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wist0ragic · 3 months

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#☆ sonic headcanons but video games!!

(a little simple and silly but they were fun to brain storm)

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Sonic!

- personally i think sonic would really like rhythm games, his favourites are project diva x and mega mix, as well as muse dash

- for rhythm games he of course enjoys playing the faster paced songs and starts off with hard, completely skipping normal

- but for party games he really likes to play splatoon with all of his friends

- he definitely gets competitive and likes to push straight through to the other teams base to ink

- but for two player games his favourite is for sure cuphead and he saves that game for whenever him and tails hang out

- sonic always plays as cuphead and tails always plays as mugman

- now taking a bit of a leap here, i think sonic would also really have fun playing fromsoft games, like elden ring and bloodborne (more so elden ring)

- for these games he likes to play them with shadow but they never get anything done because sonic is always messing with him and tricking him

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Amy!

- she LOVES animal crossing and put lots of time and effort into making her island cute and pretty with her main theme being something along the lines of coquette for sure

- amy of course tries to convince everyone to play animal crossing as well so they can all see each others islands and decorate together

- she also likes to play rhythm games but is less worried about her score unlike sonic, and she actually enjoys the slow songs

- but if amy had the whole day to herself she could easily spend every hour of it playing the sims which seems to confuse everyone but she’s just having a blast

- she also really loves the legend of zelda games and adores zelda

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Shadow!

- okay now i know that amy and sonic already like rhythm games but i think shadow would also really enjoy them

- he definitely challenges sonic to the harder songs and secretly enjoys playing with him, even if he might be a little bitter since his score was only 1% away from beating him

- but circling back to elden ring and bloodborne, he’s actually pretty damn good at those games. in elden ring he prefers a bleed build and in bloodborne he usually just sticks with the saw cleaver

- aaaand despite his gruff attitude he actually likes animal crossing so him and amy like to visit each others islands

- i also think he might enjoy a good story game like omori, dredge, night in the woods, far lone sails etc

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Knuckles!

- he’s for sure someone who mainly plays fighter games like street fighters and constantly gets his friends to try and play with him in a 1v1

- same goes with smash bros of course, he really enjoys it and likes to play against sonic

- knuckles also has loads of fun playing any justdance game with his friends. he gets competitive for sure but somehow always manages to get 2nd or 3rd

- and much like amy if he had the whole day to himself he could easily play hours and hours of his favourite game, fallout 4

- he usually likes to join the brotherhood of steal for their power armour and such

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Tails!

- tails loves the portal games and especially loves to play portal two with sonic and explain the puzzles

- he also likes to play legend of zelda of games but his favourite is for sure tears of the kingdom because he can invent all kinds of stuff

- once in a while he’ll replay undertale because he enjoys the jokes and story but he can only ever do the pacifist run, he’s very emotionally invested

- and on the days where he simply just wants to sit back and relax he’ll unwind with games like unpacking, a little to the left, some animal crossing and so on

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Rouge!

- now she doesn’t play many games but one of her favourites i feel like would be resident evil 4, both the original and the remake (a big part of it is because she really loves ada)

- she’ll play animal crossing for amy but doesn’t invest too much time in decorating and what not, though she does love how cute the game is

- and meanwhile thanks to knuckles she’s gotten pretty good at smash bros and street fighter since she plays with him the most

- and last but not least she also likes to play fromsoft games with shadow but she’s definitely more chill while playing

#sonic the hedgehog #sonic headcanons #rouge the bat #knuckles the echidna #tails the fox #amy rose #shadow the hedgehog

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bmaxwell · 2 years

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Elden Ring

Years ago I had a hot and heavy couple of weeks with Demon's Souls on the Playstation 3. The game was hard as hell, but there was something there that kept drawing me back. I'd get my ass kicked, get frustrated and put it down, then come back. I eventually fell off for good without coming close to finishing it. I repeated this to varying degrees with every Souls game, as well as Bloodborne and Nioh. Something draws me to these games. Even though they're just not for me, I desperately want them to be.

When Elden Ring was announced, I shrugged. Looks cool, but I've been burned every time I touch a Soulsborne game. The involvement of George RR Martin is not a draw for me. I was steadfast in my resolve until I saw some gameplay and heard the positive reviews for it. I figured "I have a spare $60 and bad judgment, why not?". Also, Best Buy was offering a steelbook case. I'm a sucker for those.

It felt immediately familiar. The movement, the lock on, being stuck in attack animations, the chunky dodge with its i-frames. The way any lowly enemy can kill you if you're sloppy and careless. Elden Ring felt like Another One of These. And, in a way, it is. There is one crucial thing that sets it apart: it's an open world.

