#i have the delux vr

[nestedfeathers]

Siblings am i rite?

[remmy-stims]

intro:

hi there ! my name's rem, i'm in my twenties and this is my sideblog where you can request moodboards and stimboards ! i'll also be using this blog to share others' creations that i like :3

requests are currently: closed ! (10/10) (5/10 finished)

make sure to fill out this form to make a request . my limit is one request per person at a time (for example, once i finish your request you can request another but please be reasonable as i am only one person) . if you have any questions or concerns, my asks are open as well !

dni . you post/repost/like/engage in any way with illegal content, even if it's fictional (meaning pro.ship) . i won't bother you if you don't bother me, please respect that boundary . and no n.sfw/k.ink blogs, i'd like to keep this blog pretty sfw . i am an adult so i may swear from time to time so keep that in mind, and do not message me for personal reasons if you're a minor for my own comfort . i will block anyone i don't want interacting with me .

fandoms:

( italics means i'm more familiar with them . these are mostly just ones i could think of or like myself, and it is subject to updates . check the blacklist in the google form if you don't see your fandom of choice here and send me an ask if you're unsure if i'll do a board for it )

tv series: supernatural (main atm) dark angel (2000) tracker (2024) criminal minds doctor who broadchurch good omens psych what we do in the shadows stranger things the edge of sleep

animated series: gravity falls regular show my little pony powerpuff girls (1998) the amazing world of gumball spongebob squarepants fairly odd parents ( & a new wish) monster high adventure time fionna & cake smiling friends eddsworld

movies: my bloody valentine 3D (2009) house of wax (2005) scream final destination (1,2,3,5) psycho (1960) lord of the rings/the hobbit labyrinth (1986) the lost boys (1987) the twilight saga chucky/child's play movies free guy little miss sunshine equestria girls trolls challengers marvel/dc star wars star trek

video games: mouthwashing the stanley parable ( + ultra deluxe) detroit: become human until dawn life is strange minecraft minecraft: story mode mortal kombat animal crossing the legend of zelda borderlands overwatch resident evil silent hill undertale deltarune

etc. (fits in multiple or other sections) half life vr but the ai is self aware the last of us (game & tv show) super mario bros (games & movie) five nights at freddy's (games & movie) scott pilgrim (movie,series&comics)

[cloud-anon]

Pinned post!!

About Me:

I’m a minor! Do with that what you will- if you don’t feel comfortable interacting with minors then don’t, I won’t judge!

DNI homophobes, racists, misogynists, ableists, etc. you know the drill. Don’t be rude or I will be rude back. If you’re nice I promise I will be too!

I am neurodivergent- highly likely anxiety and depression (according to me and everyone I know) and semi-diagnosed autism (NOT diagnosed but someone who is legally capable of diagnosing believes that I have it). Also auditory processing disorder as fuck (undiagnosed but like it’s so fucking obvious) if I ever talk to you irl you gotta give me a sec

I’m Christian! You don’t have to be Christian to talk or be a moot, just don’t come after me for it lmao. Sometimes I talk about Christianity whether it be a random topic (probably that we’re learning about in school) or my personal experience but check the tags section on this post for that one.

Pronouns:

any at all! He, she, they, ze, zey, xe, play Russian roulette with them I’ll watch delightfully from the sidelines

Edit: I have a pronouns page now because it’s easier than explaining everything fully. Here ya go! That^ still applies though it’s basically that

Side blogs, fandoms, etc under cut

Side Blogs:

@cloud-anon-does-art where I post art wips and products (I do not do art very often or very well, be warned)

@cloud-anon-does-words where I post fic snippets, WIPs and products (these will be almost 100% sickfics!)

As of August 31 2024 these have not been set up very well. I plan to do that as soon as I finish editing this post

Hobbies:

-writing

-drawing (ish? Not well lmfao)

-singing! (Both choir and for fun)

-softball

-volleyball

Favorites:

Animal- rabbits!

Colour: blue and purple!

Food: any kind of pasta, usually

Song: changes frequently, will not stay updated if I try! If you want to know, shoot me an ask and I’ll tell you what it is at that moment!

Character: same as above but doesn’t change quite as frequently. Any character that I latch onto probably has a sickfic written about them.

Ask me more of my favorites?? I don’t know what else to put lol

Fandoms: (will add to as I remember- these include games, musicals, shows, etc.)

✍️- will write for/have written for

⭐️- has been or is a hyperfixation

📢- will rant about

❗️-currently in

❌- not currently in

~~

Beetlejuice ❌

Bendy and the Ink Machine ❌ (only really know anything about the first game)

Dear Evan Hansen ❌

EPIC: The Musical ❗️✍️⭐️📢 (will rant, but probably only if prompted lol)

Five Nights at Freddy’s ❗️📢⭐️(every game except AR (Special Delivery), VR (Help Wanted) is iffy|working on Fazbear’s Frights, hoping to read other books, have seen movie)

Goosebumps the Musical: Phantom of the Auditorium ✍️⭐️📢❗️

Hazbin Hotel ❗️✍️⭐️ (but only specific characters really)

Helluva Boss ❗️✍️⭐️ (also only specific characters)

Kirby ❗️⭐️📢(played Epic Yarn, Return to Dream Land, Planet Robobot, Triple Deluxe, want to play Forgotten Land, have watched anime)

Legally Blonde ❌

The Legend of Zelda ❗️✍️⭐️📢(played Skyward Sword, Twilight Princess (and read manga), Majora’s Mask (incomplete), Link’s Awakening, Link to the Past (incomplete), Wind Waker (incomplete), Hyrule Warriors (not DLC), Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom (incomplete, in progress))

