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tswhiisftteedr · 11 months ago

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Gamer ‘Friend’ ☆ Chapter 2: Game Night

☆ Pervy!Dom!Idia Shroud x Fem!Reader : On a Thursday night, Ignihyde’s dorm leader, Idia Shroud bumps into a fellow gamer, and that happens to be you, someone that had become infamous on campus. Being new to this world, and having the headmaster stingy with money, you had yet to experience this world’s gaming. But not to worry, after all Idia Shroud the professional gamer that he is, is here to help, in more ways than attended…

(In this version reader eats breakfast alone not with her friends, lol)

Warnings: THIS IS DARK, DON’T READ IF NOT COMFORTABLE WITH — Mature content, Non-Con, Dub-Con, Somnophilia, Penetrative Sex, Degradation, Inappropriate use of magic, Raw/No Protection(Don’t do this, wrap it before you tap it lol) Cumming on body, Multiple orgasm(female). Mentally unstable Idia and reader. Idia being extremely delusional and entitled. IDIA IS CANONICAL 18. (Reader is either really dumb or a really good actor, you choose for now lol)

Note: Reader is; a heavy sleeper(or maybe not👀), shorter than Idia, a masochistic degradee, an airhead, fucked up, unhinged pervert. And Idia gets horny very easily around the reader, since they are the first girl he’s ever seen in real life, besides from his family and the S.T.Y.X employees. Things move really fast because Idia is loke an obsessive pervert. Also when y/n is written it only refers to the first name. Idia is a bit/lot occ, not proofread. Also reader’s bed is pushed against a wall, this is just a note on the bedroom design lol.

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☆ more under the cut. ☆

Idia woke up feeling lighter than before, as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. He gets dressed in his usual uniform, hoping today would be another normal day at school. However, the memory of last night's activities still haunted him.

As he walked down the hallway towards class, he noticed you walking ahead of him, your hair swaying gracefully with each step. His mind drifted back to yesterday's encounter, and his cock twitched involuntarily in his pants. He struggled to focus on anything else but you.

When you guys arrived in the cafeteria, he sat down next to you, trying hard not to notice how your skirt hugged your curves enticingly. "Good morning, y/n," he managed to croak out, forcing a fake smile onto his face. "Did you sleep well?"

“Umm.. well I guess, but..” You begin than move closer to his ear and whisper; ”The pervert returned. This morning I woke up with my panties full of jizz, I could feel the guys cum right against my pussy…. Plus my lock was definitely picked, I have no extra keys under my doormat or something, yet my door was left wide open both last night, and the night before.” You pause to take a sip of orange juice “Honestly I hope that whoever did those things, at least locked the door behind themselves, when they leave.”

Idia's heart beats faster as you whispered in his ear, your breath brushing against his earlobe sending shivers down his spine.

You said those things to him in a manner full of innocence, making it sound like you truly don’t who broke in. But your words, they hit Idia in a way, making him feel like you definitely know that he was the pervert. ‘Even if he saw you sound asleep with his own eyes, someway, somehow you knew he was the one…’

His hands trembled as he sipped on his coffee, trying to maintain composure. "I... I-I... uh..." He stuttered, struggling to find words.

"Oh goddammit," he muttered under his breath, covering his face with his hand. "I-I... I-I...." he trailed off, unable to bring himself to admit it was him who had done those things to you.

“You okay Idia, you’re getting red again?” You asks sweetly, just like you’d done the day prior.

Idia's face flushed crimson, his heart pounding in his ears as you concernfully reached out to touch his cheek. He nodded weakly, clearing his throat. "I-I... I'm fine," he managed to croak out, his voice barely above a whisper. "Just... uh... stressful dreams, I guess."

After hearing his words you pull back gently. “You don’t really sleep well often, huh…” You stop to think about a solution. “You should come by the ramshackle for our after school gaming session. I’ve studying and collected the herbs that grow in the mountains around it. And I have the perfect herbal mix that will not only make you sleep like a baby, but also chase away nightmares. That’s what I like the most about this world, magical herbs and plants that actually work!” You tell him cheerfully.

Idia nodded gratefully, his relief palpable as you offered him the chance to visit your dormitory, with your consent this time. "Thank you, Y/n," he managed to choke out between sips of his coffee. "I-I appreciate it."

Standing up from his seat, he gathered his belongings hurriedly, eager to escape the confines of the crowded cafeteria and the ‘temptress’ sitting aside from him. "See you later, then," he mumbled, rushing out of the dining hall, leaving behind a trail of confused looks and whispers among the male students who had witnessed their strange exchange. In their mind, it was odd to see the ignihyde dorm leader talk to anyone, much less a girl.

“No prob.” You whisper to yourself, glad to be growing closer to your ‘new friend’.

Idia hurried back to his dormitory, skipping class once again, his mind racing with mixed emotions of relief and dread. He knew he couldn't keep hiding from the consequences of his actions forever.

Once inside his empty room, he collapsed onto his bed, burying his face in his hands as tears welled up in his eyes. ‘How had things escalated so quickly? From breaking into your dorm to stealing a pair of panties from your body and violating you while you slept? What kind of monster had he become? And why didn’t he feel that bad about it?’

It was now after class…

Idia arrived at the run-down Ramshackle dormitory, his heart pounding in his ears as he approached the dilapidated building. He took a deep breath before knocking lightly on the wooden door, hoping you would answer.

But instead he was met by Grim. The fiery magical cat opened the door, his glowing eyes assessing Idia's appearance. "What do you want, human?" His voice was high and trying to be menacing, reflecting his need to be superior.

Idia's heart rejoice at the sight of Grim, despite your furry roommate’s ominous glare, he couldn't help but feel a strange sense of comfort around the protective beast. He stepped forward cautiously, extending his hand towards the cat. "Hi, Grim," he said softly, his voice trembling slightly. "It's Idia. I-I'm here to see y/n. She said she prepared something for me."

“Oh yeah, my henchmen did mention something along those lines. You can wait in her room, she’s showering right now.” With that, Grim nodded slowly, swishing back and forth as he stepped aside, allowing Idia to enter the dimly lit hallway of the Ramshackle. The air inside was cooler than outside, a welcome respite from the heat of the day. By then Grim had retreated to his own room.

Following the familiar sounds of running water, he made his way towards your room, his steps lighter than usual as anticipation mixed with anxiety consumed him.

You had finished your shower, and towards your room, not having know Idia was heading there.

Idia froze mid-step when he heard the sound of water stopping and footsteps approaching his direction. Turning around, he gasped in shock as you emerged from the bathroom, naked except for a towel wrapped loosely around your figure. Your frame was even more pronounced than he remembered, and the sight of your wet skin glistening under the dim lighting made his heart skip a beat.

Your eyes widened in surprise when you saw Idia standing there, wearing his usual uniform despite the warm weather outside. "Oh, hey Idia," You greeted him with a slight smile, my voice slightly husky from the steam inhalation.

Idia's mouth opened and closed wordlessly as he stared at the sight before him, his eyes devouring every inch of your flawless body. He forced himself to clear his throat awkwardly. "H-Hi... y/n," he managed to croak out, his voice barely above a whisper.

“I’m glad you could make it! But would you mind staying out of my room for a minute, so I can change.” You pause then with a malicious grin on your face you say. “Well that is, unless you want to see me naked~”

Idia nodded in disagreement quickly, his heart racing in his ears as he turned around and backed away from the rooms entrance, he watch as you closed the door behind yourself. He leaned against the wall outside, taking deep breaths to calm himself as he waited for you to finish changing.

After a couple minutes…

“Okay you can come in!” You say to him through the door, you were now wearing a pair shorts and an oversized shirt.

Idia took a steady breath before pushing open the door, his eyes widening in admiration as he took in the sight of you standing before him, clad in your comfy attire that still managed to accentuate your figure perfectly. "You look... amazing, Y/n," he managed to croak out, his voice cracking slightly with admiration and possibly something else deeper.

“Aw thanks Idia, but those are just pjs lol. Also you should careful with your words, or i might think you’re trying to seduce me.” You fake a reprimanding tone, than follow your words with a chuckle.

Idia blushed crimson, his eyes darting away from yours as he cleared his throat awkwardly. "S-Sorry, I... uh... I mean, you really do look amazing," he stuttered out, his voice barely above a whisper.

“You’re just the best! You are, so, so sweet and nice. I love that about you! Anyways let’s stop standing and sit on my bed instead!” You invite him, now sitting on your bed.

Idia nodded nervously, his heart still racing in his ears as he followed you into the cozy haven of your bedroom. He sat down on the edge of the bed, crossing his legs tightly as he tried to maintain some distance between them. "Thank you, y/n," he managed to choke out, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Why are you sitting at the edge? It can’t be comfortable that way. Come closer, I won’t bite, promise!” You tease him, turning on the laptop and console he gave you. When you were changing, you also had moved a table close to your bed to put the gaming equipment on.

Idia swallowed visibly, his hands fidgeting with the fabric of his uniform pants as he slowly scooted closer to you, until your knees brushed against each other's thighs. His heart pounded in his ears as he tried to maintain eye contact with yours, seeking reassurance in those beautiful eyes.

“Okay we can either play the car game you gave me or my new game.” You give him the choice.

Idia nodded gratefully, relief washing over him as you changed the subject to something more familiar. "Whichever you prefer, y/n," he responded, his voice still barely above a whisper.

“I guess we’ll just play the car game, after-all you’re way too innocent to play the other game.” You tease, knowing from his demeanour that such words would rule him up.

Idia shook his head playfully, a small smirk tugging at the corners of his lips."No, no, I-I mean... I'm not that innocent," he protested, clearing his throat awkwardly. "I can handle whatever game you have in mind."

You stand up, go to your desk and hide something behind your back. Than seat back in your spot.

“Oh really? Then what about this one!” You question him, pulling out the erotic game he had left for you 2 days ago, from behind yourself.

Idia's eyes widened in shock as you revealed the explicit game, his heart stopping momentarily before racing faster than ever. He bit his bottom lip nervously, his hands gripping the edge of the bed tightly as he studied the cover art. "Y-You... you have something like that?" he managed to mumble out, fainting innocence. And internally cursing at himself for having brought it to you. ‘Sure you request something like it, but you also said you wouldn’t play something like ‘it’ with him! He had put himself in this situation, and now he had to endure it.’

“Yeah, remember. I told you that when the pervert broke in for the first time he left my books on my desk, along an eroge.” You explain nonchalantly. “But judging from your reaction, you’re too pussy to play with me.” You egged him on.

And that actually gets him really riled up. Sure he is shy and awkward, but when his gaming abilities are questioned or at stake, he let’s his pride show, becoming competitive and not backing down.

‘Plus he had already beaten that game, so beating it again would be a piece of cake!’

Idia's eyes flashed with defiance as you challenged him, his pride rising up inside him like a fiery inferno. "Is that so?" he growled lowly, his voice deeper than usual. "Well, then let's see how brave you really are, Y/n ," he challenged back, taking the box containing the game disc from your hands. He takes out the disc and puts it in the old console on the table, himself. He then takes a controller and passes one to you.

The familiar opening theme of 'Maiden of the Abyss' played as the game loaded up on the old console, filling the small room with its sinister melody. The screen flickered to life, revealing the dark and twisted world where demons and monsters roamed freely, waiting for unsuspecting victims. The home screen appeared, filled with graphic and lewd images and sounds that sent shivers down spines of even the most seasoned gamers.

The game began, the camera panning over the desolate town of Hollowheart, where darkness seemed to permeate every corner. The voice of the demonic narrator echoed throughout the empty streets.

"Welcome, mortals... to the realm of Hell's Embrace." the screen faded to black as ominous laughter filled the silence.

Maiden of the abyss is an erotic game, that follows the story line of male protagonist whom is an exorcist. After transferring to St. Diavolo's Academy—an elite institution for those gifted with intellectual abilities, under the church’s order, or main protagonists has to face demons disguised as humans in turn by turn battle, collecting cards and items to use during said battles. Another main plot point is that the protagonists will encounter 7 demon sisters, all based on the seven princes of hell. Their names are Lucia, Maria, Odette, Levi, Beatrice, Scarlet and Belle.

A battle between the protagonists and one of the sisters, will go along those lines:

Depending on the sister the numbers of battle stage will differentiate. For example you’ll first encounter Belle in the storyline, she’ll only have two battle stages, one wave of henchman to battle then a versus between her and the protagonists. On the other hand, you’ll have to face 7 waves of henchmen before battling Lucia herself, as she is the last and strongest of all the sisters. Another component of the game is that when encountering one of the first sisters you’ll be force into battle, but after losing to one at least once, you’ll be able to skip the battle and report it for later. (You still have to defeat all of them).

The goal of the game is to beat, all the sisters and their henchmen, then recruiting the 7 sisters to your side to fight the final boss, principal Diavolo aka the kings of demons. In result of using your acquired skills and the help from the sisters you’ll rid the human realm from all demons, liberating it from evils. Finishing the storyline by choosing one sister to keep by your side while the other 6 return to their realm.

Now the question is where does the erotic content come in, and how do you recruit a demon sister per say?

Well simple, a battle against a sister can have 3 outcomes. The first one it’s that you lose against on of them, loosing a life with a total of 7 lives, then you’ll just go back in time before you engaged battle with her. Now having the choice to either skip or redo the battle. The second one is where you lose on your last life, causing the game to restart from the beginning. And third outcome is when you win against one of them, which unlocks a sequence. A sexual one at that, you’ll watch you customized character fuck the sister for about 2-10 minutes depending how well you did in the fight. The better the score, the longer the sequence. After your character ‘releases’ in her, a lewd crest will appear, making her your servant and consequently your ally for further battles.

Another fun gimmick to the game is that you can play as two character when enabling ‘Duo Mode’. Which will modify the sex scenes to make the two characters tag team the demon sisters.

As you finish customizing your characters…

Idia controlled his avatar, a silent and brooding high school student named Alex, in the battle tutorial.

You did the same, on the other hand you had chose a more confident avatar, named William.

Then as you both press start, the game began, the camera panning over the lavish halls of St. Diavolo’s Academy, where wealth and power seemed to be the currency of those who attended.

"Welcome, new students... to your new home," the voice of a sultry female announcer announced over the intercom.

“The graphics are nice.” You point out to Idia, amazed that the old console would have such nice ones.

Idia nodded briefly, admiring the high-quality graphics and immersive world of the game. "Yeah, pretty impressive," he muttered under his breath as he continued to guide Alex through the maze of corridors towards his shared dorms, with your avatar right behind his.

On the way there your avatars had encountered low level demons, and collected items and cards. But right before entering your shared dormitory, as you turned corner, you were suddenly ambushed by a group of demonic creatures led by Belle, the First Demoness—a seductive being with crimson wings and a wicked grin.

"So, newbies... ready to taste Hell's pleasures?" she purred, her voice echoing eerily in the empty hallway of the game, and for you and Idia, right out the screen.

Idia’s character, Alex, gritted his teeth as he fought back against the demonic horde, his fists flying fast and furious as he dodged and weaved through the onslaught of claws and tentacles. Sweat dripped down his forehead as he focused all his energy on survival.

Soon the brutal battle that left both avatar exhausted ended victorious, Belle’s tired form crumbled to the floor as the avatars panted heavily, their breathing labored in sync. Sound radiating from the console into your ears.

Alex's breathing gradually slowed down as he surveyed the defeated succubus lying before them. A cruel smirk spread across his lips as he turned to look at William, a mix of satisfaction and darkness in his eyes. "Well done, William," he managed to croak out between ragged breaths. "Now let's claim our reward."

Then a screen flashes, warning the player that the next scenes would contain explicit content. And after we press yes to continue, the art sly changes to a more detailed one and the scene begins in the boys dorm:

William nodded grimly, his own breath coming out in ragged gasps as he approached the fallen demoness. Without hesitation, he grabbed her slender waist roughly, lifting her up off the ground effortlessly before pressing their lips against hers forcefully. His tongue pushed past her parted lips, claiming her mouth as his hands roamed freely over her exposed skin.

Meanwhile, Alex's hands found their way under her skirt, gripping tightly onto her ass cheeks through the thin fabric of her tights. He squeezed and massaged them possessively, moaning against her ear as he leaned closer.

