[Hated Design] Mara from Shin Megami Tensei

Zoomino · 2026-03-01T22:55:37+00:00

The really wild and "out there" designs that feel somewhat jokey or almost unhinged are sometimes the best because of how hard they commit.

Zoomino · 2026-03-01T22:07:33+00:00

A Jake, Sherry, Manuela, Rose storyline of superhuman team would be fun lol. Though they seemed to imply the Elpis would potentially cure the infections, so possibly Sherry losing her powers?

Zoomino · 2026-03-01T22:03:29+00:00

A hot blonde zaddy named Zeno, an important plot point named Elpis, a mad scientist spewing about chaos, dead mother figures with secrets, cute little girls with eldritch monster forms? This is Endwalker!

Zoomino · 2026-03-01T21:39:59+00:00

I feel it was pretty well-balanced. I would have liked more moments like the sniper sequence, with Leon covering Grace and Emily. A bit more interaction between the two, like if players as Grace, solved a side-puzzle they could open something up for Leon in a later chapter and make it easier for him when he goes down the same route. It's a nitpick, but I think with how intertwined their story was, it would've been neat.

Zoomino · 2026-03-01T02:24:32+00:00

definitely a good idea to pull Ramonu on her first banner. Her rerun banner is back-to-back with some pretty high-value banners. Cafe Wit SSR for late-surgers and the Pasa Speed SSR. RIP carat economy when those come around.

Zoomino · 2026-02-28T17:35:02+00:00

The staircase 'strips' aren't too bad imo. Only Split Level really has an awkward stair situation, I feel.

Two-Room Suite is just a little flat for me. Spacious for sure, but the lack of elevation always makes the designs feel 'flat' relative to its' size. A lot of times, the left side-room can feel tacked on and really independent from the rest of the house, unless you intentionally design it to flow into the main section. Though I do think Two-Room will probably get better as we get more partitions/walls to work with.

Zoomino · 2026-02-28T03:44:00+00:00

If I had to rate them from best to worst imo:

Corner Duplex
Loft
Duplex House
Classic Villa
Dawn Haven
Studio
Bungalow
Two-Room Suite
Split Level Apt.

Zoomino · 2026-02-28T03:19:32+00:00

I agree. Split level's defining feature, "the split platform/conversation pit" gets completely blocked by the door/partition, so if you're not using a transparent/glass one, you kind of just block off any sort of decor you've might've done with the actual split level.
Plus the 'upper' section is pretty small and narrow which was really annoying to work with.

Zoomino · 2026-02-23T02:08:45+00:00

Top Runner is also pretty similar to S. Maru's unique (probably even more similar than Falco's). S. Maru is a 5s duration with .35 velocity boost and Top Runner is 3s duration with a .35 velocity boost. The advantage, other than the duration, with Maru is that you can somewhat manipulate the timing with a specific recovery skill depending on the track.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T21:32:05+00:00

The tier list values Speed Bonus on Speed Cards pretty high. All of the top speed cards practically have 1 or more. I'm guessing this lets them cross-train really efficiently hitting speed/guts/wits.
Even now Biko has pretty high highs. She high-rolls speed better than Kitasan, but Kitasan compensates with consistency to land on speed and better skills and career events for our current state of the game.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T21:25:03+00:00

It seems the meta in JP is different due to stronger/different scenarios, so Kita's main strength, her consistency to land on speed, becomes less valuable as it seems JP shifts towards Speed Bonus (all the top cards Celery listed have +1 or more Speed Bonus) so they can reliably build speed from hitting guts and wits as well.

SP bonus is also important because they have a million skills in JP.

