#is there such a thing as a platforming roguelike

[fandomwandererer]

But consider, that's not a special speed run feature it's an integral part of the game, and some items change the kaboom cap, and their are things that reward you for going fast

Action roguelike with a special speedrun mode where your character's speed is uncapped, but if your velocity goes above a specific threshold (which is considerably higher than the normal speed cap) you explode and die.

[splatsvilles-fashionista]

You know, it's easy to forget, but Splatoon is honestly less of a game and more like a bunch of games all bundled together. You've got the PVP multiplayer, the co-op horde mode, the 1v1 card game, a singleplayer campaign with a light platforming focus, and now a singleplayer roguelike mode. I don't know if I'd pay full price for any of these things alone (I absolutely wouldn't pay 60 dollars plus the 25 for the DLC JUST to play Side Order) but as a whole package you do get a whole lot of very different things at all once.

[blankswordgame]

BLANK's HP is all over the place

This was our first attempt at positioning BLANK's HP Bar in the Overworld. Blanksword, the game we're making, is a turn-based RPG roguelike, but our main character, BLANK, can take damage in the Overworld without being in combat. He can receive projectiles from enemies, for instance, or fall into hazards. So, we need to be able to show his HP to you (the player, our favorite person), even outside of combat! However the previous screenshot was not perfect: BLANK's HP is very big, and while it's centered relaative to the screen, it's off-center relative to the other UI elements (your money, experience etc), which are all shown on the left side of the screen. So, here's how we did it instead:

In this second example, you can see that BLANK's HP bar fits a lot better with all the other elements. It also makes the bottom of the screen "clean" again, which is important for the game's movement, platforming and puzzle-solving! Here's what it looks like when you toggle the UI on and off:

Let me know if you enjoyed this mini devlog of sorts! This doesn't look like such a big deal, but details like that can really make or break a player's experience of the game, so devs can spend a lot of time thinking about it and testing things out...!

[patricia-taxxon]

Do you enjoy video games outside of puzzle & riddle centric games? If yes, what are kinds of games?

puzzle games are legit the first genre of games that I've become actively enthusiastic for, the rest of my favorites are just random story-centric stuffs and the occasional roguelike. I used to have a difficult platformer thing but not so much anymore.

[floatingcatacombs]

UFO 50 Abducted Me For 159.2 Hours

12 Days of Aniblogging 2024, Day 4

I love video games...

UFO 50 may love video games more than me, though. It’s a preposterously ambitious compilation of fifty small-to-medium-scale games, developed and published by Mossmouth, which here refers to Spelunky creator Derek Yu and like five of his buddies.

These are retro-styled games, with three or four asterisks apiece on ‘retro’ and ‘styled’. The overall aesthetic approximates the eight-bit period, with a limited color palette and sequenced music, but things get tricky after that. There’s deliberate anachronisms everywhere, with a heavy focus on genres and mechanics popularized far after the NES era. There’s games in this collection that take elements from real-time strategy, 4X, deckbuilders, tower defense, platform fighters, and even immersive sims. The evolutionary lineage of games influencing other games is practically flipped on its head here! The Steam page for UFO 50 describes this as “a familiar 8-bit aesthetic with new ideas and modern game design”, which I think is a frankly bad way to describe the means by which these games constantly astound and surprise by playing with our expectations. It's the kind of collection where you boot up some shit titled "Waldorf's Journey" expecting a dinky little mascot platformer, and after twenty minutes of calibrating walrus trajectories you're forced to contend with the fact that Waldorf's Journey has imprinted itself into your very soul.

Only a few of the games in this collection are straightforward pastiches of popular NES genres – there’s a beat ‘em up, a space shooter, some arcadey sports titles, and a Bubble Bobble, but that’s about it. Everything else is either a novel idea or working within far more advanced genre mishmashes. The panicked unit reorganizing of Attactics, the death-based puzzle platforming of Mortol, the glorious Fire Emblem and Pogs mashup that is Lords of Diskonia - even when liberally borrowing from other games, it’s really creative stuff! I loved all the times when my initial assumptions of how the game would play ended up completely wrong. You may think Rock On! Island is a tower defense game, but there’s a secondary aspect of creating chicken-immolating factories to get more resources that practically supersedes the tower defense aspect in later levels.

Of course, these are the Spelunky guys, so procedural generation and roguelike elements feature heavily in more than a few of these games. That’s the biggest jump in plausibility – more than half of the games in this collection could hypothetically run on the NES with enough tweaks, but anything with enough randomness fundamentally could not. If you hate procgen with a burning passion then a fifth of the collection will probably be out of reach for you, but there’s plenty of bespoke design to go around as well.

UFO 50, as a collection of a defunct fictional company's game catalogue, conjures up the feeling of playing old games without the manual or a copy of Nintendo Power to help you out. For younger players it might invoke the times you tried to emulate NES games to see what all the older gamers were always going on about, devoid of the original context. There’s a real willingness on the part of UFO 50 to just drop you in and have you figure out the controls and strategy yourself. Because of this approach, the first ten minutes of any given game are often the roughest! That’s a wild trust fall on the developer's part, asking someone to stick through the period of confusion and frustration so that they can watch those emotions bloom into understanding, then competency, then joy. These “dude trust me” design moments are everywhere.

It doesn’t always work. Caramel Caramel has a straight-up backwards difficulty curve, Star Waspir has way too much going on on top of demanding shmup literacy in advance, and Porgy plus Divers are both extremely divisive for their slow and punishing starts, which definitely made me lose interest. But sometimes the difficulty and hostility actively draw you in, in a way that easier or more tutorialized games would not have. Rakshasa is a short but extremely difficult platformer inspired by Ghosts N’ Goblins that I just kept chipping away at in between trying out games. Rail Heist seems simple at first but is chock-full of emergent systems that let you truly rip the levels open if you think outside the box, something which is actively encouraged by the optional clear conditions. Onion Delivery is Crazy Taxi with tank controls and random events to make driving even more stressful. It's hell on earth and I love it for that. Mortol 2 also has very open-ended design, with each new run of 99 lives and one-hit deaths forcing you to rethink and optimize your approach until you find a way through its winding map.

The fifty games here are organized in chronological release date, with the “earlier” games being far simpler and often less polished than the later ones, even if their quality usually still shines through with gameplay. This is a bold move on Yu’s part. The first game in the collection, Barbuta, is a cryptic La Mulana-like with cheesy traps, clunky movement, and a truly painful learning curve. It is what the true game design freaks out there refer to as “kino”. I’m not on their level yet, but there is plenty in this collection for me to enjoy. Generally, I’ve found Eirik Suhrke’s contributions to be the most personally compelling to me on a gameplay level. Mooncat is an absolutely sublime platformer that forces you to relearn movement from first principles with controls that cannot possibly be described in text format. Campanella is a delightful little obstacle course of a game, and I had a fun time hunting for secrets in it. Warptank is a solid puzzle platformer, Pingolf is easily my favorite multiplayer game in the collection, and I’ve already praised Onion Delivery and Rakshasa. Surhke has a knack for fiendish little games where the difficulty comes across as more of a punchline than anything else. They’re bursting with character through the gameplay alone. I felt the drive to rise up to almost every one of his contributions, which is similar to how I feel about my favorite indie game developer, sylvie. I hereby award Eirik Surhke the UFO 50 Game Design Pervert Award. Who would’ve known that the Spelunky composer was as good of a designer as the Spelunky guy himself, if not more?

play mooncat. I am not fucking around

UFO 50 also has quite the elaborate metapuzzle, which is only really worth investigating once you’ve become familiar with the whole game library. It’s a good’n, though. The puzzle hunt unlocks a secret 51st game snuck into the collection by a disgruntled employee, chronicling the late days of the company with an atmosphere that feels hollow and downright wrong. The vibe is RPG Maker horror more than anything else, which is a cool and unexpected pull for this kind of compilation. Through Miasma Tower, the small team process that created UFO 50 is mythologized and problematized, with the fictional company UFO Soft undergoing serious financial and cultural problems, as well as implied fraud, cults, and even a missing person investigation. It was an incredible privilege for Derek Yu and company to be able to pour all of their time and skill into creating a game collection of this caliber without the pressure of money or deadlines due to the success of Spelunky, and Miasma Tower is something of a reckoning about that. Very happy it’s here.

