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theskylarkin · 10 months

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KH OC Week Day 1 Part 1 - (Re)Introductions

Hello again! I’m back with my Scala Survivors AU OCs, although they and the AU as a whole have had some changes since last year’s entries and the Dark Road finale. (RIP 75% of my DR era headcanons lol, but I did mostly enjoy how the story played out in canon.)

Major spoilers for Dark Road ahead (for this post and the rest of my entries this week)!

The premise of this AU: Due to the meddling of a certain dark witch, the events of Dark Road played out a little differently in this worldline. TL;DR - Hermod, Urd, Vor, Vidar, Hoder, and Bragi survived Baldr’s rampage. With the exception of “Bragi” (as Luxu had to wait a while to finally swap vessels for Plot Reasons™), they lived all the way to the BBS era where they’ve taken on apprentices just like Eraqus and Xehanort. My OCs for this week are said apprentices.

(Fair Warning: This is not a fix-it AU, this is a “break more things” AU. Just throwing it out there now.)

We’ll start with the two characters that underwent the least amount of changes since the finale dropped:

Name: Sophia

Gender: Female (She/Her)

Age: 19 years old during the events of BBS

See her art and full character profile here

Biggest changes: Sophia got a redesigned keyblade with a new name and new outfits, but not that much has changed for her story-wise. Her post-timeskip design now includes matching scars with Brandr and Virdandi (but in different places for each of them) due to the attack in Traverse Town. (To go along with the emotional scarring, of course!)

Name: Ferrum

Gender: Male (He/Him)

See his art and full character profile here. (He’s gone by the time of BBS, but he haunts the narrative like it’s his job.)

Biggest changes: Besides aging up by two years, Ferrum also made it out of the rewrite relatively unscathed. Most of his changes happened as a result of fleshing out his backstory and motivation for being a keyblade wielder, as well as adding a “supporting cast” for him in the period of time before Brandr and Virdandi were apprentices.

Speaking of those two, of course my two OC fankids were the most affected by the post-DR rewrite, especially:

Name: Brandr

Gender: Male (He/Him)

Age: 18 years old during the events of BBS

See his art and full character profile here. (Note: Major spoilers for Dark Road mentioned)

Biggest changes: Oh boy. Obviously my “Bragi is just a red herring because giving him a name that’s only one letter off from Braig is way too obvious, even for Nomura” theory didn’t really pan out. (At least his cool but anachronistic jacket makes a lot more sense now.) With the timeline established by the events of DR, a lot of plot contrivances would have to occur for Brandr to exist at all now… but I did it anyway!

In his new backstory, Brandr is being raised by his single mother (a free spirit who’s into older men) and Bragi/Luxu isn’t a presence in his life at all. In fact, Luxu has no idea Brandr even exists due to being distracted by the previously mentioned Plot Reasons™ and he didn’t think to check up on the gorgeous lady from Scala that he’d had a brief fling with before finally swapping vessels.

If he had known about Brandr, Luxu would be freaked out to discover that his son has developed the same rare power that the Master of Masters had. Whether due to centuries of Luxu’s body-swapping doing weird things to his genes or just a cruel twist of cosmic irony, Brandr has the ability to glimpse visions of the future. Except Brandr doesn’t have the same level of control over his powers as the MoM and the uncontrollable visions that resulted from this socially ostracized him from most of his homeworld and basically ruined his childhood until Master Urd taught him how to (mostly) manage his condition.

Brandr’s driving motivation as a character has also changed pre and post-timeskip. When he meets Sophia, his greatest desire is social acceptance. After the events in Traverse Town, his main goal is to learn how to change the terrible futures he foresees for himself and his friends. Destiny doesn’t really work like that though. And the power of foresight alone doesn’t make one a competent chessmaster…

Design-wise, pre-timeskip Brandr has clothing more appropriate for the world and time period he lives in instead of t-shirts and sweatpants. I wanted to keep the anachronistic clothing concept for his post-timeskip look, but this time he’s dressed like someone from a past era. Due to Brandr’s newfound interest in history (as the past is the only time period he can only experience through books), Sophia and Virdandi (but mostly Sophia) got him a coat in the style of Scala’s Gothic era for his eighteenth birthday. He might’ve cried a little.

(And that’s my in-universe justification for why he’s dressed like a knockoff Bloodborne cosplayer lol.)

Brandr’s keyblade has been slightly redesigned, with the most important new detail being the Gazing Eye on the token. Brandr might not know who the eye belongs to but he knows they’re watching him, so Virdandi’s dad made him a metal cover in the shape of an apple to encase the end of the keychain.

Name: Virdandi

Gender: Gender: Female (She/Her)

Age: 17 years old during the events of BBS

See her art and full character profile here

Biggest changes: Virdandi’s story also has a lot of notable differences compared to the previous year. Due to Dark Road using the previous name for one of the upperclassmen, Virdandi’s dad is now named Magni. (Sigyn, who is now Virdandi’s little sister instead of Brandr’s, doesn’t need a name change because the Norse mythological figure she’s named after is different from Sigrun I think?) Neither he nor Urd get a statue this time due to the surviving keyblade wielders trying to cover up the details of the “Calamity” and Baldr’s corruption. (But that’s a story for another time.)

