#a playable slice. yknow.

[bobzora]

hate drawing backgrounds & not good at them anyway -> oh i'll just 3d model the backgrounds for my game -> wait. i still have to design the locations to model them. mfw

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Today's random maddiman thought!

I am ABSOLUTELY DETERMINED to write my oc comics for the LP as a wild alternate universe where maddiman is actually befriendable and playable and my oc hugs him and yes

And i was just thinking about maybe a really emotional moment where everything just gets a bit too much for him after something reminds him of how much he misses his family, and Mallory and the rest of the yokai team just sit with him for a little while and comfort him while he lets out all the tears he's had locked up inside for decades. I was thinking possibly it could happen during the Hoaxy Coaxy fight in yw3, cos i thought itd be cool if i showed all my yokai's dreams as well as the protagonist. And of course for poor madds itd be an illusion of himself being alive again and his family coming back and he gets to tell them how sorry he is. So i think thatd be really emotional to end this mostly goofy funny battle with a melancholy note like that, and everyone helping poor sad dad remember that he has people who still love him in the real world and not to give up hope.

Srsly there would be SO MANY cool plot opportunities from maddiman joining your team full time!! And also he could be friends with both the yw3 protagonists! Cos in this au my protagonist oc would have befriended him around the postgame of yw2. so madds could play a dual role in both stories of yw3 by being summoned overseas to help Mallory sometimes in her story and meeting and befriending Hailey back in his slice of life adventures in his lab. And it could be a lil sad with Mallory not being able to see him as often after they'd bonded so much in the last game, cos she feels like dragging him along to america would be selfish when he has..yknow..reasons to be tied to that hospital and want to stay there. But her and the other yokai still send him postcards and pictures and keep in touch over the internet, and sometimes he's summoned for particularly tough fights or just when he wants to come visit. (And also itd make it easier to get him to america for the plot with his son later) And his friendshipw ith Hailey could also seem even more heartwarming cos she came into his life when he was feeling lonely from losing his last human friend, and now here's this new kid who helps him make even more progress on getting his life together, in different ways. Like double super duo friendship team up to help this damn daddo get a happy ending!! And wouldnt it be so sweet if Mallory came back to visit and got to meet Madds's new baby turtles and see how happy he is?

God i just have so many FEELINGS

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Okay it seems we don’t actually have a full res pic of all the pokedex and that pic actually was compressed to the point of unviewability even on desktop tumblr?? And clicking through the link it seems it’s really hard to run this supposed rom file of the beta, and there’s debates about its authenticity cos the file claims it’s the ‘spaceworld demo’ yet we have limited pics of that demo and the titlescreen was different. So it seems weird that this would be labelled as that very specific demo, unless it’s a.. beta of a demo, i guess? That could be possible cos people are saying it literally just crashes when the world map runs out, instead of having your usual ‘thanks for playing this is where the demo stops’ message. So AAAA I wish I was smart enough to understand all this technical talk, and to do the hex editing stuff to actually play the rom myself! But for now I guess I’ll just wait with baited breath and hope there’s more updates as people pick it aprt.

it would REALLY suck if it turned out to be a fake rom hack or something, tho. i hope that’s false and the confusion is just cos it was a fragmented rom or a demo for a different event than people think it is, or something. But tbh it would be a prime time to release a fake demo hack, since we recently had the first new slice of beta info on the early generations that we’ve had in decades. it would be a good time to ride the hype on the speculation about ‘gorochu’. BUT then it doesn’t seem like a rom hack because wouldn’t it actually be a straight up rom, then? like actually playable without a bunch of editing and datamining and running through five emulators at once? i would think it would be harder to fake a non functioning rom that’s still rescue-able, yknow? and why would they even do that, nobody would even be expecting a non-functioning rom so it wouldn’t add more authenticity. We haven’t ever got ahold of any beta roms for the gameboy games so we don’t have any preconceptions about what file type nintendo stored them as. But then on the other hand it seems really unlikely that we’d suddenly get a burst of new info on stuff that was never even remotely mentioned before by nintendo. But then again nintendo itself just did that with gorochu! And TCRF is a really credible source, and they actually dug up that screenshot of beta girafarig SO MANY YEARS after we first heard nintendo talk about the concept, and it matched perfectly with what we were expecting. And it just dropped out of NOWHERE overnight and left zero signs of where the user managed to find it, yet was still proven to be legit...

