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17 votes
-
Midweek Movie Free Talk
Warning: this post may contain spoilers
Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.
Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.
7 votes -
The US Supreme Court's Republican appointees end civil rights redistricting protections
29 votes -
‘Stargate’ TV series from Martin Gero not moving forward at Amazon
35 votes -
Acting attorney general says US President Donald Trump’s $1.8bn anti-weaponization fund is scrapped
26 votes -
Rich Markdown Editor Userscript for Tildes
Some of the discussion in another thread inspired me to try making a user-script that would inject some rich text editor into the tildes desktop site. I have only tried it on Firefox, but figured...
Some of the discussion in another thread inspired me to try making a user-script that would inject some rich text editor into the tildes desktop site. I have only tried it on Firefox, but figured it might be worth sharing in case anyone finds it useful or has suggestions for improvements.
Install Tampermonkey extension. (Chrome, Firefox).
With the extension installed, this link should be detected as an installable userscript.
@ some people who directly said they want a better editor in that thread.
It injects EasyMDE with some extra css to make it match the Tildes theme. EasyMDE uses FontAwesome for its toolbar icons, but Tildes's content policy seems to make it impossible to use this. Instead, I add some CSS to put plain text in the toolbar buttons. Some nice features
- Full-screen and side-by-side editors.
- Spell checker.
- Auto-save. (Based on the URL and element ID, so each comment reply is saved separately.)
- Keyboard shortcuts like
Ctrl+B,Ctrl+K, etc. - Conveniences like "enter" on a list adds an item to the list, or in a quote adds a line to the quote.
It is not perfect, however. It bugs out if you pick the built-in "preview" tab (the editor is still visible but does not update the preview), and it does not understand username mentions or group mentions.
I used it to write this, and the auto-save behavior seems to be fine, but I'm not sure how much I trust it not to lose my work.
Screenshots!
21 votes -
Fatekeeper | Early Access release trailer
8 votes -
New Mexico's Jeffrey Epstein 'Truth Commission' issues fourteen subpoenas at inaugural meeting
25 votes -
Humble Choice - June 2026
June 2026's Humble Choice is now available with the following eight Steam games. Steam Page OpenCritic Steam Recent/All Operating Systems Steam Deck ProtonDB OCTOPATH TRAVELER II 85 85 / 93 Win ✅...
June 2026's Humble Choice is now available with the following eight Steam games.
Steam Page OpenCritic Steam Recent/All Operating Systems Steam Deck ProtonDB OCTOPATH TRAVELER II 85 85 / 93 Win ✅ Verified 🎖️ Platinum The Riftbreaker 80 90 / 90 Win 🟨 Playable 🟨 Gold Life is Strange: Double Exposure 71 74 / 67 Win 🟨 Playable 🎖️ Platinum INDIKA 79 88 / 89 Win ✅ Verified 🟨 Gold Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector 87 86 / 91 Win 🟨 Playable 🎖️ Platinum Construction Simulator 72 75 / 80 Win ✅ Verified 🎖️ Platinum Hell Clock 82 93 / 84 Win 🟨 Playable 🎖️ Platinum Overlooting -- 85 / 81 Win 🟨 Playable 🎖️ Platinum Does anyone have experience with any of the games and, if so, would you recommend them? Is there anything in here that you're particularly excited to play?
12 votes -
Together To The Stars – Mourner (2026)
2 votes -
The Hero of Cheese (Wallace & Gromit x Zelda parody)
18 votes -
Hegemonic digitalisation in policy on older people – the Finnish case and wider social implications
7 votes -
100 years of television design
16 votes -
Godot Android Build Environment
16 votes -
Xteink X4 Developer Edition
13 votes -
Wesley So leads Norway Chess 2026 after round seven, with Alireza Firouzja 2.5 points behind
6 votes -
TV Tuesdays Free Talk
Warning: this post may contain spoilers
Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.
Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.
5 votes -
Your URL bar can be a CLI for searching websites
35 votes -
You can now use your Gmail account in Proton Mail
35 votes -
Carcass of dead humpback whale, whose attempted rescue captivated many across Germany, has been pulled ashore in Denmark ahead of autopsy
5 votes -
Denmark gets four-party centre-left government after months of negotiations
10 votes -
What do you think about Destiny 2’s imminent death and games as a service?
Before I go into my rant I would like to ask you: Have you played Destiny or Destiny 2? What are your thoughts on Bungie, the imminent death of Destiny, their push for Marathon, and “games as a...