Linked Universe ❗️✍️⭐️📢

Mario ❌ (have played 3D World, Bowser’s Fury, and Super Paper Mario, sometimes play Mario Kart Wii and used to play Mario Kart 8 (it broke) want to play Odyssey)

Newsies❗️⭐️✍️

Pokémon ❗️✍️⭐️📢? (Never played a game in my life, show is in progress)

School Bus Graveyard ❗️

Sonic ❌(kind of?? Not really. Yet)

Tattletail ❌

Undertale ❗️⭐️✍️📢

Undertale Yellow ❗️⭐️✍️📢 (have not seen neutral or genocide routes yet but know quite a bit about them)

Wicked ❌✍️⭐️📢

Tags!:

#cloud speaks: I talk about stuff (numbered list of friends because I talk about them a LOT but don't want to namedrop them (they don't have a specific tag. could tag "cloud's friend misadventures" but I've talked about it so much already without that tag I'd forget to constantly so we're leaving it as is). might start using nicknames at some point as it would make life WAY easier but for now we're sticking with numbers.)

I believe #christian stuff is my tag for when I talk about anything relating to my religion- need to double check this tag (update: I can’t find the post where I said what the tag would be so I can’t confirm it was correct but that’s what it will be from now on)

#cloud does stuff: other tags will fall under this (#cloud watches Pokemon, #cloud plays totk, etc), basically me playing/watching/reading whatever

#cloud sings: I post me singing! Hopefully will happen more often when I have time over the summer

#cloud writes. he does?? he does!: I do writing stuff!

#cloud writes lyrics: I write lyrics. Either to songs that don’t have lyrics or if I’m writing my own song I guess

#cloud does art and #cloud pretends she can do art (latter is not used anymore I don’t think): I talk about drawing/animating/etc

#cloud’s art and #cloud’s words the actual products or WIPs (not me just talking about them). Will also usually be tagged with #cloud does art and #cloud writes. he does?? he does!.

#asks have evaporated to the sky :): asks! Accompanied by #anon ❤️ or #[name] ❤️

Vent posts are tagged #tw vent. Block if uncomfortable.

#cloud’s goodnights are just me saying goodnight to everyone (I try to be consistent with this. I fail, but I try!) same with #cloud’s good mornings

#cloud’s [] misadventures (musical, school, softball, volleyball, etc): just me doing things at practice, musicals, school. The works

#cloud posts random lyrics: this will happen from time to time. Frequency varies!

Probably missing some, will update

Ask games, prompts, reblog games, picrews, and tag games are tagged accordingly!

[kariachi]

Okay, for Christmas this year, I have steam keys to give away! If you see a game below you'd like, send me an ask, it's all first-come-first-served. Keys are only available up to the 25th of December, 2023. Titles will be removed as they're claimed.

Aces and Adventures

Superhot

Long-Vinter

Sapiens

Xenonauts: Strategic Planetary Defense Simulator

Marble World

Make Way

Astronimo

8-Bit Armies

A Story Beside

Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock

Cosmo's Quickstop

Deepest Chamber: Resurrection

Deployment

Earthlock

Fly Punch Boom!

Godfall Ultimate Edition

Golfie

Homeworld Remastered Collection

Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak

Mars Horizon

MetaPhysical

PlateUp Cosmetic DLC

Repella Fella

Run, Prop, Run!

Silicon Zeroes

Slap City

Slice of Sea

Space Gladiators: Escaping Tartarus

Tiny Life

Tinytopia

Train Valley 2

Tunguska: The Visitation

Turbo Gold Racing

Valthirian Arc: Hero School Story

Vermillion VR

We Are the Dwarves

Whispers in the West

Witchtastic

MCC Island (Java Edition) Rewards Pack

SIFU Deluxe Cosmetic Pack

[jackalgirl]

For the two of you who might be momentarily obsessed (as I am) with the ancient (everywhere, as it turns out, I mean, it does stand to reason) game/divination method of knucklebones (and who are, of course, both to be found on Tumblr), check out Misha Tikh's video showing off 3D printed tali. You get get these on Shapeways (a bit spendy, but they turn out really nicely): https://www.shapeways.com/product/LE3XNVQQM/knucklebone-dice-set Or, if you have your own 3D printer, the file that Misha has made available on Thingiverse prints up beautifully: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1036458 (I've printed these out at 80% scale and am currently priming them for some painting & weathering). From a completely different group of folks, there is a full deluxe set of "Tali", as was put together on Kickstarter something like five years ago, on sale for $25 from the original $40 over at VR-Soft Games: https://vrgames-vr-soft-com.myshopify.com/products/tali-deluxe-w-4-player-add-on-characters -- this comes with a whole roleplaying game version of the game, with coin-tokens, and may be very well suited for anyone who's interested in ancient history and who possesses a crow brain (your mileage may vary).

[dandelionsprout42]

Comparison of Transformers early 2010's shared canon to the MLP G5 canon

Back when MLP G5 started with A New Generation, which still remains the best MLP media ever made by far and beyond, I had an advantage that pretty much no one else had.

I grew up with Transformers Prime (in itself the best show to have originated on The Hub by far, with only Berry Bitty Adventures coming remotely close despite extremely dated CGI.), so I had familiarity with the Binder of Revelation™©®™, which was an attempt by Hasbro to keep TF media more tightly connected into one timeline across cartoons, games, comics, and novels. It worked pretty well for a while, though it eventually broke down after a supposed scriptwriter mutiny and the resulting Robots in Disguise 2015.

So when Tell Your Tale and Make Your Make were both announced to start in 2022, I had the advantage. All I had to do then, was to see how far Hasbro would spread the Binder of Revelation 2®©™™. And man, did they spread it far.

