#More like demo analysis but whatever

[plitaka]

Okay so because I’m gay and mentally ill I have decided to take it upon myself to go through Kafka’s demo frame by frame and overanalyze the shit out of anything I find interesting

It’s insanely packed with blink or you’ll miss it details so buckle up folks- this is gonna be a ride

Right off the bat she starts off with the same coin she also ends the demo with. This isn’t something that’s been part of her character so far nor do I think it has any real significance, so she just brought it to be extra and torment the poor souls she’s planning to slaughter anyway. Annoying dramatic bitch

Also just to get this out of the way now, this is indeed the Belobog museum, or at least its assets. The floor of some of the inner rooms, the staircases, the chandelier and the big golden clock thingy are the same, and in one of the shots you can clearly see the portraits of the former supreme guardians which is. Makes you wonder if they just picked the museum for grand dramatic interior or if she actually had reasons to have business there.

This. This fucking part is probably no longer than 5 seconds and yet, even with the video on 0.25 speed I had to constantly rewind and pause to catch everything and it still probably isn’t 100% accurate. Also I had to cut out a lot things because Tumblr only allows 30 images per post but like, you get the picture

“What do you see” over and over again as images of Rorschach tests flash across the screen so fast you barely have a chance *to* see. Personally I mainly see spider like things and butterflies. Among them are images are some flashes of the robo guards, which to me give the feeling of them getting caught in her web, losing themselves and their control to her mind games and technique.

Something else worth nothing is that this sequence is kickstarted by her throwing the coin and ends with it still in her hand, just thought that was an interesting choice

Before moving on to the next point, however, I want to point out the obvious irony of her telling the guards “don’t be afraid”. Truly words to hear from the woman who is incapable of feeling fear. And what is the name of the demo? Dramatic irony. We’ll get back to that.

Anyway, after that we see the camera pan away from her and over the guards as she uses spirit whisper. The camera movement is accompanied by a single rose petal that starts from Kafka and flies over the guards, which kinda feels like the visual representation of spirit whisper, a gentle rose petal innocently brushing across them as if carried by an invisible breeze

I wanted to make a joke about how her bounty is as large as her strap but seeing as I’m restricted in the number of images I can put I’ll just state the obvious and say she has the largest known bounty of the Stellaron hunters. I’m going to guess the only one higher than hers is Elio’s.

can’t be 100% sure this is what’s going on here, but the imagery makes it look like she’s taking a nice calming stroll and playing Vivaldi in her head while letting the guards slaughter each other, either by controlling them with her strings or with spirit whisper

Dozens of hands reaching out for her, trying to grab her as she’s cocooned in a vulnerable state, pupils visible. I’m sure we’ll eventually get an ingame explanation as to what’s actually going on with her eyes, but for now I do think this is a VERY interesting time to show them. She’s in a compromising position, she’s cornered and vulnerable, but she’s confident and cocky and always, always in control. To anyone else this would be horrifying, but she can’t feel fear, why should she care. Like genuinely this is terrifying imagery that in media is more often than not used to showcase or symbolize sexual violence of sorts and personally makes my skin crawl. I don’t want to get too much into it here I think it needs its own separate post, so for now I’ll keep it short and say that up until now, her pupils have only been shown in situations where she’s at a physical disadvantage (held prisoner at the divination commission, whatever this is etc)

Something a bit lighter to focus on is what she’s saying; “the silk is too fragile to be a treat… unless you’re more fragile than the silk.” Symbolism aside she always seems to refer to silk when talking about fragile things, which we know are, in her opinion, the most beautiful. I really don’t think she’s referring to herself here seeing as the next scene demonstrates she’s far from fragile, so I think she does mean it in a much more literal way and is talking about a spider web; too fragile to capture humans, strong enough to capture its intended prey, this being weaker bugs. All in all she’s probably insulting them by comparing them to bugs weaker than a fragile silk web.

Nothing much to say about the fight scene other than that it’s incredibly choreographed and confirms that Kafka is strong enough to roundhouse kick a guy in the head (god I wish that were me) and do backflips in midair while firing her guns. Also the elevator counting down the survivors as their forces dwindle is fucking rad.

“Destiny has thousands of faces, why does it choose to wear this one?” In the context of the scene this reads to me as her mockingly lamenting the guards’ fate as she beautifully takes them down one by one, but it’s also one hell of a peculiar sentence from someone working for a guy who supposedly sees destiny and directs his followers according to that. She’s a nihilist, everything is predetermined in her eyes, she’s one of destiny’s slaves, but destiny also has thousands of faces? Is she really so nihilistic that even her own worldviews are contrasting in her eyes? As I’m writing this it makes me think of dadaism more than anything else. To quote from wikipedia: “an early 20th-century international movement in art, literature, music, and film, repudiating and mocking artistic and social conventions and emphasizing the illogical and absurd.” Kafka herself in an artist in many ways; she’s an actress first and foremost, always dramatic and theatrical, following a script to a T. But she’s also a musician, everything about her steeped in classical music and references. Anyway, dada is an absurdist nihilistic movement, and you know which real life author known for his absurdism lived and wrote parallel to the Dada? Franz Kafka.

Genuinely Idk where I was going with this I just thought it was worth sharing, MOVING ON-

Neat way of visualizing what I’m assuming is supposed to be her spirit whisper. Also I’m extremely stingy with images (thanks Tumblr), but if you slow down the video around 1:17 you could see that the shot of her katana very quickly flashes into another spider, just wanted to mention that.

These are all narrative screenplay terms that flash by in like a millisecond each after the big ult (that, btw, has a similar shot saying ‘intermission’ right before she casts it but it flashes by so fast and with such bright colors that I couldn’t take a proper screenshot of it) and shown on the Belobog Museum’s projector. The most interesting one here imo is Oneiric Structure; “a cinematic story using dream like visuals, exploring the structure of dreams, memories, and human consciousness”, very fitting considering how much of her abilitieseing how dramatic irony is yet another narrative device.

All these movie terms and framings, however, feel to me more like a wink to Kafka’s roots than anything else. This is the third time she’s been tied to movies somehow (the web event, one of her leaked messages that actually mentions how she’d hate for her life to be turned into a movie), and this is one time too many for me to stop denying that the inspiration for her character was at least in part Makima from Chainsaw Man. I won’t elaborate too much not to spoil the 3 people unfamiliar with csm, but this whole thing feels like a homage, a love letter to Fujimoto’s own love letter for cinema.

Also she *is* an actress following a script, so there’s that as well.

The demo ends with her taunting the one remaining guard with the very same coin from the beginning, flipping it in her palm and asking the guard to guess the ending with heads or tails, prefacing it by saying “sooner or later, the curtain has to fall”. To me this indicates that she sees life as kind of a one gigantic play, with no fear and no value for human life everything is a performance to her, it doesn’t matter beyond what’s happening on the stage in the presence. But also the way this is all framed makes it very easy to assume she’s actually talking about the end of the guard’s life, and asking him how he thinks this encounter between them will end, lol.

Another thing about the coin that Meadows mentioned “her flipping the coin over and over is both like, play with fate, a distraction (like, think in movies, you see someone flipping a coin your eyes are drawn to it and not the sleight of hand happening elsewhere), and ofc her clear obsession with vintage shit”

This has been it from me for now, too dead to properly edit through this rn so I’ll probably go back and add some details once I’m feeling better. Would also love for anyone to chime in with their own conclusions since this is just one person’s interpretation. Especially if you have more knowledge than me about classical music and have ideas regarding the use of Vivaldi’s winter

[anonymous-eggy]

your leander analysis was soooo spot on !! it's the first one that made sense to me !! i was always like ?? why would he try to mess with you ?? it just didn't make sense to me ?? you're so big brain

exactlyyyy!

i think my point didnt really get across because i said it in a very dramatic manner, but the point is there.

at the end of the day, Leander wants to manipulate you into trusting him. for what reason? we don't know yet. To take down the senobium? for selfish reasons? both?

no matter the reason, he's cunning and manipulative. he's not prone to outbursts and immediate revenge from what we've seen in the demo. he didn't become the trusted and adored leader of a huge gang by having childish outbursts and taking his frustration out on others for not trusting him or not wanting to be around him. he's like a wolf. he will play the long game if he really has to. if it becomes a game of stamina, he'll keep chasing you until you dont want to or cant run anywhere but into his arms. into his maw of fangs that he's conditioned you to believe is home so he can finally snap his jaw shut on you.

He is the safehouse, the leader. everyone follows him eventually. he just likes to make you feel like it was your choice all along and not something he was steering you towards since the very beginning.

this is literally what makes him such an attractive character. we know in the back of our minds (whether or not we realize it) that this is what he's doing. its so bad, but it so good at the same time. he has secrets and depth to his character and we want to know them.

honestly, if anything, he grabbed mc's hand when they choose to hesitate out of desperation to prove he can handle it and gain that huge leap of trust in Mc.

which caused mc a moment of panic and surprise, thus causing their curse to flare up. the same way i assume mhin's curse would flare up to protect them. this flare up was more than what leander had planned for, so he has a moment where he has to bat away the curse with whatever stupid powerful magic he's gotten ahold of.

once again, he wants you to trust him. this is obviously a bad situation where there's only two believable and sucky ways to play it off. the truth, or a prank. so he has to pick the lesser of two bad choices and play it off like he was just messing around. like it was just jokes and everything was fine all along!!! i think theres a small crack in his facade when he says something along the lines of Mc's curse being some serious stuff he's never seen before. this is a true statement buried in false ones. its easy to breeze over. he's successfully fooled you and won if he can get you to believe he was genuinely just fucking with you.

but yeah, sure Mc could have gotten pissed with him, but isnt a moment of Mc being pissed at a joke better than them not trusting him with their curse? the trust broken from a prank is MUCH easier to repair than trust broken from a curse that almost slipped through his magical protections.

Leander wants Mc alive, safe, and trusting him COMPLETELY. He (i assume unknowingly) hints at this anytime he talks about how he shouldn't have let you leave his side. he is that one "the illusion of choice" meme.

