#the first time you find an environment puzzle in the witness

[coelpts]

tosses you a 23 for the ask!

23. A “Wow” moment of awe

HRRRRNGH okay listen. there's a problem here. if there's a moment in a game that makes me feel so reverent and in awe of it, i do not want to tell people about it because i want them to just see it on their own. no expectations, no preconceptions, because that sort of feeling of…wonder, of awe and beauty, is deeply…like, it's part of my brain chemistry, right? That's My Emotion! that's The Big One!

the biggest game that inspired that awe in me was no doubt Outer Wilds. it did something to me. but i REFUSE to spoil anything about that game. it's one of those experiences you can only ever have one single time, and going in blind is THE best option. so if you want a game full of that sort of feeling: please, PLEASE play Outer Wilds. you WILL enjoy it. it's got some horror elements, there are jump scares in at least one planet and i've heard the dlc is pretty spooky too- but i really can't recommend it enough.

BUT. i will share a key moment for you. SPOILERS FOR THE GAME TUNIC. if you want to go in blind, BACK OUT NOW.

so like…specifically i was only really around for the back half of tunic while my roommate was playing it, but that's when the good puzzle shit kicks in so i'm not upset about that. BUT. as you play through tunic, you collect pieces of its manual. like, in-game. you start out completely in the dark with only the basic controls, and get more pages as you go.

BUT. this manual is ILLEGIBLE. it's written entirely in moonrunes that you cannot read, and that are never translated at any point.

that's because you can figure out how to translate the runes all by yourself. and the moment that i realized i could READ it? that was like christmas morning. i was writing and reading and figuring out all the rules as my roommate played. i don't think i'll forget that feeling.

[sjsmith56]

Chance Encounter - Part 1

Summary: A chance encounter at a supermarket triggers a brief memory in Bucky. When he investigates he finds a link to his past.

Length: 4.5 K

Characters: Bucky Barnes, named OFC, named OFC (child), named OMC

Warnings: Evidence of spousal abuse, forced marriage to a minor, feeling of familiarity for Bucky, HYDRA memories.

Author notes: This story started out as a meet cute but took a serious 180 degree turn.

🛒 🛻

The first time Bucky saw the young woman was in the supermarket, the big one with tall shelves full of everything the discerning customer would ever need. She stood in the middle of the aisle, looking like she was ready to cry and wringing her hands. Her whole look and manner seemed out of place in the modern environment, as her long dress skimmed the floor; its tiny floral print reminding Bucky of something the older women in the neighbourhood would wear when he was a boy, not something a woman of her age would choose in these modern times. Even her hair was different, braided, then coiled around her head and covered in a large dark kerchief. He watched for a moment, as she looked helplessly at the upper shelf, while people blithely walked past her, ignoring her confused and frightened face. A couple of times she tried to stand on the edge of the bottom shelf to reach the product she wanted on the top, but she still couldn’t reach it. Just as she was about to walk away, he came to her rescue.

“What can I help you get?” he asked, kindly.

She was startled at his approach and immediately looked down at the ground as she answered in a voice so muted that even he had trouble hearing it. “The onion soup mix, please. The large box.”

Easily reaching up, Bucky grabbed one of each of the three brands that had a large size. “Take your choice,” he said.

Grabbing the closest one she quickly put it in her cart and smiled briefly. When she looked up at him, she gasped, her face a bright red while she mumbled her thanks.

“No problem,” he answered, placing the other two boxes back up top. “Is there anything else on this aisle you need help with?”

She shook her head and pushed her cart quickly down the aisle away from him. As she slipped away around the corner she looked back, and he had a brief flashback of a moment when he was the Winter Soldier. There was something about the way she looked at him, then the memory was gone, and he was left puzzled at why she seemed even remotely familiar to him. Her body language hinted that she was either extremely introverted or was so terrified that the act of grocery shopping was a stretch for her. Certainly, she wasn’t comfortable inside the store and although he could empathize with that, having experienced it himself when he first began acclimating back to society, it wasn’t something he had witnessed in anyone else, not in the way she manifested it.

As he approached the line of cashiers, he saw she was already in the process of having her items rung through. Each sound of the scanner as it read the barcode made her jump a little, as if it was a foreign sound to her. When the total was announced, she pulled a change purse out of a pocket in her dress, opening it up, and carefully pulled some folded bills out of it, placing them on the surface of the counter as she separated the denominations. That was followed by several coin pieces as she tried to pay as close to the exact amount as possible. While the person who was bagging her purchases made small talk with the cashier, the woman looked nervously through the large window of the store to the parking lot, as if she was expecting someone to be waiting for her. With the last item bagged and her cart in front of her, she pushed it out the door but didn’t enter the parking lot. Instead, she sat on a bench, pulling the cart closely to her.

She was still there when Bucky exited with his own purchases. Looking mostly at the ground in front of her, she occasionally looked up whenever a vehicle entered the parking lot. He pushed his cart to his SUV, opening the back and slowly transferred his bags in, while still observing her. When a large black truck entered the parking lot, she looked up and for a moment a flash of fear appeared on her face, but she quickly stifled it and stood up, waiting for the truck to stop in front of her. A considerably older man got out, and right away Bucky knew there was something about him that was even more familiar. His hulking frame indicated someone used to dominating people, in the same way as a guard … a prison guard. The man barely glanced at her, just uttered a command and she got inside the truck, sitting in the back seat of the large cab, next to a child in a car seat. He transferred the groceries to the truck box, then got back in, not even returning the cart to where the others were nestled together at the cart station. Bucky pushed his cart towards it, looked at the licence plate and watched as the truck pulled away from the front of the store and left the parking lot. Back in his vehicle, he dialled Sam.

“Hey, what’s up?” asked his partner. “You’re not bored already. You’ve only been home a day.”

“No, I need you to access the vehicle database,” said Bucky. “Had an encounter with someone today and it brought up a brief memory of when I was the Winter Soldier. She was picked up by a man whose face reinforced that feeling. I have his licence plate number.”

“You think they’re HYDRA?” asked Sam, his voice becoming more businesslike.

“I don’t know. She seemed out of place, like being in a supermarket was something totally foreign to her. She was terrified of it, Sam; the same way I was when I first got away. If she’s HYDRA, it’s not by choice. The guy, however, gave off completely different vibes.”

Once Sam was logged in Bucky gave him the licence plate number and vehicle description. The name it was registered to meant nothing to Bucky, but Sam ran it through another database, bringing up a picture that he texted to his partner.

“Yeah, that’s him,” said the former Winter Soldier. “There’s something familiar about him but I can’t place it. Maybe it’s in a repressed memory or something still fragmented.”

“Leave it with me,” said Sam. “I’ll do some digging and start up a file on this guy. You going to put them under surveillance?”

“Something like that,” answered Bucky. “You might as well come up when you have some intel.”

For the longest time after Sam hung up, Bucky looked at the image of the man on his phone, Sergei Ivanov, age 53. There was something definitely familiar about him, something chilling. Recalling the look of fear on the woman’s face when the truck first appeared he was sure that she wasn’t with the guy freely. He could look in his cloud storage for the HYDRA files he had but without a context to the two people, it would be a slow process. If he could just remember why they seemed familiar and from where, perhaps he could narrow it down.

After returning home and eating dinner he changed into something more suitable for surveillance. Looking up the address that Sam pulled from the truck registration he headed out. As it wasn’t far, he didn’t use his own vehicle, primarily so it wouldn’t be seen and identified as belonging to him. Instead, he took the subway for one stop, then walked the rest of the way, checking out the neighbourhood, assessing the exit points if things led to a confrontation. Not that he was planning for it, but if this guy did turn out to be ex-HYDRA, then he was going to assume the man had combat skills.

Staying in the shadows as it got darker, Bucky approached closer to the address, a square, ugly building with cheap siding on it. Everything about it on the outside screamed that it was the type of place you wouldn’t want your family living in but by what he could see through the narrow slats of the blinds on the windows the man in the truck lived here with the woman from the supermarket, along with the small child, sitting in a booster chair as she ate. The man finished his plate, then gestured to the woman. Quickly, she stood up, but it wasn’t quick enough for him and he struck her with the back of his hand. Bucky curled his fists up tight when he saw that, then he heard the man’s yelled words to the woman, words that were said in Russian.

“I should have left you to rot there with your parents,” he spewed as she attempted to keep from crying, while hurriedly transferring more food for him onto his plate. “You’re useless, just like your idiot father when he got a stupid idea and sealed his fate.”

She put the full plate of food on the table, then slunk back to a corner of the kitchen, watching him with fearful eyes, as he continued to snarl at her while eating his meal. She began making a lunch for him, three sandwiches, fruit, and cookies, along with a thermos of coffee. Packing it into a metal lunch box, she put it on a table near the door, then backed away again, out of his sightline, and out of his reach. The man finished his meal, looking at her and shaking his head in disgust before leaving the kitchen. Bucky followed the man’s path in the house through the window, seeing him enter a bathroom and closing the door. When he looked back at the woman, she rubbed her cheek and cried silently, before picking up the child and kissing it, fussing over it.

A sound from the bathroom, probably the toilet flushing, alerted her to the man’s imminent appearance and she quickly put the child back in the booster seat, whispering to it. Her face was obscured so Bucky could only assume she was telling the child to stay quiet. The bathroom door opened, and the man came out, going to the bedroom, coming out dressed in a security guard’s uniform. According to the patch on his jacket arm he worked for Marina Security. Returning to the kitchen, the man picked up his lunchbox and thermos, sneered at the woman again and left.

Dropping back into the shadows, Bucky watched the man get into his truck, light up a cigarette, and start the vehicle before he drove away. Back at the window he could see the woman was still in the kitchen, sitting at the table with her face in her hands. There was still no memory of where Bucky had seen the man or the woman before, but he did know one thing. He wasn’t going to leave her there, not with that man using violence against her so easily. Coming out of the shadows he approached the door and knocked on it. It took several long moments before she opened it but when she did her eyes opened wide.

“Soldier?” she asked. “Is it you? Is it really you?”

“It’s who I was,” he replied. “I’m not him anymore. You know me?”

It took a moment for her to realize that he didn’t remember her, and she stepped back, making it possible for him to enter. Closing and locking the door behind him, she stepped past and walked into the kitchen, picking up the child, who just stared at Bucky without fear.

“I’m Katrina,” she said, with the slightest of Russian accents. “You killed my parents.”

Those words hit Bucky hard, even though they were said calmly, without fear. A heat filled him up inside as he felt sick at her revelation. His mouth was dry, and he licked his lips, trying to find a way to answer her statement.

“I don’t remember,” he finally said.

With a sad smile, she nodded, then swallowed. “Sergei said they tried to help you get away from HYDRA about a year before you were recognized, so he betrayed them, and turned them over to the man who was your handler in America. They processed you to perform the execution, wanting them to be an example to anyone else who thought of helping you. Sergei took me back to Russia in 2014 and forced me to be his wife. A year ago, someone contacted him, said they found you here, in New York, because of the Flag Smashers. He came back here with me and my daughter. You must leave before they find you.”

“You’re coming with me,” said Bucky. “I saw how he treated you and I’m not leaving you here.”

A genuine smile appeared on her face, but she shook her head. “He’ll find me. He always does. If I’m with you, then he’ll find you and he will say the words to turn you.”

“They don’t work anymore,” replied Bucky. “I’m in control and I will never be their weapon again. Katrina, you’re terrified of him, and it won’t be long before he turns his anger on your daughter. You know that, right?”

She nodded her head slightly. “He was angry that I didn’t give him a child for so long, then he was angry it wasn’t a son. She’s only three but she already knows he’s not to be trusted.”

“I have friends,” said Bucky. “We’ll protect you. Please.”

She considered his plea, studying his face for some time, then nodded and went into the bedroom, to pack for herself and her daughter, Anna. When she was finished packing, she came back out to the kitchen, stopping in front of a locked cabinet. She looked at Bucky’s left hand.

“Can you break the lock?” she asked.

“Why?”

“I need what’s in here,” she said. “It’s a supplement that Anna and I take every day, during breakfast. Sergei said if we don’t take it then our health will suffer. I don’t know if that’s entirely true, but I don’t want to take any chances.”

Taking hold of the lock in his left hand, Bucky twisted it, tearing it off the door. Katrina opened it to show several unmarked boxes. She pulled them out, then took an already opened bottle that had English handwriting on it. Suppressants for Subject Alpha / Delta / 1. She looked up at Bucky.

“I think I’m Subject Alpha / Delta / 1. Sergei would never say but I know he took these from the base outside Washington and hid them with someone. We were almost out of them in Russia, because he started giving them to Anna about a year ago, and this is all that’s left here.”

“We’ll take them all,” said Bucky, looking for a cloth shopping bag and placing all the boxes and the single bottle inside.

He took the bag and the suitcase, while she picked up Anna. With a final shudder at the cheap accommodations, she went through the door without a backwards look. They walked to the nearest train station, boarding it, and getting off near his flat. Even dressed as they were nobody gave them a second look. They waited briefly in the shadows, while Bucky scanned the area around his residence. Satisfied that nothing was out of place he escorted her into the building, and up the elevator to his floor. Once they were inside, he put her suitcase in the bedroom, pulling out some sweatpants and a T-shirt for himself to wear.

“You and your daughter take the bed,” he said. “I’ll take the couch. Tomorrow, I’ll take you someplace safe, I promise.”

“Soldier,” she began.