Speaking of Virdandi’s parents, due to the canon timeline established between the events of DR and BBS, the only reason Virdandi exists at all (since Urd should be old enough to be a grandmother by the time her daughter is born) is because of a helpful scientist who owed Urd a favor after she saved her from an experiment gone terribly wrong. Virdandi is biologically Urd and Magni’s daughter, just grown in a tank for the first nine months of her existence. (She’s mostly just sad she didn’t get any superpowers from it.)

Aside from Sigyn, Virdandi also took on Brandr’s burden of expectations from having a Keyblade Master as a parent and the strained parent-child relationship resulting from that. In Virdandi and Urd’s case, however, the issue is that Virdandi actually wants to be a keyblade wielder but Urd doesn’t have time to train her because she’s busy trying to help Brandr manage his powers. Virdandi’s reaction to this lack of attention from her mother is to act out, causing issues with not only Urd but Hoder as well until another keyblade master steps in.

With Bragi out of the picture due to the Dark Road finale reveal, Vidar is now Virdandi’s keyblade master (mostly because I thought it’d be interesting to see what would happen if he lived to face the consequences of his actions in DR). Their relationship is a lot less antagonistic because Virdandi admires him for having wandered the worlds as a Seeker and Vidar has the patience to deal with Virdandi’s idiosyncrasies and shut down any of her temper tantrums.

Aside from the story additions, Virdandi also got a new keyblade design and a different post-timeskip haircut. She adopted Urd’s weird turtleneck thing into her post-timeskip outfit as a sign of their relationship improving.

With all of that out of the way…

Link to Part Two

@khoc-week

#KHOCWeek2023 #KHOC Week #KHOC #KH OC #Kingdom Hearts OC #Original Characters #Long Post #Scala Survivors AU #OC: Sophia #OC: Ferrum #OC: Brandr #OC: Virdandi #KH Dark Road Spoilers

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oveliagirlhaditright · 2 years

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New Nomura art dropped.

#kh #kingdom hearts #xehanort #young xehanort #dark road #tetsuya nomura

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smokeybrandreviews · 2 years

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Greatness Awaits

Yesterday, Sony had a pretty solid State of Play. I am, and have been, a total PlayStation fanboy since the ate Nineties. The PS2 is arguably my favorite console of all time so I'm always here for the Sony drops It’s been slim pickings for the current gen of consoles but I was rather impressed with everything presented but there were, for me, three standouts.

Final Fantasy XVI

Final Fantasy XVI looks interesting. Obviously, it's gorgeous, it's an FF title, but this thing feels, narratively, like something else I've been a huge fan of for some time; The Wicked and the Divine. W and D is a comic about reincarnated Gods that kind of live, fight, and die, only to repeat the cycle all over again. I am getting those same vibes with this newest FF entry. It looks like the principal characters are mortal versions of Summons and you eventually unlock that god mode for battle, kind of like Bloody Roar meets Pokemon. I am intrigued but i can't say I'm excited. I'll get it because it's an FF but i don't really care about this game right now, not when Final Fantasy VII Remake part II is still a figment of Nomura’s imagination.

Street Fighter 6

Street Fighter 6 looks dope as f*ck. I am loving the art style, i am loving the animations, i am loving the aesthetic. Curious where this thing falls in the timeline because Bison is dead and it doesn't look like it takes place before Gill did his Messiah thing. Is it an actual continuation of the story re we finally progressing past the Third Impact timeline? Either way, I'm hyped. I'm terrible at Street Fighter, most Capcom fighters actually, but i am looking forward to this new SF, which is odd because i feel next to nothing about that new, mainline FF title. Also, thanks to some pretty substantial roster leaks, i got a look at my darling Cammy. I’ve been a Ms. White main since she was introduced way back in the Nineties and i must say, she is lookin’ FIIIIIIIINE!

Resident Evil 4 Remake

REmake 4 looks pretty awesome. I'm reserving judgment for now because i didn't care for RE4 when it originally came out, I'm a Raccoon City purist and i absolutely abhorred what 4 did to the franchise going forward the following twelve years until RE7 fixed what it broke. like, RE4 was fun to play. It was innovative and injected a ton of great, new, ideas into a franchise that was already a few titles deep. That said, Capcom took the exact wrong lesson from why 4 is considered so great. Action in my Biohazard games should never trump the horror elements. If i wanted to run and gun down zombies, I'd play House of the Dead. REmake 4 looks to have decided to lean heavy into atmosphere this go around, however, I'm going to reserve judgment until we see some actual gameplay. If they revamped the system, made the game focus more on the horror and not the action, it might be worth a pick up.

#Sony #State of Play #PlayStation #Final Fantasy XVI #Street Fighter 6 #Resident Evil 4 #REmake 4

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doom-nerdo-666 · 11 months

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This is a repost of something i wrote once but edited a bit.

