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destiny-smasher · 11 months ago

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Stuff From 2023!

List of things of note I experienced in 2023! A few things didn't technically release in 2023, I'm sure, but yea. Will contain my 'Top 10 Games I Played in 2023' as well.

Firstly, something I played a lot of this year in bursts but doesn't quite crack my Top 10 is Vampire Survivors. Very addicting, did some very fun goofy shit that had me laughing and engaged in a lizard brain way. Appreciated the many Castlevania references and jokes, too.

A couple of games I played every weekend for a few hours across many weeks this year were Project Zomboid and Roots of Pacha, both in a group 4. We had lots of fun with those two, and I think they're both great co-op time-sink games. Zomboid is a zombie survival sim that has way more attention to detail than its graphics may imply. It's still in early access but the depth to its is honestly pretty dang impressive. Pacha iterates on the Stardew Valley formula in a ton of small but deliberate, thoughtful ways that make for a nice twist on that Harvest Moon style game.

REMAKES

There were so many great remakes this year, on top of just amazing games in general, I can't fit them all into my Top 10. So here's a segment dedicated to most of the remakes I loved this year.

The remake of Super Mario RPG was such a surprise, and turned out very damn well. That game, turns out, is very near and dear to my heart and I did not fully appreciate that until this remake was revealed. It comes just shy of cracking my Top 10 list and that's honestly only because I finished Mother 3 finally right at the tail end of the year. This game manages to still feel weirdly fresh even today just due to how fucking strange it is, and the remake speeds up the pacing a bit while also adding in some new mechanics and a chunk of new post-game content. Everything was handled so well. This is like the new gold standard of complete one-to-one remakes of sprite-based games imo. I will admit the artstyle is a bit 'off' in some ways but I think it's very clean looking and captures that 90's CGI spirit really well, all things considered. And the music, OOF, so damn good.

The remake of Dead Space I don't have much to talk about, but it's very well produced. It's remade so well, in fact, that it felt like my memories of the original, even though I know it's not an exact recreation. Very well done and still holds up as a great horror action game with these improvements.

The remaster of Metroid Prime is so impressive it feels like a remake, even if the game is identical to the original aside from presentation and some control changes. It's an iconic classic, and yet I have no patience to do the Chozo Artifact stuff, so I actually did not roll credits on this version BUT still thoroughly enjoyed reliving the game with a very nice new coat of paint. It makes me excited to see what Prime 4 will look like on, I expect, more powerful hardware.

SHOWS/MOVIES

The year started strong with a TV adaptation of The Last of Us. While I've come to have conflicted feelings with the franchise at large, mainly due to its leading boss man, I thoroughly enjoyed the first season of this series. Very well done adaptation that picked and chose what to keep and what to change and honestly makes for a better story as a whole if you ask me, while not really replacing the game's tactile interactive tensions. Cannot wait to see what they do with Part 2 tbqh. I loved that game more than the original but also felt it was worse as an overall game/experience/narrative. But a fresh take on that same plot could potentially address a lot of the issues I had with Part 2, while simultaneously not really 'replacing' it, either.

The Bear. If you haven't seen it, it's just. Very good television. Two seasons in and it's sitting up there chasing Mr. Robot and Better Call Saul as one of the best live action series I've ever seen. Season 2 did such a great job of giving us deeper dives on the various characters and building toward an organic and rewarding conclusion that still leaves room for another season to theoretically wrap things up. Nothing too crazy with this show, it's super down to earth, and it owns that very well with editing and pacing that varies per episode, kind of in line with the different character perspectives.

Super Mario Bros.: The Movie had me worried for a while, mainly due to the animation studio and casting. And while I'm still not 100% sold on this celebrity casting, I will admit it didn't weight the experience down -- even if it's still the second weakest element by far. The weakest element is the writing. It's not, like, offense -- it's loyal to the source material and works, it functions. But it's not doing anything beyond pushing us from set piece to set piece. If anything, the movie is a bit too short for all of the stuff it's cramming in. But on the upside, there is a lot of amazingly rendered visuals and music to take in. A real treat for fans of the franchise, and the most loyal gaming adaptation in movie form, I would say.

