#but like others on tumblr im a lore fan. AND i also know mechanics! so if you're ever in a bind ingame i can give some g8mr advice

[stormbreaker101]

welcome to wizblr!

hey looking for mutuals who are into wizard101 and post about it :) i've been on a playing streak but more than that i'm trying to get more knowledge on the lore for the sake of a story i'm writing (self indulgent lol but i like these things to be accurate)

i know the community is likely very small but this does not discourage me! please let's be friends

[thecoolerliauditore]

hater hour 👍

i feel like... maybe this is just me but ive been noticing this weird kind of disturbing trend of people being way overprotective of the CCs whilst increasingly aggressive towards their fellow fandom artists/writers.

We all love gem on here. i think it'd be preaching to the choir to say she didn't deserve the hate she got for. Existing in the series or whatever people were mad about. but more and more people seem to think that any negativity is Bad and Affects The CCs and when they list examples it's all like. idk. ppl not liking the SL mechanic or the watcher lore or certain gimmicks (zombie apocalypse comes to mind) etc etc

while we are not owed any level of quality for entertainment getting put out by mcyters For Free, this is still a series that means a lot to me and most of the fandom take it seriously. so it can be disappointing when it feels like decisions are made for the sake of rushing things or forcing something specific to happen. Limlife is my least favourite season by a pretty long margin because i think it was pretty apparent the cast were very burnt out during it and I would like for them to make the series at their own pace instead of doing that. I still loved limlife and think it's super funny i just think it was weighed down by a lot of things.

when secret life came to close i loved the ending but the fandom space. scared me a little and it still does kind of reek ngl. i saw blocks of text telling people to shut the fuck up about their favourite pairings or characters because How Dare they not appreciate every other person just as much Alot. and now im seeing people say we should "know our place" as fans and never voice our "entitled" discontent because the poor CCs are just doing this for fun. as someone who tries to dig deep on every individual character and relationship it just all felt a little bit. Violent.

This + ive been seeing a lot more people recently who are like. very very mad about the way people draw the CCs?? i know i do my fair share of hating on hybrid designs and being the fun police but like. people are genuinely out here accusing others of being Evil for not drawing specific body types to match characters to CCs while in the same breath saying that character/CC divide is obvious. +people being mad about like. arghh ear wings are dumb!! everyone who draws [specific headcanon] should be melted into wax!! so on and so forth

can we please stop assuming that tumblr user 69 saying lmao watcher lore dumb is going to give martyn inthelittlewood depression irl and start thinking about the mental health of more inexperienced artists who straight up Don't Know how to draw certain features yet that they're the scum of the earth for it in a space that's supposed to be fun.

if you're asking for people critiquing the series itself (one of the most popular mcyt series as a whole right now) to do it more gently and politely the least we can do is ask the same etiquette for talking about fanwork pls. that's also yknow. made for fun and shared for free 👍

[yostresswritinggirl]

@butterfly-mochi​ Rewrote this freaking thing thrice because it keeps getting deleted wth tumblr agjvahkfajkvk- I enjoyed writing it a lot tho and since I’m too weak to the characters I ended up writing for all of them (except for Sucrose, im sorry bb huhu, I ran out of brain power). This is my first time writing for so many of them in one go so please excuse me for any mistakes or blandness ywy thank you for letting me write for my baby Ganyu too hhhhh

Universe Reversal 2

Genshin Impact Character Reader and Modern Players with Zhongli, Childe & Ganyu (how they simp for you) (event masterlist / Part 1 / Part 3)

Zhongli the F2P

The most relatable out of the bunch because this man is still broke and can only rely on the primogems he can farm. And he had a LOT. The one thing he doesn’t have a lot on, however, is his luck.

So how did he manage to pull you?: Well after exhausting all his primogem on your banner with nothing but weapons and other characters, he has lost his resolve. But by some weird luck, there was a character bug that was fixed and in his email was the almighty consolation primogem. Enough for ONE pull. And by the Gods he FINALLY got you.

