It doesn't let me go up from the linked folder for whatever reason. Still, looks like a good find.

There's also this collection - it has resources from all of the MICA games as well (plus some lore stuff). It's great that there are multiple sources for that stuff.

Still in the manhwa mines, don't mind me.

The Antagonist's Pet

I finished it last week. It's a really warm story about bonds, love and just being there for each other. I really liked all of the main characters and the general philosophy presented throughout - it was fun, touching and generally a joy to go through. All in all, a really enjoyable read.
One warning though: this series contains multiple scenes of physical and psychological abuse - keep that in mind if it's something that affects you.

Some random thoughts on the series:

• Double isekai plot did indeed happen, turned out very differently than what I expected.

Spoiler talk

The whole situation with Minah (Angela) had to be terrifying. A teenager being randomly dropped into another world and seeing playing the role of a mother as her only way to maybe possibly get back to her own world? Of course she's not going to make good choices in a situation like that.
That doesn't justify her abusing everyone around her, obviously, but I can understand why she was so desperate about it.

A terrible situation all round.

• Another surprise: the final arc. While the story had its share of more serious topics I didn't think it would end with political intrigue and everything else that followed. It was good but I'm still going back and forth on how well it fits (or rather, how I feel about it fitting in) with the story.
• There are many flashback chapters throughout the series. They are good and do a lot to flesh out backstories and motivations of all the important characters but man... every time they show up it feels pretty random and out of place. It's like there just wasn't a good way to lead into them so they are just cold dropped at times they kinda sorta work.

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Not That Villainess! / Mistaken for a Wicked Woman!

Girl from a poor noble family travels to the capital to become a knight, gets mistaken for her "villainess twin sister" she didn't even know about, shenanigans ensue. Also she has a stupidly rich father she didn't know about either.

A pretty fun read though I feel like it kinda moves past the initial idea pretty quickly. It's still there to some extent but it doesn't feel as relevant. At least MC being headstrong and unwilling to get played with keeps things interesting.

Will have to see how season 2 goes before I can come up with an opinion honestly.

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A Handbook for Villainesses

Fake saintess is used to do a lot of bad things, gets tired of the charade and kills herself right before becoming a sacrifice. She wakes up alive, 10 years earlier and wants to repent for everything wrong she did in her past life. She also decides to act like "a bad girl" to make sure no one tries to make her pretend to be a saintess ever again.

Pretty strong concept, fun characters and cute art. It's a solid read and MC being thought how to act like a baddie is great. I'm not too sure about the recent story developments but I'm willing to wait and see how things play out for now.

Yeah, I'd like to think people would focus on other things now that SKG picked up the pace but he'll most likely be brought up for a long time regardless on what happens with the campaign in the future - even if just as a punching bag for people to feel superior about.

It's a jab at the Pirate Software guy, I believe.

• "Oi, this company (ASD) is going too far with their research. Kill them all!"
• "Imperator Eddison has now relaxed scientific research as a means to try and further push the drive to really end this crisis across Stanton."

Yeah, makes sense. Please don't take this comment too seriously.

Non combat event which has a chance to stay non combat and UI change are much appreciated. Lets hope things work out properly throughout the whole thing.

Indeed. Been at it for about a year now.

Not necessarily too old, it's just that industry (in general, not just gacha) changes in the way that many of us don't really like. That's the price of pushing their way into mainstream. All we can do is look in less obvious places and try more, sometimes not obvious, titles - there might be a diamond or two hidden somewhere if one's lucky enough.

I'm still stuck in the villainess mines, it's just what I crave these days.

• Behold the True Villainess
  Finished it, it was pretty good for the most part. There were a few sections I wasn't really hot on (spying on the fiance comes to mind) but other than that it managed to keep up a solid quality until the end. Probably won't stick as one of my favourites though.

• The Villainess's Bestie
  It's about a 5 year old maid working in the imperial palace who becomes friends with the empress (the titular villainess). It's mostly comedy, with some slightly more serious elements thrown in the mix here and there.
  Pretty fun read, unfortunately it went on hiatus in 2023 so there's only 60 chapters available.

• The Antagonist's Pet
  Pretty similar premise to the previous series just replace kid maid with young girl from unimportant noble family who's treated like a favourite pet by ladies of higher status (that's actually her survival mechanism for this environment). Don't know how I feel about it yet, "it's fun enough" is all I can say for now.
  Oh, this one is actually a double isekai (as in, two people were dropped into this fantasy world) which might lead to something interesting down the line.

Other than that The Big Bees got a healthy update recently which is always a blessing. Love me some fat bees.

