#also this scene FUCKED me up on my first playthrough

[wxlfbrxthers]

"Just don't lie to me ever again... Ever."

[classicjdog]

13 sentinels is absolutely positively batshit fucking insane

just finished the game last night and WOW is it fucking good

[matrixbearer2024]

HELLO ITS ME 🥭Anon!!! I JUST HAD THE MOST BAZINGA IDEA EVER DJSHAJHDHJAF

So.... Hear me out..

Cuz like what if like ever since reader beat Vox at that videogame he started training practicing idk to prepare to beat reader again until reader goes to erm reverse heaven

So then reader brings it up and Vox gets pissy (as usual) but then she recommends multiplayer, like those games that have a storyline and bosses, so they try it out and it ends up being one of their pass-times

Then when they finally beat the final boss after like a billion attempts, reader gets a lil too hyped and like kisses vox all over the screen which of course causes him to blue screen like a love-sick-idiot-in-denial (official term for Vox being a river in Egypt) while reader is just bouncing off the walls unaware of what they did

(could be before or after they start dating though I think it'd be a lot cuter when they're still friends)

(P.S: remember to drink water and rest properly!) -🥭anon

Video Gaming, Competitive Raging

Vox x CollegeStudent!Reader

A/N: Heeeey! You're back 🥭 Anon! Nice to see you! Also yes, I love this idea lmao- it's not something I wouldn't put past Reader cuz they're just like that HAHAHAHAHA- the story itself is a little deviated from the prompt but the idea is the same XD- maybe after this I'll stop bullying these two and actually write a confession scene because damn they just runnin around in CIRCLES LMFAOOO. Send me ideas for how you want to confess to the Picturebox y'all cuz I'm kinda pulling blanks XD. Yes I'm saying Reader's gonna confess first, Vox would end up bluescreening in his attempt to even take initiative. I might write a few more interludes before the confession but yeah- I WANT THEM TO SMOOCH- SIKEEE NAH IT WON'T BE THAT EASY HAHAHAHAHAHA- But do pls send me ideas I am in a funk whdksjdjsksj-

A/N: Btw I'd imagine they're playing a game kinda like cuphead? Cuz that game was the fucking BANE of my existence when I played it. I didn't want to accept I was struggling and continued to play on the hardest difficulty right off the bat cuz I was so sure I could handle it HAHAHAHAHA.

No one at the hotel could've honestly expected whatever was going on to happen.

You and Vox were practically screaming at the TV screen in sheer rage while replaying a level in a game you'd both been stuck on for hours.

Charlie didn't know if this was slightly her fault or not for even suggesting game night.

Hell, nobody knew you'd invited the technology overlord until he showed up at the door and you simply pulled him inside as usual.

He was roped into most of the games you guys played-

Well, except for the trivia ones because you quickly pointed out he had the internet quite literally an extension of his mind.

So any niche fact or trivia that was asked- he could just search it up which was straight up cheating.

But everyone had severely underestimated just how competitive you and Vox could become as a duo.

From constantly teaming in the board games to immediately getting invested in the co-op video game that they switched to.

Charlie and Vaggie had leisurely enjoyed the game-

Angel and Husker didn't really play much and instead made jabs at each other's skill-

Alastor and Lucifer couldn't even get started with their confusion on the controls-

And you and Vox decided to play the game on the hardest difficulty because it didn't seem that bad in Charlie and Vaggie's playthrough.

Oh, it was that bad.

But the both of you refused to admit it and switch it back to the easier mode.

Vox and his huge ego, you and your pride as a gamer.

"You actually practiced ever since I beat you that one time??"

"Didn't I mention that I would? I'm getting that rematch eventually dollface."

"PFFT- Bro I didn't think you were serious!"

"Why you little-!"

Though, this was totally and entirely different from the PvP game you and Vox had played prior.

This game actually had a storyline and plot.

That neither of you gave enough of a rat's ass to pay attention to.

The hardest difficulty was pretty much just a consistent boss rush, and as if you weren't both always on low HP-

Someone was always dying every level.

"REZ ME! REZ ME YOU BASTARD!!"

"STOP FUCKING DYING AND I WON'T HAVE TO REZ YOU BITCH!!"

Admittedly, it was extremely entertaining to watch you both go up and down with your moods whenever anything happened.

Alastor couldn't for the life of him understand most of your gamer gibberish and slang though-

The rest of the gang had just taken seats on the couch behind you both and made silly bets on who would go wayside from frustration first.

Either from the level's sheer difficulty or the puzzles themselves that were a bit too convoluted for their own good.

"No- NO! Move that cube to the right!!"

"I- HUH?! THERE'S NO PATH ON THE RIGHT!"

"VOX YOUR OTHER RIGHT-"

"JUST SAY MY LEFT FOR FUCK'S SAKE-"

Everyone else was already starting to guess some mishaps that would happen from you two raging.

Like who would break a controller first-

Vox did, but there were thankfully a couple spares anyway and he'd just replace the broken one soon.

And who would get mad enough to break the TV.

Which in a hilarious twist of events- was actually you.

In one of your expletive filled episodes you threw your controller at the screen hard enough that it broke the screen and your controller.

Everyone kind of thought you and Vox would be done with the game after that.

But nope-

Come tomorrow there was a new VoxTech TV shipped to the hotel to replace the one you broke.

At first, it seemed like it was because Vox was simply being courteous-

Well Charlie thought that.

Everyone just guessed he wanted something in the hotel he could use to spy on everyone-

Still, the actual reason was somehow entirely disconnected from that.

"Egh. He sent over a new one."

Of course Alastor would notice the device and hate it's existence immediately.

"Aww! How nice of him!"

Charlie- bless her heart- she really only sees the best in people-

"Not really, I'd bet it's just so he can spy on us."

Hahaha- now that's a more realistic view from Vaggie.

"Wouldn't put it against him, especially after what he had pentious do before."

Angel still never forgot that, he sometimes even made jabs at Vox for it until now.

"Oh! It's here! Yo help me set this up!"

"Well, somebody's excited."

Husker just came over to check what the commotion was, he didn't realize what he was getting into though.

"No DUH. I've been wanting to finish that game with Vox!"

"Wait- what game? The one where you got so angry you broke the TV?!"

"Uhhh, yeah? What else?"

Your reply had everyone just dumbfounded.

Why would you subject yourself back to such clear torture-

Actually Alastor just found you going back to playing that game entertaining, especially after it was clear that it had sadistic levels of difficulty.

After that, the others would often catch you and the TV overlord continue your playthrough as a pastime-

Either online or when you were both physically there in the hotel lobby.

And every session was possibly just as explosive as the last.

Curses were hurled around, screaming, throwing things-

Angel couldn't help but realize just how similar you were to your flatscreen companion in this regard.

That or you both had spent enough time with each other that the habits and mannerisms of one bled into the other.

Vox definitely became more docile- and you...

Actually no one could tell if you were already that wild or not.

"FUUUUUCK!!! THIS STUPID BOSS JUST WON'T DIE!"

"I CANNOT WITH THESE ATTACK PATTERNS?! DID MASOCHISTS FUCKING DESIGN THIS SHIT?!"

The both of you didn't mellow out at all after any of your shared gaming sessions.

In fact, everyone mostly steered clear of you afterwards because of how snappy and irritable you were.

The only one who could put up with your grumpy sarcasm was Angel or Lucifer.

Alastor would often just come in to bother you more while you played-

Which would soon turn into both you and Vox absolutely screeching at him for throwing you both off when you were so close to winning.

