#shit is making me want to get a gaming pc goddamn

[talesfromthebandgeekmafia]

Holy fucking shit Baldur’s Gate is so good game of the year indeed

[anthurak]

9S is the final boss though? Like his whole arc after 2B dies is him going insane until you get to the final fight with A2 with her being the obviously better choice.

Alright, ‘cracks knuckles’ guess I’m finally talking about those Nier takes I’ve never gotten around to.

Yes, you are correct. Which is why I call 9S a ‘blemish’ and not something that outright ruined the game for me.

It’s still annoying when you get into later parts of Route B when 9S starts stumbling onto all the big lore and backstory reveals with even Commander White dropping into emphasize how important what he’s finding is. As if the story is saying ‘aren’t you a smart and special little boy, 9S, for discovering all these important things’. Which combined with 2B dying at the start of Route C, makes it feel like, as I said, 9S is getting the ‘he was the REAL main character all along!’ treatment. Particularly when we consider that 9S gets to be the PC of both Route B and half of Route C, whereas 2B only gets Route A and A2 only gets half of Route C, effectively meaning that 9S technically gets the most screen time, story-wise.

Add on the fact that, as I said in the original repost, 9S reads and acts like literally every generic, cardboard-cutout self-insert anime protag-guy, to the point where some of his dialogue with 2B that I think the game wants us to interpret as ‘flirting’ feels like it’s out of a goddamn visual novel, and you can see why I consider him pretty insufferable.

It also doesn’t help that every time I’ve revisited Nier: Automata, I’m always finding 2B more and more interesting and compelling as a character. Just as an example, has anyone noticed that despite being seemingly the most ‘professional’ and loyal to the YoRHA cause on the surface of the three PCs, 2B is actually the most merciful of the three to the machine lifeforms? Like how when you first encounter non-hostile machines, 2B doesn’t want to attack them, stating that there is no reason to attack those that aren’t attacking them. Or how 2B is actually the MOST open of the three to talking and working with Pascal, whereas A2 is at first extremely distrustful and 9S just wanted to attack him on sight.

And yes, I really like A2 as well. Unfortunately the way her route is constructed means that she feels just as much like a replacement for 2B as she does a separate character in her own right. Which combined with the shorter length of Route C, makes her character feel a bit truncated.

And yes, 9S rapidly revealing himself to be a crazed, murderous incel simping for 2B the moment she dies IS in and of itself a great, twisted and interesting character turn, and I wholly agree that A2 having to Old-Yeller him is absolutely the better choice for the final battle. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really change everything else I’ve been saying up to now. Or the fact that 2B absolutely got fridged to make it happen.

Personally, for a long time now I’ve felt a better way to do the post-‘everything’s gone to shit’ reveal that we see in Route C would have 2B not actually dying but instead taken by A2 and eventually purged of the logic virus, though with 9S still wholly BELIEVING that 2B is dead at A2’s hands. Say, A2 still stabs 2B, but it turns out to be non-fatal.

From there, Route C follows A2 and a weakened/regaining-her-strength 2B working together. Likely with some fun gameplay twists were-in you’re switching control between the two. All the while, 9S is deteriorating even further than what we saw originally, to the point where even when he learns that 2B is alive and sees her again, he just goes into an even more crazed ‘you abandoned me!’ and ‘you left me for her!’ mode.

Which actually ends up leading to 9S mirroring Eve’s own crazed obsession with Adam and the rampage he went on after the latter’s death. Which in turn at first leads 2B to believe that 9S has some lingering virus infection from Adam and Eve from when they were holding him captive and that is the source of his madness, meaning that 9S could still be saved.

Of course, in a tragic twist, it is revealed that it ISN’T something lingering from Eve, but rather that 9S is deliberately re-infecting himself with the virus. That the true source of 9S’s madness is simply his own twisted obsession with 2B.

Which in turn leads to a final boss fight of 2B and A2 fighting a now-monstrous 9S. A fight which culminates in 2B and A2, with the help of Pods 042 and 153, hacking 9S in an extended trippy hacking sequence.

A sequence which culminates in 2B/the player having to hack into 9S’s menu and actually forcibly uninstall his OS-chip in order to put him down for good. Complete with you/2B effectively having to fight the ‘Are you sure?’ confirmation box which becomes progressively more crazed and unhinged, until Pod 042 mentions that you can force-uninstall the chip through some seemingly simply method like holding the button. Or perhaps something equally zany like switching control to A2 to uninstall the chip while the confirmation box is ‘occupied’ with 2B.

Thus, we still get a tragic/bittersweet ending of 2B being forced to kill 9S, but this time for good with the sense that now she can finally move on. Also this version would absolutely have 2B and A2 becoming a couple.

So yeah, that's a... few of my takes on Nier. Heck, I didn't even go into the AU I've had percolating for a few years now wherein 9S is expunged from the story entirely, 2B is partnered with 60 and is a bit of a yuri-harem-protag and there is frankly WAY more world-building than is necessary.

[fernsnailz]

goddamn it now you've got me thinking about Sonic Minecraft headcanons and shit lmaoooo lemme like... spout a few: -Tails is the redstone nerd, he's the one who would literally learn to build computers inside of minecraft. The others purposefully ignore redstone in caves purely because they dont want him building massive shit that lags the entire server lmao, if he wants the redstone he has to get it himself. -Amy and Sonic are the two who use shaders, Sonic has a beefy-ass PC that Tails made for him so he likes to use shaders to make the world look as cool as possible, but he's also still a freak for high FPS so he tends to use low-end shaders with very basic texture packs. Amy, however, pushes her own PC to it's limits to make shit look as beautiful as possible, and she has a whole slew of texture packs that she's organized and uses. She's the screenshot lover, and the primary builder of the group. -Omega isn't in the server because he would not stop asking for mods that add explosives so he gets his own modded world where it's just.... always chaos. -Amy is also the primary server moderator, while Tails helps her with the technical stuff. -Rouge has been banned and unbanned like 14 times for stealing so now they shut down the server if Amy or Tails isn't online to make sure she doesn't cause trouble again. -Sonic, as you've mentioned, tends to explore a lot, so the others often find random dirt huts every 1000 blocks or so from when he forgets to take food with him and his sprint runs out at night time lol -Knuckles is the primary mining dude, he also absolutely refuses to give up his emeralds to trade with villagers because he wants to rebuild his home ruins in Minecraft and hopes to use emerald blocks for that. -Shadow is.... a bit of a wildcard??? He just tends to do whatever the hell he feels like, which is either building onto his house made of an assortment of random blocks, or causing absolute fucking mayhem for everyone else. He's also the one who spends his EXP on naming his weapons the most batshit insane stuff. -There was a moment in time when they were all in a VC together that Sonic said "Oh hey I found Shadow!" and not even 5 seconds later the message "SpeedyBoi was slain by XxUltimateShitlordxX" appeared in the in-game chat -Tails most likely helped set up some of their Minecraft accounts so many of them ended up stuck with names they absolutely did not choose

thats all i can think of right now lol, but this is making me wanna make a Shadow skin for MC

these are very fun, i think the only thing i would add is that the one time omega was in the server he downloaded every speedrunning strat known to man and beat the ender dragon in under five minutes

also silver does not play because he thinks herobrine is real <3

[balketh]

Lol, sorry if I want clear: I'm not here to debate. If you disagree with my thoughts on Starfield because you still like what Bethesda are doing, keep it to yourself. Triple A gaming has gotten worse because of this acceptance of shit (aside from the CEO capitalistic nightmare in the industry atm.) I truly could not want to hear those opinions less; it's like hearing from sports video game fans that current gen sports games are fine being so utterly engorged with dark pattern microtransations. Have some fucking standards, please.

Skyrim was truly only worth a damn because of modding. Oblivion, Morrowind; only still relevant because they're moddable. Bethesda wouldn't have been the first company ever to successfully shoehorn PAID MODDING on CONSOLES if that wasn't 100% the case. Something literally NO other company forced through before them. Skyrim would not have been a mega success if players on PC couldn't fix their issues. It didn't last because of console players. It lasted because of bugfixing and pornmaking modders, and that's a goddamn fact.

Nothing else they've done since has been nearly as good or long lasting. That longevity - because of modding - is the only real reason they've had so many chances to make more games. It's the only reason they're such a big fucking company now. If it wasn't, they wouldn't have released the CK for Starfield.

They have not learned; their games keep getting worse, their sales keep going down. It might be slow, but it's a fucking fact. Reviews aren't everything, just as sales aren't everything, but Bethesda is, largely, on the decline, and that's not up for debate.

Jee, it's almost like headlines like "An All-Time Low For Bethesda Studios" re: Starfield DLC completely support my entire point that Bethesda is in a serious decline that they won't recover from because they keep making worse shit than the last thing they made, and it's been that way SINCE THEY JUST KEPT REMAKING SKYRIM.

I cannot be clear enough when I say it won't improve. A writer for Bethesda, Will Shen, (one of the better writers - responsible for all of Nick Valentine/Far Harbour in FO4, the best bits of FO4), left Bethesda after Starfield, because of how awfully run by upper management it was. That's 1000000% what I'm talking about. I could not be more correct. You don't have to believe me if you don't want to, but people inside the fucking company can see it, exactly as I said.

Emil Pagliarulo, lead writer on - let's see, Bethesda's four worst written games, games known for having shitty stories that people actively disregard in favour of just playing with the game like a sandbox full of toys - FO3, Skyrim, FO4, and Starfield, (with known shitty contributions to Oblivion) claims that Starfield is Bethesda's best work yet. The guy who wrote the Dark Brotherhood storyline in Oblivion, which, to be clear, is dogshit. Not the 'kill creatively' gameplay, not the lore from TES at large, the actual writing, dialogue, and in-game narrative surrounding your actions; go and look it up right now. It's contrived slop, and this was his 'big win'.

