#i play with pretty great graphics on THIS laptop

[kimmkitsuragi]

wow cant even play bg3 tonight bc my laptop decided to pass away due to adobe illustrator at 11pm. press f

[pythoria]

started playing dragon age origins (only played for like 15 minutes aside from character creation cause my laptop died) and just. wow. i cannot believe just how robbed i was not knowing this existed until the bg3 community told me about it. someone told be to beware bc it's an old game and the graphics are bad but like what are you talking about the graphics are better than dos2 (no shade! great game). hell, i am just gobsmacked at how pretty and HD the character models are, that there's cinematic angles, for a game released in 2008 it's nuts. i mean to be fair i'm not playing the original release of the game so it's undoubtedly better than what it was in 2008 but you can't build greatness on a bad foundation. this game is Great. the control scheme might be an all time favourite. the fact that you can hold both left and right click and move seamlessly like with wasd blew me away. i started as a mage elf so the starting area is that withered place and GOD it looks cool as hell. i feel ROBBED how has this existed for FIFTEEN YEARS without me giving it a go. the character creation was also a delight, better than something like skyrim that came out years later. and after bg1's mess of a combat system i was wary for a second when i saw this was real time with pause but it works incredibly well. it's simplified compared to bg1&2 a Lot so i got the hang of it rlly fast and i love that i can just pause so i don't get overwhelmed. it's rlly late so i can't play more rn but the first 15 minutes of this game already exceeded every expectation (and i went in with high expectations considering the praise i saw for it online). thank u to everyone who recommended i play this it was love at first sight!

[lilblucat]

I just saw the ask by slushysblog. In response you sent a gif that blew me away:

You see, I'm just getting into digital art, and my PC can only handle about 5 or 6 layers before my graphics environment crashes. (Ofc this forces me to restart my PC and lose anything not saved.)

I've learned to work around this, my art isn't nearly so complex as yours, but I know if I want to continue I'll have to get a better computer at some point.

I was hoping you could tell me a bit about the technical side of your work. What are your PC specs? What software do you use? That sort of thing.

Thanks in advance! I love your art!

My set-up is complete overkill for art. It's a heavy gaming-ready desktop PC I got a few years back that I've upgraded the RAM and storage on over the years. I was doing fine with 16GB of RAM but I always have open a lot in CSP and other stuff so upgrading was definitely something I needed to do. 16GB should be fine for most people though.

You can also see that I run Arch Linux and uh yeahhhhhh it's a long story. The short of it is that my old laptop broke its Windows install during an update and I was completely unable to fix it so I just.... switched to Linux lol. I started out on Ubuntu and switched to Arch after a while. I don't rec using Arch unless you know what you're doing, Ubuntu is way easier.

What you might find more interesting is my away from home set up on my laptop since it's an older gaming laptop.

The graphics card is actually a NVIDIA Geforce 850 or something. It's so old that you can't play some games on it. However, I have no issues with it for art. I can open my comic project files in CSP fine on it. It's also running on Linux Mint, which isn't showing up on the little image for some reason. Both of my devices run Linux, but that's a me preference/need thing and I don't rec messing with your operating system if you don't know much about computers. It gives me a bit of an edge since the system doesn't use as much RAM as Windows but yeah don't touch unless you're committed to learn. Windows will serve you fine. Or MacOS even.

As for my program, I use Clip Studio Paint EX. I bought Pro a long time ago and upgraded to EX because of the extra tools for comics and animation (I've heard animators don't like CSP though, it's the BEST program for comics however). It's a really solid program but the recent changes to pricing and updates is really stupid. Fun fact: I use only default brushes and materials because getting it to run on Linux breaks the store. I also use an older version of it because of how I got it working on this system.

For my tablet I use an XP-Pen Artist 12 Pro. It's a pretty solid screen tablet on a budget (I bought it on a sale) and I have no issues with it. I actually partly got it because I thought it was cool that XP-Pen carries official drivers for Linux too, and this helped a bit since this was before Windows bricked on me and I switched to that. It was kinda weird how it played out lol. I would heavily not rec a Wacom tablet unless it's an older one for cheap. Wacom is stupidly expensive and you can get a better bang for your buck at other companies. My first tablet is a Wacom and it's still holding up pretty well but their quality on their new tablets isn't great. Check out XP-Pen, Gaomon, and Huion for better tablet options.

[canmom]

VR observations, 10 months in

I've been a game dev for 10 months now. It's pretty great, I'm enjoying it a lot, I get to spend my days doing crazy shader shit and animations and voxels and visual effects. Hopefully the game that will come out of all this will be one people enjoy, and in any case I'm learning so much that will eventually come back to the personal ~artistic~ side of things. I can't talk about that game just yet though (but soon it will be announced, I'm pretty sure). So this is a post about other games.

Mind you, I don't actually play very many VR games, or games in general these days, because I'm too busy developing the dang things. but sometimes I do! And I think it's interesting to talk about them.

These aren't really reviews as such. You could project all sorts of ulterior motives if it was. Like my livelihood does sorta depend on people buying VR headsets and then games on them. This is more just like things I observe.

Headsets

The biggest problem with VR at the moment is wearing a headset for too long kinda sucks. The weight of the headset is all effectively held on a lever arm and it presses on your face. However, this is heavily dependent on the strap you use to hold it to your head. A better balanced and cushioned strap can hold the headset still with less pressure and better balance the forces.

The strap that comes with the Quest 3 is absolute dogshit. So a big part of the reason I wouldn't play VR games for fun is because after wearing the headset for 30-60 minutes in the daily meeting, the absolute last thing I'd want to do is wear it any longer. Recently I got a new strap (a ~£25 Devaso one, the low end of straps), and it's markedly improved. It would probably be even better if I got one of the high end Bobo straps. So please take it from me: if you wanna get into VR, get a decent strap.

I hear the Apple Vision Pro is a lot more comfortable to wear for long periods, though I won't have a chance to try it until later this month.

During the time I've been working at Holonautic, Meta released their Quest 3, and more recently Apple released their hyper expensive Vision Pro for much fanfare.

The Quest 3 is a decent headset and probably the one I'd recommend if you're getting into VR and can afford a new console. It's not a massive improvement over the Quest 2 - the main thing that's better is the 'passthrough' (aka 'augmented reality', the mode where the 3D objects are composited into video of what's in front of you), which is now in full colour, and feels a lot less intrusive than the blown out greyscale that the Quest 2 did. But it still has some trouble with properly taking into account depth when combining the feeds from multiple cameras, so you get weird space warping effects when something in the foreground moves over something in the background.

The Vision Pro is by all accounts the bees knees, though it costs $3500 and already sold out, so good luck getting one. It brings a new interaction mode based on eye tracking, where you look at a thing with your eyes to select it like with a mouse pointer, and hold your hands in your lap and pinch to interact. Its passthrough is apparently miles ahead, it's got a laptop tier chip, etc etc. I'm not gonna talk about that though, if you want to read product reviews there are a million places you can do it.

Instead I wanna talk about rendering, since I think this is something that only gets discussed among devs, and maybe people outside might be interested.

Right now there is only one game engine that builds to the Vision Pro, which is Unity. However, Apple have their own graphics API, and the PolySpatial API used for the mixed reality mode is pretty heavily locked down in terms of what you can do.

