#gfl commander

[genshingorlsrevengeance]

(GFL Short Fic) AN-94 attempts romance

AN-94 has no idea how to approach romance, given her lack of social skills and knowledge about humans in general.

But she would do her best to let her feelings be known!

AN-94 sat in her dorm dressed in her casual uniform, that being a black t-shirt and pants. Her gaze was focused on the wall, but she was fighting a mental battle.

She had learned that she quite enjoyed spending time with one of the human personnel, who seemed to feel the same. But it was...strange. It wasn't quite the same nature of how she felt for the rest of DEFY.

According to (Y/N), she seemed to smile around them and acted differently. What did humans call two people that were always together again?

(AN-94) "...A couple?"

That's right, they were called 'couples' according to the internet searches she had conducted in her head. But how did one become a couple? As far as she could tell, they were just friends. If that internet definition was even right, anyway.

(AK-12's Voice) "Thinking about (Y/N) again?"

(AN-94) "Ah, yes. Do you know how couples are made, AK-12?"

AK-12's Advice

(AK-12) "Hm, I'm not entirely sure. But why bother asking me when you could do so yourself? Come on, go out there and be yourself! I'm sure it'll be fine!"

AN-94 nodded.

(AN-94) "Understood. Commencing mission."

She left the dorm with a determined walk, AK-15 and RPK-16 looking outwards after her.

(AK-15) "...You realize this will end poorly, correct?"

(AK-12) "Probably. But better to learn from failure, eh?"

(RPK-16) "Agreed."

...

(Y/N) "So, what brings you by today, 94? Need something?"

(AN-94) "I am just being myself."

(Y/N) "...I-Is that right?"

(AN-94) "Is that a problem?"

(Y/N) "Hah, no. I don't mind a bit. I'm just gonna be organizing some paperwork for the commander, I can't imagine it's exactly exciting."

(AN-94) "Then allow me to help."

(Y/N) "Sure, that'd be great! Thanks again!"

AN-94 helped (Y/N) with the paperwork. True to her mission, she remained herself, not mentioning a single thing about her feelings towards (Y/N) and remaining almost silent the entire time.

For (Y/N), it was quite a comfortable silence. For AN-94, she was even more confused. She had changed nothing, why was (Y/N) not mentioning they were in love yet?

RPK-16's Advice

(RPK-16) "So, they didn't have a reaction?"

(AN-94) "Negative. I am unsure what I did wrong."

(RPK-16) "Hm, well you do have the sort of air to just be seen through..."

AN-94 slightly frowned at the comment until RPK-16 excitedly put her hands together.

(RPK-16) "How about physical contact? Humans are quite like rabbits where they desperately crave it!"

(AN-94) "Physical contact?...I see, that may work."

...

(Y/N) was suddenly confused as to why AN-94 was suddenly in their quarters. Not to mention she was completely still, her face literally in their chest.

It also didn't help they were also on their bed. She remained unmoving like a statue, and she was acting as if there was nothing wrong.

(Y/N) "U-Um...!"

(AN-94) "Does this bother you?"

Her voice was muffled in their shirt.

(Y/N) "A-A little. It's almost midnight, why are you just-"

(AN-94) "Then this method is not working. Please, excuse me."

Quickly removing herself from their upper torso, she stood back up and left the room without saying anything else, leaving an extremely confused (Y/N).

Commander's Advice

(AN-94) "...And that explains my situation, sir."

(Commander) "...Now, I know I have an open door policy, but why did you come to me about this?"

(AN-94) "Are you unversed in romance, sir?"

The commander awkwardly coughed into his hand, adjusting his jacket's collar and trying to ignore the fact AN-94 had just called him out for being single.

(Commander) "I'm just saying there are probably others who's far better at reading these kinds of emotions. Plus, that probably confused the hell out of poor (Y/N)..."

(AN-94) "They did seem quite perplexed as to why I was so close to them."

(Commander) "...Oh, I know who could help!"

He said, snapping his finger. He quickly reached for a nearby intercom and called out the T-Doll's name.

Springfield's Advice

Springfield brought out a small tray containing four muffins she had baked, giving AN-94 a warm smile.