He’d nonchalantly post his screenshot of pulling you using a single acquaint fate in his friend group without any words and everyone else just loses their shit. “You got them in one pull?!” “Yeah” A riot.

This was partnered with the fact that not only is Zhongli an F2P player, but also barely has any five star characters.

He looks calm and apathetic over the news, but behind the screen he’s exhausted and relieved, silently livid.

He has no primogems left to squeeze for a constellation so you’re instead pampered with the best weapon suitable for you (because that’s all he keeps getting).

Zhongles spends most of his time farming for materials to quickly level you up, unlocking all your stories and voiceline, but he fucked up on your build (his artifacts are messy).

He follows communities, forums and videos regarding your character to know all the things he needs to perfect your build. You can barely make a dent against normal mobs, so he knew he was doing something VERY wrong.

Is the type of person to keep refreshing the page for new content, very updated.

Ask him a question about your character and he’s gonna bring you the word vomit that is his research. He’s not gonna stop- probably accidentally developed a copypasta for you.

Also follows your VA in both Tiktok and Twitter to indulge in every bit of content. He also has that screenshot of his pull saved and locked.

On his birthday, a friend of his gifted him a chibi plushie of you and he has treasured it ever since, treating and handling it like its a figurine.

“It is merely pure luck and grace from the gacha gods that I got this character, and I will make sure that they know I am very grateful for this fortune.”

Favorite Voiceline: Birthday Message

Childe The Whaler

This lucky wealthy bastard with no remorse for his money whales for EVERY character. He’s making a collection, which is to get all the characters, especially the five stars. So when your banner finally popped up, he’s gonna square up and trigger a whole ass meteor shower.

How he pulled you: Money. His luck with this games are actually not the best so he always compensates with money, he got you halfway through the first failed pity, almost giving him a heart attack that he might actually break the bank just to get you.

And then he pulls more to raise your constellation lol.

The first thing he does is look over your character info and read through it all; constellation infos, your base stats, artifact compatibility.

At the end when he’s maximized everything, he would then focus on playing around with your character *coughs climbing noises coughs*

He thought you’d just be another part of his collection but playing with your character was very enjoyable and in-line with his playstyle- oops 100 screenshots with the Kamera-

Any and all merchandise that he fancies would be his, and he’s definitely flexing it to the other sweetie nerds who call themselves simps. He’s fighting for the simping title, and he’s currently neck and neck with this fanartist in Pixiv.

Speaking of that fanartist, he definitely commissioned an expensive and detailed portrait of you, full rights and everything. No one else was allowed to use it but him.

Was also the first one with the audacity to call out your VA to create an account on Tiktok to create more content with your voice. He was successful.

His obssession also comes in the form of self-indulgent contents, and had been keeping track of the ship wars happening. During conventions, he cosplays as the character shipped with you the most (or the character he thinks should end up with you).

Silently scrutinizing those who cosplay you, only ever taking pictures with/of the best looking one, sorry haha

Definitely flaunts that you are his waifu/husbando and will fight for best girl/best boy during debates or polls. Has mobilized the community to vote for you once. He’s very persuasive.

“Hm? Why I’m just the best collector in the game, and I am more than happy to let everyone know that I am their number one fan haha, everyone who claims otherwise is definitely wrong!”

Favorite Voiceline: More About (Y/N) I-IV, (Y/N)’s Hobbies...

Ganyu the Employed

Ganyu, our dearest overworker, is one of the players in the older stage who actually has a job but still plays Genshin for their past times. The gorgeous sceneries and the music is her main focus in playing the game, not much of a try-hard but still decent in the combat mechanics.

How she pulled you: You came home within 50 pulls! And you appeared again after another 10 pull! Ganyu was so SHOOKT and so distressed because oh goodness, what does she do? She doesn’t know anything much about you!