Before I go into my rant I would like to ask you: Have you played Destiny or Destiny 2? What are your thoughts on Bungie, the imminent death of Destiny, their push for Marathon, and “games as a service” in general?
As for my opinion, I think that the real problem is that (probably) most managers, CEOs, investors, and shareholders involved in live service games aren’t gamers. They don’t care about the quality of the games. A majority of them probably don’t even play what they publish.
What they care about is to maximize revenue with minimal effort, cost, and risk.
The programmers and artists suffer from low wages and job insecurity, and the gamers suffer from live service slop that eventually gets sunset even when it has a dedicated fan base (that could grow if the game was better).
We can’t win against this horde of managers, CEOs, investors, and shareholders. They got AAA in a chokehold, especially in live service.
We gotta continue to vote with our wallets and give our money to the companies who deliver quality games, and pull our money out when they don’t.
If Bungie dies, I’ll be sad because I have a long history with Halo (Combat Evolved, 2, 3, ODST, and Reach), but so be it. Something better may rise from their ashes.
We gotta resist the slop. It’s like fast food. We gotta resist it even if it’s addictive, and go get better quality grub elsewhere even if it costs more. If we keep eating the slop, they’ll continue frying more of it.
Edit: To make sure I don’t confuse anyone, I should add that Destiny 2 will receive one last content update this month, and will remain playable, just as its predecessor, for the time being. What I think most people are complaining about is that a game that could potentially be excellent, will be left in a messy state, designed mostly around maximizing revenue through micro-transactions, rather than offering a good experience. It has a large and passionate fanbase, but will basically abandoned by Bungie, in favor of their new game Marathon, which no one cares about
38 votes -
Bernie Sanders: The public should own half of the big AI companies
30 votes -
Which Substacks do you subscribe to/follow?
Im dabbling in substack and starting with this one food writer.. but who else should i follow? I see a lot of people post these interesting essays from Substack - any general recs?
16 votes -
Breadmaker update: one year in!
A little less than a year ago, I asked for your recommendations on bread maker tips, tricks, and recipes, and thought I’d give a small update. The bread maker I bought is functionally the Breville...
A little less than a year ago, I asked for your recommendations on bread maker tips, tricks, and recipes, and thought I’d give a small update.
The bread maker I bought is functionally the Breville Custom Loaf, rebranded for the local market (“Tramontina by Breville”). I paid R$3069 for it. It was on sale: the same machine now sells for anywhere between R$2991 to R$3690. (These equate to about 565USD then and 594USD to 732USD now, considering contemporaneous exchange rates.)
My +/- weekly recipe eventually settled upon via much trial and many errors comes from an amalgamation of various sources, by now mostly lost. In the summer, I have to halve the recipe and make bread twice as often, or the maresia / damp sea air makes it mould before we can eat the whole thing!
I have also not tried to make anything but this exact bread since I started. My dreams of raisin buns are as of yet unrealised. Next year for the end of the year, I plan to make panettone in it, as we don’t plan to travel.
My unhalved recipe is:
- 450ml water (filtered, cool)
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 4 cups 100% whole wheat / integral flour
- >1 tsp demerara sugar
- <1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp (freezer stored, instant dry) yeast
- ~3/4 cup walnuts, in pieces, raw, unsalted, to fill the “automatic” dispenser on the machine (sometimes the bulk goods shop by me is out of nuts. the bread is better with nuts, but fine without.)
Cost wise, this breaks down to:
- 500mL olive oil : R$25 (0,75/loaf)
- 1kg flour : R$7 (3,17/loaf)
- 1kg sugar : R$10 (0,05/loaf)
- 1kg salt : R$4 (0,02/loaf)
- 100g walnuts : R$10 (12,50/loaf)
I didn’t include the yeast in the breakdown because I have yet to buy any. The 1kg package of yeast I purchased four years ago to make pizza and kept in the freezer since is still going strong. At present, a kilo of yeast costs ~R$23.
Without nuts, my cost per loaf is R$3,99, while with nuts, it’s R$16,49. My local supermarket sells a (frankly inferior) and much smaller (350g) “100% whole wheat” loaf for R$25.
Having kept incomplete records, I believe for most of the year we have made a loaf about every five days: let’s pretend means over the past year, I’ve made 70 loaves at about a 50/50 split of nuts or no-nuts, so let’s put my total cost of making bread as R$716,80. If we buy bread, it’s an every-other-day occurance, so R$4562,50 spent on bread in a year. Adding the cost of the bread maker to the mix, if these were real figures, we would have saved R$776,70 so far, just in this year alone.
