#Gameplay analysis

[anthurak]

Thinking more on Psychonauts (since I’m still replaying the first game at the moment lol) and how while it’s never really commented on all that much, Raz’s acrobatics training as part of his family circus is actually a HUGE part of his abilities and the gameplay.

As in, it’s the in-universe justification for the game’s platforming.

For example, just look at Oleander’s Basic Braining from both a gameplay and narrative perspective: Gameplay-wise, it’s the opening tutorial level that introduces the basic controls and all the platforming mechanics that will define the rest of the game, and because of that the level is pretty easy and forgiving to the player.

Now where this gets interesting is when we consider that it’s pretty clear that for the rest of the campers, Basic Braining is basically a horrifying death with most not even being able to finish.

So it’s basically implied that the level being so easy represents that for Raz, it WAS easy. Specifically BECAUSE of all his acrobatics experience. While all the other kids were struggling with ridiculously long ladders, net walls, rope-swings, multiple trapezes, dodging machine-gun fire or just getting blown up by random landmines, Raz the trained-before-he-could-walk acrobat was absolutely blitzing through all of that. He got through it so fast Raz almost stumbled onto the big bad’s evil plan simply because Oleander never thought he’d get through the course so fast!

And the fun thing is that this unspoken emphasis on Raz’s acrobatics skill permeates through the entire rest of the game, and even explains a few metanarrative elements! Like you know how it’s implied that Raz pics up new psychic abilities and skills ridiculously fast for a kid his age while at camp?

Well, aside from his natural talent and drive to learn, from a gameplay perspective we can assume at least part of it is Raz picking up a bunch of those Psi cards, Challenge Markers and Scavenger Hunt items scattered around the camp. Most of which just so happen to be squirreled away in some VERY hard-to-reach places. At least, hard to reach for anyone without years of acrobatics training.

And that’s not even touching on what happens when Raz picks up Levitation. Like for the other kids, levitation is just a fun gimmick to zip around rolling on a glowing ball. But as we see with Raz, he’s practically FLYING.

Is it any wonder Ranger Cruller is surprised when Raz gets half the scavenger hunt done in an afternoon? And is pretty sure nobody has ever done the whole thing when Raz finally finishes the hunt?*

And I think this all plays very nicely into the narrative thru-line that runs across both the first and second games: That for all the baggage that may come from them, Raz’s connection to his family is still an important part of his life. Particularly with how this plays into the end of the first game with Raz reconciling with his father, and into the second game with both reconciling and dealing with several of his broader family issues.

That regardless of what he learns as a psychonaut, the lessons Raz learned from his family will always be of help to him.

*I mean, aside from the fact that one of the items can only be obtained through use of a psychic power that doesn’t seem available to campers, and another item straight-up isn’t even in the camp.

[moltz23]

The Odd One Theorem: Why "Fixing" Three Houses' Crimson Flower isn't Straightfoward

A week ago, I did a keen analysis on how Three Houses manages difficulty for every one of its four routes which I’ve been slowly improving thanks to the feedback I’ve received on it (many thanks to those who helped btw!). From all the notes I’ve gathered, something very interesting stood out about how the game handles challenges with each path, which reminded me of a certain possibility I raised in yet another previous post surrounding Black Eagles’ development and the hidden intentions lurking within.

And you know what? I think it’s time I make it into an actual theorem because it’s really bugging me out that much. After all the stuff I’ve seen about 3H’s gameplay and how it handles challenges per route, I am convinced that “fixing” Crimson Flower isn’t as straightforward as people make it up to be.

Before getting into why gameplay evidence of all things has convinced me of such, I wanna cover all my bases first just in case someone (and somehow, ‘cause a part of me finds it unlikely) has no clue what I’ll be talking about.

So… Here's context:

Why “Fix” the Odd One?

…Also known as Crimson Flower.

Three Houses has four routes overall. From those, Crimson Flower is the only one which has 18 story chapters while the others get 22 (or 21, in Silver Snow case). Saying this made people mad back when the game was new would honestly be an understatement given there’s a youtube video called “Edelgard deserved better” done sometime after its launch which has over 250k views as of this post.

Incidentally, the idea of “fixing” CF is far from new, and the go-to direction most attempts I’ve seen, do it by crafting a small 4 chapter arc after the main plot (so it can reach the 22 Chapter quota Dimitri and Claude’s routes follow, which the idea inherently assumes it was the original goal of the route), eventually leading Edelgard and co. fighting “those who slither in the dark” in their headquarters, something which is mentioned it will happen a few times during the route, but as a very distant… thing, due to Edelgard’s n°1 enemy being not them in the main plot. This gets to the point that an S-Support and even a few solo endings touch upon it in a way that might or might not be mean spirited from the devs’ POV???.

Anyways, now that’s out of the way, it’s time to jump into the actual meat of the theorem:

No House Stands Equal - Three Houses' Difficulty from a Design Perspective

The key findings of my exhaustive attempt at analyzing 3H’s difficulty (which you can check by clicking on the title above) is that Three Houses, from a gameplay perspective, handles difficulty by messing with factors like:

Average Enemy Level between Chapters (+ their Suggested Level, which is directly related to the AEL).

Available resources, and the timing in which new ones are unlocked and/or lost.

When the game stops using Intermediate Classes for enemies (in a more conventional Fire Emblem context, this would be like saying “when the game stops throwing Unpromoted Enemies at you).

And more.

Thus, at a macro/superficial level and, according to the info at hand, Three Houses does the following:

The Average Enemy Level almost always increases by 2 per Chapter, regardless of the chosen difficulty.

The Armory/Vendor/Battalion Guild stock is updated 3 times; first in Ch. 3, then in Ch. 8, and last in Ch. 14.

Part 1 ends in Ch. 12 with a Suggested Level of 23.

Your chosen House Leader gets their unique battalion in Chapter 13.

The most number of bosses you’re forced to take down to clear main story missions is 4 in Ch. 16 once (3 if you play carefully), and then 2 for other maps that do this.

The game stops throwing Intermediate Class enemies around Ch. 18~ for main story maps (17 for Silver Snow, 16 for Azure Moon, and 18 for Verdant Wind, for those curious).

Your chosen House Leader’s paralogue is unlocked around the second half of Part 2 (Ch. 19 for Dimitri, and Ch. 17 for Claude).

The difference in enemy levels between the successive Enbarr invasion missions is always 1.

And finally, the route ends in Ch. 22 (or 21 if you’re in Silver Snow) with a final Suggested Level of 42.

This pattern is followed religiously in all the routes which happen to share a lot of content up until Chapter 17 (or 16, in Silver Snow’s case) due to story reasons, yet despite this, there’s still many quirks exclusive to certain routes which make one experience different from the other.

