You roll your electric bicycle to the charger, only to find someone doing the "fool the bicycle charger" challenge, dressed in a false-positive bicycle suit, limbs clamped down, mouth agape as hundreds of volts are pumped into their spinal jack. Good thing the next one's free!!!
*tall, chrome, mouthless android gazes upon the lonely, meaningless wasteland into which they were born*
"Aww it's so frickin sad look look it wants to cry–"
*the android turns. A skittering is heard, then it sees two trails of rodent paws leading from under a boulder and back*
Artwork name / artist name combo checks out
First of all, I want to thank everyone who, on discovering that the character "Joker" from Persona was announced for Smash Bros. DLC, did NOT stoop to posting "I can't believe Pacman, Robin AND the Joker are in Smash" immediately
I actually feel Lyle In Cube Sector, the game Uurnog and its predecessor FiNCK borrows a lot of its visual language from, had pretty good world design, each area feeling very distinctive while similarly dark, the name "Cube Sector" lending a unifying hint of futurist dystopia.
Also I checked out the official site after playing, and, uh, the creators really aren't that good at making the game sound appetising, unfortunately. Which I guess is due to the shallowness of its world design, as the game's main entry point.
Anyway, that's just an example of the sort of thing you can expect from this game. There's not much narrative otherwise, even on just a world design standpoint (which is kind of disheartening considering the creator's pedigree) so don't let that put you off.
And then, we get The Punchline: you go past the disabled laser into the next room. It contains a new enemy. The enemy is armed with another emitter. The enemy shoots the bombs and enemies at you which, you now realise, you just unwittingly explicitly armed it with.
So, you feed 9 nearby objects – bombs, enemies – into the devices. Now the laser is disabled, but now the save points and fast travel have stopped working. And, if you return to the hub room, the bombs and enemies will appear and attack your accrued resources.
Sometimes the devices are lasers. Sometimes the lasers block paths, which you can't pass without getting zapped to the hub room - a "soft death". You can disable all the magenta devices by zapping 9 objects, which the game stores in a queue until you visit the hub room's emitter.
Reinventing common game idioms from its own set of principles is where most of the joy of Uurnlimited's design is. Another source of joy is when these reinvented idioms are shown to be more than what they are, because of their construction.
Throughout the world are magenta devices. Sometimes they're pads, sometimes lasers. These can zap up objects, including yourself. An emitter in the hub room empties out the objects when you re-enter. The devices are a save point AND fast travel, reinvented from first principles.
Also like some roguelikes, objects in rooms don't despawn even if you leave and return, until you die or reset. Only your inventory and the central hub room persist after deaths. Permanent progress heavily leverages the hub room - accruing more resources to beat more puzzles.
#IPlayed Uurnog Uurnlimited. It's an exploration puzzle platformer, but with an inventory that lets you bring in objects from other rooms. Often you must bring in objects, and it resembles a metroidvania. Often you must take objects without dying, and it resembles a roguelike.
I've been seeing a few of these triptyches on Pixiv recently, and conceptually I approve. (Artist: https://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?id=637318)
So, how many of you are now planning to use the line "They called this hypothetical event “the Inversion"" for your bottom surgery fundraiser
(I'm 90% certain that when the day comes, all these remaining ones are just going to be flattened into non-interactive movie files, which depresses me immensely.)
(The second biggest obstacle is the Flash plugin being obliterated in 2020, while, despite declarations by Viz to port all the content to HTML5, a good deal of interactive pages, such as https://www.homestuck.com/story/3001, remain in SWF to this day.)
The biggest obstacle for a new reader getting in Homestuck today is that regularly it will reference whatever Sweet Bro And Hella Jeff comic was current at time of update, so you basically have to read and memorise all 50+ of them to guarantee you get the joke first try each time
This isn't meant to sound cynical… if anything, I'm glad for it…
Metagame trends, progression and discoveries, for me, are "exciting times" for a world where only fear, disgust and grief can be found. They're really just a way to experience and behold "progress" in a world of inexorable regress.
I was thinking about why I'm in to competitive metagames, for Smash and MTG and speedrunning and such… It's like, much as games have become a surrogate for travel and recreation as the real world has grown more impoverished, metagames are a surrogate for science and politics.
