#the story is interesting AND the gameplay slaps

[genshin-impact-updates]

Web Event "Tales of the Youkai" Now Online: Take Part to Obtain Primogems and Other Rewards

The limited-time web event "Tales of the Youkai" is now available. Let's write a light novel together!

>>Click to Take Part in Event<<

〓Event Period〓

December 21, 2022 – December 30, 2022 23:59 (UTC+8)

*Rewards cannot be claimed after the event ends. Please claim them in time.

〓Eligibility〓

Travelers who have reached Adventure Rank 30 or above can participate in this event.

〓Event Description〓

During the event, you can gather inspiration by logging into Genshin Impact and completing the corresponding missions in the game. Inspiration can be used to unlock creative levels with different youkai themes.

The first time you clear a youkai-themed level, you will receive a reward. You can create several pieces of content for the same unlocked youkai theme, and you can see a variety of creative results in readers' replies~

〓Get Inspiration〓

1. You can gather inspiration by logging into Genshin Impact cumulatively and completing the corresponding quests in the game.

2. During the first five days after the event begins, a new inspiration quest will go online every day at 04:00 on server time. You can switch tabs to preview quest details.

3. You can also make progress for quests that are not yet available. As soon as that quest is available, you can then receive the reward.

*If Travelers try to do the event around 04:00 (Server Time), which is when the Daily Commissions refresh, there might be a brief network error. Please refresh your page if you encounter such a situation.

〓Writing Light Novels〓

1. From the first day of the event, a new youkai-themed creation level will be unlocked each day at 04:00 server time. There are five youkai themes in total.

2. After the youkai-themed level is unlocked, you have to consume a certain amount of Inspiration to get started on the theme.

3. If you have already unlocked the different themes, you can choose the order in which they'll be opened according to your preferences.

4. You can create several pieces of content for the same unlocked youkai theme, but rewards for each theme can only be awarded once.

〓Reader's Reply〓

1. After the light novel is completed, it will be sent to Yae Publishing House for sale. After the release, the light novel will get a reply from readers.

2. You can choose different titles and stories, and you will get responses from different readers. There are six responses to each youkai theme.

〓Event Rewards〓

1. The first time you clear a youkai-themed level, you will receive a reward. Complete 5 youkai themes in total to receive all rewards. Details of the rewards can be found in "Writing Paycheck."

Complete all youkai-themed light novels to receive Primogems ×120, Mystic Enhancement Ore ×5, Hero's Wit ×10, and Mora ×100,000.

*The in-game rewards will be distributed via in-game mail. The mail will expire after 30 days, so don't forget to claim the rewards in time.

*This web event is provided purely for entertainment. It is not indicative of any related gameplay features in Genshin Impact.

#genshin impact #genshin impact updates #official #genshin impact news #web events #THIS ONE IS SO CUTE #akitsu kimodameshi has to be one of my favorite events of all time tbh #the story is interesting AND the gameplay slaps

[luisleyyaoi]

Infinite is such an interesting character it’s a shame the writing in Forces sucks ass and half the interesting stuff is in a separate comic instead of the game for some fucking reason and the other half is in some dlc I didn’t know existed until yesterday

#anyway apparently there’s shadow dlc for #forces #and some prequel comics #and god infinite is so ducking interesting #like for starters he chose to work for eggman he wasn’t invented #shadow fucking KILLED is jackal crew #and he’s like insecure or some shit #oh and #the way the phantom ruby works when you fight him is really cool #with it only having wacky shit happen if you get hit with the beam and it altering reality for whoever it’s being used on #and it’s just ajdjajjsisjsks #I love the concept of him so much #I love the concept of forces too #could’ve been so good #but it’s just mediocre #worst part is ​I enjoy the gameplay #which makes the story and characterization of classic characters an even bigger slap in the face

[fishareglorious]

Hey, just wanted to say that I really enjoyed reading through your limbus "Liveblog(?)" Always entertaining to see someone's first time through a PM game

Thanks! I've been immensely enjoying the game so far.

#fish asks #i've been trying to fill in the hole another gacha game has left and so far limbus has surprisingly been good! #i've been liking the story and all the sinners have captivated my attention with what is going on with all of them #the gameplay is interesting and pretty fun even though i thought it wasn't my thing in the first place #the sxf and the music slaps so hard #i like the violence and murder. hehehe #and grinding isn't that tedious as said other gacha game #you can quickly breeze through the dungeons if you have enough enkephalin to spare and all #i still love genshin and i have nothing against it but the burnout has hit me hard #the back to back events and new stuff and lore every patch exhausted me i suppose #its a big game and trying to keep up with all the stuff- even the characters and lore im fixated on just got tiring to me #i still look into the fandom sometimes but its not exactly the forefront of my interests any more #limbus is a breath of fresh air to me because yeah its tied with the other project moon games i don't feel the need to parse through twelve #dozen contexts for why this is this and that is that idk #my deepest apologies this turned into a rant about my genshin burnout lmao

[utilitycaster]

Daggerheart Character Build thoughts!

I am actually out at work and haven't checked the version that's since come out, but I did participate in the character build beta, and the NDA is officially lifted, so here's my thoughts from that! It's definitely limited since I just made a L1 character and didn't go through gameplay, though I surmise about some aspects of gameplay.

Overall, it clearly seems to be made by people who love a lot of things about D&D 5e but wanted both more flexibility and more simplicity, which is difficult. I think they succeed.

To that end, it takes away some of the crunchier aspects (precise positioning, exact amounts of gold) and I think for some people that will be a problem, and that's valid, but ultimately this game wants to both allow for interesting mechanics in and out of combat while also not being terribly math/map/resource management heavy. It is a hard line to walk; most systems either go hard crunch or go entirely gooey.

The dice mechanic (2d12, Hope and Fear system) is fantastic; look it up but I think it handles mixed successes more gracefully and interestingly than a lot of games.

The playtest was not super clear on armor and evasion choices (or indeed what evasion means; it seems to be sort of initiative but sort of dex save, or maybe more like the Pathfinder/old school D&D varying ACs by scenario?). It was much, MUCH clearer than D&D on weapon choices (part of why I play casters? Weapon rules in D&D are annoying and poorly explained and many people rightfully ignore them) so I'm hoping this becomes clear when there's a full guide rather than just the character creation info.

The character creation questions by class were fantastic and in general, and this is a theme, this feels like it guides people towards collaboration. FWIW I feel like D&D has that information, but the way it's presented is very much as flavor text rather than a thing you should be doing. Daggerheart makes this a much more core part of creation. The Experience mechanic is particularly clear: you better be working with your GM and really thinking about background, rather than slapping it on as a mechanic.

The other side of character creation questions is that it really encourages engagement with the class, which is something I've talked about. I think either subversion for the sake of subversion, or picking a class for the mechanics and aesthetic but not the fundamental concept, will be much harder to justify in Daggerheart, and I think that's a good thing because when people do that, their characters tend to be weaker.

The downtime is designed for you to write hurt/comfort fanfic about and this is a compliment. There are a number of mechanics that reward RP, particularly one of the healing mechanics under the Splendor track. I feel like a weakness of D&D is that when you try to reward RP it's really nebulous because there's not actually a ton of space to put that - you can give inspiration, but, for example, the empathy domain Matt homebrewed actually feels kind of off because it's based on such fuzzy concepts amid mechanics that are usually more rigid. Daggerheart comes off as much cleaner yet still RP-focused, and I'm excited to see it in action.

A judgement of Candela and I suppose Daggerheart might be that it's designed for actual play. I've mentioned before that I know people who are super into the crunch and combat and numbers of TTRPGs and are less story-oriented, and again, that's valid, but actual play is just storytelling using a ttrpg and so yes, a game that encourages RP while also having mechanics to support that and influence it is an extremely good goal. I am not an actual player, but I do like D&D games with a good plot and not just Go Kill Monsters, and I want to play this. (I also have some real salty thoughts about how if you modify an existing game for AP purposes that's staggering genius apparently, but if you make your own game how dare you but that's another post).

And now, the classes/subclasses. I am going to sort of use D&D language to describe them because that's a point of reference most people reading this will understand, but they are not one-to-one. A couple notes: everyone can use weapons and armor. HP is not totally clear to me but it seems to be threshold based - everyone has the same HP to start but people have different thresholds and armor, so the tank classes have the same amount of HP but are much harder to actually do damage to.