He interrupted her. “My name is James Buchanan Barnes. You can call me Bucky. I’m not the Winter Soldier anymore.” He took a ragged breath. “I’m sorry for what I did to your parents. I don’t remember it, but I never had a choice in any of my missions. I still did it, and I accept that responsibility.”

“Bucky,” she said, then she smiled. “I never blamed you for their deaths. You were just the weapon they used.” She looked at her daughter. “I should get her to bed but I would like to talk to you after. Can we do that?”

He nodded and as she prepared the child for sleep, he changed out of his clothing into his comfortable clothes. When she came out of the bedroom, and closed the door, she was also changed, wearing a long-sleeved nightgown. Bucky handed her a throw from the couch as she sat at one end of it and him the other. It took several moments of awkward silence, but he finally turned to her.

“Who were your parents?”

“Irina and Pavel Medvedev, technicians; Papa worked on the cryogenics crew while Mama worked on your arm. They were brought here from Russia, and I was born here in 1998. I didn’t see you often, but when I did, you would watch me. One time, I was playing outside the base building near Washington, as you were escorted out. The guards were ready to kick me out of the way, but you stopped them, even pushed the one man into a fence. Then you waited while I picked up my toys. After that, it seemed like you always watched out for me. We never spoke or interacted that I can remember, but you wouldn’t let them bully me or abuse me.”

“I had a sister,” said Bucky. “13 years younger than me. Maybe you reminded me of her. You’re 26 years old now?” She nodded. “Where were you when your parents were working?”

“I was allowed to go to regular high school,” she smiled. “My parents tried to shield me as much as possible and give me a normal life, but I knew it wasn’t a good place. I always had people watching me, making sure I didn’t say anything about the base, or my parents’ work, or you. Pierce even came to see me several times.” She became solemn then and her lips trembled. “He did say I had a purpose and that when I graduated from high school, I would be brought into the fold. It didn’t happen as he was killed, you escaped, and HYDRA fell apart. That’s when Sergei came and took me away. He said I would be arrested but he could get me to safety. It didn’t take long for me to realize that he was a liar but by then I was in Russia, couldn’t speak the language very well, and he had my American passport.”

“He’s abused you since then, hasn’t he?” asked Bucky.

She nodded. “I was to dress modestly, behave as if I were invisible, don’t speak unless I was spoken to, cook, clean, and keep his house, then submit to him whenever he demanded it. That has been my life for ten years. I had resigned myself to living this way forever.”

The sound of defeat in her voice both saddened and angered him. Yes, her parents were HYDRA but obviously they were not true believers, not if they tried to help him, or they protected her from what was really happening.

“What did Sergei do for HYDRA?” he asked.

“He was part of the guard detail on you,” she answered. “He didn’t like you and I would hear my parents talk of how he would torment you when he thought no one was watching. Several times, he mentioned doing things to you … terrible things that I’m ashamed to repeat.”

“Don’t say them. I have access to the HYDRA files, and I’ll look it up if I want to know. I remember almost all of my victims, but I don’t remember them so either they were wiped completely from my memories or … or they weren’t my victims.”

She shifted more towards him when he said that. “I saw you do it. Pierce ordered everyone to witness it. He said it was an object lesson.”

He looked away, feeling shame that she had been forced to see that when she was so young.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I was responsible for so much death.”

“Bucky, even I knew you had no choice.”

When Katrina began yawning, he encouraged her to go to bed. They could talk more in the morning. Once she was in the bedroom Bucky texted her name, her age, and her parent’s names to Sam, telling him of their HYDRA connection. Then he laid back on his couch, using a cushion for his pillow, and the throw blanket for his cover. It was some time before he fell asleep as he kept thinking there was more to her than even she knew. She was familiar to him, that was certain.

He woke to the touch of a very small but soft hand on his cheek. Opening his eyes, he found himself looking at the face of 3-year-old Anna, who smiled at him.

“Hello,” he said. “What are you doing up?”

“Toast,” she declared. “I want toast.”

“Okay,” he said, standing up. He looked at the time. It was early but not too early for him. “Let’s get you some toast.”

She waited for him to get off the couch and he sat her on a dining chair, telling her to stay while he went to the bathroom. When he came out, she was still sitting patiently. He opened his freezer, pulling out a couple of slices of bread, popping them into the toaster. Since he didn’t know if she had a peanut allergy, he took a jar of strawberry jam out of the fridge.

“You like jam?” he asked. She nodded her head. “Milk?” She nodded her head again. He had another thought while they waited for the toast. “Do you have to go to the bathroom?”

“Yes,” she said, sliding off backwards from the chair.

Taking her hand, he took her to the bathroom, then took a look under her nightgown, noticing she wore a pull up diaper that was wet. Looking away, he slid the diaper off, then sat her on the toilet. Folding up the wet diaper, he put it in the garbage, then opened the door to the bedroom, where Katrina was still asleep. Inside the open suitcase were several unused diapers and he grabbed one, closing the door quietly behind him. When he got back to the bathroom, Anna was still sitting there.

“Are you done?” he asked. “Did you do number 1 or number 2?”

“Number 1,” she answered, putting up one finger. “Toilet paper, please.”

He took some off the roll and handed it to her, looking away while she took care of that, then he put the pull up over her feet, before lifting her off and pulling it up the rest of the way. She stepped close to the toilet to flush it, then smiled at him.

“Good girl,” he said. “Wash your hands.”

He squeezed some liquid soap on her hands, then watched, amused, as she rubbed them together to distribute it. Turning on the water, he held her up so she could rinse the soap off her hands, then dried them with a towel. By the time they got back out to the kitchen the toast was up and he spread jam on it, then cut the slices into quarters, poured her some milk and watched as she devoured the food.

“More?” she asked.

“Do you like eggs?” he asked, thinking some protein would fill her up.

“Yes.”

She smiled sweetly at him, so he pulled the carton of eggs out and made her a cheese omelet, cutting it into pieces for her. While she ate, he made himself an omelet, dicing some onions, peppers, and ham into it, along with the cheese that he always bought pre-shredded. By the time he finished making it she was done, and she looked at him again.

“More please.”

“You’re still hungry?”

She nodded and he kneeled down to her level, looking closely at her. Her eyes were slightly different from the previous evening, as if a different colour was bleeding through. Not only that, he was very aware of her scent, of how much she smelled like her mother, but there was also something else there, something familiar. He cut his omelet up into small bits and moved the plate in front of her, watching as she ate the whole thing.

“Anna, where is she?”

Katrina was standing in the bedroom doorway, almost panicking, then appeared relieved when she saw her daughter. Bucky stood up and looked closely at the woman, noticing changes in her as well, particularly in her eyes. They had started changing colour, just very subtly.

“What?” she asked, noticing how he stared at her. “What’s wrong?”

“Your eyes are changing colour,” he replied. “Both of you. Anna’s also very hungry and has eaten more than an adult for breakfast.”

“Did you give her a pill?”

“No, I didn’t think of it,” he said, watching as Katrina took the bottle out of the shopping bag and removed a green pill from it.

She looked for a glass, filling it with water then offered the pill to Anna, watching carefully as she took it and drank the glass of water. She took one herself then continued to watch Anna carefully, especially in the eyes and began acting normally again as the girl’s eyes went back to their dark brown colour.

“Next time, make sure she has it before you feed her,” she said to Bucky. “Otherwise, she will have a tantrum as her hunger takes over.”

“Who are you, really?” He stared at her, noticing her eyes were also returning to their original colour. “That child ate as much food as I do, and both of your eyes were changing colour, and are now going back to their original colour.

“I don’t really know who I am,” she admitted, seeming distressed. “Everything I told you last night is what I know or remember. Yes, sometimes we get hungry, very hungry to the point of eating everything we can see. I can control it, but Anna is just a child and if she doesn’t get what she wants then she has a tantrum. I don’t know what happens if her tantrum gets out of control because Sergei never let it get that far. There is so much that I had questions about, but he never gave me an answer.”

“Then I’ll take you to someone who can find out the truth,” he said.

He wanted to believe her. Everything in his training indicated she was telling the truth but there was something off about her and the child. Perhaps, it was something that was deliberately kept from her as she grew up. There was only one way to find out and that was going to involve a bit of a drive. He was going to take them to the compound.

Part 2>>

Series masterlist

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[blueeyedrat]

Steam Next Fest, winter 2024. Just when you're starting to get into a groove with a project, something new comes up to distract you. So it goes.

This one was all over the map — some games I really liked, a few that were kind of a letdown, and a few that were just sort of there. I think this is the first time a batch of demos has removed more items from my Steam wishlist than it's added. More detailed (though perhaps less organized) thoughts under the cut.

Okay so Balatro doesn't really count, I've been playing the demo for this game for months at this point, but I want to mention it anyway. It's a deckbuilder in the purest sense: you're given a plain deck of cards and tasked with scoring points via poker hands, accumulating a variety of buffs and modifiers to literally rig the deck in your favor. It is perhaps the most make number go up game I have played in a good while, and it's addicting as heck. I know some folks who will be playing the full version nonstop when it comes out later this month, and I might be one of 'em.

As far as city/settlement builders go, I don't think Synergy is jumping to the front of the queue when it has to compete with the likes of Laysara or The Wandering Village, but it does have some neat ideas. I do enjoy when I get to treat this sort of builder like a puzzle of sorts, fitting all of the pieces together, and the ways this demo asked me to do so on both small and large scale were just interesting enough to pique my curiosity. Might be worth a look in the future.

Now, a quick rundown of the demos that didn't land quite as well: Planetiles and Kamaeru had charming aesthetics, but the UI in both games felt a bit clunky and the gameplay left me wanting a bit more substance. Train Valley World moved away from the gameplay I enjoyed in the previous two entries in the series, in favor of something I'm not particularly interested in. There were a few other games I found while putting together my list this time around, but either bounced off of (Electrogical, Bounties of Babylon) or didn't get enough to pass judgement (Omnibullet, Overmorrow), so I may need to revisit them later.

Somewhere in the middle, I'd say, was Aarik and the Ruined Kingdom, a Monument Valley-esque puzzle game. It was… alright. I liked it, I just liked most of the other stuff I tried more. I need to sit down and play Monument Valley at some point.

There are two games on this list I'm torn on. Flock is a cute exploration game that reminds me of Sky: Children of the Light and charmed me in very similar ways. Customizing a character, flying around, and observing the game's colorful ecosystem was a lot of fun. Botany Manor is a puzzle game somewhere between The Witness and Return of the Obra Dinn, where you gather clues in your environment and use them to piece together answers to a central puzzle — in this case, figuring out how to make various plants grow. Some neat ideas to be had here.

I really liked both of these demos! But both of them ran into the same problem: I get motion-sick kind of easily, and there's a small subset of video games that make me dizzy if I play them for too long (and sometimes "too long" is, like, five minutes). To its credit, Botany Manor acknowledges this and has options to make it more accessible… but if there's a specific configuration of camera settings that doesn't give me a literal headache, I didn't find it. It's really frustrating that some of the games I enjoyed the most in this list are ones I'm not sure I can physically handle in the long term. I'll keep an eye on them, but… we'll see.

Moving on. Duck Detective is another "fill in the blanks" mystery in the vein of Case of the Golden Idol or the aforementioned Obra Dinn. It's a much more humorous and lighthearted take on the idea, and while the demo was pretty short, it gave a decent enough look at the gameplay and style that I'm interested in what lies beyond.

#BLUD immediately stands out for its hyper-cartoony art style, which it definitely leans into (it's got episode title cards, for crying out loud). It backs up that style with some charming writing and a decent Zelda-ish mix of exploration and dungeon crawling. I'm not sure the combat entirely clicked with me, especially early on before your character gets a proper weapon, but I still liked the demo well enough overall.

Crypt Custodian also took some time to grow on me, but when I did get into a groove I wound up having a pretty good time with it. It's a top-down 'vania — my closest comparison would be Hyper Light Drifter, with character progression and looser movement closer to something like Ori or Hollow Knight. It was a bit of a gauntlet at first, and didn't always give you a lot of direction (apparently that's an upgrade you need to unlock), but once I got a few more options for movement and combat it felt like I could handle most of what it was throwing at me. Seems fun.

For a more direct comparison to Ori, we close out with Tales of Kenzera. This was one of the other highlights of the bunch for me. The movement and combat felt good and offered a lot of options up front, and kept adding more throughout the demo — similar to Ori, it's not the tightest and prioritizes spectacle over precision, but the level and encounter design never asks for too much. The art, animation, and voice work are all excellent, and the story (drawing inspiration from Bantu folklore) shows a lot of promise. I'm interested to see where this one goes, for sure.

[agentrouka-blog]

I will admit, I’ve never read the books (for SHAME, I know) and have only seen the show and read many analyses by all you lovely folks (I like my happy little pro Sansa & Jon/Jonsa corner), so the question I’m about to ask might be silly.

I get Varys’ endgame - he wants Aegon (aka a king he has influence over/he thinks will be good) in charge. And that’s been his plan since AGOT, IIRC. But… what do you think was Littlefinger’s plan at the start? Did he even have one? Or was it just “chaos is a ladder” and he was winging it? We know he convinced Lysa to Poison Jon Arryn and place the blame on the Lannisters… was he hoping Ned would make it to the Capitol, let his honor get him killed, and then that would open up Cat for marriage? He tells Lysa he’s only ever loved Cat, but even so I don’t know what a marriage to Cat would get him… He’s always wanted her so there’s satisfaction in that, but would that be enough for a power hungry man like LF? I doubt it. And killing off sickly sweetrobin is one thing, but Cat had three healthy boys so it’s not like he could reasonably get that warden position. Obviously, at some point his plan became “get Sansa the North, Riverlands, and the Vale and become her consort,” but I find it hard to believe that was his plan from the very start… I’m rambling now so I’ll shut up, but would love to know your thoughts on it??