[Japanese-English bilingual pun involving Undertale follows this line]
Who called it an Annoying Dog and not an Inuisance
[Japanese-English bilingual pun involving Undertale precedes this line]
(Also the "cyber" aspect is more theological than technological, but then, even original cyberpunk was never really about computers deep down, anyway.)
I haven't played any Persona and I don't think I'd want to play any Persona, but based on the impressions of my feed I've been led to believe it's basically: cyberpunk, but typical 10's-style cyberpunk written by people who are too privileged to be "punk" in any real sense.
*the customer orders something from the lunch menu during breakfast* "Brave? Possibly. Foolish? Certainly."
"The gist is, me, Ego, Inner Child, and Courage are working on a secret project called "Operation Become Cute". I can't reveal any details, but it's a huge deal."
"So what do you need me for?"
"Well… if Denial hears about–" *loud rumbling footsteps* "Oh no, she's coming! Hide!"
"Humans and other bios are scared of death because they think they're all irreplaceable and unique. My personality was algorithmically created from a pseudorandom seed, and I have complete peace of mind knowing it repeats every 4 billion cycles." *spins loaded revolver on finger*
Skeleton Whose Skull Has Three Huge Teeth And No Bottom Jaw: "W-What? Fight the Lord of All Hell?! For your freedom? I dunno…" *eye sockets narrow* "I think fighting is against Hell Rules."
If humans can blow kisses, what's to stop kisses from naturally forming in the upper atmosphere, from rain, "God's saliva"
"Yeah, I'm the only shop in the caves that still takes credits, old world dollars, AND gold pieces. There's still a few robot vendors, networked storefronts and cranky immortal merchants that only want one currency… and they're aaaaall exclusively in my supply chain. Har har!"
"He thinks he's won, but he's forgotten that he was once a court wizard, and his powers were bestowed by the Kingdom. And as the last living heir to the royal family–" *removes tiara* "–all I have to do–" *places it in jail cell toilet* "–is dissolve the monarchy." *flushes it*
Me: Look, the Trickster Mode arc of Homestuck may've been a cute idea executed rather badly, but it was NOT "just clown TF"–
*I open a page*
Oh my god. It was just clown TF.
*it was just clown TF*
It was just clown TF. *staring wistfully at the stars* It was just clown TF.
*it wa
Stoat Knight
A field carnivore given armour and told to kill.
Stoat Knight 2
Looks and behaves just like Stoat Knight. (Twins?)
Stoat Knight 3
Again, no way to tell this from Stoat Knight.
Stoat Knight 4
Maybe I shouldn't give each one a separate bestiary ent[INK RAN OUT HERE]
"So if this pit really is bottomless…"
"Yeah?"
"How exactly are the walls around it held up?"
*a low rumbling noise becomes audible as the grass around the pit starts falling away*
"Hmm."
"I'm assembling a team of Earth's gloomiest people. I need your power."
"I… I can't leave my apartment."
"You just have to lie still and transform into a vast black ooze that covers the sky."
"…Will that save Earth?"
"It's… like putting a blanket on a dog to make it sleep."
This is resized from the full size 68MB version on The Spriters' Resource https://www.spriters-resource.com/nintendo_switch/supersmashbrosultimate/sheet/111398/ which suggests the hilarious image of using a 3000x6000 PNG to make an episode of your 00's-era sprite comic.
This is the Smash Bros. adventure mode submap "The Mysterious Space" (a.k.a "the quiz area"). I like it because it's actually pretty well-drawn, and also because "a massive vortex of arbitrary garbage frozen in time" is a good description of what Smash Bros. has become >:33333333
The second one is whoever runs Salty Bet.
I don't know about you, but to me the "first Twitch megastar" will always be that guy who managed to throw an eggplant at the last boss of Spelunky HD which half my feed spontaneously livetweeted for reasons which remain baffling to this day.
OK, my #SmashBros DLC bet is that the next character will be Sora from Kingdom Hearts. Then, everyone will think for five seconds, realise the DLC is following a trend of heart-themed RPGs, think for three more seconds, then
Problem: it looks out-of-character for the player to constantly sprint everywhere regardless of urgency.
Solution: running is replaced with the walking animation sped-up and with a VHS fast-forward filter.
Problem: game NPCs sound robotic when you talk to them and they repeat the same dialogue.
