#its a fun game. too bad about the racism though

[ckret2]

What are some of your favorite books?

This is not an exhaustive list. I have read a fucking lot of books. I guarantee you I have forgotten 8 out of my top 10 favorites.

Here are the answers that would make my literature teachers proud:

Grendel; To The Lighthouse; Dracula but I was into Dracula before it was cool; Don Quixote; a moment ago I had two others but I forgor

Here are some other answers:

When I was a kid my mom said I was too young to read RL Stine's Goosebumps books so I was banned, so I picked up one of RL Stine's Fear Street books instead, because at age 7 I understood malicious compliance. The book was Revenge of the Shadow People. It was the first horror story I ever read. Because of that I've had a lifelong obsession with shadow people characters. (Heartless, Aku, Okage Evil King Stan...) It's a modest book, but it helped shape my personality, so it belongs on this list.

My middle school favorite books—because I read them 5,000 times and will never forget them—were How To Disappear Completely And Never Be Found; The Last Book In The Universe; Self-Portrait with Wings; and anything by Neal Shusterman. The Last Unicorn SHOULD have been one of my favorites except I only saw the movie and didn't learn about the book until I was an adult.

As a kid I was really into Lovecraft when I was still young & ignorant enough to be like "gee, the way he writes about other races sounds kinda racist, but I'm sure there's a good reason for that!" The reason was he's hella racist. On the bright side, there's now a bunch of very good Lovecraftian stories ABOUT racism. I liked Lovecraft Country (of course) and The Ballad of Black Tom.

Lovecraft was the biggest influence on how I think about horror and Hitchhiker's Guide was the biggest influence on how I think about comedy and idk what that combo says.

Adultier favorites: Wild Seed (anything by Octavia Butler tbh), Machineries of Empire trilogy, Sherlock Holmes Vs. Cthulhu and I shan't apologize for my terrible taste; The Android's Dream; NOS-4-A2 which I picked up because it had the same name as a Buzz Lightyear character even though the Buzz Lightyear character is a robot and the book is about a car; I'm gradually working my way through Poirot; Carnacki the Ghost-Finder. 

I read the Popol Vuh in college and was hypnotized by its poetry but that was an academic translation and more recently it's had a poetic translation that I've bought but I haven't read yet.

Here's some random recent books I enjoyed—not necessarily my "favorites," but they're in my recent library card history so it's easy for me to look them up rather than trying to pull titles of old out of my ADHD black hole. Beholder by Ryan La Sala was fantastic—fun cosmic horror (both the premise and the entity itself), fun mystery, and I like it when you can say "and it's a queer romance" as a bonus to what makes the story good as opposed to being its only selling point. Such a Bad Influence had such a perfect ending that I went to the writer's site to immediately email her about it but then my browser crashed so I went to sleep and I still need to email her about it. Darcy Coates is my current "pumps out a million haunted house mysteries" author whose books I'm working my way through. Zero Sum Game was good, I still need to read the sequels.

Separate from the above, I'm in the market for book recs that feature Death/the Reaper as a main character, because I just read one that was crap. (The book was fine; but Death was characterized boringly and didn't have any significant impact on the plot. Like he was the selling point of the book and they could have just left him out.) Bonus points if Death is depicted as an actual skeleton rather than just some guy. I'm flexible on genres, but if it's romance Death has GOTTA be a skeleton, I'm not interested in a monsterfucker bait-and-switch. I already know about Discworld and respect that Death, I just want something that isn't Discworld.

[kirkwallguy]

crazy how we can criticize the racism and bigotry in DAO and DA2 without being bothered but if we DARE criticize the same shit in DAV suddenly it's an issue. The old games are good I love them, they also have a lot of weird and gross issues. There are many many ways they could've handled XYZ better to genuinely improve the games, not even just the representation but like story and character choices they made, DAV is not different. Weird way to word this maybe but 'DAV Looks more 'woke' so therefore it is and any pushback on that is anti-woke.' As well as the game being as deep as a puddle, it says nothing and everyone loves each other, the game itself tells players not to think too deeply and that every companion or good guy is just good and all the people you have to murder are faceless and purely evil don't worry about it, no nuance here. (like it's pointed out in DA2 that bloodmages are generally people pushed to that out of fear or desperation, the abominations we kill were mostly scared mages backed into a corner, you still have a lot of the faceless enemies but because there's nuance to the companions and main npcs it feels less bland.) DAV has issues with it's rep and to ignore that or worse, get mad at the criticism, is genuinely weird and ends up wrapping back around to being a form of bigotry. I'm repeating what you said but different atp but it's just weird!!! To an extent I can understand being so defensive over something you care so much about and put so much of yourself in (like a AAA game where you can be trans and that gets (barely) acknowledged, very cool I get it) but when it's being pointed out that a AAA game has some issues, you kinda just gotta acknowledge that or you're cringe and lame idk what to tell em. also crazy crazy that people who will defend the game so hard end up being bigoted shits towards its (mostly queer and ND) critics. Like are y'all woke or not?

tbf i DO still see pushback when people point out the racism in the other games, i think it's typically just one of the unfortunate things you'll find across all fandoms where white fans place their enjoyment over the comfort of fans of colour (+ other oppressed people/forms of bigotry). i agree though that the fact that veilguard appears progressive and makes an attempt at being diverse means people are just that much more unwilling to examine it properly, and there are so many reasons behind it that will definitely be familiar to anyone who's seen the denial of bigotry in supposedly progressive spaces.

imho if people were more receptive to valid criticism then half these arguments wouldn't happen. some people definitely get weird / mean with their criticisms of things that don't matter (the fact that the game is bad) but as an adult on the internet you should be able to differentiate when it's time for a fun fandom spat (and sometimes it is! who among us hasn't enjoyed some petty discourse) and when someone is having a proper serious discussion.

[raven]

As someone who plays persona I feel you’re a good person to ask: should I play a persona game

you know a game is a real one when the answer is "if you do, please dont think im stupid for liking it". the first persona game anyone should ever play is persona 5 royal and that game is. well. the best part isnt until 70-90 hours in on average. tries really hard to be a social commentary but fumbles basically every aspect. can barely keep a cohesive character arc for most main characters. "the gameplay is really good though" -karl marx. so like short answer, do you have a hundred hours or so and want an excuse to hate on something's story and politics while also having a good time in the actual gameplay, sure... i feel like i can recommend this to any general person but i feel less confident recommending it to you specifically as i feel you are a woman of taste. but you're also someone who loves the slop at times. and what is this game if not slop. i put the rest under a read more because i said too much. My bad for being loquacious

like storywise i do like it... Mostly. and i do like the characters. and i think akechi is genuinely a great character, well written, well acted, yaoibait, knocked everything out of the park with him. he is what kept me going, but if you dont like characters whose main flaw is that theyre a teenager and therefore stupid, he might not click with you. like yeah, everything he does is poorly thought out... it's consistent. it's in character. and he does it with such swag, too. everything in the game's story seems designed around him, including the phantom thieves themselves. but i dont know whats in it for people who dont like him. not that you'll really get to know him for a good chunk of the game. which is the biggest thing... i could say "keep going, it gets better" but... does it? for everyone? it did for me, but it was made in a lab for me.

the game can understand that violence against women is wrong, but it doesnt understand what violence against women is. it can understand that the current system isnt working, but is too weak to actually take a stance on how to fix it. it's too obsessed with giving the player a power fantasy than to give them any challenges at all, or to make them think for a second. which i like in a game. i like it when games fuck up hard because theres more to discuss. and one of my biggest issues was discussed in the very last part. not necessarily to the depth i would have preferred, but it lets you draw your own conclusions. it also really shocked me at one point near the end there, which really colored my view in a positive way. i had grown complacent. i stopped thinking. i didnt think the game could do anything interesting... and then it did. but that level of shock was only because of my specific proclivities... i dunno. like it's hard to defend.. oh also theres a massive climax that builds up to a twist and reveal which is genuinely one of the worst ive seen a story ever do it, especially with such a strong set up. like genuinely laughable. but once you reach that part you're about 3/4 of the way through so you cant really stop there just have a laugh and know it's almost done.