Also like seriously half of the gold and silver beta art looks completely non-legit, its all in a wildly different art style! I don’t know if anyone’s ever found out why that is? Like does it just mean they had multiple artists at the time and were still experimenting before they settled on sugimori as the main one? But gen 1 had already had a full set of sugimori art by then. but then again later interviews had nintendo revealing that ‘half of gen 2′ were actually designed in the process of making red and green, and they just got cut out because of cartridge space. (So basically, beta stantler + 30 others were what became missingno.) So it could be entirely plausable that these gen 2 mons were designed BEFORE some of the gen 1 ones, and thus had different art...? Though there’s also the theory I had which i haven’t seen anyone else talking about. Considering how the Spaceworld Beta has been super shrouded in myth and we only have first hand accounts of what the pokemon vaguely looked like, maybe these ‘beta artworks’ are actually fan art someone made while attending the convention? like not fake betas or anything, i mean someone was trying to quickly jot down the mons while the demo reel played, cos they couldnt take pictures. And then all the confusion of passing info between japanese and english fandoms in the early days of the internet could mean this stuff was archived as ‘early official art’ and not ‘artist’s recreation of unreleased promotional material’. I just started thinking about this because the screenshot of beta girafarig ended up being EXACTLY the same pose as that artwork of it. And it’s very rare that sprites exactly mimic the official art, especially back in the gameboy era where the sprites were rudimentary and inconsistant between versions. So it seems more plausable that this maybe proves the art was drawn by someone seeing that sprite?

Further potential proof- the ‘beta art’ of Silver:

Now that’s not only a wildly different art style but he’s drawn with super big cutesy eyes and cheek blush. I mean that could indicate his personality was completely different back then, or it could indicate this was someone drawing their own interpretation of a different official art, who didnt know what role this character would have in the actual game. Also we’ve heard people saying that Silver’s gender was unknown at the time of this first beta appearance, so that could potentially mean this fan artist draw him shoujo-style cos they headcanoned the new rival would be a girl? or just that the androgenous style of his appearance would equal a personality that was typical of an androgenous anime character- i.e a cutesy shy boy or a rowdy tomboy girl, etc. Tho tbh that whole line of theory confused me because this beta silver seems to have similar short hair to his redesign way later. I don’t think this design would be remotely perceived as ‘androgenous’ if the art style wasn’t drawn cutesy like this. So maybe this was indeed the early art style? And man, who knows, maybe the inconsistancy of sugimori already existing just means that they weren’t gonna keep sugimori in the second game? The very sketchy nature of these artworks could make sense if it was an attempt to completely redesign a new style for the sequel, so every generation would look different. I wonder what genre of anime every other region would have looked like! I’m imagining some sort of mysterious Clamp-esque style for sinnoh maybe, since its the ‘relic region’? And maybe unova would have even been american cartoon style!

Anyway in summary bunni is very confused and also bunni really fuckin misses silver’s old long haired design and will NEVER FUCKING UNDERSTAND why they gave him the exact same hair as roark and mars in the same generation they introduced roark and mars. (I dunno why people don’t include roark in the family headcanons. Mayb just cos his without-hat look is only seen briefly in anime?)

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Gremp Review: Dr Herregods

Okay, today’s new grandpa that I adore!

I’ve been playing the remake of Sonny lately and TOTALLY having a nostalgia explosion! Its like a reboot of an old classic Flash game series I used to play a lot as a kid. The art, music, and everything has had a HUGE update, and they even added some new characters! Its a shame, however, that we lost the animated sprites and ability to see visual changes as you equip stuff. I’m guessing they just didnt have the budget to make it happen with the high res graphic update. Also some of the story changes are a bit weird, but an equally large amount of them are super good, so it all balances out. I just wish all the new characters didnt REPLACE the old characters, yknow?

