#It's just gameplay that kinda isn't my favorite sometimes

[wayfinderships]

Good afternoon gamers!!! I miss F.inal F.antasy. I miss it a lot-

[thydungeongal]

I genuinely don't understand what y'all mean by "ok to kill enemies." Everytime it comes up I feel less and less confident I am following the conversation.

D&D kind of has, as part of its DNA, the idea that combat will eventually happen in the game. To that end, throughout the history of the game there have been many different types of guy that in the text of the game have been presented as like almost self-evidently okay to kill simply because. While different editions of the game have tried to move away from some of the more overtly problematic portrayals of this (basically saying that certain types of humanoids are okay to kill because they look funny and live in caves is kinda fucked up), the truth is that pretty much every attempt to look for a suitable Boogeyman that player characters can kill without any iffy ethics about it is going to end up really weird.

Anyway this is why people will often look for types of guy to present as enemies where characters can engage in no-thoughts-head-empty lethal sports with them without anyone needing to have a "wait a minute, are we the baddies?" moment. Demons and the undead are pretty easy to go for here.

My personal favorite approach is to just accept the fact that D&D kinda sucks with black-and-white morality and instead of making the conflict in the world about clear good and evil teams make it about different groups of people with different goals. Orcs can be present but they're no longer "the evil guys it's always morally okay to kill because of biotruths" but instead just some guys who might sometimes have violent disagreements with other people.

Anyway a lot of this stuff doesn't mean anything and as said not engaging with games as texts on this level isn't really necessary to enjoy them. But for me at least it can often elevate gameplay. When bandits aren't just some guys who decided to become evil criminals some day but actual people whose banditry is a response to something going on in the world and their lives, it suddenly makes the conflicts in the world a lot more real and grounded (and sometimes killing those bandits can be the right thing to do, but sometimes negotiating with them or even cooperating them can be the right thing to do. Basically, once you start thinking about all the different types of Guy that inhabit the worlds of D&D not just as game tokens that player characters can hit to make XP come out [although that is also fine and dandy as a playstyle] but as living thinking creatures with actual goals, the types of narratives the game starts to produce also expands a hundredfold.)

Anyway I'm not sure if that answers your question because I went on like a bunch of tangents. But it was also kind of a vague question.

[cinamun]

I know you spend a lot of time making TFA for all of us, so I know you have a busy schedule, but do you actually take time to do gameplay? I know you let them wander sometimes (we won't talk about that time Hope was electrocuted lmao!), but I just wonder if you play the game sometimes. I myself have a hard time trying to actually play the game. TS3 was and still is my favorite, but TS4 has the look of the sims looking delicious but I can't keep my attention since there so many things missing. Just wondering if the story of TFA keeps you going or gameplay and the story.

I was just saying that I want to play the game more. There have been numerous really big arcs lately in TFA which is time consuming. I definitely just play the characters (my sweet baby OCs) in between setting up shots and stuff like that. If its the wrong time of day for the scene, for example, I'll play the household until the right time. Send Jay to work, work on milestones with the twins, etc. It all depends on the household. I definitely need a break to just play in general. I tried that a few months back but I got some weird comments and just kinda went back into story mode.

I'll be honest, though, I very much enjoy sims 4. For me, its fun and I don't share the idea that too much is missing (not saying there isn't). When cottage living came out I played out a couple generations on a farm. It was relaxing and fun and I want to do something like that again. I should also add that I only played sims 3 initially when it was first released, lost interest in the sims and missed the entire sims 3 era. So what some might find missing, its all new to me.

TFA keeps me going but I'd be lying if I didn't say it wasn't emotionally taxing. I just love the characters so any chance I get to just unpause and let them fulfil their wants, goof off and occassionally get hit by lightning, I very much have a blast.

[marigoidz]

hello! what quarry counselors do you think would play the fnaf games & who's actually good enough to beat any of them?

Hii :)

I narrowed this down in my head to games 1-6 to make things. a bit simpler

Jacob: I doubt he'd want anything to do with the games since he hates horror. If he played one for a dare or something he wouldn't get very far

Nick + Abi: Would watch other people's gameplay and lore videos but not play themselves

Emma: I think she'd like the games. A lot of the strats on winning come down to getting into a rhythm and exploiting certain patterns which I think she could do well with. Though I think with Pizzeria Simulator specifically she would take on a lot of unnecessary risk, make the game way harder than it needs to be and end up rage quitting.

Ryan: I think he would also like the games. I see him mostly watching playthroughs though. Playing himself sometimes but not doing the best at them. I think he'd get kinda stumped with the mechanics as things get more complicated. With Sister Location especially, I just see him saying "yeah no this isn't gonna work" and watching someone else or looking up a guide. I think he'd also watch some lore videos here and there.

Max: Wouldn't exactly be a fan, but if he was with a group of friends and they wanted him to play one he would. I think he'd be goofing off the whole time though, not taking it seriously enough to get to the end.

Dylan: Similar to Max at first but would start to take things more seriously while playing and be able to win eventually.

Laura: I think she'd like the games mainly for the story. She'd do pretty well with the gameplay but also complain about it the whole time. All of it. I also think she'd temporarily rage quit a few times with each

Kaitlyn: I think she'd be the biggest fan of actually playing the games, and the best at them. I also get the feeling FNAF 2 would be her favorite for some reason

[spinningbuster98]

Let's talk about Sequence Breaking

Sequence Breaking has got to be one of the most satisfying things I've ever seen in a videogame

And I'm talking about intentional breaks. Yeah yeah sure, stuff involving glitches and exploits is also impressive, hell even more so, you might even argue that it's not a "true" sequence break unless it's 100% unintended

But I love the idea of a game giving you the means to obtain items earlier than intended and telling you "are you skilled enough to do it?"

This is why I will forever defend Super's Wall Jump

"But it's too finicky and the timing is weird it sucks!"

Yeah sorry to sound like an elitist but, you don't get it

Yoy really don't

This isn't Mega Man X or Hollow Knight, where wall jumping is an integral part of the platforming that you have to perform on the regular, here wall jumping is akin to a cheat code: something you're not supposed to use (though you actually are in reality) and that is only required to break the game. If wall jumping were as easy as in those games then sequence breaking wouldn't be nearly as satisfying since even a baby could pull it off. Wall Jumping in this game is SUPPOSED to require skill, it is MEANT to be somewhat finicky to an extent. Not that I won't have some negatives to talk about concerning this game's controls, though manybe next time...

I personally find it weird how this game's sequence breaking continues to be my favorite. since both Zero Mission and Dread handle it better in some areas

Zero Mission just flat out has more of it: Super kinda stops having any more real sequence breaking instances (again: excluding glitches) after Norfair. There's that early Energy Tank in that water room in the Wrecked Ship I guess? But after that pretty much everything can be obtained on your first run through an area with the skills that you already have. You can't even get the Screw Attack early to my understanding

Dread doesn't have as much sequence breaking as the other 2, and some of it is pretty stupidly implemented (why should I bother with the early Super Missiles and the Kraid Bomb insta kill when those require MORE backtracking that just doing things by the book?), but others not only result in less backtracking but also in some actual gameplay advantages: getting the Grapple Beam early allows you to skip two slow water sections in Burenia a little later and getting the early Gravity Suit (and the early Screw Attack that's pretty much connected to it) allows you to absolutely rip Ferenia open like a tin can, especially if you also get the Space Jump before the Storm Missiles, allowing you to go wherever you want, destroy the boss with no effort and make a joke out of its EMMI Zone. By contrast sequence breaking in Super only really results in cutting back on backtracking: what do you get from early Power Bombs? Eh I guess you regain access to Crateria and Brinstar earlier.... it's kinda useless though. Early Spazer and Wave Beams? Kinda useful but it's not like enemies are super tough here and they don't really open new areas or shortcuts. Ever Zero Mission's sequence breaking gives you more practical advantages sometimes: early Varia Suit? More defense earlier on and you can use it to explore some extra rooms in Norfair earlier. Early Screw Attack and Super Missiles? Those speak for themselves

