#like.... okay? then why ARE you here if no-lifing bloodborne lore is so bad?

[katyspersonal]

I will sound like I am 45 and not 25 ofc, but to be truthful, I am heading towards losing my joy and passion as a fan-artist. It is about the fandoms as a concept in general, without applying it to any specific one. More like about, WHAT fandoms are by now.

I tend to dive into a game/show/whatever ears deep because as an autist I interact with a lot of concepts vicariously through fiction, but also because I just have this natural wish to respect and love (revere, even) something, and complicated creative works that combine several art types work just well. But fandoms are... bad. They are just bad. Now this is absolutely normal for some gremlin that doesn't know anything about the source material to jump in and start to do their thing - be it being super inaccurate to begin with, breaking the source material to replace with their agenda and tastes, or simply spam a lot of samey, 'soulless'(?) fanart with clear clout in mind to, as kids call it, "build the platform" so they can let the STONKS roll in and promote their own stuff at last if they have it.

Like... This is what fandoms ARE by now. Halfway the grinding ground to gain following to sell commissions to, halfway a ground to spread politics and opinions. Business or propaganda. Not a matter of whether products and propaganda are for good things, they're value neutral concepts and can be used for good or bad equally, but both are not ABOUT the source material. Okay, not fully halfway - some ears-deep fans still are here. But why even? When we, actual fans, give people essays on why they are drastically wrong about a character - we get mocked for not having (highlight the correct: real life, girlfriend, touched the grass, job, all applies). When we demand respect and accuracy to the source material - we are called snobbish entitled gatekeepers at least, accused of various isms and phobias at large. When we try to encourage something deeper and more interesting - again, people tell us we are "boring" and that no one cares about this or that character, and outright boast about how they are only here for this sexy man or for that ship and not really lore dive.

Even basically ancient fandoms like Doctor Who, Star Wars or Star Trek that sprouted THANKS TO those exact "30+ loosers with no life" could no longer uphold the whole ears-deep fan mentality because new installments invited too much shallow fans that are prone to mocking too, and celebrities that are responsible for making awful reboots/continuations can just violate the source however they want under cover of "everyone who doesn't like it is just a sexist and racist incel". This is just how it is now. Passion, elaborate knowledge on the source and respect for a thing truly great creative minds created are now considered DIRTY things, and are a proof of one's inferiority in accomplishments and personality. Because fandoms are no longer a place to gather FANS. They are "platforms".

I just consider, would it be more fun to either invest in the fandoms for real people (composers, poets, scientists, etc) where loving the source material for what it is is a requirement (because...... real people... historical accuracy....), or to just head towards creation my own thing sooner than later? I got to say though, I am thankful for each and every fan in whatever fandom I visited that was/is just as passionate as me. It felt, and still feels less lonely to have more people that don't see shame in REALLY fucking loving stories and characters.

[xynchronicity]

Have some of the other AUs I’ve thought of recently before I go to bed/nap time.

Reaper:

Biblical AU (in other words just another Fallen Angel AU). Of course, Reaper is a Fallen Angel in this verse. This can be just his fall from grace (Gabriel maybe?) or he was…tempted by darker and crueler means and that lost him his ‘grace’. I like the idea that Gabriel (yes, the archangel but also Gabi) was being corrupted or otherwise needed to be “cleansed”. However, this cleansing had unexpected side effects. It made an entire copy of Gabi although a Fallen Archangel version to signify its “badness”. Reaper is a Fallen Angel so that means blackened wings! Black feathers! Clawed hands (bc I wanna keep those >:c)! Also, some blackened limbs (particularly his hands up to just past his elbows and his feet to his knees). He has no memories either! Essentially a “just born Angel” but not welcomed into Heaven. Has to make his own way in life which includes having to take up being a human…which he isn’t entirely great at. Underestimates his strength for simple tasks, someone gets hurt and they’re healed by his touch, his wings come out anytime he has no shirt on so showering is a pain in the ass so he settles for a “grumpy bath” (really he’s just sitting on the floor of the shower with his knees to his chest and the water hitting the top of his head, pouring over him, as he wears an annoyed expression - meanwhile his wings are just splayed out wildly against the shower wall and bathroom as a whole…I mean he has six wings so not a lot of room to work with tbh). Would totally pull a Lucifer (the show) here and attempt to rip his wings out AT LEAST once. “They get in the way!” He could just never go without a shirt and has tried to do so once but sitting in a soaking wet shirt from a shower is not ideal. -100/10, would never try again.

Dark Souls AU. Yep, mentioned this in one of my answers to an ask yesterday. And by “mentioned” I mean “my mind thought of it on the spot”. I’m not deep into the DS lore so WIP? This could also be extended into a Bloodborne AU as well which I feel would be better imo because I know that one a bit better in terms of why we do what we do.