My ending statement will be this: i am OBSESSED with characters that have a true personality hidden under a different one. the little phrases that slip out and give insight into the truth are my JAM. characters that dangle a shiny charming personality like an angler fish. maybe its because of my trauma, but we dont have to talk about that.

[evelynpr]

Arlecchino Demo Music Analysis

DISCLAIMER: I am no musical expert in any way, just a massive fan of the Genshin soundtrack and learned music theory as a hobby.

One of my favorite things about Genshin is its music. It is not just that it sounds amazing, but each element, style, and motif has meaning and purpose- while being orchestrated and mixed to create a truly magnificent and unique musical experience. It is no exaggeration that this soundtrack is one of a kind.

Arlecchino's Character Demo has just been released, so I want to make a musical breakdown of it because I think it is a stellar example of how Genshin uses music to signify its themes and present its story. Before we get into that, there are ideas that I must detail for you to get the full picture, so I hope you enjoy!

Genshin uses musical elements to signify certain ideas (places, characters, elements, etc.). For example, Chinese and Japanese instrumentation signify Liyue and Fontaine respectively, but it goes beyond this.

"Travelers' Reverie" — Behind the Scenes of the Music of Sumeru | Genshin Impact

You may have noticed that a majority of Genshin's environmental music consists of real world instruments. There are even videos showcasing the orchestras and instruments of each nation (Mondstadt, Liyue, Inazuma, Sumeru, Fontaine), and using orchestral/live instruments even applies to other regions such as Enkanomiya, The Chasm, Golden Apple Archipelago, and etc. This gives each region a distinct musical identity, but all together it establishes them as places that are grounded and real.

During the final act of Fontaine's archon quest, we have been introduced to a new musical identity. This is Genshin's dubstep, and it has been used to signify otherworldly power. This genre not made by a real orchestra or real instruments, but through sampling (using existing sounds/music) and technology.

This is the identity in its most blatant form: (Shadow phase of the All Devouring Narwal boss fight)

This entire track symbolizes this. No other track within Genshin's world sounds remotely like it, symbolizing its otherworldly nature. It does not belong here- not with the live orchestras and melodic symphonies of Genshin's world.

Simply put, hardcore dubstep = otherworldly

Note: I am aware that many character demos and other tracks also use dubstep/EDM, but for the purposes of this post I think it should be left separate. Only if someone openly disputes this conclusion then I would happily oblige in presenting more evidence to this thru a reply or rb. Essentially, dubstep IS used in other tracks, but only in Silhouette of Catastrophe and Arlecchino's demo is the dubstep used as a"main idea", while also accompanied by heavy bass and "smaller intricate" sounds. This specific form of dubstep is what signifies being otherworldly.

Another musical element is children's singing!

In terms of the in-game ost, children's singing is used most prominently in Dragonspine's soundtrack in Genshin's world- and I will admit that I am not sure why that is. Perhaps Dragonspine has themes relating to innocence? Childhood? Tranquility? Whatever it is, I am not sure of. (If you have an idea, I would love to know!)

Instead, we can look at a certain character demo:

Nahida's! The beatdrop of her demo begins with children's singing. I believe this represents her innocent nature, status as a young archon, and the children of the forest that surround her- the Aranara.

Not only that, but the only other people in her demo are all children. Suffice to say, Genshin pays very close attention to using their music to reflect the themes and attributes of their characters in their demos (I could make more posts about this- breaking down more demo music...I think that'd be fun)

It's fairly straightforward, but essentially children's singing = children, innocence, and childhood

Now let's (finally) look at Arlecchino's demo

Let's first review each of the main musical elements and what they represent:

Dubstep and distortion: Otherworldly power. For Arlecchino: her curse, power, and dominance. "A spark cannot shatter all shadows until it sets all ablaze"

Children's voices and music box: Children. For Arlecchino: a lullaby; possibly protectiveness/care or tainted innocence (depending on how you interpret how she sees her children)

The music begins with a solo piano- lonely, melancholic, and mysterious. This is how she is after the death of Clervie and the rest of the children of the HotH.

Afterwards, the piano gets distorted- then replaced with harsh artificial beats and musical turmoil. This may be reflected on how she defeated her "mother" using her otherworldly power- her curse.

Following this is the anticipated beatdrop. Fascinatingly, it is not actually lead by dubstep, but by a distorted music box with a creeping melody. Not only that, but it is accompanied by a children's choir and a drum beat together.

The dubstep then ramps up- completely overtaking the track. But one it has reached its height, it is interrupted by the music box and singing children.

One can interpret this as her children holding her back from unleashing her true power. When she is most ruthless and violent, she is reminded of their playfulness and innocence.

The choir ends abruptly- but afterwards, the children's voices and music box lead the melody, while the dubstep and distortions accompany it harmoniously to create one whole piece.

This is who Arlecchino is. A Father and Harbringer defined by "caring" for her children and her otherworldly power. A love that nurtures and neglects- a power that frees and destroys. A wolf in sheep's clothing, or a sheep in wolf's clothing?

However the demo doesn't end there- the solo piano returns once again.

"Its flame is no longer needed, for you have the strength to defend yourselves"

This is going into speculative territory, but perhaps after she passes on her title as "king", she is once again lonely, left without a family. After all, she may no longer be needed or wanted at all- not after all that she has done, not after all that she has failed to do.

Conclusion

I love Genshin's music from the bottom of my heart. One reason why is the attention, detail, and beauty put into each track. Each piece is not only an experience, but also a story, an idea, a character, a place, whatever the artists wish to portray.

Arlecchino's Character Demo is one but many pieces that showcase this. In this track, we are able to discern Arlecchino's two core ideas, her relationship with her children and otherworldly power, through an incredible combination of singing, a music box, and dubstep. One can even theorize the course of her story through its visuals and music, in the end creating a beautiful and encompassing display of "Arlecchino".

[aprofessionalwithoutstandards]

It's kind of funny that the tf2 fandom is split into a bunch of different groups, like the stark difference between how more straight male dominated side of the community with r/tf2 only ever ironically post about 'gay buff men' vs how the tumblr/ao3 side of the community sincerely want to fuck these geriatric men

I would honestly split it up even further. Here's my analysis of how different types of people in the tf2 community and how they treat the physicality of the tf2 guys:

r/tf2 type who "ironically" posts about gay buff men and femboy Scout and whatever. Spent seventy real, live, American dollars the Burly Beast "as a joke". If not closeted gay or trans, this type is at least a closeted ally.

r/tf2 type who finds any sexualization of the tf2 men to be viscerally repulsive, even "as a joke." Can be split up even further into "depicts the tf2 guys all as saggy old men for weird comedy purposes" and "depicts the tf2 guys all as muscle-bound Greek gods for weird masculinity purposes". Either way, this is a guy who gets mad at the Gnarliest Garb.

Tf2blr type who is attracted to the tf2 guys, but only if they ascribe to more socially conventional standards of masculine attractiveness. Think, 2014-ish fandom years. Medic is a buff-slim 30-something-lookin ass with the personality of a businessman daddy dom archetype. He's most often straight, but sometimes bi. Other characters, like Sniper and Spy, are also inexplicably muscle-bound daddy doms obsessed with y/n. Everyone else is ignored.

Tf2blr type who is attracted to the tf2 guys, but only through an odd, outdated, "yaoi sin bucket" type of fandom culture standard of masculine attractiveness. Sniper and Spy are thin, curvy, pale, hairless 20-something sexyboys who yaoi out with each other.

Tf2blr type who is attracted to the tf2 guys when presented as saggy old men (or yknow, Tumblr's idea of "old men". No one in tf2 is "geriatric", Medic's like. fifty, maybe sixty). This is the most modern type, and is probably what you, dear reader, are most familiar with. This isn't a type immune of its problems, honestly, I find it susceptible to honestly many of the pitfalls of the previous types (an almost infantilized, misogynistic way of treating characters deemed to be "babygirl", and on the other end of the spectrum, a reactionary, imo homophobic push to Protect The Masculinity of the tf2 guys by insisting that they're BUFF and HAIRY and not fa- I mean "twinks") and its own new issues (conflating a man being a little chubby with "being old". "Demo should have a beer belly because he's Old" actually he probably isn't old and even if he's not, a beer belly is not a "sign of aging", anyone can look like that). Either way, I do appreciate its prevalence now. If it means we can fucking Finally stop drawing Medic tf2 with a six pack I'll die happy

[amadeusgame]

A Small Developer's Next Fest Retrospective

This write-up is mostly intended for people working on their first indie game who have no idea what to expect from an event like Steam Next Fest going in with a relatively small following and wishlist count. Almost all of the advice and available information I have seen is geared for games that have wishlists in the 4-5 digits, which is decidedly not me. So I am publishing my numbers for reference.

For full transparency and disclosure, Amadeus: A Riddle for Thee ~ Episode 1 ~ Waltz went in to Next Fest with 137 outstanding wishlists. This number was huge and hard-earned for my standards, even if it's a number that most studios consider "nothing." If there is one takeaway from this writeup, I hope it's that "nothing" is highly contextual, and any number you worked hard for is substantial.

As the Fest wraps up, the current outstanding count for Amadeus is....

259.

That is almost double what I started with. THAT'S HUGE!

It is incredibly important to keep perspective in mind when analyzing numbers like this. If you go in to Next Fest with 40k wishlists, getting ~120 more will feel like absolutely nothing. But if you go in with under 150, 120 is remarkable and significant. So whatever amount you have in anticipation of Next Fest, set your expectations based on that. Don't compare yourself to a super polished game made by a team of 30 people and a budget.

What follows is a lot of numbers and strategies and analysis of what I tried and how I think it went.

This write-up is going to be split into three sections.

The first is "Strikes Against Amadeus," in which I will outline all of the things I did that were not-optimal. You can decide whether to learn from that and avoid the same issues, or understand that doing them anyway means your numbers will suffer (as was my approach). This first part is very writing-heavy and has a lot of speculation and subjective commentary from a small solo dev POV.

