#I’m very tempted to start a second playthrough already

[elcorhamletlive]

Top 5 Mass Effect companions? Your meta posts have me pretty tempted to pick up the remastered trilogy and try it out 😊

Ooooh i'm glad to hear it! Mass Effect has such a special place in my heart and I'm always happy to encourage other to play it. I actually haven't tried the remastered edition yet, but I've heard only good things about it.

Onto the list:

5. Samara. Number 5 is hard to choose because I seriously like everyone in ME, and Samara is far from being one of the squadmates with most content, but still, she is such a striking presence and I treasure every scene with her through the trilogy. I love her status as this super powerful extreme moralist and how it contrasts with her relationship with her daughters (she is kind of a terrible parent, which I love). I love her voice acting and her dramatic but also serious and intimidating dialogue. Her loyalty quest has some bits of wonky writing, but it's different from other quests and carries such a mysterious and epic vibe that I can't help but adore. I love her.

4. Garrus. It's an unpopular opinion to have him so low, but I guess because people worship him so much I never had to justify liking him, so he's not a character I'm particularly protective of, which justifies this ranking. Anyway. Garrus is popular for a reason: He's just a great guy with one of the best character arcs of the entire trilogy, and the fact that Shepard can actually shape his moral compass and the person he becomes is really an awesome bit of writing and helps to reinforce how important their friendship it. I always have a weakness for characters trying to do the right thing and be just in a fundamentally unjust setting, even if they mess it up terribly, so there was no question I'd love him from his introduction. No Shepard without Vakarian, indeed.

3. Mordin. It's funny that Mordin is technically only a squadmate for one game, because he's one of the most memorable characters of the franchise and, in my opinion, the one with the best character arc. When he was first introduced I was wary of him because the Genophage is one of the bits of ME lore that always struck me the hardest, I wanted to cure it since finding out what it was, so having the guy who was responsible for it on my crew wasn't something I was looking forward to. But from his introduction Mordin is such an interesting character with so many layers, and the way the writing deals with his own sense of guilt and how he represses it, and how in ME3 he finally gets to admit to himself and to the world he made a mistake and work towards fixing it, is just so, so well done. His final scene in ME3 marks the ending of my favorite mission of the entire trilogy, and in both the full Paragon and the full Renegade playthroughs he gets one hell of a fantastic send off. Just... really, really good.

2. Kaidan. Kaidan is kind of the opposite of Garrus to me, in that I feel like I've become a lot more attached to him because I find myself having to defend him so often. People tend to dismiss him as "boring" which I find so unfair and part of general fandom trend I hate - to view any character who isn't quippy and funny as someone with no personality. With Kaidan I find it specially absurd because you literally only have to talk to him a few times and you get a sense of who he is, and who he is is a very great guy. He has his issues, he bottles stuff up a lot, but in general he's introduced as pretty much the only member of your crew with a good moral compass (his story about Vyrnnus is a perfect example of a person who is actually managing to deal with meeting new species without falling into a racist, defensive posture). He's not a doormat either - people get mad at him for lashing out at Shepard during Horizon but he was right! Cerberus sucks and it's sketchy as hell for Shepard to suddenly be working with them! And I think the fact he openly disagrees with that makes his relationship with Shepard more interesting, because he's not afraid of challenging them. It's great tension and the way it builds up and blows up in Mass Effect 3 is something I love (and which works fantastically for his romance with M!Shepard).

1. Liara. I mean... What can I say? One of the defining moments of my very first Mass Effect playthrough was the "wait, can I be gay in this? oh hell YES i can be gay in this" moment, and I fell in love with Liara from her very first scene. My OG Shepard never had eyes for anyone else, and why would she? Liara is such a loveable character from the start, with her awkward flirting and her dorky excitement over the historic implications of what you're discovering (that no one else seems to give a shit about lol). Her romance comes across as believable, being so sweet at first and then taking a tragic turn in the second game, which is dealt with amazingly in the Shadowbroker DLC. And what I love most about it is that Liara as a character grows so much while you're apart, and yet we also get to witness some of it in the DLC. Then in ME3 she's already a far cry from the inexperiened scientist you met in the first game, but she's still very much her, still attached to an overly romantic view of the protheans, still caring and compassionate and brave. People complain about her reaction to Thessia which annoys me so much, because it's such a realistic reaction, it's a moment of vulnerability that makes perfect sense and it helps to keep the stakes of the war feeling high. And I love that even near the end she's thinking ahead, trying to help future generations who might face the reapers if you fail, but also preserving Shepard's memory because she loves her so much. I adore Liara.

[tree-woven]

i was holding back but now that a friend finished her first dai playthrough and immediately started her second i’m incredibly tempted to just... do the same. so now i’m forcing myself to write a detailed to-do list, with “start a new dai playthrough” on the very bottom... we’ll see how this goes, since i’ve already spend an hour looking at mods

[msbarrows]

Quilla, My Bestest Town Ever!

So after saying in the tags on my Banished post that went up Wednesday morning that I didn’t think there were many more of the accomplishments I wanted to try for, I promptly went and had a super-playthrough that got me 27 of the 36 possible, leaving me at 34 of 36. Holy crap this was a good town.

Started playing Wednesday afternoon, played through until it was already Thursday, then Thursday afternoon resumed, and continued playing until late Thursday evening. I initially had fairly minor plans; I wanted to try for Isolationist (300 citizens without building a trading post) and decided to combine it with One With Nature (400 citizens without building fields, orchards, or pastures) so I wouldn’t be wanting seeds or livestock, and therefor wouldn’t be tempted to build a trading post to trade for same. In looking further down the list of accomplishments, I figured that since I wouldn’t have a ton of villagers tied up in farming and animal husbandry, I might as well also try for the Miner and Mason accomplishments (have two mines or two quarries respectively, with 30 employees at each for 3 years - which seemed weird since mines and quarries only need 15 employees each (more on this later)). And then since I’d be doing so much mining and quarrying without using the results as trade goods... well, I might as well try for a few accomplishments based on those resources, like Blacksmith (equip a population of 200 with steel tools for 4 years), Highwaymen (build a town with 2000 stone paved road tiles) and Built From Stone (build a town with 100 stone houses).

Since I was trying for One With Nature, I also decided to start in hard mode, which gives you just 4 families, nothing pre-built, and no seeds or livestock. But to make things a trifle easier on myself I also went for a large map and a mild climate. And thus started Quilla (first screenshot). Using the stuff I’d learned up in earlier playthroughs, I laid out major building sites ahead of time (second screenshot), and it wasn’t long before I was creating my first extension on the other side of the river that zig-zagged through my map (third screenshot). I achieved Isolationist within the first 50 years, and ditto One With Nature. Along the way I’d also picked up Educated (Fully educated population of at least 200 adults for 4 years).

Now that I could build a trading post, I decided to aim for Farmer as well (have access to all 3 livestocks, 8 fruit & nut trees, and 8 crop types), because even with all the building I was doing, I had tons of trade goods available (fourth screenshot). At this point I was checking for other accomplishments I might as well knock off if conditions were right, like Golden Gate Bridge (a bridge at least 50 tiles in length - fifth screenshot). I achieved Built From Stone, Highwaymen, and Blacksmith, in the course of which I also knocked off Stonework (produce 10,000 blocks of stone within a 100 year period) and Ready for Anything (Simultaneously stockpile 2000 logs, 2000 fuel - not sure if that was firewood or coal or both - 500 stone, 500 iron, 200 tools, 200 coats, and 30k food). And that was the end of the first very lengthy playsession.

Today (Thursday, when I’m tyoing this, though it won’t be posted until Friday morning) I settled in to see what else I could manage to accomplishment. I hit Lumberjack pretty soon after (produce 10k logs within a 100 year period), and all my trading also saw Farmer finished off:

With that is was super-easy to get Food Variety (plant all types of fields and crops and harvest same within a single year... which sounds tricky once you know orchards take several years of growth before they start producing fruit and nuts, but is actually ridiculously easy if you already have mature orchards of all of them). You can see the cluster of orchards and fields I planted specifically for the accomplishment in the lower right area of the eigth screenshot (seventh shows how many carefullly-spaced-out docks I was developing along the river... and this is just one small stretch of them).

Along in there I also got Village (population of 600 citizens), Stylish (population of over 200 with warm coats for 4 years), Smelter (produce 10k iron within a 100 year period).

Now I was very purposefully setting up conditions for specific accomplishments I hadn’t originally planned on, like Exports (stock a trading post with at least 500 ale, 300 steel tools, and 200 warm coats), Master Builder (build a town with 3 churches, 5 boarding homes, 4 markets, 5 hospitals, 2 trading posts, 6 taverns, and a town hall), Master Trader (trade 100k units of stuff in one town - basically I bought a lot of stuff whether or not I technically needed it atm). I rolled over the 100 year mark and got Established (town of at least 300 citizens after 100 years). In fact shortly after that I got Town (reach a population of 900 citizens) because I also decided to take advantage of a couple large nomadic groups to get Immigrants (allow 200 nomads into a single town).

Then I also got Jack of All Trades (town of over 200 people with someone working in every profession for at least 5 years) and Livestock (have a town with at least 60 cattle, 75 sheep, and 180 chickens).

By this point I’d given up on the Miner and Mason accomplishments; I just couldn’t get conditions right for them, no matter what I tried, even after consulting google to try and figure out what I was doing wrong. By this point my town was bustling enough (and trading enough) that I needed more than just two mines and two quarries. So I gave up, built a bunch more of both... and a few years later got the accomplishments!? I think what the wording on them should have said was something along the lines of “have at least two mines/quarries, and at least 60 employees total working for 3 years” to get it. Because it sure didn’t happen when I had just two of each with 30 extra employees.

The final two accomplishments I gathered in were Tombstone (fill graveyards with at least 400 graves) and Firefighter (build 20 wells in a single town).

There’s just two accomplishments left, and I really, really do not feel like trying for either of them right now; one of them is 300 citizens without ever building a school (which I may attempt at some future date), and the other is having a population of 500 after 200 years. I... very much don’t feel like ever playing for 200 years - this town or a new one - especially considering I have already reached > 900 citizens. So I’m probably finished with Banished for now, since I have so many other games I picked up in the Steam summer sale to try out.

Though this was an extremely enjoyable (if lengthy) town to play.

[luckyspike]

An Absolute Menace - A Good Omens fanfiction

behold and lo for i have heard your cries for a sequel to the whole Crowley is a twitch streamer story

and i have written this monstrosity (4k words)

have fun enjoy

(credit to BrownMan and LetsPlay, without whose playthroughs I never would have been able to accomplish this level of detail since i do not own the game or requisite gaming system)

-

2000 hours GMT: Stream time.

There is only one problem tonight, and that problem is that Crowley, retired demon and part-time Twitch streamer, has lost his voice. Oh, certainly, he could miracle his vocal cords back to health, soothe the inflammation brought on by an entire afternoon screaming at Manchester the day prior, no problem. But that would remove his excuse to look forlorn while Aziraphale brewed yet another pot of honey-infused tea, and more importantly, would negate his entire strategy for the stream tonight.

If asked directly, he would deny that he had intentionally screamed exceptionally loudly the day prior. That would be an outright lie but, well, demon.

“Come on, angel,” he wheedles hoarsely, over the rim of a steaming mug of tea. “Please?”

“I don’t know the first thing about video games, dear boy.” Aziraphale maneuvers the mug away from Crowley for a second, long enough to deposit a dollop of honey into the mug and stir it in. “I don’t understand why you don’t just fix it for yourself. Really, frivolous miracles aren’t exactly something we should be worried about anymore -”

A memory swims to the forefront of Crowley’s brain, and he slumps. Tries to look pathetic. Aziraphale is better at it, always, but Crowley is fairly competent when he needs to be. “It’s not the same,” he manages. He sounds absolutely pathetic, and his voice cracks pitifully at the end. “It doesn’t work the same.” He sips the tea - too much honey for him, it mingles unpleasantly with the ever-present taste of ash, but it does feel good going down. “Come on, angel, I’ll pick a really easy game. Just tonight. Please?”

Aziraphale watches him for a moment. Frowns thoughtfully. Sips his own tea. “You planned this.”

“I did not.” He sets the mug down, sprawls across the counter, and looks up at Aziraphale, eyes wide and pleading. “Please, Aziraphale. It’ll be on the Switch, nice and easy, I’ll sit right next to you the whole time in case you need help. I can’t do a three-hour talking thing tonight.”

“Hm.” He purses his lips. Takes another sip of tea. “You’ll owe me.”

“Absolutely. Anything you want. Baked goods, rare books … I’ll even go to the opera, if you want. One whole night, not a word out of me, just respectful and quiet.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it.” It is an agreement, and the angel sets his own mug down, the better to straighten his bow tie. “You swear it’ll be an easy game, yes?”

“Cross my heart,” says Crowley, solemn. “It’s about animals. You like animals.”

