#But turning it into stronger penalties for having opinions

[yesterdayiwrote]

Dude, F1 has a toxicity problem for sure, but what the fuck is this?

They're tightening the leash even further against drivers and personnel so they'll have even less room to criticise stewarding decisions, because they're taking their comments as inciting abuse...

This feels like insane overreach, because surely the easiest way to prevent public harassment of race stewards, is to not publicise the stewards panel? We don't need to know that information, only the teams do.

[charles-leclerc-official]

my thoughts are that ferrari may have seen less incentive risking charles’s PU for mexico, when they understand that they can just maximize a P3 there. considering charles’s discomfort and lack of practice running, i think they ultimately decided they could not risk damaging his PU and needing him to take on a penalty in exchange for a new one, especially given his particular driving style + the ferrari’s altitude issues in the past.

and moreover, they probably found more incentive in preventing a penalty considering they definitely know that charles is the one to rely on for their final push for points. we saw this last year when the other ferrari driver all but disappeared in the last stretch of races fighting for p2 in the wcc and charles was left carrying the team in abu dhabi. tldr; after my initial frustrations wore off, i kind of understand at least some of the reasoning behind protecting charles’s PU in mexico, regardless if it turned out he had an issue in the race or not. ultimately, i hope this works out in charles’s favor in the long run! forza charles!

I agree, I think that it was frustrating to watch in the moment. When you look at the numbers and the performance Charles was getting from practice and quali it was evident things were not optimized. And yes it does seem there were greater concerns about his PU and to a certain extent Carlos' as well. I don't think Carlos would have been able to push too much if Lando had actually caught up.

Which honestly I am impressed if these are the results we get when things are not optimized with the car and for Charles. It's a step up.

I think people have misunderstood Fred's comment of "there were no issues" first I think he was covering as they were checking Charles car for damage post race (the chassis) and also that's the point. There were no problems because of the preventative measures. It will come down to opinion on whether someone thinks they were too conservative on pace on Sunday. But at the end of the day I have no way of knowing, they are the ones with the real time temp and engine data.

And if you look Charles was on the exact same pace as Carlos in that second stint, that was the target pace for both cars. It didn't work for Charles I think because he was dealing with some understeer in a few corners, and also the overall condition of the PU has been questioned, among other small conditional factors.

I know someone is going to come in here and talk about stint 1 again, and I'll say I think it was pretty clear they did not want Charles and Carlos to fight for position on track.

Ultimately I think you can tell when a weekend was bad. It's usually pretty clear, and while things were a little tense they were clearly not "I'm gonna burn down the garage" bad.

And I would like to remind people that before you attribute something to a conspiracy or to malice, usually the most boring explanation is what actually happened. 99 times out of 100 it's the boring answer.

Also you are very right, the final stint of races are strong for Charles, 2 tracks in particular. Carlos was the stronger and more comfortable in Mexico, he was all weekend that's reflected in the data and Charles fully explains he was not where he wanted to be and they were managing with the limited practice. So I think strategically it all made sense.

Charles has always pulled strong performances at the end of the season, so this run of tracks should be good.

Like I think we need to put into perspective that was a P3 finish with a less than perfect setup, limited practice time, and the need for extra PU management. Based on some things with the team I think the P3 finish was what they were targeting/expecting.

[retphienix]

Hell yeah!

I shouldn't be alive!

Due to nerves I ran into not one but AT LEAST 2 lasers at the end and my ass was saved by squeaky!

I fell down to like single digits health and here I am!

Now in all honesty, I don't feel like this is a fluke victory since I had MUCH stronger runs prior and just let nerves hit my ass this time (but got carried despite that)- it's earned, complain about it on your own time lmao

But I did it!

Yippee!

Now I can farm a ton of stuff and make a ton of stuff and become ultra powerful (maybe) and then die 10k times to the end-game bosses of Fargo Souls and maybe give up if I become convinced I just can't properly acquire the bullet hell skills necessary for them!

We'll see!

Mostly excited and happy! lol

I will say, as a remix this is one of my favorites in the mod at the moment.

Normal moonlord is kind of... 'spammy' would be how I describe it? He's just constantly throwing projectiles all over the place and when his true eyes are busted out you start getting lasers at inopportune times and most of my victories against him have involved going "Actually, fuck this" and making a giant asphalt road from one end of the world to the other so that I can basically outpace his eyes the entire fight. THIS? It feels like a genuinely enjoyable bullet hell. Not like, Ikaruga levels, but I really- really can't express how much I would not enjoy it if it was lol

Keep it lighter, for my sanity, please :( And this was! This is a good remix :) If the damage was lower I'd be clambering for it to be base game- same with the pillars tbh! The weapon type demands for both moonlord and the pillars are neat to me- definitely a "Please make this expert+ only, thank you" mechanic, but I think if it was softened a bit to just a damage penalty and not immunity it could work as nice flavor :)

Honestly I think almost all of the eternity remixes have been really fun- some of which felt so nice I wish they were slapped in base game as well with the same considerations for nerfing to match base equipment- with only a couple feeling.... "Not Right" for base game and not more fun for my preferences I guess I'd say.

(TANGENT INCOMING)

Like I didn't think bee was any more fun or interesting, it was just different and trying to be harder. I DO NOT think Duke is more fun in large part because I genuinely think the debuff associated with his fight is entirely unfun.

Same with plantera's debuff to be honest but her debuff only hurt me once in all my matches, Duke's debuff is like "Haha! Clipped you with my phase 3 mega speed, you lost all your max health and die in one hit now" that's not fun for a lower experience player like me.

I will say almost all the adjustments to his moveset are actually really nice- the horizontal/vertical sharks that phase in before he dashes at you were 10/10 extra gameplay, his bubble patterns were honestly nice even if they screwed me over a few times. His final phase just wasn't it at all for me, it became "Just dash away a lot and you'll win, this is bullshit"- and the use of his tornados sucked ass in my opinion- I just genuinely don't like them at all.

It felt like a lot of "I'm a boss that moves REALLY fast and demands you keep moving constantly- oh- also I sometimes set up stage hazards that WILL INSTANTLY SHRED YOU just out of sight off screen- good luck :)" didn't like that, feel like they almost needed a built in boss arrow to always denote where they were. Or, you know, to not have hitboxes at all because they added nothing to his fight. That'd be nice.

(TANGENT OVER)

ANYWAYS. Eternity mode bosses fucking rule, like genuinely I turned on eternity mode because I saw that most of the content was locked behind it and I wanted to /try/ to see what I could- I mostly turned it on for the accessories- I wanted to explore the new gear.

But I KEPT it on because the boss remixes RULE in this mod.

Anyways marching on to whatever's next- be that a wall I can't overcome or awesome gear I fall in love with lol

[kaibacorpstocksplit]

anyways i know i have a post on this before but i dont tag my regular text posts (and i never will) but yeah after seeing both im still of the opinion that manga version of castle gambit is stronger, because i think the context with the previous duels really adds to the weight and severity of the situation. life-ruining things happen whenever kaiba loses to yugi, and now on duel 3 everything he has left is on the line. losing is already terrifying to kaiba because of gozaburo, and that terror is only compounded by yugi/atem proving gozaburo right in their previous duels. death-t however shows how kaiba is willing to meet them at their level, in a sense, and castle gambit is also a way of turning the tables: where in death-t he tried to use penalty games for himself, in castle gambit he’s forcing atem to use one against him instead- and also morbidly taking agency in his own consequences for losing. no more hallucinations or comas, he’s choosing the penalty this time so you can either play your own game or lose.

[eretzyisrael]

What We Can Do About It

Last week I explained How They Did It, how the enemies of Israel – the Arabs, the Soviets, the international Left, and others – turned much of the West against us. What can we do about it?

I concentrated on the ‘softer’ aspects of cognitive warfare, such as the infiltration of higher education and international organizations like NGOs and UN agencies, corporations, the use of social media, the exploitation of minorities with grievances, and the support of public antisemites (e.g., Ilhan Omar). But we should keep in mind that more kinetic actions can also have primarily cognitive objectives. The PLO’s European terrorism during the 1970s paved the way for its conversion from a gang of despicable terrorists into a member of the UN, and for murderer and thief Yasser Arafat to become a “statesman.” The 9/11 attacks against the US changed the media portrayal of its Arab and Muslim citizens from “billionaires, bombers, and belly dancers” to hardworking citizens who are targets for islamophobic hatred (this is not the case with Jews, despite the fact that Jews are far more likely to be the victims of hate crimes today).

Terrorism works on various levels, but on the deepest, visceral one it creates paralyzing fear, which the mind – still subconsciously – tries to rationalize away by distancing itself from the victims and identifying with the terrorists. “Don’t kill me, I am on your side!” the terrorized mind shouts. “I’m one of the good ones!” (e.g, a “Jew for Palestine”).

The counterattack has to be planned, coordinated, and specifically targeted in all of the arenas, soft and hard, in which cognitive war is being waged against us. This is something the State of Israel has never come close to doing. Our efforts at public diplomacy have often been most charitably described as a bad joke, like the campaign to advertise Israel as a destination for gay tourism(“Come to Israel! We have nice beaches and we won’t hang you!”) At best we are reactive, responding to vicious accusations of war crimes, apartheid, and other depravities, usually long after the damage has been done. And we often ignore the cognitive implications of our actions, or the lack thereof.

It won’t be easy. Organized support for anti-Israel organizations (including those connected with terrorism) has been going on for decades, with millions of dollars annually flowing from sources like the George Soros organizationsand the European Union. Social media, especially, is constantly changing and new battlefields appear almost daily. Everywhere you look (e.g., Wikipedia) there is anti-Israel bias. And for every pro-Israel activist there are ten, or a hundred, attacking us.

An effective cognitive counterattack must have two parts: how we speak to the world, and – most important – how we act. Let me take the second part first.

There are basic human instincts that precede the ideas expressed in the UN charter by hundreds of thousands of years. Our actions must affect those instincts in a way that will cause others to respect us, and our enemies to fear us. I am not suggesting that we follow the example of the PLO and hijack planes in Europe, but our response to terrorism and threats from enemy countries (e.g., Iran) can be designed to have the appropriate effect. Humans are attracted to strength. They want to be on the side that’s stronger. They talk about the importance of moral and legal principles, but they bet on the winner. Our actions should radiate power and control, and even ruthlessness.

For example, no terrorist should survive his attack. Israeli security forces and the individuals involved have been sharply criticized, both by Israelis and others, for the “Bus 300 affair” in 1984, when two captured terrorists were executed in the field after interrogation. My contention is that this action sent exactly the right message, both to our enemies – “don’t try this or you will die” – and to the rest of the world – “Israel does not tolerate terrorism against her citizens.”

Our pusillanimous responses to Hamas, which has on numerous occasions killed Israelis and which today holds two Israeli citizens and the bodies of two soldiers hostage, is supposed to be justified for practical reasons, but is a total failure from the standpoint of cognitive warfare. When Israel bombs an unoccupied Hamas installation after arson balloons or even rockets from Gaza have burned crops or damaged buildings, the message that is sent is that we are too weak to protect ourselves. When our citizens are held captive while we supply electricity and water to the Gaza Strip, the message is that Hamas is in control, not Israel. I understand the limitations of our power, as viewed by the IDF, but I believe that they are not weighing the cognitive aspects of the question heavily enough.

