welcome to extrospection.

July 2, 2025, 9:52 AM

Yo.

Honestly I've been having a lot of thoughts lately so I've decided to make this section of the website so that my brain doesn't explode (or implode!). Everyone needs some sort of outlet (of the non-electrical variety) in their lives, so extrospection was made for that purpose.

So let me talk about some of the manga I've read for the past year or so and my general thoughts on them:

• Sailor Moon
• The first arc was really good! It establishes the characters quite well and the backstory of the lost lunar kingdom was introduced naturally! After the second or third arc or so it kinda fell off for me. Maybe I need to see the anime adaptation of it someday...
• Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind
• As SOON as I saw the movie I knew I had to read it. One presidential election later and I got my hands on two beefy books that contained the entire thing. I highly recommend watching the movie before reading because a lot of the worldbuilding from it is changed and greatly expanded on in the manga. A lot of characters are also changed from the movie. Kushana's character is very different from it, for example. She's honestly more on the side of neutral leaning good in my opinion. The art depicting the post-apoc setting is also fantastic, as is expected. There's one spread in the second book I have of Nausicaa gliding over the herd of Ohmu that's one of my favorite-looking parts of the book. All in all, you should get it.
• No. 5
• This is a very interesting series of four books which I have. I'm honestly not sure what to make of it and it was kinda hard to follow at times but I dig the artstyle. In the second half of the series, I think the main character, the titular No. 5, takes a back seat to No. 1 which I found mildly dissapointing, but the ending of the manga feels like the ending of the game OFF in a way, though I feel that the world of No. 5 is in a much more optimistic trajectory than OFF's for obvious reasons.

I'm gonna have to make a separate entry for the entirety of Junji Ito's work because holy hell I read a lot of this man's work...

I suppose that's all for now... see you next time.

One more thing. I am EXTREMELY dissapointed that I used frickin markdown when coding this entry lmao...

July 3, 2025, 6:32 PM

Yo.

Have you ever had a moment where you're so focused on gaming that you forget about literally everything around you?

That happened when I played modded Terraria today. Made my way all the way up to the Devourer of Gods (who took the most attempts out of any boss to beat, though the pack I'm playing with is pretty easy given I'm doing expert revengeance). Anyways HOLY SHIT Wrath of the Gods has content! Solyn is a very neat character and I am very scared of the dimensional rift that is now blocking the sun and causing an ice age...

Also Fargo's souls is neat... maybe I'll use it with an Infernum playthrough next world... tho I am def removing Community Remix and the piss mod from the pack because they exist solely to be a menace.

I'm gonna get back to dtawing now.

July 4, 2025, 9:08 PM

Yo.

Ended up playing more modded Terraria today. Wrath of the Gods is a good mod, though I encountered a few game-breaking bugs... well technically one that bugs out the overlay. Shame! I guess I'll have to leave that world in purgatory whilst I wait for those to get patched... or perhaps it might be with one of the mods fuckin around with it, who knows.

Speaking of games, I finally got my grubby little hands on FRACTAL BLOCK WORLD!!!!

While the dungeons I find kinda tedious it is more than made up for in the exploration factor alone, along with the size-changing mechanic. You shrink/grow pretty rapidly via usage of green/red rings (specifically, each changes your size by a factor of 16 (or 1/16 if you're shrinking)). This is honestly what puts the Fractal in Fractal Block World; if you use the green ring 6 times, a block that said green ring was next to would be the size of the entire earth... assuming that that block is a cubic meter.

Talk about depth!

I also got Caves of Qud today... I'll try it out tomorrow.

July 5, 2025, 7:36 PM

Yo.

Ended up playing a lot of Fractal Block World today. I really enjoy it, and I especially like how the cannon's secondary (right-click) mode allows you to watch as your enemies are obliterated one by one by a homing projectile that bounces through enemies... Shame I couldn't get through the third level of the stoney caves... there are FAR too many menaces in there for me to just go in right now.

Just look at that above image! There is so much to explore and I know I haven't even scraped the surface of the metaphorical iceberg...

Also tried out Qud today. I got stoned to death by baboons at Red Rock. The game's atmosphere is really great and I love the sound design especially. I'll have to play it more.

Another Saturday comes and goes...

July 5, 2025, 8:28 PM

Yo.

Honestly I just wanna say one more thing. Or rather, talk about one more thing.

Moriwo recently did an update on Yume 2kki and I saw people absolutely bitch and moan about it. Foliage Estate got revamped and people hated it. So I went there recently to check out what all the hubbub was about.

Verdict: it isn't that bad of a map.