I just wanted to repost something i wrote about the Mick Gordon situation (It's also because of what's happening with Reddit as a whole).

If it feels outdated, it might be because of how long it's been since people talked about it.

I always wondered if with videogames, there's a sort of push against "video game stars".

Specially because videogames are made by teams of various people, but there's usually a director or someone that is seen as the main force, even if he's an "ideas guy".

You can see that specially with indie devs like Toby Fox and Japanese devs as well (Taro, Kojima, Kamiya, ZUN, Nomura, Harada and so on), which i think it's because of videogames' reception as a medium (And all these arguements about games being art or "just mindless toys").

There are also names that people drop out, but mostly to either make fun of or to point out some negative aspects of the industry like David Cage or Randy Pitchford.

id is notorious for this: Not just names like Romero or Carmack, but with the new games, you had Hugo Martin.

I expect Mick Gordon's popularity and following had something to do with this: The "guy" people associate with the games became the music composer and not an actual dev.

This can be farfetched because we're not sure if Hugo Martin was as aggressive and demanding to Mick as Marty Stratton was.

But also because, if Bethesda/ZeniMax wanted, they'd tried to downplay Hugo's involvement as well and make id a "team": Something that at first promises to highlight the numerous people that worked in the game, but may result in dehumanizing the studio as this faceless blog that just makes stuff.

Specially because people view game publishers like that; Specially those with controversies and dark history, but people still name some CEO's or anyone as examples.

Because it made me think of movies as a medium: They take a lot of people to make, but there's still a director or producer or someone "in charge".

This is part of Martin Scorsese's complaint in regards to MCU movies: Most of them don't feel "personal" because the "directors" are irrelevant and the "studio" (Or Disney) is the one in charge.

Like a restaurant where there could be "too many cooks" because they are not the ones in charge.

I think Disney Star Wars is more like this: Most movies released with dates too close to each other, barely any planning except for coming up with different endings and choosing one with the best test audience approval, had multiple directors, had actors of both new and past generations disappointed with it and interviews that made it seem like executives and others were blaming each other.

Whereas the 6 other movies had larger gaps between release dates and were mainly George Lucas' project, even if he needed people (Be it actors or his wife) to step in and help him, because of his potential misfires.

We're in an age where pop culture continues to be more special to people, even if they know little of it: It's why it's always worth looking into the history of things and the people behind them.

And speaking of history: I guess it's also worth mentioning what Bethesda did to Prey 2, how id somehow had Tim Willits for that long and how Romero wanted to share unused Doom assets but was told to stop.

I think one main reason why people are sad over Mick Gordon's abuse is because of how Doom and id Software were seen in the industry: They were seen as exceptions and most praise came in the form of "unlike other games/devs" etc.

With r/Doom and Twitter, there can be repetition of information and people missing out on more interesting details or insights.

It's why i also had to keep up with Doomworld threads because older internet forums can have a more helpful format that modern internet sites don't (Partially due to being made with phones in mind and the internet being among "normal people" who don't invest much on some topics as much as nerds did).

One can argue that people are ignoring what Mick said in regards to starting an "harassment campaign", even with the counter arguements of costumers voicing concerns.

But i think it's moreso how the information itself is deliverd and/or reacted to.

I just had something in mind and felt like sharing it, even if i misworded some shit or whatever.

And here's an addition:

I keep saying that a new Doom game should take a while to come out because Doom should not be Call of Duty/Assassin's Creed/Pokemon in terms of releases.

And i kinda think Eternal releasing at least 3/4 years after 2016 might be part of the issue with Mick, since he already had other projects like the new Prey, Wolfenstein 2 and Borderlands 3.

#doom #id software #opinions #mick gordon #music #long post

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boinin · 1 year

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Blue Lock Manga

Scanlation of Chapter 220, "See-Saw Game", just dropped! Chow time!

Thoughts under the cut. There will be two weeks between this release and Chapter 221, which will release in Japan on 7 June I believe.

Previous chapter analyses

I love this goofball. Can't start without saying that.

Anyway, what a chapter. It's very action orientated, and that speaks for itself: holy fuck Kaiser. But as usual, I have brain worms, so I'll share as is routine.

In one chapter, Kaiser collectively reminded the fandom why he's NG11, why he's been manmarked by another NG11 since the beginning of the match, and of the gap between him and the other players. No sweat for the 👑 Also, clear Predator Eyes in action, right? 🐱

It's an excellent play. He scored in spite of being pressed by two defenders, through the legs of another and past the goalkeeper. It got so close to Aiku, man must have feared for his future baby-making capacity 💀

Isagi's good. Kaiser is on his own level.

It's spelt out in the chapter: in the face of opposition from Aiku, Isagi did the rational thing and passed, forsaking a score on his own terms. In much worse circumstances, Kaiser believed in the impossible and scored. This is the fundamental difference in their ego and approach to football. I hope they revisit this theme in the next chapter.

It's going to be titled "Take Me" 👀 I'm dying to know who that refers to, especially if it ends up being shipbait. Ness? Isagi? Hiori? Who knows?

