week before her release.

Since Evo is almost here, maybe they can announce the 15th and 16th characters after the Senna trailer at Evo Japan. They have to because Evo is the most prestigious event that has reveals, right? I want to see who they are. After all, 2XKO needs to have more characters and having a tag fighter with a small roster is a sign of claustrophobia and repetitiveness, especially in the competitive scenes. But having 16 characters this year is less repetitive and it's the number of characters X-Men vs. Street Fighter has.

Surely, Akali's debut in 2XKO could mean that Katarina could be the fourth character of the year to fall within Season 2 with Senna and that's what we came for since she was Thanos-snapped from the game's earlier stage of development. Now, I know that people are gonna complain when Katarina is scrapped. "Hello?! The red-haired assassin of Noxus?!" "For the love of God, Katarina was itching to be in the roster!" I'm telling you, Arucelli's work on her concept art and submission to designers for her redesign stage confirms that our red-haired assassin of Noxus is still planned.

That aside, this brings me to my point. Remember what I said that Kennen and Miss Fortune are potentially making their debut to 2XKO this year? Since the seasonal structure is going to have three seasons that each come with a new stage, I don't think that Kennen nor Miss Fortune is gonna be the 16th character since Season 3 will have a new stage.

Conclusion:

It has been a while since my previous Joe's Monologues. I hope to see you in the next one.

How Violent Video Games CHANGED the Industry Forever

If you were to look at the history of video games and if you were going to ask what became the ongoing trend in gaming that changed the game industry and changed how we play games forever, the answer, in my opinion, would be violent video games. If you go back to the beginning of video games, especially with the inception of 16-bit era home consoles consisting of the SNES, Genesis and even the SEGA CD, fighting games have always become a popular trend on the era. This was popularized by one of the popular fighting game franchises, Street Fighter. However, there is another popular fighting game franchise that sparked controversy, Mortal Kombat.

The very first Mortal Kombat was released in 1992 for arcades by Midway Games. But when Acclaim Entertainment ported it to the NES and Genesis, the game became egregiously controversial because of its photoreaslistic sprites with depictions of bloody violence with gore caused by Fatalities, unlike Street Fighter II, which uses traditional handmade sprites that resembled cartoon or comic book illustrations and has little to no blood. This served as a subject of starting the 1993-94 United States Senate hearings on controversial video games held by two senators, Joe Lieberman and Herb Kohl and covers in newspapers.

Nintendo and SEGA released Mortal Kombat, respectively. The SEGA Genesis version, while shipped, has eliminated the graphic effects and can be added by using a well-published cheat code titled "ABACABB" while Nintendo required Acclaim to replace blood with gray sweat, edit Fatalities and change other parts of the game's artwork to remove inappropriate elements like severed heads from spikes in a way for Nintendo to keep the SNES family-friendly on the SNES version, but the gray sweat effects can be reverted to the original red blood effects and bring back uncensored Fatalities via a Game Genie code input as BDB4-DD07. However, the SEGA Genesis version sold more than the SNES version.

But the first Mortal Kombat wasn't the only one that was graphically violent to be a part of the hearing because Night Trap was also a part of the hearing after it had sexual violence against women, deeming it very offensive. Lethal Enforcers' home console release is also obvious to have graphic violence. This prompted Toys "R" Us and KB Toys to remove the following games and peripherals that looked like guns from shelves and SEGA to cease making copies in January 1994.

SEGA created their own game rating system, the Videogame Rating Council, which used three ratings, GA, MA-13 and MA-17. When the SEGA Genesis version of Mortal Kombat was shipped to have toned down violence, it was given an MA-13 rating. After the respective extremely violent and offensive video games came out on home consoles, they became a part of the senate hearing talking about the following games. The hearing made calls to establish the rating system in North America, the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB).

The ESRB was established back in September 1994 by the ESA in response to the backlash and criticism regarding controversial video games that contain extreme violence or sexual content, especially after the 1993 congressional hearings following the home console releases of Mortal Kombat and Night Trap and even the home computer release of Doom. After the establishment date, future games beyond that date carry the ESRB rating. The Videogame Rating Council was eventually retired in favor of the ESRB.

While Mortal Kombat is aimed at mature audiences because of its graphic and gory nature that leads to getting an M rating, we did see one mainline game of the franchise that is not M-rated, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. It was given a T rating due to the inclusion of DC characters, which is why the violence and Fatalities were toned down. While the game was met with mixed reception, there is one thing that was quite interesting about this game.

When Raiden and Superman, the two leaders of their universes, destabilized the portal when taking down Shao Kahn and Darkseid, the two antagonists of both universes, they created a combined force behind the combat rage, Dark Kahn. It created my favorite events like Liu Kang and Scorpion ending up in Gotham, Raiden teleporting to a different world to save Liu Kang and even Raiden and Superman teaming up to defeat Dark Kahn to make the universes back to normal, which resulted a switcheroo of defeat -- Darkseid being bound in the Netherrealm and Shao Kahn being trapped in shattering pieces of glass. And to be honest, the parts of the story in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe are really interesting to experience. Used Bandicam to record my favorite parts of the story.

However, this would be the final game to be published by Midway before their liquidation. Then the 2011 reboot of Mortal Kombat came out as the first game of the franchise published by WB Games and developed under the NetherRealm Studios umbrella to return to its roots of a 2D fighter, which of course, retained the series' controversy regarding graphic violence and marks of start of strong language where you will hear bad words from certain characters.

There are child-friendly games that have violence in them, but the physical inflict in them is not graphic and has no blood. Take Pokémon for example. It's a child-friendly IP that doesn't have any mature content in them and has content appropriate for all ages, including adults, who also play child-friendly games. That's why the IP is mostly rated E for Everyone, like other IPs that are family-friendly like Super Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog and many others. These are the ones that have non-graphic violence. This type of violence is called cartoon violence.

Violence is something that has zero-tolerance in real life. Let me give you an example. I'll talk about school violence. It is essentially an offense that leads to suspensions or expulsion, except to bullies. Basically hitting others that lead to consequences and it's something that must be avoided. In fact, it happened back in the day. But violence in video games is a staple in the industry today that it has much more tolerance than violence in real life.

Controversial video games became the source of starting the predicament of them having sexual content and excessively extreme violence, so what are two controversial games that sparked the creation of the ESRB upon release on home consoles? Mortal Kombat and Night Trap. That started the predicament and sparked the hearings that allowed experts to make calls to establish the ESRB. That's how violent video games changed the industry forever. The trend of violence in video games will continue as future games with violence will come upon us.

I seem to have another backstory blog post coming soon, so stay tuned for that.