northberg

On the northwest Belgian coast, there is a little known tradition: shrimp fishing on horseback. The activity consists of what its name describes: fishing shrimp on a horse. In the 15th century, shrimp fishing on horseback was still practised on the North Sea coasts in France, the Netherlands and even the South of England. This activity represented an extra revenue needed for the household. Nowadays there is only one place in which it is still ongoing: Oostduinkerke, a sub-municipality of the municipality of Koksijde.

Star stable featured puzzles, mystery, danger -themes of sisterhood, friendship, pressure from expectations, loss and death etc.- it was DIFFERENT! and people loved having a game focused around the animal they love with a real adventure alongside it rather than just shopping or competing -especially young girls/afab people who have never been the target audience of most games until more recent years- we always had extremely basic and stereotypical feminine games given to us

At some point they've decided they want their target audience to be younger kids, while at the same time being aware that most people keeping jorvik alive are the teens that grew up but keep coming back; so now they want to be both interesting/mysterious and dumb down challenges for convenience and so the little kids keep playing

And I hate thinking about what could have been if they just kept their focus on a slightly older target audience

Jorvik used to have mystery but not enough to scare you off; it actually made you more curious about the land... now it's all bright and colourful and it just doesn't feel the same, and I don't think the new style is an issue because they can have their new style and still create an atmosphere of magic and mystery

Anyway who said that?

sso was always targeted towards kids. approx. 8-9 and above. which it STILL IS (officially, it's said to be for ages 8-18) they're just catering to TODAYS standards for such kids (fried patience mostly). what type of games kids can play has shifted during the years. hell, what type of game ANY given audience can play has changed drastically. i think the most obvious shift can be seen if you follow the Elder Scrolls series progression. Daggerfall and below is a literal nightmare and is notoriously difficult, most modern players play with a mod to "make it playable". Morrowind is easier, but won't lead you easily, it's difficult still. Oblivion has a massive shift in difficulty (the addition of the quest marker... wowee). Skyrim practically leads you by the hand through every single quests (now you can see the quest marker in the world itself? what) and most puzzles are ridiculously easy. all of these games are for the exact same audience, made by the same people, and is in the same world/series, but the difficulty levels and gameplay style is heavily simplified because people as a whole don't have patience anymore. it's also been censored (Daggerfall had tiddies and a book with explicit smut in it for like 1-2 pages, that was nerfed heavily for Morrowind but there's still... references. Skyrim? lmao what is a sex) and just generally made less graphic. because idk, potential wider audience? barely?

so no i don't think it has anything to do with them changing age range (because they haven't) but them expecting kids to be stupid now. which is unfortunately partly right. swedes do you remember that article where 4th graders couldn't use scissors properly? yeah.

also all of this doesn't apply for ssl and other pre-sso games, only sso. though ssl was for a pre-teen-to-teen audience too lol. our expectations are just very different now and tbh that's also a huge shame

~Commissions~

This has been a loooong long time coming, but Honey has finally had her surgery to remove the bothersome right eye that she's been blind in for most of her life. The operation went great, she's recovering well and a very happy girl.

I'd like to open up commissions again to help pay off the vet bill. The above examples are samples of the kind of work I'm offering at the moment. Perfectly happy to still draw people and other creatures too! Pop me a message here (or if you prefer Discord you can also find me there, just let me know your handle). <3

Spin the wheel again. That’s who’s trying to protect you.

(If you have zero idea about a name you got, spin until you see someone you recognize.)