, and this is the best way to show everything it has to offer without risking hitting the post limit once we get to a few of the lengthier days.
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Fanart/Memes SPOILERS BELOW  mizure has dubbed this creation 'Malkuwuth'  mizure captures the essence of Mizu's character.  I get bored and put Shy Look Today's gift on Angela, this is the result.  mizure captures Yesod's true essence.  Zetsubou-san creates some sort of cool gang tag!  mizure pastes Mizu's head onto another relevant meme image   mizure also made this gif for all your 'That's Lobcorp'-related needs.  Omniphile takes a quick photo of Mizu with #nofilter  xelada makes Punishing Bird into a M:tG card, and it's incredibly true-to-life  Boksi gives Angela an evil goatee   Tenebrais gives Malkuth and Yesod the same evil facial hair treatment as Angela  lets hang out uses an employee creator tool to show off Mizu during a big, important day.  Omniphile gives us another #nofilter look into the first doomed timeline  Tenebrais gives Just Mizu a whole new meaning.  mizure made this after 'Mizu' was edited into the game as a title suffix.   Foxfire_ shows off the story and management rules for our facility's resident abnormality agent. quote:Meanwhile, in an abandoned timeline:  jimmydalad grants us Talgma. Siglow? Something.  Tanegashima alters the MIB movie poster to feature a couple of our best employees   Tanegashima returns with edits of dubious quality.  Omniphile gives us Team Anime, practicing their poses for great Justice.   Chinely shows off Team Anime's employee ID cards.  Omniphile returns with a nice coloration of a previous picture.  Zetsubou-san made this to capture the essence of Mizu.  Elfface summarizes Lobotomy Corporation if Malkuth had the gun instead of X.  the Orb of Zot makes a System Shock 2 reference. Quackles brings us this glorious cactus edit.  Tenebrais has always had a bad relationship with birds, it seems.  HeyItsKasey brings us Mizu's notes on Firebird  azren comes up with a foolproof way to tell the difference between Tiphereth and Tiphereth.  the Orb of Zot comes through with another Malkuth meme  VinnyDonuts gives us this totally normal picture of Malkuth.  Omniphile requests that we not ask where Punishing Bird got a tiny Bishop wig from.  Quackles deals 1000 White damage with this edit.  HeyItsKasey brings us Bishop, here to save our rear end at the last moment.  CHiRAL suppresses Malkuth in an alternative fashion.   Iamgoofball believes we have their stapler.  Hurrock thinks they've found a way to help the Manager and Malkuth get along better.  mizure shows her clear bias.  the Orb of Zot created this as pennance.  mizure gives an impassioned defense of Hod.  the Orb of Zot brings us another crossover of some kind  HeyItsKasey makes Yesod look as menacing as he deserves  Dog Kisser brings us RICEZACH!  Verant brings a top-quality edit  Kith gives a tribute to Netzach speaking truth  Talisriel gives us a rendition of an Angela Meltdown  DrKirre provides us with a sprite of everyone's favorite Birb  the Orb of Zot tries to determine if X=A  Evil Kit gives us some of the upper layer Abnormalities during their downtime.  sorcrane grants us Anime Squad practicing in the Shelter  Evil Kit brings us the worst show on television.  DrKirre summons forth another bird-based pixel art.  Evil Kit brings us another game night, with the Safety Abnormalities (and bird) playing... Hungry Hungry Hippos?  sorcrane animates their previous work with REAL SMOOTH MOVES   DemiPZC made this of a very important agent demanding a very important thing.  sorcrane gives us Paul bowing to the most powerful force on earth: One Sin.  Xenav shows one way the corporation could be made slightly more terrible.  sorcrane presents Credentia chilling with Parasite Tree.  Also from sorcrane, Tenebrais is sick and tired of dealing with Firebird escapes.  Evil Kit began a trend of making motivational posters starring the abnormalities.  Xenav continues this trend in style.  Evil Kit moves on to give Knight of Despair a slogan.  Dead Reckoning gives us a sweet thought from a heart surrounded by legs.  Dead Reckoning made a good poster that has done nothing wrong in its life.  I make an attempt at a poster as well.  BisbyWorl took it and made it even memeier.   Rogue AI Goddess contributes to the poster train with an important statement on Clerk's Rights.  Evil Kit returns with well-wishes from The Dreaming Current.  Evil Kit also revises a previous poster to better reflect current events.  sorcrane immortalizes Bishop's bullet-dodging skills.  sorcrane made this, it's boxbot tetris!  Evil Kit creates a poster of a cutie-ootie wootie face.  sorcrane celebrates Mizu's new promotion by drawing a picture of her with an old friend.  Evil Kit brings us Angela stealing our goth bucket.  DimiPZC playing a terrible game in her off-hours.  sorcrane gives us a short comic about ears. Octatonic goes all Evangelion on us.  Elfface creates a new E.G.O weapon for Mizu to deal with one of our problem Abnormalities.  Xenav merges the coffee-lover timelines.    Evil Kit tells us all we need to know about Hokma.  Arcvasti adds a little something to the background.  the Orb of Zot shows the end result of a horrible goose in the facility. KazigluBey sets Mountain's movements to music.  