I've had hella art block so I finally gave in and played videogames. Locked in on Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars this past weekend and played through all the endings. Since playing Inscryption I've been really craving that (reads notes) tabletop role-playing game feel, especially the moody first area on that game, and Voice of Cards has been on my radar for months after seeing the characters on Mudae lol.

The 3D models of the table, player effigy, dice and whatnot are polished enough to get you into the tabletop vibe, along with the lightning, and the art on the cards is quite beautiful. Also loved the way cards are affected to reflect battle status and even just the way the characters feel, like MC in this screenshot looking tattered lol the game is narrated by the game master, and there's enough personality sprinkled on that the narrator becomes his own person without becoming a whole person that affects the story: snoring if you don't move on the map, some small comments on the characters and on you if you're playing in a silly way (like trying to do a dungeon that requires an item to traverse), stumbling with character's name pronunciation, things like that. Very charming. Music was great as well.

It's not a HUGELY AMAZING game but it was a very nice experience and I liked it enough to want to get every ending, which is rare. I'm a hoarder and I love paper stuff but I have sweaty hands, so these types of videogames with beautiful cards scratch an itch I don't get to indulge on in real life. Also this is my first Yoko Taro experience lol cool.

The mixed reviews on Steam kept me from giving it a go, and sure, it is quite short I guess if you go straight to your established goal. I love doing everything but that, so I spent a lot of time exploring the maps and I felt quite satisfied. The card aesthetic really paid off in my opinion with reveal of the final boss, ahh so beautiful, linked a gameplay video to show it with the time stamp below (44:52 to 46:00).

(Also nobody cares but I really wanted to share this bit and spent too long looking for a peertube instance to make an account to upload it and worrying about file size but then thought "what's the point mate it must be on YouTube already" ANYWAY please look at this beautiful. wonderful reveal.)

https://youtu.be/VWyxU4ljues?list=PL0w8Te9HdCC7g77d8VRLKAZTPjHVFZpcX&t=2693

#voiceofcards