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Post by Gab on Apr 28, 2018 17:42:27 GMT
Okay, I got the chance to play Volume 2 of Friendsim last night. If you've played or at all familiar with the first volume, it's pretty much more of that. As such I think it serves as an expansion to a simple and I think effective approach towards both padding out time between proper Act releases as a sort of "Intermission" while also being something small enough to potentially attract newcomers with a quick preview of ... Alternia. In all its infectious, weirdly charming insanity. I am very particular about spoilers, so I will contain these thoughts in a spoiler tag. Since it's so short, I implore you to go play it for yourself first!!!!! In my opinion, neither Amisia nor Cirava are as "bad" as Ardata, it never gets quite that crazy. Actually, I find them both pretty cute and charming in their own ways. Cirava's is probably the more "Diemen" of the two routes, and has what I'd call the best ending of all the volumes so far. But personally, I'm more charmed with Amisia. She's just so cuute XO and I guess I admire her ambition toward artistry. But don't tell her I'm an artist too, I don't want her to give me the cold shoulder D: I had suspected before playing that this volume might not be written by Andrew, but only because I remembered it being advertized that the first volume was being written by him. But I forgot to ever check the writing credits, and I still haven't gotten around to it. To me, the writing is almost every bit as good as his. In fact, in some places I was almost sure it was him, though I don't think it is. The only complaint I can really think of is their quirks. Diemen and Ardata both had simple, clever quotes that suited them perfectly. Cirava pretty much doesn't have one, and I don't really get Amisia's, so to me it's pretty much nonexistent too. I don't know whether to blame this on the writers? I certainly wouldn't put it past Andrew to be uniquely capable of coming up with quirks as elegantly effective as Ardata's, but I would have thought many of these typing styles would have been made up for Act 2 well before the idea for the friendsim was even a thing. But it should be noted this is a pretty pedantic complaint. Cirava and Amisia are still both written very nicely and have very distinct voices and personalities evident in the way they talk. Leave it to a Homestuck to take issue with specifically the syntax So yeah, I liked it overall. It continues to provide glimpses into Alternian culture, with a particular emphasis it seems like on internet culture in particular. I wonder if there's a reason for that that will play into the plot of Hiveswap. I mean, I guess other than the fact that Trizza falls under that umbrella as well? That'd probably be a good reason for it to be relevant I guess.
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Post by Gab on May 25, 2018 13:11:50 GMT
Oh man, I guess I never put my thoughts on Volume 3 here?? That sucks, considering it's probably my favorite Volume so far. But I don't really feel up to typing that all up right now. I'm just here to say that Volume 4 is on it's way. Will probably drop around 1 PM Central time, so about five hours from now. This one will star... EDIT: I think I was an hour off. EDIT EDIT: Volume 4 is out! And I've played it! So now I'll post my thoughts on it. As well as Volume 3. Why not? Volume 3 review: I think this one is my favorite Volume, personally, including the one that came out after this. I have automatic fealty to Jadebloods as a Virgo sign myself, and Skylla was one of my top then from the trollcall but for real! Both the stories are pretty good. Skylla is probably one of the most warmhearted trolls we've met so far. Even Diemen, in any of his routes, wants something out of you, and can be a bit selfish and pushy. But Skylla is totally hospitable to you, she's just a total sweetheart. Her good route is exhilarating, and her bad route manages to be one of the most painful. Her route is obviously my favorite, but Bronya's is pretty good too. She's perfectly nice as well, but she has her own concerns to attend, and sees you as either something of a distraction to those concerns, or a bit of a pity case. Her route can be pretty heartfelt too, but also pretty messed up if you get it wrong. Anyway, something I enjoy is that both these routes have nice ways of expanding on the lore. We really get to feel what it's like to be in the scenarios we're put into, in ways that the exposition provided in Homestuck itself didn't touch on, and that Hiveswap may do in still greater detail. We even get glimpses of backstory for our protagonist, which is something I'd like to go on about for a bit, if I may. Because it's fun. The main protagonist is functionally a stand-in for the player, obviously, and is therefore human... in theory. They have all the typical anatomical features one would expect, makes references to things familiar to humans, including pop culture, and so on. But some things with the protagonist are a little different from canon. For instance, Ardata in Volume 1 is capable of mind controlling you, even though all evidence in Homestuck suggests this is impossible, barring very special circumstances. Obviously this is for the better, so we can experience first-hand just what it's like for that to happen to you. It opens a window of possibility, but personally I doubt Joey will be susceptible to mind control, as per canon, only being able to be put to sleep. Anyway, this combined with the way the character is portrayed as... somewhat different from how humans typically art with the vague generic "stand-in" person, I think suggests there is some subtle kind of difference between the in-story humans from Universe B1 like Joey, and the kind of human that the friendsim protag is. Except for the mind control thing, I don't suppose that's terribly relevant, but I find it fascinating to overthink this idea. Speaking of, back to my previous point. In I think the start of Skylla's route the text mentions something about you stealing the rocket that sent you to Alternia, giving some backstory to the character. It's still pretty vague, but it's plenty. There's also the fact that a plentitude of text is given to exploring the character's (your) feelings about various subjects, their motivation behind what they do, and what they think about information presented to them, rather than letting the actual player have these thoughts for themselves. It's potentially a bold move, most likely made for the sake of telling more jokes and filling out the play time of the games with