#that’s usually how fromsoft fights are

[wyllaztopia]

My question is: let's imagine that Nightmare had a childhood friend, his one and only childhood friend, and that she was a little girl who liked to fight to protect him and who literally had scars because of that because she literally fought every day to defend him, let's imagine that she survived the "incident", After the corruption of Nightmare how would he be with her? Would he be distant because he doesn't want to remember his past and the fact that he needed someone to defend himself, would he be tsundere with her or would he have a soft spot? Because I mean, his brother did not protect Nightmare because he was not aware of the others who harassed him, but she was the only one who had protected him, in part in any case. sooo.. would he be able to hurt her as much as he would be able to hurt Dream? After all, it's not as if she had protected Nightmare from absolutely everything, because as you said, it's not the only reason why Nightmare became corrupt and there were many others who added up.

ʕ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ (i love that enoji-)

I really love your version of Dreamtale! Joku doesn't give any more news so I have trouble orienting myself with Dreamtale’s story, but you show a whole new vision of things with Soulsborne! The philosophy you gave to Nightmare is much more complex than that of the original but I really hope that Joku will develop Dreamtale in the future! And we're counting on you for Soulsborne and his development 🫵🏼

thank you for such kind words omg this version of dreamtale literally came to mind when me and @neotxnic were reading the original dreamtale comic after we had a session of elden ring - it was also around the time i was delving deep into the dark souls trilogy lore. i wanted to add more depth and tone to the world of dreamtale and fromsoft games have really good story telling and lore so i wanted that to reflect on our revision of the story. note that i'm not trying to compete with joku and the original dreamtale. i think the original is good as is and very fun + heartfelt to read. on anotherrrr note - this will be a really long response to the initial question so buckle up because i will lore dump.

For this specific scenario, I won't make this character's insertion into the lore canon yet - I actually want you lot to share your opinions on the addition of Nightmare having a childhood friend.

-

Nightmare and Dream were both born from the roots of Motus Arbor (the Tree of Feelings, the very being of Nim or what's left of her). The two of them are task to guard the tree - Dream guarding the negative apples and Nightmare guarding the positive ones.

Dream sought out to the people, he believes that through guarding the tree, he also has to guard the feelings of others. Thus, he often travels around the kingdom where he does his best to help his people have a brighter day.

Meanwhile, Nightmare keeps to himself and guards the tree while Dream focuses on their people to keep their emotions stable. He usually sits by the bed of motus arbor and reads books under its huge shade.

Because of Nightmare guarding the positive apples and the stereotype people have formed of him being the guardian of negativity (despite Dream's attempts to let people know that Nightmare isn't a bad person), many other kids would go behind Dream's back to harass Nightmare and accuse him of taking advantage of the positive apples.

This happens often but Nightmare never paid mind to these claims or mistreatment. Because of his pessimism being influenced by the positive apples that he guards, he's more of a realist (pessimism-leaning) - and so he doesn't see much value in the bullying.

However, a young girl around his age would stand up against the bullies, speaking up about their prejudice and unfair treatment. She called them out about how their judgement held no merit because they didn't know Nightmare personally, what right did they have to come to such conclusions about a person?

As the kids went away, Nightmare told her that there was no need for her to stand up for him since he wasn't affected by the mistreatment. He was perfectly fine simply ignoring the flock. She shook her head at his statement,

She told him her belief that passiveness won't progress society to a better environment. If we simply ignore the bad, does that make us good? Does that stop the evil? Does that stop the dishonesty? How will a wrong become a right if nothing is done for it to be so?

This philosophy was quickly dismissed by Nightmare; "Fighting fire with fire never bears any good fruit."

Despite their opposing ideals, this girl would pursue a friendship with the dark prince. She was true to herself despite how different their worldviews are but somehow, some of their morals were seen to overlap - such as their respect for intellect and honesty. The two both found enjoyment in books and being less social. It was a blissful friendship where they didn't feel the need to be someone else and the other was perfectly fine with it.

However, the conflict between Dream and Nightmare happened. Nightmare saw that Dream was being mistreated by the other kids, that they were abusing his kindness - and he hid his feelings from his very own brother, Nightmare. The guardian of negativity slowly realized that Dream's ignorance and selflessness - whilst spreading happiness… it was happiness given the wrong way. It was a clear imbalance.

And for the first time, he'd heed his friend's words: something had to be done. - and as for how nightmare would treat this friend of his in the present time? well, he holds no attachments. he had already stripped himself for any positive feelings towards anyone - including the very friend that pioneered his current ideals. however, deep down, he respects her integrity - a thought lingers within him that she'd understand his plans if one day she were to find out. however, if he finds reason to, he'll kill her with his own hands.

[gae-bolg-alternative-dot-exe]

Hi random ask out of the blue. I'm running a ttrpg campaign that has every party member but the rogue deciding to wear battle lingerie. All the players are incredibly serious about their roles and I don't think I've ever had to dm over such strong characters (players are still very funny and friendly). Maybe it's because I haven't explored many stories involving girls in bikini armor/robes but I can't help not taking them seriously ;n;. I ask you because you seem very chill and casual about liking skin revealing characters but how would you overcome this perception of mine? I want to get into character just like they are 😤

I don't know the context of your story or your way of doing world building within your campaign but I almost feel like you already have the solution to your own question. You said the players all have very strong characters and are all very serious in their roleplaying. Idk if your familiar with fromsoft soulsborne games but there are times when other players decide to invade your game and one of the biggest indications at least for me to when I know I'm absolutely fucked is when the player invading me is naked or has an usual armor piece. There is nothing more intimidating than knowing this player doesn't need armor to kill me because I'm going to get skilled checked. Your half naked players may be silly from your prospective as dm but to the fictional creatures they are fighting, I imagine that squad must be terrifying once the heads start rolling.

It's fine to think battle lingerie is silly and idk you have it effect stats at all or is just for aesthetics. Your players or their characters could simply be perverts for all I know but maybe there is a social understanding in your world that if one don's the battle lingerie, it signifies the utmost confidence in strength and skill. You don't want to mess with that person. There is a really popular artwork on here with a naked warrior woman with just a knife saying "come at me bro" to a guy in fullplate.

You can also just have fun with it because as long as your players are having fun and they're invested with your storytelling. What they decide to wear shouldn't matter.

My real advice would be to convince your rogue to join the team aesthetic cohesion. It's always the rogue smh.

[zealsoughtsequesterustanxiedemon]

Shadow of Erdtree Spoilers regarding Miquella

I haven't posted a lot of my thoughts regarding the DLC, but overall I really liked it. However, it did have a disappointment for me. I really wanted something more out of Miquella's story. Don't get me wrong, what we got works well as a story, it was just kind of expected? Oh this mysterious character we never get to see who is associated with great kindness AND mind control, I wonder how their story is going to end once it gets focus...