Silver Snow, for example, is meant to be really hard according to the devs, and as the spreadsheet reveals, it does this by handicapping the heck out of the player (very squishy starting cast with no Relics besides Byleth’s; one deployment slot less, far less resources; losing your House Leader + N°2 midway through the game; etc). Due to this, Azure Moon and Verdant Wind by design are more beginner friendly by simply having none of that (AKA more balanced casts that stays with you; more Hero Relics; more resources, etc), while still deviating in other areas. Azure Moon for one, gets the most resources between all routes to play with, still gets their exclusive units handicapped in other ways, and in the late game, it has a “turret & mage infestation problem”, for a lack of a proper term. Conversely, Verdant Wind gets just a pretty decent amount of tools, has no actual handicaps for their cast, and their late game isn’t so overly specific in enemy variety as Azure Moon’s.

Fairly straightforward stuff so far. But as you might have noticed, I haven’t mentioned Crimson Flower once, and that's for a reason.

Crimson Flower, by design, is not built like the other three routes.

♫ One of these is not like the others ♫

To explain what makes CF challenging, I need to go back again into into how 3H manages its difficulty, because unlike the other three paths, this one follows its own set of rules:

The Armory/Vendor/Battalion Guild stock is updated one third and last time in Ch. 12.

Part 1 ends in Ch. 12 with a Suggested Level of 25.

Edelgard & Hubert get their unique battalions in Chapter 12 (is Hubert a lord too…?).

The most number of bosses you’re forced to take down to clear story missions is 4 in Ch. 15 once (3 if you play carefully), and then 5 for both Ch. 16 and Ch. 17.

The game stops throwing Intermediate Class enemies in Ch. 14 for main story missions.

Edelgard’s paralogue is unlocked in Ch. 15, midway through Part 2.

The difference in enemy levels between successive story missions goes as follows:

Ch. 11 to Ch. 12: 4 in Normal & Hard, and 3 in Maddening.

Ch. 17 to Ch. 18: 2 in Normal & Hard, and 3 in Maddening.

And finally, the game ends in Ch. 18 with a final Suggested Level of 37.

And this isn’t even considering how every story mission from Ch. 12 onwards is exclusive to it for story reasons, or even factoring the other tweaks exclusive to CF, such as: having one Chapter less to receive funds and recruit students/teachers; having 2 units that join in Part 2 with innate access to Mastermind; its second half of the game being full of enemy pegasi/wyvern riders; its last chapters having a high number of monsters with anti-magic barriers, and with weapons used in no other route; and more stuff which I won’t cover here for brevity’s sake.

Dedue's Monster form is legit the strongest Giant Demonic Beast in the game in both raw stats and weapon.

Everything mentioned so far about Edelgard’s route highlights that, compared to the other three paths: it scales up the difficulty earlier; makes its resources available earlier as well; and raises the challenge of its last two chapters considerably. Incidentally, this in turn explains why the path is a viable option to obtain the “Yellow Title Screen” after finishing it on Maddening difficulty despite having fewer Chapters; it's because its difficulty was optimized to work with that specific length in mind.

Here is where the crux at hand lies. Why “fixing” Crimson Flower isn’t just adding more chapters to it and calling it a day.

Edelgard’s route, structure-wise, does not feel it was meant to be as long as the other three paths.

This is important because, as well-intentioned the idea of “fixing” the route is, adding more chapters over what’s already there would completely throw off its balancing and potentially and unintentionally make it the hardest route of the four by numbers alone (and this is is still accounting that you would have to fight even more bosses later on…).

To illustrate what exactly I mean by this-

I'm going to propose 2 experiments.

First, let’s imagine an hypothetical scenario where KT and Intelligent Systems listen to the fan uproar over Crimson Flower’s shortness and add more chapters to it. The catch? There won’t be any other changes done to the base game. As a result, CF’s unique scaling stays due to the assumption it's presence is unrelated to its short length, meaning:

There's still 4/3 levels of difference between Chapter 11 and 12, for Normal & Hard/Maddening).

The level scaling remains consistent with no alterations unlike the other routes, up until the Last Chapter in Maddening Difficulty where the Average Enemy Level increases by 3.

This is how the route’ Suggested Levels' would look like for its chapters, compared to Dimitri and Claude’s stories, as well the Church's.

Now everyone's finally- Wait a second...

(Click here if you wanna check it on the spreadsheet)

(Note: Suggested Level is the value shown when you're about to start a mission. In-game, it's used as an indicator of the map's difficulty and the level the game expects you to be in order to beat it.)

From my understanding, the whole point of the idea of “fixing” CF comes from the desire of making it a proper equal to Azure Moon and Verdant Wind, not unlike how in Warriors: Three Hopes, Scarlet Blaze, Azure Gleam and Golden Wildfire are equal in length and difficulty scaling (at least by the time the game ends). From the get go, we can see how this experiment has failed, because now Crimson Flower has the highest average enemy levels for its late game. To properly “fix” Crimson Flower in this instance, we would need to either redo its difficulty scaling from scratch to make it match the other routes, or just simply give it one Chapter less like Silver Snow, in which case, it still fails the experiment's purpose.

As a result, we now move to our Second Experiment: We will make Edelgard’s route unfinished. To do this, we will assume CF was meant to always have 22 Chapters, and as logic dictates, it's unique difficulty scaling would serve no purpose, meaning that, as far difficulty parameters go, there's now a 1 level difference for enemies between Chapters whose missions are played back to back, impacting now both Ch.11 to Ch. 12, and Ch.17 to Ch. 18.

Here’s how the Suggested Levels' would look like in this case:

(Scaling it for Maddening wasn't easy...).

(Click here if you wanna check it on the spreadsheet)

These numbers look far more harmonious, yeah? Not only that, in this one you can clearly tell by the sequence the numbers follow that something is very off with Edelgard’s path- Not only it's somehow easier in Normal and Hard, something which is meant to come after Ch. 18 clearly isn’t there. Will it come around later as free DLC, as the rumors say? The evidence says it’s likely, though we dunno if it will happen yet.

This isn’t our reality though, and I have a big hunch on why it was never on the cards in our case. Both interviews which speak about the route’s development always coincide on one vital area:

–On top of that, [Black Eagles] also had a hidden story branch. Yokota: We kept it hidden, but the idea to have a story branch was there since the creation of the Black Eagle route. –Did you have plans to implement a story branch for the other houses? Yokota: No. We only decided it for the Black Eagle house and to keep it a secret.

——————————————————————————————————

Kusakihara: [...] Walking with Edelgard in “Crimson Flower”, or rather known as the, “Supreme Ruler Route” is something we honestly meant to be much more difficult to enter. Yokota: I’m really sorry to you, Kusakihara-san too, but I was also someone who battled with Koei Tecmo on it. The exploration event split was initially too difficult and there were no hints at all.[...] Kusakihara: Compared to what I envisioned, it’s about 3 times easier to enter, but that’s fine, I think.

From all four routes, CF was the only one which was meant to be a secret.

