#incredibly obscure fighting game mechanics

[sono-yume]

Did I really sign up for this?

[toskarin]

there's a lot of doubly-obscure rpgs I love a lot but can't recommend because like..

when people ask for game recommendations, I've come to understand that it's not entirely appropriate to point them to an unfinished doujin eroge that's incredibly difficult, has revolting content, very scuffed design, and overall boring mechanics boring up until you engage with a single entirely unique mechanic that changed the way I think about game design forever

completely unreasonable to go "play this kusoge for ten hours to get to the one really interesting fight in it that I still go back and watch my old recordings of when I'm bored"

[blind-alchemists]

sorry, Zagreus, I've had your sister for five hours and I already like her more than you.

anyway! I did treat myself and bought the game early and. it's just very good!

in somewhat chronological order, my thoughts after yesterday's session

the music! the music is even more amazing than in the first game and if I'm done, I need to listen to the whole OST on loop

the art!! also even better than in the first game!!

Melinoë is a great protagonist

it's incredibly funny the first god we encounter is Apollo, because Apollo is the guy people modded into the first game years ago

... boy, I wonder what the speedrunning meta will look like for this game (I have very obscure knowledge about Hades I speedrunning meta)

I love the little backgrounds that pop out with the art

oh, right, I jumped into the Hades I EA late, so I never saw the place holder graphics in-game before

the environments!! beautiful.

I shouldn't have played the first game last week. It's fucking with me. where's my second dash??? Why do we start with 30 HP??? where are my death defiances??? weapon mechanics???

of course there's a fishing mechanic again.

I like Hecate's design.

saluting??? what's the lore behind that?

OH. this tone of the story isn't ... quite what I expected. A lot more serious. a lot more severe.

Melinoë doesn't remember her family??? Hello??? what the fuck???

and she keeps talking about her task with such a dutiful determination ... no, I'm not crying. But. That's such an interesting conflict.

NEMESIS!! She's holding her sword aspect!! her design!! her resentment!! her vengeance!! her rivalry with Mel. how Mel calls her Nem. please. tell me she's a romance option. PLEASE.

oh, hi odysseus.

hey, there's hypnos! ... why's he sleeping??? (funny thing is, I got the Charon dialogue that implies he's more useful this way lol)

I cannot. Take. Skelly serious. It's worse because Mel does.

I like Moros' design. The long hair going over the horns? Yeah, that's good.

Mel gets an AXE??? a heavy, double-bladed axe??? (I love women wielding heavy weapons, and as long as the rail doesn't make a return, I'm good with anything after enough time)

I like the new art sprites for reoccurring characters!

ahhh, the good old "we don't trust Olympus so we're not telling them everything" line. understandable, but I figure that's going to blow up sooner or later.

I love Mel's bond with Artemis and Selene and the implication that both helped raise her.

... and I like the predominantly female cast so far

Nemesis can show up in Erebus???

BABY MELINOË omg

why does every chthonic goddess / titaness sound like they have a thing for Persephone. Nyx already had a few lines like that in the first game. Why does Hecate also have these kinds of lines.

the Hecate fight frustrates me to no end, because I'm very used to more dashes, more health, and more death defiances, and very different weapons :( (I have bet her twice in total so far)

unrelated, but I didn't know I needed a sheep in the Hades art style but it's so damn cute and I want a large art print of it

Archane!! I love how her silks change Mel's avatar

Oceanus is beautiful

... except for the traps. Really not digging the traps. or the maps.

CHAOS??? why are you holding your old form's head??? and why is there an embryo coming out of it??? why do you have wings??? why do you wear a suit??? the new design unfortunately checks all the boxes but upon reflection that is because it fits into that very niche character design trope I've seen in manwha recently and I couldn't put a name on it if I tried

on that note, I also adore Aphrodite's new design!!

not quite sure what I think of the gathering / farming mechanic yet

I do like the incantations, magic, hexes, and arcana though!

HERMES! I also adore his design.

wait, what? Mel's going to Olympus? You're telling me one part of the game is descending into the House of Hades and the other is climbing to Mount Olympus?? (that's my speculation, at least.)

god, I hope the cast of the first game is alright/alive. :(

I hope we also get to see Athena, Ares, and Dionysus at some point :(

on that note, I can't wait for Mel to meet her brother and realize he's the opposite of her lol. I love siblings and mirrors.

[rosymourning]

The Dark Justiciar - a Shadowheart build

"Dark Lady, help me strike true."

Shadowheart is a Trickery Domain Cleric and Gloom Stalker Ranger, spreading Shar's Darkness with every strike. This build is heavy on Necrotic damage and gives Shadowheart everything she thought she wanted.

[check out my other builds!]

Gameplay Notes

Many of the items used in this build are discoverable in the world and completely independent of any narrative choices. Until you get the full Dark Justiciar set (and to be honest, even after, though it’s definitely better), this build is nonoptimized, gaining only small bonuses to Necrotic damage and benefits while obscured. As always, I value getting to see Shadowheart in armor that suits her and lore-accurate builds over optimization, so I think it's worth it.

However, at the end of Act 2, the build really comes online with some incredibly strong items. What were small bonuses to Necrotic damage are now worth building around, and what used to be a somewhat finnicky mechanic of trying to maintain obscurity is now dwarfed by near constant Darkness. Notably, all other party members should gain immunity to blindness as soon as possible (using the Eversight Ring, Steelwatcher Helmet, or Helldusk Helmet) in order to function.

Your top priority will be creating or maintaining Darkness. You can use this Darkness as cover to avoid taking hits or as an offensive maneuver to blind enemies and melee attack. With Darkness on the playing field, ranged attacks will be more challenging to make use of.

