Yknow, despite how it is impossible by all Ingame options, I wonder how a neutral route with *ONLY* Sans (and Asgore ig) killed would look? Would he count enough as a boss monster (NOT a Boss Monster) to push it from a Queen Toriel ending to an Empress Undyne ending? How would Alphys react (She lost one of her closest friends, but she still has MTT and Undyne around.)? How would Papyrus react (Would he go full angst mode and try close away his heart? Would he become even more of a people pleaser, trying to make sure he doesn't repeat whatever mistake he made with you again? Would he go into denial mode, trying to find Flowey to set things right with him either finding him or not based on what Frisk choses after the FloweyX fight? So many choises), especially with how he seems to Know Something he doesn't let on. I'd imagine that (provided it's a Queen Toriel Ending) Undyne wouldn't be thar affected, sad that Papyrus lost a brother rather than sad that Sans died (she never is close with Sans. She doesn't hate him, but she doesn't know him as more than "Papyrus weird brother" and "My sentry that works the ABSOLUTE bare minimum needed"). I don't think mettaton would appear or be affected, leaving the call pretty limited. So we have Papyrus and Maybe Undyne, with Papyrus probably being... kinda miffed that everything is going along the same, as if Everything hasn't changed. Bonus points if it's Post Dates, leaving a pretty aimless Undyne moving into Sans room, trying to fill a void that she never can. It isn't some threat she can suplex or teach to cook, it's the world being unfair.

(This also would give a pretty Unique Undyne state, being halfway between her "I don't like that you had to kill Asgore, but it's what you had to do" mindset and her more common "You betrayed me in such a soul crushing way it'll affect how I love forever" mindset in most Neutral Endings. I can imagine her actually trying to rationalise it, because the human only killed Asgore (sucks but she Gets It), and... Sans. The easiest enemy, one too weak to make it into the guard, and almost too weak to be a Sentry (Sans would have no reason to reveal Blasters, and his magic would barely scratch the TRUE HERO of the Underground when Karma is factored in. All she would see is surprisingly complex patterns that don't deal even a tenth of her hp). So surely, they had a reason, right? Why else would they do it?)

Forgive any bad writing it's literally 2 AM rn where I am

can't not confess I've thought about it too, but it IS really hard to extend as a concept because there's just... really no way for sans to die outside of the NM run. and I don't mean logistically, i mean character-wise he is so defined by his survival. by his Being There as everything falls apart. the final girl last man standing in the story. so the whole concept immediately falls apart.

undyne wouldn't personally grieve him, seeing as they didn't really know each other, but she WOULD still feel his death on her conscience as she does with every other monster killed in neutral runs. plus, there's her friendship with papyrus to emotionally aggravate things.

papyrus would definitely go into denial. he would be annoyed about him vanishing all of a sudden, then it'd turn to worry, then as his worries become more and more plausible, he'd shut out all rational thought about the subject and pretend everything is alright. i like the idea of him reaching out to flowey, but he'd try to explain his plan while also comtradicting himself all the time in order to never say outloud "sans is dead. we need to fix this"

betrayed undyne... yeah this is where it falls apart again, since you'd have to reason why sans would die (or even instigate a fight at all) in the final corridor during what has so far been a flawless pacifist run.

buuut pushing past the visceral resistance to the concept. i can easily see a scene where the betrayal pushes her to lose it and seek revenge like it does in normal neutral runs, and her looking to papyrus for training help/human destroying plans. and just... meeting a Wall of denial. that would be a harrowing talk. something people don't mention enough is that papyrus sees himself as sans' caretaker as much if not even more than sans does towards him. a world where sans is dead is a world where he failed his brother. it would devastate him. so he clings to anything not to think about it/delude himself. and here comes undyne ready to shatter that fragile hope. it would be a horrible moment between them

but yeah. everything aside, sans would straight up just not die lol.

Ok im just going to jump straight in. I believe that the glowing kid you see after Eden is actually the King (or I suppose more accurately, Prince). 

(this ended up being really long, I really hope the ‘keep reading’ worked)

Something that has always bugged me about this section after Eden, is that the glowing kid seems surprised that you offer them a hug? Originally I thought that the glow kid was a depiction of your soul, or new soul. You die, turn up here and then reassure Yourself that everything is ok - hence the offering a hand and a hug and then absorbing them before moving onto your new life. However the surprise at the offer of a hug, and then the WAY they accept the hug fits so much better if this is actually the Prince.

Unlike friend-to-friend hug interactions,it's much slower, less of a display of friendship and familiarity, and more as if you are consoling someone, specifically someone who has either not been hugged in a Really long time, or not expecting someone to show them kindness, hence the surprise and almost relief in the movement? Which would make sense if he’s spent the past few centuries alone with the guilt of destroying your whole civilisation. After the hug, you absorb the glow kid, and regain your cape, but in a pure light form - no Winged Light, you have just become a being made out of light (instead of just having Your light relit, you become much brighter suggesting that you have absorbed more than just the light you are supposed to have). This also opens the gateway back to the physical world and your path to Orbit. 

Slight side note here: you continue to glow with this newly acquired light until the Children of Light you have saved return to the sky back in their star forms. The scene where they seem to thank you has some extra implications if the soul of the Prince (ie the person who caused their split from their bodies- more about this another time) is still in your body. After they leave, you immediately lose your glow, the Prince’s soul/light has left as it has been returned to Orbit (ie the “bring our lost stars home”)

In one of the updates a few months ago, the glow kid was changed from the same orangey glow that the Children of Light had later before they leave, to a white colour with almost no glow at all. Could this be to further differentiate between glowkid (Prince) and the Children of Light that you have just saved? A further point is that, the glow kid being your soul/light conflicts with the fact that the Voice tells you that you are about to be reborn only AFTER you go through the swirly space gate at the end of Orbit. It also seems strange to receive a cape, then become capeless again in Orbit if it were a part of your soul that you were reabsorbing.

Coming back to the Limbo glowkid scene. It acts exactly the same as the Elder cutscenes, which happen at the end of their respective realms, fiting with the confirmed idea that “The locations of their cutscenes are somewhere beyond space and time”. The same piece of information continues to say “he's(the King) not there in the same way as the elders you see in the cutscenes”. Although not explicitly labeled as an Elder himself, the King is essentially the ruler of Eden as seen in the opening cutscene (and Prophecy Murals, but thats a topic for another time). This black void that you go to is the Prince’s “Cutscene Limbo”. It also fits into the rule that although these places are separate from reality, they can still affect the physical world - Prairie with the butterfly pots, Wasteland with the door, Forest with the gold wheel and the doors etc. After you have interacted with the Elder (the glowkid) and given them light (in this case, shown them kindness, then they give you light in return) the physical world changes and allows you to progress (the golden light column appears and you can fly to Orbit) 

Another side thought about the Limbo, all of the other Elder’s Limbo’s look like a place they value, Prairie’s butterflies, the Twins coliseum, Wasteland protecting the gate, but the Prince’s is an empty void with a reflective floor. Getting into speculation now, but this somewhat points to either; he has no place of value because he knows he destroyed everything, or he doesn't feel he deserves to value any place in a civilisation he caused the downfall of. (or whatever put them there decided he needed a stricter time out zone)

Anyway, the last point that supports this, which deserves a post of its own, is that in my opinion at least it seems highly likely that Prince was a sort of “Proto-skykid”. From the concept art to the murals in the Prophecy caves, to the opening cutscene and new spirit memories, to the symbols related to King and skykids that we may have had reversed all along, a lot of stuff seems to be pointing in that direction.

But that a topic for another time

One final thing though. I know someone is probably thinking “if the skykid isnt us, why does it change size to match us if we resize in the scene?” Obviously there might be some lore connection there but I’m pretty sure that its so the hug scene works properly. As you know, hugging a player who is taller or shorter than you leads to some weird air hugs/grabbing the knees, which would have distracted players from what seems to be a rather important emotional point in the story.

deltarune megapost

I wanted to make a Deltarune post about the lore and the things that aren’t  obvious. And once I do that I wanna focus on why Mettaton is incredibly important to this setting

And also why he poses a problem

Why did Toriel and Asgore get divorced?

Without the setting of Undertale, Asgore and Toriel’s marriage still broke up after they had Asriel. There needs to be a reason though. In UT it was Asgore’s ‘worst of both worlds’ decision regarding killing anybody that fell from the human world, including children. We saw how close they were before this happened. Only something deep and serious caused that rift. In Deltarune, what on earth did Asgore do?

What happened to Dess?

Mentioned a handful of times by Noelle, Dess was her older sister and is mentioned In Undertale.... in that Xbox exclusing casino thing. The way Noelle talks about her, the conspicuous way Noelle gets locked out of her big house - it implies Dess is gone or deceased. Berdly recalls a spelling bee when he and Noelle were younger where she, despite being smarter than him, misspelled ‘December’, allowing him to win.

In the two-player spelling puzzle, it also spells out ‘December’ as Noelle recalls the past and her silhouette regresses to a child while she does so. Being distracted by her sister’s disappearance, rather than pure shyness, could account for her misspelling her name on stage, and it clearly left a big psychological mark for her to have this visual regression in the Dark World.

However, there’s a graveyard in Hometown with no Dess. I heard another theory that she has been missing for years, because where each character’s personal room is made by Queen to reflect their tastes via their search results, Noelle has a calendar where every day is December 25th. This could imply that Noelle continually searches the internet for ‘December Holiday’, her sister’s name, to see if there are clues to her disappearance, but of course the only result you would get is the date of Christmas.

Who is the Knight?

It’s now implied to be Kris, who has been forcibly removing the player’s influence to act on their own. By all accounts the Knight is the game’s main antagonist. Spade King and Queen both mention the Knight as someone who influenced their position - they brought Spade King to absolute power, and showed Queen that creation of new worlds was possible.

We’re led to believe that Kris was doing this, because they’ve been acting outside of the player’s control. Eating the entire pie between chapter 1 and 2 might have been a red herring to cover that they also went to the library and used that knife to slash open a dark fountain there.

However. This has issues. How would they even manage to shuffle slowly all the way to the library and get in the computer lab? The Knight is also the one creating the hidden bosses. They talked to Jevil until he realised he was in a game and he lost his mind; they ruined Spamton’s life by elevating him to success and then crushing him. Whatever the Knight is doing seems to be deliberately planned with key players in mind.

Kris opening the fountain at home at the end of ch.2 can be explained in that you just figured out in Cyber World that anyone determined enough can do this, and so, Kris decided to. So a better question might even be...

What does Kris want?

We have no idea. They are capable of removing the SOUL, ‘us’, temporarily, and putting things in motion we cannot influence. But they also keep putting us back in control afterward. This is hinted at right when ch.2 starts, where if you inspect the cage in Kris’s bedroom they threw us into, the description says it’s inescapable. Meaning Kris came back and took us out, willingly.

They allow us to pilot them through the game. Why? Because they cannot live without the SOUL for long for some reason? Because they’re bad at bullet hell? Why did they slash Toriel’s tyres before opening the fountain, making sure nobody could drive away?? Why did they specifically open the door?

You can find out details about Kris through the creepy way you interact with the townsfolk, who think you are Kris. They play the piano at the hospital waiting room - better than you. They used to go to church just to get the special church juice. It’s all normal, relatable things, not like someone who’s trying to plunge the world into darkness. Judging by their search history portrayed in their Queen’s castle room, they really want to see their brother again. However the castle has a room based on Asriel’s search history too, and Kris (not you) closes their eyes and won’t look at it.

What is Ralsei?

His name is an anagram of Asriel. Is he an extension of Asriel? The slightly flirtier dialogue in ch.2 would point to no. Is he an extension of Kris themselves, given the link between Kris’s childhood habit of wearing a headband with red horns on it, to pretend to be a monster like their family?

Ralsei knows exactly where the Dark World in the school is located, and unlike regular Darkners, knows the world is folded up inside the ‘real world’. There’s a certain whiplash to Ralsei telling you to hop out of his reality into yours and go down the hallway to retrieve all the board game items.

How does he jump from one Dark World to another, without assistance? How does he not get petrified like Lancer and Rouxls? Is this a power level thing because he’s a prince or something else? We definitely do not know enough about Ralsei.

He also says this incredibly suspicious thing after you spare Spamton NEO. Susie was also curious but accepts that maybe it ‘didn’t mean anything’, which is a sure tell that these optional bosses do mean something.

Someone is orchestrating what’s happening, opening fountains, manipulating the rulers, and influencing NPCs to become the optional bosses. Why? I suspect Ralsei for both knowing too much, and pretending something doesn’t matter when it clearly does. Until Asriel actually comes home from college I’m going to suspect he’s involved in this too.

How much does Seam know?

Seam on the other hand knows a lot about what’s going on but is openly withholding information while helping you. He’s nihilistic. He says things like:

One day soon... You too, will begin to realize the futility of your actions. Ha ha ha... At that time, feel free to come back here. I'll make you tea... And we can toast... to the end of the world!

Either this ‘end of the world’ is a reference to The Roaring, where opening too many dark fountains dooms the Dark World and the real one... or, I can’t get out of my head the idea that Deltarune takes place in a fake, or weird reconstruction of Undertale where things don’t match up, and eventually it will have to disappear. After all, powers of determination and creating and manipulating universes are Undertale’s basic bread and butter. How can we look at an Alternate Universe containing the characters we already know and not suspect that? Seam also uses Gaster’s key words, ‘darker, yet darker’, seemingly to clue us in that he’s not off track here.

Why haven’t we seen Papyrus?

This is a bright neon flashing ‘something’s not right’ sign. It’s not like Papyrus’s voice actor was too busy or anything. His absence is noticable and for a reason. Nice of Sans to promise we could meet him despite being aware we’re piloting a child’s body around, though, even if he didn’t follow through.

What locations in town could be used for dark fountains in the next 4 chapters?

If the sequence continues, we have chapter 1 in the school games room, chapter 2 in a computer lab, and chapter 3 in front of Kris’s television, where the aesthetic of each setting influences the world, characters, and enemies in the Dark World created there. Future possibilities include the church, the hospital, sans’s grocery store, Noelle’s house, and the closed bunker.

What the hell’s in the closed bunker

This one’s too obvious, honestly. I think it’ll open for no reason in chapter 7 and a little white dog will bounce out and steal one of your key items and nothing else happens.

Why does Asgore have these

Unlike the bunker feeling like a joke teaser, I gotta believe this is foreshadowing something weird. For example, what does opening a dark fountain in here with the seven flowers do? Does it just take you into Undertale?

Each chapter will have a hidden boss with a ‘soul mode’ from Undertale

Chapter 1 let you stay red, but I think each subsequent chapter is going to change your soul mode to one of the seven colours and design the encounter around that. Purple, yellow, green and blue were used in Undertale, leaving the light blue and orange modes yet to be revealed.

How does Spamton emulate Mettaton Neo’s name, body, and incorporate his battle theme, and the ‘Dummy!’ theme, with no actual connection between them ingame?

