I think it’s about time I put up a better write of my story, so, with that in mind: Hello everyone, both old and new. Despite my constant yapping on here my primary passion has always been writing, and my passion project is called Hedge Knight. What is Hedge Knight? It’s an epic progression fantasy novel series that follows the tales of Helbram Alligard, our titular character, across Ellios, a land filled with magic and mystery. Its scope is meant to be focused on a series of individual adventures in place of a constant, sweeping narrative with the main cast being the thread that ties it all together. Do not let the epic fantasy label shape your expectations entirely, however, for Hedge Knight takes the “kitchen sink” approach to its world building elements. Expect elements that could just as easily belong in sci-fi, steampunk, or even dieselpunk novels. Just to give an example, the first book of the series deals with an army of bandits led by an alien conqueror. The intent is to deliver all these elements with enough verisimilitude that it all fits together without pulling readers out of the experiences. More importantly, do not expect any of it to be dripping with irony, either. I want Hedge Knight to be a series with a single, earnest goal: to tell a story as best it can without thinking it needs to depreciate itself for fear of being “cringe”. Anything that sounds absurd on paper will be played straight, as I firmly believe that any idea can be good so long as the steps are taken to execute it competently. Does that mean the series is serious business all the time? No, I actually try to inject a good amount of humor throughout, just expect it to be pulled back more readily than a lot of stories you may see today. The art attached, drawn by the amazing @studio_kart, are glimpses into the world I’m trying to create. But, let’s also introduce the main party of Hedge Knight, shall we? (A thread)

It’s simple. All the races and species have their own countries and cultures that are distinct from one another. In the case of these different races comingling, there is an established dynamic that feels realistic, like the Dunmer in Winterhold, to use a popular example. When you go to a country in The Elder Scrolls, you don’t see downtown LA, you see a country that is more likely to exist in the time period that it’s emulating. Verisimilitude exists, and as a result people buy into it without thinking. Exposures to other cultures in specific regions still happens, but it’s not overtly intrusive and more just a window into the outside world at times. If you make it all make sense and distinctive, the average person is going to accept it. Many creatives forget that step.

Gonna have to respectfully disagree there. The concept of a planet sized Death Star being built without anyone in the Republic knowing ahead of time is one issue of a long list of many issues. It’s got the same issues as the Holdo Maneuver, where the spectacle is striking but the context is just dumb. That and I feel like the whole “Yelling at the head of the army” argument thing actually removes the weight from scene because it ceases to be intimidating and switches to instead be annoying. Not everyone has to be Thanos, but I’m imagining someone cold and calculative like Tarken giving a matter of fact, dead serious speech punctuated by the beam firing would make it hit much harder. It looks pretty, but has so many issues that it instantly loses appeal.

All this Vtuber drama I see just makes me glad I mainly watch Chibidoki. She’s a silly goose and absolute gremlin, but she’s got her head on straight.

Where Rebirth fumbled was the conclusion with Dyne. Having him do a last stand against Shinra just didn’t hit as hard as him just feeling the full weight of his own actions and then deciding to end it all in a solemn silence. Everything else building up to that, however, Rebirth did well.

E33 doesn’t deserve its fans, and I don’t mean that disparagingly to E33 and Sandfall. Its fanbase will just not allow the game to stand on its own merits and love to use it as a cudgel against the JRPG genre as a whole. It’s perfectly capable of standing with the greats by its own merits. The subsection of its fans that instead label is at “the real Final Fantasy” are honestly extremely disrespectful to the game itself because they refuse to just accept the game as a result of being inspired by FF and a multiple of other games that innovated its systems into something unique. The other section using it as the “see these games don’t have to be anime cringe!” Example also again are using the game to disparage the games that inspired it. I love the game for its own merits, but good lord you guys need to learn how to enjoy something without being utter snobs and hostile about it.

This art style really is falling into that weird “too western to feel eastern, too eastern to feel western” spot which makes its visual design just feel really flat and hollow to me. Also, THAT’S supposed to be to be Bizzaro?! At least go all the way with the design!

Bro really said: “I heard your complaints about Chadley, so now we’re going to make him call you so much that he gets a customizable ringtone.” I’m not even mad about that. This is trolling for the love of the game.