Across the Spiderverse is in essence the first half of a two part film. That makes it kind of difficult to talk about, especially when it's also a sequel, and the production sounds like it was marred with bad management and crunch. But the results they came up with actually met my hopes and expectations for a sequel, and that is saying something, as I had very high expectations. I completely adore this film's stupendous sense of style, editing, framing, writing, and the way it's making meta-commentary on multiple levels on top of just being an effective narrative on its own. This is animated storytelling running at full capacity in my opinion, and in general just film doing all of the kinds of things film can do. So it's no wonder that there's still a rub -- this is the first half of the story they planned. The editing, animation, framing, effects, acting, action sequences, music, writing, theming, just Farore's sake, this is SUCH a damn banger of a film and one of the best movies I've ever seen, which, again, is kind of insane given the circumstances. I can only hope they don't fuck up the conclusion.

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off was quite the surprise announcement, and as it turns out, quite the surprise adaptation. I won't spoil much but I will say that by the end of the first episode, it becomes very apparent that this series is no mere by-the-books adaptation, and does something unique and edifying, even if it still maintains a certain surface-level depth I wish the franchise would push beyond. Either way, I enjoyed it way more than I expected to going in, and I think it makes for a great companion to the rest of the series. The animation style was super fun, as well, with some great action sequences.

But Blue Eye Samurai sucker-punched me, having released before I'd even known about it. This show is something else, something unlike any other animated show I've seen besides Arcane. And it's not like it's mimicking Arcane, it's just the closest I can think to compare it to: a quality, thoughtfully framed, thoughtfully written, made-for-adults animated series. It tows the line between fantasy and realism in a refreshing way, its protagonist is great, its cast is compelling, its plot goes to some neat places, and things just feel very well thought-out and well-executed. Slap this in second place behind Arcane as the TV series I am the most excited to see more of in the future, just ahead of The Bear.

Something I did near the end of the year was watch The Hunger Games movies, back to back over the course of like, a week. Have not read the books but man, watching these sure made me interested in doing so at some point. I totally get why people were so enamored with this franchise, and honestly, I think its themes and messages are more relevant now than they were when this franchise was at the peak of its popularity. The films certainly have glaring issues for my tastes but yea, I managed to really enjoy them as a whole despite my lack of mainstream sensibilities. Looking forward to reading the books eventually.

Another thing my wife shared with me was 花ざかりの君たちへ (often called 'Hana-Kimi' for short). Specifically, the 2007 version, as, uh, apparently there are multiple adaptations of this. It was a live action Japanese drama about a high schooler who was born female but transfers into an all-boys school, identifying as a boy while she is there. There's more to it than that, and I won't say it handles everything the best (it's from the mid 2000's) or concludes things in quite the way I'd have preferred. Not to mention it's kind of weird seeing many tropes I'm used to seeing in anime rendered by physical, real actors. BUT it was overall a really sweet, adorable, funny, heartfelt, and reached for pro-queer expression in a time and place when that wasn't mainstream yet (and honestly kinda still isn't depending on who you ask).

Good Omens Season 3 also dropped this year. I actually don't have much to say partly because I think a big element of it is just not knowing what to expect going into it! But it was also very good, very fun, pretty damn gay, I really enjoyed it and am crossing my fingers hard they get to wrap it up the way they want.

All right! Onto my personal top 10 GOTYs.

TOP 11 GAMES

(I played and finished in 2023)

11) Mother 3

The one entry on this list that did not actually come out this year -- in fact, it's never technically released outside of Japan. Originally release in 2007 on the Game Boy Advance, this quirky RPG has developed quite the reputation. I started playing the fan translation back in like 2020, and only got around to finally finishing it this year. While that likely did tarnish the experience a bit for me, so does the final third or so -- it kind of drags on a bit, and any old school format RPG that requires grinding to progress can become a bit of a chore.

