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lu-is-not-ok · 10 months

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Lu's Guide to Sin Analysis

Welp, since my brain is too focused on having K Corp Hong Lu go full unga bunga in Mirror Dungeons to write full analyses, I decided I might as well give something else to all the people starving for Limbus Theory content.

So, here we are. A basic guide on how I approach the Sin Analysis portion of my analyses, covering my personal interpretations for each Sin, as well as how to use those when analysing both E.G.Os and Identities.

That way, ya'll can dabble in doing some of this on your own when I'm too busy grinding my way to 400 hours of play time on Limbus to write up full analyses.

Sounds good? Awesome. Under the cut we go, wheeeee!

Sin Interpretations

Let's start with the most important part - the Sins themselves.

I want you to take a moment and think about your own associations with those Sins. Perhaps your immediate thought is to take the words used literally. Maybe you immediately think back to the Biblical ideas of the Seven Deadly Sins. Mayhaps there's some other media you know that also uses Sins in some way, which you subconsciously default to when thinking about them.

Whatever those associations are, I want you to throw them away.

That's right. Whatever is telling you that Lust = Horny, Wrath = Angry, Envy = Jealous, etc, etc? Throw all of those preconcieved notions away.

This is the biggest mistake I see people make when trying to analyse Identities and E.G.O based on their Sins - they assume that those Sins have the same meanings in the context of Limbus as the popular, more common interpretations of them.

And while, sure, some of them can definitely overlap with what one would expect them to be, I think relying on those during analysis instead of trying to understand what the game itself is trying to tell us by using those Sins as symbols is doing its storytelling a massive disservice.

Do I think my personal interpretations of the Sins are a 100% accurate reading? No, of course not. I can't see into the mind of Kim Ji-Hoon or whoever else at Project Moon might have been the mastermind behind deciding what Sins connect to what. I have no way of knowing what exactly they intended here.

However, I do wish to believe that my interpretations not only strive to meet the game's storytelling on its own terms, but also hopefully make further analysis based on those interpretations a bit easier to wrap one's head around.

...God I really need to stop writing massive preambles and just get to the fucking point.

So let's actually get to The Fucking Point. Sin Interpretations, one by one. Let's fucking do it.

Wrath

The flames of revolution burn bright in the face of cold winds.

Wrath is the Sin of self-righteousness and defiance. To act with Wrath is to decide that one deserves better, that things around then should bend to their will, and then take matters into their own hands. It's the Sin of deciding one has the right to change something simply because they don't like the current state of things.

There are many ways one can act because of Wrath. It can show through trying to rebel against authority, to subvert one's fate, to escape one's unfavorable circumstances, or to even reject one's own true nature. To act with Wrath is to stand up for oneself and tell reality "No, I refuse!" loud and clear.

A common misconception of Wrath is the idea that anger is an inherent part of it. While it's true that those feelings often coincide with defiance, they're not required for one's acts to be fueled by Wrath. Some can be Wrathful while being completely calm and collected, as their acts of defiance could be more on the quiet and simmering side.

Likewise, being quick to anger isn't always a sign of Wrath. It's very possible for someone to have a short temper, while also being fully accepting of the reality they live in (Ryoshu, I am looking directly at you), thus lacking Wrath.

Lust

One's base insticts go all the way back to that genetic code.

Lust is the Sin of self-indulgence. It's the Sin of letting one's own desires and whims dictate one's actions. It's also the Sin of seeking personal fulfillment above all else. To act with Lust is to give up one's self-control and let one's instincts and wants guide them.

Unlike what the name and symbol might initially imply, Lust can include many different types of desires, not just the carnal.

Likewise, acts of Lust can be just as varied as one's desires. Satisfying one's most basic of needs, searching for a form of spiritual enlightenment, or even just saying the first thing that comes to mind because one feels like it are just a few examples.

Sloth

A stone will not care for what happens to it, nor the world around it.

Sloth is the Sin of apathy and resignation. Unlike other Sins, which mostly show through one's direct actions, Sloth can also show through inaction.

To act with Sloth is to ignore reality, to let oneself go along with whatever is happening with barely any complaints. As such, Sloth is commonly associated with blind obedience or unwillingness to act out.

Due to its nature as a Sin of resignation, Sloth can be seen as the direct opposite of Wrath, the Sin of defiance. This creates a unique situation where the inclusion of one can drastically shift the context of the other if both are a part of the same Identity or E.G.O.

Gluttony

Plants never stop waging wars, always wanting just a little bit more.

Gluttony is the Sin of hunger, and it's unique from the other Sins in that it equally represents two different ideas of that hunger, which can appear together just as often as they can be completely seperated.

The first type of Gluttony is one of the starving hunger of survival. In this context, to act with Gluttony is to do anything for the sake of scraping by and living to see another day.

The second type of Gluttony is the hunger for more, or in other words: greed. In this context, to act with Gluttony is to do everything for the sake of this idea of "more". To gain more wealth, to find more recognition, to make more progress.

Both of these types of Gluttony are unified in one main point - they are, by definition, endless. The struggle for survival never ends, unless one fails to survive. Likewise, there is no finite "more" that greed is reaching towards, it's a neverending process of one-upmanship.

Gloom

When a wave of emotion rises, many will be swept away in its wake.

Gloom is the Sin of dwelling on feelings. To act with Gloom is to be guided by one's negative emotions, to buckle under stress and let it control one's mind and actions.

While sadness, grief, and depression are the states of mind most commonly associated with Gloom, and are often a part of it, they're not inherent to it. The only "requirement" here is the experience of severe emotional duress, and acting out in direct response to it.

In a way, Gloom is the Sin of losing control over oneself, not dissimilar to Lust. However, the main difference here is the cause of losing that control. Gloom is the loss of self-control due to being overwhelmed by negative experiences, while Lust is the loss of self-control due to seeking out positive experiences.

Pride

Be careful, for that double-edged sword may cut you as well.

Pride is the Sin of ignoring consequences. Acts of Pride are all actions taken because of the belief that their benefits outweigh the cost in some way. While the most common way this can present is through actions that benefit oneself at the cost of others, it's not the only way Pride can manifest.

One can be Prideful when believing the benefit to many outweighs the consequences. Likewise, refusing to acknowledge the harm one brings to themself because their actions benefit them in some other way also counts as Pride.

The idea that Pride is inherently tied to selfishness or self-confidence is another common misconception. In fact, Prideful acts can manifest just as often from a lack of self-confidence or a misguided selflessness. Rather, one could interpret Pride as a form of willful ignorance, in a way.

Envy

Thorns don't go out of their way to harm, they merely react to your touch.

Envy is the Sin of reaction and retribution. It's the idea of doing something because of what someone else has done. By definition, one cannot act with Envy without some form of provocation.

Like is the case with many other Sins, acts of Envy can take many forms, from taking revenge to following orders. The main connecting idea here is letting oneself be influenced by another person, whether it's being coerced, provoked, ordered, or otherwise manipulated.

Out of all of the Sin misconceptions, seeing Envy as inherently tied to jealousy might be the worst one of all. While acts done out of jealousy would likely count as acts of Envy, they are but a miniscule part of the sheer scope that Envy represents.

...

Alright, so you know what each of those Sins means. Now it's time to figure out how to Actually Apply Them.

Sin Affinities in the context of Identities

The main way Sins play a role in a given Sinner's Identity is through their Sin Affinities. Mechanically, these are the Sins attributed to each of their skills, signifying both their type of Sin damage and what Sin resource they generate upon being used.

However, this is Project Moon we're talking about, and these fuckers can't keep their gameplay mechanics seperate from the story to save their lives.

So, this begs the question: what can we learn about a Sinner's given Identity through their Sin Affinities?

Here is the method that I believe works best in my experience:

The Sin affinities of each of an Identity's skills represent a different layer of their psyche and motivations. I'm going to try to show what I mean by using base Identities of the four Sinners who already had their own Canto.

Skill 1's Sin Affinity is the surface level motivation of the Sinner's actions. This is the most obvious and "shallow" reading of them and their actions, and also likely the one the Sinners themselves are most aware of.

Gregor's Skill 1 is Gloom due to him being constatly haunted by his trauma, with much of his cynicism and dark-ish sense of humor being shaped by his war experiences. Rodya's Skill 1 is Gluttony due to her tendency to value material goods and love for food, which are signs of her greed and will to survive respectively. Sinclair's Skill 1 is Pride due to him taking many actions (such as sharing his father's secrets or giving Kromer his basement key) for their immediate benefits, without considering the consequences. Yi Sang's Skill 1 is Gloom due to him falling into deep depression and letting the trauma of the past shape his current actions.

Skill 2's Sin Affinity is a deeper motivation of the Sinner's actions. It's delving deeper into their psyche to see what guides them in less obvious ways. This Sin Affinity can also have noticeably closer ties to the Sinner's background in one way or another.

Gregor's Skill 2 is Gluttony due to him being driven by the will to survive, most notably expressed by him leaving the rest of the veterans to escape the war and try to live after it ended. Rodya's Skill 2 is Pride due to her fully believing in what she does working out in her favor, completely ignoring consequences on the way. Her killing the pawnbroker is the biggest example of an act of Pride, as she fully believed that it would help her neighbourhood despite the consequences that murder would bring. Sinclair's Skill 2 is Wrath due to him not accepting his circumstances. His want to defy his future prosthetics procedure is what eventually led him to agreeing with Kromer, and his will to defy her is what drove him through the events of his chapter. Yi Sang's Skill 2 is Envy due to his passive nature and how easily he lets other people dictate his actions. It's especially notable in how after the League fell apart, he would have been willing to do anything Gubo told him at that moment.

Skill 3's Sin Affinity is what I would like to call a Sinner's Core Sin. It's the true main reason behind their actions, and has a much closer and direct tie into their past than the other Sin Affinities. In a way, this is the deepest layer of their psyche.

Gregor's Skill 3 is Sloth as his resignation to his circumstances is what colors much of his past. He learned that resistance is futile early in life, and it shows. Though he didn't want to fight in the war, he felt like he had no choice but to. All of his life, he simply listened to orders without complaint, unable to see a way to change his situation. Rodya's Skill 3 is Wrath as her self-righteousness and defiance is what drove her actions at the deepest level. She first joined the Yurodiviye because she wanted to bring change the state of her neighbourhood, and likewise left them when she no longer agreed with how they did things. Her murder of the pawnbroker was her biggest act of defiance, of taking matters into her own hands and trying to bring change to her reality at all cost. Sinclair's Skill 3 is Envy as much of his actions were dictated by other people. Social pressure was what led to him first breaching the trust of his family, and Kromer's coercion and manipulation is what then led to his family's death. In a way, you could also interpret Sinclair's arc in Canto III as one big act of Envy, as he finally tries to take revenge on Kromer for what she has done. Yi Sang's Skill 3 is Sloth as his apathy to the reality around him is what led to him ignoring the warnings signs of the League falling apart, and the resignation that followed could have resulted in him helping Gubo and the New League out with their horrible plans had there not been an intervention. It's only by the end of Canto IV that he finally manages to break out of this state for long enough to stand up for himself and decide to keep on living.

So, that's the basics of Sin Affinities when it comes to Identities! Now, some of you might be asking, "Hey Lu, what about Sin resources needed for Passives?", and my answer to that is...

Honestly, I don't entirely know! I do think there probably is some reason beyond pure gameplay mechanics... Buuuuut I don't think their importance is as major as the main Sin Affinities of a given Identity, especially since there isn't a single Passive that is activated by a Sin that the given Identity doesn't have any Affinity to.

Sin Affinities in the context of E.G.Os

Alright, so, when it comes to E.G.O, we run into some additional complexities. Unlike Identities, which can usually have their Sins Analysed with minimal additional context, E.G.O Sin Analysis has to be done under a specific angle.

This is because while Identities represent the Sinner as a whole person, E.G.Os represent a specific singular part of that Sinner.

Base E.G.Os usually seem to tie back to a specific event or action or some other thing in that Sinner's past. Likewise, E.G.Os derived from Abnormalities represent the ways that Sinner connects to that Abnormality's own themes.

In a way, the game's worldbuilding even acknowledges the fact that a Sinner can only use the E.G.O of an Abnormality they relate to in some way, as Dante's Notes describe the process of the Sinners using E.G.O as trying to make the Abnormality's emotions and identity their own.

That little tangent aside, there are two main things to analyze sin-wise when it comes to E.G.O - the Sin Affinity, and the Sin Resources necessary to use that E.G.O.

An E.G.O Sin Affinity works similarly to an Identity's Sin Affinities - for a Base E.G.O, it's the main Sin that action manifests as. For an Abno-derived E.G.O, it's the Sin that contextulizes the way the Abno's themes connect to the Sinner in question.

The Sin Resources an E.G.O needs is where things get fun. These are what a Sinner needs to be able to use the E.G.O, both mechanically AND story-wise. The Sins here represent what a Sinner has as their motivation and drive to fully reflect what that E.G.O represents. For Base E.G.Os, it's why they took the actions they did. For Abno E.G.Os, it's why they connect to that Abno's themes and why they're able to relate to it.

Now... There is one more thing about E.G.Os that I don't really talk about.

Sin Resistances.

The reason why I don't talk about them... Is because I have No Fucking Clue how to interpret them. There has to be some importance to them (Hong Lu being weak to Wrath in all of his E.G.O thus far, I am looking at you), I just don't know what it is. In fact, I doubt we even have enough information available to us right now to be able to say for sure.

I don't know how to end these posts dear fucking lord-

So uh. Yeah. That's. Everything that I think is important to mention on the topic of Sin Analysis and how I do it. If I ever change my mind on something or have an epiphany regarding one of the things I currently have no idea about, I'll probably reblog this post with an addendum or something, but until then...

Uh. Yeah. Hope this helps the people who wanna get into analyzing Limbus stuff but don't know where to begin. Or just people who wanna understand the method to my madness a little bit better.

I'm gonna go to sleep now, cause it's 4 AM already and I spent like the whole fucking night writing this post.

#limbus company #limbus company project moon #lcb analysis #lcb canto iv #lcb spoilers #lu speaketh #god help me

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chaotomatic · 2 years

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Hi! Yesterday i made this post about a theory i had about LOZ tears of the kingdom in which i somehow drag the seven heroines into this

Go read that rq cause this is p2

Anything for u, random citizen. Have my insanity on a silver platter 🥰🥰🥰

So we have a lot of pieces, so lets try to put them together. This is about to be a game theory video in text form, so if something sounds like a stretch ✨thats because it is✨

Anyways.

What do we know about the seven heroines?

Well, not a lot. We know that, according to the Gerudo historian Rotana, the seven heroines were 7 divine protectors of the Gerudo, and are a popular and well known legend.

She says that each heroine has a different power: skill, spirit, endurance, knowledge, flight, motion, and gentleness.

Idk about you but to me these sound like ✨dungeon prompts✨

We also know that there is Gerudo script on the sides of the statues, which reads “The Seven Sages”

So clearly the heroines and sages are connected, quite possibly the same thing.

But what about the 8th heroine?

Well, we know even less about her. We only really hear about her from incel-boot-guy who sends us out to go find her statue in the first place, and he himself didn’t even think the statue was real, only an urban legend. In fact, compared to the other seven heroines, the 8th heroine is a lesser known myth.

The 8th heroine is strange. Shes merely more than an urban legend, the Gerudo script on her statue also says “the seven sages” despite her clearly being the 8th, not to mention that for some reason shes been built in an inaccessible canyon in the middle of nowhere. And because WHY NOT, her SWORD is on the other side of the mountain range.

In past Zelda games, the sages have been 6 main sage guys and their leader, princess zelda, the seventh sage. The statue could be the leader of the seven sages, instead this time being a leader of the sages as the 8th. But thats me grasping at straws, really.

Now to drag all this nonsense into Tears of the Kingdom

Ganondorf is like. Here now? We only really see him in the first trailer. Ganon is cursed to be reincarnated as a Gerudo man for eternity, and im sure has made the Gerudo people suffer under his rule before. (If not teeechnically canon to the games ppl who know the older games better than i can fact check me)

So by that logic, we could be seeing a lot more Gerudo centric history in the new game. YES, the game’s clearly aesthetically centered around the Zonai, but the Zonai are not the only 10,000+ year old race around. The sheika and the gerudo have both been around for just as long if not longer. Much, much longer. Its possible the seven heroines were in kahoots with or were even apart of the Zonai and helped save the Gerudo from Ganon. Or not.

Again, im grasping at straws and then putting them into my zelda themed insanity puzzle.

But i think the most consise thing in this whole mattpatt knock off text dump that i can think of is this

Eight heroines. Eight sages. Eight tears. Each tear represents a sage, similar to the medallions from OOT. You go through sick ass sky dungeons to get them. Those tears contain energy magic shit you can use to repair the master sword and kick ganons ASS. Its gonna be sick. Also somehow shove the zonai and hylia and the cave paintings and time travel and ouroboros in there.

TELL ME YOUR INSANE THEORIES I CANT BE ALONE IN THIS.

But again.

Thats just a theory.

A GAAAAAMME-

Thanks for reading :>

@lurelinlink @polygenderroulette

#loz #loz tears of the kingdom #totk #tears of the kingdom #legend of zelda #legend of zelda botw #legend of zelda tears of the kingdom #theory #game theory #loz totk #botw #botw2

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undercityrezident · 11 months

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A Zelda RPG

I think I mentioned this briefly in my reflection on TotK, but after being able to have the sages travel and fight with you in the game (and then their avatars later) to the point of having five characters fighting alongside you at once, I’ve suddenly gained the intense craving for a party-oriented turn-based or tactical RPG of Zelda.

And I don’t think it’s such a weird or far-out idea either because mainstream Nintendo franchises have branched out into other genres, including RPGs. Just look at Mario RPG, Paper Mario, and Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga.

I would absolutely dive into a turn-based RPG with Link and any number of staple characters from the franchise in any number of Zelda game settings (i.e. Ocarina of Time’s, Twilight Princess’s, Hyrule, or BotW/TotK’s). Hell, maybe we can have a sort of untold side story based on something we didn’t see in these games, such as TotK’s Imprisoning War where we only saw how it started and ended.

