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moreespressoformydepresso · 10 months ago

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I’m working on a thing where all the tributes of the 10th Hunger Games won separate games, ultimately leading to president Snow getting his shit rocked because he sucked from the beginning and TBOSAS proved that, and I was thinking about how all the tributes would have won their games. The way you play the game and what led to your victory will probably have impact on how you cope and what exactly triggers PTSD. I’ve been mostly focused on Lamina and Treech because I love the district 7 tributes they’re built different, but I’ll try to come up with as many as possible for this list:

Velvereen was a career, and scored multiple kills while working with them, but ultimately the alliance broke apart as their members died off in their attempts to hunt down others. Velvereen, being less murder-happy, didn’t get revenge killed, nor did she get overwhelmed by a tribute she attacked, which left her as the last of the pack standing. She won because her last opponent used a melee weapon and she used throwing knives. Thanks to the advantage she had by not only having a long range weapon, but also a lifetime of training to hone her accuracy, she ended their would-be-battle swiftly and took the win.

Facet was also a part of the career pack, not necessarily hunting people down but going out of his way to kill whoever he came across that wasn’t a career. His weapon of choice was a spear, and he won by leaving the career pack when the water got a bit too hot under the team’s feet, and spearing the last tribute like a cannibal-style meat skewer.

Sabyn made full use of her superior health and knowledge of building structures in an urban arena. Aside from using her skill with the mace to bludgeon people to death, she also used it to hit all the weak points in the structures and collapsed walls on top of people. She took out the last remaining tributes by collapsing a building on top of them and killing off the survivors with her mace.

Marcus spent most of his games using his vastly superior physical strength and more well-fed state to his advantage, knowing most of his allies were waiting for the moment they thought they no longer needed him to get rid of him. His solution was to run awa- just kidding he killed them all in their sleep and used the intellect everyone thought he lacked for the rest of the games until the final fight, where he bashed the other tribute’s head into the rocks and then choked them to death.

Teslee wins her games by using her knowledge of electronics to reactivate the mines around the starting platforms and hiding in the cornucopia when there’s only four people left. When the mutts drive everyone to the middle of the arena, they’re subsequently blown up.

Circ wins his games in similar fashion to Teslee, except he gets forced to help the careers with his intellect and knowledge of technology. In response, Circ uses his intellect and knowledge of technology to trick the careers into protecting him and handing him weapons until he no longer needs them, then having the plan they made him execute literally blow up in their face and electrocuting several of them in the process. The last career is killed when Circ evades their attacks until they hit an electrical line with their fully metal weapon.

Coral probably won the same way she almost did in the movie. She was part of the career pack and made sure to be the one to backstab their allies first. There is no little brother figure for her to be worried about, nor are there snakes designed to kill every last person in the arena, so she has all the room and time she needs to handily shish kebab the last tribute and claim victory.

Mizzen doesn’t have as much brutal efficiency, nor the physique that Coral did even though I’m aging him up. He instead wins by mixing her strategy with the tried and true method of staying away from the things that could turn you into a pincushion. It’s like Marcus’ approach in reverse, starting with intellect and finishing with brute strength. He joins the careers, but as soon as things go slightly south he takes out the biggest threat when they aren’t paying attention and runs for the hills (or ocean, because district 4). He lures the last tribute to a body of water by pretending to run away and using the dark so they don’t see the cliff coming, and once they’re in his territory he uses his net to catch them and his trident or knife to finish them off.

Lamina cries so much in the lead up to the games that everyone, including her mentors, have given up on her. Once the games actually begin she surprises everyone with her strategy and skill with an ax, climbing a mountain high enough that people can’t kill her without going up themself and only coming down when she has to. When she does, she stockpiles water and food so she can stay up as long as possible while waiting for the others to whittle down the numbers. On one of her runs she finds a tribute who had a run in with the careers and was tortured almost to death. At their request, she puts them out of their misery. At the end of the games she’s barely got a scratch on her and is still at peak health for the circumstances. She’s forced to come down by the gamemakers, and all but one tribute is killed by the mutts. However, they’re so badly hurt that they beg her to just finish it and end their torment, at which point she hands out a second mercy kill.

Treech won his games by focusing on survival during training and pretending to be very bad at wielding an ax, only showing enough skill to avoid suspicion since he’s from the lumber district. He used good looks and charm during the interview to gain sponsors and talked about home to set up a proper sob story to get sympathy. He used the confusion of the cornucopia to snatch some of the supplies further away from the cornucopia and stays hidden from other tributes for the entirety of his games. Thanks to his stealing from everyone, including the careers, without getting caught, he has enough screen time to maintain his sponsors without putting himself in too much danger, especially before he gets his hands on an ax. His only kills occur during the final minutes of the games, where he jumps the last three careers once he realizes they won’t fight each other until he’s dead and waiting for the capitol to send mutts is more dangerous. He uses the element of surprise to jump the careers, cleaving one in the head and throwing his ax at the career with a long range weapon, before using his knife to injure the last tribute while stopping them from fatally wounding him until he manages to pull the ax from the body of the second career, turning to avoid a swing and gain momentum before swinging down and planting his ax in the last kid’s neck, killing them instantly.

Bobbin lost his arm in the games (I cannot see him as someone that isn’t Knox Gibson), and killed someone with a needle since he knows five ways to do exactly that. After losing his arm, he stayed alive by sewing it and several dangerous gashes closed so he wouldn’t bleed to death. He tripped the second to last other tribute using thread from his clothing and they got ripped to shreds by mutts that had been released into the arena. The last person was killed with that same thread, a brick, and yet again a needle.

Wovey used her perceived disadvantage (again, I cannot see a Wovey that isn’t Sofia Sanchez) by making everyone believe she’s weak. The arena was an industrial terrain not unlike district eight, which meant hiding was a piece of cake for her. Also, she used her knowledge of these kinds of buildings to lead whatever tribute was chasing her around until they were in a prime place for her to strike or ran into another tribute to strike for her. The last tribute was pushed into a machine, which crunched them to death.

Sheaf used her agility to her advantage, and luckily there was a sickle in the arena for her so her strategy became to rush at people with melee weapons, who would then predictably prepare to block a head-on attack, only to duck past them and cleave them in the back. She won her games by tiring her opponent out and decapitating them.

Panlo picks up on skills easily, and in the three days he had at the training centre he learned to shoot pretty decently with a bow and arrow. He’s best with a sickle, but they didn’t have those in his arena and he’d rather stay long range so bow and arrow it was. Nobody expected him to become so proficient so quickly, and since none of the careers used bows Panlo waited until after the bloodbath to run to the cornucopia and grab the set, as well as some supplies. He spent his games scoping out good sniper posts and shooting anyone who got too close for comfort, winning the games by waiting for the last two to finish duking it out and shooting the winner in the stomach, then finishing it with a shot through the chest.

Tanner won his games by joining an alliance (not the careers) and relying on their numbers to keep others from attacking him for as long as possible. During the final fight he uses his strength to wrestle the other person to the ground and uses his knife and experience from working in the slaughterhouses to gut them.

Brandy wins her games by using everything she knows from the slaughterhouses to kill the other tributes. During her last battle, she wrestles the other tribute to the ground and snaps their neck.

Dill is also aged up, and used her fragile state to play innocent before dropping all sorts of deadly things on people’s heads from the trees and poisoning them with her knowledge of agriculture.

Reaper is basically Thresh if Thresh hadn’t died so the capitol could have their star-crossed lovers death battle (you cannot tell me the storm didn’t have that exact purpose, the mutts are more ambiguous). Physically intimidating and strong, but deciding to lay low for most of the games rather than going on a rampant murder spree. He refuses to play the game and doesn’t kill anyone until he and one of the careers are the last two standing. The skirmish ends with Reaper scoring a revenge kill for his district partner, who was killed by this tribute.

Jessup used his strength to to intimidate the other tributes into steering clear of him. He joins the careers right until they’ve got one more dangerous tribute to get rid of, at which point he knows it’s time to cut his losses and run away. He keeps the careers alive, because he needs them to get rid of the other tribute and he’s lower on the priority list, but he knows that once that kid’s gone he’s the next to go. So he subtly stalls them until a night where it’s his turn to watch and grabs as many supplies as he can quietly get his hands on and leaves them behind. Another tribute stumbles across them and gets rid of half the pack, but that’s not Jessup’s concern. He wins the games by smashing a bottle over another tribute’s head and stabbing them to death with the shards.

Lucy Gray Baird wins by becoming the capitol favorite for her games. Her “performance” leads to her getting more sponsors than even some of the careers, which allows her to stay alive without having to put herself into much danger to get supplies. She wins by singing to snake mutts until they recognize her scent and stop attacking her, at which point she has venomous sentient weapons in her arsenal which she makes full use of, taking out two tributes with snake bites and ultimately distracting the last other tribute with them, using the opening it gives her to kill them.

I genuinely cannot think of anything for Hy, Sol, Ginnee or Otto for now, sorry 😅.

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monsoon-of-art · 10 months ago

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Donut Hole - Chapter 19

Plant Life

I saw a ghost on the stairs And sheets on the tables and chairs The silverware swam with the sharks in the sink Even so, I don't know what to think

I've been longing for daisies to push through the floor And I wish plant life would grow all around me So, I won't feel dead anymore So, I won't feel dead anymore - Plant Life, Owl City

[In which Laventon is MVP, and Dawn feels a bit betrayed.

[ao3 link]

Not quite out of the woods yet…but soon :) I do have ideas for a sequel fic, btw. But we're not there yet. And! HAPPY ANNIVERSARY POKEMON LEGENDS ARCEUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MAN!!!! Thanks for sending me back down a hyperfixation rabbithole that has somehow gotten me into buying retro Pokemon Games and DS consoles!]

Dawn turned towards Deertrack heights. “Help! Please!! He won’t wake up- please! ”

She knew someone would come eventually. Either from atop Deetrack heights or from Jubilife - she could’ve sworn Palina and the Professor were just behind her.

Someone was bound to help.

Someone had to be nearby to answer some questions at the very least.

How long had Barry been in Hisui? Why was he in such a rough shape? What had happened to him? Why hadn’t anyone told her? Sure, maybe she wasn’t exactly friends with the Wardens and Leaders, but didn’t they trust her? Didn’t Adaman and Irida listen to her sobs about Barry? Surely they would’ve remembered…

When she called for help, Dawn did not expect the metaphorical avalanche of people and pokemon that began descending down the hill.

Leading the charge was a strange pokemon, one that was strangely familiar but equally as alien. Dawn could recognize the traits of a ralts evolution when she saw one, but this was…not right. Somehow both, somehow neither.

Regardless of what it was, it was tearing down the mountain like a crobat out of hell with murder in its eyes.

Running directly at her-!

Dawn yelped, trying to move her body to shield Barry from whatever this pokemon was going to do.

