#also its kind of hard to do a timeloop like the one in-game in a modern way?

[coern-art-very-cool-and-nice]

sekai au 👊😔

[insertdisc5]

Devlog #12: Localization Milestone and Key Art

Hello everyone! Welcome to this month’s devlog!

If you just stumbled upon this, I am Adrienne, also known as insertdisc5! I’m the developer, writer, artist, main programmer, etc of the game. The game being In Stars and Time, a timeloop RPG, which is also the next and final game in the START AGAIN series, following START AGAIN: a prologue (available here!). You can find out more about In Stars and Time here!!!

LET’S GET TO IT. This month has some localization news, as well as a breakdown on key art! What’s key art? Where do you use it? Can you eat it? Read and find out.

The first pass of the Japanese localization is done and implemented!!! You can play the whole game in Japanese from beginning to end now!!!

The next step now is the localization QA, where the localization team plays the game and makes sure the Japanese script works in context. The team got the script in an excel sheet and I tried my best to give context for scenes where I could, but playing through the game themselves allows them to get The Most Context. All Of The Context. So they can make changes to their localization so it can be the best!!!

That’s it for news. Other things are chugga-chugga-chuggin’ behind the scenes as well, and I can’t wait to share it all with you all!!!

Today’s topic-since-I-don’t-have-much-to-talk-about is: key art!

“Adrienne what on Earth is a ‘key art’” This above is the key art.

More generally (and keep in mind this is my layman self talking, I’m sure you could get a better answer elsewhere, but also you’re here, so you might as well learn something huh???), key art is The Big Art that games (and, I assume, other mediums???) use to show off their style and visuals in things such as store fronts, articles, and other such things. It’s Mario jumping in a cool way with his lil star buddy while the planets are behind him. It’s Kratos and Atreus on a boat. It’s sad Siffrin in the foreground, surrounded by stars, while his friends are having fun in the background. It’s The Art!!! It’s the first thing people see about your game!!! It needs to be cool and represent your game!!!

Here’s some examples of the key art being used for Steam store assets. Itch.io is very kind and asks for like 2 assets, but Steam asks for a whoopin’ 30 assets, all with different sizes and orientations, so it means one of the biggest things your key art should be is MODULAR AS HELL. From a massive 1440x3160 vertical banner to an itty-bitty 231x87 horizontal button (called a capsule, it’s the small banner above, and since it’s usually the first thing you see about a game it is THE MOST IMPORTANT ASSET), your key art needs to be ready for anything!!!

For the prologue, I did not plan for this very well. I learned pretty late in development that store assets for itch.io (and later, Steam) were gonna be a thing I should worry about, so I ended up deciding to use the title card art. Which, like, it worked out.

BUT! I had to redraw Siffrin to make sure their hat and body weren’t weirdly cut out, and had to remake the pixelly gradient like a thousand times for each asset to make sure it wouldn’t hide Siffrin’s face. And that’s without mentioning the hell I went through to make sure the massive title logo would fit. Why did I think “START AGAIN START AGAIN START AGAIN: a prologue” was a good title. It was so hard to make it fit in its entirety every time (because, of course, Steam asks you to show the logo in its entirety in every single asset). Why did I choose this title (I’m a Kingdom Hearts fan and my heart is rotten and thinks long titles are funny)

So since I went through hell with START AGAIN’s store assets, for ISAT I made sure to think about the key art way ahead of time teehee.

Every so often I become an absolute genius so I only had to sketch the key art once, as you can see above. You don’t need to understand it because I do and it’s all that matters. Teehee!

Here's the rough illustration! I made it to block out the shapes, and figure out where that dang logo would go. Once again, reminder: if you have text of any kind, figure out where it goes in the rough stage. Future you will thank you. I also had Siffrin look directly at the camera in this rough stage, and then figured. That it would look sadder. If Siffrin looked emo-ly to the side. I do like the look at the camera though. He Is Looking

To talk about The Meaning very quickly, I wanted to show Siffrin front and center, since the whole story is about them. And I wanted to show the whole party, but clearly separated from Siffrin- Siffrin is stuck in a time loop, feels completely apart from them, and I wanted to show that in the key art! With the expressions too- everyone else is happy or engaged in something, interacting with each other, while Siffrin is in his emo phase. And also stars everywhere. Because of course.

Here are all the layers I used- I made sure to draw them on a vector layer in Clip Studio Paint, which means the lines never become pixelated even if you zoom in a lot! As a side note, the full file for this is 4000x3000, which I thought would be too big, but is actually just the right size for all those dang assets.

I also made sure that Siffrin would look the most detailed, since I knew that while everyone could fit for the bigger pictures, for the itty-bitty small ones (or the extremely horizontal ones), I would only show off Siffrin’s face. MODULAR!!!!!

In the end this key art worked pretty well to make the store assets, but if I could talk to past me I would tell them. Make the circle bg taller so it’d fit the more vertical assets. And find a way to leave more space for the characters in the background. I had to remove them/rotate them/zoom them out very often because Siffrin hides them too much because Siffrin is just too dang big. But that’s still manageable, past me. You did a good job past me

So, TLDR, from my experience, what you need to keep in mind when making your key art is:

-make sure it has enough layers to be able to move things around as needed, but not so many layers that you become lost

-fun art that represents your game and its vibe well

-cool everywhere, but able to get by if you zoom in on one thing (which usually for ISAT’s assets is Siffrin’s face)

-able to work in a vertical and horizontal format and at many different sizes

I hope my key art made people interested enough in the game to try to find out more!!

That’s all I have to say for today! Let me know if you have any questions, or if there’s any aspect of the game development struggle you’d like me to talk about! See you next time!!!

AND DON’T FORGET TO WISHLIST THE GAME ON STEAM ALSO IT REALLY HELPS BECAUSE STEAM’S ALGORITHM IS MORE LIKELY TO SHOW OFF GAMES WITH A HIGH AMOUNT OF WISHLISTS THAT’S THE REASON WHY GAME DEVS ALWAYS ASK TO WISHLIST!!! OKAY BYE!!!!

[the-bitter-ocean]

oceaaaannn hiii! let's go with 3, 5, and 15 for the isat ask game c:

(MAJOR A6SE / 2HATS SPOILERS + FULL GAME SPOILERS AHOY) Thank you for the questions @dekupalace ! Since I’m going to be talking more in depth about the game for one of these questions I’m going to put my responses under a read more:

3- favorite soundtrack?

Oh god that’s such a hard question the whole game has certified bangers. The musicians at Studio Thumpy Puppy were not messing around or pulling any punches. The soundtrack of the game elevates literally every emotional beat. If I was forced to choose only one song out of the soundtrack my favorite track in the whole game has to be “How Can You Help Me, Stardust?” aka the theme that plays when you fight Loop at the Favor tree during act six. Hearing that for the first time while getting the full context of loop’s backstory made me go crazy. It was so fucking emotional and well done. That and it’s just objectively a super intense high energy song that makes me wanna dance around. If anyone deserves the coolest fight theme in the game, it’s Loop.

5- favorite optional event?

Ooh this is also a hard one! I adore a lot of the optional story events because each of them really shed light on Siffrin’s mental state /characterization, as well as gives depth to other aspects like the other character of the world building as a whole which strengthens the themes of the story. Aside from the obvious choice (2Hats Ending/ Act six loop encounter) I think my favorite optional event would have to be the “Who Was Phone” achievement (Change God event). There’s something so fascinating about learning about the Change God. Someone who clearly adores their certified little guy (Mirabelle) and is willing to offer words of kindness and assurance in her identity even if it knows she won’t remember in one instance..and then in the very same breath tell Siffrin that they enjoy watching Siffrin in the timeloop torment nexus because they’re curious to see how they change in a situation where everything is forced to stagnate. It was so genuinely fucked. I will think about it always forever.

15- anything you’d change about the game? be it game mechanics, a new feature, a change in plot, etc

Overall I’m pretty satisfied with the game both in story and gameplay actually. I think Adrienne did a good job writing and expanding on the characters and story that was set up in the prologue. The quality of life in terms of gameplay got improved since the previous game as well ( those who played the prologue can attest to this) . The fact that it was a in universe story reason as to why makes it all the more satisfying (if you want to know what I mean by that please read my mutuals @felikatze analysis about it here.)

I just am happy that Siffrin got to be happy in the end and stay with their family, to be able to talk things out and escape the loops. I know some people didn’t like that or expected a more darker/sadder ending or wanted the gameplay to be more challenging … my response to that is Literally Just Play Start Again: A Prologue. To me it would be extremely reductive to have Siffrin just suffer with no reprieve or escape from the loops (because that’s just a repeat of what happened in its predecessor) or have the group just split off from each other immediately after everything happened. It would have been extremely unsatisfying and ultimately missing the point of the themes of the game as a whole gonna be real lol.

The only things I’d maybe change or add is like it would’ve been cute to see Euphrasie and Claude be together/ reunite on screen in act 6. They should kiss. Lol. (That and just I would’ve personally loved to see Euphrasie in canon expanded on a little more but that’s not necessarily needed she serves her purpose in the narrative. I just like analyzing her and giving her more depth and I like when others do too, but that’s what fanart/ fics and aus are for so I’m not fussed.) 

I don’t mind that the game is sort of open ended and doesn’t answer all the questions. I think that gives artists, fanfic writers, Au makers and people who like to analyze the game more freedom to come up with their own interpretations for things that happened in pre canon and post canon which to me is more interesting. I know Loop disappearing at the end of the game in both endings is sad/ bittersweet but I wouldn’t necessarily change the way that was structured either. I like that their fate was ambiguous because it leads the viewer to come up with their own theories as to where they went. ( personally I love seeing stuff where loop gets to travel on their own and form a new life and identity outside of the loops and learn to heal, as well as post game getting to meet back up with the party and learn to navigate this new life/ change one step at a time. )

[wyauwu]

pizzasatAU expansion

sequel to this post: pizzasat 1

okay so in a post 2 hour long intensive math work delirium i came up with more for this. mightve lost some of it after coming back to my senses but ill probably recall it as i put it down.

the MOTHER vs mr arim conflict mainly stays the same as it is in pizza game, with the ending of the true route of pizza game kicking off kiane's journey. kind of? MOTHER finally has enough of trapping arim in a timeloop and decides to just start erasing everyone in the country she has grown to hate, starting with everyone in the big microsoffit. she tries to get kiane with her MOTHER CURSE TM (which i decided to make different from the king's time freezy stuff just for fun. instead its like the wish that erased The Island but not exactly? like if someone was hit with the MOTHER CURSE TM you could remember what they were to you, who they were friends with, stuff you did together, but you couldn't remember their favourite food, what they liked to do, what they liked to wear. what their face looked like. their phantoms unconsciously wander the places they used to live, invisble to everybody except the people who once knew them. now i know this sounds exceptionally edgy for a pizza game au. but consider. this is also an isat au.) but MOTHER fails bc kiane got a fake birthday protection blessing from mr arim a few days prior and also bc inner is linked to her at this point and even though she's limited by the mortal plane she is NOT gonna let her host get killed by a power granted by the fucking UNIVERSE of all deities. pretentious asshole doesn't even bother to manifest an avatar to interact with the others, and the idea that they 'wouldn't really be "the universe" if they were confined to one singular form' is just an EXCUSE and THEY FUCKING KNOW IT!!!!!!

the MOTHER CURSE is spreading across the land and getting people but she's not really doing it actively bc mr. arim has locked himself in his office and she's too busy trying to get in and kill him to focus too hard on erasing everybody else rn.

sensei is a party member exclusive to doo's timeline, he joins the party with lamp. in roobit's timeline, the MOTHER CURSE TM gets him before they join. in the timeline where hes a party member, flowersei shows up after they beat MOTHER and wipes them all from existence so thoroughly that it almost overcomes roobit's do-overs and the universe, scrambling to save her, turns her into doo and kicks her into roobit's timeline.

sav is already fighting MOTHER once the party reaches her (he's losing) and at least one of roobit's do-overs is because she walks directly into his ultimate attack and dies instantly.

[friends-to-lovers-tournament]

Friends to Lovers Tournament: Round 2, Side A, Match 4

propaganda under the cut!