Stats and Leveling

Final build: Level 5 Trickery Domain Cleric, Level 7 Gloom Stalker Ranger

Shadowheart's (default) stats: STR 13 / DEX 13 / CON 14 / INT 10 / WIS 17 / CHA 8

[STR elixirs will be helpful here - I don't like changing companion stats, but even I can admit these are decidedly not ideal numbers]

Level 1 - Cleric (Trickery Domain) Level 1

Cantrips: Guidance, Produce Flame, Resistance

1st Level Spells [Command is useful throughout the entire game]

Level 2 - Cleric (Trickery Domain) Level 2

Channel Divinity [Trickery Domain is super lame… ugh]

Level 3 - Cleric (Trickery Domain) Level 3

2nd Level Spells

Level 4 - Cleric (Trickery Domain) Level 4

Feat: ASI+ STR>14, WIS>18

Cantrips: add Thaumaturgy

Level 5 - Cleric (Trickery Domain) Level 5

3rd Level Spells [Spirit Guardians is great, but this build doesn’t use/abuse it much]

Level 6 - Ranger Level 1

Favored Enemy: Sanctified Stalker

Natural Explorer: Urban Tracker

Level 7 - Ranger Level 2

Fighting Style: Dueling [only choose Dueling if it still works with versatile weapons + shield]

Learn Spells: Longstrider, Enhance Leap

Level 8 - Ranger (Gloom Stalker) Level 3

Dread Ambusher [bonus action Hide might be the best part to be honest]

Learn Spells: Speak with Animals […at least this is a ritual spell]

Level 9 - Ranger (Gloom Stalker) Level 4

Feat: Polearm Master [I think this is still bugged, but I think it’s fitting for the build, so whatever]

Level 10 - Ranger (Gloom Stalker) Level 5

Extra Attack

Learn Spells: Silence

Level 11 - Ranger (Gloom Stalker) Level 6

Additional Favored Enemy: Mage Breaker [if the build used heavy armour, it’d be Ranger Knight]

Additional Natural Explorer: Beast Tamer [do you think she still likes animals as a Dark Justiciar?]

Level 12 - Ranger (Gloom Stalker) Level 7

Learn Spells: Lesser Restoration

Items

Armor -

Dark Justiciar Mail (1 Grymforge)

Dark Justiciar Half-Plate (Rare) (2 Gauntlet of Shar)

Dark Justiciar Half-Plate (Very Rare) (3 Nightsong)

Melee Weapon -

Shar's Spear of Evening (2 Nightsong)

Justiciar's Great Shield (2 Gauntlet of Shar)

Ranged Weapon - Sharran Crossbow (1 Grymforge)

Amulet - Amulet of Restoration (1 Myconid Colony)

Helmet -

Dark Justiciar Helm (1 Grymforge)

Dark Justiciar Helmet (2 Gauntlet of Shar)

Ring 1 - Shadow Cloaked Ring (2 Ruined Battlefield)

Ring 2 - Ring of Twilight (2 Ruined Battlefield)

Gloves -

Dark Justiciar Gauntlets (Uncommon) (2 Gauntlet of Shar)

Dark Justiciar Gauntlets (Rare) (2 Nightsong)

Boots - Dark Justiciar Boots (2 Nightsong)

Cloak - Vivacious Cloak (2 Mausoleum)

Lore and Flavor

The first half of this build (before any interaction with The Nightsong) is representative of where Shadowheart begins her story. Regardless of my plans for her at the end of Act 2, this is how I usually build Shadowheart in the early game. I love the idea of her getting excited to find equipment from Dark Justiciars and wanting to use it.

The "final" form of this build does require Shadowheart's dark ending, as the strongest pieces of the Dark Justiciar set are understandably given as a reward for actually becoming a Dark Justiciar. While decidedly not the good ending, this is still a powerful story and an impressive character that everyone should experience at least once.

Other Dark Justiciars in the game have a similar combat style to this build, relying heavily on Darkness and a mix of melee attacks and spell casting.

Shadowheart's backstory feels very relevant to this build, of course, but I don't consider this a true "canonical" ending for her. I'm working on writing up something for post-Act 2 that I think fits her much better and, thankfully, works better in the meta of BG3 (so much better, in fact, that it makes me wonder if it was intentional...). A big issue I have with this build is that Trickery Domain is a really weak domain in general and given the gameplay and itemization of this build. But, if Shadowheart is a Dark Justiciar of Shar, I think she would choose an actual domain of Shar. In 5e, that's either Trickery or Death. Death would be great, but isn't an option in game - this would be a cool chance to use some of the incredible Cleric Domain mods out there!

[check out my build disclaimer for info about how and why I don't min/max or completely optimize builds, prioritizing lore and vibe instead]

[deusexlachina]

The best Dragon Age rogue can even steal the niche of tanking

There's a big discourse, among Dragon Age: Origins fans who play Dragon Age at all for the strategy aspect, on whether rogues should minmax Dexterity or Cunning.

The consensus is Cunning. That's wrong. Dexterity ends up being much better. On console, you want Strength.

Explanation below the cut, because it requires talking in some depth about combat mechanics and, honestly, who plays Dragon Age as a strategy game?

(I do)

The consensus, among Math People, is to go Cun, since Lethality lets you use Cun instead of Strength for damage. So maximizing Cun boosts regular damage on top of "armor penetration" (which is an obscure way of saying "more damage"), in addition to several other roguetastic damage buffs.

Indeed, if you're just going for The Big Number, pumping Cun is better, hands-down. But, on Nightmare, just going for The Big Number will get you killed. Fast. They'll hurt badly if they hit, because you don't have enough Str for good armour, and they will hit, because you ignored Dex, and you won't hit them because you ignored both Dex and Str, and Lethality makes Cun add to damage but still uses Str for hit rate because the combat mechanics are incredibly complicated and obtuse. I say this with love.

Only an arrogant fool would go against such a strong, well-informed consensus. Lucky for you, I'm an arrogant fool, so I can give you a tasty piece of advice: Do the exact opposite of what the Math People say. If you want a combat-tastic rogue, go for dexterity and strength. Ignore cunning!

The strength isn't actually that good on its own, but it lets you equip heavier armour, which is good for Everyone But Mages And Maybe Them Too If They're Arcane Warriors. Fatigue only penalizes activated talents, which, if you're a rogue, are generally worse than your autoattack. The main exception is Dirty Fighting, because it stuns anything that can be stunned, with no chance to resist, and even things that can't be stunned will release your buddies from a grab, which is a death sentence. The game doesn't explain any of that because the combat mechanics are incredibly complicated and obtuse.

