Intro
The team shares what they played in March 2026, from Pokopia addiction to Resident Evil Requiem and Ghost of Yotei: Legends.
This might be the biggest month for us. You’ll be surprised by who has logged the most game time during March Madness.
Allen
What Have You Been Playing in March?
- Dragon Quest VII Reimagined
- Ghost of Yotei: Legends
- Resident Evil Requiem
What Are Your Thoughts?
SPOILERS AHEAD
Dragon Quest VII Reimagined has been slowly moving along. I have been getting into a lot of parts of the game, strangely not a lot of voice acting, considering that they seem to be main story plots.
I also have my full party with the 4th and 5th characters joining. I’ve been sticking to the first four for the most part. I do like Aishe, and I’m interested to see how she is tied to Kiefer’s story.
I have also unlocked the moonlighting ability, so now I can have two jobs at the same time. Having two sets of job abilities makes the game a lot more fun, and I do feel a little bit more overpowered than normal. Trying not to have any overlaps so I have the most skills available, so far it’s been working out.
Even after all that, I believe I’ve logged in 30+ hours, and I’m still only 50% of the way through. I remember giving up on the original PSX version because the game got too long for me, and I had other things to do. I’m having the same vibe, even if this is a more truncated version of the game. I will have to take a break for a while.
Ghost of Yotei Legends, the free multiplayer DLC, is finally out. I remember playing Ghost of Tsushima Legends years ago and having a lot of fun, so I was excited to get to play this one as well. I love how extra the samurai world can be in Legends. The horror and story aspects are exaggerated like in an old samurai movie, I love it. Art style goes hard and is super crisp thanks to the new version of PSSR.
I decided to build up a mercenary after seeing the perk with the dog. However, I switched that out back to the perk where you create a sword and chuck it at enemies. I went with a build that will weaken enemies when you throw a weapon, and it hits with a radius blast. So my usual goal in every match is to go unga bunga and hit everything I can while my teammates kill off the rest.
There are so many cosmetic unlocks, and I’ve been having fun trying to unlock them all. Most of the time, I will just get into matches like normal to get what I can. This is my current build. Platinum difficulty and incursion missions are no joke. It has been a nice balance between fun and difficulty that has had me playing more matches over and over. However, I had to take a break from this game as well.
Resident Evil Requiem has been the game I’ve been itching to play for the last month. Thanks to a friend of mine, I was able to borrow a copy and finally check it out.
Best looking game of the year so far. The graphics are so good, very detailed. You can see the sweat off Grace and the facial hair on Leon with such detail. I got the pleasure of playing on the new PSSR, and everything was crisp; I never had any frame rate drops. I love how detailed some of the zombies are, especially the larger creeper ones. Seeing hallways covered in blood after taking out zombies in explosive fashion just had me admiring them longer than one normally should.
I do like the different styles that Grace and Leon have. I went in blind for my first playthrough and was surprised that Grace was more of a classic style of game, where you have limited inventory space and a storage box to work with throughout. I did try to go as stealthily as possible, trying to squeeze by zombies in tight hallways, but I would always get caught. I may have died more than ten times while playing as Grace, trying to figure things out. Having the blood mechanic for crafting ammo was weird at first, but I ended up using it more than usual. I ended up crafting more ammo after deciding to kill more zombies with Grace. I probably should have gone with more hemolytic injectors so the zombies wouldn’t respawn as blister heads.
Switching over to Leon’s segments, he felt like such an action star. More guns to blow up zombies, but I loved the hatchet and taking out zombies with the quick-time hatchet actions. At first, his sections were too short. However, once I got to Raccoon City, that thought was thrown out the window since it is pretty much all Leon at that point.
Getting back to RPD was such a nostalgic trip. I never got to play RE2 or RE3 remakes from a few years ago; however, there was plenty to remember even from the PSX days. The music got me right away, with the little tones that harken back to the original soundtrack. They found a good mix of sections of silence, so the sound effects could be pushed forward; it had me on edge for much of my first run.
This is my run time for my first blind playthrough. I will have to look at some tips to figure out my next playthrough and speed runs. I would like to go crazy with infinite ammo and get the rest of the trophies.
