#I don't feel like restarting the game either at this point so I'm not playing anymore

[the-insanity-of-mojiru]

Happy Birthday Mattsun! I love his stupid rice loving fish monger face!

[dayntee]

So I finished Veilguard a while back, and of course I have thoughts. I'm sure none of them are original and have been plenty stated, but hey, we all need to mourn a game when we're done with it for better or worse, so here's mine.

Note: I wrote and queued this before I was aware of the layoffs at Bioware today. This is, in no way, meant to rub salt in the wound or point fingers. If anything, I'm gutted for the people who poured their heart into this game only to be found jobless today. I'm in the exact same position myself, and have nothing but empathy for the situation. To spoil what's below - I enjoyed my time with Veilguard. It could have been better, and if you're a dev that worked on it, you probably know that. I'm sorry it's turned out the way it has, but thank you for the experience regardless. It was a fun game.

Spoilers after the break, obviously. Be aware there will be discourse, but I'm not here specifically to bash. If anything, I'm actually still grateful for the experience.

Overall, I did enjoy my time with Veilguard. After all, my final save file was around the 85 hour mark, so clearly I had no issues continuing to sink time into the game. I itched to play when I wasn't, and I got my Solavellan ending I've been waiting 10 years for, and I damn near 100%'d the whole thing (including getting the hidden cinematic after the credits). So what went wrong? What did I not like? Why do I feel so… empty now that it's over?

If I were to summarize my issues and feelings with Veilguard, it's that it felt like it gave just enough to be passable content, but never committed to being a truly exemplary experience. In every way, from system design to companion design to overarching story to itemization, everything is fine… but not great.

Knowing that DAV went through development hell contextualizes a lot of these issues. If the art book is to be believed, the project had two full blown restart buttons pushed and many leadership handoffs. I've been in conversations, though, where folks ask "Why on earth could DA2 pull off a great storytelling experience, but DAV couldn't?"

There's something else at play, and after my own experiences in the game industry and squinting between the lines to try to glean what I think may have gone wrong, I have a hunch. Pure speculation ahead: I don't think leadership ever fully agreed on a committed vision.

The broad strokes are there, and they are strong:

The Lighthouse is a cool fucking hub. It grows with your group, responds to their needs, and shapes itself around you as you experience the world. The concept of this is dope AF.

The goal is closure on all the questions left unanswered after DAI. It does get to most of these, even if not as fully and as satisfying as some of us lore nerds would have liked.

Combat is fluid and pretty engaging (at least at first). It's simple, fun, and generally fulfills power fantasies well (for context, I specialized as a full Veil Jumper Archery Rogue).

WE GET TO EXPLORE NORTHERN THEDAS. This is so cool and a place we've all wanted to go for ages. TEVINTER. NEVARRA. WEISSHAUPT. All exciting prospects.

Level design and map design are pretty A+, imo. Landscapes and set dressings are beautiful and artfully crafted. Even if there are aspects of the visual design you disagree with, they committed to it and fulfilled it well.

Exploration is fun. I rarely hunt down every chest in a game. I could not stop treasure hunting for the life of me, and some of those hidden treasures felt really special and rewarding to uncover.

The cast of characters and factions you interact with are interesting and very different - from one another and from previous casts. It's nice to see some new tropes that either haven't been used or have been out of rotation for a while.

Solas is a good antagonist. He was before, and he still is, and biased Solasmancing aside - I always looked forward to the breaks in the game where I got to banter with the Egg.

Voice over cast is fantastic. I know some folks were less fond of non-British/American accents, but honestly, I was very fine with it. It reinforced that this part of Thedas, and this time in the overall storyline, is new and different. Thedas is changing, and so are its people.

All these things said - every single positive I have above feels like they were baseline requirements for a AAA Bioware RPG. That they don't go above and beyond these bare minimums is where the game feels like it fails, especially as a payoff for a critically acclaimed entry that's 10 years old and has a passionately dedicated fanbase.

A phrase I've been using a lot with folks is that DAV feels like the Lacroix of Dragon Age games. It's got the branding, it looks like Dragon Age, and it kind of tastes like Dragon Age, but… just barely. It leaves you feeling like it's lacking. It's a hint of it, and going back to drink it again doesn't quite satisfy you.

What we call this in game development is minimum viable product (MVP), which is usually trotted out at the point by production and/or leadership when you realize you've meandered on the project for so long that you just gotta ship something. This works if you're actually going to commit to polishing it up and continuing to make it better after launch for a live service game; fix it later is fine when that's a reasonable expectation.

But Veilguard walked back on that concept. It no longer was going to be live service, but a one-and-done, and the final, late pivot meant it just had less time to cook in its final form and likely a ton of wasted work that got chucked out. There are so many places where the experience feels like an alpha or beta version of what they actually wanted to do. The Lighthouse and Companions as a whole both exemplify this; they feel and look cool, but the experience of both are shallow and underdeveloped. They felt like they were missing something.

The most egregious issues, in my opinion, in no particular order:

Apologies in advance if they're your favorite, but Rook is probably the worst protagonist we've ever been given. Not because their concept is inherently bad, but because I couldn't really make them mine. Rook has no arc, makes few decisions that truly matter, and no moral conundrums barring maybe the Treviso/Minrathous decision. Even then—it feels like there's a right answer to that decision.

To explain: Minrathous gets fucked at the end of the game anyway. If you pick to save Minrathous, you've just doomed two metropolis level cities to excessive death and destruction AND locked yourself out of a potential romance option for no particular reason.

Rook's actions in Thedas also matter the least. The end state of the game is the same no matter what: the Evanuris fall, and the Veil is preserved. How you do it is largely immaterial. In every other game entry, shit can seriously go sideways and it's always directly because of your decisions.

Companion arcs are largely shallow and so reliant on Rook, they fail to feel real. Some of these arcs are more egregious in this manner than others, and some of them have truly excellent stories to tell (oh, hi there Emmrich). But even with the best arcs, this person asks you to make utterly life-altering decisions for them and you've probably known them for like a month or two at best. It just doesn't feel like I, as the PC, have the right to make that call, or that I've earned it. There's not enough time nor enough high stakes prior to those moment.

I won't beat this one to death, but the limited amount of previous choices not mattering in this entry hurts, and I know how complicated it would have been to explore all of them. That said, there were a few that had a ton of specific investment that deserved better resolution: Kieran in particular would have mattered so fucking much if he existed as canon. I understand that's the crux of the problem, but it makes it so that if he was part of your world state in both DAO and DAI, his absence is all the more noticeable.

The South being destroyed off-screen through text will never not bother me. The Inquisitor is apparently faffing about doing fuck all with the resources they've built over time, especially if they chose not to disband the Inquisition. They didn't chase after Solas, who they knew was going to be a problem, and then they ALSO let the South fall? I'm sorry - it does a hero that the majority of this fandom is most likely heavily invested in the worst service no matter which way you look at it.

Veilguard feels like a game that couldn't get out of its own way. The part that has me grieving the most is that you can see under the surface a great game was there, but just not fully realized.

Without being one of the people who made the game, we can only speculate and can't presume the cause for why we got what we did. Hell, as someone who works in game development, sometimes you never get the answer yourself as to why things went so horribly sideways. The larger the game and studio, the more blind spots you're likely going to have on the overall project.  That said, I have nothing but empathy for the Veilguard team. It's very clear that at least the majority of folks working on it poured in a ton of work and cared a lot about it.

It's not my place to blame anyone in particular for it, because I don't have the first-hand knowledge necessary to cast that judgement. I hope the folks who worked on this don't let it get them too down; you still made a fun game. And I'm sure you're just as disappointed it wasn't the love letter to Dragon Age that you probably wanted it to be, as much as any of us fans who feel it didn't meet the bar.

You had an impossible job to do; the expectations here were so high, and you had more obstacles than any dev team should reasonably have during their project, regardless of the expected fires we all run into during development. Despite that, I still had fun, and I still care quite a bit about these characters.

That's worth something. Thank you for the experience.

[maleyanderecafe]

Are you aware of male yandere who are older and if yes do you mind posting links to their Tumblrs?

Not sure what you mean? Do you mean just like older yanderes? Like Ocs? Or games? Or writing?

I have a list here for yanderes that are in their 20-30s or are a bit older. Let me think if I can find anymore. I do feel like older yanderes tend to end up being either side characters or villains though .

@yandereworlds I believe has some older looking yanderes. I don't remember the exact ages though.