“I do, rather.”

Aziraphale sits, awkwardly, in Crowley’s usual chair in front of the bank of monitors in the den while Crowley fiddles with a few things on the computer. He hands Aziraphale the controller, briefs him on the buttons (“Right, move with that thing, yeah just push it around, you’ll figure it out, and your right hand has all the little letter buttons”), and then, after affirming that they’re both ready for whatever Crowley has in store, starts the stream.

He starts, as he always does, with the introduction: “Hey guys, welcome to the stream, I’m your host AJ, variety streamer and quite possibly the oldest streamer on Twitch*. And this is … uh, Ari Fell, he’s been in a few videos, why don’t you introduce yourself?”

[* He definitely is. By a long shot.]

Aziraphale had been in a few videos by this point, most significantly the infamous Nuzlocke run of Pokemon X, which was thrilling and captivating and ended up with both of them crying over the untimely demise of Blanche Devereux, the plucky little Diggersby that perished in the final conflict with the Elite Four. He’d been in a few others, too, and by now they have a routine down. Crowley has the same standard introduction every time, but when Aziraphale makes an appearance, he likes to mix it up.

“Yes, I’m Mr. Fell. AJ’s best friend, his eternal nemesis and your … ah, local tartan enthusiast.”

Crowley snorted. “Accurate. Anyway, as you all -” all 500 people, and counting, although Aziraphale tries immediately to banish that thought and forget that section of the monitors ever existed “- can probably tell, got a bit of a voice problem right now, not really up to a full stream, so I’ve pulled in the backup to try out a little game that’s gotten a lot of press in the past but I never got around to it. You’ll like it, s’got animals in it.” He taps a few buttons on the computer, and the game screen changes. Soothing piano music begins, and they are both bathed in the blue light of the monitor. “So this is Untitled Goose Game by House House. Now, angel -” Aziraphale ignores the deluge of heart icons that fills the chat “- you have never played this game before, correct?”

“You know I haven’t.”

“Great. So the whole point is to be a goose and complete the items on your checklist. Hit ‘begin’.” He coughs, and takes a swig of tea as the screen loads in an image of a little clearing. “Right, says ‘press Y to honk’ so press the Y button and honk.”

Honk. Aziraphale frowns. “Is this the whole game?” Honk. Honk. Honkhonkhonkhonkhonk.

“Nah, says press B to run.” Aziraphale, a little tentatively, begins to maneuver his goose avatar around the screen. He gets increasingly confident, following the tutorial as it directs him.

“Oh, wings, of course, my wings. Can I fly?”

“Nah. Grounded like the rest of us poor saps.” He grins in the face of Aziraphale’s scowl, and takes a diversionary sip of tea. Honk. “Right, through the gate, there you go, tutorial done.”

“Seems simple enough.” Aziraphale is studying the screen, thoughtful, as his goose paddles across the lake. “Now, you said a to-do list - oh! Oh, where’s the dash button? Ah, there. Yes. Excellent, alright. So first it looks like we need to get into the garden.” Crowley nods, and Aziraphale reads on. “Get the groundskeeper wet? What has the groundskeeper ever done to me?”

“Nothing. When has a goose ever needed justification for its actions?”

“Hm, yes. Yes, I suppose you’re right. ‘Steal the groundskeeper’s keys’.” He sighs. “Crowley you picked this game on purpose. You wanted to tempt me into making mayhem.”

Crowley is laughing. “I did,” he confirms. “Oh, definitely, definitely did.”

“Right, well, I suppose it’s just a video game.” He straightens up a little. “And I am a goose. They’re practically agents of chaos in their own right anyhow, so nothing lost.” Crowley is laughing and coughing in the background, curled up in his chair with his free arm around his knees. “Very well. ‘Make the groundskeeper wear his sun hat.’ That one’s not so bad. ‘Rake in a lake’ … well rakes are waterproof so - oh! Have a picnic! How nice.” Crowley does not agree, mostly because he is too busy laughing. 

“I suppose I’ll start with the nicer ones.” He leaves the to-do list, and starts wandering around in the game. “Is there a way into the garden? Perhaps if I get on top of these bags. Is that a radio?” Crowley giggles, although it comes out more of a whimper. “I’ll just move that. I say! Bagpipes!”

“I think I need this for the picnic, anyway, don’t I? Where do I go to find the blanket?” He runs around for a minute, radio playing some kind of bagpipe rendition. Honk. “Argh!” The groundskeeper appears from stage right, and begins to pursue the goose. “No, I need this! No, it’s mine now!” The goose swims into the lake. “Hah! Mine. No!” The groundskeeper pursues him, and the goose drops the radio. “No, I took that!” Honk. Honk honk. The goose pursues the groundskeeper now, and snatches the radio back out of his hand, turning and escaping hurriedly into the pond. “Haha! Catch me now!” The goose paddles across the pond, escaping under the bridge. When he crosses under the bridge, the groundskeeper turns back, defeated. “Crow - AJ, look! I got the radio!”

“Yeah.” Crowley is wheezing, curled up in the chair, the tea safely stashed on the nearest plant stand. “Good job, buddy, you got it.”

“Did you see him chase me into the pond? The cheek. I did mark off the ‘get the groundskeeper wet’ item though.” On-screen, the goose is wandering around, tinny music blasting from the radio. “Now if I could only find the blanket …” He looks happily surprised. “Aha, but he opened the garden gate!” The goose waddles toward the gate, when suddenly the groundskeeper appears from the garden, summoned by the siren song of his radio. “No! No, not again!” Honkhonkhonkhonk. The goose, once again, flees into the pond and under the bridge. “Give up already, you stupid man!”

“I’m dying,” Crowley gasps hoarsely in the background. “I’m actually dying.”

“Where’s the blanket?” Aziraphale is coming as close as he ever does to snarling. “I have never in all my years had to work this hard to have a picnic!”

Crowley is clutching his sides. “That makes one of us,” he manages, before lounging back in the chair and coughing, face aching from laughing. “Oh I’m gonna die.”

“When have you had to put in this much effort for a picnic?” Aziraphale grouses, before he brightens when he spots the plaid picnic blanket. “Ha! Got it!”

“Oh, I dunno, basically from ‘You go too fast for me’ until about three years ago.” Honk. The goose freezes because Aziraphale has whipped around in his chair, the better to glare at Crowley.

“Dear boy.”

“You asked,” he says, before he dissolves into giggles again. “Go on, you have to finish the picnic.”

Honk. “We’ll discuss this later.”

“I imagine we will.” Crowley lunges forward, taps a button on the keyboard, and leans in close to Aziraphale, smarmy grin plastered on his face. “Love you, you’re pretty.”

“There’s a microphone -”

“Muted it.”

“... You’re an absolute nightmare.”

“And you’ve got 600 people watching you pretend to be a goose.” He jerks his head toward the computer. “Game on, angel.” The button is tapped again, the microphone live again. “Sorry, technical difficulties, nothing to see here. How’s the picnic going?”

Gradually, the items for the picnic are assembled. Aziraphale, as the groundskeeper goes on chasing him, becomes more antagonistic. “I’m going to steal this crate just because I can.” He gasps. “A goose hole!”

“A goose hole!” Crowley wheezes behind him. “Yes, a goose hole! Get his keys and throw them in the pond!” 

By the time the to-do list updates with ‘make the groundskeeper hit his thumb with a hammer’, Aziraphale has fully embraced his bastard side and is more than eager to honk with prejudice. The second phase of the game is worse: the shopkeeper that continuously chases him away with a broom becomes the fully-realized subject of his ire, and Aziraphale pursues her with all the determination of a spiteful avenging angel. When the challenge comes to lock her in the garage, he complies with gusto, even confining her beyond the required instance.

“You stay in there you hateful creature,” he grumbles, as the door once again comes down and entraps her. “Forever.”

“You bastard,” Crowley snickers in the background. “You’re brilliant.”

When he proceeds to the third portion of the game, he waddles straight into the meticulously-kept garden of the older gentleman reading his newspaper. Honk! “This is the next twenty minutes of your life, sir, dreadfully sorry, but I’m sure you’ll do something in the next fifteen seconds to absolve me of guilt.”

The man does not, truthfully, do anything to make Aziraphale feel less guilty about stealing his slippers, his hat, and the rest of his possessions, although the woman next door with the painting is annoying enough with her constant fence repairs that the angel is able to alleviate some of his guilt by mis-directing his frustration with her to the man. After he accomplishes the ‘do the washing’ task, the two of them watch in amused fascination as the man tries to throw the woman’s bra back over the fence and misses, repeatedly.

“I spent eight pounds on this game,” Crowley observes. His voice is barely-audible at this point, between the laughing and the occasional instructions to the angel. “What a spectacular physics engine.”

“Is that a lot for a game?”

“It is a criminally low amount to charge for this game.” The man again fails at throwing the bra at the fence. “Can you imagine if we walked outside one day and saw our neighbors doing this?” His eyes widen. “What if you could possess a goose and instigate all this in real life?”

“Can demons possess geese?” Aziraphale has moved on, and is dragging the woman’s duck statue away so that he can impersonate it and get dressed up with a ribbon.

“Nah. Geese are already demonic - too much evil for one soul, probably explode. Or become a Mega-Goose and destroy the world.” He looks thoughtful. “I hope demons can’t possess geese.”

“Mm.” The woman fastens the bow on his neck, and Aziraphale beams. Honk! The woman falls down. “Look how dapper he looks with the ribbon!” He flees, through the hole in the fence, and into the next zone. Crowley groans, nearly silently. He checks his watch.

“Angel, you’ve been going for three hours. You want to save this for later?” If Aziraphale hears him, he doesn’t acknowledge it, instead studying the to-do list.

“‘Make the old man fall on his bum’ … Mhmm. Let’s do that one first.”

“Oy.” Crowley slouches forward, his hands folded and resting on Aziraphale’s shoulder. “You’ve been going three hours. You can call it and finish the game next stream, if you want.”

Aziraphale turns to him, brow furrowed, entirely incredulous. “Dear boy, you can’t possibly be serious. This town is absolutely discriminating against fine, upstanding geese -” Crowley lets his forehead fall onto Aziraphale’s shoulder, his own skinny shoulders once again shaking with laughter, “and I will not rest until I’ve put them all into their place.” Honk. “Now go get yourself some more tea, you sound dreadful.”

“Don’t break the computer.”

“I won’t.”

When the demon returns with a fresh mug, the typical honking of the goose has been replaced by a frantic off-key harmonica. “Serves you right for playing such an appalling instrument! Stop chasing me!” Crowley adds a slug of honey to the tea out of the plastic bear-shaped container, and relaxes back into his chair.

“What’re you doing now?”

“I’m going to make this man fall on his bum,” Aziraphale announces. “Hang on, wait for it …” The old man in the game starts to sit on the little stool, and Aziraphale directs the goose to snatch the seat out from under him. “Take that!” The character drops his harmonica too, and the goose snatches it up, waddling away and tooting through the infernal instrument relentlessly. “Mr. Fell strikes again!” 

Crowley puts his face in his hand, although he is grinning from ear-to-ear. “You’re a madman. You’ve gone mad with power.”

“Goose power,” Aziraphale agrees. “Nearly god-like.”

Crowley winces. “Careful,” he rasps. “Not that I don’t love the hubris but … you know.”

“Tell me it’s not.” He drops a bucket onto another man’s head, and then cackles as the man falls into a full box of tomatoes. The back of his trousers are splattered with tomato. “He’ll never get that stain out. It’d take a miracle.” Crowley snorts.

The most thrilling part, by far, is probably supposed to be the end of the game. The stealthy lift of the beautiful golden bell, and the sneaking back to the goose’s den where the bell is to be deposited to join its fellows. Crowley imagines that if he were to be the one playing it, he would be sneaking through, crouching all the while, waiting around corners for people to be distracted before slinking by with the bell, careful not to make a sound.

But Crowley is not playing, and never before, he thinks, has the difference between a celestial soldier and an infernal demon of temptation and subtlety been so stark. Aziraphale seizes the bell, honks triumphantly, actually out loud with his mouth yells the word ‘Honk’, and takes off through the town. “The goose is loose, catch me if you can, suckers!” Crowley has just enough time to put his tea down on the plant stand before he is overcome with laughter once again, doubling over and spilling onto the floor. “It’s my bell now!”

He makes it all the way through the pub and into the garden of the poor neighbors before the first bell-theft occurs. The painter catches up to him as he drops the bell to destroy the desk, and Aziraphale squeaks in indignation. “No! No, I worked hard for that!” He tugs the bell back away from the painter, and makes a bid for the desk. She catches up to him.

“No! No, you won’t - just drop it, I’m taking it, you can’t stop me!” She snatches the bell again, and begins to walk away. “You’ll be the first to fall under my vengeance!” The goose waddles to the larger bell in the garden, and a resounding bong distracts the painter from her task. The goose, once again, grabs the bell from her hand and hurries over the desk, across the fence. “Hah! Thwarted!”