A shout out to our newly minted redhead. He gets clowned on, but I liked seeing him swap to a defensive role. Noodle legs, go! 🍜 It shows how well Ubers, and in particular the former U20s team members, can reforge themselves around new strategies and playstyles.

Also, Aiku is one of those captains with a coaching/affirmative leadership style. He endorses Sendou here, and Niko in the chapter before. Can't help but simp for the guy, even if he's a scumbag in how he treats women. 🐍

I don't have much more to add! Art-wise, it was glorious: Kaiser's goal is rendered vibrantly, from multiple perspectives. As usual, the reader gets a great sense of where everyone is, and their reaction. To the end, Ubers put up a good fight, and as mesmerised as you are by Kaiser, I really enjoy that the artist knows where the other players are in the context of the goal. Great spacial awareness, Nomura-sensei!

My favourite panel outside of His Excellency's is the one where half of Isagi's face is dissolving into puzzle pieces. It's more grotesque than it usually is, maybe showing how pissed off yet amazed he is by Kaiser. I love that Isagi hates him, but doesn't deny his talent. The best sports anime protagonist *pats head*

Random thoughts corner: Yukimiya didn't get much to do, but Lorenzo abandoning his mark is an indicator that he posed a significant threat to the goal. I'm kind of hoping he gets the next BM goal (if BM indeed win). I say him over Kunigami, because Kunigami HAS to get a goal against PXG (else we riot).

Speaking of, Kunigami is specifically mentioned to have vacated the goal area by Isagi. Wonder why? He's a goal poacher, so you'd think he'd be around somewhere... I'm kinda hoping he calls out Isagi for that ball steal last chapter, although that's my bias showing haha. In chp 219, Isagi's rationale for stealing was that Kunigami didn't have the capacity to evade the defenders. But Kunigami's levelled up his dribbling and speed since the Manshine match... I imagine he's nurturing some resentment in that little emo brain of his. Remember, he and Isagi are rivals to unseat Kaiser and become BM's lead striker in the NEL.

...just give us some Kunigami development. PLEASE.

Ness has done absolutely nothing but whinge since chapter 218. Kaiser just proved he doesn't need assists to score... in light of Ness's derailment, is it time for a substitute? manifesting that hiori sub c'mon

Last one: how many Ubers broke ranks this play? Sendou's a forward that ended up tackling Kaiser in the centre back lines. Lorenzo left his mark too. Now, arguably it was his only choice, in light of Yukimiya being unmarked and a valid threat to the goal, while Kaiser remained deep in defender territory, but nevertheless... will we see any remorse from Ubers? Any comment from the GOAT coach himself, Snuffy?

Two weeks until we find out 🥹

Prediction tracker

(alternatively: how wrong can one nerd be week to week?)

Last week, I predicted: Isagi will try to beat Aiku one-on-one, or maybe use Yukimiya as a decoy to do so. This is based on the recurring references to winning one-on-one duels being the key to beating Ubers. Also, Isagi’s got a hang up about passing near the goal, which he’s got to overcome at some point.

What I’m (and mostly everyone else) certain of is, Isagi’s not scoring the next goal. There wasn’t a peep out of Kaiser this chapter… maybe he’ll spring a surprise Kaiser Impact on Ubers while they’re busy fending off Isagi?

Actuality: Isagi passed, Yukimiya gets blocked by Lorenzo. Isagi himself was the decoy, and Kaiser manages to execute a brutal goal.

I got some of it! /copium Kaiser scoring was a foregone conclusion though, so not throwing everything away to go into fortune telling just yet.

Three more chapters for Hiori get subbed in. Otherwise, one of my hats is in danger... 🐑

Chapter 221 will be both teams reckoning with this goal. We'll likely get input from both Ubers and BM, and some sort of change in dynamic--be it a substitution or the coaches opting to play (reeeally doubt this will happen though, unless they get a nudge from Ego). In particular, I'm eager to see how Lorenzo and Hiori process this. Also, someone's going to yell at Isagi. Kunigami or Raichi are my guess.

#bllk chp 220 #text post #blue lock spoilers #isagi yoichi #michael kaiser #don lorenzo #aiku oliver #sendou shuto #yukimiya kenyuu #kunigami rensuke #mine #bllk #bllk manga spoilers #bllk manga #blue lock #boinin talks bllk

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miqosandy · 2 years

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You cant just drop new nomura sora art on me right before work im overwhelmed

#miqochat

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smokeybrand · 2 years

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Greatness Awaits

Final Fantasy XVI

Street Fighter 6

Resident Evil 4 Remake

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badsongpetey · 2 years

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Trollhunters: Returning on AO3

Working on the next chapter of the fic. Sorry for the delay, I was preoccupied with ART! I see now why a lot of people choose one or the other and not both lol. Anyhow, here’s an extra long preview to try to atone for the delay. I’m hoping to post in the next couple of days. As before, spoilers lie below if you’re not caught up, you have been warned.

