#i love that cutscene so fucking much. i dont give a shit about the rest of emet's screentime

[kraefishh]

figured i'd post mine and my friends wols on main for the time being while im still stockpiling stuff for when i eventually make that side blog for em

basic stuff is - 1) there's more than one wol 2) by more than one i mean there are seven of them 3) each one/two of them are designated for a specific expansion 4) i have so much stuff planned for them all and have not even finished stormblood (please help me)

also im putting them under a cut so the post isnt naturally extremely fucking long

SO WE'LL START IN ORDER!!!!

Alidae Mendica -- ARR WoL. only one without a "traditional" name convention. SMN/MCH/GNB. bloody banquet happened and she got to ishgard and went "NOPE. I'M DONE." and goes and spends most of her time at the skysteel manufactory with garlond ironworks.

i love her very much she was the first i made. i nearly played an elezen but then really wanted to be small. so after finishing the opening cutscene i restarted and well!! shes here!! shes ready to kick some ass!!!

T'lyr Kho -- 1/2 Heavensward WoLs. is half miqo half garlean, possesses the third eye as well (hence the shaggy hair+forehead coverings). PLD/DRG/DRK/SGE. is never doing well at any given moment. he is (not) coping.

he's the one who made me spiral and make 3 more characters. i love him so so dearly.

Touya Kawa (@twisted-solace's wol) -- the other Heavensward WoL. WAR/DRG/RPR. the most shy and well spoken but will not hesitate to cleave you. works himself to death (quite nearly literally!).

i wish i had more to say about him other than he is very silly. him and t'lyr picked up lancer as a bonding experience and then got roped into dragoon lore (whoopsie!!)

Koren Cadoret -- 1/2 Stormblood WoLs. has 1v1'd Zenos too many times to count. very very protective of his sister and friends. MNK/SAM (plus blue mage and soon to be viper!!).

I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM!!!! punch first ask questions later. wants to be everyone's friend. separation anxiety got his ass in shadowbringers cause he was the last wol to be summoned to the first.

Raana Cadoret -- the other Stormblood WoL. took her brother and left her village the moment she was declared to be the next matriarch. DNC/AST/RDM. likes to give koren shit about his poor decisions.

she makes me go :) !!!!! we really cant decide if she picks up astrologian on the first or if she does it beforehand.

Sthallona Dhemskyltwyn -- 1.0 WoL and also Shadowbringers at the same time?? shes going through it. WHM/BLM. grew up the daughter of a famous pirate. Thancred's childhood best friend.

feigned death after the calamity until she gets pulled to the first and is like "AH SHIT. HERE WE GO AGAIN." she gives me perhaps the most brainworms.

AND FINALLY

Sarangerel Malqir (@trying_to_cosplay on insta's wol) -- Endwalker WoL while also being a whole can of worms by herself. was her universe's only WoL before shit collided in shadowbringers and she met everyone else

the love of my life-- ahem. currently only Warrior canonically because my friend is not even halfway through ARR. very much younger sibling energy to the rest of the scions/wols.

last notes - 1) t'lyr and touya are gay (lovingly referred to as 'the boyfs' by me and @twisted-solace) touya nearly fucking dies for t'lyr and t'lyr proceeds to go oh wait fuck i dont want to lose you. normal shit for their line of work. 2) koren canonically says "you wanna fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid" to zenos. and zenos proceeds to get very confused. zenos isnt even who he ends up with koren just likes fucking with him. 3) raana went through 3 different wol/npc ship ideas before we finally landed on haurchefant. that was hell. 4) alidae and cid are best friends!! stamp of approval right here!!! alidae also hates nero's guts. 5) if biggs and wedge (who i lovingly refer to as the 'lab boys') are around, alidae is not far behind. 6) alidae was named before i realized there was a character named alisaie. this is canonically a struggle for everyone. 7) sthallona swam her ass to sharlayan upon realizing that thancred had been taken under louisoix's wing. insert LET ME IN. LET ME IIIIIIN gif here. she wrote a thesis on how to combine conjuring and thaumaturge magic before ever knowing what a red mage was. (she is very stupid but also unnaturally smart). 8) t'lyr can't use magic. point blank. his third eye fucks that up for him. only reason he can be a Sage is because the magitek does it for him. on the bright side he's really good at parkour!!!

anyway if you got down this far thank you for looking at my blorbos. i am working (not very) hard to get that sideblog set up for these weirdos. i appreciate them very much they consume my every waking thought.

#krae plays game #krae rambles #long post #wol posting #ffxiv #krae oc #ffxiv oc #possible game spoilers?? #just in case #arr spoilers #shadowbringers spoilers #those are the only two expansions that i mention spoiler-ish content for

[memorys-skyscraper]

Took over 3 hours to log in today but we’re here

Endwalker day 3 (somehow these keep getting longer)

LMAO these bunnies talking to Urianger like “yeah you seem like someone willing to do some fucked up shit when needed, pls help”

so the sharlayans are the ones sending shit up here, right. like that seems pretty obvious. they investigated the aetherial sea, found hydaelyn, she was like “hey help the buns”, they’ve been doing it in secret ever since

of course Urianger is up to some shady bullshit once again, the expansion wouldn’t be complete without it. could really do without these stealth sections though

Uriangerrrrrrr ;n; I love him SO much, literally one of my top 3 favs, of course this scene is the first to get the waterworks really flowing. his VA is so good too

STOP not this cutscene of him and the buns, don’t do this..... NOT PUDDINGWAY LMAO, good fuckin save Urianger

GOD the writers were really targeting me specifically with this whole sequence, when Urianger kneels down to talk to someone smaller than him it’s already over for me, though pls tell me this doesn’t mean Urianger is benched for the rest of the expansion

Zenos viator Galvus, huh. interesting. if we get a Zenos redemption arc I’m gonna lose my shit

lol Fourchenault leaves, the twins’ 6 other parents roll up instead, WAIT why do I have to guess who’s at the door??? oh wait am I choosing who it is? ok im manifesting Graha

oh NOT him doing his little tail wag, hand wringing he did as exarch!!!!! Graha im love you!!!!! what a lovely little conversation, def gonna go back and see what the other convos look like, though I wish Urianger was an option

bun boy!!!! and Sid the DRK job tutor in the back!!! there is extremely ominous shit happening and everything is about to go real bad but im glad bun boy is okay (for now)

what the fuck the part of this dungeon where the mom turns into a monster and her kids are so upset that they do too is so fucked up, holy shit

what the FUCK, RIP satrap

holy shit graha going full exarch mode, fuck yeah let’s GO

god damn the animation team sure as hell got a budget this time around, anyway can we do cpr on a baby? wait are you KIDDING ME, NOT MATSYA AND THE BABY, WHAT THE FUCK

oh thank fucking christ Estinien and Vrtra. awwwww baby like big drago

lots of burials in this one, god. always with the twins too

me going around this village during the literal fucking apocalypse telling people “why dont you have some tea and maybe youll calm down”

uh hello? shithead dad? the fuck are you doing here? YEAH THAT’S RIGHT TRASH DAD, VRTRA IS A BIG DRAGON AND HE’S OUR FRIEND, FUCK OFF

Nidhana is such a delight, I love her sm

SDLKFJDSFKHG LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO I CALLED THIS SHIT!!!!!!!!!! LET’S GO GET ELIDIBUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IM POPPING ALL THE WAY OFF

im gonna fuckin CRY im back in the first.......... Lyna!!!!!! BEQ LUGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FEO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! RYNE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i have the biggest dumbest grin on my face, im so happy

tiny elidibus..................... im emotional................. wait WHAT?? TIME TRAVELING WITH ELIDIBUS??? omgggggg WHAT is graha gonna say when I get back and im like “sorry borrowed the crystal tower for a lil time travel and let elidibus drive lmaoo”

fucking shit I talked to Elidibus for all of 3 minutes and im an emotional wreck

LMAO Emet throwing a fucking fit as soon as he shows up, he is such a CHILD omg, anyway thanks for the body, and the height?????? WOW thanks bud!!!!

HYTHLODAEUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! the way I just GASPED and slapped a hand over my heart, IM LOVE HIM!!!! he’s so pretty omg, so nice, his voice is so pleasant~

Meteion got a higher animation budget than all of the scions combined holy shit

“will I have to remove you by force” oh fucking TRY ME OLD MAN, I’ll kick your ass again, give you a preview of how it’s gonna feel 12000 years in the future

"if I’m thin it’s because Emet-Selch didn’t do a proper job” why even give me other options, of course I’m dragging Emet, LMAO he’s so mad, his VA is so good

LMAO BULLYING EMET-SELCH THIS IS THE CONTENT I CRAVE

ppfphhphhhhhhhhwehhh me n Emet n Hythlodaeus were best friendssssssss ;n;

lmao Hythlodaeus just going on his lil tangent about sharks <3 also Venat was the Azem before me huh, that’s pretty wild........ also she really told Emet “you should smile more sweetie :)” lmao

so am I gonna explain the bit where I killed Emet in this little recounting of MSQ OH SHIT I AM LOL, how is this not creating some kind of paradox or something, pretty understandable he’d be pissed lol

me vs. Venat, no items, final destination, LMAOOOO I GOT FUCKING BODIED also WHAT is this music, WHEW okay got it on the second try, cannot imagine being a BLM in that one, needed my whole SMN kit & allllll that mobility to survive

“do not approach me, do not speak to me, and do not dare to presume to treat me as a friend” BOY Emet’s still extremely mad huh

WHAT THE FUCK!!!!!!!!!!! IT IS TOO LATE AT NIGHT FOR THAT SHIT!!!!!! GET YOUR FUCKING BLEEDING BLACK EYES OUT OF HERE

WWWWWWWWWWAIT TRUST DUNGEON WITH EMET VENAT AND HYTHLODAEUS?????????? NO FUCKING WAY!!!!!!!!!! NO!!!!!! WAY!!!!!!!!! THIS IS THE FUCKING BEST I CANNOT BELIEVE

EMET!!!!!!! IS!!!! A FUCKING!!!!!! DRK!!!!!!! WHAT THE FUCK THEY TELEPORT FOR MECHANICS, YOU FUCKIN CHEATERS!!!!! i am absolutely BESIDE myself right now holy fuck, trusts are my favorite thing in this game, I main DRK when I’m not SMN, this is just................ so much........... I cannot get over it, like here I was thinking Zenos as a trust was a wild idea but clearly I wasn’t thinking big enough

I absolutely adore that Emet has all the standard DRK skills but they’re all named pretentious-ass greek names because of COURSE. yoshi p PLEASE can I keep emet, I need another tank that isn’t Thancred, I love Graha but he needs a break sometimes

boy Hermes/Fandaniel/Amon’s VA is putting in a lot of boss fight work here huh, good thing he’s really good at it

that whole sequence was just. so good. why did Hythlodaeus saying “hey we’ll probably remember all this when we die” hit like a fucking truck though

oh man not original Answers, oh FUCK me not Hythlodaeus giving a casual smile & wave to Emet-Selch as he leaves to go be sacrificed for Zodiark, ANYTHING but this

“henceforth, he shall walk” god damn, well, that’s as good a stopping point as any I think

#rambles #ff14 liveblogging #ffxiv #ffxiv spoilers #endwalker #endwalker spoilers

[legionofpotatoes]

we decided to watch all story cutscenes from the new resident evil village videogame on a whim, since it’s not really our cup of tea gameplay-wise but seems to be this massive zeitgeist moment that made us morbidly curious. And I know how much everyone cares about my thoughts on things I know very little about, so. let’s get into it huh gamers. and yeah spoilers?

for context, I’ve only played resident evil 4 and a small portion of 5. I also read the wikipedia entry for 7’s plot recently. all this to say I was only vaguely aware of how tonally wacky the series was going in

I also completely gave up following the plot of the mutagens’ soap opera, so that paid off in spades here as you might imagine

anyway so that baby in the intro. that baby’s head is just massive. humongous toddlerdome. when ethan finds the baby’s head in a jar later on. there is no way that head would fit into that jar. bad game design. no not even game design. basic stuff. one hundred years in prison for jar modeler

if I see a single functional hetero marriage in video games I will cry tears of joy. I understand their misery is kind of The Point irt them badly working through the hillbilly romp trauma but like. sheesh. at least set that up as an emotional story goal the plot will help resolve. but nope they start off miserable and it goes nowhere

I know I know the mia thing has a huge wrinkle in it but like. not really in terms of dramatic function?? set up a happy end to the re7 nightmare (miranda can keep up appearances for all she cares) and then take that all away from angry griffin mcelroy for manpain. it will still absolutely work to set up the dramatic forward momentum. why throw in this cliche Hollywood Tension in their marriage if you’re not going to address it oh maybe because it’s normalized as automatically interesting because nuclear families are a self-propagating pit of a very narrow chance at emotional happiness relying on social stigma to preserve their empty function oops my baggage slipped in yikes abort mission

I called him griffin mcelroy because I saw his face on twitter and. yeah. I will continue to do this occasionally. my house my rules

... fuck the reason I’m hung up on this is specifically because the rest of the game is so tonally dexterous (which is a shining point to me! more on that later!), and yet they felt weirdly compelled to create the aesthetic trapping of a family-at-odds trope without following it through too well. a sign of both the good and the bad stuff to come

but listen the real reason why I wanted to talk about any of this is to nitpick the fascinating backwards-engineered nucleus of the entire thing; in that this game essentially creates a melting pot of just SO many disparate horror tropes and then makes a no-holds-barred unhinged effort at weaving thick lore to piece them all together. it is truly a sight to behold. like straight up you got your backwoods fright night situation, your gothic castle vampires, your rural-industrial werewolves, and don’t forget your bloated swamp monsters over there, with then a hard left turn into robotic body horror, and the entire ass subgenre of Creepy Doll writ large, and the bloodborne tentacle monsters, and a hellboy angel bossfight, which rides on the coattails of a mech-on-mech pacific rim bonanza, and just jesus henry christ slow down

almost all of these are textural hijack jobs that don’t really get into the metaphor plain of any of those settings but the game sort-of makes an argument that the texture IS the point and revels in it. It is kind of admirable almost. The same reason why the intro felt boxed in and unmotivated is also why the rest of the game just blasts off of its hinges to the point of complete and self-indulgent tonal abandon. I kinda loved that about it. lady dimitrescu made sure to hold her hat down as she bent forward in mahogany doorways and then suddenly she’s a giant gore dragon and you settle in your temp role as dark souls man with Gun to take her ass down. Excellent??