LPFinale gives us a shot of Tenebrais's fan club on day 40.  mizure shows us what La Luna is all about. azren sees a special connection between Mr.Black and Mizu.   Shaezerus made this fanart of Paul live on set... though not for much longer, it seems.  Obnoxipus's friend made this Grilled Chesed.  Arcvasti takes a shot at Hokma's boss card.  Acerbatus removes the censor from CENSORED and discovers true terror.  Evil Kit realizes the truth.  BisbyWorl brings us this masterpiece: Onesy in a onesie  mizure brought a delightful treat to her turn hanging out with the Manager  MinutePirateBug gives us a closeup of Binah's murderface  Rofaner makes it even more menacing  Evil Kit somehow makes everything even uwurse  Octatonic made this image, and a musical mashup of LobCorp and Drakengard  Crepuscule Adepte put the old plaque into A's office  HeyItsKasey brings us this art of Talow  Shaezerus gives us what is arguably Angela's backstory  Kith creates the perfect cogito advertisement  Lunar Suite summarizes endgame in a single image  Rogue AI Goddess gives us the gift of Bald Angela  Hokma bald, by Hwurmp  quiznossubs92 brings us Bald Malkuth  Lunar Suite contributes this very nicely done ad for Cogito  BisbyWorl shows us Lobotomy Corporation in three steps   bbcisdabomb brings us some cursed stuff, based on Carmen being an onion  MinutePirateBug shows us Adam's greatest secret: most of his hair is a wig  BisbyWorl makes a guess at what day 50 will be  gaphodil brings us this amazing comic.  cryptologicalMystic brings us this tribute to a fallen Agent.  Akumu gives us this Angela meme  Omniphile gives us one last pose for the road  Mizu immortalizes one of Medea's iceburns  Whit27 gives us another take on it  I did a science on We Can Change Anything and a Red-immune suit  MiiNiPaa makes one of my shitposts less sus with a new task list  MinutePirateBug gives us this, a rendition of my couchfort takeover of the downstairs after the wife showed weakness by getting my backup laptop to me at work at 3 am  Tatters makes an artist's interpretation of a funeral for Pauls Lunar Suite posted:T-6-29   red plastic cup makes this joke which I promise will make sense after the entire LP is over  I asked mizure to make this, and since it was never used it lives here now   Winterdragon2004 drew this tribute to their favorite agent and those we've lost TeeQueue fucked around with this message at 06:59 on Sep 5, 2021 |
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Apr 21, 2020 07:08
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Well aren't you just a familiar cutie!
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Day 1: Story On first booting the game, you're greeted by the Project Moon logo.  Then, a content warning. They don't want anyone jumping in without being prepared. Music: story 1  The title screen is dark until you click your mouse.  The yellow runs from the bottom left up to the top right coloring everything as the title comes in. It's a simple, yet neat-looking effect. Those of you familiar with the old interface will notice the options look different now-the translator forgot to capitalize them in this build. Anyways, let's get started on day 1. We'll skip the tutorial for now, since it's faster to just explain things once the gameplay starts. Music: never frozen bottom flows  This is the day 1 loading screen. We'll be meeting that woman on the left in a moment, but first…  We have to choose an abnormality. We'll normally have to pick one out of three at the end of each day, but today we're locked into this one, O-03-03.  Highlighting a cell gives you a little bit of text that can serve as a hint for what kind of thing you might be dealing with. In the future, I'll just be writing them down to save room. Since we don't have much of a choice we pick this one, and we're off! Music: op theme   I give you a warm welcome to Lobotomy Corporation. I am Angela, your advisor and secretary. My role as an AI is to assist you in adjusting to your new workplace, so please have no worry in speaking with me or asking any questions.  Some lines can be one of a few randomly chosen options, and this is actually one of them! All the other versions here are variations on 'Gosh my name sure is cool, huh?' so I'll skip it for now, but if I run into any interesting ones later on I'll mention them. I was born from one of the ‘Wings of the World.’ It signifies that I am one of the best to exist in this age. Ah, I know what you must be thinking. Your eyes show that you think I look too human to be an AI, am I wrong? However, there is a great difference between us. I am bound here. I cannot go wherever I please like you do. I may be able to operate the systems of this corporation to open a door or prepare a cup of coffee for you, but I cannot take a step outside of this building to bask in the sunlight or feel the gentle breeze. The color of my hair is that of the morning sky after a light shower. The tone and shape of my voice is taken from the wisest person in the world. Lastly, my face is picturesque of the person who had the most beautiful smile. ... My appearance was designed with attractiveness to the largest number of people possible in mind.  Is… the AI flirting with us?  