#visual-spacial ability

[authormarialberg]

Visuospatial Reasoning

It’s our last full week of NaPoWriMo (National /Global Poetry Writing Month) and the A-Z Challenge. I hope you’re enjoying the A to Z of Depth. from “Visual-Spatial Ability Test” at ScienceDirect Did you ever take a test with images like the ones above? If so, you were asked to look at the image on the left and imagine it as a 3-D object, then turn it in your mind and choose what it would look…

[pico-farad]

I've been watching Vrains for the first time, and I finished season 1

some thoughts below (a lot. a lot of thoughts below)

Setting & Setup

The setting is a very smart choice, and the highlight of Vrains in my opinion.

The aesthetic is relevant, it integrates well with Konami marketing its mobile games, and it neatly deals with the problem every Yugioh series has to address of how to make consequences for duels that can be safely broadcast on children's television (aka the shadow realm / sent to the stars problem)

The virtual world opens up so much possibility in how to present things. 

In the character and setting designs, obviously, but also, the duels have their own visual identity. They don't need to play cards on a duel disk or hold cards in their hand, cards will just appear and disappear in pixels (it also probably saves on their animation budget). The duel grid and other visualizations can show up as they're relevant. And seeing the character take gashes to their avatars is dramatic while still being kid-friendly.

Every Yugioh needs its peanut gallery to react to the duel and be explained to, and Vrains incorporates them the most easily of any series, since they don't need to be physically present.

Kill the frog and the pigeon though.

On the topic of duels, I like both link summoning and speed duels.

I like the spacial/positioning element of link summoning, it puts an additional layer on top of "little monsters make big monster."

And speed duels have all the advantages of turbo duels, allowing for dynamic action, visual metaphor for the tide of the duel, and the ability to change locations without sacrificing pacing, all while requiring less suspension of disbelief than card games on motorcycles. It's easy to take for granted, but the heist sequences wouldn't work at all if they had to be standing duels. 

I also liked this about season 1 of 5Ds, where there's two modes of dueling (turbo duels and ground duels). The contrast between speed duels and master duels is fun.

Skills are cool too, though I feel like they could have designed better ones. Seeing Yusaku drop below 1000 got kind of predictable.

And finally, there is rich thematic potential in this kind of virtual setting. Themes about our relationship with social media, video games, artificial intelligence, and tech corporations are very relevant and have depth. I don't have the highest of hopes for Yugioh tackling them, based on how this first season has gone, but I'll withhold judgment on this until I'm finished.

Yusaku

I like Yusaku. He's blunt, but he's not edgy like I thought he would be. He's actually kind of nice toward Naoki when they meet. The three things tic is charming. I like his hacker deck, it's probably my favorite protagonist deck theme after Elemental Heroes.

Yusaku's problem is not that he's boring per se, but he isn't really put in any interesting situations in S1. 

A lot of his duels are just him being challenged to a duel he has no interest in (Go, Blue Angel, Ghost Girl), he beats them, and they don't actually end up forming a relationship or establishing a dynamic. Because their characters don't have anything to do with each-other except mutually not wanting the bad guys to do bad things.

Yusaku gains allies, but he doesn't make friends. He starts off with his only real relationship being Kusanagi, and that doesn't really change by the end of the season (and his relationship with Kusanagi is not very developed either).

Now, there is a reason for this, which is I think the core of Yusaku's character in S1. It's that due to the traumatic event of his childhood, time has stopped for him. This is very real for victims of traumatic events, being unable to move forward in their lives, develop relationships or think about the future, because their minds are still stuck in the past. This is why Yusaku seeks his revenge. It's not revenge he's seeking, it's closure.

This is a theme that's worth exploring. The problem is that I don't really think they explore it, not sufficiently enough for me to give them credit. If they were exploring it, they could have shown Yusaku reckoning with the divide between him and others in a number of ways. 

Most chiefly, by forcing him to make friends anyway. This is Yugioh goddamnit. The opportunity was right there with Naoki, but it's just played as a joke. Instead, most of this theme is squeezed in at the end of the final duel vs. Revolver, and without the proper build-up, the moment of Yusaku renouncing his revenge and reaching out to be friends with Revolver doesn't land nearly as strong as it could have.

If there is one relationship that Yusaku maybe develops though, it's...

Ai

The relationship between Yusaku and Ai should be what the show hinges on, based on the premise, Ai's status as the "partner," and glimpses I've seen of them through fandom.

Ai is the inciting incident of the story, his existence drives the plot forward, because Hanoi wants him, but Yusaku has him, and Ai doesn't want anything to do with either of them. This premise is gold. It's rife with dramatic potential. Ai is forced to work together with his captor. Yusaku is forced to work together with this goddamn annoying AI. They are both just trying to use the other, but end up developing a bond.

Or at least... that's what I think should have happened...

Very little happens between them in season 1, and it either goes nowhere, or comes out of nowhere. Ai tries to escape, but that thread is just dropped and forgotten. Various Hanoi guys hint that the Ignis can't be trusted, but it doesn't really faze Yusaku because he already doesn't trust Ai. The same thing happens when Revolver reveals that Ai is his counterpart from the Lost Incident and has known it this whole time.

There's only one turning point in their dynamic, which is in the second to last duel vs. Revolver, where Ai uses his body as a shield so that Yusaku can use Storm Access. And even then, Ai says it's because if Yusaku loses, Revolver will kill him. But that's been their entire dynamic for the season anyway? Why is this positioned as the emotional moment where they become partners?

By the end of season 1, they're... allies. The same as the rest of the characters on Yusaku's side. But if there was one character Yusaku should have made friends with, it's Ai. Especially if they are positioning for a humans vs. AI conflict.

His design is cute though.

Go

Go's problem is that he needs to be integrated into the story and cast. Aoi at least has a relationship with her brother and Ghost Girl. Go is connected to... some nameless orphan children, a nameless manager, and a childhood orphan friend who shows up for 5 seconds, is put into a coma in order for Go to have a motivation to duel Genome, and never appears again.

Go isn't a best friend character, and he's not a rival either. He's not even a friend character, period. He really just seems there to be a third duelist.

Does he even know about the Lost Incident, or why Playmaker is even fighting Hanoi? Go has no clue what the plot even is, how can he be involved in it? My guy is living in a different story.

It's a shame, because Go does have some interesting bits to his character. Being a charisma duelist is central to his character (unlike Aoi, whose relationship to charisma dueling seems to end at being a cute idol girl), which could have been used to explore the culture of Link Vrains and the performativity of online spaces.

This is tied to some kind of theme he has going on of dueling for others vs. dueling for yourself. It's brought up in contrast to Yusaku, and why he initially dislikes Playmaker. All of that could have been interesting, but it doesn't really get a full treatment.

Revolver

Revolver is fine as a season 1 antagonist. He's not really a character yet, but I'm interested in where they take him from here. His backstory is sympathetic honestly. It's a pretty familiar and tragic situation, where a child narcs on their parent, who isn't even a good parent, but then comes to regret it.

I also think Revolver is sympathetic because I would nuke the internet in a heartbeat.

