#game rambles

I think 828 total sends with only 12 extra story tickets spent was a good run.... I may ramble under the cut later on what I had prepared & tricks I did to optimize sends if you're interested!!

I did a casual playthrough of Deltarune for the first time when I got my Switch 2 (Chapter 1-4) and I didn't see the Soul as the player being a separate entity from Kris.

When you start the game, Kris has already dealt with "The Soul". They know how to rip it out. They know how to trap it. They aren't freaking out about having the player around... It's just normal life.

I saw "The Soul" as part of Kris that needed to be taken out/locked away so that Kris could make hard choices. Typically Kris will do whatever their heart wants to do but knows that sometimes they need to ignore their heart and perform unsavory actions.

So, what about the weird stuff that gets told to us at the start. How our choices don't matter?

Well, that's part of it.

Our choices aren't our choices. They're Kris' choices. When we pick an option, Kris is fine either way. We're just the coin flip, so to speak.

We know, with 100% certainty, that Kris will make specific choices if they want and we can't change their mind. This isn't just slashing their mom's tires, this is when Kris is being a goober with Susie and pouring drinks into each other's mouths.

So, we aren't playing "us", we're playing a part of Kris that Kris wants to silence. Yeah, we're the soul but we are Kris' soul. We are two sides of the same coin.

I don't think we're Kris' "conscious" in a moral sense cause, you know, SnowGrave/Weird Route exist. But it does show that if we, the soul, lines up with Kris' goals then we can do some fucked up shit. Beyond that, because we know Kris can lock us out for a time, Kris was ok with SnowGrave as Kris could have stopped it at any time.

Our choices don't matter cause the only choices we make are ones that Kris is ok with...

Just “finished” Hades. Gotta post abt this because this is one of the best games I’ve ever played. I can absolutely see where the praise for this game was coming from. The combat is so fun, the art is beautiful, and most importantly, the characters are all so amazing and likable (except Theseus and Tisiphone). No joke this game has prob my favorite cast of characters I’ve ever played in game period. There’s so much more I can glaze abt this game but I don’t wanna make this too long. I’m so glad I went into this as mostly blind. 10/10

Okay so hear me out:

We know that Anya told Swansea about the things that Jonah has done (the game doesn't specify, but let's presume it was everything) and, in turn, Swansea becomes more rude and antagonistic towards James, as well as being even more protective of the Utility Room.

We don't fully know the contents of the conversation between them. Jimbo interrupted both of them, they could've continued talking about it afterwards or maybe they were at the tail end of it. The matter is, they talked about the remaining cryo pod and - from my interpretation - collectively decided to give Daisuke the cryo pod if a time for it came. Anya crying could be either because she was opening up to Swansea about Jimminy's crimes, the fact that she was going to stay behind with Swansea for Daisuke's sake, or a combination of both.

So... who knows if Anya even asked Swansea to do something about Jerry. For all we know they decided she'd just lock herself in the med room every night away from Jonathan while Swansea kept guard of the Utility Room. Maybe she asked Swansea to do something and he - like Curly - failed her. Or maybe she even told him not do anything hasty... which sincerely I feel was the case.

Hear me out hear me out! I think there are two reasons why Anya would ask Swansea to just keep it between them for now and not do anything harsh/violent against Jeremiah:

1) People don't just think about murder as their first response, it's *hard* to decide to kill someone, even if they are deserving considering the circunstances and how they reject any and all accountability;

2) As a nurse, I think Anya is well aware of what could happen by killing Jambalaya. There are mental effects that could happen, morale would go down from the loss of human life, killing someone is not an easy thing to do and their minds have already been stretched thin from the whole crash situation. And also, imagine they killed Jamboree... what now? They can't just dispose of the body. What happens after some time when the body decomposes? What happens when the putrid air takes over the ship? What mental and physical consequences would that bring to the rest of the crew inside such a closed space with that smell? What if it's very hot inside and now you're stuck with that smell?

