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inbarfink · 2 months

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I think a lot about the Concept of ‘choices that matter’ in video games. Like, in terms of what it is that makes a choice ‘really matter’, what do we perceive as a choice that matters or has a consequence, how do different games with different amounts of branching or non-branching storylines play with those ideas… Especially because Undertale is one of my favorite games of all time, and it has often been hyped as ‘a game where your choices REALLY matter’ and… honestly, I dunno if all of this hype was fully conducive to Undertale. Because the way it handles the concept of Video Game Choices is actually a lot more interesting and complex than that simplistic descriptor makes it seem.

Because Undertale actually has a lot of choices that ‘don’t really matter’! Lots of dialogue choices and silly little decisions that on a first playthrough seem like they’re some sort of moral choice or a branching plotline but end up always leading to basically the same result regardless of what you do!

And the game doesn’t really try to hide the fact that these choices are kinda 'Fake'. I mean, on a first playthrough a player might assume there’s gonna be some Massive Consequences for picking the ‘wrong’ drink on Undyne’s date, but the game’s narrative expects for there to be multiple playthroughs and pretty much every Choice that Doesn’t Matter is peppered with that Undertale brand of wacky character-focused humor that inherently makes the moment memorable. Papyrus leading Undyne straight to you no matter what you do is basically a cross-timeline running gag.

On some level I see this as a sort of gag that serves as meta-commentary about the expectations around Choices That Matter in Video Games. As in, a lot of games have their Moral Choices happen in clearly easily marked ‘this is a Moral Choice!’ moments within the story, while the actual gameplay (and any violence the player might cause as part of said gameplay) is basically entirely divorced from any element of narrative-branching and doesn't effect the story at all. Undertale basically entirely inverts this dynamic; the most important factor for which Route you’re own is how you handle your FIGHTs, and what seems like clearly-marked and obvious Moral Choices are just goofy insubstantial minor changes in dialogue.

But also… there is also a level where you must ask yourself ‘what does it mean when we say that these choices Don’t Matter’. I mean, it’s not like they didn't change anything about the game, the Player still made the character say that other thing, the choice probably led to an alternate piece of dialogue, probably a joke with a call-back at the end of the game… The line between a one-off joke and an actual story-changing moment can be a little blurry if you look at it too deeply.

For example, near the end of the Waterfall part of the game, the Player is given the choice to save Monster Kid even at the risk of having to face down Undyne.

Pretty much anyone who isn’t deliberately trying to be an asshole is going to rush to save them and obviously that includes the Pacifist Route Players. But you can actually leave Monster Kid to die without it 'mattering' in the sense that it wouldn't divert you from the Pacifist Route. Undyne saves them instead of you, and ends up with slightly less HP for her battle (which might Matter for Runs when you try and FIGHT her but obviously not in Pacifist Runs) and… by the end of the game, during the extremely happy True Pacifist Ending, they still clearly remember that you abandoned them and are upset by it.

So… does saving Monster Kid ‘matter’ or not? On one hand, choosing not to save them mostly just changes a few lines of dialogue but… these lines of dialogue kinda recontextualize this happy ending and the Player’s actions in general. Despite the True Pacifist Ending otherwise portraying the Player/Frisk as a kind-hearted and brave hero... they still did this undeniably cowardly (and perhaps even cruel) act to one of their friends .

Was running away and leaving Monster Kid to die a brief but significant moment of weakness that the Player regrets and has cost them what could’ve been the start of a lovely friendship? Or is that simply that being a True Pacifist was always more of a matter of pragmatism rather than ideals? Were they only acting as a Pacifist to get that promised 'Best Ending', and only Monster Kid has an inkling they are not as heroic or kind as everyone thinks they are?

And then there’s the Snowman ‘quest’.

A free healing item given early in the game, with your mission being to carry it along in your inventory for as long as you can without ever consuming it. The only reward you will ever see from it is a few lines of dialogue…

But for many, it is more than enough of an incentive to preserve the Snowman’s Piece. You can do whatever you want with the Snowman without it ‘mattering’ in terms of Ending or consequences. You could carry it through all of your adventures with care and kindness... or you could eat it while he can’t see you and then go back to him and tell him that you ‘lost’ it and then get another piece and eat that as well, you could eat it right in front of his face, horrifying him.

And much like with Monster Kid, you can STILL get the True Pacifist Ending after doing that, all that would change is a few optional pieces of dialogue from the Snowman…

And a total recontextualization of the Player’s behavior and the ending. The Snowman sees the Player as a cruel and heartless person who is just pretending to be good so they can be liked - the way they acted with this immobile, powerless Snowman who could do nothing for them and their reputation reveals their true self. And he says their friends will realize that too one day...

Doing a True Reset on the Pacifist Ending is, by definition, a (almost) consequence-free action and yet it changes future Pacifist Routes immeasurably. Turning the Player into a Hypocrite doing the exact same thing they were trying to stop Flowey/Asriel from doing - trapping all of their friends into a time-loop so they can play with them forever while never actually letting them to enjoy freedom on the surface, simply because they are not willing to move on or put their friends' wishes and agency above their own. Nothing in the game actually changes, not one character can even suspect that you did something like that, and yet for the Player - this choice makes the entire Meaning of the game flip on its head.

Even the most famous and heavily-toted Big Consequence in the whole game - selling your soul to Chara after completing a Murder Route… mostly what it does is just… recontextualize the ending of the Game.

As a game, ‘Undertale’ is very much about the ways in which a Player engages with a game can radically recontextualize it. The huge chasm of difference between the Pacifist and Muder Routes is just the most literal example of it. But, in a way, even the tiny little Dialogue Options - where the lack of real choice and consequences is Obviously a Joke - matter. Because of the way they can recontextualize the Player Character’s behavior.

(Okay, maybe not this one, but hear me out…)

Do you trust Papyrus to not betray you, even after you spied on him with Undyne?

Do you have the integrity to admit you forgot something or got it wrong even when there’s no consequences for just lying about it?

Are you a hypocrite for trying to get Alphys to be truthful with Undyne only to then immediately turn around and lie to Undyne yourself?