So what Unity does is essentially run a transpilation step to map its own constructs into PolySpatial ones. For example, say you make a shader in Shader Graph (you have to use shader graph, it won't take HLSL shaders in general) - Unity will generate a vision pro compatible shader (in MaterialX format) from that. Vertex and fragment shaders mostly work, particle systems mostly don't, you don't get any postprocessing shaders, anything that involves a compute shader is right out (which means no VFX graph), Entities Graphics doesn't work. I don't think you get much control over stuff like batching. It's pretty limited compared to what we're used to on other platforms.

I said fragment shaders mostly work. It's true that most Shader Graph nodes work the same. However, if you're doing custom lighting calculations in a Unity shader, a standard way to do things is to use the 'main light' property provided by Unity. On the Vision Pro, you don't get a main light.

The Vision Pro actually uses an image-based lighting model, which uses the actual room around you to provide lighting information. This is great because objects in VR look like they actually belong in the space you're in, but it would of course be a huge security issue if all programs could get realtime video of your room, and I imagine the maths involved is pretty complex. So the only light information you get is a shader graph node which does a PBR lighting calculation based on provided parameters (albedo, normal, roughness, metallicity etc.). You can then instruct it to do whatever you want with the output of that inside the shader.

The upshot of this is that we have to make different versions of all our shaders for the Vision Pro version of the game.

Once the game is announced we'll probably have a lot to write about developing interactions for the vision pro vs the quest, so I'll save that for now. It's pretty fascinating though.

Anyway, right now I've still yet to wear a Vision Pro. Apple straight up aren't handing out devkits, we only have two in the company still, so mostly I'm hearing about things second hand.

Shores of Loci

A few genres of VR game have emerged by now. Shooting and climbing are two pretty well-solved problems, so a lot of games involve that. But another one is 3D puzzles. This is something that would be incredibly difficult on a flat screen, where manipulating 3D objects is quite difficult, but becomes quite natural and straightforward in VR.

I've heard about one such game that uses 3D scans of real locations, but Shores of Loci is all about very environment artist authored levels, lots of grand sweeping vistas and planets hanging in the sky and so on. Basically you go through a series of locations and assemble teetering ramshackle buildings and chunks of landscape, which then grow really big and settle into the water. You can pull the pieces towards you with your hand, and then when you rotate them into roughly the right position and orientation relative to another piece, they snap together.

It's diverting, if kinda annoying when you just can't find the place the piece should go - especially if the answer turns out to be that there's an intermediate piece that floated off somewhere. The environments are well-designed and appealing, it's cool to see the little guys appearing to inhabit them. That said it does kinda just... repeat that concept a bunch. The narrative is... there's a big stone giant who appears and gives you pieces sometimes. That's it basically.

Still, it's interesting to see the different environment concepts. Transitions have this very cool distorted sky/black hole effect.

However, the real thing that got me with this game, the thing that I'm writing about now, was the water. They got planar reflections working. On the Quest! This is something of a white whale for me. Doing anything that involves reading from a render texture is so expensive that it's usually a no-go, and yet here it's working great - planar reflections complete with natural looking distortion from ripples. There's enough meshes that I assume there must be a reasonably high number of draw calls, and yet... it's definitely realtime planar reflections, reflections move with objects, it all seems to work.

There's a plugin called Mirrors and Reflections for VR that provides an implementation, but so far my experience has been that the effect is too expensive (in terms of rendertime) to keep 72fps in a more complex scene. I kind of suspect the devs are using this plugin, but I'm really curious how they optimised the draw calls down hard enough to work with it, since there tends to be quite a bit going on...

Moss

This game's just straight up incredibly cute.

Third person VR games, where you interact with a character moving across a diorama-like level, are a tiny minority of VR games at the moment. I think it's a shame because the concept is fantastic.

Moss is a puzzle-platformer with light combat in a Redwall/Mouse Guard-like setting. The best part of Moss is 1000% interacting with your tiny little mousegirl, who is really gorgeously animated - her ears twitch, her tail swings back and forth, she tumbles, clambers, and generally moves in a very convincing and lifelike way.

Arguably this is the kind of game that doesn't need to be made in VR - we already have strong implementations of 'platformer' for flatscreen. What I think the VR brings in this case is this wonderful sense of interacting with a tiny 3D world like a diorama. In some ways it's sorta purposefully awkward - if Quill walks behind something, you get a glowing outline, but you might need to crane your neck to see her - but having the level laid out in this way as a 3D structure you can play with is really endearing.

Mechanically, you move Quill around with the analogue stick, and make her jump with the buttons, standard stuff. Various level elements can be pushed or pulled by grabbing them with the controllers, and you can also drag enemies around to make them stand on buttons, so solving a level is a combination of moving pieces of the level and then making Quill jump as appropriate.

The fact that you're instantiated in the level, separate from Quill, also adds an interesting wrinkle in terms of 'identification with player character'. In most third person games, you tend to feel that the player character is you to some degree. In Moss, it feels much more like Quill is someone I've been made responsible for, and I feel guilty whenever I accidentally make her fall off a cliff or something.

A lot is clearly designed around fostering that protective vibe - to heal Quill, you have to reach out and hold her with your hand, causing her to glow briefly. When you complete some levels, she will stop to give you a high five or celebrate with you. Even though the player is really just here as 'puzzle solver' and 'powerful macguffin', it puts some work in to make you feel personally connected to Quill.

Since the camera is not locked to the character, the controls are instead relative to the stage, i.e. you point the stick in the direction on the 2D plane you want Moss to move. This can make certain bits of platforming, like moving along a narrow ledge or tightrope, kinda fiddly. In general it's pretty manageable though.

The combat system is straightforward but solid enough. Quill has a three button string, and it can be cancelled into a dash using the jump button, and directed with the analogue stick. Enemies telegraph their attacks pretty clearly, so it's rarely difficult, but there's enough there to be engaging.

The game is built in Unreal, unlike most Quest games (almost all are made in Unity). It actually doesn't feel so very different though - likely because the lighting calculations that are cheap enough to run in Unity are the same ones that are cheap enough to run in Unreal. It benefits a lot from baked lighting. Some things are obvious jank - anything behind where the player is assumed to be sitting tends not to be modelled or textured - but the environments are in general very lively and I really like some of the interactions: you can slash through the grass and floating platforms rock as you jump onto them.

The story is sadly pretty standard high fantasy royalist chosen one stuff, nothing exciting really going on there. Though there are some very cute elements - the elf queen has a large frog which gives you challenges to unlock certain powers, and you can pet the frog, and even give it a high five. Basically all the small scale stuff is done really well, I just wish they'd put some more thought into what it's about. The Redwall/Mouse Guard style has a ton of potential - what sort of society would these sapient forest animals have? They just wanted a fairytale vibe though evidently.

Cutscene delivery is a weak point. You pull back into a cathedral-like space where you're paging through a large book, which is kinda cool, and listening to narration while looking at illustrations. In general I think these cutscenes would have worked better if you just stayed in the diorama world and watched the characters have animated interactions. Maybe it's a cost-saving measure. I guess having you turn the pages of the book is also a way to give you something to do, since sitting around watching NPCs talk is notoriously not fun in VR.

There are some very nice touches in the environment design though! In one area you walk across a bunch of human sized suits of armour and swords that are now rusting - nobody comments, but it definitely suggests that humans did exist in this world at some point. The actual puzzle levels tend to make less sense, they're very clearly designed as puzzles first and 'spaces people would live in' not at all, but they do tend to look pretty, and there's a clear sense of progression through different architectural areas - so far fairly standard forest, swamp, stone ruins etc. but I'll be curious to see if it goes anywhere weird with it later.