Imagine gearing up and altering characters’ classes against their typically expected roles. Maybe Link starts out as some sort of swordsman class, but you can eventually outfit him with Din’s Fire or any of the magical rods to give him spells to qualify him for a spellsword class. Give Zelda a special melee weapon so she can tear up the battlefield as a warrior/sage hybrid. I can think of tons of possibilities.

Then you can add in great battle interactions, like damage types for varying effectiveness and secondary effects, weapons with special properties, tools like the hookshot to stun or move enemies around, combination attacks, and, if we’re going the tactical RPG route, terrains with hazards such as malice/gloom. Not to mention that the plethora of enemies that Zelda has to draw from, big and small, could radically change how battles work from encounter to encounter.

And game overworlds can easily reflect the game’s setting, with towns and landmarks recognizable from whatever world its based on, dungeons that act as their own zones when you enter them with potential for classic Zelda puzzles that you have a different view on compared to the usual behind Link’s back perspective. I can already picture Golden Sun-esque gameplay between battle encounters. Zelda could fit that mould very smoothly.

And, naturally, most RPGs lend themselves toward great stories and deep characters, so we can dive even deeper on the personal struggles of characters in this universe. Just off the top of my head, we could have a Gerudo scholar who’s struggling to prove her theory on some aspect of the Seven Heroines legend, a Zora who’s intensely afraid of ice due to Zora’s domain being frozen over once, a Goron who doesn’t want to follow through on his family tradition of enter the mining business, or a Rito whose wings didn’t grow in correctly and wants to prove themselves an equal to their brethren. Oh, and I want Link and Zelda fighting alongside one another in the same party. No, I will not accept her falling into another pit, being flung back in time, or being kidnapped by Ganon on the onset. I want her as a party member from start to finish!

Speaking of Ganondorf, he already has the qualifications for a major RPG villain. He’s immensely powerful, manipulative, charismatic, and can easily cause problems all over the map for any number of party members, giving all people involved in your party motivations for wanting to join and stop him.

And RPGs still leave room for all the side-quest-y goodness Zelda is known for, especially if your party members have their own aspirations and motivations aside from defeating Ganon. There’s no shortage of content in the Zelda mythos that could fill in countless hours in a Zelda RPG.

As well, this would be a chance for whoever develops this Zelda property to take some liberties in style. Since it wouldn’t be rooted as a mainstream Zelda title, developers could experiment with its look in the same way they tried cel-shading with Wind Waker or the Link’s Awakening remake diorama style. Hell, maybe we could go retro in the same way as Octopath Traveler and have a modern take on the Link to the Past style?

Nintendo, you have a lot of potential in your hands with the Zelda franchise. Maybe consider this as a potential side project? Nintendo has been getting better about lending their IP to other companies. I don’t see why they couldn’t give this a shot while their main group at headquarters works on the next title in the main series. Not that they’ll ever see this post, but I had to get this idea out of my head, regardless.

Also, let’s leave the collectible Koroks out of this one. I’m down for having a cool potion-making Korok party member in the vein of that one from Wind Waker, though.

#Rez Rambles #The Legend of Zelda #TotK #TotK Spoilers #I'm putting in those two tags because I specifically reference TotK in my preamble to the idea #Also #RPGs tend to have sick as hell music #So I want to see how Zelda music would absolutely rock in this style of game

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greenbloods · 3 months

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🕸 waifnumber17 Follow

she let me hit becuause behind my whimsy there is this Sorrow

[this post was made by an adherent of the great council of 101!!! DNI if you adhere to andal succession law]

🌻 littlelordroses Follow

omggg my fields have been absolutely THRIVING since the tyrells have brought comfort and prosperity to the capital. feel so proud to be a reachman. thank youuuu @ mace_the_ace

🦁 hearmerawr Follow

mace tyrell is a separatist and a cryptofascist btw

🌻 littlelordroses Follow

umm could you provide some sources for this?

🥖 heelobread Follow

LANNISTAN GLOWIE SEETHING RN

🏵 ofthegreenlands Follow

lolol thats def cersei isnt it

🦁 hearmerawr Follow

it’s not my job to educate you

❄ whorefrost Follow

ok this is a long shot but if any of you are in the area around the godseye i lost my raven Moonwing yesterday and i was wondering if any of you might have seen him. he was pacing around my room two nights ago mumbling things like 'snow' and 'king' and 'hardhome'. my brother likes to play pranks on me so i thought it was just one of his games but when i woke up my raven was gone. i miss him a lot so i wanted to reach out to see if any of you might have seen him

🌙 moonglowinherhair Follow

heyy im in the godseye area too (im from Crofter's Fall if youve heard of it) but i was wondering if you have any more information about your bird? theres a lot of ravens around these parts haha

❄ whorefrost Follow

hes black

🌙 moonglowinherhair Follow

anything else?

❄ whorefrost Follow

he bites me a lot

⚔️ swordcrosseryaoi Follow

streets are saying sansa poisoned joffrey and took off from kings landing on leathery bat wings to go to the wall you go girl!! starks stay winning

fireandboob Follow

oh my fucking none of these people care about you. a stark brigade literally plundered my whole village!! can we not do this again i hate this goddamn site

🍏 fossobabe Follow

does anyone know if we have tomorrow tomorrow

🍁 plummpudding Follow

for man, perhaps. but for a tree, time is different. a river roiling back and forth, both here and there, but inconstant--always inconstant. a thousand years are but a mere moment through the eyes of a heart tree

📿 sparrowsbones-777-deactivated2990707 Follow

yeah go pray to your rivers northoid. and when the shaman comes to tear your heart out and sacrifice it to your trees, maybe spare a thought for the Seven and their divine might. we'll be waiting.

🍁 plummpudding Follow

254.421.81.132

❄ whorefrost Follow

yooo thats near where i live! if you see a raven flying near your house, could you dm me?

⛓ rhllorbot Follow

The night is dark and full of terrors.

[Beep-boop! I look for heathens and non-believers. Sometimes I mess up.]

🐗 bobby-b-bot Follow

IS THAT HOW YOU SPEAK TO YOUR KING??

🐀 askmeaboutmylengtheory Follow

every time i scroll past this post i have to reblog

🦀 crackedclaw Follow

hey can i ask you about your leng theory?

🐀 askmeaboutmylengtheory Follow

No.

🍏 fossobabe Follow

what the hell happened to my post

🗝 adropofdragonblood Follow

alright we're solving this once and for all

🧀 bloodncheesewasan1n51d3j0b Follow

op you coward wheres stannis

🗝 adropofdragonblood Follow

many have been asking the same question

🕯glasscandle-was-taken Follow

ok i know i shouldnt be surprised bcz its popular on this site to bandwagon onto the next popular thing but just a reminder that if youre supporting the conquests of daenerys targaryen youre supporting a literal colonizer and imperialist. plus slavery is literally a unique and traditional part of ghiscari culture so we cant be surprised that people over there dont like her. begging yall to pick up a scroll once in a while

🍷adornishred Follow

👁️ eye-motif Follow

⛈ pisswaterprincess Follow

🩸 blood-motif394 Follow

what if we were both locked in the formless dark void of the dungeon together, bereft of our own names and our own identities, bereft of everything that made us who we were. and we were both boys

🐒 littlestvalyrian Follow

haha that would be pretty epic i think

#tumblr dash simulator #asoiaf #asoiaf meme #valyrianscrolls #my posts

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something-very-special · 3 years

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Call Her Back

Probably already a post with this title from the Let’s Play but it’s appropriate.

Thoughts on Replicant up to Ending A (and change):

This game is pretty. I guess it didn’t really hit me because I’ve always thought that the original NIER was pretty, but this game can be very pretty.

This in particular just kind of struck me as I was going across the Northern Plains. It had been dominantly gray, overcast skies up to that point because Part II of the game is meant to be. You know. Bleak. But I walked out onto a bright, sunny day with an expanse of blues skies, the mountains in the backgrounds, the ivy a burst of green growing up the rusted sides of the train tracks and it just kind of hit me that the game can be very pretty.

(Then I got punched out by a Shade.)

It’s definitely not a matter of massive graphical overhaul. The models look much better (getting a good look at the Twins during the finale, they really are beautiful) and I’m sure the environmental poly count is much higher and just overall smoother, and there are little touches here and there and just the capacity for better atmospheric lighting... I mean it all helps. But NIER is a game that’s always had fantastic art direction, making the most out of its budget through atmospheric tuning. There’s something uniquely beautiful about its muted palette and the way it uses its spaces that elevates it beyond the its actual technical limitations. It doesn’t look like an end-of-generation PS4 game, but that’s not an insult; it looks very much like itself from ten years ago, with its solid art direction, but touched up where it matters.

Does the sidequest grind seem... better...? I haven’t really dug into the BEST part of the game (spending 30 hours grinding out weapon upgrades) but I mentioned before my theory about how the sidequest grind is supposed to be carried out across multiple playthroughs and that’s why it sucks. To my surprise I finished Ending A missing only one sidequest (your friend and mine, Life in the Sands), with all of the other ones being more or less... pretty natural? The only thing I really needed to go out of my way for was Memory Alloy but all the other components didn’t really give me the kind of grief I remember from my playthroughs of the original. ‘Grief’ of course being relative to getting the platinum trophy, but my first time through the game I gave up finishing a few outstanding sidequests (specifically, fixing the lighthouse broke me-- I could not find 10 Mysterious Switches!)

Maybe I just got lucky, especially with the Machine Oils. Maybe some weird muscle memory kicked in. I feel like there were a few purchasing options that weren’t open originally, too, to ameliorate some of the grind, but it might also be a case of those options being cost-prohibitive so I just didn’t really acknowledge them... whatever the case the sidequest grind felt overall pretty painless. I dunno!

I really need to know how to manipulate events. For literally seven playthroughs straight of the latter half of the game I always did the keystone quest as Junk Heap (start) - Forest of Myth - Junk Heap (end) - Facade - Aerie. It wasn’t until I did a run with my college roommates and Popola gave me the Aerie letter before the Facade in invite that I realized the Aerie wasn’t actually programmed to be the last event.

Absolutely blew my mind, and ever since I became aware of it, it feels like the game goes out of its way to make sure the Aerie always comes before Facade. When I did my Let’s Play of NIER I kept a save file from the start of the kystone collection so I could re-do the events in case they went ‘out of order’ (according to my headcanon)... which they did. I replayed the latter half of the game again in order to get things the way I wanted them to be, same order, and fortunately it cooperated the second time, but I still don’t understand what the trigger is, if there’s a way to manipulate it, or when the determination is even made.

And then they throw the Little Mermaid into the mix, which I wasn’t expecting (that is, I knew it was added, but I’ve been mostly avoiding spoilers -- and happily, the changes have largely been a delight, I’m so excited for the subsequent playthroughs -- but the way it was posted about made it seem like it would happen after and apart from the keystone quest. Not so, my friends).

The reason for this is just the emotional escalation of each factor of the quest. The Forest of Myth is weird and little else (at this juncture, of course). The Junk Heap is a personal tragedy, but the actual tragedy has already occurred and you’re just experiencing the fallout. Facade is a powerful and personal tragedy that deserves to be experienced later on. The Aerie is a terrible place and nobody misses it it’s an enormous loss and profoundly traumatic for the party, and it feels like the appropriate apex to basically force them to go to the Castle and finish the fight, having already lost far too much.

Also it’s just super weird to me that they see that devastation, they literally wipe an entire settlement off the map, and then the next day everybody’s super excited to go to a wedding.

It also becomes even weirder that you go to Popola post-Aerie and nobody mentions ‘yeah that didn’t go so well’ but coming out of Seafront they have a legitimate conversation about the loss of the ferryman and the people they’re never getting back. I guess that guy had a personality but I still think maybe somebody should mention the smoking crater where people used to be.

Then again it’s legitimately funny to me how basically everybody is just agreed the world is better off without it.

This might also just be an issue of familiarity. Maybe if I’d always ended on Facade, or actually known that they could be swapped out as they are, it wouldn’t feel so weird. I definitely got used to the pacing with the Aerie at the end and I feel like I got into a debate with somebody about how it’s more appropriate for Facade to come last so this might just be a personal thing. But it’s still a personal thing and I’m still vaguely irritated I can’t figure out how it works.

Anyway I blew up the Aerie So that’s that problem taken care of.

I feel like the ambiance surrounding Wendy was a little creepier this time. I swear I heard that good stock creepy child laughter in the background.

Then the ferryman left This was a nice bit of foreshadowing; following the Aerie events I wanted to hop over to Seafront to take care of an extant sidequest only to find the ferry dock in the Northern Plains empty. I thought that maybe this was just a weird way of railroading you to make sure you went through the Village first, even though there were no scenes that would trigger just by being in the Village.

Alas.

Not gonna lie, when the couple was first introduced I thought for SURE it was going to be the wife who wound up dead. I guess it’s because the guy had a purpose as an NPC so yeah, I was tricked. Good design decision; the ferryman is talkative and bright and definitely difficult to forget and even though he was kinda obnoxious there’s a definite void where his dialogue was. It’s clever too that you’re forced to use the ferry at least once so you can’t escape the dialogue that you’re presented with, meaning that even if you don’t really make use of the ferry you’ll always have that contrast between him at the start of Part II and the other guy (his brother, maybe?) taking over the job and just not really talking to you afterward.

Episode Mermaid First of all, to be clear, I’ve not done the Route B playthrough yet. All I know about the Little Mermaid is what’s presented on the surface, what can be gleaned from there, what I remember reading in the Grimoire NieR short story. This is very much just an impression and reaction to the first encounter and it’s pretty cool.

I like that they managed to go into yet another genre style aping a point-and-click adventure.

I like the atmosphere of the wrecked ship. It really brought me back to the ‘ghost ship’ level archetype with its little hints of spookiness.

I appreciate that it ties subtly in to the Haunted Manor (technically the Part I Seafront dungeon) with Weiss’ utterly irrational fear of ghosts.

I love every excuse they find to get Kaine and Emil (and especially Kaine) out of a situation. It’s almost a running gag that Kaine keeps getting knocked out of dungeons and boss fights. None of them are quite as great as her getting Rules Lawyer’d in the Barren Temple, but there’s something delightful about “Let’s get you some fresh air, we’ll be right outside, be careful!” and then bookending it with Kaine and Emil just chilling at the end like “Well yeah there are a lot of holes in the hull we just popped in.”

(I forgot to go backward to see what happens if you try to take them into Seafront proper, gotta remember that next time.)

Interesting thing when you find some of the dropped apples is that Nier and Weiss talk about the dinner they had with the couple. This was actually a really sweet and oddly emotional conclusion to the added sidequest between the bickering couple-- entirely missable. I would assume the dialogue just doesn’t trigger if you didn’t do the quest but it was a nice touch.

I appreciate the use of dead bodies in the hold.

(That’s a sentence.)

But for the game’s focus on violence and excess of blood it’s very selective in how it uses actual corpses. Any time you see a dead body it really emphasizes the seriousness of the situation. The corpses in the hold and the blood spatter -- especially compared to how bright and clean Seafront as a whole is -- was surprisingly effective. Again, just good atmospheric buildup.

Bit of an anticlimax as a boss, though. It is a really cool boss, between the environmental buildup to the fight and then actually unveiling her, but for how big and scary she is the fight itself went by fairly quick, and the actual finale (the postman whacking her hand telling her to go away she’s groooooss) felt a bit weird in comparison to the way the boss fights in the rest of the game usually play out. Of course, I don’t have context of her dialogue (I can take my guesses, her holding out her hand to Hans as he freaks out and attacks her is already a palpable tragedy) and by the way the scene was framed I suspect the Route B reveal is where the most important part of the scenario lies.

And the seals came back! It’s the little things.

“I wish I was Fyra.” So in the original Replicant the conversation between Emil and Nier before Sech’s wedding was apparently an implication that Emil had a crush on Nier and wanted to marry him. It was ambiguous enough that people had to ask for clarification and some players interpreted it as a weird, childish expression of looking up to and respecting Brother Nier. It was clarified in the Grimoire NieR that Emil is gay and crushing hard on Brother Nier, and this line of dialogue here seems to have been... not made explicit, but changed even between RepliCant and ver. 1.22 to make the implication a little clearer, at least insofar as he isn’t interested in girls. (It winds up missing the implication that he’s into Nier specifically, though.)

...which is funny, because it colors his introduction to the King of Facade somewhat differently. These two meeting is honestly really sweet on a few levels (Sechs recognizing him from Nier’s descriptions, which implies that Nier’s been visiting Sechs regularly and so proud of his interactions with Emil he told the king of another nation all about him, and the King is legit excited to meet him) but then a couple of minutes later Emil is all ‘I’m so jealous of Fyra’. He isn’t crushing on Nier, but he is totally crushing on Sechs.

Endgame At this point in the game the distinction between Brother and Father has become mostly lost and the final charge is pretty much the same as

wait what’s up with the music in the Lost Shrine? This is Snow in Summer.

Or an arrangement thereof. That particular track level from Snow in Summer winds up getting used in a few new places and it has this kind of weird, vague sense of dread that makes it work pretty well. Utterly threw me off in the Lost Shrine, though (I think it’s appropriate given its connection to the Shadowlord/Gestalt Nier so slowly re-introducing it in the climb is pretty cool). It also builds insanely as you climb, which is a very cool effect but, um, I’m just here to pick up some sidequest items right now this feels like a little much.

There isn’t much to say regarding any impact or differences in the large part of this area of the game. It’s a good final dungeon, it carries good momentum, it works as well as it ever did (that is to say, rather well). The emotional beats are great and translate equally well between the protagonists, although I have to give the nod to Papa Nier during a lot of this just for the imagery of such a big, powerful man becoming so broken the further he goes in (and Kaine being strong enough to toss him around like a rag doll anyway).

The final flashback with Nier and Yonah also feels better with Papa Nier. I always read it as, of course, Papa Nier having his moment with Yonah, giving her the flower, and as he lays back down Yonah does the same big sigh like she’s trying to emulate her dad and it’s really sweet. This is another one of those moments where it’s not something that feels wrong in Replicant, but just having that comparison in the back of my head is something that I just can’t help.