(Springfield) "You know what they say! The quickest way to a person's heart is their stomach!"

AN-94 contemplated that for a moment before Springfield cleared her throat.

(Springfield) "It's a metaphor dear. Before you tear out their internal organs, it means that they'll get your message of love a lot faster if you give them good food!"

AN-94 nodded and stared at the muffins.

(AN-94) "But...these are made by you. Would (Y/N) not love you instead of me?"

Springfield couldn't help but giggle at her innocence. AN-94 tilted her head.

(Springfield) "I'm sorry, that wasn't meant to offend, sweetie. Well, you do have a good point, it would mean a bit more if it came from you, but-"

(AN-94) "May I borrow your kitchen? I would like to make some muffins."

(Springfield) "Be my guest!"

...

(Y/N) "Mmm! These muffins are so good! Thank you so much for bringing them here! Springfield always knows how to bake them just right."

For some reason AN-94 was flustered, unable to look them in the eye. Maybe it was because of that whole planking incident a few days ago? (Y/N) was confused, they weren't angry at her to begin with.

(Y/N) "Would you like some? There's more than enough for the two of us!"

(AN-94) "...T-Thank you."

Seeing her smile got (Y/N) to smile now as well, something she immediately took notice of. AN-94 made sure not to tell them of the fires that broke out in the attempts of her trying to cook for them.

Instead she had to use Springfield's muffins in the end.

...

AK-15's Advice

AN-94 sat back in DEFY's dorm, looking dejected as she laid in her bed. Every attempt had failed spectacularly. If only romance was like the battlefield, then she could complete this mission with no problems. She could hear AK-15 sigh as she approached her bed, crossing her arms.

(AK-15) "So, have you tried telling (Y/N) you liked them directly?"

(AN-94) "...What?"

(AK-15) "There's no use of beating around the bush. Tell them how you feel so you can avoid any further misconceptions, and get results that way."

That...made sense, actually.

(AN-94) "Thank you, AK-15."

Springing up from her bed, she immediately dashed out and made way towards (Y/N)'s quarters once again.

(AK-15) "...Human etiquette is so inefficient..."

...

(Y/N) "You...like me?"

(AN-94) "I do, (Y/N). I...I only hope that I am irreplaceable in your heart."

(Y/N) began laughing, which made AN-94 confused again. Before she could voice it, they stepped closer to her, grabbing both her hands gently.

(Y/N) "Is this what those last few days have been about? Why didn't you just tell me?"

(AN-94) "I...I wanted to try things a human would."

Seeing her flustered reaction made (Y/N) embrace her tightly, laughing gently and making her comfortable.

(Y/N) "Fair enough. I...I like you too, AN-94. And you've always been irreplaceable to me."

AN-94 smiled back and sunk deeper into their embrace, the two of them remaining silent.

AK-12 was listening in around the corner, nodding to herself in satisfaction. Walking off, she came across RPK-16 and AK-15 who were also nearby.

(AK-15) "You could have just told her to do that from the beginning and saved her the headache."

(RPK-16) "Oh come now, it's about the experience as well as the end result. Not everything has to be so direct, you know!~"

AK-15 simply grunted. AK-12 couldn't agree more. She'd have to pay (Y/N) a visit later, and make sure they'd be the best partner AN-94 could have outside the battlefield.

[khrysos-karnifex]

Complete and Comprehensive Guide to Different Gacha Insert Protags

Chief

Navigator

Commander

Shikikan

Dokutah

Bonus for the Arknights operators

reply with who got them the shirts

[cielhunternorwood]

So, apparently, amongst a wealth of customization options, you can put a red beret on characters in the new Tekken.

You know what I had to do when I saw the shield emblem on it.

[melthemia]

Venting a bit.

I hate feeling so conflicted in relation to something I'm so passionate about.

There's a lot of thinly-veiled casual misogyny and bigotry writhing around the GFL community that I've personally witnessed being completely unchallenged in open, actively moderated spaces. Ranging from "jokingly" hating anyone who picks the female commander in GFL2 to downright conspiracy theories about LGBT "propaganda."