the gameplay IS good though. like it's not only flashy, it's fun. i think the only issue is that it can be too easy, and the merciless mode is famously easier than hard. but as persona games go, it really is the best. it's just fun! the social sim elements are... well lets just say the majority of character writing in this game is stupid. otherwise, it can be fun to try to balance everything. it's possible to do it all on your first playthrough even if you don't know the perfect strategy, but if you fuck up too much you really wont be able to finish them all.

but heres the thing: metaphor refantazio just came out, which, aside from the time aspect (you have so much time lol) almost improves on persona 5 in every way. it's slightly less misogynistic. the social commentary... well, its fantasy racism, but it's a little more well thought out than p5's. but the main thing is the gameplay. and like, the gameplay in p5 was already good! metaphor is much more balanced for difficulty than p5's, but if you really get a hang of character building you can really take control. the slight differences in battle systems really take it for me. press turn system every day. i adore it. basically you get turns if you hit a weakness but if you miss you lose two turns. same goes for the enemies, so you can really get destroyed, but you can dodge every attack and they wont be able to do shit. but the story is, well, it's okay. there were some really good moments, and i liked it mostly because its kind of.. the least bad anyone could ever do it? it's pretty idealistic but just seemed like, nice in a way that i really cant describe. like, i have my issues with it that i could go into detail, but i still generally liked it. beautiful presentation as well-- and is that not all that matters? give me literally anything with a beautiful cutscene and I'll be tearing up. and the words "election magic" are so potent to me. its also shorter than p5r. but will it stick with me as much? no. would it have caused me to play the rest of the persona games? unsure. have i listened to the soundtrack so often while falling asleep that atlus is my number 5 artist on my spotify wrapped, not because the soundtrack is so calming or because i especially like it, but because i was trying to conjure a character in my dreams? NO. and persona 5 was a resounding yes on all fronts.

in terms of the other persona games, i dont recommend 4 unless you want to feel like, actually bad? i dunno it just put me in a foul mood. it was like radiation emanating from my switch for several weeks. incredibly homophobic with a side of (possibly slightly unintentional) transphobia. as well as some very fatphobic jokes (what game from this time period doesnt, but.. well it's bad every time!) and of course our classic misogyny. all this and the gameplay is worse than every other (new) persona game, and the story is fine. it thinks its twin peaks at the beginning. it is not twin peaks. LMFAO. 3 is better than 4 but theres not really a definitive edition even though it just got remade. each version has its ups and downs. if you look it up and any of it compels you i can give you more info on that one. the aesthetics alone are enough to be compelling , I'll admit. if you like boring and repetitive gameplay this ones for you! Im being serious. the story's pretty good though, and the characters are probably the best in the persona series. 2 (which is a duology, but the gameplay is the same and the second is well, a sequel) is pretty bad gameplay wise that i would only recommend if you're really into the series. i really liked the story but yeah i dunno. eh, it's fun. hard to recommend. 1 is okay. underwhelming. nothing much.

[thealexchen]

What parts or characters of the LIS series do you think aged sorta badly?

OH-HO, could I go on...

LiS1:

The slang /j

Max's comment about the vaccine poster "The last time I got the flu shot, I got the flu. Fuck you!" is so made fun of that it's become the "Max is anti-vaxx!" joke, but yeah, that has aged even more badly since COVID.

In all seriousness, I don't think Nathan telling Max, "now get out of my face, d*ke!" in Chaos Theory was necessary. Assholes gonna asshole, but Max was neither out nor really aware of her queerness, and she wasn't overtly flirty with Chloe in Nathan's presence or presented as stereotypically butch. Nathan's name-calling felt more out of left field because he didn't have much to go off of, rather than something like "get out of my face, nosy (insert nasty name here)" or whatever.

BtS:

What I think is the most egregious example: Rachel (with Chloe as an accomplice) literally drugging Victoria to unconsciousness to get her role in the play back. That is in wildly and insanely bad taste when the first game's involved Jefferson illegally drugging and kidnapping teenage girls, and how Rachel herself fucking died. It's barely covered up with a sapphic-coded moment Victoria calling Rachel pretty, but the fact that it's framed as funny at all is batshit crazy.

Also, how Nathan and Frank's characters are softened so they can be almost buddy-buddy with Chloe, when Nathan can literally kill her three years later. Also, D9 actually animated Frank checking out a 15-year-old Rachel for a second in "Hell is Empty" 🤢

D9 sorta shot themselves in the foot by framing Chloe in a more sympathetic light in this game (Chloe attempting to reach out but getting increasingly ghosted, Chloe missing Max so much in-game) after how the narrative treats her in DE...

LiS2:

So ironically, because Trump-era racism is still alive and unfortunately more relevant than ever again, the racism depicted in LiS2 is now being brought up by fans as "ahead of its time." Cassidy and Finn's dreads were already a bad move in 2019, though. I do think what will age badly are the explicit uses of slurs: Brett calling Daniel the r-word, Hank (and later Chad in ep4) calling Sean a racial slur, and Nicholas calling Jacob a homophobic slur.

I don't think the Blood Brothers ending has aged well. It feels so bizarre and backwards that Sean and Daniel spend the whole game trying to clear their names and escape to a life in Mexico where they intend to live peacefully... but then the BB ending has them stealing money and involved in gang crime. It's such a disappointingly shallow, stereotypical depiction of Mexico. I also don't like how low morality Daniel becomes such a cold murder machine given how normal and stable his upbringing was.

Daniel should've been obsessed with Fortnite, not Minecraft /j

TC:

I wouldn't say aged badly like "became problematic" but with time, the game's relentlessly optimistic tone has led to a less memorable product. Actually, everyone in the game is so cheerful and sanitized that I can't really think of any truly problematic things from the games besides some off-screen events like Alex and Isaac. In 2021, I loved TC's persistent themes of hope and looking to the future and I think it fit with Alex's character arc of grief and learning to identify her own emotional needs. Narratively though, Alex's grief felt a bit too neat and tidy and it makes for a less compelling story upon replay. Trauma can manifest in irrational, ugly, hurtful ways, and I think D9 could've afforded to make Alex, Steph, Ryan, and Gabe a little rougher around the edges.

DE:

The entire Pricefield breakup has already aged badly AHAHAHA

Thank you for asking! I really appreciate these LiS-related asks!

[seeminglydeathlessredshirt]

Ramblings on Bioshock Infinite

So, I've decided to start writing down how I feel about what I'm playing here rather than wait for my friends to be online so I can infodump at them.

Anyway, Bioshock: Infinite. The original was pretty alright. I didn't get all the way through it because I was getting a bit tired of Rapture and some other little annoyances, but it was a perfectly decent experience. Skipped past 2 because once again, not in the mood for spending a dozen more hours underwater, and went right to the one that people fuss about all the time to see what the fuss is all about.

I shouldn't have gone out of my way to see what all the fuss is about.

Spoilers for an 11-year old game will follow, but I do not recommend going out and checking this out yourself.

To its credit, the game does have a very strong opening. The welcome centre/church you arrive in offers absolutely gorgeous visuals and a strange yet interesting blend of Christian motifs and the weird sort of reverence built up around the founders of America. "Gee," I thought, "maybe this will be a game that finally tackles religion in an interesting and nuanced way that doesn't just feel like it was written by a 14-year old who just discovered Reddit." Unfortunately, it doesn't(if anyone knows a game that does, please let me know.) After a level where you walk around and take in the sights of Columbia(an experience that feels like walking into a veritable wasp nest. Either one, take your pick), you're thrust into your standard action game plot shenanigans. Kill a bunch of guys while someone rants at you over an intercom, go through various setpieces, all that good stuff.