Thankfully, Mother 3 did earn its hallowed reputation in my eyes now that I have experienced it. I totally get the passion for this game now, and I am a convert. It makes me want to finally finish Mother 2, aka Earthbound. But here's the biggest thing about Mother 3 I weirdly did not expect going in, yet smashed my face in like a hammer by the time I finished it:

without Mother 3, there is no way Undertale/deltarune would exist.

The DNA for Toby Fox's works is achingly obvious in its relation to this game, specifically. I won't spoil anything and I won't go into my long list of evidence like an Ace Attorney case, but trust me, there is ample evidence to make this claim.

And that also means that Mother 3 stands on its own merits as doing things that RPGs just plain were not doing in 2007, and in some ways still aren't today. Aside from some pacing issues further in, the characters in your party aren't as developed as much as I'd like. BUT the overall narrative it tells, especially in those opening chapters, have a rare kind of earnest, human magic to them that most games just don't let themselves fall into. And it concludes in ways I did not expect and yet offered clarity as to why it is so beloved, and how Toby Fox was so inspired to put his own mark on the gaming landscape.

I owe a great deal to Undertale, personally, and as such, I also owe a great deal to Mother 3. You don't need to have played others in the series to enjoy it, you'll just be missing some referential stuff here and there. It's quite playable and unique by today's standards and I strongly recommend it if you want an RPG that is heartfelt, funny, fun mechanically, and has some simple but hard-hitting things to say about the world we live in, and what we are doing to ourselves and that world.

10) Super Mario Bros. Wonder

What can be said that hasn't been said already? Nintendo knocked it out the park with this one. This was everything I've wanted in a 2D Mario for like 15 years. The only thing 'missing' from it is playable Rosalina, but hey, we finally got Daisy in a mainline Mario game, so I'll take it. After a decade or so of dragging their feet with low-effort but enjoyable 2D games, Super Mario Wonder finally, at long last, captures what makes Nintendo games great and with their best foot forward. They haven't done 2D Mario this well since World on the SNES in 1991. And they have never put this level of production into a 2D game since... ever?

This is one of the all-time best 2D platformers out there, and for once it finally feels like 2D Mario is running on all cylinders as a big budget passion project kind of game. You love to see it.

9) Scarlet Hollow

This game isn't technically finished yet, as it is episodic, and its developers wanted to release Slay the Princess in the interim, but that doesn't stop its quality from being good enough to make my list. This game is doing the kinds of things visual novels should be doing, the kinds of things I wish to do in a sense with my own visual novel development.

It's a horror themed experience but balances the high tension with actual real stakes very well against mostly down-to-earth conversations, with lots of great tricks and touches of presentation you don't typically see in indie visual novels, along with a fantastic art style, charming characters (my favorite character has turned out to be the one I immediately disliked at first, and that's rare for me), and meaningful choices.

I can't wait to see how this one wraps up but even as it stands it's one of the best things I experienced in 2023.

8) Xenoblade Chronicles: Future Redeemed

I will admit I skipped Xenoblade Chronicles 2 after giving it an honest go in like, 2019 or so. A few hours in and i couldn't stomach it, the tonal whiplash from Xenoblade 1 (one of the best RPGs I've ever played) was too much for me. But then Xenoblade 3 came out last year, and is also one of the best RPGs I've ever played, even better than the original for my tastes.

But I wasn't prepared for the DLC to drop a whole ass side-game on us, a self-contained prequel to 3 that serves as narrative cohesion to tie the whole trilogy together with a bow on top, complete with perfectly tuned fanservice (and not the sexy kind, although grown-up Rex and Shulk, well, yes) that really respects its fanbase for investing hundreds of hours in this franchise.

