#I know more people agree now

[the-far-bright-center]

I wrote about why TFA made no sense and why it was inherently destructive to the meaning of the saga all the way back in 2016, long before the rest of the fake-sequels were released.

It’s easy to blame TLJ, since it was terrible, but I do want to stake a claim to “TFA threw the OT trio under the bus and positioned OT heroes as failures in need of redemption”. I think that element was always poison and without a thorough explanation/justification as the core of the trilogy, excitement would always wear off and disappointment would always creep in.

[technically-human]

Ooh, now that we’ve seen N!Edwin and DP!Edwin talk about Feelings could we see the same with N!Charles and DP!Charles?

As simple as that.

Edwins version

ko-fi

[crossdressingdeath]

You know what the most frustrating thing about DAV criticism is at the moment? It's that I do in fact have criticisms. Quite a few, actually. It's a Bioware game, of course I have criticisms. No one I've spoken to or whose posts I've seen thinks it's perfect or above criticism. But the thing is, I—and I imagine a lot of other firmly positive blogs—know that if I share any of those criticisms, if I make posts discussing them and talk about the game's flaws, I will immediately be inundated by people using those complaints to insist that the whole game is garbage and the writing is bad and Bioware's a terrible studio who can't make good games and DAI (of all fucking games) was so much better and blah blah blah blah. I know that because it's happened every goddamn time I've made a less-than-positive post about DAV. And I don't have the energy to deal with that! The endless stream of bad faith criticism wears me down and having to constantly stop to defend a game I like when I'm trying to discuss its flaws because if I don't (and frankly half the time even if I do) people will use my posts to claim the whole game is garbage is exhausting, and fandom is supposed to be fun. So I can't discuss DAV's flaws on tumblr if I want to avoid that, and it is infuriating. I see people bitching about toxic positivity and people refusing to acknowledge the game's flaws, and I really want those people to take a second to consider: do the game's fans ignore its flaws and refuse to accept that anything about it is bad? Or have you created an environment that is so toxic that no one who likes the game wants to risk getting your attention by mentioning what's bad about it and they respond more aggressively than is warranted to even genuine critique in an attempt to ward you off? Because there will always be assholes who claim that genuine problems are Fine, Actually, Stop Being Such A Baby... but if people can't address the game's flaws in public without immediately getting dragged into five different arguments about how it is in fact ultimately a really solid game, they're not going to do it no matter how much they recognise those flaws.

[kizzer55555]

Welcome to the Restraint! (Restaurant)

Imagine Danny runs to Gotham and starts squatting in an abandoned old building in Crime Alley. Slowly putting some ecto into the place to claim it as his haunt (while recovering from the sudden loss of his old one). And he does the normal stuff to survive. Finds some odd jobs, often as a messenger, and is just surviving. Another thing he does is make his own food. It’s cheaper than takeout and he’s gotten pretty good at cooking (out of necessity instead of eating sentient hotdogs). Then he ends up accidentally taking in some street kids. Or more like they follow him home. He can’t just turn them away so he makes a meal for them and lets them stay the night then sends them on their way. And then it happens again. And again. And ok, so maybe he saved a girl from getting molested. And that older guy from getting his only good blanket stolen. And sure, maybe letting that poor pizza delivery guy rant was unnecessary but he looked like he was having a bad day ok? Pretty sure that kid with the scar is a meta too but…he needed a place to stay a few nights alright? It’s not like any of them stay permanently. Danny’s started picking up a few more odd jobs to pay for all the extra food he’s had to buy. Always keeping his place stocked. At least he doesn’t have to pay for water and a fridge, he just makes some ice (or melts it). Sure the water is cold, but it’s probbaly the cleanest water in Gotham. And then some of the people start paying. Like…actually paying in exchange for food. Not sure if it’s because of guilt or pity but Danny won’t look a gift horse in the mouth. And with all the money, he hasn’t had to take as many dangerous jobs. Soon, his little abandoned apartment became what’s essentially the closest thing to a legitimate restaurant in Crime Alley.