Belles’s moans of surprise turned into a mixture of pleasure and pain as they continued their brutal assault on her fragile body. Her wings flailed helplessly as she struggled futilely against their hold while William's tongue ravaged her mouth relentlessly.

With a growl of satisfaction, William's hand pulled down his own pants and boxers, freeing his massive cock from its confines. It stood tall and hard against the cool air, throbbing with impatience.

Alex followed suit, pulling down his own pants and boxers, revealing his own impressive member—equally as thick and long as William's. Grinning evilly, he lined up the head of his cock at the entrance of Belle’s tight pussy before pushing hard

Belle’s screams of agony turned into moans of pleasure as their cocks penetrated her virgin flesh, stretching it to its limits. Her walls clamped tightly around them, milking every inch as they began to move in sync, their rapid thrusts matching the fast pace of their breathing.

As they fucked her relentlessly, their hips colliding with hers in rhythmic syncophrance, their seed mixed together inside her womb. Each powerful thrust brought forth another loud moan from the helpless succubus as she clawed at nothing air around her.

The scenes ends with a close up to the crest that formed on Belle’s womb, afterward the game returns to its regular visual. With now Belle as an ally to aid them with the next battle.

“Fuck, that was hot.” You admit to Idia, your eyes still glued at the screen.

Idia chuckled darkly, wiping sweat from his brow with a shaky hand. "Tell me about it," he croaked out between gasps for air, he had been holding his ever since the scene began. "But we're not done yet, there are six more of those fucking bitches left to deal with." He said trying to act though, but in reality he was embarrassed, due to the fact that he was painfully hard. Not only because of the explicit visual but the thought of you: That you were not only beside him at such close proximity but also probably wet from watching the scene yourself. ‘Good thing I’m still wearing my hoodie.’ He though as the oversized article was the one covering his erected member from you.

By the way Idia’s thoughts were correct, you were indeed wet. But to cover up that fact yourself you just try and continue the conversation. ”Yeah, you’re right!” You respond to his previous comment cheerfully.

Then you followed it by a nod in agreement, your own breath coming out in shallow gasps as you leaned against the wall behind you, your chest rising and falling rapidly. “Let's get started then," you tell him.

Four hours later, the gaming session had ended.

About half way through the game, you guys had defeated the forth sister. But was now late, so Idia had to go back to his dorm. Before he left you gave him the herbal mix.

Idia had nodded gratefully, accepting the small bag of herbs from you with a tired smile. "Thank you, y/n," he gently says. "I'll use these tonight before bed." With a final wave goodbye, he gathered his left the building and started making his way back to his own dormitory, exhaustion weighing heavily on every step he took.

Idia was now laying down on his bed, still fully erect despite walking through the the cold of the night. The only reason behind it was that contrary to what you might have thought about him when he gently accepted your herbal mix,— the dude was going insane. Like bad shit crazy into his own thoughts.

‘You definitely knew he was the one who gave the game, and today’s game session was his punishing for lying and being a deranged pervert. But wait, you did say you found it cute when he broke in and stole your underwear, and he is more than sure you got off when you saw your panties full of semen from the way you reacted to the rough way your avatars were treating the demon sisters. Your little gasps, subtle moans, constant shifting around and rubbing of your thighs, yea he NOTICED, those little things drove him mad. And now adding all those things like together like puzzle pieces, Idia was now convinced that today wasn’t a punishment anymore. No, not at all, it was obviously you trying to seduce him, you knew he was the one who had been breaking in and doing despicable things to you. And this was totally your way to tell him, he could have his way with you, and that you would definitely be into it! It oblivious, how could he have been so dumb to overlook all of it, but not to worry, he was certainly going to fix his oversight now that he knew about it.’ — Yeah he had lost it.

It was past midnight,

when Idia returned to the Ramshackle, his steps silent as he approached your bedroom as he had successfully broke in for the third time. He thought about getting you better locks for a moment.

He carefully twist the handle of your bedroom door, having ensuring that Grim was fast asleep on duty outside before approach the room all together. Creeping inside, he made his way towards your sleeping form, admiring the sight of you peacefully resting in your cozy bed.

Idia's heart still raced at the thought of his next actions, even after his previous interactions.

He stood over your unconscious body, his cock still hard in his pants. With careful precision, he reached down and gently lifted your legs, taking off your shorts and panties, exposing your perfectly pussy. ‘Ready for the taking.’

He had lubed up his fingers with his spit, than he started stretching you out. Getting excited at every sounds you produced. And then when he had decided you were wet enough, he undid his belt and pulled down both his pants and boxers, taking them completely off.

Idia's breath caught in his throat as he positioned himself between your spread legs, lining up the head of his massive cock against your now wet pussy lips.

He teased you mercilessly by rubbing his tip in circles around your entrance, savoring the sounds of your soft moans as you shifted slightly in your sleep.

Without warning, he pushed hard, forcing his entire length to disappear inside your tight walls. A muffled gasp escaped your lips as he began to thrust rapidly, his hips moving in sync with the rhythm of their combined breathing.

And obviously with such a pace, you sub-consequently wake up.

Idia's heart nearly stopped as your body jerked awake, your beautiful eyes opening wide with confusion and fear in them. But those eyes quickly transformed into a mix of surprise and pleasure as you realized what was happening to you.

After observing your expressions, Idia's thrusts intensified, his hips hammering against your as he held onto your waist tightly, claiming your body fully. His cock stretched and filled your tight pussy walls, causing your breasts to jiggle enticingly with each powerful thrust

Idia's breathing grew more ragged as he began to degrade you verbally, his voice low and husky with lust. "You wanted this, y/n," he growled between heavy breaths. "You basically begged for it when you asked me to play that fucking game with you." His hips picked up the pace even further, his cock hitting your G-spot with every brutal thrust.

Despite being a total virgin, he had watch enough pornography to get an idea of what to do. And the rest of his moves came to him with the flow.

Idia switched positions, pulling out of you pussy with a wet pop before spinning around to face your ass. His hands gripped your plump ass cheeks roughly, lifting your hips upward as he lined up his cockhead against your tight hole. "Spread those legs wider, slut," he growled, his voice laced with pure malice. Without waiting for a response, he pushed hard, forcing entry into your pussy once more while simultaneously spanking your already-red ass cheeks harshly.

Your screams of pain turned into moans of pleasure as he began to ravage your pussy relentlessly form the new position, his hips moving in sync with the sound of your heavy breathing. His cock stretched your tight hole, causing your body to shake with each powerful thrust.

Idia's thrusts became more brutal as he reached climax, his cock pulsing inside your wet hole as he held onto your ass and breasts tightly. With a final grunt, he slowed down his pace, pulling almost all the way out before pushing back in slowly, savoring the sounds of your moans. And as ecstasy hits you, he changes the position once more. Now having you fold in a mating press, pounding your hole with a care for you or the world around. As another orgasm builds up Idia's own release followed suit.

After you had squirted on his dick, he pulls out, exploding on your pussy and stomach. Saying something along the line of ‘you don’t deserve my cum in you right now, y’a haven’t been trained enough’.

Idia panted heavily as he pulled away from your exhausted body, he released your hips slowly, letting your now heavy feeling legs fall back down onto the mattress. Wiping sweat from his brow with a shaking hand and his dick with some tissues.

He reaches into his pocket and retrieved his magic pen. "That's enough for tonight, whore," he growled, his breathing now more even. But then his face gradually twisted to a warm smile.

"Sleep... sweet dreams," he muttered softly, waving the pen towards your head as he spoke the incantation for a sleep spell and a memory loss one. The room fell silent as your eyelids fluttered shut, your body relaxing fully under the effects of the magic.

This time Idia had remembered to lock the door as he left the Ramshackle. By now he had arrived back at his room in Ignihyde.

As Idia closed the door behind him, he leaned against it heavily, his heart racing in his ears as he tried to process what had just happened. He'd... he'd lost control. His mind replayed the events of the night—the gaming session, the fight with Belle, Scarlet, Beatrice, Levi, the sex scenes that came with, and especially how rough he'd been with you. Shock and horror washed over him as reality set in: he hadn't been himself tonight. He wasn't the shy, introverted boy everyone knew him to be. He had never behaved like this before—not towards anyone, let alone you.

Sure he had violated you before, but.. he had never been so mean about it.

But there was something about seeing you in tears... it brought out a darkness within him that he couldn't deny. A feeling of control and power that made him feel alive. As he walked to his bed, he couldn't help but smile at the thought of how easily you had succumbed to his twisted desires.

Meanwhile your mind might not remember the nights events in the morning, but your body sure will, due to its soreness and the sticky cum covering it.

©tswhiisfttedr. dn translate, or plagiarize.

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syrikif · 1 year ago

Text

Gamer Etiquette

Kodzuken x Streamer!Y/N

Pairing: Kenma Kozume x Fem!Reader

Genre: SMAU, Written Elements, Strangers to Lovers, Romance, Fluff, Humor, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Streamer/Youtuber AU

Upcoming content creator/streamer, Y/N, has gone viral for lots of things. Her infamous dumb moments, her blended cookie recipe (which tastes better than it sounds), the way she rages at her friends during games, and about a hundred more.

But her most recent viral moment? Accidentally knocking famous streamer, Kodzuken, off the Bedwars map and making him lose his two year winning streak.

Now with more attention (and hate) than she ever asked for, her only option left is to go to the source: the man himself, Kenma Kozume.

Previous | Masterlist | Next

Chapter 2 (b): Boredom

Word Count: 2187

It’s been an hour since Kenma started streaming, and he’ll admit that he’s starting to get a bit bored. He usually enjoys playing Bedwars on stream but he’s been doing it so often lately that it’s beginning to get repetitive.

“What the hell is this guy doing,” he asks as he notices someone start building a tower of blocks on the emerald island. Kenma sprints over to the player, jumping up to knock him off the tower.

“Hype_boy2000 was killed by Kodzuken!”

“People that play minecraft are brainless sometimes I swear to god,” he hears Kuroo mutter in his headset.

Despite living together, his best friend usually only joins the stream via voice call, so he can interact with Kenma’s viewers and still be comfortable in his own room. Kenma honestly actually prefers this, it’s easier to hear him and he doesn’t have to worry about his roommate doing anything dumb in front of the camera.

He shakes his head, “You play minecraft.”

“Exactly!”

Kenma snorts, taking a quick glance at his chat to see how his audience is feeling.

Kodzuken is a GOD

People who play mc are losers🙄🙄🙄 (I play mc)

I’m not bad at the game but watching Kenma makes me feel like I am 💀

He looks bored 😕

His eyebrows furrow then because he’s almost completely positive that he’s hiding his feelings well enough for no one to notice. Apparently he’s not.

He feels something tug at his neck and briefly looks down to see what it is, resisting a smile at the sight of one of the younger cats, Mars, playing with the drawstring of his hoodie. “Do we wanna try playing something else after this?”

“Why? You gettin’ bored of winning all the time,” his roommate teases and Kenma has to force himself not to react to his words because he might just be joking but he’s hit the nail right on the head.

Kenma pretends he doesn’t hear him as he kills the last player (winning himself yet another game),“I’ll go one more round and then we can figure out something else to play.”

OMG do you guys see the paw????

SHOW US THE CATS

We wanna see the cats

“I think the only reason you’re famous is because we have a million cats,” Kuroo announces and Kenma can almost see the accompanying eye roll.

“I’m fine with that,” he shrugs. “But I guess I can show you guys the cats before we start.”

He changes his scene in OBS so that it’s only showing his camera, making sure he’s in full view before he scoops up the bengal cat still sitting in his lap. “This is Mars, we got him like a month ago. How old is he? Um like five months I think?”

He sets him back down on his desk, “There’s only like four cats in here right now by the way.”

ONLY FOUR???

How many cats does he have lol

“I think there’s like fifteen in the house right now,” Kenma’s head unconsciously tilts as he silently counts all their cats. “No- wait. Seventeen now, plus however many Minnie will have when she gives birth.”

“Yeah but don’t worry we have three different rooms in the house for them, plus the loft and then the house itself is three stories.” Kuroo chimes in, defending Kenma’s apparent obsession despite the fact that he supposedly doesn’t care. “And then we have like ten cat towers and eight litter robots.”

EIGHT?????

Oh so they’re rich rich

Half of those litter boxes would pay all my bills 💀

“Anyways um-,” Kenma pauses to reach for the orange cat currently laying in the cat bed beside his desk. “This is Enji, she’s been with us for three years now and she’s five years old.” Enji meows in disapproval as Kenma picks her up and tries to show her to the camera. She fights against him, her claws digging into his forearms and making him grimace. “She doesn’t like being picked up.”

As if on cue Enji jumps out of his arms and lays right back down in the bed, eyeing Kenma like he’s just committed some sort of grave sin.

“Well now that she hates me,” he shoots the camera a look, “Let’s go grab another one.”

He stands from his chair, taking a cursory glance throughout the room to spot any other animals lingering. “Oh-,” he notices a ball of fluff hiding in the cat tower sitting in the corner of his streaming room.

Miomi is much more willing to be picked up, her purrs echoing throughout the room as he cradles her in his arms and walks back to his desk. “This is Miomi, she’s a ragdoll obviously.”

“She’s my favorite,” Kuroo suddenly chimes in. “Literally so cuddly I love it.”

“She is very sweet,” Kenma agrees as he strokes the cat’s stomach. She blinks up at him slowly, her purrs lessening as she drifts back to sleep. “We’ve had her the longest, ever since we moved in.”

Kenma gently moves to set her back into the cat tower, to which she stretches only once before immediately falling right back asleep. He then looks up towards the cat shelves he’d put on his walls a few years ago, snorting when he spots exactly who he was expecting to find up there.

“Come here little buddy,” he coaxes the animal into his hands who meows in protest as his little paws reach out to cling onto his shoulders. And Kenma is just barely able to move into the camera frame before he starts practically screaming. “This is void,” he pauses to lightly pat his head, knowing that usually helps to calm him down. “Any guesses as to why we named him that?” The question is entirely rhetorical.

“Dude he’s like blending into your fucking sweatshirt,” Kuroo suddenly laughs.

Kenma leans forward to look at the viewfinder of his camera, “Holy shit he is.”

Void starts meowing again at the change in position and Kenma can feel himself flinch from how loud it is. “Hey hey hey, it’s okay. You’re okay,” he swiftly places him back on the shelf.

“That’s all the cats in here,” Kenma tells his viewers as he sits back down. “I might do a full video introducing everyone but it would just take a while to film because a few of them like going outside a lot.”

“Yeah I haven’t seen Binx inside in like two months,” his roommate further adds.

“I see him in the backyard a lot but he’s usually sitting up on the fence,” Kenma notes as he reopens the game on his stream.

Kenma goes outside???

He went out to touch grass

Binx is such a funny name lol

He ignores their jests, running in game to play his final round of bedwars for the night. “How about a three v. three?”

“Oh yeah you haven’t played in teams in a while have you?”

“A couple months I think,” he responds as he selects the game. “What do we wanna play after this?” The streamer directs his gaze to the chat while he waits for his character to load into the game.

“I was thinking something like Spiderman, or we could play Stardew with Kuro,” he adds just as he’s spawned into the map.

“Um, hello?” His roommate’s voice is loud with disbelief.

“Hi.” Kenma takes a moment to collect as much iron and gold he needs before sprinting to get a stone sword and some wool.

“Do I get a say in this at all?”

Kenma feels his eyebrows furrow, “You realize that you’re here solely for the viewers entertainment right?”

He begins speed-bridging across to the emerald island as he hears his best friend scoff. “Fuck you.”

“No thank you,” Kenma hums as he finishes off the bridge and jumps into one of the emerald spawners.

“Sometimes I wonder why we’re friends,” while the words themselves are mean, both men know that Kuroo is entirely joking as he says it.

Kenma subconsciously nods, “All the time.”

He spots another player from a distance and moves to crouch behind a pile of blocks next to the spawner. “I think my strat is to just kinda run and kill everyone and let my teammates worry about the bed,” he explains.

