#Some very minor control issues but they're easy to get over

[fang-feraligatr-blog]

I just beat Going Under

For a first game from Aggro Crab with help from team 17, I can safely say that I love this game and it's "depressingly realistic capitalism talk" sense of humor. As a rouge like the difficulty is high but the challenge is fair. Plus once you get into the groove you'll find it's pretty easy to completely break the game and make it a cake walk. It does also have settings to make the game easier for you so what the heck, if you liked Another Crab's Treasure and wondered what game that Cartridge Shell was based on, play Going Under. There was even DLC and it's a blast and a REAL challenge. And if you can clear the DLC area on it's hardest difficulty WITHOUT ASSIT MODE ON then I demand PROOF!!

In short: Going Under is a beautiful game about a real go-getter girl destroying Amazon from the inside.

9.5/10 would dismantle capitalism again

[the-final-sif]

I know you are studying law, and I just wanted to ask is there any reason why Quackity wouldn't want to deal with this union thing outside of a court room? Does he just think they're bluffing or does he just think he has enough evidence that he had no idea about the workplace environment and payment issues.

I'm actually not studying law! I keep up with a number of cases and one of my younger brothers is studying law/in the process of becoming a lawyer, but I'm not in college for it or anything. It's mostly just a personal interest and a willingness to sit down and read through case law for like 10 hours to understand why something has to happen a certain way. That and a willingness to go bother the lawyers I know to help understand things.

That aside, I honestly think that some of it is arrogance and an assumption that he's safe because he's not physically in France. Which is a very bad assumption, but he'd hardly be the first person to make it. It's very clear that he doesn't have anyone remotely competent near his company because they would've told him to avoid hiring people in the EU like a plague.

In this case, since he's clear got control over the company (ie being able to come in and change anything he wants whenever he wants), it wouldn't matter if he was aware or not, at least to my understanding.

Within US law at least, there's something called "constructive knowledge" which basically means "regardless of whether or not you actually knew about this, if you were behaving reasonably and according to your duties then you should have known about this". This means that negligence isn't an excuse, particularly when you have managerial responsibility. You can't ignore illegal shit happening and not do your job and then claim no responsibility for the outcome. You have a duty of care to employees, which includes stuff like ensuring people get paid, health and safety measures and also that you aren't employing like, minors illegally or in unsafe conditions.

If employers could just like, not ask for any details about who someone is and thus not be liable for any of their actions, they would happily do that. But they can't, you're supposed to know and keep all this information on file for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is taxes.

Speaking as someone who works at a company with international workers, it's not easy to do and you need to be careful how you do it. If you do it willy-nilly, you end up doing a lot of labor crimes. Like what happened here.

[blueskittlesart]

Hey it's the anon who wants to play BOTW but is egregious bad at video games again. I took your advice and I've shocked myself at how much progress i've made, I got to the goron village, korok forest, and rito village. One current issue is that I am still. SO bad at the combat. Like SO bad. I panic immediately and lose all coordination (which I already had very little of). I managed to get myself killed before I could even get to the point where Sidon GIVES YOU the quest to get to Zora's domain. I completely fumbled through a minor test of strength.

Any tips for improving general combat capabilities. HELP

hi! first of all, i'm gonna go over the basics of combat and how/when you should use them. the game does technically tell you these things, but they come up early game and are pretty easy to miss imo. you might know some of them already tho!

the first thing that's probably going to be really helpful to you if you don't already know about it is enemy targeting. this locks the camera in place on a specific enemy, even within a horde of them, giving you free reign to abandon the right stick and focus on button pressing. to target an enemy, get close and press the left trigger (ZL.) this will also equip your shield if you're using a one-handed weapon, but the targeting is the most important. Once you're locked in on one enemy, so long as you keep the trigger pressed, the camera will auto-lock into a straight line from link's back to the enemy, so there's no need for you to worry about camera controls. if you DO touch the right stick while targeting, the target camera will jump to the next closest enemy to link and auto-lock again. in general, when fighting, your left pointer should be pressing the trigger to target at all times, your left thumb should be on the stick moving link around, and your right thumb should be pressing Y and shouldn't move from that button. that's the basic combat configuration and there aren't a lot of scenarios where you're going to have to do much more than that (except maybe the right trigger for your bow.)

next is weapon classes. there are 3 different melee weapon classes in botw--swords, greatswords, and polearms. each weapon class has a different attack pattern and speed, and each class has its own strengths and weaknesses.

swords are any weapon link swings one-handed. (examples include the master sword, broadswords, tree branches, boomerangs, small boko clubs, etc.) they have a decently fast attack pattern and when they're equipped link can also use a shield in his left hand with ZL. this is my favorite weapon class, as it's pretty middle-of-the road, usually they have mid-range attack points, as previously mentioned their attack speed isn't too slow, and they come with the added bonus of being able to use a shield. if you're fighting something like a guardian where shielding is necessary, you should always aim to be using a sword-class weapon as it's the only weapon class that link can also hold a shield with.

greatswords are heavy two-handed weapons (examples include claymores and bigger boko clubs.) they usually have very large attack stats, often in the 50s or above, which makes them tempting, especially early game. however, they have several noticeable drawbacks that make them my least favorite weapon class. because of their weight, their attack speed is very low, and because they're two-handed link can't shield when he has one equipped. I personally stay away from this weapon class early-game--imo they're only worth it if you have both hearts and stamina to spare. I only ever use them for hard-hitting charged attacks after stunning an enemy, and will almost always switch back to a sword-class weapon for regular combat.

polearms are long, light two-handed weapons that link holds like a spear (examples include spears, halberds, and tridents.) these have the fastest attack speed in the game, but because they're two-handed link still can't shield with one equipped. these weapons also usually have a longer reach than swords and greatswords, so they can be useful if you don't want to get too close to what you're fighting (however you forfeit the more reliable protection of a shield in order to get that benefit.) these are useful in a pinch, and personally i won't actively discard them like i tend to do with greatswords, but they definitely don't have the same versatility and ease of use as a sword-class weapon.

for early-game, i'd try to stick to sword-class weapons as much as possible, and ALWAYS have your shield up with the left trigger/ZL when you're in combat. this alone will make you harder to hit and let you last a lot longer. with the limited weapon slots you have early-game, i'd focus on collecting weapons that are easy for you to use rather than the ones with the highest attack stats, especially since they're going to break anyway. be willing to sacrifice a high-attack greatsword for a lower-attack one-handed sword in a pinch.

as for the actual mechanics of combat, there are plenty of fancy things you CAN do, but very few of them are actually necessary to beat the game. you can get through 90% of all combat in botw by just targeting with ZL and mashing Y, maybe occasionally sprinting with B to avoid enemy attacks. there are shrines and npcs that will teach you fancy things like backflips and perfect-dodges, which are useful if you can reliably perform them, but if you're someone who gets easily confused when you have to perform a lot of button presses in quick succession, it'll probably be more useful for you to just stick to Y attacks.

the one special combo attack you ARE going to need to learn in order to get through the game is a perfect shield parry, which is going to sound scary and difficult when i explain it but i promise it becomes like second nature after a while. this combo is the easiest way to combat anything that has a laser-beam attack, like guardians and certain late-game bosses. you hold your shield up with ZL, (this combo can ONLY be performed if you're holding a one-handed weapon, and make sure you're targeting the enemy attacking you and not just holding your shield up at nothing) wait for the laser to lock onto you, (the target line will blink rapidly and then disappear just before the laser fires) and then, right when the laser hits your shield, hit the A button to redirect the beam back towards the enemy. there is some level of danger here, because if you press A too early the beam may hit you, but most of the time if you fail to perform a perfect parry the beam will still just bounce off your shield and not do any damage to you. there are plenty of stationary guardians on the map you can use to practice this skill until the timing is ingrained into you, and i would highly recommend practicing it as it's super useful late-game.

as a final note, remember that botw is a game designed for versatility. it seems like you're doing everything very by-the-book--fighting whenever the game tells you to fight, regardless of whether you really WANT to fight. and there's nothing wrong with that, but it's also by no means the only way to get through the game. if you find yourself struggling with melee combat, there's nothing stopping you from buying a bunch of bomb arrows and just firing them off at enemies from afar, or even just eating a shit ton of stealth food and sneaking around them. certain combat scenarios are going to be unavoidable, but botw is a game that prioritizes player innovation, meaning that very rarely is there going to only be one way out of a situation. if you're struggling with melee combat, try something else! try your bow, or a rune, or avoiding combat altogether, until you find something that sticks and makes the game fun for you. there's no wrong way to play!