None of these choices matter for the ending, some of them don’t even get, like, a call-back joke or anything, but… if you are engaged in this story as a narrative, if you are invested in these characters as if they were people, if you are honestly trying to be the best person you can be, if you are trying to self-reflect at the way you approach this game… even the silliest little dialogue option can suddenly be imbued with deep implications and you can make them matter.

Undertale is one of the best demonstrations of this concept, but this is absolutely not exclusive to it. For example….

‘Ace Attorney’ is pretty much as far away as you can get from a ‘branching narrative’ within the video game sphere. It is a heavily-linear Visual Novel where 70% of the time it won’t even let you talk to random characters at anything but the exact order it expects you to and any ‘Bad Endings’ are basically just glorified Game Over Screens. (... because this is the Internet and something something piss on the poor, I should probably specify that I am talking about ‘Ace Attorney’ because I love Ace Attorney and these are neutral descriptions of the game and not complaints. There’s nothing wrong with a game being linear.)

If there’s any Dialogue Choice in AA, it’s generally a very basic ‘right answer-wrong answer’ choice between Progress and a Penalty, or a total non-choice that just gets you to the same final result regardless. Except… Well… as we just talked about, getting to the same final result doesn’t necessarily mean a choice is ‘meaningless’, does it?

There’s actually a lot of great storytelling moments where Ace Attorney, despite its otherwise strict linearity, uses this exact sort of recontextualizing mindset I’ve talked about with Undertale to make choices with some really powerful emotional impact…. Even if technically, the ending is the same ending. It can be something as basic as ‘even if picking this Wrong Answer doesn’t get me a penalty, it still embarrassed my character and disappointed my friends/rivals and thus I feel bad for picking it’. Consequences as recontextualizing your character as more incompetent than they should’ve come across at that moment.

And then there’s moments like the iconic ending of ‘Justice for All’. That moment before Franziska bursts into the Courtroom with the case-making evidence and saves the day. The moment where it seems like Phoenix really is gonna have to pick between protecting his best friend and carrying out a rightful sentence.

The player gets to pick between the two options, but Phoenix never gets to say his choice out loud before Franziska comes running in... and yet… he, and the player, still made that choice. Even if no one ever has to experience the consequences of your choice, even if the rest of the world has no idea what Phoenix Wright would’ve chosen if the Miracle hadn’t happened, we know what we picked and that knowledge of the choice matters. Because of how we feel about this choice and what it says about our interpretation of Phoenix… and about us.

There’s also a bit of this ludonarrative device in ‘The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures’. During “The Adventures of the Runaway Room”, when you investigate the Omnibus for the second time and start finding things that… don’t quite fit together. When you’re finally starting to make progress with proving McGilded’s innocence, while also maybe starting to notice that something is… wrong with these pieces of evidence.

The unchanging linear narrative of the game is that Ryunosuke does eventually realizes McGilded's trickery, puts truth ahead of victory in court and yet, despite his effort and good intentions - the case still ends with a false Not Guilty verdict. And yet, the Player has the choice to... tweak the details.

There are several points where Ryunosuke can object, where he can call out the inconsistencies even though they help his case, where he can support Van Zieks in his accusations of tempered evidence... or he can not. Not necessarily intentionally misleading the Court as much as subconsciously trying to ignore the inconsistencies in the name of trusting his client.

And yet… in the end it doesn’t matter. Maybe Susato calls out the inconsistency instead of him, maybe Van Zieks does, maybe it remains uncontested but... no matter what you do, the case will end with a Not Guilty verdict (I mean, I guess you can deliberately fail the game but that will not progress the plot), McGilded doesn’t seem like he held a grudge (in the few minutes he had left to live), and a few cases later - Ryunosuke would always be punished for his part at this false verdict.

So it doesn’t really matter what Ryunosuke did back then? Does it matter if he did his best and called out every single inconsistencies or if he kinda half-assed it until he (and the Player) had to? He’s still going to suffer the same consequences down the line. And yet….

And yet, I think there’s something so powerful about giving us that option. About knowing that Ryunosuke, and we, did try and do something about McGilded's dirty tricks- even if it didn’t work. Or alternative, knowing that there was more that Ryunosuke and us could’ve done even if it was not nearly enough. Even if in the eyes of the game and the British Justice system there is no difference, the fact that we know what did and what we could’ve done can radically change the way the player feels about all of the later scenes concerning the truth about McGilded’s trial. It can radically change the way the player interpret Ryunosuke’s feelings about it as well.

Because even though the game itself keeps playing along with the same script regardless, that trial had irrevocable consequences for the Player.

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bogleech · 4 months

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Mortasheen: The Tabletop RPG slowly releasing as of right now

If you backed the Mortasheen kickstarter 3 years ago, check your emails, because I just put up version 0.1 of the first initial digital-only edition; it contains the entire gameplay system by Morgan Mullins, pages and pages of monster abilities, dozens of setting locations including NPC characters and even some non-monster (but still not normal) wildlife, plus over 100 monsters with playable stats. If you aren't a kickstarter backer you'll have to wait until later this year for the general public release. First there will be a free update of this digital version adding several more monsters, one additional chapter of various other tweaks, then work can begin on the final public version for both digital and physical.

I spent about 15 years of my life waiting to be able to put this out. It outlasted my 20's and now outlasted my 30's. For 99% of that development I was left out of the loop on what was even happening with it while I hoped it would come out any year now to maybe possibly make me a little bit of money while being poor the entire time. I almost feel like it kind of took half my life away?

In the time this RPG has been in development, the entire "Adventure Time" franchise debuted as a Nickelodeon short, got picked up as a Cartoon Network series, redefined the animation industry, revealed several plot points coincidentally almost identical to many major reveals of the Mortasheen setting, ended, and has now returned as a spinoff.

I can't wait til I can show it to everybody else but for now it's for all those backers who waited two years longer than the time frame I expected. Here's some of my more recent artwork for it without any context:

I wish I was making this post on some kind of actually special day or something and not just a random friday in january but I basically uploaded a passable book the very moment I had a passable book.

#mortasheen #art

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ranna-alga · 5 months

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I just realised something from the TLOU gameplay that made me so depressed that I needed to share with you all.

Rewind back to the prologue where Sarah is dying, and we see Joel look away from her a total of two times before she dies: the first time is at the same moment the camera pans to solely Tommy, of whom Joel is looking at (first image). Before he is out of shot, Joel can just be seen looking to Sarah again, until the camera turns back to him where he looks away a second time towards Tommy again (second image).

