#I did make a whole map for it with a lot of npcs and where they live and what each little town is like so…

[szkicel]

I’m working on a pinned post, where I want to include a short description for each of my major project so it’ll be easier to navigate my characters, bc a big shock - I also have projects that aren’t about bugs lol (tho you know damm well that I will try to implement them somehow anyway jhbdjhbd)

I thought about also mentioning minor projects that I have in the background and which aren’t that well developed yet, but ngl the list is literally like „a hamster metroidvania” or „dystopian central europe” bc they’re THAT underdeveloped, so I decided I’m not gonna bother unless you ppl will ask me to talk about it lol

[heartless-tate]

Hi! If I may be so self indulgent and request something... 👉🏻👈🏻

Reader being a (for lack of better words) boring person. They're good at blending in within social circles but never standing out or having a circle or friend of their own. Good laughing at jokes but can't come up with good ones or even if they did, they don't have the courage to tell them outright. They're very much a chicken when it comes to expressing themselves as an individual because they're never comfortable enough around anyone. They are a chicken in general, to be honest. This essentially (and sadly) leaves them as an NPC in their own life. And they've accepted it, trying to come to terms with a life of extreme mediocrity. They're actively trying to push down any need of wanting more from life 99% of days.

However, when you're good at listening, you observe things much better and you learn things faster. And subconsciously, reader has been observing a lot of things about Velaris (including the IC). I'm not sure where this would lead but this is probably the only real skill they have; being a good observer and learner.

I leave the rest to you. I was thinking pairing them with Azriel (since he would probably understand her better) but I'm open to any modifications.

Also, just an afterthought, I've always wondered what job I would love to have in a fantasy world (and I don't know if this counts as an actual job) but something like observing the sky/stars to look for any forthcoming events sounds really cool. So I guess reader could do that since major events happen don't happen once in a hundred years or something which ultimately makes their job very boring. However, they love it because who wouldn't love spending their whole night star-gazing (potential date idea?? YESS).

Sorry this became way longer than I intended. I wouldn't judge if you chose not to write on it. Thanks & have a great day :)

Am I boring? | Azriel X boring F reader

A/N: Hiii! Tysm for your ask. I hope I captured what you were imagining right. 💖

summary: You’re a star mapper. And you’re boring with no hope of love. Or at least you believed that until Azriel came along.

1.2k words

warnings: no use of y/n, she/her pronouns, cussing??, romance?? That’s it?? I think?

The stars shined brighter tonight. Since you were a little girl, you had always been fascinated by them. How they sparkled. They were interesting, and beautiful- unlike you. Maybe that’s why you clung onto them.

You pulled a piece of parchment from your bag, and started mapping the stars. Rhysand, the highlord of the night court, had invited you to his court to observe and map stars from this  part of the world. You accepted, wanting some change. Even if you knew it wouldn’t be much of a difference to you. The inner circle was more than nice to you, and you appreciated it.

Laughter bubbled from behind you. You currently sat with your telescope on the balcony of the House of Wind. This was your third week here. Rhysand had offered you a permanent place here in the night court, but you were yet to accept. You didn’t fit in. You were a background character. A random star mapper, a job would probably never be much of use to anyone. Except weird star fanatics. Aka you. You were sure he only offered you a place here because of pity.

The inner circle seemed to really like you, and whether that was because of your quiet and shy nature, or the fact you always listened and gave great advice, or the fact you always laughed to try and fit in even if you didn’t quite understand the joke, you didn’t know. The only one who seemed to see past your mask of people pleasing was the Shadowsinger.

Anytime you ‘laughed’ at Cassian’s jokes, he was always there, smirking with a known look at you. As if he knew you. As if he had known you your whole life. Azriel had seemed curious about you. It was uncomfortable. Nobody had ever been curious about you. Everyone always enjoyed someone that they could talk to about themselves for hours. But he was the one always interrupting the other members of the inner circle to question you, on you. And your own life. And sadly you didn’t have many answers other than, “oh I don’t know.”

It made you feel weird at how interested he seemed in you. It made you feel awkward. But you knew he would lose interest once he really discovered there wasn’t actually much to you. You were a bore.

“Those stars are named Arktos, Carynth, and Oristes. They shine above that mountain for a week once a year during the blood rite.” A voice said beside you. You flinched as you noticed Azriel sitting directly by you, his shadows swirling around you both. He was always appearing out of nowhere. He handed you a plate of cake.

“Courtesy of Elain. She baked dessert tonight.” Azriel said, lifting a bite of his cake to his mouth and chewing on it.

“Oh.” You responded, setting the plate down beside you. You quickly labeled the stars on your parchment. They were beautiful.

“Do you like cake?” He questioned.

You paused and stared blank at him.

“I’m not sure?” You responded, fiddling with your hands. “It’s okay, I guess.”

Azriel smiled at you knowingly. Loud laughter boomed from the room behind you two. He looked right at you with piercing amber eyes that seemed annoyed. As if he had noticed you flinching from the loud sounds.

“Come with me? Just trust me.” He whispered, grasping your hand gently with caution. It was sudden. And you weren’t sure. You didn’t know him much. How could you trust him? But something in your body and soul screamed yes. Why not? It was risky- but life was boring.

“Okay.” You responded, gasping as he pulled you close, his wings wrapping you close to him, and his shadows swarming around you both before all of a sudden you were now standing on a cliff. Oh gods. His hands were on your hips gently, his wings spread wide, letting you see the view.

You both stood on a cliff that overlooked a waterfall and river. The moon reflected in the water and the stars did too, creating a mirror effect. It was probably the most gorgeous sight you had ever seen.

“Its- it’s…” Your words fumbled, mouth open in shock. “Beautiful..” you whispered. His breath was hot against your ear.

“Very.” He whispered back. When you looked at him he wasn’t even looking at the view. His eyes were glued on you. And he was looking at you as if you were a goddess. Azriel’s eyes softened, with adoration. It scared you. Nobody had ever looked at you like that. With a blush you realized he was holding you like a lover. He smirked at you as if knowing you just realized it.

Azriel slowly let go and used his wing to guide you to turn around. Blankets and pillows were on the ground. Like a picnic but a nest. His shadows swirled excitedly around the set up. He guided you gently to the set up, helping you sit down before sitting beside you.

“Do you want your mapping materials? My shadows can retrieve them for you. I wasn’t sure if you’d want to just relax and enjoy this night or continue star mapping.” He murmured.

You thought for a second. This was odd. Was this a date? Or did he do this with all of his friends? Did you want to map or did you want to enjoy this night with him?

“No it’s okay.” You replied, eyes glued to the stars above. They were much clearer from this view then from the House of Wind. You guess the city lights blurred them out. But here? They were in their full glory.

“Why did you bring me here?” He seemed to pause before responding. 

“My shadows told me you might be leaving soon. This is my attempt at convincing you to stay here. In the night court. With your mate.” Azriel confessed.

He watched your eyebrows furrow.

“Mate? I don’t have a mate-“ you panicked.

His wings cocooned you and his arm enveloped you. It was like he could sense your panic. He rocked you back and forth like a child. And it was comforting.

“I’m your mate. I’ve known since I’ve met you. I thought I would have more time to get to know you and the bond would snap for you, but then my shadows informed me of your soon departure.”

You swallowed, throat bobbing. You blinked a few times. “There isn’t anything about me to get to know.” You replied harshly. Azriel’s eyebrows furrowed with concern. Shadows swirled around you both, some tendrils caressing you.

“Don’t say that. I know it isn’t true. Everyday I learn something new about you. I don’t care what you say, you are the most interesting person I’ve ever met.” He said, words much louder and firmer now. He thinks you’re interesting?

“Stay. Stay with me. Let me get to know you. I don’t expect you to accept the bond anytime soon. But give me- give us a chance.” Azriel said, wings tightening around you both. His eyes bore into you, with a fierce and loving look in them. You couldn’t help but soften in his hold.

You realized then, you deserved love. And for once a belonging feeling overwhelmed your senses.

“I’ll stay.”

Hope you guys enjoyed 💗

[emo-crowgirl]

I guess this could count as a continuation my whole “Miko being a glitch and somehow reverting into a root form” post. Because I did a lot more thinking on Glitch!Miko-focused scenarios and just: What happens if Miko were to encounter something that also originated from her game. Ranging from an npc to an item to an enemy.

Because ignoring any kind of “Miko Encounters Herself” scenario, just imagine.

Like for an item, sure Miko would probably be drawn to it immediately, especially if it’s something that her game equivalent uses. Glitches act on their code and even if Miko is Sentient/Sapient, consciously or not her game code will definitely at least influence her.

