#matt plays ffxiv

[blooferlady86]

Look, I don't have any proof that this is true, but...

We know Matt Mercer has at least created a character in ffxiv.

We know that Dawntrail releases on Friday.

Lots of people I know have taken a day or several off of work to play the first few days of the expansion.

And well, well, well, look who finds a substitute DM right before Dawntrail drops.

See you in Tural, Mercer.

[ponett]

when it first came out i wasn't particularly bothered by the english dub in botw and its characters that fluctuate between american english and fake british accents. like, i didn't think it was the most amazing dub i'd ever heard, and it didn't sound "authentic," but it just sounded about how i'd expect the dub of a game like that to sound

but i really think playing ffxiv this year and getting to heavensward, where the entire north american voice cast suddenly gets replaced with actors from the UK, has made me allergic to that "anime dub actors doing halfhearted fake british accents because it's fantasy" kinda dub. obviously it doesn't take a genius to realize that getting actors who already have the accents you're looking for is usually going to sound better. but it just feels so illustrative of the issue with how much more natural everyone sounds jumping from the last scenes of ARR to the first scenes of heavensward. to have that mix of different specific regional dialects instead of a series of impersonations. i was like, oh. we don't have to settle for the fake fantasy british dubs after all. it doesn't even have to be a special case like xenoblade where it got localized for europe first

watching the totk trailer i was like "oh, did the voice acting always sound this rough?" and the answer is yes. i still think zelda sounds okay, but going back to king rhoam's big scene and listening to that accent fade in and out is really rough. and honestly matt mercer sounds pretty bad as ganondorf. beyond the fake accents on a lot of the characters, it must be the direction they're getting or something. it's not like matt mercer is some inexperienced novice

[raptorix]

Having a fixation on both FFXIV and Critical Role is a mess for me right now. 'Downfall' and 'Dawntrail' are too close for my ADHD brain and I nearly tagged something as 'CR Dawntrail' oops.

NGL I really wish FFXIV would collab with Critical Role for a one-shot simply because Sam and Taliesin voiced ARR characters, and Matt honestly did/(does?) play.

[tekutiger]

There's something I've been wanting to post here for about a week now, but I've been putting it off, waiting for the Dawntrail Benchmark to release. (That can be found here btw: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/ffe3a1a5430a5a8168ca9782ab9ec0e57cd5be62)

On the official Square Enix forums (both English and Japanese), there is an entire thread for the Graphical Update Viera Noses. Our communities are not exactly thrilled with the changes, to say the least.

The (current) last page of the English thread can be found here: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/493947-Graphical-Update-Viera-Nose/page19

The first page of the English thread can be found here: (or you can just go to the link above, scroll to the bottom and click "First") https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/493947-Graphical-Update-Viera-Nose

I tried checking here on Tumblr if this had been posted already but the FFXIV tags are spammed so much 🫠

The Japanese thread link is within the EN thread somewhere, I forget which page.

If you play a Viera, you've probably noticed that your beloved WoL doesn't quite look the same- specifically the nose, and to a lesser extent with their eyes.

That's all pointed out and discussed in the thread. And yes, I did voice my opinion to it 🙃

I'm trying to find some comparison screenies of my bunboi and fembun to contribute here.

The thing I was worried about, and still kind of am even after going through the benchmark- is the strange "shine" you see on bunboi's noses in certain areas, or at random times. I couldn't find any rhyme or reason to why or when this would happen 🤷🏻‍♀️

We were also shown a preview of bunboi's with their nose like 7 shades darker than their skin tone and that didn't sit well with me. Between that and the shine? No. Just no.

This is current graphics 👆🏻

Another thing I noticed in the benchmark is that they removed the colored eyelashes from Face 1 (the face I'm using on my bunboi). It's literally like, 1 of the 2 primary reasons I chose this face to begin with. (They usually match your hair color.)