Recently, the IDF demolished the home of a terrorist murderer, a citizen of the PA who was also an American citizen, despite a request from the US State Department to desist. This was the correct action from the cognitive point of view, sending the message that Israel is a sovereign state which controls Judea/Samaria, and which does not tolerate terrorism. On the other hand, the continued presence of the illegal Bedouin settlement of Khan al-Ahmar as a result of pressure from the EU and the UN tells the world that Israel does not control the land.

Our greatest enemy is Iran, whose regime has explicitly threatened to destroy us on numerous occasions and is developing nuclear weapons. There are obviously multiple considerations that play into choosing the best response, from a pre-emptive strike on her nuclear installations to a continuation of the campaign of sabotage that Israel has been waging for the last few years. Cognitively, the best approach is the one that publicly demonstrates that Israel has the power to destroy the installations, regardless of the distance or their fortification. This could be a massive aerial attack, or it could be covert action that is made public after the fact. The worst case is that we refrain from taking action because of pressure from the US.

In the soft realm, one priority is to put an end to Israel’s self-imposed cognitive failures. There is no reason that Israelis should be allowed to act as paid agents of the EU or the international Left, as is the case with B’Tselem and numerous other anti-state organizatons. There is a weakly enforced law that requires Israeli NGOs that receive half of their funding from foreign governments to report that, on penalty of a relatively small fine; and even that was opposed by the Left and the Arab parties in the Knesset. It is absurd that these groups should be allowed to operate in Israel. All foreign funding – private or governmental – for political NGOs should be forbidden, period. Representatives of foreign NGOs hostile to Israel should not be allowed into the country.

Speaking of Arab parties, there is a Basic Law that says that in order to run for election to the Knesset, a candidate or list must not “[negate] the existence of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.” This law is interpreted loosely by the Supreme Court, so that Arabs who do precisely that can sit in the Knesset. That must end.

Israel has military censorship, which sometimes makes us look foolish when foreign publications are revealing details that Israelis are not allowed to read or hear from their own media, but at the same time, the Ha’aretz newspaper is allowed to attack the state, day in and day out, often using material from the foreign-funded NGOs. Foreign propaganda outlets make good use of it, saying “even Israelis admit…” This is unacceptable; it borders on treason, and it must stop.

There is a place for traditional hasbara, explanation, or presentation of the news from the viewpoint of the state. I am not sure why everyone is entitled to an opinion and a platform from which to broadcast it, while the state is not. Why not a government TV/radio/Internet news outlet, staffed with professionals who could respond immediately and accurately to false accusations? Doing this properly, so that it would be both authoritative and not boring, would be expensive and require high quality personnel that would not be easy to find; but it is worth doing.

Much of what I have suggested will be criticized because “it violates human rights” or it is “antidemocratic,” or similar things. I don’t disagree. But the idea that Israel has to be a paragon of human rights and democracy is wrong. It is an expression of the antisemitic idea that Jews must always be held to the highest of standards – indeed, to a standard that is continually raised so as to always be out of reach. Israel is not a Platonic ideal state; it is not even the United States. It is a tiny nation with no strategic depth that is surrounded by enemies who themselves violate every standard of civilized behavior. National survival is more important than human rights – especially when those defining the concept of human rights are indifferent (or worse) to our survival.

Abu Yehuda

[meaningofmotorsport]

Italian Grand Prix Preview

Sprint qualifying is back, which means I can review qualifying here, and it also means more points on offer for the team which works best around this temple of speed! On today’s evidence, you would have to say that is Mercedes!

Having not won for the past 3 races, it was important that the reigning champions get back on the front foot in the championship fight for their sake. Their form guide around this track, especially compared to Red Bull in the past was very favourable, and so it proved to be this time, at least over one lap! It was not Hamilton though, who will get to start from the front for the Sprint tomorrow, instead, the man on his way out showed he still has it, as he grabbed the top spot right at the end of the session. Fair play to Bottas, as it must have been a hit for him psychologically, to know he is leaving the team, so this is a great way to bounce back.

Lewis barely missed out, and will want to take that spot back tomorrow, to get all 3 points. That is what could make the Sprint very interesting, as Bottas may want to get all the points for his own sake, whereas Hamilton needs the points against Max, who will in turn be right on them going into Turn 1. My guess would be, right now, that Mercedes will have a race pace advantage too over Red Bull, but probably less than what we saw today.

4 tenths of a second gap to first place is pretty big, given the gaps we have seen so far this year. Yet, for Red Bull, they cannot be disappointed, it is simply a side effect of their high rake set up, which causes more drag on the car. In fact, Verstappen did well to get to 3rd, as there were other fast cars out there. In both the Sprint and the main race, Max needs to attack on the 1st lap, otherwise the Mercedes will likely pull away from him, it could be fascinating to see if we get drama at the start! Perez was a sacrificial lamb today, all to get Max as far up front as they could, bearing that and their lack of pace in mind, 9th isn’t terrible for him, and he has 2 starts to make his way forwards.

With the Mercedes engine in the back, the McLaren is looking like a weapon this weekend, with both cars right up the front, nearly pushing Verstappen down to 5th. They could very well take advantage of any action in front of them, or simply have the straight line speed to attack the Red Bull. With Bottas taking an engine penalty for Sunday, they will be in the box seat to grab that final spot on the podium, depending on how well Checo climbs through the field. Credit to Ricciardo as well, for being right where he should be on pace with Lando. I hope this can become a common trend now for the Aussie, as they look to reapply the pressure to Ferrari!

It is becoming almost expected now, that Gasly will be doing amazing things over one lap consistently week after week. With his upturn in race pace, and the draggier Ferrari’s behind, it is very feasible he could stay there for both races this weekend. His teammate once again wasn’t where he needs to be, this time with track limits catching him out!

After the engine scandal of 2019, coming to a power track like this, didn’t bode well for the home team of Ferrari. Having said that, I was impressed with how they went today, and if Charles had had a smoother session, it could have been even better. Moving forwards will be tough as I said, it may be more about watching out for the Mercedes powered Aston Martin’s behind!

Talking of them, they just didn’t have that pure speed compared to those in front, but as usual should come back stronger over a longer run. Someone who did perform over 1 lap, was once again Giovinazzi, who for whatever reason has come alive in recent races. Whether he knows he is being fired, and has used the anger to fuel himself I don’t know, but it is a shame it is happening now, and not a year or two ago.

Alpine and Williams both fell back compared to Zandvoort, my guess would be that they have draggy cars, which didn’t show up on the Dutch beaches, but certainly will here. As always in this part of the field, it will be all about making the most of the opportunities you have, to try and get near the points. The Haas’ and Kubica were fairly close to the pack on pace, which is good to see, and there didn’t seem to be anymore drama between the two rookies either!

Finally, as always at Monza, slipstreams and traffic are big talking points. Again, this year we saw the stupidity and danger that comes from it. The problem is that teams will keep on doing it, because it works for them, they all want to be in the bunch at the right time, so they end up on top of one another. The fines for Alpine and Aston Martin are right in my view, as there was blatant impeding by both teams on leaving the garage. If other cars like Leclerc are penalised for on track blocking, that is probably fair too, although it wasn’t just their fault.

The solution to this seems simple to me, and even if we did it just at this track, I don’t think it would be a problem, that is one shot qualifying. It eliminates all risk of blocking and impeding, and in my opinion, gives us as much drama and suspense in qualifying as we have in it now. It would still be a 1 hour session, so works for TV, and allows every team to have 2 mins of guaranteed TV time per car for sponsors, which could boost investment in the sport. I believe it would also be a more natural way to shake up the grid, as if you don’t nail that one lap, that is it!

Returning to the action we are seeing this weekend, these two race starts could mean fireworks for any number of drivers. Especially for the main race, where it could be just Lewis vs Max! Silverstone Round 2 anyone?

-M

Thank you very much for reading this article! To keep up to date with when they go out, and to see my reactions to races and other news, follow me on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/MeaningofMotor1

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[radiantresplendence]

The Dark Bishop Class - Fire Emblem Three Houses

The Dark Bishop is a bit of an odd class, being both male-exclusive and the only dark magic specialist Advanced Class or beyond, despite 75% of the dark mages in the game being women. To help offset this odd situation, the class doesn’t have a Magic Uses x2 skill that the other magic Advanced Classes have. This leaves the Dark Bishop feeling like a bit of a black sheep. 

In order to qualify for the class, you need to have acquired the certification for the Dark Mage. The class also requires a Dark Seal to take the exam. Essentially this means that to even take the exam, you’d have had to have beaten the Death Knight twice, as he’s your source of Dark Seals throughout the game. Like the rival reason Advanced Class, the Warlock, you’re going to want A in reason for the exam, but with a little luck you can sneak through with lower. 

Analysis

The Dark Bishop’s bases are identical to it’s black magic rival, the warlock. It grants the newly-promoted unit a minimum of 17 magic, 12 dexterity and 14 speed. As it’s a magic-using class, I’ll also take note of its 10 luck, however it needs to be taken into account that every other Advanced Class also guarantees 10 luck. For stat boosts for classing into Dark Bishop, the class grants 4 magic (second only to the Gremory Master Class) and 2 dexterity. The 4 magic is worth noting, as it’s a point higher than its Warlock rival.

Dark Bishops had pretty lackluster mobility. You keep your default 4 move. Granted it is a mage-type, so you don’t take movement penalties for sand terrain, but it’s still really nothing impressive. 

The class has an odd set of Class Skills: Miasma Δ, Fiendish Blow and Heartseeker. The class’s Mastery Skill is Lifetaker. These skills wind up being a little incongruous when taken together. 

Miasma Δ grants the Dark Bishop 10 uses of the titular spell. It replaces the other caster Advanced Classes magic x2 skills. It’s worse than those skills though as Miasma Δ is really nothing to write home about as a spell. It’s stronger on a unit who lacks a robust spell list. 

Fiendish Blow is a mixed bag. It’s extremely strong, granting 6 additional magic during the player phase, but it’s also an easy skill to acquire by mastering the Mage class. It doesn’t stack with itself. That’s its main problem. 

Heartseeker has no business being on this class. It’s like exclusively for the use of boss Hubert on a fortified tile. Adjacent enemy units suffer a 20 point penalty to evasion. Your Dark Bishop shouldn’t be in melee range. 

Lifetaker heals the unit equipped with it whenever they defeat an enemy. It’s too situational. For builds that want to be at low health, it turns off their skills. For Dark Bishops, you don’t want to be taking too much damage. For everything else, all casters can cast white magic in Three Houses.

The growths of the Dark Bishop are adequate but inferior to the Warlock. It grants 10 percent to magic, which is what the class really wants, but it suffers a 5 percent defense growth penalty. Compared to the Warlock, it lacks a charm boost. 

Good Dark Bishops

To no one’s surprise, Hubert makes a good Dark Bishop. Unintuitively, I think the best way to use Hubert in the class would be with a Magic Bow. Basically, I think that the best way to use the Dark Bishop would be with magic-based weapons to take advantage of the Fiendish Blow over a more conventional tomefaire. I think that using the Dark Bishop as a bow-user who is able to cast is the main draw. Following the same train of thought, Hanneman also makes a good Dark Bishop. Both have strengths in both bows and reasons. 

Ignatz and Felix both have budding talents in reason and have strengths in bows. Ignatz is the stronger choice here, boasting Physic and a good reason to go into Dark Mage to begin with (Poison Strike). Felix gains the potent Black Magic Crit +10 which is worth noting, however it doesn’t affect Miasma Δ. (Balthus is of note too... with like a Bolt Axe... and Black Magic Crit...)