additional writing, rather than letting the games be even shorter by having it be primarily other people speaking and descriptions of action that happens in the routes. It also serves to flesh out this character, obviously still one designed to serve largely as a player surrogate, but one that still has something of an identity of their own. Anyway, no real point to that whole spiel there, just something I've been thinking about since the third volume... moving along. Volume 4 review: This one hadn't piqued my interest as much as the last entry, as neither of the characters had really made much of a blip on my radar during the trollcall. But once the store page went up and we got a look at them, I started to get more excited. Tagora was the one to catch my attention in particular. But actually, both routes were a lot of fun. As usual, the both of them are quite different from each other, one in general being "darker" than the other, but both somewhat disturbing in their own ways. And also hilarious. I pretty much had no opinion at all of Vikare, but once I started his route I started to like him pretty quickly, and I enjoyed him more and more as the route went on. His schtick is pretty simple, but there's kind of an infectious energy to him. Actually, anyone who's read Homestuck will find him strikingly similar to a certain character there, and I for one can't help thinking they'd get along smashingly. As for Tagora... the guy is so anime. He teeters precariously between his slimy, professional demeanor and being an utter fucking dweeb, and it's amazing. Between the two, his route is definitely my favorite. Keeping with the trend so far, the art only continues to improve. Tagora and Vikare both look great, and so do the backgrounds present in their routes. Well... some of those are still pretty sketchy and basic, but others are in a more finished state, and lush with details. Speaking of, very exciting for me and probably very few others, this episode actually adds in a couple new characters to the Alternian text font. A colon ":", and what is most likely an exclamation point a shout pole "!" As far as downsides, the typing/speaking quirks continue to be lackluster. I keep going on about this, but hey, I was charmed by the elegant simplicity of the quirks in the first volume, and they've just been disappointing since then. Tagora doesn't have one at all as far as I can tell, and Vikare's is just ~tildes at the beginning and ending of his statements.~ Again, tremendously minor quibble, but there you have it. Simply put, this volume is as good as any other. In a subtle way it feels as though things are moving forward. There's obviously no plot, but we're not playing the character in the same state they were in in past volumes. Their injuries are less severe, and they're growing more familiar with Alternia, hopefully along with the players. If I did have something I'd like to see in future volumes (and from the looks of things it does look like we'll be getting more; exactly how much, who rightly knows), it'd be nice to explore more diverse environments, kind of like we did in Volume 3. Minor spoiler alert, but in this one we return to the same neighborhood as the other chapters, and while that's perfectly fine, and returning to a familiar place is different and exciting in its own right, I'm just greedy to see more of this terrific, terrible place Coming up against a purpleblood would be very interesting, I hope we get that one some time. Sigh... I wrote up some extra thoughts I had, but I just got them deleted by accident and I am just way too tired to repost them all. I'll just link to this video I was talking about, which is probably a bit spoilery for Act 2, but it's also pretty old so some stuff could have been changed since then. Maybe another time I'll have the energy to say what I was gonna again, if someone else doesn't bring it up first anyway.
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Post by Gab on Jun 9, 2018 3:11:08 GMT
It's that time again! Volume 4 is an interesting one. It features Zebruh Codakk and a... mystery troll we've never seen before??? First I'll say some general things. The backgrounds are lazier in this one than usual, it feels like. And I'm also PRETTY sure there's some old-style inverted daedric troll text in there, on backgrounds that I'm pretty sure are recycled so they've probably been there in other episodes too. I wonder if they're going to need to do something about that. The art for the characters themselves is as good as ever, but the lusus portrayal is also... different. I don't want to say it really looks lazier or much worse than how it already was, but... well, they do have a good reason to do it this way for a visual gag, but the thing about THAT is you can only really see it if you press H to hide the text boxes and stuff to see the character sprites in full. Anyway, to touch briefly on the writing, it occurs to me it's getting increasingly silly to try and analyze the writing of each of them. Speaking personally, I can't detect much variance in quality or skill from one episode or writer to the next. In fact, I still haven't even bothered to look up who writes who. I just don't care that much. I... GUESS? The writing seems a little more clever and funny than last volume? Both routes this time had a line that actually made me laugh out loud, and that's not something that happens to me often. I don't know if any of the last volumes did that even. But take that with a grain of salt. I don't think it matters either way because the characters are all so different and convey so many different crazy things that it's hard to really compare them to each other. But since the writing always does the job of exploring the character, showing them in their highs and lows, everything else ends up being tied to the quality of the character itself. Anyway, I think that's about as much as I feel like saying without getting into spoiler territory, so if you haven't yet, check it out. I recommend it as much as any other volume! Now, then... I'll go in the order I did, so Zebruh first. Hoo boy, Zebruh. So, imagine Cronus and Kankri rolled into one, and on Alternia instead of Beforus, and there you go. That's the character. He's about as slimy and duplicitous as either of them, probably one the most absolutely despicable we've seen in friendsim so far. Even Ardata questions herself sometimes, feeling trapped in her fate. Zebruh pretends like he cares about the rights and comforts of lowbloods, like he's an ally, as an obvious ploy to score with them. His quirk is even to surround certain remarks with symbols explicating