Gaming Memories

DESCRIPTONA 1997 horizontal shoot-em-up about a kamikaze pilot from the Moon attacking a city named after Sodom — built by ex-Konami programmers inside Square at the peak of the Final Fantasy VII era.I want to talk about why Einhänder exists, why the production story matters more than most people realize, and why the game is one of the most specific shmups ever made.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━CHAPTERS00:00 - Intro03:06 - Part 1 — The Konami Game Hiding Inside Square 12:13 - Part 2 —Squaresoft is Hiding in the Name20:35 - Part 3 — Stricken from the Records━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SOURCESEinhänder on Wikipediahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einh%C3...Einhänder Deep Dive — Paul Brownlee, Hardcore Gaming 101 (2007)https://www.hardcoregaming101.net/ein...Re-release This: Einhänder — Marc Normandin, Retro XPhttps://retroxp.substack.com/p/re-rel...Einhänder Review — Rob Fahey, Eurogamerhttps://www.eurogamer.net/articles/ei...Einhänder Feature — Automaton Westhttps://automaton-media.com/en/review...Einhänder Review — Greg Kasavin, GameSpot (1998)https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/einh...Einhänder Review — Jay Boor, IGN (1998)https://www.ign.com/articles/1998/08/...TGS: Einhänder Steals the Show — IGN (1997)https://www.ign.com/articles/1997/09/...Square Enix Osaka Studio History — NeoGAFhttps://www.neogaf.com/threads/square...Kenichiro Fukui Composer Profile — VGMOhttp://www.vgmonline.net/kenichirofukui/Einhänder Original Soundtrack Review — Soundtrack Centralhttps://soundtrackcentral.com/einhand...Einhänder OST Review — VGMOhttp://www.vgmonline.net/einhander/ROM HACKS & PRESERVATIONEinhänder Soundtrack in FLAC — Internet Archivehttps://archive.org/details/einhander...Einhänder Regional Differences — The Cutting Room Floorhttps://tcrf.net/Einh%C3%A4nderEinhänder Plot Analysis FAQ — MMitchell, GameFAQshttps://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps/1972...Einhänder FAQ — Zach Keene, GameFAQshttps://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps/1972...FAN PROJECTSMetal Crisis — An Indie Einhänder Homage Currently in Developmenthttps://www.timeextension.com/news/20...COMMUNITY DISCUSSIONRTTP: Einhänder — NeoGAFhttps://www.neogaf.com/threads/rttp-e...Einhänder Discussion Thread — shmups.system11.orghttps://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic...Kingdom Hearts III Einhänder Easter Egg Discussion — ResetErahttps://www.resetera.com/threads/kh3-...━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SUPPORT THE CHANNELPatreon —   / gaming  \_memories Discord —   / discord  Everything else — https://linktr.ee/gamingmemoriesBusiness inquiries — [email protected]