Is the killing actually all that fun? For a certain stretch of the game, yes. You have some okay abilities, a good selection of weapons to choose from, and takedowns are pretty cool as well. The skyrails scattered around some maps are gimmicky, though a welcome addition(the irony of a game like this leaning heavily on what are basically rollercoasters is not lost on me.) But somewhere past the halfway point, it takes a steep nosedive. The weapon list gets bloated to hell and back, and a combination of the carry limit of two plus the tendency to only ever give ammo for everything you don't want to use drags it down. Enemies also seem to get substantially spongier and more numerous, which makes fights incredibly unsatisfying. Bioshock was already firmly in that grey area between immersive sim and combat sandbox, and Infinite is neither of those. Everything feels so much less versatile, there's no thinking outside the box to be done here.

As for the rest of the story, you may have heard about how centrist it gets, and I am sad to report that everything they said was true. What really gets me is how it's already setting up the "both sides are the exact same thing" even before the characters would have any reason to think that. They're literally basing this entire viewpoint off of "oh, the workers are being violent about overthrowing their oppressors, that's super bad, right????" This game also does try to tackle things like racism but I don't exactly have a good eye for whether or not something tackles that matter maturely, so all I'll say is that it feels very surface-level and inconsequential. "Inconsequential" can sum up everything else in this paragraph too because it's all eventually abandoned for !!Dimensional Shenanigans!! This is what the last few levels are taken up by entirely and all it accomplishes is covering over a weak attempt at social themes with an even weaker attempt at sci-fi themes. The ending is certainly a bit more batshit than you'd expect for your standard seventh-generation slop, but it can't salvage this. The fanservice just reminded me of a somewhat better game. I would make a joke about this game only having two characters, but then it goes out of its way to say "yes, there really are only two characters."

I am not playing the fucking DLCs.

[outivv]

I would rather not get too much into the wuwa vs genshin vs r1999 because each game has their own pros and cons. But I'll say this much about these three games.

Genshin representation is getting to a point where it's now becoming a racist Fandom, especially on genshintwt. These fuckers harrased and made fun of a Hawaiian because all she did was to show how Maulani is EXTREMELY whitewash. Both her and her brother are no longer on twt due to constant racism. (Doesn't help the fact that Maulani and her tribe are the stereotype of the "nice welcoming Hawaiian"). With every excuse that these racist would always use, "it's fiction it not suppose to be reality". The same can be said for HSR

r1999 does have good representation on LGBTQIA, sexual oritentation, and having characters that aren't just pasty white. HOWEVER, as many people have stated, we have yet to have a black person. They have mentioned Black historical figures such as Louise Armstrong but not yet a playable character. It's also doesn't help that in one city they have an area called "Cotton Club". The last time they had a POC was in 1.3 as of right now, at least in CN service, it is now 2.0 and there hasn't been another Black or brown character. Those who do have brown skin are usually the "ambiguous brown" (take a look a Joe)

Wuwa...I'm just gonna say this much. Kuro games has a history of being generous. We see this in PGR so for veteran players their generosity is nothing new. Representation wise....it's a not that great but its not bad. While they do have some brown and dark skin (really depends if you see their skin as ashy or not with the exception of Vonnegut) characters, they still follow some Oritentalism as well as not having another Black or Brown character for awhile. Seeing how they are open to new cultures and how they listen to feedback we can only wait to see if they are going fix their mistakes or not.

Each game has their fair share if criticism. However to say r1999 has "better" representation than Genshin is a stretch. They have a good set of diverse characters but no Black Characters despite the fact they have entered an era based of the Roaring 20s.

Off topic the only CN game I have see that has Black Characters is Dislyte. At the beginning they did have racist stereotypes but they learned from their mistakes. And there are some ambiguous brown/Black Characters. Moroyama and Yalina for example.

I agree, I should probably word myself better when talking about the games as to not seem so- like putting one on a pedestal cause they all have their pros and cons (though genshin is bottom of the barrel dogshit in terms of rep)

I love Dislyte though, they genuinely seemed to have improved a lot in terms of how they represent characters, and people, and just overall cultures- and I’m honestly really happy with that. The Dislyte fandom is like… microscopic I feel BAHAJHAHA, so I haven’t heard much in terms of criticisms for them, so I won’t speak on that because I don’t know- and I’m just not aware :’)

[sotc]

Post Veilguard high thoughts

Firstly, I LOVED LUCANIS. Despite my grievances below I can't help but love the game, and I'm high on copium on what potential future DA games could look like if they actually focused more on the fffff FUCKING ROLEPLAYING!!!!!!!! aspect of this game than an action adventure!!! UGH lol. I LOVED playing Armas so much tho and ultimately my affection for this game ties into that. I know I'm wearing red-tinted glasses. I know I am cringe but... I am free. I LOVED LUCANIS. Playing a Rook who was more stern towards people really helped balance the overall 'uwu live laugh love' tone the game was forcing. I think I can count on one hand the amount of times I selected the 'nice' options in this game. You can't be an evil dickhead or anything but it helped and made it far more tolerable and enjoyable. Slap in 'a Crow has to be a little unhinged since they murder for a living' headcanon and I came up with a recipe that tied together nicely. I truly don't think I can play a nice character in this game bc I'd kms sorry LMAO (but maybe that's also just me because I like playing bastards) And did I mention I loved Lucanis?

If you want to read a bit more detailed opinions it's below:

1) I loved the gameplay! The animations and detail to the animations were STELLAR. I feel like they really nailed the gameplay aspect in this game. I loved the level exploration, the specializations/talent system, the companion leveling, and the combat was amazing. I liked a lot of the OST. I really loved playing a rogue SO much I'm really excited to see how warrior feels. I really loved seeing the little codex entries with Dorian, seeing the Inquisitor again, and even Solas 💗 I think the major story missions like Weisshaupt, some companion quests and the last 3 hours of the game with its suicide mission was SO fun. HOWEVER.....

2) A lot of my frustrations with the writing largely comes from lack of nuance and deeper exploration. There is no mature explorations of these stories and topics because it all feels sanitized. There are dark portions to this game (the Blight especially, loved all that) but a large portion of story beats that try to explore its depths simply fall flat on its face because it all comes down to "every bad or evil thing is because of the evil gods and cultists." For example, racism, classism, slavery etc etc is shown to be enforced only by the Venatori and not the oppressive ruling class of mages or even other citizens in Minrathous is my biggest gripe. We walk into a literal police state in the first 10mins of the game where you see a giant beam shining down on a citizen being arrested and none of that oppression truly gets explored afterwards. I digress lol. 2-a) I think this also comes down to the scope of the story getting so large and ahead of itself there was never really a chance to let it breathe. It doesn't ground you or your character to the world where your Rook reacts to these situations more personally. Environmental storytelling is done well for the most part but the game really needed to dig deeper in a more personal roleplaying experience explored in side quests.

2-b) Character dialogue was WAY too modernized, there are few opportunities to talk to them, and conflict with them was absolutely nonexistent or minimal. MY team of people trying to save Thedas would never know what positive affirmation, mental health and group therapy is!! sorry but god dammit what da hell is this!!! Still, I did love all the companions though overall.

3) I expected more out of the lore. Even without worldstates no longer really being relevant (which I am willing to let go of). Like, we had heard so much about Tevinter and Antiva but we never got to really sink our teeth into their societies at all. There is so much rich lore there to explore that gets glossed over. Which again just goes back to 2-a lol.

4) Lucanis romance was SO lovely but suffered from lack of content that left much to be desired. His romance feels unfinished, which makes sense given he suffered from multiple rewrites and his writer was also let go in the middle of production. I have heard a lot of the romances suffer from feeling incomplete or lackluster too.

