How Wonderfully Wrongly

Hi, my name’s Rose, he/him, adult

[ink-the-artist]

I was rewatching ep 23 of Well Theres Your Problem podcast, they were talking about the Chernobyl exclusion zone and Alice said "The wildlife were returning they were sitting on barrels playing balalaikas" I was so enamored by that image I had to draw it

[ink-the-artist]

Btw check out the clean futures fund, they help those affected by the disaster and they even have a program for the dogs of Chernobyl

[tandemunicycle]

I felt nostalgic about some old warrior OCs.... so I redrew them all! Didn’t realize how many related characters I made until I connected them

[shitzpostz]

[tandemunicycle]

Honestly? Kinda a pussy move Paris didn’t give Hera the apple. I mean the ENTIRE continent of asia?? But no of corse he just wanted a pretty wife fuckin creep

[tandemunicycle]

this bull is queer

[tandemunicycle]

Farming Sims: an exercise in futility, and the one that got it right

tl/dr: The only good farming game is Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life and I will die on this hill.

Keep reading

[deactivated-blog]

I think…maybe…you just don’t like farming games.

[tandemunicycle]

[tandemunicycle]

Farming Sims: an exercise in futility, and the one that got it right

tl/dr: The only good farming game is Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life and I will die on this hill.

Before I begin I would just like to say; I have not done extensive research into the actual logistics of these games or the opinions of goals of their creators, this is based purely on my own experience and opinions.

So first off, some loose education for those who are not indoctrinated, a farming sim is short for a farming simulator, basically a game that, well, simulates farming. The levels of scrutiny in the simulation vary, with some having aspects of fantasy while others delving into the specifics of crop growth and animal management. In many of these farming sims, however, the farming itself is not so much the focus of the game as is the life of a farmer, especially one living in a small town. Growing relationships, fixing up the town, getting married, getting a better farm, all of these common gameplay features of popular farming games such as Stardew Valley and Rune Factory.

There comes a time, however, that many players of these kinds of games become quickly familiar with. It can come early, or later in gameplay as your farm and daily chores become more and more automated, and the daily habit of farm chores become chores to the player as well. I'll just refer to it as the slump, as I don’t know if other gamers actually have a phrase for this.

You see, in these types of games it's all about A. resource management and B. upgrades to living conditions. You chop lots of wood to get a bigger house so you can cook better food and better food lets you farm longer and better tools let you farm even longer than that. These are not inherently slump-inducing, but you soon come to realize as you progress that there is no end. No goal. Sure you may make your farm the biggest or the richest or improve your town to the max but… then what? The years go by and nothing changes. You do chores to what, get a better fishing rod? Romance all the people you can in town just to see what they say? You’re an immortal god in a sandbox full of turnips and although there is no end, most likely you’ll just start over again, because the game wasn’t about the town or the people or you, but about all the shit you could collect and do.

Farming sims induce a strange sort of depression in me. A monotonous day to day that only changes on the surface. Kind of dramatic, but I think it’s true.

Now let me tell you about Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life.

This game is not beautiful. It’s 2003 GameCube graphics with low polygons, the music is often repetitive and lulling, the writing and translations are choppy at best and confusing at worst, some aspects of the game like any farming sim are painfully repetitive and slow, and I think to have fun sometimes you need to plug in a podcast and play mindlessly. But this game does something no other game of its breed had the bravery to do. And it starts quick.

After the first year you have to marry one of the Bachelorettes (or bachelors if you’re playing the Another Wonderful Life version, which I may mention some details from, but generally follows the same formula), and the next chapter (Chapters start with being a year long, then time between them increases, except in Another Wonderful Life where they remain one year long. It is implied that several years had passed in between chapters) you live in a larger home with your wife and toddler son. What has changed other than the size of your home and family? Well, Nina, a kindly old woman who lived with her husband Galan, has died. Galan, now sullen and nearly speechless, has moved to the hill where Nina's grave is, while a new family has moved into the home they once had together.

This immediately breaks the standard set by its predecessors and its successors. Change in farming sims usually only happens when the player initiates it, acting as a sandbox for farming and ranching and dating random hicks, but as you play Harvest Moon you start to realize this isn’t just a farming sim, this is a life sim.

The changes with time don’t stop there. As the years go by the player character and all of the people around them grow and change. Galan after a while (and helped if the player befriends him and keeps him company) comes back out of his shell as a friendly townsfolk again, only to die a chapter later. The player character, as well as other adult characters around you, slowly grow grey hairs and wrinkles. Some faster than others. Your son grows up, and in what I think is a stroke of video game genius, your son's future career path is affected not only by you and what toys you give him, but by who you befriend, what you do, and how you run your farm.

And in the final chapter, chapter 6, when you are old and grey and your son a surly teenager and all the people around you different, some new, some there since the beginning. How does this final chapter end?

You die. And that's the end.

This is the genius of Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life. Change doesn’t just happen because of you, it happens to you. People grow old and die and move away and move in and change and stay the same and when you’re old, you know what? You die too. That is so beautiful. Sure the writing can be flat and sure the characters aren’t as deep as some games, but it also has that unique feel that you can only have in Japanese games that everything going on isn’t said. Some things are just left for you to feel.

For a long time I didn’t understand why other farming games just felt off. Bland and flat and soulless, and I realized after thinking about Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life, that games before and after it had a completely different philosophy to them. They were collector and builder games, about getting the best farm and chopping wood and completing the town museum and fishing all the fish and making the town and land cute and cool and efficient. Those kinds of things aren't bad, but I felt so incomplete with them. They felt hollow.

