#but i want to play..... farming sim too............ its been so long

[dnangelic]

[taleeater]

Fragile Part 6

😈😈😈

(This chapter got too long- I had to cut it short,,,, :]]] Enjoy!)

Generation: Bayverse TMNT

Tmnt x Reader Fanfic

Pronouns: Gender Neutral (except ‘dudette’, 'miss', and ‘princess’)

Warnings: injury, blood, electrocution, graphic depictions of torture, not proof read

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

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Today you were spending time with Donnie while he worked in front of his monitors. You liked it there much better than in his lab. He had a map of the city up with little marks indicating spots where the Foot had been spotted. But that wasn’t what he was working on right now.

No, you and Donnie were doing much more important things at the moment.

Like playing the new update in Stardew Valley.

“Fishing mods are cheating.” 

You gawked at him in mock offense. “But you can’t pause in a multiplayer farm, there’s no time to play the fishing mini game!!”

“That’s why it’s more of a challenge!” He stuck his tongue out while he clicked his mouse rapidly to fight off a slime in the mines.

You pouted, adjusting the laptop in your lap. “I don’t need my cozy farming sim to be challenging…” 

Donnie did not miss the cute grin that graced your face after, his heart fluttering in his chest. 

These past few days you found yourself smiling more and more easily. Whether it was Mikey getting covered in flour while you baked cookies together, or Raph teaching you how to purl stitch, or Leo showing you how to wield a sword. You were enjoying spending more personal time with the turtles as you got to know them better.

Your toes curled where you were perched in the chair beside Donnie, glancing up at the map again. Your eyes always drawn to the blinking red dot marking the location of the lab you escaped only weeks before. The police had raided it and found it empty, which only increased your unease as to where Dr Stockman might be hiding. It already felt like a lifetime ago, that night when the turtles first found you. 

You owed them your life.

���Hey (y/n), you almost ready for afternoon training?” Leo came over, snapping you out of your thoughts. Leo leaned against the back on Donnie’s chair, earning a dismissive swat from his younger brother.

“We’ll stop after we finish up this day, Leo.” Donnie said not even taking his eyes off the screen. You giggled and got back to fishing on the beach.

You were two hours into your training session with Leo. 

“Okay, good. Now when you kick, focus on your balance. Stay firmly planted and your leg should have more power.” Leo coached you. 

Master Splinter was supervising while sipping his tea. It had barely been 5 days since your mutant abilities had manifested. But you were already making astounding progress in unlocking its potential. Leonardo had played a big part in the process, being the one who had helped you work through your fears of using your mutant reflexes, so the abilities came more easily to you when training. He trained with you every day, while Master Splinter provided guidance. Everyone was doing their best to support you through all the changes.

Casey suddenly jogged in through the entrance of the lair. 

“Guys! Just got word, the Foot are planning to rob a warehouse full of high tech weapons tonight. We gotta go intercept it.” He said waving around his cellphone.

“What? Where? Their communication frequency has been quiet since they moved those chemicals to the old Sacks building!” Donnie spun around in his chair to face Casey, you and Leo walking into the living room with Raph and Mikey close behind.

“Queens. Our contact in the Foot Clan leaked the info to us just half an hour ago.”

“Huh, that’s strange. That’s all the way on the other side of town. Aside from Sacks Tower, they’ve only really been active around the East Village and ChinaTown this past week. Maybe they changed their frequency again to throw us off track.” Donnie was quickly typing up info on his keyboard. 

“Well, regardless, we better go check it out.” Leo sighed. He wanted to keep training with you, but it would have to wait.

“Heck yeah! I’m bringin’ the steak-out snacks. Who wants Doritos?” Mikey grabbed his ratty old Jansport backpack and started shoving cans of Orange Crush into it. 

“(Y/n), you stay here and keep an eye on Donnie’s computer. The Foot might try to communicate about their raid tonight. Donnie’s program will intercept it. April will be here in about an hour, so just tell her if anything suspicious comes up.” Leo asked you.

“Right!” You said standing to attention and giving a military salute with a silly little grin on your face. 

It made Leo’s heart melt in his chest and his expression turned soft. 

“Just, stay safe, okay?” He patted you on the head then headed for the exit. 

As the rest of the boys filed out of the lair, they each stopped by you. Mikey getting a high five, you quickly cleaned Donnie’s glasses for him, and Raph, always last, ducked down for a quick hug when his brothers weren’t looking. Casey rushed ahead of them.

Master Splinter waved goodbye to his sons next to you. Once the boys had left, he informed you he was going to go meditate, and to come find him if you needed anything.

About 45 minutes later, you were casually watching YouTube videos on Donnie’s computer when a flashing red light appeared on the screen. It was indicating that Donnie’s program was intercepting a message from the Foot’s closed communication server. A message popped up on the screen, and you gasped.

“We have captured the turtles. Continue with the plan.” 

Then a video feed loaded up on the main screen. 

Your blood ran cold.

It looked like the feed from a security camera, depicting Leo, Mikey, and Donnie all locked in glass cages, restrained with thin tubes of red connected to their arms. They looked weak, they looked bad.

“What….? No… No, not this… please no…!”

Where was Raphael? He was nowhere to be seen. How did they get captured so fast…? They had barely been gone an hour!

Your mind was racing. You recognized those machines. Dr Stockman used them to take blood samples from Bebop and Rocksteady. If that was the case, there was no time to lose.

You made up your mind.

You snuck past the dojo and muttered a quick apology to Master Splinter. You knew Master Splinter wouldn’t let you go, so you kept quiet. Then you grabbed the handheld GPS device Donnie left on his work table. You entered the location on the map where the message was sent from. 

The old Sacks Tower. 

Time to move.

April arrived at the lair much later than expected. She and Casey had just finished speaking to the commissioner about police activities being leaked to the Foot. When they entered the living room, they were confused to only see Master Splinter waiting for them. The old rat was pacing and anxiously stroking his beard. 

“Splinter? Where’s (y/n)?” April asked, confused.

Splinter shook his head. 

“You don’t know where they are?” April became concerned, walking further into the lair. 

“It appears, that our greatest fears have been realized.” His expression deeply troubled. Before April could ask, she noticed what Splinter was looking at. 

Playing in a loop on Donatello’s monitor was old CCTV footage from when the turtles had been captured 10 years ago by Shredder and Mr Sacks. April breathed a sigh of relief, immediately recognizing the scene.

“Splinter, the turtles are safe. I spoke to Leo on the phone only 10 minutes ago. They’re staking out a warehouse in Queens. This is old footage.” 

Splinter’s eyes widened and looked back to the screen. His expression turned contemplative. 

“If that is so, then perhaps Miss (y/n) has made the same mistake.” He spoke gravely.

April had a look of shock. She quickly pulled out her phone and speed dialed Leo’s number.

Leo thankfully answered quickly. “Hey April, anything new?”

“Leo, is (y/n) with you?”

Leo paused a long moment and sent a look over to his brothers, getting their attention. “No…. Aren’t they at the lair?” All of his brother's eyes were suddenly on him. Leo turned the phone on speaker.

“No!! They’re gone. And there’s a video playing on Donnie’s computer. It’s a recording of you Mikey and Donnie locked up at Sacks’ estate from over 10 years ago… I think this is what (y/n) saw before they left.”

“They left?” Leo felt his heart drop into his stomach. “To go where, Sacks’ estate?” His brothers immediately started packing up their stakeout equipment to leave. 

“No I don’t think so, the sender’s location was tracked, it’s still on the screen. It says it was sent from Sack Tower in Times Square.”

Donnie came over and joined in the call, typing furiously at the keyboard on his wrist. “Sacks Tower. That’s where they were spotted smuggling those stolen chemicals into the other day…! From my notifications, it appears that the message was sent through an older Foot Clan communication frequency approximately 43 minutes ago.”

“Donnie, how long will it take (y/n) to get to Sacks Tower.”

“From my calculations, if (y/n) left the lair heading to the Sacks building about 40 minutes ago, going by subway, they should arrive in about uhhh, approximately 8 minutes.”

“And how long will it take us to get there.” Raph asked.

“From where we are now, if we manage to hitch a ride on the next nonstop train to Times Square…… about 1 and a half hours.”

“Shit!” 

Raph cursed loudly and turned away frustrated, and Mikey put his hands on his head. Donnie was typing away at the keypad on his arm, trying to find any kind of faster route and muttering about how stupid he was for not making you a shellcell.

“We don’t have a minute to waste. Let’s move out.”

That’s all they needed to hear. Everyone sprung into action and booked it for the closest subway station manhole cover.

“April, we are headed to Sacks Tower as fast as we can. And get ahold of the police commissioner again. Whoever gave us the information to come to this warehouse tonight was intentionally planted with misinformation. There was no sign of the Foot at the warehouse. …..It was most likely a diversion.”

“Right. I’ll get back to you soon.”

Leo hung up the phone and jumped off the apartment building and dove down towards the street’s manhole cover.

Leo grit his teeth.

“Hold on (y/n).”

The halls of the building were eerily empty. This place made your skin crawl. The laboratory felt all too similar to the one you had been trapped in before. But this one had clearly been abandoned for a long time. Broken glass, graffiti, turned over chairs, scattered paper. But strangely the power was still on. You didn’t dare try to use the elevator in fear of giving away your position. But you were confused as to why you had yet to see any guards. This is where the message was sent from, the turtles had to be here, right?

You climbed the steps to another floor, but paused as you creaked open the door exiting the stairwell. This floor felt like a world apart from the previous ones. It was clean.

And the lights were on.

You kept low, and hyper vigilant. Steadying your breathing like Leo had taught you, you crept into the sterile white hallway. There were glass windows along the hall looking into different labs. One held chemistry equipment, another held big bulky medical equipment that clicked and beeped. Finally, the last room at the end of the hall, a room with no windows. You had a sinking feeling in your gut, but still you crept towards the door. Slowly and quietly you pulled open the heavy door, and revealed a large lit room with a high ceiling, and there you saw it.

“Guys….!”

There along the back wall were 4 glass boxes with 3 of the turtles strung up and being drained of blood. You had found them! Seeing no one else in the room, you rushed in. 

“I’m going to get you out of here, just you wait!” You went to the first machine in front of Donnie and reached out to touch the screen-

Your hand passed right through.

“What…?” You tried to touch it again but there was nothing there.

The hologram distorted, and then the turtles disappeared. You gasped.

It was a trap.

You turned around to book it towards the exit, but the door was opening again. Bebop and Rocksteady squeezed through the small door one at a time, and blocked your exit. Then over an intercom you heard the familiar laugh that sent a shiver down your spine.

Stockman chuckled darkly. “Just how I planned it! Like catching a fly with honey. So predictable!”

You backed up slowly as Bebop and Rocksteady approached you. 

“Did you miss us, little kitty?” Rocksteady sneered.

The intercom buzzed as Stockman spoke again. “Bebop, Rocksteady, keep them occupied until I arrive. I will be there momentarily. And let’s not have a repeat of last time, please!” There was a clicking sound and the intercom went quiet.

Bebop chuckled. “Hell yeah! It’s been so long since we last played! Let’s make the most of it.” 

“That’s right! And we gotta pay you back for all the trouble you caused us! We missed you so much after you left. You wanna go first Beebs?”

“My man!” Bebop smiled at Rocksteady and clasped his hand, they both laughed. 