Fuyupoly:

Submission 1:

they're from the winter troupe of the mankai company, and unlike the other troupes they're all adults. that said, they all have varying degrees of trauma and emotional stuntedness. it takes them some time to fully open up to each other bc they're all very cautious of each other's boundaries and don't want to cross any lines which initially led to some issues in the group's formation. over time they've learned to bridge the gap while still being mindful of hard boundaries. at one point they have a discussion about what exactly their relationship is (gay) cuz they were talking about how the other troupes have clearly defined dynamics (spring=family, summer=besties, autumn=rivals & teammates) but they don't,, and homare deadass says they're "people bound by a common destiny" which in and of itself sounds very Gay (like why are you as a man bound to other men by a common destiny), but it goes even further because homare starts spouting WEDDING VOWS: "In sickness and in health, for better or for worse, we shall share our laughter and our tears as those with an intertwined fate... How beautiful we are!" THIS IS A DIRECT QUOTE FROM THE GAME AND THE MC EVEN REMARKS "i can already hear wedding bells in the distance..." 

gradually they become closer, in individual sub-units based on who's paired up as co-leads for a play, and as a troupe overall. also two of its members are childhood friends who had a messy 'divorce' in their young adulthood and it took the game breaking its genre to introduce a timeloop for them to finally make up if that means anything to you. one of their troupe songs "precious to us ~bokura no kisetsu" has some pretty beautiful and fruity lines: "The many kindnesses born in me here / Never fail to breathe life into my chest / Even all the pain and bitterness / Have now become dear to me (Ah…Stay with me)", "No matter how many times our season passes / Let us keep living together / Holding our hands, without ever letting go / Let us open up the curtain of tomorrow", "There is no need for words, because once our gazes meet / Joy sparks a light in your eyes", "Our journey, may it be a brilliant one / As our breaths overlap as one"

a lot of their plays has a LOT of homoerotic tension between the two leads too. their first play has tsumugi and tasuku play angels, and it's heavily implied that tasuku's character has an unrequited crush on tsumugi's character. their third play has azuma play a vampire and tasuku play Just Some Guy and it's generally agreed in the fandom to be one of the gayest, if not THE gayest, play A3 has ever written. obviously the vampire thing is very fruity, but there's also how the vampire was longing to bite the human but was holding himself back, and when the vampire left the human in the end, the human was absolutely HEARTBROKEN over it and was swearing they would reunite one day. the stage play of this takes it even further by having the vampire embrace the human from behind and BITE his neck. the fourth play is a watered-down adaptation of Phantom of the Opera where they genderbend Christine into Chris among other things and change the relationship between Chris and the Phantom to one of friendship.... ostensibly so, because there's still a lot of homoerotic undertones in their interactions. i could go on but this should be enough of a sampling taste 

Submission 2:

the writers rlly said "let's take 2 normal guys who are childhood friends and have been into theatre since their school days and have them go through a pre-canon messy divorce, an eccentric poet with a potentially controversial haircut, an amnesiac sleepyhead who can only be awoken with marshmallows but is also somehow extremely athletic despite doing nothing but sleeping and eating marshmallows all day, a man who is so beautiful and mysterious he breaks gender, and a supposed android from a fictional south asian country, and throw them into a blender, oh and for good measure let's throw in some theatre and angst and gay and angst and gay" and the end result was marriage. i mean it took them a lot of awkward fumbling around and conflicts to get there but they got there and thats what matters. ok *technically* in-text they're all rlly good friends and kinda found family BUT they are found family via marriage papers i do not make the rules chief

Submission 3:

The reason why they are so friends-to-lovers to me is because their relationship is founded on quiet and unconditional acceptance of each other—regardless of how flawed they may be or how heavy their burdens and trauma may be. When the troupe first formed (sans Guy who was in another country at the time), they didn’t have any major clashing personalities at the very beginning and generally they were mindful of each other’s boundaries, unlike the other troupes that came before them. However, it’s BECAUSE they were too mindful of said boundaries that it was difficult for them to break down their walls and bond as a team—and there were a LOT of walls to break down, as all of them had varying degrees of emotional baggage and trauma.

In fact, it’s only three plays in that they finally truly start opening up to each other, with Azuma getting the ball rolling by opening up about the deep loneliness that haunted him ever since his childhood. It’s during this conversation that they also discuss what their relationship as a troupe is, because the other troupes have defined their relationship as a team (Spring is family, Summer is best friends, Autumn is rivals & teammates), and Homare goes on to declare that they’re “people bound by a common destiny” and goes on to spew wedding vows: "In sickness and in health, for better or for worse, we shall share our laughter and our tears as those with an intertwined fate... How beautiful we are!" I mean… it can’t get any more obvious than this, really. They are married.

But anyway, Tsumugi says he wants their relationship to be one where while they respect each other’s need for space, they’ll also be there for each other and share their pains and burdens—or in his words: “supporting each other when our burdens become too heavy to bear on our own”—which I think is really sweet because it carries this idea of quiet, unconditional acceptance; they don’t push each other to share more than they’re comfortable with sharing, but with whatever they ARE comfortable with sharing everyone carries the load and pain because pain is easier to bear when you’re not bearing it alone <3 

A later part of the story focuses on Hisoka, a mysterious amnesiac, being terrified of regaining his memories and facing some “sin�� from his past that has led to another character, Chikage, trying to take revenge on him. When he confesses this to the rest of the Winter troupe, Homare asks, “How heavy is this sin you bear?” and Azuma suggests, “Perhaps it’s just heavy enough for the five of us to carry together.” (at this point Guy hasn’t joined yet). The stage play adapts this scene into a song called Key to Memory. The key (pun unintended) part is 1:27 where there’s a back-and-forth between Hisoka and the other Winter troupe members (sans Tasuku because he wasn’t in that particular play)

Hisoka: “I’m scared…”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “It’s okay.”

Hisoka: “My unforgivable sin…”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “Let’s carry it together.”

Hisoka: “I might not be me anymore.”

Tsumugi, Homare, Azuma: “It’s all right. We understand and we accept you, so let’s go together.”

And it ends with Hisoka singing: “I was afraid to open the door of my locked memories. But if everyone is here, I believe I can do it.”  In both the game and stage play, Hisoka fully regains his memories and reconciles with Chikage (long story). He tells Fuyupoly he can’t go into detail about his past with Chikage because it’s dangerous but he’ll tell them when the time is right, and they accept this saying that no matter what his past is, they know and love him as their Hisoka which obviously is a very sweet thing for friends to say, but it’s also very Marriage-coded to me.

Later, Guy is introduced as an android from Zahra (a fictional South Asian country) and joins the Winter troupe as a temporary member—because he’s stuck in Japan for the foreseeable future—until they find a permanent member to replace him. The other Winter members have a conversation among themselves and agree that regardless of whether he’s really an android or a human they’ll accept Guy for who he is and help him improve his acting, which again harkens back to the idea of ‘unconditional acceptance’. Eventually it’s revealed that Guy is in fact a human who has forgotten his memories of the past and his emotions. He recovers his memories all at once which shocks his system and causes him to pass out. When he wakes up in his room, he finds the rest of the Winter Troupe asleep around the room—which I believe is symbolic of their whole theme of “quiet acceptance”: they don’t want to push Guy to share beyond what he’s comfortable with, but they’re always there to listen to him and share his load if that’s what he wants. He opens up about the memories he recovered, and they don’t treat him with pity like he’s a lost child, but still extend gentle empathy and understanding. They also emphasise that it genuinely doesn’t matter to them whether he’s human or android because he’s Guy first and foremost. It’s at this point that Guy truly lets himself become part of the Winter troupe/Fuyupoly and not just as a temporary stand-in member, because he’s found a place where he’s found himself again and people who will accept who this ��himself” is, whether that be an android devoid of emotions or a human brimming with vivid beautiful emotions.[Mod note: There’s a LOT more but we’re afraid of crashing the post. I (Deli) summarised it the best I can since I’m familiar with A3, but if you want to read the full thing you can check it out on this google doc)

Sourin:

okay so i have a picture to crack explain the sourin supremacy

but i also have legitimate reasons lmao

1. sousuke and rin both GET what it's like to want something so bad but not be able to achieve it. they know each other's pain so well, and they know just how much effort the other person puts into swimming. AND THAT MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING STRENGTHENS THEIR BOND SO MUCH!!! this is also the reason why they are each others' comfort person because the other just GETS it, no need for any explanations

2. they're passionate as fuck about the same thing (swimming) and they help each other train harder and swim better,,, like get you a couple with the same obsessions as you!!!

3. THEY SWAM A RELAY TOGETHER and that means a lot in swimming because IT'S BASICALLY SMTH A TEAM DOES WHEN THEY HAVE ABSOLUTE TRUST IN EACH OTHER AND THEY DEPEND ON EACH OTHER AND THEY LOVE EACH OTHER AND IT'S BASICALLY THE SWIMMING ANIME EQUIVALENT OF I LOVE YOU

4. when sousuke told rin about the shoulder injury he was literally so devastated because his love couldn't follow his passions anymore,, AND WHEN SOUSUKE RECOVERED FROM THE SURGERY RIN LEGIT CRIED HAPPY TEARS!!! and sousuke was always there for rin w/e he had a slump bc he compared himself too much to haru and others,,, like gods they care so much for each other

5. sousuke is the earth and rin is the fire,,, AND RIN LIGHTS A FIRE IN SOUSUKE WHILE SOUSUKE GROUNDS RIN LIKE PLEASE THE MOTIFS ARE LITERALLY RIGHT THERE EVEN IN THEIR COLOUR SCHEMES (teal + maroon) 

in short: sourin supremacy because these two bois are so perfect for each other"

[piratesoftheseaandsky]

just started Slay the Princess last night, I made it through three endings. The Tower, The witch, and The Prisoner. I got them in reverse order to how they were listed. Anyway time for my thoughts. The first thing I wonder about is: what are we? What is the body we inhabit? Birdlike, obviously, the hands make that clear, but if we're the chosen...creature to slay the princess, then why? Are we what's considered normal among our people? I think the more likely option is we are an outcast who was disposable enough to send the Princess's way and not have to worry about tormenting someone worth something with whatever it is that waits in the Long Quiet. If we have no one to go home to, then who would ever notice we disappeared to kill the princess and never came back. Also, the mirror is a wonderful example of forced self-reflection, something I think timeloop games are very well-fitted for, as a mechanic. We have to look into the mirror, and say goodbye to the voices, if we want to enter the Long Quiet. Our appearance is always shrouded, only the eyes and forearms truly visible, but we see them change every time we look. I found myself with my normal reflection, then I bloated, then I decayed. What am I? WHO am I? Does it matter? In the Long Quiet we are simply...us. We change in the same way the whoever it is does. We come out of every ending having met another voice, been another version of ourselves, we aren't all that different from the princess. One and the same, reflections of one another. It makes it ever so hard to not be...devoted to the Thing in the Long Quiet. We are the only two of our kind, the only one the other has ever truly known. How could we not give everything we have to see it happy? I don't find myself afraid, when I play Slay the Princess. Sure, there's gore that can freak me out a little the first time, but repetition loses its effectiveness. Maybe it's supposed to. Maybe we're meant to grow as numb to it as the Princess is. Maybe the horror comes from how willing we have to be, to hurt and be hurt over and over again. Even so, I find myself wondering if this causes more fear for others. It's not just me, I hope, who finds themself growing more loyal and curious, longing to know what's at the end of the tunnel, what we will become at the end of this. But what do other people feel when they play this. Does going down those stairs every time terrify them, fearing what they're going to find? Is cutting off the Princess's arm too horrifying for them to through with? Do they kill her right out the gate, because Blindly trusting the Narrator is easier than trusting her, and it's better to kill the horrors now than later. This game fascinates me, but what other players do does too.

[anachronistic-falsehood]

10 + 23 + 31!!!!!!! :333

HI HI ROS!! oh these r good questioms.....

10. Top three favourite fic tropes

HARD QUESTION. hmmmm. definitely slowburn for sure. i love when shit takes so fucking long to happen. they better not even hold hands until chapter 50!!!!! THE YEARNING!!! next one hmmm probably "and there was only one bed" I LOVE THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED. ESPECIALLY if its used in a slowburn fic. like. they want 2 be close so so bad and yeah maybe they should ask for another room that has two beds but whatever they're already here right???? they can share just for one night it's fineeeee it's fine!!!! they dont need 2 worry about it it's not their fault if they wake up tangled together and if they both pretend to be asleep longer in the morning so they dont have to get up!!!! im also a big fan of timeloop fics. doesnt have 2 be ship related i just want 2 put those fucking guys in a loop!!!!!! make them suffer!!! torment nexus!!!!!

