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Square Enix announced the upcoming FFXIV Patch 6.55 Part 2 release date. It is set for January 16, 2024, and the patch brings with it the grand finale to the post-Endwalker storyline and pave the way for the upcoming Dawntrail expansion.

The release date was revealed during the Fan Fest Tokyo 2024 keynote. The impending release date is quite soon and will offer players the final set of main scenario quests for the Endwalker expansion. It will conclude the story and introduce characters and elements from the upcoming expansion of Dawntrail.

The Final Fantasy XIV Tokyo Fan Fest 2024 revealed the latest Disciple of Magic FFXIV Dawntrail job known as the Pictomancer. The Pictomancer will join the likes of Black Mage, Red Mage, and Summoner as the new ranged magical DPS class. The job class originated in Final Fantasy VI and takes some inspiration from that entry, while offering new features.

The Pictomancer wields a brush and easel with which they create magical images to use spells in battle. It has a broad approach, allowing the Pictomancer to draw creatures, weapons, and landscapes to deal damage to foes. A short gameplay trailer also released during the 2024 FFXIV Tokyo Fan Fest, showing off some of the Pictomancer’s abilities and attacks in action.

The spells appear to have a unique and colorful aesthetic to them with the dedicated visual effects. The background for the Pictomancer involves using Aether on their brush to turn their imaginations into reality. Pictomancer has access to both traditional casting abilities and instant ones. While not a total support job, it offers some supportive abilities to make it less directly DPS-focused than other jobs like Black Mage.

Here's the FFXIV Dawntrail Pictomancer:

During the keynote for the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival 2024 Tokyo, an updated Dawntrail trailer showed the female Hrothgar. A new ally for the Warrior of Light is a member of this race from Yok Tural.

The new character’s name, who appears as an example of how a female Hrothgar will appear in Final Fantasy XIV, didn’t get a name in the new trailer. She does speak in it, however. She says, “At least, we come to the land you call the new world. My home: Tural.” Later in the keynote, Yoshida said her name is Wuclomat, she's the daughter of the current ruler of Tural, and she's the one who requested the Scions' help.

Here are some screenshots of her in the trailer.

The Xbox One may have paved the way for the Xbox Series X and S, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have some excellent Japanese role-playing games of its own to play. These are some of the best Xbox One JRPGs we recommend to all owners, depending on what you’re looking for.

Best Xbox One Action-RPG JRPG: NieR Automata

While many will think of turn-based games when they consider JRPGs, there are action ones as well. NieR Automata (and its predecessor) have some of the best action hack-and-slash gameplay on the Xbox One. PlatinumGames did a stellar job blending together fast-paced boss battles with a gripping story.

Marion Crepes announced an upcoming collaboration with Honkai: Star Rail. For a limited time, you’ll be able to order crepes that were designed with Ruan Mei and Dr Ratio in mind.

The Honkai: Star Rail crepes will be available from January 12 to 28, 2024. Some stores will also feature life-sized standees of Ruan Mei, Dr Ratio, or both. You can find the full list of locations via Marion Crepes’s website. As for stores with standees, they’ll be in some stores in Tokyo, Kanagawa, and Kyoto.

The Ruan Mei crepe will have peach-flavored red bean jelly, yellow peach slices, chocolate sticks, strawberry sauce, sugar, and a monaka. As for the Dr Ratio one, it’ll have blueberries, bananas, white cream cookies, pie crust, colorful sugar, blueberry sauce, and a monaka. Monaka is a traditional Japanese dessert that’s two wafers with red bean paste in the middle. Both crepes will cost 950 JPY. You’ll be able to get a random Honkai: Star Rail sticker with your purchase too.

The first episode of the Fullmetal Alchemist Mobile voice drama is now available on the Square Enix official Japanese YouTube channel. The voice drama will be 12 episodes long, and the first episode is titled “Top Secret Special Mission.”

Each episode will be released weekly on Fridays starting from January 5, 2024, and will be available for a limited time. The first episode is approximately 30 minutes and 14 seconds long, and it features various background illustrations, simple in-game backgrounds, as well as character portraits and visual novel style text boxes to aid while listening.

You can check out the first episode of the Fullmetal Alchemist Mobile voice drama below. The episode is available in Japanese only.

