#I don't know if I want to play this game

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Happy one year anniversary to In Stars and Time!

[bixels]

In the past, people in the Animal Crossing community would make fun of Tom Nook as a sleazy landlord. Since then, he's really rehabilitated his image as this 'heart of gold' businessman (he's the one who puts bells and furniture in trees for you to find! he adopted orphans! he donates to charity!), but New Horizons genuinely paints the most devious version of him.

He's successfully privatized settler colonialism: you pay HIM to move to a "deserted island" (which apparently the oceans in the AC world are just full of) and start a colony that he is directly invested in. At best he's running a weird vacation package scam (you arrive on the island with no money and in debt for "using his services"). At worst, he's using you to set up company towns. For god's sake, he literally has his own fake currency that he forces you to use to pay off your debt. But don't worry, he's repackaged it in a way that definitely doesn't sound like an MLM scam: the Nook Mileage Program!

You're no longer just his tenant or his temporary part-timer, you're his business lackey. The entire tutorial section of the game has you spending actual weeks running around completing tasks and doing hard labor to set up his colony. You're even tasked with preparing his properties and finding buyers for them. No, you aren't a tenant anymore. You work for the landlord. You are directly responsible for finding tenants for him. And he doesn't even fucking pay you. Not for setting up town hall and museum, or his nephew's shop –– which is the ONLY store on the entire island that sells necessities –– or bringing KK Slider to town, or helping populate his town. Not a single cent. No, actually, you have to pay HIM to BUY infrastructure like bridges and stairs and park benches. And all the while, he's telling you're the "resident representative"; you get to call the shots! That the reward is the community's progress. That what you're doing is in everyone's best interest (but most importantly, his).

Since NH's release, people have done a lot of legwork to say that Tom Nook isn't a capitalist while the game shows him at his very worst. He owns the only general store in town. You're forced to use a phone that he modified and branded as his own. Buy Nook-branded furniture and merchandise at the self-serve kiosk in the town hall, a governmental building! There's no conflict of interest here!

But hey, if you're tired of being the landlord/business mogul's goon, you can also find work as a deluxe resort home designer for a company that also pays you in their special company currency that can only be used to buy their products instead of a real salary! Because that's what the Animal Crossing franchise needs! More vacation homes!!!

[shivunin]

Because I have just seen this specific thing for the second time, I would like to say:

If I reblog your art, I do not expect you to reblog (or share!) my fic in return

If I comment on your fic, I do not expect you to comment on (or read!) mine in return

My enjoyment of anyone's work does not come with strings or expectations

My friendship is not a bill that you will have to pay later

That's it!

[that-wildwolf]

hey, remember being 18 years old and playing mass effect for the first time and it's got this like intense aura of being very small and very insignificant in a very big, very empty galaxy? remember playing mass effect for the first time and everything all of this is so new and mysterious, and it's 2am and you're sitting in a dark room in the light from your tv and you're playing through feros for the first time and you feel that this is someting very old and very ancient and you are somewhere you shouldn't be and you don't know what's going to happen or where you're going but you keep on. there's a tingling in your stomach and you're playing mass effect for the first time. the thorian is a milennia old sentient plant being. the rachni queen is old and telepathic and a hive mind and in pain. sovereign is an ancient machine that has not been built but is, and has always been, and this is something so alien and so unlike and beyond anything your human mind can comprehend, and this is something unexplainable and huge and as uncaring and indifferent as the empty galaxy around you. you're playing mass effect for the first time and you're walking on the surface of an almost completely empty planet with nothing but your two companions silently walking beside you and everything is so huge and empty and silent and you're so small and insignificant and it's so beautiful and so scary and you feel like you are on a rollercoaster about to drop down. you are playing mass effect for the first time and you're playing the mission on the moon and you stop and just look up at earth visible in the sky. you know this. this is home. you are playing mass effect for the first time, and the galaxy is so big, and you are so tiny, and everything is about to change for you.

[galoogamelady]

I downloaded New Vegas partially because of Buttons, partially because I love the show and want to get to know the games. I’ve never died so many times in the first ten minutes of a game. I accidentally stole a guy’s milk and now he won’t stop following me and shooting me 😭. Anyway, love your content!! Thanks for introducing me to Fallout!