It didn’t look normal. The chairs and tables were more like old couches and stools pulled up to coffee tables and cabinets turned on their side. Although with the bulling becoming more like Danny’s haunt, the walls naturally started repairing themselves so at least it didn’t look like it was gonna collapse anymore. And ok…so Danny might have rescued a few feral kids who…weirdly have gold eyes. And possibly stopped a meta trafficking ring on accident. And look, these people didn’t have anywhere to go! And the apartment did have empty rooms. It was already known as a place someone could crash for the night (last winter the entire place was cramped with people. Danny had to break up multiple fights but they usually calmed down when he got there.)

One benefit from controlling a haunt is controlling the temperature inside so it was one of the only buildings with ‘heat’. But back to his…strays. So yeah…most didn’t seem like they could rejoin society…so he let them stay. And…they kind of became employees? Impromptu bodyguards? (Some of the golden eyed people almost felt like he was rangling feral ghosts again.) they came in all ages. A few kids, lots of teens, and a few adults. Same with the metas he rescued. They mostly helped deliver food to costumers. They even got a phone line working and could take orders. (Although the new…employees…also got more protective whenever a fight broke out.) With all the extra money he’s been getting he was even able to afford some medical supplies. A lot of his customers(?) came in injured and he tried his best to patch them up but now he could do more than tie some ripped clothing around the wound and use ice to numb it. He’s got bandages. And pain killers. Plus other medical stuff. He can even give someone stickers now! All that experience as an injured vigilante was paying off. Even Villains and goons start attending this place. The place was unofficially designated as one of the Alley’s ‘safe zones’ where no fighting takes place inside (the body guards make sure of it.) the metas and Talons are getting an identity for themselves, the street kids even get a job and a hideout, random people can go there for help or to pass messages, this place provides food, shelter, and medical care. No one wants it going down.

So yeah, welcome to the restaurant!

(I’m debating whether I want this to be the weirdest restaurant/safe place/truce area in the alley, or whether I want Danny to accidentally become a crime lord. Possibly both.)

Also, this place is called the Restraint because I keep misspelling Restaurant and I think Danny would do the same so the name stuck. (Or one of the kids spelled it when making a sign or passing around messages to spread the word of this safe place.)

So anyways, to add some angst, after Danny adopts a bunch of crime alley kids/villains they find out about Danny’s powers and that he’s a ghost, only they don’t know about Halfas so they think Danny is fully dead and this super kind guy who has been the only person to ever treat them like people…died. He died likely a long time ago and there’s nothing any of them can do to change that.

(And if the GIW dare to come into the alley, they better be prepared for the entire place to turn on them.)

[quibbs126]

Random stupid fic idea that came to my brain just now

So you got Optimus and Megatron, post TF One, both being sad about the whole breakup

But they’re like, so sad and mopey that basically everyone on both sides is like “okay this can’t go on, we need to get them back together”, to the point they basically secretly meet up and agree to do this and live in peace afterwards because they can’t take this anymore

But also they can’t exactly just tell them to get back together since Megatron’s technically still a war criminal and Megatron refuses to outwardly admit he misses Optimus. So basically they have to get them back together without letting them know they’re doing so

But also the two are idiots who refuse to admit to anything, and everyone is going crazy and trying to come up with increasingly elaborate ways to get them to make up

I don’t know, I thought it was funny

[moeblob]

No fun allowed.

[vaguely-concerned]

my capacity to see a bad fandom take and just blithely say 'okay! I disagree' internally and move on because it's not my responsibility or concern that someone else thinks that has leveled up so tremendously over the years. I haven't quite escaped the pit of misery yet but I think I'm getting there

[teyrnacousland]

When we find out that the elves were spirits there's a whole debate about whether or not we should tell people. Why don't we do that when we find out that some of the core beliefs of Andrastianism are a lie?

[evermoredeluxe]

.

