Like cameras, ghosts, and/or Japanese horror? The Fatal Frame games may be for you!
Fatal Frame is probably the least known of the major survival horror franchises. Which is a shame, because this Japanese survival horror game series is scary and lovely in its own right. They all take place in various haunted locations, from mansions to mountains, hospitals to abandoned villages, all where a failed ritual took place. Fatal Frame III is unusual in that the haunted location is a dream mansion instead of a physical location (there is a physical location that is very much in ruins), but it is no less deadly.
While there is one main protagonist - Rei, a photographer grieving the lost of her fiance Yuu - there are three playable characters in total. This was a change from the first two games, which gave you brief control over a secondary character, and the change was popular enough that the fourth and fifth games in the series all have multiple playable characters. The other playable characters are Miku, Rei's assistant and the protagonist of Fatal Frame I, and Kei, who is dealing with what happened to his nieces (Mio and Mayu of Fatal Frame II).
Plot-wise, after seeing what seems to be Yuu in the ruins of a manor, Rei starts dreaming of the mansion as it was. She encounters the trapped ghosts of not only the inhabitants, but of others that were trapped in the dream world and gave up. Along the way, she starts having dreams where she's Miku or Kei. As her dream progresses, the ghosts start showing up in the waking world. She has to resolve the mystery and break the curse before she becomes one of the lost souls haunting the surreal manor.
While all the Fatal Frame games are scary, the unique bit about Fatal Frame III is that Rei in some ways has a safe space (not common in the Fatal Frame games) in her waking hours. It becomes progressively less safe as her curse draws the ghosts into her waking world.
The game also deals heavily with survivor's guilt - mostly Rei's and Miku's. (Kei's is more secondhand as it is Mio's survivor's guilt that drew her in, and he got drawn in worrying about her.) And they are far from the only ones, as the curse draws in those who suffer from guilt and/or grief.
Fatal Frame III does not assume you've played the first two games in the series but you'll get more out of it if you have (some of the locations in the dream are from the first two games, you'll know what Miku and Mio have gone through, etc). That being said, I encourage interested people to check out the series. Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water (game 5), while not the best game in the series, got rereleased last year, and Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse (game 4) is getting released next year. The first two games were PS2 and Xbox releases and the third was a PS2-only release so they're harder to find, but the 2nd game had a Wii re-release/remaster (unfortunately not in North America) that may be easier to find.
Content-wise, this is a horror game, so there are people getting killed (one on screen, not counting any ghosts re-enacting their deaths), some blood, a bit of gore on some of the ghosts. Rei has some very obvious depression, as does Miku.
If video promos/reviews are more your thing: Nitro Rad's review is a balanced review (some inevitable spoilers, but minimal) and Ragnarox's "Why Fatal Frame III is secretly genius" is far less so, but brings up everything I love about the game (it's a bit more spoilerific, though). There are also many playthroughs - I'm not going to recommend any but it's easy to find one that you like.
Edited (Content warnings (do I need content warnings on a survival horror game? Probably not, but adding them anyway)) Date: 2022-10-16 11:30 pm (UTC)
Tangle Tower harks back to older mystery point-and-click games and pairs them with interesting suspects, witty dialogue, and a great soundtrack. It intrigued me enough that I, not a fan of murder mystery point-and-click games (outside the Nancy Drew series), took a chance and downloaded it on Apple Arcade.
You play as Detective Grimoire who, along with his assistant Sally, comes to investigate a very intriguing mystery. A young woman named Freya Fellow has been killed, apparently by her own painting. The truth, of course, is a little less fantastical. The characters and scenery are portrayed in a cartoonish style and there's limited animation, but it's very good limited animation.
