#Just writing on them walls

[im-not-a-sheep]

Portal art!!!

I wonder what GLaDOS is telling Chell?

tbh she's probably calling Chell a lunatic-

[monkesupreme]

Starving and wasting away etc etc

bonus:

Hes tall and huge and HEAVY and he is so overly active that he has to maintain an insanely high caloric intake to make sure his body doesnt collapse from the strain of everything. He will eat virtually anything but he is spoiled from the best takeout Gotham has to offer: 11$ shrimp and broccoli from the chinese food spot that closes at 4am- among other things.

[lotus-pear]

saw the labru trend and IMMEDIATELY thought of them

[foxstens]

andrew always being at kevin's side because kevin needs it and andrew driving kevin to night practice and andrew patting kevin down to check for injuries and andrew promising kevin it'll be fine and andrew looking awake, interested because of kevin and andrew conserving his energy for kevin's quiet meltdown and andrew smiling for the first time without the drugs because of kevin and andrew always picking up when kevin calls

[somesecretpie]

[robinfollies]

KEEP THE DANGER OUT // KEEP THE DANGER IN

[muckyschmuck]

ultimately!

[rawliverandgoronspice]

I think what particularly annoys me with the "zelda was always gameplay before story" is that... it's not true? At least I don't think it's true in the way people mean it.

Zelda games were always kind of integrating story based on the standards of the time. When game stories were in game pamphlets, Zelda's stories was in the pamphlets. ALTTP tried to tell a pretty complicated stories with the limitations of the time. OoT was actively trying to tell an epic, cinematic tale packed with ambiance and expand what 3D could offer that 2D games struggled with. Majora's Mask is deeply character-driven in many, many ways. Wind Waker and Twilight Princess are both pretty concerned about their stories, down to the point that some people were bored by TP's cutscenes in particular. Skyward Sword, from what little I have played it, is very very invested in its characters and their journey (and 2D Zeldas have Link's Awakening, Minish Cap... None of them are visual novels, but they are concerned with emotional journeys, character arcs, mysteries about their own world...)

What is true is that the narrative wraps around the mechanics, and not the other way around. The mechanics drive themes, aesthetics, emotional beats and character journeys; and that's great. The world is a puzzle, and the world is delightfully absurd when it needs to be, full of heart when it calls for it, dark and oppressive when it suits the player experience.

That does not mean the games aren't invested in their stories. Even BotW has a pretty complicated story to tell about an entire world rather than one specific tale or legend --all of it at the service of the gameplay, which is exploration and mastery of your environment.

So. Yes, none of the Zelda games are million-words long visual novels that care deeply about consistency and nuance; but stories don't need consistency or deep lore to be meaningful and serve an emotional journey. Again: gameplay is story. The two cannot be so easily parsed from each other.

And Zelda as a franchise obviously care deeply about story, characters and setting (and still does right now --otherwise there wouldn't be a movie), even if it doesn't try to imitate prestige narrative-driven games, which is great and part of why I love this series so much. Doesn't mean it couldn't have done better in the past, it obviously could have, but I feel like pretending that nobody ever cared about story or character is just... false? It's a huge disservice to the devs too. Some of them obviously cared immensely.

The "gameplay above story", at least in the extent to which it is paraded today to defend TotK, mostly, is a really recent development. And I think it's one that deserves to receive some pushback.

[fatedroses]

Tank-on-Tank violence.

[5-turtleducks-in-a-trenchcoat]

Everytime I listen to the Ancient Rome Sidequest it destroys me emotionally. But who knows, maybe somewhere there's a world where nothing terrible happens and it's just Sasha and Grizzop having fun adventures in ancient Rome.