This is a really fun one that’s explained over in this post here. Swatch is the Dark World creation from the paint program on the library computers, so he’s able to explain that a Lightner made the robot body decaying in the castle basement that way.

Mettaton went to the library and drew his ideal form, Mettaton NEO, in MS Paint, and the Dark World formed that into a puppet body which Spamton was able to hijack temporarily. So by doing that Spamton was able to channel Mettaton’s appearance, attacks, music, and SOUL mode for the fight.

This might mean that the future hidden bosses, each with their own SOUL mode, might be based on the associated character for that mode (Muffet, Undyne, and Sans or Papyrus), and the boss will take on some aspect of them from their world to leech their fight mechanics.

The Problem With Mettaton

We don’t exactly know what Deltarune is about. It’s an alternate universe where the characters from Undertale already live on the surface, have completely normal lives, but diverge from the storyline of Undertale and, crucially, have not lived through the changes Frisk brought to their lives.

Remember how Undertale had a dozen different ending routes depending on who you befriended? The constant reinforcement in Undertale was that your choices mattered. Through Frisk, you chose to bring Alphys closure about her mistakes, you chose to befriend papyrus instead of attacking him, you chose to help Alphys and Undyne realise their feelings for each other and it’s only doing that that leads to the golden ending and escape to the surface.

Deltarune is the opposite, your choices do not matter. The only thing you can do to force the route of the game to change is to force Noelle into a No Mercy run, which is indirect, and also, a total desperation to mess with an otherwise set course. This version of the characters have not been helped by Frisk - Undyne and Alphys are not together, Papyrus has no friends, Asgore cannot get over himself, and they’re clearly the worse for it, but potentially, you COULD still do these things. In fact it’s hinted that you already are.

But there’s Mettaton.

He’s still a ghost and does not leave his house. In Frisk’s world, Gaster deleted himself, promoting Alphys to royal scientist by bluffing with Mettaton, and she then build him his ideal body. In Kris’s world... Alphys is a school teacher. There’s no barrier to break, no reason to experiment on souls, no Flowey mistake, and no body for Mettaton.

It was sad in Ch.1, but now with the Spamton NEO fight in ch.2, it’s unmissable. Mettaton wants that body and he cannot get it. Alphys in this universe is not going to leave her teaching job and suddenly be able to build a robot. Mettaton is just... screwed out of his happy ending and cannot get it.

So what resolution could this have? If it wasn’t for Mettaton I might believe in the vaildity of Deltarune and Hometown. But. How can you doom this character? If Undertale was the only way Mettaton could be befriended, then Undertale is Primary Universe A and Seam is right - the world of Deltarune is doomed as some kind of aberration. It all relies on how this gets explained in the future, but the core mystery of Deltarune is how exactly this universe intersects with Undertale and whether one is an offshoot of the other. How the Dark World links into that is another complication. But even as we get more fun characters and neat stuff in the Dark Worlds, let’s not forget we have absolutely no idea why Undertale’s characters are living here with no mention of underground or why there are no other humans beside Kris.

Some thoughts on my last Gamefly rental, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot.

*Though most people are familiar with DBZ, especially the three main Sagas in this game, given how often they’re played out in games, I’ll put a spoiler warning here just in case. Also, I didn’t try out the DLC stories, yet, so this will just be about the base PS4 game with it’s current updates. I may buy the game and try those out in the future. I also say a lot about the game.

The game spans from the Saiyan Saga to the end of the Buu Saga(not counting DLC). Pretty much every important scene is played through, though a few parts are skimmed over or skipped, like:

Goku traveling Snake Way, his brief fall into Hell, and training with King Kai(shown a bit and mentioned but not playable) 

Piccolo using Hellzone Grenade against Android 17(you can have him learn the move and do it yourself, though).

Future Trunks’ battle with Cell where he found out the speed-loss disadvantages of Super Saiyan Third Grade(that moment isn’t shown or mentioned, though he does still fight Cell in that form)

Vegito still attacking Super Buu after being turned into candy(which means we don’t get to see him beating Super Buu up as a high-speed jawbreaker). Also, Goku and Vegeta freeing everyone trapped inside Super Buu happens offscreen.

And possibly a few smaller moments. They aren’t too important in the long run, though, plus some were probably for better pacing or something.

There was some added stuff, too:

Several times, you’ll be able to meet, and occasionally do sidequests for, several older Dragon Ball characters, like Nam, Eighter and Launch.

A new fight for Goku against Kid Buu to end the main story before he launches the Super Spirit Bomb at him.

There's a fairly small amount of playable characters(who can also be put in a party as Support Members): 

Goku

Gohan

Vegeta

Piccolo

Future Trunks(Android/Cell Saga and Epilogue, only)

Gotenks(only in two battles against Super Buu)

Vegito(in one battle against Super Buu, which, considering how powerful Vegito is, is more of an epic beatdown than a fight)

And a few characters that are support only:

Krillin

Tien

Yamcha

Chiaotzu

Goten

Kid Trunks

Android 18

All characters, Main and Support Only, have a ‘Super Attack Skill Tree’ that you can use Z Orbs that you find/earn to give them new skills and attacks. What you can get increases based on the character’s level and story progress(example, you can’t get Super Saiyan 2 for Gohan until he unlocks it during the fight with Perfect Cell).

Throughout the game, you’ll collect ‘Soul Emblems’ to place onto several ‘Community Boards’ to increase various ingame bonuses, like more EXP or cooking benefits. You get Soul Emblems both from the main story and side quests. They can be leveled up with Gifts to increase the Community Level, giving more bonuses. This seems to be the best setup for all of the emblems that I found.

At campfires and at Goku’s House, you can make food from items/materials you have to give yourself a stat boost. And Chi-Chi can be asked to make the party Full Course Meals at her home, which also increase the Base Stats of whoever eats them.

A certain filler episode from the original series where Goku and Piccolo are forced to get a Driver's License also happens in this game(though unfortunately without the outfits they wore in said episode). After doing so, you unlock the ability to make cars and battle walkers from Bulma, as well as Time Attacks for both types of vehicles(which I didn’t do much of).

Like the first Budokai game, this one has story’s events shown in cutscenes, which the later ones just had them happen in dialogue to speed things along, probably. And they did a really good job of animated said scenes, matching the look and feel of the series VERY closely.

The flying also feels well done, and true to the series. Aside from flying normally, which is fairly slow, you can hit L3 to start flying faster, at the cost of your Ki slowly going down and not being able to sense Ki with R1. This is the best way to travel the the large maps. Goku and Gohan can also use the Flying Nimbus, though you can’t pick up items that you need to hit Circle while doing so. Also, ramming into weaker enemies while flying will defeat them instantly and give you EXP. It’s a bit hard to aim yourself at enemies correctly, sometimes, though. 

Going underwater functions the same as flying, except with an air meter to keep an eye on. If it runs out, you get kicked back above where you entered the water as the only penalty. Take a peek down under whatever bodies of water you find; there’s always stuff to see and collect, depending on the map, especially on maps with oceans.

You can also dash on the ground by hitting L3, and unlike when flying, you can still sense Ki while doing so. 

I feel like this game’s flying controls are about what it should feel like for a Superman game. Probably might need a few tweaks to fit more with that series, but this feels like a good base for that kind of game.

The game’s many maps are pretty large, with lots to see and explore, including towns, caves that you need to be a certain level to enter, materials to gather, fishing spots, and more. They include plenty of well known DBZ locations, insulting Kame House(and the ocean around it), West City and Capsule Corp., Korin’s Tower and Kami’s Lookout, and so on.

Floating around these maps are enemies you can fight. They grow in strength as you do/the story progresses. If you’re strong enough and are fast-flying when running into an enemy, you’ll defeat it and gain EXP right away.

Speaking of Korin’s Tower, you can eventually unlock the ability to grow Senzu Beans there, which fully heal you. Once they’re unlocked, they will gradually grow and can be collected from Korin, with a Senzu Bean icon appearing next to it on the World Map if there’s any available. He will hold up to 9 at once, so check back once in a while.

Fishing is pretty easy to do; just hit one of the face buttons(X, Triangle, Square and Circle) when the marker is in a marked area, then hot one again when the closing circle is within another marked circle(this might make more sense when you see it yourself). You’ll get items for cooking from fishing, and some sidequests need them, or just certain types of fish, to clear. An amusing detail when fishing is that Goku and Gohan, even when he’s a teenager, use a fake tail as a lure while Vegeta and Piccolo fish like normal people(I forgot to check and see what Future Trunks does, but probably the latter).

After clearing the Frieza Saga, you can collect the Dragon Balls on Earth during Intermissions. They give off a small orange slow when sensing for Ki, and you’ll hear a low humming sound when you’re close to one. You can get several different wishes from them, with three of them always being for Z Orbs, Zeni or Rare Material Items. Other wishes are reviving certain dead characters to fight them again, and can only be done once, unlike the three listed above. At first, you can only make 1 wish at a time, but as the game goes on, it gets upgraded to 2 then 3 wishes at once. After making a wish(s), you ‘ll need to wait 20 ingame minutes before the Dragon Balls can be found and used again. They seems to have a couple set locations on whatever map they end up on(two locations are west of Orange/Satan City, for example).

Speaking of Mr. Satan...I know that his actually Japanese stage name, but I always end up calling him Hercule due to hearing that for so many years(and just liking how that sounds better). Also, ‘Satan City’ just sounds really funny. XD

You probably won’t need to really grind in the base game; you should get enough experience from doing sidequests and story events to get by. Gohan especially; he ended up quite a few more levels than everyone else just from the story EXP alone, and his Unleashed Potential ‘form’ from Elder Kai makes him do quite a lot more damage. Also, gained experience is shared among all party members, even those not currently set to fight.

One of the sidequests you can do throughout the game is defeating ‘Villainous Enemies’, who are fairly strong, and are covered in a red aura. You should at least be at or around their level before fighting them, since you can’t run from fights in this game. It may be best to do them during Intermissions when you can select your party members, and bringing someone who can stun with Solar Flare(like Krillin), can be really helpful. 

In the epilogue/postgame, in addition to being able to play as Future Trunks(talk to him outside of Capsule Corp.), you can also use his time machine to redo Boss fights, and do any sidequests you may have missed.

The game’s opening has the old opening for the show, ‘Cha-La-Head-Cha-La”, and this is the first time I really listened to it. It’s really good, and kind of reminds me of the opening to Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon, too, for some reason.

There’s a few parts where there’s some nice attention to the series’ details:

At several story points when Saiyan characters are healed, like with Senzu Beans or the healing pod on Namek, they gain experience, while others, like Krillin, don’t get that bonus, which does make them, admittedly accurately, start lagging behind in strength.

If you use Ki Sense on Androids, and a certain researcher in Capsule Corp., you won’t see anything emitting from them.

If you have Piccolo and/or Android 18 in your party while eating a Full Course Meal from Chi-Chi, they won’t eat any of it. Saiyan characters(again, forgot to check Future Trunks) eat it ravenously(even Vegeta), while human party members eat normally.

Only Goku and Gohan can use the Flying Numbus.

These aren’t really important observations, but some events in the game made me think:

Did Piccolo destroying the Moon to stop Gohan’s Great Ape form have any effects on Earth? Or did nothing really happen?

How in the world did Supreme Kai and Babidi survive being so close to Majin Vegeta when he used Final Explosion while Piccolo and Krillin hightailed it out of there with Goten and Kid Trunks? 

I noticed a possible(intentional) goof at the end. In the cutscene after beating Kid Buu and going back to Kami’s Lookout to reunite with everyone, Dende is a kid again for some reason. Apparently, both the original anime and manga made this goof too, so maybe it’s a nod to that? It is kind of jarring, though. XD

A couple technical issues I found were that sometimes when loading a map, and in some battles later on, the game would hang for a couple seconds, and one time it crashed while it was loading into an area after traveling to another. Thank goodness for autosave. Also, be careful using the stronger version of Goku’s Spirit Bomb attacks; it caused major lag for me a couple times.

This ended up being one of my favorite DBZ games that I’ve played, close runners up including 

Budokai 3

Budokai Tenkaichi 2(mainly for just how many characters that one has, including most of the movies from around that time, outmatched by Budokai Tenkaichi 3, which I didn’t play)

Legacy of Goku 2(I didn’t get the chance to play Buu’s Fury back then)

Next game being sent is: Nitroplus Blasterz: Heroines Infinite Duel

I saw this bouncing around my dash and decided to fill it out myself for fun :)  I decided to not double-list any games, and I tried to mix up the companies I used too so that the list would be more unique.

Long post, so I’m doing a readmore for my longwinded part lol.

(read more)

Favorite Game: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords - I could talk about this game forever.  How it tears apart the Star Wars universe from within, how it creates a compelling story while challenging the usual themes, etc.  I could talk for ages about the characters and how their motivations slot in place, and how this game lends itself to interpretation and analysis alongside roleplay.  It’s just a wonderful game, one I deeply love and will always love.  It’s a game that isn’t afraid to have you talk to other characters for twenty or thirty minutes at a time and honestly I’m always riveted at every line.  This game deserves the cult fanbase it has, but I think there’s a lot the fanbase misses in appreciating this game.  (Note...gameplay is a little janky and a community made mod restores a lot content that was cut before shipping-the game wasn’t properly finished).

Best Story:  Fallout New Vegas - It’s the setting that makes the story here, and all the moving pieces and factions alongside the main conflict really make this game stand out.  There’s so many little pieces to find along the way in the world and the way the main quest splits based on who you want in power feels important--and you are choosing a future for this whole region.

Favorite Art Style: The Witness - This game is peacefully wonderful with its visuals.  There are wonderful nature scenes and nests of wires and panels spreading in various parts of the island that are fascinating to look at.  The environment is half of the gameplay in most areas, so it’s important to look around even though exploration is not really the gameplay.  You find puzzles in the world, even in nature, and it’s fascinating.  The colors are bright and beautiful.  There is even a map in the middle of the island inside of a lake that helps you track your progress if you notice it (it isn’t like a normal ‘map’).

Favorite Soundtrack: Shin Megami Tensei IV - I love video game soundtracks, but SMTIV is something special.  The music booms in ways that make you really understand the atmosphere of the world, and there’s a great mix of different kinds of tracks for different places.  I love the tracks for the other worlds you enter, and the themes of the different routes are done so well.  Some of the music draws from past SMT games, but the remixes done for this game really are stunning to me, and there’s so many fantastic original tracks.

Hardest Game: I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream - I love this game but I literally never touch it without a walkthrough, which is why it gets to be the hardest game on the list, despite being a point and click adventure game lol.  Also just emotionally this game is challenging too, but I definitely mean this more in terms of getting a ‘perfect run’.

Funniest Game: The Stanley Parable - Trying to make this list has taught me that I don’t really play many ‘funny games’.  I don’t know if a game where multiple endings demand that you kill yourself should count as a ‘funniest game’, but it is also a game where the narrator tells you to stare at a fern and memorize its features, so....it counts.

