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Commander Keene posted:Oh, well, we knew Team Psycho Knight's reign of terror over the Labyrinths had to end at some point. We'll have to settle for them trivializing two (three?) bosses. Hopefully Katie fits into the team and Luna achieves similar success in her solo endeavors. They did great work. Honestly, I think it’s a miracle they managed to dodge this for so long. I thought for sure that two or three of the members would have been replaced by now given previous recruitment. I think once Katie is caught up in levels the team will get back to dominance. The main point of concern for me is how this changes the team skill selection. And yeah, I knew Collette was small, but I didn't expect her to be that tiny. Reone is nearly twice her size and even Tarua is bigger than she is (by a decent amount too). The Flying Twybil posted:That's s garter/suspender belt- they're a post WWII design meant for holding up stockings. Earlier versions of garters were woven fabric ties that were tied around the lower or upper knee. See, I had typed garter, but then I thought about it and was like "No, garters are those at weddings. The little leg belts." I didn't know that they were the same thing. I figured there was a particular name for that combination. I like Yuzuha's hair as well. They took the Tifa dolphin tail style and then grafted fins and flippers and stuff on to it. Mokinokaro posted:It is a bit odd they did the full models but you can't bring them into dungeons and such like in the sequel (which is a big thing missing here. Bringing them in sure helped give them agency.) The only reason I can think of is that it made rigging easier because they could see the full body and how it would move in different poses and stances. Either that or they weren't sure at the time if the full model would be shown, so they designed the full model just in case it was needed. You are right in that the Maidens not going into dungeons is bad, but we need to remember that this was the first game. Conception II is where they fixed that problem by involving the Maidens in the dungeon fun. I haven't figured out the Alfie situation yet. I'm going to try and get that Polyoshka tomorrow or Wednesday (whenever I have free time). That seems like a possible revival method. Like I said in the update, no other Matryoshka so far has had a unique name like that. The closest is Star Matryoshka, but that still has Matryoshka in the name. The Polyoshka has got to do something good or important.
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Feb 11, 2020 04:52
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Yeah that is one thing you do have to give the devs: you can really tell they recognized this game's biggest weaknesses when it came to the sequel. These are still definitely budget titles in terms of dev cost, though, and that will show.
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Feb 11, 2020 05:50
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I think the closest I've seen to an in-game lineup is at the sports festival, and even then you have the issue of whether people are standing up straight.
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Feb 11, 2020 11:48
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Polsy posted:I think the closest I've seen to an in-game lineup is at the sports festival, and even then you have the issue of whether people are standing up straight. I don't think that is as accurate as the 3D models though, because the Sports Festival uses the anime sprites. It's hard to tell if they are standing on equal ground or if the sprite is just being positioned/framed differently in the 2D portions of the game. For example, if you set up Collette and Reone's anime sprites side-by-side, the top of Collette's head comes up to Reone's chin. But if you look at the comparison I posted in the update, Collette only comes up to the bottom of Reone's chest. The 3D models kind of have this as well (Collette looks like she's up to Reone's eyes in Bonding Events for example), but the Database let's us get a full view without the perspective shifting or camera trickery. The anime will probably give us a good side-by-side shot at some point, but the problem there is that height is left up to interpretation of the studio behind the animation. I think the 3D comparisons are the best we can do, unless this game has a CG where everyone is lined up. Mokinokaro posted:Hope you figure out what's going on with Alfie. That's probably some of the best drama this mediocre game produced. Good news: I'm fairly certain I've figured out the Alfie issue. I think it was just a matter of waiting for some in-game time to pass. I haven't seen any new bonding events, but Alfie related things are happening so I take that as a sign that I'm on the right track. Bad news is that I still have no idea what the hell that Polyoshka is. I picked up one Sheer Lingerie while training City Level fodder, then got 2 from a Quest once City Level hit 10, but that quest does not appear to be repeatable and a maxxed out Gift Shop doesn't sell that item. So it looks like I'm stuck relying on RNG for the last 2 I need to get my hands on that weird Matryoshka. It's bugging me quite a bit... My next plan is to crank out a few teams of Star Children with the highest Luck stat possible and maybe throw in a team of Merchants or Thieves to see if there's a Team Skill for boosting item rates (there was in CII). Hopefully that will make things go easier. I also still need 1 more "Book" for that locked Star Child class, so I'll have to do item farming one way or another.
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Feb 11, 2020 18:32
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I looked it up and I think I know what the Poly is. It unlocks a new classmating mechanic if I've got things right.
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Feb 11, 2020 20:45
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Mokinokaro posted:I looked it up and I think I know what the Poly is. It unlocks a new classmating mechanic if I've got things right. What mechanic do you think it is? I couldn't find anything on that item and I don't know what mechanical change could be made to Classmating. Actually, let me phrase it this way. Do you think it's worth it for me to item farm for it? I mean, beyond the farming I need to do for that last book.
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Feb 11, 2020 20:58
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EDIT: nvm, I seem to be wrong. I've got no idea what it does.
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Feb 11, 2020 21:02
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Mokinokaro posted:EDIT: nvm, I seem to be wrong. I've got no idea what it does. drat. I was gonna ask how you managed to find it, because I couldn't find out anything. Even the Japanese wikia has "???" next to the item in the list of Matryoshkas. Oh well, item farming it is then. Edit: gently caress, wait, no. It just struck me. I'm fairly sure I know what it is now. I hope to god I'm wrong, but it all just clicked. I think it's because you mentioned new mechanics. -Quest name is "Shock and Capture". What would we be capturing? -You need to turn in 5 sets of sheer (meaning nearly see-through) lingerie. Who/what would that lure in? -The reward is a unique Matryoshka, which is an item used for Classmating/the creation of Star Children. Who would have access to something like that? -Poly as a prefix means "multi", so the Polyoshka probably involves some form of Tri-Mating. -We now know that the item isn't for bringing back Alfie.  I think the Polyoshka allows us to Tri-mate with Mana...
Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 14:42 on Feb 12, 2020 |
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Feb 11, 2020 22:54
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Yeah my thought was tri-mating....but my mind didn't go to that horrific conclusion.
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Feb 11, 2020 23:40
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Honestly, my first thought on seeing the name Polyoshka was a little more simple. It probably just encourages Twin/Triplets to be born when used. Could be wong and it may be something wierd, but Occams Razor and all that.
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Feb 12, 2020 04:50
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Thank you for spoiler tagging that horrible conclusion. Hopefully it's wrong, because that's like...that's just wrong.
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Feb 12, 2020 04:51
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EDIT: I got the Polyoshka, after two or three hours spent roaming dungeons. It doesn't have to do with Alfie and it doesn't have to do with Mana (as far as I can tell). I used it to create a Star Child and I don't see anything remotely different about them. The quest that gives you the Polyoshka doesn't seem to be repeatable either, so you can only get one of them per save it appears. The description says that it's an "electrifyingly special Matryoshka" or something to that effect, but there was no discernible difference between the Star Child I made with it and the one I had made a few minutes before (the one I made with Polyoshka had 2 defensive elements instead of 1, but that isn't special because a lot of the Star Children we currently have also have that). So I guess I still don't have any loving idea what the thing is supposed to do. I might save scum and try it out over and over to see if I can spot anything which stands out, but more than likely I will hold on to it until the end of the game. It's a unique item that you can't get more of and it doesn't seem to do anything special when used for its (normally) intended purpose. Maybe it's some kind of key item you need for a particular ending? Anyway, in less irritating news, I did manage to collect the final Book item for that locked class during my travels. I guess the time I spent wasn't a complete waste. Once the next Labyrinth is cleared, we'll have access to every Star Child class and I guess I'll open up voting for one more team vote. The level caps on the Star Children are at 99 now that the bond gauges are maxed and all classes will be available, so I don't really see the need for any more change ups to our teams. Especially since dungeons will be such a minor part of the LP until the 12th/13th. I've also discovered that each Star Maiden has a special event when their Bond Gauge is maxed. I think I'll save that event for when the thread decides on which Ending it wants. I didn't read it, but I would assume it's some kind of "Final" side event where the game assumes you've made your choice of Maiden. Ashsaber posted:Honestly, my first thought on seeing the name Polyoshka was a little more simple. It probably just encourages Twin/Triplets to be born when used. Could be wong and it may be something wierd, but Occams Razor and all that. Twins don't really have any intrinsic benefit. All Twins do is save you a few seconds and an extra 100/150 BP (which is trivial to get back) when you are creating a bunch of Star Children. They're basically a Freebie Star Child. The Polyoshka seems like too much work just for that. There's definitely a chance that that's all it does, I won't throw out the possibility entirely. I just don't think it's especially likely. Now if it boosts the chance of Genius Star Children, that's a different story. I don't see where "Poly" would fit into that, though. You'd also have to (presumably) use the Poloshka in place of a different Matryoshka that could give stat boosts or elements. Skylight posted:Thank you for spoiler tagging that horrible conclusion. Hopefully it's wrong, because that's like...that's just wrong. Mokinokaro posted:Yeah my thought was tri-mating....but my mind didn't go to that horrific conclusion. I'm going to do my best to find out the answer to this mystery this afternoon when I get back home. The Starmas Events aren't crazy long and I posted an update on Monday, so I think I can afford to hold off working on that for a day. I didn't think much of it at first, but now that it doesn't seem to be related to Alfie (and I've discovered that the quest can only be completed through item farming/RNG), I'm really curious to know what this thing is/does. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 00:34 on Feb 13, 2020 |
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Feb 12, 2020 14:39
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Going forward, I have to wonder if there's gonna be a real chance of another Bond Eater being created.
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Feb 14, 2020 14:25
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Psycho Knight posted:EDIT: I got the Polyoshka, after two or three hours spent roaming dungeons. It doesn't have to do with Alfie and it doesn't have to do with Mana (as far as I can tell). Merciful, but disappointing in a way. Explains why even the wiki had it as ???, though.
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Feb 14, 2020 15:49
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Special Events II: The Star Conception Festival What in god’s name is this thing for? Hm? Oh, sorry. I was trying to figure something out. We’ll get back to the Polyoshka and its vague purpose in the next story update. For now, we’re taking a look at the next “Japan Event” (even though this one technically already existed in Granvania, just in a different form).  Just like with the Autumn Festival, Alfie does not have one of these events (she’s also currently dead… so, yeah…). That means we’re starting with Arie. Unlike the Autumn Festival, none of the Maidens get unique costumes or CGs for this one. We’ll take a look at Arie, Femiruna, Ruka, Farun, and Mirei, since they are the Focus Maidens at the moment. After that, I’ll include some of the Bottom 7 Star Maidens in detail. The rest will stay as summaries. ~Star God Academy Field~  Also, pay no mind to the date up in the corner. The Star Conception Festival events will only trigger when you try and bond with a Star Maiden during the Winter months (December, January, February). The reason the date says “June” in these screenshots is because I’m viewing them in the database, which uses the in-game date of the save file you choose.  I heard you have a similar ceremony in your world too. Oh yeah, Mana mentioned something about a festival that’s similar to Christmas. Yeah, I wouldn’t mind checking it out. Then, if you’d like… would you mind joining us for the Star Conception Festival? …Us? It may be rude to ask you to join, but if you’d like… So we’ll be there with all those kids, huh? If you don’t want to, that’s quite all right. Every year, the priest and I chaperone the children… But the priest has caught a cold this year… Oh, well, I could give you a hand with that. I don’t want to leave you hanging. Not after what happened at the party that one time. Really? Thank you! The children will be overjoyed. Ooh, pretty. Beats the crap out of that gaudy Christmas tree garbage. Come on, everyone. Are you done with the decorating?[Children]: Yup! Now, let’s exchange presents. Presents! [Child A]: What a pipsqueak! I thought God’s Gifts were big and strong! We’re big enough to kick your rear end.  Little poo poo. Hey now, don’t say that![Child A]: Even I can kick his butt! This little brat… Okay, fine. I’m willing to accept that challenge. Come on “Child A”, let’s see what you’ve got. C-Come now… Please forgive them, Itsuki, they’re only children… It’s fine. I’m sort of used to it. [Child A]: Hey! Who do you think you are! Jerkwad! Hold on a second… Is this the little player that asked Arie to marry him? Are we moving in on his action? HA!  You sure have your hands full. Let’s exchange presents now. Um, Itsuki… Did you bring a present to be exchanged? Of course. It’s just something simple, though. Then let’s…[Child A]: Hey! Teacher’s whispering to God’s Gift in secret! They’re totally dating! They’re a couple! In your face, Child A! Arie is ours! At least until the thread votes on which Maiden we actually want and the others are left by the wayside.  Good grief… I’m sorry, Itsuki. Now, let’s start with the present exchange. Come, children. Let’s sing the song.[Children]: Okaaay! And 1, and 2, and…*The ear-splitting sound of the terrible singing of children then follows. Thankfully we don’t have to actually hear it* Be safe as you head home, children. Phew… Thank you, Itsuki. The children loved it. I bet they did. They spent most of their time teasing me… But everyone said they wanted to play with you again. Well, if it’s you asking me, then sure. Thank you. Speaking of which, what present did you get? I got some candy. I’m going to guess that it wasn’t from you. Right. My present was a hat. My fluffy hat is incredibly popular. Well, it’s definitely appropriate for the season. It’s unfortunate my present didn’t go to you… Why can’t we have nice things? I wanted an Arie hat… it’s cool… So instead… take this. Hm? What’s this? It’s small, but it’s a protective charm. It has fluffy wool woven into it. Can you take it with you as a good luck charm inside the labyrinths? Of course I will. I’ll gladly take anything that helps protect me. Thank you, Arie. I should be the one thanking you. Because of you, this turned out to be a very fun Star Conception Festival. I know with the children, it can get a bit too lively… Not going to lie… I do like it when things are a bit quieter. And that’s all for Arie. The children got in the way of anything romantic happening and Star God apparently rigged it so that we didn’t get an awesome Arie Hat. Maybe Femiruna’s will go a little better. ~Star God Academy Hallway~ Hey, Femiruna. Do you want to go check out the Star Conception Festival with me? …I do not mind. That’s what I was told. Itsuki, what are you going to wish for…? I’m not really sure. Inviting you was kind of the first step. Didn’t really put any thought into the festival part. Please Star God… make the Conception PLUS Anime not as bad as it looks. *sigh*… As expected of someone who never plans anything out. Very well… I do not mind going with you. Really? Thanks, Femiruna. …You had other plans? …No, it is nothing.~Great Star Tree~ Is this your first time at this festival? The tree isn’t lit up in this event. At least not yet. Usually, I come here with Mother and Father. But they are quite busy, so after praying, they immediately return home. Oh, I see… Then is it really okay that you’re here with me this time? Then I guess you’re stuck with me all day. What…?! What a lewd way of phrasing it! Wait… what? What was lewd about that? Y-You have no need to concern yourself over me. I am used to this sort of thing. Let us hurry and pray to the Star God and return home! R-Right… okay.*After some praying that it’s doubtful Star God is listening to… because he’s an rear end in a top hat* Okay, the praying is done. We can head back now, if you want. Uh… yes? You said you would be with me all day… But you said you wanted to just pray and go home. Oh… …Itsuki, what did you wish for from the Star God? Me? Well… um… I wished that we’d always be together… …How corny. You probably say that to everyone.You’re not wrong. No I don’t. Really now? Well… whatever. My wish has been the same since I was a small child… That’s kind of sad. But this year, my wish was a bit different. What’s different about this year? Hehe… Well, I have been greedier this past year. Just this year, huh? What is with that face? No, it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it. My wish every year is rather modest. But… It was a problem this year. No matter how much I wish for, it is never enough. Wait, so what’s different? There are so many joyous things that have occurred at the academy. So many interesting things… Like with Tarua and Farun…What the sweet Christ happened with Tarua that could be considered “interesting”? *A time skip happens here for some reason. I guess we don’t get to hear about all the things that Femiruna thought was interesting* Whew… I talked more than usual there. Yeah, it’s getting late. We should head back. Hehe… This year seems different from all the others. The most different thing is that you… …Me, what? It was fun. Now good day to you!