The man who openly stated that he doesn't like using design documents in his work. On massive, sprawling, open-world narrative games. The man literally responsible for every single bad story Bethesda has released since Oblivion - yes, all of them, because that's what lead writers do, they approve and direct the writing of their team. The awful non-protag from-birth-fInD-uR-dAd of FO3. Skyrim's utterly generic dRaGoNs-R-bAcK! Go shout at them until they stop! and the god awful lol-all-sides-are-shitheels-but-whatever Thalmor, Legion, and Stormcloaks. FO4's hilarious improvement on FO3, 'SHAUN, WHERE IS MY BABY SHAUN', with the most obvious fucking minute-one twist imaginable, and now, his pièce de résistance, an entire universe of uninteresting, themeless, cookie-cutter sci-fi drudgery with no real reason to explore or be invested. A man so anti-protag in singleplayer games that rather than make you the protagonist in Starfield, they used the restartable ending to write off your singular importance by having there be infinity of you.

The fucker responsible for Shattered Space's absolutely dogshit reception, and its terrible writing and narrative direction. That lead to article headlines like 'Bethesda Honcho says Starfield is "the best game we've ever made" in massive bout of amnesia', something that would only fly if, oh, I don't know, we were generally all aware of how dogshit Bethesda's writing and dialogue have been for a decade. He might not have done the genuinely fucking bland, soulless gameplay, or riddled the game with fucking BETHESDA MENUS, but he's responsible for the most unfixable thing in all of these games: the writing.

That's who will be doing ES6, probably with Todd backing him.

People didn't buy Skyrim 17 times (yes, that's how many discrete versions of Skyrim you could have bought without buying the same game on the same console twice) for the fucking story. They bought it because it's a fucking fantasy sandbox that did not have a competitor of similar scope for years. Starfield is a bad sandbox, and it shows.

Yeah, no, Bethesda's a fucking goner if he does ES6. It won't flop, because people will fucking RUSH to buy it day 1 without knowing a thing about it, but the reviews that follow will eviscerate it. ES6 will be the downfall of Bethesda. Both of them need to fuckin' retire, and let some actual talent do the writing for once in this decade.

I can only wish it would drop sooner rather than later, so they could just fucking stop.

[chipped-chimera]

I enter the cyberpunk 2077 tag. I see a post about the game not being 'punk' because of all the triple A gaming company typical shit 'means it's not punk'. I roll my eyes so hard I exit the tag.

Points, context, rebuttal, whatever beloooow (I am not reblogging post because I don't want to attract hate to OP, but I am writing this cause I'm sick of seeing it).

Yeah triple A dev treatment fucking sucks. It sucks CDPR vowed to do different and didn't but that is missing a bunch of context. Here comes the context -

I've been following CDPR since about 2010-ish. They've always held onto older era gaming attitudes and respect their consumers. I guess in a way they were still made for an older era around the Cyberpunk release for the following reasons.

They shot themselves in the foot with their own marketing. Hiring a big name may have done that. If you look at the teaser trailer for Cyberpunk 2077 on announcement it basically says release date wise 'its done when it's done'. Being part of that older era they want to put out a COMPLETE game. Well tested. They came from a time where game updates were a LUXURY and that's why I trusted them to release a good product.

Marketing however got so big that it exited the realm of core fans and into the general public (derogatory). When they announced another delay, I was chill. I trusted them. Shit takes time man, whatever it takes to make it good AND treat your employees well bro. General public however was out for blood, sending death threats, pulling preorders.

There's this fine line you have to tread in marketing. Too little hype, no one knows about your product. Too much hype, you skyrocket expectations. Hype at the wrong time - you end up peaking at the wrong moment and end up losing momentum for release. You can see the conundrum here. They were arguably in the skyrocketed expectations and the losing momentum risk region.

So they did crunch time for release. In a way they had to. I mean sure they could have been 'punk' like OP suggested and said fuck you to the non-core fanbase but unfortunately punk doesn't pay bills. It doesn't keep the lights on. It doesn't keep your employees employed. It doesn't stop them from getting sent death threats for a delay.

So they rushed it out, it bombed. That sucked BUT it brought them peace. Because while everyone was making fun of them and quickly forgetting about it to go laugh at the next bomb of the month - it meant they could actually get onto fixing/finishing their game because people like ME knew them. It wouldn't be left as is. Also let them work at a less insane pace.

I started playing it (I finally had a PC that could handle it) right before the Edgerunners release and the public reboot. It was a fucking. Solid. Game. I studied game design and if I didn't get sick and had to stop this game would have been my goddamn final paper. There are so many good choices narratively and mechanically to the point you can't separate the two. It was everything I expected.

They worked hard to get there. We currently live in an era where entertainment is treated like fast food and people can be fucking incoherent when they're told to have patience. Why do you think so many games release in a scuffed state? Why do you think this new 'redemption arc' story in the game industry has become increasingly common? Because Devs keep getting sent DEATH THREATS just for doing work. That's fucking insane. No wonder they're working overtime and sleeping at the office because the general public has turned gamedev into an industry that basically uses psychological torture as a whip to get your game out 'on time'.

Yes there are absolutely horrible triple A gamedev companies, usually under the stable of a larger company (EA, Activision etc. take your pick) but CDPR ain't that. In my eyes their hand was forced.

You know what is punk? Going with a little, 'unpopular' (basically not DnD) ttrpg written by a black man and building a new IP and experience from it - AND having him on board and getting his active input during development. Because dear lord current media in general seems to be allergic to taking risks and new IPs.

You know what else is punk? Releasing free DLC updates that would be a micro transaction otherwise (no I am not talking about Phantom Liberty and I argue that's an 'expansion' though I guess no one uses that word now) and putting the goddamn pdf of the ttrpg handbook they based it off with the game download. Putting stickers in physical releases (going by my witcher experience), giving you goddamn HIGH RESOLUTION IMAGES of in game posters to print for yourself FOR. FREE. No one DOES THAT anymore.

Also arguably putting out Cyberpunk is punk just in the narrative it tells in the goddamn first place - especially in the current climate, but I think I've made my point here.

Also my last point, in big letters because it's driving me fucking insane:

CYBERPUNK. IS. A. GENRE. A GENRE. THEY DID NOT INVENT CYBERPUNK. BLADE RUNNER. NEUROMANCER. ALTERED CARBON. IT'S A GENRE. THE PUNK ELEMENT IS IN THE NARRATIVE. IT'S NOT SOME KIND OF 'STATEMENT' ABOUT THEMSELVES, IT'S A GENRE AND ALSO THE LITERAL TITLE OF THE TTRPG THE THING WAS BASED OFF IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Anyway I'm sick of seeing CDPR being thrown under the bus and being treated in ways that will actively end up affecting future development. I really, really hope they haven't been too affected but if they end up feeling forced into modern day gamedev cycles and all the bullshit that goes with it ... well I know why.

And it starts with people who spout shit like this.

[hellafluff]

@dalishious made a fun fillable chart (blank here) for your DA Faves. Gave my reasoning under the cut bc i love to talk

DAO Companion: Shale of course! If Shale has 1 fan its me and if Shale has 0 fans I'm dead, you know how it goes. Shale is sassy and delightful and I love that they're my nonbinary rep bc I for one LOVE non-human enbies as someone who feels pretty non-human.

DA2 Companion: I'm extremely basic and have been in love with Varric Tetras for years.

DAI Companion: DORIAN!!! His journey through the game and how involved the Quizzy gets feels more personal then any of the other companions and I love the banter the two have together. My Lavellan and him are extremely close.

Excited for Veilguard Companion: Emmrich Volkarin I am Deeply Attracted To You. I have his official art as my phone lockscreen right now. I love necromancers and older men and he's so goddamn cute. Plus, Skeleton friend!!!!!!

Favorite Other Media Character: I've been obsessed with Maevaris Tilani for years and if she isn't in Veilguard I am going to end up on the news. She's a queen and the scene of her and her husband in the fade in the comics makes me so sad.

Favorite NPC: Sandal because I decided to put the Architect in the antagonist slot! I do sincerely love Sandal and I'm excited to see if we get anymore lore on him in DATV. I love the theory that he's a Sha-Brytol.

Favorite PC: Warden-Commander Mirabelle Aeducan, Mira to her friends. I love my get-shit-done exiled princess. She put her brother on the throne but also punched him very hard first chance they were alone. She is still treated as royalty in Orzammar and keeps visiting and making surface trade agreements for them as she searches for a Cure for the Calling. Is she supposed to be doing all that? No but the Wardens sure as shit aren't gonna stop her. She misses Alistair very much but purposefully broke up with him so he could be on the throne. They still keep in contact whenever they can.

Favorite Antagonist: I'm going to kiss The Architect. If we do not see him again in DATV I'm. Well I'm not gonna end up on the news but I will be extremely sad. I want to see the rest of the Ancient Magisters very bad, I think they would make great side DLC content for DATV.

Fave NPC Ship: Wade and Herren are married and I am constantly upset that weren't in Inquisition as like a specialty weapon shop at the very least.

Fave NPC Friends: Blackwall and Sera. The goddamn... Weird Uncle and Weird Niece ass relationship they have. They have some of the best banter in the game. I wasn't a Sera fan for a long time but them together really makes both of their characters shine.

Favorite Romance: I'm extremely basic and want to commit terrorism with and for Anders. Krista Hawke can and will do everything in her power to protect this man.

Favorite Friendship: Dorian again! Seriously, him and my Lavellan are basically in a QPR. He really brings her out of her shell and she matches his energy and wants to help him anyway she can. If she wasn't with Iron Bull by Trespasser she'd probably have gone to Tevinter with him.

Favorite Quest: I like the back half of Paragon of Her Kind a lot, the final confrontation with Branka and Caridin especially. Throw Shale in there for lore and fuck yeah. A lot of it comes down to my Warden being Aeducan and my love of Shale but what can I say, if my Hawke could be a Dwarf she absolutely would have been.

Favorite DLC: I played Jaws of Hakkon as a reluctant mage elf on my last playthrough and fucking sobbed after the Ameridan Meeting. That DLC is absolutely life ruining if you play that kind of Inquisitor, it was all of Adana's deepest fears realized and it shook me how deep in character I got playing it.

Favorite Game: DA2! I love it's jank and story in a story nature and relationship mechanics. I really hope we get a rivalry mechanic in DATV or other games try something like that. I don't want to piss a companion off so much they leave I want them to stay and get bitchy with me in every dialogue! I wanna romance someone who curses my name! Also just has the best story of all the games.