Kimbark Street - believe has an older yandere, though it's a bit hard to tell because we're playing as him and he does live in an older time period.

Love Me Dearly - the main yandere in this one is quite old. This game is pretty good for what it is, devolving more into a mystery.

A Date with Denial/Be My Muse - does it count if the yandere is hundreds of years old? I mean that counts as older, right? Zecharias I believe has been around for a long time looking for his love.

Worthy Lover - does have one but he is a platonic yandere, if you believe that those exist. He is the dad of Ezra from the game Restart Heart.

I’ll Twist the Neck of a Sweet Dog - does have an older yandere, but he is a groomer, so he runs more like a villainous yandere if anything.

The Red Fox - The kind that is less like a human and more like a myth. He is a very good villain in the story and the entire thing feels like a tragedy more than anything.

Cursery: The Crooked Man and the Crooked Cat - sort of. The entire thing is more of a storybook type of yandere love, the type where the yandere is trying to bring back their love. It's a very fun point and click game though.

Yeah, I'm not sure if that's what you mean? But hopefully these are at least good examples. There aren't a lot of older/dilf style yanderes that I really know of, which means I hope somebody will be able to fit the niche one day. This list is a little shorter and more haphazardly slapped together at the moment, so I apologize for that.

[deiaiko]

#20.7 Reason

The day passed by slowly for Agni. Grace had left to show Bam around the ship, and Agni had already become bored after playing three rounds of a racing game with Gyetang. He excused to feed Velt and let her out of the lighthouse bowl, leaving Gyetang to play on his own. Then he went off to read.

Grace and Bam came back about an hour later, and they decided to make dessert together to pass the time. Agni couldn't help but watch them enjoy themselves; it was a nice view in contrast to what Agni had with his younger self. At least Grace was in a far better mood than he was an hour ago, so Agni was glad for him.

His thoughts stopped when Grace locked eyes with him. Grace smiled upon noticing his stare, which Agni returned after restarting his brain. A few moments later, Grace walked up to him, delivering a cup of chamomile tea and leaving a lingering touch on his shoulder before going back to the kitchen.

Agni took a sip to hide his blush. The sweet aroma and warmth soothed him, and the sweet taste with a hint of mint was pleasant on his mouth. After letting out some steam when playing games, relaxing when solving riddle books, and keeping his mind from wandering to unnecessary places, he realized that he was also feeling much better himself.

He stole glances now and then to the Grace brothers who were still in the kitchen across, now seemingly getting bothered by Velt. He felt a smile tugging on his lips from watching their antics. It was such an unusual yet nice view. To think of how much Grace had grown, to see the stark differences and the similarities with Bam, and to be the lucky person that Grace fell in love with… Agni quickly looked away when Grace met his eyes again, somehow feeling embarrassed at such a cheesy thought. He summoned his lighthouse and began working to keep his brain occupied.

Dan and Novick announced their return some time later, joining Grace and Bam in the kitchen to put groceries away. Agni focused his hearing to make out what they were saying.

"Hello! Are you Viole? Gyetang told us you're visiting." Dan extended his hand to Bam. "My name's Dan, and this is Novick. We've heard a thing or two about you."

Agni tuned out their conversation when the electric eels that Dan had brought along finally made themselves visible, hovering near Agni to demand attention and seek for food. So Agni got up and refilled their pellet bowl, then went to sit in the cafeteria to listen better to the conversation happening in the kitchen.

"So…other than Hyung and Mr. Agni, none of you are FUG?"

"Nope," Dan replied.

"And you're okay with it?"

'Living together with FUG members.' Agni supplied Bam's unspoken sentence in his mind.

"It was a shocking revelation when they told us," Novick commented. "Because Agni is clearly from the Khun family and Grace didn't seem like a guy who would join a criminal organization."

"Yes. Exactly." Dan emphasized the syllables to make his point. "Though they told us that they joined FUG so they could keep an eye on someone named Bam."

"Not 'keeping an eye', Dan. You make it sound like I'm keeping him on a leash." Grace immediately refuted. "I'm here to look out for him, to keep him company. And by the way, this is Bam."

"Huh." Agni imagined the gear on Dan's brain halted for a second before resuming. "Wait…so Viole and Bam are the same person?"

Right. Dan, Novick and Gyetang had heard the name Viole from Hwaryun or Jinsung when they came for a visit, and the team probably had known that Viole was FUG's newest slayer candidate. However, the name Bam was only used by him and Grace, and they never really talk much about him in public.

"Yes. Viole is the name that FUG gave him, while Bam is his name before that."

"Oh, then…should we…?"

"Viole is fine," Bam assured. "I don't mind either way."

It piqued Agni's interest, so he looked their way and saw Grace giving Bam a slightly surprised glance, but giving no further question.

Then they agreed to call him Viole, since they were already used to hearing that name.

"Wait!!" Dan flicked his fingers and pointed a finger gun to Grace, "It makes so much more sense now! So I assume Viole got kidnapped by FUG. If you can't get him out, then you're the one who went in, so that you can look out for your brother."

'They really do look like brothers now, don’t they?' Agni smiled at the thought. He wondered if Khun would one day consider him as one, too.

"Really, Hyung?" Bam gave Grace his puppy eyes.

"You didn't choose to be part of FUG. They gave you no choice." Grace patted Bam's back and squatted to check on the oven. "The least I can do is make it bearable."

Bam only stood there. "Why?" 

'Why are you doing this?' Was what Agni thought Bam wanted to ask.

"Why not?" Grace unlocked the oven and the delicious aroma of garlic bread filled the room. "I was you, once upon a time. You reminded me of myself, of the things that I've lost. All my regrets, it feels like I can fix them this time by helping you. So if you can live better than I have, it will make me feel more at ease."

Agni sipped his tea, finding the idea amusing. For him, he'd be more at ease knowing that their team had a better chance of survival, which also aligned with Grace's goal of keeping everyone alive. But in order to do that, they'd have to get through hellish training, and it had to be done if they wanted things to turn out differently. Which, in Agni's opinion, didn't count as living better. But Grace's definition of living better was different from his, knowing how much Grace treasured his friends. Working and training hard, coming back bruised black and blue and bloodied, sometimes close to passing out, was a small price to pay for him.

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[moonpaw]

Would you be willing to explain why you don't like insurgence and xenoberse? I also keep seeing them recommended, but I'm currently playing uranium.

insurgence seems to be an over the top edgy game that's just super not in my wheelhouse

xenoverse because i did play through that one and its just. so goddamn lackluster. the plot and gameplay was constantly pissing me off 😭 though i think my main issue was that i was pretty excited going into the game because i watched as several people overhyped it, calling the story fantastic and the best thing ever and then i played it and it was just... not.

it was ALRIGHT. i guess. but eurgh. my biggest issue is the other playable character (that you don't choose) only showing up like a handful of times (i think literally can be counted on one goddamn hand) and is heavily shoving a romance in your face from the moment you meet them. which whatever, ok, sure. except. if you choose to play as a girl, the boy option, LOOKS VERY MUCH LIKE YOUR DAD. and it just made the whole thing SUPER uncomfortable to me to the point i had to restart the whole game over to choose to be a boy instead because at least the girl doesn't look like either parent even though i still very much hated the whole forced romance crush thing. but hey. at least it didn't feel like i was being flirted on by a younger version of your dad 😭

also the gameplay itself was just. really felt like it was all glitter and hype and then felt like ass trying to actually play and make sense of from a plot perspective

and then my next gripe is your dad and this one is end of game spoiler territory

the game is focused on finding your dad who got kidnapped at the beginning of the game (10 years ago) except oops! nope! he's the leader of the villain gang! also he's SILVER FROM THE CANON SERIES (with your mom being leaf!)

and him being the leader of the big bads just. GOES AGAINST HIS WHOLE CHARACTER?? hello. hello. hello. i still had the whole elite 4 or whatever post game there was but finding out it was silver just. made me stop playing it pissed me off soooooo much

[exaltedfuzz]

HI I LOVEEEEE your Art I LOVEEEE your ema! I wanted to ask if you've played aa6 and your thoughts on aa6 ema! I really like that they brought her back and i really think they balanced her personality well by making her more upbeat because of her job, but shes not wholly optimistic either. I really like her relationship with prosecutor sadmadhi throughout the game too! I feel like there's a scale in emas mind from Most to least acceptable prosecutor men and on one end is Miles edgeworth, the other is Klavier gavin, and sadmadhi is in the middle. if that makes sense lol. I just think she talks like she doesn't like him, but she goes along with him way more than she would if Klavier ever asked her to do half the things he asks of her. Also I think it's really interesting that aa6 had ema and mayas first canon interaction! that was interesting to me because ema was sort of designed with Maya in mind and lana and mia obviously have some history, I think it was time for their sisters to meet too. sorry for the Long ask but I just treasure your interpretation of these characters so much!