The second section is "What Apparently Went Well," discussing the things that I think contributed to the game almost doubling its wishlists. Clearly, I did something right!

The final section is just numbers and data. Numbers on wishlists, wishlist deletions, correlations between stream viewership and wishlists/stream viewership and timeslots, etc. Feel free to skip directly to this part if you just want data.

I. Strikes Against Amadeus

Things that certainly contributed to it not doing as well as it might have.

Unpolished demo

Capsule art doesn't really show what the game looks like

Inconsistent gameplay

Streaming mistakes

1. Unpolished Demo

First things first—I ignored a very key piece of advice about getting the most out of Next Fest. Ignoring it was the correct choice for me, but I am aware it almost certainly had a negative impact on the numbers.

The advice: do not enter Next Fest until your demo is basically release-ready, as polished as it will ever be.

Next Fest is showing your game to a massive audience who are checking out hundreds of games. If you want your game to have a chance of standing out it should be the best it's going to be. And you only get one Next Fest for your game.

Why did I ignore it? Because I am a solo developer with limited time making a game that will never feel polished, and I wanted to focus on the big picture of my game's eventual release.

I am aiming to release the full game in October. If I waited until the following Next Fest, that festival would also be in October. I already know from releasing the demo that a release is MASSIVELY time-consuming and stressful. Do I want to deal with the stress of participating in a week-long festival while I am also dealing with the stress of a release? Absolutely not. I decided it was better to enter the June festival so when October comes my attention is not divided.

Given that I'd decided on the June festival, I was faced with another decision: I had already made many mechanical and writing improvements in my test build since the released demo. Should I update the demo build with those improvements before the Next Fest, so the demo feels better?

For similar reasons, I decided no.

Pushing an updated demo build would probably require a dedicated week just to test & troubleshoot all platforms in case something broke, and I am deep in the middle of development to finish the full game. Taking a week off of development to release a slightly more polished build for Next Fest felt like bad prioritizing.

I already know my game is a bit scrappy, and unlikely to do Big Numbers no matter what. More importantly, it doesn't matter HOW many wishlists I get if I don't actually finish the full game for release. So I focused on just continuing to work on my game.

If you choose to enter the Fest with an unpolished demo, as I did, you do need to accept that this means a lot of people will pass on it who may have given it a chance if it was more finished.

If you are anything like me, you might also need to prepare yourself for getting stressed out when you find yourself with 200+ people watching your unpolished game in real time, in silent judgement, causing you to become hyper-aware of every flaw and imperfection.

2. Capsule Art Doesn't Showcase Game

I knew that my game's store visual assets are not, shall we say... optimized. You can barely read the game's subtitle in it. It's also one of the only capsules in the whole Visual Novel category of the fest that doesn't clearly show what any of the characters actually look like.

I DO think that it looks unique, which is a large point in its favor, but I should probably consider making the protagonist or other discernible-at-a-glance art visible so people can see what the game actually looks like. There are so many hundreds upon hundreds of games in the Fest to scroll through, and a lot of people might scroll right past mine even if it's a game they would like because the thumbnail shows them nothing about how the game itself looks.

I'm not a graphic designer and my budget for this game is $0 + all my spare time, but it might have been pertinent to learn a little about graphic design principles in much the same way I have learned a little about animation principles to create Amadeus's walking animation, etc.

...That said, I am kind of attached to the non-optimal thumbnail just because it really does look different from all the others. Sometimes standing out isn't a good thing, but hey. This game exists because of unmarketably niche self-indulgence. I still feel that it suits it in a way.

3. Inconsistent Gameplay

This is something inherent to my game that I will absolutely not be fixing, but it is worth addressing.

Amadeus has scenes that are pure visual novel with minimal, if any, player input. These largely just feature text, character sprites and/or CGs, music/sound, and... that's really it. There are barely any choices or interactions to speak of.

It also has scenes where you control Amadeus and interact with the environment via point-and-click (or WASD) gameplay. These portions were inspired by my love of games like Zelda and Paper Mario, and for better or worse, I basically refused to compromise on the vision of actually walking around and controlling a little guy in my game.

These two gameplay experiences, in all honesty, have very little in common with each other.

Important note: I scripted every mechanic in the game myself, which means that neither of these very distinct scenarios feel polished (the visual novel scenes don't have pauses after punctuation in the shipped demo - I only figured out how to do this very recently; and the point-and-click scenes have janky pathing where Amadeus walks against walls not-infrequently). This means both gameplay types introduce potential friction/frustration because they're unpolished. This also makes the player experience very inconsistent between scenes.

The reason I draw attention to the inconsistency is that I noticed, during my livestreams throughout the week, a particular pattern in viewership.

It seemed at first that I would accumulate viewers during the point-and-click segments and they would drop off dramatically during VN segments. I attributed this to an elitist "VNs don't have GAMEPLAY" attitude and shrugged it off, until I noticed on a later stream that the exact opposite pattern was happening.

On that later stream, I accumulated viewers during long VN segments with no "gameplay," and they dropped off dramatically when it transitioned to a point-and-click gameplay segment.

That's when I realized that it's not a matter of one part of the game being Better To Market than the other; it's a matter of people generally valuing consistency. This bodes very well for people making pure visual novels, or otherwise hybrids that are more cohesive than mine is. The fact that my game feels like two different games awkwardly shoved together is, understandably, off-putting.

This is also not an aspect of my game I have any intention whatsoever to fix. The jarringly different gameplay experiences in it are a core part of its identity as a visual novel inspired by Sonic Adventure. However, it is probably worth noting that this doesn't make it very marketable.

(Maybe I should put Solea in a mech in Episode 2?)

4. Streaming Mistakes

This is probably the #1 thing to fix for next time I participate in a Next Fest, and the easiest adjustment to make now that I know better.

Before Next Fest, you are encouraged to sign up for 2 hour-long slots during which your game will receive a spotlight on the streaming schedule. This grants it a significant boost because the stream schedule is right there on the main page of Next Fest.

I've seen a lot of debates about when to schedule these and I do not have enough data points to draw any strong conclusions other than "definitely take advantage of this and schedule two, on two separate days." I've published my own numbers in the data section.

If you take no other advice from this write-up, take the following:

Test streaming to Steam before the Fest.

Publish your scheduled stream events before the Fest, so they appear on the schedule in advance.

Start streaming at least an hour before your spotlight time begins.

Continue streaming until you are back down to what an average, no-spotlight stream viewership for your game looks like.

My biggest "mistake" was really that I had no idea what average, no-spotlight stream viewership looked like because I scheduled my first stream at the start of the fest. I did start about an hour before the spotlight, and was steadily climbing in the double digits of viewers. I assumed this was with no boost (as my spotlight hour hadn't started). During the spotlight I averaged around 200 viewers, which felt insane. After the spotlight, I kept going for another half hour and it went back down to a little over 100, and since I was kind of exhausted and stressed I cut stream.

The next time I did a stream with no spotlight.... I averaged, um, maybe 8 viewers.

This was a very important lesson.

I still tried to do streams just about daily, mostly at night when I had time (and since there were fewer streams total, these seemed to do very marginally better anyway; maybe averaging closer to 10 viewers); but not very long ones. I didn't want to stress myself out trying to maximize exposure when I knew my game would never be a smash hit on release anyway, especially since the story won't be finished until all 5 episodes are out.

These smaller streams were really key in helping me figure out what viewers were looking for, though. I kept a close eye on viewer count while playing to look for patterns. More on that in the "What Went Well" section.

My second spotlight stream was on Saturday, and this time I started streaming about an hour and a half before it started. The beginning was pretty average, maybe slightly above average, but right on the hour-before mark I saw a pretty sizeable boost to an average of 30ish viewers (compared to 10ish, that's significant!), and then the hour itself saw a peak of around 400 viewers and an average of around 350, which is almost twice as good as the first stream, and just totally nuts. After the spotlight hour ended, I stayed live for another 2 hours because it was still in the triple digits and I knew that I would never get those numbers again. I eventually cut stream with still over 70 viewers because I was exhausted and needed food, but boy, was that a learning experience!

If I had kept going for another hour or so on Monday's stream (not that I knew better at the time), I really think the numbers from that day could have been even stronger.

II. What Went Well

This section covers the 4 major things that I think are working in my game's favor and helping it gain some interest.

Unique aesthetic identity

Additional marketing efforts

Good tagging

Adapting Livestream Approach

1. Unique Aesthetics

It's impossible to put a number on this, but I believe the fact I am a musician and an artist well before I am a programmer means the game has an aesthetic vision that stands out. It looks and sounds very unlike almost anything else I can immediately think of, including its clear influences. And because I have coded the mechanics myself instead of using an engine built for that purpose, I have made my life harder for no reason, and also made a game that feels unique.

If you can't be marketable, be memorable! Not a lot of people proportionately are going to find or be interested in Amadeus, but I like to think some of the people who saw it were captivated by the heart I've put into it and the clear vision I have for it.

2. Additional Marketing

This will be further outlined in the numbers section below, but on most days of the Fest I did some shilling elsewhere (mostly on Twitter) to try and get the most out of it. I have no way of knowing whether this was successful, but I will note which days I did which external shilling in case it is insightful.

I sincerely apologize to all of my Twitter followers for all that spam, by the way. You only get one Next Fest...

3. Good Tagging

This was almost certainly invaluable. There are SO MANY games participating in the Fest that anyone just scrolling through upcoming games will never see mine, as it's almost at the bottom in terms of wishlists. But the whole point of the Fest is to connect gamers with games they want to see, including really specific ones.

Steam has an awesome tagging wizard to tag your game on their store to identify really specific factors that people might look for. People browsing the Fest can use tags to filter for games that sound appealing to them in particular. So even if there are thousands of games, someone looking for a very specific type of VN/point-and-click that Amadeus fits the bill for should be able to find it.

(Even before the Fest, I am certain a nonzero number of wishlists came from my game being tagged "werewolf.")

4. Adapting Livestream Approach

Related to a point above, on what didn't go so well... in my second spotlight stream, I was able to get a lot more eyes on my game from knowing full well how much the spotlight hour mattered, by starting earlier and continuing later.