And it has served us well, with some slight oddities!
The first is based on the machine: never once in the usage of the machine has the “automatic” dispenser of nuts automatically added the nuts at the proper stage. I have read the documentation, and I can find no explanation. At present, if I want nuts added, I have to remain at home when the maker is going, as it screams something awful (buzzer) when it’s “going to” add the nuts, and then I run along and poke open the dispenser door with my finger until the latch opens and the nuts dispense into the awaiting dough. If I know I won’t be home, I don’t add nuts, because otherwise, I will come home to a nice loaf of bread and a small dispenser of lightly warmed nuts. (Heh.)
The second is that my recipe is not as good when I have to halve it! In the damp season, I had to throw away a few half-loaves, as mold loves my poor little bread, and the bread does not survive well in the fridge. But splitting the recipe (and altering the settings on the bread maker to reflect, which is itself an imprecise science) has yet to lead to a smaller version of my usual recipe: what comes out is a biscotti-shaped, flat, dense, but still edible loaf. I’m still figuring it out!
All in all, thanks to everyone who encouraged me in the previous thread, and let this be encouragement to anyone else on the fence to try out a breadmaker!
29 votes -
May 2026 Backlog Burner: Conclusion and Recap
The May 2026 Backlog Burner event is officially over! Over the month of May, 14 participants moved 176 games out of their backlogs. Congratulations to the following Bingo winners: u/aphoenix...
The May 2026 Backlog Burner event is officially over!
Over the month of May, 14 participants moved 176 games out of their backlogs.
Congratulations to the following Bingo winners:
- u/aphoenix
- u/BailerAppleby
- u/CannibalisticApple
- u/kfwyre
- u/ShroudedScribe
- u/SingedFrostLantern
- u/Wes
Special congratulations:
- u/1338 playing a total of 39 games (including many that you can't even buy anymore)
- u/aphoenix for masterfully executing a thematically relevant plan for participating
- u/BailerAppleby for playing so many games from the Tildes Game Giveaways
- u/dannydotcafe for a truly mellow win
- u/Durinthal for finishing a game from the 2024 Backlog Burner
- u/J-Chiptunator for prioritizing their health
- u/JCPhoenix for posting awesome Let's Plays
- u/Wes for his many thoughtful comments
To everyone who played games, shared their thoughts, or even just read through the comments for the event:
This event is amazing because y'all all make it amazing. Thank you for playing.
Use this topic to post your final bingo cards, give recaps of your games, and share any thoughts you have on the event itself.
Who won?
The question on everyone's mind.
The feud between the Motivateds and the Mellows was a (possibly one-sided?) rivalry for the ages.
Who came out on top?
Well, I'm happy to report that the final numbers are in, and the Grand Winners are:
Winner
🎉 Team Mellowtivated 🎉
We are all one team! There's no actual rivalry. We've actually been gaming together as one wonderful little group this whole time! (Now everybody saw "AWWWWWW" and get all sappy)
Also, the jury has returned a verdict in u/Wes's trial:
Verdict
He has been found guilty of being awesome. His sentence is that he is required to feel immensely proud of his community service in making the amazing Backlog Bingo site and responding thoughtfully to everyone all month long.
Statistics
- We averaged 12.6 games per person and 40.0 games per week.
- There were 424 comments posted across 5 topics.
- Games starting with the letter
Saccounted for a full 12% of what we played. - Shortest game title: 3 characters (Hue)
- Longest game title: 54 characters (Bubsy 3D: Bubsy Visits the James Turrell Retrospective) (a 1700% increase)
Game Lists
Full Game List (alphabetical)
0-9
A
- Agent Intercept
- Alt-Frequencies
- Analogue: A Hate Story
- Another Crab's Treasure
- Ape Escape
- Aris Arcanum
- Assault on Proxima
- Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
- AtmaSphere
B
- Baba Is You
- The Ball
- Bendy and the Ink Machine
- Berserk Boy
- Beyond Blue
- Blast Rush LS
- Blue Maiden
- Bomb Rush Cyberfunk
- Breakneck
- Broken Age
- Bubsy 3D: Bubsy Visits the James Turrell Retrospective
C
- Camera Obscura
- Cards and Towers
- Cargo! - The quest for gravity
- Cat Quest 2
- Chains
- co-open
- Coffee Talk Tokyo
- Crash Time - Undercover
- Crescent Bay
- Curious Expedition
D
- DEAD LETTER DEPT.
