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Hobgoblin2099 posted:Ora was always a hallucination. Always. The Ninja has the mark from the moment he wakes up on Stage 1. So, if you wondered back in the first level why she was the only other person who didn't get captured? 
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Aug 22, 2014 04:02
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chiasaur11 posted:So, if you wondered back in the first level why she was the only other person who didn't get captured? Also how she manages to constantly catch up with you despite this supposedly being Ninja Mission Impossible.
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Aug 22, 2014 04:36
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It's also interesting because her first rule is not to get her killed... How would she get killed? Mark stabbing himself after the mission was over is a good way. I really like the minimal story, because it has "The story of Mark, he sacrificed himself for the cause after a struggle to remain peaceful" as well as "The story of Mark, a strong ninja who was corrupted by the mark and in his final moments of lucidity he ends his torment before he can harm more of his fellow ninja." I have a lot more words I'll have to write, but not now.
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Aug 22, 2014 04:43
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Clarste posted:Also how she manages to constantly catch up with you despite this supposedly being Ninja Mission Impossible. And how she can give you Mission Control guidance even when she's nowhere near you. And how none of the other NPCs react to her existence in cutscenes. And how she knows exactly what's going on in the Marked Ninja's mind ("Have the hallucinations started yet?" in the last level).
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Aug 22, 2014 04:50
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I don't think I noticed too much up with Ora my first playthrough, but I'm not one to really notice these things anyway. It's possible she is or was a real person, but we seem to meet her for the first time in the same way Mark did. I do think it is the tattoos infecting Mark's brain and taking hold in the real world, carrying out the mission since that's what Mark is thinking about, a new, fresh body for the ink, so uh, "try not to get me killed". But as the couple stray thoughts creep in that it'll soon be over, the ink takes hold, not wanting to die, becoming more and more forceful and convincing, until whether Ora is what Mark is thinking or is taking over is something to speculate. ...I like this game.
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Aug 22, 2014 05:03
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Yeah, they did a surprisingly good job with the minimalist writing in this game. I always admire anything that can do more with less.
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Aug 22, 2014 05:06
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The only thing is that this game's minimalist writing is so perfect that you kinda just want more, but you know this is going to be a standalone game. 
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Aug 22, 2014 05:43
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Here's my overly-lengthy take: The tattoo thing is a red herring. Azai tried to sacrifice Mark under false pretenses and that is Not Cool. You can argue he did it for the betterment of Mark's clan but if Azai lives the Clan he will lead will not be the clan Mark was a part of - the new equipment will move the clan away from the traditions and skills that Mark had mastered, and Mark won't be there to see it, so all it shares with Mark's clan is the name. So really it was for the betterment of Azai's clan. Okay, let's talk about the red herring. Here's a few quotes I think are really telling: Relevant scroll 1: After Tetsuji came the Hundred Years of Darkness. Only when the sumi was nearly gone did the madness stop. Under Otomo the Hungry, who wrote these poems, we bound ourselves to a code of honor. Gluttony, lust and rage / Enslave us; our appetites / Make us unworthy Gluttony, lust and rage. Appetites. Unworthiness. That doesn't sound like ink-induced madness, it sounds more like the decadence of a clan that was catapulted into power. I suspect that an ascetic, traditionalist faction rose to power after the ink started to dry up and blamed the ink itself for the moral failings of the previous leadership - or, and here I'm really speculating, used accusations of such to undermine the power of said ink-empowered rulers. Relevant scroll 2: Today, only students, not masters, receive the mark - because we can guide them, and we can control them. Still, I wonder: do the tattoos make one mad, or simply... dangerous? I see no difference between the two. This is really telling, to my eye. "Someone strong enough to possibly slip their leash and threaten the status quo is no different to someone who is literally an insane magical ninja who hungers for murder." The ink is a weapon - jabbed into some poor sucker in times of crisis and they're badgered with honour and threats of insanity into killing themselves once the latest brushfire is put out. I know what you're about to say. "But Tehan, Mark was practically mayor of Crazytown by the end." Well, yeah. At the end. Ora was the only hint of madness (or possibly the only one I noticed) before that, and right up until the return to the temple and the revelations of Azai's looting, Ora was the best wingwoman a ninja could ask for, and she was completely rational and stable. The ink gave him a Hobbes to his Calvin, which is practically another superpower instead of a drawback. And at the end, when Mark discovers that Azai's lied to him to get Mark to sacrifice himself to help Azai throw all the clan's traditions out the window to cover up Azai's failure... that's a garden path to a mental breakdown even for someone who isn't jabbed up with crazy-juice. What I'd like is for Mark to go off somewhere peaceful and wrestle with his personal demons for a while, see if there's still a ramping up of madness when he's not ticking every box on the How To Give Yourself PTSD checklist. See if Ora goes back to her usual helpful and reasonable self. Shame there's no option to just walk away after the confrontation.