I had also learned from paying close attention to viewership patterns during the smaller streams over the week that certain behaviors on stream tended to drop viewers like flies. Opening menus too much instead of just letting VN scenes play out turned out to be a big no-no! I thought they'd want to see GAMEPLAY AND INTERACTION(TM), but it turns out viewers do not want to see adjustment of text speed sliders or opening of a backlog on someone else's pace; viewers want to see the game so they can decide if it's one they want to play or not.

I learned from this, so by the time my second major spotlight hour came around, I knew that the optimal way to play for viewers was just to toggle on the auto button and watch the Sonic Adventure 2: Battle 180 emblem speedrun world record VOD on another tab until a point-and-click segment came up.

III. The Numbers

Data from streams, wishlists, demo plays, etc.

I showed the overall total wishlist numbers from "demo launch on Steam store" to "right now" at the top to show just how much Next Fest has helped, but here is another view of that: wishlist adds and removals per day, since demo launch through Next Fest:

The big peak you see on the right, from Day 1 of Next Fest, is the single biggest day ever for wishlists the game has ever had. INCLUDING LAUNCH DAY.

I saw so many people say "Next Fest isn't going to help you if you're a tiny game with 50 wishlists," but, I mean.... I'm a tiny game with ~130 wishlists, and it has helped massively.

Zooming in on the Next Fest week:

I'll transcribe the exact numbers, for both wishlist adds and deletions, because the deletion number is interesting too:

Sun Jun 09 - 3 adds, 0 deletes Mon Jun 10 - 38 adds, 1 delete - Scheduled Stream 1 Tue Jun 11 - 19 adds, 4 deletes - Unscheduled Evening Stream Wed Jun 12 - 16 adds, 0 deletes - Unscheduled Evening Stream Thur Jun 13 - 9 adds, 1 delete - Unscheduled Daytime Stream Fri Jun 14 - 10 adds, 0 deletes - Unscheduled Evening Stream Sat Jun 15 - 24 adds, 4 deletes - Scheduled Stream 2 Sun Jun 16 - 16 adds, 0 deletes - No Stream

Adjusting for Additional Marketing:

It is probably worth noting that on the following days I made a lot of annoying Twitter posts shilling my game trailer on blue check accounts asking people to post their #indiegame. I have no idea if this influenced the numbers, but here is the amount of shilling per day:

Mon Jun 10 - 1 original post advertising the stream Tue Jun 11 - 2 original posts advertising Next Fest, 11 replies to "show me your indie game in Next Fest" blue check engagement bait posts (I am sorry) Wed Jun 12 - 1 reply to "show me your indie game in Next Fest" blue check engagement bait post Thu Jun 13 - 1 reply to "show me your indie game in Next Fest" blue check engagement bait post Fri Jun 14 - 1 original post advertising the stream Saturday. Lots of unrelated posting about Sonic the Hedgehog Sat Jun 15 - no posts Sun Jun 16 - 1 original post saying "it's my birthday play my game" that got more engagement than usual (5 RTs)

Important data points:

The two biggest days for wishlist deletions - ever - were Tuesday and Saturday. Presumably Tuesday is because it is the day following the most adds ever, and people got around to playing and decided "nah." Presumably Saturday is because it was the first weekend day where people got around to trying the demo and decided "nah."

The two biggest days for wishlist adds were Monday and Saturday. These correspond exactly with the days of my 2 scheduled streams. While I have heard that generally wishlists start high and taper off as the week goes on, the Saturday stream clearly had a massive impact on wishlists. That said, although it had almost twice as many viewers, it did not have nearly as many wishlists, implying the stream was far from the only factor.

Sunday performed above average and I did not stream at all that day.

Thursday performed the lowest throughout the week, and I streamed around midday (other days I streamed at night).

My extrapolations from these data points:

Small non-promoted daily streams... may not really matter; considering how well Sunday performed on a day I didn't stream at all, it seems that the boost I got from doing those small streams could be negligible.

That said, I recommend streaming late at night and not at midday if you are a smaller game for unscheduled streams.

It is difficult to tell if Thursday's low performance was due to the lower-than-average stream attendance from streaming at a more competitive time, or if that is just expected on a Thursday. Also, with numbers this small, some fluctuations may simply be statistically insignificant.

The "worst" day of the fest was still WAY above average for the game, and 4 days of the fest did better in wishlist adds than any other day except Day 1 of demo launch.

I obviously cannot say how well this scales to games that go in with 400-1000 wishlists, or games that go in with 50-100. But hopefully this helps!

I also want to show some metrics from the streams, including the times and whether they were spotlight streams or just extra streams. BEHOLD. DATA:

Mon Jun 10 - 278 max viewers | 7,213 total viewers | 2h16m Tue Jun 11 - 19 max viewers | 454 total viewers | 1h30m Wed Jun 12 - 10 max viewers | 161 total viewers | 1h00m Thur Jun 13 - 12 max viewers | 247 total viewers | 1h58m Fri Jun 14 - 18 max viewers | 481 total viewers | 2h30m Sat Jun 15 - 428 max viewers | 10,440 total viewers | 5h11m

That comes out to the following "average viewers" (total/length):

(All times in Pacific.)

Mon: 53.0 viewers/min - 1:15PM-3:33PM - spotlight 2PM-3PM Tue: 5.04 viewers/min - 9:00PM-10:31PM Wed: 2.68 viewers/min - 9:40PM-10:41PM Thu: 2.09 viewers/min - 10:54AM-12:53PM Fri: 3.21 viewers/min - 9:14PM - 11:45PM Sat: 33.6 viewers/min* - 9:34AM - 2:46PM - spotlight 11AM-12PM * this is much lower than monday only because the stream started well before spotlight and continued for another 2-3 hours after the spotlight ended, whereas Monday the stream only lasted a little longer than the spotlight hour.

Here's how the spotlight hour affected the Saturday stream, so you can see the boost in the hour before as well as how even with the drop-off after, it's a significant boost:

The boost at that first vertical boundary is it going from ~10 viewers to about ~30 viewers on average, then it is probably obvious where the spotlight hour itself starts. Notice that even with the sharp decline after it ends, it still tapers off to well above the average before the hour.

This is why I think it's essential to stream an hour before your stream starts, and continue well after the hour ends until viewers have truly tapered off to nothing significant. You'll get way more eyes on your game than you would any other time of the Fest!

I honestly have a lot more data points, but this post is getting long enough as it is. If you have any particular questions please feel free to send them my way. My primary goal is to put numbers out there for a game with a very small following, because I want small creators to have some data points on which they can base expectations for their own experience.

I hope you find this helpful or insightful! And if you're interested in a visual novel/point-and-click hybrid about a shithead teenager werewolf getting trolled by Witches in a super metanarrative-y game about memories and trauma, you know where to find it.

Good luck out there!

[lizardsfromspace]

The Mario movie really put into relief how much online people hugely overestimate how big a share of the moviegoing audience is driven by online people. Like people think its success involves hardcore animation people saying it's "not deep like Pixar and that's okay" or part of this or that discourse and it's depressing that audiences liked it more and

its core demo is "families who take their boys in Mario & Luigi costumes". Like it didn't take off as a backlash to [online animated discourse] it took off bc it's a world-famous property, one of the few huge in both Japan and the West, one of the few equally beloved both by nostalgic adults and modern kids, and that looks well-animated and not like a cheap cash grab

not only do people who go to see a movie or watch a show or whatever and go "well that was fun" and don't think about it much exist they're the majority of people who go to see movies (I mean, research has been consistent for decades that many - even most - people go to the movie theater without knowing what movie they're going to see). I think a lot of people who are deep into intense fandom or online media analysis just...forget that?

[kyleiskoool]

ive said this before but i hate hate hate the dialouge in fantasies come true. gang its so bad. its my favourite song (to sing atleast) in the show BUT OH MY GOD!!!

having nicky sleeping is a fine concept and its pretty funnt but idk most of the dialouge just isnt that funny. i know it isnt supposed to make sense and it represents dream talk like yes i understand that. but most of the things he says are just... meh.

exception is all the actual plot forwarding shit ("i love you rod" "take off ur shirt") and "you look like david hasselhoff" those lines are absolute fire idc what anyone says.

dont get me wrong i think the lyrics are so good. fantasies come true does no wrong. the harmonies r peak and the lyrics are amazing.

buttt they did get rid of the best line in the entire song from the demo tracks. (its on my youtube somewhere) so you know that pissed me off. but also i can see why they got rid of it. because it took away from how rod actually felt in his heart or whatever. it took away from some of the seriousness from the song. so i guess i can see but like it was so funny and ughghgh.

actually i wanna make a quick analysis on why they did that. im gonna guess that in a time where gay people werent really seen, theybdidnt want to fall into the stereotype of "all gays are sexual" or something like that. and they wanted to show that queer people could genuinely fall in love with a man and it not just be about sexual favours. they didnt want rods feelings to be a joke. with having a gay man playing rod as-well, it was probs the best option. once again homophobia has taken from us...

okay and i think the ending is SOOOO LAZY. like they drop the most amazing harmonies and the most wonderful beautiful duet of the show showing how both kate and rod have found someone so important, so special to them. theyve both found someone who loves them unconditionally and theyve both so excited because nobody has loved them like this before.

then they RIP it away from rod. they pull the elemantary school narative writing conclusion of "it was all a dream so none of this really matters" i just think in a tony winning musical pulling something that an elementary school student could write is a bit of a bore and disapointing.

hell, i wouldve liked it better if it was just rod imagining it up but getting pulled out of it somehow. idk. i just think it was such a rug pull like "oh no, now hes actually heartbroken because iT wAS alL a dReAM"

i mean it does do a good job of getting rod to realise/confess hes in love with nicky but... rrrrrr... doesnt make sense.

pull the demo track though like even if rod was mishearing what he was saying or they found a way to make it non-romantic or something idk.

at what point do tou just make nicky and rod gay? like at what point do you decide that it would make more sense (jk i think nicky being straight is okay in canon but thats for another massive convoluted rant)

anyways yeah guys that was my rant about fantasies come true. make sure to like, subscribe and click that bell! i hope you enjoyed the tumblr rant. ill see you in the next one

[princeofcyberpunk]

once again im making a trailer analysis

yo you know what time it is. its time for prince to over analyze the trailer of that game that is never coming out lol

new design for the decaband or whatever it was called

(2024 Theme song trailer)

(2023 concept image trailer)

its a lot more detailed in the new trailer, looks a lot better

2. this idiot

thats it that my analysis for this part hes just an idiot and i want to shove him in a locker

though he does look weirdly lighter in this trailer? cmon man dont whitewash my boy

3. i really hope this is a reoccurring gag

4.

harvard is the only one not looking at Misae. while the rest look at her the whole time, he starts looking elsewhere. either his ass is not listening and he doesnt care or hes just autistic with it (same). also its interesting that its called "the Decapolis" now? Is it that or DecaSim? Maybe its just a mistranslated idk

5.

the lighting in this scene is absolutely gorgeous. though it is incredibly funny how intently Carl is looking at him lol hes locked in and listening (unlike harvard)

6.

this line sounds weirdly familiar? i think it might have been in the demo maybe? i know it wasnt in a different trailer. either way, this is very intriguing.