Toby and Claire were fighting again. Jim sat on the hard, cold stone floor of the Forge and leaned back against the wall as he watched them go at it. He knew he should go over there, but he was just too tired. Not physically, well, a little he supposed. Mostly he was tired of thinking. God, everything since he came back was so complicated. Everything was so much work. And just when he thought it was okay — they had the bridge, Draal and Strickler were a friends again, his mom was onboard, Trollmarket and the world were safe from Gunmar, and even Nomura was coming around — just when he thought he could relax… BAM! Claire hates him, Strickler’s about to have a nervous breakdown, and Bular’s plotting the end of the world, again.

Jim hugged his knees to his chest, turned up the music on his phone, and closed his eyes. He just needed to get away, just for a little bit, just for a minute.

His respite was short-lived, and ended when something hard smacked against his shin.

“OW! What the hell?” He opened his eyes to see Toby, in full armor, glaring down at him.

Toby’s mouth opened and closed, mercifully muted by the music in Jim’s headphones. He frankly didn’t care, Toby looked annoyed, and Jim didn’t want to hear it today.

In a remarkably swift movement, Toby reached down and snatched the headphones off Jim’s head.

“Dude!” Toby snorted, “Cripes, you haven’t heard a word I said have you?”

Jim blinked up at him sullenly. Not today Tobes.

Toby gave Jim’s headphones the side eye, then put one of the speakers up to his ear, and rolled his eyes. “‘Chances’ again? You know all this emo crap is going to rot your brain. No wonder you’re all MOOD today.”

“I don’t need your music snob attitude right now Toby.” Jim angrily reached up to try to grab his headphones back, but Toby held them just out of reach.

Toby smirked. “How ‘bout I give them back after you get your emo butt off the floor and get some sparring practice in with the rest of the class, huh?” He jerked his thumb back over his shoulder towards where Draal was showing Claire how to properly block an attack with a sword.

Jim huffed out an impatient breath and glared up at his friend, he knew how to fight just fine already, let the rest of them practice. “Give them back now Toby.”

Toby narrowed his eyes and swung the headphones around his finger like a hula hoop. “You know, I went to all the trouble to make you ‘Toby’s Kickass Playlist’, you could, at least, listen to some actual music while you sulk like a weenie.”

That’s it. Enough. Jim sprung up and lunged for the headphones.

Toby narrowly sidestepped the ambush. “Ho HO! And he’s on his feet folks!”

Jim growled, and charged at the boy as Toby turned and ran back towards the center of the arena.

“Hey Draal!” Toby yelled gleefully. “New student incoming!”

Draal instantly spun and dropped into an attack stance, and Jim realized too late that he was about spar whether he liked it or not. He dropped to grab a spare training staff lying nearby, there was no way he could take Draal on, even for practice, bare-handed.

Draal looked thrilled. “HAH! A fight. Excellent.” He barked out in his gravel voice.

Jim grunted as he picked up momentum and threw himself towards his opponent. Draal dropped even lower to thwart Jim’s easiest strike options, and…

“BLINKOUS GLADRIGAL! WHAT HAVOC HAVE YOU BROUGHT UPON US NOW?”

Jim slid ungracefully to a stop, slamming into a surprised Draal. Couldn’t Vendel just enter a room like a normal person for once?

#tales of arcadia #trollhunters #toa trollhunters #toa #jim lake jr #toby domzalski #toa fanfic #draal the deadly #post rott fix it

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thechocobros · 2 years

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I didn't even know that Nomura dropped a new art for Dark Road? Hfjsgskahdhfjakakjdhsk

#kingdom hearts #xehanort #tetsuya nomura #kh dark road #kh

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cloudofash · 4 years

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Nintendo dropped the second KH:MoM trailer, Square dropped new Kingdom Hearts shoes and Nomura himself dropped new artwork of Kairi for the MoM boxart. Be fed KH fans. 😭

I wanna talk about the KH:MoM boxart of Kairi versus the KH3 boxart of Sora. Just take a look at this. The contrast between Sora and Kairi couldn't be any clearer.

Sora is surrounded by Darkness. Kairi is surrounded by Light.

Sora is awake. Kairi is asleep.

Sora's picture frames are all empty. Kairi's picture frames are all full of old memories.

If Kairi is looking back on and holding onto past memories then perhaps Sora is looking towards the future and is opening up his heart to create new memories.

But the most pressing question here is why is Sora surrounded by Darkness? This has been a question since this art was first released, with many assuming Nomura was just calling back to FFXV's Noctis and that the pose meant nothing. Now that we see Sora juxtaposed with Kairi, I believe this was all intentional.

Many are theorizing that Sora will eventually fall to darkness or will get lost in Darkness and we've practically been told as such by Young Xehanort who said he is already lost to the abyss. The world of Verum Rex shows the phrase "Reclaim your Heart" and we know from the Nameless Star that Yozora's heart was replaced by another's, thus Yozora is most likely out to reclaim his heart. The same will most likely happen to Sora as he wanders around in Shibuya, lost. When we look at the facial expression of Sora on the throne we can see that he has a face unlike anything he's ever worn. He looks overly confident with his legs crossed while his head wrests on his fist. His furrowed brow and cock-sure smirk are daring to the viewer, daring them to approach him. And he seems to have crowned himself a king. Maybe this is concept art of Sora losing his heart and forgetting who he once was, hence the lack of memories.