At least Veraduz stuck around, and now he’s got a cool expanded backstory and reasons for joining your party. Its not just ‘we’re both zombies, lets stick together, i found a robot suit and somehow instantly knew how to use it’. Nah, instead now he’s a regular human who actually OWNS that robot suit, he starts off on the other side and joins you after seeing you’re sentient and deserve to live. Also he’s a disabled veteran whose robot suit is basically a mobility device to replace his lost legs. That’s instantly incredibly sympathetic and interesting! And still he’s our cool sassy giant buff healer dude and major BROTP with the protagonist. Woo~! ANYWAY, less rambling about loving that character, and more rambling about loving the new ones!

One of the best new changes to the plot was the addition of Dr Herregods, aka SUPER SCIENCE GRANDPA!

Further review below:

He’s actually the only new character who technically did exist in the original flash game, he used to be a tough bonus boss battle and got promoted to playable here. Obviously he took a huge power cut, but he’s actually still pretty damn strong! He starts off fragile but he gets A LOT of really good attacks. He can set up barriers and regen on his allies and DEAAAAR GOD am I happy that the ally AI is great in the remake, he’s saved me so many times! And his actual damage output isnt very good even if you buff him up, but he has Acid Element which bypasses defense buffs. Usually you have mr fragile grandpa dealing half as much as everyone else, and then when you face some overblown buffed up thing he’s suddenly the sole savior of the world! AND he can deal useful attack debuffs, so he frees up a move slot on your protagonist if you dont need to worry about those. Here I’ve got him very stacked up with defensive items at the expense of everything else, cos even if he’s buffed its not like he’s ever gonna be super fast or strong. Its best to just cover his fragility! Currently he’s actually one of the best defenders, I went with fragile speedster build for my other two party members Sonny and Kara. (Incidentally I love Kara! I wish Felicity didnt have to be replaced by her tho, is it some sort of rule that these games must only have one playable lady?) Tho the fragile build is fun to play in its own right! It just feels super in-character that he’d be like an overpowered useful buffer mage dude that you have to protect. The enemy still seems to try and take him out more often than not, even when he has enough extra defense to withstand it. LEAV GRANDPA ALON

Anyway, the Sonny games have never been super dialogue heavy or well written, tho the remake adds a lot of extra scene which has been nice. Its still kind of a crazy cliche storm, but its a sassy one with high production values and a SUPER well developed high difficulty battle system. The ways they make buffs and statuses and passives interact.. god, its beautiful! And in the remake you have a choice of way more elemental paths to customize, and can even ‘evolve’ moves mid battle. its like a limit break but you choose to turn one of your regular moves into a limit break and it stays that way for the rest of the battle! So you get advantages the longer the fight goes on, and the more damage you can take without dying. However the limit breaks are subject to the RNG so sometimes you get a bunch of buffs that arent actually useful for your selected move, and you basically waste your whole bar. Alas! ANYWAY LESS RAMBLING ABOUT HOW FUN THE GAME IS, YO