If you have Return to Ostagar, Cailan's Armour is shockingly good on a rogue. The full set gives you +5 health regeneration in combat, meaning you regenerate health more than most mages regenerate mana. It's even made for rogues: it gives you extra backstab damage, which is strange because only rogues can do backstabs and rogues aren't expected to invest in strength. It's an excellent way of representing the way Cailan backstabs Anora by secretly planning to dump her.

The dexterity gives you hit rate and defence on top of raw damage. In Origins, if your attack and the enemy defence are equal, you have a measly 54% chance to hit. You ever wondered why Origins combat seems to be a whole lot of missing? That. Each point of difference between attack and defence adds or subtracts 1 from the percentage chance to hit. If a target has enough defence, it's quite possible to have no chance to hit!

So, if your defence is high enough, you can have situations where dozens of guys are stabbing you but only maybe two of them are doing anything. The entire rest of the party being dead is normally a death sentence, but for you it's a mild inconvenience, because it means you'll just take that much longer to fertilize the earth with your enemies' corpses.

After all, you didn't max out Cunning.

[ask-the-achs]

*another fight*

Singer times! Wait a second you're not the star!

TSUGU VS FREDBEAR/GOLDEN FREDDY

ALL TSUGUS IN ONE THAT ILL CALL RAGNAROK AND ADDING THE POWERS OF FNAF WORLD GOLDEN FREDDY WITH FREDBEAR AND NIGHTMARE FREDBEAR (NOT NIGHTMARE. AS IM NOT SURE WHAT THAT IS.)

Fredbear info

Hight:7' 4" (yes it's that big)

Weight:at least 400lbs. Maybe? Unknown.

Weapons:its body

Strengths:superhuman strength (comparing to the other robots golden can throw arcade machines tear apart metal and can easily tear apart the other animatronics can easily overpower humans and crush skulls. Novels claim it can control the others.) Superhuman durability (scaling claims they can survive being in burning buildings and even getting attacked by wall busting robots and monsters. Can tank gunshots with relative ease.) High speed(the animatronic should compare to springtrap and foxy both of whom can move at 17-20mph.) In fnaf world has many skills among its forms like

Jumpscare:Stuns all enemies for a few seconds.

Rainy Day 2:Temporarily decreases all enemies defense and damages all enemies multiple times.

Haunting:Summons a ghostly Freddy Fazbear that has a possibility of Freezing an opponent for a short time.

Bad Pizza:Massively damages all enemies.

Poison bite:Massively damages and poisons a single enemy.

Freddles:Summons a stampede of Freddles that massively damages all enemies multiple times.

Mega Bite:Bites the enemy, it's 2× stronger than a normal Bite Deals an incredible amount of damage to enemies.

Regen Song:Heals the party over time.

Mimic Ball:Summons a temporary mimic that duplicates any attacks used.

*as Fredbear it can run and move like a human. As nightmare fredbear it has an extra mouth on its stomach and sharpened teeth can somehow teleport as both Nightmare fredbear and golden freddy can mimic powers of other robots in the AR game. Like..*

Turning invisible

Make static to obscure vision

Drain electric power

Turn off lights in a building

Turn on lights in a building

Disassemble itself and reassemble itself

Cause hallucinations

Track a person through movement.

Is resistant to shocks and hacking

Weaknesses:it's not a fighter. Can be fooled by a fake Freddy fazbear mask. Can dissappear if it's foe isn't looking at it. Has three souls with different personalities(ones always scared and crying. Ones a loyal but agony full friend and the last one is angry as all hell and seems to be like an animal.) Like the other bots is weak to fire and is very flammable. It's shock resistant not shock immune. Could maybe be hacked?

Tsugu info

Height:the wiki claims 5' 1" but she could be bigger.

Weight:Unknown but light according to Paradox

Weapons:prosthetic arm. her own martial art skills. Anything she can find.

Strengths:superhuman strength(could easily overpower villains and heros of MHA and has spent enough time in fairy tail she can lift and throw cannonballs and throw manhole covers like discus, comparing to the other Einherjars she could break buildings apart and as a phantom thief and a pretty cure she can kick away building size monsters.) Superhuman durability(can get up after Hercules punched her hard enough to shake a city block. Can get shot in the back and walk it off. Lost her arm in a car crash and managed to power through to drag her mother away from the crash. Can endure building size blasts. Her persona that shares pain with her got inpaled by Hercules club and she didn't flinch.) Superhuman speed(can dodge lightning. Deflects sniper rounds. Could react to Apollo's arrows which are made of sunlight. Outran Derail once who could outrun a horse.) Many skills and knowledge of fighting thanks to her getting the powers and memories of her other lives along with their powers which are!

Flight through a bat form

Teleportation

Mind reading

Explosions and fire manipulation

Regular flight through levitation

Lightning manipulation

Mechanical skills

Ice magic/manipulation

Metal magic/manipulation

Werewolf form has claws fangs and can regenerate in moonlight

'Dark magic'

A zombie form

She can see ghosts and summon them to her aid.

Body swapping

A robot secondary form

A ghost form that can phase through things and possess others

Her own persona m'lady grants her the ability to heal herself boost even more stats and has both light manipulation and psychic attacks.

All her forms have enhanced senses

In the reboot/isekai timeline got two more powers.

Deku gave her a minor sound quirk which allows her to understand any language and make sound vibrations to cut anything she touchs.

Paradox taught her sound magic which can make sound blasts and barriers to defend herself.

Weaknesses:isn't one to fight aggressively. Always puts herself down. Scared of being forgotten. As her persona is light based she's weak to dark attacks. Hasn't used dark magic yet. Can't use Völundr as this is a one on one. Apparently scared of bugs and spiders. Has to take time to switch forms. Her dragon magic (the ice and metal ones) can irreversibly turn her into a massive dragon if not careful. Enhanced senses make her unable to take boats or trains without getting seasick or motion sick.