From January 11, 2024 to February 12, 2024, Sanrio will open up a pop-up store featuring I Cinnamoroll. You’ll be able to shop there in Tokyo’s Hello Kitty Japan DiverCity Tokyo Plaza store and Osaka’s Sanrio Gift Gate Namba Ebisubashi store.

The name of the story is “Nice Meeting You, I Cinnamoroll,” which will help introduce fans to I Cinnamoroll. I Cinnamoroll is a newer brand that focuses on an alternate version of Cinnamoroll where he never met Anna and never became the face of Cafe Cinnamon. Much like Aggretsuko, I Cinnamoroll is an older character and he promotes self-love. He leads a very leisurely life where he does what makes himself happy instead of following trends or listening to people on social media.

There is a wide selection of goods that you can purchase from the I Cinnamoroll pop-up store. Here is a list of some examples:

• Apron: 3960 JPY
• Clear folder: 330 JPY
• Digital photo frame: 7480 JPY
• Doll: 2970 JPY

I didn’t play The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood at launch. It was a matter of too many games, too little time, and I figured I’d eventually get into it. (I’m sure there’s some sort of misconception that because I do what I do for a living, I get tons of free games and somehow have the time to play them all, but alas it isn’t true.) I added it to my eShop wishlist, figured I’d get it eventually, and moved along. A week off from work for the holidays and 20% discount meant I eventually caved, and in so doing discovered it is the perfect game to play at the very end of an old year or beginning of a new one.

For those who missed Deconstructeam and Devolver Digital’s adventure when it debuted back in August 2023, it is a game about endings and beginnings. Fortuna is a witch sentenced to 1,000 years in exile. She’s an oracle, and one of her tarot card readings said the coven she belongs to would end. 200 years into it, she performs forbidden magic to summon a Behemoth to find a way out. This is the impetus for change, bringing an end to many things and new beginnings for Fortuna, other witches she knows, and the coven.

Cover Corporation, the company that owns VTuber agency Hololive, has announced that it donated 5 million JPY to Japan’s Red Cross Society in order to help victims affected by the 2024 earthquake that occurred near Noto Peninsula. This would equate to around $34,580.

In a statement on Cover’s website, the company states that it hopes this donation will aid “in the restoration and reconstruction of the affected areas.” It also hopes that the money will help with disaster relief. Finally, it expresses sympathy for the victims and prays that the area will recover soon. Japanese fans have replied to Cover's Tweet announcing this, thanking the company for its support.

The Pokemon Foundation in Japan has announced that it donated 50 million JPY to help those affected by the 2024 Sea of Japan earthquake that struck Noto Peninsula on January 1, 2024. That would equate to around $345,770.

You can read The Pokemon Foundation’s full statement on the official Twitter (X) account for Pokemon. It expresses sympathy for the victims and prays that they’re able to finish with the rebuilding and recuperating efforts as soon as possible. In order to help them with that, The Pokemon Company has donated 50 million JPY to the Japanese Red Cross Society, as well as local volunteer groups. The Pokemon With You Foundation will also help provide disaster relief so “children in the affected areas can regain their smiles.”

Yen Press announced its first batch of new manga, light novel, and art book announcements, and among them is Sword Art Online: Kiss & Fly. This is a manga of side-stories set during the series.

The name might sound familiar. That’s because this is based on Sword Art Online 22. That light novel consisted of four short stories following different characters. The two primary ones involved one with Kirito and Asuna after they just get married and Asuna after she heads into ALfheim Online.

For people who don’t want to wait, Yen Press did already release the light novel that included these stories outside of Japan. That appeared in English back in June 2021. 

As for all of the January 2024 Yen Press manga, art book, and light novel announcements, here’s what people can expect to see from the company this year.

• Apocalypse Bringer Mynoghra by Fehu Kazuno and Yasaiko Midorihana(Manga)

8-Colors Star Guardians + is one of those games that makes you think you know what it is and how to approach it at a glance. However, this relatively short game from Andrea Demetrio and Flynns Arcade instead is more about strategy and picking the right moves even before you head into its turn-based battles.