[adventures-in-a-world-of-fiction]

I didn't watch the James Somerton apology video because I didn't want to give him the views, but I did watch a react video that showed basically all of it. The whole thing felt so disingenuous.

He admitted to plagiarising (I think at this point he basically had to) but the way he framed it really downplayed what he did. If you hadn't seen the evidence against him and just saw this video, it would be very easy to come away with the impression that it was a few, minor mistakes.

He talked about crediting people in the opening of his videos, implying that he credited everyone, just not at the exact point he was using their words. We know this isn't true.

He also talked about how he would copy bits into his script, intending to reword them later, but then would forget because of his "memory issues". This is a problem for so many reasons. Firstly, it implies that he thinks it's fine if he paraphrases enough that you can't find the original by putting the words into Google, even though he's still taking other people's ideas without credit. So even if this were completely true, it would still be plagiarism. Secondly, even if his memory issues are real, there would be so many ways to make sure these "mistakes" didn't happen. He could have highlighted text in a different colour to show it needs reworking. He could have written the source in brackets in the script next to the section so he remembers where it came from. This is the sort of thing that you could do once or twice by accident, but after the first few accusations of plagiarism, you would learn a way to make sure the mistake didn't happen again. You wouldn't keep doing it for years. So even if he isn't making up the memory thing completely, it wouldn't be an excuse after all this time.

He talked about using other people's work because he didn't want to just be one cis, white guy talking about important topics and how he wanted to bring other people's voices and stories into the discussion. And this is such an infuriating excuse, because he was talking over those other voices and silencing them by stealing their words and passing them off as his own.

Half of his video was him going, "This is no excuse but..." and then spinning a sob story to get the audience's sympathy.

Then there are all the things he didn't talk about. He didn't acknowledge the video pointing out the many, many ways he made stuff up in his videos or apologise for the blatant lies. There was a tiny hint about "factual errors" that was quickly glossed over.

He didn't talk about the fact that when he got accused of plagiarism the previous times, he would lie about being harassed and set his followers out to bully the people who had called him out. If you didn't know better, you could come away from this video believing that this was the first time anyone had ever caught him plagiarising.

And I think that's the point. This wasn't a video aimed at the people he's hurt or the internet in general. This was a video aimed at his fans who haven't actually watched the videos laying out the evidence against him. He downplays what he did, spins out a sob story, and then makes an apology and promises to do better in the future. I can easily imagine his fans watching this and thinking that the uproar has been overblown because poor James has got memory problems and he did put people's names in the video credits and people on the internet are being so mean to him. I think there are people who will watch this video and believe his apology because they're only James' side.

If James was remotely genuine, he wouldn't have described what happened the way he did, but the people who know the truth aren't the target audience. The target audience are the people who already like him, so he can get some control of the narrative back and stop those people from listening to everyone else.

[nemo-draco]

Bendy: Secrets of the Machine Thoughts

Putting them under a spoiler cut for readability

So far, there is a lot of intrigue regarding GENT and their role, as well as the potential return of the Nightmare Run characters.

GENT's involvement so far as been more on the sidelines in the games. It's implied they have similar issues with the supernatural, and they are running experiments with the ink the Machine produces, the books also backing this up with the reappearance of Archie Carter. However, with the new character. Riley Wells, introduced, it creates a more interesting layer to this, in that it is implied that she was recruited by GENT shortly following her dismissal from JDS. Now, if she is a villain or a victim is up for debate. It could be that they hired her as a test subject similar to Archie Carter and her metamorphosis was just far more severe as a result of the traumatic experience in her childhood, or perhaps she provided the specs that ended up producing a real-life version of "Bloodwheel", the more monster-y version of Gaskette that even gets a whole song in Riley's flashback.

Riley's story is also interesting in that it provides a canon explanation for why the Nightmare Run toons are more monstrous, though it really only does so for Gaskette. She's never shown drawing any of the other bosses, just him. Which makes me wonder if maybe she was part of the character design for only him, and the others are all going to get their own stories later on in the game. I really do hope they go this route, mostly because it would be a nice callback to the no longer available Nightmare Run, and you could have some real fun with the bosses 'backstories', depending on how involved you want to be.

Can think of a few things immediately off the bat: Chester being another example of a childhood fear turned into a debilitating trauma, except involving someone who has thalassophobia strong enough to rival H.P. Lovecraft. Kind of paves the way for a lot of spooky imagery involving the ocean, ocean life, and ink.

Dewey at first seemed a little comical to think about in this context, after all, a fear of librarians seems extreme, though thinking more on it my thought is that he's the product of a different type of emotional stuckage. Instead of a fearful person, perhaps Dewey was created by a very angry person, someone who had a lot of trouble controlling their temper and would frequently blow up at seemingly minor issues. After all, Dewey's main character trait seems to be his temper, as we remember from his character card that he has a disproportionate reaction to Bendy knocking over some books. Granted, between the fact that the exact quantity of books is never mentioned, and a cartoon being a cartoon, it makes me wonder if Bendy might not have knocked over a few books, but more likely a few stacks or even whole shelves worth. I mean, what's funnier, a few books coming down or the library getting a spontaneous remodeling job thanks to a careless patron?

...It's probably not so fun for the librarian, but you get my point. So, potentially, we have someone who has a temper problem creating this character as a way to offset their issues. It might just be less helpful and creating a bit of a feedback loop, where they're constantly ruminating over their problems rather than addressing and moving on from them.

Canoodle was another one that eluded me a bit, though there are two potential driving forces that could have fueled his creation. On one front, junkyards aren't exactly friendly places sometimes, and it would be easy for some sort of accident to happen that could produce some sort of negative association, though there is also the fact that a sentient can being in a junkyard creates this almost weird mental image. You'd think that'd be a dangerous place for him, and this is somewhat proven true if you beat him in Nightmare Run, as he's promptly crushed and disposed of. So, perhaps a preoccupation with death, or a person who is constantly cheating bad or dangerous circumstances? It's something, and it could definitely be interesting played out if that's the direction they're planning on going with this.

There are also plenty of other fun moments and little easter eggs for fans, so either way, we do get something fun. I would honestly be over the moon if they did something for all of the Nightmare Run toons though. Gaskette is a good nod, and Riley's backstory intrigues me given the circumstances, and especially the apparent involvement with GENT. Kinda makes me wonder if they're, in a sense, keeping tabs on people who were associated with JDS, people who maybe would have some stronger ties to the art being produced there and potentially have a bigger reaction when the ink is used on them.

It's something to think about, for sure. If anything, I'll enjoy using these puzzle pieces in my own work.