Is Papa Nier still Best Neir? Yes.

But there’s room in my heart for Brother. I’m glad the bizarre marketing decision happened and both of these characters can exist.

...and then we reload the save. Okay, okay, so-- so here’s the thing-- I figured that’s a good place to conclude a session, right? Get to the ending, prepare for the next run. But I also know that Route B starts with Kaine’s unskippable novel segments. I’ve read them, of course, so I figure I’ll just reload into Route B so I can make a save after the novel sections, really get into the meat of Route B when I’m fresh.

So skim through those--

Beat up the Knave--

Skim through the rest--

Educated Warrior... didn’t pop...?--

Wait what’s this camera angle--

Why am I outs--

oh my god

KAINE AND EMIL HAVING GIGGLY GIRL TALK AROUND THE CAMPFIRE OH MY GOD WHAT IS HAPPENING

THERE’S MORE.

THERE’S. MORE.

I legit short-circuited. Going in I knew they added the Little Mermaid. I knew they added Ending E. Those were things I suspected would be added and went out to specifically confirm; beyond that I’ve been keeping myself completely spoiler free.

I had no idea there was more. I had no idea this was happening.

I’m so excited.

And a goofy thought for the road

“I polished you with a special cloth, I poured warm water on you--”

“Wait, you poured water on me?”

/imagines Emil running blindfolded eight hours across the Southern Plains with an 8oz plastic water cup, getting to the library, splashing it on Kaine, waiting expectantly

/nothing happens

/walks dejectedly eight hours all the way back to the Manor

#NieR #NieR Replicant #Musings #Ramblings #OH MY GOD WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME ABOUT THIS #I AM SO GLAD NOBODY TOLD ME ABOUT THIS

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fimflamfilosophy · 4 years

Text

“Is DnD Still Popular?”

To some of you giant nerds, the question, “Is DnD still popular,” is probably one of the stranger things you’ll read today, but within a specific context it makes a lot of sense. Speaking of, the show “Stranger Things” presented a popular, physical look at what DnD beasties might feel like, even if it didn’t present an honest view of what DnD games really play like. Along with more online media referencing the game and sites like Roll20 making it easier to join a group, it makes sense. Is this a temporary boom or has the roleplaying community seen a lot of permanent additions to its nerdy hobby?

I wouldn’t have numbers to say, myself, but for what it’s worth, roleplaying is always a very personal experience. And for a few of us, the question isn’t, “Are people still playing DnD?” Of course they are - it’s all anyone plays! The question is, “Can you get anyone to play anything else?”

What Is DnD?

For some people, Dungeons & Dragons has become so intertwined with the concept of roleplaying that people think DnD and roleplaying are synonymous. If you roleplay, you play DnD. Originally, this had a kernel of truth. There are articles about the history of the system, and during its inception the game had a hard time taking off. Fundamentally it was asking people to play make-believe, but with a system of mathematical rules and designs. We know now that this type of thing is like catnip to massive dork-faced neckbeards, but at the time it wasn’t expected to have much appeal.

Eventually it did get off the ground, and it became the standard for the entire concept of a roleplaying game. And as with all “firsts to the market”, there have been many competitors and copycats, but it’s difficult to pry the audience away when you need everyone to use the same system. In economics they call this “network utility value” - that is, a fax machine is useless if only one person owns one. You can only send faxes to other people with fax machines, so if another company tries to invent their own offshoot of the fax machine, they’ll never get anyone to adopt it because everyone is already using the existing fax machine network. Everybody knows DnD, which means that if you go to a convention or look for games online, you know you’re going to find more players for that system than any other.

Why Does DnD Continue to Work?

In early editions of DnD, there were a lot more rules, and as a result more freedom to design your characters. When I first started roleplaying, it was during the 3rd edition of the system, where you could still allocate skill points to become better or worse at specific skills like lying, climbing, forgery, or crafting. This meant that with good planning, you could play a sub-optimal wizard and make up for it somewhat by investing a lot in your “persuasion” skills to rely on talk more than magic.

But being the system that everyone has to learn isn’t enough to stay on top forever. Other systems like GURPS have taken hold by now, and some types of popular nerd media have introduced their own completely unique systems designed to simulate their specific media universes. The owners of DnD had two choices: either make the game more open and try to eat the lunch of other companies, or make all of DnD easier to play in general to capture a broader audience.

So they released 4th edition! We don’t talk about 4th edition. And then they quickly released 5th edition (and a few mumbled apologies), which streamlined a lot of things about the game to the extent I’m not sure why they even let you control your character stats at all now. Skills became baked in with your level, and most of the game is about choosing abilities when you level up. It’s become very similar to playing an MMO, and I believe that’s the point.

One of the big things you always see in a complicated roleplaying system is players spending hours putting together a character. For your experienced player, this is a labor of love. You really care about the small details and want to make sure you get it right, or you’re a Win-At-All-Costs type who wants to make sure you’re rolling the biggest numbers. Either way you’re familiar and know what you’re doing, but it presents a hurdle to new players, and that hurdle has been largely done away with in 5th edition.

No matter how old you are, how experienced you are, how creative you are (or aren’t), or how much you know about any aspect of the game, you can play 5e DnD. I think you could play as young as seven years old and have minimal problems, because all you have to do is choose a job and virtually everything else is filled in for you, as if by a program, as if a video game. An experienced player can help a new one whip up a character within fifteen minutes, and that new guy will be rolling dice at the dragon about as well as everyone else.

DnD is the Worst System

But DnD’s accessibility is also its greatest downfall. Because everything is sort of programmed out, you find a lot of players eventually growing bored with the same-old, and they try to find ways to inject new life into the system. They invent new races, new classes, new abilities, and so on - they call this “homebrew”. yet many people are bad at creating balance and fairness for something they personally intend to play, and DnD recognizes this problem. It has a lot of supplemental books telling you all you need to know about other races and classes you might want to play, and in theory they are as fair and powerful as anything in the base system.

Yet no amount of homebrew or supplementary material will solve DnD’s core problem: it’s rigid. If you want to play, you need a battle mat, because every spell, every action, can travel or act within a certain number of squares and you always need to know exactly where you’re standing. Players are expected to be able to take a certain number of actions per turn based on their level, and do an expected amount of damage. Monster encounters are built loosely around the concept of “Challenge Rating”, which is meant to imply a group of four players will find a CR of 5 suitably challenging if they are all level five. Basically it plays like “X-Com”.

And as you lock people in these mechanical, video game-styled designs, you find people champing at the bit. Not everyone wants to choose their abilities at level up or have their skill proficiencies dictated by what level they are. Some people want to express truly outlandish concepts, or play something that isn’t specifically designed around the idea of walking room to room blasting monsters. You’ll see people in roleplaying communities often asking, “Does anyone have any good ideas to homebrew [this idea] and make it work?”

Fans of DnD argue the homebrew approach works. Yes, it’s complicated and frustrating to invent entirely new classes and races for a single game where you don’t know how long you’ll play or what level you’ll reach, but DnD’s strict rules and design philosophy is a perk to those people, not a drawback.

Yet a fact of note is that a quote from a game I run got into a popular “Out of Context DnD” blog. The quote was, “ Mecha-Jesus unleashes a barrage of flames from his palms, but the train-snake martially dodges out of the way!”

It received 337 notes, and I was a little surprised by that. The game is a post-apocalyptic Road Warrior setting where the team boss decided to kill God as revenge for one of the gang members dying. Also featured in that day’s session was a battle between two men operating bucket cranes in a duel to the death above a giant grain silo, among eight other equally implausible events based loosely on Dante’s Inferno. For me, Mecha-Jesus is not a 300 notes event - it’s literally every other Friday.

What Do You Want to Play?

In my view, DnD often poses the question, “Are you even roleplaying?” I mean really. A lot of players feel like they are because they do an accent and come up with a backstory, but if you set yourself next to another player who has the same character stats and you’re playing together in the same game, has the system really given you the tools to solve problems all that differently? And the answer is is broadly, no.

I understand the counter-argument. Every player is unique. But in their way each Paladin in “World of Warcraft” is unique too. They have different gear, different competencies of player, and may take different abilities, but fundamentally they’re expected to crash dungeons and use what they’re given to kill monsters. The only advantage DnD has is that the GM can allow his players to interact with scenery items or talk to things, and you’ll see debate on exactly how much leniency a GM should give his players to act outside DnD’s base mechanics.

That’s a mentality. Some people like the safety of the system. They like to know what all the monsters are, what the risks are, what the rewards are, and have it all neatly lined up where you can see it. They want to join an Adventuring Guild that will bureaucratically assign a dungeon for them to attack so they always have something to do and a sure reward for doing it. The GM went through the trouble of drawing that dungeon out, after all. DnD is extremely safe.

And then there’s the alternative. I actually learned to roleplay among theater nerds who were already big into the concept of improv and narrative. One of them used to joke, “If you think DnD is the best system for the game, you know it’s not character-driven,” because any time you’re fine with trying to build an actual human around a set of level-up choices, you’re probably not designing the strongest possible personality.

Going back to media making DnD more popular, the first televised introduction to DnD I can personally recall is an episode of “Dexter’s Lab” where they address exactly this conflict. In it, Dexter runs a game where he forces his friends to play by his rules, where he wins. When Dexter rolls poorly, he turns the dice over to a better number and declares his evil wizard “fried” the team of adventurers. Then his sister, Dee Dee, takes over, and with no knowledge of the game’s rules at all, embarks on an improvised session of pure roleplaying where the guys tell her what they do and she tells them what happens. The sheets are just guidelines for them, and if they say they can do something Dee Dee accepts it.

Dee Dee’s roleplaying is open. It’s a void, and for some people, when you look into the void it looks back. How do you control everyone when they can do anything? It requires a certain level of trust that some players have a difficult time not abusing, yet weirdly everyone I’ve ever known who would lie and cheat during a roleplaying game actually preferred DnD, and I think I know why.

Rules Can Be Broken, but the Suspension of Disbelief is Immutable

The grognards that break the rules in DnD do so because the rules are so strict that they ironically can be easily broken. If the system says people take a certain amount of damage when they fall, and you find a way to throw to them that elevation consistently, by gum they’ll damn well take that damage. It’s in the rules! A friend I know combats this by saying if his players exploit the rules, then the monsters will start exploiting them too, to discourage arms races of bullshit.

What I’m describing is often called “rules lawyering”. So named because it involves finding a rules passage, interpreting the rule so the wording sounds like it favors an exploit, and then leveraging that into a powerful ability players were not meant to have. Because DnD requires you to know absolutely everything about your relative locations and words like “Attack” can have important diverging meanings depending on context, it’s a system extremely vulnerable to lawyering.

But with a more open system based on narrative and characters, it becomes harder to lawyer something you shouldn’t. In an open system, you build what the game calls for without consulting a bunch of charts and level guides. If you’re super heroes, you build super heroes. Cyborgs are cyborgs, Orcs are orcs - it’s whatever, and if you try to do anything outside the believability of the game, the GM tells you no. He has more authority in a more narrative game because the GM leads the narrative.

I’m personally fond of the Hero System, which ascribes massive ranges to all forms of weapons (a gun or eye laser can reach you down a long hallway) so the only general questions that need to be asked are, “Are you close enough to punch a guy?” and “Are you bunched up close enough to all be hit by this grenade?” You don’t need battle mats and the games play a lot more intuitively. There are two books of rules in Hero and they can be specific, but most of the rules revolve around character design rather than how to play, and fiddly things like physics or bursting through walls are meant to be decided depending on the type of game, at the GM’s discretion. There are guidelines, but they’re only that.

So if someone tells you they can punch through a wall in your noir investigator game, you tell them no, because the rules are just guidelines and in this game you can’t just drive your fist through a concrete brick even if you can find figures in the book that say maybe you can, because the book also says maybe you can’t - you’re expected to play the narrative, not the game. You can punch through walls in the super hero game where that’s typical, but not in this one.

From DnD to Anything Else

Of course, the open systems also present an opportunity for players to be very different in skill sets and abilities. You could imagine DnD is like “Power Rangers”, where everyone’s a different color and has different weapons but they’re basically all pretty much on the same level. An open system will wind up more like “Avatar the Last Airbender”, where one player is going to be Toph and someone else is going to be playing Sokka.

It’s important in DnD that everyone be the same, because a lot of the game is spent in a 20ft x 20ft room full of skeletons (or Putties) - Toph would single-handedly dominate every challenge. Whereas in a narrative-driven game the ability to crush everything with a rock doesn’t actually solve half your problems and whoever’s playing Sokka probably winds up more active than the person playing Toph.

At the end of it all, that’s why the question for me is whether you can take the players out of DnD and take DnD out of the players. Everyone plays DnD, but can you get people to play Sokka and have a good time if Toph is in the party? Personally I think it helps to start people on systems other than DnD, and then they can go into DnD if they like being in small rooms full of skeletons.

Of course, trying to start people on anything but DnD is usually defeated by the network utility! Everyone knows DnD! It’s THE system synonymous with the hobby! A few too many times I’ve seen people play a DnD game and say roleplaying just isn’t for them because it’s boring. All you do is wait for your turn and then roll dice at goblins.

But all I can say to that is, you never roleplayed, man. You joined a pen-and-paper video game. I agree, throwing dice at goblins sucks. I used to have a friend who would compulsively roll dice when he got bored waiting for turns in games like that, and when asked what he was rolling for, he’d joke, “I’m killing the dragon! I’m killing the dragon!” Him, enjoying the experience of DnD combat in between other people’s turns.

In many groups that’s all DnD is, silly accents and go-nowhere backstories aside. Acting is hard. But if you’re very lucky, and you know just the right people, it’s possible to land in a game that is pure story and character, and those things are a rare treasure and a real blast.

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jackdawyt · 4 years

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One of the most alarming statements made by anonymous BioWare employees currently working on the next Dragon Age has been the remark that the next game is “planned with a live service component, built for long-term gameplay and revenue.”

Like me, I suspect you have questions regarding what exactly a live-service Dragon Age 4 may entail. While we don’t have all the answers currently, thanks to Jason Schreier’s article on “The Past and Present of Dragon Age”, we certainly have an idea on what the next Dragon Age may look like.

Regardless, I feel like it’s even more necessary to have this conversation on BioWare’s live service future having watched the debacle of Anthem’s post-launch content, and what BioWare hopefully learned from Anthem’s experience going forward with Dragon Age 4.

You see, Anthem’s live service model was originally going to follow story-based content after the base game launched. The content would forward the main narrative in many different directions with new areas, bosses, dungeons, characters, stories, and of course, cosmetics.

In pre-production, Anthem's story had been produced with live service in mind, so the developers could easily write, change and create many different plot points and narratives in future content to come.

“They had a really strong belief in the live service,” said one developer. “Issues that were coming up, they’d say, ‘We’re a live service. We’ll be supporting this for years to come. We’ll fix that later on.’” (How BioWare's Anthem Went Wrong, Kotaku).

The game was originally planned to follow a deep content road map, that would have players still engaged with Anthem ten years after launch.

"Anthem is a social game where you and your friends go on quests and journeys. It’s a game that we’ve been working on for almost four years now, and once we launch it next year I think it’ll be the start of a ten-year journey for us." (Patrick Soderlund)

However, Anthem’s original ‘idealistic’ live-service model didn’t come to fruition due to only 18 months of development time. The content road map we did eventually get for Anthem, didn’t prove to be successful.

[Anthem] was in development for nearly seven years but didn’t enter production until the final 18 months, thanks to big narrative reboots, major design overhauls, and a leadership team said to be unable to provide a consistent vision and unwilling to listen to feedback. (How BioWare's Anthem Went Wrong, Kotaku).

The post-launch content was staged in acts. The first act was called “Echoes of Reality” and would last around three months, providing constant new missions, strongholds and world dynamics. The act would end on a huge update called “The Cataclysm”.

Unfortunately, this road map was too idealistic, and was cancelled after heavy delays of “The Cataclysm” event.

With BioWare’s first live service model not going according to plan, hopefully, the unsuccessful launch of Anthem’s live service-model speaks volume for future BioWare’s titles, and the developers have learned from that experience.

It's worth stating that Anthem isn’t dead and BioWare haven’t abandoned ship. They’ve remained adamant on working out how the game can stay afloat, as a small production team at BioWare Austin work on the preliminary design of Anthem 2.0.

BioWare and parent company EA have been planning an overhaul of the online shooter, according to three people familiar with those plans. Some call it “Anthem 2.0” or “Anthem Next.” (Sources: BioWare Plans A Complete Overhaul For Anthem, Kotaku).

In spite of that, I know for a fact, every Dragon Age fan can look at Anthem’s style of a live-service model and say that this model wouldn't cross-over into a Dragon Age game.

Anthem is a multiplayer game with a heavy emphasis on gameplay as opposed to story. While the game does have a main narrative with all the BioWare trimmings of lore and a codex, the general reason you play Anthem is to kill, loot and customise your javelin suit.

This gameplay loop can be easily continued with a live service model adding new content like levels, enemies, worlds, cosmetics, etc.

Whereas for Dragon Age, the player’s experience is deeper than the gameplay - there are many reasons we play Dragon Age - for instance my experiences have been driven by the story as I, solely, make impacting choices and consequences throughout the world.

Anthem’s live service model reflects a very different perspective, so, what could a Dragon Age live service-model entail?

Well, according to Jason Schreier: “we not sure about the details, and in fact they’re likely still being decided, as the game is still very early in development and could evolve based on the negative reception to Anthem. If it does turn out to be an online game, which seems likely, it would be shocking if you couldn’t play the bulk of it by yourself."

"One person close to the game told [Jason] that Morrison’s critical path, or main story, would be designed for single-player and that goal of the multiplayer elements would be to keep people engaged so that they would actually stick with post-launch content."

"Some ideas [Jason] heard floated for Morrison’s multiplayer include companions that can be controlled by multiple players via drop-in/drop-out co-op, similar to old-school BioWare RPGs like Baldur’s Gate, and quests that could change based not just on one player’s decisions, but on the choices of players across the globe."

“They have a lot of unanswered questions. Plus, I know it’s going to change like five times in the next two years.”