“You showed her,” Crowley wheezes from his place on the floor, where he has resolved himself to watching the finale upside-down. “Go, angel, go!”

“You’ll never take me alive!” His eyes widen. “Oh, no the shopkeeper. We’re going to have to get past the shopkeeper. She’s atrocious.”

“Just run?”

“She’s fast. She’s wily.” He frowns. “Oh, this part would be perfect for you, dear boy - I’m sure you’d slip past her without any trouble.”

“Oh, indubitably, but you’re the one playing. Just try sneaking.”

He tries to sneak. Probably. It’s a terrible attempt, and the shopkeeper is alerted to the goose with the golden bell soon enough, giving chase. Aziraphale flees, straight into a dead-end. “No! No, you abominable woman that’s mine, that’s -” Honkhonkhonkhonkhonkhonkhonkhonkhonk. The woman knocks the bell from the goose’s beak. “Assault! Thief! Stop!” Honkhonkhonkhonk. He nips the bell from her hands and runs. “Later loser!”

The groundskeeper, for all the consternation he caused early in the game, does not present much of a problem. Aziraphale darts past him, bell jangling, honking madly, and swims briskly across the pond to his base in the little glade. Proudly, honkhonkhonk, he proceeds to the gulley where a good five-plus bells are already deposited. He drops the bell. Crowley claps.

“Angel! You beat a video game!”

Aziraphale throws his hands up in victory. “I’m the greatest goose in the world!” He turns to Crowley, who also has thrown his hands in the air in celebration, and slaps him with a high-five hard enough to nearly dislocate the demon’s elbow. “The town surely has been taught the error of their ways.”

“Yep, you showed them. You’re a bloody menace.” The game tinkles out another piano riff, and they glance at the screen. “Oh, there’s more.”

“Is there?” But the angel is already studying the task list. “‘Make the boy fall into a puddle’ - oh, I’m certainly doing these.” Crowley has since slithered back up into his chair, and is sipping at his tea, the better to soothe his voice which, after the laughter Aziraphale induced with his bell escape, is essentially completely gone. Aziraphale pats him on the knee. “I’ll play off-stream, though, Cr - AJ. I wouldn’t want to steal your time.”

Crowley shakes his head, and points to the chat stream. Aziraphale looks, and then smiles. ‘No, on stream!’ seems to be the overwhelming sentiment, accompanied by various pictographs and variations on ‘Nooooo more Fell!! More Fell!’ “Oh, you’re all much too kind.” Hearts explode in the chat. “Oh, my.” He turns to Crowley the better to disguise the flush in his cheeks. “I suppose I did alright, then?”

Crowley nods, encouragingly, and then gestures to the computer. “Sign off and end the stream,” he whispers, with a heavy element of hissing. Aziraphale considers that if they hadn’t known each other for so long, he might not have understood him. Crowley waves a hand again, as if shooing Aziraphale toward the computer screen, and he turns back around, suddenly unsure of what to say in the face of the camera.

“Ah. Very well. I suppose that’s all for tonight. I … I’m afraid I don’t remember what you usually say at the end, dear.” He looks to Crowley, who shrugs. “I suppose I could make up my own. Ah …” He thinks about it, and then smiles, peaceful and content. “Thank you for staying, I hope you had a nice time. Be kind to one another.” He turns, nods to Crowley, and the demon nods back, leans forward, and taps the stream off. 

“Did I do alright?” Aziraphale asks, as soon as the screen showing the viewers’ perspective goes dark. Behind him, Crowley tosses his sunglasses onto the plant stand next to his mug.

“You were perfect. Wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“No, it was … fun.” He looks toward the computer. “What nights do you usually do this?”

Crowley swallows, the better to make his voice at least somewhat audible. “Well, tomorrow’s one, typically. And I doubt I’ll be up to a full stream even in 24 hours …”

“Perfect. Back to Goose Town, then.”

“Back to Goose Town.” He grabs his mug off the plant stand, takes a slow, meditative drink, and watches Aziraphale for a minute, yellow eyes fixed on blue. “You can really be a bastard sometimes, you know it?”

“Yes, but as a goose I am absolved of my actions by virtue of being a goose. It’s just goose-driven mischief.”

“True.” Crowley sighs, and leans into the angel, eyes closing, at peace. “I still like it.”

“You would.” Aziraphale idly runs his fingers through the demon’s hair, and sighs as well, equally content. “So I’ll play again tomorrow. And then …?”

“Well, if you don’t finish, you can take another day, too.” He shrugs. “You want to do another one?”

Aziraphale considers it. “Are there … games for two people?”

“Oh? Oh, yeah. Loads.” He coughs. “Bunch of ‘em.”

“Without a lot of murder?”

“Yep.” He is quiet for a long time, and Aziraphale thinks he must have fallen asleep like that, slouched up against Aziraphale’s shoulder, mug of tea nestled loosely between his knees. Aziraphale is considering how he will take him to bed; last time he tried to carry him in a bridal carry, and he tripped over the rug in the hall and dropped the demon, who promptly turned into a snake and hid under the couch for twelve hours. He figures he will start with the tea, and inches his hand toward the mug, before it spills. Unexpectedly, Crowley stirs, and takes another gulp of tea. “You think you might like a game about farming?”

“Farming?” He hums thoughtfully. “Maybe. I’m sure if it’s with you, I’ll enjoy it.”

“Maybe we can do that one next, then.” He blinks his eyes open and yawns. “Long as you let me organize the greenhouse. You can have the galaxy sword.”

Aziraphale smiles softly. “Might not be a good idea. I don’t have a great track record with swords.”

“Hm. True.” He shrugs. “Figure it out when we get there, I suppose.”

[halberdierminister]

July Monthly Goals Check-In

1. Write 250 Words Each Day Well, I started out very faithful to this. But sometime around the middle of the month, I got pretty choppy. I honestly don't know exactly how many days I skipped. I'm gonna try to write a fair amount today when I can and hope that it is enough to make up for it. Which is fine. It has been an otherwise very productive month in many other ways, so I cannot be too upset about it. I may start running a wordpress blog with a friend of mine, and if I do that may keep me more on track with these.. We shall see. We shall see.

2. Read 55 Books This Year I finished reading 55 books in May! Last month I read 10 more books. THIS month, however… I read 31 books. That brings me to a total of 97 books read for the year!!! A lot of them have been VERY short books. Lots of poetry collections, manga volumes, graphic novels, etc etc etc. But not exclusively!! I was hoping to get to 100 books by the time I wrote this but the last couple days, I have not been able to make the magic happen. But that's fine! That's TOTALLY FINE. This will be a very significant get, but I have months to get over that hump. By the time you hear from me on this goals check-in next month, I will undoubtedly be decently well over 100 books, and I can talk about why that personally feels so good then!

3. Get A Full Time Job I did not get a full time job this month. BUT. I applied to 38 full time jobs. Got a bunch of rejections. HOWEVER, I have scheduled EXACTLY ONE JOB INTERVIEW so far so that is good news! And that would be a VERY good job if I were to get it! Some of these jobs are actually pretty exciting things and I feel confident for the first time in a while that I might actually find a good job IN MY CAREER PLAN!!!! Also I almost lost my part time job but the library director was able to convince the village to let me stay on as a substitute, and it has paid off surprisingly well. I've been working two to three shifts a week on that, which is more than any of us expected. So I guess what I'm saying is I am making good progress again and I hope I can have something positive to report by the time I'm thirty. Eugh.

4. Move Out Speaking of being almost thirty. I really do not want to be here. If I get the job I interview for, I would be able to move in with my friends in Milwaukee just about as soon as possible. So that is good news. Every day it gets more tempting to just say "screw it" and live down there. But that won't help me find a job. And the job really is the important thing.

5. Drink Less Soda I mean yeah. Occasionally, I drink-a the soda. But not too much. I am good at drinking less soda than I did last year or the years before that. That's because I would have several sodas each day, to the point where it worried some of the people I know.

6. Get Something Published Just found out that I'm getting something else published today! So that is one new poem published this month! I also had my fic in the Lalonde Zine come out, but it turns out that the Lalonde Zine was more of a shared Google Drive folder than an actual zine. Maybe I should offer to compile the zine into one document? I should do that. That would be a good thing to do and it would give me a lot of experience with doing that, something I haven't really done in a while. So the practice would do me good! And then I would feel better saying that I got published there too. But yes so besides the Lalonde fic, I have had two poems published in zines, one poem published in an online literary journal, and one fic published in an online fanzine this year! If you include the articles I wrote for school newspapers, I have gotten at least one thing published every year for the past fifteen years. If you don't count the articles (or the Lalonde fic yet), I have had 30 pieces of fiction and poetry published since 2005! That's pretty neat! I want even more though!!!!!! I found a publisher's website that accepts unsolicited manuscripts. I'm going to try to put together an honest to god actual collection of my poetry, one bigger than either of the two digital chapbooks I have made. I have a friend who is a professional editor -- not of poetry, mind you, but I might be able to convince her to give it a shot -- and I would honestly hire her at full price to take a look at it. I actually will need to seek a lot of feedback from a lot of people, so if you want to read a document full of a bunch of my poetry, lemme know and I will show you what I've got when I've got something.

7. Finish Writing A Legitimate Businessman Finished in April! No new news. But just because I completed this goal doesn't mean that is the end of it! I do still have the sequel to work on, even though I haven't done any of that this month. And one of these days I am going to get around to sitting down with the printed copy and a pen and editing the shit out of it so that I can write draft #2! I think I'll probably throw draft #2 up on wattpad (why not?? I've been curious about that website and know absolutely nothing about it) and maybe I'll make a nice looking e-book out of it that I can distribute on noisetrade or itchio or something! I wonder if I could get it printed on demand or something. Obviously not for profit. But like, maybe I have friends I want to send a nice printed copy to.

8. Write More The Revelation of Takaya According to Jin Finished in Februrary! No new news. A friend of mine has offered to bind a copy of it when he has access to the materials, and I think that'd be dope as hell. I ought to work on compiling it into a nice document. I don't know if that's what he would need. He would probably want to do that work himself. Sometimes I think about the concept of making an illustration for it? I don't know. I can't draw. But I might not need to draw for the thing I have in mind. Really I should be consulting with him on that. Ah well. Either way, I hope that ends up happening. That would be so friggin cool.

MINOR GOALS

9. Finish Playthroughs Of 1. The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild: Finished in January! 2. Persona 1 Main Quest Good Ending: I didn't do anything on this whooooops. Getting into the second half of the year without once having touched it. I ought to get back to this. 3. Pokemon Sword: Finished in March! 4. Pokemon Let's Go Eevee: Finished in February and March! 5. Persona Q2: I have finished the fourth dungeon and gotten to The Twist!!! It's weak. This really is the kids' version of a Persona game. Minus like… the fact that it's still rated M for partial nudity. There was exactly one moment of horror and even that was like… just a bit scarier than The Nightmare Before Christmas. But I did some of the side quests and those are actually decently fun. So I have the final dungeon left. I just wanna sort of power through this. I'll worry about completion when I do new game plus, whenever that might be.

10. Record More Ukulele Videos I did not do this. I want a new microphone. These are not inherently related things, as I do have a microphone already. I have everything I need to do this. I just haven't done this. And I would like a new microphone. Also, an amp for the uke would be nice. I should text my old coworker, see if he still has one to sell.

11. Record Let's Plays Neither did I do this. How could I? My parents think video gaming is the Devil's Lettuce. And they are always home. They would notice if they heard me talking to my computer. And that is assuming that I had something I could play on my computer that anyone would want to watch. I need a better computer. A gaming computer. An editing computer. I'm lucky that these are the same thing.

12. Duolingo? I was SUPER gung ho in the end of June and the beginning of July, but before too long I petered out. I've used a couple streak freezes and have really been doing mostly the bare minimum to not drop out of the emerald league. But I've got a streak of about 208 days, and that is nothing to sneeze at! Do I feel like I'm learning? I dunno. But I am at least interacting with Spanish just about every day so that… that's got to be helpful, right? right?

This was over one thousand five hundred words. Wait! Sixteen hundred exactly.

[lizzybeth1986]

Hey, it's the Kiara Deserves Better™ anon! I haven't had the chance to finish it until recently. Your essay was great as always and highlighted why I'm so frustrated with how they've written Kiara. I'm tempted to ask you for another essay, but I'm not sure what to ask for xD. But I figured since you've written so much for me already, I thought I'd share about me: I want to replay and do Hana's route because she deserves better as always, so are there any diamond choices you would *not* pick?

Ahhh yes! I remember you xD I'm always happy to churn out essays as long as I know what I'm talking about 😅😅 I'm glad we agree about how frustrating (and downright disgushing) the treatment for Kiara was. I can't promise to do entire essays on her BUT I sure am planning some fanfic prominently featuring her and Hana 😃 I'm just in two minds because either I'll need to wait until TRH QTs are over or I'll need to abandon my QTs altogether. But I have loads of ideas and I'm impatient to start!!