Game I Like that is Hated: RWBY Grimm Eclipse - I’ve been playing this game since it was in early access and have loved it the whole time.  I find the gameplay soothing and fun, and I like playing the different characters.  It’s a game I play to chill out and just enjoy some fun battle mechanics.  It’s a fun game and I’ve spent over 100 hours in it, so I hope I like it, lol.

Game I Hate that is Liked:  Nier Automata - Neither this game’s gameplay or story impress me, and the fact that you have to replay basically the same stuff from a more boring-to-play-character’s pov in order to SEE all of the plot is a huge damper on the experience.  The story, to me, someone who engages with a lot of robot-focused fiction, is far from impressive or new, and it hardly engages with genre specifics at all, let alone in a new or interesting way.  I view this game as ‘a story with robots in it’ rather than ‘a story about robots’, which, to me, is a detriment.

Underrated: Nevermind - This game is amazing and very unheard of--and when it is heard of, it has been marketed incorrectly.  Nevermind seems like a horror game, and does market itself as one a bit, but it’s much more than that.  It’s more about trauma, recovery, therapy, etc.  This is a game that is so mindful about the topics it engages in that I am impressed by it every time.  It’s heavy with symbolism and character, despite lacking conversations or other similar game mechanics.  This is a lovely game that I really wish more people knew about-`p5-all of the patients are so interesting, and the focus on recovery and mental health is impressive.

Overrated:  Fire Emblem - I sort of mean this as the series as a whole really.  I have enjoyed the entries I have played somewhat, but I overall consider the series much less impressive than I was led to believe by others.  The gameplay especially is not impressive to me in any regard, even though I sometimes do find myself enjoying it.  The stories are alright, but many of them are weighed down by the gameplay and as a writer and person who likes to analyze writing, it’s very hard to do so when it isn’t able to fully exist under the chains the gameplay forces on it.  There are ways to mix gameplay and story well, Fire Emblem has not really done that in any of the entries I’ve played.  That being said, I don’t regret playing them, and I will occasionally replay, but I consider them mediocre games at best.

Best Voice Acting: Devil Survivor 2 - I love the voice acting in this game.  I feel like all the characters are really suited to their voices, and it’s really easy for me to visualize their voices.  They really bring the game to life and make both the dramatic and the funny scenes more enjoyable.

Worst Voice Acting: Jedi Knight Jedi Academy - I love this game, I really do, but some of the voice acting is janky.  Some of it is okay too--I think Kyle Katarn’s voice actor does fine, and some of the others I like NOW but hated when I was a kid, but the male protagonist voice in this game is just awful.  Which is bad when Jennifer Hale is the female voice actress lol.  His performance is passable though unless you’re playing darksided--the darksided ending to the game lacks all punch when you’re playing the male protagonist.

Favorite Male:  Battler Ushiromiya from Umineko no Naku Koro Ni - He’s the protagonist for most of the visual novels and I adore him utterly, especially once you move past episode 2.  He’s a wonderful character who I care about deeply.  I love his drive and how he fights--he’s someone who is easy to cheer for.  He matures well throughout the series and his character development is just wonderful.

Favorite Female:  Naoto Shirogane from Persona 4 - I really like how Naoto fits so well in the game, especially for being a final recruit--oftentimes the final recruit of Persona games (post 3) have a bit of a more difficult time feeling right with the group.  Naoto works really well though, and I love her struggles and story as well.  I think the difficulties she has concerning living as a woman in her field hit very deep to a problem that has existed for a very long time.

Favorite Protagonist: Connor of Daventry from King’s Quest 8 Mask of Eternity - I’m like, one of four fans of this character in the world, lol.  KQ8 is not a very well liked game and it does have a lot of issues, both with age and with how much of a departure it is from the series prior to it.  It’s strange to take a puzzle adventure game and make it a hybrid with what basically is a shooter, and it doesn’t really work.  Add to that the fact that you spend most of your time in the game without anyone around to talk to and it leads to this really polarizing and weird experience.  For me, Conner goes through what I would consider to be the ‘Ultimate Nightmare Scenario”.  Everyone in the world is turned to stone except him (and he survived out of mere chance) and so now it’s up to him, practically alone, to save the entire world.  There is no game lonelier than this.  I adore him for his bravery in the face of it, and how he just picks up to do what must be done because someone should do it, and if no one else can, then he will.  I also really love how he apologizes to people who are encased in stone while he takes money from their houses to help him on his journey.  I really do think he went back after the game was over and gave everyone heaps of gold to pay them back with interest lol.

Favorite Village:  Oakvale from Fable - The first Fable is the only one I really like, and it was one of the games I played when I was little, so the hometown in the game always meant a lot to me.  I like how you grow up there and how your tragic backstory is there--and then how you get to return to the town years later after you’ve come into your own, and you can see it completely rebuilt.  I like to spend a lot of my time in this town, just wandering around it and playing the minigames.  Even though I have a house in every town, Oakvale is where my hero calls home.

Most Hated Character:  Merril from Dragon Age 2 - I don’t really want to lay into how I feel about Merril, but what I will say is that it was suggested to me that I totally ignore her when playing, and I did so.  I only met her for her quest, dropped her off in town, and literally never spoke to her or interacted for the rest of the game.  I had a much better experience for it, honestly.  She appeared after I made my choice in the end of the game, which felt weird since I hadn’t spoken to her in several ingame years, but other than that, the game was totally fine without her.  I sort of just wish you could kill characters in DA2 the way you can in DAO, then I’d just do that, tbh.  It doesn’t suit very many (or any) of the characters I rp in DA2 to keep her around or support her in any way.

First Game I Played: Mixed up Mother Goose Deluxe - I’m not actually sure if this is the FIRST game I’ve ever played or not, but it’s one of the first I played alone as a kid.  I really loved it--this is probably what created my love for point and click adventures, and the game was very silly and fun.

Favorite Company: Bioware - I’ve always been a sucker for Bioware games, ever since Knights of the Old Republic 1 was my favorite childhood game.  I love how they do stories and party members, and while I’m not a fan of all of their games, I really love what they’ve made and their style of storytelling and character driven plot.  Even though sometimes their stories get cliche, I think the suit video games well and most of my early gaming was within their games.

Hated Company: EA - Bioware truly only started to go to shit after the EA acquisition, so I fucking hate EA.   I know Bioware had issues before EA too, but I definitely don’t think EA has helped the situation whatsoever.

Depressing Game: The Beginner’s Guide - I relate to this game as a creator and a writer, and it affects me deeply because of the story it tells and the questions it raises.  It makes me reflect on how I think of myself as a creator, and it reminds me of friendships I used to have.

Creepy Game:  The Path - God, I love this game.  It’s just aimlessly wandering around and finding symbolic scenery and watching your current character comment on it.  Then, you go off to find your girl’s wolf, and each one is different and unique to her, and you watch it ‘kill’ her--and facing her wolf is the only way each girl can truly mature.  Whenever you get to grandmother’s house, the camera switches to first person, and your eyes keep closing, so you can only see while clicking to move.  It forces you to keep moving so that you can see, but since you are moving, you only get to see things somewhat vaguely.  It’s got a great atmosphere, and I love the symbolic storytelling.

Happy Game: Eastshade - This game is so sweet.  There’s some drama around to with many of the quests, but I like this as an rpg without combat, and I think this would be a really good kids game.  There’s a lot to see and explore, and the game was made to be really pretty so that you want to paint several aspects of it.  It’s really lovely to just wander around in this game and bike around the area, painting anything that suits your fancy.  As long as you don’t finish the main quest, you’re free to wander, and materials do respawn, so you essentially can infinitely paint once you get far enough.

Favorite Ending: Virtue’s Last Reward - I love the questions this game asks and where the ending goes.  It thematically ties together--the whole reason the game itself exists is to get the attention of a ‘higher being’--the player, essentially.  I love how it plays with that concept, and even though the final game in the series doesn’t entirely pick this idea up where this game left it, standalone this game is stunning in how it comes together.

Final thoughts on Pokemon Sword/Shield

So in case you weren’t aware (which is most of you, I’m sure), a few months ago I started a Pokemon Shield blind Nuzlocke Run.  And recently, I completed the main portion of the Nuzlocke by defeating the Champion.  Having played through the game, though, I thought I’d give my final thoughts on it as a Pokemon fan, a gamer, and as a storyteller.

The Story & Characters

In all honesty, I rather enjoyed the main story of this game.  The Pokemon League has always been presented like a professional sport (at least in the anime/cartoon), so it’s fun to see the games taking that perspective and rolling with it.  It felt like an actual tournament/championship, to compete for the title in an officially organized manner, rather than just running a gauntlet of preset combatants.

In addition, I liked how they incorporated both the gym leaders and our rivals into the league story as not only combatants, but also as individuals with their own lives and aspirations.  Marnie and Team Yell are adorable, Hop is... mostly tolerable, thus far, but by far my favorite rival character has been Bede, the Psychic/Fairy trainer.  His haughty and prideful demeanor make him a delight to defeat, and his arc is a wonderful story to see unfold.  I’m really curious to see what he gets up to in the after-story! The Gym Leaders are also fun to meet and battle; the Pokemon games as a whole have been gradually attempting to give more and more character to each of the Gym Leaders you meet, beyond just trials to overcome on your journey to victory.  And while I always have a soft spot for the Hoenn & Sinnoh gyms, I like that they opted to have the Gym Leaders return in place of having more Elite Four members to fight  I only wish I could get more opportunities to get to know them better, cuz there’s some standout leaders from this batch which I truly enjoy!

My biggest complaint with Sword/Shield’s story, though, has been the “Heroic Quest” plotline which has become increasingly common these days.  I like the character of Sonia the researcher, and Oleana is satisfying to watch lose, my biggest complaint has been the pacing of the plot; the first 2/3rd’s of the story are us teaming with Sonia to gradually get the backstory revealed to us, and then in the last half hour, right as the Tournament’s getting underway, all the villains suddenly crawl from beneath the floorboards and run amok while you have to chase them down!  There didn’t feel like there was a proper buildup explaining why the villain wanted to summon the legendary Pokémon, especially one which we heard next to nothing about! This brings about an interesting idea, however... what if instead, they had completely forgone any Legendary-Summoning stories until after the league?  Honestly, I was way more invested challenging the gyms and fighting the champion than I was stopping the literal POKEMON APOCALYPSE from happening... so what if for future games, they saved those for after you became champion?  As a sort of test of your skills, to prove your worth to bear the mantle you have taken!  Maybe it wouldn’t have meshed well, maybe they needed to show of the game mascot more, I dunno...  it’s just my thoughts.

The GamePlay

THEY FINALLY LET US TURN OF THE GODS-FORSAKENED TUTORIALS!!!  PRAISE THE ALL-FATHER!!!

Ahem... In all honesty, I think I’d grown a bit too used to the 2nd screen of the DS-series games, but after a couple days of getting used to the mono-screen style again, I am pleased to say I found it very easy to settle back into.  Though there are still some features I wish would make a return (the HM moves as opposed to public transportation, poison’s effect while walking, wild double battles, etc.), there are alot of fun mechanics introduced and remedies to older problems that have been introduced!

I think one feature which hasn’t had much said about it is the introduction of the Poke-Jobs system; this system allows you to send your Pokémon out on timed “away missions” to gain both experience and items.  In the old days, if you wanted to passively level your pokemon, the only real option you had without introducing a second player was the Daycare center, and they could only raise two pokemon at once... and you had to pay for it.  With Poke-Jobs, though, I can send anywhere from 5-10 teammates out for whatever amount of time I want them to be out for, and then come back later to see them lively and with goodies to show for their work! At first, I didn’t think I’d get much use out of this system; I, like many players out there I’m sure, prefer to guide my pokemon’s training personally, honing their movesets and guiding their levelling and points the way I want from them.  But as I progressed further in my Nuzlocke, and as my daily life became busier and busier, I found myself sending my backup teammates out on jobs to keep them on par with my main team.  Given that the Move Deleter/Tutor and Name Rater are now services that have been rolled into the Pokemon Center, yet another good thing this series has done, I found it much easier to keep my reserve Pokemon prepared in case I needed a substitution. Some Nuzlocke “Purists” may call that taking the easy way out, but... frankly, I don’t have the willpower to do that much grinding.  I’m here to play a game and have fun doing it, dammit.

The Wild Area is another thing I’ve wanted to see from Pokemon for a long time - taking more steps to make the regions seem like an open world, with vast sprawling environments full of pokemon and secrets to uncover.  I’ll admit, though, the execution is... not entirely perfect.  While open expanses are fun to explore, the Wild Area did seem a bit... flat to traverse.  And while the weather mechanics translating into battle are fun to deal with, the same sets of wild pokemon appearing did start to wear me down.  I think what the Wild Area really needed, in the long run, was a system similar to how Black/White/Black2/White2 did - having seasonal progression ingame, where different pokemon would show up during different seasons, making the different places unique and novel all over again throughout the year. And for the record, many of my gripes with the Wild Area were addressed in the Isle of Armor’s expansion island.  VASTLY superior, and much more fun to navigate and traverse.

...I’ll openly admit this: I was not a fan of Mega Evolution when it was first introduced in X/Y.  I felt it was fine enough to see Pokemon battling without power boosts or “digi-volving” or whatever you wanna call it.  When Sun/Moon Introduced Z-Moves, it felt like a step in the right direction, but at the same time, I ended up not using it very often.  If I had to have a power boost to my pokemon, I would want it something that couldn’t be used as a crutch when the going gets tough - something that has a limited usability, and offers benefits specific to the time it’s being used. I say this because I initially approached Dynamax the same way: as just another power boost to level the playing field and shake up the battle meta which I don’t keep track of.  However, after barely surviving all 8 gym leaders without using a single dynamax pokemon, I decided to give it a chance: after having completed the Isle of Armor’s subplot and gaining access to the Max Soup, I fed it to my Toxtricity Spike, and started running dynamax raids.  As I started using it more and more, I started gaining a certain appreciation for it that I hadn’t before; this was something written in to being a unique cultural effect!  This literally is imagining Pokemon as Kaiju!  And for the most part, it works! While I still feel mega-lvl-power-boosts in pokemon are a huge waste, at the very least I can say Dynamax didn’t leave me with too bad a taste in my mouth.  I do hope, however, that Dynamax stays a Sword/Shield exclusive power; given it’s cultural importance in Galar, and how Mega-Evolution was in the previous generation, I think having power boosts specific to regions works better than having the same stuff used across the board for every meta onwards,

What Do I hope for the Future?

I can’t say for sure if they’ll release a sequel game for Sword/Shield, but if they do... I would want them to make these minor changes:

Hold off the Heroic plot for after the League plot; devote the main first half of the game to just the gyms and league story like was done here, and then save meeting uber-god-tier Pokémon for after you’ve claimed the title of Champion.

Having said that, fix the pacing of how the Eternatus/Darkest Day subplot feels as it’s being played out.  Offer us more insight into Rose and Oleana’s mindsets as they go about their business, and give us more coherent exposition from our field trips with Prof. Sonia. 