[magnuficentwo]

My dad and I play Borderlands 2 together as a bonding activity and we recently beat the whole main campaign + all sidequests, so we started doing DLCs as a way to warm up before TVH mode. Here's our reviews of all the DLC we played so far (I'm doing all the write-y parts but my dad agrees dw)

Captain Scarlet and her Pirate's booty -

Pretty fun, though the slower pacing really did make it hard to get through a lot of it, especially with how ginormous the maps are. It takes a long time to get anywhere, and we got pretty disinterested in most of the side quests due to how far apart everything is. The set design is really gorgeous, but you can only appreciate it when you're walking by it slowly and taking note of all the fossilized coral– Otherwise when you're in the boat most of what you see is just A Lot o Sand.

Captain Scarlet herself is awesome, super witty lady with hilariously upfront intentions to betray you and leave you to die, I just wish she was allowed to have more dialogue that wasn't directly related to the quests like Jack was. The reveal was thoroughly expected and although the battle with her pet Rakk Nest was a bit boring, she was still very funny. Shade is so fucking funny and I felt bad for him, I kept joking we would just bring him back to Sanctuary after the dlc was over, but he was also slightly underbaked due to the lack of focus the dlc had with its characters. We liked the boat more than the usual cars even though it was a pain in the ass to shoot with. Also the racism was really fucking odd I don't know why they did that for.

Combat was just kinda fine. Maybe weirdly balanced sometimes ? We had a lot of sections we breezed through completely without the intended difficulty level because we accidentally overleveled, but enemies didn't really keep up with that. Could be our fault though so I'm not giving the game shit for that. What I AM giving the game shit for however is the fact it was VERY bad at rewarding us for when it actually did keep up with our level, because all the loot we got was all blues and greens. And I'm still pissy about not getting at Least one Leg in that final loot room.

My rating: 6/10 (Had fun overall + Scarlett and Shade are awesome - points deducted for Racism.)

My dad's rating: 6/10 (He had fun but thought it got boring very fast - Racism also bothered him a lot.)

Tina Tiny's Assault on Dragon Keep -

Such a blast all around. Enemies were challenging but once we got used to the difficulty spike (from PB to this one), it was really fun. The comedy of having a 13 year old girl dungeon Bunker Master guide her grown up friends around a brand new campaign, all while having to learn balancing and storytelling on the spot, is just Objectively really funny, but with how charming Tina and the gang are here it's even more so.

Tina is such a delightful weird little girl, and I love how you immediately gather that the whole game is her coping (A Bit Badly) with the recent deaths of her friends. Lilith, Mordecai and Brick are also really good too, from Lilith being a total dork and getting super immersed in the game (her getting defensive of Torgue not being a real geek is so funny to me because I acted like that when I was 13. But she's like a grown woman so its even funnier), to Brick embodying every murderhobo rpg player in the history of the world, to Mordecai slowly but surely warming up to the story, it's so damn fun.

The combat also gets spiced up with all the fun new enemies and status conditions, to the point where when we went back to base game temporarily we got confused some of them weren't present originally. Also the ending had us both sitting there in silence for an uncomfortable amount of time which is ALWAYS a plus in my book ! Overall, the dlc captures the whimsical nature of tabletop games and fantasy super well, while also being incredibly funny in the classic borderlands way and surprisingly emotional at times. Very fun time, both of us want to play Wonderlands now though.

My rating: 10/10 (No notes, just a very good time all around for me)

My dad's rating: 10/10 (He's hard to please but he really liked it + he said he wishes he could play the whole dlc again + We played the whole thing in one sitting, that's how good it is)

Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt -

Whoever is responsible for this DLC needs to go to hell right now. Immediately.

(Lots of interesting concepts that go completely unappreciated simply due to the fact that this DLC has no respect for you as a player and even less for minorities. Genuinely a huge shame, because it's honestly really cool stuff that could've been a lot more interesting if they weren't tied to a pile of garbage. Sir Hammerlock sweetie let me get you out of here please you deserve so much better all the time, I wish the actual dlc was about a big game hunt with this guy instead of whatever it was. We didn't play a lot of it because it's just ridiculous. There's better things to do with your time, don't bother w this one)

My rating: -1/10 (I'm bound by no entities saying I need to give it a positive score, and personally I don't think it deserves one as it deserves nothing, so -1 will do.)

My dad's rating: 0/10 (Got so disappointed we just stopped playing the game all together and started playing Diablo IV on his computer instead.)

The rest of them we haven't touched on a lot yet. Raid on Digistruct Peak was kinda forgettable but a good enough concept for what it's worth, Fink's Slaughterhouse didn't seem appealing to us so we haven't played yet, and we want to play Commander Lilith last just for dramatic effect, but overall the Borderlands 2 consensus for DLC exists in 3 categories: A) Life changing DLC of all time B) Pretty okay, but it's just Borderlands 2 in a different place and C) This should've bever been created. I'll see if this keeps true for the rest of them but for now that's it. Thank you for reading, goodbye and don't die.

[l-llavellans]

i have soooo many complicated thoughts about veilguard (and dragon age in general) but i will say that overall i really enjoyed playing it (but i would enjoy anything bioware released and slapped a dragon age logo on, lets be real)

I could go on and on all day about what’s good about it and what isn’t so good but here are my main thoughts - yall ain’t got to read all this it is mostly just for me to get all this out and stop bouncing around like a marble in my brain lol

Potential Veilguard spoilers under the cut! And also my rambling thoughts no one wants to read haha

okay let me get the bad stuff out of the way first. these are my biggest complaints about veilguard:

first, it really does feel like a lot of decisions from previous games either don’t matter or are completely disregarded. i really would’ve liked to see more consequences and choices integrated into the story, which i know is complicated because of the change in setting and everything but at least in the form of codex entries or something. just some kind of acknowledgement of oh, you played three games before this that involved making choices with big impacts on the state of the world and here’s how that’s still felt

secondly, i feel like a lot of stuff happens “off-screen” in veilguard. like it almost feels like certain scenes are missing in some places. not even just with the romances, but in characters’ personal quests i just feel like there could’ve been some more detail thrown in there or even just added cutscenes of characters talking to each other or working things out. i really feel this in harding’s case like did we all just forget she can’t touch anyone without her new magic affecting them. how did she resolve that…is it ever acknowledged again…

third and this is my main complaint: a lot of it felt too sanitized. i was sooooo excited to get to play as a crow knowing how characters have talked about them in the past and how controversial they are - zevran literally spends a whole game talking about the child abuse, exploitation, etc that the crows put people through and then you get to veilguard and it’s like oh now they’re noble freedom fighters…the crows rule antiva…where’s the grit!!! it would’ve been really fun to be able to play a character that’s loyal to the crows even after everything they’ve gone through at their hands or a character like zevran that’s disillusioned them and their methods and have that actually acknowledged in game. you can also just freely walk around as a qunari or an elf in tevinter and anywhere really and nobody says anything. even in inquisition npcs would remark about your inq’s race and I know fantasy racism is its own monster. don’t even get me started there. but if it’s already been established then why erase it when you set this game in an area notorious for it? i just feel like my qunari rook would not be able to stroll through minrathous with no acknowledgement whatsoever. it would’ve been fun to see how these issues were talked about in game by the companions and other npcs instead of just ignoring it entirely

okay now the positives!

i loveeeeeeeeeee the different regions. treviso my beloved…arlathan forest…they’re so beautiful. it was really fun to get to explore places that the franchise has spent so long describing and referring to and i LOVE the necropolis that’s literally one of my main positives of the whole game lol

the characters are another huge positive for me. i think the companions are really interesting in veilguard and their personal quests, though i did mention how they sometimes feel lacking, were all really fun to do and reflected each of their personal struggles and character arcs well i think. plus i was so excited to have Harding as a companion lol she practically never left my party so that was a bonus. also manfred. need i say any more

damn if you read this far you got brain worms as bad as me but overall i did really like veilguard. if i sit and think about any dragon age game for too long of course i (and anybody else) can come up with a million things to complain about but at the end of the day it was FUN!! it’s a video game!!! it’s just for fun!! and im going to keep replaying it until I can’t stand the sight of solas’s shiny bald head anymore

[ataraxixx]

Hey oomfieeee !!!