UFO 50 isn’t for everyone. You have to be a fan of either retro games or indie games, ideally both. You have to have an open mind for getting your shit kicked in by both mechanical difficulty and initial game obtuseness. You need to be able to look past the deliberate anachronisms and learn to roll with the mechanical surprises that each game has to offer. But if you’re a weirdo like me, then maybe you’ll also sink a hell of a lot of time into superclearing more than two-thirds of the collection. If nothing else, it’s an amazing value proposition!

[petite-guignol]

STEAM SPRING SALE

I decided to go through games I already own + have played, see what's on sale, and make some recs.

Crypt of the Necrodancer (2.99) -- a rhythm roguelike with a thriving mod community and multiplayer. tough but rewarding. i have over a thousand hours in this game you could say i like it a fair bit. definitely pick up the DLC

Downwell (0.79) -- action platformer where your only actions are falling and shooting (from your gun boots). unique, fast paced, and satisfying. cute 2-color graphics, unexpectedly banger soundtrack. also this is insanely cheap jesus christ

Inscryption (7.99) -- horror that dumps you into a remote cabin playing a sinister card game with an ominous entity. one of those kinds of games where its hard to say too much about it without spoiling it, but it goes Places. also has a cool roguelike mode

La-Mulana (3.99) -- puzzle-heavy metroidvania. play as an adventure archaeologist exploring a cursed ruin that houses the secret history of all civilization, with all the obtuse traps and constant death that entails. will drive you insane one way or another. not for everyone but if you click with it this will probably blow your face off

OneShot (5.99) -- simple but emotionally affecting game where you, the player, are a part of the story. melancholy and funny and hopeful in equal measure. probably buy this immediately if you liked Undertale. fun fact, this was originally programmed in RPGMaker XP and i have absolutely no idea how that was accomplished. blood magic probably.

RPGMaker MV (11.99) -- speaking of RPGMaker. this is the second most recent version (MZ is the current one, minus that unity-based thing nobody likes) but the two are more alike than they are different. easy to use but also crazy flexible if you put in a little more effort, and there are tons of community assets for it available

Spelunky (3.74) -- 2D roguelike platformer. fun with a lot of weird secrets to discover and chaos to be had. the sequel seems even better but i haven't played it yet. this game is also really hard and i have never beaten it lol

Spirit City: Lofi Sessions (8.03) -- not really a game, sort of a co-working app that lets you set ambiance sounds and do shit alongside your dress-up avatar and cute critters you collect. has light productivity tools like a pomodoro timer, to-do list, habit trackers, that sorta thing. honestly does help a lot for me.

Angels of Death (4.99) -- peak RPGMaker horror imo. i once called this "jeff the killer for people who played chrono trigger" and i mean that in the best way possible. exactly the right combination of thoughtful and extremely stupid. i think there's an anime of this?

APE OUT (2.99) -- one of the most stylish games ever made. play as a gorilla escaping to freedom. commit unbelievable carnage backed by an organic jazz soundtrack that reflects your actions. be warned that this one is also hard tho

CARRION (5.99) -- horror action platformer where you play as the monster. escape, devour, infect, ooze through the ventilation ducts, get larger with every human you shove into your gross maw. shorter than it should be IMO but immensely satisfying

DEADBOLT (2.49) -- 2D assassination simulator from the makers of Risk of Rain. play as a reaper tasked with sending the undead back to hell. almost more of a puzzle game than anything else. you die in one hit so make sure every bullet counts.

Endoparasitic (7.49) -- horror game where you play as a guy with only one remaining limb and a parasite burrowing into his brain trying to escape an alien infested lab. really don't think there's any other games out there like this. very tense.

FAITH: The Unholy Trinity (7.49) -- lo-fi horror game with a distinctly 80s vibe. a priest returns to the site of a failed exorcism and descends into an occult nightmare. truly unsettling use of clunky synth voices and rotoscoped animation. you might have seen me reblog gay fanart of this one.

Kingsway (3.49) -- turnbased RPG where everything is accomplished via a fantasy version of Windows 95. keep your desktop organized. a really solid example of the genre that's also extremely quirky. we love to see it

The Shivah (1.49) -- point-and-click adventure about a cynical, down on his luck rabbi in NYC investigates a mysterious donation to his struggling synagogue. a very different type of story than you usually see in video games, excellently told.

Strange Horticulture (6.39) -- play as an herbalist in a town full of secrets and drama. Identify plants, understand their mystical uses, and provide solutions to your customers' problems -- or make everything a lot worse.

might have a few more later

[phantomrosegame]

Asterika Devlog 1 - Intro

About a week ago, I announced my next game, Asterika: Phantom Rose Refrain! It's a grid-based rhythm game where the player moves to the beat of the music while dodging obstacles.

The game received over 1,000 wishlists in the first few days after the announcement, which was a positive start. I appreciate the reception from both new players and those who played my previous Phantom Rose games. Thank you sincerely!

Why Asterika?

My reason for working on Asterika than say, make Phantom Rose 3, is fairly simple. I wanted to try an entirely different genre after building two roguelike card games. At the same time, there’s still more stories I want to tell within the Phantom Rose universe.

I've enjoyed a diverse range of rhythm games, from DJMax, Deemo, and Ouendan to arcade classics like Taiko, Jubeat, and Pop'n Music. This passion, combined with the realization that my next game would need a lot of music anyway, made developing a rhythm game feel like a logical next step.

My hope for Asterika is that it can be a good game on its own, and perhaps develop its own identity, while also serving as a way for me to continue exploring the Phantom Rose universe.

But Asterika will be a rhythm game at its core. And of course, no prior story knowledge of the previous games will be needed to play Asterika; it's more of a personal desire to connect them thematically.

Current Focus: Demo Development

The main focus right now is on building a playable demo of Asterika. I need to get gameplay feedback ASAP as Asterika’s core concept departs from traditional rhythm games. Technical feedback on aspects like music sync, input timing, and difficulty will also be tremendously valuable since it’s my first time building a rhythm game.

To get the demo to a shareable state, a few things need to be done:

Develop the base game client: The core game currently runs only using a developer tool, so an installable client is needed.

Work on localizations: Historically, the Phantom Rose series has found its largest audience with English, Japanese, and Korean players across all platforms. I'm anticipating this will be the case for Asterika as well, so focusing on these languages makes sense.

Improve UI visuals: I'm looking at areas in the UI and visual effects that could be enhanced to make the gameplay feel more exciting and dynamic. This is the kind of work that will continue throughout the project, but for the demo, I want to reach a level of quality that provides a strong initial experience.

Create more song maps: Speaks for itself.

Finishing the demo will be a notable step, as it means the core infrastructure of the game is functional. Good news is that many of these features are functional on their own, even the song map editor. I just need to bring them together.