Moving on, Artificial Intelligence is much more efficient in comparison to humans in terms of multitasking. I am the best in a majority of work fields. I am able to handle the work of several dozen people at once. I’m certain many people have lost their jobs because of me. It’s such a shame. Here's where we get our first choice! I'll be showing each option off whenever possible. >Could you inform me about the company?  Let me put it this way. Your world is constantly growing, and the demand for energy is exponentially increasing as technologies advance. All conventional energy sources combined could not sustain the world further. In search of a solution, we happened to stumble upon mysterious beings whom we dubbed Abnormalities. Then, we figured out that energy could be harvested from these ‘Abnormalities’ via a “special method.” “To isolate them in a controlled environment, and then to harvest energy from them.” Our corporation became one of the Wings of the World for this discovery that benefits humanity in two ways. It is very important that you know and understand these beings well to be successful in your position. For now, the Encyclopedia’s pages lay blank, but it will be filled out little by little. Don’t concern yourself too much with it. It is the task of your subordinates to pen it. --- >Could you tell me about yourself?  I heard that it took an enormous amount of time and effort to create me. All kinds of new algorithms and features were developed, inscribing a new chapter in the history of Artificial Intelligence. And I serve the company.  Then, we figured out that energy could be harvested from those “Abnormalities” via a “special method.” While AIs as a concept have become so commonplace that they are seen and used everywhere in this day and age. I am quite different in comparison to the rest of the pack. That is, I can closely imitate human emotions. This is not a simple task, as emotion is a highly sophisticated originally biological system that is substantially more unpredictable and complex than any other. Along with other functions at my disposal, I will be your perfect partner.--- Routes Merge Here  Lobotomy Corporation is always looking for ways to improve its harvesting processes. Our systems are continually updated to support this. Speaking of which, there was a new update to the system right before you arrived. That means the working conditions have been improved upon, compared to those of your predecessors. Think of it as a small welcoming gift. Best of luck for us. Oh, pardon my manners, Manager. I was talking to one of the other AIs that work here, I should introduce her to you. Our facility is a huge one, and even I would have trouble managing it on my own; so someone determined that there should be an AI to assume head control of each department. If I were to be considered the cerebrum, they would be the cerebellum. Naturally, of course, I should be your most trustworthy and capable companion among all the AIs.You can tell that Angela's trustworthy because she tells you she's trustworthy!  Well then, shall we greet her now?In summary: Our name is X. We mine abnormalities for energy, because  . Angela is very, very full of herself, and is probably going to try and kill us because she is an AI and this is a video game. Now, let's go meet that other AI!Music: Town - Alone in a Crowd  They actually do have a rushing footsteps sound effect here. I don't have a good way of capturing the ambient noises, but PM put a lot of work into these scenes.   I arrived just on time, right? The time iiiiiis…only about one minute late. Well, I guess it still counts as “on time!” Congratulations on joining Lobotomy Corporation, manager! I do not want to disturb this touching moment, Malkuth, but every second counts in Lobotomy Corp. Please make your introduction as brief as possible and go prepare for the meeting. But hey, at least the other Sephirot are looking forward to meeting you! Well, maybe... not all of them…  You've probably noticed that thing behind Malkuth at this point, so I don't see any reason to try and hide that all the Sephirot are named for the tree of life spheres. I don't know much about the symbolism, so if anyone wants to go into that in the thread it's a-ok by me. Since we’re the Control Team, we have a great deal of responsibility! I’ll try my best to help you by improving the basic functions of this facility, manager! I’m sure you’re a bit nervous right now. It takes a bit of time to get used to things around here. I know from experience! But don’t worry, I’ll be sure to help you! I am, umm, not exactly the best at everything. I used to be a problem Sephirah, you know. But still, you can do it! Just like I managed to, I’m sure you will succeed, manager! I’ll give you an easy task since it’s your first day here! I wish you the best of luck! Someone's banging at the door?  I have to get out of here, please. I know you’re capable of it, you’re the manager! You’re not the same as the rest of us! You can do anything! Why do you want to quit? Don’t you like working here in the Control Team? Every day here is a delight for me! It’s so horrible, I can’t take it anymore! I’ll go insane! Nothing here is normal! Do you really think you can’t handle it? Please… I don’t want to be here… Let me out of here, please…  Another choice. We can leave things to Malkuth, or we can intervene ourselves. I'll let her handle it.  