A New Generation

Tell Your Tale (YouTube cartoon; attempts to add it to Netflix went very, very poorly)

Make Your Mark (Netflix cartoon)

2 multi-platform games made by Outright Games, whose business model involves buying any rights they can physically get, get a team of 10 people to make the game, and then release it for a slight profit.

An Apple Arcade game, whose Apple TV version was a porting disaster deluxe.

2-ish phone games, 1 by Gameloft and other I can't remember.

A comic series (or two?) whose first 10 issues were the worst crap I've ever come across in the history of comics

A phone-based VR game.

An official podcast.

A "Relax in bed" podcast on a paid service.

But in contrast to in TF's case, G5's binder was actually played out to completion. So after the arc where Alphabittle finally realised that Misty has definitely reached her teenages, I could tell that Hasbro were thinking, "Okay, so what on earth do we do now? Should we add one of those jaquins from Elena of Avalor or something?"

The jaquin idea didn't really work out, so now the story is complete with almost all G5-focused loose ends filled.

[randomvarious]

London Breakbeat Playlist

Alright, folks, I think this is probably gonna be my last breakbeat playlist post for a good while, so ya better all savor it! Introducing a nice and diverse crop of breakbeat tunes that were made and/or remixed by people who, at the time, hailed from the world's most musically vibrant metropolis: London. I've had a YouTube version of this playlist going for a good while, which I'll get to in a little bit, but now the time's finally come for me to start building a Spotify one too, now that I've rooted through enough of my own collection to actually formulate one.

Some names you may or may not be familiar with on here are the Future Sound of London, Coldcut, Ashley Beedle, and Si Begg, all of whom are electronic and dance music legends in their own right. And Beedle gets two tracks on this playlist: the jazz-loungey "Do You Believe in Love?," which he made with Uschi Classen, and appears on Coldcut-owned label Ninja Tune's 1996 Ninja Cuts: Flexistentialism comp, as well as his Latin "Sun Barrio Break Mix" of Tokyo-based musician Takada's "Ola-Le," which you can find on one of my favorite mixes of all time, Dimitri From Paris' Monsieur Dimitri's Deluxe House of Funk, which came out in 1997. "Do You Believe in Love?" has over 73.1K plays on Spotify, but the "Ola-Le" remix only has 8.4K, which is criminally low, considering just how phenomenal of a song it really is.

This playlist is ordered as chronologically as possible:

The Future Sound of London - "Expander (remix)" Tim 'Love' Lee - "One Word" Fluid - "The Man With Three Heads" Coldcut - "Atomic Moog 2000" Ashley Beedle Presents The Uschi Classen Band - "Do You Believe in Love?" Spacer - "It's a Nano World" Takada - "Ola-Le (Ashley Beedle's Sun Barrio Break Mix)" Transmutator - "My Beautiful Friend (Children of Dub Mix)" Shur-i-ken - "Niomi's Dream" Si Begg - "Muchacha"

But in addition to all those songs, the YouTube version of this playlist also has a few more tracks on it that can't be found on Spotify; like one from a worldbeat group called Loop Guru, who, in 1995, put out their third album, Amrita (…All These and the Japanese Soup Warriors), which included a song on it called “Diwana.” Loop Guru are one of those acts who take Eastern music—in their case, Indonesian gamelan and traditional Indian—and fit it within a Western electronic framework of sorts. And for this particular tune, they executed that formula by fusing together a load of Eastern sounds with a punchy drum break beneath it all, and it ended up yielding a pretty damn transcendent dance tune 😌. The song’s also been titled as “Olwana” as well, and across its multiple uploads on YouTube, it has about 9,200 plays, which again, is very low.

And another excellent, not-on-Spotify stunner is Genaside II's "The Genaside Will Not Be Televised," which adapts famed New York street poet Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" for a British public, transforming it into a totally cinematic and dystopian slapper of London underground greatness 😊; currently at a little over 10.4K plays.

Plaid - "Scoobs in Columbia" DJ Food - "Ninja Walk" Loop Guru - "Olwana" Lisa Germano - "Lovesick (Underdog Rmx) [as heard on DJ-Kicks by Kid Loco] Sons of Mecha [VR Boy & DJ Erb] - "Rocweiller" Genaside II - "The Genaside Will Not Be Televised"

And this playlist is also on YouTube Music.

So with the kickoff of the Spotify version of this playlist, we have ten songs that amount to almost an hour, but over on YouTube, we have 16 songs that run for 88 minutes. So if you want some really tremendous bangers that are harder to find, you should really give the YouTube one a listen.

And for those who want something a little more specific or shorter, I've got a London breakbeat playlist that solely deals with the 90s too:

1990s London Breakbeat: YouTube / YouTube Music

Next week, trip hop!

Enjoy!

More to come, eventually. Stay tuned!

Like what you hear? Follow me on Spotify and YouTube for more cool playlists and uploads!

[stubborndooter]

So I wanted to make a quick post cuz like I wanna play with more people so I figured I can make a post of all the multi-player games I play and have it like pinned on my profile or something and I don't know how else to go about this. Okay, so here's some games I play that I wouldn't mind playing with y'all if able to!

Pokémon (Ultra Moon/Sword/Scarlet)

Monster Hunter (Rise/Stories 2/World/Generations)

Roblox

Rec Room

VR Chat

Mario Kart (7/8 Deluxe)

Nintendo Switch Sports

Super Smash Bros (3DS/Ultimate)

Animal Crossing (New Leaf/New Horizons)

Left 4 Dead 2

Portal 2

Beat Saber

Minecraft

Terraria

Don't Starve Together

This list will be updated as time goes on, chances are I'm forgetting games anyway lmao

Also bonus list here's games I wish were multi-player lol. Also will be updated as time happens.

Cult of the Lamb (naturally lmao. I want to play Knucklebones with someone.)