this rhino rampage impulse to gobble up every horror aesthetic known to man comes to head when the game wrestles with its FPS trappings in what is the most hilarious solution in creating visceral player damage moments. Since most cinematics and the entire game is in first person, that leaves precious little real estate for the devs to work with if they really want to sell griffin’s physical crucible. To wit. This dude’s forearms. Specifically just the forearms. They are MASSACRED throughout the story. The poor man lives out the silent hill dimension of a hand model. by the end cutscene he looks like a neatly dressed desk clerk who had decided to stick both his grabbers into garbage disposal grinders just a few hours prior. like in addition to everything else it manages to rope in that tinge of slapstick violence into its general grievous genre collection except this time it IS for a lack of trying! truly incredible

but wait his miracle clawbacks from everything his poor paws go through are retroactively explained away, yes, but far too vaguely and far too late to console me as I sat and watched everyone’s favorite baby brother reattach an entirely severed hand to his wrist stump by just. placing it on there. and giving it a lil twist ‘n pop terminator-style. and then willing his fingers back into motion right in front of my bulging eyes. this game just does not care. it does not give a shit. and boy howdy will it work to make that into one of its strongest suits

cause generally speaking resident evil was THE premiere vanilla zombie content destinaysh for like a decade, right? and as the rest of the world and mainstream media started encroaching and bloodying its blue ocean it went and just exploded in every single conceivable horror trope direction like a smilodon on catnip. truly, genuinely fascinating franchise moves

yeah the big vampire milf is hot. other news; grass... green. although I do love the implication that her closet is just identical white dresses on a rack. cartoon network-level queen shit

apropos of nothing I’ve said there’s also this hobo dante-devimaycry-magneto man, and I can’t believe this sentence makes sense. anyway he made that “boulder-punching asshole” joke referring to chris redfield and it was probably the only easter egg that really landed for me and boy did it land hard. I have not seen him punch the boulder in re5, mind. I had only heard about how funny it is from friends. and here this dude was, probably in the same exact mindset as me, trying to grapple with that insane mental image. with you on that ian mckellen, loud and clear

I advocate vehemently against the shallow pursuit of hyper photorealism in art direction but I gotta admit it works really in favor of immersive horror like this. the european village shacks especially gave me super unchill flashbacks to my rural countryside retreat in western georgia. I could smell the linoleum dude. not cool

faces are weird in this game. can’t place it. nice textures, good animation, but the modeling template is... uuh strange? and the hair. it has that clustered-flat-clumpy look that harkens to something very specific and unpleasant but I just don’t know what. sue me

griffin’s mental aptitude to take all this shit in stride and end every seemingly traumatizing bossfight involving some fucking eldritch being yet unseen through mortal eyes by essentially throwing out an MCU quip is just. What the fuck dude? I mean that was funny how you casually yelled the f-word at a god damn werewolf that you considered a fairy tale an hour ago but are you like, all right?? it was swinging a sledgehammer the size of a bus at you, ethan

oh oh the vampires are afraid of cold and your last name is winters. I get it haha

Pro Gamer Nitpick: boss fights seemed a bit unnecessarily long?? idk why the youtuber we picked decided the ENTIRE propeller man fight counted towards the vital story scenes he was stitching together, but man mr big daddy lite there really had some get up and go huh??

why are they saying dimitrescu.. like that. is it really how you say that word or is the english language relapsing into its fetish for ending every single word with a consonant at all costs

I’m not saying it’s a dramatic miss of a twist in context of all that’s going on, but the “you died in the last game actually and have been DC’s clayface ever since” revelation is low-key. it’s. it’s just funny to me, I dont know what to say. century-old god-witch fails her evil plan after she mistakenly removes heart from what was definitely NOT just some white guy with eight fingers after all

chris realizing he’s about to become the player character and immediately swapping out his tsundere trenchcoat for the muscletight sex haver sweater

the little bluetooth speaker-sized pipe bomb he taped to his knife was nuclear?? really??? I must have missed something because that is just too good. I buy it though I totally buy it. chris just got them fun-sized nukes in his car trunk for, you guessed it, Situations

anyway this is all for now just wanted to briefly touch on how unexpectedly funny and tonally irreverent this seemingly serious game turned out to be. did not articulate any cathartic story beats whatsoever but my god it had fun connecting those plot points. he just fucking put his severed hand back on his stump and it Just Worked todd howard get in here

#text #another one in my bulleted review series with no rhyme or reason #sorry resident evil fans this could be a painful read pls turn away #i know almost nothing about it but i am gonna be super fake familiar and critical of this one hey ho

[eframschweigersskincells]

So, Return to Hell was an absolute rollercoaster of emotions and I couldn't have asked for a better ending to the season three dlc missions.

SPOILER WARNING BY THE WAY!

Holy shit was this season a wild ride and with an absolute banger of an ending all I can say is well done rebellion you pulled it out the bag and held it high, I was so happy with everything and just my god its really hard to put down everything I'm so enthralled I can barely think straight.

I remember when the trailer dropped and I was so overcome with both excitement and sadness at seeing what the dlc entailed, I was so happy to see schweiger alive but devastated to see what was happening to him and originally I thought we were going to sacrifice him to help Umbra which terrified me, thank fuck I was wrong I dont think I could handle hurting my boy.

The intro was excellent, it really felt like distressing and that this was truly a moment of despair the way bruno spoke of it was absolutely amazing and I couldn't wait to get stick in. And when it finally gave way to the gameplay the opening area was absolutely stunning!

The way it's so familiar yet so foreign, like I'd seen it before but it had been so twisted that it was unrecognisable, lava around every corner and debris floating as if frozen in time the ground and walls cracked and crumbling and the fiery hues made this a fantastic yet haunting sight I hadn't even begun playing and I already fell in love with it.

When I finally moved on and the Baron began his tirade about the state of hell and how it was shaped and molded to fit the subconscious mind of schweiger I was shocked and saddened, to think that this was schweiger's fractured mind was frightening, all his guilt, fear, anger, confusion, sadness became reality and hell took its horrifying form filled with endless undead. I also found it really cool to see events play out from schweiger's perspective, meat locker, hell base and terror lab all playing out in schweiger's memories allowing us a glimpse in to everything that happened to him. He was betrayed so many times, I don't blame him at all for turning on us in deeper than hell, the amount of cruelty he suffered would drive anyone insane.

Being captured and forced to research the occult without any understanding of why, being tricked in to activating the relic allowing hitler to activate plan Z, working your hardest to try and make the world right then have your team infiltrated by nazi bastards who push you in to a hell tower and forcefully tear you from this plane of existence and left to rot in hell. Just when you think you can finally escape you're confronted with the fact you can not leave, only your closest comrades can leaving you in hell against everyone's will, then a voice manipulates you in to believing you were betrayed by your friends you're lied to and tricked in to believing this voice is your only friend who makes you do horrific rituals.

I remember how horrific I felt hearing this and then when Umbra revealed that he did all of this so he could break schweiger's will so he could steal his body I was filled with rage. Rebellion were amazing at putting emotion in to this one I genuinely went through constant emotional shifts realising that everything we had done up to this point was planned by Umbra and that everything we had done was only to fuel his plans. It was never schweiger's fault it was umbras and that knocked me on my arse.

The gameplay was a lot of fun, one of the best parts was that absolutely everything was randomised! The main sections of the map where always switched around no matter how many times you play it at first I went meat locker, hell base then terror lab then my second time I went hell base, terror lab then meat locker! I was shocked when everything cane out of order but it fits so well with everything! Schweiger's mind is so badly fractured that when hell took form as schweiger's subconscious not even hell itself could keep things in order.

I genuinely adore how the old familiar faces of these maps are destroyed, twisted and corrupted they are what we have seen before but warped till they look like different maps entirely, with so much more to explore in some areas it really gives you a sense of walking through broken memories like piecing together a memory Efram barely has a grip on anymore.

I loved how enemies were randomised too, getting attacked by a screamer around the corner then next time you go there prepared for a screamer you get blown up by suiciders or slaughtered by skeletons or an elite or in my favourite case being attacked by zombie alpha squad members! When zombie me jumped out and attacked I was so confused I didnt have time to respond when zombie jun popped out and killed me it was fucking awesome!

All our favourite enemy variations are here too, vampire creepers, electric suiciders, armored commanders, skeletons etc which really made for a really tough but good fight, never knowing what variation was coming to get you made everything even more fun.

And with the spitters now having a variant that spat magma it made what was usually an annoying inconvenience an actual proper threat and I love that so fucking much, maybe the spitters aren't so horrible after all.

That's a lie I still fucking hate them but oh well!

Once we successfully complete all three areas we now return to the main area with a very pissed off Umbra and schweiger who although conscious is barely alive. As soon as we arrive back to were we began we are immediately attacked and dragged off to an unknown place that we only know as the void as coined by Umbra.

Let me tell you when I say the void is creepy I fucking mean it, the void is of course pitch black you cant see anything not even your flash light does anything to the surrounding darkness, all you see when you spawn is the pitch black and eframs body of a slab surrounded by candles with Umbra looking over us and you really get the the sense of "holy shit, this is it!"

I genuinely adored the design of the void, the fact you only ever see your surroundings when a split second of bright red lighting strikes and even then you only see the faint outline of distant places, walking through the endless river of blood that stops you to a near snail's pace while fending of oncoming dead is genuinely spectacular! Holy fuck did rebellion pull it out the bag this round!

Just when you think you're about to have to do something to the incapacitated schweiger, Edie finally fucking shows up and does something useful for once, breaking schweiger out of his trance and giving him enough power to fend for himself when she realises Umbra has no defences! Thank fuck because now we know how to finally end The Baron and let me tell you I couldn't be happier to get the chance at killing the bastard.

The fights were challenging and had me cornered a few times and I'll admit I died a couple times but it was absolutely worth it, there was so much going on but it wasnt overbearing, with how large the areas you had to fight the hordes in were it made the fucking insane amounts of zombies absolutely balanced, I never felt like it was impossible but never felt it was too easy either just the right balance of insanity. And to make it even better I get to listen to schweiger shit talk the Baron as we help Efram regain strength while weakening Umbra.

Listening to Umbra beg and plead for mercy was great, it really felt like we were overpowering hell itself, no matter what Umbra threw our way it did absolutely nothing and listening to schweiger come to terms with what he's done and immediately work towards redemption by putting down Umbra was heartwarming. We were the winners not Umbra.

Then finally we get to what I've been wanting to do since the beginning of the DLC, after two whole hours I finally got to put an end to the Baron, activating that ending cutscene was so satisfying and I got to put down my controller and watch.

I'll admit I was confused when Umbea sprung back to life and actually attacked, where hitler failed to stop us during hell machine Umbra full pounced, he was going to take us with him and for a second I absolutely believed we were going to die with him, the fuck tries ripping our soul out rendering us absolutely useless. Its schweiger that saves us, pulling us away from Umbra then eviscerating the fuck out of him with ease and with that The Baron himself is dead, finally the tyrant is dead and everything we had worked towards was finally put to rest.

Just before that scene ends, we see schweiger smile! He's actually happy for once, free from Umbras grip, he's faced his fears and insecurities and in the end was the one who saved us and destroyed The Baron. To see him smile was one of the greatest things ever and I'm so glad we finally got to see that.

In last few moments of the ending, we wake up on the side of a cliff with Dr schweiger by our side and as the camera zooms out we see nothing but an endless sea of lava and I'm left thinking.

What the fuck is Projekt Ragnarok?

#zombies #horror #rebellion #shooter #zombie army 4 #zombie army 4 dead war #efram schweiger #photography #best game 2020 #god i love this game #who allowed you to be that awesome #what an achievement #best dlc ever

[akechicrimes]

I'd love to hear your commentary on "A Level Knife": It's one of my gold standard fics and I often revisit it to get a refresher on what feels like really accurate character voices/interactions! (also sorry for sending you the prompt "grief" when you were looking for fluff lol)

level knife

LMAO dont apologize, i might have asked for prompts but let’s be real...... i definitely went through those prompts and chose all the ones with angst in them because im an angst writer at heart :’)

im so 😳😳 that u think that fic has accurate characterization especially because it was the first shuake fic i ever wrote and i was PARANOID about messing up the characterization........ i was so worried hfmghfgmh

the original conceit was that goro wouldnt get his hair cut in public because he doesnt want to be seen in an inelegant state, but then it derailed because. akira is a silent protagonist.

because it was my first shuake fic, i really stressed over the characterization for both of them in this fic, so i was like, ok, i’ll start small and easy, and i’ll just try and replicate as best as i can one of the typical interactions that they have at the leblanc bar. i was very dead certain that i did NOT want to give akira a personality outside of what he has in canon, because i felt strongly that akira has a canon personality, even if it’s understated. but then that meant that i had to confront the fact that it would be incredibly unnerving to hold a conversation with a jrpg protagonist who barely spoke. 

and i remember being like, aw, fuck, what am i gonna do?? should i cave and give him a personality? long story short i was SO god damn stubborn that i stuck to my guns and went with akira “silent protagonist” kurusu who says only four words at a time, even went out of my way to shorten his sentences and remove some of his dialogue, and then as soon as i did that the rest of it just sort of....... happened

once i decided that akira was going to behave the way he did, it seemed the natural conclusion that nervous akira’s silence and lack of expression would make anyone, but especially someone who wants people’s approval as much as goro does, how difficult it would be to figure out how to make a type of human connection when everyone else around goro seems to fall easily for the detective prince shtick, how uncertain goro might feel, never sure what akira is thinking, like goro’s shooting in the dark until he’d just nervous-talk on and on and on, trying to get any sort of reaction out of him and then being confused by whatever reaction he gets because akira has such a brick wall for a face.......... but that probably those are exactly the qualities that goro finds so interesting and even admirable...... it was kind of almost an accident that goro wound up behaving so skittishly, but ten i remembered that goro has a habit in vanilla cutscenes of just showing up  in akira’s house and throws words at him like he’s desperate for a reaction until suddenly standing up and running the fuck away JSKJSKJ

all these characterizations were mostly an accident because i was thinking about transferring JRPG Silent Protagonists To the Fanfiction Page and i wasnt deep in the Goro Characterization Meta Sauce yet but i guess......... i think i always wondered if akira and akechi can be rivals if goro doesn’t feel genuinely threatened by akira on some level?? not even in an angry hatred way, but in an insecure and nervous way........ threatened by his abilities, his mysteriousness, akira’s apparent lack of emotional weakness, how much goro finds himself doing stupid shit around akira, or just the mortifying ordeal of being known......... LMAO

but i havent really written anything since about goro having soft weak sides of himself that make him uncertain and nervous ever since....... i mean it’s come up here and there but maybe i should reincorporate that idea more meaningfully into the way i write him from now on 🤔🤔

also i distinctly remember that when i wrote this fic, i was like, “well i dont REALLY ship shuake, it’s just a neat idea and a series of prompts that i saw on tumblr, i’ll just do these seven prompts and then go back to writing pegoryu and shukita” and obviously that. did not happen. as you can see. loooooooooooooooolololololol

ask for the director’s cut on a fic i’ve written

#mine #long post #impropercorvus

[murcidea]

aight under the cut is my notes i took, I wrote down all of sugimuras lines in the game Sans the shadow sugimura as that was a cognition of okumuras and added commentary about how i take them. so. here. under the cut. if you dont know what these events are then sorry man. its in order, the first meething with him, the confidant where u meet him, and then in that one cutscene where every1 thinks akira is dead.

you made me look everywhere for you... 

(genuinely annoyed. where the fuck was she? he has obligations to spend time with her and would rather not waste it searching for a person he already dislikes.)

What were you doing somewhere without reception? Out late with guys--Thats it. Isn't it? 

(he doesnt think she was at all. He knows her too well. In his eyes shes a prudish little girl, theres no way she was doing  that. hes being a bitch to make her upset. he wants her to hate him. maybe this will be what finally pushes her over the edge and makes her ask her dad call it off. he has no clue that kunikazu is so awful that he would allow her to be literally abused. he thinks hes better than his own father at teh very least becuase shes so gentle. he must be kind to her unlike his dad.)