The player passes by then and Kenma manages to take him out within a few simple hits, as he usually does. He looks over at the chat, expecting the same praise he always receives after getting a kill but is entirely thrown off by seeing a completely random topic of conversation instead.

AHHHHH IT’S Y/N

Most unexpected duo ever💀

I was literally watching her stream twenty minutes ago

Wtf is happening lol

“Y/N?” Kenma is more than confused at this point, completely lost as to who or what his chat is obsessing over.

“What’s that? Is that like the name of the map or something?”

Kenma’s in slight shock for a moment at his question because there’s no way he lives with someone as stupid as Kuroo. “You’re literally an idiot. Look at chat, dumbass.”

He decides to start making his way back to his team’s island, building a bridge to the diamonds to collect any that spawned on his way. “Oh she’s a streamer too apparently.”

“Oh really?” He turns his character to look in the general direction of their island just out of simple curiosity, only to see something totally unexpected.

He watches as one of his teammate’s suddenly jumps out from behind a giant pyramid of blocks, running towards an encroaching enemy player and knocking him into the void before they’re even able to make it onto the island.

But that’s not what makes Kenma stop and stare. It’s when the player starts jumping around, punching the air and spinning in circles as they seemingly celebrate the kill, that Kenma pauses. “What the fuck are they doing,” he hears himself mutter as he finally remembers to finish bridging to their island.

GIVE HER THE STUFF

She needs supplies to cover the beeeeedddd

Y/N kinda sweaty ngl

He blinks, “That’s Y/N?”

He runs over to her, abiding to his chat and throwing the stuff he collected on the ground in front of her (it’s not like he’s going to need any of it anyways). But she just stares at him, and he realizes that she must be dumber than he initially thought because she definitely doesn’t know what he’s doing.

He tries his best to non-verbally tell her to pick it up - which takes longer than Kenma would like - but she finally understands and runs forward to grab the items. “Holy shit,” he mutters to himself as he turns and sprints back the way he came.

He decides to start getting the beds of the enemy teams and he’s in the middle of killing the last player on the purple team when he sees a highlighted message pop up in his game chat.

“Thanks :)”

He knocks the player off, hearing the tell-tale sound of their death as he opens game chat to look back at the message. “Shouldn’t she be paying attention to the game?” He says it like he’s annoyed, and he’s sure that it comes off that way to his viewers judging by their reactions to his words.

But he’s almost certain that Kuroo is able to tell that he’s not (he’s the opposite really) when he teasingly says, “Aw, she said thank you Kenma.”

“Shut up.”

