#forget canon. the sims 4 character creator is my canon now

[itskikanow]

In honor of the DLC coming out tomorrow I’ve replayed Error 143 to enjoy the adorable dork that is Micah Yujin. So let me gush about him will ya.

Micah Yujin is the main character and only love interest of the indie dating sim called Error 143 made by Jenny Vi Pham and her crew. The main premise is that you, the player, lost in a coding/hacking competition to your rival (Micah) and you as the sane level headed person as you are decided to troll him by hacking his computer and leaving a note “Ha, whose the better hacker now”. In response Micah hacks you back and puts you in his not discord server that he made and from then on comedy ensues.

The gameplay is pretty straightforward, it’s like every other dating sim. There’s the occasional hacking minigame that is just hangman which is neat, but the whole design of the whole game is so cool. I love pixel art and not discord looks fantastic with it. I also find it elegant that the parts without voice acting look like chat conversations, and the conversations with voice acting to be video calls is fucking great!

Also his voice actor goes hard!!! Corey Wilder is a talented va and I wish nothing but the best for them!^^

Micah himself is a funny playful cheeky guy with a shit eating grin on his face. His banter with the player is honestly hilarious and wholesome at times. He doesn’t hide the fact that he thinks you’re hot and he starts being flirty around day one or two. Him and the player have some good chemistry and they really match each other’s vibe. (Oh yeah forgot to mention but the player character actually have a personality in this game. They’re not a fully fleshed out character but it’s more than what the player character gets in these games. The only other time I can think something similar happened was in The Arcana [also a great dating sim I do recommend that])

The story spans out 5 days (well, 4 actually cuz day 4 is pretty short). In those 5 days the player and Micah get to know each other pretty quickly and it’s pretty obvious you both really like each other. And Micah puts his money where his mouth is because on day 5 he makes your dream first date come true. I find that so wholesome and sweet like on my first playthrough my first thought ‘I wanna hug him’ and ‘AAAAAAAAAA!!!!!’ (And that’s just one of the sweetest things he does in game, there’s like two other one which I both adore a ton.)

But I couldn’t because the game ended! 🥲🥲🥲🥲 (Thankfully the dlc is coming and will probably give me that option and I honestly cannot wait!^^) It is a short game but it’s definitely one of the best ones out there!

I also remember when this game first came out it got really popular in just a few short days. And I also cannot forget how in just one night a bunch of twitter ghouls jumped on the creator and accused her of fetishizing black men, hiring a va who voiced in a pe** game and how her writing is actually very racist because….. she shared some old concept ideas for Micah’s parents that are not even canon. Back then I was pretty scared about those accusations because I myself am not white and thought “oh fuck what if actual black people found something actually problematic that I’ve missed”. In reality what actually happened was a bunch of racists didn’t like that there was a dating sim out there with the main love interest being a half Korean half African American. And they hurled shit on both Jenny and Corey. I even saw people whom I used to follow take those accusations seriously and write it of as “ah even when we get a dating sim with a black love interest there’s always a catch”. (I was honestly baffled by them cuz, ‘wha- you can’t be serious! There’s gotta be something more to this’.) Thankfully Jenny managed to resolve that drama in the end by explaining everything in a tweet longer? (idk the exact name of it but you know what that is) and addressing every main accusation while also addressing how the harassment has affected her. I’m honestly proud how she managed to still write on Twitter where most would’ve gone silent to take a break from that bullshit. But she and Corey shouldn’t have been subjected to that kind of harassment in the first fucking place.

Still, I’m so happy that things are better now. I don’t have Twitter anymore (and I’ve been much happier since) so I don’t know if anything similar happened since then (hopefully not).

Amidst all that bullshit tho there were some people who gave genuine constructive criticism, one I can remember is about Micah’s inconsistent hair texture. Since there are a lot of artists in the team they all drew his hair a little differently every time. Jenny responded to that critique apologizing and doing some research before deciding what Micah’s hair type is gonna be. Ever since then his hair has been consistent in official arts. The assets in game hadn’t been switched out but by the sneak peeks she posted on Instagram, it looks like they’re gonna be finally.