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon (I can give berries to peeps and such heal up pls I'm here for you)

Miitopia (it seems like it'd work well, I don't see why it wouldn't so if it does become a thing I'd be happy)

[emptyheadgamer]

What video games are you buying this year? ❓

So many. I have a humble choice subscription so most of what I'm getting I'm not sure. I add everything to my steam account each month, so recently I've picked up and played the likes of alien fireteam elite, buomutant, and rollerdrome

For switch my to buy list has tears of the kingdom and the remakes for metroid prime, advance wars, and the megaman battle network games. Earlier this year I got Kirby return to dreamland deluxe and mario and rabbids spark of hope.

On PC I finally picked up hades, and earlier this year I picked up psychonauts 2 and went so far as to 100% it. I also got and 100% Zombie driver hd back in march. Currently im playing a VR puzzle game called the wanderer and recently grabbed a racing game called grip on sale which I've enjoyed immensely. My steam wishlist is pretty long but sitting right at the top is jedi survivor, armored core, and hades II.

I must admit, I mostly shop way behind the release schedule. Anything that comes out more recently gets put on a steam or amazon wishlist to buy later pending a sale or price drop (or frequently as gifts for bday or xmas)

[maximuswolf]

Help me choose what to get for my birthday

Help me choose what to get for my birthday So I'm torn between a few games and one bigger thing:Stellar Blade (really loved the demo)Baldur's Gate 3 Deluxe Edition (haven't played it, but I don't have much experience with hardcore RPGs)Mortal Kombat 1Dead Space RemakeRent a new VR headset and finally play HL Alyx (rent because I don't think I'll use a VR for anything else)Buy an older VR headset (if you convince me it's worth it for other things than HL Alyx)The comment with the most votes will help me with the decision, because I really can't decide lol Submitted April 25, 2024 at 05:22AM by Ivaylo_87 https://ift.tt/bj6aLVT via /r/gaming

[silverstringmedia]

Getting to Know Us -- FAQs

What is Silverstring Media?

We’re a critically-acclaimed indie game studio and narrative design consultancy based in Vancouver, Canada. With a team full of unique voices, we create hopeful, imperfect worlds, and fill digital spaces with love and cosmic awe. Check out our intro post or our other links in bio :)

How long has Silverstring been active?

The studio has had many lives. It was founded by writer and transmedia designer Lucas J.W. Johnson as a solo narrative design firm. In 2013 he leveled up by partnering with Claris Cyarron, consulting on a host of award winning games and creating a series of experimental and strange altgames, including critically-acclaimed cult classic Glitchhikers: First Drive. 

In 2020 Silverstring started production on its first full length in-house game, Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between. The studio grew to a team of nine passionate people, with a diversity of backgrounds, skills, and experiences to help propel the studio to create new and exciting stories that excite our audience and challenge the status quo of what games and stories can be.

What kind of games do you make?

We make people-first, story-rich, indie games. We like to push the boundaries of interactive experiences to create games that are fresh, experimental, and representative of more diverse experiences. Original music is also a key component of our projects. 

While we want to tell stories that reflect the complicated world we live in and have nuanced conversations with our players, we lean into cosmic awe, community, and hope.

Along with our full length projects, Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between and Flow Weaver VR, you can check out some of our earlier short experimental projects on Itch.io.

What is Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between?

Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between is about the thoughts that you have when your mind is free to wander, everyday journeys that dominate our time but not our attention, and the parts of our world and existence normally left unexamined. Take a late night highway drive, a quiet train car in the early hours, a walk through a moonlight park, or wait in a deserted airport. Leverage the transformative power of liminal spaces and conversations with strangers.

Part walking sim, part visual novel, this chill and relaxing experience wants you to take some time and space to introspect, connect, and interrogate your own wisdom. It encourages you to be in the moment as you explore several familiar modern rituals, listen to ambient music, and receive light guidance through meandering voiceovers and questions from curious Hikers. 

Where can I get your music?

You can find the Glitchhikers Deluxe Soundtrack on your favourite streaming services storefronts here. For other Silverstring Projects, check out the bandcamp of our Lead Composer Devin Vibert (along with some of his amazing personal work).

Do you have a Discord?

For now we don’t have our own Discord Server, but you can hang out with us in the Glitchhikers channel of our publisher Fellow Traveller’s server. We plan on having our own server soon though, so watch this space.

Where else can I follow you?

We plan on having Tumblr be our most active platform as we slowly divest from Twitter. You can follow us on Twitch for weekly streams with our team too. Check out our other platforms here: https://linktr.ee/slvrstrng

Can I join your team?

We aren’t hiring currently but when a position opens up we will post it here, on LinkedIn, and on our jobs page. You can also subscribe to our newsletter.

[grimoire-of-geekery]

Detect Magic: the Sixth World Tarot by Echo Chernik

(pictured here- the deluxe edition [left] and the Arcanist edition of the Sixth World Tarot by Echo Chernik)

Y'know, it's been a long time since I did one of these, but here goes. It's time for another Detect Magic review. I haven't put the Dork Magician hat on for a while, so let's give this a whirl!

Today we're taking a look at the Sixth World Tarot, by Echo and Lazarus Chernik. She has this available on her website (click the above link), which come signed by the artist and the author. I'm a bit bummed, I bought a copy of this deck juuuuust before she started signing them. Not her fault, but still. XD

For those of you unfamiliar with Shadowrun, it's a cyberpunk dystopian magic-and-mech RPG setting and fantasy novel universe which originated in the late 80's. The premise is that magic is growing stronger, the world experienced a big Awakening in the early 2000's, right around the same time that corporations managed to gain extraterritoriality. So, you have dragons running huge megacorps, which basically enslave people to be lifelong wageslaves from birth (or as soon as they can get their hands on a desired talent), immersive VR Matrix hackers, cyberware enhanced fighters and magic practitioners acting as "deniable assets" to said corps for all sorts of shady business.