Although... I don't know what I expected from such a relatively small and insular fanbase that has a decent chunk of its English following most prominently on 4chan, and ESPECIALLY from a game series popularised by marketing towards gun enthusiasts, on top of being an anime gacha game. I feel it should be obvious what kind of demographic that combination naturally fosters.

But even with that obvious fact in mind, it still hurts. I really like this series and the stories it has to tell. It has helped me get through incredibly tough times in my life since I started playing it in 2018, and continues to give me a lot of joy. But seeing the casual acceptance of some of the attitudes in a lot of the community makes me feel highly uncomfortable and unwelcome, and it risks tainting my view of the franchise at times.

It wasn't helped by me re-reading the GFL manga's sole English translation only to find the scanlator inserted extra "jokes" into their scanlation, and by "jokes" I mean some intrusive unfunny memes that break immersion in the scene combined with the occasional slur and hard-R thrown in for good measure.

Or people almost ALWAYS referring to the commander as a "he" 90% of the time, combined with despising the commander being female in the manga and calling her a mary sue. And we all know that term is always used accurately and never just used because you don't like a female main character nowadays, devoid of the term's original meaning.

A lot of these people seem to fear and dread GFL2 getting popular and "ruining" the franchise's core community, whether they mean it seriously or ironically. At this point, I hope it does. More people means more diversity, more success for Mica Team, and more people who can experience GFL's tales of love and hope.

The only part of the fandom I've found that I feel safe enough around to interact with actively is here on Tumblr, and I want to say thank you to everyone who posts about GFL on here. You're awesome.

Have some sapphic T-Dolls as a palette cleanser, thank you for reading this mess of a rant.

[pocketbelt]

Girls’ Frontline: Longitudinal Strain

This had the potential to be a fantastic event but it’s hampered by a mix of recurring sins and bizarre technical issues.

GFL has always been janky and buggy, but the 3.0 UI overhaul pressed most of that out of the menus and shit, at least. The more elaborate event UIs behaved themselves and the game’s performance broadly improved, even if some things in maps could still be touch-and-go. That’s out the window here; Longtudinal Strain’s fancy train-themed UI shown above lags like shit and is trailing at sub-30 frames on an iPad Pro. More bafflingly, the visual novel segments are also chugging even as the maps and battles are fine!

The actual event story is mostly pretty good with rad concepts, although it is basically entirely disconnected from the previous event and is relying on being setup for the next one. A black market being run out of a virtual space carried around inside the head of the marketeer robot who runs it, to which other robots connect to do their business unnoticed in public on a cross-continental train is some real clever shit, there’s fun stuff here. There’s shit involving a Russian gang and outside of its fucking hilarious leader, everything involving them after their initial reveal isn’t too enthralling, but everyone else largely makes up for it.

But most of the maps fucking suck, as has tragically become a pattern for GFL; there’s still the tedious stealth/evasion maps, four separate maps involve kiting/evading an arbitrarily invincible boss unit, and only maybe half at absolute best use your own squads in a game about building squads (which is tragically a better batting average than other recent events).

And finally, the single biggest issue of recent story events still shows its fucking face here. The writer or writers seem to break down, shit themselves and cry if the main antagonist faction Paradeus has to hold even the most minor and temporary of Ls for more than a single scene: the climactic event of the story is the new Paradeus agent getting domed and defeated at the cost of the lives of three other characters, and another loses her memory of it all…only for a post-credit scene to have a clone of the agent go "JUST AS KEIKAKU WE MOVE". They continue to be infalliable and invincible and literally incapable of losing in any way that matters.

Again I teeter on the brink of just packing it in, or just mashing skip throughout the next event if it’s again Commander vs Paradeus. This and previous event Eclipse & Saros are, tragically, quite elevated by just relegating the main fucking cast to cameo/bit player roles and ignoring the main plot to do their own shit. Which should tell you about where GFL1 is, at this critical time where GFL2 seems like it’ll release in China later this year at long last.

