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[sonic7ischaos]

Having only played up to Halo 4, been trying to think of what I would've done to follow up the Bungie games if I was left to follow up Halo 3.

Story wise, I think it was ABSOLUTELY the correct decision to follow up the wider narrative about Humanity struggling against impossible odds and escaping the religious indoctrination of the Covenant by the Elites with a smaller, more personal narrative about Chief and Cortana's relationship, though I'd have probably made that narrative cover the entire second trilogy of games ending with Cortana's death and sacrifice at the end of 4 in 5 or Infinite (or 6 since this is a different timeline). I think the whole trilogy would have Cortana just beginning to show signs of rampancy in 4, ending with her separating from Chief at the end and beginning to go fully mad, leading into 5 where she's both an ally and the antagonist of that game as she struggles to help you from afar like in Halo 3 against her worst, most authoritarian impulses, ending with Infinite where Chief is assigned her replacement, "the weapon" (haven't played Infinite, but I know a little about her) or whatever it'd wind up being, and she's confronted with her worst fears expressed in Halo 4 becoming real eventually realizing what she's done and solemnly, symbolically handing over the torch to her replacement, saying goodbye to Chief and signalling her approval of the next Cortana, assuaging her fears and insecurities about living up to her predecessor.

Basically NONE of the Forerunner stuff happens at all. Specifically the reveal of them being a different species than humanity. I'm not as hung up on this bit as a lot of Halo fans, and I actually do like a lot of the lore surrounding them in and of itself for what it is, but c'mon. The Bungie games said what they said, Guilty Spark said what he said, even if we ignore that as direct confirmation that ancient humanity WERE the Forerunners, they're a lot cooler a presence in Halo if that is left to implication rather than exploring it in such exhaustive detail. Mystery, like with horror, is what makes ancient majesty so powerful a feeling.

In terms of gameplay, and story to some extent, I don't mind the Prometheans (in principle). I mean, there's nothing about them that CAN'T work with the Bungie Halo story, setting, and sandbox quality, they're just executed poorly.

They're variants on the Sentinel faction, they're robots built to counter the flood. Weapons and tactics to counter the different flood forms. There's be a lot less annoying bullshit. Knights would still teleport, but the animation would be telegraphed earlier to give players a chance to kill them first, and they'd have a longer cooldown between jumps. Watchers would still catch grenades, but sticky grenades would kill them. Crawlers would remain untouched, they're the sentinel equivalent to Flood infection forms, you want that sort of swarming one shot kill enemy in the sandbox for automatic and precision weapons. Like popping bubble wrap.

The weapon sandbox, specifically the Forerunner additions, would be a lot more diverse in their roles. There wouldn't just be 3 roughly similar sandbox variants because why the FUCK would the ancient alien god people have any version of a pistol? Humans and Covenant have those roles covered squarely. No, with the lore in mind, the creators of the Halo rings would have a lot of crowd control weapons specializing in dealing with the Flood. More powerful versions of Sentinel beams, flamethrower like area denial weapons. Maybe a gun that shoots big energy blades for cutting through Flood hordes? If they HAD a shotgun equivalent, I'd imagine something more akin to the Gravity Hammer, for pushing back large groups clustered together instead of a concentrated blast for dealing with single enemies. There'd be a lot less precision weapons, which you'd get from the humans and Covenant anyway.

ALSO Forerunner vehicles. Crazy how we never get to see any. I know they can teleport, but they'd also have reasons to want to move quickly WHILE attacking. Antigravity stuff, maybe more flying vehicles than the other factions? Vehicles with shields for ramming crowds? I dunno, missed opportunity.

For the level design, there'd be a lot less "press the 3 buttons to progress" type stuff. Missions would be more organic "meet up with this group to relay information" "Kill this high priority target", "Defend this territory until support arrives", stuff like that. I'd also open up the levels more for exploration, fewer hallways, more big open spaces. Maybe not CE level big, but c'mon this is the first time we've been on Forerunner architecture that wasn't directly connected to a Halo array, let me look around more. Not open world till 6/Infinite, and I've outlined how I'd do that before; fully explorable Halo ring, Dynasty Warrior style factioned area capture mechanics, seamless transitions between areas accessed on all terrain including air, sea, and space, but not amusement park guided experience either. We're telling a more personal story with more personal emotional stakes, the world should be somewhat more intimate to reflect that. No Ubisoft style open world either, no warp towers, waypoints, meaningless busywork, entire gameplay loop and world design should exist to enhance the INTRINSIC qualities of Halo's core sandbox shooter mechanics, not add a pointless checklist disconnected from them.

Going back to story, I do think Halo 5 should still have the Spartan IV's chasing a rogue Chief as its narrative. Because that's sick as a fuck, and gives an opportunity to get out of his head and look at his relationship to Cortana as well as humanize him more as a character separate from the Player's control. I've heard Halo 5 butchered the idea sold in its marketing of that, but my GOD that would've been so cool. Make Chief an antagonistic force you have to contend with as a UNSC soldier, show us the lengths he'll go to protect Cortana. Not a VILLAIN, his highest priority is still protecting humanity, but outside of that show who he is when he's not at the UNSC's beck and call. Swap perspectives with him and Locke, where some missions are him alone, and some he's allied with Elites against Spartans, and then have you play as those Spartans in those conflicts. Make him the single most difficult, capable enemy NPC the series has ever seen, show what a force to be reckoned with he is from the other perspective.