[wickedstitchingworkshop]

hey indie devs

i hate hollow knight, i'm so done to see other games just snatch mechanics from it blindly, hk has gameplay flaws such as cheesy bosses, bad platforming, unclear hitboxes, slow paced unfun fighting, useless obscure mechanics, dumb map which infuriates me. And all this crap mixed with an interesting story, mind-blowing lore and graphics and incredible atmosphere, which probably can only be compared with games by From Software

i want to see someone makes 3d lowpoly metroidvania with nice parkour like in doom eternal, actual puzzles, like in crosscode or portal and mechanics that are deeper than overused charms, stat collectibles and "rpg skill trees" with no rpg behind them

i believe there are indie devs who share my vision and can make a game that will beat damn hollow knight and give new breath to the genre

[general9chaos]

Okay, that's quite a thing. It just hijacked my brain for the last few hours. I can't not reblog it. You know insight porn? Yeah, this feels like actual insight into why I like the things I like.

My autism level is 5, because I'm most interested in fanfiction and jumpchain. I don't even watch or read most of the canons I read fanfic for. I am well steeped in fanon. I read fic from many fandoms, but my mainstay is Worm. Wormfic is mostly on the forum Spacebattles, rather than AO3. It often revolves around giving Taylor, the MC, powers from some completely different story. It's playing legos with powers, and there's always some new power to give Taylor and see how her character changes with it. Power based characterization is my jam.

You've probably never heard of jumpchain because it's obscure and I talk about it on spacebattles rather than tumblr, but goddamn is it autistic. You know the thing where people of any level can enjoy just about any story, as long as they can enjoy it in the way they prefer? Yeah, jumpchain is a way to take any setting and turn it into a well formatted list of perks and items, ready to be vacuumed up into the database in my brain. I love thinking about combos and comparing and contrasting perks that do the same thing. My companions tend to start as lists of perks I like, and then accrete archetypal personality traits around that core.

Even beyond that, though, the route to my heart is interesting details about some setting presented by someone who clearly understands that setting at an incredibly deep level. Also power fantasy. That's great too. I love Ryuugi's rants just as much if not more than the stories they expand upon. I'm clearly not reading him for well structured plots, because he never finishes things! I'm reading for the worldbuilding, the powers that canon forgot, the deep understanding of the stuff he has read, and the conclusions he draws.

Brockton's Celestial Forge draws on jumpchain as a source of crafting perks. I love the consideration LordRoustabout gives every perk that Joe gets, the towering stacks of perk combos Joe has accumulated, and the things Joe has made. The pacing is dogshit and the characterization is great, yet I keep reading for the perks. Many readers dislike the way the story stops and turns into introspection about the newest perk every couple thousand words, but I love precisely that.

I really seriously don't give a fuck about pacing. You want to stop writing about the fight you're in to introspect about something for a dozen paragraphs? Be my guest. I'll pick up where you left off when you're done thinking. You want to spend the next couple months recapping the big fight from someone else's angle? Sure, I'll read that. You want to explore the consequences of the big fight for the ground level people for a hundred kilowords? That's the good shit.

When Exalted/Worm fics were getting popular, I got into Exalted. It's a tabletop RPG with fantastic worldbuilding and lore, as well as hilariously broken systems. I have never played a game of it, and yet I read through the whole chapter on mechanics and combat resolution so I could actually understand what the charms do. I absolutely needed to know how the fuck a paranoia combo works, and I figured it out!

Ascensions and Transgressions, an Exalted roleplay log, has a lot of things going for it. The characterization in particular is the epitome of the whole "take traits and archetypes and random junk and make a person out of them" thing. Read Calesco's character description. It's amazing. To build a character Aleph and EarthScorpion style, start by making a dozen lists, from pantheon charms to political ideologies to elements to Keris's principles to the yozis. Pick an intersection on two of those lists. Flesh out that character with stuff from all the other lists. Then roleplay with that character for years and integrate all the cool ideas you come up with into her. That is the kind of character building that really gets me.

I'm going to wrap it up there so I can get some sleep tonight.

i get that she's moved on from her more politically incorrect irreverent brand & i definitely have issues with this video's framing of autism as both pathology & just a 4chan conceptualization of a weirdo loser, but it's also the first fucking time i ever considered my autism as something that informs my taste & identity and kinda changed my life as a result. konjiki no gash bell is a level 4 autism manga thats why i loved it so much as a pup.

[artistsystemhub]

Metroid stuff and uhh yeah

So we've finally played through all the 2D metroid games, including AM2R, and I've had such a blast. I tried my best to go through the orignal 1 and 2 but just couldn't because of the lack of map, but Zero Mission, AM2R and the official Metroid 2 remake were fantastic anyway.

Honestly I just loved each of the games more and more as I played. So here's a few points about each game.

SPOILERS

ZERO MISSION

Honestly, made the original actually playable for me. It was the first one I played and how I got into the series. It's pretty simple compared to the other ones, but the final section after the escape sequence was just phenomenal.

I do think the zero-suit portion went on for just a little too long but it was worth it just to get the power suit back. Awesome shit. Fuck the mother brain fight though, that thing can just BURN.

SAMUS RETURNS

Samus Returns for the 3DS was really, really fun. I didn't play on hardware (please don't tell on me) so I can't say if the original controls were bad or not. I just love all the little mechanics they added, so many that came back improved in Dread like the parry.

I just didn't quite enjoy some of those metroid fights, and the powerbomb spiderball move was just so obscure and... strange. Also, please stop with the touchscreen stuff, it was so damn hard to change weapons in the middle of a fight.

That being said, I love the final section with the baby metroid. The cutscene was actually pretty cute imo, and a nice contrast against all of the great glory kills you'll see throughout. Great stuff all around, even if Ridley was a liiiittle bit ham fisted into the story.

SUPER METROID

This one is alright, I guess.

I'm kidding, obviously. It's a fantastic game. Now, I wouldn't exactly say it's the best as I personally enjoyed Fusion and Dread more, but I do not blame the people who find this their favorite. Playing through this I felt like that puzzles had just the perfect mix of obscure, foreshadowed and intuitive. It felt fair for the most part, and I just had a lot of fun.

