#I could totally draw a series of guilty gear characters like this now!!!

[datcravat]

asphalt <3 I love you goofy silly gooby wife

[katzkinder]

Day 8: Melancholy/THANK YOU!

I ended up joining Servamp fandom here on tumblr about... Four years ago now? In 2018, right after moving to a different state and leaving everything I knew behind. I found the anime by complete chance while browsing the Josei tag, and now... Here I am!!

I don’t know where I would be right now without this fandom, I really, truly, don’t. I’ve met so many wonderful, kind, amazing people through this series, rediscovered my love of creation, and made tons of friends!

To everyone who’s been with me on this journey... THANK YOU!

First up, @hello-vampire-kitty thank you for your hard work translating the chapters! I really appreciate the translation notes you add, and how clearly important it is to you to treat this series with the love the English localization won’t /hj

@xchibikai thank you for providing the RAWs! You’ve been doing it for so long, and without you and Kitty, we’d all be totally lost! Not to mention your Tsukimitsu sib art always makes me feel so warm and fuzzy; it’s so cute!

@servamp-announcements Even though you just started, I’m already so grateful! The formatting on posts is really easy to read, and the blog theme is also very easy to navigate! I especially appreciate that you provide sources and links back to the original announcements 🥰

@ryotakun-translations it looks like I can’t tag you, but I still wanted to give my thanks! Commissioning translations from you is always so easy and pleasant, and I know I’m getting quality work when I do.

@kalu-chan Thank you for uploading the interactions from Final Servamp Quest, and the translation for both the White Day routes and Gear of Night Trick! Your doc was super easy to navigate, and it must have taken a long time.

@rubyleaf We haven’t really ever talked before, but I still wanted to take a moment to say thanks!! Your fanfic Guilty Pleasure Friends is AMAZING, and I really admire the dedication it takes to keep updating something like that for so long. I love reading it during long car rides, and the cafe scene to this day brings me so much joy

@crazyanime3 I’ve been taking excellent care of the boys you sent me... Was it already two years ago?? Thank you for helping me start my collection way back when! I still have the little message and doodle you sent along with the buttons, saved somewhere safe

@snowlilys-wife @cottoncanada @shinychxndelure Thank you for being so supportive and accepting! I love talking with you all and hashing out scenarios and headcanons is always really fun! Also, y’all are funny af

@mahi-does-some-art @pomfry @hisakata-resutomoshibi @yarrayora @haru-jje @unwelcomedfox  @revoleotion @xthunderbolt @madburnishes @tipzycat y’all some talented and also incredibly sweet motherfuckers, holy shit. I’m so, so glad I met all of you.

@joydoesathing your genderbend designs are always so creative and I love so, so many of them! I think my favorites are Gil and Hugh. I also love your Virtues au a lot, too! Your eye for character design is incredible, and then you do all that in pen on top of it? Amazing!!

@chayam-chi Your art is so cute! You’re such a sweet person, and so funny, too! I always look forward to seeing you on my dash, and I look forward to seeing where you go from here!!

@danozi1 Your sense of humor and the creepy cuteness of your works always scratch a very specific itch for me, and also you have Good Taste

@mystivio @meiwaku-san Your panel colorings are so good and always leave me floored. Like, coloring goals, full on.

@random-husky I’ve super duper enjoyed everything you’ve posted this week, from your ideas to your compositions, you’re so creative!!

@kiwitheweebartist you’re getting better and better every day! Your little commentary posts and random thoughts are all very cute and it makes me smile whenever I read one.

@kchk-55 @d01110010rr You’re so young, but already so talented?? I’m amazed! I hope good things find you both going forward, and that school and life in general is easy on you. If anyone is mean to y’all, I’ll beat them up!!

@jutsuzuban MIKEY. YOU. I love you!!

@niccodoesart Sushi! I love the way you color; you’re so good with markers! The way you draw feet is so cute ❤

@faith-gigliorosa Your edits are so cool, holy shit. I always look forward to them! Ballad of the mona lisa is still one of my favorites.

@blackrose4242564 @theartcat2 @maria-the-mage @wingedpaperpeachpurse @radioactivesweet @fgfhfhfhf @ourelenabespalovafan @ezuja-deatro @ninjagirl142 @pause143 I see you guys in my notes for practically everything I post and thank you so much for your support!!!

@bluemoonfantasiesiii there’s a lot of things I could say to you and about you. There’s a lot of things I want to express. There’s a lot of moments and talks that I hold dear to my heart, but I think the best way to sum up my feelings towards you, is this... ......... >:3c

... That was a lot of people, huh. |D Sorry if I annoyed anyone with this, but I just... Wanted to express my sincere gratitude to each and every one of you. I’m a better, happier person for each person I’ve met here, and I’ve never quite had this kind of experience within a fandom before. I’m glad Servamp was the first time I held my hand out within an online community to quite this degree, and thank you to every single person who reached back.

A very merry, very belated, HAPPY 10TH ANNIVERSARY to you all!

