#may or may not add on to this list later with more- albeit unrelated- games

[pikkish]

@dwellerinroots videogame exchange list for you! A handful of my favorite open world/open world adjacent games.

Hollow Knight - 2D metroidvania platformer. Metroidvanias are like, basically open world games, right? right? It’s still centered on exploration, so I’m gonna say it counts. Anyway, Hollow Knight is a very special game in that it is one of two games where, partway through, I stopped and thought, “I did not pay nearly enough for this game.”  You play as a strange little bug creature known only as the knight or the little ghost, and explore the ruins of a forgotten underground city that long fell to a mysterious disease. Very little lore is directly given to you, and not much of that given to you makes sense until much later, but the game is an excellent example, and should be a role model, of “show, don’t tell” and environmental storytelling. Beautiful art, haunting soundtrack, compelling characters, a huge map to explore, tons of secrets to find, a lore rich story, and a fast and tight combat system. It does have a reputation for being very difficult, both for combat and platforming, but less “this is a poorly designed game” and more it just has a steep learning curve. Well worth the challenge, though; the game will rip out your heart in the best way possible. I cried about at least two of the endings.

Subnautica - probably one of the crown jewels of open world exploration, tbh. Your ship crashes on an aquatic planet, and you have to survive, find out what crashed your ship, and build a rocket to escape. The world is beautifully alien, vibrantly alive, and the entire thing being underwater lends map design a unique sense of verticality that most normal-landscape open world games don’t have. There are, iirc, two timed events that happen, but otherwise you are free to ignore everything plot-related and explore as you please. I’d recommend playing in a dark room with good headphones for the full atmospheric effect. *(Due note though that Subnautica is... a little broken in some places. Reviews say it’s partially a horror game, but the scariest thing that happened to me was when one of the giant fish that wants to eat you pulled a Bethesda on me and clipped straight through a mountain to come get me. It’s a bit unpolished in areas, some mechanics don’t work quite as well as they were intended, and I suspect some areas might’ve been a victim of scope creep. There’s apparently been an update recently that supposedly fixed a lot of these, but based on my experience, it doesn’t quite feel like a complete game, and I’d definitely wait for it to go on sale before buying.)

Dying Light - This one is a bit more populated and quest heavy, but it has neat maps and fun gameplay. There’s been an outbreak of a zombie virus, and you’re a secret agent dropped into the quarantine zone to find some research on a cure. You must work with the survivors set up in the quarantined city both to accomplish your goal, and just to stay alive. The core gameplay is parkouring across the city to escape the zombie hordes, some of which are just as good at climbing as you are. Said parkour mechanics are very fast and fluid, and running around the city, chased by zombies, on a quest, or just for fun, is downright exhilarating. I did have some stuttering issues I couldn’t quite figure out how to fix, which is... a little bit of a problem when the gameplay is all about how fast and smooth you can move, but otherwise a great experience.

Rain World - ‘nother metroidvania platformer. I actually didn’t get too far in this one on account of the controls being a bit more -heh- sluggish, but that’s more of a personal preference thing than an actual problem with gameplay. You play as a little creature known as a slugcat. Separated from your family and stuck within the decaying corpse of an ancient machine, you must scavenge food to fill your belly, avoid other creatures that very much want to fill their bellies with you, and seek shelter at the end of each cycle to avoid drowning in each night’s torrential downpours. Very large map, wonderfully designed environments, and an achingly melancholic feel to the entire thing. I know there’s some pretty deep lore from watching a friend who was far better at the game play it, but if my own experiences are anything to go by, you are entirely able to scurry around and do your own thing for hours without paying the slightest bit of attention to lore.

Noita - This one’s a roguelike, but I feel like it deserves an honorable mention as an open world game, just for how dang big it is, both in actual map size, and in how much content there is crammed into that map. It’s apparently very heavily based in Finnish folklore, but it doesn’t really tell you any of that, it just kinda goes “Here’s how you move, here’s how you shoot, ok have fun!! :)”  and then just throws you into the game. Its combat system centers about building your own magic wands with different spells on them, and combining spells in different ways can have wildly different results.For as deep as the wand mechanics are, though, the real selling point is the world simulation: every individual pixel is simulated, and everything interacts with everything else. You can burn things, break things, crumble things, shatter things, melt things, freeze things, and probably do a whole lot of other things I don’t even know about. Expect to die a lot, and expect to accidentally kill yourself a lot.