The setting itself is intriguing. Tangle Tower is actually two towers. One side houses the Fellow family, the other the Pointer family. They're all vaguely related to each other. There's a family member who seems to have taken a vow of silence, a neurodivergent microbiologist, a bird keeper, a botanist/gardener, a pianist, an explorer and an astronomer, all kind of weird and delightfully eccentric. There's also another private detective who's been called in to investigate a completely different mystery. They're all suspects, and it's not immediately obvious who it is. It's also very apparently not quite our world as monsters like bigfoot are real and the plants and animals are not our own. (One of the characters does have a walkman, though, and there's a tape player in one room.)
Grimoire and Sally can comment on pretty much everything in the room they're in. Grimoire is a bit dense but has a good heart, and Sally is wonderfully deadpan and sarcastic. They're fun to listen to. In addition, you can have the family members (and the private detective) comment on each other and any evidence that you show them, and sometimes the comments are hilarious. Hint-wise, Poppy is the best person to listen to regarding the family. Her clues are cryptic at first glance but as you gain knowledge you can go back to them and pick up what's going on.
There are a few puzzles. The game tries to help you through them without completely solving them for you, but if you get stuck there are quite a few guides on the internet on how to solve them. In addition, if you're stuck on which room to go to next, there is a button to give you a hint. Sometimes it can get a little bit frustrating ("maybe we should talk to Poppy" when you seem to have run through everything you can talk to her about, for example) but you can also be sure that Grimoire and Sally have the evidence they need when you confront various family members about possible clues.
Content-wise, this is a murder mystery (albeit in a very cartoony art style) so there is one room with blood on the floor, and two characters get knocked out in one scene.
The only negative thing I can say is that this is a murder mystery and it does not have alternate endings, so it's not infinitely replayable. If you have an iPhone/iPad and an Apple Arcade subscription, that is probably the best way to access this lovely game.
Incidentally, here's a promo for this lovely game if you want to see what it actually looks like.
Edited (Oh wait I play Nancy Drew games!) Date: 2022-10-28 11:56 pm (UTC)
I'm just going to copy most of my promo post that I did on the Yuletide comm for this one.
The Expression Amrilato (Kotonoha Amrilato) is a visual novel with educational, canon f/f, and isekai elements. Rin is an average high school student who accidentally arrives in a different universe where she cannot speak or understand the local language, and the sky is an eternal pink. Shortly after arriving she's found by Ruka, a younger teenager, who takes her home. Rin finds herself slowly learning the local language and also falling in love with Ruka. There may be a way to go home, but does she want to take it?
What do you love about it?: The world that the vast majority of the story is set in is so interesting! Without spoiling too much, Rin is far from the first unexpected arrival. Because of the educational aspect (the game teaches you basic Esperanto, which the locals call Juliamo), Rin - like pretty much every new arrival - does not insta-learn how to speak and read the local language and must struggle to communicate with most of the people around her.
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: Worldbuilding! I liked Rin and Ruka's relationship, but the background worldbuilding interests me more because there's so much to explore! How do you help people who do but don't speak the local language? How do you integrate them into your local society? The way they did this is really interesting and I want more!
(Note: There's a setting in the options to disable quizzes if you're not interested in the learning aspect. There's still some educational stuff (Rin does have some segments where you would like her to take a pause from studying Juliamo and there's one bit where you have to get a body part or two correct to progress in the story), but most of it's easily ignored since Rin auto-translates the words she's learned and you can enable translation for the Juliamo-only dialogue in new game+.)
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: Not really. The worldbuilding is mostly done in little bits throughout the game.
Content warnings: Some past and present bullying, both for Rin in the past and Ruka in the present.(I didn't note in the original promo post, but Ruka is very interested in Rin and not sex-adverse, there is an implication that they have sex in one ending, and Rin is partially nude in an early scene.)
These are some notes that I took for The Expression Amrilato and its sequel. I'm hoping they'll be helpful for someone who may not remember all of what Rin finds out during the game or hasn't played the sequel. Be aware that if you are reading this and have not played the game this spoils some of the plot.