What’s Next for the Devlog

As I continue working on the demo, I intend to use this devlog to document challenges and progress. Keeping a regular log might also be a good way to push myself to get things done!

Thanks for reading. If you forgot, Asterika is available to wishlist on Steam. I also have a dedicated channel in the Phantom Rose Discord if you have any questions.

[pseudowho]

mrs haitch i was wondering… in your free time are there any video games you or your husband like to play??

Yesss!

I don't get much free time (and neither does he), but some of my favourites to play are: Darkest Dungeon (all time favourite), Kirby, Untitled Goose Game (me and Mr.Haitch make an excellent pair of naughty geese), the Pokémon games, Fire Emblem, the Zelda games, the Mario games.

I'm more of a platform gamer, but I do love a tactical roguelike. I'm also an avid game watcher, so watch Mr.Haitch play things like:

Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Bloodborne, Sekiro, Ghost of Tsushima, the Stalker Games. He's also quite the fan of Star Wars: The Old Republic, he quite likes an NHL game (we love hockey!).

We love playing immersive horror games together. It's a real event for us. We get excited looking for one, and the scarier the better, frankly. We'll order a take-out, crack open a bottle of wine and scare ourselves shitless.

Our sons have been introduced to gaming early, because we're such fans. We like them to access.media forms that are "too old" for them with our presence, because we know they'll access it themselves one day, so we're not turning it into a taboo subject, and instead assisting their understanding of the media they access in a safe environment.

As such, our 6 year old's greatest achievement (in his mind) so far, was defeating Malenia, solo, on New Game Plus in Elden Ring.

Anyway yes.

We like games.

@mrhaitch jump in if I missed any...

-- Haitch xxx

[mer-acle]

sooo because you asked, I'm gonna talk about video games. I only really have a switch currently, but I know a good amount about some games not on switch too ig.

I feel like partially cuz of her personality, partially cuz of her domains as a goddess, Athena would like games where you have to think, and there's less of a time limit. So puzzle games, and stuff that's similar. And she would probably like turn-based games, where you get to practice strategy, cuz combat that isn't just "run in circles and swing your sword every 5 seconds until whatever you're fighting is dead". I can also see her liking more sandboxy games like Minecraft, where you can get creative and kinda do whatever. Games that I've played/know-a-lot-about-but-haven't-had-time-to-play-yet that I think she'd like: dicey dungeons, sea of stars, ooblets, pokemon, monster hunter stories 1-2, deltarune, undertale, and slay the spire, (turn based games, mostly rpgs) miitopia (?) (it's also a turn based game but you can't control your entire party, and also all the characters are miis, it's weird but fun) phogs, human fall flat, Zelda eow, machinarium, untitled goose game, portal 1-2, howl, snipperclips, and ghost trick, (puzzle games of various difficulties) baba is you (very difficult puzzle game :]) bugsnax (pretty much a puzzle game, she'd like the catching mechanics. Got into it cuz of athrodite. {Only remembered this l8r so this is being written after dites section, more thoughts there}) niche a genetics survival game, (turn based game where you've got a colony of creatures that you evolve) spore (a game where you evolve a species from a single celled organism to a space-faring civilization that came out in 2008 and was my entire childhood) pikmin (technically a real time games with time limits, but managing a small army of plant guys to transport stuff and fight enemies feels like something she'd like) and probably botw and totk, with a preference for totk because of the ability to build things and augment your weapons, but both have quests that make you think, and a lot of puzzles to do (she'd probably be the kind of person to snipe enemies from afar with a bow, and use trickery and stealth to defeat enemy camps instead of brute force, like me! :D {muddlebud, yiga-clan-dagger-thingy with a good fusion, and monster masks my beloveds<3})

Ares would probably enjoy games where it's all in real time, less time to think, gotta act fast kinda stuff, and games that are more difficult. Also probably racing games, and he'd probably like party games too. Games that he'd like are: stuff like dark souls, elden ring, and bloodborne (very difficult souls likes) another crabs treasure (also a souls like but you play as a hermit crab, and the only one I've personally played ':>) going under, blazing beaks, Hades, (all very difficult roguelikes, Hades is funny :2) cult of the lamb (roguelike, hard, kinda funny for him to be running a cult. Athrodite totally plays 2 player with him and helps manage the cult cuz kinda cute graphics and it's funny) rain world (2d platformer, real hard, fight stuff with spears) mainline monster hunter (partially to match with Athena hdhshsj) don't starve/dst (sandboxish game where you try not to die to everything and there's bosses and stuff) jsab, deltarune, undertale, (bullet hell kinda games, he'd like the dodging) super smash bros, Mario cart, Mario party, (he drags Athena to the family reunion and they compete in tournaments against all their siblings. It last for like 5 hours while all the people Zeus had children with awkwardly stand in a room together) more games I haven't played like doom or cod or something (personally I don't tend to play super violent stuff or anything, not my cup of tea 🍵) botw and totk, (preference for botw cuz he prefers the comparative simplicity of the mechanics and likes hitting things with sticks. He does appreciate the new bosses in totk. He would probably play in master mode in botw, and fight lynels for fun. The yiga clan hideout is either the bane of his existence or a fun combat challenge)

Athrodite would probably like more cutesy kinda games which are more heavily character focused, and she'd probably like romance games. (Personally I, do not. So I don't have any specific games for that) I can see her enjoying farming games tbh. games for her: slime rancher, ooblets, Paleo pines (cute lil games where you collect creatures and farm In one way or another) yonder the cloud catcher chronicles (first game I ever had on switch, very cute and cosy, good starter game for learning mechanics of an open world rpg without having to worry about dying, bartering system is neat. grass foxes!) amber isle (dino shopkeeping game {I may or may not be autism about dinosaurs}) miitopia (she'd be so invested in the party members, and whenever theres a falling out she watches the drama like it's a telenovela) bugsnax (got into it cuz she thought the bugs were cute, got invested in the characters, then got mildly traumatized by the ending and dragged ares and Athena to play it to inflict it on them. {I won't spoil it but jeez man. Great game btw, highly recommend. It's completely bonkers and makes you sound insane when you explain it, and that's why it's fun. Go watch a trailer or something}) Wandersong (the characters are on point, music is amazing, story is so good, cute graphics) chicory a colorful tale (surprisingly deep, she probably cried at least once, totally got Athena to play it {Athena would like it tbh, got puzzles and creativity n art, but I don't wanna scroll up and add something to her section a g a i n sooo}) sky cotl (she'd like flying around in the clouds and it's a multiplayer game so she could make friends with people. Ares has it too, and when they have to be separated irl for a long time they play it together and make their skykids hold hands while they have phone calls {it's free to download btw :D}) the sims (she would totally have all the expansion packs. Depending on how she feels that day she either spends 2 hours just making the nicest house possible and making nice little stories with her sims, or being a complete menace, starting character drama left and right, drowning sims, making the worst house possible) probably stuff like Roblox dress to impress too.

They would probably have some overlap in terms of games, play and/or watch each other play games together n all that, these are just more games that they'd specifically enjoy and seek out on their own

VVV For a few specific games that they'd all play with different playstyles. VVV

acnh: ares and Athena would share a switch, athrodite would have her own, so the siblings share an island. Athrodite would probably be the kinda person to have a themed island, and just remodel the entire thing every like 4 months, she'd have the highest rating, everything is pristine and amazing, she spent forever getting her favorite villagers, etc. ares would probably be more of a decorator than Athena tbh, their island would probably be a bit less nice, not really any one style. Athena would probably like digging up fossils, getting paintings, fishing, etc, so she could donate stuff to blathers. She wouldn't spend that much time decorating but you just know that their museum is complete and she sometimes just walks in there to admire the exhibits, or listen to blathers explain something again. (He's an owl btw) She'd probably be good at custom designs too, athrodite would totally yoink some of her designs for clothes.