Hi! I recognize your username from my notifs. Thanks for the support, and for your ask! 🫡 Glad you like the Emas!

I have mixed feelings on SoJ, but Ema is my favorite part of it. I like her a lot in it. She's still got a bit of the edge from AJ, which is nice to see. I like some of her new sprites too, like the swaying thinking one and the 🥺 one. Much prefer her munching sprite from AJ though. The shovelling snacks into her mouth is much more Ema. I also really don't like her official full body art for SoJ.

Unfortunately, Nahyuta doesn't really interest me... His design is too complex to do silly drawings of, for one. I feel like their dynamic was a little underdeveloped, a bit shoehorned in. It's a shame, because their backstories set up a possible dynamic that could be quite interesting, since Lana and Nahyuta kind of have the same motivations - writing team missed a trick. Also, I think Ema would have realistically been grumpier about having to fly halfway across the world every few days. It didn't reeeeaaally feel organic to me. But I do like the idea of their dynamic.

I like the way Maya and Ema interact, even if it's brief. Implies that they have met before, and they're friends, which is cute, though I wish it was a little more delved into. I feel like Maya's characterisation in SoJ is kind of boring. Not as bad as Pearl got it, but still nowhere near as good as she was in the trilogy. Honestly, the whole game falls flat for me when you compare it to the emotional weight the trilogy and AJ have. I really like some of the cases though. And Ema's mini games are great as always. Except the bit with the suitcase which lagged out my 3DS and made me restart it twice, haha. (Though, again! Her mini games were kind of better in the other games!!!)

So, to answer your question, I do like Ema in SoJ. And, despite my criticism, I do like SoJ! Just not as much as the other games in the series. When you play them all in a row, it feels kind of disappointing. I think it's because it's not on the intimate, domestic scale of the trilogy, which is where I think Ace Attorney really shines. (Case in point: Bridge to the Turnabout)

Super happy to see her in another game though, she's really fun, exactly what SoJ needed, and I'm really glad she was the detective they went for. Also, the outfit they put her in for the DLC cutscenes at the wedding is really really good. They were cooking with that one.

I'm really happy to hear you're interested in my interpretations, it means a lot. They're characters I've grown quite fond of.

This turned out quite long. Haha

Here's Ema and Nahyuta for you:

[novarex]

I'm luke warm on Veilguard thus far. I don't hate it, but it hasn't really impressed me either. This is my first impression as of today.

It's pretty. The character creator is really great - that's the biggest highlight for me. Overall, I like the visuals. They obviously don't do mocap, and the mouths are always noticeably off.

The combat is a bit repetitive. Nothing particularly new or interesting to set it apart from the last game. I still like Origins' gameplay best. The menus work pretty well, but I feel like that isn't anything special.

The voice acting is a major weak point. So much of it sounds like a bland anime. The dialog is also very bland, which is unfortunate because so much of DA has had really great dialog. Even Varric is bland. I'm hoping some of it will get better farther into the game. I also don't need so much commentary from the companions on what I'm supposed to be doing, especially since so much of it is really simple and obvious.

The environments are really pretty. I'll give them that. I'm not a fan of the overly simplistic or cartoony ways in which we interact with chests, pick up gold, or items. It feels like it was made for 10 year olds. I don't need everything over explained.

It's buggy on PC. It's crashed three times, I can't run it on ultra without a bunch of lag, and my machine absolutely should handle it, no problem. Controllers seem to be totally bugged and don't work for me despite tons of troubleshooting (I'm not the only one). Sometimes controls don't work at all and I have to restart.

So, 5/10 so far from me. I'm hoping they will fix some bugs, and I'll get deeper in and like it more... but I already liked the last 3 a lot more this far in the first time I played.

[troblsomtwins829]

More Pacific Drive Ramblings

This game has me by the neck. It's so intriguing in a way I don't often get to experience. I'm not a regular gamer, and it's really easy to put me off from a game if it's either too bright, too busy, or too hard/forgiving for my fumbling hands. I like games that give me a goal, but let me get there at my own pace using whatever path I find works for me. Games that have a life lived within them, have a history, have a past and a future. Games that just are and what that is to me is determined by what I find and how I find it. Where lore is found on the surface, and answers are found deep beneath the earth. I can find those answers if I want them, or I can just play the game and let it be. I can get from point A to B and be done with it.

But I'm already planning on playing more, playing it again. I've made an actual shopping list of the materials I'll need to create and all-electric vehicle. I've imagined myself actually traversing these hellscapes, navigating both on foot and behind the wheel, I've pondered a no-car run since my first minute of playtime, and now, as I'm trying and failing to focus on other tasks that I need to complete, all I can think of is playing again.

TOTK had me pretty bad, but only up until I finished the game, I've hardly touched it since. Stardew Valley has had so many restarts, I couldn't tell you what the original plan for my first farm was if I tried. Minecraft? Forget it. Skyrim? Can't be bothered. Party games? I'm an introvert, parties are a very rare thing.

Pacific Drive makes me want to get out and explore almost as much as it makes me want to run crying back to the relative safety of my vehicle. The environments are beautifully crafted maps of confusing anomalies and debris, chock full of this or that, and brimming with an ambience so unenviably ominous that I feel like I'm back in the woods and all by myself.

My only real, both human AND intelligent, companions are voices on a radio. Voices of people that may not even be real. Voices that could have been recorded a day, a week, ten years ago, or maybe even some unknown future date. Time is weird here. I could be completely alone for all I know.

Alone, defenseless, but nonetheless determined to survive.

[sarasa-cat]

I want to get back to Veilguard soon now that it is February and I have "time" for gaming.

Have collected everyone, but probably still in act 1. When I last left off, I had started the first companion quest for Taash and I think Emmrich had just finished setting up his room in the lighthouse and maybe his first companion quest became available too.

So....

My Shadow Dragon Rook made a decision (you know which one) that cut off any chance of a Lucanis romance which, honestly, was what I wanted for her in this game. Hm.

There is definitely a vibe developing between my Shadow Dragon Rook and Neve ... although she feels like a third wheel when Lucanis is around and, like, yeah, she really *wanted* to romance him but now it is all **whomp whomp whomp** saaaaad trombones.

Meanwhile, Emmrich looks like a very interesting romance but I'm just not feeling it for these two characters and want to make a Mourn Watch Rook Goth Nerd **just** for him.

(Honestly, I like making Rooks even if I don't end up playing them ahahahaha lol. it cannot be helped.)

So. It is decision time:

1. I can continue my current playthrough with my Shadow Dragon and just sort of fall into a Neve romance despite all the weirdness (which makes for interesting headcanon tbh).

2. I could back up a good bit in the game to make The Other Choice and then pursue the Lucanismance as planned AND be forced to make up some interesting headcanon for why she lets her home town burn.

3. I can keep my current playthrough as is and push her into a romance with Emmrich even if it feels awkward and I'd rather make a different character who makes different choices just for him. Nope, I definitely have a Rook & a world state in mind for Emmrich.

... While the ultimate situation would be Play ALL The Rooks, the reality is no. Life is busy, games are many, and I realistically only think I can guarantee two runs through Veilguard so I can see how different major events play out.

Despite some of the Rooks I have made so far, I think I am really only interested in playing a Shadow Dragon, a Mournwatch, or an Antivan Crow Rook.

Realizing now that aesthetically, I do want to do is NOT have a shadow dragon/shadow dragon and a crow/crow as my two world states. I want some tension in making That Decision. But I might just want to put that off for a second full run through.

Maybe I'm restarting (facepalm facepalm facepalm) with a new Rook (after all, it been a long while since I touched the game) who is a Mourn Watch and Emmrich is her kind of catnip. And I honestly don't really care what kinds of decisions she makes for the rest of the game. She'll make decisions as they happen. (Note: I am partly spoiled on a lot of the game but more in vague one-liner descriptions of the spoilers rather than in-depth knowledge).

Then, at some later point, I'll roll back my Shadow Dragon to *before* that big decision that cuts off Lucanis and proceed from there.