And despite always being notoriously calm on stream, Kenma’s face suddenly feels warm.

~~~

“You guys saw that right?” Kenma is in disbelief as he spectates Y/N, who’s currently just standing and not doing anything to stop the enemy player running towards her. “What the fuck is she doing now? Is her game frozen?”

Y/N doesn’t react at all as she’s being attacked and Kenma can feel his jaw literally drop when she’s abruptly killed.

“Red Team has been eliminated!"

He sits back in his chair, his eyes wide and mouth still agape as he tries to process what just happened.

He didn’t really care when she knocked him off the bridge, was even slightly impressed that she was willing to take down her own teammate to survive. But that all changed when she didn’t even try to fight back against the other player.

“We just lost,” he whispers, mostly to himself, and the sentence feels foreign on his tongue.

He can hear his roommate saying something over the headset but he can’t quite understand what it is, nor does he currently care enough to try to figure it out.

“We lost,” he repeats, louder this time and it’s insane because he feels like laughing.

He can feel himself grinning as his character loads back into the lobby, “I can’t believe we actually just lost.”

And he feels almost giddy as he watches his win streak fall all the way back down to zero; because, for the first time in two years, something is different.

And never has he ever been so happy to lose.

Taglist: @crazy-people-are-here, @existential-traveller, @peachesncats, @royalz658

Any names in bold are unable to be tagged.

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sapphire-weapon · 1 month ago

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All this talk about story structures gives me severe flashbacks of arguing that the Last of Us part 2 follows the five act story structure of a classic tragedy and its story does not work with the three act structure that everyone was trying to force upon it, and getting bashed for it 💀 Though it looks like this idea is way more accepted now after some time has passed. Maybe the same will happen with RE4R over the years. I kinda feel like the idea puts people off so much because romance as a whole and subsequently romance story structure are seen as just that? Romance and nothing else? But romance doesn't have to be the center point of a story for it to be following the romance story structure.

I guess that's where people get confused with this. A story's structure and a story's focus do not go hand-in-hand all the time. It is just a specific way to unify the story's elements into a single narrative. But people read the word 'romance' and that's all they need to read lol

Yeah, and honestly that's not unprecedented in vidya analysis. It usually takes a while for deeper understandings of narratives to take hold across a fanbase. I think it was 2 or 3 years before it became widely accepted that TEW even had a story at all, let alone one that made sense LMAO Gamers are reactionary by nature, and people get very attached to their first impressions.

There's also the problem that a lot of people's understandings of story structure and analysis comes from youtubers, and most youtubers' understandings of it come from film analysis -- and films usually follow a very rigid structure that vidya is not beholden to, because films have to pack their whole story into about two hours.

That's where this whole "hero's journey" bullshit comes from. It came from analysis youtubers who primarily focus on movies. And then people get it in their head somehow that most stories are structured that way by default, and it's like... no????

But it's like I said earlier. I say "romance" and people think I'm calling RE4make a chick flick, or they think of a trashy paperback with Fabio on the cover and a waifish girl fainting in his arms.

It's just a storytelling convention. Think of like... Alien is a good example. Alien actually follows the story structure and thematic framework of the horror genre. But the first thing you'd tell someone about it is that it's sci-fi.

RE4make follows the story structure and thematic framework of the romance genre. But the first thing you'd tell someone about it is that it's horror.

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tlendeth · 2 months ago

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one thing that really hit me earlier today is how HUGE of a difference it can make how your friends/social circle treat attraction to men. (lots of rambling under cut)

Like, in my "old" friendgroup (we still get along, see each other when I'm back in my hometown, and text, but obvi less than when we all lived in the same town) attraction to men was (mostly) treated as a thing of "oh, men are gross, but unfortunately I am attracted to them", "how could anyone just be into men? that musst be such a miserable life", "people need to decenter men, wanting to be with a man is kinda gross" and "I wish I could recover from being attracted to men". And while I dont think that was something that was meant explicitly homophobic it does a great job at forbidding those of us who are just attracted to men to be happy about it, to be unappologetically gay, to love men and celebrate it.

And honestly? Looking back that certainly was one of the things that kept me in the closet for the 2 years roughly it took me to come out as gay instead of bisexual, because it made me feel like I was failing them somehow, and like I should be grossed out by myself and my attraction to men. I *want* to be with a man, and while my boyfriend and I have been together for way longer than that, and I love him dearly, those sentiments about men also kept me from seeinf that relationship as queer, because I felt like seeing the relationship as a mlm one rather than the "bi alt girly with a gamer bf" stereotype (sort of the only thing that got made fun of, but not called gross semi regularly), even with me being transmasc would be treason to them.

Which didnt permanently keep me from coming out, and after starting T last year I finally admitted being gay to myself and others (as then it had become very obvious to me that I was trying to force attraction where there was none, and with being on T I felt like I now might not be "appropriating the term" too much (internalized transphobia as well as transphobia in the gay community be thanked for that one-.-), but like I said, delayed it for 2 years. And I'm going to be honest: allowing myself to just be attracted to men, and only men has been one of the most diffcult "desicions" I made, yet so incredibly freeing. And I'm gonna be honest: I do honestly think it dampered my connection to some of them for a little while.

Meanwhile in the friendgroup I have from uni (who admittedly only know me as gay) there are jokes along the lines of "boobs are great on me n others, and clearly the best", but like... Never in a "ew men are gross, how could someone?!" way, and probably equally as many "no thanks, dont like 'em, neither on me nor others (and I tried the former xD)". And that, as well as becoming good friends with another gay guy has been so fcking amazing. I think this really healed something in me, by now I honestly just love being gay. I love being attracted to men, I love my boyfriend, I love just being *allowed* to be gay and myself, and be happy about it at the same time.

So basically tl;dr: be carefull with all your "men are gross and get well soon if you like them/only them" type "jokes", it can cause a lot more harm in some of us than u might think

#gay #mlm #nblm #trans #transmasc #lgbtqia+#bi #coming out #homosexual #queer #original post

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crazylittlejester · 3 months ago

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4 10 14 and 26 for the asks :)

- hero-of-the-wolf

4 Whats your favorite feeling?

that feeling you get when you step outside after a storm and it’s still raining a little

10 When was the last time you laughed so hard you cried? (or just felt really good afterwards)

when my fiancee was showing me the things they named their bg3 saves 😭 I WAS DYING. and i was real close to tear last night when TWO people sent me the same big hero 6 edit and it also popped up on my fyp because it was so insane and ridiculous 😭

14 Whats something upcoming that you’re excited for?

GENUINELY, FALL BREAK. because i intend to make my friends watch OTGW with me and do crafts and maybe i’ll force them to get cider n donuts with me too who knows

26 If you could live anywhere with anyone you want, where would it be and who would you bring?

Silly answer: id want an apartment building and id put all the mutuals in it because all of us in the same building would be so funny and chaotic

Genuinely tho, i’d wanna live somewhere like where i am now, maybe with more open space and a little closer to the actual fields, and with my fiancee. because we’re gonna have some incredible ass home decor and also ENDLESS SLEEPOVERS? GAMER TIME AT 2 AM FOREVER??? and also i’d bring our friend too, because then we could all be silly

#jes talks #jes ask #ask game

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dors-ee · 6 months ago

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so I've been playing Hades 2 and here's my feels for now! (I think I need to make an actual official review for supergiant on steam but idk how to do it... if someone knows! I am not comfortable doing it on discord )

For someone that is not a gamer and one of the last game I'd play being roguelike (adhd and boredom plus the stress of the fights) I love Hades 2! The art is what attracted me first then I watched the technical test and was basically sold haha!

I had to put god mode on bc I am just too bad as a player but I still am having a blast. God mode doesn't make it all too easy and Eris still kicks my ass and Chronos I can beat him but gosh is he stressful (but I love him!). It makes it accessible for me, I dabbled into the oath and trials of Chaos thing. I'm really not good enough haha rven with god mode, but it was still fun to do the first levels and I do hope I'll improve enough to try them again.

Like I really like this balance of hard and accessible. I play on a keyboard too, so it's sometimes tricky with thr weapons and I avoid a few of them, but again I'm still having a lot of fun!

The amount of ressources and things to deal with (enhancements, etc.) is a lot when you look at it like that but it is introduced in a way that makes it not overwhelming and I actually like it. I think it keeps you busy, with always something to aim toward (in addition to the story) without being overwhelming. Also you can decide to prioritize one or the other.

The thing they implemented in patch one with the gathering tools definitely helped though! It was a bit bothersome the old system.

All in all I really really love the game, the story, the art, but actually also the gameplay! I prefer it to Hades 1 -which I tried yes!-. More... idk, interesting for me. I had to sometimes be strategic and I am far from being as good at it and as using the gameplay as good players are, but for me, it pushed me. It also means I have to play when i am not too cognitvely tired haha. Cause to handle all the keys on the keyboard, the different abilities/attacks, foes, dodge, etc. that's taking! Not too much, but personally when I tire out I definitely start to take more risks and sometimes it pays off and other times just rushing in the fight head first without avoiding anything is not the way to go 🤣 (even with god mode on).

I really find the game taking and interesting and compelling. For me it striked a good balance on many many different places. Busy but not overwhelming, still hard even with god mode bur accessible, fun, but serious, and like I said I do need some cognitive ressources but also not that muchm like it still is fun.

I love love love the characters and the lore with the witchraft. I prefer the underworld path for now, bc I really struggle with the surface ennemies but like the idea of the rift of Thessaly in itself? Awesome! Same for the city! The ideas are great!

The game is very varied, but without like it being too much. It still ties in together into a coherent whole thing. Like it's great. The songs, etc.

I really am enjoying the game and can't wait to see what else they'll add! My only fear is that they'd make it less accessible for people like me not being very good at video games... I know for Hades 1 some people complained at the lack of difficulty for seasoned players. So idk...

I want to enjoy it and have the story and all. I do like challenge but I prefer like a desirable difficulty like there is now. I can pick my challenge and the game itself is still accessible -challenging too- but I can do it. And I can improve and succeed and even when I lose I am not too too frustrated (except Eris maybe) but just "ah well I'll try again. I learnt stuff, I'll apply them next time!" (I also hope they wouldn't make it too easy... it's a hard balance to find I am aware of it!).

I also have the choice. I like that, the choice of the challenge, the choice of the weapon, etc. i don't have to do things I don't want to do, I am not forced to like use weapons I don't like. You can still get the story, and have fun and progress. yes you are encouraged to challenge yourself and try things but you also aren't punished if you don't. And I really really really like that. I know it already was in the first game, and I am happy they did it again and hope they'll keep this aspect. You are encouraged to do thingsx but not punished if you don't and like keep to a few weapons or Arcana cards, etc.

edit : I also hope they won't change Chaos and Chronos! I love them as they are! Same for Melinoë! I ssw some criticism of her (and Chaos' design) but I really really really love her as she is! (And Chaos' design).

and Chronos is just... Chronos 🤣 Love this titan. (hate love, you know. He makes me laugh. He's I think also more complex than we think. At least his character and the story is... like I saw someone speak of the little sprinkles here and there of "ya know maybe the gods -olympians- are not so good etc etc." and like I am so HYPED about this, I really hope it'll go somewhere, it's SO INTERESTING. And so yeah, Chronos is a bitch and he did terrible stuff but is he really that much of a villain? Or if he is, which yeah he kinda is, ... is the alternative to him that good? And the Fate storyline... SO GREAT GREAT GREAT. Melinoë wants to save them and all... but should she? As for Chronos : he's fun, but scary, but fun. )

#hades 2 review #hades 2 #hades game #hades ii #hades supergiant #hades spoilers #hades 2 spoilers #hades 2 supergiant

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degenrcy · 1 year ago

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only i can hurt you (chapter 2)

same warnings as last one but with more highlight on the ed part of the relationship!

you two were out grocery shopping for the league with a whopping budget of barely 120 dollars. it was getting hot out, summer not just rolling but suddenly jumping you from around the corner with multiple day long heat waves predicted for the next 2 weeks. this meant no one wants to smoke drugs in a non-air-conditioned in an already heated car. this meant dabi and shigaraki weren't making much on their deals. this meant 120 dollars for groceries. for a house full of adults.

minus you two of course. "it's perfect tomu, we don't have enough for all of us so me and you can just... not eat for a little. nothing we can't handle, right tomu?" you clung to his skeletal form, instinctually running your hands up and down the length and wrapping your fingers around different parts of his arm. it was self-soothing yet a burdening reminder you two were only centimeters apart when it came to gaps and circumfrences of limbs and calories and weight and food and disgust and fat and-

"don't call me that in public. good idea i guess," he sighed, then motioned to the shelves of the current aisle you were in. "but look. we buy two packs for 12 dollars and we can get another THREE for free. i can be set for like, 2 weeks more if we invest in this."

you scowled, tugging him away into a different aisle. shigaraki was addicted to every diet soda out there, making it his mission to try every flavor before he dies as if he has 3 months left to live. full sugar soda was his vice when you two first met, cliche mountain dew drinking gamer with fast food bags inside more fast food bags inside grocery store plastic bags- he was disgusting. his teeth were nothing short of rotting and yellowed. but he was skinny. unintentionally omad-ing a burger and fries with a bunch of soda to wash it down after going days with either snacks and energy drinks or nothing at all when he was grinding out gameplays. you had grown up trying every sort of diet and eating all types of food but god has cursed women for eternity and blessed shigaraki tomura and every other male you've known with statistic-breaking metabolisms and simple cravings.

the only thing that ever worked for you was him. someone else's force. him forcing you to not eat by keeping you in his room for days. forcing you to purge those fries you got because can you imagine how much fat is actually in there? they don't weigh your food out, and look, all the fries are different sizes. the calories aren't gonna be accurate, you know that. it was fun to eat, but now all that salt is gonna make you look fat. actually, be fat. you're fat. go to the fucking bathroom and get that disgusting shit out of your stomach before you get fatter. by making you feel so horrible about yourself, you couldn't even stomach the thought of eating anything with sustenance.

you tossed a couple boxes of gauze and this really good disinfectant cream you two use, a lot, in the cart. sometimes he cuts you- one for every extra piece of food over your limit, every pound gained or not lost within acceptance, for even suggesting eating. how else would you have learned without him? without shigaraki's love and dedication to you, you'd be lost. and fat.

you tossed in some of toga's requested items- this new organic ramen cup rip off that was 2 dollars more expensive than being normal. a new pack of razors- but in an artistic way. toga likes to make art pieces with razors. and blood. who's blood? no one asked. everyone knew. some fruit went in the cart that everyone could enjoy. a lot of sale-priced store brand microwavable foods followed. cucumbers and pickles were the only vegetables you and shigaraki could handle. salad was to expensive. the biggest budget-denter was all of jin's mass amounts of protein. chicken, turkey, protein bars, protein powder, protein drinks, shit you guys didn't have money for anyways. you could only buy a nice pack of chicken for him. some tofu for dinner and broth.

"he can buy the rest with his gym-guy money. we don't owe him." you tugged on shigaraki's hoodie again, and he jerked his shoulder away from you. you gripped his forearm, and he frowned. haha, shigaraki, you can't hurt women in public.

by the time you guys got home, everyone was there.

"when the fuck did we all get days off, huh?" shigaraki yelled as he entered the house with two packs of strawberry flavored diet coke. he won that argument, judging by the three shakily stacked up in your arms. dabi got up from his permanent spot on the couch and the smoke around him twisted and curled until it reached the open door. they dapped eachother up, as boys do, dabi handing off the blunt without missing a beat to your boyfriend and showing him something on that god-forsaken beat up iphone 7. you couldn't really tell what was going on, didn't care much, just focused on bringing in the last few bags. you heard some expressions of disbelief, some anger, some laughing.

"i gotta kill her." dabi was saying as you put the final bag down, taking a few moments to catch your breath. you felt like you were gonna pass out.

"shit, i'd kill mine too if she did that." they were both leaning against the wall now, you could tell they were trying to inconspicuously get to the couch to knock out.

"shiiiiit," dabi ashed the blunt on the floor, then pointed to shigaraki with it. "you'd kill yours for breathing too fat."

there was an awkward moment of silence for you, followed by the two guys laughing their asses off and shigaraki not disagreeing.

"hey," you panted. "can you help clean out the cabinents?"

they looked at your hunched over form, hands on your knees, panting like a dog. and laughed at you. dabi slapping his thighs while he died of laughter and shigaraki stomping his boots against the floor, also laughing, also driving the ash further into the grains of the wood.

"gotta kill you now, y/n. out of breath over one set of stairs." he shook his head, giving one last hit to the blunt before letting dabi finish it. "fat bitch. clean this place up yourself." he spat, pulling off his hoodie after carefully peeling it away from his arms. your eyes started to well with tears, stinging. you pulled off your own hoodie, setting it on the couch and getting to work. you had thirty minutes left till your fast was over, it was enough time to clean out the old food from the kitchen and organize all the new stuff. enough time to get some wet paper and clean the floors. (what's a swiffer?) enough time to think about how hungry you were while staring in the fridge absentmindedly. fat bitch. enough time to chug a glass of tap water and physically shake your head free of food thoughts. dog.

you held the warm mug of soup in your hands, always cold and shaking. now recently added, veins sticking out more. it made you want to slice up your hands and fingers. you sighed, swirling the soup around with your spoon. you wish you could put bread in the soup, or maybe have a bowls worth and not just a cup. it wasn't on the plan shig had you on though, and it probably would never be. you gave up bread months ago, along with things like cereal and any soda at all. however sugar was always the hardest part, going strong for a month or two then ultimately binging on a whole candy bar one of the roommates gave you.

shigaraki comforted you that day, holding you in his arms. "i know it sucks you ate all that candy. you've been doing good so far, and i'm disappointed, but it could be worse. just make sure you're back on track tomorrow like you have been." he kissed the top of your head. "they never offer me candy or their food, you know."

"...what?" you lifted your head to look at him, clutching onto him tighter.

"yeah," he nodded. you felt like a little kid listening to his story. "i think it's because you're almost bmi 19, finally, but don't look any different from when you first were starting to lose weight. i mean, look at me babe. would you ever offer someone like me something so depraving as chocolate?"

your lip trembled.

"they know what i am. they can already tell i don't need it, that i won't take it from them. you know why?"

"cuz' your so skinny." you sniffled, trying to hide in his sleeve. he nodded again.

"and they all know you're the fat girl that they can buy a hershey bar for. that they can share their food with and you'll finish it for them. is that what you want?"

