LunaEndlessWitch
Fuck
2016
Honestly about still as good as I remember?
I feel like there's more to appreciate coming back to it now in a,, endearing way. It's like a collective playable synthwave album, down to how the attacks are basically a rhythm, but just jumbled around by bursts of twin stick sections and walking moments where you let the music play while a stupid pastiche narrates at you. And all of that is still really really fun to me. I'm enjoying the push and pull like normal, even if it's all rudimentary now that I've already beaten Furier and still have the muscle memory.
Which really surprised me, because I think that's the kind of opaque bullshit I would come back and go "wow this meant genuinely nothing, what the fuck did they think they were cooking?", but with all the environments and how the music sways it comes off more in the stoner sense where they THOUGHT they were being so interesting and deep but their eyes are staring blank straight through you lol. That's like the best way I can explain why it's fun to experience on a return.
It congeals together in such a way that I find myself unable to resent its very standard and now blatantly generic "phase" design. It's like yeah, I can get into it ^.=.^ I'm still banging my head to You're Mine, after all. Hilariously it makes me feel like I'm too harsh on Sekiro that This is the rhythm like action game I'm eating up today.
I feel like there's more to appreciate coming back to it now in a,, endearing way. It's like a collective playable synthwave album, down to how the attacks are basically a rhythm, but just jumbled around by bursts of twin stick sections and walking moments where you let the music play while a stupid pastiche narrates at you. And all of that is still really really fun to me. I'm enjoying the push and pull like normal, even if it's all rudimentary now that I've already beaten Furier and still have the muscle memory.
Which really surprised me, because I think that's the kind of opaque bullshit I would come back and go "wow this meant genuinely nothing, what the fuck did they think they were cooking?", but with all the environments and how the music sways it comes off more in the stoner sense where they THOUGHT they were being so interesting and deep but their eyes are staring blank straight through you lol. That's like the best way I can explain why it's fun to experience on a return.
It congeals together in such a way that I find myself unable to resent its very standard and now blatantly generic "phase" design. It's like yeah, I can get into it ^.=.^ I'm still banging my head to You're Mine, after all. Hilariously it makes me feel like I'm too harsh on Sekiro that This is the rhythm like action game I'm eating up today.
Sweet and Beautiful, warm and fuzzy, heartfelt and peaceful <3
Reminders and memories of the day to day we live by, and grow by ^w^ Nothing more and nothing less!!!
Reminders and memories of the day to day we live by, and grow by ^w^ Nothing more and nothing less!!!
2017
Kind of interesting how much the space of these years were really into the sort of Tron/FC3 Blood Dragon Cyberspace. I think it's kind of "fun" in the way any cotton candy town can be appealing and enjoyable. Now on replay it hurts my eyes every so often, almost intentionally with its awful and absolutely dire random tv-crt cuts.
And that sums up the experience, awful every so often in a disappointing way. When the overall work grabs you it can be genuinely incredible, with desyncing enemies and comboing sequences together to become an absolute fast-and-furious powerhouse that demolishes through tactile precision and great understandings of your gunplay fundamentals. Things like blowing up a stage bomb to turn a few slashing enemies into projectiles that you've conveniently pushed towards an increasingly large shuriken, getting a particular bonus you set up ahead of time, to then use the new speed to rocket up another set of enemies that you then laser point-blank underneath their hides for ANOTHER bonus.
And then the encounter is already over.
What?
Yeah, the game is honestly way too forgiving, way too easy. It's so afraid of throwing particular enemy combos at you or putting too much on you that even its second boss fight will go invulnerable and just stand there staring at you while you take care of a poultry wave first. The real meat is in its aberration challenges, but those kind of pull apart having your own "sandbox" to combo enemies in favor of a pre-determined affair. Which I do personally prefer, but it means that about 3/4 of whatever setup you do with the menuing means nothing if the weapons are different.
But, when you've accustomed to the game's own rhythm, they provide the closest Desync gets to pulling you apart in a very engaging way. When these hardmode levels take away your dash and force you to tactfully make your kills to get back HP before your meter runs out. When you're playing a weird game of "keep-away" with weapons that require getting at least a bit close to do proper damage, because the enemies now decided to explode on overkill. When you've got one hit to your name and a host of smaller enemies swarming on you and there's only ONE way you can stagger them to do damage in the first place.
It all helps that at the end of the day this is a very fun frictional shooter, with devs at a midway point where they don't give a shit what you think but also graft on a rpg-your-weapon modifications because that's a thing now. It's a team that lets you be able to make the final boss a multi-enemy one of your own volition and say "deal with it", and has the least accessibility for its nauseating interface. The moniker "adult swim games" has great meaning here, and that's pretty cool.
