#my player level is 59 (i think)

[talietikasero]

i need 1.5 more levels before i get my second mastered style (cammy) but i hit max style with ryu tonight 🥳

[psychhound]

the more i dm vs play other ttrpgs the more frustrated i get with how npcs work in 5e. my game centers around a small town with a recurring cast of npcs, as well as newly introduced npcs each arc that my players frequently adopt, and every time i open my Documents (tone: weary) filled with npcs i just wish 5e npcs were Built Different(tm) to pcs. obviously theres statblocks and stuff you can use but if youre working under the assumption these npcs are Full People who are going to take up space in the pcs lives youre going to be building them like you would a pc and frankly it sucks for a couple reasons

one, if i want to introduce a new batch of npcs of a level that will prove imposing for my pcs to fight, it shouldnt take me 10 hours to make them. two, once the fight is happening it would be great if they didnt have so many abilities and spells that im just hoping and praying i can make them function even a little smartly without grinding the whole fight to a halt every time its a spellcasters turn

and third, which i think deserves its own paragraph(s), i wish npcs didnt have the same set of skills that pcs get

i like trying to give my guys, pcs or npcs alike, pretty high mods on things, bc, you know, good for the game and also big numbers fun. but some skills are either inherently useless for an npc to have, or imply a loss of player agency if i was rolling them

like, charisma skills. deception is really useful for an npc to have, because then pcs have to roll insight against it to learn information. persuasion, however, is not something an npc should really ever roll. if theyre rolling persuasion on a pc, that player is experiencing a loss of agency over how their pc reacts to a request. if theyre rolling it on another npc, youre now just playing dollies with yourself while the pcs watch. if im ever choosing between persuasion and deception for an npc, im always going to give them proficiency in deception even if that makes less sense for their character. same problem for intimidation. either youre telling the pcs how to feel or playing dollies with yourself

stealth and sleight of hand are overall way more helpful for npcs than for pcs who arent rogues. and perception is far more useful for an npc to have than like ... survival. when are your npcs going to be rolling survival? if you have a ranger or ranger-like character whos helping your pcs navigate wilderness then why does it make more sense for them to be rolling survival and potentially mess up something they are meant to be good at, causing potentially unfun complications for your party, than just ... knowing that character can help them navigate, so they do? especially if thats the reason that npc is there?

idk like my players respond very well to the npcs being Full People and i do think theres a level of enjoyment to like. comparing pc and npc stats or players learning what feats an npc took or lore around subclasses but also. also im so miserly and decrepit and my google doc of my four bad guys this arc and their spells is 59 pages long im Tired Save Me

[funwalker]

The Curious Phenomenon of Player Turnover in Video Games and also a Review of Garden Story.

[This is a crosspost form cohost. The original was posted on Aug. 3, 2024.]

I played Garden Story.

It's a cute little game. Not quite what i expected when I played the demo (however many years ago that was now).

I had assumed it would be an adventure game in the vein of The Legend of Zelda where you pick your way through the world fighting monsters and solving puzzles, but it's really quite different from that, sort of blending in management sim(?) elements (managing your towns by gathering resources every day, fighting off monsters, fixing broken things around town, etc.).

A lot of games have trophies that act as milestones for player progress, like "beat the first boss", "beat the second boss", etc. There are four towns in this game which basically serve as chapters of the story. A play in four acts, you might say.

Now, I understand that for any given game--regardless of genre, regardless of length--it's unlikely that most players will finish it. Like all the way to the end. It's an interesting statistic, but people bounce off of games for all kinds of reasons, and I'm definitely guilty of this sort of thing as well. I was both a little surprised and also not surprised at all that only about 35% of players had beaten the first boss (according to the steam trophies).

For context, these are like, the numbers that you get when a player has to jump over some sort of hurdle. Some excerpts from my Steam library: Only about 40% of players made it past the first major story beat in Broken Age, and it's been a while since I've played it, but I'm pretty sure it's mostly due to obtuse solutions and some point and click jank. About 23% of people who looked past the finicky controls of Skatebird and made it to the second level. The number of people who made it past the tutorial of Deadly Premonition is about 45%. (Honestly, I'm surprised it's even that high, but I guess most people who pick it up know what they're in for...)

Garden Story is not an especially long game. Steam says I've played it for about 26 hours now, but probably 4 were tending to my towns post-game, and another 6 of those were the game just on in the background while i walked away to do something else. (It's one of those games that only saves at the end of an in-game day, so instead of completing a day and shutting it off, I usually opt to just leave it running.... ) [A memory floods into view of my hands as a child, turning off my tv but leaving my snes, ps2, wii, ps3 running as I go off to school. I return, play, finally save my game. the in-game clock reads 999:59, as it has for the last several days.] Does anyone else still do this? lol

But anyways, I think i clocked in at about 15 actual hours of play upon completion. Not long. Not short. Much of that time was spent extending days on into endless nights gathering every last resource from the land so I could upgrade my hammer or whatever.

The first town is definitely the shortest to complete from the start to the boss. It maybe took me about 2-3 hours, and those first hours bounced off about 65% of players. I honestly also thought about putting it down in that time.

I think it's fair to say that the gameplay at the beginning kinda drags. The game emphasizes how "cozy" it is in the trailer, which is kind of true, I suppose, but for me it lacks the satisfaction of something like a farmsim or puzzle game. The daily tasks are pretty shallow and usually uninteresting. Some of the quests (like finding rare resources for NPCs) are downright frustrating. It took me probably 4 or 5 days to find a single glass lens. 4 or 5 days of breaking the same 4 or 5 glass bottles on the beach. It was a quest that required two lenses, but I had the first before starting the quest, which may have skewed my perception of how easy it would be. Maybe I just got really unlucky. I nearly gave up on it though.

Starting out, Concord (your main character) is pretty weak. You have two pips of stamina which means you can attack twice before taking a break. Or you can run for a second and attack once. Or run for a few seconds and attack none. You're pretty slow. Combat--while not really challenging--takes a long time. You pick your way slowly through any screen with enemies. Attack, attack, recover, wait (the enemy is charging up it's rebuttal which takes a second), attack, sidestep, attack. Move on to the next one.

Add this little dance to the first boss fight (which, aside from the last, was the only one that killed me), where you have to wait for the boss to come down from the ceiling to become vulnerable and then you can only get a few weak whacks in before it retreats again... I can understand why a lot of people may not have had the patience to make it this far.

After this battle, you get your first upgrade to stamina (unless you're smarter than I am and equipped Concord's memory instead of Plum's), and that's when the game gained some semblance of fun for me. The difference between two and three pips of stamina is honestly an ocean.

I think maybe the player should've started out with 3 stamina instead of two and it really would've fixed a lot of issues I personally had starting out. Maybe they would've even retained another 10% of players past that first boss fight.

The story starting out doesn't appear to be anything special. Very fantasy-adventure-chosen-one-save-the-world but with cute little talking vegetables and also frogs. It's generally well written, though perhaps a bit needlessly padded in a way that had me skimming and skipping a lot of the dialogue, but I found myself actually getting into it as I went through the final town. There's something quite lovely and bittersweet about the ending that I like a lot, but it took quite a bit of time for me to get there.

All in all, I think it was a pretty alright game. I played it mostly as something to do at night and less as an actually engaging experience. The art is wonderful. The music is nice. I think the bosses are neat. I'm kinda sad that you can't fight them again in the post game. The story really only picks up in the last act, but it went a way I was not expecting from the outset and deals with themes of loss in a way that you don't see often, which I liked.

For as charming as I think this little game actually is, I can understand why 65% of players could not make it to even the second area. There are a lot of little things that add up. The nothingness of a lot of the daily missions. The tedium of fighting enemies. Confusing and under-explained mechanics. The reuse of certain interactable assets in ways that you can't interact with them and vice versa. The feeling that you must be missing something as you try to progress through the world.

There are things where I'm so sure that as a dev, having played through certain scenarios hundred of times, I would find acceptable, but as a player, having to interact with them only a few times, drove me nuts.

But putting that aside (after all, most of the people who did not finish the game had already left by that point), the question I'd like to ask is, "Why was the retention rate so bad, and how could I avoid such a thing in a game that I make?"

For me personally, I think this question can also be answered by a post I saw floating around on cohost a while ago about reasons for unfavorable ratings on Japanese indie games. A large part of it was those games not finding their target audiences. People complained that combat was too hard, the graphics were ugly, they wanted a different game than what they got.