Now, if you go and listen to the audio of the actual scene itself, you'll notice that the second time he looks away is when Sarah draws her last breath and passes away. She's already dead now.

And Joel missed it by looking away for only a second.

The second time he looks away and then looks back at Sarah, she is already gone. He couldn't do anything. He couldn't look into her eyes, still filled with life (albeit hanging on a thread) anymore before becoming absolutely soulless because he missed it. He didn't see the light leave her, he didn’t see her succumb to the bullet wound where she would move on to no longer feel anymore pain in death. He missed it almost instantly. His last good look of her is after the second time he looked away, when she's already passed on.

But then we fast-forward to the very near end of the game where Joel is trying to perform CPR on Ellie after she almost drowned. He's becoming mentally and emotionally frantic because he cannot lose another one and projects this by trying to resuscitate her. He is back to where he was twenty years prior trying to save Sarah. And then the Fireflies appear.

Joel looks away from Ellie one time. He probably doesn’t even realise that these are Fireflies (they could have been Hunters or even FEDRA for all he cared). The look on his face in the second image is heart-breaking, but it only lasts for a second before he immediately looks down to Ellie.

He only looks up at them once. He doesn’t look up a second time.

Again, if you watch the original scene with audio enabled, you can hear the shakiness in Joel's voice, almost tearfully and very much coming from a place of fear. He's literally pleading for Ellie to wake up, all the while keeping his eyes on her - not looking up again - not even with one of the Firefly soldiers approaching him with an armed weapon.

He can't look away a second time because the last time he did, he lost Sarah immediately. He fears that will happen again, but he cannot let that occur. He won't. Not with Ellie: his second chance, his new reason to live, his new love. Joel refuses to tear his eyes away from her, even for another second, if it risks her life suddenly slipping away before he could even realise it.

He cannot afford to have another daughter lay lifeless in his arms and have her drift off to a place where he cannot follow and protect her anymore, even if it means placing his own life on the line.

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kuromhiel · 1 year

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BSD MEN PLAYING HORROR GAMES (MIMIC)

Headcanons!

↣Dazai Osamu, Nakahara Chuuya, Nakajima Atsushi, Akutagawa Ryuunosuke, Doppo Kunikida, Edogawa Ranpo, Nikolai Gogol, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Tetcho Suehiro, Saigiku Jono

↝Requests are open!

Osamu Dazai

> He would definetly be confident. You'd go up to him and be like: 'Samu let's play Mimic!

> He never heard of that game but he's hella interested.

> Both of you started playing and then he gets lost the moment you appear.

> Don't tell me this guy does not kill himself everytime.

> Definetly screams when there are jumpscares and would freeze for a second so you laugh at him

> Surprisingly good at the game and finishes it. (When he doesn't waste half of his time dying.)

Chuuya Nakahara

> Horror game? LET'S GO!

> Regrets it instantly because he forgot there are jumpscares.

> Would definetly flinch so hard and say "What? I'm not scared."

> When you scream, he screams.

> He'd be the type to disappear and get lost and you're just looking for him everywhere.

> He'd be the type to see something and say "I found the exit!" And it was actually the entrance..

> He'd curse at the character that'll jumpscare him.

> Shhh, he's a rage quiter.

Atsushi Nakajima

> MY BABYYYYY<3

> Once you tell him you want to play a horror game with him, he'd instantly freeze and hesitate before accepting.

> It's you, of course he'd agree.

> Poor guy would be shaking once there are crazy ahh sound effects.

> Horrified, one loud sound, one scream, one jumpscare, he'd flinch immediately.

> Bros the type to throw his phone/himself across the room.

> Actually really good at mazes! Just starts panicking when something chases him HELP.

> Never will play again.

Ryuunosuke Akutagawa

> Bro thinks he's so good at it.

> You tell him you want to play and he just says "ok."

> Bro is secretly scared but the whole time you look at him he's just •_•

> Those jumpscares out of nowhere makes his eyes widen or he makes a small little sound and when you look at him he accidentally actives Rashomon-

> I feel like he'd say he knows the way and gets lost and get jumpscared.

> Bro doesn't run and you just tell him to use the running button, and he's just like "no."

> Bro wants to solo and leaves you alone and you're like: "Ryuu where are you??" "I found a spirit."

> Doesn't want to play ever again.

Kunikida Doppo

> Automatically will not play once you do all your reports.

> Says he's too busy for those childhood games but he can't resist you so he fits the gameplay in his schedule!

> Does this dude even get jumpscared..?

> The whole time he's just instructing you in what to do-

> He's good at making ways to escape and distracts the ghost for you.

> If you play with him repeatedly and have game nights he'd definetly memorize when the jumpscare will happen.

Ranpo Edogawa

> Bro...Once you ask him you already see the place set up for your gameplay.

> One word: You'll finish the game in a few minutes only.

> He knows every crook and crany around the game.

> Knows the whole backstory and tells you about it so you just shut him up with candy.

> You play by yourself now because he knows everything and spoils the fun. RIP..

Nikolai Gogol

> He'd definetly be interested in the game.

> He'll be the type to scare you if it's suddenly quiet and you slap the shit out of him on accident.

> Would throw the phone at your face when he gets jumpscared.

> Bro is the type to play hide and seek with you mid-game.

> He'd definetly die a ton of times while trying to show you how he can "dodge" the ghost's attack/running at him.

> He fails misreably..

> He'd be the type to have the ghost chase after him and go to you so you both end up dying and go back to square 1.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

> You force him to play because he has no comment about it all.

> Jumpscares happen and he's just, •_•

> He'd be the type to find everything in just a few minutes and you'd be so confused like ???

> You'd give him the side eye for being to quiet while playing the game. You're screaming and flinching meanwhile he passes everything so quickly.

> He'd be the type to let you follow.

> Like did he play this game before???

> If you're too scared to go through a maze or get something, he'd be the one to distract the enemy

> Scary smart man...

Tetcho Suehiro

> Bro is hella confused. Like what are you supposed to do in the horror game??

> He'd definetly scream and just stare at you for a few moments..

> Help this poor man, he'd definetly quit mid game and just let you play it by yourself while you're watching.

