#So many moments where the game just throws out the character I've made and what I can do for a scripted sequence for drama

[xenodile]

I have finished Cyberpunk 2077.

I do not like it.

[theresattrpgforthat]

@alizarinessence thank you for your patience as I took my time to respond to you! PbtA games can be pretty daunting, and I certainly didn't understand how the play flow was supposed to work at first. I personally learned through trial and error, as well as watching other GMs who had figured it out - I am blessed to have a friend who is very experienced in running PbtA games so I was able to play in some of his games and ask him questions.

That being said, there have been a few things that I've also found helpful that I can refer to you, so I'm going to put them up here.

The Flow Chart

This flow chart was originally posted in a Dungeon World reddit post, and later referred to me when I started asking for PbtA advice. You'll likely see a similar flow chart in Apocalypse Keys, where Rae Nedjadi illustrates how a typical session of play is likely to look like.

In any given PbtA game, you as a GM are going to be presenting pieces of information to the players, just as you would in any other ttrpg. PbtA codifies this information as "moves," and each game will present you with information that is considered useful for the kind of story that it is design to tell.

In Masks, the players are teenage superheroes, so the game encourages the GM to introduce facts such as "civilians are in danger" or "your dad thinks you're being irresponsible."

In The Ward, the players are medical doctors in an Emergency Ward, so the game advises the GM to introduce truths such as "a patient's condition is worsening" or "someone's dad is fighting with a nurse in another room."

This reinforces the common maxim that the game is a conversation, a cycle of presenting new information, letting players decide what they want to do with that information, and making a roll if the fiction calls for it. This is a rather simplified cycle of course - the "see what happens" sections may include moments when players may jump in with their own characters' reactions, generating more events that the GM doesn't need to add to in order to make them interesting. Many PbtA games thrive off of player conflict, which can occupy the table for a couple of hours without the GM needing to add anything (Last Fleet is a good example of this kind of play.)

Listening to Others

Listening to other people play PbtA games can give you a sense of how the game is meant to feel, especially when the GM's and players take their time to talk through their moves and how they work.

I found Monster Hour to be exceptionally helpful; they started out as a Monster of the Week podcast, and even though I've never run MotW specifically, listening to Quinn talk the players through how to ask questions or use different moves made the game very easy for me to understand.

Joining a Community

Joining a community that loves a specific PbtA game, or PbtA games in general can be very helpful when seeking out advice. The PbtA Discord channel has a number of players and designers, who have a lot of game experience and are more than happy to dish out advice.

Start With Games That Have Guide-Rails

Not all PbtA games are created equal, and while the original spirit of the game was to make sure you didn't plot out a story-line, there's still some games that have a certain amount of prep that will give you the tools you need to gain confidence as a GM. Here's some of my favourites:

Visigoths vs. Mall Goths can be played as a one-shot, and doesn't require players to make a lot of decisions when putting their characters together. It has a number of scenarios that you can throw at your players, a mapped-out mall with details on all of the NPCs (and whether or not you can flirt with them), and some pretty hard limitations on what you can and cannot do. You can't leave the mall, for example - go through an exit on one side of the mall and you'll just pop back in on the other. You can visit the stores throughout the day, but each team of players can only go to so many places before the mall is closed for the day, therefore bringing the mission to a close.

Apocalypse Keys has a game structure that looks daunting but can be broken down into steps, and also comes with pre-written scenarios as well as instructions on how to create your own. The concept is pretty straightforward - you're solving a mystery, and you need to do it before one of the Doors of the Apocalypse is opened. This puts the game on a timer, which helps GMs keep their players on task, and also provides the Game Master with a list of clues to drop into the story as the players look for them. I've heard very good things about how Brindlewood Bay, which inspired some of the mechanics in Apocalypse Keys, makes itself easy to run for new GMs, so if you can get your hands on that book, you might find it helpful!

Last Fleet is laser-focused on a very specific premise - you are humans, in space, running away from a terrible and insidious threat. What is more, this threat has the ability to infiltrate your fleet. The laser-focus brings everyone at the table to the same page pretty quickly, and the setting includes a mounting pressure track that will make sure things keep happening, so as the person running the game, you won't have to do much after you set up the initial scenario. The game also comes with some really good advice on where you want to start with your players, to make sure they're on edge, but not fully panicking yet. Then you just need to tip the scales enough to cause them to ask questions, make questionable choices, and start a series of actions that snowball into catastrophe.

Wrapping Up

This is all the advice I have for stepping into PbtA, but more than anything, I recommend just diving in and giving it a go! As with any GM-ing endeavour, you will likely walk away from your first session with a list of things that you'll want to do differently the next time around, but that's just a sign that you're learning.

[fiendishartist2]

im not fucking around anymore. here's the full "Paul is Care" essay i've been working on:

“Alright. So there's uh, nothing out here, as far as I've seen. But actually, I think there is something out here. I just haven't seen it yet.”

In Petscop, the story is told between the lines. When you feel like you have a grasp on it, a single colour or date throws off everything you’ve built up. That’s why I like to look at Petscop in another way; not as a series of events, but an exploration of a single character: Paul.

Some people like to map everything out in a single timeline; when did Care go missing, when did the family get the game, when did Lina and Mike die. I think that every interpretation of Petscop has its own value, because Petscop means something different to everyone who watches it. But, when I look at Petscop, I don’t just see a series of events wrapped up in the mystery of Care’s disappearance. I see a video game used as a device to explore and understand the connection between the past and the present. I see the ways in which Paul Leskowitz is Carrie Mark.

I know that to some that notion might seem crazy; the broader discussion of Petscop is different to the niche ones held by crazy people in the tags of a Tumblr post . Obviously, this theory is personally significant and I hold it very near and dear to my heart. But, I want to share this theory in a way that makes sense to the general audience of Petscop because I genuinely believe you guys are missing out! So, keep an open mind and enter my Petscop mind-palace…

“...were signs along the way. Um, that I ignored. Because it would have been a completely ridiculous idea to me. Um. But when I found my room, it made, uh, well, I was shocked at first, but it made sense, especially considering where I found the game in the first place, um, that it would be tied, in some way, to me through you. Um. And I'm trying to think, when was the last time I saw any of you at all? It had to have been in like, 1999. I was a kid, I was a small kid. Tiny kid. Um. And after that, just, you know. But, it would make sense in the timeline.” (Petscop 11)

A lot of Petscop theories surround the actual textual proof found in the videos, so that’s where I’ll start. There’s many instances where Paul makes the connection between himself and Care, but one moment continues to stick with me. In Petscop 11, Paul finally enters the house and takes a look around. He’s on the phone with someone, presumably Belle. Paul goes up to the calendars and starts talking about Care, “Yeah, on that topic... I don't remember meeting this girl at all. Um, I don't remember knowing her at any point (…) Um, and I remember you saying that we were, that we, we are, um, exactly the same age.” (Petscop 11). He points out that he and Care share the same birthday, down to the year. We get further confirmation of this in Petscop 14, when Paul’s conversation with Jill that he had on his own birthday is superimposed onto Care’s. The next part though, is what really gets the theory started, “I do agree there's a resemblance. Um. Very strong resemblance between us.” (Petscop 11).

Faces are incredibly important in Petscop. Marvin thought Care and Mike could be rebirthed into Lina because they had similar features, and Care had to be given Mike’s eyebrows specifically to change her room. So, for Paul and Care to have such similar facial features that someone else pointed out the resemblance is significant.

They also happen to share the name “Leskowitz”, which is both Anna and Lina’s last name. We know this because his Reddit account is “p_leskowitz”.

If he’s a Leskowitz, then that explains his complicated feelings towards “the family”. “The family” is a foreboding presence throughout Petscop. Their meddling isn’t outright malicious, but even Paul admits that he’s intimidated by them. And it makes sense, as “the family” (comprised of Anna and Jill) each have a major role in the core mystery of Petscop. Anna is the mother of Care and the wife of Marvin, while Jill is Marvin’s sister and the mother of both Rainer and Mike. To be a Leskowitz, Paul would need to be blood related to Anna or Lina in some way. Paul shows that he has this relation to the family in Petscop 22, when he’s talking to Belle about finding the windmill, “And, I don't th- and you don't have to worry about it, right, 'cause... 'cause you aren't, you aren't family, so you wouldn't... have a room, that's the thing.” (Petscop 22). In this context, Paul is asking Belle whether Jill has contacted her. When he tells her she doesn’t have a room, this is in reference to the Child Library explored in Petscop 3 and 7. This means that in order to be part of the Leskowitz-Mark family (and in our case, related to Care), you have to have a room in the Child Library, something both Paul and Care possess.

Paul being related to the family is also supported by his casual mention of meeting Rainer as a child, “‘Rainer’... I saw him at a birthday party once. All the older kids were down in the basement playing video games, to hide from everyone. He was down there, too. He was older than the rest of them, though.” (Petscop 11), and his confusion of not knowing Care, with the implication that if she was real, he would have met her through the family.

A rarely discussed aspect of Paul’s character is that he can’t tell his left from his right. When he’s doing the disc puzzle in Anna and Marvin’s room is Petscop 11, “Um, we can see what the room looks like in that recording, um, on the uh, right? ... Left? Left? Right ... side.” (Petscop 14) and before he even enters the house, “And, I mean, I still get confused about that. Because, I mean, well, I know it's always the top, but, um, I still have to think. I have to think.” (Petscop 11), we can clearly see that he has trouble with directions. In a similar fashion, Care is described as “dizzy”, most notably in the end credits of Petscop. She is also described as blind by Rainer in Petscop 17, “You were blind. At some point, your movements stopped making sense.” (Petscop 17). In the counsellor’s office, the counsellor says to Paul, “Are you right handed, or left handed? You don't know? Really?” (Petscop 22). I’ll get more into it later, but this sequence is presumably a real conversation that the game is recreating. If this scene is taken from Care’s real childhood, then it confirms that she also had problems with her lefts and rights.

Now, this is the base level of the theory. It’s easy to figure out that Paul is a Leskowitz, he literally calls them “the family”. And while I think the bits about faces and birthdays and directions are significant to this theory, I wanted to get all of the textual evidence out of the way so that I could get into the fun part of this essay: the subtext.

”Some things you can't rewrite.” (Petscop 14)

Petscop is nothing if not a collection of symbols and metaphors. Ask me what Petscop is all about on any given day and there’s a non-zero chance I will start explaining why the car is orange. While it is necessary to analyse Petscop as a real series of events, I think that another approach can be taken; what if we analysed Petscop as a series of events that are happening to Paul specifically? That the game is creating meaning by placing Paul specifically in these snippets of the past. By looking at each moment as “Why did the game make Paul do this?” instead of “What is happening in the game?”, we can see everything through a new lens.

First, I want to discuss colour. Colour plays a huge role in Petscop; almost every character is assigned their own colour. This is most often used to denote who is speaking in text, but it’s also used for other things like the tool. You are probably aware that Care’s colour is yellow, as all of her text is yellow. What you might not know is that Paul’s colour is red. Paul has exactly one instance in all of Petscop where he has coloured text and that is in Petscop 22, when he gives the counsellor his name. The calendars in the house are also colour coded, as the one showing 2017 is red.