Varren:

Living Universe AU. Okay…so this one I thought of because of a song. The stone are sentient and speak to Varren on several occasions, specifically when they use them as well as when their emotions are stressed or otherwise in a stressful situation - all in attempts to keep Varren calm and rational when it comes to decision making. I mean, they have the ability to unmake entire realities, entire worlds, entire universes. So, sort of have to keep that in check, y’know? Make sure they don’t accidentally mess stuff up. Now that you know all of this, erase it from your memory because all of that is thrown out the window. In this AU, Varren is corrupted/obsessed (I don’t know the right word here) with this power. It started with small things. Using their powers in a casual sense; using telekinesis to bring stuff to them without getting up to get it. When they wanted something done right - let’s say an employee at a coffee shop - they’d mind control the person so they’d get things done right or to Varren’s liking. That’d slowly build and build and build until they wanted control over everything. The other voices, the six voices of the stones, fell on deaf ears because they didn’t matter. They’re bound to Varren and so they follow their will now. They essentially attempt to become the next Living Tribunal (hence the AU name). Also, they’d likely copy or steal things from the universe to put within their own which is housed in their own little pocket dimension. One which they have complete control over. You know just one wouldn’t be enough though, right?

What if…? We’re getting this series in August, but I’ve already thought of some ideas because of watching the cast do a silly buzzfeed quiz to see if they’d survive the snap. Chris (Evans), Mark and Don all got dusted while Brie, Chris (Hems), Paul, Jeremy, Karen, Scarlett and Danai survived the snap. So, the only change here is that Captain America, Hulk and War Machine were part of the dusted (I’d say in exchange for Peter, T’Challa and Sam). In other words, Varren is left alone because the only two people that they were close to were dusted right in front of them. Anguish is one word to describe what Varren felt at that moment. Even more of a reason to fight Thanos or at the very least make sure he doesn’t get away so easily….like tackling him while he attempts to teleport away to become a lonely farmer. Thanos tries to destroy the stones, it fails as they go to Varren and both Varren and the stones disappear in a flash of light and a scream. Thanos thinks the stones and tiny human are destroyed. Who all is left of the Avengers find Thanos, demand the stones but they’re “destroyed”. Meanwhile, Varren is in this pocket dimension utterly losing it. Strangled by grief and anguish that the stones powers are going off the scales and causing chaos. Least it’s in a pocket dimension where it can’t hurt anyone save for Varren but even then it’s only them causing more psychological harm by replaying the moment subconsciously via the stones. Those five years are long. Having to reign in their emotions, work through the stages of grief (possibly a Wandavision type of deal here where they build a life or world where that shit didn’t happen and process via that bc yeah they’d attempt to just “live happily with them even if it’s a false reality” but the stones are sentient so they also alter stuff to force them to work through it). When they get back to Earth, they find Natasha and the rest of the gang that’s left - particularly showing up around the time Scott does. Marvel still brings Nebula and Tony home. Varren does the first snap (rather than Hulk) to bring everyone that was lost back which makes them weak as first time using that much power and they aren’t used to it yet. Thanos still arrives to finish things. Avengers and crew fight it out with Thanos and his army while Varren rests from using so much energy. However, they soon see that their teammates aren’t standing too great of a chance. That is until backup arrives via the mystical arts users bringing in the cavalry. With renewed energy at this, they enter the fight. Varren calls out to Thanos saying if he wanted the stones and the Gauntlet then he’d “have to come get me”. With renewed energy in their system from seeing the camaraderie between everyone, they summon two guardians to assist in keeping Thanos and his army at a distance from themself. While they fight to get to Varren….Varren gives a speech about how Thanos will never be able to do something like this again or hurt entire galaxies for his selfish reasons (adding the comics reasoning behind his method to this because it just makes little sense otherwise - dude could’ve just doubled or tripled the resources and yeah that could cause more problems but like better than killing half of every planets life???) then destroys Thanos, his army, his ships and also undoes the damage he did to all the other planets he visited to remove half the life of everything. This causes Varren to fall to their knees, essentially completely exhausted now. Watching Thanos and his army be dusted puts a smile on Varren’s face and they’re content with seeing that and their allies again as the last thing they see before everything fades to black. Content. Peace. Comfortable emotions to end on.

[achronologyofbits]

GOTY 2019

I wanted to write a personal Game of the Year list, but I realized I really didn’t play that many games that were new in 2019. So I’m ranking them, but it’s less a “top 10” and more a “10 games I played and how I felt about them.”  

10. Kingdom Hearts III

Kingdom Hearts III plays like a game from 2005.

I’m not sure I can fully articulate what I mean by that. Maybe I mean its combat is largely simplistic and button-mashy. Maybe I mean its rhythms of level traversal and cutscene exposition dumps are archaic and outdated. Maybe feeling like this game is a relic from another time is unavoidable, given how many years have passed since its first series entry.  

But there’s also something joyful and celebratory about it all — something kind of refreshing about a work that knows only a tiny portion of its players will understand all its references and lore and world-building, and just doesn’t care.

Despite all the mockery and memery surrounding its fiction, Kingdom Hearts’ strongest storytelling moments are actually pretty simple. They’re about the struggle to exist, to belong, and to define what those things mean for yourself. I think that’s why the series reaches the people it does.

Those moments make Kingdom Hearts III worth defending, if not worth recommending.

9. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

Admittedly, I only played about 10-15 hours of this in 2019. Perhaps fittingly, that’s about the amount of time I originally spent on Dark Souls when it released in 2011. I bounced off, hard, because I didn’t understand what it was asking of me. Once I did — though, it has to be said, I needed other people to explain those expectations to me, because the game sure as hell didn’t — Dark Souls became an all-time favorite. And I’ve played every FromSoft game since then, and enjoyed them all. Until Sekiro.

