/ot/ - Off-Topic

>>13182
It felt like people were trying hard to overcorrect and celebrate a 'return to form' in Echoes after giving Awakening and Fates so much flack. I enjoyed all three games, but I really miss the GBA era's designs and gameplay in particular. They felt like a good middle ground compared to what we have now. After the Edelgard discourse in 3H, I tried to stop discussing the series with randoms.

Related, I posted a long time ago about doing a FE9 run and I did end up finishing it after months of procrastination. Tormod and Mia ended up being my strongest carries outside of Ike, and I had a lot of fun using units I don't usually touch.

>>13183
I haven't really played the GBA games all that much but maybe someday I will. I started FE7 during the pandemic and got a bit bored, then tried FE8 but it turned out the second hand copy I had was a cheap copy that didn't work very well and I never finished Eirika's route. I don't feel like emulating anything, maybe I'll check if I can get a legit copy of FE8 that doesn't cost an arm and a leg because I enjoyed it.

>>13186
Both are included in Nintendo Online if you happen to have a Switch and don't want to drop $70 on a cartridge.

>>13190
I thought it was only for the Switch 2. I'll look into it. I already checked if my FE7 cartridge is legit and it is, I never had any issue with it so I can replay it with my DS Lite anytime.

I actually went and ordered a legit copy of FE Sacred Stones online for a bit more than 50€ because I'm dumb like that I guess. It's not like I'm going to spend money on video games anytime soon though.

>>13243
I respect your decision. Lately my own game purchasing vs piracy decisions have just come down to convenience. I'll pirate DS and GBA games, and probably 3DS games too if they're rare enough, because I find it easy to put them on my modded 3DS but I try to buy reasonably-priced older console games physically cause I can't be assed to download and set up new emulators for them. There's a certain rare gamecube game listing that I've been eyeing because it's missing a booklet and therefore it's cheaper than complete editions but it's still expensive enough that it's outside of my budget right now.

>>13245
>Lately my own game purchasing vs piracy decisions have just come down to convenience
I totally get it. I don't think I ever pirated games before, besides one time when someone gave me an R4 cartridge with too many games so some of them barely worked and some Sonic Advance romhacks when I was in middle school. I usually really care about having physical copies but after too many cases of games I bought for relatively cheap but disliked or found boring I stopped doing that. And don't even get me started on Fatlus games during the 3DS era in Europe. I'm still seething to this day because of what they did with SMT4. Getting second hand copies of older games is a major pain in the ass nowadays because of scalpers and graded games, I will never judge anyone who pirate games to play them.

>>13247
Retro prices are what mainly stop me from completing my RL collection at this point. I've been fortunate that I was able to keep most of the games I bought over my life so I have a bunch of stuff worth a couple hundred each, but nowadays I just emulate what I feel like playing if it isn't under $60.

>>13243
I hope you enjoy Sacred Stones this time, nonnie! Did you have any units you like?

Trying to get into Homiciper since Scarletella is cute. The game has a cool concept and is making me feel stupid since I can't figure out what half the words are.

If there aren't fanfics of the Doctor fucking the head I revolt.

I'm hesitating between asking anons if they want to play online on the Switch, especially to trade pokemon and to visit each other's islands on ACNH and not doing it because I use my real name for the playable characters…

>>13713
Can’t you change your name?

>>13715
No, unfortunately.

>>13713
To ease your fear a bit, a 'real' name in a game doesn't mean someone will automatically assume it's yours without you telling them. I use a different name than my own for most of my player characters, but both are common among girls in my generation.

I'd make more sure you haven't posted your island code or trainer ID elsewhere on the internet where you might have other more identifiable personal information (ie reddit, tumblr). That sort of thing is much easier for someone to look for.

>>13717
>I'd make more sure you haven't posted your island code or trainer ID elsewhere on the internet where you might have other more identifiable personal information (ie reddit, tumblr).
I already posted some of the outfits I made on twitter and I often post screenshots/progress in my games on twitter as well on top of more personal things. I don't have a lot of followers but I'd rather not take that risk. Especially when I managed to find a lot of people I know on twitter just because one of them posted a link to his small business account on fb and followed his friend who was dumb enough to use a selfie as his pfp.