One of my favourite moments in all of Petscop uses colour in a way that supports this theory perfectly. When Paul takes Care out of the rebirthing machine, she has been transformed into an Easter egg. A red and yellow striped Easter egg. I will get into this egg later on, but for now, I want to point out how Paul and Care’s colours have been used here. Of course, it’s significant just that they've been put together, but it's more than that. Care’s final form, the egg she has been placed in to keep her safe from all of the trauma she has suffered, that she will spend the rest of the series in, is painted a combination of her and Paul’s colours. In the same sequence, when Paul is playing the Needles Piano for Care B, the “wrong” notes he plays to turn her into the Easter Egg are all red. There’s a joke about eggs and transness in here somewhere.

Right after Care’s rebirth into the egg, Paul places her in the locker with the purple egg and the “new life” letter. If we abide by the established colour theory, this second egg would be Belle’s/Tiara’s egg. By putting them together, alongside the letter, it symbolises Care and Belle’s transfer to Lina��s care; this can also be supported by the ending of Petscop. In the final scene of the soundtrack, Belle recounts when she and Paul were adopted, “There is Boss waiting for her son. Pall do you remember being born. Smuggled away driving to your new house. Boss in driver seat me in back.” (Petscop Soundtrack). “Do you remember being born” is a question posed over and over again throughout Petscop. It’s meant to be a reference to rebirthing, but here it’s Paul being asked if he remembers being born, not Care; you can also connect this to the “new life” letter, making it apparent Belle is asking if he remembers when he was given his “new life” with her and “Boss”. There’s also the implication of the wording “smuggled away”, implying that there was something stopping Paul from being taken to his new home. Paul and Care’s final scenes parallel each other; Care is placed with Belle’s/Tiara’s egg with the “new life” letter, while Paul is taken back to “Boss” by Belle. Care and Paul are both asked if they “remember being born”.

Another, smaller piece of colour theory in Petscop comes from the board games in the counsellor’s office. The board game “Accident” features red and yellow puzzle pieces that fit together, but are broken apart. Remember that Care’s colour is yellow, so assume that she symbolises the yellow piece; Paul’s colour is red, so assume that he symbolises the red piece. The red piece is bigger and fits into the smaller yellow piece, like it’s missing the beginning of it. The yellow piece comes before the red piece, as if it adds context to the red piece. When we think of this in terms of Care and Paul, we can see that Care is the “missing piece” of Paul; the small part of his past that adds the context that completes him. Paul’s piece is bigger because he’s been Paul for so much longer (if we interpret the counsellor’s office as a real event the way it is shown, then that could be the moment he changed. Or, if we consider Care’s rebirth into the egg as the moment Care turned into Paul, then that would be the moment instead), meanwhile Care’s piece is small because she was only a small part of his life.

Taking colour into account, we can get into the meat of the symbolism in Petscop. When we view the events of Petscop through our new lens, many things become significant. Paul is placed in the role of Care many times throughout the series; on Care’s birthday, in the counsellor's office, and in Rainer’s “you are Carrie Mark” monologue.

During the “strange situation” birthday scene, Paul carries around a yellow balloon, symbolising that he is standing in for Care. This is further cemented by Anna’s dialogue addressing Paul as if he is Care on the day she came home, “You made it. Happy birthday! (...) Why are you covering your face? (...) Of course I recognize you. Those eyes. That nose. That’s still you.” (Petscop 14).

This next dialogue from Anna is particularly interesting to me; she doesn’t just tell Paul that she’s happy Care is home safe or ask him where she’s been, but instead she says this, “I sure hope you’ve realised by now. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been gone. It doesn’t matter how much you’ve changed. You aren’t lost. Stop wandering and come home.” (Petscop 14). When we talk about Petscop, we have the urge to deny any supernatural involvement in the story. Whether through AI or predictive programming or alternate timelines, we want Petscop to be plausible. Understandable. Easy to digest. But, we often forget that Paul poses the question of a literal “ghost in the machine” in the first few episodes. I want to consider this quote– Anna talking to her child who has been “lost” for many years– as an act of this ghost. The game is talking back to Paul, telling him that no matter how much he has changed, he still has the same eyes, the same nose that made him Carrie Mark. And we know how important eyes and noses are in Petscop. Also as a side note, consider how Anna didn’t specify eyebrows; we know that Care’s lack of eyebrows is in some way due to Marvin, but when she tells Paul she recognises his eyes and nose, she doesn’t add on eyebrows. Paul said it himself in Petscop 7, “Um, and why am I doing that? Well, because eyebrows seem to be important.” (Petscop 7). I like to think that she couldn’t have said that Paul has the same eyebrows because, since Marvin isn’t in the picture anymore, he wouldn’t have any reason to pluck them.

Another scene that mixes up Paul and Care is the counsellor's office. When Paul finally enters the “girl wall” in Petscop 22, he is placed into a school’s counsellor’s office. Again, they talk to Paul as if he is Care, apologising for taking him out of class and saying he needs to “catch up”, implying that he’s missed a significant amount of school. As they start to play Graverobber (Jesus Christ, Rainer), the counsellor is confused about Paul’s name; they ask him if they have the wrong name written down, as his save file is currently “Strange Situation” and when they called out the name on file, Paul didn’t respond. Now, the connection here is a little more nuanced, but it still comes to a conclusion that I think greatly supports the theory. “Strange situation” is in reference to the Mary Ainsworth Strange Situation Experiment, a test in which an infant is deliberately separated from their mother to test their level of attachment. This is a very base level understanding of this concept, but when applied to this specific scene, it becomes apparent that this “strange situation” is another reference to Care. Care was separated from her mother for about half a year, only returning during the birthday party scene; the counsellor’s scene was accessible once Paul started using the “Strange Situation” file. Care stopped recognising the name she used before the seperation, considering herself to be “Strange Situation” instead. She has literally stopped recognising the name Care, and picks out her own name (which in the game Paul sets to his own).

Also consider the implication of the “girl wall”. At first, it’s an absurd joke, meant to lighten the mood using the same roundabout humour the rest of the series has. But, the counsellor asking if they have the wrong name, listing Paul as “Strange Situation” instead of his name, combined with the fact that when Paul is placed in front of the girl wall, he can’t walk away from it, it becomes a bit of an analogy; The game keeps forcefully showing Paul the word “GiRL” over and over and when he finally enters the “girl-world” as Strange Situation, he is called the wrong name and once again placed in Care’s shoes.

Let’s revisit the “ghost in the machine” idea. In Petscop 17, we are shown a past recording of Petscop; we never find out who was playing at this time, but it’s easy to assume Paul is the one watching the recording. The footage is less interesting than the dialogue, but it is notable that it’s a recording of the player running backwards in a very deliberate pattern. The actually relevant part of this sequence is Rainer’s monologue; in particular, the way he frames it, “You are a girl named Carrie Mark, and you were born on November 12th, 1992. You have a mommy named Anna, a daddy named Marvin, an auntie named Jill, an uncle named Thomas, a cousin named Daniel, ......I know what you must be thinking. Have these statements always been true? Or have I cursed you? Is there such a thing? A curse that changes your past?” (Petscop 17). There’s something about the forcefulness of this dialogue, “You are Carrie Mark,” as if Rainer is trying to make it so just by saying it. The inclusion of the birthday is also notable; we have been shown time and time again that Paul and Care share a birthday, and that this is an important part of both of their characters. So, when Rainer asks if these statements have always been true, or if it’s “a curse that changes your past”, we’re meant to interpret it as such: some of the statements are true, but the “you” being addressed is not currently “a girl named Carrie Mark”. Rainer casts a spell to make the player retrace their steps and although he might not be playing, the use of the word “you” and present tense language makes the statement pointed towards Paul. There’s something to be said about Rainer’s position in all of this; he isn’t the only tangible “ghost” in Petscop (Marvin and Tiara fit Paul’s definition established in Petscop 6), but he’s the only one to be fully dead. It truly feels, in this moment, like Petscop– like Rainer– is talking directly to Paul. The “curse that changes your past” is the part that ties it all together. This past that Paul doesn’t fully remember, where Anna and Marvin have a daughter named Care, where someone in his family went missing for months– by learning about this through the game, Rainer is essentially changing Paul’s version of the past. Your memory and physical evidence are all you have of the past; when your memory tells you one thing, but physical evidence tells you another, what version of your past is true?

“You’re the Newmaker. You can turn Care NLM into Care A, and close the loop.” (Petscop 9)

Finally, I want to explain why this theory is supportive of the themes of Petscop. Of course, there’s the obvious link between rebirth and the change from Care to Paul. But, there’s also themes of blood family versus chosen family, breaking the cycle of abuse, and of healing from your past. I want to provide an explanation of each of these themes and how the “Paul is Care” theory fits into them.

Let’s begin with the family point, since I already expanded on the family’s role in Petscop earlier. There’s a story behind the scenes in this series; the conflict between the chosen family versus the blood family. Anna and Jill against Belle and Lina. Anna and Jill are restrictive– they take over the channel and block certain things from the audience. Paul admits that he’s intimidated by them, and he’s concerned when he thinks Jill could be in contact with Belle. When we get the only dialogue from Jill, Paul is hostile and aggressive with her, something we don’t see from him otherwise. Alternately, Anna comes off as dismissive in most of her dialogue; when Care shows up at the birthday party, Anna treats her like no time has passed, like they haven’t been searching for her for months. We don’t get direct contact between Anna and Paul (except for a phone call in Petscop 11 that you could interpret as being with Anna), but the way she talks to the player through Care during the birthday party is still dismissive, “I sure hope you’ve realised by now. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been gone. It doesn’t matter how much you’ve changed. You aren’t lost. Stop wandering and come home.” (Petscop 14). There’s a level of distance between Paul and the family, which is evident from the name alone; Paul identifies himself as part of the family, but he still calls them “the family” as opposed to “my family”. When you pair that with the fact that he calls them all by their first names instead of any term of endearment (like how Rainer calls her “Auntie Jill” in his spell), it paints a clear picture: Paul does not want to be part of this family.

In direct contrast, Belle is shown a significant amount of affection from Paul. Not only is he on the phone with her for a good handful of the episodes, but Belle also has a familial connection to Paul. In Petscop 2, Paul is talking to Belle and he says “When you come home next month, and uh, hopefully you're feeling a little more enthusiastic about that now, we can investigate this together, and maybe you'll find stuff that I can't find here.” (Petscop 2). I think the casual use of the word ‘home’ to describe where Belle is staying implies a certain closeness, maybe even that they live in the same household. That’s not the part of this line that is important to me, however. Take a look at Belle’s final speech at the end of Petscop; Belle says “I could not wait too be your friend,” and Paul responds, “Family”, to which Belle says, “We can investigate this together.” (Petscop Soundtrack). After distancing himself from the family, as well as directly telling her she’s not part of the family (following it up with “Uhh... I didn't- I didn't mean it that way,” (Petscop 22), implying they have a similar connection that she’s defending), Paul calls Belle family. She states that they’re friends and Paul corrects her by telling her that they’re not just friends, but family. The most gut wrenching part of this dialogue is the use of ‘we can investigate this together’. It’s like a ward, a promise that Belle is making to Paul. He doesn’t have to go through this alone, she’s promising to be there for him. She’s going to investigate this with him, like he asked her to in the second episode. Paul doesn’t call his blood relatives family, but he tells Belle that they are his family; her and the “Boss”.