[hunterofthehunters]

14) Resident Evil 3 (PS1)

playing this on a vita may not have been the wisest decision (also on pre-4th of july time with family and relatives, but it's fine)

okay so. how to summarize my feelings here...

full disclosure: i played this on hard mode, and also as i said before on a vita. i did not learn until near the end there was a manual aim because it was physically not bound to any button. as such i had to make those adjustments myself very late. so yeah.

this game's really good and i can immediately see why people remembered it so fondly. but at the same time i'm very. mixed on my opinions.

i think the general presentation of it is great. the story's simple enough with a good premise and good execution. i like jill in it, i like carlos, nikolai is a bastard. but we're not here for those other two. we're here for the Big Boy

nemesis is very fucking effective in this game. like, actually a sincerely terrifying hunter enemy. but he isn't effective bc of his a.i. or his moveset in fights or anything. re3 does this very clever thing where it spawns him in specific ways, at specific times, with specific framing that gives off the impression he is constantly on your ass. they didn't have the ability to program a persistent enemy that actually chases you across the map. it's just a trick; a cleverly hidden illusion, and a great example of how games are very much bullshit that tricks you into believing certain things are happening in a certain way. it's a reminder of how similar to theatre they are imo and i like it a lot.

what i like less is when the game expects you to actually deal with nemesis instead of run

okay so. tank controls aren't inherently bad. they can even be really cool and fun, and they're why i think games like armored core fuck immensely

i don't feel like re's tank controls fall under that category. the number of times i got into bad situations, not because i made a fundamental error in judgement, but because the controls themselves were fighting against me, was actually very frustrating. these things are really just minor grievances when dealing with normal enemies (hell even the hunters were easy in this, but that was bc carlos had an assault rifle).

these minor issues become Really Fuckin Big Ones when nemesis decides to stop being a chase sequence and become an actual boss battle. the tank controls are designed for very slow, methodical gameplay. nemesis meanwhile is moving like you're playing an action game where you have a consistent dodge to avoid getting combo'd for half your health in a single sudden hit.

"oh well you can just get used to the weird dodge and get good" yeah i did. i'm posting this now, aren't i? the problem is the process was kinda grating. i don't feel like his moveset was really considered alongside the gameplay. he moves so quickly, so aggressively, and he has so many ways to disrupt your ability to fight him and make you mash to get up and Whoops He's Instakilled You Off A OTG Command Throw, Better Reload

i swear i don't hate nemesis in this. i like him a lot. i think i just feel a little let-down because i was expecting some masterpiece of design like people kept hyping him up as vs the remake. instead i'm seeing a flawed but cool idea that was let down by faulty boss design.

maybe that was the problem with the remake. people wanted to see it fulfill that promise.

either way, this whole rant is a minor gripe. these fights only happen like 3 times and the latter two can be beaten through the power of Let The Idiot Walk Into The Trap. which is fine i guess and fits the tank controls better. (i'll admit seeing him fall apart over time and grow more frenzied and blinded in the acid valves fight was a very cool bit. why didn't you do that, remake.)

re3 ps1 is a great game. i liked it a lot. i just wish i would've loved it.

[lorz-ix]

Time for another "I was bored this summer so I binged an entire horror series" post

As with the Saw one, I'll keep my thoughts on each entry as brief as possible, since these tend to take a while to write. Also trying to avoid spoiling stuff as much as I can, since that would ruin the point of making recommendations.

The Purge (2013)

When discussing this series, this is pretty much the only one people broadly tolerate. The premise is very easy to understand: the very conservative US government has instituted a "yearly national holiday" during which all crime, with a few extreme exceptions, is made legal for 12 hours. The subtext isn't subtle at all, it's obvious that the government is using this event as a scapegoat to avoid addressing broader social issues. Violent crime is supposedly kept under control because people "relieve their violent feelings" once a year, they don't have to care about poor people and welfare since they're massacred during every purge, as the primary targets of the violence.

It's a very clear satire of how conservatives turn a blind eye to these issues in real life, how they justify violence when it benefits them and the gun lobby, how they're classist as hell, how this classism manifests as racism since it disproportionately affects minorities. You might think the messaging isn't that smart, but I think it's neat, and it's used as pretty cool background for a decent thriller here.

The Purge: Anarchy (2014)

Extremely simple. Do you think you would enjoy some worldbuilding after watching the previous movie? Do you care about the plot of the movie itself, "lore" aside, being super generic? Do you want the political messaging to get even more explicit? Then you might enjoy this.

I really mean it, it's a very nothing movie unless you're the kind of fan who cares about questions being answered rather than following an interesting story.

A nugget of worldbuilding I really like though? The government knows most people don't want to go out there and kill each other or commit crimes for fun, so they manufacture violent incidents to make it look like the purge works. Really makes you think...

The Purge: Election Year (2016)

Hmmmmmm I wonder if the year this came out and that subtitle are related...

A slightly more interesting affair than Anarchy, they at least have some strong stakes in this story. We mainly follow an opposition candidate to the presidency who's rising in popularity and wants to get rid of the purge. We understand that the holiday, despite everything, is very unpopular, but the current government will enlist the help of neo-nazis to get rid of the opposition. The satire is reaching new levels of unsubtlety and I honestly kinda love it.

What I don't love is the implication that winning an election is all it takes to get rid of the problem, along with other milquetoast soy latte liberal takes. Black liberation groups are generally painted in a positive light in the series, but it feels somewhat dishonest when the savior is a white girlboss. Truly a very 2016 movie.

The First Purge (2018)

That first teaser poster was somehow even more 2016 than the previous flick, holy Jesus Christ this is very funny.

I feel pretty much the same as I did with Anarchy. Generic flick, focuses a lot on disadvantaged, african american communities, makes very similar points to the ones we saw before. If again, the "lore" is your thing, this prequel might be of interest, otherwise you can skip it.

The Forever Purge (2021)

Shit, finally something interesting, I thought. This story starts off in a previously unseen setting, a southern town. We get to see the prejudiced relationships between mexican immigrants and wealthy white americans. The premise said "the purgers want to keep the massacre going after it's over", so I thought it meant "banning the purge didn't work", which is the point I wanted to see. But no, we learn very early on that the original party simply won the elections and re-instated the holiday, which is a way more underwhelming way of getting there. The purgers simply don't want the holiday to be over after 12 hours, and somehow things devolve into an uncontrollable nation-wide riot.

Is it more interesting and a bit scarier than most previous entries? Yeah, a bit. Does it bring new possibilities to the table? Yes, sure. Are the added analogies for immigration in this franchise's universe kinda neat? I guess. Does that make for a good movie? Not really. It's, once again, rather generic and forgettable once the actual conflict fully explodes. I really do like these for what they try to say and how explicitly they do so. I wish more movies had these levels of ridiculous, yet more or less adequate political satire.

The Purge (TV series, season 1, 2018)

10 episodes, lads. They're 1 hour long each. Watching this thing would take you longer than all of the movies combined, and let me tell ya, it's not worth it.

Starts off promising enough, it shows us more insight into the religious cults that grew around the purge for example, and that's properly disturbing, but after a while the story stops being intriguing. You quickly realize you're watching another generic bunch of characters go through a mostly forgettable series of perils. Yet again, an interesting world did not make for an interesting story in the slightest. These things aren't even that awful, they're just painfully bland.

The Purge (TV series, season 2, 2019)

Just like S1, it's 10 episodes and they're all one hour long. But thank god, finally this time they had a set of ideas that felt worth watching.

For the first and only time, the story focuses on what happens after the purge is over. How people get traumatized by the violent events. How pro-purge nutjobs eat up and spread propaganda all year round. What happens if shocking acts of violence do happen outside of those 12 hours? What happens if someone tries to kill you during the purge and they fail? How do you cope with the idea that someone wants you dead and no one would do a thing about it because it would have been legal and normal to kill you?