And that sums up the experience, awful every so often in a disappointing way. When the overall work grabs you it can be genuinely incredible, with desyncing enemies and comboing sequences together to become an absolute fast-and-furious powerhouse that demolishes through tactile precision and great understandings of your gunplay fundamentals. Things like blowing up a stage bomb to turn a few slashing enemies into projectiles that you've conveniently pushed towards an increasingly large shuriken, getting a particular bonus you set up ahead of time, to then use the new speed to rocket up another set of enemies that you then laser point-blank underneath their hides for ANOTHER bonus.
And then the encounter is already over.
What?
Yeah, the game is honestly way too forgiving, way too easy. It's so afraid of throwing particular enemy combos at you or putting too much on you that even its second boss fight will go invulnerable and just stand there staring at you while you take care of a poultry wave first. The real meat is in its aberration challenges, but those kind of pull apart having your own "sandbox" to combo enemies in favor of a pre-determined affair. Which I do personally prefer, but it means that about 3/4 of whatever setup you do with the menuing means nothing if the weapons are different.
But, when you've accustomed to the game's own rhythm, they provide the closest Desync gets to pulling you apart in a very engaging way. When these hardmode levels take away your dash and force you to tactfully make your kills to get back HP before your meter runs out. When you're playing a weird game of "keep-away" with weapons that require getting at least a bit close to do proper damage, because the enemies now decided to explode on overkill. When you've got one hit to your name and a host of smaller enemies swarming on you and there's only ONE way you can stagger them to do damage in the first place.
It all helps that at the end of the day this is a very fun frictional shooter, with devs at a midway point where they don't give a shit what you think but also graft on a rpg-your-weapon modifications because that's a thing now. It's a team that lets you be able to make the final boss a multi-enemy one of your own volition and say "deal with it", and has the least accessibility for its nauseating interface. The moniker "adult swim games" has great meaning here, and that's pretty cool.
The understandings that come between characters worlds apart, rendered blissfully through everyday life, from absurd to natural. Nasu's most interpersonal poignant work I feel, largely by nature of being invested in the day-to-day growth between its cast, reflecting on people throughout their days of steely clouds, fallen snow, and fairy tale amusement parks. Ever more blissfully held up by how Type Moon's characters are given such vibrancy, with each interaction always flowing off the page for me into a real group of multifaceted people ^/w/^
I will admit though, that I found myself wishing there was more to chew on than what's here. There's a crazy good juxtaposition between the changing architecture, the diametrically opposed functions of old and new, nostalgic and living-in-the-present, but it ends up becoming more cornerstones of the players of life rather than delved into thinkpieces. Which is largely the point, after all, as this is coming-of-age in its truest form. Everything is open, wide, and turning pages into a more difficult cityscape that demands resolution from you as you're just starting to figure out what you're looking for. And in that way the platitudes, the stories of making the most of your life, the ending divvying up of regrets you still have of the life you've led so far, all culminate together into something deeply fulfilling.
It's a wonderfully graceful work with all that. I'll really have to think on it a lot more as I leave it.
I will admit though, that I found myself wishing there was more to chew on than what's here. There's a crazy good juxtaposition between the changing architecture, the diametrically opposed functions of old and new, nostalgic and living-in-the-present, but it ends up becoming more cornerstones of the players of life rather than delved into thinkpieces. Which is largely the point, after all, as this is coming-of-age in its truest form. Everything is open, wide, and turning pages into a more difficult cityscape that demands resolution from you as you're just starting to figure out what you're looking for. And in that way the platitudes, the stories of making the most of your life, the ending divvying up of regrets you still have of the life you've led so far, all culminate together into something deeply fulfilling.
It's a wonderfully graceful work with all that. I'll really have to think on it a lot more as I leave it.
Genuinely the best feeling 3D platformer I've played innnnnn gotta be at least 5 years. It's, just, pouring out the seams with charm and earnest love, to the point where the polish feels homemade with its partly-crusty lining. Sometimes for woe though, of course, like when the geometry can ~occasionally~ disagree with your particular momentum and existence. Otherwise it feels as clean as it should be!