This is all a theory and yes I know I could be overthinking it. Nomura put Sora on a throne once before on the KH 1.5/2.5 cover, a throne with keyblades sticking out of it like Game of Thrones' Iron Throne. See below:

This was most likely just artwork that had no meaning behind it, or perhaps it was concept art for this current picture, concept art for the series' future. You can never really tell with Nomura, he throws things into the series all the time and then uses it in the future like that machine waaay back in KH1 at the end of the world, which we found out per Khux is a teleporter.

I think we better brace ourselves for whatever they have planned for the future. It could get a whole lot darker.

Update: Also want to include this Dark Road image of Young Xehanort. Notice that he is also sitting in on a very similar throne, but his throne looks like Kairi's and isn't surrounded by Darkness but is instead surrounded by his friends. Considering that this is the point in Xehanort's life before he falls to Darkness it makes sense that his throne would be light like Kairi's. It's telling that not even Xehanort's throne is as dark as Sora's despite spending most of his life in Darkness versus Sora who we haven't even really seen fall to Darkness. I honestly hope he does, I think it would be a very interesting character arc for Sora and would lead to very good character development which to me would be about time!

#kh mom #kh:mom #kh #kingdom hearts #sora #kairi

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catncore · 4 years

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THEY DROPPED NEW TWEWY KEY ART FOR ANIME EXPO

NOMURA WHAT THE FUCK DOES THIS MEAN

as a heads up the two characters at the top are the anime expo con OC’s for promo reasons just to avoid confusion.

#the world ends with you #TWEWY #anime expo #anime expo 2020

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partnersatfazbear · 3 years

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Sorry there aren’t any FNAF sketches ;__; I can’t really explain what’s going on in my personal life this time (since it’s personal to someone else but affecting me) but I haven’t had a lot of time...

My friend and my FIL really want me to get back to writing my novels and attempt publishing them, so I am also devoting x amount of hours a week to them. For reference, there’s about 12 + two spin offs last I counted... One has a completed rough draft. Having said all that, the characters in the top left are the first in the timeline and the characters on the top right are last in the timeline =XD For Celestial Sphere in particular, I was getting Nomura vibes... haha...

Star Ocean 2 fan art in the bottom left corner because I can... I mean, I haven’t been wasting hours trying to attempt Cave of Trials in Galaxy Mode... (I have. It’s going better than expected, actually, but the sheer amount of TIME to go from floor to floor is literally hours) There’s no save in the 13 floor dungeon, so... Also I spent a good 3 days just updating my new Star Ocean 2 website, scanning over 100 items in my collection and I’m still not done... >>;

My mom got me a new phone and I haven’t added Tumblr yet... so that’s part of why I’m not updating as often... It’s hard to sit down at my desk.

The Animal Crossing direct dropped and... it’s HUGE. So much content!! I did redecorate my town for Halloween, but I scrapped it and now my town is full of BUNNIES hahaha I am prepping for a farm area and recruiting some buns. I’m styling my town after my fictional town in my works it’s based on “Bog Cape”, so it’s a seaside/harbor kind of town (not so much a tourist trap, because I lived in one of those for a long time and they suck ass)

I got new buns in real life, too! (This isn’t all of them... I got a bunch of little ones from my mom, too.) In particular my bff got me the last one. She thought it was a cookie jar, but she saw that it was yellow and had the same broken ear as Springtrap (I’m really shocked she knew that, actually!) and she had to get it for me. He’s one of my most prized buns! :) The mushroom one is a solar lamp, which will eventually go in my garden... and I don’t think Louise needs explaining lol

Speaking of, here’s all my Springy Bois and Dawko so far. Still waiting on the new plush and Glitchtrap to get here in the mail. (Spring Bonnie plush is on the right side of my shelf in his own box... had to put him there to avoid sunfading)

Let me talk about FNAF. My guess so far is a release date of 12-17. I have to get Truth Seeker written before then, even if I don’t post it... I don’t want Security Breach influencing my fic... and between time and all that I just haven’t gotten to it. I am determined to finish it before my birthday, in early November...

I have been keeping up with the Freddy and Friends on Tour videos, but I think I’d rather wait and theorize on them all at once at the end unless something I haven’t seen posted jumps out at me (see my recent post on the Vanessa Glitch)

If you guys have any random asks or requests, feel free to send them my way!