Will rewatch your three trailers to try and understand your skills better, ended up saving the soundtracks from them because that was such a nice trailer music! Tnbee gains a new follower!

Ganyu will take a while before she can properly play or build you up because she’s so busy with work, she only ever plays when she feels fully done with her work.

During her break she plays with your character while multi-tasking on eating, earphones plugged in and sight on the phone as she farms materials and artifacts for you.

The moment she gets more help from her player friends tho, holy shit, you just ended up being so OP. She had so many good artifacts and weapons for you because she didn’t know what they were for before.

She loves how you’re so easy to use and can easily solo the enemies and even the boss fights. A huge breather, because now Ganyu can cheese the battles that takes a while, to give her more time to focus on the storyline and lores.

Since Ganyu plays for the story and aesthetic, she’ll find you almost always in her team. Still very proud of her pull, she makes the best screenshots of your fights or in the best angle through exploration.

Treasures you so much she starts talking to her phone- “Ah, no, please don’t fall.” “There’s violetgrass up there, let’s try and get it”

Blushes everytime you produce a sound when climbing, doesn’t change you anyways tho

Hums to your trailer music while working, and if permitted, would have the song on repeat while she buries herself in work. She finds it really refreshing and the time she spends in work miraculously flies by fast when she gets lost in the sound.

At one point, when she was given a day-off or if the convention was on her free time, she attends to look for cosplayers of you and take a picture. No one rejects her because she’s so adorable and cute when asking shyly.

Had brought a decent amount of merchandise, preferably the functional/practical ones like a phone cover, mug or keychain. Also has an earphones clamp with your little chibi self as the holder.

When asked, she would shyly announce that she likes your character the most.

“Their character theme and music really soothes me during work, it feels nice to have them, and I have not once regretted ever pulling for them. They are the best.”

Favorite Voicelines: Good Night/Afternoon..., About Us, Something To Share..., Interesting Things...

so enjoyable...

@moaa @zelos-simp @legionqueensav @dandelion-dreams @snackgod @rxsalinee

[strifesolution]

ask response + rambling abt mcyt, dont want ppl mistaking this as me disliking new age stuff so im putting it under the cut

i KNOW part of it is nostalgia blindness 100% honestly. i poke fun at dreamsmp’s popularity (despite now watching it myself and having a toe dipped in the fandom) out of??? jealous i guess? no other minecraft fandom was really like it, no matter how popular yogs/ah/mianite/team crafted got at their prime, none of them had the *fandom* culture it had. yogs had it special thing on tumblr, but it never reached cross platform. hermitcraft too, is still very popular, but hasn’t reached the same level dreamsmp has, and honestly, good! i really think it’s going to stick around *because* it’s not crazy popular.

 but the amount of fanmade content is INSANE compared to any other mcyt fandom. it’s unsurprising with people in quarantine having the time to watch long livestreams and produce it, and the fact that twitter is the norm for that fandom... you get the idea. and it just makes me, deep down, sad yogs never got an animatic that got 10 million views. 

but the THING ABOUT THIS IS i think that’s WHY it’s not the same! thinking back, im relieved old mcyt fandoms arent as main stream, god knows the alternate timeline where xephos getting confirmed gay trends on twitter. there was comfort (and still is) in them being small. even at its height the yogs fandom was condensed, ppl knew the names of most big fandom blogs, the drama wasnt often *between* fans, more between creators and fans, which is why the relation was distanced. 