"...nooo!" you cried out, tears dripping down your cheeks. he kissed them, pink and hot from the shame of being his fat girlfriend.

"good... fix it then."

you were now barely bmi 17, and your boyfriend was nearing 15. you cried every time you thought about it, which was everyday. every gash on your arm for all the binges and regret and disgust and hatred and anger and all those gross feelings you got about being alive were imprinted on you forever now. you wanted thin forever, you wanted to be beautiful for your boyfriend forever, even if it wasn't gonna be shigaraki. you saw how amazing jin treats his women before his next episode, toga's insanely strong adoration for the same person she's been on about for years- yet her ability to do it for her current partner anyways. how dabi sleazes up girls at parties to be his customers and in his bed by the morning. even some of shigaraki's cut-off family seems nicer than what he's ever told you. they speak fancy and dress nice, they're rich. they pay the rent here for shigaraki and his 'friends', he was a rich boy living the poor life.

"you have money shigaraki, we could buy a new car or fix the fucking washer if you just called your stupid fucking uncle!" you were arguing again, not really remembering what really started it. the missed car payment might've been it, but no one really cared about paying off a car you guys bought for like 5k- oh, then wanting a new one, you were caught up now. "we could maybe have a kitchen, with, you know, real food!"

he scoffed.

"what?!"

"always thinking about food," he rolled his eyes. "even if i did get more money from them, i'm sure you'd waste all my gas money on driving to food spots. spend all the water in the washer washing away the grease and food stains from your clothes. your clothes, which go up in size," he got closer to you, back against the wall. "if i called my stupid-" his fist collided with the wall, actually breaking through it. it crumbled and fell in small pieces on your shoulder and to the floor, you flinched but didn't dare to scream. "-fucking uncle. for more money. you'd just spend it on filling up the kitchen, with real food. is that what you're telling me?"

he was in your face, seething. eyebrows pinched tightly, looking into your sunken eyes. you shrugged. he smacked you.

"you don't eat shit unless i tell you to." he grabbed your jaw, forcing you straight, then smacked you again. with similar force that he gave the wall apparently, knocking you to his feet and oh shit you were actually seeing stars. his boot pressed between your shoulders, holding you on the floor. "lay here while i make jin his retarded fucking pre-workout. if you get up, i'll kill you."

you sobbed as quietly as you could into your arms, phone buzzing in your pocket. the fast was over. you had 2 hours to eat. start with something light, maybe a cup of soup. some fruit for fiber, or something. uh, maybe tomu will make you some of his good tofu... takes too long though, it'll be 7 by then, and you don't eat past 7. you lay there. even after tomu walked by you, even after he came back to tell you to get up, even when he kicked you.

you felt small as he picked you up, grumbling and cursing, setting you down into his bed. he rubbed your head, down your spine, over your hip bones. he pushed you flat on the bed, running his fingers up over your flattened stomach and feeling up your ribs. he kissed your collarbones, each side, then your forehead. "just a few more." he whispered to you as you whined. few more pounds, okay. few more hours, okay. whatever tomura wanted, you would gladly do. you love hurting yourself, but he does all the work for you. you loved losing the weight, loved the perfect scars, loved the feelings that weren't complete distain so it surely meant they were good-feelings.

you loved tomura.

#shigaraki tomura/reader #shigaraki/reader #shigaraki tomura dark fic #tw.ed #tw.abuse #tw.misogyny #tw.enabling #tw.self harm

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ankhlesbian · 1 year ago

Note

What are you reading and is it any good?

Im assuming you mean “tka” and not the other random stuff ive been spamming lately

It stands for “the king’s avatar”

Oversimplified clickb8 summary:

In a world where esports are awesome and epic and beloved by all the godliest gamer of all time is forced to retire and give up his character…. But wait…. He ends up using this chance to start playing the game from lvl 1 all over again with a never before seen class and weapon, taking the gaming world by storm!

It’s not particularly deep or anything but as far as stuff thats borderline dudebro power leveling its top notch. Solid action scenes, lovable characters, good humor, some of the best escalation of stakes ever seen in a webnocel period (esp considering its like 1000+ chapters long)

Oh yeah its long as fuck last time i got into it i spent like 2 weeks reading 8 hrs + a day and still didnt finish it teehee

I’d def say it’s good as far as entertainment goes ~ there could be more gaybait and the women could be treated a bit better and as said earlier theres not a lot jn terms of ThEmEs to analyze but if you just want endless fun and action and feel good out maneuvering and hijinks take a peek~ shpild be really easy to find it floatin arouns i nabbed an ebook from skmewhere

#asks

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astrobstrd · 2 years ago

Text

2022. GAME OF THE YEAR. OK?

Hey folks, season's greetings. Runner-up for most sentimental gamer 2021 here and I got a bug up my ass to write about video games. It's equal parts games that did and didn't release this year. Forgive me for any run-ons or excessive commas, this started as a piece on one game on the list and then became a top 10, then it spiraled out of control a tad as I forced myself to write more. Regardless, I'm happy with it and you can check it out under the read more. Happy holidays!

GUNDAM EVOLUTION

Gundam Evo is so goddamned weird. It’s a great game that I cannot recommend anyone jump into now. I really enjoy the core gameplay loop and what it does versus a game like Overwatch— the dash and boost system serve as a salve to the ever-present hero shooter roll-out problem and offer a little bit of movement unpredictability, the lack of clearly defined roles prevented the game from having a dichotomy of “hard” or “soft” tank and support units, and, generally, I found myself having more fun with it than I could recall having with OG Overwatch at the time. Every time I think about going back, however, I remember that it’s one of the clearest examples in recent memory of a publisher just not really giving a shit about its product.

The game sits at a sub-1k player count on Steam, with no way for people in certain regions of the world to even play the game, the console versions took a full two months after initial release to hit digital storefronts, and there’s no backfill system in any capacity. For a game to have such promise in a world where only one hero shooter really survived the late ‘10s burnout period, then to fizzle out so quickly… it’s just kind of a bummer. I would not be surprised if the game is shuttered by this time next year. Still, the time I spent with it felt immensely satisfying.

FORTNITE

Yeah. I fell in last year, (completely by coincidence, when they put the skanking emote in, if you can believe that, which you shouldn't,) and now that I can play Zero Build, my playtime's only gone up. I've also watched as the remaining capital G-I Games Industry folks I follow, who poked and laughed at the Tower Building Gaming For Children also fall into the exact same hole. So... lmao.

I think as you get older you do look for a few more opportunities to have a common activity that you nor your friends really pay a whole lot of attention to but use as a vehicle to shoot the shit. That's Fortnite. It's like getting drunk at a baseball game in the middle of the day for late millennials. It also has full patch cycles that are genuinely, unabashedly, very fun. We got dirtbikes and gravity hammers and fuckin Doom Slayer now man! It's great!

Oh, and to defend my honor just a little, I've spent a grand total of $14 on it. I caved to buy the Rasputin and Gangnam Style emote. What are you, the IRS? Leave me alone.

SONIC ROBO BLAST KART 2

...henceforth referred to as SRB2K because I'm not typing all of that out again, is not a live service game, and also a mod for Doom. It's (probably) the best Sonic kart racer ever made, and it's all built in a game that has nothing to do with the little blue freak. It feels fantastic to play, and it evokes the same feeling of fuzzy-warm coziness that I got from playing a lot of Skulltag one winter. I spent quite a lot of time in late January and February compiling user created SRB2K mods, hacking together soundpacks for existing characters, and screaming into a microphone as I careened through some of the best and worst maps I've ever played in a racing game.

DEAD BY DAYLIGHT

I pretend to hate this game and sometimes I do.

And now it's time for

Let's find out!

10) Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge

Man, was this a fun surprise! I’ve never been the biggest turtles guy, but I am enough of one to have a favorite that I’ve picked almost entirely on the basis of color and weaponry. (It’s Don, for the record.) I am also enough of a fan of cooperative side-scrolling beat-em-ups that playing this whole game in a little under four hours with a group of friends was a complete blast. I have this weird hang up where I just can’t play these games solo. I think most beat-em-up devs also know that the real meat is in flying through them with a buddy or three or five. (After all, the only way I was ever going to finish Double Dragon: Neon, a game that I love but was definitely not the target market for, was playing it in co-op a year after its release.) That all being said, the fact that TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge allowed for six players at a time is as perfect as it is completely batshit and overwhelming. I’d routinely lose my place altogether as the genuinely fantastic backdrops and battle arenas turned into a flurry of blows and flying footclan bodies, and I simply did not mind.

While my time with it didn’t last long, I couldn’t help but admire the fact there was enough depth in the combos and strategic use of heavy moves, super attacks and thug-juggling technique to potentially make the game worth replaying. This is not even mentioning the genuinely fantastic sprite, level and sound design work. Fast, fun, and punching above its weight class as a title that was free day one on Game Pass, a fact of the gaming landscape that I constantly feel like we’re on the verge of having a reckoning with. Anyway!

9) Rumbleverse

I must preface this blurb with the fact that I have completely fallen off of Rumbleverse and I am genuinely sad I don’t have more to say about it. It’s been probably 3 months since I last fired into Grapital City, but the pull to go back amidst my neuroses and general malaise has been strong. It’s one of the few battle royale games where the insane love for its inspirations and the dedication poured into the game itself both shine right through. From the looser fighting game influence in its move priority and combo systems, to the completely unmistakable wrestling mark DNA, Rumbleverse is authentic and just plain fun. Compared to your bog-standard, shooty-bang-bang battle royale, the hype, guttural-noise-inducing moment ratio is off the fucking charts here, and that’s reason enough for me to include it.

By the way, every now and then I’ll hear people bemoan the fact that there are no melee-focused battle royale games. The fact that this game did not once and for all solve this quandry for people despite being the best implementation of that concept? It makes me want to scream.

8) Marvel Snap

Don’t look at me like that.

I really didn’t expect to like Marvel Snap. I’m not a comic book or superhero movie guy, but it’s amazing what being both free and available on Steam can do for you. Despite starting a little rough and having some growing pains in making decks that I actually wanted to use, the game of Snap itself is undeniably fun and incredibly easy to fall into. As of the time of writing this, I’m collection level 593 and I can no longer deny that I’m just playing it for giggles. This is the game that the certain-Blizzard-card-game-playing-me of 2017 wanted and just didn’t realize. Despite the whale bait in this very obviously mobile card game being clear and evident, and the fact that there is no way to assuredly get cards you want before level 500, I still somehow feel like this is the one online CCG I’ve seen that treats you with some modicum of respect... so long as you pace yourself and play in chunks. The quick nature of Snap, of course, isn’t really conducive to this, but you really just have to chalk that one up to terrible, awful, no-good, very bad mammalian reward responses.

I know the one thing that people just cannot shut up about is the game’s brevity, but it really is important to herald. As someone who’s played half-hour Hearthstone matches, it’s an undeniable factor in its continued popularity. After a particularly rough two days in late November where I kept snapping and kept playing despite losing six(!) ranks, I remembered an extremely salient realization I had while falling out of love with MOBAs a few years ago— if it sucks bad enough, you can leave. You can hit da bricks, so to speak, if you’re not making anyone else suffer as a result of it. If you’ve put a handful of your chips on black the last six spins and lost every time, it's okay to walk away from the goddamn table.

Latent gambling impulses aside, Snap is undeniably fantastic, and not even the only card game I’ve been playing this year.

7) Downfall: Slay The Spire

I’ve played a lot of Slay The Spire. It’s probably not even a fraction as much as the truly dedicated card gaming wizards that I’ll occasionally see screenshots from on the Community Hub, but damn, I love that game. Slay The Spire also came to me in a weird time; I was knee deep in my graveyard shift job at a gas station and spent my evenings, (7AM-11AM on any given day,) trying DESPERATELY to find a game that didn’t require too much of me but was still engaging enough to play between smoking pot, drinking, doing laundry, or all three. I bought the game on a whim, knowing only that it was a rogueli(k)(t)e and a card game, then fell ass over end into a Spire shaped hole.

Downfall: Slay The Spire is a lovingly crafted mod that pretty much just serves as an excuse to get me to play even more of this damn game. From the incredibly well-translated boss characters to the Hermit’s ability to pass as a character that Mega Crit would’ve made themselves, Downfall is fantastic. It could easily pass as an officially released expansion, and it's something I’ve already lauded over in the Steam Reviews for it

6) HYPER DEMON

This shit is bananas, man. I loved Devil Daggers so, so much, and despite still being squarely stuck 50 seconds away from the Devil Dagger, I swear I will get it before I shuffle off this mortal coil. And you’re gonna give me another lofty goal to strive for in a completely different game 6 years later? Fuck you m4tt. I love you m4tt.

I’ve played 3 ½ hours of HYPER DEMON so far. It was all in one sitting. I was amazed I didn’t forget to breathe during all of those 210 minutes. It’s the exact same all-consuming, focus demanding immersion that Devil Daggers ensnared me with in 2016. It’s Devil Daggers: Puzzle Fighter. It’s a cocktail of cosmic horror, Windows Media Player visualizer, Quake 3 montage over-editing, what I imagine the visual sensation of DMT looks like, and pure, unfettered skill-based FPS ecstasy. HYPER DEMON holds you to the sanding belt of its incomprehensible blazing-fast iridescent horrorscape and is unfeeling to whether you can handle it or not. I want more.

I need to play more. I will be playing more. I live to serve SORATH.

5) Super Mario 64 — B3313

I have never completed Super Mario 64. In fact, to my recollection, I never actually owned a copy of it despite having an N64 around the time of its release. I did, however, play an awful lot of this Super Mario 64 romhack in January. It has stuck with me ever since.

In second? grade I’d pass the controller at my best friend's house, as each of us desperately tried to clinch the red coin star in Lethal Lava Land or not tumble off Cool, Cool Mountain. In my teens I’d boot up an emulated copy through Project64 and try, to my behest, to play a game that paled in comparison to the breadth of experiences I’d already had with, at the time, recently released games. (Of course, when your high watermark is something like Garry’s Mod with workshop support or Just Cause 2, anything else feels like hoop and stick.) Even still, I appreciated what Mario 64 meant at both of these stages of my life, for one reason or another. Now, as an adult who claims to have a pretty good understanding of video gaming history, that respect has only deepened.

As a kid, I could recall broad strokes of the in-game world when I was away from the Mario Sanctioned Zone of my best friend’s house. The general layout of the first floor of Peach’s Castle, the first Bowser stage, the royal slide, as well as strange fragments of the hub world architecture scattered through my brainspace. In the days after a hang-out or sleepover, I’d devise ways to get around stages in my head, but SM64 never stuck in my craw for long amounts of time. Yet, I still had moments where it was forced back into my consciousness.

During a particularly shitty bout with the flu when I was about seven, my child brain conjured up visions of a castle that… sort of existed. In between retching up anything that wasn't saltines and soup, half-watched segments of Nickelodeon’s Games and Sports channel, and confronting the sickly taste of bile and lemon-lime Gatorade, I’d pass in and out of dreams, seeing feverish facsimiles of Mario 64. Strange floating voids that might’ve resembled a run-up to Bowser, Tick-Tock-Clocks that didn’t seem to match up with what was on the cartridge, and impossibly long hallways that bled into one another.

I had a passing knowledge of the “every copy of SM64 is personalized” “meme” before playing B3313, and saw increasingly convoluted icebergs and the Wario Apparition, (something that thankfully doesn’t show up in this romhack,) as laughably goofy addendums to already lame gaming creepypastas. The general idea of this hack, despite being fueled by this mix of amateur horror, is something still so genuinely fascinating to me. It's not even really the concept of a game with a “personalization AI,” but moreso the idea of imperfect memory. Things might be changing without any input from some spooky and malicious entity pulling the strings, you just can't remember what these places looked like. Those who are as equally fascinated with B3313 as I am use that term— “fever dream.” They use it liberally when talking about the general feel of the romhack, while also mentioning that at some point during their childhood, they would also have dreams about parts of Mario 64 that didn’t exist, or were slightly off. As one of those people, B3313 nails that exact feeling one-hundred percent.

Super Mario 64: B3313 is a fever dream come true. It’s a slurry of beta, demo-build and original content that bleeds into areas from the retail copy of Super Mario 64. Despite its brief, eyeroll-worthy, yet awkwardly fitting brushes with metatextual horror writing, (enter this cave if you want to see your deepest fears unfold!!!!!!!!!,) the main conceit of this strange, alternate-history beta-dump Mario romhack still hits like a guided missile to my brain. The seldom-played yet still familiar memories of Peach's Castle turn from a welcoming environment into an LSD: the Dream Emulator-esque maze of doors to entirely different castles, alternate versions of existing Mario worlds, densely foggy ominous hallways, and harshly inhuman architecture. It’s bizarre, surprisingly unsettling and manages to evoke a sense of familiar unfamiliarity.

B3313, Wet Dry World’s Negative Emotional Aura and the Personalized Copy concepts are at a bizarrely interesting confluence of childhood imagination, video game folklore, niche meme culture, and, most importantly to me, the impermanence of memory. It already feels like decades ago that we were telling people that, no, Nelson Mandela did not die in prison, the Berenstain bears’ surname was just being misremembered, and, uh, that Taco Bell never had “medium” sauce, but there’s something weirdly different about the foggy, self-aware recollection of sections from Peach’s Castle that never actually existed. There’s an unspoken understanding in YouTube comment sections and other circles versed with B3313 that none of this is, y’know, for real. It’s all gotten a bit tongue and cheek and suffocatingly ironic now, and while some would consider this a horrible breaching of kayfabe, I see it as a necessity to prevent B3313 and other experiences like it from becoming deeply lame, reminiscent of the early days of extremely self-serious YouTube ARGs.

There’s a seal that you break at some point if you came up playing video games. It’s the realization that everything in the game you’re currently playing is there on the disc. Emotion engines and curated experiences cannot magically conjure a completely unique experience specifically for you. With digital games, automatic updates, and the increasing capabilities of neural networks and AI, this becomes a harder point to make, but we’re not quite to the point where games can just generate new assets out of thin air. New content speeds through pipelines for still-alive service games, patch notes get nailed to the theoretical doors of your chosen Gaming Chapel, yet ghosts do not haunt hardware. There is no “personalization AI” present in a two-decade old N64 rom, and with how fast information travels and the fact that leaking video game news and secrets is basically a goddamned industry now, most games don’t get to keep their secrets for long, no matter how much I may want them to.

As you do with the childhood loss of innocence, you learn to eventually understand and cope with the feeling that games are not infinite dream machines made for you and you alone. However, you inevitably replace that malaise and disappointment with the fact that these collections of data and if-then statements still have so, so much to share with you. Experiences like B3313 come along from time to time to serve as a haunting reminder, though. This romhack is a transmission from a moderately different yet hauntingly similar reality that threatens to plunge you back into the depths of childlike mystique, wonder, and, funnily enough, horror, but with your current adult understanding and awareness. It’s equally as enticing as it is terrifying.