Hi there!

First of all:

(We shame because we love. <3 )

That out of the way, I think Littlefinger’s main motivation with Ned is not gaining power through a marriage to Catelyn. As you describe, that’s an impossibility. 

I’d say it’s simple revenge, alongside the intention to destabilize the kingdoms to create some of that much-desired chaos for ladder purposes. 

Petyr Baelish was a charity ward in a High Lord’s castle, and the effect of growing up in such an environment, the wealth and opportunity and power he witnessed without being able to fully partake - and the ease with which he was expelled - left a deep wound and an insatiable ambition. 

He challenged Brandon Stark (!) for Catelyn’s hand, perhaps because he believed she slept with him that one time, perhaps because he genuninely believed (like Quentyn) the power of a good story would be enough to overcome reality, and their classist society and give him his dream. Instead he was beaten to a pulp and then thrown out on his still-recovering butt two weeks later when Lysa spilled the beans about the pregnancy to Hoster. 

Everyone thought it was because of that stupid duel with Brandon Stark, but that wasn't so. (ASOS, Sansa VII)

He was completely humiliated and reminded of “his place”, and had only Lysa’s infatuation left to capitalize on. Which he did thoroughly. A slow climb based on flexibly taking advantage of every opportunity he could identify. Once the pieces lined up, he could get to work on doing to them what was done to him. 

Littlefinger gets Ned killed - killed and humiliated and publicly stripped of his honor: the guy who got Catelyn, brother to the guy who physically humiliated him. But he also destroys Catelyn’s happiness, her family, her peace. He may have loved her, and he certainly uses that sentiment as a weapon to hurt Lysa in her final moments, but it’s not his motivation to be with Catelyn now. 

He transferred that past obsession onto someone new, and incorporated that into his plan to destroy his past “enemies” Tully and Stark, while at the same time making her a potential puzzle piece to gaining power through her (as of yet potential) inheritance. 

Reason 1: her look and her family connection (easily controlled replacement Catelyn)

When Sansa finally looked up, a man was standing over her, staring. He was short, with a pointed beard and a silver streak in his hair, almost as old as her father. "You must be one of her daughters," he said to her. He had grey-green eyes that did not smile when his mouth did. "You have the Tully look."

"I'm Sansa Stark," she said, ill at ease. The man wore a heavy cloak with a fur collar, fastened with a silver mockingbird, and he had the effortless manner of a high lord, but she did not know him. "I have not had the honor, my lord." 

Septa Mordane quickly took a hand. "Sweet child, this is Lord Petyr Baelish, of the king's small council."

"Your mother was my queen of beauty once," the man said quietly. His breath smelled of mint. "You have her hair." His fingers brushed against her cheek as he stroked one auburn lock. Quite abruptly he turned and walked away. (AGOT, Sansa II)

Reason 2: her romanticism, which is thoroughly unlike Catelyn and feeds into the fantasies he harbored as a boy.

Lord Baelish stroked his little pointed beard and said, "Nothing? Tell me, child, why would you have sent Ser Loras?"

Sansa had no choice but to explain about heroes and monsters. The king's councillor smiled. "Well, those are not the reasons I'd have given, but …" He had touched her cheek, his thumb lightly tracing the line of a cheekbone. "Life is not a song, sweetling. You may learn that one day to your sorrow."

Sansa did not feel like telling all that to Jeyne, however; it made her uneasy just to think back on it. (AGOT, Sansa III)

Reason 3: the Bael the Bard move. 

One day in his bitterness he called Bael a craven who preyed only on the weak. When word o' that got back, Bael vowed to teach the lord a lesson. (ACOK, Jon VI) 

He was humiliated so he’ll humiliate them back, by stealing the daughter of his enemies (Tully and Stark) and making her his, claiming their legacy and turning it into his own. 

He has pragmatic, political reasons to use Sansa as a pawn, but his inability to control himself around her, his uninvited touching gives away that he is personally invested.  

That’s what will break his neck eventually. He’ll trip into vastly overestimating himself like he did with Brandon, and this time no one will beg to spare him. Not because that boy back then deserved to be crushed by feudal hierarchy, but because he allowed himself to become a monster because of his bitterness and caused vast death and destruction. 

[the-larxist-manifesto]

GameGirl31 ~ Dr. Mario

It's Dr. Mario time. We all know it. We've all played it (even if you don't remember how or why). We all are a little more than confused by its existence.

Let me briefly tell my story with Dr. Mario. When I was just a girl—at a time where my only video games were whatever random N64 and PS1 games my parents owned—I really looked forward to the occasional visit to my gamer aunt and uncle's house. Having extended family who are into video games is just the coolest feeling as a child, when all other grown-ups do only boring stuff like reading and fishing trips. During one fateful day out with my aunt, I was gifted my very own Nintendo DS Lite—the first console I felt was truly mine. An amazing feature of my silver DS, I would come to find, was backwards compatibility with GameBoy Advance games! And one of the first games I received to test it out was a little combo cartridge called Dr. Mario & Puzzle League

My actual childhood Dr. Mario & Puzzle League cartridge! (alongside my physical copy of GB Dr. Mario :p)

I'll be blunt here: I hated Dr. Mario. Its companion, Puzzle League, was (excuse my pun) leagues better, offering tons of single player puzzles, customization options, and a catchy as hell soundtrack—in addition to its multiplayer connectivity! Dr. Mario, sadly, only contained a couple of variations on endless mode; not much fun to be had for a child with no link cable to play with friends. Dr. Mario seemed too... simple. Only 3 colors? All you do is clear viruses? Nah, I was above this game.

And that was the last time I ever played Dr. Mario.

UNTIL NOW.

~Earning my PhD~

I began playing this game with the standard GameGirl procedure; playing a few rounds to get accustomed to the new environment, checking out the manual, conducting a small amount of personal research, and then setting goals to beat the game. The manual offered the usual gallery of fun official art and basic tutorial, but it didn't contain anything I didn't already know. That is, except one interesting detail that caught my attention.

Let me ask you a question that was at the forefront of my mind at this time: how do I "beat" Dr. Mario? An endless, arcade-style puzzle game with no story? The manual, Dr. Mario himself, had the answer.

Pay special attention to the second bullet point. I'll see "something special?" It's so ambiguous yet so enticing, and with such a difficult condition to discover whatever it was, I couldn't hold myself back. I knew that my destiny was to complete the game on the highest difficulty on the highest speed setting.

To do this, I put about 10 hours of work into practicing this game; matching colors, creating combos, managing junk pills, refining my reflexes, always looking at the next piece coming up, and then the one after that. I learned some very valuable techniques for getting far in this game. Always having at least one column available with each of the three colors is extremely helpful when you're given a pill (or, when you're unlucky, three or four in a row) of a color that simply does not match the current trouble virus. You must put care into placing each and every pill. You must be cunning to attack viruses from above, below, from the sides, or even a falling combo. You must be dexterous on the higher speeds, shifting pills across the bottle and rotating it twice in less than a second.

When I finally accomplished my first milestone, I was met with a scene I'd never witnessed before. A tranquil, wide open ocean floor...

The viruses sit there, watching the occasional sea life drift by. The sea appears so lonely...

~Dr. Mario master~

Yes, my goals for this game primarily entailed clearing levels at the highest difficulty. Specifically, I considered the game "beaten" if I cleared MED speed levels 5, 10, 15, and 20, and I considered it "100% completed" if I cleared HI speed levels 5, 10, 15, and 20. But what about the actual game? Was it fun? Worth becoming so competent at playing?

Unsurprisingly, this is the simplest and shortest GB title yet. I placed it here in the challenge as sort of a break from larger adventures, after all. The visuals are quite simple; beyond the initial gag of Mario dressed up in a lab coat, there isn't much to look at. The viruses do a funny little dance at the bottom of the screen, then get knocked over and blipped out of existence as you clear them. The game has a total of 6 unique songs: one for mode select, the iconic Fever and Chill that you may choose for gameplay, jingles for winning in multiplayer or setting up a combo of four or more, and then a special song for the special something after clearing one of the four MED or HI speed levels. The songs will easily get stuck in your head, and the special song was well worth earning each time I arrived at the bottom of the infested sea. The blips and bloops of gameplay will sometimes match up PERFECTLY with the gameplay themes; its like the composition is playing together with you, as well as being solid tunes that have been hummed by fans and remade by Nintendo for decades to come. They did a good job with the sound design, overall!

I guess my biggest gripe is... the overall concept of Dr. Mario? I still find it a bit too simple, even after all this time. There aren't many reasons to come back to it, if you aren't attempting the insane feat of 100% completion. The main draw of this game is the multiplayer and hoping that the satisfying falling-block match-4 formula keeps players hooked long enough to keep coming back when bored. But sadly, there isn't much versatility with the mechanics. Where other puzzle games contain a higher variety of pieces (Tetris), or greater combo opportunity (Puyo Puyo), or slicker visuals (Meteos), or some other wacky gimmick to keep you continuously exploring (Meteos again)... Dr. Mario falls short of a cure-all for boredom.

For the sake of this challenge, I did try out the multiplayer with a friend! A very cool feature of the NSO retro games is being able to connect with friends online, and play as if you were sitting across from each other with a link cable! In this game, you and your competitor (did you know that's what COM stands for? Competitor? Not "computer," as I always thought) race to clear the bottle of viruses before the other. The multiplayer does contain some unique visuals, including an indicator for how many remaining viruses your competitor needs to clear or how many wins you've accumulated (best three out of five).

Shoutouts to @br00f for playing with me! She beat me in a best of five that went all the way to game 5... and I have to call her Dr. Broof from now on...

~Conclusion~

In a vacuum, Dr. Mario is a well-made, fun, fast-paced puzzle game with some cool cutscenes and music to discover if you become skilled enough. Compared to other puzzle games, I find it a bit lacking in single-player content. I also think that the concept is a bit bare-bones, especially in this first iteration. Not much to accomplish beyond basic combos and managing three colors; it's almost too simple even for a casual player (as we witnessed in the Dr. Mario & Puzzle League anecdote).

Granted, I've never played the newer iterations of Dr. Mario. Maybe they've come up with more ways to shake up the formula? I won't be pursuing it anytime soon, I'm afraid; Dr. Mario just isn't for me. I can acknowledge it as a very important and solid GB title, worthy of being a member of the NSO library. That's about it.

Recommend? Sure, try it. It's probably as good as any other version of Dr. Mario

Oh, and I did manage to 100% complete the game! Check it out!

Look! All the viruses have been cleared away, the ocean flows freely with life once again~

[positivelyruined]

How I See Mita | happy golden birthday, lolu! 20 years old on the 20th of May @lorcandidlucienwill

Animal 🦊 FOX

The phrase “cunning as a fox” came about for a reason. Nearly every culture regards the fox as stealthy, and smart. However, their intelligence is related to their comfort. As creatures, they become incredibly well-acclimated to their surroundings and can navigate with surprising speed. Immediately, Fox represents the elusive and mysterious adaptability to dwell in difficult environments, but never lose their playful edge.

Place 🌌 TOYAMA BAY, JAPAN

Toyama Bay, Japan is one of the few locations worldwide where you can see the inner workings of nature lit from below — instead of above. Most blue beaches are the result of bioluminescent algae, but in Toyama, the bright glow is caused by an active gathering of the Firefly Squid. The species glows at night, lighting the beaches, and attract visitors from near and far.

Flower 🐯💐 TIGER LILY

The Tiger Lily is a bright, eye catching addition to any flower garden. However, these striking blooms are more than just aesthetically pleasing. They also hold significant spiritual and symbolic meaning throughout history. In many ancient cultures, Tiger Lily flowers were considered sacred. The bright orange color of the petals is an embodiment of life energy and was thought to represent creativity and passion. Tiger Lily flowers were often used in rituals as an offering to invoke healing, protection, and good fortune.

Character 🪷 KATE SHARMA

Ah, Kathani Sharma — a quick-witted, bold, and stubborn heroine — who puzzles Anthony Bridgerton to his very end. Kate possesses a true essence of independence, which was rare for women of her time. Positioning herself as an outsider in the ton made it much easier for her to handle the sharp words of those who disagreed with her fiercely formed opinions. Underneath her sharp exterior is a deeply loyal sister, dedicated friend, and passionate woman. Her story is a journey of learning to respect her own needs and desires after a lifetime of putting others first.

Season 🍁 AUTUMN

The beauty of Autumn is in the change. Autumn’s fiery colors are embraced around the world; but they are not the only part of it which holds beauty. Autumn is the blender on a painter’s palette, taking all the best of both summer and winter, and merging their drastically different elements into warm and comforting creations. Apple Cider, anyone?

Hobby 🗺️ ADVENTURING

Adventure is the call to action, no matter where, no matter when. The hardiest of souls can find adventure within the great scope of nature or in the quiet lore of an old bookshop. Wherever they go, adventurers bring with them a sense of excitement for whatever lies ahead. Don’t let them get bored — they can cause trouble when not properly occupied.