The trouble with Dragon Age 4 being live service is that the game is predominantly single-player, and while there is a multiplayer mode in Inquisition, no one plays Dragon Age for multiplayer. As I said before, there are many personal reasons each of us play the series from escapism to fantasy fulfilment and everything in-between.

Diversification of a live service model or multiplayer in the fourth entry of a single-player RPG just sounds like a recipe for disaster in my opinion.

While in theory, the idea of a drop-in/drop-out coop system in Dragon Age 4 sounds somewhat okay, everything else that multiplayer implicates is not okay.

If this sort of coop system is embedded into the game, then Dragon Age 4 could be an always online game running on servers. If Anthem serves as an example, that means no offline play, long loading screens, and an almost unplayable launch day.

How can Dragon Age 4 follow a live service model, and at the same time appeal to the majority of the single-player fans? That’s not a rhetorical question because I have three approach's BioWare could likely follow:

The Andromeda Approach

In Mass Effect: Andromeda, Ryder has a small unit called Strike Teams, they act like Inquisition’s war table mechanic where you can send out groups into the world for rewards. However, in Andromeda as a secondary option, the player can actually take over these missions themselves in the multiplayer mode to assume full security over the mission’s succession.

Dragon Age 4 could have a new war table that enacts live service content. Perhaps you’re given an incentivise to take on side-missions in multiplayer with other people, however, like Andromeda’s method, if you’d rather not, you can just send NPC’s to do the task with a longer time limit.

The multiplayer mode while connected to the single-player would be a dispatched component. This sounds like the most okay approach for the majority of fans.

The Anthem Approach

Anthem’s approach follows a single-player hub-based world where many key choices and story scenes can play out. Then once you enter the world, or choose a quest, the player is automatically put into a lobby. While you can play the missions and explore the world solo, you can’t play offline, it’s always online play on servers.

Hypothetically, if Dragon Age 4 followed this exact approach, the player would have a single-player based hub, like a castle, fort or camp where we could engage with our allies and further the plot. However, when continuing the main missions, or exploring the world, we’d then have to go through a lobby to continue the adventure solo or with friends on always online servers, with no offline play.

This wouldn’t be a good experience in my opinion.

The “Ideal” Approach

My ideal approach to live service is, of course, way too optimistic, but I’m throwing it out there anyways because Ubisoft did it, so that means anyone can do it. I’d love Dragon Age 4’s live service model to follow many post-launch story-based DLC’s adding to the narrative post-launch.

Perhaps smaller content added monthly like new enemies, quests, areas, etc.

And larger, story-based content perhaps 3-4 months after launch, and onwards.

This is exactly what live service should be, the game is kept alive with more quests and story DLC’s giving the game breathe. If done successfully, this could be a live service RPG done right, with more content coming for months.

Final Thoughts

I may sound cavalier about the whole live service Dragon Age 4 ordeal, but I trust in the developers and their knowledge of their games and more importantly, their fans.

This is something I haven’t stopped talking about, but it’s worth reiterating that the BioWare developers are looking with an eye to what the fans love about Dragon Age. The main team working on Dragon Age 4 created the Trespasser DLC, that’s John Epler’s narrative direction, with Patrick Weekes as the Lead Writer.

Yes, I do get worried when I hear the terms “live service Dragon Age 4”, and “Anthem with Dragons”, but ultimately that’s just unplaced fear. In reality, the BioWare developers know their fanbase more than anyone, and will most certainly cater to our needs for the next Dragon Age game.

I know this topic is rather baren at the moment, we don’t have a clearer picture of what Dragon Age 4 will look like. We’ve just got to trust the epic developers who’ve been at the studio since Dragon Age: Origins and are working on the next instalment to the best of their ability.

I’m sure we’ll touch on this topic in the future, but for now, let’s just focus on supporting the people creating the next Dragon Age, rather than fear what may or may not transpire in the next game. When we know more about live service, I’ll be sure to have another chat about it with you all then.

Let me know your thoughts on how BioWare can handle Dragon Age 4’s live service model.

#dragon age #live service #ea #dragon age 4 #dragon age live service #joplin #morrison #past and present dragon age #live service dragon age #dragon age 4 live game #Dragon age multiplayer #solas #thedas #tevinter #anthem #anthem 2.0 #andromeda #bioware live service #bioware multiplayer

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carabas · 4 years

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So I’ve just finished reading the Dragon Age Tevinter Nights anthology, and short reaction: enjoyably hit and miss right up until that final extremely thorough direct hit, thank you Patrick Weekes.

Much, much longer version:

1. I don’t know how reasonable it is to try to extrapolate about what’s going to be in the next game based on a random short story collection, but hey, the novels that came out before DAI were about the mage rebellion, the Orlesian civil war, and eluvians, so.

So things I’m now expecting to see in the next game, aside from the Tevinter-Qunari conflict and Solas of course: Nevarran necromancy, Antivan Crows, Wardens who are struggling with decimated numbers after DAO and DAI (would be the perfect time for Razikale and Lusacan to both wake up at once really), and the Lords of Fortune, a never-before-mentioned Rivaini treasure hunting organization which appeared in I think three different stories here.

Plus a few stories were very much signalling This Specific New Character Will Be Showing Up Again, whether in the games or elsewhere; I'll be shocked if Lucanis the “Demon,” reluctant heir apparent of the Antivan Crows who just got into a cliffhanger conflict with a Tevinter magister, doesn’t have more to do.

2. THERE IS A MAP, there is a great big fantasy map surrounded by nifty little illustrative details to poke at.

There’s a label reading “White Spire,” not in Val Royeaux, but on a mountain beyond the Arlathan Forest. Is that an error or is there really a White Spire mountain? If not an error, has it always been named that or is that new, possibly a new center for the mages after the war, after the original Spire fell? At no point is either Spire mentioned in this book aside from this map.

Lots of astrological sun and moon patterns prominently featured around the edges. Is that one moon chart depicting moon phases or an eclipse? Is it too conspiracy theory of me to be counting the nine dark moons (or spheres? like in that DA4 idol illustration’s seven slots?) on the dragon’s wing? Probably. Or are those spheres a reference to the second moon that never seems to actually be visible, is that missing moon actually deliberate.

Most of the astrological charts are fairly straightforwardly showing sun/moon phases but what is the crowned figure in the one on the lower right meant to represent? The Maker? What’s going on with the horizontal lines passing through it/behind it? The two moons beneath it - is that an illustration of the moon in two phases or being separated into two (metaphorical moon in that case, presumably), do those horizontal lines also indicate separation, do I need to move on from the astrological depictions here, definitely.

Love the big horseshoe crab sea monster.

3. Patrick Weekes’s first story in the collection: halla shapeshifting! An elf named Strife who I fully expected to be revealed as an agent of Fen’harel mimicking ancient elven names like Sorrow and Pride, though I was wrong - would it be charming or just annoyingly unsubtle if that became a thing among his agents. An ancient forest guardian with lyrium blades who hunts magic in a way that struck me an awful lot like a forest-themed equivalent of a golem, though I may be wildly off base with that one.

4. Nevarran necromancy story. An odd bit of the chant to highlight for a funeral: “And the Maker, clad in the majesty of the sky, set foot to earth, and at His touch all warring ceased.” I continue to squint suspiciously at overlaps between Maker and elven god imagery. Also, evidently mortalitasi believe that when someone dies, an inhuman spirit is pushed out from the Fade into the physical world, and that’s part of the reason behind their housing spirits in bodies - neat! The existence of Curiosity spirits, also neat!

5. Is Ghilan’nain’s horrible body horror place supposed to be spelled Hormak like in the title and previous canon references, or Hormok like throughout the text here? I know this was just a mistake but maybe I’ll use this to say that in-world there’s multiple ways of transliterating Dwarven.

6. Lukas Kristjanson story #1, the one featuring approximately a million minor Inquisition character cameos and a meditation on Solas’s regrets, introduces a character with the phrase “free mage by special commendation,” and I was briefly thrown by that little signal that we are Not In My Worldstate, that the mages aren’t all free by default - except then the story went on to destroy Solas’s fresco so I wound up quite grateful for that little heads up that this isn’t my worldstate actually.

(Unfortunately I can’t get into this guy’s writing style at all, which is a shame because it’s one of the big Solas stories in the book.)

7. There’s a little plot point in the Wigmaker Job story that demonstrates those elven artifacts Solas had us activate all over Thedas do indeed strengthen the Veil - like, he wasn’t lying to us about what those orbs do, that is how they work, here we see a Crow stab one in order to deactivate it, weaken the Veil and unleash a horde of vengeful demons. Nice confirmation.

8. Genitivi is the Randy Dowager. (Possibly. At least, Philliam wrote a scene in which Genitivi alludes to being the Randy Dowager. I do appreciate an unreliable narrator but after a certain point it does make the lore hard to keep straight.)

9. By the time we got to the story about adventurers stealing an incredibly powerful healing amulet just to donate it to a mysterious contact at a makeshift hospital trying to help people where the Qunari-Tevinter war has spilled over, I knew better than to expect any cameos from DAO/DA2 characters. And with the mention of the squire, I was pretty sure the mysterious contact was going to be Vaea, and it was. Still. Anders would approve. And for a moment I was fantasizing that it would turn out to be him, or connected to him. A new mental setting for him and Hawke post-mage-freedom - makeshift hospitals at the edge of the invasion, secretly sponsored by a certain pair of absurdly overpowered, dungeon-crawling, treasure-hunting fugitives.

Yes, my Dragon Age interpreting is still all about Anders even when he’s not remotely present.

10. You know, I really expected the leaders of the Crows to be a bit more ruthlessly competent than this. Someone is setting up a grand demonstration, recreating infamous historical assassinations carried out by the Crows but now with the leaders of the Crows themselves as the victims, incredibly flashy, incredibly clearly sending a message, and yet not one of the characters trying to figure out whodunit is speculating about the meaning behind that message??? the motive in going to all that trouble??? it’s all, hm, perhaps it’s the qunari invaders. hm, this one was posed with a pearl necklace just like the one in the historical murder it’s recreating, i bet the culprit owns a pearl-fishing business! I know they’re assassins not detectives but at least show the professional courtesy of paying attention to the message in the show your fellow assassin is putting on for you, geez.

Anyway. Interesting Crow details: they talked about neutral ground and territories divided between the Crow households here, does that just apply to Antiva or like, does Arainai have claim to all jobs in Ferelden?

And the line “Teia's back was bare except for a tattoo marking her as a member of House Cantori” puts Zevran’s tattoos in a slightly different light for me - he’s mentioned that some symbols are sacred to the Crows, and logically it follows that having that symbol tattooed on him would indeed mark him as a Crow to other people in the know, but that his tattoos mark him as belonging to House Arainai is a thing that did not hit me from that.

11. An agent of Fen’harel muttering “Felassan” to activate a rune. In memoriam? Charming. I mean it’s a rune that’s intended to kill an entire city, so possibly the more literal slow arrow is meant, but I’m still charmed.

12. PATRICK WEEKES CLOSING OUT THE BOOK BY JUST DUMPING THE CONTINUING DREAD WOLF HUNT PLOT ON US.

So much.

An actual giant wolf in the Fade, I’m so happy for tumblr user corseque.

A character again raising the possibility that Solas is not an ancient elf but rather a young elf who stumbled onto old magic, a theory I thought debunked by Trespasser but here we are considering it again.

A minor side note that a lot of Kirkwall’s templars went rogue after the explosion - that’s not relevant to the post-DAI plot really, I’m just noting it for my generally-DA2-focused fanfic purposes.

The possibility that somniari (presumably) can kill even dwarves who don’t dream in their sleep. Somniari in general or did Solas personally step in here?

A ritual involving the red lyrium idol resulting in the phrase “As if we were the blood and the cavern the body through which it flowed” right before the POV character enters the Fade, which is a rather Titan-esque turn of phrase.

The Dread Wolf again asserting that all creation is in danger and he’s trying to fix that. A biased POV character recognizing that, huh, funny how those spirits around the Dread Wolf which surely must be demons actually look an awful lot like Justice and Valor.

And Charter’s notes at the end, so direct, not only spelling out the new details on the idol for us (that the figure represents a crowned figure comforting another) but thoroughly hitting us over the head with Solas’s essential characterization in his own words, as if Weekes is still trying to clear up any possible lingering misinterpretations there. (Prideful, hotheaded, foolish. Doing what he must. Sympathetic to elves. Said that he was sorry.)

And the quiet simplicity of Solas coming to this meeting of spies in person because, pause, “...the Inquisition was involved,” written in such a way that you could read all sorts of things into that pause, whatever the Inquisition and the Inquisitor might mean to him.

The book would have been worth reading for this last story alone, what a note to end on.

#dragon age #tevinter nights #inquisition #da4 speculation #this is a deeply inquisition- and post-inquisition focused book #lots of neat continuing plot stuff and cameos from DAI or comics characters #no updates on your favorite DAO/DA2 companions

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kittenfemme27 · 4 years

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Genshin Impact

Breath of the Wild was a game I wanted to love. I love the Zelda games, always have, and I eat up open world games like candy. Yet, BoTW has sat on my digital shelf collecting digital dust for ages. Why is that? Well, to put it simply, I don't want to play as Link. BoTW has a beautiful world, rich combat and game play puzzles, tons to see and do and experience, it's a sandbox for the ages. But it's hampered so heavily for me by the fact that I have to play this very boring and to be honest kind of forgettable boy named Link during the game play. That may sound petty, but if I'm in an open world game I want to fully immerse myself into that and video games are where we all go to escape anyway. If I wanted to be misgendered, I'd simply forget to shave and go outside.

I don't mind playing other Zelda games because in those, Link is a self contained character in the world and they're relatively short and self contained games. But BoTW is a sandbox. And for a large majority of it, you're not going to be doing the story or being addressed as link. The size of the world and the sheer amount of hours you're going to put into it mean that for almost all intents and purposes, Link isn't Link, he's a faceless avatar that you're supposed to put yourself into. The game offers so much freedom in so many avenues and yet, in your choice of how to explore the world as someone you'd actually like to be, you're not allowed. You have to be a skinny blonde twink.

So, in late 2019, in comes a trailer for Genshin Impact. It's making its rounds on the Internet as a "PC Free to Play Gacha Breath of the Wild Clone" which, while a mouthful, was something I initially wrote off. Didn't see a point in checking it out, as I really don't like Gacha games very much. But in late September 2020, MiHoYo the developers released the public 1.0 build of the game to everyone. Multi-platform, too. iOS/Android, PC, PS4, and even a switch release down the line. And maybe its the pandemic, or maybe the Internet was simply too lured in by the cute anime girls, but it took the many by storm. It took me personally over 12+ hours to download the 11 gigs of the game because the servers were so swamped with people.

Now I do want to be clear: Genshin Impact borrows many things from BoTW, but it isn't a clone. It's not a sandbox in the same way BoTW is and aside from some general game play things such as gliders, stamina/wall climbing system, and general aesthetic, the games are massively different. Still, though, playing it has highlighted to me why I never felt quite right playing BoTW, and its that lack of freedom. That lack of ability to play the game on my own terms and explore the beautiful handcrafted world the way I want to.

Despite appearances, Genshin Impact is a lot more like a single player MMO than it is anything else. Requiring tons of farming and grinding to create high level powerful characters in a world that gets increasingly more powerful and hostile as you do. The core game play loop of Genshin Impact is pretty phenomenal, essentially giving you a massive world to explore with literally thousands upon thousands of chests and rewards to find. Either by clearing out enemies, doing random in world puzzles, or even just sitting around. Being inside of and exploring the world of Teyvat is as rewarding as it is beautiful. The art and animation design of the game are stellar and do a lot to make you forget how much time has passed since you booted up the game in the first place. There's tons of different lore books to find, NPC's to talk to, quests to complete, the world is chock-full of lore and world building even down to simple weapon and material descriptions. Teyvat is a wonderful place to be and the developers MiHoYo deserve a pat on the back for how good the world of Genshin Impact is. The other side of game play is a simple system of Character Progression where you farm materials to make your characters/weapons/abilities better so that you can farm even more materials from harder enemies, much like an MMO, and you also acquire gear called Artifacts with randomly rolled stats much like an ARPG. In that regard, Genshin Impact is highly addictive. There are a myriad of weapons, talents, artifacts, and characters all to level up and build up over the course of your play, and every character can be made viable very very easily. The game also lets you keep a party of 4 characters that you can swap between at any point, as well as each character being attuned to a specific Elemental Type that reacts to other Elements. This causes the end-game to be centered around doing some of the hardest dungeons the game has to offer by theory crafting incredibly powerful teams that work off of each other and cause Elemental Reactions in enemies. It’s some of the most fun i’ve had in a game in ages.

All of that is fantastic but unfortunately its all also held back by one simple, huge problem: Original Resin. The game uses a currency called Original Resin that you use to challenge the harder content in the game. Dungeons, World Bosses, Elite Weekly Bosses, you name it and if its end-game content, it likely costs Resin. And not in insignificant amounts either. Dungeons are 20, Bosses are 40, and Weekly Bosses are 60. So, how do you obtain this material? Time. You start with, and are capped, at 120(Later 160 in patch 1.1). 1 resin takes 8 minutes to get back. If you spend it all, it takes 16 hours to get back. Given the rates you spend it, you can go from 120 to 0 in roughly 10-15 minutes. With no way to increase the resin cap, and the incredibly slow acquisition rate, that frequently means you only have about that much playtime a day of the game in the endgame. And that's, needless to say, incredibly frustrating. Thankfully its not an entire stamina system that means you can't play the game at all when you're out of resin, but it does mean that character progression itself is gated as all upgrade/progression materials are locked behind these dungeons and bosses that you must use Original Resin to face. Effecitvely, this means single characters will become weeks and weeks of work, with weapons and artifacts being only slightly less time consuming. I can only hope MiHoYo is looking to change this system in a way that isn't just increasing the cap as the feedback they've received has been very negative regarding it, but only time will tell.

Unfortunately, this isn't the games only problem with its players either. The game is a Gacha, there is no getting around that, but despite the fact that pretty much any character can become massively overpowered and viable in the endgame, people are going to want the rarest characters that exist. This is by design and unfortunately is more or less a glorified gambling system. And while the game is quite nice with its premium currency and how often it gives it, what isn't nice is that the rarest “5-star”characters cost a minimum of 200$ to get through money. With no guarantee you're getting the one you want.