[ganondoodle]

(Original art) Xaror, any pronouns, species (?), age (?)

short summary about them; they act as both an antagonist and an ally since they are only really interested in what they want or whats fun to them, they are immortal and call themselves 'death itself' since they have a special connection to souls (being the only one able to communicate with them) and the ability to seperate souls from their bodies in such a way that nothing can harm the soul afterwards their main goal is to .. bother and disturb the 'celestials'*, which they hate, as much as they can, breaking into their palace, freeing prisoners, destroying research, destroying the place, and most importantly, making as many souls unusable to them as possible-

they dont want to destroy the celestials though, they cant fight them anyway and this game of doing 'good' only with the goal of annoying them is their most treasured activity, so Xaror doesnt intend to stop them from killing or hurting anyone, only from harvesting what they are actually after (though Xaror doesnt actually care as little as they think they do about people, and has a soft spot for demons)

most of their appearance is later into the story; Zaphira (the empress) had been in coma and the medical facility she was treated in was destroyed by Shargon (orange eyed demon who acts as her bodyguard for the first part) in an attempt to save her from her estranged relatives taking over her country after they heard of her decline in health, she is believed dead but washes up on the shore of the mountain Xaror resides at years later (it has a reason, too much to write here) and they slowly nurse her back to health, the reason they give for it is that they found their first encounter very fun, thats all (is it?)

(more lore under the cut bc this is already so long .. im trying to keep it short q-q ......... this is stuff i have been working on since i was a kid so uh, some things might be cheesy but i cant change them anymore ..)

just to get some basics out of the way; theres three worlds, the celestials palace, human world and demon world, each are their own planet connected via different gateways

*celestials (possibly not final name, loosely based on angels) are the last remaining "survivors" of their planets demise, when their world died the most powerful among them cannibalized the weaker to sustain themselves until there were only less than 10 left, who each turned into different beings from it and dont resemble their own people much anymore, they built a palace from what was left on their world that protects them from space as its atmosphere collapsed shortly after- however they still needed something to live off; they discover the human world and are delighted to find rather short lived people with powerful souls, the best kind of sustenance for them (now), they aim to herd them like cattle, but a problem arose when it turned out another world has long been in contact with the human world; demons

demons are semi immortal creatures that act as protectors for their world, protection they extended, more or less secretely, to the human world ensuring them a long and secure life- the celestials need them to die at their whim though (demons are few in numbers, hard to kill and rarely have offspring, not an ideal target); as they worked out a plan on how to get rid of demons one of the celestials, Xanthriel (time) grew somewhat fond of people as they spent alot of time in the human world to observe and research them; in the end turning on their own completely, but losing the fight against Uriel (knowledge)

Xanthriel was supposed to be executed for their betrayal, but it doesnt work, instead they are splintered into many parts after a lot of struggle, most body, memory and most strength is one part (ending up as motionless forever bleeding corpse kept locked up in the palace), the rest is some time later gathered together and reforms as a seperate, weak mockery of them, they embody Xanthriels emotion- Xaror, without memory, strangely cut to pieces (hence all the missing limbs and broken halo) but driven by an unstoppable desire to disturb the celestials (they live seperate long enough to each become their own person, at some point Xaror discovers Xanthriels body after all and they merge back together, though as they are now two, Xanthriel only takes over once directly after merging, stays silent for a long time and lets Xaror be themselves, only later revealing that they are there at all .. hiding perhaps- i rarely have specific ideas for voices, but Xanthriels is like, like coarse rocks being violently rubbed against each other, less voice more noise)

(also, the celestials use Xanthriels blood from the day of their execution to create a plague that nearly wipes out all demons, only the youngest of them survived, effectively robbing them of everything, culture, history, knowledge etc- as demons rarely have children, like a complete restart of their society, they disappeared from the human world, and over time being largely forgotten as actually existing- the celestials wanted them all gone however, so they kept kidnapping them to try and find somethign that would work similarly against the young ones too (and then in general, bc the only usable blood of Xanthriel was from the day of their fall, and that has long since been used up) one of the young ones was Shargon, he was the only one still alive from his group