So circling back to my first impressions, I honestly can't tell you whether the demo gave me a false impression of what the game would be like, but the impression I held of this game in my memory was indeed quite different from what I got. Looking at the launch trailer... well, it doesn't quite misrepresent the game but more like... beefs up its resume.

Scrolling through the first page of Steam reviews, I only saw two that wouldn't recommend this game and their main complaints are completely valid that the start of the game is pretty rough, tedious, and repetitive. Digging further, I think becomes apparent that the main complaint is the actual gameplay doesn't support what sold people on this game: the idea of a cozy gardening game. (Seemingly, some sources compared it to Stardew Valley, which gave people a false impression of what sort of game it would be.) Despite the incredibly high bounce off rate of players in the first couple hours of the game, most of the reviews on steam are positive. Probably, the take away from this is that most of the players that bounced off were just apathetic. The game isn't so irredeemable in the beginning to inspire anger. Some of the negative reviews even expressed a sympathy that they couldn't really recommend this game because it turned out they liked it in the end.

Looking past the presentation, I think this is a basic pacing problem. Like when reading a book, you need a hook to hold interest. Your book can be really good in the latter half, but if there's no interesting or urgent conflict to be resolved, a lot of people won't make it to the good part.

With games, this problem is two-fold. You need either a good gameplay hook or a story hook (preferably both). I've played games with mediocre stories because the gameplay was fun and vice versa, but you can't just coast off of both average story and gameplay. Obviously, some people will play anyways, but if you have something to say and you want that thing to be heard by anyone but the most dedicated players, I do think you need something to propel people. Especially if your game relies heavily on random generation and grinding to pad itself.

A "hook" doesn't have to be a big bombastic thing. Even without doing a bunch of fixes to clarify things in the design of the game--without changing the story or even the gameplay nearly at all--I think really it just needed a small adjustment, whether it's just that one extra pip of stamina to make early game combat and foraging more fun or even to trim out a lot of the superfluous dialogue. The art and the music are there. It just needs a little kick in the pants.

As a game designer, I try to keep in mind all of the reasons why someone would buy my game but not make it to the end, because I think that's the goal of most game designers--to find their target audience and give them a meaningful experience to engage with. That's kind of the nature of art, isn't it? I think maybe Garden Story became a good game eventually, but I do also think it had art at its heart the whole time. I know it maybe sounds like I didn't like it, but I really did enjoy it in the end.

Anyways, that's my onion. After about 10 hours into this game, I glanced at the Steam trophies and this piece was born. Haha.

Anyways, thanks for reading. Stay fresh.

It's summer in Texas. Pray for me.

[pernillemagda]

“Kvindefodboldpodcasten” with Lars Søndergaard

I have translated some of the podcast here, mostly the part with Lars Søndergaard and who should play as a 9 in the future

04:33 - The hosts had made a top four with their best four Danish players in this international break, the players are Maja Bay Østergaard, Janni Thomsen, Josefine Hasbo and Sofie Svava and Lars says that he doesn't disagree, but also doesn't want to say who he thought did the best.

13:00 – They think that Maja was the best of the three goalkeepers in the squad this tournament, it was her debut, she was confident and had a good game against Norway.

Interview with Lars Søndergaard begins.

33:30 – Fun fact, they only had one training before the game against France as the first got canceled because the flight to France was delayed by 3,5 hours

35:25 – Lars says that the referee in the last game wasn’t so competent and then he adjusts it to a “less good referee” and then Amalie, the host, says that it was clear to see his blood pressure rose even though he was a “simple Northjutlander”, but he says he thinks that he was calm, compared to the rest of the team who sat on the bench 😂

38:00 - They have changed formation from 3-4-3 to 4-3-3

39:25 – Talks about Luna Gevitz and how she has been to two euros without having played a game (I have just checked her stats, she only had 20 caps for the A-team, where four of them are world-cup-qualification and 16 are friendlies)

42:30 – Talks about how Josefine Hasbo is doing really well and that the level in college football is high. She is dedicated to what she does and thrives well at Harvard with school and football.

48:00 – They mention Pernille for the first time and how to get goals from the attackers like Signe Bruun, Amalie Vangsgaard and Stine Larsen when Pernille isn’t playing.

He says that Bruun’s problem is, that she doesn’t get so much playing time, but is a really good box player and player with the head.

50:30 – Host asks, “Is Harder an alternative as a 9, if none of the other attackers in doesn’t get in form in their clubs before the world cup”, Lars’ answer “Yeah, luckily, we have Harder, she can play everywhere. I think Harder in a 4-3-3 is best at an 8 or 10, a little behind, and can send some good and decisive passes and help control the game from there. Then we have to wait and see where she should play. She showed against Spain, that if she had more support, especially in the first half and periods in the second, she was outstanding she is against tough teams and she is always finding space, so she could be an alternative in the 9 position even though we look more at some other at that position right now.

52:00 – He thinks it is the best time to end his trainer career after the world cup after 5,5 years. He has been through a lot with the team and thinks it is a good place to stop after a tournament, he would like to stop on the top, which he hopes he does. He doesn’t know what he should do afterward if it is something with football, or if he should just go on a “ski vacation” 😂 or do something totally different.

56:20 – What does it take to be a good coach for Denmark, “you have to be competent and have professionalism, also because the players are extremely focused on the details. It’s not a job where you just find a random training exercise. Women’s football is in big changes, and it takes a lot and takes collaboration and a whole team as coaches behind, not just the head coach.

59:25 – I really hope I can answer that the biggest achievement will be the last.

In the clip on Instagram he also says this, bit it isn’t in the podcast:

“In DBU we dream about getting far in this tournament. And that will put some demands on how we play, but our minimum goal is to get out of the group, we will be very disappointed if we don’t. I really hope that I can say that my biggest achievement will be my last.”

Then they also had a national team barometer to "take the temperature" and describe the teams form right now with emojis

Amalie uses this one to show that the teams level ir rising even though it had been low in the fall: 📈 Verner uses this one, also to show that it haven't been the best in the fall, but that we're now getting better: 🤒

[charcadett]

Since Larry’s staraptor during the first gym battle is level 36 and the e4 battle it’s level 59 I think it’s safe to assume he has 2 staraptors. One for gym battles and one for e4.

honestly, there is no real right answer for that. i think it just depends on how you interpret game mechanics in regards to the Actual world of pokemon. like, does larry have two staraptors, or was the one on his elite team leveled that many levels to enhance The Game? sort of like in littleroot town. are there really only three buildings in littleroot town, or was it made that way because of The Game? but thats the fun of it! reality can literally be whatever you make it. you can decide what aspects you can take at face value or expand on. anyway, that being said, personally i feel like the staraptor larry uses in general is the same one, despite the level difference. just because i like the specific bond between him and his staraptor i made up in my head. but also im sure he has more starly/staravia/staraptor behind the scenes that he doesnt use for battle, and the same goes for other normal and flying type pokemom! same with the other gym leaders! maybe they all have a rotating team that the player character didnt get to see, or pokemon that help them out in day to day life rather than battle. I VERY MUCH RAMBLED HERE SORRY BUT YEAH. i got a different interpretation but yours is epic and cool. larry with two high leveled straptor is everything to me. just a business man with his birds! :} (they are massive)

[implausiblyjosh]

TEW 2020: Let's At Least Run One Show

Last time we booted up TEW 2020, we did all the setup stuff. We defined our player character (Poppy, a real-life pop star), made our company, hired workers, made some title belts, and... that was basically it! (Last post here)

It's now the middle of June 2023. What's the plan for our first show?

Well, one of our bigger "gets" was The Voros Twins (Da Vinky???), which I think tells us one direction we should go in: tag teams.

The Voros Twins are heels (bad guys), and while we do have some faces (good guys) to put in a team (I've put Amazing Red & Samuray del Sol into a team called "Amazing Sol") I think it may be a good idea to look for some tag teams who are available to work for us.

While we wait for people to get hired, let's look at our Storylines. Our product type wants storylines, and I think what I really want is a "Good Guy Group vs. Bad Guy Group" thing going on at the start. We've established that Poppy is an on-screen personality, and we've floated the idea of Shane McMahon as some "outsider CEO type" last time, so let's go with that?

I've got another idea with this, as well. What if we tie in The Voros Twins? So Shane has brought in The Voros Twins (and other heels) to try and take over True Power Wrestling, while Poppy will bring in her good guys (Amazing Sol and other faces) to stop the takeover.