Pragmata might be the most disciplined AAA game I've played in years: one combat verb, ten to fifteen hours, no padding, no open-world bloat. I think that narrowness is the whole point — it's the reason a quiet, almost wordless ending hits as hard as it does. Capcom spent six years making this game smaller instead of bigger, and this is my case for why that restraint is exactly what I want more of AAA to be.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━CHAPTERS00:00 Intro01:28 Disclaimer03:22 Part One — Capcom's Quiet Revolution05:42 Part Two — The Director You Haven't Heard Of08:39 Part Three — NASA Punk13:07 Part Four — A Strand of Hair17:50 Part Five — One Loop, Done Right22:00 Part Six — Diana, and the Game Underneath27:42 Part Seven — The Sacrifice32:10 Part Eight — What Discipline Costs35:46 Close━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SOURCESOFFICIAL / PRIMARY SOURCESPRAGMATA on SteamSource: CAPCOM Co., Ltd.Link: https://store.steampowered.com/app/33...Pragmata interview: combat, hacking, resource management, and moreSource: PlayStation.BlogLink: https://blog.playstation.com/2026/03/...Capcom's All-new IP PRAGMATA to Launch on April 24, 2026Source: BusinessWireLink: https://www.businesswire.com/news/hom...DEVELOPER INTERVIEWS / PRODUCTION HISTORYWhy Pragmata disappeared for 6 years, and how Capcom built a new IPSource: GamesRadar+Link: https://www.gamesradar.com/games/acti..."There Was So Much Trial And Error" — Pragmata Director Reveals The Reason For The Game's Indefinite DelaySource: TheGamerLink: https://www.thegamer.com/pragmata-dir...Capcom Had To Tweak Its RE Engine For One Unexpected Thing In PragmataSource: GameSpotLink: https://www.gamespot.com/articles/cap...Capcom has thanked Macross and Transformers legend Shoji Kawamori for PragmataSource: VGCLink: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/n...REVIEWS / RELEASE COVERAGEPragmata Review - Capcom's Next Great FranchiseSource: GameSpotLink: https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/prag...Review: Pragmata (PS5)Source: PushSquareLink: https://www.pushsquare.com/reviews/ps...Pragmata's Review Scores Among The Highest Of 2026Source: TheGamerLink: https://www.thegamer.com/pragmata-rev...RETROSPECTIVES / COMMENTARYPragmata Is a "Fun Uncle" GameSource: The Punished BacklogLink: https://punishedbacklog.com/pragmata-...COMMUNITY / FAN DISCUSSIONPragmata fans support dad whose late daughter looked just like DianaSource: DexertoLink: https://www.dexerto.com/gaming/pragma...TECHNICAL / PERFORMANCE ANALYSISPragmata Performance Benchmark Review - 30+ GPUs TestedSource: TechPowerUpLink: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/pr...Future Capcom games will have better hair, thanks to PragmataSource: VGCLink: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/n...REFERENCEPragmataSource: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PragmataVanquish (video game)Source: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanquis...)Shinji MikamiSource: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinji_...Dead Space (2008 video game)Source: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Sp...)Binary DomainSource: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_...Zone of the EndersSource: WikipediaLink: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_of...━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SUPPORT THE CHANNELPatreon —   / gaming_memories  Discord —   / discord  Everything else — https://linktr.ee/gamingmemoriesBusiness inquiries — [email protected]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━This started as a passion project. It still is.#gamingmemories #videogameessay #pragmata #capcom #ps5