Like any super sentai sort of series, 8-Colors Star Guardians + begins with the world in danger. Taking healthy doses of inspiration from both Sailor Moon and Power Rangers, players pick and choose characters to form a three-person squad to fight bosses while the remainder “hold down the fort.” All eight monsters are attacking at once, providing an excuse for why you can choose the order in which you fight foes, and your goal is to eventually wipe them all out.

Larian Studios announced that bans related to Baldur’s Gate 3 capture clips on the Xbox Series X and S will be lifted. The team made an announcement through the official social media channels confirming the developer is in discussions with Microsoft to address the issue.

The bans are related to capture clips of Baldur’s Gate 3 made directly through the Xbox game sharing feature. Reports began to come in of users recording explicit scenes from the game to share with friends. However, because all clips recorded through the share functions are automatically uploaded to the Xbox servers, they clashed with Microsoft’s policies.

Capcom and hardware company MSI announced a new collaboration collection of limited edition Monster Hunter themed laptops, controllers, and gaming PCs. While it is currently unknown when the products will become available, MSI promised a preview at the upcoming CES trade event starting on January 9, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The MSI collaboration range is being produced as part of the 20th anniversary celebration of the Monster Hunter franchise. The anniversary itself is not until March 2024, but Capcom starting building up to it with promotional art and monster popularity polls.

The items include a Crosshair 16 HX gaming notebook, an nVidia GeForce RTX 4060 graphics card, a MPG Z790 motherboard, a MAG 274QRF QD E2 monitor, a MAG E360 liquid cooling system, an MPG Gungnir 300 PC case, and a Force GC30 controller. Each item in the MSI and Monster Hunter range will be limited and decorated with the image of the iconic Rathalos.

You can see the official announcement tweet below:

Ahead of the February 2024 debut of Granblue Fantasy Relink, Cygames made some of the Granblue Fantasy: The Animation anime episodes free to watch on YouTube. People can find them on the English and Japanese channels. 

There were two seasons of this show. The first one ran in 2017, and second followed in 2019. While there were 12 main episodes and two EX ones in the first season, only the first seven are available on YouTube for free during this promotion. The ones on the English YouTube channel feature the Japanese dub. By turning on the closed captions option, people can pick English, French, German, Portuguese, or Spanish subtitles. The Japanese channel only offers the Japanese dub and subtitle options.

Here’s the full list of all seven Granblue Fantasy season 1 anime episodes temporarily available on YouTube, with direct links to each one:

1. “Girl in Blue”
2. “Departure”

The Kaiju No 8: B-Side spin-off manga series is now running in Shonen Jump. Both MangaPlus and Viz Media have the first chapter available online in English for people to read for free.

The original Kaiju No 8 series follows Kafka Hibino, a man who gains the ability to turn into the kaiju he formerly would clean up after for the government. As a result, he gains the ability to transform into one and ends up the official Defense Force alongside a coworker named Reno Ichikawa that he met cleaning up after monsters. In that storyline, Soshiro Hoshina is a supporting cast member who is also a part of the government division fighting kaiju. This new B-Side manga focuses on his swordsmanship and work with the Third Division. 

This story begins with Hoshina training with swords. After that, we see him take part in an interview about the new rookies in his division, during which he discusses Hibino. Later in the chapter, we also get to seeIchikawa, Hibino, and Hakua Igarashi in a training session with Hoshina. But once that segment is done, the first chapter seems to suggest that the rest of the series will focus on him when he first joined Third Division and started working under Mina Ashiro.

Elsa Japan in collaboration with Square Enix opened pre-orders for a series of Final Fantasy XIV PC units. The computer units include designs and motifs inspired by the popular MMORPG.

There are three different options available for purchase with high end, standard, and entry level specs. The high end computer specifications include an Intel Core i9-13900F, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080, and 64GB of DDR5 RAM. Meanwhile, the standard computer has an Intel Core i7-13700F, RTX 4070, and 32GB of DDR5 RAM. The entry level rig includes a Intel Core i5-13400F, RTX 4060, and 32GB of DDR5 RAM again.