Solution: remove the ability to talk to NPCs more than once.
Tangentially related to this thread, my game GIF Tumblr blog that I started in 2012 http://animatedscreenshots.tumblr.com/ is no longer updating. If you want to relive some of the good times, hit up this link: http://animatedscreenshots.tumblr.com/random
Anyway, time to tone switch with an MTG joke. Hurkyl's Recall? That's when you puke something up, right?
–
Arnott, L. 2018, "𝙃𝙪𝙧𝙠𝙮𝙡'𝙨 𝙍𝙚𝙘𝙖𝙡𝙡? 𝙏𝙝𝙖𝙩'𝙨 𝙬𝙝𝙚𝙣 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙥𝙪𝙠𝙚 𝙨𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙪𝙥, 𝙧𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩?"
ASCII
On loan from the Kick Ass Tweets Collection
If any of you lot have scrounged through what's left of your Tumblr likes and seen anything you're certain I'd like, that's on the same blog as any post which an open source NN will probably decide is porn, AND I all you to DM me, feel free to DM it to me over the next day.
I'll be honest… I'll open up for a second… There's a lot to be distressed about nowadays, but this Tumblr deletion thing in particular is deeply wounding me. It's just… such an affront to so many values I hold dear. I really do find it unbearable.
The only occasion the "Hero of Time" moniker is really called for is in the context of Wind Waker's backstory, where it's a title assigned not from prophecy but from legend, and serves to distinguish the previous game's Link from the current one.
Whenever someone calls a non-OoT Link "the Hero of Time" I screech inwardly because it's incorrect.
Whenever someone calls the OoT Link "the Hero of Time" I screech inwardly because they respect OoT enough to go along with its dead-serious messianic chosen-one hero garbage.
I guess it's just… Melee in 2002 felt vividly future-looking. Obviously that had more to do with the GameCube vs the N64, but the game felt interested in celebrating and furthering the franchises it exhibited.
This one only feels interested in celebrating Smash Bros, ultimately.
all stuff based on the past Smash titles' budget restrictions and release dates, and which now barely make sense without that context, and which is at the dubious cost of new stages or moves, or thoughtful revision and reconsideration of past designs.
Not just unenjoyable stage layouts like Onett or Skyworld, or ill-fitting movesets like Samus's and Ganondorf's, but painful distributions of content and focus, like three Links, four Marths, seven "world 1" Mario stages, three "jungle" DK stages, "Dr. Mario", et cetera,
I mean, the decision to make this one a compilation of the previous titles' roster and stages was pretty amazing spin, but the end result feels overwhelmingly like a self-congratulatory parade of the series's awkward and dated designs.
I'm finding it even harder to enjoy the new Smash Bros. than I expected. It all just feels so overwhelmingly… regressive.
I see you scrolling! I'm not a tweet, I'm a prince!! I've been transformed into this pathetic form by a UFO's curse, but you can undo this by clicking on me!
*you click this tweet*
AhhhHHAHA! I WAS just another tweet after all! And now I'm BIG! Your whole screen is MINE! MINE!!
The RPG mode in the new Smash game is an impressively massive aesthetic nightmare, and slugging through it is making me become queasy at not just the act of playing Smash in general, but the very concept of fictional crossovers itself.
0% damage brain: Smash 4.5
100% damage brain: Brawl 3
300% damage brain: Melee 4
0.1HP stamina brain: Smash 69
I mean, I looked over the linked stipulations (https://www.nic.io/rules.htm) and this bit in the very same sentence seems almost unenforceable in letter, so maybe it can't be taken that seriously, but then again,
Saw this tweet from Pillowfort dot io a couple of times over the past week, about how they intend to move off the .io domain because its registrar prohibits .io domains from hosting pornographic or sexual content.
Has anyone, like…… told Leaf Corcoran https://twitter.com/Pillowfort_io/status/1070065521863737344
It's a shame they'll never make a Kid Icarus Uprising sequel, or even just a port *it is here that I am informed that all the female KIU characters were recast with non-union voice actors for their Smash Bros. cameos* But, I Guess It's For The Best
"Ho ho, you only do the 9-digit Sudoku? Well…! If that's the best you can do…! But I prefer the 11-digit."