[laurellala]

A Shakespearean comedy of errors

bonus:

[yume127]

I find it interesting how Roxas is often described as the “angry one” or “short-tempered one” when compared to Sora or Ventus, mostly because I always felt Sora and Ven have a shorter fuse than Roxas.

The association between Roxas and anger is understandable, because many of Roxas’ most poignant moments in the series happen when he is very (and understandably) angry, but I also feel like it’s a disservice to his character to only reduce him to his anger, especially when it’s far from who he is in normal circumstances.

For example, during Days, many Organization members treat him poorly and insult him to his face and, for the most part, Roxas doesn’t react at all. In Halloween Town, Lock, Shock, and Barrel throw bombs in his face multiple times before Roxas finally snaps at them. He senses that many people around him are keeping things from him, but it takes him months before he confronts someone about it. That’s far from someone I’d consider short-tempered or easy to anger.

The only situation I can think of when we see him get upset quickly is if anyone does or says something bad to Xion and, even then, the most of his reaction is verbally snapping at Saix to make him stop disrespecting her. In Axel’s case (when Roxas is upset with him for attacking Xion), Roxas doesn’t confront him at all, he just avoids him altogether. Also, I think it’s important to note that every moment in which Roxas is very angry happens when his entire life is falling apart, which is a situation in which, I believe, everyone would be upset.

Roxas seems the kind of person who bottles everything up without much reaction until it becomes too much and he explodes, and that’s when he has a hard time controlling his anger/emotions. Having spent most of his life in the organization probably plays a part in it as, every time he brings up any emotion, his feelings are invalidated and suppressed. That’s not an environment that gave him the tools to process strong emotions in a healthy way.

Let’s compare that to Ventus. Ven is the definition of short-tempered in BBS. He’s ready to throw hands with Vanitas the moment he says something remotely bad about Terra, which was minutes after he met him for the first time. He fought the dwarves without a second thought just because they refused to talk with him. His first reaction when he becomes small and is trapped in a mousetrap is to shout. These are just some examples from the top of my head, but it’s clear Ven has a shorter fuse than Roxas.

Ventus usually expresses how he feels in any given situation and has a short fuse. On the flip side, he doesn’t seem to hold on to these feelings at all. He externalises them the moment he feels them, but then he lets it go and it doesn’t bother him anymore. Out of the three of them, Ventus seems the most open about his emotions and, from what I remember, when he opens up about feeling a certain way with his friends, his feelings are usually not invalidated nor brushed aside. In UX, Ventus seems calmer and doesn’t have much anger in him, but he’s still open to expressing his feelings of low self-worth and sadness with the other union leaders.

Sora, I think he falls in the middle? He seems to have a shorter temper compared to Roxas, which was especially clear in KH2, where he snaps at the Organization multiple times, but he also bottles up his emotions more than Ven, especially around his friends. This happens mostly with his sadness, which he always tries to hide or brush aside, but in KH3 we can also see, for example, how much he’s bothered by everyone constantly bringing up him not passing the Mark of Mastery, even if he tries not to show it.

I think Sora feels like he should always be happy for his friends’ sake, and even during the rare moments when he tries to express his sadness, his feelings are not truly welcomed (“No frowning. No sad faces. This boat runs on happy faces”), so he just tries to brush it off as a joke. He’s loud in expressing any kind of positive emotion, and he openly expresses his anger against his enemies (and to his friends too, sometimes), but he also doesn’t hold on to that anger and is pretty forgiving. However, he usually bottles up his sadness, low self-esteem and other negative feelings, and then explodes when he can’t hold it together any longer (like it happened at the Keyblade Graveyard when he thought all his friends were gone forever).