Dawntrail Benchmarker 👆🏻

You can see some of this "so called shine" in some of these, but it's not as bad as I thought it'd be originally. I guess I can live with it and over time I'll probably get used to it.

I can probably even get over the fact that his white eyelashes are gone, though I'll miss them. I don't know... 😖

I do appreciate the updated quality of the hair, and the iris/eyes, and his facial feathers. I also like that the added "lip color" I gave him appears to be matte and not a gloss, but I'm not sure how other people will like that, lol.

ALSO. There's a very specific scene in the benchmarker that shows your WoL's face so much better but for some strange stupid reason you cannot take screenies during it. I feel like SE really let the ball slip there.

There's probably a reason for it, and then again there might not be- because if I really wanted to, there are loop holes and I could still get those screenshots if I had more time, Lol 😅

Current graphics 👆🏻

I don't have a plethora of screenshots of my fembun like I do of my bunboi- but looking at my fembun specifically I'm realizing her bunny nose doesn't seem that prominent, even now? I guess I thought it was defined more 🤔. Perhaps it's the lighting of this specific shot.

I was going through this phase of changing her hair color from red to yin yang colors, back to red, back to yin yang, rinse & repeat, so...

Dawntrail Benchmarker 👆🏻

Again, I appreciate the high quality in the iris/eyes, hair, facial features- like her tattoos.

It does seem like the highlights in her eyes get a little lost, if that makes sense? The anime type white reflection. Not just for her but for my bunboi too. I think that goes for all character now- I've seen this commented about all across Twitter (yeah I know it's called X, but I'll never call it X).

Her bunny nose seems to disappear in many scenes and then it "seems" to be there in some scenes. I don't know what to make of it.

I feel so wishy washy with this graphics update. There are parts I like and parts I dislike. At this point I'm wondering if it's that whole mentality of "People dislike change" / "People fear the unknown" and over time we'll get used to it.

But also, I've seen some comparisons of people's characters and the overall appearance, the overall vibe of their character has totally shifted. It's understandable they're upset.

I want to offer a couple of pieces of advice here. If you have any commentary to add about Vieras (or any other characters really- like moon kitties got royally shafted on their fangs)- please visit that thread and put your two cents in. Hopefully SE will see it and potentially listen to the community feedback. But in the case of Moon kitties, there's likely a respective thread for them so you'll have to seek out that thread.

The other thing is, take advantage of this benchmarker in tandem with our free fantasia (coming soon). I feel the character creation screen does not properly display what our characters are going to look like once ingame. Do not take the character creation screen at face value. Create and/or modify your character in the benchmarker (you can save your character data). Play it out- make sure you're happy with how they look in the benchmarker. Then go on and use that fantasia. You can load the saved data from the benchmarker into the real game. (unless they changed things, which I highly doubt)

Edit: Adding in some links to other threads ⤵️ (Its been mentioned by others that it's best to keep posts pooled in one thread vs. spread sporadically out across several threads. If SE or Mods are likely to read anything, it's going to be in one centralized large thread.)

Thread: [Dawntrail] Miqo'te face 4 Keeper nose smudge nerfed

Thread: Benchmark/Graphics Update - Lip shape concern and eyes

Thread: Keeper fangs nerfed in the update

[kazamajun]

Making a list of fictional characters Gomez has shown interest in when I'm playing games, maybe when there's enough I'll do a tier list of his reactions. So far he has visibly been intrigued by:

Kazuya Mishima (has gotten on my lap twice when I've made gifs of him and stared at the screen)

Daemon Targaryen as played by Matt Smith in HOTD (he sat on my lap eyes glued to the screen for his scenes in the season finale)

Raubahn from FFXIV (went from being on my lap to practically climbing across the keyboard to get closer to the monitor when he was on screen)

Y'mhitra from FFXIV (watched her very intently moving his head from side to side when she was on, clearly enamoured)

Characters he has had a negative reaction to:

Kan-E-Senna from FFXIV (visibly lost interest twice when she appeared in a scene, the second time he jumped down off my lap)