23. Dialogue or description? Why is the other one so hard?

DIALOGUE I LOVE U. im so much better at dialogue than descriptions. especially if it's like. action. im so bad at writing action. but even descriptions in general r so fucking hard sometimes!! thats why all my fics r so dialogue heavy. like writing in the characters voice is so fucking easy u already know what words are in their vocabulary and how they speak!!! but how the fuck do i describe a fucking building without making it sound too specific and overly detailed!!!! how do u do that!!!! agh!!!

31. What was the most difficult fic for you to write (but in the end you made it)?

man. i dont even know!!!! all my first fics for a fandom r usually kind of hard to write but thats just bc my stupid monkey brain is saying "NO IF U FUCK IT UP AND PUBLISH IT IT'LL BE EMBARRASSING FOR U!!!!!" it's always hard 2 get thru them. hmmm i think. probably my old sanders sides human au fic Saint Bernard. that shit was PERSONAL like tbh trying to write it and actually publish it was like pulling teeth but i did it anyway bc doing that made me feel a lot better about. various Things. its a good fic!! but god was it hard 2 write

link 2 the ask game :3

[liquidstar]

what exactly is a3?? like what do you do? i tried googling it but i just can't seem to get a comprehensive answer :[

a bit hard to explain, but basically its a card based gacha game where you use the character cards you got to compete in "plays," the mechanics themselves are actually really simple with cards having different skills in action/comedy/drama, and different character combos giving you boosts. you basically just have to get enough points to pass the play w them

but honestly i dont think ppl really care much abt that part of it. if anything the events are just a means to an end- unlocking more of the story as you level up.

because on the other side of the coin its a VN with an actual plot about a small theater troupe and all the actors it employs. its separated into acts, and they tend to each focus on sub-troupes(separated into spring, summer, autumn, and winter). every event also has its own side story, about 11 chapters, with focus on a specific character (whoever the lead in that play is). and also each card has its own mini story that comes with it. and theres little tiny chats and a lot of other stuff so.. theres like a LOT of story and content. its totally packed which is why its fun.

i really dont care for gacha stuff usually, if anything im pretty cynical with the way they operate. but the actual story of a3 is a very sweet one about found family and a bunch of theater dorks working through their trauma by acting lol. also the story itself is kind of insane because it involves stuff like runaway princes and yakuza and timeloops and a room that disappears sometimes and a magnifying glass that can read peoples minds and a guy who can just straight up talk to cats, and none of this is ever dwelled on because... the show must go on. and taichi is there.

unnnnfortunately the english servers went offline a while ago. you can still easily access the stories online (yaycupcake, an independent fan wiki, has a lot of them), but if you wanna play the game and get the cards you gotta do it on the japanese server

[digitalsatyr23]

Life Update (04/10/2023)

Been a little bit so I felt like sharing. Almost directly after finishing the school term I ended up getting hit hard by a really bad cold. I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t get sick often but when I do, I go down HARD. Once the symptoms set in I was basically non-functioning for a few days and then got worse for a couple more days, and now I’m slooowly recovering and getting better. Considering it is constantly cold and rainy outside and the heating situation at my place is less than reliable, I’d say that’s not too bad. I think the main issue is that the cold has drained so much of my energy so I’ve barely done anything on those days. I’ll usually be up for like a few hours then pass out, wake up, do one or two things, then pass out again. TBH it’s almost felt like being stuck in a weird timeloop where the only way I can tell the days apart by what small activities I did on them. Cartoons I’ve been watching:  - Gargoyles (A classic from my childhood I felt like revisiting)  - The Ghost and Molly McGee (it’s weird hearing Master Shake’s VA but funny)  - The Owl House (dat s3 finale) Anime I’ve been watching:  - Trigun (I had never seen the original but I like it more than Stampede so far)  - Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury (Just got caught up for S2) Recent movies I’ve watched:  - Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (Much better than I anticipated) Games I’ve been playing:  - Death Road to Canada (It’s a great game, especially for its price)  - Resident Evil 4 Remake (I have some complaints but overall it’s a solid game) I’ve also been poking and prodding at my fantasy setting when I have the energy, adding little bits to it here and there, trying to fill in holes and make stats for stuff since I also run ttrpgs in it. These last couple of weeks have been downright miserable, but I’m glad I have lots of online friends I can reach out to. I hope you all have been doing okay. Try and take care of yourselves! When I make something worth sharing, I’ll be sure to post it here. Have you seen/played some of the stuff I mentioned above? What kind of stuff have you been watching/playing/reading? I’d love to know and hear what you think of them!

[shameboree]

Could you tell us more about your bad vives AU? I love your art btw <3

okay id like to preface with a lot of it is VIBES which means if smth doesnt make sense i need everyone to suspend the FUCK out of their disbelief dont question me we are here for a GOOD TIME and a GOOD TIME ONLY. here are some bullet points largely summing up things ive already drawn!!!! pls note my fav kind of Time Stuff is bullshit miserable groundhog day style time loops

-chat blanc gets the bunny miraculous we dont ask questions about this

-he SLINKS ARND IN THE SHADOWS of paris for a while and it builds up marinettes paranoia bc shes TOTALLY 100% SEEN CHAT NOIR and knows that absolutely he isnt akumatized so she gaslights herself into thinking she hasnt caught random glimpses of chat blanc BUT ALSO spirals into a state of FULL BLOWN constant fight or flight response and wont sleep so that shes not vulnerable

-blah blah chat blanc drops in on her while adrien is arnd entirely bc i really wanted to draw that thing of adrien doing the Mom Arm when the car stops too fast bc this whole sitch is just a violent messy WRECK. anyway chat blancs whole attitude is like hewwo my love <:3c im here to give us a super romantic ending <:3c and marinettes response to everything is just like. okay cool, i am going to puke now!! meanwhile adriens just like what the FUCK is happening here

-anyway. more cat n mouse games. ANYWAY. at some point its lb vs cb but chat blanc is just having a great week and WINNING so gets her earrings or smth who cares and successfully romeo and juliets himself n marinette yandere style. a VERY ROMANTIC ENDING bc nothing was ever gonna fix things OBVI so ofc they have to just die in each others arms 💖

-YES adrien experiences massive manpain NO i dont care anyones opinion on it bc i love to see the kids cry. OBVI he is catastropically devastated and NO there is no identity reveal hes just deeply and viciously torn tf UP over marinette getting dead and also feeling completely helpless AND ALSO ALSO like hes the one to blame <:3

-everyone is so catatonic in the wake of No More Marinette that even adrien doesnt notice ladybug hasnt been arnd since

-idk. timeloop shit. adriens stuck in a cycle of the night before (V HARD TO GET A HEAD START IN SUCH A SHORT TIMEFRAME!!) day of, n day after (so no matter what he always has to reexperience the aftermath hehe). i am actually not a huge fan of when longer timespan loops get past mid teens (ESP when it gets to TRIPLE DIGITS???!) bc it feels like it cheapens the experience and also acute stress is sexier than chronic SO ANYWAY. eventually he will obviously succeed in brking the loop and keeping marinette frm dying. good for him.

-every loop is a little different bc every loop marinette CANT PUT HER FINGER ON IT but she knows something is Not Right, which chat blanc is ALSO feelin, so every time they react or do smth diff which means adrien is constantly having to deal w CHANGING VARIABLES !! hes having a bad time. marinette is having a bad time. chat blanc is having a very good time

-final actual confrontation or whatever is pure marichat (DOUBLETEAM. MARI IS AN ACTIVE PARTICIPANT EVEN AS A CIVILIAN. YOU GO BABY!!). ive only drawn adrinette moment but the whole thing is very marichat bc im PREDICTABLE!! anyway no lb bc marinette freaks out cb is gonna take her earrings or cataclysm them so she just straight up swallows em. good job baby.

-THE END BABY!! epilogue reveal EVENTUALLY but for quite some time after they are both quietly carrying the weight of their secret traumas alone w neither of them having a full picture of the situation but not knowing it. what a good time :)

i think this looks v adrien focused but they are all having their separate little stories here and its largely marinette feeling isolated and small for all her mistakes, and chat blanc feels like the worst possible one she has or could ever make so she cant consider asking anyone, let alone CHAT NOIR HIMSELF!! to help her, which just makes everything 100000x harder. by the end of the STORY PROPER she accepts she can trust herself in chat noirs hands but shes still too scared to put her full weight on him bc she doesnt wanna FUCK UP. meanwhile adrien wont say shit to her abt it bc he doesnt wanna burden her w his SECRETS also hes drownin in guilt. also eventual identity reveal changes nothing for him in terms of grief bc he already felt like he died every time marinette did except worse bc he had to just keep living anyway :) but now also hes afraid of an identity reveal for probably obvious reasons. and then beloved CHAT BLANC man of the HOUR switched gears frm wanting to Fix things to wanting to destroy things bc hes a fucking yandere wifeguy OKAY. he knows he is forever RUINED for love of marinette and since he cant have her future is instead entirely focused on making sure he has all of her end <:3c

dw the kids are gonna be OKAY. they are insane and the power of LOVE will help pull them thru, theyre just going to be incredibly clingy for the rest of their LIVES

i love to draw very cutesy w soft and warm palettes and then have the Content be batshit miserable badtimes. i also like to draw a lot of goofy moments btwn and during the Traumas bc i love to be a dumbass

THIS ENDED UP SO LONG SORRY EVERYONE!!! please enjoy my unhinged misery porn 😊💖

[thegeminisage]

WAIT HI I'M BACK BECAUSE I REMEMBERED MY FAVORITE CONTROL QUOTE it's not a spoiler, I promise, its just npc dialogue

so I was in the hub area after I unlocked it, just wandering around and listening to the NPCs and I hear one of them say, with SO much confidence:

"The world's not round or flat, it's clearly a non-euclidean rhombus."

and I'm still losing my shit over this, they said it with SO MUCH confidence and Im just like. WHO SAID THIS. YOU ARE RESEARCHERS. WHO BELIEVES THE WORLD IS A FUCKING RHOMBUS

anyways, whenever you get it, I hope you have fun! Emily Pope is the best, I think you'll like Raya. I had mixed feelings on her but she's cool, she doesn't show up much though.

oh, you can replay specific chapters too! i follow you, so whenever you get it and if you liveblog it, I'm gonna come back when you're near a specific part near the end-ish and tell you to have fun there! not in a "this is a hard part, good luck" way, it's one of my favorite parts and I think I'll go replay it today because it was fun and the music during it is GREAT

ALSO there are 3 outfits that are preorder only (2 of them are ps4 "only") but you can unlock them all on pc anyways with a mod on nexusmods, i did that, I like the Astral Diver one, Jesse's hair looks great. i like the Asynchronous Suit you can unlock after a mission. actually all the outfits are good but DON'T look them up, one is a spoiler!

anyways, I will be buying Deathloop to see if I like it today, probably will.

actually wait, does it have stealth portions? this doesn't change whether I'll buy it (probably) but I'm not very good at them 😖

this got kind of long, my bad. uh have a good day!!!