I think that focus on trauma and how the purge affects the psychology of every single person makes for some actually compelling characters for once. Finally, we get a story where we're not completely sure of what will happen next. It's probably not that great in the grand scheme of things, but god dammit, they finally made something remotely worthwhile with this franchise.

[oftenderweapons]

Dirty ABCs | Namjoon and Vixen

Pairing: Namjoon x Vixen (OC)

Wordcount: 2.1k

Genre: headcanons

Rating: 18+. Minors, do not interact.

This just me having a little bit of fun in between collabs and commissions with an NSFW alphabet, so I can also get to know my characters better (yes, they're just characters. Do not assume the boys like/dislike any of the things I mention). A new drabble should be out soon, but just in case you missed it, here's Jimin's post-Soowoozoo smut! Please, read the trigger warnings carefully 🥺💖

Here's my masterlist! enjoy!!!! 💜✨

Trigger warnings: cumshots, cumeating, creampie, marking, unprotected sex, switch!vixen, switch!joon, daddy!joon, DDLG, lapdance, stripping, masturbation, voyeurism, exhibitionism, roleplay, homework within a professorxstudent roleplay, positions (doggy, missionary, reverse cowgirl, bend over), intimacy kink (?), bondage (hands tied, gags), impact play, oral sex, oral fixation, biting, casual mention of foot fetish, food play, choking kink, erotic massage, jealousy (kink), sapiosexuality, size kink, mention of infidelity and sharing partners, mention of outdoor sex, sex toys (dildo, vibrator, manacles, cockring, paddle, buttplug), edging, orgasm denial, orgasm control, overstimulation, BDSM club, uhm...bicuriosity ig?, thickdick!Namjoon, bubblebutt!Vixen impressive sex drive (?)

Aftercare: Namjoon is the kind of guy who’d gladly collapse in bed after some good, nasty fucking. He puts plenty of energy in it and he isn’t content until he’s barely alive before calling it a night. Yes, both him and Vixen need to force the other into heading to the bathroom and cleaning up before falling asleep. When he goes especially hard on her, aftercare becomes a way to relax for both of them: he needs to pamper her to even things out, and she in return likes spoiling him, giving him cuddles, letting him fall asleep with his head on her chest while she strokes his hair. Yes, his favourite cuddle is her touching his hair and chatting about how they felt during sex.

Body part: He most definitely has a thing for legs, hips and ass. Vixen is all about his chest and arms — but, truth is she’s absolutely crazy about his neck.

Cum: He either cums inside or on Vixen’s ass. No other alternatives for him. He hates cumming in her mouth, mostly because her cunt is soooo much better to him; and then again, that means he can eat her out right after — or mark her up and shove his cum back inside. Vixen is a fan of him cumming inside, she’s pretty much traditional about this.

Dirty secret: Namjoon loves when Vixen doms him. He’d never admit that out loud but he’s praying for her to tie him up and strip for him before performing a lapdance and fucking herself with that glass dildo he bought her… He’ll just wait… hopefully… Vixen wants Namjoon to give her homework on some impossible topic and then punish her for every mistake she makes while he’s dressed in a suit and glasses.

Experience: We know all about Joon’s and Vixen’s bodycount. Joon had four, possibly five partners, one of which broke his heart. He wasn’t entirely vanilla with them, but Vixen is most definitely the spiciest he’s been with — and the most rewarding. Vixen had two partners before Namjoon and her first boyfriend was way more experienced than Namjoon is, but that is not an issue to her. She knows if she ever asked him, they could try out pretty much anything.

Favourite position: Namjoon is mostly about doggy and missionary. Doggy for enthusiastic fucking with that teenage eagerness that characterises them both. Missionary when he needs to make love to her slow and steady — though he admits Vixen on top of him in reverse cowgirl is also a hot topic for him. Vixen likes good old missionary since she likes Namjoon’s body shielding hers. She also enjoys bending over for him — especially on the back of the sofa.

Goofy: neither of them is that goofy when it comes to sex. For them is a moment to get rid of tension and gain more intimacy. It’s a moment of communication and connection, and a very spiritual one at that. There might be little giggles and laughs here and there when they’re in a playful mood, but even then they’re more happy than goofy.

Hair: Namjoon trims his hair slightly, just to keep things neat and tidy. Vixen used to shave at the beginning of their relationship. She waxed a few times, to try something different and to feel Namjoon’s tongue better when he goes down on her. She switched to trimming when she found out Namjoon enjoyed a more natural look.

Intimacy: Nothing isn’t intimate between these two. Brushing their teeth together before going to bed? Religion. Getting dinner ready? A ritual. Making love? Therapy. Fucking like gorillas? Relief. These two share one single soul. They’re each other’s temple, and their bedroom is their church.

Jack off: These two? Masturbation galore. They’re the literal proof that being in a relationship should never stop you from taking care of yourself. They masturbate together while they watch porn, they masturbate to the sight of the other one doing it or just watching them. Namjoon is a huge fan of watching Vixen touch herself. He can do it with his hands tied, untied, or stroking his cock. He really doesn’t care as long as he can watch. Plus the fact that the wall dividing his bedroom from the shower is made of glass really gives him the best view when he has morning wood and Vixen is washing herself. And that goes both ways. She likes watching him while she showers, putting on a bit of a show. Vixen also likes watching Namjoon masturbate, though she prefers putting her hands on him. And Namjoon prefers her hands to his own, especially since she’s so fucking good at that.

Kink: We all know these two are the resident DDLG freaks. Other than that Namjoon suffers from a pretty severe case of voyeurism. On the side, all giving, we have oral fixation, impact play, marking, biting, cumplay and cumeating, and a very mild, very experimental foot fetish. He’s also into roleplay, especially regarding school/university environments. To that, we need to add on Vixen’s end exhibitionism and food play, and then, all giving, choking kink, exhibitionism, bondage and gags, erotic massage.

Location: these two need someplace private, since they can’t get in the mood unless they’re 200% sure they can take their time and relax and be as loud as possible. Namjoon would never stand the idea of them getting caught: he needs to protect Vixen. And Vixen would never try something in public. She knows he’d be too focused on the possible dangers to properly enjoy the experience. That doesn’t mean that they don’t tease each other in public. Vixen likes when they talk dirty in public so once they get home Namjoon rips her clothes off her.

Motivation: Namjoon gets turned on whenever Vixen looks incredibly refined and elegant, completely out of his league. Pair that up with someone flirting with her and he goes out of his way to remind her why she got his ring on her finger ten months after they first met. He also gets hot under the collar when he’s reminded of how fucking smart she is; that makes him both proud and horny. On a baser level, she just needs to grind against his thigh, rub her ass on his crotch, kiss his neck or suck his fingers to make him instantly hard. Vixen gets horny very easily when she sees him exercise power — which happens pretty often with him being the leader. Also watching him tower over someone who isn’t her makes her a little volatile — that’s her daddy, he’s her protector.

No: easy. Sharing. Even simply her moans being overheard by someone would make him nervous. Once he used to share everything about his sex life with his friends, but after he and Vixen got engaged, everything involving her without clothes on became a 100% restricted topic. He still happens to talk about sex with his friends, but he must be in need of desperate help in order to share details. Vixen agrees on sharing being a hard no. She also thinks doing stuff in public is absolutely a hard no: she’s far too attached to her job to risk a scandal ruining it. And of course she would never stand Namjoon’s career and reputation going downhill.

Oral: Both fans, Namjoon both on the giving and receiving side, though he prefers giving by far. Vixen is also a fan of receiving. If Namjoon weren’t so damn intimidating, she would enjoy giving more, too.