Pokemon champions may be an excuse for me to get more into competitive pokemon. It's too bad that it has microtransaction battlepass slop built into it but generally speaking the game feels smooth and quick to play. On some level I feel like if I was really serious I would've been grinding the ladder on showdown years ago but it's less intimidating to start on a platform that's flooded with newbies anyway.
>>13722
I know that feeling. I don't post my face or IRL info on my main social media platforms and I'm by no means popular online but I still feel paranoid about someone finding out I post here.

>>13722
I really don't understand why you guys still use sns platforms for anything that isn't silently following artists. There's no one even worth talking to on those sites for you to be broadcasting all your info there

>>13732
I follow artists but also use twitter to keep up with releases for new video games and manga/anime without interacting directly with people, and to check information about conventions and which artists will go there, at least at first. I also wanted to post my video game progress on twitter as soon as I got my Switch because the feature to post directly on twitter with the Switch was still there at the time, my backlog of games was getting out of control and I saw people posting about ACNH and wanted inspiration from their islands and houses, I thought why not? But I made a few mutuals along the way who are into BL and the same books and games I enjoy and when I'm very bored I post a lot more, which is usually when I'm stuck outside or at my job. I post way less when I have way more free time because I keep myself busy with better things to do. By the way, some Japanese artists are paranoid and will assume the worst if you don't actually use twitter yourself and only like and/or retweet things, especially the ones with locked account who accept anybody who's over 18 years old, so posting from time to time actually helped following more artists.

As to why twitter and not another platform, on top of the Asian fandoms staying on twitter after a shit ton of Japanese and Korean artists and fans fled tumblr around 2016/2017, it's like I said, because I could easily post screenshots on the Switch. I know how to transfer them to my phone now but it didn't work the first time I tried because of internet problems with my previous phone. It's very dumb, I know.

>>13732
>There's no one even worth talking to on those sites for you to be broadcasting all your info there
They exist in theory, but in practice it's a major pain in the ass to find random cool people to follow, especially with a certain someone buying twitter and ruining it for everyone the past few years. New rules means a lot of regular normal people who post a lot about normal topics or fan stuff are treated as bots and banned while actual bots have more views than ever. At least I never post personal info that could get me doxed and even removed lots of pictures of my recent trips overseas just in case.

So Final fantasy 14's free trial now includes Shadowbringers, my favourite expansion in the game, so I'd like to give it a shoutout. I can't say anything substantial about the ShB story content without spoilers but I enjoy the way it depicts the theme of still finding hope amidst extreme hardship. Earlier expansion stories have themes such as corruption in the church affecting a whole nation and how younger generations deal with growing up in a colonized country. On a lighter note, throughout the whole game I can actually count five male characters who are captivated by (you) in some form or another. Instead of treating it like a yume thing you can just make your player character an OC to ship with your favourite male NPC or use the canon MC design to treat it like a Persona/Pokemon MC situation. The NPC/NPC BL ships that I'm personally interested in are in the expansions you still need to pay for so I can't actually use those as advertising for the free trial. While this game is an MMO the devs have taken steps to make it solo friendly by adding NPC party members for battle content that's required for story progress. You can play with mouse and keyboard but it also has controller support.

>>13983
>not doing the (new) meme pitch
Would be good for the general fandom to get more fujos. I was big on Asahi/Zenos but apparently no one but 10 people care. I know it's one sided. That is the point. I want messy toxic yaoi.

After a long break from video games because of work and then a trip overseas to visit relatives, I'm trying more PC games and will try to beat most of them before september, including some otome and BL visual novels. Some of them are longer than others so I started Stardew Valley and… what's the point of it? I'm very familiar with Animal Crossing, a lot less with Story of Seasons/Harvest Moon, so maybe that's because I'm biased but so far I think I just need to clean up my farm and talk to people in the village little by little until something happens? I will play it little by little, I don't feel like playing it for hours in a row to unlock as many things as possible. If I end up disappointed I will just move on to another game.