You tried your best to steady your breathing like Leo taught you. Your hands were trembling. But you needed a way out. Bebop and Rocksteady were not fast, if you timed it right, maybe you can get past them to the door.

Bebop approached you. You stayed still and waited. Then when he got close enough, you ran right towards him, surprising Bebop. He reached out to grab you but you slid right between his legs, then jumped up behind him and tried to run past Rocksteady before he could react. He was still too close to you and managed to grab you from behind, but you were ready for him. Just like in training, you reached up and grabbed him around his neck, and taking a deep breath, you threw all your strength forward and down and managed to flip Rocksteady onto his back- stunning him. You quickly jumped over him and ran for the door, slamming into it fast and wretched the handle to pull it open. 

Locked. (Warning for graphic depictions of torture ahead.)

“No…!” You felt a bruising grip close around your arm, and you were torn away from the door. “NO!!” You cried out as you were thrown hard onto the floor between the two oversized mutants. 

“See? Now that’s your problem. You gotta go makin’ our job harder than it needs to be!” Bebop complained. 

Rocksteady was picking himself back up, rubbing the back of his head tenderly. “Don’t let them get to ya Beebs, we’ll sort them out quick before Stockman gets here.” Bebop then reached into his pocket and pulled out an all too familiar black taser. 

Rocksteady took the taser and chuckled. “Little kitty needs a check-up!” 

You tried to get up and run, but Rocksteady stomped down hard on your left arm. There was a sickening snap and you screamed, writhing in pain. You were pinned. 

“Tsk, tsk. You know what happens when kitty gets naughty!” The taser was flicked on, all you could do was close your eyes before a strong surge of electricity was shot into your ribcage and throughout your body. You convulsed as the shocks seized you, your shoulder getting dislocated from the spasms, then collapsed back on the floor. 

“Just like good ol’ times!” Rocksteady passed the taser to Bebop.

Rocksteady laughed and removed his foot from your arm, then Bebop tased you in the ribs again. You yelped and rolled onto your stomach, tucking your very broken arm underneath you and tried to crawl away. 

“Hey, where ya goin? We’re just getting STARTED!” Rocksteady punctuated his sentence by kicking you in the stomach hard enough to throw you across the room. You hit the ground and your body rolled another few feet until you stopped on your side and curled in on yourself, the air knocked out of your lungs.

Bebop took his time strolling over to you, and grabbed you by the hair to lift you up. You coughed and gasped for air, grabbing at his hand and tried to pry his fingers off of his grip. 

“Think you can just up and leave whenever you want, do ya?” He growled in your ear, then dropped you down haphazardly to the floor. You were on your knees, buckled forward and holding your left shoulder, when suddenly Bebop’s foot stomped down on your right ankle and you heard a loud crunch. 

You shrieked. 

Exhausted and riddled with unbearable pain, you crippled to the floor. It took everything you had just to pull breath. 

“Alright, I’m back! How is our lovely patient doing?” Came the cheerful sing-song voice of Dr Stockman entering the room through the locked door, Karai tailing behind him. 

“Hey boss! Uhhh, we were just warming them up for ya! See? They can’t run away no more.” Bebop nudged your side with his foot, knocking you onto your side so Stockman could see the pain riddled on your face. You were barely conscious by this point. 

“Excellent! Bring them to me.” Stockman ordered.

Bebop picked you up by your good arm and carried you over to where Dr Stockman was walking to in the back of the room. Karai stepped in Bebop’s way for a moment, taking in your beaten appearance, and back-handed your face hard for good measure, leaving a shiny bruise and angry red gash across your cheek. That woke you up a bit. 

Just enough to retaliate.

You took a deep breath and tore your arm out of Bebop’s grasp and punched Karai in the stomach, hard enough to throw her into a large display screen next to where Stockman was standing. Stockman squawked in surprise. She rolled onto the floor, and pushed herself up onto her side. Spitting a bit of blood onto the ground and wiping away at her lip. 

You tried to stand on your good leg but you were too weak and collapsed back to the floor. Bebop and Rocksteady grabbed you by each of your arms and brought you in front of Stockman.

He was looking at you in awe, and reached out tentatively to swipe at the blood on your cheek. He rushed over to his desk, jumping a bit in excitement. He put a drop of your blood onto a slide, and observed it under his microscope.

“Ha…! HA HA…! YES!!” Stockman shouted in excitement and did a little dance. Bebop and Rocksteady exchanged a confused look and Karai stood up and walked over to Stockman, eyeing you angrily and rolling her shoulder.

“What does this mean?” She questioned him. 

“It means that the mutation was a SUCCESS!!! Those stupid turtles must have triggered it somehow. And now we can finally proceed with the plan!!!” He grabbed something off his desk and skipped over to the stairs leading up to the circular titanium base in the middle of the room. “Bring them here!!” He called over, waving his hand to Bebop and Rocksteady.

They dragged you over to Stockman, and were deposited on the round podium that sat under a large glass tube. Stockman started to pull down long rubber tubes from above, and attached large thick needles to the ends. You tried once again to crawl away with your good arm, as Bebop and Rocksteady retreated. 

But Stockman approached you from behind. In a quick jab, he stabbed the two needled tubes deep into your back. You grunted and groaned in pain, but could do nothing, collapsing on the podium. Beaten, bruised, and bleeding.

When Dr Stockman was finished, he descended the stairs and rushed over to his computer, giggling excitedly he typed in a command and the glass tube descended over you until it clicked into place at the sturdy titanium base. Locking you inside.

“They’ll be placed in suspended animation. Once the tank is completely filled with the preservation fluid, they’ll become nothing more than a convenient blood bag, supplying an endless supply of mutagen for our mutant army.” Stockman rubbed his hands together evilly.

“And what about the turtles?” Karai asked. 

“It is already too late for them to stop us. Even if they manage to get through your guards, they will be unable to free them from this tank. Once I start the filtration process, I will delete the programmed command to empty or release the containment cylinder. They won’t be able to free them without my help!” Stockman typed away quickly at his computer. 

One of the tubes connected to your back began to pull blood from your body, leading up through a small opening in the top of the cylinder then down into a canister at the base. Then from the second tube, a white milky substance full of liquid nutrients began to filter through and down into your body. It did nothing to numb the pain you felt as you laid there in a state of half consciousness. 

Suddenly, the loud banging of gunshots could be heard somewhere outside the door. 

“We’re not ready yet! Hold them back!” Stockman ordered Bebop and Rocksteady, who positioned themselves between Stockman and the door. 

The door suddenly blew wide open, and the four turtles rushed into the room, angry and weapons at the ready.

“Where’s (y/n).”

Part 7

@itsberrydreemurstuff @thecreat0r64 @eli-chris @kurlyfrasier @autisticnutcase @drenix004 @donniesgirlie @cherryp-op @foggyturtleknightangel @blackrockshooter780 @l-n-g-t @peachesdabunny @silverwatergalaxy @willy-the-witch @caeliasaida @veri-varily @xnorthstar3x 

If anyone else wants to be tagged for the next update, let me know in the comments! :]

[noxinara]

Obey Me! Brothers and what kind of games I think they'd play

this is a very biased list (and long post) based off of games that I've played before :) (jk its really not biased, just games I think they would play!) I made this because I couldn't sleep last night and had brain worms-- Will probably make one for the dateables sometime soon, but this list is just the brothers!

Lucifer

Traditional Board Games.

There have been MANY times where he's been playing various board games with you, Diavolo, and Simeon.

Gets VERY competitive over games like Sorry!, Monopoly, Trouble.... Candy Land???

Will only let Diavolo win.

Shows no mercy to anyone else, including you. Sorry, love.

Card Games.

Particularly amazing at Poker. He would not let Mammon know this... until you guys have an in-house Poker night and he literally takes all??? Has the best poker face you've ever seen.

Won't even let you guys beat him at Uno or Go Fish. Boooooooo.

Puzzle Games.

I could see Luci being very good at Tetris for some reason?

One time Levi challenged him to the game to try and get out of going to RAD one day...

Let's just say he had to go to RAD that day and also had to stay over on cleaning duty. Courtesy of getting absolutely DESTROYED.

Controversial Pick: Rhythm Games.

I could 100000% see Luci tearing up some OSU! But only when all of the brothers are asleep and he's completed most of his work.

They help him unwind.

...Was that rhythmic tapping you heard when walking by his office late one night..? Interesting.

You saw him wearing Levi's VR headset playing Beat Saber one day.

No, you will NOT bring it up and you will NOT let him know of that video you took.

Oh. You posted it on Fab Snap?

Good luck. You're gonna need it.

Mammon

Gambling Games/Apps.

Where I live you can just gamble from home because it's legal to have and play gambling apps?

He would have SO many on his D.D.D. They're taking up so much of his storage space.

Plays them a lot when you're around because he thinks that you're his good luck charm.

He also goes on a lot of Horse Racing and Sports Betting sites...

It got so bad that Lucifer had to figure out how to IP block him from these. it doesn't stop him--

Gacha Games.

Has absolutely insane luck for some reason??? Only on gacha games, tho.

Has definitely played Genshin Impact and Honkai Starrail because of Levi.

He got those 5 star and Ultra Rare pulls he wanted in his first 1-10 pulls? But you? It took you over 100 pulls to get what you wanted. WTF?????

You swear he must be cheating the system somehow. There is NO WAY.

Racing Games.

Particularly the ones that you can have a full racing setup for.

He's splurged thousands of Grimm on this.

Gran Turismo? Forza? F1? iRacing? He has them all.

He is VERY picky about who he lets touch his decked out setup... He'll let you use it any time you want, though. :) You're his treasure, ofc

Controversial Pick: Old School MMOs

Definitely played Old School RuneScape or Black Desert Online or Classic WoW and created gold farming empires.

Doesn't even do end game content, he's just a guild leader making bank off the work of his members.

He probably hosts fun events though.

Would definitely be the kind of guy that makes up scavenger hunts/fashion shows/trivia nights/etc. and gives out sick prizes...

Might also rig these to make sure you or his officers win the best prizes. How sweet.

Leviathan

He is literally THE gamer.

There probably isn't a single genre of game he hasn't played.

His favorite games are definitely MMORPGs and Visual Novels/Dating Sims/Bishojos/Gal games.

Could see him as a raid lead in all of the biggest MMOs like WoW, FFXIV and GW2.

He also 100% visits the degenerate RP server places like Moon Guard's Goldshire and Balmung's Quicksand.

He's definitely not a BLUSHING MESS and rushing to close his game if you catch him in one of these places!!! He would never go there!!! Oh... you want to join him? DEFINITELY NOT.

He would get too jealous of anyone daring to look at you to even let you breath in the vicinity of these degen realms.

He's also done plenty of MMO Ironman challenges and was one of the first people to complete Classic Hardcore WoW entirely solo. Didn't even group for dungeons. What a MAN.

Bishojo/Gal games are his guilty pleasure, how could they not be?

He gets all the waifus with none of the jealousy, right???

What do you mean he picks the same one every time? He can't just cheat on them MC!!

Loves JRPGs and Soulslike games.

Has definitely beaten Elden Ring more times than he can count. Knows literally all of the ins, outs, and secrets and is eagerly anticipating the DLC.

Has probably played every single Final Fantasy game and beaten them all. Would very much have a soft spot for FF4, FF7, and FF9.

Could definitely see him playing MOBAs and 4x strategy/Grand strategy games.