How does this connect to Care? It’s not hard evidence, but when you take this theme of family into account, it makes more sense for Paul to have a strained relationship with the family if we apply Care’s story to him. Think about it; Paul was ‘smuggled away driving too [his] new house’ and he hasn’t seen the family since he was a child, and Care’s egg was (metaphorically) placed with Belle’s and the New Life Letter when she would have been around 5, since that’s the age she was when she was kidnapped. Care went through an extremely traumatic event in a toxic environment– why wouldn’t someone step in and take her out of that family? To me, this theory extends the same closure Paul gets at the end of Petscop to Care; it tells us that even after everything she went through, she finds people who love and take care of her.

Abuse is a huge focus in Petscop, both as a plot point and a major theme. Rainer’s main motivation is to expose Marvin’s abuse of both Mike and Care to the family– whether or not that’s successful is not important. Because years after Rainer’s attempt, Paul is back doing the exact same; although, his playthrough of Petscop is less of an expose and more of an attempt at solving the mystery. Now, I think it’s a little pedantic, but in this context, I think the “cycle of abuse” in Petscop refers less to a generational cycle, but a continuous cycle that happens every time Petscop is played. Care is stuck in this version of the past that Rainer has created, forced to live through it as many years as Petscop is left on. Paul doesn’t continue this cycle though; as far as we know, Paul is the only person to reach the good ending of the game, where he’s rebirthed Care into the egg and reconnected with Belle and ‘Boss’. Paul is the only person who could understand what Care needed, because it’s exactly what he needed.

Care’s trauma is replayed for us throughout Petscop. Every knowable aspect of it is shown, leaving behind a raw feeling; like somehow, Paul and Rainer have made a spectacle of her abuse. But, I don’t think that’s entirely true. Rainer, although he is bitter and vengeful, is ultimately the person who finds the truth about Care and Mike and (if we are to believe him) is also the one who found Care at the school. In the beginning, it’s obvious that Paul is playing the game to see the mystery and is slowly engulfed by it throughout the rest of the series. When the game tells him that, “Marvin picks up tool hurts me when playstation on,” (Petscop 3), Paul proceeds anyway. The same happens when Care is caught in her room; Paul sees what is obviously a child being kidnapped and continues to solve the puzzle anyway. He picks the flower, catching Care NLM, and leads Marvin to the house. Paul follows through on everything he can to ‘solve’ the mystery of Carrie Mark, but in the end, he defies what the game has told him to do and saves Care. He does what Rainer couldn’t do: he breaks the cycle of abuse in the Mark-Leskowitz family. It’s kind of poetic, the idea that the person Care grew to be is the same person who confronts and lays to rest her trauma. The fact that playing his own theme would be the key to changing Care into the egg (a symbol of birth and potential) is beautiful.

The last thing I want to talk about is the theme of healing. This concept is more nebulous; we don’t see much of Paul post-Petscop, but the final scene does always leave me feeling hopeful for him. I think the reconnection with Belle and ‘Boss’, alongside the reassurance that, “[they] can investigate this together,” shows that Paul is out of the mindset and environment Petscop put him in. I’ve always thought that throughout Petscop, we see a deterioration of Paul; in the beginning, he’s intrigued and confused, but we see him become more and more disturbed, irritable, and frustrated towards the end. This is first evident with the CD puzzle in the house, where Paul is so out of his depth and confused that he stops acting with the same calm rationality shown throughout the earlier episodes. Then, when Paul is messing about with the demo recordings, he stops speaking in the videos entirely. When Paul sees the final blacked out object, which are coordinates to the real life windmill, he is the most stuttery we’ve ever seen, “Hm. Y- y- yep, yep. Yep... yep. N- we would- we would have to find out how big... like, we'd have to find out how big a tile is..? One of the tiles..? Like, if we could- if we could figure out how big... one tile is, in... u- in, umm... Like, feet. Or... Uhh, yeah. Meters.” (Petscop 22). He’s frazzled and excited and a little bit scared, evidenced by how he talks about the family, “They didn't... I don't like talking to them. They intimidate me…” (Petscop 22). All of this changes by the end; Paul is no longer stuck playing the game and he’s free to return to the people who love him most. This freedom is summed up in a single image: the final one we see in Petscop. Paul’s chair is empty and the blue sky beyond the desk is brimming with hope.

All this to say, Paul choosing Belle and ‘Boss’ over the game as well as saving Care by doing what’s best for her instead of finishing the final puzzle, alongside his final scene where he is welcomed home by his real family, shows us an interpretation of Petscop that paints it not as a tragedy, but a story of chosen family, breaking the cycle of abuse, and healing trauma through connection.

Thank you so much for hearing me out.

Bye-bye!

[dbacklot99]

2024 fic roundup game

Can I just create an ask game? said @cheeseplants

Yes!! Thanks to @cheeseplants and anyone else you tagged me.

What fandoms do you write in? Good Omens! Only Good Omens, Forever Good Omens.

How many words have you published in 2024? Ok, including some chapters for an upcoming [redcated] collab, I'm estimating 150k that I actually wrote. Which....isn't much in this incredibly talented fandom BUT was a lot for me.

What is your greatest achievement this year? Getting out there and collaborating!! I talked to artists (y'all are magical and terrifying), I joined the [redacted] project and wrote amazing angst with @gaiaseyes451, @sixbynine-da, @kneelbeforeyourdogbabylon, @groovynightstrawberry, and MxThirteen, PLUS more artists, @apocalyptic-scenes & babyrubysoho.

And then kept on writing with a lot of those folks to create some amazing crack - and Lucicrow?

My point is, once you start collaborating, you have no idea where it will take you!

What are your top three fics you’ve written this year? Mirrors (E, WIP but almost finished): Angsty reverse omens AU, but there's a happy ending I PROMISE. With amazing art from @daneecastle and @c0smicdisaster.

Cracked Pepper (E): Utterly absurd birthday crack for @kneelbeforeyourdogbabylon. I'm still tickled that I somehow wrote this.

Have We Been Here Before? (E): A one-shot love letter to the fandom (also podfic from the amazing @nosferatini )

What was your biggest pit of despair moment? Hmmm, I got kind of lost in my subplots in the middle of After Heaven. But it worked out and I actually love the ending.

I regularly despair that I will never have enough time to write - or to write as well as I want.

What have you learned? I've gotten some sense of the things I'm ok at. And learning to work on adding descriptions and feelings, not just plot.

Still need to improve my gif game!

What fic did you want to do but never made it off the ground? I have three historical scenes hopping around, but not fully formed yet...

Did you beta any fics? Any favs you want to shout out? Yes!! I can't name all of them - and some aren't published yet (looking at you, @on1occasionfork). But some to throw love at:

Saint of Lost Things (E) by @gaiaseyes451. This would have gone on my year's best list, but I'm sneaking it in here. Post S2 angst and redemption is absolute marvel of story telling!

What Have I Lost (M) Another post2S fic, from MarieCuriosity that I can't wait to see how it comes together!

The Show Must Go On (M) A great 1941 follow-up by @vieux-yeux

Lady of Rheged (E): A West Essex historical AU by @mageofthepeople

Seasons of Nightingales (M): A massive, sweet post2S fic from @nosferatini that is almost done!!!

but i still want more (E): An intense but heartachingly lovely postS2 fic from @cordsycords

Confeitor (M): pure poetry from @adverbian

What three fics have you read this year that you love? Lol, 3!!!

Tethered (E): WIP by MarieCuriosity based on a Gleafer prompt

Someone is Calling Him Shorewards (E): by @harlotofupdog. Gah, if you haven't read it yet, what are you waiting for?

Trial & Error (M) by @fellshish. I love everything postS2 and this one was so original!

Anything ginger_cat wrote

Angel-Centered Therapy (G) I thought this was the perfect counterpoint to its big brother (sister?), Demonology.

Rosae series (E) by UKCalico. Sure, it's incredibly hot, but then hits you with these deep insights into the characters and their lives.

If I loved you less, We Could have Coffee (M): The Chapell Roan fic you didn't know you needed; excited to see what happens next! By @spectrallydistracted

Teach me, both the art from @gahellhimself-blog and the fics from Jeans. A really amazing collaboration!

What ideas are percolating for next year? Going to start off with a couple sequels, and then we'll see where the plot bunnies take us.

Who do you want to thank? @goodomensafterdark for endless support and entertainment. Wibly for maps!! @ireallyneedmoretea & @moderndayklutz for being beta rockstars on [redacted]!

Are you somewhere in this post? Should you be? Go on and play the game!

[spiritsglade]

Could you do Talia al Ghul for the character ask game? I’d be curious to see your thoughts on her!

[character ask game]

Hi hello!! Unfortunately my Talia knowledge is deeply limited so like 90% of this is just Lost Days haha.

My first impression

I think my first real encounter with her was in the fic Across the Sands by Lulu_Rhythm. I haven't reread it since but I remember enjoying it. At that point I was still very much operating based on fanon and hadn't read the comics yet. Her portrayal is relatively positive in that fic iirc, but I remember viewing her as an antagonist and the associated dislike.

I may have read negative portrayals of her (as in, purposefully manipulating Jason into hate Bruce) prior to that, or just got that vibe. First impression was overall negative.

My impression now

She's a really interesting character and one that I want to read more of, when I get the chance!! I am not quite at defending her with my life level yet but I will FIGHT you if you make her evil.

Favorite thing about that character

Her compassion, I think. How much she cares. I don't know the exact details of her relationship with Ra's but from what I heard it's extremely compelling!! I love characters torn between loyalty towards their parents & their own values.

Least favorite thing

I don't know what Morrison did to her and I don't want to know and if I close my eyes it doesn't exist and cannot hurt me. Also that scene in Lost Days Issue #6. Not at all surprised Winick wrote that considering that Batman Annual 25 also had her kissing Jason on the mouth. Going to continue to pretend that doesn't exist <3

Favorite line/scene

But you should know, more than any other reason--I have done this for LOVE.

^ thinking about this alll the time. It's part of the letter she writes for Jason before throwing him in the Pit.

Favorite interaction that character has with another

Lost Days Issue #1 scene where she's just rambling to a catatonic Jason about Bruce. "Since he lost you, he's changed. He's become.. unforgiving. I know that most probably don't see that quality in him… but you know. I know it, too." <- sobbing

A character that I wish that character would interact with more

I've heard that Dick hates her and I think that's fun. I would like to see more of that. This is probably my own fault for not reading many of her comics though (I'm working on that).

While we're here I am also planning on checking out more of her original meeting with Bruce and stuff about their relationship in general.

Another character from another fandom that reminds me of that character

Hmm bit of a stretch but Icicle from Wings of Fire. Fucked up families & a Fandom that loves villainizing them.

A headcanon about that character

Probably less a headcanon and more a specific way of reading canon, but this is a concept that I immediately forget how to explain the moment I decide to try, so here's a couple paragraphs from a fic I wrote back in November that sort of catches the vibe.