Something we should talk about, while I'm thinking about it, is "Perception". In previous TEW games, you could just tell the game "I think this person is a Main Event level talent" or, crucially, the game could tell you. This would fluctuate, and you can push someone or manually go in and make adjustments, but the game "knew" where to put people for the most part when you're just starting out. This is not how it works in TEW 2020. In this game, it's all about crowd perception, and there's no way for you to flag in-game where you, the owner/booker, think a talent should be.

Take for example Shane McMahon. Let's assume he was actually wrestling for us. Based on his popularity (59 Pop across the US) and his skills, he would probably be a main event talent. In TEW 2016, there's a drop-down I can select and put him there, which will help me with my organization and booking of shows down the line. In TEW 2020, despite the fact that people know who Shane McMahon is (remember, Popularity of 59/100 in the US!), and despite the fact that the in-game news reports on my company and all other wrestling companies, Shane McMahon has yet to get a perception rating.

Now, I get what this is trying to approximate. This system is trying to play out the difference between what the owners/bookers see (ex. Roman Reigns is The Big Star, he's gonna be on TV all the time) and what the fans see (ex. Roman Reigns doesn't have it, they are pushing him too hard and he just kinda sucks, we don't wanna see him on TV). The problem is that they've only allowed one part of that equation any form of categorization. Yes, I can get a notebook out and write out who belongs in what tier, but that's not useful when I'm trying to search through people. Right now it's manageable, we've got maybe 20 people total that we've hired. What happens when you play as a company as big as WWE? How do you go and filter for Main Event talent from your roster of like 50+ wrestlers? Not people the audience sees as a star, people you have labeled a star? You can't. There's no way.

Anyways, this is all to say that apparently my audience will not have a single sense or idea of what kind of talent Shane McMahon is until the day of the show or until I pre-book a segment/match, despite the obvious information in-game to the contrary. So, let's pre-book a match.

But first, let's make a dang event.

Not too much going on here, but this is how we set the specifics of our show. I'm gonna name the event TPW - Power Zone I, it will be 1 hour long, and it will happen on the last Saturday of every month. Tickets will be cheap so we get more people coming out to our shows, and we'll spend a bit of money to get better sets. Also, for now, this will not be put on TV in any capacity. We couldn't even get on public access lol

Now that we have an event, let's pre-book a match!

I've decided the match I want to pre-book will be that tag team match we've been talking about. Even though we're likely to get more people hired on before the show, I really want to have this one match ready to go. So I've selected 2 Vs. 2 from the left, clicked the boxes in the center bottom to add my wrestlers, then clicked on "Road Agent Notes" to explain how the match should go.

This is going to be a 15 minute match between The Voros Twins and Amazing Sol. One of the Amazing Sol guys will win, and the goal of this match should be to further the storyline they're involved in. Click pre-book and... uh-oh, apparently none of these guys can call a match in the ring, according to this game. Okay, change that to "scripted beforehand", and the pre-booking will go through.

Now that I've pre-booked a match, I get to finally see those perceptions! What does our audience think? That The Voros Twins are unimportant. Great.

Now, this isn't that big a deal. I can keep pushing them as main event talent, and if they perform well then the audience will see that. But... sucks that I couldn't have known any of this before this moment! Good thing we're having the twins lose, cause apparently the audience loves Amazing Sol!

With all that done, it's time to finally advance time.

We are finally at the screen that will handle our show! These show screens happen the "night" of the show happening. Now, in this screenshot it says we don't have a backstage incident, and that's cause I took the screenshot late. We did have one incident:

Neat. We have to acknowledge this incident before we actually run the show later, so we'll do that now. We do have "Absent Workers" highlighted, which tells us Shane McMahon is injured so he can't wrestle, Kylie Rae is on maternity leave, and Komander & Aero Star are working with AAA tonight). Guess we may have to find another night to run our shows for the future!

I've added my one match to the show, The Voros Twins vs. Amazing Sol, and I've used the "auto-booker" to generate more matches and angles for me. I really don't know how people view my roster, so I definitely need the help! After a touch of tweaking, here's the match card so far:

From first to last: 1. An Angle w/ Shane and Poppy (I imagine this to be an introduction to the "Shane wants to buy out True Power Wrestling") 2. El Hijo de L.A. Park vs Reyna Isis 3. Allysin Kay vs. Dragon Bane 4. An Angle w/ Big Swole & Frightmare (I imagine this is table setting for their match later on in the card) 5. The Voros Twins vs. Amazing Sol 6. Angle w/ Poppy 7. Frightmare vs. Big Swole

There are some people being left off the card, so I think I'll have them be in a tag match for the post-show. Otherwise, I'm pretty happy with this lineup! I'll click start show once I've made my final changes.

Every time a segment happens, we get this screen that gives us a breakdown of what happened and how it got rated. Here's our opening segment w/ Shane & Poppy, and we can see it got the crowd hotter and it started the show off hot. We'll get this for every single segment, but I won't show every single segment.

So. Our angles are good, but our matches... not so much. The thing that hindered most was that they were unscripted matches, and it doesn't seem like anyone on the roster has the skills to call the match in the ring. I'll need to change our settings to make every match scripted. Big Swole is now our True Power title holder, and Allysin Kay is our Rising Star title holder. Now I gotta make a speech and finish out this day.

I'm going to compliment Shane, Patrick Voros, and Black Taurus. Giving people positive feedback will improve their morale after a few times, which is great! You want your backstage morale high so things don't fall apart socially. Limiting the messups to "i am a bad booker" is much better than "i am a bad booker and everyone hates each other backstage".

And with that, our first show was run! In the news the next morning, there's an "article": True Power Wrestling held TPW - Power Zone I in Mid South, and drew 86 fans. The feedback has been very positive.

Looking at our budget, we lost about $25k and earned around $5k. At this rate, we lose about $20k per show, and it won't get better until we can draw more people in. Since no one even knows about our promotion, we're gonna be in the red for a lonnnng time at this rate. Once we get to 17 Popularity in the Mid South we'll move from "Insignificant" to "Tiny", which will hopefully bring in more viewers. Until then... we keep up this pace as best we can, and try and get popular.

Until then... See ya next time!

[pywackett-barchetta]

Commit to the Bit

A winter evening.

A dear friend of mine has wrangled me into an online roleplay community. In this weekly, sessions are held live in a chat client, with each of us playing our characters through our clients. My character in this particular series is Taro, and this game, as many do, has a rule on sleep; you must have your character rest for five in-game hours (it's typically about 5 minutes per hour in real time).

However, the GMs did not insist that the sleep has to be in one's own bed, and as Taro entered the high-level suite of a corporate executive, I decided to play with this.

Taro Bladehardt (Pywackett) — 01/15/2023 5:42 PM …can I sleep in the Penthouse Bedroom Excalibur — 01/15/2023 5:42 PM Nobody's told you no…

See, the aforementioned friend was, notably, at my house. They were in another roleplay earlier in the week and asked to borrow my computer for that; in turn, I was okay with playing a session while they were over. I did also offer to get them dinner; there's a place near here that has absolutely excellent burgers.

So, this is a good chance to go get those.

Or so I thought. There are a few problems here with this plan. I've already placed the order and already had my character go to bed, so we are committed to this.

But now, it is snowing. Alright. This can't be the quick run I hoped. But I promised I would go do this, so I will. I ask my friend to watch the keyboard for me; one of the GMs decided to sneak my character in this time, as well.

Sneaking is a feature of this client that masks your presence in the area; if somebody types a command that shows them who's around, it won't show anybody that's sneaking. The logic was my character was snug under the covers.

But I know them. They know me. There's better logic at play. There's comedy. Because I did not lock the suite. So when the rest of the players come in looking around for plot, they will instead have fun fun Taro jumpscare.

I head out.

It is brutally, horribly cold. The freezing air batters my lungs. I head to the restaurant; they misheard my card information over the phone, so we just have to wait to reprocess it.

18:10:24$H: Levi Koi has entered from the Penthouse Reception. 18:10:27$H: Diana Eostre has entered from the Penthouse Reception. 18:10:29$H: Ryoko Otonashi has entered from the Penthouse Reception. 18:10:29$H: Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana] has entered from the Penthouse Reception.

My phone immediately dings.

CountNeko — 01/15/2023 6:11 PM Bunch of people just came in here I am obligated to inform

Shit.