im jumping topics here without rly finishing them, but also, on canon stuff. one thing that i care a lot about with yogs is that... nothing and everything is canon? the “lore” we were given was so vague and randomly thrown out ppl could pick and choose what they wanted. i really still appreciate what rythian and zoey acknowledged when they released the blackrock plot, abt how the story is ours now. w/ a lot of dreamsmp lore, ive noticed, yeah, it’s cool that stuff becomes canon and lore is validated, but then someone’s headcanon they made is inconsistent with what’s made canon, and bc of fandom pressure, they can’t rly express that headcanon without backlash or at least ppl explaining why its not canon

with yogs, i can say “hey, i headcanon nano and parvis as siblings!” and no one cares! but with dreamsmp, if i say “hey i like (x) and (y) as siblings” someone might say “actually, canonically (x) is the sibling of (z)”

dont get me wrong, i HAVE seen plenty of people super chill about personal headcanons! this is more just how by making certain things canon and not canon, the series looses its “its minecraft nothing is canon or non-canon” uniqueness to it.  ON YOUR SECOND POINT.

man. man. yeah. do you have any idea how bad i want server god dream lore on the smp??? that would fuck. something about the way the fandom characterizes admins is SO cool and im sad its just...not acknowledged on dreamsmp? same w other certain game mechanics, ppl getting kicked/banned, respawning, mechanics. remember how theres a lore explanation early blackrock about why modpacks change when servers change? THAT SHIT IS SO COOL. 

for my own personal reasons its hard for me to consume certain ghostbur content, but the whole “3 lore deaths” is cool in concept! but the dark comedy implications of respawning will always be more fun to me. ya dead ya dead was such a fun idea of hardcore mode as well. 

summery of this part: to some extent, old mcyt fandoms couldnt thrive without minecraft itself being popular, while dreamsmp just uses minecraft as its launching point

anyways, this is long and rambly and NOOOOOTTT consistent, but again, i like a lot of dreamsmp stuff, genuinely, but the general feeling and energy of it is VERY strangely than a lot of other mcyt fandoms. anyways its 5am im sorry if nothing makes senseaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

[hopoo]

RoR2 Q&A 12/2/17

Since we got a million asks, I’ll collapse all the answers periodically into one giant QA so it doesn’t ruin your tumblr feed. I tried to answer every question - if yours isnt there, someone else might’ve asked the same question. Expand below to read!

Q: Are you thinking about putting out a beta version to test or are you just waiting for the game to be fully released A: Not sure exactly how we want to do it – we HAVE to have some way of getting the game out to testers, especially for networking/matchmaking testing. It will most likely be some form of closed/limited beta, but we really haven’t though too much about it.

Q: Any ideas on what the system requirements could be? Will they be high or playable on most machines? Also will it work with integrated graphics? A: Most likely the game will be pretty light for GPU with our graphical style, but CPU intensive. What that actually translates to won’t be until the game is closer to launch, where we start optimizing.

Q: ROR1 most loved thing me and my friends liked to do is ruining the framerate with all the items that we had. we had lots of fun crashing the game for whoever hosted the game. might this still be able to happen? I'm looking forward to the release anyway and so are my friends especialy with peer to peer now we can connect better. A: Uhh hopefuly you won’t be able to crash the game, but the game will still scale infinitely like it did previously

Q: Could you make it so that when you use Unstable Watch and timestop, all colors in the game become inverted for the duration? And if you want to go all the way with a certain reference, have only Chef's cleavers stop in midair at the edge of a radius from an enemy, and when the timestop ends the cleavers hit at the same time. A: No memes

Q: Super excites for risk of rain 2. Im real glad i found it in a steam summer sale, bought then and after that bought it for my ps4. Are we going to see any new characters? (Bandit will always be fav so as long as hes good im happy) A: Yes, definitely new characters!

Q: can you make one of the new death messages be "HOST WHEN?" A: No memes!!!!

Q: While Vita's out of the question, what about the Switch, which basically seems to have slotted itself in the 'more powerful handheld device' niche? A: We’d obviously love to be on the switch, but that ultimately depends on A. can we optimize the game to run on the Switch, and B. do we have the technical know-how to actually get it running? Porting to consoles tends to be a much more dramatic change than people expect, even if the engine natively exports to it.