Hence the name "Shadowrun."

This setting, one of my absolute favorite settings out there, has had the misfortune of developing a sort of eerie prophetic element akin to the Simpsons and its bizarre track record of prediction of ludicrous world events. Shadowrun was intended to be a cautionary tale, not an oracular one. That being said, that does make a tarot based on Shadowrun more than a little on-the-nose for predictive purposes. After all, they're telling the future without even trying. Wait until they actually put some effort into it...

All right, time to Detect Magic!

Accessory- Crit (4 out of 4) Stunning artwork, evocative imagery... this deck is gorgeous. It's so beautiful, and so intricate and well made, that people who don't even read tarot (or even particularly like tarot) buy several copies for their geeky collections, and even people who don't particularly care about Shadowrun have dropped their jaw when I showed the deck to them.

A bit busier than I'm used to working with (not the art, but the extras which I'll explain later), I was pleasantly surprised at how much I loved the cards when I first got them. The box for both editions I own are a nice durable gloss with a magnetic foldover closure, there's a ribbon inside each to help pull the cards and book out of the box, and the decorative artwork is gorgeous and fitting with the setting. Definitely aesthetically pleasing enough to take places, and durable enough to resist scuffing or tearing for on-the-go divination and gaming use.

Tome- Crit (4 out of 4) So, the Tome section of this review is supposed to be about how well the cards help one in the pursuit of learning magic and practicing geekomancy. And... really, I don't think I've found a deck (or any artifact of fandom) quite as good as this.

Let me explain.

Tarot, in the sorcery practice I teach, are already basically a pictorial grimoire, describing life in a way that allows us to learn the hidden movements, mysteries, and forces at play in our world. Art is good for things like that in general. It helps you see the world through a special lens, one which allows you to see things you might have missed.

The thing is, the lens of this deck is the Shadowrun continuity, which as I said earlier, has proven to be more than a little prophetic, and alarmingly so.

The magic system of Shadowrun is pretty adjacent to our own. Life force lines, spiritual power sites, astral projection and spirits and magical "energy" forms, initiatory mysteries... it's all pretty much the same as our own reality, just juiced up a bit, with some extra game elements added (don't even ask me about insect spirits).

This makes the deck particularly helpful if one wishes to learn magic in any of the myriad ways described in Shadowrun (and they're particularly respectful and diverse and true-to-life in their tradition descriptions).

BUT, it also has an entire lore-book called the Book of the Lost associated with it, which explains all these little secret sigils and images and easter eggs stored throughout the deck, which can be used for gamebuilding and storytelling, but are designed to be arcane indicators and omens, among other things. And the kinds of symbols they use range from sentences or mottos in dead languages, all the way to waveform patterns and dot-matrix maps. I swear, if you're one of those people who like puzzles and cryptography, this deck is even more fun than the Hermetic Tarot.

In summary, while you'll have to get some Shadowrun sourcebooks to really get deep into the canon lore, there's so much of it that the cards really show you on their own that I don't consider this a setback at all. Feel free to deep-dive with this deck, you'll learn a TON about magic if you let it guide you.

Relic- Success (3 out of 4) If you read the Book of the Lost, or Unearthed Arcana, or any of the 5th edition Shadowrun magic sourcebooks, you'll see that "tarot magic" is an up and coming thing in their canon. Each text helps you see how practitioners use the cards in-game for spellcasting, ritual magic, initiation practices and spirit summoning. The Tarot are already really valuable as central objects of importance to certain kinds of magical practice. This particular deck is designed to be so handy a central object that there's an entire book dedicated to it.

Weapon- Success (3 out of 4) The only reason I'm rating this a success instead of a crit is because they don't provide enough spreads in the various associated books for one to immediately begin casting spells with them, which means you'll have to do some designing. They do have a couple solid unique spreads for basic divination though.

The deck's canon in-game suggests ritual practices like gathering and doing a ritual with sets of related cards, and one such ritual was easily adapted in my own practice, into the Lucky Kimono spread I designed (which people can read about on my Patreon at the higher tiers). So, even without outright including spell-spreads, they sort of gave us clues anyway.

Again, you're going to need the sourcebooks, but it's only a few of them, and they're well worth a read even if you're not planning on playing the game (and I don't play in the actual Shadowrun mechanical system, though I do like the sourcebooks for campaign setting ideas).

Overall Rating: Critical Success (14 out of 16)

Achievement Unlocked: Novahot Echo's artwork is already legendary in the dork realms of geekomancy. She's done work for Dungeons and Dragons, Mage: the Ascension, House of Night... she's even working on a Fate: the Winx Saga playing card deck right now. Her art-nouveau delicacy combined with the powerful non-pandering way she draws women means that her paintings pack a punch!

That being said, it's rare that we see professional artists create a tarot deck of this magnitude as a gaming accessory. Most tarot decks of this caliber are found in professional occult catalogues or as independent projects by artists just wanting to flex their skills for their own reasons. To have a deck like this, clearly a labor of love by all involved, as a major element of gameplay within a franchise is really very special. And something this diverse, deep, and absolutely saturated with layers of ciphers and riddles... it's a geekomancer's dream come true.

Level Up: 2 Levels I think the only way anyone's going to be able to top this deck is if they manage to design a tarot deck that's also a fully immersive VR video game AND an AR game and divination tool useable with one's iPhone or Android. Legit, Echo and Lazarus left everyone in the dust. I haven't been this excited about Shadowrun since Shadowrun Returns first came out, and I got a set of dogtags that had a USB drive with the game on it.