which quadrant he's hitting on you with, which he'll do any quadrant at random. We even see the rather disgusting consequences of living this lifestyle, holding trolls essentially hostage in his mansion, forcing them to do the housekeeping and starving them while he tells them to their face how nice he's being to them. In his route, whichever you choose to do, go out or stay in, he ends up talking you into doing the opposite of what you just chose, which sums him up in a nutshell. He doesn't hear other people at all, he talks for them, even if what he decides they're saying is attacking him until he pisses himself off and takes it out on them. This is not to imply I despise him myself, personally. Though I'm sure plenty of other people will. And he is DESIGNED to be especially rotten, just like Cronus. It feels intentional that there's no sympathetic side to him or some sort of reason for why he's the way he is, even by the standards of Alternia, though he is also implied to hardly be the only highblood that takes advantage of the socially disatvantaged romantically like he does. My point is though, I view this with a sense of some distance from how relatable and somewhat familiar this kind of dickweed can be, viewing him sort of the same way I do the straight-up torturers and killers like Ardata and Amisia, or for that matter the purplebloods. I find him funny in a kind of pathetic way, as well as a fucked up and dangerous way, as we see. Actually, I like the quirk too. The specific sentences he uses to hit on you in various quadrants have a way of illuminating how the quadrants work emotionally. Matespritship is obviously pretty straightforward, and he tends to highlight sentences where he insinuates wanting to get alone and intimate with you. When he's pushing Moiraillegiance, he tends to try to sound especially supportive and helpful, such as by emotionally comforting them or providing for them physically in some way. Uhh, not in that way. That's still matespritship. Kismesissitude tends to involve gentle mockery, sort of teasing. If it gets too aggressive, he isn't really hateflirting with you. Spade lines will also sometimes just compliment generally aggressive behavior, such as referring positively to being forward or tough or something. I think one spade line is also more straight up bedroom talk. His auspisticism lines are a little trickier to pin down a particular pattern, which is also hilariously referenced as the quadrant that just straight up makes no sense to the main character at all, in that line I mentioned above that made me laugh. I suppose, if I had to look back on it and try to guess, they have a similar tone to his pale lines, like trying to help you out in what would be a more platonic relationship for a human. I suppose with the ashen quadrant he carries a tone more specifically of trying to lift you out of a shitty situation, which would fit. But it's hard for me to say without really breaking the lines down. Anyway, phew, I... Didn't mean to go on so long about that. And geez, I didn't even get to the other one we have to talk about yet! Anyway, last chance before I spoil it. Ready? ........... At first I thought it might be a lime blood. It was relatively obvious that the "gold blood" masking their identity and boasting a sign outside of the troll call wasn't who they appeared to be. That sign looked a little too simple in design to be a real one. I really should stop getting my hopes up like that though. I mean, I guess I was close. She's not lime blooded, but olive. In fact, she's not an unfamiliar troll at all. She's Polypa Goezee! She begins the route in disguise, fleeing the scene of the crime for which she's to blame. She reveals herself to you in private (wonk) and things go from there. I don't actually have much to say about this route, it's more relatively standard fare than Zebruh. She's a hired assassin, but one that feels strangely sympathetic? She just somehow has a good heart, I dunno! Oh, I will say this. After all the complaining, she FINALLY has a decent quirk! Around where she'd normally put a comma or period, she just uses an asterisk * and her statements end with *| It's a little bizarre, but it's unique and prolific enough for me. I sort of hear it as her speaking entirely with run-on sentences, where all her statements begin and end being kind of vague. I dig it. Something else she does that's cool is she mentions Chittr, the twitter/tumblr? troll social app thing that hasn't been heard from since beta content, so that's pretty cool. Um, one other noteworthy thing that BOTH routes do is make mention of their companion troll in the trollcall. Polypa references Tegiri or whatever his name is, the tealblood swordsman, and Zebruh does the same with Chixie. Anyway, that's about that. It looks like there's a slot for a Volume Six, so I have reason to still be excited. I wasn't sure how many volumes we were going to get, but I don't know if I thought we were going to get this many. It's pretty nice. I still doubt we'll get enough for ALL the trollcall trolls, but that's fine. Anyway, this is all pretty exciting. While we aren't getting much news about Act 2 these days, it's still SOMETHING we're getting, it's regular, and it passes the time and tells us more about the world of Alternia. Even I have to admit it's infinitely better than the absolute dead silence we were enduring for SO LONG before Act 1 finally came out.
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Post by Gab on Jun 23, 2018 1:40:46 GMT
AUUUGGGGHHHHHHHH okay I wrote out my thoughts on Volume 6 and for the THIRD FUCKING TIME IN A ROW I just hit the send button. I should KNOW by now that I need to copy it or else the forum eats the post and I FORGOT AGAIN. Uuuuuugh, it wasn't a whole ton this time, but even so I just DO NOT have the energy to write it all again. Just. Ugh. Why won't I LEARN. =.= Bottom line it's spicy EDIT: Okay, I'm a little better now. This volume stars ?????? Elwurd, & Folykl Darane aaaand Kuprum Maxlol! I liked the goldbloods, for some reason their crazy, scuzzy energy rubbed off well on me. I have to admit, though, there was something about the writing in Elwurd's route that... I didn't like as much? Which is something I wouldn't have thought I'd say about any of the friendsims, let alone this one. Other people seem to like her fine, and I don't really have a problem with her personality or the journey her route takes, but... Idunno. It's hard to say what my issue is with it, even. There's just... SOMETHING about it that feels kind of awkward? Maybe if I play it again I'll feel differently but, there it is.