*And Femiruna loving hauls rear end out of that conversation* Not bad, but I felt like that scene was a little incoherent/unclear. Could have been written a bit better than that. Oh well, I guess that’s what happens when you’re trying to write these in a somewhat neutral way that accounts for the fact you can trigger them at any point in the story/character route. ~Star God Academy Classroom~ Ruka, the Star Conception Festival is going on right now. Why are you talking to me about it? Can you not even show up long enough for me to give you a gift? I heard that’s what they do at the festival. Do it if you want. You’ll just be exchanging gifts with yourself. That’s kind of harsh, don’t you think? Hmph… Anyway, I have to be at the orphanage for the Star Conception Festival. Do you want some help with it? I guess I’d be thankful if you helped… But how am I supposed to introduce you to everyone? I’m just a friend, aren’t I? I don’t think anyone will care that much. I-I care! Whoah. That’s a huge leap, Ruka. Don’t get me wrong, they will mercilessly tease you about having a boyfriend, but calling you a tramp? I doubt that. Ruka, none of them are going to think that. I-I just don’t want anyone to misunderstand! Is there any way I can get you to accept my gift?You’re coming on a little strong now, Itsuki. … Th-Then, once it’s over, I’ll contact you through the magic transmission device. That’s fine with me. I’ll wait for you. Y-You really don’t have to do this… Well, goodbye for now.~Great Star Tree~ She just messaged me, so I guess that means she’ll be here in a little bit…*Ruka then runs in* Huff… Huff… Did you run the whole way? You didn’t need to rush like that. I would have waited. I overate, so I just wanted to get some exercise in! It’s not because I felt bad about making you wait or anything. If you say so. Well, here’s the gift I got for you. Thanks for everything, Ruka. I appreciate all of your help. H-Hmph. You’re welcome. …Can I open this? Of course. It’s your gift. What’s this? A ribbon…? I figured it would be better to get you something you could use regularly. I tried to get something that matches your style. Um… This… is from me. Sorry it’s leftovers, but it’s my fried chicken. I put it in some containers. I wanted to get you something proper, but…Hey, don’t ever feel bad about food. Itsuki is a man of simple pleasures. I didn’t have time before preparing the party, so I’ll buy you something later. I think this is fine, but if you insist, then I’ll look forward to it. I can’t get you anything too expensive, so don’t expect too much. With that out of the way, I’m going back. The party isn’t over yet. Wait, you left the party and came all the way out here just for me? Sorry about that. I thought the partying would have been over by now. There’s no deep meaning behind it. So, goodbye then. Right. Oh! Wait a second! Do you still want something? Here. This is for the kids. I-I can’t take that. What am I supposed to say when I give this to them? You could always say it’s from Santa. He’s an old legend that was turned into a corporate mascot. Don’t worry about it. He’s part of the Christmas tradition from my world. He has a sleigh that’s pulled by reindeer and delivers presents to good children on Christmas morning. Oh? I don’t understand… Is he like some gift fairy? Well… Actually, never mind. I’ve got an explanation written down with the sweets. Just read through it later. Put the gifts next to their pillows. Oh? That sounds like fun. Thank you. I’ll read it later. …Are we done here? Um… Thank you for the gifts for the kids… Oh, and for my gift too… Something wrong? Um… While I’m here, maybe I should use the ribbon you just gave me. Help me tie it. You want to put it on right now? I-I want you to see if it looks good on me! STOP USING THAT PHRASE! It sounds stupid! Okay. What do I need to do? Hold on. Let me untie the one I’m using. It’s long, so it’s a ton of work just to tie it up… All you have to do is hold down my hair…*A fade-to-black happens as Itsuki helps Ruka tie the ribbon… no, we won’t actually see the ribbon when it fades back. Are you crazy? It’s not like they have an accessory system that could have been easily employed here (as well as a ribbon accessory that can be given to anyone, including Ruka). Sheesh* Hmph… All done. What do you think…? H-How does it look? I think it looks great. It’s hard to imagine you without it. H-Hmph… I’m not wearing a ribbon for you, you know? But it does feel comfortable, so I’ll be sure to take good care of it… One more thing. What? There’s still more? Why don’t you say it all at once? Well, it’s just… I saw you with your hair down earlier. I think it made you look really mature. It suits you in its own way.Too bad we couldn’t see it. Seriously, this event was begging for a CG. D-Don’t stop me just to stay [sic] that… Jerk… No matter how much you compliment me, I won’t change my hairstyle. I’ll make you help me tie it again… Sure thing. H-Hmph. Don’t cause too much trouble for me next year. Well… A happy New Year’s to you then.That went on for a while. It was sort of sweet though… in a strange way. You know, when you get past Ruka’s stupid tsundere crap. ~Star God Academy Classroom~  Itsuki, are ya goin’ to the Star Conception Festival? You mean the Christmas thing? Yeah, I was thinking about it. Why? Then do ya wanna go with me? I’m in the same boat, you know. Since we both don’t know, isn’t that just perfect? Please, Itsuki! Sure, I don’t mind. Really? Great!  Everyone does it, right? I wanna do it too! Let’s meet up in front of that tree. See ya later!Just getting right to the good stuff, huh? I’m cool with that. ~Great Star Tree~  Hey! Sorry… I didn’t mean to make you wait… Hey, Itsuki. Take a look at that. The decorations are great. It’s gigantic… I don’t think I’ve seen a tree that big in my world. What was it like in your world? It’s a day when family and lovers spend time together. Oh, lovers, huh. I wouldn’t understand… But this is really romantic. I’m sure it’d be fun goin’ a [sic] date here. I didn’t expect you to think about stuff like that. Course I do… Seein’ the starry skies always feels so romantic to me…  I did think ‘bout that durin’ my travels, I’ll have ya know. You could always try walking around with me. What do you say? Hehe… That’s a cute thing to say. Right now, my heart is full of warmth. An’ I got that thanks to you. So thanks, Itsuki. Well, that’s it for this topic.So you don’t want to walk around…?  Oh, right. Here. Not sure if you’ll like it, but… Haha. My heart’s racin’~ Can I take a look inside? Let’s see… Oh… gloves?Weeeeeak. I was told that they’re really popular in town at the moment, so I… Uh… Farun? Can ya open up my gift now? Sure… I guess… Oh, it’s- This… kinda feels weird, right? Sorry… We’re like a couple. Huh…? Oh, right. I guess ya can look at it that way. Huh… Just thinkin’ that we’re wearin’ the same thing…I mean, judging by those thong straps you’ve got up around your hips and the kind of swimsuit that Itsuki apparently likes to wear… those gloves are probably not the only clothing you’re wearing that’s similar. I-I’m suddenly feelin’ really embarrassed ‘bout it… Why? I like them. I-I know, but… I just feel bad ‘bout it. Are ya sure you’re okay ‘bout lookin’ the same as me? I’m fine with it. Are you not? I-It’s not that at all! There’s no way I don’t like ‘em!  O-Okay… So, we’re gonna have the same look then… Hehe, it kinda feels more precious this way. Thanks for the wonderful gift, Itsuki!*Some time passes* Huh? Looks like people are goin’ home. Looks like everything is wrapping up. We should probably do the same. Right. Thanks for comin’ here with me today. I got a taste of what it’s like to be lovers. Wait, what?! Just kiddin’! Ahaha! Thanks for the present! See ya later!That was fine. I think the glove conversation dragged a bit longer than it needed to, but overall it was sweet. ~Star God Academy Classroom~   I want you to go with me… I don’t mind… but why are you so eager to go with me? I was asked by His Majesty to make the Great Star Tree shine brightly this year. It’s supposedly to follow the custom of your world. Custom? Oh, you mean like the lights on a Christmas tree. It’s more flashy and interesting that way. But Narcisstes didn’t seem to like it.Narcisstes can go to hell. We’re still looking for answers on that life stealing alchemist circle in his basement. Thanks to him, I had to redo it. He’s so troublesome despite the busy season. He does seem like the micromanaging type. In the end, I made simpler lighting. Today is the lighting ceremony after all. Sounds easy enough. Thank you. Then let’s go.~Great Star Tree~ Looks like a big turnout. The king was on stage earlier, why weren’t you up there too? Fair enough. Either way, I’m looking forward to this. To what? The decorations you made. You always do really good work. Yes. I’m looking forward to that as well. I am sort of nervous though. I’m standing right next to the person that made them. [Announcement]: Thank you for gathering here today. The countdown will now begin. Here we go…[Announcement]: Five… Four… Three… Two… One… Zero!  This loses a bit of the impact when we just saw this exact CG like 4 times before this. …Heheh. Why are you laughing? Nothing. I merely thought to myself about how childish your reaction was. How does it compare to the ones on Sora? Please tell me your thoughts. This is a lot better.Yeah, I like this more restrained look. Christmas decorations/lights in our world are super tacky and abused. Some people turn their houses into a miniature sun.  I think you did an amazing job. You’re quite honest. It feels special when you compliment me. Will you compliment me some more? Okay, take it easy now. It’s getting weird. Eheheh. Thank you, Itsuki. Looks like the crowd is loving it as well. Are you sure you don’t want to go up on stage? I only made what was requested of me.  Until it’s not up to their lofty standards, then they want to know who made it so that they can send threats and insults until their demands are met. I’m going to return now. Well, I know who made it. You’re the one that created this amazing show. Heheh… I told you I didn’t care. You’re so strange.  I’m returning to my lab. See you later.That one started out okay, but I think it went a little too far with the “praising Mirei” aspect. Not that I don’t think she deserves praise, mind you. I just think they went overboard with Itsuki’s gushing over her. We’ll pick up the rest in Part 2, since the update is too big for a single post. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 04:01 on Feb 15, 2020 |
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Feb 15, 2020 00:59
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Special Events II – Star Conception Festival (Part 2) + Valentine’s Day We’ll take a detailed look at Tarua and Mahiru this time. I’ll include Lillith/Lillie, Yuzuha, and Sue in the Beach/Flower Viewing Events. I know that Reone has a unique CG for the Flower Viewing Event, so we’ll save her inclusion for that. Collette already got a detailed event during the Autumn Festival, so she’s relegated to summaries for the remaining “Japan Events”. ~Star God Academy Field~  It’s like -17 degrees outside plus windchill for me right now. No part of that CG behind you implies that it’s anything even close to approaching 5. Don’t talk to me about cold, Tarua. Well, it’s getting close to Christmas after all. Oh, right! I heard about that from Mahiru. They have Christmas on Sora, right? What do you do for this “Christmas”? Well, exchanging gifts is a big part of it. Augh? What’s that? We get gifts for each other and then exchange them on Christmas day. Well, I don’t have anything with me right now. Augh… That’s too bad… What else, what else? Is there anything else you do? We send Christmas cards.Yes. We’re really doing this. You might have thought that some new or interesting detail about Tarua would crop up in this event, but nope! We’re still talking about her letter delivery thing. Augh? Christmas cards?  I want to send Christmas cards to everyone all around the country! Are you planning to deliver them all? That’s going to be tough. I’m sure everyone would like it. If I ask Boss, he’ll prepare the cards for me. *Later on* Augh! I had Boss help me make tons of Christmas cards! That’s… that’s a lot of cards, Tarua… Yup! All that’s left is to deliver them all! I’ll go and do that right now! Let me help you this time. Augh? There’s no need. I’m doing this because I want to. These aren’t normal letters though. They’re coming from you. Augh. Maybe… Hmmm… All right then, please help me! I guess it’d be easier if we worked together. Right. Let’s get to it then.~Granvania Shopping Center~ Phew… that’s finally the last of them. Well, except for this one anyway… Who is this for? Itsuki!*Tarua comes running in to frame*  I’m done with my share too. Glad they liked them. Augh! It’s thanks to you helping out! Hey, Tarua? I still have one card left, though. So… Merry Christmas, Tarua. Augh? I-It’s… for me? You’ve been working really hard. You deserve it. Augh… I-I didn’t think I’d get one… I’m sure they did. R-Really? Hehe… That’d be nice. Augh augh. This makes me so happy, Itsuki. Merry Christmas. Hehe. Everyone liked the cards, and I even got one from you. I think you should get a reward for your hard work. Reward? Well, there’s something I want more than a Christmas card…Can anyone guess? Think real hard about it now… We haven’t done a gift exchange yet. So, what do you want? Augh… Can I really say it? There it is. Um… I want you to pat my head more than usual. Tons and tons of times. Is that really it? Grrrr! You make it sound so insignificant! It’s important to me! If you say so. Come here, then. Hehe… It’s Christmas with Itsuki. I feel so happy. Play with me again sometime. Promise me, Itsuki!Well, that’s done. I want to clarify that I don’t hate Tarua. I don’t find anything particularly offensive about her, other than maybe the creepy head patting fetish. I just wish that she had a character. She likes to run, she likes to deliver letters/be a mailman, and she likes Boss. I don’t think she ever goes beyond that or does anything with it. It’s so boring.  Anyway, the handful of Tarua fans out there have now had a chance to see one of her events in detail rather than just a summary. Let’s wrap this up with Mahiru and then we’ll take a look at the rest in summaries. ~Granvania Shopping Center~ People are getting ready for that Star Conception Festival… Has it really been a year already?Technically it’s been longer than that (I think I’ve skipped through 3 or 4 years at this point), but let’s ignore that from a narrative perspective. ~Star God Academy Field~  Yeah, it looks positively freezing. Hey, Mahiru. I can’t believe you’re working on the flowerbed on a day like today. Why? Is today some special day? The Star Conception Festival is about to happen. Ah… I completely forgot. Why are you doing that barehanded? Here, let me help out. No, I’m almost done. You missed your chance to help and deepen our bonds.Well, if you say so. That’s fine with me. Don’t say that. Why don’t we go check out the Star Conception Festival together? I don’t mind… It’s basically Christmas, right? That’s news to me. I thought Christmas only existed as a means to force you to hang around family and awkwardly stand around until you’re finally allowed to go home. I think you’re thinking of Valentine’s Day, Mahiru. Coincidentally, that happens to be today as of my typing this. What’s up to my fellow single peeps out there! Make sure to hit the stores tomorrow to snag all that sweet 50% discounted chocolate so that you can drown all your sorrows from today! Sugar will always be there for you. I think you’ve got a really skewed interpretation of this holiday. Don’t be weird about it, just relax and enjoy it. Come on. Hold on. I’m going to wash my hands.*Mahiru then leaves to wash her hands* ~Great Star Tree~  Everyone is doing the gift exchange. But I didn’t bring one. Yeah… I didn’t really plan that far ahead either… I didn’t think we’d have nothing to do on Christmas day. Why don’t we run out real quick and find some presents to exchange? I’m sure there’s something around here we can get. Hmm… I guess that’s better than daydreaming here the whole time. I’ll go back to the dorm for now. Let’s meet back in an hour.*One hour later* Huff… Sorry… Did you wait long? No, I just arrived. Waiting for each other like this makes us look like a couple. One hour wasn’t a lot of time. I didn’t have a lot of options as far as gifts go. So, what did you get me? It’s… uh… a charm for safe birth.”Gardening Gloves” is the best choice here, but I liked this one better. Besides, we already had a “glove” moment with Farun. Besides, this fits better with the “I had one hour to rush out and grab whatever I could” situation.  I was thinking about it more from a Star Child angle. Maybe the meaning is different? Yeah… I think it’s pretty different. Sorry… I didn’t have a lot of time to think things over. Thanks. I’m plenty happy receiving any gift from you. I never thought I’d be celebrating Christmas in Granvania… Well, it’s my turn now. What did you manage to find? Is this is a good luck talisman? Yeah, a talisman for your safety. I put Star Energy into it with my wish. Did you make this? It doesn’t look store bought. How did you do that in an hour? So it’s a regift then. So, in that sense, today was the perfect day.Although, I guess I don’t have much room to talk. I basically did the same thing with Wake in CII. In terms of LP canon, Wake had a closet full of gift items that he just pulled from whenever he needed it. Thanks, Mahiru. The labyrinths should go much smoother with this. Just don’t get yourself killed… If you die, I’ll never forgive you. I know, I know. I’m not going to leave you alone like that. Fine. It’s a promise. *sigh*… My breath is all white. It’s getting colder. There’s not much else to do, so let’s go home before we catch a cold.Wimps. This talisman is a lot heavier than it looks. What did you put inside it? Oh, don’t look! Why not? If you open it, the Star Energy will escape, making the talisman useless.…What was that part about “something of mine”?  …I’m sort of more curious now. What do you mean by “something of mine”? It’s nothing big. You’ll just be disappointed even if you look. I won’t open it. Just tell me what’s in there. N-No… I don’t want to say. Okay, I’ll leave it alone if it’s that embarrassing.I’d rather not know, either. We’ll pretend that it’s a strand of hair or something. Still a bit creepy, but better than almost every other alternative. I think that’s for the best. Looking inside will weaken its effect too. Got it. Protection is more important to me than curiosity. Hey, Itsuki. Look. Hm? What? Not very common on Sora. Seems like Granvania has it, though. Did you know girls who stand under mistletoe can’t refuse a kiss? Isn’t that just a foreign custom? I bet you wouldn’t have the guts to go kiss her. You wish. It’s not that big a deal. Oh? You sure about that?*Mahiru then wanders off towards the tree* Look. Now I’m under the mistletoe. I can’t refuse your kiss now… What will you do?Coming on strong here, Mahiru. I won’t knock that though. …There’s only one thing to do. Just a cheek kiss, though. You can move away if you can’t handle that. O-Okay… If you did do something so bold, you think I’d back off, huh? You won’t ever kiss me in a public place like this. Same goes for you, you know. You’re always talking about how unbelievable it is in games and on TV. No way. Here I go! I won’t run away! Go ahead and try me!