It's been a year since i finished The House in Fata Morgana and still to this day i regarded it as one of the greatest story ever written. From story development and unique characters and settings that are set in 3 time periods, with interconnected characters and stories to using modern Japanese with a little 'flavor' of language from ancient times, which makes The House in Fata Morgana adapted to the current era. All of that provides a tense, sad atmosphere and at the same time a bit of comedy. However, the story in Fata Morgana is available in 7 Bad Endings and 1 True Ending, where the true ending of this visual novel gave me a cool breeze for my heart which has been holding back emotions since the story began.

The House in Fata Morgana has 8 different stories to tell throughout the entire story or what they call them "door". The story is set in one main setting, an old mansion which has a dark history starting from the persecution of a girl known as a 'witch' to the story of the protagonist 'you' and the maid welcomes you, sees your condition, and offers to give you a tour, which she hopes will help you jog your memory. Each room leads to you viewing various memories of past events that have taken place there. These memories are quite memorable, and set the stage for future revelations, even if it’s quite subtle in how it does it.

The first story tells the story of a brother and sister who live peacefully and freely with their family, until a mysterious white-haired and red-eyed girl comes to become a servant for the family.

The second story is probably the darkest part in this story for me, it tells of a 'monster' known as a sadistic murderer who lives in the big old house and a girl who is the same as the first story but in a different form enters the mysterious house. This story is extremely gruesome and graphic. Is it not for the faint of heart and I felt a little sick reading it at times.

The third story tells a wealthy businessman and his estranged relationship with his wife and the story behind that estranged relationship. It’s an incredibly moving story that shows how even the very best and self-sacrificing people have limits, and everyone will eventually break.

And from the fourth door to the last door or the eighth door becomes the main story which will discuss the past of the 'witch' who haunt the mansion, the servant girl, and the main character 'you', as well as their relationship with the three stories in the initial opening.

All of these stories have incredibly tragic ends, that could have been avoided with some other decision be it better communication, honesty, or repentance. But they serve to introduce characters that have a long-lasting effect on the overarching narrative, as well as establish the relevance of the mansion and its curse. Describing even a word past chapter three or door three leads too far down spoiler territory to say any more so i won't go deep into that.

There is quite a bit of foreshadowing as you expect from mystery genre like other titles, in even the simplest of events, and the story takes the time it needs to expound on each character, story, and theme. And that what makes The House in Fata Morgana's storytelling excellent.

Then you add another fantastic element on top of the writing which is the music because holy macaroonis they ain't lying when they said you have to experience it with headphone in the loading screen. Each character, scene, and mood is properly represented with a theme, that is sometimes really eerie with noises and sound effects, other times a moody piano, and often with simply incredible female vocals like the soundtracks 'Giselle' and 'Cicio'. The words are all in an ancient dialect of Portuguese, and sound very Latin and mysterious. Some of the songs will make your hair stand up, while others sound nearly reverent.

What i learn from The House in Fata Morgana is that wherever and whenever a person are there are people who will love and care for them until they wait for us to return and be by their side, revenge is not a good thing but you have to let go of it and move forward in a better direction. Life is a difficult thing where sometimes we encounter bad things and even tragedy, but behind it all there is a beautiful story.

All in all, The House in Fata Morgana is one of those tales that is incredibly well written, mature, dark, and bloody that explore the deepest, darkest depths of depravity in the human soul. Even though at first I was not used to the realist images of this visual novel, in the end I realized that the realist images and the choice not to use voice actors for each character were so that players could enjoy the story, and for me personally this visual novel has parts that can answer questions in life. An unrushed story with the characters each having their own reasons and backstories that portrayed what is sacrificial love looks like.

I went into the Vtuber rabbit hole back in 2019 and of course it was Hololive that introduced me to the world of Vtubing. So when a fan-made game of Hololive based on Vampire Survivors (i haven't play it and i might soon) called Holocure released i was really shocked and hype to try it out. It was fun, chaotic and addicting more than anything else.

Two things that made me appreciate this game every time i play it, the first one is that it has a gacha system for the characters but it won't cost you any payment instead the characters are unlocked by collecting coins in the game and then spending them a thousand at a time on an in-game gacha mechanic. Yu, the developer is keen to emphasise that the gacha is purely in-game currency and does not involve any sort of monetisation, you just need to play the game a few times to unlock the additional characters.

Second and this might be the best thing about Holocure is that you don't need to know anything whatsoever about Hololive to appreciate it. If you have never explored VTuber culture at all, the game’s intro sequence provides a brief bit of context, and from there the playable characters can all simply be seen as cute girls with unique abilities. At the other end of the spectrum, however, if you are deeply immersed into VTuber culture and Hololive culture specifically then the game is absolutely rammed full of references and in-jokes that will continually delight your experience.