#and its really cool turning into a whole different person/creature

[cult-of-the-eye]

Love spending at least an hour every week dissociating in the mirror painting my face with eyeshadow into avant garde makeup looks. It's pretty much free therapy.

[slitherpunk]

games i liked in 2023 (And Other)

I like games ! You know that ?! and I played a lot 2023! and I liked a lot :). They aren't in any specific order, it's just a little highlight of games that stood out to me this year. I've attempted to write a few thoughts on each so I hope take a look. I wrote playtimes for some also but that is very subjective.

-Ones that actually came out 2023-

Lunacid https://store.steampowered.com/app/1745510/Lunacid/ I think I mentioned enjoying this in 2022 but it officially released so I can say it was one of my favorite games in 2023 :3! I like to feel around this game's walls for secrets. I like the npcs that are full of hope and whimsy despite the bleakness of its world. Chill and occasionally spooky first person dungeon crawling around moody caverns and ruins varying from underground forests to vampire castles and blood lake. (Blood lake!!!! Lake of blood!!! Big creature there.) Lots of fun weapons and spells to find, I like the one that lets you turn blood into coffins.

~20 hours

Orbo's Odyssey https://feverdreamjohnny.itch.io/orbos-odyssey If you played the massively popular demo for "Peeb Adventures" by feverdreamjohnny then you know that Johnny makes some fun and funny games and this is certainly one of them. speedy and satisfying platforming! funny dracula moments! short and sweet.

~2 hours

A Walk in the Woods https://mooncaller.itch.io/a-walk-in-the-woods Quaint little GBStudio game :) Made by some friends of mine for a jam :) It's cute I like it. There's minigames where you catch bugs and birdwatch.

~30 minutes long

Undertale Yellow https://gamejolt.com/games/UndertaleYellow/136925 I've only completed the pacifist run and checked out a neutral run so far. as the title somewhat implies, this is a prequel to Undertale where you play as the fallen human who had the yellow colored soul. This Undertale fangame has a lot of charm!!! A lot of battles really feel like they could have been in the original, with quite a bit of extra flair in some circumstances.

~10 hours

vs really cool bird https://bobacupcake.itch.io/vs-really-cool-bird you know that really cool bird that rob bobacupcake made well you can fight it in undertale and it's really fun. yeah two undertale fangames. . . wat of it …

~30 minutes

Misericorde: Volume One https://xeecee.itch.io/misericorde I wont lie the main draw for me into this was cute anime nuns I sure didn't know a whole lot else about it when I dug into it. But it's (the first part of) a VN murder mystery! And I enjoyed it a whole lot. All the characters are memorable and I really enjoy how all of them have differentiating designs. The protagonist is so failgirl. She sucks so much and I love her. I'm very intrigued by the mechanics of the game's world, it clues you in near the beginning to expect something a bit supernatural/fantastical, which gives you (and later the protagonist) a curiosity about what's real and what isn't. The music is all very impressive too, with the ost reaching past 100 tracks varying through post-rock, folk, drum & bass, and others. (Remembering when the track "Scandal" played and my friends and I took a moment to be like- okay hang on this track pwns.) Big fan of its haunting locals and how the aesthetic of the game fits them well. Also the humor is a lot of fun, and I love all the moments getting to know the different characters. Very excited to see the eventual continuation of this.

~12 hours

Absolutely Perfect Specimen https://chambersoft.itch.io/absolutely-perfect-specimen It seems like a lot of people are craving toxic horror yuri lately. Here's a recommendation. It's a VN about the android maid "Pan" and the mad scientist girl who created her. Horrifying & gut wrenching & largely about having other people define you. The art and music is haunting & poignant and matches the ever increasing feeling of dread throughout. It's yuri with the chunks. Peak robotgirl horror for those who can stomach it.

~90 minutes

Wordhopper https://kokoscript.itch.io/wordhopper Very quaint word search type puzzle game for ms dos! I think its style is very slick and that's pretty impressive to see. Chill game with nice vibes and eyecandy visuals. also it was so cool to have played this and then ended up seeing the dev's booth at Vintage Computer Festival Midwest. I was like omg woah I just played this.

~bunny

Bossgame https://lilyv.itch.io/bossgame This game is yuriful as f*ck. Delightful humor and fun character dynamics! A simple-to-understand-difficult-to-master boss rush battle system that makes you satisfied to get it right, and enticing to get just a little farther if you get it wrong. There's a lot of detail and charm to this game's menus and dialogues and win screens, I remember noticing that once you beat a boss there would be some marquee text that would pass by with some prose on it. I love how it balances its silly moments with its heartfelt moments and its high octane moments. I like the character development and revelations had throughout the plot. & I like how good the protagonists are for each other :) It's very sweet. It's hype as hell. if you want some boss rush action paired well with that sweet sweet girl's love, you *will* play this game.

~5 hours

Elly's Adventure https://bikwins.itch.io/ellys-adventure Very cute and witchy!! You are the little witch girl "Elly" on an adventure to get your toys back!! Feels like a pretty authentic gameboy type experience, it takes a lot of design cues from Kirby's adventure and the like. I am a big fan of how playful it feels.

~1 hour

Nour https://store.steampowered.com/app/1141050/Nour_Play_with_Your_Food/ This was a treat for me, but I understand that not everybody is going to get it. It's a game where you play with food(and food accessories). And that's it. It knows what it was going for. I think a lot of people were expecting something else for some reason. It's a cute little toy game and I felt satisfied with my time with it.

~food

Hi-Fi Rush https://store.steampowered.com/app/1817230/HiFi_RUSH/ Do I have to say this game is super fun? It's a big one everybody probably already knows it. This game's dopey humor made me laugh a lot and I'm not afraid to admit it.

~12 hours

WHISKEY.ST2007S https://bonicle.itch.io/whiskey-st2007nes One of the last games I played in the year because it released super last minute. Does anybody else get a rush when running a shopping cart down the parking lot? This emulates that feeling. Short game where you collect whisky stones in the whisky stone dimension because you forgot to go christmas shopping until the very last minute. it rules. It's very short you can go play it right now & get a highscore.

~5 minutes

re:curse https://devpalmer.itch.io/re-curse Discovered this one near the very end of the year also. Fun little rpg maker horror/humor game about a weird scientist lady, her butch, and an evil clown computer virus that figured out how to warp reality. I got a kick out of it. and also enjoyed digging through the game's files, which was actively encouraged by the dev, which I thought was very fun.

~90 minutes

-Didn't technically get to until 2024 but released last year-

SWOLLEN TO BURSTING UNTIL I AM DISAPPEARING ON PURPOSE https://1207.itch.io/swollen-to-bursting-until-i-am-disappearing-on-purpose People love to dunk on a lot of indie rpgs for being "quirky Earthbound inspired and about depression" or whatever. Earthbound's great. If people can nail the kind of humor and absurdity it likes to pull off while also balancing difficult topics I think that deserves a high mark. SWOLLEN TO BURSTING was fun. Bizarre and charming places to explore & distressing secrets to find. I like how it blends meander-around-the-town gameplay with Yume Nikki sort of exploration and effects. Also I'm a big fan of the music. I like how it has the lofi sound which matches the early 3d look of the game.

~6 hours

HalOPE https://starbage.itch.io/halope Another for the fans of sweet little rpg maker games that have a lot of heart. HalOPE is about an incomplete little angel wondering through worlds. Each has a theme, usually to do with an emotion or feeling, and they do well at evoking that feeling as well as its antithesis. a lot of the music is very homey and charming at moments and unnerving at others, sometimes lonely, all doing well in their corresponding chapters to further the feeling of its specified theme. There are so many delightful characters and designs in this & I found myself feeling really attached to their tiny little stories. The narrative at the core of it all hit me. If I may be vulnerable, I cried a whole lot at various moments in this game. It was really cathartic. I feel very excited for people to experience this game.

~5 hours

-Favs I finally got around to that didn't come out 2023-

An Outcry https://quinnk.itch.io/an-outcry Kind of sad it took me so long to get to this one, but glad it meant I got to play the "definitive" updated version of it. Apartment wandering RPG maker horror. Bum smokes from your neighbors and use them to save the game. I wish I could unwrap a lot more of what I like about this game than I can without spoiling too much. But if I could, I'd probably go on for too long. Let me attempt to be succinct & not giving too much away. You can tell pretty early on that An Outcry is about taking action when necessary & not turning a blind eye. What it explores about player vs protagonist agency is very fascinating to me as well, and I enjoyed learning about the inspirations for why the game's narrative works the way it does. The character Anne is such a sweetie and I love her a whole lot. This game has a very tangible feeling, this apartment complex is dirty and crumby, it smells of smoke, and there's a surrounding desperation you can feel.

~5 hours

Pigments https://punkcake.itch.io/pigments Honestly I had gotten this game in a bundle and while I was playing it I hadn't looked at the name and I just kept calling it FRUIT. On call with my friends I'd be like "hey im gonna play more FRUIT". I straight up didn't read the title screen. But it's called Pigments. You play as a fruit and you try to paint the whole floor and not get sliced by buzzsaws. Fun little arcade type game.

~fruit

Bridge, October 3rd https://lowpolis.itch.io/bridge-october-3rd Very short vignette. I like it. It's what it says it is. I'm not going to overexplain.

~like a minute

-Other Games I Want To Mention-

Pseudoregalia https://store.steampowered.com/app/2365810/Pseudoregalia/ I think a lot of people might have already known this one but I felt like it was a pretty fun 3d platformer. There were a few issues I had with it (boss fight at the beginning was frustrating, and I got lost a lot [but it looks like there's been a map patch by now, so, perhaps for some that is a fix]). I enjoyed it but sure felt weird that the only accessibility option was to give the protagonist pants. What kind of joke is that?

~5 hours

Mushroom Musume https://mortallymoonstruckgames.itch.io/mushroom-musume (Disclaimer, this game is still early access, but I saw a lot of people talking about it last year. SO I will mention here?) Haven't played much of this yet, but I have enjoyed what I played so far!! As of writing I've gone through 6 playthroughs, I feel like I've hardly scratched the surface and I've been so impressed by its depth. It's very charming, you never know what sorts of fairytale shenanigans are going to happen, and it's very cool to see how your different stats will affect things. It very much plays out like a roguelike vn. Which is not the sort of thing you may expect to make much sense but it pulls this off well. Also all the mushroom girls are very cute and I love them very much. I hope the sad goopy one who had bugs in her skin rests in peace.

