Playing

Don’t Pick Up Strange Aliens – Very cute and cuddly and innocent.  This was one of many intriguing participants in Otome Jam 2026; a couple of others from the jam that I also bookmarked to play are Love’s Young Dream and Abracademia, but I didn’t get around to playing them. 😭  And looking at the list again, now I also want to play Starfallen Strength, Our Light Affliction, Mysterious Thief Emerald, and Ember Sands… GAH!  This is the whole reason that I’m supposed to have a “just play something, anything, just for like 20 mins a day, just do it do it do it the backlog is too long!!” habit, but I’ve clearly fallen off of it again. 😅

Watching the BF Play

Live A Live – (My representative image here is one of the countdown illustrations from Square-Enix’s twitter leading up to the HD-2D remake release – it’s cute!)  Only Oersted’s route and Final Chapter were left to do after last month.  I was very, very grateful that @wreckscalibur hadn’t been spoiled about key turning points of this game so the exciting moments came as a surprise for him.  You know a game has a good ending when you’re cheering “YEEEAAAAHHHH!!!” during the climactic moments of the final battle.

Fairune 2 – Fairune dares to ask, “What if Hydlyde was good?”  LOVE this developer; other good Skipmore games I can recommend in particular are the first Fairune (the series is bundled together on Steam), Kamiko (one of the first digital games we ever bought when we first got our Switch), and Synopsis Quest (very silly browser game).  Love to have a quick and snappy little adventure with satisfying progression – though this is larger than you’d expect.  When you first start, there’s an overworld map that you gradually fill out, as well as an ‘underground’ map where all of the caves are, and I remember assuming, “Ah, these two maps are probably the scale of the whole game.”  NAY.  There are MORE OVERWORLDS.  And even more after that!  Tons of very fun little secrets to find all around.

Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons – My childhood game was Ages and I’ve never seen Seasons in full.  I like the Subrosians, they’re silly!  Very interesting seeing the different versions of the items that upgrade in different ways between the two games (both games have a Roc’s Feather, but only Seasons gets the Roc’s Cape; and both games have Zora Flippers, but only Ages upgrades it to a mermaid tail, etc…).  It made me wanna reread the Zelda manga that I have, too, so you’ll see that in the later section!

Casual Gaming

Anthropeum – As in “anthropology.”  Try to guess where in the world an artifact (sourced from The Met Gallery’s collection) came from, and from when.  I’m okay-ish at the where but terrible at the when. 🤔  I tend to just default to 1 BCE for everything unless I know otherwise.

Huekle – A bunch of color-based puzzles??  Sometimes I can’t tell what the controls or instructions are.  But it’s so stylish to look at and there are SO MANY daily games here that one or two meh ones aren’t so bothersome.

Rebusly – A daily rebus puzzle (one of my favorite kinds of puzzles! and rare to find in daily/online format) based on a news headline of the day.  Your hints are snippets from the article.

Spellsword – It’s hard to get a screenshot of this one because there are about three different word games wrapped up in an adventurous little story.  You get a cute little intro, combine parts of words to identify the “enemy” you’ll be fighting, then you string letters together to do damage to its HP bar.  Then the enemy fights back, but you can defend if you unscramble an anagram quickly enough.  It’s not REALLY all that much like playing an RPG but just having a little bit of flavor or a theme of the day makes a basic word game more fun.  The “story” actually continues a little bit further every day.

Threezy – Similar to the card game Set (which can also be played in your browser) but the cards get replaced instead of staying on the screen.  If you don’t know of Set, it’s a little hard to explain, but you have to find sets of shapes that are all the same in some dimensions (shape, color, fill style, quantity, etc.) but different in at least one other dimension.  It’s hard to explain in words but starts to make sense once you’re looking at it and giving it a try.  I was excited to find a new online variation because sometimes a different choice of shapes or slightly different rules can be all it takes to make something new and refreshing lol.