Picture this: you’re developing a video game with four routes that happens to love recycling its own content a lot, and you even have solid in-universe reasons for it too! And yet, you decide to hide one of the four just because. The reasoning here isn’t important. What is, however, is its secrecy. You want people to play the game, and have some of them stumble across it by accident and be surprised. Under this train of logic, I ask the following question:

Would it work to its benefit, if it was very similar to the other three routes regardless?

The answer to this question would be probably not. From then on, it becomes important to have that one route be different. Not follow the same rules the others do. Otherwise, what is the point of having it be a secret?

Edelgard’s route, as the theorem, proposes is the odd one out on purpose. Its identity stems from how it was conceived as the route which would be super hard to access, before the plan changed because Silver Snow was received poorly by KT’s testing team + devs. And because it’s the odd one out, trying to make it fit a very different mold isn’t gonna be an easy job, to the point you have to wonder if it would be best to just redo the whole thing from scratch instead.

In my humble opinion, this very well explains why the route is so different in both gameplay and outside of it, but I'll digress on the latter since that one's not the point of this post...

[loathemetc]

Bedman? Analysis from a guy who started playing Bedman last week

Bedman in Xrd:

Has four quartercircle forward specials

These specials leave behind an icon in the place they were used

By using the equivalent quartercircle back these attacks could be repeated from the icon point 

The icons could be destroyed and you could only have one of the two projectile attacks and their repeats out at once anyways 

Has a very short range super and a really bad super

Bedman in Strive:

Has three different quartercircle forward specials 

After one of these attacks is used, a different automatic follow up attack happens a fixed period of time later, independant of bedman's movement 

Quartercircle back inputs can be used to speed up or delay the automatic attack 

Has a super that buffs Bedman and his followup attacks and a short range? super

It seems like Bedman’s going to be a lot stronger in Strive now that his follow up attacks can’t be completely negated by smacking a little icon, and he has a good install super instead of. The sheep one. I’m going to miss the bed slam attack and it’s a bit of a shame to lose the boomerang and teleporting properties of his old projectiles, but it seems like he’ll be just as(?) versatile with the followups, even if it’s in a different way. 

...Well, I’m not actually going to be missing it because I’ll still be playing Xrd. I don’t own Strive that shit’s expensive and I just spent way too much money pre-ordering Street Fighter 6. 

[ideas-on-paper]

Why I love Mass Effect 1's gameplay (spoiler-free review)

Very recently, I completed my first ever playthrough of Mass Effect 1 - a well renown, beloved game that has nevertheless received quite harsh criticisms for its gameplay. The somewhat rough-around the edges shooter gameplay, the confusing inventory system and frustrating Mako controls were the most common complaints, some of which BioWare addressed in the recent Legendary Edition remake of ME1.

Still, after some extensive research, I decided to buy the old trilogy version anyway (call me oldschool if you like, but I'm a bigger fan of some of the OG light effects) - and imagine my surprise when despite having signed up for a somewhat more tedious gameplay experience, I came to actually enjoy it. In fact, I think ME1 does a lot of things right that other RPGs do wrong - to this day, I might add. For analysis purposes, I will be using the game NieR: Automata (© SquareEnix/Platinum Games, 2017) as a comparison, mainly because I played these two games back to back.

The level system

One thing I absolutely loathe about modern RPGs is how you can essentially break the game by overleveling yourself - not by conscious grinding, but by simply knowing what you're doing. While the level of some enemies in Nier Automata - especially during Route A - may seem daunting at first, all of this can be completely bypassed with the help of one little trinket: the EXP+ chip. While the effect may not be immediate, you will eventually reach the point where you surpass everything the game throws at you in terms of strength - by nothing more than understanding and making use of the game's mechanics. Nier Automata tried to remedy that by introducing a level scaling system, and while this worked out fine in Route B, it appears the developers were too lazy to properly implement it during the endgame: In Route C, all of the enemies are stuck at level 50 (60 for some bosses), so they really were no match for me at level 95. At some point, I got tired of all enemies keeling over if I so much as blew in their general direction, which was one of the reasons why Route C just felt so lackluster to me.

Because of this, I decided to play Mass Effect 1 on Veteran difficulty from the start, just so I don't accidentally make the game too easy for me again (despite having never played a shooter before, lol). However, little did I know there was no need to worry, because somewhat miraculously, Mass Effect 1 manages to avoid any kind of level exploit entirely: The reason for that is that unlike in many other RPGs (including Nier Automata), leveling up doesn't give you an inherent boost to your attack/defense - instead, you have to allot points to specific skills to improve your base values. However, while a little bonus to your stats certainly helps, it's the combat skills that you should focus on: To gain the upper hand in battle, you have to make use of abilities such as temporary damage immunity, overloading the enemies' shields or making them more vulnerable to your attacks. Although this means that you will be spamming abilities pretty much non-stop, you don't have to worry about robbing yourself of any challenge, as the game will keep you on your toes from the first battle right until the final boss. Also, since the level cap is set at 50, you can't simply max out all of your skills, which acts as a nice counterbalance and compels you to distribute your points wisely. (Imagine if the level cap in Nier Automata would've been 50 - perhaps that would've made the endgame actually challenging.)

Another thing I really appreciate is that the equipment you find is always appropriate to your current level. This is because once you start a mission, land on a planet or enter a facility, the equipment you can loot is randomly generated on the spot (you can see this if you revisit a place you went to before but didn't loot: the items will always match the level you were at during your first visit). This not only prevents you from potentially finding an OP weapon early on which you can solo the whole game with, but also the awkward situation of stumbling into "low-level" sidequest when you can no longer use the items you get from them. Also, since the enemies' strength relies just as much on equipment as your own, you always fight on pretty even ground, which means you will neither run into an overpowered squad too strong for you nor an underleveled group which goes down faster than a cardboard wall. Now, that's a way to implement proper level scaling.

The game economy

Another problem that many games suffer from is that you get tons of money, but have next to no opportunity to actually spend it on anything. In the first half of Nier Automata, the "Half-wit Inventor" quest may give a motivation to invest your money into something, but once you accumulated the 180,000 G, pretty much all you need money for is buying and upgrading your weapons, and finding the materials to do the latter is generally more of an issue. The one really cost-intensive thing you need currency for is fusing chips, but since the max chip level is 6 and your capacity is limited anyway, you will arrive at the point where you neither can nor want to upgrade your chips any further. As one might guess, this resulted in me amassing huge amounts of money (in no small part due to my extensive fishing trips), but since there was nothing that I could spend it on, the numbers didn't do much besides looking good.

Mass Effect, on the other hand, possesses a very effective game economy which gives you ample opportunities to make use of the money you earned - if you're focused on optimization, that is. Even though you will find plenty of equipment lying around, it's worth checking the shops from time to time, since they sometimes offer items slightly above your current level. Of course, the prices are accordingly high, and I often had to use almost all the money I made by mining minerals, looting chests/safes, etc.