[nochi-quinn]

candela obscura chapter 1 episode 2: hey entire table what the fuck

still enjoying matt in shirtsleeves

still weird that his wrists are naked

are his sideburns going grey? like under the bulk of his hair

this is a scene that jumped into matt's head fully formed and he has to give all the details

source: been there

auggie!

that's my son!

vexnvax syndrome strikes again

going 'yum' just as charlotte's art pops up: correct

if there's one thing anjali's going to do it's play a hot lady in period clothing

"I've been smoking since I was eight" "then you can find your own smokes"

"sir, ma'am - " "doctor"

mala: the three genders

is "otherwhere" like ffxiv and "anyroad" or is it like. a place.

if there's one thing laura's gonna do it's try to get a magical item out of the GM

thank you, howard

witcher potion

auggie, whose friend turned into an ice ghost not even a month ago: fuck you, werewolves aren't real

arlo: maybe SOME PEOPLE - not me - are just SHY - I'm not tho - and have TROUBLE with PEOPLE - except me, I'm fine

bidet

"let matthew know" snickersnort

"what's my name?"

your name is also matthew

I don't know why "make a sneak" makes me smile but it does

howard just faceplants in the background

the story's too long to tell here but one time a woman brained herself on a hamster cage in petsmart and that's all I could think of with the guard blocking auggie

this voice is very endearing

not weird but WEIRD weird

all this for a loaf of bread?

matt making up names off the top of his head

aha! drugs

oh no

Quite Betrothed

fate dating au

"have you ever seen boiled bacon?" revolting!

"I have moments where new information makes me somewhat uncomfortable" autism mood

"I'm gonna touch it" to "this was a mistake" pipeline

if any of them were gonna succeed this seems like where you would want to succeed

yeah, DEAD SCIENTISTS, HOWARD

howard is now craving bacon

I WAS JOKING

I also enjoy this voice very much

aha. veterans.

he is An Doctor

bottom table is ND as f u c k

channeling patrick loller from tiktok: "if you thank me for my service you have to give me $5"

pocket bacon!

yeah see, $5

"we're not doing Get Help"

and that's just what the couple did to the room!

oh shit it's the fuzz

"our first victorian shit!" robbie what

joke three people in the world will get: you can only poop in the designated areas

the whole table: howard no robbie: HOWARD YES

nose punch go CRUNCH

"HOWARD WENT ROGUE"

howard said acab

what is anjali feeding her dice

robbie do you want to tempt the wrath of the whatever

the secretary's a werewolf

with a very cute accent

"he was a horn player" "I bet he was"

"s e x u a l i n t e r c o u r s e"

howard

"I wanna take his badge" fearne lives

he ran into a doorknob"

"WHY DID YOU TALK"

"stairs is faster" confused me until I remembered some people can actually walk down stairs instead of having to take them one at a time, one foot then the other, while clinging to the rail for dear life

laura

the way my brain autofilled "stayed open during the pandemic"

"is he a tall lanky boy" tailed by slenderman

grumbles in public transportation

everybody gets to punch a cop!

cable car fun fact: I was reading dashiell hammet for the first time and had to google what a broadway car was bc he said it like 90 times in the first three pages

and I'm STILL not sure I got it right

"how do you know I'm OUP" "the everything about you"

"my name is gertrude! I mean ethel!"

"spend all the drives! you won't need them later!"

"steal the man of the cloth's cloth!"