Q: Hi. I’ve been a fan of risk of rain for the past few years. I just want to ask: in risk of rain, some mechanics like heaven cracker can pierce a line of enemies and the huntress’ ability to hit and run. With the change from 2D to 3D  environment, how will they work? There are many other abilities and mechanics that i also want to ask about, but these two were the first ones that i could remember immediately. A: We’re not going to bring back any mechanics that don’t fit just for the sake of continuity – however, the Heaven Cracker I can see being actually more fun in 3D since you have to actually align yourself with the enemies. Since everyone can shoot and run in the 3D version, Huntress’ niche is sorta gone, but we have some clever ideas to make that back

Q: In DevBlog #8 you explain some of the steam integration going into Risk of Rain 2 which will make a lot of people happy but will RoR2 also be available without steam for those who prefer? For example will I be able to buy it on GOG like I did RoR1, and play LAN games without steam? A: Right now we’re focusing on making it work via Steam P2P, but (I believe) that we haven’t done anything to explicity lock out connections via IP. You just won’t get the same Nat punchthrough benefits (I’ll have to ask Jeff, our network dude about it to make sure this is correct, but afaik I think that’s right)

Q: Would you guys happen to have an idea of when you think the game would be realeased? A: Nope! Hopefully not too long!

Q: Hello! I loved Risk of Rain 1 and it is great to play with friends. I have two questions (technically three, I'm cheating). 1. I am assuming you're going to release it on steam, so that said will there be steam multiplayer integration? Like... Invite via steam, games are created with the help of steam peer-to-peer. It was a pain to get 4 people playing on one server without port forwarding. 2. Will there be a better way to keep track of items? 3. Can you add a menu to see what items you have? A: Yes, steam invites and all that are the goal. I know we talked about holding TAB to expand the item menu so you could see more at once, but we haven’t actually done that yet. I know it was a bit silly for it to be uncropped and expanding off the screen.

Q: Is this still in development? A: No we’re just pretending

Q: Are you gonna have the same soundtrack from the first game? A different soundtrack? A mix of both? (Don't get rid of the Dried Lake or Sunken Tombs songs). A: That’ll ultimately be up to Chris, but I’m sure he’s in the same boat as us and doesn’t want to cover the same ground that we did previously.

Q: I was telling a friend how excited I was for this, and he expressed a concern I’d like to ask you guys about. He said that, being 3D, the game might end up either not as hectic as the first, or too hectic, what with the hoards coming from all around you. What’s your take on this? (I’m not actually too worried about it, but I still wanna hear your take on the matter.) A: Currently, we’re using SFX as a tool to present not only how close an enemy is, but what state they’re in and how many there are. Since I’ve also been playing the game for like a million hours I’ve also developed the ability to recognize which enemy by the frequency of their screenshake… but that won’t be relevant to most players. We’re really hoping to avoid radars or anything like that for awareness.

Q: Just wanted to say, RoR2 is looking to be coming along fantastically. I really love that you are constantly taking things in unexpected directions-- I never expected to see the game translated to 3D but you have done it and I can imagine many hundreds of hours spent playing. Will Chris Christodoulou be working on the music this game as well? A: Yes, he will be back!

Q: Have you considered calling the second Risk of Rain "Risk of Twain"? A: Not until now

Q: This is kind of a question and a half. How big will the RoR2 maps be and will all the RoR1 maps return in 3D with the additions of new maps or just overall new maps? A: Overall we’re not really looking at the previous maps for the inspiration for our new ones – we’re not making RoR 3D, but a sequel, so we don’t really want to recreate too much old stuff!

Q: Since RoR2 is moving to more dynamic network model, how will people with screwy NATs be affected? NAT Punchthrough is great and all, but if implemented incorrectly can lead to multiple users on the same NAT being unable to join servers outside of the NAT (See Rainbow Six Siege). Will users still be able to host dedicated servers like the old game? What does this mean for users buying the game through GOG/Humble Bundle? Really hope everything goes swimmingly because port forwarding sucks. A: This is the exact reason that we will have to have some form of limited beta, because this is something that we can’t recreate in office. I honestly don’t know enough to respond accurately on what would happen in that particular situation, but thanks for the heads up

Q: Relative to the first one, will Risk of Rain 2 be a sequel, prequel, completely unrelated, or even have story at all? A: Sequel!