The high end version costs 554,800 yen (or approximately $3,845,) while the standard version costs 354,800 yen (~$2,460,) and the entry level version costs 264,800 yen (~$1,835.) For orders placed during January 2024, the computers will release around early March 2024. For orders made after February 1, 2024 more information, about the release window will arrive at a later date

Vtuber Pomu Rainpuff from Nijisanji EN announced her graduation from the agency, which will hapen on January 20, 2024. She thanked her fans in the initial and discussed the announcement during her January 5, 2024 stream, which is live at the time of writing.

Nijisanji said that after her graduation, her Twitter, Youtube, and other social media accounts will be made private and the sale of her various merchandise will be ended gradually, although the company will still collect fan letters until February 20, 2024. However, during Pomu's January 5, 2024 stream, she said her videos will remain available.

Pomu debuted in 2021 as part of Nijisanji EN's first unit, LazuLight, alongside Finana Ryugu and Elira Pendragon. She is known for her streams of the Metal Gear Solid series and frequent collaborations. She will continue streaming until her graduation date and shared a schedule on her Twitter account.

You can find the official Nijisanji Announcement, as well as Pomu's comment, below:

HoYoVerse brought up the new 7.2 playable character joining Honkai Impact 3rd, and it is an S-rank battlesuit for Fu Hua. It is called Fenghuang of Vicissitude, and the company shared a video going over some in-game footage and her development.

Fua Hua is a Honkai Impact 3rd character who featured prominently in the game for years. She’s been affiliated with both Schicksal and the 13 Flame-Chasers. This will mark her eighth battlesuit in Honkai Impact 3rd.

The new trailer for her begins by showing her training, then using a flurry of fiery kicks, punches, and energy blasts. After that, members of the team discussed the inspiration behind the new version of the character’s design. One described her as a “divine bird rising from the ashes.” Another called her the “strongest version of Fu Hua.” This is because she’s tapping into the Ichor of Garuda for this battlesuit. 

Square Enix is now selling a Final Fantasy XIV Woodland Warden’s Attire glamour set in the FFXIV Online Store. There’s also a sale on some items ahead of the Japanese Fan Festival event starting on January 7, 2024. 

The Woodland Warden’s Attire is a set of five items. It costs $18. People get the Woodland Warden’s Breeches, Fingerstalls, Longboots, Skirt, and Top in the bundle. Any race or gender can wear it. Someone can also dye it.

Here’s a gallery showing the new FFXIV Woodland Warden’s Attire glamour set on different races from the front and back, with one screenshot showing how it would look if someone chose to dye it.

Atlus shared the Persona 3 Reload opening movie, which also included a chance to hear a new song from the soundtrack. The music that plays over it is the track “Full Moon Full Life.”

Here’s the full Persona 3 Reload opening movie with soundtrack song preview. It begins with the protagonist sitting down and preparing to listen to music on his MP3 player. After scrolling past older tracks from the game like “Burn my Dread” and “Want to be Close,” he settles on the new opening them. It’s then that we see the original animation that highlights him and other party members like Yukari Takeba, Junpei Iori, Mitsuru Kirijo, Akihiko Sanada, Shinjiro Aragaki, and Ken Amada. We also see references to the Midnight Hour and Velvet Room.

Calliope Mori announced on social media that all five Vtubers in Hololive English Myth, which includes Amelia Watson, Kiara Takanashi, Ninomae Ina’nis, and Gawr Gura, will play Lethal Company together on January 5, 2024. She also teased an announcement will come up at the end of the stream.

Due to schedules and other obligations, it can often be difficult for all five members of the three and a half year old generation to get together. For example, Gawr Gura is taking part in other kinds of activities, such as the Gurarium Sendai Umino-Mori Aquarium promotional event. Her last solo stream was one going over that event in November 2023. Calliope Mori often is working on music, as are other members like Kiara Takanashi. 

The Hololive English Myth Lethal Company collab stream will involve all four Vtubers playing it at 2pm PT/5pm ET/11pm CET. It is unknown how long it will last. So far, Calliope Mori, Kiara Takanashi, and Amelia Watson shared placeholder videos indicating people will be able to watch from their viewpoints.  

As part of Famitsu’s 2024 New Year Greetings column, Mistwalker CEO Hironobu Sakaguchi said that the studio has started production of a new scenario. The developer also said that he has been playing a lot of Final Fantasy XIV every day. [Thanks, Famitsu!]