Time allowing, at some point I will make a Crow with epic cheekbones who will romance Neve. Because I do want a Nevemance playthough.

Also: this is sort of a rare moment for me with Dragon Age games. Normally I am interested in romance either 1 and only 1, or 0 of the romanceable characters (when playing as a female PC without romance-unlocking mods).

This is a rare Dragon Age game where at least 3 if not more of the characters interest me as romances. That said, this is also more of a "cosy dragon age game" for me rather than a Politically and Philosophically Charged Dragon Age game (I still prefer DAO/A and DA2 overall).

Le sigh.

If only I had more free time for gaming and less games in my Play Me Now queue.

[agnol117]

i haven't thought of myself as my deadname since i was fifteen.

this wasn't intentional, but i don't think it was unintentional, either. i'd adopted the name "Agnol" online by then, taking a word i'd learned in french and chopping off letters until i was left with a word that was just sounds, and wasn't necessarily masculine (it's worth noting that "Agnol" is also the name of a superboss in Pokémon Colosseum, and that may have inspired me, but i don't recall ever reaching that boss). this wasn't really for trans reasons, not at the time. if you'd asked fifteen year old me about it, i probably wouldn't have had anything positive to say about being trans, if I had anything to say at all. but even then, there was a sort of sense in my mind that "deadname" was my body, while "Agnol" was me, in a way that was separate from my body.

in addition to all of this, i'd been playing as the girl in any game that let me since Dragon Warrior III on the gameboy color. truthfully, this came in waves, especially in Pokémon games -- i'd make a girl character, get embarassed about it, restart as the boy, get frustrated that that didn't "feel" right, restart as a girl, and repeat the cycle. eventually i just took to getting both versions, one to play "publically" at school as the boy, one to play on my own as the girl. and while all this was going on, i played around with names. i won't go through them all, but suffice it to say that it took me a while to settle on "jill," a name that feels right in a way i'm not going to get into here, and by the time i did i was pretty willing to actually acknowledge that i was, in fact, trans. i was also, by this time, thirty-one. it had been a rough decade and a half, and even then, i'd spent quite a lot of that time actively avoiding thinking about gender stuff.

all of this now brings us to Earthbound. there's gonna be pretty heavy spoilers here, and while it is a thirty year old game and most of what I've got to say has been kinda brough into the pop culture knowledge of Earthbound, this is your chance to turn back.

i'd been using "jill" as my name for characters when i could for about a year and a half when i got to my first playthrough of Earthbound. i'm not out in real life, because for reasons involving my health and safety, i can't be. so i was jill in games, in the places i could be. but, well, as much as i wished it didn't, that always felt like a character i was playing. and really, that's to be expected. much as i might wish i was, i'm not a pokémon trainer. even things like OneShot, where you as player are ostensibly a character in the story, didn't really feel like i was really "there." it didn't really feel like me.

Earthbound changed that.

at a certain point in Earthbound, you're prompted to enter your name. notably, the game specifies that it's asking for your name. you, the player. it verifies this later, but after that, you still have like four more dungeons to go through and a bunch of story shit happens and honestly i forgot it happened.

and then you get to Giygas.

i have a lot of feelings about this fight, but really, most of them aren't relevant here. the important part is how the fight ends. you reach a point where your characters cannot damage Giygas anymore. that's actually underselling it -- the fight reachs a point where you can't even understand what Giygas is doing to your characters anymore. it's become a meme at this point, but "You cannot grasp the true form of Giygas's attack!" is legitimately terrifying. you're not even fighting a clearly defined opponent anymore. you're fighting the background.

and Paula prays.

the game kind of obliquely hints at this, but having played Mother (which is, in retrospect, a truly tragic name for the series) previously and knowing that when you fought Giygas in that, you beat him by singing a lullaby at him until he has a mental breakdown and leaves (it's that kind of series), i kind of expected this. Paula prays, and as she does, various other characters in the game sense it, and they pray for you and add their strength to yours. and then, after praying a bunch of times and getting help from so many of your friends, your prayers stop working. Paula's call is absorbed by the darkness. but she tries one more time, and someone answers.

you.

the player.

the name you put in.

this was...moving. this touched me in a way that i struggle to find words for. i said in a previous post about this that after beating Earthbound, i had to go take a nap, and i wasn't kidding. it has been a week since i finished the game, and i'm still trying to process this. because they called out to me, and they did so using the name i've picked for myself. they needed me, and the me they needed is the me i've been trying to be for so long. for so long that when i first felt that longing, that feeling that i wasn't who everyone was telling me i was, i didn't have the words for it. i didn't know it was a thing i could feel. and Ness and his friends needed me. the person i want to be. the person i really am.

and my god, that just meant the world to me.

[silver-rings-and-rabbits]

I've just finished chapter 9 of Open Heart Second Year and wanted to share my thoughts at the halfway point (ch 10-11 are another world entirely). It's a long post and probably repeats all the arguments that have been made since the original release...but I'm gonna post anyway.

When Second Year started, I couldn't decide which romance route to take. I genuinely restarted the first chapter several times, but EVENTUALLY I settled on Ethan. And...I got bored. He was there all the time and I just didn't feel anything like I did in book 1 (the opera scene had me in a chokehold for a while). Meanwhile, Raf had apparently broken up with MC and had a new partner which was leaving me intrigued on how it would go (sweet naivety before I saw the ch 10 draft). So during the first hiatus, between ch 8-9, I replayed the whole lot for Rafael.

The difference is stark. For two people who aren't allowed to be together, MC and Ethan sure ended up spending a lot of time alone together. They sure held hands a lot. MC sure had a lot of extra flirty dialogue. Yet Rafael appears briefly every couple of chapters to talk about how he would risk his life for another (I should have seen the signs sooner) then disappears back to his new partner that we still know nothing about. Most of the pining for Rafael was in my imagination and personal interpretation of the scenes.

Players were willing to justify this with 'Ethan is our boss' and 'we work on the same team so obviously they will spend time together'. Bryce and Jackie are our best friends or partners, Jackie is our freaking ROOMMATE and we don't see them at all?

Furthermore, we have two brand new characters in June and Baz and barely spent any time with them because Ethan had to be front and centre. I would have happily spent diamonds to get to know either of them one-on-one. But no...

An idea: instead of Ethan having a professional diamond scene every chapter (patient's house visit, visiting the art gallery, making a pictagram account), this is where June or Baz come in. Especially if Ethan also had a personal diamond scene in the chapter. Open Heart was popular because of its diverse cast after all (including Ethan, yes, but there was someone for everyone in book 1).

FURTHER furthermore, one of the 'plots' of this book was MC teaching their own intern, Esme Ortega. And we had a diamond scene to take her with us on Diagnostic work, a diamond scene to mentor her around six chapters later, and...a few quick scenes of MC giving her some work to do. That's it. Because even though being a mentor is part of MCs job, it's not nearly as important as Ethan's screen time.

I've played all four romance routes, and obviously Ethan's had the most content (his romance route v platonic route is night and day!!). Raf's route was completely empty to the point where it made sense to me that MC was in the hospital with Ethan all the time because they didn't want to spend their free time sitting at home nursing a broken heart. But Bryce and Jackie's routes had no reason for that. There's almost no reason to play the chapters without them and it's no surprise their fans started dropping away. All the signs pointed to one LI being killed off, but the other two didn't have anything to hope for either so why stick around?

Chapter 8 is the baseball game and we get to spend time with Bryce and Keiki, AND practice baseball with some friends. Probably the most friend group content we saw since the chapter 5 music festival. I enjoyed being rude to Landry (again, my MC is too stressed and upset at this point to spend energy being nice to him) but I didn't like how my response to him determined how the two sides interacted. Just because I'm rude to Landry doesn't mean I don't want to meet Sienna's med school friends at Kenmore. We then get to go back with Ethan for dinner or go home alone. I don't suppose it would have killed PB to put some kind of friend group scene in as an alternative? They did in book 1...

Chapter 9 is where the emotions really pick up as we have Kyra's cancer getting worse. Man, I love well-written angst. When MC is overwhelmed and has to calm down in a supply closet they are discovered by...June. Who at this point is becoming the villain (despite the fact this plot line would have only made sense if you were romancing 1/4 LIs).