Q: How were you going to implement artifacts this time around? Is it going to be based around areas that are randomly generated and you sometimes have access, or multiple spawn locations, etc. A:  Dunno, we haven’t implemented really any form of map permutations yet. The artifacts also ended up taking a much more important role in the game than we initially expected – not sure if the old way of unlocking is strange if it’s to be a core feature.

Q: (Big fan) I just had some curious questions; How many characters do you intend there to be in RoR2?, How differently do you plan on changing the previous characters?, Any hints on the final boss? pls, What is the estimated price of the game? and will their be any chance of PvP? Cannot wait, super hyped and keep up the great work :D A: We’re aiming for 10 characters on launch. No spoilers or hints! Definitely not PvP in any official capacity since the networking structure wasn’t designed for a good PvP experience.

Q: I've got three questions : 1) Will it be called RoR2 or will you find / have you found something else ? 2) Why the hell is there one more 'o' in the tumblr URL than in the actual 'Hopoo' name ? 3) What's the average of the team's favorite meals ? thx xoxo <3 A: I think it’ll just be RoR2. The hopoo tumblr was taken on creation of this tumblr, so we had to make it hopooo instead ☹

Q: Will RoR2 reveal why the Contact Light was carrying a teleporter linked to a planet crammed with hostile lifeforms? A: I’d like to explore what the heck is up with the humans in this game, but I sorta wish I had a better avenue that’s not just item logs and monster logs.

Q: I'm going to ask the real questions, is Sniper a man or woman? This is important because reasons. A:

Q: Theres something that confuses me alot about risk of rain 2. It's the lore. If the characters have left the planet, why would they come back? A: Canonically, the returning characters were never on the Contact Light to begin with (and presumably there could totally be like, a bunch of engineers and commando suits.)

[meiizumi]

Castle of Shikigami: An informal rant nobody asked for about my most obscure obsession to date

STOP i spent like 2 days writing this post and im only posting it on tumblr because it’s the one website i’m a member of that can hold the most text. i wanted to infodump somewhere...... read this to learn something i guess (´･ω･`)

Bad voice acting is the Peak of comedy to me, and while I was looking for something to laugh at one day, I found this game called Castle Shikigami 2 for the PS2. The US version of the game's dialogue is rife with machine translated text that makes no sense, and awkward voice acting to boot. They even have voice actors saying the wrong lines, voice actors speaking implied commands, and a few voice lines are left in Japanese. Apparently, Roger Craig Smith (Sonic the Hedgehog's current voice actor) was in this game but I don't think he's even credited?! I think I know which character he voiced but I’m not exactly sure.

The history behind this game’s localization is REALLY weird. Castle of Shikigami/Shikigami no Shiro was originally an arcade bullet hell shoot em up game. The series was created by Alfa System and it was one of Alfa System’s main IPs. There are three main shmup installments and a text adventure game for the PS2, Nanayozuki Gensoukyoku. Nanayozuki was practically fanservice for whatever number of CoS fans there were back then. Each main game in the series was originally an arcade cabinet, but they were all ported to PC and home consoles. In CoS 2′s case, it came out on the PS2, Gamecube, and Dreamcast, but only the PS2 version got localized. The western publisher, XS Games specializes in publishing quality budget titles such as “Bass Pro Shops: The Strike” for the Wii. I theorize they didn’t care too much about the actual content of CoS 2 and were more focused on selling a game quickly for a low price, so they just machine translated it and adjusted a few things. If you’re wondering if Castle of Shikigami 1 was also translated this badly, the answer is No. XS Games instead removed all the dialogue from the western release of CoS 1, and released it with the title “Mobile Light Force 2″.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘Mobile Light Force TWO’ if Castle of Shikigami 1 is the first game in the series?” If you want to know what Mobile Light Force 1 was, it’s GUNBIRD; another shmup game, but by a completely different developer than Castle of Shikigami. I don’t know why they did that. What really kills me though is that both MLF 1 and 2 use the same boxart, which is COMPLETELY unrelated to the actual contents of either game. AFJQHJFOKLJFDS look at this