*Itsuki then kisses Mahiru… on the cheek I presume. That’s what he said* There. Now you can’t say anything about those romance dramas or video games. Merry Christmas, Mahiru. Merry Christmas, Itsuki…~Summaries of Others~  Yuzuha’s event has her talking about going to sketch the Great Star Tree and then hanging up the drawing. She also mentions that she’s a Star Maiden and therefore has to go celebrate Star God’s birthday (which makes sense, but the other Star Maidens don’t say anything about being required to go). Yuzuha and Itsuki make plans to do a gift exchange with each other and Yuzuha has a brief moment of “Are you sure you want to spend the festival with me…?” Yuzuha also mentions that she has to get ready, because her hands get cold during the festival (yes, we’re giving gloves as a gift again). At the Star Tree, Yuzuha does her drawing and then goes to hang it up, but says that it didn’t turn out too well because her hands are numb from the cold. She goes to tie it to the tree anyway, but finds that she’s too short. Itsuki offers to boost her up, which Yuzuha finds embarrassing. Itsuki does it anyway, because she did work on the drawing and it wouldn’t be right to just leave without hanging it.  Yuzuha starts moving around too much and Itsuki can’t hold her up properly, so Yuzuha falls and is left face-to-face with Itsuki. She then says that she can’t move away because the threads on their clothes are tangled (how the gently caress is that even possible?). The two eventually manage to get free of each other and Yuzuha mentions that she managed to get her picture hung up in a place where it doesn’t stand out (which she is happy about). The two then do their gift exchange, with Itsuki giving Yuzuha a pair of gloves and Yuzuha giving him a handmade scarf which is apparently like two meters long. The event wraps up around there, with Itsuki offering to wrap the scarf around the both of them for the trip home.  Itsuki asks Reone what she’s doing for the Star Conception Festival, but she replies that she’ll probably just drink champagne at home by herself. Itsuki asks if they could celebrate it together since he doesn’t really know how this festival works. Reone tells him about the Gift Exchange and expresses interest in seeing what Itsuki would get her. She agrees to go with him and the two plan to meet up later that evening.  Itsuki ends up waiting around for Reone to show up. When she arrives, she says that she was running late because she was trying to prepare his gift. She wonders if Itsuki was cold waiting for her, but he brushes if off because he’s a real manly man. Reone thinks that’s adorable. Gift Exchange time happens and Reone reveals that she got Itsuki some sexy lucky underwear and that he should try wearing them during the ritual to feel more motivated. Itsuki is less than enthused about this and Reone mentions that she couldn’t find one she liked in the men’s section, so she got the woman’s piece. She then reveals that she was joking and that it’s just a stomach warmer. She wants Itsuki to stay warm this season. Itsuki’s gift-  At first seems a little hard to figure out. Sexy lingerie is obviously the wrong answer, despite who we’re dealing with. Alcohol-free champagne seems like the wrong choice as well, but it actually is the best option. Itsuki gives his reasoning by explaining that this way he’ll be able to celebrate with Reone, who had planned on drinking alone. Reone thinks that’s pretty perceptive of him. Later on, the two make their wish to Star God. Reone says that she’ll wish for the same thing that Itsuki did: for him to get back home soon. Itsuki tells her that she should really wish for something for herself and Reone replies that in that case she’ll wish to be able to do this again with him next year. They eventually settle on wishing for everyone to be happy and then head off to go pop that bubbly.  Sue isn’t particularly concerned about the festival, since she has a lot to take care of at the ranch during the winter (preparing extra food, closing up the ranch to keep the cold out, etc). She does mention that she’s wanted to try going, but she has to take care of her animals. Itsuki offers to help so that Sue will be able to go to the festival with him, which makes her happy.  The pair manage to make it to the festival just as it’s wrapping up. They decide to at least make wishes/prayers and decide to pray for the safety of Sue’s animals. Sue also wants to pray for Itsuki’s safety. Praying happens and Itsuki reveals that he prayed for Sue to always be healthy. Sue says she had fun, but the next time she comes to the festival she only wants to pray for Itsuki. Things wrap up there. It’s a fairly straightforward event.   Going to invite Collette has her talking about how sad it is that Itsuki is all alone on a day that tests his abilities as a man. After some back and forth about Itsuki insisting that he wouldn’t be sad about being alone on Christmas and Collette doing her strange teasing, Itsuki asks what the situation is like at her bakery. She says that Star Conception Festival day is a major day for business, but she does still close at night. Both her and Itsuki make plans to meet up at the Star Tree later. At the tree, Itsuki asks how things went at the bakery. Collette says it was a great day for sales and that she can probably spend a nice New Year’s with the income. Collette and Itsuki then talk about having to do something romantic and Collette says to go ahead. Itsuki isn’t sure what she means, but figures that it would be weird for a man not to do anything. Collette then has a-  …strange animation that I don’t think was intentional. Anyway, she’s embarrassed because his face is really close, then changes the topic to prayers. Collette says she prayed in a very romantic way, then asks Itsuki what he was thinking she meant by “romantic”. Collette asks if he was thinking of stealing a kiss, Itsuki goes “Who wouldn’t?”, and then Collette starts doing her creepy “I’m just a pure little girl” routine. Collette says she’ll reward him for not lying, then… I think kisses him? It’s not clear what happens. Either way, Collette moves on to “Strawberry Time”, which Itsuki is unclear about. Collette says that it’s normally called a gift exchange. She then hands over a fruitcake to Itsuki and explains how it’s made. Collette jokes that it was a leftover from the bakery, but clarifies that she actually baked it for herself originally. Itsuki then realizes that he forgot to get Collette anything, which she mocks him for. Collette still agrees to spend the festival with Itsuki the big loser. They then share the fruitcake together.   Lillith starts off the event by talking about how worn out she is from all the customers coming by at this time of year. Itsuki explains that it’s probably because of the Star Conception Festival, since it’s a big time for lovers. Itsuki asks her if she plans to go see the tree, but Lillith says she has nobody to go with. Itsuki offers to take her, which makes her a bit self-conscious since she’s never gone to a place for lovers before. Itsuki eventually convinces her to go.  At the Great Tree, Lillith gets caught up in the sights of the festival. Lillith then starts getting shy and mentions that her heart is racing and her body feels warm. She asks if this might be love that she’s feeling, but Itsuki feels her forehead and thinks that it’s probably a fever. Itsuki offers to take her home, but Lillith says that it felt like a comfortable sort of nervousness… then she drops like a rock.  Back at Lillith’s house, she finally comes to and asks if Itsuki brought her there. Itsuki says that he’ll get going now, but Lillith stops him to thank him for taking her to the festival. The event wraps up shortly afterward with Itsuki wishing Lillith “Merry Christmas” and then explaining what the hell he means by that (she doesn’t know what Christmas is after all).  Speaking of Valentine’s Day and drowning sorrows in chocolate, it’s time for Valentine’s Day in Granvania. Valentine’s Day will initially trigger in the fourth week of January (which is when this conversation with Mana will happen). That’s the day where you give chocolates to someone you like, right?I should clarify that this isn’t actually Valentine’s Day, at least not how it’s known in the West. This is Valentine’s Day as it’s known in Southeast Asia. Valentine’s Day in the West involves people just giving cards or chocolates or roses or whatever to someone they like, either a special someone or a friend or family. Guys and gals both do it. Valentine’s Day in Southeast Asia (primarily Japan) is all about the ladies giving chocolates to gents. There’s love chocolate, friendship chocolate, family chocolate, and obligation chocolate. It can be store-bought or handmade, but generally if you get handmade then it carries a little more weight (they went to the trouble to actually bake you chocolate instead of just grabbing it from Wal-Mart after all). It also has a counterpart day called White Day, which is one month after Valentine’s. March 14th is when the guys have to man up and give chocolate of their own. This way chocolate companies can spread the love (and profits) out over a longer time! Hurray! The reason I make this distinction is because Itsuki will not be giving any chocolates of his own. There’s no “White Day” in this game where we have to pick Star Maidens to give God’s Gift Chocolate to. Wasted opportunity in my opinion. You could have used that event as a Bond Booster thing.  What else but that? I’m a little surprised that you celebrate that here. Granvania has incorporated a ton of Sora’s culture into its own. God’s Gifts receive chocolate from Star Maidens. You should really get them on your good side for that. *sigh* Thanks for letting me know that in advance… Nar and the King are your biggest rivals. Prepare yourself. After this, the actual Valentine’s Day moment of truth will happen during Week 2 of February.  I’m looking forward to seeing how much chocolate you’ll get from the Star Maidens! Let’s just hope they genuinely give it to you instead of out of obligation.Spoiler Alert: The Star Maidens do not do “obligation chocolate.” Well, Ruka will call it that, but she’s clearly lying because she’s a tsundere. If you haven’t bonded with a particular Maiden enough, Itsuki gets jack poo poo from them on this day (I think you need a bond level of 2 or 3 in order to get to Friendship level chocolate. It might even be as low as Level 1). If Itsuki ends up without any chocolate, then Mana will feel bad for him and give him a Marble Candy gift item. The Star Maidens have class today. Let’s hurry to the academy.~Star God Academy Hallway~ Looks like they’re not in class right now. …Oh, someone’s coming. I’m gonna hide. Do you best! Each Maiden that you have a high enough bond with will give you a “Choco” item. They all do the same thing when used (Restore 50% HP). I won’t document each Maiden here, because they all only have a single line that’s a variation of “Here you go.” I will show off all the different chocolate designs though.            Alfie doesn’t seem to get a Valentine’s Day thing, but that’s not a major surprise since she seems to be excluded from all side events. Also, she’s currently dead. I cannot stress enough just how dead she is.  It’s hard to believe, but look… R-R-R-Really?! I’ve got nothing left to teach you to swoon the hearts of women. Since when have you been teaching me anything about that?And that’s it! …Okay, well not entirely. It is possible to get “Love” chocolates. These involve slightly more elaborate scenes of the Maiden pulling Itsuki aside and talking to him about wanting to give something special.  These will only happen once the Bond Gauge has been completely maxed.  The “Favor” chocolate items are different from the friendship versions. Each Maiden’s love chocolate has a different effect. I don’t have all of them just yet, because I’m still in the process of grinding Bond Levels to Max. I’ll show off all the different box/chocolate designs, descriptions, and their associated events later on. The best time for this will probably be once we’ve seen the Level 5 events. Next time: It’s back to the Labyrinths for us as we tackle our Sixth Star Offering. We’ll discuss the strange Polyoshka and what it doesn’t seem to do, we’ll get to complete our collection of Star Child classes, we'll talk a little about the soundtrack to this game (and the Maidens' individual themes) and we’ll get ready for what could be the last Star Child Team Vote. As for me…  I have an anime to start watching… That’s right, the time is nearly nigh for us to explore the (supposedly) slapped together marketing tie-in for this game.
Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 04:46 on Feb 15, 2020 |
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Feb 15, 2020 01:00
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 This is gonna be such a trainwreck
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Feb 15, 2020 02:26
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Psycho Knight posted:That’s news to me. I thought Christmas only existed as a means to force you to hang around family and awkwardly stand around until you’re finally allowed to go home. I think you’re thinking of Valentine’s Day, Mahiru. Coincidentally, that happens to be today as of my typing this. What’s up to my fellow single peeps out there! Make sure to hit the stores tomorrow to snag all that sweet 50% discounted chocolate so that you can drown all your sorrows from today! Oh, it was Valentine's Day? I'd entirely forgotten. Hell, I think I probably forgot it existed in the first place. Just goes to show what my status is. I'd hit the stores for chocolate, but I'm basically broke and I can't really eat sugar. Wow, what a great holiday this is! Anyways, the events were nice enough, I suppose. I don't really get how the threads of their clothing is supposed to get stuck together, but maybe it just had something to do with hanging decorations on their clothes or something. All of that being said... SSNeoman posted:
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Feb 15, 2020 06:48
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Just a small note, Japan is East Asia, not Southeast Asia 
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Feb 15, 2020 09:53
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Mahiru scene check: it's basically the same except the mistletoe ending part cuts off earlier with her saying 'ha, I was joking' before Itsuki approaches her for the kiss. Also, all the gift options are charms (safe birth charm, exam luck charm, general safety charm), not sure why they changed two of them when, like you say, 'the only thing I could find' is more realistic. And I'm pretty sure your reward for not lying to Collette is getting patted on the head. Psycho Knight posted:Spoiler Alert: The Star Maidens do not do “obligation chocolate.” Well, Ruka will call it that, but she’s clearly lying because she’s a tsundere. The item actually is obligation chocolate even in Japanese Conception Plus, they just translated it as friendship presumably to confuse Westerners slightly less. I'm not sure that change was entirely communicated to the dialogue writers.
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Feb 15, 2020 13:19
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Polsy posted:Mahiru scene check: it's basically the same except the mistletoe ending part cuts off earlier with her saying 'ha, I was joking' before Itsuki approaches her for the kiss. Also, all the gift options are charms (safe birth charm, exam luck charm, general safety charm), not sure why they changed two of them when, like you say, 'the only thing I could find' is more realistic. Wow, so they really expanded that Mahiru portion then. That’s a fairly lengthy part of this event. I guess that would explain why Mahiru’s felt longer than everyone else's. Also, really? Why change it like that? Further still, why would it be obligation chocolate even in Japan? You only get these scenes/items after the bond level has been raised a certain amount, so surely that would imply friendship chocolate at least. Obligation chocolate seems like something they would give at zero/near zero bond gauge just because they have to work with Itsuki and at least pretend to like him for the sake of fhe world. Maybe that's exactly why the translators changed it to friendship? Keep in mind that there are only two chocolate item varieties. That means in Japanese Conception/Plus, a character like Farun will still be giving "obligation" chocolate even after the event where she does that lovers dance for Itsuki. Hell, Reone will still give it even after Itsuki saved her life and helped her fulfill her dead brother's final wish. I'm pretty sure the first chocolate is given up to Bond Level 4 and the love chocolate is only given in BL5. I will rarely side with the translators, but I've got to give this one to them. They made the right call with this change. That said, I will include your note about this in the update later, just to highlight that a change was indeed made that screwed up the scene a little bit. Ibblebibble posted:Just a small note, Japan is East Asia, not Southeast Asia Yeah, I guess that only includes countries in that little pocket between China and India, huh? I'll change it to just East when I get back. I was trying to say that Japan isn’t the only Asian country that does it like that. The Flying Twybil posted:Oh, it was Valentine's Day? I'd entirely forgotten. Hell, I think I probably forgot it existed in the first place. Just goes to show what my status is. Might depend on where you are. It's impossible for me to avoid because the university has flyers up everywhere for all kinds of events and I lead some ESL discussion groups where the topic will obviously come up during this time of year. It’s sort of inescapable for me, even though I'd rather not have to acknowledge it. Sucks about your thing with sugar though, although maybe it's for the best. Chocolate is a major weakness for me, especially since I managed to completely kick diet soda a few months ago and therefore no longer have anything that even tastes like sugar to snack on. Kicking chocolate is next, but that's closer to a cliff than a step. SSNeoman posted:
See, I'm inclined to agree and also not. Make no mistake, this anime adaption will not be finding its way into my favourites list and I highly doubt it will for anyone else here. On the other hand, I'm not expecting it to be horrifically bad. At the very least the animation of the clips I've seen looks decent. Keep in mind that my standards for horrifically bad are likely skewed. I have a fairly high tolerance for anime BS. That said, there are a few things I'm dreading going in to this: 1. A reliance on Mana: I hate Mana because I hate "nudge nudge wink wink" characters. Mana's personality will also probably (somehow) be exaggerated beyond what we've been dealing with in the game in order to try and be goofier or funnier. 2. Complete reduction of the Star Maidens to their quirks, which are then jacked up to 11: The series is only 12 episodes I think, so no way in hell are we getting any kind of narrative from the Star Maidens like what the game has been giving us. Expect Mirei’s mad-scientist thing to be front and center at all times and probably Arie's secret kinky side to be on full display. We might get some passing nods to their character routes, but for the most part this will likely just focus on whatever singular aspect of each Maiden the writers thought would be "funny". 3. How much editing I might have to do to show screenshots: I have a rough idea based on the Classmating clip I saw, but I don’t know for sure just how far this show goes. I know the envelope for fanservice has been pushed way further since the last time I watched one of these kinds of anime (which was probably Ikki Tousen. Not new Ikki Tousen, I mean OG 17 years ago 2003 season 1 Ikki Tousen). I'm aware that Highschool DxD upped the ante at some point between 2012-2015, but I have no idea what level it's risen to since then.