He's not the Grand Admiral of Hell's Navy for nothin'. He knows strategy games like the back of his hand.

The only brother that ever rivals him in strategic knowledge is Satan. (and Lucifer, but we're talking about GAMES here.)

He spends countless hours on League of Legends.

He mains JG/Mid and gets very toxic.

Has favorite characters, but honestly just plays whatever is in meta.

Owns every skin for Ahri, Lux, Katarina, Evelynn, and Akali.

He's definitely in Challengers.

Would 100% make a Smurf account if you wanted to play and would duo bot with you.

He'd play ADC and do anything to protect you, his loving support.

Would not be toxic in your games (unless you are too).

Faker who???

Controversial pick: Casual Mobile Games

Played Flappy Bird all the time when it was popular, still has a cracked copy on his D.D.D... I don't think anyone is beating his high score.

He's got a ridiculous amount of hours on Candy Crush, Angry Birds, and Fruit Ninja.

Would throw his D.D.D into his fish tank and have Henry 2.0 guard it before he'd ever let you catch him on one of these 'normie' games...

But... he secretly likes them so much.

Satan

Hear me out, Satan would be a SUCKER for CYOA (Choose-your-own-adventure)/IF (Interactive Fiction) text games.

Would have Choice of Games, Hosted Games, and Heart's Choice hidden on his D.D.D.

He LOVES immersing himself in story games and creating various MCs.

Oh, look! An RO that reminds him of you? Don't mind him self-inserting.

Probably has character sheets made for his favorite MCs. 

Will play through his favorite stories many, many times.

It all started with Choice of the Deathless and now he owns every game on each platform? (I'm jealous)

Also goes on Dashing Don... What do you MEAN author hasn't finished this story yet? AAAA-

Detective/Mystery/Escape Rooms Games.

I don't think any explanation is needed here. It's just who he is.

Would definitely get all of his brothers (minus Lucifer) together to do a virtual escape room... Unfortunately, it became so chaotic they never finished it. Oh well.

Once played Phasmophobia with Levi, Beel, and Belphie. Was very proud of himself for figuring out the ghost... Definitely did not sacrifice his brothers for the info.

Life Sims.

Specifically ones that let you own or are centered around cats.

Has played every single Sims game and bought their cat and dogs expansions.

Definitely did NOT recreate you and himself with 6 cute cats!!!

He did NOT get the mod that extends household size so that you two could own 97 cats. He wouldn't do that, no way!!!

...Was there actually a baby in the household, too..? Why did it have his hair and your eyes...? SATAN?!?!

you know the Catz DS game? He owned every single version and will NOT let you touch them... Okay. Maybe he gave into letting you touch them, but ONLY when he's supervising!

Very much enjoys RTS Games.

He's scarily good at games like StarCraft Brood Wars/2, the Age of Empires franchise, or Rise of Nations.

He's also gotten into 4x games like Stellaris and Civ. Thanks, Levi.

Don't try and challenge him, he can beat the hardest bots and WIN... THE BOTS LITERALLY CHEAT.

HOW DOES HE DO IT? 

Controversial Pick: Fighting Games

Specifically games like Guilty Gear, Street Fighter, Tekken, BlazBlue, etc. Courtesy of Levi again. Thanks, Levi.

It helps him temper his wrath.

He'll sometimes play Mortal Kombat just for the finishers?? Why is he this way?

He could spend hours learning all the combos and tech of his favorite characters.

Has created himself some tech books and would only show them to you, esp. if you showed interest in learning the games with him!

I could see him and Levi settling disputes by doing best 3 out of 5 1v1s against each other.

Could see him maining Giovanna or Leo from GGST? Tends to prefer rushdown characters. (this one is completely biased, i named my cat after Giovanna from GG--)

Asmodeus

Dress-up/Fashion/Stylist Games.

SuitU, Love Nikki, Covet Fashion - you name it.

He has all of them on his D.D.D and will shell out major Grimm to get any outfit he likes.

Might try to make the outfits he gets in these games for himself and you, because you're the perfect model!

Has a lot of fun with it and might try and talk you into playing with him.

Will definitely post amazing outfits he makes in-game on Devilgram. Will also post countless photos and videos of you two modeling those outfits he brings to life.

...NSFW/Eroge Games.

Not gonna go into detail on these ones because you already know what I mean.

Enjoys playing those games that haunt the front pages of my Steam.

Would proudly play them in front of you to laugh at how ridiculous they are sometimes (as long as you're 18+)

Like Satan, I could see him enjoying Life Sims...

Unlike Satan, it's not because he wants animals.

Plays games like the Sims, Stardew Valley, and Sun Haven.

Self-inserts himself and will romance EVERYONE.

Has the mods where you can marry every single villager and the bed mod that makes your bed MASSIVE so all your husbands and wives can sleep with you.

Made a Sims save with just himself romping around town... No sim is safe from Asmo.

Also has a Sims save with you and him that he openly enjoys more. It has both of you enjoying that Sims Nightlife as celebrities and living in a MASSIVE mansion he custom decorated.

Will also play any Visual Novel/Dating Game that is recommended to him by Levi.

Bonus points if it never shows the MC so he can self-insert himself.

Controversial pick (in this case, not really): VR Games

Specifically things like VRChat or Chillout VR.

Would be extraordinarily popular and have custom avatars of HIMSELF made with so many toggles that it'll make your head spin.

He would always be hanging out in night club or bar worlds.

Occasionally Mammon joins him.

Sometimes he also invites you to join him~! (Would not like it if people started hanging all over you, tho, and would probably bring you to a hot home world with just you and him if that happened...)

Beelzebub

Sports games.

No doubts about this one.

Could definitely see him playing FIFA or Madden.

Levi thinks these are SUPER normie games and is offended to have them in the house.

Beel doesn't care.

Ooo, they made a game of Fangol?!?! He becomes an expert so fast, you have no idea. Would 100% teach you how to play with him.

Loves Cooking Games or Food-themed Games...

He just can't play them for long, however.

One time you got him to play Cooking Mama with you, Luke, Simeon, and Solomon but you had to stop because he got so hungry that he was trying to eat the television????

Would have to bring in MANY snacks and vow to make dishes from the games if you wanted to play these with him around... Which is a shame because he genuinely enjoys them. 

I could see him loving Multiplayer Party/Minigame Games like Mario Party or WarioWare.

You mean he gets to play silly mini games with all of his favorite people?

He doesn't care if he wins, he just loves having you guys around.

Almost always comes in last place when he's playing with you, Belphie, and Levi but that's okay. The faces you guys make when you get your stars are worth it.

Controversial pick (and I mean this one is VERY controversial): FPS games

Now, I know what you're thinking. Beel is a gentle giant and wouldn't play these types of games...

But! I could see him forming 5 stacks with you and his brothers in games like CS2 and Valorant and being scarily good because of his amazing hand-eye coordination and reaction times?

Like he and Levi could easily carry you guys to high Asc/Low Immortal lobbies.

He would just play fill when everyone's around, but his mains would be Kay-O and Breach.

He would always be the initiator in Counter-Strike, following Levi's IGL calls perfectly.

He would also probably love playing games like Squad or Modern Warfare or Battlefield with all of his brothers, you + the dateables.

Belphie

Our resident Horror Game lover.

They give him ideas on how to prank his brothers dreams.

Once made Mammon go through Outlast in his dreams (nightmares??).

You better run, little pig.

But he genuinely enjoys them... When he can stay awake through them.

Hey, you, why don't you just play for him?

Loved playing through games like Amnesia... Unfortunately for you, his love for puzzle psychological horror probably contributed to how he acted in Act 16 OM--

Loves Psychological Dramas and those Interactive Media Games.

You know. The ones where you're combing through footage or watching videos and making choices to find out the hidden/deeper/darker meanings?

He LOVES those.

Usually has you or his brothers playing for him. It's most likely Satan.

You all get equally invested.

Idle Games.

He can run these while he's asleep.

There's nothing more to be said. 

These are the simplest type of games there are....

He's probably got a cookie empire.

Has a soft spot for Kart Racing Games.

Will regularly be in the room when you, Levi, Beel or Mammon are playing.

He's honestly pretty good at them??

When he's not falling asleep behind the wheel that is.

Controversial pick: Auto Battlers

These are games like TFT, Hearthstone Battlegrounds, and DOTA's Auto Chess.

He naps in between rounds and wakes up in 20s increments to prepare for his turn... Why does he have the timing down to a tee???

You're sure you've even seen him pick perfectly in his sleep??? How does he do it?????

Regularly comes in the Top 4, usually first or second. 

What do you mean he's a Challenger TFT player??? Wtf how???

Will not coach you if you ask, but you're free to watch!

Will definitely cuddle with you the whole time he's playing these.

All Brothers, with a bonus YOU!

I could honestly see them ALL enjoying CRPGs as a group.

They always get the mods that let you increase your party size.

Went through Baldur's Gate 3 with you on your recommendation.

They all fought over who would get to play Astarion and Mammon won?!?!

Satan got Gale

Beel got Karlach

Levi was Laz'ael

Lucifer was Wyll

Belphie got Shadowheart

And Asmo made a Dark Urge Bard that looked exactly like himself????

He literally doesn't even make any Dark Urge decisions.

He doesn't want blood staining his clothes. 😔

You got to choose whatever you wanted though!

You took the Dark Urge from Asmo and he just played a normal, flirty bard with impeccable fashion sense.

This playthrough took MONTHS and MONTHS... but you all had a blast!

Literally.

You cannot count the number of times Satan 'accidentally' hit you with fire balls. (He claims he was aiming for Lucifer.)

Lucifer somehow ended up getting you all the luckiest ending? How did he roll 3 nat 20s?????

You're on to play Divinity: Original Sin II next...

Satan has already claimed Fane.

[miscling]

🌻

this thing is out of brain atm.

what it's doing with its afternoon is taking a little gaming time. this this thing has been gaming longer than some of its followers have been alive, which is fun to think about.

it's played a lot of different things. it grew up with an atari 2600, and has played games across so many consoles: a master system, sega megadrive (or genesis as it was called in the US), N64, PSX, PS2, PSP, xbox, xbox 360, PS4, the original gameboy, GBC, GBA, Nintendo DS, then the DSi, wii, wii U, switch. it played a whole lot of early PC games, and now plays the occasional modern pc game.

gaming has come a long way tbh, though it's not got as much patience for games as it used to, there's a lot of grind and way too many games out there. it used to go nuts for old school final fantasy, castlevania, metroid, legend of zelda, and pokemon. it's played a fair few recent releases, but it's had more fun things on its mind as of late, so it's been less comitted to its gaming. it's still pretty good at games, but it prefers action over more thinky games, and cooperative over pvp games.

now it kinda plays games socially. mostly shooters, some mario kart when it's in the mood, and some farming sim type things. it's played a fair amount of ffxiv (still hasn't finished dawntrail though), and is just sorta vibing with whatever games others are playing. today it's playing some classic castlevania: aria of sorrow.

it enjoys gaming though. it's a nice downtime activity, something to do with folks to bond with them outside of kink and have things to do that aren't play when the mood isn't there. it has a lot of fun playing with people, when it has the time!

thank you for the 🌻!