She has known the body longer than she has known him, and that makes something prickle down his spine. Jason Todd is dead, and so is Robin, and so is the shell that Talia liked. That Talia misses, because no matter how much she speaks like they are one and the same, Hood has a body with adroit hands and an intact skull. He has a body that grows too fast for its skin, like even it knows there is something wrong with how it has been made anew.

Waves my hands around vaguely. Talia's relationship with Jason pre and post-Pit are very different. I think she misses the easy peace she had with pre-Pit Jason. There was a fondness there.

A song that reminds of that character

Not a song listener... it's been a while since I listed to the Lace Silksong sample by Christopher Larkin but I'm gravitating towards that.

An unpopular opinion about that character

Don't think I know her well enough to have a good grasp on this but I will reiterate she is not evil. Yes she was manipulating Jason in Lost Days but she wasn't brainwashing him into hating Bruce. Most fanon interpretations of Jason I can stomach (I can tolerate 'replacement' on a good day) but if you bring up Talia manipulating him into hating Bruce and/or wanting to kill Tim I am walking in the opposite direction.

Favorite picture

Mikel Janín's Talia al Ghul I love you...

[thelostgirl21]

Alright, so this is a reply to @my-jokes-are-my-armour brilliant additions to my post, because the original one was getting insanely long, and apparently I had lots of feels about this, but asfoljasdfklsf;asldkfas;flkjasdlkjffslksjdf;s...

That "maybe"...

There are so many possible "layers" to that "maybe"!

And that's definitely one the places where Jaskier and Radovid's respective situations massively differ in that scene, too, IMHO.

Like you've said, Jaskier has a found family that he's spent about 20+ years investing in.

So, obviously, it would make absolutely no sense for him to sacrifice the ties he's already built with Geralt, Yennefer, and Ciri, for a relationship that does have great potential, but is still in its infancy; whereas Radovid has made no such personal commitments in his life.

I don't know if you're familiar with the YouTube channel "Cinema Therapy" (basically, a psychologist and filmmaker analysing various movie relationships, characters psychology, etc. I highly recommend it!), but they've occasionally spoken about the notion of "shelving your agenda".

Essentially, "shelving your agenda" relates to a person's ability to "temporarily delay one's own needs to meet those of another".

And, in this particular situation, the only one of them that can afford to shelve his own agenda for the other is Radovid.

Because, at that moment, Jaskier is facing the possibility of devastating potential losses within his family system that greatly threaten his emotional and psychological well-being.

Radovid can (or at least could, while Vizimir was the one still wearing that crown) afford to be the one providing him with emotional, physical and financial support to give Jaskier his best chance at being reunited with those he loves.

But Jaskier can't really promise or offer Radovid anything in return for the time being.

And sadly, he doesn't know how bad things are for Radovid at court, either.

He doesn't know that Philippa and Dijkstra orchestrated Queen Hedwig's murder, right under King Vizimir's nose, with such confidence in their ability to get away with it that they openly told the Crown Prince of Redania about it!

He doesn't know about Radovid's relationship dynamic with his brother, and the fact that being the King's little brother is no longer enough to keep Radovid safe in that castle.

And I don't think Jaskier fully grasps just how much being in his presence is already offering Radovid something that's rather essential for his own emotional and psychological well-being, too, that he has never been able to find anywhere else.

Jaskier: "You don't understand. [This is not me trying to walk away from a relationship with you.] The war brewing outside is nothing compared to what Geralt will unleash on this Continent to find his daughter. [I'm pretty much planning to go throw myself headfirst into some desperate suicide mission with a stubborn, insanely protective Witcher dad!] I don't know what happens next. [I've no idea what will happen to me. Out there, none of us will be safe!]"

Radovid: [Oh boy! Where do I even start?] "Just let me be there with you." [Trust me, as terrible as you are trying to make it sound, joining you on a suicide mission following an angry overprotective Witcher around is actually my safest, least bad option.] "Prove that I'm more than a mask." [I belong with you and your family out there, not stuck at court playing games!]

Basically, I've a feeling that Jaskier might be operating under the belief that the safest place for the Crown Prince of Redania to be, in times of war with Nilfgaard, is behind the well guarded walls of a castle; not running around the Continent helping him and Geralt go rescue a Princess!

If he returns to Tretogor and stay there, Radovid will have an entire army standing between him and Nilfgaard!

Which, you know, is pretty much the reason that had convinced him that Ciri might be better off in Redania rather than anywhere else...

If he comes with him, well, Radovid is probably one of the last people you'd want anyone loyal to Nilfgaard to get their hands on.

The King's brother - and sole current living heir to the throne (at the time) - is very much someone that Redania's enemies would want to capture so they can use as leverage against the King.

And Jaskier's pretty much planning on being Geralt's ride or die companion on his quest to find Ciri.

So, I'm not sure how comfortable Jaskier is with the possibility of Radovid getting himself captured by enemies or killed trying to help them out there; or, even worse, winding up sacrificing his life to save Jaskier's.

Because Radovid has already proven that he values Jaskier's safety and freedom above his own, when he ditched his whole (now very dead) royal security detail to go see him and Ciri at the cabin.

Radovid is willing to make Jaskier his #1 priority, in a situation where Jaskier needs to make Geralt, Yennefer and Ciri his own #1 priority.

Jaskier is planning to "shelve his agenda" for his family, to the point of being willing to risk sacrificing his life for them…

…while Radovid is talking about "shelving his agenda" for Jaskier, while being willing to risk sacrificing his life for him, and - by extension - Jaskier's family, too.

It's likely a lot for Jaskier to take in.

And, perhaps, knowing that Radovid - at least - would be safe back in his castle, would give Jaskier some peace of mind, and even something for him to fight to come back to, should he somehow succeed in helping Geralt get Ciri back without managing to get himself killed in the process!

So, Jaskier's "maybe" is likely the most sincere answer Jaskier can give him at the moment, since Jaskier genuinely doesn't know what happens next, and he probably doesn't want Radovid to make the decision to take such a huge risk for himself and his family based on the promise of things that he might never be given the chance to offer him.

Had Jaskier known that the greatest threat Radovid was facing could be found within his castle's well guarded walls, his response to Radovid's desire to be there with him might have been different.

Perhaps he might have said something along the lines of "Forget about the money, and if you really want to come with me, come with me now! We'll think of a way to let your brother know you're relatively safe, and haven't been killed or kidnapped while we're on the road!", or something.

And then, hope his own family would understand why he chose to take Radovid with him, and for them hopefully to not be upset that he's just managed to make their whole situation even more complicated than it already was.

[Poor Geralt though…

Geralt: Let me get this straight… Of all the people on the Continent you could have romantically fallen for, you somehow managed to pick the Crown Prince of Redania? And now, the prince - who comes from a bad home that has been mistreating him - has been following you outside his castle, and you're asking if we can adopt and keep him?

Jaskier: *Smiles sheepishly and attempts to look adorable.* Yes?

Geralt: *Mumbling to himself.* Why does Destiny fucking hate me so much? How many princes and princesses am I supposed to be looking after? I'm a Witcher, for fuck's sake! I'm supposed to be killing monsters! Not opening a royal rescue shelter…

Radovid: *Concerned.* Ah, is your Witcher okay?

Jaskier: Just give him a moment to have a mental breakdown, and he'll be fine!]

But Jaskier doesn't know how bad things are for Radovid back at Tretogor.

Actually, even Radovid himself doesn't fully know!

As far as Radovid is concerned, Dijkstra briefly perceived him as a threat - or at least a nuisance - with regards to the complete and absolute influence he has on King Vizimir, and threatened to have him killed if he gets in their way.

So, by leaving, he'd technically be doing him a favor! No more "baby prince brother" royalsitting for Dijkstra and Philippa! They can go back to the way they've always preferred doing things, without having Radovid to deal with!

But Radovid doesn't know his brother has decided to let Philippa take the fall for Thanedd, and that the best solution the sorceress came up with, to deal with the issue, is "Yup! Imma get rid of Vizimir and put that spare on the throne!"

On a scale of 0 to "the spymasters are so confident they can get away with regicide that they feel totally comfortable making the guy they gleefully confessed Queen Hedwig's murder to King", just how fucking screwed are you?

I don't think Radovid had fully realised he'd reached that very last stage yet.

But yeah, Jaskier answering "maybe" made much more sense, to me, than him going "yes please, come with me, where I'll almost certainly manage to get you and/or myself killed in a desperate attempt to keep my family safe!"

And I love how long he hesitates before giving that answer, and the way his thoughts really appear to be racing, even after he says "maybe", because it is an incredibly complex and multi-factorial situation for him to deal with.

Whereas Radovid has essentially two choices:

Return to a loveless, toxic, dangerous place where he's totally disconnected from himself, and isolated from healthy human interactions.

Be out there in the world, risking his life for something - someone - that's worth taking those risks for, thus acting in accordance with who he is, and what matters to him the most.

So, Radovid basically saying "I'm all in! Let's go!", while Jaskier is saying "maybe", to me, might have more to do with how well they are both ready to handle and accept the potential consequences of Radovid choosing to go with Jaskier at that moment; than it has to do with how much they both desire to have the chance to potentially be together, or even Jaskier struggling with forgiving him.

Of course, there's also Jaskier's own personal fears (of abandonment, of falling back into unhealthy codependent patterns, etc.) that may play a role in him hesitating to treat his feelings for Radovid as a full-fledged partnership right away, and being comfortable with the idea of trusting Radovid enough to rely on him for support, too (trust and forgiveness are not quite the same thing).

That "maybe" is filled with so much potential delicious meanings, I'm telling you!

And, given that being told "maybe" didn't deter Radovid from wanting to go to Jaskier, I've a feeling that Radovid knew that Jaskier's "maybe" was also filled with a lot of hope and yearning, and as close to a "yes" as Jaskier could afford to offer him.

After all, he'd already told Radovid that his plans [of breaking things off between them] had changed.

When Radovid said "I don't get it", Jaskier could have answered him with: "it's the right thing to do", or "I may no longer want to see you, that doesn't mean I wish you to get hurt, Radovid", or "I owe you for having ditched - and now lost - your guards when you came to see me. This is me doing what I can do to pay back the favor."

But Jaskier said "plans change", with some of the most cautiously hopeful and vulnerable puppy dog eyes I've ever seen him throw at anyone.

To me, there was a sense of forgiveness and a bit of an apology, even, in Jaskier's expression at that moment…

Because the fact remains that Jaskier didn't offer Radovid his help, the night before, when he told him he was scared; resulting in Jaskier having allowed Radovid to back himself into that corner where people might say and do stupid things.

It would be a bit unfair for Jaskier to be upset with Radovid for not having trusted him with everything he knew when he came to see him and Ciri, when Jaskier himself was so scared to trust Radovid that he didn't call him out for having avoided to directly answer his question, and instead chose to test what he'd do with the information that the forcefield only lasted 'til dawn.

He's accusing Radovid of not fully trusting him and having kept his full intentions from him, when Jaskier himself literally set up a trap for him, because he was too scared to trust him…

And Radovid had the honesty of saying "I'm scared, Jaskier", at the very least. Whereas Jaskier kept his own fears to himself, and chose to play games and test him.