Favorite Other Media: I really enjoyed Absolution! I think some parts of it are under written because of how short it is (Qwydion just being comic relief is the thing that really gets me) but the overall plot and animation is REALLY good! I haven't watched it since it aired tho. I'm hoping it gets another season to cover the Meredith stinger, because I don't know how they'd handle that in DATV.

[styrmwb]

I beat Final Fantasy Tactics Advance

This might be the longest game from start to finish I've ever played

Not in the sense that this is a long game but in the fact that this is the first real game I ever played (I'm sorry, I'm not considering pc learning programs for baby), and it took me approximately 18-19 years to get around to Finally beating it. It's very funny to say that my first experience into gaming was a strategy game. I also think that somewhere, deep down in my heart, this planted the seed for what games I ended up loving in my present. Experiencing this game with an adult mind was ALMOST a fresh experience, yet I uncovered a lot of old memories and experiences during it.

This game is goddamn addicting. I Genuinely had so much trouble putting it down at times because I just Kept Wanting To Play. Let me explain to you my thoughts :)

Gameplay

I love RPGs to the bottom of my heart; HOWEVER. I have Always Always Always HATED gear management. I don't think I ever truly appreciated it in a game until Final Fantasy IX, where equipping gear and holding onto it taught you abilities permanently. It made me care about my gear and when to equip it more than just stat buffs and "yeah I guess I'll get fire immunity whatever". I LOVE that system so much. Another system that I love to the bottom of my heart (also an FF Classic but Dragon Quest gave me this too) is the job/class system. The freedom of changing my characters to be whatever I want and to mix and match their abilities is so fun and leads to a lot of flavor and mechanics. Final Fantasy V does it the best imo. So what do I get here? I get 2 of my favorite RPG mechanics of all time put into one!!! The reason this game is so addicting is it's basically to me character building simulator. I am constantly thinking about job paths, what I want each of my guys to be, how much time am I putting them in battles and spreading across their usage and swapping gear to maximize AP gains and make a small army of broken warriors. It's an absolute joy. The base gameplay is super solid too which helps. I mean, I love strategy RPGs (I am, unfortunately, a Fire Emblem bitch), so you literally can't go wrong with it.

I loved the jobs in this game. In fact, I'm gonna be a big nerd and tell you about my whole clan because this is MY post and I make the rules

Marche - Paladin/Fighter: World's Strongest Child. Fighter's damage output is insane, and has a wide range of abilities that helped out with its accuracy or distance, as well as just some meaty hits to annihilate. I went into Paladin just for some extra defense, and was also blessed with some good support skills and a stupid strong nuke in Holy Blade.

Montblanc - Mog Knight/Juggler: To be real here, I fucked up with this dude. I Did Not know what I wanted to do with him, and messed his stats up a little as a result. But Juggler is such a good support unit, especially with Dagger's disable + damage and Smile's instant turn ratio. Mog Knight did not perform how I wanted it to, but it has funny ability names.

Nikolai - Hunter/Archer: As I mentioned before, I'm a Fire Emblem bitch; and what that means is that I'm used to archers sucking shit (fuck you Python hit your damned shots). I was NOT expecting the bowman here to be as goated as he was. The utility of the aim abilities from damage boosting to disabling the enemy, as well as hunt's huge monster damage, this dude was a prime stay throughout the entire playthrough.

Chelney - Dragoon/Gladiator: This guy took a bit to load up, but once he did, holy shit. Absolute damage demon. Dragoon's wide range of AOE abilities + spear usage given some extra strength and smaller focus when needed from Gladiator, on top of the insane movement I gave him meant I had a Bangaa missile land wherever I wanted it to.

Eugene - Sage/White Mage/Beastmaster (when needed): Another unit I didn't really do optimally. White Mage is obviously a great support as it always is, but I genuinely thought Sage was gonna be a support type. Instead I got some damage skills (which to be fair were nice to have) that were super rare to find and didn't feel really BEEFY. Beastmaster was mostly there to support the Blue Mage.

Gertrude - Red Mage/Summoner: The early playthrough goat and 1/2 of the reason why I think Viera units are the best units in the game. Red Mage's wide variety of abilities came in clutch, as well as the bit of Fencer I gave her at first to cover both magic and physical. Then came Summoner, which was just "haha drop a big explosion". THEN I got Doublecast. "HAHA DROP TWO BIG EXPLOSIONS". Very very very fun unit, I just wish she actually managed to hit more. I blame myself for not giving her more movement to get behind the enemy.

Skimble - Time Mage/Black Mage: The epitome of a glass cannon, Poor Skimble could nuke anyone he saw but kept constantly getting targeted and killed. I actually did really like this mix of jobs because he could pull off support and damage well whenever I needed.

Gotwald - Bishop/White Monk: Not the most used unit, but a VERY fun combination of jobs. Bishop is like, Good Sage, with its healing and damage magic, and then the White Monk abilities balanced it out with some physical attacks as needed and Revive. Thematically it all balances out very well, I loved this.

Gallahad - Ninja: Another unit I didn't really know what to do with. He started out as a thief but I never really liked stealing in games (mainly cause it just never seemed worth the trouble). It was worth it to get to Ninja, though. His damage output, especially once I unlocked Double Sword was insane. The utility of Ninja Skills are also awesome, I just wish he could land them.

Agatha - Assassin/Sniper: I lied when I said Gertrude was 1/2 of what convinced me Vieras were the best. Agatha is 5/6ths of what convinced me of this fact. Having her in Sniper was already really solid with Doubleshot, Death Scythe, Aim:Weapon, etc (a really funny combo was dooming someone then using Montblanc to speed up their turns and thus their demise.) But then Assassin? Holy shit. Literally just instantly killing anything across the field, dashing around at mach speed, everything in her range. Once I mastered Ultima Buster and gave her back a greatbow, everyone was just "am I going to Last Breath or Ultima Buster you? You get one shot either way". Insane unit.

Karl - Gunner/Animist: This is such a fun long range hide in the back of the map combo. Gunner has surprisingly crazy damage, and it can keep up that damage AND cause statuses. Animist rounds it out nicely with the self heal and AOE attacks (oh I can't shoot you? Get Chocobo'd, idiot.)

Nobel - Blue Mage/Fighter: This is a Blue Mage that is 1000% worth the investment. You don't even need all the spells. Matra Magic is one of the funniest spells in a strategy game I've ever used, and even beyond that I had Twister and Dragon Force. Fighter was there to give them extra meat for their attack based spells, as well as no MP options because Damage > MP is a thing and is good.

That was my clan, and I feel like most everyone got their time to shine (even if certain bunnies and lizards got a little more than others). There are some jobs I wish I got to experience a little more but I just couldn't put the investment into it. Illusionist and Alchemist are a couple that I think I could have cooked with in an alternate timeline; Templar as well. Gadgeteer scares me, but a luck based affect everyone class is really funny conceptually. I also really appreciated how throughout the game, the base jobs weren't always invalidated, and they had their place when needed.

I think building characters, while it is the part I enjoyed the most through the game, is very much sunk cost. You gotta just invest in your guys from the get go cause nobody you recruit later is going to even out just due to amount of abilities.

Other gameplay things I liked: customizable map is really cool. I ended up going with an optimized guide just cause I wanted treasure and I know I don't play games more than once often so I was going for full 100%, but as a replayability feature it's SO cool. I also actually quite enjoyed the little bit of time management that was there; it reminded me of Persona. Hold off to accept this mission cause I can't make it in time to do these other couple, plan out my optimal route to hit as many or as little battles as I could in this period. Map navigation was an actual part of the game which was cool.

The Law system gives me feelings so complicated. Thematically, it's very cool and fits in perfectly in the world (or I should say the world is built around it very well.) And theoretically, it really gives you incentive to switch around your units and plan out their growth. But in my experience, 80% of the time it was just annoying? (which again, flavor wise, VERY accurate). Like there were times where I got hit with "do not hit animals go to jail" on a mission I did not know was exclusively full of animals. I also don't think they were the clearest things at times, and you really do just have to get punished to find out the limits of stuff. It's not The Worst, but I don't think I had a lot of fun with it. Except when it prevented the enemies from doing something that was hilarious. Stupid Illusionist can't do anything when target all is illegal lmfao

To tie in two previous points, I think Jagds were a very cool area. The trade off of no laws but for permadeath is neat, and those zones actually gave me fear and made me try to plan and prepare when I went around them. I also have a memory of my childhood playthrough losing my favorite guy so I didn't want a repeat of that hahaha. But I think the permadeath eventually becomes WAY more of a punishment than it should be due to how hard raising a character is. One wrong move, and the guy you put dozens of hours and AP into is gone. I will say, this game absolutely made me anal about saving constantly, so that might be good? Maybe?

Two things I can strictly say I disliked, were the randomness and dispatch missions/mission items. When it comes to randomness, I feel like I was really blocked out of certain things just because I couldn't get the units or items I wanted. I didn't get the chance to recruit a second Viera for so long, which sucks when jobs are race based. (I read somewhere that it was based off month but I found that out way too late). Items as well; when abilities are locked to gear, you Need gear to reach potentials. But I barely got any Sage weapons, I was losing out on a lot of ice magic cause I just couldn't get the items, and I literally never got to figure out how to steal said weapons cause I didn't get the weapon to do that. It bothered me. Mission items are the absolute bane of my existence. I HATED them. You need them for so many missions, but those missions will appear WAY before you can even get the items, and some items are one time get only meaning you can screw yourself out of everything, which I hated. Yes, I know that if I was playing this back in the day (and if I had friends when I was playing this back in the day), you could trade and link for items, but as a solo player, it just doesn't work. The mystery difficulty of dispatch missions sucked too. I had to look up the formula just to figure out how to make something guaranteed to win.

I think this wins the award for Game With Gameplay I Actually Really Cared For And Had Opinions About 2024

Story + Characters

As a kid, I really didn't think about the story at all even though I could read it just fine. I was just a small one who named his character ABCDabcdef and had fun moving my guys around (also god damn I was a lot smarter than I thought considering how far I got) My adult brain though, was actually able to appreciate what this game was. I think it offers a really interesting inversion on the Isekai genre, before the Isekai genre even blew up. What if the main character wanted to go home? For a GBA game in 2003, I feel like this was surprisingly... profound? is that the word? I'm not saying it was the greatest piece of media ever written, in fact I think there were a couple areas where I would have liked a little more clarification/details, but like, for what it is. It's really cool.