His Link Vrains design is cool. Mirror Force is funny, so are the gun dragons. The final duel vs. Yusaku was sick honestly, I loved the extra extra link.

Anyway, I still enjoyed season 1 and think there's room to take a turn for the better. In my experience, there's two kinds of yugiohs, the ones that start off strong, and the ones that end strong. My suspicion is that Vrains is the latter.

On to season 2! Time to meet everyone's favorite Salad king :^)

Hm? Was there someone I missed?

ha ha...... you get your own post, Aoi.

[atiny-for-life]

Ateez's Full Storyline Explained - THE CROMER

Masterlist

First Appearance: Diary Film

Hongjoong is asleep on the couch when his alternate self from the Black Pirates appears to him in a dream and hands it over

Hongjoong awakens and the Cromer rests on the coffee table in front of him, indicating the Black Pirate was not just in his dream but physically switched from the Z- to the A-World

Known Versions

Z-World: Destroyed by Yeosang in Deja Vu/Fever Part 3 Diary Entries

A-World: Currently in use by Ateez/Black Pirates after being taken to Z-World following Yeosang's destruction of the original Z-World Cromer

Presumed: Unknown World/Halazia World: giant shattered Cromer Yunho was sitting in (could've originated from yet another reality) plus the unknown shattered Cromer seen at the end of Crazy Form

Unknown Location: The 4 Witnesses in Halazia also utilized a Cromer

CROMER ABILITIES:

The origin of the Cromer's powers are unclear. However, Sciensalvar has a theory in both the A- and Z-World:

A-World: it's a Mayan Relic with inherent power

Z-World: it contains some form of Quantum Energy (whatever that means - quantum just means extremely small, like quark-sized small)

Important side-note: the Cromer's abilities are influenced by the phases of the moon which also dictate its size. This is first mentioned in the Fever Epilogue Diary Entries

Time Travel - UNKNOWN

Visual Indicator:

The sand inside the Cromer flows from bottom to top.

Documented Instances of time travel:

Ateez when they first travel to Z-World: Forward in time

Ateez when they returned to the A-World: Back in time

Presumed: Halazia's Ateez: back in time within the Z-World

The first time is made less clear but took place right after Z-World's Hongjoong handed over the Cromer to his alternate self.

Proof of this is, for one, the gravity-defying sand in the Cromer which can be seen in the Fever Part 1 Diary Entries, but also a scene from the Fever Part 2 Diary Entries in which the Grimes siblings know the Black Pirates were captured by the time they first meet Ateez right after their arrival in the Z-World.

At that point, enough time must've passed for the news to reach the siblings. This implies Ateez travelled forward in time when they moved to the Z-World since the Black Pirates were captured right after the Cromer was handed over and A-World's Ateez came here right after receiving it.

The second instance took place when Yeosang shattered the Cromer to save his members while he was being captured by the Android Guardians at the end of the Fever Part 3 Diary Entries and leading into the Fever Epilogue Entries.

They assumed it was because the Cromer was destroyed but, as we learned in the Golden Hour: Part 2 Diary Entries, shattering the Cromer doesn't just lead to travel through time but also between worlds. Which requirements are needed for time travel thus remains unclear.

The final instance is in the Halazia MV in which Ateez from yet another world travelled into the Z-World back in time to create the Sopro which was then used by the Black Pirates and A-World's Ateez to free the people of Strictland. In the MV, we once again see a broken Cromer.

Jumping Between Realities - FULL MOON

First of all, I'd like to clarify that early diary entries referred to the alternate universes as different "dimensions". However, that term is normally used to talk about the three spacial and one time dimension our real universe is made up of (given our current understanding of it) which is why I call them "worlds" or "realities" like newer Ateez content does.

Documented Instances of travel between worlds:

Black Pirate Hongjoong: Z to A to Z in Diary Film

Ateez: A to Z in Diary Film

Ateez minus Yeosang: Z to A in Deja Vu

Ateez: A to Z in Fever Epilogue Diary Entries

Presumed: Halazia's Ateez: Halazia World to Z, then Z to A

Ateez: Golden Hour Part 1/2

Visual Indicators and Required Circumstances:

In Diary Film, the Cromer lights up as the jump is happening which we've also seen at the end of Deja Vu

An early warning sign of what's to come seems to be a gravitation anomaly; objects begin to float like we're used to seeing in zero gravity environments while other objects and (in this case) Hongjoong remain firmly on the ground

This is something we get to witness again during Halazia in the Z-World in which Yunho is sitting in the remnants of a giant Cromer (the moon must've been extremely close or something else must've gone really wrong to blow it up to these proportions)

Here, Ateez escaped from their original world to the Z-World but, unlike in Diary Film, the Cromer seems to have been destroyed to activate these powers

We're presented with another presumed instance of Reality-Jumping in Matz when we see Halazia's Hongjoong and Seonghwa take down Sciensalvar in the A-World

Unfortunately, neither moon phase, nor Cromer are shown here

What stands out here is one thing: inconsistency

In Diary Film, the Cromer was smaller than in Halazia, but larger than in Fever Part 3 and, additionally, in Halazia, Fever Part 3, and Golden Hour Part 2, the Cromer had to be shattered to enable its world-jumping abilities while it remained intact in Diary Film and Matz where we see them use its other abilities

So what gives? I think it's got to do with the amount of energy needed for a leap between worlds; depending on the moon phase, the Cromer can provide varying amounts of energy, and if it's not the right moon phase for a leap, then breaking it is the only way to set free enough energy to make a jump possible.

Travelling Into Dreams - CRESCENT MOON

Unlike the former power, this one is less flashy but we do get to see it used just as frequently as it allows for more fun, out there music video concepts.

Documented Instances of Dream Travel:

Black Pirate Hongjoong: Hongjoong's Dream in Diary Film

Potential: Ateez: a shared dream in Eternal Sunshine

Ateez: a shared dream in Illusion

Black Pirate: Ateez's shared dream in Illusion

Ateez: a shared dream in Wave

Black Pirates: a shared dream with all Strictland residents in Crazy Form

Visual Indicators and Required Circumstances:

Diary Film: Hongjoong is asleep while he sees his alternate self who is gone when he wakes

Eternal Sunshine: Unnatural colors, laws of nature and physics do not apply

Illusion: Everyone is asleep at the beginning of the MV, the environment is all pastels, backgrounds are often cartoonish and nonsensical

Notably, the crescent moon is shown on multiple occasions which links dream-travelling with this moon phase for the first time

Wave: Once again, the MV begins with everyone waking up which makes 'Illusion' a dream within a dream

In addition, we also have this album's aptly named track "Crescent" with the repeated line of "Open your eyes" so we can now safely connect the power to the crescent moon

Crazy Form: We open on a crescent moon shot, Black Pirate Hongjoong fires his finger gun and real bullets appear, the video has frequently glitches, cartoon panels pop up, etc.

Additionally, we also get the album track "Crescent Part 2"

Teleportation - UNCLEAR

Given the frequent use of this ability, I currently believe it to be non-moon phase dependant, meaning it can be accessed at all times.

Documented Instances of Teleportation:

Fever Part 2 Diary Entries

Direct quote from Seonghwa's entry:

The Central Government put the men in Black Fedora on the wanted list, but they repeatedly failed to arrest them due to them being able to teleport using the Cromer.