*flips to a puzzle where each square grid has 11 cells somehow, and looking at it makes your eyes water*
"Haha! Intimidated?!"
*puts a ε next to another ε without looking*
Anyone else think it's odd that we in English still call it "the" hiccups, like it's some pre-20th-century malady, comparable to "the" gout or "the" vapours
Everyone stop yapping about fighting game rosters and start yapping about the important gaming news: this week the Celeste devs patched in a new difficulty mode where everything is the same except Madeline has the hiccups.
I've just been informed by indirect means that late-90s MTG advertisements included someone dressed up as the Prodigal Sorcerer card, complete with his atrocious facial hair, and all I want to say is that I disapprove.
*deliberate misreading voice* Wow, I've heard that writing is the art of omission, but adding new content by removing half the text seems extreme
Anyway, the takeaway of all this is to please, for the love of all that is holy, put the women and nb's in your ensemble cast game in the lead. I'm begging you. No I'm not. I'm not begging you because I deserve it, damnit. Or at least stop giving the men the same damn haircut and
I'm not counting any Mario series characters because, as we all intimately know by now, that series's character rep is not bound by the laws of god or man.
There are two other "flukes" that have made it in that I should mention: Palutena and Isabelle. The first arriving by slight creator favouritism (Smash sharing its lead designer with Kid Icarus Uprising), the second by an overwhelming tidal wave of crowd favouritism.
As an addendum: I'm fully aware Lucina isn't even that Well Designed compared to some of the other women that could've gotten in, like Chun Li or Tetra, which explains her inclusion (design similarity to Marth) and is also darkly funny. https://twitter.com/webbedspace/status/1070907085016117250
"Just as the prophecy foretold, we are now in space." *scrambles to grab broadsword in microgravity, then flails backward as its blade lazily rotates toward arm*
"Hey. Look. Look at us." *stands next to another OC who's also half-angel half-demon, but their angel half is the right side instead of the left*
"We can be your angel…" *they both turn around on the spot* "…or your devil."
"Why don't you like me freezing the village in time over the whole winter?" *leans on a dog in mid-jump* "Three months of solitude for us, and everyone else skips to spring."
"Uh, the snow's piled up in a dome above us? The sun's blotted out?"
"Well, it IS still Halloween night."
"Prepare yourself…" *sneers fiercely* "as I unleash my ultimate barrage!"
"Is that your war face, or your "holding in a sneeze" face?"
"All I'm holding in is a heaven-shaking blast!"
"Please, unleash it into your elbow crook, not your hands."
"I'm taking this dog park with me to my Sky Kingdom, where my qilin will frolic freely, and there's nothing you can do!"
"Never! If you think we'd give up letting our dogs run around while we vegetate on a bench, it's your head that's in the clouds!!"
*epic witch dogfight ensues*
"Bye, sweetie… and when your flight lands…" *does a hand signal*
"Is that… the horns?"
*the lips move, indicating the hand signal is clearly the "call me" mime*
"You're speaking… into the horns?"
*the hand signal continues, insistently*
"You want me to call Satan?"
"SwampTek mechs are hard to come by nowadays, what with the Permaflood and all, but if you dredge enough of the new rivers' banks, you too might snag one as intact as this baby." *smacks the controls, causing the Rocket Tongue to launch and smash through a tree trunk*
Me: Wonder if unicode has a glyph that's like _ but on the top instead…
"Bug princess? Yeah, "princess" was just a made-up title the bugs bestowed on me because they thought my "warlike human brain" couldn't handle an egalitarian society." *reclines sumptuously on her partner's vast wing covers* "I'm getting them back by utterly living it, though."
"We've broken down "Reversing Climate Change", humanity's greatest challenge, to a small grid of tasks." *flips whiteboard* "Now, task 1, "Raising the Dead", may sound hard, but our experiments zapping protozoans until they move again have been promising, and we're sure scalabili
"Sure, the insect extinc– species diversity crash was a bit of a shock in the early decades, but the surviving species have steadily filled the niches." *footage of mosquitoes carrying pollen* "All we had to do was start paying them." *cut to restrained nude man covered in mosqui
Suddenly realising a week later that those "dream researchers" only ever paid you inside the dream, and you don't remember getting paid in real life after waking up. Or, for that matter, waking up.