I believe it’s more that it feels like these companies are going out of their way to avoid including anything that could be taken as fan service from the loud crowd that throws fits about it, and that in turn makes the original audience feel like the thing they used to love has now been restrained to kowtow to people who don’t really care and just want to feel good about pushing these changes onto others. It signals a lack of backbone from the companies, and that in turn can make the audience feel like they’re not really getting the full authentic experience than if these devs just didn’t care about what the crowd said and did everything they wanted at full tilt. I’m not even a huge fan service guy. My own writing doesn’t even focus that much on titillation, but there is an understanding between me and my audience that I wouldn’t shy away from it should it come to that from how I address many things and the artist I commission. Most of these artists aren’t vocal like me, and so when people want that reassurance that the vision isn’t going to be compromised for the sake of “a wider audience” they use something like fan service as a canary in the coal mine to tell if there is going to be a problem. A game series that had fan service all of the sudden pull it all back is indicative of this, and thus fans don’t get as interested to a greater degree, because they can feel that shift. If Xenoblade didn’t have this expectation set, this wouldn’t be raised as a point now. It’s not contempt for the medium when people raise these points. I wish they would present them better, personally, but that is the crux of their worry. “Muh goons” is not their issue, it’s the impression that something at the core of an IP they love has been altered. Are there people that truly are that shallow? Yeah no doubt, but I don’t believe them to be the majority. Most people operate on feel and vibes, and if the feel and vibes of a franchise change too drastically then a lot of people just don’t follow it.

I can tell you that men don’t cry online for days on end for being called out for having a shit, disingenuous take. Just change your profile pic to a projector. So damn fragile.

I love Mandalore’s breakdowns because he takes into account everything in the game and it just feels more objective overall. Plus he’s got my kind of humor. Sseth is who I go to when I need unhinged ramblings that somehow also have a solid argument.

The entertainment industry has a severe case of people just failing upwards for some reason despite constant duds. Meanwhile indies will get thrown into the blast furnace if they make these same missteps.

Eh, I’d say overall the major criticisms such as empty world design, poor combat encounters (not system, encounters), and shallow systems are spot on. There are also quite a bit of writing issues I have with it, especially in the third act. It’s a 6/10 objectively. In terms of how much I subjectively enjoyed it? 9/10, which honestly makes the fumbles feel more painful because with a few tweaks and a focused vision we’d have a solid objectively 8-9/10 game on our hands.

His actual quote is in regards to how to make a game look appealing enough that, when you watch a streamer play it, you want to play it too. He wasn’t disparaging streamers as the cause of the game’s woes, but rather how it’s something to adapt to. There are many issues with the remakes, and I would probably agree with you on quite a few of them, but we gotta stop popping off on tangents where they’re not needed. It just makes said arguments seem obnoxious.

Gonna be real, I don’t like the CGI cutscenes in the midst of a pixel battle. I know I can skip it, so there’s that, but it does feel out of place. Everything else about the game look like it’s gonna be a hell of a ride though.

Legend of the Northern Blade is friggin crazy for a lot of the stuff it pulls. Highly recommend it to anyone wanting to read a good manhwa about Murim and martial arts.

Oh boy I get to bring this out for Halo now? How fun.

Yeah this sounds about to a T as to how I predicted it would go when it was announced. The only thing that would make that call out perfect is if the nun bleeding him out was someone who was wronged by him in the past and she is portrayed as justified for killing him. Now, I’m aware that the original Robin Hood has quite the murky and shady history, so this may be accurate to that, I just find the timing of it to be tiresome because it feels just like the same old song and dance of “your heroes were never heroes in the first place”.

So, it looks like he’s agreeing with you here. The “crisis” that he’s talking about here is developing a game that provokes the questions that make people buy the game. Congrats! You guys have common ground! Maybe show the quote next time.

And this makes the ones that get angry because said pixels do depict boobs and ass exempt from being criticized because…? And don’t tell me it’s because you “respect women”. You don’t, you wouldn’t be trying to hide behind them as a shield if you did.

I wonder if people making this argument ever stop and think about how the concept of a woman being pretty = porn is just misogyny from a different angle. “God forbid a woman be pretty, she needs to be toned down or I’ll just think of PORN. I’m not at fault here, she is for her looks!” Like, guys, just think about what you’re even saying instead of trying to make it a reflex.