Guerrilla

At the beginning of the MV, Hongjoong teleports away from the rooftop

The jump is indicated by the screen flashing red and a whooshing sound effect

Movement Diary Version: The Revolution

At the beginning of the revolution, when the Black Pirates and Ateez are performing in the streets and handing out flyers, Android Guardians try to catch them

To avoid capture, they begin to teleport short distances among the chaos, allowing them to complete the mission and return safely to their hideout

Outlaw - The World Ep. 2 Diary Entries

Yunho uses teleportation to safe the boy's brother from falling to his death and (presumably) to safe Wooyoung from getting snatched up by a Guardian

Both Ateez and the Black Pirates also uses teleportation as a part of their performance for the Prestige Academy students

Will - The World Ep. Fin Diary Entries

Half of Ateez use the Cromer to teleport prisoners out of the Disposal Site before also using it to teleport back to rejoin the rest

Mingi uses it to safe the boy from falling into the incinerator and dying like his brother

He also uses it to dispose of the remaining Android Guardians at the Disposal Site

San teleports them away from the Disposal Site before it could bury them as it exploded

Matz

Hongjonong and Seonghwa seem to teleport at 1:54

A negative frame is seemingly used to indicate this

IT's You

Wooyoung, Yeosang, and San teleport at the conclusion of the MV

A negative frame flashes before black grain blurs into their frame and makes it seem like they're dissipating

[donnerpartyofone]

This morning I went over to the church to see my favorite guy, who is so often surprising and challenging. He seemed a little out of sorts today, stammering and losing his place; I sometimes worry about this old guy, and I was paying attention. Then at the end of the mass he said that they're having air quality problems in the rectory and the EPA is involved. I hope he's not getting brain damage!

It was sort of funny, though, because the homily was about having trouble focusing--not being able to concentrate, and having anxiety about the future. That was pretty relevant to me, medically and otherwise. I'm writing this on the morning of the new moon, just to be extra flaky, about how much trouble I have forming goals.

Pursuing goals is also hard, but step one should be having a vision, and that's the really impossible part. When I was a little kid I had two ambitions: to be a writer, and to be dead. The latter thing represents one of the main motivating forces in my life, which is pain avoidance. I think this is the chief motivator of many people without them even realizing it; comfort-seeking itself can be a form of pain avoidance. Pain avoidance is not a legitimate goal, it's more of a reflex, and it can become a preoccupying distraction from any kind of actual ambition (especially as fulfilling ambitions often involves some amount of discomfort). Focusing on what you do not want is not equivalent to focusing on what you do want.

I never had a very good idea of what I want. I found this out when I went into therapy as an adult; I couldn't formulate any notion of what I wanted out of life. I couldn't even come up with any masturbatory, pie in the sky fantasies. I might vaguely be able to say something like "a bigger, nicer apartment", but I can't come up with any compelling ideas about what that would even look like. I try, but I know I'm faking it. Certainly part of my interest in religion and occultism is the idea that I could train myself to really clearly conceptualize any kind of goals or desires. In the case of occultism specifically (and, let's be honest, many forms of self-help), visualization is always a key element. In recent years I learned that I am abnormally incapable of forming mental images, and I have come to believe that this is intimately connected to my inability to figure out what I want or how to get it.

Nearly all of my thinking is verbal. I found out what aphantasia was while talking to my dad, who is extremely visual with an excellent grasp of spacial relations (something I have almost no concept of). He was shocked when I said I can't really picture anything, asking me "Then how do you do anything?" He said when he decides to make a sandwich, for instance, he automatically sees himself performing the actions of sandwich-making, and sees the aspirational sandwich in his mind's eye. Visualizing is essential to his entire executive process. It so happens that I am aphantasic and I have a lot of executive dysfunction. I no longer think this is coincidental.

(I'm also very faceblind, and I think this is connected; something to do with the ability to reconstitute a visual memory and relate it to something that is presently in front of me. But anyway...)

Perhaps oddly, I am an artist, or at least I have been. But I've never been able to draw from my imagination, like at all. The best work I've ever done is all swipes; I am a great believer in swipes, it can reveal a lot about your personal style and obsessions and when you re-draw someone else's art. But I can't just sit and think up something fun to draw, even when I try to just doodle I'm usually responding more to the lines I see emerging on the paper than anything I'm thinking or feeling. I think this is related to the fact that I'm an obsessive scopophile; I take in a lot of detail from my environment, and I watch movies with the same attitude and frequency with which most people listen to music. Recently I started to joke that I have an image deficiency and that's why I have to consume huge amounts of visual media, I need the external infusion. But like, it's not that much of a joke, maybe.

In my 30s I randomly developed this condition where scar tissue grows over your corneas, and I had to have a series of freaky eye surgeries. My doctors always asked if I grew up somewhere warm and sunny and windy, if I do a lot of outdoor sports (sometimes this condition is called "surfer's eye"); I thought this was pretty funny since I couldn't be more of an indoor kid, although maybe cycling is somewhat at fault. Still, my preferred diagnosis is that I watch so much trashy and violent crap that it literally scars my eyes. It's as good an explanation as any! And it does have this weird synergy with my other visual problems.

Anyway, it's not as if I've done absolutely nothing with my life. Quite a few personal achievements piled up in just the last couple of years; certainly I've benefited a lot from luck and the good will of others, but nothing would have happened without my own creativity and commitment. I just wish I had more, you know. Vision. I spend too much of my life "taking one day at a time" and waiting for things to happen to me, assuming I don't have much control over my experiences. I'd rather be able to imagine something that I want to happen and act on it; regardless of whether the thing is going to happen, I'd like to be able to formulate a goal other than paying the rent, or like, not waking up and going to sleep in a state of stark terror. I'm not sure how to get myself to that place, but maybe saying that that's what I want can count for something.

Anyway here are some photos of the thoughtfully planted shrubbery from the church. I missed the full bloom of the weeping cherries, but as soon as they die off the shrubs below turn bright red, pink, yellow, and white. It's pretty inviting I must say.

[techni-kolor]

My slightly deranged HC that Nikolai Gogol is visually impaired!

So this is truly off the rails, but watching the anime I had an odd realization that his mannerisms really suggest a reduced and/or blurred visual field to me.

First up? This seemed quite strange to me. It took a while to pinpoint it, but Nikolai is sitting with his blind side towards Sigma. Which is odd. Wouldn't he prefer to keep Sigma within his view? Even his peripherals would give some sort of awareness if he still wanted to face the water. So why not sit on the reverse side? Because it doesn't matter anyway! Notice how Nikolai only reacts when Sigma calls his name. He was already planning on using his hearing to track Sigma's movements rather than his sight. I also think it's interesting how his uncovered eye narrows as he smiles. Maybe it's meant to portray emotion, maybe it's related to his plans. I just think it's interesting when combined with the rest of the scene.

