#like the main selling point of the game is so you can finish the story. thats what we download the game for in the first place

[thankssteveditko]

Sony's PlayStation 5 Presents Insomniac's Marvel's Spider-Man 2 (the third game in the series)

I beat the main story and have enjoyed my time with the game overall! I want to talk about spoilers and things that I liked and disliked in the story, so here's a post with some scattered thoughts.

(Hello! I haven't forgotten that this blog exists! Like I said, no update schedule, I will read more of the Lee/Ditko comics whenever I make time for it. I've actually been sitting on a mostly-complete version of this post since I beat the game in October, thinking that I'd finish the rest of the side quests so I could throw in thoughts on those. But... eh, I'll do that whenever the inevitable DLC rolls around. I just wanna get these thoughts posted.)

Spider-Cop No More

First off: they downplayed the cop shit!!! This was the first thing that really struck me about the game, and I'm stunned that they actually listened to criticism on this. I thought we'd just be stuck with it forever.

It'll never be completely gone, of course. Spider-Man is always going to leave criminals webbed up for the police to take to prison, hoping that they'll do their time and come out the other side as Productive Members of Society. That's just a thing I begrudgingly accept as part of the genre that will probably never go away. But Spider-Man is no longer repairing police surveillance networks. You're no longer beating the shit out of random drug dealers. Gangs of escaped convicts still wearing their orange jumpsuits are no longer terrorizing the streets of New York.

Instead, Peter and Miles are played more as firefighters. Sometimes very literally! They work with firefighters, they rescue people from collapsing buildings, they rush injured people to the hospital. In general there's a huge increase in the number of random onlookers present during the big action setpieces, and the Spider-Men frequently have to save them from harm. One of the major side quest lines is even literally about a cult of arsonists, and you'll routinely find burning fuel tanker trucks you have to extinguish with your webs. It's great! Love this for them.

I also generally liked the side missions in this. There's a lot of good stuff with the Spider-Men being neighborhood heroes willing to help out anyone in need, no matter the problem. Some of them can get corny, sure, but that street level stuff has always been the real heart of Spider-Man to me.

Gameplay

The gameplay's as fun as ever. That probably goes without saying. I will not be spending a thousand words explaining that swinging is fun.

In particular, I really liked the changes to the Focus mechanic. I never loved the way Miles' game made you choose between healing and doing your special attacks, but here your four specials have their own cooldowns, and the Focus meter is spent on either healing or finishers. It still offers that risk/reward element, but those vicious cycles where you can't do any real damage because you keep needing to heal aren't nearly as bad as they were before.

Personally I didn't turn off the swing assist or turn on fall damage, because the streamlined swinging never bothered me in these games, but I'm glad the options are there for people who want them.

Kraven

I liked Kraven in this! I liked the way they leaned into his Hunters being this weird death cult, and him wanting to go down in a blaze of glory against a worthy foe, to the point that he's actually disappointed anytime a foe can't kill him. It riffs on things people liked in Kraven's Last Hunt without being the exact same story. I like that Kraven's gang is renting out this manor or whatever and just being a complete terror to the wait staff. I liked the way Kraven hunting Peter's rogues' gallery clashed with Peter's belief in giving his villains second chances. I liked that they were willing to have Kraven kill off a couple of the minor villains from the first game to sell how dangerous he is. (I know some people hated this, but like, come on. We already fought the Sinister Six. They don't need to do that again.) I like the way Kraven pushed Peter to the absolute brink, turning him more and more aggressive with the Black Suit. Good stuff all around, even if the Hunter enemy types did wear out their welcome a little bit by the end.

The Black Suit arc

I think I liked the way Insomniac handled Peter's Black Suit arc overall, but there's a tradeoff here.

They REALLY lean into the body horror tentacle stuff, with Black Suit Peter basically just being a skinny Venom by the end. The sequence where you play as Mary Jane while the symbiote puppets an unconscious Peter's body around and goes on a rampage against the Hunters was REALLY great at selling how scary Peter is becoming, and it made me completely change my tune on the inclusion of the MJ stealth missions in the sequel. Having to beat an out-of-control Peter as Miles immediately after Peter beats Kraven was also really good. This is all cool!

BUT, the thing is... with the symbiote powers being so freaky from the start, it really pushes my suspension of disbelief when Peter and co. take so long to become wary of it. I guess when you've been bitten by a radioactive spider and given superpowers, and when you live in the same universe as the Avengers and the X-Men, your perception of what's "normal" is going to be pretty warped. But they buy the whole "organic exosuit created to treat Harry's illness" story WAY too easily lmao. How do the self-aware slime tentacles help with his illness, exactly?

And I'm not sure how I feel about giving Peter Anti-Venom powers in the last act. It feels like it's primarily a concession so that they can give players that branch of their skill tree back, but honestly, the designer in me thinks it would be really cool (if risky) to just permanently lock players out of Peter's most powerful skills past a certain point. Yeah, it'd definitely piss people off, but it drives home the idea that Peter's given up greater power because it's the right thing to do. It'd put you in his shoes! Instead he just gets the symbiote powers back, but it's fine because the Venom voice in his head is gone and also the slime tendrils that explode out of his body are white now, which means they're good.

I have to say it. I'm sorry. The glistening white goo... they turned Peter into the Amazing Cum-Man. I changed back to the Classic Suit after rolling the credits and forgot I still had the Anti-Venom skills equipped, so I just saw regular old Spider-Man exploding his white goo everywhere. Terrible.

Assuming Peter is just stepping into more of a supporting role to Miles and not fully retiring after the events of this game, I really hope the Anti-Venom stuff is gone. I get that he needed it to counter Venom, but that's not what I want for Peter Parker.

Miles

Miles is good in this, and I really like his arc where he struggles with whether or not he should avenge his dad by killing Martin Li. I like how all that plays out. Unfortunately, they don't quite stick the landing when it comes to making him and Peter feel like equals in terms of narrative focus. His arc is definitely the B-plot to Peter's for the middle chunk of the story, which I guess was kind of inevitable since they decided to do the Black Suit arc. But Miles does at least get a lot of moments to shine, and by the end he's very much taking the lead as the main Spider-Man.

Becoming the main Spider-Man also gets Miles a new, wholly original suit that ended up being super controversial, and honestly... I kinda like it? Or at least I like what it's going for, even if the actual design could still use some work. It's something totally unique for Miles, and I like spandex/streetwear combo suits like what the Spider-Verse movies have popularized. But showing his hair is really pushing the limits of his secret identity. He hangs around Brooklyn Visions WAY too much for his classmates to not recognize his voice and haircut. And I understand why people would be wary about it becoming his "canon" look moving forward. But I think it's got potential.

On the subject of Miles, though, I will say that while I liked Miles' side missions, it feels like he's often saddled with the game's broad, kinda touristy, kinda token attempts at Showcasing The Diversity Of New York, in a way that Peter isn't.

I like that Miles has a deaf graffiti artist girlfriend that he and Ganke sign with, and I like that there's a series of side missions that explore some local jazz history, and I like that there's a mission where Miles helps a gay classmate ask his crush to prom. I like all these things! I like Spider-Man being involved with his community, and that said community includes such a wide variety of people! I like that this game slows down to savor these types of moments instead of just being all action all the time! But when I step back, I notice some patterns.

Hailey doesn't have a big role in the main plot, especially when compared to MJ, but Miles gets a side mission where you briefly play as her with muffled audio to teach you what being deaf is like. There are no major queer characters in the story - unless you count Felicia showing up for exactly one mission to mention she has an unseen, unnamed girlfriend in Paris now - but you get a side mission where Miles helps out a gay couple at his school, who then never come up again. To put it very uncharitably, they can feel like Very Special Episode missions. It's like the devs going: we're going to give Miles a Gay Mission, and an Impaired Hearing Mission, and a Cultural History Mission, so that we can say we touched on these things, but we're gonna make them all optional and keep them far away from the full-blown Superhero Stuff like fighting costumed villains. Those flavors cannot mix. Meanwhile, Peter gets to have a whole elaborate subplot about teaming up with Wraith to track down fucking Cletus Kasady. There's an imbalance here, and I think it's part of the reason why Peter still feels like the "main" Spider-Man for so much of the story.