Color 💃🏻 MAROON

“And I chose you

The one I was dancing with in New York

No shoes

Looked up at the sky and it was

So scarlet, it was maroon.”

MAROON — Taylor Swift

Gemstone 💎 AMBER

Amber frequently holds once living things, so the ancients believed that amber possessed the essence of life itself. Colored with the drops of the sun, there is little question as to why. Its warm beauty is still associated with positive energy, warmth, and connection.

Food 🥟 SAMOSAS

Samosas are a triangular shaped, South Asian pastry filled with spiced potatoes, meat, or fish. They can be served as an entree, appetizer, or snack. Their origin dates back to the Medieval Times, in the Middle East.

[papillon82fluttersby]

FFAN Wrap-Up & Recs

Introductory post

Masterpost

This concludes our foray into Famous Five vintage (and not-so-vintage) art!

I started this project about a year and a half ago and I’m very pleased to have brought it to its conclusion. I ultimately got more ambitious that I imagined at the start, and managed to gather physical copies from almost every edition from the 1950s to the 1980s (I also have a few from the 1990s onwards, but I didn’t make a concerted effort to find them all as they rarely contain original inside illustrations, and the cover art can be found online). The only physical book I know I’m missing is one from the Swiss publisher with Umberto Nonna’s illustrations. If it so happens that I find a copy of this book – or any additional editions that I don’t currently know of – I will make an additional post to the FFAN series, but until then I’m calling it done!

You can expect three more posts over the next few days focusing on the Five enjoying fun outdoorsy activities to accompany you into summertime! 🎒🏕️🏖️🌞

And to wrap thing up, I thought I’d share some light about my favourite books from both Blyton’s and Voilier’s series.

From Enid Blyton’s original series:

#10 Five On A Hike Together: I love how the action is condensed over five days, with the events leading smoothly one to the other. The children were just going on a carefree hike, when they inadvertently get pulled into a mystery and solve a puzzling “treasure map”. They get to show their wits, be self-reliant, outsmart the bad guys, and find the treasure just in time before going back to school, all the while enjoying the lovely scenery of the countryside in the fall! Dick and Anne also get their special moment in the spotlight, which doesn't happen in many of the books.

#03 Five Run Away Together: The first adventure where the Five go off on their own for an extended period of time without any adults around. I think this one appealed to me when I was a child because of the fantasy of running away from ill-meaning adults and thriving on their own. (Just to be clear, I did not personally live in an environment where I was faced with ill-meaning adults, so this wasn’t wish-fulfilment. But I do remember several books that I particularly liked and that were focused on a teen protagonist(s) running away and living for a time on their own away from adults, so this is clearly a storyline that appealed to me.) I also like how, this being early in the series, George tends to respond to things on her own, because she’s used to being an only child, and needs to get some sense knocked into her to realise that she now has three cousins who have her back.

#04 Five Go To Smuggler’s Top: A spectacular, spooky scenery for a baffling mystery. The secondary characters (Block, Mr Barling, Mr Lenoir, and of course Sooty) are particularly memorable!

#19 Five Go To Demon’s Rocks: Once again I like that the children are going away on their own (at least I’m consistent in my preferences! 😅), and the scenery of the lighthouse is spectacular! I do think that the resolution is a bit of a let-down with the children finding the treasure pretty much by chance. But it is followed by a thrilling climax at the top of the lighthouse in a storm!

#07 Five Go Off To Camp: This book is just a very good mix of humour and mystery. Mr Luffy is also a very entertaining character and I wouldn’t have minded seeing him in more books!

Honourable mentions to #01 Five On A Treasure Island, the book which opens the series and in which our main characters first meet; #08 Five Get Into Trouble, which only didn’t make it into my top five because I find Richard annoying (which is entirely the point of this character); #15 Five On A Secret Trail, whose plot I like but which again gets bumped a few spots down because I find the whole “twins” plot twist very quickly annoying; and #18 Five On Finniston Farm, with its charming scenery but ultimately very thin plot.

From Claude Voilier’s continuation series:

#LC23 Les Cinq et le trésor du pirate: I had not read this book as a child and it was a really nice discovery. As I mentioned in the detailed post, this book felt much better written than a lot of the other books in the continuation series, making for a very entertaining read. I can absolutely recommend it if you want dip your toes into Voilier’s series. (Although, well, this is one of the few books that were never translated into English, so you’ll have to make do with the original French! 😉)

#LC18 Les Cinq et le trésor de Roquépine: This one was a favourite back when I was a child, and the nostalgia remains strong to this day. What can I say, I do love the treasure hunt trope! 🤷🏻‍♀️

#LC11 Les Cinq dans la cité secrète: Also a childhood favourite, this one for the Indiana Jones vibes!

#LC07 Les Cinq contre le Masque Noir: Another recent discovery. I liked the wide cast of characters/suspects, and the Five striking them off their list one by one based on their sleuthing. I did, however, figure out who the real culprit was really early on, so that did diminish the impact of the ultimate plot twist. (But I do wonder if I would have figured it out if I had read this book as a pre-teen/teen and not as an adult.)

#LC08 Les Cinq et le galion d’or: Several fun twists with the customary treasure being found by the children very early on, but stolen again, and the mystery being where the thieves keep moving it to. But points docked off for the resolution being due to a stroke of luck rather than the children getting to use their wits.