C'mon, let me have some fun too, will ya? 

(in the off chance he would never have agreed to go through with it. he doesnt want to fuck her. hes not that depraved, hes more into actual adults than highschool girls. sure shes legal but good lord no thanks. he would probably just call her a slut and laugh at her for thinking he wanted her.)

Can't you do that for me?

(same as above, hes just trying to scare her.)

//gasp// What the-- Goddamn cat! Will you shut up you stupid cat?

(under normal circumstances he would not have kicked a cat at all but he was genuinely scared. Hes a jumpy person by nature and morgana scared the fuck out of him. when he told the cat to shut up it was more him paniced. He was thinking more along the lines of "please be quiet while i think about what to do oh dear god i hope its not hurt but im so fucking mad." hes got irrational anger issues. he would go home later and regret it so badly he adopts a cat to make up for all hes done to the one (morgana) he kicked earlier.)

Sorry about the disturbance. It's just a... lovers quarrel with my fiance. 

(saving face. His father is cruel and making him look bad would get him great punishment from his father. He doesnt want to have to fist fight or anything. god that would suck.)

How dare you make a fool of me. i'll be telling your father about this too. I won't forget your faces. 

(he realizes theres no point in saving face now. theyre cunty little teenagers. he hates them as his nights already been bad enough. theyre on the shit list and he hopes they go fuck themselves. even then he doesnt hate them 100% id say its about 55%, hes not truthfully a hateful person, mostly apathetic.)

----

Haru? I was just heading home from a business engagement when i saw you from my car window.

(he wanted to see her as he saw the opproutunity to harass her about hanging out with akira. no other reason.)

Hm? Do I know you from somewhere? .....!

Youre one of those brats from before... 

( He knew this from the get go, hes just a very good actor.)

...Hold on, Haru. You think you can go on a date with another man and leave your fiance in the dust?  

(he couldnt care less, hes got an obligation to be sure she doesnt make them look bad however. as much as he hates to interfere hes gotta be sure she doesnt ruin either his or her reputation. this is all to upset her but also an obligation to be sure shes not fucking up.)

Oh yeah? And what about the contract I made with your father? Are you sure about that? Think about the reparations clause. If you back out of the deal now, you will lose everything you own. Okumura Foods, your estate... And what about your employees? Are you really willing to put their jobs on the line for the sake of your selfishness?

(it was his fathers idea to say these things if it ever came up, hes going along with it out of obligation. a bit afraid to go against his intentions as he can easily cut yutaka out of the family and their money.)

Besides this marriage is exactly what Okumura Foods needs right now. My father would have no trouble managing your shares or sweeping away your company's tarnished image.

(ah this line. exactly what made me think that perhaps sugimura is not as evil as he seems. theres someone behind him pulling the strings. he doesnt say he will fix it, no, its his father. hes just a playing peice in his fathers plan, not unlike haru.)

That reminds me, did Takakura-san tell you about the wedding hall? He got us the Phoenix wing at the Wilton. He made a provisional reservation for ten days this coming spring. After all, The sooner the better. We'll have to look into our guests' schedules as well. There'll be over three hundred of them, you know.

(yeah he wants it the fuck over with. he doesnt want to marry her at all no. but he thinks making the deadline closer will make her more likely to panic and drop out of this arrangement all together. he knows she must hate him. he hopes she pulls out.)

Takakura-san can handle Okumura Foods in the meantime. Why don't You go stop by the gym or something, Haru? I mean, if you have time to mess around with this punk, you damn well have time to get a little thinner.  

(straight up hes being a rude ass he loves thicc bitches.)

I'm out of here.

-----

I believe your father can rest in peace now. That phantom thief could never have changed anything. Only a handful of people are qualified to alter the world.

(he says this very pompously but its actually the result of him watching powerful people stand by while he's suffered his whole life. He doubts that the phantom thieves are even really doing anything worthwhile. not like they can help everyone. he hates the false home he thinks they're giving people.)

So you've been coming home late. Thats what I've heard. I make a good playmate, you know.

(obligatory creepiness as she STILL hasn't called off their arrangement god DAMN IT PLEASE HARU. he does talk like this for real with people hes into tho. ngl.)

#about #long post #god i hope this doesnt show up in any tags anywhere dear lord

[mellz117]

Hello and welcome to the start of Mellz Plays Kingdom Hearts Re:CoM on the Playstation 2; Riku’s campaign

If you haven’t seen my thoughts on Sora’s story, why not start with Part 1? For the 5 of you who’ve been following along since then, welcome back! Check out the rest under the read more! I’m playing on standard difficulty so if I’m having a hard time, I just suck.

So we, as Riku wake up in the basement of Castle Oblivion. How did he get there? Sora just waltzed in like it was no big deal. Riku has to materialize in a cold basement and be woken up by the disembodied voice of an all too familiar bastard… Who has a new voice.

Thanks for the card, voice of Ansem, “Seeker of Darkness”. That ain’t him. It’s been almost 10 years and I don’t remember much of this game but I know that new Richard Epcar voice ain’t Ansem.

Riku’s got no time to waste, he’s a man on a mission.

So we get a melancholy scene with Riku happening upon the room Maleficent gave him during his association with her in the first game. Memories he’d rather forget.

After progressing a bit, the disembodied voice returns once again to taunt Riku. “You cast aside your home, your friends, the darkness. What else do you have? Nothing. Your heart is as empty as your old room.”

It’s so weird playing as Riku but I hope we get more of that beyond KH3 (ReMind hasn’t released at the time of writing this)

Alot of this game so far has been me saying “I don’t remember this”… …So I don’t remember Riku’s level up system being this different to Sora’s.

…well that’s bullshit. I vaguely remember that. The fact that I can’t even edit the order my cards appear to me in battle is even more bullshit. I like to organize my cards by type and value until I’m forced to use a different method.

So I dont have to wait for the reload gauge to count down, it’s immediate and I dont lose a card on every reload like I thought I remembered… What’s the catch? I don’t trust like that.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

We meet up with Maleficent at the end of the map. She’s 100% aware she’s a figment of Riku’s memory. Riku is none too pleased to see her.

I love his sass

Riku’s ready to kick the asses of everyone corrupted by darkness, including his own, he says. Time for a dragon fight because otherwise Maleficent isn’t a threat apparently lmao. I don’t think the mcguffen card even showed up.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Oh look it’s that asshole. Or is it? Dun dun dunnnnn. God his lips look soft. Why was this necessary???

So who has dominion over this castle? Marluxia, or Ansem?

This fucker is like “Sonny, you couldn’t even win against Sora. You don’t stand a chance against me”.

You have a teenager lying on the ground... Please reword your demands.

Oh my god it’s Mickey Mouse! well… sort of. He’s a bright light. Gives Riku some nice words to keep him going.

Knowing what I know now about the Guardian heartless bro, everything is so much worse…

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Ooh first scene with the boys in the dark room. “Don’t I even warrant a hello, Lexaeus?” I don’t remember seeing this as funny before but now, like 10 years later I appreciate how funny it truly is. Zexion sounds so insulted.. Lexaeus is a man of few words. Then Vexen shows up and he’s getting right down to business. Zexion’s like “Nice to see you too. We all used to be so close, what happened?”

Vexen’s all offended about that and gets pissy about “rank this, rank that, ooh I’m number 4, you shrimpy child.” as if your number indicated rank. Xigbar is the 2nd member but Xemnas’s 2nd in command is Saix (from my understanding) so sit your ass down, Vex.

So Zexion’s special talent? He smells people.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Riku smells people too?. Oh ok he can smell the darkness in his skin. Take a shower! …When was the last time he even got the opportunity?

Mickey appears before him and tells him some words of encouragement. He’s transparent because he can’t fully manifest in the castle right now. So where’s the other 50% opacity hanging out at?

“We shook hands in our hearts” omg… 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Let’s go to Neverland first yay. I did a team attack with Mickey. I remember that!

Imagine being in Riku’s stupid, dumb, giant, anime boy shoes… addressing a giant, bipedal mouse as “Your Majesty”……….. Actually my sister and I used to do that back in the day when we both were obsessed with the series. Regardless of context we’d call him “King Mickey”. It makes me cringe thinking back on it.

Oh I was gonna try to challenge myself to avoid using the dark power but I guess I dont have a choice but to use it. Might as well put points into it if that’s the case.

uses Key to Beginnings, is immediately thrown into a battle with Captain Hook oh I guess we’re not focusing on any events in these worlds they’re literally just to pad out Riku’s story. Riku is officially less Disney than Sora.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

How does Zexy know who Riku is? “Riku is here because Sora is here”. Vex that makes zero sense. What else is new?

Agrabah. Uneventful. Riku is not good at hitting small targets. Had a hell of a time fighting Jafar, or rather beating Iago to a pulp, in comparison to playing as Sora.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Next scene, and immediately like NO breath between the fade in and the scene itself, Vexen appears. And in even less time after he appears, “I take it you’re Riku?” This mofo has no time to waste. He’s a busy man.

Riku’s already tired of his bullshit and is ready to FIGHT. Same, Riku. Same.

I had him stun locked during most of this battle.

I JUST LOVE RIKU’S COMPLETE LACK OF FUCKS GIVEN HE’LL BEAT VEXEN’S SHIELD WITH HIS FISTS AND POMMEL

Vexen is a fucking twerp. And seems alot more crazy, mad scientist-y when interacting with Riku than Sora. Emphasis on “mad”. He cray

Why do they hang out in the dark? I mean, why no lamps? All I can imagine is them hanging out and barely able to actually see each other. The only way anyone knows who’s there is because Zexion can smell people, everyone else just assumes Lexaeus is there, Vexen won’t shut up about something something science, and Axel likes to hear himself talk.

Fat boi

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Zexion and Lexaeus are talking about what’s going on,  I’m still not sure what they’re doing here. Like, do they want Sora for the Organization? But Marluxia wants Sora as his personal puppet? What about Roxas? Isn’t he like, in a coma or something? Just kill Sora, Roxas will wake up, and SOMEONE’S got a Keyblade wielder again. Lex says Vexen hates Marluxia and things with the replica could turn out disastrously because of it. What IS Vexen’s beef with Marly?

Ok I know it’s to pad out a second campaign but why does Riku go to SORA’S memory worlds? Unless Riku stalked him throughout the entirety of KH1, or had so visit them for darkness missions, and those are his memories as well? Idk, it doesn’t have to be explicitly stated

Oh no Riku, it’s you.

So at this point he’s aware hes a copy? Does he forget later? With Namine’s meddling? How does Vexen create a living, breathing entity out of battle data? Like, where did the body come from? Did he have it on standby for a while until the right moment?

“You’re afraid of the dark” Repliku states.. Lmao yeah, Riku- he still sleeps with a night light. Don’t tell Sora.

Repliku is like, a worse Riku as far as personality goes. The punk-ass bitch Riku from KH1 but worse. Repliku is quick to ditch the double pants with suspenders and ankle belts for a muscle suit and grass skirt. I’m not sure which one’s worse.

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! I got two level ups out of that!

I high key love Repliku’s laugh here when Riku tries to attacks him again RIGHT AFTER THEIR FIGHT. It’s adorable, hilarious, and creepy. GG David Gallagher! Check out that video if you want. [video]

Dutch angles make everything more dramatic. Unofficial rule no. 1 of cinema. Repliku peaces out and we give chase up another flight of stairs and another cutscene plays. Repliku joins Zexion, Lexaeus, and Vexen in the dark room and they talk about introducing him to Sora.

Riku finds himself alone on the next floor, yelling at empty air. Ansem shows up to taunt Riku again. This dude just doesn’t quit. God forbid he learns no means go the fuck away.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Oh hey we’re in Atlantica! Maybe Riku can wash that darkness smell off his skin. Oh wait the water doesn’t really exist. And hes just a human, not swimming like a mermaid. Give me mer-Riku, you cowards. Twiggy mer-Sora is funny, twiggy mer-Riku with buff arms would be HYSTERICAL. I had a difficult time with Ursula because poor card management and I’m avoiding battles to get this game over with, which kinda shoots me in the foot as I’m not leveling up.

Yeah I was right, he ends up thinking HE’S Riku. I honestly feel bad for the guy… he’s so scared and betrayed. I know I was shit talking him just a bit ago but I need to protect Repliku. [video]

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Give Riku a Halloween Town outfit, you cowards.

This scene between Repliku and Namine is so bittersweet. [video] Just listen to how gentle he talks to Namine. Oh, my heart cannot handle it.

This game makes me so sad. Poor Repliku, poor Namine… Larxene continues to be The Worst. Like, the ABSOLUTE worst. Was Elrena like this?

(I keep getting progressively more and more angry because I can’t upload a video file to this on desktop but I can on mobile, but if I post a video on mobile I can’t edit a read more on desktop. AND I HAVE THREE VIDEOS I WANT TO PUT IN. SO I MADE A BLOG SPECIFICALLY SO I CAN POST THEM THERE AND LINK THEM HERE)

See you in part 2, where I will continue to drag Larxene.

#mellz plays kh recom #Kingdom Hearts series #kh recom #kingdom hearts re:chain of memories #square enix #Playstation 2 #mellz post

[metalempire]

Fire Emblem Three Houses Review: A Great Game Crippled By Squandered Potential

Now that the clickbait title has grabbed ur dick and engaged the hate boner it’s time to sit down and take a look at the newly released Fire Emblem game everyone loves (including me, to an extent, despite what the title says.) 

I’ll put the whole thing under a readmore to safeguard from spoilers, save dashboards and for anyone who doesn’t give a shit to just stop reading now at a convenient point. As for mobile users, fuck you, I’m a phone hating old man. Read this on an Apple Refrigerator or die.

The TL:DR version is: Game good overall, but not enough variety and near lazy repetition makes both gameplay and story feel a bit disappointing overall once you play all the routes. 

Also you can’t fuck Rodrigue so 0/10 worst game in the series. 

Right now I’ll address the good points about the game since I do in fact have heaps of praises to sing it’s just easier to clickbait with negativity of which I do have but the positive bits come first cos I said so. 

The gameplay is good Fire Emblem, unlike SoV which was ass don’t @ me, as the kids say. Aside from fog of war and a very occasional desert map there’s not too much unpleasant shit and there’s not really any spam which is great since the past few games were getting guilty of that. The maps are a bit plain in layout but they’re not bad either and the enemy placements, choices, map features and terrain are all nicely put together to make a fairly pleasant experience with each one. There are no desert fort maps surrounded by 5 range archers on all sides. There are no cantors spamming infinite terrors or infinitely spawning faceless reinforcements. The weapon triangle might be absent but the breaker skills have been retooled and brought back to allow you to choose if you feel like opting into it or not on your own end. It allows alot of units and weapons to shine and combined with the class freedom the game gives to allow you the wiggle room to make your own playstyle, so if an entire army of Wyvern Lords if your thing then the game is nothing short of an enabler there. Combat Arts are back and nicely well balanced and feel more useful than in SoV, not to mention gambits being a natural expansion on them, Battalions being a positive this game brings to up the scale of warfare rather than it just being Anime Teens VS The World and adds another combat art not tied to a weapon and nice stat boosts and effects to change how you interact with enemies, such as using Assembly to drag a boss off a heal tile, and so forth. The more options the better, and the game is full of freedoms for you to play around with. 