Corresponding with his message, the keyphrase for the studio this year is “production of a new work begins.” Hironobu Sakaguchi didn’t elaborate on what type of scenario Mistwalker is working on. Still, the developer confirmed that they concluded plotted the overall scenario and are now in the main scenario writing stage. Sakaguchi remarked that it is important to condense and make the writing entertaining at this stage of development.

The latest game developed by Mistwalker is the Apple Arcade exclusive turn-based RPG Fantasian. On August 2023, a listing for Fantasian appeared on SteamDB. No information about a possible port has appeared after this, but Sakaguchi himself commented on the possibility of a PC release or a sequel to the game back in February 2023.

HoYoVerse has posted some information on the Raiden Shogun and Yoimiya re-run banners that will start soon in Genshin Impact. The Version 4.3 Phase II banners will begin on January 9 and run until January 30, 2024.

During this time, you can pull for Raiden Shogun and Yoimiya, who are usually unavailable in the game. The 4-stars who have a boosted drop rate are Kujou Sara, Bennett, and Chevreuse. Of these characters, Chevreuse is the only new one, and she’s a 4-star Ousia-aligned Pyro Polearm character. She will greatly benefit from Overload reactions, which you can cause with Electro and Pyro. This is likely why she’s running on Raiden Shogun and Yoimiya’s banners since these two characters are good at causing overload.

Raiden Shogun made her playable debut in Version 2.1, and she’s a 5-star Electro Polearm character who can work as either a main or sub-DPS character. She can work very well as an on-field DPS with her Elemental Burst and apply Electro to enemies with her Elemental Skill. As for Yoimiya, she debuted in Version 2.0 and is a 5-star Pyro Bow character. She is a good on-field DPS character against single targets and can increase her team’s ATK with her Burst.

Kitty cat versions of the Jujutsu Kaisen cast will appear as plushes, which you can pre-order from Movic. They cost 2420 JPY ($16.70) each and will ship out in early May 2024. [Thanks, PR Times!]

There are two variations of Jujutsu Kaisen cat plushes. You can get keyholder versions of them where they’re standing up. Only three characters—Gojo, Geto, and Toji—are part of this set. Gojo and Geto will look like they did during the Hidden Inventory/Premature Death Arc, which means they look younger than they do now.

The second variation of cat plushes has them lying down on their front. You’ll be able to get a plush of Yuji, Megumi, Nobara, Nanami, or Gojo. All cat plushes have an eyemask that you can put over their faces to change their expressions.

You can check out the plushes in the gallery below:

NHK has revealed its line-up of games that its TV show Game Genome will cover in season 2. It’ll start airing its episode on Final Fantasy XIV on January 10, 2024. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]

There will be ten episodes in total. The list of games that Game Genome will cover is:

• Final Fantasy XIV (January 10, 2024)
• Street Fighter series (January 17, 2024)
• Journey (January 24, 2024)
• Mushiking: The King of Beetles, Love, and Berry: Dress Up and Dance! (January 31, 2024)
• It Takes Two
• Power Pros
• NieR Automata
• Cities: Skylines
• Fatal Frame

From January 4, 2024, Square Enix will temporarily suspend the auto-housing demolition timer in FFXIV. This is in response to the Noto Peninsula earthquake that occurred in Japan on January 1, 2024.

You can read the full statement on the company’s official webpage. To sum it up, Square Enix stopped the auto-demolition counter in the early hours of January 4, 2024. It will resume depending on the situation, and Square Enix will inform everyone once it decides.

When it does, it will resume from before the suspension. This suspension affects all worlds under Elemental Data Center, Gaia Data Center, Mana Data Center, and Meteor Data Center. Square Enix also expresses sympathy to everyone who was affected by the earthquake.

As part of the Famitsu 2024 New Year Greetings column, Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time Producer Keiji Inafune said that he will “do [his] best to improve the quality of the game” for its Summer 2024 release. [Thanks, Famitsu!]

Famitsu also revealed that Inafune’s 2024 keyword is “explosion,” and his aspirations for the new year involve “endless evolution and growth as a person.” Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time was originally revealed on February 2023. The game will appear on the Nintendo Switch, and it was initially scheduled for a 2023 release.