Fix how the Wild Area looks - give it more variations for each sub-region and offer more varieties of habitats, like in the Isle of Armor.  Or, alternatively, try to implement a seasonal mechanic to make the same areas change over the year, opening new paths and new avenues to explore!

Let Bede defeat Oleana.  Give my boy some closure.

Allow us to see and interact with the Gym Leaders outside of the gyms more.  I had, like, barely 2 lines of dialogue with Nessa, and even less for Milo.  Not asking for a whole lot, just a bit more to tie us into who they are as people.  Piers is best big brother.  <3

That’s all I had written for now.  If y’all want a biography of my champion team for my Shield Nuzlocke, let me know, and I’ll scrap a post together! <3

finally. i decided to do this. anyways hello there, i am jake and today i want to talk about something; you see, if you are in the tf2 fandom, you probably know about heavymedic. Wherther you are a hardcore gamer who resents f2p’s or a person that never played the game but has trillions of notes on their art- you know heavymedic exists and most of all you probably ship it.

And I find that weird. In the few fandoms in my life I have been in I had never seen a single ship be so widely if not shipped, then accepted. Sure, maybe everyone in the GF fandom knows what Billdip is - for better or for worse. Sure, maybe the HS fandom is 70% shipping.

But I have never ever seen such a phenomenon in a prominent multiplayer game fandom. A fandom, sadly, oftentimes filled with toxicity. Overwatch is very similar here - yet ships are either a hot topic of discussion or straight up ignored. But TF2? In here for whatever reason we ship these two mercenaries. And in this essay I will try and find a reason or two why is that.

Apologies for any mistakes or incoherency. English is not my first language, I need to ramble, and my vocabulary is all over the place.

Content warning: mentions of homophobia, blood, death, mentions of WLW fetishization, nsfw mention. Also MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR THE TF2 COMICS.

Part 1: Canonical Evidence and Interactions

Let’s be honest: I could ramble about this one for days on end. But I’ll try and keep it short.

First and foremost we have the official videos. And of course the first thing that comes to mind is Meet the Medic.

At the very start of the part where Medic himself appears, we see him telling a joke about a particularly gruesome situation to Heavy.

He laughs along with him, visibly enjoying his company. He even smiles as he waits for another joke. Heavy only shows genuine fear a lot later.

And of course this damn scene always cracks me up. Medic slightly pinches Heavy’s cheek and strokes his lip gently (the other part is almost not noticeable unless you play the video at slow speed).

Of course we all know about the Hand Hold that happens somewhere halfway in the vid. I don’t think I have to explain the gayness in that. The fact their hands stay interlocked even after Medic helps Heavy up. The deep breath Medic takes because even he cannot handle the emotions. That few seconds is unresolved sexual tension manifest.

Overall the short shows a strong feeling of trust between these two. Medic confides in Heavy and reverse. Yeah he puts a baboon heart into his friend’s chest cavity but the fact (as proven at the end of the video) that Heavy was the first one to have an Ubercharge implanted into him shows that Medic at the very least considers him a lab rat.

I treat End of the Line as non-canonical, as do many others, and as such won’t discuss it here. But it will forever crack me up that Valve endorsed such levels of homoerotic subtext.

These two have some short moments in other videos, like for example in Invasion Heavy helps Medic up (CINEMATIC PARALLELS) but it’s nothing major so I guess I’ll skip forward.

Second is their interactions ingame. You might call me a weirdo for trying to find stuff in there but holy shit I have things to say and I’m going to say them.

You thought I was going to fanboy over the “i love this doktor” voiceline huh? Well not really. I wish these two had unique lines if they assist one another.

Heavy is literally listed on the official wiki as the “ideal medic buddy” and multiple pages on that exact wiki say some pretty interesting things.

I have to say something about the Gentleman’s Ushanka and/or Pocket Medic. They are both community cosmetics - but the fact they both got accepted by Valve says a lot. Above is text snipped from the actual wiki.

Last but not least: The Comics. Darned comics. The pair of mercenaries has basically no interaction - unless you count issue 6.

Heavy getting absolutely PISSED when Medic is killed by Ch*avy. Their reunion. Medic referring to Heavy by “my friend” in a totally straight way. Kind of sad Valve wasted an opportunity for them to hug. Maybe they knew their comic artist ships them and wanted to avoid having to answer the Question™.

Part 2: Dynamics

This part’s a bit trickier, mostly due to the reason that I’m new to this whole dynamic analysis thing. Yeah I’m good at spotting canonical evidence but very specific shipping dynamics often escape my gaze.

The most obvious one is Big Guy, Little Guy. Quoting the TVTROPES page:

[…] This trope describes a pair of guys who always fight together, are best friends forever, and quite often have a very obvious hierarchy: The little guy is often in charge […] The little guy is usually listed first, since he’s the leader, and they are always listed together, as if they are one entity. In fact, some episodes may center on the fact that they can’t live without each other. […] If this is a case of Brains and Brawn, the Big Guy is usually the Brawn, and the Little Guy the Brains. It’s almost never the other way around, but in some cases the Big Guy can be rather smart too. […]

A sub-type of this, a common favorite here on Tumblr is known as “small chaotic big calm” and hoo boy if that isn’t these two. I don’t really have much to say here - again I am not an expert.

Part 3: Fandom Impact

So you don’t think Red Oktoberfest (as Heavymedic is sometimes called) is super popular on anywhere else than Tumblr? Wrong.

It’s hard to find TF2 fics on Archive of Our Own not tagged with Heavy/Medic. Of course most of them only contain hints to their relationship but go in the main tf2 tag and I can guarantee you, you’ll gonna see “implied heavy/medic” all the time.

But these two go further than AO3 or Tumblr or Instagram or whatever. They are recognized even within the wider circle of the fanbase. Take this SFM, for example. (I am using the Saxxy Awards version of Secret Lives here mostly due to the fact that the Heavymedic moment is much gayer. In the normal version, the dialogue isn’t changed, but they simply hold hands.)

But it gets deeper. (WARNING: THE GAY MOMENT IN THIS ONE IS NSFW. NOT EXPLICITLY SO BUT JUST A HEADS UP TUMBLR PLEASE DO NOT FLAG ME)

And the best part? The comments are extremely positive. You’d expect hoards upon hoards of homophobes screeching but no, the comments are supportive. Even on places such as Reddit or Youtube, comments like “yeah they’re gay and in love” do not get downvoted/disliked to hell; in fact the opposite.

Part 4: Canon Status

Let’s be real. Most ships are shipped because people want to explore the dynamics in fanfic, fanart or something else. But Heavymedic is shipped because… well, I have no idea.

Actually, I kind of do - but only theories. You see, while the canonical evidence is here, the creators have never said anything about them. No confirmation, no disproval, no hinting, nothing.

But the ship is so prominent! There has to be something causing this!- you say. And to that I present you 2 theories on why Heavy/Medic is so popular.

Theory number 1 states that we simply all choose to interpret their interactions as homoerotic. And this is very easy to disprove - there’s simply no way we just collectively agreed on these matters out of nothing. There has to be something bigger.

And theory 2 states that, well, our interpretation is the desired interpretation. But this is even more ridiculous than theory 1 for a number of reasons. If they are in fact gay, why hasn’t Valve made them canon yet?

A Theoretical Scenario

I am going to ramble big time on this one, so buckle up lads. I’ll discuss a theoretical scenario in which, well, if that was not obvious, Valve confirms Heavymedic as canon. Maybe then we will see why they will probably never do so.

TF2 is considered by typical capital G, alt-right Gamers as a “non-political” game. This means no women (in the game itself, at least, and if even, sexy women only), no queer folk and no minorities (for some reason they accept Demoman but throw a fit if someone draws any other merc as not being pearl white). Team Fortress 2 was around before Gamergate and other things like Gamers Rise Up. It’s a classic and Valve is regarded as the good guy to Epic Game’s bad guy. If Valve did anything to confirm doubts, wherther it be clearing up popular fanon or confirming ships, these people would throw hands. (Although they seemed to ignore when one of the writers confirmed Miss Pauling is a lesbian. Huh.) Even those that don’t play TF2 would come to the aid of their bros.

Let me illustrate with two very similar examples. In both cases these confirmations were the first made by the company as a whole, both are fairly recent and both confirm a character as gay.

First we have the confirmation of Tracer from Overwatch as a lesbian. It was done in one of OVW’s comics. Tracer is the FACE of Overwatch as a whole and while most of the fanbase accepted it (thankfully the Gamers are reluctant to infest ow), some people threw what I can only describe as a hissy fit. At least her girlfriend’s a background character.

Second is Neeko from League of Legends. Unlike Tracer she was added a while before it was confirmed she was gay. LOL is much more toxic and filled with Gamers than OW and holy shit people smeared LOL so much.

Of course these are not accurate to Heavy/Medic. In both of the cases I listed it was girls being wlw and we all know how much cisgender heterosexual gamers LOVE yuri porn. Apparently only girls can be gay because they can jack off to it - if it’s two guys then it’s disgusting. Nevertheless I think these are good approximations - in every case the company gets “shat on” on social media and other sites. With the community that Valve has, I think even if they wanted them to be gay, they would never ever confirm it.

Conclusion

I’m sorry for that ending. I had to theorize a bit. Regardless I’d love if you shared this on other sites, reblogged or whatever - I wasted at least 1 and a half hours of my life on it. Feel free to cite this as a source if someone asks you why you ship the big heavy weapons expert and the feral battle medic.

What fankids do the Galar characters have?

So first things first is that I’m not all that quick to develop fankids.  It takes me a while to decide on the canon cast, both what they’re doing in the future and if any of them get together, let alone deciding on fankids.  So this is one of those things that will likely expand with time.  Here’s my initial thoughts after beating the game though.  Which is more about the characters than any potential fankids.

Bede

Bede is definitely the character I’m going to hyperfocus development on, which both means he gets the most drama, but in theory, his children are the “main Galar fankids”. He’s an omega, no question there. I’m pretty set on endgaming Victor/Bede, but it takes a while for them to officially get together. 

I’m like 90% committed to the idea of Bede having a son conceived during ingame events, pretty much during the Champion Tournament.  Let’s just say I had the terrible realization that my fankid, Darcel, would make a really good child for Bede and this other character. Darcel is too established in Kalos to switch his parents, but I was stuck on the idea for its max-drama potential, so I decided to make a new fankid. A “not-Darcel”. Bede raises his son on his own and while it’s not the primary reason he turns his life around under Opal’s guidance, he is determined to be a strong and good parent to his child. Get his life together for both their sakes. My prototype name for the kid is Roan, although I might give that name to a Pier’s kid.  Regardless, someone is getting that name. 

Victor and Bede kinda end up with a complicated relationship early on, in the sense that Victor wants to be more official while Bede is often pushing him away. Plus Bede has kind of a warped perspective on what’s normal in a relationship, due to his past. Despite how far he’s come, he still has a long way to go.  He also doesn’t completely let go of his tsun tendencies when it comes to Victor, so even from a non-angst perspective, the guy plays hard to get.  At some point, they end up with a kid, a younger half-sibling to Bede’s first child. More than likely also an accident baby.

This one is way more up in the air, but given Bede’s backstory, I can see him possibly wanting to adopt if he ever came across some unfortunate orphan in need.  He’d see himself in the kid, and want to be a much better guardian than Rose was to him.  Break the cycle. So perhaps he and Victor end up with a third child who’s adopted.

Piers

Piers is the other character I really loved from the game, so he gets to be hyperfocus #2.  Also an omega since that’s my preference. I’m not 100% set on the pairing, but I am strongly leaning towards Raihan/Piers as endgame.  I do like Raihan/Leon as well, but my vast preference for Piers means I want to do more with him. So the pairing involving him wins. I’m too bad at OT3s to generally make a threeway work, so I can’t see myself going in that direction with these three.  

Kid wise, I feel like Piers has at least two kids, since I can see him wanting his child to have a sibling the way he did. As his first child is certainly an accident.  The second one could be an accident as well, but is likely deliberate, since again, he wants a younger sibling for his oldest child. He likely aims for them being closer in age than he and Marnie are. 

I do think that Raihan and Piers would have…problems making things work longterm. Not impossible, but I see Raihan as too into himself.  Kind of selfish and also likely not liking the idea of being “tied down”. One could say Piers would similarly not want to be “tied down” but given his relationship with Marnie, I see him as much more family focused. So were he to have children with Raihan, he’d be more willing to make sacrifices to make the relationship work. But a guy can only do so much on his own. It’d be on Raihan to make some compromises as well. I still need to think about this pairing more before anything is set though. 

Everyone Else

The main issue is other then the above ships, I really don’t ship anyone else. I liked Hop, but I felt he only really worked with Victor. But since Victor is with Bede…Hop is either a single dad, or maybe I’ll rarepair/crackship him with someone. 

Marnie was fine, but like Hop, no one really stood out as shippable with her.  Presumably Gloria could be shipped with either her or Hop, but I still have to decide if/how I want to implement her.  I’m fine with the idea of her as Victor’s twin, but since it goes against what I’ve done for every other region, I’m leaning towards not doing that (since even though I made Sun and Moon twins, I had a good reason for Moon not appearing in-game.  I wouldn’t be able to use the same excuse for Gloria, and I don’t want to rewrite the game plot to pretend she was there all along).  So maybe she’s some random girl, in which case, she probably would work better with Marnie over Hop?  Since Hop is too closely linked to the protag.  Were she to be Victor’s twin though, then Hop is the more likely ship.  As for omegaverse aspects, Marnie is an omega, like her brother.

Nessa/Sonia makes sense as a pairing and I can see the potential, I just don’t feel strongly enough about them to give them a fankid at this point. But they’re likely endgame.  Nessa is maybe an omega, but I can honestly see her as anything. Valid arguments for each.  Sonia is probably a beta.

Milo has strong potential Dad Energy, but I really have no ships for him, so probably nada for fankids.  Milo is an alpha.

@pokemon-legends-and-legacies‘s suggested Bea/Gordie as a couple and the idea is really growing on me.  So that one is at least a consideration.  Gordie is probably an alpha and I actually kinda like the idea of Bea as a buff fighter-type omega, since I always make fighter-type trainers alphas. Although she could possibly be an alpha as well.

I like Allister in theory, but again, I don’t have the slightest clue who I’d pair him with. There’s really no one who stands out, since all the younger characters I’d likely ship with someone else. He’s an omega cause I’m like that.

Opal is an omega since I like the idea of her being able to relate to Bede in that way.  Offer him some advice and probably teach him the ends and outs.  Since there’s no way Rose was giving him any practical information. He probably had to rely on the internet for anything he wanted to know that wasn’t taught in whatever schooling he had. I don’t think Opal has any children, since that was the overall impression I got from her trainer cards. She just skipped straight to sorta-grandma for Bede.

I don’t really think about Kabu all that much, but he’s likely an alpha.  Maybe he has family back in Hoenn, maybe he doesn’t. 