I will say though that ME1 lacks any unique weapons - ultimately, there are 1-3 "high-end" items for each equipment category (often with marginal differences in stats), while all the other inferior products can simply be disregarded. This means that you usually want to pick the best weapons and armor possible and pimp them with mods as much as you can, while the rest of the stuff is there just for selling. However, even though this may be a bit of a chore, it actually benefits the game economy as a whole: Right before the final mission, I bought a high-end armor for Wrex and two level 10 mods at the Emporium on the Citadel, almost exhausting my entire money reserves - something which wouldn't have been possible without the few extra credits I made by selling superfluous equipment to the outfitter on the ship. The only criticism I have is that there is no "sort by" filter for the selling screen (e.g. selecting that you want to sell shotguns, assault rifles, etc. instead of the standard arrangement by item level) - that would've made things less tedious and time-consuming.

Saving

This may sound silly, but one thing I honestly perceived as such a quality of life improvement when I started playing Mass Effect is that you can not only save literally everywhere, but you will also continue exactly where you left off upon loading. In Nier Automata - and quite a few other games for that matter - you can either only save at certain checkpoints, or the game will automatically place you next to the nearest checkpoint upon loading your save (which may be a fair walking distance away from where you actually left off). However, in Mass Effect, you won't find yourself in the general vicinity of where you last saved, but at the exact same spot - a true blessing that spares you a lot of backtracking and frustration. (I know some people like to call this "save-scumming", but believe me, when one of your squadmates can't join you in battle because they got stuck behind a closed door - which happened to me with Wrex on Noveria - you will thank every god in existence that you're able to load a recent save game.)

Exploration and sidequests

If there's one aspect where Nier Automata and Mass Effect are actually tied, I'd say it's the open world exploration. All criticisms aside, the environments of Nier Automata are a true highlight, and I spent hours walking around just enjoying the scenery, atmosphere, and music. Although Mass Effect is understandably more limited in the graphical department due to its release in 2007, the extraterrestrial landscapes nevertheless manage to look truly captivating, and I had fun taking screenshots of some of my favorite views. However, while you usually explore the world of Nier Automata on foot (or with a mount of your choice), you inevitably will have to use the Mako for Mass Effect's planet-bound missions. Admittedly, the Mako has absolutely earned its reputation as a bouncy vehicle with next to no roadholding, and the physics of that thing are occasionally quite insane. Still, from my experience, it's not completely uncontrollable, and as long as you don't drive like a madman and try to avoid steep terrain, you should be fine - unless you have no other choice than to vertically drive up a cliff (P.S. I hate you Eletania).

Nevertheless, my little excursions in both Nier Automata and Mass Effect ended up having a similar, very relaxing effect on me - which is something that actually surprised even myself, since I'm usually not the biggest fan of open world games. I guess that's because a lot of them tend to have huge, overwhelming maps, and while having the biggest open world is something like a "status symbol" among game developers these days, it doesn't really do anything except making me feel lost and confused. Meanwhile, the free-roaming areas of Nier Automata and Mass Effect are quite spacious, but not so large that you lose any kind of orientation. Also, another thing many open world games do (and that really annoys me) is that they simply put a bunch of symbols on your map for you to traipse around, which is really nothing more than an employment-creation measure for the player. In contrast, Nier Automata and Mass Effect deliberately avoid putting all points of interest on the map - instead, you have to find chests, minerals, and all kinds of other treasures by yourself. While this may be perceived as "userunfriendly" by some players, I think it actually encourages you to go out there and explore, and the feeling of being rewarded for your own curiosity is immensely satisfying - a thousand times better than having everything served on a silver platter.

Last but not least, although Nier Automata is the one that always gets praised for its ambivalent, disturbing sidequests - and rightfully so (in fact, you could say I enjoyed the sidequests more than the main story) - Mass Effect is in no way inferior to it: Just like in Nier Automata, there are sidequests which really make you feel pensive and empty by the end. Personally, "Citadel: Signal Tracking" and "UNC: Geth Incursions" were the ones that unsettled me the most, but "UNC: Missing Survey Team", "UNC: Dead Scientists", and "UNC: Besieged Base" are also runners-up. In general, many of the quests ultimately leave you wondering "what did I actually do right now?" and whether your actions were justified - it truly feels like an insolvable aporia with no right or wrong solution, the only difference being your own moral perspective.

Furthermore, I think it's noteworthy how sidequests are utilized in both of these games from a storytelling perspective. If you take Witcher 3, for example, you will notice that the game tries to make its sidequests into their own independent storylines - a story in a story, so to speak. Meanwhile, the approach of Nier Automata and Mass Effect is completely different: Instead of treating its sidequests as separate entities, they act as little snippets presenting themes and topics that tie directly into the main narrative, enhancing the story as a whole. Together, all these pieces form an intricate, well-constructed web, making up the essence of the story when viewed in its entirety - a strategy which I personally find way more appealing.

---

Conclusion

Despite feeling a bit dated, Mass Effect 1's gameplay still holds up surprisingly well - in fact, the game manages to avoid a lot of pitfalls that many RPGs struggle with even today. Thus, I think the first entry of BioWare's hit series truly sets the standard for what is a good RPG, being an example that all game developers should learn some valuable lessons from.

[blueskittlesart]

did u not like totk?

i LOVED totk. i think it was well-written and did its job as a sequel to botw very well. HOWEVER. i do think it suffered slightly from the commercial success of botw. as i mentioned in my last post, nintendo does this. thing. when one of their games gets popular where every game after it has to be Exactly The Same so they can make all the money in the world via comparison marketing. (and this is a problem with the wider game industry in general but also a very observable pattern in loz specifically.) I know it's been a pretty long time since botw came out, but before (and immediately following) its release there was some pushback from longtime fans who worried that the open-world and lack of traditional dungeons meant that the game had strayed too far from the classic formula that makes a game a "zelda game." this is to say, botw was EXPERIMENTAL. and the devs had no idea if what they were doing was going to be successful or not. the open-world of botw wasn't a gimmick, and it wasn't the devs jumping on the open-world bandwagon. it was what CREATED that bandwagon. the open-world was a deliberate choice made specifically for botw because it reinforced the story that botw was designed to tell. the game is about exploring a desolate world, about making connections, and rebuilding both the broken kingdom and the player character's shattered sense of self by traveling and learning and building relationships. a large open-world map with only minor quest guidelines and lots of collectibles and side quests lends itself perfectly to this specific story, which is specifically about exploration and rebirth.

the problem is, botw was. almost TOO good. it was so good that every other game company on the planet started scrambling to build giant open-world maps into their next release, regardless of how much sense that actually made narratively. and because of that, when it came time to release a sequel to botw, the devs had a lot to think about. they had HUGE shoes to fill in terms of fan reception, but they were ALSO being asked to follow up one of the best-performing games of all time, commercially. totk needed to SELL as well as botw. And, likely because nintendo was worried about that potential commercial value, totk needed to keep people comfortable. I don't know for certain, but I definitely get the feeling playing totk that the devs were specifically told not to stray too far from what made botw marketable and successful--that being the open world and the versatility of gameplay. so in order to follow that up, they made... 2 more huge open maps, and new gimmick gameplay which was explicitly super-versatile.