Make Johnson's plea, his COMMAND to not EVER let Cortana go mean something. Let it be the heart of the whole narrative, of this child soldier finding his place in the universe as a human being, not at the beck and call of his handlers. Let the story show that he is a hero not by necessity, but by choice, that even without orders, he would have still fought through the threats of the Human Covenant war all the same.

[sonic7ischaos]

The premise of Halo SCREAMS for an open world game that lets you traverse the whole ring.

The way I see it, the gameplay purpose is clear; Halo is a sandbox shooter, each gun, each weapon, each enemy type and behavior, all the vehicles, any items or armor abilities, they all serve to let you approach any combat encounter in different ways, and a fully explorable open Halo ringworld would be no different. You wouldn't just be considering approaches from the ground or air, you could also attack from the sea, or space between ringworld segments. Imagine taking a Banshee, and flying UP, until it becomes DOWN and dropping on a Covenant outpost.

I saw Campaign Evolved had its entire map and all NPCs with their ongoing conflicts continue without despawning them to load in the next map section, the whole map all loads in at once and any combat encounters you leave behind KEEP GOING when you leave. Imagine that for an entire game world. Imagine ACTUALLY fighting to claim and reclaim territory against the Covenant...

Imagine mid to late game the Flood being introduced, and it starts spreading through the whole map, and enemy AND allied combat zones all start becoming Flood territory and you're cleansing and retaking small territories but more of the map is getting infected and resources are getting scarcer and the longer it goes the more the atmosphere is being changed, the green Flood fog starts having more and more of a presence the longer it goes.

Imagine you fall behind enough and HORDES of Flood start amassing everywhere you're fighting armies, they're piloting vehicles and airships weapons and resources are getting scarce. I imagine an ending being you firing the ring locally, killing the local Flood infestation before it can spread elsewhere.

I know Halo Infinite did the whole "open world" thing, but from what I understand it never let you explore the whole ring. I like to think in this hypothetical game, the locations from Halo CE can be found on the map. Y'know this ring's version of the initial escape pod crash site, all the snowy areas and catwalks between parts of the installation, the Flood containment bunker they initially escape from in "343 Guilty Spark". I just think it'd be cool to stumble on these areas organically, Breath of the Wild style. Like how you'd get to Lon Lon Ranch in that game and get the somber hit of recognition.

And EVERY enemy type gets Flood forms. Elites, Grunts, Jackals, Brutes, Hunters, Sentinels (I know corrupted Forerunner AI is a thing, I am peripherally aware of background lore). Hell, add Prometheans back and give them Flood forms (have only played up to Halo 4, do not know if they ever came back or were done better, but let's assume for this hypothetical game they're here, and they're well designed). Let a heavily infected Halo ring have a Gravemind I can find that loudly, cryptically rhymes at me like in Halo 2 & 3. Let me find a Gravemind body I can kill.

All of this assuming Halo Studios gets their shit together. I liked Halo 4 (doesn't compare to the Bungie games, but still pretty solid in spite of its many shortcomings) but I know Halo has fallen FAR from its source material and its potential. As a diehard Sonic fan, I feel for the struggling Halo diehards.

[roonerlooner]

So you're suggesting like a Halo version of the middle earth games?

[sonic7ischaos]

Haven't played those games so I wouldn't know. They're the ones with the Nemesis system right? Where the game generates its own meta narrative with a recurring antagonist that you build a relationship with throughout your playthrough?

I don't have a specific point of reference for this idea. I could say Breath of the Wild, because of the big open world with a lot of environmental storytelling built into the terrain that uses your knowledge of previous games to enforce an emotional connection with the player, but that's still too traditional open world game for my liking with something like this. No Man's Sky? (another game I haven't played).

My thinking is broadly just this big, seamless open world with the shooter sandbox of Halo. No waypoints, no fast travel, a Plague inc meets Dynasty Warriors meets complex Bungie Halo AI system of factions and captured territory, where you're waging an actual functional war with enemy factions across the ring until the Flood breaches containment and starts spreading. I'm thinking the ring would be divided into big loading zones to save resources, with simulated battles running in the background, deciding which side won or lost a specific conflict. In Halo tradition, ideally, the game would track specific NPC numbers and locations from when the player is around so it can keep its "Object Permanence", where you can go back through the whole level and defeated enemies, weapons, and vehicles plus all the battle damage are where you left them instead of despawning (they would eventually despawn, but there'd be a timer to give the player a chance to jump back in after leaving to turn the tides or avenge defeated allies or just see what happened after they left).

Instead of fast travel, you use flying vehicles to go in and out of the atmosphere, I really want to retain the feeling of vastness to the rings from Combat Evolved, and I think in an open world format true fast travel would make them feel too small. There's a good reason sprint wasn't in the original and it wasn't a technical or development limitation, you're slow so Halo feels bigger and enemy encounters are more strategic, less action oriented. You're not running in guns blazing mostly, you're planning shots, prioritizing enemy types, positioning your self, managing ammunition and reload times. Having to manually fly between sections of the ring lets it feel like you're actually ON a Halo ring, instead of a set of video game levels. And because Banshees and other flying vehicles are built for space travel as well, we can have them speed up a lot outside the atmosphere to make it a little more convenient. Inside the atmosphere you have to actually fly the normal sandbox gameplay speed to cross the ring's circumference.

