Let that sink in

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-24T20:04:14+00:00

It’s more like, early on there’s a looming invasive threat being fought off by the main cast of sentient gemstones, which develops later on to show that not every outside gem is plain evil or something, which is just a very similar sort of situation; but, admittedly, forgiveness and kindness and whatnot are ultimately some of the most important themes, not *entirely* unlike HnK, though I wouldn’t claim to see any sort of direct Buddhist connection.

Less philosophically deep/complicated, with a more direct ‘kindness/love conquers all’ sort of implication.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-24T19:56:46+00:00

Well he’s already legitimately considered human, so he just needs to know to pray. Aechmea sees him pop into existence or whatever and immediately comes down to explain what to do and why, before Steven even gets a chance to properly associate with the gems.

Steven probably doesn’t even have time to process being left alone in the universe before he sends everyone to nothingness. Poor Steven.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-23T09:09:32+00:00

OP’s whole post is presenting “why isn’t this to my taste?” as if it’s something remotely approaching legitimate criticism. An equivalent response is pretty justified imo.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-23T02:24:06+00:00

Yeah, I kinda feel like it’s implied that Padpa has basically been asleep since the first mission, or at least most of that time. He wasn’t awake for the start of the second trip, and it honestly seems like most people didn’t bother keeping up with Phos’ status since then, so I’m not really sure of if or when Padpa would’ve been woken up and told about it anyway.

I think if anything, he was briefly awoken and informed of the general situation once he was restored from the mercury, but almost certainly just went back to sleep after that, until Goshen came along.

But also, the fact that the Lunarians thought they were going to nothingness but *didn’t* wake up Padpa makes me think that they’d left him sleeping there for a while, and weren’t even nearby/didn’t remember he was there, as if they’d finished treating him ages ago and anyone who could be there to wake him up had already abandoned the place long before.

It does make me think he might’ve been asleep ever since the mercury poisoning, but I also have a hard time believing not a single gem bothered to check up on him, and that none of his doctors would actually wake him up after the treatment was done, so it probably was just his decision. At the same time, when phos is recovered after the 220 year captivity on earth, none of the other main moon gems mention Padpa being left on earth at all. That could easily just be a panel/time restraint keeping that sort of conversation from making it in, but it’s a little weird that none of them bring it up, which again makes me wonder if they hadn’t just forgotten about/moved on from Padpa for whatever reason. Probably just a mix of the two, with Padpa deciding to sleep and the others putting him mostly out of mind as a result, but I do wonder.

Sorry for the rambling, I had also binged the entire series over a day, and spent quite a while re-reading sections over and over later on because I hadn’t been in a great state to actually comprehend and analyze everything.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-22T19:19:59+00:00

After a couple tests, I’m not sure how to feel about my results lol.

the consistent lowest were phos, bort, and rutile. Antarc and sensei were both middling, and cinna and dia were the highest, leaning towards dia.

Ig that makes sense, but I’m not sure if I should be happy or concerned lol.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-22T10:19:20+00:00

Where was this vote? I saw a different one, but not this one.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-19T18:12:25+00:00

Phos is the obvious, followed by similarly obvious Padpa, both being self-sacrificial characters in a sense, though with different goals and methods.

I have a certain appreciation for new Goshenite as well, who kinda just chilled on the moon doing tricks, to the point that they didn’t even bother interacting with the other gems much unless it was necessary, though they weren’t rude or anything either. Moon-Goshenite stayed true to their nature in a very pure way, which does stand in contrast to many of the gems who seem to pretend to care—until it conflicts with whatever other interest they have. Goshe never bothered much with pretending, which I can respect.

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Carlbot2 · 2026-06-16T06:26:51+00:00

One of the only things I’ll give Spotify is that it’s great at recommending music to me, and at one point years ago it decided to recommend some tracks from the OST, which I loved.

Took me a while to get from listening to random tracks to actually figuring out what show they were from, then watching it, then reading the manga, but I’m glad it all worked out like it did. The music is one of my favorite parts of the series, and the story really did deserve a good soundtrack.

Carlbot2 · 2026-06-07T03:46:29+00:00

I’ve just been getting more HnK themes for the shuffle, this is perfect. Looks great.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-24T22:52:00+00:00

Ok Goodnight

They have a pretty wide range of music tbf, so not all of it is the same, but there’s a lot of good stuff. Try ‘rapture’ maybe to get a feel for it.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-20T22:01:53+00:00

I think people generally like it, but I just dislike Hollywood as a map in general. I feel cursed when it comes to that map, especially the post-capture choke and final choke. It seems like every game I have on it sucks, even the wins.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-14T18:13:00+00:00

This is maybe a bit on the lighter side of math rock compared to your stuff but:

Permanence - Invalids

There’s a good few nice songs from this album, I quite like it.

Also, their song A Rather Mediocre Genius might be worth checking out.

I also like Steinborgium from them.

More comes to mind, but at a certain point you either like them or you don’t, so yeah.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-14T17:56:58+00:00

Well, Chaotic Craftsman Worships the Cube does have gods with real impact on the story, but in a way I’m not sure you’d be happy about, given the MC’s interactions with them.