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Feb 15, 2020 15:12
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I think Christmas is actually a bit of a romantic holiday in Japan. Also I feel your pain with the cold. I live in Minnesota and it was -35 fahrenheit with the windchill the other day.
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Feb 15, 2020 16:34
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Psycho Knight posted:Might depend on where you are. It's impossible for me to avoid because the university has flyers up everywhere for all kinds of events and I lead some ESL discussion groups where the topic will obviously come up during this time of year. It’s sort of inescapable for me, even though I'd rather not have to acknowledge it. It's probably where I'm at, given I don't get out much anymore aside from some volunteer work on the weekends. I don't watch television anymore either, so... yeah. I've always disliked Valentine's Day, especially since it's just a commercial cash grab far from its original intention. I can have sugar additives in very small amounts and it won't bother me, which is nice since most food would be unbearable otherwise. It was at its worst when I first had to drop it, given I used to have a very strong sweet tooth, but the pain was enough of a help to kick the habit, harsh as it is. If I gave it a couple more years, I could probably go back to eating it, but it'd just start again. I dropped all soda about five to six years ago now, mostly out of caffeine concerns, but it was a major contributor to my sugar issue as well. Health-wise it just means I get more cravings for salt and carbs now, which isn't too bad, I suppose. Psycho Knight posted:Make no mistake, this anime adaption will not be finding its way into my favourites list and I highly doubt it will for anyone else here. It goes without saying that it likely won't be in my favorites list, as I 've proved already I typically dislike most anime BS and I'm far from the intended crowd for this sort of thing. I just have a fascination with awful games/ writing. I don't really have high standards for anime to begin with based on what I've tried to look at, but then again, I tolerated the Legend of Zelda TV show. It's...not great, if you've never seen it before. At least the animation's less jank than the Super Mario Super Show and there's a certain enjoyment in how bad it is. I'm very sure the animation for this adaption is less jank than that show's jank. I have to say, though, I hate it when characters feel inconsistent with their original selves, especially when they're reduced to one-note characters. For only 12 episodes, I think we're either going to see 1 of 2 things: Either, it's rather muted for the most part and serves as a teaser to get people to buy the game, or it is turned all the way up to 11. FalloutFan56 posted:I think Christmas is actually a bit of a romantic holiday in Japan. Also I feel your pain with the cold. I live in Minnesota and it was -35 fahrenheit with the windchill the other day. Kind of is, if TokiMemo is anything to go by, at least. I can't even imagine -35 Fahrenheit, though- it's never hit anything less than -3 where I live, and that was long ago. That being said, it's been flipping between freezing temperatures and ~70 degrees every other day where I'm at. It's getting a bit ridiculous. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 16:54 on Feb 15, 2020 |
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Feb 15, 2020 16:50
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Psycho Knight posted:Also, really? Why change it like that? Further still, why would it be obligation chocolate even in Japan? You only get these scenes/items after the bond level has been raised a certain amount, so surely that would imply friendship chocolate at least. Obligation chocolate seems like something they would give at zero/near zero bond gauge just because they have to work with Itsuki and at least pretend to like him for the sake of fhe world. Yeah, when you put it that way it is kind of weird. Of course they have to draw a ilne somewhere but they should probably have moved it down a notch if those are the only two options.
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Feb 15, 2020 18:10
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Psycho Knight posted:
*slaps hand on table* drat right!
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Feb 15, 2020 19:18
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FalloutFan56 posted:I think Christmas is actually a bit of a romantic holiday in Japan. Also I feel your pain with the cold. I live in Minnesota and it was -35 fahrenheit with the windchill the other day. You poor bastard. We haven't had any days like that this winter, although the other side of the country got hit with it. I think British Colombia spent a few weeks dealing with -40C or -50C. Windchill is what really gets to you. It cuts through whatever your wearing and gets right in yer bones. And yeah, Christmas is a romantic holiday, I just don't think it's the romantic holiday. "Couples making out" isn't really the first thing that pops up when it comes to Christmas. I do recognize that Mahiru was being cranky and overly dramatic about it though, since she basically had to be dragged along. The Flying Twybil posted:I have to say, though, I hate it when characters feel inconsistent with their original selves, especially when they're reduced to one-note characters. Oh, you should expect a lot of that. The one I'm keeping the closest eye on is Ruka, because I've seen a brief clip from a trailer/teaser where she looks to be acting completely different from her game version. I think it was a quick shot of her smirking and teasing Mahiru or something. Polsy posted:Yeah, when you put it that way it is kind of weird. Of course they have to draw a ilne somewhere but they should probably have moved it down a notch if those are the only two options. It would make total sense if there were three versions of the chocolates. But if you're only going with two, then why pick "Love" and "Obligation"? There's a gigantic gap between those two things. You can't even justify it from a narrative perspective either. If Itsuki and Mahiru had shown up in October or November, then you could make an excuse like "Well, Itsuki hasn't been in Granvania long enough to build a deep friendship." But Itsuki and Mahiru show up in this world in March. That's 11-12 months of interaction and bonding and Classmating. That's got to be good enough for friendship chocolate. It's such a weird decision when you stop and think about it. I just can't believe that this is something I'm taking the side of the translators on. Usually they're the ones making the mistakes or weird changes. booksnake posted:*slaps hand on table* drat right! 
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Feb 16, 2020 00:15
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Update XIII: You come on like a flame; Then you turn a cold shoulder Song Title Reference: Fire and Ice - By Pat Benatar The whole "song reference as a title" thing is really biting me in the rear end now that there's barely anything to base my references off of...  Let’s jump straight into it. Most of the side stuff I want to show off is better saved for after this next labyrinth is sealed up. We’re going to Gemini this time. The Seasonal Labyrinths don’t really matter anymore, so let’s just clear out each one in order.  One thing I want to mention in advance, just as a little aside: You see how there’s an exclamation point symbol on Gemini that signals a quest item/monster is in this labyrinth? Well, that symbol will tell you what part of the labyrinth and even what floor a quest thing can be found on. What it doesn’t seem to tell you is which quest item/monster it is. I tried all the buttons and nothing seems to work. This will be semi-important for after the boss fight.  The Gemini Labyrinth has the trippy colours of the inside of Lillie’s hair. The columns also have the belts and costume colours of Lillith and Lillie. You can also see that the doors have the weird headband design that both Lillith and Lillie wear.  One thing of note that happened here almost immediately was Itsuki finally getting an upgrade to his armour. Shooting Star Clothes are a straight upgrade to the Great Spirit armour that I’ve been stubbornly refusing to get rid of.  It’s a big upgrade. Shooting Star Clothes maintains the speed boost from Great Spirit and manages to improve on it by a smidge. However, on top of keeping Itsuki nice and speedy, it also jacked up his defence by 2,205 (his physical defence is now over 6,300). He also got another sword upgrade, but it’s just a slightly higher tier of Bio Gauche so I won’t bother to show it off.  I also worked on getting Katie caught up in levels. She’s hit her level cap, but she’s around the same level as the other Star Children, so it’s not a big deal. This group of Star Children are likely on their way out after this dungeon anyway. Katie’s higher level improves Team Psycho Knight’s stats, but they are still lower than they were with Luna. Team Psycho Knight’s MAT has surpassed Team Canada 2.0’s and they’ve roughly tied them in terms of DEF, but that’s about it. Team Canada 2.0 still holds the edge in things like SPD and ATK. Meanwhile, Team A(wful) 2.0 has become the ace team, dwarfing Team PK and Team Canada in both ATK and DEF (Team A(wful)’s ATK is nearly 5,000) while also possessing higher MAT and SPD.  The only other piece of interesting equipment is the IM Ibrik, which I gave to Magnus. It’s a little weaker than Planet Rod+, but it gives a bigger boost to MDF. You may also notice that it’s the same staff that Clerics hold in their anime portraits (ID Ibrik is the Green/Red variant).  I also discover that it’s possible to empty out the item shrines in labyrinths. We have acquired almost all “Gift” items in the game by this point, so when I try to offer Gift items to the item shrine, it spits it back out. This doesn’t use the “charge” of the item shrine, by the way. You can keep trying to offer items/weapons/armor/gifts until one of them takes. Only when you get something in return will the shrine go dormant and be unusable. I’ll quickly showcase some of the more interesting gifts later in this update. I think we’re still missing 2, but I’m unsure of how to get them if the shrine won’t cough them up (the item shrines are supposed to give you an item of similar value which you don’t already have).  All right, let’s get this over with. What does Gemini have in store for us?  Oh drat, that thing looks cool. I dig that design.  Let’s skip Mana’s generic pre-boss dialogue and just get to what’s important. Iniquitatis is Light element. That’s gonna be a problem. Mana continues on to say that its physical and magic defence are average but to watch out for direct attacks. That information is mostly accurate…  Maybe it’s because of the weird scaling of bosses, but that defence does not look “average”, especially when you factor in that it has Light element defences on top of that. The Light element thing is going to be the worst part of this boss. Remember, unlike in CII, there is no element in CP that is effective against Light. The Null Element in CP is just weaker than everything, whereas in CII it at least had a use as a counter to Light and Dark elements. The best you can do in this fight is to attack it with one of the base four elements, which will at least be neutral. Likewise, due to Iniquitatis’ Light attack element, you’ll want to try and have one of the base four elements as your team’s defence. This is unfortunately a problem for Itsuki, because I haven’t found any armour so far that changes his defence element (even weapons that change his attack element are pretty rare).   Like every boss, Iniquitatis has helpers. At least one of them has a support spell this time. Of course, that just means that Crater A will be the priority target.  Itsuki and Team A(wful) 2.0 immediately kill Crater A, but Iniquitatis is a fast little bugger and is able to outrun both Team Canada 2.0 and Team PK.  That’s going to require some boo-boo kisses later on. As shown above, Iniquitatis is able to strike two zones at once, but only two that are opposite one another. Keep this in mind when sending in your teams to start attacking it. Try and keep Itsuki/two of the Star Child Teams positioned in adjacent zones so that Iniquitatis won’t be able to score hits on multiple teams at once. Also, I just want to note that despite it looking like Iniquitatis just attacked with Fire and Water/Ice attacks, it was actually Light. Iniquitatis has Fire and Ice spells, but its physical attack element is locked in at Light. Enemies can't change their attack element on the fly (thank god).  Team PK and Team Canada 2.0 power through the damage they received and make a hasty escape from the boss. Instead, they pop over to Crater F and strike it down. Iniquitatis is now left standing alone, so it uses its next turn to follow after Teams PK and Canada.  This is the tricky stage of the fight. The support enemies are dead, but Iniquitatis will likely have moved into attack position of one of your groups. It’s a prime moment to rush in and start dumping on it, but moving Itsuki in can be dangerous. It’s fairly easy for Iniquitatis to wipe Itsuki with two attacks or one well-placed critical. That damage output is no joke. You also don’t want to get caught with all of your teams surrounding Iniquitatis, because then you’re guaranteeing Iniquitatis multiple targets for its physical attack and getting caught up in a loop of constantly healing everyone.  The method I went with for in this fight was Chain Driving. Itsuki as well as a few of the Star Children have skills that can boost the CD gauge. Chaining Iniquitatis will slow it down and give you a chance to heal everyone up and get in a few free hits. You could also use the free turns to jack up defence if you felt so inclined.  Blitz Blow won’t do much to chip at Iniquitatis’ health, but it does fill the CD gauge by 30-40%. Team A(wful) unfortunately didn’t have a CD boosting skill, so I had them use Rite of Auras instead, in order to boost their damage resistance.  I get lucky with this move. Team Canada 2.0 was in a tough spot. Iniquitatis was directly behind them and they were low on HP. I could heal them to try and tank the backstab or I could just have them turn around and swing, hoping to get some damage in before they were wiped out. However, instead of Iniquitatis using its far more devastating physical attack, it decided to use one of its low-tier element spells. Even weakened, Team Canada 2.0 was able to brush off an attack like that. I’m not sure what the boss AI was hoping for here. Actually, I’m not even particularly sure why the boss has piddly magic attacks like this in the first place. I’m not even sure if it’s possible to beat this boss while also having an MDF so low that spells like this would actually hurt. The only thing I can think of is that Impurity Bosses receive a bump to their level and stats when you defeat one of the other bosses, but their skills aren’t changed at all. That might cause some wonkiness if we go up against a magic heavy boss in the future (and there’s a good chance of that, because we’ve been fighting a lot of physically focused bosses so far). It’s going to be pretty sad if we end up facing a boss in the high 70’s that only has access to first tier magic.  Anyway, I take a gamble with this good fortune and risk Team PK moving in to join the fight. Their attack combined with another Blitz Blow from Itsuki is enough to chain Iniquitatis just before its turn comes up.  This is what decides the battle. I take a split approach to the assault, having Team A(wful) and Itsuki go on the offensive with their turns while Team Canada uses theirs to heal up. Team PK’s turn is delayed for a while due to the magic attack they used to help chain the boss, so Itsuki and Teams A(wful) and Canada take over the damage dealing for this portion.  Iniquitatis’ speed isn’t amazing, so chaining winds up giving our heroes 6 or 7 chances to attack before it can free itself. It does not actually manage to get free.   The chaining also provides us with a sweet EXP bonus. Six of the Star Children gain levels, although that’s not super helpful at this point since they are all on their way to retirement. Itsuki gets another level though, which is good.  Also, I just realized that I don’t think I’ve ever highlighted this. Itsuki has a shield on his left arm that looks kind of like a mini riot shield. There’s no explanation of where it came from. He’s had it since the day he got here. I’m guessing that it was summoned at the same time he conjured up that sword when Mahiru’s impurity attacked. I wish we could get different ones for him.  Anyway, you know the deal. Itsuki does the thing and seals the labyrinth.  With that out of the way, let’s poke around with some random stuff. I am in no way procrastinating to avoid working on any upcoming update which I might be less than enthused about.  The shop has new stock, but it’s all equipment that’s one or two labyrinths outdated. At the tavern, I turn in two quests. One is for the boss we just beat.  And the other is a random one which gives us a few Matryoshkas in exchange for 5 Luck boosting Matryoshkas. Normally I wouldn’t do this, because LUC ones are harder to get your hands on, but I wanted to have this quest marked as clear in case it opens another quest.  Speaking of quests, I finally tracked down where to get the Sheer Lingerie item that was needed for the “Shock and Capture” quest (the one that gives us the mysterious “Polyoshka”). So remember how I mentioned earlier that the game doesn’t tell you which quest is on which floor or dungeon section? Sheer Lingerie is a gift item that can only be obtained from treasure chests. You might have noticed that the Granvania City Level is maxed out at Level 10 now. Well, I did that in the hopes that the gift shop would start stocking this gift item. Turns out you can’t buy this one (there are a few other gift items that can’t be bought either). So I had to run around various labyrinth floors with exclamation points on them hoping for Sheer Lingerie to drop, not knowing if the exclamation point I was chasing was for this quest item or something completely different. For anyone else that may be ripping their hair out about this in the future (I couldn’t find item guides for this drat game anywhere online at the time of writing), Sheer Lingerie is only found on Floor 10 of the Autumn Labyrinth. At least, that’s the only place I could get it. It’s possible that it also pops up in Scorpio and Sagittarius, but it doesn’t seem to appear in Libra.  This is your reward. As of writing, I have no loving idea what the poo poo this thing does. Even the Japanese fan wiki for this game doesn’t know what it does (they just have ??? listed next to the Polyoshka description).  You can use it in classmating and despite what I initially thought, it turns out that the quest to get this thing is repeatable, so it is possible to get more of these (although it requires a bunch of item farming for more Sheer Lingerie). That said, there’s no visible difference between a Star Child made with the Polyoshka and one made with a different Matryoshka.   