I think this was all written with admirable intentions, but as others have pointed out, you can kinda tell that this game was mainly written by some white guys based in California. These attempts at depicting various marginalized groups can feel kind of detached in the same way that Insomniac's map of New York doesn't quite line up with the real thing. But I dunno. I'm not really the one to dig deep into some of this stuff as a white woman from Florida. I would be curious to read others' takes on this.

Maybe I'm just being overly cynical about the writers' well-meaning but corny and kinda out of touch liberal politics because of the podcasts.

The podcasters

I wish Jameson was in this more! They psyched us out by giving him a full character model for, like, two scenes. I like him being MJ's boss, but I wish we saw inside the Daily Bugle offices to get more Jameson.

At least his podcasts are better than the ones in the Miles game, though. Him completely trusting in Roxxon was just too much for me. Here he condemns Oscorp for the symbiote shit, and he also gets some moments where he takes the ongoing crises seriously and isn't just ranting about the Spider-Men. He isn't just a conspiracy theorist crackpot here. Shit like his "fuck Spider-Man, we have a justice system for a reason" speech makes him feel more like a human being with a point of view, rather than just a caricature. Definitely an improvement.

Unfortunately, I still find The Danikast grating. I'm sorry, Ashly Burch. It's not your fault. The quirky heckin' wholesome millennial podcaster lady who catches you up on current events and then reminds you to drink 64 ounces of water a day in the same breath is just too much for me. At least she doesn't have any lines as bad as her throwing in a "damn" and then going (direct quote here) "That's right - no censoring! That's how REAL I'm being right now!" like in Miles' game. Instead they give her this, like, almost psychic insight into the main plot to try and make her the angel on Peter's shoulder. The second Peter gets the symbiote she's like "Wow, y'all. Have you seen Spider-Man's new black suit? Something's different about him. He's been giving me such bad vibes lately. #NotMySpiderMan" Also she's supposed to be this, like, underdog independent podcaster who started her show on a whim and has become the voice of the people... but she's got billboards plastered all over the fucking city. Which makes her feel like an industry plant lmao

Again, there's a detachment with the writing. This is, like, some middle aged white liberal game dev guys' idea of what a modern leftist teenager would think is a Cool Activism Podcast. Unfortunately, because Insomniac thinks Danika's a hero, Mary Jane's triumphant ending is that she quits her job at the Bugle to become a podcaster, too, delivering a thinly veiled monologue about the pandemic to kick off her new podcast literally titled "The New Normal." She's going to save the world with podcasting, because that's the highest form of activism, I guess.

Venom

So! Venom! Venom was... okay.

Surprising no one, Harry Osborn is Venom. Harry's okay both as himself and as Venom, but I'm not sure his arc is a smooth one. He starts out as Peter's comically perfect best friend who returns to reminisce about the good ol' days and hand him his dream job on a silver platter, and then later he becomes a little ball of rage over the fact that Peter gets his symbiote and can't/won't give it back. I'm not sure that pivot is handled the most convincingly. You kind of have to write it off as the symbiote messing with their heads, I guess.

When he actually becomes Venom, I'm... mixed on the execution. On the one hand, the cool factor is absolutely there. He's a very cool big monster, and Tony Todd is great in the role. But he also wants to take over the world and make everyone a symbiote, and aside from any lingering resentment towards Peter, that's really all there is to him. It makes for a good video game to have a bunch of symbiote enemies and creepy symbiote nests and symbiote tentacles climbing up the sides of buildings in the last act... but is that really what I want out of Venom? Probably not. But he sure does look cool as a big monster guy to fight, and I was happy he was briefly playable.

Suits

Part of me feels like there's something lacking about the suit selection here, but almost every suit I liked in the previous games is back, and also I'm the type of person to give Peter the Classic Suit the second I unlock it and use that for most of the game. So does it really matter for me?

Peter's selection feels dominated by the various live action movie suits, but I get that those are going to be some of the suits people want to wear the most. I wish he had the Peter B. Parker skin to go with Miles' Spider-Verse alts, though. No idea why it's missing. Really I think I mainly just want more of the Spider-Verse designs.

Also I've complained about how most of the original suits designed for these games make Peter and Miles look like they were bitten by radioactive Alienware products, but I can just, you know. Wear other suits.

Misc thoughts

Everyone's already made this joke, but it's extremely funny that the Avengers didn't help with the symbiote invasion. Took one look at that and decided it wasn't their problem

On the subject of other superheroes, I do wish these games would acknowledge the Fantastic Four more. Peter's close relationship with that team feels woefully underutilized in his various adaptations

I like the trope of a boss fight that's a heightened version of a personal conflict between two people who are close, where throughout the fight the boss is airing out their grievances while the hero tries to get through to them emotionally. That especially works for Spider-Man! But WOW has Insomniac played that card a lot of times by the end of Spider-Man 2 lol

They're teasing the addition of Silk, I guess? I'm gonna be honest, I don't know shit about Silk, but I guess it was inevitable that they'd give us some form of Spider-Woman at some point. Gotta work all those costumes in somehow, and they're not brave enough to let one of the boys cosplay as Spider-Gwen.

They WERE, however, brave enough to let Harry say he loves Peter. I liked that little moment. They presumably meant it platonically, but clearly ol' Yaoi Lowenthal knows what's up

Post-leak addendum

So, obviously, by the time I got around to finishing this post the big Insomniac leak happened. I wish the game industry wasn't so secretive that it took a massive, dangerous data breach just to get our hands on some very basic info that would be public knowledge if Insomniac was a film studio, but here we are.

We now know that Insomniac spent somewhere around $315 million making Spider-Man 2 - triple what the first Spider-Man game cost to make. A quote about this from a leaked presentation has been stuck in my head ever since I first saw it on Twitter. “Is 3x the investment in [Spider-Man 2] evident to anyone who plays the game?”

To be honest, I'm not sure it is.

I liked Spider-Man 2, but I'd probably say that overall I liked it about as much as the first game. It's certainly a somewhat bigger game, with marginally more realistic looking graphics thanks to the power of the PS5. But I think I could do without ray tracing and more realistic hair rendering and whatnot if it meant that these games didn't take like five years and hundreds of millions of dollars to make. I could not give less of a shit if the swinging animations were recycled between games. I'd be fine with them being shorter, too.

I like these games, but as we look at that leaked project lineup and realize that Insomniac is turning into The Marvel Game Studio, I think about how many smaller, more original games that those resources could go towards if they scaled back the Marvel stuff just a bit. How many Ape Escapes or Patapons or Gravity Rushes could get made for the budget of just one of these massive AAA tentpole games of Sony's, which are apparently barely even breaking even? How many could be made for the budget of the "smaller, cheaper" Miles Morales game, which somehow cost $156 million to make despite using an updated version of the same Manhattan map from the first game? Hell, how many smaller games could have been made with the $39 million that went into remastering the first Spider-Man game for PS5 a mere two years after launch? How many people will lose their jobs if any one of Insomniac's upcoming Marvel games underperforms - which, in this case, could mean selling "only" 5 million copies? And would hardcore PlayStation fans even accept those smaller games at this point, now that they've been trained to only appreciate mega-budget Prestige Games with cutting edge graphics and treat everything else with disdain? How much worse will this get as the graphical arms race continues?

I think I just miss Japan Studio. Fuck Sony. Uhh but anyway the Spider-Man game this post was supposed to be about was good, some writing complaints aside. 8/10

[derpydoteddrake]

Why s2 will set viktor up as the future main antagonists for piltover and zaun after arcane.

(this is less of a thematic analysis and more of a meta one about the marketing and worldbuilding they did so far and probably do in the future. no le*ks)

First, let's ask the question, why is arcane canon? yes money but beyond that looking at where s1 left the characters off, it was quite oblivious if they only wanted 1 more season (which they said even after s1 came out), they can not finish every ones story properly.