Garreg Mach Monastery is where most of the game takes place and where a good chunk of hours are spent. Being able to train weapon and movement type ranks outside of battle is also great and adds more micromanaging onto a series about alot of micromanaging and helps units keep up with each other, as well as letting you farm your own resources, bond with the gang and do little activities to give you some reprieve between fights. You can tell Koei Tecmo did alot of work on the development of Three Houses since this section of the game reminds me of Dynasty Warriors when you go back to your base and sort things out there and wander around. It also breathes some life into the setting and gives a good sense of permanence to the world and its’ characters. 

The world of Fodlan is also a major strong point, there’s lore, backstory, history, politics, a culture and even clashes and divides. It’s the most well realised world in a Fire Emblem game since Jugdral which it clearly has drawn inspiration from and I cannot praise Fodlan enough for being as well realised as a setting as it is, since the characters and exposition really give you a proper impression of how this world functions on social and political levels. The school setting of Garreg Mach is one I was initially iffy about but it fits surprisingly well and definitely grows on you over time since the game does a good job of immersing you in the role of a teacher. 

Tying into the world is also Crests, which, when combined with the Ability system, is great, making you pay attention to your characters crests, what they do, how they can benefit you, how you could use them, and to pay attention to enemy bosses and minibosses to see what crests they have, and in turn, pay attention to abilities some more too, to both create your ideal units, and keep an eye out for the same on the enemy team. It’s quite well balanced overall and is a sneaky hint of a possible Genealogy remake on the way someday.

The characters are also wonderful, often three dimensional with their own political views, own social perspectives, quirks, oddities, backstories, character conflicts, relationships, and of course, boatloads of trauma. Watching them all interact with each other and reacting to the story events and getting to know them was an excellent experience in proper character writing and interactions that the series has been starved of thanks to the very hit or miss (mostly miss) characterisation from Fates. The main lords are also incredible, from Edelgard and her dark as fuck backstory and her powerful resolve and willingness to do whatever it takes to achieve her wider scale goals, to Dimitri and his intensely personal conflicts and emotional baggage and his journey of highs and lows, to Claude and his boundless charisma and similarly his own ambitions and dreams all wrapped together in a charming package. The characters are all great and I can’t really find myself with any grievances about them that don’t boil down to wanking off over nitpicks over Hubert’s left testicle being out of place in a cutscene or something daft like that. 

The soundtrack is good. Not my favourite one but as always with Fire Emblem it’s good and makes the maps more fun since you can listen to a nice tune while thinking about how to murk the pair of armour knights. My only gripe really is the normal versions of songs all sound better than the in-battle variations they get. I also like that a boss theme or miniboss theme will continue to keep playing on the map itself until you beat that character, so you dont have to dip and dive into chip damaging Lyon to hear The Prince’s Despair anymore. 

The overall story is fairly decent, not as bad as Fates’ writing, or the fairly bland writing of some of the past games like Awakening that play it too safe. It’s willing to go in dark directions and focus in worldbuilding with its’ plot. However I do have alot of negatives to say about it by contrast but know that the overall story of the game and its’ many routes is one that I don’t hate, but I certainly feel wasn’t as well handled, especially in the second part of the game, as it should be. On an individual level, each route is decently well paced, aside from Edelgard’s route which is mysteriously 4 chapters shorter than the rest for no discernable reason at present until developer interviews shed light on that. The plot is for the most part decently well executed on an individual level. 

Now I’m going to insert a very important opinion of mine. I think a game can have a bad story, or no story at all, and still be great, so long as the gameplay is good, because gameplay is what makes a video game a video game, rather than just a dvd with an interactive menu. A game can have a great story, but if the gameplay is shit, the game suffers as a result, and it needs to play its’ focuses very well in order to redeem that. I try not to put as much important on story if I can’t help it, since I’m playing games for the game part first and foremost.

I bring that up because unlike Fates, where you can ignore the plot and have a good time with it, Three Houses isn’t so merciful, due to how much raw time is spent in cutscenes before, during and after battles, as well as engaging with the story at the monastery too, alot of time in Three Houses is not spent in the gameplay portion, but interacting with the story instead, so I have to place importance on the story because the game is, so I have to put more focus than I usually do on it because the game does by necessity of raw amount of time. Otherwise I honestly wouldn’t mind either way if the story was bad or good. 

This is to transition over to the negatives. 

For the bits where I’m not tying the gameplay and story together for reasons seen in a bit, understand that I was wary about the removal of the weapon triangle. While I don’t mind how it’s been handled, I still think the game is missing something for not having it since the beginning, and it’s definitely a core aspect I enjoy about the series, since now you can forgo unit variety and planning weapon level ups and just use whatever to win, and that level of freedom can hamper strategy in thinking on a more necessity based level, which in turn has subtle but noticeable effects on difficulty. 

The amount of time you spend not doing maps is honestly still jarring. Most of the time in these games if you’re ever spending lots of time between maps, it’s usually to get through a mountain of supports you forgot about, rather than spending alot of your time in cutscenes and doing stuff in a monastery. While I don’t hate it, I find alot of my time is spent not doing the Fire Emblem parts of the Fire Emblem game I’m playing and considering the fact that each route is 18-22 chapters long, compared to most FE games which go more than that typically, and you come to realise that the other stuff is sort of padding to distract from the low chapter count overall.

Now this is where I tie gameplay and story together in terms of the more major flaws to the game and what really held it back for me. 

Three Houses has 4 routes, all of which I’ve played; Edelgard’s route, Dimitri’s route, Claude’s route, and the Church route. The big problem here in both story and gameplay is the raw amount of repetition and lack of variation the game has with this. Unlike Fates, where the three routes all featured both unique maps, variations on maps, or if they did share maps, usually put them at different stages in the game, Three Houses doesn’t do that at all. Map variety is something this game is weak in, since paralogues just reuse story maps, and so far, only 2 or 3 maps seem exclusive to paralogues, and even then can be repeated by other paralogues. Worse still, earlier paralogues, like Ingrid and Dorothea’s, can spoil maps later on, and don’t even make sense when you get the context for that location. In every other past FE game, the paralogues all got their own maps. Repeating maps in a single run is already a risky business, but then there’s overall repetition. The first part of the game is exactly the same on all routes, it follows the same story and overall beats, an the only variation is chapter 12, if you’re playing Edelgard’s route, if not, it’s the same for the other 3. And for context, I did Edelgard first, Dimitri second, Claude third and Church last. In hindsight, that was a terrible order, since I basically ended up repeating myself 3 times in a row thinking I was getting something different. When the timeskip hits you expect each route to get different, but only Edelgard’s does. the other 3 routes are all about fighting the Adrestian Empire to save Rhea. That’s it. Dimitri, Claude and the Church routes all follow the same story, and by extension, maps, making you do them all in the same order as each other, with a minor variation here or there like Dimiri getting a chapter to retake Fhirdiad then resuming the static map path. The only difference is in the plot contrivances that don’t come up on the other routes despite following the exact same events to steer you towards a different final boss. Those Who Slither In the Dark are a great example of this. They destroy Fort Merceus only in Claude’s route, and for no reason are barely involved in the fights of the other routes and are never dealt with. They themselves are also wasted villains, with Kronya and Solon shown off once, then killed off in their second appearances, then Thales barely being in the game only to die in Claude’s route. The game sort of forgets about them in the other routes, and, insultingly, they’re fought by Edlegard in her route, but only in the epilogue, rather than having her missing 4 chapters cover that conflict. 

Really, the only point to playing a route is to get a different final boss, and to get some different lore in the final chapter. You only learn about Nemesis right at the end of Claude’s route, you only learn Byleth’s origin story at the end of the Church route. Outside of things like that, you’re just playing the same game, same maps, and same story but with different playable characters over and over again with no real variety until right at the very end, which is highly hollow. Edelgard’s route offers the most variation on all this, and yet it’s 4 chapters shorter than the other routes, so you’re either condemned to play the same shit over again, or you barely get any time with the one that’s a bit different. It really sucks since the map variety really is nonexistent. You play the exact same game for 12 chapters, think you’re getting some variety, then just get the same shit as the last run, or, only get a few maps and then you’re done. Either way, the sheer lack of variety in maps and accompanying story really makes the hyped up timeskip feel like a colossal disappointment in hindsight, and when Fates, a 3DS game, has more map and story variety (yes even if that story was awful) than a home console game, then something is deeply flawed about this game.

The pacing is also fairly bad if not close to terrible. At most the game is 22-23 chapters at the most, 18 at the least, and it spends 12 of these on the Academy phase of the game. The game drags its’ feet with the story for the first half, slow burning its’ way along, feeding you hints of lore to come and setting things up and, to be honest, doing a good job at worldbuilding. Then the timeskip happens and the war phase just rushes by at one hell of a fast pace. The maps being the same across them doesn’t help, but pacing can also damage the routes. For example, Verdant Wind builds up to fighting the Agarthans, it builds up to them but only with hints and setup while you’re busy fighting Edelgard, and then once’s that’s done, you have two chapters left, one of which has you fight the Agarthans in one map, beat them, and then have the final battle with Nemesis, which, while the map itself is arguably the best of the 4 and really feels like a final battle, story-wise comes out of fuckin nowhere just to have a cool end to the game. And then there’s Crimson flower, which steamrolls through the game and is definitely missing chapters, with key events like the battle at Gronder just not being there at all. In general the story pacing is just too wonky and every route really needed more chapters to flesh out the conflicts rather than rushing along the most engaging bits of the game.

Also the graphics are kind of weird looking for a 2019 game and some of the cutscenes are animated so stiffly it’s strange to watch. Honestly the visual presentation in Fire Emblem has never really been very good outside of fully rendered cutscenes in previous games like Awakening or Radiant Dawn, but it’s a shame the Switch’s capabilities weren’t fully utilised, especially with some textures, although Warriors with its’ JPEG stone floor in Hoshido Castle is no doubt to blame as well for that influence. That said, it’s not all that big of an issue for this series, and you really don’t notice it as much, just felt the need to address it since it is there and the Switch launched with Breath of the Wild which looks wonderful and then there’s Three Houses looking like it just got out of bed by comparison.

My main issues with the game stem mostly from the larger segment above, the constant repetition of maps in almost perfect order after each other, the exact same story playing out for the majority of what should be different routes, and the school phase being the most repetitive as well really dragging the game down. The first time I played the game I loved it, no doubt, but the subsequent runs made me realise that alot less overall variety was put into the game than I thought would be, and that hurts the quality for me, to know that 3/4 options have me doing 95% the same thing but with different units, and the other option is just a bit too short to be able to fully enjoy what it has to offer. Fire Emblem is a bigger name now than it used to be, and Three Houses honestly deserved to be a bit better than this overall. 

Also you can’t fuck Felix’s dad so what’s even the point of it all, really. 

 I have no doubts though that people will still love this game, and rightfully so, it’s a great entry in the series, just not the best. I’m sure people who’ve only done one or two routes will think it’s fantastic, but once you do all four of them, I think the honeymoon period will pass by, and the initial spark of excitement of a new game will wear off, and just like how everyone tore into Fates a year after release, I think Three Houses might end up suffering a slightly similar fate as well once people realise that the game really doesn’t offer as much variety as it seemed to be offering. Maybe there are people who don’t mind all the repetition and the sameyness of it all, but for me, it held the game back from being truly great. The Lords are what really carry their respective routes, due to their character strengths, and a certain route definitely suffers for only having Byleth (and Seteth of all people) as the main driving force of that route. 

All that said, I really recommend any Fire Emblem fan or even any Switch owner to play Three Houses. It’s not perfect, and it certainly loses it’s magic over time and really needs some reworking in places and major injections of variety, or a really good DLC,  but it’s still definitely got plenty of good quality to enjoy and the bits that are good are really good and worth sticking through each route to be able to play with. 

The score this game gets is a

Forever Pissed I Can’t Marry Rodrigue/10

#Fire Emblem Three Houses #Fire Emblem #FE3H #long post

[edge-lorde]

hp update: time to see how well i remember the various subplots of the O.W.L’s event. i will go through each npc kid an describe their plots, more or less in order of when we see them. 

Jae: slippery to the end. i meet him in sandwich hell detention. pitts is shown once again to have no real power over the kids he supervises because jae is straight up organizing his contraband in order to sell it to other kids specifically so that they can cheat on the tests. he tells you most of this stuff will just get you caught cheating, which is worse than failing, but his clients dont need to know that. pretty good business practice, right? ;y. i agree with him.

penny comes in, looking to buy. again, this is the middle of jaes detention. mc has a overly moral reaction to penny trying to cheat. jae is like hey what the fuck. im trying to make a deal here. 

i dont remember him having another level devoted to him. unlike other kids who the mc tries to convince to study, the dont try this on jae. probably because jaes not scared he just doesnt give a fuck. i do remember seeing him with his head down after the charms exam. 

Penny: penny has good reason to be looking to cheat. SPOILERS her little sister has been trapped in a painting all year END SPOILERS. after she tries to buy from jae and you stop her, she decides not to cheat. i have little moral issue with cheating on a test like this and had less issue with it when i was in high school, but its true that cheating is much more likely to end in getting caught when the test proctors have magic, so still a wise choice. you study potions with her on her level. 

Andre: charlie calls you in for emergency friend services; andre has not studied at all for his exams because he says hes going to be a professional quidditch player and doesnt need to. you have a butterbeer with them in hogsmead and do a friendship level with him, trying to convince him that he shouldnt blow the tests off.

 in the cutscene beforehand, charlie is there sitting at the table with you. as soon as the level starts he disappears. we get a nice talk about non-academic magical careers. when the level ends i dont get any friendship exp with andre for some reason?? at the end andre concludes “well, shit.” 

Rowan: already detailed most of this one. we get a study party for all the kids in your house. rowan has studied herself to death. chiara knows whats up, takes you and rowan out to the forest to pet perma-wolf form werewolf pup borf for awhile. it helps. 

Tonks: we meet tonks at zonko’s joke shop. shes freaking out, upset, becuase shes worried shes not going to get good enough grades to be an auror. mc tries to cheer her with jokes and pranks. doesnt help. ben shows up and says something about helping other kids cope with pressure. 

her plot coincides with tulips, ends with some sneaking into filches office to simulate the skills an auror would need: sneaking and turning permanent records into rats. it works! she gets her mojo back. >:D

Tulip: T girls study sesh is in the library. tulip wants to prank people instead of study. tonks is like no actually... must take this seriously. tulip complys but gets a little upset. at age 15, she doesnt know what she wants to be when she grows up yet. all she knows is that she doesnt want a boring ministry job like her parents have. its very relatable. i ultimately choose to follow tulips lead and stay undecided at the end of the event. a good solidarity moment. 