Part of it is, again, down to expectation. Dark Souls trained its players on a certain style of combat: cautious movements, careful attention to spacing, committing to weighty attacks, waiting for counterattacks. In every game since then, FromSoft have iterated on those expectations in the same direction in an attempt to encourage players to be less cautious and more aggressive. The series moved from tank-heavy play in Dark Souls, to dual-wielding in DS2, to weapon arts and reworking poise in DS3, to the system of regaining health by attacking in Bloodborne.

In some ways, Sekiro is a natural continuation of this trend toward aggression, but in others, it’s a complete U-turn. Bloodborne eschewed blocking and prioritized dodging as the quickest, most effective defensive option. Sekiro does exactly the opposite. Blocking is always your first choice, parrying is essential instead of largely optional, and dodging is near useless except in special cases. FromSoft spent five games teaching me my habits, and it was just too hard for me to break them for Sekiro.

I have other issues, too — health/damage upgrades are gated behind boss fights, so grinding is pointless; the setting and story lack some of the creativity of the game’s predecessors; there’s no variety of builds or playstyles — but the FromSoft magic is still there, too. Nothing can match the feeling of beating a Souls-series boss. And the addition of a grappling hook makes the verticality of Sekiro’s level design fascinating.

I dunno. I feel like there’s more here I’d enjoy, if I ever manage to push through the barriers. Maybe — as I finally did with the first Dark Souls, over a year after its release — someday I will.

8. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

In December, my wife and I traveled to Newport Beach for a family wedding, and we stayed an extra day to visit Disneyland. As an early birthday present, Aubrey bought me the experience of building a lightsaber in Galaxy’s Edge. And the experience is definitely what you’re paying for; the lightsaber itself is cool, but it’s cool because it’s made from parts I selected, with a blade color I chose, and I got to riff and banter with in-character park employees while doing it. (“Can you actually read those?” one asked me in an awed voice, when I selected a lightsaber hilt portion adorned with ancient Jedi runes. “Not yet,” I told her. “We’ll see if the Force can teach me.”)

Maybe it’s because I just had that experience, but by far my favorite moment in Jedi: Fallen Order is when main character Cal Kestis overcomes his own fears and memories to forge his own lightsaber, using a kyber crystal that calls to him personally. It’s maybe the only part of the game that made me feel like a Jedi, in a way the hours of Souls-inspired lightsaber slashing didn’t.

I think that’s telling. And I think it’s because so much of Fallen Order is derivative of other works, both in the current canon of gaming and of Star Wars. That’s not to say it’s bad — the mélange of Uncharted/Tomb Raider traversal, combat that evokes Souls and God of War, and vaguely Metroid-y power acquisition and exploration mostly works — but it’s just a titch less than the sum of those parts.

Similarly, as a Star Wars story, it feels under-baked. There’s potential in exploring the period immediately after Order 66 and the Jedi purge, but you only see glimpses of that. And I understand the difficulty of telling a story where the characters succeed but in a way that doesn’t affect established canon, but it still seemed like there were a couple of missed opportunities at touching base with the larger Star Wars universe. (And the one big reference that does pop up at the end feels forced and unrealistic.)

When I got home from California, I took my lightsaber apart just to see how it all worked. Outside of the hushed tones and glowing lights of Savi’s Workshop, it seems a little less special. It’s still really cool…but I sort of wish I had had a wider variety of parts to choose from. And that I had bought some of the other crystal colors. Just in case.

That’s how I feel about Jedi: Fallen Order. I had fun with it. But it’s easier now to see the parts for what they are.

7. Untitled Goose Game

Aubrey and I first saw this game at PAX, at a booth which charmingly recreated the garden of the game’s first level. We were instantly smitten, and as I’ve introduced it to family and friends, they’ve all had the same reaction. When we visited my brother’s family in Florida over the holidays, my eight-year-old niece and nephew peppered me with questions about some of the more complex puzzles. Even my father, whose gaming experience basically topped out at NES Open Tournament Golf in 1991, gave it a shot.

I’m not sure I have a lot more to say here, other than a few bullet points:

1) I love that Untitled Goose Game is completely nonviolent. It would’ve been easy to add a “peck” option as another gameplay verb, another means of mischief. (And, from what I understand, it would be entirely appropriate, given the aggression of actual geese.) That the developers resisted this is refreshing.

2) I’m glad a game this size can have such a wide reach, and that it doesn’t have to be a platform exclusive.

3) Honk.

6. Tetris 99

Despite the number of hours I’ve spent playing games, and the variety of genres that time has spanned, I’m not much for competitive gaming. This is partially because the competitive aspect of my personality has waned with age, and partially because I am extremely bad at most multiplayer games.

The one exception to this is Tetris.

I am a Tetris GOD.

Of course, that’s an incredible overstatement. Now that I’ve seen real Ecstasy of Order, Grandmaster-level Tetris players, I realize how mediocre I am. But in my real, actual life, I have never found anyone near my skill level. In high school, I would bring two Game Boys, two copies of Tetris, and a link cable on long bus rides to marching band competitions, hoping to find willing challengers. The Game Boys themselves became very popular. Playing me did not.