Honourable mentions to #LC20 Les Cinq jouent serré due to several genuinely funny moments; and #LC21 Les Cinq contre les fantômes, for its mystery aura.

~~~~~~

Thanks for reading!

[miirshroom]

Elden Ring: Miyazaki's Undiscovered Element

Here's my pitch: puzzle type #3 from The Witness (2016)

The first type of puzzle in The Witness is the one that the game is marketed for - a series of line puzzles on panels. The second type I won't spoil here. The third type is otherwise known as "perspective easter eggs". I am at this point reasonably certain that this is the so-called "last secret" of Elden Ring, or at least part of it.

Firstly, to clear things up Miyazaki did not say that there was "one last secret" - that was a clickbait title invented by articles a few degrees removed from the original interview. The quote as presented in the IGN article is as follows:

“For me personally, there is a small element that I feel has not yet been discovered. So, whether that’s up to user interpretation or up to just further investigation and playing, that’s something I’m looking forward to....I think it’s a question of when and not if, but there may be something small still missing.”

Points of Comparison with The Witness: Forced Perspective

Here are some examples of what these perspective tricks look like in the Witness:

The statue in the foreground and the one far away on the mountain appear to be reaching for each other. The petrified man reaches for a gold chalice forever out of reach, but his shadow already holds the cup. A pair of wings is hung up in a window frame and you can pose your character in front. A small twig stands in front of a window and only from inside the building does it have a canopy made of cloud.

I have noticed similar set pieces in the environments of Elden Ring:

But here is where I think that Elden Ring diverges from the Witness. Simply finding these satisfying setpieces is half of the work, and the other half is puzzling over the meaning of the perspective, in the context of place and time.

Going through Castle Morne and thinking on what is in the field of view while standing in front of the wooden artillery boards with the metal wing decals. For example, there is a chamber to the left upon entering Castle Morne with no items or enemies inside it. Across from the entrance there is one of these boards. And looking into the little room from the perspective of a person desiring wings, you can see the significant thing about the room: two of the fire spewing dragon shaped flamethrowers that are not used at Castle Morne but are in use at Stormveil. Further examining the room, this is a manufacturing workshop for them.

The bald man cultivating one bud from a crucible producing many sunflower buds is menaced by a shadowy figure emerging from the firey Mt. Gelmir. Is there more to be observed with this one? Probably, as this set of figures occurs several times in sequence and the column with spear-holding figure appears in various states of repair. Something that I have noted is that there is a spike in complexity of these types of observations upon reaching Altus Plateau.

Another Elden Ring Innovation: Visions of Collectible Items

But let's say you are unconvinced about any particular meaning behind lining up a nice photograph at any statue. Here are some examples of scenes built around using items in the environment that can be interacted with:

Heading east of the Abandoned Coffin site of grace and up the hillside there is a place on the right-hand side just near the cliff with 1 carriage stacked on 2 others. At the top corner there is a purple soul item - which is a nascent butterfly. The camera can be angled so that it looks like the soul of the broken golem on the ground below.

Of other uses of nascent butterflies, there's the collapsing cliff at the Chapel of Anticipation - the goal is so close yet out of reach. There's a Wormface in the area under the bridge where Gold Mask first appears that is sobbing in front of a pool of water filled with gold fireflies and slugs, and directly across the pool from the Wormface there is a group of Nascent Butterflies.

And involving Scorched Butterflies: in the small Kaiden Mercenary encampment in Limgrave one of them is sitting and sleeping in front of the fire. Sneaking up and standing directly on top of the Herba behind him, there appears to be a soul item emerging from the stack of fire kindling on the left. The Scorched Butterflies here do not remain over the fire, but instead drift between fire and kindling. The item is actually obtained from a corpse behind the firewood and is the Armorer's Cookbook [1] that allows crafting of Fire Grease and Fireproof Dried Liver.

There is another notable place on the beach in Limgrave looking north where a Kaiden Raider seems to grieve over a corpse in its funeral pyre. A soul item "white flesh" emerges from the corpse, while Scorched Butterflies seem to rise above the flames and towards the Chapel of Anticipation in the distance. From standing at the location of the corpse, the sun sets beyond a rotten boat sitting on the shore.

The Last Sights of Dead Men: Iterating on Dark Souls

"There were once heroes who walked the battlefields, abundantly blessed by the Erdtree itself, who upon earning their honor simply died." - Hero's Rune

It is not uncommon to find corpses simply lying out in the open in many places in Elden Ring and holding "soul" items - by which I mean that they resemble the design of souls in the Dark Souls games. Some of these are unique weapons or key items, and some hold something more mundane like a handful of Stormhawk feathers. What were they looking at when they died? What are they running towards or away from? Standing on top of them, is there anything in the surrounding landscape that is perfectly aligned with another thing in a way that seems deliberate? Items in this game represent concepts - what insights did these dead men reach that caused them and the items they hold to be abandoned by the Greater Will and simply die in place?

In the Weeping Peninsula there is a group of 4 angry jellyfish standing around 3 chairs with 2 corpses on the beach to east of Castle Morne. Looking towards the Weeping Peninsula Minor Erdtree with back against the middle chair (corpse holding Arteria Leaf), there is a visual illusion with the cliffside and wall turret that makes it look to be sitting in a little pot (this is the image used at the top of the post). This draws some connection between the genesis of the Erdtree and pots - a crucible is a type of pot. What is this little scene saying about the Crucible era? Another prominent feature here is that Morne Moangrave is visible, but the tree behind it does not become visible until walking far enough south on the cliff to coincide with two dark jellyfish on the lower beach becoming visible.

Behind Castle Morne there is a corpse lying in a crevasse which is posed with a bag over its head and being eaten by two crabs. The corpse holds 15 Fire Arrows and is looking directly towards a tower with a flammable 6-sided wooden structure at the tower top. There is also a small cut out in the cliff to allow clear sightline towards a single jellyfish which is very small beside the tall tower.

In the room in Stormveil where Nepheli Loux stands over the corpse of the Banished Knight, as you stand in the doorway the position where she's standing is right over his…codpiece. However, looking from the perspective of the corpse in the corner on the right she appears to be emerging from his head, like Athena from the head of Zeus.

From the vantage point of the corpse looking over the cliff behind the Church of Vows the Raya Lucaria Debate Parlour is haloed by the Liurnia South Erdtree. Things aligning with Minor Erdtrees from particular marked locations is a not uncommon observation. This corpse holds 8 Stormhawk feathers - can corpses be found with other quantities of feathers and strung together to show a sequence of travel? Is there a pattern in general behind sets of corpses that hold various quantities of common material items? One thing that this does imply is that there is a connection between the Liurnia South Erdtree and Radagon's arrival at Raya Lucaria, even though it is separated by distance from the Church.

Many Small Things that are Easily Overlooked

Essentially, for any static item found in the environment that can be picked up into the inventory there will be one or more notable observations in the landscape. I mean everything. Sites of grace. Rebirth monuments. Mushrooms. Rowa fruit. There are noticeable patterns where some tree or rock or other structure will be very deliberately placed in alignment or obscuring distant landmarks while standing at these locations marked by game mechanic objects. Landmarks such as the Erdtree, Divine Towers, the Minor Erdtrees, the Moon, and the Giant's Forge are common to take note of since they are so prominent, but any structure can be significant.

To show how finely tuned this can be - in this example Ranni's Rise is obscured when standing directly on top of the mushroom. Standing a metre to the right and the tower is again visible:

If nothing else, pausing to look around at these item points helps build an awareness that at many key locations on the map one or more divine towers will be in alignment with the Erdtree. This is quite possibly the only means of getting answers about what is the purpose of the divine towers - I'm guessing that they represent the influence of the Great Runes that they hold. Depending on which combinations of Erdtrees and towers are visible from the specifically marked points in the landscape it shows that the near location is in the domain of the distant landmark.

For example, the Liurnia Divine Tower is directly in front of the Erdtree from the Rebirth Monument at Laskyar Ruins, and 3 other divine towers are also visible from this location:

The types of common observations do depend on type of item. Patterns emerge that from the viewpoint standing on top of mushrooms there are distant landmarks very deliberately blocked by adjacent trees. Rowa Fruit Bushes are often found in pairs and there are subtle changes from comparing the two perspectives. Sometimes at Trina's Lilies it's more about what landmarks are blocked from sight until moving far enough away from them that it exceeds the draw distance of the item - as if the lilies are in hiding.

As with enemy difficulty, the environmental observations have scaling difficulty depending on the region of the map. Limgrave and the Weeping Peninsula seem to function as something of a tutorial zone for the Rowa Fruit Bushes especially. Liurnia has a lot more going on with the mushrooms and the time of day and visibility of the moon and sun are important. Altus Plateau does much longer sequences of tree alignment observations (starting from mushrooms), and keep an eye on the number of visible segments on the bolt of Gransax from any given location in Leyndell.

Why do I think that this is connected to the missing element?

I have seen a number of discussions popping up in the past few weeks of people noticing something that they have never noticed before and declaring that the "secret" is found. It's often something like an artwork detail or line of text that in retrospect has connection to the DLC. This is not special - I think we will find that a lot of things already in-game are connected to the DLC because - y'know - it's still the same game and the DLC is revealing a buried history that FromSoft always knew was there. I'm happy for people being more observant, but again it's a very limited interpretation of what a "missing element" or "something small still missing" could be.

And then there is the other part of the argument that Miyazaki is just trolling and saying that there is something small missing - when there is no possible way for him to have followed every discussion on what people have and have not seen.

But consider this: I am suggesting that there is an entire element of intended gameplay that is not being used. If people were serious about hunting for clues in the environment of the type that I have described there should be videos about it! Secret hunting streams, compilation videos, whatever. Articles with top 10 quirky photos you can take. I can happily run around for hours sneaking past all enemies and trying to observe them unnoticed from various angles like a virtual wildlife photographer.

And what I have shown is just the most aesthetically pleasing findings and "easy" spots to draw conclusions about. Think about how many corpses and how many items there are to interact with in the environment. Thousands. There is so much.

[satoshi-mochida]

The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology announced for PS5, Xbox Series, PS4, Xbox One, and PC

Gematsu Source

Publisher Forthright Entertainment and developer Soma Games have announced The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC (Steam). It will launch on December 1.

The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology includes the complete story of The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout as told across three acts.

Here is an overview of the game, via Forthright Entertainment:

About

Step into the epic, story-rich world of Mossflower in the first official Redwall story since 2011. The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology is a linear action–adventure game told in three acts. Play as Liam or Sophia, the newest member of the Lilygrove Scout Corps, as the young mice find themselves on the journey of a lifetime to save their home from ruthless pirates. Will they reach Redwall and save their friends before all is lost?

Story

Act 1 – After months of training, betrothed mice Liam and Sophia are ready to graduate into fully-fledged Scouts: a group of woodland rangers tasked with the protection of the land and trained in the ancient ways of woodcraft. Their initiate ceremonies are cut short when sea rats attack their beloved home. As the senior Scouts rally for battle, it’s up to the Scout Corps’ newest recruit to outwit the enemy, light the beacon, and summon aid from the surrounding woodlands – before there is nothing left to save.

Act 2 – The beacon is lit, troops rally to fend off the invading searats, and Liam reunites with his dear Sophia beneath the Lilygrove Lighthouse, but not all is well. Scumsnout’s vengeful cries can be heard in the distance and it is revealed that our Scout’s betrothed has been poisoned by the wereat’s venomous bite. With no time to spare, the couple race to the Winsome Wraith, where a mysterious and dangerous stoat may have the antidote they seek. As if things weren’t bad enough, the sea rats are moving inland and the shadow of a large predatory bird lurks just at the edge of the woods.

Act 3 – After being mortally poisoned by Scumsnout’s vicious maw, our young Scouts have made it to the Winsome Wraith in one piece, if just barely. While the mysterious stoat’s treatment has bought some precious time, Liam and Sophia must now travel the rest of the way to Redwall Abbey for a more permanent cure. This is the dramatic conclusion of their journey through the murk of Portman’s Slough, the miraculously-functioning puzzles of Grating Gulley, and the ancient ruins of the Otters’ Den.

Key Features

A brand new original story set the winter before the events of the first book.

A stunning woodland world inhabited by charming critters and villainous vermin.

Two characters with divergent dialog for replayability.

Unique real-time scent mechanic fitting for woodlanders who experience the world primarily through their noses.

An assortment of achievements and collectables for the completionist spirit.

Original soundtrack created especially for fans of Redwall.

Fully voice acted by a talented cast of new and established actors.

Engaging puzzles and side stories for those who delight in world building.

Mechanics

The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology debuts a dynamic scent system unlike any game before it. Rather than stagnant, pre-designed paths that imitate scent, particles read the wind and the environment to simulate realistic currents and pools. Scents themselves consist of parts and patterns designed around real scent theory.

When traversing the world of Mossflower, you make use of your mouse agility to explore the world in a unique and wondrous way. Shimmy along ledges, scramble sheer cliffs, and even squeeze through impossibly small spaces. With courage, faith, and friends by your side, Mossflower’s fate rests in your paws!

Rely on stealth, wit, and agility to evade your enemies. Manipulate dull-witted vermin with scent and scent to avoid getting caught in their grubby paws.

Use your trusty way glass to scope the area and identify danger. Rely on your home-made slingshot to solve puzzles, break pots, and activate traps.

Decide if you will prioritize the mission and leave the others to save themselves or take the time to lend a helping paw. Some may praise philanthropy, still others would praise pragmatism.

Watch the announcement trailer below. View a set of screenshots at the gallery.

Announce Trailer

[kamenstranger]

Two years after my review of the first Heisei Gamera, it's time to jump back in and talk about the sequel. Following the success of 1995’s Gamera: Guardian of the Universe, the sequel was put into production soon afterwards, with an announcement made in November of ‘95. Much of the same creative team would return for the sequel, including Shusuke Kaneko in the director's chair, a new screenplay by Kazunori Ito, and Shinji Higuchi once again directing the special effects. Here’s the thing about Gamera 2’s story; it’s dead simple. I don’t mean that as an insult, but I can sum up the broad strokes by simply calling it a classic B-movie plot. In some ways that’s doing a disservice to the unique and captivating characteristics bestowed upon Legion, but otherwise it’s standard plot paying homage to classic sci-fi, most notably Ultra Q, with beats not dissimilar to the previous Gamera entry. However, much like its predecessor, Gamera 2’s brilliance lies in the presentation. There’s an initially slow yet well paced suspenseful build towards the mysterious creatures, what they are and how they operate, keeping the audience wondering what event will transpire next.

The film starts off in classic fashion with a strange meteor shower and bizarre lights, prompting the JSDF to respond to a particularly large impact creator. Troublingly, there’s no sign of the meteor.

We’re then properly introduced to our main protagonist Midori Honami (Miki Mizuno), a curator for the nearby Sapporo Science Center, who becomes involved with the JSDF’s puzzling case. Several more bizarre incidents take place, including one of the eeriest scenes as two bumbling security guards witness a strange creature consuming bottles inside a brewery. The only evidence left behind at the scene is silicon, indicating a possible diet for the creature.

Following the brewery incident, multiple underground fiber optics are destroyed, each attack creeping closer to Sapporo until 5 days later a subway is attacked by a number of monsters. Things escalate as Police arrive, which goes about as well as you’d expect. The dread continues to escalate as communications across the region are cut off, and a massive plant erupts from a building above the tunnels.