#updates #my art #sketches #sketchbook #oc #star ocean the second story #star ocean 2 #so2 #truth seeker au #beginning of the world #celestial sphere #fnaf merch #bunnies #dawko

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baphomet-media · 3 years

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Getting Psyched - A The World Ends With You Retro Review

Genre: Adventure Subgenre: JRPG Developer: Square Enix, Jupiter Publisher: Square Enix Platform(s): DS Release Date: July 27th, 2007 Hours Played: 42 hours this playthrough

You’ve almost certainly heard of this game, especially if you’re into JRPGs. When a game advertises itself as being “from the team that made Kingdom Hearts,” I was sold instantly as a kid. One look at the game’s box art confirms that Tetsuya Nomura had a hand at this game with his distinctive bold art style. But the game itself was something that nobody at the time had predicted. The game has an urban fantasy story unlike much that had been told at the time. Furthermore, the game was made to push the DS to its limits and create a battle system that could only work on the DS’s two screens. Does this cult classic live up to the hype, or is it just a janky mess? Let’s find out.

Story

TWEWY opens by introducing our protagonist, an antisocial teen named Neku Sakuraba. Neku unexpectedly awakens in the iconic scramble crossing of Shibuya, Tokyo. To his surprise, the crowds seem to walk right through him, and a strange pin appears in his hand that allows him to read the thoughts of passersby. Neku quickly learns that he has been thrust into the Reapers’ Game, a seven-day death game where the Players are the recently deceased that must partner up to fight the Noise, hostile part-animal-part-tribal-graffiti creatures that seek to erase the Players. What’s more, each day Players must complete missions given to them by the Reapers within strict time limits while avoiding the reapers themselves. If they can make it to the end of the week, they might just be able to return to life.

Along the way, Neku will meet a chaotic cast of characters including Shiki, the headstrong seamstress who is eventually able to get Neku out of his angsty shell, Beat and Rhyme, a pair of street-smart siblings with heavy 2000’s skater vibes, Joshua, an abrasive, sarcastic, literal Christ figure who’s somehow a good guy? Or maybe he’s a bad guy? Or… maybe he’s a good guy again? On top of that, the Reapers themselves vary wildly from the contrasting duo of the laid-back Kariya and the high-strung Uzuki to the lone radical Minamimoto. The game does a good job of having a full roster of characters without overloading the player. Furthermore, while most characters seem wacky at first, they all have motivations and layers behind them that become clearer as you progress through the story.

Without spoiling anything, nothing is as it seems in the Reaper’s game, and multiple parties are vying for control for different reasons, meaning the whole thing feels like one big political intrigue story on top of an urban JRPG. Even on my most recent replay after having played the game countless times over the years, I was hungry to put the pieces together. While the main storyline mostly follows Neku’s perspective and doesn’t explain a lot of the behind-the-scenes interactions and motivations of the secondary characters, the game fortunately has a Secret Reports feature, which are written by a certain character who seems to know way more than they let on. These Secret Reports are near essential to understanding the game’s true story, and reveal whole layers to the plot and world that the main story doesn’t even touch on.

Needless to say, I loved the story of TWEWY. Everything feels perfectly crafted, leaving no loose ends, while still leaving the player wanting more. If anything I wanted to see more of Neku and his friends after the game’s conclusion just hanging out in real life.

Gameplay

TWEWY is a JRPG, but in the loosest sense possible. In the overworld, the player controls Neku, guiding him around the various streets of Shibuya on the touch screen or with the face buttons. Unlike in traditional RPGs, outside of story events the player must deliberately initiate combat with the Noise. By scanning their environment they can read the surface thoughts of passersby, but also reveal noise symbols in the environment. By tapping on these symbols, the player can queue up battles with the noise, and can even chain multiple battles together for back-to-back fights that multiply your drop rate.

In battle, Neku and his partner are sent to separate Zones, with Neku on the touch screen and his partner on the top screen. Neku fights the noise by activating the abilities of pins he has equipped, called Psychs. Each psych has its own activation method, from swiping on an enemy to tapping empty space, to scratching on the screen, to shouting into the microphone, and more. It’s up to the player to equip Neku with the best pins, though pins level up as they are used, becoming more powerful and sometimes evolving into even stronger pins.

On the top screen, Neku’s partner fights the noise by using the DS’s face buttons to move through a combo map and select certain finishers. By selecting the right finishers, you can charge your Sync gauge to perform a powerful special attack. Both characters share an HP gauge, damage to each character subtracting from each side. If you’re following along, that means the game expects you to control both Neku and his partner at the same time. This can be tricky for new players, but you quickly get used to it. Additionally, you can have your partner auto-fight with a customizable delay, meaning you technically don’t have to control your partner at all. However, if you really want to deal major damage and wipe the floor with the Noise on higher difficulties, you’ll want to master battling with both characters at once. When I first played the game in 2007, I found the parner battling to be too difficult to keep up with, but now that I’m older and more experienced, I find the combat to be incredibly deep and rewarding. Additionally, the game rewards back-and-forth control of Neku and his partner with the Light Puck mechanic. Essentially, when one character performs a combo finisher, the light puck is passed to the other character, and passed back when that character does a finisher. In this way, you can build up a damage multiplier based on how quickly you rally the light puck. This creates a natural back-and-forth flow of using Neku until his psychs discharge, then getting a few hits in with his partner, and so on.