However I can't help but find Super's more fun to pull off

Every instance of sequence breaking in Super is a matter of pure skill and imagination: YOU have to pull off those wall jumps and shinesparks, YOU have to make those long jumps after running certain distances

By contrast sequence breaking in ZM and Dread tends to be more dependent on finding secret passages. You want to fight Ridley first in ZM? Find the secret shaft in Norfair. Early Screw Attack? You gotta know there are some secret missile blocks in the room right below it. Wanna skip the Long Beam? You gotta know that there are a few secret breakable blocks

Dread is a bit of both worlds in a way: getting the Grapple Beam early requires you to find a secret passage yes, but you must also be able to use your slide jump really well to go through said passage. Getting the Gravity Suit as early as possible also requires you to be skilled with the shinespark both to reach the Green Teleportal early and to clear the Shinespark puzzle required to access the secret route

This isn't a bad way to go about things by any means, hell it's appropriate for adventure games! But I also find it inherently less interesting and intuitive than Super's

In this game it's all about "Hmm... this looks like I can wall jump here and access this door earlier!" It's all about intuitively approaching the level design once you have a good unserstanding of your abilities and have some good creativity with your movements. It's not even just about sequence breaking per se though that's for another time

In those other two you mostly just gotta know that at X spot you can shoot thus revealing a secret passage, which is satisfying the first time but then that's it

Anyway Maridia is actually pretty good.

First off, for the "Muh Maridia tube" crowd: did you know that there's another entrance to Maridia accessible from the Wrecked Ship? It'll take you to a damp region in Crateria full of dead ends but using the X Ray Scope on one of them reveals a breakable wall, and boom: entrance to Maridia!

Second: The area is certainly much bigger than the others and the game has pretty much stopped nudging you in any particular direction....but honestly it's really not so bad once you notice that you'll be mostly just moving from left to right to reach Draygon and that you'll have to avoid the bottom half of the map

However if we wanna talk about problems then yeah the sand pits and sandfalls are really awkward and not in a fun way. The room just before Draygon's where it's full of sand and the game wants you to use the Grapple Beam in very precise manners is kinda bad. Yeah I used the wall jump to get through it much quicker and easier....but as I said this is an ability that's secret, you shouldn't be depending on it to not have an awkward time with level design

Then there's the process of 100%ing this place which requires you to go through half of it twice just for those items hidden in those two secret sand pit rooms.

This is dumb. Very dumb. People complain about the "final victory laps" in the next games, and we'll get to those, but this is honestly just stupid and nonsensical as it adds nothing to the experience, it's not challenging, it doesn't require any real routing as there are only 2 possible routes you can go about this to my knowledge. It's just a big time waster

(also I've always thought that they gave you the Spring Ball this late as a joke. Why is it here?)

You wanna know an issue that I have with this game? The fact that the goddamn full item jingle plays when you get every single item expansion. EVERY.SINGLE.ONE.

In the last two games and those afterwards either the item jingle is really short or there's a much shorter jingle that plays out with minor items.

Here it's the full thing every single time. Not only is this aggravating as fuck when you're going for 100%, as it stops the action for approximately 5 seconds every 5 minutes, but it also resets the fucking stage music!

Super Metroid has some of my favorite tracks in the series, yet I barely get to listen to them fully because it feels like every 3 rooms I'm getting a round of NANANANANANANANANANANANANAAAAAAAAAAA

No I don't care that Dread only gives you a couple of beeps when you get an item expansion it keeps things moving goddamnit!

[bahamutgames]

Paper Mario: The Thousand Afterthoughts

Game: Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door (May 23, 2024)

Console: Nintendo Switch

It's that time again!! If you had told me not too long ago that I'd have to give my thoughts on 2 different Mario RPG remakes on Switch (and an upcoming brand new M&L) so close to each other, I would've laughed you out of the room. But here we are. And now I look quite foolish, don't I?

My mood is kinda in free fall and I only want to write about these Mario RPGs when I'm in a good mood, but I think I'm okay right now. So I'll capitalize on it. Similar to the Super Mario RPG Remake I'll try to focus on what makes this such a lovely remake rather than gushing about why I adore TTYD. But if you're curious, it has some of the best characters, writing, and combat in the series. While I also think it's a really padded out game. That's my micro review of the original. Okay? Okay.

As always, this isn't a review. Just me throwing up my thoughts. Go play Thousand Year Door RIGHT NOW. Either the original or the remake. I'll wait.

Now that they're gone-

SPOILERS FOR THOUSAND YEAR DOOR AHEAD, YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!!

Opening

I feel like I've given you my long, tragic backstory with Mario RPGs a billion times but if you somehow missed it. These were my favorite games of all time, they fell off, I get sad, so on and so forth. Thousand Year Door is one of my favorite video games ever, in the trio of greatest Mario games ever made you have Super Mario RPG, Bowser's Inside Story, and TTYD. And, yeah, needless to say. I was bummed when Paper Mario started to go in its new direction. But I'd like to not give that the oxygen of attention at the moment.

So when they were like "Oh there's one last thing" in that direct, the MILLISECOND that first note hit I was like "HUH???" And I flipped my fucking LID, I couldn't believe they were ACTUALLY gonna remake TTYD. And not only that, it was looking good! And then it came out and I couldn't afford it lol.

But thankfully my good friend (Idk if they want me to name them here so I'll avoid it for the time being) bought it for me. Which was so so so nice of them and I genuinely appreciate it cause this was such a wonderful experience. So this review is sponsored by my friend :)

And again, I'll skip the suspense. This is another WONDERFUL remake that's a total love letter to the original and understands what made it so good.

Stuff I liked

I think the best place to start would be with how faithful this is to the original. It doesn't change pretty much ANYTHING. If there's any major changes to stuff that was in the original (not counting new content) I can't remember it. Not that I was expecting them to change it but still, it's nice that they didn't like, butcher it or something crazy. It's the same good plot, pretty much an identical script (with any changes being for the better imo.), and the same wonderful gameplay.

But of course, what makes a remake interesting is what ACTUALLY gets changed. And I think pretty much right out the gate you'll notice the MASSIVE graphics overhaul this game got. It takes a more papercraft approach like the secondary Paper Mario Trilogy (SS, CS, OK) but applies it to the worlds from the original game. And it looks AMAZING! This is basically exactly what I wanted ever since we got to see the SS Flavion in Smash 3DS lmao. In addition to that there's SO many new sprites in this game for each character. It's actually crazy just how much new animations there are for everyone. Not just teammates, who now have back sprites and TONS of facial expressions and reactions, but even enemies and NPCs have TONS of new things that can do. Sometimes enemies will laugh at you if you get fucked over, people will change to match the mood of what they're saying. It's actually crazy, I had to stop playing every 5 seconds to look at all the new sprites and details. One of my personal favorite new expressions is Mario tipping his hat in respect when death is brought up. It's small but it's such a Mario thing to do and I actually flipped out when I first saw it.

Then there's the redone soundtrack. OH MY GOD it's SOOOOO GOOD. This might be a better OST than the original, and may be one of my new favorite Mario RPG OSTs in general. Every song is lovingly redone and they all sound SO NICE. In particular the battle theme, which changes for each chapter, is SUCH a treat. I adored that. All the boss remixes are great (Cortez in particular was a big shock that I loved) and I believe the teammate themes are actually new. This was also a lovely addition. Bobbery (not biased because he's my favorite partner) probably has my favorite theme. And some of my favorite songs, 'Happiness and Sadness' + 'We're Counting On You, Mario' were both SO well done!! And it's changes and upgrades like these that REALLY add to the experience and make it even better in my opinion! Or at least, wonderful to reexperience!