Reading

Manga Classics: Jane Eyre – I never covered Jane Eyre during school, so this was a read purely for satisfying my curiosity.  As with other Manga Classics I’ve written about in these summaries, I enjoyed reading Sparknotes study guides after finishing the comic for deeper understanding.  I know that the Bronte sisters have a whole library of wonderful books – are there others that you’d recommend I should check out next? 🤗  (I thiiiiink I’ve already read Wuthering Heights in school, but I barely remember anything from it.)

Swordheart by T. Kingfisher – I have other T. Kingfisher books in my Want To Read list that I’m still willing to try, but I didn’t jive with the humor in this one.  If the witty exchanges were more like just one (1) quirky observation from the heroine and one (1) clever response from the male lead as the action moves them along, it would be bearable, but it’s the fact that every conversation is 3-5x longer than it needs to be because each participant must make a witty remark about the witty remark that the other one just said.  I don’t mind “quippy” protagonists; I like Murderbot, and I like Saturday morning cartoons from the 80s.  If it were simply that the characters said their funny line and then the momentum moved forward, I’d love it, but nothing ruins a good joke like dragging it out.  I certainly might be in the minority here because this book has tens of thousands of positive reviews that all praise its humor.  Like I said, I’m going to go ahead and try other books from this author because overall I like the D&D campaign-like adventure.

Honeysuckle Cottage by P.G. Wodehouse – Listened to this as an audiobook (free on youtube because most P.G. Wodehouse books are in the public domain!) while doing crafts outdoors.  Very silly and charming and only an hour of time investment.  You may worry about the protagonist’s behavior and attitude toward women, but don’t worry, it has a good ending, which is that the woman doesn’t end up married to this miserable guy lol.

Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons – Gee, Oracle of Seasons, how come Mom lets you have two categories?  Well, because both the game and the manga are really good, that’s why lol.  Why not read along? 😄  Every time I reread one of the Zelda manga volumes, it just reminds me that one of these days I have GOT to check out the massive Twilight Princess series sometime.  And because I own this physically, it’s another comic I could enjoy outdoors in the sunshine. ☀️  There are some fun new dynamics present in this adaptation that aren’t in the game, such as some familial background for Link, the fact that Link joins and travels with the dancing troupe for a while, and eventually you get a whole little adventuring party with Ricky and Maple on the quest alongside him.

The Sequel by Jean Hanff Korelitz – The protagonist of the first book (which I read last year) was a Miserable Man, now the POV has shifted to a Miserable Woman, and it’s remarkable how similar the two of them are considering how much she despised him.  There’s some morbid satisfaction in watching a Massive Jerk build what they think is an impenetrable fortress around them, but the weak foundation crumbles and we get to watch all of the consequences of their actions come crashing down and bury them.  I guess observing that sort of glorious train wreck again was what made me want to check out this second book, although interestingly things don’t turn out as terribly for the female protagonist as they did for the guy, somehow, other than all the murders I guess??  These aren’t protagonists to cheer for, so this is very much a “What if this happened, wouldn’t that be messed up” kind of story.

Watching

Pretty Boy Detective Club – I… thiiink I enjoyed this?  What a strange story, with a strange mood.  It’s a bit less of a detective mystery than you’d expect, more like just a bunch of weird things that happen involving their school… odd that most of the dialog of each episode is delivered through monologues (either the heroine’s inner thoughts, or very very long and roundabout deductions from the other Detective Club members that somehow always point toward government conspiracy).  I liked the Artistic Genius guy (wearing the oversized lab coat) because the rare times when he spoke were always very impactful.

An Observation Log of My Fiancée Who Calls Herself a Villainess – This is SO STINKIN’ cute and funny, then, as most things do, makes a serious swerve in the last third.  Emotions get a little high, but it’s a comedy so it keeps making gags to keep things light.  I loved all the pretty clothes!  And if you’ve read/watched any otome isekai villainess anything, you already know how this kind of story goes, but it was interesting for the main POV to be from the male lead this time around, and that the heroine was genre-savvy as well!  (The heroine’s name is ‘Heronia’ btw, which made me laugh.)