The level design was great, the secrets felt great to find and I just loved exploring each and every new area. Plus with each entry the controls felt more and more refined. Incredible game. Also I saved the animals and that made me feel happy on the inside which something I cherish very much.

Oh and of course the ending + escape sequence, superb stuff.

METROID FUSION

Metroid Fusion really had me hooked with its plot and presentation. The opening cutscene, Samus's new suit design, the concept of the X and SA-X, it was all very intriguing to me from the get go.

Even with Adam telling me where to go at each turn, I felt the frustration Samus probably did. I think the linearity of the game helps its narrative quite a lot, and it was what had me glued to my screen, wanting to see what would happen next to the plot.

The two things about this game I didn't like very much were:

Anything that happened between that shitty spider boss and getting the plasma beam.

Sometimes I felt like I couldn't explore as much as I wanted to, and that I would just have to wait until the end to see most of the secrets.

Probably had my favorite ending yet, though. It was my favorite one until...

METROID DREAD

Metroid Dread was just the pinnacle of everything I played in each of the other games. The game and level design were on point, the narrative and writing were at their best and I just couldn't wait to play more everytime I put the game down.

The controls are snappy, along with the animations. It's for sure the best metroid game mechanics wise. It's responsive, it uses the upgrades in very interesting ways, the shinespark puzzles are the best in the series so far and everything I loved about the previous games was just amplified here.

Can't recommend this game more than I already have, and it seriously made me fall in love with the franchise even more.

AM2R

This fan remake was genuinely really well done. It feels almost official to play, even adding some QOL changes that not even Nintendo did. There's plenty to enjoy here from faithful recreations of particular rooms, to new mechanics to the metroid fights being a bit more interesting due to their arena changes.

Not to mention, it's not made obsolete by the official remake and it doesn't make that obsolete either. It's a lot more faithful to the original and has value on its own even if you've already played the one on the 3DS.

Every single one of these is absolutely worth a playthrough. An incredible series through and through, and I just cannot wait to see what they do with Dread's sequel and Metroid Prime 4.

Oh yeah, the Prime games. I gotta start those.

I hope they're not as bad as people say they are.

- Leaf

[huecycles]

Any fun facts you want to share about Mike and Halojack?

yes

several

i do want to show some of the interesting stuff through art and leaks but here are some crumbs from my brainstorming sessions with @just-ornstein (sorry to tag lmao but you helped me a lot with this!)

About M.I.K.E

sometimes references Mike Teavee lines from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: "DIE! DIE! DIE!" "Why is everything here so pointless?"

Mike only swaps letters for numbers when he's either emphasizing something or is angry/unstable, he usually speaks in all caps and uses normal case sporadically. guy has terrible anger issues too

has several different screens as his "faces". most of them are pretty different from one another, a few show his eyes (like the angry one), another shows text and a few have his smile changing expressions

his fight starts with the logo of his company showing up, like a trademark kinda thing lmao

has a replay mechanic of the "best moments" like a tv host would do. sometimes an attack of his can repeat suddenly with an audio cue and a text on screen

focuses on gameshows entirely due to Kris and Asriel playing games when they were kids.

did something incredibly shitty to Spamton, which resulted in him calling Mike a "criminal" (i'll probably make a comic about this i think it's really interesting)

had a family. he doesn't associate with them anymore, despite ironically becoming just like them later down the line.

About Halojack

her Light World equivalent is a signal amplifier in Kris' house. Toriel keeps losing it and everytime she finds it, it's in a different place (you know, like that one item in everyone's house that keeps getting lost). this correlates with the fact she's a hijacker and no one really knows where she lives

her halo is an indicative of her signal, if it wobbles or glitches, it means it's either bad or going haywire. it wasn't always pitch black. she wasn't always like THAT, design wise... a lot happened

her eyelids are fucked, she can squint her right eye but can't actually blink, and her left eye which is obscured by the mask is the opposite, it's hard to keep it open for too long. there's a reason for this

never calls anyone by their given name. she comes up with titles instead of nicknames: "The Tellyman" = Mike, "Caged Bird" = Kris, "Devilish Bad Looks" = Jevil, "Long-Nosed Doll" = Spamton (yup that's where spamton got that description from lol). the only other person she calls by their actual name is Susie.

your soul becomes cyan when you fight her (patience soul). and i already know how it's gonna work, but i wanna keep this as a surprise!

bonus:

[beingatoaster]

okay so i know Zero things about it, but: genshin impact blorbos?

THANK YOU because this is absolutely my hyperfixation right now (also I will simply use your not-knowing as an excuse to yell more/link pictures >>)

blorbo (favorite character, character I think about the most)

Jean Gunnhildr, Acting Grand Master of the Knights of Favonius, a kind-but-strong blonde knight with a strong sense of duty and honor, and also, between her powerset (healer/hitter) and background lore (the Knights of Favonius are the military branch of a religious org), technically a paladin! It's as if miHoYo designed this character explicitly for me. I love her. She works way too hard and badly needs so many naps.

scrunkly (my “baby”, character that gives me cuteness aggression, character that is So Shaped)

Razor, an abandoned child adopted by an ancient wolf-spirit and raised by wolves, with some later contributions by Jean's boss and her girlfriend the Favonius Librarian. Classic 'feral child does not speak good and has simple wisdom' but he actually has so much tragedy in his backstory and I love him a lot.

scrimblo bimblo (underrated/underappreciated fave)

Amber, an incredibly sweet and energetic young archer who has the misfortune to be the weakest of your free starter characters and also your first tutorial explainer, but who is a very good kid and was one of the starring characters of the manga, which is how I was lured into the game in the first place, so a lot of people go "annoying starter character" but when I first met her in game I was like "a friend! a friend has appeared! :D"

...cutting below this because there are spoilers and also I got rambly

glup shitto (obscure fave, character that can appear in the background for 0.2 seconds and I won’t shut up about it for a week)

...aside from, uh, also Amber? Several, really, especially as the plot moves away from the Knights of Favonius which are my always faves (you know me. give me a religious-oriented knightly order and I am stuck there), but probably Cloud Retainer, who has gotten more plot-relevant recently but is still an NPC. She is a powerful bird-spirit who thinks of herself as a machinist/inventor (actual results are... mixed... *stares at the cooking pot thing*) and also adopts children at the drop of a hat.