7.

panda zhang! hes so cool dawg, love the cyberpunky neon ears

8.

ok, this is really interesting! the rest of them are all plushie-like, but mikey stands out as being a robot thing. we already knew that, obviously, but now we can see he has some kind of katana? is he a robot samurai? thats cool as fuck!

9.

im sorry im just so normal about her dawg her design is absolutely adorable. bnunny moment

10.

OK I KNOW I ALREADY TALKED ABOUT THIS IN ANOTHER POST BUT IM FUCKING OBSESSED WITH THIS GOTH LOLITA FOX(?) MISAE(?) DESIGN. SHES ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE. though it is worth noting that her hair is weirdly similar to clown's?

11.

hm. maybe theres a possible hacking plotline here? we already know that someone hacked the DecaSim/Decopolis to turn them all into toys but he looks evil here? maybe the hacker can use that to take over their minds?

12.

i lost my fucking mind over this why is he doing the "boi" spongebob thing

13.

ok edgelord

14.

HER. HER. HER. im so curious. is she a villain? morally grey anti hero? part of the police force? maybe some kind of criminal? its worth noting that she has green eyes, i think. ill get to that later

15.

kabibby

16.

oh hey its later now. so. i have several theories about this:

the kid in this picture is harvard, but hes changed his appearence in recent years to look more like his mom for whatever reason

this kid is possibly his brother? then who is taking the photo, and why is he not in it?

who is taking this photo in general??

you know how i mentioned like two seconds ago that its worth noting that mystery girl has green eyes? Maybe shes related to harvard, if this is him in the photo.

edit: i just noticed the cake says police. huh. maybe this kid really is harvard's little brother or something? and they threw some kind of party for him when he got accepted into university?

and i will return in 1 year when they give us another trailer. yay

[expfcultragreen]

I think ive loosely compiled a bake your own alex kit out of the various impactful medias, fiction and nonfiction....

I wanna run thru something here tho: i think its would be funny for conventional childrens media milestones to include sleeping beauty on ice at ages 0-4, then disney classics particularly fantasia as well as don bluth movies et al from 5-9, then start xena and sailor moon but at a weekly pace, oldschool style, thats 10-12. Then youre set, watch whatever, theres more to it of course.....theres so much eyewitness and nova and attenborough to go thru of course, david the gnome, fern gully, beethoven (the dog movie).....etc etc etc. Stop the smoggies, captain planet.....the brave little toaster....maybe who framed roger rabbit once theyve got some analysis together....or before that, if you want them Very weird

It helps if the parents also are prepared to cowboy up to the ideals imparted by any of this, as opposed to scorning and belitting the child and pushing them into the arts

Like, mine actually took me to the san diego zoo to see lemurs when i was 8 and paid for field school so i could then do my masters....thats like 6k all together they never asked for a repayment on

But it was always "tomorrow youll fix it because youll be in charge when youre our age as long as you study hard and work hard now" it was never "lets go to a demo today then"

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow right? All tomorrows parties. Sometimes tomorrow never comes

[friendlifyre]

the problem about becoming as obsessed w al-haitham as i have is that when i say i think about him a normal amount (lying) people just assume i had the near-universal experience of becoming instantly obsessed when he was first showcased in the sumeru preview because he was hot or whatever, when. that couldnt be further from the truth. i could not have been more indifferent about him at the time and when the 3.0 trailer happened the only thing that had me eyes emoji was his voice. he piqued my interest in the first act as a character BUT in a very ‘i would hate this man with a burning passion if he existed irl’ way and he continued to be insufferable throughout act 3 and 4 albeit i guess then in the sense of i would like to study him under a microscope maybe. it was only when i saw tumblr user yupuffin’s analysis of his behavior in act 4 that i started perceiving all the underlying qualities and from then on it was too late he was like a nasty weed in my brain that kept growing and then just took over for good with the final act in 3.2 cemented with his release last month where both his teaser and demo made me so emotional (for different reasons) and then in his story quest he doubled down as top tier introvert + autistic rep. tl;dr he had to Claw his way into my brain where he now lives rent free and i wish it wasnt so easy for people to assume he was eagerly invited there just bc hes attractive or whatever

[excelcourseonlineau]

Best Excel Courses in Australia

Excel Courses Online: Distant learning makes it possible to Prowess Movements and knowledge of Spreadsheets from Anywhere.

With the experience of digital age that we are going through, the requirement for Microsoft Excel fluency is more appealing than before. Digital Excel education can either be a college, a job, or a self-improvement venture, and regardless of your choice, online courses provide training with deep insights and in a simplified way. Nowadays, it is rather hard to imagine any employer who will not derive any benefits from various benefits of Excel. Thus, today I will show you why you should enroll for Excel courses online and how to get the maximum out of the learning process.

The perks of Being Trained Online in Excel. Flexibility The other notable advantage of Excel courses online is the way that this provides an opportunity to learn at your own pace and in your own way. Different, online courses give learners an opportunity to learn at the pace they prefer and choose the time that is convenient for them. Whether you are a busy professional or a full-time student, you will be able to open class materials anytime and anywhere and that will prove you a great opportunity to fit learning into a busy lifestyle. Cost-effectiveness In addition to Excel courses online, also being pocket-friendly is another important factor why people choose them. Digital platforms make classes accessible to everyone since usually the courses are not only affordable but may be even provided for free and need no costly textbooks or commuting. Furthermore, the self-paced nature of online courses makes them a lot more convenient as, once you have bought the content you are able to go through the course material as many times as you need even after the course has already finished.

Variety of Courses

Online training systems offer many Excel courses or tutorials that are aimed at various levels of student proficiency and educational purposes. Whether you are simply a novice trying to grasp the basics of the software of if you are a seasoned user seeking to master the most advanced functions and even macros, whatever your skill level, there is a course for you to engage. A variety of courses are on the table starting from beginner’s stage to vigorous certification. You may select a course that suits your learning interest.

What is the Criteria for Selecting Appropriate Excel Course Offered Online.

The selection of an online Excel course relies upon the concentration upon varied factors to make the learning-procedure more effective.

Assessing Skill Level

Check yourself out with Excel before taking a course to know where you stand on this skill. Are you just starting, still new, or experienced with their particular skill level and industry knowledge? Take a course you are good at, so avoid the constant frustration.

Checking Course Content

Please study the course syllabus that compiles subjects that could possibly serve your objectives. Select topics which addressed fundamentals of the Excel capable of carrying out some functions like formulas, functions, data analysis and visualization skills.

Reading Reviews and Testimonials

During your course research, don't forget to check out reviews/testimonies from previous students to see how they felt about the programme. Ensure you look into the course quality, instructor qualifications, and students' satisfaction ratings, so to made the best choice.

Top Online Platforms for Excel Courses: Demo

Many online platforms provide a broad range of excel courses and they are able to meet every level of language learner.

Udemy

Udemy an online learning platform that, among other subjects, hosts more than 10.000 Excel lessons of the professionals. Udemy gives freedom and cheapness by its courses which guide users starting from the simple spreadsheets navigation up to the advanced data processing. Udemy has, therefore, brought variety for the students all over the world.

Coursera

Coursera partners with leading universities and other educational institutions to provide Excel courses of the world’s top quality. Through options of self-paced learning or taught instruction, the teaching learner of Coursera is equipped with a full-learning experience that allows for interaction with group tasks, quizzes, assignment reviews and hands-on projects.

LinkedIn Learning

Which is formally Lynda.com, now LinkedIn Learning is a near-measurable library of Excel training courses to assist people enrich their skills and more, get theirs career to advance. With instructional content from the basics to the expert level, LinkedIn Learning customizes suggestions using community standards and learning intentions.

An advanced Excel course you might want to consider taking online should have the following features:

A Listed Below Factors to Look for Whilst Opting for an Excel Module Online.

Interactive Lessons

Prefer classes that make use of an instructional method that is exceptional and interactive to encourage these students actively. Role playing, quizzing, and practical examples might help to reinforce the learning components and to make the information to be retained.

Hands-on Exercises

Experiential executions are crucial in bringing the abstract principles to the real-world applications. Write down what you heard. Please search for classes that offer chances to apply Excel features and formulas by using simple instructions and tasks.

Certification Options

If you are running for credit which is the evidence of your Excel literacy, you may opt for courses that grant a certificate on successful completion. Certification programs help you enhance your resume and on the spot by others like employers, clients, and project partners.

Guidelines for Achievements in Online Excel Courses

Success in your online Excel courses can depend on on how you do these, so here are a few suggestions to keep you on track.

Set Goals

Prior to starting a course, you should formulate goals being the ground for gains. If you are aiming at all the functions of your car or completing all the exercises on a certification, it can help you stay motivated and focused all the time.