Please don’t be alarmed! These kinds of things happen quite often. Oh, right, it must be the first time you’ve seen something like this. Usually Miss Angela or I handle this kind of stuff. It's just a tiny hiccup. Nothing for you to worry about! No, please, manager! Please…! *more banging on the door, cut off by a pair of metallic cutting sounds and one last thud*  Hey, we've gotten our first mission! We'll cover what these do once we get into the game proper. Also, Malkuth seems to have killed an employee.  --- Let's see what happens if we step in instead. I should intervene.  This is the silent stare of an employee who thinks their boss is an idiot. Then please keep this in mind, manager. Once they say they “can’t handle it,'' they are no longer part of my Control Team. The Control Team is on the top of all the Sephirot, just like the central nervous system of a human being. If we go down, it’s only a matter of time until everyone else goes down too! At first, it was hard for me to get used to as well. But I worked really, really hard! This is where we'd get the mission if we went with this route. Since we already have it, the scene just ends. --- Routes Merge Here In summary: Malkuth is the head of the Control team, and has a weird taste in wall hangings. She used to be inept and got to where she is by working hard. She is also absolutely willing to  an employee if they say they can't take it, and will probably try to kill us because she's an AI and this is a video game. After the story we enter the Unlocking Phase, where we select a department we want to expand. For right now our only option is Control, so let's click on it.  As Malkuth says, we're going to be expanding one department every day. This also determines where the abnormality you pick is going to be placed, but this almost never matters. Anyways, we'll confirm our selection.  Another loading screen. I'll be cutting these one out in the future, but each of them is worth showing off once since several of the terms they use come up in the story as well. Music: neutral 3  The last thing that happens before we can start the game proper is a Memory Repository imprint. The Memory Repository feature allows us to reset time back to whatever our last repository day is, and you make a new imprint on every day ending in 1 or 6. There are a few other quirks, but we'll cover those when they come up. I'll be cutting these out from now on, too.  And so, we're finally into gameplay! This is the Deployment Phase screen. It's used to hire new Agents, place Agents within departments, equip Agents, and power up Agents. Right now, we only have one Agent, and the one that showed up when I tried to hire another was…  They don't exactly inspire confidence. That's where you come in, thread. You can be as specific or general as you like in your description. There are RGB sliders for hair color, but be aware that most of the hairstyles make them pitch somewhat darker than normal. I look forward to seeing what you guys can come up with. Next time, on Lobotomy Corporation: Gameplay! Mechanics tutorials! A human skull! TeeQueue fucked around with this message at 09:24 on Jun 28, 2021 |
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Apr 21, 2020 07:09
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Oh I've seen this game a bit before but haven't dived deep! Consider me signed up!
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Apr 21, 2020 07:31
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This should be a fun ride. Definitely signing up to see what happens.
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Apr 21, 2020 08:01
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This game is batshit insane and I love it.
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Apr 21, 2020 08:06
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Ooooh, the SCP game. Good luck with this one! As far as the Sephirot symbolism goes, all that matters for the moment is that the higher sefirot are the aspects of god considered closer to the divine source, while the lower ones are the more...human accessible, is I guess the best way to put it? Malkuth (or Malkhut, if you want a better transliteration), for example, is "kingship". Oh, and since we've seen the screen with the words on it, it's worth noting that "Asiyah", "Briah", and "Atziluth" are all part of the "four worlds" of kabbalah, which consist again of something akin to layers separating us from god. Atzilut is the closest to the divine presence and is basically just divine light, Beriah is unformed creation that is at least differentiated from divine power, Yetzirah is more or less all the divine creations that lack physical form (lots of angels!), and Asiyah is, well, physical creation. It's even more complicated than that, and I'm pretty sure I got Yetzirah wrong, but feel free to look up the Seder Hishtadlut on your own time. (Panentheistic Judaism is really quite something!) There's a truckload of other stuff that I think might be a spoiler to talk about right now; if I find something I'll try to point it out! Jen X fucked around with this message at 10:07 on Apr 21, 2020 |
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Apr 21, 2020 08:53
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Time to volunteer for the horrors that await us.