Fromsoft's usual suite of characters include a bunch of charaters that are either good-natured but meet a tragic end OR are developed to be much more morally grey with a sinister nature inside or surrounding their story. However, there are the rare charachters that escape the tragedy. Characters who are either 100% unquestioningly on your side, with the occasional one who's good to you as long as you're good to them/seeking the "good" ending. These usually take the form of the level-up maidens, but in general they are women. All of this isn't objective (I haven't even played all the souls games, missing out on DeS and DS2), but the main point I'm trying to make is that there is typically a friendly female npc who stands out and feels particularly benevolent.

Sekiro was refreshing with having this character, Kuro, be a boy instead. Elden Ring's level-up maiden, Melina, although crucial to the plot takes more of a step back outside of exposition and a few big plot moments (including not trying to have you fuck up). She unfortunately must be sacrificed (unless you betray her and then cleanse yourself of the frenzied flame to do one of the other endings). So the closest thing to this type of character feels like Ranni, although she's a ends-justify-the-means type of gal and has her trust issues, you do get to talk to her a decent amount, you get to marry her, and you have those ending with her which feels pretty hopeful all things considered.

Ranni definitely felt like a new direction for a Fromsoft game and so I was hoping Miquella's story would be taking points from both her and Kuro, into exploring a new kind of "maiden" in this dlc. Unfortunately, we have really no interaction with him besides reading the notes he left behind. Miquella's actual screen time is wholly within the final boss fight and the surrounding cutscenes. That alone disappointed me a good amount. Like the type of story they went with would have actually worked A LOT stronger if we had that interaction. At least the fight would've hurt more.

It's something where we didn't get what I hoped the most for and I didn't get what would've made what we got interesting or impactful for me. Again, I liked the DLC and I think this story beat still functions for this character, it was just a little underwhelming, especially compared to the rest of Elden Rings major story paths and questlines.

[ambrosearietes]

We (and by that I mean myself) demand more headcanons cuz they go hard asf😈

i have so many i’m gonna break these up by character. i will only do like the major ones. these are not all my headcanons just my big ones.

ADAM

despite living in slavic countries for most of his life, adam speaks english with a british accent because he learned it from anthony. he can also do a perfect american accent because he played WAAAAAAAYYYYYY too much fallout

adam is autistic (this one actually is canon, i mean come On dude) but also has ADHD and C-PTSD

scrawny because he was malnourished during his time as d-class. very insecure about it.

he and sylvester sloan know each other through anthony. i mentioned that sloan babysat adam occasionally, i was completely serious. he let adam watch star wars and adam literally wanted to BE luke skywalker.

yeah luke was his gender awakening

uses she/her to refer to his younger self from before anthony saved him as a coping mechanism— in reality he’s trying to deny that it even happened to him in the first place.

smokes weed when the team is off. calvin does not approve.

marries harvey in every stardew valley playthrough.

romances halsin in baldur’s gate 3.

cracked at fromsoft games.

CALVIN

bisexual, he just doesn’t realize it.

calvin is a gamer. he had adam build him a setup. they play together. adam beats his fucking ass in everything and makes fun of him for it.

really, really bad habit of bottling his emotions (which is why olivia keeps dumping him)

was ~19 when he got arrested for the stuff hyun-ki mentioned. vehicular manslaughter while driving under the influence is considered a felony charge.

grew up in the midwest. talks like a midwestern dad.

his aunt owns a horse ranch. calvin REALLY likes horses as a result.

he once promised adam to take him to meet his horse and teach him to ride after everything. poor guys :(

he and aaron would have had a father-son relationship.

he was a very “difficult” child due to him not being believed about his mother’s death. he had no idea how to cope with it. often got into fights, which is why his aunt ended up sending him to boarding school. she got a lot of calls even when he was there because calvin just. got into a fuckton of fights.

he didn’t go to therapy until the insurgency MADE HIM go to therapy.

legally can’t drive. doesn’t give a fuck.

he would occasionally let adam just lay on top of him like a cat. he thought it was platonic. like just guys being dudes.

would be a good father.

if he saw his dad again he’d shoot the guy without any hesitation.

blames the foundation’s negligence for his mom’s death.

likes planes a lot.

OLIVIA

sees adam as her little brother. they’re extremely close by O5-3’s chapter. she’s rather protective and very quick to defend him.

adam taught her to play dungeons and dragons and gives her book recommendations. she plays a halfling life-domain cleric/college of swords bard (multiclassing)

loves mystery novels.

adam introduced her to stardew valley. she usually marries leah.

bisexual. does not know this.

easily frustrated with calvin because calvin is terrible at communicating his feelings. calvin is trying to work on this. it’s going terribly. despite this, calvin is very affectionate with her and she does how open he is with that.

very relationship-centric person. this is mostly because she didn’t get much characterization in twie.

keeps a sketchbook. mostly doodles flowers.

her and sophia would have gotten along amazingly.

likes to dabble in poetry.

would romance wyll in bg3

huge fan of law and order. adam questions her taste in television shows.

if she had procreate she’d be fucking unstoppable.

i don’t have much on her bc characterization is so lacking :((

would have gladly taken sam (O5-11) with her back to the insurgency. deeply regrets that she didn’t. she thinks about sam a LOT, it genuinely haunts her. like she will try to sleep and she’ll just hear that gunshot and want to throw up.

VINCENT ARIANS / ANTHONY WRIGHT

i don’t remember if i mentioned this in the last post but vincent is a cat person. had a cat named mira. she was a calico.

insomniac.

in his ‘ideal world’ he would have lived with aaron and been able to raise adam.

very, very envious of people with ‘normal lives’.

we don’t know much about what vincent did in the foundation— the dialogue from O5-13 at the end of the children matches up with what he tells aaron in the apartment scene so i assume vincent was felix’s predecessor and felix held another number. as for what he did, we do know he was, like, an ACTUAL engineer who designed bombs at some point (stated in O5-5’s chapter); he could have been in charge of security.

it’s implied he had a second-in-command type position under aaron and likely was on the first delta command before his first ‘disappearance’, unless he wrote the summa modus operandi then just vanished off the face of the fucking earth for a while.

records of vincent are next to impossible to find within the insurgency as he worked so closely with the engineer and they don’t even know who the engineer was.

aaron thought vincent was dead until he received reports of anthony wright working with calvin.

anthony and sloan were good friends and out of all members of delta command during the way it ends, he respected sloan the most. anthony would have considered an actual relationship with him if he wasn’t like “no, i’m probably gonna disappear again or just straight up die soon anyway.” anthony was right, he did in fact die.

sloan knew who vincent arians was, he just had no idea that anthony and vincent were the same person.

genuinely, anthony wanted to die.

adam gave him a reason to live outside of vengeance.