- Dead Space Demake
- Death and Taxes
- Death's Door
- Delver
- DigDigDrill
- Doc Clock: The Toasted Sandwich of Time
- Doki Doki Literature Club (x2)
- Dokimon: Quest
- Donna: The Canine Quest
- Dorfromantik
- Dreadhalls
- Droplitz
E
F
G
H
- Hades
- Haimrik
- Halfway
- Hate Plus
- Hatoful Boyfriend
- Heeey! Park-Boy
- Hello Neighbour
- Hexcells Plus
- Hive Jump
- Homebody
- The House in Fata Morgana
- Hue
- The Hundred Line - Last Defense Academy
I
- I Am Legion: Stand Survivors
- Immortals Fenyx Rising
- Infectionator 3: Apocalypse
- Infinite Air with Mark McMorris
- Interactivity: The Interactive Experience
- Intergalactic Bubbles
- Invisible, Inc.
- Ironclad Tactics
- It Comes in Waves
- It Takes a War
J
K
- Kaamos
- Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru (The Frog for Whom the Bell Tolls)
- Keyboard Sports
- Knights of Pen and Paper
L
- Layers of Fear
- Legend of Grimrock 2
- Library of Ruina
- Little-Known Galaxy
- A Little to the Left
- Lost Nova
- Lucid
M
- Machinika: Museum
- Magicka
- Marble Mayhem: Fragile Ball
- Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle
- Minami Lane
- Monaco: What's Yours Is Mine
- Mr Rescue
N
O
P
- The Pedestrian
- Pie in the Sky
- Pikuniku
- Pinball Spire
- Pixel Wheels
- Pokemon Trading Card Game 2
- Pokémon: Kanto Expansion Pak
- Polarity
- Poly Bridge 2
- Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom
- Programming Factory
- Proteus
- Pseudoregalia
- pureya
- Pyre
Q
R
S
- Sanicball
- Say No! More
- Serial Cleaner
- Seven: Enhanced Edition
- The Shapeshifting Detective
- shapez
- Sir, You Are Being Hunted
- SMIB: Mission Cure
- SOMA
- Sonic GT
- Still There
- Strange Horticulture
- Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical
- Styx: Shards of Darkness
- Subnautica 2
- Subserial Network
- SUMMERHOUSE
- Sunblaze
- Super Mining Mechs
- SuperTuxKart
- SYMMETRY
T
- Tails Noir
- Tales of the Neonsea
- Tametsi
- The Textorcist: The Story of Ray Bibbia
- theBlu
- THOR.N
- Tinykin
- Touhou Mystia's Izakaya
- Transistor
- Tunnet
- Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane
U
V
W
X
Y
Z
Full Game List (by week)
Week 1
- 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim
- Aris Arcanum
- Assault on Proxima
- AtmaSphere
- Blue Maiden
- Death and Taxes
- DigDigDrill
- Donna: The Canine Quest
- FINAL FANTASY IV
- Hades
- Hatoful Boyfriend
- Marble Mayhem: Fragile Ball
- Monaco: What's Yours Is Mine
- Not Tonight 2
- The Pedestrian
- Pokémon: Kanto Expansion Pak
- Polarity
- Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom
- Ravenswatch
- Serial Cleaner
- The Shapeshifting Detective
- shapez
- Strange Horticulture
- The Textorcist: The Story of Ray Bibbia
- Vartio
- Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom
Week 2
- 911 Operator
- Agent Intercept
- Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
- Bendy and the Ink Machine
- Berserk Boy
- Cards and Towers
- Curious Expedition
- Doki Doki Literature Club
- Dorfromantik
- Heeey! Park-Boy
- Hello Neighbour
- Hue
- The Hundred Line - Last Defense Academy
- Knights of Pen and Paper
- Library of Ruina
- Lucid
- Machinika: Museum
- Node Farm
- Ocean's Heart
- Pokemon Trading Card Game 2
- Programming Factory
- Pyre
- Say No! More
- Sir, You Are Being Hunted
- SOMA
- Subserial Network
- Tametsi
- THOR.N
- Transistor
- Understand
- Wolfenstein: The Old Blood
Week 3
- Analogue: A Hate Story
- Blast Rush LS
- Bomb Rush Cyberfunk
- Breakneck
- Broken Age
- Bubsy 3D: Bubsy Visits the James Turrell Retrospective
- Camera Obscura
- co-open
- Death's Door
- Delver
- Doki Doki Literature Club
- Dokimon: Quest
- Elephant in the Room
- Fields of Fortune
- Forgotten 23
- Gamedec
- Generation Zero
- Guild of Darksteel
- Infectionator 3: Apocalypse
- Invisible, Inc.