CountNeko — 01/15/2023 6:12 PM Would you like to relay an action or you getting back soon

No, I've got this. I'll be right back.

I wait.

[18:10:43]Levi Koi: [They're in a person's bedroom.] [18:10:48]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: [Enters.] At least this room is somewhat more modest… [18:11:06]Ryoko Otonashi: Oh. [Upon entering the room she goes to…] [18:11:09]Diana Eostre: A woman's room too, huh? Hooooo… [18:11:12]Ryoko Otonashi: [The dresses] [18:11:29]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: Tch- It's a simulation! Let's not think of it like that! [18:11:32]Diana Eostre: …Nothing that would fit me.

I wait.

I wai- the burgers arrive. I thank them briskly, tip, and run.

And this is where I realize I've maybe not had the best thought process in the world,

[18:13:43]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: Ah, I see this is one of those… What were they called? Decktops? [18:13:57]Levi Koi: Desktops. [He corrects bluntly.] [18:14:06]Levi Koi: Now let's see here… [18:14:20]Levi Koi: …Familiar formatting. [18:14:24]Ryoko Otonashi: [She takes an opulent red dress from the rack, then walks over to the boys and their computer]

as I run full speed, through a snowstorm that is picking up, my lungs burning, my legs screaming, my hands roasting with the hot foods secured only by styrofoam between them,

[18:14:47]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: Right, right. So you know how to use it? I for one have never touched one before. [18:14:59]Levi Koi: …One of the names from the meeting room is here. [18:15:06]Ryoko Otonashi: Anything interesting? [She peeks over to look]

and my best friend watches me throw the door open, stumble in with a gasp, throw my shoes off, shout "BURGERS," throw those onto the kitchen table, and race into my room with my face a frozen beet-red, just to slam my hands down on the keyboard,

[18:18:28]Bed: [The bed stirs and rattles.] 18:18:28 $H: You are no longer sneaking. [18:18:35]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: . . . [Takeru's eyes narrow once he finishes reading-] [18:18:39]Diana Eostre: Huh… [She continues looking at the computer.] [18:18:42]Ryoko Otonashi: …Huh? [18:18:43]Taro w/ Guitar Bag: Huh? Oh. Mornin'. [18:18:49]Ryoko Otonashi: Wha- [18:18:52]Taro w/ Guitar Bag: Huh. Busy in here. [18:18:53]Diana Eostre: … [18:19:05]Takeru Matsuda [w/Katana]: T-Taro! [His head does a complete whiplash towards him.] [18:19:08]Ryoko Otonashi: Has he been here the whole time? [18:19:12]Levi Koi: The fuck-?! [He spins around in the chair to see Taro.]

No moral of the story on this one, unless you count "hey, don't do this" as a moral. Burger was pretty good

[bluepoodle7]

#Illbleed #BetaStuff #TheScrappedDreamcastSpiralStairCase

I wanted a gif of a longer cut of Eriko running down the scrapped Dreamcast spiral stairs from a really rare early promo so the quality is not as great.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-17-zdDgwCQkI985LNu6-rBrp0V-hnet

I wanted a gif of that blue ghost looking haunted house effect in the beginning of the video from the same video.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-17-gMQ7PTgOn07w3QEO-WltUPT-HNET

I wanted a gif of Illbleed calling itself a haunted house game in red letters while Eriko walks up to Mr. Banballow's house from the same video.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-17-gMQ7PTgOn07w3QEO-cSMPqM-HNET

I wanted a gif of Eriko running through the beta level 2 where the cars are in different places than in the finished game and level 3 I think looks to have snow on the ground since it is white on the ground that was scrapped.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-18-HPAjjyH91GW3o5Wn-oo56Ap-hnet

0:54-0:55

(For the spiral staircase.)

I wanted a gif of that scrapped silver machine that only shows up in two trailers for Illbleed before not appearing like the evil Mary Doll White Outfit Version.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-18-bIMoOsRalf5icGDX-JTA9bf-hnet

(For the mysterious machine.)

0:44-0:45

Illbleed (Dreamcast) early promo video - YouTube

I got a gif image of this machine but in this trailer it seems to be just a quick image of this scrapped mysterious machine while in the earlier trailer the middle part moved up and down slowly.

My guess is that this machine is from level 5.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-20-Pc90j56BVx2iT0IS-02IWpf-hnet

The mysterious machine.

0:32

(DC) Illbleed - Trailer - YouTube

Got a gif of the beta level 2 revenge of the queen worm level where Eriko is petrified crawling while fighting off one of two Meat Men that are not in finished level 2 and Kevin petrified crawling from Mr. Banballow.

This is from the same trailer.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-21-cFs1ov1icF7dh6bi-9s4xNj-hnet

I just wanted the first part of that Illbleed trailer with the logos.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240921-21-zRlczudPWTfedSRi-MKVLdS-HNET

I got a gif of Cashman spider fighting Eriko in the first part of Mr. Banballow's inn house hostel like right when you walk in near where the gassy Hassy with the old school logo on it.

1:58-2:01

Illbleed (02/2001) - YouTube

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240927-18-7E7K36H23SEuw680-6jiiIQ-hnet

I got a better gif of Cashman spider fighting Eriko in the first part of Mr. Banballow's inn house hostel with the green and white narrow escape helicopter pad on the ground.

1:59-2:01

Illbleed 2001 AIA US a2 - YouTube

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240928-06-Zo7Xat3meETdTymr-taukDZ-hnet

I got a even better gif of Cashman spider fighting Eriko in the first part of Mr. Banballow's inn house hostel with the green and white narrow escape helicopter pad on the ground.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240928-23-u1NKJRwWlXe9bpph-3J6YBy-HNET

This Eriko is getting a bleeding death.

Or a strength empty death since the green bar is lower even though Cashman is at infinity and this Eriko could just leave since the fight is in a tight corner.

Sometimes the game will put your player character in tight corners when you encounter a enemy.

Now I imagine when the Cashman spider climbs on the ceiling that it should mess with the narrow escape helicopter like you can't use it similar to the pause menu in fights while Cashman is on the ceiling near where the green and white helicopter pad is.

1:57-2:00

Illbleed (Dreamcast) Trailer - (VHS 2001) (youtube.com)

I got a gif of Eriko trying to narrow escape a blowtorch Mr. Banballow in the many bathrooms with the Michel beta UI.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240929-02-BrQs6Jta1LFNn5RS-zuXPvp-hnet

Seems only the strength empty is the only death this Eriko might get unless the character dodges.

1:22-1:25

Illbleed Trailer DC - YouTube

I wanted a gif of Illbleed with the inside of Mr.Banballow's house moving around then shows a faded out face of Mr. Banballow with his face in a shock event from this trailer.

https://gifmaker.me/video-to-gif/viewimage/20240929-02-B53fSZ1PsbefJ1gf-arwTSt-hnet

0:00-0:07

Illbleed 2001 AIA US - YouTube

[theoutlasttrials24]

Survival Tactics: Mastering The Outlast Trials

Over a decade since Red Barrels dropped Outlast, they've come back strong with The Outlast Trials, a fresh twist on the franchise that still leaves time to think about where to buy Xbox games. Unlike the old solo missions, this one's all about squad play with your crew. The deal is simple: you and three buddies team up to dodge pure nightmare fuel. Solve puzzles, hit objectives, and bolt for your life—just a slice of the crazy fun in this game. It kicks off a classic with a grim scene of you getting snatched by white coats and goons. Then, you craft your own character with a slick customization setup. After suiting up your 'patient', it's time to grind through the tutorial. This bit nails what it takes to survive: mastering every move while enemies track your every step. I dug this tutorial 'cause it's a throwback to Outlast's true vibe—survival horror. It could've been a co-op gig, but solo mode really amps up the tension, making sure you grasp what's at stake before leaning on your crew. The storyline in The Outlast Trials keeps it hush-hush and cryptic. Set in '59, smack dab in the Cold War era, it's a prequel to the earlier games. Murkhoff Corp's gone bonkers, nabbing test dummies left and right—even snatching up the homeless. It's a solid setup, but like most multiplayer gigs, the gameplay's the real star, nudging the plot to the back burner. They drop hints and crumbs for you to piece together, hidden notes and files scattered through the levels. Finish the trials and you unlock a solo round with an enigmatic, mysterious finale. It's a cool move, especially since this game's been evolving since its early access launch last year. The way they handle the story and play strikes a sweet spot—focused on gameplay but not forgetting the lore.