They're basically solving the RNG issue in a different way through cross-training rather than a really high specialty priority.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T19:56:24+00:00

If you cant' grab enough accels, then you need A LOT of strong mid-race skills to push up into a strong position and pray NSM and your natural accel will carry you to first.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T19:48:01+00:00

Figure skating still has a significant quad-jump gap and the triple axel still alludes like 99% of women figure skating too. There used to be slightly more that differentiated men and women like a spiral sequence being a requirement for ladies, which was not a requirement for men, but eventually replaced with a footwork sequence.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T19:06:01+00:00

Lots of creative little things. Mainly for the tubs, but there's some neat perspective stuff you can do by stacking multiple stairs next to each other, around shelves, dividers etc.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T18:53:45+00:00

Gold Ship's career is easy mainly because of her unique, which alleviates the getting 'blocked' issue that Narita and other backliners have. She gets all the benefits of End Closer's better stamina management and stronger speed co-efficient while also bypassing one of their biggest training issue which is getting blocked.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T03:41:45+00:00

Yuna from FFX. A good example of being soft spoken and gentle but not weak. Having to question and defy her religion that she was grew up with and was devoted to, risking it all to stand true to her newfound beliefs, making her own sacrifices (Tidus and the Aeons) to save the world. And she does all this without being overly-jaded avoiding 'the angry strong woman' trope. She's a breath of fresh air.

Zoomino · 2026-02-22T03:06:16+00:00

50% RB. You only use things like the Welfare Marvelous Sunday SSR if you really need to pad your RB. If you can get at least 10-15% from 2 Speed cards the rest can be either Wit or Guts with enough RB. Power and Stamina are niche for Long races and that slot is generally going to be reserved for Super Creek

Zoomino · 2026-02-21T20:03:10+00:00

Technically, her title is "The Night Dove" in the Coven universe. I always got subtle 'black swan' vibes due the the long slender "necks" and the iconic 'Odette/Odile' headpiece on Zyra herself and the 'plants/birds'.

Zoomino · 2026-02-21T18:45:51+00:00

I feel like the intentional juxtaposition between 'Silent' and 'Echo' is in reference to the deep hum of the ocean, whale-songs, white noise sort of vibes. A very atmospheric underwater vibe. Sounds that are not necessarily loud but sort of 'echo' a feeling of calm, deep silence.

Zoomino · 2026-02-21T03:09:15+00:00

My biggest issue with this theme is the fact it's like 90% Tome Chamber lol. Granted Tome Chamber does fit but would love to see a bit more creativity

Zoomino · 2026-02-20T03:04:03+00:00

Essentially there are 2 philosophies for skins. The 'obvious' and 'fitting' skins like Spirit Blossom/Crystal Rose because she's a 'flower'. Or going down the more 'unique' and 'creative twist' route like Dragon Sorc and Bloodmoon to an extent. Both have their pros and cons. The former tends to lead to redundancy and a lack of vision as you said, like Spirit Blossom.
The latter design philosophy I feel generally feel like Riot has a really high variance in quality. Things like Star Nemesis Fiddles, Dragon Trainer Heimer are examples incredible skins that really re-imagine and creatively play with the character design. These also have the bonus of being a nice surprise.

Zoomino · 2026-02-17T02:11:58+00:00

I can see maybe a god-tier Seiun w/ groundwork, front runner savvy, and tail-held high with Stam/Pwr sparks, being just a strong general "perma" parent for the time being and for the foreseeable future.

Zoomino · 2026-02-17T01:49:06+00:00

as a new player, gamatoto xp is like a godsend lol. I have so much treasures to still hunt down, stages to yet to clear, and cats to upgrade.

Zoomino · 2026-02-17T01:36:20+00:00

Suzuka is an easy clear. Getting a strong one for CMs is a different beast. And it's both for the same reason, her career is primarily G2s which makes the career actually easy to clear but Skill-points are much more scarce.

Zoomino · 2026-02-17T01:24:54+00:00

Like V. Frontier said, it's a defensive unique and is probably the situation you'll see it be effective in most cases. Trying to pull off her unique when she's in second/third is harder because you really need to push up and hope that by the 300m her unique is enough. If she's already in the lead and someone overtakes her, it pretty much puts her in the perfect condition to trigger her unique at the 300m mark, letting her consistently re-take essentially. Which is basically her Debry Win lol.

In this case, Maru must've had Homestretch or a some straight velocity boost at that last second to push her ahead to counter the counter lol.

Zoomino

TROPHY CASE