But what if it’s an item that Miko CANT use. Like say that Miko’s game has some kind of class system and Miko’s class isn’t meant to use a specific weapon, or Miko herself originates from an enemy or NPC and therefore simply can’t use any weapons that the player would pick up, because entities that aren’t the player can’t pick up and use the player’s stuff. They just aren’t programmed to be able to do it.

For a real world equivalent or items from any other glitch, Miko’s fine. Her programming doesn’t care because there’s nothing in her code telling her that she can’t pick this thing up, plus Miko is obviously not a regular glitch. She’s Sapient and clearly capable of at least somewhat defying her programming. Or maybe her code literally does not recognize this glitch item because it’s not explicitly from her game of origin. Glitches are good at effectively ad-libbing or ignoring stuff like that.

But then Miko sees some item from her own game, and her code can TELL. Miko may or may not recognize it, maybe some deja vu, but her code knows exactly what it is and exactly how Miko is and isn’t supposed to interact with it. It could range from a complete mental block where Miko can’t get herself interact with it because her code is subconsciously preventing it, to Miko managing to pick it up, only for her code to freak out and start breaking down because it has no idea how to handle this scenario that according to it, should be impossible. Maybe the item can also tell, it’s also a glitch with its own programming, and just doesn’t let Miko touch it. Sliding away from her, doing it’s best to get the fuck out of Miko’s hands if she manages to pick it up, and also proceeding to freak out and break down if Miko holding it is such an crash-causing event.

And then there’s stuff like how characters from Miko’s game would interact with her. If Miko’s a player controlled character, enemies would probably zero in on her immediately, because even if there’s other techs around, they are literally MADE to fight Miko specifically. If she’s an enemy or boss the same goes for glitches of the player character(s). Or if she’s an NPC, who knows? Characters may not be able to interact with her at all. Enemies ignoring her because they were never programmed to attack NPCs, player characters unable to harm her because they were only programmed to speak to her, etc.

(Then again, Glitches DO seem to be able to ad-lib and operate just barely outside the normal restraints of their code if they need to, for example dialogue like Count Nogrog altering his single player dialogue to use plurals when dealing with two players or Team-Enter-Name creating dialogue on the fly when interacting with what they think is a regular map, so the glitch could just reclassify Miko as an enemy/player if they need to, but still).

But that also applies to Miko. She could see an enemy from her old game and go ballistic. Don’t even know if she’d even be aware of what she’s doing or if the sentient part of her just blacks out and whatever old programming she has buried beneath the parts of code that make her Miko takes over for a bit. Or she could see an enemy/player character/NPC and just. Not be able to harm them. She can harm other glitches, but her programming actively prevents her from harming something that according to it, should be impossible for her to harm in her original game.

[jean-dieu]

Dragon age the Veilguard: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Don't expect too much there, I'm just writing my own subjective, non-organized, badly written critic of the game. Spoilers ahead, so be warned!

The Good is the good stuff, The Bad is the bad stuff that isn't too jarring or that doesn't threaten the whole setting so much so it's okay to just ignore them, and The Ugly is the bad stuff that DOES make me want to fucking die and explode.

The Good:

-It's beautiful. Not a fan of a lot of design choices but it's obviously well made. The landscapes are very pretty.

-The character creator. It's always funny to me when I see some dudebros complaining about it as if they're not purposefully making ugly characters. It has quite a lot of option, nice skin details, scars, tattoos and all.

-I really like the combat. I still think DAO is the superior system but I'm much more happy with a true action rpg than whatever Inquisition was trying to do.

-I'm going to be more objective there and say the maps are better than Inquisition. THAT BEING SAID I love the Hinterlands so I still prefer Inquisiton's bloated open world lmao.

-There's a lot of nice details all around! Neve's metallic prothesis walking sound, the decorations all around, tears in character's eyes, ect.

-Solas. Can't believe I'm saying it as I didn't like him much in DAI and I don't like Solavellan but DATV made me like him very much. He's much more morally grey and less uwu wet cat and I'm here for that. Excellent voice acting of course.

-Mythal. Again, I love whatever Solas and Mythal have going on. It's toxic, it's passionate, it's one sided, and Mythal is a very interesting character IMO.

-Felassan. Again, such a cool and compelling character.

-A lot of NPCs were very cool. Antoine who's singlehandly saving the French's reputation, Evka, The Viper, Strife, Viago, Teia, etc. They're cool and rather compelling.

-I did enjoy a lot of the companion's personal quests. Davrin and Bellara especially as they felt more in line with Dragon Age in general.

-For a game where the Bad Guys are Comically Evil... Johanna Hezenkoss fits the bill and yet she's a delight.

-There's really cool codex entries. Irelin's letter about mourning Arlathan for example. Antoine's letter to Evka should he ever be Called.

-Ghilahn'ain's design.

-I liked the living Blight! OK the darkspawns were ugly af but I still really enjoyed the idea.

-I actually liked the puzzles lmao? I'm sorry but I usually find puzzles fucking annoying in that type of game so I'd rather have something easy and fun than scratching my head in a rpg.

-I was glad to see Valta again!

The Bad: (vaguely in order of importance)

-Unpopular opinion but Assan and Manfred felt forced af. Yeah I got it, they're cute... Now can we go back on uh, the apocalypse.

-The music is boring. Fuck man Inquisition and Origins musics make me cry, but Veilguard's main them... Exists.

-I would prefer the companion to be stationary and being able to talk to them whenever want. They tried something but it didn't deliver.

-The fuck is Inky wearing.

-The fuck is Isabela wearing, but racist edition. Oh well. At least it's an easy fix with a mod.

-The companions have potential but they often lack something. I wish we got more than Lucanis liking coffee. Also, some characters concept from the art book felt so much more interesting. The only character I REALLY was interested in was Davrin because he feels very dragon age-y. A Dalish Grey Warden! That's interesting!

-The Lore seems alright and coherent with the serie so far, but it was just lore drops after lore drops, with no time for reactions, and your companions being sometimes waaaaay too chill about it.

-The overall sanitazing of the world while the grim stuff still somehow being there regarding Tevinter. It's very close to be in the Ugly category but because it's supposed to be there, I'm encline to believe it's still canon and not a retcon, and just a poor presentation. Where are the slaves? We see some of course, and some stuff were legitimately jarring... But because we're confined in docktowns, we don't get to see the ruling magisters and slavers. Docktowns almost seem... Nice. But it doesnt stop there. The Lords of Fortune not stealing artifacts because they respect cultures. The Crows being patriotic vigilantes. Lucanis being a mage killer but only for evil tevene magisters.

-I understand the impossibility to be Evil as you're recruited by Varric and he wouldn't have recruited the local serial killer that drowns kitties for fun. But... You should be able to be aggressive, stern, serious and all. You should be able to play a no-nonsense character who is authoritative and assertive while still following the plot.

-Again, I understand the companions being healthier than whatever DA2 crew had going on (love them tho) but it should have been more like Inquisition. People working together and forcing themselves to make it work for the sake of the world YET fighting and disagreeing on plenty of subjects. And Rook should be able to tell the companion to stfu sometimes. To tell Taash that they're an ass. To tell Emmerich you don't give a shit about his magic and that Manfred is fucking weird and shouldn't exist. To tell Bellara to stop whining.

-On the same note, the companions are all WAY too nice. One their own they're alright, but none of them have some true flaws/secrets/dark past/opposing convictions or whatever. Davrin and Lucanis are almost the only one who are arguing and fighting a bit but it's very tame. We never hear them arguing over politics, religion, or even ways of doing things (except for food lol. why is this game so much about food). If you take Inquisition for example, the companions are ALL working together in the face of a Ancient Evil threatening Thedas. Yet, they still argue about plenty of things. Solas and Iron Bull about the Qun. Vivienne and Solas about the existence of Circles. Varric and Cassandra's fighting is ruthless even when it's about nothing important. Try to show your pride as a Dalish to Sera and she won't take it well. Tell Cassandra that you don't give a shit about the Chantry and she'll disapprove. And still, these persons managed to work together. The excuse of "They put their differences aside because of the current threat" doesn't hold. The companions don't necessarily need DA2's level of animosity between them, but they don't need to all be best friends forever second one. Bellara could be suspicious of Neve for the sole reason of her being a Tevinter Mage. Lucanis too ("Mage Killer"!!!), but because he doesn't trust magic at all. Davrin and Bellara could argue about what it means to be Dalish to them, or argue about their faith!! EVERYONE Should be more worried about Lucanis being an abomination, damn it!

-I understand the Crows we see are not the one experiencing the worst of the organisation since they're highranking members but c'mon... It should be acknowledged at least.