(Ok I originally wanted to write down his hair type but I’m actually not sure what she said cuz I forgor but comparing his hair to pictures on google, seems to his hair is either 4B, 4C or a mix between those two. I’m sorry I don’t remember 🥲)

My apologies for the detour there. My final thoughts about the game though is that it’s amazing, fun and I adore Micah a lot! If you like dating sims, fun and wholesome cheesy romance then I can recommend it to you wholeheartedly!^^

[fnaf-phoenix-au]

Hello and welcome!

This is the blog for the Phoenix AU, formerly the Everyone Lives AU.

I'll try to answer questions when I have time (and if I don't forget the blog exists but that's a secret between you and me), but chances are your question will eventually be answered!

You can ask a character a question, or me if it's about the AU itself that either can't be answered in-universe or you want a response from me as the creator (please specify if it's the second one, but otherwise any questions answered directly by me are because the characters can't explain).

There's very few rules to this blog, but there are some boundaries to what you can ask for my own safety (and sanity in some cases).

You CAN: - Ask silly things! The Phoenix AU is basically just my "it's my AU and I decide what's canon" AU, so asking every character you can if they can do a flip is definitely within the ruleset. - Reblog the post to continue a conversation! I'll probably cut it off in the tags at some point to keep one ask chain from taking over the entire blog, but until then feel free to keep going.

You CAN'T: - Ask sexual things. I was going to say general NSFW, but since blood and gore is often considered NSFW I will specify sexual. This doesn't mean you can't ask about a character's sexuality, that's completely fine! There's a difference between asking if a character is gay and asking if you can fuck one of the characters. - Spam the ask button with the same thing over and over. There has to be different question and/or character for each ask.

I am very ready to add to these rules if I must.

DNI if you are:

A pedophile, necrophile, zoophile etc.

Proship

Racist

Sexist

LGBTQ+phobic (yes, this includes you, TERFs)

Zionist, pro-Israel, or neutral

I will probably be adding to the DNI list at some point. These are just the things I can think of off the top of my head.

Finally, now that everything else is out of the way, we have the sheer insanity of just how many characters you could theoretically ask in this AU! It takes place a bit after Ruin, maybe a few weeks/a month. I'll sort the characters by game/first official appearance (characters who are technically the same as another will be listed as the name/appearance they use in the AU, such as the Withereds being the Classics):

FNaF 1

Classic Freddy

Classic Bonnie

Classic Chica

Classic Foxy

FNaF 2

Toy Freddy

Toy Bonnie

Toy Chica

The Mangle

The Puppet

Shadow Freddy

Shadow Bonnie

Charlie Emily

FNaF 3

Springbonnie/trap

William Afton

FNaF 4

Evan Afton

Sister Location

Funtime Freddy

BonBon

Funtime Foxy

Ballora

Circus Baby

Yenndo

Bonnet

Lolbit

Michael Afton

Elizabeth Afton

Pizzeria Sim

Rockstar Bonnie

Rockstar Chica

Rockstar Foxy

Funtime Chica

Mr. Hippo

Orville Elephant

Happy Frog

Nedd Bear

Music Man

Helpy

Henry Emily

Security Breach/Ruin

Glamrock Freddy

Glamrock Bonnie

Glamrock Chica

Roxanne Wolf

Montgomery Gator

Daycare Attendant

Vannesa

Gregory

Cassie

Other

Susie

Gabriel

Fritz

Jeremy

Cassidy

Unavailable Characters and Why

Golden Freddy/Fredbear: by this point the animatronic is too damaged to function, and while Michael could fix him, he's not sure he wants to (everyone understands why, for one reason or another)

Jeremy Fitzgerald: something happened, I'm not sure what yet but it leaves him unavailable