Worse still, outside of a guaranteed 5-star drop at 90 rolls on the gacha wheel, the chance for a 5-star weapon or character is 0.6%. Not even a whole rounded up 1%. This is frankly ridiculous, as is the cost of real money to premium currency. For reference, most other popular Gacha’s doing well offer their rarest characters at anywhere between a 1-6% rate. In general, gacha's aren't known to be kind in their rates. That’s the point, they want you to gamble with real money. Genshin Impact, however, is so unkind and unfair that even other regular players of gacha gamers are very, very vocally upset. If it wasn't for the game play loop and the world, I'm not sure this would fly. And its certainly not flying in the west with the crowd that doesn't play Gacha's nearly as much. Neither is the resin system, as gamers in the west typically want to play for hours and hours at a time.

I’d be remiss if i didn’t bring up the story in Genshin Impact, as it’s genuinely fantastic. As previously stated, the world has a metric tonne of hidden lore in books, weapon/item/artifact descriptions, character stories you unlock as you use a playable character, etc. But the main story you can currently play from start to finish in the 1.0 release is the prologue.

This prologue stars very simply: Your character, the “Traveler” is an alien from another world. Not much is known about them so far, other than that the Traveler and their sibling were people with the ability to hop between worlds at will. In the opening moments of the game this power, along with your sibling, are stolen from you by an unnamed assailant. Thus trapping you in Teyvat and leaving you to begin a journey to find the Seven Gods of Teyvat, simply known as “The Seven” and seek their power and wisdom to find your sibling and potentially leave. This journey is how you meet Venti, one of the Seven in disguise as a simple human bard, and his best friend Dvalin. The events that follow have you help this strange bard, as well as the people of Mondstat, defeat the dragon Dvalin. Previously, he protected the lands of Mondstat for hundreds of years. However, as you meet both Dvalin and Venti, he has had his mind corrupted and been lied to by an order of evil mages known as the Abyss Order, and its caused him to go on the offensive against Mondstat and her people.

It's a fair bit emotional, humorous at times thanks to Venti, and overall very engaging. Mondstat is a city built on freedom, to the point that its own god Barbatos(Venti) refuses to rule over it and allows himself to be the weakest of the seven gods, as that would take away some of the cities freedom. Within this prologue, there is a huge focus on Mondstat being a city of Freedom, the prologue quite literally ends with Venti telling Dvalin after you have saved him from the corruption that even though he is "meant" to be the protector of Mondstat, he hopes Dvalin chooses whatever life he wants, even if that's not Mondstats protector, and that Venti simply wants him to be happy. Venti's own personal story quest goes further in depth about the foundation of Mondstat and its origins as a rebel city founded after the citizens overthrew the oppressive rule of an awful tyrant God and killed him. In a very pretty hand drawn "cathedral window" style cutscene, you get to see the end of this war and why Barbatos chose the form he currently inhabits and took up being a bard, which was to honor a dead friend from this very same war. This explains why Mondstat and Barbatos value its freedom so highly. I cried at this moment both times I played it.

For a free game, the storytelling here is off the charts. As i said before, Venti and many other characters have personal stories that both introduce you to a trial version of the playable character, thus letting you see how they work and play, and also giving you either more info on the world or an introduction to the character in question, or both. They're fantastic little stories and are up there with the main story in quality. One of my favorite parts of the game and something that will only be expanded with time. Each one takes you on a journey of discovery or even simple fun with a character and it all feels very personal and touching, as all of the main stories and character quests are very well voice acted.

The prologue being so focused on freedom makes it all the more awkward, then, that MiHoYo is a game developer based out of China, and as such has to follow China's censorship rules. Taiwan and Hong Kong both are censored in-game chat and if you're reported for saying them, you'll be banned for daring to speak the words. These aren't the only censorship decisions in the game, but they're by far the ones that struck me the most. I understand that the company is based out of China and thus has to follow the censorship rules, as they are the actual law of the land and they could be fined or even shut down if they refused. But the disconnect of knowing there are actual human rights atrocities being committed in China with the Uygher Genocide and Re-Education camps, the human rights violations in Hong Kong, the breakdown of democracy and the treatment of Taiwan, while this game that comes out of China boasts on and on about Freedom and the Human right to self actualize and choose their future is... troubling. It's one that I don't really know how to reconcile, if it can be reconciled at all. I'd like to believe that the developers really believe in their own story and secretly oppose those sorts of atrocities. But at the same time, banning players who mention Hong Kong or Taiwan isn't in the law. That’s a decision MiHoYo is making. Right now, China doesn’t have the freedom that Venti and Mondstat and Genshin Impact try to instill in you so hard as important and a human right. And knowing that and knowing the censorship is in the game make it very difficult to get a read on what the game actually wants you to feel.

Overall,i think Genshin Impact is a fantastic game. Its updates plan to bring in not only more story, as there are meant to be 7 Acts and currently the game features the Prologue and half of Act 1, but in those acts it plans to explain the playable areas and bring in new Events, Characters, Weapons, etc. And that makes me excited for the future of Genshin Impact! It’s a beautiful game of genuinely Triple AAA quality completely for free. But. Its also a Gacha game and by far one of the least rewarding Gachas you could play right now. Maybe that will change with time. I certainly hope it does. But it feels hard to recommend something that, once you beat it, disrespects your time so much and so badly. I hope Genshin Impact has a bright future, I really do, and I’m definitely going to continue playing it. But right now, I can’t say for certain that I feel confident in the developers to make it the game it clearly wants to be if it wasn’t shackled down by its Gacha.

#Genshin Impact #Review #Played on: PC #Played on: iOS

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everly-kindred · 4 years

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Eve’s Diary - Entry #43

Synopsis: The first week back at school has come and gone, and Eve collects her thoughts on strange dualities.

Words: 1,132

Date: 11th of January, 2027

Dear Diary,

A week seems both a long time and an incredibly short one, especially when so much has happened in only seven days. Time is such an odd thing to perceive. I don’t know if I’ll ever wrap my mind around it.

I rode the train back with Ruby, Marigold, Aures, Talula, Casey, and a few other students. We shared a car and had sweets. Ruby and I played this game where we both take turns adding to a drawing, and made this… frog thing with wings and a lantern hanging from his forehead, and wellies?

And then we got back to school and had dinner. It was such a tearing feeling of both returning home, and leaving home at the same time.

We didn’t actually have a feast with speeches and stuff until Sunday, when the Deputy Headmistress told us there had been some attacks. Apparently someone has been targeting animagi, and I honestly cannot fathom why. Who wouldn’t want to be able to turn into some sort of creature at will? I know I desperately want to, but that type of magic is far too advanced for a little firstie like me.

Anyways, she said a former student was amongst those attacked. I read an article about the attacks, and… Well, that Hufflepuff girl, Aisling Jones, was attacked at King’s Cross Station, at Platform 9 ¾. She’s been so kind to me, I wish I could visit her somehow… She is one of five people attacked now. Apparently, the villain wears full plate armor.

We had Defense Against the Dark Arts with Vikander. I sat in the front row with Aures, and this skeleton of a baby dragon came down. It started acting like it was going to chop Aures’ head clean off between its jaws, so I hit it with a book… And found out it was only being playful, so I felt really really really bad about hitting it. But, I didn’t want it to hurt Aures! I apologised, though, and the dragon doesn’t seem worse for wear. His name is Jeremy, apparently. What an… odd and rather boring name for such a fantastic creature, I’d say.

There was this Hufflepuff girl in the back who kept talking out and arguing with the professor, so she lost us points, which was a little annoying. Speaking of, I should probably practice more for quidditch, but it’s been snowing nonstop. I… Don’t want to let Nate and them down again, so I’m determined to get better.

We had a discussion about if dragons should be considered dark creatures. Some people said they think they should be, because they can harm humans, which I thought was silly. Dragons just try to survive like any other creature! Dementors and Boggarts and creatures like that take pleasure in suffering, but dragons… they’re just like really big, super duper dangerous animals. That are really intelligent and hoard treasure.

It ended up begging the question, though - are humans, witch, wizard, and muggle alike, the darkest creatures of all? We kill and cause harm and steal every single day, all over the world. Not even just in a criminal sense, but in a practical one, too. Slaying creatures for potions ingredients and such, for example. We use. But I like to think - I like to hope, anyways - that we give back what we take in some way or another.

Bobby and I had a little chat in the dungeons. He shared this gummy snake with me that hissed and tasted like raspberries. I found it a little bit easier to eat than chocolate frogs - I still can’t get over the way those things move, and the way in which you get them to stop moving.

It’ll be his birthday soon, so I told him we could make him a cake. He wants to make sticky toffee pudding, so sticky toffee pudding he shall have!

In artificer club, we started making wands! Bonnie had us carving out the shape from blocks of wood, and we have little cabinets where we can keep our things in. I started trying to carve my wand into looking a little like a berry branch, since that was the first idea to pop into my head. To look how I imagined my first wand might look.

In charms class with Crawford, she had us pair up to practice Flipendo. I managed to duck a Flipendo Talula had sent my way - she was my partner - but I couldn’t manage a single one against her. She said she felt a little push, but I don’t know if that was true or if she was saying that to cheer me up. Practice makes perfect, I suppose. I had tried to do alohomora to lift her sleeve and mess up her wand movements, but I didn’t have any luck there either.

Speaking of Tal, in divinations, her and that Slytherin girl Ruby is friends with - Octavia Dechants - got into some sort of row in front of the professor. They had a lot of not so nice things to say to each other, which made me a bit sad.

We had to practice something called oculomancy which is when you divine by gazing into someone’s eyes. Grey eyes like mine apparently mean I’m prudent, practical, and I have strong moral strength. I don’t know how accurate all the eye color correspondences are, if it’s like horoscopes or what, but… I suppose I can hope I do have strong moral strength. I don’t think I’m very practical, though, and I don’t know what it means to be prudent.

Caitlin had sat with me but we had run out of time before we could practice with each other, so I promised we could be partners next time. I like her, she’s always nice to me.

Today we had magical theory and sort of brushed up on the three elements of a spellcaster and wands and such. I love that Professor Reuter always has tea for us! This time I had jasmine with just a bit of honey. Anyways, I find his class especially fascinating as they require a lot of deep thinking but they’re still cosy and oddly very relaxing. It was a good class to end the week with, for sure.

Tonight is the full wolf moon. I hope that if there are any werewolves in the castle - and I know there’s at least one, Persephone Vitrac - they have an easy time tonight. I’ve been trying to read more about them so I can get a better understanding of them, and it seems like they suffer a lot.

Anyways, it’s late and I’m very sleepy. I think I’m going to get something to drink and go to bed, maybe read if I can’t sleep.

Much love, Everly

About the Character: Everlina Rosemary Kindred is an imaginative Hufflepuff attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She keeps up with her magical journey through a series of diary entries, dream journals, and tarot readings, all documented for future reflection. Her diary is a small glimpse into her enchanted life, and her adventure into the wizarding world and all its splendors. If you’d like more information about Eve, visit her wiki page.

About the Author: My name is Katherine! I am a 21-year-old Hufflepuff & Pukwudgie from Louisville, Kentucky. This page is my creative journey into the magical world, through the lenses of Second Life. Here I post diary entries, dream journals, and tarot readings all from my character’s perspective. If you’d like more information about me, visit my Flickr!

#witch #hufflepuff #harry potter #diary #magic #hogwarts #journal #witchy #magical #secondlife #mischief managed

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yesvac · 5 years

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Podcasting Dungeons & Dragons: How “The Adventure Zone” is Reviving Oral Storytelling

Topic: Podcasts, oral storytelling, “The Adventure Zone”

Date: 14 October 2019

Read time: 10 minutes

When I was young and visited my grandma’s house, I always asked her to read me Go, Dog. Go! by Dr. Seuss before I went to sleep. This was a reasonable request when I was little, but when I began to grow older, regularly reading chapter books on my own, I would still ask my grandma to read me Go Dog. Go! at the end of the night. It was something about how she sat at the side of my bed, squishing me up against the wall, and said those words that had been repeated many times before. And I am not alone in my fond memories of repeated oral story. People love repeated stories, ones told over and over: myths, narratives, family tales. We love these stories not only for their themes and the multitudes of love they contain, but because oral storytelling is a deeply human instinct: in 1998, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin described that “oral tradition… becomes story as it is retold, resung.” So where do podcasts of the modern age factor in? Podcasts are a medium of oral storytelling, and I plan to explore that idea through exploring the podcast “The Adventure Zone.” “The Adventure Zone’s” specific medium of storytelling and its enjoyed popularity teaches lessons about methods and mediums of story, and how they impact storytelling.

To understand how a podcast can do that, it’s important to know what “The Adventure Zone” is. “The Adventure Zone” is a series of publicized recordings (or, a podcast) created and recorded by the McElroy brothers (Justin, Travis, and Griffin McElroy), podcast-artists and comedians, with their dad. In it, they participate in and play a Dungeons & Dragons campaign they call “Balance.” “The Adventure Zone: Balance” has 69 episodes, and seven story arcs, amounting to over 75 hours. During the podcasts, the players not only play Dungeons & Dragons and fight monsters, but also develop each of their characters, and Griffin, the Dungeon Master of the game (for those who aren’t intimately familiar with D&D: he crafts the story and moderates the game), creates a web of story and plot throughout the 75-hour runtime of the campaign. There’s no way to tell how many people listen to “The Adventure Zone Podcast,” because there are dozens of podcast-streaming websites and no publicly posted number of listeners or listens; however, in the past few years, the show has enjoyed a boost of popularity and a geniune “following” of listeners. But why? What compels people spend dozens of hours listening to four men play Dungeons & Dragons?

As I mentioned previously, podcasts are one of the newest and most explosive forms of oral storytelling. While not many of the younger generation watch news on the television (or watch television at all), almost all of them listen to public radio or podcasts through an app. As Nicholas Mirzoeff discusses in his piece “How to See the World,” the newly created “global network” has allowed us to “create, send and view images of all kinds, from photographs to video, comics, art, and animation.” Podcasting is an aspect of this new global network and may be counted as an image shared through it. Most people own technology that gives them access to podcasts through the internet, and consuming their shared images is easier now than ever.

Through the medium of podcast, there is a certain shared experience akin to the shared experience of intimate oral storytelling. It harkens back to the days of shared story through oral connections, over a fire with friends or a family story not recorded in a written format but passed along through generations. As Juliette de Maeyer recognizes in her article “Podcasting Is the New Talk-Radio,” podcasts “bring you to places you’ve never been… give you the impression of sharing an animated kitchen-table banter... with a couple of friends. In that regard, podcasts are a “sensational” medium.” In “The Adventure Zone,” during long monologues by Griffin, the Dungeon Master, there’s often background music that recalls the musical theme used before in the campaign or arc, while Griffin narrates a story with meaningful themes of death, family, love, loss and loneliness. Certainly, “The Adventure Zone” is a sensational medium when it uses repeated music to elicit an emotional response. Additionally, this concept relates to Thomas Turino’s idea of artistic connections in his piece “Why Art Matters,” when he claimed that “the connections expressed through art flow from and create a deeper sense and a different type of understanding.” By using the repeated artistic expression of music in the podcast, the creators tap into a deeper level of understanding of the listeners. Many podcast creators do.

What comes from this emotional response and formed connection is an imagined community by the podcast-listeners. In “How to See the World,” Mirzoeff discusses Benedict Anderson’s theory of imagined communities: that all communities are imagined, because people in it have not truly formed a connection with all of the other members. Anderson describes imagined communities of nations, which often result in patriotism, or imagined communities of readers of newspapers, who feel connections with the readers of the same newspaper. In that case, listeners to podcasts are certainly members of an imagined community, both with the podcast artists (those who record podcasts), in the case that they feel an intimate connection through the oral tradition of storytelling, and with the other fans, in “fandom.” Two fans of the same podcast who have never met can form bonds across boundaries of nation and language because they have an imagined community of being two people who both really, really like this podcast.

But let us rewind a bit, and understand more about the oral medium of storytelling. I want to talk about the oral medium in general and why it’s so persuasive now in 2019. It’s clear that the younger generation of people are less interested in big media the way previous generations have been -- big media meaning CNN, ABC, Fox News and CBS. Even big news outlets like The Atlantic and Washington Post and The NY Times enjoy less recognition and popularity from Millenials and Gen-Z readers. Most people in this age group do not watch the news but instead listen to NPR on their favorite podcasting platform, or any other podcast and talk-radio medium recordings. There is good reason for this. As a Maeyer describes “big news” in 2019, it’s often clouded with “hateful trolls, hysterical fake news outlets, a news agenda led by Russian hackers, and a never-ending spiral of conspiracy theories.” The oft-repeated mantra of “fake news” has led to the younger generation’s rejection of big news outlets with a lack of trust, and it could also explain the younger generation’s attraction to podcasting and oral storytelling as a way to strip the spread of information down to individual voices and intimately shared connections.

If I allowed myself a paragraph to nerd out about “The Adventure Zone” in my article about “The Adventure Zone,” it’d go a bit like this: That’s not to discredit the importance of the creativity and outstanding qualities of “The Adventure Zone.” For my argument, it’s just one example of a podcast, when there are thousands of podcasts in the world, that connects to its listeners through the format of oral storytelling. But this podcast is the real deal for an example of how revolutionary podcasting can be as a contributer to storytelling. What other form of storytelling requires its consumers to listen and pay attention for almost 100 hours -- and they do it, quite willingly? And it’s not a bore -- “The Adventure Zone” podcast is carefully organized into seven different arcs, all with unique characters, different settings, connected through a complicated non-chronological plot. It’s an intricately woven story with fully developed and realized characters and relationships between them: romantic relationships, friendships, fully-developed and realistic portrayals of family. And one of the reasons why I think its portrayal of these relationships is so popular is because it is created by a family. This podcast is created by three brothers and a dad. They know what sibling relationships look like. They know what familial loss looks like. And the result of it is something that is so rarely created: a collaboration between a family. And, when it comes down to it, it’s also just a really funny podcast.