All classes are built on a combination of a subclass and two domains. There are 9 classes and 9 domains. This technically means that if you wanted to fuck around and homebrew you could make up to 36 classes (27 additional) by just grabbing two domains that weren't otherwise combined, which is fun to consider for the potential. Anyway I cover the classes and briefly describe domains within them. You can take any domain card within your domain, regardless of subclass.

There are six stats. Presence, Instinct, Knowledge, and Strength map roughly to Charisma, Wisdom, Intelligence, and Strength. Dex is split into Agility and Finesse; Agility covers gross motor skills (jumping, most ranged weapons, "maneuvering") and Finesse finer ones (lockpicking and tinkering, though also it does cover hiding). The really big wins are first, no CON score, so you don't need to sink stat points into something that grants no skills but keeps you alive. The second one is that the "hybrid" classes spellcast from their physical stat. This is fucking fantastic. The thing about ranger or paladin or the spellcasting subclasses of rogue and fighter in D&D is that if you don't roll pretty well you're locked into the core stats and CON and nothing else. (This also doesn't have rolling for stats: you assign +2 to one stat, presumably your main, and then distribute two +1s, two 0s, and one -1.)

Your HP, Evasion, and Thresholds are set by class, and there's a core ability; the rest is all from the cards you take for subclass and domain.

Leveling up is very much based on taking more domain cards (abilities) but has a certain degree of flexibility. It's by chunks: in leveling up anywhere levels 2-4, you can, for example, increase your proficiency by +1 once, so if you wanted to do that at level 2 but your fellow player wanted to wait until level 4 and take something else at level 2 instead, they could. It allows for more min-maxing, but also everyone has the same level up rules and differs only in the abilities on the cards, which is very cool.

Bard: Grace (enchantment spells) and Codex (learned spellcaster stuff; the spells available are definitely arcane in vibes) based, Presence is your main stat. The two subclasses map roughly to lore-style stuff and eloquence. Core class ability is sort of like inspiration but not entirely. It's a bard; I like bards a lot, and this is very similar vibes-wise to your D&D bards. If you like D&D bards you will like this.

Druid: Sage (nature spells) and Arcana (raw magical power spellcaster stuff), Instinct is your spellcasting/main stat. The two subclasses are elemental but frankly cooler than circle of the moon, and a more healing/tranquility of nature focused one. I really think Marisha probably gave feedback on this one, because the elemental version is really strong. You do get beastform; it is quite similar to a D&D druid under a different system, as the bard, but the beastform options are, frankly, better and easier to understand.

Guardian: Valor (melee tank/damager) and Blade (damage). Strength based for the most part (Valor mechanics assume strength) though you could go for like, +2 Agility +1 Strength to start. This is barbarian but like. 20 times better. It is, fundamentally, a tank class, and it is very good at it, with one even more tank-focused subclass and one that is more about retaliatory damage. You do have a damage-halving ability once per day, but really guardian's questions are incredible. I think Travis and Ashley likely gave feedback. Also rage doesn't render you incapable of concentration as that doesn't seem to be a thing, so multiclassing seems way more possible (you are, I think, only allowed to do one multiclass, and not until you reach level 5 minimum, which I am in favor of). Yes, you can be a Bardian.

Ranger: This is what I built! It is based on Sage and Bone (movement around the field/dodging stuff) and it is Agility-based, including for spellcasting, which is a MASSIVE help (as is, again, the fact that CON isn't a thing.) The subclasses are basically being really good at navigation, or animal companion. Most importantly to me you can be a ranger with a longsword and you are not penalized; Bone works with either ranged weapons or melee.

Rogue: Midnight (stealth/disguise/assassination spells and skills) and Grace-based. Yes, rogue is by default a spellcaster, which does help a LOT with the vibes for me. One subclass is basically about having lots of connections (as a spy or criminal might) and the other is about magical slinking about. Hiding/sneak attack are also streamlined. I will admit I'm still more interested in…almost everything else, but I think it evened out a lot of rogue weaknesses.

Seraph: Splendor (healing/divine magic) and Valor. This is your Paladin equivalent. It is strength-based for casting, again making hybrid classes way less stressful. Questions for this area also incredible; you do have something not unlike a lay on hands pool as well. Your subclasses are being able to fly and do extra damage; or being able to make your melee weapon do ranged attacks and also some extra healing stuff, the latter of which is my favorite. Yasha vibes from this, honestly. Single downside is this is the only class where they recommend you dump Knowledge. I will not, and I never will. Now that I don't have to make sure CON is high? I am for REAL never giving myself less than a +1 Knowledge in this game.

Sorcerer: Arcana (raw nature of magic/elemental vibes) and Midnight based. Yes, sorcerers and rogues now share a vibe, for your convenient….less enthused feelings. Instinct-based, which intrigues me, and the core features are in fact really good. The two subclasses are either one that focuses on metamagic abilities, or one that is elemental based. I would play this for a long-running game, though it's not my favorite, and I can't say that for D&D sorcerer (except divine soul).

Warrior: Blade and Bone, and the recommended build is Agility but you could do a strength build. Fighter! One subclass is about doing damage and one is about the hope/fear mechanics core to the game that I have NOT talked much about. I will admit, the hybrid martials and Guardian are more interesting to me but you do have good battle knowledge.

Wizard: Codex and Splendor. Wizards can heal in this system; farewell, I will be doing nothing else (jk). Knowledge-based, and you can either go hardcore expertise in knowledge, or be a battle wizard.

Other scattered thoughts: healing is not as big a deal here; there is no pure cleric class! There is also no monk, warlock, or artificer. There is not a way to do monk as a weaponless class really though you might be able to flavor the glowing rings as a monk weapon and play a warrior. Wizard, meanwhile, with the right experiences and high finesse, would allow for some artificer flavor. Cleric and Warlock are the two tough ones and I will admit those are tricky; I feel like you'd have to multiclass (which you cannot do until level 5) between perhaps seraph and a caster class and you're still going to come off very paladin.

#critical role #daggerheart #ttrpg mechanics #long post

[sansundertale14x1]

why NauseAxe_404 loves your writing so much…

based on this silly tweet, I’m gonna use ‘Nick’ for this- for ease of writing (and for my poor poor hands.)

no pronouns but ‘you’- little post cuz I haven’t written in a while.- use of the in-game website: "Dumblr", no it's not a typo;-; Proshippers DNI

word count: 878

content warning: brief explanations of canon violence, creepy stalker-ish behavior (NOTHING SEXUAL ATTACHED), Nick being a weirdo honestly.

vvv that isn't my art, and this entire writing is a fanfic for a game " Monster x Mediator" made by HeadLocker! I really recommend playing the game or watching the gameplay, cuz it's really fantastic!

Story under cut :3

Nick’s in love with your writing…(if you already couldn’t tell), but it’s difficult for you to understand why.

Usually, when you'd open up your laptop, it was after a tough shift at your crap job and you just wanted to do something to fill in the time after dinner and before bed. It was always on the shorter side, 100 words each, and was normally just a quick and crappy self-insert fic to satisfy your creative urges from doing a boring-ass job all day. You never really thought your tiny one-shots would attract any attention, but the man you've been staying with proves otherwise.

"NauseAxe_404" is what he called himself, but you've just been calling him 'Nick' for now. He had been reading your old Dumblr blog for who knows how long, and he's taken a major interest in your little shitposts...So much, so that he had taken the time to print out every single one of your posts and personal information pinned to his room's walls. It's extremely creepy...but also sort of charming?

For the last few days or so, you've been held in Nick's hotel room, practically glued to a desk with a typewriter...slowly making your way through a 100-paged fic that he specifically requested of you. Though you technically could stand up and leave...you'd really prefer for your skull to stay in one piece...and not have a bullet put through your temple.

Nick has been staring at you almost the entire time...which only certified in your mind that he is not human. Every time you turn to see if he's still there...like an unmoving fortress, he always is. It's been a solid 8+ hours of you sitting there and writing...and your stomach starts to emit loud sounds of hunger. You pray he didn't hear that, and continue to type away at the dated machine. However, to your dismay, his deep voice chimes in.

"...What page are you on...?"

Nick asks, seemingly trying to speak quietly for you, but his naturally booming voice isn't giving you any favors.

"...uhm..."

You take a moment to review what you have done...it doesn't look like much but it feels like it took AGES to write out...