Another idea: we get to choose which LI discovers us, just like in book 1! We could have a rare moment of softness with Jackie because it kills her that she can't help the situation. It could have been the catalyst for Bryce to look into radical gore-tex surgeries as a last resort. Or we could have had a painful heart-to-heart with Rafael, maybe MC being standoffish because he's their ex or open and desperately wishing Raf could comfort them as before. The possibilities are endless, but we can't waste time (or money) on those guys.

Speaking of Rafael, this is the infamous chapter ending:

Like a punch in the heart. But possibly what hurt more was the fact that chapter 10 opened with - of all things - a time jump to a few days later with the Senator coming to Edenbrook!! Because that's the Diagnostic team which is the only thing that matters! In fact, Rafael isn't mentioned until around two thirds of the way through when the narration - of all things - casually mentions that he is in fact moving to BRAZIL. More fool me, I thought he was just moving to another state, but no. Another freaking country. There is no way that would have been an easy conversation, especially on his romance route, but it's yet another conversation that happens OFF-SCREEN for the reader to be hastily informed later.

Book 2 began with a recap that omitted Rafael completely, despite the fact his superhero complex was going to be 'plot point' of book 2. Luckily he does appear in the next recap but this scene has been retconned with him saying 'I'm moving to Brazil' (if I remember to get a screenshot of that later, I'll post it).

PB tried to justify all this with 'Open Heart is a mature story...exploring themes of heartbreak and loss' (and some players will still believe that), but it never was. If it was, we would have seen the break-up between MC and Rafael, we would have been able to talk with Raf about his suspension in detail and how it was affecting him, and we would have SEEN THIS VERY CONVERSATION. But all the resources went into Ethan and his parents, Ethan and his morals, Ethan cooking a chicken.

I get it, he was a big moneymaker. I myself contributed once upon a time. But that doesn't justify throwing out the rest of your characters. (My school sold out my year group to get some money, and in doing so lost all credibility with a generation of girls). Like I said before, Open Heart was good because of ALL it's characters that we had grown to love and PB now wanted to chuck those out. Unless a LI had absolutely 0% interest, you write for them or you don't put them in the story (and we all know where that leads us: single LI books). Why alienate Bryce, Raf and Jackie romancers when, for all you know, they might be Sam Dalton's biggest fans? (The biggest book I can think of that was releasing at the same time as Open Heart). This whole thing was a stupid, stupid decision by PB and it has nothing to do with Rafael.

I hope there were people on the OH team who knew this was a bad idea from the start. I hope the higher-ups started sweating at the reactions to Sora and the ending to chapter 9, and I hope the smart ones on the team felt unbelievably smug about being right.

[aquilamage]

Rain world is really good but the difficulty is defo one of my biggest gripes. Like, it sets out to be a hard game, and it is, but there are straight up some areas you may fall into that are so hard to get out of people suggest just restarting! Which feels weird and bad, to me at least. The wall jumping also drives me crazy, I feel like I can only sometimes get the rhythm right for it. I’ve found tho that if possible, putting a stick in the wall as a kind of ‘check point’ helps (you may already be doing that tho haha)

I am all for a game being designed to challenge the player in whatever ways because you can genuinely get some cool things out of it, and it's fine if that's considered the 'default' mode. But there's two caveats to that.

There's a difference between well-balanced and reasonable difficult and stuff that's hard either just for its own sake without thinking about whether it's enjoyable to play/overcome or hard because it's not designed as well as it could be. I'm by no means an expert on game design but having parts of the game where the common advice is just "yeah if you end up here just restart the game" that's not like. a glitch. Doesn't seem the greatest to me.

People have said this way more eloquently than me but even if the intended experience is for the game to be difficult, even extremely so, putting in features you can select that make the game literally as easy as possible should just be the default because that just means there are now more people who can or will play the game and it doesn't actually take anything away from people who want to play it with the highest difficulty.

Literally I think my game experience would be so much improved if there was just an option for more forgiving wall-jumps or even just a plain wall-climbing option. (I don't have that much platformer game experience overall but like. I've done all of Hollow Knight's platforming challenges except the White Palace and I'm almost done with chapter 7 of Celeste and iirc those are at least considered somewhat challenging as platformers. So I think I'm allowed a little bit of saying this is related to how this game's mechanic works). And if there were other options to make things easier I might take those too and that's fine! Because otherwise you have me sitting here contemplating whether I can keep playing a game I genuinely like because of it just being too much stress on me to be healthy probably! And y'know, maybe not fun enough to be worth it, I don't know yet.

It's like how about halfway through playing Subnautica I got too frustrated with being attacked and just put in the cheat code that let me not be attacked by the monsters. Even turned off oxygen a couple times when watching that made me too claustrophobic and it was great because then I just got to concentrate on playing the game and enjoying it; and it didn't feel like a lesser experience.

And yeah depending on how popular the game is overall and how many people might feel the same there may be a mod for this kind of stuff out there. But! As I said I have the switch version and I shouldn't have to buy the game again and play on a platform that doesn't work as well for me (or at all depending on how much it demands of a computer) just to get a version that's more accessible!

All that aside I do still think it's a neat game with some great design aspects to its gameplay. Wouldn't be talking about this so much if not or contemplating other options to experience it; I would've probably just dropped it.

(Oh yeah I definitely have been doing the spears-in-the-wall to facilitate climbing. All the time, including some spots where I made a ladder of several because searching for more spears was easier than doing the climbing. Super appreciate the tip though because if I hadn't that would've been SO useful to know)

[wandringaesthetic]

Thoughts on FFXVI so far (Jill is awake and she and Clive are on the way to Rosaria) (spoilers to that point)

The game is beautiful. I've been taking a lot of screenshots like "man this pretty"/"man this almost looks real." I saw a few "this looks like a PS3 game" comments from earlier demo/gameplay footage, and I think I understand that, because the zones from the demo (the barren mountains where Titan and Shiva fight and the blighted village) are somewhat empty and have fewer/more muted colors. The story takes place in a dying world, and has the look and lighting of somewhere far north. You can quibble with the aesthetics if you like but not the graphics.

The thing that impresses me most in this generation in graphics is lighting, so. I keep being like "woa" and taking screenshots of water.

There is no minimap, and in "dungeon" zones, no map at all. I like this a lot, because I feel like I stare at the map if it's there instead of the very beautiful pictures in front of me, and I think it's appropriate to feel a little lost and disoriented and nervous about it in, say, the enemy castle you are infiltrating. But I imagine some people will not like this. Areas so far have been fairly linear, though I did get a little turned around in the first forest area (the greatwood?)

Bosses and midbosses are fun and very beautifully animated. Average field enemies feel like a bit of a waste of time and should either be a little easier or a lot tougher. I feel like, with skill, one could absolutely blaze through boss fights, and with either more caution or less skill they're a bit of a slow grinding down. Feel like I'm generally falling somewhere in between on these.

I'm playing on "action" mode and am not using any of the "timely" accessories. I have played some action-y games but am by no means a real pro gamer. I've had to retry some boss fights (when you do this, the game lets you restart the fight with a full inventory of potions (4 potions and 3 hi potions)) but I haven't felt like I've been "stuck" on anything yet. I feel like the "reward" of increasing your skill isn't necessarily just getting through the game (which you can probably do regardless of skill if you just grind at it) but feeling like a bamf as you do.

(there is a kinship with FFVIII in this regard)

I've done....4? Sidequests so far. They are very reminiscent of FFXIV sidequests. Go rescue this girl and grab the supplies she was supposed to gather. Be Valisthea's surliest waiter. Not too exciting but they fulfill what I think is their primary function of fleshing out the world building.

The intuition I had regarding the "bearer" tattoos from the trailers and the demo was that they were magical and either sedated or memory wiped the bearer or somehow made it impossible to escape (need to the spell renewed so often or they kill you or something like that). And it turns out, no, the system of slavery is so ingrained and the odds of being cast out and then hunted down are so high that they don't need to be magical. The mark is enough.

I ALSO thought the bearers were generally POW slaves acquired through conquest and weren't necessarily people who can use magic. THEN I thought they were ALL people who could use magic, but no and no. They are ALL people who can use magic WITHOUT a crystal (excepting dominants, which are special) and Clive was actually a weird cultural exception as the first shield of Rosaria BEFORE he was branded and then fell into the general norm after. Which makes a terrible sense! We do not like what we can't control! Also makes Annabella's weird disgust towards him make more sense!

I think probably part of the reasoning behind that awkward Yoshi-P statement saying "everyone in this game is white because we didn't want it to be about race" is probably BECAUSE slavery is a major plot and world-building thing in a system that in some ways mimics but mostly doesn't real world chattel slavery. Whether making it all be white on white crime is effective or worth it is something I'm going to reserve judgement on for now.