~mushroom

Knuckle Sandwich https://andybrophy.itch.io/knuckle-sandwich -_- Hm. Where do I start with this one. I was pretty excited for this one since the demo and kickstarter in 2018. I felt like the demo was a hell of a hook that got me curious & horrified. As time went on, it seemed to be shaping up into something really cool. turn based combat with action commands and wario-ware-type microgames?? with a banging soundtrack?? like, count me in!! Then it released and well, the gameplay, art, music all delivered. It was very fun and engaging in those aspects. But the story… oh it just devolves into disappointing nonsensical randomness. The whole hook at the beginning seemed to be completely thrown away for the wild goose chase plot that ensues, leaving you to wonder if it was ever going to be relevant again. It felt like it had no idea what it was trying to say or do. It disappointed me that a game that has so much good in so much else about it gets brought down so much for me by this plot.

~12 hours

Rhythm Doctor https://store.steampowered.com/app/774181/Rhythm_Doctor/ (Putting this one in mentions because it is early access.) I really enjoyed the act 5 release. When I first saw this game, I kind of shrugged it off, thinking "that base mechanic doesn't seem like it will last". I thought it was basically just that one ghost shooting game from Rhythm Heaven which I Hate. Well let's just say I am now seeking penitence for my previous transgressions. It's really fun. There's a lot more to it that I didn't know when I first took a look. Also, consistently amazed by people's custom levels, I had no idea that its level editor allows people to do so much in it, I look at some levels and think "This editor seems as complex as an industry standard video editor". I'm looking forward to what they're planning next, very curious how they could possibly one-up the last update.

~rhythm

El Paso Elsewhere https://strangescaffold.itch.io/el-paso-elsewhere This was really fun & funny so far but unfortunately I had been encountering an issue with a certain level where the game would crash. I reported the issue, got a response, and there has been an update since then so I think there's a possibility that it got fixed but I have not tried yet. I would like to return to this sometime but having to relearn controls midway through is always daunting to me.

~?

-Things that looked good but didn't get around to-

Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood https://store.steampowered.com/app/1340480/The_Cosmic_Wheel_Sisterhood/ Still don't know a whole lot about this. But there are witches, and I like witches.

Casette Beasts https://store.steampowered.com/app/1321440/Cassette_Beasts/ I haven't felt thrilled about Pokémon lately. I know a lot of people seemed to really enjoy this little monster-collecting-rpg. The style is appealing to me as a die-hard gen 5 fan. I started playing it but haven't set aside the dedicated time for it yet, but I'm excited to dig in more when I do.

Little Goody Two Shoes https://store.steampowered.com/app/1812370/Little_Goody_Two_Shoes/ Started watching a friend play this, and I'm certainly curious.. Some sort of horror fairytale but also there's yuri? Yum. Enjoyed the style and animation in the nightmare segments that I saw.

Venba https://store.steampowered.com/app/1491670/Venba/ I've picked this up a while ago but still haven't gotten around to it, but I'm eager to, I've heard nothing but good things.

Goodbye Volcano High https://store.steampowered.com/app/1310330/Goodbye_Volcano_High/ I think there are gay dinosaurs in a band and it's going to be the apocalypse? I have also heard nothing but good things about this.

-Things I watched friends play-

Signalis https://store.steampowered.com/app/1262350/SIGNALIS/ This was a pretty big one. You probably already know it, right? Watched a friend play this and I missed various parts but I understood a solid bit of it. hey. robotgirls are always getting put in these fucked up situations. have you noticed this? one time i got really high and cried about it. it isn't fair

Bomb Rush Cyberfunk https://store.steampowered.com/app/1353230/Bomb_Rush_Cyberfunk/ This one was also probably big enough you don't need me to sing its praises. but it looked really neat. swag.

-Various Thoughts-

Lately I've been thinking more about design and narrative. I feel like I haven't been doing as much analysis as I should be when it comes to games. I want to dissect more what games are saying and figure out meaning. Also attempt to see how the mechanics aid in that. I feel like most of my own work is pretty abstract & random. I simply make what I like. While that's fun and all, I still want to improve in a lot of ways, especially in having more of a theme or message. Figuring out how other games accomplish this is obviously a good step toward this.

If you saw games here that interest you I highly urge you to take a look, many are pretty short, and I pretty explicitly wanted to highlight some smaller titles. If you know me you know I like to uplift small games. (Save for the occasional big game, but that's rare these days) I think it's healthy for you to play and support independently developed & published works. I don't want to ramble too much this time about why that's important, but I hope that you might have found something you may enjoy here and if not then I encourage you to find small stuff that you would like. And I would like to encourage everybody to share their findings as well! Little games need our help to be seen and talked about! They don't have the budgets the big ones do for advertising, and advertising on your own is a whole ton of work. If you like something, spread the word! I'm sure the developers would very much appreciate that.

[holmsister]

I think one of the things Dungeon Meshi is definitely about is how different people deal with being an outsider/marginalised/neurodivergent/what have you and basically what im getting at is that Kabru is TEXTBOOK "high functioning [insert diagnosis here]". Its that how they say it still? Don't care.

Basically. This man shows up and you listens to him talk and see how his party treats him and you think. Oh this is a cool guy who has his shit together. And then after like two pages you find out that he has constant flashbacks to Utaya that make him completely freeze, anxiety attacks, thought spirals, is incapable of analyzing his own feelings, is a stuttering mess when the stakes are high, has never done a chore in his life, keeps putting himself in triggering situations and re-traumatising himself, and the icing on the cake is when you read the extra material and it turns out he regularly forgets to eat and lives in a depression nest of dirty clothes and self-medicates insomnia with alcohol and also is 22. Which also kind of puts Misilril not wanting to let him go in another light - yeah for sure she's controlling and infantilising and also its not like she was really helping his issues but also she was not entirely wrong in her judgement. This man does NOT know how to take care of himself. He knows how to do the bare minimum so when he shows up at work the next day he can fool his coworkers into thinking hes got it together enough. For a bit.

He is DEEPLY unwell and he knows it but he is carried by the desperate wish to avoid another catastrophe. If he stops for a moment he KNOWS he'll collapse so he doesn't.

I also think this is why him acting nurse to Mithrun is such an important part of his arc. Its like. This person who has spent all of his adult life focused on a single objective disregarding everything else is faced with what happens when you do that for too long. And the result is a wet tissue of a creature who looks like he doesn't know where he is most of the time.

He is a man on the brink. I have no doubt he felt relieved when he decided he could trust Laios - not even in a Labru way, straight up because he knew he could not keep going like this.

But also like. Of all the characters in the manga, I think Senshi and Kabru are the most lonely ones. Except Senshi seems to be OK with solitude - for sure it's not entirely healthy to be alone for as long as he was but he definitely did well enough. He is very good at taking care of himself. Meanwhile Kabru *knows* a lot of people but can you really say he has friends? Rin, maybe, arguably, but even she does not seem to truly know him, you know? He keeps himself hidden from everyone. I think the only time we see him entirely honest is when he says to Laios that he wanted to be his friend, and hes so shocked when it comes out, you can tell he did not mean to say it. And differently from Senshi, he does NOT fare well alone. He likes people, he needs people. Again compare with Mithrun - he has like a squad of people taking care of him. If Kabru had a breakdown of that size can you say his party would go out of its way to help? Im not sure. Not because they're bad people, but because he's simply not that intimate with any of them.

Idk man it just struck me all of a sudden. Laios is weird and offputting and doesn't care about other humans the way Kabru does and YET he is infinitely more successful at building deep, meaningful relationships and taking care of himself as well. I think this is part of why Kabru is so fascinated with him as well. He can tell Laios has something he doesn't have. Wait this is turning into a whole another post I'll write this next time.

[biomic]

Hi! I see a lot of screenshots and such from your blog for things like (I believe) Kamen Rider(?) I might be wrong please forgive me if so. I have always had a sort of vague interest in sentai media but never knew good hopping on points, do you have any personal recommendations for where an absolute beginner might jump in to watch shows like that?

if you're interested in tokusatsu, you can really start anywhere that looks cool or interesting to you! most seasons, aside from some anniversaries and the very rare sequel show, are pretty self-contained for the most part. diehard fans will make a big deal out of "good and bad starting points" but the truth is every show has been someone's first and hooked them on the genre, even the "bad" seasons (the poor quality of which is often exaggerated by fandom anyway) or the experimental entries not indicative of the wider franchise they're part of

but! if you want some real beginner friendly, you'll-probably-have-fun-with-this toku, my go-to recs for The Big Three™:

if you want to follow a team of heroes grow together as they fight evil in increasingly silly scenarios, super sentai's probably the series for you (and my favorite ^_^)

watch kiramager if you want a straightforward throwback to classic sentai. it's a back-to-basics season that gives you a good baseline of what sentai as a whole can be, while elevated enough by its stellar cast and infectious energy so as to never feel generic

shinkenger takes a more dramatic approach to the usual sentai formula, following a team of samurai recruited to serve under a lord who isn't telling them everything he knows. an incredibly stylish show that's almost sure to leave an impression

kamen rider began as a tragic hero, kidnapped by the villainous organization shocker and turned into a cyborg against his will, ultimately escaping and using his newfound abilities to put an end to their evil. since the original story, kamen rider has gone through a whole host of various different tones and storylines, arguably becoming the most versatile of the big franchises, though certain elements remain consistent like the near ever-present bug motif or our heroes using powers derived from evil for the sake of good

created in the wake of the 2011 tohoku earthquake disaster, kamen rider fourze was made with the goal to make children smile again, and that desire led to something really special. arguably The Power of Friendship™ show to end all others, and while its upbeat tone might not exactly be in line with Classic Kamen Rider™, it stands as a great entry point thanks to the passion behind it and its clear love for the genre

probably best experienced as blind as possible, kamen rider build is a rollercoaster of a series full of high stakes, mystery, intrigue, and Heated Drama Between Men™. if you want something more serialized that'll keep you on the edge of your seat throughout, build's one of the very best

i also wanna mention kamen rider gotchard, the currently airing series! we're only 8 episodes in at the time of this post, so you could catch up quick while still going through the backlog. very much a back-to-basics season, introducing pokemon-style creatures for our protagonists to catch in addition to the usual superheroics. it's been pretty cute so far :)

ultraman is a sci-fi series that typically follows a defense team created to defend the earth from aliens and kaiju, aided by the giant of light, ultraman. as opposed to the other two franchises where there's often a serial plot to follow and a centralized villain faction, ultra typically thrives with telling standalone sci-fi stories, usually aligning with a show's overarching theme and often compared to shows like star trek or the twilight zone, though recent seasons have been more willing to switch up the format

ultraman x is for anyone who's ever asked, "but... what if we could be friends with godzilla?" young XiO scientist daichi becomes bonded with the alien ultraman x and work together to protect the earth and fight for a future where humans, aliens, and kaiju can coexist. to me this is like, the platonic ideal of what ultraman is, and a perfect starting point because of it. also features several crossover episodes with past ultra seasons throughout the show, but it's all still very new-viewer friendly and could even entice you to check out some of those shows yourself!