"About...10? It's not a-"

"That's wonderful, Superstar!"

He cuts you off just as you begin to speak.

Of course, he's going to be ecstatic. You can't fathom why he seems to be so hopelessly in love with whatever you slap on the paper. You're curious..so you begin to speak.

"...uhm...Nick...why do you..take interest in my writing?"

You softly speak, trying to be careful with your words...you can't afford to overstimulate this man.

For a chatty guy...Nick was oddly silent at the ask of this question…or at least for a few seconds.

“I was trying to find a way to ease the boredom and loneliness of this fucking hotel, so…huff…I joined Dumblr and started to search for writing…that was…huff….purposeful…and that could fix me..”

No way in hell your crackfics could change this man...He must've come out of the womb like that. (or...however the hell he was made..)

"...I came across your first post years ago..huff...and fell in love with the way you wrote your love interest....huff...I knew you were talking about me when I wrote all those comments~"

You never looked at comments due to embarrassment...and you honestly didn't think anyone would even care to comment in the first place.

"....you weren't responding to me...huff...so I might've found everything about you in the meantime...huff...just so I could notice you in a crowd...I always will~"

Okay, now it's getting creepy. You hope that by just turning back around and continuing to write maybe he'd shut up...You guess it's sorta your fault for striking up a conversation with the creep.

"All the other writers don't know shit about writing...huff...1k word counts...huff...long and complicated stories that don't make any fucking sense..."

There goes the rambles. You stop typing for a moment to process what the hell he just said. He either is really balls-deep into this fantasy of you being a perfect human...or he's just trying to fluff you up so you'll continue writing for him. He's really delusional, that's it. It's seriously hard to believe your crap was life-changing for Nick.

“Simplicity is the most important part…huff…not describing some stupid walk sequence for 3 sentences…huff…it’s a waste of space..”

"....maybe you just like simpler writing...?"

You softly reply, yet again praying that you didn't accidentally strike a chord with this guy. He stares you down, and even if you aren't looking back at him, you can still feel the burning of his eyes on the back of your head.

"That's possible."

Oh, it's highly probable. He gets so emotional over the tiniest bit of anything, so...He just doesn't need too many words to evoke a reaction...It checks out because you also like to write a straight-to-the-point sorta piece.

"but don't let your mind wander for...huff...too long...my superstar...you've got at least 90+ pages to go~"

Shit, he was right...time to get back to work.

#monster x mediator #fanfiction #nauseaxe 404 #nick mxm #your biggest fan #fanfic #fan work #twitter link #me yapping #my writing #writing #creative writing #on writing #writeblr #writers on tumblr #writers and poets #not my art #i love him #tw weapon #tw mention of murder

[minas-linkverse]

If your still interested in talking about ur opinions on zelda games... how about phantom hourglass

Phantom hourglass is a facinating one to ask about, because the feelings I have for it are so contradictory.

The game looks stale, at worst ugly... BUT it does have some genuinely memorable and fun designs and locations too.

The gameplay is jarring and hard to get immersed in, yet it also does some of the most fun and innovative tricks the DS ever got used for??

The music is nothing new, yet Linebeck's theme slaps extremely hard????

The story is odd, and has terrible decisions like making Tetra into a damsel and the odd choice of ending... 🤨

Yet... I love Linebeck. I love the ghost ship concept. I think Bellum is an excellent and underrated antagonist! The ocean king stuff was neat and oh how I adore Ciela. She isn't rly a character that got written well or respected by the narrative that was supposed to be about her... But what you can make it into with a bit of your own imagination is soo fun.

Not to mention how Phantom Hourglass has perhaps the best humour in a Zelda game and stuff from dialogue to cutscenes is so immersive, silly and lovable.

Phantom Hourglass is absolutely worth experiencing, and to many it'll be a real special hidden gem. Others like me arent gonna be able to get past the many issues... But I think its an incredibly charming clunky mess. I really like it. 💛

#Ask #Game Reviews tm #I wonder what the development of the game was likw #Im sure it'd help explain some of the decisions made by the team

[maleyanderecafe]

(Spoilers for Dead Plate) Would you consider Dead Plate to be a yandere vn with that one ending where Vince makes Rody eat his ex?

Dead Plate is actually pretty fun because I actually quite like the type of gameplay of the diner dash genre, and it is impressive they were able to code this into RPG Maker of all things. Unfortunately, the gameplay is still pretty glitchy and majorly difficult to do in later levels because you need to hit a certain amount of quota to get certain endings, and the gameplay is rather difficult, so I had to search up some of the endings instead of completing the game like I usually do. To answer your question... kind of? It's one of those "it depends on your interpretation" kind of things (and probably the creator's twitter).

The story starts out with Rody who is hired to be a waiter at Vince's fancy restaurant after a lot of begging. We see that Rody is kind of a himbo and Vince is very straight laced. The majority of the story comes through the dialogue they have together. We learn that Rody is taking this temporary job to get a really fancy gift for his ex, Manon so that they can get back together again. Vince on the other hand seems to be a famous chef with a specific type of interest in food and is very serious about his job as a chef, to the point of intensity. We see in one of the scenes were Rody comes to take out the trash that he is yelling at one of the cooks for making a mistake, even putting their face over the oven fire to punish them. Similarly, when Rody accidentally knocks over the trash while taking ti out, Vince slaps him. At some point, Rody asks Vince if he can take some of the leftovers after each day, seeing as he doesn't really have much to eat. Vince allows him and each day, he is given a new dish that he leaves in the fridge. In one of the days, Rody interacts with a mouse, only to be served that to him as his leftovers. Rody also periodically gets very strange dreams about being eaten or otherwise prepared for food, often with Vince in them. During one of the days, after work, Rody ends up going into Vince's office, only to find a picture of him and Manon together in a bloody locket. He doesn't seem very happy about this, but proceeds as normal. Near the end of the week, Vince invites him to his house to serve a bunch of guests, which he does begrudgingly. Here we get to know how the other members of the guest know Vince. We also get to know that Rody considers Vince's food to taste not that great and that it in fact tastes "self absorbed", and we also learned that Rody dropped out of school at some point as well. After this, Rody ends up going into Vince's room and getting the fridge key but is promptly caught by Vince. Vince thanks him (sort of) for coming over and tending to his guest.

There are a couple of endings depending on certain criteria but we will go over them best we can.

The first ending happens when you are able to get enough money after doing all the shifts and quits the job from Vince telling him he no longer needs it. Rody, finally having enough money attempts to call Manon so that they can get dinner together, but the line is disconnected. He tries a couple of times, getting more desperate as he calls, even stating that he just wants to hear her voice, but no matter what, the call never connects.

The second ending happens when going into the freezer during the last day. Rody is caught and then promptly tied up by Vince. He is unable to escape, but Vince allows him to attempt to escape. He fails, no matter what and Vince kills him.

The third ending is probably the one that has the most information on the rest of the story, and is likely the most "cannon" ending for this game. It's similar to the second ending where he is tied up in the freezer, but this time he has brought matches to help him escape. He is able to escape the freezer, but finds a plate of meat on the counter. He is then promptly caught by Vince and has to avoid his attack. Missing this will cause Vince to kill Rody and drag him into the freezer. However, not missing will cause Vince to instead tear off Rody's ear and eat it, much to Rody's fear. We learn that the dish is actually Manon served up that Vince prepared specifically for him. We learn through Vince catching Rody a couple of times that Vince actually didn't care too much about his relationship with Manon, but rather the fact that Rody cared about her so much was what intrigued him. In fact, the reason why Vince ended up serving Rody Manon like this was because his critiques always talked about how his food was lack in love but due to Vince's lack of being able to taste, was never able to understand (this is foreshadowed when Rody calls his food bland and "self absorbed"). Because Rody constantly went on and on about Manon, he though that if he served him the thing he loved (Manon), that he would be able to make something that actually had that taste in "love" again (this is why Vince ends up serving the mouse he interacts with in one of the days, as he showed it "love"). Vince also reveals that this isn't something he normally does, as even the chef that he harassed earlier, he only fired and that he would never serve something like that to his customers, only seemingly doing this so he can revive his sense of "taste". Eventually, Rody ends up going into Vince's office and taking a broken bottle, stabbing Vince in the neck. He then ends up spreading oil all over the kitchen and promptly burning the entire building down, as Vince is still alive in it.