This scene always struck me as interesting! Who aims a gun without looking? Especially when using an incredibly precise spacial splicing ability? Possibly someone who can't see well enough for it to matter. With the proximity here Nikolai wouldn't need amazing aim. Just shooting straight ahead would certainly be a kill shot. Which is also why I think that his head down, eyes covered position here isn't an effort to conceal his identity. He doesn't need to bother when he is murdering the officer anyway and is already planning to introduce himself to Mushitaro.

Violence, however, brings me to my next point!

The only time we see Nikolai attempt to shoot someone who was actually prepared for it (disregarding Mr. Tonan and the officer who were both unprepared) he misses abysmally. And to be fair, Atsushi is supernaturally quick and agile. It's simply interesting to me that Nikolai can't seem to aim unless he is less than a meter away from his target and they are sitting completely still.

This scene really could be anything! I just think it's interesting that someone as coordinated and graceful as Nikolai would fall flat on his face. Maybe struggling to properly access depth or missing unknown obstacles because of a reduced visual field? Or maybe he just had a clumsy moment! It happens!

This next bit involves a lot of uncertainty! Since Nikolai has some eccentric mannerisms in general. But I find it curious how many involve him shutting his eyes. Even during combative situations.

Here!

And here!

Eyes shut again!

To be honest? His eyes are shut during a lot of his prison monolog!

With an honorable mention to this scene! Which likely has more to do with Nikolai's morality than his eyesight but still is unprecedented in the anime! (No iris at ALL)

Although speaking of Nikolai and Meursault, I just want to yell to the void that maybe Nikolai felt the need to yank Fyodor up Like ThatTM to see his face clearly? From approximately two inches away.

And to wrap up this Red String Board of Doom, I'd like to also mention that Nikolai would likely be albino if this was not anime! I have serious doubts that his skin, eye, and hair color are anything except an aesthetic choice but it is interesting when albinism typically comes with other effects. Such as poor vision!

If anyone stayed through this entire ramble, thank you! And please note this as my disclaimer that everything here is purely speculation and definitely reaching in most areas! I'm not an expert of any sort and just wanted to share my headcanon! ☆

[autolabrum]

Watched Barry Lyndon

Gorgeous. Adored the picaresque tone of the first half. Took until a bit into the second half for the enormity of the project to hit me. In the gorgeous, painterly shot of the dining room immediately before Bryan asks prematurely about his birthday present, and after we have been informed by the narrator that he will die before his father, I was struck by the purpose of the painting motif. Barry Lyndon effectively expresses the personhoods of the kind of subject we usually only understand in the static form of painting. In one direction, yes, it presents Barry's life as unchangeable, past, and set as in a painting, but it can also be understood in the opposite way. It imposes the humanity of its subjects on the audience by reforming the aesthetic object of the painting as a narrative subject, with depth of life and person. This is a perfect use of the filmic medium, which bridges the gap between the poetic and the visual (equivalent, in Gotthold Lessing's construction, to the gap between the temporal and the spacial) to improve our belief in the legitimacy of both pursuits, as it combines the painterly style with Thackeray's novel. This movie will change the way I look at all non-narrative visual art, and I believe has improved my ability to perceive its subjects with depth and dignity.

[katy-133]

Alex Hill: Whispers at White Oak Inn Demo Feedback

Things like general thoughts, reactions, and suggestions for the full game.

Housekeeping/Context: I have around 9+ years of game dev experience as a hobby, having made (directed, written, drew, programmed) 10 games (mainly visual novels or other 2D narrative-driven games) and been involved in an additional 17 games (either as a voice actor, additional writer, artist, playtester, or animator). I've also been a narrative/design consultant for additional games during pre-production. Please keep this in mind, as while I have developer experience, it is mainly in a different medium of games (though they have some overlap with Myst-likes, like Alex Hill). With all that in mind, these are my notes.

First impressions before playing: I love detective games, especially the Nancy Drew series, which I played growing up. They're very nostalgic to me, so seeing Alex Hill's promo art drew me in because of the comparisons.

Pre-rendered backgrounds:

This is the big reason why I wanted to play this. I love pre-rendered video game art and actively search for games that use it. I love that I can see wood grain in the furniture. The view of the inn from outside has this haunting look to it. The ability to explore locations without NPCs gives that feeling you get when you're playing Myst where you feel like you're the last person on Earth (which is one of the major attractions of Myst-like games). Beautiful work.

Performance issues:

I noticed large moments of lagging (frame rate dropping) while playing. These happened in spikes (specific moments, rather than consistent throughout). I was confused at first, as one of the main pros of pre-rendered art is that it tends to have much better performance than real time rendering. Then I talked to Cassandra and saw her hair load in last. I realised that (if I am correct in this) the methodology of the game's design is that the backgrounds are pre-rendered, but all the characters are rendered in real time. I would recommend having the characters be rendered as image sequences instead, to remove the real time rendering from the game. These dropped frames are a major performance issue and I would place optimisation as the highest priority out of all my notes here. If you take away one this from this feedback, I want it to be this. Players who have less speedy PCs than mine will only have greater difficulty playing (I've observed that the Nancy Drew fandom tends to favour laptops and non-gamer setups, so this is quite likely). Let me know if you'd like a copy of my specs.

My specs are (via Speccy):

Exploration:

I love the exploration in this demo. Moving throughout did not feel cumbersome. I could get to where I wanted easily. I love the classic exploration style. I love the design of the cursor. I like how it changes to different icons for hotspots and exploration. It's clear to understand and easy to see in different environments. The moments where I'm given the option to look out a window into the night forest is haunting because I'm always worried that I'll see something outside in the distance. It's great atmosphere.

Camera's perspective:

The camera feels placed oddly-high. The angle appears to be aligned 1:1 with the horizon line, instead of angled slightly lower. This causes the furniture (as it's meeting the ground, not the ceiling) to appear smaller and obscured by the GUI (user interface), because the GUI is placed at the bottom of the screen. This gives an unappealing spacial feel where there's a lot of empty space at the top of the screen, but too much at the bottom of the screen that feels cropped off. My suggestion would be to either lower the angle of the camera or to move the GUI to the top of the screen.

User Interface (GUI):

I love the design of the Main Menu, with the font typeface choice, and the image of the inn at night. It is responsive too (has no lag/no frame rate drops). It was so beautiful, I paused to stare at it for a while because I thought I could see the stars twinkle, despite it being a still image.

Right now, the Settings menu feels unfinished. One of the aesthetic attractions to Myst-like games is that their GUI tends to be diegetic (meaning, the GUI buttons are objects that exist in-universe, or are presented with an aesthetic that feels that way). Currently, the Settings GUI feels too minimalist to be diegetic. It's text with bars. I would suggest something with a more wood or paper feel to it, or something else that invokes private detectives.

The loading screen feels like a default loading screen and could use some more aesthetic polish (like a looping animated logo--or "throbber"--at the centre of the screen).

The in-game GUI like the the inventory is readable, using rendered images of objects as icons (which is good--compare it to Nancy Drew's Midnight in Salem, where the inventory used mono-coloured icons to represent inventory items, making different key cards or documents unreadable to the eye as they were all the same colour and shape). The in-game GUI also doesn't feel diegetic, but rather follows "invisible" minimalist design rules. I wonder if a diegetic design would be more aesthetically appealing, but that is a light suggestion.