Weak story aside, I'm really impressed with Moss. Glad to see someone else giving third person VR a real shot. I'm looking forward to playing the rest of it.

...that's kinda all I played in a while huh. For example, I still haven't given Asgard's Wrath II, the swordfighting game produced internally at Meta that you get free on the Quest 3, a shot. Or Boneworks. I still haven't finished Half Life Alyx, even! Partly that's because the Quest 3 did not get on well with my long USB A to C cable - for some reason it only seems to work properly on a high quality C to C cable - and that restricts me from playing PCVR games that require too much movement. Still though...

Anyway, the game I've been working on these past 10 months should be ready to announce pretty soon. So I'm very excited for that.

[lennies-blog]

Hello!

I saw that on Sky Germany website there is a video of Sebastian at the SailGP. Do you still translate things related to Sebastian Vettel?

Here https://sport.sky.de/artikel/segeln-ex-formel-1-fahrer-sebastian-vettel-feiert-premiere/12925984/34240

Translation coming up!

Okay it's really weird, because most parts of the video don't have sound 🤔

My phone cannot play the video at all, saying it's not available and then I thought my laptop has difficulties with playing sound overall, but the video has got sound, but only the parts where Seb is talking and it sounds like he is answering some kind of questions so there is definitely something missing!

—————————————————

To sum it up:

Seb is now co-owner of the German SailGP team and was able to take part in a drive around on the German F50-catamaran this weekend at the coast of Los Angeles. The video shows Seb interacting with people, getting on the boat and a little segment of him taking part in the drive. (*all without sound*🥲)

—————————————————

But here are the parts that I could hear (some of which were already in English which I only transcribed. I also did little paragraphs where I suspect new questionshave been asked):

"It was by coincidence obviously. I often heard that there are a lot of similarities between sailing really high class and racing on the track, which I know (*laughs*) probably a lot better (*laughs*), but yeah, then though Thomas, who yeah, was the initiator of the German team, I got into it, I heard about it, learned about it, and yeah, I got more and more hooked. I'm not a sailor myself, yet, so maybe to be, but yeah, that's how it all started. (I) tried windsurfing, that's as close as I got.

Now it's fascinating to see there's a whole nother world that which I said has a lot ofthings in common and yeah, to understand the element of wind is very difficult because you can't grab it.

I think watching now on TV is a lot easier then back in the day, because you've got all the graphics, so you understand actually who is leading, what's going on, you see where the wind is coming and what's most likely to happen. In the end it's all about details and that's what every team seems to be looking for.

Well I think for sure by nature. It's more sustainable, I mean it's powered by nature, so obviously that's very exciting. Once it gets the lift and foils, it's pretty incredible. Also to stand on land and see it is pretty cool.

Well it's still early days. If you look at it, as far as I understand where the team comes from I think it's a big shot. I think we are happy with how the first event went and looking forward to the second one.

Yeah I think for one, the speed. When the boat was up once, everything is suddenly quiet and you can only hear the wind, but then the wind gets stronger and then the maneuvers in the corners, the interaction of the crew, the coordination just beforehand and the start, cause there us not much time left then to speed around the corners. I think you kind of understand more of how everything works together, so that it will work well, if you've driven yourself.

Yeah, I would say I still have the view if an athlete and I think it's incredibly interesting. I think every kind of sport has its charm and if you get into it like today it helps you a lot more to assess it. That the level is very high I think you can see from the outside, how big the boats are and then the speeds added to that, but if you then have the chance to participate/drive in it once, I really enjoyed it, then I think you can get more into the rhythm and understand what exactly is demanded. Its very very physical, you are on edge the whole time, especially with the G forces in the corners and yeah, it's oftentimes hard to explain, even if back then when I talked about racing it was very hard to convey that it's actually really exhausting, and yeah, it's a great sport, really.

Yeah well, my role isn't really that active that I sit in the boat every weekend, steer it and make decisions with them, but rather try to incorporate my experience from theoutside. Especially the teamwork and the all data is something that I worked with extensively within the last years, or was allowed to work with, and be able to bring something to the table there, I think just this inside view, because I think not dependable on the kind of sport you can contribute a lot of experiences and if it helps, all the better.

Ah well, it was great. I didn't know what to expect to be honest. It was really impressive in many ways, first of all the speed on water is you know, a different perception of speed. But then the G forces, the cornering, but also to see the crew, you know communicating to each other, preparing sort of the next move, why you're trying to optimise the current course, yeah. Also you know there's sometimes not much time before you make a decision orbefore you got to make a turn, so that was very impressive to feel it from the inside.

Yeah for sure, it's very different to racing. I mean I did miss my seat belts and my seat, so it was a bit adventurous at the beginning, the changing sides, gotta aim for the little hole to jump into, but yeah, I did get used to that part, but the first couple of times was, I wouldn't say scary, just very very unusual. But yeah, then you get in the groove and obviously I had whole trust in the team surrounding and it was fun to then feel the boat also accelerating, picking up speed, so that was very nice."

—————————————————

Interview, after Seb was just taking a ride on the catamaran:

Person A: "Allright, you're ready? Is everything working?"

B: "Yeah"

A: "Cool! (To Seb:) Okay, if you can look at me: So, what is your first reaction? You actually got to drive and fly the boat! What was it like?"

Seb: "Well it was amazing! I think (it's) very different when you're on the boat than when you are on land, but everything is moving, changing sides is eh, quite a challenge the first time, then you sort of get used to it. Very very impressed by the G force, you were able to pull the boat round the corners, I did not expect that! Yeah, I was wishing for a setabelt to be honest (*laughs*) when cornering, but yeah it was incredible to see how the team interacts with each other, always trying to keep the boat in control and obviously try to make it go as fast as possible, yeah, was impressive."

A: "How was the crossing-the-boat?"

*Switches to German and basically repeats it all*

Seb: "Yeah, I mean I didn't look down, so I just focused on where I needed to end up and also, you know, when you see the corner, the turn coming, I was sometimes a little bit, not panicking, cause I trust them, but thinking 'okay, it's about time! Should J really? Switch? To the other side?' And then obviously they're used to it, doing it in the last second so literally a second before the last turn, the last guy hops in the hole and we got the corner coming, so yeah, good fun, definitely!

Yeah, it was mega! Very different from what I expected, especially the G forces in the corners, you can really let it fly around the corners. But also the speed in general! Just with the wind, when the boat is going up it all gets a little quieter and you only hear the wind that is getting louder and louder. Yeah it was a lot of fun and also seeing how the team works together and always has everything under control, yeah a lot to take in, but it was really good!"

[sarasa-cat]

Oh - re: having a slow burn love affair with my steam deck— ahhhhhhh finally a handheld that doesn’t feel cramped and is actually pretty powerful for what it is — sorta like an entry level gaming laptop only portable console shaped.

BUT

I have no idea where I packed all the connectors for my ultra slender portable 13” monitor & docking station so until I find those, I’m less inclined to play high end RPGs on the smaller screen while the steam deck roasts my thighs. Ouch!!!

Thus, playing games with less graphical requirements that look great on the small built in screen. I started a new Harry in Disco Elysian and he lucked out and got the talking tie!!!

Found lots of stuff I have never seen before and am verrrrry early in the game - still on day 1.