Marche I think is an interesting character. He felt very... responsible. Like "haha ok guys we had our fun but we Need to go back." He was able to call the bullshit on the world, and try to pull everything back to reality. I felt this even further reading about his backstory and relationship to his family. Sure, he had freedom, but he dedicated his effort To his brother, and his mother, to make them happy, even at the cost of his own. He's a character that I very much appreciated and related to. Although, I think I would have liked more to his motivation. A stronger reason behind his intense want to go home.

Ritz and Doned were fine. I like them, but there isn't much To them. Ritz was a cool, strong character who I liked how she never backed down from her wants, and Doned hit close to my heart, being a very accurate younger brother; and I felt for him, "gaining" the health he always wanted. I really liked the scene between him and Marche fighting about what the other has. But they didn't get to show up much, which stinks, and in Ritz's case especially I wish her motivation was a little stronger.

Mewt I think was the perfect character to cause this story and this world. I completely understood his struggles between the bullying and the loss of his mother, seeing the struggles of his father, and wanting that all to go away, dealing with, or more aptly NOT dealing with the pain by running away from it. His mental state literally shaped the world, from the laws of the land to creating an overpowered coping mechanism in the form of him but backwards (fuck you Llednar you're too damn strong).

This game has a good Cid. I expected him to be a shithead, but in the real world he was just depressed and in Ivalice he was actually really honorable.

Montblanc and Shara were both good friends to their respective child, but I do wish they both had a little more background/depth. (I also wish that Shara hit literally any of her shots come on I wasted a unit slot on you)

Both the Nu Mou surprised me; Babus actually made me feel for the dude, clearly caring about his prince and fighting for him; his behavior and appearance made me think he was Mewt's stuffed animal given life. Ezel's fucking hilarious, this dude said FUCK the government, laws are no fun at all. I love that dude so much.

I don't have much to say about Remedi, as she's literally an extension of Mewt. She serves her role as being that physical incarnation of a metaphysical concept to plunge your sword into that every FF game needs.

To kinda summarize my point, I did like everything, and I thought there were a lot of cool concepts. The game made me feel feelings, it plucked at my heart a little. But it's not as deep as I would have liked, I don't think. Granted, this is a GBA game. I'm not expecting Shakespeare or anything, but if we ever got a remake or something? I'd love some expansion.

Apart from the main story, I actually quite enjoyed the background story of Clan Borzoi. These guys are being menaces, you defeat them, and through reading the rumors and dispatch missions, you find out their leader runs away in a boat you helped him with, only for him to come back 4x as evil, bringing fiends and becoming a fucking vampire. It was honestly a joy and a side plot that Did Not need to be there but I loved.

The post game 100% completion judge storyline was fun too. We get more Cid screentime AND we get to fight against the law being shitty and corrupt which you always love to see.

Art

I love this game's art style and direction. The portraits, the way everyone looks, is so fun, it's cartoony and unique. The monster designs are so special yet still recognizably classic. The game itself is really colorful and vibrant which makes it a joy to look at, especially as I can't tear myself away from playing it.

Even the animations just make me really happy to look at, although I recognize part of that is nostalgia. The spells are fun, like the demi squishy circle, or the Illusionist full screen hellfests (Stardust is the best one). Even the summon animations, for being on a GBA game, had that classic FF sense of grandness, power, and being over the top. I love looking at this game.

Music

It's amazing how even through the GBA sounds, this is very recognizably a Sakimoto soundtrack. I can feel that grand feeling that the XII OST gives me in the form of beeps and boops. I don't care what some people say, I love the way the GBA sounds, and I think this game has a very good soundtrack. The title theme lives in my head rent free, as well as the bar theme. Marche's theme is also probably one of my favorites, being a slower piece compared to most of the game.

Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin

See it's funny cause Marche is a stranger in paradise and I'm about to talk about the origins of Final Fantasy

Go play the silly Jack game dammit

I never truly appreciated how FF this game is. I will preface this by saying I Have Not played the original Tactics yet (I should have done it before Advance but childhood experiences win the matchup low diff), so my experiences are mainly second hand, that might affect some of my outlook. But as I was saying, this game feels INCREDIBLY classic Final Fantasy. Between the monsters, the jobs, the colorful nature of the game, the references to previous characters (I saw the four fiends! And Gilgame[sh]!) the fantastical aspects over the more serious political drama, I get the same vibes as the first few FF games, which makes me happy. I honestly feel like this game feels more FF than XII does (I am not saying XII is not an FF game it obviously is).

Speaking of XII, it is INSANE how much Tactics Advance brought to that game, and how little credit I feel the general public attributes to it. Like, This Game Came First. This game created Viera, Bangaa, Nu Mou. This game had Montblanc and Nono. This game had the Giza Plains. This game had monsters like Carrot. This game created Judges! So much of XII's identity is Tactics, and playing through this made me realize that even more of it is still Tactics. We wouldn't have Fran, we wouldn't have Gabranth, without Tactics Advance, and I wish this game got the respect it was due.

Shoutouts to XIV being the only game to acknowledge it in the form of Clan Nutsy. (I'm retroactively mad at Theatrhythm for not doing ANYTHING)

Post Too Long! Red Card: Go To Prison!

I'm so glad I finally got to finish this game, and complete a mission that I've had since I was a kid. I specifically remember giving up on the Llednar -> Mateus combo, and now here I am, 100% completion.

I can absolutely see why I put so much time into this game; it's addicting, and it has so many features and aspects of games that I love put into one package, even if there are bits I could do without.

The game as a whole feels ahead of its time, and even beyond the console it was on, and I hope one day it can get the recognition it deserves, rather than only getting a rerelease on the Wii U. I do recommend any FF fan to play this game. To finish off the post, I would say;

8/10. An absolutely addicting fun time and a key point in the history of my favorite franchise, as well as my own life. It's got some frustrations and imperfections, but it's such a solid experience.

[alertarchitect]

Full disclosure, this is a long one. It's also a vent post. I'm mainly writing this out to help get the thoughts and feelings regarding this kind of organized and out of my head, makes dealing with them just a little easier. Maybe it'll help you put to words your own thoughts & feelings on this kinda shit, too, and if it does, I'm glad my screaming into the void at least helped out someone other than myself! After all, if anything I say, write, or do ends up helping at least one other person, then maybe I'm doing something right :]

Sometimes having long-time special interests in an ongoing franchise FUCKING SUCKS. Perfect example - I am both a big Halo nerd, and really enjoy the overaching lore of Bungie's connected worlds (with how Marathon, Pathways into Darkness, Myth, Destiny, and even the ways Halo originally connected before it had to become its own thing thanks to Microsoft). Here are the ways that currently sucks:

The state of Halo Infinite, the most recent Halo game, both currently and at launch. At launch, you had a buggy mess, with multiplayer that barely functioned, lacking feature parity (even just on the multiplayer side of things, not counting the campaign) with Halo Reach, a game from 2010. Currently, 343i has admittedly fixed a lot of the launch issues - there's more customization than the game has ever had before (still not as good as Reach's customization imo, but at this point I've given up hope on any multiplayer AAA game having that level of customization for free ever again), the desync issues (in my experience) are no longer happening, and it has the most powerful Forge mode in any Halo game to date. The flip side of that, though? Egregiously horrendous monetization, an armor core and coating system that both hurt the customization more than help, and a drip-feed of content with little to no communication from 343 on anything past the most recent update. Not to mention the issues that come from a focus on "Live Service" bullshit.

The issues at 343 Industries itself, which come part and parcel with the massive issues related to Microsoft as a company. Massive megacorporation, horrible management, staff getting screwed over, crunch culture, and more - it just goes on and on.

Halo 5, despite its generally negative reception, is horrendously inaccessible to those of us that want to experience it as a piece of history and/or try out the multiplayer. A perfect example of how little companies care about game preservation, despite the decent track record 343i has had in that respect thanks to the Master Chief Collection, its PC release and addition of Halo Reach, and the efforts to find, occasionally recreate from almost nothing, and implement lost & cut content in the MCC titles.

Being a fan of Bungie's overarching stuff... really bad when you are at PEAK investment into their stuff, namely my Destiny 2 hyperfixation, and they not only announce that their new Marathon game is going to be a fucking EXTRACTION SHOOTER, and thus unlikely to have one of the most interesting things about Marathon in it (that being its lore) while also being very hard to get into thanks to people treating that kind of game as a massive sweat-fest, but also suddenly lay off a bunch of employees (when previously they had a good track record of treating employees decently...) due to Square Enix levels of profit overestimations of Lightfall, the BEST SELLING DESTINY EXPANSION EVER only getting 45% of the expected sales. Because why be realistic, right? Just fuck over employees, that certainly won't hurt us in the end!

The fact that, despite ALL OF THIS and my moral convictions against the shitty nature of this stuff, my dumbass brain still wants me to just spend spend spend on it anyway because of how much of a special interest Halo & the Bungie lore are to me - it almost hurts. I generally prefer fantasy stuff, but I can't stop myself from loving the lore and stories associated with this stuff. I have to fight myself every goddamn time I have money to not fall into the traps. It's easier with Destiny - I uninstalled it, replaced my PvE needs with Warframe and Risk of Rain 2, replaced my PvP needs with Halo Infinite, and just keep up with the story from a distance. But now that Halo Infinite is back in my life? I love the gameplay, hell I'd go as far as to say it has some of the strongest gameplay in the series (though some modes could use a bit more work, for example the Infection mode just isn't as fun as the Infection from Halo Reach), but the monetization just... AAAARGH it hurts me that I want to spend on it, both for customization and to have little goals to work towards in the (thankfully well-implemented due to them being available eternally) battle passes.

I just want to be able to love something that's been so central to me for so long - I played a cracked version of the CE PC demo for countless hours growing up, to the point that to this day I know the mission Silent Cartographer back to front from memory & could do it in my sleep, and associate Blood Gulch with countless memories of Halo's multiplayer from how often I'd play it with my sister, and to add onto all of that Halo Reach is one of my favorite games ever made, period - without caveats and moral hangups. I just want to love something without justifying it every time I think of it, both to myself and others.