Okay soooo...which Hana scenes wouldn't I pick? I think that depends on what kind of diamond content you wouldn't like, but rn I'll go with the ones I feel have least value in terms of actually getting to know her.

A lot of the times my problem is that you can tell when they wrote a scene clearly so you could gain advantages, rather than anything related to Hana herself. In such scenes she is not important - how the MC can use her (and at least on one occasion steal credit for Hana's creativity) is. Which bleeds into my overall problem with the canon Hana and MC dynamic (friendship or romantic) itself. Like, when you have to aggressively rewrite whole parts of canon in your fanfic to make your MC seem like a better friend at least...you know there is something wrong.

Book 1: Most of the scenes are top level! Cordonian Waltz...Piano Scene...Yacht scene...Her Confession Scene...Her Finale Scene...all very beautiful and very unique and they all explored different facets of her character. Like even the ones that are about skill or give perks have space for HER personally!

Perhaps some of the scenes in Applewood you can skip, but that would mean you won't get much time to interact with her on closer level there. The pie baking contest is really more about the special touches Hana adds to the pie (like the decoration and additional instructions), but I think you can win the contest for free as well! Buying the Derby champion horse also unlocks an extra scene where she teaches you dressage moves but a lot of the personal stuff she tells you is mostly free content. So on a more personal level (and if you don't mind Hana winning the horse race at Fox Hunt 😁) it doesn't exactly count for much and you can maybe give it a miss.

Book 2: Oof. Terrible mostly. I won't deny you'll find a few gems (Patisserie scene...Library scene...Proposal scene 😍😍😍 Even the McDermots scene is pretty good, besides that one dialogue option where they make Hana call Shanghai "ancient" 🙄). One of the worst ever Hana scenes comes from this book.

Hot Chocolate Scene: Okay so on it's own it's actually a nice scene! It involves genuine personal time with Hana where you ask her questions and show concern...and that gets harder to come by later on in the series. BUT the part that makes this so awful is that this scene should have been where we saw the flashback, not Drake's. In fact the scenes should have been reversed. Drake had no authority talking about something that involved Hana esp when Hana herself never gets the opportunity to use this fact (that Liam brought her back, not Madeleine) to her advantage. So yeah. This scene is good coz you know a little more about her family but awful coz she was robbed of the chance to talk about how she REALLY returned.

PARIS RUNWAY: I put this in caps and italics and red letters because it is the worst scene in the history of this series!!!! Like ever. Where do I even begin with the PROBLEMS in this one.

First, this is not a Hana scene. It's a Penelope scene with a Hana kiss tacked on at the end, for convenience. I bought the scene in my fail playthrough and didn't include Penelope and you could really feel the difference.

Second, like...you know how wearing the Snow Bunny outfit in Book 1 unlocks the Drake Meteor Shower scene, right? They could have easily used that kind of coding here. Buy the outfit and you unlock the chance to model. You know what happens if you don't buy it and buy the Hana scene? The audience applauds you for going on stage in a tank top and jeans. In Paris. It doesn't make any fucking sense!

Third, this particular chapter has diamond scenes for all three LIs. Liam gets to take the MC to the Eiffel Tower and talk about his father as a King and his vision for Cordonia, Drake gets an emotional reunion with his sister. Hana gets...this. A scene that doesn't even give HER importance coz no, kissing Penelope's ass is more important. Hana got bullied the previous night and Madeleine lied through her teeth about her motives the next day (by option) but no, the girl who secretly dragged our reputation through the mud is more important.

Fourth, the scene preceding this one was a group scene masquerading as a "Comfort Hana!" scene. That scene basically focused on anyone who wasn't Hana (including Olivia btw)

The other scenes are fine (following this is patisserie scene and library scene, my favourites in this book), and the Champagne scene is okay, but ultimately it's a decent scene that views the upcoming trip to NY as more important, and there is very little on Hana herself. When you think of that in the context of Hana having very little attention to herself in her own home, and the fact that in the next chapter she is NOT THERE...it's not great. But you can still purchase it because nothing can ever be as bad as the Paris Runway scene.

Book 3: Okay so in this book your scenes are split between "character" and "LI" scenes. The first you will get no matter who you are marrying, coz it's supposed to be about their issues or things only they can specifically impart to you. The second will be exclusively romantic scenes with your LIs.

Character Development Scenes: Hana has three and none of them are good at all. The team took laziness to a whole other level in this book. The Polo scene gives you extra perks at the game in Portavira, but there are very few variations between the "friend" version of this scene and the "LI" versions. Like when Hana has questions about her future the MC - whether she is marrying Hana or not - can claim (optionally) that Hana could be a "professional best friend" (to this day I don't understand why they couldn't replace that option with "Duchess" in Hana's playthrough). The scene where they get Hana's traditional handmade outfit was supposed to be the culmination of Hana's arc but it was awfully executed but the big downside to NOT buying it is that Hana never gets to wear that lovely outfit again (except for a brief time during the wedding). I would have called this the worst scene if Paris Runway didn't take that title and run with it. The Snow Angel scene is Lythikos is...okay, I guess? At least it's about her and not how the MC can best use her.

Again, in the case of both Polo scene and Snow Angel - the scenes are decent, but in both those chapters they're pitted against Drake scenes where you can see the difference in effort!! You can tell Hana's scenes were a real quickie, and devoid of any care or love from the writer for that character.

LI scenes: Thankfully you get better LI scenes for her in plenty. I'd avoid the one in the bathtub in Chapter 2. It's not very well written and the LIs all sounded like each other. This was originally a problem in the Applewood spa scene too but I think they changed it here and there. The rest of the LI scenes were pretty fantastic Hana wise. Some of them even delved a little into the aftereffects of her upbringing...which they never ever brought up again.

Honorary Mention: Hana's Gift. Coz every other LI gets beautiful gifts that are unique to them but for Hana the MC grabs a...telescope and slaps a Hallmark card message to it.

But the thing is that perhaps your criteria for what scenes would be good or not would be vastly different from mine, so do keep that in mind when you're choosing. A good way to gauge would be to maybe take a look at a particular scene on YouTube just to confirm.

Hope this helped!!

[airlock]

airlock grades the Gharnef archetype

so, I got a random hankering to start a text post series where I launch myself off on reviews of each character from a certain villainous archetype in Fire Emblem -- and hey, it’s a reasonably nice time of the year to be doing posts like these, what with that new upcoming entry that we learn more about each day, isn’t it?

to kick off the festivities, I’m doing one of my favorites -- let’s see who wore the heavy robes better!

(do note: under cut are spoilers for... everything, and also a significant amount of me criticizing or blamming characters that you might like. you’ve been warned! but if you’d still persist, you childish sword lord, then come along and meet my challenge-)

the man himself

(6/10)

although the execution suffers from myriad flaws -- of which several can be touted to stem from storage space limitations in FE1 and FE3, but are inexcusably retained in the remakes -- it’s not for no reason that this fellow spawned a lengthy line of imitators.

the detail of his backstory and motivation is brillant; he’s a perfectly understandable villain without being remotely redeemable -- a much-needed class in antagonist writing for more recent entries of the series. he’s also effective as a terrifying, genuinely threatening villain, implacable and powerful.

unfortunately, however, his excellently written characterization is largely confined to flavor; it fails to inform his actions or the flow of the plot, and so, he tends to come across as a plot device instead of a character. even his takeover of Khadein is written very powerfully for something that isn’t seen and barely influences any of the game’s events. and although his sheer ambition in withholding Falchion to eventually betray Medeus ends up coming across as a plot action instead of something steeped in his essence. and this all to say nothing of his second appearance, where he fully forgoes being a character and behaves indistinguishably from a non-sentinent madness-inducing talisman.

overall, he’s a splendid concept for a villain that is ultimately laid low in execution, largely because, back in his day, the text wasn’t big enough to comfortably carry him, and the more recent incarnations were ineffective in expanding it despite having more than enough room to do so.

I also docked a point or two for being an antisemitic/anti-roma stereotype in his earlier incarnations, what with the hooked nose and rare darker skintone; the remakes thankfully eschew this by swapping out the nose and making the skintone outright inhuman, but the more recent Heroes design, while an improvement on many fronts, seems to roll back on this one.

church gharnef

(6/10)

unlike the above-mentioned, this one was in a remake that changed a lot of things; I mention this as a healthy preface to the fact that I am only familiar with his more recent incarnation!

like Gharnef above, he’s an unforgivable, but genuine villain; while a lust for power is hardly fresh as far as motivations go, the game does reasonably well at establishing that he’s already powerful and influential, and has fallen to cruel orthodoxy in a bid to eliminate threats to his power at all costs -- in other words, his characterization is timelessly realistic.

unfortunately, however, that much is all text, if not outright fanon; the story proper restricts him to behaving as an unconvincing cacklefiend playing at a kidnap-the-princess plot that the princess in question should’ve been too strong and too smart to fall prey to. making Celica a somewhat willing hostage instead of a helpless captive was a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t cover the distance; it would have been far more interesting if Jedah had gotten the chance to overpower Celica in the arena of genuine manipulation through theological debate -- and on the other coin of things, I’m sure his preying on Celica’s fears would seem a lot more organic if not for how dedicated the game is to telling her that she’s wrong before she even takes the steps across the point of no return.

he’s much like the original Gharnef in being an intriguing concept that falls flat on execution, although with both of those qualities amped up -- even more interesting in theory, even flatter in practice.

discount gharnef

(2/10)

sorry not sorry for nicknaming him that!

I believe I’ve said it a number of times and I’ll say it again: Manfroy is a manipulative villain in a setting full of people who don’t need manipulation to make bad decisions and ruin their own lives. he comes across as a plot device at the best of times, and as a null factor at the worst of times; he brings nothing to any cutscene that he appears in.

Seliph’s visit to the Yied Shrine alludes to his backstory -- that which he shares with the rest of the cult -- but this instance is even poorer than previous examples at establishing a plot presence; it not only fails to inform Manfroy’s choices in any interesting way, but it’s also outright contradicted by his actions sometimes (cfr: withholding the Naga tome, in a move that brings Gharnef’s playbook to mind but makes no sense at all for Manfroy).

points have been docked again for racial stereotyping, also; the sprite alone doesn’t make it very evident but he’s also got a face that can be used as a fishing pole.

irrelevant gharnef

(1/10)

Veld is a step beneath even Manfroy, as yet another pointless manipulative villain -- notorious for stealing a slice of agency from one of the far more genuine antagonists of the setting -- who doesn’t make his presence felt at all. I was halfway tempted to consider Raydrik the actual Manfroy here, even.

he retains one point only for not being a racial stereotype, for once.

the absence of a gharnef

(wha?/10)

Binding Blade, for all its highly repetitious usage of archetypes (being, in fact, arguably responsible for making them a thing in the first place, where they were previously just repetitive Kaga quirks), seems to have eschewed the Gharnef. this actually somewhat works in its favor; although the game’s plot is ultimately one of the shallower ones in the series, the lack of a core manipulative villain puts the focus on the self-interested factionalism that each country suffers from as they fail to mobilize a resistance against the primary villain. so, overall, an approach that would have worked out great in Jugdral.

monsterfucker gharnef

(8.5/10)

where Binding Blade had succeeded in building a plot that doesn’t need a Gharnef, its prequel was successful in the opposite: creating one of the most effective incarnations of the archetype to date, and making him front and center, to boot.

although all Gharnefs thus far have been manipulative villains, Nergal and his cronies are the first ones who show true skill in manipulation -- as in, conning people into acting against their interests, in situations where they otherwise would not have. through this, he cements himself as the primary antagonist and driver of the plot, where his predecessors were content, if dishonest, in serving a greater evil. and he brings very perceptible weight to the position, specially in the scenes where he presses the buttons of the heroes; although he fails to ultimately discourage them from defeating him, it comes across as a result of heroic strength, not of ineffective villainy.

that said, however he shimmers and shines as the heavy, he’s somewhat held back by his backstory -- one that only partially succeeds at informing his actions (however compelling it is when it does manage to do so), and worse, is largely locked to second-playthrough bonuses, where the story would’ve benefitted much more from naturally doling out his secrets along the way.