I like that there is a both skip button and a hotkey for dialogue lines, as it's useful for replays.

With dialogue options, you may want to consider adding some sort of indicator for the player when there's options where you'll get to pick all of them (you're just choosing which order you're picking them in) and not losing the option to pick the other questions if you pick one over the other. (You could use an icon or do what disco Elysium does and add a "Wait," in front of those dialogue options.) This is a light suggestion, as other games also don't have such indicators.

Gamefeel (aka Game Juice):

Something I noticed multiple times was that (even in Fullscreen mode) if I clicked too far on the edge of the screen (left or right), I would accidentally click out of the game and switch to my desktop. This happened frequently, as I would move my cursor to the edge of the screen to turn as I explored.

Additionally, in the Main Menu, every time I started a new game, I would need to click on the screen (anywhere on the screen) to get the cursor to start highlighting buttons when I hovered over them (I assume this is caused by the game not being "activated" automatically upon starting the game and the active window instead being the Steam window instead). I recommend finding a solution to resolve these two issues, as it lowers the gamefeel, making me feel like I have less control over the controls. Adventure games have very minimal interactivity compared to (for example) an FPS game (as first-person shooters require instant reactions to the player moving the camera and firing at enemies). So any interactivity in an adventure game like Alex Hill that is off in some way (non-responsive) will be noticeable.

Interactions:

I love being able to drink coffee and eat chips in this game. I like the bag sfx and voice acting of the player character enjoying the food/drink. It's the little interactions that make the difference. I hope the full game will have environment interactions like this throughout.

Characters:

In the demo, I came across 3 on-screen characters, the player character, the unseen driver, a phone/text character (Mom), and 2 ghost characters (ghost = writing term for an offscreen character who "haunts" the narrative)--the literal ghost and the (currently alive but offscreen) mother of the ghost. I like the idea of the player character being a private detective that recently messed up a previous case, it gives her something to prove and may be relatable to different players (the feeling of having messed up and being given a second chance and that weight hanging over you like a Sword of Damocles).

With the mom, I got the feeling through the texts that Alex is on close, good terms with her.

The ghost character, Audrey, as well as the ghost's mother I found compelling--I imagine we'll see more ghost sightings and we'll eventually contact the mother as she'll have more information.

Cassandra feels like an old friend who you met at work. I'm not sure what to make of Concillo (the player's boss) in the short interaction I had. I tried to find a character archetype that he fit into to describe him, which was somewhere between "the chief commissioner who gives you your assignment" and "fatherly mentor." Ronnie seems like an interesting suspect, striking me as timid but trying to be a helpful/hospitable host.

Puzzles:

The only puzzles I found in my first playthrough of the demo were the crossword puzzle and the inventory puzzle of unlocking my room. Neither gave me a feeling of classic Myth-like puzzles because the crossword puzzle is optional (doesn't advance the plot) and the design of the door puzzle doesn't feel like a puzzle because you are given the key before being presented with the locked door (usually, it's the opposite) and I didn't need to drag the inventory object to the door to open it, it was automatic (removing my interactivity with the puzzle). I searched around for more puzzles, as I wanted to get a feel of what the full game's puzzles would be like.

In my second playthrough, I found the clock puzzle, which was a compelling puzzle. The hint in Latin, the design of the puzzle box, and the environment's context clues were a nice touch.

Mystery:

A common pitfall I've noticed with Myst-like adventure games is the "finding the plot" problem where the player is dumped somewhere at the beginning of the game and has to spend the beginning faffing around aimlessly trying to get the plot to happen (such as a main conflict of mystery to appear for them to solve). This demo avoids this I'm happy to say. We are given a task (minor goal), we are shown a glimpse of the possibly supernatural element (the mystery/major goal) near the beginning of the demo, giving the player a motivation and something to solve.

It's a compelling mystery--It's either a supernatural cause, or someone is trying to make it look like something supernatural is happening.

Music:

I love the main menu music. It's atmospheric and fitting. The slow piano keys feel mysterious.

The music sometimes cuts out if I linger in an area for too long (while solving the crossword puzzle).

SFX/Voice acting:

The voice acting is good, believable, and fits the character designs. The sound mixing is good (no odd audio levels or audio cutting off or peaking issues).

I like the ambient sounds of the street outside the detective agency, the sfx for touching objects. Those are details that add life to the scenery.

All in all, I'm super-excited about Alex Hill: Whispers at White Oak Inn l and have wishlisted the game.

[personalamina]

Intelligence

☝🏼Spacial Intelligence: I have the ability to visualize with my mind's eye. I major in architecture and having high social

Intelligence was one of the main reasons why I chose

architecture.

[congealedweapon]

I have aphantasia and SDAM sounds absolutely like me too. Im just realising that while I can unintentionally experience a small level of some other senses, like smell and taste, in my brain, that doesn't happen with visuals ever - I don't even see anything when I dream, and I'm a lucid/vivid dreamer (I do both, I know they aren't the same thing).

I also don't have more than minimal of the spacial thingo the author mentioned, I feel like I can conceptually mind map a little but I have no internal concept of size and space and stuff, which also means that I can't figure out or remember how big something is without looking at it and measuring it beyond vaguely having some size boxes, like "thing is bigger than a bread box" but it's often a genuine struggle when I have to describe things. I also can't give directions beyond very small specific areas I've walked many times either, and getting lost even with directions was a genuine issue before google maps was on every smart phone (for a few years I relied on printed maps and taking photos every so often along routes if I was shown how to get somewhere in person). I also have local places assigned to several groupings of locations that divide my city into a few key sections, but beyond that they all sort of float disconnectedly in a void in my head, maybe with a small radius of knowledge, like I know what's across the street from the shopping centre, and what suburb it's in, but what streets to take or even what they look like or anything concrete between there and a location in the suburb over or even which general direction to go? No clue.

I also absolutely consider my aphantasia and related brain stuff that I bundle with it (especially cuz that was the only term I had until learning SDAM today) - in part because I'm an artist, not professionally, but its one of the things that brings me joy and purpose in life, and has been a significant interest since I was little. I like trying new mediums, and include things considered "crafts" (I just don't consider it art if I just followed someone else's pattern) and have genuinely had to find ways to get around and work with multiple disabilities I didn't initially have any understanding of or words for, including my aphantasia.

It's also interesting to me how it affects a lot of how I am and function as a person - do I have my own weird kind of trauma flashbacks, given that I have aphantasia and fit SDAM? I absolutely have trauma and I'll sometimes suddenly be confronted with a memory, but it's not like how flashbacks are ever described. I also used to have a significant issue with dissociating and maladaptive daydreaming but also without actual visuals. And I've hallucinated once (auditory with an emotional component), but again no visuals and I wonder about how aphantasia affects hallucinations in general esp because that might be a heritable thing in my family. If I can *feel* like I'm seeing things without actual seeing things in my vivid and lucid dreams, it seems plausible that that is potentially possible for hallucinations, although potentially helpful as a way to tell what's real.