[ask-artsy-oncie]

The Rabbit Bugs Bunny, the linchpin of the Looney Tunes, has been called everything from "classic" to "perennial" to "an American institution" to "one of our national heroes"--and "wascally wabbit," "long-eared galoot," and a lot of other things besides! But most of us just like to call him Bugs. Now he's starring in Space Jam, Warner Bros.' first original feature film graced by Bugs in a leading role--opposite Michael Jordan, no less! Producer Ivan Reitman and director Joe Pytka head a team of filmmakers including producers Joe Medjuck and Daniel Goldberg, executive producers Ken Ross and David Falk, and screenwriters Leo Benvenuti & Steve Rudnick and Timothy Harris & Herschel Weingrod to bring this ambitious and precedent-setting project to life. Starring with Bugs and Michael Jordan are Wayne Knight, Theresa Randle and the voice of Danny DeVito. Heading the bill in Space Jam with one of the sports world's most entertaining players is a natural opportunity for the venerable Warner Bros. character. After all, Bugs was voted the most popular in the entire short-subject field in the United States and Canada for the year 1945, and then stayed in the Number One spot for the next 16 years straight. Today, in 1996, Bugs continues to draw a crowd--in fact, a recent survey showed him to be the most popular animated character in the world! When Bugs' classic cartoons were being made and regularly released to theaters in the 1940s and 1950s, it was his stardom in short subjects that skyrocketed his studio to prominence in the animation field. Part of Bugs' great achievement had been to establish a strong personality who can exist for 7 minutes at a time, show us a facet of his personality, disappear for weeks, months, maybe years at a time, then reappear and still be recognizeable and entertaining. His possibilities were not exhausted by any single episode. The trick was not to sustain seven minutes, but to live for 50 years. And once you've sustained 56 years of amazing popularity with one generation after another all over the world, it's hardly likely you're going to have much trouble sustaining a 90 minute feature. Michael Maltese, one of Bugs' writers, remembered that in the old days, a theater's marquee had to say no more than "2 Bugs Bunny Cartoons" for people to plunk their money down--forgetting what features or other short subjects were playing, forgetting that the "2 Bugs Bunny Cartoons" would be over in 15 minutes--and, most of all, forgetting their troubles. "After a while, Bugs Bunny was so well loved by the audience that he could do no wrong," said Maltese. "They loved the rabbit, and what he stood for." Friz Freleng, one of the leading directors of Bugs' classic shorts, once remarked, "The cocky characters, for some reason, the public seems to like. They don't like those kinds of people in real life." Mel Blanc, who first provided The Rabbit's voice, believed that "Bugs Bunny appeals to the rebel in all of us. Everybody loves a winner, and Bugs Bunny always wins." There's a moment in A Hare Grows in Manhattan when Bugs dives into a manhole to escape the bulldog pursuing him, and between the time the dog leaps in the air and the time he reaches the manhole, Bugs has managed to resurface, grab the manhole cover, and pull it into place--turning the dog's face into something resembling a waffle. It's a simple enough gag, but the point is that there is a look of such total delight on Bugs' face as he performs the act, that he turns the whole business into something else altogether, a conflict of viewpoints rather than a physical conflict between two animals. Bugs is Puck reborn; he enjoys the scrapes he gets into because he knows he'll win eventually. This goes a long way toward making him the irresistible character he is: he holds out the possibility that the Battle is winnable, that we can vanquish the foe and have fun doing it, that every setback can become another challenge, another excuse for high spirits. This is possibly the critical factor of what we love about Bugs: that he will not only make us laugh but make us feel victorious and triumphant. There are heroes and there are comedians; rarely do the two meet. This made him a difficult character to write for, but it's what gave him that special spark that made him the phenomenon that he has been. From the time he first asked Elmer Fudd "What's up, Doc?" right up to the release of Space Jam, Bugs has been both sophisticated and naive, innocent and guilty, Child of Nature and Street-Tough Smart Guy, fool and hero, one of the most rounded and all-around characters in the history of film, a multi-faceted gem. A Wild Hare and Beyond The hardy hare has been delighting fans of every age, nationality, and persuasion for longer than the majority of his youthful fans probably realize. Most of the current crop of screen heroes were not even born when Bugs first rose casually from his rabbit hole, chewing on a carrot, peering down the barrel of a gun, and cracking a cool "Eh-h-h-h-What's up. Doc?" out of one corner of his mouth, in a cartoon called A Wild Hare, directed by Tex Avery and released by Warner Bros. in July of 1940. Bugs, like most characters, inspires that insistent question, "Who created him?" A simple answer is expected. But no simple answer works. The clearest family line reaches back to Tex Avery, who gave The Rabbit his famous personality. When asked how Bugs came into being, the soft-spoken Texan was laconic. "Oh," he said, "it just came out of a cartoon. We decided he was going to be a smartaleck rabbit, but casual about it, and his opening line in the very first one was `Eh, what's up, Doc?' And, gee, it floored `em! They expected the rabbit to scream, or anything but make a casual remark--here's a guy with a gun in his face! It got such a laugh that we said, `Boy, we'll do that every chance we get.' It became a series of `What's up, Docs?'