do i think that the extra maps and ultrahand were BAD choices? no. however, i don't think they necessarily ADDED anything to the game as a narrative whole. one of my favorite things about botw was how everything seemed to be designed AROUND the narrative, with gameplay elements slotting neatly into the story thematically. totk just. didn't really have that, imo. there wasn't a huge narrative benefit to the gigantic, completely unpopulated depths and sky maps. ultrahand was cool, but within the context of the story it meant basically nothing. in some ways, i almost think totk could have benefitted from a much more linear approach to its storytelling, a la skyward sword, because there are a lot of story beats that have to be found in chronological order in order to have the right emotional impact, but because of the nonlinear open-world it kind of became a struggle to hit all the important story points in the right order. an easy example of this is the dragon's tears in comparison to the memories--the dragon tears have a very specific set order in which they happen, and finding them out of order can make the story you're seeing in them feel confusing and disjointed. the order in which they should be found is technically displayed on the temple wall, but most players aren't going to pick up on that or follow it--more likely, they're just going to explore the geoglyphs as they come across them organically, and therefore will likely witness the story in a completely disjointed way. compare this to the botw memories, which ALSO technically have a set order--the order in which they're displayed on the sheikah slate. however, because they're largely just small moments in time, and not one continuous story, finding them out of order has a lot less of an impact on how you as the player experience the narrative, and it's not hugely detrimental to your experience of the story if you find them naturally as you explore rather than explicitly seeking them out in order. If TOTK had been allowed to deviate from the botw formula a bit, i think we may have ended up with a more cohesive game in terms of narrative beats like that. as it is, i just think the game is torn slightly between wanting to be its own new game with new gameplay and needing to be botw, if that makes sense.

[rdr2gifs]

''the morning light, when it comes to me, it was there but I could not see''

Arthur’s life was profoundly shaped by his self-hatred, lack of self-worth and disbelief in the existence of kindness in a seemingly dark and cruel world.

I strongly disagree with the statement that Arthur only became a ‘’better’’ man after being diagnosed with tb. His struggle with his true/inner self is apparent as early as chapter one. ‘’You are not who you think you are, sir… which is lucky’’

He has lived a rough life, raised by criminals and surrounded by violence ever since he was born. It was installed in him early that his value lied within being a violent enforcer and he has lived this life since, knowing nothing else. As a highly aware person, Arthur's actions weight heavy on his soul. He accepts that his actions have consequences. He knows that a person who has caused so much suffering is not meant to have happiness in life. His way of life has caused him to believe that he is not worthy of love or redemption. He doesn’t want to believe that a person like him could be capable of any good. (a thing to note here is that imo, Arthur’s actions near his death weren’t attempts at redemption but rather a strong desire to do right and possibly be his true self.) This is why he keeps living as he does as it’s the only thing he’s ever known, it’s the thing that brings him profit, praise from the person he looks up to and he is already damned so he might as well continue living this life anyway.

The internal problem Arthur faces is that this violent, cruel way of life doesn’t align with what I’d call his true self/ideals. He is torn between the harsh reality he has known and an unconscious yearning for righteousness/love. To be able to carry on with his actions he must enforce certain ideals within himself, such as: I am bad, ugly, nasty, ignorant, mean etc. He also decides to see the dark side of reality, telling himself that the world is a grim dark place and this is just as things were meant to be. This is why he feels so uncomfortable being complimented for his good deeds, because a bad rotten person like him should not be able to do good. It breaks the image he has built for himself and he doesn’t want that happening. This can be seen a lot during the ‘’Money Lending and Other Sins’’ missions where he is unusually mean (even for his standards) to each of the debtors. Imo, he acts this way because he must truly convince himself of being a terrible man to be able to carry out a job which revolts him so badly. In the last debt collecting mission with J. John Weathers, it can be seen in his face/expressions how much he is struggling to put on a tough, uncaring, heartless act. He needs to maintain a ruthless persona to survive in the world he knows. He must convince himself of his own cruelty.

''Forgive me, but that's the problem. You don't know you.''

Contrary to Arthur’s beliefs, he is a naturally kind-hearted person who is unconsciously drawn towards kindness. And yes, even before he was diagnosed with tb. This can be seen in the people he respects the most and, in his willingness to help strangers (notice how he often does unnecessary acts of service for total strangers such as: carrying their things, holding out hands etc. even though they had already troubled him). Despite the life he has lived, Arthur does not enjoy violence, he does not enjoy hurting people. He doesn’t want to dominate over others. He thinks mostly about others and not about himself. This fact alone is very telling of his character.

He writes about Charles, a man who he truly respects: ‘’He’s a better man than me. He does not need to think to be good. It comes naturally to him, like right is deep within as opposed to this conflict between GOOD↔EVIL that rages within me.’’ A man who is not struggling with his inner self would not have written this. To me this clearly implies an inner desire to be a better man. He writes about his mentors: ‘’I love Dutch like a father, but in many ways, I love Hosea even more. He’s kind and fair and like a human being. Dutch is something else.’’ Clearly showing a preference for Hosea who is of a more gentle nature and shows genuine kindness. Unsurprisingly, these are the people who see through his dumb/though act and encourage him to drop it.

When he comes across Brother Dorkins for the first time, he writes: ‘’(he)was one of those innocent people who make you feel better about human beings and about yourself a little. Must be odd to see all that goodness in the world. Place always seemed dark and brutal to me.’’ Expressing how he does not see goodness in the world, implying lack of good examples/kindness/good experiences in his life. Yet, the monk leaves an impression and imo, this encounter (seeing genuine goodness) disrupts Arthur’s perception of what the world truly is. ‘’Just as evil begat evil your whole life long, so good may begat good’’ (what strengthens my belief in this, is the following, symbolic scene of Arthur realising the consequences of his actions right after picking up a crucifix. He was aware of them before sure, but is unable to truly ignore them now having seen it right in front of his eyes). If only Arthur was presented with more examples of goodness in his life.

''You have it in you... I can tell!''

His desire to do as much good as possible after realising he won’t live long is instant. This would not be the mindset of someone who did not already possess kindness in his heart. ‘’Know glory and forget about shame.’’ Arthur’s shame and self-loathing caused by his previous actions were what was holding him back from allowing kindness into his life. Knowing that he has limited time left has not made him into someone he wasn’t before. The diagnosis was a catalyst, allowing him to embrace that love/goodness truly does exist and accelerate the process of chipping away from the persona he has made for himself. This was a newfound understanding for him as in the past he was rejecting any notion of kindess. In himself and perhaps the whole existence of it. ‘’You keep hidden all that matters, even from yourself.’’