- Kaamos
- Layers of Fear
- Legend of Grimrock 2
- A Little to the Left
- Lost Nova
- Mr Rescue
- Nex Machina
- Oxenfree
- Poly Bridge 2
- Pseudoregalia
- pureya
- Seven: Enhanced Edition
- Styx: Shards of Darkness
- Sunblaze
- Touhou Mystia's Izakaya
- Tunnet
- Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
- Wanderlust: Rebirth
- Woten
- You Suck at Parking
Week 4
- Alt-Frequencies
- Another Crab's Treasure
- Baba Is You
- Beyond Blue
- Cat Quest 2
- Crash Time - Undercover
- Crescent Bay
- Doc Clock: The Toasted Sandwich of Time
- Dreadhalls
- Dead Space Demake
- Escape First Alchemist (x2)
- Fabledom
- Gods Will Be Watching
- Haimrik
- Hexcells Plus
- Hive Jump
- Immortals Fenyx Rising
- Infinite Air with Mark McMorris
- Intergalactic Bubbles
- Ironclad Tactics
- Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru (The Frog for Whom the Bell Tolls)
- Keyboard Sports
- Magicka
- Minami Lane
- NUTS
- Out There Somewhere
- Pie in the Sky
- Quern - Undying Thoughts
- Quiet City
- Ritual of Raven
- Rogue Mansion
- Roman Sands
- SMIB: Mission Cure
- Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical
- Still There
- Subnautica 2
- SUMMERHOUSE
- SuperTuxKart
- Tales of the Neonsea
- The Ball
- theBlu
- Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane
- ZODIAC XX
Week 5(ish)
- 60 Parsecs!
- Ape Escape
- Cargo! - The quest for gravity
- Chains
- Coffee Talk Tokyo
- DEAD LETTER DEPT.
- Droplitz
- Electronic Super Joy
- Halfway
- Hate Plus
- Homebody
- The House in Fata Morgana
- I Am Legion: Stand Survivors
- Interactivity: The Interactive Experience
- It Comes in Waves
- It Takes a War
- JARS
- Little-Known Galaxy
- Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle
- Nexuiz
- Nexuiz BETA
- Nexuiz STUPID Mode
- Octahedron
- Pikuniku
- Pinball Spire
- Pixel Wheels
- Proteus
- Sanicball
- Sonic GT
- Super Mining Mechs
- SYMMETRY
- Tails Noir
- Tinykin
- Vigil: Blood Bitterness
- Zoombinis
20 votes -
Decades of effort restore steelhead and salmon passage on California's Alameda Creek
9 votes -
Angelo De Augustine - Angel in Plainclothes (2026)
1 vote -
It's not just X. It's Y.
29 votes -
RednasVGM - Ocarina of Time Soundtrack, featuring The Beatles (2026)
1 vote -
Hackers used Meta’s AI support bot to seize Instagram accounts
18 votes -
Why Chevron and PG&E are spending millions in California to boost Xavier Becerra
8 votes -
What change would make you quit Tildes?
I'm curious to see how many have as strong opinions as me about Tildes. I'll go first. I'd quit if the site shifted away from a text-only philosophy.
57 votes -
Overworld - A video game news aggregator by Wavelengths
9 votes -
The fall of the theorem economy
18 votes -
The dead economy theory
26 votes -
Thorium – MG42 (2026)
1 vote -
Who’s buying SpaceX and Anthropic?
Both are filing for IPOs. Are y'all buying at launch? I think I will.
31 votes -
Konsta Helenius scored the golden goal that gave Finland a 1-0 victory over Switzerland in the finals of the 2026 IIHF World Championship
3 votes -
What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them?
What have you been playing lately? Discussion about video games and board games are both welcome. Please don't just make a list of titles, give some thoughts about the game(s) as well.
22 votes -
Hi, how are you? Mental health support and discussion thread (June 2026)
This is a monthly thread for those who need it. Vent, share your experiences, ask for advice, talk about how you are doing. Let's make this a compassionate space for all who may need one.
17 votes -
What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking?
What food and drinks have you been enjoying (or not enjoying) recently? Have you cooked or created anything interesting? Tell us about it!