GENUINELY sees adam as his son. he’s a bit harsh on him during TWIE because he never wanted adam in the insurgency at all. he and adam had a conversation at some point where anthony expressed this and told adam he wished the latter just went to a good college and worked in programming or IT.

would not have been able to kill calvin had he made it to the end. would also have not been able to kill aaron.

frederick traumatized this man just as much as he traumatized aaron, vincent just absolutely refuses to acknowledge it.

sophia knew about vincent’s love for aaron and may have even encouraged it.

if his love for aaron was reciprocated, they likely had a relationship while aaron was with the insurgency and tried to be secretive about it but felix carter just “I know what you are.”

he would be very sweet as a lover. very sappy. hopeless romantic. given who he was in love with, are we even surprised?

cigarettes are part of how he started aging again.

the insurgency kind of knows he’s older than he looks, they just say he’s in his fifties because he looks like it, but even TWIE says he’s been around as long as anyone can remember. likely, vincent surfaced as anthony wright around the same time that sylvester sloan joined the insurgency.

his plan in case anyone saw any old photos of vincent and noticed that he looked eerily similar to anthony was to say that he’s vincent arians’ grandson and that his mother was arians’ daughter.

vincent had no children, but he did like being around kids.

during his years with the foundation he’d often lock himself in his lab just to cry. aaron often checked in on him.

frederick repeatedly called him aaron’s dog as a joke that vincent found very not funny. vincent/anthony isn’t really big on dogs because of this.

if anthony saw adam today he’d be immensely proud.

if anthony had made it to the end he would have tried to make aaron tell him why he left. aaron would not have been able to tell him.

anthony was a bit scared of how much like aaron calvin is.

would have liked O5-11 if they met.

AARON SIEGEL / O5-1 “THE MAN WITH THE INFINITY GUN,” “THE FOUNDER”

if you claim to be frederick’s #1 hater and you’re not aaron siegel then you’re fucking lying.

very sappy romantic, similar to vincent, but only with sophia. she thinks it’s adorable. he just really loves his wife a lot.

cannot let go of anything for shit. if he was at the scene of vincent’s death he would have tried to bring him back.

had a very weird father-child relationship with sam.

tolerated most of the other O5s at best, especially rufus (O5-6) and valerie (O5-7).

felix has always been his favorite aside from sophia (and vincent during the insurgency days)

borderline personality disorder

capable of straight up hanging up on frederick. this annoys the absolute fuck out of frederick.

PETTIEST BITCH IN THE WOOOORRRLLLDDD he’s like a fucking crow

sees mortimer (O5-5) as family because he’s the grandfather of alison chao, at least in other realities. mortimer gets along well with aaron.

very easily sent into overstimulation, it’s unknown why. he’s only ever perfectly calm in a sensory deprivation chamber.

extremely pale.

lives at overwatch. often falls asleep at his desk or on the fucking floor.

wreck of a man, but a surprisingly exceptional leader when he actually feels like leading instead of letting valerie handle things.

the other O5s don’t even know much about him.

visits san marco as much as he can.

FREDERICK WILLIAMS / THE ADMINISTRATOR

obsessed with the string theory, literally discovered it before the idea was even conceived.

had a wife and daughter, both died horribly. his daughter was extremely young and he’s a tad bit obsessed with the idea of bringing her back. driven by grief but also the fact he’s just a Bad Person in General

extremely manipulative (canon), but also just likes to fuck with people.

sometimes he doesn’t even call aaron or calvin he just speaks into their heads.

sometimes he’ll just call them and ask shit like this. aaron would hang up on him but calvin can’t.

can manifest however he wants, he usually chooses the phone.

reality bender (canon) and extremely powerful at it. like it’s lowkey concerning.

god complex.

totally the kind of guy to go “no don’t kill me im just a girl”

adam ivanov as the engineer would beat the shit out of him if given the chance.

what aaron described in the apartment scene was literal psychological torture. aaron was not the only person he subjected, just his favorite punching bag.

aaron, near the end of his life, got him a world’s worst boss mug and kept it next to the phone. calvin got a second one just to drive the point home.

a bit obsessed with antediluvian anomalies (project paragon). talks to calvin about them extensively.

hated vincent for no real reason he was just a bitch.

[partikron]

Everyone's always talking about how hard FromSoft games supposedly are, but nobody says a word about the absolute gankfest that most Horizon Forbidden West fights turn out to be.

Yes, I would LOVE to fight a Slaughterspine, a Stormbird and 15 of all their besties all at once. Delightful.

And like, yeah, you don't usually die a lot, but still.

10/10 game, though.

[miquella-everywhere]

Hi. This is my first ask here! Sorry for any mistakes; but your latest post about the Wiki got me thinking: we know that even with Miquella’s needle Malenia wasn’t able to eliminate the Goddess of Rot; and maybe the same thing happened to Miquella. He tried to get rid of his outer god’s influence but failed. Maybe Trina is a sort of Outer God of Slumber, because when you sleep time passes differently (?), maybe that’s why he is seen as young. It would be interesting to fight Trina and perhaps free him of its influence once and for all. Miquella is one of the biggest mysteries… anyway this was floating in my head since my first playthrough. I’m scared of the DLC, because I’m on NG+3!! Keep up the good work!

I definitely think that Miquella is attempting to rid himself of whatever Outer God has cursed him, which parallels Ranni's own shedding of her flesh to escape the control of the Two Fingers, but compared to her it's clearly a far more difficult and complicated matter altogether. Maybe the only way he can do that is in the Realm of Shadow... or maybe Miquella breaking his curse is actually a lost cause and instead he's focusing his efforts towards a different goal in the Realm of Shadow? 🤔

Regardless, I am very excited to get some more context behind Miquella's curse and how much deeper it goes than just "eternal childhood" and also how it severely cripples Miquella's true strength(most likely intentionally)

As for Trina I personally doubt that she is straight up an Outer God. Outer Gods/Great Ones in any Fromsoft game are usually vague, unseen beings that are never directly met/seen but still hold tremendous influence despite their enigmatic nature. Now Trina could potentially have come to be because of the meddling of an Outer God or could be working for one 🤔 I read a theory a long time ago that there could be an Outer God associated with the different status ailments, and for now there's not much to go off of in regards to sleep.