Neither of you were close to the goal at all-

Which the radio demon could tell, and he found your fits absolutely hilarious.

Though eventually, after pouring so many painful hours into the game-

Both you and Vox predictably got better at it.

But that didn't stop either of you from getting stuck at the final boss level.

And that absolutely made both of you raging so much worse.

"I'M GOING TO COMMIT MASS FUCKING GENOCIDE IF WE DIE TO THIS BASTARD ONE MORE TIME I SWEAR TO GOD-"

"AND I'D GLADLY JOIN YOU DOLL! HOW THE FUCK WOULD ANYONE EVEN THINK OF MAKING THIS LEVEL?!"

You died again, but the retry button was once again slammed because both of you were stubborn.

Neither of you were willing to give up so easily, especially when the game's end was in sight.

So near but yet so far-

But that wouldn't stop you guys from trying.

Everyone else in the hotel was just waiting and watching to see what would happen next.

After all, it became so interesting to watch what you two would do next.

Eventually, Vox took off his coat and rolled up his sleeves while you somehow ended up with his hat on your head.

Common sense and sanity was starting to become a little less common when the game was taking up so much energy and focus.

It took another hour of frustrated screaming and cursing before you both eventually managed to beat the final boss.

And to say you two were over the moon was an understatement.

"WE BEAT IT! WE BEAT IT!!!"

"WE FINALLY FUCKING WON!"

You threw your arms around Vox as you both jumped up in place and shouted in excitement.

Your enthusiasm was so contagious it unintentionally spilled over to your overlord buddy.

The grins on your faces were so wide as you both just celebrated and cheered for a hot minute.

Vox completely lost himself when you finally let go and just ran around the lobby screaming.

Of course that winning high was searing through his circuits, it was well fucking deserved after all the painstaking effort he put in!

"FUCK YOU (Boss Name)! AHAHAHA! THIS IS BETTER THAN SEX!!"

Everyone, aside from you, gave him an odd look when he flipped off the TV screen and said that.

It was still displaying the victory menu even-

It was so unprompted and out of left field which made little to no sense even with context-

Not that anyone expected you or Vox to have any marbles left in your heads after that intense gaming session.

So imagine everyone's collective surprise when you suddenly tackled the taller TV overlord and peppered kisses all over his screen from joy.

You were just so pleased with yourself for finally beating the game that you didn't realize what you had done.

Especially when you quickly got up and started running around the room again too.

All that sudden affection from you spiked Vox's emotions almost immediately-

So it was expected that his screen very swiftly overheated and glitched.

And in no sooner than a few seconds, the man also bluescreened.

But you were too busy bouncing off the walls to even realize!

Everyone else just shared a laugh at how stupid the whole situation was.

But knowing how your relationship was with the TV overlord-

This kind of chaos wouldn't ever be a rare occurrence again with you two around.

[thebibliosphere]

hello, this is just me kinda sharing unsolicited Batman related feelings that i’m wallowing in, don’t mind me

i started playing Gotham Knights after seeing a few of your posts about it, and i’ve had a bit of a Batman/Justice League/Batfam fixation for the past few weeks. i was enjoying it! the environments were interesting and the combat was cool, and i loved listening to whatever Alfred had to say.

however, i made the mistake of finding Gotham Cemetery as Nightwing and thinking, “wait, is Bruce…?”, followed my gamer instincts (which is usually something along the lines of “follow the lights”), and ended up climbing to a higher vantage point to see if i could spot Bruce’s grave.

welp, all i had to do was spin the camera a little and oh. i’m standing next it. my boy Dick is already standing next to his father’s grave. it’s cleaner, newer than the surrounding headstones, there’s fresh flowers on it, and the rain made for a scene that kinda wrote itself.

somehow that hit me harder than the video Bruce left behind, harder than the funeral. i got so sad i had to quit the game and start reading some Batman comics :’) i wasn’t expecting me the player to also process grief along with all the characters, damn.

anyway, hope you’re having an awesome day!

Oh man, yeah. I did the same thing and then spent a lot of time walking through the cemetery, looking at all the names. I really liked that they carved Wayne Tower out of his stone so that when you look through it at a certain angle, you can see the Gotham skyline through his headstone. (And then the game dragged me back there later for one of Dick's cutscenes, and I went through all the stages of grief all over again. I had a similar reaction to Barbara visiting her father's monument. I won't spoil it, but man. Man.)

The makeshift memorial outside Wayne Tower also left a lump in my throat the first time I saw it. As did the #ThankYouBruce hashtag they have on the electronic billboards showing Bruce's face in profile against the city.

IDK, just something about the idea of Dick having to walk past that every time he gets dragged into a shareholder meeting fucks me up.

The game has many issues, but its ability to wring every emotion known to man and some kaleidoscopic ones only known to shrimp out of my jaded husk of a soul is not one of them.

I hope you continue to enjoy playing it! And take breaks. I ended up mainlining an entire season of Wayne Family Adventures after I finished my first playthrough 😅

[eight-freakin-gids]

With a game like In Stars and Time, there are so many little things someone playing it might never experience. I'm on my second playthrough, and I know I'm still not going to see everything.

I want to talk about a moment I just experience that I think fucked me up more than anything else I've experienced in this game.

Mondo spoilers ahead

This is what it looks like on your 3rd completion of a Friendship Quest loop. This screenshot sums it up pretty well: Despite how shocking this scene was for everyone to experience the first time, now Siffrin only sees it as a reminder that his family loves him.

And for some reason, this nearly moved me to tears where nothing else in this game has done so yet. Sure, I want to share this like I said, but mostly I just want to figure out why this scene made me feel the way it did. And I think the answer is that, for me, this hammers home the tragedy of Siffrin's situation more than any other moment in the game.

Leading up to this, I saw so many instances of the immense stress Siffrin is under. The bathroom scene had them breaking down, unable to cry in spite of the intense emotional strain he has to endure, and then panicking because they briefly forgot Odile's name. Then, something as simple as a soft roll of toilet paper from Odile snaps them out of it, and he's like 'Yay, I'm still experiencing new things!", only for them to immediately break down again because a roll of fucking toilet paper was what was giving him hope to carry on. This loop also had Siffrin believing that his family only loves them because he manipulated them into feeling that way.

And even before all of that, my second playthrough of this game has given me a much better understanding of Siffrin as a character. I only ever did the Friendship Quests once in my first playthrough, and I was now going out of my way to do them multiple times. It was fascinating to see Siffrin acknowledge that they could be doing these conversations differently, but choosing to not change them.

Because the last time he tried changing things too much, we got the gutpunch of the 1st Friendship Quest ending, and the later gutpunch of the Act 3 Finale. So instead, best stick to the script. If nothing new happens, nothing unexpected or bad will happen.

That brings us back to the ending of this loop. This is Siffrin's third time experiencing this moment. He knows what's going to happen, so it can't hurt him. And it's tragic, that in spite of everything that he's experienced, this is still the happiest he's been in his life. In this moment, he knows that he exists. Their family knows them and cares for them, even if Siffrin believes that they only feel that way because he made them feel that way. Siffrin can accept that. Siffrin would endure hell if it meant he could stay with the people they love, even if those people don't love him the same way. Siffrin is happy to do so, even as they're losing his mind.

End of post.