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Aug 23, 2014 04:28
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There are a lot of 'choice endings' in games that would be improved if the player character had the option to just go 'gently caress this poo poo im going home.'
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Aug 23, 2014 04:32
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Woah, that's one FBI document there. I think we're past the point of spoilers, anyone who's reading this far without watching the videos should expect spoiler talk, so no more black bars, please. And Mark was pretty much going crazy, with the freaky red background, thinking his ninja clan friends were soldiers with guns, then going into a strange white void in the last level. Granted, that might not be the tattoos, but that's the thing that sets him apart from everyone else, giving us crazy skills to turn us into killing machines. So why doesn't everyone else have them then if there wasn't a great cost? But the tattoos being a red herring is definitely something I never thought of. And Ora does go a little crazy, is really into killing Karajan, then Azai, even the entire clan, to "cleanse" them. Do they need cleansing? Is the rest of the Hisomi-Jo at fault here? I think she was getting a bit too into it at the end, very sure in her beliefs but not able to see both sides. Azai was definitely measured in this response, letting us make the choice and simply having faith that we would make the right one. Maybe because he was so sure in his beliefs he didn't think we would kill him. And yet, when we do kill him, he barely changes, he tightens up, but he isn't scared, or shocked, he simply accepts it. Ora, meanwhile, is visibly shocked, she did not believe you would kill her and, indeed, yourself. It's interesting what a few frames of animation can show so much. Anyway, new videos in the next post.
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Aug 24, 2014 01:39
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  The DLC and the first pacifist video. They will be similar, but shorter, due to how we'll slip through guard after guard. It's also a good time to talk about the game, how it was made, the commentary stuff, etc. It's an exciting time to posts lots of words. Crosspeice fucked around with this message at 07:02 on Feb 4, 2015 |
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Aug 24, 2014 01:39
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I absolutely love the Dosan DLC. Ninja weapons? Nah, he just suplexes people with his bare hands. That being said, that Fungus is one of my favorite attack weapons alongside the Hisomu Terror Dart and Man Eating Insects.
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Aug 24, 2014 01:56
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Okay, fine, I guess I'll go fire up MotN again and play the DLC.  My reading on the technology is not so much that technology has recently improved, as that up until recently the clan was able to use the tattoos to keep up despite their technological disadvantage. But since the ink was no longer available, they had to tech-up to keep up. Anyway, if you compare the tech level of, say, the 1960's to the 2010's, the only especially anachronistic element is the guards with night vision goggles, I think. Stuff like flare guns, body armor, riot shields, and of course their rifles and pistols is all pretty mature tech. They get lighter with modern improvements, but not necessarily any more effective otherwise. Fun fact: throwing an unconscious guard at another guard still terrorizes them. So that guard that you shot with a dart so he walked into a trap you'd knocked to the floor? Even better is to toss a guard off the ledge above that guard; he'll get terrified, and stumble backwards into the explosive.  The "create spikes in the narrow crawlways" trap doesn't actually render them totally impassable; you just can't linger in them. The spikes are on a delay, like the traps you used to kill Stalkers in the last few mainline game levels.