Prior to Tetris 99, the only version of the game that gave me any shred of humility in a competitive sense was Tetris DS, where Japanese players I found online routinely handed me my ass. I held my own, too, but that was the first time in my life when I wasn’t light-years beyond any opponent.

As time passed and internet gaming and culture became more accessible, I soon realized I was nowhere near the true best Tetris players in the world. Which was okay by me. I’m happy to be a big fish in a small pond, in pretty much all aspects of my life.

Tetris 99 has given me a perfectly sized pond. I feel like I’m a favorite to win every round I play, and I usually finish in the top 10 or higher. But it’s also always a challenge, because there’s just enough metagame to navigate. Have I targeted the right enemies? Do I have enough badges to make my Tetrises hit harder? Can I stay below the radar for long enough? These aspects go beyond and combine with the fundamental piece-dropping in a way I absolutely love.

The one thing I haven’t done yet is win an Invictus match (a mode reserved only for those who have won a standard 99-player match). But it’s only a matter of time.  

5. Pokemon Sword/Shield

I don’t think I’ve played a Pokemon game through to completion since the originals. I always buy them, but I always seem to lose steam halfway through. But I finished Shield over the holidays, and I had a blast doing it.

Because I’m a mostly casual Pokeplayer, the decision to not include every ‘mon in series history didn’t bother me at all. I really enjoyed learning about new Pokemon and forcing myself to try moving away from my usual standards. (Although I did still use a Gyarados in my final team.)

As a fan of English soccer, the stadium-centric, British-flavored setting also contributed to my desire to see the game through. Changing into my uniform and walking onto a huge, grassy pitch, with tens of thousands of cheering fans looking on, really did give me a different feeling than battles in past games, which always seemed to be in weird, isolated settings.

I’m not sure I’ll push too far into the postgame; I’ve never felt the need to catch ‘em all. But I had a great time with the ones I caught.

4. The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening

I have a strange relationship with the Zelda series, especially now. They are my wife’s favorite games of all time. But I don’t know if I’ve ever actually sat down and beaten one since the original Link’s Awakening. Even with Breath of the Wild, which I adore, I was content to watch Aubrey do the heavy lifting. I know the series well, I’ve played bits of all of them, but most haven’t stuck with me.

Link’s Awakening has. I wrote a piece once about its existential storytelling and how it affected me as a child. I love the way the graphics in this remake preserve that dreamlike quality. It’s pretty much a re-skin of the original game, but the cutesy, toy-set aesthetic pairs well with the heavy material. If this is all a dream, whose dream is it? And when we wake up, what happens to it?

Truthfully, some of the puzzles and design decisions haven’t held up super well. Despite the fresh coat of paint, it definitely feels like a 25-year-old game. But I’m so glad this version exists.

Oh, and that solo clarinet in the Mabe Village theme? *Chef’s kiss*

3. Control

I actually haven’t seen a lot of the influences Control wears on its sleeve. I’ve never gone completely through all the episodes of the X-Files, Fringe, and Twin Peaks; I’m only vaguely familiar with the series of “creepypasta” fiction called SCP Foundation; and I have never endeavored to sit through a broadcast of Coast to Coast AM. I’m also unfamiliar with Remedy’s best-known work in the genre, Alan Wake. But I know enough about all those works to be able to identify their inspiration on the Federal Bureau of Control, Jesse Faden, and the Oldest House.

Control is an interesting game to recommend (which I do), because I’m not sure how much I really enjoyed its combat. For most of the game, it’s a pretty standard third-person shooter. You can’t snap to cover, which indicates you’re intended to stay on the move. This becomes even more obvious when you gain the ability to air dash and fly. But you do need to use cover, because Jesse doesn’t have much health even at the end of the game. So combat encounters can get out of hand quickly, and there’s little incentive to keep fighting enemies in the late game. Yet they respawn at a frustratingly frequent rate. The game’s checkpointing system compounds this — you only respawn at “control points,” which act like Souls-style bonfires. This leads to some unfortunately tedious runbacks after boss fights.

On the other hand, Jesse’s telekinesis power always feels fantastic, and varying your attacks between gunshots, thrown objects, melee, and mind controlling enemies can be frenetic fun. That all comes to a head in the game’s combat (and perhaps aesthetic?) high point, the Ashtray Maze. To say more would be doing a disservice. It’s awesome.

The rest of the gameplay is awesome, too — and I do call it “gameplay,” though unfortunately you don’t have many options for affecting the world beyond violence. The act of exploring the Oldest House and scouring it for bureaucratic case files, audio recordings, and those unbelievably creepy “Threshold Kids” videos is pure joy. The way the case files are redacted leaves just enough to the imagination, and the idea of a federal facility being built on top of and absorbed into a sort of nexus of interdimensional weirdness is perfectly executed. And what’s up with that motel? And the alien, all-seeing, vaguely sinister Board? So cool.

With such great worldbuilding, I did wish for a little more player agency. There are no real dialogue choices — no way to imbue Jesse with any character traits beyond what’s pre-written for her — and only one ending. This kind of unchecked weird science is the perfect environment for forcing the player into difficult decisions (what do we study? How far is too far? How do we keep it all secret?), and that just isn’t part of the game at all. Which is fine — Control isn’t quite an immersive sim like Prey, and it’s not trying to be. I just see some similarities and potential, and I wish they had been explored a little.