Matthew is easily one of my all-time fav RPG main characters, probably the favorite RPG main character when I think of it (as main characters specifically go, anyway), and his game is a fraction of the length of many RPGs out there. But as usual, the entire cast had their charms, the story was nicely paced, the gameplay and overall length was just about damn perfect for what I could want from the genre.

As an expansion to a pre-existing game, this is one of the top 3 best expansions/DLCs I've ever played. When taken as a side story to an overarching trilogy, I'm not even 100% in on the lore and I still enjoyed the hell out of it, it's just the kind of thing that hits a tone of 'damn, video games are a fucking unique medium that we can do specific narrative things with across years of telling a story.'

I don't know where Monolith Soft is going next, though the ending certainly offers some intriguing teasing, but I suspect I will be there day one to see it, and am looking forward to it.

7) Pikmin 4

Given the long wait (10 years!) one might understand fan concern over the state of Pikmin 4. Turns out, that extra time was spent making this game fucking good. It's not the largest, most impressive, most complex, most inspiring, most 'anything' game I played this year, and yet I can't help saying that this is a damned good video game. It really nailed what it set out to do as a sequel, incorporating just the right ideas to spice up the formula while bringing things back to how Pikmin 2 was, and improving on the series in basically every way -- including stuff to do!

This is easily the most Pikmin game... in a Pikmin game. I still haven't 100%'d it. Without giving away any details, I'll just say that when a game rolls credits and you're only like, halfway through its content, and it just keeps going, that's just kind of wild. It would've felt like a great game even then, but the breadth and depth it ends up going to in order to keep giving you ways to engage with its wonderfully detailed world and addictive mechanics, I love it.

I just want more of it. Give me DLC with more Dandori content, the formula and feel just works so well at this point.

6) Sea of Stars

How the hell I forgot to include this one on my list initially is boggling. Easily one of the best indie games I've ever experienced. The writing is nothing to, well, write home about, but it's not bad. And in fact the story has a lot of great things going on, from an interesting world to a very potent arc with the leading support character (who, let's face it, is kind of more the main character than your two main characters).

The game's art and music are phenomenal, capturing the essence of 90's era RPGs but clearly doing things not capable back then. Made even sweeter, the game is a prequel to the studio's prior work, The Messenger, which I also played and adored in tandem, kind of going back and forth between the two once I was partway into Sea of Stars. The way this RPG repurposes songs from Messenger as well as all kinds of seemingly superfluous elements but makes it feel cohesive is pretty great.

The game also trims a lot of the fat you'd find in older RPGs, as well as lets you customize your experience in a modern way using collectibles you can toggle on and off to grant all kinds of effects, like increasing or decreasing the difficulty in various ways.

The homage paid to classics like Chrono Trigger and Super Mario RPG is clear but it's not at all copy-cat-ing, instead wearing those inspirations proudly on its sleeves and forging its own path with its own ideas. A fantastic collection of party members, a wonderful world, amazing presentation, and environments and pacing that help it stand apart from the genre that inspired it. I wish we got to know the leads better, there is a lack of character growth in many ways, but that's me grasping at straws to critique, it's just a fantastic experience and the studio should be very proud of what they've accomplished.

5) Hi-Fi Rush

This is gonna be a running trend from here on out, but on any other year, Hi-Fi Rush would've been my GOTY, easy. From this point on, we're talking measures of inches rather than miles in terms of my love for these games.

Hi-Fi Rush finally delivered on something I have waited like 20 years for: a rhythm action adventure where playing the game in sync with the music felt fucking cool and gave me emotional resonance in a way only this medium can. The humor was charmng. The visual aesthetic is almost peak 'my taste.' The music was groovy with a few tracks I did not see coming but loved seeing how they were incorporated. The story was surprisingly fun! The characters were fantastic, I loved the entire main crew in a way I rarely ever do and would jump at the chance to spend more time with (and hey, there's a whole bunch of post-game I have yet to do, so I intend to in 2024).