." "We didn't feel that we had anything until we got it on the screen and it got quite a few laughs," Avery recalled. "When we saw that on the screen, we knew we had a hit character," Freleng remembered. "He was the most timid of animals, yet he had courage and brashness. The whole gimmick was a rabbit so cocky that he wasn't afraid of a guy with a gun who was hunting him." But the new character had no name at first. Jack Rabbit, or Jack E. Rabbit, was the personal choice of Avery himself, since he had spent so much time hunting jackrabbits and since "I thought it would please my Texas friends." But another of the Warner cartoon directors, Ben Hardaway, whose nickname was "Bugs," had already asked designer Charlie Thorsen to create a rabbit for an earlier cartoon, and when Thorsen had submitted the model sheet, he'd labeled it "Bugs' Bunny." Now, with this model sheet circulating the studio, and with a search for a good name underway, publicist Rose Horsely jumped on the label "Bugs Bunny" as "so cute!" It wasn't "cute" to Tex Avery. "That's sissy," he said. "Mine's a rabbit! A tall, lanky, mean rabbit. He isn't a fuzzy little bunny." But Horsely had the ear of Leon Schlesinger, who produced the cartoons for Warner Bros. Schlesinger thought a moment, then said, "O.K. Bugs Bunny. We'll go with it." "We were always very proud of what we were doing there," says Phil Monroe, one of the Warner animators. "We thought our pictures were funnier than anybody else's. We were all geared for humor--the animators would be asked to submit gags for pictures, and a lot of them were used." A new style was developing: most of it was Avery's doing, most of it was taking place right there at Warner Bros., and most of it was focused on The Rabbit. Finally the directors realized you couldn't look down on this character, the way you could with most cartoon clowns. You could only look up to him. It was at that point that Bugs came to life, individually, for each of the directors at Warner Bros., and, better than that, became a focal point for everything they saw as the best in themselves. Almost as soon as they started working with the character, the Bob Clampett unit, with McKimson in the lead, started giving Bugs less of an oval shape than the first model sheets called for, and his face began to look less ratlike. Then they started structuring the nose differently, and the teeth were naturally anchored to the same bone structure, in a more appealing facial design. By the time Clampett made Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid in 1942, he had arrived at what we might call the Classic Bugs Bunny. By late 1944 the same design was reaching the screen in the cartoons of the other units. Once Freleng made Stage Door Cartoon, released near the end of that year, the McKimson look was universal. "Bugs was gradually becoming a more complex character," Chuck Jones remembers. "The writers and directors were all beginning to realize that we had the potential of a brilliant and lasting star on our hands, a rambunctious, unbridled, and often balky baby Bugs that needed now to grow, to smooth out; we must find out how to harness that energy without destroying the spirit and how to guide the child without steering it. Bugs changed because he had to, not because we were brilliant." Bugs, madder than the March Hare and saner than Alice, knows he's in a cartoon. He always had a trick, and he always had the prop that was necessary to pull of that trick. Whatever it was--a sledgehammer, a stick of dynamite, an anvil, a cannon--he needed it, he got it? Where did it come from? Nobody wanted to know, they just wanted to see him pull off his fast one. Bugs was the cartoon version of the loud-mouthed but loveable Brooklynese smart-aleck who turns up in the cockpit, in the barracks, or on the battlefield in every World War II movie, as inevitable as the flag, and, apparently, just as effective in rallying the spirits of a beleaguered nation. The idea that the battle was winnable was a very popular one during World War II. "It was during those war years...that the Bugs Bunny cartoons...passed Disney and MGM for the first time to become the Number One short subject," Bob Clampett recalled. The studio received an offer from the Utah Celery Company of Salt Lake City to keep all staffers well supplied with their product if Bugs would only switch from carrots to their crunchy greens. Later the Broccoli Institute of America strongly urged The Bunny to sample their product once in a while. It never happened. Mel Blanc would have been happy to switch to any of these vegetables, since carrots made his throat muscles tighten and the words couldn't come out, but it was no go. Carrots were Bugs' trademark. The only concession they ever made was to move the carrot-crunching sounds and dialog to the last spot in the recording session. In the 1950s, with the post-war Baby Boom transforming his previous audience from rowdy kids in uniform to mature adults with responsibilities, Bugs found his new audience extended to include those "responsibilities." The nation was filling its nurseries and schools to capacity with children, and they were all becoming Bugs Bunny fans. By 1957 Bugs' perennial popularity had become as much a bewilderment as a source of pride. The theatrical short subject market had gone through a series of drastic changes, Bugs' contemporaries from the early `40s had largely faded from the scene, even Disney had phased out the one-reel cartoon, and television was posing new threats every year. The world of 1940 was becoming history. Didn't matter. Bugs went on being Champ, no matter what he did. © 1996 Warner Bros.