5 votes -
Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of June 1
This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate...
This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate topic, but almost all should be posted in here.
This is an inherently political thread; please try to avoid antagonistic arguments and bickering matches. Comment threads that devolve into unproductive arguments may be removed so that the overall topic is able to continue.
17 votes -
Wesley So leads Norway Chess 2026 after a bloody round six that ended in three decisive results – inflicted a second consecutive loss on Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu
2 votes -
CGA-2026-06 🦇🧛♀️🔥 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
COLOSSAL GAME ADVENTURES PRESENTS: 🦇🧛♀️🔥 Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow Yarrr! Now it be me... [ahem] Sorry, we're out of Pirates!. Now it's ACTUALLY my time to post! Let's set the scene. Looking...
COLOSSAL GAME ADVENTURES PRESENTS: 🦇🧛♀️🔥 Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Yarrr! Now it be me... [ahem] Sorry, we're out of Pirates!. Now it's ACTUALLY my time to post! Let's set the scene. Looking for a nice summary last month, I found this one from TCRF:
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow is a Castlevania game that, shock, isn't about one of the Belmonts! Instead, we get some white-haired emo kid that happens to have the ability to absorb souls.
... Thanks, TCRF. I'll spoiler the writeup for the sake of scrolling through twice.
Some background: Dracula in your Pocket
Unfortunately, as a slap in the face to my thirties, the GBA is a decidedly proper "retro" console. That shouldn't really be a surprise, though, as it's a distinctly 16-bit console with many parallels to SNES hardware. Sampled audio, mode 7 graphics... But only a little 240x160 screen. Despite that, a few companies managed to pack in some very robust experiences on the hardware.
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow is the third GBA Castlevania entry; before it came Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance. At the time, these were pretty well-received - Circle was nominated for a few awards and sold ~500k copies. Harmony wasn't quite as universally acclaimed, but sold a respectable 120k in America. It flopped in Japan.
That said, nowadays the first two titles aren't esteemed quite as well. Circle is a very polarizing title. Some appreciate the mechanics and exploration, while others detest it for some awful control scheme decisions. The GBA display did not suit its dark color palate well, and playing it on original hardware without a backlight is asking for eye strain. Since it was made by a different team than the contemporary Castlevania devs headed by Koji Igarashi, he swept Circle under the rug when it came to establishing a Castlevania timeline. (I have not played it myself yet, though I suspect my wrists are not ready for the impending RSI of a double-tap dpad run command.)
Where Circle's experimental bits get love, Harmony of Dissonance has really not aged well for many. Igarashi was looking to get a Symphony of the Night experience in a mobile form factor by design, but this meant a pretty conservative approach. He unfortunately left the comparison open - at a time when you can play both games on the same device - to call Harmony "SotN at home". The aesthetics are kind of nutty as well; the team flew in the opposite direction of Circle by making things - especially Juste Belmont - glow with a very garish set of vibrant blues, reds, and greens, on top of purple and sky blue backgrounds. This was to REALLY stand out without a backlight. Boy do they. The soundtrack was also compressed to save room on the cartridge, leading to a reputation as one of the worst Castlevania soundtracks in a pretty musically-storied franchise. (With some proper sampling, I love it! Played back on the little high-pass GBA speaker, though, stuff like this really grates.)
Igarashi and his team had another shot on the platform. This time, they nailed something special in the coffin.
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Aria takes place in the year 2035, quite farther ahead than anything else in the series. Japanese transfer student
and fashionista boy band dreamboatSoma Cruz is hanging out with his friend and shrine maiden Mina Hakuba to observe a solar eclipse. In doing so, he finds himself warped to the eclipse itself, where Dracula's Castle has been imprisoned. There, an enigmatic man introduces him to his unknown power - the dominion over monsters' souls to use for himself. Trying to find his way out of the castle, he meets a few other mysterious figures who are there for various reasons and agendas... I'll leave the rest of the plot to you to discover.Now, we're not quite at 2035. (I think bell bottoms are back? I don't see the fur coats and flame boots yet.) However, it is 2026 now, and much like the cycle of Dracula's castle, last year's most hyped release was a 2D Metroidvania! Konami just announced the first 2D Metroidvania in a very long time, and they and the Dead Cells dev team will be fighting a forest which they all themselves planted. But looking backwards, despite over two decades of iterative work on this genre, Aria has plenty that stands out - not just against Castlevania's run of six games over about seven or eight years, but arguably still today in a very crowded genre.