It has the makings of doing the Super Mario Odyssey flowchart of hat-tricking, but with detours and digressions from that linear track, encouraged both for score and conserving momentum. Sonic but not-quite-Sonic sprinklings on top, and that all flows together phenomenally. What's altogether more stunning though is it's the only work of its ilk that bothers to really have "level design." There's real guidance through its stages in a way that lets you go absolutely hogwild with its toolkit without ever being 'too open' or 'too constrained.' You can reasonably skip as much as you'd like to by mastering the speed of yo-yo tricks well enough, but there's always some things you Need to do. It's so super encouraging of going for the One-Combo 100% run through its stages, to the point where I actually went and did a few. I can't say a game like this has done that to me! It helps that the music is so bouncy and blissful, and stages never outstay their welcome to where the prospect of "you need to do this entire stage again" is a "absolutely hun let's do even better this time".
My only ~real~ issue is that the swinging and twirling, sadly, lacks enough bite, at least for me. I don't think there's a single stage or moment where the game challenged me, and this is AFTER doing every bonus stage. Sure I can do the one-combos and those can be difficult but with all the skips it's only really as hard as I let it be? Even though it's not uncharacteristic for such a clearly soft platformer, I find myself so unsatisfied with the lengths the game really went to, especially when the final boss was more of a wet fart than a real demonstration of the game's skills, or like, your performance as an artist!!! Give it an encore! A real spicy star road!
It has the makings of doing the Super Mario Odyssey flowchart of hat-tricking, but with detours and digressions from that linear track, encouraged both for score and conserving momentum. Sonic but not-quite-Sonic sprinklings on top, and that all flows together phenomenally. What's altogether more stunning though is it's the only work of its ilk that bothers to really have "level design." There's real guidance through its stages in a way that lets you go absolutely hogwild with its toolkit without ever being 'too open' or 'too constrained.' You can reasonably skip as much as you'd like to by mastering the speed of yo-yo tricks well enough, but there's always some things you Need to do. It's so super encouraging of going for the One-Combo 100% run through its stages, to the point where I actually went and did a few. I can't say a game like this has done that to me! It helps that the music is so bouncy and blissful, and stages never outstay their welcome to where the prospect of "you need to do this entire stage again" is a "absolutely hun let's do even better this time".
My only ~real~ issue is that the swinging and twirling, sadly, lacks enough bite, at least for me. I don't think there's a single stage or moment where the game challenged me, and this is AFTER doing every bonus stage. Sure I can do the one-combos and those can be difficult but with all the skips it's only really as hard as I let it be? Even though it's not uncharacteristic for such a clearly soft platformer, I find myself so unsatisfied with the lengths the game really went to, especially when the final boss was more of a wet fart than a real demonstration of the game's skills, or like, your performance as an artist!!! Give it an encore! A real spicy star road!
The makings of a full super duper lovely and cute hamtaro season congealed into one very wonderful ~metroidvania-esque~ package. It's really sweet <3 Lot of smiles, lot of wonderfully relaxing and cozy vibes while simply taking care of all the hamsters as you help them find love!!!
2014
Genuinely the most creative set of fps levels I've got to experience <3
The full characteristics of cyriak videos + old-doom level design philosophy congealed into a rocking-rollercoaster of an Office Experience. Smile on my face from start to finish, from just, incredible use of space and wonderful level gimmicks. Big shoutout to the one messing with past/future, titanfall 2 could never /s /s
If anything, my only 'real' issue is that there's a lot of jumps in terms of difficulty (although a lot of the later breathing room makes sense,, some of these maps hold nothing back), as it does always make me giggle when the Hardest challenge was Well Before the halfway point for me. Then again I do feel like just experiencing this pack front-to-back helped me buff out a lot of my amateur-ness with running these maps. I feel more equipped than ever to tackle stuff like Sunlust again.
If you have even the remote interest in trying out a Doom WAD, I think this is the best place to start, just so you can experience the true 9-5 workerman perspective.
The full characteristics of cyriak videos + old-doom level design philosophy congealed into a rocking-rollercoaster of an Office Experience. Smile on my face from start to finish, from just, incredible use of space and wonderful level gimmicks. Big shoutout to the one messing with past/future, titanfall 2 could never /s /s
If anything, my only 'real' issue is that there's a lot of jumps in terms of difficulty (although a lot of the later breathing room makes sense,, some of these maps hold nothing back), as it does always make me giggle when the Hardest challenge was Well Before the halfway point for me. Then again I do feel like just experiencing this pack front-to-back helped me buff out a lot of my amateur-ness with running these maps. I feel more equipped than ever to tackle stuff like Sunlust again.
If you have even the remote interest in trying out a Doom WAD, I think this is the best place to start, just so you can experience the true 9-5 workerman perspective.