I'm psyched that the DLC is gonna expand more upon sleep because it is so under underutilized in the base game, and ngl sleep is really fun to use and super OP if you have the right build for it lol

Also dont be afraid of the DLC! Just go into the Realm of Shadow tenacious, stubborn and moreover flexible! We're getting several new weapon types, items, talismans, spells, buffs, spirit summons, so on and so forth! Take advantage of all that is there to help you succeed and you'll do fine! And if it makes you feel any better, I'm on NG+6 and I know for a fact I'm gonna get my ass kicked more often than not, and I am afraid as well but still so very excited! 😂

[katyspersonal]

I mean... Miyazaki doesn't make "good" gods. I doubt Miquella wouldn't be on the Griffith tier of evil that the insane folks speak of, but considering that Malenia is dead, he got violated, and there's a godslayer tarnished running around... unless he plays a similar role to Ranni we're gonna fight him, and those theorists are gonna be ANNOYING

I think the first statement is a bit irrelevant. There are some "good" gods..... when they are true Gods, not 'humans with privileges of Gods'! For example, Kos in Bloodborne was not doing anything bad, she was just vibing with her worshippers in the village! Or Rom, who is protecting humanity from Eldrich Horrors. Or Ebrietas, who is cooperating with humans to help them to ascend! On the other end, we have Gods who are kinda neutral, like the Old One in Demon Souls who doesn't really have mind and simply devours everything, or Greater Will in Elden Ring that relies on mortals to give it the purpose, the "order", whatever it is, and its morality depends on what the person it gave moderator rights will choose! Formless Mother or God of Rot also basically just exist, they are as "good" or "evil" as forces of nature can be!

What I am saying is, Miyazaki doesn't blame everything on "evil gods" and what IS more common is theme of humanity being the true evil 🤔 Usually the "gods" who are corrupt either were corrupted by human evil or are human in all but status!

(Lol Goldmask was something else) Which, yes, in this case, Miquella is not safe from the trend, I just wanted to point this out because Fromsoft games try to make a point that real evil is not the girls (gender neutral) from outer space, deep see or astral realm. The real evil is in our nature!

We do not know what to expect from Miquella, but considering Soulsborne's trademark depression, my bet would be that Miquella was a genuinely good, kind person, but got ruined. This world is an awful place for a good, compassionate soul! His body might be "unalloyed", but his soul is not necessarily so! It is hard to stay kind and strong no matter what, and it is risky to always try to help because sometimes it will be a mistake. For how long you can remain kind before you lose your patience and decide people are not worth it? 'Die hero or live long enough to be the villain'. In my opinion we can expect to find him in fallen, despair state, and either we help to encourage him to get back up or the story asks us a question whether we, or someone else, is willing to take the kind hero's 'mantle' from him, even despite someday surely ending in this sorry state too.

Okay I've gone too chatty, but my point is, Miquella might end up being "evil"; something that was not there from the start, but giving away self-destructively to the kind that doesn't deserve kindness done it. But if, IF he was "evil" from the start for lack of better term.. that'd be on his human side, not on his god side!

[iamthekaijuking]

A Review of Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon

I just finished up my 13th play through (this is the most I’ve ever replayed a video game), and I know I’m technically reviewing this game but there isn’t really anything I can say that hasn’t been said.

The controls and movement is smooth, and while there’s a learning curve it’s incredibly satisfying. Boosting requires you to manage your energy. It can be depleted, but will also recharge after a few seconds. But in the incredibly explosive combat of AC6, every second counts. Energy weapons also requires further energy management. Different generators can make things easier, and different thrusters can determine how you move and how much boosting uses up your energy. But you also need to worry about weight management on your AC. Your legs can determine how much you can carry as well as how you move. Ultimately you’ll need to spend time looking at stats and testing things out in the garage, but that’s part of the draw of Armored Core. Fine tuning your mech.

Combat is hectic and fast, feeling more like dogfights than anything. Both parties are pelting and trying to outmaneuver each other in a hope to stagger their opponents and get a chance to deal massive damage. Unlike in soulsborne games, there is no invincibility frames in AC6, so dodging is used to dart away from incoming damage and mitigate it, not negate it. You’ll also have different “core expansions” which can give you shields, cover, or an extra means of damaging enemies.

Every part has some use, and while there are weapons that are obviously The Metatm and you can get through a lot of missions with whatever build you feel really comfortable in, different situations will reward different things and you’d be surprised at how satisfying it is when replaying missions to bring different weapons and set ups directly catered to the task. Every weapon has at least one situational use. Fighting in an open space with no roof? Vertical missiles. Enclosed space? Grenades or napalm. Opponents have pulse shields? Use pulse guns to destroy the shields. Also use flamethrowers, songbirds, and the wheelchair tanktreads on the “Escort The Weaponized Mining Ship” mission you will thank me.

The customization and image making system is incredibly freeing and allows for a ton of self expression. It’s incredibly fun. You’ve probably seen some funny looking mechs circulating through the internet in the last year.

Ultimately, the game wants you to experiment with different builds, and even allows you to save up to 160 presets, gives you the presets of every enemy AC you’ll encounter in the story, and even allows you to download up to 40 builds that other players have uploaded online (sadly only on the same platform as you though).

As far as music goes, it’s super good. Fromsoft pretty consistently delivers, but the Armored Core soundtrack is different from their lineup from the past decade. Fitting of a SciFi setting, the AC6 soundtrack features heavy use of synths and droning sounds. There are some exceptions of course. It’s not EDM music (I doubt anyone is breaking it to Coral Guardian or C Weapon) but it’s probably somewhere within Techno.

As for the setting, it’s somewhat par for the course with Armored Core and to an extent the mecha genre itself. A hypercapitalist world where the average person has few rights, the ultra rich wage wars, and mass murder is not only entirely acceptable but is in fact encouraged if it turns a profit. Uniquely though, hyper-industrialization is a thing as well, and the landscape is peppered with inconceivably massive sprawling megastructures that can reach into the sky. There are some firsts for Armored Core as well. The series usually takes place on earth or places importance on its (always) ruined state. In 6 though, earth is completely out of the picture; it’s not important. Instead the game takes place on Rubicon 3, which is… somewhere in the galaxy. Interstellar travel is commonplace and for the first time in Armored Core, sapient aliens appear.

For themes, there’s always a feeling of isolation (as is normal for the franchise), but a not insignificant amount of attention is given to the idea, and importance, of choice and human will. There is importance to your decisions and the human will to live and desire to be free is a strong one, and ultimately you are in charge of your destiny and what you want to do.

All in all, 10/10 game. Please play it and make the funniest mechs ever.

[simon-newman]

Spirit Ashes

So. Getting into Elden Ring now I do look for content around the Internet.

What did get my attention is a lot of hatred for Spirit Ashes mechanic which is apparently new thing for Fromsoftware games.

To put is simply - Spirit Ashes are a summoning mechanic where you can call upon a specific AI controlled Spirit to be your ally in the fight.

Some Soulslike veterans insist that this is Fromsoft's method of giving casual players an "easy mode" in an otherwise difficult (or not*) game.

* - The other thing is that there isn't even a consensus if the game is easy or not - some claim it's unbalanced and Fromsoft jumped the shark/used cheap gimmicks to up the difficulty while others claim it's the easiest one and made for casuals even without Spirit Ashes.

Anyway.