This Harry is leaning into being an absolute emotional wreck with zero filter and it is sooooo much fun. Literally laughing out loud way too often.

All the foreshadowing in the game is so there.

…

Often too tired and too physically antsy to end of each work day to then continue to sit in front of gaming machine after being on a computer all day so until I can return to waking up really early to game at sunrise, might not be doing much in certain games although connecting my steam deck to my super slim 13 inch portable monitor will help…. Probably need to unpack another suit case to do that and uh hhhhhh hahaha yeah.

There is no room right now. Don’t ask. Facepalm.

[softsapphicvibes]

I played HI3 when it first came out and then genshin and now HSR and if it's okay, I'd like to rank them a litte, because I have SO many feelings right now.

HI3 is literally the baby, she isn't the firstborn but she is and will forever be the most iconic. It's like a whole saga about love and lesbians and the power that those two things can accomplish. HI3 has some not so great lore in the earlier days--especially when hoyo was really just trying to get out there, and some of their writing decisions don't sit well with me, but HI3 is very clearly a heavy labor of love for the company and with how part 1 ends, you feel some level of closure--which is very rare for these types of games.

I would rank HI3's story a solid 9/10, graphics are 8.9/10 and gameplay is a 5/10(My phone is small and my thumbs are clumsy 😭 it was a challenge)

Genshin. Is certainly there.

In the spirit of fairness, I will say that genshin allowed more people to get into Honkai Impact. On the other hand, genshin's initial release and a year or two after were its strongest, but that game is incredibly boring. While it does look pretty, everything feels empty and unappealing. Paimon is a huge deterrent as she is speaking for you essentially, and it drags the game into a repetitive and annoying sandbox.

This is 100% subjective and is based on my personal feelings, obvi, but my word, I just can't imagine playing genshin again.

I'd give the graphics an 7.9/10. Very pretty but the size of the world is not working in their favor. Story is a 2/10. A very strong opening but QUICKLY falls off and struggles to pick back up. Gameplay 3/10. Again, the game feels incredibly repetitive without any real reward. It's a time sink and the only reason to come back is either because you've already put x amount of hours in or because your favorite character might be in the newest update. Sorry for being a mean lesbian but none of the genshin characters are interesting or appealing enough to be heavily invested in it.

And the newest baby, Star Rail.

NO SPOILERS

Just initial thoughts. Very very fun, influenced by how new it is, but the way it's introduced feels a lot like Honkai Impact 3rd, which I love. Since this is a Honkai game i feel like im more likely to enjoy it and that's due to familiar faces and setting.

Story 8/10 I really like it but I haven't gotten very far. Graphics 9/10. It's a Honkai game, I will say that my laptop had some performance issues with some scenes which is a little sad but I can live with playing on a lower setting. Gameplay 10/10 I LOVE IT SO MUCH LIKE TURN BASED GAMES ARE SO MUCH FUN AND HSR DOES SUCH A GOOD JOB HERE LIKE I LITERALLY DO NOT CARE HOW LONG I SPEND PLAYING THIS GAME BECAUSE THE COMBAT FEELS SO FAIR FUN AND BALANCED IT'S AMAZING.

HI3 has an captain mc who does not exist like they functionally are not real outside of the login screen.

Genshin has an MC but your personality, voice, and thoughts are all dictated by other people and you have little to no real input or say in the game. I HATE games that do that they are so boring. Paimon might as well be the MC for how little you do outside of slashing and climbing.

Star Rails MCs have a bigger air of mystery than Gen's and have more personality as well. Your companions don't speak for you, and MC has voice acting. Games like these typically tend to make the MC loved by all (which is another one of Genshin's problems) but in HSR you can at least understand why people might want to hang around the MC.

All in all, I feel like HSR is the game that deserves to follow the success of HI3. It's real fun and more focused. I enjoy the characters I met and the gameplay is absolutely steller.

Hope you have fun once you get to play!

anon. ANON. I love this so much! also same hat! i've also played hi3, genshin and star rail from release!

I totally agree about hi3 being a labour of love and about it giving a level of closure that I didn't particularly expect. I also agree that it begins quite confused because it was supposed to be a ggz sequel and then it wasn't and then they brought some lore over from ggz but also retconned some stuff... hi3 hasn't always been pretty lore-wise but overall I am super happy with it <3 I know what you mean about playing it on mobile though, once I got a laptop that could handle the game I had a lot more fun lol

I also agree with your thoughts about genshin - it's super pretty, it had a strong start and I genuinely enjoyed the story at the beginning, but I have also dropped off and may only return if there are big story developments. I agree that it's stunted by the mc being silent or a self-insert character, for me I would prefer to play as an actual character with established lore and opinions etc. there's also not enough lesbianism for me and I haven't been really grasped by a character besides with aesthetics? whereas i'm super interested in the lore of pretty much all of the honkai cast.

I also much prefer the way that hi3 deals with story progression and the character development of the cast through new battlesuits. I think I saw someone mention this somewhere but you can literally see bronya, for instance, age from 14 at the beginning of the story into a fully-grown adult by apho part 2. I think sticking with a consistent and slightly smaller cast allows them to really develop the characters in a way they can't do as well in genshin. I think the idea that you meet a new batch of characters for each nation is a good one, and it's really nice to play events and see older characters again, but it doesn't allow for the same level of detail that hi3 loves to dump on people.

thank you for no spoilers on the star rail part too! I will be opening it right after answering this~ super excited by how much you seem to like it because that's probably a sign that I will also like it 👀 I was kinda put off when I saw the mcs for star rail, but hopefully they're like you said and have more of a functional role in the story overall!

I really liked reading this ask it was very fun and we have a lot of the same opinions! i'm glad you like star rail so far and I endorse your rankings as absolutely correct with no flaws 😇

[anamoon63]

Well, I've run out of pictures of Appaloosa Plains and Sunlit Tides, and I'll need a little more time to build the next episodes of Time Traveler and The Cho Brothers, as both require new sets and characters that I want to work on calmly, so, in the meantime, I'll keep posting some random pictures of my sims and gameplay, outtakes and stuff, like these (unedited) pictures I took of Sunset Valley:

I'm also sharing these photos of Lucky Palms, again no filters and no editing:

It turns out that in December I got a new gaming laptop, so I copied my entire Sims 3 game with all my saves and cc there. It wasn't that complicated, just a little hassle at the beginning to get the game to detect the graphics card, because you know, you have to edit the Graphic Cards document and all that. But the game installed easy (thanks Steam) and started working properly right away. :)

Then I started copying all my current game (saves, cc and mods) from my PC to the laptop. That did take longer, maybe around three days or so, but it was worth it, because the game runs beautifully, no lag, no problems, and after almost a month of playing, I haven't had any issues.

So far, I haven't had any problems with Windows 11 either, everything works fine with it, in fact, I like it, it's quite light and pretty. :P

The Sunset Valley and Lucky Palms photos here were taken in my newly installed game. I haven't messed with the Nvidia Settings yet, but I will very soon to see if I can improve them a bit, as I don't use programs like Reshade, or Gshade or anything like that, just my photo editor. For now, this is just with the graphics settings in the game menu, all the options at maximum, still zero lag, neither in game, nor in CAS (the latter thanks in great part to Lazy Duchess' Smooth Patch, I can't thank them enough for this!)