[all-hail-trudos]

I know the jokes of Depression Frontline have been around for years now, but... Fixed Point feels like Mica Team took it a little too much to heart. We've had dark events before. We've encountered moments that genuinely felt hopeless. But somehow the ending always had an appropriate sense of payoff. Or at least enough of a sense of hope that I could muster up enough copium to anticipate the next event. But this time... Idk, the death count is too high, the stakes were raised too much, and the ending feels cheap by comparison.

I don't know how to talk about it yet, and I don't know who to talk to about it. Reddit is too busy arguing over plotholes and whether the Commander was right in telling Griffin to go to hell. And Tumblr's gfl presence seems negligible at best. But Fixed Point feels too dark, and has left me too depressed, and I don't even know where to begin. Other than the final scenes with the commander actually feel badly written. Actually badly written. And I feel painfully let down by a story I've loved dearly for going on five years.

[nekasu]

You ever meet a guy who was an Admiral, Commander, Doctor, Traveler, Trailblazer, Rover, Master, Captain, and loser at the same time?

"I can't imagine someone having that many jobs."

Let's see, Azur Lane/Kancolle, Nikke/GFL, Arknights, Genshin, HSR, WuWa, FGO, uh...GBF?, and don't all of them count as losers in the end?

[tiredstudents]

When it comes to Nikke I don’t play the game because I play too many Gachas already but I’ve caught up with the story thanks to YouTube. So 100% going to make a twin commander verse for Daniel and Iris in the future, one that can be used for GFL too.

[kokocharm]

STEELTIPPED LAB LIST

I FOUND IT.

Before GreenFirest Lab, further down south, was a lab that went by the name of Steeltipped Lab (Headmaster sort of sucks with names...) This is where Cybro was created.

This information comes directly from his databanks, so I am not sure whether this information is accurate to the official documents or not, as those were likely lost when the lab shut down.

A major thing I did notice was that none of these subjects fit what we know about GFLS-35, M1CRO, who originates from this lab. I will try to look into it, but I am a mere documentor. I'm not technically permitted to interrogate subjects, which means I would be depending on Cybro.

I will be making notes for myself to look back on and find answers to. Mostly because I have nothing better to do.

01: Sacrid

The leader of everybody, bloodthirsty and brutal. It commanded the war (what war? -AP) and everyone follows its orders, also hungry for vengance. 

02: Rot

Tries to be as useful as possible. She's been rotting for hundreds of years, making her absolutely terrifying. The ground beneath it will decay. Any mortal around it will fall seriously ill. Not to mention shes snappy and dislikes everybody. (Similar to GFLS-15, but more powerful -AP)

03: Avian

First ever winged subject the scientists made. (I thought GFLS-04 was the first? -AP) Is absolutely brutal, killing animals and people for fun. Itll tear you apart while youre still alive, hardly caring about the bloody mess he’ll make because he wants to spread the terror.

04: Jackie & October

Can switch between the two forms. Jackie is more powerful with brute force, terrifyingly huge. October is horrifyingly smart, and together they work together side by side to kill anybody who stands in their way.

05: Patchwork

Can stitch wounds together, loves making artwork out of others skin and such. Shes quite a horrifying artist, even if their creations come out pretty, she’ll make it in the grimmest way possible. Shes alarmingly cheerful, making it easy for them to trick you into becoming apart of their artwork.

06: Gaze

Mind reading abilities. They have very sensitive hearing so others must use a low voice around them, otherwise they might get pissed and try and murder everybody just to keep it quiet.

07: Speaker

They will lure others into the forest/lab with fake sounds to either kill or trap them.

08: Wither

Will literally rot people from the inside out. Hardly a shred of sympathy in them. He wont kill others for fun, he simply follows orders when given. However he is still very aggressive. (Two subjects who rot? Is this a pattern? -AP)

09: Blew

If he gets to upset he will end up causing a big explosion. He can easily plant little bombs everywhere and denoate it at any given point. He can choose whether its destructive or not. (Similiar to GFLS-49 -AP)

10: Clock

Can see into others past and futures. (GFLS-35? -AP) Able to time travel, as well as freeze time. Despite not having many powers to help her fight, she loves watching the life pour out of innocent souls. (What a strange subject... its powers are like a mix of GFLS-47 and GFLS-28. -AP)

11: Infinity

Can switch bodies with others and make others switch bodies, meaning she traps herself and switches bodies with someone to make them do her dirty work. She can also drop into peoples dreams and stuff.