Casablanca – I’ve seen this before (many years ago, and I didn’t remember much from it) but it was a new watch for Wreckscalibur.  Watching Casablanca is one of the most constant ‘Ohhh, that’s where that reference comes from’ experiences you can have, haha.  And afterward, it’s required viewing to check out some classic parodies, like Looney Tunes’s Carrotblanca, and who could ever forget all of the magnificently-adapted Casablanca scenes in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, Overdrawn at the Memory Bank?  (that’s a link to an entire movie btw. enjoy.)

The Great Mouse Detective – This is like the inverse of Casablanca in that it’s something Wreckscalibur watched as a kid, but this was my first viewing of it.  It’s great, love it!  Had no idea about Vincent Price as the villain, who naturally had some great songs as most Disney Villains do.  The surprise guest appearance of Basil Rathbone’s (posthumous) voice as the human Sherlock Holmes speaking off-screen was also a great cameo.

King Arthur & The Knights of Justice – Ok so you know how I read the recent Princess Gwenevere & The Jewel Riders comics in the past months?  The publisher of those ALSO did a similar comic series for THIS OTHER Saturday morning cartoon, and THERE’S A BONUS CROSSOVER CHAPTER BETWEEN THEM.  So the two cartoons themselves, despite being about King Arthur and Gwenevere, aren’t actually related, but the modern comic adaptations are.  So now I’ve got to watch this nonsense (affectionate), just to learn & understand a little of what the comic is going to be and so I can ultimately read the crossover.  It’s good nonsense!!  We only watched two episodes but that was all it took to download all of them and put it in our shuffled nostalgic cartoon playlist on our TV (btw I highly recommend this practice, it’s great when you don’t know what to watch, just hit shuffle on the folder).  It’s about a football team that gets isekai’d into King Arthur times and they all get dumb (affectionate) superpowers.  They hype themselves up with the chant “Knights! Knights! Knights!” in the same way you’d say “Lads! Lads! Lads!” and Merlin has the same voice actor as Doctor Light from the Ruby Spears Mega Man series.  Everyone should watch this.

There were two manufacturers I recently tested plush items from; the first was Wooacry and the other is Vograce!

Vograce is a bit more well-known as manufacturer of convention artist booth-style merchandise, since they have been around for longer. Just like Wooacry, Vograce also has a SMETA certification ensuring ethical labor practices & fair wages, and an FSC certification for their paper and wooden products that ensures environmental sustainability.

Things are a bit more open-ended when you submit designs to Vograce compared to Wooacry. With these character plushies on Vograce, you can add any sew-on details you like, such as ears, hair tufts, ponytails, wings, and tails. On Wooacry, you are limited to the ear & tail styles that are selectable in the listing and cannot restyle them yourself (they provide a decent spread of kitty ears & tails, bunny ears & tails, etc., but you can’t make a custom shape for your character’s unique ponytail or dragon wings or something).

This open-ended customization leads to a change in the upload process between them as well. On Vograce, the file you upload must be in PSD format with its layers intact, the reason being that you need to have created enough room for bleed as well as indicating the sewing lines for those custom sew-on pieces yourself. It can be tricky to get the right bleed amount and make some vectored outlines if you aren’t familiar with the tools in your art software. So there’s a bit of a trade-off of more complicated file preparation if you want fully customizable 3-dimensional extra bits on your plush when you go through Vograce, as opposed to the simpler upload process of Wooacry (where you can add basic animal ears and tails but none of your own shapes).