The Juliamo world itself: * It's a magnet for visitors from other dimensions/worlds. (Worlds from here on out.) The first visitors arrived "a long time ago" and many spoke a language familiar but not. Visitors arrive all over the world but Japan gets a larger amount than most countries. * The world governments created special districts where people seemed to arrive most. They also adopted a common language (Esperanto) that the early visitors spoke with some linguistic merges from their own and named it "Juliamo". People in the districts eventually grew to use Juliamo exclusively, though the local native language is sometimes heard. Monuments built pre-district are still in the native language. * We don't know how long ago that was, but Esperanto came into existence in the 1880s here, and one of the characters in the 2nd game is a teenager who speaks Juliamo natively and had an adoptive vizitanto sister who was several years older. So it had to have been probably more than 18 years ago but less than 135 years ago. * It's unknown how large these districts are. Rin takes a train ride from the local station (which would have the Juliamo names for cities) but the map in Ofuna (Oohuno) seems to have the place names in Juliamo as well as she doesn't say anything about trying to understand unknown kanji. * The world used to have a regular day-night schedule, and then the sky became pink all the time around the time the first visitors from the other worlds arrived.
Vizitantoj (Visitors from other worlds, singular is vizitanto): * Arrive speaking (and reading) their native language. Their spoken/written language may not be understood by either other speakers of the same language from another world or the Juliamo residents. (So a Japanese speaker from our world would probably not understand the Japanese of the Juliamo world and probably wouldn't understand a Japanese speaker of yet another world.) Rin, for example, can read very little of this world's Japanese. * The Visitor's Administration (Administrado de vizitantoj) works to find new arrivals, figure out their proficiency, set them up with some assistance, and introduce them to Juliamo. * The orientation also weeds out false claimants who want the benefits that vizitantoj get. (Which is some cash payments and a card that gives them a certain discount in shops.) * Some people don't like vizitantoj for one reason or another. This is somewhat due to the government cutting down the reimbursement to shops that give discounts to vizitantoj; some vizitantoj are charged more rather than less for items. * There's a guardianship system where one person agrees to be a sort of legal guardian to a newly arrived person. This guardian doesn't have to be older than the new arrival but usually is. (Ruka is guardian over Rin, who is 3 years older than she is, but two other guardianship situations were adults having guardianship over minors.) * Sometimes the sky will turn blue (this is known as "Night's Return") for a short time, likely visible only to (certain) vizitantoj. This is thought to happen when a vizitanto opens a gate to return home. These gates have not been scientifically proven, but vizitantoj will sometimes sense that the gate has opened back to their world. Only those who can see the sky change can go through the gate home. (Not stated, but implied that the sky change that Rin and Ruka see is someone from Rin's own universe returning home.) * Those interested in (going through) the gates are called "esperanto" or "the hopeful" (esper- means hope, -ant is commonly translated as "one who") by other vizitantoj.
Other stuff: * The special district that Rin arrives at uses its own currency and not the Japanese Yen. It's unknown if people outside the special district use this currency. * Electronics and such seem to be pretty much the same as our world, but specifics may be different. (For example, cellphones are a thing in the Juliamo world, but Rin cannot plug her phone from her original world in and she has no signal.) * At least in the particular area the game is set, people use the western first name-family name order instead of the family name-first name order. (Interestingly, in Esperanto it's common to put the family name in all caps (so Rin would be TAKATO Rin) but that's a bit harder to do in conversation.)
Do you like to play non-combat professions in a RPG? I'm not speaking of ones where you by the way have to craft something in order to get the best armor, I'm talking about spending most of your game just making bigger and better crafts. If so, Fantasy Life may be the game for you!
This game has the usual combat classes: the lightly-armored Paladins with their shields, the more heavily-armored Mercenaries with their huge blades, the Hunters who use bows, and the Magicians/Wizards who use wands. But they also have three gathering classes (Miners, Woodcutters, and Anglers), as well as 5 crafting classes (Alchemists, Carpenters, Blacksmiths, Cooks, and Tailors). You choose a class (what the game calls a Life) at the start, but you're not locked into it and you can easily swap by going to the nearest guild office. While I'd recommend a small dip into a combat class (the Mercenary and Hunter classes are my choice), you can easily play a game where you're focused on crafting or gathering. Or you can play a combat class (with maybe small dips into a crafting or gathering class) as a more traditional game.