HIII AGAIN BESTIE sorry i took so long to answer :( i was really busy and then lacked the brain cells to socialize normally for a little while

deathloop DOES have stealth sections but not like. so the way it's designed is kind of sandboxy, there's 1000 ways to do any given task, so if you're bad at stealth you can do a guns-blazing approach. i am also bad at stealth!! so while it wsa pretty forgiving at not seeing me sometimes when i should have been seen (most of the time...more on that in a sec) i also usually didn't HAVE to do stealth if i was getting too frustrated with it. this is all to do with your abilities

so like, you have only a handful of abilities but they're very diverse - one lets you turn completely invisiible temporarily. VERY invaluable on missions where i can't stop getting caught. another boosts both your attack and defense temporarily making you nearly invisible, which is good for situations where you're just like "fuck it" & wanna mow down everyone. you can only equip 2 at once and there's like 5 total i think so you have to pick and choose (and i always kept the one on that's the deathloop version of "blink," the teleportation power from dishonored, so for me i really only picked 1 at a time). but imo that's part of the strategizing fun part! it's a thing where you might die a lot, but as with all timeloops, the more you do it, the more you Learn it, and the further your mastery of it progresses (plus you get to die three times before you get a game over, so to speak, so again, it's pretty forgiving - i think w/ difficulty settings you may even be able to increase that number?!). but yeah it's a lot like undertael boss fights in that way, if you've ever played that - or the way you do levels in celeste if you've ever played THAT. the mastery comes in repetition and when you can FEEL yourself getting better at every attempt it's actually quite addictive and satisfying

there is one mission that requires near-perfect stealth or you essentially die instantly, and the boss at the end of that mission has the invincibility slab so you can't just snipe her, or go in with your own invincibility on to try and take her out before she can instadeath you. you HAVE to stealth it. this one drove me INSANE it took me almost twenty tries (of dying 3x each) to get before i finally went out and got the invisibility thing to get it done, and it's really the only part of the game i truly disliked. once i finally got it i feel like i could do it again if i needed to, so it's not different from the rest of the game in that respect, it just wasn't...fun and i wouldn't WANT to do it again. THAT SAID that mission is really the only time i struggled with my lack of stealth skills, and with ~20 tries under my belt i can and will definitely advise you if you find you get to that mission and it's making you want to throw your controller at the wall. although you SHOULD be fine mostly and wouldn't it be funny if you came back like "hi liz i defeated fia on the first try"

anywa ygod the mods for control sound SO good and this is always my problem like. if i play on console i can take clips but i can't mod. and if i play on pc i can mod but not take clips. i wish there was an automatic clip-taker for pc bc it's one of my favorite parts about gaming!!!!!! geez someone get on that. i would have posted soooo many good deathloop clips for you all

also the thing about the rhombus made me SCREAM girl gn what the hell are you on. a rhombus!! control sounds so fun ik one day when i get around to it ill have a great time ty for telling me about it <3

[that-there-is-a-wierd0]

---oof ctrl enter automatically reblogs. let's try this again Just adding on my thoughts here, no hate intended but i'd like to add on to the reblog because signalis brainrot

I have a hard time comprehending longer texts, please let me know or add on if I get something wrong. This essay...is extremely heavy for a fairly straightforward topic. The first few paragraphs clarify the blunt references both made in Signalis and making up Signalis. Simply put, this game is very obvious with its imagery, warping its story based of its influences. Honestly, as most creative work is derivative, then who is to say that Signalis is any different, if more blunt with its inspiration?

Images have meanings, defined in part by their contexts, and if Signalis wishes to lift imagery from Silent Hill 2 and other works, then it, by necessity, carries the meanings with them, whether it intends to or not.

Here the previous paragraph implied that Signalis mishandles its borrowed imagery by comparing it to the mishandling of Pyramid Head and his meaning in subsequent cameos compared to his original purpose and meaning. However, examples of that imagery are not explicitly given. Therefore there is no frame of reference to what exactly is being mishandled in the first place. The claim is that Signalis is carrying imagery from Silent Hill 2, misusing it, but it's not defined how.

[Signalis] wisely avoids including an overtly masculine sexually threatening figure like the Red Pyramid in its cast but there remain traces of that impulse dancing around the edges in figures like the Storch enemy and Adler, who is both the only male character in the game and also the closest thing it has to a malevolent antagonist. And yet, it's impossible to shake the feeling for me that there does seem something odd about borrowing all this in a game largely uninterested in masculinity, of placing these same rhythms of violence against twisted representations of the female form - some explicitly sexualized - in the hands of someone who does not have the kind of commentary James Sunderland brought to the act.

Again, what explicitly is Signalis borrowing? There can be an argument that the replikas of Signalis are sexualized, in that all of them are pale skinned, skinny, and conventionally pretty. That would be a fair argument, even considering Mynah's body shape and Falke's body and image made explicitly based of the "Great Revolutionary and her daughter".

Also, how do Storches/Adler carry "traces" of overt masculinity or sexual threat? If I can recall, Storches are brutish and Adler is just a man, but neither of those things make them inherently 'masculine' nor does it imply they are a sexual threat to the other units and gestalts. ((i have a bit of a hard time with my own gender presentation, so please correct me if this sounds off)).

With Adler, whom I sympathize with, he is not completely malevolent as he is morally grey. Ariane's timeloops add, changes, and removes things; both Adler and Elster are the only ones aware of this. As stated in his error file about his unit, Adler is attached to Falke to a fault, something hardwired into him. I bring this up because theory suggests he simply does not want Falke to change with the timeloop; he is parallel to Elster in that he "loves" Falke, thereby his motivation is to stop Elster and the timeloop from progressing. Protecting Falke may also be the reason he was hunting down Isa as well. In addition, the corrupted units and Falke serve as much more intimidating antagonists.

There are elements of complexity you can read into their relationship - the argument that Ariane putting the burden of her suicide onto Elster is an extraordinary act of abuse, or the fact that as per the game's world, Elster is not Ariane's equal and is in fact closer to her slave, a piece of property that she owns - but overwhelmingly this is not the reading I have seen made of their relationship. Even the latter is seemingly a major part of the appeal to their relationship to at least one fan I spoke to, a depiction of gentle BDSM or pet-play dynamics that they found affecting. People care about Elster and Ariane in a way they just don't for James and Mary.

This is what got me to writing this dissection out, but I will not ignore your previous point. There is an element of power dynamics involved with Ariane and Elster's relationship. The burden of killing your loved one can be unimaginably horrific, but that's the thing about the promise; most people do not harp on this element of the game too much because it's implied to be mutually consenting. Ariane comes to terms that she will die one way or another (as per the 3000 cycles message from the nation) and she wants to be with Elster as she dies. Elster is at the very least willing to carry Ariane's wishes, going through the whole game and successfully killing Ariane in the promise ending. We can even see in the cut-scene after that Elster is devastated by her loss as she perished next to Ariane in the cyro chamber. Elster does love Ariane, and we do see her struggle in the game as she carries out her promise, and both Ariane and Elster know that Ariane needs to die due to her suffering and (presumably) unchecked bioresonant abilities.

People also love Ariane and Elster for how they treat each other in canon. I will not be going into people's fetishes, good for them, but it is very clear how much Ariane treats Elster as an equal. First, replikas are considered property of the nation, under AEON. It is up to AEON when they are built, what they are built for, and when they are decommissioned. Many replikas only serve a linear purpose. Elster is no different, on the Penrose 512 she is meant as a maintenance unit to help Ariane with her assignment. She does not belong to Ariane. And despite being a replika, Ariane still falls in love with Elster. She hugs Elster, kisses her, dances with her, cuddles with her, doing things that absolutely contribute to Elster's persona degradation later down the line. Ariane genuinely cares for Elster, to the extent of allowing Elster kill her. And Elster reciprocates, not fighting back or retreating in anyway. Arguably, replikas do not argue with gestalts, but they also do not argue with their leaders, Falke/Kholibri or the Nation. Yet Elster defies them, the nation, her assignment because she loves Ariane and will tear S-23 Sierpinski to shreds to fufill her promise. Arguably horrifying, Signalis can be framed as a love story where indeed all parties suffer, not only Ariane.

If the world of the game is the product of the inner world of Ariane, brought to life by her reality-warping powers, and filled with both her memories and the art and music she was obsessed with, would it too not be filled with her influences? Would we be able to escape the symbols that have made us in a world made of ourselves? Or would they haunt us, creep into every thought, tainting every dream, screaming that we are nothing but them?

This is where the full extent of bioresosance becomes vague, in my opinion. By definition it is a matter of manipulating both mind and matter, and to what extent is left mostly undefined besides the Great Revolutionaty, Kholibri, Falke (i think), and Ariane. Point being, what reality is and isn't is very much left to interpretation. The problem is indeed reality is becoming "corrupted", as verbatim from the game according to Adler's notes (i forgot which one, again it has been a while since i played lol). The world is very much being filled with Ariane's influence, but not in a way that is neat or symbolically orderly. Ariane is destroying and corrupting reality in my opnion. Much of the imagery in game can be a way for players to interpret and understand the cosmic mechanisms of Signalis and what it means for the characters. As a result those symbols may not be related to Ariane herself.

Overall I did not see much parallel to Silent Hill 2 nor how its imagery was borrowed and mishandled. Author's interpretation of various elements of the game, such as Ariane's bioresonance existing in an inner world, is very interesting!

Anyways video games are so cool you guys

Signalis is Trapped in a Prison of Itself

"We believe that we invent symbols. The truth is that they invent us; we are their creatures, shaped by their hard, defining edges." - The Book of the New Sun

Full spoilers for Signalis and Silent Hill 2 are as follows. CW: Spousal death, abuse, suicide, self-harm.

Last year's surprise horror darling Signalis is a game that begs to be read through the lens of its influences. It is difficult to find a piece on the game that does not, in some way, position its narrative on the game around the fact that it does not so much wear its influences on its sleeve, so much as its outfit is covered entirely by pins and badges of all things it holds dear.

While other works may invite argument on the degree of a respective influence, Signalis leaves no room for debate. It eases us into it at first, beginning with survival horror key-hunting gameplay that evokes Resident Evil, but these mechanics have become diffused, diluted, and become Norms, where specific evocation becomes difficult to detect. It's only at the end of its tutorial that Signalis makes itself clear: if you know the things it knows, if you love the things it loves, then there will be no escape from them.

You climb through the hole from Silent Hill 4: The Room into a room that evokes Henry Townshend's bedroom from that same game, whereupon the desk awaits Robert W. Chambers' The King in Yellow. Examining the book takes you into a cutscene that distantly evokes the sharp editing of Neon Genesis Evangelion, itself influenced strongly by works such as Gerry Anderson's UFO. And then, when you re-emerge from the cutscene, you find yourself staring at a mirror, unable to escape the weight of Silent Hill 2's opening shot bearing down upon you, as the segment of Chopin's Raindrop - Prelude that played in the memorable Halo 3 "Believe" trailer fades out.

That last one may sound tongue in cheek or a misapprehension, and it very well could be, but the trick Signalis plays by not so much as evoking its influences but replicating them so constantly that barely a minute can pass without a direct reference to another work is that when there's something you can't quite place the direct line to, your mind draws the strings themselves. Signalis is already into so many of the things I am into. We both like Eva and Silent Hill. We both had a Lovecraft phase, evidently. Is it possible that it first heard Raindrop in an advertisement for Halo 3? By this question, all things within Signalis become supplicant to the question of influence, trapped within it. It is perhaps for this reason that so much writing on the game becomes about detangling and identifying these influences.

Even the basic language of interaction is steeped in influence and in one overriding influence in particular. While I referred to Resident Evil above as providing the foundation for the key-lock survival horror gameplay of Signalis, it is truly Silent Hill 2 that provides the framework to build atop that foundation. Like that game, it is broken up into smaller segments rather than the interconnected game-encompassing levels of Resident Evil, filled with doors to nowhere with broken locks that will never open. The combat might best be described as simply being Silent Hill 2, translated into an overhead angle, with near-identical audio design and enemies that very frequently feel like they walked straight over from that mist-covered town, most notably with the Mandarin and Nurse enemies. Despite the sci-fi setting, narratively we're still playing in Silent Hill 2's haunted wheelhouse: a message from a lost love calling to our character, a promise unkept, for now. Like James, Signalis' Elster is always descending through labyrinths both euclidean and otherwise, encountering her own Angela and Maria. This culminates in what might be the strangest decision of the game: to set the majority of its middle third inside a level from the original Silent Hill, namely, Nowhere.

It's here I began to struggle with Signalis. Its eagerness to reference was difficult for me to deal with at the beginning of the game, but only as a kind of annoyance, something that pushed me out of the game's wonderfully crafted atmosphere. I groaned when the first keycode of the game was "0451", I sighed when I saw the carpet from Stanley Kubrick's The Shining appear again and again. It feels frustrating, but ultimately it's something I could live with. The Silent Hill evocation, though? That I found difficult to swallow.

Silent Hill 2 is a special game, a kind of special that often makes it difficult to address or speak to. Its qualities are pored over relentlessly and sung with such enthusiasm as to become grating, and yet the countless eulogies to Silent Hill 2's self-evident beauty rarely reach the truth of it. It is, after all, the clear and direct inspiration for an entire series of unsatisfying horror games, namely the "Silent Hill" games, published by Konami and developed by a cadre of different developers from Europe and America. It's hardly controversial to call those games failures, and like Silent Hill 2, their failures are astonishingly well-documented. Every Silent Hill work after the original - including Cristophe Gans' not-entirely-irredeemable film - chases the shadow of Silent Hill 2 to its detriment, replicating wholesale ideas, images, and beats from that game, stripping them bare and rendering them devoid of meaning.

You've heard it a hundred times before: Pyramid Head is a representation of James Sunderland's thoughts of and capacity for psychosexual violence. And by bringing him back without James, these latter Silent Hill works stripped Pyramid Head of meaning, rendering him an aestheticized object of straightforward fannish devotion, replicated from a place of sincerity but without understanding. From his appearance in Silent Hill: Homecoming to becoming a playable character in Dead By Daylight, Pyramid Head has become an icon of Konami's persistent misunderstanding and mishandling of Silent Hill as a concept.