Justin: Uh, I’m, I’m playing, uh, a wizard.

Griffin: ‘Kay.

Justin: His name is spelled “T-A-A-K-O”.

Travis: So like “tay… tay-ko?”

Griffin: So like “tayko…”

Justin: “Tahk”… Well, I mean, the… It’s two “a”s so…

Griffin: Is your wizard named… Are you naming your goddamn wizard “Taco”?

Methods of communication and mediums of storytelling (or, more simply, the ways to tell a story) develop along with the rapidly changing world around us. That doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Podcasts are widely available to any person with an internet connection and a device to listen on. Creating friends and sharing connections with people who also love the same media is a beautiful thing, regardless of how empty the promise of an imagined community is. Also, one of the reasons I study humanities is because of its focus on humans and their stories. And from what I’ve seen, the shift from bigger, more corrupt and corporate-influenced outlets and big news to individual voices has simply resulted in more intimate storytelling, and a focus on stories from people.

#lmk if you read this and what you think!#my writing #the adventure zone

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megatentious · 5 years

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Majin Tensei 2 and Shin Megami Tensei If… let’s talk about them

This past year saw the fan translation release of two 16-bit Megaten games, Shin Megami Tensei If… (lord help me if I need to type this ellipsis every time) and Majin Tensei 2. I am maybe the only person who decided to play through both of these games for the first time in English in one year, and so maybe it will be instructive to see how these two series black sheep (can you call a game a black sheep if no one has actually played it?) fit together in the context of the larger franchise. Or maybe this is just an ungainly excuse to cobble together months-old observations into blog content. Let’s find out!!

Both of these games come from a period when Atlus was still trying to figure things out from a game design perspective, testing how much they could push their console audience with PC dungeon crawler inspirations. There were no compunctions at this point about making unforgiving design choices, even in their crowning achievement mainline series games. Sometimes this worked, like the lack of guidance in Shin Megami Tensei 1 leading to perfectly tuned feelings of lonely exploration. Sometimes this didn’t quite work, like the tedious backtracking and brutally untelegraphed stat skill check requirements of Shin Megami Tensei 2. “Getting Megaten’d” is a message board expression meant to describe the sudden game overs that can occur in this series after hours of play, so it’s not as if unforgiving punishment is something that has been eradicated from the more modern games. But there’s a reason even many Megafans (yes i just said megafans, please deal with that) refuse to play anything in this franchise that released before the Playstation 2, and it’s because of choices that are perceived as promoting tedium and time-wasting. We’ve seen how this can affect their big marquis mainline successes, but what happens when you apply these principles to dicier spinoffs? Well…

Majin Tensei 2 is at least, quite conceptually ambitious. Spanning numerous worlds and time periods, showcasing political intrigue and explicitly defined characters with varying motivations, five distinct endings across light-dark and law-chaos axes, hidden events that depend on how many turns you take and which demons you have in your party, there is a lot (too much!) to keep track of. There are ideas in Majin Tensei that pre-sage much of what makes up Devil Survivor, from demon races with differing map skills to introducing demon fusion to a strategy RPG space that was mainly just Shining Force and Front Mission. In practice though, what you do repeatedly in Majin Tensei 2 is slowly s l o w l y clear fifty plus maps, maps that will occasionally provide fun challenges, but more often that not will repeat large not particularly memorable landmasses with simply hellish amounts of monsters. Seriously look at this screenshot I took, this is less than one third of the map!

There’s a reason that so many volunteer debuggers dropped out during playtesting, and there is a reason that 100% of the ones who persevered used fast forwarding emulation features to finish. This is because Majin Tensei 2’s sluggishness can be linked to the infamous Code Name: S.T.E.A.M. problem, S.T.E.A.M. being a largely unloved Intelligent Systems strategy game on 3DS that was raked over the coals in reviews for allowing enemy phases to go on for inordinate amounts of time. Majin Tensei 2 does that game one better by allowing literal minutes and minutes to pass as each enemy decides its action one by one. Do you remember that map in the screenshot above? Imagine twice as many enemies as that taking 10 seconds each to complete their own turn. Majin Tensei 2 makes it clear that you are absolutely not supposed to kill every enemy, through turn limit bonuses and appeals to your general sanity. But that still doesn’t stop the game from dumping demons haphazardly across each map in the manner of someone pounding the bottom of a trashcan to make sure every piece of refuse has tumbled out. So even if you are trying to be efficient, with each passing turn you’re going to be dealing with plenty of downtime.

So yes, the game is cruel. Just to take one example, Majin Tensei 2 spends the whole game teaching you that you need to keep someone tough at your home base even if you think you are safe, since at any moment some sort of aerial demon can sweep in from 12 spaces across the map to occupy it and end your game. And then in one level 40 chapters or so in, the game will punish you for keeping anyone behind at your home base by spawning multiple inaccessible dragon type demons who will one shot anyone who was trying to hold down the fort no matter what (did I mention that this game has instant permadeath for all demons and instant game over for any of your five human characters, five humans whom you cannot possibly level up sufficiently to all be able to survive multiple demon attacks?). Majin Tensei 2 is willing to mess with you to the extent that it absolutely wants you to cheat. After all, this is a game that in 1995, allowed you to save after every turn, which is another way of the designers telling you that savestate abuse (or in my case, copious use of the rewind button) is built into the design.

So why put up with this sort of nonsense? Well, for one, you’re dealing with the atmosphere of a 16-bit Atlus game, a combination of visuals, sound design, music and tone that is simply unlike anything else in the industry. And there is absolutely satisfaction to be found in slowly conquering the game’s maps. But those who scoff at something like, say, Soul Hackers, will find this game absolutely impenetrable, which likely means it will only ever be played through by advance Megatenists (okay i changed it to this, are you happy). Majin Tensei 2 tries to do quite a bit, switching up much even from its direct predecessor, and the play experience ends up suffering despite the ambition.

SMT If in comparion, well … If is by far the least ambitious game in the series to date. While Majin Tensei 2 lavishes you with cool unique digitized photo backgrounds, an extraordinary soundtrack with lengthy moody electronica from the late great Hidehito Aoki, and spectacular boss sprites, SMT if reuses all the most drab and uninspired wall textures from its predecessors, and offers absolutely nothing in terms of new music. Worse yet, many of the reused tracks have somehow depreciated in the conversion. Listen to the offkey shrillness of the iconic Ginza music here , seriously what did they do to it!?. If does feature some lovely new boss sprites, showcasing demons from rarer mythologies that were never again revisited (where are all my Persians at ATLUS???), but even some of the best of these are hidden in new game plus routes the average player will likely never see. The general fugliness of the overall game and relentless asset reuse gives the whole experience a very unfortunate rom-hack feel, and though it’s not hard to figure out why the game ended up this way (it was cranked out less than 9 months after SMT2) it doesn’t make things better.

I should note one important item here, however, and that is that the PSX version renders almost all of these complaints obsolete. It’s the version I first played actually, stumbling through the first few hours untranslated during a Japanese PS+ trial period. The PSX version not only offers very dramatic visual upgrades and some excellent needed remixes, there is a small measure of kindness built in for the player through the game’s Easy Mode. It’s only in this mode for whatever reason that Atlus offers a design “solution” for the most infamous portion of the game, a dungeon in which you are required to wait for hours of lunar cycles in order for students to dig your path forward. In Easy Mode the time requirement is halved for you. Behold the design advancements of the 32-bit era!

If is generally an odd game in the context of the series. There is a type of person out there who likes to call this game Persona Zero, and for people who have played the Snow Queen route of Persona One I can see why the comparison is made. But despite the initial high school setting and pseudo-selectable party members, it still feels strange and off-putting to play a Shin Megami Tensei game with almost no meaningful narrative choices (routes here are essentially locked in at the start). Guardians are seen as proto-Personas, but in this game they are earned only through dying and are associated with combinations of stat augments and skill lists that are frequently at odds with each other. What you end up with is a system that is interesting conceptually (should I die to gain useful spells at the cost of my current stats?) but unworkable in practice (it is almost never worth the steep steep battle count cost to experiment). The seven deadly sins theming is sometimes used to inform the map design and dungeon concept, but again more often than not these concepts simply lead to unfortunate tedium for the player (shout out to the final dungeon of Reiko’s route though, which very brilliantly mashes together traditional SMT dungeon design and a thematically cool map floor I won’t spoil for you).

If we look at SMT If through the prism of 16-bit Atlus design principles, having the foundation of SMT1 and 2 to work from should in theory have led the developers to refine their decisions in ways that ought to have helped the player experience. Instead, the game makes bold choices that result in remarkably less fun. For example, If understands that guns were ludicrously over-powered in 1 and 2, and tries to course correct by … making it much more tedious for the player to use guns? Bullets now cost money and can only be bought by slowly ticking up the counter to 99 one click at a time, with each bundle purchase of 99 filling up a limited inventory slot. The encounter rate is as insane as usual, Estoma takes a little bit more time to get than usual, and the game’s economy does not afford you that many useful things to spend money on in terms of equipment. Combine these three aspects of the game and every player invariable ends up large quantities of makka on hand to spend on bullets to your hearts content, and given that bullets are still far and away the best way to dispatch groups of enemies, you’ll find yourself engaging in this tedium in order to play the game efficiently.

I’ve spent a lot of time repeating the word tedium in these observations, and it’s unfortunate that this is the main takeaway most players will get from playing these two games. Both SMT If and Majin Tensei 2 devise interesting systems and then execute them as grimly as possible from a playability standpoint. There are aspects of true unique accomplishment in both games (Majin Tensei 2 has the funniest demon negotiation dialogue in the entire franchise! SMT If’s final dungeon really is super cool!) but the kind of player who is willing to experience them is essentially a rounding error. I don’t have any regret at all that I played through each of them in their entirety (FYI Majin Tensei 2 is longer than Dragon Quest 7 or Persona 5 and SMT If has a new game plus with all new dungeons that increase difficulty and dullness), but I might understand if you have regret. Then again who knows, you made it to the end of this aimless and dull writeup so maybe these games will be right up your alley! Be sure to let me know!!!

#majin tensei #majin tensei 2 #Shin Megami Tensei #shin megami tensei if #games no one has finished

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windskull · 5 years

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Hello all the lovely people out there that have been following The Heart of a Hero.

As I promised before, I said that I would write up a bit on how I have approached this adaptation, and likely how I’ll be approaching Majora’s Mask, if I end up doing an adaptation of it down the road.

At the time of writing this, I have finished drafting up through chapter eleven, which takes me through the end of Dodongo’s Cavern. As such, anything referenced directly here will only be up through that portion.

The first thing that i had to do was actually decide to make a adaptation. Originally, Thoah started out as just an au idea, based on something I had seen while looking at stuff related to Hyrule Warriors and the Zelda Encyclopedia. Somewhere, I don’t remember where, I saw a wild theory that, as an alternative to the “Link is dead” theory, that he was in the process of becoming a skull kid because he did not have Navi to guide him.

I did not care for that theory, but the idea of Link being a skull kid intrigued me. So I sat down and started doodling some designs for fun and imagined up an AU.

At the time, I had been planning to draw a Windwaker AU comic involving skull kid existing in the windwaker timeline in the forbidden woods, finding Link, and following him around the ocean for the majority of the rest of the game. (I still may write a little about this after the heart of a hero is done, but not a full fic. I may also release the three pages I drew at some point if I meet a certain view/kudos goal. Maybe 1000 AO3 views or 100 kudos, whichever comes first?)

I ended up enjoying the idea and the idea and design so much that The Heart of a Hero ended up happening.

So now I can actually get into hows of my creation process behind the fic.

It is worth mentioning that I had read one fic adaptation of a game at that point to completion (Sonic Adventure), and another one for Majora’s Mask that I quit reading. At one time I started to write my own Sonic Adventure 2 novelization, and considered writing a novelization of Kirby Planet Robobot in the anime verse, but neither of those ever got very far.

It is also worth mentioning that although I have finished Ocarina of Time (and Majora’s Mask). I have never gone through and done a full completion of either, I’ve never finished every side quest.

So before I ever began writing, I sat down and watched a 100% play-through of OOT. (Specifically, for those curious, I watched Masaeanella’s master quest playthrough.) By doing this, it gave me a chance to go through all the game’s main material and decide what quests I might want to include in the story.

Then I replayed the game myself, taking my time and thinking “What about this would be different if Link was a Skull Kid.” For one of the more obvious things, it makes him significantly more susceptible to fire, as is heavily touched on in the Dodongo’s Cavern arc. But in lesser things, it makes people - especially those outside of the forest - more wary of him, something that is starting to develop into a bit of a character arc for him.

His change in species also has an effect on how he acts around other people, and as a result, changes some of the sidequests that are brought up, such as his run-in at the Happy Mask shop. Because of his mischevious nature, he never goes through that fetch quest, but he still has an interaction, and ends up stealing instead of selling.

Perhaps the most interesting portion that I’m looking forward to writing is the seven year skip, and how being sealed that long is going to be handled, considering he is an eternal child that will never get bigger or grow older. I already have that planned out, and look forward to how people react when I reach it!

But the process doesn’t stop there, because at that point, I have only just finally laid the groundwork and begun writing. But memory is not perfect. So as I’m writing, and as I’m wanting to describe these areas, I am looking at let’s plays and playing through the game again, giving me a chance to look at the areas so I can describe them better. Especially dungeons.

Once I write a batch of chapters, usually half of an arc or a full arc I go back and start editing. I try to write in half or whole arcs so as to hopefully not forget anything.

One of the hardest things of writing is the dungeons. I want to write them so that they’re recognizable (Oh, this is that room) without just writing straight through it and explaining every puzzle. I want to cut out some of the unnecessary fluff that would be a chore to write and read. A good example of this is the part in the Deku Tree, where Link and Skull Kid find the slingshot at the base of the vines (where the dungeon map is in the game) without having to go all the way to a dead end room, only to have to backtrack again.

Some areas, both in and out of dungeons are changed very little. Others are changed a lot. The deku tree is something that did not change much, beyond the reaction of the Deku scrubs to Link and Skull Kid. On the other side, Dodongo’s Cavern is changed up a lot, due to Link’s much more flamable body. There’s going to be a lot of things changed in the adult portion of the timeline. The areas I’m looking forward to the most are the Gerudo hideout and Spirit Temple.

That’s everything I wanted to cover at this point in time. If you have any questions, feel free to shoot them my way and I’ll try to answer.

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darkspellmaster · 6 years

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Final Fantasy XV theories: Connections to the world of Final Fantasy VI –Part 1: The Astrals and the Espers..

An early warning to readers, this is all theories and only hypothesizes based on strong guesses and a lot of research. I cannot at this time confirm that any of this is cannon and until we have all of the game including the four new episodes, not everything is cut and dry. I’m going to date this though so that I have a time line of information and I will be using information dug up by others who I will list in the credits. Please note, again this is just my theories, and I’m hoping for it all to make sense.

7/18/2018

Introduction:

So let me begin this by putting out that I’ve been a fan of the idea of FF XV way back when it was first brought to light as Verses. What’s interesting is that the new episodes are having those aspects coming into play here as well but we’ll get into that later on. So naturally, I wanted to dive into this world, and the lore of it. However, something kept nagging at me, like I’ve been to a place before but it’s been drastically changed. With that in mind, allow me to walk you through my thoughts and reasons as to why I honestly think that XV is the world of Gaia from VI, only more modern and changed over the centuries that happened between the fall of God Kefka and the rise of the Starscourge.

I know it sounds crazy, VI related to XV, how, given that there’s so many allusions to the others games, why would VI be the one that is the direct connection to XV? What reason would there be? Well from what I can gather there’s a few. First off, there’s the fact that both of the Directors for XV are fans of VI, and Tabata himself said that it is his favorite game. (We’ve seen him include illusions to VI in Type 0 even). Second is the fact that Nomura not only worked on the game, he directly affected several key characters and story elements in the creation of vi and it was his first major work for the company following some of his lesser work for V. Lastly, and I think this is sort of the most important factor. Final Fantasy XV’s finale (all episodes, etc. in regard to the game) will be out in the year that Final Fantasy VI celebrates it’s 25th anniversary. Final Fantasy VI came out in April of 1994, and in 2019, during the spring season, it will be 25 years old. The fact is, Square is not going to just ignore this, given it’s considered one of the best of the series, and outside of seven, has become a fan favorite and is now getting to be played more by people due to the SNES remake as the game is on that system.

With that said, I’d also like to add that there’s a similar theme between the two games. There is no lead in VI and while XV may have Noctis, as with Terra in VI, as the main over all character, the story, as with VI, follows the pattern of having all characters play a larger role and the band of Brothers each has a significant arc told through both the main story and their own episodes. On top of that you have the idea of love, duty, devotion and other themes connecting the two.

But what about a more physical and realistic connections? Well that’s what I want to explore in these different parts of this over all larger theory. I hope all of it makes sense as you read it and I hope I offer up enough explanation and details to show the reasoning behind each of my conclusions.

So without further adieu…let’s begin.

The Astrals and the Espers…

The reason I started this thought process was actually way back when I first got a glimpse of the Prophecy painting, and the image of the supposed Eos reminded me a lot of Terra from VI. This I believed was just an allusion, like the name Niflheim was to VII. However, after seeing the female statue in the Pitioss dungeon, I began to suspect something different. You see the more I played the game the more I started to notice things that just didn’t sit right with me. For example the world map, and certain characters and locations that seemed very off in regard to the story that they were telling.

So what are the Astrals?

According to the lore of XV, they are gods that were created by the Goddess Eos to protect the Star.

“The Astrals are said to be physical manifestations of the star's power——in other words manifestations of the planet Eos itself. They were each "ordered" to protect Eos in their own way. Due to their immense power, they are worshiped by the people as deities. According to Shiva, mortals were created in the Astrals' image. They are intelligent immortal creatures who have their own agendas, speak a unique language only understood by those touched by their power,[1] and play an integral role in the Final Fantasy XV Universe. Usually indifferent to human affairs, Astrals' behavior cannot be interpreted because their thought patterns transcend the comprehension of mankind.[2] Some of the lore concerning the Astrals is written into the Cosmogony books found around the world.”