What I wouldn't want is the typical Ubisoft style open world, which even Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom draw from to a large extent. Really play into having to one man hold the line in a war across the entire ring, capturing and holding territory, which would then stock said territory with UNSC weapons, NPCs, vehicles, and supplies.

I would ALSO, possibly controversially, bring back the CE health bar system rather than relying purely on recovering energy shields. It just lets you take more risks in combat, experiment more with weapons and tactics instead of having to constantly hide behind cover.

[sonic7ischaos]

Having never watched the Halo TV show (and I never will I know ENOUGH of what they DID!...), I think you'd have to be crazy to make Master Chief the main character of that. I love him, but Chief isn't even the most interesting character in his own GAMES. You don't want to be telling a story through his perspective, that works in the games because his perspective is YOUR perspective, in film YOU have a PASSIVE role, so you have to pay attention to what CHIEF, the near blank slate power fantasy character is doing.

Chief is someone you hear about in the background of the main plot. During overheard telecom briefings with the captains of UNSC vessels. If you're really good, you recreate certain cutscenes from the games in the background to help establish a narrative timeline. Like the call with Lord Hood in the bunker in Halo 3, have your MC, a marine running off to their station or a doctor heading to triage, passing by while that conversation is happening, fading in the background as they move. Tells the Halo fans watching exactly WHEN in the sequence of events this is happening without actually needing any exposition about it. Stuff like that.

Anyway I digress.

In a story like this, you want the Halo universe and its canon events to be a backdrop and larger context for the story's events. You don't want to just do "Halo the games, but as a TV show". Like, you probably COULD, but even then you'd want to follow Cortana's perspective AT LEAST, because SHE is a fully realized character with her own independent motivations and drives, she's not reliant on the player (or in a non-interactive medium a commanding officer) to drive her actions, she acts for herself by herself (again, love Chief, and I KNOW he has a personality, I just mean his functional role and why he's as quiet as he is, to leave room for the player to project themselves onto this badass one-liner machine).

She's not who I'd pick, we already see her story play out that way in the games because again, we're piloting Chief's perspective, but still. Halsey could drive the plot of a show. She's an interesting, morally complex character to explore and unravel in the context of a Halo story, but honestly I'd be more interested in a ground level perspective. Not a soldier I don't think. A doctor, a civilian, an engineer, one of the covenant. Maybe see the start of the war break out from the eyes of a regular person living in a human colony, sort of a "beginning of Independence day" situation where humanity is waiting on bated breath watching the news in anticipation after first contact with the Covenant before all hell breaks loose. Big disaster movie vibes before we start really getting our shit together and start fighting back.

Or maybe we get a tense political drama/thriller about the immediate aftermath of the war post Halo 3, maybe swapping perspectives between human and Elite diplomats like Chief and Arbiter in Halo 2, each side probing and testing each other and their cultural differences, trying and sometimes failing to come to an understanding, everyone nervous about setting off a war again.

Maybe expand a bit on the Halo 3 promotional material and do a full "Historical documentary" on the war, old school History Channel style. Interviews with veterans, with former Covenant allied volunteers sharing their perspective, looking at specific battles and significant figures in the war effort, full "re-enactments".

It's just insane to me that as big as Halo was in its heyday, and as big as it's trying to be now, that nothing like any of this has ever happened, that the only full show Halo fans have ever gotten was something that butchered and disrespected everything about Halo and its lore, its characters, its story and the rules of its world. I know there's the old "curse of video game adaptations" but as we've seen with Sonic, and Detective Pikachu, and Mario, and Castlevania, that is and always has been bullshit. They CAN do it well, they just don't WANT to. Halo was so big new first person shooters were being called "Halo clones". This was AFTER "First Person Shooter" had been established as the name for the genre, and was NOT a "Doom Clone" situation.

Seriously fuck off with that bullshit. It's fine if you don't care for the source material, but then don't drag it through the mud to fulfill a half assed version of YOUR creative vision. From what I know, the Halo show is like someone wanted to make their own thing but were forced to make it Halo. Don't know how true that is, but my point still stands, if you've got a Halo show on your hands, make it a Halo show. Do your research, and then adhere to it. Stop making excuses.

[sonic7ischaos]

Fuck it, I'm in a Halo mood. I love Chief and Cortana's relationship in Halo. Obviously there's the whole "AI who's very human paired with Human who is more machine than man", but what I like about it most is Cortana, more than anyone else, treats Chief like a person, like her friend, or family.

