YMMV / Subverse

• Awesome Ego: Like all kloi, Ela is extremely arrogant and proud of herself. However, she is also the best warrior of a genetically-perfect species whom the ex-empress Kasidora considers the only real threat to the Imperium, so she is kind of justified in that attitude. Most importantly, though, while she obviously holds herself in the highest regard, she never really looks down on other species, at worst accepting that not everyone can be genetically engineered to perfection, and at best actively lusting after them without a second thought.
• Broken Base:
  • During its development phase, Studio FOW reached out to a YouTuber named Arch (formerly known as Arch-Warhammer) to help promote Subverse by doing an exclusive gameplay reveal/preview. Arch is a highly controversial figure within the Warhammer Community whose extreme political views and derogatory remarks are still under fire to this day. After receiving significant backlash for collaborating with him, Studio Fow apologized on their official discord while claiming they were not aware of Arch's history...only to then retract their apology later. Now claiming their statement was made in haste and that their game was meant to be apolitical. This debacle as a result has irrevocably split Subverse's fanbase with renewed debate on a whole host of hot-button topics.
  • The reaction to Subverse's early access release in particular has caused a moderate amount of divisiveness as well. The main points of contention being the repetitiveness of both the SHMUP and turn-based combat systems with the later being highly unbalanced, the well-worn juvenile humor that overtakes the plot and character interactions, and the surprisingly sparse amount of actual adult content with the existing H-scenes being nothing more than 3-5 second looped animations you need to purchase via an in-game viewer gallery with grind-centric tokens called "Pooter Points". While continued supporters of Subverse are willing to give FOW Interactive a pass due to the game still being in early access, the detractors have regularly voiced their disappointment about the mediocre state of the game after 2 years worth of development time on a 2 million dollar budget.
• Common Knowledge: Pandora’s scenes are just cheaply-animated looped .GIFS!! …except they aren’t, they’re actually animations rendered in real-time (you can even slightly move the camera!). The reason why they look like that it’s because making them with in-game graphics is way more cost-effective than making them in high-quality cinematics, which wouldn’t be practical considering there’s going to be a LOT of Pandora scenes (more than a 100 if we’re going by Ela’s update having more than 50, all distributed with all 4 waifus so far) and they’re not supposed to be long and complex, considering that the whole point of Pandora is to make your own set for… uh, your viewing pleasure.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • A rare example of this happening BEFORE the product was actually released. DEMI was originally going to be a minor NPC, but fans backing the game on Kickstarter loved her SO MUCH because of her appealing design and Bordeaux Black’s seductively monotone voice acting that she was promoted to a major character, including being one of the waifus you can have sex with (although you can’t take her into battle, so her original, more passive role is still somewhat intact. As a compromise, she still levels up along with the waifus who can fight). She’s even the main character shown on the game’s most prominent promotional poster, effectively making her the game’s official mascot!
  • Fortune is also beloved, mostly because of her design, her perky, snarky and youthful personality coupled with her being the only sane woman in a main cast full of horndogs, which makes for some of the games funnier bits. Iris Harman’s voice acting also helps. It’s no wonder a lot of fans just cannot wait for her to be “Recruited.” ^Explanation Ergo, for the Captain to have sex with her and thus unlocking her Pandora scenes.
• Epileptic Trees: Just who the HELL was the owner of the panties the Captain wears on his helmet?
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Just TRY watching this infamous scene from Starchaser: The Legend of Orin without thinking of this game, especially DEMI.
• Fan Nickname:
  • "Ship Mom" for DEMI because of her dedication to the Mary Celeste… and also for being so willing to take care of the crew's… er, "needs." It originated in an interview with her voice actress, Bordeaux Black, and has since been embraced by both her and the fandom.
  • To a lesser extent and similarly to above, Lily is referred to as "Ship MILF."
• Just Here for Godzilla:
  • Lots of people expressed interest in the game just for the sexual content given Studio FOW's previous works.
  • Similarly to above, some people expressed interest because of the various NSFW voice actors working on it.
• Magnificent Bastard: Senator Erark has officially qualified for this title with his scheme to kill off Lord Azzorion. After Azzorion discovers Erark's indecent intentions for Celestina and blackmails him with it, Erark reveals to him the location of an already-dormant secret weapons research project he ran for Kasidora, before leading the Mary Celeste to the same location and giving them just enough of a leg-up to kill the senu (something that no one has apparently managed to do before). In the aftermath, he masterfully deflects Kasidora's suspicions of him getting too close to Celestina, before gaslighting her into believing that she was the one who somehow leaked information on Project Tremor Fury to Azzorion, indirectly blaming her for his death, while also covering up the Captain's involvement in it. Immediately thereafter, he deflects Fortune's suspicions about him knowing more than he lets on by urging her and the crew to accelerate their plans, now that they have drawn the wrath of the Imperium and of the Coven of Nine.
• Memetic Mutation: In the fandom, every mention of Fortune (more specifically, her VERY generous posterior) is accompanied by someone saying "7/10" as a reference to her introduction scene where she states that her ass is "AT LEAST a 7/10."
• Misblamed: Some people call out Studio FOW of being lazy for not adding a “Free Camera” option in Pandora… except the reason why there isn’t one it’s because, if there was one, you’d be able to see animations errors that are purposely done and hidden in order to make the animations look presentable, which is an EXTREMELY common technique in 3D animation. This includes tamer stuff like body parts clipping (yes, including the penetrations)… and stuff like the Captain’s body contorting in horrific ways in order to make the action more visible. For what it’s worth, recent updates HAVE included an option to move the camera, but unsurprisingly it’s VERY limited.
• Moe:
  • Let's be real, even with her seductively deep voice and willingness to have all kinds of fetishistic sex, DEMI is downright adorable and huggable.
  • Celestina is also considered to be extremely adorable by most of the fandom, but unlike DEMI, is more because of how seemingly pure and innocent she is in a game where almost EVERYONE is horny, even getting easily flustered by people just talking about sex.
• Narm: Debatable given the kind of game this is, but it is rather distracting whenever some characters are talking about something seemingly serious and then they start dropping gratuitous F-bombs and sexual innuendos.
• Narm Charm:
  • Despite Ela's voice being definitely NOT what most people would associate with an elegant-looking elf warrior lady like her and being rather jarring when she speaks for the first time, her almost cartoonishly Valley Girl accent IS rather endearing (with a lot of fans still finding it VERY sexy).
  • The overly vulgar dialogue is also considered this by a lot of fans (if they don't think it's just Narm), mostly BECAUSE it's so shameless and ends up being pretty amusing a lot of the times.
• No Such Thing as Bad Publicity: By virtue of being an H-Game created by a developer whose already controversial content got them permanently banned from Patreon, the heated contention that would arise from this title is unsurprising. However, FOW Interactive was miraculously able to raise around 2.3 million dollars in crowdfunding and shot all the way to the top of Steam's bestseller list when it finally released in Early Access. Turning what began as a relatively niche porn project into a mainstream success.

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