12: Phobia

Can see others deepest fears and make them hallucinate said fear. Itll make you live your fears, sending you nightmares for days. When living through the phobia, the subject will entirely pass out.

13: Cold

Can turn others into stone. Likes smashing stone structures. (Could play into GFLS-06's background. We did find it as a statue... -AP)

14: Dire

Shadow like powers. She can manipulate others shadows, sink into the ground, ect. She’s also a keeper of dreams, able to slink her way into others dreams and give them a fright to remember. She takes power off of fear. (...similar to GFLS-06. Related? -AP)

15: Enchant

Able to touch objects with magic to do any of their bidding. She could make the entire world their puppet if she wanted to. Their favorite thing to do is toy with their victim until she finally kills them in some harsh way.

16: Adder

Adder is a stone-faced cold-hearted murderer who is brutal and ruthless, letting his rage guide him. He is based off of a snake, slipping around silently with unblinking eyes and deadly venom-tipped claws and teeth. (Cybro reports that he used to be a rockstar..? -AP)

17: Mirror

Can distort others realities, making them question themself and hallucinate, inducing terror in them. She finds joy in others pain, purposely causing issues and blaming it on others just to find an excuse to hurt someone.

18: Hallucination

Can cause others hallucinations that are able to cause physical changes and harm to the persons body. This includes vision, hearing, smell, temperature, ect.

19: Century

The first ever sokochou the lab got their hands on. Shes one of the more reasonable subjects. She's obediant, wouldnt dare break a rule. Just dont make her angry. (This doesn't make sense. GFLS-53 is the first sokochou. It could be a mistake in Cybro's databanks, but... I need to look more into this. -AP)

20: Ragdoll

Can make others lose feeling in their entire body, practically turning them into a ragdoll. He has extreme sensory issues and purposely mutilates himself constantly, hardly able to feel pain.

[mocca-bun]

Completely forgot to post it here but there we go

Kinda felt like sketching @octovias_markus 's gfl Commander again cuz why not

https://twitter.com/mocca_bun/status/1317857979660730368

[genshingorlsrevengeance]

Any girls of your choice having their S.o come back home and the first thing they say is "If I asked you to kill someone no questions asked could you do it?"

(Genshin Impact/GFL) Getting asked if they would kill someone for S/O

Genshin: Arlecchino, Jean, Chiori, Eula, Dehya, Lynette, Shenhe, Noelle, Rosaria, Xinyan, Girls Frontline: M4A1, M16A1, M4 SOPMOD II, HK416, AK-15, AN-94,

In the words of our glorious Steve Harvey: KILL!

Arlecchino is a little amused by S/O's question, but more curious than anything. Who could they possibly need her to kill?

And that was pretty bold of them to ask, considering who she is, and the fact she had not even been home for all of ten seconds.

Not that it exactly bothers her.

(Arlecchino) "An interesting propsal to walk in on. If I asked the same for you, S/O, would you?"

Jean felt the wind (HA) knocked out of her with that question.

After a long day of dealing with shenanigans at the Knights' Headquarters, this is what she gets?

Initial shock wearing off, she frowns at S/O, not thinking that this joke was funny.

(Jean) "No, I would not S/O. Who would even say yes to that question as soon as they came home?"

(Chiori) "Probably, if they were a particularly nasty customer."

Chiori answered as soon as she opened the door to her home and not even batting an eye.

There was many a day she would if it was legal.

But alas, throwing trash out her door and windows would have to suffice.

Eula raises an eyebrow at the question, closing the door behind her.

Honestly? She's a little offended at the question.

(Eula) "Do you take me for a barbarian? Absolutely not, I'm not like the rest of the Lawrence Clan!"

This is not what she wants to talk about before she even gets to sit down.

(Dehya) "Woah, someone got you super pissed off today?"