Luckily, her bag shifted as one of her pokeballs forced itself open.

Her Alpha Lopunny, Daffodil.

The charging pokemon came to a skidding halt just before her and the Lopunny, the two engaged in a fierce, yet silent stand-off. The Gardevoir-Gallade stood, bristling with barely contained anger.

It moved to attack, what looked to be a close combat. But the rabbit was faster with her own attack, play rough. It was clear just from the Mystery Pokemon’s expression that it did not expect the attack, and that it was very painful.

And yet, it charged again. Hellbent on attacking her for whatever reason-

It clicked. This was Barry’s pokemon.

“Daffodil, st-” she began to say, but there was no stopping Daffodil now. Not in the heat of combat. The lopunny ducked under the punch that the Gallade-Gardevoir tried to throw and threw her own.

The second play rough hit just as hard as the first. The Gallade-Gardevoir stumbled back, trying hard to stay standing. But its legs buckled, and it collapsed to its knees. Finally, it fell onto the ground.

The pokemon was unconscious, for now.

It did not stop the horde currently coming their way.

Lord Adaman and Mai arrived first, on the back of Wyrdeer. Adaman began to say something along the lines of ‘put the boy down’, but was unable to finish. Unfortunately for Adaman, he was swiftly descended upon by an Alpha Honchkrow.

The rest of the Wardens and Nobles were subsequently attacked by seemingly rogue pokemon - the aforementioned honchkrow, a snover, a prinplup, and a shiny mothim. Some of these pokemon weren’t native to the Fieldlands, how far had they traveled to get here? Why were they so aggressive?

Dawn’s head was swimming with questions. So much was happening all at once. Trying to decide on what to do first was difficult, but she settled on quelling the furious rogues.

The enormous rabbit slowly turned to Dawn with her wide, unblinking eyes, waiting for commands.

It was honestly a miracle that she listened to Dawn at all. If she had to guess, it must be a 50/50 chance. A flip of the coin.

Dawn glanced over at the chaos, seeing the Honchkrow grab a large chunk of Adaman’s hair in its beak and starting to yank. But upon noticing her, the enormous bird let him go and started to head her way.

“Take out that Honchkrow!”

Flip of the coin. Heads.

Daffodil rubbed her paws together, creating the static electricity needed for a Thunderpunch.

Diving down, talons raised to swipe at Dawn, the honchkrow was either oblivious to the incoming attack, or maybe it thought it could take the damage.

Either way, Daffodil slammed her fist into the bird’s stomach, knocking the large bird out of the sky with her electrical attack.

Daffodil watched the honchkrow fall to the ground, then turned her dark eyes to the other rogue pokemon. She needed no instruction for what else needed to be done.

With blazing speed she surged into the crowd, readying her paws for more of her signature punches.

Palina and Iscan caught up to the chaos, Lord Arcanine whining as he slowed to a stop.

“Such chaos, caused by a single child-” Palina began to say.

“Why didn't you tell me?” Asked Dawn, voice trembling with hurt feelings and fear. “Why didn't you tell me sooner?”

Palina looked into the girl’s tear-filled eyes, mouth open…but nothing came out. She tried again, glancing at Iscan for support, but words still evaded her.

Daffodil made quick work of the Snover with a drain punch, tossing the unconscious pokemon next to the honchkrow. The prinplup and mothim had noticed that their comrades were swiftly falling to the fluffy behemoth, and switched targets to attack the lopunny instead.

Adaman and Irida could finally approach Dawn without risk of being attacked. “Dawn, oh thank Sinnoh you’re here!” said Irida as she dismounted.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked again, hoping for an actual answer. “You knew! You knew! And you kept me in the dark! Why didn’t you tell me?!”

Irida shut her mouth faster than a shellder at that. “Because…” Adaman started to say, looking apologetic. “Because we weren’t totally sure. And I didn’t want to raise your hopes in case it wasn’t.”

Dawn tried to blink away tears, turning away to not look at them.

Finally, Laventon and Rei, her saviors, arrived. The professor was panting and sweating, but here nonetheless. “R-Right…right…now, what’s…all the fuss?”

He placed a hand on Dawn’s shoulder (or was he using her as support? Either way, she appreciated the gesture) and looked at Barry. “Good God, he’s in a state, isn’t he? This is him, right?”

“Yes, yes, and he might be dangerous-” Irida tried again. “Please, Dawn, put him down-”

“No! No no! He’s not dangerous! He’s my friend! He wouldn’t hurt a beautifly- he’s hurt! He’s hurt!”

Palina felt the need to step in again, finally finding her voice. “Don’t treat the boy like a criminal, Irida, look at him. He’s completely unconscious.”

The rest of the clans cautiously approached now that they weren’t being harassed by rogue pokemon. (Daffodil had defeated the prinplup and quickly added it to the pile, and was now chasing after the mothim).

“He is a criminal!” Melli shot back, despite not being part of this conversation, “Remember the damage he caused?! Our settlement under rubble? Your settlement on fire?!”

“Melli. Hush.” Ingo hissed.

Everyone was talking now, including people she hadn’t even met before. It was all blurring together into a horrible white noise. Dawn started to hyperventilate, squeezing Barry tight. If he were awake, he’d be trying to comfort her, trying to pull her away.

But he was unconscious in her arms, and no one was helping him.

“Professor Laventon.” Dawn pleaded, tears threatening to roll down her cheeks. “We need to take him to Jubilife, please.” When she squeezed Barry tight, she could feel his ribs and his spine, something she never could before.

“Here, let me take him-” Laventon began to say, holding out his hands to take the boy.

“No!” shouted Dawn, squeezing Barry tighter. “He did all of this for me! I’m not letting him go!”

He had traveled across time and space for her. He had traveled all over Hisui for her. He had worked himself down to exhaustion just for her.

Laventon knew very well that Dawn was close to her breaking point. He needed to get her away from all of this chaos, all of the yelling, all of the stress. Maybe then she’d be more comfortable with separating from her injured friend.

He clapped his hands together, speaking above the crowd.. “I think the Wardens should return to their settlements then! You clearly have some troubles back home, and I do think we can take it from here.”

He didn’t wait for an answer before gently taking Dawn by the shoulders and beginning to lead her away. “Come, come. That’s it, my girl. Let’s go back home.”

Then, Laventon looked over his shoulder to the clan leaders, mouthing harshly, “You two. Come WITH.”

“Lu- Rei. Rei . ” Dawn shimmied Barry in her grip to grab his bag, handing it off to her fellow survey corps member. “I think….those pokemon are his…can you see if they have pokeballs?”

Rei frowned. “How would a stranger know how pokeballs work?”

“I just…have a feeling he used them. He's very smart. Daffy! Daffy we’re leaving!”

Daffodil the lopunny tossed the unconscious Mothim onto the pile with a satisfied huff. Job completed, she parted the crowd of nobles and wardens to follow.

Mai crossed her arms. “Well, Adaman? Irida? What are we doing now? The boy seems to be in decent hands now. I doubt he has the capacity to do any damage in that state.”

“And if so, it’s definitely not our problem.” Gaeric added.

Irida hesitated. Adaman did not. “I think Laventon said it best. Return to the settlements, we'll take it from here.”

Sabi smirked, “Have fun explaining this to Kamado!”

Jubilife had barely recovered from the surprise visit of Lord Arcanine when the survey team - flanked by both clan leaders and a giant rabbit - returned.

Zisu was first to greet them. “You all caused quite the stir! Kamado is furious! Breaking our gates like that?” she shook her head. “I hope you all have a good excuse, or I honestly think he might start spitting fire.”

Laventon spoke first between panting breaths. “If you’d please…go tell Pesselle…we have a young boy in need…of medical attention.”

Zisu glanced down at Barry in Dawn’s arms. “...who is that? You know what? Doesn’t matter. Let’s get him to Pesselle. But you need to explain this to Kamado and Cyllene. I’m not risking my head getting bit off.”

Dawn made a quiet noise of fear. Laventon rested a hand on her back, speaking softly, “My girl, everything will be just fine, I will make absolute sure of it. Let’s get your friend to Pesselle, and she’ll fix him right up.”

Zisu jogged ahead, with the group following close behind.

The doors to the Galaxy Hall swung open. Adaman and Irida stepped inside, but before Dawn could enter, Laventon stopped her. “My dear girl. We can take it from here.”

Dawn shifted from foot to foot, glancing down at Barry's face. He looked dirty and scraped up and thin.

“B-But professor-”

“I know. I know. But I want you to go home and relax. Because once we get your friend into the medical wing, Kamado will want an explanation.” he said in a reassuring hush.

The idea of speaking to the terrifying force that was Commander Kamado was enough to cause Dawn’s face to drain of all color.

“Exactly. And quite frankly, you are completely innocent in this whole mess. The Leaders are the ones who kept this whole thing to themselves, and it spiraled out of control. You did nothing wrong.”

She squeezed Barry tight. For a moment, it felt like he was squeezing her back. “...can you promise me he'll be OK?”

Laventon nodded. “My dear girl, I won't let anything happen to him. I'll take him straight to Pesselle, and when things are settled down, you'll be the first to know.”

Dawn finally relented, carefully handing off Barry to professor Laventon. “He’s…lighter than I expected! Thank goodness for that!” Laventon said, trying to crack a joke.

“Why don’t you wait in your home. Rei or myself will come get you when everything is settled, alright?”

Dawn’s lopunny nudged her with a soft rumble, giving the girl a lick on her head, trying its best to be comforting. She took the offer, absentmindedly stroking its long ears. “O-OK professor. I’ll…I’ll go wait. Everything will be fine?”

Laventon nodded with a smile. “Everything will be fine.”

#pokemon legends arceus #pla #dppt barry #pkmn barry

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rotiaftermath · 3 months ago

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can i request jo & brick? their rivalry is so fun

That post was mostly to gauge interest however. This does answer my question and you’re right it is fun so here we go

The day’s challenge was over, so Jo did the same thing she always did after a challenge: go for an afternoon run. It was one of her favorite parts of the day, actually, but today she sped away more agitated than usual. The challenge sucked, some stupid fashion bullshit followed by some rescue mission that, admittedly, was more her style.

Until stupid Mike (Chester? She didn’t keep track of his dumb characters. Except Svetlana. She actually kind of liked that one) gave her that god awful makeup job. Jokes on her for wanting to feel pretty, she guessed. She clenched her fists and ran faster, eager to get her mind off of it. But that wasn’t the only reason for her distress.

“Good afternoon, Jo!” Brick gave her a salute as she slowed down to meet him.

“At ease, corporal pants wetter,” Jo replied, smirking when he complied, “ready for me to beat you again?”

Brick grinned, “I think you’ll be surprised, ma’am. I’ve been closing the gap between us lately.”

Jo rolled her eyes, playfully, “I’d like to see you try.”