That may not sound like much. It's still the same style of punishing gameplay. There are plenty of bullshit deaths where you step through a doorway and get ambushed by an enemy you didn't expect. Bosses are often massive and feel insurmountable. Precise parries are something I am awful at - I panic during these big fights, and different enemies will have an assortment of different attacks, each with their own hesitations and timing. All of this is still present in Elden Ring.

The ability to simply fuck off elsewhere cannot be overstated. Demon's Souls felt very limited. There were a couple of areas you could go at any given time, and those felt narrow. If you were having a hard time, well, get fucked. With Elden Ring, you are playing in a world that feels absolutely massive. The blend of open space and shit to find feels spot-on perfect. There's stuff to find EVERYWHERE, but it never feels like you're stumbling over a checklist strewn about to pad the game's length. The game inspired a sense of wonder and joyous exploration I haven't felt since the early days of World of Warcraft.

There is a staggering amount of optional content to be found or ignored. Elden Ring does not give a FUCK about you or your experience. That also hasn't changed. I was constantly finding really cool shit everywhere. Shrines and caves tucked aside and out of the way, things that you make you feel like a goddamn cartographer who is discovering something brand new because of the size of the world. So many times I'd see a temple, a castle, or a massive tree and think "Oh, that's not that far away. I'll pop over there and check it out" and then find out that no, it's actually pretty damn far away - but hey, there are a half dozen other things to get distracted by.

Sometimes I'd find a spell or piece of gear that was a big deal. More often than not, I'd find something neat that didn't fit for my character. I played a spellcaster, so most weapons were a no-go. It's my understanding that spellcasters are more viable than in previous From games, and that it's an easier way to play the game. Which I am comfortable with. "Easy mode" or not, I had a hell of a time with several parts of Elden Ring. It's an exercise in both perseverance and frustration. I had the classic video game experience of losing to a boss 20 times, rage-quitting, then kicking its ass the next day more than once.

The feeling of finally overcoming a challenge that once felt insurmountable is a special feeling. It's the draw to Soulsborne games. It's the positive side of the "git gud" mentality (the vocal members of this group are generally giant assholes). The exhilaration of overcoming the challenge is key to the experience. That said, I'm fine with everyone enjoying games their own way. I used sorceries and summons, and I'm sure some people would look down their nose about it. I figure fuck 'em. I had a good time and the game gave me a hell of a challenge.

The game is not without its flaws. I encountered a few bugs in my time with it on Xbox Series X - a few quest things that were supposed to trigger did not do so until I exited and relaunched the game. There's also noticeable pop-in, especially after fast-traveling. Also, I usually don't care about how my characters look, but the game desperately needs some cosmetic options because the best gear I had frequently looked dumb as hell.

The game is deliberately opaque. There's a story here, one with a lot of threads all running in parallel. It's tough to try to keep track of it, and I found myself searching the internet for what specific items did, or how to follow specific quest lines; the answer was frequently something I would have never found on my own. This is part and parcel with From games, and it's not necessarily a flaw. It just kept me from really digging into the story - I'll turn to the internet for that.

Likewise, parsing the differences between gear was tough too. Similar to the story bits, you get out what you put in. The game isn't going to say "This armor is a 15 and this other armor is an 18, so the 18 is clearly better." It's going to give you a dozen metrics for each piece and let you choose. If you want protection from lightning and slashing, go with this one; the other is better against holy and piercing though, so......

I'm sure some longtime fans of From games would disagree with me, but it feels like with Elden Ring they made a game with more mass appeal than ever before, but still kept the traits that made their games special over the past decade plus. It's a game teeming with cool, bizarre, unexpected things but it never flaunts it. It doesn't say "Hey, look over here! See this icon on your map? Remember the lady in the village told you about this? You should TOTALLY go there!" It trusts the player to be curious, and rewards that curiosity constantly - either with some weird little nugget, or with a hideous monster that you can take on or abandon.

They finally made a Soulslike game for me. I could scarcely pull myself away from it for the 113 hours it took me to see credits. I will keep playing it, because there is still a ton of unexplored areas of the map for me. The graphical fidelity pales next to games like Horizon Forbidden West, or Ghost of Tsushima. It is a work of art though - the massive, dreary world feels vast and - in its own Nihilistic way - extremely beautiful. It dwarfs the player, as do the gargantuan bosses.

Everything about the Lands Between screams "This is terrifying, you are outmatched, and this is all doomed." It's a fantastic version of the classic "stranger in a strange land" story. The lone warrior in a harsh world, railing against impossible odds. It's Link waking up with nothing but a wooden sword and the knowledge that Zelda needs him. It's Wander, hoping against hope to bring back his lost love by slaying 16 titanic colossi. To persevere and succeed in the face of that is incredibly rewarding. Elden Ring frustrated me like few games do, but it also challenged and delighted me in a way few games do.

There's also a lot of weird finger stuff.

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