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Post by thezcmme on Jul 2, 2018 15:51:16 GMT
In regards to Elwurd's route on Volume 6.... I was kind of upset that this volume established a relationship between Elwurd and Bronya and had them already broken up, I thought there was some sort of possibility for some real cute couple potential there, but as it seems either of them get let go, maybe there's possibility of them getting back together, who knows. All I know is that I hope the pairing is touched on again in the future, be it in Friendsim or in actual Hiveswap
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Post by Gab on Jul 9, 2018 21:38:48 GMT
Whoops, this past Friday volume 7 came out! Please don't take my lateness on this for disinterest, I've just been obnoxiously busy and it's hard to find the time to do all the stuff I want to do, like this. Anyway, let's go over it real quick! --- HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Seven - Of Business, Flagrantly Illegal Remele Namaaq - written by Cee L. Kyle - theme: Piwates ',:^]Konyyl Okimaw - written by Aysha U. Farah - theme: Olive ScribeArt by Gina ChacónThought I could stand to be a little more informative, now that I myself am trying to stay more informed again. ;B As usual I don't have much to say about my own experience, but I liked it. If I thought there might have been something missing last time, it certainly found its way back this time. For being yet another cerulean, Remele stands out from the others. I guess they all have a way of being distinct from each other. Guess there's just something about the caste that makes you want to notice and admire them ;3 While it's much more understated than the case of, for instance, Ardata, I get the feeling once upon a time Remele wanted to be a legitimate artist(e) but got burned bad enough she decided doing it this way was better. I dunno, though. I could be wrong about that. For SURE my favorite tho and probably one of my new faves of Konyyl. She's precious and I love her. All her routes are the best, the end. Huh that's funny, the one I didn't care as much about I said more and the one I loved I said barely anything. Well, there's this too. Something James Roach said that is pretty interesting about music. Tho it includes a low-level spoiler about Act 2 so if you're trying to avoid knowing ANYTHING about how it'll go, be aware.
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Post by Gab on Jul 21, 2018 21:23:12 GMT
Yesterday Volume 8 released, here's the infos on it! I'm feeling sort of wiped out atm, so this is all I'll put for now. I may put my thoughts on it later. --- HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Eight - Of Stresses, Song and Otherwise Tyzias Entyyk - written by Lalo Hunt - theme: Single Female Lawyer by Alexander RosettiChixie Roixmr - written by Aysha U. Farah - theme: it be like that sometimes by James RoachArt by Adrienne Garcia
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Post by Gab on Aug 3, 2018 23:07:53 GMT
Boom, I'm all over it this time! Fwoosh HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Nine - Of Gazes Cool and Tempers Hot Azdaja Knelax - written by Kieran Miranda - theme: daJam by Alexander Rosettiand... Amisia Erdehn? Again?? Haha... psyche. Chahut Maenad - written by Aysha U. Farah - theme: take me to clown church by James RoachArt by Gina ChacónI'll say no more, for now. I haven't even played it yet! But maybe I'll come back and edit this post.EDIT: Played it now! Probably my favorite personal volume so far. The both of them are even better than I could have expected. It's hard to say which route I like more, but I think I'll say Azdaja just because I think most everyone would pick Chahut, I think. Not without good reason, either. But yeah.
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Post by Gab on Aug 18, 2018 22:59:03 GMT
I was pretty busy last night, so I got to it pretty late today, but here it is! HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Ten - Of Faraway Lands and Nearby Pals Zebede Tongva - written by Magdalena Clark AND Aysha U. Farah - theme: beekeeper who? i dont know her. by James Roach
and...
Tegiri Kalbur - written by David Turnbull - theme: ASSAULT by Toby FoxArt: Characters - Adrienne GarciaBackgrounds - Phil Gibson, Angela ShamEndings - Phil GibsonZebede's theme is actually really good, and I CAN'T WAIT to hear the more somber version hopefully in Act 2. Also, Zebede confirmed to be the one who lives in hive featured in some pre-release pics seen in the kickstarter. He's kind of, like, knowingly pathetic?, but lots of lowbloods have demonstrated this before, and the way the episode uses this quality is pretty novel. All in all, I really do like him.
Tegiri, though. Man. What a fuckin weeaboo.
Both of these eps have had plenty to translate, which always fills me with glee. Plus more backstory and lore relevant to the friendsims and Hiveswap proper, which is also awesome and I'll probably be talking about some of that in the meta thread. This was a fun one.
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Post by Gab on Sept 4, 2018 13:03:27 GMT
Whoops, delays! For those who don't already know, while the game came out on mobile as scheduled, it's steam release was delayed to Monday. I did play it, but I didn't get around to making my post about it right away. Sry bout that uou HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Eleven - Of Pals and Promises, Made and Broken Mallek Adalov - written by Aysha U. Farah - theme: fortnite funny moments epic fails episode 413 by James Roachand... Lynera Skalbi - written by Cee L. Kyle - theme: Frostbite by Toby FoxArt: Characters - Adrienne GarciaBackgrounds - Phil GibsonEndings - Phil GibsonI'd say these were another good couple volumes, but that just feels redundant at this point. They've ALL been pretty dang good for a while lately, it feels like. Mallek is fun. He feels like a "not Vriska" like Elwurd, rather than being straight up crazy like Ardata. Also, his sprite has a certain popular fan anatomical feature probably not "canon" or anything but still fun. Lynera has got to be one of my new favorites though. She IS completely fucking crazy, in a way I don't think we've quite seen in other characters before. I think I might be fond of her because she has nearly the same sign as I do. Same caste and aspect, but she is Derse where I am Prospit. Which makes us theoretically pretty similar. And I kind of have to pay extra attention to her because I'm designing a troll with the Viricorn sign so it feels relevant
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Post by Gab on Sept 15, 2018 21:01:43 GMT
Whoops, a day late again. Does anyone even read these? Well whatever, it's a good way to vent excitement anyway. HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Twelve - Of Know-Nothings and Know-It-Alls Galekh Xigisi - written by Lalo Hunt - theme: Snow Pollen by Toby Foxand... Tirona Kasund - written by David Turnbull - theme: Carefree Princess Berryboo by Alexander RosettiArt: Characters - Adrienne GarciaBackgrounds - Leland GoodmanEndings - Leland GoodmanAnd now for my thoughts on it! I loved this volume!