Yeah - I have been using Spirit Ashes since I got a set of 3 puppies from Ranni. Then I switched to some stronger ones like Jellyfish and finally Banished Knight Oleg. Are they helpful? Well. Yes? They do provide another target for the boss to focus on. They also deal some damage on their own.

Are they an "easy mode"? Are they breaking the game? Do they win on their own?

Short answer. No - they are not.

First I need to make a disclaimer. The summons can't be used everywhere - only in specific locations. Additionally they can't be re-summoned. They can be upgraded up to +10 but nothing above that - meaning they'll continue to lose in value as the monsters get stronger. Especially when I tackle the NG+ which scales the enemies up 7 times up to NG7+.

Now as to how useful are they playing the game for the first time?

It depends on the boss really.

Beastman of Farum Azula in Limgrave? Yeah - the wolves helped me tear him apart.

I've tackled the Tree Sentinel at lvl 17 and they didn't survive long enough to get his hp down by 1/3.

Pictured above - both me and the wolves are dead already.

Margit? The wolves were lucky if 1 survived till phase 2 (50% hp). Calling them in phase 2 alone was useless as they'd get annihilated with about 2 hammer strikes.

I will say that I did feel kinda bad for some bosses once I switched to Oleg.

Admittedly - this guy is a lot tankier and deadlier than the pups and did save my skin several times.

But he's not an almighty "I win button".

Magma Wyrm just melted him in it's AoE. Same with double gargoyle fight. Even at +7 in a lot of fights he's only enough of a distraction to get in a few initial attacks.

In my ~10 attempts he has NEVER survived long enough to take down one of the gargoyles and I had to fight 2 vs 1 in every single iteration of that fight.

Even without AoE this is often the case against bosses that are an actual challenge.

This is way after Oleg got annihilated by the Crucible Knights. Mostly in 1v1 fight. He wouldn't last long enough for me to get one of them to 50%.

This means that I had to do 75% of the fight solo anyway.

And there are worse examples.

Astel the Naturalborn of the Void? Oleg was pretty much useless and would die almost instantly due to AoE gravity attacks that he also helped trigger more often.

Falligstar beast is outright easier to deal with if it focuses it's attacks on you because most of them is blockable and can be punished.

His contribution against Lansseax was next to none.

Malenia is known for healing from hitting enemies - meaning the summon whose AI is just going to tank blows might end up doing more harm than good.

And that's not mentioning bosses that you can't even use summons against.

In general if a summon is strong enough to make a major contribution to the fight the boss is usually weak enough to die in around 10 hits from me alone anyway.

Ultimately Spirit Ashes are just a mechanic to be used as you see fit. There are people who play without armor or even without leveling. It's their choice and a testament to their skills.

I am just wondering how many soulslike elitists who keep saying that "Spirit Ashes are for unskilled casuals" themselves followed precise meta build guides from the Internet to make sure their Tarnished is the most optimized boss killing machine possible so that they wouldn't struggle.

[fluffypichu876]

If you were to recommend Sekiro to someone, perhaps a Mutual even, how would you go about it?

(I'm always on the roll looking for soulsborne design content, as it is a big topic in the industry, and I am too much of a whimp to play something that openly sadomasochistic xD, but sekiro is the one I'm lest knowledgable about of them all and I'd love a first-hand opinion on it/maybe a reccomend to see if there might be something interesting to try to brave it For, and not just difficulty for difficulty's sake)

That is a GREAT ask, mutual, and I am very glad to answer it to you! (i never miss an opportunity to discuss game design xD)

Well, the game is REALLY good. It's rewarding and it just feels good to play. That's why I recommend it in very simple words, with the small warning that it is, indeed, a difficult game.

But if I was allowed to go into detail on why I love it and recommend it so much...

Sekiro is a very interesting soulsbourne. It follows many traditions of FromSoft's other games, but it also breaks enough of these rules to stand out as a game of its own.

One thing that differs in Sekiro is the very way that you tackle bossfights. Boss design is one of, if not the most important aspect of a soulslike. I have yet to play other soulsbournes, but from what I've heard, in these games there are usually multiple ways of dealing with a tough boss. You can grind and find better equipment to fight them, use cheese strategies, get help from another player (co-op), or just git gud and try to defeat the boss by learning their patterns and relying on pure skill. Each boss is always designed with that in mind, focusing on providing a fair experience to the player no matter which option they choose.

But in Sekiro, there's none of that. No co-op, very little cheese strats, a stat system that requires the defeat of a major boss to increase damage output (by very little), and a EXP system that only grants a few new skills (some of them are very useful though, such as the Mikiri counter). Oh, and you lose EXP when you die.

To beat a boss here, you must rely on pure skill. Git gud, as people say. This skill consists basically of your ability to recognize and correctly counter all the types of enemy attacks. Deflect strikes, dodge grabs, Mikiri-counter thrusts, jump over sweeps and ocassionaly redirect lightning. If you don't understand and properly use these skills, you will not get very far, because every enemy and every boss will demand varying levels of your knowledge about the game, and more importantly your ability to actually use said knowledge. Their very design is based on the player's skill.

It may sound bad, but this focus on pure player skill is exactly what makes this game so compelling and rewarding. When you fight a boss in Sekiro, you are not mastering the bossfight, you are mastering the game itself. Each boss requires the same skills to defeat, consisting of a single core gameplay loop, and extra items or tools are merely extra help and not really necessary to win (with the exception of a few gimmick optional bosses). Master these skills and the whole game becomes much easier to understand and overcome. You'll still die a lot, but you will feel your progress, understand why you died, and become even more confident after every defeat.

Once you beat Lady Butterfly and Genichiro, you have already mastered the game. From now on, you will be just sharpening your skills.

In simple words, Sekiro's definition of getting good is very different from other soulsbourne games. Beating this game is like a personal journey of improvement, in which you aim to improve because you know it's worth it.

The revival mechanic is also very interesting to me. From what I understand, it serves both as a mid-battle breathing room, and as a motivator.

Dying in a bossfight doesn't feel good, and enough deaths can motivate the player to give up, so giving them time to breath and consider their options before reviving and trying again is very nice. It's a period of time used to strategize and reflect what exactly is going wrong. Allowing the player to revive once or twice during a fight doesn't make the game easier, it makes the game fair. The player will not have to repeat a part of the fight that they have already mastered, and will have another opportunity to try and understand what's currently going on. Then, they can carry this new knowledge to the next attempts, making the whole "die and try again" experience much more fluid.

Following this logic, the revival mechanic also serves as a motivator. If the player has good enough base knowledge of a bossfight, giving them a second chance will motivate them to take risks, which leads into the discovery of potentially better strategies. Dying now will not really grant too much of a bad consequence, so why not risk something new? The whole combat system revolves about your agressiveness and lack of hesitation, so a motivator like this is very important.