All of this is to say that much of Signalis feels very much the same.

That's a provocative statement, and I recognize that. To compare Signalis so directly to the western-developed Silent Hill sequels, some of the most popularly loathed horror games of the past two decades, is a move maybe destined to raise eyebrows. To be clear, Signalis is a better, more accomplished work in my estimation than Silent Hill Homecoming. But at the same time, Signalis begs to be read through its influences. If it did not wish this to be so, it would not make these influences so apparent, so impossible to ignore. Signalis is not a game that attempts to mask and blend its influences, it is a game that excoriates them and confronts you with them at every turn. It is a pastiche. To try to look past it would feel to me like an attempt to move past the intentions of the work, rather than fully engage with them. Images have meanings, defined in part by their contexts, and if Signalis wishes to lift imagery from Silent Hill 2 and other works, then it, by necessity, carries the meanings with them, whether it intends to or not.

Hewing so close to the imagery and ideas of a game about the psychosexual violent impulses of a man who killed his wife - however you wish to interpret James' motivations, the fact is that he did kill Mary - produces some odd effects, particularly in a game about lesbian robots. It wisely avoids including an overtly masculine sexually threatening figure like the Red Pyramid in its cast but there remain traces of that impulse dancing around the edges in figures like the Storch enemy and Adler, who is both the only male character in the game and also the closest thing it has to a malevolent antagonist. And yet, it's impossible to shake the feeling for me that there does seem something odd about borrowing all this in a game largely uninterested in masculinity, of placing these same rhythms of violence against twisted representations of the female form - some explicitly sexualized - in the hands of someone who does not have the kind of commentary James Sunderland brought to the act.

Which is not that they're a completely terrible fit in and of themselves. Signalis is, in the end, at least partially, a game about killing your wife.

I say "killing" rather than "murdering", which is how I would describe James Sunderland's act, because crucially, unlike Mary, Ariane (player character Elster's partner) is outright and openly suicidal. Mary's feelings on her illness and her impending death in Silent Hill 2 are complicated, often contradictory, in an intensely human way, but there's never a suggestion that Mary wanted James to kill her, and in one ending, she's actively furious that he did so. In Signalis, this ambiguity is strip-mined out of the act: Ariane wants to die and asks Elster to kill her. In fact, the final act reveals that the entire game is likely an endless loop of Elster making her way through Ariane's nightmares, given flesh and form by reality-bending powers, down to the bottom of the labyrinth to try to kill her, over and over again, sometimes making it, sometimes not. While I'd hardly claim that the suicidal impulse is ever a simple one, and certainly there's a lot to read into the substance of Ariane's nightmares, Elster's goal is not mired in the same ambiguity, the same torrent of mixed emotions, that James' act is. She is motivated single-mindedly by her love for Ariane, and her desire to fulfill the last wish of the woman she loves.

This sits...uncomfortably with the tattered remains of Silent Hill 2's sexual violence that dangle off Signalis' skin grafts. Framing the killing of Ariane in such terms colors the sublimated act of wife-killing you spend the entire game doing, using it to underscore Elster's undying determination and love rather than the difficult and upsetting inner world of James that his monsters demonstrated. There are elements of complexity you can read into their relationship - the argument that Ariane putting the burden of her suicide onto Elster is an extraordinary act of abuse, or the fact that as per the game's world, Elster is not Ariane's equal and is in fact closer to her slave, a piece of property that she owns - but overwhelmingly this is not the reading I have seen made of their relationship. Even the latter is seemingly a major part of the appeal to their relationship to at least one fan I spoke to, a depiction of gentle BDSM or pet-play dynamics that they found affecting. People care about Elster and Ariane in a way they just don't for James and Mary.

This is perhaps best demonstrated in how the game goes about its goal to replicate the multiple endings of Silent Hill 2, but with significantly less impact. The two endings you get based on your performance through the game feel like echoes of the ending you're most likely to get, where Elster gets close to her goal but ultimately either fails or turns away. They are defined, in large part, by the "primary" ending. Again, like Silent Hill 2, there is another secret ending that you can get on New Game+, where you can perform a ritual that evokes the calling of the player character's wife back from death. Neither Silent Hill 2 nor Signalis explicitly depicts this - in Silent Hill 2 it is framed as a doomed, fool's errand, the ultimate failure of James' inability to accept what happened, while Signalis shows the ritual and then a short scene of Elster and Ariane dancing together in the wreckage of the ship that was their home.

When I watched this ending, I read it much the same way that I read the corresponding Rebirth ending in Silent Hill 2: this was a deeply sad, futile attempt by Elster to reclaim something she can never really get back, a deep dive into esoterica out of a futile desperation that feels so concretely hollow. I was surprised, then, to find that so many people online did not feel this way about the scene. In most of what I read about it, I found that people read it as the closest thing to a happy ending the game has to offer, a moment of the two together. Similarly, most fan art of the game that I've seen depicts Elster and Ariane as a happy couple, holding hands, reading together, railing each other...it speaks to the earnestness by which the game depicts Elster's love that people invest in it wholeheartedly, in a way I've never really seen with James and Maria, a relationship too difficult and complicated and fraught to easily romanticize.

I don't know if it's a reading I can easily see for myself. Part of this is personal hangups - I have never sat well with works that romanticize literal owner/property romantic relationships, it's just a personal trigger point - but I can't deny that part of it is that I am also trapped in the same cage of influence that Signalis has entombed itself in. My knowledge of, affection for, and reading of Silent Hill 2 in the context of Signalis' constant evocation of it and other influences is as a fog that comes down around me, that renders me incapable of seeing through these influences. Even my reading of Silent Hill 2 is just that - a reading, one that prevents me from seeing it in terms of one who might disagree strongly with the things I have asserted about it. Can I break free, or will I never be able to hear Chopin's Raindrop without thinking of the Master Chief?

At the bottom of the spiral, this is when the game finally clicked for me. If the world of the game is the product of the inner world of Ariane, brought to life by her reality-warping powers, and filled with both her memories and the art and music she was obsessed with, would it too not be filled with her influences? Would we be able to escape the symbols that have made us in a world made of ourselves? Or would they haunt us, creep into every thought, tainting every dream, screaming that we are nothing but them?

Signalis is a game about its influences, or rather, what it means to be influenced by them. It's about what it means to have an image, a note, a word stuck in your head so deep that you cannot pull it out, a painting that colors everything you see in those same tones, a book that consumes your thoughts entirely and demands you read its words in every book that you see after it, about the limitations and boundaries our influences place upon us. About the prison that we make for ourselves out of them, in our own hearts our own minds, preventing us from seeing anything apart from their terms, doomed to the same looping events, over and over, unable to imagine anything new. The horror of things becoming norms that wrap around us and pull us tight. No moving on, no breaking free. Just this, just us. Forever, and ever, and ever.

I don't love Signalis, and I don't feel able to use this reading to absolve it of its failings. Regardless of how intentional it might be, I still find its eagerness to aestheticize its imagery immature and unsatisfying, creating some moments that I found either embarrassing - the conflation of Russian, East German, and Chinese iconography into a tuneless morass of red scare imagery is more than a little eye-rolling - or outright offensive - the game's shallow use of explicit self-harm imagery. I think the technical competence on display is nothing short of remarkable, and I think this team has a great game in them. I just don't think this is it.

And yet, I can't deny that I find it affecting. I can't deny that it worked on me. I can't deny that I saw myself in it.

Because I too, am trapped in a prison of myself.

Aren't we all?

[bill-beauxquais]

Blogging my Bravely Default II Playthrough - Chapter 2

Here we are for a new chapter!

As usual, spoilers for up to chapter 3′s title card below the cut (so all of chapter 2, none of chapter 3), you have been warned.

Overall opinion: The game is still fun to play and while I sometimes laments being so slow, I like that I can play a lot without feeling like I’m goind too fast. On a story standpoint, I’m a bit bummed that this chapter didn’t really make any real progress in its main thematics, but on a gameplay level, it was fun.

Gameplay: I talked about there being more strategy in battle already, but I realise I didn’t mention why. Compared to previous games, it seems like enemies use brave and default a lot more, and they actually go into negative. It happened in previous game, but if my memory serve, it was only certain enemies who had this quirk baked into them. Also, nearly all of them have counters and immunity, preventing you from just braving 4 times and calling it a day (albeit it still works reasonably often).

However, I did notice a flaw as well in the balancing. Some sidequests (most notably, the mushrooms sidequest) only opened to me after I finished the chapter’s story, but they took place in a dungeon where every enemy was WAY underpowered. I’m still getting underdog bonuses in the story, so I’m not overleveled. I don’t know what exactly unlocked the sidequest, but I checked everytime I set food in Wisward. On the other hand, the sidequest boss actually took me some planning, while I basically Yolo’d all the asterisks of the chapter. Weird. In the end, the whole dungeon was simply a long corridor (every enemy fleeing from me), with one tough boss at the end. Jarring.

Speaking of dungeon, this chapter really made them a lot longer than anything the serie had until now. On one hand, they can get a little boring and frustrating after a while, but on the other, I do like that they allow you to really train your new asterisks by putting more time between each of them, so overall I’d say it’s a positive.

Speaking of which, I finally looked into what you get from the boat, and I need to mention the inclusion of JP orbs, to give you JP experience on the go. It makes it easier to level up jobs without having to grind with ill matched teams, which is a good idea, since ill matched teams are sometimes really unforgiving because of the immunities and counters mentioned earlier. You still end up having to train jobs the old fashioned way, but any shortcut is good.

Speaking of grinding, I was surprised that I didn’t need to grind even once, for now. I wouldn’t qualify the asterisk battles of underwhelming, they took me half an hour on average and demanded strategy and quick thinking or risk taking, but I went into most of them with in-training teams full of ill matched underleveled and redundant jobs and still won. For me, that’s just the right difficulty to be interesting without getting frustrating.

My favorite asterisk of this chapter probably was the Shieldbearer for more Gloria Tankness (I also noticed it pairs well with White mage for a tanky healer)  , but Ranger is good as well (but I’m biaised from the previous games. Always liked hunter). I appreciate that they changed red mage to be less of a watered down mix of Black and White, but I’m not sure I’m using it very efficiently. It just doesn’t seems to deal a lot of damage, and I prefered the old one’s design. This one looks a lot more boring. As for Artist, I’m not really using it very well for now either. I feel like there’s already tons of debuffing skills in other classes.

I didn’t really get the point of Wayward Wood, since you know where the correct exit is, there’s not much point in making a looping/”lost wood” kinda dungeon, because it’s not like you will get lost (unless you’re doing it willingly the first time just to see what happens). Maybe it’ll open other paths later, who knows.

Writing: Still good, albeit I think i prefered Savalon. I suppose I expected to see more of Elvis’s backstory and family, why did he come study magic, how did Lady Emma pass away... But nothing of the sort. I don’t think like it really helped see Elvis any more in depth, sure he is a good friend, but that’s something we already could infer. I would’ve liked to see his character broken down more.

I’m always happy to see dead kids stories (don’t get me wrong, I love kids, but I also roll my eyes quite a lot when writers chicken out on having anything bad happen to a kid in their stories) but I don’t know if this was strong enough to be the focus of the entire chapter. I don’t think it had any connection to Musa’s downfall or the crystals. But I could see Wiswald coming back later in the story to tie back into these themes, and maybe that was just the Wiswald introduction chapter.

With the dead kids, crazy people, greenery, hunter & red mage asterisks, and those darn Mushrooms and flower enemies, it’s also hard to shake the feeling of this being Florem.02, and Florem will always be extra special to me.

Writing - Theories: Definitely called it for Edna’s veiled ass, although introducing that silver haired lady just before almost threw me for a loop. I’m assuming she’s the traveler handing out asterisks like candies, and Adelle probably knows (or at least she knows her sister is related to asterisks in some way)

I don’t know if I mentioned it, but I had a theory back when playing Default for the first time, that asterisk made people crazy or at least, more extreme, and that’s why they all made the perfect little mascot for theirs each time. And also why Ringabel *and* Artemia in the anthology lost their memories when they lost their asterisk: it plays into their brain and personalities. So, nice to see theory confirmed by the sequel.

As expected of its unredeemable bosses, Folie kicked the bucket, which begs the question: I fully expect them to have another gauntlet like the previous games. So is a timeloop/universe hopping all but confirmed at this point, or will this be something else? Will the characters’ deaths be retconed or explained away? I feel like some of these characters could be redeemed in a timeloop, and stopped an saved before they do much damage. The asterisk are pretty much the ones to blame in nearly every case for the sudden change of heart of their holders.