So, the new computer arrived just in time, because my PC hardly keeps running anymore, sometimes it shuts itself off and refuses to turn on again, but now I can send it to the workshop to do the upgrades I've been wanting to do for months, without having to stop playing my game. ❤️😊

Something else I want to share with you this year are my Sims 4 pictures. Yes, I started playing it again last October, after two long years of not touching it, or was it three? 🤔I don't remember, I stopped playing it since before the pandemic, you go figure, thing is I decided to give it another chance, but I'll tell you about that in a later post. Please, brace yourselves cause I have a considerable amount of Sims 4 pictures to share with you, I hope you like them! 😉

(Of course, this doesn't mean I will leave The Sims 3. I will never ever quit The Sims 3! 😍)

P.S. Sorry for the wall of text.

[goremet-chef]

just found someone who makes monster hunter lego builds do NOT speak to me im. this. GRGRGRG

anyways heres some gifs i have of monsters cuz im in love with this series forever and always (super long ramble SFJKS ive been writing this for hours)

odogaron + ebony odo is like.... you dont understand. thats me i kin so many monsters from MH its insane like.. thats literally me nothing reflects me better LOOK AT THEM. rathalos, odogaron, nargacuga like any red scary thing i resonate with deep in my soul its insane

this one is one of my headmates favorites. shrieking legi really came thru when he was having a bad time and i love this for him. ITS JUST LIKE... so many of the monsters resonate with us on such personal levels, that its hard to even explain. i am selfish, and i do view monster hunter as my game (got that autism special) like these are my creatures they were made for me

REAL TALK THO, these two were genuinely actually made for me look at this shit

unknown (black flying wyvern) and valstrax my beloveds. fucking god tier

the fact that i already resonate with the rathalos so hard, and it turns out theres a black and red edgier cool version of it/????like are you insane when i discovered this thing i was. SO UNWELL IN MY CHANNEL ON DISCORD i literally rambled about it for AN HOUR STRAIGHT. then when i found out about valstrax i rambled about that one for an hour too SKFJS like wow they are so cool. autism is real

also have this one, xeno'jiiva is so. MHW was my first MH game (say what you will) and god damn. im gonna be real idk if id be so into it if it wasnt for MHW, cuz like.... the main appeal of the entire game series to me is the monsters themselves. like im. when i first started i was TOO SCARED TO FIGHT THE GREAT JAGRAS (yknow. the first large monster you fight 😭😭 like the 3rd quest. insane) because ive never been into fighting games and having something large PURSUE ME didnt sound pleasant

crazy that i went from being too scared to play it again to LITERALLY playing for 72 hours almost STRAIGHT with minimal pee and sleep breaks, and giving myself carpal fucking tunnel cuz i was just. obsessed. AUTISM IS REAL

went from couldnt stand 10 minutes of it to 400 hours in game SKFJSD

and i would do it again bitch!!!

so what im SAYING. alright. is that im not a fighter in games (well NOW i am, but before i super wasnt) but what drew me in was how i could just.. watch. how i could see all the big scary monsters sleep and eat and walk around and fight eachother. how i could get their tracks, listen to their sounds, ETC. like it was so. IT WAS THRILLING and ive never been more in love

like for context my first special interest is fnaf and i wouldnt be anything like myself if i never got into fnaf like life changing shit. but i gotta say, i mean. ive played the fnaf games and i love the story and EVERYTHING this is not a diss on my first home!!!! but i played MHW to the point of exhaustion, to where i needed to have an arm brace and even then despite the HORRIBLE PAIN in my wrist, i still kept playing

i played so much i literally managed to rub the s and w letters of my siblings keyboard KSJFSF like it was for real. i miss that, like a lot. i dont play as much anymore because i mean. i have it on my laptop. my laptop is a gaming laptop and it can run!! but its better for my

yknow i dont think i have an actual reason and im literally about to cry thinking about it SKFSFJ the good computer with the good graphics and running is my siblings and id need permission, yknow how it is. PLUS im a bit stuck? i need an urugaan ruby for my barioth mission lmao but ill get there

monster hunter world is so beautiful. the environments are fucking stunning, the visual upgrade for the monsters was INSANE and just watching them be animals? it brings me so much joy KSJSJSJ

one of my favorites is the rotten vale, which is funny cuz i remember the first time i ever went there i was so. PARANOID. i use sound with pretty much everything i play since my eyes might not track everything thats happening, so hearing the ambience for the vale freaked me out so much, i stayedat the camp for SO LONG and good thing too cuz the radobaan makes its way down that path and i was shook SKFJSF

also the big fucking dalamadur skeleton in the vale is so. UGHHHH

i love horror and rot and decay!!! its frightening its unsettling but even still the vale is such a necessary part of the ecosystem!!! like wow monsters come there to DIE? are youINSANE

(dalamadur is like one of the biggest monsters for reference. the whole upper part of the vale is made of its skeleton cuz its a big snake its so UGHHH)

also the???? STOMACH ACID POOL?

they were cooking bro,,,,, such a gorgeous and unsettling environment goddd

like GOD i cant think of anything better, the story for MHW is so good man. the tracker said "its an ecological marvel" and i took that personally (i repeat that so much about random shit its not even funny how long ive been doing that for)

or how like... any of the docile monsters (tobi kadachi, banbaro, kulu ya ku, ETC) i genuinely if i go on expedition, and i see theres a docile monster in one of the locales, ill go there and just follow them around the ENTIRE TIME SFKSFS

heres SEVERAL pics of me with banbaros at different times KSJFS

that isnt even all of them with JUST banbaro 💀💀💀 its my favorite activity

and sometimes i get hit with the banbaro / nightshade paolumu / coral pukei combo!!!! thats a triple docile whammy!!!!! thriving

also heres a cute viper tobi shot :] love viper tobi

also also i cant believe i never said anything yet but VAAL HAZAK??? my actual liege look at this mf

MY LORD!!! vaal is so fucking cool man. and the KICKER??? DOCILE

whenever i do this quest i do just follow it around for a while (which. ive had to do this quest A LOT cuz i thought i get vitality crystals from it (yknow cuz i got some from it) so i have probably 100% killed more vaal hazak than any of the other elder dragons SKFJSF

vaal hazak is so cool cuz its covered in rotten meat and uses the effluvium (corpse gas) as its like. life source. it pulls excess effluvium from the vale into itself and expels it when theres not enough, so its keeping the ecosystem tame its so cool UGHH

also one of its moves it plays dead its so fucked up itll fall over like you've knocked it over and then just lay there but you hear its inhale and it looks up and BLASTS YOU with its effluvia gas beam (WHICH. THAT THING HURTS!!!!!! for real the effluvium attack is so. plus it also halves yr health? like if vaal hits you with that shit itll give you miasma or whatever and it HALFS YR HEALTH BAR and you gotta eat a nulberry to negate it

im not one for switching shit around in my like item bar tho (MAINLY cuz most the time ive played MHW was with my siblings mouse and its scroll bare was broken so swapping items was hard) so i just put on like 3 effluvia resistance gems and it cant give me miasma. problem solved SKFSJF

i did get so tired of fighting it cuz yknw its a hard fight its an elder dragon, but i will say like the MUSIC? thats one of the things like. when we fought megan in the forest, they gave us battle music and THAT is why i kicked ass and abandoned all my fear, monster hunter instincts kicked in and i tanked alright like it was NOTHING, battle music just hits different

vaal hazak theme is so fucking good!!!! "keeper of hades" ARE YOU INSANE? HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND????? i cant believe this shit!!!!!!!!