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Aug 24, 2014 03:45
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Fun fact: throwing an unconscious guard at another guard still terrorizes them. So that guard that you shot with a dart so he walked into a trap you'd knocked to the floor? Even better is to toss a guard off the ledge above that guard; he'll get terrified, and stumble backwards into the explosive. You might be remembering incorrectly. Any time I threw an unconscious guard at anyone, it just lead to them going on alert due to being attacked and finding an unconscious guard.
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Aug 24, 2014 03:58
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Fun fact: throwing an unconscious guard at another guard still terrorizes them. So that guard that you shot with a dart so he walked into a trap you'd knocked to the floor? Even better is to toss a guard off the ledge above that guard; he'll get terrified, and stumble backwards into the explosive. Oh, if only I'd thought of that, that would've been fantastic! (And I do throw a few guards into each other, it's fun to watch them stumble) It doesn't make them impassable, true, but moving quickly and getting stuck on the walls/grates happens a lot, just easier to get it last.
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Aug 24, 2014 03:58
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One thing I find odd about this DLC is that it shows that Mark's level of skill was clearly attainable without the use of magic tattoos. So all they really got him were all those crappy abilities like farsight which weren't necessary or even all that useful for robbing and murdering Karajan. Essentially Azai condemned Mark to insanity for no reason at all.
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Aug 24, 2014 12:03
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SovietPotatoe posted:One thing I find odd about this DLC is that it shows that Mark's level of skill was clearly attainable without the use of magic tattoos. So all they really got him were all those crappy abilities like farsight which weren't necessary or even all that useful for robbing and murdering Karajan. Essentially Azai condemned Mark to insanity for no reason at all. Keep in mind that these bandits aren't nearly as well-trained as the Hessian PMCs. There's no Elite Bandit enemy, for instance. Additionally, there were things like automated weaponry and security systems that Mark had to get past.
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Aug 24, 2014 13:25
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And there's the question; how good WAS Mark beforehand? Dosan might be a prodigy of stealth, but perhaps the tattoos allow you to enhance the "good" to "supreme". A once-in-a-lifetime prodigy, on his own, is inconvenient to hope for in a time of need; but if you can dope someone up on crazy-ink to become the ultimate ninja to save the clan in a crisis - with plans to gear out the clan with nightvision, laserguns, and armor to modernize and avoid the problem of needing to rely on crazy-ink - could be considered a good trade for the clan as a whole. A dick thing to ask of Mark, for sure, but if he's already devoted his life to the clan, could be seen as saving it in perpetuity - even at the cost of tradition in favor of continued relevance, and preventing the need for future sacrifices. Edit: Also, inspired to get an avatar, finally, thanks to this thread reminding me of my love for this game. Excited to see more of the pacifism run! Nekomimi-Maiden fucked around with this message at 13:38 on Aug 24, 2014 |
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Aug 24, 2014 13:32
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The Ora question is compounded by the uncertainty as to what, exactly, she is. Is she Mark's subconscious given voice by the ink fraying his mental state, or is she a manifestation of the ink itself? If it's the latter, that suggests that there's some element of sentience to the plants, or some sort of spirit bound to the plants, or whatever vaguely mystic handwave you use to explain tattoos turning into teleportation, psychic powers and a projected ninja wingwoman. And that really puts a new shade on Azai having caused the extinction of the plants. Or maybe Mark's just crazy
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Aug 24, 2014 14:39
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Is it possible that Ora was real in level 1-3? Because she wasn't the only one free when mark woke up; there was the guy ringing the bell also.
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Aug 24, 2014 16:33
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Major_JF posted:Is it possible that Ora was real in level 1-3? Because she wasn't the only one free when mark woke up; there was the guy ringing the bell also. I'm inclined to think not, for two reasons. First, her subsequent disappearance / transfer into hallucination would be a little too pat; wouldn't there be ninjas talking about where she'd gone? I mean I guess Mark could just be suppressing memories of hearing that she'd died and hallucinating a living replacement, but that's kind of contorted. Second and more importantly, though, is her line "We've been together since the beginning". The easiest way to read that is "I've always been a part of your subconscious".
