#I do love this from a game standpoint though because I thought this was a plot hole

[hollenka99]

*thinks back to Siffrin's first death and how the rock didn't fall until he'd stopped searching for signs of a trap, reassuring his friends there was no danger*

Oh that's so mean, what the hell.

[sugar-petals]

⌈ pile I - QUEEN OF CUPS „i adore you so much“

⌈ pile II - ACE OF CUPS „i’m your lover in plain sight“

⌈ pile III - JUSTICE „i’m the one you deserve“

🔓 select the tarot card that you noticed first.

⌈ NOTE 🌹 ➝ welcome to this extended nsfw reading. at the bottom of the deck i found the 5 OF WANDS (see below cut) so the overall theme is: teasing 😏 let’s find out what it means for you individually in your piles. what steamy thoughts are running circles in your person’s mind? tell me what you got and enjoy 🐝

[ deck used | the wonderful golden art noveau tarot by Giulia Massaglia — gilded example cards below, not the actual piles ]

{ 𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚝/𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘 𝚖.𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝 }

the FIVE OF WANDS - today’s overall energy is playfighting. 

message. they want to give you a sexual challenge rather than indulging in a soft and hesitant mood: tease them right back and they’ll appreciate it. it’s all in good spirits as long as both play along. boldness is appreciated and keeps the chemistry running. 

no need to fear conflict, this is all friendly banter without the intent of hurting. behind all of that is the idea of testing limits + experimenting sexually through fun and activity rather than keeping it a guessing game what the other person might like. 

pile i - QUEEN OF CUPS „i adore you so much“

⌈ QUEEN OF WANDS - THE EMPEROR - PAGE OF COINS - 3 OF CUPS

Oh hot damn… Lucky in Love or Drunk in Love are the type of lyrics I’m getting from this. Nothing prevents them from thirsting over you lmao but it’s a good thing! Because they’re confident in liking you so. Damn. Much. And they know you like them back. What a secure lover this person is becomes apparent in their ambitions: They reflect dedication. Meanwhile, they’ve got a balance of mature and outgoing/youthful energy alike. And I feel like they really went from being serious in your presence to just letting it all out! Good for them, because they’re on a roll since they met you slash made contact.

The main kink I’m seeing here is teacher and student, hands down. They are seriously into pretending there’s a difference in power, authority, knowledge, age, looks, all of that. Doesn’t have to be real, it can be roleplay, but they do consider you to be someone to look up to. They pleasure themselves like mad to those thoughts, honestly. The Daddy or Mommy kink is real in this one because whew, QUEEN + EMPEROR? That’s a big deal. You two are either two bold personalities coming together (or they fantasize about that, some major powerplay) or they identify you as that person who pulls all of their strings with little to no effort. Far from intimidated, they are ready to learn and enjoy because they’re your babe.

This person is not a starfish though. Happily under your spell, I can see them quite actively horny because wow Pile 1, their sex drive is just impressive, to say the least. Not scattered, just very strong in general. And they see you just like that as well. They know you are in charge, they feel that you’ll handle the shit out of them without hesitating. Boss of their body is what I’m hearing! Not an inch will belong to anybody else. They love how madly possessive they are.

At the same time, they also think you can learn together, it’s not so set in stone. I like that contrast in the cards. Sovereignty and mature sex versus being carefree and raunchy like a student party. Like they want you to pounce on them and dominate their every cell, but they also want to be your cute little pet to fool around with. I get the impression that this person worships the hell out of you and thinks you’re the best in bed, no matter your degree of experience. That’s the thing, they would be happy with a virgin and a sexpert alike, as I said they hardly care! Because you charmed them and made your standpoint clear! Even if you have a hot VERSUS stone-cold demeanor and sex appeal, they feel inspired by that.

Your sexual energies complement each other well I feel. In their mind, you could top them so easily. They gladly submit to an orgy of pleasure. I think they trust you a lot, they just want to lose control and be chased. They won’t chase you! You’re too prideful and want to set this up on your own terms. This relationship is yours to create, they won’t interfere. They’re too starstruck and want to gather their resources first, only to find out you’re tremendous fun to be with and they had nothing to worry about.

You are the sun of their universe Pile 1, you seduced them so much. If only you would boss them around, they want it so badly. This scenario could be a total clash of titans since you are both a total smokeshow in your own ways.  They looked at you and wanted you to open up, leave the stiff old life behind and feel younger again. Since you’re so foxy to them, they treat you like the bombshell you are, with lots of reverence and respect. I’m even getting service sub vibes from your person, Pile 1, they’ll just do whatever you ask `em like you’re royalty, long as it’s consensual of course, but I don’t get any toxic fantasies from this pile, just very dom-sub centered ones.

{ 𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚝/𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘 𝚖.𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝 }

pile ii - ACE OF CUPS „i’m your lover in plain sight“

⌈ EIGHT OF SWORDS - KNIGHT OF WANDS - 6 OF COINS - PAGE OF CUPS

Whirlwind kind of romance right here, lots of ups and downs in their anxious mind. You left them feeling powerless to all the energy they perceive you to so blazingly have, Pile 2. They were thunderstruck by your presence, were frozen on the damn spot. Tied. Up. Which leads us to the card imagery, by the way. Bondage fantasies is a huge theme here. I’m just sayin’… That’s their sexual fantasy when they think of you. If you’d blindfold them, or try something like knife play, even (as the swords card indicates), that would get them going so much. Despite their freaky imagination, ironically they are the mellow one, while you are the fiery counterpart that doles it all out to them in their wet dreams.

As contradictory as it sounds, reciprocating and giving back is the dynamic here, though. For instance, if you bought stuff for them, they’d be so happy and fawn over you like wild. Since this is a rollercoaster ride, however… I can’t quite tell what exactly their constant feelings are for you, Pile 2, as they are just so changeable. From no sex drive to reckless abandon to self-control to begging to being a fool in love. What a journey they’ve been through because of you. You make them feel all of this, and they’re saying thank you.

One day they want to be controlled by you, the other, they want to unleash their passion without any help and do their own dance to impress you. They have an edge but they’re romantic, they’re hopeless and they’re hot shit, they’re fair and then such a tease giving you less than you deserve, full well knowing it will keep you hooked and coming for them like an avalanche.

They want you rushing to their home like it's the firefighters. Because well, well… they’re feeling way too hot, aren’t they. At the same time, that’s the puzzling thing, they also want you to keep them at an arm’s length. If you aren’t confused about this person yet, at this point, you gotta be: Which mirrors them, in fact. They don’t quite know what they want consistently, you left them too dumbfounded to understand the situation for sure. Pile 2, this individual is head over heels for you.

Now this starstruck person dreams about being acted upon by you and they love that. Pillow prince/ss is what I’m seeing all over the spread, they have that receptive energy for the most part. They might be a little unruly once they get out of their comfort zone or don’t feel like they’re acknowledged by you (they might as well have a come-save-me fantasy… do them a favor and help them out). But when they do get signals, they are back in love romantically, yes, not so much sexually, they’re touchy-feely like crazy. Just when they felt like roaming free before! If there’s some hunter-prey fantasy going on here I wouldn’t be surprised, they want to keep you on your toes.

As I said, you get the best of both worlds Pile 2, your person is not the predictable type. Maybe that’s why you like `em. They are flirts and then they’re not. They want rough sex and then they want affection little by little. But the final note in their mind is always this: They want you to glued to them, to go wild for them, to witness them like a fish in the water: Through requited love. All they want is to be asked out and live their dreamy, sensitive love. Confusing you is not their intention. Don’t forget they just want love at the end of the day.

{ 𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚝/𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘 𝚖.𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝 }

pile iii - JUSTICE „i’m the one you deserve“

⌈ KNIGHT OF COINS - PAGE OF SWORDS - THE SUN - THE EMPRESS

What started out as a sensual, stable connection which didn’t go down in flames of horniness now turned their head into a mush. Which then turned into them bursting with vitality! An online message of yours shook them up, or something you said. But in a positive way, because they’re so happy now. Romantic, personal, sexual bliss, they’re feeling so good about themselves because of you, the dull days are over. What a mood boost you gave them, and they’re confident in their looks because of your steady presence/communication, oh my word.

Because you started out easygoing and then picked up speed, they are absolutely feeling themselves like it’s nobody’s business. I’m so happy for you, Pile 3, because your person is just prancing around like a child after you’ve been frank with them. Talking it out was so needed. Approaching it from a headspace was. Being chatty with them made your person super hot and bothered, too. Hell, they are totally into your voice, the way you take your time when you walk, the way you carry yourself, how you dress up, the way your hair is tousled (if you wear it longer), how you treat yourself, how you choose your words, and how you smile especially.

At first, they were so scared how serious and single-minded you came across. Now they’re blushing and sweating their ass off because you said what you said and you paid attention to them! When they thought they were the knight in shining armor, you gave them a reality check and dodged the bullet, stood your ground instead of playing helpless — which worked in their favor not to get their hopes up and invest right away. That’s how you made this person’s libido explode. But in a good, wholesome way.

This proper mix of humor and the crazy slow burn (!) between the two of you has them going nuts without actually making them crazy, you know? Just healthy adoration and warmth they feel. I get the impression your person has lots of sexual stamina, Pile 3. They know what they’re doing, y’all… they might come across as a total sunshine, but they are, oh my word. Fertile as hell, go all the way, ready to make those babies and live the good life. In this economy? Your person thinks so, who am I to judge, they want that settling down and parenthood. They just know you’d be good at raising kids. But without compromising the mental stimulation, which you give them consistently.

And because you’re such a hottie with charm and good looks, they’re at your feet. You rule them! Your sex appeal has their pretty head spinning, their routine is broken, they can’t get enough of you, they want this in-depth (literally!). For long, they fantasized about having carefree sex with you out in nature, wild and free. Never too much of a good thing with you. You’re so juicy to them, graceful, steamy, gorgeous, you seem to have it all in their eyes. 

They think you have elevated status or just carry yourself in a way that shows your life is fulfilled and abundant. Oh hell, what don’t they like about you. Maybe you can be too direct and frank at times? They prefer your magnanimous, silly, soft, giving, cute’n’comfy side. They need to be taken care of a little, or need your cheer-ups. Because they want to take it easy, and not have conflict and difficulty in communication. Healthy, loving, and lasting (!) sexuality is the gist of this, I’m thinking. Quite Venusian of them, I see their sexual thoughts as Libra/7th house or Taurus/2nd house-themed. An all-around feel-good reading, Pile 3, I love the positive cards you got.

{ 𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚝/𝚊𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘 𝚖.𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝 }

FINAL NOTE. meet me in the reply section if you want, and if you got stuff i can improve about my PAC posts, drop a comment as well, i want to brush up my format again!

⭐️ DISCLAIMER // there is no guarantee for accuracy. believing in the cards is a choice. 

© 2017-2023 sugar-petals. All readings for entertainment purposes only: They do not substitute any professional advice. Take what resonates, discard the piles that don’t hit home. If you aren’t drawn to any pile that’s okay, these messages aren’t for you. Do not repost my readings.