Combat is generally not difficult (you spend a lot of time rushing in to damage a monster and then rushing away to avoid damage) and you can recruit NPCs as the game goes along to help you fight.
There is a small plot that mostly stays out of your way. You are, of course, the Designated Hero That Will Save Reveria, but you'll most likely spend most of your game doing what you want to do with no real urgency to save the world. There's a DLC that's very much worth the cost that will add another storyline that is, again, not urgent.
In addition, this is a game with some very enjoyable, funny dialogue. The characters are generally fun to interact with, there's quite a variety of things to do, and in general, it's a nice fluffy game without too much darkness (even in Al Maajik or the overlying plot) that you can spend hours playing.
Content-wise, it's pretty much E-for-everyone. Typical fantasy RPG violence, no blood, maybe a thing or two that flies over peoples' heads.
Getting it is starting to become more difficult as the 3DS eShop is closing down (I believe that you cannot put more money in at this point but you can spend what you have?), but physical cartridges still exist if you don't mind not having the DLC. (For my request, you do not need it.) Let's plays are a little less common because it's a 3DS game (it's harder to get 3DS output) and it's such a long game that there's a lot of abandoned let's plays. That being said, there are a few complete ones, including one or two that include the DLC.
(If you're writing for me, Porto Puerto is the first city you get to outside Castele and you have to complete two main sections of the plot to get there. You meet Olivia in the third section and Aurora in the next to last.)
Note that there is a gacha/free to play "sequel" called Fantasy Life online. I don't play it myself (because it's a money-hungry gacha and Boltrend is generally apparently a really horrible company) but beneath the gatcha bits it feels very true to the original if you want to get a feel for the original game before trying to track it down. (I will mention two things I like, though: crafting/gathering classes now use their gear as weapons instead of all relying on daggers like the original so if you have better crafting/gathering gear you'll do better at combat, and the fact that you can just have spur of the moment raids with random people you never have to meet again.)
Edited (Content warnings.) Date: 2022-10-17 03:56 am (UTC)
Do you like children's/young adult science fiction programming? Do you like stories that eschew violence? Thoughtful but sometimes cheesy storylines? Well, this may be the show for you!
The Tomorrow People has had three iterations so far and this is the middle one. The first one from the 1970s was a competitor to Doctor Who with cheesy production values but the optimistic idea that we could grow beyond violence - the protagonists had telepathy and telelportation (as well as other powers) but those powers also made them unable to kill. It was brought to North America as a coproduction in the 1990s with mixed British, Australian, and American characters (as well as British, Australian, Canadian, and American actors) and a very 1990s Nickelodeon feel and direction. (There was a third reboot written for a far more mature audience. I have written fic for it. That is all I will say about it.)
This series is very much a fun, cheesy, very 1990s YA science fiction adventure series. The main characters are likeable, the villains can be scary, cheesy, or both, they had some great actors on there (Jean Marsh and Christopher Lee both played bad guys and very much chewed the scenery in their respective series) and the fact that the main characters had to come up with a solution that wasn't kill/do violence was very appealing. It was also an early acting gig for Naomie Harris (of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies among other things) and she is lovely as Ami, one of the main characters. The villains range from a greedy Lady to parasitic invaders from outer space. The main characters are aided by General Damon (main character Megabyte's dad) as well as an array of interesting characters each serial.
Content-wise, it's pretty tame. Some bits are a bit scary, but there's very little violence onscreen and no sexual content/nudity. (It is a 1990s cable TV show, after all!)
There are 3 seasons with 5 serials total and each serial has 5 24-minute episodes each, so it's fairly short. There were four novelizations that were published in the 1990s that might be easy to find on Amazon/book sites if you're curious, and sometimes you can find episodes on various user-uploaded streaming sites.