ultraman orb, the 50th anniversary of the series, changes course by making the defense team a background component in favor of following amateur investigators and the mysterious, lone wanderer who's suddenly entered their lives (hint: he's ultraman). another iconic entry in the Heated Drama Between Men Cinematic Universe and a nice balance between ultra's classic status quo and a more modern ongoing narrative

i'd also be remiss not to mention the currently airing ultraman blazar, which i unfortunately have not been able to keep up with due to outside circumstances but have heard NOTHING but glowing praise for. it's simulcast on youtube every week with english subtitles AND an optional english dub!

pretty much all of these can be snagged over at nyaa(.)si, and x and orb can be watched legally over on tubitv(.)com!

[inventors-fair]

Victorious: One-Word Winners ~

Our winners this week are @curiooftheheart, @horsecrash, and @xenobladexfan!

@curiooftheheart — Maroon

Sometimes you just have to have that sweeping effect, don't you. It's a big uncommon spell that does a lot of work to remove some massive threats and/or save your own permanents, and you can just redraw things if need be. It's a serious thinker of a card that forces choices in a way that I'm thoroughly impressed with. Now, to delve into the flavorful aspect, I feel that there's a sense of abandonment that could be attributed to marooning that could've gone on a bunch of different types of cards. The choice to abandon being left up to the permanents' controller is pretty cool to me, and the drawing feels like a nod of affirmation: if you survive this, I'll match you card for card.

What a limited blowout at parity if this resolves, though. Maybe this card feels at first like a lot of text, but it's strong enough to be grokable and it's grokable enough to be a stellar example for this contest. Sometimes you need all that space to tell what the card needs to do. I still think that a little art direction could've been a personal touch, but that's not really necessary on a card that's explaining exactly what's happening through its rules text. When the rules are the story, and the story's part of a larger trope on an established world (and like, I assume Ixalan, but I'm flexible), then there's power in the card's own overall presentation that's being evoked here. Good job in knowing where to draw that line, and good job playing with big blue space. The octopus is a good touch. Keep that around.

@horsecrash — Scowl

Before I get into the flavorful aspect, I think that the mechanics here are pretty much just what wither wants to do. Wither's return is...lemme check real quick. Wow, a seven on the storm scale? Really? I guess that's fair because of R&D and -1/-1, but whatever. I think the world can make it happen just like how madness happened. A "bite" spell that can sink a creature down permanently is pretty much exactly what an uncommon slot would want, so no complaints there. It's not hard removal, but it's removal to me, as all bite spells want to be. If your opponent isn't attacking into a stalled board, too bad! This card forces your favor and forces interaction, and I love that little precision.

But that flavor text. Gadzooks. It's curt, it's emphatic, and it's final. "I'm going to Scowl" is a hell of a line to drop across the table, and there's that side to Lorwyn elves that really differentiates them from the rest of the elves in the multiverse—that utter disdain, that hierarchical horror. The sense that they can just twitch their brow and have something shrivel from the utter disdain is something I can clearly picture here without a shred of doubt. It's a clear marriage between the effect of the card and the world in which the card is presented, and what could be better than that? There were a few ideas that I thought were neat, but in the inbox, this was one of the first cards where I could clearly distinguish a favorite. Huh. I really hope Diedra appreciates that, because it's a little awkward to gush knowing that the elves would've expected this outcome...

@xenobladexfan — Eternalize

Straight up, we were a little surprised that this specific kind of effect hadn't been done. I guess it makes sense considering that there would've been no room for it in the sets leading up to the whole Eternals thing in Magic. All the same, though, it's all-around sensible, innit? The flavor is something we've sort of seen before, but not in the sense of an overdone trope—more like, we know that it's an event that's happened in the past and it's an expected situation resulting in a cool card. Having the rites of initiates turn into a book of sorts is neat as well, although I'm not sure how well it meshes with lore? Eh, having a book of rites makes sense. It's a fitting end to a scroll, actually, and it's got a good horrific feeling without being over-the-top. This is what it means to be eternalized from the voice of a writer.

And the effect is exactly what we'd expect! Pseudo-cloning your own ETB effects or making an Army even bigger in the long term is fun, but milling an opponent and stealing one of their value creatures is fun too. And getting something big off the board is relevant at five mana. I think in hindsight I was too enamored with this card to note that it should be a rare, because multiple removal-and-present effects at uncommon would be a little warping. I think in the end that would be my only criticism, because I want this effect to happen and I want to play with it. Literally the closest thing I could find from a cursory search is Nemesis Trap or Supplant Form, neither one of which does this exact effect. I could have sworn... But this card knows what it wants to be. It's a moment from the Bolas arc, it's a strong removal spell, and it's a limited-designed hella strong effect. Glory to the god-dude.

And who's right behind them? Let's find out soon. @abelzumi

[dekarios]

so your southern reachposting has piqued my interest. as someone who has seen the annihilation movie but not read the books, and might be interested in reading the books. without major spoilers, what would you say are the main differences or things you like about the books better than the film?

ok. ok. for you my dear anon. i am going to try very hard to destroy my bias and think objectively for you.

i watched the movie first and then the books. i thought the movie was pretty good, mostly ok, but i didn't love it. the books are probably my new favourite thing in the entire world now. to share my sort of feelings on both lol

things i like in the movie that are not in the book:

THE BEAR. the entire bear stuff. it was TERRIFYING. and so cool of a design. the bear fucks hard

i think the plant people were really gorgeous and the whole scene with the plants growing out of the self harm wounds/scars was honestly really touching and how she sort of chose to become a plant to find peace was nice. i did honestly like that. when i watched it first time it touched me

the body merged with the wall was a really cool visual and felt very jeff vandermeer. that was cool as heck

the moving intestines ... REALLY AWESOME

some of my thoughts:

i think they fucking butchered the biologist (named lena in the movie, i think? natalie portmans character). she's part asian in the book, she's built STRONG, shes 6ft, shes MUSCULAR AS ALL HELL, she has a violence to her, she's touch, she's autistic as hell, she's unpleasant, shes rude, shes not a good person, she doesnt like people, she says she hates when you anthropomorphise animals but also as a child gave animals silly names, she wants to live in a swamp or a bog for the rest of her life, SHE WOULD NEVER CHEAT ON HER HUSBAND, she was not a teacher, she wasnt the type of character who would be liked by their boss, she was a brilliant biologist AND A TERRIBLE ONE TOO - because she would be given grants to do studies and not do the studies. she would do whatever the fuck she wanted instead, she gets drunk and yells at a tide pool, she wants to live at that tide pool..... she's just. she's so special. and the movie did not care about what made her special at all

i also think they butchered the psychologist (dr. ventress?) in similar ways. she's my favourite and i don't wanna go into her too heavily for spoiler reasons, but she's half native american, shes also muscular, in fact shes built like a fucking linebacker, SHES HUGE, shes old and husky and greying and SHE'S A HUGE MUSCULAR WOMAN like a brick fucking wall, shes so sexy and hot and the movie also just turned her into a skinny white woman. i'm angry about this

none of the characters have names. this might seem weird, but there is an extremely good reason, a FASCINATING reason, as to why they are unnamed. i won't tell you much, but giving them names ... it feels insulting. they are not people. they are FUNCTIONS.

there ARE animals that are "antagonistic" but there is no, now theres a spooky bear talking to you scene and theres no oh no shes been bitten by a gator scene or whatever. its much more subtle, and i think very well done. while i do like the bear, i prefer how the book handles animals

"the shimmer" is lame as fuck. sorry. it sucks.

the handling of the lighthouse sucks.

the main "creature" isn't in the movie. at all. it's literally everything and it's not in there. along with something else important to this "creature" and the story.

the biologist is an unreliable narrator and this can't translate over properly. this makes the movie feel like it's lost something immediately. i don't think the book translates well to movie in general mostly cuz of this.

i think the biologist and her relationship with her husband in the movie is really bad. i think they butchered her husband. the scenes at the end of the book revolving around her husband had me sobbing like a fucking baby. i did not care for the movie stuff involving their relationship.

i think they fucked up the "husband comes back wrong" stuff. it was haunting and horrifying for me to read in the book. in the movie its like. ehhh... ok ?

i've bitched about this particular thing before but when the psychologist says "annihilation" at the end of her speech in the .. beach cave i suppose i could call it, it makes me so angry. the word annihilation has a VERY SPECIFIC MEANING in the book and its INCREDIBLY POWERFUL and its just used. as a name drop. in the movie. and i'm mad about it

the doppelganger/clone stuff pisses me off so bad especially in the content of authority, the second book. REALLY pisses me off. anyway

i think they fucked up the southern reach too. the fact they were so chill, chatting together and shit at the start of the movie... no... no i don't think so

the sort of "we're suicidal/don't wanna live/have nothing to live for/are terminally ill and thats why we wanna go in there cuz we know people dont come out normally" pissed me off. EDIT: i deleted part of this cuz i was scared it might be a spoiler even if i don't think it is. it could be for u! but this isn't in the books

the movie has no hypnosis despite it being a primary thing in the book. i hate this change too. the hypnosis is so important (it might actually i might just not remember it because it wasn't well told to the viewer?? i really don't remember it though)

ok i think thats enough. i think i can stop here. i do not think i can ever watch the movie again and think of it as anything but insulting.

jeff vandermeer himself has insulted the movie on his social media, and in an interview he said he had no control over the script or casting, and that in future projects he won't let that happen again. he was polite, but it was very clear he was not happy.

i think if the author is shit talking the movie adaption of their work and it made them realise they need to have creative control in any future projects and not having it was a mistake... says so, so much.

