Lurker > dotsdfe

That was always one of my favorite creepy stories, along with:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somerton_Man

...That one.

I'd argue Scream, even with 3.

3 is goofy, but it's still a fun movie.

On some level, I'm a bit sad that the revival fell through. I have fond memories of E3 and all of the exciting announcements it had. It was always a fun time of the year.

...But it has sadly become kind of redundant, and the attempt to revive it was seriously falling apart extremely quickly.

Ehh, I'll try one last bump in case anyone is interested, I guess. I'm not sure if there are a ton of VN fans here, though.

BurmesePenguin posted...

Sadly I don't do handheld gaming.

That's fair, sorry about that.

I can't really say for how the Switch's controller style is personally, just that I heard it mentioned as a criticism in a review of the Switch version.

BurmesePenguin posted...

That's a shame, but of those platforms the Switch is the only one I game on, so I'll have to live with it. Definitely looks like something I might be into, but also looks like a wait for a sale.

For what it's worth, the review that I glanced at for the Switch version said playing with a controller felt a bit clunky, but that playing in handheld mode with touch screen controls was perfectly fine.

But yeah, I'd definitely recommend keeping it in mind if you love mystery VNs. I'm a big fan of the genre and I wasn't disappointed.

BurmesePenguin posted...

What platforms is it on and is there a physical release?

Yeah, as mentioned, PC/Switch/Mobile.

Of those, I'd recommend the PC version if at all possible. Apparently the Switch version's control scheme has some strange sensitivity issues in trying to match a controller to the mouse controls, but I got it on Steam so I never personally encountered those.

Well, there doesn't seem to be a ton of interest here, but I'll bump this at least, I suppose.

Is that title convoluted and kind of silly? Yes.

But I just finished it and really loved it. I'm a huge VN fan and I heard strong things about this game, so I decided to give it a shot since it was like $15 on its release sale (which, sadly, may have expired by now).

It was a bit short (10-15~ hours or so), but I was consistently engaged by it. The characters were fun, the mysteries were interesting and satisfying, it had some really cool puzzles, and the themes were surprisingly poignant.

I don't want to get into spoilers here (though I'd be up for a discussion if anyone else has happened to play/beat this game, as nobody I know has even heard of this game), but suffice to say, it was a strong one. Not quite one of my favorite VNs ever, as it'd be tough to topple things like Ace Attorney & Fata Morgana from that, but it's up there and I enjoyed it.

Edit: The game's trailer for the curious:

https://youtu.be/xMRvEdxlli8

Blazing for sure. It's one of my favorites in the series.

SD is sadly pretty bland. They went very faithful to the original, and it all just feels very dated despite having some smooth gameplay modernizations. Also the art style is very creepy and soulless.

Conquest is great.
Birthright is okay.
Revelation is...playable. (Just skip the story in all three of these)
Shadows of Valentia is good but has pretty whatever maps.
Awakening is a trainwreck.

CQ is definitely the biggest one to grab, and I like SoV a lot despite its really mediocre map design.

SrRd_RacinG posted...

According to the 2020 ransomware leak, Capcom is remaking Power Stone.

Though, at this point, I sorta feel like some of the things mentioned in the leak were moved around or possibly entirely called off.

Ace Attorney 7 was allegedly in production and being aimed at a late 2021 release. At this point, I kinda feel like the game was canceled entirely, because it hasn't been announced a year and a half after its alleged release date.

The leak was definitely legit, but I do think it's possible that some plans have shifted since that data was released, so it might not necessarily still be in the cards.

I really hope that Emmy shows up. There was kind of setup for that, but the series sort of ended before anything could be done with it.

In general, I always felt like there was more story potential in the series post-UF, so I'm really hyped to see it continue. LMJ was sadly pretty terrible, especially since it basically didn't even bother having a real plot.

At a glance, Vero feels pretty good but a bit too RNG reliant (literally all of my rolls thus far have been 3*s or 4*s), and Chrom reminds me of Leif or Roy in being perfectly fine but not really anything game breaking.

Though that's only from a tiny bit of testing.

At the very least, neither of these feel as crazy as Soren or Tiki, who are both busted, IMO.

