SleepingSilence

Books!

I have to admit, I prefer physical, tangible books when it comes to reading. You'll never catch me reading a book off of a tablet or kindle.

I feel similar, albeit not as strongly.

I recently got myself a library card and read through a few graphic novels. So I have the potential to get my hands on some more material. But I don't have too many recommendations. Since I'm still struggling to find something particularly engrossing myself.

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

HAAK's final boss is a one-way to win gimmick boss and fuck that.

Unfortunately, Zapling Bygone, is another one that I'd not recommend in its current state. Because its bugs locked off (potentially) critical parts of the game for me. But I also REALLY don't like this game's appalling sense of direction. Having little to no clue what you're meant to be doing. (And someone REALLY needs to tell developers that no one liked Ori And The Blind Forest for its trial and error chase sequences.) Shame, because I do like the art design/world building comic panels. (But I'm putting this on hold until I get answers for fixing that.)

What Are You Listening To?

Why is everyone so horny on this site?

Because they're the RP's that garner the most consistent activity on average.

Toontown | The Guild's #1 Stop for Cartoon Discussion

I know bad anime tends to have the exact opposite problem of bad western shows. In that its hack writers are giving people exactly want they want.

But after trying to watch, and eventually skimming through the entire montage episode of "Reincarnated As A Sword." It was just insufferable to sit through. (It was just the Spider anime all over again. But the MC is now a far more obnoxious, mass murderer, without the actual need to kill. Including the slice of life Isekai staple of having the overpowered MC adopting his own slave girl.)

Point is, I really hope this upcoming season has better "good shows" than this.

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But to review the few anime that I actually finished...

Summertime Rendering is the best kind of anime that improves upon its source material. And its one of the few anime's in recent memory that ended satisfyingly.

Made In Abyss' Second Season might not have been the strongest in terms of logical writing. But it still makes for a compelling watch for the most part.

Also, Crunchyroll apparently paid their English voice actors only $300 bucks for the Jujutsu Kaisen movie.

Just another story of how good they've been to the anime industry.

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

I’ve discovered that when I’m playing a game full of secrets. One of two things will come out of my mouth on a regular basis. Either, “God, I love this game.” Or various flavors of, 2. “Fuck off. How was I supposed to know that?” (And rarely do these things mix together.)

A mood that only tends to increase the more I keep playing. Thus, the longer it goes on, the higher/lower my score will get.

So with that said, I’m at the final boss encounter of HAAK. And it would be unfair of me to simply state, much like Ender Lilies, the game provokes the latter option. (Since I don’t hate the game, and I’d argue it does many things better than that one.)

But there’s many things that I don’t like either. And the things that I do, are only getting worse through how long this game feels to play.

Because the game is certainly challenging and has plenty of content in it. With more story, lore for every monster, necessary side quests, sequence breaking flashbacks, uninteresting characters, and so much fucking dialogue to go through. That it easily takes the prize for “Most bloated plot-driven Metroidvania”.

However, I don’t know why the creators seem to hold such contempt for the player. But I feel it in so many of their game design choices.

• Almost every single room has a secret wall (likely multiple) that you’ll easily miss, a door (likely multiple) that blocks progress, fake routes that are impassable, or a pathway that you cannot go into until way later in the game. A bit TOO late into the game.
• The overall challenge is often very cheap and gimmicky. With Dark Souls Two levels of monsters in cramped/closed off spaces. One hit kill lasers. Poison gas. Gimmick platforming sections that demand precise controls. (Which this game doesn’t have. The slide is needed everywhere, and yet it only works half the time.)
• The common occurrence of monsters hitting you the second you go into the room.
• The inability to pan up or down, makes the platforming “leap of faith” a lot of the time.
• The moral options in side quests always offer you less rewards.
• The game openly mocks the player with “a git gud” rating, if you decide to use certain upgrades.
• Several secrets in the game are ‘developer notes’, in which they complain about playtesters not getting how their mechanics work.
• The game constantly takes control away from you, in order to provide you with imperfect english-translated dialogue scenes.
• With unlikeable and obnoxious character moments. Such as how the main character gripes about your customization choices. A pointless side character that condescends to you about “how you need to enter the right code, to open the coded door” every time you come across one. Another main character who blames you for doing something in the story. (Regardless of if you actually do it.) The game even has a side character questioning if you pirated their game.
• It has a random terrible trial and error (Ori And The Blind Forest-like) chase sequence. Without the pretty visual spectacle to go along with it.

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I'd say its probably looking at a 5 out of 10.

With my only other comments, pointing out how their discord is full of people and none of them are playing HAAK. (Some are even playing other Metroidvanias instead.) And because it always happens, I found a reddit comment in response to criticism about its controls. Suggesting "There's bad controls in all games." Like my man has never played Hollow Knight before. But seriously, how is that a defense? And why do people insist on downplaying other (much better) things in order to defend something they like?