Sekiro also has stealth mechanics, yipeee!!! Fitting, since you are a shinobi. Stealth here mostly serves as an second option to deal with areas filled to the brim with enemies. Attacking any enemy from behind without their notice will instantly delete an entire healthbar. This means death to most lesser foes. It also helps you deal with mini-bosses who have more than one healthbar.

Having said all of that, Sekiro is an amazing game, and I can't recommend it enough. In my opinion, you don't even have to be too much of a masochist to like this game! I found the whole experience to be pretty fair and rewarding, and not really painful at all (maybe it's just me on that xD). Patience is all that you really need, patience to slowly learn and understand, as if you where learning how to use a sword in real life. After all, that's exactly what you must do to beat this game.

[cursed-40k-thoughts]

Is Armoured Core on the same difficulty level has Dark Souls or is it possible for casual players to play?

Like the gameplay looks fun from a trailer but. Will I need to frame perfect time parries or something awful like that?

I'm generally just looking for mech games with single player modes on console given the abandonment of Titanfall 2

Similar difficulty in a different direction. Familiarity with enemy timing and attack patterns is still a thing, usual FromSoft fight stuff, but you don’t take/parry attacks. The benefit of being a robot with thrusters means that your way of dealing with attacks is to fly/boost out of the way or get out of range. That’s the core of it really. Just move out the way, and return fire with your choice of guns/missiles/lasers. Certain weapons can be more or less effective against certain enemies. All the AC games have that sort of basic deal.

We know from the most recent showcase there are other factors for AC6, too. Enemies have a somewhat pronounced stagger meter. You fill it up by attacking them, and when it’s full they get stunned and you can smack them up for free for a bit. There’s also some sort of checkpoint system. We don’t have the full details regarding it yet, but based on what we saw of it, and based on the way a similar system was utilised in Elden Ring, it seems to let you tweak your loadout and respawn next to an important fight or boss encounter if you die to that encounter.

So yeah. Don’t get me wrong, Armored Core can get pretty fast, and it’s certainly challenging at times, but the premise of combat timing is based more around you just… moving and shooting enemies when ideal. A lot of difficulty honestly did stem from how awkward the some of the button layouts and technical aspects were. For me, anyway.

I do genuinely think that, despite the AC games (particularly the newer ones) being “faster” than Soulsborne games, the actual core of what they ask from you is a lot simpler. Again, a lot of the stuff that I found to be obtuse was a product of tech limitations and questionable design elements, and I think that FromSoft has come a long way since then in both game design and their technological capability.

We still don’t have anything approaching a full picture for all of the finer details of the game yet, so time will tell, but yeah. It’s really not as bad or as mind-blowingly tricky as some people make it seem. I’m very sure that once we get to see more fleshed out gameplay and info that you’ll be able to make a hard decision for yourself. It’s the kind of thing where you’ll be able to tell if you are or aren’t into it.

[goombasa]

Thoughts on Elden Ring and the DLC

So, I spent the better part of June playing through Elden Ring for the second time after my initial playthrough not long after the game came out. It was mostly in preparation for the DLC that launched at the end of the month, but it was also an excuse to go through the game again with an entirely different build, and let me tell you, while prior knowledge might have something to do with it, the game feels so much different when you intentionally change up the way you're playing, and it feels great when it works out.

I've told this story before, but I was a late arrival to the Soulsborne games, owing to a poor experience I had with the original PS3 version of Demon Souls. Since then, I have played through all of the main Soulsborne games, including the remake of Demon Souls, and ‘Soulslike’ has become one of my favorite subgenres to try out and play through as well. Out of all of them, Elden Ring stands on its own pedestal as not only a great Souls game, but also an excellent example of how to make a densely packed open world that rewards exploration and constantly make you feel like you're finding something interesting and amazing for poking your nose everywhere. It was such a breath of fresh air when it came out.

I will say, personally, I do feel like the sudden jump in difficult for the endgame was a bit much. I don't even Fromsoft's difficulty, in that since the game is designed to be as open and explorable as possible right from the get-go, it's difficult to design an endgame that is going to feel like a challenge for folks that have gone out of their way to conquer every other challenge in the world, and could potentially be overleveled for the endgame. Souls games are usually very good about balancing this, but again, the wide open nature of the game makes this more of a challenge, and that's why you have things at the end of the game like the Godskin Duo. It's not an insurmountable challenge, but it is quite a jump out of nowhere, from the moment you set foot on the snowy mountaintop to the moment you sit upon the throne.

And then the DLC dropped.

God, this is great. It's hard, but it's fantastic. Anyone who got through the difficulty jump at the end of the base game is going to feel right at home here. It feels like an entire souls game smooshed into its own expansion, and adds so much more to the game in terms of weapons, challenges, items, recipes, armor sets, it's legitimately impressive just how much the game gives you, and just how much it challenges you.

The bosses in the DLC are very interesting, as they really feel like an extension of that endgame. Their attack patterns of powerful and long, and more than ever, you have to really learn their patterns and figure out where and when you can attack them safely. Good timing is absolutely essential against them. Again, they don't feel insurmountable, but man, some of these bosses really felt like a round two against Malenia, and that's without her penchant for healing herself. I'm actually impressed that there aren't any other bosses that use that same sort of gimmick anywhere in the DLC, it remains wholly a gimmick unique to her.

Not that these guys don't lack their own gimmicks on top of just being really freaking challenging. Even the first major boss, the Dancing Lion, will change between four different damage types as the fight goes on, basically guaranteeing that you won't be able to fully defend against everything that it's throwing at you, no matter what you do. You can lower your defense to cover everything, but you can't really account for everything it can potentially throw at you.

The way the word is designed is much more like a puzzle in and of itself. Technically speaking, much like the base game, there's not a lot that's keeping you from exploring everything around you at any time, except trying to figure out how to get around. The Land of Shadow is very vertically oriented, with several layers to it, and even from the starting area, you'll find yourself looking out over large cliffside vistas that you aren't able to safely ascend or descend, and you have to parse out how to traverse these areas, or find a tunnel or cave or hidden path through a legacy dungeon that will allow you to spill out into that new area. It's legitimately fascinating and it takes the open world concept introduced in the base game and turns it into more of a puzzle, making exploration even more important and tied into the game feel even more. It's a very clever expansion.

BE WARNED, STORY SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT

I also find the story quite interesting as well. We learn a lot about Marika's history through this, and just how screwed up she really is, along with the rest of her family. I don't think that was every really in doubt, but there was always one particular bright spot in Miquella, the eternally young demigod.