There was something offputting to me at first about Galekh, but he turned out to be a surprisingly pleasant guy. You can see his, err, highblood-ier side peek through rarely but for the most part he's just a darling. He also reminds me of Kankri in a few ways, which is funny. His route was a lot of fun.
The definite winner for me this time though was Tirona. What a little fuck. Actually, compared to the other teals she reminds me the most of Terezi for some reason. Maybe that says something unpleasant about me. I love her I think in the way people love to hate villains or generally smug chumps, so that makes her one of the more interesting friends for sure. Of course, you can see the, for want of a better word, humanity buried deep down once you get her vulnerable, and one of her bad endings, despite what I just said about her, is probably one of the worst in all the friendsims so far.
Something both routes have is a bit of worldbuilding to expand what we know about trolls, which is dope. And Tirona in particular feels tied closer than usual to the plot of Hiveswap proper, being highly interested in this supposed rebellion brewing. All in all, really good stuff, and the good route was probably one of my favorites in terms of writing.
Speaking of, I'm really starting to take notice how much the overall tone and the nature of the protagonist has changed from the onset. At the start, we were much more desperate and unsure of ourselves, and constantly in some state of injury. Nowadays we have much more confidence and awareness of Alternian culture, not to mention a growing web of allies who are making an increased impact in the unfolding plotlines as we go along. It's really cool to see things develop like this. I'm kind of hoping we start picking up troll terminology without realizing right away. :B Honestly some pretty cool things could be done with character development, but I don't think it's really the place of these goofy friendsims to attempt anything too ambitious. Probably better off for it too in the end.
Anyway, excited as heck for the next volume!
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Post by Gab on Sept 29, 2018 1:35:17 GMT
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Post by Gab on Oct 4, 2018 16:05:35 GMT
Okay, it's been about a week, so let's (me alone) talk about Boldir :B
The thing with her route is it seems to point at a plotline of sorts happening within the friendsims, that what the unnamed, non-gender-identified protagonist is important. Important to exactly who or what end is still unclear, though. Boldir, perhaps by sheer coincidence, seems to be privy to this on some level. She does seek you out to talk about something "important," but once you do meet her she talks about fate and paradoxes and stuff. It's bizarre, to say the least.
But to go along with this talk is acknowledgement, on some vague level, that the protagonist's journey doesn't really make a lot of logical sense. By and large each subsequent plot tends to assume each route went optimally and thus the protagonist has a long list of friends. But they also sometimes mention things that happen exclusively on bad routes, little details that honestly I think could be hand-waved one way or another personally, but still.
In Boldir's bad ending she's the victim of an assassination attempt, and the protagonist in this moment reveals they have witnessed the deaths of several potential friends, arguably remembering some highly unfavorable timeline where they went through all the bad endings. They then experience something... odd. The screen wobbles and turns weird colors for a moment. It's not explained further, but context implies this has something to do with remembering contrary versions of events. Uniquely, after the end of the bad route, a voice with no identity behind it says, "Again? Must I do everything myself?" Implying of course that someone is manipulating events, seemingly to the protagonist's benefit.
Probably part of the reason I like this so much is because I was starting to want to see some sort of route that explicitly contradicts other routes, one where things have gone much more poorly for the protagonist, to explore different themes I guess. Man, that sounds depressing when I say it that way. I love that things are mostly getting better for the protagonist, but still it was a fascinating idea to me. But anyway, Boldir is a really interesting character in her own right, not really like I expected her to be. And more than that, her route seems to point to some depth in these games I sure never thought we were going to get, something greater that it is starting to work towards. Could be wrong, but if I'm not it's going to be VERY interesting. Makes me hella excited for next week's, and for that matter the remaining 4 or 5 episodes before we've met all the trollcall trolls.
Also, much smaller detail, it looks to me like the little "13" in the episode's steam image is pink on olive. Usually the two colors are the blood castes of the characters introduced in that volume. But it looks like Stelsa gets pink instead of teal. That's cool.
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Post by Gab on Oct 13, 2018 1:41:54 GMT
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Post by Gab on Oct 21, 2018 2:07:49 GMT
Alright, about now's a good time to get into it. First Marsti. I don't have as much to say about her, but her route goes a little differently from the others. She doesn't really "connect" with you the way the others do, where you kind of help them figure themselves out and improve their lives in some way. She's rather terse, but it's because she's inordinately aware of the shitty hand she's been dealt by Alternian's brutal society, and there's nothing she can do but suck it up and do the best she can with what she has. It's a somber route overall, I'd say.