But Control’s still a fantastic experience, and in any other year, it probably would’ve been my number one pick. That’s how good these next two games are.

2. Outer Wilds

Honestly, this is the best game of 2019. But I’m not listing it as number one because I didn’t play most of it — Aubrey did. Usually we play everything together; even if we’re not passing a controller back and forth, one of us will watch while the other one plays. And that definitely happened for a large chunk of Outer Wilds. But Aubrey did make some key discoveries while I was otherwise occupied, so while I think it’s probably the best game, it’s not the one I personally spent the most time with.

The time I did spend, though? Wow. From the moment you wake up at the campfire and set off in search of your spaceship launch codes, it’s clear that this is a game that revels in discovery. Discovery for its own sake, for the furthering of knowledge, for the protection of others, for the sheer fun of it. Some games actively discourage players from asking the question, “Hey, what’s that over there?” Outer Wilds begs you to ask it, and then rewards you not with treasure or statistical growth, but with the opportunity to ask again, about something even more wondrous and significant.

There are so many memorable moments of discovery in this game. The discovery that, hey, does that sun look redder to you than it used to? The discovery that, whoa, why did I wake up where I started after seemingly dying in space? Your first trip through a black hole. Your first trip to the quantum moon. Your first trip to the weird, bigger-on-the-inside fog-filled heart of a certain dark, brambly place. (Aubrey won’t forget that any time soon.)

They take effort, those moments. They do have to be earned, and it isn’t easy. Your spaceship flies like it looks: sketchy, taped together, powered by ingenuity and, like, marshmallows, probably. Some of the leaps you have to make — both of intuition and of jetpack — are a little too far. (We weren’t too proud to look up a couple hints when we were truly stuck.) But in the tradition of the best adventure games (which is what this is, at heart), you have everything you need right from the beginning. All you have to do is gather the knowledge to understand it and put it into action.

And beyond those moments of logical and graphical discovery, there’s real emotion and pathos, too. As you explore the remnants of the lost civilization that preceded yours, your only method of communication is reading their writing. And as you do, you start to get a picture of them not just as individuals (who fight, flirt, and work together to help each other), but as a species whose boundless thirst for discovery was their greatest asset, highest priority, undoing, and salvation, all at once.

I don’t think I can say much more without delving into spoilers, or retreading ground others have covered. (Go read Austin Walker’s beautiful and insightful review for more.) It’s an incredible game, and one everyone with even a passing interest in the medium should try.

(Last thing: Yes, I manually flew to the Sun Station and got inside. No, I don’t recommend it.)

1. Fire Emblem: Three Houses

If I hadn’t just started a replay of this game, I don’t think I’d be listing it in the number one slot. I started a replay because I showed it to my brother when we visited him in Florida last month, and immediately, all the old feelings came flooding back. I needed another hit.

No game this year has been as compelling for me. That’s an overused word in entertainment criticism, but I mean it literally: There have been nights where I absolutely HAVE to keep playing (much to Aubrey’s dismay). One more week of in-game time. One more study session to raise a skill rank. One more meal together so I can recruit another student. One more battle. Just a little longer.

I’m not sure I can put my finger on the source of that compulsion. Part of it is the excellence of craftsmanship on display; if any technical or creative aspect of Three Houses was less polished than it is, I probably wouldn’t feel so drawn to it. But the two big answers, I think, are the characters and their growth, both mechanically and narratively.

At the start of the game, you pick one of the titular three houses to oversee as professor. While this choice defines who you’ll have in your starting party, that can be mitigated later, as almost every other student from the other two houses can be recruited to join yours. What you’re really choosing is which perspective you’ll see the events of the story from, and through whose eyes: Edelgard of the Black Eagles, Dimitri of the Blue Lions, or Claude of the Golden Deer. (This is also why the game almost demands at least three playthroughs.)

These three narratives are deftly written so you simultaneously feel like you made the only possible canonical choice, while also sowing questions into your decision-making. Edelgard’s furious desire for change is just but perhaps not justifiable; Dimitri hides an obsession with revenge behind a façade of noblesse oblige; Claude is more conniving and pragmatic than he lets on. No matter who you side with, you’ll eventually have to face the others. And everyone can make a case that they, not you, are on the right side.

This is especially effective because almost every character in Three Houses is dealing with a legacy of war and violence. A big theme of the game’s story is how those experiences inform and influence the actions of the victims. What steps are justified to counteract such suffering? How do you break the cycle if you can’t break the power structures that perpetuate it? How do good people end up fighting for bad causes?

While you and your child soldiers (yeah, you do kind of have to just skip over that part; they’re in their late teens, at least? Still not good enough, but could be worse?) are grappling with these questions, they’re also growing in combat strength, at your direction. This is the part that really grabbed me and my lizard brain — watching those numbers get bigger was unbelievably gratifying. Each character class has certain skill requirement prerequisites, and as professor, you get to define how your students meet those requirements, and which they focus on. Each student has certain innate skills, but they also have hidden interests that only come to the surface with guidance. A character who seems a shoo-in to serve as a white mage might secretly make an incredibly effective knight; someone who seems destined for a life as a swordsman suddenly shows a talent for black magic. You can lean into their predilections, or go against them, with almost equal efficacy.