The JSDF intervenes shortly after, and once they rescue the subway survivors (the attacks upon whom seem random) they begin monitoring the colony and various forms of atmospheric changes, notably, the oxygen levels are rising dramatically, creating a toxic environment. Honami theorizes that the Legion and the plant are like Leaf-cutter ants colonizing fungus to survive. Ergo, you destroy one, the other will die with it in a symbiotic fashion. Furthermore, the purpose of the plant is called into question given that it’s not a food source. The more dire theory being that’s how the Legion spreads its colonies. I.e. What crashed in Hokkaido may have been a seed launched from such a plant. As such, the JSDF plans to destroy the structure before it can bloom. Because the Legion emits electromagnetic waves to communicate, Radios are largely useless in the surrounding area, leading to more basic forms for communications such as Morse Lamp. I find it notable that the film manages to incorporate a “fear of technology” angle without it being the technology itself being demonized or the threat as it often was in mid-late 90s media. Rather it's the loss of modern conveniences in a hyper modern city, it’s a concept that still holds up really well today. Additionally, the Legion see tech as a threat, as it’s discovered the subway victims all had phones, pagers, radios etc. This will be important later on.

Meanwhile, operations with the plant hit a snag; Oxygen levels have risen so dramatically that attempting to destroy the structure could be just as catastrophic as the flower blooming. A smaller explosion is set off which temporarily disrupts the flowing plant and the Legion, allowing radio communication to resume just in time to hear that Gamera has emerged from the sea and is headed towards Sapporo. Gamera arrives, inhales the excess oxygen, burns the flower, and rips it up by the roots. Thousands of Legion swarm and attack Gamera, who only manages to escape when the fiends are sent into a frenzy by a nearby Transformer. In the ensuing chaos, a larger winged Queen Legion emerges and escapes.

From here on the movie is in full swing. We’re given well needed breathers that keep the film from being suffocating, allowing us to reflect on the events at hand. But the pace is very brisk after Gamera shows up, and we’ve pretty much learned most of the mystery behind Legion, so now it’s about seeing how that knowledge can be applied to defeat them. The one last truly notable story piece that pops up is Asagi Kusanagi returning from the previous film. She is mentioned early on, showing that her story is known about if not widely believed. She appears a couple more times before finally crossing paths with Honami during an evacuation near an airport, just as a battle between Gamera and a now fully grown Legion Queen breaks out over a second flowering plant.

Asagi still has a connection to Gamera, which is both a great focal point of the film and also probably one of the few things I wish was handled better. As poignant as Kusanagi’s role is in this film, she’s barely featured and quite frankly it feels like more should’ve been done to emphasize her significance. I don’t know if they just couldn’t get Ayako Fujitani for more than they did, but it feels like they didn’t have her for long, as she’s in relatively few scenes. One thing I do like is that her connection is far weaker than the first film, which makes sense given that it was implied to be severed after Gyaos’ defeat. It’s questionable how much Asagi’s connection even remains, certainly not enough for Gamera’s injuries to reflect upon her as in the past, nor much to aid him in battle. The Legion Queen is victorious in their first fight and she burrows away. Gamera limps his way to the second flowering plant and manages to topple it over, but it still goes off causing a 6 mile explosion and carbonizing an already wounded Gamera.

In the coming days a vigil of sorts would form around Gamera, becoming something of a pilgrimage site for people hoping for Gamera’s revival, even harkening back to the Showa era’s “friend to all children” angle with families visiting the site.

Asagi remains by his side, still acting the role of priestess, and eventually catalyst. The religious parallels become more blatant when the gathering results in a formation of energy that revives Gamera. However, Asagi’s Magatama breaks apart, unquestionably severing her connection to Gamera, and his to Humanity.

After his revival, Gamera goes off for the climatic battles, a very minor subplot regarding the JSDF’s hesitancy to assist Gamera gets wrapped up when they ultimately fight alongside him against Legion (I can only assume this was a severely downplayed component due to the whole kerfuffle with the JSDF and Godzilla vs. Mothra) We get a few more character moments for our cast, and Gamera finally decimates the Legion Mother in spectacular fashion by demonstrating a power he’s never used before.

But it looks cool as shit. In the aftermath, Honami playfully, if ominously, theorizes that maybe Gamera didn’t save humanity so much as all life on earth, and they should be careful to never be seen as a threat.

And that’s pretty much all of Gamera 2’s story, it’s as simple as that. At an hour and thirty-six minutes long, there’s not much to go over, for better or worse.

You may have noticed I didn’t detail the characters the way I usually do, and that’s because I don’t have much to say about them. Midori Honami obviously gets the most focus. She’s very similar in character to Mayumi Nagamine from the previous film, with that sorta plucky go get’em attitude. She’s someone whose knowledge can be applied to the current situation, and her dynamic with the JSDF’s Hanatani (Tamotsu Ishibashi) isn’t that different from Mayumi’s with Yoshinari. It’s a starchy independent 90s woman of science paired with a well meaning military man. She has a couple of cute moments that reinforce her personality, such as refusing help getting down from a raised platform, but there’s not much to her than that. As for Hanatani, he has less to work with and I didn’t feel he was worth mentioning much.

Another character I’ve yet to mention is Obitsu (Mitsuru Fukikoshi) an engineer at NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone) You may recognize Fukikoshi from Ryusoulger, or perhaps Takashi Miike’s Lesson of the Evil. He plays a supporting role here, but he’s probably the most interesting character just for his outside the box thinking. His best moment is near the climax of the film when Gamera is once again swarmed by Legion drones. Obitsu manages to get a power plant to divert a large chunk of their output to a series of nearby transformers, drawing the Legion away and saving Gamera. But that’s about all there is to say. Like the first film, the monsters are the real stars while the human cast moves the story along. The opening 45 minutes or so are the absolute best story wise. But I also think it’s fair to point out that outside those moments with Legion, most of the story beats are the same as the first film. Mysterious creatures require investigating, a woman of science & military man cross paths to solve said mystery, Gamera gets injured and is incapacitated until the final battle. In a way, it feels like a soft do-over of what the filmmakers wanted previously but couldn’t. So most of the story is repeated with a few original tidbits, and another excuse to prop up the big selling point: the Special effects.

Gamera GOTU had some of the most incredible miniature work at the time, blowing anything of the Heisei Godzilla era out of the water. So when we get to Gamera 2, there was a presumed expectation that they had to up the ante-- and they did.

Firstly, the team had much more creative freedom after the surprise success of the first film. Gamera underwent a redesign much more in line with what was originally intended for GOTU; sharper angles, sea turtle fins for a flight mode, and the elbow spikes are now permanently visible. It feels like a proper Heisei era design with all the kinks worked out, in much the same way ‘89 BioGoji is to ‘84 Goji. That’s even seen in the poster at the top, which feels more of the era by emulating Noriyoshi Ohrai’s style rather than a call back to the Showa Era.

The main body was mostly left unchanged, although redesigned dimensionally to better fit Akira Ohashi, taking over from both Manabe and Suzuki from the previous film. The biggest change to the design aside from the sculpt is the mechanical components being improved. Gamera’s eyes are much more expressive, and there’s a wider range of motion for the neck that would move along with Ohashi’s.

Likewise, they were free to incorporate an original monster, by far the best part of the movie. And Legion… What is there even left to say? The Soldiers are great, but the queen is one of the most fascinatingly intricate and unique designs. I have to commend the team for not only the sheer complexity of the aesthetic and size (requiring both Mizuho Yoshida and Toshinori Sasaki to operate) but still making good fight scenes centered around something that’s even more cumbersome than King Ghidorah (Although the soldiers pick up some the slack there) What’s even more amazing is how much of the suit was being worked on to the last minute, and I don’t mean before shooting. According to designer Fuyuki Shinada, they were constantly modifying the suit throughout, and if you look closely, you can see that the arms gain articulation as the film progresses. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a review that didn’t hold Legion as the pinnacle of Gamera 2’s assets. Although they’re far from the only highlight, the best visuals are often built around them. The suspense of the brewery attack, the subway scene that makes the soldiers look like they’re on the ceiling, the massive swarm that attacks Gamera. All of that makes 2 stick out from what otherwise would be a too familiar retread, and that care is seen throughout the film. One of the best examples of their love and attention to detail is when the first flower topples over. In just about any other film it would’ve simply fallen and pyrotechnics go off. But we see the roots of the plant tear through the snowy roads, because it would- and it looks amazing, which sums up a lot of the film. It’s just full of little touches like that.

Another would be the first Legion Queen battle. There are wonderful overhead shots of the monsters, Gamera’s shell gets a chunk taken out, but my favorite moment is where Gamera looks at the flower in the distance about to bloom, the camera pans to the flower, and the Legion Queen sidesteps to put herself between the flower and Gamera. So much personality conveyed in a few simple shots.

That said, there is one other area where the films SFX is rough, and that’s the CG…kinda. Frankly I don’t wanna spend too much time on this because A: It’s no worse than Spawn’s released a year later, and B: They only use it when they absolutely need to. It’s also worth pointing out that Gamera 2 was something of a transitional film for special effects. GOTU used composite and some CGI, while in 2 it’s the opposite, more CGI and almost no composites.

I’m kinda shocked at the stuff they don't use it for. When the hundreds of Legion soldiers crawl up Gamera, that’s CGI, of course. But then it transitions into a practical effect with hundreds of miniatures attached to the suit. Sure, it was probably cheaper than CGI at the time anyway, but it’s incredible that they pulled it off.

There’s also other areas where the CG is actually really great for the era, such as the light effects. The tone matching upon the Actors sells it. Honestly, I’m hard pressed to find any fault with the visuals because Gamera 2 is so much more polished than the previous entry. The one major criticism I would hold against the film’s visuals is how many night scenes there are. The first film was a bit more balanced with a slight skew towards day scenes. Here, the only day scene between the monsters in the airport- that’s it. While I do appreciate the contrast, it also makes it difficult to actually see finer details… which might’ve been intentional given the mechanical issues with Legion and the technological angle with CG looking far better in low light. That said, it’s still better lit than most modern modern Hollywood films. I can still see what’s happening. The fights are more interesting with Legion than Gyaos, scene transitions are better, the snowy environment is fairly unique for this medium and genre. Even the pacing of individual set pieces is better. I can overlook dark environments for all the other positives, which sorta leads into my final overall thoughts.

As much as I notice the flaws more than I did years ago when I first saw G2, it’s still a notable improvement over the first film. Even with some of the repeated character archetypes, it’s hard not to look at G2 as better in almost every other regard. Gamera 1 is by no means a bad film, I heaped a lot of praise on it. But if we compare it to the sequel, well, the first is a hell of a lot more clunky, if more fresh. Gamera 1 has a lot of moving parts for what it is with the whole Atlantis angle and having to explain Gamera in addition to the Gyaos, his connection to Asagi, the environmental angle, etc. Gamera 1 does a better job with the two main leads, but it’s also much rougher around the edges experience compared to Legion. G2 manages to capture the same mysterious aura the Gyaos had and even more so, while trimming out a lot of the awkwardness. Say what you will about the CGI, it’s aged, but I think that’s more forgivable than some of the opticals in 1 which was simply inexcusable for ‘95. You can tell certain aspects in the first film were rushed due to time, or were too ambitious. While that can make the first film more charming in its own way, G2 curbs many of those problems with the experience gained from the first go. You also don’t have anything as contrived as not knowing how to get their schoolgirl protagonist to the base of Mt. Fuji for an important scene, so just have a taxi driver manage to break through a military blockade. Everything is just more streamlined and better thought out in this sequel. It’s not perfect, of course, it sometimes feels like it strokes the JSDF a little too much, bordering on propaganda.

(This Salute and a stand off with a single Legion solider near the climax are perhaps the most embarrassing moments of the movie)

Still, I don’t think you can ask much more from a follow up than working out the kinks and then excelling in nearly all the parts that worked and then some. Gamera 2 is a fantastic sequel that, for whatever flaws it has, is ultimately better than the first and too fun to be down on. If I am allowed to make a very strange comparison, I would say it’s very much like Evil Dead 2. Sure, it’s basically the same plot as the first one, but everything is refined and has enough cool new shit that it doesn’t matter. And for the most part, that's how Gamera 2 was received in ‘96. It won a Seiun Award just like its predecessor, and (Controversially) the 17th Nihon SF Taishō Award. But those accolades sadly didn’t translate to ticket sales. While G2 made a respectable ¥700 million, 180 million more than GOTU, G2 had considerably more weight behind it. While I wasn’t able to find any solid numbers on the budget, we do know that it was more than the first, and Gamera 2 was Toho’s Big Summer release for July. By contrast, GOTU was dumped off in March and was considered to not have made as much as possible due to not courting the Theaters. So expectations were high for a sequel to hit the magical ¥1 Billion mark. I would argue that’s a slightly unrealistic goal for a Kaiju film at that time (outside Godzilla and Mothra). But the fact it only made 180 more than a film released in March, and a poorly distributed one at that, is pretty sad if not pathetic.

Nevertheless, the film made money and was critically well received, leading to a third and final entry. But while I won’t be jumping into that just yet, I do want to talk briefly about the legacy Gamera 2 left. I don’t think I can overstate how much Gamera 2 was a major touchstone for the Kaiju Genre. While that’s true for the whole trilogy, and I even touched upon something similar in GOTU in how much the Legendary Monsterverse took from it, I think it’s a bit more poetic here. Gamera 2 is an unabashed love letter to the Ultra series. You can draw a direct line from Ultra Q all the way to Gamera 2.

The kids who grew up with Ultraman were themselves becoming the next step in refining Japanese special effects, emulating concepts that were established, but doing them better, and eventually elevating the production standards of the franchise that inspired them. The entire time I was watching this for the review I kept thinking “This still looks amazing, but TsuPro is able to do the same if not significantly better nowadays” and that’s not a knock, this movie is nearly 27 years old, many of the artists went to work on Ultraman. But it’s also fitting that's how far things have come. Just like how the Ultra series was putting anything from the Godzilla films to shame because of Toho veterans and new blood, and then Gamera was doing better effects work than Heisei Godzilla. Now once again Television productions are far surpassing the level of detail that was once dominant and only possible in theatrical productions. I can see Gamera’s foot crash through a street and a bike topple over along with a phone booth shattering…and I can see the same thing 3-4 times better in an episode Ultraman Z. I think that’s wonderful. We're not done with the Ultraman comparisons, either. We'll be getting back to those when we get to Iris in Gamera 3.

And for those interested in checking out Gamera 2, annoyingly, it along with G3 were taken down from Tubi just as this was going up (GOTU is still up, oddly) Gamera 2 is (as of this posting) still available on Amazon Prime, along with the other two films. Of course there’s also a fantastic release by Arrow Video, both a Steel book of the trilogy, and a release containing the trilogy and Gamera The Brave. I highly recommend these sets, particularly the steel book, which tend to be pretty affordable. As for the next review, well, I had planned on getting to Gamera 3, but getting screen shots is too troublesome at the moment. Of course, the next big thing on everyone's mind is Shin Kamen Rider. I'm only going so say "We'll see" 7:00 showing on a Wednesdays is far from ideal, even for someone flexible. Regardless of whatever happens there, perhaps it's time to tackle another series...

[tiredfoxtf]

Guys, if you can I really recommend you to play these games:

Child of Light A fairy tale like story heavy platformer with turn based fighting system. All art visuals are hand drawn, very beautiful environment and character designs combined with absolutely outstanding atmospheric orchestral music.

Deponia (original, Chaos on Deponia and Goodbye Deponia) A game series of point-and-click adventure genre. Resembles mostly a comedy and satire in the style with a great delivery by voice actors. It's also has one of the funniest and creative solutions to puzzles and quests. With a very compelling story as well.