poor little meow meow (“problematic”/unpopular/controversial/otherwise pathetic fave)

Dottore, currently only mentioned in-game and only appearing in the manga, who runs terrible experiments on children, among many other evil deeds. He's one of the bad-guy group and absolutely the one I am most excited to see in-game, please give him to me miHoYo, I love him and I want to wreck his shit so bad.

horse plinko (character I would torment for fun, for whatever reason)

either Childe (another of the bad-guy group but also a friendly guy who happened to stab you in the back, loves fighting and in fact game-mechanics-wise you noncanonically fight him weekly which the fandom has a LOT of fun with) or Diluc (a rich dude who plays Batman on the regular, is your ally but also tortures enemies in front of you what the hell, honestly i think he's fascinating but also he attempted to murder his baby brother who's a second-level blorbo for me so I kind of want to dangle him over the plinko fire until he sorts out his many, many issues and admits that torture is wrong)

eeby deeby (character I would send to superhell)

Ei, a.k.a. Baal, a.k.a. the Raiden Shogun (but that also appears to be how they refer to the magic robot she made to imitate her and store her consciousness while she meditates on the astral plane after having dissolved her body, and I very badly want to free the magic robot). Honestly her whole character + arc was done bad by the writers and most of my issues with her can be laid at their door, but from a Watsonian perspective, she decided to steal everyone in her nation's magic (which are supposedly solidified hopes and dreams) and sat in her mindpalace not giving a fuck while her decisions catapulted her nation into disastrous civil war.

I literally do not care how much trauma led up to that set of decisions, I cannot abide leaders who let their own bullshit fuck up their people and do not, like, at least look at the situation and acknowledge they did wrong? The narrative (again, victim of the writing, but she exists within this narrative) never even has her acknowledge she fucked up in any way. Jean Gunnhildr would not allow her own trauma to shatter the nation she cares for, and she's not even a god!

[sonicasura]

Top 5 Game Series That Need The N.Sane Treatment

Crash Bandicoot was a series that hadn't been seen for years until the Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy was revealed to the world. Thanks to this trilogy, not only was the franchise revitalized but we also got a sequel for Crash Warped in the form of Crash 4: It's About Time.

This is a recipe that could potentially bring games lost in obscurity back into the limelight but even a chance for new games to come. Here are some of my picks!

1. Jak and Daxter

One of the games that seriously needs the N.Sane Trilogy treatment. Jak and Daxter was a game series made by Naughty Dog that would inspire many platforms after. It stars the Demolition Duo, Jak and his partner ottsel, Daxter, on incredible adventures that change in tone over each game. You begin with a goofy island adventure to a dark futuristic playground as new mechanics get introduced.

Out of the main trio which consists of Jak, Sly, and Ratchet, Jak was actually the first game I played amongst them. A series that needs a comeback especially with the Easter Eggs often seen in Ratchet and Clank games throughout the years.

Touch up the graphics into a different style depending on the game, the Precursor Legacy be a bit more cartoony in appearance like Crash 4, and then switch to a style similar to the N.Sane Trilogy for the darker games like Jak 2 and 3.

Adjust the controls to run smoother, change difficulty of certain games like lower the difficulty of Jak 2 a smidge and place an optional mode to play with the original difficulty.

This would lay down the groundwork for an actual proper sequel, Jak X feels more like a side game while Lost Frontier is a snore fest.

If Naughty Dog doesn't take this route and continues pushing out flavorless games, I suggest any decent company that can do should buy the rights to Jak and Daxter. This is a gold mine covered in dust that needs to come back!

2. Sly Cooper

Yep! We're going to the other member of this once legendary trio, Sly Cooper. Sly Cooper was the second game series from Sucker Punch that I played, the first being Infamous series.

This game revolves around a group of thieves who steal from criminals and tend to get wrapped up in saving the world a few times or battling enemies out to end the bloodline of the main character, Sly Cooper, who comes from a legendary family of thieves.

Before the series disappeared into discontinuity, we had a total of 3 main games alongside one made by Sanzaru. Sanzaru's Thieves of Time was decent but midway World 3, the quality seriously declined and left fans with a very unsatisfied ending. Perfect for crossovers but terrible for the franchise.

Giving this game the N.Sane Trilogy treatment would not only give a more successful chance than attempts to make a movie, but it could to more proper sequel than Sanzaru's version. Use a design similar to Sanzaru's or go for a more rounded one like N.Sane Trilogy.

Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart even had an Easter Egg with Sly in it too! Insomniac acknowledges that these game series still exist by dropping these little nuggets of nostalgia, take the hint and bring back the Legendary Playstation Trio!

3. Spectrobes

Nintendo's alternate version of Pokemon. Spectrobes is a trilogy game series that debuted on the DS and last game was made for the Wii.

This series revolves around Rallen and Jeena, two members of the Nanairo Patrol, as they search for the fossils of creatures of light known as Spectrobes to find the planet devouring darkness known as Krawl.

You travel through various planets to uncover different kinds of fossils and some very interesting or whacky but loveable characters. It has elements similar to Fossil Fighters where you have to dig up fossils before awakening them. Care for your Spectrobes to battle the Krawl.

The evolving battle system, new mechanics, various locales and the unique design of each Spectrobe were something I loved but pretty sure many would like too. It even had a book and a mini series on YouTube! The game's graphics could take a route similar to Rayman Legends or Dragonball FighterZ.

Don't go for Jump Force please. We need actual expression than stiff faces and aggravating screams.

This is game series worth bringing back even if it just gets a remake.

4. Golden Sun

Another Nintendo franchise that needs return from obscurity. Golden Sun was a JRPG that came along systems like the Gameboy Advance during a severe lack of games for it. It revolves around different groups of people who use Psynergy, their version of alchemy, to battle evil as they travel the realm of Weyward.

A great game series enriched by its many characters, lore, growing battle system such as Djnn and Summons to turn the tide in battles, unique story and all sorts of areas to explore.