For me, this was the best part of Three Houses, and the part that kept me up long after my wife had gone to bed. Planning a student’s final battle role takes far-seeing planning and preparation, and each step along the way felt thrilling. How can you not forge a connection with characters you’ve taken such pains to help along the way? How can you not explode with joy when they reach their goals?

That’s the real draw of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, I think: the joy of seeing people you care about grow, while simultaneously confronting those you once cared about, but who followed another path. No wonder I wanted to start another playthrough. I think I’ll be starting them all over again for a long time.

[kapanbenernya]

Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide 2 -- Extreme Rat Extermination Service

So not long ago, my friend told me about another game on steam that he wanted me to check out. The game in question was Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide 2. He said it’s some kind of four player co-op game like Left 4 Dead 2. Actually he needn’t explain the game to me because I actually owned Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide, the game that came before this one. I remembered buying it years ago and unable to actually play it until years later because my PC and my internet could not support the game. Actually now that I think about it, I still never get to really play it because nobody is still interested in the game. You know what? Let’s forget everything I said about it and refocus on Vermin 2.

Yeah, I’m just gonna call it Vermin 2, the full game’s name is too fucking long

In Vermin 2, you are some guy/elf/dwarf living in some Victorian Era London type of world fighting giant rats and buff white dudes. This very basic and very unrepresentative description of the world and the lore of the game might just net me an invitation to the chopping block by the Warhammer fanboys, but I don’t care. Look, it’s a Warhammer lore okay, so cheat-sheet's probably there’s a god or some gods with their respective cults and war happens, hopefully involving hammers. Here’s what I can gather from the prologue: a rat guy and some lovechild between a viking and an orc wants to open a portal to somewhere not good, and our heroes must stop them. 

Warriors from the northern region with horned helmets? Wonder where the inspiration came from

Our heroes are a ragtag band of five people which includes a soldier with kickass facial hair, a religious nutter, a fire witch, a scottish elf-woman, and discount Gimli. The gang was formed in the events of the first game which I have absolutely no idea how it happened because I didn’t play it, and I have no intention of checking the lore. I mean have you SEEN the lore? If you can be bothered to check, it’s actually rich and ornate, with multiple race and languages. That’s why I will never touch it without a 10-foot barge pole; I still aspire to have a decent sex life someday. 

But I’m getting sidetracked, so here’s how the number of heroes will affect the gameplay

The hero you choose will define your play-style. Or to be more exact, the play-style you prefer will mostly dictate which hero you will find enjoyable. You wanna be a quick whoosh whoosh DPS? Go for the elf. You wanna be a stone-wall tank? Go check out the shield-bearing duo: the soldier and the dwarf. You wanna be kinda useful and kinda useless at the same time? Go for the character that looks like he’s from Bloodborne. Interested in being the prick that fills everyone’s screen with bullshit? The fire witch’s your lady, matey. But that’s not all the depth that comes from choosing a hero. You got 3 class for each hero, each offers different passive buffs and hero skill. Don’t think you can try them all instantly though, the game’s gonna make you work for it. You will have to unlock the classes by leveling up with the first class already unlocked from the get-go. 

I mean if they didn’t do that, I’d be able to make a joke about being in a classless society etc etc.

After you’ve chosen how highly you are ranked above the local commoner, in comes the weapons. Your main bread and butter is the melee weapon. Of course there’s the good old stereotype on the weapon variety: fast but weak, strong but slow, and medium but medium. The only ones that are a bit different than the rest are the weapons that’s paired with shields, which allows you to block more incoming attacks from enemies before getting your guard broken. Okay, let’s see the variety of shield weapons available: fast but weak, strong but-oh bother, it’s just the fucking same. Mind you, these weapons are not shared among heroes, for each weapon are exclusive to one hero and one hero only. So don’t think you can cheat the game by giving the whoosh whoosh elf a goddamn mace and shield. 

But as the old adage goes: “man cannot survive on bread, rats, and buff dudes alone”, so here comes some tasty peanut butter spread to save us from blandness in the form of ranged weapons. As with the melee weapons there are also varieties of different types of ranged weapon for each hero and class, and also like melee weapons, exclusive to each hero. Now, don’t expect to me explain the uniqueness of each weapon type and/or combinations, because that shit’s up to you to try and decide which one’s up your alley. 

With those weapons explained, care for a little test drive on rats and buff dudes?

Believe me when I say there are a lot of enemy variations in this game. First off, there’s two factions of enemies going hand in hand to knock the living shit out of your party: the Skaven and the Chaos Army. Although for simplicity matters, I preferred calling them rats and buff dudes respectively, simply because that’s what they are. To start, you’ve got the mob enemies. They’re weak, plentiful, bland, and makes up for 90% of the enemy. And then there’s the elite enemies. They are enemies that have different behavior and approach towards your party. There are ones that disables a player, the ones that punishes loners and drags them away from the party, area denial, the big tanky mini-boss, and so on. These elite enemies are unique in design and therefore can be easily distinguished from the mob by audio cues and vision, especially after the in-game characters shouted callouts before the enemy can even be seen anywhere in this plane of existence. But the one thing I find curious is that design-wise and gameplay-wise, I find that the elite rat enemies are more interesting than the elite buff dudes. I mean you got the sneaky rat and the hooker rat that makes you stick together, the gas rat and fire rat that pushes you away from a beloved choke point, and gatling rat that’s 100% bullshit. But the elite buff dudes are just variations of even buffer dudes that charge in blindly with the mob with roughly the same results or fat dudes with magic hurricanes that’s just here to fuck your shit up, fam.

