In Media Rest - 2025-09-14
No Good Posts post this week, as I haven't been keeping up much with the onlines. These weeks tend to have a bit more other media happening in them so I'm starting this up.
Films
Yojimbo (1961)
My brother and his wife spent a few months working their way through Kurosawa's oeuvre and were raving about the experience, so I decided to do the same.
I haven't seen any Kurosawa before despite knowing how influential it is, loving his direct stylistic successors, and being a massive weeb.
Throne of Blood (1957) was first on the list, and this weekend we watched Yojimbo - what a shift. Obviously some of that shift is that Throne of Blood is an adaptation of a play where Yojimbo is an original script, but it also feels incredibly modern in its overall execution and delivery. Mifune is a delight in everything, but here he feels particularly contemporary.
Instantly among my favourite films, just expertly put together and brilliantly performed.
Videogames
Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance
I bought SMTV at launch on Switch in 2021 but dropped out due to the performance in hopes it would be patched. A couple of years later I picked it back up and spent 100 hours enduring the terrible framerates because it's just a very good game. Literally the day after I finished it they announced SMTV:Vengeance, the multi-platform expanded edition.
Having recovered from my momentary fury over this timing, I've come to play the expansion, and... yeah it's pretty decent. It's hard to fully commit to a replay of an RPG like this, so I'm playing short sub-hour sessions and am just getting to the Tokyo Tower boss now, but I have some initial thoughts.
I got the Deluxe Edition on sale as it was like £2 extra, and that means I'm playing with the increased Mitama spawns that were available to whales in the first game - holy shit they are incredibly excessive, at least to this point in the game. What a terrible idea - there's so little actual gameplay left. I'm turning it off, even if it means my grinds will take longer. Can always turn it back off, eh.
Vengeance has a bunch of extra systems vs the base game, and so far I like them - nothing crazy, but enough to think about what were previously more or less no-brainers.
Will probably be a recurring entry in this post category.
FALLSTRUKTUR
I've played a little more of this, but haven't been trying to improve my WR. Instead I've looked at potential new strats (nothing RTA viable) and made a spliced theory run to see how far it might go in future. I need to restructure it for better splice points, but I think it gives a good idea of how much slack is left in this seemingly optimised run.
Finally seeing some competition for the WR though! The 2nd place runner has had some time to grind and is looking very good to get a 37.xx before long.
Online
RLCS Worlds
RLCS Worlds was this weekend! I quite enjoyed a lot of the matches, but this final day was a bit limp. Having the first French LAN have no French team in the final, and a crowd that was passive towards one team and hostile towards the other... eh. They were on decent behaviour, but the last two matches were a dreary, unenjoyable watch so I wouldn't blame them if they had acted up.
This single-elim top 4 format robbed us of the true grand final imo, which took place in the first semi-final.