Barnaby: barnabys plot was especially hard hitting for me because i could see it in motion. earlier, during the charms exam, i saw him just doing the confused animation while the other kids did their lumos’s. at the end of the test, you can see him putting his head down on his desk. jae does this too, but i didnt see him actually do it. 

later, during the transfig exam, i see the weasel on his desk suspiciously not changing shape. and there was the line earlier in the year where he said he didnt know what owls everyone was studying...

his level is in the woods. all 3 weird animal loving kids are hanging out in there, as they do; barnaby, liz, and charlie. barnaby is upset because hes worried he wont make good enough grades to become a magizoologist. i forget his exact words, but they seemed both really sad and really relateable, it was something like “im not very good at taking tests...” it was like admitting to your parents that you dont want to go to the party because you dont have any friends. barnaby knows hes the dumbest kid in the friend group and thats an awful feeling. 

but the mc, liz and charlie are like no, barnaby. your not dumb. you know this stuff. then prof kettleburn pops out of the mist like a one-armed guardian angel, says he lost his bowtruckle. we all help him look for it. barnaby uses his magizoological knowledge to find it, which gives him some confidence, then i tell him that the bowtruckles name is barnaby jr, which i picked for it in year 4 i think. that cheers him up as well. 

later, at the end of the event, one of his lines during an assembly is “if i get any T’s, ill just pretend they stand for Terrific! :D” 

and ill have to get back to the rest of this tomorrow... i wanted to go to bed early tonight. RIP me

EDIT: this post continued HERE

#hp #harry potter #hogwats mystery #hphm #barnaby lee #rowan khanna #tulip kasaru #chiara lobosca #jae kim #andre egwu #liz tuttle #charlie weasley #penny haywood #nymphadora tonks #tonks #o.w.l.s #sirius business

[tumblunni]

Okay I know that kingdom hearts has a bad reputation for sticking crucial plot information on obscure spinoff games but HOLY SHIT I just finally watched a lets play of the fuckin digimon tcg game and found out it ACTUALLY HAS A GODDAMN CONCLUSION TO ANALOGMAN FROM DIGIMON WORLD 1

like 90% of the damn game has no plot whatsoever let alone indicating its a digimon world sequel! and then suddenly in the last battle without being foreshadowed whatsoever analogman returns and gets possibly the best boss battle ever IN A GODDAMN TCG GAME

holy shit his whole fight is framed as ‘this is literally the same guy from digimon world 1, hacking another game’, the interface wigs out and a bunch of fake command windows pop up with rapidly scrolling code of the game supposedly falling apart. And then his boss battle flips the entire gameplay system on its head by giving him fourth wall breaking special moves that pull overpowered effects by “hacking the engine”, with cool animations to fit. Fuckin badasssss!!

and it also fuckin FINALLY EXPLAINS THE DAMN PLOT LIKE GEEZ

digimon world’s conclusion was so rushed, you never even meet the villain until the final battle and it ends all weird with just “something” going wrong that causes him to get sucked into a portal or something while screaming dramatically in weirdly high resolution terror faces??? the tcg game confirms that this was him attempting to flee back to the human world after you defeated him, but one of the stray attacks from the battle damaged his machine and it caused him to essentially commit accidental suicide when he turned it on.

and HOLY SHIT MY FUCKIN OBSCURE HEADCANON IS TRUE????

the game had some sequel bait hints that maybe analogman is somehow still around and that the portal explosion just turned him into “corrupted data” so he can never return to the human world. and i always thought it would be super ironic if he actually got turned into a digimon aka the thing he hates more than anything

WELL OKAY I GUESS CRITICAL LORE IN A TCG GAME IS OKAY WHEN ITS A BIG YES BUNNI U THEORY BE CORRECT

he appears in this game as a malomyotismon who does a damn good vexen face during the fight, lol. And he’s all “gahh that stupid kid ruined my plans but this accursed body at least improved my hacking abilities!” Tho its implied that his corrupted state is more like a bodyless cloud of data that can possess/copy different digimon, which would be REALLY FUCKIN CRITICAL to explaining the goddamn plot of Digimon World Next Order!

Seriously wtf is up with this series? Digimon World 2 is not the sequel to Digimon World 1, all the numbered games are entirely separate individual stories with wildly different genres from pet sim to roguelike strategy. The real sequel is fucking DIGIMON THE CARD GAME THE GAME and then Digimon World Next Order a bazillion years later for the ps4. In which i am STILL REALLY SALTY that they have a FUCKIN RAD remix of analogman’s boss theme yet he doesn’t appear in the game. The added context of this damn tcg game confirms once and for all that the Ambiguous As Fuck Ending actually WAS him appearing in the game, this unexplained “oh wait the villain was good all along and he was just possessed by an evil virus” was supposed to be corrupted-digi-analogman and seriously WHY DONT THEY JUST FUCKIN EXPLAIN IT!!! this tcg game wasnt even released in europe!! and even american fans probably had no clue it was linked to this entirely separate subseries! You have to friggin piece it together with context clues like the battle music and the fact analogman’s signature mon was machinedramon. I mean vjesus christ Next Order is a litera; sequel with the grown up version of Digimon World’s protagonist as a badass home ec teacher who still defends the digital world in his free time yet you couldnt spare ONE LINE OF DIALOGUE mentioning the name of the villain?? and summarizing the fuckin tcg game everyone missed??? AND CONFIRMING THAT THE VILLAIN IS INDEED MAKING A REAPPEARANCE POSSESSING THIS GUY??? oh god everything makes SENSE, thank you terrible card game adaptation. ehh but i do still love Next Order for making Hiro/Mameo’s canon partner Mamemon, he’s even more badass as this big tough bishie version of himself with a tiny adorable pal that can shoot rocket fists through space and time. (its funny tho cos the DW1 intro movie showed metalmamemon and metalgreymon and the american boxart flipped a coin and decided metalgreymon must have been the one the protagonist was using in that scene. Whoops!)

anyway even with the added context that IT WAS INDEED GODDAMN ANALOGMAN, the final boss fight in Next Order was as terrible as the rest of the plot. So I’m glad trash gramps got a suitably badass boss fight after all, even if it was a CARD GAME VERSION! lets all celebrate the awesomeness of this obscure fuckin spinoff game’s obscure fuckin intercontinuity cameo with the boss fight music that other game wasted

seriously fuckin hell the biggest challenge in that final boss was that i was so distracted by SHEER OFFENDEDNESS at the cool music not matching it that it was hard to keep focused

its not just a great boss theme for a terrible boss, its a really fuckin EMOTIONAL song for anyone whose childhood was fuckin defined by the first game!!!

and look you had a PERFECT FUCKIN EXCUSE for a REALLY GOOD boss battle against MY MAN GRUMPY GRANDPA OF THE COOL DAMN NAME. Seriously guys analogman was THE FIRST digimon villain! digimon world came out before the anime, digimon world was the BETA FOR THE ANIME! this was the first place they had the ideas for file island, so much of the areas in the game are awkwardly mistranslated versions of stuff that would later appear in the anime in a different form. before this digimon had never been anything more than a fuckin 2-bit graphics tamagotchi and this was (after the manga) only the second goddamn time these monsters had an actual full colour character design! all of those charmingly janky 90s gross out show styled tcg illustrations? that was concept art that this game was working from! fuckin hell this game thought up the idea for metalgreymon’s changed design that ended up becoming the iconic partner of tai in the anime. (you can also see beta tai in the manga with a beta veemon as a partner instead! o_O)

SO LIKE...

JUST....

I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT ANALOGMAN OKAY!!! he’s a badly written guy with only like five sentences across all the videogames but fuckin hell he was such an Iconique part of the development of this series that they named him fucking ANALOGMAN

like dude you could have SO EASILY made me scream at my tv in a more positive way by bringing him out as the surprise villain and showing us wtf his deisgn is even supposed to look like cos god all we have is a blurry faceless early ps1 model buried under the glow filters of Mt Infinity’s funky background effects.

AND FUCKING

IF IT IS CANON

THAT MY FUCKIN

STUPID THEORY

IS CANON

slap a fuckin O on this man and LITERALLY LET ME BEAT HIM UP

like dont even give him a team or anything, just let me fight THE MAN HIMSELF

you canonically fuckin said he’s a digital ghost now and basically the same as a digimon

let me beat the shit out of a regular businessman in a suit and tie while he pulls his badass ‘i’m hacking the game i’m in’ bullshit from the GODDAMN TCG GAME THAT WAS MORE CLIMACTIC THAN YOUR SHITTY CASH GRAB FAKE SEQUEL

man god i didnt expect a fuckin TCG GAME to revive my righteous fury from back when i first played that piece of shit. i hate it cos Next order is so pretty and its gameplay is so good and i really loved my twin digis but there were SO MANY bugs and cut corners and missing content and really bad writing and GOD it made me so sad that the dub team really really tried, they tried so hard that they got fuckin renamon’s original voice actress back even though the renamon in this game has nothing to do with the anime one. THE DUB WAS REALLY GOOD BUT IT COULDNT SALVAGE THAT SCRIPT!! THE MUSIC WAS REALLY GOOD AND THE ART WAS REALLY GOOD AND THE DIGIMON THEMSELVES WERE MY BEST DAMN FRIENDS FOR THAT MONTH OF MY LIFE BUT THE GODDAMN FUCKIN SCRIPT!!! the postgame was MORE FUN because FINALLY everything opened up like the sandbox of the first game and you could just fuckin hug u digis without being distracted by constant cutscenes butchering your childhood nostalgia

man i wanted to write a fic/draw a comic about my headcanons on how to fix it but i never managed to do it cos holy shit it was basically “throw everything out and make a different game geez” I COULD RAMBLE FOR HOURS ABOUT THE ENTIRELY DIFFERENT SEQUEL THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN!! and a fuckin!! tcg game!! was closer to that sequel!!!

and fuckin MY THEORY WAS RIGHT AND MY BETTER GAME IDEA ACTUALLY WOULD WORK IN CANON

fuck it im gonna do draw myself decking business gramps in the face

oh! and the female protagonist design! thats another rare good part of that thing! i loved the pixellization effect on her ponytal, way better than the male equivelant having a very ordinary costume design just with a pixel corner taken out of his jacket. also why did the plot never actually make a thing out of that? like you’d think that ‘unlike every other digimon tamer i’ve got this scar of my digitization’ would be a plot point. like they didnt give everyone else a cool pixel squares mark! they could have at least used it as an excuse why the protagonist is the Only Chosen One who can do all this plot shit. or if it was me i would have made it early foreshadowing for the Return Of Business Gramps, like you were partially infected by the Oooo Mysterious Unexplained Digi Virus (seriously why did they not just have ONE SENTENCE explaining its the fuckin original villain returning????) during the prologue and i dunno somehow that gives you powers to break analogman’s control on the digimon he possesses. or maybe the pixel thing is like a tracking device he put on you? or just give that cool design trait to the protagonist of digimon cyber sleuth instead, whose entire plot is that theyre a digimon human hybrid with literaly the power to pixellize themself into computers.

ALSO!!! actually do something!!! with mameo!!!

they really fuckin hyped up in all the prelease materials that the digimon world 1 protagonist was gonna be in this game and he’s all grown up now. and then he does NOTHING in the plot except babble exposition and stand around your home base. and has one line about how he’s a badass teacher now and his partner is mamemon but hey we made a bullshit excuse for why his digimon is sealed away and he never gets to fight :<

give me an actual cool teamup of new protag girl and her cool teacher dude beating the shit out of business trash with their bare fists and also their digimon’s bare fists while THE BEST DAMN MUSIC GOES UNWASTED

...fuck i sure do Feel Intensely about nostalgic games lol. i wonder if i’ll be so rambley when i play kh3? maybe itd be a really shitty lp, aaagh...

#no gramps shall go unappreciated in the bunni house

[pinksweatergettingbetter]

warning, the following has mainly snarky (and possibly furious) opinions on Spirit of Justice. Reader discretion is advised.

Okay folks. this is it. part 1 of the final chapter

here we go.

-

trial day 2?? oh yeah i forgot they split this game up in the worst, uneven way possible 

-

wow that cutscene was

something alright

-

wow datz actually managed to hold onto the snow globe. kudos?

-

what the fuck

i think i heard it wrong but Dhurke’s objection sounds like an old man 

I'm pretty sure i heard it wrong 

missed the bass

-

who was that no– oh Garananana

i guess she's gonna be the final boss instead huh

- 

im so tired i cant even snark properly 

-

“is that kosher?”

i like it

-

oh god

what.... what is she wearing 

i mean

fuckin

TALK about madonna-whore complex. oh yeah, time to turn super evil?? bear your midriff! show off dem tiddies! 

look, SOJ. theres only one bad bitch in ace attorney who can pull off floaty tendril hair, and its NOT ga’ran.

i cant believe i have to look at this train wreck for the rest of the trial

-

“heh heh heh. its all coming back now. the feel of my blood pumping through my veins”

this is perhaps because youre actually moving now, your eminence.

-

can we just dispense with the trial and have a good old fashioned anime fight? cmon apollo, spike up that hair and grab your BFS. 

-

“meep”

WHATS WITH THE MEEPING

BONNY DID THAT TOO

SOJ ITS 2016 ...ACTUALLY ITS 2028 YOU HOLES

-

everyone in the court: :O what??? whats wrong with rayfa??? why is she sad???

oh i dunno maybe because her fucking Father just got brutally murdered?? maybe??

what the fuck is up with SOJ characters being dumb as a bag of bricks when it comes to other peoples’ feelings regarding death of loved ones???

-

phoenix: shits fucked, thats why?? apollo: OHHHHHHHHHHHHH

-

“seems like she's worse off today than she was yesterday”

hey game you'd better not be implying any shit 

-

“discipline”

soj

-

alright, back after another longass break. i can do this.

( That’s oddly compassionate of him, all things considered )

I was about to defend Nahyuta because what kind of person wouldn’t try to spare a child from witnessing that kind of trauma... but then again, this is the Sadmad who purposefully tried to trigger someone into losing a trial so

(shrug emoji)

-

grana’s gone into full HORHORHOR BITCH MODE 

partially I'm totally numb because i dont have any stakes in her newfound ebilness, and partially I'm tired of this weird new trend of child abuse in the new games 

- 

“Barbed head.”

oh my god 

the first person she goes to after realizing that her caretaker is gone is fucking Phoenix 

im gonna cry 

“ive been reduced to “royal robe remover”” NO NICK YOU’VE BEEN UPGRADED TO DAD BY SOMEONE WHO’S NOT YOU

( ‘It’s like she’s grooming Mr. Wright to be Nayna’s replacement’) 

I know this game is all about confusing bullshit for heartwarming moments and vice versa but guys 

good lord

my heart

i really needed that 

-

(sigh) they really couldn’t get someone who sounded like a fucking 14 year old to do her voice?? really???

-

rayfa: (looks like she's going to die and collapses)

apollo: this is not good...

gee apollo you really think so? 

-

wait a fuking second 

we went through the whole dance cutscene and we’re not even going to see the pool??? does that mean the priestess has to be conscious and present for the images to be visible? ...and how does that work, anyway? 

i just realized, a medium could use a pool to see the dead, but how the hell could they project it for others to see?? does she literally open a portal to hell???

(sigh) i just regret sitting through that cutscene again

-

“cabal of traitorous lawyers”

i love that

-

(Seriously Dhurke? This is no laughing matter.)

this basically sums up Dhurke’s entire personality 

...yknow, i know what they were trying to do with his character– i really do. i know he’s supposed to come off as a dashing, cavalier rebel who laughs in the face of danger. 

but they overshot endearingly irreverent and ploughed straight into fuckwaddome. if you want a character to be charming, they need softer moments too. Dhurke isn’t a bad person, but he’s kind of an asshole when you get right down to it, and nothing so far is proving otherwise. 