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Aug 24, 2014 19:29
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Tehan posted:The Ora question is compounded by the uncertainty as to what, exactly, she is. Is she Mark's subconscious given voice by the ink fraying his mental state, or is she a manifestation of the ink itself? Considering how Mark dies from self-impalement when he stabs her, it's likely the former.
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Aug 24, 2014 20:29
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...why would the ink be self-aware? That's a bizarre thing to think. I guess the story is subtle enough to allow for speculation, but that's a pretty large leap to make. Anyway, yeah, my reading of it was that Ora never existed in the first place, she was just a hallucination you saw immediately after getting the tattoos and didn't question because you were already a bit crazy. Clarste fucked around with this message at 11:06 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 00:33
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The brilliance is that we as gamers don't question Ora's existence because we've been conditioned to expect some sort of mission control in games or a narrator who speaks for a voiceless protagonist. So our unquestioning nature becomes the ninja's too.
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Aug 26, 2014 00:40
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It's not too far fetched, this ink is allowing us to teleport and freeze time. Having it root into our brain and project itself through our vision isn't too outlandish.
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Aug 26, 2014 01:10
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Crosspeice posted:It's not too far fetched, this ink is allowing us to teleport and freeze time. Having it root into our brain and project itself through our vision isn't too outlandish. It does neither of those things, it heightens the ninja's reflexes and speed to such an extent that it seems like those things to the outside observer - 'natural' rather than supernatural, given that those fall under the rule of cool when ninjas are involved. Considering the complete lack of supernatural elements otherwise, the ink being sentient would be an outlier, whereas the hallucinations being a reflection of Mark's subconscious fit in.
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Aug 26, 2014 17:59
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WFGuy posted:It does neither of those things, it heightens the ninja's reflexes and speed to such an extent that it seems like those things to the outside observer - 'natural' rather than supernatural, given that those fall under the rule of cool when ninjas are involved. Considering the complete lack of supernatural elements otherwise, the ink being sentient would be an outlier, whereas the hallucinations being a reflection of Mark's subconscious fit in. And how do you explain being able to "see" what devices a switch is hooked up to, especially considering that the ninjas are explicitly atechnological?
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Aug 26, 2014 18:06
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WFGuy posted:It does neither of those things, it heightens the ninja's reflexes and speed to such an extent that it seems like those things to the outside observer - 'natural' rather than supernatural, given that those fall under the rule of cool when ninjas are involved. Considering the complete lack of supernatural elements otherwise, the ink being sentient would be an outlier, whereas the hallucinations being a reflection of Mark's subconscious fit in. I think you've got that backwards in regards to the Mark of Serenity; it is a literal teleport that outside observers can only explain as incredible speed. It even gets used in some challenge rooms in positions that would be impossible to move through normally, like spaces smaller than you. The ink is the one supernatural element in the game's world, and as that world moved to more modern times, fewer champions were chosen, so the abilities it granted fell into legend, but it still grants those abilities. Which reminds me of a possible argument to make for "Ora is a manifestation of the ink"; in one of the levels before you kill Karajan, she talks about how previous champions of the clan weren't given a name so kind as "champion". How would she know about that when your character doesn't, except by having seen it firsthand?