2009
Masterclass in indulgence and responsible for too many things in my life.
This one's for all the real witches,,,
This one's for all the real witches,,,
2023
My kneejerk reaction is that l feel super weird about loving what is essentially an architectural achievement. I can't help but have, a sense of unease at a lot of the surroundings of this experience. The basic copypasta-like clearly House of Leaves-rip that doesn't really have much of a personal soul to it, and more the boxings of one, just rides on me (especially if the trauma part of that is actually real, which makes things even more complicated). Especially when it pulls memes and such of the internet to congeal here, and especially when I'm literally in an in-progress read of the book that leaves me too numb to feel the lovings of a homage without kind of scoffing at the quality attempt.
,,,on that same token though, it is a homage. A very carefully crafted one that manages to utilize its medium in ways that lift the ech-beginnings into something that emotionally feels haunting and winding. It's a very terrible reduction, but sometimes being a meticulous, loving director can help transcend a pretty shitty script. I really was terrified constantly. I found each exploration vast and visceral. Cheating (because this derg, is scared) doesn't even help when more often than not you get lost in ways that unnerve. Walking down the first long corridor and hitting ~The Labyrinth~ I immediately closed the WAD reflexively knowing there was a beast around the corner. I don't want to even talk about the dogs.
There's a big inner giddiness of "gosh I want to see more like this", a nerd-like love from experience looking at the ins-and-outs of WAD-making, feeling the rush when it's all demystified and going "gosh how did they do this??? Amazing!!" Sicker than suburbs have any real right to be. Manages to defy my usual personal distaste for the 'innovative' meta without a concrete narrative heart (e.g. Inscryption (sorry), Pony Island (not sorry), etc.).
,,,on that same token though, it is a homage. A very carefully crafted one that manages to utilize its medium in ways that lift the ech-beginnings into something that emotionally feels haunting and winding. It's a very terrible reduction, but sometimes being a meticulous, loving director can help transcend a pretty shitty script. I really was terrified constantly. I found each exploration vast and visceral. Cheating (because this derg, is scared) doesn't even help when more often than not you get lost in ways that unnerve. Walking down the first long corridor and hitting ~The Labyrinth~ I immediately closed the WAD reflexively knowing there was a beast around the corner. I don't want to even talk about the dogs.
There's a big inner giddiness of "gosh I want to see more like this", a nerd-like love from experience looking at the ins-and-outs of WAD-making, feeling the rush when it's all demystified and going "gosh how did they do this??? Amazing!!" Sicker than suburbs have any real right to be. Manages to defy my usual personal distaste for the 'innovative' meta without a concrete narrative heart (e.g. Inscryption (sorry), Pony Island (not sorry), etc.).
The cutest thing about this is making like 5+ something name replacements of Limewire-and-related stuff of the time for like 3 scenes, that I'm absolutely not going to give you the context for because I think exploring haunted libraries about your trauma is fun for everyone.
2017
"Please stop taking over my life."
"Aw but don't you want the full motion tracking for-"
"NO"
"Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to immerse yourself lying down and-"
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO"
"Just get that model too hun. You want it."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
"Aw but don't you want the full motion tracking for-"
"NO"
"Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to immerse yourself lying down and-"
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO"
"Just get that model too hun. You want it."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
2020
please free my SO she's 50 hours deep still in act 1 and keeps sharing snippits of wanting to fuck the vampire I can no longer reach her
2023
This review contains spoilers
I ended up stopping rather early because many things about it were starting to make me very uncomfortable over time. I was,, kind of enjoying myself I feel half the time. The lovely ~next gen~ presentation, a level of genuine aesthetic fidelity that actually gave power to how scenes evolved, rather than feeling fleeting or weightless. Combat for the most part kind of rode that roller coaster too, being technical and combo-y and rather fun to mash. It's not deep enough for me to personally come back, not as far as I got anyway, but the functions of it were kinesthetically lovely, and I liked to optimize where I could. Also the general vibe was making me really like,, two of the characters. Clive in particular, which I feel is probably obvious, as the narrative certainly favors him by design. But he feels really human, very much at odds with a sense of broken adolescence and vengenace and multiple levels of emotion he lets pull him and be earnest with. Side quests especially make that apparent, and those are all good I liked those!! They're fun and hammy and Worldbuilding and feel a kind of neatly alive in a way I like about 7R's sidequests but with just more of that flavor here (also especially the way Clive acts in response he's so cute).