Practice Regularly

A technique for grasping Excel skills is to practice it continuously. The most important thing is the use of each day or week to get hands-on experience with the objects learnt, ranging from trying out new formulas to analyzing datasets. Learning something is all about repetition. If you implement the appropriate practice, the clearer you will be able to see the outcome.

Seek Help When Needed

Don't delay seeking help when you meet problems or you need guidance along the way while you go through your learning. In many online courses, there are forums, discussion boards, or instructor mentorship that can be used so you can ask for help if you get confused or just want to understand the content better by the other students or experts in the field.

Conclusion

Excel online courses can be regarded as something short of a miracle that would serve adults in terms of being both affordable and time-saving as long as they are not forced to change the location where they are studying. Through making up mind on what course to look for, getting exposed to the interactive components, and using Excel you can surely make your skills better and take advantage of new opportunities in your personal and professional lives.

FAQs

Can sponsored intermittent online courses be associated with the beginners?

Absolutely, there are a lot of beginner-friendly platforms that provide Excel with step-by-step shoing and hands-low exercise.

Do I have the ability to learn Excel online without cost?

Some resources, provide free Excel training. On the other hand, others may charge a minimal fee for access to the most comprehensive content and certification modules.

How much time is taken to do online the course of Excel?

The length for an online Excel course depend on how hard course is & you own speed of learning it. Some would be shorter, say 1-2 hours long and others could take several days or weeks to complete.

Do sometimes companies accept Excel online certifications among the employees?

Many employers honor and even incorporate information about the online Excel certifications from the reputable providers in their platforms in the resume. Consequently, having these certificates enhance the credibility of the job seekers in the job market.

In what way can one learn through exercises after obtaining the Excel knowledge through online sources?

Hands-on experience is essential for the learning of Excel. Practice the application by developing actual real-world projects, solving the relevant problems and using Excel in various tool operations.

[davidfegan]

VisionOS App Development Company

VisionOS App Development Services by Agicent

We’ve started learning and honing our skills on VisionOS from the day it was launched in 2023 and now when the device is actually here, we are getting overwhelming requirements for our VisionOS App development services and we offer a complete spectrum of services which are useful for all sizes of projects and startups.

VisionOS App Discovery Session & Consulting Service

In this step, we understand your product vision and the market you want to cater. We gather all your requirements (feature list, use-case, goal, monetization methods and goals, integrations, future vision etc) and consult you on the best features for the MVP or for full product, and also do a competitor analysis to let you know the gaps in the market and propose you the best possible solution. We also lay out a scope of the work and provide you either a fixed price estimation for the VisionOS App development or offer you a dev team on month-on-month basis with these pricing plans.

You can book a Free VisionOS App Discovery Session from here.

VisionOS Apps Design, Wireframes, Prototyping Service

In this step, we convert your feature list into visual design and wireframes. This is the most crucial step among all others as whatever we are going to launch in the market is visualized and finalized here. We closely coordinate with you at this stage, figure out what kind of target market we have and what type of design would they like, and then create the design and simulate that like a clickable prototype or a demo video like this example.

We send these design visualizations for your feedback and approval and do as many iterations as you want and once approved we proceed towards the actual development.

Tech Architecture and Coding Phase: Agile Sprints

Once design is approved, we create the tech architecture to achieve what we have visualized in terms of the design and functionality. And the next step is coding the VisionOS App using SwiftUI, ARKit, Unity, Xcode, ComposerPro tech stacks as well as backend technologies like Node.js, MongoDB or likes.

We create the tech architecture keeping a larger future vision in mind so the MVP VisionOS App we develop today assuming for a small amount of users, should be scaled easily and quickly to cater millions of the users and more advanced features and also leave a lot of room for future integrations with different technologies. Usually our CTO and Engineering leads do the architecture job.

The whole project is broken down into small feature bunches and then they Weekly Agile Sprints are schedule to achieve those features week by week. At every weekend a progressive Adhoc VisionOS App build is released for testers and clients for the UAT. Any bugs or enhancements are noted down and added with the next week’s dev sprint and the build is shipped to either live or test server depending upon your priorities.

Adhoc Distribution and Final go-live

During the development phase, the visionOS App is distributed across a private network (of clients, early users/ testers, dev teams) as an Adhoc build that we create using Apple’s guidelines and protocols on its iTunes connect ecosystem integrated with the Xcode and other tech stacks associated with the VisionOS App Development.

The final App store submission is done when the Dev cycle is complete and you give us a go ahead to go live. We do the whole job for you.

The whole solution is also ported onto the live cloud server and infrastructure using our DevOps experts.

VisionOS App Maintenance, Enhancements, Upkeep

Once the first version goes live, you can either switch to the maintenance phase for the upkeep of the VisionOS App or can go about launched further features for enhancements. Our Dev and maintenance plans starts from as low as $ 2900 mo and sometimes even lesser if you only need under 100 hours of maintenance a month.

Like advanced mobile apps, VisionOS Apps also utilizes various third party APIs from user authentication to several other features like integration with maps, payment gateways, with other apps and backend and all such APIs launch new updates very frequently and hence the VisionOS app will have to be updated accordingly. Also the VisionOS itself is in its nascent stage right now and we can expect atleast 10 major or minor OS upgrades this year and for which a regular support & maintenance service will be required.

By offer Development, Design, Marketing, Maintenance, Porting services we make ourselves as you one stop VisionOS App Development Company.

VisionPro App Porting Services

Here we work to make your existing web app or mobile app to be absolutely compatible and oriented towards the new VisionPro Devices and VisionOS Operating system. You can leverage your existing product and userbase and scale them for VisionOS VisionPro device.

We’ll consult you in identifying which features can be ported onto VisionOS as is and which ones need to be made cmpatible and adaptable to the visionOS unique spatial features.

In most of the existing mobile apps, voice gesture commands and eye commands will be added as a go-to features when it comes to porting on to the visionOS and then more options can be added as the app grows.

VisionPro App Marketing Services

We render our inhouse marketing and sales expertise, tools and workflows for our clients and craft highly efficient and performance-oriented performance marketing campaigns to promote your VisionPro App.

This can include (but not limited to) – Paid ad campaigns to install VisionOS Apps across big outlets like Google, Meta/ FB/ Insta, Linkedin; organic SEO and organic campaigns, Organic and paid PR campaigns, Video content marketing, influencer marketing, Opinion leadership influenced market, Cross App integration promotion and so on.

You tell us your monthly App marketing budget and goal and we’ll craft and run and optimize the best campaign inside that.

Benefits of creating VisionOS Apps for Startups and Business

Clear Competitive Edge: The early mover advantage

It’s a very new device and have only started being sold in some parts of the US only. Anyone moving first for this device is definitely going to get a lot of advantage in terms of targeting the niche and comparatively upscale user-base.

Even the existing Apps that will scale for VisionPro Device exploiting its AR/ VR spatial capabilities are going to offer enhanced experience to its existing user base and gain more customer loyalty and branding.

A new world of opportunity to Innovative

For the same reasons as stated above, its spatial computing capabilities have opened a whole new world of amazing innovation opportunities. We’ve listed below some of the possible innovative use cases for various industries on this page itself, and we believe that there will be millions of amazing use cases out there that can solve the current world problems in much better ways than what is being done by the current smartphone device and apps.

Integrating the VisionOS apps with different devices will offer great possibility to further innovate as well where several interconnected devices sharing and exchanging data will proide more seamless convenient life to the user especially for healthcare, home automation, and business usage.

Unique and Immersive Experience

Vision Pro’s unique spatial computing, tracking and depth perception allow for highly realistic and interactive experiences in augmented reality (AR) and Virtual reality. Users can experience and manipulate virtual objects in a natural human way and that will create a sense of real presence and break down the barrier between the physical and virtual digital world.

Any app utilizing these spatial immersive capabilities are going to be used more and more by the users compared to regular mobile or web apps and therefore launching an app on VisionOS gives you a more loyal and consistently engaged user-base.

Better interactive Storytelling

You can tell your story in more interactive and appealing way when it looks and feel closer to the reality and that is exactly what Visionpro device offers to its users. Businesses as well as creators can create and tell immersive mixed reality stories that can actually engage users for a longer span than just scrolling back in few seconds.

A historical content creator can create virtual historical battles that you can see happening in front of your eyes, or or viewing ancient battles unfold right before your eyes. Or a virtual story showcasing you the world of dinosaurs as a moving and sounding reality.

Same goes for product visualization as we’ve discussed the same concept in details below in Ecommerce Use-case. You can showcase and appeal your product with a realistic experience, creation of immersive demos and free trials can help marketers win the consumer’s confidence to a higher degree than what you are able to do with the old technologies.

Story is everything, and VisionOS allows you to tell your story in the best way possible so far in the history of the mankind.

VisionOS App development is not complex

Creating mixed reality Apps have always been a complex and typical exercise compared to the conventional software development, especially because of the demand of creating interactive virtual reality UI and UX. However, VisionOS has already done majority of the heavy lifting and if developers are familiar with Apple iOS development and Arkit (which our developers are) then creating VisionOS Apps using the same skill sets becomes really easy.

Its juts a transition of the device and the change of UI, while rest of the technologies will be as same as iOS developers have been using for the last few years.

Process of Creating VisonPro VisionOS Apps and the required Tools

Understanding the Vision Pro Ecosystem and its features

At the heart of the Vision Pro experience is the blend of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), powered by Apple’s cutting-edge M2 chip and a specialized R1 chip. These components work in harmony to deliver unparalleled performance and immersive experiences, tracking your movements and rendering captivating virtual environments.

Understand its most important and unique features, such as:

Eye, Hands, and Voice based gesture commands:So whichever VisionPro app idea that you are contemplating to create should completely exploit these cool features.

Virtual Avatars and 3D Facetime: Virtual avatar in VisionPro universe are going to more realistic and so as the video calls. We also think of a scenario where an AI avatar of yours takes a meeting on your behalf while you physically take another meeting and the possibilities are endless.

Immersive-ness Control:VisionPro users can increase or decrease the level of immersiveness as per their choice, so your App should be compliant to the same.