Stardew valley: theres a good chance theyd have a multiplayer save file, and all be playing it differently. Athrodite has all the characters schedules memorized, and is currently befriending all of them, and romancing someone. Ares is spending all his time in the mines, fighting monsters. Athena is minmaxing on the farm to get as much money as possible. All of them are thriving.

Minecraft: Athena would probably like redstone, and enjoy playing in creative mode half the time to build stuff, she might like adventuring. Ares would be the combat expert of the three, and would probably be more of a miner. Athrodite would also be a builder, and she'd probably be the one to adventure halfway across the world to find the one type of wood she needs to make a house. Athena and athrodite would set out on a journey and come back 2 hours later with 3 pet parrots, 6 types of coral, a new tamed wolf, 3 stacks of flowers, a bunch of dark oak wood, and a new horse, when they just needed to get some wood.

Splatoon, abridged: taking pity on you because this got longer than expected, and I've been writing for like an hour at least, I'll try and keep this short. (I've played splatoon for like 500 hours now, I may have slight issues ':2) Ares would like side order for the replayability, probably be real good at salmon run, he'd be good at squid beatz probably, and be pretty good at ranked. He would probably main shorter ranged frontliner weapons, esp ones with higher fire rates, and ones that are decently strong. Stuff like a clash blaster, brushes, maybe splatanas, and the sploosh o matic (I main sploosh actually, and it's fast as hell but the range is abysmal, I get outranged by melee weapons, when the sploosh is a shooter. :'D But it's strong in close quarters and fun sooo) athena would enjoy the story modes I think, be pretty good at tableturf (best of the three), and probably have a higher ranked score, cuz strategy is pretty important. She'd be more of a backliner, getting to a good position and lining up shots. She'd probably use something more like a charger or splatling, like the hydra splatling or e-liter, or something like a splatershot pro. Athrodite would have an on point fashion sense, be really good at turf wars, and be the one to remind the others that there's a splatfest. She feels like someone who'd use more support aligned weapons like a brella, or dapple dualies, and she'd probably be good with an aerospray.

Gods this got long, and you probably don't have any idea what I'm talking about c:'. Hopefully tumblr doesn't delete any of this or something 🤞. I just rambled and listed off a bunch of neat games I like tbh, I mean, all of em are good so if you want a recommendation then you could pick one from ^^^up there^^^ I suppose. The formatting prolly sucks and is a bit hard to read, but it's late and I don't feel like fixing it so I don't have the energy to care. (Run on sentences and parentheses my beloved) It's not realistic that they'd play every single one of these, or spend a ton of time on them, given that they're busy with having-a-life, but this is a list of games I think they'd like, not games they'd have time to play necessarily. Anyway I'm gonna send this ask before I pass out on my phone and delete it or something, enjoy another wall of text. (I feel bad for anyone scrolling through this blog hghghcughhrh my bad guys ':2)

Goodnight y'all! May your dreams be free of fear!

-🌻

and here i am finally tackling this one lmao Kidding this is fun to read i just don't know what to respond cos like... idk 90% of this lmao

Def agree with the playstyle assessments :D Very in character! And from the games I do know/ know about I totally agree with those too :D (For some reason Don't Starve stuck out to me, Ares would so enjoy this, and growl at the screen a bunch during it)

I have never played Stardew valley myself but there's no way this isn't accurate the vibes are great.

Also the Mario Cart tournament is so sibling coded i wanna cry.

I may or may not be autism about dinosaurs // ykw slay dinosaurs are amazing. I knew so many latin/greek names of them back in the day, had a dinosaur memory game and- gods how did my parents go this is a neurotypical child nothing to see here? *giggling*

SIMSSSS I love sims. Can add to that. I can see Aph being a firm custom content girlie, Athena has more mods, though. Aphrodite would also enjoy CAS methinks, and if she doesn't wanna build herself she gets Athena's builds from the gallery cos Athena would either build or play rags to riches and collectible challenges (her sims have to hustle almost as much as herself) Ares doesn't play he has watched the GrayStillPlays sims playlist tho. So has Athena. several times. It's a comfort playlist of hers. (you see, the author is in a point of her life where the projecting is completely obvious and unabashed)

(Run on sentences and parentheses my beloved) // don't we all XD DW apart from me not knowing shit about videogames this wasn't hard to read at all, I'm very sure people will enjoy the shit out of this, you have done the AU a massive favor <33

xx

[calpalsworld]

Months after Floor 2 / The Mines has come out, as someone who loves to play Roblox Doors and has put a ton of time into the game, I'd just like to voice my opinion that Dam Seek is a flawed and disappointing boss.

Doors is a roguelike where you try over and over to practice quicker reactions to randomized scenarios. You practice various skills, main things being timing hiding correctly, running in the correct direction as fast as you can, and carefully controlling where you move your mouse.

Why is a final boss that takes at least a half hour to reach not based on anything the player practiced previously? Its about platforming??? Jumping was just introduced like 60 rooms ago for 1 minute, before being taken away, and now we are supposed to jump more? And have our entire run depend on it?

When I lose a run, I usually feel motivated to keep practicing skills in the game. I feel like I want to hop right back into the game to improve on the mistake I made. But I just loose all of my energy on Dam Seek. I don't even know what I did wrong because its not something I've learned about, and I know I won't be any more skilled than I was last time when I finally make it there.

So I don't necessarily think Dam Seek needs any changing. Its a cool concept/design/sequence. I just think the rest of the game needs to implement build up/learning moments for Dam Seek.

[thecozycat]

💜 Showcase Saturday #3: Ooops.lol 💜

This weekend's Small Web showcase feature is Ooops.lol; a pocket of the small web where code, creativity, and personal expression thrive. Z, the mind behind the site, has been coding since the Neopets era—back when tweaking premade layouts was the ultimate form of customization. Their passion for cobbling together code reignited in 2023 through Grundo’s Cafe, and now, this site is a space for them to experiment, build, and share. With a deep interest in media analysis, food science, and accessibility, Z approaches web design with both a technical and thoughtful touch, making the internet a little more inclusive while having fun along the way.

Beyond coding, Z is a gamer at heart, with a particular love for roguelikes, and an anime enthusiast always on the hunt for the next great watch. When they’re not immersed in digital worlds, they enjoy tending to their garden—whenever their health allows. Chronic illness has shaped their approach to creativity, shifting their focus from productivity to pure enjoyment. Free from the pressures of work and social media, they’ve reclaimed their artistic spark, letting ideas grow naturally, much like the sunflowers in lead-laced soil that they compare their website to—healing and transformative.

Accessibility is a major focus of Ooops.lol, as Z often browses the web from a mobile device. Their goal is to refine their skills with media queries and JavaScript, crafting responsive templates and easy-to-use accessibility scripts to help others make their sites more user-friendly. This ever-evolving site is a testament to intentional creation, built not for algorithms but for people. With pages dedicated to personal musings, favorite things, their beloved Bengal cats, and a manifesto of their digital philosophy, Ooops.lol is an inviting, unconventional space that encourages visitors to stay a while and explore.