The Phantoms: they're hallucinations and not real characters you can hold a conversation with

The Nightmares: similar to the Phantoms, they are nightmares and you can't hold a conversation with them (they'd just kill you)

Bidybabs/Minireenas: this is going to sound lazy but honestly I can't be bothered with them (yes this counts for Electrobab too)

Rockstar Freddy: Everyone Lives was technically a lie since the fire absolutely fried his circuits beyond repair

Lefty: Charlie shoved Henry into Lefty and he hasn't gotten out yet (Charlie's letting him figure that out on his own since he thought trapping her in the bear-shaped timeout box was a good idea)

Glitchtrap: it's basically just a lil bit of William's soul that got into some circuit boards and didn't get the "I'm in hell" memo, so it's pretty much the same as asking William something

DJ Music Man: Michael and the Funtimes couldn't move him out of the ruined Pizzaplex, so sadly he's still left there (don't worry, he understands)

STAFF Bots/PatPats/Map Bot/Mask Bot: I hopefully don't need to explain why

The Mimic: let's just say there was a scooper incident while Michael and the Funtimes were getting Cassie and the other animatronics out of the Pizzaplex

None of the characters from Fazbear Frights or Tales from the Pizzaplex are here If I did do something like that it would be a different AU blog!

And that concludes my Mr. Hippo story of a post on a probably overambitious project that luckily I am doing on my own time and can figure it out as I go!

[nathanielwhy-deprecated]

so, i try not to design my characters too far away from their game designs. it pulls me out of it a lil bit. but in the case of da:o, where the cc is just... So bad, i caved and p much designed them from scratch and. whatever dude. everybody in that game looks like an extra crunchy bag of doritos anyway so that’s fine

it occurred to me i’m gonna have to pull the same treatment w both my ryders bc the cc is... That Bad, and that’s...... Bad

[acerace]

...you have opened my eyes to a vast universe of VintageBeef lore that I was unaware of. I knew about the New Hermit Order, of course, and the UHC invention, and I've watched a few of his CTM things but -- I will take all the info and lore you feel like giving out because Beef is amazing and my knowledge is so small.

Vintagebeef my beloved <3

So the thing is, right, until about 2016 I only watched two (2) youtubers- Vintagebeef for Minecraft and aDrive for Pokemon (and funnily enough both of them are named Dan irl). So I've watched most of Beef's videos over the years and have a general knowledge of most of his stuff, except because it's been like a decade I don't remember where most of the lore comes from XD

The thing with him is that he doesn't do Lore tm the way other mcyters often do lore- he doesn't have an extensive RP series to draw from like Grian, doesn't have a solo world with steadily increasing amounts of lore like Etho or Zisteau, and while he's played on SMPs and been involved in storylines before it's not really the focus of his episodes unlike with Evo or Legacy or Empires

So where does that leave us?

IRL, Beef always has multiple series running at the same time. Often he's playing on an smp while doing a singleplayer, often modded, series as well as a CTM or modpack with a group of friends. For example, right now he's playing on Hermitcraft, doing weekly Pixelmon and Building a Zoo episodes, and a CTM map with Slip. And to me, this translates to one thing: Beef is an adventurer. He travels frequently- he explores a world and when he decides he's done, he leaves for the next one. That's the basis of my personal interpretation of his series and his character for my writing.

Ok so reading this back, this got extremely long and didn't explain much in the way of lore, somehow? If anyone has any additions to add please do so, I am very definitely leaving out a lot and would love to see what other lore people remember and are using for Beef! I didn’t include the Hermitcraft stuff since my memory of season 4 is blurry (his base was themed after the Martian, that much I know, and he and Iskall were buddies :D) and most of the s5 NHO lore is best watched from Bdub’s perspective from what I remember, and the only s6 stuff is a single line in Hermitgang and then the Area 77 arc with its possibility of an NHO reunion which we did not get rip. And s7 of course had the cloning machine and also the Podzol Party as the main lore. So all the original rambling is still below the cut though it is very long, and I'm gonna bullet point the main stuff here instead:

Actual canonical things:

Invented UHC and was the only survivor of the first ever uhc (Mindcrack UHC s1)

Married to an ender dragon (one of the UHCs I think), later father to a different dragon (Mindcrack season 3? I think?)