[cottoncandiescupcakes]

I'll be honest to TROP haters that say it changed too much of the material I mean YES you are right but so did Peter Jackson

I mean Arwen's fate being tied to the ring? Arwen saving Frodo instead of Glorfindel, a very important elf who actually slayed a Balrog, who wasn't in the movie at all. Tom Bombadil, Goldberry and Old Man Willow also weren't in it

Also Tolkien would not be happy with Gimli's fairly undignified treatment at times and also, Legolas' 'orc counter',

Legolas would never happily kill he'd do it to save his friends and for Middle Earth obviously but he's not going around treating killing orcs like a kind of action game having fun doing it

Also for some reason he made Thranduil almost a kind of villainous character though he does redeem himself(and looks fabulous doing it) and I do love this character but it's not very accurate to Tolkien's thoughts on this character which was literally just a typical elf king who mistrusted dwarves and rightfully imprisoned a bunch of dwarves sneaking into his woods

Other things Peter Jackson did he made Denethor WAY more evil than in the books. In the books he's basically a broken, grieving very old man who has lost it versus a 50-60 or something year old man just ranting and raving on everyone going crazy

Another thing Peter Jackson did was make the evil characters like Saruman and Grima way more obviously evil than the book ones so you could instantly tell they were evil, which, the point was they decieved people. That Grima decieves no one lol.

So he changed a LOT of things about the characters, for example Aragorn looks like, you know he's going to be heroic from the start just because of Viggo's bearing but he's meant to be almost unattractive and scary looking at first, then slowly becomes like a king and noble and handsome looking. Like, Pippin literally says he looks foul LMAO I am serious. Boromir is meant to be the perfect gallant hero looking one who almost falls to temptation where Aragorn is meant to look very rough but have a noble heart, they are like foils

I love those movies but he also did change a lot but especially, PJ's work glorifies war too much for Tolkien's standpoint, not always but there are scenes he's making it too action-y while other scenes, like Boromir and Theoden's deaths, are perfect

Also BOTH these works make the elves too serious, like, the books have the elves singing, playing tricks and carrying harps and flutes around and acting more like Medieval fairy ring style elves at times along with being more serious also, they had both sides to them while adaptations just make them very dignified

I know Gil-Galad misses his harp guys HE WAS ALREADY SINGING. Free him

[gortashs-skidmark]

Tieflings DnD - variations for the fanfic writers and artists!! -

There’s a lot about tieflings on the internet. THESE ARE CANON, except for one thought i put in.

If you’re gonna do BG3 fanfics about Tieflings, please please please consider adding some spice with origin lore and CANON facts about their race :) it would be SO fun!

Pls I need more zevlor fanfic too.

PLS READ: I don’t believe in censorship or ignoring the subject of people who are oppressed, but be mindful of how you write and use oppression of dnd races on your tav pls.

- Orange; Canon Historical Events, Abilities, Bodily Facts, and Bloodlines. It means i think you should look into it.

Pink: I think it's cute. Red; Warning, Comment Purple; Headcanon (only one of them)

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- Tieflings are prone to bad luck, because of the Curse of Aasimar.

- Planar Proverb “don’t ever make a bet with a Tiefling” hey I already made one with Lakrissa.

- They’re arcanally gifted, most of them. Zariel Tieflings are much better melee fighters.

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- Tielfling Blood; is tainted from the hells so they could have human parents. Be descendants of demon, devils, evil deities, night hags, and succubus!

- i know y’all love aphrodisiac fanfics, succubus spittle is exactly what you need dawg. Someone make me a fanfic including succubus heritage.

- along with that, Tieflings are unable to breed with anyone except humans or other Tieflings. Literally. They can be Tiefling or human.

- Usually there is some tell to if they’re Zariel, Asmodeus, Mephistopheles by birth mark, or traits like cat eyes, or night hags bloodlines have red eyes without pupils or scelaras

EDIT: I thought the flaming pupils were cat-like slit eyes in the game, but Karlach does indeed have regular slits!

- Tieflings can be male, female, or without gender. It is a canon fact. A win for my gender struggling homies.

- They can have green, blue, purple, pink, yellow, red skin tones. With dark hair colors only like black, purple, dark red and blue. I don’t care for this, genes be gene-ing so have any color you want.

Mephestopheles is recorded as to having blue skin, pale blue whites and red eyes, soot black scales, with large wings in the 2nd Manual. BUT in a 3e version he is described having red skin, bat wings, being 9ft, with white eyes, and slick black hair. Both of these are present in Mephestophic Bloodlines in BG3. Raphael is the son, though cambion, is red.

Asmodeus rules the Nine Hells. Mephestopheles being his archduke, only rules the 8th layer. Asmodeus has a humanoid, and a scale-fiend version of himself. He's red, slim, 13ft tall, horned, vibrant red eyes, and a neatly trimmed beard. He is Lawful-Evil.

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The Blood War (where Karlach escaped) is described as a "philosophical war" and which kind of evil would rule. Asmodeus plays a part but didn't start it, it's rooted in ancient Hell conflicts. Asmodeus claimed it was a senselessly bloody conflict from a militia standpoint. He really hates it, he's not a fan of it. INFERNAL POLITICS ARE FUCKING COMPLICATED. look into it :)

Zevlor was a Hellrider or Rider of Elturel! a Cavalry unit for Elturel during the 14th and 15th century. They ride horseback, and use spears and bows. They're well reguarded!! Zevlor should have more pride in himself for his service, being a refugee isn't his fault, or The Descent.

In the late 1400's striving for Paladin Knighthood in the Order of Companion was a rank of Hell rider. Before and after the year 1494, you could be a Paladin and join freely.

The Order of Companions was an Elturel, of Western Heartland, theocratic realm of Paladin Knighthood. It's just a region of Paladins that are highly reguarded. They typically worship Tyr, Torm, Helm, and Aumanator.

They kept order in the high capital of Elturel, preserving local civilization from outer destruction. They're super Lawful Good.

Typically an Oath of Devotion or an Oath of the Crown.

"For a City Guard, they outmatched the armies of the Whole Realm" - Forgotten Wiki Realms

They guard general land, they aren't really police, and can escort as far as Waterdeep if privileged to. It is a job they hold for life. I FUYCKING LOVE HELLRIDERS.

Shortly after Elturel’s descent into Avernus, the Tieflings were blamed for the fall, and expelled from the city entirely. Zevlor and any tiefling hellrider’s title has been stripped from them. Any hellrider’s were arrested at The Gate. And the reputation of tieflings sunk even lower.

Badlurian’s are Elturian’s rivals but Duke Ravenguard was tricked into coming to Elturel for politics and ended up helping and sending in troops to help fight. He’s extra important! I might find Wyll, all though lovely, useless, his father is very brave and noble and amazing for what he does.

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- Tieflings can have feathers! Although rare. They can have fur, scales, or be bald like humans. They can be any variation of sorts!

- A more common portrayal of tieflings, is having solid colored eyes, whites and irises the same color. They can be black, red, silver, gold, or white.

- Tieflings are technically minorities and don’t live in the highest neighborhoods. It gives them an even worse reputation.

- Most of the Tieflings with famous status, also give bad reps. Climbing their way to the top in corruption.

- When Tieflings get nervous, experience anxiety, or are upset. They’re known to wrap their tails around their leg!! Super telling.

- They can use their tail like a monkey, very dexterous about it. It’s about 5-6ft long.

- Their ages, weight, height. All similar to humans. Idk how logical that is with 5 extra feet of meat behind them. Sometimes they can live longer, to about 120-150 years old.

- Tieflings can look just like humans. Though they can have their hellish features, those with strong hellish features are often killed at birth out of disgust.

- They can also have legs of a goat, tail akin to a horse or a lizard.

- Tieflings can be really good at thieving, hiding, and deceit.

- their diet consists of meat, marrow, gristle, fat, and bones. They’re highly carnivorous. They even eat roasted insects.

- Many worship Besheba, the goddess of bad luck, finding similarities in them and their goddess.

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- Tieflings are as sensitive as humans, same hearing. They usually have dark vision. And their body temperatures can be colder or warmer than humans depending on their type of tainted blood. --Mephistopheles blood lines are from the frozen layer of hell, maybe their blood is colder.

- They don’t purr, sorry girlies. They’re closer to humans than Tabaxis or Driders.

- Tieflings don’t regrow horns unless they’re still young, though they do tend to file them down.

- They have a natural unsettling aura about them. Even if their heritage is unknown to others, it makes people uncomfortable. They also can smell of sulphur.

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- There are so many Tieflings bloodlines. I love the Babau Tieflings bc they’re already known as uncanny creatures-- Babau Tieflings are gaunt and skinny, darker skin, and a small horn coming from the back of their head.

- Marilith Tieflings are known to be seductive- more than they already are, and have dark hair. They have snake-like half-bodies and have grey tongues.

- Succubus Tieflings! They’re like the ones you see in bg3, often have a small set of wings.

- Tieflings can have so many fucking variations it makes me dizzy.

- Tieflings can have bat-like wing shaped ears, that perk up and shit. I know yall think about ear movements. <zevlor has this>

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Edit: Ya'll loved this :) I can do another on Tiefling politics if ya'll want. Or more bloodlines and fun facts if you want.

I have built another list of Canon facts about Driders and Kar'niss Headcanons if you monster fuckers are interested!!

Currently in the works; He Who Was Headcanons and Shadar'Kai canon facts and events.

[arowyn-m]

Why Viktor Could Die in S2

“They won’t kill a champion because—“ okay just pause for a second and humor me. I’ve made a lot of arguments in the past about why every Arcane character is fair game but that’s not what I’m arguing here—I’m arguing from a narrative standpoint.

Viktor’s my favorite character in Arcane, but I believe him dying in the series finale is the most likely conclusion to his arc. Here’s why:

Viktor’s whole arc is about life and death as a concept—what really constitutes “living”? (Posed by the scenes with Rio) Why is a human life inherently valuable? (Posed by capitalizing on his aggressive need to leave a legacy) Which is more important—a person’s effect on the world around them or their effect on their loved ones? (Viktor realizing too late that Sky valued him not just for his output but for who he is)

There’s also a ton of foreshadowing to Viktor’s demise coming about by a fault in his technology or by the careless way he relates technology to human life (usually himself but not always), and it’s often disguised as humor (the “of course not” scene) or hidden behind false foreshadowing for death by illness (basically everything to do with the Hexcore in eps 5 and 6)

I’ve theorized about it on here before, but I believe at the end of the series the Hexcore will be destroyed (probably by Jayce, specifically to call back to the promise he made to Viktor), effectively ending the threat of the Void overtaking Piltover. Viktor will be so connected to the Hexcore by the finale that destroying it will kill him. He reaches his Glorious Evolution, yes, but it destroys him in the end.

And yeah there is merit to the “how can you live with yourself” kind of approach to ending a character’s story, but that conclusion has the strongest impact if the character’s arc is about learning to live with your mistakes. Most of the character arcs in this show pose that question, but Viktor’s arc really doesn’t?

As far as we can tell with Viktor so far, there’s very little grappling with that concept up until his last 5 or so minutes of screentime, and even then it’s more of a blip that resolves itself (“In pursuit of great, we failed to do good. We have to make it right.”) If Viktor’s story is about defining the respective values of “life” and “humanity” then the most bittersweet ending to his story would be by letting him die after briefly coming back to his humanity.

At the same time, in Ep 5 of BtR Alex Yee says this when talking through writing the script for S2:

“It’s, like, die or accept some things being imperfect. That would be the way that they could go back to humanity.”

So if we assume he’s talking about Viktor covertly here (he very well could be talking about some other character, but yk “going back to humanity” is a very Viktor-coded issue) we could also speculate that they may try to end Viktor’s arc with him accepting the Glorious Evolution just…doesn’t work. I hope that’s not the case because that kind of kills his whole shtick but anything’s possible lol.