Here is a side-by-side of two new Star Children (I’ll introduce the class after this). Dominic was made with the Polyoshka while Aria was made with a Star Matryoshka (gives a general stat boost. We have like 13 of those things though). As you can see, there’s nothing that stands out between the two. There is a little variation between stats, but that’s natural. Soo…. yeah.  Beats me. I still need to do a little testing, specifically with leveling the Star Children to see if maybe there is a difference in stat growth potentials or something. But as it stands, I have no clue what this thing is supposed to be for. Moving on, here is the new Star Child class that was shown above. Ninja’s are fast and sturdy with decent attack. Not much for magic, though. The only way to unlock the Ninja class is to collect 9 unique “Book” items.  I showed these off when we stumbled upon the first one. The different books don’t seem to be tied to certain areas or parts of the dungeon, but I think you have a better chance of finding them in later levels (Floors 10-15 for example). It is possible to get multiple of the same book, so this process has the potential to take forever if RNG truly hates your guts. Inner was the final book that I needed and I collected it while power-leveling Star Children to use as City Level fodder (and also scouring dungeons for Sheer Lingerie). Ninjas have a special attack that has a chance of instant killing an enemy. They also have Invisibility, which is a field skill that you can use to make yourself undetectable by enemies for a while (helpful for when you just want to plow through a dungeon). They also have an auto-skill called Smoke Bomb that makes it easier to escape from battles that you do get caught in, although you could always just buy Star Bombs and use those instead (they guarantee escape).  Ninjas are also the missing piece of the “Killing Field” puzzle. Killing Field is a team skill that’s great for spamming against trash mobs. It hits from all sides and has a chance of instant death.  Next up is Dungeon Master. Dungeon Master is only unlocked once you have cleared 6 Star Labyrinths. They have a bit of a lopsided stat growth, but the stats they lean towards are definitely worth it. Well, except maybe TEC. TEC is mostly useless. In terms of skills, they have Gran Chain for boosting the CD gauge and Trap Circus which is a very good attack. Special skills include Escape (same effect as the Escape Device item), Remove (All of our current SC teams have this. It temporarily prevents you from getting hit by certain traps), and most importantly Labyrinth Seer. Labyrinth Seer will reveal the map for each dungeon floor when you enter it. This is a godsend for blitzing through Labyrinths since you’ll be able to see exactly where the Next Floor portal is right from the get-go.  The final Star Child class is Bondsman, which you can only unlock by creating one of every other class in the game. They have a similar stat chart to Dungeon Master, but their growth rates are better. Their skills are less useful, though. At least, that’s what I think. Temple Chain is always welcome, because it boosts the CD gauge. They also have Swift Thrust, which is an attack skill that also ups SPD by 5%. Their unique skills are all centered around using BP instead of MP. Bond Breaker uses BP to deal damage equal to 30% of an enemy’s HP. Before you ask: No, it doesn’t work on bosses. The skill is nice enough to tell you this in advance. It’s not a great skill, but I can see it having some uses. There are some enemies in the game, even now, which are a bitch to kill (Micros will always be a pain in the rear end unless you have stuff like Shine). Bonding Mind is completely worthless though. Bonding Mind uses BP to cast a mid-tier heal on someone. I have a backpack overflowing with mid-tier and better healing items at this point, not to mention that every one of our Star Child Teams right now is able to cast Grand Heal.  Now this skill, this one is pretty helpful. MECUNITE wasn’t really necessary in CII, but in CP it’s been fairly useful, especially for clearing out trash mobs. Cutting down on the amount of BP that MECUNITE uses will let us get more mileage out of it during grinding runs. It doesn’t seem particularly good, but that’s because you guys aren’t the ones grinding out EXP for new Star Children. God’s Poke only gets you so far before you need to start buckling down and actually fighting the enemies.  So that’s all for Star Children. When making Plus, the developers apparently didn’t feel it was worth it to include all the new classes that CII added, which I was disappointed to learn. I liked a lot of the classes that CII introduced. Oh well. At this point, I will set up another vote for Star Child teams. I’m pretty sure that this will be the last one for the LP. You might have noticed during the Ninja class comparison that the level caps on the Star Children are now a natural 99. We also have access to every class and all types of Matryoshka, so I don’t see any reason for us to keep switching things up. Not like we’ll be seeing much of these new teams until we hit Ophiuchus anyway. Anyway, that will be for after the update. We still have a few more things to go over before then. Such as…  Yes, it turns out that I didn’t horribly gently caress up somewhere and screw us out of Alfie’s final bonding events. Apparently if you Rest/Labyrinth to skip some time, Alfie will be available at the Star God Academy. The game doesn’t give you any notification of this, you just need to go and check on her. However…  I guess I should go pray again today. Alfie…   Despite the developers removing the Touch Communication feature for this version, it was brought in for a particular use in Alfie’s route. To my knowledge, this is the only time it’s ever used in PLUS. A screenshot exists of it being used in Tarua’s route, but I think that may have been a pre-release screenshot because it’s never happened outside of this moment (unless Tarua’s Level 5 events do it). It doesn’t matter where you touch the Matryoshka, just hover the hand over it and click.  When I touch it here… it reminds me of our first kiss. That was how Alfie’s Star Maiden powers were released… And yet… because she protected me, she’s turned into this… I’m so sorry… Please… come back to me and show me your smile…And that’s it. We’re taken back to the Star God Academy after that. If you skip another week and come back, you can do the event a second time. The event, including Itsuki’s dialogue, is identical.  But the Alfie Matryoshka’s reaction changes slightly.  Doing this event a third time will result in this message popping up after the Touch Communication portion. The event will also cut off after this (Itsuki won’t do the “When I touch it here…” dialogue).  Heading over to the Church will then reveal that Alfie is available for Classmating again. Her Bond Gauge has also been maxed out from those events (each “Touch the Matryoshka” event gives a pretty major boost to the gauge). Buuut… we’ll have to hold off on this for now. Alfie’s bonding event is tied to her Classmating event, so we’ll have to wait until the Bond Level 5 update before we find out the conclusion to Alfie’s route.  Next up, let’s have a quick look at some Gift items that have been collected in my laborious travels through the labyrinths. Some of these come from quests and others can be bought from the Gift Shop once Granvania hits max level, but I got a lot of the harder to find ones from the Item Shrine (until it stopped putting out Gifts anyway).  Both the Mirai badge and the Sho Terashima badge are references to a recent Spike Chunsoft title: Zanki Zero. Zanki Zero was released in July of 2018 for Japan, but it didn’t get its English release until a year later (April 2019). It came out on the PS4, Vita, and later the PC in Japan. English audiences can only play it on PS4 or PC though, since the Vita has been long dead in the West.  ”God created the world in seven days. It only took one day for humans to destroy the world. Life as we knew it sank to the depths of the sea...until yesterday. We do not yet know the broken world and the reasons left behind there. An earth where ruins drift about. Buildings, houses, light posts. Cars, traffic lights, asphalt... Modern civilization was destroyed, becoming nothing more than debris wading in the sea. New ruins drift one after the other before the protagonist, who lives on one of those decaying islands.” Zanki Zero follows a group of eight survivors who are stuck on Junk Island. These “survivors” are actually clones that only have a lifespan of 13 days. They rapidly age and then die, only to be reborn as a new clone through the Extend Device (basically a cloning chamber). Each character is based on one of the seven deadly sins, as well as one who is based on original sin. Gameplay is Survival-RPG, so you run around battling animals and human-looking creatures while trying to collect resources to stay alive and improve the livelihood of the clones. How the clones die determines what kind of bonuses they get in their next life cycle. Mirai and Sho Terashima are the hosts of an animated TV program in Zanki Zero that give guidance to the clones (like how to make shelter, or cook food, that kind of thing). The game (at least its premise) sounds really interesting. It’s sort of like 7 Seeds. I haven’t played it, though. While I really like the sound of the game, I’m not in a great emotional/psychological state in life. Games about the post-apocalypse and watching characters constantly die, either through player fuckups or rapid aging, are not a great way to help depression. Let’s not even get started on the existential questions that cloning brings up when it comes to whether or not the character you’re looking at is the same person or a completely different individual that just looks the same and shares some memories/experiences with their previous life (like a nature versus nurture thing).  Monokuma is a character from the Danganronpa franchise, which is also made by Spike Chunsoft (and produced by Yoshinori Terasawa, who is also the producer of Conception and Zanki Zero). Monokuma made a guest appearance in CII as well, but his badge was a lot meaner than what we see here (it said something like “It’s not my fault I’m stupid” on it). He was also a bonus boss in that game. I’m not sure if he reprises that role in CP, though.  We also find out that on top of photobooks, Seiya has his own line of pins in production. Seriously, how was this character not made into a rival/foil to Itsuki?  There’s also a Granvanian Medal of Honor or whatever the hell this thing is for.  Finally, I included this one because it looks Sailor Moon as gently caress and I love it. All Star Maidens will like this gift.  …There’s also some weird non-accessory gift items. Like this. I don’t know exactly which Maidens like to receive this and I’m not sure I want to find out. Chances are that Mirei is included in that list, though. ~The Sounds of Conception… the game I mean, not sex~ To finish the update, I wanted to have a look (or I guess technically a listen) at some of the music in this game. I originally intended to plug in the tracks as the LP came across them, but I had trouble finding an uploaded playlist of all the songs. One does exist for the original PSP title, so I’ve decided to just use that. Now, the OST is included with the Steam version of the game. It’s just a dump of mp3s (there’s also FLAC versions as well, but those total up to 1.5 gigs), so I could have uploaded them, but I don’t like risking my account by doing that. Some companies are like bloodhounds when it comes to that stuff. Generic Event Music: A Story Beginning in the Future Granvania Map Music: Navi-GATE Dungeon Battle Lv. 1 There’s also the fact that the general tracks are largely forgettable. The Lv. 1 Battle Theme is okay, but it’s a big letdown compared to Conception II’s (I will forever defend CII’s battle theme. The one that goes “You guys, bring it on! They say that you’re a God”. It rules). Dungeon Battle Lv. 4 The Level 4 Battle theme is a little better, but I feel like it never breaks out, if you know what I mean. The guitar builds up, but there’s no break out moment where the track feels like it really kicks in. Victory Theme: Sweeping Victory And the Victory Theme sounds like something straight out of an N64-era racing game. Boss Battle The Boss Battle isn’t much better. It’s just noises jumbled together that does nothing to build the excitement or tension. That stuff isn’t really why I’m doing this segment though. I was hoping that this game would have a few weird gems in the common music (like the “Congratulations!” Star Child making theme in CII), but the Conception/Conception PLUS soundtrack seems to be far less vocal and catchy than CII’s. So let’s skip over the ambient stuff and look specifically at each Star Maiden’s theme. Note: I’m using the title of the tracks as they appear in the OST included with my Steam copy. The ones I’m linking to on Youtube may have slightly different titles, but they are the exact same song. Also note that I am not a musician at all. I love listening to music, that’s about the extent of my “expertise”. I can’t even play any instruments. Keep that in mind while you read through my pretentious sounding impressions.  Alfie’s Theme: To a Star That Will Shine Someday I had to upload Alfie’s Theme myself because it doesn’t appear to be up online (it wasn’t part of the Conception PSP Soundtrack, obviously). I don’t have a lot to comment on when it comes to Alfie’s Theme. It is fitting, don’t get me wrong. It sounds like a backing track that an Idol would skip on to stage to. I’m honestly not sure what I wanted from Alfie’s theme. She’s always had the idol personality of being cheery and upbeat and a little goofy. There’s been a few moments where she’s been feeling down or upset (the Bond Eater stuff), but nothing really keeps her down. I think this theme is perfectly fine, if a bit generic. Arie’s Theme: Turquoise Pilgrimage Arie’s Theme reminds me a lot of starting villages in JRPG’s. It’s slow and gentle with a bit of an underlying pulse to the tune. I suppose it’s fitting for Arie. She’s a nun and normally soft-spoken, so her theme backs up the gentleness. Personally, I was expecting something a little more choral, or maybe something with a bit more focus on the organ. You know, something with a “Church” or “Holy” sound. Maybe that would have been too predictable though. Femiruna’s Theme: The Lion’s Heart Beyond the Meadow This sounds like the theme of a JRPG City/Capital City. You know, the first big city you get to after leaving behind the (likely) burning wreckage of the protagonist’s hometown. This theme screams Femiruna. It has the constant sound of marching drums in the background and the rising orchestral moments that make it sound like Femiruna’s family has a full band on standby with a red carpet wherever they go. What I appreciate about this theme is that it sort of relaxes after the big buildup which stops the music from drowning out Femiruna (remember, these themes tend to play during events with the Maidens, so if the music is too loud or busy then it starts to overpower their dialogue).  WARNING: The video I’ve linked to has CGs we haven’t seen yet for Ruka. Some of it may also be fan art. Probably best to tab away after opening the video. Ruka’s Theme: Praying to the White Clover I don’t have a lot to say about Ruka’s. It’s definitely fitting for her “Shrine Maiden” look, I’ll give it that. I’m not sure if it really fits her character though. It sounds like a tranquil song, which Ruka is most certainly not (at least, not for the first half of her route). She spends a lot of her route agonizing over her status/powers as a Tsukuyomi, her alienation from the kids at the orphanage, and her frustration at not being able to connect with that little barefoot girl. Her route has turned around recently and things seem to be going fine, but even then I don’t think this is quite the right sound for her. I guess you could say that it’s gentle and that Ruka is a gentle and caring person at heart. Outside of that, I think this theme fits more with Ruka’s appearance than her actual character. Farun’s Theme: Stage Full of Shooting Stars Farun’s theme starts off very appropriate to her. It’s got a dance/electronica beat to it which Farun would be all about. What ruins this theme for me is that it then shifts into a very piercing high-pitched sound. It’s honestly hard to listen to and it drags on for a big portion of the theme. As for how it is related to Farun, I don’t think it matches up to her especially well. The first part is just fine, as she is a dancer and her clothing looks like it would fit in just fine at a club. But the second part of that song doesn’t seem to relate to anything. Farun does have a few moments where she does excited squealing, but it’s not a big part of her character (she usually does it at the Tavern, where it’s possible that she’s drunk on something, given how weird she tends to act there). But given that she’s a traveler, I was expecting something with a bit more worldliness to it. Maybe some more variety in the sounds/instruments. Mirei’s Theme: Moonlight Magic This is way too upbeat and energetic for Mirei. It has that spacey/future sound that fits with her scientist/researcher thing, but I think it has a bit too much peppiness for her. Mirei’s theme is one I was expecting to be quirky and weird sounding, to match that whole “weirdo” appearance she has to outsiders like the Granvania citizens. On the other hand, it kind of reminds me of Phantasy Star Online a little bit, and there’s nothing wrong with remembering the good old days of PSO (except for the painful memories of SEGA dangling PSO2 in front of the West for the past 7 loving years. 2020, SEGA!  