I’ve got that flimsy theory that Shirley is Emma’s kid, based on a similar hairstyle, the fact the gambler asterisk pairs well with black mage, and that Shirley mentioned her mother leaving her father. Who knows. I liked Shirley.

Adelle is definitely crushing hard on Elvis, but I think he’s pretty much ace. Interesting to see how this develops.

Graphics: Gonna hand it to them, i was impressed that they actually made a unique model for Mona, all to use it for one cutscene. Long gone are the days in which they just reused Yew and Magnolia’s models for Altair and Vega, two majors characters. This is the kind of attention to detail we like to see here. No cutting corners. They even made a model for the paintings, too.

The fog effect was pretty rad as well, and definitely got me running a few laps like a giddy kid. You like to see it.

Elvis’ head looked pretty big compared to his friends, noticeably so. But I suppose Bravely Default 1 and second weren’t that much better, and even worse. The main 4 were DEFINITELY chibised compared to other characters (which made Alternis look like a baby in the Eternian team)

Performance: I noticed a bit less lag, but I also made the battle speed slower, this is probably related. Else, it’s the same things.

Music: Elvis’ theme is pretty good. I remember listening to the first drafts that were datamined from the first demo back in the day, and it was already my favorite.

However, I wasn’t a fan of Wiswald’s overworld theme, and the city’s was forgettable.

[aceofwands]

it wants to give us the exciting parts and the emotional pay off without actually doing any of the work, is the best way I can think to explain it Ria hateblogs Discovery: Episode 7 “[Poorly Written Time Travel] Magic to Make[s] the Sanest [Wo]Man Go Mad”

liveblogged to @kendradaynes

we had entirely 'last time on Discovery' before the intro credits, like not even a teaser ...

kendradaynes... That's an unusual choice

aceofwands I thought so too!

it was just Mudd being left behind on the Klingon ship. probs cause Mudd is gonna show up (we saw in the teaser last week). seems an odd choice too, like it was only a couple episodes ago, we haven't forgotten what they did???

close up of Michael's face, giving a personal log

oh lord

already paused it to write an awful line of dialogue down: "despite my fears, I seem to have found my place on this discovery"

discovery of WHAT

the dialogue is so bad Shin, so bad

kendradaynes..... What? That is...That makes angsty teenage fic seem well written

aceofwands: she's talking about the ship's settled into routine ... which ... what? aren't they in the middle of a war?!!!!!!!!

and about how she's made a friend in Tilly, and how she's taken comfort in her work

and how "this ship has become the most important weapon in the Federation's arsenal"

and I can't even

it doesn't even feel like they're at war! the way they go around on this shiny ship and talk about how it's settled into routine?????? 

kendradaynes... I want to send them all of DS9 s7 and Voyager's Year of Hell 2 parter and maybe Enterprise season 3 to show WHY THAT WOULDN'T WORK

aceofwands: Stamet's wacky drive piloting ability has "Given him access not just to unseen parts of space but his personality as well" and like ... that's a worry! WHY IS NO ONE WORRIED ABOUT THIS

kendradaynes THAT IS NOT A GOOD THING GET THAT MAN TO A PSYCHOLOGIST

aceofwands I keep pausing this ONE PERSONAL LOG

she confesses she finds some members of the crew more interesting than others (lol what others, they feel even more like background characters than any of the other shows somehow???) and it's her talking to Voq-Tyler

(people online have been debating how it's too obvious that he's Voq, but I don't have any faith in these writers not doing the really fucking obvious)

"Lt Tyler has suffered so much and still maintains such dignity and kindness" I really really hope he actually is Voq like wow I want them to be this bad at writing (and nothing I've seen so far makes me think they're any good at it)

“I fear my personal history interferes with my ability to forge relationships. I am among the others yet also apart." I can't get over this, it's like bad self-insert fan fic (I'm not even 5 mins in lol, I'd better let her finish her stupid log and stop pausing it lol)

oh lord, she's facing one of her greatest challenges so far ... they're having a party

they're ... playing ... beer ... pong ... on Star Trek

this is like a gross noisy college frat party ... on Star Trek ...

why is Michael not wearing casual clothes ...

kendradaynes... #weneedtheorville

aceofwands Orville's party in Pria had more dignity??? which y'know, the show is full of dick jokes

oh it's okay though, Tyler is giving a speech

wait did he just point to a guy who's "sacrificed for us" who had some sort of disability? I went back - there's a guy sitting on what I think is supposed to be a futuristic wheelchair I guess?

how did we get from It's Only a Paper Moon to this?

kendradaynes There are also... Very few disabling things that can't be at least partially cured by the 23rd century

aceofwands yeeeeah my thoughts exactly. but it was unclear and part of a dramatic speech so

Tilly left Michael and Tyler alone together at the party, but they were asked to report to the bridge

I still don’t know why everyone loves Tilly ... she doesn't seem like a cadet, unless you count the AOS crew as cadets ... again, everyone's too 2017

ummmmmmm. so Michael and Tyler were walking along the corridor. when she bumped into Stamets and knocked a container of whatsits over. and he hugged her and asked why she's apologising for a random moment that makes life so gloriously unpredictable and WHY IS NO ONE CONCERNED FOR HIM

kendradaynes... That makes sense. He sounds high

aceofwands ohthe Doctor has just shown up in this conversation out of nowhere. "I deeply apologise for my partner, lately he's been acting ... different"

WHY ARE YOU HERE IN THIS RANDOM CORRIDOR DOC! YOU WEREN'T WALKING BESIDES STAMETS??? WHY DID YOU TURN UP JUST TO BE PART OF THIS CONVERSATION

(I keep pausing it, I'm only 7 mins in, I might uh ... stop pausing it and try to keep up lol)

kendradaynes There are so many plot holes in this show

aceofwands they made a cybernetic augment for his arm?? 

then they asked what the deal between Michael and Tyler is ... and I just ... why is this show ... so ... clumsy? there is no nuance, no subtlety, it’s like they have to hit us over the head with everything like MICHAEL AND TYLER LIKE EACH OTHER OKAY AUDIENCE, DO YOU GET IT?

kendradaynes Honestly it feels like 18 year old self-insert fanfiction

aceofwands cut to the bridge. Saru and Lorca found an unidentified signal ... its some sort of biological space organism

which Michael knows a lot about

kendradaynes Of course. Because she knows everything

aceofwands protocol requires them to take care of it, because it's endangered, which is nice because actual Star Trek things

and um what

kendradaynes I hate her, jsyk

aceofwands they just beamed it into the cargo bay???????????????????

IT LIVES IN SPACE

IN VACUUM

HOW WOULD IT SURVIVE IN ATMOSPHERE AND GRAVITY???

kendradaynes welp that thing would be dead

aceofwands OMG IT HAS A DEMOGORGON FACE 

 some dude in a helmet hitched a ride inside its mouth and used it to get on board

its killed a bunch of people, but Michael escaped

oh its Mudd, to no one's surprise

kendradaynes Of course. Because self insert

aceofwands "did you really think you could leave me in a Klingon prison and suffer no repercussions?"

what have they done to his character

good fucking grief

kendradaynes*sigh*

aceofwands he's come here to find out why the Discovery is special, and is talking about how he's gonna sell it to the Klingons, but "not this time". so Mudd's causing a time travel loop. exploding their ship. the Discovery is blowing up. but now it's back to the party

this sucks

usually I LOVE time loop episodes

they're usually so fun! but this show is boring and dumb

oh man ... if you're gonna repeat scenes ... THIS IS THE BEST YOU'VE GOT???? them walking along a corridor talking

OH LOL it's Stamets. he's the only one who recognises the time loop. and everyone thinks he's crazy! "I need all of you blasted people to start listening"

why is this episode not about Stamets talking to someone?

why wouldn’t they listen to him???

Michael's all "oooooh how did Stamets know what it was going to be???"

.....had to pause it. Michael requested being in charge of the operation. Lorca: "I don't give a damn, I just want it done". then Tyler requested being in charge for security. and Lorca: "I still don't give a damn"

this. is. not. Star. Trek.

seriously

when there was a time loop on Next Gen and they started realising they HELD A FUCKING STAFF MEETING! and they realised through the poker game, which was clever! and everything about that was more fun and impressive than this shit has been in the first 15 mins!

the spore drive just activated, and they're all like 'why is this happening?". but obvs Mudd's in engineering

Tyler and Michael are threatening him with phasers, but haven't shot him on sight. oh they finally did. but there was a forcefield. Mudd's trying to figure out how the drive works. 

Michael: "You are mad."

Mudd: "No, I'm Mudd."

WHY

I wish the idiots who wrote this garbage would get stuck in a time loop and forced to watch this awful episode over and over until they figured out how to stop it from being so bad

then he yelled at them to tell him how to work it AND STAMETS WAS BEHIND HIM AND SHOT HIM IN THE BACK. and said: "As days go, this was a weird one" which is hilarious

except that I'm not even 20 mins in and somehow bored?

how can they make time loops boring?

they keep saying different things???? in the scenes????

is it a time loop or isn't it?

do they know or don't they?

this doesn't make sense!

kendradaynes That's... not how a timeloop works. It only changes when they realise it

aceofwands yeah it's clearly trying to jump to the parts later on, cause Stamets implies that they've looped many times already. but instead - as usual - it just comes across as .. confused? muddled? like it's not really a time loop because they clearly know it's a loop enough to change what they say, but not enough to realise they're looping???

kendradaynes Yeah that's not how time loops are meant to work and I'm mildly vexed

aceofwands Mudd has got Lorca to come down with him "I really can't take it from the top again Lorca"

ummmm Mudd's talking about how he's explained this to Lorca before, but needs his help to access part of the ship ... if he's aware they're looping then ... why is he so bad at ... I don't even know .... [I stopped being able to explain everything wrong with this episode’s plot around this point]

this episode is a primer in How Not To Write Time Travel

Stamets is explaining how he thinks he's outside of the loop: "it's getting really hard to keep it straight" lol

he needs Michael to talk to Tyler but they're about to loop, and Stamets wants her to tell him something so she'll trust him straight away next loop. and she did??? and he made a sad face and said he was sorry

don't make me have feelings with your decent acting Anthony Rapp

but also do they not have protocols for time travel or like anything else to share???

"now is usually around the time he kills the Captain" - can we stay in that when we fix the loop lol

"you kill a Starfleet captain they lock you up for ever" ummm do they really

LOL WE'RE GETTING ALL THE LOOPS WHERE MUDD KILLS LORCA AND IT'S ACTUALLY REALLY SATISFYING WATCHING HIM DIE

HE'S EATING A SANDWICH AND HAD LORCA BEAMED TO SPACE

53 TIMES LOL

AHAHAHAHAHAHHAA

OKAY

ACTUALLY HILARIOUS PART

loop back to the party: Michael and Tilly talking. Stamets appears, taps Tilly, "I just spotted the hottest guy over there and apparently, he's in a band! Have fun!" (she was explaining earlier how she used to be into soldiers but is lately into musicians, cause that's what passes for character development on this awful show)

genuinely made me laugh

Michael's secret is that she's never been in love ... which we knew from the way she acted earlier in the episode??? not even a secret

HIS DIALOGUE IS DIFFERENT

THIS ISN'T HOW TIME LOOPS WORK

oh that was enough for Stamets to prove he was telling the truth ... and she now has to talk to Tyler about mudd?? idk it's super unclear why this is happening or what they're hoping to achieve ?????

honestly this episode is a terrible muddled mess

...................had to pause it again

to explain this scene

I'm leaving out so much and you're probably confused (I'm watching it and I'm confused)

she blew her chance to talk to Tyler because she likes him, which Stamets points out, and she says she's out of her element, so he says 'dance with me, for science, so I can see what I'm working with ... 'and like .... helping Michael talk to the guy she likes .... .... so they can save the ship from a time loop ... is the worst idea for a Star Trek episode I've ever heard. and I've watched Threshold

stupid space lizards make more sense than this plot

she's wondering how people make connections

and Stamets is explaining how Dr Culber and he got together

because the Doc was humming terrible opera

I ... I ... this

I can't Shin

you'll have to watch this dumb show with me if you want to make sense of it

I have to go back and attempt

no I'll just type out this conversation

see if it makes any sense to you

kendradaynes This sounds like it's impossible to make sense of even while watching

aceofwands 

"Hugh and I fell in love after I told him to get lost." 

"That doesn't make any sense." 