Tbh, the communication with the Vograce team was a little odd… they ask you to include a mockup in the PSD file you upload, which I did, and they still got something wrong when they showed me the “here’s how it will look, what do you think?” mockup from their end (the bunny tails were backwards, with the shading facing in rather than being visible on the back). 😐 Like, what was the point of me putting time & energy into making a mockup at all if you were going to make your own mockup, and incorrectly at that…? Oh well, I’m grateful that they sent that message because I could point it out and correct them, but even just that little bit of back-and-forth communication caused a longer delay before production started. If I can avoid it, I’d prefer to stick with ordering items from Wooacry in the future instead of Vograce just because they’ve got their process so streamlined (an advantage of having only those basic animal ears/tails to choose from – the whole team is familiar with working with them and there’s no chance at all of extra bits or bobs to worry about being sewn backwards or upside down).

Anyway, here are the pics of the plushies I designed!

Subjects: Eloise (the bunnygirl) and Rosie (the pink-haired guy), both are player-created characters from Xenoblade Chronicles X.
Product: Custom Stuffed Toy Keychains Plush Toy keychain [sic; this is what the product is called on Vograce’s website lol]

Even after the small hiccup during production, I LOVE how these little guys came out. THEY ARE SO SILLY LOL. I carry my little pink guy around with me even just moving around the house. He sits next to me while I am working at my computer and I hold him while I am watching TV and I just squish sqiush squimsh his big silly face.

Since the bunnygirl got ears & tail sew-ons, I went ahead and gave the other guy ears & tail as well, just to make them match and because how could I resist making my gwumpy guy into a cute bunny?? Eloise also gets to wear her ears and hibiscus accessory simultaneously, which is impossible in the game since you can only wear one headgear at a time. Such is the beauty of custom products with full creative freedom!

Here they are from the back:

Those are the bunny tails that apparently were too confusing in my mockup… 😐 And the light gradient shading that caused the problem in the first place ended up being barely visible at all on the physical product in the end… 😅 Such ado over nothing at all.

Anyway, if you want chibi character plushies in this shape, you’ve got to go through Vograce for now.

But wouldn’t you believe it; on THE VERY DAY before I received these in the mail, Wooacry announced that they will also have chibi character plushes like these available soon, although the overall shape is a bit different:

Wooacry’s version looks like the head is less wide, with more definition for the jaw line (there’s a whole extra piece of fabric for the neck/chin), and a larger body with a more rounded shape to the arms compared to Vograce’s tiny starfish-shaped body.

I’m grateful that Wooacry is adding this because I’ll be able to have all of my chibi plushie dreams fulfilled through them rather than struggling with Vograce to make my own sew lines in the PSD file and needing to make corrections during production. I like so many of Wooacry’s other products that, once this new printed plush is available, I can get basically everything that I want through them rather than splitting orders between two manufacturers.

I’m really looking forward to when they make this available! I’ll probably make more Xenoblade characters to test it out! 😆

If you follow me on Tumblr, you’ve already seen how I got REALLY attached to the character Phog in Xenoblade Chronicles X…  Well, his deal is that he is the younger brother of another party member, Frye, but mysteriously the two cannot be on your party together at the same time, and circumstances reveal that they are not on speaking terms.

I’ve spent a good chunk of this game looking forward to the quest that reunites them at last, and I went a little overboard and took a bamillion screenshots when I finally reached that point myself.  Here is a little screenshot diary of them!

Click any of them to see the full resolution – I cropped most of them so that the text size would be more readable on this page, but in the more zoomed-out ones feel free to click the image to see it larger if you have to.

Here is the Affinitiy Mission that initiates the quest – it’s near the East Gate of NLA.
I had to get through Chapter 8 to finally meet the requirements for it –
Chapter 8 was so stressful ahh!!!

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During the mission briefing, you’re given the option to go on offense with Frye
or defend the city with Phog.
I reloaded a few times during this quest to try each side
(in a bit you’ll see my character equipped differently and with other party members),
but for now, let’s see Phog’s side.

He’s appreciative of our help. c:

–

Ahh, I wonder if this is the first time these two have spoken to each other in years. ;_;

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The others empty out, and Phog is still hoping for the safety of his bro.

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Here’s the first example of the other set of equipment and party members
you’ll see in these screenshots lol!
This is a cute line and I missed catching it the first time around.