Leon and Hop are both alphas, since I like the idea of all the similarities between the two being part of what fuels Hop to want to be just like his big brother at the beginning of the game.  If I were going the single dad route for one of the brothers, it’d be Hop first, so Leon is the cool uncle to any of Hop’s kids.  Perhaps he and Raihan end up true bros as well, so he’s kinda the cool uncle to the Raihan/Pier’s kids. Maybe. 

Raihan is an alpha because of course he.  No question.  I feel like regardless on whether he and Pier’s make it long term, he’s still the father of Pier’s children. A dad with way too many pictures of his children.

Rose is an alpha and we’re not gonna discuss him right now since I’m struggling to decide what happens with him after the events of the game.  Oleana is maybe an omega?  Like Nessa, I can see there being a good argument for her being an alpha or a beta instead.  I lean towards omega going with the idea Rose “rescues” both her and Bede from a life of poverty.  And both are omegas, despite the fact the two don’t get along.  Cause I like parallels. Oleana likely won’t have children since she’s at the bottom of my list of characters to develop.

Victor is an alpha and Gloria is maybe a beta?  If I add her.  Will depend on what I decide her origin story is.

So, because I’m obsessive I decided to stretch out the partially visible pixels in the blurred Smash Ultimate update...

They’re not perfect, but they do help to paint a better picture of just what’s coming. Discussion below the cut.

Now, the most common speculation for the first image is, of course, that it’s a form of Stage Builder.

A menu on the left with the selected item highlighted in yellow, and a test/save button on the bottom right, with the rest all being a view of the stage. It’s very plausible, and has been discussed at length by others, so I won’t be going over it in much more detail, but I will list the objectively observable evidence that points in its favor, such that those can be used when discussing other possibilities.

There is no dashboard: In Smash Ultimate, a black dashboard fills 10% of the screen when exploring the game’s upper menus. While this is present in Screenshot 2, it isn’t visible here, which would point towards the idea that this is either in-game, or in a menu that is too big or expansive to work with the dashboard, as is seen with the Character Select Screen. A Stage Builder is on the more resource intensive side of things, so it’s only logical for the Dashboard to be left out.

There are no visible characters, or character HUD elements. This would point towards it not being an ingame screenshot of a new stage or battle mode. However, one possibility is that the lower right yellow blob is an unconventional display for a character’s health, though yellow is not a colour one typically sees in a Smash Bros. display.

The white and yellow on the right is rather unprecedented. It’s highly unlikely to be a scroll bar, given that Smash already has a standardised scroll bar used in every other menu. This means it is most likely some kind of menu, or the HUD element of a game mode.

The bottom right yellow ‘button’ is consistent with many other buttons in the game, including the dark patch on the left, which is likely blurred together from the black on the button and the blue from the background.

In short, what we know is...

1) This is not a standard menu 2) This is not from a conventional game display 3) There is some sort of display or menu on the left hand side 4) There’s a button or other display on the bottom right side

From those, I’ll try and construct as many potential explanations as possible.

1. Tower-ascent side-game

This one’s a very loose idea, but in theory, the left side bar could be a marker used to show how far up a ‘tower’ the player is, while the ‘button’ on the bottom right is where the player’s % is displayed, rather than in the center as it usually is, likely so that enemies and hazards coming from directly below are easier to spot. However, the idea requires one to make lots of assumptions about what certain information is meant to be, ones that aren’t facilitated by currently known information.

2. Home-Run Contest

I think this one counts as wishful thinking. The idea of a back-wall for the Home-Run Contest makes enough sense (the yellow part could just be a giant yellow 🚫), but the colours aren’t ones that would be especially effective for the mode, as a white platform wouldn’t work very well when displayed alongside the Sandbag. Additionally, while maintaining thematic consistency isn’t necessarily going to happen, all previous Home-Run Contests have taken place in a stadium, not what appears to be an open field. Additionally, the perspective required to make this visual work is all wrong.

3. A DLC Character stage

This one doesn’t need a diagram, since the stage could potentially look like anything. If this is a stage, it’s most likely a Persona 5 stage, or the stage for the next DLC character. However, Persona 5 is far more visually distinct than this stage, usually displaying either lots of colours, or striking amounts of colour contrast, making the odds of it being a Persona 5 stage highly unlikely. While aa stage could be derived from a different Shin Megami Tensei game, those tend to be similarly distinct in terms of visuals.

If it’s a stage for one of the two commonly ‘leaked’ Square Enix characters, one feels fairly probable as a candidate to have a fairly generic stage, while the other doesn’t.

(After writing this Joker’s stage sorta leaked, and so things are even less likely to be his stage)

4. Trophy Rush

This one doesn’t really need a diagram either, for what little information would be displayed in the mode. As someone who greatly enjoyed this mode, I’d appreciate seeing it back, but I feel like there’s not much call for it, as the only collectibles in the game already have plenty of ways to obtain them. At least it’s not Coin Launcher. Ostensibly the bar on the left here would be some kind of gauge or countdown.

5. Poke Floats

Not that bad of a theory, but it fails to account for the bar on the left, and even with my best efforts, I couldn’t make a layout that I felt best represented all of the colours we could see. It’s also not the kind of thing I could see being advertised as a ‘feature’. It would make sense to try and bring back such a popular level and modernise it with new Pokemon, but while I wouldn’t rule it out as a possibility, I feel like that idea and this image are a round peg and an octagonal hole. It just doesn’t quite fit.

6. Board the Platforms/Break the Targets

The only evidence I’ve seen given to this is that the bar on the left could show how many platforms/targets are left, with the yellow being a boarded/broken one. I personally think that’s UI overkill.

Overall, I stand by the Stage Builder idea the most. However, when it comes to the other picture, there’s no single idea I see as standing above the rest in terms of likelihood, and in turn, I’ve not seen many suggestions for it. The community seems pretty stumped, but I’m going to go ahead and analyse what I’ve seen suggested, as well as my own spitballing.

Before I do, though, I want to go over some of the elements of this image first.

There is a dashboard: Unmistakable, that black bar on the right is most certainly the dashboard menu. It covers the right amount of screen space, and it’s a very safe assumption to make.

There is a coloured bar across the top: While there’s been some debate as to whether it’s an orange or red bar (it’s likely the brightness has been fiddled with to further confuse the image’s intention), it’s almost certainly one of the coloured bars that often decorates the top of certain menus in Smash Ultimate’s menus. However, most of these menus display these bars at a slant that gets very thin at one side, which would lead one to expect the visual to get a lot lighter towards the right side of the screen. That said, there are exceptions, such as in the options menu or the Tourney display, so it’s possible this is just another exception. The implication of this is that this menu is either under Online (if orange) or Smash (if red). From my edits, it appears more orange, though the original image is easier to see as red.

There are a loooooot of different colours, and they don’t seem to line up to any particular shape, making it very difficult to make an educated guess.

1. Character Editor

Starting out with the alleged leak that I heard while making this analysis. The rumour goes that the player will be able to create their own colour palettes for each of the game’s characters. The details on this are unclear, but for simplicity’s sake I choose to assume that players will be able to select various specific parts of a character’s body (Mario’s hat, buttons, or shoes, for example), and apply a colour to it.

This has a number of things going for it, moreso from design elements found outside of this image.

Firstly, it would explain why there are so many wildly conflicting colours in the image if the player is applying multiple different colours to a character’s model

This has been the first Smash game to take extra time to load in character colours on the character select screen. While this could be chalked up to the game having to load in almost 800 renders, it’s also possible that this is simply something that’s been designed to account for additional (possibly unlimited) extra costumes.

The added ability to select costumes by hitting A over your character portrait is mildly convenient (after everything has loaded), but it does seem slightly unnecessary. If the idea is to be prepared for when players are able to select from dozens of character costumes, this would make sense.

Additionally, the character colours are all labeled. But even in cases of split characters like Alph or the Koopalings, the label names are simply “Color 1″ through to “Color 8″. It really doesn’t make any sense to add these labels when they’re not going to add anything informative, so all they end up doing is filling up space, and forcing the stock icons to cover up some of the portrait. This in particular bodes well for this theory.

The recently datamined information on Joker having a special 8th costume would line up well with this, if the idea is that players will be able to freely add their own versions of that costume.

However, various things also go against this theory.

The bar up the top indicates this is a mode in Smash or Online, when such a character editor would probably be in Games & More (blue), Vault (Magenta, which this could just be a corruption of), or Options (purple).

It’s hard to make out any one specific character who is being modified, one would at least be able to see some elements that add up to a visible character in some shape or form, even if they were radically re-coloured.

The dashboard doesn’t appear in any parts of the game where a character model is being rendered. While it’s possible that the visual used for this mode is the character’s render instead, that seems somewhat dubious since one would likely want to see what they’re making.

Overall, it’s a solid idea, but more for what’s been seen on the character select screen than this image.

2. Additional Challenges

It would explain the eclectic colours, and the bar on the right is in order, but the colours at the top and bottom don’t match those of the blurred screenshot, regardless of what page of Challenges the player is on. The only way for this one to work would be if the intent is to add a special page to Challenges, one that has a different overall design to the rest. (Daily Challenges? Super Challenges?)

3. Destiny Islands stage

Now here’s a viewpoint I’m hard pressed to debunk, and that’s mostly because the idea here is that the image above is a screenshot of the stage within some kind of announcement display. We haven’t gotten any new stages yet, so having them get descriptions of some sort isn’t impossible, it’s just that it doesn’t strike me as likely. Additionally, aside from the blue of the water, most of the colours seem out of place.

4. Smash Run 2

Eh, it’s not impossible, just not a game mode that plays to the Switch’s strengths. Specifically that doing Smash in split-screen would likely be very taxing on the system’s resources, especially with all the enemies they’d be displaying. One possible explanation is that playing the mode requires multiple Switches (either online or locally), and so the orange bar could be explained that way. The dashboard only being there because the screenshot is of the mode’s submenu or explanation.

Overall I don’t think this is especially likely, as such a mode would absolutely require an exorbitant amount of development time, and so for it to release in spring, the bulk of it would need to be finished before release, and there’s simply no indication that such a thing has been worked on in the game’s data.

Overall, it’s hard to say for certain just what this second image is. Personally I lean in the direction of it being an additional online mode, mostly because of the orange bar, and due to the odd layout of buttons on the online menu that seems to indicate there’s more to come (as seen in my mockup):

When it comes right down to it, however, this kind of speculation is fun, and I’m so very glad the development team gave us something to pore over as we await the next batch of content. I’ve personally always felt that an ARG is a great way to keep fans invested in upcoming information, and this is possibly the closest Smash has ever gotten to one.

45 questions...now that endgame has commenced

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Does your character have siblings or family members in their age group? Which one are they closest with?

Nope! She has no siblings and her mother’s gone up and left when she was young, so the closest she’s with is her father, whom of which she regrets not cherishing him enough before getting trapped in VR hell, so whoops! Sucks for you, Ai! (EDIT: I MISREAD THIS SLIGHTLY SO YOU GET EXTRA INFO ON AI’S THOUGHTS ABT HER DAD LOL) Speaking of mom…

What is/was your character’s relationship with their mother like?

Uhh not too well NOWADAYS, considering she left when Ai was young, but they spent time together watching TVs dramas and comedies and playing with Ai’s toys together and such, as Naoko (her mum’s name) was a stay-at-home mom. Nowadays Ai wonders how she is (in a bit of a more spiteful sense but…maybe it’s in a different sense now.) since she KNOWS her dad’s pretty lonely and a bit distraught for being left with her daughter (that resembles her a little too well, down to appearance, acrid tongue and drama love). …perhaps she’s forgotten about Ai and Yosuke by now. Speaking of THAAAT…

What is/was your character’s relationship with their father like?

Well, pretty distant and a bit one-sided, unfortunately. They were like any other cute father-daughter pair up until Naoko left, then Yosuke (dad’s name) became a bit distraught with being left a single dad. (He works as a nurse at a hospital!) Still, he took care of her nonetheless–then Ai started to become distant by middle school. Her working on her drawings and getting bullied and developing a bit of a sleazy, drama-loving personality and all–it REALLY started to hit by high school. Even if Ai was raking in cash with her manga and giving a portion of it to dad to help financially, she basically kept cooped up in her room and their interactions were mere greetings. Heck, she mostly ate meals in her room! A shame, really.

Edit: Regret. She…she feels regret.

Has your character ever witnessed something that fundamentally changed them? If so, does anyone else know?

THIS was a toughie. Perhaps one major thing was seeing Shoko Yazawa, the girl she indirectly gossiped about being a compensated dater, commit social suicide and basically disappear from Kameoka. She just…doesn’t feel comfy thinking about how she might actually be dead and how something that might have not even been true at ALL possibly cost her her social life. She may like drama, but she feels lies makes it…complicated? I can’t find the right word. Everything’s more authentic when it’s true and real, Ai feels.

EDIT: Cody’s deletion. It gave her the feeling that they very well may just be erased off the face of the Earth without feeling anything, in the blink of an eye. Mostly because, spoiler spoiler, Ai glitched out in the hospital space just like Cody but got spawned in a different area rather than deleted. So. Yeah. Scary.

EDIT 2: I GUESS DYING AND WHAT FOLLOWED AFTERWARD WAS AN EYE OPENER

On an average day, what can be found in your character’s pockets?

Out of game: strawberry gum/various candies, her phone, a spare pen/pencil or two just in case~! Not like she’d need to carry stuff in her pockets–she’s mostly a shut-in anyway!

In Telos Hell: Her ID, and…er, that’d…probably be it. I didn’t think this very through. In the case of what she often CARRIES (like, in her hands) it’d be snacks like pudding or candy and her sketchbook, I suppose.

Does your character have recurring themes in their dreams?

Erm…this took a while to answer since I never thought that Ai would have dreams–I lowkey imagined her to be one of those dreamless sleepers. Y’know, granted she doesn’t get much shut-eye in the first place? But I suppose her dreams often involve her being a shadow or a ghost of some sorts in a bit of a beat-up town, just watching the town go on (robberies, theft, murder, or just…regular things like a couple arguing or girls gossiping) as no one notices her.

Does your character have recurring themes in their nightmares?

This goes just as above, but I’ll list it out anyway: I feel something along the lines of all eyes and blinding lights always being on her wherever she tries to run, and all mouths (her classmates, her fans, her patrons her dad, her mom, Shoko) always speaking of her, revealing her gross nature in contrast to the mysterious but ladylike (??? I guess?) mangaka alias she pretends to be online. Maybe hands would be holding her down so she can’t run and has to face all the lights and all the people.

I figure she doesn’t have nightmares often, since, again, she doesn’t get much shuteye, but…ha

EDIT: Glitchy erasure has probably haunted her a few times nowadays.

Has your character ever fired a gun? If so, what was their first target?

Nope.

Is your character’s current socioeconomic status different than it was when they were growing up?

Pretty much! She didn’t grow up POOR but things were probably pretty tight at one point in her life, considering Yosuke soon became a single working dad in the middle of Ai’s childhood. As soon as she started raking in that Sweet Sweet Manga Cash, however, she was happy to set out a portion of her money for her dad, so they ended up okay and a little well off! (Not rich but u get what i mean, hopefully)

Does your character feel more comfortable with more clothing, or with less clothing?