Might not have legs if you choose to take that joke as canon (Mindcrack s2)

Was a wizard (RAD)

is a zookeeper (Building a Zoo) 

Had a wife and kids (Sims in Minecraft)

Part of the Trial of the B Team court case (Mindcrack)

NHO founder, founder of the Podzol Party (Hermitcraft)

Created a cloning machine that sort of works (Hermitcraft)

Played the Forest which is I believe the first time he and Keralis played together (look up the trigger warnings for this one, it's a horror game)

Was the creator/owner of Sourceblock SMP (featuring some familiar faces if you know Legacy, Empires, or MCC) and there is literal magic from a mysterious sourceblock of water that teleports people and summons mobs and probably more stuff that I haven't seen yet since I'm still watching it myself

Things you can infer:

Good with animals (Life in the Woods, Pixelmon, Ark)

Is a car nerd (irl and all of the car games he's played)

Is a highly experienced adventurer who has traveled through dozens of worlds both vanilla and modded, across multiple dimensions (Twilight Forest, the Aether, the Betweenlands, Limbo), completed dozens of monuments, fought in blood sports, survived apocalypse after apocalypse, tamed dinosaurs, and played a lot of prop hunt and golf with your friends

If you're looking for what to watch for lore purposes, I'd say the Mindcrack UHCs and Team Canada's RAD series are pretty good, definitely Sourceblock and HC s5, plus the Diversity CTM maps and Ruins of the Mindcrackers maybe? And Mindcrack Prank Wars for the chaos and the origin of Team Canada. And if you can handle horror than the Forest is fun and if you don't do horror you can watch the Pojkband play golf or prop hunt they're hilarious I love them sm I want a Pojkband reunion So Bad 

Beef's first series was a singleplayer series in beta 1.4_01 though he had played the game extensively before that, and was a big fan of Guude, having watched his own Minecraft videos. The series was functionally a hardcore one where if he died Beef would delete the world and start again! I haven't actually Watched this series so idk if he died or how often lmao. When Guude made Mindcrack, which was btw one of the very first Minecraft SMPs, he also hosted a competition for people to join, and Beef submitted a video (which is still viewable on his channel I believe!) and won, and was added to Mindcrack in season 2 :D (fun fact, Guude said that even if Beef hadn’t won he would have added him anyway) 

Two running jokes emerged from Mindcrack- pulling a Vintagebeef and Beef doesn't have legs. The first is a reference to Beef dying of fall damage (I believe the exact instance was him trying to jump into his swimming pool and failing spectacularly) and after the incident, every time someone died of fall damage they were pulling a Vintagebeef. The second joke comes from Guude, who joked that the reason Beef wasn't going to a convention was because he didn't have legs, and then he pranked Beef's base by building a giant pair of legs at the entrance to his castle so you had to walk between them to get into the base. This joke has long since died and both Beef and Guude feel pretty bad about it iirc because there were people who genuinely thought Beef was disabled and were emailing him supportive messages and stuff oops. So if you go looking on the Salad or find old Mindcrack fics, you might see references to Beef having prosthetic legs!