[witcher voice] for your discretion

"if only you knew how I was making my money"

ty for not popping your shoulders out on stream anjali

(I originally said "popping them out" and decided specificity was necessary)

this music is a+

"first name trio" is a good name for a band

disco elysium crossover

"she's having an idea….and it hurts" mood

"SHE DID IT" my crackpot theory is vindicated

that is certainly a way to put it

eddie? eyes emoji?

ashley very quietly reaching for her pencil

bacon plague!

banana spiders

"make sure you bring your hand with you"

c o n s u m e

"I've been working on this really great YA novel" MATTHEW I have already snorted lemonade through my nose once tonight, you can't say shit like that

ARLO

AUGGIE

I love them

why was my only thought AT THE OPERA TONIGHT

"do I recognize her as a TA?" "she's an ex-student" you get how that's worse, right

you have buried the lede slightly arlo

anjali: "I shouldn't curse" matt: who told you that shit

"that's poor people talk"

classism!

arlo

"THAT MAN TOUCHED MY BREAST"

"JEEEEEEEMY GOD"

we never should have given matt buttons

matt you live in LA you're giving them all trauma

kickin buddies

[pounding table] werewolf weREWOLF

that's. not a werewolf.

that's a bloodborne monster

just the panicked yelling dlkfjls

I too yell wordlessly when forced to make decisions

"until it was trying to merge with your body" hate THAT wording

hey matt what the fuck

HEY MATT WHAT THE FUCK

"if I'm still aliVE YOU NERDS HELP ME" bakugocore

"its own viscosity" despise it

hey. hey howard. whatcha doin.

[justin mcelroy voice] DON'T DRILL A HOLE IN YOUR HEAD

DON'T YOU PUN RIGHT NOW

hey robbie what the F U C K

"a gun! :D"

hey. hey arlo. hey arlo whatcha doin

some fullmetal alchemist shit is what

I hate everything about this

laura has just decided all her characters are coloring books now

"this arm doesn't have function anymore" oh mood

"takE IT, ROBBIE"

"you just do. what other choice is there?" hey I don't need this right now

hey howard what the fuck

HOWARD'S HAUNTED

see this is why you don't drill a hole in your head, you get ghosts

[jcmarchi]

FFXIV: Dawntrail Impressions, Infinity Nikki Beta, And Alan Wake 2's Night Springs DLC | GI Show

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/ffxiv-dawntrail-impressions-infinity-nikki-beta-and-alan-wake-2s-night-springs-dlc-gi-show/

FFXIV: Dawntrail Impressions, Infinity Nikki Beta, And Alan Wake 2's Night Springs DLC | GI Show

In this week’s episode of The Game Informer Show, former GI editor and current writer for The Indie Informer John Carson drops by to share his impressions of Final Fantasy XIV’s newly released Dawntrail expansion. We’re also joined by our wonderful podcast editor Matt Storm to give their thoughts on Alan Wake 2’s Night Springs DLC, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door, Dragon Age: The Veilguard, and their first foray into Sam Barlow’s Immortality. Marcus Stewart spills the tea on his time playing the closed beta for the bubbly open-world dress up game Infinity Nikki and his first excursion through the typing-based dungeon crawler Cryptmaster. We round the show with Kyle Hillard and Marcus giving their obligatory Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree check-ins. 

[embedded content]

Follow us on social media: Marcus Stewart (@MarcusStewart7), Kyle Hilliard (@KyleMHilliard), John Carson (@John_Carson), and Matt Storm (@dj_stormageddon). 

The Game Informer Show is a weekly gaming podcast covering the latest video game news, industry topics, exclusive reveals, and reviews. Join us every Thursday to chat about your favorite games – past and present – with Game Informer staff, developers, and special guests from around the industry. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

Matt Storm, the freelance audio editor for The Game Informer Show, edited this episode. Matt is an experienced podcast host and producer who’s been speaking into a microphone for over a decade. You should listen to Matt’s shows like the “Fun” And Games Podcast and Reignite, a BioWare-focused podcast. 