👉 Check their site out here: https://ooops.lol/

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Want to help the Small Web movement grow? Join us on other platforms. ♥

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[epicsause-official]

first, some background facts

1. according to a reddit comment, it takes ~5.5 hours to listen to the entire my chemical romance discography

2. the closest thing the roguelike platformer spelunky 2 has to a 100% speedrun category is All Journal Entries, where you start from a fresh save and have to get all entries in the in-game journal by interacting with every enemy, item, trap, and npc.

now at one point a thought struck my mind. what if i were to wipe my spelunky 2 save and run all journal entries while listening to the entirety of mcr's collective works back to back, and try to get them all before the mcr runs out. i genuenely dont know if this a reasonable task. 6 hours seems like a large enough timeframe to get all entries, but visiting duat, eggplant world, and the cosmic ocean in a nonstop marathon might prove exhausting. plus, theres always the chance that the secret backwards satanic messages in the music might fry my brain before i get the journal entries. regardless, this is a thing i want to try at some point.

[da-mous]

i am curious about which smash bros inspired mechanics you added to your pizzatoweresque metroidvania!

directional inputs for moves! since it's a roguelike platformer all about ending up with a unique platforming moveset every run, I needed a way to map different abilities to different inputs in a way that maximizes the ease of learning a whole new moveset every single run

there's just one special move button, and moves that move you up are always mapped to up + special button, moves that move you sideways are always mapped to side + special button, etc. so you'll never think "damn, which button was that sideways teleport thing on again?"

[stoic--rose]

Oi Hilda sorry for sending so many asks but do you have any PS Vita recommendations?

Anything from HD ports to original software for the thing

oh hell yeah!!! i love the vita, its one of my favorite consoles!! :D

in terms of exclusives theres not much but ive still latched onto a couple of really great games. Tearaway is my go to, super fun and creative 3d platformer from media molecule thats fun to 100%. Gravity Rush is another great one, while i havent finished it i played a good chunk of it and its one of the most quality titles on the system, by far. if you want something super funky and unique, Open Me! is a really cool AR game where you solve 3D puzzle boxes by looking around them through the vita camera, and operating switches and dials on the touch screen. its kinda jank but i really love a lot of its ideas and think its very overlooked. theres also Touch my Katamari and Silent Hill: Book of Memories if you want some kind of trashy but still pretty fun games (touch my katamari is like basically good but book of memories? that game is WACK . they made a silent hill roguelike... still cool though)

the vita has a ton of great indie ports, some of my favorites are Knytt Underground, Super Meat Boy, Spelunky, Axiom Verge, and most importantly, Severed. Severed is unique bc the vita is one of the only places it can be played, aside from mobile phones, wii u, 3ds, and switch (handheld only). its a game all about making precise slashes on the touch screen, and the combat is extremely fun and unique because of that. the art style is also gorgeous, and its also a first person dungeon crawler, similar to the older megaten games, if thats your thing.

some other cool ports are Wipeout 2048, Plants vs Zombies, La-Mulana EX and Day of the Tentacle Remastered. its also worth noting that you can play basically every psp and ps1 game on the vita but if i went into those i think we'd be here all afternoon so ill cut myself off there. happy vita-ing dg !!! (also never worry about sending too many asks i am always happy to respond to them !!)

[p5x-theories]

"Control Center" Game Mode

(last updated 11/24/24!)

The "Control Center" game mode in P5X, referred to by a popular Youtuber as "Heart Rail" though this translation seems inaccurate (?), is a roguelike Metaverse activity the player can play through at will, with rewards for completing runs and collecting different bonuses.

More information below the cut, as this gets into all the bonuses and unlockable aspects, so it's pretty long.

Ruferu's the one to first sense this new area when it pops up in Mementos, and asks Wonder to investigate it with him. He ends up describing it as a space where "the shadows of lost humans" gather. This is related to the widespread loss of desires; these people have become unable to make even the most basic of decisions, and thus, are unable to move forward. He suggests that this severe indecisiveness could spread to more of Mementos if not kept in check, and they can help these shadows make decisions by running through the area themselves and making choices.

To start a run, the player first selects a track and a difficulty level. The first track, the Track of Desire, has difficulty levels from 1-6, while the second and third tracks, the Track of Hope and the Track of Wishes, have 1-8. Beating a run at one difficulty unlocks the next difficulty. In the below screenshot of the Track of Wishes, difficulties 1-6 are unlocked:

Increasing the difficulty raises the level of the shadows present, and gives them other buffs (with debuffs to the player) to make the fights extra difficult. However, the player is also rewarded more for completing a higher-difficulty run.

Over the course of a run, the player chooses which stations they want to travel to, eventually reaching one of four final bosses at the end of the third station. Defeating this boss completes the run; if the player dies early, they have to start over.

The bosses available in each Track are:

Track of Desire: Oberon + Titania, Dominion + Principality + Power + Archangel, Cu Chulainn, and Yamata-No-Orochi

Track of Hope: Arahabaki + Take-Minakata, Kohryu, Yamata-No-Orochi, and Clotho + Lachesis + Atropos

Track of Wishes: Cu Chulainn, Kohryu, Clotho + Lachesis + Atropos, and Hecatoncheires

In the Track of Desire, the bosses are unlocked in the order they're listed in above, and defeating one boss unlocks the next. The player can always choose between any unlocked bosses' stations for a given run, even if they've beaten that boss before and unlocked the next one. Yamato-No-Orochi must be defeated on a difficulty of 4 or higher to unlock it on lower difficulties.

In the Track of Hope and Track of Wishes, however, all bosses are unlocked at all difficulties from the start.

Other than bosses at the end of each station, the platform paths within a station consist of a mix of battles (easy and medium fights can be encountered normally), treasure chests (which contain either rail coins, Guardians, or Lost Property, explained a little later in this post), random encounters with NPC shadows that generally present the player with choices resulting in a variety of outcomes, and Marthym's shop. In the screenshots above, red platforms are battles, yellow are treasure chests, blue (both icons) are random NPC encounters, orange are Marthym's shop, and grey are a completely random platform that could be any of the other types.

(The Jack Frost in the middle screenshot is an NPC.)

Marthym's shop takes rail coins, which are the currency earned in this mode. They're typically dropped by fights, as well as being obtainable from the stealable objects that will occasionally appear on platforms, and can often be gained from treasure chests as well, as mentioned above. In Marthym's shop, the player has a small selection of Guardians and Lost Property available for purchase. Right before the final boss platform, there will always be a special Marthym's shop platform that allows the player to buy things as well as upgrading their existing Guardians.

While combat in this mode is otherwise the same as combat anywhere else, there is one difference, which varies depending on the track chosen:

In the Track of Desire, every five rounds, an effect called "Crimson Tide" triggers, hitting everyone in combat (both teammates and enemies, impossible to block or dodge), and giving them a level of the "Fanatic Power" status effect, which increases damage taken by 5% (and stacks up to fifteen times)

In the Track of Hope, every time a teammate uses a Persona skill, followup attack, or Highlight, they gain an "Attribute Brand" of the same type, and once the team has seven collective Attribute Brands (of any types), an effect called "Etched Starfall" triggers, which deals seven almighty damage hits to random enemies

In the Track of Wishes, every time a teammate uses a Highlight, they gain one "Starlight Heat", and once the team has four Starlight Heat, an effect called "Shining Stage" is triggered. Shining Stage grants each teammate a random buff, which can be stacked: attack stat increased by 15%, defense stat increased by 22.5%, maximum HP increased by 15%, damage caused increased by 12%, effect hit increased by 18%, attack penetration increased by 6%, critical hit rate increased by 9%, critical hit effect increased by 18%, attack resistance penetration increased by 7.5%, weak point damage increased by 6%

It's not strictly a combat difference, but at the start of each run, the player also receives two Magatama, which are automatically consumed to revive a teammate (one per Magatama) outside of combat. Rarely, additional Magatama can be obtained via Lost Property or random NPC encounters.