> You'd definetly scream and it'll make him alerted.

> You both decide to restart the game and he thinks that he can kill the ghost and eventually dies..

> Please teach him the basic of horror games.

Jono Saigiku

> So like...

> Okay but he can hear things well so he eventually just listens to you while you play.

> Don't hurt his ear drums you might hit ariana grande notes while getting jumpscared or chased.

> He'd be the type to know when the ghost is approaching and warn you, he has good sense of hearing of course.

> That's why you're like ??? "How did you know when the ghost will come :O"

> He can literally hear one milisecond of the starting of the chasing music and you'd already be hiding.

> Man is a life saver.

> He'd definetly stare at you like ^^ if you apologize for screaming.

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lobautumny · 4 months

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Alright, guess this toy's gonna talk about Palworld, because it's seen Discourse™️ start to crop up about how "supporting the game is immoral because it's stealing designs from Pokemon!"

Now look, this toy's not about to sit here and tell you that all of the monster designs in Palworld are completely original and the game isn't, on some level, a bootleg. Obviously a lot of the designs are bootleg pokemon. That's not the point it wants to get at. The point is that it doesn't really matter.

First of all, nobody is being hurt by Palworld having knockoff pokemon among the ranks of its monsters. Game Freak is not some tiny indie developer struggling to make ends meet having their work unfairly co-opted by a big, bad corporation. Pokemon is, in fact, the largest, most profitable media franchise of all time, and Palworld is an indie game. The reason that something like this would hypothetically be scummy/shitty is if someone were taking someone else's work, changing it slightly, claiming it as their own, and thus depriving the original creator of credit/visibility that they should've had. But that literally can't happen here, because everyone already knows what Pokemon is. So unless it gets found that they're stealing designs from fakemon artists or something (there was one alleged instance, but it seems to have just been a coincidence of two different people having the idea of "what if Chimecho but with big, bulky arms?"), Palworld is hurting nobody through having bootleg designs, so the moral argument against the game falls flat.

With that out of the way, there's a much more interesting topic to discuss here: Why is it that when someone's fangame gets C&D'd, everyone immediately jumps to the creator's support, accurately assessing that our copyright system is broken and primarily serves to hurt independent artists, but the moment a developer makes the changes necessary to make sure their fangame doesn't get hit with a C&D (and to allow them to make money off of it), it's suddenly bad and cringe and unoriginal?

The argument that "Palworld is lazy and unoriginal and therefore bad because the monster designs are too similar to Pokemon's designs" is something that this toy would be willing to hear out if Palworld were a turn-based singles-format RPG with similar systems/overall structure to those found in Pokemon games, but, uh. It isn't. It's a third-person shooter with monster-catching mechanics and, like, Factorio-ass automation and base-building, from what this toy can tell. And it doesn't know if the game is good, as someone who has not played it (or even really seen gameplay of it), but it can absolutely tell you that the game's not lazy.

Sure, they could have done more to make the monster designs feel more unique, and that's absolutely a valid criticism for the game. This toy doesn't want to come across like it's saying otherwise. It just wants people to recognize that that's kind of a nitpick when the game is, on a mechanical and genre level, something completely different from anything any Pokemon game ever has been or ever will be, and that nobody would be complaining about laziness or a lack of originality if this came out as a fangame literally just using actual pokemon. In that reality, people would've been popping off at how high-effort it is, actually. And like, even putting money aside, this game literally could not exist as a fangame. A while back, someone uploaded some videos on Youtube showcasing a fangame they were developing that was an FPS where the enemies were pokemon. They got hit with a C&D and their Youtube account was terminated within a couple days of the videos being uploaded. The game was not monetized, and in fact, never even had a download link, to this toy's recollection. Palworld would have suffered the same exact fate if it wasn't its own IP.

#autumn rants #palworld

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leighsartworks216 · 9 months

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My Sunshine

Astarion x gn!Tav/Reader

Part 2 Here: Tumblr link - AO3 link

This is probably definitely ooc but I needed to get it out of my brain anyway. I also have not seen any actual gameplay (aside from the romance scenes) so this won't be 100% canon compliant

For @niermortem bc I need you to read this and suffer (affectionate)

Warnings: alcohol use, swearing, grief/mourning, blood, injury, fluff and angst, hurt/comfort

Word Count: 3,146

Masterlist

AO3

You raised your goblet of wine in the air, smiling blindingly bright at your best friend. "To another case solved, and another criminal behind bars!"

He laughed and clinked his goblet with yours. The red liquid sloshed against the edge, almost spilling into yours. You each drank deeply.

"You make that toast after every trial," he bemoaned, but a stray chuckle ruined his disapproval. "It's a minor court for minor offenses - It's not like I locked up a serial killer."

You huffed and nudged his shoulder. "Don't sell yourself short! What you do is incredible, Astarion. It's so rare for an elf as young as you to get appointed as a magistrate. That's worth celebrating."

He hummed, smirk dancing across his face. "You're younger than me, my dear, and from what I've heard you're doing just as well." He gestured around the room.

The light of the fireplace cast odd shadows of your figures against the wall. Between the flickering shapes, Astarion could see the several paintings hung up on the wall. Portraits, landscapes - all formed with careful brush strokes and intense patience. It was no mean feat. He'd grown up alongside you, witnessed your struggles with charcoal and accuracy. He'd even posed for a few so you could study anatomy and shadow. Pride swelled in his chest thinking of those shaky, rough sketches and seeing the confident, soft strokes that composed the paintings.

You avoided looking, staring into the fire. For the briefest moment, he wanted to smooth out the crease in your brow and remove the frown from your face. Instead he gripped his goblet tighter and took another drink.

"I wish I could be as proud of them as you are, my sunshine. But when I look at them, all I see are mistakes."

He sighed quietly. "Your parents still don't approve, then?"

"They approve my profession - finally - but they think my execution is lackluster. I paint like a human."

"You paint like a god, darling."

“Ah,” you chuckled, “is the praise being turned back on me now?"

He smiled and raised his goblet. "A toast to the greatest artist Baldur's Gate has ever seen and will ever see again."

After a moment's hesitation, you raised your glass and knocked it against his. He threw back the last remaining contents, a drop of red falling from the corner of his mouth and down his neck. He finished off the rich alcohol with a contented sigh.