[xb-squaredx]

B-Squared’s Top Games of 2018!

2018 had a lotta games in it, and while I didn’t get a chance to play ALL of what gaming had to offer this year, I was able to narrow down a list of five great games that I’d highly recommend this year. The list is rather loose, and while they all might have a flaw here or there, they’re all real “Game of the Year” contenders. Without any further ado, let’s go!

I’ve had a bit of a love/hate relationship with the Monster Hunter games. While a fan of some aspects of them, other aspects would frustrate me. It was a franchise that needed quite an overhaul, and World is just that. A great modernization of the games, World not only makes a more involved, seamless world to explore and do battle in, it looks amazing in HD and is a great place for beginners to start. Being able to play this on a controller automatically makes things so much better, but in general all the weapons are really fun to mess with this time around. I love the slinger and all the ways to interact with the environment, though honestly some areas in the game are a little TOO big and complex for their own good.

The game falls a bit short for me when it comes to post-game content and its implementation of online play, though. But considering this is on a totally new engine and they’re essentially starting from scratch after years on handhelds, I can understand that it’ll take them quite a bit of time to get a handle on things, but World is a great foundation for the series going forward.

There have been a TON of Dragon Ball games over the decades, and honestly, a lot of the fighters aren’t all that good. They’re good spectacle and decent “DBZ Simulators” but lack any real competitive merit. This all changes with FighterZ, a gorgeous, streamlined ArcSys game that pays loving homage to the series, there’s so much to love here. While many past Dragon Ball games have looked pretty good and faithful, Arc System Work’s graphical magic that started with the latest Guilty Gear helps take things to the next level. The game is just really dang pretty and in many cases matches up directly with manga panels or as great recreations of iconic anime moments. Tons of visual fanservice there.

The gameplay is fast, aggressive and has just about everything you’d expect in a game starring Goku and friends, but also manages to be a huge crowd pleaser for more competitive fans. I love how each character is designed in such a way to emulate how they operate in the series itself. Yamcha is weak, but incredibly fast and good at setting things up for stronger characters on the team. Krillin is great support with Senzu Beans as an assist, or overall tricky moves that keep the opponent guessing, while Tien can do TONS of damage at the cost of his life, just to name a few. While I feel the roster has some…odd picks (like Base Goku and Vegeta) and if I played it more competitively I’d surely run into more issues, it’s a lot of fun and I actually went and double-dipped to get it on my PS4 and Switch. Can’t say I do that too often.

There are plenty of great indie titles out there this year, but for me, Celeste is a real standout. On one hand, it’s a brutally tough pixel-based platformer that honestly doesn’t seem like it should be that notable, but as you play, you discover a very intimate, cathartic game based around dealing with mental illness. Our hero Madeline attempts to climb a mountain while dealing with inner turmoil, and that’s represented to the player by throwing them into a super tough game that constantly knocks you down. Depression isn’t something you can just “get over;” you will have setbacks and times when all seems lost. Multiple times through Celeste I was ready to give up, but felt compelled to give it one more try, and with that I finally saw the horizon from atop Mt. Celeste, and I think that’ll stay with me for a long time.

It’s rare to play a game that teaches me something about myself, but with Celeste it forced me to confront how I view failure, both in games and in life. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to have to confront, but I did it anyway, and going forward I’m trying to view failure as something that isn’t always a bad thing, something that’s just part of the journey. Celeste tries to frame deaths in a level as a badge of honor. So what if you died over 100 times on this level? That just means you got up 101 times and beat it. You didn’t give up, and that counts for a lot. So yeah, this game definitely stands out to me for making be all introspective and junk.

Spider-Man is one of my favorite super heroes, and he’s had no shortage of great games, but for too long it feels like we’ve held the game based on the second Sam Raimi movie to such a high standard, and it was time for a new game to raise the bar. So if I’m even talking about Insomniac’s take on the wall-crawler, then it’s a pretty safe bet that they did it. I’ll be honest here; Spider-Man isn’t exactly groundbreaking for an open-world title. It has all the hallmarks of a standard open-world experience: enemy bases, towers to climb, collectibles scattered all over the map, and all manner of repetitive challenges and side content. But here’s the thing…all of that stuff is made about 1000% more fun when you’re controlling Spider-Man. Movement is fluid, effortless and fun all by itself. Combat and stealth has this interesting flow as you zip around the battlefield, using web gadgets and good ol’ fisticuffs in perfect tandem. It’s just a pure blast to play and I absolutely devoured this game when it came out.

This is all paired with probably one of the best Spider-Man stories out there. Yuri Lowenthal is a terrific Peter Parker and Spider-Man, and this is hands down my favorite interpretation of Doc Ock. I genuinely didn’t expect the story for this to be so good, written and acted with so much love for the source material. I was actually bawling at the ending, such a raw, bittersweet end to a wild ride of a game. All that helps elevate what could have been a bog-standard open-world game up several notches to not just a great Spider-Man game, but a great game in general and no-doubt the most fun I had with a single-player game this year. And yes, I’m still kinda salty that it didn’t win anything at The Game Awards.

And lastly, we come to something that’s kind of an easy shoe-in for Game of the Year for me. Honestly, there’s a power gap between Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and everything else on this list. Without a doubt, Smash Bros. is my favorite franchise in just about anything, and any time a new game is about to come out, it’s a real magical time. The speculation of just who is making the roster before release, the countless hours of playtime after it comes out, and now we’re in DLC speculation season so in some ways this hype train never stops.