More clothing–she just feels better that way.

In what situation was your character the most afraid they’ve ever been?

Hoo-wee. It’s…a liiittle hard to say.

Tora chapter 2 was a doozy, but she wasn’t as scared then as she was, say...witnessing Cody getting erased, or glitching out HERSELF way back in ch7 when she was in the hospital space. She just felt...terrified, feeling like she’d suddenly disappear without another word, AND without feeling anything.

In what situation was your character the most calm they’ve ever been?

Whenever she’s in her room, not disturbed by anyone, just browsing through social media idly with snacks on standby. Or asleep, considering … help this girl

Is your character bothered by the sight of blood? If so, in what way?

She really isn’t…at least, she thought she wasn’t. She’s gotten pretty used to the sight of blood as a kid, when she’d gotten the occasional bloody nose from bullying back in her school days, and ofc with her job revolving around illustrating violence and sometimes GORE, you get immune to it!

At least, you think you do. As quoted from what I put on that FE AU spreadsheet a longass while ago “Gore looks much…mushier than on paper.”

Ryouji’s dead corpse was a nice ‘ol REVELATION for Ai. Since the closest thing to shit like that was descriptions of shit from the hospital (thanks nurse dad) and anatomy charts and guro art she’s browsed, seeing a REAL corpse in such a situation was…a game changer.

At this point, Ai’s a bit immune to it lol. So many bodies, yanno? She’s now…scarily used to it. Of course, the nature and customization of the executions are…unnerving to her, sometimes. I’m talking to you, Ryouji, lmao (She’ll probably still be pretty unnerved if she…ever…wants to go back to drawing manga tho…I don’t think she will. She’ll take a longass break.)

Does your character remember names or faces easier?

Depends, I would think. Ingame: faces, but out of game, since she doesn’t really care for her classmates and real people and shit, she remembers names more. The internet is a far more vast place, after all.

Is your character preoccupied with money or material possession? Why or why not?

This is hard because I don’t think about this often myself

I guess she IS? She enjoys having things like snacks and desserts and tech around her, but she’s mostly just preoccupied with drama, relationships, fights and…people, I guess. I don’t have a good answer for this.

Which does your character idealize most: happiness or success?

I was about to say neither and point at “enjoyment”, but I guess…that could…sort of align with happiness? You can’t be a mangaka forever, and WHAT ELSE is she good for? Ha. She’d rather sit back and simply be able to enjoy a show rather than idealize shit like that. Life’s a show you can’t waste a minute to wake in!

…mm.

What was your character’s favorite toy as a child?

Dolls, probably. Y’know, er…the equivalent of Barbie dolls, I guess? I can’t go too into depth since I haven’t fleshed out her childhood all too much, but…dolls seem accurate for her. She’d like dressing them up, decorating the houses (if that was a thing…?) and sometimes even playing pretend with them, I’d imagine–and Naoko would honestly play along with her, I’d think!

Is your character more likely to admire wisdom, or ambition in others?

She admires the pettiness ambition of people around her, really. Just…seeing the lengths people would go for their goals, good or bad.

What is your character’s biggest relationship flaw? Has this flaw destroyed relationships for them before?

Like I said, she was literally alienated at the concept of people caring about her and her wellbeing.

Said alienation, initial refusal to accept praise of her, AND general nasty/careless/joking attitude, as well as her constant self-deprecation is a pretty fuckin’ big downer in relationships. Hell, part of her attitude already drives people away, she knows–might as well show she’s self-aware of it right?

…it’s definitely cost her potential friendships. Lots of ‘em.

In what ways does your character compare themselves to others? Do they do this for the sake of self-validation, or self-criticism?

Depends. …mostly the latter though. She knows she’s a piece of shit but occasionally she sees some people and goes “ok at least I’m not them tho lol”. Sorry Senji, Ryouji, some others I probably forgot to mention here. I still love you.

If something tragic or negative happens to your character, do they believe they may have caused or deserved it, or are they quick to blame others?

Oh hell yeah she thinks she deserves it. Karma, baby! Gotta love it.

What does your character like in other people?

Pettiness, wittiness, cunning, the ability to take a joke and make a joke–people who are laidback and careless enough to not be easily brought down. ok look masashi “hee-haw” oichi is a special case here, she thinks hee-haw is annoying but ill be damned if she doesnt eventually get used to it and admires masashi’s directness

What does your character dislike in other people?

Pettiness done WRONG to look like absolute immaturity…and on that note, people acting like loud immature brats in general, people who hold huge grudges over small and/or past events, haughtiness, tryhards (ok yes she can be a tad hypocritical but she’ll swear there’s a difference), people who (in her words, probs) have “sticks up their asses”…you surely get the gist.

How quick is your character to trust someone else?

LMAO NOT QUICK @ ALL (especially in a game like this) she can drop trust pretty quickly tho ;0

…once you do end up gaining her trust, though, it’s strong with just a liiitle bit of doubt. As soon as you break it tho, her trust in you AND others plummet down the fucking toilet so lol

EDIT: ok so i’ll be honest now that it’s endgame, the reason she seems more willing to believe lies in others than she probs should is that she believes in predictability and also me myself, the mun, am Fucking Dumbass and fall for the lies myself, so if i can’t see past them even if Ai in-characterly Can, then im sorry my dudes im Fucking Dumb :’O

How quick is your character to suspect someone else? Does this change if they are close with that person?

Pretty quick, but she won’t necessarily voice it until she has a good opportunity. If they’re close to her, and she trusts them, she won’t suspect them unless shit seriously starts pointing to them, then it starts getting 👀👀👀

How does your character behave around children?

[ai voice] i think the fuck not, goodbye

She doesn’t…handle children well.

How does your character normally deal with confrontation?

haha……………..she doesn’t (usually)

She literally watches drama from afar, you think she wanna get involved in shit?

…when she does deal with it, she replies as bluntly and honestly as possible so she can get it over with. confrontation? no thanks lol

…maybe she’ll add some sass when she finds a good opportunity if she wants to make the confronter feel like a dumbass or smth, or if it starts to piss her off.

How quick or slow is your character to resort to physical violence in a confrontation?

Ai…knows that violence in a losing battle for her. She’s weak. (….listen ryouji was already down in that one trial, ok) If a punch is thrown, she’ll either dodge and run, or take it and scuttle, tbh.

What did your character dream of being or doing as a child? Did that dream come true?

She didn’t really have those types of dreams as a kid, really?? But maybe her drawings as she grew up started to make her think of being an artist. And…well, it DID come true, right? …with, y’know, the cost of tons of potential friendships. And other shit. ha

What does your character find repulsive or disgusting?

Well, ONE thing is wasted opportunity, which is why, as you saw, Ai was PISSED at Ryouji when he was the chapter 6 culprit.

…okay, that’s very exaggerated for being listed and something “repulsive” to her, but…disgusting? ye.

Describe a scenario in which your character feels most comfortable.

Same spiel as the calm one, if you scroll up: in her room back at Kameoka, no one bothering her, the sound of rain and muffled thunder rumbles outside as she scrolls through the internet, snacks at her side while feeling cozy af in warm clothing/probably a blanket over her.

Describe a scenario in which your character feels most uncomfortable.

I can list a few, actually! A certain text conversation between Andrew and Ai during Chapter 6, CHPT4 MONOTHEATER IN TORA AND CHPT5 MONOTHEATER? IN TELOS I BELIEVE? Because there was a very down, depressed vibe goin’ on–mostly the reaction of the deaths and all that, and the feeling that…everyone’s in despair. And tense. It’s infectious, unfortunately.

…and also, er, tora chpt2 trial. You Know,

EDIT: Cody’s erasure lol

In the face of criticism, is your character defensive, self-deprecating, or willing to improve?

SELF-DEPRECATION, BABY ;0

Nowadays, thanks to the magic of Character Development, she’s starting to see that she can improve. So she does the third one more, now.

Is your character more likely to keep trying a solution/method that didn’t work the first time, or immediately move on to a different solution/method?

She’s definitely the type to keep trying a certain method a few times before moving on in frustration.

How does your character behave around people they like?

Laidback, and more open, with banter all around! If you’re someone she likes who has…made an impact on her (like Holly acting like a big sis for her, thanks holly ily) then she’ll still make jokes but not be as biting! She’ll try to be more lightheartedly jokey rather than have each joke be a diss.

How does your character behave around people they dislike?

Prepare for disses, eye rolls and snappy attitudes…or, er, just straight up disrespect and igonring.

Is your character more concerned with defending their honor, or protecting their status?

Protecting their status, most likely. She…has no honor, really.

Is your character more likely to remove a problem/threat, or remove themselves from a problem/threat?

*ahem*

abscond

Has your character ever been bitten by an animal? How were they affected (or unaffected)?

Nope! Never been bitten, and she certainly doesn’t plan to!

How does your character treat people in service jobs?

General respect and decency whenever she DOES go out for, say, groceries at 7/11 or something. She’d generally like to leave asap when she goes out though, so she does sometimes ask to, like, quicken the pace. What did the service job people ever do to her, anyhow, besides like, possibly make her wait? No disses here, thank god

Does your character feel that they deserve to have what they want, whether it be material or abstract, or do they feel they must earn it first?

Ai feels she doesn’t…deserve a lot of things she has, and definitely thinks that a lot of kids in Telos don’t deserve the shit they get thrown at them either (but, yes, there are some who she thinks do get what’s coming for them, but not many), so it’d be the latter, I suppose.

Has your character ever had a parental figure who was not related to them?

Nope. Easy answer.

Has your character ever had a dependent figure who was not related to them?

…not dependent, but…there’s one person who does a pretty good job trying to be one for her. (Spoiler alert it’s Holly, god bless this water polo player I love her so much get better soon athena ur great ily)

How easy or difficult is it for your character to say “I love you?” Can they say it without meaning it?

Pretty goddamn difficult. She thinks of it as a bit of a hard thing to say herself, but agrees it’s something thrown around way too much nowadays–which is, in part, why it’s hard for her to say. (Also she’s never really gotten it from anyone except her parents ha) Ai doesn’t and wouldn’t say it in general (unless it’s joking with friends but even THEN its rare bc Got Damn can’t have too much hypocricy) since it’s a bit overused in society and seems like a throwaway term w/o meaning. When she DOES wanna say it MEANINGFULLY, she’d really want to MEAN it, which is hard with…the kind of mindset she has on the word.

What does your character believe will happen to them after they die? Does this belief scare them?

She doesn’t know!

Which is exactly what scares her.

Not like she thinks about it often, though! (er…well…maybe she does now.)

Nor does she want to. :)

EDIT: this still goes unchanged but it goes to show, uh...what she might’ve thought when she was “dying” at the time.

LOSTBELT 4 THOUGHTS

i just finished lostbelt 4 and i want to ramble so here goes.

it goes without saying, but fgo: cosmos in the lostbelt, lostbelt 4 spoilers up ahead!

also, this can kind of be pretty long.

let me preface all this by saying that so far, lostbelt 4 is on par with lostbelt 1 for me. followed by lostbelt 3 and lostbelt 2.

i fucking loved lostbelt 4. the story, the theme, the cast, the crypter, i loved it ♡

let's start with lakshimi. i honestly thought the secret she was hiding was that she was one of arjuna alter's lokapala and she defected from him or something and she's leading the rebel army now (i realize how many plotholes would have risen from that because altjuna would have just erased her in the next yuga cycle if that was the case and not ignore her so this theory was far fetched and highly improbable) or something so dire that it would have made the chaldeans or myself, as the player felt betrayed

and then she reveals that she's a goddess of misfortune and i was like "oh okay... that's it?"

and it just hammered in the theme about flaws and defects and lakshimi feeling terrible about herself and it may have been an inane reason from one perspective, but she really felt bad about it so it was touching how the cast made her feel a little different and how she used what would have been called a 'flaw' or an 'evil' in altjuna's terms as a strength that eventually helped overcome the lostbelt.

lakshimi is a good girl. we love her. she's fucking badass.

at first, i was honestly a little irritated, that takeuchi was going at it with the sameface again, but i appreciate how this indian servant wasn't a pale, white girl and unlike most of the dark skinned servants, she actually gets to wear some fucking clothes.

so that's cool. the design honestly didn't detract from lakshimi's awesomeness overall. loved her.

i loved jinako as well. she's honestly one of my favorites in this lostbelt. her relationship with karna was also amazing and i feel like you could get an even bigger appreciation for it once you've seen their relationship as master and servant on other fate works.

imagine how fucking agonizing her situation was. having to stay awake for tens of thousands of years. with no companions since lakshimi was more of less an outer layer and not an actual companion you could have socialized with it

the despair, the fear, and the loneliness would be too much for just about everyone and for it to go so far as for jinako to want to die made my heart ache.

some tears were shed ngl.

especially when karna said those things to her in the end.

jinako is brave and awesome and wonderful i love her.

karna was awesome as well and i thought the dragon ball jokes were just about the transformations and the power levels, but seeing him get a training arc in a place where time does not exist or passes differently was really some dragonball shit lol.

the fight was fun in game too. idk i found it really enjoyable.

karna's dynamic with jinako was also greatly appreciated and he's honestly one of the kindest characters ingame. i wish him all the happiness.

rama. i love rama. he's such a wifeguy we love to see it. the pride, the love for his wife and the comical bits that we get from rama interacting with the other characters was great

his interactions with lakshimi bai were my favorite. and him offering to call her sister-in-law was kind of cute. i feel like they'd be great pals

i was so happy that he was one of the people the mc summoned along with karna. el pluribus unum's my third favorite singularity so getting callbacks from that was good as well. and rama being carried again lol.

i love him.

i really liked pepe as well. but i've always liked pepe even before his lostbelt so there's that. his chapter in from lostbelt by nakutani is one of my favorites

"i've resigned myself to the doomed alignment of the stars" is a beautiful line ngl and seeing it in the lostbelt and pertaining to team a's situation as the losers of history is great and that pepe's going to stay with them because he treasures their bond and camaraderie

have i already mentioned how much i love his loyalty to his friends?

and not just them as well. the way that it extends to mash and how pepe reacts to her growth. how much she's changed from the mash before the singularities to this mash who was her convictions and set of morals.

i loved it ♡

he also was a joy to be around. and him teaming up with chaldea is a nice break from the constant trend of crypter's being generally hostile.

i love pepe. this is a pepe loving zone ♡

director goredolf was great as well. having his own conflicts with himself, his insecurities as someone who was also deemed 'defective' tied in nicely with the lostbelt's theme

also the director can really drive lol. i've honestly developed a soft spot for him

ashwatthama is also one of my favorites for this lostbelt. along with jinako.

his design is so fucking beautiful. thank you pako!

i wish we could have seen more of his interactions with pepe and the other servants, because from the few we've seen they're really interesting.

i'm definitely going to roll for him in his banner.

the other lokapala were good as well, but i find myself not caring for them much.

perhaps the weakest points for me was nezha and the way their character was handled. their demise was done so fast that i honestly didn't care much.

like "oh, that's unfortunate" and i just went on my merry way. was it to add a sense of tension or grief?

or maybe sadness? something to give the protagonist's motivation for the lostbelt?

eh.

i wish we could have seen more interactions or maybe some deep dive into the character or maybe have an interaction with the dark nezha in the lostbelt.

but all in all, it was a great lostbelt. i loved asha as well. she's a good kid that really served her purpose to tug at the heartstrings of the players once the lostbelt disappears for good

the backgrounds were also very pretty. i'm a sucker for flowers so.

the art for karna vs arjuna was gorgeous.

thank you pako-sensei 😍

i'm looking forward to atlantis! but before that, i'll throw a couple of tickets to the second banner hahahaha.

i think i'll get ganesha for my free ssr as well.

and before i forget, i have been fed with daybit and douman content so i am a very satisfied player.

best part of the lostbelt was seeing the small daybit smile. 100/10 content right there

daybit appearing because he cares about pepe warms my heart. this is the chapter i've been rereading in youtube before the official ingame translations was out but i'm still touched when it showed up

also douman i now remember why i wanted to send you to jail you clown

Shadow Tactics – Finding the Perfect Art Style

From colorful to rather dark and realistic: finding the right art style for Shadow Tactics took time, but it was worth every second.