They got to pick between letting it stay unfinished, more seasons, or making it canon so they can get back to it later.

And we know which they picked.

They wanted to use their popular show to function as an entry point for this universe/brand.

And this is the second important question to note: what's arcanes purpose?

Yes to be a good show, but let's not be naive, they want to sell you their universe, they want you to play the games and watch the shows and read their books.

So s2 will end with a hook. The storie of the 2 sisters may be over for now, but they want u to come back, so some tangible conflict for the future will be set up.

And we know that they already using arcane to set up future major players in the universe.

But then why cant ambessa fill that role for the future? they pushing her so hard.

Well, the book summary kinda gives it away.

After arcane she wont gonna stay as key player in pnz, she will be a key player in noxus, as an adversary for swain.

So who or what could work as setted up future antagonist, someone who commands enough power to be a real threat for the cities?

Silco - is dead

Warwick - dangerous but couldn't bend an entire city

Singed - he doesn't organise people in a way that would be a problem

Jinx - by the end of the show her story is probably finished for a while

Ambessa - the conflict with her is also finished for at least while

other then them pnz had prominent antagonists before like Renata Urgot or Camille, but with the rewrites they not only exist in a limbo, but if they goal with arcane is to bring in new fans, they would use an existing character in the show to fill that role.

and even though I think noxus will be presented as a continuous threat, (even in the previous lore it said noxus wanted to take over piltover and it even had a strong relationship with zaun but) the main one will be something else to switch things up.

So we are left with one glorious man who is the best candidate for the job.

Not only it wouldn't make sense for his story to conclude yet since even in s1 it was oblivious his story is only beginning, but it would make a lot of sense if they spend the series setting up the next big villain, in a way casual watchers didn't even realize.

It looks like they going strong with the cultist angel which means:

he has a considerable amount of manpower he can command

by himself he is capable of magic

and it is very likely when he changes people's bodies he will have some control over them.

Which means he will most likely end up in the perfect position to take over this role, the marketing and release dates also seems to be align with this.

First they teased the main villain for the series with her release to properly build up hype.

But I suspect when the show kicks into full gear they will switch their markething around and promote the 3 main women and thats when most likely they legendaries drop.

legends of runaterra pretty much confirmed this. They using Ambessa to promote the beginning of the series release (prologue), we have a middle that will most likely feature most prominently jinx, vi and caitlin, and then an epilogue that sets up future things.

The same way they wanted to drop Ambessa everywhere in a relatively short time frame, we could expect the same treatment for the Viktor vgu next month, which would align with the epilogue celebration in december.

Which will most likely feature jayce and viktor. Not only they have been absent from the promotion so far, they will both receive confirmed legendaries, and the hex cores present is continuously alluded to in marketing.

I believe this indicates that they have big plans for them, and in a way that will be a surprise for both newcomers and old fans, this is why they are so secretive about them.

And thats because the 3. act and the epilogue of arcane will set viktor up as the next main antagonist of pnz.

[asukaskerian]

peddling svsss (spoilers abound)

lovingthatofficeyfeel: ok. Now try to sell me on SVSSS because I read the summary and go 'nope, nope, nope icky power dynamics do not want, nooooope' because if it is not that I am also amenable (Book summary: "Half-demon Luo Binghe rose from humble beginnings and a tortured past to become unrivaled in strength and beauty. With his harem of over three hundred wives, and dominion over both the human and demonic realms, he is truly the most powerful protagonist—in a trashy web novel series!

At least, that's what Shen Yuan, online alias "Peerless Cucumber," believes as he finishes reading the final chapter in Proud Immortal Demon Way. But when a combination of rage and a poor meal choice leads to his death, Shen Yuan finds himself reborn into the world of the web novel, in the body of Shen Qingqiu—the beautiful but cruel teacher to a young Luo Binghe.

Although as Shen Qingqiu, he now has incredible power and abilities as a cultivator, he’s destined to be horrifically punished for crimes against the protagonist, so this new Shen Qingqiu has only one course of action: get into Luo Binghe’s good graces before the young man’s rise to power. That’s the only way he’ll escape the awful fate of a true scum villain!")

lovingthatofficeyfeel: ^ like based on that summary, I would never read that light novel on my own

Askerian: oh man yeah it makes it sound like grooming as fuck Askerian: grooosssss

lovingthatofficeyfeel: exactly! lovingthatofficeyfeel: its like this for most of the danmei!

Askerian: it's not like that at ALL

lovingthatofficeyfeel: which is why I want to know why people like it so much

Askerian: ok first of all, the guy he's stuck inside of is a high ranking ice bitch, so he has to speak that way too, BUT! he's a huge nerd inside! Askerian: the contrast between the speech and the narration is sometimes completely hilarious Askerian: also. his screen name peerless cucumber is a dick joke. and the book author's airplane shooting toward the sky is also a dick joke Askerian: this guy is the kind of oblivious demisexual who will read a 600+ chapters harem story for the worldbuilding

Askerian: and the protagonist! he LOVES the main character, so he also looks favorably upon him getting everything life owes him including sex, he supposes, but! none of his wives LOVE HIM PROPERLY. hm. let's flame the author over that. Askerian: anyway so then he lands himself in the body of a teacher to a 14 year old abused kid. who is a kid! and a very adorable kid. yeee time to spoil the shit out of him Askerian: the issue there is that there's a system/game manager forcing plot points and assigning quests and no matter what he does some things must happen, such as his betraying his poor clingy baby student so that he can rise magnificently from a hell dimension and take his place as a demon king Askerian: so when his adorable little student comes back Pissed and starts doing things that look very similar to what happened in the book just before murdering his evil teacher, he starts running. but he also really wants to help his student survive and even thrive! but also, not die in the process PLEASE.

Askerian: meanwhile luo binghe went from abused by sensei to spoiled by sensei to "i will marry sensei when i grow up" to "STOP RUNNING FROM ME AND EXPLAIN"

Askerian: main character can't explain, btw. he'd die.

lovingthatofficeyfeel: ahahahahahahah OMG lovingthatofficeyfeel: see THIS, this is my shit lovingthatofficeyfeel: this sounds freaking God Tier hijinks humour

Askerian: it's so damn fun XD

lovingthatofficeyfeel: you should write the summaries for seven seas' danmei books

Askerian: also the System sells "small scenario pushers" for points Askerian: guy "what's that, ok, let's buy, maybe it'l save my life" => WHY DID I END UP HALF NAKED AND DRENCHED Askerian: luo binghe : hhhhhhh 🍆

lovingthatofficeyfeel: ahahahaha omg, wet hanfu Saves Lives XD

Askerian: shen yuan: idk what distracted him but time to run Askerian: luo binghe: D:< wAIT STOP BEING NAKED AROUND MY LOVE RIVALS shen yuan: oh no he wants to kill me twice as much Askerian: he's Oblivious (tm)

lovingthatofficeyfeel: omg. 'oblivious demi-sexual keeps running away from future-demon-king trying to seduce him'

Askerian: yiss

lovingthatofficeyfeel: this is a fanfic plot in the best way

Askerian: YISS. Askerian: i kinda love luo binghe's character too tbh. he's so nice! but he's such a yandere sometimes Askerian: i mean, nice. :X Askerian: "my fantasy life is to be my master's little housewife and i will burn down the world to make it happen" dude :X

lovingthatofficeyfeel: honestly, good on him for having balanced life goals XD

Askerian: as a kid he's adorable but also already "i hear what you said! i understand it! gonna do what i felt was right tho" Askerian: after he's been given unconditional love by sensei!!!!! but also betrayed by sensei!!! he doesnt know which way is up anymore. it's kinda clear that in the book he was from, his original version was using "seduction and sex with this random new girl that will disappear from the plot in five chapters" to paper the holes Askerian: like, couldn't trust anybody's love because he never had any, but desperately needed it. Askerian: this one's had a taste before, and doesn't know what he must have done to lose it, but he will fix it!! but only sensei will do Askerian: main character keeps expecting him to hook up with dozens of girls and it never happens and he's ?? while also totally missing all the admirers HE is gathering Askerian: also issues because he's a half demon, and sensei said he thought good demons must exist, but he was still rejected on reveal, so does that mean "there can be good demons but you're not one" Askerian: and since he's naturally smooth and it easily goes into manipulation, everything he does or say, sensei takes it as some underhanded threat or plot! he was a demon king in the book ok?! Askerian: book him was NOT nice Askerian: anyway a REALLY fun read

Askerian: though don't expect the sex scene to be good because it's a half-feral "fixing you via magic sex" and he canonically has huge meat :X Askerian: and since he has ZERO experience it uh, goes badly Askerian: tbh the author's gift does not lie with sexy porn

but tbf the point of the scene was NOT to be sexy, soooo...