(While researching for this mini-promo, I ran across a review of the first serial that also included an interview for Kristian Schmid, one of the actors! You can see it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXf_3K5bP6w)
Edited (Content warnings.) Date: 2022-10-17 03:58 am (UTC)
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winterfish
Fatal Frame III: The Tormented (and the Fatal Frame series in general)
Date: 2022-10-16 06:53 pm (UTC)Fatal Frame is probably the least known of the major survival horror franchises. Which is a shame, because this Japanese survival horror game series is scary and lovely in its own right. They all take place in various haunted locations, from mansions to mountains, hospitals to abandoned villages, all where a failed ritual took place. Fatal Frame III is unusual in that the haunted location is a dream mansion instead of a physical location (there is a physical location that is very much in ruins), but it is no less deadly.
While there is one main protagonist - Rei, a photographer grieving the lost of her fiance Yuu - there are three playable characters in total. This was a change from the first two games, which gave you brief control over a secondary character, and the change was popular enough that the fourth and fifth games in the series all have multiple playable characters. The other playable characters are Miku, Rei's assistant and the protagonist of Fatal Frame I, and Kei, who is dealing with what happened to his nieces (Mio and Mayu of Fatal Frame II).
Plot-wise, after seeing what seems to be Yuu in the ruins of a manor, Rei starts dreaming of the mansion as it was. She encounters the trapped ghosts of not only the inhabitants, but of others that were trapped in the dream world and gave up. Along the way, she starts having dreams where she's Miku or Kei. As her dream progresses, the ghosts start showing up in the waking world. She has to resolve the mystery and break the curse before she becomes one of the lost souls haunting the surreal manor.
While all the Fatal Frame games are scary, the unique bit about Fatal Frame III is that Rei in some ways has a safe space (not common in the Fatal Frame games) in her waking hours. It becomes progressively less safe as her curse draws the ghosts into her waking world.
The game also deals heavily with survivor's guilt - mostly Rei's and Miku's. (Kei's is more secondhand as it is Mio's survivor's guilt that drew her in, and he got drawn in worrying about her.) And they are far from the only ones, as the curse draws in those who suffer from guilt and/or grief.
Fatal Frame III does not assume you've played the first two games in the series but you'll get more out of it if you have (some of the locations in the dream are from the first two games, you'll know what Miku and Mio have gone through, etc). That being said, I encourage interested people to check out the series. Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water (game 5), while not the best game in the series, got rereleased last year, and Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse (game 4) is getting released next year. The first two games were PS2 and Xbox releases and the third was a PS2-only release so they're harder to find, but the 2nd game had a Wii re-release/remaster (unfortunately not in North America) that may be easier to find.
Content-wise, this is a horror game, so there are people getting killed (one on screen, not counting any ghosts re-enacting their deaths), some blood, a bit of gore on some of the ghosts. Rei has some very obvious depression, as does Miku.
If video promos/reviews are more your thing: Nitro Rad's review is a balanced review (some inevitable spoilers, but minimal) and Ragnarox's "Why Fatal Frame III is secretly genius" is far less so, but brings up everything I love about the game (it's a bit more spoilerific, though). There are also many playthroughs - I'm not going to recommend any but it's easy to find one that you like.
Tangle Tower
Date: 2022-10-16 09:29 pm (UTC)You play as Detective Grimoire who, along with his assistant Sally, comes to investigate a very intriguing mystery. A young woman named Freya Fellow has been killed, apparently by her own painting. The truth, of course, is a little less fantastical. The characters and scenery are portrayed in a cartoonish style and there's limited animation, but it's very good limited animation.