It's just... crazy cool.

Full disclosure, I've had the deluxe edition of these cards for a while now, so I've basically been low-key squeeing about this deck since I first heard about it in 2018, even before I got it. I've been utterly astonished that people weren't more excited about them, and I wasn't hearing about them everywhere.

Before this, I created my own Shadowrun tarot method using the Universal Transparent Tarot (cuz, y'know, plastic and see-through and weird little mosaic readings all in one place, seemed fitting to me), and when I got the Sixth World Tarot? I don't think I've opened the UTT since!

Anyway, this is my review of this deck! Go follow the link up at the top of this post, and buy yourself one! And hey, let me know if you figure out the cool little map trick. My jaw literally dropped when I was shown that!

[sofoxcentral]

Segaworld Memories

As a kid in the 90s, I rabidly read Sonic the Comic (the UK comic made by Egmont Fleetway). Totally into Sega and Sonic at the time I read about this magical place called Segaworld, located in The Trocadero, London. I was so excited, my imagination filling it up into this amazing place. Despite living in Dublin, I so wanted to visit.

And so it eventually came to be that Mum and I were in London, looking for Segaworld! So lucky and thankful!

The building was actually a bit hard to find at first, it was about 7 stories (going by recollection), but it was part of a "terrace" of other buildings. But then we caught the decoration of Sonic above the entrance, and knew it was the right place.

After paying a double figure fee, we took the escalator. I knew from a magazine that this was how it worked, the escalator took you to the top, and you made your way down on stairs. The escalator was surrounded by these neon rings around it, which made it feel cool. Also I don't think it was continuous.

At the top, I saw a big statue of Sonic and felt so excited. There was also a Segasonic the Arcade cabinet. You know, the one with Ray and Mighty. I'd heard about this but for some reason I didn't play it. I've since heard it had a trackball but I don't remember that detail.

And so I wandered around excited. Unfortunately, it gradually occurred to me that Segaworld was mostly an big arcade. One you still had to pay for each play, despite the entrance fee. I accepted it, but it meant I had to be selective with what games I played.

I played a Jurassic Park shooting game, and also think I played that game where you used actual bicycle pedals to fly your virtual craft around an open area. Other stuff like Virtual Cop too.

Generally speaking, we're talking about a lot of arcade cabinets and machines, somewhat themed by floor (each floor had a different theme). One floor even had a more carnival theme where you could earn tickets for prizes... but that wasn't all.

You see, each floor aimed to have a star attraction, something super cool and fun!

One of them was a VR game at a big scale. We walked into a theatre like area (rows of seats, etc) where each seat had a VR headset and some controls with buttons on them at the armrest. After putting on the headset, the "warmup" scene was a 3D simplified recreation of the theatre. I was sitting at the same seat! Even cooler, everyone wearing a headset was represented in the virtual theatre by a 3d humanoid model that was also wearing a headset.

I turned to my left where my Mum was sitting and saw a virtual person there. I called "Mum can you hear me? See me? I can see you but you look different" the model turned to face me and I heard Mum's voice outside the headset saying "I can see you and you look different too." It's cool since the system was clearly making everyone's model move in respect to the real world headset movements. Only the heads though, when I looked down I could see my virtual hands on the controls, even when I took my real hands off of them.

The game itself involved flying through a cityscape, while enemy craft flew around, and you shot them by pressing a button that would make you shoot bright lasers/projectiles wherever you were looking, or at least, wherever your head was facing. It was novel though I didn't like how it literally didn't track your eyes so you could shoot exactly where you looked.

I think there was another VR thing outside which I tried out, no strong memories.

But another thing I was looking forward to was the bumper car system where you could shoot at other cars. Unfortunately, it wasn't that busy when we visited. Good for a lot of other stuff there, but bad for a bumper car thing like this since not many other people were on the field.

Anyway, unlike regular bumper cars, these ones were much taller, you sat down properly, and surrounding you were windows with tough wire mesh protecting you.

It turned out, you weren't allowed to actually bump other cars, but that's okay, because the main thing you did was drive over balls that were scattered around the ground, and after your buggy picked them up, you could shot them straight out using a gun that you could control the tilt of (the angle was of course controlled by turning the car itself, at least so I recall).

Your target was a literal target at the top of the other cars, so you had to align things and get the trajectory right.. or you could just suck up enough balls and blind fire.

It was fun and novel. I did dislike the lack of actually bumping cars and maybe I felt it could have been a bit better. But honestly, at no other time in my life have I played something in the real world that let you shoot something at someone else's vehicle. It was fun.

There were a few other star attractions too, but those two are the ones I remember the most.

I'll be honest, I was a bit disappointed by Segaworld especially at first. I'd expected an amazing magical themepark and instead I got a deluxe arcade.. but I still liked arcades, and some of its unique attractions were just that: Unique!

Oh, and I forgot one of the best parts: The gift shop. Full of Sonic and Sega merch! What's more, around that time I'd missed some recent issues of Sonic the Comic. I'd just had trouble getting my hands on them, they were getting rarer, and I was fearing that I would end up stop reading it after missing so many in a row... but then I found, right there in the shop, not just selling the most recent episode of Sonic the Comic, but also the 4 most recent issues, neatly filling the gap. I bought the missing issues and later on in a family friend's house in London, I excitedly read through them catching up on what I missed. Hence, I didn't stop reading the series, and would ultimately keep reading the series until it went fully reprint.

So yeah, Segaworld may not have been fully what I expected but I had a fun and memorable time there regardless, with some unique experiences I'll always remember. It was a great feeling to have something I was passionate about have a physical representation in the real world, I'm so thankful I had the chance to go when it was still active, and I'm very appreciative of the memories I have.