I know part of it is just getting older, not having enough space in your head for everything, and generally just "recording over" less important events in your life, but I've realized in the last few years that I don't remember parts of my childhood. I'm not talking year long spans or anything like that, but traumatic experiences that my brain has blotted out, or lengths of time that I just used to remember very succinctly. I don't think my childhood was any more or less extraordinary than anyone else's, probably on the "less" side of that spectrum, actually, but… it just feels weird. In finding old TV show uploads and reliving games from that time period, I feel like I've been trying to piece it back together or convince myself that I shouldn't. I think this romhack, in its own way, helped me cope with a little bit of that.

Playing B3313 is tasting honey lemon cough drops as I sweat into my childhood bedsheets, drifting in and out of tenuous sleep in my dark bedroom in the middle of the day. In its own weird way, it’s beautiful.

4) Hitman: World of Assassination

Thanks for sticking with me through that.

Up until recently, I always felt like an outsider when I said I was a fan of the Hitman games. I loved Blood Money when I was at the ripe old age of 10, and loved watching Tom Bowen’s “How Not To Play Hitman” series slightly more than actually playing it. I did end up finishing Blood Money, eventually moving onto Silent Assassin and, for some reason, Codename 47. I could not finish the first, nor stomach the latter, and it always made me feel like… a poser, I guess? They were pretty “hardcore” games at the time, known for stringent stealth and detection mechanics, and looking at forum posts and videos at the time it felt like I wasn’t getting The Full Experience by not being a bad enough dude to play them, let alone get Silent Assassin ranks. The World of Assassination trilogy has blown that locked door off the fucking hinges for me.

The three newest Hitman games are wonderful romps. As someone who’s been following Giant Bomb for a decade and loved their Hitman coverage and content, it feels like I’m just copying their homework here, but oh well. From throwing homing briefcases and walking around as a clown with a WA2000, to actually seeing the bald beauty's story wrap in the third chapter, Hitman asks you to take these games as seriously as you can. While you’re still definitely Agent 47, (nom de guerre, Tobias Rieper,) and still definitely going through an actually pretty good plot thrust in between garroting sociopathic billionaires, you are given carte blanche to steal so many clothes, chuck so many wrenches and empty as much lead into bystanders as possible with very little restriction. It's this distinction that I feel makes stuff like World of Assasination and, in my opinion, the Dead Rising series work. Comedy is often a hard thing to do in games, and I feel it's best left up to player expression and interpretation in most cases.

Whenever possible, I WILL go for alert-less stealth runs in any game where it's possible, and I killed hours meticulously reloading checkpoints, or missions wholesale, in the World Of Assassination trilogy back in February just to get Silent Assassin. But I also had plenty of moments where I had to break my own self-imposed restrictions to, for example, shoot Vanya Shah right in the back of her smug head and beat a quick, immediately exposed retreat as I let the exhausted sweatshop workers she rules over see her body careen two stories to the ground below her. This was a moment so satisfying that I am struggling to not reinstall the game right now and record a clip myself. (By the way, while Hitman has never been about killing people who don’t deserve it, WoA’s targets ride a hell of a line between being laughably sociopathic and ripped from the headlines of [what is hopefully not] the near future. I really do admire it.)

Hitman had some of my absolute favorite moments this year and, despite it pushing you strongly to a lot of those moments, they never felt unearned. I often yearn for the desire to feel like I truly was the brain genius who earned my moments, but Hitman helped lessen some of that stringency on myself while still allowing me to push my understanding of the game. From throwing Erich Soders’ replacement heart into the trash to whacking the Janus in a send-up to Blood Money’s A New Life, it’s some of the most satisfied I’ve ever been getting lead to water.

And, god, that fucking mission in Berlin? Insane. Insane. I know people talk up Dartmoor a lot and it does deserve it but… man.

3) Dicey Dungeons

In the midst of my summer-time seasonal depression, nothing was really working for me. I found myself pouring over what was on PC Game Pass, writing off games that seemed like too much of an undertaking after I’d completed a certain, lengthy RPG earlier in the season. Dicey Dungeons was a blip on my radar once upon a time, but had slipped through the cracks of my memory until I scrolled past it in my Xbox app, then inched my way back up to it.

I am both surprised and not that I spent SO much time playing Dicey Dungeons this year. As a man that will play any rogueli(k)(t)e you put in front of me at least to the completion of one successful run, it’s basic fuckin’ math. It’s the logical conclusion of just how rudimentary you can make a roguelike and have me still play it.

It’s also, by technicality, the third god damned card game on this list.

Dead simple— Dicey Dungeons is a game of rogueli(k)(t)e Yahtzee with RPG classes, inventory management, and an absolutely fantastic soundtrack that has me picking up my chiptune defending sword-and-board once again. The fate of your runs are, with some influence from the player, entirely up to literal dice rolls. I truly love just how much the game leans into being a stone-cold RNG fest, down to the fact that the entire thing takes place in a game(show) of fate hosted by an anthropomorphized Lady Luck. Its writing and enemy design is sickeningly, saccharine sweet and just a tiny skosh insufferable, but it never gets in the way of how rock solid and addictive the game itself is. So much so that I squeezed this damn game dry of content.

I’ve seen quite literally every piece of new content the game has to offer shy of the Halloween expansion, (it turns the game into a lethal puzzle thing, just not my cup of tea,) and I still had to stop writing this section of the list to go play a quick round. Played Robot in Parallel Universe with a decisive victory against Madison, in case you’re curious. And I cranked the volume in the boss fight for the first time since I turned it down to catch up on podcasts and video essays while whittling through the end-game hard modes. Lifeline goes completely insane as does the rest of the soundtrack. I was throwing ass in my kitchen making sandwiches listening to this months ago. This game just rules.

2) Yakuza 7: Like A Dragon

Of all the ‘guys’ I have claimed to not be in this GOTY list, I am, maybe least of them all, a turn-based RPG guy. I’ve tried, multiple times to breach them, and the best I can get is about halfway through most mainline Pokemon games before the tedium of Okay Now You Go battling gets to me. And yeah, I know, I just got done rattling on about two different card and dice-based roguelikes that are also turn based but… that’s different, y’know? I’m not just highlighting Firaga and watching an animation play out, I’m throwin’ dice and channeling lightning orbs and…

Look, it’s not important. What is important is I finished my first fucking Yakuza game this year. And it was the goddamn turn based RPG! Yakuza 7 is one of the most charming and enjoyable games I’ve played in my life! And it’s a turn based RPG!

That’s horrifying!

I don’t need to sing the praises of any of Ryu Ga Gotoku’s games. If you’re following me, you’re probably fully bought into the series or have heard people around you audibly get boners for Goro Majima and Kazuma Kiryu. In fact, I find it incredibly difficult to write anything new or provocative about this game that hasn’t already been said, but I just feel so strongly about it. It’s the insanely fun video-game-meets-real-life premise and immeasurably loveable cast of misfits that excel. It’s the heat moves. It’s Zhao. It’s the raw passion, genuine heartbreak, and joy of just being here that really got me. It’s Zhao again. Combine all that with an active battle system that satisfies the goopy goblin gamer brain’s need for near constant input and man? I’m set.

I know through cultural osmosis that Yakuza is a series about a few key things: compassion, loyalty, the bonds we share with others, and what loyalty really means. Yakuza 7 obviously has all of this in spades, but especially what it has to say about the lower/working class, anyone unfortunate enough to be homeless, sex workers, and those from impoverished backgrounds is so effortlessly excellent that it makes me excited to go back and play this series from the word go. I’ll miss the hell out of Ichiban and the shonen protagonist brand of fire-blooded vigor and bullheadedness he brought, but I’m excited to (…eventually) start anew.

1) Jabroni Brawl: Episode 3

Here we are. Finally. I’m not only writing something about a released version of Jaykin Bacon Jabroni Brawl, but I also genuinely feel it’s my game of the year. And now that we’ve arrived at this juncture I just keep thinking… what the hell do I even say about this game? I found something, but fuck, it took a while:

It must be said that I was raised in a triple parent household: I was brought up by my mother, father, and the Source engine. When I was 9 years old, I tuned into a mid day re-run of the now anicent television program The Screensavers that showed off version five of Garry’s Mod. At that point, I’d already played scattered chunks of the short, but enthralling Half-Life 2 demo we had on our family computer, (of course, the Icthyosaur jumpscare and being teleported to Ravenholm scared me right off,) but hadn't picked up the game. I begged my poor cash strapped father for a copy probably too many times, and after we both realized the pirated copy he nabbed wouldn’t be compatible, got a Half-Life 2 & Counter Strike: Source double pack for me as a birthday/Christmas gift.

I loved Garry’s Mod. I’ve got no clue how many hours I poured into version 9 before its subsequent release on Steam as an officially sanctioned mod, but let’s just say it was a lot. In December 2005 I joined the Facepunch forums, learned the difference between models and textures, corrected a lot of spelling mistakes, had my first bouts with navigating Windows folder directories, definitely made some crude sex poses, and found my first group of online friends shortly thereafter. I would eventually slowly slip away from regular patronage to Facepunch sometime in the early 2010s, but the impact it had on me as a youth is unquestionable. We can talk about whether it was a net good some other time though.

Before this gets too far into navel gazing and nostalgia, I’ll say that along the line I played a wonderful mod for Half-Life 1 called Half-Life 2: Jaykin Bacon Source that serves as the genesis for Jabroni Brawl. It’s a mess, but up until its Facepunch-branded revival and subsequent alpha/beta tests, it was the only thing I’d ever played like it. It’s full of ripped assets from other mods, purposefully goofy voice acting from its shithead (lovingly) teenage creator, and plenty of stuff taken from the then-recent Metal Gear Solid 3, a game I had also fallen in love with prior. It was dumb fun that I have forced multiple groups of friends at varying stages of my life to play and have a ludicrous amount of attachment to.

And Jabroni Brawl: Episode 3 is that, all over again, from the faithfully recreated weapons and impenetrable Facepunch callbacks, to the fact that this more or less ended up being a surprisingly official-feeling love letter to anyone who has ever made anything in either Source or Goldsrc. Jabroni Brawl knows what it is, and that’s all it is. It’s a deathmatch mod for and by the people still cherishing the rapidly atrophying muscular structure of a game engine that just won’t seem to die. It's for the people who want to get a group of people together on a Friday and throw friction grenades at/fart on each other. And that's all it needs to be to knock it out of the park.

Source and its modding scene still means a lot to people, myself included. For a lot of us weirdoes, it was a playground that evolved into a way to make friends, hone skills and even turn interests into hobbies and jobs.

But hey, this is getting KINDA GAY!!!!!!!!

Jabroni Brawl is frenetic FPS bullshit. It’s terminally stupid, rough around the edges, and unbelievably fun with the right people. Jabroni Brawl is gaming. It’s e-sports. It's, dare I say, hobby-grade. And it’s a complete goddamn miracle. I mean, fuck, this is probably the one project to start on Facepunch and actually see the light of day, right? Even seeing the Tales From The Galactopticon models in the customization menu made me feel positively ancient.

Here’s an in-game clip of a good friend killing himself in maybe the funniest way I’ve ever seen. Take care, and Feliz Navidad.

#goty #long post #writing

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catgirl-catboy · 2 years ago

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I love Sonia too but I agree.. And I was tend to like Soniaki more because the chapter 5 rebuttal give Sonia a great relevance.

But Gundam acting like Sparkling Justice to impress Sonia? I would find it funny and if Kazuichi calls him out for it, it could be a great humour too.

I love Peko too, my girl get therapy, pet some rabbits. It will be good and one thing too because that shit joke they made.

What do you think about Nekomaru? I read you see him and Nagito as foils and I love Nagito to the death soo

Yeah. From what little we got of Sondam, it was shaping up to be a really enjoyable romance plot. I wish Kodaka didn't have Kazuichi simping for Sonia and Sonia's narrative passivity get in the way of it.

This is not to say I'm anti Kazuichi simping. It makes sense for his character, and the fandom flanderizes him for it so hard! :( I think that perhaps he could have chosen a different target, like Mahiru, Mikan, or Chiaki.

If Kodaka picked Mahiru as the target, Kazuichi would be forced into performing masculinity in a way that's just NOT him. It'd also only last 2 chapters and would be less stale.

Mikan would work for a more comedic angle. (Hiyoko voice:) "Ewww Kazuichi get you're eyes checked.)

Chiaki would have made sense, because everyone puts her on a pedestal, Kaz would just be the most obvious about it. I also don't think she'd mind, because it might help her redeem him. Also gamer girl simps are a real thing and everyone knows one.

I think they could have made Kazuichi simping for Sonia work if Sonia felt conflicted about the whole thing. "As a princess, I should be used to this. As a person, he is ruining my chances with Gundam >:(" but Sonia's arc is both too cluttered and not busy enough. Shit just happens to her.

With that probably uninteresting tangent out of the way. (my target audience for the daily DR tedtalk is me, I am so sorry.)

Nekomaru is such a good concept: "Nagito, but healthy coping mechanisms. He does what Nagito wants to do, but fails spectacularly at."

Also, tangent: really important headcanon to me. Nekomaru has Bowel issues either due to his condition, or due to medicines he has to take for his condition. (I'm not a doctor) Nobody knows this in canon, but it makes a lot of sense.

Second tangent: His design sucks ass. I do not like it.

Third tangent: I hate the name Mechamaru, so I will not be using it. Like Gundam, Nekomaru's name is really important to him, and I don't like the (percived, possibly entirely in my head) implication that his robotification changed something key about himself like his name.

I feel like he really suffers from the fact that you don't get his life story unless you play his FTEs. I know thats how the series works most of the time, but it doesn't make sense from a character perspective. Dude overshares everything, there's no way he wouldn't mention his heart condition at least once nonchalantly.

Like: "Teruteru, can you skimp on the beef for my portion? The doctor recommends it for my heart health!"

Or: "Sorry Akane! I can't spar with you at the moment! Coach's gotta do his doctor-mandated 30 minute break in between strenuous activities."

I also feel like as a disabled person, ch4 was a missed opportunity to dissect the trope of curing disabilities and just disabilities in general. From Nekomaru's POV (he doesn't know this is fake!) Monokuma just extended his life, only to continue trying to cut it short. However, his body is now changed beyond recognition, and he now has a completely different set of limits he isn't used to.

If I were in charge of writing (aka the elaborate rewrite that only exists inside mya brain) I'd have Nagito volunteer to be killed in just your average Nagito move. But then, I'd have him mention that since he's going to die anyway, his life is less valuable than the others.

This would really set Nekomaru off. He'd tell Nagito to stop that negative self-talk, since it affects others to! By saying that, he's implying that his life is less valuable since he was going to die young. That he knows his life has just as much meaning as everyone else's, but chose to give it up for Akane anyways.

If you really want to comment on complex issues, maybe bring in Fuyuhiko's recent vision loss and that he's struggling with it.

Nagito's so high on copium that the point flies right over his fluffy little head.

I'd imagine the rest of Ch4 proceeds as normal.

I also feel like it was a missed opportunity to have Nekomaru be absent for Ch3 specifically, when he could have been absent for Ch2, where he had little plot relevance. He's spent his life in the hospital, he's a natural pick for hospital staff alongside Hajime and Fuyuhiko. Its also sad that despite his relationship with Akane (which I really like, actually!), he never actually see's her hidden depths onscreen or her at her lowest.

Imagine the drama. :)

#ask tag #crowtalks #nekomaru nidai #sonia nevermind

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view-from-over-the-controller · 2 years ago

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Half-Life 2 and Episodes 1&2 - Why 2023 is the best time to experience this masterpiece.

Half-Life 2 and its episodes are a cult classic that I revisited in 2022, they are the cool older brother of the gaming industry, sometimes lost on modern gamers now due to their age. But when I picked up the orange box for Xbox 360 I didn't expect this perfect little collection of games to live up and almost point out the flaws of current video games as they did. They have a class about them, a poise, a nuance that makes them feel utterly distinct.

Much like the cool older brother they have “lived” they have this mystery and status that makes you wish you were there in their hay day, but have a level of care and attention in their design that makes them some of the greatest games that have ever been made.

In this blog, I will break down how the Gameplay, Story, Atmosphere, and creative freedom make these games just a must-play even 18 years plus after their release!

“Pick up that can” - Gameplay

Possibly the most surprising thing to me when I re-acquainted myself with this masterpiece was the gameplay. The last time I played Half-Life 2 was an era ago when I would sit in my tiny gaming dungeon of a room and wait patiently as the loading screens buffered on my original Xbox! Since then most of the quaint pieces of gameplay had slipped away from my memory as it had been so long. So when I entered into some of these fantastic moments, now flawlessly loading on the Xbox Series X and with some all-time great games under my belt I was invigorated by how much this game stands out to this day as an example of fantastic and intuitive gameplay.

Physics are are the heart of these games, they are often referred to as a tech demo with a story and the use of these is constantly engaging and makes for some really memorable moments that stand out now against modern games. You are often presented with a scenario that feels like walking into a room with a set of tools hanging on the wall and everything you would need to use them on sprawled out on the floor. Moments that exemplify this are where you are hindered and need to find out via the use of physics how to get yourself to where you need to go.

As opposed to the more modern takes like Breath Of The Wild where you are literally put into a room with the available tools in the shrines, or God Of War where things at times feel inorganic and forced (you are Kratos why can't you just smash through it?) Half-Life organically places you into scenarios that are obstacles and puzzles but also tutorials and feel like realistic barriers that require problem-solving.

Such as putting bricks on one side of a see-saw-like plank so that you can use it as a ramp, or using buoyant barrels to fill an underwater crate to rise a platform. Later in the game and into the two episodes the gravity gun opens up so many fantastic and engaging ways to work out how to fix problems like when you can shunt a car into a hole at the top of burrows to stop the Antlion enemies from crawling up out of it. But what makes the physics-based puzzles so fantastic is their variety, their pacing and placement, and that they feel less intentional to get more hours out of the game but genuine obstacles for you to get through to get to where you are going. The tools are often laid in front of you but in a more experimental, do-it-yourself way, you can certainly see how these fed into Portal, utterly brilliant.

Another thing I must mention before we move on from gameplay is the plethora of weapons that Half-Life offers you as a player and how they not only have a distinct feel but also affect how refreshing and engaging the gameplay feels. The guns are super varied, from the zombie smashing shotgun to the hard-hitting Combine pulse rifle with its ultra satisfying reload animation where tiny spider-like robotic arms discharge and replace the ammo pouches, and a secondary fire that shoots an energy ball that bounces around the room and vaporizes any enemy it comes into contact with. But each weapon doesn't just offer a different means to destroy but a different strategy, Caught in sniper fire? Use cover and sneak up and throw a grenade into where they are. Facing a lot of zombies? Run away through an alley with a gas leak and use the pistol to ignite the flames and watch them burn away! Strider waltzing around laying waste to you and your freedom-fighting pals? Use a rocket launcher and a healthy dose of cover! Antlions burrowing from the floor fly aggressively at your face? Use the ant lion pouch from a queen and they become your new minions to pile into unsuspecting Combine troops.