[peaterookie]

Had to post this late because below is like a whole indepth analysis of this drawing + Perrin's history

Happy Birthday Perrin!!! It's really been 10 whole years... it's honestly astounding to even say this. Lil bro's so old...

Ok! if you clicked the keep reading button, expect to be here for a while, for i will be walking you through every single design and aus in this drawing and the history behind it!!

Perrin, or his old name, Peater, is a silly, bastardly little boy that has the magical powers to make people's dreams into reality. But that's just his canon lore. He also used to be a winged swordsman, a kirby with a repeater hat, and a little alien that escaped a lab. In different universes, he's a phantom thief, a god, a demon, or just a simple schoolboy!

Essentially, I use him for almost any story ideas that i find cool. He's one of the first ocs that I made and he gets involved in almost anything due to him being the favorite oc. His personality, still, has been very consistent, but you should just read his Toyhouse page if you wanna learn more because I don't want this to get any longer than it already is rn

Ok! Let's get started on the first design!!

~ Kirby Era ~

Before Perrin was a human, he was a puffball!

I used to be a huge PvZ and Kirby fan (still is) and so Perrin was born as a combination of both of those things. The general gist is that its a Kirby with a Peashooter hat. Simple enough.

The left design however, was I think another concept for Perrin that I had earlier or around the same time as Kirbypeater (this is the name for the Kirby version of Perrin) So I also considered that design a Perrin design as well. Also it's just super fucking funny because of how much it stands out. It straight up looks like a Mary Sue.

These two designs have absolutely zero lore, most of their lore will be coming with the next designs!!

2015 was honestly peak Kirbypeater era in terms of development. I drew him a LOT and gave him some personality and powers.

There were also a lot of design variations aside from these four (ignore the human one for now) most of them comes down to his bandanna color, his shoes, and whether he's wearing the repeater hat or not.

I was also a big Strikeforce Squad fan during that time so I reaally reaaally wanted him to be part of the lore and be a member lmao

You can notice that I changed the Peashooter to Repeater, which is my favorite plant in pvz. Around the end I changed it to Primal Peashooter, but that change was something I ended up not approving of in the future.

The katana is inspired by Zoro from One Piece, which is my fav OP character. His swordsman skill came extremely early on. The green hair guy (the one that got hit by the pea) is just mid 2015 Kirbypeater without the hat. Sometimes he has black hair however, which hairstyle was based off of Len Kagamine/Glutamine (the utaite)

~ 2016 - 2017 ~ The Blue Bitch Era

Sadly, the Kirbypeater era has now come to an end, because shortly after 2015, I decided to transition from drawing little funny kirby creatures to little funny boys.

Okay, let's go back to the guy riding the roadroller, because that was Perrin's first human design !!

The roadroller was a reference to this vocaloid song, if you didn't know already.

The first human design takes the black hair design from Kirbypeater, and the sweater was clearly inspired from my Undertale obsession back then 😔 little did he know that sweater was gonna stay for so damn long...

The part that did not stay long however were the green eyes and the black hair, that drawing was mostly a proof of concept only and didn't really reflect on what he'd become later.

ngl, this drawing is pretty damn good for a first time. I think i really didn't want to screw up back then.

THEN OUT OF NOWHERE?? HIS SWEATER THEN TURNED BLUE!!

I call this little era the blue bitch era because the sweater he wore turned blue for no damn reason, like no, you're suppose to be green, not blue... the disappointment i hold is immense right now.

Other than the blue, his iconic green hair first appeared during this time!! I also changed his eyes to brown, maybe as a way to make his design more grounded to real life? at least i think thats what little me was going at.

The second picture is the first AU i made for Perrin, based off of my playthrough of Pokemon Crystal where I named my pokemon after my Sony Sketch friends (hence Pokesketch.) Perrin would be the trainer and yeah.

I have no fucking idea what I was cooking for the third reference sheet, I think i wanted to imitate the ref sheet style a friend had and ended up making something INSANELY cringe. the undertale fan stink radiates off of that drawing and you guys are free to make fun of it as much as you want.

alright!! now its this fucker!!

this design was made as a sort of inside joke between my friends one day, where all of us just decided to have the same profile pic and name as this one other friend. the pfp (center) was of their ink sans oc and it was fucking funny as hell

it lasted like one day but i think that design is too good to not include in the art piece. you can see him fighting the chara perrin guy as a little nod to their similar inspirations #iloveundertale

~ 2018 - 2019 ~ Ninja Perrin makes an appearance ! Also these weird guys are here for some reason.

This era is kinda weird because there's nothing really stands out in terms of changes. But that's ok! Life isn't always just bumps and... idk where i was going with that uh anyways NINJA PERRIN

his swordsman ass is back again and now as a funny ninja guy!! honestly i cant recall lore wise why he was a ninja but i think it mightve been based off of naruto (i dont even watch naruto) also wow look guys his sweater finally stopped being blue! and now he has shorts!!!

also scratch that entire part about me saying there wasnt any significant changes because there was a time where i almost made perrin's hair NOT GREEN. that's right. absolutely BLASPHEMOUS. i shouldve been pelted with rocks for even considering such things.

but being real, i think a part of me back then felt? insecure about the fact that perrin's hair was an unnatural color for a while? green especially was not a common color to use back then so i felt like people didn't like him for that reason so i changed it to brown for a while to see if i liked it. uh spoiler alert i didnt and i changed it a month later i believe.

dude wait until 2019 peater sees gon from hxh

also you might be wondering why i only drew mid 2019 perrin wearing the ninja outfit and not early 2018. that is because that one drawing of ninja perrin from 2019 got meme'd to fucking DEATH by my friend because it had a funny face. i was forever scarred and so i decided to draw it as a funny reminder of that time.

oh yeah christmas tree peater. yeah bro.

moving on, here's the collection of weird perrins from this time.

the first is art i drew for art fight 2019, where I drew perrin with outfit themed with the team i joined which was team dream. i fucking lost horrendously that year. if i had a team i regretted joining it was team dream

next is!!! these four fucks!!!

these little guys are what was supposed to be representing peater's main personality traits, i made designs for them then that was it i did nothing with them. they were kinda dumb anyway

hopefully one of you guys know that thomas sander series with the four personality traits because that was what inspired these :smill:

and yknow what? I should probably cover all of the christmas perrins all in a row because getting rid of all of them rn would better fit the writing flow better-

oh. there's a picture limit. god fucking damn!!! see you later then!!!

Second Part

[wonderlandleighleigh]

So its early but I'm on Tumblr, and like.

You know. Saw a post. Like you do.

And it's about appropriating Jewish mythology and symbols and terms. And there is so much "DON'T DO THAT" in the post.

But I think the post gets it a lil wrong. What we're really looking for is respect. Respect our things. Our culture. Or symbols. They're not Happy Meal toys. Make some effort.

I saw a lot of comments on the post saying that people had never met a Jewish person, and that we are "professional victims."

Well hello. I'm a Jewish person, and we've been run out of more countries than you've had hot dinners, so we're more like professionals at getting the fuck out of places where people want us dead.

Let's do an edit!

Golems: if you're going to use them in your fantasy, please treat them with respect. They're a mythological creature borne out of the desperation of a people constantly on the run from assholes trying to burn down their lives, and thought of as protective. Don't use them as a weird monster. It's easy to find the lore. Read up.

Kabbalah: is so much stranger than you know, and worth doing research on. Please be respectful if you intend to use it in a story, or even try to practice it.

If it's Hebrew and it doesn't have anything to do with Judaism...man that is a weird one. Cuz it's our religious language but also people who aren't Jewish live in Israel and speak Hebrew but this one feels funny.

The Star of David: it's not a pentagram. It's not a generic symbol. It's pretty specifically Jewish. Sometimes it gets worn by people who want us dead? Uncomfortable.

Goy: isn't considered polite but is more polite than "fuckin goy" which I sometimes use when some goy is being a terrible asshole.

Lenny Bruce had a whole bit on this one:

Gentile: less rude. You non jews are just gentiles.

Antisemitism: that funny feeling in your bones when you know someone either doesn't like you because you are Jewish (those fuckers who wear the "6 million was not enough" shirts. IE; Hitler shoulda kilt more Jews), or when someone says shit like "you guys control the banks so I bet you'll get all 7 days of Passover off soon enough." We don't control the banks. I fucking promise. We don't control shit. Whatever power white Jewish people might have is allowed by the white gentile power structure and can be easily taken away.

When the big orange goy was president, and employed Steven Miller (Jewish. A piece of shit) I used to tell people that "we'll all wind up in the same train car anyway. He's no safer from the hate than the rest of us." I'm still right.

The word Jew: context matters. "The Jews" is an easy shorthand. The Jewish People takes longer to say. One time in a bar, in Mississippi, the director of another department from work pointed at me and yelled "JEW!!!" and that felt.

Bad.

It felt bad you guys.

1. Being singled out for what you are feels bad.

2. Mississippi feels like a place you don't want to be singled out for being Jewish.

3. "Jew" often gets bent into "jewy" which is derogatory. Women were sometimes called "jewesses" which was a little like being called a witch they wanted to burn at the stake.

Probably safe bet to just say Jewish People.

We've been around a long time, but there aren't a whole of us left. But we also come in all different types. A bunch of us are white, but some of us are Black or Latinx or Asian or Middle Eastern. We don't agree on any one way of doing things and we have a lot of opinions and sometimes some dude wanders around The Rockaways in New York with a machete looking for the closest synagogue because Kanye told him we're all evil.

We are constantly on the lookout for people who don't like us because WE KEEP FINDING THEM. Like sometimes you think somebody's cool, but it turns out they think we have horns and eat white Christian baby blood.