There is another part to it as well. The route plays more with some of the oddness that came up in Boldir's route, who was written by the same person. It seems as though the protagonist has the ability to remember, to some extent or another, alternate histories and versions of their own path through these games. It's been a little while and, though I SHOULD, I haven't yet replayed it, so I don't remember exactly how it worked, but I remember it as sometimes being a sense of deja vu that is quickly suppressed, or sometimes even something akin to a slip of the tongue, as if the capacity to remember some terrible hidden truth is there, but often buried, consciously or otherwise. Though I might be misremembering. While it doesn't get as heavy as in Boldir's route, it furthers the plot thread and continues to point to a strange, interesting revelation of some kind.
And then there's Karako.
I learned that "Geezey," Aysha's father, is apparently a sci-fi writer, and that makes a lot of sense with some things about his route, like this vivid, captivating description of incredibly dangerous plants and fauna that the protag has to deal with in this chapter. It's really good stuff, something that's really never been given attention before and a fun way to flesh out Alternia. Anyway, Karako himself is absolutely fucking precious and pure. This is just one of those really solid, fun, good routes. The good ending makes you feel good, even as it results in brutal murder, which, now that I say that... is a rather sobering (haha?) realization? I guess we're acclimating to the Alternian way of life (and death) even more than I thought...
The bad ending bears special mention though, cuz like, holy shit. It's crazy. The bad endings can be anything (except for, uh, good I guess) from kind of comical, to unsettling, to disheartening, to outright crushing. This one is altogether different from any of that (except maybe for the first one, depending on your angle), to say the least. I don't even want to mention the details of it just in case there is a chance of spoiling it for someone who hasn't played it for themselves yet, which they absolutely should. I'll say it involves a particularly fascinating take on the Dark Carnival, which points to something very interesting for one of the next friendsims down the line. Good stuff as always. Excited like usual for the next one. These, I think, are gearing up to get better and better as we reach the final few. What are there, about..... four episodes left until they cover all the trollcall trolls. And we haven't reeeeeally had to deal with a droubt in content since the release of Hiveswap Act 1, so I wonder what will happen once we reach that point. Hmmm. Food for thought.
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Post by Gab on Oct 27, 2018 15:37:20 GMT
HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Fifteen - Of Creatives, Conventional or Otherwise Charun Krojib - written by Kieran Miranda - theme: Charun's Cave by Toby Foxand... Wanshi Adyata - written by Lalo Hunt - theme: idk man you name it im tired by James RoachArt: Characters - Adrienne GarciaBackgrounds - Phil GibsonEndings - Phil GibsonI was a little late with this one, I got held up by getting into something new yesterday. Anyway, this seems to be the first time Toby has made some original music for the friendsims, and I couldn't find it posted anywhere. There was also a lot of background cameos, maybe when I talk about this next time I'll do some research to find out who they are.
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Post by Gab on Nov 14, 2018 18:40:11 GMT
Oops I've been dropping the ball on this again HIVESWAP FRIENDSIMVolume Sixteen - Of Cult- And Capt-ivation Marsti Houtek - written by Geezey - theme: GRAVEYARD SHIFT (PLAY THE ROUTE AND THEN TWEET @hamesatron ABOUT HOW GOOD THIS TITLE IS) by James Roachand... Marvus Xoloto - written by V - theme: CLOWNFUCKER by James Roach AND Toby FoxArt: Characters - Kim QuachBackgrounds - CJ WalkerEndings - CJ WalkerI'm not certain who CJ Walker is. I found this website but I can't find confirmation that this is the person that worked on this route. Another route by Aysha's father, and one by someone who wishes to remain anonymous it seems. Both these routes have fascinating tidbits to the lore that seems to be building towards an ending that may actually have some sort of payoff on the last volume. I'll just assume people have played the routes at this point, if you're even reading this, so I won't get into it TOO much. Fozzer's is probably the most troubling and saddest to me, and I'm not sure what to say or what it means for the greater troll society. Marvus seems to be the most explicit confirmation yet of the Purpleblood's latent chucklevoodoo powers, probably explaining why he's so famous and influential. His ability to intrinsically understand the nature of the meta he's in, I get the feeling, is another quality latent within purplebloods. Either way, references to this reality are becoming more frequent and the protagonist is beginning to adjust to them and accept them as a normal quality of their own life. It's probably just going to keep getting worse until it builds to... whatever is coming in the final volume. I think people are suspecting the final friends will be Lanque and the twins, and I agree. I have to admit, I'm starting to get pretty curious about it. It could end up being something big... well, for what this series has been anyway.
One other thing. I haven't double checked, but I thought the interior of Marvus' limo looked extremely reminiscent of one of the earliest concept art pieces we ever got of Hiveswap, before we even knew the name or concept of the game. Okay I think that's all. I'll maybe try not to be this late with the other one. EDIT: Oh wait no I'm immediately wrong. Next volume will be delayed by a week due to forces of Thanksgiving. Ummmmmm. Okay NOW I think that's it????