Granted, Radovid could have pretended to be scared to get Jaskier to lower his defenses, and manipulate him. I'm not saying that Jaskier didn't have very valid reasons for choosing to test him, rather than opting for a direct confrontation.

Trust eventually does become essential in a relationship, but it would be unrealistic to expect it to "magically be there" until both sides have experienced how the other responds in a variety of situations - including their ability to make each other still feel safe while they handle conflicts and mistakes.

So, I'm not pointing out Jaskier's own contribution to this whole mess while trying to determine who is to blame, who was wrong, or who hurt the other the most.

Just hoping that, maybe, Jaskier is allowing himself to recognize that they are both very flawed, complex and human individuals that never meant to hurt each other at that moment.

That part of the reasons why he sits down and looks at Radovid with such a sad, defeated expression, is that he's realizing that they were simply dealing and coping with their own respective fears and doubts as best they could back at the cabin, and got both a good, strong bite in the arse as a result!

When Radovid ran away from the cabin earlier, Jaskier made a little move as if instinctively wanting to run after him.

I think that, maybe, in all of the ways Jaskier might have expected their confrontation to go when "catching Radovid in the act" that morning, he might have imagined facing more outrage from Radovid, more fight…

He might have expected for him to start blaming him in return, etc.

Because, had Radovid indeed been a "knife" and wearing a mask with Jaskier, he might have played "meek" and attempted to "reason with" Jaskier in the beginning in a desperate last ditch attempt to hold onto his mask, sure!

But, when he'd realised it didn't work - and Jaskier would not be so easily fooled - the mask would eventually have had to come off!

Radovid could easily have pretended that he had only wanted to test if Jaskier was being sincere with him.

He could have claimed that he'd realised, the night before, that Jaskier had only let him know about when the forcefield would come down, because he'd never truly cared about him, nor trusted him!

And low and behold! He was right!

Radovid could have accused Jaskier of having been dishonest and manipulative with him, of only having ever pretended to care for him, so he could use him because of his wealth and position at court.

He could have mocked Jaskier for having claimed that "he had no desire" to be playing games with him through his song, only to then go on scheming against him, and setting up traps for him at the first opportunity he got!

A skilled "knife", caught in a lie, will not admit to any wrongdoing, and will make it sound like you're the villain, they're the victim, and the problem lies with you, not them.

But Radovid's response was being truthful in his answers, internalize Jaskier's blame, look like he'd just been kicked, utter a pitiful "I'm so sorry," and run away!

Unless you are someone that enjoy dominating other people and bringing them down (something I do not believe Jaskier does), there's no sense of triumph, or even validation to be derived from Radovid's response!

There's no sense of relief from "having escaped being fooled by such a manipulative and dangerous individual" to be found!

Radovid just took all the blame on himself, brokenly apologized for having managed to hurt and disappoint Jaskier, and ran away thinking he'd forever lost him.

Had Jaskier's priority not been to ensure Ciri's safety, I think he might have followed his impulse and gone after Radovid to attempt to get to the bottom of what was actually happening.

And, even should he have suspected that Radovid's behavior was yet another manipulation attempt - that Radovid would be patient enough to hold onto his mask a while longer while faking taking responsibility for his mistakes and hurting Jaskier…

There's absolutely no way Radovid could have predicted that Jaskier was going to come investigate the room he'd huddled himself into a dark corner to cry.

So, I like to think that Jaskier did regret his harsh words, the way he'd jumped to conclusions back at the cabin, and how he'd cut short Radovid's attempt to explain, as soon as he'd mentioned that he'd be out from under Dijkstra's thumb.

I like to think that Jaskier was sorry for the way he'd hurt Radovid, too, and that he realised that he'd let his own fears and issues get the best of him.

Now, it's up to them to decide if they'll allow their respective fears and issues to win; or instead let that deep, beautiful and delicate connection that they've been experiencing together come out on top.

So, since "the plan" was for Radovid to have seen the last of Jaskier…

I tend to interpret Jaskier saying "plans change" as a way of telling Radovid "I don't want this to be the last you see of me. If you'll still have me, when this is over, I'd like to come back to you."

With Radovid's immediate response being "Come with me, then."

Because Radovid does very much still want Jaskier.

Except Jaskier has a family he needs to go help first, before he can be free to go back to Radovid and continue to explore and deepen that relationship.

And OMFG, yes! Found families are a theme that I absolutely adore in virtually any form of media (perhaps because I had to leave my own family of origin behind to go find "my own tribe")…

By the way, do you have that season 3 review link nearby? I'm not sure if I had the chance to read it yet, or if it somehow managed to pass me by… But I'd be interested to have a first or second read at it!

Otherwise, I pretty much found myself just nodding along while reading your comments.

I definitely think that, the first time Radovid meets Jaskier, he's deeply intrigued by him and how he personally connects with his songs, but still a bit in a "playing games" mindframe, because that's just the way his world is, and has always been, and how people communicate.

And now, I'm amazed, because you've just made me realise that, when Jaskier came to see Radovid wanting to share intel with him, it could very much have made it look like he only cared about Radovid's position, wealth, and resources; rather than about Radovid himself!

In many ways, Jaskier is 100% aware that the Crown Prince of Redania "fancies him", and I think that, under normal circumstances, he wouldn't be above taking advantage of that attraction to help protect his family.

To be clear, I don't think Jaskier would ever look to manipulate the emotions of anyone that would be having sincere, non-entitled, and reciprocal feelings for him.

But a royal that would be looking to own, use, or control him? I think he'd be feeling perfectly justified using his own charms to get what he wants from them.

He tells Vespula "you can't play a player", therefore very much perceiving himself as "a player", in a sense.

And, given that nobles often have an inflated ego and sense of self-importance, "playing them" is typically not that hard to do.

But Radovid does not.

He is far from immune to Jaskier's charms, but he does not perceive him as a some type of potential "trophy lover" or conquest. He's genuinely curious about him, and wishes to better get to know and understand him.

In such a context, trust should normally go both ways.

Jaskier tells Philippa and Radovid that, if they get rid of Rience, they will have earned Ciri's, Geralt's, and his own trust (and he talks about winning his own trust while pointedly looking at Radovid)…

But what is Jaskier willing to do to earn Radovid's trust in return?

You've just made me realise that, while I often tend to remind myself that there is lot that the audience knows about Radovid that Jaskier himself doesn't…

Well, there is also a lot that the audience knows about Jaskier that Radovid himself simply doesn't, too.

Sure, Jaskier's initial response towards learning that Radovid was the Crown Prince of Redania was rather flattering and amusing, especially since it brought a certain balance to the way Radovid himself was slightly starstruck by Jaskier.

Rockstar meets royalty, basically… and forgets to let his hand go, much to royalty's delight!

But, once that initial moment has passed, does Jaskier still only sees Radovid as a prince - with all the privileges tied to his position that he could use for his own gain - or a person that's worth knowing, too?

We all assume that Jaskier's motives are honorable, because we know him, but Radovid only knows about Jaskier's songs and what little he's been able to pick up from him during two rather short encounters.

In that context, Jaskier showing up all "So, I hear you've got money! Maybe you could use it to get the two detectives to talk, and help Geralt and I find out who Rience is working for?" could actually be… borderline insulting?

Technically, it wouldn't, if Radovid was into such things as power and influence, wanted to find Ciri for himself rather than to please his brother, and Jaskier's suggestion was helping him get closer to something he really wished to get closer to besides the man standing right before him.

Again, Jaskier doesn't know that; so, there's a bit of an ongoing comedy of errors happening between these two this season.

And he doesn't know that Radovid doesn't actually have that much money "ready to be handed out" like that, either.

That Radovid would have to first sell some of his own belongings to pay for that intel.

Jaskier's basically prancing right into the palace while making a bunch of (albeit flirtatious) assumptions about Radovid - most of them kinda wrong / only half right - and it's really no wonder Radovid himself would be unwilling to "collaborate" with him so easily, admit to what he knows, and instead choose to initially continue to play dumb/drunk!

To be fair, most nobles would likely love to be reminded of their wealth, status and power, and go "Oh yeah, I've got money and I'm so important, uwu!"

They would likely welcome any opportunity to put it on display and use it to further seduce Jaskier! Normally, a prince should have favorably responded to Jaskier's innuendos...

Whereas Radovid's pretty much "Yes, yes, very interesting… Now, enough about me, let's talk about you! Here's your lute, may I humbly ask you to sing about what you prefer singing the most? Please?Maybe your white-haired Witcher? I really want to get to know you…"

And look, the fact that Jaskier got his crush to agree to help him because he was moved by his singing, cares about him, and has made it his personal mission in life to learn to better understand what makes him so special, must be so much more satisfying to Jaskier’s than it being because Radovid likes to display his wealth and feel influential and important!

I mean, look at that face...

He's just so pleased with the unexpected way things turned out...

[culttonotfollow]

Why I love “Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice” so much

So as I stated, I'm writing a post about my experience with this game and why I think it's as good as it is, including my favourite aspects of it. To this day it's my favourite game and one of the few I've managed to 100% complete.

This post is going to include spoilers. Do not read if you do not want spoilers.

Disclaimer out of the way, I actually want to start by saying that before this game was recommended to me by a friend (thank you, Markus- shout out to you), I had no idea what it was about other than the fact that it dealt in some way with mental health. I mostly forgot about it until I saw it on sale sometime in October (it might have been the Halloween sale), at which point I made the decision to purchase it.

To begin with, the visuals are stunning—beautiful and terrifying at the same time. And just to get mechanics out of the way so I can ramble about the story and the way it made me feel—some of the puzzles are challenging at first, but they are so rewarding after you figure them out that I almost didn't mind the difficulty. The fighting feels almost perfect, particularly with the autobalancing option.

The premise of the game is that Senua, a Celtic warrior with severe mental illness, sets out on a journey to the homeland of the Northmen after discovering what had happened to her lover, planning to enter Helheilm, the mythological land of the dead, or what would be considered hell, and retrieving his soul through bargaining with Hela (or Hel, as she's more commonly known). Throughout the entire game- with the exception of a segment in the story- she wears his skull on her belt, wrapped in a cloth.

The Game uses sound to mess with you??

The game throws you right in with whispers bouncing all around your head (even during the menu when you first open the game)- I will never not applaud Ninja Theory for their choice of using binaural sound (here is an article by Splice on what it is), otherwise it wouldn't be what it is. This is one of the few experiences where the classic "Best experienced with headphones" recommendation should be taken seriously.

As you paddle past, well, burnt, staked and hung corpses that don't make it less tense either, the voices get progressively louder and more erratic until you don't know how many there are anymore or where they're coming from, urging Senua to turn back or calling her a coward in many different ways- with the exception of a few, who actually argue with the others and encourage Senua to push on.

There have been moments when the voices stopped for a little while, but by the time I realized there was nothing in the background anymore except for my own racing thoughts, I was already somewhat uneasy.

To add on to that, one of the trials Senua goes through relies solely on intuition an hearing to get throught the darkness safely, with an extremely limited field of view. I can safely say that was when I was most terrified and hyperfocused in my 12 hours of gameplay. I have to admit after my first run I went to bed and the whispers were still there because of how much I was hearing them the past several hours.