I know this is a massively first-world issue, having the luxury to whine about my Favorite Things going through years and years of getting fucked by their own successes driving them into corporatism, but it still sucks. Obviously not as much as other issues both myself and others deal with, and DEFINITELY not as much as the horrible shit people are enduring in several parts of the world, but just enough for me to want/need to vent about how much corporations like to shit on the little rays of sunshine that we use to feel better about life.

[jennathearcher]

I was tagged by the always wonderful @gellavonhamster to post four characters that make me go "my man, my man, my man!!"

(I've done an images-only version of this post previously, but I'm thrilled to elaborate on WHY I adore said characters here :P)

Jonathan Sims (The Magnus Archives)

(fanart credit here)

How do I begin to explain Jonathan Archivist? He's flawless :P In all seriousness, Jon is legit one of the best, most complex characters I've ever seen in media, and perhaps one of the first characters to ever make me go "THAT ONE. MINE." XD

The best part is when I first started listening to the podcast, and didn't really know WHERE it was going to go or how big the story was going to become, I had s1 Jon who is kind of an asshole and I was SO frustrated by his skepticism CONSTANTLY XD then the end of s1 rolls around, s2 illustrates a character arc that encapsulates the immediate aftermath of a severe trauma SO well, and by the end of s2, I had my ".....oh. Oh no" moment :P

Jon spends pretty much the rest of the series just GOING THROUGH IT in one way or another, and pretty consistently going "This is fine" about all of it even though he is Very Not Fine :P I want to just wrap this man in a big cozy blanket and TAKE CARE OF HIM. Because Jon goes through so much of his whole storyline.....essentially ALONE and it DRIVES ME BONKERS XD There's a point in this series where Jon has pretty much lost every friend he's ever had and it is HEARTBREAKING.

But also, his transformation throughout the series :P I don't want to go into TOO much detail here for spoiler reasons, but god. Jon has moments especially in the latter half of the series where he is SCARY. HE IS POWERFUL. AND HE IS GODDAMN SEXY :P (my bestie likes to listen to s5 episodes with me and laugh maniacally over me Losing My Shit from sheer simp-itude XD)

Also, bonus points for being a Canon Asexual 8D like me!! <3

Johnny Silverhand (Cyberpunk 2077)

Oh, Johnny, Johnny <3 I pretty much went into this game knowing he was gonna steal my heart, but even then, I was utterly unprepared for just how attached I would become :3

A lot of that is due to playing as a POV character that you essentially craft yourself from the ground up -- prime real estate for a self insert lover like myself XD And despite there being a myriad of colorful characters in the world of Cyberpunk, four of which you can romance, everyone can pretty much agree that Johnny is by far the most important character to the PC, who has the placeholder moniker of V.

The basics of the game's story are that your character, V, is a mercenary in the postapocalyptic world of 2077, and they are betrayed and nearly killed by one of their clients -- their life only being saved due to the presence of a chip they installed in their head during a job, without realizing said chip contained, essentially, the soul of Johnny Silverhand; a rock star turned terrorist who died in 2023.

The main plot of the game focuses on V's attempts to stabilize Johnny's presence in their brain, before the chip eventually overwrites their consciousness and kills them. A lot of that depends on the player's interactions with Johnny throughout the game, but as you can imagine, literally sharing a brain and body with someone can be quite the bonding experience :P

Especially because Johnny is a MESS. He's an alcoholic and drug addict who hides his supreme self-loathing behind a seemingly massive ego -- who talks a big game about his hatred of capitalism but in reality blew up the biggest conglomerate in the city because his girlfriend died (and it was his fault) and he doesn't know how to deal with his feelings.

The moments in the game when Johnny actually opens up to V are CAPTIVATING, certainly in part due to a masterful performance from Keanu Reeves :P This is one of those games that just grabs you with its immersion, and got me genuinely emotional several times during my first playthrough. (One day, I'll get the chance to play it again :P one day XD)

Plus there's also the aspect of building my own personal canon for my V and her relationship with Johnny, and all that adds up to holding a very special place in my heart :3

Gale Dekarios (Baldur's Gate 3)

I. LOVE. THIS. STUPID. WIZARD. SO. DAMN. MUCH.

Of course I jumped onto the BG3 train for Astarion and ended up falling head-over for the character I most commonly heard referred to as annoying :P

A dorky wizard you say? Who's highly autistic coded? Loves books and his cat? Strongly implied to be an abuse survivor at the hands of an older female partner? AND HE'S SUICIDAL??? I didn't stand a fucking chance :P

I just love listening to him talk so much XD and thank god because he never shuts up :P Nothing like a guy who thinks he's the smartest man in the room who is, IN FACT, very very dumb <3

And lest we forget if you keep him around until the third act of the game, he decides his new coping mechanism is SEEKING GODLY POWER like babe please calm down XD

I've done pretty much all of his possible endings so far outside of doing his origin run (aka playing through the whole game as him), and I just. LOVE HIM SO MUCH <3 I'm excited to romance him again, especially since I missed out on stuff the first time XD Every time I start a new playthrough I end up half-romancing him anyway because I CAN'T HELP MYSELF :P ultimately breaking my own heart when I have to commit to the character I originally set out to romance in the first place XD and he's always the first companion I get to the Exceptional approval level :3

that's my emotional support wizard :P and I WILL make him useful by juicing him up with all the good spells, thank you VERY MUCH XD

Black Leg Sanji (One Piece)

You all knew this was coming :P

Hey, you ever casually look at a fun pirate manga here and there as a teenager without ever really getting into it, but you know EXACTLY which character would be your fave and just kinda tuck that away in the back of your mind?

And then some odd years later, that manga gets adapted into an extremely successful and astonishingly well made live action Netflix series that is much more accessible to you than the source material?

And THEN that gets you engaging with more and more of the source material's fan content until you still haven't even watched the anime proper yet and somehow THIS has happened to you??

Anyway moral of the story is that your first instinct as to what character is going to be your favorite it always right no matter what :P OH MY GOD WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO ME

I just. Love him SO MUCH.

He cooks. He fights by KICKING PEOPLE REALLY HARD. Like SO hard. Hard enough that he can SHATTER CONCRETE WALLS??? WITH HIS HANDS IN HIS POCKETS LIKE HE'S ORANGE CASSIDY.

He smokes CONSTANTLY. He's ALWAYS associated with fire. He LIGHTS HIMSELF ON FIRE FOR COMBAT PURPOSES. And yet he has the most water elemental oriented soul I've EVER SEEN. (and CHRIST HOW IS HE SO FUCKING SHREDDED--)

He's 80% Leg. His EYEBROWS do the fucking THING. He's FRENCH. The extent of his post-timeskip transformation is PARTING HIS HAIR DIFFERENTLY. His name is a PUN. He is AN IDIOT and also SO SMART. He has to have 17 karmic punishments from the narrative before we ever get to his tragic backstory. His adoptive dad ate his own foot.

He's a Hopeless Romantic. He COMPLETELY FORGETS HOW TO ACT every time he so much as Sees A Woman at thirty paces. He gets so many comedic anime nosebleeds that it becomes A PLOT POINT. He has a CODE OF CHIVALRY that actually makes sense kind of (especially once you know his tragic backstory).

Lest we forget to mention that he's part of a FOUND FAMILY!!!! He has SO much love to give and his love language is all of them :P A different one for each person on the crew, as far as I can tell. With Zoro it's "the only person who's allowed to kill you is me, dammit" XD

ALSO!!!!! COME TO FIND OUT HE'S AN ACTUAL FUCKING PRINCE THAT'S JUST CASUALLY THROWN OUT THERE I JUST FLDKJAFLKDAFJLDSAF

I just. Husband Material. HUSBAND. I wanna lock that shit down SO BAD. I'm AS OBSESSED WITH HIM as he is with EVERYONE ELSE and by god I am making it the problem of all of my followers :P

~

tagging (with no pressure) @pink-cenobite @talesfromthecrypts @piratespencil @thebarefootking @damngoodbabysiitter @lady-phasma and anyone else who wants to do the thing!! <3

[bossyuri]

Ima put my random thoughts about SRV in here! It probably won't make much sense but wtv sdfsg

again I haven't placed the last building or conquered the whole map yet, as context, but i did finish the main story aside from that.

So ima start of with thoughts while disregarding how the bugs affected the experience!

Overall, I had a good time! I really enjoyed it. I love the new crew. I loved the focus on friendship. I'd say the story overall is nothing really special though, which I don't think is necesserily a bad thing. Sometimes a chill story packaged in a fun game is good ya know.

I loved finding out bits and pieces about our friends through dialogue, I think that was great, and I really liked that it felt like a solid friend group. Modern Yuri (as I like to colloqually call him lmao) is so much more mellow from having a good support system early on lol. But he's still got some Classic Yuri in him.

The rival gangs I think that thematically, visually, their music and stuff, they were great. I liked them a lot, they had good contrast, their music when you fight them rules. I do think that they were a little underused in the actual story though so they don't quite leave the impact that say, the Syndicate did. The threat they posed felt more theorical than anything you actually see. Again not the worst thing, but I feel like they could've used a bit more time to be more present. (I did like how the Panteros stuff ended because it tied in with other things later though!). Like I think in particular that the collective could have been used a lot more.

That said I did play with looong months-long break for the first quarter of the game so idk how that affected my impression. And the last few missions I think were really, really cool, I really liked them! But I felt like the middle parts after a certain point weren't quite as memorable.

But I don't think it was bad! And the game isn't quite over yet, so I'm looking forward to what's to come.

Also I did like how narratively the game tries to give you a nice fantasy release from a lot of real life issues. I'm sure many people at Volition had to face these frustrations in their lives and it felt like. relatable yknow.