-Some of the dialogues are fucking awful especially at the begining. They repeat themselves so much. The scene with "Nooo Rook you need to help us resolve our problems otherwise we will be too weak to fight the gods!! Rook, do my personal quests or I'll be too sad to fight!!". Harding's "Awkwaaaard". Bellara's quirky uwu manic pixie girl vibes at the begining.

The Ugly:

-Anything related to the elves. For a game centered on elven gods... We get so much yet nothing. Why are they all more or less cool about their "Gods" being real and evil? No one freaking out about having Elgarnan's vallaslin on their face? No crisis of faith? No elves joining them, really? Not a single one? No dalish celebrating their return before realizing the awful truth? No city elves or elven slaves fleeing to them because they have nothing to lose anyway? That's unrealistic. I can understand the Veil Jumpers already knowing the truth, it's more or less explained in the books anyway, but there's no way it's commonly accepted among all dalish clans. Speaking of dalish clans, were are they? And Briala ? Didn't she also control the Eluvian? What about city elves in general? And elven slaves? There's just nothing. The elven pantheon wasn't some myths for the Dalish. It was a religion. Their religion. Damn, imagine Christians learning Jesus is coming back BUT he's in fact very evil and is launching nuclear weapons everywhere? And their only reaction is "Oh no, we have to stop Jesus :(" ? I'm taking the christian example but you could say that about pretty much every religion.

-Where are Fen'harel agents? A few lines and one or two NPC mentioning Solas parting ways with them or even making the Veil Jumpers the ex-agents left behind would have been SO much more interesting than whatever they justified in the AMA. I can't believe they didn't even put A CODEX ENTRY explaining their absence in game. That's lazy af.

-No repercussion on the elves AT ALL? Seriously, realistically speaking, what is the future for the elves at the end of DATV? "Their" Gods almost destroyed the world, "Their" Gods killed countless, "Their" Gods created the Blight, "Their" Gods that many dalish still worshipped only a few years ago. What do you mean humans aren't going to declare open season on them? Like OF COURSE I don't want that to happen, and I'm hoping that idk, they'll found their own country in a reclaimed Arlathan, or that the instability in the south allows some of them to grab positions of power but don't tell me the humans aren't going to feel so fucking justify in their hatred, especially towards the Dalish who never converted to the Chantry. The fact that the endgame doesn't mention ANYTHING about it is jarring. Bioware ffs drop a book or whatever soon I need answers. I need hope. The game is treating the racism against Elves as... Some prejudices humans soooometimes have against them and not... centuries of systematic oppression, genocide, cultural erasure. The City Elf origins, Chevaliers killing Alienage elves for funsies, Celene burning down a whole Alienage, the genocide of dalish clans anyone? All of this is stuff that happened like... Between 8 and 20 years ago. It's not ancient history.

-Blighting Ferelden Beyond Repair, the Venatori Coup in Orlais and Kirkwall's evacuation was mean. Of cours the South is dealing with the blight and a shitload of problem but the "we lost Denerim. And Redcliff. And anything really. Idk if there's survivors. But if there is they'll starve anyway. xoxo the Inky." was just mean spirited I'm sorry. Same as above, Bioware. I fucking need hope for the South. Anything really. They could have stopped as "Yo there's a big Blight in the south and it sucks, Denerim is struggling and we lost villages and all" and that would have been FINE. No need to go scorched earth damnit.

-The lack of worldstate choices. C'mon. I understand not having a lot of them but a list of 6-10 easy questions would have been nice. Who's Divine? Who's ruling in the South? Who drank from the Well of Sorrow? It wouldn't have asked much work to just personalize a few sentences to adjust that. Also, saying they only kept 3 choices so they could really mean something... Liar. The only thing that really has an impact is did u date solas or not. Which fine, of course it matters! But all the other romances, the inquisition disbanded or not, stopping solas or not had NO IMPACT whatsoever.

-Where the fuck is Fenris. Idgaf Inquisition had Leliana when she could die in DAO, so bring Fenris in the Shadow Dragon. He needs to be there.

-The Antaam is such a fucking racist trope I can't believe they did it. Yeah, let make them growl like damn animals.

-Speaking of Qunari, even Taash is... Urgh. Why do you mean they sniff people. Also, their whole storyline on their gender identity was badly written. That scene with Isabela... No. That's not how you apologize. You misgender someone by mistake? Say sorry, correct yourself, move on. That's it.

-Dwarves had cool moments in the game but dang, we really, REALLY needed more of it. So many revelation about them, and while some of them were very well written, it doesn't have enough impact.

-The absence of reactions and dialogues related to your race is jarring. Can't believe I'm begging the game for racial slurs but here we are. EVERYONE in Origins commented on you playing an Elf. A non-human Inquisitor faced struggles as the Herald. Why is Qunari Rook able to roam freely in Minrathous without a SINGLE comment on their race? Same for the elves, to a lesser degree since at least they are not a rare occurence in Tevinter. Can't believe dwarves get so little reaction for all the big reveals. Can't believe elves barely get to react to ELVEN GODS destroying the world or Bellara's guilt about it.

-WHERE'S THE CHANTRY. WHERE. DAMN IT. Even if it's not the focus of the game, I'd expect to still see its influence. Man I'm almost wishing Harding was more of a Chantry Girl.

-Morrigan's whole storyline is an insult to her character.

[i-rate-horse-games]

rating Horse Life on Roblox

i made a roblox account just to play this game, and i’m glad i did. this game is what Horse Isle 3 wishes it was.

gameplay: horse breeding!!! FAST horse breeding!! not limitless, but not paywalled! there are in-app purchases, but i barely noticed them the whole time i was playing. there’s little quests to complete in order to unlock the ability to tame cooler horse-like species, and while doing them you get a better feel of what the game is all about. there’s tons of coat variation, size variation, and there’s always the chance for spontaneous mutations to show up and grant your horse 10% extra speed, jumping ability, wings!? wings that have different levels to them, and at which level 3 allows you to fully fly around the map? the coat variations don’t seem to have to do with genetics, which is a little annoying when you breed a black and white horse with an Orange horse and you get a poor foal that looks like a moldy jack-o-lantern got trampled into mush. there’s a cosmetic challenge, where you try to breed a horse that matches the one on display, which i feel like is a challenge some of you guys would love!

you can catch horses two ways, by lassoing it on horseback or by feeding it by hand, which presents you with a fun little minigame sorta like that locks task in among us that most people don’t like but that i love because i got rhythm muahahah. you can breed any two horses together, even horses that are different species, although the offspring will always be just one species and fertile. after you breed two horses together, your mare will only be pregnant for about four and a half hours, which you can just completely skip for free by feeding them whatever food you foraged while training your horse’s strength stats! and then you can just. Keep Going until you run out of food or stable space. and you can upgrade stable space and inventory space just by playing the game, for free! love that!

also, you can play as the horse, which makes for some funny interactions. i just tried to tame a horse who i think was a person because i couldn’t feed them and they kept shaking their head at me. but . i’m also not SURE that it wasn’t a wild horse. it was acting perfectly like a wild horse. oh man. no i think that was just a normal horse. but what if

between catching wild horses, breeding your own, and training them to raise foals into adults or just make your favorite mount even tougher, this game has a lot to offer! there’s a few NPCs to talk to every day to level up their bond, there’s giant statues and ruins that allude to a mysterious past, and there’s even a centaur ominously standing on the edge of the map, gazing out over the ocean. and the game isn’t even finished! recently it got an update that allows you to fish for kelpies (water horsies) with a fishing rod, making them slightly easier to find. there are a few buildings in town that have almost nothing in them but are clearly intended to be a saloon and a jail, so i’m interested in seeing where that goes! i’m also curious if they will ever fix the fact that if you walk into the ocean you just instantly plummet through the world & teleport back to town, or if you’re lucky (like mee) you’ll respawn underneath town on the secret Second Floor, which you can then fall from and get stuck in an unceasing loop, watching your home slip away from under your feet, your poor horse falling after you, over and over and over again. that’s just part of the magic, honestly, no complaints there. it was fun. i’ll do it again.

also while i was playing, they launched an update that adds horse races! it's a fun little mariokart-ish loop that lets you lap your opponents, and winning gives you fun prizes! they called me the horse king in college

one small thing is that the in-game not-paid currency is in these horseshoe coins, but in the shop if something costs more than 1,000 coins, they’ll abbreviate it as… 1.5k $ .   dollar sign. that’s a little odd, but alright. when i was a kid I had an ipad for exactly 1 night before i accidentally spent $50 of my parent’s real money to unlock giraffes in a zoo game. i remember hesitating at the sudden shift from in-game coins to dollar signs, then thinking “surely this isn’t real money! nobody would spend fifty real dollars to buy giraffes in a zoo game!” and then i clicked it and got in trouble lol

playerbase: chat tends to stay pretty quiet, except for when two players who are already friends come online and use the global chat like their own dms. i saw many references to playing while in the car & someone bragging about staying all the way up until 10pm so safe to say most of these people are ipad kids. i was impressed with the amount of organization before one of the spirit totem summonings, an hourly event where players work together to win goodies. 