Mindfuckery taken to the next level

I spent the majority of the game in awe, watching the story unfold in front of my eyes. A lot of games or franchises, in my opinion, struggle to make their characters feel human, but Hellblade managed to do it. Even equipped with a sword, I felt vurnelable at all times, the game does a great job at causing anxiety even during the most mundane moments.

There isn't a combat tutorial of any kind; you have to either figure out the "guide" is in the menu, or keep failing the first battle until you figure it out. The game actually only gives you a single prompt in regards to combat: Each time you fail (die), the rot on Senua's arm spreads, and when it reaches her head all progress is lost. This alone made me so much more conscious of every move I was making for over half the game, until I learned the truth.

It's not an actual mechanic, it's only put in place as a warning to add another thick layer of tension to every other already existing, anxiety inducing element of the game, and further enforce the game's primary goal of distorting your perception: what's real and what's not, what/who can you actually trust, what is the truth? It brought me anxiety to the point where it was borderline uncomfortable, and that's exactly why I loved it so much.

I spent the majority of this game in awe, just watching the story unfold. Every twist or reveal felt like a gut punch (in the best way I could mean this), and it made Senua (the girl you play as) feel human, something not a lot of games can do properly in my opinion. This game uses everything in its arsenal to create a truly dreadful experience: visuals, audio, light, combat, etc. without abusing jumpscares or scary monsters (although fighting Fenrir scared the ever loving hell out of me, but so did dealing with him in general). Rather, it capitalizes on its strongest suit: the childlike fear of what lies in the dark- what might occur if the dark really does take control.

The ending made me question my entire purpose (sort of)

It's going to sound weird, or insane, but the ending changed me as a person I think. It made me seriously reconsider some major things in my life, and take a moment to appreciate some others. It's both some sort of psychological torture or terror and an enlightening experience. It brought me to tears and left me completely speechless for what felt- and actually was- hours.

In its own very special and well done way, it's not strictly a game about a girl that's gone mad, or a quest about retrieving a soul, but it sucessfully and sensibly touches upon themes of grief, loss, and folklore. I can safely say I've never been more immersed or touched by a game on every single level. There are tens of memorable moments that I think back on, and I can't believe I got through every single one of these.

The ending took a twist for me. It was far from what I expected, but I think that's what made me as satisfied as it did- and yet it left me wanting even more. Which is why I'm so incredibly pumped for when the sequel comes out. Despite warning about spoilers, I won't actually say how it ended. I'll let whoever reads this discover for themselves one way or another.

Conclusion?

I recommend this game with my whole heart to whoever can handle these kinds of topics. It's beautiful, the story is heartbreaking, the gameplay is fun, and the visuals are beyond gorgerous.

[bluebudgie]

I accidentally sausagefinger deleted my 20k DA4 review so you get an abridged version now. No more nuance and elaboration, i can't be arsed to retype all of this.

Tl;dr

- Solid game with many flaws.

- If you already are a DA fan it's worth playing

- If you want to get into the series don't start here unless you really want to for a specific reason

Not entirely spoiler free:

Liked the game overall. Also no game has annoyed me this much in years.

Here's some good stuff:

- Beautiful, gorgeous environments.

- Overall cool and likeable cast with mostly interesting companion quests and fun character interactions.

- High quality german localization and VA (didn't try english)

- Appreciate the inclusion of gender neutral pronouns which is even less a given than it is in english since as of now there is no officially recognized equivalent for they/them in this language

- Loved the little things. Returning voice actors. Punching Solas in the face. Dorian Pavus.

- Great sound design during the Weisshaupt quest. Felt very immersive.

- Rivain exploration Tangled Depths moment. When you look at your destination 5 meters above your head and go HUH?

Stuff I hated that's extremely subjective:

Combat. Least fun combat I've experienced in any game ever. Every battle is a pvp match against 10 longbow bear rangers that spam point blank shot with no cooldown. Spending 98% of the battle dodging isn't fun

- Why is there a parry build in the skill tree when half of the enemies have huge hammers you cant parry (skill issue?)

- Party members being invulnerable pets that do nothing but use 1 out of 3 skills off cooldown is bullshit

Soundtrack. Ok no listen I didn't spend the last two months agonizing over this to give you the abridged version now. [takes a deep breath] Here we go again.

"I'm not angry with you, I'm just very disappointed." [Heavy Silence]

Seriously what the fuck was that. The biggest nothingburger that ever nothinged. Or burgered. Like cool they got Hans Zimmer or whatever but if they only had the budget to pay for 2 songs and 3 chords then maybe... don't?

Half of the game is dead silence interrupted by the same 3 notes. Once in a while you dare hope that a song starts playing only for it to fade out within a few seconds. Even many of the battles (including story battles) are fought in silence. And like. Don't get me wrong here. Silence can be good if utilized effectively. I like a good ambient soundtrack. Inquisition had great ambience (mage quest or winter palace bgm anyone?). Super Metroid has great ambience. Hell my favourite gw2 map has insect chittering for music. But this game. They really went "Go girl give us nothing!" with full conviction.

The little music that is there is largely generically inoffensive but also extremely repetitive. And despite all the repetition it's still forgettable as hell. Dictionary definition of an orchestral slop soundtrack. And also the dictionary definition of disappointment. Good god.

Ok moving on with the abridged review. The following points are things that sort of bugged me and I could imagine that other people feel similarly.

- I mean the main story with those saturday morning cartoon villains speaking in stock villain lines was silly but that's just kinda bioware storywriting so all as expected. We're here for interpersonal relationships and side stories anyway.

- So I said I liked the cast. They're too likable. Too safe. Too sanitized. Has everyone forgotten how to be an asshole?

- It's almost impossible to have companions disagree with your decisions. Where are the contrarians? Who do I throw fists with? Why is everyone licking main character boots? I know we've all* hated on Solas for years but that doesn't mean we can't have dicks in the party anymore? We're not babies?? *not you

- Also why does main character get to do life altering decisions for everyone 😭 Bruh none of your business... In some cases it made sense, but some of these... (Taash...??)

- Taash's questline sucked we all agree on this right

- That extremely unsubtle choice pop up whenever a decision you made had an influence on something. Like bruh ok you don't have to tell me about every little choice branch, where's the surprises man

- Companion quests being a mandatory gameplay element isn't the worst of these things but I did prefer when they were entirely optional so it was your bad when you missed out on relationships etc. Plus the gameplay loop created by this in da4 was very tedious after a while

- I don't like how the main character was kinda predetermined as a sassy jokester no matter which dialogue choices you pick but you get used to it

- The also extremely unsubtle faction meter that practically screams "if you don't fill the meter it will have consequences during the final battle". Again where's the surprises?

In general the game felt too predictable and too sanitized to be the least amount of inconvenient as possible.

And that's all I can think of right now.

Overall I'd say

DA2 < DA4 < DA:O < DA:I

[risingoflights]

Hmm, you don't feel comfortable talking about it unless someone asks your opinions? Then this is your official ask!

I've never played the critically acclaimed- er, you know. And I have no idea what the Ilsabard Region is or what its story and tone are.

So! What is it, and how does it compare to what you've experienced of Rebirth so far? What do you get from one that's missing in the other? What are the strengths and weaknesses of each narrative, and which do you feel, at this point, will have the most replay value?

(Plus anything else that's crossed your mind!)

ah friend, you should know better than to ask, but thank you for asking <3

leaving xiv out of this for a moment, i can tell you exactly why chapter 7 specifically of rebirth is the one to have caused me to openly gripe.

and, as you might expect, it's to do with hojo.

i was always going to judge the entirety of this game by its handling of hojo, and so far i've been sorely disappointed. standing by what i said in my previous post about nostalgia and fandom goggles, i still believe there was more written into hojo in og than, say, scarlet and heideggar. and since remake did a decent job rounding out president shinra, i was hoping hojo would get similar treatment. so far though, it seems like they've gone the opposite way.

i try not to make too many comparisons to og because many characters are pointedly deviating away from their og characterisations (rufus seems a standout so far), but this point in og was importantly where hojo started shaping up to be more than the trope he began as. it was crucial that as soon as sephiroth reappeared, hojo abandoned shinra. in fact if memory serves, someone (heideggar or rufus?) even points this out in og - hojo's 'disappeared'. then when you see him in costa and cloud asks why he's there, hojo admits 'the same reason as you'. cloud was chasing sephiroth, so was hojo. and he was doing it without shinra because finding sephiroth wasn't on shinra's agenda - at least not at that point.

i was actually so hopeful and happy at the end of remake where the camera pans across the executives lined up in front of rufus, and hojo is decidedly missing - off laughing to himself...! excellent! that defiance seems to have led nowhere in rebirth!

you could argue that in rebirth, hojo decided to continue using shinra resources to go after sephiroth and he's still playing his own long game. doesn't change the fact that rufus was openly out to kill sephiroth now - so what did he tell hojo to make him stay, if hojo had wanted to leave? i mean, you could argue a lot of things to make things make things deeper. and maybe things will get deeper - i'm only halfway through rebirth after all - but rebirth hojo was still on the beach to capture the robes and study them. that single-minded drive and obsession with sephiroth just isn't present. it felt like the icing off the original cake. the bikini girls fawning on him, really fun! him throwing off-handed remarks about recruiting them for his sephiroth breeding program, noooooot... as fun! the whole shinra bigwig come to town, johnny being made to carry his briefcase and push crowds on the beach out of his way? ish! sort of a... dazzling superficial picking of what that scene originally was? did i laugh? yes! was i let down? also yes!

the other thing that really grated on me was the optional aerith dialogue, but that's no surprise - the whole aerith situation has been one big headache for me so far and promises to continue to be so. talk to aerith on the beach and she says a bunch of things about hojo culminating in 'i hate him'. oh. oh, like we really needed this explicitly said? you know, what i really loved about og here is twofold - 1. hojo doesn't appear to even remember aerith's name, which is such a good demonstrating of him not registering her as worthy of ifalna, compared to rebirth where hojo literally yells this at her during battle. this was one of the neat little consistent touches about og hojo - he didn't give a shit, but passively and dismissively - like, it's not so much he deliberately chose to harm others as he just didn't even register harming others as a concept, which made the few people and times he did choose to be sadistic stand out more. and 2. og aerith, instead of... any of the ugly things she could've said to and about hojo, asks him about her lineage and connection to sephiroth instead. how loaded does that make their relationship? that no matter what he did to her and her mother, she still registers him as a source of knowledge and felt pressed to ask him despite the subject being a particular sore point for her?

og aerith probably also hated hojo - i mean, that just makes sense. but the way that scene played out really sets precedent for more questions... what more? what else? which. i guess summarises a lot of the issues i have with rebirth so far. that whole sense of wonder is just not there. the game likes to hand you everything, tell you exactly what to think. this is often done at its detriment, because real complexity simply cannot be spoonfed! BUT - i have to keep reiterating - nostalgia and fandom goggles. they're grafted to my face and i can't take them off.

....so after all that, would you still like to hear about ilsabard? i realise i've just completely failed to answer all your questions but, thank you for allowing me to vent a little!