Of the people who I wouldn’t consider typical casters, Yuri makes the strongest Dark Bishop in my opinion. He has the Fetters of Dromi, and his Personal Skill, Honorable Spirit works in tandem with Heartseeker. The chance to half damage from his Hero’s Relic can give Yuri a little more bulk, and it also bestows Canto while granting an additional square of movement. I’m not saying that it’s the best way to use Yuri, but it’s certainly something that you can do. Yuri’s budding talent even gives him the Deadeye bow Combat Art, which will chew through your magic bow, but gives Yuri a long range attack in a pinch. 

Conclusion

Magic weapons are good and Dark Bishop is a good class to play around with them when wanting to optimize your skill economy. Unfortunately it’s a little weaker than most of the more weapon-specific classes. I really can’t recommend it for a dedicated caster build, as most will wind up better off as a Dark Knight due to better movement, Canto and a tomefaire. I can’t really recommend it for leveling either due to the exclusivity and inferior growths to the other Advanced Classes that fill a caster role. 

I’ve done more of these: find them here.

[casualotptrash]

Why the Persona 3 FES vs Portable Debate Makes Me Want to Fly Into the Sun Pt. 1

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Yes, this is an emotionally fueled rant about Persona 3. No, this is not meant to send hate at those who enjoy Persona 3 FES or dislike Persona 3 Portable.

That being said, this discussion mentally pains me. I won’t go into all of my opinions on the matter here (I’ll probably go into it later with more posts), but I will be talking about one of the most prevalent “points” that I see being brought up every time the comparison between FES and Portable is made:

“Just play FES with the controllable party members mod.”

This point, although it doesn’t say so directly, essentially sends the message to anyone who doesn’t know the differences between the two games that the only thing Portable has to offer (besides the obvious changes to the game) is controllable party members. For the sake of this post, I won’t be going into the obvious changes such as having cutscenes and The Answer in FES compared to no cutscenes and a FeMC route in Portable. Instead, I’m going to rant about every other positive change I can remember that no one seems to talk about.

1. Jealousy Mechanic

Unlike in FES, the jealousy mechanic is completely erased in the Male Route. The dialogue/warning will still show up after hanging out with multiple female social links, but the social link will never reverse or break because of this. Social links are already a pain to try and max out in a run, even on NG+ without a guide, so the fact that you don’t have to stop seeing a social link for awhile or focus on just one girl at a time means this will at least be marginally easier in Portable. For those who don’t care about maxing out all of the social links, it’s still a relief because you can hang out with whatever social link you want without any penalty. This doesn’t apply to the Female Route as there isn’t a jealousy mechanic even implemented into that.

2. Fatigue Mechanic

For the pure amount of people I see complain about Tartarus, and don’t get me wrong I’m one of them too, I cannot comprehend how they fail to mention this change. In Portable, the fatigue mechanic is totally gone. Much like the jealousy mechanic, the text is still there where the navigator will say you’re getting tired, but no one actually gets the tired effect until you leave Tartarus completely. This means you can bust out a whole block in one sitting, if you so choose. I found this extremely useful because I hated being in Tartarus and this allowed me to just get it all done quickly instead of having to go back and forth from the Dark Hour multiple times.

3. Various Battle Mechanics

In addition to adding the “direct” command to the tactics menu (allowing controllable party members), Portable also adds the “defend” option. This is akin to the “guard” option in the other games where you use your turn to gain more defense. The combat system has also been improved to function more like P4′s in the way that you can get a 1-more from knocking just one enemy down, it no longer takes a full turn for a party member to get up after being knocked down (so you can stand up and immediately do your turn), party members can follow up with a co-op attack if you knock an enemy down, and after a certain social link event for the team social link party members can take a fatal blow for the MC. Again, I don’t know how people are not talking about any of these changes besides the “direct command” addition while also complaining about how Tartarus is a slog. You know what makes it less like a slog? All of these additions.

4. Equipment Menu

Many of the changes not talked about are tweaks to Tartarus/battle gameplay, and this is another one of them. Although more of a small quality of life change to save some hassle, I personally appreciate any change that makes Tartarus easier to get through. In FES, if you wanted to change your party member’s equipment, you would have to talk to the party member who you wanted to change the equipment for. That means if you wanted to change your whole party you would have to do your own first and then talk to your three other party members individually. Portable changes this so that there is one overarching equipment menu that you can access (like in the future games) and change their equipment there.

5. Fusion skills being items + Personas giving you skill cards

This is probably one of the smaller changes, but it can still be really useful. First off, fusion skills in FES are activated when you have two specific personas needed for the skill, but in Portable fusion skills can be bought as items from a store. They cost “gems” that are collected in Tartarus and I think some can be acquired as rewards for quests. This can be useful if you want to use a fusion skill without needing to have the two specific personas taking up slots. Additionally, every persona now gives the player a skill card once they reach a certain level with them. Skill cards can also be bought for gems in the same store that fusion skill items can be bought from. With how fusion works in P3, in which skills are unable to be specifically selected to pass onto the persona being fused, having skills cards is a pretty good change.

6. More Tartarus events/anomalies

Sometimes when going into Tartarus, “anomalies” can occur. This ranges from entering a floor and having your whole party be separated or entering a floor and having no shadows present. Portable adds four new anomalies, and although they may not add much sometimes they can be pretty helpful. The four new events are experience gain will increase on the floor, enemy items drops will increase, the floor will become dark and the auto-mapping feature in game is temporarily disabled, and upon entering the floor it can be fully mapped by the navigator. I specifically found the increased experience gain to be useful because that really boosted the experience cards and could easily level you up without having to grind for hours.

7. Two more added difficulties + Vision Quest

With the new changes to combat, some people dislike how easy the game can seem. To counteract this, or for people who really just want to play the game for the story, two new difficulties were added to Portable: Beginner and Maniac. Beginner is below Easy and significantly toned down enemy damage, and the player has 30 plumes of dusk (opposed to 10 when starting on Easy). Maniac is above Hard, and it adds a heap of new things to make the game more difficult such as enemies deal 2 times more damage than normal, can gain a higher chance of Enemy Advantage when not taken by surprise, and certain weapon fusions cannot be performed. If this still isn’t hard enough for you...I’m sorry, or something? I personally played on Easy because I was working my way through the Neo-Persona (3-5) games and didn’t want it to take ten years.

If you still want more of a challenge, or a fun time-killer, Portable also added Vision Quest. Like the Monad Depths, it’s accessible through Tartarus. Upon entering there are is a door corresponding to each Full Moon boss (besides the Magician) and five special doors. Each Full Moon boss door can be fought with any party members, but the bosses are much stronger than when they were originally fought. For example, the Hanged Moon boss (last one fought) is level 54 in the base game. In the Vision Quest, the Hanged Moon boss is level 95. I did complete all of the doors in Vision Quest (on my NG+) and this one took me almost as long as the final boss of the game to beat, because of the level and the fact that is has 18,000 hp. Yes, I was around level 95 at the time too because I wanted to fuse Messiah. For reference, the final boss has around 25,500 hp in total and is level 76. The five special doors are more so puzzles rather than standard fights in my opinion because you’re forced into the fight with specific party members and stats. Each special door also has its own strategy to beat it, which is where the puzzle part comes in. An example of what these doors offer ranges from having three strong enemies you can only hit with physical attacks that consistently switch between nulling, being weak to, and absorbing all three kinds of physical attacks (and the three enemies switch at different rates/patterns) to fighting an enemy one on one that you need to kill in a certain amount of turns before they insta-kill you (and there is also a pattern of what these enemies are weak to/null/etc.) If you even try looking up what the Vision Quests are you’ll likely to see a plethora of guides because these fights can be very frustrating if you can’t get the patterns down on your own. However, that’s still good for a challenge. In addition to all of this, if you beat all of the doors you get the option to fight a second secret boss: Margaret (from Persona 4).

8. More part-time jobs

One of the more minor changes, but in Portable there are more places where you can work at for part-time jobs. I don’t know if it follows the same system as FES, but generally the longer you work at a job the more money they will give to you. This can be helpful in the early game if you want to raise a stat by working and gain money at the same time.

9. Soundtrack 

This one is tied in directly with the FeMC Route, but a whole new soundtrack is available in this game. You are able to hear almost the full Persona 3 FES soundtrack in this game with the Male Route too, so if you play both routes you won’t miss out on a majority of the songs. Personally, I like a lot of the songs from both soundtracks (and the P3 soundtrack is one of my favorites, if not maybe my number one favorite, of the 3-5 series). I believe it is also widely regarded as a solid soundtrack, and some even like it more than the Male Route one. You could just listen to the soundtrack without playing the game, but again this list is just going through changes from FES to Portable that people don’t often mention.

10. Extra scene at the end of a NG+ run (Spoilers for those who do not know the end of the game)

For everyone out there who likes the dating sim portion of Persona and a heaping of heart-breaking angst, this is for you. On a NG+ run of either route, in the final scene before the credits roll you are able to spend your last moments with whoever you romanced. They each have their own personalized little scene, that is beyond adorable and sad, and the game ends with one last loving comment/sentiment from them before you fade away and Memories of You starts playing. In my opinion, it’s a great little addition, especially for those who like to play multiple runs.

And that’s the last of it I suppose, although there are some other minor changes I probably missed because they’re too small or probably can’t be considered either a “good” or “bad” change. Anyway, asking others for their opinion on the two games is obviously fine, but if you’re someone who boils down the situation with providing the input “Just play FES with the controllable party members mod.” ....don’t. Please :)

[formula-one-thoughts]

Styrian Grand Prix Race Weekend Review

Whilst I think we can agree any racing is good racing, there is an argument to be made that qualifying for the Styrian Grand Prix was more exciting than the race itself. One of the most rain-drenched sessions I’ve ever seen, all of the drivers exhibited incredible skill. I honestly expected far more chaos and crashes than we saw, but was grateful that we were treated to some spectacular displays of driving with only one red flag punctuating the session.  The Racing Points did NOT seem to enjoy the rain, but someone who did was George Russell, who managed to pull off a spectacular P12, and then was promoted to P11 following Charles Leclerc’s grid penalty. It was Williams’ first appearance in Q2 since Brazil 2018, and it was wonderful to see George display the talent he so clearly has (despite his race not going quite so well). The Uno reverse card came out at Ferrari, with this time Vettel pushing Leclerc out of Q3, the German only able to manage P10 at the end of the day. The battle for pole was primarily between the two drivers who have gained the strongest reputations for commanding a rainy track: Hamilton and Verstappen. But while Max put in a brilliant performance, demonstrating great control as he saved his car from a nasty accident after sliding through the final corner (the kind of thing we first saw in Brazil 2016), it was Lewis’s day. He put in a completely commanding final lap that cemented him as back in the game after a disappointing last weekend, the gap between him and Verstappen a mind-blowing and unheard of 1.2 seconds! Sainz, Ocon and Gasly also impressed, qualifying P3, P5 and P7 respectively.

Due to the wet qualifying, everyone had a free choice of tyres come race day, with most drivers electing to begin on the softs. Almost instantly it was all over for Ferrari, an ill-judged move from Leclerc taking their weekend from bad to worse. It goes back to the saying that you can’t win a race on the first lap, but you can easily lose one. His attempt to go down the inside of Vettel was completely unnecessary, and both drivers paid the price (Leclerc did apologise profusely and accept all the blame). With their car not even looking ‘best of the rest’ and this being their second race ending collision in four races, you get the feeling Sainz might be feeling a little less than happy about his upcoming move to the Scuderia. The incident necessitated a safety car for a couple of laps whilst the remains of Vettel’s rear wing were cleared off the track.