[aion-rsa]

Space Sweepers and the History of Working Class People In Space

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This week saw the release of Space Sweepers, Korea’s first big budget special effects space movie extravaganza. There are a lot of interesting things to say about this movie, but one of the things that makes it stand out is it’s an excellent portrayal of people in space who are skint.

See, I hate to break it to you, but you’re probably never going into space. Unless you’re a highly trained technical specialist (well done!) or a billionaire (pay your taxes!), your best shot at seeing Earth from space within your lifetime is the development of realistic-yet-cheap VR headsets.

And the thing is, a lot of the time this holds up in sci-fi as well. Space travellers are either living in a post-scarcity utopia, are part of the military, or are some kind of genius scientists.

Even where we see supposedly salt-of-the-Earth relatable types, like Han Solo or Mal Reynolds, their scruffy outfits and roguish ways can’t quite cover for the fact that they own and live in the equivalent of a massive luxury yacht or private plane. Serenity may look like a rust bucket, but it’s far from the equivalent of a white van, and while Mal is constantly complaining about the costs of fuel and repairs, that doesn’t change the fact that he seems to own the ship outright, and in “Oxygen” he appears ready to buy the ship for cash.

As for Han Solo, leaving for a moment his humble origins and that he won the ship in a card game, within the Galaxy Far Far Away the ratio of space travellers to non-space travellers doesn’t seem that different from the one on Earth. Yes, there are lots of smugglers and Tie-fighter pilots and interplanetary bounty hunters, but for every one of them there are millions of Tusken sand raiders, Jawa scrap merchants, moisture farmers and Corellian street rats. Spacecraft might come and go from the spires of Coruscant as regularly as buses, but the population density is such that most people on that planet will be lucky to see sunlight, let alone the stars.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, the chances of an ordinary person getting into space even in the foreseeable future vary between Willy Wonka Golden ticket level lucky, or truly dystopian. On the one hand, Elon Musk has announced the first all-civilian mission to space, led by billionaire Jared Isaacman (so, not what you’d call an everyman), two seats given to people who have won a place by donating to St Jude’s Hospital (it probably won’t be one of the smaller donors), and finally, one lucky front-line health worker.

But Elon Musk wants to colonise Mars, and sadly billionaires still need people to clean the toilets, so Musk has other ideas for how ordinary people might get into space. Unfortunately that idea is indentured slavery, demonstrating that the most prescient science fiction writers of our generation are the writers of first-person shooters.

This is why, outside of post-scarcity-fully-automated-luxury-space-communism, and the military, science fiction is always oddly quiet about money. With a few honourable exceptions.

We Just Work Here

The first and most obvious reason why any ordinary working-class person would end up in space is “they’re paid to”.

Pretty much the codifier of working-class people in space is Alien. The crew of Nostromo aren’t scientists, they’ve not got The Right Stuff. Nobody on that ship is getting a high school named after them. The crew of the Nostromo are basically truck drivers who venture off the highway and run into something nasty. Yes, ironically they show a great deal more competence, professionalism and intelligence in encountering an alien threat than the actual scientists in the prequel movie, but the first conversation these characters have when they come out of hyper sleep is about money. From the outset, these are people in a place of work.

It’s a model that set the format for gritty-industrial-working-class-people in space movies going forward for better or worse. Event Horizon just lifts Alien’s aesthetic completely for the rescue ship Lewis & Clark, as does the videogame series Dead Space, like Alien, set aboard a mining ship.

Away from the horror genre, Outland sees Sean Connery play sheriff in a final frontier mining town that could have taken place in the same world as Alien.

And of course, Red Dwarf, which not only made good use of the Alien aesthetic, but also cast the colony commander from Aliens as their Captain, to tell the story of chicken soup repairmen in space.

Across all of these stories, and of course the aforementioned videogames, the life of the blue collar space traveller is an unpleasant one, exploited by a company that not only controls your life while you work, but also owns all of your food, water and air. Indeed, it’s not rare for them to go further. In Moon, another film where the spacemen-to-earthmen ratio seems not far what it is now, Sam Bell’s employer decides to save the cost of training employees and ferrying them back and forth from Earth to the Moon by taking one employee and filling a cellar full of his pre-programmed, short-lived disposable clones.

Space Sweepers

Public Transport

But maybe you don’t want to work for “the Man”, not an unwise call given the Man is probably trying to feed you to something horrible in the hope of creating a new bioweapon. One surprisingly under-utilised method of getting into space is public transport.

In The Fifth Element, Bruce Willis plays a special-forces-operative-turned-cab-driver who, as part of his cover, wins a ticket to go on a space cruise. Although looking at the sets and the extras in this movie, as well as the packed-in-as-tightly-as-we-can apartments back on Earth, one gets the impression this is not an option open to the majority of working joes.

Perhaps the best example of this is in the shockingly under-loved 2018 flick, Prospect, featuring future Mandalorian Pedro Pascal.

In Prospect, the spaceship is little more than a rotating framework filled with cargo containers in front of a massive engine. The father and daughter prospecting team are on board a lander that resembles nothing so much as an old Apollo Lunar Lander on the inside, and as the mothership approaches their destination the ship doesn’t even stop, it just releases the lander, tells them when the ship is going to be passing back that way and warns them the line is being terminated, so there won’t be another ship passing that way.

This is a model it would be fantastic to see more of. The landing module is small enough that it’s entirely plausible that even these not-very-well-off characters could buy, hire or rent one. Rather than having the freedom of the space ways like Mal or Han, their travel options are entirely restricted by what destinations are profitable for large shipping companies and whether they’ll let you tag along. And while on the surface the aesthetic looks a bit Alien, in truth it feels far more like it’s cobbled together from relics of the actual space age.