[randomfoggytiger]

Fail Better Premium: David's Thoughts (Part XII, 2/2)

Creating a breadcrumb trail with David Duchovny's personal growth.

"And what I didn't get to-- we covered so much; she was a, she brought me to many different places I hadn't even thought about going-- but I didn't want to talk about the strained relationship between author and subject. In her case, sports journalist and athlete. And how they necessarily enable one another-- y'know, the athlete enables the writer because he or she gives the writer a subject, a game, a match, a career; and the writer gives the athlete to become a narrative, to become a story, to become a legend, to become... written. A myth. An icon, whatever. And they need each other; and yet, there's wariness, y'know. And how do you-- as a writer, you're going 'How am I not going to get played by this athlete?'-- who's going to want to tell the narrative his or her way to, 'Ey, I want to get to something more' like I was saying a moment ago. And as the athlete, you go, 'Eh, how honest can I be with this person? Can I trust them to..." [bird caws] "...tell my story with what I give them; or do I try and tell my story even before my story's going to be told by the author?' It's a tricky dance; and I wanted to ask her how different it is now--" [birds loudly cawing] "--with sports journalism. Y'know, it's there's not a lot of long forms in sports journalism, right? There's certainly not a lot of short form. Y'know, like I go to the New York Times and I look at the sports section-- it's not what it used to be. They're not talking about yesterday's games; that's elsewhere on the internet, in The Athletic or whatever, or all the sports podcast. So you have... it's splintered.

"And you have a lot of different figures out there who are, more or less, embedded with the athletes now. And what is, how is that relationship working? Y'know, if you're embedded with an athlete, you're the guy or the gal that somebody goes to tell their news, their secret news: where I want to be traded to, or where I'm gonna be traded to.... What do you expect in return for that scoop? ...Uh, I don't know. I don't know where that goes."

[Voice changes to upbeat as someone approaches.] "I'm just leaving a voice memo for the podcast, so, I'm not talking to myself." [Other person laughs lightly.] "I am talking to somebody. It's just--" [Unintelligible one-word reply, possibly 'yourself'.] "Myself; and whoever else is listening.

"So yeah, so there's that relationship that I wanted to talk about. Y'know, I think of Steven A. Smith, um, y'know. If he's privy to information nobody else is privy to, what's-what's he paying for that? What should he pay for that? What's fair? I don't mean to single out Steven A. Smith; but he's, to me, he's the biggest, loudest voice out there that I could think of. I don't really know that world-- Bill Simmons is terrific, I've been on his podcast, and I've read his stuff. Always fun. But , uh... I don't know. I don't know the state of it.

"But it also made me think about just writing in general, and my own career as a writer. Where-- y'know, writers are vampiric in a way: they need something to write about. And it might be you, y'know. And if, and if you have a writer in the family, nobody's safe, in a way. Because writers are going to write about what's near, especially in the beginning; what's in front of them. And, um, it's a beautiful relationship because a writer is making art of what they're given; but it's also a fraught one, a difficult one. To be in a close relationship with a writer, uh. I think. And uh, I've always tried to-- y'know, if I feel I'm encroaching upon somebody's privacy or sanctity as an individual human, I try to bury the lead as much as I can, cover the tracks as much as I can. Throw people off the scent as much as I can. Even if it's writing about myself, right? Even if I'm the starting point for a character.

"So, uh. Interesting, I think. Uh... and now I'm feeling bad-- I don't want to give away too much, y'know. I-I'm not trying to get people-- 'Oh, let's go figure out who he's been writing about!'" [Negatory click noise.] "I don't want that, that feels... here's a writerly word for you, 'icky', to me."

[Voice change, possible edit.]

"Oh, why the cold tub? Well, it's exactly what Sally and I were talking about, y'know, stress. Living with stress, controlled stress-- because I'm in control of whether or not I'm sitting in this cold tub-- is preparation for the stress of life that you can't control. I think that-- aside from whatever health benefits, which I guess are up in the air at this point; that, uh, sitting in 52 degree, uh, water for twelve minutes a day has.' [Laughs exaggeratedly.] "I think it's definitely a stressful situation. It hurts, a little bit. So, uh. But I'm in control of it. And the theory that works for me is, uh, the more times I can put myself in a stressful situation-- and this has to do with rehearsal and practice; we talk about it on the podcast, y'know, the Patriots had practiced like it was the Super Bowl-- then, when life brings you those stressful situations-- and they are the moments between failure and success, they can be-- um, you're like, 'This feels familiar. I-I know-- I'm not going to panic."

(Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV: 1/3, Part IV: 2/3, Part IV: 3/3, Part V: 1/3, Part V: 2/3, Part V: 3/3, Part VI: 1/2, Part VI: 2/2, Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX, Part X, Part XI, Part XII: 1/2)

[petruchio]

Bestie recent thg reblog got me thinking and I know I’m late to this revelation but Peeta’s stunt with the Bread? The boy is a REBEL since birth?!?!

If I remember correctly Katniss is surprised at him at a few points for being so rebellious - his position in town makes him out to be straight laced - but rebellion is one of his core trait and arguably why Katniss has always liked him.

Peeta’s first encounter with her is a pure rebellion, where he stands to gain nothing, but stands to loose a lot. The only authority in his young life threatens him with violence, but he defies it anyway. Because it’s right. Because we have bread that we’re throwing away, don’t we owe it to the starving girl?

Don’t we owe each other things? Doesn’t it matter?

Something something he’s like Katniss’s father, a rebel when it counts, even when he gets nothing out of it, in the name of kindness, etc. etc.

YES!!!!! he's always been a rebel -- i always also think about the moment in catching fire when she's surprised that he's angry at the capitol party. and it's like my queen, how are you surprised about all this coming from mr. "hold them out i want everyone to see"?? it's another one of his character traits that gets GUTTED in the films, but yeah everything starts with the bread because THE BREAD IS REBELLING. it's going decisively against what his mother is doing (having food to give but feeding it to a pig instead of another person) and thus rebelling not only against his family on a situational level but also against an entire society and system of beliefs (that his mother subscribes to)

so your connection of peeta to katniss' father is extremely apt!! i don't know if i've ever articulated that before, or really even made that connection, but it's true that all katniss' favorite people, all the people she loves the most, are the ones who are not just rebels in *name* but rebels in their actions from the very first moment they're introduced. peeta, her father, haymitch, even rue. (and yes, i would include her mother in that as well -- because her parents are rebels in the fact that they ALSO reject the seam vs. town narrative of twelve. katniss aligns herself with her father in her head but she's similar to her mother in many ways as well -- which is the reason her mother's abandonment hurts her so deeply and scars so permanently.)

what do we owe to each other? what is fair and what is just? what does it mean to owe anything at all? is owing a debt that must be repaid or is it simply owing someone kindness when you have nothing else to give? the hunger games asks a lot of questions about what it means to "owe" someone something, what you can "repay" someone for, what is a "debt" and what we are owed by our society and our social groups simply for being human. for example: if someone saves your life, and you save theirs, can you then extract yourself from the relationship? is there nothing more owed? katniss lives this dilemma out in the first book -- and she can't. peeta even excuses her, saying "you've repaid that debt in full" but she still can't let go. so perhaps owing is not about fairness at all -- it is never a simple calculation, one life saving incident equals one life saving incident back. because you don't *have* to do extraordinary things to deserve kindness. you don't have to save someone's life to earn their love. we aren't owed kindness because of a debt. we are owed kindness because we are human.

[triscribeaucollection]

Hi! For the writing asks: ✨ and 🌷?

Hi Crystal! Your timing is perfect, and I'm gonna combine these to ramble about my topic of the evening: Justice League Unlimited plays Wolfen and Warlocks

✨ - newest wip / 🌷 - writing achievement you want to brag about

Some of the stone elementals charged forward to throw punches. Others cracked and split the ground, making it harder to approach them by foot. The biggest one, guarding the portal, created a ring of spikes to better protect it.

And Clark’s friends proved exactly why an RPG was the best choice for them to play, rather than a card or board game.

Wally annoyed different targets into following him into range of Diana’s fists. John pinned others in place for Shayera to strike and destroy. Clark and J’onn cast magical shields and restored health points, keeping everyone else moving, and when Bruce’s fairy reached the others to share what he’d learned about the portal’s crystal power source, the seven of them formed up seamlessly to go after it.

Even better, they all clearly had fun doing so.

And *I* had *immense* fun writing this nonsense, okay?

Picking out races, abilities, and stats for each of the seven, figuring out how to balance them against one another through the game encounter, picking the exact worst possible moment for Bruce roll a 1 and almost hit Wally's character instead of the final boss, which he is absolutely never going to live down, that's gonna become the running joke for however many chapters this thing goes:

Flash: "You missed! He was three feet in front of you, how could you miss-!"

Batman: "Shut. Up."

Flash: =D

But of course I've already determined how I'm going to have more fun with it, by bringing in Zatanna to play Storymaster so Clark isn't pulling double duty. And she gets invested, my dudes, full on spooky voice reading the intro blurbs, using magic to make a veil of mist around her spot at the table, bringing the map and character tokens to life for a bit of flair, so on and so forth

There will be other superheroes who get interested. Further interactions in twos and threes as the game spreads through the League. Robin hears about all this and pesters Batman to teach him to play, and between the two of them at home it basically turns into an extra training exercise, Bruce making use of the 'solve a mystery' aspect woven into most pre-made campaigns to teach Tim some more detective skills (this being the DCAU and not comics continuity)

I might even have Alfred insist on hosting one night, just so he gets to lay eyes on Bruce opening up his walls bit with friends- sorry, *cough*, colleagues. Tim will of course get to join in, and does NOT hesitate to grab the "You Missed!" joke and run with it like the little gremlin he deserves to be. Dick and Babs will be beyond delighted when he lets it slip to them as well >:D

And this is like. Full circle, for me. Rather emotional, when I think about it.

Few years back I was writing a scene for a story in a whole other fandom, and decided the kid main character and his best friend needed to be distracted from ongoing misfortune in the form of a new adult friend teaching them to play a D&D knockoff game. I didn't want to use *actual* Dungeons and Dragons, because where's the fun in that, but I felt I needed some actual Thing to use as reference rather than purely winging it. And thus, Wolfen and Warlocks was born.

Now, rather than making things up as I went along for that fic, I've got the Actual Game to reference, or at least all the materials meant for the first edition of it. Not put together or published, yet, but that's only because I'm still beta testing with the help of various friends - including @yogurtbear242, Player The First who gave the best reactions to unexpected developments and was an all around good sport despite not ever having played a tabletop rpg before, in-person or online:

(Everybody salute Bear for being a wonderful crash test dummy)

And now! I get to put the Justice League's founding members through the same shenanigans!!

Self-indulgence *and* self-promotion at it's finest x)

[velvet-vox]

Yet another status update.

If you have been reading my posts for a very long time, you may have noticed that, in the last couple of months, I have slowed down the previous output that I had this summer.

The reason as to why that is, as I've stated in the past, is because I'm very busy at the moment, between work, helping out my friends, multiple writing projects etc... I don't want to get into the specifics because I value my privacy a lot.