The Game Informer Show – Podcast Timestamps:

00:00:00 – Intro 00:04:16 – Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail 00:23:36 – Infinity Nikki Beta 00:46:00 – Alan Wake 2 Night Springs Expansion 00:52:59 – Kyle’s Jurassic Park Corner 00:58:51 – Cryptmaster 01:08:13 – Immortality 01:16:30 – Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door 01:22:33 – Marcus’ Manor Lords Update 01:26:05 – Dragon Age: The Veilguard 01:35:54 – Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree 01:47:47 – Housekeeping

[greenmagic-oilspill]

Gonna make a pinned post I guess

Name: Matt, sometimes I use Cogs (as in a XIV OC, Cogflox), Baithin, or Flibbertigibbi on other sites though

On tumblr since: like 2010 (🤮)

Currently writing: Opera Omnia: Opus Divinitas, a fanfic continuing the story where Dissidia Opera Omnia left off at the end of Act 4. Also dabbling in some original fiction.

Hi! This is my tumblr where I mostly reblog posts about various FF games and occasionally yell about them in the tags. I have played every single main game and almost every spinoff and I genuinely love them all. Occasionally you’ll see other fandom posts but it’s mostly FF.

Favorite games: XIV, X/X-2, and XII

Currently playing: FF Explorers, last played FFXIV Dawntrail

I’m also a bit known for Distorted Reality, an Avatar: The Last Airbender fanfic.

XIV characters: Edge Marbrand, Baithin Alberona, Azionne Melisandre, Granny Moss, Talon Oakes, Linini Mooglesworn, Siz’ir Johcandalo, Yue Dustdreamer (Balmung), and also Pachi Jovas, Majv Saga (Zalera). I also used to be Gogonegi Momonegi, but he has been retired.

FF games I still need to play/finish: Dirge of Cerberus, Lightning Returns (mostly done), Dissidia Duodecim (mostly done), FFXV Comrades DLC, My Life as a King/Darklord, Chocobo Fables, FF Explorers, Vagrant Story (I’m counting it)

Sorry, I do not have a consistent tagging system because I’m just too lazy.

[semi-imaginary-place]

ffxiv on to shadowbringers full spoilers

i joined ffxiv right around 5.2-5.3 so i actually got super spoiled on shb

really they're putting the gate at the lake and not in the special crystal tower zone where the raids were.

... are those unique animations? that wasn't the default run. wow you can really see how the funding has improved since arr.

oof that bloom effect my eyes are suffering for making a pale ass character dressed in white. the one time in videogaming history where the bloom is narratively appropriate.

so ardbert in shadow. uh i don't recognize the narrator voice. oh hey minfilia haven't seen you in forever. so why did player character get whole body teleported when all the other scions left their bodies behind. (or is the pc secretly collapsed on the source)

now i could go for the map marker.... ooooor i could run around the entire map. boooo the devs thought ahead and blocked me off.

they killed off the brenon clone immediately D:

i can't tell if it's lore significant or not but the crystal exarch's arm doesn't have the lighting effects crystal usually has. like most of the crystal in ffxiv is kinda glowy and a little translucent but the arm is matte like paint. maybe it's a graphics limitation thing idk.

is it me or does the crystal tower look different. i don't remember those basalt looking formations. there's fluffy amaljaa! was initially confused because underground is the WORST place for an herbarium but if the problem is too much light i guess it makes sense. having giant grates in the library seems like a bad idea. hmm the naming scheme seems sharlayan. why is the marketplace called universal music? its a good thing i know most of these terms from other ff games and shab spoilers otherwise if you threw like 7 new race names at me i'd cry. once again the lack of guard rails is concerning. why are the hortorium and sweetsieve no next to each other. a lot of wroght iron and glass.. art noveau? is this entire city built over silvertear lake?

great now the writers have a precedent for timetravel

exarch described feo ul as "kanojo"

ghostbert angst. i joke but i do find this sort of stuff compelling. oh that clears it up, so his title changed. because i just heard that the warriors of light killed the shadowkeeper and caused the Flood but arbert was also going around calling himself the warrior of darkness, and i didn't connect it until now but it was all them. hey this is that melody that plays whenever the pc does something heroic, played prominently in the ultima and around the end of 2.0 but here its real slow and sad.

did the faeries take over ishgard???? especially curious is the faeries are the equivalent to the sylphs. and rak'tika is the shroud equivalent. limsa was gentrified lol. what im curious about is the habitable part of novrant is shown as both an oval and a circle and i don't know which map is right.

exploring lakeland and uh is that a giant lake monster? yeh that's a giatn lake monster. why's there a road at the bottom of the lake. you guys have extremely nice outdoor furniture. like damn going to spend the budget on nice furniture instead of having a roof.