Dehya can't help but laugh and also think someone got her S/O in a bad mood.

Otherwise, why would you ever ask a merc if they would kill someone?

But if they were particularly nasty, she wouldn't even need payment to, but otherwise no.

Lynette rolls her eyes at the question.

(Lynette) "I can't magic someone away permanently, S/O."

That was a lie, she technically could, but that was reserved for orders from the House.

And anyone that tried to constantly interrupt her resting mode.

Shenhe doesn't flinch at the question, instead answering immediately.

(Shenhe) "Yes."

Pray that S/O doesn't ask that question when her ropes are off.

Because then they actually will get a body.

Noelle gasps audibly.

(Noelle) "What?! Of course not! I'm a maid, not an assassin!"

Noelle is absolutely flabbergasted that S/O would even ask a thing!

She proceeds to give them a lecture that violence is not the answer, regardless if it was a joke or not.

Rosaria first thinks in her mind:

Oh, now you tell me this after I come home from my work.

(Rosaria) "Hello to you too."

If S/O really did know what she did at night, then this was the strangest way to confront that.

Xinyan takes a second to process S/O's question as she moves her guitar before it bumps into the door.

...Say what?!

(Xinyan) "The heck are ya talking about, S/O!? And what makes ya think I would do that either?!"

Absolutely not! She's a musician, not a hitman!

M4A1 glares at S/O, not amused in the slightest.

(M4A1) "Last I recall, you're not my Commander, S/O."

After coming back to base, and given Griffin's status, the question isn't really that lighthearted to her.

Especially after an operation where she's constantly fighting to survive.

M16 chuckles, crossing her arms.

(M16A1) "We're T-Dolls, not drones. Buuuut, why do you need me to do it?"

She knows they're (hopefully) joking, and doubts its anyone at Griffin that she needs to knock the head off.

If it was Sangvis, then let her at 'em!

VIOLENCE

(M4 SOPMOD II) "Who needs killing?!"

SOPMOD is always happy to fight, and she just needs only the slightest reason to start blasting.

And it seemed S/O was giving her one!

HK416 scoffs at S/O.

What kind of question was that for someone who just came home?

(HK416) "You aren't the one paying me. So, no."

Unless her S/O became the client for 404's operations, then they could talk about proper killing.

15 sighs at their question, moving to put her equipment up.

(AK-15) "No."

She wasn't really in the mood to entertain these kinds of questions from S/O.

Besides, Angelia was the one who gave those kinds of orders anyway.

AN-94 shakes her head no.

(AN-94) "Only if Angelia or AK-12 gave the order, S/O."

She takes that as a genuine question, and gives S/O a genuine answer.

[galacticfootyleague]

Dru: What a brilliant victory for Torrent Company against the Corrie Massifs! What does the team captain have to say?

Sors: I am down here on the podium with Captain Rex. Congratulations on your win! How do you feel after this match against the Massifs?

Rex: It was a very close game. The Coruscant Guard is a formidable opponent and-.

*a mix of Torrent Company and Corrie Massifs players stealthily pull out a filled kiddie pool from underneath the podium*

Rex: -so I think our tenacity and adaptability really helped us against the Massifs.

Sors: I see. One more question, Captain. Can you swim?

Rex, visibly confused: What?

Hound: Grizzer, go!

*Grizzer charges across the podium and slams into Rex who tumbles back into the pool with a yelp*

Hound, fist-bumping Sors: Thanks for the assist.

Sors: Anything to make Fox less miserable to interview later.

*camera cuts to Fox filming Rex floundering in the kiddie pool with a smirk*

Reminiscing about pushing Rex into a fountain turned into this.

[melthemia]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

FEMALE COMMANDER AS AN OPTION IN GFL2 GOT CONFIRMED IN CBT3!

In GFL, even though we had Commander customisation, it never had any effect on the story. Hell, even in Neural Cloud that's the same case (which is really odd, considering the gender choice was there from the beginning of the game and not added in post like in GFL1.) For me it felt like trying to read the story while interpreting the Commander as a woman was almost... headcanonish?