The majority of the race was not super eventful, with only one further retirement – Esteban Ocon. Hamilton pulled away from Verstappen and the trio of Hamilton, Verstappen and Bottas in turn pulled away from those behind them. The midfield was closely bunched together for much of the race with lots of good battles, Perez in particular making his mark with a remarkable drive where he was up to 5thfrom 17thby lap 49 (having also pitted), pulling out fastest laps all over the place. Stroll was not able to make quite the same impact, struggling to pass Ricciardo for most of the race. Sainz’s race was rather ruined by a botched pit stop that put him out at the back of the group that included Norris, Ricciardo and Stroll, but he did manage to set fastest lap (and set a new lap record), giving McLaren their first consecutive fastest laps since 2011.

It really started to heat up on lap 67, with Bottas finally catching Verstappen, who was struggling with older tyres and some front wing damage. It looked like the Finn had got him, but Verstappen pulled off an insane move to regain the position, if only for 1 lap. It really showed Max’s passion that despite knowing Valterri was in the faster car and would eventually pass him he still put up an amazing fight, providing the fans with the entertainment we wanted. In my opinion, this drive, fight, and unwillingness to give up are the qualities of a future world champion. Perez finally caught Albon, but suffered damage that seriously compromised his speed, causing him to drop back. Lando Norris has come alive at the end of both races so far, and it’s great to see. Over the final 2 laps he went from 8thto 5th, capitalising upon Stroll and Ricciardo’s battle that saw both cars go off-track, and then passing the ailing car of Perez on the penultimate corner. The Mexican was soon caught by his teammate and the Renault, and the trio crossed the line three abreast, Perez just clinging on to 6thwith only a second separating Norris in 5thand Ricciardo in 8th. It was a Mercedes 1-2, with Hamilton putting in a totally dominant performance to win the race.

One of the most powerful moments of the weekend came during the podium celebration, when Stephanie Travers, Mercedes’ Trackside Fluid Engineer, accepted their constructor’s trophy. She is one of only NINE women ever to stand on an F1 podium, and the only woman of colour. I want to talk about gender diversity in the sport more in another post, but the importance of Stephanie standing up there alongside the drivers cannot be understated. Representation is so important, and the fact that women and young people of colour could see someone who looked like them on that podium says there is a place for them in the sport. I would read Lewis’s Instagram post if you want to find out more about Stephanie, and I think he was certainly instrumental in selecting her to join him for the champagne. Other teams should take note; although this is only a start, it was a display of genuine (rather than just performative) allyship.

Ferrari need to get their act together for Hungary this weekend; if they don’t show any improvement then I can’t see them having much of a chance of success for the rest of the year. Apart from Sainz’s pit stop it was a great weekend for McLaren, who stand 3rdin the constructors championship, with Norris maintaining 3rdin the drivers (with over half the points he managed to get all of last year). Toto Wolff has said he expects Red Bull to be a threat at the Hungaroring, but he has been known to make these kind of comments only for the Mercedes to appear stronger than ever, so we shall have to wait and see. Verstappen was narrowly beaten by Hamilton for the win last year, but managed to secure his first pole position, and has performed steadily there over the years. However, this is arguably the track where Hamilton has seen the most success – he has won 7 out of his 13 races there, and could be set to equal Michael Schumacher’s record of most race wins at the same circuit. Whatever happens, I can’t wait for more racing.

[ceciliasheplin]

Master post for all my fics so far

I’ve put here most of the tags but not all, so please read them. My recurring themes are: Reylo is madly in love, Happy ending, Redemption/Healing of some sort. Let me know what you guys think!

Morpho Menelaus

Rated M, 1189 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/24635509

🏷 Modern AU, Grief/Mourning, Pinned Insects, Swearing, Butterflies, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst

Rey works at an insectarium and notices a recurring visitor at the butterfly exhibit.

This fic is the ao3 version of a twitter fic that I wrote for this prompt by @reylo_prompts:

"Ben and Rey work at a zoo Rey always finds Ben in the butterfly exhibit, he likes to go there when he’s sad."

Ever since the Roll-out came out, I’ve been in love with the butterflies, like many fellow Reylos, and couldn’t wait for them to show up in the fics. My headcanon is that the butterflies are a symbol of the love between father and son, so tragically broken apart (by cruel writers). I love this little fic. It makes me happy. It gives me closure and hope.

🦋🦋🦋

***

A Quick Death

Rated M, 2293 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/24563752

🏷 Canon Divergence, Post TLJ, Wounds, animal blood, Mention of death penalty, Forgiveness, Redemption

This is my contribution to a Prompt Gangbang event: “Rey finds Ben tied to a tree.”

I can’t write fix-it fics because TROS made canon so bad, there is no fixing it other than ignoring that piece of shit of a movie completely, in my opinion. So I divorced myself from that and live in denial ever since, never missing an opportunity of writing about what it should have been.

🌳🌳🌳

***

What Am I Here For?

Rated E, 25577 words, 16 chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/23903074/chapters/57471235

🏷 Modern AU, Breylo, Polyamory, Heavy Angst, Grief/Mourning, No Incest, Skywalker Family Drama, Loss of appetite, Consensual Infidelity, Internalized Prejudices, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Threesome - F/M/M, Everyone Is Alive, No Pregnancy, No Kids

This is the Breylo version of this old prompt by @reylo_prompts: "When Ben is declared missing, and then presumed dead, his fiance, Rey, is heartbroken. He returns years later, only to find she didn't wait for him as she'd promised she would."

This is my favourite fic that I wrote. It features smut but it’s not a smut fic, I wanted to write something different this time. Also, I had a lot of grief to let out and needed to find a way for these characters to heal and find a happy ending, even after all they’ve been through. I poured my heart out writing this one. I’m still in love with my poly babies Rey, Ben and Kylo and always will be.

❤️💛💙

***

Smitten

Rated M, 16065 words, 8 Chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/23306047/chapters/55821535

🏷 Modern Setting, Angel Rey, Human Ben, Mild Smut, Loss of Virginity, Protected Sex, Family Drama, Fluff

Rey is an angel who falls to protect human Ben from demon Snoke. They fall in love while figuring out the truth about Ben's family.

Inspired by Diablo (the video game) mythos, but this fic is super fluffy. Listen, I just wanted a feral angel girl to protect SoftBoi Ben, okay? And fall in love and bone him along the way...

😇😇😇

***

Macrolepidoptera

Rated E, 3215 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/23588158

🏷 Modern, Mothlo, Porn with Feelings, Hurt/Comfort, Monsterfucking, Body Worship, Biting, Blood Play, Fluff and Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dark fic

Rey runs after her Mothman to show him how much she loves him

MOTHLOOOO!!! I fell in love with Mothlo and had the urge to let the whole fandom know, haha. Really, this is about Kylo believing he’s worthy of love and Rey being true to herself. Another favourite, because I will always love those sweet monsters who are better than so many ‘nice guys’ we meet out there.

🖤🦋🖤 

***

Ash & Blood

Rated E, 6596 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/22568317

🏷 Medieval, Dark fic, Murderous Lovers, Minor Character Death, Betrayal between friends, Violence, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, Rey is not nice, but they love each other

Bloodthirsty warrior Kylo Ren is betrayed by his men and must flee. He is helped by a mysterious woman and her friends. He joins forces with them to get his revenge.

My first dark fic. It was a gift for my wonderful friend. It was a lot of fun to write people being bad.

🗡🖤🔥

***

Heal

Rated T, 4379 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/22537060

🏷 Canon Divergence, Angst, Fluff, Kyber Crystals, Force Bond, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Sharing a Bed, Visions

A few weeks after the Battle of Crait, the Force connects Rey and Ben again on several occasions as she is trying to heal the legacy saber's Kyber crystal.

Another gift for a Valentine’s Day exchange. When my giftee asked for soft romance and Rey touching Ben’s hair I rubbed my hands together and gave an evil laugh because it’s what I do best, haha. This is my first T rated fic and it’s very soft and cute.

💎💎💎

***

High Seas

Rated E, 19923, 10 chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/21640174/chapters/51602203

🏷 Pirate AU, Porn With Plot, Mention of Reyux, Infidelity Kink, Praise Kink, Light Dom/sub, Dom Kylo Ren, Sub Rey, Betrayal, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Name-Calling, Dirty Talk, Rough Sex, Period-Typical Sexism, Slut Shaming, Revenge Sex, Pirate Rey, Lovers to enemies to lovers, Mention of pregnancy at the very end of the epilogue

Rey is stuck in a loveless and sexless marriage. So she turns to the alluring Commander Kylo Ren to quench her thirst.

This is my dirtiest fic and I love it to death. I’m not the best smut writer in the world, but this porn was liberating to write. Also, I wanted to write Ben as not a Softboi this time, and Rey as someone a little more flawed than what I usually do. Horny Reylo at their best.

🏴‍☠️ 🌊

***

The Tide

Rated E, 14949 words, 6 chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/20658665/chapters/49060343

🏷 Canon Divergence, Slow Burn, Hurt/Comfort, Domestic Fluff, Angst, Eventual Smut, Mention of abuse, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Gardening, Spoiler for Kylo Ren comic, No Pregnancy, No Kids

This fic was based on a prompt from @reylo_prompts: “The Resistance catches Supreme Leader and decides on his execution. Rey promises that if they do that, the Jedi won't support their cause any longer. Nevertheless, they proceed. She leaves. Several years later, Palpatine's return prompts the Resistance to seek Rey out. They are shocked to find her peacefully living with very much alive Kylo in a cute cottage on an outer rim planet.”

In sharp contrast to the latter, this is mostly plot driven. I wanted to write about them falling in love gradually, facing who they really are and what happened in canon (I wrote this before TROS came out so some of my lines sound kinda funny now). Also, Leia and Ben have a chance to make things right here, something that will forever be missing in my heart.

🏡🌻🌏

***

The Dark Prince

Rated E, 38471 words, 17 chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/20739284/chapters/49274468

🏷 Fantasy AU, Slow Burn, Curses, Demons, Angst, Fluff, Smut, Attempt Self-Sacrifice, Battles

In a fantasy land, Rey, a Jedi Monk, travels across the land in the winter to end the war the First Order has been waging. There, she finds their great power being challenged by a small but brave group of dissidents, the Resistance, and also by something else. A demon who haunts the woods nearby and attacks those who dare to cross the forest.

This was my RFFA fic. I tried to create a world where the heroes would be able to fight and win by not fighting what they hate but saving what they love.

***

Something Beautiful

Rated E, 6186 words, One-shot

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/20263963

🏷 Medieval AU, Arranged Marriage, Fluff, Angst, Smut, Loss of Virginity, Virgin Rey, Virgin Ben Solo, Gentle Sex

Rey begrudgingly agrees to marry her greatest enemy and fears her wedding night.

This fic was inspired by a prompt from @reylo_prompts: “Lord Ren forces orphan Rey to marry him. On their wedding night he refuses to take her because he wants her to be willing. Rey is both enraged and frustrated. She may hate him but she isn’t exactly opposed to being ravished by her husband.”

This is my most successful fic. I loved the idea of a character being so sure of something and then be proven wrong. It’s basically two dumb virgins figuring it all out, connecting deeply in the process. And I could never have a fic where Rey is a passive onlooker in her own life. She knows what she wants and she’s going to get it.