[imsobadatnicknames2]

i keep thinking about ur stardew valley + land ownership/colonialism post and while i was thinking that too ive also been trying to think about like is there a way to make a farming sim not predicated on those? since as a game genre there is a niche of Watching Things Grow but also i know farming has been around since we first left huntergathering behind and it wasn't always about land ownership. i suppose the first step would be leaving behind the american/european idea/aesthetic of farming and finding some gameplay way of disincentivizing max yields/max profits playstyles

Okay this is an interesting ask and one I don't have all the answers to, but...

I think a game that comes much closer to simulating the actual ideals of communal land ownership is Dwarf Fortress and the way its mechanics depict dwarven society as at least communist-adjacent*. Now of course DF isn't exactly the type of game you would think of when someone mentions cozy relaxing farm games (it's, after all, a pretty crunchy simulator that can get pretty violent and gruesome when things go wrong) but you generally do a lot of the same things in it (growing crops, gathering resources, watching things grow, etc). and there are a lot of principles in it that could probably be incorporated into a Wholesome™ game.

In Dwarf Fortress there is the sense that the land you have is communally owned and managed by the entire population of your fortress. You as a player designate a list of tasks that need to be done and then available dwarves divide those tasks among themselves based on their labor preferences. And generally they don't have an economy based on wages and buying and selling products. When a dwarf makes a piece of clothing it isn't made to be sold, instead it goes on one of the clothing stockpiles, and then when a dwarf needs a new shirt they go to the clothing stockpile and grab one. The meals that are made in the kitchen go to the food stockpile, and then when one of your dwarves is hungry they go to the food stockpile and grab something to eat. And they don't have to pay for any of it because it's assumed that they're also doing the labor they can to contribute to the fort. So it works a lot less like Petty-Bourgeois Landowner Business Simulator and more similar to something like a commune.

Of course, this isn't to say that its base ideological assumptions don't share a lot of pitfalls with other farming simulator/terraforming type games. After all, it still fundamentally stems from the premise of "this plot of untouched land is here for you to do whatever you want with it" and more generally it still has a lot of themes of Civilizing Untamed Wilderness that have a lot of ideological implications which... You know, play into a bit of a colonialist mindset, but it's something you could potentially write around if, for example, your hypothetical game revolved around a community already living there or something like that.

And of course it still implies a bit of an extractivist ideology because ultimately you're still trying to Extract Resources and Maximize Efficiency but I think at least it has some mechanics that play counter to this e.g. having too many animals grazing in the same area for a long time will cause it to lose vegetation so your animals will go hungry if you don't rotate them between different pastures, fortress wealth is used as a trigger for events such as hostile invasions and megabeast attacks, etc.

Anyway, I just think the way land management is depicted in dwarf fortress avoids some of the bourgeois ideological implications of some farming games and incorporating some of the things it does right could be considered a step in the right direction.

*I say communist-adjacent bc I don't wanna fall into the trap of projecting my own politics into the game when in some aspects it just doesn't share them. I've heard several ppl claim that DF is a straight-up communist game, and while the way you play in it does share some aspects of communism, the government system of dwarves is still clearly depicted as a monarchy, and while nobles DO contribute to labor just like everybody else, the game still expects you to give them luxurious quarters, private dining rooms and offices that stand above those of other dwarves. I've had a lot of people reply to this with something along the lines of "oh but you know, when I play I just arrange 'unfortunate accidents' for all of my nobles" and like...yeah but that's not really the way you're intended to play, so saying that the game is straight-up communist because you can do that is still very much projecting your own politics onto it.

[demonfox38]

Completed - Wild Guns Reloaded

What do you mean, you can't use a single screenshot from a video game as both your feminist philosophy and gender identity?

How about two? Would two work?

Man, so many things confuse me about Natsume as a company. Like, its history, for one. Splitting to form two different companies, both of which use Natsume in the name (Natsume Co. vs. Natsumi Atari, which no, is also not the Atari you are thinking of.) Then, of all products for Natsume-associated games to become popular, it's "Harvest Moon." Like. What? Why? I'm not saying the library of Natsume works is the most creative set, but they're all excellent zeitgeist encapsulations. Like, you want hard platforms with ninjas and bullet hell adjacent shooters with snappy music? Man, Natsume has you covered. But apparently, it's the dating/farming sims that the masses are all about. I just don't get it.

Look, man. I live in Iowa. If I wanted to do "Harvest Moon" shit, I would have done it in real life. Ya know. Joined 4-H. Picked rocks on my grandparents' farm. Showed animals at a county fair or two. Get knocked up in high school. Worked in an industrial slaughterhouse for Tyson. The kind of stuff that I have deliberately avoided.

Shooting robots in petticoats ain't something I can get in real life, so that's the game from the Natsume library I'm playin'. Living that sweet South Dakota lifestyle, I guess!

"Wild Guns Reloaded" (not to be confused with "Wild Arms," despite me doing that multiple times) is a 2016 remaster of Natsume’s SNES title "Wild Guns." Set in a vague futuristic depiction of the American West, you are charged with blasting the notorious Kid gang's faces cranially inward through a series of bullet-riddled levels. Do you have the structural integrity of a paper plate? Yes. But you also have access to several gun styles, bombs, electric lassos, grenades, and a drone being led around by a little long-haired dachshund. You'd be surprised what you can do with such an arsenal.

Look man, you're not playing this game for plot. You're doing it for the challenge and the sweet, sweet aesthetics.

Like, God. The original "Wild Guns" was already a stunner with its large, detailed sprite work and bombastic music. "Wild Guns Reloaded" has doubled-down on that, smoothing out its animations while keeping its bright sprites, broadening the play field, remixing its score with higher-fidelity instruments, adding two new stages, and throwing in two new characters with unique playstyles into the mix. And man, what a choice they made there, too! Getting a cute little doggie? Adorable. Getting a gigantic gal with legs like a Ninja Turtle action figure and the ability to pitch grenades in heaps at will? Outstanding!

Could there have been more logical character archetypes to pull? Sure. An Indigenous American, Latino, or Chinese immigrant character could have made sense, if care was taken into their implementation. But, man! I appreciate the stones of a game to toss a second Big Bertha into the mix. I'm not gonna be the bitch to argue against a dog, either. Excellent choices! Very creative! Bark bark bark!

As cool as it is, "Wild Guns Reloaded" is an unyielding steel wall in terms of difficulty. Like, yeah. I'm used to getting my teeth kicked in with certain games, so I wasn't surprised when even the first screen of the first stage was enough to push me back on my first try. What did surprise me is how few people on Steam have been able to drive through that first barrier. We're talking a 46.7% achievement rate for people able to beat the first boss. Next boss? 22.1%. Like, holy crap. Are we as a community that weak willed in spirit?

Having said that, I don't think it's actually very well communicated how to even play this game. Like, yeah, there's a manual. A whole whopping three pages long! But, that doesn't even remotely get into the logic behind the game. Or, hell. Even how to properly shoot.

So, I want to take a good chunk of this evaluation to do just that! Because damn it, this game is too fucking cool to not help other people get into it.

At heart, "Wild Guns Reloaded" is an arcade-style shooting gallery. In some sense, it could even be seen as an extreme variant of Treasure's "Sin and Punishment" series, or perhaps a game akin to "Galaga" or "Gradius." To survive, you need to not only dodge shots, but turn the tables on your enemies, using reflexes and memorization to hold waves back and smack bosses around for daring to try the same trick twice on you.

You have two planes of action to monitor:

The red space is your general field of play (where you are expected to shoot down.) The green space is the area that you occupy. Aiming and walking are tied to the same controls, so you will move around a little bit when you are drawing a shot.

If you are in danger of getting hit, the game will let you know with a little "Look Out!" message.

You can also watch the trajectory of an enemy's fire through this flashing cursor on screen:

Missiles will have a subtle shadow effect on your territory as well, so keep an eye out for them:

Your evasion options are either:

Walk with the control stick/directional keys (not generally advised unless you are playing the dog)

Jump using a dedicated Jump button (gets above obstacles)

Dodge by hitting the Jump button and your directional controls left or right while keeping the Fire button held (keeps your character on the ground; allows for faster recovery)

If the enemy lobs a stick of dynamite at you, you don't necessarily have to run. Stop firing, pick the dynamite up using the Fire button, and toss it back at your foes for a little extra damage! Whatever you decide to do, commit to it ASAP. You do not want to be around with that goes off.

Generally speaking, it's to your benefit to plant your heels in the center of the screen and only move out of it when you are about to take a hit. (If you had a buddy, perhaps you could split the screen. But, good luck with that…) The game tends to punish you for hanging out in the corners of the screen, often deliberately planting sentries at the edges to rebuff you. Camping in the corners also reduces your space to evade, so it's better to keep your options open for evasion by owning the center.

Your offensive options differ depending on the character you play. For the original characters (Clint and Annie), the standard style is:

Hold the Fire button to shoot an uninterrupted stream of bullets

Tap the Fire button repeatedly and release to shoot out an electric lasso that stuns your target (allowing you to return to regular file and blast the crap out of them for a few seconds)

Whack the Fire button when an enemy is in your territory (sending them flying back)

FYI—you should notice a brief change in your character's stance when you can whack an enemy.

Normal:

Whacking:

Doris' play style is based on building up power to unleash barrages of grenades at a target. Unlike Clint and Annie, she's waiting for a perfect opportunity to strike once and as hard as possible. Hold the Fire button to charge up her attack, then release it for her to unleash it. You can charge Doris' grenades up to an x7 multiplier, but most situations can be handled with at least a x3. Also, you can preserve her multiplier through dodges, so prioritize dodging on the ground to jumps where possible.

Bullet's style separates his hit box into two separate entities (the drone and the doggie.) The drone can be activated by pressing the Fire button. It will continuously attack anything that comes into its aiming reticle, but it will have to be released and reset for new targets outside of its range. Bullet can't defend himself, but he can wiggle around much quicker than other characters, so it makes it easy for him to avoid getting hit while his robot buddy provides a steady stream of damage.

You will have to disengage the robot to whack people back on the playing field, so make sure to keep Bullet by his buddy when someone comes creeping along the bottom of the stage. It is important to note that the robot can also be stunned, so you should try to keep it out of enemy fire when possible. It's just not a run ender necessarily if it takes a hit.

All characters have a bomb ability to clear the room when necessary to keep the screen from getting too busy. These are limited, so use them with discretion.

Be sure to pick them up any time you see them on screen! You can usually find them either by killing specific enemies or blowing up chunks of the terrain.

Clint, Annie, and Bullet can get limited-time modifiers for their weaponry. This can include a machine gun for faster damage, a shotgun for a broader range of damage, a grenade launcher for big and heavy damage, a laser gun for some precise spicy damage, and a harmless pop gun designed just to screw with you. All have a limited ammo account (around 50 for everything), so use (or deplete) wisely!

The machine gun, shotgun, grenade launcher, and laser gun will all appear on screen as an icon with a single letter for their ammo type (M, S, G, and L, respectively.) A randomized weapon (including potentially the pop gun!) comes out of these:

Everyone has a green meter on their HUD.

This builds up as they hit and kill enemies. When it maxes out, this triggers the Vulcan Cannon. This weapon not only deals massive damage on hit, but it also makes your character invulnerable. It will run out of steam within a few seconds, so don't be too reliant on that status. But, it can help in a pinch.

Everything past that? It's standard video game stuff, ya know? Memorize waves. Endure a minute or so of gunplay to get to the next boss. Learn their special moves. Find the glowing weak point. Crack it open. Regular Peppy Hare behavior.