Enhance Your Gameplay with Specialized Rigs

After finishing the tutorial, you step into the 'Sleep Room,' the game's online hub. Waking up in your bed and stepping out, nerves jangling, but entering the main hub area just blew my mind, making me momentarily forget about where to buy Xbox games. Random players are scattered around, ready to team up and face the madness together. What really gets me is the attention to detail. Fancy a quick chess match or an arm wrestle with a stranger? Yep, these are legit online mini-games here, small touches that make a big difference. It's clear the devs poured their hearts into this game. Besides the mini-games, the hub is where you customize your character and their room. Decorating with bizarre ornaments and showing off to others led to some hilarious moments with my friends. I mean, who wouldn't want a bowl of teeth on their desk? The hub also handles your progression and upgrades. You can unlock abilities like silent movement or power up one of four rigs, each offering a different playstyle. Want to sneak around and spot enemies through walls? There's a rig for that. Prefer to distract and stun monsters? The stun rig's your go-to. Be the team healer with the healing rig or mess with enemy perception using the blind rig. It keeps things exciting and opens up new strategies.

Unveiling the Essence of Outlast: Embracing Psychological Horror

Despite not being a horror fan at all, I surprisingly had a blast with this game. The gameplay is straightforward: sneak through five main trials set in unique locations, complete tasks, gather gear and health to survive, and use everyday items to stun enemies that roam the levels like crazed animals. It's a simple loop, but exploring these trials with friends is insanely fun. Being chased is heart-pounding, and looking back while running is a crucial technique. The movement feels smooth and natural, great for newcomers to the series. The trials themselves are both incredible and grotesque.

[kiru-miru]

Injection Deflection

Programmer/Designer: Me

Artist/Producer: Joey Montiel

Description:

In Injection Deflection you play as a patient trapped inside a haunted hospital. You wake up and find yourself surrounded by zombie doctors trying to inject you with a virus! You’ll need to deflect their injections using scalpels for 1 minute.

Controls:

Use the WASD or number keys to move. 

Press the left or space button to shoot a scalpel.

Use the mouse position to determine where to shoot.

There are no diagonals. You can only aim up, down, left or right.

So, if your mouse is above the character, the scalpel will shoot up

Issues:

You can push the enemies around (and they can push you) which looks weird.

Countdown doesn’t show 60 and starts at 59.'

Notes:

The game as it is right now is decently complete, albeit short. The initial goal was to have multiple levels and have them be in waves. If I were to further develop the game, I would add more levels that have more room to walk around and also add different kinds of enemies. Perhaps ones that shoot the player. I also want to add proper start and end screens and maybe even a pause menu. It might also be worth exploring some kind of story. I'm also thinking of making the arrow keys be the buttons you use to shoot the scalpels. I still like the challenge that not being able to shoot diagonally gives you since it forces you to really move around and aim. But, using the arrow keys instead of solely the mouse to aim would make it easier. This is how one of the games I like "The Binding of Isaac" does it. Overall though, my art partner did a fantastic job with the animations, and I really appreciate her for her work.

Game credits:

Since this was my first time touching Unity, I didn't know how anything worked. The in class demo by Ben Beary really helped a lot, as well as BlackThornProd and Coco Code for UI stuff. I think I know enough to be able to make a new game completely on my own now which is cool.

[malixxxmizer]

favorite pantera album? I love far beyond driven and reinventing the steel, but I would love to hear yours! From one pantera fangirl to the next 😉

Malixxx’s Album Analysis 📈

Vulgar Display of Power: Pantera (February 25, 1992)

⛤ First and Foremost, Happy 32nd birthday to the album that literally changed my life two years ago!!! This album has definitely had lots of influence on my music taste, and social interactions. I know this might sound really silly but honestly every song and every lyric on this album really makes me think about my life and how I would like to live it.

⛤ From power ballads like “This Love” and “Hollow” to beautiful dime solos in “Regular People (Conceit)” and their most popular track off the album “Walk”. Let’s be real, what’s not to like about the album.

Track list

1.) Mouth For War 3:56

2.) A New Level 2:57

3.) Walk 5:15

4.) Fucking Hostile 2:49

5.) This Love 6:32

6.) Rise 4:36

7.) No Good (Attack The Radical) 4:50

8.) Live In A Hole 4:59

9.) Regular People (Conceit) 5:27

10.) By Demons Be Driven 4:39

11.) Hollow 5:45

⛤ Fun Fact: the title of Pantera's 1992 album "Vulgar Display of Power" was inspired by a line in "The Exorcist". When Father Karras asks Regan why she can't make the straps restraining her disappear if she's supposedly the devil, she replies,

"That's much too vulgar a display of power, Karras."

Alex Karras was Webster's dad in the hit TV show Webster which Pantera was a huge fan of. Karras was a professional football player for the Detroit Lions and was known for his vulgar display of power. Pantera loved the symmetry and that's why they loved the TV show Webster.

⛤ I’m a band kid and musician who’s an absolute sucker for power ballads and power metal so you better believe that my top tracks off of this album are “This Love” and “Hollow”. I relate to “This Love” because it made me realize that there is so many different dynamics of love and it is completely valid to be mad at it when it doesn’t turn out the way you thought it would. “Hollow” on the other hand might not resonate with others but after I went through a similar situation in my life a couple months ago, I knew it was always gonna be a favorite.

⛤ Musicianship, Emotion, Lyricism, Individuality, Brutality, and Dedication. This was a recipe for greatness which Pantera fell nothing short of with the success of their sixth studio album “Vulgar Display of Power”. It’s always so amazing to know that there is always different directions that a specific band can take throughout their career growth; here is where the bands raw emotions reveals a new sense of vulnerability contrasting to their moody rock sound in previous work. Some may say that different isn’t always good, then there’s bands like Pantera that go above and beyond to kill those laws of nature.

Rating Overview:

•10/10

for outstanding musicianship, emotion, and delivery

Happy F*****g Birthday Vulgar Display of Power!

⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤ ⛤

[jfbuckley]

It’s a funny world.

First half 2-0 to A Villa. United apparently even worse than recent appalling performances. Looking like heading to a 6-0 drubbing.

Second half - result 3-2 to United, even had goal disallowed at start. Apparently played like a totally different team. Even Rashford put a bit of effort in. Garnacho scored two (plus the disallowed one) and Hojlund scored the winner, his first premier league goal.

I’m at a complete loss to either explain or understand it. First half = worst of a shocking season. Second half = as good as anything from the Ferguson era, the exact opposite of everything else (except Chelsea) that has gone down this season.

I wonder what my football correspondent will say….

———————-

hi - in the days long ago when i was younger than today festive football sometimes irritated me as the front of the match programme bore the smiling faces of the team wishing me a merry xmas - i used to angrily think 'then why are you spoiling it by playing so badly' - fast forward to the present day i offer in evidence united's loss at west ham which was plain boring which is the biggest crime you can level at a united team

to be fair united were a match for villa in the 1st half - they had a few attacks which were repelled - villas high defensive line offered scope for the ball over the top which either wasn't forthcoming  (much to rashfords  visible annoyance) or when it did hojlund, garnacho and rashford were offside

villa had 2 notable set pieces - from out on the right touchline opposite the united area mcginn shaped to take the kick - some of his colleagues were in obvious offside positions with 1 almost standing on onanas toes - if this was designed to confuse united it worked wonderfully as when the ball was played in the offside players ran away to all points of the compass - nobody touched the ball and the inert onana watched it enter goal

shortly after a corner found the totally unmarked lenglet in oceans of space just beyond the far post - he headed across the 6 yard box where dendoncker skilfully turned in number 2

so united trooped in 2 down at half time to a chorus of boos and much debate in the stands of how disappointing this season is turning out to be albeit in much more colourful language

early in the 2nd half united broke through the defensive line - rashford (playing on the left) fed garnacho (playing on the right) who dribbled around keeper martinez and from an acute angle thrillingly shot into goal - sadly however VAR played mr scrooge and for what seemed the umpteenth time this season the goal was ruled out

however what VAR couldn't stop was the shift in momentum of this encounter - the crowd, given a modicum of hope, were now on united's side and the stretford end tried to suck the ball in - on 59 minutes united provided an action replay of the disallowed goal - this time garnacho was on side and it was 2 - 1 - onana ensured it stayed that way with a save from bailey

on 71 minutes garnacho pressed forward and played in fernandes on the right wing - his 1st time cross was half cleared to garnacho who gathered, danced past a tackle, then fired in a shot which was deflected away from martinez and united were level

villa came again and the heroic evans blocked a certain goal for mcginn but the force was with united - on 80 minutes a united corner, heads went up, the ball fell onto mcginn and then to hojlund whose instant left shot went in off the post - the comeback was complete, rasmus had his premier league goal and unconfined joy abounded