🏰🌕💞

***

The Balance

Rated E, 70382 words, 21 chapters

📎https://archiveofourown.org/works/17664236/chapters/41660696

🏷 Canonverse, Slow Burn, Eventual Smut, The Force Ships It, Softboi Ben, Rey is confident, Lightsabers, Force Bond, Kylo Ren Redemption

It has been a few months since the battle of Crait. Both sides are rushing to rebuild. Rey is getting stronger as a Jedi. Ben, however, is feeling unsure. They cannot forget about each other as dreams haunt them both. A series of events brings them together again.

Okay, this is my first fic... It’s bad... Like, really bad... I’m not disowning it but this is cringeworthy, even if I still love it and stand by some of my ideas. We all gotta start somewhere, right? Also, it’s better than TROS... 😘

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Big thanks to @leofgyth​, @reylotrash711​, @thehobbem​ and starcrossreylo for the betas and moodboards. I love you guys!

[bountyofbeads]

https://www.theplayerstribune.com/en-us/articles/sue-bird-megan-rapinoe-uswnt

"What’s it like to have the literal President of the literal United States (of literal America) go Full Adolescent Boy on your girlfriend? Hmm. Well… it’s WEIRD.”

Sue Bird calls out Trump in hilarious and touching tribute to girlfriend Meghan Rapinoe. 👏👏👏👏

"Hi!! @S10Bird here. This is my WC Semis preview. Title was supposed to be “So the President F*cking Hates My Girlfriend (& 10 Other Things I Want You to Know Before the World Cup Semifinals)” but we ran out of space. My bad. Thanks for reading. GO @USWNT."

Hi!! Sue here. This is my World Cup Semifinals preview. The title was supposed to be “So the President F*cking Hates My Girlfriend (and 10 Other Things I Want You to Know Before the World Cup Semifinals)” but we ran out of space. My bad. Thanks for reading. GO USWNT.

(1) I’m back!! I was done, I swear!! No, really, I SWEAR. Last year I broke my nose, and then I wrote about it, and then I seriously did think that was going to be it for me in the writing game. I remember telling my editor here something like, “It would take the President of the United States going on a hate-filled Twitter spree trolling my girlfriend while she was putting American soccer, women’s sports, equal pay, gay pride and TRUE LOVE on her back, all at once, scoring two majestic goals to lead Team USA to a thrilling victory over France and a place in the World Cup SEMIFINALS, for me to ever even thinkabout writing again.” But I’m a woman of my word. So here I am.

(2) First of all, I’ve gotta get this on the record, if it’s not already clear: I’m SO proud of Megan!!

And the entire damn USWNT. That’s why I’m writing this article, mainly. So if you could do me a favor, let’s just take a second, for real, and appreciate this RUN my girl’s been on?? Like, take away all of the “extra” stuff — and just focus for a second on the soccer alone. Two goals against Spain. Two goals against France, WHILE A GUEST IN THEIR MAISON. I want to hit on a lot of other topics while I’m here, and trust me I will — but I just think it’s also really important not to forget what this is actually, first and foremost, about, you know? It’s about a world-class athlete, operating at the absolute peak of her powers, on the absolute biggest stage that there is. It’s about an athlete f*cking killing it. 

It’s about Megan coming through.

(3) O.K. so now that that’s out of the way, I’ll answer The Question.

The one that’s probably most on your mind. And by that I mean: What’s it like to have the literal President of the literal United States (of literal America) go Full Adolescent Boy on your girlfriend?  Hmm. Well… it’s WEIRD. And I’d say I actually had a pretty standard reaction to it: which was to freak out a little.

That’s one thing that you kind of have to know about me and Megan: our politics are similar — after we won the WNBA title in Seattle last season, no way were we going to the (f*cking) White House! — but our dispositions are not. And as we’ve been talking through a lot of this “stuff,” as it’s been happening to her, you know, I’ll be honest here….. some of it scares the sh*t out of me!!

I mean, some of it is kind of funny….. but like in a REALLY? REALLY? THIS GUY??? kind of way. Like, dude — there’s nothing better demanding your attention?? It would be ridiculous to the point of laughter, if it wasn’t so gross. (And if his legislations and policies weren’t ruining the lives of so many innocent people.) And then what’s legitimately scary, I guess, is like….. how it’s not just his tweets. Because now suddenly you’ve got all these MAGA peeps getting hostile in your mentions. And you’ve got all these crazy blogs writing terrible things about this person you care so much about. And now they’re doing takedowns of Meganon Fox News, and who knows whatever else. It’s like an out-of-body experience, really — that’s how I’d describe it. That’s how it was for me.

But then Megan, man….. I’ll tell you what. You just cannot shake that girl. She’s going to do her thing, at her own damn speed, to her own damn rhythm, and she’s going to apologize to exactly NO ONE for it. So when all the Trump business started to go down last week, I mean — the fact that Megan just seemed completely unfazed? It’s strange to say, but that was probably the only normal thing about it. It’s not an act with her. It’s not a deflection. To me it’s more just like: Megan is at the boss level in the video game of knowing herself. She’s always been confident….. but that doesn’t mean she’s always been immune. She’s as sensitive as anyone — maybe more!! She’s just figured out how to harness that sensitivity.

And I think Megan’s sensitivity is what drives her to fight for others. I think it’s what drove her to take a knee. The Megan you’re seeing now? It’s the stronger version of the one who knelt in the first place. All the threats, all the criticism, all the fallout — coming out on the other side of that is what makes her seem so unfazed by the assholes of the world now.

I think in trying to help others, Megan has cemented who she is.

(4) A few 100% random and 100% unrelated facts, presented without commentary.

Donald Trump has never invited a WNBA champion to the White House.

In 2017, when South Carolina Women’s Basketball — coached by a black woman (the legend Dawn Staley) — won the national championship, they were not initially invited to the White House.

In 2019, when Baylor Women’s Basketball — coached by a white woman (also a legend, Kim Mulkey) — won the national championship, they were invited to the White House with no issues.

Stumbled across this cool website the other day. Check it out 🙂

(5) Alright….. yeah. It’s time. It’s definitely time.

We Need To Talk About Megan’s Pink Hair.

I’m actually just going to say this out loud, and put it all the way out there, since the Players’ Tribune is a space for honesty (plus there’s this whole Atlantic Ocean between us): The hair?? I was….. AGAINST it. Phew!! That felt really good to say. I was against it. I thought it was too impulsive and I voted no. (LOL not that I actually got a vote — our relationship when it comes to Megan’s fashion is based on what you might call a “modified democracy,” where we both give our opinion and then Megan does what she wants.)

But yeah, my feeling was — you’re going to the World Cup!! To do great things!! And hopefully, if all goes well, you’re going to be memorialized in all of these pictures that will be around for….. EVER! Plus, blonde hair is like — Your Signature Thing!! You look amazing blonde. We know that looks good on you. Pink? Megan, are you sure?Don’t you think you might regret this??

And Megan was just, like, Nope. World Cup. Pink hair. I’m in. Let’s get it. She got it colored the DAY before she left, without a care in the freaking world. I mean….. if you were ever wondering what the Rapinoe Lifestyle was about….. that’s it, truly.

(Also, I love it now? Now that’s it’s settled in and looks a little more purple. Don’t tell Megan.)

(6) Back to the France game for a second. A few thoughts here.

One, I’m not sure if you saw — but, my girlfriend?? She shrugged off the Rude Man on Twitter, and managed to play….. I’d say pretty well 🙂

Two, France!! They were incredible. I really hope some of them are reading this, because I just want them to know that. They stayed so damn tough, I thought, through the whole tournament — and that’s with the pressure of hosting the event, too. The way they persevered to make it a match, late, after getting down two goals early?? I mean, don’t get me wrong — I was 100% on MANIAC mode, cheering for our squad. Obviously. But I still hated that anyone had to lose.

Three, on the advice of counsel I’d like to issue a formal apology to everyone who was on the plane with me last week, and had to watch me fistpump like a bozo after each of Megan’s goals, and smash the REFRESH button on my phone like a….. well, also a bozo, after my bars started cutting out in the second half.

It won’t happen again except let me be clear it might.

(7) YOU GUYS: WHAT ARE PENALTY KICKS.

No, seriously — I could not imagine taking one??????

I think the more I watch soccer, and the more I find these ways to apply it to what I know about basketball, the better feel I get for the game. Like, for example, as a point guard, I have a pretty strong sense of floor-spacing….. and I think that ends up being extremely relevant for soccer. I’m definitely starting to “see the field,” you know? And I’m noticing the way that plays develop, and stuff. (They just kind of develop.)

O.K. so that’s my plus column.

My minus column? PENALTY KICKS. Like, I guess they’re kind of like free throws? Only if there was someone trying to BLOCK your free throw, and you had to use your foot (??), and oh yeah if you missed it you’d never forgive yourself and have it haunt you for the rest of your LIFE?? So what I’m saying is it’s not like a free throw at all.

I don’t want Megan to turn out to be an alien from another planet, but I’m just going to say the truth of how I feel right now: If you’re good at penalty kicks, you’re a f*cking alien from another planet.

(8) I had a long thing prepared here about the equal pay debate.

I was planning on “making some points” and “going in.”

But then I thought about it some more, and to tell you the truth….. I’m kind of done with that.

If you’re not on the right side of this fight, and advocating fiercely for equal pay — whether it’s in soccer, or basketball, or in any other industry, and across every intersectional boundary — then I just straight-up feel bad for you.

Because you’re sad, and wrong, and going down.

I feel that in my bones, increasingly, over these last several months — having seen my colleagues in the W show we mean business on a new CBA. 

I feel that in my bones, increasingly, over these last couple of years — having seen our NBA counterparts start (START!) to stick their necks out for us, more and more, in solidarity and out of respect.

And I feel that in my bones, increasingly, right f*cking now — having seen these indestructible USWNT women stand up for themselves and (this seriously can’t be stressed enough) crack a LAWSUIT over the heads of U.S. Soccer while they go out and grind for a freaking World Cup.

Oh right and they literally are MORE PROFITABLE THAN THE MEN.

COOL!!!!!!!!!

TLDR: Pay us.

(9) They told me I should make some predictions!! LOL.

In the first semi, I’ve got those frisky lil AMERICANS taking down England, by a score of 2-0. I feel like we’re vibing right now, and the offense is really humming, so yeah — this one’s USA all the way. (QUICK NOTE ON METHODOLOGY: I may have just made the prediction that results in me getting a summer trip to Paris.)

In the second semi….. O.K., so, I won’t reveal my sources, but I heard this major scoop that the Netherlands might be a team people are sleeping on?? But then I guess on the other hand, you also have Sweden, who thumped us in the Olympics….. so that’s a “cool final” maybe….. I don’t know, I feel like these teams probably know each other really well. Like a classic neighborhood beef. How am I doing? Should I keep faking it here? Let’s go with the Netherlands, 2-1.

(10) Wait let’s do a story time.

I’ve been lucky enough to hear a few awesome stories about the USWNT in my day, so I feel like — since you’ve put up with my decidedly non-expert World Cup semifinal preview, and been so cool about it — I owe you one of them here. 

I’ll actually tell you my favorite.

Alright so it’s halftime of the 2015 World Cup Final….. and of course, if you’re reading this, you know the score: 4-1 U.S. Carli has her hat trick, Lauren has one, and Japan has their one. And I think we’re all among friends at this point, so let’s just be real: It wasn’t even THAT close. It was over, dudes. World Cup? Over. Amazing!! Party!!