[nightlyrayne]

So after 700 hours of gaming, four restarts due to glitches, five or more different startings, I finally FINALLY finished a playthrough of BG3. SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT

So, the playthrough I finished, funny enough, is a Durge run with my girl Octavia. She's a fucking badass monster who wooed God Gale and Ascended Astarion (thank you mods 🙏) and I saved before making the big choice of whether or not to take control yourself or kill the netherbrain. And (of course) I had her control the brain first choice. And I'm kind sad that there was nothing more. Like, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing her sit on that throne of hers and say 'In my name's like the Queen she is. But Ascended Astarion, who was also all for taking over everyone and the world, was not standing by her side. Even after watching with a satisfied smirk as she took control of their friends. And even more so, since he was by her side, I'm a little disappointed there wasn't an ending with them both showing, taking over the world afterwards. A bit of lackluster ending tbh.

HOWEVER, I did reload so I could see the other ending(s). Something definitely glitched with my mod, as I am supposed to get all endings of the ones my 'Tav' is dating. But I had to reload in for those as well. Nonetheless, here are my thoughts on those.

First: God Gale. Sad I didn't get a bed scene with him, but also understandable since he was away looking for the crown. Loved that I could act like I totally didn't want to be a goddess by Gale's side to Tara and had her wanting me to visit Gale's mom. Gale, darling, love. You wouldn't have gotten the crown without my help in the first place. Step down from the clouds a bit and kneel to your queen goddess. Love you, kisses. Thank you for taking me up to heavens with you my love 🖤

Second: Ascended Astarion. Ho ho ho oh my gods. Haha I hate that I love it. But it's also so perfect for my evil little Queen. She fits by his side to rule so perfectly. The matching outfits he insisted on and the subtle "I should have been the one throwing the party" 😂 My darling, you can throw one at our castle and invite all our dearest friends. I promise. Now, pour me some blood so I can sit up on your lap

Over all, still a 10/10. Looking forward to finishing my other 'Tav's to see their endings. I'll be sure to update the poly mod for my self insert too cause I'll be romancing Shadowheart, Gale, Astarion, and Halsin 🥰🖤🖤

I leave you with the gorgeous Queen herself: In Her name

[meanbossart]

Misc. Ask compilation

These aren't all of the asks I want to reply to, just some that I can answer relatively quickly to clean the ol' inbox out before things get out of hand. Thanks for your patience!

HAHAHA THANK YOU FOR PERUSING AROUND and for enjoying my work! I had a... Weird Gale experience my first playthrough which led to his characterization being what it is in my comics. Here's the beat-by-beat of all the shenanigans: https://meanbossart.tumblr.com/post/740827466716807168/alright-i-am-like-90-sure-there-is-one-line-in-a

And here's just some of my personal thoughts on him! https://meanbossart.tumblr.com/post/736193145686114305/can-you-tell-me-more-about-how-you-would-make-gale

I would be lying if I said I'm not conflicted to know my style still bears some remnants of my edgy teen roots (not your fault not noticing it though, you aren't the first and won't be the last) BUT... That comic did mean a lot to me as a youth, so I guess I should be proud 🤷 and honestly it is a little cool that such a thing would survive for so long in what I do, crazy how that works.

LMAO, re: the bottom/top debacle, I was honestly so surprised to see people react to it like it's something novel. If I ever expected to get any push back on the matter, I thought it would be from people assuming DU drow was the top and taking issue with how violent and big he is (and yknow, some people are weirdly protective of Astarion as if he isn't a sneaky murder machine rippling with lean muscle)

Very disheartening to see that mindset still so alive and well among young people, but I guess it just means I gotta draw DU drow throwing more back and Astarion drooling over more ass until the stereotype is forcefully banished out of people's minds!

(more asks below the cut)

"Sleeper agent activation phrase" absolutely took me out, Thank you so much LOL

YEAH I got it pretty late though, Astarion had already told my durge that he was a vampire of his own accord (and the response was, of course, "no duh") I forgot wheter this happened before or after the first romance scene triggered, but I think after.

Since this was after DU drow decided he was gonna fuck him out of pure contrarian spite and was shamelessly laying it extremely thick, He happilly let Astarion drink his blood. Hell, he was probably a little Too Eager - the guy likes pain and he likes letting people he trusts do with his body whatever they will, and while he didn't yet trust Astarion at that point, that event might've very well reminded him of something from his past that planted a seed which would eventually grow into his genuine affection for the guy.

Ah, he definitely got a half-chub as it happened too. I'm sure Astarion noticed it and just walked off rolling his eyes and thinking "eugh of course" lmao.

Hello!!!

Oh man, I grew up fascinated with horror things. I remember from a very young age just looking at the covers and backs of horror movies at the film-rental even though I wasn't allowed to watch them. I was also easily scared but I sought those things out anyway - I think i just enjoyed the visceral reactions it drew out of me and was always curious about most things taboo.

When I got access to the internet that just opened a (very unfortunate) door to all things vile and awful like it did for so many people at that age in time. Though my tastes have changed a lot since then (Less August Underground, more The Devils kind of guy nowadays) my stories and art are just always going to fall into a horror-y category because I just... Don't think there's many better ways to showcase the human experience and emotional range without many of the elements native to the genre, and I'm all about that.

Thank you for your question and your sweet words, have a good week yourself!

I did a little write-up about that over here! https://meanbossart.tumblr.com/post/742508493562593280/i-dont-have-a-particular-question-in-mind-sorry

That's the result of a scene that happens relatively early in the story I'm writing ("A Novel Experience" on Ao3).

{SPOILERS} DU drow accidentally passes out on a blade which puts a relatively deep gash on his hip. Meanwhile, Astarion is weakened and starved after certain events that transpired the prior night. They have a private exchange both in a somewhat hazy-state of mind and Astarion ends up prodding and prying at his wound while feeding, so it's a laceration and bite mark that just scarred over badly.

Elves apparently don't grow body hair so never LOL guess they'll just have to slip&slide up on each other for heat

[punishedcrow]

OKAY YALL MAJOR RESIDENT LOVER SPOILERS HERE IM THEORIZING

So far I've done the Cassandra, Donna and Bela routes. This order is important. I've started with Cassandra because I continued on my demo save and so far everything seemed normal with some hints of mystery here and there, but I didn't get too much out of the romance objective and yes I save scummed a lot so I know a little about Cassandra's bad ending, but haven't gone fully through with it, I've just had the scene with her where she's all creepy.

I knew I'd have to solve mysteries, but in a game where you start over and over again, how would the secrets I found matter? THATS WHERE DONNA'S PLAYTHROUGH COMES IN. AGAIN, MAJOR SPOILERS!!!

So her route was full of secrets I didn't pry on. I save scummed a couple times, but since I loved Donna so much, I didn't even go too much further to know what happened on the bad choices. Only on her playthrough, characters star mentioning "rounds" and "next time" and Donna talks about not letting this happen again. MC is really important to Mother Miranda and the whole purpose of the game is for you to find out why. I've found some stuff at Cassandra's playthrough by sneaking in the third floor, but that didn't give me much clues. On Donnas route I've looked at some stuff and went back to a save when she absolutely hated it, but it didn't trigger a "secret found" prompt.

Donna knows about Miranda's plans and her capabilities, but she seems to have some power too bc Miranda didn't pressure her as much as you'd think. Like she straight up fucking turns of Bela's heart with magic (I told you there's spoilers) as punishment, but she's just "boogey woogey imma scare you" with Donna. What is Donna capable of? I need to know, maybe on another playthrough with her where I snoop around and try as many options as possible? I need to know, specially because she knows.