To round off this thought by comparison—there’s no chance Jinx dies by the series finale because her whole character arc will inevitably move from “Am I Powder or am I Jinx?” to “Okay, I’m Jinx. How do I live in that identity with the knowledge of my past mistakes?” Her dying at the end of the series would be an unsatisfying conclusion to that question. Same thing with Vi. Vi’s arc was about trying to “fix” things. She just wanted things to go back to the way they were, and they just can’t. Her arc is probably going to be centered around her grappling with grief over losing Powder AGAIN and learning to accept things will never go back to how they were before. Caitlyn’s arc is going to be her exacting revenge and maybe living with regret and bitterness. None of those character arcs logically conclude with “and though they found the answer to their life’s question, they died.”

Viktor’s probably will.

Also here’s a link to a longer more in-depth theory I had a while ago—kind of a adjacent to this thought (for some reason it won’t work as an embedded link) https://www.tumblr.com/arowyn-m/755893249865039872/jayceviktorhexcore-situation-in-s2?source=share

[katapotato55]

how to make your writing be remembered forever and possibly be well loved.

(incredibly stupid and silly fanfiction line at the end of this post) I know that title is incredibly daunting but listen, its very simple. you ready?

MAKE STRONG CHARACTERS

"but kat! surely its not that simple! " nononono listen. bear with me. I want you to think of your favorite thing. Now ask: what do you remember the most about the thing you love? I will go first:

I love team fortress 2. and guess what: this game has been around since 2007, and was in development hell since before I was even born. The game has been around for 16 fucking years. And guess what? in the strong year of 2023 team fortress 2 Is STILL getting memed about. and do you want to know the crazy part? the character designs to the naked eye are not special at all. ok sure from a designer standpoint, these are very well designed characters made so that you can easily tell who they are based on their silhouette. but from the average joe.... tf2 is iconic but overall it looks ok. it doesn't seem special to a stranger to tf2. look at this completely random and arbitrary example of a game in the same genre:

I don't know shit about the characters in overwatch. Yeah i have a BASIC idea on what their personality is like based on voice lines and some videos i guess... but in-game they just exist. these characters are brightly colored, they have beautiful unique designs, hell they have even more diversity such as robots and people from other cultures! but i don't remember shit about these characters. Maybe I remember the ice lady and tracer, but nothing else. and yeah part of overwatch struggling right now is incompetant development, BUT: The characters in team fortress 2 are SO remember-able because the characters have such a vibrant personality. I am an orange box owner, its been a decade and a half and I am still remembering this game and enjoying art about it.

"but kat! that is a comedy game! Overwatch is a very serious game! are you saying comedy is needed to make a character more noticeable?" no. though I think allowing your characters to lighten up every now and then would humanize them. Not full on goofy, just give them something that makes them likeable. and if you cant do that, you can STILL make a compelling character even though they are mostly seriousness. I have an even more awfully thought out example:

kung fu panda is a masterclass in making a serious comedic movie somehow work. Master Oogway.... he isn't a comedic character at all. Yeah we made memes about him, but ignoring that, he is a wise and resourceful person. He is at calm and has faith in this intuition. there are a lot of characters like this. What makes Oogway stand out is that he is also a little bit kooky and sassy.

this youtube clip sums up what I mean. It is a funny line, it fits the character, and It doesn't ruin the seriousness of the moment. Some of the most successful series in history have something about them that has appealed to people. In my opinion: characters with strong personality and interesting traits is always a good way to ensure your writing is successful. The second most important is the characters bouncing off of each other in terms of their chemistry with each other. There is a reason why I spent years playing the first Destiny game and all of the DLC, but I remember fuck all about the characters. I think I maybe remember the bootleg star lord robot guy.

A writing exercise

here is an exercise to get you in the spirit of character making. step 1- get a random character from a random bit of media. In this case let me bring you master Oogway. Step 2- Get a completely different character from a completely unrelated series. I am going to give you Scout from team fortress 2. step 3- write a random ass thing about them interacting. Think about how the characters would react to each other and why. Think about each characters values in life and think about how they would bond and conflict with each other. Think about characters similar to the character they met in the past and how they reacted then, and if they have never interacted, make something interesting with it. Step 4- keep experimenting. Once you get into the spirit you can apply this to any new character you could want to make anyways thats it byeee- "arent you going to do that ?" do what? "make a writing thing about oogway and scout. " ........

Scout: let's go turtle you got nothing on my speed- Oogway: The one who first resorts to violence shows that he has no more arguments. Scout: that sounds like chicken talk! come on tough guy let me have it- Oogway then proceeds to make scout eat shit before vanishing in a cloud of cherry blossoms and dust from the desert. If this post isn't popular I want you to know my dignity was lost for nothing.

[14dayswithyou]

So I just played through the game for the first time and was hit with a terrible thought. In my game, I said that teo and I had had a “fling.” I then realized that Ren, like Teo, has tattoos. So that got me thinking.

What if Ren started getting tattoos because he saw what MC was doing with Teo? He was trying so hard to become everything MC wanted, only to find out that MC was just using Teo as “safe dick,” and didn’t actually care about the tattoos at all.

He may have found that he really likes tattoos, and so he designed them his own way. But there’s NO WAY that MC hooking up with a Big Tattoo Guy (multiple times, according to Teo) wouldn’t have effected his aesthetic at that time. So I wanted to ask, did he have those tattoos before MC met Teo? Or were they reactive?

✦゜ANSWERED: Canonically, Ren gave himself tattoos at a young age out of his own accord!! I spoke about it a year ago here, and very recently here.

Non-canonically (but something Ren would definitely do), is that he would take aspects from Teo's appearance if Angel was genuinely interested in him. Ren's entire shtick is mimicking Angel's hyper-fixations and turning himself into their ideal type — and if that happens to be Teo — then so be it. He'll take inspiration from the way he dresses, how he acts, and the tattoos he gets.

From a storyteller standpoint, however; Teo is supposed to be Ren's narrative foil! I spoke about this topic briefly in the Discord server, but they share a lot of similar characteristics (contrasting colour palette, conflicting personalities, two-tone hair, snake vs koi fish tattoos, 2 gold rings vs 2 gold earrings, etc.). So the tattoos were a deliberate choice!! However, they're not meant to signify that they're the same character or anything. It's just a way for me to kinda show (not tell) that despite two characters being "the same", they can be completely different as well.

But from and even more literal standpoint, Teo is also the direct derivative of 2017!Ren! In the very first version of 14DWY, Teo didn't even exist at all. But when remaking the game, I figured people wouldn't like Ren [with Teo's personality], so I changed him completely. I didn't want to completely scrap the "toxic playboy" character though, so I turned him into Teo and never looked back since

(I looked back once and now half the fandom are in love with him T_T /silly)

[exhausted-archivist]

Early Game First Impressions

I have some thoughts and critiques about it from at least an early point.

So far, being 28 hours in (and I just got my 4th companion so the time I've been in the game isn't really indicative of my plot progress) I have some general thoughts. None of them are spoilers, but to be safe, I will keep them below the cut.

Please note, these are my first impressions. I'm doing a mostly blind playthrough and I'm mostly sharing to start a dialogue but also document my feelings. Please be respectful of that and others who may comment. Also my comments on armor/clothing is going to be a whole seperate kit and kaboodle.

My main focuses based on priority to me:

Combat

Flashing accessibility issues

The Bloom effect

Character creator

Photomode

Writing (General)

Dialogue and Banter

Maps and Quest Guidance

Food Lore

Combat, Accessibility, and Bloom Render

So far my biggest complaint is related to the combat. In terms of general enjoyment, this is one of the most enjoyable combat systems in the series for me. The flow is nice, I like the UI, overall a solid 7/10 for me. Except for one thing: I hate button mashing, I cannot handle it for too long, it is a large part of the reason I've never played through dao again. I found that da2 and dai really found a nice middle ground with it. But with datv, the issues are that if I press and hold, it will charge attacks and not continuously fire them off like in the previous two games.

I also don't like how frequently my companions bark at me in combat. Lucanis yelling "Move Rook!" while I'm stuck in a corner or something has thrown off my timing and is also just kinda annoying at times. Something I also don't like when I'm trying to explore but more on that later.

Additionally, I find the rebinding of keys is way too restrictive. It is hard to find a calibration that works, it doesn't solve the button mashing, and it isn't any better for mouse and keyboard. The fact that (at least last time I tried) I couldn't rebind the keys from ASWD to the arrow keys is a huge miss to me. So, while I find combat engaging and fun with a nice flow, button mashing and the key rebinding for combat are a big con. Particularly from an accessibility standpoint.

Speaking of accessibility, while the accessibility for the game is robust (but for some features an okay attempt for a first attempt) not being able to adjust the flashing rendering is the second biggest. That is a major accessibility thing and one of the bare minimum features I've come to expect in most games. Now while at present it hasn't been too bad for me since the prologue, I do not know if it will be an issue again later on. The flashing paired with the way the bloom renders, makes the game very migraine triggering if I'm not careful.

So on the note of the bloom, it is another big con for me because it messes with my eyes. While I can remove it in photomode and see what it looks like without it, I think it could have done with less bloom and still looked good. I do like how it has an almost Dishonored texture rendering to the people. I am curious if they pushed it a little harder if it would be more interesting visually and make the bloom more effective. Not only that, but I see the vision, I appreciate it, but not really friendly to me. Which is okay, to be clear. This is one of those things where the vision is great, the execution might not be universally loved, but it is good. Sort of like Arcane (though not to that level), I will never be able to watch it because of the flashing. But I know it is still an amazing show.

Character Creator

Now, in terms of the character creator I think they could have pushed things more. I'm over all very impressed and I love what they did, the variety and extremes you can push are amazing. From a technical standpoint it is gorgeous, and I overall rate it 8/10.

On a minor point, I do wish we could adjust eye size/shape independently of the head morph as well as change the mouth shape. I also wish there were more extreme limits to the body morph. While there is an okay range for what we have, I do wish I could make a heavier set character than I have, whether they're more muscular defined (think Bull and his almost barrel chested build) or someone who is just heavy. But I also wish I could make someone who looked like Isabela in da2 proportionately. I do get some of the criticism that cropped up, though I think the way most of it was presented/worded was exaggerated because the bust and glute sizes weren't "hollywood" style.

But my biggest issue with the cc is there is not any true dark skin tones. They do not go dark enough, they get close, but I couldn't make anyone who looks like several of my family members or oc skin tones I have. This is a major con for me, because they were heading in the right direction and then fell disappointingly short. I think it likely has to do with lighting, to which I seriously think they need to work on learning to how to light darker skins. I think they also need to learn how to make and layer darker skins. They have the basics down, now they need to push it further.

I also have to speak towards the fact that it seems with the bloom rendering and this art style, they did not push things hard enough to allow us to play older characters in appearance. And because all non-important npcs are made with the same cc as rook, we are pushed to having a very small visual age range for the game. Wrinkles do not appear well or strong, and it is disappointing to say the least. It has always been a weak point in Dragon Age.

Connected to these two points, but on a much more minor note, I think having complexion cover skin texture, freckles, dark circles, birthmarks, and acne was too much. They should have had 2-3 selectors for that - and this might be a rendering, technology issue. But not being able to be freckled and wrinkled or have dark circles, falls short, and it especially impacts being able to create an older Inquisitor. This also touches on the imbalance of which they aged femme presenting characters vs masc presenting characters, but that is another post.

Moving onto the last point I have thoughts on, is the hair. While they definitely improved in the hair options, they still lean heavily one way or the other. Especially with the offset of non-qunari getting 88 hairstyles and qunari getting 33. While we no longer have 50 shades of bald, and they heard our thoughts on hair and horns being connected for qunari, the large gap between the two categories is unfair. Especially given the fewer textured options for qunari and the even fewer length variations. It also looks like some were removed from what we saw during marketing. I've also seen the call for bangs, while they aren't something I usually desire I do agree the few bang choices are a notable.