#pikspeak #bideogaem rambling :) #hope at least one of these catches your attention! #def let me know if u pick one up and what u think of it #may or may not add on to this list later with more- albeit unrelated- games #some of these descriptions got a little longer than anticipated haha #love talking about my favorite games :)

[burmecianblackmage]

KNOW THE MUN - for real! - THROUGH MUSE!

Tag muns you want to know better; repost - don’t reblog.

What inspired you to try/create that muse/s: The year is 2013, and yours truly is a more or less active player on a german site called Legend of the Green Dragon. After having started with a mage character back in 2006 and eventually retiring him, I’ve been playing a young Samurai for a good year and a half, maybe already two, and I am a member of a small guild. It is a guild of similar characters, allowing for their stories to mix and mesh rather fluidly. One of them becomes my boy’s teacher, the other his rival that always tries to one up him when it comes to a certain lady corsair, who after a while falls for my boy. And there is also another girl, older than my boy, that used to be his new master’s sole student (and love interest), and that is mad furious about having to share her esteemed Sensei’s attention with my character.

It is with the mun behind said girl that I am talking, sitting in a little cafe with her as I am on my way back from visiting some people in Germany and decided to stop by. After all, since the guild meet.up the year before, we’ve been rather close friends, capable of both talking about serious stuff and worries as well as brainstorming some delightful nonsense.

One of these nonsense thoughts we have comes up when we discuss Final Fantasy, especially my fondness for Black Mages and FF IX. Having played the game as well and having taken a deep liking to the character of Freya, my friend remarks that she feels her part had been too small ultimately, and that it’s a shame we never got to explore Burmecia and the Burmecians more. And that’s when it happens:

“What if there was a Burmecian that was also a Black Mage? A Burmecian Black Mage?”

It is a couple weeks later when I am back home already and have mostly forgotten about it that I receive a message from my friend, with a dA link attached. A link to this sketch.

Initially, nothing comes from the idea, but I hold on to the sketch. And then one day, when upon lamenting the decline in activity on LotGD, a friend suggests roleplaying on tumblr, and I start to ponder what kind of muse I could play, I remember the sketch.

The basic concept for Sceada (whose name was lazily picked identically to my uername on most sites, I have to admit) takes less than two days to take shape, and on February 4th 2014, I first throw my new creation at another roleplayer and their muse - which, most fittingly, happens to be Freya Crescent.

And from there on out, the little Burmecian Black Mage as well as his backstory and characteristics continued to grow andfrow, further taking shape before ultimately arriving at what you are looking at today - and from here on out, he’ll keep growing further...

What is inspiration for that muse/s: To a large extent, Sceada is an amalgamation of mriad stories I read, as well as several mangas(animes featuring wizards and spellcasters, and last but not least the question, how an adult Vivi might be. There’s constantly stuff influencing and inspiring new facts and developments about him, be it from music that touches me, narratives that move me or even random ideas that come up in conversation, Much of Sceada has been shaped by both what happens to him in plays, as well as what people have come up with together with me. 

There’s even some crucial facts about him that only came about because of an at first glance unrelated comment by someone, like for example, Sceada not being a “real” Burmecian, and actually having a non-Burmecian father. That initially came about courtesy of a remark about how he didn’t really look all that rat like, and more like a, I quote, “a damn Tree-Kangaroo” - a sentiment I do not really agree with, but even so... it inspired his mixed parenthood, which in turn developed into an explanation on why he can use magic. Funny how that sometimes goes, huh?

Thread/AU that made you really happy: Currently, I’d have difficulties naming a favorite AU, simply because I don’t seem to have any left running anymore. Sure, I could count the ships as respective verses/AUs, but nah. Those are still the same Sceada. So yeah...

I was always fond of the group verses, and the interactions born from those. Especially Pledged Prelude back in the day offered me a lot of great interaction, and has proven to be a big part of the foundation on which Sceada is ultimately built. Though, strictly speaking it was no AU, and is part of his canon, so well.... I don’t know. Crystathereum was fun, but sadly didn’t get underway as much as we all hoped it would, and the same goes for Crowned Reveries. They allowed me to meet new people, and gave me some fun plays, but ultimately they didn’t stick as long as I’d have hoped.

Speaking of favorite threads, there’s some that come to mind. From the AUs, the battle between Victoria F. Stein and Sceada in Myrefall was a clear favorite, as it highlighted not only a lot about Sceada’s skills but also about his character, and featured some truly interesting - and disturbing - choices on his end. Setting your own clothes and fur on fire so you won’t get ripped to shreds by a blizzard full of icy blades? And then actually managing to save the city he despised as a direct result of that move and the static electricity it built in the storm clouds overhead? Talk about crazy, and crazy fun to write.