Also, another very big thing for me is that I spent a huge chunk of the last few months writing My top 30 favourite female antagonists of all time; I've been working on that project in conjunction with many others for a long while, and I've been writing all three parts more or less simultaneously, hence why the first part took this long to release.

My original plan was to release all three parts at the same time, for the most, overall "spread" of the posts.

However, since I'm still relatively new to this site, and I was unsure if there was someone who really liked to read my stuff and wanted something new, I decided to release the first part as a standalone hook, since the other two parts were much more juicy in comparison.

That said... the amount of time that I spent writing it, and the fact that, from my point of view, not many people saw it or cared for it made me think that maybe I should focus on something else that is easier to make.

So, here's a survey on some of the ideas that I want to do, and should be faster to execute, unlike the top 30 thing.

The Fethry Duck analysis has zero work done on it at the point of writing this, but I already know what I want to say and how I want to talk about the subject. I want to do it just to have at least one DuckTales analysis done by me on this blog, as I still haven't done one at this point in time.

However more than an actual analysis on the character, it'll be an analysis on how the writers decided to adapt the character to the reboot, and I'll use my favourite Fethry comic as a comparison.

With the recent release of Epic Mickey Rebrushed, which came out of nowhere from my point of view, my love and appreciation for this series has been rekindled, just like my hyper fixation, to the point where I've already done 7 play throughs, platinated the game 2 times, and done 3 speedruns ever since it's release.

But it got me thinking:

Many people assume/want Purple Lamp to also be doing a remake of the second game in the franchise, one that, according to the official site, would need a lot more tweaking in order for it to stand on par with the first game.

However, the question of whether or not the story would need to be changed in order for them to do so is still up in the air.

But what was the story of EM2 exactly all about? What were the original writers trying to say?

That's what I want to talk about and analyse.

As a way to further celebrate Rebrushed, and as a momentary conclusion to my Epic Mickey character arc, I plan to do public pools ranking of all the levels in Epic Mickey, Rebrushed/Original game variants included. I'll give more information about this one when I get around to doing it.

I still want to do analyses on the antagonists of Wakfu, Dark Vlad, Julith, Toross... possibly a sequel trilogy to my analyses of Oropo... but not right now.

Same thing for my Kung Fu Panda stuff: there are things that I want to do more right now.

If you've been following me for a very long time, know that my "famous" (it's not, but I've been throwing it around a lot, even outside of this site) Critique of Doll is still coming..... Next year.

That... "thing"... will be the summary of a journey.

As for more Murder Drones ideas, I have a few, but I don't want to do them now, unless someone asks for them:

Making the case for why Alice is the best humanoid villain in Murder Drones; a fun little idea that I had a while ago. To be honest, I don't sincerely think Alice is the best humanoid villain of Murder Drones, but I think that Alice fans could enjoy this post.

If you've been following me since the very beginning, you know that I wanted to do a comparison post between Nox (Wakfu) and Doll (MD) ever since I watched Murder Drones for the first time, and now that the show is over, I think this is the best time for me to do so.

While thinking about the Nox and Doll comparison, I realised something else: there's an argument to be made that Qilby and Cyn, characters from the same series as Nox and Doll, share enough similarities with each other that I could probably make a post comparing them too, and I think it could be very interesting.

In the meantime, while I wait for the survey to be over, if everything goes according to plan, this weekend I'll release an analysis on a small, current obsession of mine.

You may have already guessed it, considering all the foreshadowing that I did for the past couple of days, but here it is:

The character of Turbo, from Wreck-It Ralph (2012).

Edit: forget what I said. The Wreck-It Ralph analysis is coming whenever it is ready. Work and Arcane season 2 took away all of my free time. From now on, I'll just release stuff when it's ready and when I want to.

[fonulyn]

I just want to say I’m literally obsessed with your fic where Chris and piers find out about Leon being pressured into becoming an agent. I think that’s such a huge sad plot point that gets looked over and none of the other characters know. No one else knows that this traumatized 21 year old rookie was forced to become an special agent under threat of killing a child. I wish so badly it was explored more in fandom and game.

ansjdkfn first of all, thank you 💖 i'm so happy to hear something i wrote resonated with someone!

and i agree, i wish it was addressed in canon properly, and I wish the fandom remembered it more. there are so many Hot Takes out there that just ignore that he didn't choose to be a hotshot agent but was literally forced to take the job. (and that's something else I wish was talked about more! how he chose to sacrifice himself for a girl he barely knew! that is a good man, damnit)

it'd be so interesting to see the reactions from other characters, too! everyone else had some agency over their choices, got to do what they felt was right and choose the path suitable for them. aside from Sherry, of course, who was a victim of this same shitshow too. and that's just another added layer of hurt to Leon's situation.

personally, i've hinted at that in like two dozen of my fics lol because it's just such an integral part of Leon that anything that isn't a straight up pwp or pointless fluff somehow ends at least referencing it. and i'm gonna use this moment as a shameless self-promo :'D lmao.

but yeah, the fic that was already mentioned: where the past meets the future, which is an ot3 fic specifically with the premise of Chris and Piers finding out about Leon's recruitment.

I also wrote about Leon telling Piers about that in the self-indulgent series in you're the world that i wanna discover. there's a lot of fluff lol but then at the end there's That Conversation. there's also a small scene of Leon telling Sherry about it further in the same series in happiness is made not found.

then there's of course question all my doubts, although it's less Leon getting to open up about the recruitment and more Krauser throwing it in his face but 😅

for something that's so often in my mind I haven't utilized it a lot in fic, either. but it's always there, lurking in the background, and it's vaguely referenced and offhandedly mentioned much more than these. still. Leon's been through so damn much shit that i guess it's natural for some of it to slip past and get less attention.

anyhow! this is me rambling and saying that i absolutely agree it'd be wonderful to see more of it :3

[chelzone]

just played thru Goodbye Volcano High finally, to completion

here's me thoughts, under a spoiler block just like i did for after i beat Snoot Game

story flows nicely from start to finish, though i feel like a tiiiiny bit could have been trimmed cus it did feel a bit too long for playing through

affinity system is cool, feel like i hadn't seen people dig into that one as much as they should've. i was unable to get the Rosa gender reveal sequence cus i didnt max out her stuffs BUT they still throw in moments prior that telegraph it very much so so that's still something!

gorgeous backgrounds, absolutely zero complaints about any of them. while the characters animations can be a tad bit stiff at times, i feel like i can still most of the time realistically imagine them within the scenes properly

i understand you had to have 3 L&L segments for it to make sense as a DnD sessions sort of thing but,, i didnt like the segments in general. i feel like you could have still explored Reed's character without dedicating far too much time to these

music for the rhythm game segments is definitely NOT my personal taste, so i cant rlly say much about the content that wouldn't be heavily biased. i feel like also the controls were a bit too complicated, especially on keyboard. perhaps it couldve been easier to play on a controller but like,, visually there's still way way way too much to keep track of so it gets overwhelming at times. also very very hard to focus on the scenes going on while trying to play the rhythm segments, and i feel like that hurts the final one with the montage

Naomi and Fang is a match made in Heaven, what else is to say? jumps the gun a wee bit but idk i kind of like that shit and i do that for me own characters at time. wishing those two the best in dino heaven

was not expecting Fang to be so selfish throughout the entire game, it's genuinely a bit jarring at times. the way it's patched up in the end feels a bit too rushed, but then again i said the game felt a bit too long so no idea what the solution would be

Swamp Babies i wish u got more screentime, but i digress. Curtis having no voice let alone dialogue was a bummer

i hope they keep patching it cus i did get softlocked multiple times and there were many times where backgrounds failed to load in for a bit during many scenes ;w;

fave characters from this iteration gotta be Stella, Sage and Reed. funnily enough, two of their iterations in Snoot Game are also a delight! sad to see Sage didnt make the latter cut aside from positive text messagez

the logo and poster design stuff paired with the picture day sequence were pretty cool!

not a fan of the twitter stuff in-game just cus i loathe the real life equivalent, sorry ;w;

all in all now that i've done a full single run for both games (i am not replaying either, this is too much of a time commitment for a narrative-heavy experience), i think i can say i give Snoot Game a 9/10 rating and Goodbye Volcano High a 6/10

pleasantly happy with both, despite any complaints or criticisms! looking forward to drawing more fanart of both series too, as well as having a blast hanging out in discords with folks from either communities. met some good people in a cruel world

[carrinth]

Whelp I've done it. Just finished Witch Hunt which now marks the end of my Dragon: Age Origins run. 10/10 would recommend. Especially Awakening and Witch Hunt DLC.

And y'know what? Witch Hunt was worth it for this moment. A fitting end for my Warden. Reunited with his love (and baby mama) and peaces out of work and responsibilities via magic mirror. Just look at that face. I think this is honestly the first time I've seen my Warden-Commander smile in a LONG time. Poor guy.

Minor DA2 rant below cut;

Actually I finished it awhile ago but had been procrastinating by replaying Awakening.

Because uggghhhhhh... I don't want to play DA2.

Don't get me wrong, I'm sure I'll grow to love Hawke again but right now my mood is just... meh. Replaying Origins and all its DLCs just made the differences in quality and content between the two all the more jarring. Aaaand on a more personal level -- I don't want to stop being a Grey Warden. ಥ_ಥ

For the last near 150 hours, I was sold on being a Grey Warden. In fact, I think my best fun was Awakening where I actually got to BE a Grey Warden doing Grey Warden things WITH OTHER GREY WARDENS. We ALL drank the nasty juice! It was a bonding experience! This game spent so much time building up the lore and excitement of being a Grey Warden -- leaving so many unanswered questions about the Taint, the Blight, what it all means, dO wE GET griFFONs -- only to just... drop it all in DA2.

I'm just so confused by the direction DA2 went. Replaying Origins with the knowledge of the upcoming mage/templar plot in DA2, the conflict in Origins felt... minor. Sure we get hints here and there that things are Kinda Bad. But nothing major. Heck, I played a Circle Mage as my Origin and I never felt that 'Oh wow, mage rebellion should totally be Main Focus of the next game!' Like don't get me wrong, mage/templar conflict is 😌👌but the Darkspawn and Grey Wardens was what set Dragon Age apart from other fantasy.

"Well the Blight's over Carrinth, there's no more story to tell about Grey Wardens" you say. And yet, Awakening did a fantastic job of making an entire campaign post-Blight.

Part of me feels like if they didn't want to keep the Main Character the same (ala Mass Effect with Cmdr Shepard) then couldn't they have still made the DA2 MC a grey warden? Like a junior(?) Warden that's investigating Corypheus or whatever in Kirkwall but gets caught in the mage/templar mess. Sure we would have gotten a very different story but would that have been so bad?

In the end, I will likely end up playing DA2, if only for the excellent companions and to reunite with my Sad Mage and Angry Spirit Husbands. But at the moment... *sigh*

So goodbye Marzel Amell. You were the best Warden-Commander and I had fun throwing Storm of the Century on fools, flexing my maxed out Coercion, and painstakingly working out TACTICS. I will probably still keep stubbornly drawing Awakening fanart (because I am Not Normal about those idiots) but DA2 stuff will likely eventually bleed in. ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

Farewell Marzel and go live gloriously in mirror land with ur spider lady and kid.