[peacockrulz]

I'm sorry to anybody who expected me to post smth normal but. /j

these doodles are entirely based off the text of the fic Cyn's Night Out. which is a part from a series of fics that I haven't actually read but!! this particular part of it I have so jdskfjsdkf

I dub these two,,, StillKicking (get it? because,,football?? and Cyn never fucking dies????) anway here slightly more sketchy doodles under the cut:

Your Honor. I need More Of This.

[pixie05love]

I can't be the only one who doesn't know whether Isagi's resolution was good or bad for him...

[orion4ever]

hey dude, i know you mean well for the ol community, and i think you're really cool and have been following you for a while, but i really don't think all this shitting on rose is justified. spreading callout posts by taking shitty things people have said out of context, especially queer poc, is a real tactic used by terfs to spread discourse and isolate queer people from communities, and it's worked so well that queer people have started doing the same to their own with really good intentions, but the overall effect is nonsense discourse and the spread of hatred. kab herself has publicly said that she and rose have a good relationship and that she thinks most of rose's impact on the games and community has been really helpful for checking her own biases. the screenshots and shitty things you've read about her are not the full story, and yes, i do agree that rose handled certain things really really shittily and i am not excusing that at all, but rose isn't a bad person at all, what the callouts show is out of context and does not show rose accurately as a person, and the degree of hatred for a group of people honestly trying to create a safe space for queer people is wildly disproportional. i really hope this doesn't come off as any way accusatory, because it really isn't, and i really look up to you as a creator. i just want you to be aware that this is something that has been settled by the people involved, and continuing discourse and wanting rose fired goes directly against kab's own wishes and is based on misinformation. thanks for reading this far. please have a wonderful day

I respect you and I appreciate that you reached out respectfully with this.

I do not repost these call out post to be malicious or start a hate campaign like some people have been accusing others of.

I do not encourage witch-hunting or harassment of Rose or Kab ; As they are people and make mistakes , even if the mistakes are extremely shitty and I understand that those screenshots were a private conversation but frankly , I think some of the stuff Rose said was extremely odd and vulgar , context or without.

I am not in the official OL server so maybe your right about them not being as bad but even if that was the case they should still be let go of the role as sensitivity reader because they’re views aren’t open minded and its ironic that they are supposed to help prevent bias and keep the game inclusive when they’ve shown a weird rhetoric and the paper bag comment actually made my jaw drop.

OL has been one of the most comforting things to me , I was in a really dark place when I started a new save file and fell in love with all the characters and the game so believe me when I tell you I would never want to attack the very person who created and brought me that comfort. It physically exhausted me and upset me yesterday when it all came to light , considering it has been a huge hyperfixation and boosted my self esteem.

I don’t care if GB is okay with their friends talking an insane amount of crap behind their backs. It's not my business, I just think that they need better friends.

Even with this in mind, I can’t continue my support for Kab if they decide to keep Rose on the development team, not purely just because of what they said in private but how they treated my friend. The both of them are insinuating that they’re a “liar” or that they “overreacted” when they just wanted to express a grievance. And a surprisingly large number of people are harassing them and accusing them of starting a “racist campaign” towards Rose when they are a trans minority as well. If the fandom is so quick to villainize my friend for simply speaking out then frankly I don’t want to be a part of this fandom.

I hope you also have a good day.

[evocatiio]

if chibnall was the one writing this season you lot would be talking VERY differently

[le-panda-chocovore]

Kinda meta but. Satosugu on both ends.

[ ID in ALT ]

Let me elaborate.

Teenagers SatoSugu is the cutest thing ever. They're the only one who are able to catch up with the other. They're the strongest together. They are pieces of a puzzle that fit perfectly. They complete each other, they understand each other, they help each other and more importantly, they love each other. No one else can follow the path of Gojo Satoru and makes him feel human other than Suguru. No one else can bring a genuine smile on Geto Suguru's face and makes his life worth living fully other than Satoru. They're the epitome of young exorcists.