Mindcrack also brought about the creation of several Player groups- Team Nancy Drew, Team Canada, and GOB to name a few relevant to Beef. Team Nancy Drew consists of Beef, Pauseunpause, Guude, and Baj, who formed to investigate a prank on one of the members but I forget who. They're named Nancy Drew after the detective! Team Canada also formed in retaliation to pranks, with it consisting of Beef, Etho, and Pause, the three Canadian members on the server (not including Adlington who moved to Canada but never joined the group). There was also a Team America who pranked them with American flags everywhere. GOB is Guude, OMGChad, and Beef, who played stuff like the Ragecraft, Pantheon, and Monstrosity ctms together but that's way down the line lol

Team Nancy Drew is also notable for inventing UHC. It was Beef's brainchild but it was the four of them who first played it! The first UHC had the four of them working to kill the dragon with no natural regen, with everyone dying but Beef, who "won" the UHC. The second uhc was still dragon focused and iirc is where Beef married the dragon? Memories are hazy but they do kill the dragon in this one I think. UHC was then revamped as a pvp event and became a regular Mindcrack game every few months, featuring most of the Mindcrackers and several special guests, including Dinnerbone, who as we know Thanos-snapped Doc's arm out of existence as a result of Doc killing him in one of them

In one of the seasons of Mindcrack, Beef invited swedish Mindcracker and good friend Anderzel to go caving with him and invented ABBA Rules caving, where the winner takes it all. ABBA Rules is a game where each ore (and also dungeon loot like nametags) is assigned a point value and the person with the most points at the end wins and gets to keep all the stuff collected from the game.

In Mindcrack season 3?, Beef punched the ender dragon in an... awkward area, so when the dragon died and left the egg behind, Guude said Beef was the father of the egg XD I don't remember if I watched s3 so I have no idea if anything Happened with this concept but *history of the world voice* you could make lore out of this!

So Team Canada has played a Lot of CTM maps (which fun fact were pretty much invented by another Mindcrack member, Vechs, with his Super Hostile series! Super Hostile has a bunch of things called "Zistonian", which are references to another Mindcrack member Zisteau, who has a very wild singleplayer series with even wilder lore but I digress). In Ruins of the Mindcrackers, they had a running joke that Beef was Etho and Pause's mom, which is a joke we can leave in the past actually /lh. They also played all the Diversity maps, Sky Factory, Terra Restore, Uncharted Territory uhhh and a couple more ctms and adventure maps! Each map kinda has its own story so in Diversity 3 for example they were trapped in a simulation? I think? Team Canada also recently played the Roguelike Adventures and Dungeons modpack, aka RAD, in which Beef was a wizard with a magic staff that could do anything from summon lightning to control hostile mobs.

Sourceblock SMP is a vanilla survival 1.14 series that ran for one season and the series starts with each of the Players being drawn to a strange sparkling water source that, once they touch it, brings them to the Sourceblock world. It also summons a giant zombie at one point. There's probably more lore for this series but like I said I haven't watched it all the way through yet 

He has a Patreon server called VintageCraft and has done a series or two on there as well, and played a few UHCs with them, so lore that how you will! 

Beef also played a few popular mods, notably Pixelmon, Life in the Woods, and Feed the Beast, with LitW being singleplayer and the other multiplayer. He's also recently played the Zoo and Wild Animals mod a lot. He did a short series with the Minecraft Comes Alive mod where he married one of the villagers and had two children, so that's canon now :D he’s played a Lot of Pixelmon starting when the mod first came out iirc (he chose Turtwig in his first series and built a Grass gym, then made a Normal gym in another series in uhh 2016) and he still plays to this day. Quite a few Hermits played on his Pixelmon servers with him, like Wels, Etho, Iskall, Stress, Slip, Zueljin, and also Guude and Phedran (a Mindcrack adjacent player and creator of the LitW modpack) and a few Mindcrackers on the older servers 

Mindcrack and friends played a lot of other games too- 7 Days to Die, Ark Survival Evolved, Unturned, to name a few, so you can pull a lot of lore out of these as well. Speaking of friends and non-Minecraft games, Beef teamed up with Pause, Keralis, and Slip (a former Hermit) to play the horror game the Forest, which saw them stuck on an island trying to survive against terrifying mutated human... things. They played it a few times as the game updated but as afaik it's the first time Beef played with Keralis and possibly Slip and since the game starts with the Player's airplane crashing, that could totally be how Beef first met them in-universe 

I... think? that’s everything I mentioned in the tags? There is probably way more stuff I’ve forgotten that stems from inside jokes and things that happen within each series, but I hope that was a) helpful and b) at least somewhat comprehensible lmao 

[brakken]

Played Life is Strange Before the Storm episode 1, thoughts below the cut

Happy to say, I’m enjoying it so far. 