Honestly, getting a handle on your offense style and movement capabilities is most of the challenge. The weird little movement ticks were what caught me off guard. I would be studying what few YouTube videos I could pull up for this game, stop, then go "Wait, what? I can do that?" before booting the game up and doing exactly what I saw. Like, I didn't even know how to fire my goddamn gun right. I didn't even think about holding my Fire button! I just went into rapid tapping! That's how far behind I was in all of this!

Having said that, you may want to remap your controller to something like this:

(Buttons pictured correspond to an Xbox 360 controller.)

It'll allow you to keep spraying bullets with the back of your thumb joint, then kick in jumps or dodges as needed with the front of thumb.

As far as other issues go? I would have liked having some kind of screen select or boss rush for practicing. (I suppose just playing the game is practice enough. Still, I would have liked to focus on a few trouble spots at my leisure.) I know some people in the forums for this game on Steam were disappointed that the multiplayer function was local co-op only, but man, I can't imagine what a mess the net code and rollback situation for this kind of game would have been like. Especially, when you live in the middle of Fuckoff, Iowa and the really cool players are out in South Korea. I guess people out here do okay with whatever flavor of "Call of Duty" is available, but those games are also far more forgiving when it comes to injury and death. It's hard to get people recruited for this kind of abuse.

Although, I could see my dad playing this. Maybe just once!

Look, this game isn't for everybody. I get it. It’s a tough cookie. But, I think "Wild Guns Reloaded" deserves more than for half of its players to give up on it within 0.3 seconds of their first death. It's a wonderfully constructed game, and there's a lot of logic underpinning its challenges. It does require some gumption, analytical skills, and reflexes to push past the worst the game throws at you, but it's not insurmountable! Hell, the game gives you infinite continues! You just gotta grit your teeth and get in there!

Hell, I got my first game clear in under four hours of playing! It can be done, and maybe even in a reasonable amount of time! (Though, maybe keep your playing sessions under an hour and a half to give your hands a break.)

If you feel like you could use a waltz with a Winchester, "Wild Guns Reloaded" is currently available on Steam for $14.99. You may want to wait for a sale, if you're feeling iffy on it. Fine. Reasonable. Definitely more so than the average going price of ~$250.00 for the original SNES game. I might be a sucker for the retro market, but damn it. Even I've got to put my foot down every once in a while. Especially, when an affordable upgrade is available!

Life is hard. Sometimes, people just want to work on their cutesy little gardens and snuggle with their video game spouses. Get through the sadness softly. There's room for that in this world. Hell, there should be more room for it, if we're being honest.

But, uh…I prefer having a hearty digital ass-kicking instead. Even when neither the computer nor I know whose ass is going to get kicked.

[gurokichi]

I live in a small city in a farming community, most people around here have pets! We definitely have more than most though, we are just big animal lovers! Awe, I'm so sorry to hear that they aren't keen on the idea of you keeping pets, they truly are amazing! I love rats so much, they make such great little friends, I hope you get some ratties one day <3

Doll will definitely have to check out both Stardew and Fields of Mistria once it gets its computer!!! I also have so much freetime on my hands right now,,, does Bon not go to school? Be free to DM me, Bon already knows who Dolly is (III╥_╥⁠)

In Minecraft, I really like the grindy stuff (chopping down trees, mining), as well as building!!! Oftentimes, I'll put a bunch of effort into the outside of my house, and the inside is an organized disaster! In the Sims usually I build, I rather build houses in the Sims than play with the Sim,,, usually I will build a Sim or a family, then create a house for them! I feel like actually playing a household in the Sims can get very repetitive, though, and it just doesn't seem to keep my attention for as long as building or creating a Sim/Family! My recent favorite games to play on roblox have been, Stop it Slender, Doors, and Hide and Seek! Slow Damage and Sweet Pool are both BL Visual Novel games made by the Company Nitro+CHiRAL. They both contain darker topics and themes, but I know that at least SD is absolutely amazing. I don't know much about Sweet Pool tbh, other than there is gore and cannibalism, but I'm quite set on playing it eventually! Slow Damage I just desperately want to play myself, I've watched about halfway through a playthrough of SD and read the manga, which covers the first (Fraise) chapter of SD!

-Doll 🎀

That sounds like such a lovely place to live! I'd kill to live somewhere like that. Ehehe, thank you for the kind words. Rats are just adorable and so intelligent too! I also hope I'll be able to get some one day.

Ah, how come you have a lot of free time? School's started up already for most people (/nf). I don't go to school, I have pretty bad agoraphobia, and so I just never got the courage to return to going after schools opened up again. You can see in my pinned that I identify with the term "hiki(komori)neet" because of that. ...I hope that doesn't make you think less of me. I appreciate the offer to DM you, and I'll keep it in mind. I get nervous pretty easily, so it might take me a little bit, ahah.

I also enjoy the Minecraft grind! Building in both Minecraft and the Sims is fun. I definitely agree with you that actually playing households can get boring quickly. I love the customization aspects of the Sims much more. I haven't heard of Stop It Slender in awhile; that's an olddd game. It used to be one of my favorites to play, though! Doors is fun; you might like Pressure too if you haven't tried that. It's similar to Doors. Speaking of doors, I still need to play floor 2... waiting for my friends to play with me. I'll be sure to check those two visual novels out and see if they'd be something I'd enjoy playing for my doll. They seem interesting!

You sent an ask off anon again, silly doll. I'll answer that one here too.

Doll will be sure to make the bracelet tonight or tomorrow and will definitely show you!!! So happy Bon liked my idea! (⁄ ⁄>⁄ ▽ ⁄<⁄ ⁄) 💕 Eep! -Doll

I can't wait to see it! You can either send it to me in DMs or send an ask containing the image. If you send an ask, I won't post it unless you specify wanting me to... although you do need to go off anon to put images in asks. Probably best you stick to DMs if you don't want to expose your blog.

[hummingbird-games]

2022 IN REVIEW (VN/INDIE GAMES EDITION)

(Missed last year’s?? Check me out!!)

This year had lots of personal high highs and lower lows, so I’m glad I had games to distract from things 😂Without further ado, here’s my year in review:

DEMOS

Pivot of Heart - I’m unsure of the current status of this one, but I played it earlier this year and fell in love with the MC, the art, and was intrigued by the tarot inspired gameplay!

My Alien Roommate - I will 100% be supporting the Kickstarter the MOMENT it’s live. I was actually upset when I reached the end of the demo knowing good and well it was only a demo so that’s how you know I had a fun time 🤣 also, how can you not wanna romance an alien?? That’s what I thought. 

Our Life Now and Forever - On one hand, if you’re plugged into the VN scene, you’re already aware of this game and there’s no need for me to draw attention to it. On the other hand, to quote Billie Stevenson, “I do what I want.”

Infinite Blue - Oh man did I have fun with this one! To say I’m excited for the full game is an understatement! (review for this one is on the blog too btw)

Error143 - Seeing people simp for Micah Yujin has added 10 years to my life because a dark-skinned love interest getting THIS much attention??? Players be ready to risk it all for him and I love it. Also yeah he has my attention too, I am not immune, TF you thought this was???☠️

Garden of Seif - I’m not much help in selling this game because I just straight up inhaled it?? Everything was on point, from the characters, to the unraveling story, to our LIs and supporting cast, and of course, can’t love a game with loving the MC (at least, that’s how I work)

Fully Released & Played (at least 1 playthrough)

Gilded Shadows - The brain rot for this game is so real??? So. Damn. Real. It got to a point where after I played so many routes and unlocked multiple endings that I had to stop playing so I could work on my game! And there’s still content on the way?????? Oh to live at the same time as GS 🤗

Sifting Thyme - I’d be lying if I said this wasn’t my favorite high school otome game.  And I thought long and hard about the many other games I’ve played. And I have played a lot of high school romance/dating sim games ☠️ But this one takes the cake!!--and because food is involved, pun intended. If I could have played this in one sitting I totally would have.

An Everyday Love - Check the tags on this blog. I never shut up about this game. Seriously. 

Butterfly Soup 2 - Sequel’s only been out for like 2 months and I’m already begging for a third.  

Blanket Cat & Teacup - The first is a cozy visual novel that gives storybook/ younger me watching Reading Rainbow vibes, and the second is a puzzle, point and click narrative about an introverted frog girl who needs to get tea ingredients for her party, and both these games reminded me of the healing power of gaming. 

Still Shinning - Simply and lovely in its execution. I need to check out this dev’s other titles as well!

Portrait of a Texas Family - If you play no other games on this list, play this one. I don’t have any better words other than “I love it” and “this family and their love and their worry stick with you”.

Dusk & Dawn - SFHJSHFJSEJE THIS WAS SO GOOD LIKE WHAAA??? Black female MC, demi rep, superheroes, 2 dating options, multiple endings/dead ends, ughhh this game had it all. The only thing stopping it from being perfect is a sequel. And no, there’s no announced sequel so we can sulk together...

Fully Released (& still on 1st playthrough)

Wylde Flowers - I suck at farming sims in general, but this game has a special place in my heart. It’s the definition of charming + cozy and it was made to be played in bed so shoutout to the Switch port!!

ValiDate: Struggling Singles in your Area - I want to go in depth about this game when I’ve played all or majority of the routes, but for now just know I also believe this game was made for playing in bed LOL.

Gemi’s Gushies

(a list within a list of games that have devs trucking along in the background and I want to spotlight for y’all)

Band Camp Boyfriend

Ise and Kai

The Closet Door

Herotome

College Craze

Trouble Comes Twice

[raitrolling]

ok now i have Brain Power (AAAAE-A-E-I-E-A-) again i can go back to my thoughts on how my ocs would play Cosy Games cuz i always think its funny how people always assign characters who are Nice People as being solely animal crossing or minecraft or stardew players and its always like 'they have really pretty towns and are nice to all the NPCS uwu'

katrin is one of those people who maybe plays for hours one day but then never picks up the game again. shit like animal crossing is too daunting for her because you put down that game for a week and your town is full of weeds and the animals ask where youve been and it is just Too Scary to return to and face your failures

nancor likes to aimlessly wander around in his games and is prone to getting lost. you check your minecraft server logs and you just see him getting mauled by various mobs. hes having fun tho, dont worry about it

ashe is a Sidequest Guy, always doing all the little jobs for npcs because he likes to be helpful :) he agonises for ages over what gifts to give his animal crossing villagers when he sends them mail because he wants to make sure they like it, he needs a Good Grade In Friendships ok. he would also get up to a point in a stardew or harvest moon game where an npc asks to marry him and then he immediately checks with cheran if its okay for him to say yes or if he should turn them down LMFAO

velour is looking up tutorials for how to design the prettiest minecraft houses ever, and trying to make sure his stardew farms are the most Aesthetic ever. catch him awake at like 5am having spent all night redesigning his entire animal crossing island because he's going to livestream a tour for his YouTube channel and it needs to be Perfect

mikiel could care less about video games, and is doing the bare minimum in any game he'd touch. most likely the guy who does all the combat quests in Minecraft like fighting the ender dragon or the wither so other people he's playing with can get all the items

lucy is a Task Guy, and is dutifully doing every single daily chore in the game as well as trying to finish any quests as quickly as possible to not keep any NPCs waiting. loves fishing minigames, and completed his fishing + bug catching sections in the animal crossing museum within like a week after he learned how to time travel

viltau is a Spreadsheet Guy aiming for 100% completion and get the absolute most out of any game he'd touch, but he is also an Aesthetics Guy prone to completely renovating his animal crossing worlds / farming sim farms on a whim because he's gotten bored of how they look. he is just like velour being awake at ungodly hours trying to redo his island, but rather than doing it for fan approval hes just generally Deranged

glas just likes to fuck around and doesn't care about having any long-term goals in their games, and generally just designs shit to weird out any of their friends who visit their animal crossing island or minecraft server. why is there a corner of their island full of dolls? why do they have big meme murals in the nether? why is their cow named 'daddy milkies'? don't worry about it

vallis gets obsessed with any sort of animal raising or breeding mechanic and tends to forget about everything else. yeah his island is full of weeds and he still hasn't paid off any debts, but check out his rows upon rows of perfect hybrid flowers he's been crossbreeding

[mamthew]

When Harvestella was first announced, I was surprised by how excited I was for it. I don't even play farming sims, and I've had more criticism than praise for Square Enix side projects like Bravely Default and ESPECIALLY Octopath Traveler, but the trailer was so reminscient of Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles that I couldn't help but eagerly anticipate it. The idea of a fifth season of death that kills crops, forcing adventurers to venture outside in search of a way to stop it had the potential to give this farming sim as potent a sense of urgent melancholy as miasma had done for FFCC, and I've yearned for some kind of aesthetic successor to that game for nearly as long as I've been playing video games, with little luck. The game's action combat and use of huge crystals as setpieces further cemented in my mind that the two games were alike.