There’s more hilarity behind Mobile Light Force that isn’t hard to find so you can search that up if you’re interested. But thankfully, Castle of Shikigami 3's Wii edition got more of a proper localization by Aksys Games.

Now I would bluntly say something like “stan castle of shikigami” but:

1. This series’ lore is insanely convoluted. It’s an essential part of this expansive fictional universe referred to as “Mumei Sekaikan” (I don’t know what this translates to in English) where there’s like, 7 different parallel worlds. There’s more obscure ass games and manga that are tied to this universe, and I think there’s even a tabletop RPG made based off it. Have you heard of “Gunparade March”? Most likely you haven’t; it’s an obscure video game made by Alfa System that also got adapted into an anime, and I feel it can be described as Mechas x Persona. One of the characters in CoS 2 is just one of the GPM characters going undercover to find her senpai who traveled to the CoS world. Or something like that. The 7-world universe isn’t explicitly talked about in the game but they make so many references to it without defining anything that it’s like you Must know about it. There is NO documentation in English about the Mumei Sekaikan I could find on the internet, although there is a wiki in Japanese where I got a ton of knowledge from (GOOGLE TRANSLATE IS MY TRUSTED FRIEND) I feel like I might be THE person in the United States who has the most knowledge on the Mumei Sekaikan, and I could go on another tangent talking about what I know so far (and who this one specific dude Shibamura Yuuri is) but I won’t.

2. The writing isn’t excellent and can be pretty Unwoke ™; the first game came out in 2001 and the third game came out in 2005 if that gives you a sense on what era these writers were in. As far as the games dialogue goes, the characters appear kind of flat. CoS 1 and 2 Kotaro (i refuse to use the official “Kohtaro”) is stupid and driven by JUSTICE to a point where it’s annoying. I can’t tell if Hyuga is trying to be a Ladies Man in CoS 2 and 3. Kim, a religious tae kwon do instructor, spends CoS 2 thinking about how he should atone for his sins, then he turns himself into jail at the end. Sayo’s backstory is that she was a shrine maiden raised as a “human weapon” to have no emotions and her only goal in life was to kill god and then die, something like that. However, after CoS 1, she gets a crush on Kotaro because he actually treats her like a human and Of course that’s what you’d expect from the main teen girl and boy in the series. In CoS 3, Sayo's character is mostly played out to be a major tsundere for Kotaro even though surprisingly HIS character in this game changed a ton compared to 1 and 2 (he had to kill an illusion of his older brother, who he learned actually died earlier, and now he has to kill an illusion of his childhood sweetheart... damb that shit sucks :/). He’s still stupid though

There’s a gag in CoS 2 that I can’t clearly remember where it’s like, Niigi makes Sayo and Fumiko, who are both romantically interested in Kotaro, think that he’s only into little girls? Meanwhile, Fumiko’s magic goes wrong and her appearance turns to that of a child though in response she’s like “hee hee maybe Kotaro will like this”. basically more On-Brand early 2000′s anime unwokeness than average. Speaking of Fumiko, she’s a 400+ year old militaristic witch who constantly teases Kotaro (who’s like 16 or 17) and she wants to marry him for his magical potential since he’s like one of the candidates for becoming God??? From the official CoS 3 character descriptions, “Her hobby is to steal the men from other women. Her second hobby is trampling upon people.” She canonically stole her stepmother’s husband from her stepmother (the 3rd boss of CoS 3). I don’t get how that shit would have worked