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Post by Gab on Dec 1, 2018 20:26:55 GMT
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Post by Gab on Dec 8, 2018 3:19:30 GMT
Guess now's as good a time as any to get into it. Let's start with Nihkee. To be upfront, hers is the more interesting by far. But to start with, for being described as a "subcultural gatekeeper" she wasn't nearly as grating as I thought she'd be. Pretty fun route all around and the good route sure makes you feel energized and, yes, dare I say it... STRONG? The bad ending, though... hot damn. It's instigated increasingly intense speculation into the protagonist's class & aspect, and I have my own guess. Seer of Heart. Here's my reasoning. To start with, Seer seems like a pretty solid guess at this point. By concentrating the protagonist is able to experience visions of alternate timelines, which matches precisely with how Terezi's power worked, and otherwise seems to best fit with the Seer role as we understand it. The tricky part is determining the aspect, and the scene seems to intentionally obfuscate between the three likeliest options: Time, Heart, & Mind. I have no waterproof case to without question lock in Heart as the definite aspect, but I'll explain why I think so. Time is the first to discount, since to me there isn't a lot about the protagonist that aligns with the nature of the Time aspect, except when it comes up overwhelmingly, such as in the case of knowingly existing in a doomed timeline. There's also this excerpt from the extended zodiac, which states that the Time-bound are "fundamentally incapable of just accepting things as they come," which describes practically the opposite of how the protagonist behaves. Which brings the debate down to Heart vs. Mind, complementary aspects. Aside from wanting to shy away from a "Seer of Mind" role to avoid duplicates within the same universe, I do think a few things point towards Heart over Mind. Mind-bound are described as a thoughtful, logical type— and simply put, that doesn't describe the friendsim protagonist. Though it does say that "Their identity is fluid-it can change from day-to-day, from thought-to-thought, from interaction-to-interaction," it ALSO says Heart-bound are "excellent at putting on and taking off masks as the situation calls for them." In other words, they're capable of behaving flexibly to suit the situation, but this doesn't change their core identity. The way I see it, both aspects deal with Identity and Self. Heart deals with who you are, Mind with what you do. Similar, but with an important distinction. Let's go back to the Seer thing for a moment. When Seers have their visions, I believe it tends to be for a specific reason, even if Seers of two different aspects might see similar visions. In Terezi's case, I would say the purpose of her visions was to see the consequences of certain choices, to better inform her of the choices she should make. I'd say with the friendsim protag, the visions inform them more about their own identity. I think this is why they gradually begin to get the ability to remember a wide variety of different realities where they made different choices to the point of not being able to tell them apart, and eventually (in this chapter) being able to witness a reality that never happens (these are wild speculation territories but that's my view). That's a little shaky, though, since the protagonist's personality is pretty flimsy, since they're meant to be something of a blank slate for the player to project on to. But let's consider another thing. Their quest for friendship remains, for the most part, stalwart. No matter how many people they meet they continue to seek out further companions, and it never quite seems to fill the hole in their heart. Something the protagonist also has a talent for is, like, exposing the core of someone in the course of their route, getting them to open up about themselves in some way, and usually make a change for the better. Let's note that a Seer is (most likely) a passive Class, which can be broadly interpreted (among other definitons) as one that involves impacting those around the Hero moreso than themselves. And that is the basis of my guess. Protagonist has these powers because it is in their nature, in their destiny, to explore the truest, deepest meaning of FRIENDSHIP. To explore their personalities, their strengths and weaknesses, what they like and dislike, every aspect of their being. And I think not just to improve their lives, necessarily. That's why there are good and bad endings to every route, and why the protagonist can't always tell which version of history is "real." Heart, as we all know, often deals with fractured self, and the protagonist is drifting from one timeline to the next, the lines between their alternate lives blurring until they fade away. They come close to understanding the nature of their Ultimate Self, and they bear witness to the best and worst of practically everyone they meet, and one of those isn't better or more important than the other. Sometimes it's critical to go through a tragedy with someone, even if it's awful, even unbearable, to learn something important, or just gain a greater perspective. I think this is the core of the protagonist's journey. That's definitely not ALL there is, though. That doesn't explain whatever... that was with Fozzer. And I don't think this explains that voice at the end of Boldir's bad ending. Both these seem to hint at some sort of greater influence, affecting you, the people around you, or random citizens of Alternia. Maybe Scratch? Easy guess, but it could be anything. And there are other, kind of lesser things. Anyway, all of that gets me real excited to see what the hell is in store for Volume 18. Damn, after all that, the Daraya section is gonna be practically nothing. It's far tamer to say the least, but that's saying something because hers gets pretty deep in both routes. Seeing her completely give up hope (And that is her Aspect, so I find it especially crushing. Is it wrong to feel that way?) and just surrender to self-destructive nihilism, seeing her empty face is honestly haunting. Sometimes you piss a potential friend off, or even get them killed, but then there are the ones you somehow end up hurting worse than that, or simply fail to save them. Reminds me of Wanshi's bad route. It's just really rough. Her good route is good too, since it really gets more into what having a rebellious spirit is actually like on Alternia, and how she manages to hang onto hope. It's good stuff. And that's that. Phew, that's a lot of words. Oh, and one other thing. The trollcall page on the Hiveswap site has been overhauled with a new look. Now, instead of all the cards linking to the tumblr posts, it's insular and text-based, with all the information available on the page. The trolls are also now re-sorted in the order they're featured in the friendsim games. Of note here is that some of those bullet points have been changed around in various ways, mostly fairly minor but worth mentioning. Oh, and Karako's name is now no secret, and the previously hidden signs for Ardata and Marvus are now revealed. Okay, one last thing to note. Due to that business happening on Tumblr a lot of the developers are basically jumping ship or more heavily emphasizing their twitter accounts. I'm considering overhauling my own credits list to do the same. We'll see.