[darkfictionjude]

I've followed blogs without a demo before and while sometimes it has paid off - I find myself doing it less and less overtime because all too often I go back to a blog 3/4 months later and find it dead with no demo.

That being said in a lot of cases the demos never being finished feels like a cycle of :

*wanting to foster interest and community around your writing* -> *writing an IF is a huge task and it takes longer than expected to learn coding/write a branching narrative/limit story scope to a feasible level* -> *interest dies down because it has been a long time with no demo* -> *low/no interaction on posts ends up feeling demotivating especially when compared to other IF authors so they lose passion for the project*

To compromise, on my part I don't often follow blogs with no demo but if I'm genuinely interested in the story I try to go back to the blog and like/reblog posts or ask questions if there's anything I'm curious about. I definitely think you should write what you want for yourself without necessarily expecting attention - but attention and interaction is always going to feel good regardless.

At the end of the day as an audience member you're never actually 'owed' free content (especially given that its more often then not a passion project) so I have no hard feelings for writers who make demo blogs just to share some fun info about their characters/story and then dip - even if it can feel disappointing.

It 100% feels weird/kind of scammy to have a patreon if you haven't actually written anything though, because you're taking money from people (who often don't have huge amounts in the first place) before they even know if they like your writing/world/story - and before they know if you're capable of actually fulfilling any of the promises you make (which given that IF is generally much longer than a traditional novel is a *massive* promise to make to your audience in exchange for their financial support).

After an author has dropped a demo (even before any/consistent updates) patreon is all good in my book. At that point the audience has a 'sample' of the writing and can use that as a method to judge if they enjoy it. As long as the promised content on the patreon tiers are being fulfilled - you as an audience member are now getting what you've paid for - and can unsubscribe at any point if you no longer wish to keep paying for it.

Yeah I do feel like writers tend to want to work on something that will sell, and why not? It feels good to know your hard work is recognized and appreciated

This is a very nuanced take, I feel that some people even get angry when writers disappear, which yeah I’ve been burned before but like I don’t understand getting pissed when at the end of the day there are more games out there and as you said, no one is owed free content. IF writers are hobbyists, like this is a side thing for most of us it’s a gruelling hobby not only work load wise but also if you unfortunately get anons being mean to you

Yeah I didn’t want to say that but it does feel strange when there’s no work but there’s a Patreon. Because Patreon is just additional writing, it’s meant to be complementary to the main work. People pay for additional writing because they hope it adds to their experience when reading the IF proper.

I mean based on the name it is a modern version of being a painter in Europe during the renaissance and have a richer patron pay you to make art 😭

[teenage-fleabag]

Some thoughts on the Life is Strange franchise

To be fair I'm not really up to date with recent Life is Strange discourse, but since the somewhat recent announcement I've had so many thoughts and I just wanted to ramble a bit.

I've been a huge Life is Strange fan for years now, falling in love with the first game when I played it at fourteen. Since then I've played every game that has been released in this franchise. But the first game has always felt special, like a little glimmer in time that no other game has been able to replicate, but that doesn't mean that the other games suck though!! I've quite enjoyed them!! I just think that Deck Nine aren't really living up to the standards set up by the games made by Don't Nod.

Even though one of the critiques of Life is Strange 1 is how the choices made throughout the game don't really matter in the end, seeing as they all can be easily erased by the last choice, it still felt as though they all had a purpose? They contributed to the sentiment of ''your choices matter'', letting the players see the butterfly effects that they themselves were responsible for. And all of this culminates with the final choice - being dictated by how you played the game and which relationships mattered the most to you, creating an incredibly heart wrenching ending.

And I was so excited to see how Don't Nod expanded on the choice mechanics in the second game!! Life is Strange 2 isn't without fault or criticism and I understand why many people didn't love it, especially if they played it while the episodes were being released, but it was so refreshing to see a new story and mostly, to see that the creators were trying to improve and make something different. Especially knowing that they probably saw the love for Max and Chloe, but stood firm that their story was over, which I think creatively was the best choice.

Before the Storm is difficult to talk about, because even if I do genuinely love it, it still suffers from the ending just not being as strong as you'd expect from a Life is Strange game. But I've always kind of written that off as something that you just have to deal with when creating a prequel. But then True Colors came out, which I was very excited about, even if the storyline seemed a bit similar to the first game (small town, mysterious death - I know it's kind of a reach, but still), but once I finished it I felt quite disappointed. I loved the characters, but I thought the ending absolutely sucked. So did the big reveal. It felt as though Deck Nine had learned nothing from the progress made by Don't Nod.

Since the release of True Colors I've had this feeling that Deck Nine ar just trying to recreate the magic of the first game without making any bold creative choices themselves, just juggling around elements of Life is Strange 1, trying to figure out which one will grant them the most success. This point being further proven by the announcement of Double Exposure.

Don't get me wrong, I love Max, but her story was over, she had her arc. And yeah, sure, maybe a part of me is saying this because I don't want to see her suffer anymore than she already has, but there's a reason why Don't Nod have been so adamant that her story is over for now. I know the new game isn't out yet, and I'm still holding out hope that it'll surprise me, but I truly cannot see how they can make a Life is Strange game with Max as the main character, while basically ignoring the events of the first game. I get that it has to be stand alone for commercial purposes, that a direct sequel probably wouldn't sell as well, but that makes this game just feel like fan service without actually serving the fans.

I truly have no clue how they plan on just explaining away Chloe if a player chose the bae ending, especially since they were still mentioned as being together in Life is Strange 2. I'm aware that they mentioned that the player will be prompted to input their ending during a conversation, but Max's story is so much more than just a simple conversation. It makes it seem as though a whole part of her is just being erased, a whole games worth of trauma just ignored for the hope of selling a game to as many people as possible.

I don't really know how to end this, but I'm not sure that Double Exposure will really hit the mark for many fans of the franchise. I'm still excited to play it, but I'm staying cautiously hopeful that I might be pleasantly surprised.

[theoxenfree]

final verdict of mouthwashing:

YO, MAN. WHAT THE FUCK

total gameplay time: steam is clocking me at 3.5hrs; realistically, most players will probs finish in under 2.5hrs.

overall rating: 4.2/5

gore rating: 4.5/5

fucked up rating: 4.7/5

LITERALLY BIGGEST SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT + other notes.

if you just want to know: would I recommend you spend the money to play this? yes, but, you've gotta be able to handle some pretty immense gore.

realistically, this game is extremely linear and from what I've looked up after finishing, there is only one actual ending to the game. you aren't really given much choice in the things you do, but to be fair, some of the stuff that looked like you may have been able to do (e.g. feed curly isopropyl alcohol vs the painkillers(, I didn't venture with.

steam clocked me at 3.5hrs for the playthrough, but without my additional time to wander around, trying to interact with everything possible + some of the gameplay being fucking annoying (e.g. cargo haul and graveyard) I'd say the realistic play time is closer to 2-2.5hrs total.

there really aren't any options for things. the devs had a script and a plot in mind and went full throttle with it. in this case, I really appreciated it, bc this is the sort of story that can easily overwhelm players they'd been loaded up with different endings and choices.

because the game was made using unity, the gameplay was mostly smooth throughout, despite the N64/PS1 graphics lmao. the main map of the game is pretty straightforward, you don't really need to memorize it bc it's basically a circuit.

there were a couple of maps in the game that were frustrating bc, like, solutions and moving forward with the storyline weren't immediately doable. but, even those didn't hold me up too long.

they were annoying enough to take a cut into the overall rating tho. they interrupted the immersion of the story.

