Felipe Pepe
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felipepepe.bsky.social
Felipe Pepe
@felipepepe.bsky.social
Brazilian living in Tokyo. Editor of the CRPG Book, a free book on the history of Computer Role-Playing Games: https://crpgbook.wordpress.com/
Meanwhile the early draft of the CRPG Book looked like an 80s PC gaming magazine because that's what I associate with CRPG history lol

Luckily I showed it to friends who are normal human beings and they were like "please don't".
November 8, 2025 at 2:44 AM
Incredibly disappointed that the video of the girl learning Brazilian Portuguese to shit talk a Portuguese mother-in-law was just an ad.

Nothing is sacred anymore.
November 7, 2025 at 6:12 AM
Ah não mano... q merda
November 7, 2025 at 6:06 AM
I'm quite sure many D&D players would be super excited to play Bleak Falls in a campaign... It's what they associate with a fun adventure.
November 6, 2025 at 4:47 AM
As a suggestion, I would love something about the culture around those places where you pay per hour to play consoles :)
November 4, 2025 at 1:13 AM
Also, shout out to @thevideogamelibrary.org ! I only know about books like 'Videogames in the Indian Subcontinent' because of their work in being a global database.

Check their #GlobalPerspective tag for a very cool selection: www.thevideogamelibrary.org/blog/hashtag...
November 3, 2025 at 11:50 PM
They started by developing an Adventure game called Eureka! for the UK market. It came with a clever marketing trick - there was a code hidden inside it, the first to finish the game and find the code would get paid 25,000 pounds!
November 1, 2025 at 10:29 PM
It's so cool to have people all over the world reach out to share their stories!

Look at this documentary about the birth of Hungarian game development (with English subtitles)- it tells how loopholes & smuggling allowed a studio to be founded in socialist Hungary and sell games to Western markets.
November 1, 2025 at 10:29 PM
Better a pig than a fascist
November 1, 2025 at 12:54 AM
Yup, Gaming the Iron Curtain is one of my favorite reads on game history, would love to hear the equivalent in East Germany :)
October 31, 2025 at 7:13 AM
Dei uma folheada aqui e parece uma leitura maravilhosa (pra gente esquisita como eu). Já sabia q parte vinha do Paraguai ter relações com Taiwan, mas aqui explica muita coisa:
October 30, 2025 at 2:04 PM
Galera BR de games, principalmente quem trabalhou em banca/locadora/camelô nos anos 90... tenho uma dúvida:

Como os vendedores conseguiam os jogos?

Paradox lá nas Europa crackeou FIFA de PS1, como isso chegava no camelô de Piraporinha do Sul? Era tudo trazido do Paraguai? Baixavam os ISO a 28kbps?
October 30, 2025 at 1:18 PM
Gracias!
October 29, 2025 at 2:23 PM
I'm glad that high-quality printed game magazines like APWOT exist, but I wish they made their content more accessible... physical-only is costly.

The CRPG Book has 200,000+ free PDF downloads and that didn't stop the hardcover book from being a best-seller. If anything, it helped it sell more...
October 29, 2025 at 1:40 PM
Another fun example is Jingxun Computer Magazine (精訊電腦) in Taiwan, that began in 1986 as basically the Nintendo Power of a local company doing unauthorized imports.

Sounds like minor stuff, but it's tied to the birth of Softstar - a giant company that dominated Chinese-language games in the 90s/00s
October 29, 2025 at 12:16 AM
Is no secret that many game magazines were poorly-disguised sales catalogs for certain companies, but even that has to adapt to local realities.

In 1993, Brazil got ProGamers magazine, backed by a chain of game rental / pay-by-hour stores. So issues came with tips on how to start your own store lol
October 29, 2025 at 12:16 AM
100% support this, really solid old-school roguelike that balances accessibility with depth & challenge.
October 28, 2025 at 11:50 PM
If any of this interest you, I personally prefer using MORT:
github.com/killkimno/MO...

Just be aware of 2 things:
- It's machine translation. It will be understandable, but nowhere as enjoyable as real translations. It's part of why these tools remain niche.
- Menus & stylized fonts might not work
October 27, 2025 at 1:33 PM
Cool, but since 2019 you can do this on any platform using Retroarch's AI translation - it just overlays instead of using a 2nd screen.

And on desktop there's tons of options, like MORT, Visual Novel Reader, Universal Game Translator, etc...

Again, it's cool, but you can do this right now for free
October 27, 2025 at 1:18 PM
I wanted to gift The King in Yellow on Halloween to a friend... Amazon JPN has like 60 different versions, most with terrible AI covers and "published" in 2024-2025... and with reviews like "is not illustrated or annotated as the listing says, but the text is good".

I'm so tired of AI & grifters 💀
October 27, 2025 at 12:49 PM
So, if you're not satisfied with the current tsunami of RPGs - Digimon, Trails in the Sky 1st, FFT remaster, Hades 2, Fantasy Maiden Wars, Avernum 4, etc...

...The Last Sovereign just hit 1.0 after 10+yrs of development. One of the top adult RPG Maker titles:
store.steampowered.com/app/951830/T...
October 26, 2025 at 1:39 PM
Digimon Story: Time Strangers is nothing groundbreaking, but it's such a good game for the fans. I'm now about 18 hours in and really enjoying it.
October 26, 2025 at 1:12 PM
Great video on one of the hidden CRPG gems - Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer.

I reckon that most people will not be willing to deal with NWN2's engine to play this, so might as well at least get an overview of its epic story & lore in this video (there's way more to see if you play it).
October 25, 2025 at 2:34 AM
So uh... Genshin Impact now has custom characters (with gacha cosmetics) and a ROBLOX-like system of mini-games made by users with an editor tool? What?
October 24, 2025 at 11:15 AM
Almost done, really happy with this! Honestly, I thought I was too clumsy to build a tiny paper miniature, so it's a nice feeling seeing it come together.
October 22, 2025 at 11:59 AM