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Post by Gab on Dec 15, 2018 5:04:25 GMT
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Post by Gab on Dec 27, 2018 3:48:48 GMT
HIVESWAP: FRIENDSHIP SIMULATORDirector: Andrew HussieProducers: - Ash Paulsen - Cindy Dominguez - Cohen Edenfield (Volume 1) - Julian Dominguez (Volume 2+) UI Designer: David TurnbullGame Design & Programming: - David Turnbull (Volume 1-5, 7, 10, 17) - Mint Chipleaf (Volume 6, 8, 9, 11-18) Quality Assurance: Sondra Crawford (Volume 3+) Title Theme, Fanfares, & END OF FRIENDVANGELION by James RoachVolume One - Of Bloodthirst and Bratwurst Volume Two - Of Aesthetics, Crimson and Otherwise Volume Three - Of Ladies Gray and Lusii White Volume Four - Of Wright and Wronged Volume Five - Of Affection, Unwanted or Untrue Volume Six - Of Text and Envy, Green Volume Seven - Of Business, Flagrantly Illegal Volume Eight - Of Stresses, Song and Otherwise Volume Nine - Of Gazes Cool and Tempers Hot Volume Ten - Of Faraway Lands and Nearby Pals Volume Eleven - Of Pals and Promises, Made and Broken Volume Twelve - Of Know-Nothings and Know-It-Alls Volume Thirteen - Of Fate, Fortune, and Fashion Volume Fourteen - Of Cleanliness and Clownliness Volume Fifteen - Of Creatives, Conventional or Otherwise Volume Sixteen - Of Cult- and Capt-ivation Volume Seventeen - Of Teen and Tech, Acerbic Volume Eighteen - Of Endings, Many Epilogue - Of Hosts, Excellent Most James Roach tracks available here on BandcampHere is a masterpost of credits for all the Friendsim episodes u7u in light of the whole tumblr thing, I've decided to shift a bunch of social media links over to alternatives, mostly twitter. I did the best I could. This has taken a while to get together, so I'm going to take another break before I write any opinions and theories and such on Vol 18 I think. EDIT: First fix, also forgot to say a few things. Also due to What Pumpkin having retired their tumblr account, I got a little worried about the permanence of the links to the trollcall images, which also now don't officially exist anywhere. For now, I'm hosting them on my own DA account, which is probably not an ideal solution. (And you can look at them here if you're really curious)For the most part, though, I tried to keep most of James' tumblr links to his songs, because they tend to contain some interesting little like trivia or development notes and stuff. I wonder if I'm forgetting to mention anything else. EDIT: The author of Marvus' and lonk's routes, V, decided to get a twitter, and has been answering questions and stuff. I've updated their credit on this list to reflect that. As for V, they're... well, a lot like you'd expect, I guess. Take that for what you will, but there is some interesting stuff here. Hmm, guess I could finally add my thoughts about the final route, but... Well I'm a little distracted with the New Year and all, so maybe next time. Speaking of. Happy New Year!~ Here's hoping for a strong 2019. Whoever's going to actually read this, that it.
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Post by Gab on May 16, 2019 0:19:36 GMT
Been a while huh? Over this past weekend there were some pre-recorded streams about Hiveswap. There was: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wIZnwPKsCMAn introduction done by James Roach (the music boy) & Aysha U. Farah (who's name should be familiar from most of the posts I've made in this thread) basically breaking down what the next two streams are gonna be and some general news. youtu.be/_l5KrkGgoeMA Friendsim stream with Aysha and Kate Mitchell, who hosts the Perfectly Generic Podcast. And finally an Act 1 stream with James, Aysha, and Pip & Taz. Taz is optimisticDuelist, who I've brought up on this forum in the past. I believe he is a popular theory boy who is frequently on said podcast. And Pip is... I have absolutely no idea. Other than that they are sometimes on that podcast too. Update on this: I believe Pip is this person, who helps with the podcast and is working on that Vast Error comic too I guess? Kate works on that too actually. I've had a real bitch of a time trying to find the video for that segment. Which is a shame because I believe it's the one with the juiciest reveals about unreleased content. I'm sure it'll turn up at some point. I was gonna say some more but I'm kind of low on energy at the moment, sorry...
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Post by Gab on Jun 29, 2019 19:33:49 GMT
There's a brief news update on a revived and revamped What Pumpkin website. Though this was announced on the kickstarter, the post itself is available for all to see: whatpumpkin.com/and-were-back-with-another-sneak-peek-at-hiveswap-act-2/As you can see it just answers a few questions about the state of things, but not a whole lot of concrete new info or teaser content. But it seems like they want to make updates like this regularly. Whether that means once a month or so, however, remains to be seen.
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Post by Gab on Jul 30, 2019 23:27:58 GMT
Oh, I forgot to add this but I guess I'll put here in the Game Content discussion page. There was also a teaser image included with the other news I mentioned: I took a look and it doesn't really match, but based on all the weird structures, I'd say this could be a candidate for Charun's cave.
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Post by Gab on Oct 25, 2020 20:38:30 GMT
HIVESWAP Act 2 is coming this November.EDIT: The Hiveswap Website has been updated, and has some new screenshots teasing Act 2, so check it out!
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