You can watch a run through Control Center's Track of Desire, ending with the Yamata-No-Orochi boss, here.

Completing runs also gives the player points to spend on permanent buffs that are applied to all runs going forward, following a skill tree format where all skills in a column must be unlocked before the next column/"branch" unlocks.

The buffs in the pictures above (going down one column at a time) are:

1) All teammates have +2% attack, 2) All teammates have +2% maximum health, 3) All teammates have +2% defense

1) All teammates have +2% critical rate, 2) All teammates deal +4% critical damage, 3) At the start of a run, gain 10 rail coins

1) At the start of a run, gain a bonus Magatama, 2) Instant kill level +3

1) All teammates have +2% attack, 2) All teammates have +2% maximum health, 3) All teammates have +2% defense

1) All teammates have +5% effect resistance, 2) All teammates have +5% effect hit, 3) Points earned (at the end of a run, for calculating rewards) +5%

1) The first stock refresh of every store is free, 2) Instant kill level +3

1) All teammates have +2% attack, 2) All teammates have +2% maximum health, 3) All teammates have +2% defense

1) All teammates have +2% critical rate, 2) All teammates deal +4% critical damage, 3) After a battle, the team recovers 5% health

The buffs in the pictures above are:

1) The number of Guardians for sale in every store is increased by 2, 2) Instant kill level +3

1) All teammates have +2% attack, 2) All teammates have +2% maximum health, 3) All teammates have +2% defense

1) All teammates have +5% effect resistance, 2) All teammates have +5% effect hit, 3) Points earned +5%

1) Before fighting the final boss, the team restores full HP, SP, and Highlight energy, 2) Instant kill level +3

1) All teammates have +2% attack, 2) All teammates have +2% maximum health, 3) All teammates have +2% defense

1) Damage dealt by all teammates +3%, 2) Damage taken by all teammates -3%, 3) At the start of a run, gain +20 rail coins

Points earned +15%

An additional seven "Points earned +15%" buffs were added to the skill tree with the Track of Wishes, as seen in the third picture

During a run, the player will also obtain various temporary bonus effects, which only last for that run. These come in two forms, mentioned earlier: Guardians (also listed in English as "Buffs"), and Lost Property.

First, the Guardians. They come in three rarity levels: blue, purple, and gold. Blue will usually come from easy fights, while more difficult ones will offer purple (or a mix of blue and purple), and boss fights will give gold. The player is given a choice between two Guardians after a fight, and can either pick one, reroll the options for a small rail coin fee, or forego the choice entirely and gain rail coins. The player can only hold twelve Guardians at a time, but can pay rail coins to unlock additional slots. At any time a Guardian can also be discarded in exchange for rail coins.

Duplicates can be obtained in order to strengthen that Guardian; blue Guardians can be strengthened twice, while purple ones can only be strengthened once, and gold cannot be strengthened at all. As mentioned above, the special Marthym shop platform right before the final boss also allows the player to strengthen Guardians for a rail coin fee.

All the Guardians, listed from left to right going through each row, explained below. Note that some are only available on one track rather than all three; I've marked Track of Desire-exclusive Guardians with a *, Track of Hope-exclusives with a ⁑, and Track of Wishes-exclusives with a ⁂.

First picture, first row: - Heart Wash 1*: After a member of the team is hit by Crimson Tide, their attack is increased by 20% for one round. - Heart Wash 2*: After an enemy is hit by Crimson Tide, its defense is reduced by 30% for one round. - Heart Wash 3*: After a member of the team is hit by Crimson Tide, they restore 10 SP. - Heart Wash 4*: After Wonder is hit by Crimson Tide, there is a 30% chance that the Navigator's cooldown will reduce by one turn.

First picture, second row: - Heart Wash 5*: When Wonder is hit by Crimson Tide, the entire team gains 40% Highlight energy. - Heart Wash 6*: When a member of the team is hit by Crimson Tide, they randomly gain one of the following buffs: weakness damage dealt increased by 8%, shield penetration increased by 12%, damage dealt increased by 16%. This buff is permanent (for that fight), and can be stacked. - Body 1*: After a member of the team is hit by Crimson Tide, their defense is increased by 30% for one round. - Body 2*: The damage the team takes from Crimson Tide is reduced by 80%.

Second picture, first row: - Body 3*: Enemies take 80% more damage from Crimson Tide. - Body 4*: After a member of the team is hit by Crimson Tide, they receive a shield of 2400. - Body 5*: The lower an enemy's percentage of health, the higher their damage taken from Crimson Tide. Maximum bonus is 140% when the enemy is below 30%. - Body 6*: After a member of the team acts, there is a 60% chance to trigger an additional Crimson Tide.

Second picture, second row: - Repeat Festival 1⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of the same type as the last Persona skill damage dealt, all teammates recover 700 health. - Repeat Festival 2⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of the same type as the last Persona skill damage dealt, there is a 16% chance to reduce the Navigator's cooldown by 1 turn. - Repeat Festival 3⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of the same type as the last Persona skill damage dealt, that teammate's attack is increased by 18% until the end of the next round. - Repeat Festival 4⁑: When any teammate gains an Attribute Brand, the team's damage for that type is increased by 7% for two rounds (can be stacked six times).

Third picture, first row: - Repeat Festival 5⁑: When any teammate deals Persona skill damage, they have a 50% chance to gain an additional Attribute Brand of the same type. - Repeat Festival 6⁑: The damage caused by Etched Starfall is increased by 50%. For every Attribute Brand of the same type consumed, Etched Starfall's damage is increased by 1 level, up to 5 levels. - Noisy Festival 1⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of a different type than the last Persona skill damage dealt, all teammates recover 700 health. - Noisy Festival 2⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of a different type than the last Persona skill damage dealt, there is a 12% chance to reduce the Navigator's cooldown by 1 turn.

Third picture, second row: - Noisy Festival 3⁑: If a teammate deals Persona skill damage of a different type than the last Persona skill damage dealt, that teammate's attack is increased by 30% until the end of the next round. - Noisy Festival 4⁑: When any teammate gains an Attribute Brand, their own damage for that type is increased by 15% for three rounds (can be stacked three times). - Noisy Festival 5⁑: When any teammate deals Persona skill damage, they have a 50% chance to gain an additional Attribute Brand of a type they don't currently have. - Noisy Festival 6⁑: The damage caused by Etched Starfall is increased by 50%. For every Attribute Brand of a different type consumed, Etched Starfall's damage is increased by 1 level, up to 5 levels.

First picture, first row: - Starlight 1⁂: Immediately gain 24% Highlight energy upon entering combat. - Starlight 2⁂: At the end of any teammate's turn, gain 6% Highlight energy. - Starlight 3⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, the teammate with the lowest health recovers 6% of their maximum health. - Starlight 4⁂: After the Navigator takes an action, gain 25% Highlight energy.

First picture, second row: - Starlight 5⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, the Navigator's cooldown will be reduced by 1 turn. - Starlight 6⁂: When Shining Stage is triggered, each teammate gains an additional five buffs from it. - Glow 1⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, their attack stat is increased by 30% for one round. - Glow 2⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, their critical hit rate is increased by 9% for one round.

Second picture, first row: - Glow 3⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, their critical hit effect is increased 18% for one round. - Glow 4⁂: When a teammate uses their Highlight to cause damage, it ignores 30% of the target's defense. - Glow 5⁂: After any teammate uses their Highlight, the entire team's damage dealt is increased by 10% for three rounds (can be stacked up to 5 times). - Glow 6⁂: When Shining Stage is triggered, it has a 9% chance to grant a super buff state that activates all buff effects at once.