Then of course there's the combat, which is pretty much completely unchanged as far as I can recall? But they did actually add new super bosses which was really cool! You can fight Prince Mush which is neat, and Whacka which is AWESOME! This actually gives a reason to do the Pit of 100 Trials a second time (fun fact, this remake was my first time ever beating the pit! And I did it without dying. You can retry a floor if you die in this remade version of the pit, just as an fyi).

And the game over all is filled with nice little changes like that. Stuff that's maybe not ground breaking, or giving you a brand new reason to try it like the changes to Super Mario RPG's combat. But in my opinion, these small quality of life improvements are just as good. A much easier to access quick travel room to warp to each chapter is added in the sewers. Saving is instant, similar to Origami King and such. Most of the backtracking that people complain about has been cut out with simple pipes and springs in convenient locations. They even add more stuff to collect like letting you unlock CONCEPT ART WHICH IS SO FUCKING COOL, I still haven't looked through it all but it's actually amazing they did this and I'd KILL for Mario Art Books from every Mario game please just release more Mario concept art UGH. And of course there's the changed dialogue to confirm vivian being trans which is so nice, and I'm honestly shocked they actually did it. It feels almost un-nintendo of them to do. But I'm so happy they did it! It's a real remake, baby!!

In general, yeah, this game is perfect. It's filled with clear love for the original, without being afraid of acknowledging where improvements were made in future titles. Like, again, instant saving or the really nice graphics or music changing for each chapter. And while there aren't any WILD changes like brand new cutscenes in the Super Mario RPG remake, I'd say what they add and ultimately didn't add makes this such a wonderful remake all the same. I had a blast playing it and it felt so good to just, genuinely no coping love playing Paper Mario again!

Stuff I didn't like

But of course no game is perfect. And I do have some nit picks. Like, why don't they use Mario's official new signature when he signs up to join the Glitz Pit? No but seriously, folks-

There's not much wrong with this remake, there's some small stuff like them not fixing EVERY bit of fluff from the original. You still have to mash 100 times for the 'I Love You' scene. Which is funny! But like, no one complains about THIS but you all complain about a little backtracking? Amateur hour. I also think the Prince Mush fight isn't as cool as everyone says it is. I'm not huge on fights where you have to play 100% perfectly but I know that's just a me thing. And I wish SO badly they could've done a tiny bit more to have teammates interact with each other more. Although I do love that everyone comes out whenever you stand on the altar in front of the door. But like, I think everyone should've come out when the Crystal Stars are gathering everyone's wishes... OH MY GOD I FORGOT THEY MADE THE CRYSTAL STARS UGLY IN THIS REMAKE OH NOOOOO GAME RUINED-

But really, I think my big main complaint is that this remake feels a little... Too easy? Compared to the original. In the original the game is MASSIVELY padded out by having you get constantly fucked over by the stage elements. But this time I swear I got hit by a stage element maybe 2 or 3 times. But my enemy was CONSTANTLY getting fried or slammed to death in every fight. It's too common on the enemies, but feels like it's massively toned down on you. I think in the original you can get fucked over a bit much, but this doesn't feel like a compromise, if that makes sense?

Final Thoughts

But WHO CARES!! This remake is SO good! Genuinely, if you love Thousand Year Door, if you hate Thousand Year Door, if you've never played Paper Mario in your life. I think you owe it to yourself to finally experience this wonderful video game. It's truly one of my favorite video games ever and I think it's such a fantastic entry into the RPG genre.

From small changes to big changes, this is a wonderful remake. I don't know if I'd say it's a replacement to the original, personally. I actually think the original's more simple graphics have a GREAT and cartoonish feel to them that's lost a little bit with the papercraft look. And obviously nostalgia is a hell of a drug, but if someone told me they prefer this version? It's absolutely a no-brainer why. I'm so happy I loved this game so much...

Sooooo, how about that Paper Mario 64 remake, guys-

===

And that's that! Once again, I know I've said this a million times. But even though this remake was amazing and made me fall in love with Paper Mario all over again. I'm still waiting patiently for them to do a new Paper Mario in this style. I'm only so impressed that they made an amazing game amazing again. I want to know if they have what it takes to make something BRAND NEW with such a wonderful plot, characters, and combat. I'm very excited for the potential of future Mario RPGs regardless though, and I can't wait to see what's in store for us with Brothership. But Intelligent Systems, I AM wait for a new Paper Mario in this style. You've been warned.

That's all I have for now. Go out and play a game you adore!

[belongsinthetrash]

What interesting things have you gotten interested in, in these past few interesting months, my interesting friend

Well, well-well-well-well, welllllll, a few thing-a-ma-bobs. But it's mainly been 4 fandoms that have come and intergrained themselves in my grey matterspace.

Disco Elysium is pretty obvious with some of my recent posts, BUT I've really only gotten 5 or so hours into my first playthrough so far and from what I can guess, it is nowhere near the end for me. I'm gonna try and get back to it sometime soon, but it's just been a case of notyet getting into the mindset to play a deeply written detective-human psychology-political story novel, to the surprise of myself. It's highly enjoyable, don't miscontrue my words, but it's an undertaking.

Speaking of politics, guess which underwater, steampunk, civil war simulator franchise I've played and has shot to the top of favorite games of all time? Yeah, Bioshock 1 and 2 had knocked my socks off with their presentation and story than I had first expected. I knew the games were classics, but I had just thought they wouldn't interest me since I'm kinda lukewarm on the steampunk genre admittedly. But Rapture as a whole had made me engrossed with every inner working and system in the sunken city, not withstanding the competing and aggressive interactions between the personification of political stances called Andrew Ryan, Sofia Lamb, and Frank Fontaine. Lovely games and my heart is sent to every Big Daddy and Little Sister down there, specially Delta.

Oh, and Infinite? ...i-it's fine. Like, I liked looking at the grim alternate history of Columbia (which is another reason Rapture had grabbed me) and I got used to the gameplay and feeling of being akin to Half-Life 2, but the ending kinda fell super flat on me and I wasn't a fan of how they intergrated parallel worlds into the story. And less said about Burial at Sea, I'll give you as many sugardoodles as need be.

Now back to our normal scheduled program, and by normal, I mean bizarre. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. Good segueway, I know. But yeah, Jojo has occupied a lot of brainspace in me too recently, which is rare for an anime to do so for me. But fuck me, did the story grip me by Part 2. I had felt like it had finally start to get it's narrative grip by the time I had seen the Pillar Men emerge to be cool, strong, honorific yet bastard vampire dudes. It may have also been the gay talking and Joseph being iconic. But what sucks about my situation is that I'm not far into Part 3 because I've been watching through it on a friend's behalf and her schedule hasn't aligned for it for the past month, so I'm stuck in a purgatory of waiting to get the full context of scenes through the actual story while I tiptoe around spoilers when watching content made by Jojo fans, and it kills me more when I slowly feel like I'll fucking ADORE Parts 5, 6, and 7 when I get to it! Basille, you bitch (affectionate), WATCH JOJO WITH ME!

Ahem, sorry bout that, let me get to the last thing right quick. Risk of Rain was yet another thing recommended to me by a friend and I've had my fair share of enjoyment playing through both of the games. The first game's style is wonderfully Terraria feeling for a guy that knows that Terraria is not my speed in the slightest, and I had a fair bit in fun in completing the game with every survivor. Risk of Rain 2 has been even more fun but also more infuriating as another result, since I really like the transition into 3d and how the game feels much more smoother to play, but I've grinded myself at trying to beat the game even once after 30+ attempts that it has burned me out even when I get a good run. Maybe it's just because I complete stages too slowly, but I can't help but wanting to complete shit. I've gotten to Mithrix once and have been waiting to taste that wonderful feeling again. And what is another kick in the pants is how RIsk of Rain Returns has released but isn't on consoles beside the Switch and I want it!