And this is why the developers of this game are geniuses bc Dona FUCKING REMEMBERS MC. At Bela's playthrough, when you go to her flower shop, she blushes when greeting you. Donna does NOT act like that at first glance on her playthrough. And it happened right after, on this order. WHY THE HELL WOULD SHE ACT LIKE THAT IF SHE DIDN'T REMEMBER??? And it explains a lot why she was so jealous and possessive on her route. She knew she'd be seeing you with a bunch of other people over and over until eventually you came back to her (?). And also, even though Cassandra is flirty with everyone, she flirted with MC a lot at Donna's playthrough, when I still had a couple of Cassandra's saves registered. And at Bela's route, when I met Donna, I still had a couple of saves from the second playthrough. But none from Cassandra, since it had all been overwritten already and she didn't flirt with MC at all on Bela's playthrough, without her saves.

What I can deduce from the story I've seen so far is that the only Dimitrescu kid that has a hint of what's happening at this school is Bela, since she's been fucking cursed by Miranda. Donna knows because she's Miranda's "daughter" and Alcina's sister, who also knows about all the cult shit. But I cannot confirm if their remembrance is truly coded in the game. It probably is, because that is the point of this doki doki literature club time loop plotline. Like of course that's the plot line, come on, that's what's most fun about it.

Miranda wants something from MC, so imma leave her for last.

I've also noticed that Angie has been drinking more and more, specially on the third playthrough, after Donna, who's her aunt/mother. It almost felt like she was depressed everything was happening again and Donna would be depressed again (not the case apparently), so she got depressed too.

My game plan now is Dani, Angie, Alcina and Miranda. Let's see how this goes. After all that I'll mess around with Donna's route and others to see some bad endings with the creepy sprites like Cassandra covered in blood and zombie Bela killing my ass, that truly caught me off guard btw.

Oh and I'm really loving this game. The descriptions, the way it's written, it's all so well thought out to me. It's sensible, it's relatable, it's honestly quite captivating tbh. I love all those women and I don't feel like any of them are my super favorites, but maybe Donna bc I've always loved the character since I played RE Village. They're all so different and interesting that I like them all in different ways.

Honestly, I have no conclusion for this, but I know MC is important for some kind of ritual Miranda's cult is doing. What could it be? How does it connect to the time loop?

[summeroflove-if]

Early release, anyone? Okay, as I posted earlier, my laptop fucked me over, and I've lost somewhere between 40k and 50k words, which is everything I'd written for chapter 6 so far, so after re-editing the bits that hadn't backed up for chapters 4 and 5 (coding all related to events in chapter 6, tbf), I am releasing this so I feel less guilty and feel less pressured to rush a chapter that is going to be pretty big.

In this release:

Have a chat with Izzie or Theo (your choice).

Have a breakfast date with the person you're coupled up with (and potentially fall out with your partner).

Meet the first bombshell!

Participate in a challenge that might include quite a bit of kissing and dirty secrets.

Set your MC as trans and/or demisexual.

Word Count:

Total of 573k words (+331k words) - as said in the last release, the playthroughs are a lot shorter, probably only about 41k words, but the word count increases stupidly fast when you have so many scenes that you have to rewrite slightly for each person you can couple up with.

Game Summary:

Welcome to Summer of Love. You and nine other singles will enter a luxury villa and couple up, spending a month in each other’s company, along with a few extras along the way – you’ll live together, eat together, sleep together, and hopefully, fall in love together. Sound familiar? Thought so – but instead of coupling ceremonies being split by boys and girls as is typical in shows like these, the public will be the ones deciding the order of who gets to pick, and as the cast is an all-bi one, you can pick whoever you like, so long as they haven’t already been picked. At the end of the month, the most popular couple could win as much as £500,000, depending on what challenges you win or lose and how well you win over the public. As for the other couples? As there are no dumpings, everyone has the potential to find love, and those in exclusive relationships by the end could also win as much as £100,000 per couple. So, how much you win is entirely down to you. Ready for your summer of love to begin?

Play chapters 1-5 on Dashingdon now!

[antiv3nom]

Tell me something about Sin that you've been dying to type a bunch of paragraphs about!!

THANKS FOR THE ASK SOL !!!!!!!!

okay so a joke i frequenly make about sin but have genuine feelings about is that, despite being raised by sol "what are feelings?" badguy, sin ended up being SO emotionally intelligent. like sol would not have ever had any sort of conversations regarding fuckin empathy or the like with sin, he was too busy TYING THE KID TO A TREE when he was busy, yk? (dont have enough time to dig into all of my feelings on sin's upbringing lmao, i could write a whole different essay about that)

ANYWAYS! yeah. sin has a lot of issues in overture, and he feels...like he's full of a lot of rage and resentment over a lot of things. i can't entirely speak on everything as i still have yet to watch a playthrough of the entirety of overture (i know what happens! i just havent seen all of the nitty-gritty interactions with him and others) but i know that he's got a lot more rage in him then he does in xrd. which of course makes sense, since he's still in the process of understanding and eventually re-accepting ky, and he's gotta interact a lot with him on a personal level in overture, notably without dizzy to mediate, which i personally think is likely how things went down before she was frozen.

anyways i wanna move onto xrd because i have a lot of feelings about him in sign, STARTING with his conversation with sol at one point. he's just got out after talking with ram for the first time, and sol is telling him to give it up and sin recognizes this for exactly what it is, that sol is showing his own lack of trust and actively choosing not to follow him in this, and while after this is pointed out sol worries that he's trying to turn sin into him, ky is actually the one to recognize that sin understands him at his core. i mean, of course. sin's spent probably more time with sol than he's spent with anyone else, and i find it interesting that he came out of that, not being cold and callous like sol has become, but the absolute opposite. i think he trained himself to be almost the opposite of sol, to be able to see through the walls that his guardian puts up and really understand a lot of what he's getting at. it makes a lot of sense, honestly!

i'd also like to bring up a line that he says earlier in sign, which is, "my heart always has been, and will be, open to all" and i think the real thing that cements this being absolutely TRUE is that it's towards elphelt, almost immediately after being told directly by elphelt that she's quote unquote "hot shit" akin to ram. look if he was the same person as his father or his extra father he'd be worried! but he's NOT! he very much is the type of person to trust in a person and that's important! because without that they never would have worked with elphelt to the degree they did, they never would have tried to save her and thus figured out fucking EVERYTHING with rev, they never would have gotten ramlethal as an ally, none of it! because sin had trust in them and took the time and energy to pay attention to them and try to actually emotionally connect with them, and he was a big part of the reason that ramlethal realized she had feelings!!!! fuck!!!!!!! hes integral to the plot because he is inherently kind!!!!!!!!!!!!!

also fuck. fucking hell his relationship with ky. again. i could write a whole different essay on this and it WILL be covered in bread fic which yes will be updated i swear it. anyways. it takes a lot to willingly accept an effort to repair a relationship and put in effort yourself. and it takes MORE to realize the other side of the situation, especially when it's familial. i just. fuck dude. sin cares so much about his mother and through that finds a new path of caring about his own father whom he hated for almost all of his life. fuck dude. he called him dad. he called him dad. i cannot stress enough how much it fucked me up the first time i saw that scene i was crying in public about it i love them so fucking much dude. so much.

anyways this is a big old ramble but fuck sin gets narrowed down to "haha stupid large child who eats a lot" by a lot of people and i think more of us should recognize that while yes he is a 5 year old who looks jacked and yes he does have the funny eat move, he is also an incredibly kind and emotionally mature character

[rottenbrainstuff]

BG3 playthrough - House of Hope

Man I’m getting legit sad I’m getting so close to being done.