The only real thing I could reasonably ask for from this game is a way to play as those other party members in post-game content or new-game plus or something. And who knows, maybe we get that some day. Even if we don't, what they came up with here is the next best thing besides. And what we got is one the most video-gamey video games I have ever played, a real classic and one I think will go down as one of my all-time favs. A passion project given meaningful time, budget, and creatives to bring it to life.

Had this game offered multiple playable characters, a bit more development in its story, and maybe a stronger climax, it'd be higher. I still love it to death and want more games like it regardless.

Hi-Fi Rush is exactly what kind of game we could have gotten more of if the Internet hadn't pushed gaming into a 'live service' direction. It is literally the spirit of a PS2/GameCube game given modern form. And either way, we did get it, at least, in that form, and it fucking rocks.

4) Resident Evil 4 (Remake)

This year was big for remakes and remasters, but one stands tall above the rest, if you ask me. The original RE4 has stood as my fav in the franchise, the one that got me into the franchise, the one that got me into M-rated games in the first place. Lots of nostalgia, but it's held up surprisingly well over the years despite some limitations of the time (mainly the controls) and some older-fashioned sensibilities ("with ballistics, too~").

But Capcom fucking nailed it with this reimagining. Like Final Fantasy VII: Remake, this game is not a remaster, or a one-to-one recreation. It is a brand new game, built from the ground up, reimagining the original entirely, complete with new mechanics and story. But unlike with FF7, this is also shockingly authentic and loyal to the original at the same time. It remixes elements from the original game, maintains most of the original's map design, adds in new stuff, removes some of the more goofy shit -- and even 90% of what feels 'removed' is revealed to be repurposed for the Ada side story DLC.

It looks great, it sounds great, the adjustments to characters and story are improvements across the board, (except for Hunnigan, RIP) the gameplay is improved in intensity and feel and action and replayability. And yet despite all of this, it balances that campy tone of the original just enough to still evoke what I loved about the original's tone. And it doesn't outright replace the original game, either. The two are now like different recipes of the same sandwich or something. There's reasons to revisit the original, though for me this has now replaced the remake of RE2 as my fav in the franchise.

I really don't know where they go from here but I will look forward to it, and regardless, they fucking nailed this one.

3) Street Fighter 6

Two Capcom games, back-to-back? They had a fucking good year in my eyes. The interesting thing about this particular entry is that unlike the others on this list, I will be continuing to play this one for hours and hours into 2024, especially with more fighters still planned. And in another year, this would've easily been my GOTY.

After all, Street Fighter 6 is the single-best traditional fighting game I think I've ever played. And while fighting games are my overall personal favorite genre, I'm more of a Smash player who also loves the hell out of Street Fighter and then dabbles in Tekken and whatever else releases. Street Fighter has always been one of my go-to top multiplayer games since I got into the franchise with SF4 in 2010. While I did enjoy SF5 well enough, it just didn't keep me hungry to come back for more like 4 did. SF6 has fixed that problem by way of a multitude of changes.

It has easily the most fun single player mode I've seen any fighting game have. Like, yea, The Subspace Emmisary (and even then, I don't love that mode like other folks do, I kinda think it's... fine?) but tbqh World Tour is just better in most every way. You get to build your own fighter, earn and mix and match different costumes and individual character special moves with each fighter's fight style. You get to just hang out with the SF characters, get to know them as people, their hobbies, their fears, their insecurities, their passions besides just beating the shit out of each other. On top of this, the realistic art style shift (a by-product of the RE Engine) seals the deal on what Street Fighter 6 is aiming to do: humanize its cast.

Is it still wacky as fuck? Is it still comical and weird and goofy? Hell yes, it is. Is the story mode deep in its narrative? Not in the slightest. But it's still stepping confidently in a direction fighting games should be trying to, not being too self-serious, but also being earnest.