Brick raised a brow — or half his unibrow, rather, “Isn’t that why we’re having a race?”

“Ha! Fair enough!” Jo guffawed, getting into a starting position, “But get ready to eat my dust!”

Brick followed suit, smirking, “Not if you eat mine, first.” He glanced at her, “Ready?”

Jo took off without another word, Brick right behind her. They ran around the camp, through the trees and back again, making laps around the area without going too far into the mutant filled forest. Jo had gotten a good start on Brick, creating and widening the gap between them for the first lap, but with each subsequent lap Brick was managing to catch up, slowly but steadily closing it as they continued to race. They were neck and neck as they rounded the last curve, Jo gritting her teeth and Brick furrowing his brow in determination as they did one final kick to the finish. In the end the one who made it back first was…

Jo cackled as she stepped back into camp just a second before Brick did. “I win!” She said, between pants, “you’re still… a hundred years… too early… to beat me.”

Brick put his hands on his knees as he entered after her, “You sure… did… but I… got close.” He stood up as he finished catching his breath, holding his hand out, “It was a good race, Jo.”

Jo rolled her eyes, but shook his hand, anyway. It could be the last time, after all. “Yeah, yeah. Nice racing you one last time.”

Brick frowned, “What do you mean?”

Jo frowned, “Aren’t you scared of getting voted out?”

Brick chuckled, “Actually, I think I’m safe. Scott and Lightning were talking about voting for Sam, and I agreed.”

Jo blinked, “Oh. Huh.” Apparently she completely misread that situation. But she couldn’t deny feeling relieved that Brick would still be in the game. Not that she’d admit it out loud.

Brick nodded, “Sam performed admirably during the challenge, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough. It was also his advice that caused the Sasquatchanawka to kidnap Lindsay to begin with.” He rubbed his chin in thought, “Although I was the one who ultimately chose the clothing, so I can’t deny there’s still a possibility of me going out.”

Jo frowned, “Just stick to the plan. They’d have to be idiots to vote you out.”

Brick frowned, “I guess. Wait...” He looked at Jo, unable to stop himself from smiling, “Were you… worried about me?”

Jo scoffed, “No. I just didn’t want to lose a rival. Who else would I compete against? Lightning?”

Brick smiled at her, “Well, you don’t need to worry about that. I’m not going anywhere until I beat you.”

Jo smirked, “Then I guess you’re staying for a long time.”

#writings #td jo #td brick #yeah not too long #but still I hope you enjoyed!!#also forgive me for minor errors from the episodes events #I’m doing this by memory #auster answers

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annakie · 5 months ago

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Never Fade Away

THIS IS A VERY LONG POST with big spoilers in both words and pictures for Cyberpunk 2077!

But it's also all my feels about a playthrough that's taken me many months and almost 300 hours to complete.

----

I played Cyberpunk 2077 on release. As I said in this "Games I played in 2021" post, which is a thing I wish I'd remembered to do every year, I loved it. That said, it probably wouldn't have cracked my top 10 or maybe even 20 favorite games ever, but I thought it was amazing, right out of the box. I ran into a couple of bugs, like couldn't complete the Delamain questline, and definitely agreed with some popular opinions about the game that parts of it didn't seem quite done, I had a couple of crashes and times I had to reload from something weird happening, but playing on PC I didn't have a lot of the problems console players did apparently.

It very much felt to me like another Andromeda situation -- another game that needed another couple of months to finish ironing a couple of bugs out but was mostly a victim of its own over-anticipaiton and overhyped-edness by the fanboys (and girls.)

That said, when I finished it I set it aside to wait for major updates before I'd pick it up again.

So last fall when it's one and only DLC, Phantom Liberty finally released, it was right around when the BG3 hype was happening so BG3 came first. But I kept having to wait for mods to update after patches dropped, so during one of these breaks I went and started playthrough #2 of Cyberpunk 2077.

My first time through I was a Nomad, so to mix it up this time I went Corpo. I really enjoyed Corpo a lot more and thought it had some much cooler interactions than Nomad ever gave me. Although, I thought the introduction and subsequent friendship with Jackie felt more natural with Nomad.

There were several goals I had going in to this playthrough.

Different origin - check.

Send Jackie's body to Mama Welles -- with no spoilers from my first run, I thought sending the body to Vik to work on first would be the most logical choice and either he could help Jackie or at least get him interred properly so Jackie's mom WOULDN'T HAVE TO BE TRAUMATIZED by her son's body just showing up. Guess that was the wrong choice and it was way too late to change once I found that out. So yeah, start things off right with Mama.

Complete the Delamain quest now that the showstopper bug a LOT of people ran into was fixed. (Didn't mention it later, but check!)

Find all the Hidden Gems

Pick a different ending.

Install cool mods to enhance things without breaking the game.

Generally, just do everything. Except maybe the Sinnerman questline. (I aborted halfway through and didn't regret it.)

Understand the main storyline in ways that had confused the hell out of me the first time around.

High quality Screenshots screenshots screenshots screenshots screenshots.

So with 1 checked off, I decided before advancing the main storyline much, I'd try to raise my fame level a bit and also just let Jackie live for awhile.

I did some research and landed on installing the Welcome to Night City mod collection. It's well researched, well maintained, the creator is really responsive, and has a Discord with a well supported community. Importantly for me, it also didn't have any "sexy" mods, just great gameplay tweaks, fixes, customizable on how much harder/easier it made the game, and added a lot of flavor and experience but felt like everything just worked in the background. Also since I have a Premium Nexus Mods experience, the install and upgrades were very, very easy. I didn't do the upgraded CyberpunkTHING experience, since it makes the game harder. I was here for a good time.

(And yes, I endorsed every mod in the collection!)

Honestly it added so many things that I'm sure there was a ton of stuff I just experienced thinking that that's just how the game was now, but it was a part of a seamlessly integrated mod collection.

I'll definitely use this mod pack again the next time I play. But also I didn't install ANY other mods really for a very long time, and I now really wish that I had. But we'll get to that.

I also installed several other graphics mods on my own, like a high-res skin for River (and the... shall we say... anti-Kendoll mod for him lol) and like, this mod (and several others from that author) that tones down the hypersexuality of the ads in the game. I realized early on that they don't bother me in-game -- it totally fits the aesthetic and tone of the game! But also I didn't want all that in screenshots that I will have rotating on my desktop for years (shoutout to DisplayFusion) and would have the possibility of like, my AC guy or my neighbors kids having to see as my Office is my living room (and my living room is the smallest bedroom of my house).

I did a lot of the gigs in Watson before advancing the main storyline so I'd have an OK character for storming stuff this time. I recently found a list of places Johnny talks in early Watson jobs to avoid doing early next time:

Side Job: Losing My Religion (where you have to free the monk from Maelstrom)

Fixer Gig: Backs Against the Wall (recover stolen medicine from veteran)

Fixer Gig: Scrolls before Swine (get the CCTV footage for the cop, only if you watch before downloading)

So you can do all NCPD hustles, the first 10 Fixer gigs and and all side jobs except Losing My Religion without losing out on any of the Johnny experience.

Leaving that there for next time. Anyway, it feels like it makes more sense to get this chance at the big gig when you have some experience, and can pretend you and Jackie were living life together a little while longer. Next playthrough -- use AMM to take some hanging out with Jackie screenshots early on.

---

Eventually I advanced the main storyline enough and finished the Heist, and was able to check #2 off my list. Loved not getting yelled at by Mama Welles this time. And felt with the added time that I had a right to be doing this -- still extremely stupid in retrospect -- gig. But it was more fun have tools to deal with the hotel guards this time.

Knowing who Takemora was and meeting Johnny again were really enhanced by knowing what the fuck was going on the second time around. Keanu really knocks it out of the park when you finally really understand the character.

Though I hate the early adversarial feeling between him and V, I get it a lot more now. Watching the relationship grow is really worth it.

---

I wasn't invited to Jackie's memorial the first time. So getting to go the second time and help repair Misty and Mama Wells' relationship was great, and I really loved getting to know Jackie better by picking out something for the funeral at his garage, and the added time with Misty.

---

I told myself I'd do a different spec than stealth-hacker. I was wrong. I still did that. I love using Contagion and Overheat to take enemies out non-lethally while crouched behind something nearby. The ones that really deserve it get a shot from Skippy later.

Yeah, as soon as lockdown was over I hightailed it down to Valentino's territory and then headed back to Watson / Japantown. I gave Skippy up as late as possible, when he was outliving his usefulness. I got him back as fast as I could, but I miss his voice. I miss his quips.

After that when I needed a weapon I mostly used the Arasaka experimental smart SMG. IDK, I just liked the feeling of stealing shit from Arasaka and using it to fuck up their own people whenever possible. But again, I didn't shoot weapons much anyway.

---

I spent so, so much time just driving around taking pictures of my cars and the amazing ways the light looked while driving through the city. I absolutely fell in love with the aesthetics of the city, every part of it, over and over again. I posted a few photosets. There are more in the queue. There are so many screenshots I didn't use.

Like, honestly out of everything I love about this game just... looking at it is maybe my favorite thing. There's so much to see, all of the time, everywhere. Your eyes can never take it all in. I'll be in a place I've been a dozen times and still find new awesome things to look at. I just can't describe how much I enjoy just... looking at this game.

I never fast travel anywhere -- except out of the Megabuilding 10 apartment. I took the metro a few times just to sit back and relax watching the scenery go by but normally I just drive everywhere.

Jackie's Arch and the Porche 911 (and its variant in the bottom screenshot) are my favorite vehicles. Bikes for maneuverability, but also likewise the Porche has better handling than a bike while still being really easy to weave through traffic in.

Night City is one of the few locations in any video game I've ever played that TRULY feels like it could be a real place. Every neighborhood is distinct. Though there are some familiar things, one Captain Caliente doesn't look like every other one. You'll see a few of the same signs around, there are some generic small building structures but where it makes sense. Yeah there's a few monolithic Arasaka buildings but of course they would be. How efficient. The megabuildings are similar, but different enough. It feels like every detail of the world was crafted so carefully. There's so much beauty even in the ugly bits.

I never want to stop looking at it, or screenshotting it. I just love the city so much.

I'm going to run out of screenshot space on this post.

---

I romanced River again. Look, I'm a basic primarily het romancer in video games. I love Judy, she's amazing, but River ticks my boxes -- the Paladin archetype who gives it all up to do the right thing even when it costs him.

I hate that he's the most undercooked of all the companions plot and time-wise. But there were some huge improvements this time. All the companions had gotten extra text message interactions. A fun little quest that added a bit more content in PL. They Really Want To Stay at Your House! And along with that, amazing mods are now available to make those things even better. (River Romanced Enhanced, the Really Want To Stay At Your House and Romance Interactions Enhanced mods)

Around the mid-point in game after seeing some amazing photosets on my desktop, I got brave and installed Appearance Mod Menu and a bunch of other pose and photomode mods that go along with it. Also some outfit mods for River. And then things really got cooking screenshot wise.