Now though.....so I work in game QA, going on my 7th year, and the game released in....really an unnacceptable state, which was really a bummer and really harmed it. I don't blame the devs. Devs want to give us good games. But they don't control release dates.

and they did not control covid. I know a lot people see covid as an "excuse" to fuck up games but trust me as someone who was working in the industry through it all, it absolutely messed up a *lot* of stuff that you may never know about. My setup from home is still not ideal. And thats not even getting into employee burnout but anyway-

I've had crashes to desktop, blockers in missions (regularly), broken multiplayer (tho i havent had a chance to test it again after patches) needing full game restarts for a variety of reasons (clothes broken, face broken, world stopped populating, quest blocked...) the clothes system still breaks for me after so many months after release (thought its a lot better. i dont fear the stores as much anymore lol). I don't know if it's a quirk of the PC version, but it would have been so much more of a good experience if they had had the time to polish the game more before release. Lots of gamers don't have much patience for this kinda shit, and it's a shame for a game that has a lot of love put into it.

But they're still patching the game, and the QOL changes that they keep adding are really good. The game is a lot more stable for me too so I will definitely keep playing, and I'm hoping that my mental state will allow me to make some fun content from it. I'm still kinda hoping for a steam release sometime so I might get to replay the story again if that happens. Because taking screenshots on epic is a goddamn pain.

So huh anyway. I don't think anyone cares that much but if you've read that far thank you! And also thanks for sticking around with me for so long despite my dropping off the face of the earth in a depression spiral. But I'm still around and Yuri is still around. And Saints Row V is fun!

[carterashofficial]

I need to vent for a hot moment about my usually fantastic boyfriend

So. Tonight I make dinner. My boyfriend knows I love to cook. His father has been living with us since April (don’t even get me started but I am ready for him to move out)

I make Tacos b/c Taco Tuesday. I’ve got a chicken breast the size of Rhode Island (thanks Costco), beans, rice, cheese, tortillas, cilantro, a whole onion. I go all out. My big frypan is full of onion and chicken. Like 2lbs of this shit. Can of beans boiling on the stove with cumin and salt. I add cilantro and lime to my rice.

When I say that this could’ve fed like 6 people, I mean it. 6 people with 2 tacos made of 10” tortillas, and it would be fine. I have 2 tacos. Boyfriend has 3? His father, I’m not sure, I’m going to assume 3. Point is, a decent amount of chicken and beans were left over, certainly enough for my lunch tomorrow and maybe the day after.

I tell both of these dudes that in an hour, during break time for my group video game night, I will pack up the leftovers for my lunch tomorrow. Both make sounds of acknowledgement.

Break time comes.

There are no beans or chicken left. I ask where it all went, because boyfriend’s father sometimes packs up the leftovers.

Boyfriend says his dad asked if he could eat the rest, and boyfriend said yes.

I tell them both that I literally had said that I was going to pack it up for my lunch. Boyfriend says he can cook more chicken. Or do something with the 1/4 cup rice left.

Dear reader, this man can build a high level gaming PC or decently play a song on a guitar. His skills do not lay in cooking unless someone (me) is there to keep him from stabbing himself with a paring knife, or he has a YouTube video open to follow along; and even then I’m still nearby b/c he will ask “is this okay?” Or “is this mixed enough together”. I love him. Cooking is not his strong suit, but he can make a nice grilled cheese or scrambled eggs.

So I do not trust my boyfriend to cut up another Rhode-Island chicken tit with a paring knife. We have no beans. The rice has been sitting out for an hour and is slightly crunchy.

I’m pissed. I spent an hour making dinner and I can’t even take any leftovers for lunch, which I definitely made enough to do.

Boyfriend is mad that I’m upset b/c I have to cook again. It’s that or I spend $ on takeout for lunch tomorrow and I don’t want to do that. I wanted my taco salad.

Boyfriend offers to tell his dad to go get me something I can take tomorrow. Obviously it would be takeout b/c his dad can’t cook either. I don’t want takeout.

So.

I’m pissed and cooking again at 9 at night.

Boyfriend is upset b/c I’m pissed.

And his dad is snoring on my couch and I want to scream b/c it’s been 5 goddamn months of him living here and he can’t go somewhere else.

[bainhardt]

Pokemon SV thoughts: tumblr exclusive dlc version sorry this is so long but too bad lol

I got to the credits tonight and to be honest, I feel like I have way too much to say about SV, but that'd be kind of exhausting, so I'll try to keep it to broad strokes. It reminded me a lot of Legends Arceus: I had my share of fun, but I have numerous complaints as well.

First, if what people are tired and cynical about is Game Freak's supposed lack of "innovation," I feel this game is proof that they are finally coming around to trying new ideas. This and LA are the freshest the franchise has been in decades. But new ideas take a lot of refining.

The most fun aspect was exploration. It's legitimately awesome to simply wander, see Pokemon, and catch Pokemon, and you can go basically anywhere you want from the word “Go.” I remember wanting far more out of the exploration in Legends Arceus, and I was relieved to find when playing SV that it felt much closer to what I had envisioned for the concept. This is a big step forward in terms of freedom (and the region is pretty cool, which helps).

But the battling is the same as always (even with the new gimmick), the gyms are the same, the E4 is the same. If the core gameplay loop has grown old for you, there won't be much to win you over; you can do these battles in any order you like, but they're still just... battles.

Add on top of that this game has... a LOT of cutscenes, and it can really drag just trying to get things done so you can progress and become stronger. Story is always subjective, but if you're not invested in the plotlines, you are NOT going to enjoy the pacing (I didn't).

Despite that, the "endgame zone" so to speak is probably the single coolest thing I've seen in a Pokemon game to date. idk that I'd say it makes up for the first portions, but I did start to enjoy the story in the back half. imo the coolest villain/plan segment in the franchise.

Lastly, this game runs like shit. This is THE worst technical showcase of any game I've played on my Switch, bar none. I'm not talking your occasional slowdown or something - this is literally a game that spends more time chugging and breaking than not.

It really brings the entire experience down to know this was a game that was willing to put the work in with its ideas and ambition, only to be held back by hardware limitations and likely development problems (three Pokemon games in a year, all felt crunched and unpolished). I honestly feel like now that the fanbase at large has gotten their hands on gen 9, just about anyone would’ve been willing to give up BDSP and Arceus if it meant this game got the time and resources it really needed. But that problem rings true for any one of them; all three of these games needed more work than they got in the end. Not one of them has felt truly complete when compared to SWSH.

Anyway, all I really had left in terms of complaints are minor ones, but man, I had about a thousand. You can't turn move animations off, you can't L=A mode, there's no Battle Style Shift or Set option, the Pokedex and Bag don't remember where your cursor left off in between uses, the PC box takes forever to load each page, you can’t change to the All Boxes view while holding a Pokemon, the summary screens work differently between the PC and the Party screen, the Bag and Pokedex have no fast scroll buttons, the sandwich recipe menu has a favorite button but then no way to filter by favorites, each time you use an item on a Pokemon it deselects that item and makes you select it again... you get the idea. Many people don’t notice things like this, but for me they’re like pebbles in my shoe, and holy shit - this game was like walking on goddamn gravel.

If this game worked as intended, it would very probably rank the best in the franchise like, unanimously. For a lot of players, it likely still will be. But to me, it's hard to recommend a game that feels this broken, that feels this slapdash when I know they can make them better.

Also, I never tend to include this as part of my actual review’s parameters, but I liked a lot of new Pokemon (most since like gen 5 maybe) and thought a lot of new abilities/moves/battle stuff was really creative. This was the first game I can remember in years where I actually used a team of nothing but new guys, and a full team of six at that. But there's also some truly batshit insane powercreep stuff that's looking to make competitive a nightmare (getting my predictions in early). Continuing the post-3D trend, practically every new Pokemon has a signature move, signature ability, or both, and holy fuck some of the new moves are unbelievable. And the two box legendaries have some Calyrex-ass double down abilities that are sure to make the restricted format full of them. Ugh.

Another thing I felt even before the game came out and after playing still feel is: I really hate the approach to graphical presentation and how that factored into the designs and appearances of the human characters. It’s admirable that they’re trying to add more detail to the Pokemon with texture and lighting, but the people in this game look properly fucking weird to me. The clothes are textured to look more real, the hair is attempting a realistic texture with like visible strands (although it does look pretty shoddy)... but then the skin and faces are still giant plasticy anime-style deals. It reminded me a lot of fashion dolls. Just kind of uncanny, you know?

And personally, I don’t even want the graphics to be more realistic at the end of the day; Pokemon is supposed to be cartoony, and I think this bizarre middle ground only hurts the style in a lot of ways more than it improves it. The trainers and NPCs at large suffer from this lack of cartoonishness, and I feel like the entire world’s color and vitality gets brought down a level from generations past. Yes, the gym leaders still manage some good and a couple great designs; yes, the Star leaders are probably the best designs in the game. But virtually everyone else in the game look like “boring human in clothes.” Battling what few trainers I did, it felt hard to believe this is the same franchise that used to have unique Youngsters, Lasses, Beauties, Fishermen, Hikers, Ace Trainers, Battle Girls and Black Belts, where everyone from business people to scientists to janitors to students and their teachers had memorable and new appearances each generation. Looking at this game, the notion that we could see a repeat of what happened to XY’s Hex Maniac, for example, was laughable. They really put all their eggs into one basket with the main cast, which I think is a significant step backwards.

The actual, real, final thing I can remember to say at this time was that I felt the gym/E4′s use of Terastallization was poor and a huge missed opportunity. Each gym, the leader uses a random ace that they Tera into their gym’s type, which only serves to make the battles as much of a sweep as always if the player is sufficiently prepared. When wiping the Water gym leader with my Electric type, I actually paused for a second when seeing his final Pokemon was Crabominable. I thought “huh, now I don’t have a great move for this, do I switch out to-” before remembering he was, of course, going to change it to a Water type like everything else and I could finish the battle with no more trouble than before.

To me, the better way to handle this and introduce the depth and possibilities of the mechanic is to have each leader’s ace still be a Pokemon of their type, which they Tera into something different and unexpected, reflecting the way it will work in real battles with other players. This also serves to showcase a range of basic strategic choices for each type players could choose to use in their own teams. The only leader that felt close to this was Iono, Terastallizing a Mismagius into Electric so as to have no weaknesses with Levitate. Giving her something like a Volt Absorb Pokemon to Tera into Flying or Water and negate a weakness wouldn’t have been as “strong,” but I feel it would’ve been more thematically appropriate while requiring players to actually vary their approach a little more.