For the record, white Christians don't season their food, so that shit is too bland. Not enough dill. We'll pass.

But yeah. Just some thoughts on my culture. Thanks for reading.

[palepinkgoat]

(warning, kind of gross and about mental health. Such is my life.)

I've had intrusive thoughts my whole life. Like, for as long as I can remember. A young child. Not just random thoughts that pop into my head, or even ones that are negative self-talk for example.

No, I'm talking about the ones where I can't stop thinking about seeing my fingers broken, or seeing them with the tendons hanging out or skin stripped off, or just anything gross you can think of, really. I'll be lying in bed and the thoughts will come, and I'll squeeze my eyes shut tight, trying to will the images away. But they persist. I imagine the worst things, the worst damage. I pull my hands out from under the blanket and stare at them. They're safe. I'm safe.

But then there it is again, not even a half hour later. And that's when I crawl out of bed and take an Ativan, and try to relax. But it's all so exhausting to think about. It runs me ragged. The worst times are when it seems just normal. I'll be doing something and an image will pop into my head, and I shake my head and keep doing the dishes.

Hey look, your skin is falling off.

No its not.

What if it DID though? What if it breaks and bones stick out? Like tiny little bones that -

Stop it. Leave me alone.

These are different than hallucinations. I have had those too. This is about my thoughts. I don't SEE my hands like this. I see them as normal fingers. But the THOUGHT of them being injured is so real. So real I can ALMOST see it.

This is about persistent wild jabs into the soft creature of my brain. One day the thoughts will leave me, and won't come back in this form probably. It will choose something else. So I just get to wait and see, I guess.

Being a mentally ill person is hard. Sometimes it's so boring, and sometimes when I feel things in episodes it's just so normal to me that it's hard to imagine other people don't live like this. Then sometimes it's me trying to heal myself from the inside out, staring at my hands, chanting "you're safe, you're safe, you're safe."

I told my doctor about them. Pychiatrists are cool because when you say something that other people would be like "Gross, that's crazy" they are just kind of like "oh, okay." At least that's how mine is. To be understood that way is deeply comforting.

I think this whole thing was triggered by a relative's upcoming hand surgery. It's like my brain heard that, woke up and pounced on it, a bright shiny thing it turned over and over, fascinated, unable to look away. Take that and run it through the wires and this all comes out instead. Lost in translation.

This won't last. I know that. My brain will set the shiny thing down and walk away toward the next shiny thing. But being mentally ill? The bipolar? That's forever. There is no cure. Meds aren't a cure, they are a tool. Underneath all of it is my sick and vulnerable and brilliant brain, looking for something to destroy for a little while. It never gets tired of that mission.

But I'm tired.

[serenanymph]

wip intro - beast, witch's book

Five long, excruciating seconds pass. Bit by bit, Icarus pulls Crys up, till they’re both collapsed and wheezing in the snow, safe on the clifftop, the Witchrisen far below them. “Well,” Icarus says, still out of breath, and he eyes the last of the rope as it goes over the side, eliciting an angry shriek a moment later when the Witchrisen finds no prey on the other end. “That was not fun. Thanks for the save, though, uh…” He turns towards the hooded figure, packing away the short length of rope they’d manage to hack off and salvage into a small satchel sitting in the snow. “Oh, don’t thank me,” they grouse, “ruined my day and my rope. What I want to know” – they whirl, finally tugging down their hood to reveal the freckled, scowling face of a young girl – “is just what the fuck did you do to piss of a Witchrisen that size?”

GENRE: YA high fantasy

POV: third person, multiple, present tense

STATUS: ongoing (first draft)

FEATURES:

flashbacks. tragedy. tragedy flashbacks

we got snow. we got mountains. we got more snow

secrets!!!

more magic, shapeshifting, undead creatures

the Journey continues

mine tunnels, mysterious underground labs, auctions

basically ten thousand different things because I'm overambitious but it's going to look cool. promise

(synopsis, characters and other stuff under cut. it's a lil long)

SYNOPSIS:

The Khujsa Mountains. Cold, unforgiving, and housing one of the Anti-Magic Army's biggest strongholds, it might also just be the most dangerous place anywhere in the country, especially for Beasts.

After a week of travelling, Crys and Icarus have finally reached the Elai Pass. From there, they're supposed to pass through to Riel, and then it's (mostly) smooth sailing all the way to Tel, where Icarus's contact resides.

But upon arrival, they find that things may not be as easy as they seem.

A Beast rebellion group. A Halfling in the AMA. And a young, brash girl who seems to hate the AMA just as much as she hates Beasts, and who certainly has something of her own to hide. Throw that onto the fact that Elai is an AMA stronghold, add in a Knight Captain from the Order of Klysmos, plus sprinkle in the hint of a conspiracy…well, they've certainly got their work cut out for them.

On the other end, after an equally stressful two weeks, Beatriz Das-Reille has finally reached Crys's village… just to find out Icarus is already long gone. However, she soon gets her own set of problems to worry about - joining up with Dahlia Reistveil brings to light that a certain poacher group has come back to town, and that this entire operation may run deeper than she's ever imagined. Does she go after Ink, now that she knows where he is? Or does she pursue this deeper and unearth what's going on, despite the risk it brings and the fact that she'll have to abandon her original goal?

Crys had picked to save someone in the face of an impossible choice. Icarus just wants to get home. Beatriz had never asked for any of this, and Dahlia only wants to do the right thing, but  one thing is true for all of them.

No matter their intentions at first, they've just been pulled into something that might be far bigger than them - and if they aren't careful, that something will swallow them whole. No country is without its secrets, after all, and Kosei has quite the number of skeletons in her closet…

POV CHARACTERS

Crys Averwell - 16, human, archer. sharp tongue and even sharper wit. walking personification of "I'm fine", needs sleep and therapy but is getting neither because I keep putting him in Situations

Icarus "Ink" Kal-Nira - 17, Beast (Crow), dual-wielder. ray of sunshine and genuinely the nicest person to ever exist. giant golden retriever energy. Trying His Best

Dahlia Reistveil - 17, human, daughter of a tavern-owner. Crys's childhood friend. often seen as the Mature One, but underneath all that she has a boatload of her own Issues

Beatriz Das-Reille - 16, Beast (Crow), Icarus's sort-of-but-not-really-little-sister. fast flier, wields a rapier, and is made up of only anxiety and more anxiety.

+

Rhyme - 14, human (???), apothecary from the mountains with a lot to hide. picks all her herbs and medicines directly from the wild so she knows her way around. extremely angry. will make your ears bleed

Carrick "Sol" Solder - 15, Halfling (Wolf), soldier in the AMA. commonly known as the Witchhunter's Mutt. often addressed as either "Sol" or "soldier". anger issues 2.0, never stops arguing with Rhyme the instant he meets her

taglist: @sapphos-scientist, @allianaavelinjackson

gen tag, wip tag

okay so my wip intros are kind of a mess right now, and I still haven't made a page for beast, but since I'm working on book 2 right now and there are a lot more new characters, I figured I should at least attempt to clear up some of the future confusion.

anyway, this is the wip intro for book 2, and there's another one here that's more a mashup intro between the overall series and book 1...? yeah I'm gonna remake that. just bear with me here I don't really know what I'm doing. also!!! there is a taglist now!!! let me know if you want to be added, not like I'm really sure how it should work.

[eyes-that-decieve]

Tal and Dreaming, one of the guys who was in the corridors with you came in for a statement. Just thought I'd let you know.

Recorded it, I got permission to send the transcript (the actual file corrupted and broke after playing it back once, I didn't mean to record it on my phone), so if anyone wants to read it!

[Recording begins. The device seems to be in a pocket, the view is tilted and obstructed about halfway down by a table. A visibly shaken boy, maybe 17, sits on the other side of the table. His skin is pale and has an almost gray look, possibly the lighting. His brown eyes dart around nervously as he fidgets, occasionally using one hand to fix short black hair, three pronounced white streaks near his temple that appear to be natural.]

Styx: Why here, and not the institute?

Penn: I got pulled in through a door over there, you have to know if that happens in your place, right?

Styx: Right. Want to tell me about it?¿

Penn: Yea- Yes.

[Sound of a quiet breath, a few muttered words from Styx]

Penn: I was in here for a coffee before catching the bus home- [Speaking very quickly, cutting himself off before speaking much more normally.] Long day and all. There was a really brightly painted door over there. Black background, neon I believe?

[Penn gestures to one wall, his hand going out of frame]

Penn: I hadn't been in here before, so I didn't think it was out of place. It just felt a little off. It opened from the other side, someone beckoning me, claiming something about free food. When I come to think of it, I can't remember what they looked like. The second I stepped over the threshold, the door snapped shut and was gone.

The person who led me in was gone too. I turned around again and a flippin' dragon was right in front of me! Thought it was kinda cool for a second, all shiny black scales and purple and yellow eyes. It laughed for a second, in two different voices? This sounds ridiculous.

[Penn pinches the bridge of his nose with two fingers, but keeps talking.]

Penn: They jumped at me and I started running. They didn't chase me. The whole place must have been too confusing, even for a dragon. It was like the door, everything was dark and neon at the same time, edged in bright colors. It all hurt my eyes, I ran straight into a lamppost right in the middle of the path after a few minutes. I kept walking, but my head still hurts from it. That must have messed up my eyes worse, because everything got more confusing. Branching paths, curving back on each other. I swear I ran into that same lamppost three times. I was going in circles.

At some point it hit me. And by 'it' I mean a person. The whole place had been shaking for a few minutes, then someone comes hurtling down from the ceiling and knocks me to the ground. They had. . . Wings? Feathered ones, I remember the sound. Other than that, I don't remember what they looked like. 'If nothing was a person' comes to mind, but I don't remember why. They immediately ran over to a tree while I was still reeling, and straight up punched the thing. The whole place shifted, from dark and neon to colorless. The floor was gone, the trees were gone, the little buildings were gone.

I don't know how long I wandered that emptiness. I thought I was going to die there. Or at least almost die, again. At some point I saw a door open in the distance, and the same dragon walk in. It was talking to someone else, still outside the door. It started painting on the void with its tail. I headed over there, because of course, it's something different from the void I'm stuck in.