That’s what you said. Don’t pull any funny business).Mahiru’s Theme: A Maiden’s Circumstances I thought this was the same as Alfie’s theme when I first listened to it. It is different, but it shares Alfie’s “Idol backing track” feel. I guess that’s sort of understandable for Mahiru though. Mahiru isn’t a pop idol, but she is the school idol. I’m not sure what I can comment on here exactly. Remember that the Mahiru we’ve been getting to know is some twisted up version of the original. The developers adjusted her personality to make her kinder and slightly less of a jerk to Itsuki. I guess this theme fits the Mahiru that we know a bit better than original Mahiru, but it’s hard to say for sure. User Polsy has been documenting the changes made to Mahiru over the course of the game, but it’s hard to get a direct comparison of personality from that, mainly because there was no localization done on the PSP title. Yuzuha’s Theme: Rainbow Paint I think Yuzuha’s theme is perfectly suited to her. It has the vibe of something that would play in the atelier of a painter. It’s also a little slow, which fits her sickly/sleepy nature. It also seems to maintain the core of the track while switching up the other sounds every ten or twenty seconds (although you could say that other tracks do that a lot too. This music is meant to loop after all). Nothing really jumps out at me though. Reone’s Theme: Scorpion’s Law Reone’s theme starts off with more generic music similar to Alfie and Mahiru, but it eventually brings in some of the sax that I was anticipating from an “erotic” character. Not in the way that I was hoping for though. I thought Reone’s theme would have more of a smooth jazz sound. Her whole deal is being the “mature sexy teasing” character. This theme sounds more like an idol song surrounding a saxophone solo. I’m not a fan. It’s already blending together in my mind with Alfie and Mahiru’s music. Let’s not even get into the fact that no part of this song fits with Reone’s dead-brother/hospital for the poor/street fighter subplot. It also doesn’t sound forceful enough to be called something like “Scorpion’s Law”. Sue’s Theme: World Sniper Sue’s theme is strange… Not quite sure how. It’s slow and sounds “tribal” or “woodsy”, like something you would expect from Sue who keeps to herself and runs a ranch. I think this is a similar case to Ruka, where the music seems to match the appearance (or in this case, location) rather than the character. Sue is quiet, but she’s also quirky and a little excitable. She’s also holding on to a lot of emotional baggage from the death of her parents. I don’t know. I can’t think of much to say about this. Also, what the hell is with that title? Collette’s Theme: Water of Destiny I’m similarly lost with Collette’s song. It sounds like the same kind of theme that Alfie and Mahiru have. It’s perky and upbeat, which I guess fits Collette’s character. It’s meant to be cute, which is a card that Collette likes to play whenever she wants to make things creepy by highlighting just how young and small she is. …That’s all I got. It’s definitely a song. Keep in mind that I’ve never been particularly invested in Collette because of the creepy loli factor. Lillith/Lillie’s Theme: Peerless Twins This is a weird song that gets a little weirder as it goes on. It starts with a flowing harp-like sound, maybe a bit of synth, then it gets a quicker beat added on top of it, then around the 1 minute mark something else takes over that I can’t even describe. The underlying theme (the one that the song starts off with) seems more like something that would match Lillith while the rest sounds like something closer to Lillie. I can see the twins thing they were going for, but I think the kinds of sounds they are using are a bit too close. I think the song would have been better with a bigger difference in sounds/instruments that could play up the “two things fusing together” angle. That would have made it more fitting for Lillith/Lillie. In terms of how this song fits with Lillith/Lillie, I think it’s another case of appearance instead of character. I’m not really sure what I was thinking for Lillith, but for Lillie I imagined the sound to be more fitting for a prankster. Tarua’s Theme: Sunflower’s Dusk I know it would never happen, but I was secretly hoping that Tarua’s would just be the title theme from Sonic the Hedgehog. Anyway, joking aside, what is there to say about Tarua’s theme? It’s quick and matches well to a girl whose major character trait is “likes to run”. About 40 seconds in it also does this start-stop thing where the track fades out and it goes back to the sound from the first few seconds of the track (I don’t know how to describe it, it’s like a rapid tiny sound, if that makes sense), then it just starts blasting the main track again before cutting off a second time and repeating that. I think that fits Tarua’s manic/”inability to sit still for five seconds” nature. I also think it’s upbeat enough for her. That’s really all that can be said. We know very little about Tarua as a person other than her love of letters, running, Boss, and head pats. Other than running, none of those things lend themselves to music very well. That’s it for the update. Now that everyone is thoroughly bored out of their skulls by me showing off Itsuki’s various knick-knacks and then talking about music that you either didn’t listen to or have already forgotten (I know I’ve already forgotten 8 of those songs at the very least), there is something a little different on the horizon. Next Update: We take a look at the first three episodes of Conception: The Anime.  Oh hell yeah, this is how I wanted to spend my winter semester break. Look at those 1-Star ratings, baby. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 13:18 on Apr 19, 2020 |
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Feb 16, 2020 21:37
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Psycho Knight posted:Oh hell yeah, this is how I wanted to spend my winter semester break. Look at those 1-Star ratings, baby. Oh...dear. This is going to be something. I think I'm more worried about those 20 reviews for 5 stars. Cripes, what do those even have to say... ...Oh. Er... Huh. This... this'll be an experience, I suppose. Most of them really just say that it's not terrible if you don't think about it too hard, but all the information from the others suggests a different story. One of them is particularly cursed, and I really hope it's just a joke. It's got spoilery info, but... cripes. Cripes.
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Feb 16, 2020 23:03
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Remember that CR's community absolutely loves trash like Shield(aka Incel) Hero.
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Feb 16, 2020 23:22
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Mokinokaro posted:Remember that CR's community absolutely loves trash like Shield(aka Incel) Hero. This. If you throw out the people giving 5 star reviews as a joke or because they think it was so bad that it was hilarious, the rest can be explained as such. For god’s sake, one of them calls Mana the best character. Best. The Flying Twybil posted:Huh. This... this'll be an experience, I suppose. Most of them really just say that it's not terrible if you don't think about it too hard, but all the information from the others suggests a different story. One of them is particularly cursed, and I really hope it's just a joke. It's got spoilery info, but... cripes. Be thankful that it will only be a passive experience for you. I originally said "Pff, I doubt it will be that bad", but after glancing through those reviews I am now rethinking my skepticism. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 00:48 on Feb 17, 2020 |
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Feb 17, 2020 00:20
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booksnake posted:*slaps hand on table* drat right!  x10.edit: nm CannonFodder fucked around with this message at 01:28 on Feb 17, 2020 |
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Feb 17, 2020 01:09
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Apparently the Polyoshka is a reference to Dengeki Playstation magazine's mascot (as seen in their twitter avatar). I'm guessing the fact that nobody I can find has any idea what it does means it doesn't actually do anything. Dengeki means electric shock, or shocking, thus the description. I have seen a Conception pre-release screenshot that specifically says it has a "special effect", but they may have cut that even before release. I haven't seen a release Conception or Japanese Conception Plus screenshot of it, probably because most people doing a Let's Play aren't invested enough to do all the quests.
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Feb 17, 2020 02:03
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Polsy posted:Apparently the Polyoshka is a reference to Dengeki Playstation magazine's mascot (as seen in their twitter avatar). I'm guessing the fact that nobody I can find has any idea what it does means it doesn't actually do anything. Dengeki means electric shock, or shocking, thus the description. So what you're saying is, I wasted over an hour hunting down those items for something that's very likely a useless marketing plug...  CannonFodder posted:Her awesome hat reminds me of a tall ushanka. They are super warm and worth every It has aspects of a ushanka and a bearskin. It's tall like a bearskin hat and is missing the ear flaps, but its furriness is closer to the ushanka (bearskin hats have more ruffly/longer fur). Either way, I want one. I want one in that colour and with that Aries emblem on it.
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Feb 17, 2020 02:58
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Psycho Knight posted:So what you're saying is, I wasted over an hour hunting down those items for something that's very likely a useless marketing plug... Yeah, it's only that it's hard to get that makes me question whether it is, actually, useless. If it was almost as easy to get as a regular matryoshka I wouldn't hesitate.
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Feb 17, 2020 03:15
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Polsy posted:Yeah, it's only that it's hard to get that makes me question whether it is, actually, useless. If it was almost as easy to get as a regular matryoshka I wouldn't hesitate. I better do some testing then. At this point, I'd be happy if it just added a little icon under the Star Child in dungeons. Just give me something that tells me it wasn't a complete waste of time. Just a reminder to people: Final Star Child vote is now on. I'll be looking for Team suggestions for Team C (and Team B if enough people submit ideas). Team A(wful) link is at the top of the update and also the OP.
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Feb 17, 2020 03:20
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Note: This update is heavier on fanservice than the game updates. Just a heads up. Special Update II: “Conception: The Game: The Anime: The Advertisement” (Episodes 1-3) So I said I would eventually do this and now here we are. Because most of the story content is out of the way and we are nearly finished with each Star Maiden’s character route, we can now take a look at the Anime adaption (hopefully) without fear of spoilers being randomly dropped. That being said, we’re only going to take a look at 3 episodes or so at a time, just in case something does crop up which ruins any part of the game we haven’t reached it. The Conception Anime was announced in May of 2018 and started airing in October of the same year in Japan. It finished airing a few weeks before the release of Conception PLUS in Japan. The Producer of the Conception series (as well as Danganronpa and other stuff at Spike Chunsoft), Yoshinori Terasawa, acted as Producer for the anime series as well, but the rest of the main production staff seem to be unrelated to the game. The Director was Keitaro Motonaga, who has a fairly lengthy portfolio of projects that he’s worked on.  The studio behind the anime was Gonzo. Gonzo has… well, let’s just call it a rocky history. I won’t get into a deep dive of the history behind the company or the constantly resurfacing financial difficulties or the shady business practices and shifty accounting or any of that fun stuff. We’re not here to talk about them as a company after all (although I admit that that would be a fun research project). The company was built by a former Studio Gainax employee and took a lot of risks with their animations. The point is, Gonzo has a mixed track record (like a lot of companies that enjoy being experimental). They have done or been involved with some good stuff:  But they’ve also pumped out a lot of… not so good stuff.  I own a season of this that I fished out of a Wal-Mart DVD budget bin back when the early 2000’s Anime Boom was running out of steam. Even back in my teenaged years, this was not great. Anyway, keep that in mind as we get into this series. You know drat well that the Conception Anime is not hanging with Afro Samurai, Samurai 7, or Full Metal Panic in Gonzo’s library. We’re heading firmly into their “not so great” section.  I’ll be ranking the episodes in batches based on a handful of criteria. Namely: -Animation Quality -Fanservice (that is the type of anime this is, so I may as well let you know what it’s got) -As Advertised (How closely the anime matches up to the game) Now you might be saying “Come on, it’s an anime adaption. Are you really going to knock it every time it says or does something that even slightly deviates from the source material?" The answer is yes. Normally I would agree that scrutinizing an anime tie-in for not being identical to the game is a little much, but—well, you’ll see why I wanted to include this as part of the rating. Conception: The Anime is a marketing ploy for the game and it will be shoving that in your face constantly. Also, why no sound rating? I mentioned in this in the previous update when talking about music, but I am not an audiophile or connoisseur of sound. The music for the anime is largely pulled from the game (at least, I think it is. It’s hard to tell since Conception doesn’t really have any memorable tracks). The voice cast is also taken from the game (with a few notable changes made to some characters). Honestly, from what I’ve seen so far, nothing sounds particularly bad and nothing sounds particularly good. It sounds like the game (for better or for worse). I just don’t feel as though I can really give a rating for audio quality. If I did, I’d likely just rate each batch as 3/5.  Anyway, enough of that. I’m not an anime reviewer, I’m a terrible LP writer. Not like anyone reading this LP is going to be looking for my recommendations on a fanservice show.  Episode 1 is almost entirely exposition. It follows Update I of this LP pretty closely (ending just before Classmating/Maiden Introductions). The animation didn’t look too bad at first. I think the colours are a bit muted considering the source material, but whatever. That being said, there’s not a lot of movement going on during the start. Itsuki and Mahiru are meeting on the rooftop and discussing how Mahiru is pregnant (or how she thinks she is, anyway), so nothing is really moving. Which, I’ll warn you right now. At least going by the first three episodes, this seems like it’s going to be a running theme with the Conception Anime. The anime has so far looked good while still, but the animation during movement heavy portions (like action scenes) is lacking. I think the studio might have been aware of this (or were trying to keep costs down), because this series has a lot of moments where I thought my browser/the video player had hosed up and froze. There are quite a few shots where nothing happens and the only reason you know the video didn’t stop to buffer is because you can still hear characters speaking.  Anyway, the opening progresses largely the same as the game. Mahiru is noticeably more teasing/joking though. The screenshot above is from a point where she tells Itsuki she’s pregnant and then starts suggesting that they’ve been doing “all kinds of stuff” in the three years since he started living with her family. This causes Itsuki to wordlessly freak out a bit (his eyes go wide and his mouth flaps, but there’s no subtitles or voice so… beats me. Maybe they forgot to record a reaction?) until Mahiru tells him that he should know better than that and that their relationship has never been like that.  Then, just like in the game, the big sky portal opens up just as Mahiru is about to reveal the father. Not as cool as in the game I might add. The sky doesn’t do the “shattering glass/reality” thing. A big magic glyph just appears in the sky and sucks them up, then disappears. Kind of disappointing. I really liked the reality breaking thing that the game did.  In the Labyrinth, we see that Mahiru literally just did a Google search and diagnosed herself entirely based on web results. I just think that’s funny, honestly (Note: I have definitely had panic attack moments where I have consulted Dr. Google about everything from colon cancer to heart disease. I still think this is funny despite being able to relate).  The look of a girl that believes she’s now a teen mom. No deviations from the game so far. The only thing that’s really stood out to me is just how different Mahiru is. Not even compared to original Mahiru. Anime Mahiru is even less of a tsundere than Conception Plus Mahiru, to the point that I only remember one moment in the first three episodes where she gets angry with Itsuki and slightly scolds him. It leaves Anime Mahiru with even less personality that her tweaked Plus version, in my opinion.  I should note that around 5 minutes in to the episode, we get the action scene in the Labyrinth where Mahiru spits out the buff dude monster and it attacks Itsuki. Here you can see what I was talking about earlier with the drop in animation quality for action heavy scenes. I think they were going for slow motion, but it just looks like a bunch of frames have been dropped. The animation is not smooth at all is what I’m saying.  After escaping the Labyrinth, we get our first look at Mana. I hate Mana. I mean, I kind of hate her anyway just from the game, but anime Mana is 10 times worse. It doesn’t show much right now, but just wait like 5 more minutes.  We also get a look at Narc, who doesn’t look too bad. The real reason for this screenshot is the subtitle though. The anime (or at least the English Sub that I was watching) constantly refers to Itsuki and Mahiru as “Visitors” instead of “God’s Gifts”. I don’t know why this change was made. It’s technically still accurate, but I think “God’s Gift” has an air of importance about it that “Visitor” doesn’t. Itsuki and Mahiru are saviours of this world and the only hope for everyone that lives in Granvania. “Visitor” really seems like it’s underselling that aspect. Earth is also referred to as “Sola” in the Sub instead of “Sora”, but this could easily be chalked up to a translation thing. “R”s and “L”s are often swapped in translation from Japanese due to the difference in linguistics (for example, Leone was changed to Reone in the English translation). That being said, Shangri-La is still Shangri-La. That probably has something to do with it being a foreign name, though. It’s weird. Could also be a matter of subber preference.  Another difference from the game is that while Shangri-La and Narcisstes do the whole spiel about having to save the world every 10 years thing, there is no mention (yet) of Impurities by name or the process in which they are created. This may have been cut for time purposes, since this episode is attempting to cram in all the exposition it can in order to hastily assemble a framework for the series. We don’t get any talk about how sex is making monsters or anything either.  An example of the “freeze frame” thing I mentioned. Dialogue is happening, but Itsuki and Mana aren’t moving at all despite Itsuki clearly being mid-stride (they are also shown to be walking when the scene zooms closer). Which isn’t to say that this series is trying to tone things down by taking out the sex references. Oh lord no. Case-in-point:    Get used to this from Itsuki by the way. While the game gives you some leeway in how Itsuki acts, Official Itsuki is still definitely on the shy/easily embarrassed side. He gets a lot of blush reactions, stuttering, and is generally annoyed by Mana’s suggestive or perverted crap. Anime Itsuki on the other hand, Anime Itsuki is completely on board for this poo poo. He still blushes a little, but for the most part he is far more willing to go along with characters like Mana and Reone. You’ll see more examples of this as the update goes on.  