I’m not super into the idea of prequels - I find they get too caught up in foreshadowing later events, or trip up on continuity. So my biggest concern going into this was that it was gonna be nothing more than ‘Hella:Origins’ . It’s not entirely free of that, but right off the bat it was nice to see it had plenty of its own focus. 

Thusfar, the recurring characters/locations feel like they’re here for this story, instead of shallow easter eggs of what’s to come. And then some of the bigger callbacks (or callforwards?) are embellishing the first game rather than just acknowledging it. Chloe and Rachel walk along the train tracks, but only Chloe is balancing on the rail - they’re not connecting right now. Every journal entry is addressed to Max, so we’re finally seeing more of Chloe’s side to this (I love this. even though it’s only there as a recap, the added narrative aspect has me reading every update).

It really feels like Deck Nine has done the hard work to make this a consistent piece of the full story. The coming episodes will have to pull through as well, but I’m glad that it hasn’t been a struggle to treat this as canon yet. In general I’ve been quite pleased at how they’ve reworked things to fit playing as Chloe. Graffiti instead of photos, backtalk instead of time travel, dreams instead of visions.

And, yes, I was already braced for our deep dive into the genesis of ‘hella’, but it didn’t stop me from cringing when it came up. As someone who never really cared about its usage to begin with, it’s kinda sucky they still feel expected to rib themselves about it - still, glad it was over quick.

I think my biggest disconnect so far has been the aesthetic. It may be because I’ve just played the original, but some of the art assets in this one seem slightly... off. The flame and smoke effects are rendered too realistically. Some of the side characters look like leftover models from the Walking Dead. And Rachel... looks fresh out of the Sims 4 character creator. I’m sure I’ll adjust to it, but it’s kept me from engaging fully when it all has this slight air of a fan-made game.

On the flip-side to that, plenty is being done really well. I noticed quite a few names in the Motion Capture department in the credits, which was a wise investment. All of the character animation has improved since the first game. You can actually read their lips and decipher what they’re saying, and I think every conversation so far has featured at least one moment of unique movement. The voice acting is also a step up from the first game - I think having an english-speaking development team has aided in that. I haven’t caught any incorrect inflections so far which I’m really thankful for (though it is a little jarring to have different actors in some roles). 

I dig the new soundtrack a lot. They’ve managed to capture the feeling of a different character in a different time while not straying into entirely different territory from the original. Some parts of the game are still feeling a little silent, but Deck Nine have also managed to make the music loop in certain environments which I’m really glad for.

I knew going into this that I would have to manage my expectations somewhat. A big reason why the first game worked for me was the supernatural element. Both for the plot and gameplay reasons, it made what had otherwise been a less-than-fun style of game into something that I could really get into. But since Chloe doesn’t have powers, I had to be ready for this one to not hit that same bar.

In my thoughts about LiS ep. 1 I talked about my issues with Telltale’s series of games - notably my distaste for the timer on your choices, and how glad I was to be away with that when decision-making as Max.

That said, I’m a fan of the backtalk feature for Chloe. It’s a fun and character-relevant replacement for Max’s time travel. The timer now has a use - it’s there as an added challenge, making for small bursts of stressful choice-making in an otherwise safe design. And best of all, it’s optional! If you’re not up for the challenge, or you feel that backing down is a better action, you’re free to do so. I was tempted to do them each time, but felt it was more appropriate to just endure David’s lecture than try and argue out of it. It’s like they took the Kate scene from the first game and tweaked it into something more solid.