Photomode

I'm going to be blunt with this one as it is the most cosmetic of them all, I feel like there could have been more options. I love we got it, but it's pretty bare bones comparatively with others we get.

I think looking at Horizon (Zero Dawn and Forbidden West) would be a good reference for a strong photomode. CP77 if they went further. Being able to add different effects/filters or even remove some depending on where you're photomoding would go miles. Being able to remove dead enemies (that you didn't kill) would also be nice. But I think the biggest thing is the limited range that the camera can be from Rook. It likely has to do with rendering range, but I think they could have pushed it more. That's all. I've been living in photomode though, using it near constantly to be honest. Just a qol thing.

The Writing: General, Dialogue, and Banter

Off the bat, I find the writing of this game to be the most Dragon Age between Inquisition and The Veilguard. The series has always been campy and quipy. It is the same semi-serious stuff I've expected from BioWare. I do think they have improved in some areas, stayed the same in others, and got weaker in some.

One of the things I think BioWare, especially the da team, has always struggled with is hitting the sweet spot that doesn't isolate new players but also doesn't aggravate lore nerds or long time players. DA2 I think is probably the best of the series at that. But with datv, I find points of aggravation with the wording, just like I did with Inquisition when I went to replay it after having started the series from The Stolen Throne and playing all the way through to Inquisition again. I cannot decide if they have gotten better or what, however I do think the glossary is an excellent addition. Even if I argue with some of them haha.

A clear point of improvement for me so far is the line summaries. I find they are better than dai, though there are some misses.

In terms of banter, I think I'm starting to see what people have been talking about in terms of its substance. However, I don't think it is unique to datv. Rarely has banter effected anything outside that moment, especially for da2-dai. I've only played dao once so I don't know if they tied banter into main story more or not. For me, banter not having substantial effect outside the moment isn't surprising, and I don't know if that is something I was hoping would change or not. This one I think might change as I play.

I also get what people are saying about the banter erring on the side of toothless, but I only see that in like comparison to da2 where companions were brutal with each other. I would say it is the same level/as close to dai. But I'm still early and don't have all the companions. So another thing that might change when I play further.

Maps and Quest Guidance

They did a really good at fixing the dai overcorrection of maps from da2. They're compact, relatively easy to navigate, and so far a distinct lack of bears!

Though while they pulled back on one overcorrection I feel in turn that they overcorrected on the guidance/party direction banter in response to the loud feedback of dai not having enough guidance. This touches back on the companions yelling at me while I'm exploring, or the persistent markers and pop ups. While turning off some of the UI/setting elements greatly helped, and I have heard that it gets less demanding further in, it is a con for me.

Delving into maps though, as someone who is fixated on maps I have thoughts and feelings over the area maps as well as the map texutures the display as setting design. So far, I'm dissappointedwith the set design ones. I haven't seen any new ones, they reuse the map released with the Tevinter Nights and then the first Thedas map they've used since dao. Now those aren't inherently negative, but I like maps and I was hoping for more, especially at the beginning.

Food Lore

Okay, I know this is last and I said I listed these in like priority, but this one was a HUGE point for me and I wanted to end on a positive note. The food lore so far is rich, it is clearly done with some thought, there are more varieties, and I am thrilled with what I've seen. It is rich, indepth, they've added a lot more than I thought they would. So far, the location I've found to have the most rich lore is Treviso. With a nutrition specialist and Julia, the fruit merchant who's husband is allergic to alubia carilla (black eyed peas). It is something so small comparitively that makes the world so rich. I've been compiling and collecting, and I have been flooded with people sending me screencaps and dialogue snippets (without spoiling anything) and I am so overjoyed and appreciative.

[goingbuggy]

Although I absolutely loved episode 2 because of how Jeff Ward and the writers portrayed a different side of Buggy, if there's one thing that I didn't like, it's this line:

In Orange Town, Buggy's reasons for why he wants to enter the Grand Line are kept purposefully vague. It is clear that he wants the "world's treasure/all the treasure in the world," but not once does Buggy outright state that he wants A.) the One Piece, and B.) to be Pirate King.

Of course, after 1082, we know that being Pirate King has been his dream all along, and these manga panels do let readers form their own conclusions. (i.e. If Buggy wants "all the treasure in the world," does that mean he knows and wants to find the One Piece, too? Oda encourages us to ask these questions.)

I don't believe the live action adaptation will reach as far as 1082, unfortunately; it would be nice if it did, but there is a lot getting in the way. However, the writing decision to jump the gun and just have Buggy claim to want to be king.... totally undermines the impact of 1082. Buggy never believed in himself. Even though he desperately wanted to be king, it was the one thing he could not bring himself to say explicitly until 1082.

There are so many throwaway lines in Orange Town which imply Buggy sees himself as incapable/inferior. Take his "Pirate God" comment, for example. He underestimates Luffy, yes, but the impact of that line -- "If you are the next Pirate King, then I must be Pirate God" -- also serves to underestimate himself. Of course he's not a god; he's not claiming to be. He is belittling them both. "If someone as little as you can become king, then I can be god," is what he's really saying, which implies that he, too, is lesser. Buggy talks himself down in subtleties because he needs to maintain his facade, for his crew's sake and his own.

That is why it is so inspiring and emotional to see Buggy finally admit his real dream in 1082 -- one, because it was only ever (at most) implied before, and two, because as a character, we realize he was too insecure to achieve that dream before this point in the story. Buggy talks a big game, but it was not until he recognized he was on equal footing with Shanks that he realized he could finally go after his own dream. By 1082, he is not just a former warlord, but a man with massive influence. He's a goddamn emperor! For an insecure character, realizing you have power is a hell of a motivator.

Buggy has no real reason to outright claim the title of king yet. It just... doesn't work from a narrative standpoint, given where we are in East Blue. And for that, I am a little disappointed. Feel free to give your own thoughts, though!

[marabarl-and-marlbara]

Hi Mara, do you think it’s at all possible to force oneself to enjoy things one usually doesn’t, or do you think it is like chirality and one’s “natural” interests and proclivities are not subject to change? I can’t help but feel stupid and like a liar to myself when trying to live healthier, or be productive and work on myself. It’s just fake, I don’t really care, and so the good habits never stick, but accepting myself for who I am, an empty lazy slob with no real interests, doesn’t feel too good either.

Hi anonymous, thank you for the opportunity for me to yap -- I haven't gotten a good opportunity in awhile :-))

'Naturalness' is weighty and ought not have much to do with the self outside of chirality (if you are approaching it from a Maraist standpoint): all that is, is not much more than confusing shadows that are manipulated by outside actors to stimulate you and draw you in-to the performance, to keep you engaged and connected--I wouldn't believe another person if they told me they a) believe this, and b) live in accordance to the belief of this, as the best way to depart from the actors and their game is to self-depart and un-live, and the dead do not weigh in on much cept soil and dirt.

WITHIN CONFUSION, when I'd been thinking about answering this initially I'd been thinking that I can barely relate to you, anonymous, as most of the 'need' to fake interests seems to be related wholly to connectiveness and those whom we find ourselves connected to, ie: faking acceptance of political issues that match the odorous vibe of the friend group when deep-down the thought needles and smarts, or: someone you care about showing you something that immediately makes you think this is the dumbest thing I have ever seen but I want this person in my life so I'll say something warm, or etcetera; connection itself is a long smear of the self (small and insignificant like a little mustard seed amongst grain) to bury it in a greater body such that the color and timbre is lost amongst the neighbors, as the self is made to become a neighbor, and the self itself is but an echo of the word trapt in fat and mud (or, on the other hand: an echo of the mud trapt in shrill songs and migraine colors); you are, by design, made to be subject to a Gravity and pressurized down away from heaven, and away from self--that is the natural-way;

WITHIN CONFUSION, and less unnecessarily esoteric and verbose and stupid: I don't really believe in 'fixing' yourself one way or the other; I eat the same yogurt concoctions every morning because I struggle thinking of a better temperature/texture combination, but I am getting tired of it--and if I were to extrapolate this out, I think of etiquette-breaks like 'psychiatric profiles' an attempt at suggesting that "Mara will, and forever will, be a breakfast yogurt-lover" though all my life I'd been held over a candle and slowly melted into a yogurt-lover-shaped mold and been made to set that way. The issue I had with struggling to relate is, because I'm fairly lonely and private lately, I do not really have much other than myself to compare my 'likes' and 'dislikes' to. It is very easy for me to not bother forcing myself on-to a dislike, because there aren't many Gravities to pressure me lately. But that isn't completely true; taking cold showers, for instance: hated this but kept up with it; waking up at 4am and cleaning the house and exercising for at-least an hour: hated this, but now it is just an excuse for me to listen to more Stephen King audiobooks before breakfast; morning prayer, same as the morning routine. For some things it really has just been truth to me that if you are forced to adjust, you will adjust--a person can not be passionate forever in their dislikes or hates, same way a honeymoon fades; what you love will become a tired routine (me and yogurt), what you hate will become a tired routine (me and waking up at 4am and jogging), but if you give yourself breaks eventually you allow those feelings to melt and recollect and be subject to passions and not-set as routine.

My failings, anonymous: me and drawing and writing--never been able to force myself to do these; I struggle with forcing myself to abide the word and forbid myself from listening to music completely; even though I have no problem with the vegan diet itself and had a pretty solid run with it: couldn't stop obsessing over "every-thing I hadn't yet tried" and death looming over my head (as it seemed) made the dietary sacrifices seem even more painful and pathetic and done wholly out of some forced desire to be Pure and Saintly (yet on the inside begging sin and dirt no better than a lunatic rat clawing at a cupboard). On food and diet, though: I used to be obese from middle-school to high-school and basically forced myself to exercise/diet pretty strictly out of (as you said) not liking myself as a slob--and I still am driven more-so out of a desire (fear) to not be fat, not be unhealthy, not be a slob, not be ugly--because I am scared of all of those things; it was easy enough to convince myself that eating more than 4 pieces of cereal for breakfast was a gluttonous amount of food and then slowly watch my hair fall out and lose the ability to stand from fatigue--somehow that was less scary than being fat. As well, there's just a mechanical motivation from being intensely sick from diet; if I eat the wrong thing or eat too much I end up bedridden for several days from migraines (the fear imposed from this makes it hard to seek-out trigger foods).

This part isn't even slightly helpful (likely the latter parts, too) but I think regarding diet and food specifically, it helps a lot being open to liking a lot of foods and shaking out what you think you dislike. I might be super privileged there because (although I have some preferences that I stick to ala yogurt for breakfast and wraps) I mostly do not dislike any food, and can only really think of disliking artichokes/brusselsprouts (I hear they're good if you fry them in oil but that is most things..) and badly prepared liver; I love veggies and fruits.

IN CONCLUSION, anonymous, I don't think any of this is particularly good advice and I think a better thing to analyze (than what I wrote) is what you wrote to me, how you refer to yourself, and how you're laying pitfalls for yourself. This world is made to bury you in gravity and lose you in soil, smeared under layer-after-layer of connection until you're convinced you are wax over a candle dripping down into some strange form, and those confusing shadows keep on whispering and whispering and then your mind is looking up out of a mold. Are you unable to force your likes to change? Are you someone who is unable to care about improving yourself? Do you really dislike being a slob? Who are you, anonymous?

To me: you are anonymous; take care, anonymous.

[curio-queries]

I’m loving your production breakdown posts, they are so interesting and insightful.