Smash Ultimate seeks out to be the definitive Smash game and it largely lives up to that claim. An outrageously gigantic roster, tons of content to sift through, and containing so much love and reverence not just to Nintendo, not just to its third party guests, but to the franchise itself and how far it’s come. Nearly twenty years old, it’s crazy to think how this series has grown. What was once Masahiro Sakurai’s pet project has blossomed into this mega-franchise, and now we’re left with one question: where can you POSSIBLY go from here?

Sure, the online is kinda problematic in its matchmaking, and the World of Light adventure mode is a tad too bloated, but this is a game I’m going to probably sink hundreds of hours into with friends for years to come, and it’s been a joy to play so far. Released right at the tail-end of the year, it was a long wait, but Ultimate lived up to the hype for me, and really made 2018 end on a high note…which it kinda needed.

 So that’s that! Plenty of other great titles came out in 2018 for sure, but honestly I haven’t gotten to them all yet, if I get to them at all. Indie stuff like Guacamelee 2, The Messenger and Dead Cells are something I’ll be looking into soon, and I have God of War waiting for me as well. I hear good things about Starlink too, but this is pretty much where I draw the line for honorable mentions. Anything else that came out this year was either OK, or not something I’d consider Game of Anything. So that’ll do. Here’s hoping 2019 can top this year!

Until next time,

-B

[alternativesaga]

Snazz???

Full Name: "Snazzy" Sans the Skeleton (reason I'm putting quotations is because they're nicknames. Not the names of the AUs themselves)Gender and Sexuality: Male and Pansexual(I have a joke on this but I feel I'll offend people. I hope not, but please know that I'm joking if I ever draw it)Pronouns: He/Him They/Them He doesn't really care at the most part Ethnicity/Species: Skeleton monster (?)Birthplace and Birthdate: His home AU and still not sure on his own birthday as well. I'm getting there, just take me this week Guilty Pleasures: He loves to be lazy, can binge watch a whole series in 3 days, listens to metal like if it was classical musicPhobias: Agoraphobia, checking this up I think Snazz has OCD, Phasmophobia, thanatophobia, Athazagoraphobia, AtelophobiaWhat They Would Be Famous For: His numerous amounts of people he's flirted with throughout AUsWhat They Would Get Arrested For: Getting caught from a prankOC You Ship Them With: Sloth sans OC Most Likely To Murder Them: Gear for being an "overly dramatic idiot who doesn't know when to quit" when he's supposed to. It's more of a moment if Snazz ever goes to extreme measures on anything. If not, maybe PB sans if he ever does it.Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Romantic novels. His heart's in for those and they could be the cheesiest ones and he'll love them. He'll read the classics from ages ago or the modern ones from today. Whether it ends happy or not, he likes the story to have some meaning behind it expressing the "passion of the soul" Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Now for sure that would be horror. Unlike Gear, he hates anything that includes scary themes even though he acts tough for his own sake on these topics. In the end, he's still a chicken when it comes to scary themesTalents and/or Powers: His feather can create magic elements from thin air and could be of good use. If he can't draw something out, he could always write it. However if the feather ever gets damaged, he has his own regular magic but it takes more time and focus to do so. If he uses too much, he could potentially damage him physically Why Someone Might Love Them: He's a gentleman. He loves to make others happy and will go to higher measures to do so if necessary. His loyalty can be charming and loves to express himself in the oddest of waysWhy Someone Might Hate Them: He tends to lie a lot to certain people. This is mostly due to the fact he doesn't want to hurt anyone as well. Also he doesn't know when to be quiet or can be slow in a situation when necessary to be caught up. This leads him to be somewhat not always on focus because he's at the same time thinking of other thingsHow They Change: Outcast of his AU and now an outgoing doesnt-give-a-damn loving person who wants others to be happy yet sometimes forgets himself to be too in the processWhy You Love Them: He's way different from my usual characters. Most of them have some darker past or it's their personality that makes them dark. In another sense, he does things I probably would never plan on doing. And unlike them, Snazz has a brighter outlook on life no matter what it is. It's pretty charming if you think about it. It's as if saying that if the world were ending, he'd express how much he enjoyed his time and spend time with the ones he'd love. He wouldn't cry about it. Instead, he'd look at it as some peaceful symbol that gives him a relief of acceptance throughout the whole time. Of course, he's also a lot more emotional as well. His emotions can tilt easily if he's misplaced in the wrong time or direction. Just in total, his personality is intriguing to me.

[neon-skies95]

Tagged by @sketchesanddoodlesandthings​

So I’ll tag @artimus-maora​, @spaceferrari​, and @141-point-12​. Do what you will.

Favorite Place: My bed. It’s warm and will never harm me.

Relationship Status: Single. 

Favorite Color: Orange,

Pets: Currently deceased.

Last song I listened to: Keep on Loving you by REO Speedwagon

Favorite TV show: That’s a good question... Generally when I watch something, I rarely re-watch it. I guess Courage the Cowardly Dog then, that’s the one I re-watch the most.

First Fandom: Power Puff Girls and Barbie. That was in the old-time when I was a wee bab.

Hobbies: Playing video games, watching anime and cartoons. It used to be drawing, but that’s kind of my job now.

Books I’m currently Reading: Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Also slowly making my way through Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.

