#verge review

[gowns]

ok listen i have been exposed to a lot of music theory and a lot of it has flown over my head -- i understood major and minor and etc and how to play easy chords and how to sing a pitch and all that, but any time people started talking about the circle of fifths and modalities i spaced out. i found this video last week and i was like whoa WHOOAAAAAAA holy shit... i understand now. and i printed out a big color picture of the circle of fifths and put it by my piano.

[pstelwitchcraft]

Goddamn i already knew Bells Hells animated was going to be AWESOME but after that absolute banger of an intro i am FROTHING at the mouth to see C3 fully animated in like 5-6 years

[fumifooms]

Thinking about Mithrun angst unfailingly gets me like

[tsfennec]

.

[mangosundae]

fuck this guy in particular. (screenshot credit goes to 1234567890num on The Let’s Play Archive.)

[lurkdragonstuff]

It is 2021, and there is time for Axiom Verge 2!

Ultimately I think Axiom Verge was the better game in terms of its appeal to me, personally. I felt like the story was paced better, if nothing else. That said, Axiom Verge 2 has its charms, and I was never mad at it, just kind of disappointed at where the story cuts off. I feel like I had to look up a few more solutions than I did with the first one, too, but that might be an artefact of my changing habits regarding looking things up.

Reading up on lore speculation and getting 100% map/item completion has made me appreciate it more. I also like how the fact that it makes your drone form the more fun one to explore with, what with its better movement capabilities, ties into its transhumanism themes. And I always love a good alternate realities mindfuck.

About the only complaint I have besides "wow, that was fast" re: the story is: why was this track not the title theme or at the very least included in the game somewhere instead of being relegated to a bonus track on the OST?

A remix of the first game's title theme in an Ancient Mesopotamian style, matching the new (and fantastic) direction of the music? With the same gloomy vibe? Come on!

The existing title theme is catchy, but much too cheerful, I think, and doesn't really reflect the music of the game proper, which mostly alternates between Ancient Mesopotamian/folky and NES-style chiptune.

...But anyway, I recommend it for fans of Metroidvanias and the first one. I enjoyed my time with it.

[go-against-fate]

tged social media au where its still the tged universe but the Internet exists via magic bullshit and lloyd just posts the most absurd things and never elaborate on it. He'll say words and phrases that no one (but him) understand. Would there just be a page dedicated to the things he said and people would try to decipher or find the origin to hopefully figure out the meaning. He said lol lmao a couple of times and there would be scholars trying to figure wtf that meant

And also this is a bit random but. An account thats dedicated to Lloyd, where he is, and what kind of (life changing) project hes currently working on. I feel like they would need that

[cthulhubert]

Catching the Record of Lodoss War OVAs on some channel's "animidnight" block was a formative experience for young me, and its design choices were scarred into my mind as the fundamental fantasy aesthetic. Which, uh, didn't exactly make me an odd one out anywhere because it hews closely to the ISO fantasy mold (and indeed helped make the mold).

"Record of Lodoss War" (I'm using quotes to indicate the literal phrase) is one of those odd-ball translation choices that ended up being iconic, just ever so slightly nonsensical, it stuck in the minds of kids like me that watched it young. A transliteration of the Japanese is Lodoss-tou Senki. -tou just means island; "senki" could credibly be translated as (and this may shock you) 'war record'. It's a specific term in Japanese that refers to the record an officer or attached scribe kept of the battles a military force took part in ("battle chronicle" is also a good translationand by metonymy is used for "military history"). As you might imagine, it's still popular in manga and novel names.

It started out as, not quite a novel, but a "RePlay", a record of the events of a table top RPG campaign, published in a magazine (Comptiq focused on computer games, but apparently content was content, and Lodoss got hugely popular). The mid-eighties predecessor to Critical Role, basically. It did really well, which makes sense, given that the dungeon master and the players were all published writers (the DM would publish what's called the first domestic Japanese high fantasy novels, Rune Soldier, in the same setting). It started out in D&D, but would also be played in Tunnels and Trolls and RuneQuest. In 1989, they ended up publishing their own set of rules, called Record of Lodoss War Companion, and later, Swordworld RPG (2.5edition came out in 2018!).

A series that was inspired and distilled a lot of the concepts that were and would remain popular in high fantasy settings in both Japan and America and then probably inspired another generation of iterations when the anime came back to America.