You'd think that more people would be intelligent enough to realize that this is a transparent scam, but...they won't.

It's also really funny to see the people buying this stuff behave in exactly the same way that they've accused others of acting for years. For all of the complaints about companies pandering politically, they don't seem to mind it when those companies are pandering to their beliefs.

Yeah, I agree. It's a shame that morality is often an option in games, but it's very rarely done in an interesting or meaningful way.

More often than not, the "evil" options are, like you said, blatantly worse, or just the characters saying "Hey, stop kidding around" and the game treating it like you picked the good option anyway.

I'd like to see more games with genuinely interesting good/evil systems. I've only played a small handful that come to mind as being interesting at all. It's sad when the Fable series, which is kind of notable for dropping the ball in a lot of areas and being a general disappointment, is what comes to mind first as an interesting morality system.

It's been obvious for a while that the trans issue was just a stepping stone. They were never going to stop as long as they can erode LGBTQ+ rights in any way.

For as much as I was told that the issue is settled and that the GOP wouldn't try this (which was always a very obvious lie), the constant attacks and the 'groomer' rhetoric made it very clear that they were going to try it.

I'd propose Mike Tyson Mysteries, it was so good.

I'm so ridiculously hyped to finally get Baizhu. I've wanted him since pretty shortly after I started.

I doubt that a single person has any idea who I am.

SomeLikeItHoth posted...

Yall tell me which Fire Emblem to play after I beat Engage in a week or two. Ive already played Three Houses twice so not that one.

Thracia.

Why? Because it's funny.

It's an April Fool's Day joke, I don't think it's meant to be analyzed all that closely.

I do agree that I expected one last twist. With how one chapter was hidden from the player, I sort of expected some big narrative switch up or stinger or something.

But...nah, the game just kinda fills in gaps that the player likely already would have figured out already and then just sorta ends.

Oh well. It doesn't detract from a really fun puzzle experience. I do think that one last twist would have done a lot for the overall narrative experience though.

Excellent game. Easily one of the most unique games that I've ever played.

Yes, absolutely. I still see her listed as one of the worst characters in the entire series, and she's nowhere near that.

Especially with characters like...the entire Graces cast sans Malik & the entire Arise cast sans Dohalim.

https://youtu.be/IY6BrcT0PoQ

I worked way too hard on this dumb review of Engage, if anyone wanted to watch. I can't edit videos to save my life, so...hopefully it doesn't look as shitty as I fear it does.

For what it's worth, most of the review is spoiler-free, but I do have a designated spoiler section later in the video.

If anyone wanted to watch it, I'd really appreciate it. It took way longer to work on than I'm proud to admit.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/2/9/7/AADDXjAAEJNZ.jpg

My team & commonly-used alternates thus far.

Some of my characters have leveled up in.....interesting ways.

Blue_Inigo posted...

Please tell me Timerra and Fogado are good

Fogado can have some major strength issues, but has a good class.

Haven't really used Timerra a lot to say.

So, uh, do Rosado and Goldmary just suck?

I finally got them, and...I'm kind of disappointed. Both struggled pretty hard on their first map.

gunplagirl posted...

<.< counterpoint that one guy you need Rolf and Ike to recruit.

Still not worst in the series but goddamn he's one of the worst and has an ability that is only useful for one chapter he's in. And that's only for the speedrun strats.

Shinon? He's a weird one to rate. He's fantastic early on and can carry in the maps he's on, and when he rejoins later, he does suck, but his growths are good enough to be pretty okay if you give him favoritism.

He usually gets points in a tier list setting for what he adds to the first few maps, though he's an odd one to rate with how he contributes.

MaxEffingBemis posted...

Rolf for a stretch in the game is your only archer too isnt he?

He is, yeah. Though whether that justifies using him with his awful bases or not is up to you. I've seen him used to pretty great effect in ironmans before, and he can become a monster later, but he definitely requires babying early on.

MaxEffingBemis posted...

Ooh, Im glad I didnt use my master seal on Boyd. I used it on Mia instead

Honestly, Boyd is perfectly fine, and there's nothing wrong with using him all game long as long as he's keeping up. He can get screwed with bad luck, but he can easily be a powerhouse.