[riflebrass]

There's a guy I know and I absolutely will NOT shut the fuck up about him. I realize this guy doesn't represent ALL welfare recipients but goddamn if this guy isn't the poster child of what Republicans act like welfare whores are like. The kicker is that this dude is a hardcore Republican himself who constantly bitches about socialism and communism with zero awareness of how much of a hypocrite this guy is.

This guy has Attention Deficit Disorder. I won't say he's "normal". He needs accommodations for work, specifically he needs someone working with him to keep him on task. When someone is on his ass he's a solid worker.

Examples of reasons he's lost jobs: 1. He abandoned his station to give new employees a tour of the facility. They missed their orientation and paperwork. He did this THREE times before they fired him because he never learned his lesson.

2. For the first week of his job he was anywhere between 30 minutes and 2 HOURS late every single day. He shrugged it off because nobody notices if he isn't there. (they noticed)

3. One job he just didn't bother showing up for a week. Never called out, just did nothing. It was an intense job that required him to eat a lot of food to keep his energy up. His foodstamps ran out and he didn't want to use the money from his wages to buy food because he was trying to save up for a gaming PC.

4. Making inappropriate comments about teenage coworkers loud enough for EVERYONE in the kitchen to hear him.

5. Quit a job on the spot because he found out he got a new one. Turned out he DIDN'T get a job, it was just an interview and he bombed it horribly. After that embarrassing fuck up he went back to his previous job and tried to clock in pretending that he never quit. His supervisor told him to get the fuck out.

But this guy is on social security for it. His first hearing for social security the judge told him if he got any work while on SS it would have to be menial stuff like sweeping floors. So he mouthed off to the judge saying he was fully capable of working just fine. The judge denied him his SS. He appealed it and eventually won.

Now he gets a shit ton of money every month from Social Security. On top of that he lives in low income housing so he said his rent is like $100 or something. He gets $300 a month for food stamps. On top of all of that he gets free health insurance through the state. All because he's scatter brained and makes a ton of really bad life choices.

While he constantly bitches about communism he has the balls to tell me he's further ahead in life than I am. Here I am working some dead end job and living with a roommate while HE thinks he's a self made man. He lives by himself. He gets money to pay all his bills. He swears up and down that he earned that money himself because he pays taxes. I'm pretty sure one month's SS check is more than he's paid in taxes his entire life. But he's convinced he's earned this money because his parents failed to raise him to be a functioning adult like the rest of us.

not enough people understand that disability benefits are basically what it would look like if you turned "if you're too sick for school you're too sick for video games" into an official public policy

[angrelysimpping]

Off Screen

Written April 3, 2024

Shout out to the talented, sweet, n hampsom 💜@inkyquince 💜 for the amazing vtm game and who made Tekli and Luka (and Rada, who is more connected to Necro's PC yet here she fucking is because I'm a silly billy >m<) (and Ifan who is connected more to Benji than Andi yet here we are)(and Sigvar, who is also more connected to Necro's PC uh)

Contents: talk of curses and ghosts; suicidal ideation and planed scuicide; unreliable narrator; dry humping; some cum eating; briefly implied sex work; biting; some mild blood and blood drinking

Words: 1,813

The boat was…eventful. Yes, that's the word he'd use, eventful. Better for keeping the spirits up. 

Eventful. 

God, he couldn't wait to get to Russia. Luka would finally be safe, they'd be-

Tekli. Tekli might be there. That's why he'd chosen this boat, in the end. He'd seen the letters, saw she might be held up in Russia. So close. So goddamn close. He just had to actually make it there. 

Not die first. 

Would he die first?

His chest still ached where the spirit, Rada, had touched him. Cursed him. 

He'd been so fucking stupid. But, hey, maybe something good would come of it? He could only hope as he trudged back to his rooms, lingering cold of the Shadow Lands still clinging to him. Funnily enough, it was almost comforting. The same constant ache that lingered in his fingers during winters, the same numbness deep in his bones that'd been the only thing keeping him from falling apart when he found himself alone. 

Alone. He always ended up alone, one way or another. 

It'd be a blessing to die. He wouldn't be alone then, would he?

The ship buckles under him, lights dimming and colors failing. Only a second, a blink of an eye, and everything is right again. 

Or would he go there? To the Shadow Lands? His family wouldn't be there, would they? He can't see Mir past the serious six year old boy fascinated with insects. Can't fathom Rzepka other than a sweet nine year old, dirt smeared across her cheek from gardening. And Polina? Whatever had happened in death, she wouldn't end up somewhere like…like the Shadow Lands, would she?

Alone, then? Alone even in death? Or, stuck hunted? Spirits like Rada chasing him down. Rada herself after him? A special hell he’d never conceptualized before?

He didn't particularly want to find out. Though, if the world kept sliding around him, out from under him, he'd have to get used to that place, sooner or later. 

Andrzej is careful not to make too much noise as he slips into his rooms. Even as sleep calls to him, he takes time to make sure the door is barricaded. 

Shuffling into his room, Andrzej changes into his sleeping clothes before pausing, looking at his rumpled bed. He'd dozed there for a bit while Luka had read and it'd been fine, comfortable. A good enough bed, better than others he'd slept on. Yet, he turns, walking back out into the shared room before crossing over to Luka's. 

The man is sound asleep, and there's a pang in Andrzej’s chest. 

God, he'd dragged Luka into a mess. Maybe he should've left him in Italy. Or not snuck him from the brothel- no. 

He's gone down that line of thought too often. If he didn't offer Luka a way out of the brothel, he would've been killed. He was sure of it. But, maybe death would've been better. Isn't that what he himself was chasing, after all? His own death?

If that’s what would've been granted to Luka, that is. Who knows what could have happened, really? Some all knowing God, maybe? Not him, though. No, if anything was proven tonight it was that he didn't know shit. 

He couldn't even find Luka a safer place to sleep. 

Do you see me as a protector, Andrzej? 

Throat constricting, lip curling, he has to fight off the urge to scream. A protector? A protector? He'd met Ifan twice and he seemed trustworthy enough but…but he knew her. He knew Tekli. Sigvar and Ifan had been there, they said, when she ghouled him. And he can't remember, he can't fucking remember. 

He'd rather cut out his own tongue than claim he thought of anyone in that sense. Yet, he might just do it if it'd secured Luka a safe place to sleep away the day. 

A protector? When was the last time Andrzej felt protected in any sense? 

And he knows the answer. Even as his own impending death bounces around his brain, Andrzej lets himself forget for a moment, dropping into bed with Luka. 

He'd meant to find a way to hide Luka away on the boat, and he'd been cursed instead. 

Maybe that's the tipping point. Maybe that's the reason a few stray tears escape the corners of his eyes, wetting Luka's hair. As the smaller man presses against him, nuzzling his face into the crook of Andrzej’s neck, what little resistance he had to becoming attached to Luka dissolves. 

Andrzej tugs off his ever present gloves, worn leather hitting the floor as he tosses them irregardless of where they fall. His hands slip under Luka’s shirt, drag the fabric up as his hands splay over smooth skin. A desperate bid to be even closer to the sleeping man that works. Even though Luka is a thinblood, dead yet not and lacking a mortal's warmth, the shards of ice lingering in Andrzej’s marrow seemed to melt away. 

“Sweet dreams, Lukasha.” He mumbles the words directly into Luka’s hair as he presses a soft kiss to the dark locks. “I’m so, so sorry.”

-

There’s a hardness pressed against his thigh.

It’s the first thing Andrzej becomes aware of as he wakes, momentary worry that he’d pulled a knife or stake in his sleep. But, that’s not what he finds. 

Luka is curled against him, and Andrzej can’t help the way his heart stutters at the sight. Dark lashes and freckled cheeks, so close he could count them if he wanted. And right next to him, still in his arms, hands still spread over his back and keeping him close. 

It’s as Luka’s dark eyes blink open, still bleary from sleep, that he registers what actually woke him. 

Luka seems to notice it at the same time as him, eyes going wide and face burning as he yelps, trying to pull away. Trying to hide the erection poking into Andrzej’s thigh. 

He can’t though. He can’t pull away when Andrzej is still holding him close, eyes wide as Luka inadvertently grinds against him. 

And, interestingly enough, his own cock answers with interest, slowly growing hard as Luka moves. 

“S-sorry.” Luka’s voice is choked, shaking as he speaks. “I-I don’t…” He trails off as Andrzej continues to stare at where their bodies meet, slowly lifting his leg to press a strong thigh against Luka’s cock. 

When was the last time he wanted this? Actually wanted? Not the itching, burning need brought on by the blood, the vitae? 

“Do you…” Andrzej’s mismatched eyes meet Luka’s. “Do you want me to, uh, take care of that?”

He didn’t think Luka could blush any darker, but he’s proven wrong as the Italian tries to register what he was just asked. 

“I-I…want,” he manages to get out, barely above a whisper, “want to…if you wanna.”

Andrzej groans, deep in the back of his throat, as he presses forward, brushing his lips right over the beauty mark on the other man’s collar bone. “If you want me to, I will, Lukasha.”

Luka isn’t graceful by any measure as he shifts, movements still blunt and clumsy by sleep as he slides on top. Not that it matters to Andrzej, his breath catching in his throat as Luka settles himself. His hands slide down, over Luka’s sides and making him shiver, before resting on the smaller man’s hips. 

The first movement is hesitant, experimental. Beyond perfect. 

Sparks shoot down Andrzej’s spine as Luka rocks forward. If he wasn’t already fully hard, he is now as Luka lets out a small, high pitched mewling sound. That seems to be some kind of trigger for the thinblood as he nearly collapses forward to tuck his face into Andrzej’s neck, humping their clothed cocks together in earnest. 

Andrzej helps him move as best he can, fingers digging into hip as the muscles flex under his palms. Each desperate movement pulls another sweet sound from Luka’s lips, and Andrzej revels in each and every one. With the way Luka is hunched over, he has unlimited access to an expanse of slender shoulder. It’d be a sin not to take advantage of such a blessing. 

Maybe he should’ve asked first, seeing as what they are, but Luka doesn’t seem to mind when Andrzej starts nipping and sucking at his exposed shoulder. In fact, his noises get louder, his movements more fervent as Andrzej bites and kisses, uncaring if he leaves any marks that might be visible once they left the sanctuary of their rooms. 