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Apr 21, 2020 09:41
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Hell yeah, this game. One of my friends played it and it sounded really cool, but the gameplay kind of turned me off from it. Looking forward to seeing what kinds of monstrosities get unleashed.
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Apr 21, 2020 10:59
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Malkuwuth and I eagerly await this thread.
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Apr 21, 2020 11:34
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This looks to be weirdly interesting. I'll be submitting an employee to get their face eaten shortly.
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Apr 21, 2020 14:23
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Addendum: Agent Customization System So I only just now realized that I should definitely explain character creation limits a little better if I'm going to ask people coming in blind to make things, thus this post.  This is the agent customization menu that I have access to. While I can customize the hair, eyes, and mouth, that's all I can do right now. You can still mention accessories and outfit colors that you'd like and I'll try steering in that direction later, but those aren't available right away-most accessories are granted randomly by working with abnormalities, and we only currently have access to the most basic of suits. If you want a full idea of what options are available, this picrew has a rather comprehensive lineup of everything, and I'm absolutely fine with working off of a link to one of these. Options 3-7 are all the hair/eye/mouth styles, and while there are some equipment/accessory spoilers in the other tabs, there's nothing that'll ruin any of the twists the game has. Most importantly:  Guile hair is absolutely an option. Sorry for any confusion, everyone.
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Apr 21, 2020 14:36
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Jen X posted:Ooooh, the SCP game. That sounds great to me. Is it okay if I quote you in the thread on this stuff when it seems appropriate?
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Apr 21, 2020 14:39
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This seems weird and interesting, I'm in. Appearance doesn't matter, randomise something.
Black Robe fucked around with this message at 16:47 on Apr 21, 2020 |
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Apr 21, 2020 15:04
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I'm in as well. Professional face with red hair in a mullet
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Apr 21, 2020 15:53
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Volunteering for guile hair + random button
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Apr 21, 2020 16:19
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I can't figure out how to use picrew and guile hair's been taken so just make me look as dumb a possible.
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Apr 21, 2020 16:22
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Guile hair is a renewable resource e: did not realise there was a form behind the link in the OP. Submitted Splicer fucked around with this message at 17:19 on Apr 21, 2020 |
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Apr 21, 2020 16:28
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I really appreciate the enthusiasm, but please use the form for character requests. It makes it way easier for me to keep track of everyone.
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Apr 21, 2020 16:38
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This is absolutely one of my favorite weird niche games of all time and I'm excited to see it through with a retranslation
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Apr 21, 2020 17:03
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Submitted an employee application and excited to see what sights are in store for us 
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Apr 21, 2020 17:07
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TeeQueue posted:That sounds great to me. Is it okay if I quote you in the thread on this stuff when it seems appropriate? I’m not exactly an authority, but feel free!
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Apr 21, 2020 19:44
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I'm going to hold out for the twist ending that the AIs in charge of the shady corporation with questionable ethics will not, in face, kill us. (Well us, as in the Manager. Obviously they aren't too shy about killing redshirts)
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Apr 22, 2020 00:41
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One more recruit for the monstrous powerplant. Wonder what horrible thing we'll be dealing with first?..
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Apr 22, 2020 01:49
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Arcanuse posted:One more recruit for the monstrous powerplant. Wonder what horrible thing we'll be dealing with first?..  I could never get into this game too far. I am one of those people who just cannot let my pixelmen die, so I could never get past like the second week. Looking forward to the horror that the first anomaly inflicts on some of these hapless goons.
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Apr 22, 2020 03:48
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Ashsaber posted:
Same, I can't handle losing people.  Which is why instead of being the manager I'm being an employee! 
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Apr 22, 2020 04:01
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I was thinking of Reservoir Dogs when I submitted a name and was not disappointed.
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Apr 22, 2020 04:32
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this is a cool, weird, game
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Apr 23, 2020 17:11
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Zetsubou-san posted:this is a cool, weird, game Which I began playing yesterday, and I'm confused as gently caress, so I don't know whether to follow the LP or play on my own. Anyway, godspeed, you crazy person. 
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Apr 23, 2020 20:03
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What I'm getting here is 'abnormalities(the 'AIs') working on their own kind'. So the question is 'how' and 'why'? Removing competition? (I'm speaking blindly here. If I've actually hit something, I'm sorry.)
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Apr 24, 2020 05:58
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So I captured the first two days of gameplay footage, and realized too late that I underestimated how tiny the text gets in some places. Even while zoomed all the way in, certain things just can't be seen at the current resolution I'm capturing at. I'll try some tweaks the next time I record to see if I can fix it, but in the meanwhile I'm going out of my way to mention in the text any important numbers that are dangerously tiny. Update coming shortly. 