Some day maybe I'll watch the anime again, it finally got an English Blu-Ray remaster in 2017. I've read the manga and some of the novelizations in the mean time and, to be honest, they were pretty middle of the road, nostalgia notwithstanding.

Thank you for reading my ramble that was intended to be a short introduction to a short video game review.

A 2D exploration platformer with RPG elements (levels, stats, different bows and weapons to equip).

Briefly: a beautiful game. No flaws, but nothing that stands out either.

This game is beautiful. If you like the pixel aesthetic at all, I think you'll also love it. Critical hit in my visual sensibilities. It looks like Symphony of the Night looks in my nostalgia painted memories. The only note: it doesn't exactly take any risks, design wise, but if it did, that wouldn't be very true to the source material would it?

The music works.

Combat is pretty fun, if a bit easy. There are seven elements, you get wind and fire options for your basic attacks, and spells and special bows for the rest. Swapping elements changes your resistances too. The different types of weapons (long sword, knife, two-handed, spear, and throwing) offer some variety, as do the attractive designs. That said, for a melee based game like this, I prefer slightly more technical and challenging combat. Hollow Knight's a good example of my sweet spot, and Blasphemous is also well in my strike zone.

Movement is basically okay. You have to feel like a badass when you leave an after image trailing behind you. The wind element comes with the ability to hover (move slowly in mid air at up to your maximum jump height above ground or water), and they do a couple fun things with that. Other than that, it's all pretty straight-forward, which is a little disappointing.

They do some fun occasional fun puzzles with the archery.

Individual room design was fun sometimes, but the overall map design was lackluster. Yet another victim of the trend where leadership says, "Adding metroidvania tag increases sales, so do it," and design can only respond, "If we take a linear game, fold the map up in a spiral, and occasionally make you back track, that makes a fun exploration experience right?" It's been done worse but it's still not great.

This sort of game tends not to have a lot of story, but what there was was pretty good. One of those cases where the writers have a "twist" in mind, but did not intend for the player to be confused about it at all, just the character. The dramatic irony still makes the pay off satisfying.

It took me about 12 hours to 100%. It's on PC for 20$, which might be worth it. The Switch and PS4 versions are full price games, which is faintly baffling for a game so short, no matter how pretty and nostalgic.

And that's why I've shared so many words with my dash over what's ultimately a decent game; because of the anchor its series dropped in my heart in childhood.

Thank you for reading.

[moviesandmania]

THE VERGE OF DEATH (2023) Reviews of Indonesian horror

The Verge of Death is a 2023 Indonesian supernatural horror film about Nadia, the sole survivor of her family’s tragic fate, as she grapples with the looming threat of her father’s sacrifice. Plot: Nadia, who is living on the brink of death, knows that she will become a victim of her father’s sacrifice. As a result of this sacrifice, her mother tragically passed away in 2002. Ten years later,…

[crippledasinfuckyou]

my bus got cancelled and i missed my asthma review and on the way back from the bus stop I HAD A FUCKING ASTHMA ATTACK and also cried im having a great time

[lakemichigans]

current time: 4 am

[junosfilmjournal]

my review for women on the verge of a nervous breakdown (1988) dir. pedro almodóvar

when i first watched this movie, i was going through a terrible depressive episode. i couldn’t bear the thought of getting out of bed. all because a boy didn’t love me like i do him. of course, there were other things contributing to my sadness, but this boy occupied every crevice of my mind 24/7. i genuinely thought i would die because the pain i was feeling was too much.

seeing these women going through what i did, feeling what i did, it made me feel understood. every time i tried explaining to others how the situation with him made me feel, i would be told i was overreacting or making something out of nothing. i felt pepa’s desperation. i felt lucia’s anger. i felt candela’s naivety.

i recently rewatched this and i just felt so much more appreciation for it. the colors, costume + set design, the way almodóvar makes everything so lively, yet realistic. it’s the movie that made me fall in love with his art. the opening credits itself is so inspiring. also, almodóvar’s writing is refreshing. seeing women be complex and have strong personalities while the men are just cheats and liars (the hot chick). anyways, thank you, pedro, for validating my delusional ass.

[scientistredacted]

❝IT APPEARS YOU HAVE REACHED❞ ❝AN END.❞

[mmiirage]

why the fuck are pen displays so expensive ughhhhh

[emilysmovingcastle]

I shouldn’t have to write a whole paper to explain my research

I should be able to say I did it here are the results and everyone would say “yea I believe u queen”