Adults Satosugu are the messiest divorced couple ever. Satoru cannot love without consuming entirely the person. Suguru cannot be saved because he's already gone too far. They are soulmates and cannot live without the other. They have been separated for years. They cannot kill each other, they cannot be with each other. They never forgot the other. Their breakup happened eons ago and they still consider the other as their one and only. And they make it everyone else's problem. Because Satoru wasn't able to burn Suguru's body, the Shibuya Incident happened. Because Suguru's memories of Satoru were so strong, Kenjaku was able to make his plan and seal the strongest sorcerer. Every one of their choices and words and actions was just an I love you so fucking loud that it doomed the universe to destruction.

[peppermint-whiskers]

Wait I just realized something. Alice is part of the God Possessed Pentious AU. However, she’s also a part of your Zestious fic “A Hundred Years and Many More”. Does… does that imply that, at least in your fic, Zestial had a crush on Pentious. Then Pentious died and got possessed by God. If so, I cannot WAIT for that reaction!

“The guy I had a crush on is, not only alive, but is also GOD’S VESSEL!!????!!!” [insert Catholic Guilt here]

Hi, thanks for the ask! "A Hundred Years and Many More" was more of a test run for the backstory, and the backstory (with Alice's glorious presence uwu) is actually part of the au

BUT

I think it'd be hilarious if Zestial and Pentious had this lingering crush on each other the entire time XD Maybe Zestial's was born out of intrigue more than romance, but they both had CRUSHES

And now god's over here like "what's with you and crushing on people who could destroy you??? what the fuck, man???" because he knows. Pentious can't really hide his massive crushes because he can't hide shit XD

[vaguely-concerned]

Origins is of course the DA game most closely in conversation with and playing around with Tolkien (right down to the walking talking poetree haha) -- and even more so than most works in the larger western fantasy tradition derived from Tolkien's work that DA:O also hails from and owes a lot of its Stuff to, what makes the game so great to me is that it's doing so very deliberately, and is subverting and deconstructing those tropes and entrenched ideas in some very interesting ways without at all denigrating what it's commenting on. (it doesn't have the almost disdainful undertones of the vein of fantasy that seeks to make the world more 'realistic' ala the more tedious reactions to G.R.R.Martin's work, for example, despite having the darker fantasy bent to it.) among other elements it adopts, what I find the most fascinating is the choice to use the same literary device/conceit Tolkien did in ostensibly only having in-universe biased sources and works to deliver the world through (which I feel is an underappreciated thing about his approach but is part of what makes his world so enduringly compelling and real-feeling -- the feeling of real scholarship devoted/applied to a made-up world. the grounding effect of a good diegetic footnote about source criticism, truly).

many things to be said there, and I'm glad each following game has taken on different perspectives and lenses and traditions to view the world of Thedas through because if you stick with that one too closely for too long I fear we could teeter precariously close to Pratchett's famous and bitingly accurate accusation of most modern fantasy of that era just being about rearranging the furniture in Tolkien's attic lol. and while you could accuse DA2 (my perfect wife who has never done anything wrong in her life to be clear) of many things, that's not one of them, they are pulling on some completely different strings for that one and both the game and DA overall is better for it, to my mind. as so many things in this series: worth staying with and exploring for an installment even if it might get stale if all of it was like this! people are understandably sad about the elements from previous games that they liked which were lost along the way, but that capacity for reinvention is to my mind a huge strength of dragon age as a whole.

(I think Veilguard is coming in as a close second in Tolkien conversation-ness if only in outlining/revealing the worldbuilding that indeed may have been planned since DA:O around the animosity that SHOULD by all rights exist between dwarves and elves in this universe (as per Tolkienesque tradition standards). but doesn't really because you see: politics and the many pitfalls of conservation of knowledge over the ages. our ancestral enmity got semi-intentionally lost between the floorboards of history and you know what. maybe for the best. the humans are already up to so much shit you gotta keep your eyes on them at all times you can't be brawling with each other in the deep roads while they're still around getting up to their nonsense or they'll just pile up even more of it)