-

ok ive heard Dhurke’s Objection again and it doesn't sound like an old man– it just sounds about as overblown and ridiculous as Manfred von Karma’s (not to mention about as deep)

-

LET DHURKE SAY BITCH

... i guess

-

another perfect example of Dhurke being kind of a fuckwad: he keeps needling the queen and baiting her in ways that could get himself killed, which would be all fine and dandy if he were the brave resistance leader being tortured for information in the bowels of a dungeon.

...but here’s the thing.

IF YOU DIE, DHURKE, APOLLO AND PHOENIX DIE TOO. DID YOU FORGET ABOUT THE GODDAMN DC ACT? ITS NOT JUST YOUR DEAD ASS ON THE LINE HERE SO SHUT YOUR SASSY TRAP AND THINK ABOUT SOMETHING OTHER THAN YOUR *AMAZING WIT* FOR ONCE.

you’ve got 2 extra lives on the line here.

...3 if my suspicions are correct.

-

stop calling him son please you abandoned him in an orphanage and didnt contact him for 14 years.

...and if he can’t call you ‘dad’ you have no right to call him ‘son’

-

coming back to this after ghost trick has convinced me that one of ga’ran’s lackeys miiiiiight be related to Cabanela, baby

-

“Wright... I can see we are kindred spirits, you and I! Hah-ha ha ha ha ha!!”

NO

NO 

NO

NO

FUCK YOU DHURKE 

-

“It’s pretty easy to spot the difference between a soulless man and the soulless shell of a man”

ok that did get a laugh out of me, good job dhurke.

-

apollo: pls dont get us killed dhurke: mmmm ok ill try but I'm not promising anything lol

://///

-

“But remember, son, if you truly believe in me, you should be able to prove my innocence.”

do i even have to list how many reasons thats wrong and a shitty thing to say

-

“Such Insolence”

You’ve been beat out, Not So Fast

-

Ga’ran used Gust!

Apollo flinched and couldn’t move!

-

“I could behead you at any time”

she's got a point; she’s a fucking despot, there’s no reason to actually hold a trial. i mean i guess she wants to shut up the rebels but just killing them would be a lot easier and its not like she has any qualms about murder

-

“Aw shoot, ya got me.”

again, not an appropriate reaction for whats going on buddy

-

lol get fucked kjudge

-

DGFUFUS OH COOL

WE GOT GUILTY (excited cheers from the audience)

the applause and the shots of everyone with :O faces is making me feel like i just won a gameshow 

wheres my cheesy jingle 

-

also i love how Dhurke’s like “oh shit!! my assholishness has directly resulted in my son’s death!!! did NOT see that coming!!!!!!!!!”

-

again the sound mixing is drowning out the background music (sigh)

-

“your benevolence? I’d be happy to lend an ear if you’d like to talk!”

>this is it, this is why he leaves the series guys. Apollo is too good for these sinful games.

-

DAMNIT DHURKE, YOUR SHIT MOUTH IS RUBBING OFF ON YOUR SON

-

hmm

we’ve got an april may here

-

“Rayfa, I shall buy you a new servant”

so Kooraheen practices slavery..? I mean, she.... she said ‘buy’, not hire.

-

“she would have left shoeprints”

do

do you know what evaporation is your malevolence 

-

wait wait wait

that doesn't make any sense 

the only prints leading out are from Inga, but the prints inside the building are from Nayna? how did she avoid leaving prints leading inside, then?? did she just long-jump over the dirt path???

-

the guards are not fanboying, apollo, they’re toadying. there’s a difference.

-

apollo: maybe the place he was stabbed and the place he died were different 

(the game only continues after you carefully explain what dying of blood loss is three years later)

-

to be completely fair, there are actually stories of people who were unaware of being stabbed 

furthermore, when you get stabbed, you’re not going to be the most rational human being on earth. 

phoenix, don’t give sadmad that point, especially when he’s currently assaulting your protege 

now, as i was saying, Apollo’s suggestion that Inga was stabbed in the back and then ran into the temple is perfectly plausible; running to shelter from an attacker is probably the first thing you’d want to do when injured, and the tomb was a pretty safe place, i’d wager. 

tbh i really don’t know why they’re arguing about him feeling the pain as that wouldn’t really impair his movement considering he was stabbed in a place that wouldn’t affect his ability to walk???

but yeah apparently he was doped up to shit so 

-

...i highly doubt back pain medication is strong enough to negate a stab wound. on the other hand, if it is and your back pain is THAT intense, Inga, you need to see a fucking doctor pronto.

...yeah shots straight into the spine is one step away from surgery; not to be an asshole but I'm not sure Inga was doing so well anyway before he went 

-

huh. are they really gonna give us an actual choosable choice to abandon Dhurke and save our own skin? Cause that would be interesting; a lot like the old games where you could “”choose”” to defend a client or not.

to be clear here, though, i wouldn't choose “no” even as much as i dislike dhurke. we know (sigh) that he’s innocent, and even if i dont like him it’s our duty to defend his shitty ass

OH HOLY FUCK

THERES THE CHOICE

wow. y’know SOJ, i dont much like you, but you fuckin Did That. well done.

also thank you for the Justice pun it is much appreciated.

-

“And while I can’t say I’m used to it, this isn’t exactly my first rodeo”

FWHAT

>game flashes back to the Ahlbi case

DSKJFLS THIS IS LITERALLY THE “at second rodeo: this isn't my first rodeo” POST

-

YES OK WE’VE SEEN THIS CUTSCENE TWICE NOW ALREADY

WE GET IT, RAYFAS GOT COLD FEET ABOUT BEING QUEEN

MAYAS IN THE GAME 

OK

-

phoenix: allow me to mansplain how rayfa is feeling despite how fucking obvious it is. after all, we know our players have the mental and emotional capacity of goldfish!

oh hey mansplain is a legit word in the dictionary 

cool!

-

why are they building this up?? just fucking tell Rayfa to do her stupid dance again and get on with it; we already did this at the beginning of the trial 

-

“Hmm... Indeed. It would be problematic.”

ohohoooohohohhhihgjhgo

-

oh her nails are actually tiny pen 

thats neat 

thank goodness Kooraheeneese is an up-and-down written language– otherwise they’d have to make a whole new animation for the english game teehee

-

“....................But... Horn Head needs my help”

oh my heart

-

dan she just straight up begone’d her 

-

see the one thing that falls flat here is that, during a regular trial, the prosecution saying “oh, ok, have it your way; you can try to prove your theory” holds up a little more since they... you know. don’t have absolute power.

where as, with Garananana, its more like she's just a huge posturing pushover. especially since every other minute she's saying “ok, I'm gonna kill you for REAL now.”

-

rayfa: b but if i fail you'll be killed!!! i dont get it...

apollo: i literally just finished explaining that I'm 100% ready to die for my shitty job that was like 5 minutes ago

it is sweet to see that he’s cheering her on though. good big bro 

-

I'm finding small solace in this beautiful moment of “your foreign dad and bro are here for you babe reach for the stars”

Athena’s probably flashing a double thumbs up from the gallery too

-

“But... I finally know now. I know in what I can trust”

Bobby, from the afterlife: YOU’RE DOING AMAZING SWEETIE 

-

Garan: What??? my tiny 14 year old daughter is going to do a thing i don’t want her to??? fuck there’s no way i can shut her up. not even with all of my large adult man guards who could easily just escort her out of the courtroom without any resistance because they’re my fucking royal guards and I'm the Queen

-

oh shit she took off her own cape

im so glad i muted the game so her awful voice actress couldn’t ruin this cool moment

-

and now as this long ass cutscene plays out again, i simply cannot help but wonder about the poor choir and how long they’ve been on standby 

where do they keep the choir during trials 

whats it like singing the dance of devotion song every trial 

-

oh finally here we go. alright, lets see what the magic party pool has in store for us this time 

...o ...ok then

-

OH! OH SHIT 

Inga’s face blind?!

Y’know I did have a few thoughts about that when we discovered his notebook but I didn’t think they’d actually go that route... though, thinking about it now, it is pretty convenient.

...ok everyone’s freaking out. maybe they’ve never heard of face-blindness? ...or maybe its not face blindness after all

im pretty sure it is though

-

i dont know why but everyone being like FUCK ITS GOD and phoenix being like “whoops shits trippy now” made me laugh pretty hard

-

ok i gotta say I'm actually a little invested now, even if its just because i think face-blindness is an interesting thing to incorporate into a murder case. again, a convenient thing, but an interesting thing all the same.

-

ahh fuck i keep forgetting how the stupid seance works 

welp, there goes one of my souls... (sigh)

-

..apollo you dont need to show her the picture of her dead father to say “he had a cell phone”.

-

the voice was coming from INSIDE THE PHONE 

-

RAYFA HAS A PET FROG????

WHAT

SHOW US THE FROG SOJ

SHOW US THE FROG! SHOW US THE FROG! SHOW US THE FROG! 

-

...why would Rayfa interpret the sound of the warbaa’d (something she’s familiar with) with a lion’s roar (something she’s unfamiliar with) ??

-

oh i see thats why Vore Machine is an idiot 

for plot convenience 

-

Datz Are’bal, a man who throws fire crackers at children.

...sounds like an are’bal guy.

bahdum-tshh

-

“The joker who got a kick out of startling Ahlbi with his Dragon Snot Snaps”

...something tells me that if Datz found out about Youtube, he’d be one of those “””prank””” channels.

also WHY ARE THEY CALLED SNOT SNAPS

WHAT DOES THAT MEAN

-

“happy-go-lucky”

i think you mean vaguely sociopathic

-

(sigh) ive finally been worn down to the point where i need a walkthrough. ive... been beaten...

-

boy ahlbi’s just a font of knowledge isn't he 

-

DID SHE JUST BREAK HER NAILS OFF

PLEASE SAY THOSE WERE STICK ONS

HOL SHIT

-

MMMM LAY IT ON ME NICK

face blindness 

... i mean theyre not calling it that but thats what it is 

-

yeah yeah channeling blah blah come on! youre in the LAND of channeling !

-

shduhjahdjk

I'm picturing Inga running into his own dead body and flipping his shit 

-

oh man. thats the end of Trail 2 part 1.

guess i’ll see you guys on the other side... heheh. 

#soj spoilers #sulking over SOJ #ooc #its a LONG one]

[busket]

botw first impressions

i’ve only just beat the plateau and got the glider and stuff but i thought i’d give my thoughts on breath of the wild. i consider myself a pretty big zelda fan, especially from wind waker onwards and i’ve been really excited about this. i wont be talking spoilers but i’ll put it under a readmore anyway. im just gonna type as i think so sorry if it doesn’t come together all neat and tidy

first of all i really adore the music. they got a new composer for this one, right? i really love the ambient, quiet and peaceful piano, but then when things get more intense the music changes perfectly to fit it. i came across a stone talus and even though i didn’t beat it, the music is still stuck in my head like its so fun and interesting for a mini boss battle

something i’ve heard is that since there’s no “hyrule field” music, it makes the world seem kind of empty, but i’ve really been loving it. i think with almost 100% of the game taking place in the field, some hyrule field theme would get repetitive after a while, as much as i love the hyrule field music in other games

and honestly,,, i love how empty it feels??? it’s so peaceful and beautiful. i love coming across a new area with no enemies and just. being there. that area on the plateau with the little house, the soft green plain with the trees. thats like straight out of my dreams i love how it feels to walk around there. tbh going to the actual hyrule field and seeing more monsters i was kinda like “hhh stressful” like. i would be 100% okay with an emptier world, closer to what shadow of the colossus has lol

i think its a bit to early for me to judge the plot since i only know the very beginning of it. it seems interesting! i hope “calamity ganon” shows up as also like, “ganondorf”. as in.... a person. i miss that guy

changes in the formula are great; i thought the shrines were going to be like dungeons, but they were more like little puzzles and i like that. i wonder if theres gonna be any traditional dungeons at all? i love the hunting/gathering/cooking aspect, thats a lot of fun. i like the weapon collecting. controls are still pretty confusing for me, its a lot to remember but i dont have any gripes gameplay wise

i don’t like the voice acting in the cut scenes. i can’t tell if its bad voice acting, or i just like the freedom to imagine the character’s voices myself and put in the right inflections and emphasis on what seems right to me? the writing seems to get weird during the cutscenes too, saying fantasy shit like “nay” “oft” “verily”, even though the rest of the dialogue is pretty timeless. and why the fuck do they have english accents?? i never imagined that for hyrule, seems kind of silly!

and this is a gripe i have with skyward sword too but who the fuck is the goddess hylia?? idk where she came from, i’ve always known it as din, nayru and farore being the main goddesses of hyrule.......i’d be fine if hylia was like, a forgotten goddess bc she chose to be reincarnated as a mortal...sometimes i feel like skyward sword just messed shit up

anyway im having a good time and so far it’s a lot more difficult than other zelda games right of the bat! i like the idea of avoiding an enemy being just as valid as fighting it. can’t wait to play more

[omgdicks1]