Transparent Display: As VisionPro is a mixed reality spatial device, the display is actually transparent as it goes hand in hand with the reality. So your UI/UX design must adhere to this fact and in most of the cases a minimal design will turn out to be the best design because everything else will be taken care of by the real world.

02. Getting Started with visionOS App Development

The gateway to creating apps for Vision Pro is visionOS, Apple’s bespoke operating system tailored for spatial computing. This environment is your canvas, allowing you to merge digital creations with the physical world seamlessly. To set sail on this development journey, you’ll need a Mac running macOS Monterey or newer, the latest version of Xcode, and the Vision Pro developer kit. At Agicent’s VisionOS App Development Company, we’ve all the required infrastructure, team, testing devices and some more. You just have to tell us about your project, and we take care of the rest.

03. Ideation of VisionPro VisionOS App

An entrepreneur or startup or a brand should explore all the possibilities a spatial VisionOS App can achieve on this device. Do a market analysis, competitive analysis, go back to the history where web apps exploited mobile capabilities and a new market was emerged, so similarly think of what additional capabilities mobile apps can offer if they are ported onto visionPro devices.

We think of scenarios in the industries like healthcare where preventive healthcare and telemedicine apps can be created for VisionOS with spatial capabilities, or in an industry where there are plenty of machines and a VisionPro Maintenance App can tell the supervisor about health, maintenance schedule, warranty of the machines just by looking at them, or think of a real estate app where you just wear your visionpro device and see which of the properties in front of you are up for sale or rent and so on.

It is always beneficial to have a industry or subject matter expert on board while ideating for an app for that particular industry, however there are some low hanging fruits that anyone can achieve simply by scaling the existing apps with the spatial mixed reality features for the visionpro device.

We as a VisionOS App Development Company provide you consulting service even before development in figuring out the right features, UI/ UX and target userbase for your VisionOS App idea.

Source: https://visionosappdevelopmentcompany.com/

[forexer]

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[tangsakura]

Just Dinner Tonight?: What You Missed On That Hisoka X Machi Scene [A Dialogue Analysis]

+ mini lessons on Japanese language. 

Warnings: if you haven’t read chapter 55 of Hunter x Hunter or watched episode 32 of the anime, then it’s gonna be spoiler so don’t go any further if that's the case; bad grammar; unedited; typos.

Remember reading the last three panels of this page, or seeing those in the anime? That time when Hisoka asked Machi for dinner.  

In the official manga and anime translations, they translated these lines as Hisoka asking Machi dinner for the night, but that's not exactly the case. Plus, there’s more implications to his words that had been lost in translation and also difficult to express in English.

In the official raws, he said the following lines, which were also said in the anime:

「ところでどうだい? 今夜♥ 一緒に食事でも........」

Pronounced as: Tokoro de doo dai? Konya issho ni shookuji demo.....

So the first part (excluding 今夜♥) is translated like this, literally:

"Anyways, how about it? (or 'how about this?')"

One thing that I found fascinating here is that his question ended with dai (だい). This ending is usually used in male speech and/or if the question they're asking is directed towards someone they're close with like friends and family (or some sort, whichever makes them be close or comfortable enough with each other) or anyone younger like children. Or when asking a question to someone informally and you’re, implicitly demanding or asking for an answer to the question; may sound rude especially if you’re not close with them (unless you’re intentionally rude or indicating you’re not close to them). 

I don’t think the purpose of this question is the latter, but the former. For him to use this is like, well for me, breaking a bit of his mask. Showing us how close they are, or at least how much he trusts her. Maybe it's the part of him that wants to deepen their relationship that's peeking through the cracks. Whatever it is, their relationship is clearly not just a shallow, typical give-and-take one. At least, in my opinion, to Hisoka's POV.

Also, I find it funny that in this short scene, he's talking in a more masculine way. I've said before in my Hisoka meta analysis that he speaks in masculine language, but it’s not so masculine and it’s much closer to neutral. But when he transitions the subject from the Phantom Troupe stuff to this invitation, he started off strong, in a much more masculine manner than the usual. To think that he’d be more manly in asking her. Because he can just end the sentence with どう and it will still retain the same translation. 

Bonus points for the heart. He’s really presenting himself as excited or thrilled for his proposition to her for that night. 

(You can take a break here. Resume your reading when you’re ready.)

The words on the second part, just before Machi slammed the door on him, literally translates to:

今夜♥ - tonight ♥  

一緒に - together

食事でも - a meal or something

You would’ve heard this by now that Japanese verbs normally goes at the end. Sometimes they are omitted, but those who know Japanese can infer what the ending is based on context.

So if Machi didn’t shut the door on him, the sentence might’ve ended like this.

今夜♥ 一緒に食事でも【しようか? ♥】

今夜♥ 一緒に食事でも【するか? ♥】

It can also end with the same verbs, but without the か and the question mark. The verb can also be conjugated differently, depending on how Hisoka wanted to present himself to her, his mood, or whatever the variables he’s considering that are present in that scene. (obviously the heart will be at the end cuz he ‘likes’ her)

So the possible full literal translation could be:

“Tonight ♥ [Let’s have] a meal together or something.”

“Tonight ♥ [Shall we have] a meal together or something.”

“Tonight ♥ [We should have] a meal together or something.”

And so on and so forth, depending on the verb conjugation.

But the main message is that he’s inviting her “to have dinner or something tonight”. Because of the formatting the translations team has to take into account and also the size of the speech bubbles in the panels, the proofreader and the quality checkers/control people had to make sure to rephrase the translation until they can perfectly fit it inside the bubble as they desired. 

So, we get: “How about dinner......?” in a nice format.

They’re not completely wrong. Hisoka did ask Machi to have a meal with him that night, but there’s also implications in that sentence that are lost in translation.

Allow me to explain that “or something” in my full literal translations previously.

So if Hisoka is just asking Machi to have a meal with him tonight, it would look like this instead:

「今夜♥ 一緒に食事を........」(Konya issho ni shookuji o......)

But we have でも beside 食事. でも means ‘but’ in English, but it can also be used as a particle to indicate open options.

So let’s say, you want to ask a friend to go out for a drink at Starbucks, you can say:

「スタバにコーヒーでも飲みに行こうか?」ー Should (or ‘Shall’) we go to Starbucks to drink coffee (or something else).

If you put を instead of でも, you’re only limiting yourselves to having coffee when you go to Starbucks for a drink. By using でも, you are not limiting yourselves to just coffee. If you change your mind or find something better, you can get other drinks like a frappuccino, iced tea, or whatever it is.

So Hisoka is inviting Machi to dinner, but he’s also open to doing other options should any of them find anything better than having a meal or change their mind about eating dinner for the night. Well, if they’re just gonna be in Hisoka’s room the whole night, then there’s just a couple options available to them if they don’t wanna eat....... and we should know what those are by now. And this is where the famous unofficial translation of the scene came from. You know, the translation when Hisoka asked Machi to spend the night with him directly.

What made me laugh with this 「今夜♥ 一緒に食事でも........」is that it’s so indirect. Like we know Hisoka is straightforward. He literally and directly would state his intentions, especially to those he wanted to fight. Unless it would get in his way or something, then he will lie or come up with a white lie. He’s even not scared of doing the taboo, like the infamous r*pe sign he did when he asked Illumi if he could go after Killua to ‘kill’ him. 

But this time he was asking it like normal guy to someone he’s in some sort of relationship with.......... Also, he looks like a shy guy asking this type of question, but this might just be me. Like where’s the bold Hisoka I know? Whomst. But then again, that might just be censorship done since it’s a shounen series......

Also this man staring at the door for moments after Machi slammed the door on him...... Poor boy.

Anyways, that’s the end of this analysis post. Let me know what you think of it. I would love to hear your opinions. As usual, I will answer comments or stuff when I am in the mood.

Until next time.

[runninguplenorahills]

>>>brainstorming<<<

This is just me thinking thoughts and writing them down. Essentially I’m just sharing my thoughts on the episode title and what it could reference so keep in mind that these are just some vague ideas and not some mastermind-analysis theories hahahaha. These probably don’t make much sense but they’re not supposed to.

First off, two things I immediately thought of:

Demo-dogs kinda crawl so maybe “the crawl” is referencing like a huge invasion of demo-dogs that crawl out of the rifts into Hawkins which sets the start of the apocalypse.

Skin crawling is a thing so maybe “the crawl” has something to do with Will and how he reacts to the upside down bleeding into Hawkins. Maybe a more severe symptom they discover?

I’ve seen all these posts about what a “dungeon crawler” is and I tried to find a little more on that and I found this:

I feel like maybe “the crawl” references the whole group investigating different gates? Going from gate to gate to gate?

Another thing I thought of is how they 100% already filmed stuff for the first episode! And because I’m personally pretty sure that Will will be put in some kind of Vecna trance, maybe “the crawl” references El crawling into the “wizard’s dungeon” -> Will is the wizard, the dungeon is his mind! And El goes from memory to memory to memory? Maybe? Trying to get him out of the trance? Or trying to get to Vecna? Or she’s going from mind to mind to mind for who knows what reason??

Didn’t the duffers say that they were gonna take things back to Hawkins lab? And the lab is kinda like a prison which is basically a modern dungeon. So maybe “the crawl” is a plan they make to break into Hawkins lab? To get to the mother gate? For whatever reason?

[vivern-of-nosgoth]

Big Interview with Martin Persner from nordic music magazine GAFFA

by Andreas Trella, 2022 June 9

(machine translation from swedish)

From the Magna Carta Cartel, further into the Ghost circus and back again. Martin Persner can tell you about a dizzying rock carousel that has now resulted in the old music project having a new album - 13 years later.

Somewhere in the middle of a hopeful 2000s, a bunch of good friends sat with their guitars in their arms on a sofa in the airport city of Linköping. The notes they lazed together and recorded as demos were soon given the collective name Magna Carta Cartel. These demos were then recorded in the studio and first became an EP, and in 2009 the full-length album Goodmorning Restrained.