My only complaint about battles is that in later fights on higher difficulty the Noise will attack so frequently on the partner’s zone that it’s difficult to get attacks off with them at all. Your partner has a limited block/dodge, but it only does so much and there’s often tons of Noise attacking at once. It’s not insurmountable, but it can be frustrating at times.

Outside of battle, the player must constantly keep up with a few things, food, swag, and difficulty. Both Neku and his partner can eat food and wear clothing purchased from many shops around Shibuya. Food offers an up-front bonus as well as a permanent stat increase once the food is digested by completing battles. However, you can only digest so many times per real-time day, meaning you have to prioritize high-calorie foods before smaller snacks. I found the digestion limit to be a bit too limiting. It can be removed in the post-game, but it still makes food hard to deal with for someone that is effectively bingeing the game.

Swag are articles of clothing that offer flat stat increases, but also have abilities that are unlocked by showing it to the right store clerk. Each clerk can unlock the abilities of specific clothing, and you can unlock more by buying enough stuff from them to fill up their Friendship Gauge. I thought it was fun to slowly make friends with each store clerk, and I felt bad that I couldn’t hang out with them or reciprocate some of their obvious advances, though I’m sure it’s assumed that Neku cherishes his friendships with them after the game’s conclusion. However, you can’t just equip any old piece of clothing to any character. Neku can’t just pull off a dress and cargo shorts right off the bat. Each piece of clothing has a Bravery rating, with characters whose bravery is below that rating being unable to wear the clothing. Fortunately, bravery increases as you level up, and can also be increased by eating food. By the end of the game, you’ll be able to have Neku and company wearing whatever clothing you want.

Lastly there’s Difficulty. The game has four main difficulty levels, being Easy, Normal, Hard, and Ultimate. You begin the game in Normal, but once you unlock a difficulty, you can change it on the fly from the pause menu. On easier difficulty enemies have less HP and deal less damage, but you get fewer XP and worse pins. The reverse is true on higher difficulties, with some of the best pins in the game being available exclusively as drops on Ultimate difficulty. To aid you in this, you can also change your level at any time. Unlike in a standard RPG where your level is immutable to the player aside from leveling up, in TWEWY you can freely choose your level from one to the highest level you have achieved. For each level below your max that you set your level, you get a multiplier for drops. This can be combined with the battle chaining multiplier to get ultra rare drops, some of which have less than 1% and even less than 0.1% drop chances normally. This gives the player an incentive to level up aside from just stat bonuses, and rewards players who go out of their way to engage in battles. As above, battles are largely optional, but it heavily behooves the player to battle as much as they can, not only because you get drops and experience, but increasing your level gives you more wiggle room for harder fights such as bosses.

There are tons more smaller features, but these are the main ones. I thoroughly enjoyed the vast depths of the game’s mechanics and found the difficulty settings to be really engaging and a novel approach to RPG player advancement while still affording accessibility. I was enthralled for multiple hours as I struggled to get the best gear, feed my team the best food, and equip the best pins to get as strong as possible. Until the very end of the postgame, it never felt like mindless grinding, as you can just breeze through the story on Easy if you really want to, but where would be the fun in that?

Presentation

TWEWY is probably best known for its vibrant and bold incredibly urban street-art-themed style, which shows in not only the art, but the UI, music, and writing. The character art is that hard-outlined and overdressed Nomura art style that fans of Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts have come to love, and the backgrounds are all vibrant and stylized to fit. The pixel art of the character sprites and Noise are all incredibly expressive, with Neku’s idle animation as he jams out to tunes on his headphones being one of my favorites.

The game’s music is unabashedly lyrical, covering a vast array of genres including JPop, Punk, and Hip-Hop, with many different styles of each. I loved almost every song in the game, though I found one of the overworld themes to be a bit grating at times. Other than that, the music is pretty great, and what’s even better is you can buy CDs of each of the game’s songs in the game to have your own personal sound test right from the menu, even going as far as to allow you to set the background music on the menu itself.

The game even has voice acting, though it’s limited mostly to battle quips and wordless expressions for cutscenes. I actually really enjoyed the voice acting and thought they nailed each character. I was honestly surprised at the audio quality the developers were able to pack into this game. The music was a very slight bit tinny through the DS’s audio chip as is to be expected, but barring that the vocals and voice overs were super clear and the instrumentation of the songs were well mixed.

Overall, the game’s presentation is about as good as it gets on the DS, giving even home console games a huge run for their money.

Conclusion

Honestly it’s hard to say anything bad at all about TWEWY. The game was a bit hard to approach at the time, but it’s aged magnificently. These days, I wouldn’t hesitate to say that it’s the best (at least non-Pokémon) game on the DS. Honestly though some might be turned off by the game’s quirks, I think TWEWY is a masterpiece that everyone with a DS should pick up and play. I can’t wait to see how the newly-released sequel stands up, but honestly the original is a tough act to follow.

Score: 10 / 10

#gaming #article #review #retro review #twewy #the world ends with you #square enix #jupiter

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