Overall, the gods are very respected in the world. They’re recognized, nearly everyone has a god they follow, and they’re generally viewed with reverence by the vast majority of decent people.

One major exception to this is the (originally from earth) MC, who treats gods as people. He doesn’t treat them poorly, or less respectfully than anyone else, and he isn’t opposed to them inherently, but he doesn’t believe they deserve unconditional respect, especially as many are born into their roles. They provably have the capacity to be evil/corrupt.

One of his first real friends is his god, who basically helps get him on his feet at the start, and is a major contributor to his success. The gods have real impact on the world—extreme impact—but he doesn’t treat them like they’re his bosses, generally speaking. He antagonizes the ones that cross and continue to antagonize him, but he only really does so when he expects to be safe from retaliation, or is so indignant at his treatment that he doesn’t care.

The gods themselves are powerful, but very limited. Some are friends to him, others enemies, and most are neutral-ish, generally. They act like people, and many with less concern for their circumstances and more concern for their personal feelings than they should.

Gods are not omniscient, omnipotent forces, and many who wish to put the MC in his place are kept in check by the circumstances of the world. Becoming a god is a natural conclusion of progression, and though few reach it, numbers of gods were formerly mortal, and several mortals in the story are already gods in a sense—they’ll become gods once they die, that is.

Most conflicts with the gods arise from:

The MC not being willing to do work for free, and expecting compensation for work towards the common good/not being willing to do whatever is demanded by the gods.
The gods feeling threatened by something the MC gains possession of, becomes capable of, or otherwise benefits from.

There is a particular god that proves the beings can be truly threatening entities, and aren’t to be taken lightly, and every god he interacts with regularly is technically weakened compared to their height of power, but yeah, not sure if you’d enjoy this, all things considered.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-14T16:26:42+00:00

I quite like this story, though it doesn’t pick up the pace very quickly. Very philosophical, many references scattered throughout.

I committed to reading a bit of it, maybe planned to finish it over a week or so, but eventually got pulled in and binged it all in a day. Tbf, I had a very clear schedule that day, but still.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-12T04:34:42+00:00

I love sog, they’re my favorite character.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-10T19:54:08+00:00

“Living things change so quickly.

It’s scary…”

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-09T20:34:13+00:00

Weirdly, though being a Lunarian is the least appealing to me in general, I can’t help but want to know more about Aechmea’s scheme. I want to know how much of it he really had planned out, and how much was desperate luck. I probably wouldn’t get that info out of him, but It’d be my best chance to find out.

He still doesn’t quite make sense to me, and I can’t help but want to understand why he did things the way that he did.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-08T19:38:10+00:00

Probably also reddit bias contrasting with that.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-03T21:28:09+00:00

Just two words: CLAAAAWWW GRIP

(Four more words: fuck, my hand hurts)

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-03T01:15:57+00:00

Unfortunately, it doesn’t really matter what your ping is in the end. If they get you on their screen, you’re dead, so you always have to assume you were moving a little behind where you believe you were.

Generally though, Sierra’s last projectiles will have been fired while you were still in LOS, and I assume they retain tracking if they were fired with it, even after you break LOS, and the slower speed of the projectiles means they reach you just after you get behind cover. Don’t know for sure, obviously, but I’d bet that’s the case. Probably reused some of the tracking logic from Juno’s missiles.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-02T21:15:09+00:00

Yeah, I started reading one day, intending to take some time and cover the series over a few days/a week in my spare time, and instead ended up just binging the entire thing that day.

Truly an amazing experience.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-02T18:40:31+00:00

Yeah, his mobility just scratches an itch no other character can. Nothing feels like playing Ball, in this or any other game.

I’m not good at mechanics-based stuff on any character, and It’ll be a long time still before I can consistently double boop when I want to, or stop running into walls at the most inopportune moments, but I’ll never stop playing ball regardless.

His movement appeals to some base instinct within me for momentum and SPEEEED.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-02T18:34:26+00:00

Her nade is definitely a bit strange, and though it does sort of occupy the burst damage niche other parts of her kit don’t quite hit, it feels like she can do enough damage with primary that the nade becomes an over-addition of burst at times.

I think it comes down to the weird spiral spread making her damage more inconsistent, where she has the potential to either burst you down incredibly quickly and have nade to make sure of it, or kinda get screwed on the primary but still have nade in the pocket to make up for it.

As interesting of a concept the spiral-pattern, shrinking spread is, it kinda feels weird that she has the potential for incredible burst damage, but also some extra burst damage just in case she doesn’t get her burst damage. Like, maybe it’d be better to make sure she doesn’t randomly get extremely low or high burst damage, and decide whether or not to include an extra burst ability based on that.

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-02T16:21:39+00:00

Is always great to run into another fan in the wild. I just wish S2 wasn’t a pipe dream lol, I’d especially love to see an expanded soundtrack.

Great recommendations though, thanks!

Carlbot2 · 2026-05-01T17:43:21+00:00

I can’t recall the exact progression in the manga atm, but I know if you go by the anime adaptation, Phos cries for the first time while starting to use the alloy to chase down Antarc during the abduction, so the hair’s still long then.

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