I also docked a half-point because the pseudo-turban and goatee arguably veer into the racial stereotype territory again, although he at least has the point-for of not having an outright gonk design (even when the turban goes off). I should be clear: it’s not that I oppose having nonwhite/nonwestern elements on an antagonist at all, it just comes across rather poorly when certain elements are only seen on antagonists, and especially if it’s always on the ugly ones.

twink gharnef

(10/10)

Lyon is the apex of plot-driving gharnefs, plain and simple. undeniably sympathetic, but impossible to save, whether he’s too far gone or was never redeemable to begin with -- and in fact, this ambiguity is easily the most brillant aspect of all of the writing in Sacred Stones.

he’s characterized effectively from wire to wire: his appearance, mannerisms and fond flashbacks do an excellent job of disarming the player while setting them up for a staggering plot twist, but the game is also not too hesitant to bring the plot twist to fruition and saves enough time to keep building on him past the point when the big secret is out -- sidestepping a pervasive trap that otherwise often causes plot twists to weaken stories. and all the way to the end, it’s difficult to narrow his character down to one narrative that doesn’t feel strictly like a personal interpretation; there are as many Lyons as there are players, right down to the point where he comes across differently depending on whether you’re playing as Eirika or Ephraim!

there’s also credit to be given to the remainder of the cast that effectively props him up; because he has underlings that behave strongly on their own motivations -- and sometimes beyond even Lyon’s control -- he spares himself from behaving as a plot device to focus fully on serving as the genuine core of the story as a whole. I suppose he’s a good delegator if nothing else, eh?

depression gharnef

(4/10)

unlike the above, Sephiran fails crucially in one regard: he’s set up as an extremely endgame plot twist, which, coupled with a frantic, breathless third act that insuffices to fully explore the implications of the reveals it dishes out, causes his reveal to land closer to shock value than to the completion of an arc.

while his backstory is breathtakingly fascinating, it serves exclusively as a footnote to eulogize him with; it’s not just that his actions don’t seem to be informed by it, but rather that his actions completely lack weight in the plot, making it even somewhat arguable to class him as a Gharnef at all. in Path of Radiance, he only appears as an irrelevant mystery, and Radiant Dawn coming out to accredit him for some number of Ashnard’s deeds fails to budge that one’s sheer weight and doesn’t change perspectives.

it’s quite a shame, because in concept, he could’ve been the next Lyon; but the execution is painfully fragile, and amidst the complex web of characters and plots in Tellius, his greater-scope motions fail to be felt whatsoever until the late chapters of Radiant Dawn’s Part 3.

DIWNLF gharnef

(0/10)

(that’s “dad I would not like to fuck”, incidentally)

it’s not for no reason that this guy is the only major antagonist that Awakening doesn’t let you trip over still alive and kicking somehow. he is 100% plot device, adds nothing to the story or to any single scene that he appears in, lacks in personality, doesn’t present any sort of challenge that isn’t erradicated without fanfare by the protagonists, and doesn’t even have any sort of a backstory.

and he’s a racist stereotype on top of all that, so he doesn’t even get a mercy point like his similarly irrelevant predecessor from Thracia 776.

I have not played the game with this gharnef

(??/10)

I don’t even know if he counts; I see a lot of back-and-forth in that regard.

anyways, what do you all think? “oh my god someone finally said it”, or perhaps “I will kill you but not as hard as you assassinated my favorite antagonist”? if the upcoming Three Houses is to have a Gharnef, do you have any hopes for what they’ll be like? this is all nice and open to replies and reblogs, folks! don’t be shy! yes.... do it... succumb to the temptation.......

[lutiaskokopelli]

YOU DON’T KNOW HOW MUCH I LOVED AND MISS YOUR LAYTON PLAYTHROUGH

.......... °deep inhale°

Hi. You have no idea how I didn’t see that coming and how I never would have expected that me reblogging just one PL-related post would lead to so many notes on a post that I wrote more than a year ago and even to even more notes on other posts that I wrote on a whim however long ago I wrote them.

I’ll be honest... I kind of miss these posts, and I kind of... hated these posts. I have three main projects going on right now that I care about very deeply, namely a Gravity Falls fancomic, an Undertale fanfic, and an original project shrouded in mystery because I don’t want to give any details about it for now. These three projects are series I worked on for years and for which I put my all, fighting teeth and nails for, only to get a few notes for each chapter/page I’d publish. I wasn’t getting much attention on these projects, but I was fine with it, I thought that these stories just needed some time and exposure, because the few readers I had absolutely loved them.

And then I made these two PL playthrough posts. That completely broke my notes record. For absolutely no reason.

Is it possible to feel jealous of your own stuff???

Anyway... Just after the second post, just seeing how much attention this playthrough was getting in comparison with the projects that I really cared about... I grew bitter about this playthrough. I was like, “What even is the point in putting incredible amounts of efforts into working hard on imaginative plots and realistic characters if what people want from you is to do absolutely nothing imaginative at all, just rip off a game you haven’t been a fan of in years, and say stuff about it that practically anybody else could say if they just took some time to look at the game’s details and analyze.” When looking at the one post that started it, it’s not even because the walkthrough was about Professor Layton: it’s just that the introductory post, which just so happened to be the only one to contain something really original from my part, was the one that was given the least attention.

In one word: This playthrough made me feel like what people wanted from me was to just stop trying altogether, and to do something that I would have to put absolutely no conscious thought or effort to.

I’d be lying if I didn’t kinda miss this series too, sometimes, because hey, humans can be greedy and attention-seeking, so of course if I made any other walkthrough post, I’d expect to get the rough 50-70 notes the first two posts got, maybe even more, because hey, when a series grows, of course you get more and more readers as the word gets out. For someone who is used to only get 0-15 notes on all her posts constantly, that’s pretty tempting. Guiltily tempting. It feels like there’s almost no positive emotion that can lead me to carry on with this series, and I would absolutely feel bad if the only motivation I had for carrying on with this series was this bitter afterthought of “Maybe if I get enough attention on my PL playthrough, just maybe, some of these guys will be curious and see what else is on my blog and see just how much better I can do.”

On a different note... I remember that I kinda had fun? Not nearly as much fun as when I’m writing my own plots, mind you. But I remember drawing that nonsensical comic about Layton trying to solve Puzzle #002 and getting a telescope to do so. I guess that if I weren’t already so overwhelmingly busy and if my health weren’t so unstable, I probably would’ve gone back to it at least every now and then. Now that I’ve seen this one ask, alongside the notes I’ve got yesterday... Yeah? Why not just... carrying on with this series? Since, after all, it practically doesn’t take any effort from me to make aside from just some time and basic thought?

I guess only time will tell. I still have my notes on Curious Village, somewhere. Where I am right now, I can’t access my games and won’t be able to before at least September, but depending on how detailed my notes are, maybe that won’t be necessary for now. I don’t plan on making these posts too often, anyway.

So... Sorry if I disappoint, and sorry for the incredible length of that post. This ask is the first thing I saw in the morning and I may be a bit cranky, too. I guess... only time will tell. My biggest weakness has always been my inability to say “no” to anyone.

[benjikarofsky]

Once Upon a Dream || Para

WHO: Benji Karofsky (@benjikarofsky) and Topher Pierce (@topherxpierce​). Mentions Franco Del Rio ( @southsidefranco )

WHERE: “Benji’s Apartment”

WHEN: 15th May 2019

NOTES: Still hiding at Sebastian’s, Benji finds himself thinking about Topher in a fairly unusual way.

TRIGGERS: N/a

BOLD: Benji

ITALIC: Topher

WORD COUNT: 2173

Benji closed his eyes, still trying to get used to the feeling of sleeping in a bedroom other than his own. He had gotten so used to his apartment--the feeling of Franco in his arms, the sounds of Cortana sleeping in the hallway, the presence of knowing Topher was asleep just one room over... he had grown to love it. And the longer he was away from it, desperately trying to think, the longer he realized he missed it. 

He faded off quickly and within seconds was transported back into his apartment, waking up on the couch. "...Guys?" he called lightly, slowly walking from the couch to the hallway between his room and Topher's, "...Cort? Toph? Franc? ...Anyone here?"

Topher felt as though he was experiencing every emotion at the same time with the most prominent of them being fear. There was no relief that came with laying on his bed, no waves of happiness at Cortana's presence, just shockwaves of worry that struck constantly in the form of shivering. Mercy seemed to be quite the foreign concept, so the former Serpent set off towards the living room in the hopes that a game or show might provide some sort of distraction. 

He settled in his favorite chair after he'd loaded up Gears of War 2 and couldn't help a small smile when he noticed that Cortana had followed him then decided to rest by his feet. Topher hoped that he could push past all the memories of various gaming marathons with Benji, that he could just focus on the task at hand. He'd restarted the campaign the night before then paused right before he got to the so called 'impossible' level, only because his neverending concern made him sleepy.

Benji saw Topher pass him and turned, "Toph!" he called, following him and Cortana back to the living room. "Toph, I'm home," he stated, sitting on the sofa next to Topher and his chair. 

"Hey, Cort. Toph gave you your insulin while I was gone, right? You look good." He put his hand out for Cortana to lick, but paused when she didn't seem to notice, choosing to cuddle closer to Topher's feet instead. "Uh... okay. 3 days was a long time. I get it. Kinda cold though, Cort..." 

He pulled his hand back awkwardly, then turned to the TV, not realizing his best friend wasn't acknowledging him in any way. "Wait, you're replaying 2 without me? No way, Dude. I want in. Change it to split screen." He looked around for the second controller, confused that he didn't see it anywhere. "Dude, where's the controllers? I want in," he said, finally turning to look at Topher.

Topher just tried to maintain his concentration on the game, but it didn't take long for him to screw up. "Son of a -," he trailed off as he watched Marcus get annihilated by Locust all because his mind wandered for just a moment. Cort glanced up at him as if she wanted an explanation for the outburst. "It's nothing, go back to sleep honey," the former Serpent cooed, even though it couldn't have been further from the truth. 

 He remembered the repeated playthroughs of each game as if they happened yesterday. Topher knew that he could handle himself playing any game from Gears to Mario Kart, but there was still something about teaming up with Benji that made every puzzle piece fall into place. They were an army of two, an unstoppable duo. And yet the radio silence continues, he thought to himself as he removed his phone from a sweatshirt pocket. 

 "I know you can't answer me, but let's pretend you can. Cort, what's wrong with me?" Topher paused the game in order to look down at her. She just let out a sigh that was interpreted as an 'I don't know' of sorts. "Were any of those anons on to something and Benji's not coming back? Or am I just letting paranoia get the best of me?"

"What? Toph, I'm right here." He waved his hands in front of Topher's face, "I know you're pissed I left, but the silent treatment's pretty harsh as-is. It's another thing to somehow get Cort in on it." 

He bit his lip, processing the rest of what Topher said. "...I didn't mean to freak you out. I just needed to think, and I... I didn't want you to tempt me. I know he already cheated on me, but I couldn't cheat on Franc. I love him too much." 

He swallowed. "I... I don't wanna be married to Franco. Not right now, anyway. Not while he doesn't acknowledge the sacrifices I've made for him. But I do love him. And I don't mind the long engagement as much as I thought I did. B... But I love you just as much." He sighed. "And I... looked at that 'poly' stuff. Like you said. And it's still a lot to get used to... and Franco'll probably try to kill us for suggesting it, but I think it's the right solution," he rattled off--obviously the time alone had helped him think more than he first realized. 

"...Because I love you. And I want to be with you." When Topher didn't respond, he sighed louder, throwing his hands up in defeat. "...Toph, I'm so sorry I didn't tell you why I left. I didn't want Franc to find out and try to fight you or something! Just... please forgive me. It's been 4 days and 5 hours since you told me you loved me back. I wanna get this fixed so I can think about kissing you without feeling guilty. Please."

Topher continued to play Gears and as a result, failed spectacularly plenty more times in the span of a few minutes. He eventually placed the controller on an armrest as he picked up his phone again then looked down at Cortana once again. "It's nearing midnight and here I am waiting when normal people would be asleep by now. Hell, Ben's probably asleep." 

It was one thing to lack the company of your best friend. It was another thing to lack the company of someone you loved. Perhaps that was what pushed his anxieties back to the forefront of his mind and oh, how Topher hated it. He couldn't dwell on any of these negative emotions for too long or else he risked opening the door again for the storm cloud that occupied his mind after that car crash. 

"But that's what you do for loved ones, isn't it?" The former Serpent asked himself as he tapped his phone screen back to life. A picture of himself with Benji greeted him once again, one of many reminders of brighter days and the potential for many more in the future. "You worry about them like there's no tomorrow and then when they come back, you make them promise to never make you worry like that again. But I still love him, don't think there's anyway I could stop."

With a quick glance over at the door, his gaze flicked back to the paused game and then to his phone. Guess it wouldn't hurt to try texting him. So, Topher opened up his messages in order to get to typing. "I know it's late and that I should be in bed, but I wanted you to know that I still have your back and will always have it. Regardless of whatever option you take, I will follow your lead and you to the ends of the Earth," he read aloud then pressed the arrow to send it. With that, the former Serpent picked up his controller once again and hoped for the best.

"I love you too," he whispered back. He moved his hand to take Topher's, then blinked when he picked up the controller and start to play again, their two hands intertwined from Benji point-of-view, but Topher not seeming to notice. 