John-117 is military hardware for the higher ups of the UNSC. The people who work with him treat him like a hero, or a soldier. Point and shoot, smile and wave, clap at the awards ceremony. Aside from Johnson, who is Chief's OTHER best friend for exactly this reason, Cortana is constantly just, joking with him. There's an interpersonal back and forth and a genuine heartfelt emotional connection. Humanity wants to save Cortana in Halo 3 because she's their greatest asset and hope in the war against the Covenant. Chief and Johnson want to save Cortana because they care about her, they'd have charged into Flood infested territory to save her military asset or no, because for all her bravado and sass, they know she's just as vulnerable, just as scared, just as human as anyone, because they know her as a PERSON. It's one of the things that makes Halsey so detestable in her relationship with Cortana (human rights violations with her and the Spartan II program notwithstanding). Cortana sees her as a mother, she says as much in Halo 3 when she's being corrupted by the Gravemind, but Halsey was only ever going to see her as a weapon to win the war and secure her legacy. In Halo 4, Chief is so desperate to save Cortana from rampancy but even if they teleported into Halsey's office as soon as he woke up, she was never gonna try to save Cortana. Her utility to Halsey had ended, and without something specific to gain from saving her, rather than replacing her, she'd just consider it a waste of her time and ONI's resources. Why save a dying old AI when the tools and knowledge now exist to make another one, maybe even a better one?

And then I never played Halo 5 or Infinite (though I still do want to play the latter) but I heard some of what Halo 5 DID to Cortana and so help me god when I catch you writer for that story WHEN I CATCH YOU! Halo 4 was such a perfect way to end Cortana's role in Halo, just let her die and let us be sad about it you cowards. It's like what they keep doing with Toy Story after 3. Perfect ending (really 3, or Reach depending on your perspective, is the perfect ending, but still), but they just HAVE to bring it back, bring back ALL the popular characters. Halo is set in a giant Sci-fi universe with all these different factions and histories. Fuck's sake, give me a stealth game as an ONI agent infiltrating Covenant territory and taking out leadership, as an example.

I'm not even like a diehard Halo fan, but autism gonna autism, this is what my neurotransmitters are rewarding at the moment. I like Halo, kinda love Halo (the singleplayer anyway, do not give a SHIT about multiplayer, in anything) but yeah, get your shit together Halo Studios.

[sonic7ischaos]

The premise of Halo SCREAMS for an open world game that lets you traverse the whole ring.

The way I see it, the gameplay purpose is clear; Halo is a sandbox shooter, each gun, each weapon, each enemy type and behavior, all the vehicles, any items or armor abilities, they all serve to let you approach any combat encounter in different ways, and a fully explorable open Halo ringworld would be no different. You wouldn't just be considering approaches from the ground or air, you could also attack from the sea, or space between ringworld segments. Imagine taking a Banshee, and flying UP, until it becomes DOWN and dropping on a Covenant outpost.

I saw Campaign Evolved had its entire map and all NPCs with their ongoing conflicts continue without despawning them to load in the next map section, the whole map all loads in at once and any combat encounters you leave behind KEEP GOING when you leave. Imagine that for an entire game world. Imagine ACTUALLY fighting to claim and reclaim territory against the Covenant...

Imagine mid to late game the Flood being introduced, and it starts spreading through the whole map, and enemy AND allied combat zones all start becoming Flood territory and you're cleansing and retaking small territories but more of the map is getting infected and resources are getting scarcer and the longer it goes the more the atmosphere is being changed, the green Flood fog starts having more and more of a presence the longer it goes.

Imagine you fall behind enough and HORDES of Flood start amassing everywhere you're fighting armies, they're piloting vehicles and airships weapons and resources are getting scarce. I imagine an ending being you firing the ring locally, killing the local Flood infestation before it can spread elsewhere.

I know Halo Infinite did the whole "open world" thing, but from what I understand it never let you explore the whole ring. I like to think in this hypothetical game, the locations from Halo CE can be found on the map. Y'know this ring's version of the initial escape pod crash site, all the snowy areas and catwalks between parts of the installation, the Flood containment bunker they initially escape from in "343 Guilty Spark". I just think it'd be cool to stumble on these areas organically, Breath of the Wild style. Like how you'd get to Lon Lon Ranch in that game and get the somber hit of recognition.

And EVERY enemy type gets Flood forms. Elites, Grunts, Jackals, Brutes, Hunters, Sentinels (I know corrupted Forerunner AI is a thing, I am peripherally aware of background lore). Hell, add Prometheans back and give them Flood forms (have only played up to Halo 4, do not know if they ever came back or were done better, but let's assume for this hypothetical game they're here, and they're well designed). Let a heavily infected Halo ring have a Gravemind I can find that loudly, cryptically rhymes at me like in Halo 2 & 3. Let me find a Gravemind body I can kill.

All of this assuming Halo Studios gets their shit together. I liked Halo 4 (doesn't compare to the Bungie games, but still pretty solid in spite of its many shortcomings) but I know Halo has fallen FAR from its source material and its potential. As a diehard Sonic fan, I feel for the struggling Halo diehards.

[sonic7ischaos]

Installation 04 should be a weapon you can equip & fire through some esoteric, old school video game secret easter egg that with like, an armor lock you can survive and then the rest of the game is just empty and silent until the final mission where normally the Pillar of Autumn is exploding but it's fine because you didn't need to blow it up to stop Halo from firing because you killed everyone and everything including the Flood still on the ring.

It's just silence through the rest of the game with Cortana chiming in now and again to give you dry, sarcastic commentary about your decision. Like the rest of the missions are just a tour around Halo until you find the Autumn and you fly it away without music or fanfare of any kind. Just like, awkward dialogue from Cortana.