they were shouting out directions to new players, suggesting which lassos to use, reminding everyone to turn off the Show Player Horses setting so that we wouldn’t lag and disconnect in the middle of the fight. when i neighed in the chat eventually people started neighing back. i only saw one person being slightly annoying and it was just kinda funny. there is a chat filter but i can’t tell if there’s any active moderation or anything. you do have the ability to report players, and that goes through Roblox, not the horse game, so that’s probably good. Internet Safety! also if you look up questions about the game most of what comes up are tiktok videos which is a first for me lol

graphics: pretty! low-polyish so it loads nicely but colorful and feels right for the setting. there’s just the right amount of Stuff in the world for it to feel filled but not crowded. whenever the day/night cycle or weather changes, the whole world quickly switches lighting effects, but not all at once. it sorta rolls over the map. but things that are far away look bluer! nice touch. love it

music: a very short loop that got old fast, but it lets you turn off just the music in settings and still keep the lovely ambiance! i always really appreciate this setting. i wish splatoon 3 would let me do this. i play that game so much i have every battle track seared into my memory. but this isn’t really a part of rating a game lol i just like to mention it in case a game has really great music that i can add to my Horsey Time playlist. what the game does have is ambient bird noises which i LOVE. that’s a W from me

all things considered, i’m rating horse life on roblox FIVE OUT OF FIVE STARS!

★★★★★

this is the first 5/5 horse game i’ve rated!! that puts it above alicia online which is kinda funny.

here’s me with the largest and smallest horses i’ve bred so far!

side notes: why does roblox stop me from naming my player character “butch” but not “butchy”? no one else can see what i named it, it’s just so i can quick change faster. also, that means that their filter doesn’t search for words inside words, which isn’t a great system. also, butch is also a name? also, what’s wrong with butch? i did try playing this on my old 5th generation ipad to try and get the Roblox Kid experience, but my ipad wasn’t strong enough. it got a memory full warning before it crashed and felt concerningly warm, which it’s never done before, so that’s neat!

[snapscube]

What are you most looking forward to about the Final Sonic tonight?

(Also, optional bonus question, I remember back in the day you would talk about your ideas for an open world sonic game. Would you say frontiers adequately scratched that itch? I haven't played it myself and I was shrimply curious)

(HI PEACH!!)

I HONESTLY THINK i’m mostly looking forward to the NEW CHARACTER WRITING and getting to PLAY AS AMY most of all!!!! plus i’m also just rlly excited about the prospect of getting to return to such a HIT STREAM PLAYTHROUGH for one last hurrah!!!

as for ur second question i can definitely say that while Frontiers does a lot to get CLOSE to that “dream open world sonic game” i always used to rattle on about, its not 100% of the way there. the design philosophy is very different, its more of an open-area collectathon whereas my dream game would be closer to like… platformer RPG? basically the primary changes they’d have to make would be:

- an open world environment that is more seamlessly integrated with platforming challenges, so not as many disparate floating rails and boxes just In The Sky Forever. make the same structures out of like… branches, caves, the sides of full buildings, phone lines, etc

- connect the zones together into a larger, singular map. add a lot more points of interest and FULL TOWNS. NPCs, shops, secrets, the whole nine yards

- a more expansive quest system with like, Yakuza-style substories where u learn about the world as well as Sonic’s relation to these communities through small vignettes and hijinks

- hide the chaos emeralds and put them behind like, Assassins’s Creed Catacomb style dungeons throughout the world that are not marked on the map and test ur platforming and combat abilities to earn all 7 emeralds.

I would just want a lot more story, a lot more character, and a bit more of a cohesive world design. BUT this would also result in a very different game overall! I can definitely see why they went in the direction they did, they very much want Sonic to be an ACTION GAME first and foremost, which is super fair.

[lynxtheserval]

Can i request Self-awake! Yandere! Illumina x player! reader? reader main sword

deadass kinda hard to write with limited information so I'm so sorry if it's bad or ooc!

Also! This wasn't the best writing I've done so I'm so sorry for that, but schools been hella crazy ngl

Might do a part 2 if y'all want , but it might take a while to make haha

Self-Aware!Yan!Illumina x player!reader

(TW: not as hard on the yandere aspects, but still a tw for stalking (kinda), kidnapping (also kinda), and curse words)

It was a normal day for you, at first at least. You got up, went to your classes in college, went back to your dorm, and played a Roblox game for a little while. You played Slap Battles for a good moment or two until you got bored of slapping children off a cliff with your overpowered paid glove. You then got back onto your favorites page, and saw a game you haven't played in like… a week.

Phighting.

It seems it got some sort of update, because the game icon changed to… some sorta deity looking thing. You didn't know much about the lore, you were mostly just playing the game for the gameplay. You had no idea what or who the icon was showing, but you went into the game without a second thought.

It loaded up like normal, same old music, same old map, same old characters… seems like nothing much has changed.

So you picked your main, Sword, and got into the game. You went to where Zuka was, pressing all the buttons you needed to get into the game.

It loaded.

And loaded.

And loaded.

Why the hell was it taking so long?

You started getting a little frustrated, and made an audible sigh of annoyance. You tried to close the game, but.. you couldn't? You went to the task manager, and tried closing Roblox from there, but Roblox didn't even show up! In fact.. nothing did. Your computer was messed up. You tried to turn off the computer as a whole, but surprise surprise, it didn't turn off.

“What the fuck..?” You murmured.

Then your computer froze completely. You tried clicking every button, tried turning it off AGAIN, and anything you could think of, until the computer suddenly unfroze.

You looked back up at the screen, and you saw you were.. still in Phighting, somehow. You were still in Crossroads, But every other player was gone, and all the NPCs were too, you were alone.

“What the hell..?” You decided to look around the map, or the middle part of Crossroads at least.

Then you saw something in the chat. A name in purple-ish white text. A name reading: Illumina.

“Hello, I've been waiting for your arrival, Y/n.”

It.. it knew your name. Not your username, but your ACTUAL FUCKING NAME. Your own computer doesn't even know your own name! You use your username for everything!

You managed to type in the chat:

“Hello? How do you know my name?”

“I know a lot about you, my dear. Now why don't you come meet me face to face, hm?”

Your computer froze again. Then, out of nowhere, your body started hurting, your ears started ringing, your eyes got blurry, your head started aching, it felt like you were dying. You soon passed out.

You woke up startled. You quickly sat up, but your head didn't seem to be feeling too great. Once your vision calmed down and you were able to see again, you looked around at where you were. You seemed to be in some brightly lit white room with no door and no windows. You got up from the oddly comfortable bed you woke up in and stood up. And with a thud, you fell onto the floor, your legs giving up on you.

“You won't be able to walk for a few hours, Y/N. So stop trying.”

You heard a voice, intimidating and masculine in nature. You looked up towards the voice.

A man, or what looks to be a man, was looking down at you. A bright figure, with one wing, dressed in mostly flowy clothes. He was wearing mostly white, but had a hint of purple in his outfit as well. Not to mention, one purple horn protruding from the left side of his head, with two other small horns coming out of the main one.

You moved to try to get up again but before you could, the man picked you up, and placed you back on the bed. You both made eye contact, his eyes… they were completely white, and bright, they seemed like they would blind you if you looked in them too long. He took notice of this, and smiled slightly.

“Good morning, love. Are you feeling okay? Humans.. I do not know if they handle world transportation well.”

“I.. who.. who are you..?” You managed to ask, it was hard for you to talk, it seemed.

“I am Illumina, and you are Y/N, such a lovely name.”

He placed a pale hand on your cheek, and laughed a little when you tried to pull away. You were confused, and scared, but you felt so.. weak, that you didn't have enough energy to push back too hard.

“Y/N, do not worry. I’ll take good care of you.”

“Wh..what do you mean..? Wh..where am I..?”

“You're home.”

[chacaillejdr]

How to write a location for your TTRPG

An important, and for some people fastidious, part of writing a TTRPG scenario is to fill the universe. Some improvise this part, and I admire them (from afar, they scare me), but others like me need to prepare things. I suggested in a previous article some techniques to write NPCs, let me share here a few others to write places, you never know, it might come handy.

Before even starting to look at individual places, a technique that I really like and that helps a lot for players' immersion, and for giving a coherence to your universe, is the regionalization technique. It consists in dividing your universe in zones (regions, city districts, or even time periods or sociological groups) and give each a few minor characteristics. For example the houses in a given region are built from a local ochre stone, little pale blue flowers grow in another, architects from a given time period always placed the kitchen on the left just after the front door, or people from a given origin use furniture from a recognizable style.