monster hunter stop being the coolest franchise ever challenge KSFJSF

i did do vaal hazak fight with no music before cuz i was trying to see and. THE MUSIC DOES SO MUCH? literally there was like no adrenaline without the music it was just. :| oh. im in the vale. thats the dragon. hes gonna breath attack. okay LIKE IT WAS SO LACK LUSTER IT WAS INSANE

i never realized how much the music did for fights but its so.. vital bro like it gets you in the fighting mood it compliments the monster and the area its !!!GRAAAAHHHH

monster hunter soundtrack is literally so fucking good. BANGERS back to back literally every song is so fucking cracked its epic

dont even get me STARTED on "proof of a hero" that song makes me stim so fucking hard man it makes me feel so fucking good. my sibling made his ringtone for me that song and AUGHHH crying sobbing

like yeah this is proof that im a hero!!! literally makes me feel so proud and FOR WHATTTT

idk im such a firm believer in the importance of sound design, sound design is EVERYTHINGGG and MH does such a good job with that shit, the monster roars and environmental ambience, audio cues to what attack is gonna happen, the music its all. perfect 10/10 godtier shit

anyways this is my monster hunter ramble, it most likely will happen again. love this game with all my heart

[lemonstealinglibrarian]

18 and 28 for the video game asks!

18. A game location you really like

tried very hard not to answer this with a Zelda location but Zelda simply has the best Locations... I visit the Korok Forest and Rito Village in BotW/TotK instead of going to therapy.

28. series question

just answered with my experience with the Zelda series so let's talk about Assassin's Creed! I played AC2 on a shitty laptop and was obsessed. I can't believe how streamlined the graphics were on such a terrible machine. Great starting point, classic, still holds up I'm pretty sure. However it's the only game in the series I've completed - I have the pirate one on Switch but I'm not that into it somehow. I would really like to play Odyssey! I have it on my laptop actually but this computer can't render it very well, and something shifted in my brain chemistry where I hate playing games on a laptop now. If a PS5 is in my future I'll give it a try then. I'm not really keeping up with the newer games but I'd be happy to give any of them a try if I'm interested in the locations and protagonists.

[tau1tvec]

What do you recommend that’s a good base pc to build off of over time, one that’s cost effective but good enough to run ts3 and ts4 simultaneously but I can add better graphics cards and ssds later on?

I think it depends, it's hard to really recommend any specific one bc, I've only ever used one, and they don't manufacture them anymore. I also got my PC to play Fallout 4, bc my old PC crapped out, and I was over sims at the time. Considering its open world, and all the mods I would likely cram into it, I didn't wanna waste money on just anything, so I did some research on gaming PC's ( which I'd never bought until then ) and ended up getting an Acer Predator for about 1299$ at the time.

When I bought it, it had a 1060 GTX, 500GB SSD, 1TB HD and 16GB RAM, dealt with 6 years of my bs with not an issue.

Now the reason I say it depends is bc, many games can run on anything honestly, a lotta them these days want to get in as many hands as possible, so making them work well on lower end systems, esp laptops and consoles, is the best way to do that, since a lot of gamers honestly couldn't give chicken noodle soup about how great a game looks, just that it doesn't lag. However if you plan to play on high to ultra settings, with mods and cc, esp high texture cc, you're going to have to keep some things in mind.

Processor

Intel i5's are pretty powerful for the cost, but I'd recommend an i7 if you can fit the bill. Replacing it shouldn't be too difficult, so long as you find one that's compatible with your motherboard, and they tend to cost a little less, and be more readily available than GPU's for instance.

GPU

I've seen some mid-high gaming rigs run on a 1660 GTX which I hear is a pretty good card, they also run a bit cheaper than the 20 or 30 series RTX, and honestly... you don't need a 20 or 30 series RTX to play The Sims 3 or 4, it doesn't even have any built-in options to utilize a lotta the innovative features these cards have.

I played The Sims 4 on ultra on my 1060 GTX, and it ran and looked fine. Though should you decide to upgrade, understand it might be quite costly, and also a bit difficult to find considering we're still technically in a chip shortage.

Memory

16GB is pretty standard these days, anything more is for those into heavy multi-tasking, however some games are beginning to suggest 32GB.

SSD

Main drive needs to be a 500GB SSD minimum... 250 will absolutely get you nowhere with how Windows updates gobble that shit up. You'll also be storing all your saves, mods, and cc on this main drive, so honestly if you can, go for the 1TB, you won't regret it, especially since upgrading mine to a 1TB was an absolute nightmare.

You'll likely need a second drive as well, and although it's common a second drive will be a regular ol' hard drive ( HD ), which is fine, you've gotta install your Spotify app somewhere, do absolutely consider getting another 500GB or larger SSD installed later, games these days basically start at 80GB install size easy, this doesn't include updates and dlc added later, and a drive doesn't run well when it's almost full.

Brands

I've had my Acer Predator desktop for roughly 7 years now, and it's an absolute champ... my husband's Acer Predator Helios on the other hand... crapped out like two years in, he only ever played Skyrim, and only ran it on medium-high settings. So when it comes to brands it's kinda... eh, I would just try to avoid anything that's like HP or Dell... they're kinda iffy and difficult to upgrade unless you're willing to drop 2k+ on an Alienware, I hear a lotta pretty good things about Lenovo tho, and MSI, if a laptop is more your thing.

Finally, a lotta straight out the box gaming rigs are outfitted with AMD processors and cards these days, and they've come a long way over the years. They're pretty powerful now, almost equal and at times even better than their Intel or Nvidia counterparts, but can be more cost effective if price is a big concern.

[zachsgamejournal]

COMPLETED: Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee New 'n' Tasty

Within the past couple of years I played through the original again and absolutely loved it (to the best of of memory). While the vibe is great, and I'm pumped for more Oddworld, I was disappointed in what I hoped to be the definitive version of Abe's first adventure...

I was surprised that I chose to play this game. But having beaten Kena: Bridge of Spirits--I needed more beautiful adventures: NOW! I kinda new I was going to be playing Munch's Oddysee and Stranger's Wrath next--but those games are a bit graphically dated--and came out when we thought 3D graphics could deliver more than they actually could. So that desire to have pretty graphics, a great adventure, and delve into the realm of Oddworld brought me back to a game I wasn't sure I'd ever play: New 'n' Tasty.

Well...actually, I've played it before. I think it was on PS3. I was pretty pumped when it released because I LOVED the original. I was really excited to see the classic gameplay realized in a 3D environment. But I wasn't sure how they'd pull it off, because the puzzles and gameplay really is about these "screens". Probably more on that later.

What I remember from my first time replaying was that it was similiar but different. Because I hadn't played the original the world, I wasn't quite sure where they were deviating and where they stayed true. I only made it to Scabania before never playing it again (for some reason...probably kids). The game was cheap over xmas, and I bought it with almost every other Oddworld game, but I never really thought I'd play it. Yet, it called to me and I answered.

NOW, playing it again I have the benefit of having played the original fairly recently, and knowing that the original is a perfect work of art. So if I'm not feeling this version, it's because something didn't translate...and it turns out, things did not translate.

The first thing that got to me were the graphics. I was surprised to find them so bland. The whole time I was thinking, "Didn't they look better on PS3??" And my laptop is PS4 Pro equivalent. I think. I made it to the Scabanian temple before I found the graphics were set to medium. I pumped them up to full power and the game was much prettier. But I'm sad that I played the first half not seeing the game at its true glory.