The setting itself is intriguing. Tangle Tower is actually two towers. One side houses the Fellow family, the other the Pointer family. They're all vaguely related to each other. There's a family member who seems to have taken a vow of silence, a neurodivergent microbiologist, a bird keeper, a botanist/gardener, a pianist, an explorer and an astronomer, all kind of weird and delightfully eccentric. There's also another private detective who's been called in to investigate a completely different mystery. They're all suspects, and it's not immediately obvious who it is. It's also very apparently not quite our world as monsters like bigfoot are real and the plants and animals are not our own. (One of the characters does have a walkman, though, and there's a tape player in one room.)
Grimoire and Sally can comment on pretty much everything in the room they're in. Grimoire is a bit dense but has a good heart, and Sally is wonderfully deadpan and sarcastic. They're fun to listen to. In addition, you can have the family members (and the private detective) comment on each other and any evidence that you show them, and sometimes the comments are hilarious. Hint-wise, Poppy is the best person to listen to regarding the family. Her clues are cryptic at first glance but as you gain knowledge you can go back to them and pick up what's going on.
There are a few puzzles. The game tries to help you through them without completely solving them for you, but if you get stuck there are quite a few guides on the internet on how to solve them. In addition, if you're stuck on which room to go to next, there is a button to give you a hint. Sometimes it can get a little bit frustrating ("maybe we should talk to Poppy" when you seem to have run through everything you can talk to her about, for example) but you can also be sure that Grimoire and Sally have the evidence they need when you confront various family members about possible clues.
Content-wise, this is a murder mystery (albeit in a very cartoony art style) so there is one room with blood on the floor, and two characters get knocked out in one scene.
The only negative thing I can say is that this is a murder mystery and it does not have alternate endings, so it's not infinitely replayable. If you have an iPhone/iPad and an Apple Arcade subscription, that is probably the best way to access this lovely game.
Incidentally, here's a promo for this lovely game if you want to see what it actually looks like.
The Expression Amrilato
Date: 2022-10-16 10:10 pm (UTC)The Expression Amrilato (Kotonoha Amrilato) is a visual novel with educational, canon f/f, and isekai elements. Rin is an average high school student who accidentally arrives in a different universe where she cannot speak or understand the local language, and the sky is an eternal pink. Shortly after arriving she's found by Ruka, a younger teenager, who takes her home. Rin finds herself slowly learning the local language and also falling in love with Ruka. There may be a way to go home, but does she want to take it?
What do you love about it?: The world that the vast majority of the story is set in is so interesting! Without spoiling too much, Rin is far from the first unexpected arrival. Because of the educational aspect (the game teaches you basic Esperanto, which the locals call Juliamo), Rin - like pretty much every new arrival - does not insta-learn how to speak and read the local language and must struggle to communicate with most of the people around her.
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: Worldbuilding! I liked Rin and Ruka's relationship, but the background worldbuilding interests me more because there's so much to explore! How do you help people who do but don't speak the local language? How do you integrate them into your local society? The way they did this is really interesting and I want more!
(Note: There's a setting in the options to disable quizzes if you're not interested in the learning aspect. There's still some educational stuff (Rin does have some segments where you would like her to take a pause from studying Juliamo and there's one bit where you have to get a body part or two correct to progress in the story), but most of it's easily ignored since Rin auto-translates the words she's learned and you can enable translation for the Juliamo-only dialogue in new game+.)
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: Not really. The worldbuilding is mostly done in little bits throughout the game.
Content warnings: Some past and present bullying, both for Rin in the past and Ruka in the present.(I didn't note in the original promo post, but Ruka is very interested in Rin and not sex-adverse, there is an implication that they have sex in one ending, and Rin is partially nude in an early scene.)
Other:
Here's the official promo on Youtube for the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri_cN-Q-eys
If you want to hear Esperanto in itself, check out this wikitongues video of a native speaker who's talking slower than she usually does and these guys (one of which is a native Esperanto speaker) who talk entirely in Esperanto (including swearing and some crude humor, as a warning)
Worldbuilding notes for The Expression Amrilato
Date: 2022-10-16 10:19 pm (UTC)The Juliamo world itself:
* It's a magnet for visitors from other dimensions/worlds. (Worlds from here on out.) The first visitors arrived "a long time ago" and many spoke a language familiar but not. Visitors arrive all over the world but Japan gets a larger amount than most countries.