Even if the music is still the same as last time, the whole map gives me a 90s PSX type of vibe which can be best demonstrated by showcasing its visuals:

For comparison, here is an image of Foliage Estate pre-overhaul:

While I do like both versions of the map, I kinda feel like people's outrage over it is a sign of how cynical the part of the community I'm in is currently. Maybe I'm overreacting a bit: people don't really like changes to things they already like, after all.

However, I am still kinda disappointed with the moriwo update. Why? Because they didn't add any new worlds. Yep. They just overhauled Foliage Estate and that was it. I was looking forward to some new worlds from them, but nothing on that front dropped. It's unfortunate, but I have to bide my time...

Now, back to drawing...

July 8, 2025, 7:41 PM

Yo.

Ended up playing a LOT of Cornerpond today. Dunno why but I am afraid to touch Caves of Qud again because I might fuck up... but fucking up is obviously a part of the gameplay. Literally there's an achievement for dying the first time in any playthrough. I will build up my courage and dive into it tomorrow.

Also played some Fractal Block World. The scale of the game is honestly something I can't get over. You should play it. Speaking of which, you can add music to the game. There's a section of the dev's website that has a template you can download which has folders corresponding to all the sections of the world which you can put mp3 or ogg files in. You can find it here. I added some Super Mario 64 music along with songs from Yugioh Forbidden Memories and the PC-98 version of EVO Search for Eden among other things. Also have some images of the environments of the game:

I should also say that the Internet Archive has a lot of gems when it comes to videogame OSTs...

July 10, 2025, 9:41 PM

Yo.

Remember that post about me being disappointed in moriwo? Well that disappointment has...

ENTIRELY VANISHED.

moriwo not only reworked whispering sewers but also added TWO NEW WORLDS!!! I'm not spoiling them. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content. You will witness the new content.

July 20, 2025, 2:56 PM

Yo.

It's been a while, but I would like to not discard this section forever maybe perhaps!

Anyways, did you ever get the urge to do something spontaneously in a fit of ... I dunno how to describe it... but uh, yeah, that kinda happened today when I spat out an entire story today (you may find it in the short story corner.). Dunno what came over me but I had to write something.

Dunno what to call it but the closest analog is the fey moods from Dwarf Fortress. You ever have something similar?

November 9, 2025, 6:50 PM

Yo.

I am still alive, just haven't really bothered to work on the site until now. I've been rewriting my Persona fanfiction for a while now, am considering whether or not to keep or get rid of the original. I'll try to rewrite up until Jo gets her persona until I publish the rewrite of the fanfiction. Organizing my thoughts on a Google Doc has really helped me a lot with writing the story.

Also did a huge chunk of inktober but I probably won't draw the rest of the prompts. me me lazyyyy...

Also have been playing a lot of spiral knights since August. Even if the game is almost dead I am still having fun with it. The grind, tho... the grind...

November 15, 2025, 6:22 PM

Yo.

I have been playing far too much spiral knights for my own good... the mmo grindset is fully taken hold of me... anyways, as I write this I'm currently working on a drawing of Suintha that I'll be putting on my Bluesky later tonight hopefully...

Speaking of my persona fanfic, I cannot decide what persona I want Momiji to awaken to after her fake Yuki-Onna facade shatters. I want its lore to mirror her arc (i.e. longing for home whilst in a foreign land) fairly closely... I will have to do more research.

November 18, 2025, 9:50 AM

Yo.

I really should get to writing the rewritten persona story soon... funny thing about that, I got the perfect idea for Momiji's persona just after the Nov. 15th post. While the figure does mirror her arc, it also contrasts with her initial state of mind coming into Bridgepoint, which I think is quite suitable for her end state of mind. I just need to get this shit on: the road...

I really need to draw some illustrations for this story too... it's honestly a good idea because putting stuff in art will allow the text to be unburdened by adapting the game mechanics to a story format. That happens to be one of my big pet peeves when it comes to fics of that franchise. The more it flows like a story, the better the entire fic becomes.

I got a lot of inspiration for this fic from various different sources (games, books, etc. (man I should read more)) which I wanna talk about. I categorized them into the following on the google doc I'm writing the story in:

• Main

  The King in Yellow

  I was introduced to this book via Flawed Peacock's excellent analysis video done as a "bite-sized prelude to Signalis" (bite-sized being used quite liberally) and grabbed an annotated copy for myself. While I have a stronger affinity for the first four stories like a lot of other people I'm thankful that Mr. Floppy gave the last six a proper look as well. Maybe I should read it again, it's been a while.

  Lovecraft's works.

  Even if he was a bit of a racist (😨 😨 😨) I still like some of his stuff... plus the persona series wore lovecraftian influences on its sleeve (this was much more explicit in the first two games plus a bit of the third semester in 5) so it's a natural fit.