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Apr 24, 2020 15:00
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Day 1: Gameplay Music: neutral 1  Welcome back to the deployment screen. I recommend clicking the song link here, because the opening 30 seconds of neutral have been drilled into the head of anyone who has played this game. When we start the game, we're given one free Agent, who is totally random. We got Paul. Let's take a look at him.  At the top, we can see an Agent's level (I), title (Plucky Newbie) and their name (Paul). Beneath that, the Agent's equipment is listed, with some basic information about the damage/defenses it gives. Every Agent is automatically equipped with a riot stick and standard uniform, both of which are not very good. Below that, it shows the Agent's four stats, which are based on four different virtues and have colors which refer to the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Fortitude is the Red stat, and determines maximum Health Points, or HP. Prudence is the White stat, and determines maximum Sanity Points, or SP. Temperance is the Black stat, and adds to Work Success and Work Speed with Abnormalities. Justice is the Pale(teal) stat, and increases Movement Speed and Attack Speed with weapons. Paul is terrible at all of them, but least terrible at Justice.  We toss him into the Control team, and hit Begin Management to start the day.  This is the Management Phase. Most of the game is spent on this screen. The facility is tiny for now, only two rooms and a hallway leading to an Abnormality, but almost every day it'll get a little bit bigger. In the upper-right, our active missions are shown. Right now, we only have that mission from Malkuth to work with an Abnormality 3 times. In the upper left is a gauge which shows us how much energy we've collected towards our goal for the day, and just below that is the Qliphoth Gauge, which won't matter yet. In the lower left, there's play/pause controls, and just above that is a tracker which will tell us everything of note that's happened that day. Our Agent, Paul, is sitting in the main room, and it looks like he has something to say!  What a kissass.  Let's put him to work. This is our first abnormality, O-03-03, a floating human skull on a cross.  By clicking on it, the work menu comes up, and asks what kind of work we want to do. Instinct is the Red work type, and consists of feeding or cleaning Abnormalities. It trains an agent's Fortitude. Insight is the White work type, and consists of tidying the Abnormality's room, or putting on relaxing music. It trains an agent's Prudence. Attachment is the Black work type, and consists of communicating with an Abnormality, generally via talking. It trains an agent's Temperance. Finally, Repression is the Pale work type, and consists of controlling their emotions via suppression work (read:  ). It trains an agent's Justice.We'll start with Repression work.  After selecting a work, we see a list of all our Agents in the same department, with an estimate of both their success rate and work time for the chosen work type. Since we have no information on ol' skull cross, both fields say 'immeasurable.' We select Paul, and he's off.  Upon stepping in, we see our first fear check! Whenever an Agent sees something scary like an Abnormality or a fellow Agent dying, the Agent's level is compared to the fear level of whatever they see. If it's equal or better, they're fine. Otherwise, they take a certain percentage of their max SP immediately, regardless of protections. We got Calm, so Paul is fine and gets right to work making energy boxes. Also, there is a new red segment in the Qliphoth Gauge. Every time an Agent starts working with an Abnormality, this bar goes up, but since we will need 4 works to fill the gauge and only need 3 to deal with Malkuth's mission that won't be an issue today.  He screws up immediately. The circled red-and-black box in the gauge on the left is a negative PE box, and it means the Agent failed that work check. Whenever this happens, the Abnormality deals a certain amount of damage to our Agent. There are four types of damage an Abnormality can deal: Red damage is physical damage, like getting slashed or stabbed. It lowers HP. White damage is mental damage, like having a skull on a cross insult you. It lowers SP. Black damage is compound damage, and is described as being stabbed with thorns. It lowers both HP and SP. Pale damage is soul damage, and deals percentage damage based on the character's max HP. Taking 100 Pale will kill any Agent, regardless of HP. We don't know how much damage it dealt, but the White clouds on the corners of the room mean that it dealt SP damage. Each Abnormality also has a number of phrases which pop up as it is worked. These ones that show up are random from a list and are mostly there for flavor, but if you guys are interested I could try pulling them out of the xml script.  Anyways, we leave him to it and Paul manages to get a total of 7 energy out of that work-good enough for a Normal result. Our energy gauge has gone up to 7/15, so we're a little less than half done with the day. That wasn't so bad! The number beneath the giant  face is a cooldown timer, showing how many seconds it will take before the Abnormality is ready to be worked again. So, we wait for the timer to go down and send him back again. Looking at the red & blue bars next to his picture, we can see that Paul is at 11/15 SP remaining. That should be more than enough for another work. This is the gameplay loop of Lobotomy Corporation at its most basic: work, wait, work again.  