I gotta admit, still hilarious when it happens to everyone except you

Well, what else can I say about the game?

It’s your standard co-op four player PvE combat goddammit, what else do you wanna know? You grab your friends, choose your weapons, pick a map, and slay some rats. Simple, true and tried ever since the old age of beat em’ up games to the crowned exemplar of the 4 player co-op FPS genre: the Left 4 Dead series. But as of writing the previous sentence, why do I suddenly think that If I was given a choice to play Left 4 Dead or Vermin 2, I'd prefer Left 4 Dead? I mean they were basically the same: traverse map towards the objective, enemy mobs spawning at the worst possible timing, and stupid stupid teammates that just gotta fuck shit up right before the level exit.  After taking my time to reflect on both games, I think I kinda know why. I think it’s because some of Vermin 2′s elements is pretty fucking shit.

You see, the enjoyment of the game doesn’t stem from the gameplay alone.It’s also affected by the amount of bullshit you gotta go through to actually experience the gameplay. And with vermin 2, the bullshit comes from having to struggle with the bad netcode. My playtime was 23 hours, and I’m quite sure the amount of time I spent waiting for my friend to be able to connect to my lobby is about a third of that. No joke, you know the worst record? 30 minutes. And even after the four of us can connect, it’s everybody’s guess whether or not we’re still gonna be a four man party after the level or someone’s gonna get dropped from the lobby for no particular reason. And what happens when someone or everyone got dropped? That’s right! Restart the fucking lobby! 

And by restart the fucking lobby, I mean more gambling whether or not the fucking thing’s gonna connect again.

Another lesser complaint I got is the weapon power system. Unlike L4D which just plops you the same weapon on every campaign, in Vermin 2 you gotta find your own weapons via lootbox that you get by completing campaigns or challenges. Thing is, the weapon power you can get from the lootbox is capped based on the difficulty that you play. So get this, you start out with bad default weapons which will result in you getting beaten to mulch which motivates you to get better and better weapons until you hit the cap. What’s next? You have to move on to the harder difficulty with your capped weapons, which will result in you getting mulched again. So there you go, trapped in a cycle of mulch-ification towards better weapons. The small number of maps available didn’t help either. Only 13 maps in total, compared to 12 maps in L4D and L4D2.

13 is less than 12? This guy’s off his rockers

Yeah, yeah, dodgy mathematics aside, do remember that every map from L4D is divided into 4/5 segments each. That adds up into around 48/60 maps total, and I needn’t elaborate further to show you that 48 is bigger than 13. That’s not taking into account the numbers of custom maps readily available. Yeah, who’s the brainlet now, bozo? And I swear, the quick play is deliberately messing with my party. Somehow we always end up on the map where we gotta pop some pimples in a cave. If not that, the one where we gotta connect the lines on some temple. I swear to God, small map pool or not, this is ridiculous. It’s like this map tosses off the map RNG every once in a while so it gets chosen.

Now, if you’re a smarter person, you’d have followed the dotted lines all by yourself and successfully deducted the 20 car pile-up all these problems caused. But since unlike me and my big smarty brain, you didn’t know that 13 is less than 12, I fucking doubt it. Here let me explain to you and your slowy slowy boo boo brain.

visual pun, ladies and gentlemen

That’s right, 13 maps, 4 difficulty, and there you go on the mulch-ification cycle.  Hope you don’t get bored of running the same levels again and again before reaching the higher difficulty. I know I sure did.

In Brief

After all the spanking I gave the game in the last paragraphs, it’s still fun, and it’s still a good alternative for L4D. Especially more so if you like L4D, but you’d like it more if it was melee-focused, class-based, grindy, and all-around dodgier. It’s kind of a shame really, because I can see that this game had potential to be better, but in the end it just got tossed aside with the remark “like L4D, but made by somewhat incompetent spods”. All because while the core gameplay is very much fun and functional, the elements that support it ends up being a hindrance, not unlike a brake on a car that could go off randomly. This game kinda proves that you can make a gold bar shaped like the world’s sexiest pair of titties, but bury it in deep enough bullshit and people are going to stop giving a shit, mainly because you already had shit deep enough to fertilize the Sahara desert.

P.S.

I am very much aware that the connection problem might stem from me and my friends’ own internet connection, but I did rule it out because L4D works like magic in comparison, and this proves that SOMETHING had to be wrong with the game to cause all the connectivity problems.

27/8/2018

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The clones and videogames.

So there is a lot here! More under the keep reading cut! :)

·         Fives; He is pretty dam good at them. He has spent far too many hours gaming. On shore leave it’s all he does. Plays video games in his underwear for a minimum of 6 hours a day whilst on shore leave. Please don’t challenge him you will lose. He’s the type of person that has memorised Mortal Kombat finishers, looks at you whilst punching the combo in before smirking and muttering the word “Fatality” and watching the life drain from Echo’s eyes as he realises, Fives has just beaten him for the 40th time today. He’s really good at them, possibly the best in the 501st at any game. Doesn’t matter if it’s a first a person shooter, a fighting or a RPG he’s great at it. He loves Mortal Kombat, it’s his go to game. Rex comments on how he’s confused at how Fives can gracefully and quickly enter a combo but cannot gracefully throw a punch.