I think you mentioned it maybe in the first ep breakdown but it was about expenses. I just thought it was interesting in ep4 when JK mentioned at the chicken place, paying in cash, and he solely has this conversation with Tae, not Jimin. Would there be an arrangement do you think? Or was that scene cut and he’d have asked Jimin too? I’ve noticed in comparison to Bv where they were usually only allowed a certain amount of money between them, with one usually being in control, or a sum for a task, in AYS, Jimin and JK have been whipping out their cards, be it their own or a company card, in Big Dicks store, in Walmart etc.

I just found it interesting

Hi anon,

The finance bits are interesting in the most boring corporate sense if that makes any sense. 😅 Trust me on this. Let's dive in:

In my opinion, it really boils down to two concerns: taxes and sponsorships. Taxes to insure the company receives every possible benefit for every dollar they spend. Sponsorships because some brands can have fussy rules about how individuals interact with their product and especially any competitor's products while they have an active agreement.

Obviously I have no actual insight onto how the finances and budget were managed for any of these specific shows and I know absolutely nothing of the intricacies of taxes in South Korea but in the US, there are many regulations when it comes to how companies can claim expenditures for tax breaks.

Every company that has had me travel for work has gone to a lot of trouble to insure that I was aware of exactly all of the requirements on my part regarding expenditures. I'm 100% sure all of the BTS members are aware of their requirements as well so I don't particularly think there's any motive other than as a cute convo for the moment between JK and V. Imo, the only reason it made it to the final cut was JKs endearing tone in his response.

Let's go through some examples though:

Receipts: in both AYS and Bon Voyage, we see the members be very specific in getting Receipts. JM and JK talk about it as they're leaving Walmart. In BV, it's all of the shenanigans with the money pouch they acquired in Malta and continued using in New Zealand. This is usually documentation required for any operation that's going to be claimed as a business expense for tax purposes.

Personal Spending: off the top of my head I can think of several clear instances where we know that the members are using their own money for purchases we see them make on the shows. In Run BTS ep.70 in Toronto, JK pays for the member's clothing purchases himself. In BV4, JM pays for the member's clothing himself a couple of times (remember the drama of his lost wallet? 😅)

Budget as Content: BV 1 & 2 mostly only include finances as part of the game-ification of the show. The members had to earn money as an allowance for the activities and determine the best ways to spend it. (I do vaguely remember some members wanting to negotiate for more when buying souvenirs? Was that just in the extra scenes? It's been so long, I've been holding off on rewatching until I'm done with my Run series).

Thankfully, the success of BTS has basically nixed the budget games. I think the last time we saw something like this were the Run episodes of a hotel staycation? But the prices were ficticious and not necessarily about real-world spending but rather determining the secret number to not exceed. (If I'm misremembering and there are more recent examples, please share!) Imo, it would just be too tone-deaf to continue portraying the members in that context. I know we all joke about them being broke millionaires, but there's a reason why celebrity game shows always make it clear that the money involved is for charity.

Anyway, back to AYS, the interesting bit to me is wondering about the inclusion of Taehyung from a budget standpoint. How was that reconciled? None of us can possibly know the answer, but it's interesting to think about. Some costs wouldn't have changed at all with one extra participant, like the house rental, or booking the climbing gym or yacht tour. But there were a few extra concessions, getting the extra mattress likely was more a logistics headache on short notice rather than an impact to the budget. And most Korean meals are served family-style so there honestly isn't a huge difference cost-wise. Except maybe the omakase. That I can imagine was noticeably more expensive with an added individual.

But really, the most expensive item per person would likely have been travel. Did someone say Tae was already in Jeju prior to filming? If he wasn't, did the show cover his flights like they would have JK, JM, and the crew? Or is the budget on these shows big enough that it was just another drop in a bucket? Also, the intent likely was for JK to zip around on the motorbike and JM to be on the scooter. I'm curious if they weren't logistically able to get another such vehicle with the short notice or if the budget/sponsorship constraint didn't allow for a third one the day. Or it could be that the scooter exists because of the 3 member count and production thought one of them could be JKs backpack. That bike has the space for it. But perhaps the difficulty to get coverage and/or converse wasn't appealing. Or maybe there just wasn't a third radio-enabled helmet prepared?

I know the various shippers are using this in their arguments. I'd like to firmly state that I am not building a case for either side here. Go do that on your own and leave me out of it. Lol.

There are so many questions and it's interesting to theorize how the finances could have impacted the development of the show. Maybe we'll get some more insight with the remaining episodes and bonus footage but I doubt it. Finances don't usually make for engaging content.

Thanks again for the ask! It's one of the points I want to discuss when I start doing my BV and ITS posts but who knows when that will be!

[mystreet-liveblog]

Earlier today I thought to myself how Season 1 feels the most iconic despite being the least developed season (from a production and continuity standpoint)

Now I’m trying to think about why. I don’t think the reason has anything to do with the plot or characters or humor, but rather the formatting

Season 1 was a Minecraft Roleplay. Sure it had a few cinematic scenes, but at its core it was a bunch of characters existing and interacting in Minecraft. It was mostly first-person perspective with in-game dialogue read out loud by Aphmau, and it had that nostalgic feeling of playing Minecraft with your friends

None of the other seasons capture that same feeling (so far on my binge anyway). The first-person perspective is still in some bits of PDH S1 and Love~Love Paradise, but they don’t have that same Minecraft-specific vibe to them

The best example I have of what I mean is in S1 when Aphmau is unpacking her boxes and putting up her posters. She is building in Minecraft! You don’t see that past Season 1, where characters take out blocks and place them, because the story slowly starts not-being based in Minecraft

Of course, the switch to cinematic storytelling is by no means a bad thing. I’m just pointing out that the reason Season 1 feels so different is because it’s far more Minecrafty than others. The show slowly stops being a Minecraft Roleplay and starts becoming a “roleplay in Minecraft” during its run

And I think this is also why Season 3 feels sort of disconnected from the rest of the show (I know it’s where a lot of OG fans stopped watching back in the day, myself included). Season 3 is entirely cinematic, with most of the Minecraft aspects gone beyond the medium itself. Even the cats are changed from Minecraft cats to Neko Atsume cats

For the first two seasons, MyStreet was still a Minecraft Roleplay, but the third season made a big leap into TV-show territory. It sort of feels like it came out of nowhere, too, despite previous seasons having fully-cinematic episodes of their own. I can’t quite figure out why it felt so different because of this. Cinematics weren’t new, but perhaps since they often came alongside pov scenes they fit in better

And that makes Season 4 a very interesting case. I haven’t started Season 4 on my binge yet, but something I distinctly remember about it is that it brought back the first-person perspective shots (though I believe from Aaron’s pov this time, establishing him as a season protagonist). I think this is a great idea because it returns those initial S1 vibes I was referring to

Then, as the season gets more plot heavy, the pov gets replaced by more and more cinematics, until the paradigm shift fully establishes MyStreet as a TV-show once again. I think this is what Season 3 needed: a reason to become more TV-like

Season 4 is an MCRP until suddenly it isn’t, and its advancing story becomes deserving of cinematics. Season 3 didn’t entirely earn this shift. MyStreet has always been TV-like but it wasn’t a proper show until Season 4. Or, more accurately, it became a show in S3, then reverted back for a proper transition in S4

I still like S3 and its cinematics, but I also admit that it could’ve benefitted from taking itself a little less seriously at certain times. The pov shots are comedic because they remind the audience “oh yeah, this is a video game!” I don’t think S3 did anything wrong, but just by simply being different it created a different vibe to the whole thing

Anyway, I’m looking forward to starting S4 soon, and seeing if this post holds up by the end of it

[pasta-in-the-pudding]

SO IM SORRY IF THIS IS REALLY RANDOM BUT IF ITS OK COULD I REQUEST TICCI TOBY,MASKY,HOODIE,EJ WITH A TEEN!READER that's like shy but when the reader gets more comfortable around them, reader acts childish/shows their inner child bc they had to grow up quickly ifykwim

(this sounds so cringe >_< 😭)

Theres no such thing as bad cringe here, friend. Be as cringe as you'd like!

Thank you so much for requesting!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Toby

Meeting you was pretty normal for him

Most of the other kids around the manor are pretty shy too, so you being shy doesnt matter to him

But once you start getting more comfortable with him, and start opening up more, he notices that you aren't really all that shy, just kind of...yk...traumatized??

He is here for it though, and will do all the things with you

He'll get matching footie pj's with you, He'll get you your favorite childhood snack, you'll turn on your favorite cartoon and He'll help you make an awesome pillow fort

Or, if you prefer, a blanket coccoon for you to snuggle into while you watch your cartoons

He'll also get things that remind him of you

"Y/n i saw this squishmellow and thought of you! Also, i got you some more snacks in this new flavor we haven't tried"

Also, i feel like he'd be the one you go to if you wanna play any games

Lord knows that boy has too much energy for his own good

His favorite is hide and seek, but if you wanna play something else, he's fine with that too

I warn you though, he's very good at hide and seek...

Masky

Masky isn't terrible with kids, but he isn't the greatest

Teenagers are his favorite to babysit/watch, because he can just leave them alone for the most part, if they need anything, they know where to find him

So when you start to open up and show your more childish side, he is kind of taken aback

Not in a bad way, of course

Just shocked, is all

Mostly, he's just glad that you're finally opening up and being yourself

And i mean hey, if coloring in coloring books and eating fruit snacks makes you happy, then who is he to judge?

He won't partake in these activities himself, but if you wanna talk to him about it, then he's all ears

He'll show you his favorite cartoons he watched when he was a kid, he'll show you his favorite childhood snacks, and he'll tell you stories he picked up in his life

Like toby, he will also help you build a wonderful pillow fort

And tim, hes a real manly man, you know, good at building and hunting and stuff

So you KNOW that its gonna be less of a pillow fort and more of a pillow palace

Also, i feel like one of the creeps has a picture of him somewhere, all snuggled up into a pillow, nice and asleep inside your pillow fort while you watch tv

Its used as blackmail, of course

Hoodie

Hoodie loves kids

He's always wanted a kid of his own, he remembers vividly daydreaming about it as a little schoolboy

His occupation has put a bit of a hold on that dream, but the manor has plenty of children that are always begging to be played with

And so, it's probably no wonder you were drawn to him

He's just got such a good vibe, you know?

Like you know that you could tell him anything and he'd just smile and say "i think you should keep living your best life"

Like toby, he goes all out

He probably won't wear footie pj's but yk

He's not too terribly good at making pillow forts, but oh my god can he throw a tea party

And he'll let you do his hair and makeup too!

After his numerous tea parties with sally, he knows all the proper etiquette too

He'd also probably be the one on this list who'd spoil you the most

Literally just ask and he'll probably buy it/make it for you 😭

Eyeless Jack

From a medical standpoint he is very worried for you

His first reaction to you opening up was his eyes slightly widening and his thoughts going "good god who fucked up this kid??"

However, he understands that for a lot of people indulging in childhood interests is a coping mechanism that is very helpful

And it's not hurting you or anyone else, so why would he care?

He studies you intently

He won't actively indulge in your activities like everyone else

He mostly just sits somewhere close by and watches your behaviors

He wants to know what is normal for you and what isn't, that way if your mental health takesa negative turn, he can get on it as quickly as possible

The last thing they need is a kid having a mental breakdown

Maaaybe of you ask nicely he'll watch cartoons with you

Maybe

[shiki-aki]

“You told me to go wherever I like, but I want to be with you until the end.”