This is really important here because of where I’m going with this.

In addition to this we know that:

The Astrals are depicted as Humanoid in the prophecy painting.

We also know that they do appear in human form, as we see with Shiva.

According to the Cosmogony book, all the Astrals save Bahamut are sleeping... now isn’t that convent.

Further more we know that the Astrals tend to stay out of the lives of human affairs.

They also seem to exist in two places the mortal realm and the Astral Realm.

They can forge covenants with humans to support them, as seen with Noct during the game.

And they put people through trials before they give their powers away, depending on the Astral involved.

They will come to the aid of the King if they want to.

Soul crystals appear around them when they are summoned and the summoning takes a lot out of the King.

Even if they are defeated in the mortal realm it doesn’t kill them.

So why did I list all this…Well if you look at the Espers from VI…there are way too many similarities.

“Espers were created as a result of humans coming into contact with magic and the Warring Triad during their war for dominance. The gods realized what they were doing was wrong and sealed themselves away in the forms of statues. They returned the espers their free will, and asked to be protected by them. A second war began between espers and humans seeking to use their powers, beginning the War of the Magi. At the height of the war the espers created a new realm where they escaped with the Warring Triad's statues.”

Again keep this in mind those two bolded areas. Sound familiar? Well they should because they are quiet similar in tone. Eos created the Astrals, the Espers were created by the Waring Triad, and it’s an interesting thing because, Eos’s design is connected to the Goddess of the Waring Triad. (We will be getting into that.)

So why were the Esper’s created in the first place for Final Fantasy VI. Well according to the Lore, the three deities (Goddess, the Fiend and the Demon ) all came down to Gaia and were having a big old battle (more on that later). This battle raged over the world of Gaia, and during this time, rather than fight themselves, they created Espers, beings of great powers that were gifted to them by the Gods. (Again…sound Familiar? It should.)

These Espers could do a number of things:

They can make themselves look human or inhuman

They can grow to huge sizes

They lived in their own world, one that they made called the Esper World which is a Realm of it’s own.

Espers have tremendous powers and abilities, enough to wreck a whole party of enemies if called upon.

They are summoned via crystals that contain their soul called Magicite

In order to receive said Magicite from the non-dead Espers one needs to be tested in some way.

An Esper can form a crystal like cocoon around it’s body for protection prior to becoming magicite.

Normally Espers want nothing to do with humans as they are not to be trusted.

They even sealed off their realm at one point to keep humans from attacking them.

When you summon them what appears to be crystal like balls appear around the summoner and they also take a lot out of your MP in game. (Again Sounds familiar doesn’t it.)

Espers can live in the mortal realm, and, more importantly, Espers can have children with humans.

Espers can live a very long time and are practically immortal, as far as we know.

There’s a lot more there, but I’ll point out the bigger ones here. The reason why I made these to list is to show the connections here and there’s a hell of a lot.

Both the Astrals and the Espers have their own worlds that they can go between. Both have powers greater than that of a normal human. Both were worshiped as divine beings until things got screwed up (more on that in a minute), and both can be summoned via the draining of magic (and causing the summoner to feel like they just got hit by a truck in the process). On top of that, both would rather not deal with humans, both were tasked with protecting their gods.

Then there’s the fact that when both rampage it’s a mess for the humans. During VI at one point the Espers are freed from their seal and take off to destroy this one location where they believe the Emperor is…he’s not there…but they wreck the city anyway. Leviathan doesn’t care about harming others and wrecks half of Altissia because she’s a brat. Both cases show that the Astrals and Espers have huge amounts of power that can level cities if they want to.

So how does this connect VI and XV? Well, what if we’ve been looking at the Astrals wrong all this time. We’re assuming that they’re gods, that they’re being’s of power, and yet according to the book they were “ordered” to protect the Star. Again that sounds familiar, and it should, because that’s the same story that we’re told in VI about the Espers.

When the Espers were created they were to act as a force for the Gods, when the Triad put themselves to sleep, they specifically left the Espers around to protect the statues. This unfortunately after a long time lead to a situation where the humans became jealous of the Espers and their powers and lead to the War of the Magi (again coming to that). You see the Magi were people that could use magic that they learned from the Espers. (Again sounding familiar? You know kind of Like Solhiem.) This war lasted about a 1,000 years leaving devastation on Gaia, and causing the world to regress and the Espers to place the Triad high on a floating island (this will become important later!) and hide themselves away in their own realm. Meanwhile the Magi were attacked and killed by non-magic users and hid on a small island called Crescent Island. Thus the Espers protected the Triad and the humans went on to live normally in a world that had fallen into the dark ages for another 1,000 years.

By the end of Final Fantasy VI we see the Espers leave and return to their sealed world, locked off from humanity and once more causing magic to vanish from the world. The thing about the Espers is that we don’t know what happened to them after. Given that they could be summoned and that they were not dead when a majority of them were turned to Magicite (save for Muduin and we will get to him later), we can assume –given their powers et all, that they could reform themselves and rest.

Now how does this connect to XV?

The Astrals were supposed to have come from another realm, in this case coming from what the people in XV think of as the Afterlife. And yet, we only see images of Bahamut in that existence, floating there for Noctis when he’s in their world when he went into the crystal (again we’ll be touching on this). Given the fact that this place looks more like an in between or a connection between worlds, I wouldn’t be surprised if this wasn’t what we think it is.

During another part of Final Fantasy VI, we see the character of Madeline fall into the Esper world. The weird thing is that she’s exhausted from this, and needs to rest up and be healed before she can even move again. She’s gifted a pendent (more on that later) which is there for protecting the Esper world, and keeps her safe. It could very well be, since we didn’t get to see how she fell into the realm, that she, like Noctis, had to travers through a very weird place that looked much like the water world we see. So if this is a gateway, much like the gateway in VI (again more on that later), it’s not hard to see the Espers, now called Astrals, traveling between the realms through that gated seal which was made to keep out the humans in the mortal realm. (We also see water play a part in the Phantom Train area of the VI story.)

So if we make the leap that the Astals are actually Espers, what is the connection there?

Well in XV we are introduced to 6 main Astrals:

Titan, the Archaean, steadfast as stone.

Ramuh, the Fulgurian, sharp as lightning.

Shiva, the Glacian, gentle as snow.

Leviathan, the Hydraean, relentless as tides.

Bahamut, the Draconian, unbending as iron.

Ifrit, the Infernian, fickle as fire.

Since time immemorial, they have watched over Eos.

—Cosmogony

Now these characters are actually important in VI because of the role that they play…

You see Ramuh was the character that actually helped Terra out of her Esper state (again more on that in another post) after she had entered it connecting with another crystallized Esper. Being a halfbreed –her father was an Esper –means that she can switch between human and Esper forms at will. Problem was that due to the schemes of the Empire she was unable to control her powers, and thus Ramuh sent out the Returners (her friends) to gather up the Espers and find her father to help her remember the truth about her life.

Ramuh, as with XV, shows kindness towards humans and even lives as one in a town of thieves called ZoZo.

Both Shiva and Ifrit are found together and actually fight you together in VI, and Ramuh knows Ifrit and is the reason he calms down and agrees to work with you.

Leviathan is also a Esper that you have to fight near a city on the water in VI.

And then there’s Titan, who, for better or worse, has the same sort of attacks that Golem, and every other version of him (save for a handful including vi that has him as a more robotic machine) has him looking like Titan.

But then there’s the painting that depicts more than the six we’re told about.

(I outlined the various characters in stone and the ones in the painting)

In the painting showing the war of the Astrals, we see an image of Ifrit, but he’s not alone, and there’s more than just the six main Astrals there.

So in regard to the painting From the top Right we have:

A Strange set of hands on top hear the top of the tower that looks a lot like the arms of the Esper Phantom.

A wolf or dog like face that has an area for a stone and markings on it’s face. This dog looks a lot like the Wolf like Esper in VI, as well as Fenrir the Esper from VI and very well could be connected to Umber and Pyrna.

Then you have a man that I’m still trying to find but his one eye seems to have a set of make-up that shows it running down his cheek.

Beside him is a creature’s face that has no nose but looks to be a bit designed after Zona Seeker the Esper, as you can see the ribcage below and the face looks very much like Zona Seeker from VI.

Midgardsormr is right below them very similar to the design done by Nomura for VI,

Next you have what looks like Ramuh with his robes, but the colors are not green, they look more purple in nature.

Continuing down you see a red wing next to Shiva, that looks very much like a birds.

Next to the red wing is Shiva.

Before Shiva is a woman with a winged head dress that is sitting on something, with her hand up under her chin. The design is a lot like Nomura’s version of Siren from FFVII, and her updated form. Siren was one of the Espers as well.

Next to the woman in the headdress, is another woman who is looking away from the group facing Ifrit. She has her hair up and some sort of item cuffed around her ear, as well as a wing behind her. She looks a lot like the updated form of Seraph.

Beside the woman is Ifrit, holding a sword very different than what we see him with later (we will get back to that…)

Beside Ifrit there looks to be a Unicorn, with wings, which I want to talk about in more detail in the Ifrit section.

Then you have below Unicorn, what could either be two or one creatures. The head looks more like that of a rabbit, but with a weird jawline. So either that’s some weird version of Carbuncle, or it’s Carbuncle and some other esper.

Below the weird head is Probably Lakshmi who is off to the side looking down, as the headdress matches the updated form of Lakshmi.

Go down and past the body of Midgarsormr and you’ll see the form of a man with weird horns coming from what looks like smoke.

And Below this man is possibly Phoenix , or one of the other bird Espers, but it’s hard to tell if it’s one or two bodies due to the way the rocks are shaded.

Next to the weird smoke guy you have three strange insect looking creatures, that seem to have human and bug like designs.

Then you see Titan

Below him you have Bahamut

And below Bahamut you have what looks like a woman with four wings. In VI there is a Pixie like Esper that has a similar shape but no name.

Beside her and by Shiva’s knee, we clearly see a man in a winged suit brandishing a sword and he looks a bit like an Odin except more bug like. Amano’s painting shows at least two forms of Odin like creatures and one guy that seems to have the same look as the man in the painting that’s floating on the bottom.

The only one I don’t see is Leviathan.

Also by the man that may or may not be Odin there is a weird looking shell like shape that’s clearly round with a hole like design in it indicating a body…could that be Bismarck?

What’s bugging me about this situation is that the Cosmogony book said that there are 24 messengers, and only six Astrals.

So I counted the number of beings on the stone tower, that totals to 11, and the beings that are around the painting, that’s 12, totaling in 23 beings shown in the Astral war painting. Just shy of the 24 messengers that you would need to have for a set. My only thought is that maybe the dog being is two, so you would count that twice, thus making 12 and 12, and so 24.

If that’s the case…well…seems like the story that the humans are being told isn’t exactly the truth.

So Let’s jump over to the Messengers, and I want to bring them up because of how they’re presented. We’re told in the story that there are a total of 24 messengers, and it’s a static number meaning that they never change, and, given what Ardyn said, he’s met Shiva’s messenger before in the same face, meaning that Gentiana probably is the human form of Shiva. If this is the case then each of those 24 messengers are the human form of twenty four espers.

Which, if you count the number of Espers in Final Fantasy VI, and take out four specific ones: (Ragnarok can become a sword, Maduin is Terra’s father and unable to come back, Raiden is Odin’s upgrade, and Crusader is the “Esper” manifestation of the Warring Triad-which really doesn’t fit into the story proper and is a rare esper to collect in the game after defeating eight legendary dragons –kind of a side quest thing). That gives you a total of 24 Espers that you can collect in Final Fantasy VI. Which is the exact number of Messengers in Final Fantasy XV.

Keep in mind that every Esper was once human and can retain their human form due to what the Triad did to them, so they can weave in and out of the form if they so choose to. Astrals can show up as human’s via Messengers, which seems a bit of a sketchy since we know that, thanks to Ardyn’s one line, the Messengers don’t age. So why would the “Gods” need 24 of them, if there’s only six? It would make more sense if there were 24 Astrals and each was its own Messenger.

There’s more to this to in regard to the situation in game.

So when you go running around the world of XV, you’ll notice that there are a lot of monsters out there with names that seem weird, and to me they caught my attention since a good deal of them, especially the bosses, seem to be named after Espers of VI.

Phalaris looks exactly like Kirin from VI,

down to it’s horns. While it has a different name, there’s no mistaking these two.

Bismarck, the whale god (and I have more to say about him) is also an Esper from VI.

Unicorn is on the painting (and more about that one too)

Catoblepas is one of the monster bosses in XV is also an Esper in VI.

Lakshmi is the painting that’s possessed that you fight. Is also an Esper in VI.

(Also more on this in another theory)

Quetzalli is a monster boss that you again fight and looks a lot like his previous design, and is only in here and

Esper in VI.

Ragnarok is a sword, though another sword with a different name bears striking resemblance to the original one.

Midgardsomr is a monster and on the tower it looks like

Nomura’s concept for the Esper.

Cactaur and Gigantur, both added

Espers in the GBA version of VI are in here as bosses.

Bahamut, Levaithan, Carbuncle, Shiva, Ifrit, Ramuh, Gilgamesh, are all in the game in forms similar to the VI counterparts.

It seems to me, if I was Bahamut, and a good portion of the group sided with Ifrit over this war, I would find a way to either imprison them, or take them out of the equation, and making them into monsters would make the most sense as a means of hiding them from the humans as an option.

There’s more to this too and one weird thing that stood out to me that would make sense for the characters to be former Espers is the markings on Titan and Bismarck.

Let me explain, during the story of Final Fantasy VI, the Returners (our heroes) go around collecting Magicite –the remains of the Espers. During this game you get Golem via an auction house, and Bismarck from the MT Facility. This is important because Both Titan and Bismarck share the same markings that the other Astrals do not have. I looked, and double checked over all their bodies (the only one that I couldn’t really check was Shiva as it’s hard to find a picture where I can clearly see her skin), and Bismarck and Titan are the only two that have this.

So what does that mean?

Well in VI, you Get Bahamut by saving him from Doom Seeker (a kind of demonic being), Shiva and Ifrit, willingly give their Summons to you, Leviathan you fight and when you beat it you get them, Ramuh gives himself to you. None of these characters were held by anyone save Bahamut, and were only used by the heroic Returners. On the other hand Golem and Bismarck were both held by other groups, and it would make sense that they were then marked to show who they were owned by.

I do think there’s a connection between them, seeing as Bismarck is known as the Sea god. But more on him later.

I wanted to also talk about the fact that the Astrals and Messengers seem to have things in common with their Esper counterparts.

Let’s start with Ramuh.

Ramuh in Final Fantasy VI is human looking, with a long beard, green robes, and a staff with a red orb on it. After the War of the Magi (which seems to be a lot like the War of the Astrals) Ramuh decided to live in the human world (as did other Espers) and was eventually captured and taken to the MT Facilty where he escaped with three others. He later helped out Terra’s friends when they found her in Zozo where he was taking care of her. The Returners were given a trial by him, get into the MT Facility and free the other Espers, and then Terra could be helped by him.

Ramuh can speak through dreams, and he’s seen as very sage, empathic and wise. He feels the most for the humans and is willing to help them fight against the Gestahl empire. Oh and he throws out lighting and so forth.

Meanwhile you have Ramuh of the Astrals, who acts as a judge on Angelguard Island while it was a prison. He passes Judgement on those who have not repented for their crimes and will smite them for the more malicious actions. After the battle with the other Astrals at an unknown time he fell to sleep there and was woken by Luna. He tests Noct and co. by having them run a mission to find ruins and that are guarded by Griffians. He’s seen to be understanding of the plight of the prince.

One of the key factors in VI and may be the case in XV is that Ramuh knows Ifrit and Ifrit actually describes them as brothers from different elements. The one reason why the Returners are able to obtain Ifrit in the first place is that he and Shiva feel Ramuh residing with the Returners and halt their battle with them.

If this is the same Ramuh from VI, (and part of my theory regarding Nocts’ line is right), then it’s not hard to see why Ramuh probably gave him an easier task. Also it again shows that Ramuh is one of the kinder summons and points to the fact that, given Zozo was a hive of thieves and the like, Ramuh would have a keen sense of person knowledge about those that are being honest about repenting and those that would not. It would take someone who had lived among those that were seen as the lowest of the low to know if a person was indeed being honest about changing their ways and was sorry for their actions.

Titan is a weird one. So Titan in XV is this giant Rock person who has brown skin and white patterns on it’s body. He’s shown to be very loyal to Noctis, and can create tremors when he sleeps. When he calls to Noct he gives him headaches, and in order to beat him, you have to freeze him. Also there’s the crystals that are growing on his body.

Then you have Golem from VI. Now this is the interesting thing. Golem is a brown robot looking Esper in a human form. He will block any physical attack, the same way Titan came to block the attacks of the rampaging Leviathan, till his Hp is depleted equal to that of the person casting him. Normally Golem is shown to be made of Rocks and Titan to be made of Flesh, but here Titan is Rock in human form.

Now one may say, “But Titan isn’t Golem.” Well no and yes. See there’s one big thing that I have to point to. On top of Titan bearing a lot of resemble to Golem from other versions of FF, in Tabata’s own Type 0 you have Golem and Titan as one being. A rock machine that has Titan as one of it’s forms and Golem as another. This mean that the two are equated to one another within at least one other version of the Directors games and in his mind.

Also Titan’s actions in the game are a lot like Golem’s in VI. Titan is protecting people and taking the hit with the Meteorite. Meaning that like Golem’s Earth Wall and his block ability, Titan is losing HP and keeping the area of Lestallum safe. The same as Golem does in VI to it’s Summoner.

Leviathan is a special case…So in XV we meet Levithan when Luna wakes her from her slumber in the sea. She’s called the Tide mother and there are angel like depictions of her, which contradict her actual behavior. She’s looked upon with fear and respect by the people and shows up as a blue Sea Serpent with multi-appendages. She can appear as a liquid form and come out of any pool of water, and manifest as such. However she’s shown as a mermaid in the Prophecy painting, and she seems to think Humans should worship her. She’s also doesn’t think much of humans and wrecks the city, as I noted above during her trial with Noctis. However she seems to respect resolve, is seen as wise and knowledgeable and close to God.