Favorite book: Phoenix: Future by Osamu Tezuka

Name: Mia

Nickname: just use shortened version of my URL, neon. the internet using my real name just feels weird.

Sign: Scorpio.

Height: 5′1″

Sexual Orientation: Asexual

Hogwarts house: Ravenclaw. 

Favorite animal: Echidnas. They don’t have boobs so they lactate out their pores. They’re the raddest.

Time right now: 10:10 am.

Average hours of sleep: fuk

Cat or dog person: Dog. If I touch a cat, my throat closes and I run the risk of dying.

Favorite fictional character from Harry Potter: Norbert

Number of blankets you sleep with: ∞

Favorite singer or band: The Protomen. u thought echidnas were the raddest thing holy shit these wonderful ppl are 10x as rad

Dream trip: Tour of Japan. Just roughly half a year to explore the whole country. Learn some shit, buy some shit. The works.

Dream job: Character design for a video game company. I’m currently a level designer and concept artist for video game courses, so I’m getting there.

When was this blog created: long-ass fucking time ago when i was young and dreamed of glory

When did your blog reach its peak: haha wat the fuk is that?

What made you decide to make a tumblr: Most of the links to my OTPs traced back to tumblr and I had some friends already on it, so I figured I’d jump on the bandwagon.

5 things you’ll find in my bag: My laptop, at least 2 different chargers, my tablet, some pencils (most broken), and headphones.

5 things you’ll find in my bedroom: There is no bedroom, only plush toys.

5 things I’ve always wanted to do in life: Sleep all day, play all night, travel the world, learn at least one new language, and be productive. Some of these things contradict the others on this list...

5 things that make me happy: Cartoons, sleeping, plush toys, the cheesiest of music, and good scenery.

5 things I’m currently into: Pokemon, Sherlock Holmes, Transformers, Metal Gear, and sleeping

5 things on my to-do list: Required reading, meetings, finish MGSV, finish Birth by Sleep, speaking of sleep...

5 things people may not know about me: I’m a huge history buff and I like to learn as much as I can about history from different points of view. There are about 4 boxes of plush toys in my permanent home and at least 1 more still in the basement. I was a “Sherlockian” before the BBC show came out, and to this day I still prefer the Granada series. I started my love of Transformers and Pokemon roughly around the same time, and they’ve stuck ever since. Speaking of which, I have 2 other blogs: @thatcleffa (Pokemon) and @djblasterblastinrightatya (Transformers, but also just robots in general).

Rules: Put your music on “Shuffle” List the first 10 songs

(most of my music comes from Spotify, so I’ll just use my biggest playlist and go from there)

1: Bat Out of Hell - Meatloaf

2: Live & Learn: Crush 40

3: Total Eclipse of the Heart - Bonnie Tyler

4: Science Fiction/Double Feature - Richard O’Brien/Rocky Horror Picture Show

5: The Stand (Man or Machine) - The Protomen

6: December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night) - Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons

7: The Trooper - The Protomen (it’s a cover of the original)

8: Flash - The Protomen (also a cover)

9: Opening Ceremony - Bjorn Skifs/Chess

10: Shia LaBeouf Live (Actual Cannibal Shia Labeouf) - Rob Cantor

A - Age: 21

B - Biggest fear: My home going up in flames. C - Current time: 10:45 am. Time flies. D - Drink you last had: Water. Gotta stay hydrated. E - Every day starts with: reluctance F - Favorite song:  Will of the One by The Protomen G - Ghosts, are they real: i mean, they could be H - Hometown: Michigan. That’s a state not a town, but you get the idea. I - In love with: my bed. my one true love. J - Jealous of: Those who can actually draw. Also those who can pet cats. Please stop teasing me for my inability to touch cats. It’s a dick move. K - Killed someone: ur a nosy one arent ya? L - Last time you cried: like, last week. maybe last night. M - Middle name: Frances. N - Number of siblings: 1. Younger brother. O - One wish: infinite wishes. then i can do whatever. P - Person you last called/texted: My future Dungeon Master. We’re starting a one-off campaign this Friday. Q - Questions you’re always asked: Is it Mia or Maya? (when the fuck has it ever pronounced Maya???) R - Reasons to smile: my bed. it’s waiting for me. im coming my darling, just a few more hours...! S - Song last played: Keep on Loving You - REO Speedwagon T - Time you woke up: 8:00 am. Wasn’t technically awake until 8:05 am. U - Underwear color: They have the Avengers on them. V- Vacation destination: This Spring break I’m going to LA! Mostly for business reasons, but it sounds like it’ll be a lot of fun, too! W - Worst habit: I bite the inside of my lip a lot, and I grind my teeth and generally don’t realize it until my jaw hurts or my head aches. The latter is reason for most of my dental issues.

X - X-rays you’ve had: Mouth and arms, and one time my leg.

Y - Your favorite food: I can’t really choose one because if I eat too much of one thing I get sick of it. Oreos, Nutella, and lava cake are currently at the top there.

Z - Zodiac sign: Scorpio.