Oh, and I don't know if I had said this outright, but I had seen Ultrakill about a year ago and have been still into that, but even moreso now, soooo I guess that counts?

[barbatos-sama]

so far these are the pros and cons of this game, there will be a lot of comparing to gembin because the game makes no effort to hide how much of a gembin clone it is:

cons:

• character designs aren't great, a lot of them are very busy and the ones that aren't are kinda plain because the colors are kinda muted

• colors are more muted and less whimsical because this isn't a historical fantasy like gembin, like i said it's supposed to be a futuristic game so it's almost like they're trying to take classic gacha character design but make it fit into a futuristic sci fi theme and they don't really execute that very well

• the sci-fi aspect itself just doesn't appeal to me, this is obviously a matter of personal taste though

• it takes a lot of big made up science words and spits it at you all at once, making things hard to understand. gembin has some complicated fantasy terms as well but they ease you into it, starting in mond where everything is pretty easy to understand and terms are mostly normal and easy to understand. by the time it gets real bad in gembin is in sumeru, but you're so far into the game at that point where you're invested enough to actually learn and memorize these terms. this game spits them at you immediately so i was quickly discouraged and decided i didn't care abt the plot if they were gonna immediately make you do homework in order to understand anything

• speaking of the plot like i mentioned before i started skipping most of the dialogue and cutscenes because i just didn't care, it was boring. i Tried at first but i just couldn't understand what was going on bc of the nonsense technical terms they wanted me to learn

• THE INTERFACE okay my god the interface is so hard to navigate at least for me. i don't know what any of this shit is or what it does. the interface over the gameplay is almost Exactly like gembin's so that's easy to understand but the menus? nahhhh. it's like they wanted to copy homework but make it different but they made it different in the wrong way

• back to the character designs unfortunately has the "most women have big booba" problem. i don't have a problem with booba women, i kind of used to bc it made me dysphoric but it doesn't anymore and i think having some titty every now and again is fine. but when almost Every woman has big booba it makes them feel less unique. like in gembin for example there's ladies with all sizes of booba, some even have flat chests like furina and hu tao. ladies with like super big booba are actually not Super common, shenhe and yelan come to mind. in gembin you could say "the lady with the big titties" and those two would probs come to mind for whoever ur talking to, but in this game it would be like "ur gonna have to be more specific." like you know what i mean?? ahdjd not Every woman can be a booba woman you've got to branch out.

• obviously they only have twink which is a crime against me personally. the game came out rather recently so maybe there will be more, but maybe not having many twinks is a good thing bc i wont feel enticed to pull for many ppl.

• jumping is weirdly floaty and sprinting is weird

• fighting is kinda boring, ive been button mashing and things die lmao. so far there's not as much strategy as there is in gembin, but maybe i just dont know enough abt the combat system? it gave me tutorial trials tho and most of it consisted of "click four times then use your skill" so it doesn't seem very promising.

• exploration is a lot more boring than in gembin, gembin has chests and puzzles like jam packed into its world but those are much farther between in this game. since exploration is literally my favorite thing abt gembin this game is seriously lacking to me lol

• sometimes it can be kinda frustrating trying to do the things it wants me to, like it gave me a challenge to do backflips 10 times in a row without falling off a box, and the box would get smaller on each difficulty, and it took FOREVER because first of all didn't even tell me what i was doing at first so i didn't know i wasn't supposed to flip off the box, then once i figured that out it was just a rly hard thing to do but the quest marker wouldn't go away until you finished it. i finally did finish it but it was v frustrating and i was like "i come back to this game and the first thing you do is frustrate me? hello?" also there was a domain that was literally a side scroller so it was like, sonic the hedgehog but worse and very clunky. that took me several tries as well bc the controls for this segment are like, not great. i had to remap the buttons for that specific part. idk maybe someone with bigger hands can do it better but i have small hands and can't even reach the left shift button soooo

pros:

• i have just realised that almost every pro i have would be "this is like gembin" such as it having practically identical features such as how characters are built, constellations, battle pass, welkin, how quests are organized, etc. like i can't even tell you how much this game truly is "gembin but worse". they took gembin and used almost identical mechanics but made the characters uglier, the interface worse, and the exploration more boring. like i was sitting here like "okay but as a clone it had the opportunity to improve on gembin" but it didn't. like... okay it's got a bigger resin cap? you can walk up walls? i'm struggling to think of something here

[lowpolyshadow]

okay here's my final horizons review that nobody asked for :) the short summary is an overall like 8/10 personally with high highs and low lows to average it all out there, but like . god those highs are high

speaking of i played on hard mode for the entire thing and did not change it a single time so this also influences my perception but like im a loser tryhard sweaty gamer so that probably just added to the positives for me ngl JGKLASDFJL;KS okay anyways

amy gameplay 8/10, tails gameplay 8/10, knuckles gameplay 6/10

i am SO FUCKING SERIOUS WHEN I SAY KNUCKLES WOULD BE LIKE 9/10 IF HE HAD FREE CLIMBING AND WASN'T LIMITED TO THE RED SPOTS like it makes sense in this scenario since he's literally free dlc and like the game wasn't really made with knuckles in mind therefore if he was given free range to climb and shit like SA2 it might be weird or just lead to things you super weren't intended to do etc. BUT like. im just saying. in a perfect world he would be able to climb on all surfaces and that would be more than enough for me to forgive his glide's super wide turns (i already forgive it because it makes sense it's just like. from a player feel perspective)

i can't forgive some of those awful camera angles though it's the same issue i have with sonic when he wall climbs, wall climbing just has bad camera angles that i greatly dislike u__u also i think i was most looking forward to playing as knuckles so i was just kinda disappointed he isn't more punchy i want PUNCHY

amy was super fun to play and would've been a 9 but i am in fact a hammer believer, i know they like at least bring it up in game why she doesn't hammer more but i AM a hammer enjoyer and i think if she had more swingy hammer movesets it would be like. chef's kiss i love her floatiness and tarot cards

tails is tails he's so broken LMAOOOO and the wrench attack shit is genuinely really good and so funny, his entire thing fits perfectly with the fact that he's like, not really a Fighter fighter guy and matches with previous tails gameplay .... but i do still want a homing attack for specifically objects not enemies or something. idk that'd be hard to handle sometimes but that's my single grievance i thought tails was really good he's so cute :)

in general i wish all 3 had more combat options but again. it's free dlc. in the future if they do like sonic adventure 3 or whatever then i'll be more harsh for not having more moves for them like sonic but this is free dlc

sonic gameplay 8.5/10

i'm crazy and i thought the towers were a lot of fun, my favorite WOULD'VE BEEN tower 2 except the pink squares not respawning is genuinely like girl what's wrong with you + tower 5 eked out being my favorite anyways in the end

my favorites in order were 5, 2, 4, 1, and 3 (3 was by far the easiest but also like . i am so not into the wall climbing camera JGKALSDJFKLASDJ and also i had the funny glitch where the boostpad clipped me out of the tower which like, funny but now i have to climb the tower again) i thought these were super fun platforming challenges with the only grievance being they're literally WAY more difficult than anything from base game and so the sudden jump is like actually insane expecting little timmy to play frontiers on like hard mode which is very easy, and then doing this

the combat trials were disappointing bc like. .. the first one had some difficulty to it and then the rest were snzzzz and then suddenly MASTER KING KOCO BABYYYYY but again im insane. and deranged. i thought a time/ring limit boss rush was sick as fuck and perfect parry is what i wished the actual base game parry was so like. yeah. but again the boss fights weren't Made for perfect parry so especially wyvern, figuring out was like harder than necessary since this is something they throw at you with no warning or prior practice in the base game or anything

i had fun though. i had gamer fun and joy. so like <- sick in the head i just felt the thrill of battle and violence and any time i figured out the parry timing/got consistent with it and i was like being the ultimate speedrun gamer it's like. YIPPEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! also kellin quinn's vocals carried me because god the music never gets old dude that shit pumped me up (helps i only had to fight knight twice and the problem child was just wyvern lol)