So had the Magna Carta Cartel - or MCC - gone from sofa hanging to a promising band that with its unique atmospheric music seemed to have endless future possibilities. But in the same sofa, it was one of the friends who had managed to stumble across completely different tones.

Just under a year after Goodmorning Restrained, the Magna Carta Cartel suddenly becomes completely silent. This at the same time as a very mysterious band that was said to originate from the same city is starting to spread through Myspace. A band with completely masked members, except for the band's singer who seemed to be a very old gentleman wearing a satanic papal costume and with a corpse-painted face. The group went by the name Ghost.

The time in Ghost lives on in me very much. Whether I like it or not, my time as Omega is probably the most remarkable thing on my resume. And whether I like it or not, it's still how people refer to me.

The rumor about the exciting new rock band Ghost spread like wildfire all over the world. With their bubbly swinging pop rock songs, mixed with extremely dark and satanic lyrics, the band quickly became a cultural phenomenon. Maybe mainly because of the mystique surrounding the band. Since Ghost did not seem to provide any information about himself, speculation began to spread wildly about which old rock foxes were actually hiding behind the demonic masks. And who the older frontman could be.

WILLY WONKAS GOLD TICKET

Ghost would soon go from playing in cramped hometown clubs to filling arenas, hosting Grammys and being hailed by several legends in the industry such as Metallica's James Hetfield and Foo Fighters Dave Grohl. Linköping's scary little Ghost had suddenly started to become one of the world's biggest rock bands. And behind one of the increasingly coveted masks stood Martin Persner.

It may not have been a direct policy, but we never celebrated anything with Ghost. Whatever we had achieved, we never stopped feeling "now we have succeeded" or "now we have reached our goal". Instead, it was always an analysis of how we could do things even better based on what we had achieved.

Because we were actually not old rock foxes at all. Of course we had struggled with the music and were in our 30s when Ghost became a band. But this was the first time we got to taste the fruit of what we always dreamed of. So when things started to happen, we took it as seriously as possible. We had received Willy Wonka's gold ticket, and it was to be used in full.

Persner and his friends had received the key to the fine salons and personally felt that the most important thing was not to take anything for granted. It was a matter of managing the chance he and his comrades had been given in the best possible way.

That Ghost happened at all was a pure stroke of luck. But the work after that is an enormous job with so many endless thoughts behind it that it is hardly possible to describe.

Ghost, which was initially completely silent in terms of press, soon began to do more and more interviews. However, it was never the frontman Papa Emeritus who answered any questions. Instead, it was usually the lead guitarist "Alpha".

However, fans soon gave this member the nickname "Special Ghoul" instead. For people had managed to figure out that it was actually not the band's lead guitarist behind this mask during interviews. In fact, it was Papa in his own high person. Ghost's founder Tobias Forge, who was the friend who sat on the same couch as Persner and during an MCC meeting, had stumbled upon what would be the first Ghost song.

But in addition to Forge - or "Special Ghoul" - the band's other guitarist "Omega" also started to sue. Which was Martin Persner's alter ego.

There is something absolutely fantastic about being masked in a group. I do not want to say that I stepped into any role with the mask on. But they definitely stepped into a "fashion". And then watching and playing music with their friends in the same equipment gives an indescribable feeling of cohesion. It was absolutely wonderful.

THE BEAUTIFUL HANDS OF THE VAMPIRE

In several statements from Omega in these interviews, the masked Persner mentions that part of the masking is for Ghost's music and the concept itself to take precedence over who the people behind the masks actually are. But despite this, it was precisely Omega that was chosen as a clear favorite among the seemingly identical nameless guests. Fans literally fell completely in love with Omega and on forums and in the comments section, declarations of love for the masked musician were poured out.

I quickly began to understand that people were not really smart in their heads, haha. It was really not that hard to tell the difference between what people thought or wanted me to be, against who I was actually under the mask. It was absolutely super fun when people came forward and were happy and wanted to be kind, hugged and in some cases even kissed and all that. But you should not take that too personally. Especially not when these admirers literally do not have a fucking idea of who you really are.

Did it become difficult for people to paint you up to something other than what you felt you actually were?

No not directly maybe. But it was interesting to hear who you were for different people. People could come up and tell me how specifically good I was at playing guitar, while I just thought: "Damn how embarrassing, my neighbor who barely plays in any band is 100 times better than me on guitar".

Because Omega was disguised from head to toe, these fans in love had to zoom in on the only thing that was exposed. In addition to the penetrating charm that people saw in interviews and Persner's expressive stage language, you could actually see his eyes and hands through the disguise. Which then led to an infinite number of statements about Omega's magically deep eyes and fantastically beautiful and lust-filled hands.

It was absurd, haha. Because no I do not have the most beautiful hands in the world. But it was exciting that these people managed to paint the romanticized picture of my nervousness-bitten nails and my dirty fucking garden hands. And I'm not the smartest or most charming in the world either. Many times people laughed at how big-eyed people could be. Sometimes people also wondered if people only did one thing. Or if it was this madness idolism was about.

But it must still have given you proper self-confidence?

Yeah absolutely. But my self-esteem I have always had the same worries with. No matter what scene you have been allowed to stand on, or how your hands, eyes or personality have been seduced. But self-confidence naturally increases when you get to see what you are worth in the room you are then in, so to speak. And it is almost impossible not to stand on the pedestals that people build under one's feet. It's probably inevitable. But I always had the attitude to take all this with a pinch of salt. To never ever let this praise rise to my head. Because it's not healthy to get drunk on that.

Doesn't that kind of get an extremely high level of attention for your art, and does it not become extremely addictive and difficult to control?

Yes. You get hooked on that. And that feeling never disappears after you have experienced it. That thirst always remains. You eventually become a vampire. And right now I have not "eaten" for a very long time, if you understand what I mean. But at the same time, you do not listen to too much praise either. Because you never get to feel that you are in the goal as well.

FROM GHOST TO CARTEL

During a Ghost tour in 2016, fans noticed that Omega suddenly started playing on a Gibson SG without the Omega logo, instead of the characteristic Gibson RD that has become a hallmark of the band. It was also soon noticed that the only thing left of the original Omega on stage was his mask and costume. Martin Persner had been asked by Forge to leave Ghost after about two years of unrest and an unstable mood that had slowly eroded their previously strong friendship.

Did it feel weird to see Ghost from the outside?

Initially yes. But not nowadays. Or maybe a little sometimes. It's more that you observe and think: “Well, did he do this now then? It was nice, but he should not have done this instead, maybe? ”. Sometimes you feel that you might want to poke your touch a little like before. But sometimes you think: "Damn how nice he did this". Tobias has fantastic songwriters with him nowadays. Which, of course, makes me a little surprised, as I know he can write at least as good songs on his own. I think and know that he does such immensely good stuff all by himself. Although it never hurts to have experts who can come up with good advice per se.

Could you imagine being masked on stage with a Papa Emeritus by your side again at some point in the future?

Yes, I probably would. Or hmm… yes. I choose not to think about it so much. But yes it … I do not know. Maybe. Playing music disguised is fun, and playing Ghost songs is great fun. So yes, but at the same time I do not know.

Ghost continues to roll with Forge alone as the original member and manages to take the band to larger arenas and more sold and streamed Ghost albums. This while Persner finally gets the chance to revive his Magna Carta Cartel which has been cryogenically asleep on the Linköping sofa since 2009.

What was it like to revive MCC again after the whole Ghost carousel?

It was a challenge. Above all, to define and concretize something that has previously been quite indefinable. MCC was once something completely unpretentious that is now something completely different. And we are very ambitious. And also pretentious. To say otherwise would be a hoax. We like what we do, but of course we want others to do the same. We definitely do not make music solely for our own sake, but definitely have an ambition to reach out to people other than ourselves. But yes it has been difficult to jump into the Magna Carta Cartel again after the Ghost turn. But behind my mask, I have learned an enormous amount that has been invaluable in being able to go in and revive MCC again.

So Ghost felt more concrete from the start than MCC did?

Absolutely. Both the current work plan and to build up a perhaps more concrete framework for what this MCC entity actually is. I still find it quite difficult to identify exactly what the Magna Carta Cartel really is. But it is something you have to work on. Because there is considerably much more going on behind the scenes for MCC than you might think from the outside.

HAVING TO BEAR YOUR OWN FACE AGAIN

In March 2017, Persner takes off his mask and announces publicly on Youtube for the whole world that he is no longer part of Ghost and that Magna Carta Cartel is back with Persner on vocals and guitar, Pär Glendor on bass, brother Arvid Persner on drums and Niels Nielsen as a live member on guitar. A little later that year, MCC finally releases new music again in the form of the EP The Demon King which is followed by a shorter European tour.

What was it like to wear your own face on stage again?

I did not like that. I would really like to continue playing masquerade, but it does not feel really relevant right now. For example, I personally have never liked to be photographed and tense in front of cameras. But when you were masked, it was not a big problem. So now all of a sudden having to see pictures and movies when I myself am on stage in my own body actually feels a bit perverse.

You have no plans to redirect MCC to a masked band then?

Haha, no damn how sad it would feel. MCC is maskless, and it is the music that is in absolute focus. Who we are in the band should play a much smaller role. But I'm just a little above to perform without a mask so far. But it will probably be resolved soon.

Since 2017, Persner has more or less spent all his waking time on the Magna Carta Cartel. And for tactical reasons, the album The Dying Option has both been fermented and then baked in the oven for an extra long time in order to be as worthy a fresh start to a bygone era as possible.

I'm very happy with the record. However, there has been some anxiety that those who already know who we are with Goodmorning Restrained as a reference template will probably wonder what the hell we did at The Dying Option. But that is what we also find interesting. We want to do something that people to some extent may not fully anticipate.

When does MCC go on a The Dying Option tour then?

I can not answer that right now. But we will definitely go out and play, that much I can say. MCC is not a studio project. So we both want and will go out and play. But I'm not yet going to say when, where or how.

The Dying Option - Magna Carta Cartel's first album in 13 years - will be released on Spotify, CD, cassette and digital download on June 10th. The vinyl version of the album is scheduled for release in November.

Source