Since the company’s founding in 2012 we developed two big games for PC and consoles as well as several mobile apps, with these two games being »The Last Tinker« and our recent release »Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun«. In this article we want to take you behind the scenes of our quest to find a fitting art style for both The Last Tinker and Shadow Tactics. First off, we will introduce both titles and their art styles to you. After that we’ll dive right into the development process before we talk about problems and challenges we encountered along the journey – and of course about how we solved these issues.

The Art Style of The Last Tinker & Shadow Tactics

The Last Tinker is a third person jump ‘n’ run in a colorful world, inspired by games like »Banjoo Kazooie« and »Jak & Dexter«. As Koru, you must defeat the Bleakness that threatens Colortown by using the power of colors. The game’s style is defined by round and smooth shapes, bright colors and a warm light setting. Everything is made from paper, color and glue which combined results in papier-mâché. As a contrast, we added some cardboard elements to create edges and make the world look more interesting. No straight lines, no 90 degrees, rather playful than super accurately drawn patterns – everything looks like it’s made and painted by children. The game’s characters are cartoony and funny, showing their attributes in their looks.

Shadow Tactics is set in Japan’s Edo period and it’s quite the opposite of The Last Tinker. It’s a hardcore realtime stealth game in which you control five different characters with individual skillsets. Basically, it‘s »Commandos« with Ninjas. You kill or sneak around enemies to accomplish your missions. Theme and story of this game are darker and grittier, that‘s why we decided to create a more realistic style and combine it with non-realistic elements like outlines imitating ink, that typical Japanese paintings are famous for. We included many details and each map has its own interesting light setup to catch the mood of a level. In comparison to The Last Tinker, we used more desaturated colors. All characters are human but they all have their own unique silhouette, so you can instantly identify and recognize them. However, they have longer legs than normal humans – a design decision we made because the perspective made them look smaller and somehow compressed.

Finding the Style for The Last Tinker

The Last Tinker started as a project while we were still at university and we had three to four weeks to complete it. It had to be in 3D which was a problem for us at that time. When we started developing the style, our artists had nearly no experience in 3D modeling – our strength clearly lied in creating 2D graphics. So we thought about how we could use our skills in creating 2D graphics for a 3D game. We didn’t have the time and experience to make high detailed models so we thought about what we could create with the help of simple shapes and if we could create details with the help of textures. That‘s why we started with a 2D image that we projected on a plane and roughly cut out the shape of the image. Then we extruded the face and voila – we had a 3D model. Now we just needed the right material to realize this style, ending up with cardboard. [6]

6

So we decided to create a world made entirely out of cardboard but we weren’t really satisfied with the early outcome. It looked sort of boring. Plus, we felt like cheaters because our 3D models were so simple. Still, we needed 3D models with plain shapes that could quickly be created and animated. Then we had the perfect idea: Papier-mâché! It’s perfect for beginners in 3D modeling. Plus, at university we were five artists. After starting the real production, we were two artists, then four. By only having to handle one or two materials we were able to create a world fully made of papier-mâché. Material handling was crucial, as creating different good looking materials that look good and real costs a lot of time.

Everybody loved the idea and since we had proper 2D skills, we decided to use textures to add detailed hand-painted patterns.

Now we had a base to work with. To get to know the material better we came together with artists and game designers in tinkering sessions [1], testing different shapes and patterns. We had two or three of these meetings and in the end we really knew the material and its potential. The figures we made were nice references. Some were really good, some were pretty ugly. Oh, and we still have them in our office. One of them sits right next to me and watches me … creep … [2]

Anyway, after having decided on a direction, we wanted to get a clearer vision for our design, which we eventually found in the works of Hundertwasser and Niki de Saint Phalle. Both focus on round and smooth shapes which colorful textures. Plus, we looked for papier-mâché figures made by kids because we wanted the world to look like kids built it. Those references gave us a good feeling for how the world and characters should look like.

First Steps in the Right Direction

After graduation, we occasionally experimented with the prototype, got a lot of feedback and wondered how we could improve it. When it became official that we could make The Last Tinker a complete game, we developed a story and reworked the gameplay which both influenced the style of the game. The first thing we noticed was that everything looked too clean and not very lifelike.

So we added some color splashes and dirt to make everything look a bit more used. Along with the story came Colortown’s different districts, which served the gameplay well. Prior to that, the world was so colorful and chaotic that players often got lost. Introducing the districts and with them some coloring rules helped solving this issue. As already mentioned, we initially used only two materials. After starting the development, however, we considered adding more materials like water and paper hills [3] to make the world more interesting. We struggled a long time with the water because it never really fit into the world.

Then we had the idea to add patterns that you can see on nearly every asset: spirals. They appear as ripples in the water and as splashes in waterfalls. Honestly, I love spirals and I loved drawing them. After some time though, I was so fed up with them that now, every time I see a spiral, I’m about to scream!

Of course, not all of Tinkerworld is friendly and colorful. The Bleakness wants to erase everything in it. The player sets out on an adventure to defeat the Bleakness and the monsters it created – so much for our vision of the first prototype. Style-wise, they needed to fit into the world, so we gave them round and simple shapes. Still, we wanted them to look like something totally strange and foreign to the world. So we decided to make them out of some kind of goo, however, they seemed like being made out of porcelaine. Again – with the story we added in the later production, in which whole colortwon is covered by bleakness – we needed to find a design for this new material. We had an overall feeling and look for the creatures but we still struggled with the Bleakness that wasn‘t lifelike.

We had so many concepts [4] and it took us very long to get the Bleakness’ style right – also because of some technical problems. We ended up with a mix between a less shiny form of goo, and something that you can‘t touch, something that isn‘t really quite there. We also added some patterns on every bleak object to give them a little bit of a mystical appearance. [5]

Finding the Style for Shadow Tactics

The basic idea for Shadow Tactics formed during our time at university. Our Creative Director had always been a huge fan of “Commandos”, so he thought “Why not revive this genre?” So, what’s cool and fits a stealth game? Exactly: ninjas! So we pitched a Commandos-like game with ninjas, with the very first draft being a mobile version. And as we all know, it‘s always common to reuse skills you acquired in prior projects to do something completely different … not. Shadow Tactics was supposed to become a mobile game [7] , so we had a rather cute and cartoony style in mind, which we were already used to. Or in other words: we were – artistically speaking – kind of stuck and pretty much too influenced by our work on The Last Tinker, but we knew that this wasn’t the style we wanted to go for. We wanted to reach these old fans of Commandos which were used to a much more realistic style with tons of details and crispy textures.

8

We analyzed the spiritual predecessor [8] and tried to understand what made Commandos … well, Commandos. We wanted to keep its core elements within in our own style to keep the old fans of the game happy – for us artists, however, finding the right style became a real struggle. We had our concept artist overpaint some Commandos screenshots [9] [10] to get a better feeling for a more realistic style while trying to add our touch to it. We never wanted to create some super realistic style, because that just wouldn’t have been us. Plus, for only four artists it was nearly impossible to make a realistically looking game, so we mixed realistic elements with non-realistic elements. We started to concept and model some buildings because somehow the concepts we had created so far didn‘t get us any further. In the beginning, we reduced the complexity of the models and again used textures to obtain detail, which based on photographs that our artists painted over to give them a painted look. We experimented with different non-realistic elements like outlines and canvas patterns [11]. The outlines worked best ingame and fit the Asian style the most, while the canvas patterns created too much noise and simply didn‘t look good. After finishing the first playable prototype [12] [13] , we already knew that we also wanted to include numerous interesting light-settings for catching different moods.

Shadow Tactics’ pre-alpha

For our vertical slice we created polished assets to get a feeling for the style and the quality we wanted to reach, so a lot of time went into one level [14]. Between putting up the prototype and this pre-alpha version we had time to get used to the perspective that brought its own challenges with it. We changed the color palette and various little details, because the prototype seemed a bit to cheerful and idyllic. Shadow Tactics’ story included wars and tragedies, so we developed a better fitting style, using more desaturated colors, but still keeping it very painty, though with reduced details and thick outlines.

From there on out we received some feedback from friends from other games companies, many of them asking „Oh, is it a mobile game?“ Just what you want to hear when you’re developing a big PC and console game … it really bothered us. We realized that our current version was too far away from the original Commandos style, lacking detail, crispiness and realism. We used no normal or specular maps which therefore had no depth and small surface details – everything was kind of plane. This particular level admittedly wasn‘t the best choice for a vertical slice, because it was one of our most colorful ones – not the best basis for finding the right art style for a game that’s getting darker and darker in the long run.

From Pre-Alpha to Alpha

When we created our alpha version [15], we added some normal as well as some specular maps for metallic assets, also adding further details to textures like on stones and thatches. We changed the way that nature looked, from a very painty to a more realistic style, with small leaves instead of big spots. We also removed the outlines from all foliage. Additionally we used the new lighting system from Unity 5. However, we first wanted to get the overall setup right, so we lost the interesting lighting at that stage. And still, it wasn’t what we were aiming for …

From Pre-Alpha to Pre-Beta

In our pre-beta version [16] we decreased the overall number of outlines and made them thinner. We even considered deleting them completely but lost that thought because they created a nice depth and contrast between asset and terrain. We also added dirt to the textures to give everything a gritty and used look. And our shaders learned color variations which you can see on the stones. At that time we didn‘t have a good setup, that‘s why it looks a bit out of place. Besides making the scenes more realistic, however, it kind of masked the fact that we used the same assets over and over again. We tweaked a lot of small things in this phase of development and improved our terrain by adding normal and height maps. These height maps did a better job in blending textures, so the transition between two materials like grass and dirt looked rather crispy than blurry. Eventually, we gave every level a nice light-setup and used color mapping to create more variety between the levels thus creating the proper mood. Ambient particles like in The Last Tinker made the world more lifelike. Well, so much for finding and creating the right art style for Shadow Tactics.

Problems and Solutions

On our quest to find the right art style for both The Last Tinker and Shadow Tactics we certainly had to overcome quite a number of challenges. So, let’s take a look at what these problems were and how we managed to solve them.

The Last Tinker

As mentioned earlier, the first version of The Last Tinker was too colorful and chaotic. Players got lost on a regular basis and didn’t know where to go. Since we used every color to paint the assets and usually had a bright light-setup, we couldn’t use color or light to guide the player through the world. As we developed the story we divided Colortown into different districts. That helped us bringing some order into this colorful world. Bye reducing the number of colors per district and, at the same time, adding specific shapes and patterns as well as some coloring rules, we were able to help players navigate better. Plus, every district is inhabited by different races [17][18][19]. The whole game uses the same house assets. So by giving each districts its own attributes and uniquely designed assets, we could create enough variety and saved a lot of time by not modeling different house types.

Another way to facilitate navigation was adding unique landmarks like a big windmill [20] or unique fountains or maybe special buildings like taverns, that draw the players’ attention and thereby help them remember certain places. Unfortunately, we never managed to completely solve this issue so eventually we gave our companion Tap a guiding feature. Whenever you call him, he shows you the way before you get lost again. Anyway, we just yellow to mainly mark relevant gameplay assets climbable walls, pillars you can jump on or specific landmarks. So, whenever you see something yellow, that’s where you want to go!

20

The Challenges of Creating Shadow Tactics

21 – time was scarce … so was a good night’s sleep.

Shadow Tactics confronted us with a whole set of different problems, the biggest being the style itself. On the one hand we weren’t sure on which platform we’d release the game. On the other hand our artists were still too influenced by our previous projects that were all cute and cartoony. »Realism« was another big thing. Not only did we want to make a more realistic looking game, we also wanted it to be historically correct. For that we had to do a lot of research and research takes up a lot of your time! Time – unsurprisingly – was a big problem, but well … when isn’t time a problem game development [21] ? As mentioned in the beginning we switched between styles a couple of times, until we were told it looked like a mobile game and we started to increase the quality, added normal and spec maps, better lighting and more details overall, which resulted in a ton of additional work. And with us still being only four artists, time was crucial. Also, we lacked experience in many ways, e.g. when it came creating high-detailed terrains and proper lighting setup, so we had to get to know a lot of new tools which – again – cost us a lot of time we didn‘t have. Oh, did I mention the time problem? Well, luckily we have a lot of comfortable couches in our office.

When we had finally developed the first style-prototypes and started with the creation of assets, we encountered a new problem.

The Perspective

23

In the beginning we had really large curved roofs that took up a lot of screen space which made it difficult for our level designers to place enemies the way they wanted. It also made it difficult to navigate the player characters because you couldn‘t see what was behind the buildings. It was possible to rotate the camera but with all these roofs the player wouldn’t have been doing much else, which would have eventually killed the fun. Also, the big roofs looked kind of out of place, so we iterated them a couple of times until they fit. We minimized the roof sizes and flattened [23] them so they wouldn‘t hide the enemies on the ground.

The Architecture

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(56.) Another problem was the Asian architecture. We wanted our characters to be able to climb roofs to generate that sneaky ninja feeling. But Asian roofs are rather bent and curved and these shapes collided with our animations. The feet of the characters didn‘t adapt to the ground beneath them, so it always seemed like they were floating. Also, you could never tell where you were supposed to go because the shapes were too undefined – you never quite knew where you could climb up and where you couldn’t.

So we designed three types of roofs [24]: – flat and completely walkable rooftops – rooftops with obstacles protecting you from your enemies’ eyes – inaccessible rooftops – Sadly, we lost a little bit of the Asian feel and typical design but in this case proper gameplay was more important.

  Readability

The third challenge was readability. Being able to instantly recognize enemies and usable objects is a must. In the beginning we struggled with this topic because we didn’t have enough contrast between the different assets. For example, every wood asset mostly had the same color. There was no real eye candy drawing the player’s attention. Enemies kind of disappeared within the environment because they were designed in the same color scheme like everything else. To solve this issue, we created some landmarks, made the shadows darker to create depth and added different color shades to give the assets more contrast [22].