Borrow Your Way Into Space

And finally, of course, there’s the Elon Musk solution. Borrow your way into space. One of the early places to use this idea was Gateway, by Frederik Pohl. Frederik Pohl in particular is fantastic at writing science fiction worlds where people actually have to worry about money. In Gateway and its sequels humanity has discovered Ancient Aliens left a space station nearby, stocked with a lot of spaceships. Being alien technology, humans can’t control the ships accurately, they’re limited pretty much to pressing the “Stop” and “Go” buttons, and when the ship flies off it might land on a world of fabulous riches, or it might chuck you into the heart of a star.

Prospectors who want to try their luck in these ships have to take out a loan to get to the station, and throughout the novel the protagonist is constantly aware of how many credits are in his account.

Which brings us back around to Space Sweepers. At first glance the Space Sweepers set-up might seem similar to that of the Millennium Falcon or Serenity – an extremely “used” looking ship run by a rag-tag bunch of misfits. But the first time we see the protagonist, Tae-ho, he’s in a pawn shop. As soon as he gets back to the ship we learn the crew are still paying off the cost of the ship, as well as the costs of repairs and parts.

We see an awful lot of “Space sweepers” throughout the film, junk collectors gathering up salvage from Earth’s orbiting collection of derelict spacecraft and defunct satellites. But these people don’t seem like roguish space pirates, the impression they give is more akin to app-based gig workers.

This is compounded by another issue – that to work in space you need a visa, with citizenship limited to the wealthy few who are able to afford a place on the deluxe orbiting space habitats.

Everything in Space Sweepers is driven by money, whether it’s Tao-Ho’s attempts to raise enough money to find his daughter, the robot, Bubs, and her attempt to get a humanoid body that reflects her gender, and of course, the $2 million reward for “Dorothy” which drives the whole plot.

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Often space-based sci-fi is about the fantasy of freedom, of exploration. Even shows like Star Trek give us characters whose job isn’t much more than to fly around having adventures. But there is rich storytelling to be done about the people who have to clean the space toilets.

Chris Farnell’s novella series, Fermi’s Progress, is about a ship whose FTL drive vaporises planets, and features at least one space traveller who isn’t a scientist, super soldier or billionaire (although to be fair the other three characters are exactly that). You can find part one here.

The post Space Sweepers and the History of Working Class People In Space appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/375jTzb

[melseol]

reasons why I'd live in the constant

eating lasagna for breakfast would be considered somewhat normal

mental issues INSTANTLY curable

pets because I live in my mum's basement and i have no say

3d irl vr firsthand experience chess deluxe

depending on the number of other survivors i don't actually have to do anything because I'm weak and underweight and they won't trust me to kill a butterfly so i just get to chill

be a leech - stonks.

i hate the world

making a bonfire is no longer a distant fantasy

pierogi

r/nosleep becomes reality and that's heckin hilarious.

i wonder what monster meat tastes like

will pull a gordon ramsay's hell kitchen move on any noobs in my vicinity

dont have to pay rent

dont have to pay taxes

dont need to pay insurance

there might not be any sour cream & onion flavoured doritos but in the name of science i will start my own new food chain of veggie crisps.

capitalism - stonks.

major insomnia, but the good kind

i don’t need friends they disappoint me.

will no longer exist in the same dimension as my late primary tutor

[justkleinerthoughts]

Basically a budget friendly Nintendo Switch that's meant to be more portable. Unlike the iphone 11 and iphone 11 Pro, Galaxy 10e and Galaxy 10, iphone XR and iphone X, etc it doesn't keep all features the same, just downgraded. In fact like the Nintendo 2DS (compared to 3DS) it actually takes away some features. If you already own a Nintendo Switch console, you can sync* or transfer from your profile/games/saves using your Nintendo account. Very simple; when you boot up system for first time it'll walk you through it step-by-step *If you sync or link one account to multiple switch consoles, the non-main one has to verify every few hours to play downloaded games which can be a hassle if you don't have internet connection Let's go through the list of changes: 1. Size, weight, portability Overall size in general: The Switch Lite is basically the Original Switch (I'll be referring it to 'Switch' moving forward) but with one of the joy cons detached. You think this will be more portable, but in practice from my personal experience it's not. If you consider size only The Switch can detach joycons for better storage. Downside is that you must be aware where you put the screen and joycons and attach them later. There is a difference if you pocket thing whole thing without detaching i guess Seeing the smaller size, there may be more hand cramping involved if you have giant adult sized hands Switch Lite is lighter in weight, but it's not a night-and-day difference. Not going to tell unless you have both side-by-side in each hand. Bezels are colored which is nice. It's not black like on the Switch, so able to distinguish where the screen ends 2. No detachable joycons Cannot detach joycons, making the logo snap/click sound clip that game trailers start off/ends with absolutely useless when referring to Switch line of systems in general. As one singular unit, fused into the system; feels more solid in the hand compared to original Downside is that it loses some functionality in some games You are not able to split controllers to let a friend play Some games that you can't play on Switch Lite out of the box (as of this review) are: 1-2 Switch Fitness Boxing Just Dance (Series) Nintendo Labo (Series) Nintendo Lano VR Ring Fit Adventures Super Mario Party Surgeon Simulator There are also other games that's not as convenient to play in handheld only like: ARMS Fortnight Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Mario Tennis Aces Pokemon Let's Go series Super Mario Odyssey Splatoon 2 Zelda Breath of the Wild You can buy joy cons to play on Switch Lite, but that costs additional $70 MSRP. Might as well buy a Switch at that point If the thumb sticks breaks or if there are drifting issues, you can have it fixed by Nintendo for $80. 3. Cannot be docked to TV, no kick stand No docking station. If you own the Switch with docking station; the Switch Lite cannot f