Shitty samus returns review

i feel obligated to talk about how there hasnt been a new metroid game in 6 years, partly because its sad and i wanted more metroid, but mostly because every review ive seen started like this. 6 years is like 4 zeldas, 6 marios, 2 pokemons and 2 failed attempts at college. Yes technically metroid prime : chibi space marines + soccer came out in that time but if you couldnt tell by the (totally accurate title) that shit doesnt count. the world needed samus genociding aliens and promising strip teases if you do it fast enough. why not just do that by remaking the second worst metroid game(return of samus) with all the fixins of super, fusion, and zero mission. so yeah they did that something something transition story After defeating space pirates, destroying mother brain and the metroids in the first game, samus is on the galactic federations speed dial for anytime they fuck something up. This time, they find the metroid homeworld of SR388 and decide to go there without samus. 5 minutes later everyone is dead and they want samus to kill everything left on the planet. yay genocide. the story is basicly a setup to show off and kill a bunch of new metroid evolutions. its a pretty straightfoward story for a pretty straightfoward metroid game. they even got some beautiful artwork to show off these plot points as well as some chozo backstory. its some good shit. gameplay samus returns has built apon the tried and true formula of runing around, shooting aliens, and collecting shit that makes it easier to run around and shoot aliens. expect lots of caverns, hidden power ups bombable walls etc. if youve played a 2d metriod game super or after you have a pretty good idea what youre getting into. that being said there is enough new stuff here too to keep shit interesting. you have all the standard beams, missiles and bombs as well as the screw attack, morphball, spiderball, and grapple beam. the only thing missing is the shinespark, the lack of which makes back tracking a bit more tedious. most of the weapons function exactly the same althought the ice beam doesnt stack on the other beams which is kind of annoying / the grapple beam and powerbombs can pull off some new tricks. tbh im a spoiled brat and i wont be happy with the grapple beam until it has the same versatility as smash bros. as for new shit, you got a melee counter to deflect rush down enemies and set up for a quick kill or just push away critters that get to close. you have the 360 aim which makes it way easier to shoot down enemies at the cost of being locked into a standstill or jumping in place. and you got the aeion abilities that all deplete from a meter you can increase buy collecting upgrades. these abilities let you slow down time, shoot rapid fire, have a lightning armor that negates damage as well as increase the range of your mellee counter, and the scan pulse which can fill out chunks of your map and help find secrets. These new abilities are all really well implemented into the game, especially the 360 aim and the counter, i found myself using those very consistantly. they arent withought faults, the button used for the 360 takes up any space that could be used for a free running diagonal aim, something that is incredibly usefull but still doable by holding diagonal on the controll stick. the melee counter doesnt do any damage by itself which is kind of dissapointing to my fantasy of samus punching her foes to death. regardless the mechanic is still really fun even if i wish it was more damaging and could be used while running. the aeion abilities are great even if i only really used the rapid fire and slowmo when i was required. im too paranoid about running out of meter to ever use them outside of necesity or experimenting on how to kill a boss the fastest way possible. youll have plenty of time to experiment because you fight each form of metroid anywhere between 1 and 12 times. the metroids are fun, the melee counter quick time events and fighting the them in different arenas help keep shit interesting but at the end of the day youre still fighting some of these guys 10+ times. the 3 non metroid bosses are fun too, except maybe diggernaught, beating him was a little too criptic/trial and error -y. id say the bosses in this game are overall significantly harder than most of the other 2d games and im split on how to feel about it. on the one hand i like a challenge but on the other im an unstopable intergalctic genociding bounty hunter so i dont want to die 3 times on a digger robot FUCK YOU DIGGERNAUGHT. but yeah anyway i think the map is a little 2 linear for my taste. its set up in isolated levels with very little intersecting paths and almost no backtracking. for me it makes it feel less like a complete world and more like a series of stages seperated by elevators. it's a left over design from the original game that isnt exactly my cup of tea but also doesnt ruin the experience by any means. at least there are teleporters to make end game collecting easier. presentation i dont like the graphics in this game. all the edges are blocky but not really in a stylized way and the screan always seems blurry like there is to much light coming from the environment for the camera to get a crisp view. even the artwork has this overly lense flare thing going on. to be clear, the graphics in no way inhibit the gameplay. i think they get in way of the atmosphere of the game. for me id say about 50 percent of the metroid experience comes from the imursion and atmosphere that the games have. shit like big ass slugs, krysal caverns, waterfall and statues in the background go a long way to help in this department for SR but it feels like for every area there is with a great background or soundtrack there is another area with little to no soundtrack and the only background is blue or brown rocks. thats not to say this hasnt been the case in other metroid games but many of those had you spend more time running through each respective area. for me this familiarity with each area made each game feel like its own world. i remember traveling through talon IV swampy service because it was interesting, i did it a lot, and the music was great. i remember pendara drifts and norfair and kraid for all the same reasons, the seamed like part of a world. samus returns is a big circle of sometimes pretty caves and ruins connected by elevators . combine that with the less than stellar graphics (id take sprites any day) and you have a rather underwelming planet, at least on the whole. it probably doesnt help that i spent most of my time looking at the touch screen map instead of the actual game. i guess i could always just pause the game and and plan out my route on the map like i used to but meh. something i will praise about the presentation are the added cutscenes and semi quick time events. if you counter a certain bosses youll get a cutscene where you mash the missile button and beat the shit out of the bosses in spectacular ways. you fling some around by their tails, ride using there horns and all sorts of other crazy shit. these all give make samus seem as baddass as ever and really show off how strong she is. it might just be my favorite new feature in the game. i only recall 2 new/ remixed songs from metroid 2, the rest are recycled from other famous metroid games. whats there is great but id always love more. conclusion gameplay wise this might be the most refined and excessable entry in the series, at least in terms of being user friendly. controls are tight, responsive, customizable and the touch screen makes flippin through shit a breaze. the touch screen map combine with the aeion map pulse make exploring easier than ever(i haved mixed feeling but i also dont have to use it so whatever). the bosses are challenging and rarely unfair. the overall presentation is passable but not stellar. the map is pretty linear which could turn off some but does streamline the experience. overall i really enjoyed this game for what it was, as much as i harped on about things that i think have been done better in other entries in the series. i guess for a rating uh, i think i like it better than fusion but not as much as zero mission or super. lemme know if you guys want more ramblings in the future

[pinksweatergettingbetter]

what the... fuck?

yet again we start off with a cutscene that looks like its from a completely different game... or low quality anime

-

...why are we starting off in court

-

“who brings a defendant to his own trial late”

why... is this sentence not processing 

for the life of me i have no idea what that means;

-

simon: you can just SCARE the judge into not giving a fuck about shit like being late, or threatening people under the guise of clever psychological manipulation!

also hi again simon

are you ready to be fun and likeable and not awful ?? I'm excited!

-

“i wish he'd stop treating me like a child all the time”

hey, old habits die hard.

-

simons already doing well by being an overprotective dork... so far so good. dont disappoint me, samurai.

-

our defendant is drunk

we’re off to an excellent start!

-

what... accent is this...

oh its drunkinese ok 

-

“three sheets to the wind”

ive never heard that one

maybe they can get away with having a drunk guy but they cant actually say drunk?

-

somebody get this guy some raw eggs and hotsauce??

wow hes drunk enough to be close to vomiting? he’s not acting hungover so I'm assuming that he’s been drinking up till now. and simon was last with him, so...

yeah I'm blaming simon for this

-

“ive known athena longer than ive known bucky”

“ive frequented his soba restaurant”

contradiction! simon was in jail up until very recently, and knew Athena for a very short period of time during her childhood. unless he met Bucky right after taking care of athena, it’s not possible that he’s known her longer. that or i guess he could just walk right out of jail to get noodles.

-

“meat slapped between slabs of bread...”

oh no ya dont, translation team. you made your burger bed, now you have to lie in it. no mocking the joke now.

-

quit being so tsundere simon. and yes I'm giving you the luxury of being tsundere and not just an asshole who’d prefer the company of men he once tried to cut to ribbons just because Athena’s a girl. because I'm in a good mood today!

-

a) scariest ringtone to date

b) he runs that place alone?? sucks to be buck

-

please stop doing the vomit animation its making me uncomfortable 

-

“this is no time for idle chatter”

oh simon, you obviously dont know what a chekov’s... um, conversation is.

-

wow so not only are we starting in the court room, but Sadmad said his prayers already. This is shaping up to be a rushed case.

...because obviously this is just filler before we get back to the Oh-So Delightful Adventures in Lawyer Land

-

edgeworth called him back for this case?? ...why???

-

Sadmad: I could be less horrible now that I owe the WAA a favourOR I could threaten to send a young lady to hell for just doing her job!!!! GO SADMAD, GO SADMAD

-

...dont call her a spring chick.

-

wait wait MAY 12TH?!

They just finished Maya’s trial and Edgeworth hauls Sadmad back to America over night?? How the fuck does Sadmad think he’s more prepared than us?? He had about the same amount of time to prepare!

-

I’ve got a good feeling about this case

-

Sadmad just let that poor butterfly rest jfc the aesthetic isn't that important 

-

“this guy stole the deed to this other guys shop, so other guy KILLED HIM to get it back”

yes, brilliant deduction, not an overreaction at all

-

Sadmad, you literally got back here at like 1 am last night. Go fuck yourself and leave Athena alone.

-

So Apollo’s a  red pepper, Athena’s an egg yolk... But there aren’t any blue foods, so Phoenix is just stuck being called ‘putrid’ in general.

Anyway cut Athena some slack. She’s already progressed far beyond having a breakdown in court because someone talked over her. 

-

SEXY PAN UP SHOT FOR SIMON BLACKQUILL,

-

“Simon!! You didnt tell me you were taking the stand!!!”

“There wasn’t time...”

no time at all during that 5 minutes you spent in the lobby. But I'm laughin’ so I’m not judging. Also I missed that theme...

-

AW  YIS

THROW DOWN SIMON

he’s the lesser of two evils this time; I'm ready to back him up! Simon in the blue corner, ding ding!!!!

-

half-awake sadmad looks up “rakugo” on wikipedia at 3 am

“yeah that should do it”

...and memorizes the whole article apparently

(coughmartystucough)

-

Sadmad: No wasting time!! This soul must get to the afterlife post-haste! You’re all putrid lumps of fecal matter for putting off the last ri–– wait, an opportunity to gloat?! Hold onto your hats, baby! The next twenty minutes are mine!!!

-

(weeps) thank you Athena

-

simon will remember this (you blackguard)

-

sexy pan up shot for–– oh, it really is a “sexy” pan up shot this time

except for those... soulless eyes...

-

aw nuts she has that drone-y X people theme. 

-

OH GOD 

OH GOD YOUR BOOBS

THAT WOULD HURT SO FUCKING MUCH

IM CLUTCHING MY CHEST JUST THINKING ABOUT IT

but I'm also chortling at the booby jokes teehee

-

“Never show sadness! Smile, smile, smile! With a twisty-twist-twist!”

Hey, it’s the new motto of ace attorney! Your self worth is based solely on how well you can cover up your less palatable feelings! Yaaaay!!

...also I’m calling it now, she did it.

-

i think her balloons are pretty impressive, athena

-

420 WE GOT ONE FOLKS

-

“Sad Monk Sadmahdi”

simon, youre gaining brownie points fast

-

Lang Zi says... Oh, uh I mean, the Kooraheenist Bible says......

-

“I’m checking in with the big tough old man prosecutor because i underestimate this small, young, female defence attorney”

I'm getting flashbacks to Turnabout Beginnings. and not good ones. 

You kick it, girl. tell them off.

-

nice! the judge is on our side!

-

why did she mention the dog barking a lot if it was only because he was hungry?

-

that is one hongry dog

something about the dog just burying the rest of the food is making me laugh

-

oh so that was important eh

hmm

-

has athena always done this double-slam thing, or is this new?

-

Athena: Witness, I think you might’ve been lying a little bit 

Sadmad: Vile hitler-satan, I cast you down to hell for your debauchery, how dare you insinuate that this case has more to it than what is readily viewable on the surface? Tsk tsk, so inexperienced, so putrid, 

-

“What? The gallery doesn’t get a say in this!”

They’re not a jury, you know!!!

-

“Why is the whole gallery siding with prosecutor sadmadhi?”

it’s because he’s hot, athena. thats the only reason anybody likes him.

-

tbh I'm actually pretty proud of Athena

same time last year Sadmad would have put her in a panic-stupor. but not today. Kudos on working that out, kiddo. You’re moving up!

-

...wait a minute

“with a little push, you could succumb to despair”

>despair

does Sadmad know? Does he know about her PTSD? If so... He’s deliberately TRYING TO TRIGGER HER SO THAT HE CAN WIN THE CASE?!

WHAT THE FUCK

-

oh boy!! OH BOY!! a dying message!!! THOSE ARE FOOL PROOF, AS PROVED BY EVERY SINGLE CASE IN THIS SERIES TO CONTAIN ONE!!

-

“That makes perfect sense, doesn't it!”

Yes... the man who suffocated to death somehow had time to leave a clue to his killer...

...you do realize that to be suffocated, the killer has to be there the whole time, right? if there’s nothing in his lungs and no trace of poison in his stomach, then it has to have been manual suffocation, either by strangulation (though we have yet to hear about any marks on his neck) or by covering his mouth and nose. 

so youre implying that rather than fighting back, the old coot rearranged a bunch of playing cards... in plain view of his aggressor

yet again, Sadmad makes a brilliant fool proof deduction.

-

ohhh my god he’s still trying to do it. HE’S STILL TRYING TO TRIGGER HER. I SWEAR TO FUCK, he’s been tolerable–– very thinly tolerable up until now. But this is just disgusting. This is brazen, malicious cheating. I don’t care if he turns out to be jesus himself when the inevitable “urhurhur he was good all along!!” twist shows up; I’m not forgetting this.

-

Damnit , Athena, don’t fucking listen to him. Don’t listen to a word he fuckin says.

Man I’ve never been so happy to see Simon. Little bit of the pot-calling-the-kettle-black here since Simon’s MO is to threaten and manipulate–– err, ah, use psychology!! to influence people, but I hate Sadmad so much that I don’t care.

-

“To think, you were so easily manipulated by his parlour tricks...”

Watch it, Simon. You’re the lesser of two evils this time, but that doesn’t exempt you from criticism. As a psychologist, you should know WHY it worked so well on Athena and you should be SENSITIVE about it. 

You’re cleared of all charges, remember?? You don’t have to pretend to be a douchebag to keep up your ill-thought-out plan anymore.

-

“I’m not girding up anything in this skirt!”

well i just don't know what to say to that

-

Oh boy here comes Uendo.

Everyone seems to love him so I’m hoping he’ll be a reprieve from Sadmad’s......... everything 

-

Sexy pan up shot of... a guy on a bunch of flower bags. With his own theme song!

-

so far I'm loving his animations and I'm always a slut for shitty puns!!

let’s see... blush stickers for the goofy one, hair forwards and eyeshadow for the lady. Clever little things that make each one of his characters different. He's definitely a fun character so far!

-

ah I'm really enjoying his dialogue 

ill bet the translators had a ball with this

-

won't you PLEASE laugh at my PUN!!!

its ok uendy, i thought it was good.

-

“Silence is more precious than diamonds”, eh?

I can definitely see which Sadmad values more...

-

ooh a spit take! not since godot have we been blessed... also i notice they've dialled up the rock guitar in Athena’s theme. Personally don’t see it as an improvement but eh

-

“yes, making it look like the man drowned was obviously because the culprit hated him and wanted to desecrate his corpse instead of getting the fuck out of there quicker like any killer would”

not to make it look like 

he’d drowned in the bowl

to throw off the police.

of course not; that’d be too obvious.

another win for the great Sadlock Madholmes.

-

wait did Sadmad just say Objection?? I thought he didnt do that

also; duel of the growly voices

-

prosecutor sad monk. simon’s still a dick but at least his dickishness spreads to  people i dont like :3

-

ooh i love it when i can rearrange physical pictures

-

“you can put the cards back in their right place but if you cant explain them then youre fucked”

ever thought that maybe theyre irrelevant to the case and theyre just... cards?? sadmad??

i mean i know theyre not but they could easily have just been on the table when the murder happened. they could stand for absolutely nothing.

-

ahh... the sweet refreshing scent of common sense. you redeem yourself step by step, simon. i mean, when youre not being a dick about it.

-

“don’t testify.”

franziska tried this once. it was for an evil scheme. i dont want to have to threaten another witness with revealing a dark secret; that was depressing.

but at least we know meanwhile that Sadmad isn’t above dirty shit like shutting up a witness. .......not that we didnt know that before.......

-

“Are you trying to taunt him into talking? Such a petty trick will never work”

POT.

CALLING.

THE KETTLE.

JET BLACK, SADFUCK.

-

simon’s lucky he’s surrounded by idiots and people with poor impulse control, otherwise his “mind tricks” wouldn’t do shit

“to be turned by such an obvious ploy... what a man of weak spirit.”

for once, Sadmad, I gotta agree.

-

its time for 

Artistic!

License!

Psychologyyyyyyyyy!!!!

-

sadmad doesn't get his way: my god will smite you later :(((((

-

now that we’ve worn this non-joke out...

-

“seeing my master asleep just made me so fuckin sad...”

-

i love that anger has such a distinctive ping sound

-

please do not call your toe that

-

“You gotta fuss over every tiny detail like this?” yes, Uendo. That’s why I’m writing these !!