1. What can’t you sleep without? I sleep a lot easier with at least one plush to hug. 2. What are your favorite kind of socks? I have one pair with cute little Pikachus all over them and another pair with cute little sheep all over them. I try not to wear them when I have to walk a lot so they don’t get holes. 3. What’s your favorite snack/meal/drink? I really like soup... like a lot. Especially if there’s a lot of noodles and meat. It’s generally my go-to if I need a pick-me-up or can’t find anything appetizing on a menu. 4. What’s your favorite kind of weather? Sunny and warm with a hint of a breeze. 5. What do you like to listen to/do to relax and feel better when you’re upset? Get something warm (like soup), and get cuddly in bed with my plushies. Also some Youtube. 6. What’s your favorite store to shop at? Book stores. 7. What color do you wear the most? Red and occasionally dark green. And a surprisingly large amount of black. 8. What’s your favorite (video/board/social/party) game to play? Pokemon.  9. Any guilty pleasures? “One Night in Bangkok”. The song is from the concept album/play Chess, and the song is about an American chess player being a douche in Bangkok. I don’t think we’re supposed to sympathize with him, but it can be pretty cringe-y. It’s very catchy and it’s terrible. 10. If you could go anywhere (in real life or in fiction), where would it be? It would be so rad to go to Destiny Islands from Kingdom Hearts. Preferably as a kid. idk, my current age on an island of kids would be weird.

[recentanimenews]

Fantastic Fighting Action in Arc System Works’ Granblue Fantasy Versus Closed Beta

  When I was a kid, one of the most fun ideas around the lunch table was talking about who would win in a fight between favorite characters from various TV shows, anime, and other media. After discovering my love of fighting games, I started talking with people not just about who would win, but how would they play in a fighting game based around their property; who would have what types of moves, what would the system be like, all of those conversations of what-ifs and if-onlys seemed totally fanciful. After all, fighting games were usually original properties, and the history of most licensed fighting games was generally pretty grim. That all changed when Capcom branched out into their VS. series, bringing comic book characters and video game characters to their fighting game engines, giving us amazing titles like Marvel vs. Capcom 2. Nintendo gave us even more food for thought with the Smash Bros. series, pitting fan favorite Nintendo characters against each other in four player brawls. NetherRealms followed suit, giving us the Injustice series, and recently Arc System Works got in on the action with the Persona 4 Arena titles. The rebirth of fighting games seems to be now, and what better time to reignite those debates of “who would win” than with a game filled to the brim with colorful, unique characters: Granblue Fantasy!

In Granblue Fantasy Versus, players are given the ability to take on the role of various Granblue character summons and pit them against one another in fast paced, arcade style combat. Fans of Arcsys’ other fighting games such as Persona 4 Ultimax, Guilty Gear, BlazBlue, or Dragon Ball FighterZ will likely find Granblue Fantasy Versus quite welcoming, building upon many of the systems and Arcsys fighting game style that these games generally exude, while adding its own unique twists to the mix. If you’re new to fighting games, Granblue Fantasy Versus is actually very inviting, allowing players to use a simplified input system to pull of character’s special moves, and focusing on somewhat easy to learn but hard to master combat mechanics.

Each character has 3 base attacks, and a 4th specific ability unique to each character; Charlotta, for example, creates a barrier that blocks damage, and if an enemy is close enough will launch an automatic counter attack. These extra abilities help make every character feel unique and special, with the focus being on how these abilities match character personalities and fighting styles. In many cases, these abilities aid in mobility and defense, with specific and unique offensive capabilities in certain circumstances. As the game roster grows from what we were shown here, I’m eager to see the ways each character will be unique. This mechanic instantly reminded me of BlazBlue, where characters had similar 4 button layouts with one of them being a specific ability that only they had access too, such as Iron Tager’s magnetism mechanic.

Unlike games such as Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat, the focus in Granblue Fantasy Versus skews much more towards what fighting game players refer to as “anime games”, with one minor missing element: air dashing. Otherwise, there are a lot of similarities here between Granblue Fantasy Versus and other Arcsys games, showing that mechanically the company is relying on the solid basis of great games they’ve made before to keep branching out into new territory. As with Persona 4 Ultimax and Dragon Ball FighterZ, Granblue Fantasy Versus puts a lot of emphasis on making the game match the universe it draws from. And aside from making characters play similar to their personalities and traits from the base Granblue Fantasy universe, the graphical touches and voice acting are also top notch, giving characters tons of personality as they fill up the screen.

In fact, this may be one of the “largest” Arcsys casts in recent memory, with every character, from the imposing Katalina to the diminutive Charlotta, taking up huge chunks of screen real estate; I was honestly pretty surprised by how large each character was, and the amount of detail in their animations and movements were extremely fluid, making them seem alive and breathing on the screen as they fought. Overall, Granblue Fantasy Versus is a gorgeous game, and the two stages on display in this beta gave a good indication of the types of arenas we can possibly look forward to, each with lots of vibrant detail, color, and background animations and actions to occasionally draw your eye to them in the midst of battle.