Unpopular (?) opinion - I have read people explaining up and down and back and forth about how pressed they are that Haarlep says Raphael is bad in bed, how Haarlep is unreliable because he hates Raphael, how he’s an incubus so his standards must be very high, how Raphael is probably purposefully doing this or that because Haarlep is a spy keeping an eye on him for daddy so of course he’s not going to appear vulnerable in any way, even how sad and conflicted Raphael must be, being a cambian…

Honestly - I have zero trouble taking Haarlep at his literal word. 100%. Raphael’s house is literally full of paintings and statues of himself. He wrote an entire book that’s nothing but descriptions of different scenarios of him being crowned with the crown of Karsus. His diary entries are absolutely insufferable. He is the textbook definition of hubris and vanity. I have zero problem believing Haarlep literally. And I say all this affectionately, by the way: Raphael is one of my favourite characters in the entire game. But it’s kind of like how everyone wants to soften out all the rough edges on Astarion - I like him like this. I think it’s hilarious that he’s so vain. His hubris is so funny. His opinion of himself is so high and his confidence in his victory is so complete, but his personal incubus is sitting here lounging in his bed absolutely roasting his ass to complete strangers with very little prompting. I think he’s a great devil character and I don’t want to make up excuses for his behaviour in order to humanize him. I definitely do love complicated antagonists who have more to them than it first appears, but honestly I just do not get that vibe from him. And I love him for it.

Haarlep was so funny btw. I just love it when actors are having fun. That must have been so funny to come in and voice the character, like, ok so for today, you’re doing the same voice as before, except make it slutty and bitchy this time. It makes sense I guess that Haarlep can change into a female form if you want, of course he can, and I think it’s funny that even when Raphael wants to shake things up a bit, it’s still with a version of himself, but myeh, that whole thing felt to me like a “hey don’t worry if you’re icked out, we have a girl option too that we can totally switch to if you want.” Maybe I’ve just read too many forum arguments about how there’s too many gay people in this game and people are crying to have a toggle to turn it off, and it makes me hostile to anything that smacks of trying to soothe people’s hurt heterosexuality. (because like, theoretically there could be lesbians who object to the scene as well?) Oh well. Still funny in the end. I was going to go through with just sleeping with Haarlep to avoid a fight, because that’s the direction my tav generally likes to go, but then Astarion got very concerned and made me feel bad, so I changed my mind.

Well this whole area was fun. I loved Raphael’s house. I loved all the details. I loved the debtors, the tacky ostentatious bullshit in every corner, I loved the rotten banquet. Is that its natural state and he charmed it to look fresh when I arrived? (disgusting, I love it) Or has he just been so pissy about whatever went wrong with the skeleton folks at the table that he’s never bothered to have it cleared and has left it there in a temper tantrum as a lesson? (ridiculous, I also love it) I love how absolutely, singularly obsessed Raphael is with my party. I know it’s because we are the means by which he thinks he is going to get that crown, but it also feels personal and weird and uncomfortable. I love that my contract has this place of honour in his archive. It’s almost touching, if it wasn’t my fucking soul. I love how absolutely self-assured Raphael is, how confident he is that his plan is going to work, how the possibility of a failure or a trick, like, he doesn’t even have the capacity to consider that a possibility. It SO GODAMNED FUNNY to kick his ego-inflated ass when he was SO FUCKING SURE that he would win. Raphael you are such an insufferable idiot. I love him. I’m so glad the VA won a Bafta.

The Raphael fight is tricky, but honestly, half of the trick is that before you even get there, you have to fight your way to the foyer past the most annoying enemies. I guess Hope’s divine intervention which can restore your spells and HP helps to balance that out though.

It was surprising to see I was able to get Yurgir to side with me in the fight - I had assumed he’d be SO fucking pissed after I tricked him in the Shar gauntlet. Now I have an additional ally in the big brain fight! …except he really wasn’t all that helpful in the Raphael fight, not at all. He’d go invisible, pop out of invisibility, knife someone for maybe 7 HP, then pop invisible again. I guess every little bit helps but…? Come on dude. At least stay visible so you can soak some hits.

Apparently it’s possible to make Korilla survive the fight? I was… NOT able to do that. You get some extra dialogue if you do, but the fight is hard enough to win even without trying to manage a hostile NPC who is usually the first one Yurgir targets. Sorry Hope, sorry Korilla. How come you can cast Otto’s Irresistible Dance on Raphael, and it will incapacitate him, but it won’t make him actually boogie? I was so excited to see him dance, and then he didn’t, he just stands there.

It doesn’t even need to be said - Raphael’s fight song is of course amazing, chef’s kiss, perfection.

Anyway, bard vs bard fight, very fun, when you kill him Raphael crumples dramatically to the ground, I love the big boss fights in this game.

Coming back, I got a stupid lecture from the Emperor about how naughty naughty I was being. Sure asshole, lecture me about trust, that’s really rich coming from the guy who didn’t trust ME with anything, and I had to pry the truth out, unwillingly, in stages. I can’t fucking wait to doublecross that guy.

If you attack Helsik, Raphael’s boss song also plays? That was… a little bit strange! I wanted to see what was in her basement, but the fight with all the gilded imps and Minotaurs and whatnot was such a pain I didn’t bother. Apparently you can access the basement through Dammon’s basement anyways, if you really want to see it, so. I DID make sure to pickpocket those gauntlets back off her cause I want them.

Mannnn. I’m almost done the game. WTF. All I have left to do is go give Mol her contract, talk to Voss in the undercity and piss off the Emperor, get my poop in a group and… that’s it. I’m off to fight the brain. I’ve been playing this playthrough for six months, and I’m almost done.

[thunderheadfred]

We’ll see if i get started on BG3 today (i might force myself to be a good student and finish up my very last assignment before i utterly descend into madness) but in the meantime I’m trying to find some spoiler-free tips on how to romance the feral vampire man whilst playing a good(ish?) character.

Please lemme know if you have pointers. Here’s what I’ve gleaned so far:

Don’t forget to actually pick him up. According to a friend, Astarion is possible to miss somehow despite being “right the fuck there, just southwest of the spaghetti”

Don’t pick the super helpful “yes of course i’ll save you immediately” options for quests, be reluctant or non-committal, or leave Astarion in the time-out corner for those dialogues

I’m more than willing to play a reluctant “maybe i’ll help maybe i won’t” pragmatic neutral kinda protagonist, but I’m always too weak to be truly evil or mean in rpgs lmfao, at least on the first playthrough

I do not mind at all if he is constantly criticizing me in fact i would fucking love it (but i also want a sappy winning-him-over slow-burn romance, if at all possible)

I heard he likes chaos; THAT i can do. I don’t have ADHD for nothing

Rest a lot? Apparently this helps trigger scenes

[rachelsnotebook]

Wishes wrapped in Red String

Intertwine by Crescence Studio

Two souls, and an eternity to endlessly intersect. Intertwine lovingly takes the player's hand and leads them through glimpses of these souls' many lives.

You'd be hard pressed to find another game that feels uniquely special from the second the title screen pops up! It wasn't long before I felt a strong wave of emotion wash over, as noted during my first playthrough:

And it was gentle. Van and the player character's stories were worth every minute I spent playing (and replaying, and replaying...). How could anyone not latch onto that hope of finding your soulmate?

Intertwine is broken up into four short sections. Each one gives the player a satisfying taste, but it will leave you feeling greedy for so much more!

I love this game exactly how it exists, but I'd be lying if I didn't selfishly wish there were several more tales. For now, I'll just happily leave things to my wild imagination.