Even though it took a lot of effort to set this stuff up and to get poses to work right sometimes, I got to feel like River and my V went out and had real dates on the town.

Also sometimes... we just uh... stayed in.

There's so many photos that won't ever make it to tumblr. And so many more sets I want to take.

Well, that's what reloading old saves is for.

You'll see some of these screenshots again, or have before. I have a lot of things queued that will pop up... sometime. I like to surprise myself with my own photosets. :D

---

I finally installed the Virtual Atleir and started modding in outfits a little while after doing AMM, was trying to install things in waves as to not break too much. I got a few crashes here and there, but not as many as I was worried about, after installing stuff on top of Welcome to Night City.

I kind of regret waiting so long to do Virtual Atlier and clothing mods but also not. I think I manually collected like 95% or more of all the ingame clothing. I still stop by clothing stores but they usually have nothing new for me, or just things like... masks that I never use. There's such a huge variety of clothes already in the game that I didn't get to build a lot of outfits around pieces that I love. I made a whole post of ingame-outfits I made and love!

And there's one in the queue somewhere of modded-in outfits, too. Not even all of them.

Cyberpunk 2077 is the ultimate Dress-up my dolls and make them kiss game, and I may never stop playing that aspect of it.

---

Hey speaking of Kerry Eurodyne, I love him. And Panam. And Judy. And Vik. and Claire. And Misty. And Rogue. And the rest of Samurai (Well, I chose Denny and always will.) The only thing I don't love is how it feels like you still don't get enough time with any of them, except MAYBE Panam.

I would love to be able to space out all of their missions even more. I try to put as much space in between the companion missions as possible, but this time it backfired on me a little because i crammed Judy's stuff in way later in the game than I should have, around when I was doing Kerry's stuff. When all of the main quest and most of the side quest stuff was done. And we all know that we don't get Kerry until way too late anyway. But doing Panam's stuff happened so long ago that sometimes I'd just drive out to see the Aldecados and hang out for a day because I missed them. (And, as you can see in the River screenshot above, I "brought him along" to introduce him tot he family once or twice.)

I have a great photoset in the queue of all the main characters hanging out at the Corpo apartment together I can't wait to come up someday. Not posting a preview screenshot here.

Except I forgot Claire. It took me like an hour to set that scene up and now I'm thinking about doing it all again to include Claire.

Anyway, mostly I just want to say that aside from just loving River, I love them all and don't want to leave them behind either.

Or the Fixers. Or Reed. But we'll get to Phantom Liberty.

---

Just one more quick stop here to talk about the music.

I installed the Improved Radio Continued mod and wow it really enhanced the music experience for me.

I am a 98.7 Body Heat gal, with a flip to Pacific Dreams when Ponpon Shit or History would play, but loved about half the new music on Growl FM. It took some finagling, but Improved Radio let me make my own custom radio station with JUST the songs I wanted. So it's a mash of those three stations, without the songs I disliked. (There's one on Pacific Dreams, the REALLY long one that has the interlude of someone saying the same word over and over really slowly? That one... ughghgh) and that was amazing. There's a handful of songs from other stations I liked too, that got added in. And, I'm sorry, no Us Cracks allowed. I love them as characters, still hate their music.

What I didn't expect was to really fall in love with the music of Samurai this time around. Like, I knew I should have the first time but I didn't put effort into listening to them since metal isn't my usual vibe. But it IS my brother's, at least when we were in High School and College, so I listened to it a lot back then and there are still metal songs I do like.

So this time I put all the Samaurai songs in my playlist and holy shit I fell in love with them.

A couple of weeks ago I was driving to visit my parents IRL and the entire way up there I just listened to the Samurai songs on repeat. I'm a big fan now, thanks second playthrough.

----

So, Phantom Liberty was the big reason for the new playthrough. Let's talk about it.

I absolutely LOVE Dogtown. oh, Pacifica, but worse? Amazing. So much new stuff to see, and do. I loved exploring every nook and cranny.

It added SO MUCH to the game, I can't imagine playing the game without it. I didn't even go to there until I was like 2/3rds of the way through the rest of the content and I wish I'd spread it out EVEN MORE.

I will say that I thought some of the main quests were a bit long. I felt myself itching to get out and go do something else throughout some of the long sessions like basically having to do most of the stuff with the President in one big long chain, though it made sense. I loved those quests, though! And I think I'll like them even more on a subsequent playthrough some day.

The only part I really did not like at all in Phantom Liberty was -- ok look I made the choice to side with Reed the entire way. It's Idris fucking Elba okay, I have loved him since The Wire. And I absolutely understand why Songbird did what she did, and what she would have done if I'd have sided with her. And maybe I will next time. But this time, I was all in on Reed -- though I didn't become an Agent for the NUSA, fuck that. And I gave Songbird her final wish. Because again, fuck the NUSA.

But oh man, that last quest? With that FUCKING ROBOT following you around the base at the end, that is an instakill if it finds you? FUUUUUUCK that. It was so frustrating that I stopped playing for over a month because every time I thought about going back into the game to finish that my head wanted to explode.

Eventually I watched a couple of Youtube videos and read a couple of articles about exactly where to go and how to hide from it.

Look, I love exploring, I love taking my time, I love making sure I explore everything and miss nothing. That fucking robot harshed my gaming style so much. No regrets about cheating my way through that part. Zero. I made it through with only dying to it one more time and got the fuck out of there. I was also glad to see in the comments of the video I watched and articles I read that I was very much not alone in that opinion. I might side with Songbird at least most of the way to the end in future playthroughs JUST to never have to do that base again.

Otherwise, though, Phantom Liberty was a triumph. I want a mod that makes the Dogtown apartment not shit but also not luxury, and then I want to just stay there a long time.

----

So, I'm almost done with the game.

I installed two Hidden Gems mods that turn the easy-to-miss stuff into Fixer (and Ronald in Dogtown) quests and LOVED THEM. I wanted to see and do it all. And I did. I'm done with that. It took me many more hours of gameplay to get through all of that. Worth it.

In my playthrogh, River is waiting for me at my Megabuilding apartment to spend one more night together.

And then I'm calling Panam and having the Aldecados come help me storm Arasaka.

Last time I had Rogue help, and to be honest, I feel like that's still the right choice. Rogue helped start this. She should help end it.

But one of my goals was to do more things different. And to be honest, I hate the endings, so much.

It's not that I necessarily think there should be a happy ending for V. But I think that the game should let us help make sure other people have happier endings.

So here's the thing. V is richer than like 95% of Night City by the end of the game. She's got like six apartments, at least a dozen cars even if you don't buy many at the car store, My V still has like 8 million eddies.

I don't care what the game says.

In my game, V went to a financial lawyer.

V set up trusts with each of the Fixers, or maybe one for all of them, where they can access funds to hire mercs to help people who couldn't afford a Fixer but needs one. I'd trust most of them to use this wisely, or maybe Regina, or Rogue, or Dakota or Padre would help oversee it. At least a million eddies out there, to help those who get fucked by the system most.

V sets up a trust for Judy, so she's always got enough to get by. She sends her the best tech she's gotten her hands on to ply her trade with. Maybe a new van. Set aside some to help the Dolls.

V sends her heavy duty vehicles and Scorpion's bike to the Aldecados, along with a huge stash of weaponry and half a million or so eddies to help them stay solvent.

Misty's and Vik's rents paid up for at least a year. A vehicle each. Another 250k or so for each of them. They have room to breathe. Whatever Cyberware is laying around goes to Vik -- but if River wants a couple of pieces installed, he gets them (within reason. No cyberpsychosis for my man.)

Same for Claire. Set her up with her shop's rent paid up, and a trust, give her The Beast back, and another car of her choosing.

Kerry doesn't need much, but she gives him Johnny's outfit to remember him by. Or maybe to Rogue. What do these two giants want? Whatever it is, they can have. Split the memorabilia.

And then River.

First of all, a trust for Joss and the kids. 250k each, the kids get theirs in small chunks as they age. If there's a note on either of the trailers, it's paid off. If Joss wants to move into the city, done. Set the kids up with scholarships to the best schools they want to go to. A decent, reliable car for each of the four of them. Maybe Randy wants the Megabuilding apartment for when he's ready to live on his own again.

River gets most of what's left after all that. The Glen apartment specifically, that's where they made their best memories. There's still going to be like 4 million and a bunch of cars and property left. If V dies, it's his.

This is the closest thing to happily ever after that they can get, and in my mind it absolutely happens, at some point.

Honestly, if it were me, if I didn't know the "two years later" of it, then V would have taken the President's offer and gotten Johnny out of her head surgically and lived. The will probably would have triggered. Or knowing that the surgery could be risky she'd at least have put in a provision that a percent of it triggered so Joss, the kids, River, Judy, Claire and Panam would be taken care of.

She'd never have left River destitute and desperate to take care of the family. I can't accept it.

V would wake up maybe with less money, but her assets protected enough that even without being a Merc she'd be OK. The people she loved would be OK. River would have taken care of things, and would love her without her implants.

It'll never be happily ever after in Night City, but the people that matter most will be OK.

---

But I'm going to finish today, maybe tomorrow. I planned on it today but then I spent 4 hours writing this post and have a PF2E game tonight to DM that I need to prep for.

I installed the River's Epilogue Enhanced - Nomad Star Ending mod and.... so I'm bringing the Aldecados to Arasaka, and am going to have the happiest ending possible modded into the game. With my headcanon that a trust is waiting for him and the family. They'll be fine.

I love this game. I loved it before, I love it so much more now.

I can't wait to play it again someday.

#cyberpunk 2077 #river ward #kerry eurodyne #panam palmer #judy alvarez #johnny silverhand #rogue amendiares #cp2077 #long post #pptt

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miloscat · 8 months ago

Text

[Review] The Last Guardian (PS4)

Ico 2 & the Colossus.

The Last Guardian (bad name) had a messy development, with Team Ico working on the game since 2007. Struggles with the PS3 prolonged its gestation, and Team Ico disbanding and leaving Sony can't have helped. But Director Fumito Ueda formed a new studio, GenDesign, with many of the former staff, and they decided to continue collaborating with internal Sony studios to finally get the game finished in 2016.

I feel like knowing this game was in development hell for almost a decade helps me understand some things about the final product. The movement and mechanics have the same kind of clumsy jank that Ico and Shadow of the Colossus do, but somehow it doesn't hang together as well. The big new gameplay ideas end up in player frustration way too often. The overall story is full of enticing mystery but leaves off with too many lingering questions.