Finally, we get a flashback to when Rody and Manon broke up. It seems that Manon was mostly doing it because Rody would end up self sacrificing to provide for Manon, seeing as not only does he live in a shoddy apartment, but barely has enough money or interest in anything else but Manon. Manon seemed to have really loved Rody, but didn't want him to suffer by constantly catering to her, so she left him.

So now for the question of if I consider it a yandere vn, which is... it's hard to say? I don't think that this game was primarily made for a yandere to be one of the main characters (which is what I would more associate with a "yandere vn") but the two characters do exhibit some sort of yandere trait in one way or another.

Vince for instance has a very interesting take on love in terms of love in his food. You can for sure see him as just a person who is very obsessed over how his food taste, but it is also obvious that he has some sort of favoritism towards Rody, whether romantic in nature or not (it seems probably considering that Vince is gay), as all of the dishes that Rody takes home were made by Vince, and that he seems geuinely a bit sad when Rody quits on the first ending, as well as specifically making a dish made of Manon to serve to Rody. This seems to mostly be interpreted as a way for Vince to not only gain his sense of taste back but also to serve someone food with "love", but I can for sure see it as a way for him to make him shut up about Manon since he seems pretty annoyed when she's brought up. Still, he does end up killing him in like two of the endings, one where he is stuck bound up by rope in the freezer and one where he fails to defend himself. The second one can probably be chalked up to anger that Rody didn't eat the meal that Vince prepared him, but I'm not so sure about the other one. I guess it could be a way for him to eat his love like a lot of cannibal yanderes are like.

Rody himself is has a lot of the traits of light yanderes towards Manon, seeing that he basically seems to dedicate everything to her. Manon describes him as not ready for a relationship considering he keeps on trying to give up everything for her and calls his love exhausting, probably referring to how much he talks about her to Vince or to anyone. Even in his apartment, it's obvious that he doesn't really take good care of himself, with everything being very messy, with him burning his food and him sleeping on the couch. He doesn't seem very happy when seeing Manon and Vince together and seems to believe that money is the way that he can get back together with Manon, ignoring the actual reason, which is that when they are together, Rody ends up neglecting himself and just caring for Manon. On the twitter page, it's also confirmed that he would hide a body for Manon if that ever did happen.

Overall, very fun game. Love the aesthetic of the time incorporated into the game and the general character's attitudes. Whether or not Vince or even Rody is a yandere seems to be a pretty hotly debated topic amongst the fandom it's in, so I think it's for sure up to interpretation or until word of god says that they are.

#asks #Dead plate #male yandere #yandere boy #yandere #recomendation

[crime-soncloud]

I was recently introduced to, and downloaded, Limbus company, and I've decided to detail my current thoughts on the story and some of the gameplay per Canto. I had decided this in the middle of Canto 2, so I didn't do this for the first Canto, but I'll probably give my thoughts on it at some point in the future. This should go without saying but NO SPOILERS

Now first, I've got a pretty good team (2 star and 3 star identities) and so obviously I didn't struggle at all, and totally did not have two of them die on a single fight, after taking a big risk, and so couldn't fully engage with what I was probably supposed to do (/sarcasm) and also I was so close to winning the roulette event thingy, dammit don quixote you couldn't win just one last round

Firstly, this entire crew is so dysfunctional in yhe best way, I love how quickly the plan went out the window because half of them fucked it up. Between Don Quixote, Ryoshu, Heathcliff, Dante themself, and also Hong Lu and Rodion to a lesser extent, I am amazed they even managed to get the golden branch

Speaking of, I actually thought that the group would fail again, but based on what we saw I expect we'll get both the Sinners and rival(?) group swapping victories.

Now into the actual story. Firstly, I am really engaged with Sonya and the Yurodiviye, I think seeing a group actually trying to improve the standard of living, and essentially being communist revolutionaries is so cool! The theme of Action via words and policies Versus Action via... Well action, violence in this case, is done so well. The fact that both sides are shown as having advantages and disadvantages is really well done, and I think it's interesting seeing how Sonya and Rodion will go from here, especially since it appears the Yurodiviye are working with Hermann and the others. I assume the next Canto is about Sinclair since there seemingly was some ✨ foreshadowing ✨ for what is about to come.

This made Rodya very interesting to me, I was previously fairly neutral but now I'm interested in this. Her singing voice slaps, I think it was the same song that Gregor sung, and from a cursory Wikipedia glance I think I can see the parallels between her and her namesake

Overall really fun, loved getting to see some more stuff, and as for theories I'm not really sure. Dante is clearly important in some way, the characters at the beginning haven't showed up again, and I'm getting curious about Ishmael, i know she's the focus character in a future canto, and we saw Her make several references to spending half her life on a boat, if her backstory is as tragic as Rodion then I will be READY.

(@flextapeyeehaw and @zebrashork If you want to see my thoughts I'll post them here, thanks for the help in understanding this)

#limbus company #what do I even tag this? #no spoilers pls

[sasaranurude]

I'm a loser who both spends too much time playing gacha games and loves to hear myself talk, so here's another game review style post, this time covering my first day playing Break My Case. This time I'm not even being a little hater! I'm a lover! I'm cringe! I'm free! I love you Coly! I love you ikemen gacha games!!!!!!!

Break My Case is a new puzzle-music-adventure mobile game from Coly, the developers behind Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku and On Air. More relevant to BMC/BreMai is their game Stand My Heroes, with which it shares a writer, some gameplay elements, and of course a naming convention. Coly has developed a bit of a cult following for their unique status in the Japanese mobile gaming world: they're a company that was founded by women and hires women to make games for women. They put a lot of soul into their games. From the start, BMC is no different!

"Could you have pulled a clean version of this image from the internet so it didn't have all the game junk" no. it's my tumblr and you get my screenshots.

I (with help from friends) overviewed the initial Break My Case announcement back when it dropped. You can read that here! I said in that post that I thought a "dark rhythm game" would be a really cool direction for the game… and that's more or less what we got! GO ME!!!!!

First: the game's presentation is fantastic. Super slick graphical design and just amazing atmosphere. The sound design of this game is incredible. Genuinely. Really, really, good. All the music is amazing—I'm not knowledgeable enough to say anything other than "IT SLAPS!", but it totally does slap. The illustrations for the cards are all wonderfully atmospheric in and of themselves, and are just a delight to look at on the homescreen with its chill background music. Even just navigating menus is a sleek, seamless experience. The live2d is well-done, although it clashes a tad with the art style for a bit of an uncanny look at times. 

The atmosphere! The atmospheeeeeeere!!!

Of course, the draw to this game is the characters and story, so let's jump into that. I'll admit right now that I read the story through a machine translation—I have aaaalmost enough Japanese knowledge to fill in the gaps, especially since the story is fully voiced, but I'm definitely not getting the full nuance of the story that someone fluent in Japanese is going to get. THAT SAID, after completing the prologue, I was definitely intrigued enough that I want to continue slogging through the MTL just to read more! There's a great setup, centered around the bar Aporia and its three modes—a daytime cafe, a nighttime members-only bar, and, secretly, a "fixer" service who'll help anyone with any problem. Our main character, a woman who was just forced to quit her job at a corrupt company, gets hired to replace Aporia's eccentric owner while he goes on a who-knows-how-long vacation. The owner also has the role of "tail"—as in, the tail a lizard sheds to avoid being eaten. If anything in the fixer service goes wrong, it's the owner who takes the fall and the blame. This hasn't come to mean much in practice yet in the (quite short) prologue, but it's a fascinating setup. The story promises to touch on themes of the threads that weave our lives together, how small meetings can lead to massive life changes, and whether any human being is truly replaceable, even in our modern corporate world where people are treated like cogs in a machine. According to a staff interview, there are a handful of references to Stand My Heroes in BreMai, but the games' settings aren't otherwise closely linked.

Rough translation in alt text. The Aporia manager Ai may be the most mysterious, intimidating character, but he also beefs with a parrot the first time you meet him, so...