  Junji Ito's works

  By far one of my favorite manga authors. I read a lot of his stuff (inc. Uzumaki, Tomie, Gyo) and really liked it. Glad I came into his stuff blind, personally. The vibe especially of an ever-present horror manifesting itself into a town as seen in Uzumaki is something that will probably show up in the story

• Environment/Mind Palace Designs

  Valle Verde

  This series has some really awesome environments, especially in the Alamo where all the weird symbolic stuff the rogue AI made gets discarded into. It was in fact my main environment design influence for the version of the persona story that's currently up on the site, but I'm taking a lot more cues from other sources.

  Kowloon's Gate

  This game is a quite surreal experience that involves a lot of convoluted shit happening in an alternate version of the infamous City of Anarchy... the real place's environment is something that I and a lot of people find captivating, and it is in fact the source I'm gonna take a lot of cues from when it comes to designing the shadow world; some parts of it will be claustrophobic, filled with pipes, stores, paths going to nowhere, while other parts will be more open. Navigating a maze of a world to find lost memories is something I find quite fitting for the story.

  Psychonauts

  Probably a minor source of inspiration but holy balls does the game share a lot in common with persona in terms of... uh... I dunno, exploring the literal mind dungeons of people!!!

  Spiral Knights

  Oh boy this MMO has consumed a lot of my life. You can see some of the dungeons in images above this very post, in fact. I'm def taking some inspiration from this game's dungeons...

• Monster Designs

  deSPIRIA

  This game is yet another surreal experience from the same game studio (who I unfortunately can't recall the name of as I'm writing this) behind Hellnight. As for monster design inspiration, just look at the minds present within the game. Minds in deSPIRIA are kinda similar to demons in the SMT franchise (the game even has a fusion system) and they look really neat. I gotta search for images of them for my story's illustrations. Shoutout to Marsh for introducing me to the game (and SMT by extension, tho RTGame dragged me into it further).

  Valle Verde

  In addition to the Alamo, there's also the monsters that lurk inside it. That one thing that flies in to jumpscare the viewer in episode 1 iirc is one example that I find pretty cool. Then there's also the flying golden Moloch that a robot is sacrificed to in episode 3 as another example. I borrowed a lot from this series in the first version of the story...

November 23, 2025, 7:35 PM

Yo.

I have reason to believe that I'm done with chapters 1-4 of the fic... which means it's nearly ready to get out onto the website! I just gotta do some drawings for it that I'll add to the story (doing this on the suggestion of one of my online pals). It's turning out really different, but I like what I've got so far. Hopefully it'll stay that way...

Also I forgor to mention Godhusk in my last post. Once I remembered it, I knew I had to use it for some environment/monster inspo in the future. Go get it if you haven't. It's by the same artist behind VERMIS and it's awesome!

Also I forgor to mention that I'm likely gonna be making a playlist with music that fits with the story... yeah I'm going full effort into this...

November 29, 2025, 12:11 PM

Yo.

I'm very pleased that I managed to publish the first four chapters of the New Revised Version of the persona story today... I would've liked to illustrate more things but I just needed to get shit out there lmoa...

Anyways I made sure to outline more things in the Google doc so that I have a better idea of what to write next... I have a few other illustrations I want to make as well and each of them will be put in the relevant chapters. I still need to make the music playlist too lmoa

November 29, 2025, 6:52 PM

Yo.

Managed to conquer yet another Shadow Lair in Spiral Knights today, but I forgor to upload the screenshots... oh well, I'll put them up tomorrow.

I can't believe the year is almost over, man... I just wanna rewind back and stay in the same moment forever sometimes. But time moves in one direction and I've gotta live with that.

I just started work on Chapter 5 of the persona story. I wanna get as much done today and tomorrow and publish it on the site. Creating this is one of the things I find enjoyment doing, even if part of me feels it to be a bit cringe sometimes lmoa...

December 4, 2025, 10:02 AM

Yo.

I was very stoked to have gotten City of Darkness by Girard and Lambot (the revised 2014 edition), but holy balls is it a fucking chonker of a book. JUST LOOK AT THIS MASSIVE FUCKING BOOK!

I'll have to read into it a lot more, the photos do a really awesome job of capturing the lost, legendary slum that was the Walled City of Darkness... the descrptions in there reminded me that there are a lot more senses than just sight and touch too lmoa

December 6th, 2025, 6:19 PM

Yo.

Recently found out about a band by the name of Der Eisenrost (that is German for "The Iron Rust" if I'm translating correctly) thanks to this video on Godhusk. It has some absolute jams within it and I highly recommend that you give it a listen. As for the band itself, based on some research it appears to be based in Tokyo and was formed in 1993. Their album Armored Weapon is what the video revealed to me and it's a very nice listen. Mayhaps I'll add it to the playlist once I get around to making that.