I like the dimension that the devs gave the characters, particularly anya and swansea. daisuke had some background and motivations throughout the story, but I feel like he was made for you to feel sorry for by the end.

swansea is fascinating bc he's deemed the central antagonist of the game (wrong, but also not wrong). verbally abusive. former alcoholic. mean, ugly guy who you receive more clarity on as the game progresses. I won't say he is "redeemed" by the end, as I think he stays thoroughly unlikeable, but, y'know, at least he's honest until the end with some smidge of kindness to him.

anya is a... tragic character and part of me feels deeply for her story, but I'm also partly miffed by it. there are some nasty implications throughout the game, so player beware.

but, christ, even how the game ended with him was unkind and just straight up evil.

curly, MY MAN, I cannot be normal about him bc the way he suffered throughout the game was absolutely obscene—in the worst way possible. like, I kept hoping he was going to receive mercy at some point before the end and then the rest of the game was just jimmy's fucking delusions

also tho, real talk, fuck curly for not manning up and beating the shit out of jimmy after he learned what happened to anya. literally homeboy is perpetuating stupid "don't sell out your bros" shit bc he and jimmy were friends

jimmy can rot in hell, I have thoughts on this motherfucker and his character. so, if you want to know, feel free to ask, but just know

what an absolute fucking bastard 💀

one thing I'm sort of back and forth on with the game was its use of time skips—both forward and back. I'm not overly fond of those in games or writing, but they were able to keep it clean enough that I wasn't confused about the timeline of events, which was quite nice.

this game excelled primarily at gore and atmosphere. there are a couple of scenes that I'd describe as "chases" and a few "jump" moments, but it isn't a traditional horror game in which you're running from Big Bad. it depends heavily upon atmosphere and claustrophobia and just that foreboding sense of doom that gets you from the first minutes in.

the gore is nothing to laugh at.

it is disgusting and distressing and merciless. and take my word for it, as someone who is highly desensitized to this sort of stuff, it's intense. and if you can't handle that, it's gonna be a rough ride for you.

[otherversian]

Importance without Name

My alt account on Fallen London, the honourable Doctor ////// ///////// MD, known by the pseudonym "Kai Mehra", has officially reached Person Of Some Importance status without having made its name.

I did unintentionally start one quest, but made no progress on it and did not use the area it unlocked (not that Moloch Street has ever really had anything useful for me anyways lmao)

How did I do it?

Honestly? It was a community effort. I did spend a lot of time grinding my stats at 4CPpA with a Woesel (which I got by selling event items, since I started the account during an event), but the majority of my stats came from Patronage - other players spending their time and effort to improve my stats and contribute to my story.

But that might not be exactly what you're asking. After all, there is seemingly no way to achieve POSI status without either spending real-life money (which I famously do not have any of) or progressing at least one Making Your Name storyline - and yet the answer remains the same. A community effort. In theory, it is possible to do it with no expense from any participant - you CAN get the required 10 fate for free eventually through major story progression, and thus any one of the people assisting me could have done so and then sent it to me. They didn't, though. I uh... I got a generous donation of 10 very much paid fate about a year ago, and I've kept it banked for this moment. I know it may seem cheap that the answer is "I skipped it with fate", but that leads into the next point

Why did I do it?

Because I saw that it was possible. I saw, in my quest to become POSI on my main account, that there was a fate option that lets you skip the MYN grind requirement for POSI. I saw that it could be done, and I wanted to do it. So I did.

And... I dunno, I wanted an accomplishment to call my own. Ironically, the quest to avoid making my name on game was sort of a quest to make my name in real life. And just like in game, it doesn't end just because I've finished one step.

What now?

There are three tiers of POSI. I'm gonna get to the top, without ever finishing a single Making Your Name quest. Is it gonna be a slog? Yeah, probably! Do I have absolutely no idea what the game is even like past POSI 2? Absolutely! But I'm gonna do it anyways! This is my shōnen anime moment, I have my goal and by the gods I will achieve it! No more fate barriers stand in my way, everywhere I need to go can be accessed without MYN with enough brute forcing of the cards, I can do this.

I'll see you all at the top.

In Magistri Confidimus; Pro Amore, Pro Veritate

[aotopmha]

I have finished Dawntrail!

I will have a spoiler-free post (this one) and a spoiler-y post (probably one of my following ones) of my very general thoughts.

If there's a wish to avoid even this kind of post, then the warning is here.

For spoiler-free impressions, I will say that I did notice a bigger inconsistency in terms of the voice work.

The final boss had straight-up flat delivery that didn't exist in most cutscenes for ALL voice actors.

Everyone is also mostly fine when talking normally, but when yelling or stronger feelings are needed, especially the newest actors feel strangely off.

Wuk sounded absolutely fine and consistent in 6.55, but there were points where she just sounded really flat in the actual expansion.

I'm also in the camp that the credits theme sounded off. The chorus was fine (and the same track was completely fine when used in a couple of other cutscenes), but the main vocalist sounded really off. It took me out of what was otherwise a very solid final stretch of story. And the singer has done some great stuff before!

It's all really odd and I didn't think I would have these complaints ever again after A Realm Reborn because the voice work since then has ranged from good to amazing.

I'm really curious about what's going on behind the scenes.

FF14's vocal tracks have been weak at points to me, but not once have I felt a vocalist sounded absolutely awful.

Otherwise this expansion is up there in terms of the soundtrack, might be my favourite so far. Incredibly strong all the way through aside from the vocalist in this single track.

The graphics update has done wonders to endear me to the world and this will be the first expansion I will absolutely max out the FATEs for perhaps even just this reason alone. It's a miracle how much more strongly you can sell a world with better lighting and just a little bit more object density.

The content itself is also absolutely fantastic - if the story really bores you, I at least recommend skipping through it to do the dungeons and trials and maybe go back for the story via New Game+. The encounter design is refreshing, from a whole bunch of new mechanics to more interesting fodder enemy usage.

The class changes, while feeling relatively minor have felt like really good smoothing out of awkward elements.

I especially feel this with Dragoon, and as much as I miss Plunge, Dark Knight's new ability animations alone go a long way to add to that smoother feel, as well.

i also adore Viper, which I think is my favourite melee out of the ones I've played. Simple, but speedy and satisfying to play.

I will absolutely still remain a DRK main in a general sense, though.

Will be running dungeons to get everyone along all of the game.

Finally, I think the story came together really nicely by the end, with some interesting threads left behind.

It is much more simple than Shadowbringers and Endwalker, but I think it was still effective. As I've said in previous posts, it's just really thematically strong and followed that strength right to the end, even if I have varied opinions on all of the characters.

In terms of immediate impressions, content-wise (dungeons and trials in particular), as far as base expansions go, I'd place it above ARR, Heavensward and probably Endwalker (Endwalker's solo duties rocked and narrative and gameplay integration is still unmatched, but the encounter design itself isn't as distinct).

Story-wise I'd probably place it above A Realm Reborn and Stormblood because it has a similar spirit of exploration with much better pacing within its individual areas. Every time I felt the story started dragging in its own ecosystem, it moved on and the answers by the end were satisfying and made sense while ARR and StB actually didn't have that many mysteries to even think about, so had much less impetus to at least seek those out.

It had no Labyrinthos, Ruby Sea, Moogle quest or Mt. Gulg setup. But it wasn't as complex in terms of character writing as Endwalker, Shadowbringers and to some extent even Heavensward and Stormblood.

Though, as said, this is only speaking in terms of the base expansions, the only comparison I can make. Because the patch content did amazing narrative things for both Heavensward and Stormblood in particular in my eyes.

(I actually have no idea what to expect from the Dawntrail patches. Which is, once more, both super exciting and scary because the threads left behind are pretty much a complete mystery.)