Another creature came through the door. It looked kinda like a little kid? Green dress, big smile, curly red hair. It was talking with the dragon, then seemed to notice me.

Asked if I knew who it they were, and where I was. It shoved me back towards the dragon. I looked up at it, and it had too many teeth. Far too many. The dragon pushed me back towards the kid, and I ran. I heard the child say something about no way out and no one coming for me. The dragon followed after that, though I could just see its eyes, two one one side, purple and yellow, and blue on the other. Those and it's smile. Like a Cheshire cat? I turned a different way from it, I thought it was going to bite me.

The child cornered me. It said I wasn't myself, I was gone. It shoved me towards the dragon, who I didn't even realize was behind me. It's wings closed around me. No way out. No escape. I thought it was going to kill me.

[Penn laughs quietly, almost hysterically]

Penn: Next thing I know, I'm waking up on the sidewalk.

[Pause]

Styx: That it-? [Penn cuts them off]

Penn: That makes three, you know.

[Slight fabric sounds, camera is shifted slightly as if Styx is leaning forward a little.]

Penn: Three times I've nearly died in the past week. Almost hit by a car, almost fell off a balcony, ALMOST got killed by a dragon. Each time, all that's running through my head is 'is this when my luck is going to run out?' I'm not a cat, I don't have nine lives!

[Styx makes a quiet 'hm' noise.]

Penn: I don't.

[Long pause]

Styx: Statement ends.

[They clap their hands, standing up. Camera view is shifted up, no longer obscured by the table.]

Styx: Alright, thank you! [Sarcastic] I will keep dragons out of my cafe in the future.

Penn: That's it? That's all you're going to say?

Styx: Yeah, that's about it. If you have any more near death experiences like that, feel free to let me know!

Penn: Oh. Okay.

[Penn stands up, video cuts]

[myreia]

Top 10 Video Games

Thank you for the tag, @thevikingwoman! 💗

I've been thinking about this for a few days. My top 5 has been in place for a few years now, but my top 10 tends to change from year to year depending on new things I've played and how much of an impact they made or games I've revisited and rekindled a love for.

Criteria is pretty personal: games I enjoy because I find their gameplay supports their story and vice versa; games I like because it's doing something cool with the roleplay aspect; games I like purely for the gameplay; games for nostalgia or personal importance; games I think did something interesting with an interactive format to tell a story.

I'm going to exclude interactive fiction or visual novels here for a few personal reasons.

tagging @lilas @greyyourwarden @coldshrugs @galadae @a-shakespearean-in-paris @hylfystt @allaganexarch @sunshinemage @impossible-rat-babies @roguelioness if you want!

10. Heroes of Might and Magic III

I grew up with the HoMM series. It was the first computer game I was old enough to understand; I spent hours exploring maps, building up my towns, getting freaked out when the enemy AI surprised me. Hours in the custom map maker and campaign maker trying to create playable stories. The third installment in the series has so much going for it--colourful world, really beautiful creature design, interesting and challenging campaigns that really made you think about the systems and utilize them in different ways. It's light on story, but the story that is there is interesting if you spend a couple minutes thinking about it.

This series is probably the basis of turn-based combat being my favourite type of gameplay.

The music is also really nice!

09. Persona 3

I feel like a Persona game needs to be on this list, but I wasn't sure which one. My introduction to the series was backwards: I played Persona 5 first, then P4, then P3. I think the thing that always stands out to me about Persona is how much fun the turn-based combat, combined with its sometimes bonkers monster design, the dynamics between the core cast, its in-depth storytelling, and, of course, the music.

There's something about 3's characters and story that always comes back to me. The conversation it opens about death, grief and loss is very raw but also very compassionate. I think it has one of the most thoughtful handling of existentialist and nihilistic viewpoints in gaming. It has the kind of ending that will haunt you after you witness it. You might not think about the game for years but you'll have a day where you remember Persona 3's ending and get pulled right back into thinking on it.

And Mass Destruction is here.

08. Dragon Age (Series)

I can't choose one! I can't!

Dragon Age: Origins was the game that got me into gaming. I hadn't really played anything since HoMM as a kid. The flexibility of its UI and systems to be a kind of cross between an action RPG-style and a CRPG style made it really friendly for getting used to gameplay mechanics I was not used to. The storytelling and characters pulled me right in, and I think DA:O still is one of the best examples of interactive storytelling where the player actually has an impact on the unfolding narrative to date.

Dragon Age 2 continues to fascinate me. There are obvious issues with the gameplay, design, and overall storytelling, but the foundation of what they were trying to execute is really unique. The three-act structure is very theatrical and almost Shakespearean, using Varric as a bookend to narrate the whole experience adds another layer (what is the truth? what is fabricated for entertainment?). Act 2 has some of DA's strongest storytelling and really digs into its dark fantasy roots even as it rushes towards a conclusion that is unavoidable, grotesque, and bitterly unfair. I played this one last so I knew what I was getting into when I played it, so I was able to temper my expectations a fair amount and enjoy it for what it is, rather than what it could have been.

Dragon Age: Inquisition was the second DA game I played and it's the one I have the most hours in. The combat is a lot of fun, it has one of the most versatile CC's to date. The landscapes are beautiful and were a lot of fun to explore on the first few playthroughs. I'm still very fond of the story and the characters.

DA's transition from a more CRPG style and dark fantasy genre to an action RPG style and high fantasy genre is a shift that will probably always fascinate me and I love to talk about it.

If I had to narrow it down: it's DA:O for the overall story, DA2 for the characters, DA:I for the combat and gameplay.

I don't have much to say about the music other than Trevor Morris went off for Trespasser's Lost Elf theme.

07. Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning

I'll be honest, I almost put Jedi: Fallen Order here because I wanted to talk about my favourite Star Wars game but it's been a hot minute since I last played it and I think Amalur has been on my favourites list for too long to kick it off.

Kingdoms of Amalur is really good and really bad and it is trashy and I love it.

If you go digging you can find its whole sordid history, but the reasons I'm very fond of it:

whacky, campy art style

colourful worlds

THE COMBAT

The combat in this game is excellent. It is freeform. You can respec at any time. There are three main classes (warrior, rogue, mage) and you can multiclass them whichever way you want. Warrior/Rogue, Mage/Rogue, Warrior/Mage, Warrior/Mage/Rogue... It's so much fun to change it up on the fly. Combat feels smooth, and once it clicks it's really easy to feel like a badass.

This game FINALLY gives mages a cool weapon. No more scepters or staffs, we're going for magic chakrams and I love it. Best weapon in the game, hands-down. Every fantasy game that has come out after 2012 that hasn't given their mage classes chakrams is missing out.

Amalur's a campy power-trip. The worldbuilding is really interesting if you want to take the time to dig into it, but you don't have to. Its MMO roots are there in much of its quest design, which is sometimes a good thing and sometimes a bad thing. YMMV with the main characters (there aren't any companions here, there are a couple of people who regularly pass in and out of your PC's life), but in general everything is just big goofy fun that shouldn't be taken too seriously.

Again, don't have much to say about the music other than Grant Kirkhope did Grant Kirkhope things. The Dalentarth theme has some nice atmospheric stuff happening.

06. Final Fantasy XV

I love Final Fantasy, it's one of my favourite game series/franchises, but I'm only allowing myself one FF game to be on this list and it has to be this one.

FFXV is a weird game. Troubled development history, troubled story, troubled execution. It has a lot of good ideas packed into it that may or may not be done well, kind of confusing worldbuilding, and a kind of confusing story that asks you to do homework in advance (you can watch Kingsglaive and Brotherhood if you want to; I didn't, but I did end up having to read a few wiki articles to make sense of things). However, the final version of the game (Royal/Windows edition) has so much heart and soul and love in it. This is my comfort game, and I find myself returning to its world a lot just to drive around.

I think it helps to reconfigure FFXV from a grand sweeping epic adventure fantasy to a character study. The four boys and the bonds of their very deep friendship are at the heart of everything in this game. And if it does one thing really well, it's that it makes you feel for them and everything they go through and you're going to be a sobbing little puddle on the floor by the end of it.

The ending is sad. I love it, but it makes me cry. About halfway through you get an idea of where this is going and I'm so glad they commit to it because Noctis' story hinges on it.

The world is a lot of fun to drive or ride (chocobos chocobos chocobos) around in. You can fly, but you may get the boys killed because crashlanding it very easy to do. Pitioss Ruins is a thing that exists and it breaks my brain. The combat is a lot of fun once you get used to it (the secret is to press and hold the buttons, button mashing doesn't get you very far).

It also has one of my favourite FF villains. Ardyn is delightful. The level of spite emanating off this man is just a wonder to behold.

Oh, and the music is really, really good. This is probably my favourite FF soundtrack.

05. Nier: Automata

Um. Hm.

I don't know how to explain this game.

It's uh...

I don't know how to put it other than the utilization of game mechanics and UI within its story structure blew my mind. This game has an ending I still think about because I can't untangle it. Your first 15 hours is going to feel like a pretty standard scif/fantasy JRPG. Then you're going to hit what feels like the end of the story, except it's not, be asked to do something and then you're going to make faces and throw your hands in the air and ask WHY is the game asking me to do this again.

You're going to get through that next 15 hours, hit another point that feels like it should be the end of the story--

And then.

And then.

I don't know how to say that the silly android vs robots game where you can blow 2B up to see her butt (yes that's a thing, ignore it) is one of the weirdest but most compelling gameplay experiences I have ever had. It's weird. But it works. But it's weird. But it works.

Also the gameplay is really fun but it's sheer chaos because it changes what it wants to do every 5 minutes because it gets bored. You go from bullet hell shooter to hack-n-slash action with combos, to hacking into a robot and running around in a pixel world dodging balls.

The balls are endless.

The balls are everywhere.

We become as gods balls.

Have I mentioned that the music is really good.

04. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

This is another comfort game. There's something about BOTW's world that is just so relaxing. I love exploring every nook and cranny, cresting the hill to see what's on the other side. I am content to ignore the main quest just to see if I can scale a mountain in the rain (no) or terrorizing an enemy camp by launching a burning tree trunk into the middle of their campfire.