Oh Cid. Cid. What are you doing, Cid? I didn't understand what he wanted at all at first, and now I get the idea that he is good intentioned but has no coherent plan. Free as many bearers as possible and then eventually we'll have a revolution? But you don't want to say that because you're already pretty sure you'll fail. a lot of the people you're freeing are old or infirm you're not exactly forming an army. This is only working because the powers that be are too busy fighting each other to notice you. What are you going to do when they do, Cid? I'm going to do what I think is right until they come kill me and then God can judge me??

I enjoy Cid. He is just some guy who is trying and not at all an inspirational figure.

This game is pretty brutal, huh? I keep thinking about the guy who ended up as a blood spatter under a rock in the first few minutes of the game and the blood pooling under some of Shiva's ice later.

(the ice and the rocks creaking and the subtle controller vibration as you walk through the aftermath of Shiva and Titan's fight really sold the scale and also that this is all about to come crashing down)

I feel it's more tasteful, if you're going to do violence, to have semi-realistic violence rather than bloodless violence. Also I just personally like it. I like bones crunching. I like the post battle blood on your heroes clothes and armor. Enough to be slightly gross but not Dragon Age style ridiculously drenched in blood. Just right.

There are a weird number of surprise lethal axe throws though.

Alas, Benedikta. We hardly knew you. She has a kinship to Yotsuya. I actually wonder if there is a Japanese trope both of them fall under with the long pipe.

None of the soldiers in this game seem to be women. The only women we see fight are Jill and Benedikta, who are both dominants and therefore exceptional. Which... I will reserve judgement on whether that adequately makes sense later. Valisthea is in other ways not a nice place.

I get the idea that the eikons/dominants aren't always passed down via blood. It seems maybe each eikon has its own rules? I wonder if they always have a gender preference for their host.

I like the little overlay arrows showing where you can climb up or under something. It feels like that breaks immersion less so than all Horizon Forbidden West's foot and handholds being yellow, for example. Or all the walls you can run on having a certain texture, or w/e.

The music is good, ofc. Maybe my new favorite main character theme? I have to meditate on it.

Oh, the one huge awkward guy is named Goetz, which is speculated to be what Guts Berserk's name is "supposed" to be. Or Gotz, some Germanic shortening of Gottfried or similar via translation party shenanigans. I don't think this has any significance but it might be a nod. (Which make me wonder whether FFV's Bartz/Butz was supposed to be something like that now. Hmm.) Also I lay like 50% odds he's going to end up as Titan's dominant by the end of the game.

I am also on High Berserk Fan Alert due to the eclipse in the one live action trailer/advertisement.

I have NO IDEA what we're heading for here in terms of overarching plot or what the final showdown is going to be, and since I don't have enough freedom to just dick around in the game I'm getting a little antsy about that. And where's that second time skip gonna land?

(oh man I just happened to encounter the shortened version of that commercial in the wild in the break room on tv FATE WILL FALL that music aaaaaa)

There's a shot in the very beginning of the game that's a Gandalf versus Balrog visual reference and Clive opens double doors by dramatically throwing his arms wide. There are a lot of small details that feel a near copy to Game of Thrones. Clive grows up in the castle with his father's ward who is like a sibling to him. He's second fiddle to his brother. His mother figure hates his face. He has a loyal doggo. He's Aragorn. He's Jon Snow.

I've often thought that the storytelling of FFXIV feels more like doorstopper fantasy novel storytelling than video game storytelling (or movie or tv show storytelling for that matter). FFXVI seems to be continuing that. Opening up the active time lore menu (I love this feature, BTW?) feels like flipping to the glossary.

Alexander O. Smith cites A Song of Ice and Fire as inspiration for the style of Vagrant Story and FFXII. And I'm glad he did, because when I played those games in a world pre Game of Thrones television show, I was like "is anybody else seeing this???" It turns out the Venn diagram overlap of "people who play epic fantasy video games" and "people who read epic fantasy novels" is SURPRISINGLY SMALL. Smith overdoes it but just occasionally, imo. By which I mean, if you use the phrase "mummer's farce" there had best be some fucking mummers in your story. It took a long time for anyone to hit approximately this correct tone in video games again but.

I'm digressing.

ANYWAY. I THINK IT'S INTERESTING THAT WE INITIALLY ADDED THIS FLAVOR IN EX POST FACTO IN THE LOCALIZATION AND NOW WE'RE GOING FOR IT INTENTIONALLY THE WHOLE TIME. Because this was written simultaneously in English and Japanese. I find it interesting that we started by being inspired by the tabletop gaming heirs of fantasy literature and now we're taking after fantasy literature itself.

We're also seeming to go for the Game of Thrones thematic thing where the nobles are squabbling amongst each other when everyone ought to be banding together against the oncoming climate apocalypse.

But we will (most likely. Hopefully.) Be reaching a conclusion in 40-80 hours of action RPG instead of leaving me hanging for the rest of my natural life. And I would be shocked if we have some sort of red wedding situation in the works.

I'm having a good time, overall. Hesitant to quantify how much of a good time at this juncture.

Sometimes I feel like we need to put the F-word privileges back on the shelf for a minute, but mostly the swears are effective.

Oh gosh, I glanced upon this subject in tags, but I do love Clive's post accepting he killed Joshua freakout. And how Cid's all "well, why don't you just track this guy down anyway, and if he wasn't involved THEN you can kill yourself ;D" because it comes right after a moment Clive was standing on a bridge, and there's not any attention drawn to it but you KNOW he's thinking about jumping. And then Torgal bounds up to him and the moment passes.

And Cid's "welp, you're alive so you may as well make yourself useful" attitude is not the BEST but it's also not the WORST, you know?

Anyway, like I said, having a good time. Having a good time having a bad time.

[joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

Okay, I finished The Final Horizon. Spoilers following.

Thoughts specific to the stuff I didn't mention yesterday are that the final tower climb was a lil bit easier than I expected given how much time I spent on one of the ones before it, but still good stuff. The final trial is very mediocre. I think a boss rush kinda just feels shitty to have in the main game knowing that like 2 updates ago we already added a boss rush mode to begin with. The extra stipulations to make it more challenging are certainly something - you have a fully level 1 Sonic who can't get rings back and whose ring count carries over between fights, so you're on a timer for all 400 of those rings to do three titans in a row, even cylooping doesn't give you more. That part's neat, adds a lot of tension and asks that you're able to take these bosses out efficiently. The shit part is that they changed how the parry worked to give Sonic the "perfect parry", which is a linear downgrade from the normal parry lmao. Way it works is it's the parry but you need to time it. On paper a good thing! In the first place the parry window being uhhhhhh infinite was criticised quite a bit at release, and they've found a roundabout way to address it in this update. But that brings the obvious problem of now you've got to time a parry that you have never practiced with, and your training room are boss fights with a lengthy restart period if you fail, and that's coupled with the fact that the boss hitboxes really don't match their animations well at all. So the perfect parry - instead of bandaging the parry problems - just rubs salt in the wound instead. Ouch.

Once you've done that tower climb and trial, you get to go for the final boss - a fight against regular Supreme from the regular vanilla game. Very much of two minds about this because of how The Final Horizon's content is implemented into the game to begin with. Since it's just a portal on Ouranos that takes you to Ouranos but we're doing this story instead on an optional save file and stuff, it makes sense to have the exact same Supreme fight since like holistically if someone is playing the complete version of the game for their first time then hey they should see this fight, right? But on the other hand what this means is if you either beat the game before this update, or if you're playing it for the first time now and decide to go for I suppose both endings, you will at two different points in the story have to do the same Supreme fight. Feels bizarre. Also strange thing but base The End, if you fail you just start at the start of that fight, but in The Final Horizon if you fail that new version of The End you gotta refight Supreme. That's tedious and inconsistent, not really a fan.