These are purely cosmetic elements, but for one they’ll regroup your places as part of the same world, and then they’ll give you substance to fill your descriptions in a credible and easy way.

Once the regionalization is done, let’s focus on individual places. The first thing to do is to determine what is the function of your place, to place it in one of three categories : the passage location, the quest location and the recurring location.

The passage location is a place that only serves as a background for a one-off scene, for example a shop or a campsite. Your focus point for this type of place is its atmosphere. You must describe it to your players for their immersion’s sake, but mustn't dwell on it lest they might get distracted from the scene. I’ll give you advice that would make a lot of literary professors’ blood boil : use chichés. You want to build an ambiance in a few words ? That’s what stock expressions are for. Why describe a whole waterfront when “Dream beach with coconut trees” exists ? Or “Dusty crypt” ? Or “Cutthroat alley” ? Just sprinkle a bit of regionalization on it, and it will even become a unique place !

I’d tell you not to abuse clichés but… on a larger scale don’t abuse passage places. You’d get a very generic and blank universe if you did.

Now let’s see the quest location. It’s a place where a challenge occurs (puzzle, NPC discussion, battle, even a whole dungeon). While the passage location focused on the ambiance, here you’ll have to prioritize the gameplay. You have to determine what will serve the challenge, and only then will you be able to furnish the environment. Will your NPCs move on walkways over a chasm ? Will there be acid lakes around them ? Are rocks flying in the air ? Those are the main elements of your background.

Once you have your gameplay elements, the trick to avoid pulling your players out of immersion is to make them coherent in your universe. Why is the place built like this ? Is it realistic for the function it carries ? How does it work ? You actually only have to answer one level of precision, it is enough to maintain the immersion. The walkways over the chasm may decay rapidly and be difficult to repair, so their great number may be a redundancy and the players will find them at different degradation states. The acid lakes may be a natural resource and extraction equipment can be spotted since the prices for this specific acid are high on the market. The flying rocks may have a glowing mushroom growing on their underside, giving them their antigravity properties. Not only will this enrich your universe, but it may also give ideas to your PCs to exploit the environment and, in the end, play with your world instead of just going through it. Another pinch of regionalization and you’re good !

One last tip specifically about dungeons : if you don’t use a battlemap covering all of it… then don’t make a map at all ! It will only lengthen the exploration part of your adventure without giving anything to your players. It will be easier to make a logigram, with blocks for every important room and lines to connect them. It would also allow you to make your dungeon modular to adapt it to your players’ choices (and avoid backtracking if they missed something !), after all you want them to have fun, not lose them or waste their time.

Finally, on to the last category : the recurring location. This is a place where PCs might have to come back several times, to meet with important NPCs for example, or because a lot of crucial points of the scenario happen here. The main characteristic of this kind of place is to be recognizable, and to make vivid memories.

Those are the places you’ll have to write with the most care, because they must be remarkable and they will give your universe its identity. The first time your PCs enter such a place, the description must be long and detailed enough that they understand this location is important. Besides the (now traditional) regionalization, it is important that each one of these places has at least one outstanding element. A tavern may be adorned with a dreadfully stuffed deer head. A castle may be carved out of a unique gigantic crystal. A train station may have a monumental clock on its façade. Whatever it is, this element must be well described : this way, every time the PCs come back to this place, you only have to evoke this one characteristic to bring back the whole place.

Moreover, if you’re writing a campaign, some of these recurring places might need to evolve along the scenario. You should consider cosmetic, or even functional elements that may change with the actions and choices of the PCs. A window may be in good condition at the beginning, broken during a certain scene, then hastily fixed with newspapers afterwards. A whole building may be partially destroyed, and the following scenes will happen in its ruins (will the outstanding element be intact or damaged ? Your choice !) The emotional weight of the location will be reinforced by this.

A last little bit of advice for all kinds of places : add at the beginning of your notes one to three adjectives to define the atmosphere. You can refer to it for improvisation needs, and to choose the right tone to read your description.

There we go, I hope these techniques will be of use to you, or at least pleasant to read ! I’ll come back later with other articles, so stay tuned !

Index

[andmaybegayer]

watched the D&D movie. Good!

*Pointing diCaprio* room map

A cool thing in vastly expansive fantasy settings is the ability to have all the low-level details of "yeah you know Waterdeep and Baldur's Gate are here" and that means as much or as little as you remember from when those last showed up for you.

It's very funny how you can tell a PC from an NPC by whether they ever just say things or if they actually try to stay on model.

*Pointing diCaprio* family guy death pose

There's the good nods to shit your DM has done. The high level GMPC who carries you through a tough area, the random item your found earlier that completely invalidates a whole puzzle, players not caring much about history dumps, players making plans entirely at odds with your intended path that still lead them to the same place.

The Wild Shape chase was great, a solid action scene, not sure if it was intentional but I did tell "tiny size Dex bonus" at the screen.

Interesting to see where they decide to lean into game-style stuff and where they don't. The spellcasting actually gives a shit about VSM! Extremely funny because even players mostly don't pay attention to VSM unless they have to. A lot of players miss out on good stuff because they don't read the spellcasting rules. The movie only cares about range and times-per-day rules where it's funny.

You can't outrun the miles

[qwertyprophecy]

hi !! i recently played storyseeker and really loved it !! i was curious about how you went about designing the story for it ?? was it hard to keep track of all the moving narrative parts ?? how did you decide where to reveal what info ?? hope you dont mind me asking -- i really love your art !! have a great day !!

I'm glad you enjoyed Storyseeker! Old as it may be, out of everything I've made it's still the game I'd most like to make a spiritual successor to.

Answers to narrative design questions after the cut:

It's funny, Storyseeker's design process was so organic that realistically it should've turned into a right mess. But just as organically it lead into design principles that made organising the story a breeze, honestly.

What I mean by organic: As touched upon in this reply regarding worldbuilding, the story kept writing itself as long as I kept asking it questions, so I just let it do its thing. The player is meant to experience the narrative in much the same way, with me imposing as little control over them as possible while they travel as they please and narrate to themselves the story of what they see.

It sounds freeform and terribly unstructured, but I established a principle of design that aims to help the player connect the dots instead of feeling lost in a cacophony of random details. While making the game I called them "paths": routes the player is likely to take or subtly guided to take, that connect together related parts of the narrative. Visually some are literal paths or roads, but they could be anything that the player might follow. Footprints, streams of bubbles, the line of sight of an NPC, the sight of something irregular peeking at the edge of the screen...

A path presents both a question and a direction to go look for the answer. Oftentimes, the exact questions I was asking myself when building the world piece by piece. Where does this road lead? Where are these weasels swimming to (or, approaching from the opposite direction, where did they come from)? What dislodged itself from this hole in the ice and where did it go? What kind of a body are these giant toes connected to? Ie., to answer your question of when to reveal information: when the player asks for the information by moving towards where it's revealed, whether on purpose or unknowingly.

If the player follows the direction they must end up on another path because good answers beget more questions. The single most important design document I had was a piece of scrap paper with a rough sketch of the map and a whole lot of coloured lines flowing across it to mark the paths I was prepping for the player. (Lines, not arrows, since I couldn't predict which direction they'd be traveled in.) By visualising them I tried to make sure none of them stopped abruptly or looped in a circle, and that all the places of interest were covered.

(The biggest exception to this design is of course the dead end of a room that is the game's final area: the temple interior that can only be found by completionists. That's why it "completes" the game by being a narrative dead end, too.)

I genuinely didn't even plan it this way on purpose, but it turns out that it really helps keep track of a narrative when you make a game where webs of cause and consequence are all visually illustrated on a literal map. :D If you're the type of person who benefits from visually organising things, I don't see why you couldn't draw abstracted maps of your narrative even if it's not so visual in nature.

I know I definitely need to do more of that! Just last week I rescued my current project's dialogue rewrite with visualisation and arrow doodles. It had grown into an overwhelming mess of unplanned splitting and rejoining branches and microreactivity, so to have any chance of looking at it without inviting a migraine, I closed the document and instead mapped the whole script into a single page outline of what each conversation is supposed to convey to the player. It's so much easier for me to think about the shape of the story when I can see it in one glance!

[glouris]

About some characters’ possible incarnations in previous samsaras

So Teyvat is trapped in a cycle, is constantly going through samsaras, and reincarnation really is all but confirmed now apparently. 

A lot of people jumped to point at Childe and Parsifal, then speculate which other historical figures could also be his previous incarnations.

Childe's case is really, really interesting, but I wanted to bring up another character that also seems to be pulled into this samsara vortex somehow - Itto. 