AND THE FINAL BOSS .... supreme still lowkey is a very very very very mid boss. and the new THE END doesn't change it a Ton because like after you see the sickass cutscene and stuff, it becomes kind of a mid boss again but with really hype animations and all .... like it's not a hard fight. it's just ... jank .... the controls feel kinda wonky when you're trying to target the tube .... the camera is weird because it's so easy for sonic to not be visible from all the trees, so while parrying the meteors isn't hard it's just like ... why would you do this to me

final boss fight itself is like 7/10 carried by the visuals and setting, but then the end of the boss fight is like WHOOOOOOOOOOO FUCK YEAH FUCK YEAH FUCK YEAH LETS GOOOOO I FUCKING LOVE SONIC THE HEDGEHOG YYEAHHHHHH YEAHHHHHHHHHHH so like overall good dlc imo

[springlock-suits]

Glamrock Diner AU

[Reference Sheet] [further context]

Springbonnie is more prominent in this au ramble because I have blatant favoritism. But I'm working (and taking suggestions) on how Fredbear should work

I'm also taking suggestions on the entire au in general, I love working together with my followers to help flesh something out <3

And so without further ado-

.

The Retro Rink

-Fazbear ent decided to retheme the Bonnie Bowl into the Retro Rink sometime after Bonnie went missing. And added 2 new animatronics, the Retro Glamrocks, Springbonnie and Fredbear!

-For this retheme, the Retro Rink had the walls and carpet and such changed to look like a mash of the old locations, but mostly like the original Fredbear's Family Diner

-ex: Fredbear's Family Diner's striped gray walls with confetti bits at the top, blue arcade carpet, mostly red doors + decorations. Also the checkered walls and floor from other old Freddy's locations. There are also bits that are made to match the Retro Glamrocks themselves

-The ice cream/food area is very largely unchanged, but the arcade area is now more focused on "Retro games" Both real ones and stuff you'd find in old Freddy's locations

-The Retro Rink replaces Bonnie's stage with a slightly larger one, where the Retro Glamrocks now preform! They sing old songs from the diner, duets, and remixes of old songs from the diner

-Bonnie Bowl is on the 4th floor along with the Fazcade/Dance Hall whatever it's called. So while definitely still impractical, I really like imagining that DJMM has been given a tunnel to enter the area with (maybe it could also be used for one of the bonus bosses' fights?) DJMM helps with the remixes :]

.

"Gameplay"

-Neither of the Retros are wearing their roller skates when you first enter the Rink for Monty's Mystery Mix. But they are when the bonus fight "unlocks" for you. I'm not sure when the fight takes place? But I'm trying to avoid after 6. I'm also not sure storywise why they don't just chase you with rollerskates immediately

-Their roller skates are like heelys. Retractable and such. I fully believe fazbear ent is capable of making animatronic feet that can just turn into rollerskates. Can be accompanied with a fun animation too! Like they lift a foot off the ground to turn it into a skate and then lift the other. Fred and Spring can even have different animations to show off their different personalities and how they use the skates! Maybe Spring just jumps to get both feet into skate mode immediately. Ooh that'd be a fun animation to watch, esp if he jumps down from a ledge while doing it, like the DJMM tunnel 👀?

-Fredbear uses skates normally and calmly. Spring is concerningly close to crossing the line between casual skating and roller derby

-Springbonnie more actively chases you than Fredbear does. Fredbear will leave you mostly alone unless you very obviously get into his line of sight, you'll need a distraction like for tutorial Chica. But in the bonus fight Fredbear gets much more intense, kinda like fnaf 1 Freddy

-Springbonnie can jump similarly to Monty, has enhanced hearing, and of course speed from the skates. A hearing upgrade is immediately out because I can't imagine how that'd be useful gameplay wise, and it's not very accessible either. A jumping upgrade would be super cool, but at the same time doesn't feel very useful? And it feels weird giving Freddy an upgrade that isn't really unique to the animatronic you took the upgrade from. But also. It would be super cool, maybe the bonus upgrades could be made useful and special areas are added to the map where you can use it. The speed from the skates is the best upgrade I think, but ah, Fredbear should probably be the speed because I can't think of ANY other upgrades for him that'd be useful for Gregory

-So, right now I'm thinking you get a "sprint" upgrade from Fredbear and jumping from Springbonnie!

(Freddy would definitely be devastated if he learned you upgraded him with Springbonnie's parts)

.

Personally +Extras

-The Retro's love DJ Music Man!! They are besties!!!!

-I imagine Springbonnie would either love or hate Sun, but I'm not sure which. They don't see Moon all that often and don't really have a strong opinion

-Fredbear likes Sun! How nice that Sunny takes care of children :], Fredbear doesn't really like Moon however, on account of the whole traumatizing them thing

-While it took awhile for the Retro's and Glamrock's to start properly interacting and starting friendships, especially Springbonnie and Freddy, they did in the end all get along!

-Springbonnie, Roxy, and Monty get along like a house on fire and are fiercely competitive. Fredbear, Freddy, and Chica watch from the sidelines like exasperated older siblings

-Fredbear is similar to Freddy in terms of personality I think. He really cares about children and is programmed to help teach them to skate +plus take them to a med station if they get injured. Although I think if they switched roles in the tutorial Fred would've listened to Gregory about not needing medical attention, he doesn't believe him of course, but Fred figures helping the child get away from the guard and out of the pizzaplex is the more pressing matter. Fredbear also has a rather tired personality, I've always seen Fredbear as sort of a tired/chill character, probably mostly bc of how Golden Freddy is always slumped over. And it's a nice contrast to the energy of Springbonnie

"Is Glamrock Springbonnie possessed by William?"

-So far I think Springbonnie isnt possessed by William. But I figure he definitely has some "memories" not really anything Springbonnie can put into words or think about. But they instinctively call Gregory "Little Bear" because of it. Also a fear of water and fire that's just chalked up to them being an animatronic

-Since not possessed, Afton and Vanny definitely want to get their hands on poor Spring. They could also be like, slightly possessed? Yknow? Like it comes and goes.

Spring is definitely under the effects of the glitch the night you're there tho. Should I be counting the glitch and possession as different things

(Oh hmm now I'm thinking too much about Burntrap's motivations. Does he even Want a new Springbonnie body? Because while stealing Springs' casing would be easy, like, it leaves the question why he won't take the casings from any of the animatronics in the real game? Surely there's extras and some spray paint lying around. Ahh oh well whatever that's a story plot hole for this au and we're not focusing ok story right now, so this is a future me problem 👉😎👉)

Monty

-I personally like to believe that Monty didn't do anything to Glamrock Bonnie, but so far for the purposes of this au it doesn't matter if he did or didn't I think

-I really like making Spring and Monty friends

-Springbonnie absolutely loves being a menace to Monty. This was pretty much the very first thing I thought of for this au. I decided on this due to Monty being largely assumed to have destroyed the first Glamrock Bonnie. Also it's kinda cathartic for her? Like the fragmented memories make it so Spring sorta subconsciously knows about some "dangerous red alligator" so messing with Monty who they trust would never actually hurt them makes Spring feel better and more in control. This also works in favor for Monty! It's comforting for him that the new rabbit is so willing to prank and be annoying around him despite all the rumors about what he did to the old Bonnie. They're friends and they trust and care about each other :]

–(ough if I give this au plot Monty is gonna get messed up, where is his bunny friend :[ he's getting blamed for the disappearance again :[, he just wants to find Springbonnie and know he's okay)

-I actually have like a whole little comic concept of how Monty and Spring meet, I probably won't draw it, but for now just know that Monty was the first to see one of the Retros and Springbonnie enjoys chaos

-Springbonnie always says bye to Monty by saying "See ya later alligator" and greets Monty with a "Hey there alligator!". This isn't important to the au I just think it's cute

[sugarysketches]

Pokemon Alternatives

Hi! So that new Pokemon rip-off, huh? Gonna make my thoughts short and say: I don't like it!