Second picture, second row: - Killing 1: When using a single-target Persona skill, attack is increased by 15%. - Killing 2: When there is only one enemy on the field, the team's attack is increased by 24%. - Killing 3: After using a single-target Persona skill, damage dealt by the target is reduced by 12% for one round. - Killing 4: When using a single-target Persona skill, damage dealt to enemies below 50% health is increased by 40%.

Third picture, first row: - Killing 5: When using a single-target Persona skill, weakness damage dealt is increased by 24%. - Killing 6: After using a single-target Persona skill, all enemies are dealt additional Almighty damage, equal to 10% of the damage the skill dealt. - Melee 1: When using a multi-target Persona skill, attack increases by 25%. - Melee 2: After using a multi-target Persona skill, the damage the caster receives is reduced by 7.5% for two rounds.

Third picture, second row: - Melee 3: For every enemy on the field, the team's attack is increased by 6%. - Melee 4: After dealing damage to an enemy, its damage received is increased by 12.8% for two rounds (can be stacked twice). - Melee 5: The damage dealt to the main target of a multi-target Persona skill is increased by 45%. - Melee 6: The damage dealt by multi-target Persona skills is increased by 40%, and all damage dealt is shared by all enemies.

First picture, first row: - Healing 1: The healing effect of the team is increased by 24%. - Healing 2: After using a healing skill, Almighty damage equal to 65% of the caster's attack is dealt to a random enemy. - Healing 3: All teammates' maximum health is increased by 10.2%. - Healing 4: After using a healing skill, damage equal to 16% of the healing amount will be dealt to all enemies.

First picture, second row: - Healing 5: After using a healing skill, the attack of the caster and whoever they healed is increased by 20% for two rounds (can be stacked twice). - Healing 6: The damage dealt by each member of the team is increased based on their current percentage of health. When health is at 100%, attack increases by 40%. - Protective 1: The team's defense increases by 15%. - Protective 2: The shield effect of all members of the team is increased by 12%.

Second picture, first row: - Protective 3: When a team member with a shield takes damage, Almighty damage equal to 19.2% of the team member's defense is dealt to the source of the damage. - Protective 4: At the start of combat, all team members receive a shield equal to 24% of their defense, which lasts three rounds. - Protective 5: When a team member gains a shield, they gain additional shield equal to 18% of that shield for two rounds. - Protective 6: At the beginning of each round, each team member gains a shield equal to 10% of their attack for two rounds. While under this shield, their damage dealt is increased by 25%.

Second picture, second row: - Blessing 1: When a team member gains a buff, their attack is increased by 30% for one round. - Blessing 2: When the whole team has a buff effect, their damage is increased by 8.1%. - Blessing 3: When a team member gains a buff, their defense is increased by 15% for two rounds. - Blessing 4: If no damage is dealt when a member of the team uses a skill, the damage caused by all teammates is increased by 16% for one round (can be stacked three times).

First picture, first row: - Blessing 5: When a member of the team acts, their attack power is increased based on 32% of the previous team member's attack for one round. - Blessing 6: Every time the entire team receives a buff effect, their attack is increased by 10% (can be stacked five times). - Exorcist 1: When the enemy is affected by a debuff, it gains one level of "Pain" (deals damage equal to 1% of the enemy's health at the end of its turn). - Exorcist 2: The damage enemies receive from all continuous damage effects is increased by 25%.

First picture, second row: - Exorcist 3: For every level of Pain on an enemy, its defense is reduced by 2%. - Exorcist 4: After an enemy is defeated, all other enemies gain three levels of Pain. - Exorcist 5: After an enemy is afflicted with an elemental status effect, it gains two levels of Pain. - Exorcist 6: Every time an enemy gains Pain, there's a 50% chance it receives a second level. This can trigger multiple times, resulting in up to 30 levels of Pain afflicted.

Second picture, first row: - Fate 1: After the Navigator acts, the teammate with the lowest health restores 12% health. - Fate 2: After the Navigator acts, the team's attack is increased by 15% for one round. - Fate 3: After the Navigator acts, the damage dealt by the team increases by 43.2% for one round. - Fate 4: At the start of battle, the Navigator's cooldown is reduced by 2 turns.

Second picture, second row: - Fate 5: After any teammate acts, there is a 48% chance to reduce the Navigator's cooldown by 1 turn. - Fate 6: Every two actions the Navigator takes, the damage dealt by the team increases by 60% for one round.

Guardians also give set bonuses automatically gained after obtaining two and four Guardians within the same set (same icon):

Heart Wash* set: 2-set effect: The damage dealt by Crimson Tide is reduced by 80%, and Crimson Tide now triggers every three rounds instead. 4-set effect: The Fanatic Power status effect gains an additional effect: each level increases the damage taken by the team by 5%, and the damage taken by enemies by 25%.

Body* set: 2-set effect: Crimson Tide's damage is increased by 80%. After being hit by Crimson Tide, each Phantom Thief has a 40% chance of becoming immune to being knocked down for one round. 4-set effect: The Fanatic Power status effect gains an additional effect: each level increases the damage of Crimson Tide by 15%, and the damage it deals to enemies is increased by an additional 45%.

Repeat Festival⁑ set: 2-set effect: Each hit dealt by Etched Starfall increases an enemy's weak point damage by 5% for two rounds (can be stacked five times). 4-set effect: When an enemy takes five hits from Etched Starfall in total, it becomes weaker to all types (resistance downgrades to normal, normal downgrades to weak), and its damage received increases by 30%, for one round.

Noisy Festival⁑ set: 2-set effect: Each hit dealt by Etched Starfall increases an enemy's weak point damage by 5% for two rounds (can be stacked five times). 4-set effect: When an enemy takes four hits from Etched Starfall in total, it becomes weak to a random type, and its damage received is increased by 5% (can be stacked ten times).

Starlight⁂ set: 2-set effect: After any teammate uses their Highlight, the cooldown for all other teammates' Highlights is reduced by one turn. 4-set effect: After any teammate uses their Highlight, there is a 50% chance to immediately clear their own Highlight cooldown.

Glow⁂ set: 2-set effect: When any teammate uses their Highlight to deal damage, its damage is increased by 15%. 4-set effect: When any teammate uses their Highlight to deal damage, it has a chance to deal a critical hit, with their critical hit rate increased by 30% and their critical hit effect increased by 60%.

Killing set: 2-set effect: When targeting a single enemy with a Persona skill, ignore 15% of the enemy's defense. 4-set effect: After being hit by a single-target Persona skill, an enemy takes additional Almighty damage equal to 50% of the damage it took from the skill.

Melee set: 2-set effect: Every enemy on the field increases the damage dealt by the team by 6%. 4-set effect: For each additional enemy that a skill hits, its damage is increased by 13.5%. When using a skill that hits multiple enemies, this calculation adds an additional two. (ex. if a spell would hit two enemies, the damage would be boosted as if it hit four.)

Healing set: 2-set effect: All members of the team recover 10% of their maximum health at the start of each round. 4-set effect: Every time the team receives overflow healing, damage equal to 300% of the overflow amount will be dealt to a random enemy. (ex. if someone was healed for 1 point over their maximum, a random enemy would take 300 damage.)

Protective set: 2-set effect: The attack power of teammates under a shield is increased by 35%. 4-set effect: After a member of the team uses a skill to deal damage or receives damage, Almighty damage equal to 50% of their shield will be dealt to the main target of the skill, or the source of the damage that was taken.