(This is gonna be long and have A LOT of reaches and speculations.)

Let’s look at Akuou (Touzannou) from Watatsumi Island. We don't have confirmation on which species he actually belonged to, but from what information we have on him, he would most likely be either a vishap hybrid, or an oni. He was described as “the wicked fangs and claws of the Great Serpent, the savage, demonic invader of Yashiori Island”. “‘Fangs and claws of the Serpent” makes it sound like he was a vishap, but I think him being called “demonic” is a more important characterisation here. The name ‘Akuou’ also may be a reference to the legends of Akuro'ou - “an ancient demonic warrior in the Japanese folklore who fought against the imperial court”, so again, demonic, an oni. And, well, oni also have claws and fangs, but I did have to mention that this guy could be a lizard person instead. 

If we assume that Touzannou was an oni, we can start to notice a lot of coincidences pile up. First, Touzannou’s personality seems to resemble Itto’s - he was reckless, boastful, presumptuous, but very kind. Not the brightest mind, as it’s said that “his strength was his only strength". He came up with his own fighting styles that are still passed down on Watatsumi. Itto’s fighting style is his own as well: 

(I love Itto so much man.)

Touzannou fought the Tengu Sasayuri and was called Akuou  - “Wicked King”; Kokomi’s Everlasting Moonglows story mentions it like that: 

Itto’s Redhorn tells a story about an “Otogi King”, who was boisterous and boastful too. And that’s where it gets weird, please walk with me. One of Itto’s passive talents is getting more wood, and if we look at how the trees are distributed on the map, the VAST majority of the Otogi trees are found on Yashiori Island.

As already mentioned, Yashiori was invaded by Orobashi and his people 2000 years ago, and ultimately became the resting place for Akuou (Touzannou) and shrine maiden Mouun, a very important figure I’ll talk about later. 99% of Itto’s story quest also happens to take place on Yashiori.

A cornplate detail, but Itto was also at Nazuchi Beach (Yashiori Island sub-area) in his dedicated album posted on genshin’s youtube channel. The ost playing on Nazuchi Beach is called Stranded Wish, which is quite an interesting name choice for a place that suffered so much tragedy and war. 

(This is also actually a Watatsumi ship, as mentioned by an npc we can talk to there)

Speaking of Watatsumi, Itto’s most obvious connection to it is through Gorou, as he is his dedicated support. The less obvious connection is his similarities with Akuou, and some things involving Kokomi. Sure, his quest is only accessible after you complete Kokomi’s, and their signature artifacts in the same domain, but her involvement seems to run a bit deeper than that. 

You see, the whole thing that started it all is Akuou being mentioned in Kokomi’s donut. At first I thought it’s actually the same guy from the Redhorn, because their description was so similar, basically just ‘evil king that fights a tengu’. But it was exactly this description that made me notice some interesting pattern of interconnected characters.

2000 years ago: Akuou the Evil King, Mouun the shrine maiden and Tengu Sasayuri. 

500 year ago: Tengu Reizenbou, Asase Hibiki and Ako Domeki.

Present day: Arataki Itto, Kokomi, and Kujou Sara. 

Take a look at depictions of Asase Hibiki (left) and Mouun (right) from the TCG cards:

Their haircuts seem to be identical, with the hair color being the only difference. Better yet, it's also similar to Kokomi's haircut. 

The oni from their respective time periods (or samsaras) are named Akuou, Ako and Arataki. Inconsequential, but interesting. 

Let’s take a look at Ako Domeki, and speculate a little (or a lot). Both Akuou and Itto had conflicts with a tengu, but Ako seemingly didn’t. But, since he’s 500 years back on the timeline, it puts him on the same time period as Tengu Reizenbou and the ‘otogi king’ from Itto’s redhorn. There is a slight chance that this ‘otogi king’ was actually Ako Domeki post Serai and Golden Apple, but there’s nothing really to prove or disprove this, apart from the fact that they both have similarities with Akuou and Itto.

Another thing that could possibly have something to do with Ako Domeki are those weird oni symbols scattered around Watatsumi. These symbols are connected to Rinzou's Treasure world quest - you look for pirate treasure, and find Rinzou’s letter where he talks about his life.

This “outlander king” inspired Rinzou to leave Watatsumi when he grew up. And, it’s interesting that he chose an oni mask as his insignia when he left Watatsumi. If this old man was the reason for him to go into the world to seek adventure at sea and become a pirate, it would make sense for his insignia to be inspired by this old man. Which would make him an oni. 

Could this be Ako Domeki, an oni pirate, that inspired another person to become a pirate? It’s far-fetched, but again, as we don’t have any confirmation for the end of Ako Domeki story, it could have really been him. 

Getting back to Akuou and Mouun. Mouun’s name has a very interesting possible origin: 

Kokomi’s ‘slumbering dragon’ constellation comes to mind here. 

Mouun was friends with a great 900 year old whale called Daikengyou.

They both were slain during the Yashiori Island invasion. But, the fact that this whale managed to live for so long almost definitely means that it was no ordinary whale - perhaps it was the same creature as the All Devouring Narwhal. 

Meanwhile Kokomi had a whale in her demo, which should definetly raise some red flags.

Akuou was taught different rituals by Mouun and her sister Ayame, including an art of whalesong. Interestingly enough, Itto is a very good singer apparently:  

So, in light of recent developments with whales in the main story, I don’t really think that this art of ‘whalesong’ was something connected to ordinary marine life, it’s too specific now. Given that Orobashi was actively opposing Heavenly Principles, I won’t put it past him and his followers to be involved with the likes of Surtalogi that keeps celestial whales as pets. 

Last thing, the books about Akuou and Mouun, as well as about other Watatsumi dealings (Debates on the "Viceroy of the East", A Preliminary Study of Sangonomiya Folk Belief, The Life of Mouun the Shrine Maiden, and more) are not in the book archive, but in the quest items. Must be important. 

So, let’s round things up. Akuou, Ako Domeki, Arataki Itto, all with similar sounding names, are boisterous, kind oni, that all have mentions of being called ‘kings’ (Itto’s ult is called ‘raging oni king state’), all have some ties to Yashiori Island (Ako Domeki is mentioned on a note on Nazuchi Beach, and if the Otogi King and him really were the same person, there’s Yashiori having the most otogi trees in Inazuma), all being exceptional fighters, all having ties to a notable tengu and a shrine maiden, that also have connections to characters taking on the same role from a different time periods. 

Ako Domeki is up in the air, but Akuou and Itto really do seem to be connected somehow.

[sly-s-n0nfusion]

Hello octopathers I woke up in the mood to share opinions online so today it's the time to talk about

💫 Erhardt's War Crimes 💫

as well as explaining why I don't, never did, and will never like him as a character

/!\ Disclaimer: I'm not here to judge anyone who likes Erhardt, truly. I'm 100% okay with liking morally gray characters in fiction (and I do myself, as a fan of characters such as Ogen, Oshka, Kaldena and Ceraphina, which are pretty bad/terrible people as well, some of them are much worse than erhardt lol) so if he's your favorite character and your little sopping wet meow meow, that's great (you're also part of like 98% of the octopath fandom so if someone has to be the weird one here that'd be me lol) so this post is completely judgement-free 🙏 /gen

I just felt the need to address the full extent of his actions in game as some sort of reminder because I feel like the actual consequences of those are often overlooked or straight up not acknowledged, also because we see a lot of that in CoTC and many people who played OT1 did not play that one, and because I have seen quite the number of fans out there being like "Erhardt did nothing wrong" or "I'm an Erhardt apologist" or "regicide ain't that bad" when I think what he did was actually pretty bad and here's why!

TW children death, spoilers for Olberic’s story and CoTC Bestower of All

Okay so we can all agree with the fact that what happened to him was horrible. Man had to watch his hometown (and family, too) perish in a fire while Hornburg did nothing to help and he's been indoctrinated since he was just a child by Werner, who we know as being great at manipulating and inducing fear in people. Like no wonder he wanted revenge.

In Ot1 we only see him killing King Alfred and thus causing the fall of the whole kingdom of Hornburg as stated by Olberic at the beginning of his story, and then his "redemption" speech during Olberic's chapters 3 and 4, and that's pretty much it. We aren't exactly told what happened to the people of Hornburg after that.

Well, Champions of The Continent tells us as the fourth chapter of the Bestower of All storyline is set in Hell, where Hornburg and its ghosts still stand. And I say ghosts because those are all that's left of its population, with the exception of a few other NPCs we encounter in game who were lucky enough to flee in time.