But instead of going on a tirade about it, I'm gonna show you some actual Creature Collector games to play if you're tired of Pokemon! Yes, it's an entire genre, it's not just Pokemon (and sometimes Digimon) and it's probably my favorite game genre period.

Nexomon + Nexomon Extinction (have kinda mixed feelings on these ones, mainly for their plots and some of the creature designs, but they're here)

Cassette Beasts (probably, genuinely, my favorite in the list, it's a lot of fun and there's a lot of soul in it! Also if you're also an artist there's a sidequest in this game that'll really sit with you)

Coromon (I haven't played a ton of it yet, but it's very polished and very fun! There's online stuff like daily missions and alternate appearances you can get for the monsters [that don't replace the shinies])

Monster Sanctuary (A creature collector Metroidvania! The movement feels really good and the designs a really fun, but the battles are kinda tough)

Monster Crown (A game that emulates the look and feel of the Gen 1/2 games... but also unfortunately has much of the jank as well. If you can look past that though, it's really nice!)

Moonstone Island (A creature collector life-sim with deck-based battles, I also have mixed feelings on this game, mainly bc it doesn't mix all the different types of gameplay together the best imo, but it's still a very nice game!)

Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth (Ofc there has to be a Digimon game here, and this was actually my first one! A very good creature collector, even if some of the evolutions get convoluted)

That's all I have for now, but if you happen to know any games that I haven't listed, feel free to add them! I'm always looking for recommendations ^^

PS. if you're gonna try to argue with me about the Pokemon rip-off I won't name, I'm just gonna block you

PPS. if you're wondering why TemTem isn't here, it's bc I haven't played it and have no interest in it (also I cannot play MMOs due to internet problems)

[sleepdepravity]

visual/sound novel games list from that obscure games list i made earlier

i was contemplating whether i should just reblog the "mystery games" list post instead of making these their individual posts, but then i realized, i think reblogs with read mores will just uncollapse all the read mores in the entirep ost, so that would make the posts super long. here are the visual/sound novel games.

uhhhhh this one may not actually be a visual novel. I think i put it there initially because there's a lot of chatting with people and relationships, but actually, there's also a lot of walking and looking at stuff (my favorite) anyways, the ending made me super cry a lot. I lvoe AIs. there's a very good AI in this game and it makes me super sad, i cried a lot at the ending choice. i love the AI.

i am so surprised about how few reviews there are of this game??? like less than 2k. I'm very surprised because, like, this is a major player in the history of sound novels, isn't it????? like! a big name guy!!! it's very fun. There are mulitple characters, you can hop around to all of them as they do their concurrent things, and it's very fun and funny to see how each of their lives intertwine. And also it's fun to see how some of these people end up being a lot more connected than you think. also, choices you make as other people will affect what happens to other people. also, there are many bad ends. actually....i think the creators of this game is somehow tied to kamaitachi no yoru??? which was also fun and good.

i count this as a visual novel because the only gameplay is sorting food. It's a papers please-esque game. Anywyas, i am "bad" at dystopia games because no matter what, i always play my character as "guy who keeps their head down and doesn't rebel." like, i don't even replay to try other endings. i just tend to play a game once, and the ending i get is the ending i get. i feel like when you play dystopia games you're "supposed" to try to fight the system or something, but, like. i don't want to stick out, guys. i truly don't. I won't report people, i won't snitch, but i also won't. like. disobey the system outright. Sorting food was interesting, though.

this one i remember being a visual novel about AIs or robots or something. also another dystopian thing. uhhhhhh. i sort of forget what happens, but you do fortune-telling shit with these people, and you can affect what these people do based on what order you place the divination sigils, and i think that's neat. fun visuals too. I really like how people are shaded and colored.

TIME LOOP HAMLET TIME LOOP HAMLET YOU PLAY AS OPHELIA AND YOU'RE IN A TIME LOOP IT'S HAMLET TIME LOOP TIME I AM IN SUCH FUCKIN AWE THAT, LIKE, THIS GAME DOESN'T AHVE MORE REVIEWS OR ATTENTION? YOU!!! PLAY AS OHPELIA!!! IN A TIME LOOP!!!!!! therea re multipel endings. it's fun. i think it's fun. i'm not sure that this should be in this category now that i think about it, but oh well.

i, honestly kinda don't really know how to describe this game. it's definitely visual novel. it has good vibes and music, dynamic camera work. it's interesting. there are multiple side stories as well. it's a story about death and the afterlife and passing on and clinging to life.

I think some of the most interesting games are when you're just some guy encountering multiple people just going about their lives, but also sometimes the people are very much connected to each other in neat ways. This is another one of those cyberpunk type stories that explore tech and privacy and all that jazz. y'know?

I played this on mobile previously. I'm a little surprised that it doesn't have more attention on steam, but maybe it got most of its audience on mobile? i dunno. I think this one is fun in terms of the different ways you have to try to get away with murder, managing time and different people and trying to hide evidence or trying to find out dirt on other people and planting evidence on them and such.

I really like the art style on this, and i think the "conversation through cards" mechanic is interesting. this is the sort of game where you drive around to places and talk to people. vroom vroom. i like journeying around sometimes. i like collecting junk to put in a shop. the art style is very much neat, though. i really enjoyed the art style.

There's five parts to this, i believe. I think this actually is based off an actual choose your own adventure book? I'm not sure how closely it follows the book, but i think i found it quite fun, actually. just in terms of the different paths you can take, and what things you can find and pick up and the different ways you can use them. also, the art is nice! The sound design was nice. Ambient sounds got used a lot for this one to good effect. the sound that happens when you start a spell is very nice.

i believe i played this one on mobile too? i think it's possible this one might be better played on mobile, potentially. unsure. but 1. i remember thinking that this one did some very fun things with text and playing around with the way you read, metatext, puzzles, etc. Also, at the end of it, there's a thing you can do where you. email, the developers? i guess? and you get to do a shrot little roleplay with them about the ending of the game. i remember sending them the email and wondering if, like, too much time had passed for them to even respond, because i think it had been at least a year since the release? and i was like "nahhh...they wouldn't just keep monitoring that email forever, right?" but then they responded. i don't know if they will still respond. i don't think it's automated. the person who responded to me seemed very nice.

[ilaiyayaya]

Ngl I Just Wanted To Complain About Arthur That's All This Is Really About

Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest Chapter 10 is like, so bad but also like so good but also like I fucking hate it but also like it's so good but also like. There is not a single map in the entire Fire Emblem series that I think about nearly as much as Chapter 10 of Conquest, I cannot think of any other map that lives rent free in my head like this piece of shit. I'm not even replaying Fates right now, just sometimes Conquest Chapter 10 just pops up in my brain and I spend 3 hours thinking about it.