Since u want more asks than just art reqs, what are you favorite and least favorite:

Seasons

Episodes

Soundtracks

Villains

Main Characters

Side Characters

Hope u have fun letting this ask rot and decay in your askbox for like half a year or something (pls dont do that i actually rlly want the answers to all of these) >:33cc

youre so lucky im procrastinating an assignment rn so im goingto answer it immediately

fav season: sons of garmadon

least fav: skybound

fav eps: tick tock, snake jaguar, game of masks (embarrassed about how much of harumi's dialogue i know by heart here), cursed world part 1+2, return to primeval's eye

least fav eps: once bitten twice shy, literally everything in skybound that isnt echo zane, like the first half of roots..(tbh a lot of s16 i hate)also every ep of the show that includes weird racism stuff like s11 the island etc

fav soundtracks: like the entire s8 ost is so fucking good guys .....i particularly really like mr e vs snake jaguar and garmadon's true potential. i also really adore falcon chase / zane's theme. no least favorites really its hard to dislike ninjago music but i do get annoyed how often they reuse the overture in tracks that dont really need it :P

fav villains: besides harumi and mr e.... and garmy poo... i really like aspheera and unagami my sillies. AND RAS!!!!!!!!!!RAHHHHH

least fav villains: i actually really hate how morro is executed in canon sorry guys i think they made bad writing choices i could do it better. hes fine though obviously i like him as a character just not his writing as a villain. and the obvious Nadakhan and the weird personalityless villains like overlord and omega or whateva.

fav main chars: zane <3 forever my top fav ninja but i like lloyd and cole too. and pixal my WIFE ever since the day i saw her i was a pixal stan from day 1 from minute zero. she has my whole heart

least fav main chars: im kind of a jay disliker..hes like fine sorry i just dont care abt him that much and his arcs are always executed really poorly LOL. fanon is carrying him hard i fear

fav side characters: skybound is good for giving us the most banger side characters (echo and the sky pirates) and thats it. clancee nation forever

least fav side chars: i dont like shade why does he randomly flirt with nya in s9. girl we are in the apocalypse. also dorama is annoying

[byfurries4furries]

Shelter (Fantasy Visual Novel)

Shelter, made by Rausmutt, is a complicated game. It doesn't neatly fit into any particular genre. It's a dramatic fantasy scifi action porn comedy, if I were to label it, which, as you can tell, isn't an easy task. There's a lot to like about this game and a lot of disparate elements that come together to form a tight cohesive whole, but one that's not too tight for a knot.

Shelter is about a human named Luke who helps run a shelter where canine adventurers can stay and relax at. A holiday called Skies Ablaze is coming up and for various reasons, Luke spends it alone every time, but he finally finds a way to celebrate it with his closest friends. He plans to spend that night with them, but until then, he needs to pick someone to spend the rest of the day with.

Now... I could make an entire essay about what makes Shelter so good. I'd say it's probably the first furry visual novel not mostly or entirely written by Howly, who wrote Adastra, Arches, and most of Echo, that has felt this thematically and tonally rich. But unlike a lot of games in this genre, it does not try to mimic Howly, but still manages to tap into his strengths. There's strong messages about racism, exoticism, the meaning of freedom, the harms of hero worship, the difficulties of fighting hierarchies both in practice and concept, self-care vs altruism, and the fear of mortality. There's also hints at autism allegories and anarchist principles that may be unintentional, but are so well integrated into the setting and story that they feel like natural extensions of the more prominent themes.

But this isn't to say Shelter is entirely serious. It's also an extremely silly and horny game, full of dog puns and meta humor. That fact is obvious if you play the first hour or so, especially if you manage to get a bad ending. And to that end, it's really effective. It's very funny and charming and silly. And that in itself is integrated into the more serious elements. Rune is by far the silliest and horniest of the route characters, but he got that way because he fought and sacrificed A LOT to have the freedom to be that way, and you can see that from the beginning as he's the most physically scarred character in the main cast. His hedonism and goofiness is his way of enjoying the freedom he fought for.

But if there's one thing that stands out about Shelter, it's its gameplay. I know it's weird to praise a visual novel with mostly dialogue choices, quick-time events, and one somewhat confusing minigame for its gameplay, but most furry visual novels often only have dialogue choices as opportunities for interactivity and even some really good ones like Arches and Remember the Flowers don't even have that. I'm not criticizing those games for doing that though, as focusing on story and even abandoning dialogue choices has many of its own advantages, but the fact Shelter branches as much as it does really makes it stand out a lot, especially since it's still so tightly written. Because of that, I rarely use any save slots at all. I certainly save sometimes out of a nagging feeling I should, but even then, I rarely load up a saved state ever. There's so many branching paths of events to do. A lot of side quests and unlockables and hidden scenes. My favorite thing to do is boot up the game from the beginning and do slightly different dialogue choices until I get to the part I left off at in my last session. I have nearly completed everything available in the last update (v33) and I only very recently got through enough branching dialogue to safely keep a save file of the moment right before the route split. It's truly fun to have a visual novel open ended enough that I can have unlockables and completionist challenges to do. It's really a fun game on top of being a great story, especially since diverging branches are written around each other later. There are a handful of continuity mistakes, but given how complicated that is to keep track of for a story of this nature, it's impressive there aren't way more. And that's all without sacrificing the story or the core themes. In fact, I believe those act as the anchor for the game's narrative.

Overall, Shelter is an amazing game. If it weren't for how extremely NSFW this game is, I would give it my highest recommendation. In fact, I will, at least for anyone who's 18+ and isn't squeamish about gay sex and descriptions of gore. It might be my new favorite game, at least depending on how it ends up. It's currently unfinished, but it is possible to get to Burry's and Rune's good endings and Max's route is shaping up to be my favorite one with some surprising themes of mutual aid, capitalist realism (or maybe more broadly hierarchal realism), and the meaning of justice. Both of the multi-route side quests have unfinished best endings, and there are a few more unfinished branching dialogue choices. But you can go 30 hours without running out of stuff to do as it is and it might be more if you're not like me and don't skip action and sex scenes because you just can't get yourself to enjoy them when they're written out in most media, mostly due to issues with visualization skills and not really due to any fault of the authors. And with that rant about oddly specific personal stuff out of the way, keep on yiffing.

Links

Itch.io

Side Tangent: This game is so shockingly gay that the biggest twist that shook me the most is the singular instance of a feminine pronoun. There's no female characters and although even tamer characters still tend to talk about sex a lot, straight sex doesn't get mentioned at all and neither do any females, with the sole exception of this reveal. Or at least there were no other incidents that stood out. But it's safe to say Shelter fails the Bechdel test hard, so much so that it's a mystery if there are even any women in its world at all.

[skythesnake]

Tell tumblr about the unnamed book…

Oh, I could go on and on about my current wip. I love it so much and I hope to publish it one day. It started as simply worldbuilding practice, but a storyline pushed its way through, and I decided to turn it into an actual book.

The base idea is that it's set in a world where eight of the nine countries were made by different gods and then kind of mashed together into the Preimyr Continent (known to mortals as Elat, though Elat is actually this world's word for 'Earth' and also a god). The ninth country is a set of three islands created later by a different god.