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Aug 26, 2014 19:30
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:And how do you explain being able to "see" what devices a switch is hooked up to, especially considering that the ninjas are explicitly atechnological? Mark can feel the faint tingling of electricity in his skin. Hey, no one said it had to be realistic, just not supernatural. Oblivion4568238 posted:Which reminds me of a possible argument to make for "Ora is a manifestation of the ink"; in one of the levels before you kill Karajan, she talks about how previous champions of the clan weren't given a name so kind as "champion". How would she know about that when your character doesn't, except by having seen it firsthand? We have no idea what the character knows or doesn't know prior to the story. Maybe he paid attention in ninja-history class. If you take Ora's thoughts to be his own thoughts then it just makes sense that he would question these things on his own. Where would a hypothetical real Ora have learned this stuff anyway? Why wasn't her exposition sending red flags in the first place? It's just not weird at all for ninjas to know stuff. Clarste fucked around with this message at 23:43 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 23:32
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Oblivion4568238 posted:I think you've got that backwards in regards to the Mark of Serenity; it is a literal teleport that outside observers can only explain as incredible speed. It even gets used in some challenge rooms in positions that would be impossible to move through normally, like spaces smaller than you. "Nobody has borne it for years - but the legends say that you'll move so quickly, it'll seem as if you vanished in thin air." You do make a good point, I could see an argument for it either way, but based on how ninja stories tend to go I'd stick with my theory. As Legends Go, the abilities of one can be pushed to extreme limits (like this "he must have literally high-jumped from a standing start and curled around that series of projectiles with lightning speed" movement) while still being explained as utter mastery of the physical form, without need for supernatural abilities, and indeed preying on that tendency of humans to assume it must be something magical. It's definitely left kind of ambiguous in the game.
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Aug 27, 2014 17:40
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WFGuy posted:"Nobody has borne it for years - but the legends say that you'll move so quickly, it'll seem as if you vanished in thin air." When the explanation is less interesting than the question, it may be better writing to keep the question unanswered and allow imagination to give its own conclusion.
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Aug 27, 2014 17:47
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 You know what time it is. 
Crosspeice fucked around with this message at 07:03 on Feb 4, 2015 |
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Aug 28, 2014 00:05
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Time for the scariest face, 2spooky.
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Aug 28, 2014 00:33
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I am pro-nightmares.
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Aug 28, 2014 00:37
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And the mask also gives us sweet hair? Also, couple of things I didn't mention about the paths: it takes less hits to knock enemies down in Might, which is why I showed off the slide kick, but it's still bad. Items also don't replenish in Hunter and I wasn't stuck in the tower level, I could've returned to a item resource and gotten some Smoke Bombs. And something I don't think I even mentioned in the DLC is Wisdom can carry more of each items, only one or two extra, I think. They're all fairly fun and I enjoyed showing off the attacks items. As we get further into Pacifism, I'll be showing off more of the distraction items, but they're fairly explanatory. It is a lot of fun though and really changes how you play.
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Aug 28, 2014 00:47
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Regarding your difficulties with Path of Might, why aren't you using WASD for movement? Left hand for all your keypresses, right hand for the mouse, works great. My favorite thing about the Path of Nightmares is when a terrorized guard gets frightened by another (living) guard showing up, shoots them down, then sees their corpse and gets frightened again.
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Aug 28, 2014 01:09
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Regarding your difficulties with Path of Might, why aren't you using WASD for movement? Left hand for all your keypresses, right hand for the mouse, works great. ...you can do that? Huh. That is cool, but I've gotten so used to it now, it'll take a long while to use WASD. The slide kick still sucks though.
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Aug 28, 2014 01:16
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It's interesting to see that you can actually play this like an action game with the slide into stab, even though that ruins your chances of getting upgrades.
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Aug 28, 2014 03:53
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Okay, apparently all of my footage has been deleted and I don't know how. I definitely didn't do it, since I had recorded all the way up to Level 7 and unless I went crazy, I wouldn't have deleted all of it, only the footage I've uploaded for space for new footage. It's not a huge setback, I just have to record it again, so it'll probably be a week before the next video. At least there's no audio to rerecord, since I have no backlog at all. I know, I'm terrible. I might even have a backup save from before this all happened, otherwise, I'll have to go back through levels I've already completed, but it makes no difference to the playthrough. PLEASE STAND BY.
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Aug 29, 2014 14:27
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Time to hide in the shadows again!
Crosspeice fucked around with this message at 07:05 on Feb 4, 2015 |
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Sep 9, 2014 22:26
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