Bird Summoning Circle

Weird bird who writes code for a living. They/Them/It. Sometimes paints.

[merlinbird]

Hmm I’ve gotten a few new follows recently for some reason (*looking at twitter*) so I think it may be time for a quick intro post, since I have nothing like that here...

I’m Merlin. If we’ve met elsewhere before, you may remember me as (in order of most recent to “oh god did you really meet me 15+ years ago??”) Daps, Adapa, or Nil. My pronouns are they/them and I’m 34 years old. I’ve been using Tumblr since 2010, though most of it wasn’t under this account. I’m kind of a hermit and enjoy following few blogs and keeping my dash quiet and manageable.

I work in software development, and I enjoy game dev and drawing in my spare time. I haven’t released any games to speak of, but I like to build game design tools and the project I’m proudest of so far is probably qurobullet. I’m also a furry so art-wise you can expect mostly creatures of various kinds.

This blog is currently a mishmash of reblogs, my art, sometimes personal posts and other stuff. Badly tagged. Excessively loquaciously tagged, maybe, but never consistently enough to be searchable. Maybe I’ll reorganize sometime.

[squidinu]

Parsnip the librarian’s light character redesign

[dark-spirit-tamamoland]

they're still terming random transfems as i type this i see which does make quite a statement doing this today specifically

[puppetstuffing]

watched three girls who reblogged its new blog mutual aidpost (made literally 15 minutes ago) already disappear from its notifs. transfems are not included in their pride :/

[puppetedlove]

:)

[puppetvictim]

:)

[tamamowand]

QUITE the statement to be nuking transfems at the current accelerated pace right at the start of pride month like this, isn't it

[viralfrog]

[original-character-chaos]

[7777777awawawa7777777]

cis men are doing forcemasc self hypnosis every day

[7777777awawawa7777777]

cis men know that it’s possible to be amab and not a man and it’s their biggest fear

[isuggestforcefem]

I’m coming for them.

[missstrogen]

I still am

[goodgirl-inc]

[goodgirl-inc]

nevermind post cancelled he's dead again

[zeitghost]

[parkchanwoohoo]

[oneheadtoanother]

idk anything about this but I love it

[lynati]

If any competition needed to be on Tumblr, it's this one.

[scarlettohairdye]

Zelda puzzle training simulator

[snippit-crickit]

fox thingy?? fox thingy,,

[squidsmeister]

STOP! have YOU been affected by the delicious food and drink of dorohedoro that you don’t have? you may be entitled to financial compensation

[bisonwares]

Showing off the Arapaima I made! (Pattern also made by me)

This was the test of the new pattern and I love her. 🎏💕

[somacruz]

Best thing I ever saw

[somacruz]

An ancient letter G is my pet and it has a fever in its big eye

[pariambod]

(thanks (@)noufelow for translate help!)

[gumy-shark]

when you reblog a post because you think a specific mutual would enjoy it and then they reblog it from you

[bambicest]

some people really do need to start reminding themselves that the answer to "why didn't the character just do [something entirely different]" is often simply "because then there wouldn't be a story"

[clowngirlpony]

aaaaaa she's eating a burger lol

[merlinbird]

it's kinda funny to look back on Monster Hunter Wilds... monhun is one of my favourite series ever and i was SO excited for its release, but when it came out i just kinda played through the campaign with Rowan and put it down and haven't looked back at it since

at first i thought it was just bc it didn't have G rank stuff, bc that's where i tend to sink all my time in other monhun games... but then i recently saw a clip of the gameplay again and it hit me

it's the wound mechanic that killed it for me.

basically, starting in Wilds, if you hit a monster a bunch in the same spot, it'll get a "wound" there, and every weapon type has a unique special ultra-damaging move you can use on it when it appears. it was a fun new idea and it actually feels really good to do... but that ends up being exactly the problem.

it's such an exciting and powerful attack that you're basically always gonna go for it. there's never a reason not to, and they can happen incredibly frequently. it changes monsters from feeling like living creatures you're in a life or death struggle with into more like treat dispensers. everyone's just waiting for wounds to appear so they can capitalize on them and don't really have to think about their attacking strategy much more than that

having started in the MH3 era, it's unfortunately just the pattern the games have followed since then. I've watched a really weird, interesting, and very niche experience slowly get sanded down into a flatter, more cinematic, mass-market-appealing product. armor pieces no longer have downsides attached to them, so it's very easy to get builds that feel superpowered (even moreso than your usual hunter lol). you can freely swap out your equipment and inventory during a hunt now, so it feels less like you're going on an expedition that needs careful preparation and more like you're playing in your back yard and can run back inside at any time if you forgot something. all attacks have damage numbers now, so you always know exactly when and where your attacks are and aren't effective, rather than having to intuit effectiveness from things like if your attacks break a part or stagger the monster.

idk where I'm really going with this. but i guess it just kinda feels bad to see the series pursue better cinematics and high-fidelity visuals and sound in the pursuit of realism while simultaneously making the gameplay experience feel less real, more "video game-y" and simplifying the way you interact with everything. i got into it in the wii era despite it being awkward to play back then because all those weird awkward things and unusual game design choices worked together in a way that paradoxically made the game world feel weirdly grounded, natural, and coherent. and now it's much easier to get into but there's just not as much texture there for me to enjoy anymore