–

aaaaaaa any time my child (´▽｀人)

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Phog in almost all of his missions will tell you how appreciative he is toward you, actually.
It is one of the many things that I really, really like about him.

I wanted to give him some encouragement in his own efforts,
since there was an earlier mission where selecting this same “Downplay” option
was his preferred response, but he kinda shrugged it off this time.

–

You’re actually supposed to Brag about your “awesome advice,”
because it reminds Phog of his bro.

There are actually a LOT of options that Phog appreciates because
they sound like what Frye would say.  Similarly, Frye is the inverse –
being kind to NPCs will often get you affinity with Frye since it
reminds him of Phog.

these bros make me feel a lot of things.

Read the rest of this entry »

In June this past Summer, an incredibly cute MMO that I had been enjoying closed its servers. ・°・(ノД｀)・°・  But, I enjoyed it heartily in the time that I played!

I’m a big fan of X-Legends’ games!!  Their artwork and character designs are sooo cuute, and they always have the most colorful and whimsical backgrounds and settings.  Spirit Tales was ESPECIALLY whimsical, because it was the ‘tiniest’ and cutest of their games, in terms of character design~

See?  It looked like this!

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This is going to be a reeeeaaally image-heavy post, so I’m putting a cut here!!  Check out the rest of my memories (and my cute spicy red bunny character) below!

Read the rest of this entry »

There is such a wonderfully cute roundup of games coming out in the next handful of months before the holidays!  It’s so rare to get happy, colorful, cute games – and there are so, so many of them all happening together in such a short time!  I’m so excited seeing all of them!

*All of the release dates listed here are according to their Amazon listings as of the time of this writing – they may change!

Yoshi’s Woolly World

This was first shown at E3 some years back –
for some time it was only known as “Yarn Yoshi!”
But it’s finally coming out in the US on October 16 –
I’m so excited!  And I can’t wait to play co-op! ^o^
There are so many cute yarn Yoshi designs to unlock and play as, too!
OH!!  And there will be these adorable yarn Yoshi Amiibos!!

Pink Yarn Yoshi Amiibo

I need one!!!

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Return to PopoloCrois: A Story of Seasons Fairytale

Ahhhh this looks so preciousssss!!
Story of Seasons is the current localization name for the Harvest Moon series,
so really, this has the same “Fantasy Harvest Moon” subtitle as Rune Factory!
This PopoloCrois adaptation of Story of Seasons looks like a combination
of Rune Factory and Fantasy Life – my favorite game from last year!
I’m really looking forward to it!

PopoloCrois: Story of Seasons comes out January 5, 2016!

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Yo-Kai Watch

Yo-Kai Watch is an INCREDIBLE sensation in Japan,
and this is the first installment of it reaching the US!
It will be coming over along with a cartoon on TV
and toys licensed by Hasbro.
I hope it becomes very successful, because it is a wonderful world
filled with kooky Yo-Kai critters that make for an awesomely fun
little monster-collecting, RPG-battling experience!
And the girl hero that you can play as is super cute! n_n

Yo-Kai Watch comes out November 6!!

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Moco Moco Friends

OK… LOOK AT HOW CUTE THIS IS… THIS IS INSANE!!!
Moco Moco Friends is a monster-collecting and RPG-battling game
much like Yo-Kai Watch, except your player character and all of her friends
are adorable magical witch girls, and their monsters are cuddly plushes!
Really, seriously, this is the Pokemon-like game
that I have been waiting for since the monster genre first emerged.
I can’t believe it took THIS long for a 100% cutesy version of the genre to happen.

Moco Moco Friends comes out November 17!

–

Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer

After New Leaf was insanely successful,
this spinoff game centered on designing cute homes for your animal neighbors
will be out on September 25!
The options for customizing homes (and the yards outside of them)
are SO HUGELY enhanced – you have to watch videos or trailers
of this game to see it in action, it’s all sooo cuuuute!!