Reasons to Love:

- The writing reads like your new favorite book. The stories you'll find are charming, hopeful, laugh out loud funny, and romantic.

- Van might be my soulmate trapped in a visual novel for this lifetime...

I swiftly fell for his charm, and felt like a clown when the game called me out on my own cheesiness.

- I can't praise the voice acting enough! The subtle differences to each lifetime's Van was always filled with personality. The performance brought him to life and transformed these stories into very real feeling conversations.

- The replay loop mechanic was exciting. Each time back at the title screen felt like a treat. Where would Van and the playable character meet next?

- I adored the visual design of Intertwine's title screen from the start. As I learned the flow of the game it became clear that it also held a fun secret. That mechanic was delightful and unexpected. And also incredibly fun!

- As Van once said... "Fuck, this is embarrassing."

So, I think every CG scene got a surprised gasp out of me. The artwork is so lovely to stare at. There wasn't a single moment where I wasn't impressed!

- I know I already pointed out how special the writing is, but I need to throw extra confetti praise over the banter. This is probably my personal favorite aspect of Intertwine. The banter is so well done!

There's a lifetime where the player and Van are coworkers who hate each other, and then briefly worm their way into each other's hearts. I adored this change, and the chance at being a bit mean. There's something thrilling about a love that bloomed from a seed planted in frustration.