So in a general sense, I'm an early Dawntrail defender. I enjoyed it a lot. It truly felt special as my very first on-content expansion, too.

Now on to the optional dungeons!

(Have heard some great impressons on them!)

[pinkyjulien]

I finished No Coincidence and I have some THOUGHTSS

Heads up for potential spoilers 👁👄👁

You can read my condensed, spoiler light impression on Twitter also 👀

GODDDD.... What a book man fhjfg

Gotta say, the start was a bit slow? To me at least. I wasn't too interested in the individual characters, who I thought were another group of gonks like Edgerunners

At one point, I did not want to even continue; the romances between Ron and Melina, and Zor and Aya felt forced, "he's a boy she's a girl" kind of deal. "They're around each others so of course they fuck"

A lot of moments around Melina and Aya were focused on their physics, how sexy they were and how the men were attracted to them; they made it a force and used it to their advantages of course, but this felt like I was reading an old book, yknow?

Aya being the poor girl forced to sell her body to live, and Melina being the sexy corpo doing everything to stay young. It's like, aren't we past those tropes for female characters in 2024 deadass??

They eventually grew on me as we dived more in the story, they got way more interesting once the book stopped focusing on how the men felt around them; when the book stopped using the two female characters as tools to move the male characters backstories and trauma

(making it clear its nothing against Milena and Aya, as I said I really liked them and the main gang in general, just a bit of eeeh heteronormative writing, boring to me)

Once the romance "build up" was over, I really got into the story and the characters; the dynamic between the group was interesting 👁👄👁 You can tell there's more to it all, you can tell it's No coincidence if they're together

Even if you can sniff the twist coming, they still hit HARD AND GOOD, made me look away from the book with an audible Oooooooh multiple times

I did not expect Albert to be present throughout the whole book, but I loved the deep dive into the netrunning word and the cyberspace in general oof... made my brain goes bbrrrbbrrrrrr it's so good 👁👄👁 without getting too spoilery, Albert's storyline was probably my favorite; that finale is insane, got me on edge, both fascinated and terrified

ANOTHER THING I LOVED. Seeing familiar faces! I loved to see Pepe, Dum Dum, and hear about Royce. Dum Dum actually have a big place in the book, which was fun!

We also get to see Dum Dum friends, or should I say Dum Dum's partners? I really doubt they'd categorize their relationship, but that trio obviously love each others in the most *Maelstromish* way

Karla and Dixie were fun characters, adding new flavors to what we already knew and saw of the Maelstromer gang 🤌

Talking about gangs, we also get to meet with Animals, who have actual animal features in the book compared to the game! Tusks, fangs and whiskers, with actual animal head even 👁👁 wish we had that in game

Knowing everything I know, I might want to revisit it again in the future 👀 cause its def a book you wanna re read once you get all the keys AAHHH

GOOD SHIT GOOD SHIT. Recommend it if you wanna have more of Night City and of the Cyberpunk universe ⭐️

[samobservessonic]

Next, we move onto a Knuckles story that I’m much more glad has run for six parts than I was the last six part Knuckles story, with the shock(?) reveal from last time that Nack has betrayed the Chaotix to the new Metallix army in exchange for cash. I assume this was arranged prior to the Chaotix getting the jump on Knuckles at the start of this arc? So Knuckles was probably an added bonus for Nack

No one is surprised to learn that the Metallix aren’t keeping their word to Nack. What’s the most interesting here is the hint that Nack is a tech guy in StC. He’s hardly been established beyond “traitor” here, but we will be seeing more of what he can do in future

Even here, while it doesn’t help him, we see that Nack was prepared for a potential betrayal and brought a shrinking gun hidden in his hat. That’s kind of Nack’s thing in StC - he’s got weapons and stuff that he can shrink and grow. We’ll definitely be seeing more of that later

It does paint the picture of how much money means to Nack as well, if he assumed that the Metallix were probably going to betray him, but went along with this on the slim chance that they wouldn’t

Here you go everyone - Knuckles with a gun

Had he not been struck down, Nack could’ve even walked away with a victory today, since his weapon does manage to wipe out all of the Metallixes!

And since the Chaotix are the good guys, they even take him with them as they make their escape

That’s the last we see of them for this story, as on the next page, Knuckles is being dropped off home by the now recovered Omni-Viewer. He rightly assumes that there’s more to the Metallixes’ behaviour than what Robotnik’s ordering them to do and oh boy, we’re coming up to that plot point!

Eh, maybe Nack wouldn’t have been okay after all, since it turns out that the Metallixes were faking it. That’s actually really clever - they’re robots, so a display of bravado means nothing to them. The best way for them to win the fight was to simply pretend they were beaten, so their opponents would leave without causing them unnecessary damage. You don’t normally see this outcome in a comic aimed at young teenagers, since the goal is often to get to the cool fights as quickly as possible. But them wanting to avoid a fight just makes the most sense

Also, they’ve got an evil Omni-Viewer now. They can go anywhere in time and space, easily making them the most dangerous enemies in the comic. I’m also chuckling nervously, because now I have to confess that I’m a casual Doctor Who fan at best (shout out to the Ninth Doctor, love that guy!) and I’m probably not going to pick up on all the Doctor Who inspiration that went into these guys. But trust me when I say that it’s there

To hammer home this point, we end this story on this awesome establishing shot of the Brotherhood of Metallix! Once again, Elson absolutely sells this. You can feel what a massive threat this is and I’m sure there were no shortage of kids writing in asking to see more of this story But for now, it’s over and it looks like next time we’ll be getting that Knuckles & Tails story that was allured to in the main story last issue Well, now that it’s finished, I only have good things to say about this story. Despite being a backup story, it established some very central themes and gave us the biggest threat in this comic so far. If you were wondering how they’d hit the ground running after the S3&K arc, well, this is it! A lot of concepts from the game were brought into the fold in one fell swoop and honestly, for me, it worked really well. While I’d have had no problem with Nack getting a separate introduction arc, I like him as the traitor to the Chaotix and there are a lot of places you can take him from there. The Chaotix themselves are going to become big players in StC from here on out as well. Y’know, I do wonder if SEGA gave a push to StC and Archie to work in the Chaotix after Knuckles Chaotix came out or if both comics just decided having more game characters in the mix was a good idea. Because, I’ll be honest, if not for the Chaotix being in StC, I probably wouldn’t have heard of them prior to Sonic Heroes. Knuckles Chaotix was not a game anyone really talked about when I was a kid and I wasn't online until a lot later But where Archie kept the Chaotix as Knuckles’s support cast, StC actually used them mostly separately to Knuckles, adding another point to their “StC was accidentally right about something to do with the Chaotix” tally. This isn’t to say we’re never going to get more stories with Knuckles interacting with them, but we’re also going to be getting a lot of them doing their own thing. One of the biggest arcs I remember with these guys teams them up with Sonic, not Knuckles, as he gets stuck in the Special Zone for a while

I’m getting ahead of myself there. For now, we have a solid arc that leaves us with a lot of potential in future, as StC refuses to wind down the stakes on their way into the dry period of getting new Sonic games

[cru5h-cascades]

Sins of the Flesh Update Trailer Dissection!

(plus some other stuff that wasn't shown in the trailer!)

At long last, the long awaited trailer & release date reveal for the newest Cult of the Lamb update's out! Storywise, there's not much to go off of from the trailer, but hey a bunch of new stuff to do in the new update!

Right out of the gate we see one of the main selling points of the update in a short animated segment of the vid: SEX. It's here we see the mating tent, where followers can do their thing and create an egg (just like I predicted! the xmas art for CotL was a teaser for the mating feature!). In order to use the mating tent, a new mechanic is introduced where followers have to have a high enough level of love for each other in order to use the tent. Once they do, you can have them make out with each other in the tent and as soon as they finish their love making session they'll come out of the tent with an egg, which you can either A) harvest for food or B) keep the egg in tact to have A BABY FOLLOWER!!! YESSS!!! I REALLY WANTED THIS TO BE IN THE UPDATE SO FUCK YEA!!! It's unclear if we ourselves can use the mating tent, but we'll find out eventually.