-

that box of buns keeps drawing my attention. i love buns

-

Simon, you could try using some positive reinforcement. Mia wasn’t soft on Phoenix, but she encouraged him to think and puzzle things out for himself; she didn’t just call him an idiot. All the time.

-

“as sharp as a trout”

what the fuck

-

“so thats how it works ! fascinating!”

its not like i spent a lot of time working under the woman who invented said matrix!

-

its kinda sad that Athena’s never seen multiple emotions in high dudgeon 

she must hang out with a lot of mild mannered people 

-

athena: ive just proved these words mean something detrimental to the witness

sadmad: erm but they mean nothing to me therefor they warrant no further investigation.

???

i stg most of Nahyuta’s “”””counter argumnets”””” are legitimately just him trying to disparage the obvious contradiction away.

-

again athena seems unable to believe that people can only feel one intense emotion at a time

should i be worried

-

silly AA, that’s not how DID works!

oh well, at least Uendo is the fun kind of DID, unlike other... side-splittingly shameful characters I could mention...

-

Pohlfuckya indeed sadmad

-

ROLE CALL

-

“You seem proud of yourself, but all youve done is infringe on the privacy of the witness”

(sweats) i hate it when Sadmad makes good points

-

its not really dissociative if you dont... um... dissociate.

-

Sadmad: let it go and––

Athena: Shut up!!

Sadmad: Let it g––

Athena: Sssh!!!

Sadmad: le––

Athena: SJSJSJSJ

-

“if words will not sway you, perhaps pain will”

eject

him

-

i dont... like that... the beads are around her torso.......

-

YOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HE FUCKIN CUT THEM IN MID AIR

that deserves a fucking cutscene all on its own. its like the time Lang caught Franziska’s whip only cool and not bulshitty

...also you coulda maybe done that a lil earlier simon lol

-

“I dont give two flips”

all his flips have flown the coop

-

“but if Cykes dono were to submit to you here...”

DO NOT 

USE THE WORD SUBMIT

WHEN PRAYER BEAD BONDAGE IS INVOLVED

-

fuck you sadmad, not everyone has magic gary-stu powers that let them memorize everything about a single subject in one night.

-

once again sadmad wastes precious time and diamonds showing off

-

after this lengthy, lengthy, leeeeeengthy detour............ wouldyouliketoaddthisstatementtothetestimony?

-

“you look like a hen with a dozen eggs to say”

you can just say “constipated” and it'll be less creepy, simon

-

how could they... not tell... oh who cares

-

“we’ve got you by the stones now, Uendo!”

DAMN the TESTICLE references in this game!!!

-

“heres a big plot twist that i just convenientlyforgottomention urhurhurhr..”

spoken like a true prosecutor 

-

there was such a long pause there i thought he was building up to a pun

but of course he wasnt. sadmad isn't cool at all

-

heheh i just noticed that Bucky has hair noodles, just like Mr. Eldoon (tho Bucky’s dont appear to be a wig)

also its... very distressing to have a drunk client.

-

y’know i just realized

Sadmad is always talking about sending souls to the twilight realm in the proper way. but he's an international prosecutor. he’s probably prosecuted victims of all religious alignments.

isn't it kind of disrespectful to perform your religion’s funeral rites on someone who doesn’t practice it???

-

again, BK is only successful because Uendo is a moron

to be fair though, that was one of his better ones.

-

“You were leading the witness!”

I...

Just, fuckin’. Please stop making good points, sadmad. I don’t want to be enraged with you, I want to be enraged AT You!!

...well i mean I don’t want to but i hate it when you bring up excellent points.

-

anyway why doesn't sadmad want them to find Owen anyway. if it comes to nothing, who cares? can you just not stand having people who aren’t you waste time??

-

again... DID doesn’t work like that........

-

macbeth, starring athena cykes and simon blackquill

-

hey i jusT REALIZED WHERE’S TAKA

-

thats,,, reallllllyy not how DID works,,,,,,,,,,,,,

-

highfalutin’

-

“if you see one, there are likely thirty in your home’

thirty what

WTHIRTY WHAT

-

look if you knew how DID is supposed to work you'd probably have a good hypothesis by now. not an... ethical one to implement, but a working one.

-

i guess Uendo just never sleeps then, because apparently falling unconscious calls out another personality.

...brilliant.

-

Simon: STOP BEING SO NERVOUS. IS MY NAGGING AND DISAPPOINTMENT SOOTHING YOU???? IS IT?????!!!!

-

the time honoured tradition of turning a slip of paper over... truly, this is an Ace Attorney game 

-

dude.... if you conk out from the trace amounts of alcohol in a bun, you should maybe visit a doctor possibly 

-

“hmm, yes, i will allow you to render this man unconscious from alcohol.”

classic judge!!

-

au where blackqyil is a very angsty delivery boy

-

BABY

THERE HE IS

MY PRECIOUS BIRD

I WAS SO SCARED SOEMTHING HAD HAPPENED TO YOU

-

...that bird is going to fly into a shop, terrorize the workers, steal bean buns and (hopefully) drop a twenty on the counter as he flies the coop

awesome 

-

phew that was a long court... but wait if this is a half-episode (which it probably is) and it started on a court day...

no investigation?! RIP OFF

-

gonna cut this one off here. till next time...

#sulking over SOJ #soj spoilers #soj spoilers obvs]

[tumblunni]

also the final dungeon sucked and am i like the only one who hated the whole twist entirely? literally the only good bit was that mr never before foreshadowed trash hype killer villain god disguised himself as igor that was a good twist if it was anyone else, if it was a random npc like with p4′s deity final boss, then it would have had no redeeming qualities seriously it was SO THEMATICALLY BAD seriously shido is SUCH a climax boss and you have actual reasons to hate him and an actual grudge and it feels good to kick his ass! even if his boss design is stupid looking! yaldabaoth is just... nobody he’s an abstract representation of the theme of the whole plot, which already got answered it was SO DUMB to just have out of nowhere everyone learns the same lesson again in a giant literal metaphor way dude we ALREADY answered the questions about ‘whether humanity prefers to be obedient and enslaved rather than make their own choices’ and it was so artificial that public opinion of the phantom thieves suddenly tanks to 0 after they save the day?? if everyone forgot about us cos of evil godman brainwashing then HOW IS THIS A LESSON THATS BEING LEARNED. They just had to love us EVEN MORE so they were able to break the rbainwashing! like seriously it was just like.. you wanted some excuse to have everyone cheer on the phantom thieves as they watch the battle why not just have all that happen WITH SHIDO I mean he’s said to have stolen a bunch of metaverse research and know all about it it would make him much more of a threat if he did more with that say that HE is the one using mementos to brainwash the public have the phantom theieves fade from existance cos of that ‘kill myself to collapse my own palace’ plot shido did have it like.. it looks like eveyrone got out fast enough, theyre right at the entrance to the real world, but its just too late everyone fades away seeing the real world in the distance and screaming for anyone to grab their hand, but nobody sees them same effect same scene, just with shido and without three more hours of repetitive plot and a terrible TERRIBLE final dungeon! you could even still have the whole thing of the velvet room attendants fighting back against igor and saving you and then you go back and do the final fight just have it like.. igor was actually good and it was all a test, he faked betraying you. cos this is your final test- standing up to the ultimate authority figure. and he congratulates you for overcoming his challenge, and like.. reveal that the entire prison warden thing was a test for justine and caroline. they were the ones being rehibilitated. like, a test to gain free will that he always does for each new attendant. OR just have the same plot of evil igor imposter and stuff, but we dont need to have it happen after shido’s plot and lead to just goddamn repetition of p4 izanami withoutr any of the characetr development. Seriously he doesnt even get any moral ambiguity or anything! He’s just evil! He doesnt even really believe he’s doing what humanity wants! And him acting as your helper for fuckin 90 HOURS wasnt like a sign of character complexity or anyting, it as just a lie! Think of how much more interesting it could have been if yaldabaoth had a plot like ryoji, like he’s the human form of a god created to destroy everything but he ended up developing genuine affection for the protagonists and regretting the role he must inevitably play. That would have been repetitive but the plot we got is repetitive anyway!! and like seriously just SOMETHING SOMETHING somehow make him working with shido! remove the ENTIRE FINAL DUNGEON. It was padding in a game that was SO RUSHED aside from this damn moment! take that screentime and flesh out haru’s screentime more! DAMN YOOOOOOU have shido being a super mastermind who’s working with this evil god have shido be a wild card, even?? or have him as someone who’s like.. his pride and jealousy caused him to make a pact with this evil god in order to gain like.. fake wild card powers. He’s not able to actually use the metaverse on his own, he’s relied on manipulating his trash son,  and now he’s without even that option he gets so desperate he WILL NOT ACCEPT his loss and goes all super saiyan by fusing with yaldabaoth. Yaldabaoth’s lack of personality doesnt really matter here, because he’s being a plot element instead of a final boss all on his lonesome. He could even be more sympathetic, cos all we see of him is as a mcguffin holy grail acting as the warden to everyone who GENUINELY wishes for imprisonment rather than free will. We dont get to hear his voice, we dont get to see him brainwashing people who clearly didnt make that choice, just to repeat an already-answered question about whether humanity as a whole would make that choice. Its just ‘hey here’s a mcguffin that exists because of the suicidal wishes of humans, and shido has stolen it and is using it to power up, holy shit’. And all we know about yaldabaoth is that he/they/it wants to grant wishes, and has no morality to determine which are good or bad. Not that its a fuckhead with dreams of granduer who wants to trick everybody into wishes they didnt ask for, and has NO PERSONALITY instead of being izanami WITHOUT PERSONALITY and just... GAHHH So yeah like BLINDSIDED, SLAP IN THE FACE, we thought we defeated shido, we were trying to grab the holy grail but WHOOPS HE’S BACK AND HE GRABBED IT. Like, after the whole climactic ‘shido is collapsing his own palace’ scene, when everyone leaves the velvet room they’re just at the site of that locked door, skipping the whole shitty dungeon. And then we see the holy grail right there and we get the exposition about it right there, and how it could reverse all of shido’s bullshit at the cost of ending the metaverse, blah. No need for a boring month of being unable to do anything but see cutscene after cutscene of BUT WE DEFEATED SHIDO BUT NOTHING IS HAPPENING. And then like.. SURPRISE! Shido isnt really dead! we accidentally led him right to this mcguffin that he can now use to become SuperFinalBossmanRematchMode. And this is where we get the exposition of how he didnt really die, it was a fake death pill. OR, if we wanna get EVEN MORE climactic goodness, maybe shido DID die from that, and now like.. his soul is trapped in the cognitive world forever as this horrifying shadow fusion thing and he’s still whining about how its your fault and taking no responsibility for his actions. So SUPER SMACKDOWN TO FINALLY END IT ONCE AND FOR ALL! And its still high stakes cos its all ‘holy shit it should be impossible for him to still exist’ and ‘holy shit he fuckin ate a god’. And like, if yaldabaoth got fuckin bitchslapped before he could even be a presence in the plot. ‘Yeah hey i was pretending to be igor- ARRGH HOLY SHIT SHIDO NO’ Mr actual climatic boss reclaims his throne, rather literally. Makes him more imposing than he is when he’s really just another palace ruler and you never even confront the real world shido or anything. I mean you kinda already beat his plans when you removed his only minion who could access the metaverse, you just do the rest of the palace to collapse his career too... and then like fuckin.. somehow have the same thing where the metaverse and real world start blending. But it’d even have a better explanation than just Yaldabaoth Can Do That, I Guess, And He Didn’t Do It Until Right Now Because Reasons. You could say its like a consequence of the metaverse revolting at shido’s running away from death. Say his willpower is so strong that he can fuckin fuck up reality with it! His ego is THAT big! And then hoodly boo, same thing with everyone cheering you on so you summon satan and save christmas. But the final boss could look less stupid than a fuckin faceless art studio model made of chrome that pulls a gun out of its butt. Or I mean it could look even more stupid, it could just ahve shido’s shit face pasted on top XD But shido’s already proven that he can give a climactic boss fight even while looking like a dumbass wearing too many ShakeWeights(tm)! OR ORRRRRR Instant fix that could LITERALLY make the whole thing better without changing any dialogue except one namebox. Just say Yaldabaoth is someone else. Just give him the name of a fan favourite villain from early persona *COUGH NYARTHALOTEP COUGH* It would fit better with the YEAHHHHH BOYYY factor of his big twist of being fake igor, it would keep that hype going instead of murdering it with a personalityless villain and eight floors of just stairs and light puzzles. EVEN BETTER if they actually did go far enough to make it a proper nyarly cameo and give him a design as cool as his old ones. Like seriously the thing of being twisted representations of everyone’s parents would work SO WELL here thematically! it could be a rgeat moment to FINALLY see and hear more about protagonist’s parents! And like half the party has issues with family that we already saw in the other palaces, so it could be a great fake boss rush style memory lane of all those guys. instead of just pulling guns out his butt that cast all the same status effects. It could be ESPECIALLY good for GIVING POOR HARU MORE SCREENTIME AND DEVELOPMENT. Seriously, just imagine how fucked up it would be to see a twisted fake dad doll attatched to some fucker’s tentacle face, all these months after he died? it was a good idea to at least mention how he was the only palace owner who died, but it was a shame it meant he was also the only one who didnt get to cameo here and give the corresponding party member some more dialogue and developments. Especially cos Haru is fuckin awesome against bosses! HARU 4 EVARRRR But seriously even if everything was exactly the same and they just made one small reference to some character we already know something about, at least it would give us some frame of reference for yaldabaoth’s actual goddamn motives. who in the FUCK thinks its a good idea to tape on an extra 10 hours after the climactic boss to give us Nobody Mc Grail who Does Bad Cos He Want To. Srsly its like if P4 ended with ameno-sagiri and didnt even have all that izanami stuff and moral ambiguity and seriously i am gaining SO MUCH appreciation for how they managed to make a sudden unforeshadowed boss have AN ACTUAL SOUL. And she related to the themes of the story without being repetitive!  Still not as good as nyx/ryoji in my opinion, but it wasnt just ‘we are contractually obliged to throw in 1 (one) Evil God (tm) at the last second, because its a persona game’ the final scene was good, the everything else wasnt 100 Yes to Satan Saving Christmas Thank God for Giant Bullet Blow His Face Off but not THIS PARICULAR GOD because he is a detestable flaw in a game that I loved very much! at least he got fuckin sploded and got a good ‘im fucked’ face without even having a face. Seriously that brief REACTION SHOT was sooooo fuckin cathartic! his ONLY PERSONALITY he ever got was being a smug asshole who thinks he’s the best final boss ever, and we got an actual moment of ‘ha ha ha ha i win i win, i- OHHOTDIGGITYJESUSCHRIST’ *splat* thanks satan now can we seriously have no more evil gods ever, they have officially outlived their welcome can satan just shoot all of them in the head before they even get to be in the story ilu satan (also im curious now to do more research on ‘satanael’ and see what the difference even is about this form? is it just a different aspect of the christian devil like how satan and lucifer are also available in this game? or is satanael actually just a different mythological figure and the whole ‘satan saves christmas’ meme is just cos they sound similar?)

#p5 spoilers