First off, this game is eight megabytes small. It's nipping at its big brother Symphony's heels in scope, despite it being a little over one percent of SotN's CD file size, and some crazies like me still prefer it. The team made damn good use of that space after learning their mistakes from Harmony.
Despite that little size, it's a memorable adventure! I hope you enjoy it. I find Aria's main strength is setting a pace and size which it meets and rarely over- or under-stays. It's also an aesthetic crown jewel for the GBA platform; the colors still accommodate the hardware, but there's much more mastery of the system. Flowing water, the flickering moon, bats flying off in the distance... It captures the gothic feel of the castle in a more subtle way. And while I'm fond of Harmony's, uh. Dissonance, the sound design is much tighter here. Some little bits of lore and character interactions help color the adventure, and it creates plenty of space for your head to fill in the gaps, too. (Konami! J prequel when??)
The game has a number of neat secrets that I'll let you discover. So - I'll leave you to it!
...Or, if you'd like, I won't! Since Aria isn't the most obscure game, some of you may have played it. With that - or, to kick off some discussion of the game's flaws - I'd like to pivot into a new topic here!
Mods
Aria of Sorrow is great, but there are a few rough edges. Notably, the stats are a little fucky - Wit barely influences item or soul drop rate. Int is also a little weak, not influencing your bullet souls much. The colors still acquiesce to the mix of GBA and GBA SP screens, a bit too washed on modern displays. Weapon balance is a bit off, due to one particularly dominating choice.
Of course, with that 8 MB filesize, numerical problems are just a hex edit away! Bump some values around and you maybe can "solve" these problems. But is that better? Worse? In line with the developers, or a bastardization of their vision? The most powerful tool in the hands of modern video game players? Does it ruin a shared conversation of art, or does it stoke it?
For what it's worth, I personally fell off Super Metroid about three times until I applied a patch that gave Samus movement closer to the GBA games. Modding sometimes just opens up options or tastes to us - and I think when it comes to pure enjoyment, go buck wild. So I invite people to try it and see what you think!
As always, I'm a slut for randomizers and Aria rando seems fairly robust. But since I suspect I will eventually play that in Archipelago many times, I think instead I'm going to try a slew of new hacks and throw them together to see what happens. Weapons modifications! Color palate changes! Vegan items? Sure, why not! I'll post what I go with in the end.
As always, mark ya spoilers as such with the following text block:
<details> <summary>Spoilers</summary> Spoiler text goes here. </details>
Game Setup
A couple years ago, Konami released the Castlevania Advanced Collection with Circle, Harmony, the SNES version of Dracula X, and Aria. This is pretty much the only way to legally obtain Aria nowadays - and if I'm not mistaken, it includes the .gba ROM in case you'd like to play it in a way other than the official emulator. (Someone fact check me on that...)
The main purpose of this topic is to get people up and running with the game. As such, it's recommended that you:
- Share which version of the game you're playing
- Share what hardware you're playing it on
- Share if there are any tools/mods that you recommend
- Share anything you think is important for people to know before they start the game
- Share if you ever cosplay as Soma Cruz
- Ask questions if you need help
Another purpose of this topic is to revisit the game and its time period:
Do you have any memories or associations with this game itself? What about its system or era? What aspects of retro gaming were common at the time? What other games from the same time period are you familiar with? What are you expecting from this game in particular? Which Castlevania game has the best Death fight?FAQ
What is CGA?
Colossal Game Adventure (CGA) is Tildes' retro video game club.
Each month we will play a different retro game/games, discuss our thoughts, and bask in the glorious digital experiences of yesteryear!
Colossal Game Adventure is a reference to Colossal Cave Adventure. It's one of the most influential games of all time, one of the first text-based interactive games, and one of the first games to be shared online.
What do we want to do with this group? Play influential games; interact with each other through text; and share the love for retro games online!
It also abbreviates to CGA (because we love chunky pixel art), and its name communicates the Colossal amount of fun and excitement that we have with retro video Games in our shared Adventure of playing them together.
Do I have to sign up?
No. Participation is open to all.
There is a Notification List that will get pinged each time a new topic goes up. If you would like to join that list, please PM u/kfwyre.
Are there restrictions on what/how to play?
Each month will have a focus game or games that will guide our discussions. Beyond that, there are no restrictions. The philosophy of CGA is to play in a way that works for you!
This means:
- Choose whichever version of the game you want.
- You can use cheats, save states, mods, etc.