And I'm not saying I hate redditors.

Again, I don't hate redditors.

I'm just saying, I'm repeating how much I don't hate redditors. In a tone that might indicate that I in fact hate redditors.

Nnnnooooo...

Don't know why anyone would have a problem with them frankly. Seems to be out of nowhere, far as I'm concerned...

What shows/movies are you watching?

I feel like I've been seeing this headline a lot more recently. It also apparently canned an 'Alien Vs Predator anime series" that was basically finished. (Along with every other show under the sun apparently. Looking at lists of its 2021/2022 cancelled shows.)

So its not surprising that Netflix is losing millions of subscriptions. While HBOMax is in a class action lawsuit over potentially faking their subscription numbers. And Amazon is now deleting already paid for content from consumers' libraries because of licensing snafus'.

But streaming was supposed to be the be-all/end-all solution to media consumption...

Though, I do use Spotify. (And Hulu for the day my bundle with them actually worked as advertised.) The times it doesn't have music that I look up. (Especially if it's an album with one or two randomly unplayable songs in them.) I can't help but doubt my choices to purchase less physical media over the years.

Because when the power went out (again) from storms. This neighborhood and those around them are incredibly unlucky it seems... Most of my games (PC & Switch & PS4) are digital and couldn't be played.

Point is, I need to buy more physical media. And sailing the high seas is perfectly justifiable.

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Really, I haven't had the time to watch anything. But I do have several things that I plan to watch later this weekend.

the alphabet game. lol

Juniper

Toontown | The Guild's #1 Stop for Cartoon Discussion

Smiling Friends is an absolute banger, need I say more?

@Dark Cloud

That Brazil special felt pretty pointless though. (Regardless of how intentional it is.)

Still looking forward to Season Two though.

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The Jujutsu Kaisen prequel movie was pretty decent. Basically felt like a longer episode of the show.

And despite my ambivalent feelings toward Edgerunners, it was clearly a success. (In garnering interest back into a product with bad PR.) So, maybe now that this is the third time something like this has been positively received on Netflix, they'll make these instead of those shitty live action anime movies. >.>

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

HAAK is another metroidvania that I unfortunately had to stop playing. Because it pulled a game-breaking glitch on me six hours into my playthrough, where I no longer received any currency and couldn't progress in any meaningful way.

So aside from the Ori-like (trial and error) chase sequences that I hated. Its a shame that I'm unable to continue for now.

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TemTem has managed to piss me off, and continues to be an absolute borefest. Making my attempt to rant about what it fails at, too cluttered and long to be readable. So fuck it. I’m doing it by bullet points instead...

Graphics

• The human faces are fucking ugly.
• The frame rate is stuttery and inferior to the PC version.
• The environments are plain-looking, samey and confusing to navigate

Characters

• No character has said anything funny or interesting throughout.
• Most NPCS are assholes. (And not even the fun snarky kind.)
• The dialogue is bad. Yet you’re forced to talk with every trainer, before and after fighting them. (None of which give you anything of substance for your wasted curiosity.)

Exploration

• The rewards for exploring are minimal to none. (Especially lacking in the cities.)
• Every starting quest is either “give me your Temtem”, or is hard locked until you go through multiple cities.
• Like the worst of pokemon. You will step on a battle with every other step. Or one step away from every exit.

Combat and Battles

• Every single trainer has the same monsters from one to five a piece. (Usually four of them.) All water, wind and able to poison yours for several turns. So I've fought what feels like a hundred of the same fucking NPC already.
• With the "stamina bar" preventing your Temtem from attacking more than two or three times each fight, without needing to wait for it to recharge. (Meaning you’re wasting more time switching between characters, or losing health every fight.)
• Plus an added penalty for level differences. Making the EXP grind even more monotonous and slow. Despite being obviously required to progress.

TemTem/Variety

• You get about a dozen choices to start with. (One of three starters, and a generic lot to catch.) Most having the same three types, and almost none of them evolve for some reason?
• Wild pokemon don’t even have different movesets, or base traits as far as I’ve seen.
• Plus, there is no fucking way to farm money in this game. Except for way later on, (apparently) where you can release the ones you’ve caught for pittances.

Fuck this game.

• Everything costs an arm and a leg, and you don't get shit for money.
• So you (like I) will probably run out of it, the second you enter the absolute shitshow that is the first "gym". A maze of offscreen teleporters that force you to go through the whole thing, before you can even leave. (And it autosaves everything, so my unpredictable mistake cost me severely.)
• So with all that, several crashes, and music that is beyond uninteresting to listen to. This game (and the snowball’s chance in hell that I’ll ever finish playing it.) is not looking promising…

Nexomon Extinction is basically better in every way.

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