Harvestella isn't like Crystal Chronicles. It's not like Bravely Default, or Octopath Traveler. Hell, it's not even developed by Square Enix. The developers, Live Wire Inc, cut their teeth on shoot 'em up ports until 2021, when they released a sidescrolling Dark Fantasy action RPG they co-developed under a small publisher. Harvestella might be published by Square, then, but it is not to my mind A Square Game. It doesn't feel like it's trying to be the contemporary version of an old Square property the way much of Square's smaller output does. It feels like an indie game. Harvestella is best thought of as a passion project by some folks who didn't really have the budget to make something as lavish as their ideas deserved but did have some really talented artists who were able to smooth over some of the rough edges with some absolutely gorgeous visual art, one of the best RPG soundtracks in years, and a thoughtful and complex story.

Harvestella is an overly-simple action-RPG and also an overly-simple farming sim with an absolutely bonkers story that has absolutely nothing to do with farming. It's missing a lot of features that are expected in its genres. Its tutorials in some areas are close to useless, there's no way to see how much money a product will sell for until it's been sold - which is uhhhhhhh not great in a genre about simulating mercantilism, its combat never reaches a point where it feels complex or even good, its farm customization options are too basic for your farm to ever really feel like your own, and it has no romance options. None of these are dealbreakers for me - obviously, as I put over 90 hours into the game - but they're not great issues to have, either. Also, the game simultaneously has too much voice acting and not enough. Almost none of the dialogue is voiced, but characters have lines in battle and while you're farming, and the delivery for those lines ranges from just good enough to abysmal. A voice line kicks in every single time you perform any farming action, and for some reason all those lines are done in a really grating falsetto stage whisper that makes the game actively embarrassing to play. Frankly, I don't think the game is worth $60. It clearly wasn't budgeted like a AAA game. Lots of love and talent went into it, but that's true of plenty of $30-$40 games. I came away from Harvestella feeling like I'd played an indie game that industry giant Square Enix pretended was something else. But that's not the fault of Harvestella or its devs - that's Square's fault.

I want to get into story spoilers next, because the themes and philosophies of Harvestella are unique enough that I was baffled by most of the game's story decisions for over half the game, before they made it clear what they were getting at, exactly. Honestly, what Harvestella is trying to say is probably the most interesting thing about it, in a way that reminds me of Legend of Mana, which is high praise. Harvestella is a game about cultural constructs and societal collapse. For a time, I was describing the game as "post-truth," and I still think that's accurate, but not exactly in a conservative way. The first two-thirds of the story felt impenetrable for this reason. It kept making story decisions that were directly counter to the decisions that I'm used to RPGs making.

For example, one party member is a high-ranking church official, but when she joins the party, she learns that the church leader, who adopted her as a child and took her into the church, is a literal monster who has been using his position in the church to eat adherents. Pretty standard RPG fare. In the party member's side story, she learns that the church's doctrine itself was created by an AI. A robot was tasked with keeping humans from fighting each other too much and decided the most effective way of doing so was to procedurally generate a holy book using texts like the Bible and the Koran as inspirations. In most games of this kind, when the characters learn that a church's foundational history is entirely fabricated and its clergy has been engaging in murdering innocents, the characters then fight to dismantle the church. Here, though, the character decides that the good of the church, even if it is based on lies, outweighs the harm it has inflicted, and places herself as the church's leader and central figure so she can better control it as a force for good. She says she does this to "fight the status quo."

In another character quest, a character learns that his memories about the royal family he serves are all fabricated, as the family doesn't actually exist. When he confronts the robot who created his memories, the robot tells him that the species that created it had gone extinct before it was ever given consciousness, and it decided that carrying out orders for a fake master you vividly remember is better than the hell of doing the same for a real master that you have never met and never will meet. with this in mind, the character decides to keep and cherish his false memories. Moments like these gave me whiplash, and I talked to anyone who would listen about how strange the game's decisions were.

It's only in the last third of the game that these themes about pushing back against what's true and inconvenient in favor of what's imagined but comforting begin to coalesce into something interesting and worth engaging with. I won't get into all the details, but like most RPGs, Harvestella is a game about the coming climate crisis. It is revealed partway in that Harvestella takes place two millennia in the future, after humanity went extinct and new humans evolved to take their place through sci-fi means that don't really matter. The people of our time had tried desperately to flatten the differences between humans and drive cooperation in the face of climate disaster. When the internet failed, they developed technology to push the continents back together into a Pangaea, hoping that proximity would foster understanding. When that failed, scientists created a telepathic machine that could read the thought patterns of the entire population - essentially an artificial collective unconscious - so they could discover some kind of consensus they could build on. The only consensus the machine could find, in the face of seemingly inescapable societal and environmental collapse, was a belief that there was no chance of a future. People feared the existence of human diversity, fell back on nostalgia for an idealized past, and in doing so had unintentionally formed a death cult  - essentially, they had embraced fascism.

Quietus, the season of death, was created by this artificial collective unconscious to grant humanity's shared wish for an apocalypse. The game uses its theme of illusions versus the truth to argue that while the logical course of action in the face of dire news and statistics is to accept that the odds of surviving and building a better world are infinitesimally small, we have to ignore the facts and push on to survive and build that better world regardless, because there's no chance of it happening if we give up at the starting gate. It's remarkably similar to FFXIV Endwalker's dichotomy of despair versus hope and message that forcing ourselves to feel a false hope just to stave off despair is better than allowing ourselves to despair and therefore not even trying to fix things. Even Harvestella's final boss is very reminiscent of FFXIV's Endsinger boss in theming and design. Which I don't mind and don't really think is a case of one developer copying the other; this stuff is just on everyone's minds lately.

When I first began describing Harvestella as "post-truth," I did so entirely as a comparison to the rise in political lies spread and accepted by the right-wing that has been widely discussed since the beginning of the Trump era. As the game justified its theming, however, I found myself beginning to want to embrace "post-truth" as a much broader and even somewhat positive characteristic of our era. We're quickly reaching a point where believing that there can be a future at all is a lie we knowingly tell ourselves, which was the point Harvestella makes. But in a time where we are becoming increasingly aware of the presence of hegemonic narratives influencing our perceptions of reality, just pushing back against those narratives can be, to an extent, post-truth. Harvestella has almost no character creation options, but it does allow the player to choose body type, voice, and pronouns entirely independently of each other. I'd originally seen this as a nice little addition to a game in a genre that often does embrace queerness, but now I'm starting to view it as an opening manifesto. From a certain point of view, queerness is a sort of engagement in post-truth. We all are who we say we are, hegemonic narratives be damned.

The secret class you earn in Harvestella for building up your farm enough is the Aristotle, a kind of mage that can fight using the four classical - or Aristotelian - elements, fire, water, wind, and earth, which pop up throughout the game. One character from our own time finds everyone's acceptance of the classical elements frustrating when she knows about the existence of the periodic table. But because she's in a world where people only know of four elements, those elements function as the philosopher Aristotle had theorized they had. Even after your protagonist learns that there is a far greater range to science than their society has learned, they are an Aristotle anyway, drawing energy from only four elements and using that energy to cast powerful magic. Our hegemonic narratives may limit our scope, but as a bloc, we have the power to shape those narratives and change the scope. Our collective imagination can construct Truth, which is an incomprehensible amount of power that's mostly been used to oppress and harm, but we could, in theory, turn around and use for good.

I'm not sure where the line is - if there is one at all - where postmodernity ends and this post-truth begins, but I'm starting to begin to think of things in those terms. I think there's some real potential in exploring the limits and capacity of this framework, and I guess I have a simple farming sim and a simple RPG to thank.

So, Harvestella. It's an overpriced, low-budget but pretty little game with some cringeworthy voice lines, some fun farming, and a story that's possibly impacted how I think about the world from here on out. 7/10.

[thegeminisage]

ASK MEME

i got tagged by @runawaymarbles, tyvm i lov doing these

What book are you currently reading?

no books atm but i'm actually getting through the entire tag of a rarepair from ff13...only 41 fics :(

What’s your favorite movie you saw in theatres this year?

did i go to a theater this year...? surely at least once. OH YEAH i went to see sonic 2. since that's the only movie i saw in theaters this year that'll be my favorite one

What do you usually wear?

comfy-at-home clothes: tank top, shorts, no-show socks, hair fork, & bandana. out & about clothes: bandana & hair fork if i'm working or my hair needs washing, otherwise i keep it loose. a lot of black pants/shorts and bright glittery monochrome or tye-dye tank tops w/ black or rainbow choker, rainbow earrings, pride bracelet, smiley face ring, rainbow ring, ace ring, and sometimes my triforce necklace. if it's cold i will also wear rainbow arm warmers/socks and fingerless gloves with the pink peace symbols on them. if i'm REALLY dressing up i will wear rainbow tights under a long shirt or short dress. wow sorry this is the longest answer so far i just really love bright fashion!!! i can't believe god nerfed me by making plus sized clothes fucking suck so bad

How tall are you?

5’1 :/

What’s your Star Sign? Do you share a birthday with a celebrity or a historical event?

i think i'm actually a cancer LMFAO. and stuck with this username...idk about any celebrities but my birthday IS on the summer solstice which is absolutely bitchin' in my professional opinion. i could not possibly have asked for a better date although i do wish it didn't have to fall on father's day sometimes

Do you go by your name or a nick-name?

i go by liz which is not my legal first name. technically my legal middle name isn't liz either it's like elizabeth obviously but my first name is cringefail and nobody can spell it OR say it so i just don't tell most people what it is lol. i started going by liz when i was in 8th grade and sometimes my mom STILL messes it up...

Did you grow up to become what you wanted to be when you were a child?

no BUT as a kid i really really really really REALLY wanted pink hair. as an adult no one can stop me. kid me would be so jealous of adult me's look in EVERY way

What’s something you’re good at vs. something you’re bad at?

good at: dreaming. you know how in the 40s-60s most people dreamed in black and white because that was how tv looked? apparently if you play enough video games you'll get so good at controlling a simulated environment you can simply wake up on command. i never completely mastered lucid dreaming but it's a neat trick anyway. bad at: sleeping. exhibit a: i am answering this meme at 2:30 in the fucking morning, and i have not had 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep since december 10. that's like 28 days!