It’s greedy, but Andrzej has been in want for so long he doesn’t think of it. He bucks up, throwing off Luka’s rhythm and making the man squeal. He chuckles even as fingers dig into his shoulder, into his ribs. He bucks up again, tight grip on Luka’s hips keeping him firmly in place. It does exactly what Andrzej wanted, another cute sound escaping Luka's throat.

So, he keeps going. 

Luka’s mouth latches onto the joint between his shoulder and neck, hanging onto Andrzej for dear life even if the ghoul’s hold on his hips kept him safely in place. 

It’s with one of Andrzej’s rough jerks up that he makes the mistake. He’s still giving Luka’s shoulder the occasionally lick, kiss, nip, and his canine catches. Copper tang spreads over his tongue, metallic and sweet.

Luka whines, shivering, as Andrzej’s hot tongue instinctively laps up the spilt blood.

And Andrzej freezes, chest heaving and eyes wide.

Fuck. Fuck. Had he hurt Luka? He wasn’t sure. He’s still hard but that didn’t matter. Nothing else would. Luka was the one person he didn’t want to hurt and if he had-

A warm wetness seeps into his clothes.

Cum.

Luka had cum. 

Not hurt. No. The opposite. 

Luka leans back, looking down at Andrzej. His dark eyes are glazed over, somehow softer looking than ever as he slips a hand under Andrzej’s clothes. The hand is cool compared to his burning skin, a welcome change. 

He can’t look away from Luka as he starts to jerk him off. His mind empties. Maybe the first time in a long time as he gazes into the endless depths of Luka’s eyes. It’s on pure instinct, complete auto pilot, as he dips his fingers under Luka’s clothes. Collects some of the spent cum on his thumb. Pops the digit into his mouth, licking it clean. Finally breaking eye contact as his lids shut in pure pleasure, salt and copper across his tongue. 

His hand drops, gripping onto Luka’s thigh as Luka lurches forward, pressing their lips together in a quick kiss. 

“Lukasha.” 

A gasp of his name against his lips as Andrzej reaches his end, spilling into Luka’s hand. 

They stay like that for a moment, close and breathing heavy before Andrzej smiles, sitting up, Luka sprawling in his lap. “Come on, Lukallini. Let’s get cleaned up.”

[punishedsurge]

SBFC 001: This is Gonna be Terrible. [08/13/13]

1hr 12min runtime, respectable.

“TheSw1tcher” man…

Rustlemania and LoU this year on the channel, awesome.

Dragon’s Crown talk. [Still haven’t played it.]

Wonderful 101 demo talk, haven’t played it either. “WiiU is a Platinum Box.” They wonder why games are developed to need the big gamepad. [I mean of course Nintendo wanted devs to utilize it.]

Matt: I bought a brick with a screen, it’s called a Vita.

Pat: Woolie, you’re the only person without that particular brick!

Woolie: This is the worst peer pressure ever.

Matt talks about the vita making his hands cramp and ache, says meaty man hands are to blame. [I agree, mobile gaming ergonomics still suck.]

Guacamelee talk. [Haven’t played this either.]

Divekick talk, [Me no play.]

Liam: AoT and Free are the best anime ever. Free has well developed characters and abs.

Smt 4 talk.

Pat: It’s not like Persona. That would be like saying Darkstalkers is like SF because they’re 2D fighters by Capcom.

Project CrossZone talk. [No play dis either nope nope nope. They all dropped it eventually for being too long and not seeing characters they like.]

“Visual Sex Game” Ghost Song kickstarter talk. [It hit it’s funding but didn’t get released until 2022?! What the fuck.]

Shitting on Shadows of the Eternals. [CP charges dropped on someone in the dev team in between kickstarter campaigns. Oof.]

Project Phonenix talk. The various titles and IPs the team had worked on screams that the game is too good to be true. [And it was. This shit died with zero fanfare lmao.]

Pat: Diablo 3 is a weird game because it’s so good and one decision fucking ruined it (the auction house). [Sounds kind of like Diablo 4 tee-hee lol.]

Yatagarasu kickstarter talk. Bunch of small Japanese fite game devs came together for this kickstarter. Matt and Pat had issues with the characters, Matt for their designs and Pat for half the cast being palette swaps. [Max made a video about this too.]

Project Awakened mention. Matt is glad it’s kickstarter failed because it looked like shit. Looking at it, it’s hard to argue against him. [They confuse the name with “Project Awakening”, a much newer game that looks like a more generic FF16.]

Infamous and Prototype talk.

Woolie: Second Son is the first one that looks interesting.

Liam: I played Festival of Blood, that one was good.

Woolie and Pat both like Prototype more.

Pat: Infamous clearly had better production and gameplay, with more thought put into it— but you run faster in Prototype, so I’ll play that one.

Atlas sale. Index Corporation turned out to be fucky-wucky and stopped existing because of bankruptcy. The entire company is up for sale, Sega is offering 201 million dollars for the company.

Pat doesn’t like it because Sega’s output sucks, which even then wasn’t all that true. But he’s right about them axing Sega USA after bad business practices which lead to a lot of games not coming to America, except for European PC games? Idk sure I guess.

Woolie doesn’t like Sega because they ‘mistreated Platinum.’ Name a more overrated game developer (I still like their old games)

Liam accurately describes Sega’s plan for Atlus, “let them cook”, basically. He also argues there’s a huge market for Persona in the West.

Pat: Persona and SMT have a larger market out here than Yakuza ever had. [I feel Yakuza is a lot more popular than Persona nowadays, but idk]

Pat tells Liam to shut the fuck up about his desire for Project Diva to come out, he punches back by asking when Streets of Rage 4 is coming out. Pat responds with “Never”. [It finally came out in 2020, I dunno if he played it or like it.]

SALTY BET MENTIONED GODDAMN I FORGOT. [It’s still going to this day, I looked it up on Twitch and it had 300+ viewers.]

Discussion about pot splitting and collusion in the FGC. “Spooky is going nutssss” is dropped. The boys also shame players who did it. [One of the guilty is Justin Wong, one of Matt’s co-hosts on Triple K.O.]

MATT WATCH: One of the people he’s ’stalking’ is Bryan Singer for his return to the X-Men movie series with Days of Future Past, after going to a talk with the director he thinks he’s a cool enough guy.

[Dude has had sexual harassment/assault allegations since 1997, definitely not cool lmao. Pre-MeToo era Hollywood really protected shitty people, still do.]

Outro is that dope KI sample by Mick Gordon. So much better than the choice to let Woolie put on 144p songs at the end.

[multiplayingorg]

Dead Space 2: NOPE NOPE NOPE NOPE

| Repost: Originally posted by Steve "Slurms" Lichtsinn on January 17, 2012

OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT.... WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT THING? THE SHIT IS THAT!? BURN IT WITH FIRE!

If you know me at all, you know I buy a lot of games. You might also know that I almost never pay full price. Dark Souls and Star Wars: The Old Republic were the only games in 2011 that I did shell out top dollar for, everything else was picked up at some sort of a discount. Towards the end of the year, some of the games I bought on sale from Amazon came with promotional codes to get 5 bucks off certain games in January of this year. I didn’t really plan on using the codes seeing as they were only to be used one at a time and only on the top selling downloadable games from 2011. The list is comprised mainly of The Sims expansions and games I’ve already owned in one way or another. Oh well.

Then EA started dropping prices on a few titles on the list. Grand Theft Auto IV was the first. I’ve owned the game before, but never on the PC. The price dropped all the way to 5 dollars. After my promotional code was applied…it was free. I may never play the game, but it was free.

The same thing happened a week later, but with Dead Space 2. A game that had been getting a lot of talk on podcasts I listen to in regards to “great games from 2011.” I’m not much of a horror game type person, just as I’m not big on horror films, but again… it was free. Unlike GTA though, I figured I’d give Dead Space a shot.

I downloaded and installed the game, then attempted to play it. I immediately had an issue with the menu. For some reason if you have a device such as a flight stick or a keypad (like the Logitech G13 as was my case) it screws up the camera and makes the game unplayable. I unhooked the G13 and reinstalled the game (tried fixing it via the txt file, but it didn’t work) and then once that was done everything was hunky dory.

Since I hadn’t played the first Dead Space, I took the few minutes to watch the “Previously on Dead Space” video that was provided in the menu. I really dug that they put that in rather than trying to get you up to speed within the game. I’m sure people who DID play the first title were quite appreciative of it as well. After the video ended, I went in.

Warning: Very light spoilers about the first handful of minutes into the game ahead.

I went in expecting things to pop out at me as if I were walking through a haunted house. Scary, sure, but also somewhat lame and annoying in a way that makes me want to hurt someone. Instead I was greeted by a man interrogating me, slowly unraveling the idea that I had some important information in my brain but was being treated like a psych patient, straight-jacket and all. Then shit went south. I wake up to a man who is visibly panicked trying to wake my character up in order to get moving.

Still in a straight-jacket because my panicked friend didn’t last long after waking me up, I proceed to run down the hall as FUCKING CHAOS ensues all around me. Necromorphs (big, nasty, half human, half goddamn gross creatures) are tearing apart people and crawling out of the woodwork. Although it’s in space… so there’s really not any wood. Metalwork? Yeah, crawling out of the metalwork. I have nothing but the ability to run, so that’s what I do.

I eventually make it to a sealed office where I run into the doctor who I met in the beginning of the game. Dude. Went. Nuts. I won’t spoil what happens; apart from he gets you out of your straight-jacket and gives you a flashlight. FORESHADOWING!

I soon walk into a room that has no lights. GOOD THING I GOT THIS FLASHLIGHT! It’s then that the game starts to scare me. Say what you will about me, but I will repeat: I am not a fan of the horror genre. So I begin to make my way through this room, dead bodies laying on the ground and sitting in chairs, and I just know something is going to pop out at my defenseless ass. NOT GONNA HAPPEN. So I hit escape and quit.

Look, the graphics are really great, the controls feel awesome, and if you like horror games I suggest you give it a whirl. It’s not for me though. This isn’t to say I’ll never play it again, but never again right before bed.

Maybe on a bright spring morning or something…

with extra lights in my cloffice…

and my iPod playing KC and the Sunshine Band.