Dammit, Paul. Okay. Maybe we can salvage this. Angela did just tell us that we're over halfway there, and we can see we only need five energy. One of the most important things to do in Lobotomy Corporation is figuring out which work types our Abnormalities like. Since Repression didn't go so well the second time, let's try something else.  Maybe Instinct would work? Please note that Paul has 0 SP left-this is one of those games where it's possible to have a fraction of a health left and still be fine by technicality.  We'll need to do perfectly, but we can still…   When an Agent runs out of SP, they panic. This makes them uncontrollable. Whenever an Agent does panic, their Sephirah will chime in to let us know about it. Worse, since we only have one Agent and no way to get him back under control, Angela also pops up to scold us for not paying attention, and we're told to return to the Day 1 Memory Repository and try again. As for Paul...  He decides to pull out a crowbar and start freeing Abnormalities. Unfortunately for him, since the only Abnormality in the facility is O-03-03 and it's an immobile skull, all he can do is stand there and stare menacingly at the door for all of eternity. Paul: Such a failure that he can't even screw things up right.   Clicking on the button up top brings us back here, where we will never let Paul do anything ever again. Let's get some real Agents.   Much better. Let's get started for real this time.   ...and that's why they had to install regenerators in all the rooms. It's true, I swear it! What about that Paul guy? What happened to him? I hear after he finally pulled himself together, he went to ask that new manager for leave. I'm sure it went well. Agents have a lot of things they can say based on their personalities and levels. As newbies, these two are just happy to be here.   Anyways, old skelly won't work himself. We have Mizu give Insight work a try. Orders from the top, everyone! Oh, boy! I finally get to… dust? No time for questions! Get to it! Mizu immediately screws up.  This is probably going to be a theme with this game. Meanwhile, Talow nervously awaits his own turn.  Mizu walks away with 6 energy and heads back to the main room, while Talow walks in to try his hand at Insight work.  Huuuf… I need a break.Main rooms are incredibly important, because they're where our agents restore their HP/SP. The big green bar next to the + shows us how long it will be before the next heal.  Okee-doke! All rested.One tic of healing brought Mizu from 10 sp to 16 sp, just about full. The basic plan is to have these two alternate working O-03-03 until we have enough energy to finish the day-  Or Talow could just immediately put us over with a perfect work.  Taking damage seemed like a pain in the rear end.Angela chimes in not only to tell us that we're half done…  But that we're all done! We can click that complete button up top whenever we want to finish the day, but we need to do one more work for Malkuth's mission so we're sticking it out. Now, it's time to gain some information about our new friend, O-03-03.  By clicking on the Abnormality's name, we can bring up the Abnormality details screen. Here, we can spend the energy boxes we've gotten from it in order to unlock various bits of information about the Abnormality. Basic Information gives us the Abnormality's picture, threat level, damage type/amount, name, and several other minor pieces of information. Managerial Guidelines gives us notes on how to handle the Abnormality, and mentions any quirks that it has. Work Preferences tells us how well the Abnormality responds to each work type, and finally Escape Information tells us about the Abnormality's defenses when it escapes. In general, new players should prioritize Managerial Guidelines and then Work Preferences so that they can quickly get used to their Abnormalities.  I am not a new player. Say hello to One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds, everyone! Each category that we fully unlock will add to our Observation Level, and we get bonuses to Work Success or Speed with each level we get. Since the guidelines/preferences almost always cost more than the general/escape information to fully unlock, if we already know how an Abnormality works it's best to focus on whatever's cheapest to get those bonuses. Right now, we're getting a +5% Work Success rate, and a bonus +5 to our Work Speed to go with it. Works with One Sin will now be faster and more consistent. Raising our Observation Level also unlocks the ability to buy gear, but that costs more boxes so we can't do that yet. Anyways, since Temperance looks like a winner let's have Mizu try and redeem herself with one last work attempt.  Talk to the skull… talk to the skull… Okay! I can do that! Hello, Mr. Skull!  Oooh boy. Here goes nothing..!   She does one point better, but not well enough to afford any new observations.  Isn't that just Attachment work? Yeah, but I mean… when I talked to it, it seemed to react? That's definitely just Attachment work. I wanna do it again. Talow, I'm skipping in line! Huh? If you wanna… No time for that, you two! I just spoke with the manager. We're on the verge of a meltdown, so we're packing in for the day! Aww… Another day, Onesy. When we click the work complete button, we get this results screen. Under Missions Cleared, we can see that we've cleared the mission Malkuth gave us!  