If there is one major take I have about anime these days, it’s the isekai genre has few fresh and intriguing ideas. Even the more unique ones either offer little enjoyment or don't seem to be worth watching. However, the Solo Leveling anime adaptation proves there is still just a bit left in the genre's tank, if the first two episodes are anything to go off of.

Solo Leveling takes place in an alternate Earth where gates open up and supernatural beasts attack. Hunters enter these gates to defeat the dungeon bosses. They have a short time limit of seven days to close the gate before the beasts will pour out and attack modern society. It feels like an interesting enough premise, if not a bit old given past isekai anime series like Gate.

The focus of the series is the main character Sung, who is an E-rank hunter. Many consider him the worst hunter in existence, but he does the job to get money for his sister and sick mother. Since everyone is stuck with their initial rank and power, it seems as though he has no hope of tackling and surviving higher-rank dungeons.

Microsoft is continuing to run with the jokes that its consoles look like appliances by releasing an Xbox Series S toaster. It is being sold via Walmart’s website for $39.99, with an estimated January 12, 2024 delivery date if someone orders on January 4, 2024. 

The toaster is designed to resemble the console exactly, as though the system was placed horizontally. It is over seven inches tall and fifteen inches wide. It contains two slots that are extra wide, so it can handle standard bread slices, waffles, pop tarts, bagels, or larger pieces like Texas toast. When used, it prints the Xbox circular logo on the toast. 

The side of the toaster features special defrost and bagel settings, for waffles or naturally bagels. There are also six settings for browning, to allow someone to determine how long something cooks. There is a handle to eject and it features a removable crumb tray for cleaning. 

Here’s a closer look at it, which also features bread with the logo toasted onto it.

As part of the Famitsu 2024 New Year Greetings column talking to important members of the game industry, head of Ys Net Yu Suzuki said that stories like Spy x Family or The Apothecary Diaries could be good for making games. The developer also talked about his goals for the coming year. [Thanks, Famitsu!]

Yu Suzuki didn’t specify or give any details on how stories like Spy x Family could help in making new games. He only suggested they could have potential.

The developer’s keyphrase for 2024 is “create the type of games you want to play yourself.” The developer’s aspirations for the new year consist of forming a project with scriptwriters and musicians from different industries.

In 2023, Suzuki and YS Net released the previously Apple Arcade exclusive rail shooter Air Twister on home consoles and PC. Air Twister is one example of Suzuki collaborating with artists from outside the game industry, as renowned Dutch composer and multi-instrumentalist Valensia created the soundtrack of the game.

2024 just started, and Sony is already hyping up people for the upcoming year of PS5 games. A new trailer dropped today, showcasing the slate of 2024 games and snippets of each of them.

There are around 18 different games shown off during the trailer with a few seconds dedicated to each of them. It appears all of these games are set to release in 2024, even though a few of them like Silent Hill 2, don’t have release dates quite yet. The majority of these games are set to come out during the first quarter of 2024 between January to March 2024. This means we won’t have to wait too long to play most of these titles.

Here's the full "Upcoming Games in 2024" PS5 trailer:

McDonald’s restaurants in the UK are now offering Sonic the Hedgehog Happy Meal toys. They will be available in meals until February 6, 2024.

There are 12 stories total in this collection of toys. Not all of them appear in the initial images and site. Some toys involve building Sonic on a hoverboard, there are sticker sheets, jigsaw puzzles will be available, and other items will show up. 

Here’s an official image showing that item, as well as some of the flags people can pick up in-store with characters on them.

Apex Legends is getting a Final Fantasy VII Rebirth crossover event, and a new gameplay trailer shows how costume skins, Materia, and the Buster Sword will look in the game. This also means we get a better idea of how things will work and be acquired when things begin on January 9, 2024.

The trailer begins with a look at the Buster Sword from Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, before some characters in the new skins drop in. It then shows how players can approach Hop-Ups to get different Materia. Purple Materia is shown off first in the gameplay footage, followed by Blue Materia and Red Materia. 

After that, it shows the Buster Sword R2R5. This is a Mythic cosmetic for all characters that will apparently be a part of the Event packs people can buy. It, like the Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Apex Legends costume skins, was mentioned as being available via Apex Coins in the official press release. 

