The Best Time to Be a JRPG Fan is Now

Author

Stephanie Liu
April 25, 2025

Welcome to “Siliconera Speaks Up,” our newsletter for the site! This’ll be a summary of the past week’s anime or gaming news, a little reminder of things to come, and our insight on what games you should pick up next. Without further ado, let’s get into it!

Speak Up Sesh

It’s been a really exciting week for anyone who’s a fan of turn-based games or RPGs. The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and a surprise shadow drop of Oblivion… 2025 is shaping up to be a great year for those who are into story-based games!

That’s not even getting into indie games, like Splintered, that might have flown under the radar for people. The sheer amount of fun content means that my backlog grows ever longer—I still have stuff like Urban Myth Dissolution Center and No Case Remains Unsolved to play through—but I’m sure that’s a problem must people can relate to nowadays.

2025 isn’t just exciting for games; we finally, after years of waiting, can pre-order the Switch 2! I didn’t even bother trying to fight the queues, but I hope those who tried to get one did.

Yuichi Nakamura—a Japanese voice actor who’s well known for many prominent roles, including Gojo in Jujutsu Kaisen, Bucciarati in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and Gray in Fairy Tail—is having a humorous and notable crashout on X (Twitter) due to him losing the lottery for one. He’s playfully threatened to block and cut off ties with voice actors who got one, and even Masahiro Sakurai was in danger of getting blocked if Sakurai hadn’t pulled out a Men In Black-like neuralayzer light to defend himself.

What’s extra funny about the situation is that Nakamura narrated the Nintendo Direct that revealed the console, yet he can’t get his hands on one. This entire kerfuffle is blowing up on Japanese Twitter, and it’s to the point that news sites are writing up articles about the situation.

Actually, now that I think about it, it’s wild that Sakurai—the guy who literally created popular Nintendo series like Kirby and Super Smash Bros.)—had to enter the same lottery as everyone else for a Switch 2. One would figure that Nintendo would just give him one, or maybe he decided to put himself through the gauntlet on his own. Who knows?

It’s unfortunate that these exciting developments in the video game world are coinciding with less-than-stellar developments in the political world. Those in the United States might have trouble in the coming months due to tariffs, which are already affecting figure collectors. Here’s hoping that things calm down and get better in the coming days.

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Top 10 Stories From the Past Week

  1. Sanrio Character Ranking 2025 Poll Has Opened - I’ve said this so many times now, but Cinnamoroll needs to be put in a Hall of Fame, because the possibility of him winning sixth year in a row is just too ridiculous.

  2. PS3, PS4, and Vita PlayStation Network Maintenance Announced - It went down from 10 AM to 5 PM in Japan, which led to people wondering what they should do during those hours. Usually, maintenance should take place during an unobtrusive time. But maybe Sony guessed that most of the players still on the PS4, PS4, or Vita would be at work?

  3. Pompompurin Leads Sanrio Character Ranking 2025 So Far - So many people are shaming Pompompurin online for showing his butt to get ahead of the polls, and it’s honestly so funny.

  4. Blue Prince: All Painting Puzzle Solutions - For those who get stuck!

  5. Hololive VTuber Gawr Gura Making Important Announcement Today - Normally, people just doompost, but this time…it was for real…

  6. Square Enix Explains How NieR Connects to NieR Automata - I do think you can play them both separately, but it definitely enhances your understanding and appreciation of the world and story to just play both of them. If you don’t have the time to do that, you can always read or watch Let’s Plays.

  7. Preview: Call of Boba Feels Early in Development - The foundation looks fun, though! So hopefully the developers can hammer out some of the other issues.

  8. Review: Lunar Remastered Collection Revives Two Classic JRPGs - This is why it’s a general rule of thumb to never add in pop culture references that aren’t there in the original script. (Sorry, I’ve never played Lunar).

  9. Square Enix Store Pauses Some Pre-Orders Due to Trump Tariffs - Tariffs are also affecting Good Smile Company purchases from the US.

  10. Preview: Splintered Is a Special Early Access Game - Here’s hoping this preview put Splintered on more people’s maps!

Upcoming Releases

  • DOOM Dark Ages - PS5, XSX, PC (May 15, 2025)

  • Capcom Fighting Collection 2 - PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC (May 16, 2025)

  • Fantasy Life i - PS4, PS5, SXS, Switch, PC (May 21, 2025)

  • Mobile Suit Gundam SEED: Battle Destiny Remastered - Switch, PC (May 22, 2025)

  • Onimusha 2 Remastered - PS5, XSX, Switch, PC (May 23, 2025)