I would share some of my favorite lines from that lifetime, but I'm afraid that I would end up with 80% of that section posted here. I took so many screenshots.

~~~

Intertwine came out swinging and hit a home run. Now I could be biased as a hopeless romantic, but this is my blog. It's safe to say that Intertwine leaves a lasting impression and going straight onto my Best Games of 2023 list!

This piece was originally posted on July 19th, 2023 at rachelsnotebook.wixsite.com

[starastarship]

Thoughts on Indigo park chapter 1

Spoiler warning under the cut!

Alright guys so today I played Indigo park chapter 1 with my friend @theroseofazrael. And I wanted to give my thoughts on it along the way basically! Warning again spoilers for chapter 1!

Right of the bat I wanna say that this is coming from somone who watched it first and someone who played it after. So you could say I have at least 2 things to go off by

Putting this in multiple parts

Part 1: entrance

So the beginning. first of all intro cutscene was really well made and amazing to look at! Getting right put into the game, meeting Rambly for the first time was nice! (Also fun fact I did the math around the 2920 days guest absents and it's 8 years!) I liked him alot! He is cute and sweet! Love his animations and I hope he doesn't turn out evil (or at least not the AI) So we open the door with a simple puzzle and I am glad it is really just like a kind of walking simulator! Going in we are getting our critter cuff, and I was so sure in the playthrough I watched that there was one of the mascots inside the shop!

with the critter cuff around our wrist we now walk into the park and when I first saw the statue I immediatly thought "Is this a disney reference"! I liked it! going throught the tunnel and it collapses behind us. I would say I actually kinda liked that! I find it sometimes a bit more realistic if something old collapses right behind someone than it already having collapsed! Also the tunnel kinda reminded me a bit of a tunnel from my favorite theme park which I found funny!

also on a side note: I love how Rambly still tries to make this abandoned theme park sound more like that it is under construction. Deniel is a river in egypt!

part 2: The train ride

While it still plays a bit in the tunnel I put it with the train ride! Walking through the que line really helps the feeling of This was really a theme park! And while I didn't see it on my playthrough (at least I think I missed it) on SHB I saw like the tail feathers of Mollie already giving an uneasy feeling but was also a bit foreshadowing in a sense. Anyways when I was in the call with my friend, Rambly told me I would be too old for this ride and I literally said "well fuck you then". This was also still at the time where I did not realize Azra was not watching my stream, because my game crashed at the beginning and I booted it up again but forgot to stream it at the time (I honestly believe it has nothing to do with the game and more about me having too much stuff open at the time!)

Anyways we load up onto the train and off we go on our first ride! This was a very sweet introduction to the cast, and felt natural for a theme park! Meeting Mollie first I loved that introduction. I like her opimistic character as they talked (which I found also really cool that Rambly interacted with the cast during the ride!) What I didn't noticed until a bit later, down there was a door where you could see Mollie "spying" on us! I just saw how the door closed but it gave me the impression that she stalked us during the entire ride or she was like "looking around" and basically found out there is someone!

Then we get to Finleys underwater space and the entire time I was looking around if I could find Mollie somewhere again (I unfortunatley didn't see her anywhere). But then Finley say "you know me for 100 years" and Imma get this right off the bat, Mollie later on says this! I go deeper in this later on!

Then we get to a really destroyed place which thinking about it is weird! Every other place was ok looking, almost in tip top shape but this one was quiet literally ruined! It is open for alot of theories I believe, since this one was probably Salems place! it is up to you guys what this was! So off we go to repair the electricity finding a Mollie animatronic! It says one last thing about Rambly hurt Llloyd! Now this one gives me the impression that Rambly is more evil but also later on with Lloyd there is a scene that plays out. And I believe that there is more to the cuff/ the system in the park than we thought

Anyways we boot up the train again and carrie on! Next and last one is Lloyd. Here we see the first time the total distaste for Lloyd from our Raccoon! now considering how Rambly and Lloyd interact, this might be just his AI programm but throught the game, expecially the collectables, it is more to believe that this dislike isn't really programmed! So maybe that part, wasn't meant to be in a annoyed way? only time will tell! But also I knew this one from tik tok but at the end of this interaction, looking to the left shows Mollie like literally by our side coming from the courtains! I will talk about a thought when we get there!

Going out we are at the gift shop of the ride. And here I noticed that in one of the cameras we can see Molluie running after the train! We see multiple empty trains in those photos and then one in the middle with Mollie running! I believe that would have been our photo! considering all other photos are empty seats, it makes the most sense. And with mollie always popping up during the ride now and then! Now this one is more a theorie but I imagine that this photo was taken during Salems part! Maybe Mollie was chasing us, the train was just faster, and when it broke down and we went out to fix it, maybe she caught up! Then she saw we weren't there and maybe thought we ran ahead? this is really just what I have thought about this than really being a theory! Anyways i was pointing the picture out to Azra and here I noticed how stupid I was

I noticed after they told me, there was no stream, that I forgot to stream it! These entire first minutes, they did not see what I saw while I stupidly pointed out things you can only see! oTL anyways moving on to part 3!

part 3: the central area and Lloyds theater

Putting these 2 together cause I find them rather short in a way! First of going down the stairs and seeing the entire area + working and I believe opperating ferris wheel! I told to Azra that as a kid or even now that I would have gone there! I just hope they also have rollercoaster tbh! I like the adrenalin! I found the fountain actually really funny, being able to rotate like this while spitting water! Noone was save against the water! we also get to the information kiosk and to the collectables! I found it nice that we got more info about them through Rambley and expecially through our protagonist which there is one thing!

At the beginning Rambly tells us that we are a new comer/ are not in the guest data base, but looking at the descriptions it is made very clear we were in this park multiple times! I believe either, children weren't like allowed to be in the guest data base because well they were children! or because we aged and with age faces change, the face recognition didn't pick up on us!

And another thing. As I said before Rambly seems to really dislike Lloyd and with the plushies, expecially the last one we get (and old cartoon version of Lloyd) it says that Lloyd was the most popular one apperantly! or at least the company was more focused on the Lion than the Raccoon! So I believe the resentment shows that Rambly is a bit more sentient than it looks like!

Moving on, Rambly wants to bring us to the Jetstream junction but unfortunatly we need a key! And that key was in Lloyds theater. getting acess to it, we go inside! seeing the theater was really pretty! and on stage we see a sleeping Lloyd who wakes up and running away. now I wanna adress that because I feel like that they aren't really out to hurt us! after the key and getting through the section (where even if I know nothing would happen, I still anticipated it) only then when we tried to go, did he really came close enough to grab us! and that one time in the middle where he was squished under a box! And honestly i think it was also because he was like put into a croner and didn't see another way!

Here is also a funny thing because technically speaking you can get this anytime when you turn around away from the backstage area we see again Mollie! Some had it at the beginning I had it after the area and honestly I feel like it is more impactful when it is after the area!Anyways we got the key and off to Mollies place!

part 4: Jetstream junction

Now this place was really fun! We go up to rooftop racing adn are greeted with rumble having fallen onto the ride destroying it! Now I felt it was unfair we only get to ride one thing so far in the entire park! Anyways we go downstairs again and to the landing pad! or rather we should go there but off to the side is a little drinking area with an arcade machine! We can play it and it is a typical oldschool platformer! This is also where we meet Salem for the first time basically! Many also belive that this has more story relevence than it looks like. Also we get like a pixalated Ramblyberry but I think that is more an easter egg than it being exactly "canon".

Anyways we now enter the landing pad which is like a really REALLY big playground area! and we got a interesting puzzle here! simple to understand. We have blocks and need to figure out the the right combination! Easy to understand thanks to the purple block and the purple star besides it! So power goes out and we walk through the entire playground, finding all shapes and the colors to it! And guess what Mollie is with us! She is often very cose to us but never really attacks us! until after we solved the puzzle! We get our first chase in the game and the only one in chapter 1!

I died only 2 times! first time I was not expecting her to come from the front and second time I didn't knew where to jump! but overall I liked the chase! it was easy to follow and had only one moment that I thought "ARE YOU FUCKING ME?! an it is the collectable during the chase! it's not hard to see but dang I held to step back one time to get it and my adrenaline was so high holy shit!

And the ending was wow. So like I felt like with the head off it felt different than I saw on SHB. Maybe it was becuase of the pure adrenaline but I felt like they fixed the timing of when it happens! Cause with Mike I felt like the timing of the head or the distance of the jump too was weird! but maybe it was always like this. And during all of this me and Azra just went "damn she is bleeding alot" not exactly listening to Rambly saying anything about the park and stuff! But it does make me wonder what happened to the staff and expecially WHY WAS THERE FRESH LOOKING BLOOD ON BOTH MOLLIE AND LLOYD?!

Anyways we leave and soon make our way to Ocean Odyssey and I notice that is Nordic themed ! (loves it!) and after seeing a big Finley coming out there ends chapter 1!

Finally thoughts

I really enjoyed it! I don't play often horror games... actually rewrite that I never played horror games and this was my first time! gameplay wise, there were a few nitpicky things but that was their first game and for that alone this deserves a major Star because it is really good! and story wise, it got me hooked! we got enough information for anticipation withouthaving all to much said, only leaving us wondering!

Anyways can't wait for chapter 2 and see ya!

[queerbrujas]

okay i'm in a mood so we're gonna talk about my thoughts on the N route in twc book 3. they're not good so look away if you don't wanna read that etc etc

so i'd known for a while that i was going to have to bring in an oc that wasn't eva for this route because in the meantime i'd developed her enough and thought about her enough that she just didn't fit the route anymore anywhere other than in my head. i still tried it with her and i didn't like it one bit, but i thought hey, my own problem.

so i made a new detective.

let me tell you about tatiana.

tatiana is the definition of a uhaul lesbian. she's head over heels in love with nat, absolutely crazy for her, totally willing to gloss over any sort of conflict. exactly the kind of narrative the story wants you to go for (and we'll come back to this).

things that happened in tatiana's playthrough:

she confessed her love to nat only to get absolutely NO response, an attempt to initiate sex, and no commentary whatsoever in the narration on how nat didn't say anything back. like, i'm very sorry to mishka who seems to think that initiating sex is a satisfactory answer to that kind of thing and the Ultimate expression of love but i think a normal and expected reaction to this would be 'wait they didn't say it back'. i am NOT trying to say that N needed to say it back at that moment, before anyone comes for me, there are a million reasons why they wouldn't (i even had a theory that they'd freak out if they heard it!!!) but the fact that the narration absolutely does not acknowledge that fact is so excuse me what the fuck. i've been so pissed at this that i've been working on a fic purely out of hatred for that choice.

