and call him george

It occurs to me that I've read at least two stories about downtrodden young boys (slaves/servants) stealing a dragon egg for their own and rising to prominence. (There's also a Pern short story about an unexpected runty little dragonboy, but there was no theft involved nor scheming intent on his part. It just happened to him, there was no plan. Then there's Eragon, but I haven't *read* that and don't intend to.)

But I can't immediately think of stories involving a *girl* stealing a dragon's egg. (Menolly sort of?)

I do know of one where three children steal an egg together, two boys and one girl, but it's still one of the boys who gets the dragon.

In settings where you don't typically have girls as fighters, it seems like "Okay, I get BIG weapon that flies and breathes fire on you! I will nurture it and train it to love only me!" is a logical plan. Hmmm...

fail

(content warning)

There's been a big mess in the past year about hentai and censorship. And I still fall on the "censorship is bad" side of things.

However, you do have to worry about people when... well.

There's this Japan-only game for the Xbox 360. (Non-porn, I assume. Console games generally are.) You try to pick up girls working at hostess clubs. This involves drinking a lot of alcohol with them and watching them dance. Apparently one of the characters, in-game, already has a boyfriend. So when you've gone through all the steps to reach her 'good ending', she says you're a great friend, and goes off to get married. Not to you.

Many people on Teh Internets talking about this subject applaud the realism of a girl who's seriously Not That Into You. Not every girl is just waiting to swoon into your arms.

However, a few fans are seriously pissed. I've seen more than one person (well, maybe - it could be the same loon popping up in multiple places) demanding that someone create downloadable content for this game to add an option to rape the girl who dares refuse you.

...Yeah. Not a request to make her winnable, a request to 'punish' a virtual girl for daring to turn down the player's advances.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU???

just as planned

Have obtained a copy of Dokapon Journey. It's pretty much exactly as expected - cute RPG board game, takes forever to play, kinda fun but the AI is *way* better than us even set to 'easy'. Of course, it doesn't help that we have no idea what we're doing!

romance as reward

or the troubles of Love in Game Design

http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2009/09/column_homer_in_silicon_the_ro.php

Brings up some interesting issues about how a good romance tends to require some conflict between the lovers, which tends not to come across in games... all too often we're just handing flowers to our intended partner until we build up enough affection points to score.

strange bedfellows

PopCap teaming up with Square Enix?


While that writer may be sick of Puzzle Quest clones, I have yet to find one that was properly GOOD by my standards... I admit to being vaguely interested. Although I should probably hide this information from my compatriot who gets obsessed with symbol-matching crack.

Along those lines, I was amused by this from the comments thread:

So the people that brought me FF and Chrono Trigger are making a game with the people that brought me Peggle and Plants Vs Zombies?

Just make this as an app for WoW and a large % of the population on earth will loose the will to even eat.

sore thumbs yet?

from a review of
Super Robot Taisen OG Saga: Endless Frontier

It's all about juggling. Your fighting force of heroes lines up alongside the right side of the screen, then rushes forward one at a time to take on the enemies in front of them -- assaulting them with preposterously complicated strings of punches, kicks, slashes and blasts that send the helpless foes, inevitably, sailing into the air. Your task is to then keep them there, as you press the A Button with the exact right timing to start your character's next string of attacks. You're going for as long a combo as you can get, never letting your foe touch down on the ground.

While it's sort of fun to watch, I don't really want to play an RPG where I might be expected to pull off this sort of combo attack... that sounds EXHAUSTING!



Can I just stick with simple turns? :)

Aoi Shiro

Translation project for a shoujo-ai game completed! (That being, girl/girl romance, but not explicit.)

This is a translation patch for a commercial game which I don't yet own.

I have never played a full length purely shoujo-ai game and am interested to see how they handle the issue. Within anime, Marimite places the characters in an all-female religious school so that their only close bonds are to each other. At the same time, men clearly exist in the world, some angst relates to the knowledge that some of the characters WILL graduate and have to marry men, and most of the relationships aren't exactly lesbians, just Very Close Friends. The few that really are gay have their own special angst on top about whether or not it's wrong, even if they never get further than kissing.

Strawberry Panic takes it a bit further and never MENTIONS the existence of men, or any idea that the developing girl/girl relationships might be taboo. It's a Gay Universe, everyone is at least potentially that way and can be safely approached. (And the couples do clearly get up to SEX, not just angsty kissing)

I'm sure that somewhere there exists a series where everyone involved is already explicitly gay within a 'normal' world, but it's slightly hard to figure out why a group would only contain lesbians unless it were, say, a GLBT club (or a camp trying to 'cure' them!).

Knowing nothing about the game I vaguely expect them to lean more in the direction of Strawberry Panic, and simply say *nothing* about why all these girls are receptive to your advances.

the obvious thought

I suppose what I ought to do for all my curiousity about pinky-pink DS games is find one of those rental services, if I can find one that will a) actually carry DS games (some don't!) and b) include games other than the most popular.

Then I can contribute usefully to the internet by reviewing things no one else will touch! :)

(checking) Gamefly does cover the Imagine series. And even (*shudder*) My Boyfriend. No sign of the Unicorn game though. Also, I don't live in the US.

also obtained on that shopping trip

A copy of Rhapsody, used, like I'd planned.

For the person I was with, using my vast knowledge of DS titles to navigate the used-and-boxless section:

A copy of Spectrobes, because he thought digging up alien fossils to make monsters sounded cool.

A copy of Izuna: Legend of the Unemployed Ninja, because it's a roguelike known for being difficult. He's enjoying it, although he points out it's still much easier than Nethack.

I completely forgot to look for Devil Survivor. They did not have any copies of The Dark Spire. They did have Knights in the Nightmare and my shopping partner may go for that next time.

They had a wide range of pink stuff as well but, again, with no ability to play demos I'm *not* going to pick up something like Princess In Lovewhich is probably AWFUL. :) (That 'Sarah and the Unicorn' game was present but I still couldn't tell much from the box.)


Also obtained NOT on that shopping trip: Peggle Nights, because I am still addicted to bouncing balls.

only some of these items were actually useful

Level solution: a hurricane, a tornado, an apatosaurus, and Cthulhu.

scribblenauts get!

I haven't done anything terribly clever yet, but I did accidentally destroy a tree with a flyswatter.

no.

I do not yet have a copy of Scribblenauts. This is because I was running a fever yesterday. That explanation doesn't stop me from pouting though.

the enduring image of the Scantily Clad Blue Alien Babe

also known as, a discussion of sex and gender in Mass Effect.

super obscure

An NES title I've never heard of, which looks complicated and interesting and even Mobygames can't find reviews for AND there are multiple cheap copies on ebay? What am I missing here?

goo goo

Browsing through youtube videos, found an old-style platformer I'd never heard of... where you play as a baby.

destroyers of quality

Just mentioning the CDI is enough to give some gamers nightmares.

Still, there's some interesting bits to hear about here, with this Mario game that never was...

fate 3

After my frustrating experiences with Fate 2 I'm not super-enthusiastic about this new attempt. On the bright side (for ME at least) apparently Undiscovered Realms comes free with this new one, so if I can make it run, I could get both. But I have plenty of other things to do at the moment.

simplify your life

There's apparently a new easy mode available for Spirited Heart, for those who were sick of being taxed to death.

mighty!

That's a lot of game.

I've never played any Might and Magic, actually. I suppose this could be a good time to consider it.

yay transhumanism

No time to discuss at the moment, remind me to look at Eclipse Phase later.