Crystarium architecturally reminds me of my highschool pet worldbuilding project about a magic crystal floating city filled with telepathic shapeshifting immortals.

shb could have been its own game. Post apocalyptic fantasy about civilization on the brink feels like a pretty standard premises minus the light and dark swap. Writers went wild with the worldbuilding. So glad i watched ffxii and xenoblade so i know what a hume is

Theres also how the crystarium is built over silvertear lake the center of all magic. Although middy isnt on the first, then why are there dragons dragonish things around. I wonder how much shared history there is between the source and the first since right around silvertear actually is the elezen homeland and thats where the elf bandits on the first are hanging out trying to reclaim their homeland.

[swingbeard]

Just wanted to give a quick shout out to @quelfabulous, @entropytea, & @kinari for their help in taking down Alexander - The Soul of the Creator (Savage) tonight to get the mount.

That fight is still a little bit of a challenge even with an undersized and over-geared party, but it’s still a really fun time! We ran the raid a few times and were able to get everyone who ran a mount.

[macroflation]

oh my god. two days in a row, doing the daily mini cactpots, i got the 10k price twice

[anakinh]

healers and dms are actually the same thing because on one hand you’re a very important member of the group and basically a god and on the other hand you’re an asshole with delusions of grandeur who gets dragged around by a bunch of idiots

[mattskitchen67]

Vague Level 88 Endwalker Spoiler

The hug!!! My boy!!! Urianger lovers are feasting. I’m crying.

[mastro-soul]

Me: Greed Only in Alliance Raids are terrible

Also Me: *Steals the Ninja gear from the i335 Ninja PuGie while I’m running Scholar*

[flashes-rp-masterlist]

Hello! My name is Flash, and this'll be my main RP Blog for multi-fandom and multi-muse use! Below is a list of the Fandom's I RP in, what canon characters I play and how many OCs I have in that Fandom!

-------------

FFXIV (All Scions, Zenos, Emet, Hythlodaeus, Venat, 2 OCs)

Kingdom Hearts (Ventus, Terra, Aqua, Vanitas, Xehanort)

Cookie Run (Hollyberry Cookie, Sonic Cookie, Choco Werehound Brute, 3 OCs)

Sonic (Sonic, Shadow, Silver, Rouge, Tangle, Whisper, Metal Sonic, Mecha Sonic, Espio, Vector, 1 OC)

Xenoblade (Shulk, All of Ouroborus)

Psychonauts (Raz, 1 OC)

FNF (Boyfriend, Girlfriend, Pico, Garcello, Annie, Matt, Whitty, Updike, Carol, Tricky, Hank, Sanford, Deimos, Anders, Xeno, Lord X, Majin Sonic)

UT/DR (Frisk, Mettaton, Alphys, Kris, Susie, Jevil, Berdly)

Pokémon (Lucario, 2 OCs)

Digimon (Agumon)

Doraemon (Doraemon, Nobi)

Arcane (Heimerdinger)

Berserk (Guts, Judea)

Cyberpunk (V, David)

Omori (Sunny, Hero)

Dreamworks (Puss In Boots)

PlayStation (Astro)

Hollow Knight (Ghost, Quirrel, Tiso, Cloth)

Dragon Ball (Trunks, Gohan, Gogeta, Hit, Cheelai, DBS!Broly)

Chainsaw Man (Denji, Aki, Katana Man)

Cult of the Lamb (The Lamb/Luther, Narinder, 3+ OCs)

-------------------

I'll be doing alot of reblogging and following to hopefully get the ball rolling, and when it does, I hope you guys enjoy getting the chance to RP with me!