Describing the game as Ico 2 fits it well, I think. You're a little boy (unfortunately nameless this time) clambering around an old mysterious ruined castle solving puzzles to proceed through the environment, and avoiding capture by . This time instead of an enigmatic girl as your companion (or a horse, in SotC's case) you have a gryphon-like creature named Trico. A more apt comparison might be the Anzû of Mesopotamian mythology, as there's other inspirations from that culture in the looks and plot (thanks to my friend Gibbon for pointing this out). Sidenote, Trico is usually referred to with male pronouns, which breaks the pattern of male protagonist and female companion in the previous games. And yes, I feel like constant comparisons are warranted with this series since there's a fairly distinct throughline.

Anyway. The Ico continuity is clear, while Trico represents a kind of friendly Colossus, as you often have to climb on them... and try to manipulate their wilful behaviour the way you had to in some Colossus fights. A key technical goal and talking point of the game is Trico’s realistic animal behaviour… well and good but having a character you rely upon be consistently recalcitrant and obtuse did not make for a consistently enjoyable gameplay experience for me. You soon learn to issue commands to Trico and while it can be thrilling to ride them around and fight alongside them, the delays and misinterpretations really added up to frustration for me more often than I’d like. Add to this that it’s not always clear what you have to do next, and that progress sometimes looks like failure in this linear story-driven game, the result can be confusion.

The dynamic between the two is the heart and soul of the game, so when it breaks down you can feel helpless. But when it works it’s incredible, this big feathery kitty coming to trust you and helping you solve puzzles, while you work to heal Trico’s hurts and traumas. This is a really strong concept that the whole game is built around, it’s only let down by some clumsiness in the execution.

As you venture around these crumbling chambers and towers, there are a few optional things to find. Trico is fed via glowing barrel; they attract glowing butterflies of the same colour so I figured that’s what they contain but the truth may be more sinister. Finding out-of-the-way rooms with barrels adds up to costume unlocks… a limited form of cosmetic customisation that sadly is only enabled for subsequent playthroughs. Unless you’re planning on multiple runs, you’ll have to settle for finding them being its own reward. Especially when you can’t get Trico to eat the damn things, or your discovery of them gets reset when you die on a platforming section.

The Last Guardian (still a bad name) is an uncut gem, it could have been so brilliant if not for the roughness that pervades the experience. As with its two predecessors it has strong art direction, the ancient land you find yourself in the perfect place for an adventure full of mystery. But with as many cool and interesting ingredients as there are, there's aspects that are clearly not ready for primetime even after so long in the oven (to mix a metaphor). Even things like Trico's appearance I feel are representative of the game as a whole: they worked hard to give each feather individual rendering and physics, but look at it as a whole and it's a big flapping mess. Eight years on, TLG doesn't seem to have had the impact and staying power as Team Ico's other games have, and that's a shame... but I understand why.

#the last guardian #team ico #gendesign #review #ps4

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goferwashere · 8 months ago

Note

wait srry if asks rnt open but im a chismoso so hopefully this is OK to ask ;; is the little character in ur banner and pfp ur sona ? they r so silly looking i love it sm but also why is it chowing down on a hotdog bun filled with butter . DONT ELABORATE IF THERES A PERSONAL BACKGROUND ATTACHED TO IT PLS but i srsly think it's so cutesie and ive been curious abt it 4 a hot min ✝️

SAW THE NOTIFICATION AND I ROSE FROM THE DEAD BUGGY U JUST OPENED THE GATES OF HELL /POS

ALSO ASKS ARE ALWAYS OPEN!! UNLESS THE BUTTON IS GONE FEEL FREE TO SEND ME ASKS ANYTIME I LOVE GETTING THEM :DD

ASHSHSSH THANK YOU !!! Yes this is my sona her name is RB 😋 she has lore and comes from her own world but I use her like a persona :3

Here’s the OG image along with a couple others of her :D

Also her as a character can’t speak so she uses ASL to communicate (hence the banner she’s holding) so I don’t use ASL but I do use a website when I draw her speaking

funny ass gif lawllll (she’s signing ‘I am not a crook’) (yes TV Girl reference) the frame rate is too fast but I can’t fix it now

ALSO ALL OF THIS ART IS OLDER. NOTHING NEW FOR THESE GUYS FOR A WHILE I NEED TO MAKE NEW ART FOR THEM 💔💔

auughhh and her lore if you wanna read below but I understand that OC lore isn’t everyone’s thing

OKAY SO she comes from a universe where her kind are robots made by a company to terraform planets for the ultra wealthy. So if you have the funds you can purchase a whole planet and whole armies of these little bots will shape it however you want.

BUT. While on the assembly line, before even recovering her directive, a portal opens up and throws her into this odd pocket dimension, which is just a half built city floating in a bright void. (Also when I say half finished I mean more like brutalist aesthetic with just concrete and no glass on the windows)

This place (named ‘Gearsky’ by locals because massive floating gears are the only thing that exist here outside of the city itself) is full of people from their own dimensions just trying to get by. She explores, and comes across a little bear being picked on in an alleyway. (The lil green bear [party bear] in the pics above)

She saves him and then it subconsciously becomes her prime directive to help Party Bear get home/care for him. So they set up base in one of the empty apartments and she just sorta takes care of him.

NOW. How do you get home you may be asking? Well it’s easy. You just need to beat someone in a deathmatch.

Enter the only form of entertainment on this island. The man who is the dictator of this place and subsequently the host of this game, aptly named Host, loves running this game. The rules are simple. 3 people enter, and two can leave alive. Only one needs to die, and the other two can get sent home. The only thing is, you have no idea who you’re going up against.

Now, RB, being a bot made to terraform, has some power behind her with her explosive abilities. But Party Bear has no defenses. So RB tries to strike a deal with Host.

She offers to kill both people in the ring with her for multiversal travel.

Host is intrigued by this offer, and accepts. After wiping the floor with her opponents, she’s granted access to all dimensions. She’s obviously excited and goes home to try and let Party Bear go home, but is heartbroken when she discovers that she’s the only one who can travel using the portals.

But this catches the attention of someone else.

Her future boss.

Another robot, by the codename TB-89.

He took note of her deal, and approached her with a job offer.

Man’s long story short she works for him as an assassin!

There’s so much more I wanna say but I know I can’t ramble on forever lol if you read all this then thank you so much for sticking it out 🤭 I hope you enjoyed it I love gushing about my characters

#THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR ASKING THIS #I NEVER GET TO YAP LIKE THIS #oc artwork #my oc’s #oc animation #oc lore #persona lore #sona lore #idk how to tag this #gofers !! art

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landinrris · 11 months ago

Note

It's Jess here to request a little something from the grad school fic you listed in your wip title game post 👀👀

As someone who is thinking about going back for my PhD I could use a little motivation!!

Also thanks for tagging me XD I gotta get on that

The way there isn't much plot for this one right now, just vibes as I was getting my own work done one day and being like "oh, this is such a specific mood right now." The beautiful thing about grad school and a subsequent au is that there is not really a "traditional age" like university, so everyone involved would be their relative real-life age. Here, I'm thinking Lando's a second-year and Carlos is a fourth year. Their place-holder programs are different concentrations within psych because that's what I currently do, but we'll see. Truthfully, I am not sure how motivating it will be, but don't take life advice from these two 😅. Here's a rather longish and rough draft snippet of Lando and Carlos meeting each other because Lando sucks at stats as a treat Interested in learning about some wips?

When Lando gets an error message for the third time in a row on his code, he pushes back from his desk and goes to take a walk. Maybe a few minutes of wandering around the building to clear his head will help.

He finishes locking the door when he looks over to see the door of the lab next to him open where it wasn’t earlier.

The lab belongs to one of the other faculty members in the department, though most of their students are above Lando and in the middle of data collection for bigger projects. The door being open is a rarity in some regards, and Lando is desperate enough, so he tries his luck.

From what Lando can see through the half-open door, there’s a guy sitting at the large table looking down at his laptop keyboard. All Lando can see is his nose and a large bottom lip. Lando thinks he’s seen the guy around even if he doesn’t know his name. He’s beyond intimidating in a way too-attractive people often are, but Lando’s desperate, so he knocks on the open door.

The guy’s head shoots up, eyes wide in surprise. He’s probably in the middle of office hours and not expecting anyone to need him. His gaze is as piercing as Lando thinks he remembers it being.

“Can I help you?” the guy asks. And while Lando’s seen him, he doesn’t think he’s ever heard him speak. The sound of his voice is a deep timbre that curls around the English words. Does this guy teach a class, and if so, would Lando be allowed to audit it just to hear him speak for longer than four words?

“Sorry,” Lando stutters, kickstarting his brain. ”I’m Lando. I’m from the lab right next door. I’m trying to run some analyses, but I can’t get my code to run properly. My advisor’s not in either today, or I'd ask him. You don’t happen to have any experience with SAS, do you?” Damn Andrea and his attachment to a program only a few people in the department use.

“I do, actually. I can take a look if you bring your computer over here. I would come to you, but technically one of my students could show up. Not that they will, you know?” Lando does know, even if he’s only a teaching assistant.

Lando wouldn't care even if he had to drag his entire desktop into the lab. All that matters is that maybe a second pair of eyes will finally be able to help. “Mint.”

He practically bolts back to his desk and grabs his laptop, desperate to get what he needs to done before going home for the day.

When he gets back, his savior is scrolling through his phone. This lab is a bit smaller than Lando’s own. The main table he’s sitting at has five chairs around it, and there are a further two desks off to the side with desktop computers. There’s an imitation of a stout bald man on the chalkboard along the back wall who looks oddly familiar.

The guy smiles at him as he gets closer. Lando pulls out a chair next to him and sinks down. “What’s your name? Sorry, I don’t think I actually know.”

“Carlos. I’m a fourth-year I/O. We’re a little bit off to the side from everyone else sometimes.”

A name to a face. Carlos. Lando tries to be neutral about the information and not think about looking him up on the department’s website later.

“Ah yeah, I barely know people outside my area, so not your fault. Thanks again for agreeing to take a look. I’d have asked Andrea if he was here today.”

Carlos brushes his words away and leans back in his chair to angle his head toward Lando’s computer. “It’s no problem. I could use the break from this lit review. May I?”

Lando pushes his laptop in Carlos’ direction. Watching him work isn’t unlike watching Andrea— careful, methodical, eyes scanning the rows of code. He highlights a bit to run, and then resumes his scanning. Lando should be watching the screen to see what Carlos is doing, but instead, he can’t help but watch Carlos’ face. He does this thing with his jaw that doesn’t look entirely comfortable, but what does Lando know?

Evidently not how to be subtle because Carlos looks at him and very obviously catches him staring. “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?” His voice scratches lowly across the words.

“Uh… good news preferably?”

Carlos breathes out a semblance of an amused huff through his nose. “I found the error I think to make it run.”

“Wait, really? Oh thank God. What’s the bad news? Please don’t tell me my data sucks or something mate, because I will lose it.”