"You... you can't see me, can you? Or... or feel me? Or hear me?" he realized, his voice quiet. He blinked hard and realized he couldn't remember leaving Sebastian's house to come home; he didn't remember falling asleep on the couch. At the very least, this was a dream--at the most, it was a premonition. 

He swallowed hard. "...Is this what you're doing right now? Just... worrying yourself sick and trying to distract yourself? Toph, I told you to think about yourself first for a change. I didn't think you'd just..." he trailed off, letting his head drop in disappointment. He'd gotten so angry at Franco for doing it, but here he was doing the same thing with Topher. He knew how loyal his best friend was--had he thought for even a second, he would've realized that he wasn't going to just take time for himself and await his return. He was gonna worry. And knowing Topher, worry endlessly. 

"...I've been gone 3, almost 4 days... When's the last time you slept?" He knew he couldn't hear him, but he turned to Topher anyway, hoping he could trigger the question to come to him somehow. "Topher, when's the last time you slept?" he begged.

The sixth time turned out to truly be the charm and Topher finally got past the level. He gave a quiet cheer that was soon interrupted by a yawn. "Lord, what time is it?" A quick glance told him that it was past midnight, 12:34 to be exact. He couldn't remember the last time he felt so tired and that counted every single all nighter that he pulled during his high school days. 

He needed to get some rest, caffeine and rapidly multiplying concerns just weren't cutting it as an energy source anymore. But there was the chance that Benji might come home and want to talk, plus Topher generally wanted to be awake in case something else demanded his attention. Cortana's needs were taken care of though, the same went for the grand majority of his own with sleep the glaring exception. He didn't know of any other drama that was currently taking place in 'fair' Riverdale.

With those thoughts at the forefront of his mind now, the 18 year old pushed himself up in order to retrieve one of the many blankets in his room as well as a pillow. When he returned, the blanket was draped over him while the pillow went behind his back. "If I fall asleep while playing Gears, so be it," Topher remarked to himself as he resumed the game. Sleepiness already had a decent grip on him, so there was quite the grand chance he would end up asleep in this chair. His worries just needed to shut themselves up for the night and there was no better way than playing a hint more.

Benji shook his head. "I need to come home..." he whispered to himself. Knowing that Topher was doing this--staying up in the hopes that he'd be coming home--he couldn't handle it. How could he really continue putting someone he loved through this much torture? It wasn't fair.

He bit his lip and stood up, walking over so he was between Topher and the TV. He knew he couldn't see him or feel him, but that didn't change what he wanted to do. "...I'm coming home, okay? And I'm sorry that I've put you through this hell. I'll never do it again." he whispered, giving a sad smile.

"I... I can't do this until we work things out with Franco, but... this is a dream. And I'm impatient," he explained, giving a chuckle dripping with emotional exhaustion. He leaned down and cupped Topher's face, then pulled him into a soft kiss, shutting his eyes until he eventually pulled back. "...I love you, Toph. I'll be home soon."

One by one, each worry faded to the back of his mind as he navigated Marcus through treacherous territory. The desire to sleep continued to wrap itself around Topher as the moments stretched into seconds then minutes. He'd gotten bits and pieces these past few days, but that wasn't enough, even with the aid of caffeine alongside concerned energy. 

All the scenarios that had turned his brain into a movie theater slowly shut themselves off for the night, yet they left a few thousand reassurances on the tip of his tongue for no particular reason. Perhaps for later use or maybe it was just the desire to start speaking out loud again. Regardless, Topher pulled the pillow up to where it was behind his head and allowed the warmth of his blanket to pull him just a bit closer to dreamland.

"Sweet dreams Cort and Ben, wherever you are," he muttered. "I love you both with all of my heart, in ways that even I can't express properly with words. Or maybe it's just because I'm tired as hell." Topher managed to make Marcus take a few more steps, but then the game was sleepily paused and the controller fell into his lap as sleep finally won out.

[annalyticall]

1,10,14,52.

How did you get into Borderlands?

It wasn’t very straightforward. First, I played a couple hours of my ex-boyfriend’s copy of Borderlands 2 and really liked it, but I didn’t buy it for myself to play. A few months went by and Telltale came out with Tales from the Borderlands, and since I was already a fan of Telltale, I decided to try it out. After the second episode, I knew I was hooked, and went ahead and bought Borderlands 2 and all its DLC when it went on ale on steam. Ever since then I’ve been slowly collecting and playing the entire Borderlands franchise. I just finished the collection a couple weeks ago with the Handsome collection going on steep sale.

10. A NOTP?

Anyone who has followed me for a while knows I... strongly dislike Rhack. Personally, it disregards everything I love about Rhys by forcing him into the abusive relationship with the man he canonically ripped his own arm off to get rid of so, you know.

14. A gun or skill you can never seem to get along with?

For guns, I never got the hang of Tediore guns (I think that’s the gun that you can throw as a grenade when reloading?). I just think they’re weaker than the guns I can get from Jakobs or Maliwan and I don’t work well with the gimmick.

For skills, as much as I love trying to play Zer0, Deception is not a skill I can get the hang of quickly. Usually, I have to play Zer0 for a while in order to play with it ok. I’m just so used to Maya’s Phaselock I don’t adjust well to other playstyles.

52. How many times have you played each of the games?

Borderlands: Have not yet completed one playthrough. I want to say I’m about a quarter of the way through the campaign with Lilith. I just got the GOTY Enhanced Edition which is why I haven’t made much progress yet.

Borderlands Pre-Sequel: Have not yet completed one playthrough. Same with Borderlands, I’ve also gotten about a quarter of the way through with Athena, but I’m very tempted to just start over with Nisha or Jack since their playstyles also appeal to me. I probably would have gotten further with this game if I didn’t have Borderlands 2 to play instead.

Borderlands 2: I have completed 2 playthroughs with Maya and am about halfway through the last “True Vault Hunter Mode” playthrough with her. I’m also about halfway through a playthrough with Zer0.

Tales from the Borderlands: I have 4 complete playthroughs. One original playthrough, one ‘opposite’ playthrough, one playthrough for my sister, and one redone playthrough. I’m also working on a fifth playthrough, again just for the sake of replaying it because I love these characters so much.

[endless-vall]

You know why - Damien x MC fanfic

Summary: After getting pushed back against a wall back in Philadelphia by Damien, for professional reasons - Of course, Amy finds herself drowning in a sea of feelings and emotions she thought she buried long ago. It doesn’t help, either, that Damien invites her for a drink, later that day.

Author’s note: I re-watched a playthrough of chapters 6 & 7, and couldn’t resist writing this one.

Enjoy!

After returning from Philadelphia, Amy kicks her shoes off, and plops down on her couch.

whatever she, Damien and Nadia just witnessed was a lot to wrap your head around.

And she wished, she wished so bad that it would’ve been what was weighting on her mind... But it wasn’t.

Because despite how completely insane that situation was, how bizarre it felt to see Steve (Gary?) like that, and despite her seeing Hayden - The only thing Amy’s mind had a hard time to process was Damien.

How good it felt for a minor second there, to be pressed against a wall, her back to his chest. How incredibly hot and intense it was when he whispered in her ear.

Amy has to shut her eyes close, and bite at her lower lip to calm down.

She knew she shouldn’t be feeling that way, and thinking about those things... Especially not with Damien, who - Not only was her friend... But...

She also knew he had feelings for her, for a while now.

She decides to take a cold shower.

To sort out her thoughts but mostly to cool her off.

The things that were racing through her mind... The things she wanted to do to Damien... With Damien...

Weren’t things friends did together.

It wasn’t right... He didn’t deserve it. He deserved the best - Someone who loved him the way he loved her.

Not someone who woke up one morning, lusting after him. This wasn’t right... She repeated to herself, in her head.

She took off all her clothes, and climbed into the shower. She turned the tap on, letting the cold water run over her body.

After her cheeks stopped burning, and the unholy thoughts took off of her head, she finally had time to consider, trying to understand her sudden ‘change of heart’.

She knew Damien had feelings for her, for quite some time now.

She isn’t sure when she first noticed it... But definitely before she gave Eros a chance.

It was just something everyone knew. And by ‘everyone’ she meant her, Nadia and Damien himself.

Maybe he didn’t exactly know she knew about it, but for all three of them it was obvious - Damien was in love with Amy.

And it’s not like she didn’t feel something about him, too, at some point.

Just as she admitted in a game of truth or drink - or rather, didn’t admit, as she gulped down her shot of tequila - she had certain feelings for Damien.

Damien had thanked her back then - for ‘Saving them from the awkwardness’, but admittedly, he was just as curious as he was relieved.

And not answering that question was quite an answer itself, in her opinion.

She shampooed her hair, letting her dark blue waves fall down her bare shoulders, as she relaxed in her bath.

Why didn’t she ever act on those feelings, though?

She wasn’t sure herself.

It was a mixture of possibility of ruining their strong friendship with the potential of a romantic relationship, and the nervousness she felt about not feeling the same way he does.

While it was clear he was had strong feelings for her, Amy wasn’t sure if her feelings had the same kind of intensity.

Though, they were always there.

Even when she was going out with other people.

She could tone it down, when she did - but they were still present.

And then - So much time had passed, of her pushing those feelings down and hiding them... That bringing that up seemed... Silly. Out of place. So she never did.

And she listened to Nadia, going to Eros and trying, just trying to finally put this behind her, and going out with Hayden.

Hayden was great. He was charming, handsome, and funny... But he wasn’t it. She wasn’t sure why... up until now.

Up until she was able to make order in her mind and wrap around the idea, but maybe her feelings for Damien were much, much more intense than she assumed.

Because even after all this time...

It still came down to him.

After getting out of the shower, and putting on some fresh clothes, she got a call.

“Coming!” She yelled at her phone, before realizing it was stupid and laughing at herself.

Thinking about Damien too much made her a little dumb sometimes, she realized.

She made her way towards her phone in her living room, and picked it up.

It showed ‘Damien’ on the screen and Amy’s heart started pounding in her chest.

Why was he calling her now, right after she finally managed to kick him out of her mind?

Shaking those thoughts away, she answered the call.

“Hey D, what’s up?”

He asked her to meet him outside of Eros building, in ten minutes.

He refused to explain why... But asked her to trust him and just show up.

Amy agreed, not needing any further convincing, and got ready to leave.

She meets him outside and he explains his investigation of Eros. How it’s not possible a simple ‘matchmaking service’ would need to go out of their way for such high security measures, and that there must be something going on.

Amy mostly listens, her mind not exactly present. She nods and agrees with him, until his angry expression turns into an upset one.

“Damien... Did you... Take Eros’ perfect match quiz?” She hesitates as she asks.

She could bear the thought of Damien gaining a match.

For some, selfish, jealous reason, of course. Once again - he didn’t deserve this.

He groans, rubbing the back of his neck. “They said...” He sighs. “And I quote, that I’m ‘ineligible for a perfect match’.” Amy feels a weight being lifted off her chest, and immediately feels bad for feeling that way.

It doesn’t show on her face, though, and she furrows her eyebrows. Damien looks down.

Amy opens her mouth, trying to come clean with her feelings for him. She wants to tell him that he’s ‘ineligible for a perfect match’ since he already has one, but...

“They’re idiots, I think you’re great.” Is all that comes out instead.

“Oh, I know.” He teases at her, sending her a smirk.

Amy shakes her head. The flirtatious teasing never stopped, and right now? She wanted it to never stop.

Even though he plays it off, Amy can clearly see that Damien’s bummed out about being ‘unfit’ for a match.

It’s understandable, though. Being basically told that you’re unfit to finding a perfect ‘love’ can crush the spirits of the mightiest warriors.

He invites her to tag along to a nearby pub. “Don’t tell me, Archer and Hopps?” She asks.

This is where he goes to when he’s really down.

Even if she’d considered before letting him go there alone before - for both of their sake’s - now she definitely can’t.

Damien needs her right now. He needs her as a friend, and not whatever she had become this morning.

She shakes herself out of it, and nods. “Sure. Let’s go.” She smiles at him, and Damien smiles back, leading the way.

After getting to the pub, and having a few drinks, they start playing another version of the game of truth or drink - now being named after Damien. The bartender suggests it and Amy takes the offer up.

Damien gets a dare, and Amy is just tipsy enough to make him stand up and ‘embarrass’ himself.

“I dare you... To yell a long list of compliments about me, including how hot I am.” She might shouldn’t have added the last part, but was way to tempted.

Damien finishes his glass in one go, and then climbs onto the counter.

“Good evening everyone. May I have your attention please?” He’s grinning from ear to ear and Amy can feel herself blushing again even before hearing his compliments about her.

"I'd like to take a moment to celebrate my friend who's here with me tonight.

Amy is the most brilliant, funny, and not to mention hottest person in this room.

So cheers to Amy, whom I adore very much."

Amy’s biting her lip as he jumps back down, as everyone raises their glasses towards her.

She nods and raises her glass as well, while playfully rubbing Damien’s shoulder.