[tum-bakery]

I've gotten a few beach requests in my last batches so I thought I'd kill a few birds with one stone. Haven't drawn these two in awhile but It's nice to~

Edit with the og ask added:

[kaiserouo]

modern au

[stealingpotatoes]

hands you all this cal to announce i’ve FINALLY finished fallen order (by which i mean i finally picked it up again after those couple hours i played a few months ago and then finished the whole game in 2 days lol)

[necrotic-nephilim]

i personally have very complicated feelings on the Gotham Knights video game and the routes it takes with characterization. i think it has a charm to it and it goes in an interesting direction with everyone (especially within the confides of the plot of the game) but it does have certain moments that veer painfully fanon for me. (such as: the dialogue where Tim drinks too much coffee) it's an interesting story for what it is but i don't view it comics-based for characterization and therefore don't care to interact with it much for like. fanfic purposes.

that *said* though. i do have to give the game some kind of credit for giving one of the top five JayTim moments that lives rent free in my mind. every since i played the game, the cutscene lives in my mind daily. it's the specific cutscene where Jason and Tim are arguing about whether or not Jason's non-lethal bullets are too dangerous for the field, and the argument leads to TIm *standing in front of the target* Jason is shooting and telling Jason to shoot him. it lives rent free for me. i never stop thinking about this.

the absolute certainty Tim has that he is in no danger standing in front of Jason, who has a loaded gun pointed at his face. the way Jason *hesitates* for just a moment before lowering the gun. he thinks about it for just a second. Gotham Knights JayTim seem to get along very well and can rely on each other, but Jason still clearly holds a bitterness about his death and Tim that flickers through in some lines of dialogue under the guise of jokes. especially since this game deals *heavily* with concepts of Pit Madness causing an altered state of consciousness, i think it's believable that occasionally, Jason fights the urge to fight and hurt Tim for the feeling of being replaced.

i like their tension so much in this canon. they get along but you can *tell* Tim is afraid of addressing Jason's trauma or even addressing Jason head-on, and Jason leans into spooking Tim about it. which isn't very comics feeling in their dynamic, but it is an interesting way to place their dynamic if you're playing with a more timid Tim who's newer to the role of Robin. (which he seems to be in-game) he really doesn't want to offend Jason, or worse, piss him off. but he'll still face Jason head on for things like this, while completely aware of what Jason could be capable of.

and Jason seems very protective of Tim and respecting Tim as a Robin in typical Jason fashion. if Tim pushes, Jason *will* relent. he knows this is a kid who's proved himself and should be treated with equal respect, sometimes even more than Dick and Babs do in-game.

so for all that to culminate in Tim stepping in front of Jason's loaded gun that he *knows* is on the edge of being too dangerous, just to force Jason to listen? it's the most unhinged way Tim could've gotten his point across in this scene. he was literally daring Jason to hurt him and playing with a very dangerous fire. but he did it anyway bc he believed he could make Jason heel just at the thought of hurting Tim. and he was *right*. they're gay and i'm feral ty.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Welcome to the Dungeons of Fear and Hunger.

[navree]

Incorrect, the fact that Biden has dropped out and a candidate with history of supporting medicare for all and being more receptive to a ceasefire in the I/P conflict has made me go from "I cannot morally support the Democratic nominee" to "I am voting for the Democratic nominee despite the fact she isn't perfect in every respect." I'm really happy this played out. The Dems for the most part abandoned the old Obama platform and it feels like its possible an actual progressive agenda could come to pass in my lifetime.

Kamala 2024!

If you weren't going to vote Democratic in this election before Biden dropped out you're a dorkass loser who does not care about any of the issues you're yammering about here and also a fundamentally bad person, and I hope you get run over by a bus.

But you got one thing right in all of this gibberish, Kamala 2024.

[longmaxsilvarg]

something about the main menu for life is strange genuinely makes me wanna collapse and sob

[lamentable-comedy]

obsessed with the fact that baz is so good at seeming cool on the outside that no one notices he's never actually made a friend in his life.

at watford he hung out with his cousin (would have known him before school) and his cousin's roommate (dev made friends with niall and brought him along to hang out with baz). in carry on and after watford his friends are penny (package deal with simon) and shepard (decided he was friends with the group of them regardless of what they wanted).

this man doesn't know how to make friends. he knows how to have the same taste in friends as his relatives and boyfriend. and how to stand around looking cool and aloof so that people think he's mysterious instead of an awkward loser. i adore him.

[buglaur]

long time no see from the man

jan 2022 v sep 2024 cus i was curious lol

all i did was change his skin details & brows and widen his head a bit