Dogs or cats?

CATS!!!!!!! i like dogs too tho

What’s something you would like to create stuff for?

i would love to draw some zelda art. i just need a new tablet sadly none of the old ones work with my pc

If you draw/write, or create in any way, what’s your favourite picture/favourite line/favourite etc. from something you created this year?

UGH i can't post it, it's in the undisclosed project

What’s something you’re currently obsessed with?

so a very long time ago when we were teenagers my brother showed me minecraft. i played half an hour of it and then gave the controller back and told him i couldn't keep going because i would quite literally never put it down if i did. unfortunately i did NOT show that same level of foresight and self-restraint when downloading the demo of SLIME RANCHER. in my defense i was utterly unprepared for its sheer potency. i played exactly four minutes of the demo before i caved and bought it - $5 was a steal - without realizing how absolutely lethal it is to combine adhd with a farming sim especially during seasonal depression months. this thing has been churning out dopamine so fast my stupid little rat brain can't keep up. i'm frying every last pleasure receptor i ever had as thoroughly as i possibly can. i am begging one of you to physically come to my house and uninstall it from my pc.

What’s something you were excited about that turned out to be disappointing this year?

andor 🙏 sorry to all andor enjoyers but it fucking sucked (except for the prison break)

What’s a hidden talent of yours?

i'm freakishly good at packing things. items into boxes, boxes into vehicles, organizing drawers and closets, etc. at my house we call it "tetrising" since i guess that's a pro gamer move that translates to the real world..................

Are you religious?

no i am disqualified for being gay <3

What’s something you wish to have at this moment?

a completed copy of this photo album i'm supposed to be making. i got behind bc i was playing slime rancher :(

ok im tagging @slaygentford @maulthots @brownbicon @machidielontheway @paty-ofarrell @ozymandiasdirge @moogleterra @marcelgerard @elsa12tmnt @smellslikebot @youngbenkenobi and anyone else who wants to do it, do it & say i tagged you!!

[thessalian]

Thess vs Forever Demos

It’s the Steam Next Fest again! It’s throwing me a whole lot of different sorts of things at the moment; last time I went mental over the demos was when I was up to my eyes in DREDGE, so it was giving me a lot of eldritch horror. The last few weeks, though, I’ve been playing Wylde Flowers, so I got cutesy farming sims and, because there are only so many of those, I got puzzle games too. Probably because of my daily dose of A Little To The Left. So here we go!

Venba: I heard about this one from a Guardian article ages ago, so it’s been on my wishlist a long time. It’s a cooking sim sort of thing (so it ended up being suggested to me both because it was on my wishlist and because I’ve been poking at Cook, Serve, Forever a bit lately), and has some story behind it, and there was not enough demo in my demo. I mean, yes, it was enough to let me know that yes, I want it. It was just one of those moments of “Noooooooo I’m not ready for it to be over yet!” So that one hit the top of the wish list pretty quickly.

Street of Secrets: This one’s a hidden object game along the lines of A Building Full Of Cats, from a publisher / dev team that apparently focus mostly on jigsaw puzzle type deals and hentai. Which ... I mean, okay, but give me cute relaxing hidden object games. That went high up on the wishlist pretty fast too.

Viewfinder: This is another “messing with the set dressing” puzzle and walking simulator kind of thing. First person, so I have to be careful with it, but some of the mechanics are really clever. I mean, it’s a “mess with reality a bit so you can proceed” sort of thing, so yeah, clever. Another one that is Much Want.

Word Factori: Not sure what to make of this one. It’s basically this little thing where you can put a whole bunch of letter-generating factories together to make ... well, letters and whole words. It’s cute, but I don’t know if it’s really my kind of Zen.

En Garde!: This one’s ... cute. Interestingly tactical RPG that’s mostly about fencing. Just involves a lot of blocking and stun-locking and gets a bit busy for what I personally can handle. I’d recommend it to others, though. Just I don’t think I’d get on well with it long-term. It’s still on the wishlist, but quite low down; it’d be a game for when I’m having a really good day.

Logic Town: You know those logic puzzles where you get a grid and have to determine who lives where and got what pet or whatever? Well, that’s the mechanic, but with a somewhat different layout. You get clues and use them to determine what belongs with whom, whether by being directly told or by process of elimination. This was another one that I was not ready for it to be over when the demo was done. And it doesn’t even have a solid release date - just “2023″. ...But I want it noooooooow.

Quilts & Cats of Calico: This one stays low down on the list. It’s cute, but complicated. Basically involves putting quilts together with matching of colours and patterns, and getting extra points by attracting cats with specific matches. Adorable, but a little complicated for the Zen kind of thing I’d want it for.

Tales from Candleforth: Another hidden object puzzle game sort of thing, but another one where it needs work before release. I’m fine with having to poke around to find out what you need to do, but one single solitary clue might be nice when you’re dealing with a dismembered doll-baby with flowers growing out of its head and a day / night mechanic that makes some of the flowers bloom and some wilt and at least knowing the objective might have been nice... But it’s only got “coming soon” as a release date so there’s time, I guess.

That’s about all for the moment. I did one for a farming / life sim kind of thing called Wholesome Out and About, but it wasn’t so much a demo of the game as a look at the character customisation process. Which was fun but didn’t tell me much about what the game is actually like. But that one’s TBA and struggling for money to finish up so I guess I get it. So it’ll sit and gather dust at the bottom of my wishlist for awhile, I figure. I still have something called Fall of Porcupine and a first look at House Flipper 2, not to mention a few others that have been sitting in my Demo collection for awhile, but not tonight. It’s late, I’ve had a hard week, and I have shit to do tomorrow, so that’s enough for one day. Besides, I found a whole lot of good ones, and some even come out next month!

...I take my victories where I can find them.

[goose3gg]

Why can’t I commit [to a new Nintendo Switch Game]?

Recently, I’ve been on a mission: find a new Nintendo Switch game to distract myself from the games I’m avoiding playing [Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley,  both come to mind] and I’ll tell you exactly why I’m avoiding those games. In my opinion, it’s a huge challenge trying to find 

As a female gamer, sometimes it’s challenging digging through the buzzwords of the gaming community. I hear one end of the spectrum is “Cozy Games” and on the other side is... Rogue-Likes? First person Shooters? Street Fighters? Puzzle Games? Why is the only descriptor I can find of cutesy, organization, relaxing games default to this weird code word of “cozy?” Trying to find games that I’ll like based on this weird criteria, where unless the game is overtly cutesy on the outside, a single creator must deem this type of game “cozy” for it to be labeled as such. I’d love to get into a feminist, gendered debate but the subject at hand is still myself, attempting to find a Switch game I’d enjoy, digging through countless reviews of different types of games.

Why can’t I play Animal Crossing? Although I did purchase the Animal Crossing themed switch, I am not a historical Animal Crossing player. I actually grew up playing Pokemon, the card game and the DS/Gameboy games. I will admit, I am currently avoiding my current Pokemon Diamond Victory Road victory, I know I need to make my team stronger but alas I just don’t feel the commitment for it at the moment. Many game reviewers discuss how they believe that this current edition of Animal Crossing is the weakest, the least structured, and laziest, is the term most often used. I don’t hear many positive reviews of this game, due to its lack of consistent updates, and in my opinion, lore and add ons. Nintendo didn’t put much effort into the downloadable content of Happy Home Paradise, and in my own experience, I didn’t have fun in the game until I used the only two available cheats that Nintendo has somehow allowed to slip by, being; the ability to use other people’s designs for pathways, buildable objects, etc, and treasure islands. Both reminded me of the Sims cheats I used to use, bb.infinitemoney, etc, to allow for things that crutched the game, or allowed more of a freeplay version. I quickly acquired every item I could ever want, and after furnishing my house, I got bored pretty quickly. Because everyday is time synced in Animal Crossing, meaning that everyday you log on, whatever time of day it is, it’ll be the same in the game. I know a lot of people that time jump, meaning they change the time and date on their Switch to unlock things in Animal Crossing, I personally thought this was a little excessive, but to each their own. I just didn’t find the villagers interesting enough to keep me coming back, to be honest I never understood how turnips worked, and I just wasn’t convinced to keep playing the game. The last time I played Animal Crossing was about 3 hair colors ago, if that gives you an idea. 

Why can’t I play Stardew Valley? Stardew Valley has lower stakes than Animal Crossing, and is definitely easy to get back into. Again, I didn’t grow up on years of Stardew Valley, so I know very little about the lore and the long term actuality of the game. I enjoy going into cult classic games like these two cold, so I can be surprised and enjoy the game to its fullest. I also find it a big challenge, however I know if I look too hard into gameplay advice I’ll get stuck on how to perfectly play the game which is simply impossible. Stardew’s days are much shorter than Animal Crossing, and the game is also a fraction of the price. In my experience, playing Stardew can feel slightly rushed, and challenging to get everything done right. Right now I’m entering Spring of my 3rd year and I am not very proud of my farm or my organization in game. When I see how well organized streamers are I definitely feel as though I’m playing the game incorrectly. It’s an enjoyable game but because I haven’t researched the lore sometimes I feel like I’m missing the bigger direction or meaning in the game. Because Stardew takes itself a little less seriously than Animal Crossing, I find myself more easily coming back to a less intimidating game. 

Finally, what games am I considering to avoid these Cozy Gaming classics? To give you a more rounded idea of the games on my Switch, here’s some games I’ve bought/downloaded.

I just finished Coffee Talk and Cozy Grove, working on The Lego Harry Potter Collection, I couldn’t get stuck on Garden Story, Life is Strange: True Colors [I might’ve watched too many streams of this one.. I don’t wanna larp. I’m sorry], CatTails, AER, The Last Campfire, Danganronpa/Doki Doki Literature Club [I just haven’t gotten around to it], Scott Pilgrim is just a tad too challenging for me alone, I’m working on it as well. I’m so tired of reading these same titles over and over again, and I refuse to download the organization games just because they’re so short. I was interested in Inscryption, so I started watching some streams of it to see if I’d like it and I’m still unsure. If anyone has any recommendations, I’d love to hear some but I don’t know if the problem is just me. I enjoy these games, I just would love something fresh and not a super huge commitment. I’ve been watching some Breath of the Wild streams which inticed me, but I’m also not a Legend of Zelda person. Maybe I need to branch out, maybe I need a kind stranger on the internet to recommend the perfect game for me. 

[electromelancholy]

i was tagged in two different mention games by @stressfulsloth and also @lonlonranching and i am going to mash them up :))))))) it was a million years ago that i was tagged so i am also tagging the both of you to do this with updated information if you like

Current time: 9pm

Anything you've been doing lately: weaving! i bought a frame loom for cheap and i have been teaching myself how to weave. I am not good at it in any way but it is enjoyable.

Anything you intend to do later: in a couple hours me and some friends are going to try out this new multiplayer farm sim that we all bought

Anything you recently watched or played: a friend came over a couple weeks ago and i watched them play Disco Elysium. It was the first time since I played in Nov 2021 that I got more than an hour or so into the game and it was SO fun to watch someone get into it and engage with the world again with someone.