* The world governments created special districts where people seemed to arrive most. They also adopted a common language (Esperanto) that the early visitors spoke with some linguistic merges from their own and named it "Juliamo". People in the districts eventually grew to use Juliamo exclusively, though the local native language is sometimes heard. Monuments built pre-district are still in the native language.
* We don't know how long ago that was, but Esperanto came into existence in the 1880s here, and one of the characters in the 2nd game is a teenager who speaks Juliamo natively and had an adoptive vizitanto sister who was several years older. So it had to have been probably more than 18 years ago but less than 135 years ago.
* It's unknown how large these districts are. Rin takes a train ride from the local station (which would have the Juliamo names for cities) but the map in Ofuna (Oohuno) seems to have the place names in Juliamo as well as she doesn't say anything about trying to understand unknown kanji.
* The world used to have a regular day-night schedule, and then the sky became pink all the time around the time the first visitors from the other worlds arrived.
Vizitantoj (Visitors from other worlds, singular is vizitanto):
* Arrive speaking (and reading) their native language. Their spoken/written language may not be understood by either other speakers of the same language from another world or the Juliamo residents. (So a Japanese speaker from our world would probably not understand the Japanese of the Juliamo world and probably wouldn't understand a Japanese speaker of yet another world.) Rin, for example, can read very little of this world's Japanese.
* The Visitor's Administration (Administrado de vizitantoj) works to find new arrivals, figure out their proficiency, set them up with some assistance, and introduce them to Juliamo.
* The orientation also weeds out false claimants who want the benefits that vizitantoj get. (Which is some cash payments and a card that gives them a certain discount in shops.)
* Some people don't like vizitantoj for one reason or another. This is somewhat due to the government cutting down the reimbursement to shops that give discounts to vizitantoj; some vizitantoj are charged more rather than less for items.
* There's a guardianship system where one person agrees to be a sort of legal guardian to a newly arrived person. This guardian doesn't have to be older than the new arrival but usually is. (Ruka is guardian over Rin, who is 3 years older than she is, but two other guardianship situations were adults having guardianship over minors.)
* Sometimes the sky will turn blue (this is known as "Night's Return") for a short time, likely visible only to (certain) vizitantoj. This is thought to happen when a vizitanto opens a gate to return home. These gates have not been scientifically proven, but vizitantoj will sometimes sense that the gate has opened back to their world. Only those who can see the sky change can go through the gate home. (Not stated, but implied that the sky change that Rin and Ruka see is someone from Rin's own universe returning home.)
* Those interested in (going through) the gates are called "esperanto" or "the hopeful" (esper- means hope, -ant is commonly translated as "one who") by other vizitantoj.
Other stuff:
* The special district that Rin arrives at uses its own currency and not the Japanese Yen. It's unknown if people outside the special district use this currency.
* Electronics and such seem to be pretty much the same as our world, but specifics may be different. (For example, cellphones are a thing in the Juliamo world, but Rin cannot plug her phone from her original world in and she has no signal.)
* At least in the particular area the game is set, people use the western first name-family name order instead of the family name-first name order. (Interestingly, in Esperanto it's common to put the family name in all caps (so Rin would be TAKATO Rin) but that's a bit harder to do in conversation.)
Fantasy Life
Date: 2022-10-17 01:02 am (UTC)This game has the usual combat classes: the lightly-armored Paladins with their shields, the more heavily-armored Mercenaries with their huge blades, the Hunters who use bows, and the Magicians/Wizards who use wands. But they also have three gathering classes (Miners, Woodcutters, and Anglers), as well as 5 crafting classes (Alchemists, Carpenters, Blacksmiths, Cooks, and Tailors). You choose a class (what the game calls a Life) at the start, but you're not locked into it and you can easily swap by going to the nearest guild office. While I'd recommend a small dip into a combat class (the Mercenary and Hunter classes are my choice), you can easily play a game where you're focused on crafting or gathering. Or you can play a combat class (with maybe small dips into a crafting or gathering class) as a more traditional game.