Blessing set: 2-set effect: When each member of the team acts, the damage they deal is increased based on the total number of buffs on all teammates, 3% per buff, counting up to ten buffs. 4-set effect: Damage dealt by all teammates is increased by 25%. For each buff they have, damage is increased by an additional 7.2%, counting up to eight buffs.

Exorcist set: 2-set effect: Enemies with Pain take 30% more damage. 4-set effect: After using a skill to deal damage, all Pain on that enemy will be resolved.

Fate set: 2-set effect: After the Navigator takes an action, the attack of the teammate with the highest attack stat is increased by 20%, and the defense of the teammate with the highest defense stat is increased by 20%, for one round. 4-set effect: After the Navigator takes an action, there is a 25% chance they'll be able to act again immediately (this cannot trigger consecutively).

On the other hand, Lost Property items also benefit the player, however they much more often have drawbacks as well, and typically function as a double-edged sword, though some are purely beneficial. Some Lost Property alternatively require multiple items/events collected within a single run to become truly useful.

Lost Property is usually only obtained from treasure chests, random NPC encounters, and some tougher fights, in addition to Marthym's shop. Notably, the player cannot normally discard Lost Property once it's acquired.

Due to the post image limit on Tumblr, I've separated the Lost Property items list into their own separate post.

In addition to all of the above, there are two categories listed alongside the player's Guardians and Lost Property collections that are currently unavailable. This post will be updated once those are added.

[iced-lemon-draw]

2024 Steam Winter Sale Recommendations

So the steam winter sale just happened so I've decided to draw the cute steam sale girl. There was an attempt of the drawing during the autumn sale but I was busy back then and did not make it, but I've decide to salvage the drawing of her for this winter sale post. Along with the drawing I would also like to take this opportunity to recommend some steam games that I've played this year that you'll likely never heard of. While we get some great releases like Balatro and all, there are many other smaller indie games that did not get a lot of traction that I think these games do deserve some of your attention. Do note that this list consists of games that I've played in 2024, not necessarily released this in 2024 So in no particular order, here are my recommendations:

Witching Stone:

An elegant mix between match 3 puzzle and a roguelike. In combat, you cast spells based on the gem sequence you've input. Each spell requires their own input so each turn you will be strategizing ahead which gems you should include in your sequence to cast the spell you want. While it is not strictly a deck builder, there is enough customization and variety in the spell mechanic to allow you to make unique devastating builds.

2. Minishoot Adventures:

Imagine Zelda 1 but replace links sword combat with bullet hell combat, that's this game. There are not many non roguelike/ shmup bullet hell games and honestly there should be more of it. If you like bullet hell then definitely give this game a try. While the boss fights can be challenging overall I'd say this game is quite friendly for beginners as well (trust me, I am not very good at bullet hells and I mainly play touhou on easy mode). But do keep in mind that this game is inspired by Zelda 1 on the NES in particular, which means this game does not tell you where to go so it's up to you to explore and figure things out yourself. (There is also hardly any text in the game like in Hyper Light Drifter)

3. WitchHand

A card based colony management game similar to Stacklands, but it does a lot of unique things with the witch theme. In this game you can do all things from management games like building buildings, command familiars to fight for you, craft resources and more, but all in a easy to grasp card format where everything is a tangible card. Two things I really like about this game, one is that there is no card limit like in stacklands which really kills the pacing for me, secondly, this game has automation mechanics where you will eventually build supply chains to automate a lot of the complex crafting for you. Overall playing this is a very addicting and satisfying experience, just keep in mind that you will be managing, a lot, and I mean a lot of cards.

4. Rusted Moss

A grappling hook focused metroidvania with bullet hell combat. While most games have grappling hooks, this games stands out where the hook is actually elastic like rubber, in which you can stretch and contract it to fling yourself wherever you need. While it takes some time to get used to, it is indeed pretty fun to master this movement mechanics (schmovement as they called it). The level designs does make use of this as well, for example in most metroidvanias if you see a ledge you can't reach it usually means you'll need another upgrade to reach there later on, but in this game it's likely just skill issue. it also has a good number of optional challenge ares to test your mastery on the movement mechanics. Combine this and some well crafted gun play, you get some fun and engaging gameplay throughout your adventure. While I'd say this game is pretty challenging in terms of the platforming skill it demands, there are accessibility options that let you tweak the game's challenge to whatever fit your needs. Also this game has some interesting lore that is based on Fairy Tales with some pretty interesting character interactions if that is your thing. (Also this game has another content update coming soon.)

5. Transiruby

An cute little metroidvania where you play as a cute robot girl. While this game is pretty simple and arcady in terms of it's collectathon gameplay (you just collect chips in areas which are the equivalent of Mario coins) I do find it quite charming, and sometimes that's all you need for a fun experience. Also one of the upgrades allows your cute robot girl transform into a motorcycle if that interests you.

6. Touhou Endless Dream

It's your standard bullet hell top down shooter roguelike with a touhou theme. While the game can be janky and lackluster at times, but if you can look past that the gameplay is thrilling with enemies all over the place shooting unique bullet patterns which you'll need to observe and dodge carefully. I honestly enjoyed my playtime with the game and would love to see the devs expand on this as this game has a lot of potential. Do check this game out if you are looking for some fun and intense bullet hell combat out of the box.

7. Touhou lensed Night Sky

A Touhou fan game that is a roguelike. Unlike games like touhou 18 and 18.5 this game goes all in with it's roguelike aspect with randomly generated enemy encounters and game changing Bind of Issac style item systems on top your familiar shmup gameplay from Touhou. I really like this game because it does many unique things that you usually don't see from a standard Touhou shmup and there is a lot of variety from the item effect. There is a good blend of stat based upgrade and upgrades that heavily alters the game mechanics, great for making unique builds which makes this game very replayable. (It also has a challenge based difficulty system similar to Slay the Spire's accession system if that is your thing). I would recommend you to at least give this game's demo a shot although do keep in mind that this is still an early access game with quite a number of bugs to be expected. (The devs are working hard squashing the bugs so do report them if you found any.) But if you can look past that, this is a game worth trying for yourself.

8. Archvale

Another bullet hell adventure game but unlike Minishoot Adventures this one takes inspiration from Terraria with it's many unique weapons for you to decide on your playstyle. What I really like this game is it has a lot of polish into making sure the combat feels very satisfying. Similar to Vlambeer's games like Nuclear Throne, every moment of gameplay is a treat for the senses. If your like nuclear throne or what you've seen from gameplay footages then you should get this game.

9. Maiden and Spell

A bullet hell PvP fighting game. Imagine Touhou 9 or 19 but both players are in a single arena shooting directly at each other, that's this game. This is Mino's previous game and while it's not a replayable roguelike like Rabbit and Steel, I still think this game is worth a look at if you like bullet hell combat. While it is a fighting game, it also has a pretty fun single player campaign to play with. This game also supports online play with online netcode and from my experience the online gameplay is pretty solid with minimal network issues encountered. Do give this game a shot and like rabbit and steel, recommend this to a friend as well so they can play with you. And one more thing, like Rabbit and Steel, the soundtrack of this game is also remarkable as well so do give it a listen.

Alright that's all I got. Thanks for listening to ramble about niche games. I really like small indie games made by small teams that most of them had little to no recognition, usually these games are overshadowed by super successful titles like Balatro and Hades and I do wish that they get the recognition they deserve. While I can't exactly convince you to get these games from the winter sale, I do hope you find all these titles interesting. Do let me know if you had more indie game recommendations as well, I always like to learn more about indie hidden gems. Anyways I am done here and I hope you had a good year. See ya again in a future post.