After being diagnosed, he writes: ‘’What kind of a man have I been? What kind of a man am I? What world is this we live in? A land of fury or a place of love? Am I being prepared for eternal damnation? Am I past any kind of saving? Is that all fairytales? Man ain’t got much good in him. I ain’t got no good in me… I don’t think and yet I see goodness. I see it. If not in me, in good folk. In Abigail and her love for Jack. In that silly monk. In Downes, I guess. Begging not for himself but for the poor, even though he was near starving himself. Maybe I don’t want salvation. Part of me has always longed for death.’’ This entry perfectly shows how deep Arthur’s self-loathing goes and just how much it has damaged him. As his journal allows a look into his true feelings, he truly does not see a single good thing about himself. He knew for a long time that the way he lives is detestable but he could not let go of it. Not because he didn’t want to, but because it’s all that he has ever known. He didn’t believe in anything else. This sudden acceptance of goodness has allowed him to see clearly, which was obscured from him before, and for the first time, enabled him to act free of past regrets for what is right.

⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪

Arthur’s redemption is not about becoming a good man. It is about finding the strength to change and recognise your true self despite a lifetime of self-loathing and breaking free from destructive beliefs of the past.

In Arthurian legends a stag is a symbol of the unending quest of spiritual knowledge/enligtenment

[rimeiii]

Ooh interesting, kinda acts like the Modules in Arknights and the exclusive Crimebrands in Path to Nowhere (ig? I haven't played PtN in a long while)...

Actually, I desperately hope it works similarly to the Modules in Arknights, purely because of how F2P it is. Modules provide a stat buff as well as Talent modifications to an E2 unit. Requiremenrs for unlocking Modules in Arknights are as follows:

Have the unit hit Elite 2 (the final uncap stage), and following that, a certain level: 40 for 4*, 50 for 5*, 60 for 6*

The unit must reach 100 Trust (think of it like PtN's Compliance or Affection in most other gachas)

Module Data Blocks (you can get these from weekly missions, event rewards, and the Purchase Certificate shop)

Other farmable materials, depending on the unit

LMD, the in-game currency

Clearing two missions with the character (usually involves using a certain skill or killing a certain amount of enemies)

Once unlocked, you can upgrade them, which require: Data Supplement Sticks, Data Supplement Devices (both obtainable in the Stationary Security Service as well as event rewards), and some more LMD.

I think exclusive Crimebrands work similarly to Modules, but I'm not 100% sure. PtN players feel free to factcheck me on this!

Back to WHB, I can see them adopting this feature into their 'artifact' system. It keeps things F2P friendly by not gating things behind another gacha - as long as you have the unit, you're golden. Or, like OP suggested, they could also get the artifacts at a shop - this would then somewhat follow Princess Connect: ReDive's character-specific equipment unlock method, where you'll have to purchase Shards at the shop using the Memory Pieces you get from simply pulling in the gacha or grinding events to unlock them (for PriFes units and seasonal lims at least - a large amount of characters' Shards can be grinded for).

Extrapolating based on what we saw in the trailers I think this might be the case. The banners on the side seem to correspond to specific character rateups, and the items obtained in the pull video are all characters. Unless there's more banners hidden at the side there doesn't seem to be an artifact banner either, so artifacts are likely a grind tied to the character.

Ideally these artifacts will boost a unit from a mediocre/underwhelming state to a far more usable one, kinda like the infamous Mod3 S3M3 Mostima. But there are concerns that I have from the gameplay trailer with Paimon missing more damage instances than hitting - would that mean the artifact for him becomes necessary if you want to use him in any capacity? We'll have to wait and see on launch....

Anyways sorry for the long post OP hshshshshs I wanted to add my own two cents as someone who plays several gacha tower defense games

Translations from Gacha System PV

Ayeee~!!! About ~2 more days until game release! Here's a couple more TLs from the PV for the gacha system! ☆*: .｡. o(≧▽≦)o .｡.:*☆

Link to the PV: https://x.com/Prettybusy_KR/status/1676055559571906562?s=20

Names of the featured lower-level demons:

Max

Toto

Lucy

Jo*n Cena

Some Additional Features from the Game:

From the PV, it seems like we can get artifacts that can increase the rates for debuffs, attacks, etc., for specific characters. The one the PV shows is an S-level artifact called "Black Tea That Never Cools"/ "Never-cooling Black Tea" (식지 않는 홍차) . From the description, it's supposed to be for increasing the rate/impact of the attack of the character the artifact is applied to + debuff from opponent's attacks.

I'm also assuming we can buy artifacts separately in the Shop like Twisted Wonderland rather than having to pull like Genshin Impact/Honkai Star Rail based on how the PV shows only characters and not artifacts.

I could be completely wrong though since I'm not that well-versed with Korean gaming terminology and making guesses, so don't take my words at 100%  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Hopefully they keep the features where they show the increase chances of rolling a character like seen on the right though (i.e., 확률 UP with Buer and Sitri)!

[raycatzdraws]

Toon Link is aiming through his skull.

I main as Young Link and Toon Link in ssbu and thought it might be fun to tweak their designs a bit based on the alt costumes I wear and how I play. Their names are Zip and Zop (interchangeably) with botw Link as Zap.

[rayroseu]

THE MAJESTIC EXCELLENCY HERSELF 😍😍😍😍💚💚💚💚 also maybe its just me but is it a reach to hope that an ACTUAL Disney villain can cameo in TWST?? 😆 You know like how Mickey randomly appears before us akjdkss

Also i find it interesting how Yuu immediately got up to go to the Maleficent Statue after concluding the dream as "Maleficent is being left out..." She reminded him of One Guy lol 😭 Also Yuu lore crumbs that theyre finally catching up that their dreams is related to the next overblot lol

ALSO AAAAAHHH SEBEKKKK 💚💚💚✨✨✨ I missed hearing his "human!!" FULLY VOICED✨✨✨ Haruki Ishiya san... thank you 😭💚💚💚

I love his attitude change LMFAO and Silver being the polite person he is insisting Sebek to apologize and Sebek just doesnt lol... SOBS... Also agree with Grim lol Diasomnia literally the most dramatic dorm lol

Also I find it so funny that "Malleus evil smile" expression is his Happiest Expression LMFOAOAOA He's thoroughly AMUSED by Yuu calling him Hornton in front of Sebek (of all people) without hesitance 😭😭

Ohhh Malleus loves chaos alright ✅✅✅💥💥 and his family and friends getting along...😭😭💕💕💕

Also the part where the npcs talked about him broke my heart aughh...