[thessalian]

Thess vs TLoVM Ep 12

Okey-doke, here we go, finale time! I should note that the only reason I’m able to do this is that I finally have a halfway decent desk chair because this would be painful otherwise and I’d be over on the sofa, whimpering. (I have fibromyalgia and chronic sinusitis, and my neck of the woods has been hit with two back-to-back storms the last few days; the barometric pressure drop triggered both. Yay.) But I do have a halfway decent desk chair, so let’s do this.

Before we even start, who wrote this? Brandon Auman (more Marvel, TMNT, and ... ooh, Star Wars: Resistance!) ... and Sam Riegel. I may have to hug him too.

Oh for fuck’s sake, Percthax.

Go, Cassandra!

Oh, dear. Hello, Craven Edge.

Oh, cutting the intro sequence was a good move.

Ah, Scanlan. He tries. That’s as much levity as they could probably fit into there, what with the desperation and all.

Oh, the fucking GRIN as he puts the mask on is scarier than the fucking mask itself!

Well, it’s about time they figured out that Pike doesn’t talk about shit “clouding people’s souls” like it ain’t no thing. Next time? LISTEN TO THE SERVANT OF THE EVERLIGHT SO DETERMINED TO HELP YOU THAT SHE ASTRALLY PROJECTS TO YOUR LOCATION TO KICK VAMPIRE ASS! ...okay? Okay.

...HOOOOOOOOLY FUCK. I didn’t think “Take the mask off, darling” could get any better but HOOOOOOOOLY FUCK. Also, that takes that “Percy’s shadow pointing the gun to Percy’s head” thing to a whole new foreshadowing place - just not a place Orthax would want it to go. Nicely done, writing team.

And this would be Taliesin’s nat 20 to resist Orthax that ended up with Percy exorcising Orthax through sheer force of will. Which is nice that they did that.

(Also, quick aside for you FFXIV players - when I was first catching up with CR Campaign 1, I’d watched the Orthax thing a couple of months previous and @true0neutral was more or less right in the middle of it right as we were going through the endgame of the MSQ of ARR - so the base game where Taliesin was voicing Thancred. Whose name I struggle to remember because when we found out that Lahabrea was possessing Thancred, and was basically Black Smoke Dude, we remembered what Taliesin said during this whole sequence and said, in unison as we were approaching the Lahabrea boss fight, “...Therapy!” Thereafter, even though Taliesin wasn’t voicing Thancred anymore, we didn’t call him Thancred; we called him ‘Therapy’, in Taliesin’s honour. The fact that Thancred went Gunblade has done nothing to change my mind about that one, even though I don’t play FFXIV anymore.)

Oh, this whole mindscape thing is fucked up and I love it. Give me the symbolism mixed with flashback. If you ever wondered what angst I crave? This. This is it.

Holy HELL they did things with Orthax on the visual end that I hadn’t even considered. I may or may not have nightmares tonight. THANKS FOR THAT.

(No, seriously, thank you. If I worried about nightmares, I wouldn’t fall asleep on the sofa to creepy Korean horror at 3am. Nightmares are fine.)

So ... it’s Matt voicing Orthax, right? ‘Cos IMDB is failing me again. *checks X-Ray View* Yep. Matt. IMDB, GET. YOUR. SHIT. TOGETHER. Matt deserves every single kudos for this. Every last one. He refined that shit since Campaign 1. Seriously. Nightmares.

(My players are probably not thanking you. Nightmares are just another source of inspiration for campaigns for me. My players both like that and really don’t, because that’s the nature of torturing the people you made up inside your head, and then handing those tortured people you made up inside your head over to experts for more torture.)