(also, the celestials use Xanthriels blood from the day of their execution to create a plague that nearly wipes out all demons, only the youngest of them survived, effectively robbing them of everything, culture, history, knowledge etc- as demons rarely have children, like a complete restart of their society, they disappeared from the human world, and over time being largely forgotten as actually existing- the celestials wanted them all gone however, so they kept kidnapping them to try and find somethign that would work similarly against the young ones too (and then in general, bc the only usable blood of Xanthriel was from the day of their fall, and that has long since been used up) one of the young ones was Shargon, he was the only one still alive from his group (he wasnt the strongest or special, he was jsut the last in the row and always got the lowest dosage) when Xaror found them in yet another break in into the palace and got him back to the demon world .. where he was promptly blamed for the others that were taken and treated like a pretender/fake/spy bc what he got put through changed his eye color (something that demons cannot change in any form) to one that does not exist among 'real' demons (orange ... notice the inner color of Xarors broken halo? :) ), some even suggesting killing him, but none of them were brave enough to do it (they were all kids still) .. except Eadrya (the big blue-ish one, largely regarded as the strongest demon alive) but Shargon managed to escape, and since then lived largely in isolation- this is part of why he is so hated, and why he starts to spend so much time in the human world after rediscovering the pathway there)

[backpackingspace]

Do we think odysseus started pranking Athena and her temples at some point? Because I do. He argued that it was good for sneaking and evading training. And you know what Athena couldn't argue that. Her chasing odysseus across the island was good training.

[necrotic-nephilim]

For the ask game: AU where during Tim's search for Bruce, Ra's agrees to help him on one condition: Tim will sleep with him. (It's probably some kind of scheme on Ra's part.) How their dynamic would change with more overt sexual undertone underlying their interactions...

for the ask game!

UGH i love this type of thing so much. in my heart, this is canon. to me. Ra'sTim my fucked up beloveds you two are so terrible for each other.

so what i think is fun and often misunderstood in fanon is that Tim didn't go to Ra's, Ra's went to Tim. so it's even more fun if Ra's goes to Tim, and has that condition he holds over Tim's head. offering all of Ra's' resources, full access to his computers, someone just genuinely believing Tim and working with him. i think, a lot of it would be a mind game for Ra's. sure he wants to fuck Tim, but more than that, he wants to see Tim's reaction. he expects an immediate no, in the way Tim is so hesitant to work with Ra's in the first place. he's pushing Tim's buttons and basically treating Tim like a rat in a maze. so when Tim says yes, and doesn't seem to hesitate too much. *that's* intriguing. because in a perfect world for Ra's, Tim says yes because of a genuine returned attraction. but Ra's isn't quite sure if that's the reason. it could just be because of Tim's search for Bruce. so Ra's would really push it, see how far he could take the sex. it's simple sex first, but Ra's gets more and more interesting each time. slowly working in kinks just to see where Tim draws the line in the sand, and if Ra's can convince Tim to cross that line.

on Tim's side, i think it's fun if you play with Tim being so deep in the closet he doesn't even realize he's bisexual, yet. so to him, sex with Ra's doesn't *really* count as sex. he knows Ra's is weirdly obsessed with him, and Tim wants to play that to his advantage. he likes the power that obsession gives him, within the League. so, if it takes some sex to satiate Ra's, Tim mentally views it as like, a training session. no worse than those unpleasant endurance trainings Bruce used to make them all do. and i like the accidental catch-22 of it. where at first, the sex does very little for Tim. but the more Ra's gets creative and kinky about it, the more Tim *actually* starts to enjoy it. Tim's bisexual crisis except it's over a centuries-old man showing him the joys of sadomasochism in an agreement that was supposed to be totally normal for Tim bc he just gets himself into these situations.