When I play Fire Emblem my playstyle is generally super defensive, I like playing on the highest difficulty most of the time and I REFUSE to ever let any units die so like, why would I ever want my defenseless healer or my shitty low as fuck accuracy axe-user to be anywhere near danger, and this map is like the perfect counter to that type of playstyle. It's a super well-designed map, like it's really good, but I hate it so much, it's super early in the game, in Fates the first 5 chapters are a prologue shared between all 3 version, so it's effectively only the 5th chapter of Conquest, and so you don't have a lot of units to choose from, and those units are still pretty weak. I think by Chapter 10 of Conquest you can have 10 units I believe? you get 3 more a few turns in, and those new units are really good and make the rest of the map a lot less stressful, but it's still pretty bad even with those. The whole point of the stage is defending a 4 tile wide gate, but while you would probably assume this means it would be good to play defensively, absolutely not, enemies come in large waves from all sides and if you don't play extremely aggressively you will get overwhelmed within 1 turn. This is really hard to do on this particular map at this point in the game because of the available units, 1 of them is a healer that cannot attack (Elise), 1 is a dancer that technically can attack but does so little damage that she's only really useful for finishing off enemies with like 1 or 2 hp (Azura), and 1 is an optional trainee unit that is probably still too weak to do any more damage than Azura (Mozu). So basically you have 7 actual damage-dealing units to fend off large waves of enemies coming from 3 directions. The worst part is that of these 7 remaining unit, half of them were not at all made to be defensive, 1 is an archer that can take 1 or 2 hits (Niles), but obviously since they're an archer they can't counter attacks from one space away, 1 is a mage that will die in 1 hit (Odin), and 1 is a maid that really is meant more for healing than damage (Felicia), but she can at least do some debuffing and a bit of damage, still dies in like 2 hits tho. That leaves 4 units at the start of the battle that can actually reliably be put in the center of combat without instantly dying AND EVEN THOSE 4 KINDA SUCK AT THEIR JOB, the only truly outstanding unit is Effie who is a fantastic armor knight, whichever spot you place her at she can pretty much solo if you've leveled her even a little bit since her introductory chapter. The other 3 are Corrin (the protagonist) who isn't necessarily bad, and the exp they get from constantly being attacked is really good since they're a required unit for the entire game, but if you haven't levelled them enough by this point they can get overwhelmed pretty easily, another is Silas, who is potentially as good as Effie, but I personally rarely plan to use him long-term, so I usually don't level him a ton before this chapter so he's really weak for me, that's entirely my fault, but like, that valuable exp, I gotta give it to my other more useful units I can't just waste it on someone I'll drop later. The last of the available units at the start of the chapter is Arthur, Arthur is possibly my least favorite character in the entire series, I hate his character, I hate him in gameplay, I don't like his design, there is nothing about Arthur that I like, but you need to use him in this chapter AND HE'S FUCKING USELESS, he is the prime example of axe-users never being able to hit anything, even if you level him a decent amount, he isn't very defensive so he dies pretty quickly, he doesn't do much damage, and it wouldn't even matter if he did do decent damage because his accuracy is laughably poor, I have literally had attempts of this map where I have had him miss every single attack within the first 5 full turns, which is more than enough to kill a run and pretty much require a reset, he is useless, I hate him, I'm not talking about him anymore, fuck Arthur, hate that guy.

The first 3 turns are by far the hardest part of the map, dealing with the first few smaller waves of enemies and setting up your initial walls before reinforcements get to you is strangely enough a lot harder to deal with than the much larger waves of enemies that arrive in later turns, mostly because after turn 3 you get 3 more units and they are all very good. At turn 3, you get 3 extra units, Camilla, Beruka, and Selena, without these 3 this map would be a fucking nightmare (even more than it already is), Camilla alone is extremely strong and can solo most enemy units as long as they're not bow-users, and the other 2 help a lot in picking off every enemy that isn't already being walled off by Camilla or Effie. As the map goes on each new wave of enemies gets bigger and bigger, so it definitely does maintain it's difficulty throughout the entire stage, but once you've gotten a decent foothold after the first few turns, the rest becomes way more manageable. It's still hard, very hard in the 2nd half of the stage, 100% still nightmarishly difficult, and extremely frustrating if you do fuck up and now have to redo nearly an hour's worth of progress, however, whenever I play chapter 10, like 90% of my resets happen within the first 3 turns, those first few turns are brutally difficult, and if you don't simultaneously push the enemy back far enough, and create a good enough wall in the beginning, you will not make it very far once enemy waves start getting bigger in the 4th turn and beyond. It's such an interestingly, and also somewhat frustratingly designed stage, like in most Fire Emblem stages, once I get into a difficult situation I go "hrmm how do I get out of this situation hrmmrmrmrmr" and then I figure it out and I go "yipee!" but in chapter 10, if you make a mistake, and you realize you've made that mistake, it's probably already too late and it's just going to snowball into a much bigger problem within a few turns. I love resetting on turn 9 because a pegasus knight slipped by and killed Elise oopsies.

The way I've been talking about this makes it sounds like the most frustrating, least fun thing you could possibly ever experience in anything ever, and like, yea it kinda is, but it's also weirdly like, really fun??? Like, I feel like there aren't a ton of maps in any FE game that feels quite like Conquest Chapter 10, there are plenty of maps where you have to defend a point, but I don't think there's any others where you have to defend a point, while not playing defensively at all, because if you just sit there and let the enemies come to you, at least one is going to slip by. Like I said at the start of this, I play super defensively in Fire Emblem, I like to minimize risk of any units dying as much as possible, but the best way to minimize risk in this map, is to do the exact opposite as in most maps and just throw all of your strongest units directly into hordes and hope they don't die. Yea it's annoying, yea it's really fucking hard, yea it's really frustrating to reset like 30 times before getting past the 3rd turn even once, but like, it's fun frustrating, it's refreshing, I like it, but I also fucking hate it, fuck this map it's too well designed.

I had like, a lot more things I was gonna say about this map, but like, I forgor a lot of my points l had to go to work mid-writing this and so all thoughts evaporated from my brain and were replaced with PSO2 thinking gif and Soleil brainrot.

It's so sad that Chapter 10 happens too early to get Soleil, really it's probably the biggest actual objective issue with the map, unfortunately an issue shared between many early Conquest maps, if only the devs had the foresight to make Soleil available in Chapter 1, truly a major blunder. God why did they fucking write Soleil so poorly like fuck, her supports are impressively bad, like even for Fates she's written poorly. Soleil truly is the Conquest Chapter 10 of Fire Emblem characters, see I didn't just start talking about Soleil for no reason, there was a reason, it's called circular narrative, yea, yea that's what it is, I'm so good at this writing thing frfr.

[miss-k-lovenikki]

Finally out of exam season and somewhat rested enough to post ! I've been able to play LM for like two days and here are my various thoughts in random order

While i wasn't sure about the artstyle at first (it looked super uncanny to me) it kinda grew on me and i don't really mind it anymore. It's still isn't my favorite tho, i'm more of an anime gal i guess

The personalisation is crazy ! The way we can pretty easily recolor every single piece of clothing ? The character maker ? Amazing. I'm in LOVE

Love the fashion game trend of having completely bonkers story (why is it that every character i get attached to dies ?)

Now that may be a translation issue but the pacing of the story tho... sometimes it feels like they're skipping part of some scenes ? Idk but time feels weird (had the same issue w/ LN)

The inspirations are v obvious. And not in a good way ? Like i don't think we needed a sims simulation in a fashion game.

Fresh and Pure keeps on getting confused in mission titles smh

So many things i'm getting overwhelmed (was the same w/ SN so i think it's just a question of time before i know my way around the ui and general gameplay)

Character illustrations and Live2D animations are gorgeous

Super interested in the world's design and lore, i love the near future aesthetics

Not fond of the fact that opening your guild is behind a 5$ paywall, certainly explains why it took me three whole days to find one i could enter (...and then its an indonesian speaking guild that i don't remember applying to...?)