“Happy?” He asks her.

“Definitely.” She pokes one finger at his chest. “You’re smiling, you see?” She points out. “So mission accomplished.” She winks at him, maybe too flirtatiously than intended.

“No need to rub it in.” He notes, but the smile doesn’t leave his face.

They play a few more rounds until it’s late and they should get going.

There’s a certain eye contact. Amy’s sure Damien’s about to lean in and... Kiss her. But he stands abruptly and calls it a night.

She stands as well, nodding. Right.

They walk the way home. Mostly in silence, but they manage to sneak in some goofing off and making fun of Eros in the way.

By the time they reach their neighborhood, they’re not longer really drunk.

Damien’s apartment is closer by, but he offers to accompany her way home.

Amy shakes her head. “Nah.” She tells him. “I’ll be fine.” She shrugs. “It’s just a couple blocks away.” She smiles faintly at him before sending him off.

“If you’re sure.” He says, before disappearing into the stairway.

Amy makes it half a block before she stops in her tracks.

She doesn’t know what gets into her, but she runs her way back.

Climbing the stairs to his apartment, two steps at a time, she makes it to his apartment’s door.

She knock over it, and to her surprise it just pushes open.

He’s obviously inside, and taking his clothes off.

She can see his shoes laying around on the floor, and his shirt getting thrown in the air.

“Damien?” She asks, closing the door behind her.

He steps out of his room, shirtless and mending with his pants’ zipper.

“Amy?” He’s baffled, eyes blinking at her and eyebrows furrowing. “Is everything okay? What are you doing here?” He asks, not minding to close his zipper back up. He is, however, concerned with her safety... But this is not what this is about.

She steps closer to him, voice raw and vulnerable. “Back at the bar...” She’s panting, from running all the way here.

She can’t back out now.

“Back at the bar... Were you going to kiss me?” She asks, gathering her courage.

It takes Damien a moment, but the realization downs on him. “Amy...” His lips curl downwards, as if he’s upset.

She knows she shouldn’t be asking this.

She knows this isn’t fair.

But she can’t hold it any longer, too.

“Were you?” She repeats, sheer emotion in her voice. Her eyes are mirrors of her soul right now.

And she knows... She knows she’s a mess. But she has to know. She has to finally take that step.

Even if the timing’s not right.

He doesn’t answer. He keeps eye contact, and maybe his eyes and silence tell her everything she needs to know, but dammit, Amy needs to hear that out loud.

“Damien...” She pleads with him. She takes another few steps towards him.

He doesn’t back away, but he doesn’t come closer, either.

“We shouldn’t.” He simply lets out, in a low voice. As if he’s regretting it himself.

Not as if. She realizes.

She doesn’t any moment further, and closes the distance between them.

She plants her lips over his, almost tackling him down with the force of her blast. But he stands still, firm in his place.

He kisses back, right away.

This surprises Amy, considering his initial objection.

But as soon as their lips touch, their both pulled by the same force, unable to resist one another. They kiss until their lips are sore, and breathe hitches.

Pulling apart, hands holding onto one another... Amy looks up at Damien.

“If you thought we shouldn’t...” She questions. “Then why didn’t you stop me?”

Damien sighs, a conflicted look over his face. He hits resolve and a smile spreads over his lips.

“You know why.”

[moonraccoon-exe]

Ooo, you're playing Dragon Age? That's seriously one of my FAVORITE series ever, I hope you like it!! I ended up accidentally romancing Josephine my first time around (I was trying to romance Sera at the time, rip) and I just finished a playthrough with Cullen. I can safely say the advisors are just,, sweethearts. I love them. If you love Cullen now, it'll only grow, he's such a cutie!

HELL YEAH, I’M PLAYING DA: I!! :D

Sorry for late reply, buddy!! As you may have seen, weekend and what’s gone of this week so far has been sorta messy, hahah. B^^;

But back to topic, yeh, playing Dragon Age over here! 

I always heard about the titles, but could never grab copies. Regarding Playstation, I never had 2 or 3 and couldn’t afford for neither, because I already had Nintendo stuff and couldn’t affor for more, so I always had the wish to play the series but could never actually do it. Inquisition is my first. I know I’m missing some things like getting excited over the appearance of certain characters, or some of the lore, but that’s okay! It’s understandable and enjoyable despite that :)

And BOY, I’m not liking it- I’m damn LOVING IT WHOLEHEARTEDLY!! Screw me, this game is PHENOMENAL and absolutely mindblowing!!! I’m going to post some of my thoughts in a second as to rant there and not overwhelm you with my answer, haha ^^ But yes, I’m loving it so much! It’s so epic, so good, so amazing! I’m having so much fun, I can spend an entie day gaming through it!! Aaahhh!!!

Josephine!! Josephine is adorable and has some sort of charm. She doesn’t have much character development so far I’ve seen, but she’s got this...something. I guess it’s something about how smart and sly she is, how passionate for her work, how- wow man. She’s just so strong, mostly mentally speaking. Mature, firm, kind. I’m not planning to romance her, but BOY do I flirt with her because she’s such an attractive woman! 

Sera? Oh my, that’s quite a surprise, haha!! I’m just bad at handling over-confident/over-extrovert people, mostly so...killer-sincere like her. Like, she has no shame in saying everything as she thinks about it! It’s sorta intimidating and can come off as rude sometimes. But damn, she’s fun. And now that I reached skyhold she seemed to have grown a little more mature, or at least more sincere. So I don’t blame you for romancing her. She has her own charm :)

HELL YEAH, CULLEN, AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, MY SWEET SHY CUTIE PIE!!! 

[[Adding a read more because it got a tiny bit lenghty, haha :3 ]]

Sweet Cullen. I’m gonna talk about him in that post, too, but fuck, is he adorable.

And yes, the advisors are all sweethearts!! How I WIIIIIIIIIIIIISH we could romance Leliana, either as male or female (I think she’d rather go female, haha <3), because FUCK ME SHE’S SO STRONG, BADASS, WISE, INTELLIGENT, COOL. Goddammit. Her and Cassandra were/are my END. They’re both so incredibly badass! And Cullen is adorable, and SUPER mature!! And Josephien, already talked about that woman. All advisors are super badass and so cool, and they all care about you so much. I WANT TO POLY ROMANCE ALL OF THEM <3

I had some doubts when Blackwall started being SUPER CHARMING (like LEGENDARY SAIYAN LEVEL OF CHARMING) with my elf, so I googled no spoilers who I shoud romance first (lol sorry), and I did read that Cullen is apparently a vanilla, tender, sweet little cupcake made of adorableness. That, plus his first shy reaction? Hnhgnhnfg, I’m doomed to die in his arms, DAMMIT. I already had a weak spot for shy vanilla but not over-clingy men, and whent hey give one to me, they also make him super mature, super brave, and so...like...like...SO. CULLEN. AKLSJDF LKDJG AKLDJFA

I can’t wait to romance that stupid idiot, I LOVE HIM SO MUCH and it only gets better? Aaaahhhh, I’m going to melt like a little cube of butter in the arms of a warm, soft pancake ;A;

I already reached Skyhold, and I almost romanced Solas instead of Cullen. I didn’t know!! I just asked Solas to talk to me more about him and then he was “Yeah, but what about we talk somewhere nicer? :)” and I was like. Oh my god. Oh my god no- fUCK- FUCK WAIT I’M LOYAL TO MY NOT-YET-BOYFRIEND- WAIT AAAHHHHHH”. I mean, I know you can break-up with everyone as you wish, but I DON’T HAVE THE HEART TO DO THAT!! ;A;

Mostly when Solas is so cute and so wise and such a dear, good option. I felt so tempted to give in and romance him, but I really want Cullen for my firstplaythrough, haha ;u; 

So Imma be careful! I also have Blackwall very...attracted to myelf, so Imma take precautions with him even though I also want to romance him ahahaha.

How dare this game do this to me? Everyone is so charming and such good options, I want to date everyone!! Well, except maybe Vivienne. She disagrees with a lot of my ideas. BOY, she’s rude!! She has an iron fist, and I’m a soft cupcake!! ;u; She’s SUPER SENSUAL and attractive and I love her determination, but she can get sorta heavy aahhh.

But yeh! So far, I’m enjoying DA: I like CRAZY and beyond. It’s an EXQUISITE game!!

Thank you SO MUCH for this wonderful ask, my dear friend! It’s always satisfying to get the chance to talk about the stuff I like with someone. Thank you for giving me the chance to rant about this, it’s done good to my maccoonie heart. :)

Thank you for sharing your own experience with me, even if shortly! 

I hope you’re having a MOST FANTASTIC day or night, my friend!!! <3

[faygosmayhem]

Story Time #3- Final Fantasy & Me: Part Three

Landmines EVERYWHERE: 

I love Final Fantasy XII. I also hate it with seething contempt of 10,000 scorned and angry Cactuars. When the game launched I couldn’t even let myself get excited. I was deep into a period of ‘permanent grounding’ that cut me off from the world and everything else I loved (another story for another time). I stayed that way from February to December of ‘06, miserable and only getting worse. Come Christmas my parents gifted me with Final Fantasy XII. I thought it needlessly cruel at the time because they were still holding all of my electronics hostage and I had no way of playing it, but I came to understand that in giving me the game they were also giving back most of the things they had taken. 

This time, I was also given a guide to go along with it. At the start, and probably against my better judgement, I tucked the guide away with the rest of them for use only after had gotten through the game once, as usual. I had gotten a good half-way through before I decided to take a peek to look up some information on where I could find a particular spell. ‘Just that one thing,’ I told myself as I flipped through to the index.

 Of course, as I was going through a picture happened to catch my eye. Unable to help myself, I went back to it to check if I was really seeing it correctly. The picture was of 12 treasure coffers neatly lined in rows of four along a beach, with a note beside it in big,bold, lettering warning not to open ANY of them. I read a little further and discovered that this was one of four spots in the game where opening the treasure causes the best weapon in the game to disappear forever. 

At that point I nearly threw the game out the window, who does shit like that? There is absolutely no way for that to be discovered on your own, as the game makes no mention of it anywhere. I could have continued playing as I had planned, but if the game was going to pull tricky crap like that I was going to be in for one hell of a second playthrough. So, already about thirty hours into the game I scrapped the file and played it over while following the guide, grumbling about it the whole way. Turns out there’s more than one section in the game that’s nearly impossible without help if you don’t want to spent countless hours banging your head against the wall. 

Final Fantasy XII is hard. Not only does it have a lot of complex puzzles and tough enemies, you basically have to program the AI yourself or the party is going to be completely ineffective. It really doesn’t help that the game makes you pay for those little bits of code either.  It takes a lot of repetitive grinding to get through everything, and I can’t tell you how many hours I spent looping the zones over and over for LP, and Gil. 

The story is probably the most mature in the series, and full of socio-political intrigue and complicated scientific concepts. I used to play the game with a dictionary handy so I could decipher what the hell Vayne and the Judges were talking about. The cast of characters is rather polarizing for me, containing one of my all-time favorites, Balthier the debonair sky-pirate, and my least favorite of all the games- Penelo.

 I didn’t like her character from the start, I found her voice annoying, had an unexplained problem with her attitude, and absolutely could not stand her costume and hairstyle. The true reason for my hate of her, however, is that in my version of the game, for some unfathomable reason, her AI would set off EVERY SINGLE TRAP in the dungeon- even with Libra on. I had to switch her out or control her manually to stop this from happening, and since I was doing my best to level the party evenly just leaving her alone was not an option. By the end of the game I was so fed up with babysitting her I used to kill her on purpose out of spite. Yeah, I could've saved myself the effort by just making her the leader when it was the girls’ turn to grind, I found it much more enjoyable to watch Fran walk instead- her tail physics were hypnotizing. 

Final Fantasy XII caused a lot of frustration for me. There were several times I wanted to just set it down and never think about it again, but in the end it became the game I’ve spent the most time on. The game is very long and some of the individual fights can take upwards of 4 hours (I went to go make sandwiches twice while fighting Yiazmat, about 50 million HP is a little much, don’t you think devs?), but became one of the most rewarding once everything was completed thanks to that stupid Sky Pirate’s Den feature. 

If you’re reading this and skipped XII for whatever reason when it first launched, I recommend looking into the new re-master, Zodiac Age. It’s been tempting me for a while, I was actually at the Distant Worlds concert in Pennsylvania when the information on the remaster was first leaked by the game’s composer, I just don’t know if I have the will-power to pick it up again. 

A Visually Appealing Corridor Simulator: 

After finally finishing XII in ‘07, I didn’t touch a Final Fantasy game for about four years. Not like there really was anything to touch, exactly- but that’s beside the point. During those four years my life took a rather interesting turn, and I found myself immersed more in Tabletop RPGs and MMOs than anything else. It wasn’t until 2011, a year after I left my life in Arizona behind and moved to Pennsylvania that I once again found myself as the recipient of a shiny new PS3 and a copy of Final Fantasy XIII. 