He's just talking with his classmates and everyone is already whispering how "he shouldn't be in this school he's going to curse everyone" (OKAY maybe theyre going to be right about that in a few more updates butksjdjs) But aaa knowing the fact he has superb hearing skills.... I like to imagine he's hearing these rumors while talking to Yuu and the knights but he's just ignoring the rumors since there's a few peopke who are treating him like a normal person right now 😭😭

I LOVE HOW THIS IMPLIES LILIA RELIES ON SILVER THE MOST TOO!!! He couldve asked Sebek or Malleus since theyre the people with no sleep problems... but nooo he insisted on Silver waking him up!! AUDGAUHS I thought he's a general who focuses on efficiency... 😭😭 He just wants Silver to wake him up... i know you lilia 🔍🔍🔍🤨🤨

I am in good pain... considering!! in Book 7!! Lilia repeatedly appears to be a reliance for Silver whenever he feels hopeless... I CANT. Lilia is just like more lowkey about how much he actually relies on his son 😭😭💚💚

ROOK BEING IN THE RUINS TOO IS SO FUNNY LFMAOOO THATS ONE OF MALLEUS' TOP INTERSHIP LIST??? ITS LILIA'S P.E VIGNETTE ALL OVER AGAIN LMFOAOAA HE'S GONNA HARASS MALLEUS DOWN IF THEYRE COWORKERS AHFHAHDHA

Imagine them in the ruins and finally Malleus has someone who is enthusiastic about ""boring facts about Gargoyles and Abandoned Ruins"" but its just... got to be THIS GUY Rook Hunt... who once tried to playfully harm Lilia lol

Malleus and Rook Duo is actually so funny though 😂😂 It still cracks me up that Malleus was once invited on Rooks Bday but he didnt attend cuz he's annoying to him and most notably Rook is not even hostile to him??? He just didnt attend bcs he hates his guts omg😭😭💥💥

This fact is so weird to me... What do you mean that some teeth just becomes an automatic RADIO under the right conditions????😭 Is this a foreshadow to Zigvolts Dentistry??? 😳⚡💚✨✨✨

Can a fae teeth play Elvis Presley just by opening their mouths...?? You know like Stitch acting as a phonograph... 😂

But I doubt??? They have radio towers at Briar Valley so it probably doesnt happen????? But It'd be pretty funny if Briar Valley radio just play bardcore music and one poor fae was "cursed" to have "magical radio teeth" playing bardcore everytime lol

My first thought was "Sebek!!!!✨✨✨" here actually 😭💚 Since he's the only freshman we're missing rn...

But I was surprised Yuu thought of Malleus??? That just further implies Yuu recognizes him as a friend that'll help them too 😭😭😭

Its just precious to think that someone finds Malleus reliable, he'll be so happy to assist Yuu if they're having trouble with anything just like how he enthusiastically offered to explain more about the Thorn Fairy since Yuu is curious about it...😭💖💞💖💗💕 I love them to BITS OMFG...

(I'm sad that Yuu is going home too but I'm ignoring that lol🚶‍♀️🚶‍♀️ Yuu is a self insert theyre supposed to speak MY language of staying with Mal-)

Its devastating that the freshmen are so hyped up to be working together THEY ARE NOT PROCESSING THE IMPLICATIONS OF YUU GOING HOME... 💔😂 if Yuu truly goes home, theres no reason for them to be gathering like this on the cafeteria anymore... 😭😭💔💔 Making myself sad that they'll buy an extra plate for them during lunch break and not even Grim touches that food... just to honor their friend😭😭😭

Wait so we know that the first night in "sleepover to discover Mickey" consists of Deuce and Ace as Grim and Yuu's companion...

Maybe the next nights (without Malleus' overblot interupption) consisted of Epel and Jack, and then possibly Ortho and Malleus??? (since Ortho is the one who suggested that therell be a fae)

Oh but Im going to cry if at Book 7's ending consisted of Yuu inviting Malleus for a sleepover at Ramshackle despite what happened... 😭😭😭 and and like the stars aligning appears once again but this time he's not at ruined Ramshackle missing his friend... He's at a peaceful sleepover with a friend group auGh... 😭😭😭💖💕💞💗💞💗

[yarpharp]

Wait wait wait guys I take back some of my grumpy hate for the gameplay trailer because wait HOLY SHIT I CONNECTED TWO DOTS HAPAHAZARDLY AND IT FEELS LEGIT.

Okay okay so.... Remember when Rook was taking out those statue pillars? And they had very specific ornamental designs?

They were VERY SPECIFIC IN THEIR DESIGN. and now look at some enhanced images of the entities showing up behind Solas:

NOTICE ANYTHING FAMILIAR???

Like bro.... Were those designed to actually summon them or were they DESIGNED TO HOLD THEM BACK WHILE THE RITUAL WAS TAKING PLACE?

The only one that I can see in this shot that is still standing in the lower reaches near where Solas was conducting the ritual is this one:

Mega spikey head elf.

So like.... Seriously, what is going on here? Solas is obviously trying to tear down the Veil and will inevitably have to take down the Evanuris... But did he really plan on taking on the Evanuris FIRST? Or was he just gonna use them like sacrificial lambs to power the ritual??? What if those statues connected to the Evanuris??? Was Solas planning a way to hit two birds with one stone here???

Okay y'all I'm kinda back on the bandwagon again for this. This shit is wild. I take back some of my bitching. This is kinda low-key genius if this is what's going on.

[tahitismangoes]

i just finished red dead redemption 2, and i’ve gotten an overall analysis of arthur’s spirit animal being the deer.

arthur morgan being a deer makes so much sense to me. arthur, as hollow has he was, was extremely weak and fairly fragile. inside, he was always just a boy. arthur morgan didn’t know what he wanted, he never had any sense of freedom of thought, he only wanted what dutch wanted, as he was the only real adult in his life. his baby deer developed and followed the steps of dutch van der linde.

he never knew what he wanted, but, he absolutely wanted love. that’s a definite.

but; every time he fought for and managed to gain love (eg: his past partner and his son, isaac) then it would easily get ripped from him. his mother, his father, his son, and his partners. he feels like he’s a magnet for nothing but trouble, and misery, and misfit. he was defined for his antlers instead of things like his grace and his heart. which is why any, and every time he would gain a form of connection to anyone, or witness someone else attempting to love him, he uses those antlers to push people all the way back, again.

arthur never embraced a single moment of peace. as he didn’t know how NOT to live like this.

the only moment of true peace he managed to receive was the moments he was in nature, not around people who hardly understood that he needed to be approached cautiously, and that inside, he was just a kid trying to make his father figure feel proud. this is why when he climbed to the end of that cliff and led down to take his final breaths, moments like those, those were his peace. nature.

arthur morgan, how i love you

[nacrelysis]

sometimes i do just think about sumeru archon quest...i can't remember any in genshin lore where so many characters played such a huge role in the storyline and so cleanly. and how well-built the power structures/institutions are.

screams and bashes my head against the wall...the way sumeru is literally structured upon the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom but it's become a bastardized theocracy because of the akademiya sages.

the way it's literally a council of conservatives who hate the idea of moving forward with 'lesser lord' kusanali because that would actually require them to relinquish power to their god. the way they corrupt rukkhadevata's name for their own purposes because, well, she doesn't exist anymore, does she? she can't object to what they do in her name, can she? the way they intentionally pit the common people against each other and frame academia as a competition and make the entire population dependent on a network instead of their own thought so that every new generation is either burning themselves out or throwing away their identity...as long as they aren't questioning what the sages want to accomplish.