After that little hint at what’s to come, the anime starts leaning in to its true nature. Itsuki wakes up to find that Reone has managed to strip him and chain him to a bed in what appears to be the church. We also get a close-up shot of Itsuki’s boxer bulge as Reone starts talking about his body and how Itsuki shouldn’t worry because she won’t be taking his underwear off. I won’t post a screenshot of it, but I should mention that Anime Itsuki looks like he’s half-chub, at least, during this scene.  As I said, Anime Itsuki is way more into this than Game Itsuki. Reone gives a slightly more detailed explanation of the Labyrinths and Impurities, but still doesn’t say anything about how the Impurities are made. During this explanation, we also get our first real shot of fanservice… well, fanservice for the guys anyway. The ladies got a loving look at near-naked Itsuki chained to a bed and some close-ups of his package after all. The camera pans around a bit and gives us a few close shots of Reone’s rear end (clothed. She is wearing her doctor outfit thing in this scene).  Then we get the first instance of what I mentioned about this anime shoving the marketing aspect in your face. This is not the only time this happens (I think it might happen at least once per episode). Basically, if the anime references something that it doesn’t feel like it wants to explain, expect Mana to tell you to go to the official website and find it out on your own. I understand that the purpose of this anime is to market the game, but this really strikes me as going too far. You want to throw up a commercial break card that points people to the website or reminds you about the game, then go for it. But don’t include the marketing within the actual show, unless it’s being done specifically to mock it (this is not what this anime is doing, I assure you).  Immediately following that moment, we get some brief shots of the Star Maidens. There are some slight differences in some of their designs (Yosuke Okuda adapted the character designs for this show. The original character designer is Shinichiro Otsuka, who is not involved with this adaption to my knowledge). For instance, Arie is wearing lip gloss/lip stick. I think she is in the game as well, but it’s not as pronounced.  Tarua has one of those weird snaggle-tooth things that will shift from one side of her mouth to the other depending on the scene.  Lillie is missing the acid trip colours on the inside of her hair (I’ll give the studio a pass on this, because that seems like a bitch to try and animate for every scene).  Mirei also seems to be wearing lipstick/lip gloss. Like Arie, I think she is in the game as well, but it’s harder to see (only on the 3D model/CGs). Everyone else seems to be largely the same as their in-game version.  Finally, we hit the main event. While the game keeps the Classmating ritual relatively vague, we can extrapolate some details just based on character reactions and the occasional dialogue. The game version of Classmating seems to mostly involve Itsuki and the Maiden holding hands and trying to connect with each other on an emotional level. There haven’t been any concrete acknowledgements of anyone stripping down or changing into different clothes or anything physically intimate. It’s all suggestive and sort of left to your imagination. The anime does not share that approach.  Mana does this sort of teasing in the game too, but in the anime’s case she’s actually not far off when it comes to what’s about to happen.  Also, once again: Anime Itsuki is all for this. Mana says “Come on! Say it with me! ‘We love sex!’” just before this line from Itsuki.  Classmating in the anime is straight-up foreplay/grab-rear end. Itsuki and the Maiden both climb onto a huge curtained off bed with the soft mood lighting and everything. Mahiru also seems largely fine with this in the anime. She gets a little embarrassed when Reone says for her to try the ritual with Itsuki right away, but then we cut to this scene and she seems to have mostly accepted it. She’s shy, but she’s not nearly as opposed to it as she is in the game. She even talks about having thought about this before. Also:  I want to remind everyone: Mahiru is saying this to her cousin.  As I said, the anime isn’t holding back with their interpretation. Yes, Reone will eventually reveal that the Classmating Ritual is not the same thing as sex, but everything about this scene will play out in the same general way as what we’re seeing here for the other Maidens. Itsuki strips to his boxers and the Maiden is either completely naked or stripped down to her underwear before the scene cuts and Itsuki presumably removes whatever clothing she is left with. There’s a bit more fanservice during this section with Mana crawling all over Mahiru and knocking her onto her back before there’s a shot of Mana’s face between Mahiru’s thighs as Mahiru tries to fight her off. However, despite how that sounds, not a lot actually gets shown.  Itsuki eventually grabs Mana and throws her away because she’s clearly bothering Mahiru. Despite my talk about Anime Itsuki seemingly being in to Mana’s perverted stuff and appearing to be jazzed about the possibility of sex, he does generally act as a gentleman (at least for now). Throughout the first episode, he’s been consistently concerned about Mahiru’s well-being and feelings. I like that they kept that characterization, but it creates some weirdness at times where he sort of flips between the two personalities and the Star Maidens don’t seem to notice or care (even Maidens that you think would call him out for it, like Ruka).  I think my favourite part of the first episode is this scene right here. No, despite that look on Itsuki’s face, he’s not looking down at Mahiru’s naked body and trying to figure out what part goes where. What you see above is Itsuki’s face as he spends 15 seconds fumbling with the spaghetti strap of Mahiru’s top to try and remove it. He looks like he’s trying to untie the Gordian Knot. Meanwhile Mahiru looks on and has flashbacks to the time Itsuki fought that Impurity. It’s really funny, I’m not going to lie. It’s probably the best representation I’ve seen in a while from Anime-related anything of characters trying to stumble their way through intimacy for the first time. It’s like a high schooler on prom night trying to figure out the rocket-science behind the hooks on a bra. Anyway, eventually Mahiru takes Itsuki’s hands and gets him to stop, because it's getting sad at this point. She also takes the cuffs that he’s wearing off (no reason is given for why he’s wearing those). With the left strap of Mahiru’s top successfully moved off of her shoulder, Mahiru lays back and Itsuki leans over her. Having been defeated by a 2-centimeter wide piece of fabric, Itsuki instead lifts Mahiru’s top up over her chest from the bottom. The two lean in for a kiss and then credits. That’s episode 1. I should mention that the credits are a standard affair for this first episode. Why do I say standard? You’ll see when we get to the end of Episode 2. It’s… it’s not pretty. Trust me.  Episode 2 starts off with the impending sex being interrupted by the birth of the Star Child, which Itsuki and Mahiru are confused by since nothing has actually happened yet. Reone explains that Classmating (It’s always referred to as “Love Ritual” in the anime by the way, which is technically the name for it. Classmating is a translation thing that the game did) isn’t a sexual act and that Star Children are born through physical contact which heightens emotional feelings. Anime Itsuki also says “Darn” and looks pissed off when he discovers that sex isn’t going to actually happen (Mahiru has no reaction to this).  Both Reone and Mana come off looking way more like jackasses in the anime due to the way that Classmating is depicted here. I mean, Mana’s whole thing is making Itsuki believe that the ritual is sex, so she looks like a jackass in either format, but Reone looks a lot worse here than in the game. She said that she would tell them how to do the ritual in detail, but apparently at no point does she tell Itsuki or Mahiru that the ritual isn’t actually sex. She only explains this after the Star Child is born. Just to remind you: If for some reason a Star Child hadn’t popped out at that exact moment, Itsuki and Mahiru would have hosed. Both of them were in complete understanding that they had to smash in order for the ritual to work. They are childhood friends and also cousins. That’s a massive dick move, Reone.  Mana only gets worse from here. She is faaar more grabby in this than in the game. The next day has Itsuki and Mahiru shyly greeting each other and there’s some explanation from Mana about where the Star Child disappeared to (he’s gone to train in a “foster home” so that he’s ready to fight in the Labyrinths).  Here is where we get an important scene for this adaption. You can see Ruka hiding just around the corner in that screenshot. I’m going to tell you right now: Ruka is nothing like her game counterpart.  The scene has her (under Mana’s instruction) trying to pull off the “late for school” fateful encounter trope from Japanese media. She runs into Itsuki and he ends up on top of her (somehow). She then pretends to be upset (this isn’t Ruka’s tsundere side showing, she’s clearly acting that way because it’s in the script that Mana gave her. She has no real emotion behind her words and no facial expressions to match the tone). Itsuki and Mahiru are both confused as to why she’s acting like that when it’s clear she isn’t late. Mana thinks the plan went off perfectly though. This episode is supposed to be Ruka’s “focus” episode, so we’ll see more examples of her massive personality shift as the episode goes on.  Moving on, we get a look at the full group of Star Maidens for the first time (all together I mean, not in a slide-show format like before). This scene goes very similarly to the game version, so there’s not much to say about it.  ”Lillith” is translated as “Liris” here, by the way. No idea what Lillie is translated as since her name isn’t said.Except for the fact that Lillie also seems to have had a slight adjustment to her personality as well. She’s not nearly as pissed off about being hit on the head as she is in the game. Not sure if that’s a sign of things to come or if it’s just a result of time crunch for the episode. Ruka still does her “You don’t have to remember my name or anything” line, but it’s not as dismissive as it is in the game. She looks more shy than disinterested or cold.  There’s also what appears to be some wonky animation. Farun’s face does not look right in this shot. Maybe it’s just me, but the Star Maidens will often get shots in this series where their eyes appear too far apart or not properly adjusted for the angle of the view.   Is everyone loving Anime Mana? Huh? Are you? Do you like how I’m constantly nudging you in the ribs and asking if you like her? Huh? It actually makes me miss Game Mana. Also I should mention that Mana slips Itsuki a copy of a love book (written by Mana herself apparently) and tells him that she’ll teach him all about proper adult behaviour, which Itsuki thinks sounds amazing. Anime Itsuki is totally on board with Anime Mana. Never forget that going forward in this series. He seems to be taking all the advice she gives him without question. After the introduction scene, we get a brief shot with Itsuki standing on a dark stage with a spotlight on him where he says something like “And that’s how my life on Granvania began”… I don’t get it. Is it supposed to be a gag? Because so far (outside of that stupid marketing shot) the anime hasn’t positioned itself to be a fourth-wall breaking type of gag anime. What’s more, that scene lasts for roughly two seconds before the anime jumps to a completely different scene.  Said scene has Ruka and Mana meeting at night in a dark alley where Ruka questions why the gently caress she had to go and do that act. Apparently the Star Maidens are taking all of their advice from Mana as well. That scene lasts for a few seconds and then we jump to Itsuki and Mahiru walking alongside a field. Mana asks about how things are going and Itsuki says he hasn’t made any more Star Children yet. Mana then brings up Cherry Blossom viewing and the scene jumps immediately to that.   Remember Drunk Mahiru? We’re leading to that already.  The one thing I liked about this scene is seeing all of the maids lined up behind Femiruna. It’s relatively funny and it’s something the game doesn’t do all that well (that is, showing just how rich Femiruna’s family is).  That moment is somewhat ruined by what happens next. First of all, you notice how Ruka is in the screenshot above this one (the group one during flower viewing)? There is no time-passage transition to show Ruka leaving the group to go somewhere. Immediately after that scene with Femiruna’s servants, there’s a scene of Yuzuha, Sue, and Collette talking to each other before Tarua pipes up and asks where Ruka went. Itsuki then says that he’ll go look for her. It gives you the impression that Ruka literally vanished in the time it took for Collette to ask Sue about the (live) chicken she brought with her and Yuzuha to ask for some of Collette’s bread. This episode jumps around way too much. Anyway, the important part here is the scene with Ruka that this leads to. Ruka is picking flowers to bring back to the orphanage and Itsuki offers to help her, which she agrees to without any push back or hesitation at all. She talks about working at the orphanage and she also talks about—  …Yeah. Do you recall in the game how Ruka’s Tsukuyomi/mind-reader powers were a major source of hardship in her life? Remember how they caused her to push people away and wallow in self-hatred because she felt like she could never get close to anyone or be able to connect with the children at the orphanage? Remember that? Because that’s not part of Anime Ruka. We’ll see a better example of this soon. Ruka does her mind-reading thing on Itsuki, finds out she can’t read his mind, Itsuki seems to impress her a bit by empathizing with the Star Maidens and how they feel nervous about the ritual thing, then Ruka leaves. Mahiru runs into the scene and is supposedly drunk (although she’s not wasted like Game Mahiru was, unfortunately. She isn’t laughing to herself or messing up her sentences or anything). Mahiru then dumps the whole “Itsuki protecting her from bullies” story, then talks about the promise he made to her. Anime Mahiru is nowhere near as upset/depressed about Itsuki not remembering the promise though. She’s a little upset, but the 60-second timer on all scenes ends and that conversation just stops as they both head back to rejoin the others at the picnic spot. Mahiru also pulls out Keychain Man so that she can look forlornly at it while Itsuki walks away.  What’s happening in this screenshot is exactly what you think is happening. There’s more quick and short scene changes until Mana starts fondling Itsuki’s junk outside of a weapons shop. I’m not kidding. Mana gives Itsuki a partial handy through his pants outside of the weapons shop. Itsuki literally says that he got hard from it. The tone then whiplashes to Mana telling Itsuki not to underestimate the Labyrinths and that his life will very much be in danger and a lot of warriors have gone to face the Impurities but never returned.  After that strange tonally disparate scene, we get a look at the “foster home” that Mana mentioned. This is actually the Day Camp, since Alfie is here training the little Fighter Star Child that Mahiru and Itsuki made. I do like this shot a lot. The game never really tells us where the Star Children go when they aren’t with Itsuki. The Day Camp in the game is also depicted as being a shop stall or something. Alfie’s route does imply that there is a building they train in, but it’s not shown. I like the idea that the Star Children are living in this house/dormitory place.  Alfie makes a short appearance here, but there’s no talk of her being a Star Child or the Ophiuchus Maiden just yet. This is just a small cameo.  And an excuse to throw fanservice in.  There is a sweet moment in here, though. Virgo (the fighter Star Child) runs up and latches on to Itsuki, who looks a little unsure at first (in a “Is this really my child?” kind of way). One of my major complaints with Conception Plus so far has been that the Star Children aren’t as affectionate as they were in CII. They also don’t have much in the way of personality (they don’t make cute little comments about how they look like their mom or how cool dad is or any of that). Moments like these are what I wanted to see more of in CP (and even CII for that matter). The Star Children are the best thing about these games and I wish Spike Chunsoft would lean a little more heavily on them as characters, rather than just gameplay elements.  Anyway, let’s forget about that wishful thinking for now. We’re jumping back to a Ruka scene. Remember a little ways up the post where I said to think about Ruka’s character in the game and how it doesn’t exist in the anime?   Here’s the biggest indicator of the changes made to Ruka. No hangups whatsoever with touching or hugging or connecting with the other children at the orphanage. That barefoot girl isn’t even shown (as of yet), it’s just some rando orphanage kid that tripped and scuffed his knees. Following that brief moment, the scene jumps to later in the night with Itsuki talking to Ruka at the front door of the orphanage. Namely, he’s asking about the ritual. We then jump again to Ruka and Itsuki in the ritual chamber (this anime seems incapable of lingering on a shot for more than a minute). Ruka seems willing to go along with it, although she is slightly hesitant about the ritual. Itsuki proceeds to sound like he’s trying to get pity sex by talking about how the Star Child he made with Mahiru is all alone and Itsuki isn’t sure if they will be safe going in to the Labyrinths with just one Star Child.  Like, it’s not just me, right? This sounds like Itsuki is trying to play on Ruka’s sympathy in order to get her to have (not) sex with him. Like he is some scummy pickup artist at a bar. After some of that talk (and the gross implications it carries), Itsuki starts to take off Ruka’s clothes. The only resistance Ruka offers to this is telling him to turn the lights off first because she’s nervous. I swear to god, you could probably swap Anime Mahiru into all of Ruka’s scenes and not notice anything off. The two have been nearly identical so far. Ruka then lays on her back and Itsuki assumes the missionary position, then the scene cuts away to a shot of the night sky as Itsuki lowers down for a kiss. Also, Mana voices over the sky shot to congratulate herself on hooking those two up (even though she did basically nothing).  The next scene is Shangri-La giving Itsuki the 12 Star Wards (as they are referred to in the anime).  