i think one of the biggest changes would be Tim's sheer amount of power and immunity in the League would be even higher. *everyone* can tell Ra's is fucking Tim, he's not really trying to hide it with the way he looks at Tim and touches him in front of everyone. Tim tries to stay clinical and professional, but you can only look so respected working when Ra's is basically stroking your chest as you work. there are whispers, people keep tellin Ra's not to trust this random son of the Bat, but no one will say it to Tim's face. it'd give Tim more power over Ra's' operation outside of the Bruce search. sure, Tim can't change the nature of the League of Assassins, but he can. tip the scales a bit. pull Ra's back from being lethal in certain situations, convince Ra's not to engage in other places. Tim is careful not to overextend this power so he doesn't lose it, but everyone else sees just how much power Tim has. he even start working on taking people out from under Ra's, when Tim goes nuclear and leaves. like how Tim basically steals Prudence, he steals some other younger Assassins he thinks he can convince to come to his side. because he's with Ra's, he starts to command a level of respect so it's not a difficult thing to do. sure, Tim's just the kid keeping Ra's' bed warm. but also, he's the kid *Ra's* deemed worthy enough to be involved with, so it's a double-edged sword of both disgust and respect held for Tim.

it's so funny to me if Tim starts to catch feelings. Ra's of course has feelings, but Tim has never noticed his feelings for a man before so he's fucking panicking internally. and worse, he's not doing a good job of hiding it. Ra's is perceptive and has centuries of experience on Tim. so he can tell. he sees the look on Tim's face when Ra's does a genuine romantic gesture with no strings attached. and that's when Ra's really leans into it. the sex is one thing, but now it's courting. gifts, pet names, kisses, praise, the whole nine yards. and Tim doesn't outwardly deny any of it because he just... doesn't know what to do with it. he could handle stupidly good sex. but this?? this is new territory. he's constantly reminding himself Ra's isn't a good person. which isn't hard to do but still, Tim's just a little torn internally. also. i think Ra's would at least try to kill Captain Boomerang, if not outright succeed, as a courting present for Tim. and Tim is *horrified*, but then again, in canon, he almost personally killed Boomerang. so maybe. there's something nice about having Boomerang dead, while escaping culpability. Ra's thinks his corruption crusade is working on Tim and is absolutely gloating about it. they even go on a proper date.

but, in the end, Tim still backstab Ra's. i think Ra's would still try to go for control of WI, but would be convinced Tim would be totally okay with it and offers to share control with Tim. that's how Tim betrays him, he's allowed to handle so much of the paperwork, Ra's has no idea until it all goes through that he actually has no control. it's The betrayal. because Tim will always betray his love for what he thinks is the right thing to do. the infamous scene, where Ra's kicks Tim out of a window would go a lot differently. instead of a dramatic fight, it's deeply wounded betrayal. in canon Ra's always knew Tim was never in his pocket, but in this AU, he was naive enough to fall for it. and he's angry. he's angry at Tim, angry at himself. i think he'd straight up try to kidnap Tim. less "kick Tim out a window" and more "intimately hold a knife to Tim's throat" vibes. they part ways, but there's still. something lingering. the bridge isn't fully burned and Ra's is still going to seek out Tim when he needs help, and Tim will seek out Ra's. they'll never trust each other again. but they also can't seem to stop loving each other. Tim hides it from the Batfamily and Ra's never gives Tim that level of control in the League again but. the "i didn't know who else to got to." moments are inevitable and there are whispers in the villain community about how you better be careful around Red Robin because if you're not, you'll piss off the Demon Head. unspoken, deadly protection while still sort of trying to kill each other.

[goldengrecha]

How are we feeling today, people who read pokespe?

[stealingyourbones]

Gotta love when folks write Superman incredibly anti-clone even though he had good reason in the beginning to Not Like Superboy (HES A WINDOW INTO WHAT CLARK WOULD HAVE BEEN WITHOUT THE KENTS) and decide that forever on he’ll be spiteful towards clones even though he literally Does Not Care if you’re a clone unless you’re Superboy.

[lnkedmyheart]

Everytime Asagiri drops more skk backstory you realise they were not even remotely toxic, Chuuya made Dazai want to give living a chance at 15, Dazai whole convoluted plan during SB while shitty for Chuuya was ultimately to find the data on Chuuya, Dazai put the world saving plan on hold and was ready to discard it for him, he not only put an end to the dragon jead conflict he even started caring about another man's death because it upset Chuuya, and in some universe they would have ditched the mafia together. Chuuya makes Dazai do good things because Dazai cares for him and his opinions. Dude. DUDE!!