A Shikiaki Meta

Part Two: Shiki and Akira’s Encounters (I)

A sharp burst of wind; the flash of naked steel.

[Previous] Part One: Akira's Characterization

This is part two of the meta where we’ll finally get to analyzing Shiki and Akira’s initial encounters. I ended up splitting this part in half because it was getting too long, so part three of the meta will be a direct continuation of part two.

Just as a heads up, I’m going to be rambling a lot more going forward because there’s just so much I love about every single Shikiaki interaction that it’s difficult for me to organize my thoughts and lay them out in a concise manner, but I'll try. Also, I’ll probably gush over Shiki a lot, but I’ll keep it to a minimum (no I won’t lol).

The reason why I’m not ordering anything into sections but rather just analyzing each scene as they come up is because I feel like there are just so many intertwining layers when it comes to the Shikiaki dynamic, that it’s hard to talk about one aspect of their relationship without inevitably straying into another. Going through every single scene in Shiki’s route and breaking down exactly what happens in them, along with my interpretation/analysis of each scene, is, frankly, the easiest way for me to go about writing this meta, so that’s how I’m going to do it.

We pick up where we left off with Akira going into the alley even though he sees all these people running. This act in particular hints to Akira’s fearlessness, which is a character trait that’s expanded more upon later in Shiki’s route. Logically, what Akira should do is go back into the hotel and ask Rin or Motomi who Shiki is and why everyone’s running away from him. Instead, he lets his curiosity get the better of him and decides to go see who Shiki is for himself, because Akira can’t help but be intrigued by the fact that there’s someone who is so strong and powerful that his mere name and presence would inspire fear into others.

In the alley, he senses a deadly presence and can tell this person isn’t some “common thug” like those other Igra fighters. He sees the blood, the dead bodies, and then the man responsible for the massacre, and Akira instantly deduces that this man is Shiki—the guy everyone is running away from.

Honestly, I just love the tension and buildup to the moment that Akira actually sees Shiki. He can immediately sense what makes Shiki so different from everyone else.

Then we finally see Shiki in this iconic CG, and this is the first line of text that accompanies it:

—Crimson eyes, redder than blood.

I'm calling attention to this line because it tells us the very first thing that Akira notices about Shiki: his eyes.

Eyes are a recurring motif in Shiki’s route. There are several, and I mean several instances in Shiki's route where the text mentions Shiki's eyes. The game makes a point of drawing attention to Shiki's eyes, and since the game takes place from Akira's POV, it's Akira himself who is noticing Shiki's eyes each time this is happening.

From a writing standpoint, it doesn't make sense to point out Shiki's eyes or the color of his eyes so much because in real life, we rarely take notice of people's eye color. Like really, truly think about how often you take notice of people's eyes when talking to them instead of just paying attention to their body language or the words they're saying. It wouldn't make sense for Akira to notice or mention Shiki's eyes in his POV so much… unless there was a deeper meaning behind it.

In Shiki's route, the motif of eyes is repeated throughout the story as a way of highlighting and reinforcing the character dynamic between Shiki and Akira. It's not about their eyes in a literal sense, but about the figurative meanings/ideas conveyed through the motif. When Akira looks into Shiki's eyes, he's seeing and acknowledging Shiki's confidence and strength, his domineering attitude, and his single-minded ambition. When Shiki looks into Akira's eyes, he's seeing and acknowledging Akira's fearlessness, his indomitable spirit, and his strong will.

Simply put, the act of gazing into each other's eyes is about Shiki and Akira acknowledging (and more implicitly, respecting) the character traits that the other has. And it’s this recognition and understanding of each other's psyches that shape their overall dynamic and interactions. Shiki’s overbearing confidence and domineering attitude is what pushes Akira to act more stubborn and prideful, and in turn, Akira’s indomitable disposition is what pushes Shiki into acting more aggressive and forceful with him. It's this back-and-forth struggle between them that makes their individual characterizations shine, because we see how their characterizations continuously grow and develop in response to the other's actions and behaviors.

Their interactions are driven by how constantly at odds they are with each other, and this opposition between them is what leads to their eventual character growths. The more Shiki demands Akira to submit, the more Akira develops a resolve to stay true to himself and follow his own will. And the more Akira refuses to give in, the more Shiki comes to respect him and see how strength can manifest in ways other than physical prowess, and apply that principle to himself.

The recurring act of them gazing into each other's eyes throughout the narrative also doubles as a way of adding tension to their dynamic because let's be real: the way Shiki and Akira look at each other is extremely intense and sexually charged. In fact, the manga does an excellent job at showing the chemistry between their gazes, since it's a more visual medium than textual.

The gist of my point is: a lot of Shiki and Akira’s interactions in the game (and manga) involve them eye fucking each other, and it's narratively important to their dynamic that they do so. It adds sexual tension to their interactions, but it also gives us insight to their characterizations and how they perceive each other.

When Akira and Shiki finally engage in battle, Akira focuses on the weight of Shiki’s sword against his knife. That’s his initial reaction. But then his focus shifts to Shiki’s gaze on him, and while he can’t interpret any emotion from Shiki’s expression, he can identify the bloodlust in Shiki’s eyes. This is already the first instance of Akira being able to gauge something about Shiki's behavior just by looking into his eyes.

Akira’s impression of Shiki is that he looks “like a mannequin,” which is a bit of a strange descriptor to use, but it’s a deliberate choice of words here because this isn’t the only time in the game in which Shiki is likened to a doll. My interpretation of this is that Akira is perceiving Shiki’s strength, demeanor, and appearance as inhuman during this moment because Shiki is leagues beyond anyone he’s ever met, and there's just something about him that makes him stand out from the rest.

And this idea of not being human is an image that Shiki himself very carefully cultivates. He actively tries to cast away his humanity (emotions) in order to achieve what he perceives to be ultimate strength. After all, the only one who was strong enough to make him feel fear for the first time in his life was an emotionless "weapon," so Shiki tries to discard his emotions in pursuit of that same strength, believing emotions to be a source of weakness for him.

Hence why the text describes Shiki's face as "pallid and expressionless" during this scene and likens him to a mannequin. A mannequin/doll doesn't experience emotions, and it doesn't suffer the same flaws a human would when it comes to feeling exhaustion or hesitation or any other limitations in battle. Basically, Shiki wants to be like Nano, because although he'll never admit it out loud, he knows that Nano is stronger than him.

To top it all off, the soundtrack that plays whenever Shiki shows up in the game is called "Invincible," which further demonstrates how he wants to be above his humanity so he can prove (and reaffirm) his strength. The only ironic thing about all this is that he ends up developing an emotional attachment to Akira and feeling affection for him by the end of his route, and this meta is all about exploring how Shiki gets to that point.

It's not a coincidence that the choice selection for Shiki's route involves Shiki and Akira looking directly into each other's eyes. This is what I mean when I say their interactions are about them eye fucking each other. It really could not get any more explicit about how their dynamic revolves around them meeting each other’s gazes and acknowledging each other's core traits and strengths through that act.

This is the defining moment that determines whether you'll end up on Shiki's route or not. If Akira chooses to look away, you won't end up on Shiki's route because Shiki will perceive Akira as weak and disregard him. But if Akira chooses to hold his gaze, then the game will continue on Shiki's route because Shiki will recognize Akira's backbone and consider him to be different from the other fighters who usually avert their gaze out of fear.

The choice is a test of Akira's strength—not physical, but mental. It's already clear that Shiki overpowers Akira in terms of physical strength, but Akira's mental resilience is what makes Shiki interested in him following this exchange.

This moment tells us just as much info about Shiki's characterization as it does for Akira's. Shiki will only acknowledge those who are brave enough to face him head on, and Akira is exactly that type of headstrong person who won't let himself succumb to his own fears and doubts in battle.

I’m including the manga version of the same scene here because it conveys the tension of this moment extremely well, and also because I love Chayamachi Suguro’s artstyle. Mostly because I love Chayamachi Suguro’s artstyle.

The panels are formatted in a way that makes it clear the focus is on Shiki’s and Akira’s gazes, which ties back in with the motif of eyes I discussed before.

Akira recognizes that this isn't just a battle of strength between them, but also a battle of wills. He knows that looking away first would be akin to admitting defeat, but Akira is not the type of person to just roll over and give up easily. His perseverance is what enabled him to survive thus far in the first place.

Shiki calls Akira a "weakling," which pisses Akira off because it's obvious trash talk, but on some level, he knows Shiki is right.

And from Shiki's POV, he does view Akira as weak and beneath him, but he also recognizes that Akira is different from the other fighters. Instead of running away, Akira chose to fight him head on—and that's Akira's own form of strength that Shiki subconsciously acknowledges. If Shiki really did view Akira as a weakling who wasn't worth his time (or had any worth being alive at all), he would've continued his attack and killed Akira right there, but he didn't. Instead he backed off and walked away.

Even though Shiki is the one to back off first, it's clear that Akira is the loser in the fight. Akira understands this; he understands the disparity between him and Shiki in terms of strength. Shiki also knows he's made it clear just how weak Akira is compared to him, which is why it isn't an admission of defeat when he walks away first, but a power move. He knows Akira can't do anything to him.

Honestly, I love Akira's reaction after this near-death encounter with Shiki. He's aware of how easily he could've died in this fight, and yet he feels… elation/euphoria following this experience. This isn't like the fight with Takeru where it could've gone either way because they're evenly matched. Akira was 100% dead here if Shiki actually intended to kill him.

Akira's initial reaction isn't even to feel upset that he lost, but to bask in the excitement of such a thrilling encounter. This is the same guy who couldn't even feel any emotion when fighting in Bl@ster, but it was precisely because nobody in Bl@ster could match up to him and threaten his position as the champion that Akira started to feel numb. The same guy who wants to know what it's like to face death, and is now one step closer to it.

And now that Akira has finally fought someone who's way stronger than him and experiences what it's like to lose a fight, he realizes he's not as strong as he thought he was. This is the moment when Akira finally understands that Igra is a completely different experience from Bl@ster. It wasn't seeing a guy committing necrophilia, or watching the Executioners maniacally bashing someone's head in, or facing an opponent who is evenly matched with him (Takeru) that made him realize that Igra is nothing like Bl@ster. No, it was him getting his ass handed to by Shiki that made him realize this.

I'm going to pause for a moment here to draw a parallel between this Shikiaki scene and Shiki's first encounter with Nano, because it’s hard to talk about the Shikiaki dynamic without going into Shiki’s backstory and explaining his mindset and why he comes to be so fascinated with Akira in particular.

The following quote is what Shiki says at the very beginning of his drama CD:

Shiki: I have never forgotten, not once, have I forgot those vacant purple pupils. The anxiety and the feeling as if I was shivering...What led me to understand what fear was. That sole experience of humiliation in my memory. Since that day, I kept pursuing him. This memory of the weak experience in the past exists to bury that man.

(Credit to silver_spray on Livejournal for the translation. I'll be using their translation any time I cite text from Shiki's drama CD, since they have a full translation of his drama CD in one place.)

The translation is a little clunky, but we can understand what Shiki's saying in his monologue. He's talking about the day he saw Nano at the military base and how he experienced fear for the first time in his life. The reason why Shiki can't let go of this memory, and why he centers his ambition solely on the pursuit of Nano, is because Nano shattered Shiki’s self-perception and made Shiki doubt everything he knew about himself.

Shiki is someone who prides himself on his strength and bases his entire identity around being strong. He thinks that those who exhibit fear are "weak," and that's why he felt so humiliated when Nano made him feel fear for the first time. If experiencing fear makes one weak, then by Shiki's own logic, he's weak and not actually strong like he thought he was. Shiki couldn't reconcile this revelation with his mindset, and it fucked him up severely to realize he was no different from the "cowards" and "weaklings" he looked down upon.