"Love isn't logical." (they're slow dancing while this happens) 

"I was in a wonderful cafe on Alpha Centauri when three seats down comes this hideous humming. Have you ever heard someone try to hum Casselian opera?" 

"I can't say that I have." 

"Well I told him to stifle it or sit somewhere else. Instead, he sat right next to me. And he's been there ever since." [Michael looks as confused as I am] 

"After such a rude exchange. Why would he do that?"  

"I told him how I really felt. And he did the same. And we liked that about each other." 

"I'm good at honesty." 

"Never hide who you really are. That's the way relationships work."

... ............... I have no words for how little this scene makes sense. that is not how relationships work???? that is a terrible way for them to get together???? and most importantly WHY ARE THEY SLOW DANCING (hint because they realised having them stand around the corridors was fucking boring probably)

kendradaynes THAT IS NOT HOW RELATIONSHIPS WORK

aceofwands I KNOW RIGHT

THEY'RE OUT OF TIME ALREADY? NO WAY IT HAS BEEN HALF AN HOUR

lol Michael is pulling Tyler away to dance in this time loop, the lighting is very purple with lots of close ups of their hands on each other

had to pause it again I am dying of bad laughter at the nonsense

they're dancing and it's kinda sweet and they've got an almost hint at a sexy vibe .... and then Burnham goes "So I hear you were locked up in a Klingon prison cell with Harry Mudd"

whyyyy are they not having a staff meeting about this?

I mean I know Lorca is a jerk and all. but this approach makes ZERO SENSE! she's telling him the whole truth, while they dance ... Stamets is watching and looking bemused .... 

Tyler is like "why would he think I'd trust you?"

"Because I like you. And he thinks you like me too."

and he's like 'oh ... tonight's gotten weird but also very interesting'

WHY DO NONE OF THEM ACT LIKE REAL PEOPLE?

like ... how is it that Shakespearean, larger than life characters in previous series somehow feel more real and genuine????? these people just SOUND LIKE THEY'RE IN A TV SHOW????? like it sounds like TV dialogue!

I can't explain it

"if time really is repeating, this won't matter" and he kisses her. of course. 

maybe less dancing more saving the ship?

they're talking while dancing "he used to brag about robbing a Betazoid bank" 

!"a non equilibrial matter state" - a time crystal, which she learned about at the Vulcan science academy. which they haven't been able to perfect, but a 4 dimensional being must have perfected it, according to Burnham

good thing she knew all of this ??????????

IT'S SO BADLY WRITTEN SHIN

WHAT THE FUCK

there's no figuring anything out!

they just already know!!!!!! 

cut back to the bridge, wondering where Michael and Tyler are. Mudd appears, playing music

hahahahaha the computer addressed him as Captain Mudd: "I never thought I'd say this, but I'm actually tired of gloating"

he's found a weaponised dark matter ball in Lorca's stash of dangerous shit. and he's blabbing on about it "and if any of you were planning on being heroes - including you, random communications officer man" LOL (the guy just ran up to try to stop him) "you'll find there's very little I don't know."

Tyler and Michael burst out onto the bridge for some reason ????

tried to shoot Mudd, the forcefield is still there ... he chucked the dark matter at Tyler .... who dissolved .... 

Mudd: "well that was new"

why would they listen to him? Michael you KNOW IT'S A TIME LOOP

STAMETS WHAT ARE YOU DOING

WHAT

THE

FUCK

he told him to stop, because he can't watch Mudd kill any more people

I PAUSED IT UNTIL I STOPPED FEELING CONFUSED BUT I DON'T THINK I WILL EVER STOP BEING CONFUSED

why

would

he

tell

Mudd

what kind of plan .... 

why did ....

why

why

why

kendradaynes Is your brain broken?

aceofwands yes

Stamets gave himself to Mudd????? even though he knew it was a time loop?why would he do that?

Michael has figured out the space whale has a ship in its belly .... with Mudd's crystal energy source in it ..... 

how .... does Michael know about Stella ???? I can't explain this episode to you any more Shin ... you'd have to watch this nonsense for yourself

she has come to sacrifice herself .... because the Klingons want her more than the ship

"you'll get a lot for this ship, but what would I be worth to them?"

"what's in it for you?" "Lt Tyler" "Lt Tyler is dead" "Not for long" ... and then she ATE A DARK MATTER BALL .... to force him to reset the timeline .... 

NO

NO NO NO NO

HOW DOES STAMETS KNOW

WE DIDN'T SEE HIM AGAIN AFTER HE WENT OFF WITH MUDD

SO HOW DID HE KNOW TO TELL MICHAEL HER OWN PLAN

or are we supposed to believe she remembers?

this episode MAKES NO SENSE

has Stamets finally told the Captain? why is he on the bridge

yes ... she did tell them .... everyone there knows and Mudd's confused

Lorca greeted him "Captain Mudd, your chair" - offers his chair

he realised Stamets was "passing on notes"

"don't try to con a con man" "I'm not, I'm negotiating with a business man"

"why would a Federation Captain do that?" "I will not have a repeat of the Boran [sp?] [his past ship]"

this episode is complete rubbish

he's leading Michael and Stamets off to the transporter room to meet the Klingons

lol Stamets has found out about his wife Stella. they found out he's been running from Stella, not to her lol

this episode would have been clever if the time loop wasn't so poorly done!

they rewired the captain's chair to send the message to Stella and her father .... who's come to get him lol

why ... why are they even doing this? they're so obsessed with making a new Star Trek series, why keep bringing in old characters for no reason?

Michael and Tyler waiting for a turbolift, Stamets told them both that in a previous timeline they danced .... they're super awkward

OH LORD

"What I'm feeling is complicated, and strange" "It's okay, I'm not going anywhere”

STOP TELLING US YOUR FEELINGS MICHAEL

I actually think they're really cute? I would usually like so many of these characters! but wow the plots are so. bad.

and it's so clumsy!

holy crap that was bad

oh lord, Saru in the next ep, they're on a planet, there are Klingons and the Admrial being tortured

wow. that's over. and took me ages to watch because I had to stop it so often lol

I have watched a lot of time travel episodes in my decades as a Trekkie (and on other sci fi shows) and that has got to be worst I’ve ever seen! It was SO confusingly done!

they just have no internal consistency!

you have Mudd getting revenge and Stamets working against him ... really really poorly ... 

and all of their solutions to the problems just made no sense???

Stamets giving himself up to Mudd???

and then the final solution of them all working together ... it wasn't like in the Next Gen episode I keep thinking of, where they eventually realise they're looping and find the message in Data and it feels like they worked together to solve it

it feels like this show ... cuts corners

it wants to give us the exciting parts and the emotional pay off without actually doing any of the work, is the best way I can think to explain it

it was ... choppy and confused

that sums the show up to be honest.

they went on and on about how they’re telling a big serialised story, but it isn’t even? we’ve had these weird interlude episodes with Sarek and now Mudd where stuff just happens just because? and they keep TELLING us they’re fighting a war but it doesn’t feel like they’re in one! 

if they’re going to do serialised season long arcs then they need to do way way better, like I just binge watched 9 episodes of Stranger Things yesterday! I know what a good serial narrative looks like and this is not it!

and if they’re going to do episodic then they need to do way way better

the plot of this was just confused nonsense that was weirdly focused around Michael and Tyler’s relationship more than anything else ... it just feels like they’re mashing a bunch of random rubbish together and hoping it works, rather than like a carefully crafted story on either an episodic OR a serial level!

and now I’m just thinking about how much I want to go watch some fun time loop episodes - like man, give me SG1 stuck in a time loop doing stupid shit any day, at least that was fun AND made sense

[botanycameos]

What do you think the differences would be between how Khan and Stephen Strange would handle their PTSD? They would definitely have it after all they've been through. Both have enormous responsibilities on their shoulders and both I would say have trust issues (albeit for different reasons and to differing degrees). Both have been willing to endure hell to protect their charges and have a strict code of honour. But they are very different men. I wonder how they would deal with their torment?

Oh noooo, this question… XD *can’t help writing meta*

Wall of text incoming. lol

They would indeed both have PTSD, but imho, in different ways/for very different reasons. And they are indeed both extremely different people who inevitably wouldn’t handle it the same way.

KHAN

I feel like Khan’s fear of failing his people, and of them all dying because he wasn’t “enough”, would likely be worse for him than the PTSD itself (something we don’t really see in Space Seed --where he’s fresh off the ice and super confident still--, and which is at its most visible in STID, where he’s just gone through a year of being kept away from them, struggling against horrible odds to try and rescue them, and failing), although those two things would go hand in hand together, fueling one another.

Also, Khan likely has gotten PTSD since an early age, due to his life in the labs and so on. But he also would be a lot better prepared to deal with it, and his military mindset as well as life experiences (+ his extremely focused willpower and determination) would make him better able to cope with things that would have crushed a normal man. The fact that he can function at all after everything he’s gone through in his life, is proof enough of that...

He’d likely already have some degree of PTSD  at an early age and while that sucks, it also means he would have learned along the way the best ways for him to cope with it, because as we’ve seen, he’s super effective even now, so whatever methods he’s using, they are working for him, so far at least… (He managed to take over such a large part of the world despite all the past trauma, and that requires a multitude of skills that he couldn’t have been using if PTSD was controlling his daily life then. Although it’s quite possible he might have moments where things aren’t as tightly controlled.)

Khan would also likely react to some things in a significantly more proactive and even aggressive manner – imho he would actively fight his trauma, as if it was a physical enemy. (He’s a great chess-player when it comes to handling enemies, but you can’t really play the same games when the enemy is inside you.)

On one hand, it’s not ideal, because there are moments where he clearly uses wrath as a method of coping (stuff can’t hurt as much if you’re focusing on the anger instead, ergo vengeful thoughts are a way of not thinking of the loss etc. –he’s always moving forward, even when he can’t at all, it’s a form of escapism, an unhealthy coping mechanism in a way. As long as he is prepping plans to attack the conference room to avenge his crew, or trying to crash a ship etc., he isn’t having to face the void without them, or figure out how to live after that –if he was even going to consider the possibility of outliving them much longer, that is. Whatever is the what-to-do-after reasoning in his mind, the momentary violence of vengeance is a thing he chooses over the alternative of giving in to mourning and passivity).

I’m sure it’s also how Khan deals with fear. Nothing can hurt you as badly if you’re putting all of your focus on going forward and on the anger rather than the pain. In many ways, he’s like a volcano, but with extreme composure and self-control, preventing that anger erupting at the wrong time & damaging his prospects. So he only “blows up” when it can be of service to his plans (unleashing extremely effective violence like when they were making their way to the Vengeance bridge), or when he’s so lost that there’s nothing else left (like when he thought his crew was dead.)

He’s been made and brought up in a world where violence is the language spoken, and it’s one he’s mastered well, even if it’s not the one he prefers when he has a chance to chose another path. As we’ve seen clearly mentioned in canon, when he has the chance to chose peace, he does. But if he thinks that’s not an option, then he can speak the other language perfectly...

Imho, Khan bottles his problems up, but uses parts of it to fuel his anger and determination to accomplish what he set out to do (save his people, take them to safety, get them a new world) that keeps him going. Although he’s nowhere as indestructible as he appears/as he tries to make others think he is, far from it.

So in conclusion, Khan’s methods are not the healthiest but they work for him, and he’s able to cope with his pain and traumas in a way that while not ideal, helps him remain stronger and keep going.

(Though if he completely broke, he’s not necessarily the kind who can get back up after. This is what happened in TWOK, he lost it completely because of the death of his wife and so many of his crew, and madness consumed him, poor thing. But that was an event horizon of despair crossed there, like when he thought his people were dead at the end of STID. If they remain living, he likely would manage to heal or at least keep going until they’re safe.

Without his loved ones, he likely would remain lost or not survive. But as long as they are alive, he has a reason to go on, and somehow manages to pull through no matter what. He’s the ultimate survivor.) 

STEPHEN STRANGE

Stephen on the other hand, is in a far more vulnerable situation. He has none of the military training, preparedness or life experience (let alone augmented stuff), and he was a complete civilian until recently.

He too has gone through traumatic experiences over the years (the loss of all his family), but that doesn’t necessarily prepare someone for additional trauma, especially of such a vastly different nature; in fact, if you look at his life you can see that the reason why he became such a materialistic and arrogant doctor was precisely because of all the loss that’s happened in his life. That was his escape, his coping mechanism to close himself away from the pain, and it did not work. It only made things worse.

After Kamar Taj, he’s stripped of that too, as well as of his arrogance and the huge ego.