This time Carlos actually does smile. “The bad news is that you will want to bang your head against the table because it is annoyingly simple. You copy and pasted this code?”

“Yeah, but I’ve checked back over it like three times. Don’t tell me it’s a fucking comma or something.”

“Worse, it’s a semi-colon. You have put one at the end of each statement, but this one here in the middle,” Carlos points to the regression lines, “Doesn’t need one because it goes to the next line.”

Lando groans because that is embarrassingly simple. Thank God Andrea isn’t here, actually. “Fucking Christ, of course it’s a fucking semi-colon. Ugh, thank you. Do you mind if I sit here while I fix it in case something else happens?”

Carlos shakes his head with ease. “Please, stay for as long as you like or until 4:00 because that’s when I’m leaving.”

“Fair enough.”

Lando contemplates moving to a different spot to do his work so he isn’t so on top of Carlos. But Carlos doesn’t make any indication that he minds— redirecting his attention to his own computer.

#if i can jot out a rough outline to give me guidance that'd be great but we are only halfway there right now #hoping to capture that vibe™#writing tag #husbands™#grad school au

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nailgunstigmata · 1 year ago

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i got addicted to watching survivor again….i know dennis would suck at every challenge (doesnt even attempt most of them, sits out when he can) and constantly complain about every little thing on the island and annoy his tribemates. says in confessionals hes the ultra smart manipulator running the game but in reality everyone only doesnt vote for him because theyre worried mac will beat them up if they do and charlie wont let them eat his fish anymore. also he has no shot at winning so hes not a threat and might get carried to the end, but i feel like he gets voted out soon after mac and the threat of physical repercussion is gone and the rest of the tribe has decided they can do without charlies fish. sits very cuntily on the jury and the camera sweeps over all the time to get his reaction shots and his boobs in frame.

mac is a challenge beast that tries providing for the tribe (dennis and charlie) but fails miserably, he probably gets voted off before the merge because people are rightfully worried about an immunity run. i feel like mac can glance over at dennis sitting bored on the sit out bench and he stacks his entire tribe on his back and finishes the challenge single handedly. constantly talks about his love for god which might endear some more christian tribemates at first, but quickly gets annoying. when he gets voted out he accuses his tribe of being homophobes, when dennis gets voted out mac starts yelling and stomping his feet in the jury and almost storms tribal council to fight everyone and subsequently gets removed from the show. if he somehow manages to get to the end he would probably get some votes for his sheer physicality, but i dont think enough people respect the zero strategy all brute force gameplay for him to win. also they think hes annoying too.

charlie is climbing trees and swimming in the ocean catching fish without the gear, hes less providing for the tribe and its more that he catches fish with his bare hands for fun and cant eat them all on his own so after charlie mac and dennis have eaten their fill the rest of the tribe falls over charlies harvest like hungry vultures. one day charlie brings a shark to camp and nobody is brave enough to ask how he got it. is definitely fucking dennis behind some palm trees every day but nobody tells him to knock it off because hes so useful (tribe mates) and entertaining (producers). accidentally makes fake immunity idols for himself dennis and mac (he was trying to make friendship bracelets) and thus protects them all. has immunity run at the end and shouts out paddys pub every time he wins. also does a little dance. gets to final tribal council where his speech is surprisingly compelling (he mentions surviving an abortion and several jury members tear up, mac and dennis throw him obvious softballs that make him look good) and he wins with every single vote minus macs (he wrote cat as a joke but one of the other two finalists was called cat which mac didnt know and then he was too embarrassed to explain it). cashes his million out in one large suitcase and then accidentally drops it into the ocean. ate his buff.

dee gets voted out on day one. sorry but its true. the second shes sitting at tribal council shes voted out. sorry. i think she could go crazy at some challenges tho but again shes first boot. sorry. might have voted for charlie if she made jury or not, depending on her mood that day. probably not tho.

frank gets medevaced after he eats some clams he found sticking to the reef rocks and gets diarrhea. no one was voting for him anyways because charlie told everyone frank was rich (he was trying to keep it a secret). doesnt make jury but would have voted for charlie. there are some slow mo shots of him rolling around in the sand after he ate the clams, which will be his only survivor heritage.

#thanks for coming to my ted talk

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lesbian-diana-cavendish · 6 months ago

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Last night I just finished platinuming control, again, and subsequently I had a dream about control 2,

It's a little long so a read more:

Also arish is trying to grow a beard.

it starts in Jesse and emilys apartment(!), Jesse picks up a photo of the two of them and has a small conversation with Polaris about Emily that confirms they're together, Emily went into to work early and when Jesse arrives and finds her she jokingly complains about it, Emily explained she had a breakthrough dream and had to rush to work, they banter back and forth for a little and then Jesse heads to her office (if control two follows the trend of remedy games taking place the year they came out, I feel like that would have been too much time for them to have not gotten together so we don't get to see that in the games but we do get to see their relationship on a romantic lvl in 2)

it gives us a chance to run around the oldest house a bit and see it unhissed, she interacts with some of the previous npcs from one and we get life updates on how the last 7ish years have been, Dylan was still in coma, but awake me thinks he should be also be awake...

anyways fanfic ass thoughts aside, when she gets to her desk she gets the notification that the hotline is going off, and this sets off the game, the way that it becomes a video game tm with power progression despite jesse being a fully powered up and fully realized director is that the board and the former go to war and Jesse is basically stripped of her role, idk if the former did it via destroying the boards authority, or if the board did it out of spite bc Jesse wouldn't comply fully with it and is therefore a risk, but Jesse is still a parautilitarian, and rebinds to *new* oops bc the little war in the astral plane is bleeding out into the oldest house *and* the streets of New York and she needs to gear up to save everyone

#control remedy #jesse faden #this is honestly cringe sorry

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champoflightning · 6 months ago

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Zettablogging plans/notes!

I originally wanted to clean this up and make it more detailed and nice before posting it! However that doesn't seem to be happening, so I think I shall just post what I had! Spoilers for Nexomon and Sun/Ultra Sun!

-Got Ultra Wormholed after being freed from the Underworld but before getting back to the main world. Is secretly both worried about his family/what that means, and very secretly glad to be out of there.

-Has a bit of a rivalry going on with Tapu Koko. It's increasingly a friendly rivalry, but Zetta will probably always call him "that jerk".

-First partner is a Rotom because of course it is. He gets the Rotom that would inhabit the protagonist's Rotomdex in canon.

-Can talk to electric type Pokemon, speaking the language of electricity and currents. Can't talk to any other ones.

-Puts up a token effort to pretend to be human around the villagers of Iki Town. Does not bother on Rotomblr. (Theoretically pretends to be human in front of Kukui, however Kukui watched him meet and talk to his Rotom buddy so that skitty's out of the bag. Kukui probably thinks he is a Rotom.) This does not stop him from trying to get zapped by every electric type pokemon he sees. -He will eventually find out about the power plant on Ula'ula, go there, and cause a blackout by eating up the electricity there. Never admits responsibility to anyone but it's really obvious.

-Zygarde doesn't like him, for obvious reasons. He gives off the same sort of aura as an Ultra Beast. The other Tapu also start rushing to fight off this new Ultra-intruder when he lands on their islands, until and unless Koko steps in to explain.

-Is aware of Lillie as Kukui's protege, but doesn't actually meet her until late in the "game". Is in the Ultra Sun-verse, kind of. (A blend of Sun and Ultra Sun.)

-Is still pre-character-development; thinks humans are expendable, but kind of entertaining. Is royally (heh) offended to be running errands for one, but Kukui's wife studies the wormholes that dropped Zetta in Alola and she's probably his best shot at getting home. So he plays nice. He slowly gets casually fond of the ones he interacts with a lot.

-Doesn't use Pokeballs; doesn't see a reason to, and shorts them out.

-Gets a more appropriate outfit for Alola but refuses to lose his visor.

-Will eventually punch Necrozma in the face. This is not negotiable. And/or bite them.

-Runs into Xurkitree at the Aether Foundation when Moon and Gladion drag enlist him to help them rescue Lillie. Their ensuing fight and subsequent alliance would probably scare everyone who saw it if they weren't occupied with other matters at the time.

-Can't currently transform because Necrozma ate all his electricity. The more time he spends in Alola the more he recovers, though. He is incredibly whiny and upset until he starts to feel like himself again. Koko gives him a charge boost near the end so he can transform and go beat up Necrozma. (There is an AU where I tossed in a reference to one of my favourite fics and Zetta gets in contact with more legendaries at this point, but I never heard back on if it was okay for me to do that, so it remains an AU)

-Eventual team is Rotom, Vikavolt, Dedenne, Electivire, Xurkitree, aaand Oricorio-P.

-Drags his feet a little on going home; Lillie and the URS are happy to help him do so after he sends Necrozma packing, but eventually he realizes he can't put it off anymore and he has to face the music in his own world, maybe with a bit more compassion and humility than he'd had when he arrived. I would have used this foot-dragging to justify posting even after the main arc had finished.

#pokeblogging #ooc post #champoflightning #this will likely be the last post!#I really loved this idea but my other story currently has me in a headlock so I just didn't have the attention span it deserves #I'm sorry but I hope someone enjoyed this nonetheless

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emptylotfiasco · 10 months ago

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my review for yakuza 1 on the ps2 it is a really good game. you should play it forever and ever. i will probably replay it one day or like get round to finishing kiwami cause it was really fun i had a lot of fun with it <3 the minigames are cool and the substories are good and the localisation is funny and worth experiencing for urself but it also like its not a haha play this game cause its so bad its fun it is acutally a good game and i liked it a lot. 10/10 ten million thoughts under the cut

first of all minigames love in heart massage parlour my favourite it is very funny. talking to prostitutes minigame is fun i completed all of them. almost. haruka cock blocked me for one of them. baseball is good it turns me into the devil sometimes but i like it. gambling. suprisingly not that bad everytime i had to do it. i wish they would have let me skip the 60 second long roulette animation because i know that is not real. crane game. AHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! moving on. slot machines. sucked but thats okay idgaf they should have figured out not to put it in subsequent games though. colliseum yeah i did it it was fine pretty typical.

substories were good i did almost all of them excepttt i missed the casino royale one because i progressed the main story too far rawr </3 oh i didnt finish the gangbusters either because i run away from random encounters as much as i can. so i also didnt fight amon. but i like how maybe because ps2 limitations and resource limitations substories were super short and simple. i think in kiwami it was mixing the longer formatted substories with what were originally very basic premises and it didnt work for me. it is what made the substories feel like a slog to me in the remake. but in this game it is easier to gaf about a simple substory when it doesnt take that long to complete. the original game had a lot of the funny ones the one where you give tissues to a guy who ran out of toilet paper in the public bathroom and the one where kiryu picks up a dead guys phone and follows every instruction given to him by a complete stranger until he is eventually hired to kill himself. and the one where tghe guy makes kiryu get all the toys from the crane machine for his sugar baby. and the one where kiryu has to talk a guy down from suicide. and there were ones that werent funny but i still liked like that one with the street artist because I thought it was cool how you can use items from that substory to complete other substories and that one really long chain of substories that takes you all over the map.