Pace: depends on the mood. Playful or angry? Then he’s fucking her like she’s nothing but a cocksleeve, straight up jackhammering his way in. Loving and emotional? Then they’re going slow and steady so they can feel every inch of their flesh meeting and parting and squeezing and squelching and sliding.

Quickie: yes, but not excessively. Vixen can only consider a quickie as a form of foreplay. There’s no way to satisfy her unless at least two rounds are involved. Namjoon is more than happy to take his time with her. If they don’t have that much time, they prefer masturbating together — quick, efficient, delectable.

Risk: No? The only risk he would take would be fucking her out in the open, but someplace where the possibility of getting caught is lower than 0.1%. He’d book super secluded villas for their holidays and fuck her until she’s begging him to give her a break.

Stamina: Namjoon hasn’t got too much stamina and Vixen doesn’t either, they just deprive and tease each other when they want to make it super special, otherwise they would be lazy and take naps in between a round and another. And they can truly deal with that brilliantly since they are great at foreplay and that makes up for their rather weak stamina.

Toy: These two are shameless about their toys. Vixen has a thing for dildos, and Namjoon loves spoiling her with those. She has a couple vibrators too, but she’s not that much of a fan: she has a practical one, when she needs things done quick and easy and another one that looked way too cute for her not to have it. In addition to that, they have manacles, a cockring, a paddle and a quite interesting plug.

Unfair: Being with Namjoon is all about the pleasure. He’d much rather overstimulate Vixen rather than deny her. Also because he has very poor control over his instincts and he can’t deny himself. He would tease, edge or deny Vixen only to punish her and make sure that she actually reads that as a punishment and not as some sick way for her to get exactly what she wants (aka spanks). Vixen is more on the teasing side, and she enjoys controlling Namjoon’s orgasms, but she’s very fair. They like to play dirty, but they make sure everyone gets what they need.

Volume: Namjoon is all about low and deep. His moans, groans, growls and grunts all come in a very quiet, although very eloquent way. He prefers keeping it quiet so it feels more intimate. Vixen on the other hand is very vocal, especially when Namjoon goes down on her or is trying to overstimulate her. She’s still considerate about the people living next door, but at the same time, she has a thing for doing it in the studio so she can be as loud as she wants, much to Namjoon’s — and his private tracks’ — chagrin.

Wild card: if it weren’t for his jealousy and his position, Namjoon would love to fuck Vixen in a room full of strangers, just to show how good he can make her feel, and to enjoy just how deranged she would get once adrenaline started kicking in. Claiming her in a semi-public context would help him sate his possessiveness for a good while. Vixen instead would love to go to a BDSM club with Namjoon and watch scenes from other people — maybe, potentially, join? — she most definitely wishes she had done stuff with a girl before getting with Namjoon.

X-Ray: Namjoon is packed. Length is not exceedingly more than average. But match that with more than impressive girth? That’s a wild ride. It most definitely takes a stretch. Vixen has rather small boobs — but she’s more than stubborn to make up with a full, round bubble butt.

Yearning: at the beginning they go pretty wild. Vixen is used to getting at least an orgasm before falling asleep — every night. Of course that tones down once she gets with Namjoon, especially since she learns to prefer quality over quantity and he refuses to get stuff done in ten minutes. She easily slips into a two to three times a week regimen, but deprive her for longer than ten days and she’ll feel neglected. Of course she’d take care of herself, but that doesn’t mean she wouldn’t start drifting away as she’d feel emotionally neglected too. Namjoon considers himself happy as long as he can have a full weekend of fucking: he tends to cram all the sex in days where he can relax since during the week he’s often too tense to initiate anything sexual. But he wouldn’t deny it if the fancy struck him.

Zzz: He falls asleep like a bear. He goes positively lethargic the moment he hits the bed after cleaning up. Vixen finds it extremely endearing. She usually takes longer, but not too much. She likes cuddling him while he’s sleeping.

[missmentelle]

Hi MissMentelle! Thanks for everyone thing you do on this blog, it's been so helpful to me! I have a question, how do normal people act around those that they're angry at? How should I respond/talk to people that I'm angry at? All my life I've been surrounded by people who give me the silent treatment when they're upset with me so I don't know any healthy ways to respond to others when I'm angry or frustrated with them (especially those that I live with).

To some extent, it depends on the situation and your own emotional needs. There isn’t necessarily one “correct” way to deal with anger - different people have different instincts and different coping strategies that work for them, and it might take practice to figure out what works best for you. Disputes with your roommate or live-in partner can be particularly challenging; when you live in close quarters, it’s easier for small, everyday annoyances to spiral out of control. If you are having trouble dealing with your anger toward something, I recommend:

Ask yourself if the issue is worth confronting the other person over. The anger you feel towards another person may be totally justified and valid, but sometimes, it’s the sort of anger that you are better off working through on your own, and not bringing up with the other person. If there’s a recurring pattern of behaviour that is upsetting you, that’s something that needs to be addressed, but if it’s a one-time or accidental thing, or something that they couldn’t necessarily control, sometimes confronting them over it would just be more stressful, and the best course of action is to try to calm yourself down and treat the other person normally until your anger fades. If your roommate comes home drunk every single weekend and trashes the kitchen late at night, that’s infuriating and it’s something that you probably should confront them about. If your roommate comes home drunk just one in a year-long span and trashes the kitchen, the day after their partner broke up with them, that’s still annoying, but it’s probably not worth getting into a fight about it. 

Avoid getting aggressive or violent. Throwing things, hitting things or people, yelling, screaming or making threats are all inappropriate and ultimately unproductive ways to deal with anger. Getting aggressive often escalates the situation, and it’s a great way to turn minor disputes into enormous issues that consume a lot of energy and make your home feel like a hostile and unpleasant place. Getting aggressive can also be very frightening for the person you are angry with, and can make the home an unsafe environment for them. If you feel yourself getting aggressive or heated, find a way to calm yourself down. Take deep breaths. Walk away from the situation. Count backwards from 100. Put on some soothing music. Don’t approach the situation until you feel prepared to handle it without aggression. 

Give yourself the time and space to calm down. If you need some time to think and calm yourself down before talking to someone about something they did wrong, then that’s what you need to do. Take all the time you need. If someone has upset you, tell them “Hey, I’m actually really upset about this and I want us to deal with this, but I need some time to collect my thoughts first”. This does not mean you are giving the other person “the silent treatment” - the silent treatment is where you stop talking to the other person to punish them until they give in and let you have your own way. When you’re giving yourself space to calm down, you don’t have to ignore the other person entirely - be cordial when you interact with them, but let them know that you will be addressing the issue with them once you’ve had space to cool down. 

Avoid passive-aggression. Making snide comments or putting up passive-aggressive signs might seem like a good alternative to yelling, but it still escalates the situation and can make your living environment an unpleasant place to be. An issue that might have been resolved with an honest conversation can turn into months of escalating hostility. Putting your name on absolutely every item you own after your roommate borrows something without asking might be satisfying in the moment, but in the long run it doesn’t actually address the issue in a productive way. 

Take care of your physical needs. If you are feeling irritable and short-tempered, there’s a good chance that your physical state is at least partially the cause. Are you hungry? Did you get a bad sleep last night? Are you overworked or restless? Before you address an issue with someone, make sure that you are well-rested, well-fed and in generally good condition. Take a nap, have a bubble bath, change into some clean clothes, eat a snack. It will make dealing with the problem a whole lot easier. 