As for the new fight against The End, it's another thing I'm of two minds about, although I'm leaning more positive probably. The goods are the setpiece elements of this - cool as absolute fuck and I guess Cyber Super Sonic or whatever it officially ends up being called? Shit's fucking awesome, plays mostly the same but dude his attack animations are so over the top shounen badass and he does awesome poses and like shot of the back while one eye looks down at the camera, I felt like I was watching Nazo Unleashed for the first time again. Moreover the nature of this take on the story is such that every other character is significantly involved and gets to do a lot more, even if they are still ultimately spectators but like hey they're more there than they were before. Also just as a game design thing, hey it's another Super Sonic fight. Awesome. This is a long established formula within the game by now and it's far more logical to end the game on than a schmup out of largely nowhere. Good improvement. The bad though is kinda twofold. For one we're doubling down on perfect parry, which like hey technically they've introduced it to us by now so it's less of a jumpscare, buuut it's still shitty and the animations don't feel like they match up and it's just a bizarre difficulty spike in control that would really need a ground-up different approach to really fix. The other thing is I think this fight has like, pretty bad conveyance, I guess? You're told quite directly that "attacking The End head-on won't work, find something else to do", but that feels like a bizarre thing to ask of the player when they're by now already conditioned towards "super sonic = press attack buttons". Moreover the cyloop just never seems to really accomplish anything either. See what you actually need to do is attack higher up on Supreme End's body and then do specifically a quick cyloop - at which point you can deal damage. From here you do uhhhh, I don't really know? I kinda just did stuff until it was over and wasn't really confident until I hit a quicktime event. Was that fade to black a quick time event animation? Did I die? Is the fight about to be over? I never really felt like I knew. I think the fight is a cooler setpiece than vanilla The End and certainly the game "earns it more" but it seems like regardless of which one you do, the final boss of Sonic Frontiers is just kinda shitty lol.

Was a bit disappointed to see that on completing the file, you don't get to take the new playable characters back to old islands or use them in Cyberspace. Would just be a really fun and rewarding thing is all. As it stands you can use them in the same Ouranos island you can already use them in by going to a character swapper that's pretty far away from lots of stuff on the map. One of those things where I suppose implementing them into the rest of the game is a tall order, but it is a bit sad is all. Unless this is some reward for finishing all the new cyberspace levels which uhhhh I still haven't done lol. They're fuckin hard okay!!!

Overall though, I think Final Horizon is interesting - largely good (last post goes into more of the detail surrounding that), but it will change the overall conversation surrounding Frontiers quite a bit. I think updates 1 and 2 did great legwork to making Frontiers feel a lot more "complete" as a game, whereas Final Horizon kinda feels like a more standalone expansion that's perhaps so standalone that suddenly the game feels actually less complete. Like by itself this needs more updates to fit in with the rest of the game better, or something. Put another way, updates 1 and 2 are linear upgrades to base Frontiers, while Final Horizon is a good-to-mixed addition to a game that hey, tbf, was already good-to-mixed anyway, right? Hope that makes sense lol.

But I think more than anything else though I can't help but respect the hell out of this update existing. Kishimoto and the team actually taking feedback, addressing complaints, and adding new stuff to the game for fucking free is insane in this day and age, even comparing it to other Sonic titles like Origins Plus or Superstars with digital deluxe and preorder and retailer exclusive downloads and shit. The precedent that these updates set for future Sonic titles as well is also insanely exciting - lots of Frontiers' problems were addressed across the updates anyway, with some of the core fundamental parts already in the game being left as is by necessity (I'm talking like lots of the puzzle design and stuff). I think if Frontiers is to be seen as a stepping stone towards something greater then these updates really will help along that journey. And it downright goes without saying, but holy shit I'm so glad to see solo sonica die. Tails and Knuckles are back, and even Amy is on the core team. I don't strictly think every game going forward needs these exact playable characters in this exact playstyle but the general idea of how they play and how they feel compared to Sonic is perfect - that's what I want more of going forward. Perhaps in the long term this'll make Frontiers somewhat eclipsed by its successors - a game that's spoken about for what future titles did based off of it, rather than getting to fully stand on its own years down the line. There's an insanely complicated conversation to be had about that subject, and about making games for that purpose, but for a series like Sonic I think that's a worthwhile thing to aim to be and if the experiment pays off then hey, shit's all the greater.

For now though, I need to work on those cyberspace stages lmao.

[monriatitans]

MonriaTitans

Let's Play Some $#!7! - Split Attention: Little Goody Two Shoes & Maid Café on Electric Street!

Come join me for another episode of Let's Play Some $#!7 | LPS$, where I play games to provide commentary to educate on game development! Provided I don't get too caught up in the game to comment, which, in a sense, is commentary in and of itself. Today, we continued playing Little Goody Two Shoes! This was first introduced to The Weekend Game Show | WGS via Let's Play Some Demos - Part 8! After a puzzle began to piss me off, I switched to Maid Café on Electric Street, which was first introduced via Let's Play Some Demos - Part 10! I need to address 3 things before we proceed. Firstly, about Goody:

WARNING

This game contains flashing lights and intense sequences that may trigger seizures in individuals with photosensitive epilepsy. Player discretion is advised.

Secondly, if anyone is interested in streaming Maid, it is requested we don't show anything from Chapter 6.

Thirdly, thank you to the individual who purchased a book through my bookshop! It made my day!

With that out the way, on to my opinions.

Little Goody Two Shoes is absolutely fucking brilliant, which is why it started pissing me off. I'm not good with puzzles, so if one pisses me off, I'm going to guess it's a good one. I will reiterate and summarize what I said at the beginning of the stream; IF we're supposed to be freaking out every playthrough with that beginning Witchy Hour, then the locations of the keys need to be randomized. When I restarted the playthrough to get me to the point where we ended in the demo, it was a breeze because I remembered where the keys were. If the horror aspect being a breeze is fine, then well done designing the game in a way that made remembering easy! Elise is a lovable idiot, despite what my tone might have suggested. Freya and Rozenmarine are delights! Leb grew on me a bit. She can still fuck herself, though. Either I do research to figure out the puzzle so I can continue or I show it to my lovely honey so he can tell me. I wanna keep playing! Maid Café on Electric Street is absolutely fucking adorable! I love ALL the characters and it was the mood lifter I expected it to be! I Metad a little bit, since I beat it once already, and I don't regret it. I didn't spoil anything! Except for a hidden recipe, but it didn't list it with the rest of them so I don't feel bad about it. I was giving advice about which of the maids' skills should be improved quickly, and that's Cleaning. And after beating it the first time, and coming back to the Stream playthrough, I started noticing more. I don't know why I was surprised; it's the point of the streams. I started noticing more of the little things, like the wind animations, the leaves and petals falling, and, though I didn't mention it, the jiggly boobs. The pixel art in this game is sublime! I'll tell you one thing; I get better sleep in the game than I do in real life. And I have one question... WHY ARE ALL THE DAMN LIGHTS ON IN THE HOUSE?

And that's it for this mini-review! Thank you for reading! If this series of videos is something you're interested in, you can watch it on YouTube, The Titans' Discord, Steam, Rumble, and Odysee! Don’t forget to hit the Subscribe and/or Follow buttons to know when there's more!

— 

The Sunday, December 22nd, and 660th, Artist Shout-Out goes to Kevin Diep! Check them out here!

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TIMESTAMPS 0:00 - Starting Soon 9:59 - Singing Intro 10:50 - Welcome Gamers! 12:51 - Artist Shout-Out 14:50 - Just Chatting/Demo Recap 18:51 - Little Goody Two Shoes/Trigger Warning 1:53:07 - Spit Attention/Going to Break Annc. 1:55:17 - Break Time 2:10:34 - Maid Café on Electric Street 3:55:15 - Artist Shout-Out 3:56:25 - Closing/Just Chatting 3:57:34 - Rendezvous Point Bookshop Plug 3:58:14 - Farewell/Up Next

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MORE INFO & TO SUPPORT - MonriaTitans | WGS Summarized - Rendezvous Point Bookshop - Artist Shout-Out Criteria - The Titans' Discord - Throne Wishlist - #SubOffTwitch - YouTube - Rumble - Odysee - Twitch - Steam

Originally published to https://opinionsandtruth.wordpress.com on December 22, 2024.