The biggest dent to the franchise was Dark Dawn because of its questionable ending that left many players confused or dissatisfied despite the incredible graphics, plot and character interactions. After that no one has heard a single word about any sequel.

The N.Sane Treatment would not only bring the franchise back for fans both new and old but can actually fix the questionable ending for Dark Dawn. Graphic style, um, I guess something similar to Dragon Quest or maybe Persona. Persona would be the better option considering how you choose how the main character responds to certain situations.

This series has been done dirty and deserves a second chance like this.

5. Kid Icarus

A Nintendo franchise that shows bringing back old games can revitalize a lost series.

This game series is at the bottom for a decent reason actually. Masahiro Sakurai has been hearing requests about porting one of the games, Uprising, to the Switch. Something that he sounds like he wants to do but there is a problem as he admits it would be difficult.

How Uprising is made for the 3DS such as the dual screens, and specific use of the touch screen for combat. Something that can't easily be translated to something like the Switch without decent changes.

The game revolves around the angel Pit, who fights the evil forces of the Underworld with assistance from his Goddess Palutena. Each game changes the rules of battle with the greatest being Uprising as you combat various creatures and even bosses revolve mostly around Greek mythology.

I think the N. Sane Trilogy can work with this. The first Kid Icarus and the second Of Myth and Monsters might be what could provide the missing pieces for the Uprising Switch Port Situation.

Both games could be completely restyled in a format that could be similar to Zelda since in these games, your options of weapons are limited and you have to think smart for particular puzzles.

They can be used to lay down a format that can built on for an Uprising Remake since Land Battles are one half of the essential gameplay. The graphics can be Uprising since it's already a perfect that just needs to be brushed up a bit.

When it comes to Super Smash Brothers, Sakurai worked hard to make characters like Minecraft Steve or Fighting Game fighters such as Ryu and Kazuya fit into the gameplay even if it meant changing about every hitbox and aspect of the stages. A little help can go a long way.

That's what I've got for now. If I find anymore games that need the N. Sane Trilogy then I'll put em in a new list. Until next time folks!

[littlemoondarling]

For OTP ask and uh you can choose the ship

3, 12, 19, 24, 36, 44, 56, 66

Who is the least patient? Rouge x Marcel

Definitely and positively Marcel, boy would fight a clock for not going fast enough

Which of the two rolls their eyes the most often? Lucifer x Uni

It's a very close call but Lucifer is the shocking winner! He doesn't do alot of "expressing emotions" but he has to let some of that frustration out and rolling his eyes is the perfect way to do that.

Who gets a little too invested in board games? Rouge x Theodore

Both tbh, they are both very passionate and very competitive, but Theo finds Rouge's attempts at remaining calm and being the bigger person when his face is red and he is clearly on ths brink of flipping ths table much more amusing than whatever the hell they were playing.

Who’s better at dealing with emotional trauma? Ahmya x Timothy

Definitely Ahmya, after countless tries and errors, she managed to find coping mechanisms that work for her, she slips up sometimes of course but tbh anything is better than drinking yourself to oblivion.

Which of the two acts bothered by the other one but secretly enjoys every second of it? Dami x Angel

Dami because tbh being annoyed is part of their identity at this point and Angel does alot of... questionable things, but as long as no boundaries are crossed, it's all good.

Who would confess their love first? Theodore x Silas

Theodore because he used to be a sweet lil guy, this angered Silas tho who wanted to be the "man" in a relationship, and making the first move is traditionally the man's job (he's just a big misogynistic homophobe if you couldn't tell)

Who would survive the longest in the wild? Uni x Alexandria (love introducing new ocs in an obscure ask answer) or Uni x Lucifer

Uni. Forever and always. She is an incredible hunter as well as a trained fighter in both old and new school weapons. She knows how to map out her surroundings and forage for food. She's basically indestructible in the wilderness

[noircartoons]

Opinions on Cuphead?

A very gorgeous game. I've been playing it for a while and you can truly see the love from the people that made it in every single boss, every single song, every single scenary and run and gun and even npcs. It was a game made with care, by people that truly appreciate the rubberhose animation era, and that made it beautiful. I've never seen something like it.

And i have yet to see any modern rubberhose-inspired character show this much attention and adimiration to that time-not that they have to, but i think this passion added a lot to the quality of the material. I can say with confidence it would not be the same game if it was made by people that didn't love what they were working with.

I already saw the game as something incredible back when i found out the animation was drawn by hand, but the more i learned the more i fell in love with that game. From certain characters referencing classics tied to the era, to slight less known but still known(cookie carnival for example. I'm playing it in ptbr so i don't remember Abelia's name in english, but her level gave me a cobwebs hotel vibe? these two shorts are not necessarily rubberhose, yet still known as such.) to even the most obscure thing that i never thought they'd reference(i still think it was brilliant to take bimbo's inconsistent designs as inspiration for mugman, and the moment i noticed that they mimicked and modernized fleischer's technique in the background of a boss fight? that was gorgeous. not obscure but i admire even the villains that they chose the exact shades of teal, red, and brown as the beggining of colorized cartoons-disney exclusive.)

The game mechanic is amazing as well, firstly you need perfect timing for this kind of game and they nailed that. second, the varying mechanics in all of the bosses are all so creative and brilliant! (i have a few favourites myself pfpf) the bosses designs by themselves ARE GORGEOUS and so so so creative!! i could go on for some time over how amazing i find them and how well designed they are. i also enjoy the factor that there is more then one way to beat a boss, like you can use different weapons and supers and specials, i just find that neat :)

Sorry i'm starting to rant over my love for the game pfpf it's just a game i hold dear to my heart, it's so beautiful and unique and well-planned, and it was made by such amazing professionals, i admire it so much!! They really managed to make it stand out from every other rubberhose-inspired modern animation, in a way that is completely unique to this game and there is nothing like it, which is not easy at all.

[orrianreaper]

For the boss fight, how about Sruffi?