I’m very glad I was able to go into this game with very little expectation, else I would’ve ended up disliking it a great deal more than I did. For the most part I don’t hate the game, but I can understand why a lot of people do. Final Fantasy XIII mostly just makes me sad because of what the game could have been. All those beautifully designed and intricate set pieces were reduced to nothing but bland hallways because of an attempt to appeal to a larger American audience, mostly due to the fact that the game was released cross-platform for the Xbox 360 as well. 

There are a lot of problems with Final Fantasy XIII. The characters are annoying and not very fleshed out, the plot is not cohesive and almost indecipherable, and about 80% of the game is walking down a never-ending hallway, and they don’t even get around to fully fleshing out the mechanics until the game is almost over. 

Despite all of this I thought the game was OK. I was impressed by the cut-scenes (the one at the end where they all roll up to Eden during the hover-bike race on the backs of their Eidolons is a personal favorite), thought the fast-paced combat was pretty fun, and had a pretty good time making fun of the ridiculous characters. The ending was another very serious “WTF?” moment, but pretty much the whole game up to that point had been, but I do admit to tearing up when Sazh is re-united with his son. 

I was even thankful, though a bit disappointed, to find out that I didn’t even need to play the game all the way through again to complete it. That is, until I tried to do it. It’s no secret that completing a Final Fantasy game, or any RPG for that matter, takes a great deal of time and dedication to repetitive action. Completing Final Fantasy XIII, however, was the most mind-numbing endeavor I’ve ever attempted. Prepare yourselves for a rant involving lots of math, because this shit got real (I’ll set the math between lines so those that really don’t care can just skip it). 

To get one of the gold trophies, you need to own one of every weapon and accessory in the game. The only way to get most of these things in the game is to upgrade them using Gil and drops acquired from monsters. The only way to make money in the game is by selling monster drops. The item worth the most is a 25% drop from the hardest enemies in the game. Even If you execute the strategy needed to kill them absolutely perfectly, which is incredibly tricky, it still takes 5-6 minutes just to kill ONE of them, and there are only about seven or eight different spawn points for them in the game (don’t quote me on that), most of them in the same zone. 

In order to upgrade everything I needed by the time I was ready to tackle this challenge, I needed about 1.5 million gil. The 25% common drop from the monster is worth 150,000, and you need SIX additional abysmally rare drops from the same creature in order to get every character their best weapon. In a perfect world, you need to kill around 40 of these stupid things for the money alone, and I would about quadruple that value for the rare drops. In an imperfect world, there are also days where you have no luck, mess up the strategy and take too long to kill the monster, or get killed yourself and get set back. 

The fastest way I found to get everything I needed was to use the long hallway right before the final boss where one of the creatures spawns at the beginning. There”s a save point at both ends of the hallway and it’s littered with other difficult encounters that can yield some other items worth a decent amount of money if done correctly. Passing through this hallway in one direction fighting everything takes about 30 to 45 minutes. Using some easy zone-out manipulation you can fight a grand total of THREE creatures in the span of about an hour and a half. 

For the final stretch of this game I spent upwards of eight hours a day, everyday, for the span of about two whole weeks doing nothing but running down that hallway fighting the same monsters, in the same patterns, over and over again until I finally had everything I needed. This reason alone is why I will never again touch a copy of Final Fantasy XIII. 

Want More? Hell No. Well...You’re Getting It Anyway 

XIII-2 and Lightning Returns were games that served almost no purpose. Even though the end of XIII didn’t make a whole lot of sense, it was still an almost complete resolution that didn’t really leave any loose ends. Aside from the obvious ‘to make money’ there was no real reason to give us another entry for a story that most people were unimpressed and dissatisfied with, rather than making the games that were already announced that the fan base was dying for. 

There’s an optimistic part of me that wants to believe that XIII-2 was created mostly out of desire to fix the gaping flaws of the game that came before and give the fans and developers a chance to see what XIII should have been.That satisfies me, until I remember that they ended it with a cliff-hanger that needed yet another game to resolve. 

I did enjoy playing XIII-2, and was happy to finally have a more complete version of the world from XIII. What they did with the story, however, was not something I was a fan of. The plot of XIII was complicated enough. Throw in time travel, world paradoxes, and non-linear story telling, and you get something so contrived it’s not even worth trying to piece together. 

By time Lightning Returns finally graced us with its presence, I was done. I played the game for about two hours, became infuriated that the game was based around mechanics I absolutely loathe and set it aside. I didn’t even bother looking up the end of the story on YouTube- by that point I really didn’t care. I don’t think I’ll ever be desperate enough to pick it back up again. 

What We’ve All Been Waiting For:

Think back on the past ten years of your life. While doing that, remember that during that whole period, the devs of Final Fantasy XV were working on the same project. I can’t even begin to imagine what that cycle must of been like for those people, and what a triumph it must have been to see it finally on the shelves. 

It’s even harder to reconcile what we got with how long it took them to make it. The incomplete feeling of the story from XV is very hard to deal with thinking back on just how much time they took to tell it. Part of me gets it; DLC, money, also making realistic games is hard and takes forever. I absolutely understand that the developers were trying to take a new angle with the series, and that they didn’t want to get to crazy with ham-fisted storytelling like pretty much every other installment, but even with the DLC we’re still missing some pretty significant chunks of the narrative. 

Honestly that’s about my only complaint about the game, and it’s with good reason. 

I fell more in love with the characters of Final Fantasy XV than I have with any other form of media. The casual interactions and mannerisms of the four boys are so heartfelt, so real, and such a joy to watch. From that first moment spent pushing the car to the opening notes of ‘Stand By Me’ (which is now my favorite into sequence in the series), I could tell that these characters were something special. The first time I heard Ignis’ exclaim “That’s it!” after staring idly at a random sign at a diner my heart fluttered, and I was completely charmed. The first time Prompto sang the victory theme I knew I was hooked for good. 

Something about these boys just makes me happy. Not only are they all so nice to look at, but their mannerisms and interactions really make you want to know them. I really don’t understand how this game got away with having such fantastic characters in a terribly fleshed out story. While playing, I cared deeply about what happened to the four boys (and still do, as evidenced by how much time I still spend in the fan community). When they laughed, I laughed. When they were sad, so was I. When they were hurt, I couldn’t wait to get out there and ruthlessly murder the cause of it. I wanted to know everything about them, and found myself filling in my own information when there was none offered (particularly with Ignis, because that boy gets ZERO backstory). 

It’s no secret that I’m obsessed with this game, and likely will be for quite a while still. Even with the problems I have with the story, it’s still at the peak of series for me. I can only hope that in the future they fill in the holes, and we can keep the boys with us for a long time still to come. 

Well. That was a thing. All total I spent about 18 hours writing this out, and had more fun with it than I’ve had writing anything in a while. Final Fantasy is such a huge part of my life and it was almost astonishing to look back and really remember what each of these games mean to me, and why nothing will ever replace them. 

Thanks to anyone who took the time to read my long-winded rambling, you are wonderful. If you’re feeling a nostalgic as well, then I know I’ve done my job right. It will be interesting to see what else comes out of this little experiment of mine. 

Until next time

~Faygo

[docandprof]

In Which it is H-O-T HOT Outside!

Welcome back to the Internet, Doc!

Not a real professor here signing on! I’m not sure I remember how to write anything in long-form anymore.The most regular form of writing I do nowadays is prepping notes for D&D - and those are terribly organized notes, by the way. I hope we can keep this up for a long while, because I’d hate to lose touch now. 

Last week, you asked me what you should do with your life. Well, that is a tough question to be sure. I’m sitting here listening to Tyler the Creator and wondering - what should you do with your life? What should I do with my life? Both good questions as we peer into the ever thickening fog of the futures! Now would be a good time for a crystal ball....but either way, here’s what you should do with your life, in this order. Firstly, give yourself a big pat on the back. You completed your undergraduate degree at one of the world’s top universities in four years AND you got two degrees. I know for a fact it wasn’t easy, which is all the more reason to take humble pride in this achievement. Secondly, treat yourself to some good food. Not only did you graduate, but you also lined work up just, what, a month after graduation? Less than that? Another huge accomplishment! Even if it’s only something temporary while you explore what’s ahead in your life, your independence is something to be proud of too. Third, pray. The odds of the answers you’re looking for falling into your lap are pretty slim. I know it’s scary stuff to think about, and not the most fun thing to do, but maybe you just need to spend some time in your mind, and decide what you really want to do. As I understand it, you have two degrees: neuroscience, and history - both equally valuable to you, even if you feel like one might be worth more or less depending on the work you had to put in. I imagine you feel like you’re at a fork in the road: one is an immediate career in history, and the other pursuing a career in medicine. I think the most important thing to remember is that whatever you do for the next 5 years does not stop you from doing something totally different 10, 20, 30, or more years from now! You’ve got the tools and the knowledge, now it’s time to use them to forge your path forward. Happy to talk to you more about it! Sometimes it helps to speak our thoughts and feelings aloud to come to new realizations. (Thoughts on Tyler the Creator: okay sure, not bad, but WHY ARE ALL THE SONGS IN ALL CAPS ON IGOR?!)

I do want to address your comments on adolescence before I get on to what’s happening in my life. There are a couple things to remember: no source of media can tell you what you’re doing is right or wrong, and that art imitates life. Which I realize with those statements I am providing you something very contradictory. All I mean is that I think society, largely through media, has forced onto us a sense of the “normal” or “right” things to be doing right now, coming out of college. From your writing, you seemed upset by the fact that you work a temporary job, aren’t settled down, and aren’t sure what to do next, but why should you be upset by any of this? You’ve barely been out of college for a month! Finding a career and a wife aren’t things that happen over night. I just finished reading Shogun by James Clavell, and there was a quote I really liked in there that went something like, “The first rule is patience. Second, patience.” I think this is something that really hit me because I am all too aware of my own impatience, both in trivial matters like trying to explain something to my mom, or wanting a career, and a house, and a car, and mortgage payments and insurance and all these other things we didn’t have to worry about as kids. My impatience lends itself to an over-eagerness to reach the next “checkpoint” of my life. Which I think is a dangerous mindset if I want to enjoy my limited time on this Earth! TLDR: be excited about Dungeons and Dragons, Avatar, new music, and whatever else makes you happy! It’s hard to process things nowadays because COVID-19 has warped my sense of time, but for what’s its worth, my opinion is that you’re right on track.

Okay, what have I been doing, you might be asking yourself? Well, I can keep it brief. I’m working part time at two jobs, one onsite in game production which I really enjoy, and the other fully remote and flex time - so it’s a pretty lax summer schedule. When I’m not at work, I’m most likely playing Planet Zoo. Other games I’ve been playing recently include Hollow Knight, Kingdom: New Lands, and Fire Emblem: Three Houses (still trying to finish that second playthrough!). My involvement in the Planet Zoo community has become more peripheral as I’ve gotten busier, but I am working on a building contest entry that one of my favorite streamers is putting on in her Discord server, so that’s fun! I had been reading a lot while working through the 1,200 pages of Shogun, but now that it’s done I haven’t been reading as much, unless you count D&D sourcebooks, because I’m also prepping for our next sessions every week! The more I do it and talk about it, the more I love world-building. I’m tempted to start building a wholly different world now too, just as a fun little side project....when I’m not working on our campaign or my Planet Zoo project to convert Purdue’s campus into a zoo! I also run sometimes, but don’t exercise nearly enough - I need to work on that (I use the heat as my excuse for not going out enough). So long story short, I’m doing well. I know a lot of our friends and peers have been very upset about missing graduation and the end of senior year, but I’ve done my best to just roll with it, and remember that it was all going to end soon anyways. So I’m just thankful for the health of my family and friends through all this, and try not to dwell on what might have been. Another loose quote from Shogun that I liked, “Why worry about the things we cannot change?”

I’ll wrap things up there for now! I can’t wait to hear about your “Lenny” - love the name by the way. Now I’ll pose to you a more serious question, in response to your serious question: what do you really want to do with your life - if you could do anything, and money, social pressure, and the opinions of others weren’t influencing factors? Hopefully that questions helps guide some of your thoughts on where to go next in this crazy game of life! As I wrap up listening to IGOR, my verdict is that I probably won’t willfully listen to rap still, but it wasn’t bad. My recommendation this week is to start reading for pleasure again, if you’re not already. Since you didn’t like the Dark Tower, I’d definitely suggest Shogun! (Shocker, I know). It’s great historical fiction set in feudal Japan during the Spanish Inquisition while England + The Netherlands are at war with Spain + Portugal. Lots of great political intrigue and drama. It’s a huge book, but I finished it in about 2 weeks because I couldn’t put it down! If you don’t want that, I’m thinking of starting Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, but I haven’t started yet so I can’t say whether it’s good or not. And that’s all for now!

Still not a Professor,

Souls