I'm also hesitating between starting Idol Manager which I bought years ago and UuultraC. UuultraC seems like the shortest one between these two according to vndb so I can see myself reading it all weekend long maybe.

>>13991
>a lot less with Story of Seasons/Harvest Moon
That's your problem. Stardew is directly inspired by those games. It's a farming and social sim so the main objective is to socialise and get married and to grow crops, forage for items and upgrade your farm. Though for Star dew specifically you find a place that asks you to collect and turn in specific items as a general goal to work towards like a main story quest.

>>13992
>Though for Star dew specifically you find a place that asks you to collect and turn in specific items as a general goal to work towards like a main story quest.
That's going to make the game easier to play then. I felt clueless as soon as the game started because there's so much freedom 5 minutes after the game starts. I'll see what it's like by playing it from time to time for a week or two and then I'll see if I want to put it aside for later.

By the way, I started Idol Manager just now so I guess I'll play both games at the same time. I'm really bad at Idol Manager because I misclicked on something once, which made me accidentally buy something really expensive and now my character has a massive debt kek.

Any other nonnas been playing Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream? I love the customization options and the fact miis can be gay now, but I wish there was an option to share miis, plus I wish features like the Concert Hall and Quirky Questions from the 3DS version were brought over.

>>14030
I haven't since those kinds of games struggle to hold my attention long-term, but I just want to say those Miis looks great! Did you make them yourself? You got Vox's mouth exactly right.

>>14036
Thank you! And yes, I did! I'm glad you like them, I'm not super skilled when it comes to art (which is why I was disappointed when I discovered mii sharing wasn't allowed) but I still like how my Vox came out.

>>14036
Same here. With simslikes it's fun to see people's screenshots and clips of wacky stuff happening and I'm impressed by the high quality custom miis but I think that on my own I'd get bored. It's like how I enjoyed Pokopia right until I beat the story because afterwards I had to make my own fun and I don't have the patience to make complex builds.

>>14030
I absolutely hate games like this, but after watching some friends play over stream, I bit the bullet and bought it. Honestly, I'm really enjoying it so far. I have about 45 hours on it, and I'm only just now starting to get a little bored (meanwhile some friends have like 100+ hours?!). I get overwhelmed managing too many Miis, so I think that's my problem wrt boredom + some of the scenes are repetitive imo. But seeing my OTP interact is worth it.

RPG Maker Forum shutting down:
https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/threads/welcome-to-rpg-maker-guild.183984

>>14171
This makes me so sad. I am not as into RPG Maker games as I once was (and I never developed any games), but it's just kind of depressing how niche forums are slowly being overridden in favor of large, centralized hubs. I know this change has something to do with the business side, but it's still so sad.

Months after talking about it, I'm very close to finishing Unicorn Overlord. It's a fun, easy game, pretty long with plenty of side quests, so now I'm trying to complete as many side quests as possible before the last maps to get stronger weapons and accessories. The story is simple, it feels like an excuse to have battles more than anything. That also means there's barely any fujobait in there. The closest thing to it are two male characters who show up so late in the game we don't see them and their relationship all that much, but they were given the same Japanese voice actors as the canon gay pairing from 13 Sentinels Aegis Rim by the same studio. They look good so I guess there's that. There's a "marriage" mechanic that's important to the plot, you eventually have to give a ring to any of the playable character but from what I've heard it seems the main character and the other guys just friendzone each other unless there are exceptions I don't know about yet. I still recommend it, but I'm warning you.

I'm not sure what to play next, because I have too many options and a few games I already started or should have started earlier. So far it's either
>finish more routes in the first Hakuoki VN and maybe read the second VN
>finish Zelda OOT which I barely started and put aside to beat Unicorn Overlord
>start Raidou Kuzunoha remaster because I started the tutorial of the original game like 10 years ago and my PS2 stopped working
>either play Yuppie Psycho, Heartbeat because I bought them on Steam soon before the pandemic and never tried them

>>14192
Which version of OoT do you have? There's a bunch of options to play it these days so I'm curious. Hell, soon there will be a whole new option as well.