9 minutes were added at the end but united held out with relative ease for a famous victory

i cannot really explain the fluctuations in performance by united this season - more often than not they have been poor - occasionally they've done well - they showed both sides in this 1 game - they clearly have some talented individuals - they remind me of racehorses in an odd way - some prefer the going hard, some prefer it soft, that sort of thing - footballers have to perform in all circumstance - ten hag's job is to mould a team that will be effective in all sorts of conditions - not easy but he'll have to find a way otherwise he'll join the lengthening list of failed successors to fergusons throne

next up is forest way - score prediction ? performance prediction ? haven't got a scooby do

bye

[good-prog]

FF9: understanding the makings of a "comfort game"

Main campaign date: 2023/02/06-02/12 Playtime (Steam) to roll credits: 48.9 hrs Playtime (in game) to roll credits: 43.3 hrs Total playtime: 59 hours

I loved Final Fantasy IX; I'm worried about my upcoming playthroughs of FF8 and FF12 because I know that I'll be (un)consciously comparing them to this game throughout. It was a charming game with solid gameplay, with a cute (and well deserved!) romance to boot.

Spoiler warning etc etc. Less polished rambling than usual; I could talk about this game for hours.

gameplay

The combat didn't feel particularly difficult or especially in depth, but was still enjoyable. Each character served a set role that complemented the rest of the party, with later characters and more advanced abilities adding more support options. Notable challenges/areas of interest included:

Early game:

I was fairly invested in the story, so I didn't hit as many random encounters as I usually do during a typical FF playthrough (wandering around, checking all the nooks and cranies).

I was unable to finish the festival of the Hunt because I ran out of potions (oops); learned that potions are less effective out of combat the hard way.

Faced the Gizamaluke's Grotto boss at ~level 10, which took several wipes to beat (and subsequent casual level grinding)

Midgame:

Oelivert: I liked how I had to creatively use support players and passive abilities due to the magic restriction; I only wish that there were similarly restrictive challenges that forced the player to think beyond a "standard" party composition (with a healer). The pair/shrine battle was a good example, though I had no trouble with it since Quina had learned most of their spells by then.

Side note: I wish there was combat associated with each of the pairs that got sent to the shrines, (though we got to fight each of the guardians in Memoria, which made up for it somewhat))

Endgame:

Hades: after beating him (after about an hour), I read that ideally, one kills before his super destructive Doomsday move. Unfortunately, I was greedy and wanted to steal all of his loot. (I ended up only being able to survive his Doomsday casts with pumice equipped on Eiko + shell/protect on all allies)

Wiped to Necron a couple times. Like Hades, I tried with the original party (Zidane/Steiner/Vivi/Dagger) but couldn't keep up with outgoing damage; I ended up swapping to Zidane/Steiner/Quina/Eiko. Crand Cross -> zombie/death -> Phoenix Downs rendered ineffective

Ozma was an rngfest (Doomsday / Curaga spam as it dropped to low health) but I ended up beating him on a pull I just tried to extend as much as I could (with just Steiner alive, spamming Climhazzard)

I liked how I was incentivized to steal; since that was Zidane's job and he was usually in the party, I made use of it more than, say, in FF7 where it was an afterthought. I also enjoyed the ability system, since it promoted upgrading/changing gear as soon as abilities were learned, unlike most RPGs where I tend to hold on to the cheapest/weakest armor/weapons until I get better drops. The passive abilities were interesting to re-equip for bosses that took multiple pulls, though I ended up running a mostly defensive build by the end to minimize status ailments. The storytelling through some of said abilities was amusing, though; early in the game, Zidane's "protect girls" ability would often get himself killed in the process.

Minigames:

Chocobo Hot and Cold isn't the greatest minigame, though after the midpoint of the chocographs I sped up the game (i.e., more pecks in less time) to make it more bearable. There's something amusing about watching Choco zoom around that makes the grind more interesting.

Other minigames/puzzles (e.g., sword battle during I Want to be your Canary, sorting out the Fossil Roo switch puzzle) are cute and added more interactivity to the more story-heavy parts of the game.

I didn't play too much Tetra Master, and am thankful that it didn't play too much of a role in the story (beyond the required card tournament.) I wish the card strengths/weaknesses/rock-paper-scissors rules were more comprehensible; I used an external source to understand what each of the four digits on the cards meant.

Story

Overall, the plot felt tighter and more coherent than most other Final Fantasy games I've played so far. It felt like each of the supporting characters had their major development take place over the course of a zone/dungeon, which made it more tidy (but also not as in depth).

The world felt whimsical in its absurdity: of course Dali's black mage manufacturing factory was chocobo powered (and of course black mages were made with some convolution of chocobo eggs + mist). Of course giant gargants carry passengers between Treno and Alexandria. And of course Cid would get turned into a mustached oglop for cheating on his wife.

The characters are incredibly charming, and I feel like it was easy for me to fall in love with their personalities and their journey to save the world and understand themselves and in the process.

Side note: character design-wise, I liked how the main party wasn't necessarily "conventionally attractive" (I use quotes because other Final Fantasy parties seem to adhere to a more refined/"cool" aesthetic, though their body types may not be mainstream).

Impressions of the characters:

Zidane: embodiment of found family, whether it was as a member of the Tantalus troupe or as the leader of the party. In retrospect, he starts off more emotionally mature than some of the more broody protagonists in the franchise (which makes the You're Not Alone segment on Bran Bal hit even harder when he finally lets his friends help him). During the ending, of course he would go back and try to rescue Kuja—nobody is beyond saving, and he's family after all. And of course he would show up as 'Marcus' in the play to surprise Dagger/Garnet (he's a theater kid!)

Garnet: I assumed she would be a damsel in distress, but she's the exact opposite from the opening act, where--coinciding with Tantalus' mission--she asks to be kidnapped! Throughout her journey, she asserts her autonomy in numerous ways: she chooses a new name, uses her own position as princess to (somewhat naively) attempt to change her mother's mind, escapes in a bag of stinky pickles, pilots the cargo ship to Lindblum, and so on

stuffy knight in rusted armor Steiner: starts off not even using Zidane's name / insisting on rigid loyalty to the queen as rationale for the way he treats "princess" Dagger like a child -> making sure that Zidane promises to return safely at the end (almost like a surrogate parent for Dagger)

ultimate woobie Vivi (but incredibly perceptive for a being so young): starting off throwing fire spells at walls in the Ice Cavern, learning to help his friends with his magic, then coming to terms with his own mortality

unintentionally adorable / hilarious Quina: as the oldest character in the party, they impart a lot of wisdom through their food-related shenanigans. In Madain Sari, they teach Eiko to always "make more than you need" when cooking for a group. There's a certain kind of satisfaction by exploring the world to find different people, values, and of course, food.

Freya: I wish that she moved on from Sir Fratley by the end of the game, but I admired her care for her homeland as the party picked up the pieces of Burmecia and attempted to protect its refugees in Cleyra.

Amarant: felt like I could relate to him at some points becuase he was fundamentally unable to understand how kind Zidane was. I loved the scene where instead of flagging down a Gargant, he decides to take matters into his own hands and carry the kids up the Iifa tree himself.

Eiko: super sassy (calls Mikoto a bimbo!) and the ongoing gag of her crush on Zidane was cute. But she also understands loneliness: she's the last of her clan, without friends her age (or any non-moogles, really) growing up.

Beatrix had a change of heart, but also we don't get more information about whether she was the one that caused Sir Fratley to lose his memory (and she never has a chance to repair her wrongdoing, in the same way Queen Brahne only lived long enough to apologize to her adopted daughter). That said, the romantic gags between Beatrix and Steiner were hilarious.

Necron showing up at the end was a bit confusing at first, but I assumed that like a good deal of other Final Fantasy games, it was the embodiment of entropy / despair / etc. It (he?) demonstrates the theme of coping with ephemerality: how characters respond to being created with a limited lifespan/for a nefarious purpose (we're all going to die anyway; what we do with the limited time we have with each other is what matters).