This is important.

The art direction of the original is amazing. Quite often, the graphics were insanely realistic. As humorous and cartoony as it could be--some of the scenes are the most realistic and impressive I've seen in a video game. Unfortunately, there was a cost to moving to 3D on Xbox. The series couldn't rely on good art, it needed good technology. And while Xbox was the most power of its generation, 3D games still often had bland textures and block models. Some games, like Resident Evil Outbreak, were able to pull off amazing 3D graphics, but those were tight, small areas with restricted camera angles. The fully explorable world of Munch and Stranger had to sacrifice detail for freedom. Being released on PS3/PS4 (I don't know), allowed the team get more bang for the buck--but also using the side scrolling format allowed them to focus more attention to the immediate instead of sacrificing resources to render are larger world.

So yes, once I amped up the graphics I was more impressed. Even with low settings, they managed to transition many of the interesting, organic environments into cool 3D spaces. While the game clearly reuses resources, they're able to make each area feel pretty unique. This is mostly noticeable when escaping the factor at night and in Scabania.

Moving on from the presentation, I start to get disappointed...

The main problem with the game is precision. In the original, there's a station screen. Enemies within that screen can help you and enemies outside of it can't. There's minimal to no interaction outside of your screen. (I was thinking a lot of Celeste while playing this, how each screen in Celeste is a challenge that must be overcome one at a time.)

Anyway, in the original screen, Abe's movements were exact. If you pushed forward, he moved forward 1 unit. If you held down sneak, he snuck forward 1 unit. If you tapped roll forward, he rolled forward 1 unit. And if you ran, he traversed by whole units. This probably to some degree related to the use of a d-pad on PS1--but also that precision was necessary for the challenges you faced. You had to trust that Abe was going to jump to where he was supposed to, move where he was supposed to, and that "luck" was minimal to non-existent. It allowed level challenges that were very tricky, but if you figured out the right pattern of moves, you could get through it.

New 'n' Tasty lost that completely.

Instead of having set screens that have to be loaded, the game follows Abe like most 2D side scrollers would. Because of this, it's hard to know what the boundaries are. You can take over sligs, right--but in the original, sometimes the sligs would run off the screen and sometimes they'd stay. This set a parameter for the challenge you faced--can you take over this slig or not? Since there's no screens--it's hard to know when a slig is going to stay in range and when they're not. Same with the drones that zap you. Am I out of range or in range? It made each challenge a bit more organize, but that also meant there were many uncontrollable factors playing into success.

This was made worse by the controls.

As I said, the original had Abe moving in predictable units. No matter where you jumped, rolled, ran, walked--Abe would always stop at specific points on the screen--allowing you to plan tricky jumps and maneuvers. NnT allows the player to move slowly, quickly, or somewhere in between. You never quite know where Abe is going to stop. And, the greatest sin, physics seem to have a play. In the original, moving meant Abe moved immediately. But in this, Abe often has to build up momentum. This makes timing really tricky. You have to account for the build up and animations. It's like in the Crash Bandicoot remakes. In the original games, pressing jump made Crash jump immediately. In the remake there was a windup where crash had to bend down before jumping. Meaning you had to press jump a split second before you intended to. making jmping horribly imprecise. Same thing here.

One of the worst things, there's only one jump button. In the original, you could push up to jump straight up, or push triangle to jump forward. That meant you could push a button and know the result. Depend on it, even. But now I have to press forward to jump forward. And if I don't push it correctly, Abe could take a step or two before jumping--leading to my death about 100 times. This was especially frustrating at the end, where I kept dying from the imprecise controls and momentum build up. This was also really annoying when possessing a slig. They weren't as responsive as the original, so tricky sections often required me to think ahead. I wasn't able to react to things, because if you were reacting you were already too far behind. You had to know, ahead of time, what you needed to do because every action needed to be activated a few split seconds before they were expected to be executed.

This honestly made the game nearly unenjoyable.

The other issue is the story. The story and cut scenes in the original are near perfect. I rewatched a little bit and saw that some of the cut scenes had been changed. There's a great slap stick moment in the original when Abe falls into a meat barrel. As he's flicking off goo, he hits his head on a low hanging pipe. As Abe falls back into the barrel, he passes two sligs that would have killed him immediately on sight. It's a silly moment that adds some fun. These things seemed to be missed or not as well timed in the remake. The original's story was just so tight and precise (like the controls) that it didn't leave wondering what was happening, or why.

That's all I really have to say. It was awesome to see this game get a facelift, but the controls and curious storytelling decisions cause it fall behind the original in the key areas that make the game great. So the the pretty 3D graphics come at a cost.

[fayesdiary]

Oh, the video game ask has so many good questions: 1, 3, 5, 6, 14, 20, and 22, or if you don't feel like answering that many questions, then two of your choice!

1) Last game you finished

Dark Souls Remastered, weirdly enough.

I actually played the original version on PC a long time ago, but I never finished it because it was on an old laptop, the original port is garbage, and so by the time I got to Lost Izalith it turned into a slideshow which made it straight up unplayable, which was such a shame because I was especially into the series at that point.

Say what you will about the changes the remastered made, but at least it made Blighttown and Lost Izalith playable and that's good enough for me. Nice to get that pebble out of my shoe at last.

3) 1-3 games you’ve played in the past 12 months that you really enjoyed

Have you heard about the underrated indie Action RPG CrossCode?

No seriously, I know I never shut the fuck up about CrossCode but it's for good reason. The graphics are so pretty and the presentation is top notch, the music is SO GOOD, the gameplay is unbelievably fun and the story... don't get me started on the story. I still have so many feelings about Lea.

Seriously I am going to break into all your houses just to drop a copy of CrossCode and leave, just play the game already

Another great indie that gave me too many feelings is OneShot! I really recommend you play it, and I do mean play it. It's one of those fourth wall breaking games but executed so well, so if you don't play it yourself you lose so much of the experience.

5) Game(s) coming out that you’re looking forward to

Kingdom Hearts 4 and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth!

Not that I'm likely gonna play them anytime soon though, since they'll likely be on PS5 only. I am absolutely playing the whole Remake trilogy when it comes out in the inevitable cheap bundle, though!

I doubt I'l have the same patience for KH4 though...😰

6) A series you’ve enjoyed since your early days of gaming and still enjoy to this day whether it still has games coming out or is one you return to

Kirby!

Been playing that since I was in middle school and I've been a huge fun of it ever since, the games never miss!

Speaking of, I just bought Forgotten Land and I can't wait to play it👀

14) A song that’s sure to hit your nostalgia buttons

Dearly Beloved. Almost every version of it but especially KH1, 2 and 3.

20) A boss you think is really cool

Slave Knight Gael is the last boss of Dark Souls 3 and is so fucking cool. The lore, the music, the atmosphere (all the lightning in the final phase!), and the boss itself is just top notch.

Really, the best way they could have ended the Souls trilogy.

22) A game ending that’s really stuck with you

The endings of KH Days, Undertale and Mother 3. And yes, it was because they were all absolute punches in the gut.