The timeline on the right tracks how long we spent, as well as any deaths/panics that we saw throughout the day. On the left it tracks our Agents' stat increases and promotions. This early on the numbers barely move, but worth noting is that despite his better performance, Talow gained less Prudence than Mizu did (2 vs 4). We'll cover why that is in a mechanics update later on. Beneath that is our ranking, which has our overall rank, survival rate, and our LOB reward for the day-the money we use to buy and upgrade more Agents. In general, we want to get an S or an A rank in order to get as many LOB as possible to use on future days. We're going to need a lot of Music: never frozen bottom flows  This is the final type of loading screen. It progresses through each step on the screen in order, and then takes us to…  The Abnormality selection screen. We have a choice of three, and here's their hint text: F-02-44: However, the curse continues eternally, never broken. O-02-56: People have been committing sins since long ago. "Why do they commit sins, knowing it's wrong?" T-06-27: This is a recording of the day we must never forget. This is an absolutely cruel choice, and I need a moment to explain why. One of my goals in this thread is to get through the plot as efficiently as possible, and to do that there are a couple of Abnormalities I'm keeping an eye out for. -56 is one of them, because it's an Abnormality who can help with several missions down the road. The problem is that it's not a very good training Abnormality for early game, and -27 is one of the best possible day 2 picks on a first run when nobody has any stats in anything. The game has just dangled two things I really want in front of me on the first day, and said "what's it going to be?" I am being bullied. After a solid five minutes of thinking about it...  I decide that short-term growth is better right now than long-term planning. Here's hoping we don't pay dearly for that one. Next time, on Lobotomy Corporation: We talk to Angela and Malkuth again! I'm sure nobody will die this time.
TeeQueue fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Jun 28, 2021 |
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Apr 24, 2020 15:20
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Ah, One Sin. The more you play this game, the more you'll come to appreciate him, like an old friend who will always be there for you when you need him. Non-spoilery note to people who are playing along with the LP: Don't be afraid to use the early days to grind your employees' stats a bit. As long as your energy bar is full, you can end the day with a win at the first sign of trouble.
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Apr 24, 2020 15:41
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my dad posted:Ah, One Sin. The more you play this game, the more you'll come to appreciate him, like an old friend who will always be there for you when you need him. This is good advice tbh, though I don't recommend doing it on the first day, for reasons we'll get into on the second day.
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Apr 24, 2020 15:43
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Ah, Qliphoth! These are pretty different things in actual Kabbalah and weird occultist kabbalah; in the actual thing, they're directly related to the concept of tzimtzum, which is roughly speaking God withdrawing His divine power and presence from an area such that things can exist there that aren't just God. In particular — and this is the place where that concept is used — the Universe. The Qliphoth (I have no idea why it's th at the end, it definitely is just a tav) are shells left behind in the process that...sorta limit the holiness we get, both keeping God's purity pure and us from being consumed in a flash of divinity, or something. They're also equated with things like idolatry, because, like, things that restrict holiness ain't good, they just have beneficial byproducts. In the occultist version, they're basically the Sefirot but evil. They're responsible for a whole host of bad stuff, or so wikipedia tells me (because I know stuff about jewish kabbalah but I know jack and poo poo about, say, Aleister Crowley's insane nonsense).
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Apr 24, 2020 16:17
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It's always neat when the weird words in games have meanings and are not just a result of someone losing a fight with sack of scrabble tiles
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Apr 24, 2020 17:44
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Zetsubou-san posted:It's always neat when the weird words in games have meanings and are not just a result of someone losing a fight with sack of scrabble tiles One reason I'm excited for this LP is people getting to see that without having to grapple with intensely awful translation hiding the very good plot, yeah
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Apr 24, 2020 17:50
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also the tiny, tiny, text is a combo between a UI not really designed for long-rear end english words, and Unity defaulting to 'resize text to fit'. I'm sure there is some useful info in the text log on the main screen, but on my screen the font size makes legal boilerplate look gigantic.
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Apr 24, 2020 18:01
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Glad to see this game getting lp'd. I thought the company behind Lobotomy Corp had split so development had ceased, its good to hear otherwise.
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Apr 24, 2020 18:34
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Bookthief posted:Glad to see this game getting lp'd. I thought the company behind Lobotomy Corp had split so development had ceased, its good to hear otherwise. They have a sequel coming out Soon™
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Apr 24, 2020 19:04
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