There's also Cid, who's kind of just hot, but like, really really hot. His smoked-several-thousands-of-packs voice had me off my talons a little, you know? And there's that very YA ooo he's dealing with some demons in the dark but he's holding strong OOOO.
But, to dig down on something, 'favored by the narrative'. There is a stringent commonality on who is actually 'favored', at all times. The first time I felt rather taken aback is with Clive's mom, a scene where she is clearly disfavorable of him, and then further when the dad is not just keenly aware of that but practically works around the ~crazy uncaring figure~. And then WOW it turns out she's spoilers sleeping with him still for political gain and didn't really care about any of them. Oh and the other girl lead we've seen so far is sleeping with guys in a way she doesn't enjoy for political again. Oh and Jill is there in an explicitly subserviant role to the family, even if she is family. Oh and next time we see her she's in chains and smacked down to the ground before we free her. Oh and next time we see Benadiktra or whatever it becomes a thing that Cid knows about and she's soooo bad to herself and her body. Oh and there's more violence against women scene to scene. Oh it's NOT stopping??
Yeah it's gross I don't feel good about it. The further I went the less charity I had. The more time I spent away from it around like, chapter 6(?), the more I didn't feel good about myself and what this game might be for. It's not like I couldn't push aside some of this stuff and jive with the dudesss rock a little,,
So I sat through the whole story on youtube because I wasn't planning on spending too many hours on it, just needed peace of mind. Like maybe it gets better? Maybe what I feel is just some negative nanny while everyone else is enjoying themselves! Not the first time it's happened really.
I got to the Garuda scene and promptly lost what remained of good will. Almost closed it out but kept going just to see where it ends.
I shelve it now instead of dropping because I know, I love final fantasy too fucking much. Maybe I'll read someone's thing that opens up a whole new door for me for it, or something. But until that time comes I detest this shit. God awful FF. Do NOT go down the rabbit hole further trying to justify the development somewhere (this lead writer made Heavensward?? What the fuck happened??), you might find out shit like this https://twitter.com/aitaikimochi/status/1688248192968912896?s=20
There's also Cid, who's kind of just hot, but like, really really hot. His smoked-several-thousands-of-packs voice had me off my talons a little, you know? And there's that very YA ooo he's dealing with some demons in the dark but he's holding strong OOOO.
But, to dig down on something, 'favored by the narrative'. There is a stringent commonality on who is actually 'favored', at all times. The first time I felt rather taken aback is with Clive's mom, a scene where she is clearly disfavorable of him, and then further when the dad is not just keenly aware of that but practically works around the ~crazy uncaring figure~. And then WOW it turns out she's spoilers sleeping with him still for political gain and didn't really care about any of them. Oh and the other girl lead we've seen so far is sleeping with guys in a way she doesn't enjoy for political again. Oh and Jill is there in an explicitly subserviant role to the family, even if she is family. Oh and next time we see her she's in chains and smacked down to the ground before we free her. Oh and next time we see Benadiktra or whatever it becomes a thing that Cid knows about and she's soooo bad to herself and her body. Oh and there's more violence against women scene to scene. Oh it's NOT stopping??
Yeah it's gross I don't feel good about it. The further I went the less charity I had. The more time I spent away from it around like, chapter 6(?), the more I didn't feel good about myself and what this game might be for. It's not like I couldn't push aside some of this stuff and jive with the dudesss rock a little,,
So I sat through the whole story on youtube because I wasn't planning on spending too many hours on it, just needed peace of mind. Like maybe it gets better? Maybe what I feel is just some negative nanny while everyone else is enjoying themselves! Not the first time it's happened really.
I got to the Garuda scene and promptly lost what remained of good will. Almost closed it out but kept going just to see where it ends.
I shelve it now instead of dropping because I know, I love final fantasy too fucking much. Maybe I'll read someone's thing that opens up a whole new door for me for it, or something. But until that time comes I detest this shit. God awful FF. Do NOT go down the rabbit hole further trying to justify the development somewhere (this lead writer made Heavensward?? What the fuck happened??), you might find out shit like this https://twitter.com/aitaikimochi/status/1688248192968912896?s=20
2001
Too kaizo for me but I MUST respect it. Was a blast to go back and play this after growing up on super monkey ball 2 for ages. Definitely one of the “tightest” platformers to exist, and I enjoy some of the proto versions of minigames here that I’m far more familiar with the sequel for ^w^
I did manage to clear Expert but I’m NOT 1cc’ing that holy shit
I did manage to clear Expert but I’m NOT 1cc’ing that holy shit