An undecided number of years before the beginning of the book, one of the countries, Tsabal (A country on the west coast) discovered a new continent in the seas west of the Matanal Islands. There, they found a new race, but this new race unknowingly violated one of Tsabal's deeply held moral rules and so Tsabal declared war on the Junifrati people who live on the Sycandram Continent. Eventually, all countries except Kinan (the southernmost country) joined Tsabal in it's war effort and that's where we are when the story starts.

The book begins by introducing Kishan, a book smart, anxious, young woman from the northern-most country, Alanae. He talks about his genderfluidity and the fact that he feels very out of place in flat Tsabal, where he's used to the high mountain ranges back home that block Alanae from the rest of the continent. They become squad captain of Squadron 13 (a very unlucky number due to it being prime, but that's just superstition... right?) which holds a self-righteous, easily angered Fijari man (Fijarin is another country on the west coast, just south of Alanae), a strangely powerful Tashikan (Tashik is a country on the east coast and is the second most southern.), A very introspective Vishali spy (Vishal is right next to Fijarin on the east coast), and a handsome, quiet, Tsaballan man.

The book features themes about racism and discrimination and the overall themes of the book are 'just because this person doesn't act and/or look like you, doesn't mean that they're bad.' and also 'Not everyone who looks the same is the same.'

Eventually, a bubbly young Tashikan by the name of Kira'is is introduced as well and she joins the squadron after they've been transferred to a war camp on the West Matanal Island just before they make the trip to the Sycandram Continent to help the war effort there.

I have so much more lore, from the mythos (specifically the gods, but I'm working on making some more specific myths too), to character dynamics, to lore about each individual country and the cultures I've made, it's all really fun. I can't fit it all into the book, especially a lot of the mythos, so I'm thinking about making a game about the mythos and/or just dumping a bunch of it on Tumblr.

Also as a side note: I've started making music for it, I have a lullaby that originated in Ancient Tashik, and a character theme song for Kishan. I'm currently working on fleshing out the lullaby and making a instrumental theme song for the god of death and madness who plays an extremely big role in the book. I hope to flesh all these song out and then maybe release them somewhere (probably YouTube or smth) sometime in the next year or two.

This got longer than I anticipated lol. If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask away!

[anosci]

Media Thread

im making a list of media ive watched/played/etc this year with brief thoughts. its going to be far less featured than my music list, but still a bit long. again mirroring twitter except this time because fuck twitter.

list below the cut

～January～

1/ Princes Arete (2001) I was sold on this movie under the premise that it's similar to Kino no Tabi. and… it is. kinda. Kino and Arete would be cool pals. Every character is interesting, which seems rare(?) Only real drawback: the hostage situation kinda really sucked.

---

2/ Time of EVE (2008/9) the classic tale: androids indistinguishable from humans as an allegory for racism. but unlike DBH, this is actually really good. its a story that feels like a single thread in a vast tapestry that'd be fascinating to explore, but too bad: you only have 6 eps

---

3/ Spice & Wolf (2008) i remember loving this show. i don't remember understanding the economics. I took notes this time. I still struggled. (spoilers for ep3) regardless: wow this is a good show. weirdly, I saw myself in the relationship portrayals. I guess that means its realistic?

---

～February～

---

4/ Spice & Wolf II (2009) i feel like this kinda fell off? :( like it tried too hard to be action-packed. and that worked sometimes. but that first arc was just… :( it feels like a case of "just needs an editing pass. needs a bit more focus" i'll treasure S1 more, after all

---

5/ Double Fine PsychOdyssey (2023) absurdly captivating. i say that it's a miracle that any video game gets made ever. this shows that Psychonauts 2 was several miracles in succession. it's simultaneously illusion-shattering and inspiring.

---

6/ The Owl House S1 (2020) finally sat down to watch this. it's GOOD. lots of worldbuilding to chew on, and then it picked up quite nicely. im immediately pouncing on S2 and feeling glad i was late enough to be able to marathon

---

～March～

---

7/ The Owl House S2 (2022) stumbling down the boulderest mountain and hitting every rock on the way down. the rocks represent engagement. i am engaged. i adore this show. it is a little weird to suddenly freeze mid-tumble.

---

8/ Broken Age (2014) (Dr. Mick's LP) delightful start! brilliant, even! then the big bad is revealed and…. meh. I watched Dr. Mick's playthru tho, and holy shit that's some really cool commentary.

---

9/ Double Fine Adventure! (2015) its a little unfortunate that the nature of gamedev means that the ending is kinda anticlimatic but good lord what an amazing journey. i'd watch a million of these.

---

10/ Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022) ok ok fine ill [finally] watch it …oh its good. like really good. its rly funny but in a way that fascinatingly beside the point? yeah I can see why some ppl didnt like this but i think its super fun

---

11/ Nichijou (2011) a nice and cute slice of life thing… that occasionally breaks out some quality jokes. though only half of them landed for me. i feel like i would've gotten more out of this if I caught it at the time.

---

～April～

---

12/ The Owl House S3 (2023) i had a lot of reservations about the collector initially but having seen the entire arc: that came together nicely! still sad that it's The End, but like. good overall!

---

13/ Penguindrum (2011) i DONT think i followed 90% of the themes and their connections. that said, i DO love the way metaphors are treated as "literal". confusing maybe, but i adore the idea of "paint what you feel not what you see" applied to storytelling.

---

～May～

---

14/ From the New World (2012) this has a mess of an opening (several) episode(s), but it eventually found its footing and became quite a cool action adventure… thriller i guess? i do take some issues with bits and pieces but it was a good watch overall.

---

15/ GinGitune (2013) fluff. the lightest, fluffiest of fluff. melts in water. there are several elements that couldve been mined for drama and intrigue but they were all treated as background elements. (this isn't a bad thing, but it's not what you might expect.)

---

～June～

---

16/ Space Dandy (2014) dropped after ep4, but on good terms i guess? fun animation, funky vibes, sometimes even funny! anime johny bravo…or I think i saw a Dirty Pair comparison, which feels right. but im not meshing with the silly wacky high nrg antics rn. maybe another time.

---

～July～

---

17/ Death Parade (2015) rly misleading intro (i was ready to drop lol) rly rly promising setup by ep4 RLY good development and mildly biffed ending, but hard to fault considering its a 12ep. i love the aesthetics, worldbuilding, characters. overall i really really liked this!!!

---

18/ One Punch Man S1 (2015) i forgot how fun this show is! and the great worldbuilding! i dont plan to move to the second season again tho. i thought about grabbing the manga instead but good lord it's way longer than i thought. oh well.

---

19/ Flying Witch (2016) slicest of life with a la croix touch of supernatural. the normal slices didn't do much for me 90% of the time. but the supernatural slices? choice. (…mostly.) tbh i just want an entire season of that cafe.

---

～August～

---

20/ Haven't You Heard? I'm Sakamoto (2016) i was skeptical, but this actually worked rly well. for moment. a short, beautiful moment. most of the potential here was stifled by trying to add high school drama/plot. the comedy tho, at its best, had a vibe i havent felt since hayate

---

～September～

---

21/ Saiki Kusuo no Psi Nan (2016) it is VERY EASY for a comedy show to slide from "absurdity = funny" to "this is just annoying". somehow, this never crossed that line, which was weirdly refreshing? not always a winner, but overall a good mix of laughs and superpower exploration.

21b/ edit to add: oh this was right after Sakamoto! Man. The two feel kind of kindred but Saiki is leagues better at staying fresh.

---

22/ Viewfinder (2023) short but very sweet mind-bender puzzler thing. the story had a cool foundation but fumbled in execution imo. but the gameplay? top notch. felt great through and through. never too difficult. beautiful idea and beautiful execution.