It also affects my sexuality - I'm bisexual/pansexual but also don't fully connect to either allo, demi or asexual experiences and descriptions I've heard. I can be initially sexually attracted to people, but crushes have always been a bit different, especially since outgrowing the teenage hormones - I can't picture or even really remember what people look like the moment I'm not looking at them, although if I have the ability to recognise people when I see them - so I forget about any purely physical attraction the moment I stop physically seeing someone and I can't fantasise about anyone so people and actions have always had a level of seperation in my head. I also stop noticing how people look once I get to know them as a person, although I might notice a new tshirt or hair colour, so I forget that I was attracted to them, until/unless they bring it up and flip the switch back, which, especially given personal issues regarding trust and trauma, makes dating much harder, because physical attraction to someone I don't know, versus someone I do know and have forgotten how to process how they look as a whole visual feels different, and physical attraction on a purely aesthetic basis feels very theoretical and conceptual and while its clearly different than purely aesthetic attraction, it isn't as connected to specific actions I might want to take as I've heard other allosexual people describe - I do feel like I want to kiss them and vaguely want to do things, but it's like a seperate box in my head from any actual fantasies, and fantasies never have a face, and are more and more nebulous as my brain fog gets worse because I struggle to bring up any sensory elements to the imagination in my head, which, along with adhd and other issues, makes it hard to focus on. I feel like all of this sexuality stuff is very much also tied in with being auDHD as well as the aphantasia and it's hard to say how much of each but its certainly all of them.

Another important way that aphantasia, and/or more likely SDAM I am realising, is disabling is how I have developed dysphoria after my face and body significantly visually changed in a period of maybe 6 months. I've stopped recognising my face as my own on an emotional level, because I've never been able to picture it, it's always been a tenuous connection, but I could take for granted that changes would be slow enough that it would be recognisable as the same face/body I saw in the mirror the day before. It's been several years, but it hasn't improved - instead I've adjusted by doing things like dying my hair bright colours, so I can see the colour, even if it's faded and my hair is messy and dirty, and have a feeling of ownership of my reflection. I've also lost the sorta internal spacial awareness of the visuals of my body - I can't judge if a piece of clothing will fit by looking any more, I need the measurements. I didn't realise until a friend mentioned that they are about the same size as me that that was even the case - I'm vaguely aware that I'm not skinny anymore, but not as fat as many, but I have no real conception of it unless I'm actually looking at myself, outside of some memorised measurements for buying clothing - it's hard to explain but it's kinda like a weird form of derealisation, but not one I can ground myself out of, or one to escape pain, and it's like how I am vaguely aware that my fridge is bigger than a bread box, and intellectually I know it's smaller than average because I fit less food but I can't tell you by how much, even remotely

I've seen many cockroaches so I can guess those are mostly between 1cm and 4cm but I've never seen my fridge next to another fridge and have no way to conceptualize the difference. If that makes sense?

I thought I'd share in case anyone sees and relates to any of this, or finds it interesting cuz I find it all very interesting myself

In the ongoing discussion of aphantasia (see "an aphantasia fantasia" tag for more) an article popped up recently which has some details to share, including a history of how aphantasia was discovered in the scientific sense. I don't have "spatial thoughts" the way the author does, but it's also a pretty good discussion of how people who don't form mental images (or can't access sound, smell, etc in their minds) still interact normally with the world.

Here's some fucked up shit I didn't expect, however:

In a 2015 paper, a group of researchers [...] identified a new syndrome they called “Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory,” or SDAM for short. People with SDAM lack the ability to relive past experiences in their minds. While this condition is rare among the general population, a preliminary survey hints at a link with aphantasia, with as many as 51 percent of a sample of 2,000 SDAM individuals also having aphantasia. My own experience is similar. Past episodes of my life—when I can recall them at all—feel distant and non-sensory. [...] I would describe my recollections as summaries of key facts rather than first-person “mind movies.” When asked, out of the blue, about an experience I’ve surely had—say, any childhood birthday party—my mind first responds by drawing a blank. It feels as if my episodic memories were filed into a “mental cabinet” without an index. Many memories are in there, somewhere, but retrieving them is a daunting task unless I’m provided with very specific prompts. With some groping work of deduction (where did I live at the time? Who did I hang out with?) I can gather enough hints to bring out some locations and non-visual facts: I had a big party in our countryside garden when I was 11 or 12; there was cake; a lot of kids running around and … that’s about it.

This is one hundred percent how I access memory and how I assumed everyone did -- I am well aware I don't remember chunks of my past (or only remember them if prompted by something) but I do the same thing he does. I ask myself where I was living, or what other things were happening at the time, or I snag on a rare memory of a piece of clothing or a feeling, and I extrapolate from there. I don't relive memories in the way that the article implies regular people do, and while I will recognize say, the smell of a specific library, a deeply ingrained scent for me, I don't remember the smell if I'm not standing there smelling it. And this explains my dedication to making an annual photobook documenting the past year, each December -- the photobooks are powerful memory triggers and have more than once reminded me where I was or what year it was when I did XYZ thing.

Also, turns out that one of the key methods for emotional regulation in most people is calling up a happy memory to counteract sad ones, which is why depression is so pervasive, because depressed people have literal biological impairments to remembering or reliving positive memories.

And SDAM, associated with aphantasia, is an impairment to reliving any memory at all, so...

Big ol' neurological yikes, guys.

[archivedjuice]

Idk sometimes I feel it’s equally ableist when people pretend Matt’s abilities don’t give him any advantage over what a regular blind person would have. He is 100% blind, but he also has the kind of spacial awareness no other blind person has

i'm not sure who you're talking about in reference to 'people' because i've never seen anyone pretend that he doesn't have an advantage over the average mostly blind person but the enhanced spacial awareness he has due to his abilities is literally a given fact so much so you don't even have to think about it in depth to understand it. he's a vigilante so talented in martial arts & various other fighting techniques that he's made a name for himself all over the world due to said sheer talent. he is also a blind man whose brain receives zero (0) visual perception who needs disability aids because his powers are just as much as a deterrent as they are aid in themselves sometimes. both facts can co-exist.

[fujimaru]

merlin is blind (headcanon)

ok so i sent this to a few of my friends but i wanted to archive it here bc it is IMPORTANT to me and maybe some other people will enjoy the headcanon. please keep in mind this is Really self indulgent and not really rooted in anything canon but the “blind seer” trope is a thing that happens in media so idk. go crazy silly.

here’s some like... tidbits on how i think it’d impact him and such. enjoy! read more bc this is a bit ramble-y.

starting this off just saying - he keeps it a secret. he Does not want people knowing this. merlin is merlin so he has to be mysterious at all times or he will Die.

i think he has trouble remembering faces and thus has trouble placing Who people are bc he can't recognise their features visually... he relies on other traits in order to know who people are, but he's Notably bad with faces... most people attribute it to him not caring abt individual humans and he plays along with this as to not raise suspicion...

the one thing he's really good at seeing is movement, and it's so good that it really... erases most people's suspicions about him not being able to see, if they have any in the first place.

his staff! it's really important!! he uses it as a white cane but very subtly... people just assume he's doing normal staff wielder things with it but every time he extends it, taps it on the ground, or relies on it for support while walking it is ALL because it is helping him figure out where things are. :)

fou! is important too!!!!!! fou ofc knows... he is very insightful :) but like fou will often nudge merlin in the right direction silently (it looks like he's just doing normal creature things... but someone who is acute ex: artoria would notice the correlation)... ofc...