A clock on the mantelpiece chimed. You leaned back on your hand to look up at the old thing. It was a gift in lieu of payment, handmade, from its gears to its wooden casing. It chimed 11 times in all. Astarion sighed.

"One last drink for the road." You offered him the last of the wine in your goblet, and he drained it easily. “We can finish the rest tomorrow.”

“Mm, and what will we be celebrating tomorrow?”

“Anything and everything.”

He smiled fondly. What gods could have been kind enough to create you?

He rose to his knees and held your cheeks in both hands. “I look forward to it.” You closed your eyes as he planted a kiss on your forehead. It was almost a ritual, after so many years of doing it. Once he pulled away, you rose to your own knees, held his face the same way, and pressed a kiss to his forehead.

“Stay safe on your way back.” You pulled away to look him straight in the eye, an exaggerated expression of seriousness on your face. “If anything happened to you, I wouldn’t have anybody to absolve me in court.”

He chuckled. “I’ll be fine, my dear.”

“You’d better.”

You stared numbly at the headstone. Your eyes scanned the words over and over and over again. You could recite it if you wanted to.

'Astarion Ancunin 229 - 268 DR'

He was only 39. He was just a child. A child buried 6 feet under your boots, hidden away, wrapped in sheets and sealed in a wooden coffin. Thirty-nine. He was only thirty-nine.

The sun was beginning to set. There was not a cloud in the sky. No chance for rain. The only water that fell were tears, and yours had long since dried up. Everyone else left hours ago. They'd touched your shoulder, shared in your grief, promised to pray for you and Astarion. If you were perhaps a bit more naive, a bit more desperate, you would have pleaded to the gods to bring him back, no matter the cost.

You inhaled shakily and tilted your head back. The sky was so beautiful; a vibrant array of orange and yellow and blue. You cursed it, for your best friend would never get to share in its beauty with you ever again.

When you looked back down, you forced your eyes not to trace the carved stone any more. It wasn't safe at night. If you looked again, you'd never make it back home.

A hint of white in the corner of your eye stole your attention. A flower. Its petals curled back and around, almost touching itself. Blue and yellow mixed within its center, but the very tips of its petals were bright white.

Your feet felt like lead as you moved toward it. Deep prints were left behind at the end of the dirt mound. Your legs were stiff and creaky from standing so long.

When you reached down to pluck the flower, you stopped. Hand outstretched toward its stem. You'd be killing it to mourn your friend. And in an hour, it will be droopy and wilted, dying on top of the grave. But if you left it, come two days from now, it would be closed and dried up anyway.

Your frown dug creases into your skin. Lines around your mouth and between your brows. You never realized before how quickly beautiful things die. The lines smoothed slightly when you brushed the delicate petal with your fingers. It was as soft as his hair had been.

"Look after him for me," you croaked, voice raw and unused. It cracked when you whispered desperately, "Please."

You rubbed your eyes as you backed away. The burn of tears stung the back of your eyes, but no water was produced. And you needed to get out of here. It hurt too much to stay.

You allowed yourself one last glance at the grave, before you turned and left. Your home never felt so cold, so uninviting, and so empty.

You’d never been much further than the city’s limits before, yet here you were. Lost, infected, confused. The blood on your hands terrified you, but if you hadn’t fought, you would be dead. A voice in the back of your mind haunted you with memories. Unbidden, you often recalled tidbits of your life 200 years ago. This time it reminded you of Astarion, flipping knives and sneaking up on you for a laugh. He would have been much more suited to this awful situation than you were.

Your hand fell to your pocket, pressing against a hidden journal tucked safely away. You would be lost without it. It’s all that’s kept you sane all these long years.

A shock of white hair up ahead caught your attention. A man, searching down a hill, beckoning. “Hurry,” he urged in a whisper, “I’ve got one of those brain things cornered.” He kept his back to you, but something in the way he spoke seemed familiar. Or maybe you were just so tired. “There, in the grass. You can kill it, can’t you? Like you killed the others.”

You flinched, frowning at the way he said ‘killed’. It shouldn’t have bothered you as much as it did. Perhaps it sounded too confrontational. Perhaps it was the dark turn his voice took. But you swallowed down the discomfort. You weren’t going to abandon someone in need.

“I can.”

You stepped forward, ready to grab at your dagger. It was quiet. The soft rustle of dry shrubs was all you could hear. You stepped a little further.

A loud squeal made you jump out of your skin as a frightened boar ran from the grass. You stumbled backward. Before you could trip yourself up, a rough arm wrapped behind your neck and dragged you down to the ground. A knife pointed at your throat.

On pure instinct, you grabbed at the blade. It dug into your palm and fingers, but you couldn’t let go. You could feel the man applying pressure to keep it at your neck. If you let go… You shuddered to think what could happen.

“Shh. Not a sound. Not if you want to keep that darling neck of yours.” Deep crimson eyes stared into yours, contrasted by the pure white of his hair and the smirk toying his lips. He looked oddly familiar, too. Had you passed him somewhere before? No, you would remember a man like him. “Now, I saw you on the ship. Didn’t I? Nod.”

The command has you nodding with no hesitation.

“Splendid,” he purred. His voice turned serious then. “And now you’re going to tell me exactly what you and those tentacled freaks did to me.”

“I haven’t done anything,” you grit out. Blood trailed down your wrist and stained the cuff of your sleeve. His eyes flickered toward it for a moment. “They took me prisoner, too!”

“Don’t lie to me! I- Argh!”

Behind your eyes the tadpole squirms. It’s jarring and uncomfortable, and so are the images that come with it. Dark city streets seen through someone else’s eyes. They scan every passerby, studying them. But just as you urge to see more, it’s gone. All you’re left with is the sensation of fear.

The man grunts again. “What was that?” he demands. He pushed the knife even closer to your neck, despite your best efforts to keep it away. “What’s going on?!”

The fear from the memory quickly intermingled with your own terror. Your heart thumped in your ears. The words came tumbling out of you before you knew what you were saying. “Please, please just put the knife away and we can figure this out.”

For a moment, he just stared at you. Calculating. And then the pressure faded and you could let go of the dagger. His arm let go of you, and he watched as you scampered away one-handed and struggled to your feet. He stood defensively, keeping his hold on the knife.