Anything you want to watch or play: bought a stupid amount of games in the steam sale. paratopic pathologic 1 portal 1 sun haven (aforementioned multiplayer farm sim) stardew valley genesis noir. the yawhg, which i played at a party not too long ago and it was really fun.

currently reading: i dont read a lot unfortunately but its been nice out so i keep going to the nearby queer bookstore to try and find something good (i am also not a good book purchaser)

currently listening: no music because i have a headache, but that just means a random song is playing in my head for no reason: it keeps switching between fuck the pain away (peaches) and best of you (foo fighters). i have not heard either of these songs in years

current obsession: farming sims. you're telling me i can make a little character and have them grow wheat that they can mill into flour that they can turn into dough that they can turn into apple pie? how did i not know this before?

[yemaema]

September Blog Post

Since attending Otakuthon, my mind has been abuzz with ideas. Ideas for art, for merch, for projects. Its the most alive I have felt with art in a long, long time. I'm so grateful I took the plunge and got to spend the weekend with really good friends!

That said, if you are looking in from the con, thanks for your support!!

Lately I've been playing Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life, and its really got my brain buzzing. I love farm sims, I love the way it makes you feel useful to a community, taking care of animals is rewarded, and getting a good harvest is so, so satisfying. The game has added a lot of QOL to the original. But in its small changes, it got me thinking: what haven't I (personally, in any case) seen in a farm sim that I'd want to see? Why can't I do more with animals? What if, instead of this, we had... that?

SOS: AWL also came with something I haven't seen in a long time in new  videogames: A game manual. Switch cases even come with a spot to put a game manual, and yet, virtually nobody makes them anymore. Its a shame because they have such a charm - this is proven in that retro games are often worth less without the original manual. And in even older games, it was the only way to get the context of the story.

With all of this, I started sketching. I started writing notes. What would a hypothetical farm sim look like if I made it? I don't have the time or the skill or the resources to make my own videogame. I think, though, it could be fun, to make a hypothetical game's game manual. Hell, it could be fun to make a game manual for existing, modern games, too! So I think this will be my current project and my current focus in September. 

For you, it means you can expect

More art

More sketches

More insight on my process

Downloadable .pdfs ??!!

Maybe even some research

And if you don't see it here, you will definitely see it on my socials

Twitter (however long that lasts...)

cohost

ko-fi

At the very least I think I'll try and make a blog post on the first of each month. In addition for September, my goal is to build up my personal website. Lately SM has only served to make me feel worse and tired and exhausted. So let's try and break away from that.

Thanks for reading all this! Have a lovely day!

[iloveabunchofgames]

March 2023 Game Awards

#JakeReviewsItch Game of the Month Archives

You know how this works: Every day, I review an Itch.io game, and on the first day of each month, I give prestigious awards to the previous month's games. There is no reason we need to acknowledge that I've been on hiatus for more than two weeks. We can just pretend that everything is normal. This month's award categories come courtesy of Steve Kim, whose Tweet was the first hit when I Googled, "1 like = 1 game". Thanks, Steve! He also has a long-abandoned Tumblog, which is pretty fun if you want some silly goofs about things that were happening on Giant Bomb 5+ years ago.

March's Games:

Akurra 🖤 Akuto: Showdown / Akuto: Mad World 🖤 The Alabaster Donut Farm 🖤 Alfal's Grove 🖤 Alien Life Lab 🖤 All Haze Eve 🖤 All You Can Eat 🖤 Alone With You 🖤 Alt-Frequencies 🖤 Ambidangerous 🖤 Amelie 🖤 Amethyst Hearth 🖤 An Airport Game 🖤 An American Werewolf In LA 🖤 An Outcry, prologue 🖤 Anarcute 🖤 And All Would Cry Beware! 🖤 And Yet It Moves 🖤 Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe 🖤 Animal Lover 🖤 Annwn: the Otherworld 🖤 Anodyne 🖤 Anomalies 🖤 Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story 🖤 Antecrypt⚡ 🖤 Antistatic 🖤 The Aquatic Adventure of the Last Human 🖤 Arachnopunk

1 - Very first video game. Akkura

Ah, the first of March 2023. Who could the forget the day I played the mostly decent demo of a Sokoban game?

2 - Your favorite character. The cute cute cutey l'il aminals from Anarcute

Bunnies and froggies and foxies and even platypuses! They're all cuuuuuuute, and they cheerfully work together to topple fascism!

3 - A game that is underrated. Animal Lover

I went back and forth quite a bit before settling on Animal Lover's score. It's currently the highest-rated 3/5, but maybe it should have been a low 4/5.

4 - Your guilty pleasure game. Anomalies

There were quite a few big, worthwhile games in March; games that take a lot of time and effort to review fairly. Anomalies is a procedural generation toy that turns a bunch of numbers into a random mess of polygons. It took very little time and effort to review, and I feel guilty about how much pleasure I got from that.

5 - Game character you feel you are most like (or wish you were). The Angry Video Game Nerd from Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe

The character I wish I were? No. The character I feel most like? He chooses to play bad games and complains about it on the Internet. Hello.

6 - Most annoying character. Right Stick from Ambidangerous

Trying to play both characters in a two-player co-op game on one controller? "Annoying" is putting it mildly.

7 - Favorite game couple. A man and his diner from All You Can Eat

In a month with a number of solid dating sims, none touched me quite as much as the story of a man who'd spent ten years living in a diner to get the most out of an all-you-can-eat coupon. It's a love story for the ages.

8 - Best soundtrack. Anarcute

Its infectiously poppy sound fits the look and feel of the game perfectly, but I'm listening to it now, removed from the game, and this is working, too. It's music that's suitable for writing, dancing, or smashing the state. I must remember to bump these tunes in my headphones next time I go Rollerblading.

9 - Saddest game scene. Putting it together in Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story

A moment that will come to different players at different times, so I won't go into any more detail. I'm still feeling it, weeks later.

10 - Best gameplay. Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe

Originality is great. You know what else is great? Mega Man. Castlevania. Contra. If you're going to steal, steal from the best. AVGN does just that, and it's a blast to play.

11 - Gaming system of choice. Steam

In mid-March, I wrote about my beef with Steam. Here's the link, though you can safely skip it. I don't believe I made my point very well at all. In a nutshell, I think Valve's monopoly over computer games stinks. For all its frustrating issues, though, Steam's controller support is an invaluable tool.

12 - A game everyone should play. All You Can Eat

All You Can Eat is what indie games are all about. It takes one idea—What if an adventure game were presented as a newspaper comic strip?—and turns it into a funny little thing that takes, like, half an hour to complete. Short, simple, and totally ingenious.

13 - A game you've played more than five times. Alien Life Lab

I've played through Alien Life Lab twice, which is close to five times.

14 - Current (or most recent) gaming wallpaper. Anarcute

I used care about the background on my computer, but some time in the last decade, Windows gave me the default scuba diver image, and then I changed it to an image of my choosing, and then it reverted to scuba again, and after two or three times, I just gave up.

I'm pretty sure my last desktop wallpaper was a picture of Synergy, the hologram computer that allowed Jerrica Benton to become Jem. What would everyone think if I gave up on writing about video games and turned this into a full-time Jem fan site? Anyway, Anarcute is cute. I don't think I have to explain this.

15 - Post a screenshot from the game you're playing right now. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl

"Has anyone ever successfully copied Super Smash Bros.?" I asked in my Antistatic review. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl answers that question: Yeah. I guess?

16 - Game with the best cut scenes. Alone With You

You'll see them 10,000 times, each, and get sick of them long before that, but there's no denying that this game's a looker.

17 - Favorite antagonist. Conservative politics and corporate overreach from Alt-Frequencies

If only such powers were confined to sci-fi video games.

18 - Favorite protagonist. Laura from Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story

The entire game is built around empathy for a stranger who's lost her phone, and it succeeds. I don't love Laura. I don't hate Laura. I don't want to be Laura. I understand Laura, and that is powerful.

19 - Picture of a game setting you wish you lived in. The level based on the Crossfire commercial from Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe

You'll get caught up in it!

20 - Favorite genre. Let's treat this as an excuse to talk about how much interactive fiction I played in March

Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story and Alt-Frequencies easily top the list, both of which are discussed elsewhere in these awards. If you haven't gotten the message yet, allow me to be direct: Play them. Now. Animal Lover is sweet, funny, and well-written. It's not at all what I expected from a dating sim about people who have been cursed to spend eternity as animals, only returning to human form when a clumsy, anxious young woman gives them a kiss. Amelie is a bit shallow and underdeveloped. The plot is unoriginal, it seems visually incomplete, and calling this fiction "interactive" stretches that word's definition to its limit. In spite of all that, I actually had an okay time with it. Amethyst Hearth is a cheesy Christmas rom-com turned visual novel by way of RPG Maker, and also the love interest is a robot. It's such a bizarre novelty that I couldn't help but give it a passing score. My review of An Outcry, prelude was so negative the game got pulled from Itch.io, and yet, it's stuck in my mind more than most of this month's games. "Kekekaykaykikikoo" and "they got a visit of terrific birdness" are powerful phrases. And finally, there's Arcade Spirits, a dating sim that takes place in an alternate-near-future video game arcade. I was severely messed up by a bad antidepressant prescription toward the end of the month. Is that the reason I didn't like this game? I don't think so. I could revisit it and update my review with new, sober opinions, but that period was a miserable experience, and I'd rather leave it in the past.

21 - Game with the best story. Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story

These categories are a little heavy on story, no?

22 - A game sequel which disappointed you. Akuto: Showdown

It's a bummer that it stripped features from Akuto: Mad World. It's cool that it focused on one mode and made it better. The best part is that you get both games for the price of one on Itch.

23 - Game you think had the best graphics or art style. Anarcute

No, but really, where is the merch? These characters need to be toys. And key chains. And erasers. They need to be printed on shirts and folders and... Just put them on everything. Who do I need to call to set up a meeting with Sanrio?

24 - Favorite classic game. Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe

AVGN contains remasters of two games that are, themselves, homages to classic games.

25 - A game you plan on playing. There Swings a Skull

And if that goes well, I might have a date with An Outcry. Oh, plus the hundreds (thousands?) of games that are already sitting in my Itch library.

26 - Best voice acting. Alt-Frequencies

Alt-Frequencies is played by switching between radio stations, recording and playing back snippets of speech. It wouldn't work without quality acting. I don't get the impression this game had the budget for top-tier vocal talent, which makes its accomplishments even more impressive.

27 - Most epic scene ever. Angry Video Game Nerd I&II Deluxe

28 - Favorite game developer. Accidental Queens

I will follow the developers of A Normal Lost Phone, Another Lost Phone: Laura's Story, and Alt-Frequencies wherever they want to take me. The Lost Phone games follow the same format, telling worthy stories in a lightly interactive but effectively non-linear format. Then Alt-Frequencies comes along, trading the phone interface for a time-looping, call-in radio sim, and that's brilliant, too. I can't wait to see this team continue to stretch and grow.

29 - A game you thought you wouldn't like, but ended up loving. Alien Life Lab

It's so janky. It seems bad. Maybe it is bad. I've played through the whole thing twice and loved it both times. I don't understand.

30 - Your favorite game of all time. Donkey Kong

This has nothing to do with the Itch games I reviewed in March. I've just always loved playing Donkey Kong on a proper arcade cabinet.

Thirty categories, and I didn't find a single place to mention Antecrypt⚡. Let that be my parting thought. Antecrypt⚡: It's worthy of mention.