Joshua Ray
Bio
23
Writer | Poet | Gamer
https://www.joshuaraywrites.co.uk/
Stories (5)
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I Did Not Want to Enjoy Zenless Zone Zero: My First three Hours With Zenless Zone Zero Ahead of It's Xbox Release
I think like most people back in September 2020, the term ‘gacha game’ meant nothing to me. In fact, I hadn’t heard of such a thing before. And as I was stuck in my own personal island with the new Animal Crossing release, or hitting demons on the head so hard it collapsed into their ribcage on Doom Eternal, the release of Hoyoverse’s Genshin Impact meant…very little to me. In fact I saw it as nothing more than a Breath of the Wild clone with microtransactions. Even later on, picking the game up and playing through the patches, I eventually stopped due to this feeling. I just wasn’t a fan of forking out amounts of money to ‘wish’ for a character I could actually play the game with. It felt malicious, and with the gaming industry already having its fair share of shoddy business practices, I decided that no fun could be had in this game without whaling out my savings. So I left. And this did disappoint me, because there is a good game within Genshin Impact. Exploration was fun, the world was vibrant and colourful, and whilst the story for me left a bit to be desired, the character designs and personalities that differed from region to region kept me wanting to play, but in the end, it comes back to that word. Malicious, like the title was pulling me in further before attempting to sink its teeth into my wallet. I hated that feeling.
By Joshua Ray9 months ago in Gamers
"Deserves To Be Heard": My Experience With The First Three Chapters of 'South of Midnight'
Loading into South of Midnight, Compulsion Game’s new third person action-adventure game wows with a pre-rendered cutscene that has a vibrancy and design straight out of a stop-motion film. It feels like a discredit to state my first thought watching this was of Tim Burton’s Coraline, but I mean it as the highest form of compliment I can give. This beauty carries through to the game itself. From a high-octane river chase, to climbing up a towering half tree, half man, South of Midnight never stops showcasing its show stopping graphic fidelity via the Xbox Series X, and though it suffers some from its repetitive combat, South of Midnight deserves to exist and to be played, as it has a story to tell.
By Joshua Ray9 months ago in Gamers
OPINION PIECE: Sadly, Nintendo Will Not 'Drop the Prices'
I joined the Nintendo Treehouse presentation on 03/04 excited for some more updates regarding some indie titles (and yes, hopefully Silksong), and yet I left feeling somewhat perturbed by what felt more like a Treehouse of Horror due to the chatters during the presentation, and endless barrage of words all asking, demanding the same thing.
By Joshua Ray9 months ago in Gamers
A Run-Down of the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct
It’s finally here! And like all the important things in my life, I am fashionably late to talking about it. However I am here now, and so was Nintendo earlier! Here is everything YOU need to know about the Nintendo Switch 2!
By Joshua Ray9 months ago in Gamers
No, The Video Game Industry Is Not Getting Stale, You Are
FORWARD: This is a re-upload of a short article I wrote in 2023. I took it down for a variety of reasons, however I have come to appreciate it, and wished to share it again, as the rhetoric seen in this article has been spreading round again
By Joshua Ray11 months ago in Gamers