---

23/ Flip Flappers (2016) uncertain about the show at first, and then, after watching… im still uncertain. i did enjoy it, but I also felt outside the audience ig? a case where I can imagine a version of this show that knocks my socks off, but as-is it's just a fun ride

---

24/ Fionna & Cake (2023) my expectations were very low and they were VASTLY exceeded! think this show is at its strongest when exploring characters w short stories, which was most of this. the ending felt slightly fumbled…i think it couldve rocked me but instead it was just :).

---

～October～

---

25/ Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye (2021) i already played and loved this game, but happened upon About Oliver's playthrough and fell in love again. truly that is The Most outer wilds playthrough. good lord.

---

26/ The Amazing Digital Circus (2023) interesting and filled with style… but not for me. i'd list complaints but basically all of them are strengths and favorites for someone else. yknow?

---

～November～

---

27/ Little Witch Academia TV (2017) as the credits roll, i find myself with two thoughts: croix was done dirty and wow this is SPECTACLE. aptly magical. oh also! it was quite fun to follow along with contemporary discussion

---

～December～

---

28/ Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (2023) oh it's like. really good. i dont remember the movie so i cant compare but this stands well on its own and i love the character exploration, even if i dont like some of the uhh… what would you call that? scifi jokes? (spoiler territory soz)

---

29/ Land of the Lustrous (2017) FLOORED by how much I loved this. qualms about the CG turned into admiration, the shading drawing me into the world. worries about annoying characters melted away to find admirable layers. THE USE OF SYMBOLISM kept me SO well fed. and the pacing!

29b/ cont: my only complaint that isn't a nitpick: i hate how it left so, so, so many threads loose. i faceplanted my dashboard during the decelerating pace between the first 10 eps and the final 2. i get that it's from an ongoing manga but that still felt maximum bummer.

---

30/

[utilitycaster]

So you've decided to play low combat or low magic D&D:

You probably should not.

If this were a video then I'd do a fake-out fade before coming back but unfortunately my medium of choice is "long tumblr text post no one asked for", so we must soldier on.

Here's the thing: if you are a person on the internet in TTRPG spaces, and particularly if you are a D&D player, you will, at some point, hear from someone with all the misguided zeal and smug dipshittery of a missionary, though to be fair usually significantly less of the violent racism, preaching the Good Word of Indie TTRPGs that you, stupid D&D player, simply must not have heard of.

Usually, I tell these people to fuck off, because they do not have any understanding of what game I'm trying to play, ie, D&D. However, if you want a game that's not full of combat and magic, I strongly advise you actually do check those indie TTRPGs out. PbtA isn't my jam but it is almost entirely RP and simple checks, ie, the sad husk of D&D when stripped of two of its three best qualities. Not that I'm biased. Savage Worlds, also not bad. Basically, if you want to play a game that doesn't do the core things D&D does...play a game that isn't D&D.

Ok but we want to play D&D though

If you absolutely must: pick one of low combat or low magic. You can't have both. It can, technically, be done, but only by Brennan Lee Mulligan and even then it was one of the weaker Dimension 20 seasons and also 4 of the 6 players had to be rogues. Also make sure your players are fully onboard, and both you and your players should have some experience with more standard D&D. Because here's the thing: the balance of D&D - what different classes can and can't do - tends to assume a decent amount of magic and combat. A ranger might be much more useful out of combat, but a barbarian's skill set is really skewed towards the battlefield. When you mess with the balance of gameplay, you also unbalance the classes.

(continued below the jump)

You also absolutely need to have your players on board, and this might mean "we play for 3 weeks and if it sucks, we stop, reroll, and play D&D normally," because I think a lot of people are into the concept of adding these challenges without realizing that they are actually harder and often less fun to do.

If you're new to D&D, again, I need to ask: why aren't you playing a different game that is more suited to your needs.

Ok! I've picked low combat.

Ohhhhh my god u picked low combat? should we tell everyone? Should we throw a party? should we invite the dalai lama

Now that I've gotten that out of my system: You can do this. Here's what I'd advise.

make a plot heavily dependent on intrigue, mystery, or discovery. You still need stakes and a goal, and turning this into something political, investigative, or centered around creative problem-solving.

Steer players towards what are typically known as the high-utility classes, depending on what kind of plot you've picked. If it's intrigue and politics, classes that favor charisma and stealth would be wise. If it's mystery, it's time for intelligence and high perception. If it's discovery, ranger skills are helpful. I would advise people lean towards the full casters, hybrid classes, and rogues, and even then, talk through the subclasses; war clerics are going to have a rough time of it.

It's low combat, not no-combat, and if the players snap and decide to murder hobo 1. all bets are off and 2. they're valid, and dare I say correct. Let the game evolve, and don't be too closely wed to your choice of low combat if the situation no longer makes sense for it.

I've picked low magic.

I don't have any jokes for you, just a withering glance.

You can do this, and honestly a lot of high fantasy is low magic; it's just, again, D&D has wizards in it. This situation is somewhat rife for the one character playing a full caster, if you permit that, to end up with disproportionate attention, because the other thing about high fantasy is that it has chosen one narratives, which are bad in D&D. Anyway, here's my advice.

Continuing with the high fantasy aspect: you know what high fantasy has, when it doesn't suck, is really good worldbuilding. Can you do this? No? Maybe don't play low magic. I'm not only being mean here: you better have a very good reason why there's not much magic but there is some. If magic is frowned upon, why? How is this enforced? Why didn't they stomp it out entirely? If your player is a full caster, how did they become one? Even if you burned all the arcane textbooks, if you still have things like gods and the echoes of creation and draconic bloodlines, you're gonna get some sorcerers and and bards and clerics. Why haven't they killed the people controlling magic? Is that the campaign? That would rule actually, and if you're not doing this you should....but even if you're not you really do need to do a ton of extra work on your world. You did this to yourself.

Also TBH "magic is illegal" is tough to do well and "not many people have magic, they just don't" is much easier, so like, do that. If you want truly no magic, then don't allow magic. Also play Blades in the Dark or something.

You do at least have more flexibility with general plots, so that's nice.

Do NOT skimp on combat if you've gone low-magic, because most of your PCs, unless you're doing the "we are special magic users" route (in which case, technically, the world is low magic but the game isn't), will be uh, low-magic, which means their abilities are all about fighting.

To that end: steer your characters towards martial classes unless the plot is Bringing Magic Back. Hybrid classes are good options if you'd like some magic but not too much.

FOR REAL THOUGH while a low-combat game can be framed as "these characters aren't in a place with tons of violence", a low-magic world needs the worldbuilding to support it. Are you up for the task?

[wirewitchviolet]

Have I done any serious Lovecraft bashing in the last year or two? I feel like I’m overdue.

I’m almost positive I’ve sat down and written at least one big long post on the general subject of how there is nothing redeemable or interesting about H.P. Lovecraft, but I’ve also definitely seen another like hundred examples of people misrepresenting his influence and talent since, so, here’s another one.

See, there’s this popular myth that H.P. Lovecraft, despite being one of the all-time most virulent racists and quite open about it, was some kind of grand visionary who made all kinds of super important contributions to the horror genre, and... he just didn’t. Honestly I’d kinda want to burn down his legacy even if he did, because no for real, the racism was absolutely astounding. People’s jaws were on the floor about it even when he was alive. I feel pretty good about just completely throwing the whole output of right wing extremists in the dumpster like nazi game devs and such, so I don’t see why this should be different, but also for real, nothing of value is lost in doing so.

Like, first of all, he’s just a really bad writer. Really formulaic structure to all his stories, they all have basically the same protagonist and he sucks, tons of purple prose setting things up and then just kinda glossing over the main events, and dude really did just abuse the hell out of a thesaurus. And the subject matter’s not great either! In pretty much everything he ever wrote the big scary thing is kind of always just privileged white dude anxiety. “What if I’m not the center of the universe? What if I’m not actually a pure and noble white guy but I’m secretly the product of the dreaded race mixing? What if, like, a trans woman was kind of into me? What if I ad to deal with some other culture doing stuff I’m not comfortable with? There’s a couple that are more “starfish are just creepy” but it’s not a huge element in those and also I mean that’s just true.