So yeah, nobody has a super developed personality or many scenes to show it off in. But still I LOVE NEW GRANDPA! He’s my favourite sort of thing: an evil grandpa that isnt evil. He’s your own personal mini evil! He’s got all the character traits of an evil scientist, apart from the bit where he’s on your side. And he gets to act as the comedic guy with all the vices, but still he remains loyal to you guys, and his whole moveset is supporting his friends, and i just LOVE HIM!!! *hug* I am a bit sad tho that he’s another different medic character, so you kinda have to choose between him and Veraduz. At least everyone still gets to appear in story scenes regardless of who’s in the party, so it doesnt really matter. Veraduz is still your super bff who gets the most screentime of everyone! OH, but actually ALSO a reason I love new grandpa!!! He becomes the guy who gets the second most scenes after Veraduz, and he’s like THE MOST IMPORTANT to the story! His introduction works REALLY well to make the early stages work a bit better. Before you were just journeying wildly with no real motive except ‘people are trying to kill me, keep running until this problem ceases to continue’. Now you meet a rogue scientist early on and he gives you a general goal and motive, you’re trying to find out what’s actually going on and he’s analyzing the different zombies you find along the way, showing you directions to find his laboratory eventually. He falls out of focus after he gives us this motive in the intro, but he still remains pretty useful in tutorialing how to use your new mutation specializations. And its justified that you get them cos he stuck a syringe of his latest crazy experiment into your neck. He’s helping!! In his own special way!! Seriously this is just WHY I LOVE HIM! He’s such a nice good hero man who 100% thinks like a sci fi villain, and the contrast makes for a lot of funny scenes. I legit thought he was gonna just be a temporary party member who backstabs you at the end of the chapter, i was SO GLAD that I was wrong! Ominous ambiguously evil man who never becomes evil ever is such a better trope! “Hey look that latest terrifying enemy is really damn cool, I’d love to cut it open. And genetically engineer a new and better zombie virus. And test it on you, specifically.” *does so* *and nothing but good things happen* *thanks grandpa*

FINAL GREMP RATING!

Personality - How much of a unique self this grandpa has, and how interesting. Stereotypical grandpa archetypes are still loveable, but it doesn’t exactly stand out above the rest!

Dr Herregods has the same sort of appeal as other fave characters of mine, like Charon. Except with even more appeal cos he actually does join the hero team! He’s a big eccentric that you wouldn’t usually expect for this kind of medic class gramps role! ‘Evil science man’ is kind of an archetype that’s often given to grandpas, but I mean you can’t say it lacks personality! I’m just... predictable!! I really love when the ‘mad scientist’ gets to turn good! ITS SUCH A GOOD PERSONALITY, DON’T LIMIT IT TO VILLAINS However Dr Herregods isn’t grumpy or sassy, he’s just more of a cheerful dude who really loves his job of making super zombies and is comedically oblivious to everyone else thinking its an evil hobby. That’s endearing in its own way! Nobody really gets a huge amount of dialogue or development in this game though, so take his rating with that in mind.

6/10

Design - How appealing does this grandpa look as a character? How endearing, how distinctive, how much does it suit him?

His design isn’t particularly new or interesting, he honestly just looks like the third stage of bugcatchers in pokemon.

However it’s still nice that he became a grandpa at all in this remake, when his original design was just this generic npc model.

3/10

Prominance - How big of a role this grandpa plays in the actual plot or gameplay.

This is actually where he excels! its so rare to find a good playable grandpa that isn’t like a super tiny plot role, or vice versa. And most of my faves are usually neither, and mad science grandpas especially tend to get the short end of the stick! I love him just cos he’s like if someone like Charon or Hojo got to be the hero of the story! Also he is REALLY USEFUL in a fight! Also DID I MENTION I LOVE THIS CHARACTER??

9/10

G R A N D P A -  Bunni’s very personal concept of what makes me want to adopt this grandpa. How well does he fill the void in the life of someone who had a shitty family devoid of loving guardian figures and projects way too much onto fictional characters?

OH MAN, I think if he was my actual grandpa we would have all sorts of crazy adventures together! And we totally have the same opinion on how monsters are HELLA AWESOME and it would be epic to gain super undead powers! Yo grandpa give me the super juice, I wanna shoot lightning from my zombie eyes!!! Also he’s just... like... GENUINELY GOOD! For once he’s not my guilty pleasure redemption fanfic dude who would never actually join the hero team in canon. This grandpa would legitimately be a caring friend! Even if he’s also a bit of an irresponsible space case. But seriously, DUDE, SAME! We’d be so bad if we became friends, nobody could stop us from making terrible life decisions to go poke giant monsters with sticks and chug mutagenic liquids

8/10  G R A N D P A

Literally the only reason he won’t get a 10 is the same as I mentioned above, nobody gets very much dialogue in this game so he’s just like a lil slice of perfection covered in a pile o headcanons.

Final Score: 26/40