PoR is honestly one of the most balanced games in the entire series. The worst units are either just kind of characters who start weak and are tricky to train up (IE, Rolf) or ones who join really late and generally lose out to earlier units if trained up (IE, Bastian & Lucia).

The entire cast is perfectly usable, though, and the worst units in the game are far from being as bad as the worst units in other games.

You can first adopt after chapter 4, the village battle. You don't need any donation ranks to initially adopt some things, though a number of animals are gated off by donation ranks.

https://twitter.com/dotsdfe/status/1619613863451979777

80%s are the worst.

I got to the major rush of new units in chapters 11-13 and I'm in a team crisis now. A lot of my original units are starting to fall off a bit (namely Clanne, post-Celica ring when his mediocre magic stat is becoming more noticeable), and I have reasonable replacements now...but I also love sticking with my earlygame units and seeing them through to the end.

"Aw jeez, Rick, why do I sound so different today? I-it's like I have a different voice or something! I'm really freaking out here!"

"I made a voice pitch changer, Morty! (Burps) Look, we both sound so different! But it doesn't work on the rest of your family. I'm not bothering to do that. Just us. (Looks at camera) That's why we sound different. Because of a voice pitch changer. That only works on us. So don't ask."

"Jeez. That feels really lazy..."

https://twitter.com/dotsdfe/status/1617093263030358016

So it begins.

I'd love to see a good game with a super cool and open magic system. Sadly this one looks like it falls just short of that.

From what I saw in previews, a lot of the combat ends up being melee anyway, which sort of takes a lot away from the potential of the entire premise.

PBusted posted...

Wow, this is the first time ever since Awakening that I couldn't get an FE game at launch by just walking into a store (since I usually don't pre-order) as the three stores near me are all out. I remember even getting some kind of bonus stamp thing for Three Houses despite not pre-ordering.

Have you tried Wal-Mart?

I had trouble finding the game in traditional game-y stores (Best Buy & Gamestop were both sold out), but Wal-Mart had a few copies left. It strangely seems like a really solid option here.

Kajagogo posted...

Still a retcon

I disagree, I saw it theorized when Scream 4 was new. The last time we see her, she was still moving and crawling for the door, and the sound of a door can be heard in a scene not long after.

We never saw anything confirming her death, so don't see it as a retcon at all. I definitely feel like the intention was always to have her survive.

I'm kinda skeptical. JI's work doesn't translate super well to animated form overall.

I think a lot of it is because a big draw of his stories comes from the visuals, which work a lot better as stills and which are really hard to actually animate. Honestly, a lot of the actual plots are often kind of silly (though there are some fantastic ones in there too, don't get me wrong), including some of the ones that they picked for this series judging by the trailer.

Don't get me wrong, I love Junji Ito stuff overall, but I can understand why it doesn't usually work in animated form, so I'm kind of critical of this one as well out of the gate.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/3/8/AADDXjAAEGb6.jpg

Ellie (the tabby cat) is the more independent of the two. She was a cat that my dad adopted from a box at Wal-Mart on a super hot day when he felt bad for her. She ended up taking to me out of the entire family and she became mine. She likes her personal space and will hang out on her own more often than my other cat, but she's exceptionally loving and absolutely adores lap time, she always rubs her head deep into my hand whenever I hold it out, she follows me around a good deal, and she's all around friendly and sweet, especially to me.

Emmi (the black and white cat) is the biggest baby of a cat that I've ever seen. She actually comes from a story that I posted here years ago - I heard meowing outside of my house late at night and found her as a kitten, abandoned, injured, and malnourished. I took her in and nursed her back to health, and since then, she's been my little baby. She's very shy around almost any other human being, but with me, she'll follow me around anywhere she can, she loves curling up on me or kneading me or just rubbing her head against my legs and purring. She also often meows for me if I'm asleep with my door closed.

They're both absolutely precious babies. I adore them both, and they're ridiculously sweet and loving cats. They both mean a ton to me.

Yeah, I'm excited in spite of my misgivings about the art style and writing. I love FE enough that I'm really excited to play it.

Touch posted...

Finished the arc.

Komugi hands down my favorite character in the series

The ending of the arc crushed me. I just flat out cried really hard at it.