Mana also gives a brief explanation as to what the Star Wards are before once again pointing the audience to the website. I should mention that I don’t think the Japanese website for Conception Plus actually explains any of this poo poo. The website for Plus mostly just has marketing shots and a bit of character art/voice clips with a few details about the game world/story.  After the Shang scene, we get the moment where the Maidens open up the Stardust Labyrinth. I only include this screenshot because Cleric is in it and the artists gave him the “I’ve seen some poo poo” look that we all love about Male Cleric.   This looks like poor animation, but no, Male Cleric really does have that look in the game.  After that, Itsuki and the Star Children head into the Labyrinth. Mana gives a brief rundown of the structure, the Star Children proceed to kill a little Impurity (it doesn’t even move. Mana hovers right next to it and it doesn’t do anything. I actually thought it was a training dummy at first), then they proceed to get bodied by that thing in the screenshot. It’s a complete wipe (Itsuki’s sword gets knocked out of his hands before he can even charge at the thing). Mana tells him to run and Itsuki grabs the Matryoshkas of the defeated SCs and hightails it out of the Labyrinth. That’s where episode 2 ends. This episode actually has a credits sequence (the first episode just had a black screen with the credits and a little square off to the left showing moments from the episode). What will be the main credits sequence for the anime is shown off here and it is horrifying.  It's already too late to shield your eyes!   Episode 3 opens with Itsuki discovering that the Star Children are okay now (they fully recover when leaving the Labyrinth. That’s a gameplay thing so I won’t question it from an anime standpoint). I also thought it was pretty funny to see all of the Star Maidens still standing just outside the entrance. It drives home that Itsuki ran in there and then ran out again like 5 minutes later after getting his rear end kicked. The Maidens didn’t even have time to think about maybe heading home and trusting that Itsuki will be fine.  Another time skip happens that we don’t get a good sense of and Itsuki heads back in with the Star Children. It was apparently a long enough time skip for the Star Children to do more training and for Itsuki to head out and get himself a shield, but there’s no visual cue for the audience that any time has passed, so it just looks like Itsuki stood up and headed straight back in.  Also there’s more Mana moments. However, the scene doesn’t actually end with that Mana thing. There’s a short scene where the Star Children are laying on the ground at the entrance totally beaten up again and asking for help, while Itsuki stands nearby also looking like he got his poo poo kicked in. Mana freaks out and figures that something has to be going on, because they shouldn’t be getting beaten this badly. The next scene is consulting with Narcisstes in his lab/study.  Narcisstes tells Mana to relax a bit because this is an unprecedented emergency and she can’t expect everything to go exactly as it has gone in the past (Mana says that Itsuki should have defeated an Impurity God by now). Narcisstes then explains Tri-Mating.  Mana is of course ecstatic about that.  Although Itsuki says he has no idea what she’s talking about… somehow. I dunno, it’s an excuse for this three**** “gag” I guess.  Also, why in the gently caress is “threesome” partially bleeped out but “sixty-nining” is left in? What the hell is your red line, Conception Anime? Itsuki is unsure about being able to do that, but Mana tries to reassure him by saying that he can leave everything to the Maidens and just pull the old dead-fish maneuver by just laying there (oh yeah, the ladies love that move). The scene jumps to Itsuki and Mahiru walking, then a flashback to Mana explaining about Granvania’s hot springs, then back to Itsuki saying he’s not sure what Mana is up to (Itsuki’s intelligence/pervertedness seems to come and go with the tides).  This scene is similar to Mahiru’s hot springs scenes in the game. Itsuki spots “Keychain Man”, except Mahiru gets embarrassed/defensive about it this time (in the game she’s totally fine with talking about it and showing it off). Game Mahiru’s personality comes through just a little bit in this scene. She’s not embarrassed at all about stripping down in front of Itsuki to get into the hot spring (whereas Itsuki does freak out about it), but Mahiru also reveals that she apparently had a full robe with her to change in to, so she’s not actually getting naked (or even wearing a swimsuit for that matter).  You know, for an anime that I thought was going to be heavy on fanservice, this has been very tame so far. The hot springs scene follows pretty closely to the game. If you read back through that one (the one with “Keychain Man”) then it’s mostly the same. Weirdly though, the anime starts introducing gag shots for non-Mana characters.    This hasn’t happened until now. Itsuki and the Maidens never had those kinds of “anime” moments in Episodes 1 and 2. I’m not saying it’s bad or good, I’m just questioning why it’s only popping up now. It was looking like Mana was the only one who would be doing those kinds of sight gags. Oh well. The scene continues with Mahiru passing out, Keychain Man being lost, and Itsuki tracking it down. However, it also throws in the scene with Itsuki remembering about the promise he made to Mahiru (I think we’ve run through 70% of Mahiru’s route in 2 episodes). They have a moment of almost kissing, but Mana butts in to break that poo poo up.  Also, there’s more Mana. There will never not be Mana. Get used to it. Mana continues with that poo poo for like a full minute with more censored out words that anyone over the age of 16 would know and be able to guess. Mahiru is getting really embarrassed about it (Mana also brought along a carriage that’s basically a horse-drawn bed which she wants Itsuki/Mahiru to hop on to). Itsuki then has a very brief moment where it looks like he’s going to tell Mana to knock it off and stop embarrassing Mahiru—  But he actually starts talking about how the mobile Classmating bed is terrible because people from the outside can see everything going on so it ruins the excitement and titillation. This results in a very close up gag shot of Mahiru looking goofy/unamused and saying that she’s leaving.  The next scene has Itsuki sitting in front of Reone who is looking him over. He does actually have visible bruising and scars on his body from those times he got beat in the Labyrinth. I wish the game had more of that (it would make Reone’s worrying and examination make a little more sense).  Also, Mana uses some cartoon imagery of a hot dog. You know what for.  Reone then proceeds to inject Mana with something that knocks her out. Yes, I said Mana. Thank Christ we get a brief break from her. With Mana out of the way, Reone says that she’ll be one of the two Maidens for the ritual so that she can keep an eye on his condition during the ritual (he's pretty beaten up at this point, plus almost sick from that dive into the water at night).  This is also where we get most of Reone’s initial character arc. Itsuki’s stomach growls, Reone offers an apple, Itsuki asks if she can bake it (there’s some brief fanservice here with Reone offering to peel it for him. Not sure what’s overtly sexual about peeling an apple, but we get a close up of Reone’s boobs), and the conversation goes from there. This picture is a lot more clear than the game version, although they obviously still conceal Reone’s brother’s face. I guess they wanted to make sure that his supposed likeness to Itsuki wasn’t too apparent because of the creepy incest angle we had to deal with for a while during Reone’s route.  Itsuki goes wandering the streets after this, since he’s supposed to find a second Maiden for the Double Love Ritual (except he doesn’t know where Ruka is and Mahiru is pissed at him because her personality managed to claw it’s way out momentarily).  This is where Farun comes in. Once again, that animation does not look quite right to me.  Ehhhh…  I’m not kidding, this is 90% of her 7-second dance. That remains to be seen, Farun. Listen, I’m not going to say that I’m a fiend on the dancefloor, but I could do those moves easily (I’d just blind everyone in a 50-foot radius is all). The two start talking and Farun offers to get him a drink. No, Anime Itsuki is no less a stickler for Japanese Drinking Laws than Game Itsuki. Farun does tease him about it, though. I got a laugh from that (She says something like “What a baby. You want some juice, baby?”). The conversation continues much like it did in Farun’s introduction scene (in the game I mean). However, at one point she talks about feeling suffocated by being tied down to one place for so long (similar to what she says in the game about not liking the fact that, as a Star Maiden, she can’t leave Granvania). There is a brief shot of Itsuki looking at that book in his pocket (the one Mana slipped him) and then he proceeds to lean in and nibble Farun’s ear out of nowhere. He also starts saying corny lines and coming on hard.    AND THIS WORKS. It cuts to Farun and Itsuki sitting at the bar facing away from each other, but Farun looks like she’s been turned to butter and Itsuki is amazed at how well that book he got from Mana works. I’m talking about Farun here. Yes, she starts turning into a giddy high school girl as her route goes on, but at the start of her route in the game she is easily able to brush off any comments that Itsuki tries on her (she tells us that she’s heard them all before. She’s a dancer and a bar hostess after all). But Anime Itsuki sweeps her off her feet within minutes of meeting her for the first time (the introduction scene doesn’t count).  Anyway, that’s all for that scene. It’s Double Love Ritual/Tri-Mating time.  Unlike Ruka and Mahiru, Reone and Farun are buck naked for the ritual. The weird teal circle things you see over Farun’s chest are Mana censor heads. Reone has red ones covering her chest. They are fairly large as well. The fanservice has definitely ramped up, but it seems as though they aren’t quite willing to go the length of other shows by making the censor circles really small.   After what looks like a shot of silhouetted Itsuki presumably fingering Reone and Farun, we’re introduced to two more Star Children. Also, apparently Narcisstes stood by and watched that happen because we get a shot of him talking about how majestic the Double Love Ritual is.  Farun literally has a line that reads “I c*** to the ends of the universe.” I poo poo you not. And Itsuki was apparently so good that he turned Reone and Farun to jelly. So much for the “experienced” Reone we saw in the game.  Episode 3 wraps up with Itsuki and his new (now full) team of Star Children tackling the Labyrinth once more.  And there’s another reminder from Mana to visit the website.  There’s a nice shot near the end where Scorpi (the Magician Girl Star Child) is scared upon seeing that big golden Impurity from Episode 2 and Itsuki rests a hand on her shoulder and tells her to hide behind him if she feels in danger. It’s moments like these that I really wanted more of in the games. It would have done a lot to help the player feel more attached to the Star Children instead of having them be glorified stat sheets.  And no, we don’t get to actually see the battle. Are you nuts? That poo poo costs money, yo.  After sealing the Star Sign (we don’t find out which one it actually is. I guess we’ll be able to tell when we see that Boss in the game), there’s a final moment where that roaring that signals the 13th Phantom happens. So, that was Episodes 1 to 3 of the Conception Anime. How does it stack up? Animation:  When the anime is sitting still, it looks fine. However, you can’t have an anime that doesn’t move. That’s just a collection of CGs. The first three episodes do not move well. Action scenes (what few that there are) are janky and somehow low-framerate. There’s also a lot of moments where barely anything on screen is actually moving. It all looks very stiff and wooden. Fanservice: The most risqué thing in terms of fanservice was that shot of Reone and Farun at the end of Episode 3. Outside of that, if fanservice is what you are watching this for, then you won’t get any satisfaction from these episodes. Despite how much suggestive dialogue Mana has and how many times sex is hinted at, the anime doesn’t actually show much of it. There are a few shots of boobs from Reone and Alfie; a little skin from Mahiru, Ruka, and Farun; but that’s about all. As Advertised:  The episodes get across the general ideas and structure of the game, but the characterizations so far have been wildly off from their in-game versions. Ruka is completely different compared to how she is in the game, Mahiru only starts to act like Mahiru (Old or New) in one scene during Episode 3, and Reone is somehow toned down (she seems a lot less teasing and suggestive than in the game) which is baffling for a harem/fanservice series like this. Not to mention Farun loses all of her “Nice try” attitude when it comes to sweet talking from Itsuki. Uuuughh. We’ve made it through the first 3 episodes. We’ll be back for more later on, but for now, how about we get back to Bonding Events that aren’t paced like the writers were on (a higher dose of) speed. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 22:44 on Feb 21, 2020 |
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Feb 20, 2020 02:16
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Psycho Knight posted:The anime (or at least the English Sub that I was watching) constantly refers to Itsuki and Mahiru as “Visitors” instead of “God’s Gifts”. I don’t know why this change was made. It’s technically still accurate, but I think “God’s Gift” has an air of importance about it that “Visitor” doesn’t. Itsuki and Mahiru are saviours of this world and the only hope for everyone that lives in Granvania. “Visitor” really seems like it’s underselling that aspect. Visitor is a valid if rather abbreviated translation - really it has fancier implications. "God's Gift", like Classmating, was an invention of the translators for Conception 2 and carried over into Conception Plus. Amusingly the reverse also applies, in Japanese Conception 2 Wake is also referred to as 'Visitor' even though it doesn't really make sense. Between this, Sola, Liris, and anything else it's kind of curious that they didn't actually have anyone on the game translation team (assuming it had progressed that far) review it for terminology. Crunchyroll streams are officially licensed so they would certainly have been aware. Psycho Knight posted:Mana also gives a brief explanation as to what the Star Wards are before once again pointing the audience to the website. I should mention that I don’t think the Japanese website for Conception Plus actually explains any of this poo poo. The website for Plus mostly just has marketing shots and a bit of character art/voice clips with a few details about the game world/story. There's a totally separate website for the anime, the explanation pages are on there. Psycho Knight posted:Anime Itsuki is totally on board with Anime Mana Yeah, this definitely seems like the biggest concern. Or maybe second to the existence of the closing credits. For the characterisations I guess they don't really have the time available to mess around with the girls being overly shy/reluctant but it feels like they could have been a bit less extreme with the acceleration.
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Feb 20, 2020 03:41
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Well, that was bad, but not as bad as I thought it would be. Itsuki being fully into it was a surprise, though. How could they make the worst character worse in the anime? I didn't think that was possible. BlazeEmblem fucked around with this message at 03:45 on Feb 20, 2020 |
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Feb 20, 2020 03:42
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First up: I just realized that I forgot Astromancer in the Team A(wful) poll. Sorry about that. I can’t edit it unfortunately. Might have to repost. Also, I still need team suggestions for C. This is the last time I'll need this voting thing, I promise. Polsy posted:Visitor is a valid if rather abbreviated translation - really it has fancier implications. "God's Gift", like Classmating, was an invention of the translators for Conception 2 and carried over into Conception Plus. Amusingly the reverse also applies, in Japanese Conception 2 Wake is also referred to as 'Visitor' even though it doesn't really make sense. Wait, what? Wake gets referred to as "Visitor" in JP CII? That doesn't make the slightest bit of sense in any context. Who loving oversees this drat studio? Every time I think I've seen the weirdest decisions this series has to offer, a new one is discovered... They were directing people to the anime website? Why? This is a marketing series for the game (whose site was up at this point). ...God dammit, do I really want to open that site and read through it? I'm not sure I want to subject myself to the anime studio's interpretation of game lore considering the characters. I do get that they are working with limited screentime and they have 13 heroines to split into that time, but some of these Maidens are not even close to the same character. Ruka is entirely different. Mahiru doesn’t fit her old or new personality. Out of the ones we've seen so far, Reone is the only one that still seems to match her game counterpart even remotely. BlazeEmblem posted:Well, that was bad, but not as bad as I thought it would be. Itsuki being fully into it was a surprise, though. Sure, it wasn't horrible. You need to keep in mind that roughly 1.5 of those 3 episodes were devoted to exposition and framework though. That stuff is all done now, so the next episodes will be nothing but the character stuff. Also, I don't know. Just remember this: Someone on CR posted a review that called Mana the best character in the show. Let that sink in after just reading what you read. Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 05:25 on Feb 20, 2020 |
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Feb 20, 2020 04:35
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...Cripes, and I thought the game had already pushed it a good bit too far for me. I... just, drat. And I know that this isn't even the worst kind of stuff out there. Ugh. It's unfortunate that this is relatively tame, by standards. Thank goodness I'm not actually watching this awful stuff. I hope you're enjoying this in some way or another- I wouldn't want to do it on my side, but I suppose I'm sticking around out of morbid curiosity as to how bad it's going to get. Psycho Knight posted:Also, I don't know. Just remember this: Someone on CR posted a review that called Mana the best character in the show. Let that sink in after just reading what you read. I'm pretty sure I saw that one. I don't know if it's the delay between the update and when I saw it, but I really don't know why my expectations weren't lower.
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Feb 20, 2020 06:49
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