“You’re… not one of them.” You could feel his eyes searching you up and down. “They took you, just the same as me. And to think, I was ready to decorate the ground with your innards.” He laughed weakly. “Apologies.”

You cradled your hand to your chest with a frown. Nobody would blame you if you shouted insults, left him to deal with this on his own, took care of your own issues. But you couldn’t. “Apology accepted,” you sighed.

He smiled. It felt plastered on, like an actor’s during a play. “I’m out of wine and flowers, so I hope an introduction will suffice. My name’s Astarion. I was in Baldur’s Gate when those beasts snatched me.”

The last of his words was drowned out. Your heart raced, flooding your ears as a tidal wave of emotions swirled in your chest. That name. In all your years, you only knew one elf with that name. What were the chances of another carrying the same one?

Slim to none.

But it can’t be him. He died.

It has to be him. It has to.

“Darling?” He chuckled nervously, waving a hand in front of you. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

If you weren’t so dazed, maybe you would have laughed. But you just stared, wide-eyed and slack-jawed. Your eyes burned. A lump crawled up your throat and you weren’t sure if it was bile or a sob.

“You died,” you finally gasped out. It was only a whisper, but Astarion’s ears picked it up as if you’d shouted it out. His grin faltered, entire aura of confidence and sexuality falling with those two words alone. “You died… My sunshine.”

Astarion stepped back, holding his dagger up as a warning. It still dripped with your blood. His face was dark. You’d never seen it as gravely serious as this. “Who are you? How do you- How do you know that?”

Your old name - the name you had as a child - lingers in the air. He stares at you with eyes hopeful and distrusting. There is a war in his mind. You can see it in the way his dagger wavers in his hold. How he looks you up and down, studies your face. He’d grabbed you, even made you bleed - you weren’t just a fucked up figment of his imagination. But he still couldn’t fathom it.

“Prove it.”

“How?”

“I don’t care how! Just prove it!” The shout is broken and desperate.

You fumbled. Everything you knew about him fled your brain in an instant. You searched for memories in the dirt, in the dry bushes, in the curls of his hair…

Cursing, he watched as you ripped a book from your pocket. Even though you’d grabbed it with your uninjured hand, blood stained the leather binding. You held it out to him.

“These are sketches I have made every day for two hundred years.” You stepped forward, urging him to take it. “All of them are of you.”

A part of him didn’t want to listen. It wanted him to remain unaware and oblivious for the rest of his godsdamned life. The mere idea of the truth - of his past being exposed to this corrupted thing he’s become - terrified him. How easy it would be to run away. To hide away forever.

But he would never be free. Always a slave to the burning questions. Forever wondering just who you were, and if you were telling the truth.

He reaches past his knife and takes the journal. With use of his leg as an aid, he’s able to remove the string tying it shut and flip open the book.

On each page is his face. Several of them. Smiling, laughing, pouting, focused, and a thousand more expressions. After 200 years, he doesn’t quite remember what he looks like. He couldn’t recall if his hair had always been white, nor the shade of his eyes. But tucked away is a crude sketch, not of his face, but of yours. It looks like a child closed their eyes and scribbled. At the bottom of the page, in what is undoubtedly his handwriting, is his signature.

You watch desperately as he puts his knife away. He’ll have to clean it later, but he isn’t thinking about it now. Both hands freed, he flips through each page. At the beginning, the portraits are unrefined and rough. The lines are sketchy and smudged, as though someone had tried wiping away their mistakes. With each page, they get better. The lines become confident and smooth. Even further still, the style is almost elegant, but the face has become unfocused. The eyes begin losing form. The mouth feels off on the face. On one, the face has been erased and redone several times over; so much so the paper has begun crumbling. The last drawing held little resemblance to him anymore. This one was freshly done. The lines were sketchy once more, uncertain. The only recognizable features were his ears and the curls of his hair. Even the shape of his face was lost to time.

“After you… After I buried you, I…” You take a shaky breath, fighting back tears. “I didn’t want to forget you. So I sketched you, every day. I thought I’d always remember that damn smile of yours, but… I didn’t. Little by little, you were stolen from my memories, until all I had left was a vague impression of who you were, what we did together. Even looking at the old sketches couldn’t bring it back. But I kept trying.”

Astarion’s face is the epitome of sorrow when he looks up at last. There are deep set creases around his mouth and eyes, aging him - an odd concept for an elf. He looks so lost. “Where did you go?”

You frowned, and Astarion wished he could smooth out the crease between your brows. How could he forget your face? After all Cazador did to him, made him do, how could he forget you?

“After you buried me,” he clarified.

“I couldn’t bear to stay. I sold all my paintings and I left. I didn’t get very far.” You chuckled weakly. “Just stayed with my parents.”

His face lights up. “What name are you going by now?”

“Tav.”

“Tav,” he repeats. The name is different in his mouth. Not good or bad, simply there. New. He wishes he could have been there when you chose it.

You took a deep breath. It was time to ask the big question, the one burning a hole in your chest. “How are you alive?”

The corner of his lip twitches up, somewhere between amused and dismayed. “It’s a rather long story, my dear.”

“I’ve waited 200 years to hear it.”

He chuckles at that. It’s genuine, but a sour note still lingers. He closes your journal, deftly ties the strings, and saunters to stand in front of you. The intoxicating scent of your blood drives him mad. It’s so close, but he could never forgive himself if he told you the truth and you ran away. Truthfully, after so long, he wasn’t sure how you’d react. But it still felt too heavy an admission.

He slips the book back into your pocket. With both hands, he reaches to cup your face, but he stops. The motion feels wrong. He wants so desperately to hold you again. You even lean toward his palm. The tip of your pointed ear brushes his fingers. But he can’t. His hands fall back to his sides, and he plasters a smile on once more.

“Come on, darling. Let’s get you cleaned up before you attract something.”

You nod and follow alongside him as he begins leading you toward water. The bleeding has mostly stopped by now. The cut still stings, exposed to the air. But the pain feels distant. It hardly matters when the man you’ve spent two hundred years mourning is alive and with you again. And he’s changed - there is no way to deny it. His hair, his eyes, even the way he spoke had more of a lilting tune to it than it once did. But he’s here. He’s real.