What Are You Looking Forward to in April?
PRAGMATA has been on my radar for years, especially when it was in “Pregunta meme status” for a while. I’m always down for a new IP from Capcom, so I’m down to give it a try. Saros looks pretty cool, but I was pretty bad at Returnal, so I’m not sure if I would be good at Saros. My one cozy game on my list this year is inKONBINI. I’ve had this game on my radar for over a year, and hopefully I’ll have time to check it out.
Greg
What Have You Been Playing in March?
- Mario Kart World
- Pokémon Z-A
- Pokémon Pokopia
- Street Fighter 6
- Taiko no Tatsujin: Rhythm Festival
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge
What Are Your Thoughts?
I caved and bought a Nintendo Switch 2 earlier than my expected timeline to get one. I was going to wait at least a year, as I did for the Switch 1. However, the release of Pokopia accelerated my purchase. Thankfully, my tax return covered the cost of the Switch 2, a screen protector, a 256 GB memory card and a travel case.
The extra games (I bought the Mario Kart World bundle), I paid out of pocket, and man, did they cost quite a lot. Given that the ones I did buy are long and have high replay value, I think I’ll get a lot of value for what I spent.
Mario Kart World
This came with my Switch 2, so of course I was going to play it. As I mentioned, I lost to a child the last time I played, so the least I could do is learn how to play so I don’t get owned again.
Since racing games are pretty easy to pick up and play, I’m not in a rush to learn each track and unlock everything as I would in Gran Turismo. I can always go back to this game if I want something to get my gaming fix that doesn’t require a lot of brainpower.
Pokemon Z-A
My nephews are playing this game, so this was a must-buy so uncle can get cool Pokémon without having to put in too much effort. =p
This may be hard to believe, but I have never played a mainline Pokémon game until this one. I didn’t get into Pokémon until much later in its lifecycle. I know of the anime and such, but the games are all completely new to me. I’ve been having fun going around completing all the quests and such. Because of that, I haven’t quite progressed very far in the main story. I just beat the first “boss” in the game recently, if you want to know how far I am story-wise.
Honestly, this game is a bit overwhelming. I have no idea how to use most of the objects I am getting from quests and drops yet. I’ll figure it out, but it’s gonna be slow going for me. At least I have the battle system down now. So that’s something.
Pokémon Pokopia
As I mentioned above, this is why I got my Switch 2 earlier than expected. Back in my younger gaming days, I was all about world-building games like The Sims, Sim City and Age of Empires. Then, as I moved from PC-based gaming to consoles, I expanded into other genres.
But now I have returned to world-building with Pokopia. I think that this is arguably the early killer app for the Switch 2 until something else comes out to overtake it. When reviewers said this game was addictive, they weren’t kidding. I’ve spent a lot of time getting accustomed to the first two zones in the game, and the amount of stuff you have to manage the day-to-day operation of your island, and the numerous ways you can accomplish these tasks.
Everyone has the same fundamental tools, but how you use them is what makes this game so much fun. Each person who plays this game will have their own way of doing things.
For me? I’m just getting to the point of flattening the land and building from scratch. My Pokémon in the Wasteland are sleeping outside on straw mats. Some of them have low-income housing, but the majority are basically camping.
In Rocky Ridges, I am clustering my Pokémon near the ruins of the Pokémon center with more low-income housing until I figure out how I want to zone my land and stuff. These Pokémon are treated a little better, with better housing and access to a hot spring.
I have seen some crazy ass post–end–game setups for Pokopia, and I am hoping to get there one day. But for now, I am putting my Pokémon through the great depression until I can build the cold modern dystopia that will crush their souls even further.
Street Fighter 6
Between Pokémon sessions, I have continued to try to get my boy Sagat out of the gold ranks. It’s getting harder now that I’m hovering around mid-gold four rank. For this month, I have learned to slow the game down. Rushdown is definitely not my style, although I have been trying to get a bit more aggressive and keep myself from getting pushed to the corner. Keeping the game in the middle and counterattacking is my current bread and butter for offence.