I just think that they decided it was better to just cope with Jizzy for the moment - handle him very carefully - because the moment they decided to kill him it'd signal the beginning of the end, their already stretched-thin mental states wouldn't hold much longer. I *GUESS* they could've killed him, put Daisuke in the cryo pod, mercy killed Curly, then Anya could've OD'ed on the pills and Swansea could have drunk so much Mouthwashing that he expired... but like, who goes for that as their first option?

As far as the game goes, I was not disappointed. I've been a hard-core Indy fan for a solid while, and I am so glad this game is what it is. Although the combat is probably the worst part. Sigh.

The story was perfect, and I was happy to get more content of my favorite archeologist.

With that said, I want to mention a few things.

Genuinely, the whole idea of Indy documenting everything in a journal makes so much sense when I think about it, but I had never thought about it until now. Obviously, they included a few details just for gameplay mechanics—such as letting you change your disguise as long as no enemies are around. However, the detail of Indy taking photos and SKETCHING THINGS OUT is so silly. Also, he's good at drawing??? What??? I mean, it makes sense, but still. Oh, and his handwriting being perfect cursive is so him. 😭

I also really enjoyed being able to use his whip. I'm not sure why I didn't think I would be able to, I just didn't assume they'd include it as a mechanic, let alone using it to climb or knockout enemies. Same with his gun. I mean, I guess my brain went to Disney limitations but obviously there weren't many. I do really like the adventure books mechanic letting you learn things, though. The Lucky Hat is one of my favorites—the little expression Indy makes is so silly, please.

I would also like to take a moment to praise the developers for LETTING YOU GO BACK. I did NOT expect to be able to and when I was going to start collecting everything, I was fully prepared to restart the game entirely. Not to mention letting you buy maps for things like the medicine bottles, notes, artifacts, pretty much everything collectible. That's good game design, right there.

And maybe it's just the fact that I haven't played a good, new open-world adventure game in a WHILE, but this game is genuinely so beautiful. There were times when I would just drive through Sukhothai just because the music, the environment, and the graphics were just so incredible.

I think when they decided to put the game timeline-wise was also a smart decision, although I think Last Crusade might be my favorite movie, so I'm a little sad there were no nods to that. BUT they made up for it by having a reference to the fucking RIDE (love that ride, by the way, I lost my shit when I saw notes for the Temple of the Forbidden Eye in Indy's office).

Also, Gina had NO RIGHT making fun of Indy's fear of snakes. Especially in that section with the HUGE fucking water snake. I died so many times to that. 😭 But man, I would've been scared shitless of that snake, and Indy actually SWAM WITH IT. So Gina better leave this man alone—especially when she's the one afraid of WATER. I know it's because she can't swim, but still. Come on, woman.

I think my favorite section was when Indy gets poisoned (I think) and he starts hallucinating that he's back in Marshall College and is running in circles until he wakes up. I was kinda bummed there was no extra dialog that was like. "Woah, Indy, you okay there?" But there were a lot of points where I was like that.

The final boss fight was probably the worst thing ever, though. Voss pulling you back in with your whip was cool the first three times and then I just got pissed off. Not to mention, the boxing rings/bruiser pits were okay in concept, but they were the worst thing to actually have to play while trying to 100% the Vatican and Gizeh. I haven't gotten around to completing Sukhothai yet, but I'm dreading that quest so much.

I wish we spent more time in Shanghai, though. It was SO cool. I get why there wasn't a lot of time spent in it, but still. I wanted to see Short Round. Please. 🙏😩

I do think Indy feeling guilty about Marion was also a nice detail, and the tutorial being the intro to Raiders was smart. It felt like I was watching another Indiana Jones movie, one I would've loved seeing when I was a kid.

This was an awesome game and I'm genuinely so happy they made it. They did Indy justice and although I was kinda sad that there were a lot of things that weren't really wrapped up by the finale. I guess I could've just watched Last Crusade again, but that defeats the point.

Anyway, enough yapping. I'm working on getting everything in the game, so I have yet to see what lies beyond that door with the ancient artifacts in it, but I will! And I will likely talk about it afterward.