but, like. the archon quest. the traveler pops back between sumeru city and the desert because it's crucial to the development of this sociopolitical commentary. we get to see the exploitation of the desert region first-hand.

and the supporting cast is so so good. cyno, general mahamatra, and al-haitham, the akademiya scribe, give up the prestige of their titles in favor of doing the right thing: freeing nahida. dehya and candace/kandake are fighting for recognition and proper treatment of their people (dehya's character teaser literally focusing on how she uses her mercenary money to fund education for orphans and children in the desert!!) and a life free of exploitation from people claiming themselves to be "scholars." nilou tying up her mini-arc in the archon quest about how the akademiya suppresses creative liberty and the arts in order to maintain their hierarchy, nilou being the face of the resistance, nilou using her art as a method of protest and being crucial to the rescue of nahida!!

and hoyo writers tying up the socio-political commentary after the main conflict is over...nahida working with the akademiya and deshret worshippers to reconcile the prejudices and systemic oppression of the desert villages! eremites and candace and dehya and even npcs like setaria (who plays a major part in introducing the whole deshret-rukkhadevata conflict) being a part of the resolution! random notion but i really liked setaria and i'm so glad she chose to resign from the akademiya because it wasn't staying true to her moral principles in order to help improve education in her desert home ;-;

every character plays a part and i love it. i was rooting for them so hard and i was so close to crying when nahida finally got to step outside for the first time in 500 years. like !!! sumeru's archon quest got you so attached to the characters in such a little amount of time...i'm big-eyed about it all...

(also al-haitham organizing the coup so he wouldn't have to have more responsibilities in the akademiya, only to be named acting grand sage because his coup literally deposed every other possible candidate, was really funny)

[fernflowerss]

Do you see my vision? Please tell me you see my vision

[delicious-p4ncakes]

ok so I'm still confused regarding this omocat situation especially because

1) further proof is required

2) there are a lot of holes in the story

3) both melon and omocat have done bad things from what we've seen

but I do think it's completely ok to keep enjoying omori, like even Melon has said so in their twt, this thing just blew out of proportion because someone on the dev team made a rude comment to Melon while explaining their side (uncalled for tbh) and Melon decided to actually scale things up (idk what their end goal is tbh, like they blocked omocat and didn't accept the money when offered and also said they don't want money so I legit don't know how this is going to end)

if you feel like you can't support omocat anymore after everything is cleared up/ you genuinely feel bad and can't bring yourself to interact with the fan base that's totally understandable, I mean everyone has their boundaries. I'm not really that much into the fandom, I mostly stick to drawing the characters and watching gameplays so to each their own, I guess

[totem-but-shark]

let's break down what made foolishs fruit mountain technique so effective because there's actually quite a lot to unpack here. -From a doozer who's been following his fruit mountain escapades from first playing the game to developing his strategy to winning this tournament.

The diagrams two best strengths are it's simplicity and speed. It's a very repetitive technique, there's a pattern to it that when followed everything else falls into place. It being so simple cuts down significantly on time needed to assess the plate, deciding where to place and throwing your fruit as though obviously theres manual input and adjustments needed for poor placements or unlucky fruit spawns, most time and energy can be dedicated to following the systems rhythm. Foolish has become confidently fluent with this pattern and seemingly gets faster every time he plays it through, he doesn't need to spend ages judging exactly what placement would be most efficient when he knows if he continues to follow his system the fruit will continue to build and combine. This of course only feeds into his speed, which beyond being able to rack up high scores in such a short period of time and quickly catching up to opponents even after resets also has a hidden bonus, combo multipliers.

The way his system functions incorporates a lot of chain combinations, the fruit are laid out in such a way where Foolish places each fruit beside its next combined stage so that when one combines they all chain together to create one huge fruit which by itself already creates a high combo multiplier. However following the pattern of his strategy foolish doesn't need to wait to reassess the plate even after such significant reshuffling, he can immediately continue to keep placing left to right and combining, further boosting the combo multiplier with quick combines. Using this technique i've seen him reach almost a 2x point multiplier on several occasions, this would mean that even if he and an opponent were placing the exact same fruit in the exact same spots making identical combinations he would still have a higher score using his speed.

It may seem random or like pure luck that he always seems to be getting the exact fruit he needs but that's simply another trick of the diagram. Whilst there is certainly luck involved, placing left to right it allows him to quickly sort through the fruit spawns to get the specific one needed whilst also allowing room for multiple options and improvisation if it's just not working out by accommodating for this random chance element. This gives his technique a strong consistency to it that isn't present in many other play styles for fruit mountain that are often more dependant on lucky fruit drops. He makes decisions that may appear illogical, ignoring opportunities to combine or shoving a lone fruit to some back isolated corner of the plate but this is because he's following his system and prioritising creating a fruit chain that'll lead to a cleaner board and higher points from larger combines. You can put an isolated apple in a corner when you know you can simply continue to sort through the fruit for another three for an easy combine whilst the smaller fruit build up their own larger foundations on the left without needing to worry about being wedged between any bigger fruit needing to combine.

^ my recreation of the diagram

It's all in the layout, how you're able to structure the plate and getting into the flow of placing small fruit on the left and large on the right without getting too caught up in it and slipping up by missing opportunities or misplacement. Progression is clear and linear keeping the plate as clean as possible combining from one fruit to the next with a clear goal and structure for each step towards a watermelon. As consistent as this system is it isn't flawless and significant player input is required, you have to think quick and adapt on the fly. Beyond this technique Foolish is a skilled player on his own and I have to give him credit where credit is due, especially for coming up with this system entirely independently. The tournament was a blast to watch and he's more than deserving of the win.

o7 KOF (king of fruit)

[blueskittlesart]

*sigh* thoughts on Nintendo's botw/totk timeline shenanigans and tomfoolery?

tbh. my maybe-unpopular opinion is that the timeline is only important when a game's place on the timeline seriously informs the way their narrative progresses. the problem is that before botw we almost NEVER got games where it didn't matter. it matters for skyward sword because it's the beginning, and it matters for tp/ww/alttp (and their respective sequels) because the choices the hero of time makes explicitly inform the narrative of those games in one way or another. it matters which timeline we're in for those games because these cycles we're seeing are close enough to oot's cycle that they're still feeling the effects of his choices. botw, however, takes place at minimum 10 thousand years after oot, so its place on the timeline actually functionally means nothing. botw is completely divorced from the hero of time & his story, so what he does is a nonissue in the context of botw link and zelda's story. thus, which timeline botw happens in is a nonissue. honestly I kind of liked the idea that it happened in all of them. i think there's a cool idea of inevitability that can be played with there. but the point is that the timeline exists to enhance and fill in the lore of games that need it, and botw/totk don't really need it because the devs finally realized they could make a game without the hero of time in it.