[riddlerosehearts]

HII im back again again!! idm whether or not u respond or if u answer this privately or publicly BUUTT i wanted to share my playlists and my lil keychains!!

i dont have much 2 say abt these BUT i got them off of etsy!! the top ones (individuals) r from crickeescrockpot and the heart keychains r from po11ita!! i also have an ortho keychain from crickeescrockpot asw!!! i highly recommend both shops, the keychains r super cute and im literally OBSESSED with them. both times that i had either package arrive in the mail i went INSANE. ok onto my playlists...

ok so for these im just gonna say the title of the playlist, what its for/based on and then list the songs (with some explanations....) i won't get into EVERY playlist or every song on each playlist bc they get SUUUPEER lengthy. also mentioning playlists i just wanted 2 mention while i've been writing this i'm listening to a playlist my friend has made me abt classic rock love songs he felt could relate to idiavil. the playlist is titled "the playlist for idia" (idk if ive mentioned but its one of my online names cuz i relate to him like. a lot. like an uncanny amount.) and the description is "the playlist meant specifically for idia. idia's playlist." which i thought u would enjoy cuz u like the emperors new groove. also relating to that me and this same friend have yzma and kronk twst ocs. just felt like dropping that. can u tell i have adhd yet ok ANYWAYS

originally i was gonna post multiple but i'll probably spread each playlist out between different posts if u don't mind..???? just lmk cuz this is already getting SUPER LENGTHY (went back to edit this while adding the tracklist LMAO)

the tirle of my main playlist is just in all caps "IDIAVIL" and is canon based. heres some of the tracklist:

- bad romance by lady gaga (im a little monster but also the whole idea of the romance being "bad" as in not socially acceptable as in vil is a celeb and dating some guy, with his popularity there'd be some type of uproar like there is irl)

- be quiet & drive far away by deftones (personal reasons but also because i can imagine vil taking idia out on car rides or just away from nrc if he became overwhelmed with people after large events yk??? like do u see the vision?????)

- koi boy by jack stauber (THIS SONG IS SO IDIA JUST TRUST ME. "can i wake up to you laying next to me?" OH MY GOD THATS SO HIM!!! the yearning of just wanting vil to be next to him and for him to be next to vil OHHH MY GODS.)

- i won't say (i'm in love) from hercules. this one needs no explanation

- i wanna be your boyfriend by hot freaks (another idia pov one, just checks out lyrically)

- wear sunscreen by peach pyramid (ANOTHER IDIA POV ONE BUT GODS THIS ONE IS SO COMFORTING TO ME. it matches so well with idias pessimistic point of view asw as the chorus fitting how i imagine idia and vil's relationship; they better each other, both of them aren't very familiar w romantic feelings, how they "stuck around" despite past problems they probably had with each other like the bickering they have in the twisted tsumderland event)

- teenage dirtbag by wheatus (not exactly 100% canon based but i think it makes sense for the most part. like, idia dreaming abt vil and consistently telling himself "he's too good for me, i'm just some lame otaku guy that games" and then vil sees idia sulking and that one scene from idias starsending robe vignette plays out, like he compares something to a game or mentions a game instinctively and then vils like "yeah exactly" and idia jjst does a hard restart)

- treehouse by alex g and emily yacina (again idias pov, most of these are. just bc idia has his own little bubble that he really only lets ortho into, and eventually vil.)

- love like you from steven universe (could be in either vil or idia's pov, i just imagine they'd have different experiences and feelings about romance asw as different ways to show affection.)

- the zombie song by stephanie mabey (HEAR ME OUT. THIS BUT FROM IDIAS POV ITS THE ZOMBIE SONG, AND FROM VILS POV ITS BASED OFF OF HIS HALLOWEEN CARD SO ITS ABT HIM BEING A VAMPIRE INSTEAD. DO U SEE THE VISION.)

- see you again by tyler the creator and kali uchis (again from idias pov, basically idia dreaming abt vil and being in a romantic relationship witj him but he avoids vil at all costs and is rlly awkward in convo with him bc of his crush.)

- red wine supernova by chappell roan (this is another kinda unrealistic but like. i can't entirely explain it. but do u see the vision.)

- fishy love by griffinilla (they're lowk so alphys and undyne coded like be fr)

- daydream by temporex (idia's pov, again just him being like "i'm not good enough" and avoiding her so he doesn't embarrass himself, pining basically)

- don't care by temporex (idia's pov, i imagine since vil is so constantly busy the two don'tgey a lot of time completely to themselves often and so when they do idia just drops everything immediately to see his bf)

- little star by temporex (this is another i can't exactly explain but. it just makes sense to me.)

- new perspective by panic! at the disco (it's from jennifer's body i think this makes enough sense)

- stupid with love from mean girls the musical (NOT AN AU LIKE IDIA IN CANON WOULD BE SOOO BAD AT LOVE. HES SMART WITH COMPUTERS BUT STUPID WITH LOVE.)

- stupid cupid by connie francis (very similar to i won't say i'm in love, i think this one checks out easily)

OKAY THATS ALL I HAVE FOR NOW. im honestly quite tired and i have to work on my next session for my d&d players (i dm two groups & i always wait until the sunday b4 we meet up to plan, tbh sometimes i cram it all hours b4 we meet on mondays) so i'm either doing that or sleeping. i'll post more tmrw tho if u want!!! i just feel like ive already flooded ur ask box sm i dont wanna bother u 😭😭

omg so first of all i should say that you're not bothering me at all!! i don't really get a lot of asks (the blog where i get the most is the one i make stimboards on and it's literally just because i take requests there LOL) so it's always nice when i do get people wanting to chat in my inbox! also my last reply was just me rambling for giant paragraphs about the casting for an AU based on a musical that you haven't even seen AKDFJGF so no worries, if you wanna send more feel free to! you could always just share your favorite songs from each playlist or something, whatever works for you lol, it just might take me a bit longer to reply if you send multiple asks at once. anyway those keychains are all so cute!! that reminds me i didn't share what artist made my enamel pins, it's ayumisaurus--looks like since i last bought from her she moved from etsy to another site and she's on a break atm, but hopefully when she opens again she'll still have her dorm leader pins. she made pins of all the overblots too and i need to get the riddle one at some point.

i didn't know a lot of these songs because 95% of what i listen to (outside of like, broadway musical albums/disney movie soundtracks/video game music lmao) is rock/metal/punk, i don't listen to much pop music or anything, so i looked up the lyrics to most of them but here's some thoughts:

be quiet and drive is a song i DO know and i can totally see that!! however, this is going to sound really silly but the reason why you picked it reminded me of making the most of the night by carly rae jepsen and then i thought of let's get lost, also by her. i'm imagining the first song from vil's POV and the second from idia's. yes i just said i don't listen to much pop music but carly rae jepsen is an icon 💖

i wanna be your boyfriend fits SO perfectly after i looked it up. the part that goes "all the guys are crowding around / they're telling you the same things that i planned to say / i thought i was unique / maybe I'm not that way" because vil is so famous and everybody already tells him how beautiful and talented he is all the time so idia thinks he doesn't have anything special to say... augh that's so good.

the lyrics to wear sunscreen are so sweet... you're so right about both of them making each other better and both not being that familiar with romantic feelings. vil's had all kinds of people who he doesn't even know try to confess their love to him, and it's possible that he's acted in romance movies before, but that doesn't mean he's ever known what it really felt like to be in love before.

love like you is such a great song because you can really make it fit just about any two people who love each other if you want to, and i can so easily see it from both vil or idia's POV. imagine "i always thought i might be bad, now i'm sure that it's true, cause i think you're so good and i'm nothing like you" and it could be idia thinking about how vil always works so hard and tries to help everyone else be the best they can be and he just isn't like that... or it could be vil thinking about how idia literally loved his brother so much that he figured out a way to bring him back from the dead, when he was only a child and vil at the same age was busy worrying about his acting career and never could've done something like that.

WAAAAIT FISHY LOVE BY GRIFFINILLA IS SO REAL LOL THEY ARE KIND OF ALPHYS AND UNDYNE CODED.

new perspective by PATD is another song i already knew and i can definitely see it

i also know the mean girls musical pretty well and omg the idea of stupid with love as a vilidia song is SO funny but you're so right, it does fit.

AND the mention of the mean girls musical reminds me, can i also just. go off on a quick tangent about wicked again. please imagine the beginning of the song "what is this feeling" but with vil and idia (as glinda and elphaba respectively, of course). really the WHOLE song is so them, but i just think about vil and idia going "there's been some confusion for you see my roommate is..." "unusually and exceedingly peculiar and altogether quite impossible to describe" "blonde 🙄" and it kills me every time it's SOOO funny to me.

anyway i didn't wanna give thoughts on every single song or anything because i knew this would get long but i appreciate you sharing them!! if you really don't mind me posting this publicly then i will just because i hate how tumblr doesn't save asks that you answer privately. also i thought for some reason that i already followed you back but apparently i didn't so i will now!! and if you're into D&D then you should totally play baldur's gate 3 if you're ever interested in it.