All the characters are staff at Aporia with various unique roles and background. The prologue just gives you a little bit of each of them, but everyone does show up, and they all have interesting dynamics with each other already. Ai, the stern manager, has some history with the MC that he refuses to divulge, and goes so far as to force psychologist Riku to agree to not look into it. The range of relationships among the staff run the gamut from the calm and mature friendship between fortune teller Kiho and art teacher Kyoya, to the unfaltering dedication of Yu to his ex-mafioso savior Tomose, to the ridiculous Takeru and Soyogu who spend their first appearance waking up after having gotten black-out drunk together the night before. My favorite dynamic of all so far is that of Kou and Mao—Kou is a playboy who insists he's not a playboy, and is introduced evading a woman by… asking the icy Mao to pretend to be his boyfriend so that she thinks he's taken and gay and leaves him alone. Which Mao exasperatedly agrees to, telling Kou that he's used up his allotment for this month which ohmygod how often does Kou do this. Kou if you're asking this guy to pretend to be your gay lover so often he gives you a monthly limit I think you might just have to admit you want him to actually be your gay lover, Kou, oh my god— 

Rough TL in alt text. Kou is letting the implication do all the heavy lifting here. He technically never said he was dating Mao. Technically. 

On to the gameplay. There's gameplay! Unique gameplay! Good unique gameplay! Oh my god, uncharted joseimuke territory! The main gameplay mode is a match-3 puzzle game with rhythm elements. As in other rhythm games, each song in the game is its own level, more or less. (Each character has two unique songs, and three songs shared with the other members of their unit.) You set up a team with cards you've collected from the gacha, which determine your power level and special skills. The "leader" of the team has to be the character whose level you've selected. The puzzle gameplay is a tile-swapping match 3—think bejeweled or candy crush—but the tiles you've matched are only cleared once a bar sliding across the screen hits them, clearing them in tune with the song. Everything cleared in a single swipe of the bar ups the combo counter. There's also a life system, where if the bar slides across the screen without clearing a single match, you lose a life… But the bar moves pretty slow. You're not likely to game over or even lose a single life any time soon. There are more difficult versions of the levels I've yet to unlock, so I'm sure the life meter becomes relevant then. There's also "auto" and "loop" features if you want to grind a level over and over for exp and items, but, of course, the computer can't score as high as you playing it yourself.

And, really, it's fun to play, so why would you want to!? The sound of matches clearing with the music is so satisfying and really makes you want to combo as high as possible. Once you've matched some tiles, you can't move them again, nor use them in a second match (eg, in a cross shape), so if you want to maximize your combo and make as many matches as possible with what's on the board, you have to think ahead about which matches you're going to make. The bar slowly crossing the screen adds a visual timed element that gives some urgency to putting all the matches together. It definitely feels like a game you can pick up an instinct for over time, which is super fun. 

All in all, a really solid, enjoyable little puzzle game. It would be fun to play even without the promise of anime boys. Stand My Heroes is also a match-3, for the record, which is what really cements the two games as being part of the same series.

Admittedly, the anime boy staring at you while you play musical candy crush is a little disconcerting.

The second gameplay mode is "Snap'n Spin", a… gameplay-lite mode that just puts chibi characters in random strange situations and lets you take pictures of them. The mode is explained to be a video game within the world of BreMai, so it's not even trying to be realistic or relevant to anything else in the game. Once you take your pokemon snaps of the boys, they get a fun little caption. You can save up to 40 pictures in your album. Other than being cute, the main way this mode interfaces with the rest of the game is that it's the primary way to unlock card stories for the cards you pulled in gacha. 

This gameplay mode is... cute? I guess? It being so disconnected from the style and aesthetics of the entire rest of the game felt weird. The chibis are adorable, so it has that going for it. And I do like some of the captions you get on the photos afterwards. My favorite were the scenes you catch of a character drinking, and then the caption reveals their current favorite drink. That's a delightful detail for a game set in a bar. Mostly, though, this mode left me wondering "why?" ...And I imagine the answer is something like "because merchandisable chibi characters are a requirement for joseimuke games." This mode could've been anything so long as these cute, starry little dudes were in it.

Urara here hated the drink and the caption revealed that, lately, his favorite thing is sparkling water. He's the youngest character in the cast, so I guess he hasn't grown into booze yet...

One last feature I want to mention is the jukebox. Like many games, BreMai has a music player that lets you listen to tracks from the game… But its music player is, genuinely, a fully-featured music player app with shuffle, repeat, lyric displays, and even background play that works when you're in another app or your phone is off. What! Wild! When I first learned a few days ago that BreMai had a built-in player for its BGM tracks, my first thought was "Well, what's stopping someone from downloading the game just to use the music player and never spending a cent on it? Wouldn't you rather have the songs on spotify so you at least get a pittance of ad revenue, in that case? It's more than nothing."

But having played the game now, I see what they did to prevent that, lol. You don't unlock the songs in the jukebox until you get an SS score on the song's level. Which, I mean, that's normal rhythm game stuff, of course. Can't fault that decision. But, as in other gacha rhythm games, your score in a level depends on the power of your team of cards, and the cards you get from the initial handful of pulls aren't gonna get you anywhere near an SS score without significant investment. So you're either buying in-game currency to buy upgrade items, more gacha pulls, or both. Of course, you can also put a bunch of time into grinding for upgrade items—they drop from levels. Gacha currency is harder to come by. So you're not getting songs in the player without actually playing the game lmfao. The character solo songs in particular (the ones with vocals rather than just instrumentals) also require you to build up rapport with that character—the game calls it "Nice". You build up Nice with them by playing their other songs and using their cards in levels. It takes 1000 Nice on a character to unlock their song. In my first day of playing, I was able to get one character to about 250 Nice, another to 200, and a handful more with a few points, so it builds at an okay pace. There's ways to pay to speed up the grinding for Nice and for upgrade items with things like level skip tickets. So, basically: you're not getting that music player to a useful state without investing either money or time, lmao. Is paying-or-grinding to get cool music you can listen to while not playing the game more "worth it" than the usual freemium game goals of better units, new in-game outfits, or prettier card illustrations? ...Honestly, maybe it is? It's novel, at least.

All gacha rhythm games have the same card select screen, don't they. These were my cards' levels after my first day of play, and you can see they didn't quite reach a suggested score of "A", much less the maximum "SS".

But I do want to stress, the monetization is, for the most part, pretty easy to ignore. Nothing in-your-face. The button to go to the shop screen is a different color, but it's not flashing with an eternal indicator, it's not popping up at every second, it's just sitting there alongside all the other menu buttons. The game isn't shoving timers in your face at all times—there's a stamina meter, which is mildly annoying, but you get ten plays when it's full, and if you're just playing casually you're probably not going to want to play the puzzle game over and over enough to fully deplete that. I know the bar is on the damn floor here but Tokyo Debunker seriously made me realize how bad it can be with mobile game monetization. BreMai is freemium, yeah, but as far as dark patterns go, it's not egregiously bad.

So, the verdict: if you're a joseimuke game fan and aren't afraid to play a game that probably won't get an English port and doesn't even have a fan translation yet (which I realize is already counting out 99.99% of people), definitely give this one a try. See if you like the gameplay—it really is worth trying—and do check out the story if you've got the ability. Or just look at the pretty anime boys. 

#suchobabbles #break my case #do you know how self-conscious i feel posting this. its actually so bad #so many feelings like 'did you seriously just write 2k words about a gacha game you played for a single day' #'why are you trying to pretend to be a game reviewer you have no qualifications and nobody cares about your opinions' #'stop roleplaying like youre a columnist blogger in the 2010s youre literally a tumblr nobody' #but im fighting the demons and im posting this anyways

[chilchucks-timbs]

What do you think of the sequel of twewy then? You talk a lot about the original but I'm interested in your opinion of the second part because I saw a few fans disappointed :o

OKAY. Omg.

So first of all? Soundtrack? SLAPS. We won. We won with the sequel soundtrack. I actually prefer some of the new remixes to the original!

The artwork? Stuck to the original style. Can’t complain at all. The new designs? PEAK. They’re so cool. There’s new shopkeepers- who look AWESOME- who have LORE. We can access NPC LORE. I read about one who is married to one of the players? Catch me eating popcorn at that story.

Shout out to the sprites you get when you’re feeding your party members? They’re so cute. In original TWEWY we just had a voice telling us if they liked it after I’ve fed them. NOW we get to know via their face going 🤢 or 🥺 BEFORE they eat so I can give them something they definelty like! and I think that’s fun and funky fresh.