I can relate to this fear so much. I've always had a fear of a home invasion or something similar since I was a kid. One time, when I was housesitting a two-story house for my parents by myself, someone walked up to the front door and started trying to open it. I heard them walking on the deck to the front door and quickly jiggling the handle around. Thankfully, my parents' dogs started going wild and barking a ton, and that seemingly scared the person off.

I was pretty damn terrified and had a hell of a time settling down. No matter where I went, I just had this feeling that someone was watching me or that they were about to try to break in again. It took hours to calm down, and I had a ton of trouble getting to sleep afterwards.

In all likelihood, it was just some dumb kid who was either trying to luck into a random unlocked house, or just some drunk idiot who wanted to fuck with someone, but it basically dug up my fears for that entire night. It was a really shitty feeling.

I hope you can calm down soon and get some rest. I can't imagine how scary that would be, especially with her still being out there, but I really hope that you're able to at least calm your nerves soon.

Phenomenal arc, albeit a bit slow at times.

I'll give this a bump, I suppose, in case anyone has any further input.

I'm thinking that I'll formally decline tomorrow, though I'm giving it some thought beforehand. It is a decent enough opportunity if it is legitimate, so part of me wants to keep going with it, but I'm just not getting the best feeling here. There are a few too many oddities, and it feels like it's a bit too good to be true.

SomeLikeItHoth posted...

TC are you the same dots from the LOST discussion topics back in the day?

Nope. Never seen Lost before.

SomeLikeItHoth posted...

Another thing you can do is post on your towns subreddit and see if anyone else in your area has been approached by them. Odds are you arent the only one. Just make sure you look through the comment history of anyone responding.

I looked around when I started getting bad vibes, but I couldn't find any discussion about them at all either way. If they are legit, they're very new. The only reference to them that I could find anywhere is their own site and their LinkedIn. No discussion on Reddit, no reviews or profiles anywhere else, nothing.

Alucard188 posted...

If you are feeling like this going into the interviews, I would probably skip them.

Probably.

This is the strangest feeling that I've gotten from a prospective job other than one other time, where I applied and immediately (like within minutes) got a text, and they were very eager to set things up. I got weird vibes then too, and I was able to find out that that one was indeed a scam, and that it was essentially a MLM racket posing as jobs in public relations, marketing, etc. You had to basically sell flimsy products on street corners with the only pay being commission, which wasn't what was advertised at all, according to people on Reddit. I quickly blocked off all contact.

I'm getting pretty similar vibes here, which is why I started really wondering.

Cleo_II posted...

Have they asked you any sensitive information like your SSN? Thats usually a tell. They may also try to get you to pay for your equipment or something similar with promise of reimbursement.

I havent been scammed but many scammers have posed as companies Ive worked for and they can get very sophisticated by copying an open position and pretending to be a recruiter from the company.

Even on the off chance this is a real company, it doesnt sound like the kind of company youd want to work for anyway.

Thankfully not. Honestly, I would have nope'd out immediately if they had. I definitely wouldn't give out any sensitive info like that.

And yeah, it's reasonable to just criticize the practices of the company even if they are legit. The entire thing seems very peculiar and gives me a pretty negative opinion of what they'd be like if I were to work for them. The fact that they seemed really surprised and put off that I had plans already on a Saturday when we hadn't discussed the second interview at all up to that point is a pretty shaky sign for what they might be like to work for.

Kakapo posted...

Yeah, also, theres a word for those rental offices.

Furnished offices, maybe? Ive known a few businesses to use them when theyve got a HQ somewhere and need satellite offices to use on demand, but my dad was always like dont trust a company that just used furnished offices.

Yeah, the offices didn't look great from what I did see in the photos. Not a deal breaker at all, but it is worth noting.

MabusIncarnate posted...

The entire thing gives me a weird vibe. Even if they are legit, if they interview, contact and hire that fast, either the job has a ton of turnover and the employees are a revolving door which is a bad sign, or its bogus. I'd say no, but that's just instinct and speculation.

Good points. The entire thing feels weird to me, and it's good to know that it's not just me getting odd vibes here.

I'll think it over some more, but I'm definitely leaning towards declining at this point.