- You can watch a streamer or longplay instead of playing it.
If you have already played a game and want a different experience:
- Try a randomizer or challenge run.
- Play a different version of it.
- Play a related game (sequel, spiritual successor, something inspired by it, etc.)
There is no wrong way to participate in CGA, and every different way someone participates will make for more interesting discussions.
What is the schedule?
Each month the Insert Cartidge topic will be posted on the 1st, while the Remove Cartridge topic will be posted on the 28th.
Nomination and voting topics will happen in March and September (every 6 months).
Schedules are also posted then.
All CGA topics are available using the
colossal game adventuretag.What do Insert and Remove Cartridge mean?
Inserting and removing cartridges are our retro metaphor for starting and stopping a given game or games.
The Insert Cartridge topic happens at the beginning of the month and is primarily about getting the game up and running.
The Remove Cartridge topic happens toward the end of the month and is primarily about people reflecting on the game now that they've played it.
There are no hard restrictions on what has to go in either topic, and each can be used to discuss the game, post updates, ask questions, etc.
15 votes -
Do we want to stop all crime?
I was driving just now, and having a thought experiment with myself. I'll preface this that I have virtually no philosophy background, so if this is endlessly retreaded material, forgive me in...
I was driving just now, and having a thought experiment with myself.
I'll preface this that I have virtually no philosophy background, so if this is endlessly retreaded material, forgive me in advance.
With all of the talk about AI enabled security cameras, drone surveillance, digital fingerprinting and other technologies of the last few years, this topic has been top of mind for me. These technologies are being sold primarily with the goal of stopping crime, and improving public safety. There are obviously tons of issues with all of these technologies regarding bias, privacy, and so on, but I wanted to distill their pitch down to first principles, that is: is it even desirable to live in a world with perfect law enforcement?
Come with me on a magical thought experiment, and put aside real world law enforcement concerns like racism, invasive surveillance, weaponization, and all of the other problems with police for a moment.
Imagine we lived in a world where if someone committed a crime, they were instantly caught, a speedy trial was given to them, and they were quickly punished. This world does not surveil people who are not committing crimes. It doesn't get the wrong perp ever. It doesn't use excessive force to apprehend them. It doesn't selectively enforce laws against people it doesn't like.
It's as perfect of a law enforcement apperatus as we can possibly imagine. It's the fantasy that all of these security vendors and tech bros are trying to sell to us. Imagine that world is not only possible, but real.
Even with all of those caveats, would that desirable?
There's something to me that still feels dystopian about not being able to get away with crime under any circumstances.
Is it possible that we all have this quiet compulsion and drive inside us that we think that some amount of crime is desirable in society? Do we secretly want the option of doing crime and getting away with it if the need arises?
I can't quite pin down why I want crime to still exist at some low, simmering level, but I also can't ignore the fact that I do, and that when I imagine an entirely crime free society, it feels oppressive and stifling in my head, even though in this thought experiment, it's as perfect as can be. I think I'd probably feel differently if I had ever been the victim of some horrible crime, maybe? But I have been robbed, hit and run, and so on, and I still feel this way, so maybe not.
Has anyone else had a good think about this? Anyone else feel similar? Any possible explanations?
33 votes -
The loneliness of the competitive quizzer
9 votes -
Denmark's Jonas Vingegaard has become the eighth cyclist to win all three of the men's Grand Tours by securing the Giro d'Italia in Rome
9 votes -
My Accessibility Stack and the future on Wayland
29 votes -
How to prevent mold growth under weight mats
Hey all! I'm currently cleaning out the basement and rearranging some things after my brother in law has moved out. He spent the better part of every afternoon down here working out and (I'm...
Hey all!
I'm currently cleaning out the basement and rearranging some things after my brother in law has moved out. He spent the better part of every afternoon down here working out and (I'm assuming) sweating (figuratively) gallons. I pulled the mats up to move em around and was hit with a deep earthy smell which made me IMMEDIATELY panic. There was only one super dark spot which was immediately washed off with warm soapy water and steel wool. There are other places that don't look too bad, but I am seeing markings on the floor elsewhere that match the pattern of the interlocking mat.
I'd like to keep working out down here, but I'd also like to not cause mold problems in my own house. Can anyone think of a way to essentially insulate the mat from the cement floor without creating a different problem where the plastic bottom ALSO creates an environment for the mold to grow? It's also possible that I'm WAY blowing this out of proportion...
I'll include pics on a follow up post
13 votes