Except: these world-class athletes being these world-class athletes….. there is noooooo off switch in SIGHT. These women are in the locker room at half time, and they are taking it as seriously as if they were tied at one. People are talking strategy, going over plays, breaking down miscues — doing the whole bit, straight up, just biz as usual.

And then…..

And then there’s Megan.

She’s sitting there….. and she’s seeing everyone gameplan, and keep their game-faces on, and Do The Normal Halftime Thing..… and she gets it. Of course she gets it. But, like — still, you know?? Still. There is something inside of her that just….. CANNOT deal. Cannot deal with the ceremony of it all. Cannot deal with the bullshit. And she tries hard to fight it, tries not to say anything….. tries to stay somewhat relaxed. 

But then at some point the girl just….. I mean….. come on.

She can’t help herself:

 “WE’RE GONNA WIN THE WORLD CUP,” she blurted out. 

“WE’RE. GONNA. WIN. THE. WORLD CUP!!! 

WE’REGONNAWINTHEF*CKINGWORLDCUP!!!”

(11) So there’s this thing that I invented called Megan Goggles.

They’re hard to explain, but I think I’ve almost got it. I think it’s like….. O.K., so: Megan, she just does things sometimes. Do it….. then love it….. then — later, at the very end, if there’s time — worry about it. That’s her M.O. Me, on the other hand….. I’m nothing like that. I’m more of the worry about it first….. and then later, if there’s time, do it type. So the idea of Megan Goggles, I guess, it’s this idea of like — they’re this thing that I put on, and it helps me loosen up a bit?? And just open my eyes, and see the world from Megan’s Extremely Megan perspective.

And anyway, in the beginning of our relationship, I think I would use “Megan Goggles” as a sort of running joke — when we’d be doing that thing couples do where we play these almost cartoon versions of ourselves. In our case: free-spirit Megan and practical Sue.

Except now….. I wouldn’t be so practical!! So it would be like: 

[Megan walks into the closet with some scissors, then confidently walks out…..] 

[Sue puts on Megan Goggles…..] 

Sure, Megan! Absolutely let’s call that t-shirt you just cut a hole in “a look.” 

Or: 

[Megan suddenly decides that she needs to dye her eyebrows platinum blonde…..] 

[Sue puts on Megan Goggles…..] 

Wait, Megan, nevermind — I take it back that it’ll look like you have no eyebrows! And I can totally see what you mean when you say, “Trust me, they’ll pop.”

And so on and so on — and it just sort of became this, like, shorthand experience. I’d put on my Goggles, and I’d be on this amazing vacation….. to a place where I was someone a little left of my own center. Where I was someone who thinks like Megan thinks.

And then eventually I came to realize the obvious: that Megan Goggles are a lot more than some cute running joke between us, about fashion choices or whatever — and that they’re actually this kind of skeleton key to Megan herself. Or, put another way: When I put on my Megan Goggles?? What I’m really doing, I think, is learning to understand her better — and, if this even makes any sense: I think at the same time, I’m learning how to understand myselfbetter as well.

But wait I’ll get to my point. I’m bringing all this up, and trying to explain this crazy (or I hope not that crazy!!) concept, because last Friday — in the lead-up to that USWNT game vs. France, and then during the game itself, and then after??

I swear, it was like the most amazing thing happened: It was like the entire country, all at once, for this one fleeting and improbable but also somehow very very very very possible moment….. PUT ON MEGAN GOGGLES.

It was like the entire country, all at once, said — Soccer? YES. Women’s soccer? YES. An openly gay superstar swagging out with two goals and batsh*t celebrations and leading us to a huge-ass win in women’s soccer? YES. That same openly gay superstar not just taking some preapproved, basic level of pride in her sexuality, but actually being the world’s biggest most kissable goofball queen and literally crediting her sexuality for those two goals and her batsh*t celebrations and our huge-ass win in women’s soccer? YES. 

This is the American flag now, someone tweeted — and it’s a photo of my girlfriend, BEAMING ear to ear, smiling her BOOBS off on a football field, mugging for the camera, weird-ass dye job and all — just totally and completely over-goddamn-flowing with excellence? YES.

So anyway, look — I guess here’s my point:

I’m closer to 40 than 30. I’ve only been legally permitted to get married in the last handful of years. I’m a worrier, an overthinker, and — if it’s your type of thing — a 3x WNBA champion.

But on Friday? It was like for this one, perfect, fleeting, uncomplicated day….. I was everyone.

I was happy. 

I was crazy.

I was PROUD.

I was pretending to know about soccer.

I was a little overwhelmed. 

I was pretty damn American.

And I was in love with Megan Rapinoe.

Sue Bird, Seattle Storm

https://t.co/A2dJrBIzRh

[irarelypostanything]

Dale Carnegie - Uses and Revisions

The book is called How to Win Friends and Influence People, and I think it’s a solid read (especially considering that it was written several decades ago).  It’s essentially a self-help book, but it’s a self-help book with applications.  I recommend it to anyone who struggles with aspergers, identifies as an introvert, has a job heavy in human interaction, or has a pulse.

There are things I agree with in it, and things that I don’t.

Part #7 is the most controversial part of the book, but it’s also probably the most interesting part.  Basically, it explains how to manipulate someone into thinking an idea was theirs.  This is actually very applicable in engineering.  The idea is to feed someone just enough information to think that they have autonomy, but to fail to realize that you’re the one pulling the strings.  You’ve already made up your mind.  But you walk them through your thought process, make suggestions, and try to get people to see things your way.  Because they unknowingly think that they’re the ones with the idea, they will bend to your will.

A lot of the book is kind of like this...I’d go as far as to call it manipulative, but the tone of the entire book is light-hearted and mature.  So I don’t know.  People don’t care about what you want, so appeal to their self-interest.  He also says something like (I’m paraphrasing) when negotiating with people, take the back door.  Don’t start by talking about your intentions...start by exploiting research on their hobbies, or their families.  He doesn’t say things LIKE that at all, but I think it would be interesting to re-frame the entire book and rewrite it in an evil sort of way.

Anyway, uh...

The way to make people like you is to be genuinely interested in them.  That’s solid advice.  His discussion and examples on this point, alone, make the book worth reading.  Many people criticize this as common sense, but I think it’s just as easy to argue that the way to make people interested in you is by talking at length about yourself, and your story.  From my experience, I disagree.  Sometimes when companies interview candidates, they’re taken aback when the interviewee has done thorough research in the interviewer.  It prompts a discussion in which the interviewer talks about him/herself, which usually makes for some pretty interesting discussions.  It’s a rare gift in this day and age, being or at least seeming genuinely interested in the personal story, talents, and ambitions of another person.

I find that a lot of people know this “rule,” but they execute it in an annoying sort of way.  They’ll ask a person to talk, but then they’ll do this thing where they turn the conversation around and just go back to talking about themselves.  This proves that there isn’t genuine interest.  

My only challenge to this “rule” is that sometimes, you can go pretty far by talking about something outside of both of you.  The book kind of touches on this point, but you can go pretty far by talking about a TV show, or a book, or a video game, or cars.  Cooking and food is pretty great, if you actually do the former.

This was supposed to be a 10-minute free write and it’s already been 11, so let me wrap up by talking about arguments:

I disagree with the section on arguments 100%.  Maybe I just execute this part of the book badly, but I find that you’ll paradoxically be more diplomatic when you just directly argue when an argument is in order.  If you try too hard to avoid an argument, or to draw a line and call it a “discussion,” you might just make it seem clear what your position is, but then act like you’re passive-aggressively trying to manipulate the other person.  Arguments can be civil.  Arguments, some argue ( :D ), are one of the foundational elements of an intellectual society. We have opinions.  Our opinions on things, like the death penalty or abortion or tax policy, are debatable because we can’t exactly predict the future or agree on a universal morality.  So we argue.  We put our beliefs out in the open, and we let them be challenged.

But here I am, opening up Facebook or Nextdoor or whatever, and those arguments are just stupid.  There are still rules to having a good argument.  Like you don’t ask the person if they’re 12 when they’re obviously adults, or use too many buzz words, or say you “can’t understand their position” when you just disagree with it, or act like you’re personally offended and want to take this person on in a fight because they don’t believe climate change is a serious concern, or that rent control or is in the best interest of the renters.  You make a claim, you contest a claim, you debate arguments, you revise arguments, you probably don’t compromise but at the very least you refine your own ideas.  Your argument gets stronger because it’s been challenged, not weaker...unless they change your mind.

Whew okay.  That was 16 minutes. 

[willowdove]

Zutara Meta: Rediscovered Forum edition

I was looking through messages on my old email and rediscovered this forum right here: https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/2507/16292543/1/why-is-Zutara-so-popular-I-mean-no-bashing-intended-just-want-to-know

You can read through the thread, imho I think it’s interesting to look at other people’s thoughts on the matter, but it is a hugely long and rather old thread so I thought I’d republish my own specific additions here.

My original post, 5 years ago:

It is pretty hard to get Zutara right without being all sappy and stupid and throwing the entire plot away. The way the 3rd season is constructed it wouldn't make any sense for Zutara to be together in canon itself. And that's a shame, since they are so perfect.

Yes, I am a 17 year old girl. No, I don't think that it's a good pairing because of the whole opposites attract or good girl/bad boy arguments you often hear. I think it's a good pairing because they understand each other. Zuko can appreciate the dark side of Katara, without judgement. Katara accepts the effects Zuko's horrible past has had on him. They are both dark, but more importantly, they both overcome it.

Personally, I don't like Kataang. Aang really is too young for Katara. But it's not about biological age, as so many people seem to think. It's about mental age. Aang is a kid, has been the entire series. Katara is a an adult. She is the one who understands the actual weight of the world and accepts responsibility for looking after everyone. As for Maiko, I just find Mai's romantic character to be forced.

My new post: 

Wow, rediscovering this forum is a trip.  Apparently I commented on this when I was 17.  I am now 22.  Anyway since I'm here I guess I'd like to elaborate on what I said previously.

When I said that Zuko understands and accepts Katara's dark side, I meant that he actually shares her powerful sense of justice and her relentlessness.  A lot of people consider his role in the Southern Raiders to be problematic because he "encourages" Katara to murder her mother's killer, but there is more nuance to it than that.  Zuko is the only one who relates to and attempts to rectify her need for closure in relation to the death of her mother.  Even Sokka, her brother, berates her for continuing to carry emotional pain and tells her she should just let it go.  He, and Aang and everyone else, tell her to forgive the man who murdered her mother, who, let's not forget, died in place of Katara herself in a Fire Nation bid at the ethnic cleansing of all Southern waterbenders.  Now, some might say he did deserve the death penalty for that war crime.  Personally I can't say whether he did or didn't.  What I can say is that it was vitally important for Katara to be able to pursue justice for what had been done to her.  She needed to be afforded a choice in the matter, and in the making of that choice, she was able to unburden herself.  And Zuko, who desperately wished for the same choice to be afforded to him in the case of his own missing mother, and who had been given the chance to face down his abuser and officially cut ties with his father the Fire Lord on the Day of Black Sun, knew that was what she needed and gave it to her.  In turn she showed him that it was possible to achieve closure by ending the cycle of violence and become stronger for doing that.