There’s still the big influences though, right? Well, not really, no. Evil cults trying to bring back evil gods/monsters was totally ubiquitous way before Lovecraft. Super advanced space weirdos were too. Big freaky monsters doing sexual stuff with tentacles simply does not happen in any of his stuff. There’s no cool monsters really. Or people doing cool magic rituals. Just glancing at things and running away really. Like, guy wasn’t just unpopular in his day because he was a white supremacist scumbag, he also just couldn’t write well. I’m always pointing this out, but you realize Cthulu isn’t even actually much of anything in Lovecraft’s actual stories? The Call of Cthulu is mostly just this all build-up kind of story, with a couple people piecing a few random incidents into a vague semblance of an investigation, and at the end some big goofy sea monster starts to wake up from a coma and then... promptly has a ship plow into its head causing it to pass out again. That’s it. That’s the whole story. No big evil plans or minions or eating 1d6 investigators, no referencing in other stories. Basically everything in the pop culture “Lovecraftian” bubble is fan fiction, mostly tracing the route of “someone made a tabletop RPG vaguely inspired by other authors’ playing with this guy’s stuff which ended up being popular enough in Japan to be name dropped in some porn VNs, and people just kind of assume tracing that all the way back must lead to something good.”

This all made a lot more sense before/in the early days of the internet, where there was a sort of weird nerd elitism in knowing certain bits of obscure trivia and catching the right references. A lot of actually really talented horror people back in the day kind of got in the habit of referencing some memorably weird terms this one old racist tossed into stories that sometimes showed up in one of the oldest horror magazines one could find copies of if they really looked. In particular people found it really fun to keep referencing “the necronomicon” as like a pokedex for weird ancient monsters and occult stuff and made it enough of an in-joke to mislead people into thinking this was a real book. But the whole idea was you had to have access to this magazine from the 1920s to really be in on the joke. Stuff just kinda doesn’t work that way anymore. Wikis kinda killed being in the know on weird trivia connections.

The other thing though is people used to just do a little name drop of a book or a monster while doing their own stuff, and that’s fine, but now you have so damn many people doing “Lovecraftian” stuff where they more directly reference his better known stories, and there’s kinda this whole subgenre where people just run down that checklist. There’s dozens of “Lovecraftian horror” games where ooh, you’re some reedy nerd or detective and you go to this town called Innsmouth and people are suspicious and oh no they’re like fish people and they chase you around and you pass out or maybe find some weird idol and somehow or other you’re on this big mystery island and we’re directly quoting that “even death may die” line without context, and whispering voices tell you to poke at 7-pointed star symbols and oh no, you woke up Cthulu and he comes and eats you, credits. And like... it’s just running through the same checklist every time. It’s never informing a more original work, or putting interesting twists on things. It’s like how you used to have nerds just quoting whole scenes out of Monty Python and the Holy Grail or quoting catch phrases from Austin Powers or Borat. Just so incredibly tedious and pandering to people who don’t ask for anything more than having the references they know quoted back endlessly.

Anyway, point is, we really wouldn’t lose out on anything if we just freaking buried this one old racist hack. If you want to do some referencing and name dropping to weird spooky stuff that’s maybe from space or the ocean or whatever, there’s plenty of stuff you can shout out that’s actually good, and isn’t giving a certain kind of people to start grinning smugly and referencing what this guy named his cat. Like for real, any time you feel compelled to drop in some kind of Lovecraftian reference somewhere, just namedrop Junji Ito instead, or directly reference a short story of his. It’s all way more interesting and fleshed out and you’re just throwing a spotlight on someone who as far as I can tell is just a really nice talented artist who likes cats. Cats with names you can say out loud, even.

[mandareeboo]

Do you have any game recs?

Always!!!!! A quick note that I am, as I've mentioned many times before, not great at video games, even if I play them a lot. Which means that while I've beaten all listed, I've certainly not gotten enough skill to give a professional opinion rip:

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon (any)- Look. Look. You like RPGs? You like Pokemans? Buy one of these bad boys. Most of the used copies range between twenty to thirty dollars, and they're all over 15 hours of story content plus extras. This was my first experience with Pokemon. This was my first experience with a storytelling video game. Playing them as an adult, you'll spot the twists and turns, but as a child I DIDN'T and it's partially what got me so into writing. I don't have a time gear tattoo fer nothin'!

Far Cry Games- Far Cry games are racist. I'm not lying or ignoring that, and I never recommend giving money to these people when pirating is possible. But if you care about gameplay over a shitty, repetitive, bigoted storyline, Far Cry games are massive, sprawling, and beautifully rendered. You can do basically anything in them. You wanna steal a truck and run it off the road? You wanna hunt? You wanna play shitty poker? Go off majesty, it's there. One of my first FPS experiences.

Psychonauts and Psychonauts 2- You ever read A Series of Unfortunate Events? You know the vibe of 'I have a vague time period where this set in, but this is not how the world acts or people act but it's so compelling'? That's Psychonauts. Set "loosely in the 80s", the games star an acrobatic lad as he uses his psychic powers to enter minds and stop evildoing. It's twisty, it's twisted, it's FUN, and if you aren't sure it's ten dollars at full price for the first one, so you're basically in no real risk of losing out. If you like platformers and are looking for a hella fun time with interesting mechanics, definitely give this a try. (Though, fair warning: Psychonauts 2 has a fair amount of vomit in one mission. So if that squeezes you out, maybe watch a playthrough and skip the goats)

Bioshock 1 and 2- A staple, I know, but I just got to play them for the first time last year, and I loved them. Period-accurate sci-fi that is filled to the brim with POC with plotlines, backstories, and aren't just "lol isn't racism fucked up" fodder? Yes, please. You can pick between a myriad of power-ups and do battle however you want with them. Hack machines or freeze your foes or send bees after them. It's all available. I've not beaten Bioshock Infinite yet so I can't properly recommend it, but I've been told a lot of the fun mechanics are still there.

Celeste- Another platformer, Celeste has gorgeous graphics, challenging but fair gameplay, and lots of memorable characters. Climb a mountain and fist-fight your own mental illness. Each screen is its own sort of mini-level, and you start at the beginning of that when you die rather than the start of the level. It's on basically all your handy consoles AND steam, too.

Fran Bow and Little Misfortune- fun fact about me, I love weird little horror games like these. Full of imagery and psychedelic ideas, you're allowed to write your own story in the characters.

Fran Bow is the tale of a very disturbed little girl- or, perhaps, a girl who can see demons. It's all up to you. Set in the 1940s, Fran has been entered into a mental asylum following the murder of her parents. Desperate to find her kitty, you must guide her out of the jail and into the unknown, facing off with demons, ghosts, skeletons with lovely tophats, and your own uncertainty on what is true or fake.

Little Misfortune is about Misfortune, a little girl who wanders away from home to find Eternal Happiness for her mother. This one is more concrete in real-vs-fake than Fran Bow- you meet foxes with staffs, rats hosting clubs, and the pain of saying goodbye. (Warning: both games are very dark, but Little Misfortune in particular contains some vomit)

Night in the Woods- hey, you wanna question your own mortality? If god exists- and, if he does, if he even likes his job? The downfall of small town America? Cults?? Untreated mental illness? Possums? All with great humor and dialogue?? This may be your JAM! NITW honestly changed my life. It gave me a lot of perspective. And I've wanted a tattoo of a whale with the words "I believe in a universe that doesn't care, and people who do." on my right forearm ever since. 

What Remains of Edith Finch- a walking simulator, walk through the tale of the Finch family, all cursed with bad luck, as Edith returns to her childhood home and writes it all down. Each story is told with amazing flair, interesting stylization, and horrible death.