I don't hence why I currently play 3 games: first GFL (mainstay, doing dailies and events), GFL2 (giving it a year to see if it'll turn out into a sequel I'm interested in, it's a bit more convoluted compared to the first game) and P5X (want to see if it'll be fun in the long run, most likely won't be a good fit for you). I'm afraid we'll have to wait until someone comes up with a surprise hit again so companies have a new template to copy from.

The only things that come to mind right now are ones I'm not too familiar with so I might be completely off base. These would be:

• Limbus Company - what I did hear about it make it sound like a simpler game in terms of resource management.
• Snowbreak: Containment Zone - haven't played this one since their pivot into 120% horny town but I remember it being pretty basic in regards to upgrades and items. Things may have changed since then so I can't promise anything.

Is there any reason you're focused on gacha with your search? Is this about a specific mechanic or just feeling of having a constantly updated game to enjoy?

That's a pretty difficult question honestly. The easy answer would be to look for "normal" games instead but we're in a gacha community so that's obviously what you're interested in. Based on your post it feels like you're looking for a simple game with limited side content which kinda goes against the current trend of new releases.

I don't play too many titles these days but here are short descriptions of what I'm sticking with at the moment. Hopefully this will help narrow down what exactly is or isn't important for you.

Girls Frontline 2 doesn't have tons of popups and dailies there can be done in 15 minutes or less for the most part. At the same time there's A LOT of side content that, while not necessary, might count towards those things you don't want in the game. There's a few resources that could possibly count as currencies though I'm not sure what's your definition on that.

Persona5: The Phantom X has pretty fun gameplay and lightning fast dailies but global servers are treated like crap (it's SEGA after all). It also has a bunch of currencies/resources and the amount of popups can be annoying depending on where you are (I've read it differs by country, personally I've seen like 5 or so since launch).

If we're talking about games with gacha mechanics in general there's also Idol Manager - this is a "normal" buy to play title rather than a live service one. Gacha here comes in the form of idol scouting though it works more like randomised units in XCom than rolling for properly defined characters. Perhaps this could scratch that itch?

Last question: what do you mean by modern? How old are we talking about?

Confucius joining Hololive wasn't on my bingo card but hey, they do have an eye for talent.

I've been waiting for something like this ever since medical gameplay was introduced. I assume the issue for now has to do with unfinished work on the planetary on-foot navigation for NPCs but who knows. For now I just huff hopium considering navigation tasks are semi-regularly mentioned in monthly reports so... one day.

You're in luck then, they just released an exploration event! Seriously though, my hopes towards exploration are about as high as those towards medical gameplay. I hope I'm wrong though.

Tony is retired - you can find him with the title of "Game Director Emeritus" on CIG's About Page.

As for the economy sim... officially it's still coming, with the last excuse we got (or at least the one I can remember) for it not being ready being server meshing. With this year' focus on quality of life and polishing Squadron I'd say it's the usual "2 more years".

This definitely sucks but at least it seems like they had a good enough schedule to finish the season before airing. So... not a completely bad news?

Yeah, that tracks - it's a business organisation first and foremost. And yeah, we definitely do.

I'm back on the villainess train, this time with two titles I found completely at random - both being decent finds too.

• Kill the Villainess

I initially thought it will be a less interesting version of Villains Are Destined to Die, it turned out to be probably the most sombre (without being edgy) villainess themed series I've wrote about here so far.
The premise is nothing original: woman is pulled into the body of a villainess from a book and has to die to go back to real world. Guess what? She tried. Multiple times. Before the story even began.
There's no easy way out and she has to play the part of a bad guy according to the original novel, whether she likes it or not.

It's a pretty solid choice if you're in a mood for a less quirky story in this genre.

• Behold the True Villainess

A complete whiplash of emotions when paired with the first one as this is a pure comedy.

This one is also an isekai story but here the soft and timid noble girl gets taken over by someone who doesn't let herself get pushed around by anyone. She bails from a temple she was sent to, stirs trouble, gets people addicted to modernised (well, properly spiced) cuisine and spreads real world slang among the nobles (often misrepresenting what it actually means).

It's silly, it's light-hearted and it's full of pretty good jokes (visual or otherwise).

It's a group representing the biggest publishers in the industry, used as a front to pretend they're able to self-regulate when it comes to consumer laws vs business wants. So no, not a governing body but more of a cartel or lobbying group, I guess? One with A LOT of money on the line and enough lobbying power to push against things like the Stop Killing Games campaign the moment they feel threatened.

Either way it's pure speculation considering something truly massive would have to happen for Steam to even get to this point.

I might be reading too much into this but I think they're going for an anthology feel with the show and if there's ever Cyberpunk Edgerunners 3 it would once again focus on yet another group of characters. That's just how I interpreted Sztybor's words though.