Lastly, the gravity gun is the perfect example of how a weapon can be a gameplay tool, use it to pick up objects and smash them into the Combine. Or zombies, or Zombine! Use it to move supplies from unreachable places into your hands, use it to move turrets that are pelting you, Or when supercharged use it to literally grasp the very physical being of your enemies and toss them into each other, or better yet the abyss of the citadel. The gravity gun is one of the most diverse weapons in any game I have ever played, Offering a means to overcome obstacles and puzzles, but also cleverly use it to attack enemies with projectiles! Whatever the weapon the joy of using any of the ones given to you in Half-Life is that there is rarely a moment that they don't also offer you the opportunity to use your ingenuity and find clever means to make them the most lethal, and fun they can be!

“The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world” - Story

Half-Life and its episode's narratives on the surface are about a struggle against a brutal enemy, to bring down an overarching power as a rebellion. To fight Stormtrooper-like enemies and bring down the greater evil that controls them. But before you walk through a crowd of people and are awarded a medal of honor from the alliance, that you hopefully donate to the Wookie that accompanied you along the way, you should realize that this is more than a battle against a cackling Sith lord in a hood but a visceral tale of control, totalitarianism, loneliness, humanity, hope, and desperation that I believe especially now strikes a powerful cord.

In the wake of the Black Mesa incident, the combine is now almost in full control of the human race, but rather than a swift obliteration there is something more desperate and demoralizing happening, humans are in a suppression field that stops them from breeding. They are under lockdowns in numbered cities being fed on repeat the words of Dr. Breen, a voice that seems to have the feeling of something that is trying to offer you comfort but there is a disconnect, the feeling that although his words are presented in a manner of assurance that there is something just not right, and leaves you with a feeling of unease.

His echoing words saying, “Welcome to city 17, it’s safer here” then later justifying the current state of goings on and the suppression field in a long speech answering a concerned citizen that had written to him which included disconcerting comments like, “Do our benefactors really know what's best for us? What gives them the right to make this kind of decision for all mankind?”, “Our true enemy is instinct, inseparable from instinct is its dark twin superstition, instinct is inexplicably bound to unreasoning impulses, instinct has just become aware of its irrelevance, and like a cornered beast it will not go down without a bloody fight. It must be fought tooth and nail, beginning with the basest of human urges: the urge to reproduce. We should thank our benefactors for giving us respite from this overpowering force. The suppression field will be shut off the day that we have mastered ourselves. And that day of transformation, I have it on good authority is close at hand”

Although I have abbreviated Dr. Breen's words I believe even here there is enough to unpack, the combine are a disconcerting and mysterious entity, they wish to remove instinct and combine people into subservience, they do this by keeping people scared and forcefully policed. But they also apply further means to shatter the human spirit, keep people moving, and keep people confused and lonely, the people you first meet at the train station echo this, the woman waiting for her husband who she was separated from during the stopping of a train, the man who warns you off the water, “They put something in it, to make you forget, I don't even remember how I got here.” and a man pacing in anxiety about the trains explaining, “They are always departing but they never leave, there always full but no one ever gets on” all of this confusion caused by the combines clever schemes to sever what I believe is the most important human need, connection. One of the ultimate forms of that is sex and the ability to reproduce. Humans are being “Humanely” culled by the suppression field.

The combine are a powerful, intimidating force that makes people submissive through fear, now before I get all “does any of this remind you of the world you're living in now” I will say that Half-Life's story is a sight grimmer than the current state of the world we live in, but the removal of individuality, the lean towards subservience, the use of harsh physical fear inducing policing to establish control, and the voice of a man in a suit in control of where you reside telling you everything is okay but there is just that feeling of mistrust like he’s leading you in a direction that is in no way beneficial to you but certainly to him and his “benefactors” do all in some way make me feel a little uneasy about my own reality and I think that alone is a powerful thing for a video game to evoke in someone.

But what the story of half-life also does is highlight something that I certainly believe in and that is the unbreakable human spirit. Instinct is the very deep biological call that makes us question the uncomfortable and rise up against it. It's the feeling that calls you to remove yourself from situations that feel wrong. Even if it's that time you're offered a cigarette for the first time and your heart sinks and you think, I shouldn't be doing this. Gordon Freman embodies this, not only for the humans but for the Vortagons too, he is this silent anomaly, that finds a way no matter the situation of force against him, he is the guiding light you play as and every individual fighting the good fight against this suppression rallies behind him and gets to bask in his “freedom” the “free man”. The supporting cast are brilliantly written characters that fight with an upbeat and at times comedic energy against this seemingly unbeatable, unrelenting enemy with limitless resource. Alyx particularly has a great aura, a cheekiness, and slight air of flirtation, but also a childlike nature to her that makes her character particularly lovable, seeing her react to her father or dog is heartwarming, and her mischievous nature showing in excellent moments like when the lights cut out and she makes a zombie noise and laughs as you rush to turn your torch on worried you have unwelcome company but its really just her.

Each character in halflife and its episodes which are mostly solitary games manages to have genuine feeling and is really well delivered in the moments they get to shine, even Dr. Breen as an antagonist is perfectly performed and used in the narrative. They all add to the great storytelling and they all really motivate you to fight for the people around you, for freedom, and against those who seek to quell it.

Lastly like with any great storytelling, there is almost more mystery to half-life than there is revealed to you, who are the benefactors? What happened during the seven-hour war? How did Gordon get to city 17? Who is and what are the motives of the Gman?.......................................

{Fades to black} - *A Man in a dark suit approaches with slightly of center, but piercing turquoise eyes*

“Rise and shine…….rr, reader of this blog, Rise and shine! Not that I wish to imply you have been… sleeping on this read. No one is more deserving of a rest. All the effort in the world to understand would have gone to waste until….well, let's just say your time to continue reading has….. come again”

“Welcome…Welcome to city 17” - Atmosphere

The penultimate and perhaps to me most important part of this piece is about the atmosphere, Half-life has a near unexplainable magic in its atmosphere. Not only the source engine itself seems to carry this feeling but the sound effects and music do too. This is that of an eerie almost alien feel. Like you are being watched, but also alone. It's powerful, the sense of being disconnected with what is going on around you but also being intrinsically linked to everything around you as the protagonist.

The sounds of this game are so distinct, from the distant monotone robotic overlord voice echoing throughout the streets of city 17, to the sounds of the Combine's muffled voices behind their gas masks and the loud flat line as they die, the hissing of Headcrab's, the guttural moaning of the zombies that sound not only terrifying but also like they are suffering, the thundering, alien but yet mechanical moan of a strider, the hum of the gravity gun, the slight tinniness to the sound of anything being moved as if the sounds were recorded in a vast empty room. There is something individual about all of it, but there is a near indescribable nuance that seems to spread between the music and sounds that mirror that feeling of something Alien, of being watched, of being alone, a feeling of despair but also a feeling of hope and at times a sense of calm. Later games like The Last Of Us combine these feelings also but what makes half life special in comparison to The Last Of Us is that it manages to add that spooky otherworldly feel into that mix also.

A great example of this that I must highlight is the moment when you are under a bridge high above some water and there are these broken metal rails that loosely connect in a platforming section to the other end. As you begin to cross the song “Lab Practicum” plays, this song is filled with preternatural noises and a gong-like synth combined with the whistling wind hits you. (GO ahead and give it a listen) It is a stop-and-stare moment that along with the platforming, the metallic sounds of Gordons feet hitting the metal rails between jumps, and the intense rattle as one of the mysterious trains plows overhead, this is the most “Half-life” feeling moment I can possibly describe from the game. In my opinion, it connects with that part of us, that 6th sense or that “feeling” you get. I will now just place a couple of quotes below I found on the youtube link to this song that not only illustrates how this same piece connected with others but that they also tap into this “feeling” it gives them. All of these games throughout leave you with moments of this. It's just fantastic.

“This song makes me feel like there is something important I have forgot but I don't know what”

“This song feels like wanting to go home, but knowing there is no home”

“The only way I can describe this is, it's not depressing but just feels like eternal loneliness”

“The Abyss stares back”

Lastly, in this section about the fantastic atmosphere of these games, I must quickly tip my hat to a certain section of Half-Life 2 and that is Ravenholm. As a kid I think Ravenholm was the first time alongside my lifelong best friend that I truly felt fear, the game forces you through this area after cruelly building it up with the chapter name “We don’t go to Ravenholm”. This area is completely overrun by zombies and turns the game from a puzzle shooter to a horror game just for this segment, it's dark, gloomy, and full of zombies old and new. Especially the “Runner” zombies with their distant echoing howls, as opposed to the usual moans of the slower zombies they are particularly terrifying as they sprint on all fours at you and squeal aggressively as they lunge at you. The mood and general ambiance of the zombie-riddled wasteland give this area a distinct and horrific feel. But what I really want to highlight is the first moment you lay eyes on Ravenholm as I feel like with the bridge that this is a seminal moment.

The broken sign lays before you in white block caps you read “RAVENHOLM” and there is a tree with the bottom half of a body strung up on it swaying gently. The feeling of this area is just so eerie and you just have that awful gut check as you gaze upon this obvious and harrowing obstacle in your way and think to yourself “Nope”. This section is an example of how these games throughout the main and episodes flip the script, put you into different scenarios, from the citadel to the outposts, to city 17 and they all have a distinct, interesting, and memorable feel, but what is magic is that those feelings being watched but also being alone, those “spooked hairs on your neck stand up and you check behind you but no one is there” feelings are particularly special and something truly worth experiencing.

“This is the Freeman. The Combines reckoning has come” - Creative freedom

My final reason that I think that these games scratch the “Man this is a great video game and I am thoroughly enjoying myself” itch so well in 2023 and beyond is the feeling of freedom this game has. In a world where movies/games/media feel like it's rinsed dry and has no end in sight this game has a real refreshment to it. As Disney descends back down the hill to the skinny malnourished Star Wars cow, to give her yet another milk to package up and sell to us again, I personally feel a tiredness, a slog that feels like “Create, consume, create, consume” with characters being brought back that stood alone as excellent stories to be given more context and back story, that in my opinion detracts from one of the greatest things about storytelling, Mystery! Now Mos Isely cantina feels like a school reunion as you can probably name 90% of the characters in there and explain how they are all linked when, to begin with, it was this murky bar with strange and fantastic creatures drawing your eye and filling you with wonder.

Despite standouts like God Of War or Last of Us franchises that go back to the cow and find a new udder with perhaps even tastier milk than the first, Games feel to me like they are restricted like they need to only go back to the safe, and familiar ground but feel like they are under pressure from external forces to ensure they tick political boxes and comply, to market well or be seen to fit in. Which I think in certain circumstances makes them come across as pieces of art made by people who don't really “love” what they are making. They are often filled with obvious and tiresome tutorials and safe narratives. Although I am fully confident that games will continue to be amazing works of art, they definitely feel like they are products more than art at times now. Narrative games releasing with skins you can change the main character to if you purchase them. These kinds of things can make them lose that special magic.

Half-life is free of this, you can tell there is true craftsmanship behind each moment. That the people that made this game really cared about it, they cared about the narrative, the characters, the world, and the setting, and really cared about keeping this game mysterious. Half-life features a diverse cast of characters that don't feel deliberate but natural. Its narrative is about oppression, humanity, and hope. But none of it feels like it is trying to make a political statement, of course, all art derives from life, but you can tell it's from a time when people were not scrutinizing it because of social issues, and it is just a piece of art. It's a strange mysterious game full of fantastic fun, that shows you where to go without a mini-map and a curser ahead of you, it guides you without words. Silent tutorials like walking up and seeing a flammable barrel and ahead of you a slippery surface leading to the tongues of aliens that you get caught in and they pull you into their mouths above, so you throw the barrel down first and shoot it as it ascends and blow them all up. It gives you problems and the tools without a prompt appearing saying “Barrels can be used to blow enemies up if shot”. Its design does this for you, it makes you think but gives you the tools to work out problems as I mentioned earlier. This along with its narrative that is in my opinion about highlighting that gut “Feeling” of “this isn't right” and ensuring you fight against it makes these games feel so special, especially now.

These games have a freedom, a narrative that doesn't need explaining because you are supposed to wonder, to question why? I don't think you are ever supposed to really know what's happening. We don't really deep down know why we are what we are as humans, or what is beyond? Or what was before? But like Gordon here we are in this moment, faced with it all, with near no explanation and we may as well pick up a crowbar and follow our feelings and do what we can do help do what we can to feel free. They feature gameplay that promotes being inquisitive and finding a way to move beyond your current obstacle where you can tell the developers care about every moment you find yourself in. There is magic in their atmospheres that evokes so many feelings. They are the foundation from which so many fantastic games have drawn from. They have a timelessness that makes them seminal and so very playable now. They are masterpieces and I belive that the reasons above should give you the motivation to grab yourself the orange box and fire up a console or jump on steam and give these games a playthrough in 2023. if you're lucky it’ll be your first playthrough or if not like me last year give them another whirl and enjoy the nostalgia trip as perhaps you will find the experience, “Freeing”.

{Your eyes blur as if reality is crashing all around you, a man in a suit approaches again}

“Time…….. Is it really that time again? It seems as if you have only just arrived. You have read a great deal in this short timespan, You've done so …. Well in fact, that I have received some interesting offers for your services, ordinarily I wouldn't contemplate them. But these are …….. Extraordinary times.”

#gaming blog #gaming #half life #gordon freeman #valve #video games #video game photography

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wanderrlust0 · 11 months ago

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i hung out with snow and 2 of their friends for their bday (2 dozen anni celebration) and it was a lot of fun!

we got to the city around 3:15 and walked to ktown. we went to this bakery they all usually go to and they had so many tasty treats, i wanted to try them all! i got a strawberry bouchee & snow got us this strawberry refresher thats kind of carbonated but it was good! it had pieces of strawberries in it so it was cute. then we walked to kinokuniya which is this huge japanese store filled with books,magazines,manga, stationery, plushies,toys,collectables, &moreeee. it had 3 stories!!! there was soo much to look at & i def wanna go back!! i told the bestie about it & she wants to go! (i didnt realize how close it was to bryant park as well. like i totally wouldve went there last time i was in bryant park if i knewww.) we were in there for like an hr. i bought a spirited away japanese book & a cute pop up holiday card for myself bc i liked the art. i wanted a small spirited away book but they only had the big one and the book that shows miyazakis sketches. i feel like i shouldve just gotten that one, even tho it was more money..maybe on my next trip. afterwards, we went to muji, then the nintendo store. so snows friends are very much gamers. well, they allll are lol & theyre into kpop, conventions, etc so theyre quite diff from my friend group but they were very nice! & they were already talking about stuff like how i have to see their friends room bc she has cool things and how they’ll force me & snow to watch the live action.. demon slayer mugen train musical…lolll yes that. we then went backkk to ktown to eat at abiko curry, which is a spot they go to a lot. it was my first time trying it and omg it was sooo good, i ate it all. ive never had korean curry so i thought it was so cool that i could add a pork chop to it and it was crispy! it was so satisfying lol it was like our first real meal of the day at 8:30. im gonna be thinking about that curry for a whilee. afterwards, we were gonna go to this place called starbucks reserve, which is like a very fancy coffee shop/bar, but we realized we wouldnt have enough time so were saving it for some other time. we got gelato that was nearby and they had such cool flavors!! lychee, guava, plum.. i got a scoop of ube and thai iced tea and they went perfect together omg i want it again. i didnt know how thai iced tea gelato would taste but it tasted exactlyyy like the drink so it was so refreshing after our curry meal. after gelato we went back to the bakery to pick up things we wanted to take home with us. we didnt get on the train until 10:30 so we got home later than i thought & i was soso tired the next morning bc i had to wake up early but it was worth it lol. oh yeah! i forgot to mention but i gave snow their bday gift & card in the car so they opened the gift before we walked to the train station and !!! they loved it so much they criedddd D; it was sweet and also shocking and funny bc like!! i didnt mean to make you cry omggg loll for context, the gift was a framed drawing i made of inumaki from jujutsu kaisen and so they said thats its literally the best gift theyve ever gotten, mostly due to it being handmade and i was like WhaTttt no wayyy. the best gift youve ever gotten?!? they knew i was gonna draw something already bc they didnt want me to buy a gift & wanted something handmade like my art but ofc they didnt know what id draw & didnt really expect me to draw Him. they saved the card for our train ride home bc when they first opened it in the car & saw so many words they couldnt read it yet lol. when snow was on their way to my house they realized they forgot my gift (for my bday) and i was like MY Gift!!?! i really dont know what it could even be… it was fun spending time with them and i feel like its a nice change to hangout with a different friend group. idk like something about it feels fun and refreshing & just different. ofc it depends how comfortable i feel with everyone. but yeahhh, it was a good day & i got to try a lot of yummi foods

(my bracelet fell off and idk where it went:(( it could be somewhere in my room or my bfs room.. i dont believe it fell off at work.. or the shower..but i dont wanna think about thatD: it wasnt really a sentimental one i guess.. but it was like a good bracelet..& old.. &cute:( im hoping it shows uppppp!!!!)

#journal #mypost

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leam1983 · 1 year ago

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Milsim Gaming

Found the only playthrough of Ghost Recon: Wildlands that makes any sense to me, and it's coming from the most self-obsessed and boring lot I've ever had the displeasure of observing as a viewer.

Watching former soldiers, SWAT officers and other Tacticool-focused players spout off jargon while tagging targets with robotic precision, I'm left realizing that the last few Ghost Recon titles were poorly managed and marketed. Wildlands and Breakpoint were sold to us as open sandboxes wherein Gamer Normies like myself could briefly pretend to be a grizzled combat veteran with massive pipes for arms and a thing for deniable ops, but looking at normal playthroughs, you realize the entire premise requires the kind of constant shorthand most of us never develop, much less learn. Otherwise, the stealth model gives up halfway, if a competent player isn't present, and you're quickly left with a less-forgiving third-person shooter that constantly says you're the problem.

So. Take out the problem - I.E. Ordinary middle-aged gamers like myself - and swap in someone with a handle on shorthand, on teamwork and support, and on maintaining a sense of control even in harrowing situations. You'd think the end-result would be a class-act in phlegm, right?