his abilities as a seer are a REALLY incredible coverup. he can "see" anywhere in the present ofc!! this means he can hijack his vision... he's not exactly "seeing" in a visual sense, but the knowledge of what's going on around him (or wherever) is absorbed :D

his spacial reasoning skills suck. if you asked him to fit something into a crate in a way that minmaxed space he would utterly fail, it would take him multiple tries. he can't visualise sides of objects either, so if you told him to turn something on its side, he would do the opposite/etc...

hair is always messy which is partially bc it's Long and Fluffy but people point it out to him and he's like "what? i brushed that 5 times!!! it's fine!!!" (it's not fine)

i also like to think his hearing is really sensitive to make up for his vision (this often happens!!! it happened to me ) it's important to note he's not completely blind (as in, he can't see light), but he still is Blind... :) so yes he can see, but it's very very poor!!! ^-^

in battle, he focuses his mana and such on his clairvoyance in order to make up for any shortcomings... it’s not noticeable unless you Know what to look out for. sneaky sneaky.

people who i think would catch onto merlin being blind are: fujimaru (servant-master bond yadda yadda and also fujimaru is merlin’s scrunkle), da vinci (girlboss genius powers GO), romani (he’s very insightful... and even if he won’t admit it he’s close with merlin AND HE’S A DOCTOR), artoria (but i think it would be something she doesn’t speak up about... i can see her and merlin sharing some very tender moments though irt it bc thats his child!!), fou (he’s the seeing-eye beast and knows merlin’s secrets), karna (relevant to his lore he sees things people do not want them to see AND the father of his bff/soulmate was a blind king and like even if they don’t interact majorly it just Makes Sense), amakusa&edmond (they’ve met people like that in their past lives...), gilgamesh (he’d be a bitch about it but secretly cares and makes sure merlin is Doing OK. merlin feeds off of the banter though), andersen (duh), holmes (DUH... deduction is His Freaking Thing + he’s compared to merlin in camelot... he’d kinda be a Rude Boy abt it but means well, and he does keep the info private), and lastly bedivere (sidenote: i don’t think any of the other knights of the round table would know lol. they’re too busy being Fans of merlin aka they just... don’t realise!? silly guys).

and here’s a silly re: roman being like “Merlin’s seer abilities (eyes) suck”

[attackfish]

I finished playing through Wind Waker (gamecube version) for the first time yesterday, and I had thoughts about it, which led to thoughts on disability and gaming, and what it means to be a good game, so I thought I might as well try to lay them out.

A while back, I made a post about a review of Wind Waker that called it too easy, and about how I played my first Zelda game as a brain damaged ten year old: [Link], and I want to say I better understand the other reviewer's point now. The combat in Wind Waker is ludicrously easy. None of the Bosses were a real challenge, and I didn't die once. I never once felt skilled or brilliant, or badass for beating anything in the game. It was a bit of a letdown.

But would I have felt the same as that brain damaged ten year old who had never played a 3D game before and only played a few other games on gameboy and some 1980s computer platformers? Would I have felt the same if I had picked this game up instead of Ocarina of Time? Would the combat have been the right kind of frustrating that I would have felt awsome when it clicked? Yeah. Hell yeah. It would have been great.

So part of me feels like I just played this game at the wrong time, like I ran across it when I was too old, and when I had learned too well to compensate for the brain damage, and some of it had healed. But another part of me is really really glad this was not the game I first picked up instead of Ocarina of Time. I would have enjoyed it a lot. I would have loved the visuals, and it would have let me live out my Ursula K. LeGuin inspired sailing fantasies. The combat would have been the perfect level for me, and the dungeons would probably been enjoyably difficult. And unlike Ocarina of Time, it would not have taken me two years to finish it.

But also. When I was ten, I had less than a year before stopped having the constant seizures that caused my brain damage. I still have seizures, but now I have them once or twice a year, instead of multiple times a day. That brain damage, or at least a lot of it, was specifically to my spatial reasoning ability. And that's when I picked up a game in which from the very first dungeon, I had to constantly think about where I was, and where that place was in relation to the rest of the complex three dimentional maze I was in. And Inhad to think about how if I changed this in this room, it would affect this room over here, and how to get back to that room.

I picked up this game for fun, and it forced me to do exactly what my brain was struggling with, and each dungeon, each temple, was harder and more complicated than the last, and as I played, my brain grew. It healed. It fixed itself. I still have brain damage. I still struggle with aspects of spacial reasoning, and with things unrelated to spacial reasoning. But I am so much better than I was because of this game. I rarely struggle to orient myself in the world, and I almost never get lost. There is so much I can do now because I played this game.

And that would not have happened with Wind Waker. Windwaker's dungeons are painfully linear. I never had to pay attention to where I was, because I only ever had to deal with the puzzel in front of me. If I needed to go through a room again after changing it, the dungeon would take me back there without me needing to figure it out and backtrack. I never once felt lost, or like I had to think about where to go next.

Maybe ten year old me would have, but probably not for long.

So I am divided on this game. The visuals and aesthetic are delightful. The story is great actually, and I actually felt for Ganondorf in a way I was not expecting. The controls (for the most part, if we ignore the seagulls and Makar) were fluid and felt really good. Combat was lackluster, but I don't care too much.

But. There are a lot of reasons to come to Zelda games, and there are a lot of reasons to like Wind Waker. There are probably a lot of people for whom this is their favorite game, for very good reasons and I am not saying that they are wrong. But I come to Zelda for the dungeons. I come for that feeling of leaving the bright land of Hyrule, or the Great Sea, or Termina, or whatever, behind, and decending down into the dark, or ascending upwards to the sky, and either way, walking into this sprawling maze, and feeling lost and confused, poking around, looking for clues as to what to do next, putting it together and figuring it out, and then doing it, making the dungeon click together and fall into place. And the dungeons in Wind Waker were not great. I don't regret playing it. It was fun. But I don't think I'll ever replay it.

Yet at the same time, I stand by my earlier statement that a game being easy, even too easy for me, doesn't make it bad. Nintendo deliberately designs their games to be playable by children, and that's a good thing. And I hate, and I do mean hate, the fact that I have actually seen "this is so easy it could be played by a child with brain damage" used as an insult for a game, because, having been a child with brain damage, for whom video games changed my life, children with brain damage deserve good gaming experiences too, and a game that's too easy for me might be perfect for someone else. More people need to learn how to say this game was too easy for me, and put it down without it being a value judgment. Wind Waker was a good game.

Wind Waker was a good game, and I would certainly never hesitate to give it to a brain damaged ten year old. But I found this experience an excellent reminder that whether or not a game connects with us, whether or not any piece of media connects with us, has a lot to do with who we are when we encounter it. I encountered Ocarina of Time when I needed it most, and it reshaped my brain exactly the way I needed it to. Would I come to Zelda for dungeons if that weren't the first Zelda game I came across when I was ten and needed dungeons? Maybe not. Would I have liked Wind Waker a lot better if I weren't expecting to get lost just a little bit? Yeah, probably. Is it unfair to keep comparing Wind Waker to Ocarina of Time? Sure, but it's inevitable.