So I kept looking, for a long time, for something that could compare. Stardew Valley is a great game, but I came into the realization that I would just be doing this, forever with the same people no matter if I played for 3 in game years or a hundred. Other Harvest Moon games, or Story of Seasons games as they’re called in the future, are just painful to play. I got the most recent to come out, Pioneers of Olive Town, and it nearly made me cry in frustration at the pretty graphics and freedom of customization at the sacrifice of everything that gives a game soul. 

Repetitive chores and boring characters are kind of a given for the farming sim genre, but I don’t think any other game of its breed will ever live up to Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life and Harvest Moon: Another Wonderful Life until the people who make these games are brave enough to give the story a satisfying conclusion and make them more than just sandboxes to play in.

So, if you have some time, and some patience, and want to try something a little different, get *COUGH*emulate*COUGH**COUGH* Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life (or the special edition version since it shortens the chapter time because DEAR GOD THOSE GET LONG AND DULL), and tell me what you think, because while I talked about some of the gameplay aspects, I have not even mentioned the half of it and its characters.

[sporeblossom]

“the millenium falcon would wipe out the enterprise in seconds” lmao the enterprise is just an innocent science class floating thru space…. all they wanna do is look at some rocks… kiss an alien…. find some space plants….. why would you fight that its not a battleship theyre just nerds…… leave them olone 

[berniesanderssaggyleftnut-deact]

[lystheni]

A friend of mine saw this and brought up some interesting arguments

so, in other words,

[professor-maple-mod]

Pretty much.

[jaegerdelta]

here have some size comparison

[two-punch-man]

Who wins in a fight, a fully staffed Navy research vessel or your local weed man and his best friend in their souped up VW Bus?

[roobyrooth]

Patroclus and Hector meeting up in Elysium

Hector: I would hope our crimes against each other in life and war would not sour our afterlife when we cross paths. Is this agreeable?

Patroclus: ... who are you?

Hector:... what- I. I mean. I killed you.

Patroclus: (long pause) OHHH yeah, you’re the bitch who got me after a god took off my armor. And another god stole my wits. And a random guy stabbed me in the back.

Hector: I mean-

Patroclus: yknow they would not shut up about how honorable and pious you were, but that was a real dick move.

Hector: We were at war! And you killed my brother!

Patroclus: you have like a 100 of those!

Hector: and you laughed when he died!

Patroclus: *snort* oh yeah. Idiot.

[tandemunicycle]

I'm listening to the tsoa and that patroclus post hurted

I’m assuming you’re talking about my most recent one. Also: Good.

[tandemunicycle]

Man it’s cry about Patroclus hours again lads like. I’m just wondering. What was he like? What did he talk about when there was a moment of peace? What were the friendships he had like? Menelaus and Patroclus were so alike in character however Pat was much more the warrior from what I understand. Did Menelaus look up to him? Envy him? Automedon was the charioteer of Achilles but his friendship with Patroclus was much deeper. Did they bond over their shares skill in charioteering? A love of animals? An exasperation for aiding someone as prideful as Achilles? What about Antilochus, who was a dear companion of Achilles and who shared their tomb. Were they friends? What was it they saw in Achilles and loved so much? Who was Patroclus, a man so gentle in heart and so great a warrior. Who was he to the people he loved, not just Achilles.

[feminineduck-deactivated2022051]

[tandemunicycle]

A body is just an animal haunted with a soul

[tandemunicycle]

i swear to christ if i get another pragerU ad i am going to rip a phonebook with my bare hands jesus CHRIST i am so sick of their pseudo intellectual ‘lectures’ that i genuinely fear will reach people and get them down the nationalism rabbit hole

[thoodleoo]

is menelaus a dilf?

menelaus rolled up to war in a hawaiian shirt ready to hold a cookout on the shores of troy. yes he’s a dilf

[tandemunicycle]

heyyyyy you guys wanna hear what I think random Iliad dudes classes (and some subclasses) would be in dnd of course you do lets go

Agamemnon: War domain cleric. No healing spells he just has that Vibe

Menelaus: Fighter. Idk what subclass he’s just a dude doing his best

Diomedes: Hexblade Warlock. Athena gives his enemies a lot of wet willies just so he doesn’t die.

Odysseus: This one is kinda tough cuz I could very well see him as an illusionist wizard but honestly I’m leaning more towards Mastermind Rogue just from pure vibes. (ooo or multi-class)

Big Ajax: Barbarian. He kills SO many people with big rocks and I love him so much

Nestor: hmmm. Wizard. Old chaotic man. Would kill you with lightning if he could.

Hector: Oath of Devotion Paladin. He is so tired.

Paris: College of Glamour Bard. He is so make bad decisions.

Patroclus: this ones tough but honestly I think Beast Master Ranger because of his many dogs and how good he is with horses and how much he can kick ASS.

Automedon: If I think about him for too long I’m gonna cry. He is also a fighter.

Achilles: WHOO BOY OK HE IS A TOUGH ONE. I had to think very hard about him but I think he would be a sorcerer, more specifically a Divine Soul Sorcerer although I’m still iffy on it. But when pat dies I’d imagine he’d become something akin to a Wild Magic Sorcerer and just go. ham. Maybe get like 10 levels in barbarian or something.

[tandemunicycle]

You know what’s so so so so so funny to me? Everybody has this view of Achilles and Patroclus like Achilles is the unhinged feral asshole and Pat is the only thing holding him back from cutting the sleeves off of all of his shirts and idk learning how to kill people with laser vision but in The Iliad you know who consistently spares people who surrender and does his best to conduct himself with honor (before Patroclus dies)? Achilles. You know who killled 20 people within the span of ten minutes, laughed after killing a man because he fell funny, and spat blood in the face of Hector saying ‘you motherfuckers are nothing, I would’ve killed all of you if you hadn’t have two gods help take me down. I’ll see you in hell.’ PATROCLUS