·         Echo; He likes video games, wouldn’t say he was into them as much as Fives but he likes them. They keep him occupied and he does like to be kept busy. He isn’t as good as them as Fives but can easily beat Rex and Kix at something like Tekken. He’s really bad at online Shooters like Halo and Call of Duty. He’s good in war but he’s terrible at shooters online. He does like his RPGS, Dragon Quest definitely is his jam.  Sentinel of the starry skies is probably one of his favourite games of all times. It’s old he knows but he could still sit and play it till 3 in the morning. He’s really into Witcher and Skyrim, really long-winded games that have a lot of lore and a lot of story. He’s such a whore for lore and story in games.  Him and Fives can get really competitive. It usually ends with Echo regretting getting competitive as Fives can and will beat him. The one time Echo beat Fives was at Soul Calibur by button mashing and when Fives was playing as Voldo.

·         Hardcase; He loses the spur to carry on playing, his attention span will not let him play a long-winded game, unless the story is really good he’s not invested and will get really bored easily. He’s okay at multiplayer games, but he really isn’t the best. He likes games with colour and excitement that are fast paced. He is a pro at Mario Kart, but only on Rainbow road? Like everyone else is falling off the map but he’s like beating everyone. He’ll only play after a few drinks or when everyone else is playing. He once let go of a pad and it hit Echo in the face. He said he was sorry but he still laughed. Also, he can actually use Voldo on Soul Calibur really well, like everyone is confused but he just seems to be able to use him.

·         Jesse; He sucks at video games but he is a pro at one thing. Trolling. He’s a troll on multiplayer games and online. Once when on Monster Hunter, he shot a health ammo at a Jho and healed it because he thought it would be HILARIOUS. Echo’s eye twitched, Kix wanted to cry and Fives was heard screaming from the living room. He and Hardcase eventually just try to outdo each other on the annoying front. He sucks at them and instead opts to just be a massive pain in the arse. It starts off funny but then just ends up annoying Fives. He’s a camper. He lives to be irritating to make up for his lack of skill.

·         Kix; He never takes a day off from being a medic. This guy is a healer. On something like Overwatch he’s a Mercy main… when he’s on a team of ungratefuls who spam “I need healing” when they don’t or just don’t stay on the Payload and then complain that he didn’t heal them when they were on the other end of the map; he’ll switch to Moira and become a salty piece of shit. He’ll just mutter under his breath “Oh you need healing? Well tough shit should have stopped me from dying last round” SALTY. Echo and Fives always upvote him… not because of skill, but because if they don’t he’ll be even pettier next match.

·         Rex; He says he doesn’t have time and doesn’t like to play them. But secretly he loves playing them. He wouldn’t do it often by himself but with the others he gets really into it. He always aims to get on Five’s team. Why? Because Rex is competitive AF and doesn’t like to lose and Fives happens to be a king. He can’t drive so he sucks at Mario Kart but laughs about it. Usually plays it when a lil drunk so that explains why he’s laughing at losing. He once invited around members of Ghost and the Generals and they all got SLAUGHTERED. They put Hardcase (Who is the worst at it) on Dark souls and played the drinking game of it. Had to stop after 10 minutes. Rex is actually really good at Halo. Fives and he annihilate everyone else in it. Not graceful winners at all. Will rub it in your face.

·         Tup; Yeah, he doesn’t really like Videogames. He does play the Sims though. Why? Because a man needs a hobby, and if he wants to build extravagant houses he knows he’ll deffo not own after the war he can do! He made a house with Torrent in it. Fives was so happy with how his character looked… Tup accidentally killed him by letting him eat from the Jelly Bean tree… so now he’s just a ghost haunting everyone with his presence and keeping everyone awake at night by screaming. He’s still not told Fives and insists he’s away on dates and that’s why he’s not in the house. He’s actually envious his sim just gets to draw all day and gets paid for it. Lucky bastard.

·         Cody; He doesn’t do videogames. Except strategy games, stuff like Command and Conquer. He doesn’t let Kenobi know he plays them. Claims he’s working on strategies… which he sort of is. He’s really good at the Soul series and Bloodborne. Like he’s exceptionally good at them. He dies the least on them out of everybody. Watching him go through the game is like watching Bambi on a minefield. He garners quiet a crowd when playing it. Drinks are promised if he can beat Ornstein and Smough without dying. He tells Rex to make it a double before landing the finishing blow.

·         Wolffe; He hates playing videogames and finds them a waste of time… he’s just saying that because he sucks at them and that’s his cover. He doesn’t like losing and doesn’t want to risk losing to a shiny. He just doesn’t understand the appeal to them. He does play a little bit of a Skyrim though now and again. He totally did the companion quest line first and is totally still a werewolf. When the Wolf pack started playing Pokemon go his face was just a constant unimpressed glare. “Are you taking a photo of me?” “No there’s just a Haunter near you” He has no idea what that is and actually turns to see what’s near him. He just doesn’t understand. In a Games tournament to decide which Battalion is the best and a pointless and waste of time skill, he’d go with Sinker to try and save their pride… Fives is the reigning champion.