Bloom

Seriously though i didn't see half of these coming

MORE GROUNDED WOOO

Completely avoiding mentioning the Halo TV show is for the best

WOOO MORE INDIANA JONES. Last thing I thought we'd see but this is great news

Why did meatboy come out of the Mario pipe lol?

Happy for more meatboy though

More plague tale is always welcome

Anyone know what impulse triggers on the Xbox ally are? Is that just fancy marketing for hair trigger settings?

Xbox ally is interesting. Happy that it pushes play anywhere forward. Gotta see how the performance compares to the series X|S

Really hyped to play high on life 2. Crazy first reveal

@reckless.bsky.social Rewatching the Android Show and Google I/O... feels like google really did their best to avoid talking about the smart home. No indication of "Gemini in your home"

Especially with Alexa+ Launching at some point this year, feels a bit conspicuous that its missing

We need to normalize photo mode in videogames

I'm building out this profile to have quite a bit of posts, in order to to use it for testing stuff with AT Proto. So forgive me, folks who followed me through a starter pack, for I'll be appearing in your following feeds for a short time longer

I mostly play single player games but monster hunter wilds seems pretty interesting. Can anyone tell me if it's a good singleplayer experience?

Have you considered a Motorola RAZR? They nailed the cover display experience. Its less hassle to setup and even has an app switcher

Everyone go play Avowed. Its really good. Nothing more needs to be said

Also, its not like every Natlan character is good everywhere in the region. They are also specific to their areas near their tribes. There is little water near the children of echoes for Mualani to surf much like there is little mountain for Xilonen to ride in the Flower Feather Clan.

This also means that in a year when we leave Natlan, or even sooner when we have events outside Natlan the value of these characters plummets. This also affects pulling strats. Why pull for Mavuika if shes only good in Natlan while Furina can walk on water anywhere?

Being in Natlan grants additional duration and the full set of movement abilities much like their respective saurian. When leaving Natlan they have a far too small duration, and some functionality removed. So Natlaners are worth it only in Natlan, a restriction not shared by other characters

Electrograna are everywhere in Inazuma and no character will replace its functionality. Natlan characters not only are a better versions of the Saurians (a topic for another day) but without said character or saurian locks out that area's mechanics entirely.

Then we have the value of these characters. Pre-5.0 characters had a set duration on their abilities and a standard cooldown time between usage. Region specific mechanics are present throughout the whole region (where needed) and were character agnostic.

Almost none of the combat moves allow you to both fight and move around. I can mark people with Yelan's ability while running around, I can't keep grappling while grappling onto an enemy, since I also have to move direction and keep firing and find which direction to move to.

Chasca stops flying and starts firing her gun, Kachina gets off of her drill and has it shake the earth. While using the same systems as their traversal systems, their combat does different things. This gives the feeling of this being tacked onto a cool combat idea they had.

Natlan characters all have a unique movement ability that relates to which tribe they originate and said tribe's saurian subspecies. Kinich can grapple, Mualani can ride the waves, Ororon can jump and glide. The thing is that that they also have combat abilities that are entirely separate.

Pre-Natlan traversal characters have their movement action also a combat system. Kazuha jumps to pull in enemies while Yelan runs to mark them. Their movement abilities exist primarily as combat mechanics that was then expanded for exploration. What if Keqing teleports upwards or Sayu keeps rolling.

While not scares there aren't many pre 5.0 characters that have traversal mechanics. Quite a few of them are tied to movement speed, a lot of them are in Anemo characters, and they all last an arbitrary amount that doesn't really change.

I'm not going to talk about design since its so subjective and honestly I like all the designs, and my personal immersion isn't broken by Mavuika's bike. I am going to talk about their value proposition and the implementation of traversal mechanics compared to past characters.

In the 5.3 trailer we have a variation of the Natlan theme as the big finale music, where the Genshin theme would slot in perfectly (especially since its our first story focused on the Abyss and Khaenriah since Mondstadt so it really should have MORE ties to the central theme).

Almost none of the music contains any semblance of the Genshin theme, instead variations of their regions main theme. While this is present in other regions since its the focus of its music, they all tied back to the main theme to show that they are interconnected to the larger world.

Let me say that both of these regions' tracks are amazing, yet dont fit in well with the pre-established format of Genshin's music. The biggest part of is the lack of a Genshin theme in Fontaine and Natlan's music.

While Yu-Peng Chen's tracks contained an undertone of sorrow (its everywhere in Liyue and Inazuma, mostly through their melody or secondary exploration tracks), Fontaine and Natlan contains very little of it, focusing on the "bright" and "fresh" and melodic aspects of Genshin Music.