Darkest Dungeon (original or second one) A dungeon crawler rpg in dark fantasy setting, full of strategic turn based fights. Absolutely ruthless though and has quite the learning curve, but can be very fun.

Mirror's Edge: Catalyst A sequel to the original Mirror's Edge resembles a 3D platformer as you parkour through the roofs of stunning futuristic city. It's also has a story, but to me it isn't that important as the feeling you get running around the freeroam map.

The Witness A puzzle game. It has no music, just it's beautiful visuals of the island where you play and solve puzzles by drawing lines. Sounds very simple and it will be at first but then as you progress through the games puzzles will get harder and harder, involving new mechanics and environment clues. It's also has somewhat hard-to-find audio tapes with philosophical speeches of different renown people which makes the game even more interesting.

Zero Escape trilogy (9 hours, 9 persons, 9 doors; Virtue's Last Reward; Zero Time Dilemma) Absolutely crazy visual novel style escape room kind of game. All visual novel elements fully voice acted and the performance is outstanding, the characters truly feel alive. All the puzzles require thoughts and have very satisfying solutions once you figure it out. When you are not solving puzzles, the story is breathtaking, sometimes anxiety inducing, you slowly unravel the true nature of the events as you progress through the game. And it's a game where your choices actually matter. And you NEED to go through several different endings to get to the true ending. It's truly a great game trilogy.

[bunnysthetics]

Warden-Commander Trisha Amell

Born 9:11 ʸᵉˢ ᶦ ᵏⁿᵒʷ ᶦᵗˢ ᶠᵘⁿⁿʸ. 19 at the start of Origins, 33 by the time of Inquisition. She/Her

Spirit Healer Mage

Pale skin, dark blue eyes, black hair

Titles: Grey Warden, Warden-Commander of Fereldan, Hero of Fereldan, Lady Amell

Origin

Pronounced like ‘Tricia’

Trisha was only five years old before a misshap regarding a wisp had her taken away from her mother by the Templars. Despite being from Ostwick, she was sent to Kinloch Hold in Fereldan in order to keep her separate from her siblings that were stationed in various Circles across the Free Marches. Initially weary of her, the Templars advised the other young mages to keep away from her due to her noted affinity with Spirits, causing Trisha to spend much of her adolescent life in the Circle in quiet seclusion. Her closest companion was Jowan, who rarely listened to Templar orders and went out of his way to seek her out in an act of defiance before quickly forming a warm relationship with her. The two became as close as siblings, Jowan often-times getting himself in trouble with the Templars for picking fights with other apprentices in Trisha’s defense.

As Trisha grew older, her latent talents became more and more apparent to First Enchanter Irving, and he eventually took her under his wing to study spirits and the Fade in a safe and monitored environment. He taught her how to call upon benevolent spirits to assist in Spirit Healing, and quickly became the closest thing resembling a father that she ever had. This relationship didn’t help much with her social class, though, since Irving’s clear favoritism towards her was extremely clear to other apprentices and Templars alike.

As for Cullen’s crush on her idk you know that one post about the dude who saw a woman daydreaming about donuts in the train and starts fantasizing about her being his manic pixie dream girl yeah thats pretty much what that was about

Fighting & Skills

Brother idk if you’ve actually read the spells available in the Spirit category but like I’m just saying she can literally fucking explode people with her mind. I’m only barely joking .

Trisha is a very quick-thinker and is extremely observant to subtle changes around her. She tries to talk people down through wit rather than brute strength or charm. As the Warden-Commander, she has a surprising amount of military tact and utilizes much of her perceptive skills to predict her enemies’ plans before they can successfully act out on them.

Companions & Love

shes straight but also i think she has like this irresistible attraction to women who are mean and hate her because she keeps calling morrigan anora and velanna beautiful and idk whats up with that

Canon Differences

- The Fade sequence in Broken Circle goes DRASTICALLY differently in her canon. Instead of the longform shapeshifting puzzles from multiple realms, it nearly entirely takes place in Sloth’s nightmare for her. In the nightmare, she wakes up in her bunk bed to Jowan impatiently trying to jostle her awake in the same way he does in the Magi Origin; the events of her tirades as a Warden seemingly having all been a dream.

- The dream sequence has her navigating the Circle Tower, where everything is content and perfect. It’s when she begins noticing small details that are just way too good to be true (Jowan and Lily’s relationship being widely accepted by the Circle, Owain not being Tranquil, Greagoir regarding her with high praise and Irving choosing her as the next Enchanter) that the cracks begin to form and she finally finds Niall and learns about Sloth’s realm and wakes up to find her other companions.

- Teagan sends Jowan back to the Circle immediately after the Redcliffe quest, rather than waiting for Eamon to wake up and give his judgement just because well that one scene during the Sacred Ashes quest is a bituva bummer otherwise innit

- She’s the youngest, rather than the oldest, out of five siblings because it just simply does not fucking make sense to me that they shipped your ass all the way out here from fucking KIRKWALL instead of just throwing you in their own circle for what feels like literally no reason at all

- She taught Anders how to be a healer during Awakening in much of the same way Irving did because i just really think its funny to give her another close relationship with a mage from her circle only for them to turn around and literally commit an act of terror when she isn’t looking

- She would actually be 30 in the canon timeline for Inquisition but their fucking perception of time doesnt make any fuckening sense so I changed it .

Key Decisions

All companions, alive and well

Dark Ritual done, Alistair is the father

Loghain dead, by Alistair

Anora is queen, Alistair stays a Warden

Broken Circle: Saved the Mages

Nature of the Beast: Brokered Peace

Paragon of Her Kind: Defeated Branka and Harrowmont Rules

Redcliffe: Connor alive, not possessed. Isolde alive

Trisha killed the Archdemon

legends say that dog is still barking throughout her every conversation to this very day

[sunaleisocial]

LLMs develop their own understanding of reality as their language abilities improve

New Post has been published on https://sunalei.org/news/llms-develop-their-own-understanding-of-reality-as-their-language-abilities-improve/

LLMs develop their own understanding of reality as their language abilities improve

Ask a large language model (LLM) like GPT-4 to smell a rain-soaked campsite, and it’ll politely decline. Ask the same system to describe that scent to you, and it’ll wax poetic about “an air thick with anticipation” and “a scent that is both fresh and earthy,” despite having neither prior experience with rain nor a nose to help it make such observations. One possible explanation for this phenomenon is that the LLM is simply mimicking the text present in its vast training data, rather than working with any real understanding of rain or smell.

But does the lack of eyes mean that language models can’t ever “understand” that a lion is “larger” than a house cat? Philosophers and scientists alike have long considered the ability to assign meaning to language a hallmark of human intelligence — and pondered what essential ingredients enable us to do so.

Peering into this enigma, researchers from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) have uncovered intriguing results suggesting that language models may develop their own understanding of reality as a way to improve their generative abilities. The team first developed a set of small Karel puzzles, which consisted of coming up with instructions to control a robot in a simulated environment. They then trained an LLM on the solutions, but without demonstrating how the solutions actually worked. Finally, using a machine learning technique called “probing,” they looked inside the model’s “thought process” as it generates new solutions. 

After training on over 1 million random puzzles, they found that the model spontaneously developed its own conception of the underlying simulation, despite never being exposed to this reality during training. Such findings call into question our intuitions about what types of information are necessary for learning linguistic meaning — and whether LLMs may someday understand language at a deeper level than they do today.

“At the start of these experiments, the language model generated random instructions that didn’t work. By the time we completed training, our language model generated correct instructions at a rate of 92.4 percent,” says MIT electrical engineering and computer science (EECS) PhD student and CSAIL affiliate Charles Jin, who is the lead author of a new paper on the work. “This was a very exciting moment for us because we thought that if your language model could complete a task with that level of accuracy, we might expect it to understand the meanings within the language as well. This gave us a starting point to explore whether LLMs do in fact understand text, and now we see that they’re capable of much more than just blindly stitching words together.”

Inside the mind of an LLM

The probe helped Jin witness this progress firsthand. Its role was to interpret what the LLM thought the instructions meant, unveiling that the LLM developed its own internal simulation of how the robot moves in response to each instruction. As the model’s ability to solve puzzles improved, these conceptions also became more accurate, indicating that the LLM was starting to understand the instructions. Before long, the model was consistently putting the pieces together correctly to form working instructions.

Jin notes that the LLM’s understanding of language develops in phases, much like how a child learns speech in multiple steps. Starting off, it’s like a baby babbling: repetitive and mostly unintelligible. Then, the language model acquires syntax, or the rules of the language. This enables it to generate instructions that might look like genuine solutions, but they still don’t work.

The LLM’s instructions gradually improve, though. Once the model acquires meaning, it starts to churn out instructions that correctly implement the requested specifications, like a child forming coherent sentences.

Separating the method from the model: A “Bizarro World”

The probe was only intended to “go inside the brain of an LLM” as Jin characterizes it, but there was a remote possibility that it also did some of the thinking for the model. The researchers wanted to ensure that their model understood the instructions independently of the probe, instead of the probe inferring the robot’s movements from the LLM’s grasp of syntax.

“Imagine you have a pile of data that encodes the LM’s thought process,” suggests Jin. “The probe is like a forensics analyst: You hand this pile of data to the analyst and say, ‘Here’s how the robot moves, now try and find the robot’s movements in the pile of data.’ The analyst later tells you that they know what’s going on with the robot in the pile of data. But what if the pile of data actually just encodes the raw instructions, and the analyst has figured out some clever way to extract the instructions and follow them accordingly? Then the language model hasn’t really learned what the instructions mean at all.”

To disentangle their roles, the researchers flipped the meanings of the instructions for a new probe. In this “Bizarro World,” as Jin calls it, directions like “up” now meant “down” within the instructions moving the robot across its grid. 

“If the probe is translating instructions to robot positions, it should be able to translate the instructions according to the bizarro meanings equally well,” says Jin. “But if the probe is actually finding encodings of the original robot movements in the language model’s thought process, then it should struggle to extract the bizarro robot movements from the original thought process.”

As it turned out, the new probe experienced translation errors, unable to interpret a language model that had different meanings of the instructions. This meant the original semantics were embedded within the language model, indicating that the LLM understood what instructions were needed independently of the original probing classifier.

“This research directly targets a central question in modern artificial intelligence: are the surprising capabilities of large language models due simply to statistical correlations at scale, or do large language models develop a meaningful understanding of the reality that they are asked to work with? This research indicates that the LLM develops an internal model of the simulated reality, even though it was never trained to develop this model,” says Martin Rinard, an MIT professor in EECS, CSAIL member, and senior author on the paper.

This experiment further supported the team’s analysis that language models can develop a deeper understanding of language. Still, Jin acknowledges a few limitations to their paper: They used a very simple programming language and a relatively small model to glean their insights. In an upcoming work, they’ll look to use a more general setting. While Jin’s latest research doesn’t outline how to make the language model learn meaning faster, he believes future work can build on these insights to improve how language models are trained.

“An intriguing open question is whether the LLM is actually using its internal model of reality to reason about that reality as it solves the robot navigation problem,” says Rinard. “While our results are consistent with the LLM using the model in this way, our experiments are not designed to answer this next question.”

“There is a lot of debate these days about whether LLMs are actually ‘understanding’ language or rather if their success can be attributed to what is essentially tricks and heuristics that come from slurping up large volumes of text,” says Ellie Pavlick, assistant professor of computer science and linguistics at Brown University, who was not involved in the paper. “These questions lie at the heart of how we build AI and what we expect to be inherent possibilities or limitations of our technology. This is a nice paper that looks at this question in a controlled way — the authors exploit the fact that computer code, like natural language, has both syntax and semantics, but unlike natural language, the semantics can be directly observed and manipulated for experimental purposes. The experimental design is elegant, and their findings are optimistic, suggesting that maybe LLMs can learn something deeper about what language ‘means.’”

Jin and Rinard’s paper was supported, in part, by grants from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). 

[losvirtuality]

Top 10 VR Escape Rooms in Los Angeles: Experience the Ultimate Virtual Adventures

Explore the most thrilling and immersive VR escape rooms in Los Angeles. Discover why these top 10 VR experiences are a must-try for adventure seekers!

Virtual Reality (VR) escape rooms offer an unparalleled adventure, merging the excitement of escape games with the immersive experience of virtual worlds. Los Angeles, a city known for its innovative entertainment options, hosts some of the most exciting VR escape rooms in the country. Here's a comprehensive guide to the top 10 VR escape rooms in Los Angeles that will transport you to different worlds and challenge your problem-solving skills.

1. The Prison

Imagine being locked in a high-security prison and plotting your escape. The Prison VR escape room offers a thrilling scenario where you must outsmart the guards and find your way to freedom. The intricate puzzles and realistic environment make this a top pick for thrill-seekers.

2. Signal Lost

Set in a futuristic space station, the Signal Lost escape room challenges you to restore communication with Earth after a catastrophic event. The breathtaking visuals and complex challenges will keep you on your toes as you race against time to save the station.

3. Survival

Stranded on a deserted island, your survival skills are put to the test in this immersive VR escape room. You must find food, build shelter, and solve puzzles to survive and signal for rescue. The realistic environment and engaging storyline make this a favorite among escape room enthusiasts.

4. Cyberpunk

Step into a neon-lit dystopian future in the Cyberpunk VR escape room. Your mission is to hack into a mega-corporation's database and uncover their secrets. The stunning visuals and intricate hacking puzzles provide a unique and captivating experience.

5. Chernobyl

Travel back in time to the infamous Chernobyl disaster. In this VR escape room, you must navigate through the abandoned city, solve puzzles, and uncover the mystery behind the meltdown. The haunting atmosphere and historical context make this escape room both educational and thrilling.

6. Mission Sigma

As a secret agent, you are tasked with infiltrating a terrorist hideout and disarming a nuclear missile. The Mission Sigma VR escape room offers intense action and mind-bending puzzles that require quick thinking and strategic planning.

7. House of Fear

Dare to enter the House of Fear, where every corner holds a new terror. This VR escape room combines horror and puzzle-solving, creating an adrenaline-pumping experience that will test your courage and wit.

8. Christmas

Get into the holiday spirit with the Christmas VR escape room. Your mission is to save Christmas by solving festive puzzles and helping Santa. This family-friendly escape room offers a delightful and challenging experience for all ages.

9. Sanctum

Uncover the secrets of an ancient cult in the Sanctum VR escape room. With its dark and mysterious atmosphere, this escape room offers a unique blend of horror and adventure that will keep you captivated from start to finish.

10. Dream Hackers: The Book of Memories

Step into the world of Dream Hackers: The Book of Memories, where you and your team enter the mind of a dreamer to uncover hidden memories and solve puzzles. This VR escape room offers a surreal and imaginative experience with beautifully crafted environments and challenging brain teasers. It’s a must-try for those who enjoy a blend of mystery and fantasy.

Los Virtuality: Elevate Your VR Experience

For those seeking the ultimate VR escape room experience in Los Angeles, Los Virtuality offers a range of top-notch VR games and escape rooms. Whether you're a seasoned escape room veteran or a first-time adventurer, Los Virtuality provides a thrilling and immersive experience that is second to none.

Located conveniently in Los Angeles, Los Virtuality boasts state-of-the-art VR equipment and a wide variety of escape room scenarios that cater to different tastes and skill levels. Their expert staff ensures that you have a seamless and enjoyable experience from start to finish.