Unmm jingu is a shitty villain but I think that has been knew. I thought the story and the way it unfolded was really good until the very last few chapters where the government stuff really kicked in. I did know most of the story already but like. Some parts I liked were helping the counterfeiters at the hostess club and them saying they did a forgery for kazama 5 years ago. The body of the fake mizuki being explained by a a copycat bar that was trying to capitalise on Ares success having someone pretend to be mizuki and that person getting killed. I thought that was cool and interesting I like this level of detail in my weirdly complex crime drama plotlines. I think it was funny that he was voiced by Robert atkin downes. i liked haruka trust meter i thought it was so cute i liked increasing it by buying her things. I think Yumi is interesting and Reina <333 Reina <33 Reina <3 lalalalala Reina <3 kazama. nishiki wasn't interesting but like I've played yakoza 0 so like I know he is so it's fine. Sera... Idgaf like I kind of gaf but not really. I think maybe because the only involvement he had was the jingu stuff and jingu sucks so. That one guy that tortured kiryu. Actually that is an interesting part of his character that I have heard surprisingly little about. Who else. Oh yeah shinji. Anyways. Who else.

Majima category oh yeahhh Majima oh yeah . Majima was awesome because Majima is alsways awesome. People like to say wow can you imagine playing Yakuza 1 on the ps2 and thinking that one day people are gonna want to bone Majima. That must be so crazy so insane. My asnqwr is that you're not a real Majima fucker. I've always wanted to fuck him. I've alwayyysss wanted to fuck him. I was there from the start. And I want to fuck mark hamilljima too. There is no shame in this. I don't care how many polgyons he has the sleazy bpd princess with the steel tipped shoes leather pants snakeskin jacket eye patch knife bat and tits out is a monument to sex. When he threatens that one sex worker and he's like so what do you say you wanna be my bitch I'm like ohhhh do I. plus the whole point og his appeal is that hes kind of ugly. he was pretty in yakuza 0 because they gentrified him that is not the real majima. look at his ugly ass hair cut. hes fourty yhears old and a bowlcut on his head. So if you do nat wanna bone him then you cannot be trusted and I'm the only one allowed to fuck him sorry that's the rules. I swear I was going to actually write a review part here I don't know what happened. I'm just gonna move on.

the localisation is my favourite part of the game i really love how comically vulgar it is it gives me the same enjoyment factor as the silly writing from yakuza 0. it made the game very interesting and i would miss it dearly if it wasnt there. i liked it when kiryu said are you retarded or just deaf. and when yuya said look at you fuckhead. and when kiryu said i did have the urge to hit some balls today. seems like yours are gonna have to do. and when he said step the fuck up its time to die. i loved ten years in the joint fight. come on fucker bring that shit kazuma ten years in the joint made you a fucking pussy it made me say its kiryu time and i kiryued all ovedr the millenium tower. the delivery made everything really funny and like ueah it undercut the dramatic moments but it also made me like enjoy the finale scene with jingu because i kept laughing at everything everyone said so i think there was a net benefit. there was two scenes where i thought the english dub delivery made things funnier on purpose. one was where kiryu took haruka to the bath house and he was like its take your daughter- its a social studies field trip and the one scene where date was like lets break open the amulet and reina and haruka were like NO!! and he was like haha nevermind just kidding. and the one where kiryu explains what a bath house is to haruka was funny too. i love this va i think like. as strange as the action hero deep voice is for kiryu when u have not expereinced this game hes also so sooooo awkward. so awkward. and it wraps around to sounding very kiryu. cause like that kind of is him like hes intimidating but hes also awkward and autistic and doesnt know what a cell phone is or how to babysit a child so he lets her gamble away all his savings. by the way his ps2 model has very beautiful eyelashes.

OH YEAH. i like the combat. sorry. i forgot about the central gameplay mechanic of the whole game i got distracted. like of course it is clunky its a playstation 2 game. but it also was really fun <3 i especially liked. i forgot his name but the moveset of that guy that is like the captain of the nishikiyama family is kind of sick and it was cool to fight against. the combat in this game is the exact mixture of satisfying and so frustrating makes me want to rip the skin off my face and eat it that i love. kiwami is also like this. and i liked how short andd snappy the heat action animations were not to say i prefer them but just that like. i guess it made the fights feel fast paced and it felt just as good to do them as the overly animated ones. i liked how even hough some guys had huge healthbars fighting them didnt take ten million kajillion billion years. WAIT but fuck the komaki training i couldnt even complete it cause it was too hard. that was fucked up they were fucked up for that.

i really liked the style of this game i liked the art and i liked the models and. i looked at some of these cutscenes in a very damnn that looks good kind of way. that one post that is like ps2 is peak aesthetic is so true cause it looked really nice at times.

okay the end. do not expect anyone to read this becuse i said it all for myself. i wish i did get round to making the html copy of kiryus blog work cause that is probably where id ramble about yakuza. but i hate java script and also i dont care. so tumblr post.

#yakuza #i didngt realise typing a lot takes so much time its like 5pm now. oops. i dpnt even lnow ifthis is coherent cause i have not read it

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zaftikat · 1 year ago

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Game Review: Firmament

EDIT 2023-06-08: I have been informed that developers used so called AI tools to assist with asset and story development. Needless to say this makes my review moot. You should not give money to Cyan for Firmament if you haven't already.

There is something of a pit in my stomach when I think about my gameplay experience with Firmament. Deep in that pit, in a modest Dutch Colonial fixer-upper, lives the potential for this game. The setting has so much more story to tell than we were given. It lives in that Myst-like space where we enter a world at its nadir. Violent collapse has occurred, but we hold a glimmer of hope for what comes next. That is not an unfamiliar formula for fans of Cyan. Is our Virgil trustworthy, or is she leading us to damnation? Who are we when the game tells us that deep sleep erases memory? We’re told that we are the next and possibly last of the many Keepers. A collective whose goal is the preservation of a cooperative order that will create a livable world for the Arrivers. Our Mentor gives us a mission—activate a series of towers, and prepare the worlds for the Embrace. In order to do so we must complete a series of traversal puzzles with our handy dandy Adjunct—a device clearly designed for VR compatibility at the cost of the expected Cyan gameplay experience. Pausing for a moment to lift ourselves to the meta-context of this game, Cyan pitched backers on the notion of what I’m calling VR-first design when they reached out for crowdfunding in early 2019. I think that context is necessary to understanding the game, so let’s talk about it after the cut.

When the game first entered crowdfunding, I had come fresh off of a re-play of Obduction. Obduction is a game that by all accounts is a triumph of Cyan design aesthetics, and when I saw the project page for Firmament, I was ready to dive in right then and there. Games have development cycles, so I knew I would be waiting. Then 2020 happened. The project, by necessity, had to be scaled back from the early tech demos. A decision was made to redouble the focus on the Adjunct tool. It would now interact almost exclusively with nodes. This meant paring down puzzles that did not interact with the core mechanic. Cyan did not shy away from the fact that the game was going to be scaled back, and even spoke of it as a function of approachability. We know all this because they, throughout the development cycle sent numerous detailed backer updates. For all I may detract from the final product, I must equally praise the communication from Cyan. As a designer, I know games take time. Coding shaders, composing dynamic music, writing scripts, creating environments, there is so much that goes into creating a video game and Cyan kept their supporters in the loop on every part of the process. Nevertheless, it is abundantly clear the game was scaled back. I finished the game in 8, with at least an hour of that time tabbed out to work on personal projects.

The gameplay, with its VR-first design, leaves so much to be desired. Instead of the interactivity we’ve come to expect from Cyan games—with even mundane objects being game entities—we instead have a far more empty world, where every puzzle is solved by the Adjunct. In late Curievale, there is a puzzle wherein you ride an elevator up and down, then connect 4 nodes after running back across the zone in order to then run across the zone again to get to the next puzzle. The tedium of trying to finesse the nodes so that your fully upgraded adjunct will do its job is an essential mechanic to the game’s limited longevity. In the subsequent Curievale puzzle, there’s a section where the game expects you to fire a node through a miniscule gap in some ice. The puzzle isn’t about how you engage with the elements of the problem, but about how you can master ways around the physics engine. A game that uses janky controls as a difficulty gate is effectively trying to frustrate you into a longer gameplay experience. And that refrain repeated a few times while I traversed the three still visually stunning worlds.

A few months before I write this, Clayton Ashley of Polygon put out a video wherein he praises the pseudo-genre of note-taking games, and indeed does highlight their heyday by citing entries from Cyan’s game library. It bears repeating here, Firmament was designed as a VR-first game. Nothing breaks immersion in VR quite like needing to take off your headset to write things down on paper. And this fact is the truest tragedy of Firmament’s gameplay. I think fondly of getting to break out a notebook to teach myself the grid system of base 4 numbers used by the Villein in Obduction. Here, gone is the simple joy of having to learn to solve puzzles. Learning, finding secrets, and sniffing out details of the world are one of the key drivers of exploration in a puzzle game. Without that element, the worlds, despite their gorgeous and massive scale, feel lifeless. Not in the way a game like the Witness feels both lifeless and lived-in, but rather one that feels devoid of any interest. Like the world has been sanitized after everyone disappeared. It’s an empty platform on a disused subway line that has been assiduously scrubbed of any evidence of life or use. We get some bits and pieces of story, intentionally obscured by our Mentor and her agenda. Most of what we learn is told to us as a series of cryptic Proper Nouns. We don’t get a look at why until the game has been completed, twist largely untelegraphed. Myst and Obduction have bad endings that you might reach if you’re not carefully exploring and studying clues. Firmament is far too linear for that. There’s a cavernous echo where those human story elements would be in other Cyan games, and worst of all they skipped out on the FMV, an essential part of the Cyan charm.

So that I’m not just endlessly ripping on this game, let’s talk about what it does well. The aesthetic design and practicality of the setting is fascinating and beautiful. They have made gorgeous use of Art Deco style to produce a world that feels narratively coherent, nostalgic and futuristic all at once. The Arches combine that styling with a sci-fi megastructure to create that cohesive and stunning visual language. The Adjunct provides clear direction in puzzle solving by making obvious the possible interactions, though this is somewhat of a trade-off when puzzles become jank fights. The game leaves me wishing and wanting to know so much more about the setting, and that is the mark of compelling world design. There are also some truly fun puzzles like the greenhouse platform puzzle that call to mind that very Myst-like feeling of nostalgia. Each of those elements still feels insufficient to make this game what I had hoped it would be. I so desperately wanted to love this game, as badly as the soft-boy kindness influencer wants to be bi for clout. But like the milquetoast wishes-he-wasn’t-straight man, I just can't bring myself to swallow the nut this game offers.