[p7agu3]

adofai levels review (opinion based)

S, A, B: Positive C: Mid D, E, F: Negative U: Unrated (plague had skill issue)

it gets long lol

1-X A Dance of Fire and Ice: C -intro level, boring tbh -i get why it exists but its not interesting -the music is catchy tho

2-X Offbeats: B -also an intro level -more interesting than 1-X at least -the music is also good

3-X The Wind-Up: C -now the level itself is ok -faster intro level, ok music -speed trial made me rage a lot (1.5x speed, crazy) but turns out im either a lot better at the game now or im just terrible at rhythm games when im sleep deprived -and the music is also a step down from 2-X

4-X Love Letters: C -not a big fan of slow music -but it doesn't feel too much like a drag -also isn't silly or anything -decent level

5-X The Midnight Train: C -made me rage extremely hard on my first attempts + speed trial but its not that bad actually -except that one bit in the middle eughhhh

6-X Pulse: B -cool music, good level design imo -lots of mechanics from previous levels -why is speed trial only 1.1x? kick it up to 1.2x at least geez -visuals are kinda boring -good conclusion to the first worlds set -what do you mean there's another one

B-X Thanks For Playing My Game: U -adofai dev i love you but this too much for me -i can not beat this level -why did you double the bpm -please have mercy on my wretched soul

7-X Spin 2 Win: B -louis from doodle world???? -cool music but not rlly my thing

8-X Jungle City: C -raged SO HARD at this one -but the base level is so harmless.. upbeat… -i reluctantly raise it from a D because im in a sane state of mind rn but it really does deserve a lower rating on basis of my pain and suffering

9-X Classic Pursuit: S -i love this level -music slaps. also, gameplay feels great (i think it's the kick hitsound) -adofai should implement custom hitsounds i think that would be neat -its just so good!!! idk why tho

10-X Butterfly Planet: C -i think i might hate this one, 5-X, and 8-X because when i am very upset (skill issue) i do Not want to hear the silly happy fun music -also the graphics arent that good. the butterflies are ok but they dont add too much -the whole thing still feels rather eh to play, partly because it zooms out more than i'd like (even though i have a right massive laptop) -and i think i have a love-hate relationship with fast levels -was definitely overreacting the last few times i played it tho

11-X Heracles: S -heracles is GOATED!!!! -i rlly love this level -the music is epic, also i think my bass/kick hitsound preference theory might be right -it's also full of rats. my name is plague im obligated to at least appreciate rats -the 'bossfight' going on in the background is very cool and on theme, it distracted me a little on my first attempts but its cool -"Cong-rat-ulations!" i love,,,,,,

12-X Artificial Chariot: S -epic music -goats aren't rlly my thing but the level has a great aesthetic to it -synths or whtv… delicious mmm -cannot say it is better than heracles so the goat joke is lost sadly

XF-X Third Wave Flip-Flop: B -i love me some brass noises -pretty basic level otherwise -the camera turning is trippy but livable

XC-X Credits: A -it looks cool and plays pretty good -the chopped up vocals bit freaks me out a little gameplay wise b/c it's hard to follow but it does line up thankfully

XH-X Last Hope: S -so so cool of a level -it loses a few points for the weird alignment on the one vocal sample but oh my god -the middle bit with the flashing lights.. the mechanic they pull on you.. my god -its such a good twist.. aaaa -music is great too, another point for the kick theory, i wanna eat it (am i hungry? maybe)

PA-X Distance: S -its so chill…. and the level design is just so good it lines up with the music perfectly and enhances the experience its wonderful -also bass kicksound (huhuh?) -plague liking a slow level??? impossible… -aahnghhh it gets an s just for gorgeous design

XR-X Rose Garden: S -fiddle!!!1!!!!!1! -very fun level i like -silly medieval music.. i am predisposed once more but like who wouldn't be

RJ-X Fear Grows: U -i havent beaten it Dx -skill issue.. this mechanic is weird

XN-X Trans-Neptunian Object: B -this level irritates me -it feels like the music isn't synced sometimes? idk -also the honeycombs i dislike (too fast)

MN-X Night Wander (cnsouka Remix): A -bit slow, its cool tho -those triangle note things are kind of argh -narwhal

ML-X La nuit de vif: U -this level actively bullies me -crying about it

there are probably more muse dash levels that i havent unlocked yet

anyways i cannot in good faith hate any of the adofai levels, theyre overall pretty well designed. im just a salty loser lmao

play the game if you can it's pretty cheap and a really epic rhythm game (where the music actually does line up with the gameplay.. looking at you geometry dash)

[astrxealis]

Your theme is everything !!! (*ﾟ▽ﾟ*) ITS SO PRETTY if u don’t mind sharing how did u make it?

AAAAAA PARDON LATE REPLY THANK YOU !! sldhldns i appreciate it wah TwT <3 ✨ and :O idm so ... !! this won't be like. a full guide or anything LDBSKD like a complete walkthrough ?? but >< :

i'm on laptop but uhh tbh any gadget wld work? apps/websites used: canva, photopea (editing/graphics) !! for the gradients on my pinned, i used this ^^

so like uhhhhuhhh idk how to really explain well sorry but simply put, for the dividers in my pinned, uh. it's a Bit Complex and tbh there's easier ways to do it prolly but i made them w canva using 1000x40px (40 is the minimum so ya)! so that's for the big one in pinned, but to make the smaller ones i made them w photopea w say, 1000x5, 1000x10, wtvr to make the dividers smaller! yeah!!

meanwhile for the picture in pinned :O w the cat & watermelons! i just used canva for that, altho the gif required work in photopea >_< bcs it's originally a cat that like. runs from left to right and sleeps in the middle, then ofc its a gif so it repeats, so i used photopea to remove the running and just keep the lil sleeping cat! and then put that into my canva ^^ i used the tumblr banner preset size (?) and mostly it's just uhh put a picture in, add borders, & then put a little overlay (w lowered transparency) to make it look more designy yeah! basically just that ><

and then for the header !! it's like uhh a transparent gif of the (cat) ears of my favorite character :] i removed the bg and all and yeah, just left the bits i wanted - then uhh edited the picture w the colors and whatnot, making my own filter/psd? which can be done through right-clicking the file in photopea, clicking blending options, and changing stuff w color overlay! if you wna try doing that, i suggest just playing around w it yourself ? >< and then for the designs in the gif, i made a copy of the ears and all so i cld have two pictures there, and make a gif! so basically just drew diff designs on both of the pictures, and that's basically it yeah!!

there's uhh a bit more complexities (like how to actually make it into a gif ^^ there's like uhh _a_ needed at the beginning of the file i think? smth like that?) and etc but thats basically it >_< sorry if this is long or anythinfFJSBDKSN i just word vomited my thoughts and all hehe so ^^ but again thank u uwah and i hope you have a great day, kaze!!

[venusandsaturnsrings]

venusss :3 ur pc is mega kyute nd im so jealous >o< I just have a laptop, my keyboard nd gaming mouse . . not like an actual pc but I do want one ! I dnt have the space rn but when I do, I want it to be just as kyuttteeee as urs :] alsooooo whut other games do u play ^_^

hehe mimi!! Ꮚ´ꈊ｀Ꮚ i need 2 upgrade my graphics card n get a new monitor but i luv my pc!! tis my pride n joy!! i was real nervous 2 build it cuz i’d never done it before but she’s really pretty n works great hehe she’s… almost 2 years old!! zhongli n pusheen r trapped in there for public safety…

i play a LOT of different things but sum of my favs r: slime rancher 1+2, stardew valley, hollow knight, rdr2, rhythm games liek muse dash, and lots of lil psychological horror games (lilys well, the milk inside a bag series, at home alone series, etc.)!!