>>14193
I have it on the 3DS and that's a physical copy I got for cheap nearly 10 years ago when I was a broke student. It still works very well. So far I played for like 2 or 3 hours a few months ago and beat one boss and I was about to start exploring the dungeon with the rock people before I took a long break. I saw the trailer for the next remake but honestly the timing is pretty bad, I don't plan on getting a Switch 2 in the first place but on top of that my reaction to it was "damn I need to finish the game faster" kek

I liked F.E.A.R. 1 from what I played however the game crashed for me bc it's unstable af on modern systems. Tried it again later but too lazy to continue. I like the hardest difficulty in spite of being noob

>>14194
Yeah I get it. I owned a copy of Wind waker that came with the OoT master quest bonus disc so I played it through there but if I ever want to revisit the game I think I'd rather get the 3DS version myself. I like how it emulates the game's official art while the new remake teaser turns me off because I get uncanny vibes from it.

>>14196
imo the 3DS remake looks pretty good. I'll confirm this once I'm far enough into the game though. As for Wind Waker I only learned some copies included OOT very recently. I'm not a huge Zelda fan, I only played the beginning of Wind Waker long ago several times because I had to share one memory card with all my siblings and we were all deleting each other's saves after arguments kek. Once I get the gamecube back from the sibling who borrowed it last maybe I'll play it again.

lowkey tired of exaggerated hype. a mutual of mine only played the two most recent Resident Evil games yet they say the series has never been better. What surprises me is that she's a huge Fire Emblem fan who's played pretty much the entire series and can be very particular about who she considers a Fire Emblem fan. I've only played Three Houses, and I wouldn't make broad claims about whether Fire Emblem has never been better. idk

>>14201
TBH it makes sense, if you haven't played the entire franchise of course you're going to claim the ones you have played are "the best ones" I get annoyed when people do the same thing with BOTW or P5, like yeah of course the more popular ones are going to be called "the best" even though the people saying it clearly haven't dipped their toes in the rest of the franchise.

idk, it's super annoying, and I think unfairly affects my perception of the games that get subject to what I consider overhype.

Anyone else play the newest Deltarune chapter?

>>14229
Haven't played the new chapter yet but I'm starting the game from the very beginning. The game is much funnier than what I remember and I'm glad I can appreciate the humour now that I'm fully grown (I can't believe the game came out while I was still in highschool….)

>>14229
I'm playing it all for the first time. It's fun but I kind of have choice paralysis because I know there's so much missable stuff. For all the fandom osmosis and spoilers-without-context I've seen over the years I'm surprised at how much is actually new to me.

>>14241
If it helps there are only two main "routes". no matter which one you pick the conclusion will always be the same at the end of each chapter, the only thing thats different is the story's pacing. It's recommended you do the normal route first before trying the "weird route" because the weird route shortens the game significantly, causing you to miss out on a lot of story and dialogue. The game has the benefit of having multiple save files so youre able to have one file dedicated to normal and one for weird route. If youre worried about easter eggs/hidden dialogue I'd recommend a video compilation for it instead because its more tedious to backtrack to see completely optional flavour text

>>14242
> no matter which one you pick the conclusion will always be the same at the end of each chapter
NTA but I remember hearing before there was an alt route and I was confused on how that would actually work in an episodic game. Makes sense.

Another reason to despise live action. Nobody's asked for this.
https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/persona-live-action-tv-series-netflix-1236798581
>‘Persona’ Live-Action TV Adaptation in the Works at Netflix, 21 Laps & Story Kitchen to Produce (EXCLUSIVE)
>Christopher Monfette is attached to write the adaptation in addition to serving as executive producer and showrunner. Shawn Levy, Dan Levine, and Robert Atwood of 21 Laps will also executive produce along with Dmitri M. Johnson, Michael Lawrence Goldberg, and Timothy I. Stevenson via Story Kitchen. Toru Nakahara of SEGA will executive produce as well. Emily Feher is overseeing the project for 21 Laps, with the company currently under an overall TV deal with Netflix.

