The same Nvidia leak where we initially learned about Reborn and other games that have since been revealed also mentioned a Final Fantasy Tactics remake/remaster/something of the sort, so I’m expecting an announcement in the next year or so!

It is definitely worth going if you can! I went a few years ago (pre-pandemic) when it was in Kansas City, and it was pretty fantastic. (I hadn’t expected Nobuo Uematsu himself to be there but he was!)

Ahhh, I wasn’t even thinking about private loans; yeah, that makes sense!

“ student loans (25.5%)”

This seems odd to me because bankruptcy doesn’t currently get rid of student loans (which is completely wtf, but that’s another issue); maybe the student loan payments got so onerous that they got into other debt?

What the heck, really? I just remember him always mentioning it in his author’s notes at the end of his books (and for a while there I think there was also a 1-800-HI-PIERS phone number or something?). I remember as a kid wanting to subscribe to the newsletter, but I’m glad in retrospect I didn’t, yikes.

Ugh, Piers Anthony. I remember absolutely LOVING Piers Anthony’s books as a kid; I went back a while back to reread them as an adult (and read the ones I hadn’t read before) and good god, but I could not do it. Even beyond the terrible puns (not as fun when you’re not like ten years old) and the really regressive ideas of gender roles, after the third book with a young teen girl seducing a virtuous middle-aged man because he was the only one who truly loved her, I was just staring at my old books in horror.

(A few years back someone linked me to his Hi Piers newsletter, which moved to the Internet a while back. I got as far as seeing him talking about the sexual attractiveness of girls at menarche - their first period, which can be as young as 9 - and I had to stop because of the full-body shudders.)

I’ve not been a huge fan of Universes Beyond (Magic the Gathering’s recent line introducing non-Magic IP into the game) - for example, much as I love Lord of the Rings, I’ve been totally uninterested in buying their recent sets based on that - but I will probably be getting this and the supplemental products as a FF fan, to create FF-only decks to play against each other. (Admittedly it helps that I’ve been in a bit of a Final Fantasy-obsessed phase ever since Theatrhythm and the Pixel Remasters came out.)

I think it definitely homogenizes deckbuilding, but I also think a lot of the folks who use EDHREC are also folks who would be more likely to be looking at existing primers or decklists anyway, at least to start with. EDHREC just makes it easier and more convenient. But the folks who are really interested in brewing/trying new things still are doing those things, and if the decks or combos they come up with are popular enough, they will get integrated into the EDHREC stats in their own time (and move from innovation to homogenization in their turn).

This does sum up my experience with the game; I didn’t love the gameplay, but the game is just exploding with so much endearing charm that it makes you want to push through anyway. (Also the music is pretty fantastic; a standout is Jon’s Theme and its variations.)

Yeah, they had already switched up a few, and I do know a lot of folks liked Fuuka's later VA better than her earlier one. That said, yeah, it might not be a terrible idea to further differentiate characters within the series who currently have the same VA (Aigis and Nanako, Yosuke and P3MC).

Dragon Age did something similar when they recast a DLC character (Anders) from the first game as a main party member for the second, and gave him a new voice actor to go with the expanded role. And they're probably glad they did, as the actor they originally cast (who is better known for voicing a different character in DA, Cullen) went hardcore controversial a few years back (i.e., making an hour-long YouTube video in character as Cullen to decry cancel culture, talk about how the evil feminists were destroying our culture, why can't men be men anymore, etc. etc...it was incredibly cringe and ensured the company will never give him work again).

Man, I will miss the original cast. Atlus had stuck with them for so long, including for all the crossover and spinoff stuff. Are they presumably going to use the new cast going forward for anything with the P3 characters?

(I had thought that leaving Persona Q 2 in Japanese voice only was a cost-cutting measure, but now I'm wondering if they were planning on a full recasting of the English cast even then, maybe due to the issues surrounding Vic Mignogna.)

Also, maybe it's just the samples chosen, but it definitely feels like the VAs for Akihiko, Junpei, and/or Shinjiro should be switched up with each other. (Junpei's especially sounds like a good Akihiko voice.)