Of course, a fighting game is only as good as it plays, and in this regard I’m happy to say that I was very impressed with what I got to play of Granblue Fantasy Versus over the past few days. My personal tastes in fighting games tend to skew towards “anime fighters” to begin with, so I was at home with the inputs and style of fighting game that I was going to experience, but what really caught my eye was how deep and complex the seemingly simple systems really were. The player guide that was provided was a huge help, and I feel that when the game comes out, if it has a fully realized training mode, this game will prove to have a lot of options for players to tinker with and find optimal combo strings and patterns. The simplistic input option for special moves relies on using the R1 button and simple directional inputs, but I honestly found myself not using it after I had gotten used to the game, as it relies on tried and true fighting game inputs like quarter-circle movements and charge movements to accomplish characters’ special abilities.

That said, I think these simplistic options are a great addition to help players get accustomed to the game and feel like they can do one of the most important things in a fighting game for new people: do cool stuff! And, as I played more, I found that I could sometimes extend a combo or find a new combo path by combining traditional inputs with simplistic ones, something that I think will become potentially an interesting option for more seasoned players depending on what’s going on and what needs to be accomplished.

My most interesting take-away from the games I played was the importance of super meter moves (called Skybound Arts). Each character has at least 2, one that can be used when the super meter hits 100%, and another that can only be unleashed when your character hits a certain HP threshold. What I learned about these Skybound Arts is that most matches seem to only allow you to use them once per round, and knowing when to save your Skybound Art for a Critical Skybound Art, or when to use your regular one, can make all the difference between defeat and victory. Whiffing your super leaves you extremely vulnerable, but your opponent also knows that you won’t be doing that again! This isn’t to say that these Skybound Arts aren’t strong, as many of them can easily kill opponents with far more health than you’d imagine, meaning that knowing when and where to use them is extremely important.

I liked this mechanic a lot more than I thought I would at first, because I think it removes a somewhat constant crutch of some fighting games that allow super moves to become a fallback for when new players don’t do well. Relying on extremely strong moves that you can wait for and using on wake-up is an old strategy, but it makes you less aware of what you have available in your own character’s kit to save yourself. It also means that supers are very cinematic and feel, well, super, when they go off, making huge impacts on the outcomes of matches in ways that you may not normally expect. When a well timed block stopped my opponent’s super from winning them the match, I could feel the confidence drain from them as they proceeded to try and stall for time instead, knowing that they couldn’t expect to win against me now in straight on combat. In another match, I realized that if I used Charlotta’s regular Skybound Art, I’d be able to chip my opponent to death, and baited out an opening to use it, snatching a “cheap” but shocking victory from the jaws of near defeat.

Of the characters offered in the beta, I was really surprised by how varied each of them felt. Sometimes, fighting games tend to have characters that are very similar, using variations on fighting styles or other similar techniques. In this beta, each character not only felt totally unique, but each of their movesets and toolkits were totally specific to them, rather than built off of a singular framework with some minor tweaks here and there. Gran, Ferry, Charlotta, Lancelot and Katalina all feel as distinct in battle as they are in their visual styles, with each character fitting a specific style of fighting without really crossing over into the others’ territory. In some ways, I actually felt a similarity between this and Street Fighter 2 or Super Turbo, where characters became distinct by how they fought as much as how they looked.

Charlotta, the charge character offered in the demo, played totally different from Ferry, who utilizes zoning and range abilities to control the battlefield in her favor. Gran felt the most general or simplistic, but his power-up mechanic gives him avenues to change up how he plays, while Lancelot’s hit and run style means he can dish out huge damage with big combos, but can just as easily take tons of damage in return if he gets caught out. Katalina felt like a variation of Mitsuru from Persona 4 Arena, but I also found that she fulfills a very solid jill of all trades role, with her unique cancelling options from her ability giving her answers to numerous questions on offense and defense. I think in many ways Granblue Fantasy Versus will really succeed or fail after this based on the ability to build on these characters and their individual styles, giving every new playable character a wholly unique roll to fill in the roster. Based on previous Arcsys games like Guilty Gear and BlazBlue, I feel like there’s a strong potential for this to be the case, but I will always remain somewhat cautious about balance and match-up options in fighting games as they develop. Granblue Fantasy Versus feels balanced now, but that’s also because it has 5 characters available to play. How that will change over time remains to be seen.

Overall, I was incredibly surprised with how much I loved Granblue Fantasy Versus, and I’m looking forward to getting more time with the game as soon as Cygames offers us new tests leading up to a final release. The success of games like Dragon Ball FighterZ, Persona 4 Ultimax and BlazBlue Cross Tag shows that tie-in games from ArcSys have a lot of originality and life in them, and the integrity of the original material is maintained with the life that only a fighting game can really breathe into them. Hopefully Granblue Fantasy fans and fighting game fans alike find a lot to love here and support this game when it releases, as I’d love to see lots more out of this game and engine down the line. Until then, I’ll be rewatching combo videos and replays, waiting for my chance to take my beloved Charlotta back out onto the field of battle again!

Are you excited for Granblue Fantasy Versus? What character would you like to see added to the game? Are you new to fighting games, and curious because of the Granblue tie-in? Let us know in the comments!

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Nicole is a features writer and editor for Crunchyroll. Known for punching dudes in Yakuza games on her Twitch channel while professing her love for Majima. She also has a blog, Figuratively Speaking. Follow her on Twitter: @ellyberries

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