Zuko and Katara do have some personality traits that can make them clash.  They are both stubborn, quick to anger.  But their anger is a righteous anger, and one that could easily be directly towards the same target of injustice.  We have to remember, Zuko got his scar because he vehemently disapproved of using his untrained countrymen as bait in a suicidal tactic that was sure to incur an excess of causalities.  Katara famously refuses to turn her back on people who need her, whether it be her family, a boy she found in an iceberg, or villagers suffering from pollution in their river.  

One of the best things about Zutara, in my opinion, is the way that they challenge each other to become better people.  In the period of their relationship that was adversarial they had to train hard in order to be able to match the other's combat abilities.  But beyond that they challenged each other to find the humanity in their opponents on the other side of the war, and ultimately to overcome cultural biases they held towards themselves and towards each other.  And when they did come together as friends and allies, they worked together seamlessly. You need only to look at their bending scenes together to see just how well they understand and anticipate each other.  That's why Zuko asked Katara to come with him to challenge Azula out of everyone in the group, because out of everyone he had established the deepest bond with her; he trusted her implicitly and completely.

Now that I'm older I can say that Aang can and does make a lot more mature decisions than I gave him credit for, but I still feel that he was first and foremost a child at heart.  His character conflict stemmed from that- from the dichotomy between his desire to be an uncomplicated child and the responsibilities of his office of the Avatar.

Meanwhile Katara, who absolutely was not an adult (lol 17 yr old me), took on maternal responsibilities from the age of 5 on and her personality reflected that.  She did struggle to reclaim some of that childhood levity and fun, but that wasn't her primary conflict.  Her primary conflict was between honoring her culture and traditions and following her inner moral compass.  She was expected to drive Aang out of the village to protect them but instead she chose to travel with him and save him from danger.  She was expected to only become a healer through the constraint of gender norms but instead she chose to become a warrior AND a healer.  She was expected to learn and practice bloodbending from Hama to preserve the Southern style but she rejected it as amoral.  She was expected to hate and destroy all things Fire Nation but she put a stop to Jet's plans to flood a Fire Nation village, she helped the polluted village, and she came to understand and respect Zuko.  Hers is an internal conflict that closely mirrors Zuko's, who struggles for most of the narrative to unlearn Fire Nation propoganda and understand the harm colonialism and war have brought to the world, and to unlearn lessons about what constitutes good and worth that his father imposed on him.  

Some people on this thread have commented that Katara would not be "cut out" for being royalty or taking on the political role of the Fire Lady, but I have to thoroughly disagree.  Katara would take that office by storm, making sure that policies were being enacted fairly in the best interest of all nations and people of every economic class, and overseeing countless, massive humanitarian projects.  Honestly it's a shame that in canon she retreated into her role as a mom and a healer when those were only ASPECTS of Katara's personality.  As the wife of the Avatar, daughter/sister to the Chief of the Southern Water Tribe (you know Sokka succeeded that office), and a master waterbender and a legendary war hero in her own right, there is NO WAY AT ALL she would have rested on her laurels when she could have been so much more involved in the ultimate shaping of the post-war world.  But I digress.  

In conclusion Zuko and Katara are much more similar than they are different.  The ways that they are opposite are only superficial, and ultimately as a team they represent an unstoppable force of moral good.  They understand and bolster each other in ways the other characters can't or are unwilling to, but they also hold each other accountable and don't put each other on a pedestal.  I honestly have never seen how people could say these two characters "brought out the worst in each other", because actually they inspired each other to change for the better.

[thatyanderecritic]

Mystic Messenger

Title: Mystic Messenger

Media: Game. Maker: Cheritz

Yandere(s): Jumin Han, Yoosung Kim, Ray (Real name: Saeran Choi)

Yandere Scale (In order as shown above): 1/5, 3/5, 4/5

Criticism written by: Kai

Editor: Julie

The Review:

Hey there everyone! Kai here and I’m coming back with another yandere review. This time around, I’ll be reviewing the incredibly popular otome game, Mystic Messenger. It’s one of my favorite otome games out there and I’m highly opinionated about this game. Cheritz is known to include at least one yandere in their games; Mystic Messenger being no exception to that rule. For Mystic Messenger, they have a whopping three yanderes and I thankfully played all their routes on my free time for fun. Now let’s check out their yanderes, hm?

(I’m just going to assume that everyone knows the story but if you don’t, you can read the summary here)

Jumin Han:

I’ll be upfront for everyone here: Jumin is my least favorite route out of all the guys in the game. I found it to be boring, too overhyped by the fans, and Jumin’s personality to be rather lame. That being said, take some of my opinions with a grain of salt.

Now then, is Jumin a yandere? Eeeeeeh, I guess?

I describe Jumin as “baby’s first yandere”. He’s very lowkey about it and anything to suggest he is a yandere is so vague that it just went over my head. I found myself having to scrutinize everything he does and say with a goddamn microscope. Spoiler alert: if your readers have to try really hard to look for evidence that he’s a yandere, then he’s not a very good yandere. Instead, I found the other characters having to tell me that Jumin, is in fact, a yandere. Every single chatroom that have the other characters talk about Jumin in his route all go: “Oh!!! You better watch out!!! Jumin is super possessive and obsessive about you MC!!!” or “Oh man!!! Jumin gives me the creep vibes!!! There’s something unsettling about him!!!”  

I mean… I guess? Spoiler alert 2: If you have to have your side characters tell the MC that the male lead is a yandere (instead of just showing it), then he isn’t a good yandere. Like jesus Cheritz, what happened to you? You used to be pretty good in including yanderes in your games… Jumin is just… pathetic. It’s felt like they put up a bunch of neon signs around Jumin then forget to write him as a yandere. The only “yandere part” about Jumin was how he locked up the MC in his penthouse. But to be fair, the MC’s life was in danger and she willingly stays there. In fact, the whole “Locked up” part seemed rather half assed. Besides that, there wasn’t anything else about Jumin that makes him a yandere… well, besides the other characters telling me he is. Can you believe that Cheritz had the gall to compare Jumin to Jisoo from Dandelion (their other otome game)? That’s like comparing apples and oranges… just because they’re both fruits doesn’t make them the same thing.

Jumin’s route is so not worth to play if you’re hoping to “woo a yandere”. It’s honestly a waste of time and you’re better off googling Jumin’s bad end 2 CG if you want that yandere aesthetic. If you want to see some better yanderes, just check out the other two… Let’s talk about Yoosung.

Yoosung Kim:

It might come as a surprise by Yoosung was a far better and stronger yandere than Jumin. While the game was focusing so hard on portraying Jumin as a yandere, they never realize that they struck gold with Yoosung. Funny enough, I think the reason why Jumin was such a bad yandere was because cheritz concentrated on him so much that they fucked up and since they didn’t focus on Yoosung, that’s why he came out as a better yandere. But the only problem with Yoosung is that…

… He isn’t a yandere for you.

Yes, that’s right. Yoosung is a yandere but he is not a yandere for you. He is obsessed with his older cousin, Rika. Throughout his route, he won’t shut up about her. It’s “Rika this” and “Rika that”. Yoosung really tested my patients on how long I’ll stick to his route. Eventually though, Yoosung starts to the MC as his replacement for Rika. He sees Rika in the MC and start comparing the two… even thinking that they’re the same person. At some points, Yoosung really wants to turn MC into Rika. Yoosung likes you… but not THE you but the Rika version. Of course, for his good end he learns to differentiate between you two and learn how to love the MC as she is but it doesn’t change the fact that Yoosung was a yandere at certain points.

In the end, Yoosung is a yandere for his cousin. The only thing about him is A) he tries to end up with someone else by turning her into his cousin and B) he ends up loving someone else (the MC). Regardless on how you look at it, Yoosung broke our loyalty rule. I say go ahead and play his route if you want a yandere story and don’t mind being a cuck for 75% of his route. Yoosung got some pretty good yandere moments and bad endings.

Ray:

Oh my god. Ray was the best yandere I’ve seen throughout Cheritz’s games. He was damn near close to being the perfect yandere (well… my taste. But also he clicked off the ideal yandere check marks). Right off the bat, we see his clinginess to the MC, his mental instability, fear of losing the MC, and his jealousy to the other characters. He was such a sweetheart and to top it off he risked his life in saving the MC. Ray was *muah* the perfect recipe for an ideal yandere (my type). But unfortunately… Cheritz just had to ruin it.

Towards the middle Ray had a personality switch. Fearing that he wasn’t strong enough to protect the MC, Ray sort of… “killed” himself and created his alternative personality: edgy Saeran. I was absolutely heartbroken with Ray leaving for good and leaving behind that asshole. Immediately the new personality treated the MC sadistically. He starved her, spoke down to her, and was all round a piece of shit. BRING BACK MY BABY BOI CHERITZ, YOU FUCKING MONSTERS. COWARDS.

This was my last straw. I deleted Mystic Messengers right at that point and never opened it since. Ray was such a good yandere and they had to ruin it. Ray’s route is only good up to the point till his personality switch. After that it went down hill and he doesn’t even have any yandere bad endings. Fuck that.

Final thoughts:

Yoosung is the only route to play for completion if you want a yandere story. Ray was ideal but Cheritz ruined it and don’t even bother with Jumin’s route.

I have a love/hate relationship with Mystic Messenger. It was an interesting story and the concept was good in theory, but in the end the Cons out way the Pros. For one: the game is almost unplayable if you have a social life. The chatroom, phone calls, texts, and emails were a neat concept for interactive storytelling. But the issue lays in the fact you have to wait for these things to pop up. I don’t know about y’all but I have family, friends, a job, and school. Ain’t nobody got time to wait for that 2 PM phone call or that 1 AM chatroom. That’s fucking ridiculous. And don’t you tell me I can miss a couple of chatroom or phone calls. For one, it’s not like I’m missing one chatroom but multiple. I can have a pretty busy day and never have a chance to pick up my phone. Some of those chatrooms are pretty important if you want to get a good ending. There’s also the fact that I’m a completionist… I want to see ALL the content in the game. Not pick and choose what I have time for. And don’t bring up that it’s free or the hourglasses. I rather pay the game for the full price than do a microtransactions… and grinding for hourglasses is a bitch and you know it. I recalled I calculated how much it cause to complete all routes (The main cast. Not including V or Ray or the phone calls) by paying for all the missing chatroom or paying for the day… it was over $300 folks. $300 in microtransaction. Cheritz is fucking crazy. Thank god I fucking hacked this game.

There’s way more complaints about this game (like the emails. I’m tired of having three different walkthroughs up just to get through this god damn game) but I’m just talking about the main function for those interested in playing after read this review. Gameplay is really fucked and unfriendly for those with personal lives. Be ready to waste 7 days of your life to finish this game. All I’m say, Cheritz (even though I know they’re not reading), you guys should have two modes for Mystic Messenger: one where it’s like a standard otome game where the chatroom come one right after the other and you don’t get a penalty for missing chatrooms (the game actually pauses on where you stopped) for a flat rate price of what the entire game is worth… and then the free option where you play the game in the usual default state. That’s all I’m asking and it makes logical sense.

Anyways. That’s my gripe about the game and the yanderes. Play at your own discretion.

Overall Score: 7/10

(Side note: Honestly, I love the Mystic Messenger fandom but at the same time I wonder if we played the same game sometimes. The worst part is how some people won’t criticize Cheritz and their game. Like damn… some of y’all are more forgiving than Jesus Christ himself.)

[notactuallysmol]

My first book review! I’m going to attempt to review every book I read this year so if you’re interested in finding some good YA books and filtering out the not so good from your TBR then be sure to follow. Don’t worry they will all be spoiler-free and I will also be working on making the pictures more aesthetic but it was late and I wanted to get all my thoughts out while they were still in my brain. I would also just like to add, especially considering that my first review is uncharacteristicly negative, that the intent of this account is not to offend any authors or fans of these book but simply to express my own thoughts and opinions x

Book: # murdertrending

Summary: In the near future people can now watch live-streams of convicted felons and murderers being executed on an app run by a mysterious figure called the Postman. One day Dee Guerra finds herself on Alcatraz 2.0 (the suburbanised prison island the death penalties takes place) for the murder of her step-sister. One problem - she didn’t actually kill her.

Author: Gretchen McNeil

Rating: 2/5

As you can tell from the rating, I didn’t have an overall positive experience with this book. Despite how interesting I found the original concept, I feel like the idea didn’t pan out very well in the end.

In my opinion, the author should’ve abandoned some of the side plots that were clogging up the story and instead centred the book on the general corruptness of Alcatraz 2.0 rather than the main character’s history. By making the book more focused on Dee than the app, the story became unrealistic which was saddening because the horrifying realism of the Postman app would have been more shocking on its own. It felt as if McNeil didn’t realise Alcatraz 2.0 was messed up enough without all the weird extra stuff. (How to avoid spoilers 101 lol).

However by following this more convoluted story it did allow for some shocking twists and turns. Another positive thing I would say about this book, was that it was a very politically contextual book, often making witty comments about the issues of a reality TV star president which I found amusing. But besides from that small bit of humour, this ‘dark comedy’ sadly didn’t make me laugh very much. In my opinion the characters were simply too bland to be funny. Although I can understand the authors use of stereotypes, especially considering the gang were called the ‘death row breakfast club;’ due to their dullness, I found myself rooting for this random dude in the app’s comment section more than the main character, especially when her extremely morally wrong acts were brushed aside. Speaking of the comment sections, I would say that this was also one of this books more successful aspects, as it most effectively showed the human reaction to this macabre concept, holding up a shameful mirror to our current society. Or it may just be because it was the only escape from the mediocre writing (okay that was a tad harsh) that often left me zoning out from the story and trying desperately to figure what image McNeil was getting at. (Not that my writing here is very good - look I’m tired give me a break).

Moving on. The love story in this book was kinda cute but also kinda unnecessary. I don’t know about you but if I was on an island escaping murderers my top priority wouldn’t be to go get the guy. Yes you could argue that Hunger Games does the same thing but the difference is that that actually adds to the plot. Also the author made the Hunger Games a thing in this universe and I’m just not sure about that being plausible, but then again it’s certainly not the least plausible and confusing aspect of this story.

On the whole, I feel that I was mainly disappointed with this book because it wasn’t what I wanted it to be. Maybe the story could be congratulated in itself but personally the ideas I got in my brain from reading the blurb were stronger and a lot less wishy-washy than the book itself.

Thanks for reading! If you’ve read this book yourself please share your thoughts below :)

[operationrainfall]

Title Teleportals Developer PixelGreeds Publisher PixelGreeds Original Release Date June 15th, 2018 Genre Platformer Platform PC Age Rating Unpatched: Mature Patched: 18+

After having played Maytroid and giving it an average score, I decided to review another game by PixelGreeds to see if I would have a similar experience. When it comes to developers that are new to me, I do try to play more than one game by them if available, especially if it proves a group has a wider range, style, and a greater skill set than what a single game can convey. And so, I decided to give an earlier game by PixelGreeds a chance. Teleportals, as one could guess, is named after Portal, yet, similar to Maytroid’s naming, is not quite the carbon copy one should expect going in.

Teleportals is a puzzle-platformer in which you control a woman named Susan, who randomly arrives in an alternate realm. How she got there or why remains a mystery. She soon finds a companion in a one-eyed ball-like creature named Maki, who tells her that time spent in this realm will have an adverse effect on her. The only way to prevent her eventual demise is to escape. The single upside in all of this is that she can teleport to where Maki is dropped. With not much choice, Susan takes Maki with her and begins making her way through this realm in hopes of finding an exit.

The overarching plot of Teleportals is painfully straightforward with escape as a driving force. Susan arrives, wants to leave, and so she goes on her way. As to where she is, how she got there, who these things are that she meets, and how she can teleport with them, none of this is explained. It just is, and we’re meant to take it at face value. Setting all of these questions aside, there is another narrative that takes place, which does a far better job of providing a much needed story element, as well as adding character development. For one, Susan has a backstory, in that she is a scientist researching a virus. Due to her lab running out of funding, one of her colleagues, Nancy, infects herself with said virus in an attempt to garner funding and push the research forward. Susan’s thoughts often return to Nancy, a means for Susan to strive ever closer to escape.

Maki also provides narrative strength, discussing his interest in movies, which serve as his attempts to have Susan open up during their campaign. There are several moments of humor and charm here and they contrast in a particularly satisfying way with Susan’s concern for Nancy and her drive to return and finish her work. We even see Susan forget her troubles at times, hinting at a desire to run away from an anxiety that potentially runs deeper than first implied. In fact, the narrative even suggests that there is more to the situation of Nancy infecting herself than Susan lets on. These glimmers of story are helpful to a weak plot and I would have liked far more than what is delivered.

Why do I say “far more?” Because glimmers of a story do not make an intriguing, immersive experience. More than anything, I felt dissatisfied, as I was left confused, maybe even a little cheated when I finished the game. All we actually get are hints at an underlying conflict that goes beyond the text we are given. The text itself, which I believe is a translation from another language, is not nearly strong enough to make the implications it’s attempting to make. Also, there is no proper resolution to the story at the end. We are left wondering what happened, why, and again, what significance it’s trying to imply. After one ending and credit roll, there are more levels and then a vague epilogue as if those last levels didn’t happen. What was even the point? More mystery? No, just more random nonsense. Zero genuine conclusions can be made with such a fierce lack of details.

The developers want to insinuate that there’s more happening in the plot, but without proper set up and build, it comes off as a collection of fragmented ideas that, again, seem nonsensical. If you’re planning to develop a deep lore, you need details. Vague is not the same as mysterious, nor does it build mystery. Now, there are theories floating around on the game’s Steam discussion board that could potentially make sense and better connect these fragments into a coherent story. However, I believe these theories are simply too far-fetched. Huge stretches need to be made and some major assumptions are necessary for these theories to work. Granted, you can theorize until you’re blue in the face with such a lack of detail and depth. A stronger overarching plot and a far more detailed look into these characters would have turned a forgettable mess of a story into one of legitimate intrigue.

Although Teleportals suffers from this lack of story, a recurring problem I’ve seen from them, its gameplay fares better. As I mentioned, this is a puzzle-platformer, in which the goal is to reach each room’s exit. Every single room is its own puzzle filled with traps for you to avoid and designs that require the unique attributes of your companions. Susan has the ability to swap places with Maki and another character, Bruce, who you meet later on. Susan can run and jump, as well as activate switches. Maki is small and light, allowing him to pass through narrow spaces and also bounce on special platforms when dropped. This bouncing can allow Susan to swap and reach higher areas or launch over hazards. Also, if there is a jump too high for Susan, she can place a companion near the jump point, bounce herself, swap, and ride the momentum for a higher jump. As for Bruce, he is a block-shaped entity that can act as a shield against projectiles or a step for higher platforms. Many of the later rooms will require you to utilize both companions, using their attributes and working them in tandem to reach the exit. Once you start playing, it may seem like gameplay is one-dimensional, but I was easily engaged throughout. There were several puzzles that caused some frustration, but I will admit that it was always pretty satisfying to solve these more troublesome rooms, especially the ones that take you multiple tries.

Other gameplay points include zero penalties for dying and a quick reset button for starting a room over. For the most part, the game is pretty fun and it challenges you thoroughly, however some puzzles have quite a few obnoxious elements to them. Even so, with no consequences to infinite attempts, every puzzle is doable with practice. Also, there is no combat in this game. While there is a means for Susan to destroy certain traps, there are no real enemies to fight. It’s simply surviving each room and exiting, yet the simplicity offers a lot more fun than I could have expected. Finally, gameplay options include support for multiple languages. I can appreciate the wider audience multiple languages can garner, but I’m still wondering if some things got lost in the translation.

My only complaint with Teleportals’ gameplay is in regards to its controls. I had the same complaint previously with PixelGreeds, in that if you wish to use a controller, you must rely on third-party software for any customization. Teleportals requires precision in your moves, so having zero controller customization out of the box is disheartening. Keyboard controls have customization, but if you wish to make changes, you must input all of your changes anew, as you cannot simply change a single key binding.

Moving on to the aesthetics, I had much to say about several of the visual additions seen in Maytroid that basically took a game that could have been for all ages into mature and 18+ territories. This seems to be PixelGreeds’ style, as an ecchi CG gallery that can become fully 18+ with a patch is present here. And, as in my Maytroid review, this inclusion does nothing for Teleportals. It’s senseless, as it limits the potential audience that can play this game. Perhaps my opinion is an unpopular one, but not everything needs naked women to make it better. Putting that time and effort towards the plot would have made more sense. Or, if you want hentai in your game, make it the focus of the game and don’t just tack it on. Having said that, the artists responsible for these CGs do seem to have a bit of talent. I only wish those talents were utilized in the form of in-game CGs to support dialogue or other on-screen events.

As for the in-game presentation, the aesthetics are satisfactory with its 16-bit visual style. Even though this game uses the same tilesets and backgrounds as Maytroid, they are no less impressive. Several different environments are depicted, from dusty deserts to snow-covered forests. It’s hinted that these environments even symbolize the symptoms of the virus Susan is researching. For example, one of the early symptoms is coughing or a sore throat. She makes this comment while in an arid desert, which is an early game area. A later symptom is a high fever and the connection is Susan commenting that she doesn’t feel cold, despite walking around wearing only a nightie while traveling through a snowstorm. As this narrative takes place later in the game, it points to the later stage symptoms of the disease.

Unfortunately, these connections to location, time, and viral symptoms all amount to speculation, theorizing, and tidbits the developers mention on Steam, as none of this is ever directly addressed in-game. A stronger symbolism or one with more direct connections would have made more impact. I realize this is another criticism of narrative, not aesthetics, but give me a strong, fleshed out story first, and then pepper it with secrets using the other facets of the game. Having said that, the storytelling flaws don’t take away from the quality of the visuals themselves. Finally, the audio is fair, with each track pairing to their locations adequately. My complaints are that the music itself isn’t all that memorable and there is too little of it. I think I counted just four or five tracks in the entire game. Also, these tracks may actually be the same ones used in Maytroid, but again, unmemorable.

Teleportals as a whole is a collection of great gameplay elements beaten down by unfinished ideas and bad decisions. If you were to strip away the plot and the lewdness, then the gameplay by itself would most definitely serve as a fantastic base for a potentially great game. I would even say by expanding gameplay further and properly addressing the plot, this would have had the makings of a hidden gem. The game can be completed in a single sitting, clocking in between three to five hours. Perhaps its saving grace, Teleportals can be picked up for $1, even less during a sale. So, if you’re in the mood for some quick platforming fun, and not a darn thing more, then maybe Teleportals is worth your consideration.

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[easyreview cat1title=”Overall” cat1detail=”” cat1rating=”2.5″]

Review copy provided by developer.

TBT REVIEW: Teleportals Title Teleportals Developer PixelGreeds Publisher PixelGreeds Original Release Date June 15th, 2018 Genre Platformer Platform PC…