New follower attire (previously revealed alongside the announcement that booze would be added to the game)

We're re-introduced to a new weapon: the gun (previously revealed to us a few weeks before xmas) and get some footage of it in action.

A new follower interaction is shown off where we can fight a follower during a crusade (sorta like how Shamura turned a follower on a player in the base game's story campaign). May or may not be connected to the update's new story if there is one, which might be the case.

It appears you can further upgrade your meetinghouse/church/whatever you call it in this update. Perhaps even customize it? Seems like that in the trailer.

A re-introduction to the ability to serve booze to followers (also previously revealed to us before xmas)

New rituals ahoy! The one in the trailer where the followers are going ape shit is called the Rite of Wrath, where followers will go ahead and unleash the purge in your cult grounds by going around killing and fighting each other, vanalizing the cult grounds, and more. There's another one in the trailer that might have to do with more casual canabalizim in this game (instead a follower's presumably being eaten alive in this instance). And another ritual is going to be added into the update which is called the Rite of Lust, where your followers dance around a shrine in the Lamb's image naked. There's more rituals being added into the game but those are just a few.

A possibility of gaining more hearts??

Follower Sozo. That's all I gotta say here.

And that's everything that got revealed in the trailer. There's still a few more things that the trailer didn't show, which I'll talk about now:

New minigame ahoy! By using the new drum circle, you can now play a new rhythm game-based minigame!

A new food source (which remains unnamed; possibly due to lore significance?)

The new rituals may or may not have a tie with another new game mechanic called Sin. As of now it's unknown why we need to generate Sin in this update, but if I had to guess it has to do with the story of the new update.

There was other stuff revealed outside the trailer but those just had someting to do with something shown in the trailer (how the mating tent works and the Rite of Lust). We still dunno about why the crown turns into a snake-lookin' thing and we dunno why followers can turn on us in this update but hey at least we're getting the update soon! Then we can figure all of this stuff out for ourselves.

Sins of the Flesh will release January 16th!

[thaumana]

Trails of Cold Steel (2 & 3) - Easter Egg and Trivia Rambles

I just reached the first chapter of Cold Steel 3 and took a look around in the new the student dorm, where a certain sculpture in Aurelia's room caught my eye.

It's a good example that I specifically love about the series (especially since Cold Steel) how it sprinkles all kind of trivial dialogues and Easter eggs that hints some subtle background story about the characters in this world.

At first glance, one would think that the principal's private dorm room is filled with ordinary pomp and splendor copy&paste decoration. However, as my memories of Cold steel 2 were still fresh, this striking lion statue looked immediately familiar.

It was Clara's semester project, which she worked on for the majority of the time in Cold Steel 2!

During the epilogue part in the evening, after Thors Military Academy has been liberated, you can find her in the art classroom, where she's completely chill and just has finished her semester project, where you can see it turned out to be a nice-looking lion statue.

The following day after the party, there is a sidequest (the one called "Junk Wanted") where you have to gather all kinds of unwanted junk for the store owner Brandon who intended to sell stuff on the flea market. Clara was one of the donors who gave her finished sculpture away, much to Gaius' and Rean's astonishment.

This means that, whether directly or through detours, Clara's lion sculpture eventually ended up in Aurelia possession at some point, which is why you can now see it in her room a year later.

As a fine lady, Aurelia surely appreciates true art and had a good eye for Clara's craftsmanship!

I wonder how much she paid for it? Did Brandon get a good deal out of it? And will Clara ever find out about this appreciation? Not like she would be the type who cares, lol.

I finished Cold Steel 2 just a couple of weeks ago and jumped right into Cold Steel 3, so I'm not sure if they will refer to it later.

In any case, such quests and those kind of easter eggs are one of many main reasons why I love this series so much, since they add a lot of depth to every single character. Even if the details seem minor at first glance and even if most of them are side characters who are not an essential part of the main plot, their scenes and dialogues strongly contributes to my personal gaming experience and feelings I have for this series and its vivid world.

Edit: Since the game already placed a few of those lions here and there, it's more evident that it's just one of the game assets that have been reused for decoration purposes. So much about the storytelling part, lol. BUT I still like that aha moment since I knew from which scene this asset originated from.

[waxsuyaaa]

omg side order was so good

my annoying rant about everything down below⬇️ also if you dont have the dlc dont press the keep reading button

OKAY so for starters it was actually kinda disappointing to see that most of the gameplay has been shown already in the trailer, i would’ve liked to have been surprised..

and there is no feeling of progressing forward like any other storymode since you go to the start every single time you lose and all your achievements disappear unless you get into the boss fight, and only if you win you get one singular key

and all the powerups that you’re used to having just gone. poof. disappear.

i would’ve liked to see npcs that you can actually talk to because somehow there is no button to talk to pearl? like maybe they should have made a feature when you’re right underneath pearl to press A and talk to her for a bit, even if its something simple like “yo! let’s get back on track!”

you can’t even talk to marina and all she asks is if you need something to be hacked, which makes her seem as she’s just there for that mechanic and nothing else— as someone who never played splatoon 2 and doesnt know her personality im not sure what the hype is about for her

we should have been able to go into the elevator and actually walk around and talk to the characters and like salmon run, when it says ‘time to go to work!’ for side order it would say ‘arrived at floor’ or smth like that.. i would give anything to be able to walk around and interact with everyone in the elevator, like if the characters pearl, marina and dedf1sh weren’t there it would function the same

why arent we able to talk to them like. dedf1sh is such a cool character where is the lore? they just stand in a corner and is just there…

it would be so amazing if you could slowly befriend dedf1sh and get exclusive gear/random stuff from the metro or smth from them as the friendship points rack up and they become more open to you

and all the bosses are easy to tell apart from the silhouette and you can easily guess how you’re going to fight them, i want that little moment of mystery as well as not knowing how hard it’s going to be

coloured fingertips dont even seem like a thing anymore, it was just for agent 8 and her blue palette things

it looks as if you have to fight many of the same boss to get the locker key and after it just becomes repetitive and there is no story whatsoever, the villain is a glitchy entity called ‘order’??? like if that same glitchy entity thing switched to agent 4 for like half a frame the entire fandom would go WHOAH WHAT WAS THAT and we’d be talking about it for ten thousand days

the only motive is that you have to save everyone from being grayscaled blablabla but you dont even have any evidence of the character even being there, the character palettes are just a cheap way to implement more weapons, like what do you mean we don’t get the actual characters standing around the outside of the spire.. i want to talk to paul and warabi and ikkan (cough cough i mean quinn and mashup???)

we cant even get these extra characters because 3d modelling is SUCH a LOT of EFFORT for such a huge company like nintendo we should feel so sorry for all the work that they had to do, they put in their best effort (sarcasm)

all the enemies/foes are just remodelled salmon run enemies like battering largo or whatever (they could remodel the enemies but not the bands?? what)

also wheres cypher? i thought the shrimpy character would be a main character that wanders around and sells you stuff but theyre not even in sight

so uhh you can say ‘skill issue’ or smth because OHHH I HAVENT FINISHED THE GAME YEAH THIS PERSON IS JUST COMPLAINING BECAUSE THEYRE BAD AT IT or whatever im just disappointed that it was kinda overhyped and i drew art for a character that didnt even exist (skeleton agent 4)

[hungnitan]

HSR x Fate UBW coming in Q3 2025 !

(I write these in mind for anyone doesn't know Fate series at all)

For now it's unknown will it come with stories or just skin or full pack with playable UBW character

Not long ago HSR had interview with FGO team, the magazine only release their Q&A but considering both side love each other project, these collab shouldn't really suprising. If there's suprising fact is why only UBW not FGO directly ? Since there is no info about collab details, let's make some analysis for now :

FGO especially Fate series is really big world ! If you need comparasion, it's not only Honkai Impact world but all Hoyoverse become one and you need to know at least a bit of each title to make sense about Fate series !