>>14245
I say this a lot when these types of adaptations are announced but here in particular I have no idea who the target demographic is supposed to be. These are usually for normies who don't like cartoons but I've seen two different normie-leaning gamers drop the game cause they think the teacher social link is creepy. It gives me the impression that normies are repelled by persona just by default.

>>14245
>I have to hear the news about the persona live action even on here too
Please I'm already suffering enough

>>14246
There is quite frankly no target demographic. The intention is to expand the IP, no matter what. Make people interested, keep people talking. Despite the DMC adaptation being absolute dogwater, or maybe in spite of it, it did increase sales of DMC since it got people interested.
This is definitely 100% a SEGA decision because they saw success with the sonic movies and they also made Yakuza live action once (which was shit anyway). They want to hold on to persona with their dying breath, even more so to p5. Unfortunately, Persona is kinda perfect for a Netflix catastrophe because any exec can go "oh yeah, teenage kids with powers that fight against society or whatever right?" and do exactly what everyone has been dreading for Persona straight away. Set in America, adults, fill it with gays and blacks and browns, maybe even trannies too, add some tacky political message because persona started at 5 and so on.

>>14245
Despite all the articles on this using P5 images I noticed they haven't actually announced they're adapting a specific game, I wonder if they'll do something original and just slap the Persona IP on it.

>>14229
I just did and I had a lot of fun, the new characters are all mega charismatic. Sad that my OTP, Pizzapants x Blue Ears is now dead in the water but the amount of yaoi bait with Blue and Yellow made up for it kek

>>14250
That Burgerpant/NiceCream might continue next chapter. I believe.

I liked most of the flowers this chapter, though I think my favorite pairing to come from it is Asgore/Flowery.

Fuck Sony.
>Sony to end physical PlayStation game disc production in 2028
>Sony announced Wednesday that it will stop producing physical discs for all new PlayStation games starting in January 2028, marking a move into an all-digital future. After that, every new release will be sold digitally through the PlayStation Store and other retailers. Games released before the cutoff will continue to be available on disc.
>Additionally, Sony revealed on Wednesday that it’s shutting down the PlayStation Store on the PlayStation 3 in select markets later this year, followed by global closures of the PS3 and PlayStation Vita stores next year.
>Once those stores close, players won’t be able to purchase new digital content on those systems. Sony said previously purchased games and content will still be available to download for the foreseeable future.
https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/01/sony-to-end-physical-playstation-game-discs-in-2028/

Over 50% of Japanese game companies use AI in development, according to Tokyo Game Show organizer
>Japan’s Computer Entertainment Supplier’s Association (CESA), the organization running Tokyo Game Show, released a preview of the “2025 CESA Video Game Industry Report” on September 25. As reported by The Nikkei, the research includes insights into how much domestic companies are using AI and generative AI.
>Based on responses from 54 Japanese game companies collected between June and July 2025, about 51% use generative AI in game development. The most commonly cited use of AI was in the generation of visual assets and images such as characters, followed by story and text generation; and lastly programming support. Reportedly, 32% of game companies are enlisting the help of AI to develop in-house game engines. The survey sample is made up of CESA’s member companies, which range from big players like Capcom and Sega to mid-sized and indie-scale developers.
>Several Japanese developers have been open about their use (or plans to use) generative AI. Professor Layton and Yo-Kai Watch developer Level-5 is one such example – back in 2023, they detailed their use of Stable Diffusion for upscaling assets, generating reference images for artists and creating parts of in-game backgrounds; as well as the use of Github Copilot for coding assistance.
>Capcom’s technical department has also been experimenting with generative AI models like Gemini Pro, Gemini Flash and Imagen, mostly for the purpose of brainstorming and prototyping background assets needed to fill out in-game environments (like TVs and similar objects). Their technical director considers this a potential way to free up developers’ time and resources, thus leading to higher quality games.
https://automaton-media.com/en/news/over-50-of-japanese-game-companies-use-ai-in-development-according-to-tokyo-game-show-organizer