[sonic7ischaos]

I've tried talking about this before but I keep deleting it because it comes out wrong and the words I use don't actually wind up matching my intent (damn autism), but I still want to vent about it because it's frustrating and I don't know what to do. For the past week, for the first time in my life, I want to have sex with another person.

Now I'm not asexual, I have a pretty high libido and there have been plenty of women I've seen and thought I wouldn't mind doing that with, but I've never felt a specific desire to actually do it, I've always just gotten horny on my own, masturbated to deal with it, and moved on. It's always just been scratching an itch, eating a meal when I'm hungry, sleeping when I'm tired, going to pee in the middle of the night. That sort of annoying physical maintenance that pops up in regular life and you've just got to deal with. But lately, there's been this undercurrent of sadness, this craving my body is having to press against another person and be inside of them. Not even for the physical release of it, like I'll finish and feel like I might cry and there's this...hollowness, I dunno.

I should note, I've never actually HAD sex either, for a number of reasons. For one thing, I'm extremely non-social. The last meaningful conversation I had with someone that wasn't my roommate was almost a year ago, and aside from missing my mom, who died in that time (a fact I suspect is relevant to my dilemma, a newfound absence of underlying emotional support and connection driving my body to pursue it via sex). I've been in love with the same girl since I was a kid and I take that feeling VERY seriously and it is VERY strong, to the point that pursuing romance & sex have always felt like cheating to me (logically I know it's not, she's married now, I got turned down, I haven't actually seen her in a long time, but I still love her and so pursuing sex & relationships still feels like a betrayal). Also, I AM aromantic, that love for her wound up being kind of a fluke of circumstance, right time right place, and I've never so much as felt an inkling of personal attraction to anyone else.

I'm not someone who can just go up to people and hook up. It's just not a skill I have and it's not a part of my emotional makeup. There are logistical complications to hiring a sex worker. I'm almost certain a lifetime of solitude is finally catching up with me and I'm finally feeling some kind of touch starvation, though I've heard petting animals helps, and I have 4 dogs and as far as this goes it DOES NOT. Not even a little bit. And if it was JUST about getting off, I have 2 hands and an internet connection, I have NO trouble doing that, but there's this physiological, hormonal, emotional component I can't deal with that way and I DO NOT want to bring someone home. Ideally I wouldn't have to get other people involved at ALL, but short of buying a really expensive, obtrusive, uncanny, corpse-y sex doll that seems like the only option. And if I thought a hug would help, I'd already be looking for ways to do that but this feeling feels super specific. You ever crave some kinda food, and nothing else can satisfy it? Like you REALLY want egg rolls, but you don't have the money for that so you default to the frozen burritos you've been subsisting on and even when you're full it just hasn't touched the craving AT ALL? It's like that.

My body wants me to fuck a girl, finish fucking, and then lie big spoon fully naked still inside her, body pressed against her back. Like sex is definitely a part of it, but it's the aftermath, pressed naked against her back and ass fully inside her, that my body is telling me I NEED.

ALL of this is WILDLY out of character for me. I'm a quiet, socially inept, autistic guy who prefers solitude, who even now has no desire to pursue another person romantically or sexually but like...I'm hungry y'know? There's an itch on my back. I have to pee. This feeling of need isn't gonna just go away on its own if I ignore it, but the cost of pursuing it is too high, I have to give up my way of living too much.

I've thought about finding some way to simulate it without just buying a sex doll (which, because I have a roommate I don't want knowing about any of this, is off the table, also because money those things are fucking expensive). I do think some kind of sex toy is part of the solution, but the problem is that still only helps with release element of it. Every other thing I've been able to find is insufficient for what I need. A weighted blanket would likely help SOME (though in this heat there's only so much I could actually use it) but the bigger problem is the shapes and texture of the human body. Part of the need involves feeling skin. Simulating the feeling of pressing against a woman's back, reaching around her to grab her chest. Every non-sex doll option I've found is made of cloth, and I'm still not sure silicone would suffice. Yeah my skin would sweat and stick to it like skin, and that might suffice if I can immerse myself well enough.

Logistically, just hiring someone to do this for me at one of the hotels up the road would be simpler, but I have ethical qualms with doing that, I've always felt weird about any kind of sexual dynamic that's incentivized by money. It's why I dislike Hooters, all the indignity of working food service, while also having to indulge the fantasy of being into the men who come in to leer at and creep on you. Do not want to be the person some struggling person has to pretend they want to fuck just so they can survive. ESPECIALLY don't want to be that if I'm someone they feel financially obligated to fuck. Some of them really like doing it and are passionate about it, but too many also have to pretend they do and some are really good at doing that, plus I'm autistic and that seems like one of those sets of social cues I should really not be flipping the coin on my ability to catch it.

And the thing is, I'm not insecure in my looks or general confidence. There's definitely some stuff I could work on. Lose some weight, get some stuff done to my hair, clean myself up some, but I'm not such a bad looking dude, I mean I'm 6'2 and don't have a bad looking face so I've got some advantages on that front, and theoretically at least, were I to find myself in the bedroom I am VERY willing to learn. Bit of a perfectionist, and part of the fundamental appeal of sex to me is pleasing my partner, if I just wanted to get off I could do it myself, but if I'm having sex with you, I want you to like it, enough that I'd forgo getting off in the moment if it meant you getting off. Kind of have an enthusiasm kink, one of the hottest things in the world to me is knowing you want it, bluntly. I like Ahegao in hentai because it's this really visible, clear expression of pleasure and desire that leaves no room for doubt (again, autistic, the less ambiguity in communication and expression the better, coyness has its place but I MUCH PREFER bluntness. Tell me you want me to fuck you directly, do not hint, or suggest).