Gameplay? Fantastic. Absolutely brilliant. - the original game had a switch port and honestly? I really think they should’ve done better with the controls. What worked and was beautiful for the ds- felt very clunky on the switch. Especially when playing console? I mean what in the Wii controller buLLSHIT. I need my attacks ACCURATE and on tv that’s very very hard. My friend managed it but? Maybe I just need to get good LSLGFSPALDL. But NEO twewy? beautiful. Perfect. Great for the switch. no complaints on the new battle system.

The story:

edit: THE HUMOUR IS THERE. I FORGOR. I forgot how fucking funny it is. The amount of screenshots I have? Hilarious. Not any like quotable moments like there is in the original game. But there’s so much silly billy shit going on. Bunch of CLOWNS I swear.

Its messaging is not driven home as much as the original twewy is. Like my friend had to explain to me what they were doing because it’s very very subtle. The characters are changing but only just a little. -unlike the first game which, like? At the end of the game? These guys are CLEARLY not the same people who entered the game!! These are Zuko ATLA level transformations!!!: whereas Neo twewy game says? Hey. Your actions are kinda sucky bro. Ever thought about changing up your style? Like it’s THERE. But it’s clearly not the CORE of the game like the first one. And that’s where it falls flat FOR ME. I LOVE and ADORE character development and it’s just not the focus of NEO twewy. But that doesn’t mean I hated the game. I just don’t prefer it over the original.

What NEO twewy DOES focus on is world building which. I think they’ve made some super cool and interesting choices. Even if I, and many Joshua kiryu fans don’t agree with them. 💛 we just straight up ignore the new lore because we don’t like it- the one around Joshua anyway. They bring in some new reapers and some new plot line surrounding shinjuku. That’s fine. That’s fun. But. Joshua? MY MAN? No square enix, you don’t know my blorbo of 10 years better than me :))

So. In conclusion. I was not DISAPPOINTED. I just think they lost the core of what twewy meant to people for the sake of focusing on the new details theyve added. I think rindo and fret and nagi deserved better development.

ALSO IDK HOW I FEEL ABOUT TEAMS? I MISS PARTNERS. LIKE TEAMS IS FINE I GUESS BUT. PARTNER WAS SPECIAL.

Okokok real conclusion is that I was not disappointed. I had fun. I loved a lot about this game. But the original hit home so hard, and the sequel was just a good game.

#lmao #twewy #neo twewy #the sword talks #asks #thank you for your ask btw 😭 #I love talking about twewy

[averageartistamber]

So, my thoughts on Side Order

Okay, so Side Order’s been out for a few days, so I may as well give out my thoughts on it. Obviously, this post is going to contain spoilers below as I go into more detail about my opinions and observations.

I’ve completed four runs so far (almost got five but failed near the end).

Overall, Side Order’s pretty good. It’s a lot of fun, a little rough in some areas, but worth the wait.

 First, let’s talk about mechanics.

Splatoon’s gameplay works well with a rogue-lite gameplay loop, and it’ll easily keep you occupied for at least a couple of hours (Some folks have 100% completed it on release day, but for the average player I’d reckon maybe 15-20 hours?). The permanent upgrade system allows a degree of control over the difficulty (even if it can be a grind to unlock things).

The chip system is cool, especially later on when you’ve made some really goofy yet strong builds. The Pearl Drone is some of the most fun stuff we’ve seen in the series so far. Letting her be almost as overpowered in the gameplay as she is in the lore is just really funny.

One thing that I feel does bring it down though, is the lack of variety. After a few hours you do start to notice that there’s only about five different floor objectives, and there’s not that much in terms of enemy variety either (although later floors add a mechanic where Battering Lentos can carry other Jelletons around on their backs…Which is a thing. Definitely would have preferred a few new guys instead.)  

As for the Jelletons…they’re…eh. They don’t really have the charm of the Octarians or Salmonids, but the devs seem to have intentionally singled out some of the worst aspects of those enemy rosters to design these dudes. With such a small bestiary, about half of them are annoying “screw those guys” (the flying sprinkler assholes and the Stinger But Even Worse dudes come to mind)…Which I’m not sure if that’s bad game design or really good game design honestly. They do their job as obstacles and video game enemies, and the designs are solid.

At least it’s not reskinned Octarians again.

There only really being five different bosses, with three in “rotation” (and one you only fight once), which honestly feels like a huge wasted opportunity. Would have been cool to have maybe a handful more options. Maybe even have an exclusive boss for each palette on Floor 20 where Eight has to fight a screwed-up version of whoever the palette represents. In this case Parallel Canon would be exclusive to Agent 4, and Marina would have a slightly buffed version of her fight, maybe with a different barrier mechanic to differentiate her from Overlorder.

And as always, the soundtrack absolutely slaps.

Not sure if I’m personally going to bother with 100% completion, since apparently the reward is a few secret lore files that I’ll probably find and read from the wiki or something.

Story, Lore and Characters

The story is serviceable, it’s pretty much what you’d expect from Splatoon’s storytelling at this point. There’s interesting stuff there which either isn’t explored in detail or is relegated to background lore files you can unlock and read. That being said, the lore we got is cool. Like, we all guessed that the Spire of Order was some kind of VR thing Marina made, and finding out she made it in order to heal victims of KamaboCo and restore the sanitised is both in-character and a very nice tying of ends from Octo Expansion.

I will say that if you haven’t played or are otherwise aware of the plot of Octo Expansion, some things might not make the most sense (ie. you’ll probably scratching your head over who the hell Acht is and why they’re neon green.) so it’s best experienced after reading or watching a video on the previous DLC to have the full context.

Thank Cod they didn’t make Marina the villain or have her be locked away for most of the game waiting to be rescued. Although she did get put under mind control, which I kinda expected…Seems to be at least one the Story Writer’s favourite trope at this point. Or just an odd choice of running gag. This story feels more character-focused than events and plot-focused, so not much really “happens”, but we get some substantial character interactions that make up for it.

The limited cast of characters works very well in the story’s favour. Adds to the weird lonely and isolated vibe of the Memverse. Pearl and Marina are great as usual, and there’s a surprising amount of scenes and dialogue for Pearlina shippers to lose their minds over. Acht/Dedf1sh is an effective straight man to all this, providing a foil to the other characters. The vibe of “Can we please talk about literally anything else” after the aggressive Pearlina banter is entertaining. It’s just really cool that the background musician characters are starting to get more relevance.

Cipher doesn’t do very much, but might have one of the best character designs in the franchise so far. It’s alright (I think the character uses It/It’s pronouns).

On the other hand, I personally think Order/Smollusk might be the weakest of the Splatoon big bads. They don’t really have the charisma and backstory intrigue of Octavio, the presence and build-up of Mr.Grizz (who to be fair had two a whole game prior to his stint as a villain) or the menace/“creep factor” of Commander Tartar.

In fact, Order kinda feels like a toned-down or Bowdlerised Tartar, as in which Order’s goal is similar and similarly horrifying, but they haven’t been getting away with it for god knows how long and you don’t ever see the result of their plans, (No ghastly Bad Ending cutscene of everyone getting their minds destroyed by the Memverse or anything), unless you count the thing they turned Marina into. I guess the whole Virtual Reality setting makes them feel like less of a threat? Maybe it’s just me.

And I dunno if this is just localisation weirdness, but did they HAVE to make his weakened form converse in Uwu-speak?

Although this seemingly isn’t what happens, I do quite enjoy the idea of Order/Smollusk slowly getting rehabilitated and redeemed as the gang hangs out with him (and kicks his ass) several times. Unfortunately, dude seems to be really clinging hard to the “Evil Overlord” shtick, which ultimately turns the character into a one-note laugh when we could’ve had a fun little arc.

One more thing about characters….

WHERE IN THE FRESHLY FRIED AND FILLETED FLIPPER-FLOPPER IS AGENT FOUR!?

The fact that they have a sort-of presence (being the Splattershot is explicitly called Agent Four’s Palette and not, like, Squidbeak Splatoon Palette, as well as the Parallel Canon boss) really seemed to be hinting at Agent Four making a physical appearance. Maybe it’s cut content? Maybe they’ll find their way into the Memverse in an update (like with Callie in 2’s Hero Mode)?

Them being the only Agent not to appear in Splatoon 3 just kinda sucks. Like, even Nintendo themselves seem to in on the joke with them being the un-favourite (see the “supposed to be a [BIG SHOT]” line from Pearl). But I really hope that one day Agent Four gets to be something that’s a bit more than a joke, y’know?