“For the record,” you begin, stepping close enough to brush arms as you walked, “it’s good to see you again, my sunshine.”

And, oh, if that didn’t make him feel alive once more.

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dailyadventureprompts · 3 months

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Tableskills: Making a Game of It

Recently I learned a bit of an unspoken truth that I'd brushed up against in my many years of being a dungeonmaster that I'd never seen put into words before: If you want to liven up whatever's going on in your adventure, figure out a way to engage the players in some kind of game. It's simultaneously the best way to provide a roadblock while making your player's victories feel earned.

This might seem redundant, since you're already playing d&d but give a moment of thought to exactly what portions of d&d are gamified. Once you learn your way around the system, it becomes apparent that D&D really only has three modes of play:

Pure roleplay/storytelling, driven by whatever feels best for the narrative. Which is not technically a game, nor should it (IMO) be gamified.

Tactical combat with a robust rules system, the most gamelike aspect.

A mostly light weight skills based system for overcoming challenges that sits between the two in terms of complexity.

The problem is that there's quite a lot of things that happen in d&d that don't fall neatly into these three systems, the best example being exploration which was supposed to be a "pillar" of gameplay but somehow got lost along the way . This is a glaring omission given how much of the core fantasy of the game (not to mention fantasy in general) is the thrill of discovery, contrasted with the rigours of travelling to/through wondrous locations. How empty is it to have your party play out the fantasy of being on a magical odyssey or delving the unknown when you end up handwaving any actual travel because base d&d doesn't provide a satisfying framework for going from A to B besides skillchecks and random encounters (shameless plug for my own exploration system and the dungeon design framework that goes with it).

The secret sauce that's made d&d and other ttrpgs so enduring is how they fuse the dramatic conventions of storytelling with the dynamics of play. The combat system gives weight and risk to those epic confrontations, and because the players can both get good at combat and are at risk of losing it lets them engage with the moment to moment action far more than pure narration or a single skill roll ever could.

I'm not saying that we need to go as in depth as combat for every gamified narrative beat (the more light weight the better IMO) but having a toolbox full of minigames we can draw upon gives us something to fall back on when we're doing our prep, or when we need to improvise. I've found having this arsenal at hand as imortant as my ability to make memorable NPCs on the fly or rework vital plothooks the party would otherwise miss.

What I'd encourage you as a DM to do is to start building a list of light weight setups/minigames for situations you often find yourself encountering: chase scenes, drinking contests, fair games, anything you think would be useful. Either make them yourself or source them from somewhere on the web, pack your DM binder full of them as needed. While not all players are utterly thrilled by combat, everyone likes having some structured game time thrown in there along with the freeform storytelling and jokes about how that one NPC's name sounds like a sex act.

A quick minigame is likewise a great way to give structure to a session when your party ends up taking a shortcut around your prepared material. Oh they didn't take that monster hunter contract in the sewers and instead want to follow up on rumours about a local caravan? The wagon hands are playing a marble game while their boss negotiates with some local mercahnts, offering to let the party play while they wait. The heroes want to sail out to the island dungeon you don't have prepped yet? Well it looks like the navigator has gone on a bit of a bender, and the party not only need to track them down but also piece together where they left the charts from their drunken remembrances as a form of a logic puzzle.

Artsource

#tableskills #tabletop inspiration #dnd #dm tip #dm tips #dm toolbox #d&d #dungeons and dragons

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atthebell · 4 months

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okay actually here's my one thing. i understand that any collaborative project involves compromise, and that that is necessary for everyone to cooperate and get something out of the project. however. i am not a utopian. i think if anyone in a project is unhappy, something about it needs to be reworked if you want that person to stay. and if multiple people are having issues, you need to rethink what you're doing and actually communicate with everyone involved to figure out what they want out of the project. even if they can't have everything, they should still be able to have some kind of satisfaction in what's going on. compromise ought to go both ways, and at the moment, that's not what's happening. it's clear the focus is on growth and not quality. sacrificing active, interested players in service of possible or future active players shafts you in both the short and long run. it does not make for good storytelling or gameplay. and i just find it confusing because for a long time things were working for more people and players themselves had plans on how to include newer players, but now strides at being made to make things driven entirely by the larger narrative (which, imo, still does not make sense) rather than by players/characters. they want players to react to what they throw at them rather than creating something for themselves. and it's fine for that style for storytelling to work for some people, but it does not work for everyone, and assuming that it does is further miscommunication. and im really confounded about where this went wrong and why they keep having this issue

#bell.txt #neg #crit #THERE okay ive been complaining in dms all day i really didnt want to post too much #bc well everyone already knows my issues with things #but gd its just really frustrating

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inbarfink · 2 months

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One of the major themes of ‘Ace Attorney’ has always been trust, obviously. Like, this is the most important creed that Mia Fey passed down to Phoenix and from there to anyone he has touched.

As well as just generally being one of Phoenix’s most important positive qualities.

The entire arc of the first game hinges on the idea of the Power of Trust, with it being a core pillar of Phoenix's relationships with both Miles and Maya.

And even the main gameplay themes of ‘turnabout’ and ‘turning your thinking around’ are linked to this theme of Trust. The whole idea around the narrative of a ‘turnabout’ is that the Defendant seems obviously totally guilty, but the defense attorney proves them innocent by Trusting in their innocence.

And ‘turning your thinking around’ is generally framed as - rather than the general mystery-solver mindset of trying to deduce what has happened from the evidence given - trusting in your client’s innocence and looking for evidence that should be there if they are innocent/that other person is the culprit. Using the Trust in the client as the foundation to build your logic from.

And being such a core theme of the franchise, the games started reiterating on and deconstructing it almost immediately. “Farewell, My Turnabout'' having a Guilty Client feels like the most obvious example, maybe. But actually the game starts casting suspicions on Engarde pretty early on, and most of the emotional turmoil related to him is more of the, like “will Phoenix sacrifice the truth for Maya’s sake” hostage situation stuff.

I think the more important stuff in that case is more about the Phoenix-Edgeworth drama. How Phoenix’ sense of trust, which seems like such an unwavering and unbreakable virtue in the first game, does actually have limits. Phoenix feels that Miles has betrayed his trust by, y’know, running off to Europe and making him think he was dead - and it takes him time to learn how to regain this sense of trust in him.