I’m finding there’s an added difficulty in decision-making this time around. Not only are all choices final, but I’ve found it’s a little trickier to get into Chloe’s headspace. Max had a more defined moral compass, so it was typically easy to sympathise with a lot of the big choices. With a young Chloe, it’s a little less clear - I’ve been trying to grasp how set she is on rebelling at this point, or how much she’s going to change from here until the beginning of the first game. Adding to that, there’s been some navigating to do around the fact that I know what happens to a lot of these characters...

-spoilers for ending of BtS ep.1 and LiS-

... For example, am I willing to step in on Nathan getting bullied when I know he shoots Chloe a couple years down the line? How close do I want Rachel and Chloe to get, when there’s only tragedy ahead - and further, is it too early in their interactions to begin exploring it in a romantic context? In response to what their relationship was, I chose ‘Something More’  - but, once I’d finished the episode, I pondered on that and felt I’d made the choice based on knowledge only I had, not what Chloe would say in the moment. And not knowing how much the design of consequences had developed since LiS, I was also nervous that picking ‘A Friendship’ would lock any romantic options in the future episodes. I ended up replaying the whole episode, making all the same choices save for this one, changing it to ‘A Friendship’ - and the outcome of that have left me hopeful that I’ll still have sway over that in what’s to come. I don’t wanna get into a habit of revising my choices, since that’s very much Max’s ballpark, but this one felt like it was worth it.

I really dug the fire motifs. The storm was so ever-present in LiS, and this serves as a nice replacement while not having the same purpose. With how the first game played out, I was expecting the wildfire to be in the ep.3 finale somehow, so it was a nice surprise to have it come so early.

Now, I gotta talk about Rachel’s scream. I’ve been avoiding all discussion about this game since it has taken me a while to get to it, so I dunno how much this moment is being talked about. I hope it is, though. Because heck. heck. That scream gave me chills. Did you see that wind? That scream, that wind, was an actual, real, tangible connection between Rachel and the storm. No speculation as to what the butterfly or the doe symbolises, no wondering what they could possibly mean by ‘Rachel’s revenge’ or ‘destiny’. Rachel felt pain. And it altered the weather. 

Really excited to see where that leads.

As always, here are my fave moments from this episode:

-The opening shot. A cigarette lighter. A fire in the woods.

-The tabletop segment. Charming and cute.

-Chilling on the train.

-That scream.

I keep forgetting this season is just three episodes. I’m really eager to get right into the next one, but it’s also kinda scary when I remember it’ll be over so soon. Still, I’ll probably get to ep. 2 quick so I don’t have to keep avoiding spoilers, haha.

Also, I’ve made a tag for these ‘LiS thoughts’ since they’ve become sort of a frequent thing.

Thank you again for reading this far. And here’s a lil sketch for your trouble. Hope you’re doing well <3

[t-t-m-r]

heres a video game thing. it is long so begin scrolling

1:   Do you try to stay away from walkthroughs?

i try to stay away from walkthroughs until i give up completely which normally takes about 15 mins

2:   Company you're always loyal to?

i’m not really loyal to any company actually, i suppose i’m loyal to valve? but that could change real fast if they continue not revealing anything about source 2

3:   Best game you've ever played?

aaaaah never have a concrete answer for this but its currently either xenoblade chronicles or portal 2, i’m getting closer to playing witcher 3 and that will probably overtake

4:   Worst game you've ever played?

imagine a walking sim about game development but so unbelievably unforgivably pretentious and whingey and then times it by six and you have about one percent of The Beginner’s Guide, created by Stanley Parable co-creator Davey Wreden. jesus christ. the beginner’s fucking guide pisses me off so much. it’s got some really clever moments, but it also has some of the worst, most ham-handed woe is me writing about a tortured artist indie game dev who clearly hates the concept of video games being a business and video games in general. and then Davey manages to flip the whole thing on HIMSELF and turns it into a big pity party about him. instead of playing this, i’d recommend playing William Pugh (the other co-creator of the Stanley Parable)’s Dr Langeskov, the Tiger and the Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist instead. it’s free as opposed to The Beginner’s Guide, has really good and clever writing as opposed to the Beginner’s Guide, and is just in general better than the beginner’s fucking guide fuck fuck this game

also FleetCOMM, but that’s not a finished game anyways

5:   A popular series/game you just can't get into no matter how much you try?