Anyway, I have now played through every 3D Zelda except Twilight Princess, and that's next on my list to play.

[fiveandoh]

This is so interesting to me because I have a fantastic imagination/ability to visualize but cannot spatial memory my way out of a paper bag. The cable guy asked what side of the building my office was on—no idea. No clue my man. He had to actually go to the building and see for himself, I literally could not tell him.

Can’t Draw a Mental Picture? Aphantasia Causes Blind Spots in the Mind’s Eye

While people with aphantasia lack visual imagery ability, they have intact spatial memory. Findings suggest mental imagery recall and spatial memory may be stored differently in the brain.

[trans-li-ling]

Quick guide for newer players bc I feel like I see these questions a lot and the GC scrolls so fast it's hard to figure out the answers

under a readmore bc it got massive sorry

1. Ripples - there is no guaranteed way to spawn ripples, they appear at random from doing Sonic and Ritual Miracles. You'll most commonly find them while doing multibattles but I'm pretty sure they can spawn from singles. I've heard they have a 1/3% chance of spawning but I have no idea if that's confirmed.

2. If you want to at(@) someone in world chat go to their profile picture and hold it. Then check the typing space and their name should be there. It doesn't actually notify them but it's a little easier to spot.

3. Espers - Dhalia and Suhua are ripple exclusive, Melanie is only available from the club shop, and Lucas is only from completing the Spacial Tower (but is available to pull afterwards). The two event espers (Meredith and Aurelius) aren't available from pulls at the moment. You can get Aurelius from the shop but Meredith isn't going to be available for a while from what I've heard.

4. Starimon - promotion material. You can level them up but sometimes you shouldn't- for example, the ones you can get from Disassembling Espers are Level 30 Rare Starimon and (once per week) Level 40 Epic Starimon, which are both at the max level and ready to be promoted (promote them). Pay attention to the star rating because the background colors and names can be confusing. And don't level up Level 1 Epic Starimon. Promotion requires the same number of equivalent materials as the current star rank- a 3 star esper needs 3 3 star materials, a 4 star needs 4, and a 5 star needs five. Also always resonate espers before using them as materials because resonating gives a starimon of equivalent rarity.

5 - Relics - less of a question itself more of multiple building questions which come down to about the same thing. Relics have main and substats. First thing though is sell any 2 or 3 Star Relics, and sell most 4 Star Relics after early game. You will need the money.

5a. Relic main stats - sell any Square, Circle, or Spade Relics with flat stats (eg no percentage) EXCEPT FOR SPADE RELICS WITH SPEED. Spades are the only ones that can have that stat and it's very important.

5b. Substats - this is less hard and fast but generally I sell Relics with only 2/3 substats that have one or more flat stats. Unlike triangle diamond and hexagon Relics substats do not have to be flat, so if a relic has too many it's going to reduce the chance of upgrading more useful stats. Again this excludes Speed which is a VERY important stat.

6. AP and Speed - AP stands for Action Points and is measured (I've heard) 1 to 100 and is visually represented by the little progress bar with the esper icons. An esper's Speed stat affects how fast they gain AP, but some abilities also affect it. AP control is very important because it determines when you or your opponent can take your turns. It makes Point War a nightmare

7. I don't know if there's a way to turn of animations for the third skill I have never seen a definitive answer.

8. You get M-Coins from quests and they don't do anything besides give you bonus rewards from the M-Pass. Still worthwhile for free stuff but that's all they do.

I didn't expect for this to get so long but I hope this helps at least a bit! Feel free to ask questions if anything doesn't make sense.

[original-jade]

"Be present in each moment, lest you forget what makes life special."

Name: Aster (formally, unused) Nickname: Shadow Aliases: The Bound One Age: Unknown Pronouns: They/Them Origin: Outworld Universe: NRS based Affiliation: White Lotus Height: 5'7 Build: Lean muscle Hair: Dark brown, reaches the base of their shoulder blades. Usually pulled into a low ponytail. Eyes: Hazel, reflects more brown. Usually rimmed with dark, smokey eye shadow to hide exhaustion. Irises glow purple when using magic. Notable Features: Lightning-shaped webs of scars stretching from both wrists to the tip of each finger. Background: Shadow woke with no memories on Shang Tsung’s island at the start of the Mortal Kombat tournament. They couldn’t recall how they arrived there, what they were doing beforehand, or even anything about their life, but they did have knowledge of two futures that had come to pass before. Choosing to remain out of sight as much as possible, they began convincing individuals to take a different path to change this timeline’s chain of events and swearing them to secrecy. Only once Shao Kahn is destroyed do they make themself known to Earthrealm’s defenders as a whole. With only vague impressions of what may come after changing this reality’s path, Shadow helps train the kombatants while they find a place in this world and work to uncover their past. Abilities: Shadow shows a great talent for wielding magic, and though they do not remember all of their capabilities, muscle memory and instinct aid in the rediscovery of their abilities.

Enhanced physicality: Speed and strength capabilities surpass those of peak human condition due to Outworld physiology. Teleportation: Warping space to close the distance between two points. Visually appears as dissolving to and reforming from purple sparks of magic in the air. Item teleportation takes slightly more energy and concentration at minimum, scales with the size and amount of the items. Illusions: Warping space to leave an impression in the air. Visually appears as a purple aura outlining where the item would be. Full color illusions take moderate levels of energy and mid to high levels of concentration. Conjuration: Warping space to create a temporary physical object. Visually appears as a purple aura outlining where the item should be. Has limitations, such as only being temporary and not having the same properties as the conjured item (ie a conjured pen/pencil cannot write). Recreating texture (ie a conjured pillow being soft and giving way under touch) takes moderate levels of concentration. Can be used in battle for weapon and shield creation. Universal Windows: Using spacial magic to tap into the multiverse and view events of other universes. Can be made to appear in the air for others to see with moderate levels of energy and concentration at minimum, varies on size and duration of the window. Visually appears as a “screen” in the air outlined with a purple aura. Mimics: Copied abilities from individuals seen studied in person and through universal windows. Purple aura forms around the user in the shape of the individual being mimicked, including weapons. Damage type and amount dealt follows the original ability. Can be used for full shapeshifting, voice included, with mid to high levels of energy and high levels of concentration. Intersectional Doorways: Extremely dangerous. Cracking space around universal windows to link two realities together for a few moments in order to travel between them. Discovered by accident, not proficient. Results in complete energy drain.

[firespirited]

Learning to touch-type has hit a snag: caps require knowing left and right. I can get a decent 22 wpm in all lower-case, but caps takes a two second delay to register which finger will reach for the letter and reach out with the opposite little finger for the shift key. Zero spacial awareness and still no ability to visualize the keyboard means I need to learn the capitals as double sensory gestures just like the original letters. Practising is helping a little but I think I need to write a custom script to enter into a typing program to learn them from scratch and by finger combos (as seen below).

On azerty, the period is in the same place as qwerty (middle finger down) but a cap. Very tempting to remove the fingers from position and press pinky and middle on the right hand but then you’ve lost your place.