Well... No. Take four straight-edged guys in their early forties, all of them from various arms of the European SWAT and military corps, with two Brits, one German and one Australian. They spend twenty minutes roleplaying with Breakpoint's entirely cosmetic selection of tacwear, and then ten more at the bivouac, going into exhaustive detail of their planned avenue of approach for their target. This isn't a group of friends, it's professionals at keyboards and gaming peripherals.

Then comes the assault. It all works as planned - but there's no banter. No sense of fun. No poorly thought-out plan that blossoms into its own event. The enemy counts suggest something more reactive, and they seem designed to push players out of a more ordered state into something more chaotic - but it never sticks, in this group's case.

It ends as it's begun, with the target generator destroyed and the opposing force left partially decimated - and I'm left thinking that open-world games meant to have mass appeal only really come to life once you're looking at chucklefuck civilians mistiming their salvos and alerting the entire base three minutes in. If the Ghost Recon imprint were still synonymous with Milsim, I'd have an entirely different set of notes to voice out. The problem is, that etiquette now belongs to Escape from Tarkov and those two or three players who still care about Arma 2. Look back to Breakpoint's marketing, and it very solidly anchors the game as being for everyone with a hankering for a simple, sleek and individually boring power fantasy.

The last two Ghost Recon titles just shouldn't be played alone. It's just too bad that the only ones who seem to care push the mechanics so far past the games' own self-serious tones you're left with YouTube playthroughs that feel as bland as plain toast.

#Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon #Wildlands #Breakpoint #Milsim #Ubisoft #Gaming

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esor-ogramira · 1 year ago

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Update on the status of The Fenrathae Saga! And Other Stuffses!

TL;DR: I'm putting The Fenrathae Saga on mostly-hiatus due to burnout relating to it, and am gonna start working full-blast on another project of mine that involves my former RWBY OCs. I'm also gonna make a poll to see if anyone within my tiny but sweet following wants to watch me fail miserably at playing survival mode in Minecraft with cheats and certain gamerules enabled!

To read the whole thing, click on the "Keep reading" thingy below!

Sooooooo, I've realized that I'm very burned out with writing for The Fenrathae Saga. As in, I've been finding significantly more enjoyment in writing in my other projects and playing Minecraft than working on anything relating to The Fenrathae Saga and Volume 1, lately. I've also been thinking about my other projects much more often than The Fenrathae Saga, itself.

So I've decided to put The Fenrathae Saga on the back burner for the time being, aka, put it on a mostly-hiatus! For the most part, I won't be working on it as often as I have for the past 2 years, but I'll probably still chip away at the comic script every now and then. So no, the webcomic is not cancelled at all! This just means that the webcomic will come out a lot later than I anticipated.

The reason I'm doing this is because I know that if I force myself to work on something that I don't want to work on at the moment, then that something won't be done very well. I don't want The Fenrathae Saga to not be done to the best of my abilities, and I especially don't want that for the webcomic. Plus, I've been working on this iteration of The Fenrathae Saga nonstop since March of 2021. I've discovered that my way of working is to work on something full-blast for a few years, then pick up something else that I'd like to work on, set the first thing on the back burner, and then work on that something else full-blast for a few years. I definitely don't plan on abandoning The Fenrathae Saga anytime soon, another project that I've been working on on-and-off has just caught the rest of my attention when I really needed to switch passion projects for a while.

And that something else involves my former RWBY OCs! Yes, former RWBY OCs. Back when I was still really into RWBY, I developed some fan characters for a bit. I never really wrote down the story, but by the time I thought to write it down, the trailer for RWBY Volume 7 had come out, and just watching it made me realize that I'd gotten wayyyyy too emotionally invested in it to continue watching it. And then that one Twitter/X teaser where Team RWBY and Them were suddenly wanted by the government for canonical reasons really turned me off. Don't get me wrong, it's a pretty good show! Maybe not the best of shows, but it's still decent! Buuuuuuut, I just decided from that point on that I would not watch RWBY anymore and not follow any of the RWBY Official social media accounts, for my own mental health.

So after that, I decided to take my RWBY OCs and make them actual original characters and make their story and actually original story. And that's what brings us to today, where I've decided to work on their story and worldbuilding full-blast! So far, I have a good portion of the lore worked out, and most of the basics of the magic system (where there's actual magic and lots of magically-inclined mortal races of people). The story itself is still a major WIP, and I'm not sure what I'll do with the story once I feels it's ready to be shared.

OH! Also, I'm considering recording videos of me playing Java Edition Minecraft, either in survival mode with cheats and Keep Inventory enabled and no Wardens/Phantoms/Pillager Raid Parties spawning and Mob Griefing disabled, or in creative mode with all of those gamerules inplaces and cheats enabled. I know, I know, that's "not what real gamers do!" But I'm a very casual gamer, and I think the world needs more casual Minecraft YouTubers. Plus, I'm not gonna be playing to fulfill every last whim of every last potential subscriber, I'm gonna be playing Minecraft to make myself happy and to show the world how I play Minecraft. Those gamerules and cheats exist for a good reason, and that's to make the game more accessible for casual players who don't like dealing with certain annoying/scary aspects of the game! If you don't like the fact that I'm playing the game with those gamerules enabled and/or disabled, then... don't play in your Minecraft singleplayer worlds like that?? I don't know what else to tell those who don't like games being accessible to anyone who doesn't want to play games in constant fear of dying and losing all your stuff.

But since this post is so long already, I'm gonna make a separate poll to gauge interest within my small but sweet following about watching my hypothetical Minecraft videos! They'd all be uploaded to my second YouTube channel, which is @/EsorOgramiraMisc on YouTube!

#long post by esor ogramira #updates by esor ogramira #The Fenrathae Saga #The Fenrathae Saga Status Updates

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bahamutgames · 2 years ago

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AFTERTHOUGHTS - ROUNDUP

Hello, everyone! I’ve beaten a few games recently that I just didn’t have a whole lot to say about. So I figured it’d be better to round them all up into one neat post rather than making big posts for games I’m only gonna talk a little bit about. And since twitter messed up threads uh, yeah we’re doing it here.

I’ve done this before but only once before. I guess let me know if you think doing stuff like this sucks and if I should just give each of these games more time to themselves? Idk.

As always don’t consider these to be reviews, these are just me throwing up my thoughts! If you’re interested in ANY game I talk about, please give them a shot!

Rotund Zero (April 21, 2022) - PC

First up is a game I actually played last year. And technically I didn’t “Beat it” but I did play a good amount of it, and for the time being I’m kinda done with it. Rotund Zero is a VERY fun platformer with about 26 levels where the goal is just to clear as many as you can within a time limit. It’s simple, but there’s a few ways to tackle these 26 levels, and the levels themselves can be really tough. You’re constantly jumping up and down, which also adds a lot of challenge to it. It has tight controls, cute gameboy graphics, and nice music. I’d say the only bad things about it is that some of the levels can be confusing as to what to do? Basically any level with the beaver enemies SUCK lol. But aside from the levels I hated, it’s a good time attack game! If you like hard platformers and time attack stuff, you shouldn’t miss out on Rotund Zero! Plus it’s CHEAP! Totally worth checking out!

Puyopuyo Tetris (February 6, 2014) - Nintendo Switch

First off, I cannot believe this game first launched in 2014. The version I played launched 3 years later in 2017 (for context I try to use the original release date in those dates I list fyi). I actually started my playthrough of this game YEARS ago now, probably back in 2017-2018. But I got totally walled by the Ecolo fights. I only managed to come back and beat them just randomly when my sister asked if we could try the game out (we play vs puzzle games a lot). And after that I put on my big-gamer pants and beat the rest of the story mode! Sadly, this means I basically remember very little of the first half of the game.

But I will say this about it: it’s ADDICTING AS ALL HELL. I think the story is very good although, as someone not familiar with the Puyo Puyo cast it feels very... het? Or like it’s threatening to be het a lot of the time. But it’s colorful, has a lot of characters, an interesting story in a game that didn’t need one (which I always appreciate), and it’s just fun to play these games. I got totally stuck playing Tetris nonstop that it was affecting my ability to work for a few days lmao. For things I dislike? I think the fusion game mode fucking BLOWS, it’s not fun and barely works imo and they force you to use it a lot. Also Puyo is clearly stronger than Tetris, like Tetris stands no chance against Puyo. Also I think the game should have ended with them destroying the walls between all worlds and every future game adds MORE puzzle games until we have Puyo Puyo x Tetris x Dr. Mario x Panel De Pon ect ect. But other than that yeah it’s a fine game. I want to try the sequel but I feel like it’s gonna be the exact same thing? We’ll see.

Marvel vs Capcom 2 (February 24, 2000) - Dreamcast

Ah, Marvel vs Capcom! I’m not really a big Marvel guy, if I’m being honest. But sometimes when good Marvel stuff comes out I really get into it. There’s only 2 things that really scratch that itch for me and those are Spiderverse (one of my favorite movies ever) and the Marvel vs Capcom Games! (And Super Hero Squad but I haven’t watched that in years). Anyway lately I’ve been in a big MvC mood, I’ve been seeing all those AWESOME MvC3 mods and watching lots of videos on MvC2. And I got fed up with not being able to play it! I own a bootleg copy for Dreamcast but idk where it is, I cannot emulate arcade to save my life, and the game is just generally unavailable everywhere. So there’s only one place to turn... the high seas. My best friend in the whole wide world.

So I finally got to play some MvC2 again! I LOVE this game! It’s so full of love and charm! First off, I don’t think this game gets enough credit from lovers of the Y2K aesthetic. Just the menus are so calming and cool with all the water effects and bright lights. Plus this game has a surprisingly relaxed soundtrack! A lot of the music is very chill in the best way possible. Of course it has drop dead gorgeous sprite art, and I’m always a fan of 2D sprites on 3D backdrops! I actually quite like the stages even though they’re very weird. And of course, the characters are GREAT! My team right now is Venom, Shuma Gorath, and Amingo! Venom and Shuma are my favorite Marvel characters BECAUSE of MvC! And Amingo is a cactus guy so, of course. Hope he can come back in ANYTHING some day! The roster is MASSIVE and it’s honestly impressive there’s so much to choose from including TONS of really weird characters I’ve NEVER heard of like Marrow and Blackheart. It’s great how many odd picks there are.

The gameplay is also great, I feel like I probably still prefer MvC3 but I really need to play this one more to really get the hang of it again cause it’s been YEARS since I played it last. But this was also my first time beating it! I’ve beaten every other game in the series before (even MvC1 cause I had an emulator on my Xbox) except for anything prior to MvC1 I guess. I wish this game had more personalized plots but for the time and with such a big roster I do think the concept of Ruby Heart gathering fighters to fight Abyss is cool and serves its purpose well. I certainly don’t hate it. In fact I think some of the only negative things I can say about this game is just how IMPOSSIBLE it is to play without pirating it. I KNOW pirating games tends to be better anyway, but there’s something nice about playing and owning a real copy. Maybe one day it’ll get rereleased on Steam? Maybe? Please???

Regardless, yes this game is still great and I will absolutely come back and play it more! I wouldn’t mind being better at the Marvel series in general!

God of War (March 22, 2005) - Playstation 2

And here’s a new series I started for the first time this year! I’ve heard absolutely AMAZING things about the series, especially Ragnarok. So I figured it’s time for me to give a shot too, but you know me, I gotta start from the top. I’m honestly surprised I didn’t have more to say about GoW, but it was honestly VERY different from how I was expecting. I actually played the whole game on easy mode cause I’d never played a game like this before but uh... IT’S STRAIGHT UP JUST THE WEREHOG SECTIONS FROM SONIC UNLEASHED!? LIKE, DOWN TO THE TIGHTROPE SECTIONS!?!? IS THIS WHY WEREHOG SONIC HAD STRETCHY ARMS, TO MATCH THE BLADES OF CHAOS!?!?

Anyway, yeah God of War was neat. It’s a VERY brutal game that’s very dark and depressing. But that of course fits with the ton of Greek Mythology very well. And where this dark tone shines is absolutely with the game’s protagonist, Kratos! He’s EASILY the best part. Bad ass design, tragic backstory, a hard ass tough guy but he loves his wife so much and realizes that his struggle for power wasn’t worth it if it meant hurting his family. It’s great. He’s really cool and honestly fits into Greek Mythology pretty perfectly, I’m a little surprised he’s an OC cause he fits really well. The story is simple but good, the game has some cool monster designs (the armored minotaur was GREAT), and it can have some pretty nice looking environments! I do also like that you get so many different tools to deal with bad guys. From different spells and even 2 different weapons! The giant sword and Poseidon's Rage were my go to weapon choices! Probably the aspect of the game that stuck out to me the most though, and this is SUPER random. Is the fact that this game features characters with fully exposed breasts. Like you see them pretty early but there’s important characters with their boobs full on out, and a lot of the enemies are actually doing the same. And obviously Kratos has his nipples out, but I don’t think I’ve EVER seen a game where women do that. And there’s NO jokes about it, it’s just the fashion, it’s taken completely seriously and boobs are treated exactly the same regardless of who has their nipples out in the open. Obviously it’s all greek so of course but it’s COOL! I think more games should have characters with boobs and not make like a point to give them crazy jiggle physics and make jokes about BOOBS LOOK GUYS ITS BOOBS shut up. Boobs are cool and you’re giving boobs a bad name

However, despite all that praise. I honestly was not that crazy about a lot of this game. Like, for starters, the gameplay. So it’s the exact same as Sonic Unleashed’s werehog stages. But I realize now that those are REALLY fun to me because it’s just 1 half of the puzzle. In God of War you ONLY do werehog stages. And the combat is fine but it’s not that exciting to me? A lot of the enemies are REALLY annoying and MASSIVE damage sponges. And while you get a lot of weapons and spells, most of them feel useless? And especially the attacks you learn with the Blades of Chaos. Am I crazy or am I the only one who doesn’t like games where your move inputs look like this: X,X,O,X,O,X,O,O,R2,X,O,X,X,X,X,X,X,X,R1,O,L2. HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO REMEMBER THIS!? I’d rather have a small, concise moveset of iconic moves I can instantly recognize, than a MASSIVE list of moves that are completely lost in the fold that I can’t even remember how to use. Then you have SO MANY tight rope sections that are just not fun and annoying. In addition to that, like most of the game is too dark to see anything and a lot of the music isn’t that memorable imo (except for the Cliffs of Madness song I liked that one a lot). The whole game feels like a bit of a chore to get through, but it’s very generous with checkpoints and save points and ultimately it is cool even if I wasn’t SUPER into it. I think this is a series that will only get better as I play the later entries! Time to hook up Playstation Allstars and try Kratos out in that!

Fortnite Battle Pass (July 21, 2017) - PC/Xbox

Okay... I’m a little embarrassed to admit it... I got a little into Fortnite in December and I’ve been playing it since. It’s fun! I tried it way back in 2017 or 2018 and just did not like it and did not get the hype. But recently I had a massive itch to try it again and, well, yeah it clicked! I think the game is a lot more fun now! I ended up getting 2 of my siblings sucked into the game as well, and we all agreed to buy John Cena so we could run around and play as a trio of John Cenas. And I had left over V-Bucks and figured, what the hell? Doom stuff is in the battle pass and I love Doom, so I might as well buy it.

As for the game itself? It’s a ton of fun. I like running around the map, finding resources, getting augments, ect ect. It’s like a Roguelike, which I’m very iffy on. But I LOVE having random equipment on the map and having to adapt to random stuff you find. If that makes sense. But my favorite thing to do? Is DRIVE. Using a car in this game is SO much fun! Getting the Tricked Out and Supercharged Augments so I can just drive through buildings forever, crashing into people, getting my car blown up, doing flips, getting my car blown up. It’s a BLAST and leads to some hilarious moments when I hit someone right after honking at them at top volume. The game has REALLY nice graphics and art style, it’s cute and feels pretty good to play. And has a pretty neat selection of characters, both in terms of its mix of OCs and Pop characters. I do wish there was more stuff I PERSONALLY liked. But like I said earlier, John Cena, Venom, and Doom Slayer are pretty cool. But the second they do Mario or Final Fantasy stuff? It’s over for my wallet. Plus being able to mix assets from characters together can make for fun and cool combos (plus, the goofy emotes). And in addition to that there’s a lot of custom content made by fans? That’s AWESOME! Me and my sister have been having a lot of fun doing prop hunts, ghost hunting, and gathering wood in a medieval castle? Regardless it’s fun and it’s neat fans can make modes.

But yeah, the game isn’t perfect. For more nitpicky things: I think Shotguns are completely busted in this game. Maybe I’m crazy but whenever I use them, they are WORTHLESS! But when an ENEMY uses them, they are ALWAYS a 1-hit KO on me no matter what my health and shields are. Also, I think fall damage is a little extreme in this game, I’ve died just from falling from trees close to the ground at max HP. I also have a big issue with this game that the default skins SUCK. This game desperately needs a custom character creator so I don’t have to play as the boring randomized default characters. But no, the worst part of this game is easily, and you probably guessed it, the microtransaction stuff. V-Bucks are SO expensive and have terrible conversion rates. 1,000 for $8? You can buy barely ANYTHING for that price? $32 for 5,000 sounds like a lot, but at roughly 2000 V-Bucks for any character, that $32 will drain INCREDIBLY fast. I just feel like making this a little less expensive would be VERY appreciated. And in addition to that, you gain exp SO slowly on the battle pass, I know every game does this but still. It’s clear that it’s a tactic to get you to buy levels using, you guessed it, more V-Bucks. By the time I reached level 80 or so, I was gaining exp so slow and I just don’t have to energy to keep grinding to finish the dang thing. I got the Green hellsie I wanted (the green tea girl) and now. I’m happy with it. I think I’m done for the time being. I’ll still play every now and then with my siblings but I am pooped out on grinding that battle pass. Still, the game IS fun! A lot of it, and especially if you go in not planning to spend money like I did (initially) I think you’ll find a great game. But like any microtransaction riddled mess, once money gets involved it really starts to feel like a chore.

Anyway check out my Fortnite OC:

Tightrope Theatre (August 10, 2022) - PC

Last, but not least, is a nifty little platformer called Tightrope Theater! I saw this game was on sale for 99 cents during the winter sale last year, and I just couldn’t pass up a deal like that. So I picked it up and, hey, yeah this game is pretty neat! For positives: let me just start out by saying I ADORE the sprite art in this game! A LOT!! The sprites really evoke a Gameboy Advance feel to me, which is the highest praise I think I can possibly give a game. It’s incredibly charming and cartoony sprites that just look fantastic! The music is also great! Flaming Finale is easily my favorite song in the game. The game clearly had so much love poured into it despite being a small game. And there’s tons of levels too! 140 in total I believe? And there’s even time attacks to keep you coming back to try them over and over again! I didn’t do the time attacks but I did completely each chapter + the 2 bonus ones and I had a great time with it!

As for what I disliked? Well, for starters, this game feels slippery a LOT. I think it’s cause the main character rides a unicycle. SO OFTEN I would land on something and just slide clean off for no reason. Most of my deaths happened that way for sure. Then there’s also bumpers which I found to be REALLY annoying to use properly, and some levels were surprisingly difficult for me to figure out what they wanted me to do. But if I’m being honest even if they ticked me off I think the rest of the game is so much fun and has such high quality that it doesn’t really matter. This game is SERIOUSLY GREAT and I absolutely will be checking out some of their other stuff (I used to play Duke Dashington on Newgrounds a few years back actually!) If you want a small platformer and / or like clowns? Check this game out for sure!

#2022 #2023 #Roundup #Thoughts

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