But there's too many barriers for me. I don't want a relationship, or a sex friend, or to introduce new people to my life at all really, I've done enough juggling people to be done with it. Sex dolls are too conspicuous, uncanny, and expensive. Other solutions like toys+pillow+blankets+VR solve parts of the problem, but are insufficient because of a lot of the tactile elements my body is craving are missing like natural body heat, skin to skin contact, the actual shapes of the human body.

I'm kinda stuck. Maybe I'm being too picky & unreasonable, this is so far outside my wheelhouse and I don't have anyone to talk to about it who would actually understand or could help. Can't afford a therapist and can't get the insurance to cover it that aside. I wish it was just a higher libido so I could find the right porn or get off hard enough to just be done with it.

Anyway, sorry if you follow me and are here for my crazy long rants about Sonic or whatever. I don't think most of you want to read about my sexual/intimacy frustrations, I'm not particularly comfortable talking about it to people, I have pretty severe trust issues and am kinda awkward to begin with. Takes a while in my presence for me to feel comfortable and relaxed enough to speak naturally and open up any. I go on endless tirades online though, mostly because it's a lot easier to articulate my thoughts via text, though it tends to lack in conveying my tone and emotions.

[sonic7ischaos]

If "Island" is defined as land surrounded by a body of water, what do we call land floating in the sky?

Because the defining characteristic of an island is being surrounded by WATER. Specifically...I suppose you could count clouds, but a floating "Island" won't always be surrounded by clouds.

Is Angel Island even an island? Laputa? Aeolia? Skyloft? Skypiea?

[sonic7ischaos]

HOW IN THE ABSOLUTE FUCK IS THERE NOT A DUNGEON MESHI RESOURCE CRAFTING/COOKING GAME?!

Monster Hunter dungeon crawler. You go into the dungeon, where you kill monsters and collect resources from them and the environment via combat and exploration, you return to the surface which acts as a hub world where you buy and upgrade gear including cooking and resource gathering tools, can cook more complex meals in kitchens which buffs and levels your character in various ways as well as healing them, and then you go back down to repeat the process better equipped to go further. You're not just getting weapons & armor, you're getting cooking equipment like pots & pans, knives, utensils, spices, oils, even some basic ingredients. Very involved cooking system that seeks to emulate some of the actual planning and preparation you'd have to do in actual cooking, to the point that the game's difficulty is balanced around doing it well. There's even a built in soulslike revival mechanic in the resurrection office, If you've got a mage in your party, they can revive you in the dungeon, and you can pay exorbitant fees to get revived in the dungeon without them, but you'd have to protect your mage and lose money & resources thieves and extortionate prices respectively that way.

A deep, complex bestiary and encyclopedia whose descriptions and details fill out the more you interact with their subjects, and provide you with mechanical information as you learn more about the monsters and threats. Where to cut certain monsters to obtain certain cuts of meat or materials for crafting, tips & tricks for safely dealing with plant life and traps, and whatever other esoteric magic bullshit thing the dungeon throws at you like fairy rings changing your class, maybe swapping stat levels between specialties so a mage's magic stat becomes a high defense stat in a tank (I'd have said elf to dwarf, but that's not how Dungeon Meshi does races/classes).

...y'know typing this out, it's obvious why a game like this doesn't exist, that shit would be hard and expensive to do, let alone pull off well...STILL, that doesn't mean it SHOULDN'T exist!

In a semi-related note, Pokemon really should do a Monster Hunter crossover game that fully takes place in a grittier version of the Pokemon world. I get the branding reasons they wouldn't want to, but that's lame, companies should think like excited children think more often because that's how we get crazy cool shit like Smash Bros. and Kingdom Hearts.

[sonic7ischaos]

I can't articulate why, but there's something so funny about the idea that Kaufmo sounds like Arin Hanson because he IS Arin Hanson.

Imagine de-abstraction starts happening, the most recent group of abstractions gets the episode 9 slideshow treatment, and Kaufmo's comes up and instead of this sentimental look at the relevant details of his outside life, Caine just pulls up the Game Grumps Youtube channel and everyone's just like "...wait what?"

Like imagine you're Jax finding out about that. That one of the casualties of your nuclear mental health spiral was Arin " video game boy" Hanson and now you just have to live with that knowledge.

Like I said, can't articulate why that's funny to me.

[sonic7ischaos]

There's been a lot of discourse about it, but I just wanna say flat out, the end of The Amazing Digital Circus is just flat out fucking GOOD.

It ends in such a perfect way for fans to run with it. I like that within the story, abstraction is never even hinted at being fixable, and Goose herself has flat out said it isn't, but because of how the circus members decide to take care of them anyway, it leaves space in the post series fandom to speculate and headcanon abstracted members recovering. All the important questions get satisfying answers, even though the story itself is complete, there's still a lot fans can do to carry the torch.

Genuinely one of my favorite endings to any series. Not QUITE on the level of Fullmetal Alchemist and Dungeon Meshi for me, but close, which is DAMN good for a personal indie project like this.