This DLC absolutely shreds any notion that he was any better than his siblings. While yes, all of the demigods were complicated beings, equally capable of good as well as evil, but Miquella's obsessive lust for his brother Radahn, coupled with his use of his ability to charm others to do what he wants, makes him one of the more sinister of the demigods. While his goals sound altruistic (his wish to create a world where the opressed and forgotten can have a place to go and can stand on equal footing with the gifted and the favored), they are laced in a combination of childish wishing with a selfish want to have whatever he wishes, while also being on top of this new world, even leaving behind anything that would have made him a better leader. Not only does he abandon parts of his phyiscal form, but also his doubts, his fears, his anger, even his love, all while trying to ascertain godhood and revive his dead brother, assumedly putting him in a flesh puppet that would be easier to control.

Messmer himself is one of the most tragic figures that the story has introduced. Essentially an unperson forced to be a genocidal dictator by his mother, who wanted him to be a hate sink for the entire Land of Shadow so that their ire would be on him instead of her and the lands between, he does it because he was ordered to do so, but he generally hates his position, hates his mother, and seems to have some resentment for the golden order that has left him there.

I love it. Everyone in this world is essentially a tragic monster, forced to act as a martyr for something they don't even necessarily want to be a part of. And of course, none of this is told to us directly, it's all contained in item descriptions and the various little environmental touches that the Souls games love so much.

So yeah, I was worried when I saw the DLC price point, but this isn't just a piece of DLC. This isn't just a single new area, this is an entire new world to explore, and it is well worth its asking price. Just be forewarned, if you had difficulty with the endgame of the main game, Shadow of the Erdtree pulls no punches right from the start. It is punishingly difficult and tenacity is needed to push through. But the sense of accomplishment and that feeling of discovery and overcoming adversity is worth every time you have to hear about how you will be burned away in Messmer's flame.

And believe me when I say you'll probably be hearing it around as often as you hear that Malenia has never known defeat.

[weepingwitch]

beat the elden ring dlc, it was fun but made me crave the older games. even the differences between ER and DS3 are significant - the fact that fromsoft decided to entirely do away with the perilous run from the bonfire to the boss room immediately sticks out to me as one of the bigger differences in how i actually feel when i play the games. usually when i got to a boss door in ER, i'd keep respawning at the stake of marika until i beat the boss. without this quick respawn right at the door, i find myself actually More likely to play DS3 the way that people say you Should play ER - when i get to a boss, i fight it once but then i proceed to explore and thoroughly loot the area (and maybe even wander somewhere else) before trying to make the trip back to the boss door again.

[miquellah]

Hello! This isn't a fully formulated idea yet, but I wanted to see if you had a take, if you don't mind. As much as I'm not a fan of Promised Consort Radahn, there's something evocative of the image of Miquella's light being physically obscured by him in that fight. Almost like an eclipse? Miquella representing the sun (alchemically gold is associated with the sun, silver with the moon) and requiring someone of Carian heritage (or Sellian- unalloyed silver associated with the Nox- academic background) to act as the moon? I'm not sure how this would converge with his goal of upending causality as a whole, though. It seems like Miquella's decision to pick Radahn is a return to Golden Order fundamentalism in the union of opposites, possibly upon the realization that unalloyed gold could only stave (quell lol) influence from outer gods (forces of nature, possibly related to causality?) Along that line of thinking, since equal and opposite are relevant to the story: Messmer's burning of Romina's church and her subsequent clinging to the Rot might have been what spurred the force of Rot to blight Malenia, Marika's own bud. Sorry if this makes no sense and sorry for the long ask.

No i definitely feel you’re on the right track somewhere! In being parallels with marika/radagon, they both also take their haves of the Red King and White Queen as well— creating an artificial sort of rebis, like the first pair. Something something, radahn has radagon’s red hair and also represents earth, whereas miquella is just about the spitting image of marika and represents heaven

I also do like the sun and moon thing too :)9 Even if only in extracted symbolism and imagery, still neat to think about for me. I also realized that with miquella and consort radahn, there’s a— part of a sibling from each original parental pairing, too. miquella for marika/radagon, radahn for radagon/rennala, mohg(‘s corpse) for marika/godfrey. Dunno if there’s anything particularly evocative here, but definitely contributed to that feeling of like. Wholeness

I think we almost all can agree that even if the consort radahn thing could’ve been foreshadowed better, the end result IS still pretty cool as fuck. The eclipse part, too…. Miquella already had an eclipse to parallel griffith in berserk, but this would definitely fit the event timing better. And yeah that’s cool as hell regardless, i see it

And honestly when it comes to romina, i’m still needing to do a dive on her stuff… the whole rauh ruins/having a second rot kind of felt like, Filler to me? But maybe i just wasn’t paying enough attention that i could be. Nonetheless fromsoft usually implements stuff like that with genuine intent, so yeah, i probably just meed to dig more. Why two rot….?

[miloscat]

[Review] Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree (PS5)

They made Elden Ring 2 and called it a DLC.

Since playing Elden Ring (an instant classic of the dark fantasy hardcore action-RPG genre), my appreciation for it has only grown. I've watched countless lore videos and fun challenge runs that show just how deep it is, and comparing it to previous FromSoft games shows a level of polish that represents a peak for the whole meta-series. I still think the open world and material/crafting system are a bit much, but still. Great game. So I was excited to dive right into its expansion pack as soon as it dropped. A week and more than 50 hours of gameplay later and it's done; wow.

The new adventure is intended for endgame characters, so I took my completed game save in there. The difficulty does indeed continue to ramp from that point, but there's a new character scaling mechanic similar to Sekiro's memories/prayer beads, whereby you can buff your damage and defence by collecting new thingamajigs. There's also cool new weapons in there and they absolutely throw smithing stones at you. I kept my ultra-heavy greatshield but soon swapped out my Rotten Battle Hammer/Serpent Hunter/Straight Sword for the Milady, an example of the new Light Greatsword weapon class. It's got a great balance of reach, power, and speed, plus neat combo attacks where you can rapidly chain multi-hit heavy attacks into fast sweeping light attacks. Other new weapons have fun gimmicks and twists beyond what the base game encompassed, although you pretty much have to upgrade them to the max for them to be viable.

The Land of Shadow is the new setting, a realm sealed off and teeming with bitter and twisted creatures abandoned by the outer world. The story has you following in the footsteps of the lost demigod Miquella, deciding the fates of his followers, and ultimately stopping his quest for godhood. Focusing on this one plotline with a small cast of characters makes for a strong story thread, although there's plenty of side distractions along the way that all flesh out the larger story of the Lands Between. I can't wait for further analysis of the details and connections here.

This shadow realm is an excellent setting, with some stunning new biomes, like the plains full of graves, the finger-sprouting wastelands, or the stormy mountain dominated by dragons. What I most appreciate about this new zone is its density, a tightly overlapping landscape with more memorable setpieces and crafted spaces by area than the base game's world. And this despite the new map being nearly half the size of the original map, which for a DLC is huge! There has clearly been some effort to bridge the gap between the open world bloat and copy-paste filler dungeons, and the intricately designed Legacy Dungeons, and I appreciated the balanced approach here.