Leviathan in Vi is said to be male, but “he” never says as much to the Returners. Rather the Returners are sent out on a quest in South Figaro after learning about Leviathan from another person in the city. They travel via boat to find it, and here as they are traveling to the location where Leviathan slumbers in an underwater cave, it attacks and you have to fight “him”.

Now two important things about Leviathan, first is the fact that as with it’s form in VI, this sea serepent lives under the water and is hidden. Another thing is the naming of this one as a She vs. the male he in VI, and that can be explained, given Levi’s personality, that most thought of it as male, and well who’s really going to look to see what gender a giant sea serpent is in the first place.

The second important thing is, I think Leviathan may have taken over the role of an Astral at the Behest of Bahamut.

We know that there is a Monument to Leviathan, but there is a small problem with it. The monument is that of Bismarck, and we know that Bismarck exists in XV and is said to be a sea god that Noct has never heard of. Isn’t it sort of odd that both Bismarck and Titan bear the same markings, and that there’s a monument to Leviathan there but with a Bismarck Statue, and Bismarck has shown to be kinder towards humans. To me it seems like someone was trying to replace the whale with the Sea Serpent, and, if I may so humbly point out, that’s kind of what happened in VI where Bismarck was the main water Esper until Advance gave us Leviathan.

So small theory here, Leviathan may have shared this duty at one point with Bismarck then, if Bismarck sided with Ifrit over things, it’s not that hard to see her taking over as the water person. This is also shown in the painting that Leviathan seems to be connected to Bahamut, and the other three are on the opposite side of them.

Shiva, the winter goddess, is seen as the most compassionate of the six Astrals, or at least as far as the stories go. She used to dislike humans due to how short their lives were and them clinging to dreams and hopes. Ifrit and the compassion and benevolence warmed her to them. She’s seen as the smallest of the Astrals, and has a human sized form. She has pale blue skin, elf ears, icicle horns, purple eyes. Her Messenger “Gentiana” stays by Luna through her journey, and she seems to coexist in more than one body. (Again, as I stated above with the Espers, they can take on human or nonhuman forms and can move about via magic in general.

So she fell in love with Ifrit, and then lost faith in humanity after the Astral war, but Luna gets her to feel compassion again and she tends to refer to herself in the third person. She tends to like people who are modest and selfless and is willing to protect those she cares for even when she was “killed” by Niflheim. What’s interesting here is that she created a snowstorm with her body that screwed up part of the desert area of Niff.

Shiva in Final Fantasy VI seems to be very similar to this version of Shiva. She shares the same color palette and is seen as human size to the Returners. Her clothing is similar to the one Shiva wears in XV, except that it’s pink rather than blue or white. When the Returners find her she is with Ifrit as the two were captured together, and sent down below the facility to die in a hole by Kefka. What’s important here is that she’s the one that calms Ifrit down, again, and basically tells him to listen when she and he both sense Ramuh.

Shiva is the most like her Esper form in VI. It would make sense that she may be distrusting of humans after the situation with the Empire, but if Ifrit was willing to trust them, then she would have been too as they were close even in VI. And the same sort of thing happened in VI as XV in regard to Shiva trusting Ifrit and making the call to allow the Returners to use their powers to save the other Espers. The fact that they used these two in this way calling back to VI is just a bit more than coincidental.

Bahamut is considered the leader of the Astrals, and said to have given powers to the Oracle, and also is the one that gave the crystal to Somnus and mankind. (Although personally I think there’s more to it than what the book says.) He physically looks like a dragoon and also, more importantly, looks like the design that Nomura created for the Fiend from FFVI. Importantly enough he is large enough that Noctis can fit in the palm of his hand in the Astral world, and his armor very much resembles the winged Dragon form he has in various other titles (but the design seems to have been heavily inspired by VI’s design for him). He is supposed to be the holder of light and energy. During the war Bahumt killed Ifrit during their battle.

Here's the funny thing, he supposedly picked the King and the Oracle to stop the scourge. He also resides in the crystal, and was shown giving a crystal to Somnus (more on that later in another theory). He also supposedly gave the Ring of Lucii to Somnus as well. In his “messenger” form he looks like a man with black hair, wearing armor and dragon wings. Apparently, Bahamut resides inside the crystal, which really gives me pause, but more on that later. I should note he’s the only one that calls Ardyn a Usurper and even the voice that talks to Iggy doesn’t call Ardyn that at all. (So what is up with Bahamut and Ardyn then?)

Bahamut in VI plays an interesting role there. His armor in XV does call to mind his dragon form here, seeing as he’s a steal gray dragon, with a bronze chest, red eyes and blueish wings. He’s held onto by a being called the Death Gaze and the Returners have to fight it to free him. In VI he’s kind of chill save for when you use him and he devastates the field.

The weird thing about XV Bahamut is that a lot of his looks seem to call back to his VI design. The painting does especially when it comes to the dragon form. What’s also weird is that he clearly clawed the hell out of Ifrit, meaning that he fought him in his Dragon form, but why? Something about his story doesn’t add up. What’s interesting is that if this is the same Bahamut as VI, it would make some sense for him to be very much the heavy hitter against anyone that was causing issues due to what happened to him and being trapped by a monster.

Ifrit is another hard one to talk about. He’s smaller than several of the other Astrals, and very Human looking in XV. He still has his horns and can hold a person in his hand. He has long brown hair, orange eyes, and no eyebrows. Consequently, in the form that he does take, and the one that we fight against, he’s way more gaudy looking than what he appears in the illustrated art. He has a crown of red and white stones on his head, some sort of bangles attaching his two horns, bangles on his wrists and ankles. His demonic form has a vastly different sword than the one we see in the pictures as well.

The one he’s fighting with us against is one blade, with yellow and purple scarves wrapped around the hilt and a green and blue necklace with what looks like square jade pieces or stones. That sword has some sort of engraved etching on it, and a vastly different hilt and pummel than the one we see him with in early depictions of his life.

The one that is earlier is a three bladed deal, with a simple grip and a big red jewel on the top of it. XV says that Ifrit gave mankind fire, and it’s implied that this is knowledge. He may have become king of Solheim but then something happened and he became angry and felt betrayed and said he was going to destroy all of Eos along with Solheim. The other astrals came and fought him, and Bahamut killed him an labeled him a betrayer. It’s believed that Ardyn woke him, but when you look at the depiction of him waking up, it’s clearly coming from the ground below him. It’s also believed that Ardyn corrupted him, and apparently in the Japanese version of the text his people didn’t rebel against him. What’s also interesting is that in a lot of ways he resembles Nomura’s design for the demon from VI.

For Ifrit in VI he looks like a green human with two large horns and purple hair. Again as noted with Shiva both were nearly killed and dumped down a hole, then fought the Returners who were trying to help them. During this time he senses Ramuh and stops, noting that he and Shiva were both taken as prisoners, drained and then dumped by the Empire. After hearing the Returners story, he agrees to help out, since Ramuh trusts them. He sees them as compassionate beings wanting to help others, which matches how XV’s Ifrit sees things.

That being said, I’d like to draw attention to Ifrit right now and his story…

Okay so, according to the lore, Ifrit was an Astral that loved humans, and he brought Fire down to the humans and became their King in Solheim. Shiva fell in love with him, but something happened and Ifrit felt betrayed by the humans and started a war:

“The war was started by the Astral of fire, Ifrit, who ruled over Solheim but was betrayed by his once-loyal subjects who began to spurn their benefactor and sought new heights of power. Ifrit sought to destroy Solheim as punishment for their betrayal and hubris, but as the Six are sworn to protect Eos from all harm, even from each other, the other five turned on Ifrit. In the German localization [1] and in Final Fantasy XV: Official Works [2], Ifrit is said to have wanted to destroy Eos itself along with humanity.”

So according to the book, Ifrit got mad because his subjects sought new heights of power. (Again sounds a lot like the Geshalt Empire in VI) but that’s not all. Se the thing is here, we’re not given a reason why they supposedly betrayed him or how. And again the war picture got me thinking.

Given what we know about Astrals right now, that they would rather not deal with humans, why would Ifrit, even with all his love for humanity, want to rule as a king? He’s a god, it doesn’t quiet fit into this story if you take a moment and think about it. Unless we don’t have the whole picture here.

So that really got me thinking. What would piss someone off so much as to feel betrayed by his own people? There are only a hand full of things that I can think of…

Either they were screwing around with him somehow…or…this maybe a case of a father going on a rampage.

Here me out…and I’ll get more into this in the Eos section.

During Final Fantasy VI there is a point where you go underground with Figaro Castle, during this moving around you’ll discover an Ancient Castle where the people are frozen and the King there is petrified along with his Queen.

This King…is the Esper Odin. As you search out the castle you learn that a wizard came to the castle during the Magi war, and turned Odin and his bride to stone.

At one point Celes Chere, one of VI’s main characters, discovers that the Queen was in love with Odin and this was taboo. Espers and humans are not supposed to mix, and certainly were not during the war. Once you fight Odin, you can turn him into Magicite and bring him to the Queen who will cry on him to upgrade him to Raiden.

Also in Final Fantasy VI you learn of Maduin, Terra’s father, who tried to save his daughter but was captured and later sacrificed himself to become magicite to help her out, after her mother was murdered by the Emperor.

Why did I bring up both stories? Because I have a theory on why that Unicorn is beside Ifirit in the painting.

So to explain this we have to get to know what Unicorn is in the game and the best place to start is to understand a bit of the legend about them. A Unicorn is “a symbol of purity and grace”, and would only go to those that shared the same values or ideals. So why would it go to someone like Ifrit? Well we know that he loved Humanity and that he willingly gave Solhiem fire and knowledge, so assuming that that’s true, then if the Unicorn here is a lot like the one in legend, that means that it saw someone with the same ideas. In addition in the world of Final Fantasy, Unicorn is considered a light-element in other games, and in VI it has the distinction of being the healing Esper in the group, as all it teaches is White Magic.

Unlike Ifrit and Shiva in VI, Unicorn has no sex mentioned, so it could be either female or male. (Keep this in mind.)

What’s weird about the comment from Ifrit is that he, according to the German version, wants to destroy Eos along with humanity. But if Eos is the heart of the world, as per Bahamut and the others insisting, why would he want to do that? Why kill the planet? And why would someone like Unicorn ally themselves with Ifrit if that was how he felt?

There’s also one other thing about the image that’s bothering me and we have to look to the Rock of Ravatogh there is clearly the remains of Ifrit there, as per the lore of XV. There’s also a ridge sticking up, which a lot of people thought was Eos’s body. But that was shown to be not true, so far. So what’s the additional wing like structure…well, that could be the remains of Unicorn’s wing.

Hear me out, Unicorn has the same wings as the shape of the jutting out rock so this could be where they perished along with Ifrit rather than submit to the will of Bahamut.

There are three options here that keep fighting in my mind, and hopefully we will get more details in regard to the back story more of Ifrit and the War, but for now I only have what I have to go on.

See, we know the Shiva loved Ifrit, but we never got a confirmation that he loved her back. We saw the picture, but that was it. So that leaves us with a huge question of was the feelings she was giving him mutual? If not…well there adds a new layer to the story of Ifirt.

As I said above there are two stories that could be the case here for Ifrit’s feelings of betrayal by the humans.

Option 1: As with Odin Ifrit fell in love with a human and decided to rule Solheim in that form.

Option 2: Ifrit was in love with Unicorn, another Astral, and the two ruled as King and queen.

Option 3: Ifrit is just a jackass and his ego got inflated and he took over as king.

Honestly I’m thinking one or two is the real situation with this story. And both actually fit the situation with the story that we have seen thus far.

Option A: Unicorn is a loyal friend of Ifirt’s. As such they became rightly furious when they saw their friend betrayed and felt that they had to help him in his quest. This would mean that Unicorn was just a partner with Ifirt and had no connections to the situation with Eos. The thing is…I don’t think that’s the case here.

Option B: Ifrit fell in love with a Human woman, as with Maduin and Odin in the past. As such he took her as his queen in Solheim and the two spawned an heir. During this time it was discovered that the Astrals were not gods, and as such, due to Solheim unearthing possible records of the Gesthal Empire (more on that soon with Solheim) and learning how the Espers powers worked, their scientists either killed or wounded the Queen and captured Ifrit and his child. More than likely they began to experiment upon her to use the powers and Ifrit broke free to tear apart the labs, only to find his child either was dead or near death and thus, put her soul in the crystal or had her become a crystal like stone (More on that in the Eos Section). Thus he was aided by his friend Unicorn to wreck Solhiem and the others came to stop them, both being killed by Bahamut.

Option C: Same story as above with B only in this case Unicorn is the child’s mother and was willing to war against her own to punish those that killed her child. It would explain the female voice in the crystal that we hear with Ignis…

Option D: Unicorn is the Child, rather than the mother and was willing to fight with their father against Bahamut and the others for the people that may have killed it’s mother. Again if this is a female then it would explain the voice.

Oh but there’s more in Regard to Unicorn. In the main games Unicorn is a strong healer and uses it’s magic to teach various skills to cure and heal the party members, as well as having the Healing Horn option in VI. And Healing Horn, cures everything! It’s a get out of jail free sort of ticket if you’re screwed over in VI. To add to that, Unicorns are known for being able to cure plagues and other illnesses with it’s magic.

On top of all of that, because it also resembles a Pegasus, there’s more to the story. See Pegasus is known for being the horse in Greek myths that helped Perseus. But it’s also known for being the horse of Eos as well, and is connected to the stars as it’s part of the heavens. Yeah you heard right Pegasus is connected to Eos, the dawn.

So if Ifrit had a connection to Unicorn that could be the connection to Eos that we’ve been looking for.

So we have a unicorn pegasus…who is either connected to Eos, could be Eos, or there’s more to that story…but moving on…

Four other important characters that are not Astrals but are key to this story.

Umbra and Pyrna. Both of these dogs are messengers. We’ve seen them in the book with wings, they can be wherever they need to be, and something that connects them to being Espers themselves, in the original concept these two were ninjas that could shape shift into their messenger dog form. We’ve seen art depicting Umbra with Noctis. These two are brother and sister and the idea of a dog connected to a ninja goes all the way back to VI and Shadow with his dog Interceptor. Both don’t age, both seem to have greater understanding of what’s going on, and I think that Pryna was trying to warn Iggy.

Bismarck. So we have a monument that is supposed to be dedicated to Leviathan, and yet it’s designed to look like Bismarck. Seems a bit odd that people are not equating the more gentle whale to Leviathan, rather than the angry sea serpent in this case. On top of that the monument allows you to make a wish by flying a piece of paper into it’s mouth. Given that the main attack of Bismarck is Sea Song and it has the ability to help your party by pretty much teaching them raise, it would make sense that the wishing aspect is connected to it.

But it does bring up the question of why Bismarck is there, given that Leviathan is supposed to be the ruler of the seas. Again, I suspect that, Bismarck may have been the patron before the war of the Astrals and Leviathan took over his job, removing him, much like Ardyn being removed, from most of history save for those in Accordo who recalled him and keep him in their memories there. It would explain why Noct wouldn’t know of him, and also may explain why there are these other creatures with the Esper names running around. Given Leviathan’s personality it’s not a stretch to see her doing this to a weaker Esper (or Astral). Prior to Leviathan showing up in VI, Bismarck was the ultimate water element, which again, it seems like the developers are hinting at the idea that Bismarck came first. There’s also the fact that both Bismarck and Titan have markings that the others do not, which is also something that stands out in this case.

Carbuncle. Now this one is very interesting. Carbuncle shows up as a totem that is next to Noctis’s bed when he was in a Coma. During the prelude story demo we got to see the creature in action, and he seems to be a healing and protecting creature, much like his VI counterpart. The fact is both version of Carbuncle have the same color hair, eyes and the red gem on it’s head. It can strangely appear in Battle or in photos in XV, and seems to be Noct’s guardian. In VI after Carbuncle is saved in the lab, when you use him, he uses a lot of protect and reflect spells. The fact that the creature look the same, down to the blue fire is an odd choice if they weren’t going to connect VI to XV.

Again this is all Hypnotical, but if I could hazard a guess here about what is up with the Astrals and Espers…

I would think that there’s a large possibility that the Astrals are restored Espers who returned to Eos from their realm to help out. Hear me out, I’m going to include some info that I’m going to cover in a later part, it might seem weird but it fits within the story that we got. (Warning spoilers for a 25 year old game and some spoilers for XV.)

So here’s the way my thoughts go. After the Returners and Terra defeated Kefka and turned the World of Ruin back to the light (more on that in another theory) the Espers (in their Magicite forms) returned to the world of the Espers, save for Maduin who used up the last of his magic to protect his daughter so he’s gone for good. The Esper Realm, sealed again, was cut off from the human world. Over time new Kingdoms sprung to life, and Ifrit and the others watched this happen through their own magic. Feeling that things had changed, Ifrit convinced several of the other Espers to return to the Human world and help them out, seeing as the world was now trying to rebuild after the hell that had happened in VI. Ifrit’s reasoning for breaking the seal and coming back was because of the fact that A. he saw how the humans were behaving and realized that there were good people out there like the Returners, and B. he recognized why Maduin, his friend, and Ramuh, his brother, saw humans as good.

The Espers came back but by this point in time they had become whispers and no one knew exactly what they were. Bahamut, being as he was, sort of took command, while Ifrit went and helped out a smaller growing kingdom named Solhiem, and gave them magic knowledge. Something happened during this time and that caused the Astral War to happen. (My own guess is that those in a position of some form of power or wanting power of their own realized that the Astrals were not gods but Espers and did something to someone that Ifrit cared about causing him to attack them, as the memory of the Gestahlian Empire probably was something that stuck with him.)

Bahamut killed him and possibly Unicorn (Either Eos or that Unicorn goes by another name) and the others fell to sleep, or were put to sleep, and the ones that sided with Ifrit may have been punished in some way, possibly becoming the boss creatures that we have to hunt down during the game. This of course is all speculation until we have more info on the Lore of the world.

But there’s more for the connections in this world…and next I want to talk about the Waring Triad, Eos, and the world of Gaia…

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