Now the part of map we can walk on is quite big but it’s still a small fraction of the Hornburg capital (as we can see from the huge amount of buildings around the castle) and there are approximately 30+ npcs’ souls wandering around the streets, inside the castle and outside the capital (again, they’re just the ones we’re allowed to see)

(Don’t let this image fool you, he’s dead. All of them are dead, he didn’t make it out alive)

The most tragic part of all of this are obviously the souls of two children that can be found in a house, discussing which one of the Twin Blades is stronger. And honestly this piece of dialogue broke my heart

I’m afraid to inform this poor kid’s soul that Erhardt actually played a major role in the events that caused them to get killed.

And this brings me to the conclusion of this saying that no matter how strong Erhardt’s desire for vengeance was, and how manipulated he was, it still doesn’t excuse what he did. “Regicide ain’t that big of a deal” well no it isn’t, but the consequences of it are. I refuse to believe Erhardt didn’t foresee what would happen to all the inhabitants of Hornburg, children included, after he’d killed king Alfred and gave complete access to Werner’s army. Of course the ones who couldn’t flee in time would get killed. Of course he knew, but that wasn’t enough to make him think about stopping his rage.

He’s not a war criminal because he killed a guy with a crown, he’s a war criminal because he sentenced to death the whole population of a capital city and if we had doubt at first, cotc gives us undeniable proof.

Yes he lives hating himself. Yes he does regret all of it. But he had a choice. And yes, being afraid of Werner hunting him down is a solvable problem when you’re at the apex of one of the biggest kingdoms’ military force, he could’ve asked for help if only he spoke. Causing the death of so many innocent people isn’t going to bring his family and hometown back and he knew it.

That’s why I think what he did was, in no way, excusable.

“Erhardt isn’t a villain” doesn’t stick with my view of things.

Now, on to the personal reasons why I don’t like him in particular as a morally gray character lol

And that can be summed up as “Olberic’s first two chapters made a pretty damn good job at making me hate him”

But no for real it has to do with me valuing trust more than anything else in life and having the habit of self-projecting a lot on every character I play. I tend to ask myself “what would I do in this situation, how would I feel” etc, so it came natural to me to wanting to punt Erhardt into the sun instantly as soon as I saw Olberic (the guy that was my main character in his ch1) literally start his story having nightmares and being depressed because of this guy.

Of course it was instant, deep hatred from me I swear I’ve rarely wanted to kill some guy in a jrpg as much as I wanted to make him pay for what he did (even if I knew well that Olberic’s main goal was just to seek answers).

Now imagine my utter disappointment when the game didn’t let me kill him lol (just kidding, of course after his backstory traumadump I ended up sympathizing a bit with him).

Also no, Olberic never forgave him for what he did, as precisely stated by him in his chapter 3, but he does give him another chance to redeem himself because Olberic is a much better person than I am.

I… have been wanting to write this long post for a while now. I hope I didn’t upset anyone with it as that was not my intention. I get why erhardt has so many fans, with the whole emotional trauma he has and his pretty face and fabulous hair, I really do and I don’t think you’re weird for liking him. I just like to ramble about fictional characters from time to time lol

Peace ✌️

[yoiku]

more gw2 stuff

aight, PoF was much better than HoT. partly because it felt like it was more at the core of all things guild wars, with so many familiar characters and places, but also because they definitely learned something from HoT when it comes to map design. I unlocked my skyscale today so i can finally keep up with the pace at event trains, which has been really frustrating to me. It's really not fun to lag behind so much just because you don't have the same means of transport at hand. Really enjoyed the skyscale quest chain though, griffon and beetle as well, even if griffon was a bit much with the gold sink items. I also enjoy how different the mounts feel, they all take some learning and getting used to, but to me that just makes them more fun. even if i have absolutely cursed at my springer&the environment a fair amount by now. Some of the sand jackal "puzzles" and places have been insanely cool to me. I was expecting and hoping to see Livia again, and i did not expect to run into awakened Koss. Getting to briefly chat with Kormir felt nice as well. Gwen's ghost at the dragonfall camp etc. it's been fun seeing familiar faces from such a long time ago. But i've also encountered a fair share of bugs, events part of questlines or achievements being stuck and halting progress. instances glitching out pretty badly. I got disconnected during the underground kralky fight story instance and logging back in the game tried to put me back where I was with it, which was nice if it worked. it had the fight in the right phase but me back at the first platform with all the routes to advance blocked out with no npc's around. logged out and back in again and was at another platform but the portal to fly over to the next wasn't working and the npc's were all just stuck in place doing nothing. Jumped off the side to see what happens if i die, and THEN it respawned me on the right platform... buuut while the npc's were doing stuff nothing was actually progressing. logged out and back in and then everything picked off from where it should've just fine. There's really a lot of issues with the instancing + dc's and from what i've searched they're not all that uncommon. I really enjoy the longer story instances when they work, but at the same time i'm happy they're not as common anymore as they were up to HoT and whatnot, disconnecting is so punishing during those it suuuuucks. At least there seems to be at least attempts to let you continue from halfway through instead of just having to do the whole thing again now. but why aren't those also implemented into the older instances in retrospect? highly doubt it's undoable. I've done my part and sent bug reports when i've encountered something not working correctly. Glad to see the team getting better at what they do but I really wish they would also look back at times to fix problems for past content as well instead of just improving new stuff.

but if there's something i'll give praise to in retrospect, it's Joko.

[natsumespellbook]

Night Rain CRISIS - Chapter 1

(directory)

<Summer of the second year since the establishment of ES, Seisoukan Common Room>

Jun: …Ugh, I’ve worn myself out faster than I thought.

However, that boss’s strength is on another level. My current armor should be able to withstand only a single blow… 

Well, if that’s the case, I should expect to take damage at the next level.

………!?

Hinata: WHAT?? That was close! You were SO close to beating him!!

They’re gonna change their attack pattern here… Aren’t the enemies in this game a little too strong..?

Jun: It can’t be helped. It was my fault for making the wrong decision.

…Hm, Hinata-kun?

Hinata: Hey hey~! It’s Hinata-kun ♪

Well, you still have really good concentration~! I thought maybe you’d notice even a little when I was getting close!

Jun: Haha, sorry ‘bout that. It was my first big boss fight in this game, so I got a little too into it.

I mean, I was even talking to myself… Anyways, did you need something from me, Hinata-kun?

Did you wanna use this TV? If so, please let me know.

Hinata: Nah, not at all! I was just curious because my senpai was playing a game that looked kinda interesting.

Jun: I see. So that’s why you snuck up on me.

Hinata: But still, this is kind of rare. Sazanami-senpai doesn’t usually play games in the common room too often.

Jun: Well, usually I game in my room, or with a member or two of the “ASOBI Club” in their room.

But I’ve heard that most of the residents are staying somewhere overnight today and tomorrow. And if that’s the case, I thought it wouldn’t be too much of a big deal to use the common room~♪

Hinata: I see~ In the common room, you can enjoy your game on the big screen, right?

…Wait, I’ve never heard of that! Where did everybody go!?

Jun: Well, there’s an inspection going on here at Seisoukan. Looks like a lot of people are going home for that.

But also, people leave for tons of other reasons as well.

Hinata: Oh yeah, the inspection! I was so preoccupied with Yuuta-kun that I forgot all about it!

Jun: Yuuta-kun? What’s going on with him?

Hinata: Well, it seems like he’s gonna stay in the lesson room today… I just saw him off in tears.

I was ready to drop everything and go with him, but he hit me with a cold, “I wanna take lessons by myself. I do NOT want you to come with me.”

Sigh… being a big brother can be so lonely.

Jun: Hmm, I see. Well, then, how about a game as a distraction? I just got a new RPG that’s pretty interesting.

Hinata: Huh? Are you sure?

Jun: If I weren’t sure, I wouldn’t have invited you in the first place.

Besides, you can unlock more maps in two-player mode, plus I’ve heard about some special moves that can only be used during multiplayer. It’d be cool to try it out.

Hinata: Well, if that’s the case, I’d be happy to play with you ♪

Jun: Awesome. Alright, lemme find another controller… let’s see…

Ok cool, found one. Now, how do we turn this thing on…

Hinata: Fufufu. Don’t underestimate me!

I’ve learned the controls by watching your finger movements, so I’m good to go at any time.

Jun: Hell yeah. Then let’s unlock this new map and start defeating monsters!

Hinata: Roger that ☆ Alrighty, I’ll show off my gaming skills that Sora-kun taught me ♪

Hinata: (We’ve arrived at a village moments ago…)

I didn’t expect the whole village to suddenly be taken over by monsters.

There are no healer NPCs, and there aren’t many recovery items. This game… Is this only for experts??

Jun: Hinata-kun, there’s no time to rest. It looks like the monsters called for back-up, and now I’m surrounded…

Come to me and beat them up! I’ve got your back!