Seek emotional support from others. If you’re angry, it can be helpful to talk it over with someone who isn’t directly involved in the issue. The aim is not to turn that person against whomever you’re angry with, but just to have a safe place to vent and talk through the problem. If you have angry and hurtful things to say, it’s better to say them to a neutral third party who can calm you down, rather than saying them to the person you are upset with and possibly damaging the relationship.

Address the issue with the other person as soon as you feel up to it. Ultimately, if you are upset with someone, the healthiest way to address it is to talk to them about it directly when you are both in a calm enough mood to have this conversation. Tell the other person what they did to upset you, let them know how you are feeling, and let them know how you would like them to address the situation. If you’re having an issue with a roommate who never does dishes, sit the roommate down - or send them a heartfelt message - and say “Hey, it bothers me that you haven’t been cleaning up after yourself and I don’t appreciate it when I have to clean up your mess so I can cook. I need you to be more considerate and do your dishes when you’re finished cooking”. An open and honest conversation is not easy, but it’s the healthiest way of resolving the issue. 

If you are consistently clashing with someone, deeper reflection may be required. If you find that you are constantly clashing with someone and the situation isn’t getting better despite numerous attempts to talk about it and brainstorm solutions, it might be time to confront the fact that there might be a deeper issue at play. Being angry all the time is exhausting, and it’s not a pleasant way to live. Maybe you and the other person are incompatible, and need to spend some time apart. Maybe there’s an external factor at play, like one person being stressed out at work and being less considerate of others as a result. Maybe there’s something going on with you to make you easily angered - it could be a mental health issue. If you are constantly living with and struggling with anger, that’s a situation that might require further consideration, and possibly more drastic action to resolve it. 

Best of luck to you!Miss Mentelle

[iain-games-fmp]

Implementation: Dungeon Layers

The way I want to implement the random dungeon generation is by giving the player some control over the level of challenge they're going to face. With this in mind, the first idea I had was to create a "layers" system, a bit like the Chalice Dungeons in Bloodborne have layers to them that get harder and harder as you go down, I was going to do a similar thing. So, in my game not Bloodborne, if you were to select layer 1 to explore, the dungeon wouldn't have very many rooms or enemies, but it also wouldn't reward you with very much treasure. However, you might be able to get through more of them, because they're easier. On the other hand, you could go to a level 5 dungeon which has 100 rooms and is jam packed with enemies, but also gives you loads and loads of treasure. However, you may only be able to get through one or two of them before having to return home. Now obviously this plays into a lot of other systems like the way I choose to manage health and healing, and I would like to get to those soon in order to justify and explain why I've chosen to do it this way, but for the time being I just want to focus on implementing it.

First things first, I created a menu with 5 clickable buttons:

The next thing I needed to do was properly outline how I wanted this to work, because I had a vague idea, but no concrete flow. So, I spent a few minutes outlining how I wanted it to work and the idea I came up with was this:

When you select a layer, it sets the necessary variables in the game instance. Then, when the dungeon blueprint runs the event "Generate dungeon" the first thing it needs to do is grab the variables from the game instance and set the local equivalents to the according values. Then, obviously, we just need to call the generate dungeon event on begin play because otherwise it won't generate a new dungeon every time, which would be bad.

So breaking this down into constituent parts, we first need to make sure we have variables in the game instance to work with:

Easy! Next up, we need to make it so that when you press a button, it assigns some variables.

We don't even need to create any variables in the widget blueprint because they're all being stored in the game instance, so we can just set them directly there. Of course you have to go through and do this for every button, but that's not really a big deal. It's also possible that you could set these to generate randomly within a range, which is very tempting, as it would make each layer far less predictable. Even though these are generating randomly within a range. Also, one could theoretically move it so that it's not creating a range to generate in, but simply creating the number in the widget, which would end up being a little cleaner and more efficient overall.

So make the necessary changes for that, (also making sure to change it in both initialise treasure and initialise enemy, but it looks almost identical so I haven't attached screenshots of both.) Then this should work. Except not quite because first we need to make one minor tweak:

Good, this should work. However, there is a slight issue at the moment, which is that this is not going to generate new parameters on generating a new dungeon, which sucks because this is procedural and we want it to do that. The fix for this is actually really easy, as we just need to go through the layer selection process every time we generate a new dungeon, so when you interact with the ladder, create two buttons, one which says "go to a new dungeon" and one which says "return home." The "return home" button will load you into the family management screen, thus progressing time, and moving onto the next day, where you select the layer you want to go to and generate a new set of values. However, the "go to a new dungeon" button, instead of just generating a new dungeon with the same values, gives you the same menu to choose your layer. This is a simple, but hopefully effective solution to my problem. I just need to make the menu for when you interact with the ladder.

Now that I've demonstrated the premise, I will record a short video to demonstrate the final result.

[e11evenkeys]

Pitch: The Adventures of Danger Rabbit- Chapter 1 Intro Rabbit Origins

When I was younger, my dad always said, "magic can't solve everything, but a man with a brain can do enough." He wasn't the strongest man or the richest, but my dad was the wisest. Growing up, magic was ordinary, and anyone could use it. Spell books were sold like cookbooks. That being said, spells that did anything impressive or important cost more. A lot more.

There was a time when people shared spells openly and freely. Unfortunately, new laws made it illegal to share spell books of dangerous magic with anyone outside of their family. Everyone knew simple spells for things like tying shoes, but anything, like controlling the weather or talking to animals, was kept private. That's how family grimoires started.

My family didn't have a grimoire. We had a few pages of simple magic here and there, but nothing significant. Like I said, serious magic cost serious money, money that my family never had. That's why dad and I did things the old fashioned way. We couldn't afford spells to teleport or fly, so we had a car. We couldn't afford spells to grow food, so my dad had a job, two jobs actually. We couldn't afford a spell to cure addictions, so we had to put mom in rehab. That didn't work. Magic made life simple and easy for those who could afford the right spell. We couldn't afford it, so dad tried to teach me we didn't need magic to live a good life.

His message didn't sink in until after I turned 11.

It was a few days after my birthday, and I was playing with my new pet rabbit, Mr.Nickles. He was my first pet ever. Up until then, dad and I couldn't afford to feed more than two mouths. Mr.Nickles was a magic rabbit with lucky feet; my dad spent a month's worth of paychecks to get me. Dad told me not to let him out of his cage by myself, but I loved petting his silk white fur.

Dad still wasn't home from work, and I thought as long as I kept all the doors and windows shut, Mr.Nickles couldn't run away. I didn't realize lucky feet weren't his only magic. By the time my father made it home, I had lost my rabbit. I knew he had to be somewhere inside the house, but I couldn't find him anywhere. Dad tried to help me find him, but we both came up short.

After days of turning the house upside down, I finally asked if we could use a spell to find Mr.Nickles. Dad didn't know any spells to find lost pets. He said, " if we look hard enough, I'm sure we'll find him," but we never did. I knew Mr.Nickles was still in the house. I used carrots to set up traps in my bedroom, the living room, and kitchen, and every day I'd check them and find the carrots were gone. I was tired of coming up short. I didn't have enough money to buy a spell, and dad didn't know one, so I figured I'd try to make my own.

I looked online to find magic words and I used spells that I already knew to fill in the gaps. It took a few hours before I had anything I thought could work, but I had something. I waited until dad went to bed so I wouldn't be interrupted, and then in the middle of the night, I performed my first self crafted spell. All I wanted to do was find Mr.Nickles. That night I found out why ordinary people never wrote their own spells. New magic was dangerous and unpredictable. Spells were like complex formulas. Sure, spell books dumbed things down enough for kids to use, but coming up with something original wasn't safe for an 11-year-old boy to do on a school night. I said the words, and the next thing I knew, I was waking up with dad standing over me.