As always, the combat encounters are a big highlight, culminating in epic boss fights. There's a lot of variety in enemy design and much of it is brand new, with a lot of care in level design and such to ensure memorable fights. As for the bosses themselves, there's some super cool ideas and a lot of them! The base game has 15 major "remembrance" bosses, and this DLC adds a whole 10 new ones. There were many deaths in my playthrough but I'm proud to say I didn't struggle too much with most of them... until the final boss, which really, really makes you work for it. It's kind of nutty. Playing your cards right with the NPC sidequests lets you bring a couple of summon buddies into the final fight, and I really needed them. As per usual, this quest progression can be obscure and parts can be missed or skipped, so I made use of various guides along the way.

Shadow of the Erdtree complements the base game so well, filling out and expanding on aspects of it perfectly. I also think it improves on design decisions while adding some creative new sparks along the way. Taken on its own, it may be the strongest FromSoft "game" yet, and makes Elden Ring as a whole even better. So yeah, it's good. Now to watch countless more lore deep dives and challenge videos!

[ixcaliber]

Top 10 Games I Played In 2023 (Yes I Know What Month It Currently Is)

I barely played anything in the second half of last year and fell out of the habit of making these lists and then adhd kicked in. I’d like to go back to making little monthly media lists and I feel obligated to make some kind of 2023 Top 10 before I can do so… so here it is only five full months late.

10. Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon

Armored Core begrudgingly gets a spot on the list. Its sort of a frustrating experience for me specifically because while I really loved the fast paced dodge-focused combat a lot of other stuff didn’t click for me at all. I felt completely discouraged from exploration. I straight up did not gel with the equipment system and relied on Forgie to outfit my mech with whatever parts I had acquired. 

The dynamic between 621 and their handler is like so close to what I want from a game, but fundamentally unappealing because… it’s Walter. It’s some guy.

Look. Genuinely if this game allowed me to pick the gender of my handler it’d probably be my game of the year. Overall minute to minute I was having a good time but this is the least I’ve actually connected with a Fromsoft game. The only times I was really able to engage with it on more than a mechanical level was when Carla was on screen which just wasn’t enough of the time. 

9. Pseudoregalia

Pseudoregalia was my favourite Dark Souls game of the year and yeah I know how dumb a statement that is on the face of it (especially given I have at least one higher ranked Soulslike game on this list). But my favourite part of any soulslike game isn’t the combat or the big boss fights, its just the experience of exploring a cool and atmospheric location and Pseudoregalia does a fantastic job of this. 

Also yes I love Sybil and she is very fun to play and move as. 

8. The Murder of Sonic The Hedgehog

The only Sonic game of 2023 that actually felt like Sonic. The playful tone and interactions between the characters made this a joy to play through. 

7. Chants of Sennaar

I think the name for this genre of game is ‘information game’. Consisting of games like The Return of the Obra Dinn, The Case of the Golden Idol and recently Botany Manor kind of does this as well. In these games you are given information that it is up to you to interpret and then asked to use that information, usually with some kind of notebook you can fill in to check your answers. 

I like this genre of game and yeah I like this one as well. While I do enjoy it I don’t hold it quite so highly as the others for kind of a complicated reason. 

In Chants of Sennaar you are climbing a tower, learning the languages of the various peoples who live upon the tower. At any point you can type in a guess as to what you think a glyph means and it will display this guess alongside that glyph whenever you see it. I think this works well as a system, the problem is you intermittently get shown a journal page where there are drawings of all the things that the glyphs you have seen could mean and you assign them to those images to validate them. 

The problem I have is like in comparison to Return of the Obra Dinn where you’re given the entire crew manifest up front, here you’re given word meanings shortly after encountering the glyphs they are attached to. The context of when you get the information changes the feel of the puzzles, makes them more simple to solve given that you’re not choosing from a large possibility space. 

All that said it is a fun game and I don’t know how you would work around the problem of verification without limiting the possibility space and simplifying the puzzles. 

6. Steelrising

There’s just something so compelling about clockwork automata and the trappings of Revolutionary France. I enjoyed the combat. I really enjoyed the exploration. I can’t think of any other Soulslike game that puts you into recognizable real world landmarks, and yeah I just really loved this one.

5. Coquette Dragoon

I need to catch up with Coquette Dragoon. 

The last time I talked about it I think I overemphasized the melancholy of this game. Maybe I was just in a weird headspace but I don’t feel like when I think back on it that that is the tone of Coquette Dragoon. The way I’d describe it now is soft. Soft with an undercurrent of sadness maybe. Soft that can’t escape being set in a real world with all the complications that come from such a thing, but soft nonetheless. 

4. Viewfinder

I wish there was a good term for puzzle games that sort of remind me of Portal. Predominantly first person puzzle games with a strong central mechanic, usually given to you as some kind of glove or gun or something and strong iteration on its mechanics. 

Viewfinder is one of those. The gimmick of this one is that you have a special camera that can reproduce anything it takes a photograph of in 3d space. 

It’s a fun game, the only criticism I would have is that the tool you are given is so powerful that it kind of feels like it trivializes many of the puzzles. Its like. Sometimes it sort of feels like if you were playing Portal but every single surface was portalable; it would be trivial to sidestep around the intended puzzle design.

This isn’t entirely a flaw though. Giving the player such a powerful tool and allowing the flexibility to use it is neat it just doesn’t necessarily lend itself to focused puzzlesolving. All that said, some of the later levels do increase in difficulty such that you can’t just brute force them with the same techniques you’ve gotten used to throughout the rest of the game.

3. Lil Gator Game

Lil Gator Game is a game about a little gator who wants to play a sort of Legend of Zelda LARP with his sister and pretty much every other kid on the island has been recruited into providing quests, monsters (cardboard cutouts) and loot (confetti). It’s a really neat little game that uses its setup not just to provide a fun experience but to say something about the joy of making and playing games.

2. Pizza Tower

Even though I’m bad at speedrunning through the levels as the game would really like me to, I can’t deny how well designed and fun this game is. With a great sense of humour and interesting mechanical variation in almost every level. This game somehow got me to enjoy boss fights with hidden extra health bars, which is saying something.

1. The Case of the Golden Idol (and The Spider of Lanka and The Lemurian Vampire)

I love information games. I love the deductive reasoning necessary to piece together these mysteries. I love the way the game builds some narrative elements in background, allowing you to figure them out at your own pace. 

The Case of the Golden Idol is just extremely good at what it does, its puzzles are pitched perfectly, providing you with enough prompts and clues to keep everything understandable and solvable, but never overdoing it and making it too easy to be satisfying. 

Look forward to Rise of the Golden Idol as my game of the year 2024 probably (unless Silksong actually comes out (it won’t)).