#Firmament #cyan worlds #puzzle games #game review #writing on tumblr

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rottenbrainstuff · 1 year ago

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BG3 playthrough: still stuck in the Tiefling camp, and an amazing roleplay experience

(Spoilers)

First some quick notes, but then I want to talk about how this game is really making me get into *actual* roleplaying in a way I’ve never had a game do to me before. (I’m not sure why my phone keeps capitalizing Tiefling and I’m too lazy to correct it)

First of all: I am never going to leave this Tiefling camp, there’s too much to do and too many people to talk to. The Absolute is going to overrun Faerûn and I am going to still be sitting here having gruel with Otka and playing my violin for the kids.

What am I going to do if I run across another area that makes me this emotionally invested?? It is going to take me years to finish this game at this rate!!! (Well, this week I’ve had a bit less time to play though, which has also really slowed the progress down)

Hey a quick note: there was a little glitch for me with the Auntie Ethel conversation. I introduced myself to her as my tav, and got Astarion’s approval when I told her about our tadpoles, because he thinks it’s delightful how demented she seems. Then I talked to her again using a different character, got the same conversation, and got a SECOND Astarion approval. (Didn’t work again with subsequent tries) Someone told me you can do something similar when you pet scratch. Nice little bonus.

Ok anyways the main thing I wanted to talk about was the crazy fact that I am actually roleplaying in this game, getting emotionally involved, and legitimately able to make what feels like natural and realistic decisions based on what my character would actually do, rather than… you know… interacting with the game feeling very much like a player. Oh ok, here’s the conversation, here’s the normal dialogue option, here’s the smart dialogue option if my talk stats are good, and here’s the evil option, which is always bad to choose because it messes up your game. And I know, because I am a player playing a game, I should pick the normal option. This is how games always go.

Me and my friend were talking about our extremely different reactions we had to the Druids in the Emerald grove, and why.

So the Druids have been letting the Tiefling refugees stay there, but the welcome is wearing thin. Supplies are running low and goblins keep trying to attack. Now with the old leader of the Druids missing, the next highest in command wants to finally kick these Tieflings out. The current leader is creepy and militant, but mostly the other Druids range from “following orders” to “ok-ish”.

You have been told Nettie the healer might be able to help remove your tadpoles. She’s being a little evasive at first, but it’s because mindflayer infection is serious business and she wants to protect her people. After she realizes you are not going to be a threat, she confesses that unfortunately she actually doesn’t have a way to heal you. Their absent leader might though. She gives you a vial of poison and says she needs you to swear to take the poison if you start to change into a mindflayer, because if you transform in the middle of this grove you are going to kill everyone. You must swear: if you don’t directly swear it to her, she will become hostile and start a fight.

My friend who is playing is terrified of transforming into a mindflayer, and he likes Nettie, so he took the poison and promised sincerely.

In a normal game this would be the “good” route and the one I would normally take, because I am a computer game player playing a computer game and the goal of the computer game is to make the good numbers go up. Right?

My experience of the grove though has been very different from my friend’s. I am playing as a dark urge seldarine drow who is trying to be a nice guy. The Druids have been rude and racist to my character, which I’m sure he’s used to, but the contrast between that and how the Tieflings are friendly and welcoming to me is very noticeable. I had a conversation with the pickpocket kids about how people say lies and racist stuff about Tieflings too, just like they do with the drow. My character has been spending so much time getting to know the Tieflings in the grove, mediating arguments, playing with all the naughty Tiefling children, doing sleight of hand tricks for them, watching them pet Wyll’s cat familiar. (I need to be really clear, I’m not simply imaging that these activities are happening, this is flavour that is actually programmed into the game, ie the kids do literally follow around my cat and make comments about it)

So I get farther into the grove and find some frantic Tiefling parents being held back by Druid guards. Their daughter has been taken away because she stole something, (which she only stole because she thought it would prevent the Tieflings from getting kicked out of the grove, and anyway, it’s since been returned.) and they won’t let them see her. The Druid guards are, as always, being rude and racist to me, and my tav is getting angry at the way the Druids are treating his new friends.

So he goes to talk to the Druid leader, and is absolutely shocked to find she is threatening a Tiefling child with a venomous snake. Yes the kid stole something but I have to say again: she stole it because they are going to die on the road if they get kicked out, and the damned item was returned anyways. The leader is a real nasty piece of work, and when she saw me she even said that she feels this must be a good omen, having a blessed child of lolth visit their grove!!! First of all, yikes lady, but also: Lolth-sworn drow are different from seldarine, my kind rebels against the more brutal and merciless lolth-sworn, this was NOT a good comment to make to my character. By this point in time, my tav is absolutely fucking done with these fucking Druids. Yes, objectively speaking, most of the Druids are not terrible and I can see their point, but I felt like my tav in this specific situation would be feeling quite angry and hostile at this point.

So then we get to Nettie. The very first words out of her mouth to me are that the last time she saw a drow, it tried to cut open her belly, and did I have any plans of doing the same? She brings us into the back and there is a goddamned dead drow laid out on her table. I guess it attacked them and they’re studying it because it also had a tadpole infection but goddamn.

She is being evasive and asking a ton of questions. She confesses that if she decided she didn’t like us, she was going to poison us with this little thorn branch she was holding. Then she holds out the poison and demands that I swear to take it.

As a player, I know the best option is to swear, just to get her to shut up. It makes the good numbers go up, and that’s what it’s all about, right?

But my tav in that moment - I felt like he would have absolutely lost his goddamned temper. I’m doing a dark urge run and he’s trying his hardest to not hurt people horribly, but this has pushed him over the edge of his patience. The Druids have been shit to him, shit to the people he’s come to like so much, they’re dissecting another goddamned drow over in the corner, and this woman is sticking poison in his face and telling him to swear to her that he’ll kill himself. He told her fine he’ll take it, but she says that’s not enough, you need to SWEAR to me. You know what? No, he’s not! He refused, she started a fight and attacked us first, and I switched to non-lethal damage and I knocked her out.

This wasn’t just me making a fun decision on my own, like, oh: I have decided on my own, because there’s no game dialogue for this, that my stardew valley farmer is lonesome and feels like an outsider which is why she gets along with Elliott. This is like. Actual things happening within the game that are provoking a legitimate emotional response from me, and I am able to respond to it in a realistic way. When Kagha called me a blessed child of lolth, I had dialogue options to be offended by it.

I am, once again, just absolutely blown away. My friend and me were talking about how we’re both playing “good” characters but how our game experiences still have been so different that we had completely different reactions.

I think that’s absolutely amazing. I can’t remember any game I have ever played ever where I was able to actually get into the roleplaying aspect as much as this, and feel like I was making choices totally based on what my character would do, because this situation was utterly unique to the experience of my friend who is playing the exact same game.

I’ve only really scratched the surface of act 1 here. What the heck else is going to happen by the end?

#bg3 #bg3 playthrough #baldur’s gate 3 #spoilers

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elliepassmore · 2 years ago

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Ship of Theseus review

5/5 stars Recommended for people who like: puzzles, mysteries, annotated books, murder mysteries, dark academia This is a super interesting book that definitely gives the vibe of one of those murder mystery box games. It tells two stories: one, the 'book' story and the other the annotations written by Jen and Eric. The life of the book really comes from the latter of these two stories and takes place over an unidentified timeline, maybe a year, and includes personal writings as Jen and Eric get to know each other and writings as they try to solve the mystery of who V. M. Straka was. Along with the annotations, there are also pamphlets, newspaper clippings, and postcards, among other things, included between the pages of the book. In the world of this book, V. M. Straka is a well-known writer with an unknown identity. It's a big mystery in the literary world and there are fans and scholars alike dedicated to figuring out the mystery and finding clues from Straka's writings. Eric, one of the characters writing annotations, is an ex-grad student who was doing his PhD research on Straka and, specifically, Ship of Theseus. Despite no longer being a student, he's passionate about his research still and deeply invested in figuring out the mystery. Jen is a newcomer who finds the book when Eric leaves it in the library one night, but she quickly becomes equally invested in figuring out who Straka is, and the two bond over that. There's an element of unlikeableness to both characters at times, but I think over the course of the book that works to make them more realistic. They also both exhibit growth over the course of the book, as is clearly seen in their annotations to one another, and I liked seeing how the 'thems' differed from their earlier annotations (distinguished most clearly by different colored pens). It's also interesting to watch them grow closer through their writings, well before they ever meet in person. Along these same lines, the mystery evolves and grows as they do, and working together Jen and Eric discover things about the Straka mystery that had been uncovered, or relatively little known, until they stumble across it. I have to say, I was very invested in the Straka mystery and loved seeing the little bits of research they included in the margins and the added materials. There's also a code that runs through the footnotes, which was also cool, though I'm thankful Jen writes out what it says, lol. That being said, the Jen/Eric storyline is a little disjointed later on simply because they start meeting in person and not everything they discover needs to be written in the book. It's still relatively easy to follow what's going on though and I don't think it detracted from my enjoyment of the book. The other story, the one Straka wrote, focuses on identity and radicalism and the anonymous helpers vs. the agent in the spotlight, all wrapped up in a neat literary bow. And it is very literary. Straka's book reads like something you might read in a class on literary analysis and is quite loaded with symbolism (again, Eric and Jen come in clutch here and helpfully point out a lot of that symbolism). That literary style isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea, but I was pleasantly surprised to find I was invested in S.'s story (S. being the main character of Straka's book). Like with Jen and Eric, there were times I didn't like S., but overall I found him to be an interesting character and he certainly saw and did a lot of interesting things. When I finished this book I immediately got the sense that I wanted to start over from the beginning and read the annotations chronologically rather than page by page like I did the first time. I think it'll help me piece together certain things on the second go around and pick up on stuff that I didn't initially. This book definitely gives off the feel that subsequent rereads will allow you to pick up on stuff and figure out some of the mysteries in a way you couldn't the first time simply because it was all new to you. That being said, I feel like I got a full experience with the first read, where I read each page and annotations regardless of chronology, and I recommend doing it that way for your first read since it definitely amps up the suspense as you go "wait, why did Jen/Eric just write that? What's going on???" Overall I would say this book is the bookish version of a murder mystery or escape room game. It's got a base story, Straka's 'book,' and then it's got Jen and Eric's annotations and added materials, all adding up to a very layered story with mystery, suspense, and puzzles on all sides. This was definitely one of my most exciting reads of 2022 and very well may be my favorite.

#book #book recommendations #bookblr #book review #books #book lover #booklr #bookstagram #interactive books #jj abrams #unique book #mystery #annotating books #puzzles #fiction #fiction book #murder mystery #dark academia

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