Meanwhile, Matt Engarde, he considers himself strong because he trusts in no one. In contrast to Adrian, who both he and she herself see as ‘weak’ because of her tendency to blindly trust the person she is dependent on. But at the end, it’s Matt’s distrust in everyone around him that brings on his own downfall.

And the game after that adds in Dahlia Hawthorne who is, as Mia Fey’s nemesis, a sort of representation of the dangers of trust. A character who uses and manipulates those who put their trust in her.

“Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney” establishes its more cynical and deconstructivist tone compared to the original trilogy in part by always putting some sort of element of distrust between the Lawyer and the Defendant. With Apollo basically unable to really have a decent conversation with any of his clients, many of them being antagonistic towards him or hiding things from him. Phoenix Wright was basically the only defendant Apollo went into court actually 100% putting his trust in him… and we all know how that worked out.

And this moment is especially effective because… if you’re playing this game unspoiled after finishing the Phoenix Wright Trilogy, you probably trust Phoenix as well! The emotions Apollo feels as he sees who Phoenix had become are meant to mirror the emotions the Player probably feels at this very moment. And the hints and questions about what Phoenix did in the trial seven years ago are a challenge to the trust of both Apollo and the Player. Both of them are stuck between what they knew of Phoenix before and the revelation of what Phoenix confessed to in “Turnabout Trump”. Apollo’s uncertainty is the player’s uncertainty as well.

And even if Apollo’s image of Phoenix is somewhat improved by “Turnabout Successions” and it’s clearly established that, no, Phoenix never knowingly used forged evidence as an attorney… There’s no big reconciliation that fixes everything like with Phoenix and Miles. It’s clear that Apollo’s sense of trust, in Phoenix Wright and in general, never quite recovered from the events of AJAA. Later games do still reiterate that he’s a lot more distrustful than other playable attorneys.

(And that’s also a point where the Player-Player Character Synergy from ‘Turnabout Trump’ kinda diverges, since I think most Players do regain their trust in Phoenix by the end of AA4 at least. Especially as unlike Apollo, we actually got to be inside his head again - that’s not exactly an experience Apollo will ever get to have. )

But, well, maybe it’s because it’s just really fresh in my mind, but I just think what ‘The Great Ace Attorney’ Duology does with this theme is just… really cool!

These games really play on the idea of challenging the trust… not just of the Player Character Ryunosuke, but also of the Player themselves. Because Ryunosuke also gets to have a Guilty Client… as his very-first actual client who is not himself. And since the game doesn’t lay on the suspicion quite as thick as with Matt Engarde, and since there’s no hostage situation of course… This plotline can have emotional synergy between the Player and the Player Character and focus a lot more about the emotional repercussion of putting your trust in someone totally absolutely unworthy of trust.

And how this betrayal of trust haunts the characters moving forwards. How Ryunosuke now finds himself being held back by his doubts due to the memories of this terrible trial, and... not necessarily a lack of trust in others as much as a lack of trust in himself. How Susato is driven to do something she considers unforgivable - tempering with the Crime Scene behind the police’s back - because that trial had made her lose trust in the entire British Justice System.

The entire climax of the first game is thus a reaffirmation of the power of trust. By unwaveringly defending Gina - a girl they have bonded with, but has also been extremely uncooperative, shady, dishonest and literally involved in what went down in the McGilded Trial, in a very grueling and seemingly unbeatable trial - Ryunosuke and Susato rediscover their ability to trust their defendant. Because, yeah, trust is a leap of faith - you never know when you’re gonna meet a McGilded or a Dahlia Hawthorne - but it’s also absolutely worth it.

And then with the themes of conspiracy strawn throughout the games and especially ramping up in the second game, that’s really kinda a thing that’s bound to sow seeds of paranoia and distrust in the Players about… all sorts of characters. Like, okay, I am fairly sure that pretty much every player who first walked into the Lord Chief Justice’s office and saw Mael Stronghart was like “Oh look! That’s the Final Boss!”. But with the hints for there being some sort of web of intrigue being hidden in the shadows, there’s plenty of other characters that skirt the line between feeling suspicious and trustworthy. The reveal that Seishiro Jigoku is actually a culprit was one of the best-done reveals in the whole franchise. And on the other hand, there are many reasons to be suspicious of Yujin due to the amount of secrets he clearly keeps, and yet he turns out to be a very straightforwardly heroic character.

And then there’s Kazuma. And Mael Stronghart might be the Obvious Final Boss to the Conspiracy and Murder Mystery parts of the game, but within this thematic throughline of the challenges of trust, Kazuma is pretty much that part’s Final Boss.

Initially designed to be someone both the characters and the players intently trust, both in terms of the meta-perspective of how he’s set up to be a kinda Mia-Miles hybrid and any Player with knowledge of the previous games will know that’s a kind of person you can rely on. And in general, even to newcomers, everything he says and does in the first two chapters of the game make him feel like just a very upstanding guy you can trust.

Then, when he comes back in the second games, he comes back with a new attitude that feels colder towards Ryunosuke (and thus the Player) and that’s also coupled with a whole bunch of mysteries about him that were hinted in the previous game, but are now coming to the forefront.

And as the Trial of Barok Van Zieks progresses, it becomes increasingly clear that Karuma has, theoretically, all the possible motivation to kill Greyson and frame Barok for it, that he was one of the last people to see Gregson before his death and that he literally brandished a sword at him. And despite how cagey and shady he acts, he still insists he never killed anyone.

And the reveal that he has knowingly participated in an assassination plot behind the backs of both Ryunosuke and Susato is bound to cause a feeling of shock, confusion and betrayal not just in these characters - but also in the Player. The Player and Player Characters are in a lot of emotional synergy through this entire Kazuma storyline. These feelings of conflict between wanting to trust Kazuma after seeing him in his best and all the mounting suspicions due to all the revelations about him are really felt by all three of us.

And in the end the challenge for Ryunosuke and Susato is not to abandon Kazuma completely, and it’s not to continue blindly trusting their old idealized view of Kazuma - it’s to face the fact that he has kinda lost his way for single-minded revenge, while also still trusting that he is deep-down the same good not-murdery man they have known him as before.

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