I felt weird. I wasn't hurt, but something was off. Dad helped me off the floor and to my feet, and that's when it all became clear. I was covered in white fur. I had rabbit feet and long ears. I still had my thumbs, but somehow I only had four fingers on each hand. I turned myself into a sort of hybrid rabbit creature. I was mortified, and dad should have been pissed, but he was distraught.

I forgot about Mr.Nickles; I wanted to go back to normal. Unfortunately, because I came up with the spell that changed me, there was no reversal spell. Even if we had the money to pay a professional magician to undo my transformation, it would have been near impossible. I was stuck as a hybrid for the rest of my life or until I came up with a reversal for myself.

Dad wouldn't let me out of the house for almost a month while we tried to undo my mistake. Honestly, I didn't want to be seen, but eventually, we started getting phone calls from my school. If I missed any more days, my dad would have been fined for every day until my return. There was nothing we could do in the time that we had, so when the school bus came the next morning, I reluctantly got on it.

As I expected, I was the center of attention from the moment I stepped foot on the bus. Magical creatures, or Fae, weren't anything new, but my school had very few. On top of that, I wasn't a satyr, an elf, or anything reasonable. I'm pretty sure I was the first half rabbit the town, and quite possibly the world, had ever seen. Kids could be meanly spirited at times, but I think during that bus ride, everyone was too taken by surprise to be dickish.

The other kids and their opinions, while they mattered to me, were not the primary concern. When we made it to school, the principal was waiting for me. Ms. Harper wanted to discuss how my grades fell during my long absence, but when she saw me, my fur, my tail, and long ears, I'm sure my classes must have become a minor talking point. She walked me from the bus to her office, and along the way, everyone inside the building got to witness the spectacle. On the bright side, no one recognized me unless I spoke or outright told them who I was, but that didn't stop them from talking. With my oversized ears, I heard every word spoken about me as I walked by.

At the time, I was only concerned with my reputation and how everyone saw me. I was oblivious to the main issue. Ms. Harper and I spoke at length about my transformation, and throughout the conversation, I was honest at every turn. I was too young, or maybe too naive to realize my dad could have gotten in serious trouble. Magic was easy enough for kids to use, but children weren't allowed to use advanced spells on they're own. There was too much potential danger to chance the possibility of kids being careless. Anyone can use a knife or a lighter, but you wouldn't let children go around starting fires or cutting things down on their own. Advanced magic was the same way. With that in mind, my transformation was less than ok. I told Ms. Harper, I did it to myself, but that didn't stop her from believing my dad was negligent in allowing me to conduct a self-crafted spell.

It wasn't until Ms. Harper called my dad to come to my school that I began to understand. We were both in trouble. I started to backtrack, attempting to cover our asses, but it was too late. Ms. Harper wouldn't listen to another word until my dad arrived.

My dad had to speak with Ms. Harper and a couple of police officers. During their discussion, I was put out of the room to wait in the hallway. I could hear through the wood door, and nothing said was comforting. I should have been in my English class. I would have killed to be sitting at my desk reading some dead poet's early work, but I couldn't leave.

It might have been my fur, but I was sweating like crazy from some kind of overwhelming heat. I couldn't steer my attention away from my dad's attempts at salvaging the situation.

[weather-cluddy]

Yeah, I feel like some people are quick to go "But Es is neurodivergent and a minor!!" when their uglier side comes out (or like, if not neurodivergent at least fucked up pretty badly in the head thanks to Milgram's brainwashing). But Muu is barely a year older and nobody makes excuses for her superiority complex, so why should Es get to run roughshod over everyone else just because "their situation is so stressful, poor kid doesn't even remember who they are"? It's not like being kidnapped isn't disorienting for the prisoners, and that's before we get into the mental and physical punishments.

(Plus if it's an age thing, why don't they get more flak over Amane? I'm still not over them restraining and screaming at her as a power trip just because she went over all the reasons people her age can be murderers, then claimed she wasn't one herself. Es apparently saw this as her trying to use being a little kid as a way to wriggle out of punishment. So what, is it hypocrital to say "Group X is morally capable of murder, but that doesn't make every X-er automatically a murderer"?)

The brainwashing is a bit harder to judge, but even before the headaches come into play they show very little interest in questioning anything or in being anything more than "the guard". From a meta perspective, I seriously doubt all their "I'm the guard, you're the prisoners, that's the end of it" is really just Milgram's doing. It ruins the whole point of naming the entire project after a terrifying example of how easy it is for people to obey monstrous orders if the one doing so is more of a flesh automaton than an actual person. Especially because, as the whole VD says, Es is really similar to Fuuta and he sure didn't need any literal brainwashing to become the guy he is. Or the fact that Jackalope wants to explore their reasoning, which becomes more and more limited the more constrained their thinking is.

Also, in a series that's all about moral ambiguity, it'd be pretty lame if we got to the end, Es was freed from their mental fetters, and that gave us a pure angel completely different to the person we've spent 99% of the time with. So all in all, I'm not inclined to blame every bad thing Es did on the nebulous Milgram leadership or whatever. Which means that yeah, Es is just kind of an asshole. And sure, the prisoners can be too, but power brings responsibility. It's worse for the warden, somebody who has near-complete control of the prison and inmates and is practically unassailable, to be an unreasonable jerk than if it's one of the prisoners doing it.

I think they're trying to slowly develop Es into a more understanding person, with things like them pondering how their verdicts might be able to help people in Haruka's VD (as opposed to being extremely opposed to voting based on rehabilitating prisoners in Amane's), but VDs like this one make it all ring pretty hollow, precisely because Es is already making pretty mouth-noises without following through. At least when they had no pretenses of being nice to the prisoners you could believe they understood what being nice would actually entail.

Like, oh, sure, you want to understand the prisoners, but only to the extent that it doesn't bother you. They're your 'comrades' because you saw their innermost self, but only YOU saw that, it's a totally one-sided relationship. And apparently being 'comrades' doesn't mean you owe them an actual reasoned debate when it comes to choosing if they live or die*, it's just more fuel for you to be all "Oh, I'm such a great guard, I won't let these emotional attachments sway me!" about.

*I mean, if you think about it, Es counteargument is basically a mix of appeal to authority and some weird puritan "fun is bad" thing. Like, "Oh sure, our blind desire to fed our egos through 'justice' led us both to causing unintended harm far beyond what was deserved or intended, but how dare you imply I enjoyed it!? Now that is out of the line!" Is that really the issue here? Is murder all good as long as you're dour about it? Is Fuuta's real sin smiling?

The closest Es comes to trying to see Fuuta's perspective is saying "Well, if we're really the same, I guess karma will come bite me in the ass at some point like it did with you" as Fuuta is being dragged into the music machine. Because Es sure isn't willing to put in the effort to self-reflect and change themselves, so it's up to cosmic forces to do it.

But no, it's okay, they'll totally take responsibility for their actions, as you can tell by the facts they spent the first third of the VD repeating "But I didn't mean to do that!" Funny how "I'll accept the consequences when they arrive" somehow absolves them of trying to avoid said consequences, huh? I'm sure if Mahiru dies, she'll be really glad to hear that Es had already decided they didn't care if their decisions killed her. Totally makes up for everything and is in no way actually worse than Fuuta killing somebody without even considering the possibility.

IDK, I get that some of this is because of meta commentary, or leaving things open enough that them voting any combination of inno/guilty isn't obviously ridiculous, but I don't think I'll ever like Es as a person. I'm honestly pretty dubious I'll even like them as a character. If they were their own independent character they'd be able to have actual relationships with the cast and have a consistent line of reasoning I could follow, and if they were an inoffensive blank slate at least I wouldn't feel compelled to root for their downfall. As it stands, I just kinda feel like half the runtime of each interrogation is wasted on some jerk fundamentally incapable of having real, concrete character development until after the project is over. And six years is a really long time to wait for Es to get over themselves, frankly.