I feel like all the systems work together cohesively, building off each other in a way that lets the player flex their imagination, test things, and see what happens.

I remember the score getting some flak because it didn't have the bombastic and catchy themes that previous Zelda games have, but the scaled back and atmospheric tone really works for the game. BOTW is a gently horrifying post-apocalyptic world. The moments when you do need strong themes, the score delivers in spades.

03. Horizon: Zero Dawn

I love this game so much.

Aloy is such a joy to play as. Her characterization is set in stone, but when you do have diverging dialogue options, everything feels like something she would say so it's really easy to roleplay her. She does talk a fair amount as she roams around the world, but Ashly Burch's voice acting is really lovely to listen to.

HZD has one of my favourite post-apocalyptic worlds. The worldbuilding is in-depth, the developers have thought everything through in how these societies came to be and now function. The combat system is so much fun; early techniques provide a foundation for later ones, and you have options in how you want to tackle various enemies or problems. There's a lot of flexibility in how to go about things, so one person's playstyle may be completely different for someone else.

The animations and sound designs for Aloy's assorted bows are so satisfying.

This is another game where I love wandering around the world so much I usually forgo fast travel because I love the journey, even if it takes me longer.

Not much to say about the music other than the themes for Meridian are very nice.

02. Hades

Hades is probably the most polished game I have ever played. It is virtually bug-free. The gameplay compliments the story and the story compliments the gameplay in such a way that you cannot separate them. It feels like every choice behind this game's design was done with purpose and precision.

The art style is gorgeous. The music is off the charts - sometimes you can't tell what came first, the level design or the music, they're so in-sync with each other.

The characters are delightful. Everyone has understandable motivations and desires; everyone is ridiculously likeable, particularly Zagreus himself.

It's so easy to fall into the pattern of "just one more run" because you want to stay in this world a little longer, you want to push yourself further, you want to challenge yourself again. And even when you don't complete a run, losing or messing up doesn't feel like a punishment because you have all your favourite characters waiting for you back at home with another opportunity to talk to them.

01. Fire Emblem: Three Houses

I don't know where to start because I love this game so much. Turn-based combat with an in-depth levelling system and a diverging storyline so there are actually FOUR separate stories in one? Catnip to me.

The combat system is exactly the kind of turn-based combat that I can get addicted to; I love the risk/reward, the chance of failure, yelling at the AI for getting the better of me because I put a unit in a risky spot and now they're permanently dead and I can't rewind time.

Each of the stories can stand on their own and give really different perspectives on unfolding events. How you view one character on one route will be completely different when you see them on their own and get a chance to get to know them.

The cast of characters is very large, but everyone has their place and everyone has their own journey and arc to go on. The character interactions are delightful. Because of the house and recruitment system, it is really interesting to see characters you recruited out of their houses and into yours and how they change when the story diverges and puts them down a different path--especially if that path puts them in direct conflict with a former friend.

The English dub for this game is out of this world, it is one of the best ENG dubs I've heard in years. The music has some absolute bangers for combat music, especially in the endgame. Shout out to my favourite, Chasing Daybreak and also Funeral of Flowers because it's underrated.

[wifelinkmtg]

Cruel Angel’s Thesis intensifies

Technically, it’s “Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty” and not “Neon Dynasty Kamigawa” but only the latter facilitates “get in the robot, Shinji” jokes when you tap your pilot token to crew your Thundersteel Colossus, so. Anyway, none of the mecha cards are relevant to this project - it would have been too much to hope for a POWER DoLLS situation - so really, the moral of the story is that I should have saved the Samurai Jack title joke for this edition.

TODAY ON WIFELINK: GUSHING ABOUT CYBERPUNK FANTASY JAPAN

NDK was a great set, you have to understand. Do you remember how one of the few unequivocally good things about Legend of Korra was this project of imagining a 1920s industrial setting derived from (mostly) East Asian art and architecture? Yeah, similar story here. Just one example: the Imperial mecha look like someone did origami to sheet metal, which is super cool and lends their faction a distinct visual identity. The art in this set is gorgeous - soaring architecture, grungy neon alleyways, sick cyborgs, spirits (in the original Kamigawa block, spirits had some of the weirdest creature designs Magic had ever had, and this continues that legacy) - sagas! saga art is in-universe visual representation of a story that’s important to the people of the world, and NDK sagas are told on ornamental fans, wall scrolls, porcelain jugs, the carved hilt of a katana, a silk dress, in a leaf carving and vector graphics AND, the best saga art ever, on the back of a biker rat’s leather jacket. (I would be remiss at this point not to recommend Rhystic Studies’ extremely good video on sagas.)

And the mechanics! Sagas turn into creatures when the story is over, sort of living memories. Ninjutsu made a triumphant return, the channel mechanic multiplied interesting choices, and so did the reconfigure mechanic, which let you either use a mechanical centipede as a whip attached to one of your creatures, or let it operate autonomously as a creature in its own right (which led to one of the best type lines in MtG: “Legendary Artifact Creature - Equipment Jellyfish.”)

The draft environment - and I know I’m way off-topic here, but I’m about to say some mildly unkind things about this set and I need to preface it - the draft environment was the best I’ve ever encountered. There were so many different viable archetypes, so many different cool choices you could make during drafts and gameplay. The blue-black ninjas deck, fast red-black artifact sacrifice, recursive green-white enchantments - all felt powerful and fun. The whole set was flavorful and compelling, and there are not that many good wifelink hits, I’m sorry to say.

THE QUALITY OF A MAGIC THE GATHERING SET IN TERMS OF THIS PROJECT IS NOT AN IMPORTANT INDICATOR OF OVERALL SET QUALITY

Heiko Yamazaki, the General (art by Magali Villeneuve)

Heiko makes it where her cousin Norika (also by Villeneuve) doesn’t for two reasons: one is that I find Heiko’s broody expression indicative of a rich and stormy internal life, which always hits me like the smoky scent of a fine scotch or a cup of lapsang souchong. A woman with inner turmoil draws me like a moth to a bug-zapper, which I suppose is why I keep getting into trouble with older women in troubled relationships. “If I simply provide enough unpaid therapy, she’ll leave her abusive husband back in [REDACTED FORMER SOVIET REPUBLIC] & also the closet she’s been in for forty-five years & stay in the United States with me!” Yeah, that’ll happen, idiot.

The other reason is that Norika is a cop.

Tamiyo, Compleated Sage (art by Chris Rahn)

There are a lot of planeswalkers I don’t care about, personally, and I’m not only talking about the male ones. If I’m being honest, my engagement with Magic story has always been kind of shallow on account of Magic story is frequently (but not always!) bad. Like, pursuant to the previous entry, I did enjoy the apparently-uncredited story about the Yamazakis Wizards published back in February. It’s compelling! There’s juice to that relationship. We will never get anything else about these characters.

See, it turns out that the incentives of creating a collectible card game are not terribly aligned with those of creating rich long-form fantasy stories. Novelty sells cards. We hop around. Those few characters who do enjoy a prolonged spotlight often wilt under the attention as we all collectively get sick to death of the fucking Gatewatch or whoever else. Magic the Gathering is still compelling media, or else why would I be doing this, but to me it’s a kaleidoscopic whirl of mostly detached ideas, characters, settings, and vibes.

ALL OF WHICH IS TO SAY that I never knew much or cared to about Tamiyo. She was some nerd from Kamigawa who didn’t save Avacyn, whatever. Then the Phyrexians got her and turned her into an ichor-weeping cyborg brainwashed into working toward the universal expansion of New Phyrexia, a biomechanical plane of horror, corruption, and ego death, so now she’s hot!

Go-Shintai of Hidden Cruelty (art by Johannes Voss)

I don’t think I can explain this one, to be honest. Sometimes you just wanna get fucked up by a magical bone machine.

I KNOW THIS ONE HAS BEEN REALLY TALKY ALREADY BUT I GOT SOME BEHIND-THE-SCENES STUFF TO SAY AND A SET WITH ONLY THREE HITS SEEMS AS GOOD A PLACE AS ANY

Well, only three hits that I can find high-quality images of for. I suppose I could be using card rips of Tia Masic’s Moon-Circuit Hacker (reminiscent of my introduction to cyberpunk via Shadowrun, a bad setting paired with a bad system which nevertheless compelled me to consume more cyberpunk, most of it also bad) or Wisnu Tan’s Spring-Leaf Avenger (a delightful vaguely-orchid-mantis bug ninja) but that would look like

and

...oh wait that actually looks fine, at least to me on desktop. Okay, then, I’ll incorporate those into my strategy as an acceptable last resort going forward. Actually, while I’m at it:

Junji, the Midnight Sky (art by Chase Stone)

The dragon’s hot, man, I don’t know what to tell you.

THE OTHER THING IS ABOUT WHAT WE WILL GENEROUSLY CALL AN “UPDATE SCHEDULE”

Phyrexia: All Will Be One releases the second week in February and I am goddamn well going to review that as soon as it’s out, because I played Cyberqueen at the young and impressionable age of twenty-two and now “quasi-omnipotent dominatrix corrupts you into a biomechanical horror ecstatically enslaved to her will” is the hottest thing I will ever get out of Magic: the Gathering unless Ashiok decides to start force-femming planeswalkers, so I am going to be tearing through one set a week for the next three weeks.

Next time is New Capenna, the Art Deco Metropolis of organized crime, bad draft experiences, and well-muscled arms, followed by a return to Dominaria where my excitement for more Phyrexians will be tempered by the fact that my favorite characters from the last Dominaria set are not quite so hot this time round.

[bcneheaded]

So!! bathing/hygiene headcanons!! 🚿 this is a "me rambling endlessly" post, just as a warning !

I was in the shower earlier yes? as one does. and I was just thinking.... about like.... Artemis, yeah. But I was thinking about how, he probably doesn't have to shower or anything necessarily? Because he's not a living creature, and so, doesn't have to worry about like... everyday buildup of human-y dirtiness (idk how to phrase that but u kno).