Also, I wonder if it'll ever get an official game? Personally I'd love a 3D platformer, but I always want more of those, that's my favorite genre. Really a point & click adventure would make more sense given its influences. I mean, it even has the oldschool pc game render aesthetic from that era.

[sonic7ischaos]

Shot in the dark guess at what's going on with Subaru as an anime only spoilers up to season 4 episode 10 ahead:

Subaru went to the library to look at Gluttony's book so he could find out how to fix Rem directly from the source but somehow Gluttony found out and ate his memories?

LOTTA holes in that, but so far it's only been Gluttony's powers that have been able to affect people's memories (unless you count Return by Death resetting everything)...well actually, the sanctuary tests messed around with memories a little too...hm.

It does make a little sense though, they're there largely to restore those affected by Gluttony's power to normal, Rem's coma and Julius' removal from everyone's memories. Subaru realizes something and goes to the library, where he loses all his memories since coming to this world. It stands to reason that he went there to read someone's book. Rem isn't dead, Julius isn't dead, the sin archbishop of gluttony isn't dead, but the Witch of Gluttony herself IS dead, and if anyone is powerful enough to interact with Subaru through the book of memories of their own lives after their deaths, it'll be a witch. My other guess is he looked at Regulus and/or Beetelgeuse's book, as they're also directly connected to and likely interacted regularly with the sin archbishop of gluttony.

I think that moment of realization before Subaru woke up without memories is important. His behavior in Meili's memories resemble other archbishops, so the "other Subaru" who's been acting independently is likely just an archbishop possessing his body, so it points to whatever happening before them being related to the sins or their archbishops in some way.

I dunno. Such a good mystery, I can't think of something that's kept me guessing this much in a LONG time, which Re:Zero does consistently.

[sonic7ischaos]

Man, I love Rouge.

For a long time the whole internet kind of treated her like a joke. Like "Oh Rouge the Bat? You mean the SONIC THE HEDGEHOG character with BOOOOOOBS?!! HMMMMMM?! ;) ?!"

But Rouge is cool. She's funny. And yeah, she's hot. Not even her appearance, when I was a kid I did develop a little crush on Rouge, but not her appearance, her fake flirty ass personality is what got me. The line with Knuckles "You're such a creep! ;)" just...UGH! How do you NOT fall for that? I'm aromantic and that shit would STILL wind me up. Knuckles is a stronger man than me that's for sure.

I keep seeing the Sonic x DC panels with her scamming Lex Luthor out of information and then bragging to Catwoman about it and it's just like, fuck yeah dude! THAT'S what's cool about Rouge, she's on ROUGE'S side and she's smarter and wilier than basically anyone around her. She fooled Eggman. She fooled SHADOW (at first anyway).

She really deserves more love as a character. She's not ALL big boobs sexy voice, that's the mask she wears to trick gullible people. She thought it would work on Knuckles.

Pair her up with Batman...actually, he and Selina Kyle have chemistry, and are often involved with each other and she's obviously similar to Rouge...you think Rouge could successfully put the moves on him? Would that WORK? Man dresses in a giant bat costume. it's not OUT OF THE QUESTION that he'd be a furry.

And to be clear, I'm operating on the basis of Rouge's age AFTER SEGA decanonized them all, she's as young or old as is appropriate and fitting for the character.

[sonic7ischaos]

Thinking about Gamoverse again.

So if Snappers had won, if he'd KILLED Flappers, would flappers get a game over and have to restart? Would he respawn just outside the boss level, start over from the first level in the boss world, or depending on how old the game is, start from the first level?

Because if he starts out from the boss room, or even from the boss WORLD, Kit & Kaboodle can never leave. If they want to save Flappers' world, they have to keep making sure he loses until he gives up and then stay there to make sure he never tries again.

But even if he starts over from the VERY beginning, they still have to keep coming back, because if Flappers can get to the end once, he can do it again, and considering the genre, assuming it's not like a torture platformer like Ghosts n Goblins, they have to do it frequently, because platformers like Flappers are typically designed to be VERY beatable.

Which brings me to my actual observation about Gameoverse and its apparent theme: It's about the inevitability of death. Kit & Kaboodle, and Gobbles & Flappers now, are stuck delaying the inevitable encroaching end, something they can only EVER delay and not truly prevent. They're doctors, thematically speaking. They can slow the end down, but so long as the rules of the world are in place, that's the absolute limit of their abilities, they can't stop the end entirely. Given everyone's narrative connection to grief it makes sense, in order to conquer their loss, they need to help others prevent or overcome their own.

If the hero is already on their way to beat the villain, that world is doomed.

...Assuming life & death even works that way in Gameoverse. If Snappers killing Flappers just KILLS Flappers, it's a whole different thing

...GOD this show is so good.

[sonic7ischaos]

Been thinking about Gameoverse. So like, how does a game whose setting is space & takes place across multiple planets work?

Say the crew find themselves in Ratchet & Clank, whose levels consist of a group of planets. Do those planets and the space between them exist within the game world or are they a part of the wider Gameoverse?

Also, I wonder if a game character can't leave their world until the system lock is broken? I'd imagine the Farcade would've tried tricking characters into getting on their ship, leaving the world, and THEN explaining things so the planet can't stop them. They do seem to have to physically break through the skybox to enter a planet's atmosphere, maybe it's a barrier for game world elements.