I haven’t gotten to the point where I can pull off some of the more complex combos that I see a lot of Sagat players do to me consistently, but I’m getting to where I can at least execute when it’s my turn, even if it results in a dropped combo and I have to go back on defence.
Eventually, I will get out of the gold ranks.
Taiko no Tatsujin: Rhythm Festival
Taiko no Tatsujin is usually my go-to game when I am in a Japanese game center, and I don’t feel like getting my ass handed to me by a one-handed smoking salaryman in Street Fighter. It’s easy to pick up and has plenty of songs to choose from.
I had the previous version of the game for the Switch 1. I didn’t even know a sequel had come out until after I bought my Switch 2 and was looking for rhythm games to play. Like the previous version of the game, it comes with a limited number of built-in songs. Unlike the previous version, you get access to a much larger catalogue if you subscribe, or if that’s too costly, you can also buy specific songs you like.
Because I’ve been busy with Pokopia, I haven’t had a lot of time to play this in full. But like Mario Kart, this isn’t exactly hard to pick up between sessions with other games, and completing the songs on each difficulty isn’t as much of a time sink as in deeper games.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge
I went back to this because I wanted to finish it. I think I’m halfway through the game and don’t find it necessarily difficult yet. Maybe these beat ’em up games were just harder when I was a kid. I don’t know. But like the other games that are not Pokémon in this list, it’s not exactly a huge time sink, so I can go back to it and continue where I left off at any time.
What Are You Looking Forward to in April?
Building my Pokémon dystopia in Pokopia. That is all.
BigFreaky
What Have You Been Playing in March?
- Pokémon Pokopia
- Ghost of Yotei : Legends
What Are Your Thoughts?
Pokémon Pokopia
Addiction much?? I’ve logged more than 200+ hours in Pokopia in the month of March! ( I took the screenshot right before midnight!)
I have completed the Pokédex and the newly introduced “Habitat Dex.”
I had to look up a bit of help to finish up the last dozen or so habitats (and PKMN) to complete the Dexes. But for most of the game, I played and learned as I went. Which is good and bad at the same time. I could have done a few things differently and made some better progress, but all in all, I wasn’t terribly stagnant in reaching the endgame until I was very much near completion anyway.
The story was very nice and made me all misty-eyed after the main arc was complete. I hope it will be expanded in the “hoped for” updates/DLC. Unfortunately, Nintendo/PKMN have not mentioned any such content, but we will all be holding out hope. Unless we get a Pokopia 2??… and that would still be so far off.
I visited an official creators cloud island and found Mimikyu taking a nap on this cute Pikachu couch.
I also found a nice bathtub to take a short soak next to this very cool Slowpoke rug.
I’ve spent a vast amount of time creating a train system in each area. The sparkling skylands route is enormous! I’ve been creating train stations along the paths as well. I’ll share some of my builds in the upcoming WYP.
Ghost of Yotei: Legends
The wait is finally over!! Just 5 days after Pokopia dropped… Thanks.
Woof, this game starts out at 100% difficulty. Being seriously underleveled and having a higher skill ceiling in this version of Legends compared to the last made the start pretty rough! Many losses for sure, but thankfully, you still receive upgrades with a loss.
Initial feelings about this version of Legends is that I’m not as excited as the first. But that was basically Yotei’s overall feeling. I mean, it’s not the first time, so it doesn’t have that initial spark that it used to. It’s still very enjoyable, but it’s very grindy, of course. For sure, the best hook is to play with friends online, which I have done almost exclusively. There is some more unlockable content that will be dropped in the future, but until then, I’ll have to continue to level up all my characters. I have a long way to catch up to Allen.
Legends isn’t as photo-friendly as the main game, considering you are trying to fight for your life all the time, and the camera is disabled. But I’ve snagged a few frames. Of course, I’m petting all the Demon and Spirit Animals.
What Are You Looking Forward to in April?
A bit of a break from my insane grinding on Pokopia.
A continuation of my insane grinding on Pokopia.
More Ghost Legends. Trying to rank up and beat the bosses and raids.