let's talk about the sex scenes. they're bad. i'm sorry, they're bad. not only in execution (who cares) but you are not going to tell me that what is essentially a quickie is Enough for a character who has been built up as an over-the-top romantic when it's supposed to be their first time having sex with their partner. i won't buy it. it's like mishka spent these past three years marinading in the asks about agent suavewell and how smooth and sexy and horny they are and when it was time to write the book that was all she wanted to write.

it all just feels so shallow. where is the romance, for fuck's sake. it all feels unearned. beat after beat after beat with nothing to make me care about it.

and, once again—this is playing the ideal version of this route. the 'head over heels' version of this route. i don't even want to touch the other variants that continue to exist despite it being increasingly clear they are Not how the story is meant to go. i'm absolutely someone who supports authors doing whatever the fuck they want with their stories, the fact that there's a playable MC doesn't mean the player gets to dictate every single aspect of their arc or personality, but don't offer the option of things if you're not gonna commit to it. don't tell me i can be hesitant about a relationship when the narrative is gonna fall apart if i decide to do that etc etc.

IDK MAN. i'm very very happy for anyone who enjoyed this route, love that for you, but also, what the fuck.

[riddlerosehearts]

okay, the other day i watched a playthrough of the emperor's new groove video game for playstation 1. a game which, for various reasons, i have never actually played myself. but i wrote down a lot of things about it that i'd now like to share. this is basically a combination of my own thoughts on the game and a summary of all the insane things that happened in it:

the game begins after kuzco has already been turned into a llama and pacha is saying he can't help unless he builds kuzcotopia somewhere else. in the movie this is the scene which leads into kuzco going off into the jungle by himself, but the game has you start by exploring the general area of the village around pacha's hut, where his kids hang out and teach you the mechanics. kuzco also knows from the beginning that yzma is trying to kill him and encounters her as a boss multiple times in the story.

it's fully voice acted, and this is the first time that j.p. manoux had voiced kuzco. he would go on to voice kuzco in the emperor's new school and in various other projects, and while it would've been nice if they could've gotten david spade for these, i think he does a good job. pacha's voice actor is different from either the movie or the show--it's john goodman in the movie + season 2 of the show, fred tatasciore in s1 of the show, and brian cummings here--but he's not too bad either.

pacha: "don't take the villagers' coins!" kuzco: "the villagers are MY people, so those are MY coins."

tipo: "by pressing your action button, you can smash these red pots" kuzco: "good, i feel like smashing something!"

i'm kind of obsessed with the fact that these sort of standard mechanics that you don't normally think about, like keeping money you found on the ground and destroying people's belongings in order to steal their money and items, are explained in this game by the protagonist being an entitled asshole. also obsessed with tipo encouraging kuzco's destructive behavior.

chaca: "this pad raises the columns to form steps! once they're triggered, you better be quick before they lower again." kuzco: "uh, ever thought of making them stay up for good when you press the pad?" chaca: "uhh... no." kuzco: "don't tell me, you got the brains in the family."

KUZCO DON'T BULLY A CHILD AKJDSFHHDJSKGSG

there's a mechanic where you can continue playing from your last checkpoint after dying as long as you've collected a wampy. what's a wampy? it's the name of the funky looking plushie that kuzco has as a baby in the first movie and then again in kronk's new groove:

the above screenshots are from the emperor's new groove, kronk's new groove, and the video game respectively. this is a bit of a tangent, but something i find interesting is that in the emperor's new school kuzco secretly carries a plushie named wampy around everywhere for comfort and that plushie has the same basic design but completely different colors:

and the purple wampy is never seen in the show, so i can only conclude that kuzco keeps multiple of these plushies that all share the same name. maybe he leaves the purple one at home so it doesn't have to endure the horrors of high school.

anyway, back to the game--every time you collect a wampy kuzco hugs it and says things like "awww, it's my wampyyyy" in a cute little baby talk voice. fucking dork <3

there are several little scenes during the village section of the game where chaca and tipo keep showing up to give tutorials and he just keeps making snarky comments at them and asking why they're there and if they don't have anything better to do.

in one of these scenes, tipo shows up to teach kuzco how to open doors and kuzco just goes "how did you get here so fast?". to which tipo replies that this is a game. another time, when chaca explains to kuzco how the wampy mechanic works, he asks how she knows all this and she goes "i don't know! beats me!"

there's a part where some random villager tells llama kuzco to stay away from his statues and kuzco goes "i'm the emperor! open the door or i'll smash your statue to pieces!"

the guy runs off screaming "DEMON LLAMAAAAA!!" and then tipo suddenly shows up to teach you how to smash the statues. i think chicha may need to keep a closer eye on tipo in the future.

SPEAKING OF CHICHA. SHE'S NOT IN THIS FUCKING GAME. if i were actually playing the game and doing a proper review of it i would automatically have to dock points for the lack of chicha.

at the beginning kuzco breaks some kid's llama bike and then the kid keeps showing up in every single chapter with a new bike and challenging kuzco to races. he somehow manages to show up everywhere from the top of a waterfall to the middle of yzma's roller coaster and never once questions why this llama is such a jerk or why he can even talk. also, toward the end of the game you race him one last time and his bike breaks for the millionth time and he says he learned a valuable lesson. that lesson? that these llama bikes suck and he needs to stop buying them.

kuzco hates being touched so much that anytime a guard, bug, bird, etc touches him he says "no touchy" and then loses health.

at one point kuzco gets turned into a turtle and kronk shows up and asks if he's there to enter the annual village race. he refuses at first but then it turns out kronk has an item that kuzco needs to progress, sooooo you have to have turtle kuzco slide on his back down the hill and try to beat kronk in the race.

kronk is voiced by patrick warburton again btw. eartha kitt also returned as yzma for the game. they both returned for each season of the emperor's new school as well, and i believe eartha kitt in particular loved voicing yzma so much that every time they needed her, right up until her death, she showed up.

kuzco cries if you lose the race against kronk, which is understandable considering that losing means he has to climb up to the top of the hill as a turtle again.

at the end of the village section you have to run from yzma as she throws bombs at kuzco and once you manage to get away, kuzco says "you call yourself an end of level boss, yzma? you're rubbish! toodles!"

after this, kuzco ends up going into the jungle despite pacha's repeated warnings that it's too dangerous. and now instead of chaca and tipo, a talking bug trapped in a spiderweb appears to teach him additional mechanics.

when the jaguars from the movie show up kuzco says "time out" and then the frame freezes while he explains to YOU, the player, what you'll have to do to save him.

during the waterfall section chaca is somehow there AGAIN, at the top of the waterfall in a pink llama pool floatie, and is like "oh wow, another llama tied to a log!" (apparently one showed up the previous week) but does not react at all to her dad also being tied to a log. she just explains to them how this level is gonna work and then leaves.

she pops back up again a little later (still on the waterfall. they stretched this part of the movie out a lot) and calls kuzco "kinda short for a llama".

speaking of the game stretching things out a lot, pacha literally says during the waterfall levels: "this scene was much shorter in the film".

there's a whole other jungle section where kuzco spends an extensive amount of time having been turned into a frog. tipo randomly appears to help again during this section.

there's another race with kronk in an icy area that shows kronk to be an excellent ice skater. i would probably be terrible at this if i played the game.

when they finally get into the city kuzco tells pacha he knows the streets like the back of his hand and pacha replies, "but kuzco, you're a llama, you don't have any hands!"

when they separate and kuzco sneaks on his own into the palace, he gets confronted by a naked guy who's conveniently being covered up by a peacock and says the peacocks stole his clothes. he's blocking a path we need to go through so we are forced to find his underwear for him. this guy also does not question wtf is up with the talking llama.

when you get him his underwear back he, uh. well. he uses his magic sparkly underwear to fly away:

what is this guy, the incan version of captain underpants? kuzco then says in a deadpan voice, "this has gotta be the weirdest day of my entire life". can't argue with that!

i've gone way too long without mentioning that this game is primarily a platformer, which is a genre i kind of suck at and don't play often, but appears to have a lot of variety in its gameplay that makes it look pretty fun! the races with kronk, the part where you guide pacha and kuzco down the river, the part where you have to run from the jaguars, the stealth sections, and the various parts where kuzco is transformed into non-llama animals all have different types of gameplay to switch it up. the city is also huge and full of puzzle sections.

when kuzco defeats yzma in his throne room and then meets back up with pacha, they have to take the roller coaster down to yzma's lab and there's a level based on this as well. you have to control the roller coaster and turn it at just the right time to collect coins and avoid falling to your death. this looks like it could be a lot of fun to me.

tipo somehow shows up on the roller coaster to give another tutorial and kuzco tells this 6 year old to make him a sandwich and then insults his haircut 😭 kuzco i love you but why are you like this

before the final battle against yzma she says she's gonna drink a potion to turn herself into a hideous monster and rule the empire forever. and kuzco says "are you sure you didn't drink it already, you old bag of bones?"

there's this huge dramatic buildup to her drinking the potion. and then. it turns her into a cat like in the movie. and that's the final boss battle. you have to race against cat yzma to get the last potion to turn back into a human.

just from the video i watched, this race seemed very short and easy and therefore anticlimactic? but idk, maybe the person playing was just really good at it.

the final scene of the game immediately following this is kuzco visiting the village as a human again and we see scenes like kronk playing jump rope with chaca and tipo, the incan captain underpants guy flying around the roof of a house, bucky the squirrel chasing cat yzma, and kuzco + pacha's family all having a dance party while fireworks go off.

again i must reiterate that this game is missing chicha's legendary and iconic presence. my assumption is that since the characters seem to know they're in a video game, she didn't wanna have to help give kuzco tutorials because it would put too much stress on her while pregnant. still, though, it would've been nice to see her in at least the opening or ending sequences.

in conclusion: as i mentioned, i've never played this game, and the main reason for this is that i didn't know it existed when i was a kid--but even if i had i still most likely wouldn't have played it because i didn't care much about the emperor's new groove back then. the only reason i looked up a playthrough of it was because my autism brain suddenly told me i needed to learn about all of the official emperor's new groove media in existence. however, it really does look like fun and the playthrough i watched wasn't even 5 hours long, so now i kind of wanna give it a try someday? the writing is hilarious. not as hilarious as the actual movie, of course, but it was just so bizarre in such a great way and was very faithful to the movie's complete lack of a fourth wall.

also: this game has the best "game over" screen of all time. whenever kuzco dies it literally just plays a clip of the funeral scene from the movie, all the way through the "he ain't getting any deader, back to work!" bit.