All in all, i do like the game ! I'm just not sure if it's gonna stick w/ me, especially w/ LN and SN already occupying quite some space in my schedule

[madamemimic]

Just got fully caught up with Your Turn to Die. Thoughts under the cut!

Fucking loved it.

I first gave this game a shot two years ago and while I enjoyed it quite a bit, I found myself bouncing off because I wasn't a huge fan of the point-and-click adventure style puzzle solving.

Fast forward to today and holy shit am I glad I stuck with it. The shift in gameplay styles in each chapter is super novel and I had a ton of fun adapting to each of them. While I think the minigames could use some work (saving Gin from the cage and a few of the chapter 2 attractions were kind of awful), the overall gameplay loop is a lot of fun.

I think most of my grievances with the gameplay are because it's being made in RPGMaker MV. It's an engine issue - not much you could do about that at this point. Later chapters fix a lot of these issues by using the game's strengths (analysis, puzzle-solving, character knowledge) a lot more often than just "click on this thing before a timer runs out!"

Some of the logic during debates can be a little strange, too. A few times in the first two chapters I found myself getting really frustrated because, while I was technically finding potential arguments and item-statement matchups, they weren't the ones that the game wanted, so it counted them as incorrect. Also, not being able to draw statements out of characters without lowering the timer in the Gin/Q-taro minigame kinda sucked. However, I had none of these issues during the chapter 2 main game and the chapter 3 banquet, so overall the game improved on that front quite a bit.

Music isn't great, but it's one dude doing his best with garageband loops. At the very least, each song fits its respective moment super well. I'd love to see this game with an original soundtrack, though...

The art is great. Character portraits are super dynamic, character designs are super solid and memorable, and the backgrounds look absolutely fantastic. There are a few awkward character portraits (Q-taro and Gin's can be a little strange sometimes), but those are nitpicks. Game looks great.

The characters and story... hoo boy, where do I even start? I don't dislike a single character in this game, which was a shock coming from the Danganronpa series. The worst I can say is that some of the characters weren't super interesting, but that was only for like two of the dolls in chapter 3. Big fan of Keiji, Sou (Shin?), and Reko. Every character feels unique and feels like they have a place in the story. Even some of the first characters to die are given proper characterization as the story goes on, meaning that really any character can be someone's favorite.

Sara is a pretty good protagonist, too! I often have trouble relating to protags in these kinds of games, but Sara is fairly interesting in her own right. If she were a side character instead, I think I'd like her a bit better... but hey, she isn't, so I'm not judging her on that. She's a fine protagonist with lots of character.

The story has the highest Revelations Per Hour of any game I've ever played. God damn. You get zero down time, especially in the latter two chapters. I haven't been this surprised by a game in a long, long time. Fuckin' love it.

By the way: On my playthrough, I've chosen Reko over Alice and Kanna over Sou. No dolls have survived.

Overall I loved what there is of YTTD so far and can't wait for even more in the future! Also, Alice is trans and you can't convince me otherwise.

[michu-writes]

hi!!! i'd love an omori matchup!! :D

i'm an enfp 7w6 and my prns are she/her and i'm pan i have no preference at all!!!!! ^_^ my biggest interests are astronomy, astrology, anime + manga, gaming (pc mobile switch ps4), talking & being around people, and 🍃💨 HAHA :D

i'm very spiritual!!! and i love learning about philosophies and different views of the world!!! :) i love tarot as well ^_^ i'm always learning new things like that and i love to try different mindsets out if that makes sense!!!!! one time i heard "treat life like one big experiment" AND ITS JUST STUCK W ME :D

my personality can b described as talkative friendly optimistic joyful n kind!!! my mom n bff said im like a ray of sunshine & have a heart of gold (so sweet awh I LOVE THEM SM) :,) ❤️

my love languages are 1. acts of service but not anything big!!! small things like tying my shoes, or tapping my phone screen as it's turning dark!! 2. words of affirmation!! i'm super verbally affectionate!!! while dating someone i'd definitely need someone who would match my high affection levels!!! it doesn't matter if they show it behind closed doors or out to the whole world, i don't have a preference!!! :) oh and idk if this has any significance but my fav trope is bffs to lovers :D

I ship you with….

SUNNY ☀️ !

Sunny definitely needs an extrovert in his life (not like 99% of his friends already are) because he can get pretty awkward with another introvert if the other isn't as initiative, so having you by his side and kinda just leading him on would be really nice and helpful! It takes him a while to warm up with others, let alone fully gain his trust, so you both have probably been friends for a long time (maybe even ever since Mari was still alive), so that's your bffs to lovers lmao. There has been many people on multiple occasions saying it's ironic how his name is Sunny, and yet you're the sun and he's the moon. But you just tell them that just makes your relationship so special (it's true).

I have a feeling he'd really enjoy astronomy and astrology as well and would love to learn about it more with you. His favorite way of being teaching is with/by his s/o, it makes things less boring y'know!! He most likely watches anime as well, or tries to, so you guys would have movie nights and would probably spice things up by having small quizzes about the animes/mangas. And he loves gaming!! He doesn't have much money to buy that many games, so sometimes he just has to watch gameplays. But he'd love to buy whatever he needs to play with you. He also loves watching you play on your mobile or switch while you're both cuddling. He'll even let out a small chuckle whenever you fail or lose! Don't worry though, he'll give you a small kiss on the cheek whenever you win or complete something.

He's had a few philosophical questions about life during those 4 years of isolation, so he could discuss some with you if you want. But you're definitely more philosophical than he is, and he loves to just listen to you rant about it all day, he thinks it's really interesting! Like I said, he's always willing to learn new stuff with you.

He's never tried tarot before, but he has heard of it! If you know how to do tarot readings, he's just like :0!! That's so cool wtf? He'd love to get a tarot reading from you. He'd try to do read you too, but he'll just be confused.

Sunny isn't super big with words, I think we all have caught up to that now. So his words of affirmation isn't his biggest love language, but he's definitely more vocal around you than others. His love language would be physical touch. Simple gestures like hand holding, hugging, or just shoulder touching could just show how much he loves you. He's not big on pda, it's way out of his comfort zone, so he's mostly only comfortable with hand holding in public. But he wouldn't really care if it's around his close friends. Cuddles is a must!! That's his ultimate way of showing affection. You could be cuddling in silence, or just talking, or gaming, or watching something, it doesn't matter. Just as long as he gets be close to you! He's the small spoon, he has to be. Doesn't matter if you're shorter or taller than him. He missed the sensation of someone wrapping their arms around him and keeping him safe. I can tell you the first time you both cuddled, he couldn't help but cry. This poor baby is touch starved as fuck. You'd be too if you isolated yourself all alone in your house for 4 years out of depression and mental illness and guilt.

To be honest, he'd feel kinda guilty for having you do stuff for him. He understands it's a way to show affection, but man. Maybe it's just because he hasn't had anyone do this for a long time and completely forgot how it felt like. Whenever you tell him that his shoelaces are undone, he just kinda looks down is about to bend down to tie them, but then you're just like "no, don't worry I'll do it for you!" and he just has no time to hesitate. He'll mutter a small "thank you" but think "I could've done it myself, I just wasted 20 seconds of her time because of my selfish self! She probably hates me now." and oops you noticed the way he started sweating and just smooched him, now he feels better. He'll try to do the same gestures to you out of pity, but you insist.

Sunny gets flustered as hell whenever you compliment him in any way. He never realized how much he likes to be praised. You'd just say "I really like your clothes today, Sunny!" "You played that song in the violin so perfectly!" "I love you, sunshine." And he'll just pause as he slowly turns into a tomato. Sometimes he'd say something nice back, but fail miserably because of his stuttering. In real life he'd just be like o(-( but he's actually dissolving into mush in the inside. Oh and verbal praise following up with physical touch (nsx)????? He'll join Mari.