This game is so romantic; I don't recall the last time I was so invested in a fictional relationship (maybe since reading The Left Hand of Darkness and speculating on the nature of Ai and Estraven's connection, but I digress). Sure, it might have been a bit too saccharine in the way it works out for all of our protagonists at the end, but it felt deserved. I can't stop thinking about the scene in Madain Sari on the boat, where Zidane recounts the traveler Ipsen's tale. The simplicity of the sentiment is so heartfelt ("Why did you come with me?"/"only because I wanted to go with you").

Music highlights

Obligatory "I haven't met a Final Fantasy game soundtrack I disliked" disclaimer, but here were some highlights. If I ever do an Excalibur II run, I might consider doing it without music, since so many of the tracks invite the player to stop and listen for a while:

Burmecia: capturing the sense of foreboding

Dali's theme feels so nostalgic

quiet melancholy of Esto Gaza

Terra/Bran Bal's theme: somber, mysterious

obligatory mention for YOU ARE NOT ALONE. I loved how it replaced the battle theme throughout that dungeon, almost as if Zidane was ruminating on his own reckless march and impulse to push his friends away

Necron's theme (Grand Cross): feels a bit like The Extreme from FF8, in that it starts off with a haze of vocals (in this case, the groans of the damned) and kicks in in a frenzy an ATB gauge or two in

Misc

It took some time for the art style of the characters to grow on me. At first glance, I wasn't the biggest fan of the exaggerated chibis with giant hands. Though the FMVs felt cinematic, the art sometimes reminded me of a Veggietales episode in the textures and exaggerated physics. Graphics-wise, I played with the Moguri mod, which enhanced an already good-looking game's prerendered backgrounds among other QoL improvements.

I liked being able talk to NPCs between major story events and seeing how their lives are affected (e.g., Lindblum spectator during the Festival -> mourning about the destruction of the town -> commentary on rebuilding). My favorite was probably seeing Part-Time Worker Mary at the cable car station, then seeing her together with Part-Time Worker Jeff staffing the Dali item shop by the end.

I also appreciate the FF9 references in FF14 more:

Ark boss moveset / design is similar to Cruise Chaser (there was a spark of recognition followed immediately by panic as I saw "propeller wind" being cast without the clear-headed ability equipped)

Perfect Alex in TEA has wings

5v5 PVP mode uses arrangements of FF9 soundtrack.

Weirdly personal aside on Eiko:

(Apologies in advance for the "we live in a [capitalist] society" sentiment.)

The more I thought about Eiko as a character, the more I could relate to her fear of loneliness.

I love (romantic) love, in the way that it is impossible for a starving gremlin to not drool while staring at a chunk of raw meat! I will eat up any story in which people grow closer and learn to care for each other.

And yet—like Eiko—I fear it. She sees love as a source of security, so she wants to get "between" Zidane and Dagger and get Zidane to fall in love with her instead! Because society encourages the atomization of "community" into nuclear families, I feel like I have lost friendships to it. It becomes all consuming: turning down plans to spend time with a significant other, or letting them take over the topic conversation when they aren't actually there. I can't help but be happy for those friends (who wouldn't be excited for their well being?) but feel conflicted about letting them go and our friendship change.

It's weird, sometimes, seeing old friends on social media living photogenic lives (now with an additional pet or child) while I hunch in front of my computer monitor in my metaphorical basement. I have to resist the urge to comfort myself with platitudes: it's not a bad thing, just different, or perhaps reaffirm that things were temporary, anyway: we were bound to evolve and change and grow apart. I am grateful for the time we spent together, and have to learn to appreciate it and move on. It's not a lose-lose situation, of course; the amount of love in the world isn't finite, though time might be. (One of the perks of living in the 21st century is that I can reach out and reconnect easily!)

next steps

I was able to get all the non-grindy ultimate weapons (besides Quina's Gastro Fork, or Steiner's Excalibur II.) I don't plan on attempting an Excalibur II run immediately, since so much of what I enjoyed was the story, not necessarily the gameplay. But going in with better knowledge of the game might make for an interesting challenge in the future.

I can definitely see myself revisiting this game in the future. I don't have many pieces of "comfort media" that I turn to, but the hope the characters have in the face of identity- and world-shaking revelations and the happy ending definitely make it a candidate.

[thegreymoonwtf]

I posted 37 times in 2022

That's 26 more posts than 2021!

35 posts created (95%)

2 posts reblogged (5%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@thegreymoonwtf

I tagged 37 of my posts in 2022

#thegreymoon draws - 25 posts

#liveblog - 11 posts

#masterlist - 11 posts

#sky - 7 posts

#mountains - 7 posts

#luo yunxi - 6 posts

#2ha - 5 posts

#mist - 5 posts

#love like the galaxy - 5 posts

#chu wanning - 5 posts

Longest Tag: 99 characters

#the reference pic was way beyond my skill level so the painting came out looking nothing like it 😢

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Chu Fei WIP 🖤

I’m very pleased with how he’s coming along! 

29 notes - Posted October 21, 2022

#4

Cheng Shaoshang from Love Like the Galaxy, done in Autodesk Sketchbook. I love her so much 💙💙

40 notes - Posted September 25, 2022

#3

Monarch Industry Liveblog

Episodes 01 & 02   Episodes 03 & 04   Episodes 05 & 06

Episodes 07 & 08   Episodes 09 & 10   Episodes 11 & 12

Episodes 13 & 14   Episodes 15 & 16   Episodes 17 & 18

Episodes 19 & 20   Episodes 21 & 22   Episodes 23 & 24

Episodes 25 & 26   Episodes 27 & 28   Episodes 29 & 30

Episodes 31 & 32   Episodes 33 & 34   Episodes 35 & 36

Episodes 37 & 38   Episodes 39 & 40   Episodes 41 & 42

Episodes 43 & 44   Episodes 45 & 46   Episodes 47 & 48

Episodes 49 & 50   Episodes 51 & 52   Episodes 53 & 54

Episodes 55 & 56   Episodes 57 & 58   Episodes 59 & 60

Episodes 61 & 62   Episodes 63 & 64   Episodes 65 & 66

Episodes 67 & 68

46 notes - Posted January 10, 2022

#2

The royal guqin player, who most certainly is not married to the First Emperor of the Cultivation World 🙄 and who most certainly doesn’t have any other duties in the First Emperor of the Cultivation World’s bedchamber 🙄🙄

58 notes - Posted October 23, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

OK, so I discovered Autodesk SketchBook and a pile of brushes that I don’t know how to use and, yes, I am aware that there was zero skill or style involved in the making of this abomination and that I will be very ashamed of posting it soon enough, but it’s Chu Wanning and Gotou and they are making me SO HAPPY! 

My references are weeping in despair in a corner right now and my meds are wailing at me to take them and calm the fuck down, BUT I WILL NOT BE THINKING THIS THROUGH, so have the terrible full version too:

And some details because I am particularly proud of them:

See the full post

86 notes - Posted March 22, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[literaphobe]

i made the parkour tag scoring system more fair to benefit individual success: or, why dream should’ve placed higher

hi! i’m sure a bunch of you who have seen dream’s parkour tag POV must be feeling sort of confused: why did he only get 8th individually despite his spectacularly fast tagging records? why did sapnap, who only hunted twice and got the hunting bonus only once, get a better score than dream, who hunted 4 times and got the hunter bonus every single time?

that’s because the scoring system is flawed, and it splits coins between team members where it’s unnecessary. here are the current parkour tag rules:

runners: 2 coins every 10 seconds you survive runners: 60 coins (split) if you survive all 60s hunters: 6 coins per runner tagged (less over time) hunters: 20 coins for tagging out all 3 members team: 120 coins (split) for tagging all 3 runners first

okay, disregard all that at the moment. here’s how i think scores should be measured on an individual performance level:

runners: 1 coin every second you survive in 60s hunters: 1 coin for every second left on the clock once you have tagged all players

now, hear me out. these aren’t the Only points you can gain individually, it’s just two parts of my scoring system that i need to prove my point: dream did Really good

a brief explanation of the hunting rule i introduced: it’s just a bonus, because of course not every hunter can catch every player, and not all of them can do it fast. but catching really fast SHOULD get rewarded, because it’s called parkour TAG, not parkour RUN. so it’s simple, really: if you catch all 3 runners in 40 seconds, there are 20 seconds left, so you get 20 coins for it. basically, 60 - time taken. pretty straightforward!!