3. The game itself is HARD af but to be fair I’m a scrub gamer. I can’t get past stage 3 on easy difficulty without continuing. Yes i bought CoS 1 on Steam, Yes it has a port on steam i feel like i should have mentioned this earlier

4. Besides CoS 1 having a port on Steam, CoS 2 and 3 might be hard to obtain legally. The poorly translated CoS 2 was apparently super cheap back then, but since it’s an old game, its value might’ve increased. When I tried looking up prices for English CoS 3, all the listings were like at least $40 and being broke I wouldn’t want to spend more than $29 for a Wii game in 2019... honestly I just emulated CoS 2. shout out to PCSX2

Last month I was desperate, bored enough, and deep enough in the Shikigami rabbit hole that I tried to find the manga based off of it online. The CoS manga only tells the events of the first two games so I still don’t really get anything about CoS 3, like who Mihee, Batu, and Emilio are supposed to be. However, the plot events also differ. For example, Roger Sasuke exists as a character in CoS 3 but in the manga he literally Dies. There’s 11 total volumes of this; 3 volumes dedicated to CoS 1 and the latter 8 (the “Twisted Castle arc”) dedicated to CoS 2. Only the very first 3 chapters were scanlated to English all the way in 2011. Fortunately, I did find the entire manga uploaded though............... in CHINESE. So you know what I did? I “read” the entire thing using my phone’s Google Translate OCR app to take pictures of each page and comprehend the translations. Of course I still don’t understand CRAP because of the Mumei Sekaikan jargon + machine translation but I understood enough to get emotionally attached to some of the characters. I wish I hadn’t. At least through the manga I learned that the characters DO have some depth and pre-established relationships. For instance, the reason why Roger Sasuke became a ninja is because when he first landed in Japan as a kid, he was getting bullied or something and he didn’t know Japanese then Kotaro saw this and told the bullies to stop. Then after Roy /sorry i mean Roger learned that he was set to home-stay with the Kugas in the first place, he decided to dedicate his life to Japan in order to protect Kotaro back. I think. DO U SEE HOW ABSURD THIS SHIT IS Anyway Nanayozuki takes place between the second and third games and sets things up for CoS 3. There’s a full playthrough of it uploaded to YouTube and I think it contains a lot of juicy lore, but it’s just too much to go over with Shitty Google Translate OCR. There’s also Shikigami no Shiro novels which apparently contain the most backstory, but I have a 0% chance of finding these online for free. Not to mention that these would ALSO be too much effort to Google Translate.

in conclusion: You don’t HAVE to play Castle of Shikigami. Like, I’m not gonna recommend it for the content, but if you love shmups and are looking for a shmup game you haven’t heard of then I will recommend it for the gameplay (old touhou mutuals assemble theres a POWER-UP-BY-GRAZE MECHANIC). I’ve counted like 4 total fans outside of Japan that like this series for the story, and I don’t think that number is going to increase because I doubt CoS 2 will ever get retranslated and ported. I just want you to know that this series exists and that there’s a ton of wacky shit behind it besides the bad Castle Shikigami 2 dub. also if someone knows enough japanese or chinese and has an INKLING of interest in this series umm talk to me and help me decipher stuff

I��m kinda sad that the series is pretty much Dead though. This is the most recent piece of official Castle of Shikigami art I could find, and this was for the 2018 New Year. The next most recent piece of official CoS art I found was also drawn by the character designer Sonoda Miku all the way in January 2008, commemorating the end of the CoS manga serialization. Alfa System released a spiritual sequel to Castle of Shikigami on the Japanese Switch eShop called Sisters Royale, with character designs I think are still by Sonoda. By “spiritual sequel” I mean that it has some of the EXACT same shot types as CoS and the same mechanic where grazing bullets increases your power and score. This is the closest we’ll get to a Shikigami no Shiro 4. I wonder what the business decision behind that game was but it actually looks like fun and I want to play it so OK Go off i guess