#tristia

Kogado Studio has announced Neosphere of The Deep-blue Sky: Legacy, its second remastered title in the Aoi series following Tristia: Legacy. It will launch for Switch and PC via Steam and Windows in spring 2027 in Japan with English, Japanese, Traditional Chinese, and Simplified Chinese language options.

Neosphere of The Deep-blue Sky is a city building simulation game that first launched for PC in 2005 in Japan, and was later ported to PlayStation 2 and PSP.

The setting shifts from Tristia‘s “seaside city” to the “sky kingdom” of Neosphere. Together with novice inventor Nanoca Flanca, players take on unique and outlandish “inventions” with the goal of rebuilding the kingdom.

While preserving the original game’s world and the appeal of its characters, the remastered version features “beautifully updated” graphics and “systems optimized for modern gameplay.”

i have two versions:

soft song will prosper with a mind at ease:

and yet with sudden ill my heart is overcast.

the song wants solace, peace it begs the scribe:

savage winter batters me, too the winds, the sea.

and every fear assails the song; and lost

I fear today the blade is coming for my throat.

and:

song finely spun will prosper in the calm:

and yet with sudden ill my heart is overcast.

song asks the scribe for peacefulness, quiet:

savage winter batters me, too the winds, the sea.

and every fear assails the song; and lost

I fear today the blade is coming for my throat.

the first sticks more strongly to the metre, but at the cost of having "song" come as the second word in lines 1 + 3 (unlike ovid, who has lines 1 + 3 + 5 starting with a version of carmen, poem or song).

the second i have spondees at the start of the ip lines to preserve that feature, and a trochee at the end of line 3 on quiet. i wanted every ip line to finish with a word that reflected the poet's mindset (calm/quiet/lost). but each of these words is stressed, and the trochee especially makes quiet stand out. i want to try and communicate a tension between what the poet is saying with the words, and expressing through the metre, a sort of anger at this exile. but it also risks coming across as too jarring, so i'm torn.

latin under cut

Ovid, Tristia III.7.45-52 See – although I lack my fatherland, and you, And my home, and what could be taken from me’s been stolen, Nevertheless I keep company with my genius, I enjoy it – Caesar could have no power over this. Let whoever wishes end this life of mine With savage sword – though I’m dead, my fame will survive, And while Mars’ Rome, victorious, shall look on the whole world, Conquered, from its hills, I shall be read.

En ego, cum caream patria uobisque domoque,      raptaque sint, adimi quae potuere mihi, ingenio tamen ipse meo comitorque fruorque:      Caesar in hoc potuit iuris habere nihil. Quilibet hanc saeuo uitam mihi finiat ense,      me tamen extincto fama superstes erit, dumque suis uictrix omnem de montibus orbem      prospiciet domitum Martia Roma, legar.

"Evenings with Ovid" is an 11-part podcast spanning the first book of Ovid's "Tristia." It will air every Friday at 12 PM EST, from September 2 to November 11. Ovid Daily editor Margrethe and special guest Ovid, brought to life by Lu, host each episode. Each installment contains the original Latin text read in poetic meter, followed by A.L. Wheeler's 1924 English translation. "Tristia" recounts Ovid's exile from Rome in 8 CE, and his winter-time journey to the Black Sea. It is somber, heartbreaking, and at times, rather irreverent, but always beautifully composed. "Tristia" is everything you love about Ovid, but with an autobiographical slant, and a reluctantly adventurous spirit.

Join Ovid Daily for our NEW PODCAST, coming to you THIS FRIDAY, September 2, at 12 PM EST/ 6 PM CET.