i cannot get into mobas. i dont want to spend twenty hours learning the shit and then spend fifty minutes being told to kill myself

6:   A game that's changed you the most?

bioshock and the entire zero escape series have probably changed my entire life. nier did this recently as well

7:   A game you'll never forget?

THUMPER. it’s ridiculously intense and it has some of the sickest visuals i have seen in a piece of media

8:   Best soundtrack?

Xenoblade Chronicles, Nier, Jet Set Radio Future, virtually any persona game

9:   A game you turn your volume off every time you play it? i can’t actually think of a game i play with a terrible soundtrack, apart from fleetcomm 10:   A game you've completely given up on? i’m never going to finish MGSV as long as i live. i cant into stealth 11:   Hardest game you've played?

THUMPER new game + fuck you

12:   Shortest time you've beaten a game in?

beat portal 2 in under 2 hours once, also did a single segment run of mirror’s edge in around 2-3 hours? can’t remember

13:   A game you were the most excited for when it wasn't released yet?

firewatch never again

14:   A game you think would be cool if it had voice acting?

okami tbh

15:   Which two games do you think would make an awesome crossover?

portal and half life they canonically take place in the same universe comeaaaaaahn

16:   Character you've hated most? From what game?

no strong answer here but tyrann from nier can go get fucked. and the skeletons in minecraft. fuck them. fucking bow and arrow 80% accuracy pieces of shit

17:   What game do you never tell people you play?

huniepop is the deepest, most challenging, most tactically-rich match three game in existence. in the late game it turns into a chess match against the game itself as you are constantly planning your moves many turns in advance

18:   A game you wish your friends knew about?

i wish more of my friends played warframe

19:   Which game do you think deserves a revival?

mother fucking jet set radio

20:   What was the first video game you ever played?

the first good video game that wasn’t a shitty movie game was Crash Bandicoot

21:   How old were you when you first played a video game? like maybe 5? or 6? 22:   If you could immerse yourself in any game for one day, which game would it be? What would you do?

hdoom

23:   Biggest disappointment you've had in gaming?

firewatch i was interested in it from all the moments they hyped up the mystery aspect of it in press conferences and trailers. it had this sense of underlying menace that got me interested. the actual game had some truly amazing, almost cinematic moments of interactivity in the dialogue, and it was unbelievably pretty, but the entire last hour was not good. ”but you’re SUPPOSED to be disappointed! you were just assuming things because you were isolated! everything was fine in the end, there was no mystery! that’s called subverting the player’s expectations! such great writing!” no. great writing is not reintroducing and building sympathy for a character ten minutes before killing them off. and then it just kinda ended with the lowest-effort reveal that tied things up but in the most mundane way possible. henry and delilah were incredible, 3 dimensional characters, but that’s basically it. it felt like they got to the end of the game and were completely out of ideas

24:   Casual, Hardcore, or in the middle?

middle. hardcore people have no life and casual people mostly use facebook as their main social media outlet. both of those things sound awful

25:   Be honest; have you ever used cheats (like ActionReplay or Gameshark)?

no

26:   Handheld or console?

handheld and pc. i have a PS4 now though and since i’m moving away from home i’m gonna spend a lot more time on it

27:   Has there ever been a moment that has made you cry?

the after-credits ending of the Last Guardian

28:   Which character's clothes do you wish you owned the most?

to be fair my dude i have no idea

29:   Which is more important, gameplay or story?

both, fool

30:   A game that hasn't been localized in your country that you think should be localized?

rondo duo 2 i’m kidding actually i have no idea