Combat is generally not difficult (you spend a lot of time rushing in to damage a monster and then rushing away to avoid damage) and you can recruit NPCs as the game goes along to help you fight.
There is a small plot that mostly stays out of your way. You are, of course, the Designated Hero That Will Save Reveria, but you'll most likely spend most of your game doing what you want to do with no real urgency to save the world. There's a DLC that's very much worth the cost that will add another storyline that is, again, not urgent.
In addition, this is a game with some very enjoyable, funny dialogue. The characters are generally fun to interact with, there's quite a variety of things to do, and in general, it's a nice fluffy game without too much darkness (even in Al Maajik or the overlying plot) that you can spend hours playing.
Content-wise, it's pretty much E-for-everyone. Typical fantasy RPG violence, no blood, maybe a thing or two that flies over peoples' heads.
Getting it is starting to become more difficult as the 3DS eShop is closing down (I believe that you cannot put more money in at this point but you can spend what you have?), but physical cartridges still exist if you don't mind not having the DLC. (For my request, you do not need it.) Let's plays are a little less common because it's a 3DS game (it's harder to get 3DS output) and it's such a long game that there's a lot of abandoned let's plays. That being said, there are a few complete ones, including one or two that include the DLC.
(If you're writing for me, Porto Puerto is the first city you get to outside Castele and you have to complete two main sections of the plot to get there. You meet Olivia in the third section and Aurora in the next to last.)
Note that there is a gacha/free to play "sequel" called Fantasy Life online. I don't play it myself (because it's a money-hungry gacha and Boltrend is generally apparently a really horrible company) but beneath the gatcha bits it feels very true to the original if you want to get a feel for the original game before trying to track it down. (I will mention two things I like, though: crafting/gathering classes now use their gear as weapons instead of all relying on daggers like the original so if you have better crafting/gathering gear you'll do better at combat, and the fact that you can just have spur of the moment raids with random people you never have to meet again.)
The Tomorrow People (1992)
Date: 2022-10-17 01:50 am (UTC)The Tomorrow People has had three iterations so far and this is the middle one. The first one from the 1970s was a competitor to Doctor Who with cheesy production values but the optimistic idea that we could grow beyond violence - the protagonists had telepathy and telelportation (as well as other powers) but those powers also made them unable to kill. It was brought to North America as a coproduction in the 1990s with mixed British, Australian, and American characters (as well as British, Australian, Canadian, and American actors) and a very 1990s Nickelodeon feel and direction. (There was a third reboot written for a far more mature audience. I have written fic for it. That is all I will say about it.)
This series is very much a fun, cheesy, very 1990s YA science fiction adventure series. The main characters are likeable, the villains can be scary, cheesy, or both, they had some great actors on there (Jean Marsh and Christopher Lee both played bad guys and very much chewed the scenery in their respective series) and the fact that the main characters had to come up with a solution that wasn't kill/do violence was very appealing. It was also an early acting gig for Naomie Harris (of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies among other things) and she is lovely as Ami, one of the main characters. The villains range from a greedy Lady to parasitic invaders from outer space. The main characters are aided by General Damon (main character Megabyte's dad) as well as an array of interesting characters each serial.
Content-wise, it's pretty tame. Some bits are a bit scary, but there's very little violence onscreen and no sexual content/nudity. (It is a 1990s cable TV show, after all!)
There are 3 seasons with 5 serials total and each serial has 5 24-minute episodes each, so it's fairly short. There were four novelizations that were published in the 1990s that might be easy to find on Amazon/book sites if you're curious, and sometimes you can find episodes on various user-uploaded streaming sites.
(While researching for this mini-promo, I ran across a review of the first serial that also included an interview for Kristian Schmid, one of the actors! You can see it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXf_3K5bP6w)