There’s naturally also a ton of shipping threads on that list. I always especially adored the interactions between Sceada and Leonora, his first love, and how much he grew from them. Another favorite is Sceada finding Mara after a nightmare, and despite them not being a couple yet comforting her with the words “Nothing you confess could make me love you any less”, I really liked the feeling of that one. Or Maria opening Sceada’s eyes to the fact that Black Magic need not mean destruction necessarily. Selphie telling him she wants children with him, and the lead up to him wanting them to. Sceada finding Fran in the forest after she removed herself due to being in heat. Sceada inviting Maria for Valentine’s Day as friends and realizing slowly that there might be more between them.

I could go on for hours. But for now, let me end this list with saying that there’s many more that could be on here, so many more that were accumulated over the four and a half years I’ve been here by now (and even more if we add my other blogs, because everything with Edea and Kamiizumi was just so great <3), and I’m sure that list will only grow. I’m confident that before long, many many more memorable plays could be added here, with all sorts of partners.

Something really special on your wishlist: Hmm... two things come to mind rather quickly for that. One would be to see Sceada actively teach someone about Magic as a mentor or even professor of sorts. I want to see him pass on his knowledge, see him be an example for the next generation and perhaps even admired by his students - or by his protege, should he only have one student. It’d definitely be interesting to see him in such a role.

Likewise, I really want to see him in a fatherly role. This can be by becoming an actual father, or in others words, by having a child with someone he holds dear, but I can also see it with him watching over someone else’s child, for whichever reason it happens. Did he adopt them? Did their parents leave them in his care while they left for a couple years? Did he find them alone and abandoned? Did he save them from an abusive household? I’d be down for anything in that regard. And I’d really like to see not only the happy sides of being a father, but also the awkward and sometimes uncomfortable sides. The thought of Sceada having to give a child the talk is particularly amusing to me, I have to admit...

Thinking about it now, there’s two more I could actually mention, albeit briefly: I’d like to see the conflict between Sceada and his mother unfold, and not just in drabbles but in actual plays with people witnessing it and being an influence. And if possible, I’d like to explore a polyamorous Sceada one day, as I feel it could suit him well - or, at least, have him confronted with the idea, and realize why he finds it appealing, but potentially not the right thing for him. That’d work too.

Something you are looking for in short future for your muse: Finally making some progress with his Journey. I’ve been awfully slow with it for numerous reasons... *sigh* Also, in some of the ships, there are a number of small... let’s call them milestones for now, that I’d like to reach. But those will develop at their own pace.

Share something related to your muse!

While I was in rehab, my girlfriend had a plush made of Sceada for me, based on one of my favorite art pieces of him. Gotta say, I’m really fond of this one.

And for something only slightly related to Sceada, I want to say that it still baffles me that people would pay money to commission art of my little Burmecian. Seriously, that’s a big deal for me, you guys. Now, for several reasons I may not be capable of showing all of it on this blog (especially the two most recent pieces *cough*), but it is always certain to make me extremely happy.

What do you think about character’s design/how do you came up with this: Both the plays and ideas have shaped Sceada into who he is today and what he looks like. And quite frankly, even if I could start over anew, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

What your muse teached you: It’s less my muse that thought me this and more the muses that interacted with him, but... Everyone deserves to be loved, but that does not mean that you deserve a specific person’s love. Loving yourself and accepting who you are is important. And there are always many sides to a situation. Just because something was devised for destruction does not mean that it can only bring harm, that it cannot protect what we cherish and hold dear.

What is roleplay for you: In equally parts a place where I am allowed to dream, as well as an escape from the real world. It is where I can meet people and bond with them, and write a story no one person could ever write on their own. It is my hobby and my joy, and sometimes, it is also my pride.

Just say something nice about another mun!: I’ve met many a wonderful friend on here, and it would not be fair to just pick one from out of them I feel. So I’ll use this opportunity to tag some people, both ones I actively talk to a lot and those I sadly haven’t as much anymore. So, consider this a shout-out to @artemisxbow @thislovelylady @containyourmainposure @sunny-explosions @dovsebrii @rosalia-the-guardian @riotxblade @the-shadow-of-a-wielder and @not-a-rogue

tagged: @rosalia-the-guardian​ here: [x], plus I saw it from several others

tagging: I think most of the people that I would nominate and that are active already did this one, so... I’ll pass the tagging for today. If you see this and wanna do this, feel free to tag me though~

#RequestsHeeded #Mun Info #Muse Info #this got rather long... apologies for that x.x