And for settings that are built on sports and competition instead of combat, racing games and the like, could the Farcade enter the competition and win, preventing whoever the player character might happen to be from winning, or would they count as the player character in that instance? Would they need to try cancelling the race itself?

This show's premise is so cool for theory crafting. It presents so many questions that are just fun to think about.

[sonic7ischaos]

So like...anyone else wanna play Kit & Kaboodle? Y'know, Ratchet & Clank+Megaman with cute cat girl and her grumpy robot sidekick?

Actually, I kinda wanna play all the games the characters are from in Gameoverse. Even Gobbles the Learnosaurus, and that's just an oldschool point & click edutainment game for children. Like, Flappers the Superdolphin seems to me like a cross between Donkey Kong Country and Ecco the dolphin (or NiGHTS into Dreams depending on how movement works) and that just sounds rad as hell. Dusk seems to either be from a Castlevania type game or the cold Sephiroth like villain of a JRPG (given his visual similarities to Alucard, my guess is the former), and I'm always down for those kinds of games.

Like these all seem like fun, interesting games, I kinda wish Ross and the crew had the time, funds, manpower, and motivation to turn these all into fully realized games.

Also, great show. The internet is being really weird and puritanical about the fanservice bits (and to be clear, I'm NOT talking about the lacking variety in female body types, that's a valid critique, though like female cartoon characters having to wear clothes where their male counterparts don't, while that trope DOES have its roots in misogyny, it's normalized enough in cartoons in general to not necessarily be a misogynistic decision, whole other huge topic), but it's fun. The characters are compelling and funny, it does a good job establishing its dramatic tone while being comedic, it's got an appealing art style and fantastic animation, Grant Kirkhope does the music.

And I know for a fact some of the people dragging it through the mud are just doing it to be mean because they don't like Ross or Arin. I've seen a bunch of people literally admit to it. Not liking it is fine, this is art, it's all subjective, but it's a more than a little unfair and dishonest to claim it's because the show sucks if that's not your actual reason for disliking it. You dislike it because you dislike Ross or Arin? Say that. You dislike it because it's not your cup of tea or you find certain characters or tropes or whatever annoying? Say that. But to say it's the latter when it's the former? You're just being a jerk.

Personally, I love it. I hope Ross and the crew get to make a bunch more episodes. I wanna learn about Dusk. I wanna see how they approach different types of game world. I think it'd be cool if they got to go to a world that would be better off destroyed for some unambiguous cathartic heroism, give Kit a win man. I want to see Gobbles become a force to be reckoned with as he learns more and more skills throughout the adventure. I'm curious about Kaboodle's perspective on losing their game world. What's Dusk's whole deal?

I really hope the internet moves on from "the discourse" soon, because I wanna see people theorizing and talking about it without all the baggage.

[sonic7ischaos]

Thinking about the post I made yesterday, about the longevity of Hyrule due to its control of an extremely powerful farming and trade infrastructure (they control who eats and who trades goods en masse), and I made a point in the tags about Hyrule continuing to be rooted in a "Medieval" era despite its age, semi-jokingly. This is a classic "swords and sorcery, Lord of the Rings, DnD, Dragon Quest" setting, so of COURSE it stays Medieval, right? You're not supposed to consider WHY it stays that way.

But if you DID...

You'd realize how serious a problem Ganon/Ganondorf actually is. He KEEPS destroying the world, to such a degree that even records of the existence of other Links and Zeldas and Ganondorfs are continually lost. Think about the number of new Hyrules and their key players. NOW consider how many of them even know about Ganon?

It's not JUST that the world is destroyed, but that it's destroyed SO THOROUGHLY that records of Hyrule's historical struggles with Ganon and the means to defeat him are continually lost to time. Enough that again and again Hyrule's technological and scientific progress are completely reset. It makes me wonder if Demise's curse is set to wait until Hyrule reaches a certain level of advancement before reincarnating Ganondorf, or awakening Ganon? It would be in character, for it to spitefully wait until the world was sufficiently advanced before ripping all progress away from them and forcing them to start over.

And it doesn't happen EVERY time, Before its fall to the Great Sea, Hyrule carried an oral tradition carrying on the story of the Hero of Time, all the way into the customs of Outset Island's coming of age ceremony for young boys. But still, it KEEPS happening. In fact, the oldest recorded battle with Calamity Ganon seems to be from one of these societal resets. The technology of the Shiekah being buried and forgotten in the aftermath. Yes it was part of an intentional strategy on their part for dealing with the Calamity in the future, but the baseline technology to build things like Shiekah slates and Guardians wouldn't have been lost to such a degree UNLESS Ganon wiped out the people capable of reproducing it. Society would have looked way different if built on the foundation of a world where that sort of technology was readily available than it does by the time before the Great Calamity of Breath of the Wild. They should be FAR more advanced.

And like again, I KNOW it's more of an aesthetic/stylistic choice to keep things set in a time of swords and bows and horseback riding, but it's not like this sort of technological progress doesn't happen in the canon of Zelda. Hell, Fi is straight up a magically powered artificial intelligence, what that suggests about the age of Hylia preceding Skyloft and then Hyrule...