Why Choose Los Virtuality?

Diverse Game Selection: With a variety of escape room themes, there's something for everyone at Los Virtuality.

Cutting-Edge Technology: Enjoy the latest in VR technology for a truly immersive experience.

Expert Guidance: Friendly and knowledgeable staff are always on hand to assist and enhance your experience.

Convenient Location: Easily accessible in Los Angeles, making it a great option for locals and tourists alike.

Conclusion

Los Angeles offers a vibrant selection of VR escape rooms that provide unparalleled excitement and adventure. Whether you're breaking out of prison, surviving on a deserted island, or hacking into a futuristic database, these VR escape rooms deliver unique and immersive experiences. For a truly unforgettable adventure, visit Los Virtuality and explore the best that VR has to offer.

FAQs

What is a VR escape room? A VR escape room is a virtual reality experience where participants solve puzzles and complete tasks to "escape" from a simulated environment.

How long does a typical VR escape room session last? Most VR escape room sessions last between 45 minutes to an hour, depending on the complexity of the game.

Are VR escape rooms suitable for all ages? While some VR escape rooms are family-friendly, others may have themes or difficulty levels more suited for older participants. It's best to check the specific escape room's guidelines.

Do I need prior experience to enjoy a VR escape room? No prior experience is necessary. VR escape rooms are designed to be enjoyable for both beginners and experienced players.

How many people can participate in a VR escape room? The number of participants varies by escape room, but most can accommodate groups of 2 to 6 players.

Can I book a VR escape room for a private event? Yes, many VR escape room providers, including Los Virtuality, offer options for private bookings and events.

[knowledgefoundry]

Diapers and Daring Exploits: A Puppy's Adventure in Learning to Use the Toilet

Welcome to the exciting world of potty training, where diapers and daring exploits collide in the quest for independence. In this article, we will embark on a heartwarming adventure as we follow a puppy's journey in learning to use the toilet. Potty training is a significant milestone in a young pup's life, as it marks their transition from relying on diapers to becoming self-reliant in managing their bathroom needs. Join us as we explore the importance of potty training, outline effective steps, and provide valuable tips to make this journey a successful and rewarding one for both the puppy and their caregiver.

Introduction: The Journey Begins

The Excitement of Embarking on a Potty-Training Adventure

It's a journey how to teach a puppy to go to the toilet for a diaper that every parent must embark on with their little ones, and let me tell you, it's quite the adventure. From adorable tiny toilets to the infamous pee-pee dance, there's never a dull moment when it comes to teaching a puppy how to use the toilet.

Understanding the Importance of Early Potty Training

Why is potty training so important, you ask? Well, besides the obvious benefit of not having to change diapers for the rest of your life, early potty training sets the foundation for good bathroom habits. It helps develop independence and a sense of accomplishment in your furry friend. Plus, it saves you from some very messy situations down the road. Trust me, you'll thank yourself later for starting early.

Understanding the Importance of Potty Training

The Benefits of Potty Training at an Early Age

Let's talk about the perks of early potty training. First and foremost, it saves your sanity. No more frantic diaper changes or midnight trips to the store for more supplies. Secondly, it helps prevent accidents and keeps your floors clean (or at least cleaner). And lastly, it sets your puppy up for success in the long run. After all, who doesn't want a well-trained companion?

How Potty Training Promotes Independence and Confidence

Potty training isn't just about avoiding messes; it's about fostering independence and confidence in your pup. When they learn to use the toilet, they gain a sense of control over their bodily functions and become more self-reliant. It's a beautiful thing to witness your little furry friend grow into a confident and capable furball.

Step 1: Setting the Stage - Preparing the Environment

Creating a Safe and Inviting Bathroom Space

First things first, let's create a potty-friendly environment. Clear out any hazardous objects from the bathroom and make sure it's a safe space for your pup to navigate. Consider using baby gates to limit access to areas you want to keep accident-free. And hey, feel free to add some decorations - a potty party is always more fun with a little flair!

Choosing the Right Potty Training Tools

Now let's talk tools. There are plenty of options out there, from tiny toilets to training pads. Find what works best for you and your pup's needs. Whether it's a miniaturized porcelain throne or a simple pad on the floor, make sure it's something your furry friend can easily access and associate with their potty time. Variety is the spice of life, even in the world of potty training!

Step 2: Teach and Reinforce - Introducing the Concept of Using the Toilet

Introducing the Basics - Explaining the Purpose of the Toilet

It's time to teach your pup what this whole toilet business is about. Start by explaining the purpose of the toilet. Show them where their waste goes and why it's important to use the designated spot. And hey, feel free to get creative with your explanations. You never know, your pup might appreciate a bit of potty humor!

Demonstrating Proper Toilet Usage

Actions speak louder than words, and that holds true for potty training. Show your puppy how it's done by demonstrating proper toilet usage. Don't be surprised if they give you a puzzled look or wag their tail in confusion - it's all part of the learning process. Just be patient and keep showing them the ropes.

Encouraging Familiarity and Comfort with the Toilet

Lastly, let's focus on making the toilet a familiar and comfortable place for your little pal. Encourage them to spend time near the toilet, let them sniff around and explore. You can even try positive reinforcement techniques, like treats or praise, to associate the toilet with good things. Who knows, they might even end up loving their potty breaks! And there you have it - the journey of diapers to daring exploits in potty training. Remember, it's a process that takes time and patience, so don't stress too much. Just keep the bathroom door open, embrace the mess, and cheer on your furry companion every step of the way. Good luck, and may the potty-training gods be with you!

Step 3: Consistency is Key - Establishing a Routine

Designing a Potty Training Schedule

When it comes to potty training your furry friend, consistency is the name of the game. One of the best ways to achieve consistency is by establishing a potty training schedule. Now, I know what you're thinking - "A schedule? For a puppy?" Yes, my friend, even puppies need a bit of structure in their lives. The first step in designing a potty training schedule is to take note of your puppy's natural habits. Does your little buddy tend to do his business right after meals or maybe first thing in the morning? Once you've identified these patterns, it's time to create a schedule that aligns with them. Set specific times for potty breaks throughout the day and stick to them like glue. Consistency is key, remember? By following a schedule, you'll be able to anticipate when your pup needs to go and avoid any untimely accidents.

Encouraging Regular Toilet Visits

Toilet visits? That's right, folks. Just like humans, puppies need to visit the porcelain throne on a regular basis. Encouraging your pup to take regular toilet breaks will help establish good habits and prevent any unexpected surprises. Make sure to take your pup outside to the designated potty area at regular intervals throughout the day. This could be after meals, after playtime, or every couple of hours - whatever works best for your little pal. Be patient and wait for your pup to do his business before heading back inside. Remember, accidents happen. If you catch your pup in the act of relieving himself in a forbidden area, don't scold him. Instead, calmly interrupt him and bring him to the designated potty spot. Positive reinforcement is the way to go!

Implementing Positive Reinforcement Techniques

Ah, positive reinforcement - the secret sauce to successful potty training. When your puppy does his business in the right place, it's time to throw a party! Okay, maybe not an actual party, but positive reinforcement techniques can go a long way in shaping your pup's behavior. Praise your puppy lavishly when he successfully uses his designated potty area. Use a happy and enthusiastic voice, give him treats or even a little celebratory dance. Let him know that he's done a great job and that you're proud of him. Positive reinforcement will reinforce the desired behavior and make potty training a more enjoyable experience for both of you.

Overcoming Challenges and Celebrating Milestones

Addressing Resistance and Setbacks

Just when you think you've got this potty training thing all figured out, your pup throws you a curveball. Yes, setbacks and resistance are a normal part of the potty training journey. But fear not, my fellow pet parent, for there are ways to tackle these challenges head-on. If your puppy starts regressing or showing resistance to potty training, it's important not to lose your cool. Stay calm and patient, and try to identify any possible triggers for the setback. Did something change in your pup's routine or environment? Address these factors and gradually reintroduce the desired potty training behavior. Remember, accidents will happen along the way - it's all part of the learning process. When accidents occur, clean them up without making a fuss, and continue with the training. Consistency, patience, and a little bit of humor will go a long way in overcoming these hurdles.

Celebrating Progress and Achievements

On this rollercoaster journey of potty training, it's important to celebrate every little victory. Whether it's your puppy successfully going potty outside for the first time or making it through an entire day accident-free, these milestones deserve some recognition. Give your pup a big ol' pat on the back, shower him with praise, and maybe even reward him with a special treat. Celebrating progress not only helps motivate your pup, but it also keeps you motivated as a pet parent. So, be sure to pop a bottle of dog-friendly champagne (aka sparkling water) and toast to all the potty training wins - big and small.

Potty Training on the Go - Managing Toilet Training Outside the Home

Tips for Successful Toilet Training on Trips and Outings

Life with a puppy can be an adventure, and that includes potty training on the go. Whether you're taking a road trip, visiting friends, or simply going for a walk in the park, managing toilet training outside the comfort of your home requires a bit of planning and flexibility. First things first, always pack some essential potty training supplies when you leave the house. Bring along poop bags, wipes, and maybe even a portable potty pad or a small patch of fake grass. These will come in handy if your pup needs to answer nature's call while you're out and about. Secondly, be vigilant and keep an eye out for signs that your pup needs to go potty. Sniffing, circling, or suddenly becoming restless are common indicators that your furry friend needs a bathroom break. When you notice these signs, find a suitable spot and encourage your pup to do his business. Remember, accidents can still happen, so don't beat yourself up if your pup doesn't quite make it in time. Just clean up the mess, move on, and remember that each experience is a learning opportunity for both of you.

Navigating Public Restrooms with Confidence

Ah, public restrooms - those magical places filled with mysterious sounds and questionable smells. Taking your pup into a public restroom can be a challenging endeavor, but fear not, brave pet parent! With a little preparation and a dash of confidence, you'll conquer this toilet training mission like a pro. Before entering a public restroom, make sure to check if dogs are allowed. Some establishments may have specific rules or designated pet areas. Once inside, find a quiet corner or an out-of-the-way spot for your pup to do his business. Now, I don't know about you, but I find it hard to use a public restroom when someone is watching. Well, guess what? Your pup feels the same way! Give him some privacy by creating a makeshift barrier with your body or a small towel. This will help him feel more comfortable and less self-conscious about his bathroom habits. Remember, confidence is key. People might give you weird looks, but who cares? You're on a noble mission to potty train your pup, and that deserves a round of applause. Just be sure to clean up after your furry friend and leave the restroom as pristine as you found it.

Conclusion: A Successful Transition to Independence

Congratulations, my friend! You and your pup have embarked on an epic adventure in potty training, and now it's time to reflect on this incredible journey. Think back to those early days of diapers and daring exploits as our puppy's potty training adventure comes to an end, we can celebrate their successful transition to independence. Through careful preparation, consistent teaching and reinforcement, and overcoming challenges along the way, our playful pup has learned the valuable skill of using the toilet. This achievement not only brings convenience and cleanliness to their daily routine but also fosters a sense of confidence and self-reliance. Let us cherish this moment and look forward to many more milestones in our furry friend's journey of growth and learning.

FAQ

1. Can I start potty training my puppy at any age?

Yes, you can start potty training your puppy at any age. However, it is generally recommended to start as early as possible, ideally between 8 and 12 weeks of age. Puppies have a natural instinct to keep their living area clean, and starting early can help reinforce this behavior and make the training process smoother.

2. What if my puppy is resistant to using the toilet?

Resistance to potty training is not uncommon in puppies. If your puppy is showing resistance, it's essential to remain patient and consistent. Assess the situation to identify any underlying issues that may be causing the resistance, such as fear or discomfort. Adjust your training approach accordingly and offer positive reinforcement to encourage your puppy to feel more comfortable and confident using the toilet.

3. How long does potty training usually take?

The duration of potty training can vary depending on various factors, including the puppy's age, breed, and individual temperament. Generally, it can take several weeks to a few months for a puppy to become fully potty trained. Consistency, positive reinforcement, and patience are key during this process. Remember, every puppy is different, so it's important to be flexible and adapt the training approach to suit your puppy's needs.

4. Can I use potty training pads or should I go straight to using the toilet?

Using potty training pads can be an effective intermediate step in the training process, especially for puppies that are not yet ready to go outside or for households without immediate outdoor access. However, if your ultimate goal is to have your puppy use the toilet, it's recommended to transition from the pads to direct toilet use gradually. This can be done by gradually moving the pads closer to the bathroom and eventually placing them next to the toilet. Over time, encourage your puppy to use the toilet directly by removing the pads and providing positive reinforcement when they successfully use the toilet.

[legendarybaconchannel]

Starsand Gameplay

Starsand is a mystic survival game set among the dunes of an arcane desert. An open-world full of danger, vast environments and mysterious happenings await you! Explore, hunt, craft, build – and SURVIVE. Your day started as planned. Motivated and full of ambition you started the marathon of your life in the middle of the desert. The months of hard training should finally bear fruit. Suddenly, you were caught in a monstrous sandstorm and now you find yourself alone in an inhospitable, hot environment. Deserted and merciless, an ocean of sand stretches to the horizon. You feel the scorching heat on your skin, sand blowing right at your face, far and wide only vast desert ... but wait, what is that? Something is moving in the far distance. What happened? Your first thought: Survival. Your second thought: Rescue will surely come. The bitter realization: No one will come, you are completely on your own. The big question: Where are you and why are there two moons in the night sky? Find shade, find water, find life. Use your energy wisely, avoid too much effort in the heat, keep warm in the coldest nights. You must keep your wits to survive. Starsand is THE desert survival game. Dangers, mysteries, and puzzles await you! Find out what exactly happened, where you are and what connects you to the history of an extinct civilization. Will you manage to survive in the inhospitable environment, find answers and find your way back to your old life? Hunt for food, make weapons, build a shelter. Secure your shelter - the dunes are teeming with scary creatures. Find your way in the vast and lonely desert, orient yourself in sandstorms and mark your path. Thirst and heat become an invincible enemy during the day - cold endangers you during the night. Learn to live with adversity, see the beauty that the world holds, and learn from the animals and nature! In this desert you are both a hunter and prey. Insect-like predators come out of their dark nests, always looking for food. Protect yourself with fire, blow up enemies with explosive coconut grenades, secure your base and do whatever it takes to survive. We, Tunnel Vision Studio, are a small creative team ready to conquer the world with RAM sticks, dressed in GPU-coated armor and wearing a VR visor as a helmet. We are a handful of brave geeks based in Rome, not ready to give in to the temptations of countries with fiber broadband and unhealthy food. We make a living doing what we love: everything related to virtual reality and video games. Features: Large open game world in an exciting desert setting with an area of over 64 km². The lovingly designed world, far away from civilization, holds many impressive monuments, artifacts, and creatures of the past, as well as modern times. Survival action par excellence! Weather and desert capers as well as terrestrial and extra-terrestrial enemies awaken the pure survival instinct! Gather, build, secure - for protection against heat, cold, and the unknown enemy. Dynamic weather and day/night changes demand good planning, wise action, and a large portion of courage, especially in the desert. A mystical, thrilling story and the solving of numerous puzzles answer many open questions during the exciting journey into the unknown.