(I'm @sylvarilining just on my main blog)

Thank you so much! Sruffi would be quite a fun boss fight in think! I can imagine Sruffi's arena to be a large garden, covered in all sorts of flowers and clearly implied to be somewhere near Caledon Forest, it's this gorgeous vista with the coast in the distance and it's very peaceful - as a huge contrast to the fight. He'd even be gardening before you engage him, quiet and serene. During the fight the time of day and the season around you will skip around in response to some of the chronomancy Sruffi utilises. In canon Sruffi is an incredibly powerful chronomancer, and that would feature hugely in his fight - He'd send waves of time across the arena constantly, freezing any of the party caught in the path of it or it's rebound. He'd periodically straight up time split, and spawn several illusionary continuum rift's to obscure the real one- they'd need to be destroyed quickly or else he'd recover his health, and repeat more of his pattern again (due to 'cooldowns' being reset.) I think he'd also swap between short and close range at certain points - his long range would act very similar to regular mesmer greatsword, periodically forcing the group to split wide else all be impaled and take massive damage from being speared from beneath their feet. He'd lay down wells throughout the whole fight, and in particular use a similar skill to gs5 to try knock the party back into them or other portals. In close range I think Sruffi would have a rotating fixate mechanic, he'd pick a party member at random to chase in particular and freeze into place and to teleport to. Like any good mesmer, he'd of course also have a whole bunch of clones running amok at various times across the fight just to make you second guess who to hit. Some of his wells would be straight up boonstrip or boonsteals, and he'd attempt to drop them under the feet of a party member forcing them to leave it away from the party else wreck everyone's boons. I also really enjoy the idea of his chronomancy possibly affecting the timer itself. If you can break his rifts in time, you actually win back time on the clock - however Sruffi gives himself boons constantly, and when under quickness and alacrity the time actually goes down faster / skips. Break his magical time distortions, and you gain the time on the clock you need to actually beat the fight. This would go from nice on the regular version to mandatory on challenge mode - you're fighting for time agains him. There'd be a few achievements for a fight against him.

Time Out - Stun the chronomancer before he can warp the clock even once.

Seeker of the Sunrise - Defeat the challenge mode against Sruffi, awards a title of the same name - as once the fight is over the sun rises over the ocean in the distance, compared to the sunset that was there at the start.

I like to think he'd have a few unique drops too - He could drop a shoulder piece/infusion(?) perhaps which allows a pink butterfly to occasionally flitter around your character similar to how the otter infusion fuctions. Perhaps it's gathered in a similar way, by collecting echos from every fight until you've got enough to 'crystallise' into a proper infusion butterfly, a little memory made manifest.

Perhaps a unique shield, sword, or greatsword too to match this theme, though i'm not sure what they could look like really given in-game he uses the basic chrono shield, the key-sword from drizzlewood, and sunrise as GS - but i think some thematic pink, butterfly, chronomancy weapons could have fun designs!

[northernweird]

Weird’s Ultimate Alignment System:

I have been thinking about conflict of Law vs Chaos a lot recently. And I mean a lot more than usual. I was a big fan of D&D’s nine grid alignment, but ultimately it’s incredibly fiddly prone to malfunction and cause endless arguments. It’s especially dangerous if alignment has mechanical consequences, like it does in some OSR systems which I am reading currently. A lot of these systems drop the Good vs Evil angle, to focus on more primordial and weird conflict. Unfortunately they or their users almost immediately define Law as pro-social pro-hierarchy pro-status quo and Chaos as social darwinist mutant degenerates. Good job reinventing Good and Evil all over again, and somehow making it mildly faschy sounding?

I think Cosmic Order vs Chaos conflict should be more fundamental, any parallel to modern philosophies and politics merely projection on the part of people, the actual details going just slightly beyond the scope of the characters stuck in the middle. It would be useful to ground it into older lore, something that the actual players would be familiar with. Looking at ancient Greece, they defined primordial chaos as general void, that’s cool, until you think about it for a moment and realize we have circled back around to premise of Status Quo vs Destruction, which is quite flexible but oh so well trod.

This is where my law for medium awareness and self-reference comes in. What was the primordial void from which TTRPG’s came about? War Games. Endless ranks of soldiers clashing together to make measure of their equipment and their immortal leaders’ tactical merits. But wait a minute. If Chaos is Endless Conflict then what does that make Order? Peace? No that doesn’t sound quite right to the present state of TTRPGs. Besides the organized armies of depersonalized soldiers sounds perfectly in Order’s aesthetic wheelhouse. Did we not go far enough?

Because what are Roleplaying games if not continuation of noble human tradition of storytelling and play? Huddled around a campfire with no rules binding them but the magic circle and the whim of the narrator. Where the end goal were the epic highs and lows of collective past and identity. Of myths, tragedies, and heroes.

Presenting new Order and Chaos: Rules-Reference Fundamentalism vs The Unfettered Narration. (please take these tongue in cheek). Order wants everything bound together by strict laws, rules, exceptions, and examples. Every interactions and transaction must be clearly defined and overseen to be valid. Every person’s total worth must be determined by math and spreadsheets. The soldiers must be unquestionably loyal to their commanders, their freewill abstracted into binary of a morale check when going gets tough. Chaos wants to bring the world of roleplaying games back to its original roots. Back to the cozy darkness of prehistoric caves. Back when imagination and emotional connection of the audience were the actual limit to what could be accomplished. The Chaos isn’t just godmodding jerk on the rpg forums however. Chaos is perfectly aware of the innovation that has come through the conventions of storytelling over past thousand years. They understand the importance of tension and release, suspension of disbelief, and the etiquette required to create and maintain a magical circle within which play and story can flourish. They just prefer not to define these invisible lines with distinct rules, going by the feel and reaction.

Of course now these abstractions are perfectly grockable to the players, but they still should be obscure to the characters. The characters aren’t medium aware enough to understand the true scope of the conflict, so it might be good to conceal it behind the long history of scars across the tissue of material plane. PCs may at first even struggle to notice that there are two distinct side at conflict, mislead by the fact that Order and Chaos primarily prefer to fight in their own circles despite their fundamental conflict about what the world ought to look like. The other side simply doesn’t know how to have a good fight! The Art of [Competitive Balance]/[Mythical Feuding] Just Means Nothing to Them!