As for those costumes, here are the Final Fantasy VII Rebirth skins shown in the Apex Legends trailer.

Korean game publisher Nexon is being fined 11.6 billion won, or approximately $8.85 million, for manipulating the drop rates of randomized items and loot boxes in games without informing players. This practice has apparently been affecting games like MapleStory and Bubble Fighter since 2010. [Thanks, @Citrussalt!]

According to the Korean Fair Trade Commission, Nexon had been changing the item drop rates for loot boxes and other gacha mechanics in its games, including reducing some items to a 0% chance of appearing, without disclosing these changes to players. Nexon also apparantly released a statement claiming no changes had been made, aiming to "lure customers by giving them false information". 28% of MapleStory's 560 billion won in sales came from in-game purchases in 2020.

Nexon itself has accepted the decision and apologised to it's customers, but has said it may seek to challenge the decision claiming the company was not required to reveal probability information at the time.

You can find the Korean Fair Trade Commission's official statement below, or read an English summary via the Korea Times here.

Square Enix has been taking to social media to celebrate the new year with Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, with the latest images involving a kadomatsu display with Cait Sith and Cactaurs. It also features knitted ornamental mochi.

Here is the official display. Cait Sith is in the back, and it appears to be the same plush toy Square Enix was selling. The two Cactaur are alongside it and dressed up to look like the kadomatsu. The plush mochi is in front.

IGN shared a big chunk of footage from Dragon's Dogma 2, showcasing gameplay from 4 of the game's vocations, or classes. These include the shield-wielding Fighter and the nimble Thief, as well as advanced vocations like the greatsword-toting Warrior and powerful Sorceror. [Thanks, IGN!]

Fans of the original will be pleased to see the return of many characteristic elements of the first Dragon's Dogma. Despite the shiny new graphics and systems, Pawns still chatter in the same archaic English and Ogres can still dropkick you from from over a screen away, just as they did in the original.

There are a number of interesting new things to note, however, including a moment near the beginning where a Fighter perfectly times a block against a goblin attacking with a lit torch, which appears to imbue his weapons with fire without needing support from an allied mage. If that is indeed what happens (and he didn't just get a buff from an ally in the bushes) then it could be an interesting sign of potential new interactions between enemies and players.

Hololive Vtuber Sakamata Chloe took to social media to announce she will be taking a break. The performer noted she’d caught COVID-19 and will be taking time to recover.

Here is Chloe’s official announcement. She reported that when she went to the doctor, her fever was at 39.3°C. That’s almost 103°F. It was then revealed that she had caught COVID-19. She also reported that she will be taking time to recover and is taking medicine.

Prior to the announcement on January 4, 2024, she had previously noted she wasn’t feeling well. On January 3, 2024, she noted her fever had hit 37.8°C (~100°F). 

As part of the Famitsu 2024 New Year Greetings column sharing messages from major members of the video game industry, Sony Head of PlayStation Indies Shuhei Yoshida cited five indie games people should pay attention to. He pointed to Baby Steps, Pacific Drive, The Plucky Squire, SCHiM, and Ultros. [Thanks, Famitsu!]

All five of the titles will appear on PlayStation platforms, with SCHiM being the only one not coming to the PlayStation 5. Also, both Baby Steps and The Plucky Squire are Devolver Digital games. Baby Stepsis a walking simulator with Bennett Foddy as one of its developers, in which someone must control both of a character’s legs to move. It is heading to the PS5 and PC. It has a 2024 release window.

The Plucky Squireinvolves traveling from 2D to 3D across different objects to go through an adventure as a squire. Former Pokemon art director James Turner is working on that. That will be on the PS5, Switch, Xbox Series X, and PC in 2024.

Crunchyroll will start airing episodes of Chibi Maruko-chan from January 14, 2024. It’ll be available in the original Japanese dub with English subtitles. [Thanks, Manga Mogura RE!]

You can check out Crunchyroll’s trailer for Chibi Maruko-chan here:

Chibi Maruko-chan started serialization in 1986, with the manga ending in 2022. A show based on the premise originally ran between 1990 and 1992. The current one started in 1995. It, like Sazae-san and Doraemon, is a widely popular and cultural show in Japan, as well as some countries of East Asia.