…So this ended up being way longer than I thought it would be. Might come back and maybe discuss some of the new lore a bit more, but that’s my thoughts about Side Order. I ended up really enjoying it, and I’m pretty excited to see if this leads to more experimental stuff with Splatoon going forwards. I’d give it a 7/10.

#splatoon 3 #splatoon #splatoon side order #side order #side order spoilers #splatoon dlc #side order splatoon #yeah that's what I've got for now #ended up having way more to say then I thought

[nayialovecat]

The Ink Demonth 2023 - Day 31. Revival

Day 31. Revival Crossover: Bendy and the Dark Revival I'd say, Bendy, you can't be that rude... but I feel exactly the same way. I know it's not BATDR Bendy's fault that he is the way he is - but that doesn't change the fact that this is how I feel. So, if anyone else wants to ask me what I think about Ink Bendy from BATDR - I will refer to this image.

Yes, I consider it a crossover because I don't consider BATDR to be a sequel to BATIM in any way. It's a completely separate creation that is simply heavily inspired by BATIM. However, in places he rewrites the stories, changes the characters' personalities, adds new threads... This is not an expansion of the world. This is an alternative version of the Workshop - and you won't convince me to think otherwise. So a separate game with which I did a crossover called "Bendy doesn't like his alter-ego".

Actually, the only thing I like about Ink Bendy from BATDR is his voice. When I heard it first time, I felt a shiver down my neck... and then, unfortunately, I focused to the words - and all the charm was disappeared. Seriously. There are reasons why Bendy has been mute so far - and apparently the main one is how much he talks f**cking nonsense. I don't like the shape of his head. His hideous teeth, which are not scary - are disgusting. Hoofs instead of feet is a nice idea - but why both legs? Where is the wonderful asymmetry of the original? Why does he turn into a hedgehog (those spines in strange places - they make sense when they are spine vertebrae). No. Absolutely no. And what's with the skeleton arm? Someone used acid on his ink there?

As for the game itself... Uh... I was impressed at first. First chapter - great. New possibilities of moving the character, beautiful backgrounds, delightful details, an interesting ritual of starting the machine... I was delighted. My slight discouragement began when I first heard Wilson's voice over the speakers and the subsequent behavior of the Lost Ones afther that proclamation... In the second chapter, the game started to piss me off on a regular basis. Then I just watched gameplays and... I don't regret that I didn't keep playing. The game is frustrating, the characters are warped (but not in the realities of the game as they should be warped - warped from the ones we knew and liked). A lot of stupid things happen: Tom being treated like a pet, Wilson acting like a villain from the start, Allison being a fucking deus ex machina, Twisted Alice's death scene and Sammy's death - I hate them both, no physical Bendy (appears out of nowhere and instantly kills - a very lazy solution, game creators), Henry's whole entrance, that weird puppet character what's-her-name Betty... Ok, I like Porter's character a bit - but that's probably only because of his resemblance to my OC Brody.

So you've asked many times what my opinion of Dark Revival is. That's it: I hate this game. It killed my passion for creating SATIM and made me stop looking for images with BATIM on tumblr or on dA - 'cause people don't know how to hashtag and they tag BATIM when they make arts about BATDR. Okay, I'm not saying I have nothing but hatred for this game - but it disappointed me just in the way like BATDR Bendy is disappointment for SATIM Bendy in the picture. And it pisses me off when I see on dA that people add my art to folders called "Dark Survival", "BATDR art" or so. It's like a slap in my face.

That's why I made this picture as quickly as possible. An unspectacular finale - but I've been waiting to say this openly for a very long time, so appreciate the solemnity of this art.

And finally, something positive: I FINISHED ON TIME! Yeah, I did it again!

Bendy and the Ink Machine (c) Joey Drew Studios Inc. Bendy and the Dark Revival (c) Joey Drew Studios Inc. Sammy and the Ink Machine (c) Nayia Lovecat

#The Ink Demonth #Bendy and the Ink Machine #Sammy and the Ink Demonth #Bendy and the Dark Revival #BATIM #SATIM #BATDR #Bendy #Ink Bendy #Ink Demon #and that abomination from Dark Revival #well I regret nothing I said here #The Ink Demonth 2023 #crossover #I DID IT! #I DID IT AGAIN!

[sibyl-of-space]

It's time for me to go to bed. And that means everybody gets a Procrastination Essay No One Asked For About Sonic Adventure 1 for the SEGA Dreamcast!

This game is one of my super mega ultra all-time favorites. Every single time I revisit it, I am so afraid that my love for it is entirely nostalgia goggles and it will lose its charm this time around, and every single time, I just have the time of my life because the game really is great. It is so fun. It does some very cool things. It is kind of stupid but it takes itself seriously, and that is very endearing and a million times more interesting than a game that's too afraid of being perceived as cringe to be sincere.

I love basically everything about it. I painted Big the Cat on my Dreamcast and even that is not enough to communicate my vast love for this game.

MANY WORDS BELOW CUT. Visuals, audio, gameplay, I love all of it.

Visuals

The game came out in 1998. It looks like a game that came out in 1998. But the world and character designs are fantastic and the world is so detailed. I could genuinely spend hours just moving around on the Egg Carrier overworld map appreciating all the gadgets and gizmos moving around that are purely 100% set dressing. It makes up for what it lacks in polygons with cool textures and fun trinkets everywhere. The animated CGs genuinely look amazing, and you can forgive the rest of it considering the game came out in 1998.

I also love the splash screens you get after finishing each route. They're so good.

(It goes without saying that the game looks its best on a CRT. There are some really cool lighting effects CRTs just capture better.)

Audio

It obviously has an insanely good soundtrack of just nonstop banger after banger. It also has a very 1998 dub and the sound mixing and implementation are some of the worst you'll ever hear. Eggman has like 5 voice lines that are re-used in every scene he's in. But who can complain about that when they're listening to the likes of "Bad Taste Aquarium"? Literally nobody. Who cares. Every single song slaps.

"But Leo half the time the songs start and stop mid-cutscene because of how the game handles loading" who cares. I can forgive just about ANYTHING a game does in terms of audio implementation if it has a song as good as "Bad Taste Aquarium" in its soundtrack.

Narrative

Setting aside the fact that the story is kind of stupid, I really think we need to appreciate the way it tells it. The way this game has you play through the same story from everyone's different perspective, and how the scenes that overlap actually play out differently depending on who you play as, is so big brain. You don't get the full picture of what's happening until you've played as everybody, and there is no "big group of heroes collectively take on the bad guy" until the very very end Super Sonic story... until then, it's just different people having wildly different journeys that overlap here and there and are all part of a single, bigger story.

That's just cool ass storytelling. Everyone loves to bitch about my good friend Big the Cat but the entire point is that this extremely chill guy who loves to fish and just wants to save his friend was caught up in this Adventure, and he was a small but vital part of it, and it affected him differently than it affected everybody else because he had a different reason for being involved. But that goes for everybody! Everyone's story has an arc with a start and a finish, and most of them don't come close to being involved in the whole thing. Even SONIC doesn't see everything (he doesn't have a Hot Shelter level at all). Knuckles's story ends on a really cool note, with him going "I may never know the full story of what happened here, but maybe it's better that way." Or something close to that.

I also just love the concept of benevolent protector water god goes apeshit at people, as well as the concept of a ghost from thousands of years ago trying to right ancient wrongs. Chaos and Tikal are great.

Gameplay

The thing I love about Sonic Adventure is that every single character is really fun to play. This comes at the "cost" of what you might call "balance," in that half of the characters are broken as fuck and you can just disregard the very concept of platforming with most of them. I couldn't really care less about that because I just enjoy how fun it is to play as everyone.

Sonic Adventure 2 understandably put Tails in a mech because outside of it he is too damn broken. Sonic Adventure 1 lets you play as him anyway, and it rules.

The ONLY gripe I have about the gameplay is that Big the Cat does not have the means to harm robots (because he is too nice and chill to do that), but as a result he is unable to collect animals to give the chao. I cannot think of a single character in the Sonic the Hedgehog universe who would be better suited to raise chao than Big the Cat, but Big the Cat is unable to give them animals to power up. This is a tragedy.