same works for running. if you survive 15 seconds, you get 15 coins. survive 59 seconds, 59 coins. so how does this prove that dream outperformed? let’s compare his scores to quig, who placed 1st individually in parkour tag, using this system

for reference, quig and dream both hunted 4 times. each time, they eliminated all runners before the other team’s hunter. but in turns of hunting timings?

quig: 40s, 38s, 47s, 36s

dream: 16s, 37s, 16s, 20s

like. come ON now. not proportionately rewarding dream for those records is actual daylight robbery. quig did do pretty well as a runner though, a little better than dream did, so let’s see how they performed overall under these two new rules (ik its a bad table shush):

as you can see, dream would’ve gotten 356 coins under this ruleset, beating out quig’s (also very impressive) score of 315. obviously, we still need more sources of coins for hunters who can’t hunt all runners, bonus coins for runners who survive the whole round, and a team bonus:

runners: 10 coins (individual) if you survive 60s hunters: 5 coins per runner tagged, 5 coins if you tag all 3, 20 coins (individual) if you hunt faster team: 20 coins (split) if your team survived and your hunter caught all 3 runners

i won’t explain much, but running perfectly can get you 70 coins a round, whereas hunting faster than the other team’s hunter brings you 40 coins + time bonus. if you hunted them all in 20 seconds for instance, you’d make 80 coins which is more profitable than running, but if you take 55 seconds you only get 45 coins, which incentivizes good hunters to hunt more and good runners to run more. could end up disadvantaging players who keep getting caught immediately and keep failing to catch runners, but the current scoring system already punishes players for that

my scoring system isn’t perfect, but in all honesty it allows players to boost team scores without somehow sacrificing their own individual scores, which is the point. the current one just doesn’t work well enough since there isn’t enough ‘teamwork’ to justify such huge team splits, unlike games like sands of time, where sand keepers would automatically be disadvantaged if the score wasn’t split, parkour tag unfairly redistributes points for one member’s work, meaning you lose less if you do badly & get carried, but you don’t gain as much if you do the carrying

looking at games like HITW and TGTTOSAWAF, where coins are individually obtained at large but more or less involve the same level of teamwork that parkour tag does (making callouts, running around together), it doesn’t make sense why good hunters like dream who stand out because of their parkour skills should have to lose out on individual placement like that. hopefully, mcc continues to update the parkour tag scoring system. it is a relatively new game, after all :)

[demifiendrsa]

Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin | Announcement Teaser Trailer

Japanese version

It’ll launch for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC in 2022.

A demo—Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin Trial Version—-will launch for PlayStation 5 today and be available through June 24, 2021 at 7:59 p.m. PT / 10:59 p.m. ET. A survey will follow from June 13, 2021 through June 30, 2021, accessible from the menu screen of the demo.

Logos

Key visual

Character renders

Overview and Developer comments

About the Game

Final Fantasy VII Remake veterans Tetsuya Nomura and Kazushige Nojima join forces with Team Ninja from KOei Tecmo Games to deliver a bold new vision for Final Fantasy. Get your first look at Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin . Coming to PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC in 2022.

With the memory of their struggle buried deep in their hearts…

Jack and his allies, Ash and Jed, burn with resolve to defeat Chaos as they throw open the gates to the Chaos Shrine. Yet doubts remain—are they truly the Warriors of Light the prophecy foretold?

Step into a world of dark fantasy and revel in the exhilarating, action-packed battles!

Trial version available on PlayStation 5 until June 24th, 2021.

Developer Comments

Tetsuya Nomura – Creative Producer

The initial concept for Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin came up around the time following the release of Dissidia 012[duodecim] Final Fantasy. I was thinking to myself about making my next game into one that featured action elements in which locations are conquered, rather than the kind with battles against characters. Some time passed without anything coming of it, but separately I was also thinking to myself about another plan for a new series of Final Fantasy titles revolving around “the story of an angry man”. Even more time passed, at which point I received a request for a new plan, so I combined these two ideas to come up with this.

While it is Final Fantasy, it feels different—but there’s no doubt that the blood ofFinal Fantasy runs through its veins.

We’ve undertaken the challenge of finding this difficult middle ground for this mature and stylish title.

We need a little time until we’re able to complete it, and while the battle system is a bloody one, it does links to the story, so I hope you’ll use this opportunity to give it a try.

Kazushige Nojima – Story and Scenario

“It’s not a hope or a dream. It’s like a hunger. A thirst.”

When I wrote this line, I felt like the story had been brought to life.

What drives them to want to defeat Chaos as much as they do? What, then, are their hopes and dreams?

It was in this moment that what used to be fragments and pieces of story came together in a powerful way. The story that I wrote—in what seemed like a single breath after penning that line—is Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. I think it turned out to be quite a memorable story that accompanies a game which prominently features brutal imagery.

Please enjoy!

Jin Fujiwara – Producer (Square Enix)

True to its label as “a bold new vision,” this title is full of new undertakings that draw a clear distinction between it and previous Final Fantasy series titles. I can’t divulge too many details at this stage, but we prepared a glimpse of these ambitions within the trial version, including the title’s direction and overall image, so please enjoy.

I believe that the feedback we receive from all of you around the world is very important as we improve upon the title even further. Please send us your thoughts through the trial version survey or through social media.

I’m already looking forward to the day I’ll be able to play this title with you.

Daisuke Inoue – Director (Square Enix)

This is a title that has been developed with the goal of bringing something new to sit alongside the many Final Fantasy titles in the series. I think it could be considered a side story in terms of how it is positioned.

There may be some people who were disappointed that this announcement was not a new, numbered title in the series, but this game contains ambitions within that even a mainline title may not have been able to achieve.

Grounded and challenging action created by Team Ninja. Our protagonist, sprayed with blood as he literally rips apart, throws, and pulverizing his enemies. The way he looks is almost as if—

Well, we have prepared this trial version with hopes of having players experience this new flavor that the title brings with it, even if just a little bit. As we are still in development, I think there may be some areas that are not perfect and may be that way for a while to come, but I hope you’ll enjoy the trial version regardless.

Additionally, please let us know your thoughts on the game, whether it be positives or negative that you noticed—we will make great use of this feedback as we continue development.

Fumihiko Yasuda – Head of Team Ninja, Producer (Koei Tecmo Games)

Playing Final Fantasy IV 30 years ago is what made me aspire towards a career in the gaming industry, so I always hoped that someday I could be involved in the Final Fantasy series. When Team Ninja was working on Dissidia Final Fantasy, I was in charge of a different section, which meant that every night I filled my pillow with tears. I’m truly happy to be involved with a new Final Fantasy, and a title connected to its Origin at that.

Using the feedback that the players provide after playing the trial version, all of us at Team NINJA will work to make this a title that meets the expectations of not only action game fans, but also Final Fantasy series fans around the world!

Hiroya Usuda – Director (Koei Tecmo Games)

I grew up playing Final Fantasy since I was very young, so it is a great honor to have the opportunity to be involved with this title. Furthermore, I’m truly excited that Team NINJA is able to deliver the first full-on action game in the Final Fantasy series to the world.

In this trial version, we’ve made specific demo-oriented adjustments so that players of all styles will be able to enjoy it—we have incorporated elements such as multiple jobs and weapon types, adjustable difficulty levels, and great replayability. Please let us know your thoughts and feedback once you have given it a try!

Nobumichi Kumabe – Director (Koei Tecmo Games)

I’m glad we were able to announce this new Final Fantasy game—an action game in which Jack, a Warrior of Light(?), lays waste to monsters while being bathed in the spray of their blood. I’m a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series myself, so I’m going to work hard towards release so that this blood-stained Jack can become a hero!

This is a title developed with the characteristic Team Ninja level of difficulty in mind, but once you start getting the hang of it, you’ll be able to defeat enemies in an exhilarating and satisfying way. I hope you will replay the trial version many times and try out the various weapons and abilities available.

The difficulty level can be changed as well, so one recommendation I have is to start playing on an easier difficulty and gradually raise it higher for a challenge!

Demo overview

The Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin Trial Version was also announced during the showcase, which gives players the opportunity to experience a taste of the full game centering on Jack and his allies—Ash and Jed—as they throw open the gates to the Chaos Shrine. Burning with the resolve to defeat Chaos, and with the memories of their struggle buried deep in their hearts, are they the foretold Warriors of Light?

Players of the Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin Trial Version can explore this dark fantasy world as they battle an array of iconic monsters from the Final Fantasy series, using powerful spells and abilities from a sample of jobs including warrior, dragoon and black mage.