Lol, Futa's right he should kill Es. I'd help him do it at this point. Hope he teams up with Mikoto and ends this crap. The little warden is starting to piss me off more and I was already annoyed with them at the start.

[tortuga-aak]

Democrats are united against Trump, but they're stuck in a leadership vacuum

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Democrats are feeling confident after victories in recent elections around the country, but they're hardly resting easy. 

As the Clintons roar back into the headlines, with some in the Democratic party now reevaluating former President Bill Clinton’s sexual escapades and Hillary Clinton’s controversial defense of her husband, some say they are distracting from the party's rebuilding efforts. 

This comes as the party tries to usher in a new, energetic crop of candidates ahead of the 2018 and 2020 elections. 

First, they beat expectations by easily winning the Virginia governorship earlier this month and nearly taking over the state legislature’s lower house. Now they have a shot at claiming a much more improbable prize: a US Senate seat in a special election Dec. 12 in deep-red Alabama, following allegations of sexual misconduct by Republican candidate Roy Moore.

But Democrats are hardly resting easy. The Clintons have roared back into the headlines, with some in the party now reevaluating former President Bill Clinton’s sexual escapades and Hillary Clinton’s controversial defense of her husband. Mrs. Clinton also caused a recent stir by questioning the legitimacy of President Trump’s election, handing critics an argument that she’s behaving just as she said Mr. Trump would if he had lost.

Elements of the larger context haven’t helped the Democrats: Their aging leaders have become fodder for Saturday Night Live parody. The Democratic National Committee is strapped for cash. And it’s locked in an internal battle between the “Bernie Sanders wing” and the “Hillary Clinton wing,” as it seeks to dig out of years of atrophy under President Obama – and an embarrassing book by former party chair Donna Brazile.

Then there are Trump and the Republicans, who are happily using Clinton for their own purposes. They have turned her into a sort of “bogeywoman” – beginning with the campaign chants of “lock her up” and continuing to this day with calls for a special counsel to look into her various alleged misdeeds.

In short, Clinton’s shadow still hovers over the party, part of the larger phenomenon of a party with many leaders – and therefore no leader. And as the Democrats regroup, they will need to answer an important question: Can they find a way to incorporate Clinton’s perceived positives – including as a role model for women looking to go far in politics – while avoiding her negatives?

“There are certainly people still adjusting to the fact that Barack Obama is no longer president, and to the stark difference that Donald Trump gives us,” says Jane Kleeb, chairwoman of the Nebraska Democratic Party. “I think a lot of this struggle to find our footing again is compounding all of that, because there is not one unified voice.”

Associated Press/Andrew Harnik The Democrats won’t have a true leader until they have a presidential nominee, and that’s two and a half years away. In the meantime, local party officials are getting used to the cacophony of voices that amount to a collective party leadership that is doing battle – and then at times cooperating – with Trump.

Ask Democrats who their leaders are, and the list is long: from Hillary Clinton, former President Barack Obama, and former Vice President Joe Biden; to Senator Sanders of Vermont (who isn’t even a Democrat, but an independent); to DNC chairman Tom Perez and vice chair Keith Ellison; to Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, the minority leaders on Capitol Hill.

“On the one hand, such a long list is great, because it shows the kind of diversity and breadth of our Democratic Party,” says Ms. Kleeb, who was a progressive activist before becoming state party chair. “But on the other hand, it’s not great, because everybody knows that everybody’s fighting.”

Kleeb is a Sanders appointee to the DNC’s Unity Reform Commission, an effort to fix party processes and find common ground among the party’s factions. Last week, Sen. Tim Kaine (D) of Virginia called for the elimination of superdelegates, elected officials who can vote for whomever they want as the Democratic presidential nominee, without regard to the results of primaries and caucuses.

Senator Kaine’s status as an “establishment” Democrat – Clinton’s running mate in 2016, and a former DNC chair – gives his proposal added weight, as the Sanders wing seeks to make the party more “small-d” democratic. The Unity Reform Commission will meet next month and issue recommendations.

Other state party activists are more locally focused. Luis Heredia, a Democratic national committeeman from Arizona, sees opportunity for Democratic pickups in his state’s open US Senate seat, the governor’s race, and the House seat held by Rep. Martha McSally (R). But he agrees that the party’s message needs some work.

“Demographics cannot be destiny,” Mr. Heredia says. “We have a great opportunity with an emerging Latino electorate, with those energized young voters coming in. But in a midterm, you’ve got to give people a reason to vote. Democrats have to run against Trump, but also be bold, and carve out our message.”

AP Photo/Paul SancyaIn Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker (R) is seeking a third term, state Democratic Party chair Martha Laning has eliminated the term “off year” from her vocabulary.

“We’re calling this the ‘build year,’ ” says Ms. Laning, who has boosted the staff from seven people to 19 since her election in 2015. “Right now, we’re in listening mode. We’re going out and asking people, what is the most important issue to them, and hearing them out.”

None of the state party officials interviewed expressed concern that Clinton could overshadow their efforts in next year’s elections – even in a red state like Nebraska.

“A lot of women and little girls saw Hillary Clinton as a transformative figure, just like many young people and African Americans saw Barack Obama as a transformative figure,” says Kleeb. “So no, we need her. I’m definitely not in the camp saying Nancy Pelosi and others who have been on the national stage need to move aside.”

Democratic pollster Mark Mellman doesn’t see anything unusual in Clinton’s ongoing visibility. “John Kerry went back to being a senator,” says Mr. Mellman, referring to the Democrats’ 2004 nominee. “He didn’t wither away to nothingness.”

He also doesn’t see Clinton trying to exert control over the party. “To my knowledge, she’s not involved herself in any of these internal debates about party processes … or even in policy debates,” he says.

A Democratic strategist, speaking not for attribution, sees the reigniting of debate over Bill Clinton’s presidency – particularly his sexual misbehavior – as a temporary phenomenon linked to the rash of allegations made against men in various spheres of public life, including Trump.

“Let’s be honest, whatever Bill Clinton did, he concluded what the public regards as a successful presidency,” says the strategist. Hillary Clinton’s continued defense of her husband – that he was held to account for his actions – may be uncomfortable for her now, but the moment will pass, he says.

Drew Angerer/Getty ImagesRepublicans can be expected to keep demonizing Clinton, as they seek to rev up their voters and avoid a wipeout in the 2018 midterm elections.

Most recently, Republicans have been calling for a special prosecutor to look into the so-called Uranium One deal – and alleged links between hefty donations to the Clinton Foundation and the sale of shares of US uranium reserves to a Russian company, a deal approved by the State Department under then-Secretary of State Clinton, along with eight other agencies.

Clinton says the allegations have been “debunked” repeatedly, and that prosecuting her would make the country look like “some dictatorship.” For the GOP, keeping Clinton in the headlines serves an important political purpose.

“One way to keep a very fractured Republican Party together is just to bring up the name Hillary Clinton,” says Seth Masket, a political scientist at the University of Denver.

For Democrats, bringing up Trump serves the same purpose. But even there, the party’s message isn’t uniform. TV ads by billionaire Tom Steyer calling for the impeachment of Trump are opposed by many Democrats.

“Impeachment at this stage, without a smoking gun, looks like a partisan ploy,” says progressive activist Robert Borosage. “It pleases the many liberals afflicted with doses of Trump derangement syndrome, but is seen as irresponsible at best by most everyone else.”

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