Overall

Sonic Adventure is a masterpiece. Every time I play it I'm like "this is the greatest game that has ever been made." The parts of it that are clunky, awkward, kind of dumb, or very dated are still endearing because it tries to do so many things that you really just have to respect it. This is the kind of game that is fantastic whether you sit down and play it straight through from plot point to plot point or you spend three hours throwing that statue around Station Square into oncoming traffic.

Of course it's not polished. It tries to do way too many cool ass things all at once to be polished. It is WAY too ambitious to be polished. That's what makes it so good. It's perfect exactly the way it is and the fact that people will play this incredible game and go "lol, 3D Sonic sucks" is a good reminder that gamers will bitch about anything and you should never care about what gamers have to say when making games.

Big the Cat has glow-in-the-dark eyes. Game of all time.

#sonic adventure #analyses #been a while since i wrote a big long essay on the internet about random shit but you know what i was overdue #YOU WILL BEHOLD MY OPINIONS ABOUT THIS VIDEO GAME #thank you for coming to my TED talk #Youtube

[lyraoctaviawrites]

Welcome to the Octaviaverse!

This is the side blog for @lyraoctavia and I will be posting everything relating to my writing, artwork, music, games, etc here from now on. I thought it would be better to split the two to keep things more focused on the ridiculously expansive interconnected universe I’ve created over my many years as a human being, featuring literally dozens of ideas because I am a slave to my own creativity and my work is never finished. Sound good? Of course it does!

What kind of stuff do I do?

Writing: I like to write stories, usually fantasy, with epic, sprawling worlds, intricate magic, sarcastic and often completely ridiculous humour, identifiable characters with a ton of emotional development and campy ass villains who will entertain you so much that you’ll want to grind them into a fine paste with a large boot. However, I wouldn’t be adverse to also writing some slice of life stuff too. I am a certified Alice Oseman fangirl after all. I tend to not shy away from commenting on certain serious issues (e.g. abuse, death, self harm, attempted suicide) as well, so a lot of my works contain trigger warnings. However, I don’t enjoy writing explicit sexual content or stuff with a ton of blood and gore so don’t expect any of that.

Games: I am currently a game design student so most if not all of my game ideas are just that. Ideas. Ones that I will undoubtedly be crafting into the incredible experiences I know they have the ability to be. Most of my ideas are for platformers or RPGs with very little in-between and will all have, hopefully, perfect blends of story and gameplay. I personally hate when a story based game is bogged down by too many cutscenes, especially if the gameplay isn’t really that interesting (Xenoblade) so I’ll always try and strike a balance or find a workaround. My games all have amazing stories to tell but a story ain’t all a game is. Might as well make em fun first, right?

Music: I got a little less to say about this one. Most of my music writing is for my games that don’t exist yet, so I literally have hundreds of tracks just kinda sitting around waiting for me to use them. Sometimes I make other music but that’s rare. Most I’ve for for now are a couple remixes and the score concepts I’ve made for an animated series of Into the Phantasm (please gods let this happen, it would slap so dang hard).

Art: I draw cartoon characters and that’s about it. I am not a professional artist by any means, but my silly little guys can’t just stay sitting in my head forever, sometimes I gotta put ‘em on a page, even if I ain’t some modern Picasso. (Also, I’ve tried to make backgrounds and do actual shading a few times and it ruined my mental health for a while, so… I’ll stick with the glorious cartoonyness that I’m good at.)

Current WIPs

Into the Phantasm (epic fantasy 5 part book series)

Finished works

A Penguin’s Tale (stop motion movie)

News

The prologue of Into the Phantasm (the first three chapters) is available to read and the book 1 rewrite is going smoothly. Hopefully it’ll all be available soonish.

I’ve started working on two other ideas that I’m hoping to make into fully fledged stories. I’m in really early development for now so I’ll just call them Project Kelly and Project Cosmic. Might post some art about them at some point, idk.

#writeblr #writers of tumblr #writerscommunity #queer writers #Lyra Octavia #Octaviaverse #female writers #introduction #writeblr intro #writers on tumblr #writing #writing community

[windslar]

📩 Simblr question of the day: Whether it be making sims, doing gameplay, or making renders, our posts are all unique (even if you don't think so), so what makes your posts unique? ("It isn't my post if I don't do/have [blank]) Feel free to throw in examples and let your mutuals/followers tell you what makes your posts stand out on their dash!

Oh, what an interesting question!

I guess it isn't my post if I don't do some type of legacy challenge, show slices of life through gameplay, and turn it into a loose kind of story. I always start off a save saying I'm going to keep it simple, keep it lowkey; but that's never the case except maybe for the saves I've neglected and abandoned. I don't do renders because I don't know how to use blender. But I can slap a template PSD on a screenshot in Photoshop! If I can capture a scene through gameplay, 90% of the time, I'm happy with that. I'll sprinkle in posed posts now and then to add to the story; usually, it's to show my OCs personalities on a deeper level beyond gameplay's limitations. Basically, I like to dabble in different things to, hopefully, tell one cohesive story.

My Joy of Life Challenge family really shows what my posts are like, especially the 2nd generation. It's hard to choose examples but here's a variety from more recent posts: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

#inbox #ask

[cipheralreviews]

Game Review: Tetris Effect: Connected

General opinion: Positive.

Tetris Effect: Connected is, obviously, a tetris game, with a modern graphical twist. It has classic and VR modes, both of which have their own pros and cons, but are also both worth checking out if you have the ability to. With several different modes, Tetris Effect: Connected offers a lot of different styles of gameplay for varying skill levels.

Starting off, I want to give the game devs credit where credit is due: this game absolutely slaps for it's visuals. A tetris game in the Unreal engine is certainly a choice to make, and they pulled it off really well. Sparkly particles, glowing animations, and surreal visual effects bring a magical experience to a classic arcade game, no matter if you play it in VR or on your screen.

It has both a main campaign where you play through different levels in a story-like sequence, as well as other, more casual AND more intense gameplay options. Marathon modes through themed levels, gimmick modes where you clear "corrupted" blocks or deal with mind boggling effects, and calm modes where you have no game over are all available to play, giving variety for any kind of player.

On top of this, they have colourblind modes of various kinds for the game stages themselves. You can play with classic colours, custom level patterns, or modes that add patterns and colours that make it easier to distinguish the blocks from each other. There's also multiple difficulty levels, ranging from beginner to hard, so you can adjust how many lines you want to clear per level.

The final point I want to praise is the audio experience. It's amazing. There's unique, original tracks made for the game, and the "title song" (used colloquially because it's not actually the title screen song, but it is the one from the first level in the story mode) is ABSOLUTELY incredible in my opinion. Heavy beats that are influenced by the ways you turn, flip, and drop blocks paired with each level having individual themes to them that inspire and match the music playing make it both engaging as well as good to listen to on its own.

And now the negatives...

One major issue I have with this game is that the story mode does not have options for speed, nor do they have a "no game over" setting. This means people like myself, who have visual processing issues as well as mobility issues, have a harder time clearing levels and unlocking the next theme in line. Some levels have rapid speed ups and slow downs that are a bit jarring, and while I understand the fact they might not be able to give the option to not change the speed, I'd have really liked if they'd given an option to have no deaths. It meant, for me, that I got stuck on several levels that I otherwise would have really enjoyed because they went from speed level 3 to speed level 8 or higher all within one lines difference. Having this option for the story mode would have improved the experience immensely for me, as I'm still stuck on the last level in the easy mode.

The only other thing I'd add as a problem is that if you're photosensitive, it could get painful very fast, especially in VR mode. They do have options to turn down or off particles, change graphics settings, etc. but that doesn't change the fact that there are strobing lights on some levels that you cannot turn off.

The above limits the people I can truly recommend the game to, which is genuinely unfortunate, because I know several people who would LOVE this game, if it had the accessibility features mentioned.

Final notes

Overall, it's a great game that brings a really nice, fresh twist on a game that's a decade older than I am. It really justifies itself as an iteration of tetris, much like Jacob Geller has said.

If you liked this review, please go and check out Jacob Geller's video Tetris Effect And Other Games With Immaculate Vibes! It's the video that introduced me to this game, and he makes some really interesting observations on tetris and marble games, and how they interact with their history.

Additionally, I post these in my free time, but if anyone has movie, game, or series recommendations, please feel free to send them in! I really do love reviewing media, and if I can turn this into an actual job it would be incredible.

#ko reviews #ko recs #video games #tetris #video game review #game review #game recommendations