It's not just that Nano made Shiki feel fear during their encounter; it's that Shiki derives meaning in his existence by believing he's strong and proving his strength, so having his sense of self challenged like this messed him up.

And just to make it clear: I’m not judging Shiki’s character by how complex, fleshed out, or sympathetic his backstory/motivation is. I don’t mind that Shiki has a “shallow” goal, and I certainly don't think that diminishes his chemistry with Akira. What matters to me most is how consistent Shiki’s character is in relation to the themes set up within his own route, and how well he acts as a foil to Akira. Shiki embodies all the values that Akira lacks in his own life (a strong sense of purpose, an inclination to live, the freedom to do as he will with his own existence), and him acting as a foil to Akira serves to further our understanding of Akira's character. In short: I’m judging Shiki's characterization, backstory, and motivation by how well all of these factors come together to form his dynamic with Akira.

In part one of this meta, I explained how Akira’s character embodies the theme of nihilism (life is meaningless, none of your actions have any intrinsic value, death just means the body stops functioning). Shiki’s character stands directly as a contrast to this. His character embodies the theme of existentialism (you create your own meaning in life, your actions define who you are, you have the freedom to dictate your own purpose and reason for existing). Shiki finds meaning in his existence by being strong, and his actions and attitude reflect that. He walks his own path in life and doesn’t let anyone or anything impede him.

After his meeting with Nano, Shiki devotes his life to the goal of surpassing Nano—the one person who made him feel weak, who made him feel fear, who made him taste the humiliation of defeat—and his desire for revenge consumes him so much that it inadvertently becomes his sole purpose for existing.

So the big difference between Shiki and Akira is: Akira doesn’t see any reason to live, let alone a meaning to his own existence, while Shiki has made surpassing Nano his entire purpose and reason for living—his raison d'être, if you will.

If Akira's nihilism makes him believe that nothing in life has any value or meaning, therefore nothing he does matter, then Shiki's existentialism makes him believe that he can determine his own meaning in life (being the strongest) through his actions, therefore he'll devote himself to this one goal to validate his existence.

It’s the perfect setup for their dynamic. It’s not just that Shiki and Akira clash as characters—it’s that their philosophies, the very set of values that shape who they are and how they view themselves in the world, are in direct opposition with each other, but it's this polarity that makes them drawn to each other, and it’s what leads to their eventual character growths.

Again, I’m not an expert on philosophy, but to be fair, I don’t think the game is trying to do a meaningful dissection of these themes, either. It simply uses them as a framework for Shiki’s and Akira’s characterizations and their dynamic, and thus my analysis is also applied that way in this meta. I’m not focusing on their philosophies so much as I’m focusing on how, exactly, their opposing mindsets influence the way they interact and view each other, and how, eventually, their dynamic shifts from mutual hate to mutual respect.

This meta in general will focus on Akira's and Shiki's characterizations because I think their compatibility is most evident in how they individually change and complete each other's character arcs.

Getting back to the point of how Shiki and Akira’s first meeting parallels Shiki and Nano’s first meeting, Nano made Shiki feel utterly weak and powerless for the first time in his life, and Shiki does the same here to Akira. Shiki believed he was the strongest prior to his encounter with Nano, and Akira never fought anyone who could come close to beating him in Bl@ster. Even in Igra, Akira was evenly matched with Takeru. The circumstances are very similar, but the reason why Akira doesn’t feel nearly as devastated from experiencing defeat after his fight with Shiki is because unlike Shiki, he never based his identity or existence around being strong or invincible. Sure, his pride is hurt, and now he knows that being the undefeated Bl@ster champion doesn’t actually mean anything, but he just brushes it off and accepts the outcome.

The point I’m trying to make with this parallel is: Shiki takes up the role of "Nano" in his encounters with Akira, but because of this, he also sees himself in Akira when Akira struggles against him. You could say that Shiki projects onto Akira, and the reason why he likes it when Akira fights back is because it makes him feel validated in his own struggle against Nano.

But as much as I'm trying to say there's a parallel between these two scenes, there's actually a pointed difference: Shiki was overcome with fear when he faced Nano and wanted to "erase" that fear by killing Nano, while Akira stood his ground and locked eyes with Shiki as a way of challenging Shiki’s dominance. In fact, there's nothing in the text that indicates Akira feels any fear during this scene with Shiki; just anticipation and excitement. And this distinction is what leads Shiki to become so fascinated by Akira’s behavior and mindset. When confronted with the same circumstance, why is it that Akira is able to fight back without succumbing to fear?

So there’s two reasons in particular for why Akira stands out to Shiki during their first encounter:

Akira didn’t run away like the other fighters

Akira didn’t show fear/"Look Away" even when he was clearly outclassed in their fight

We know that Shiki considers people who exhibit fear to be weak. So what does that make Akira, then?

I'm leaving that question open-ended because I don't think even Shiki himself can answer that question. He might call Akira a weakling, but he obviously shows a different thought in his actions if he chooses to let Akira live, and Shiki isn’t the type of person whose words should be taken at face value considering he tries to suppress his emotions in order to be strong.

Akira is different from all the people Shiki has met before; there’s no denying that, and this feeling of "I've never met anyone like you" is mutual. For Akira, it's the first time he's met someone who can make him feel completely outclassed. For Shiki, it's the first time he's encountered someone who met his gaze in battle instead of succumbing to fear.

Okay. We are finally done analyzing this (very iconic) scene. Onto the next one.

Akira gets ambushed by three dudes, almost gets raped, also gets his arm stabbed, and then manages to barely escape because one of the guys started having a reaction after tasting Akira’s blood on his knife. Akira tries to process what happened, realizes it’s “pointless to dwell on the matter” and then decides to reflect on his encounter with Shiki instead. Like… this just shows where Akira’s priorities lie. He’s more focused on his encounter with Shiki than the encounter he just had with those three men, even though the latter was a much more dangerous and terrifying situation for him.

"He’s actually got quite the fanclub going."

(Can confirm that a Shiki fanclub exists because I’m in it.)

Jokes aside, if it wasn’t obvious enough before that Akira is interested in Shiki (especially after such an intense encounter), then it should be clear now. He tries to gather some info about Shiki from Motomi but doesn’t learn much aside from the fact that Shiki’s apparently not interested in challenging Il Re and probably has "some other goal."

The next time Shiki and Akira meet is right after Nano leaves a suitcase in Akira's hand and informs him that, "A man will be here soon."

That man turns out to be Shiki. What's interesting to me is how civil this interaction starts out—as civil as you can get with someone like Shiki. The last time they met, Shiki nearly killed Akira, and the only reason Akira came out of that fight alive was because Shiki chose to spare him.

After Shiki checks the contents of the suitcase, he threatens Akira and tells him to "forget everything [he] saw here." But think about it: if Shiki really wanted to make sure Akira wouldn't tell anyone, he could just kill Akira and permanently silence him. And yet he's making the decision to spare Akira, again. Shiki, the guy who's infamous for killing people whenever he shows up and making everyone run away at the sight of him.

Shiki's already treating Akira differently from the rest. If a random thug had been there in the alleyway instead of Akira, I think it's safe to assume Shiki would've killed the guy already without going through all this trouble of making a threat. But he gives Akira the opportunity to live, so long as Akira agrees to his demand of course, and it's probably because he remembers and acknowledges Akira's bravery from their previous encounter.

And now we get the classic Shikiaki moment of Shiki and Akira meeting each other's eyes. Akira is backed into a position where he has to obey or else Shiki will kill him, but we know from Akira’s previous encounters with the police that he hates being pushed around and told what to do, and any time someone tries to subdue him, he responds in a rebellious manner. It’s interesting to note that the text goes out of its way to state that Akira feels fear during this moment, which is understandable given how Shiki has his sword right at his throat and he’s one slice away from dying. But instead of succumbing to his fear and obeying quietly, Akira chooses to defy Shiki.

Shiki asks Akira if he would rather die, to which Akira decides yes, he would. And this decision is so important to the dynamic between them. It's what compels Shiki to keep pushing Akira so that he can see how far Akira is willing to risk death just for the sake of defying him. It's what makes Akira start to develop agency through his actions and find meaning in the choices he makes. This moment is the impetus for their dynamic in the way that it sets up all their future interactions onward.

Akira takes it one step further and even taunts Shiki to kill him. This is how much he despises being subjugated to someone else.

The reason why Akira deliberately provokes Shiki is because it's his own way of trying to take back control of the situation. If Akira is the one making the demands—"You might as well kill me"—then Shiki will technically be the one obeying Akira if he does kill him.

I've been talking a lot about how Shiki and Akira are different, how their characterizations make them clash, and how their philosophies oppose each other on a fundamental level, but actually, part of what makes their dynamic so compelling and intense is that they're… extremely similar when you think about it. They're both stubborn, strong-willed, determined to have their own way, and they refuse to submit to others, which is how you end up with this dynamic where neither of them are willing to relent. Ironically, these traits that add conflict and tension to their dynamic are the same traits that end up making them respect each other by the end of Shiki's route.

Shiki is just as stubborn as Akira is when it comes to not wanting to be under the control of someone else, which is why he chooses not to kill Akira despite the blatant provocation.

The other factor for why Shiki doesn't kill Akira during this scene is because he views Akira as an anomaly. He's so used to other Igra fighters begging for mercy from him that it genuinely catches him off guard that Akira would refuse to beg for his life.

Shiki doesn't kill Akira because on some level, he respects Akira's pride, fearlessness, and determination. Akira doesn't let his fear stop him from lashing out against Shiki.

We know that Akira feels fear during this moment because the text made a point of explicitly telling us so: "Akira felt afraid, but at the same time, he felt a rising indignation." But there's a nuance to it. Shiki thinks feeling fear is a sign of weakness—that’s why he felt so humiliated when Nano made him feel fear. Akira, on the other hand, doesn’t associate fear with humiliation or weakness; rather, being forced into submission is what makes him feel humiliated and weak, which is why he stubbornly resists Shiki in spite of the fear he feels.

The difference between Shiki and Akira is that Shiki lets his fear of Nano control his actions, while Akira doesn’t let his fear control him. And this distinction plays a big role in why Shiki slowly comes to respect Akira.

Going back to the text, Shiki decides to spare Akira, but he calls Akira a “fool.” It’s not really clear why he specifically uses this term to insult Akira, but based on my own interpretation of Shiki’s character, this is what I believe: he calls Akira a fool because he thinks it’s foolish that Akira doesn’t value or respect his own life.

Even though Shiki goes around killing people for the hell of it, I think he actually values life—way more than Akira does, at least. He only kills the people who he deems to be weak, and lets people like Akira and Rin (for a while) live. But I think Shiki’s perspective on life is most telling in the way he views his own life. He dedicates his whole life to achieving this one goal, and goes about it in an extremely unhealthy way, uncaring of the consequences that come with the path he takes.

If Akira doesn’t see a point in living because he thinks life has no meaning or value, then Shiki is the polar opposite of him in that he holds his own life in high regard, such that every action he takes has a purpose/meaning to it.

The text tells us, unambiguously, that the reason why Akira got so worked up during this confrontation is because the one thing he can't stand is people trying to control him. Again, Akira's characterization has been very consistent so far. His interactions with Shiki and the way they play out feel organic because both of their actions and dialogue match what we know of their characterizations and philosophies.