He’s now selfless and wide open, exposed. And while he certainly has learned a lot about finding peace within himself and through meditation etc., and he’s now far more in control of himself and centered, it doesn’t change the fact that he always had such high fear of failing, and now the fate of the whole world is on his shoulders. (At least Khan only has to protect his people, Stephen has to prevent the entire planet being destroyed).

“It’s not about you”, of course, but he’s still the one who has to do his best to prevent the world ending. Hence his willingness to take upon himself hardships that no one else would even think of facing.

If that wasn’t hard enough in itself, Stephen just received more brutal trauma and on a higher amount than any other hero, going through what must have felt like an eternity of agony and suffering.

That he went through that and didn’t break/didn’t give in and undo the timeloop, is truly amazing and awe-inspiring, but it does not negate the extreme damage it must have left him with.

When he came back to Earth he was so shaken still that he seemed both extremely elated that it was over (inevitable, with the horror he just got out of) and somewhat out of things, even acting weird and cracking a joke about Kaecilius’ death (something he would not normally have done, as we saw from his behavior in the NY Sanctum earlier, about the value of life. The end Kaecilius and the two zealots got was worse than death itself, and if Stephen was not totally out of it then, he would never have joked about it. He likely was later horrified by his joke, if he could remember it when he woke up).

Imho, after Mordo left, Stephen likely didn’t last much longer before collapsing, not only from all the mental trauma but also because he was extremely injured still (the stab wound alone likely required either hospitalization or better yet, whatever medical intervention they have in Kamar Taj for those cases, especially after Kaecilius ripped the stitches by kicking him in the chest during the battle. It’s likely that it was through sheer willpower and determination alone (+ the fact that he was timelooping endlessly while facing Dormammu, rather than having more time elapse) that Stephen lasted this long rather than passing out sooner.)

There’s also the fact that the life Stephen has ahead of him now is going to be extremely hard. This selfless sacrifice he’s made was not a one off. He’s been conditioned to do this (by feeling like he has to, as well as by simple lack of others to take his place – the responsibility is there, and he’s the one with the highest potential of them all, now that TAO is gone –there’s really no one else for the job of Sorcerer Supreme), feels obligated to ensure everyone’s well-being, and will put himself through countless horrors in the future also.

It was always so in the comics. He’s no longer the arrogant surgeon, and Stephen never does anything halfway: The Sorcerer’s code demands that he be always ready to die if needed, the poor thing. And then there’s also the extreme loneliness of the position.

In the comics, fairly often, things would be so bleak that Stephen would have to force himself to act cheerful because, as he said, otherwise magic might fail him, if he allows himself to become too disheartened or depressed.

At times in the comics, he was so broken that he could not even focus enough to use magic. (When his personal life fell apart even more with Clea leaving, he couldn’t even travel between dimensions due to being so depressed that he couldn’t function enough to make the magic work.)

So he has to artificially force himself to go through the motions and act cheerful etc. even when he’s not. (Something we’ve seen he has also used as a coping method for when he’s scared –cracking jokes to defuse situations where he feels uneasy, like when Wong threatened him during their first meeting– so that tendency of his will most likely keep on going).

It’s kind of heartbreaking, to imagine him so torn up inside, but still having to force himself to go on forward, to put on a brave face and force himself to smile and try to focus on not letting the depression etc. swallow him, lest he loses the ability to use the necessary magic when he has to save the day. Poor thing.

Also, the PTSD from Dormammu will likely leave him with so much trouble sleeping and so many moments of panic at random things that reminds him of it. He will likely search for so many ways to cope and try to bottle it up so much, put on a brave face etc., but hopefully Wong might be able to see through it and help him.

I wish there were so many more fics exploring this theme about Stephen. Not only the horrors he goes through as the price of having saved everyone, but also what ways he might find to get better and move forward, and the times when that doesn’t always work.

One thing is certain, this isn’t trauma you can heal from on the short run, and even once he eventually gets better, he will still have some of it with him forever. It could be years later and he will still flinch or jump when hearing something making a noise reminiscent of one of Dormammu’s piercing rocks, or have a panic attack due to something that feels too much like when he was trapped in Dormammu’s tentacles (and Stephen is a character who is constantly getting attacked by tentacles in the comics…), and so on.

It’s the most broken up characters, with jagged edges still cutting them inside, who are the most interesting and the most heroic.Especially in how they manage to still get back up and keep going, to keep helping and so on, despite the terrible damage that’s been done to them. ;-;

[jackkel-dragon]

Blue Reflection “Steam” Review

I wrote up a long review for a game I’ve been playing lately, and was going to post it as a Steam review until I noticed that my review went over the character limit. Since I couldn’t find a way to cut it down that I liked, I decided to post the full version of the review here. Behind a read more for length and spoilers. (Spoilers are also behind a warning to make the main review low-spoiler.)

Blue Reflection is a magical girl JRPG, a type of game I've been hoping to see for a while. It plays similarly to a Persona game, where it is split into daily life segments for getting to know the characters and otherworld segments for exploring and fighting.

The story is very character-focused, which works to its favor. Most of the story involves the main character gaining power through empathizing with others, allowing herself and those she meets to grow. This power is used to fight supernatural monsters from outer space and the negative emotions they impose on an otherworld sustained by humanity's collective unconscious. While there is an overarching plot, it doesn't get much play until near the end of the game. More information than that goes into spoiler territory, so that will be addressed later.

The "daily life" gameplay is very similar to the Persona series, albeit simpler and more streamlined. Outside of story chapters, free time can be spent exploring the school, completing side quests, or spending time with friends. There are several interesting things you can find in the school, particularly an odd collectible-like system where finding glowing spots in the school will open up new topics for the main character's IM app. Side quests involve either jumping into the otherworld to fight monsters/collect items, or simply bringing items to the person in question. While simple in design, each side quest has an interesting hook to give context to the mission, and so it's interesting to see what each student has problems with. Spending time with friends works similarly to Social Links/Confidants in the Persona series, where you get special events at certain levels of affection. During some of these events, the player may get a choice on how to respond, which changes the skill the player earns from completing that event. There is also a system where, at the end of each day, the player can decide what to do at night, which can cause certain events to play the next morning (sometimes giving stat boosts). There's no real time limit to free time, so it's possible to complete everything except for alternate scenes in a single playthrough.

The other gameplay for the game takes place in "The Common", an otherworld that is shaped by the collective unconscious. Because of its nature, it is split into certain "zones" such as Joy and Fear. Here the player fights monsters and prepares to fight the "Sephirot", giant monsters from outer space. The basic exploration will be familiar to those who have played the Atelier games, since it involves the same kind of on-screen monster icons and the ability to find items in certain areas. Battles are turn-based, though there are some interesting systems unlocked later in the game that make the wait time between turns an active part of the battle (such as allowing the use of a special meter to heal or accelerate turns). Instead of having XP, the game uses "growth points" to level up, which are gained exclusively from story progress and spending time with friends in daily life. This reduces some of the grind found in other JRPGs. On the other hand, it's easy enough to grind growth points from spending time with friends that combat will be easy for most of the game, even on the hardest difficulty. Each character also learns far more skills than you will ever need to use, and some skills end up being redundant because of this. While there is a system for learning specific skills in the growth point system, whatever combination of level ups you decide on will end up leaving you more than powerful enough to win. This is made even easier since HP/MP is restored after each fight. Battles can still be fun once you've become overpowered, but don't go into the game expecting something as difficult as a Megami Tensei game.

The last major gameplay element involves fighting the giant bosses. These are 2-3 phase fights that involve a single large enemy with multiple parts. You can finish each phase just by killing the main part, but each sub-part you kill will be inactive for a while and cause a debuff to the main body. These fights also allow the non-magical friends of the main character to support the team, usually with small buffs or attacks that increase the special gauge (which allows for certain abilities between turns later in the game, as mentioned earlier). These fights are usually about as easy as the rest of the game, but may take a bit longer due to high HP and the need for the player to heal.

Overall, it's a fun magical girl RPG, though not something for anyone looking for a challenge. This is very much a game focused on the stories of its major characters, with the main story and battles as part of the experience (but not the focus).

A note on the PC port: The game no longer has a game-breaking crash thanks to a patch, but it still is pretty resource-hungry and can crash under certain conditions. If you don't have a pretty recent computer, it may be better to look into the PS4 version.

Now, onto some spoiler talk... If you want to go in blind, the review essentially ends here.

====SPOILERS====

Note: I'm going to assume some basic knowledge of character names and such, in order to avoid making this part of the review longer than it already is.

To start with, I really like the characters and most of the story of the game. That might come into question with my later ramblings if I don't point it out right away. It's mostly how the main plot was handled near the end that gets to me.

With that said, let's start with some good things about the story. I really like most of the characters, and they all have really nice stories when you complete their friendship events. Even some characters that I wouldn't give a chance in real life ended up growing on me. The daily life main plot regarding the school festival was also a really nice way to explain why Hinako was getting so close to her classmates.

Now, something I have a problem with is the Sephirot. Aside from sounding cool, I have a hard time finding out what connections they have to Kabbalah and its philosophy. Aside from surface connections (Yesod, the foundation, being the first one fought; Da'at/Daath, the place where all Sephirot are one, being the last fought), I can't see a whole lot of how these space monsters are connected to Jewish mysticism. Now, the series everyone thinks inspired the game--the Megami Tensei franchise--also makes heavy use of mythology in every game. But those games also show their work in how everything connects to what they are named after. The tarot arcana in the Persona series are always thematically related to the people they are assigned to. The initial and ultimate personae of the leads are connected to the theme of the game. (For example, Orpheus/Thanatos are connected to Death.) Aside from Daath's sudden idea to combine all of humanity into one being, I don't see much connection between Blue Reflection's Sephirot and the real world's idea of Sephirot. Maybe this is a lack of research on my part, but it still bugs me.

The main plot also contradicts itself and becomes a mess near the end. Yuzu and Lime being ghosts is actually foreshadowed fairly early, but then gets swept under the rug until the reveal. More importantly, Daath directly contradicts things that Yuzu, Lime, and Yuri claim, and no one explains why this thing that shows up in the last twenty minutes of the game is suddenly changing all the information we were told. For instance, Yuzu and Lime claim that there are 22 singularities, each with a Reflector. This is further shown in a scene without Hinako that proves they aren't lying to her about this. But then, after they are outed as ghosts, they say there is only one Reflector at a time. Hinako never addresses this, and Daath later points out that only Hinako is a Reflector. There's a lot more I could complain about Daath, really. Yuzu and Lime also recognize it (him?) when he decides to show up in the final scene, yet never thought to mention him to Hinako before he started killing and absorbing people.

Even worse than Daath is the ending. I was mostly okay with it at first, despite not liking how many Japanese stories seem to end with timeloops or resets. (I have to wonder if Puella Magi Madoka Magica inspired Blue Reflection to use this particular trope, despite this game not needing such a plot point.) But the more I think about it, the suckier it is without making some serious assumptions. Basically, Yuzu and Lime return to being dead. Daath is gone, but apparently might come back later (he's not clear on whether he's dying or not). But everything else in the story snaps back to the opening cutscene, aside from Hinako remembering some of what happened. This memory alone seems to warrant a bittersweet, rather than downer, ending. But keep this in mind: this means that all twelve of Hinako's friends and all of the sidequest characters are back to where they were at the start of the game. Rin is back to being indecisive about her crush. Sarasa is back to being bitter and upset that Hinako stopped ballet. Shihori is back to being hated for something she isn't doing. Mao is back to being a loner jerk that keeps others at arms length. All of those problems that Hinako fixed are now undone, and now she doesn't have magic or Yuzu/Lime to help her re-fix everything. You have to assume that Hinako can befriend everyone again and help them in more mundane ways to solve their problems, otherwise the ending is really depressing. Yet Hinako is just happy that she didn't forget about Yuzu and Lime, and we're supposed to be okay with just that. I thought this game was about empathy and friendship overcoming adversity, not how everything one does in life is ultimately pointless.

There are other things that bother me, but those are the more major ones. Accidentally undercutting the premise of the story in the last half hour of the game is not really a good way to leave a lasting impression. I still like the game, but unless a sequel/spinoff fixes some of the issues, I have to mentally rewrite or re-contextualize the ending in order to be okay with it.

At any rate, I still recommend the game. It's a fun game, and the character-focused parts of the story are really good. As a story of how Hinako comes to terms with not being able to dance again thanks to her new friends, it works well. Just try not to take the self-contradicting myth arc too seriously if you don't want to get annoyed.