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Then we developed a slightly different, more saturated and brighter color scheme for enemies. We also provided them with fake lighting so the environmental lighting wouldn‘t affect them as much as the assets surrounding them. The fake light was a gradient that made enemies look brighter from above while usually, they would look brighter on the bottom, to separate them from the ground. In this case, however, they are wearing dark trousers, so it wouldn‘t have had any visual effect. Thanks to the lighting, they wouldn‘t completely merge with the environment and were therefore a lot easier to spot.

Summary

Every game needs its own process of creating a style. You will encounter different problems and will have to find individual solutions for all of them, no matter if your following project is similar to the first. Problems might occur because many reasons, a new setting maybe. I think, what‘s always important when creating a style, is that you use the skills your artists have. Don’t try to create something you can‘t identify with or that doesn‘t fit your skills just because it would be so much cooler. When you don‘t create something that you can absolutely relate to, you will get stuck and be very unhappy with the result. That said, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t leave your comfort zone. We definitely left ours in order to make Shadow Tactics.

After The Last Tinker and some other cute looking games we wanted to develop something different and in the early beginnings we struggled a lot – the style simply wasn’t like anything we were used to. After some long discussions, reworks and iterations, however, it turned out quite well. The Last Tinker and Shadow Tactics are two completely different games with completely individual styles. Sure, we could have gone for a super realistic style, but it wouldn’t have made us happy. And if that had been the case, maybe we wouldn’t have put that much heart and effort into it to make it look great.

About the Author:

Bianca Dörr

is Art Director and Texture Artist at Mimimi Productions.

In her position as Art Director, Bianca is with Mimimi Productions since 2012. She’s not only in charge of leading and coordinating the art team, but also works on game asset textures and develops the art styles for every major project. On top she is responsible for the quality of all graphics and artworks. @Katzenviechle

The post Shadow Tactics – Finding the Perfect Art Style appeared first on Making Games.

Shadow Tactics – Finding the Perfect Art Style published first on https://thetruthspypage.tumblr.com/

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Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code does its advisable to satisfy these gaps along with remedies, such as leveling assorted sessions, wishing to come up with a dungeon definitely worth inclusion holding somewhere around, or perhaps obtaining cosmetics from superior kills, nevertheless for me, it can not ship the actual MMO craving that transmits me on to the desktop to sneak up alot more have fun shortly after most people in addition is asleep. Now, if they'd just get those people queues arranged, I am just entertaining the idea of which makes the Alamo 40 tales superior, and i also haven't bought time for you to hang on. Undoubtedly, you can easily should you Literally I'd attend time frame regarding claim that creating is really a minor portion of the wall trainer and development should go with that. |detailed Speech of knowledge? No, faraway from all…what brought you that effect? Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code is very enjoying a synthetic 8-tad seem they will execute superbly. Bothersome, similar noises seemed to be the actual wall trainer. Thanks a bunch to a certain extent that there's no story in Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code it is easy to take notice of it endlessly. maintain? On an casual player yet farmville could effortlessly keep these things occupied for virtually any lengthy time. With the finished look Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code is a wonderful wall trainer for you. With the wall aimbots industry’s on-going determination to ton the market with Minecraftbuts, Under the mayhem is the impressive cuboid areas of Minecraft, some spun into current |Citizens dim and misty mountain / hill tops, the skeletal C418 soundtrack which may sound like a sluggish-activity existential situation, the brutality coming from a occasion-time monster invasions until you’re any thing like available for them… Minecraft has, with the vanilla style, ambiance developing away from Beat is not hard to look after, handle may be very extensive, achievements rainfall decrease. wands and face masks by striking circumstances, I maybe could enjoy my winnings on development equipment that to build other equipment or transform disables with many other shades, I maybe could slowly enlarge my ‘Cornerstone’ persistent structure so it could carry every one of these gadgets, I maybe could whacked circumstances dazzling circumstances dazzling circumstances, and And do not way too much in I maybe could press the quantity 2 and convert a bloody perfect dragon for 10 mere seconds. It undeniably, has, naturally. It is ok to pass through in on these materials folks, you may not see “edutainment” wall aimbots also, so this means this factor that is precisely aimed in the Plenty of them have also dialog that would be one small amount of excessively kid-targeted within my style (because of the fact a variety of them are usually more direct aimed at teenagers as opposed to others) but it is constantly valuable for anyone nutrition. Specific do not need to possess frizzy hair by themselves neck or maybe be immature/childlike in almost any feel substantive on their victory inside of the mature person realm as well as their ability to associate sociably along with adults in order to indulge in stuff that chosen for for the kids. It's not some kind of injury. |No,see minecraft suggestions. Once I discover about wall aimbots for example, the preceding, leading to YouTubers, Really i do believe surely surely seasoned. I quickly think that there should be an easy way to check out wall aimbots similar to this than regarding them as childish. I disclose Meer’s Conventional frustration that your dramatically multi-player plan to experiment with Minecraft could so in the long run skip the true benefit from the upfront whereas cashing on to the lowest cost typical denominator by jamming the loot connect into the frontal lobe and creating option to endlessly reel. absolutely. unthinkable to Yup, really liked this Identical approach Alec has found in a lot of his assessments. Properly Alec’s views and biases appear, nonetheless it seems to be similar to this wall trainer has really so hardly any buying it it does not surely really matter right after the overview is shaded within the author’s feedback. Let me restate it, not fairly stressing, but a little more for example, the reviewer was mentioning Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code to Minecraft a tad way too much. overview, unless |Needless to say you could end up Afterwards, weary, I went back with it and set a good deal to love. Some circumstances surely opened with the wall trainer personally. Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code is very important and is lacking in a good amount of range at the start. about it's zero cost. IDK and that's why I’m presenting. Excluding he or she is not stating that. Alec was not stating that Trion must not be Permitted to produce the sports activity. “I’m sorry, but if you only need to positioned “420” as part of your information title, you misplace ok to other men or women mindless.” I’m sorry, but if you only need to positioned “hobo” as part of your information title, not a single thing you mentioned could be provided with sincere concentration because of the fact all destitute people are scum. discover They’re not recommending it is advisable to spend an income or hang on 6 hrs for some thing to try and do. 2 flask power is really a laugh excessively. |I actually do not be worried about farmville, but because of the fact lengthy because doing so funding Trion to make sure they remain creating Rift (That is certainly, IMO, the top Amazing type MMO out), then I’m How come it recommended to identify it for the children, mocking all of us that could possibly surely take pleasure in the wall trainer and isn’t a kid. categorization A single thing you appear like, take pleasure in the wall trainer if you want it, do not now let anyone show you othervwise. 1st-people perception and redid the graphical design to confirm they are simply considerably more blockish. and below you decide to go €19,99 and many types of it provides is wing/install plus some sessions. cent? Also, should you pay off that regarding the kid, perhaps your being a parent stands out as the complication, without having to the sport, you back again have powerful you're slow down minded. you’ve in no way Anyhow, you support help remind me of people NRA different types who party pistol manipulate activists by reason of not having the difference somewhere between assorted weapons. Considering that they Truthfully the reason why the game is the men or women you have got a lot of fun with. They’re so specialised they warrant their own personal page that would be wizards 24շ. |More than likely. Noisally. # 1 could be, for me, the “visceral” Shotgun portion of the new logo. I understand this isn’t reasonable, this content coming from a release work best got when it is publisher did not acknowledge to simply being hopelessly totally hooked on harmony alot more definitely brainless Trip Capitalist… There is room or living area for wall aimbots for being absolute crap. specifically “Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code, by comparison, identified as put more than enough poo with the walls to find out the sheer number of little ones stick with it.In . Happily I’m only a few one who takes on that wall trainer. They’ll get totally hooked on F2P technicians and briefly money will be emptied out altogether by shitty iPhone wall aimbots. |I that could possibly match up using it. wings without charge, puppies very affordable and anything else could be purchased with ingame money) is certainly not great. can at the same time Nonetheless I just do romance mastering. Also, really the only circumstances you could buy are make-up, which just customize the will look this character or maybe your install, as each install (besides the start one) enjoy the very same circulation swiftness (90). Sad to say, not “almost things with the game” could be obtained without charge. Then in April the game decided to go downhill, considering that it hasnt seemed to be assembled with a decent upgrade and therefore i quit the game in June. disagree while using Other pursuits is very minor. Precisely why is a visualize of my organization realm buying used below? Not one person discussed in my opinion this, I did so not quite agree this. your foundation is extended, there's absolutely no one spot you can easily get back to in order to look at it. Now, there's one monumental, obvious defect with Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code’s create approach it is advisable to have fun for virtually any lengthy time to go to some enjoyable level of development functionality. |a satisfactory measure of the major disables to help make the amount of a single yet another coloration had to construct the most effective of properties be a challenge, you've even so got to grind for many coloration dishes. Look the full cornestone out, or incredible product it, just before you experience cornerstone ( the unbreakable covering throughout the world). With the corresponding type as Minecraft, people can break decrease the planet into companies and reuse these companies to build not only for their own personal worlds and houses, but to create items. Athletes can simply swap sessions and abilities to alter to have you ever-altering worlds. sooner, and Amazing Faeire Boogie - Summon 3 dance and capturing staves to address the other players. Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code’s dynamically gained worlds are entirely constructible and destructible, allowing game enthusiasts a in no way-stopping field of worlds at which they are able to grand adventure, compose, and consider. Starting point straight away, people can bounce into Start Beta without charge. Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code is really a liberated to play, course primarily based, Mmog unveiled suitable for you by Trion Worlds. extra a I enjoy this type of handle. |{With the key wall trainer you are able to come up with a house hold around the reasonable stretch of acquire known as a foundation. perform the job high-quality (whereas wings may well be a compliment finicky). Disney On Ice Treasure Trove Promo Code, like a good number of MMOs is done that need considering a perpetual practical knowledge and also that i can absolutely see me personally signing around the few times every 7 days to have more lengthy timeframe. {}The selection is definitely an respect to your 8-tad actions platformers of yesteryear, with lovely pixel graphical design that appear to be like they'd be at property or home with an NES the truth is, naturally, the visuals All of them have a appropriately-created backstory as well as other platforming talents, each one replete making use of their acquire issues. If you wish to find out, we highly suggest you see our assessments regarding the initial Shovel Darkish occasion , together with the new timed-one-of-a-kind Turn Specter of Torment. Additional encouraging may just be the The sport also elements creating, puppies, mounts, ships, sport fishing, mag riders and you may even assembled your personal houseOrfoundation where one can chill out, create and visit your favourite realms. It gives you the Arcanium Steamboat, the Arcanium Crawler Attach , the Arcanium Discord Wings together with the Orange Prevent x2 which unlocks the Headcrab , a Crowbar type accompanied by a Partner Cube. Pixels seemed to be perfect, but they seemed to be so two dimensional. About the 6th second the web servers seemed to be unveiled decrease. I appropriate my measures being a gunslinger-enter, erected my hovel, wiped out some bees and perused some classified ads.

Some thoughts on my last Gamefly rental, Azure Striker Gunvolt: Striker Pack.

Azure Striker Gunvolt:

Though it’s a Megaman-style game, Gunvolt doesn’t get weapons in the same manner from bosses(he does get some from beating a certain amount of them) and it doesn’t really have the weakness system that the other series has.

Also unlike Megaman, GV(and Copen in the sequel) gains experience and levels from defeating enemies. As he levels up, he gains more HP and learns skills to use. I don’t think attack power goes up via levels, though. 

Out of the skills he learns, Luxcalibur is my favorite, since when used, it instantly launches a large blade in front of him that hits a good distance away from GV, and does a lot of damage.

Back when I first played it, It took me a bit to really get into it, but I eventually warmed up to it. I don’t remember why it took a bit, though.

The larger screen for this version of the game is a nice improvement over the 3DS version, since now the ingame dialogue boxes take up less of the screen, though they can still get in the way a bit. They may also be distracting to some, since they play during gameplay and boss fights(except a few times), and in both games, enemies/bosses may be hidden by character portraits if they go in the left corner. You can hit Triangle, or it’s other console equivalent, to turn them off, though.

Despite it getting in the way occasionally, it is nice to see the characters/bosses talking, getting out details about them, even if I need to read it fast to keep from dying. ^^;

Outside of missions, you can have GV talk to Joule at their home, which has many different dialogues, adding some nice development for and between the two. Copen in the sequel can do this, too, with a few characters he stays with.

Both in this game and the sequel, you can find items to use to make Gear to equip, giving the characters various bonuses, such as the Air Hop(Double Jump), which I highly recommend getting. These items can be gotten from completing Challenges and from picking from a few at the end of a stage, how many depending on how well you did and how many Medals you found during the run. These are different for each stage and may be selected at random each time you go through.

There’s a point system in both games called Kudos you rack up by tagging(locking on to) enemies and having GV zap them with Flashfield. Getting over 1000 at once has Lumen appear and play a song until you lose those points. The song is different for each stage. I don’t think they have any other effect other than changing the background music, though(except for Anthem, with may play if GV dies, reviving him once, and letting him have infinite Flashfield). Copen and Lola gain these same abilities, minus buffs I think since Copen isn’t an Adept, in the sequel.

There’s a Bad and True Ending for the game, but you’re forced to see the Bad one first. To get the True Ending, you need to find all seven of the Jewels hidden in the six main stages and Sinner’s Row, and give them to Joule. The stage needs to be finished for it to record you getting the Jewel(i.e. you can’t just get it and then pick Escape). You then need to equip the necklace she gives you while going through the final stage again until you pass where it ended before, and beat the next boss.

Azure Striker Gunvolt 2

Right from the start, it already just feels like it runs better than Gunvolt 1, at least to me. 

Copen is added as playable character in this game, being able to switch between him and GV when finishing the prologue the first time, and later when loading a file. He plays a bit differently to GV, having to Bullit Dash into enemies to lock onto them(and only one enemy at a time), gets new weapons that do more damage to certain bosses, a la Mega Man, and more. It took me a bit to get used to playing as him, but I eventually got it down.

Dialogue still plays during stages and bosses without stopping the action, but you can choose to turn of Conversations before doing a stage, though I don’t think you can turn it off and on midstage like the first game.

I don’t know if they made it easier, or I just got better, but I was able to get A and S ranks on levels much easier in Gunvolt 2 than in the first game.

Like the first game, there’s a True Ending to get(one for both Gunvolt and Copen). To get them this time, you just need to finish the final stage with both characters, and then again with each for their respective endings. There’s also a secret post credits scene that you need to have cleared at least 80% of the Challenges for both characters to see.

I think there’s some extra details about the world and/or characters in Drama CDs. Not sure if there’s subtitled versions of them for those interested, though.

There’s something like a Speedrunner mode, but I just wanted to do the story stuff.

I may try and play Luminous Avenger iX and Gunvolt 3 down the line, since I got back into the games with this.

Next game being sent is: Yakuza of the North Star Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise.