#Formal Ferret Games

[whovian223]

Top 50 Games Played of All Time - 2024 Edition (#40-31)

Top 50 Games Played of All Time - 2024 Edition (#40-31) @RavensburgerNA @garphillgames @PlayRenegade @CosmodromeG @_dailymagic_ @tgryphgames @AportaGames @LookoutSpiele @alderac @JohnDClair @gmtgames

Two weeks and two entries into this list. Maybe I’ll be able to actually do this weekly, unlike in 2022! It was interesting doing a Top 50 rather than a Top 25. Some games have fallen enough that they wouldn’t even be listed if I was just doing a Top 25. A couple of others, even with a big increase from last time, they wouldn’t show up because they didn’t jump enough! It’s also heartening…

[anexperimentallife]

Alex and the Oracle

This is a humorous short I sold many, many years ago, before I even knew I was autistic, but the rights have reverted to me, so I'm in the middle of a rewrite/update in preparation for re-release as part of an "Alex And" collection. The premise (inspired by some of my own weird impulses) was, "What if things that might LOOK like random impulses or compulsions were actually a form of precognition?"

Alex and the Oracle by D. Robert Hamm

The first thing you need to know about Jimmy Cane is that no matter what anybody says about him, he’s not crazy. And I don’t say that just because he’s my best friend. Sure, he once showed up to a black-tie affair wearing lederhosen and leading a ferret on a leash, but I think that falls under "eccentric." Also, in his defense, I’m pretty sure lederhosen are considered formal wear in some parts of the world, he was wearing a black tie, and the invitation did say, “and guest.”

Okay, so maybe he’s a little bit crazy, but if you had Jimmy’s ‘gift,’ you would be, too.

See, Jimmy’s a precog, but not in the traditional sense. He doesn’t actually know what’s going to happen; he just gets these compulsions that usually seem to work out in the end. That whole thing with the lederhosen and the ferret? Set off a Rube Goldberg-type chain of events that saved a guy’s life. In addition to the general agitation that comes when he tries to resist acting on his compulsions, knowing that something as small as, say, what color socks you’re wearing could be a matter of life and death for someone puts a lot of pressure on a guy.

So when I let myself in over at Jimmy’s place to find him on the floor in a bathrobe surrounded by thirty or so cases of diet soda and blowing up an inflatable kiddie pool, it wasn’t the strangest thing I’d ever caught him doing.

“Hi, Alex,” Jimmy said between breaths, “I know, I know. Don't have all the soda yet; I just couldn't wait to get the pool ready.”

Which made perfect sense, in a Jimmy kind of way. I grabbed a couple of Blue Moons from the fridge and kicked back on the couch until he finished with the pool and plopped down next to me, panting. We clinked our bottles together, and he drained about a third of his in one long drought. He sighed and wiped sweat from his forehead with the sleeve of his robe.

“Okay,” I said, “Whatcha got?”

We long ago gave up on serious predictions about the outcome of Jimmy’s compulsions, but we make a game of seeing who can come up with the most outrageous guesses. We play as a team against reality, and give ourselves points every time we out-weird what actually happens. Two-on-one odds may seem a little unfair, but reality’s been doing this a lot longer than we have, and it has the home field advantage. So far, reality is winning, and I don’t even want to talk about the point spread.

“Diet soda, kiddie pool… Gotta be a connection there,” Jimmy said. “I was thinking maybe a pile of aspartame-addicted carp showing up on my doorstep.”

“Nah, not weird enough. Make ‘em talking carp and I think we’ve got something. I got a better one, though; how about the Apocalypse is nigh, and diet soda will be the only currency of value in the aftermath?”

“Makes sense; only mutants would actually drink the stuff. But what about the pool?”

“Like you said—mutants.”

“What does a kiddie pool have to do with mutants?”

“Oh, so now I’m supposed to be an expert on genetic anomalies? Maybe it’s their religion.”

Jimmy nodded sagely and stroked the three-day growth of beard on his chin. “Hm…” he said. “Plausible. Hope you’re wrong, though; I think I’m allergic to apocalypses.”

We toasted to our brilliant predictions, and Jimmy went upstairs to get dressed so I could chauffeur him around for the day. He’s got this old VW Microbus, and while it runs great, he hates driving (everyone else hates him driving, too), plus he hadn’t really slept in a couple of days, which meant he’d be a danger to life and limb out on the road alone. (Although, knowing Jimmy, if he actually felt compelled to drive, an angel would get its wings and somebody’s dead dog would come back to life.)

I do a lot of things like that for Jimmy, but it’s not a one-sided deal. He doesn’t really benefit much personally from his gift—in fact, it often screws him over—but it does provide him with just enough resources to take care of basic needs so that he can follow his compulsions full-time with no visible means of support. That seems to include whatever I need in order to get by when I take time off whatever crappy day job I’m working at the time to give him a hand and help clean up his messes.

It’s like some kind of weird temp job where I get to go on wacky adventures with my best friend and still keep up with rent, and even though it’ll never give me financial security, and even though it’s made having any kind of decent career impossible, and even though no girlfriend I’ve found so far has been willing to put up with our little adventures for more than a few months, I challenge you to come up with a better job at any salary.

Because let me tell you, being friends with Jimmy is never boring.

After several years of this kind of thing, Jimmy was showing the strain. Over the past year, I’d seen him almost in tears a few times trying to choose between three identical boxes of cereal, and there was that time he couldn’t sleep unless he wore his shoes on the wrong feet and listened to yodeling records for three days straight. Don’t even get me started on the truckload of frozen mangoes in cold storage.

It was getting to the point where Jimmy wasn’t sure what was a ‘gift’ compulsion, and what was a random impulse, and fewer and fewer of his compulsions were bearing fruit—no mango-related pun intended—or at least none that we could see. But even if he could resist the occasional impulse, he doesn’t dare, just in case doing so might have a disastrous effect on someone else. He’d even started seeing a psychiatrist, but the only thing the doc was able to do for him was prescribe sleeping and anxiety medications.

Even with the meds, or maybe in part because of them, Jimmy was in even worse shape for driving than usual, so it was a damn good thing he’d called me. Once he was ready, I fired up his microbus, and we drove the forty minutes into Kansas City, where we spent the next few hours, stopping at grocery and convenience stores. At each stop, Jimmy pulled case after case of diet soda off the shelves with increasing degrees of agitation. When he found one that “felt right,” he was able to relax for just a few minutes before he started being drawn to the next case. A few places we had to talk them into letting Jimmy go examine the back stock. You’d think they’d refuse, or at least get a little annoyed, but Jimmy has this—I don’t know—this childlike, innocent vulnerability about him that’s hard to say no to. He lives in kind of a different world than most people do, and sort of expects everybody to be as nice and as helpful as he tries to be. It’s hard to say no to Jimmy without feeling like an asshole.

Sometime around ten o’clock that night, Jimmy guided us onto I-35 North, and we waited for the compulsion to tell us where to stop. We finally found the “right” convenience store about halfway to Des Moines, and I hit the men’s room while Jimmy perused the displays. I finished just in time to see Jimmy explode out of the store waving his arms and screaming, “No! Not that one! I need that one!”

He was charging straight at a grizzly bear in denim and plaid flannel. Okay, not an actual bear, but if a real grizzly ever met this guy it’d pee its fur, scream like a twelve-year-old girl at a Jonas Brothers concert, and run crying for its mommy. Man-bear had—you guessed it—a case of diet soda under one arm. Jimmy slammed into him at full speed, and cans flew everywhere.

Man-bear’s face went from surprise to ugly(er). He pulled back a fist the size of my head, and before I could get there Jimmy was flying backwards to land on the blacktop. Man-bear dropped the soda and took a step forward.

“Don’t hurt him,” I hollered. Okay, it was a little late for that.

“You want some, too?” Man-bear said, and I froze. I wasn’t just afraid he was going to beat me up; I was afraid he was going to eat me.

Now, I’m not the world’s bravest guy, but I do think pretty fast when the alternative is getting turned into hamburger. “No, he’s my little brother,” I lied, “I-I take care of him.” It was the best I could come up with. Hey, I said I think fast, not that I do it particularly well.

“Doin’ a pretty crappy job of it.”

“I know,” I didn’t have to fake anguish. Imminent death has that effect on me, especially when it’s mine. “ Look at him, though,” I pointed to where Jimmy was crawling around muttering to himself and gathering up the fallen cans while blood dripped from his nose to the blacktop. “You can see he’s not, y’know, quite all there in the head, can’t you? It’s not his fault.”

The trucker scowled at Jimmy, then at me. “What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s a little, uh... touched, you know? He gets it in his head that something—like one particular case of soda—is important, and he thinks something bad is going to happen if he doesn’t get it.” Well, that much was true.

I spread out my hands in appeal. “Look, I’ll pay for the soda. Hell, I’ll buy you ten cases.” Man-bear was silent. “C’mon, man, do you have a brother?”

Man-bear looked at Jimmy again and nodded slowly. He sniffed, then in a wilted growl said, “Keep your money. Tell him I ain’t gonna hurt him no more.”

While I stood gaping, Man-bear pulled a grocery bag from the cab of his truck, got down on all fours, and started gathering up the cans along with Jimmy. It took me probably half a minute or so to pick up my jaw enough to pitch in myself. Man-bear even got a cold pack from the cooler behind his seat for Jimmy’s face, and before he got back into his rig, shook Jimmy’s and my hands and said that while he wasn’t going to give any details, we’d changed his life.

Once Bruce’s rig was out of sight and we were back in the Microbus, Jimmy grinned at me, split lip, bloody nose, and all. “Alex, you were brill—”

And for the second time that day, Jimmy got punched in the face. Some things simply have to be done.

“Ow. What was that for?”

I glared at him, trying to ignore the fact that I felt like a total ass for hitting him. “I felt compelled, okay?” I started the car and pointed us back toward Lawrence. “I’m getting worried about you, man.”

“Yes, I could sense the concern in your loving punch.”

“Sorry about that, but are you nuts? That could have gone a lot worse than a punch in the face.”

“Two punches,” he said.

“Okay, two punches. I said I was sorry. But man, that has got to be the craziest thing you’ve ever done, and I’ve seen you do some crazy shit. Did you see the size of that guy? He’d give Mount Everest a Napoleon complex. We could have ended up in the hospital. Or jail. Or both. Hell, maybe even the morgue. Did you even stop to think we could have just politely offered to buy the soda from him instead of trying to tackle him?”

Jimmy’s face went slack. He stared at me for a few seconds, then hung his head. When he spoke, he sounded even more tired and beaten up than he looked. “I was so caught up in...” He looked back up at me. “You really do take care of me, Alex. And I don’t say thank you enough, but you never complain, and then tonight I almost got you… I’m sorry, Alex. It’s just… This is a bad one.”

I very carefully didn’t look at him. “Just think next time, okay?” I threw in some Ramones to cut short the Hallmark moment, and we cruised along to Blitzkrieg Bop.

About halfway through I Wanna Be Sedated, Jimmy turned off the music. “Hey, Alex? If we changed that guy’s life like he said, this diet soda thing is starting to play out, right?”

“Looks like. I just think it could have been handled differently.”

Jimmy shook his head. “I know, but if it’s starting to play out, my ‘gift’ or whatever should stop poking at me, or at least ease off a little, but it’s getting worse. And there are all those other cases.”

“Jimmy, I—”

“This so-called ‘gift’ pretty much runs my life, Alex, and it’s getting worse, and I can’t control it. I never wanted it to begin with. What if it gets one of us killed someday?”

I didn’t have an answer. When we got back to his place I was going to hang around to make sure he was okay, but he said he’d put me in harm’s way enough for one weekend. There wasn’t much I could do except make him promise to call me if he needed me.

#

My phone woke me a little before three a.m. the next night, which would have been fine if it were a supermodel calling to profess her undying love, but that, I decided, was an unlikely scenario, and stuck my head under the pillow to wait for the ringing to stop.

It didn’t.

“I have a hammer,” I yelled, “and I’m not afraid to use it.” Apparently the phone was unafraid of percussive maintenance. I tracked it to the pile of laundry under which it had made its rebel lair, and flipped it open. “Please state the nature of your emergency.”

“Alex! I’m glad you’re up.” Jimmy sounded like an auctioneer who’d been up all night mainlining double-espressos. “I dialed you like, nine times. Are you busy?”

“No, I was just going through the yellow pages trying to find a re-education camp for wayward cell phones. Look, it’s three AM, and you don’t sound like a buxom supermodel.”

“That has never been my aspiration. You said to call if I needed you. And I do. So I am. It’s the soda thing.”

I squeezed the bridge of my nose and censored myself. I had told him to call. “Okay, what do you need?”

“I know how to make it stop. Gotta get one more case and get to this little spring in the Flint Hills. About a hundred and fifty miles. Don’t trust myself to drive that far.” He giggled and switched to a bad falsetto. “Help us, Obi Wan. You’re our only hope.”

“You can’t play the princess-in-distress card, Jimmy. First, it’s not fair, and second, you know I’m already in.” If he didn’t trust himself to drive, I sure as hell didn’t, especially when he sounded that out of it.

Half an hour later Jimmy lurched in and knocked (in that order) dressed much like “The Dude,” from The Big Liebowski, only Jimmy’s bathrobe was fuchsia. He banged his shin on the coffee table, but barely seemed to notice. His nose and lip were still swollen, and his eyes were spider-webbed with red, but he was practically vibrating with nervous energy.

“You look like crap,” I said. “Did you sleep at all?”

“Can’t sleep. Gotta go. Here.” He dug into the pockets of his robe and handed me a printed-out map along with the keys to his old VW min-bus.

“Okay,” I said, “but shouldn’t you be wearing pants?”

He looked down at himself and frowned. “What’s wrong with swimming trunks?”

“Dude.”

“Okay, okay. But we gotta hurry.” Jimmy’s a little smaller than I am, but I managed to find some clothes that didn’t fit him too badly. (I let the Cthulhu slippers slide. You have to pick your battles.)

Jimmy had a bunch of those big plastic bottles—the kind that go on top of home water coolers— filled with slightly brownish water and strapped together in the kiddie pool in the back of the mini-bus. “What the—”

“No time. I’ll explain on the way.”

By the time I had the mini-bus in gear he was already asleep, slumped against the passenger door. I knew how this worked, though. As soon as I stopped heading toward our destination he’d wake up frantic. Besides, I probably wouldn’t get anything coherent out of him until he’d napped, so I bit down on my curiosity.

He woke up about halfway there. “Take the next exit,” he said. “That’s where the last case is.”

I pulled off the highway. “You wanna fill me in now? And please tell me we’re not going to get our asses handed to us by a human grizzly again?”

He laughed, bouncing up and down on his seat. “No promises on that count, but I don’t think so. As for filling you in... Wait. Turn here.” We pulled into a service station with all its lights out. Jimmy opened his door.

“Dude, they’re closed.”

“Gonna check the hours on the door and see how long we have to wait.”

The station wouldn’t open for three more hours. “All right,” I said, “That’s plenty of time to fill me in, so spill.”

“I’ll warn you, it’s going to sound crazy. I’m going to sound crazy, but hear me out, okay?”

I said I would, and he continued. “You saw how I got earlier. I had to get some sleep before I finished this thing or I was going to fall apart. Or even worse, screw it up. But I couldn’t. I even took a sleeping pill, but all it did was make me spacey. I finally gave in around one and poured the soda into the kiddie pool.”

He paused and stared out the window. “Keep going,” I said, “You poured the soda into the swimming pool, and then what happened?”

He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. “I started pouring, and there was this... face.”

“What, at the window? Somebody was watching you?”

“No, in the pool. A woman’s face, there in the soda.”

Now that topped the weirdometer, even for Jimmy. “Right. You’re sleep-deprived, and like you said, you were on sleeping pills. People see things.”

“Whatever. Anyway, it freaked me out,” he said.

“Understandably.”

He got quieter. “Her lips started moving. She was saying, ‘help me.’”

“Hang on—You know it wasn’t real, right? Unless... Is your ‘gift’ giving you visuals now?”

He didn’t seem to hear me. “What could I do?” he said. “The more I poured, the more of her there was, until there was this… this beautiful woman standing in the middle of the pool. She was real, Alex. She had sort of blue-tinted skin and long green hair, and she reached out of the pool and called me her hero and kissed me, and—Hey, what are you doing?”

“I’m starting the engine. And unless I hear something of the not-crazy variety come out of your mouth in the next five seconds I’m turning around.”

“Wait, Alex. Don’t freak out on me.”

“We’re way past that. Look, it’s probably just sleep deprivation combined with Ambien, but we gotta get you looked at.”

Jimmy grabbed my sleeve. Not like he was trying to pull my hand off the steering wheel, but just to emphasize his words. “Alex,” he said. “Please. I’m not crazy.”

“Maybe not, but something’s wrong. What kind of a friend would I be if I—”

“Okay, okay” he said, “Just for argument’s sake, let’s say I was hallucinating, and that it’s from not sleeping because of this compulsion. What’s the fastest way to fix that? The only way to fix it?”

I sighed. “Seeing it through.”

“So see this through with me, give me a day or two to catch up on sleep, and if you still think I’ve lost it, I’ll go to a doctor or whatever you want. I mean, come on, it’s a few hours of driving is all, and then we’re done with it, I promise. Deal?”

I rolled my eyes and climbed into the back to stretch out by the kiddie pool. “Damn it, Jimmy, there’d better be a pot of gold at the end of this rainbow.”

It only took a few minutes for me to doze off. I couldn’t have been asleep for long, though, when I woke to shrill ringing. Jimmy jumped into the driver’s seat, slammed the door, and started the engine. We threw gravel getting back on the road.

“What the—” I looked back at the service station. The front window was broken out. “Jimmy! What did you do?”

“I couldn’t wait. She can’t hold out much longer.”

I climbed toward the front. “That’s it. You’ve lost it, man. Pull over right now. If you pay for the damages they’ll probably let you off with probation.”

Jimmy’s voice was choked and he was blinking back tears. “You don’t understand. She’s dying. There weren’t any security cameras, and I left money on the counter to pay for the window. If I drive fast we won’t get caught.”

“We? I didn’t do anything except ride along with a crazy man!” I reached for the steering wheel, but we were already going fast enough that I’d probably flip us if I grabbed it. I got out my phone. “Pull over now or I’m calling the police.”

I wasn’t really going to. As far gone as he was, he might try to outrun them, and things would only get worse.

He called my bluff. “Go ahead. If you’re still my friend, though, wait until it’s over.”

There wasn’t much of an alternative. About an hour later Jimmy turned onto a dirt road. When we got to the end of it and bounced to a stop I grabbed the keys from the ignition.

“Help me with the bottles,” Jimmy said, “The spring is just a little ways off.” He unbuckled himself and moved toward the back. I grabbed his arm, and he looked me square in the face. I have never seen him so determined. “What are you going to do, Alex? Hit me again?”

Ouch. I let go, and Jimmy’s expression softened. “I know you think I’m crazy, but I can prove I’m not.”

He started pulling stoppers out of the water bottles. “I hope she’s up to this. She’s in pretty bad shape, or I’d have tried it earlier.”

I had to clench my jaw to keep from responding. Jimmy un-stoppered the last bottle and leaned over it murmuring. “I know,” he said, “But we have to prove to my friend that you’re real before he’ll help us get you home.” He turned to me. “She wants you to know that not all of this is her. Some of it’s just regular water and soda.”

“Great,” I said, “Tell her those bottles don’t make her butt look big. Honest.”

Jimmy scowled at me, and I was about to say something more when the water moved. Trickles from each bottle snaked up and joined to form a translucent face like in, what was that movie... The Abyss or something. It—correction, she—stuck out her tongue at me before turning to Jimmy with an expression of such adoration that it broke my heart. The sun was rising, and it glinted off of her in reds and golds. Jimmy touched her lips with his fingers and she kissed them, then lost cohesion and flowed back into her bottles.

All I could do was stare.

“Well,” Jimmy said, “Am I crazy?”

Either she was real, or Jimmy’s insanity was contagious. I preferred to believe the former. I had to work my mouth a bit before anything came out. There isn’t much to say when you witness the impossible. “What are we waiting for,” I growled, “Let’s get her home.”

We used the deflated kiddie pool as a sled where we could, and carried the bottles one by one over the rough spots until we reached the spring.

Jimmy finished filling me in on the way. The woman’s name was D’lahna, and she was a naiad, a water nymph. She’d been exploring “Overhill,” as she called it, when she somehow got stuck in a soda bottling plant. She wouldn’t have lasted much longer if not for Jimmy and his gift.

We poured first the bottles, then the final case of soda, into the spring, and D’lahna rose up out of it more beautiful than you can imagine. And very, very naked. I stood staring until Jimmy punched me in the arm. “Hey. Mine.”

“Sorry.” I averted my eyes. Kind of. Hey, she might have been my best friend’s girl, but she was gorgeous. I tried not to gape at her, and searched desperately for a way to cover the awkwardness. How do you make small talk with a mythological creature?

“So, uh...” I said, “Sorry about the whole thinking you were imaginary thing. Nice place you’ve got here. Love what you’ve done with it. Seems like a quiet neighborhood.”

D’lahna laughed. If you’ve never heard a nymph’s voice, I can’t really describe it to you except to say it sort of... sparkles. “Your friend is funny,” she said to Jimmy, then looked at me. “This isn’t where I live, Alex, but it will get us there.”

It took me a moment to process that. “Us?”

I turned to Jimmy, who had just stripped naked. (Now there’s a sight I hope to never see again.) He grinned at me. “I’m going with her,” he said.

“But you... She... You can’t...”

“It’s okay,” Jimmy put his hand on my shoulder. “I’ll be in touch.”

They offered to take me with them, but instead I watched as Jimmy took D’lahna’s hand and waded into the middle of the spring with her. They turned translucent and flowed into the water.

It was a long drive home, and I thought about the two of them all the way.

Two weeks later I turned on the kitchen faucet, and out came an invitation to Jimmy and D’lahna’s engagement party. They’ve already set me up with a date—a wood nymph friend of D’lahna’s who, Jimmy thinks, just might break my losing streak. He mentioned a possible job offer, too.

And guess what D'lahna's family's favorite fruit is? Yeah, at least now I know what to do with all those frozen mangoes.

[cassieuncaged]

𝙊𝘾: 𝙉𝙮𝙭

Mortal Kombat 11

𝒄𝒓𝒆𝒅𝒊𝒕 𑁍

𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐋 𝐈𝐍𝐅𝐎

𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲 | Rachel 'Nyx' Rogers

𝗮𝗴𝗲 | 30

𝗯𝗶𝗿𝘁𝗵𝗱𝗮𝘆 | October 5th, 1988

𝘇𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗮𝗰 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻 | Libra

𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 | female

𝘀𝗲𝘅𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 | pansexual

𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗲/𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗻𝗶𝗰𝗶𝘁𝘆 | white, Irish and German

𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗻𝘁𝗿𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗻 | United States of America

𝐀𝐏𝐏𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄

𝗳𝗮𝗰𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗲 | heart shape

𝗲𝘆𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗿 | hazel (usually a steely blue)

𝗲𝘆𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗲 | hooded

𝗹𝗶𝗽𝘀 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗲 | bow

𝗻𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗲 | long and small

𝘀𝗸𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝘆𝗽𝗲 | sensitive, pale

𝗵𝗮𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁𝘆𝗹𝗲 | straight down half her back with space buns

𝗵𝗮𝗶𝗿 𝗰𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗿 | half black, half white

𝗯𝗼𝗱𝘆 𝘁𝘆𝗽𝗲 | thin and athletic

𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 | 5'7

𝘄𝗲𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 | 130 lbs

𝗰𝗹𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝘁𝘆𝗹𝗲 | goth/punk. Wears leather jackets, fishnets, combat boots, a mesh black top, goth band t-shirts, leather choker, tattoo

𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗳𝗲𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲𝘀 | scar across her left eye. tattoos: a daisy on her left forearm, a bat on a tombstone across her back, a snake in a skull on her right forearm, Ghost face in a heart on her right thigh

𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘

𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗹 | Nyx is very socially withdrawn and has never really been a people person. She's reserved and minds her own business...until she doesn't. Girl has a temper and will quickly come to the aid of others when needed or defend herself. It's incredibly hard to crack her shell and earn her trust.

𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘁𝘀 |

𑁍 resourceful

𑁍 courageous

𑁍 conscientious

𑁍 tenacious

𑁍 motivated

𝗻𝗲𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘁𝘀 |

𑁍 defensive

𑁍 cynical

𑁍 stubborn

𑁍 irritable

𑁍 secretive

𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲𝘀 |

𑁍 her family

𑁍 Ghost the ferret

𑁍 Riding her Ducati

𑁍 Pizza

𑁍 Goth Rock

𑁍 plants

𑁍 records

𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲𝘀 |

𑁍 people

𑁍 small talk

𑁍 bubblegum pop

𑁍 smugness

𑁍 cruelty (she understands the double standard but does what she has to to stay alive)

𝗵𝗼𝗯𝗯𝗶𝗲𝘀 |

𑁍 boxing

𑁍 collecting tattoos. Learned how to use a needle gun and has done a few basic ones herself

𑁍 hand to hand combat (even though she doesn't participate in cage matches)

𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐋𝐓𝐇

𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗹𝘁𝗵 | Suffers from severe anxiety and imposter syndrome. It's hard living with those considering her line of work and the fact that she has to be at the top of her game.

𝗽𝗵𝘆𝘀𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗹𝘁𝗵 | Slim but fit with muscular arms and legs. Practices boxing in her spare time to stay in shape.

𝗽𝗵𝗼𝗯𝗶𝗮(𝘀) | no known phobias though she has a strong distaste for the ocean and other bodies of water

𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀(𝗲𝘀) | generalized anxiety disorder, imposter syndrome

𝗺𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻(𝘀) | Unknown

𝗵𝘆𝗴𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗲 | She's known to go a day or two between showers as well as rewearing outfits until they begin to get a distinct odor to them. Then they go to the wash. She's kind of a slob

𝐀𝐃𝐃𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐀𝐋 𝐈𝐍𝐅𝐎

𝗿𝗲𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝘁𝘂𝘀 | formally involved with Kabal (friends with benefits. Eventually defects to the Special Forces and becomes romantically involved with Cassie Cage. They later marry.

𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘁𝘀 | vinyl records, music, vintage video games (especially 90s computer games, pleather pants, combat boots, body mods, sushi, pizza, grungy underground night clubs

𝗲𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 | graduated from high school though she didn't attend her graduation. Went to Fort Carson in Colorado Springs and joined the military.

𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻(𝘀) | hired gun

𝗳𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝘀𝘀𝘂𝗲𝘀 | had to abandon her family for their protection

𝗿𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗼𝘂𝘀 𝘃𝗶𝗲𝘄𝘀 | atheist

dividers by cafekitsune

[justdiptych]

Having been ruminating on the possible link between Archie Reid of Mask of the Rose and September of Fallen London, and having been informed what a fool I am for suggesting there might be one, I've been trying to formally lay out the evidence for and against them being one and the same, and to reckon with the unavoidable uncertainties. (Some serious spoilers for both games appear below the cut.)

FOR:

Both have red hair, green eyes, and very similar facial features.

Both are written with similar accents.

Both have established connections to the Calendar Council - September is a member, of course, while Archie is familiar with May.

Both write and publish revolutionary texts.

Both have hostile relationships with Mr Pages - Archie can expose Pages as being personally responsible for the Fall of London.

September's dialogue suggests that, like Archie, he was a student in London at the time of the Fall.

AGAINST:

September's stated background - on a baronial estate near Balmoral - does not align with Archie's stated origins in Glasgow. (See below for further examination of this point.)

Unlike other Mask of the Rose characters (Griz, Horatia, Moss, Pages, Ferret, May, Reginald, Barqujin and Batachikhan), September makes no appearance at Mrs Chapman's in Fallen London.

September doesn't mention having any history of medical practice.

UNCERTANTIES:

Our knowledge of Archie's background is complicated by the fact that 'Archie Reid' is not his original identity. He was, instead, Lucian, an officer and spy who had travelled much of the world. He had tried to warn the people of London of the impending Fall and was, for his troubles, almost erased from reality by the authorities. 'Archie Reid' is what remains of him, and even he doesn't know whether everyone's memories of Archie (including his own) are true or false.

September's age is unclear. On first meeting him, the narration describes him as a 'youth', and his portrait doesn't look like a man who would be in his late fifties at the youngest. This doesn't quite agree with his own suggestion of having been in London during the Fall. If he is Archie, perhaps his theriac staved off the effects of age?

I don't recall how much elaboration we get on Lucian's background in Mask of the Rose's Reunion ending, and whether it's compatible with September's backstory. I'm also not sure whether that matters. Did the person Lucian was, and the things he did, retroactively cease to exist when he became Archie? This is very confusing, I know.

I'm not sure whether September and the Efficient Commissioner have any relevant dialogue if they're on the board of the Great Hellbound Railway together.

Putting Watson aside and putting on our Doyle moustache for a moment, it is possible that September was not originally written to be Archie but later became him. When September first appeared in Fallen London, he used a different portrait - the same one used by the non-binary portrait artist at Helicon House. His current portrait came later. Perhaps this represented a revision of his character's backstory and identity? Eh, I'm speculating aloud here.

To sum up: I dunno. It might be him. They sure look alike. If it's not him, they'd have a lot to talk about if they ever met.

[red-balloon12]

Natemare Headcanons!

(Note that all of my versions of the Battle Egos….and basically all egos in general, aren’t inherently related in any aspect. They are they’re own individual creations. Also these H/F’s are self indulgent as hell so warning-)

General H/Cs

Name: Natemare

Age 32

Species: Nightmare Demon/Amalgamation (basically he can shapeshift his body into a nightmare-ish amalgamation. There are different phases and he can morph into any phase he sees fit at the moment)

Sexuality: Bisexual/Biromantic (leans more towards guys)

Specific H/Cs

Natemare doesn’t really need sleep because he’s a nightmare amalgamation but he chooses to sleep for fun. He does get tired though.

Natemare’s primary sense of style is a punk/goth mixture

Mare is a prankster and often pulls light hearted pranks on the other egos. Heathen is the only ego that hasn’t fallen for these pranks

He likes to write music and draw in his free time but he gets frustrated easily when he can’t think of songs during a certain period. Ironically his best work comes to him when he isn’t trying to write songs/draw.

Overall he’s a pretty chill and fun loving person but he does have a short fuse…which makes it easy for a certain person to tease him.

Boi has SO many abandonment issues you can fit a whole sonnet about it into him. He tries to make it seem like he doesn’t have them but he does.

Mare knows a lot people just sees him as the “Emo FNAF ego” which he doesn’t like but he also still likes FNAF. And so he makes it his mission to be more than that label while still enjoying his favorite game franchise…which is difficult-

Natemare is…high key jealous of Phantom because they both know Phantom is the “more popular ego” and Phantom is very vocal about it, which causes the two of them to be rivals of sorts. But Mare secretly admires Phantom from afar and he does understand why people like him so much. (Mare believes he and Phantom would be very good friends if pHNATOM WASN’T SO SMUG ALL OF THE TIME-) But he hates that no matter how hard he tries he can’t seem to get to that standard. So he plays it off as being unbothered by it which comes off as lazy and uncouth from Phantom. But DAMN does he actually care-

Mare also may have a bit of a…crush on Phantom and he mAAAY be a bit of a tsundere about it lol.

Even though he doesn’t need it, Mare has an emergency axe in his room somewhere.

He’s besties with MadPat and Virgil Sanders (Anti is more of a frenemy of his). Mad often teases him about his obvious crush on Phantom despite his (onesided) crush on Mare.

Mare acts as a big brother for Skelly/Pumpkin. He loves the kid dearly and will destroy anyone that harms him.

His favorite music genre is punk rock, Nerdcore and…Will Wood. He doesn’t have a favorite band. He likes a lot of bands.

Mare likes to cross dress from time to time. It makes him feel pretty and badass.

Mare’s favorite animals are ferrets.

Despite him being punk/goth he doesn’t mind dressing up more formally for certain events…or for fun. He’d rather die than let Phantom dress him up though.

And these are all of my current (and updated) headcanons on my blorbo. If you guys want a romantic/NSFW version let me know. I’ll be more than happy to make one. Next ego up is Phantom!

[cassiefromhell]

i’m bored so here’s a tag game.

Fantasy Character Maker

highlight whichever you select. i’ve highlighted mine. you can always add other options/categories, expansion is good! tag me in your version <3

Your Race

human // elf // fae // gnome // dwarf // tiefling/demon // goblin // dragonborn // orc // giant // centaur // angel // troll // other ____

Who Are You

a thief // royalty // a performer // a writer // a tavern goer // a tavern worker // an adventurer // a recluse // a witch/wizard/warlock // a priest[ess] // a business owner [bakery, book store, blacksmith, general store, attire, other ___] // a librarian // a bodyguard // a medic/doctor/nurse // an academic // a professor // a prostitute // a slave // a pirate // an artist // other ___

Your Weapon

a bow // a sword // a spear // a knife // a claymore // magic // poison // your hands // other ____

Your Clothing

armor [heavy, light, medium, clunky, stylish] // a dress [short, long, gown, ball gown, slip, simple, elegant, expensive, handmade, new, old, clean, ruined, tattered] // a uniform [for ____] // formal wear // work clothing // nothing at all // a blanket // just high heels and earrings // a robe // a doublet // a tunic // other ____

your material is leather // silk // cloth // chain mail // velvet // denim // chiffon // muslin // suede// tweed // fleece/fur // you have no idea // other ____

Your Home

a mansion // a palace // the streets // everywhere and yet nowhere // wherever you are at the moment // wherever your [adventure/heart] takes you // wherever your love/companion is // a cottage // a townhouse // a school // where you work // other ____

Your Item

a book // a wand // a glass // a flower // a box // a game // a potion // a bottle of alcohol // a component for a spell // an animal part // a luck charm // a star // a figurine // a doll/toy // a carving // a ticket // a pen // a hammer // a crown // a scepter // a candle // a brush // a ring/other jewelry // an ointment // a spare pair of clothes // other ____

Your Familiar/Companion

nothing. // a cat // a dog // a frog // a snake // a bug // a spider // a ferret // a bird // a fish // a bear // a wildcat // a rat // a mouse // toads // rabbit/hare // other ____

Fantasy Name (optional!):

Caetharine

anyone can jump in, but here are my no pressure tags:: @jeannineee @romantichomicide95 @peregryn-lord @d4rkven0m @arlerts-angel @thelov3lybookworm @thehighladywrites @acourtofmenandthirst @acourtofwhatthefuck @mischiefmanagers @bubybubsters @

[magnolia-miraculous]

F. Fathom (aka Argos) Headcanons :)

Haha he’s so stupid (affectionate). I honestly think of him as a pathetic little kitten sitting his butt out on the sidewalk in the middle of the pouring rain that is actively being picked up by Adrien and wrung in a towel and tossed a saucer of boiling hot milk when it comes to his social skills. Ok, dumbass speedrun 3, 2, 1, go!!

He likes oranges but not really the color orange.

Also, not a fanatic but he thinks sports cars look cool.

A naturally good swimmer. When around other people, he’ll often dive under the surface and swim around to where he wants to go that way to avoid disturbing anyone.

His kind of humor is watching Jaws for a night time pool party and diving under the water to pinch people’s ankles.

Honestly a big softie for his mother and the sweet blonde women in his life generally. Yes, this includes Rose.

He bites the middle of his lip and scowls when thinking.

He has drawn blood previously; now has a small linear scar.

Looking for it is one of the only ways to tell him and Adrien apart appearance-wise.

He has severe rbf that Adrien somehow avoided.

Really good at drifting. No one has yet unlocked his Backstory on this topic.

Talks rlly formally w/ his hands behind his back; will cuss you out tho.

Too Tired For This.

He gifts people w/ books/coffee when they meet up sometimes.

Rlly likes greco-roman mythology and astronomy.

“an orange warms the stomach.”

Likes classic/heavy rock + hyperpop. He gets his like for Jagged Stone from his mother.

He’s English, Italian, and American.

A committed polyglot by hobby.

English, French, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Greek, Latin, and German. Don’t ask how.

He watches k-dramas on the living room tv whilst eating chips and calling the characters cusses and cliche/cringy in Korean like that one meme of Leonardo DiCaprio pointing from his seat with a glass in his hand though, so there’s that.

No Shame.

Nearly aroace but not quite. He made an exception for Kagami :).

Also retconning the way they got together in canon bc that was fast and kinda weird idk. Let’s just say they take a lot more time than that talking at Rich Events ok.

He straightens/styles his hair every morning.

He likes ferrets.

He wakes up at nearly 5a every morning/early bird.

Theater kid trash.

Knows how to play basic guitar.

He takes like 1 college class every six months.

Still graduating in 4 years somehow.

Burnout hit him hard though. Now, he can only rlly ever focus on things if they genuinely interest him.

Unhinged. But, like, slightly (12%).

He likes crosswords and word games and stuff.

He’s got a Vibe Check system for talking to people. Don’t pass the Vibe Check? Bye.

So far, only a good nine people have ever really passed the Vibe Check—Adrien, Kagami, Marinette, Luka, Juleka, Rose, Alix, Nathanaël, and (strangely enough) Chloé.

(I guess she’s just persistent like that, idk, but he lets her hang around.)(She’s still an annoying lil whiny brat though.)

Auto Lila DNI. He can’t stand her tbh.

Don’t try to say they’re anything alike. At least he thinks of someone other than himself from time to time. Or has a personality other than being a nasty snake.

Expert gambler.

Firm believer that cream soda is to die for and has a designated spot in the fridge. Nerd.

He started eating a scoop of orange icecream covered in three scoops of mint to keep people *coughcoughchloécoughcough* from stealing it. He now eats it and enjoys it unironically.

He has tyramine sensitivity :(

He has outbursts similar to Adrien. Like Adrien, he too learned it from his father.

This guy is literally the best wingman.

(When he wants to be, that is.)

He does everything with such sleight of hand to make sure his ships sail.

Felix is the resident babygirl. Everyone calls him that, but if anyone new tries to he’ll slit their throat ok.

He’s incredibly good with young children; no one knows how or why he attained the knowledge he has.

Then they hit the age of three and he’s trying to teach them tax evasion. No.

Zero genuine social skills. He has them when he’s being fake and then he tries to do it for real and they go poof.

He’s just that good at magic huh.

Also has a deeply engrained fear of trusting people with knowledge of his interests thanks to trauma from his broken relationship with his father :)

You just have to understand that this man is a pathetic, sopping-wet-cat of a man. That’s, like, the message here.

Ok bye.

[rollflasher]

" There is a"The meta ea is over!" cry some people, as we are handed what is without a doubt one of the most meta mainline Sonic games I've personally played.

like I'm enjoying Frontiers's gameplay aside from some parts, but don't insist that a duck is a ferret.

I'll quote my friend Spinning and say that we're in for the Ian Flynn Era now because that's the most appropiate way to describe it. And honestly, I don't know how to feel about it.

Just like I said before, we replaced Pontaff's aside glances, fourth wall breaking and jokes for Ian's heavy Leaning On The Fourth Wall writing.

In Frontiers case, I'm neutral about the writing because on paper the story has many good moments, the tone is perfect and the characterization is improved compared to the Pontaff games (sans Eggman)...the problem is, besides the more general narrative hiccups, this is all hampered down because of the heavily meta writing.

The ''character development'' in this game feels more like a formality to reset the characters rather than a genuine growth, specially since unlike what the game wants you to believe, all we're seeing is the characters repeat their previous arcs or treat already established personality traits as if this was a brand new development for them.

I think the biggest offender is Tails, since his character arc revolves heavily on adressing his Forces characterization and the game is not subtle about it at all, in these moments I don't see the characters speaking, I just see Ian Flynn constantly winking at me with a vibe screaming ''See? I fixed it! ;)''

For me the plot is as its best when it's not trying to be meta, because otherwise I feel like I'm straight up watching a generic Sonic fanfic.

I want to be fair but if it's going to be a trend that Ian's scripts will rely heavily on expecting the viewer to react like this:

Then I'll keep insisting, SEGA should have hired Maekawa back instead.

Which made me think on how sad it is that for Sonic fans and the general public, Pontaff and Ian Flynn are the only Sonic writers, meanwhile the rest that came before them are just random people apparently.

I still insist Frontiers is an awesome game and that it was a breath of fresh air for Sonic Team, for them I can clearly see they got inspired ith this game and after a long time they finally got to do whatever they wanted...but Ian Flynn is another beast entirely and his writing is not subtle at all on how it wants to ''fix'' the series to the point of being very distracting.

[jollmaster]

Good evening, friend. Do you have more OC's like Guy, Holmi, Gildo, etc.? I really like how well and in detail you create and develop your characters, especially Gildo. I share your love for him (and for redheads, haha)

And yes, another question: remember, there was a guard in the harbor who stood at the table in the house of the harbor master? So, which of the guys do you think could be this guy (for example, he is the master's personal guard or something like that..), and which could be the harbor master?

Thank you so much!

villainously laugh

okay the list of the ones I've been thinking about the most

° Ormr (a rat, hunter and wilderness guide, managed to tame a feral cat whom he named Fang)

° Jenner (a mouse, boxman, family guy with six children, Orm's bro; they met when Fang almost ate Jenner, but Jenner loves both of them)

° Sturla (a rat, fishwife, mother of Otto Powderkeg)

° Werner Bot (a black rat, former boatswain who visited Periclav because of storm; formalized as a character because of one note in game codex)

° Akhta (a jerboa, desert bard with a morbid interest in married ladies)

° Bran (a ferret, quite young, but ill because of his work; one of Otto Powderkeg's pirates, fugitive miner from Saltar)

° Loige, or Lóegaire (a ferret, Bran's cousin, who set him up to escape)

° Whip (a rat, also one of Otto's pirates, former torture master, the quietest of the crew, but also the most dreaded)

° Wealh (a mouse, scorekeeper on the "Witch" who handled the distribution of booty; was caught stealing and pardoned for his other good deeds)

° Maritza Vaška (a weasel, former guard in the retinue of one of weasel princes; robbed and tried to kill one of imperial red rangers, for which she quickly paid (from this ranger, yes), but in postmortem joined the wild hunt, led by immortal general Jarlan)

about the guy near the table: if we talk about that rat who appears after ship's arrival, I headcanon that he's one of the guards from the ship, who stayed behind because of a bad cold and decided to wait it out at DHK (and he has absolutely no idea what the fuck is going on here)

[geekandsundry]

https://geekandsundry.com/watch-game-the-game-the-networks/

Start your own television business and create a smash TV show! In this week’s Game the Game, host Becca Scott and guests play The Networks by Formal Ferret Games. In this competitive game guests Kate Elliott, Hector Navarro, and Vikram Patel take on the role of executives creating ads, booking t...

[officialowlbear]

I’m so excited to see a faster paced, two player version of The Networks. I work in the television industry so when I found the original game a few years back I bought it instantly and had a blast playing it.  

If you like TV, if you like stupid puns, or if you just like playing a fun game with friends this is one you need on your shelf.  

[whovian223]

Friday Night Shots - Catch Up Mechanisms

Friday Night Shots - Catch Up Mechanisms

It’s the last Friday before Christmas and all through the malls, too many creatures were stirring, so much so that I would rather carve Shem Phillips’ initials into my hand with a penknife than go shopping. I think that’s how that old Christmas poem goes. I could be a bit off. Anyway, welcome back to the bar! I’m glad you decided to get cozy and warm here, having some libations (maybe not…

[thegaminggang]

'Master of Wills' Reviewed on The Daily Dope for February 18th, 2019

Tonight Jeff shares a quick how to play and reviews Master of Wills from Stormcrest Games. Plus the latest tabletop gaming news.

[tg-headcanons]

Could you write some drunk juuzou headcanons I'm curious about that ??

A MENACE

So juuzou, thankfully, doesn’t drink. It’s not that he has any reservations about substances or self control, he just doesn’t like the taste of alcohol. However, that doesn’t stop him when Marude invites Shinohara for drinks after work, and to be polite he invites Juuzou too. It’s purely a formality, and he wasn’t happy that he said yes. Honestly juuzou is only going because he loves being taken places, he’s like a dog. So Shinohara packed his ass in the car and took him to the bar

They get there and for awhile it goes as expected. Marude and Shinohara talk over a couple beers and juuzou mows through whatever snacks the bar has, but then he catches something written on the menu: Cherry Bomb. He orders one and to the horror of the other two, he likes it. It’s like beer but sweet!Juuzou doesn’t know how much alcohol is in it, he also doesn’t know that Red Bull is a key ingredient, but he likes the flavor of the shot and it was like, only one sip worth, so before Shinohara can stop him he’s three shots deep and starting on another. He makes him stop there but it’s too late

It doesn’t take any time at all for the pasty bitch to be absolutely shit faced. Utterly sloshed. Irrevocably White girl wasted. The other two have stopped drinking completely because they need to be sober to handle this absolute problem

Inebriation tends to lower inhibitions, but Juuzou already doesn’t have any. So what does he do? He immediately starts taking his shirt off in the middle of the bar. Shinohara is trying to stop him, Marude is grumbling about what a mistake with was as he quickly pays the tab, and Juuzou is whining incoherently about being uncomfortable or hot or something. Whatever the reason, clothes are coming OFF and they can only hold it off for so long

Thankfully, Juuzou’s coordination was the next to fail, and he slumped like a limp ferret the second they tried to get him to stand up. He didn’t even try again, he just sprawled out on the floor. Is he crying? Oh he’s crying. Juuzou is sobbing shamelessly and half naked on the floor until Shinohara picks him up like a cat and carries him out

He thinks it has something to do with Juuzou’s aversion to textures, and he’s mostly right. He has a tough time with lots of clothes and temperatures and when he gets drunk his first and only thought is to get rid of all of it. Apparently the car is also uncomfortable because when he’s let go of he BOOKS it. Well, he stumbles exactly 8 feet and slumps back down, giggling uncontrollably

While Marude yells at Juuzou for being a drunk idiot and at Shinohara for letting him be a drunk idiot. Shinohara points out as calmly as he can that Marude invited him and as fucked up as he is, Suzuya is an adult who can make his own decisions about what he puts in his body so long as it is within healthy limits and- fuck where did he go?

He couldn’t move a lot because the alcohol made him so uncoordinated, but he somehow managed to climb a fucking tree. It took Shinohara coaxing him out with a bag of MnMs he had stored under his car seat for bribe worthy emergencies like this to get him down, and he just grabbed the bag and crouched to eat them. Shinohara told him to get in the car, he wouldn’t, muttering about the seats being gross and the fake leather is weird, and Marude grumbles that they may as well just shove him in the trunk. Before Shinohara can admonish him Juuzou is opening the trunk agreeably

They put him in the trunk. I mean, he’s fine with it so why not? He’s like a rodent, he just wants to eat his little pellets in a dark enclosed space. Marude drops them both off at Shinohara’s house and he gets dragged out of the trunk and up to his room where he promptly passes out

The next morning is the real trouble. Juuzou is hung the fuck over and Does Not Like This. Battle injuries are one thing, but adrenaline and a lifetime of conditioning for a ghoul’s sadomasochistic games makes that fun. But hunched over in the bathroom with a splitting headache and waves of nausea? VERY BAD. He has to take a sick day, and Shinohara takes a sick day too to stay with him. He gives a little toast, with water of course, for Juuzou’s first drink and makes sure he’s taken care of. Suzuya doesn’t intend to get drunk again and Shinohara now knows not to let him order any fruity liquor. But the event isn’t completely forgotten, especially not with Marude making the picture of Juuzou drunk and shirtless in a tree his new phone background

[churchyardgrim]

I, STRAHD, by P.N. Elrod

[intro post]

rubs my horrible little goblin hands together hello yes it is time

IT IS HALLOWEEN AND IT IS TIME

this book is, unironically, the best thing i've ever read. almost nothing in it was new information to me, bc i was halfway through a CoS campaign at the time, and also Vampire of the Mists gives a pretty comprehensive cliffnotes version

but the important thing is, imo, knowing whats going to happen did not decrease my enjoyment of it one bit. this aint Game of Thrones dear reader! mind-bending twists are not what this book leans on!

there are some significant differences from the (much shorter) account in Vampire of the Mists, but honestly those i can chalk up to Strahd straight up lying in his diary

because yes, this entire book is Strahd's fuckign diary, and its beautiful

we begin our sordid tale with Strahd taking formal possession of Castle Ravenloft, and thus Barovia, with his best friend i mean lover i mean right hand man Alek Gwilym and a handful of other nobles sworn to his service

this is pre-vampire Strahd, but you wouldn't know it from looking at him! the man's an obligate goth and dresses like a depressed raven while everyone else in his family wears colors, for shame, he drinks beef gravy in the mornings instead of coffee, and fuckign bleeds on the foundations of the castle to claim it as his

i shit u not, there's a line that is verbatim "but i like wearing black!" i cannot make this shit up

they've also given him this sliver of dry humor that i fuckign love actually, these tiny little jokes that you don't notice till they're already half out of sight, it's delightful

anyway the book continues on with Strahd complaining about the minutiae of running this country what he worked so hard to get, ferreting out an assassin in his cohort, and starting his charming lil collection of magic spellbooks

three years later and guess who's coming to live with him! baby brother Sergei! baby brother whomst Strahd has never met, bc he left home for The War before Sergei was born lmao

there's also Your Middlest Brother Sturm, who avoided the entire ensuing cockup cascade by virtue of staying home and becoming an accountant. in this house we love and respect Sturm. 

but yeah Sergei is this chipper lil golden child, 20ish and slated for priesthood as is tradition, bouncing around Castle Ravenloft being all optimistic and pretty and good at swordfighting and it makes Strahd sick

this man is so jealous of his kid brother you guys. he devotes whole paragraphs of his diary talking about how he's gonna have to start dyeing his hair soon, about how depressed he is by the weight of years wasted by war, about how Sergei is everything he never got the chance to be

just god. christ. get a grip i'm begging you.

and then of course comes the last straw. Sergei, precious lil vanilla bean Sergei, brings home a girl. not just any girl either, no, but the prettiest most empty void of personality that ever had the name Tatyana. Strahd takes one fuckign look at her and is Immediately Obsessed.

this, imo, is the weakest part of the whole story by a country mile. point the first, Tatyana just…. isn't a person. she has barely any lines, takes literally no action anywhere in this mess, and even her physical description is vague and unhelpful. in my brain she looks like Keira Knightly. 

and i'm willing to let it slide, by virtue of i'm almost positive this is on purpose. P. N. Elrod is, in fact, a woman (with a very butch author portrait i might add), and she definitely knows what she's doing here. Strahd is a selfish and myopic person, and while he shows no overt misogyny and sure appears to respect the women in his army, all that goes out the window as soon as the woman in question becomes a potential romantic object to him. and given this is his diary we're reading here, unreliable narrator is the name of the game. we only get his perception of Tatyana to go on.

point the second, however, is one i have less tolerance for; Strahd's infatuation with Tatyana is not foreshadowed at all. he bemoans his youth lost to war, and the ever-closer advent of his death, and broody brood goth brood, but at no point does he express any desire for a family. prior to this moment, romance or companionship just do not seem to matter to him. and now they're all he cares about? i think not.

if i were rewriting this for my own nefarious purposes, i'd make the Tatyana thing a side-dish to the main course of his jealousy of Sergei. that's what's foreshadowed and given ample narrative support, i think that's what the clusterfuck that happens next should be leaning on.

but you know, at the end of the day i can forgive this book for a lot. the above is nothing so egregious that i can't put my quibbles aside for a generous helping of what i like best, and what i like best is overdramatic goth men messily murdering ppl in order to become vampires.

which leads us into the meat of the story, Strahd's Big Oopsie! 

the day before Sergei and Tatyana's wedding comes, and Strahd has, of course, devolved into scouring spellbooks for something, anything to break the two of them up. this is a completely sane and rational thing to do, he promises.

the hour grows late, the candles burn down, and Strahd has… a bit of a moment. Death comes to speak to him! at least, something that Strahd identifies as Death, and which doesn't seem interested in disabusing him of the notion.

the bargain offered here is simple; his heart's desire, in exchange for just a few eensie murders, and a smidge of arcane ritual. naturally, Strahd accepts.

what happens next kills me, always and completely, because Alek overheard this. Strahd sees his friend on the walkway outside and practices the famous Barovian sport of longjumping to conclusions, assuming that Alek intends to sound the alarm on him; Alek is forced on the defensive, the two of them swordfighting in beautiful dramatic fashion on a parapet in the rain, before Alek gets lucky and mortally wounds Strahd.

Strahd, now having even less to lose, returns the favor, and we get a scene to rival every wartime "bro dying in ur arms" moment in film history

Alek would have helped you you idiot! you could have had an accomplice! but noooo you had to be a suspicious motherfucker and rush to kill the witness and now look where we are. stupid.

but it's fine, everything's fine, bc Strahd's deal with Death requires blood. so Strahd cuts his friend's throat and drinks the man whole, ascending to lyctorhood i mean kickstarting the whole vampire process

it's extremely sexy and extremely emotional i'm not compromised you're compromised

anyway. Strahd then panics bc oh shit i gotta hide this body and stashes Alek's corpse in his closet. conqueror of nations, everybody, still a fucken chump at not getting caught at murders.

Strahd manages to pass out and has to go through the whole next day pretending he doesn't feel like shit, paranoid and twitchy and waiting for his chance. bc of course one dead friend isn't gonna be enough, no no. he's gotta axe the source.

so he waits, and the hour before the nuptials, he goes to give his babiest brother Sergei a wedding gift of stabby stabby murder. 

shock! horror! everyone saw this coming! Sergei's blood finishes what Alek's had started, and Strahd watches his own reflection vanish in the mirror as the mists start to close in on the castle

Strahd goes to claim his prize i mean Tatyana but uh, Strahd, buddy, idk how to tell u this, but she's just not that into you. the absence of her fiance, what you blamed on a mysterious assassin, is not gonna just make her go "oh well i guess i'll settle for the next best thing" it doesn't work like that my dude.

a lot of things happen at once here; people start yelling, Tatyana goes into grief conniptions, more ppl have died? apparently?? this is news to Strahd and distracts him long enough for Tatyana to make Rash Womanly Decisions and literally sprint off a cliff about it

istg someday i'm gonna write something that does this woman justice bc none of the established lore has, ever

anyway this is the point where Barovia as a whole lands with a lurch squarely in the dread domains; the first dread domain, actually, cemented in place and sealed off from the outside world by Strahd's Terrible Awful Very Bad No Good Day

it turns out that someone else picked this night to spring a trap, too! Leo Dilisnya, one of Strahd's lieutenants and a man whose name compels me to picture him with cat ears, had initiated a coup at pretty much the exact moment Strahd was busy murdering his brother. what a coincidence!

the good (?) news is, they haven't yet figured out that Strahd's not exactly human anymore, so they're proceeding with the coup as planned while their primary target is in fact recovering from all the arrow holes they put in him, and is also realizing exactly how tasty everyone around him suddenly looks

long story short, Strahd gets what little of his crew is both still loyal and still alive out of Castle Ravenloft, and slaughters literally everyone else

thus ends the cockup cascade of the century, leaving Strahd lording over an empty and now extremely haunted castle, with no brother, no girlfriend, and maybe five people in the whole world who he can still expect to rely upon in the future, cue five year broodfest

seriously, he spends the next however many years sulking, only sticking his head out the door to collect taxes and maybe eat an outlaw or three, and boy, if you thought he was bad before his ultimate goth makeover…

i shit you not, he spends an entire page complaining about how his coffin, what he pre-ordered two years prior to All That, has brass fittings instead of gold. and then he complains about how his custom made black marble plinth is HELD UP IN SHIPPING

i love this man so fuckign much. i want to trap him in a locker and steal his lunch money.

he also disguises the fact that he's got no fuckign staff left by pretending to be his own chamberlain whenever he has to deal with People, Ugh, and you can just tell how much he loves talking about himself in the third person

anyway Ol' Leo got away after his coup hit a vampire-shaped snag, and Strahd's been too depressed to track him down for like… thirty years at this point

the entirety of your universe is now twenty miles across, Strahd, i think you could have found him before now if you put your back into it

but he finally gets around to it and we get a frankly hilarious bit where Strahd waltzes into the abbey where Leo's been hiding out, confident as anything, and Immediately walks into a fuckign faraday cage of holy symbols and nearly gets his ass staked

but it's cool, it's fine, he gets his man, and then has to clamber over the abbey wall while carrying a corpse and it's a comedy of errors from start to finish istg

it's ok Strahd bb, you'll get the hang of this vampire thing sooner or later

anyway in a stroke of cruel genius he buries the dude in a cement tomb, lets him revive as a vampire spawn, and then fuckign leaves him there to starve

real mansplain manipulate malewife moment right there, 10/10

and such is life for our resident tortured goth overlord, until, until! guess who he runs into

fuckign Tatyana! again! fifty-plus years after her impromptu basejumping attempt!

yes we're dancing that old chestnut, the object of obsession reincarnating every few decades only to tragically die inches from Strahd's grasp, again and again and again ok we get it can we pack it in now

this lady really gets a raw deal here! she's not being punished for anything, she's just kept in her own bespoke loop of suffering for the sake of making the guy who murdered her fiance even more sad

(there is an argument to be made that the Tatyana that Strahd keeps finding and losing in the world's worst game of Where's Waldo, might not be the real Tatyana. the Dark Powers have set president for replacing the real people best suited for twisting the knife in given Darklords with constructed facsimiles, so it's not impossible that Tatyana's soul isn't trapped in an unending nightmare of death and resurrection through literally no fault of her own. not impossible, but also not likely. yes i am mad about this.)

anyway that's our lot with this one, and hoo boy did this one get long. sorry to the four of you who made it this far, but also not sorry bc this is my favorite book of all time

and i know that's a weird thing to say immediately after bitching about how it treats The Sexy Lamp Named Tatyana, but hear me out. i did say i could forgive this book for a lot of things, and Tatyana's whole deal is one of them. make of that what you will.

but aside from its bugbears, this book is fuckign fantastic. it's what i wanted when i read Dracula for the first time and spent the whole read confused and annoyed about who the hell are all these english twats. the writing is delightfully dry when it's not heartwrenchingly gothic, Strahd as a character is absolutely written tongue-in-cheek by someone who knows what she's doing, and it's just [chef kiss] delicious all around. i can't wait to reread it next year once it's faded somewhat and i can reexperience it all fresh and tasty again

if you can spring for the price tag of $40-$60, depending on where you look, i absolutely recommend it. there's also an audiobook, but i can't vouch for the narration quality there. but if you can, read it! consume this book whole like a ravenous python! that's what i'm doing as we speak!

[bloodgulchblog]

A rough assessment of the Halo novels that are still ahead of me, in no particular order:

Rion Forge stories: My hopes are so high, writing appears to be competent and premise is fun.

The latter two Ferrets books: I will endure because I am incredibly stubborn.

Silent Storm and Oblivion: I've read Silent Storm before, I expect Oblivion to be similarly forgettable. I think the Ferrets will hurt worse.

Legacy of Onyx: I heard this one is fun. I'm not impressed with Forbeck but I don't think this one is about S-IVs so it has a chance.

Bad Blood: I expect this to be pretty boring because it's another book about Buck, but it mentions Blue Team and the Arbiter for five seconds so that's something at least.

Other items I need to contend with:

Reach, Spartan Ops, 5, Wars, Wars 2: When will my attention span for long videos come back from the war? I've given up on my attention span for actually playing video games.

Escalation: Logjammed behind Spops. I'll win though. I know I will. Comics are fast even if this is the longest one.

Tales from Slipspace: Another comic anthology, I know nothing about this except copies are really expensive. (But I'm not buying comics anyway so it's fine.)

Rise of Atriox: Logjammed behind Wars 2.

Collateral Damage: I barely remember this but I know I read it once? Blue team does something.

Lone Wolf: Linda goes and does Linda things alone, curiosity and trepidation abound.

Forward Unto Dawn and Nightfall: I watched FUD before and it was okay but slow on the front end, still haven't gotten around to Nightfall despite owning it for years.

Hunt the Truth: Am I even going to bother... I've tried to consume Hunt the Truth for years and never succeeded, I'm too weary. My bones are too weak.

Legends: I am officially and formally not bothering to consume Legends again because I did not care then and I don't care now. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