Like, there's just the little things. Translation mistakes using "he" instead of "they" to refer to the Commander on a few occasions, the GFL community on other sites most commonly portraying the Commander as male (from my experience, anyway) and the general treatment the Commander receives from other characters being more in line with one a male character would receive. It honestly felt kinda iffy to me, and like a subtle constant reminder the game and community were telling me: "You're not the target demographic of this game."

It sucked. But now in GFL2, that factor has potentially... sort of gone out the window? Your choice of Commander seems to be visually represented in cutscenes and the like from what I've seen so far from people playing CBT3, as well as being voice acted. This was my biggest hope for GFL2, and I'm just so, SO happy to see it come true.

[commander-frostii]

another excellent example of how gfl’s writing is very uncomfortable for female players: Why do so many dolls have a secretary line that implies that you’re either touching or staring inappropriately at the doll in question? Not only is that just kind of gross to have in your game at all... they hit kinda close to home for some female players, you know? It’s a really aggressive reminder that the “intended” audience of the game not only isn’t me, but is somebody I don’t want to ever meet if I can at all help it.

[pocketbelt]

Girls’ Frontline: Maze Guess (iOS)

A short backstory event about one of the illicit tests Persica ran on the AR Team, before they passed fully into Angelia’s command before the plot of the game. It’s mostly fun dialogue and neat interactions between teams of Dolls whose more mature selves we already know, though it does twist itself into knots a little; one of the teams is tested with a human commander, who happens to be an ‘intern’ who is, of course, your player character from before the game’s plot started, which means you already should have recognised RO635 when she turns up and the fact that you don’t comment on it when you meet her in the main story is now peculiar.

I mean she has a pretty distinctive appearance and she was also Persica’s apparent personal assistant, which would make her pretty important given how key Persica is to the functioning of the AR Team and the state of the plot at the time RO joins you.

Outside of my nitpicking, the event itself wants to be a pseudo-roguelike thing, letting you pick buffs after every fight and having nodes that hand out drones that give special effects, but it’s not terribly good. The buffs are significant, but there’s a key issue:

The core of the system is a set of some specific key buffs (Rapid Fire, Focus, Enhancement, Patience, etc) and a lot of match rewards are specifically boosts and enhancements for those central buffs. The thing is, it’s a roguelike, it dispenses rewards at random, so it’s entirely likely (and, in fact, with the RNG implementation here, basically guaranteed) that you won’t even fucking see the core buffs themselves. So you’ll get upgrades for buffs that you don’t have so it’s basically a complete waste, and if your team isn’t strong enough to beat the boosted Sangvis bosses with minimal buffs you just have to restart the level and hope the dice roll properly this time.

You can get two of the buffs as permanently available things you can activate at map start, but that requires amassing the points paid out by wins/failures, which means just grinding the Doll drop maps or easier maps for points to get them. There’s actually another aspect; the maps get increasingly bigger and gain more tiers as you go, which means more fights, which means more upgrades you can acquire, so through sheer number of rolls you can brute force it and actually get your steamroll going. Your first real point reward also just turns on the Snipe, Bombard and Airstrike combat supports which feels basically required to get anywhere on maps with heavy armour foes.

So the earlier maps are actually harder and more annoying than the maps designed to be big endurance runs with the most powerful bosses.

It’s a cute idea and it’s the sort of twist and tweak GFL hasn’t had in a while, and you can also use your own units fairly extensively (though there are only like 10 levels), so I shouldn’t be too shitty about it. Back to waiting to see how they tie this to GFL2 in the end.

[all-hail-trudos]

The Commander at the end of DR, flashing forward to the future: "If only I had properly cherished Kalina back then. If only I had bought her flowers and held her hand and done something, anything, to demonstrate how much she meant to me and how deeply indebted I would feel to her for all eternity".

The Commander at the start of MS, desperately struggling to hold things together while she's in the hospital, lamenting over her picture on their desk: "Kalina how could I have failed you like this?! How could you sacrifice yourself for me this way?! Come back to me! I am a haunted, wretched soul without you! I'll keep the base alive for you, I'll feed the children and do all the paperwork! Just please concentrate on getting better! I can't live without you!"