Continuing point above, which is the reason they gave us years for this collab ! Their developer consider years should be enough for player to quick read most Fate series franchise (lol)

Fate as whole already into their 20 years old now so it's kinda impossible for anyone to learn that series from start (even I only know fifty percent of it). So to make it simple, they just pick their well known franchise but not making players too confused about their world building which is Fate Stay Night. UBW is decent choice considering what's happened with other two.

If anyone need comparasion, UBW kinda like GGZ in term of popularity and reminiscing (lol) while FGO kinda like former Genshin in term of popularity.

I kinda saw FGO pretty desperate nowdays or maybe they're already out of idea to promote Fate series onward. For anyone doesn't know, FGO was the king of mobile gacha games but after Genshin release their revenue drop sharply and with more Chinese gacha games out lately, you can say now it's their lowest situations so to be honest Fate series feels like gonna dying sooner or later which is this collab came.

I can say for sure that this collab came from HSR side since those otaku ops growth like now while watching/reading Fate series (lol) so I think there's no way HSR or even Fate team will slack off especially for storytelling since it's Fate main selling (if there's one for collab later lol)

Onto collab prediction since it's specifically UBW, means the main character is either Rin or/and Emiya. Maybe anyone still not read questionable leaks but there's info this collab need two version to finish means there's at least four and max six new character avaliable later. Considering UBW stories, I can think of Saber and Gilgamesh or maybe Kirei can join the roaster too.

Now for everyone who doesn't know Fate series and need pointer for later collab, first please watch Fate Stay Night, it have three titles with same story premise but different PoV with different ending (Fate Stay Night 24 episode -> Fate Stay Night Unlimited Blade Works 1 movie -> Fate Stay Night Heaven's Feel 3 parts movie). Next it's Fate Stay Night prologue, Fate Zero 24 episode and you're good to breakthrough the collab only.

Sounds simple right, which is the reason they choose Unlimited Blade Works for collab. If FGO, you could swarm yourself with 9 years FGO lore materials + other works with and without "Fate" titles on it (lol)

[crystalelemental]

What do you wanna see the postgame in Pokemon you want? I feel like it's kinda tricky to figure out myself when I replay the postgame content in numerous times.

Okay this might go for a while, because the short answer is "I don't think I know anymore."

Part of the issue is defining what count as "postgame." Like, is Kanto Redux in Gen 2 postgame because the League is the finish point, and Red is optional superboss content, or is that part of main game? Is the second half of Unova optional postgame content, or is it main game because you technically never finished your League quest? Some situations, like the Emma and Anabel quests in Gens 6 and 7, feel pretty decisively postgame, as do things like Delta Episode. But what counts and what doesn't is up for some debate, and I'm...not really sure where I draw the line. I've referred to everything in the second half of Unova as postgame, but now I question that decision.

More to the point, postgame runs into two specific problems in both story and gameplay areas.

Gameplay is probably best explained by Bopper's Gen 2 video. In it, he expresses that a major selling point of Pokemon is the emphasis on continued growth and development, talking about how moves being learned late or late appearing Pokemon give players something to work toward, and keep the game fresh and interesting. And to be honest, this tracks. As someone who's owned cheat devices most of his Pokemon career, you do try to hack in final teams right at the start and they get stale really fast. Having something to work toward is part of the fun.

Postgames tend to run into the problem of not having anything left to specifically work toward. The difference between Crystal's Kanto Redux and Platinum's battle island is that in Platinum, my team is done and has learned everything. As a result, that island doesn't really offer anything particularly fun. While I've been a proponent of Gym Leader and League rematches in the past, they also have the issue of...not doing anything different. Red as a new final conflict requires a different approach from facing off against Lance and the League, but Cynthia 1 and Cynthia 2 go down to exactly the same strategy. There's less to work toward, so the island feels entirely boring to me. It's a complete slog.

While there are opportunities to switch up the team, sometimes that comes a bit late, and isn't exactly...engaging. It works in a game like Crystal because of how type matchups work, where Misdreavus can be caught and immediately blank Red's Snorlax, or Tyranitar countering half of Red's team. Or in Emerald, Mawile can hard counter Steven's entire team with careful play. But later games don't have that opportunity. It's just lower level stuff, sometimes weaker stuff, with no real gameplay benefit.

Which leads to the main thing. This is a Monster Collecting game. Its postgame is effectively completion of the dex. Which is something Pokemon is uniquely terrible at. A game like Nexomon (which is excellent and should be played) lets your postgame be hunting down everything, which is all available in that one playthrough. But Pokemon has version exclusives that demand two games, and internet connection, and with Switch paying for online connectivity. In addition, while Nexomon has a ton of Legendary status mons, it also gives a ton of Golden Nexotraps for assured captures to simplify the process. Meanwhile, Pokemon gives you one (1) Master Ball, then gives you a gauntlet of like a dozen Legendary Pokemon that are wretched to catch because of how annoying their systems are. Monster collecting in the most popular Monster Collecting Videogame is terrible by design. It's never been good, and they're never going to make it good. Though I guess they tried with Galar's Dynamax Adventures and Paldea's fights with main legends. Though they both still do the stupid catching thing in other ways, like the Galar birds and Treasures of Ruin.

I think ideal gameplay actually gives you something to work toward, but also Pokemon really just needs to improve how it operates with catching everything. Which I think it has. To its credit, Galar and Paldea do make it easier to complete the dex by making near everything available. But that's also predicated on dealing with the awful raids and dens, which is somehow worse.

The other element, story, is where things get dicey, and I'll use a comparison to explain. In Nexomon, your postgame events are...honestly the most story intensive segments. They're really good, and my personal favorite parts. More critically, they're continuations. Nexomon 1 follows up the main story of defeating Omnicron with your story of destroying his soul so he can't regenerate (spoilers I guess). Neoxmon 2 follows up all the heavy stuff that happens with a bit of a departure, but only in the sense of setting up the connection between things that happened and things that are about to happen. It's all excellent, and the postgame story is the hook. Granted, alongside new boss fights and challenges and developments that are engaging too. Shame about how the hunt for Tyrants goes, but I digress.

Gen 2 and Gen 5, while they offer postgame, tends to be very light and disconnected on story. There's not as much relevance. Even with things like XY and SuMo and the Paldea DLC, which are much heavier on story, they have...literally no significance to the main event. Like okay, you can argue the thematic relevance of Emma as a character, or that the UB hunt is related to Lusamine's actions, but like...it's really not that connected to what was going on before. Teal Mask is just 100% disconnected, and when they do connect in the Mochi Madness thing, it kinda sucks ass and they wrote Carmine out of it entirely like assholes. I will never forgive that.

I can't say Pokemon's ever really had a great story-centric postgame. It completely lacks in that area, and tells the story it wants to tell centrally. Not that Pokemon's ever been that intense on story. So this is an area it can't really work for. But the ones that do stand out...also run into issues. XY and SuMo have great events with Looker, Emma, and Anabel...but the actual playing of those segments isn't great. And going back to the initial question, does Teal Mask count as postgame if you can do it, entirely, from nearly the start of the game?

The final issue is one of...well, the Battle Facilities. I hate them, personally. I have no investment in playing literal cheating AI at reading minds. Gimmick frontier stuff like in Emerald and Platinum can be fun, but stuff like the normal Battle Tower sucks. Add to it that legendary Pokemon don't count, and there's also very little benefit to gathering legends. You don't really get to do much but stomp the League with the box legends, and...then what? Do a bunch of extra stuff? Run battles that don't allow them? What's the point of having the postgame without those benefits? Galar fixes this a bit by letting anything into Tower, but it's a small concession more than a proper fix.

Honestly, I don't really know what this all adds up to. Part of it is desperately wishing Pokemon had better capture mechanics, because god do the current ones suck. Part of it is thinking that postgame should be a little quick, because usually my complaint is it goes on too long. But I really don't even know what I'd expect anymore. I think that, to some degree, postgame in Pokemon works while the generation is current, but falls off in importance on replays. It's why Daybreak made Legends Arceus worse.