The text also reminds us that Akira was feeling terror during this moment with Shiki. But he's not humiliated over feeling fear; he's angry that he was pushed around and forced to bend to someone's will.

We know how Akira feels after this confrontation, but what about on Shiki's end? Well, this is Shiki's POV from the drama CD:

(For context, he's just killed three men who were on Rein and is dissatisfied by how weak they were.)

Shiki: I know, even if drugs are used, if Line is used, that a suitable person that can show as strong a power as that man won't appear so easily. But the chance is not zero. That's why I am providing the original fluid of Line to Arbitro and going along with his nonsense. But, why is there still this incomprehensible irritation? [Flashback] Akira: Then just kill me. Shiki: You want to give up and seek death? Akira: It's better than having to beg you for mercy. [End flashback] Shiki: Foolish. Just a nobody I happened to let off.

We learn that the reason why Shiki goes around distributing Rein is because he wants to face worthy opponents, and the whole Igra system is set up so that only those who are strong enough to collect a correct set of tags can challenge Il Re. But the thing is, Shiki looks down on people who use Rein for power instead of relying on their internal strength. He’s looking for strong opponents who use Rein so he can reaffirm his belief that self-made strength is superior to the strength gained from drugs.

It's a very contrived way of proving his strength, but it speaks to how much he fears and despises Nano. Shiki wants to surpass Nano, but he knows he can’t get close to him, so instead, he wants to kill those who have gained power via Rein as a way of reassuring himself that he is strong, and that he's better than Nano and everyone else because he doesn't have to rely on the power of the Nicole virus.

Unfortunately, there haven't been any new challengers for Il Re lately, much to his dismay. Shiki mostly spends his spare time killing random thugs in Toshima to sate his bloodlust, and during one of these killings, Shiki feels irritated for some reason. Then his mind flashes back to his encounter with Akira, and it's heavily implied that this memory is the source of his current emotional conflict. He remembers Akira's backbone during their confrontation, then tries to dismiss it by telling himself that Akira is "just a nobody."

It's obvious Shiki is in denial of his own emotions because if Akira really was just a nobody, Shiki wouldn't even be sparing him a second thought like he is now. Clearly that encounter affected him more than he would like to admit. And take note of how this flashback is contrasted with the preceding segment of Shiki mulling over how he hasn't been able to find any worthy opponents in a while, and how even though Rein is spreading around the city, the strength of your typical Igra fighter is still too low for his standards. Shiki's monologue and the flashback with Akira are deliberately juxtaposed in a way that helps us infer how Shiki views Akira.

Shiki recalls this memory with Akira specifically because Akira stands out as an outlier among all the Igra fighters he's encountered. Akira is someone who doesn't neatly fit into Shiki's definition of a weakling. He's not strong because Shiki is superior to him in terms of physical strength. But he's not weak either because he doesn't submit to anyone, and he doesn't give in to his fear of death. Most people beg for mercy in front of Shiki, but Akira is different in that he would rather die than ever endure the humiliation of begging.

We can see that Shiki has started to take an interest in Akira, even if he acts in denial about it.

I'm going to jump ahead now to this other scene where Akira is thinking to himself after the Meal of Duty massacre and his fight with Takeru. It's not a Shikiaki scene because it's about Takeru, but I'm including it here for the sake of Akira's characterization because it provides us some perspective on Akira's values.

The last time Akira and Takeru met was in Meal of Duty. Takeru was on Rein and was fully intent on killing Akira, but Akira barely managed to escape thanks to his blood. By all means, Akira shouldn’t have any reason to sympathize with Takeru or even feel any concern for him, especially after Takeru tried to kill him. It's not like they knew each other all that well, and their encounters were always colored in hostility thanks to Takeru's aggression. Akira shouldn't feel bad or care about what happens to Takeru; he hardly cares about people in general, but he expresses some sympathy toward him because Takeru is different.

Akira himself doesn't really know why he's concerned for Takeru, but he has enough self-awareness to understand that it's probably because he "caught a glimpse of something inside Takeru… some seething passion that set him apart from the other Igra fighters."

I've been talking a lot about how the reason why Shiki becomes so obsessed with Akira is because Akira is different from all the other Igra fighters. Akira doesn't like to back down, he doesn't cower in fear or submit to anyone even when forced into a life-or-death scenario.

But, on the other side of this, Akira also develops an obsession with Shiki because Shiki is so different from any of the fighters he's met before. He's drawn to the way Shiki is so single-mindedly dedicated to his goal and how he'll stop at nothing to achieve it.

I'm not going to go in-depth about it here because I want to save my analysis for when we actually get to the moonlight scene and learn more about Shiki's motivation, but I just wanted to throw that thought out there for now.

---

This is where I’ll end off part two for now. Part three will be a direct continuation of this.

[Next] Part Three: Shiki and Akira's Encounters (II)

[vitospaghetta]

No i know that Leon's masculine but I'm just asking in what sense i suppose because there's different types and all that

Gotcha.

Obviously as a cisgender woman I can't really speak much on the male experience, but masculinity, in general, is a sliding scale. There's no strict definition or "versions" of masculinity, only our perceptions of it and the socially normative traits we often associate with it.

When Capcom was designing Leon, they wanted him to look distinctly different from Chris, who is obviously a more "traditionally" masculine character (which of course they increasingly leaned into with each game he was included in). This was because Shinji Mikami (RE2's producer) thought that Leon's original design looked too similar to him. From an entertainment standpoint, it obviously wouldn't be beneficial to create the same protagonist twice. Both Leon's physical appearance and personality rival Chris', something that's been a mainstay of the franchise.

When you compare Leon to Chris specifically, he doesn't fit into most peoples' pre-conceived notions of traditional masculinity. However, when you look at Leon strictly through a canonical lens, displays of traditional masculinity do appear throughout the franchise — his love of motorcycles, the fact that he was able to repair a bus in RE6, his interactions with women (platonic or otherwise, which is especially prevalent in the original continuity), his choice of drinks, his stoicism in times of crisis, etc. He just has a different, toned down set of traits when compared to Chris, which is the point.

When I think of Leon's masculinity, I don't think of it in terms of some sort of binary measurement with "masculine" on one end and "feminine" on the other; I instead reflect on Leon's rejection of toxic masculinity and how that's very reflective of who he is as a person and how he navigates life as a cisgender man. He's your stereotypical prettyboy character archetype, and he's fallen victim to other men projecting their own toxic masculinity onto him, having not being taken seriously before due to his appearance. Though he upholds his appearance despite this, without any regard for what those around him might think. He's comfortable enough with himself to look the way he does, and I think that says a lot. He doesn't feel pressure from other men to conform, or rather, doesn't let any pressure influence him. He's headstrong in being very thoroughly, unapologetically himself.

[notapplicableinformation]

What did Blumiere actually DO to be redeemed? 

I know this sounds like a really silly question, to be frank, it really is, and this isn't me trying to say something of the ending should have been changed in any way, because, no, I think the ending of Super is incredible, with Blumiere and Timpani professing their love at the altar with the incredible music, phenomenal. I just pondered this at one point and thought it would be interesting to look at Blumiere through an objective lense as opposed to a thematic one. 

Count Bleck as a character is incredible, so are the rest of the cast, I could go on for multiple essays for each of these wacky characters. One thing I really enjoy is the juxtaposing types of villainy and roles that Blumiere and Dimentio have to each other, how one is intricatley complex and embedded in the narriative with his tragic tale, and the other is quite paper thin on the surface story (Who may have more underneath, though personally I like him being more shallow on the lore for proper contrast to Bleck, but this isn't relevant to the plot nor this discussion), with quite a strong characterisation to pull him through. They're like two extremes of the villain spectrum; between the sympathetic and complex to the more flat twist type of antagonist that balance each other out very well. 

Count Bleck is a very well written character, I love the execution of his narriative, and the question at hand of what he did to be redeemed really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of the narriative, but it's mostly just a personal ponder-

It makes sense to me that Blumiere found happiness because of his ability to "love", how his love stretched the boundaries of comprehension, his ability to truly love is telling of Blumiere's inner good nature despite all that has been comitted. His willingness and persistance to look for Timpani to even the lengths of the Aftergame itself cannot be unoted. I'm pretty sure this is a key takeaway of Blumiere's tale that is wanted: That true love is the foundation of happiness, and without it, one is empty and hollow. Overall, the game redeems Blumiere with the sacrifice at the altar, where that true love that he does have is professed, and he is eligible for his happy ending through his act of love and sacrifice, and can now live a happy aftergame with Timpani. 

But outside of the incredible symbolic perspective, a hypothetical view where Blumiere's actions are analysed from a critical lense rather than a narriative one; What does Blumiere actually do to be redeemed?

Blumiere was implied to have killed the tribe that took Timpani away and searched to the ends of existence to fnd her, to which when her existence was no more, he sought to destroy everything, as nothing else held meaning to him other than Timpani. (Again, symbolically, all works perfectly well) 

He takes in the helpless minions and promises them a perfect world if they aid him in his destruction, though this is a lie, simply so that he can recruit them and follow the passages of the Dark Prognosticus. (In the English version, some subtext implies he manipulated them to join him, though throughout the game, Blumiere still treats his minions with respect and the original implies that Blumiere had a genuine will to help these minions from the start) 

When Timpani is seen alive, he doesn't try to stop the plan, but simly persists forth with destruction all until the very end, where when he is taken down, he immedietly stops with his destructive behaviour and aims to profess his love for Timpani one last time in a sacrifice. Thematically, this is brilliant. 

But from an active standpoint, I don't think Blumiere really didn't DO anything to get a redemption- His sacrifice, again NOT from a thematic standpoint, hardly counts because he still gets a happy ending with Timpani, alive somewhere else. Blumiere's actions across his life have been villanous, despite his intentions being through the persistence of love. 

Technically you could flip the question to say "Was Blumiere at fault for his actions in the first place?" to excuse the actions caused, and therefore be able to justify his redemption more clearly, and I find the take interesting, for perhaps Blumiere wasn't entirely at fault for his own actions.

Blumiere specifically sought for the 'history' of the prognosticus, seen in the Japanese translation, which implies that he perhaps didn't intend to cause harm to anyone and exclusivley wanted to find Timpani. There are also potential implications that he had been controlled by the Dark Prognosticus itself because of this, and the reason why he didn't stop the world's destruction immedietly when he heard Timpani was alive was because he was fighting for control of himself over the will of the Prognosticus over his mind....But I admit I'm not really too sure how probable this idea IS. The game is VERY clear when it wants to show something relevant to the plot foreshadowed, and I feel if this is the takeaway the developers wanted, that this would have been shown directly rather than in implication. Yes, technically it is said that those who read the book do not find happiness, and I think there are hints towards the book controlling him, but...I feel it's a bit vague?

Also, if he were controlled BY the prognosticus, I feel that the narriative weight of Blumiere's character would be detracted, as what makes a lot of his character so powerful is the lengths he went to show how much Timpani meant to him. Him CHOOSING to destroy all of existence because of Timpani's loss is much more powerful to me than the BOOK making him do it, because it shows Blumiere's agency in the decision. Him CHOOSING the destruction of existence proves how, without Timpani, this man did not find value in existence without the source of his true love. Rather than making Blumiere a victim of naivety for causing damages he didn't intend to.

Overall, this isn't really a serious question, I know very well the writers wanted the people playing the game to look at the big picture and perhaps look at the story from a thematic point of view as opposed to an objective one, as this is a fictional game with a story, rather than something to be looked at with an actual objective lense, but it was a fun ponder regardless. I'd be curious to hear any throughts on the matter. Have a nice day!