Final Fantasy 16 is divisive, and I think it's also the most aggressively Final Fantasy Final Fantasy ever made. The Clive and Ultima story is Creative Business Unit III interrogating the franchise's own identity, out loud. I paired this argument with over a terabyte of custom footage I captured myself using free cam tools at the highest graphics settings — angles and moments you won't find anywhere else on the internet.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━CHAPTERS00:00 Intro02:06 Disclaimer03:39 Part 1 — A Brief History05:29 Part 2 — The Argument — Mythos and Logos08:35 Part 3 — Devil May Clive12:48 Part 4 — The Connection to Vagrant Story15:41 Part 5 — Eikons Are Emotional Architecture19:30 Part 6 — Accept the Truth22:48 Part 7 — The Brother25:29 Part 8 — I, Ultima, Am the Fandom28:38 Part 9 — The Book Is Final FantasyRESOURCES & LINKS// DEVELOPER INTERVIEWS //Naoki Yoshida sheds new light on Final Fantasy XVI — PlayStation.Blog — https://blog.playstation.com/2022/06/21/interview-naoki-yoshida-sheds-new-light-on-final-fantasy-xvi/How To Build A New Final Fantasy — Game Informer — https://gameinformer.com/exclusive-feature/2023/06/06/how-to-build-a-new-final-fantasyMaehiro on worldbuilding and viewpoints — PlayStation.Blog — https://blog.playstation.com/2022/11/04/final-fantasy-xvi-interview-worldbuildingWho is FF16 Creative Director Kazutoyo Maehiro — RPG Site — https://rpgsite.net/feature/13134-who-is-final-fantasy-xvi-creative-director-kazutoyo-maehiro-developer-profileDevil May Cry Designer Crafts Magnum Opus with FF16 — Push Square — https://pushsquare.com/news/2023/06/devil-may-cry-designer-crafts-magnum-opus-with-final-fantasy-16Don't Worry, FF16 Is Inspired By Good Seasons Of Game Of Thrones — Game Informer — https://gameinformer.com/exclusive-feature/2023/05/24/final-fantasy-16-dont-worryA discussion with Ben Starr and Ralph Ineson — RPG Site — https://rpgsite.net/interview/14419-a-discussion-with-ben-starr-and-ralph-ineson// MODERN RETROSPECTIVES //Un-Tradition: On Final Fantasy's Identity and Reinvention — RPGFan — https://rpgfan.com/feature/un-tradition-on-final-fantasys-identity-and-reinvention/Final Fantasy's Greatest Strength Has Always Been Familiarity — The Escapist — https://escapistmagazine.com/final-fantasy-strength-familiarity-not-reinvention-myth/Does Final Fantasy 16 Even Know Why It's Copying Game of Thrones? — GamesRadar — https://gamesradar.com/does-final-fantasy-16-even-know-why-its-copying-game-of-thrones/Final Fantasy XVI and the Sins of Individualism — SUPERJUMP — https://superjumpmagazine.com/final-fantasy-xvi-and-the-sins-of-individualism/FF16 Is Two Years Old — How Do You Feel About It Now — ResetEra — https://resetera.com/threads/final-fantasy-xvi-is-officially-2-years-old-as-of-today// REVIEWS //Final Fantasy 16 Review - On Its Own Terms — GameSpot — https://gamespot.com/reviews/final-fantasy-16-review-on-its-own-terms/1900-6418081/Final Fantasy XVI Review — Eurogamer (3/5)Final Fantasy XVI: The Kotaku Review — Kotaku — https://kotaku.com/review-final-fantasy-16-ffxvi-ps5-rpg-release-date-1850558485Polygon Final Fantasy 16 Review// POST-2025 CONTEXT //Yoshi-P Answers The Final Fantasy 17 Question — ScreenRant — https://screenrant.com/yoshi-p-final-fantasy-17-turn-based-action/Success of Clair Obscur Might Push Final Fantasy Back To Turn-Based — Vice — https://vice.com/en/article/success-of-clair-obscur-expedition-33-might-push-final-fantasy-back-to-turn-based-combat━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━SUPPORT THE CHANNELPatreon — https://www.patreon.com/c/gaming_memoriesDiscord — https://discord.gg/yjM2j6wWEverything else — https://linktr.ee/gamingmemoriesBusiness inquiries — [email protected]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━This started as a passion project. It still is.#finalfantasy16 #ffxvi #videoessay #jrpg #gamingmemories

Eric is the host of the Unlockables podcast & a Kingdom Hearts SAGE. We chat the games that shaped him growing up and he gives me the lowdown on the total arc of Kingdom Hearts. Check out more Eric here : https://linktr.ee/unlockablespodcast

Aliens, Orbs and Esoteric Final Fantasy w/ Bledsoe Said So:Summary: We cover everything from Devil May Cry 5's kabbalistic inspiration, the gnostic teachings of Kingdom Hearts and the secret meaning behind the trifoce. SAUCY!!About the guest: Bledsoe Said So is Ryan Bledsoe, Nick Fermanides, Alex Wishon & Jennifer BledsoeThey cover a wide range of spiritual topics, occult mysticism and the UAP phenomenon. Links: https://linktr.ee/bledsoesaidsohttps://linktr.ee/gamingmemories

Matt Storm AKA Stormageddon is a podcaster, DJ and content creator. More Matt: https://linktr.ee/dj_stormagedddon

Dave Jackson is a podcast, streamer & content creator. Get more TFTBL : https://linktr.ee/talesfromthebacklog

SWARM is a music producer, voice actor & aggressive book reader. More SWARM : https://ffm.to/ahig More GM : https://linktr.ee/gamingmemories

Liam Brown is over corporate sponsorships for the Knights group, a gamer and competitive bodybuilder. More Liam : https://linktr.ee/theonlyliam More Gaming Memories : https://linktr.ee/gamingmemories

Headphone Activist is a producer, investor & military sim aficionado More HPA: https://linktr.ee/headphoneactivist More GMP : https://linktr.ee/gamingmemories