Hinata: No, no, no!! You’re way too cerebral! “Run away before they surround you as well,” is what I thought you would say!

Jun: But I don’t like the idea of running away. Wouldn’t it just be faster to kill all the enemies?

Hinata: Are all my seniors like this..? Nevertheless, let’s just avoid combat as much as possible and move on! We should save our limited recovery items for this next boss fight!

Jun: Hm… but it looks like it’s showing us the combos for a special attack, don’t it~?

Hinata: Didn’t you try that one a few times earlier? I haven’t been able to trigger that one yet…

Jun: I think it’s worth it to try again. I mean, if I succeed, we should be able to take down a whole bunch of monsters.

Hinata: I guess… Well, if you’ve got a gauge built up, why not?

Let’s see, it says all we have to do is press this button here at the same time.

Alright, press OK to confirm! I’m ready when you are, Sazanami-senpai!

Jun: Let’s do it! Ready… go~!

Hinata: ….? Uhm… I don’t think it worked.

Jun: Damn! It didn’t work again!?

Even if we don’t count the time we couldn’t use this technique during the boss fight, I never imagined it would be THIS difficult to coordinate a button press, right?

Hinata: I wonder if I’m pressing the button too late…

Hmmm. Can I take a break? I feel like I’m just gonna end up doing the same thing if I don’t

Jun: Yeah, no problem. It’s best not to rush these things.

In the meantime, I’ll keep grinding for HP recovery items, so please take your time.

<A few hours later>

Jun: Okay, thanks to the items this boss just dropped, I think I can craft a pretty solid weapon~

…But even though we managed to win, isn’t this only the first boss in the game..?

I didn’t expect it to be this hard. Well, a challenge is always fun.

Hinata: Hmm……

Jun: Aah, super sorry, Hinata-kun! I got sucked into the gaming world—

Hm?

Hinata: Zzz…. Zzzz ♪

Jun: (Oops, accidentally fell asleep, Hinata-kun?

Well, I don’t wanna wake him up when he’s looking so peaceful. It’d probably be better to let him sleep for a bit.)

Jun: *Yawnnn…*

(Ah, I think I’m getting sleepy too. Oh man, seeing him sleep like that is making me even more tired.)

Jun: Huh!?

What the hell!? That roar was so loud that even the monsters in the game ran away with their tails between their legs!

It got so dark all of a sudden, I can’t see anything!

Let me check my phone…

Huh? No, no, this is crazy!

It’s not even past midnight yet, so why is it so dark!?

----------------------------------------------------

next

[thewebcomicsreview]

Happy 10/25, the third most important religious holiday in the Homestuck Calender, and we got a new HS2 to celebrate, focusing on one of the new kids. The new kids were one of the parts of Homestuck 2 I actually liked, so let's see how the new writers handle them! With a Jailbreak reference, apparently.

Wait, hold on, deep lore: thespiansGlamor is Harry, glutinousGymnast is Tavros. RecidicivousGainsayer and gavageCunctation are names we haven't seen before. GC fits into the AGTC DNA theme of all the screen names we've seen so far (it's Terezi's acronym), and RG doesn't. They might be random NPCs, but they might also be foreshadowing. Also, neither Rose nor Kanaya appear to be on their daughter's friendlist, unless they're under the scroll bar, but maybe that's not weird.

What, uh, what did she draw the key with, HS2? That's her blood color, but she's not bleeding.

Also, who's narrating this? This has been a question in HS2 all along, but the narration here calls attention to itself more. It's much more "Homestucky" than HS2's had been.

We even have narration describing conversation, which is something HS2 has never done and HS1 restricted to carapacians.

You suggest to Vriska that you should go the other direction. Vriska says nah this is definitely where we wanna be. She says between the two of you, you've probably got enough luck to take this whole place off the map if you really wanted. You ask her what the fuck she means by that. She says you know like with your Thief of Light powers. You tell her you don't have anything like that. She says huh, weird!

Oh FFS now I have to go look up if post-Retcon Vriska met Aranea, her own dancestor who was not a Thief of Light. That's such a weird thing for Vriska to assume, that Vrissy not only has Vriska's powers but has mastered them. Also, I wonder if this narration style, besides being a Jailbreak reference, is because the new writers aren't confident writing the HS2 characters yet? Or maybe they just don't want Vriska/Vrissy dialogues because they're kind of hard to read.

I like these expressions. I also like this continuation of Candy Lore, that all the HS1 characters see Candyland as a "fake" universe and that's part of why they fucked around so much and got so fucking weird, whereas we see here that the actual Candy Natives do not see their planet as "bootleg". The fact that the HS parents don't think of their own children as entirely "real" is actually super fucked up, but I guess Yiffy's got the main right of complaint there.

I like that Vriska, who can fly, still makes Vrissy give her a boost. What a jerk!

Vriska says now THAT sounds like some shit a REAL Vriska would say! You roll your eyes and start to leave when Vriska calls out to ask if you're going without wishing her good luck. As you start to wish her luck she cuts you off and tells you to keep it, as she already has aaaaaaaall the luck she needs. You say okay dude.

I don't know if the original HS2 writers intended for the resolution of the "Vrissy kind of idolizes Vriska" subplot to end with "Vriska's so fucking Vriska that Vrissy is disillusioned within literally minutes", but it's honestly kind of funny and I like it.

JANE: From the conversation recovered from Egbert's phone, we've learned that Roxy has been... conspiring alongside the rebels for months now. Operating a lab deep within the ruins of the Troll Memorial Meteor, she and her coconspirator Calliope are preparing some kind of super weapon they've dubbed "The Plot Point". JANE: Heretofore referred to as The Point.

This feels a little like shade.

JANE: Let’s get to The Point!!

A lot like shade.

It's a little convenient to the new team that they took over right when HS2 was starting to actually go somewhere, but regardless, that was a neat page. I got a soft laugh out of it, the plot is starting to move, and there was some decent worldbuilding.

[zelenbug]

i have. NO idea where else to post this (im not making a forum thread for this) so i guess tumblr it goes. i dont know if this is known but

i was poking around the dungeon json files with tiled and found this bizarre outpost_full one

so the whole structure on the left of the map related to the peacekeeper stuff is the first thing that jumps out at me

but whats weirder is that NONE of the mech parts of the outpost are even here. youd expect them to be since the bounty missions require mechs inherently?

this corridor overall has a lot less detail than the normal outpost.json. im pretty sure some stuff isnt even wired?

so like. did they copy an early version of the outpost without any of the detail just to put the bounty house in it ???

it does have all of the objects in place at their latest state, but thats also not necessary since the outpost just uses separate dungeon files for them. you can also see the general layout of two of the rooms is completely different (outpost_full seems to predate the tech room too) and theres some other minor differences

separate dungeon files like so

outpost_peacekeeper is also a separate file but its just the sign that hires you to join them, not this entire building

anyway theres another weird dungeon i found in here too, outpost_upgrade1, which has no associated .dungeon file and only the .json. i have no idea where this is meant to go. the red square is an npc and summons a floran foundryworker, which is those that only spawn in foundry biomes so im not sure whats that about

and i think they dont even spawn as floran as that npctype has no dialogue for florans, only default, apex avian and glitch

anyway i checked the 1.0 unpacked files for outpost_full, the file is there too but without the peacekeeper building

the beakeasy corridor is just as undetailed compared to just regular outpost, also theres no weapon shops here i just noticed

i guess they put the peacekeeper building into this unused one by mistake and it didnt matter anyway because it was unused

the building doesnt seem to have anything in it besides the peacekeeper furnishing object. no bounty board or anything. im not sure what its point here even was, all of this is already present on the peacekeeper stations which have the board too

below read more is other kind of interesting observations about dungeons i found while poking around

found thsi fun unused dungeon while trying to research how does the game restrict the races for the foundry npcs anyways

actually theres a lot of template dungeons, like dungeons\microdungeons\biomes\bioluminescence\templateWITHstuff.json

challengeroom1 is the only challenge to actually be named like that instead of having a defined name like choices1 or shortcircuit or trenches (though theres 6 dungeons that are just named platform[number] and 3 quiqksilver[number] so ...)

its got templates too, for the general shape of the room to build off of

undergroundmaze has a bunch of dungeons that ive never seen, this is in the mazeornate folder. this must have been added fairly recently judging by the weapon chest being there

you do enter it from underground

and theres 4 variations of these maze dungeons. that was mazeornate but theres mazeplant, mazestone and mazetech. for some reason the same exact glitch decorations are in all of them, and theyve got the same general room layouts, just somewhat different borders

great name in this one

oh unrelated interesting note. jupiter is commented out as a song in player space stations in dungeon_worlds.config