And the barrel spins and ... ooooooooooooh fucking hell. This got darker than it was originally. And it was fucking dark to begin with. Just the thought of those empty barrels filling with names of his loved ones before anyone else, just because they ‘stood in his way’... AAAAAAAAAA.

Okay, I saw quasi-spoilers about the Desmond thing being a foreshadow but tried not to pay any attention and I see it now and also OWWWWWWWW FUCK. Do you know how many bones he just shattered?!? OW OW OW OW.

“Yes, well, thank you for not dying”. He’s had more arrows in him than a porcupine has quills and was still cracking heads; great line, exactly because of how ludicrous and yet heartfelt it is.

Yeah, they had a ‘violence and foul language’ warning on this. They ... do know that ‘gore’ is a category all its own, right? Just saying - ‘gore’ belongs there. I mean, that’s ... a throat wound. A big one. That only appropriately bled because she’d lost so much to bullet wounds already. I mean, deserved, but DAYUM.

...I wonder what would have happened if Percy had been able to feed Delilah to Orthax? To her various clones, I mean.

Oh, Cassandra, clean off your fucking blade.

Okay, Scanlan, yes - now is the time we need your antics, thank you. I needed that laugh so much.

“Do you know how much that cost? How long it will take me to make ano--” OH SHIT yeah thanks for that. I’m so glad I wasn’t taking a sip of coffee at that point it would have gone entirely down the wrong pipe and I’d have to clean caffeinated bean water with sugar off two monitors, a speaker and probably the carpet.

Oh good, Whitestone has survivors! Does someone want to cut Goliath-Minion down?

Thank you for showing us that Scanlan is an equal opportunity lover! We didn’t have confirmation of that from Sam until the Love Potion Incident! Also OUCH Vax; come on, don’t be a cock-blocker. Lesser Restoration exists for a reason, right?

Aww. “We live as long as Whitestone lives” in a new and ... very good context.

Awwwwwwwwwww. And they managed to get in a reference to “And I walk away”. Ow, though. I mean, ow. Then again, given what’s coming, that ain’t gonna last long.

Okay, we don’t have Keyleth nearly getting her hand ripped off; we have an added warning that didn’t make it to the warning screen. That would not just be ‘violence’ or even ‘gore’. That transcends into fucking ‘body horror’.

N’aww. Just a lot of n’aww.

Oop! I can kind of hear, “Sun-Tree, A-Okay!” in my head. Which is nice. It doesn’t have to be there for me to have it there when appropriate.

Hello, Diplomacy!

Yes, Jarrett. EXCELLENT TIMING. That was gonna get ... long.

Oh gods, GILMORE.

Oh. The proclamation. Oh shit. Oh shit.

Okay, I do like this speech better.

Oh, so they’ll ensure that Emon stands ‘forever’, hmm? Well, Vex’s reaction says you’ve got maybe two more minutes.

So that was an epic shot to end on. Hooooooboy. So clearly we’re going directly into the Chroma Conclave arc for Season 2, then. Like, right the fuck away. Like, immediately. I mean, I guess the Fall of Emon is the ultimate icebreaker. Literally, given Vorugal...

So when’s Season 2 coming out? Well, article on HITC (which lists TLoVM as “anime” which is weird and possibly appropriative but I do know that those genre news sites are a little weird about their categorisation sometimes) says it’s definitely confirmed but no one’s given a date yet. BOO.

So ... that’s the end of that. For now. I want more, but I can be patient. Animators and voice actors and post-production people need time to work. So when I whine that it’s not there yet, I don’t really think they should go faster than they can tolerate; I just ... want it.

And I might talk a little more about specific elements later. Like, in terms of narrative structures, voice acting, etc. But for now I’ll leave it at “thank you for coming to my liveblog, and be grateful that you’re not my neighbour because most of the block-capital HOLY FUCK etc was ... literal. Like, out loud”. Then again, it’s barely gone 8pm and my neighbours across the corridor can suck it up because they keep making our end of the corridor reek of weed so they can handle my profanity.