But at the same time, especially if he's been really busy with shop cleaning/work, has had to fight/kill something/someone, or has been out and about on his 'business trips' or something etcetcetc-- like... he's gotta get dirty sometimes.. right? even with how careful he is not to, I dont think it would matter. He'd have to clean up sometime, somehow. And I suppose... like.... if he did, it would be infrequently, "bathing", whatever that entails for him (he again like... its just another one of those things he doesn't have to worry about doing often, as its not as if ?? he's gonna get stinky like a human would).

But anyway I was just thinking about bathing / cleaning headcanon for him ?? and I came up with like... two alternatives. 1... was that he could just sponge down, genuinely just take a bathtub full of water, remove necessary clothes, clean dirty area(s) and be done with it, never needing to fully submerge unless absolutely necessary or if its just easier, depending on the level of filth he somehow found himself in for some reason. 2... second one was a little different? but involves his tar and personal abilities directly! He has the ability to manipulate his tar, yes? as well as the ability to heat it up to incredible temperatures (demonic skills yea?). So if he really wanted, he could just.... burn it.. all off ?? if thats any easier. Though, because he's more inclined to be careful not to damage his bones (and although he can remove them, he would never remove the skull. so fact remains, he'd risk fracturing the bone with the heat I suppose, unless magically protected somehow ...Which is.... possible. and likely, for everyday reasons).

But say he did that for the bones, yes? Say maybe, he goes to the basement(dungeon.... its a dungeon) and goes into one of those sealed rooms no one is allowed access to-- he could have this charm that protects the bones from the heat, and because he's somewhere that yknow.... wont burn down (stone and all yeah?) he can just let er rip ?? remove clothes to be cleaned and incinerate any trace of dirt via molten tar >:] ! which is cooler an idea than the sponging off one and also entirely plausible (given it.... would potentially be more thorough and faster).

The sponge bath could have scents added to it just as an additional nice little thing... which is likely. I feel like he'd get badru or the whispers' opinion on scent choice fjdjffgdf if any fragrance at all, it'd be very.... very faint. maybe a little dab of cologne?? but unlikely.

As for turning his tar completely molten in the safety of the dungeon-- jfdjjds i can't imagine he'd smell... particularly good after that.. (but also maybe not too BAD once he cools down?), but he probably would smell some kinda way, even if just very faintly. he'd also?? probably be just a little warmer than he usually is, potentially noticeably so, for just a little while after. and the floor?? surrounding areas of where he did it would probably be nice and toasty

gjfgjfd catch someone asking Artemis if he has heated flooring tho after he does and he just ''.....no.''

+ also ?? a thought but like..... man could walk around without clothes and would not be embarrassed about it bc of ''nakedness'' necessarily. he'd be a little embarrassed to have been seen without clothes I think, if only because its like.... "indecent". yknow. his whole Old Victorian Gentleman vibe just OUT the WINDOW... he /has/ nothing to hide so it wouldn't MATTER if anyone saw him mid-change or post bath or something but he'd be BIG :(( about it LOL

[inventors-fair]

Valiant Efforts: Battle Runners-Up ~

Our runners-up this week are @grornt, @hypexion, and @real-aspen-hours!

@grornt — Tovolar's Moonlight Assault / Harvesttide Exultation

I think this card is balanced, well-designed, flavorful, resonant, and pretty...normal! That's a good thing when you're designing cards that are supposed to be good. I did want to swing for the fences with the winners this week—as much as I could without destroying the stadium. This really is a well-designed removal suite for green and feels like it's doing everything that you can do right in the color, though, so what's to complain about?

Maybe the fact that is DOES do so much stuff is reason for concern, but green has had its heyday of advantages, and this card probably isn't going to break any formats like its pre/mid-2020s ilk. Creatures, life, card draw, and buffs isn't too bad...is it? I'm kidding, this all fits in for both how much a battle can matter when you need it to be a bit of everything, AND how easily a battle can be flavored on a world we already know with a story we're familiar with. Tovolar makes the Harvesttide a little crazy, and what more can we ask for than a witchy, wolfy get-together. Personally, I'd ask for Tovolar's digits. His wolfy, wolfy digits.

@hypexion — Attack on Eiganjo

Once more, everything about this battle makes sense. You want to find the best ways to deal damage to get the advantages that you need. The more that you penetrate the defenses, the stronger you can get. You picked a line, and stuck with it, and I'm right there with you. Did multiple people come up with the concept for the assault supertype? I missed conversations in the workshop if so. Regardless, that name makes sense and I'm glad that folks went with it. The different directions are quite interesting as well!

I wish there was an easier way for this particular scenario to be made manifest. Can you ping the battle over and over until you have eight power on board? Perhaps! Is getting two 2/2 creatures worth it, too? If they have first strike, I'd say so. The rewards for battling could perhaps be more fleshed out, and/or there could be a reward for winning the battle, if such a thing is feasible, but that hardly matters. I get what this card does and what it wants the game state to look like. It's complicated once we get there and I'd love to see the decision-making process of someone having to deal with/against this in combat.

@real-aspen-hours — Loot the Storehouses!

Another assault! Gotta love it, don't you. This is actually quite similar to the Granary card, or at least it would seem so at first glance. And then the actual ability and implied flavor happens, and we're in a different world. Probably literally! The card advantage is different, which is fine, and it's more focused on that than it is a more general reward feeling. I think what I really like here is the utilization of the second main phase, or at least how this card wants you to think about it. The benefits of battle, if you will.

I think "You may play those cards this turn" would be better than the whole "until your next end step" clause, just because of clarity, but that doesn't matter too much. Ooh, or what if you could only play them on a turn that Loot the Storehouses was attacked? There are plenty of options and there's not one right answer. Considering that card advantage is pretty easy to understand, my curiosity wants me to ask where you imagined this card taking place, y'know? What world, which storehouses, etc. It could be anywhere and that's all fine, but as it stands, I do want to thank everyone who submitted a single-faced battle this contest for all the cool things that one can do with them. Super proud.

So, I'll post about this in the Discord, but I'm going to be away from my computer most of the day. Again. Life is a long series of doing thangs. Commentary will either be up late tonight, or sometime during the day tomorrow. I'll be working as hard as I can, though!

@abelzumi

[bichitosdecolores]

i just finished totk and a link between wolds and i have thougths.

under the cut. (ill put a little spoiler warning when nessesary)

this ran out of my control so beware a really long post down there

a link between wolds first

ok okokokok. so. this is the greatest game of all time. the concept of link turning unidimensional its the most unique and cool ive seen in a zelda game. the puzzles are so cool and exploring the world(s) its so much fun.

also skyward swords its usually said to be the one that broke the zelda formula but albw also did. you can solve the dungeons in any order you want and get the items for a weird little creature (aka my new favorite character) with rupees at any time in the game.

i also loved the story. spoilers start here

This was my seventh zelda game and its definitely not my favorite story wise. BUT. the concept of it its so interesting. the twisted hyrule aka lourde its great and also hilda aka evil zelda its so interesting as well as ravio aka the weird link its the greatest reveal ive seen in a zelda game. and the twist of hilda being behind all the evil plan also surprised me.

another thing i found really interesting its the fact that the triforce its completed by the end of the game and Link and Zelda get to make a wish. because this is a concept that its been established in a lot of the games ive played but ive never actually seen it happening (i suppose its because of the downfall timeline or whatever).

spoilers end here

ill say the only thing i didnt love about the game is its difficulty. ive only played another 2d zelda game (links awakening) but in comparison this one its too easy. i died a total of 2 times, one of them in the final boss (which is a really cool fight btw). so yeah, kinda easy but not really a complaint.

totk time

man. what do i say about this game.

i didnt love botw and i usually dont like 3d games. but i guess i cannot longer say that because i love totk. its so fun and big (how does it run in the swich).

also playing totk made me appreciate botw more. its so cool how even without the main story both games tell a different story and how besides link being almost and avatar he gets to have so much story, growth and personality. In botw link is almost always alone, literally only accompanied by the ghost of his past. while in totk a lot of npc recognize him, help him and just are there with him. also hyrule tell its own story; in botw its almost a post apocalyptic (ex) kingdom. npcs are always in tiny towns, and the few that leave are scared and in danger. and everything its destroyed, gannon its trapped in the castle and theres no hope for the kingdom. but the in totk they are rebuilding!. i have never been this emotional about a bunch of npcs as i am with totk/botw once. they go out to explore and treasure hunt!. there is a school!, a newspaper!. they know zelda and link and hyrules story!. they let link sleep and gives him weapons and food whenever for free!.  im not crying i promise (lie).

and the amount of storytelling that theres is the world alone its insane. i get sad everytime i catch some poes because they are the souls of the fallen hyrule warriors and people from before botw.

now lets talk about link (again) and zelda because they had taken over my mind. link and zelda from botw failed. thats the whole point of the story. they failed the first time, they couldnt save their friends, their kingdom, they didnt defeat ganon, link couldnt defend zelda. so then 100 years latter they have to fix it and save what is left of the kingdom they couldnt protect. botw its so sad. even when they win, the kingdom its still broken and they friends are still gone.

then in totk they do everything they can to help the new hyrule, and when it its in danger again, they fight. in botw, i like to think most of the time link will be running in the wild (dah), camping alone, then go and defeat gannon on his own (the champions help but they are ghost and it was their duty anyways). and then, in totk the very first thing link does after living the sky its go to the fortress (idk its name) where there is people willing to help, then he go and travel finding and helping people on its way. they want link, the hero, to help them fight this monsters, because its gives them hope. he goes to see his friends and they willingly help him. they don't have to risk their lives but zelda asked them to help link and of curse they will. they trust him. he is their friend, and they wont let him be alone.

now a little bit of spoilers

when link goes to the castle, expecting to fight ganandof alone and then the sages show up and deflect the attack i almost cried. then at the end of the game when link loose contact with them and still goes in alone and they show up again.  im...  ;-;

and zelda!. my girl fought so much and she was alone for so much more i want to give her a hug. when she gets turned back to human and she says she was sure she would be gone (a dragon) forever... ;-;

end spoilers

now lets talk about that final fight.

damn, what a good fight. i was there for so long (my fault for getting there with 3 hearts and no food), but we did it and it was amazing.

ok thats it. in conclusion a link between worlds its almost as good as links awakening but im going to say its my new favorite zelda game because it deserves so much more love that it gets. also cook some food before you go to end game, believe me youll need it.