And I haven't even touched on the mechanics! The Drive System alone is a brilliant addition that adds a sort of 'stamina' system that works so well to add an extra layer of decision making and tension. The game's not perfectly balance imo but for how much is here it is surprisingly damn well balanced, especially given they have insisted on not pushing out a single balance patch since it launched in June. For most any other competitive game, that would be like suicide for the scene, but the game seems to be thriving and selling extremely well for the franchise. And it's earned it.

I will absolutely be continuing my warrior's journey into 2024 and I can't wait to see what else Capcom has in store for this game.

2) Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

Out of every game I played in 2023, Tears of the Kingdom is easily the most technically impressive. From a design standpoint, from a 'how in the hell is the Switch doing all of this without exploding' standpoint. From a 'holy hell how is there this much stuff in a single player game' standpoint. From a 'oh my goddesses that stupid batshit idea I had 100% worked because it actually did make sense' standpoint.

Where Breath of the Wild opened our minds as to what an open world game could be -- fully designed like one giant interconnected 'level' -- Tears of the Kingdom replied in much the way I expected: it pulled a Super Mario Galaxy 2. What I mean by that is that this is a direct sequel, building directly off the foundation of the original. You know. Like video game sequels almost always used to. And which many very successful ones still absolutely do.

But Tears of the Kingdom somehow managed to wow me all over again by adding to that open world's verticality in insane ways -- the Depths alone are probably my favorite 'mechanic' from any Zelda game ever besides the time loop of Majora's Mask (and what that did for the story and gameplay). But beyond the scale of the world basically doubling and then some (floating islands and caves on top of Depths), I was curious how this game could stand tall after Elden Ring, which is easily in my top 10 favorite games of all time at this point. Elden Ring was Fromsoft's reply to BOTW. And yet Tears of the Kingdom still managed to have something new to say in spite of that very strong reply.

Tears of the Kingdom opened the door to let players essentially create their own mechanics. By removing the abilities Link had to engage with the world before, and replacing them with a brand new toolset that includes abilities you just... don't see games give you, because they'd be 'overpowered,' TOTK designs its massive world in ways that invite you to use those 'overpowered' abilities however you see fit.

Being able to interact with the world and objects in this way, being able to fuse them together to create all kinds of effects, or new methods of transportation, even interacting with things not just spacially but in respect to time, it's nuts and fun and I've already poured like 130 hours with still so much I haven't done. And that's the thing: this game wasn't designed to be 100%'d. It was designed to just... be experienced, as much or as little as you want. And games on this level of scale/budget just do not have the guts to let so, so much 'content' be missed out on. And this game does.

It's a technical achievement and while I had my doubts with how strangely little Nintendo had to show, I am very glad that the experience itself manages to breathe new life into one of my all-time favorite games while improving on it in so many ways. It won't convert you if you didn't love the original -- this is a Super Mario Galaxy 2 style sequel, after all. But it's essentially replaced the original in ways I didn't think would be possible.

The story? Oof. Uh, not so much the story, let's ignore that part. That's what Nintendo wants you to usually do, anyway. But everything else, just. Din-damn.

It expands upon the first game's already fairly open-ended nature in an exponential way that I suspect developers will spend years to come trying to pin down, much like how they've spend the past 6 or 7 years trying to replicate BOTW's open world design.

For much of this year, I thought this was personal GOTY. And for many it will be, because it's just an extremely impressive video game.

Number 1...?

Going into this list, I kept telling myself, 'man, on any other year, this would be my GOTY. And if you know me personally you likely have already figured out what my GOTY is by omission. But the more I've thought about it, the more I've realized just how close these top 5 games are, it really is like centimeters instead of inches, and they each -- well, every game I've mentioned here, beyond the Top 10, as well -- offered something edifying that I was very satisfied with.

And no, it's not Baldur's Gate 3. While I have spent hours playing it in co-op and a little bit solo, that game's just not really for me, exactly. Like, I can enjoy it, and I have massive respect for the dev team and what they accomplished with it. But I don't much care for D&D, and the game just didn't do very much for me personally, I lack the motivation to finish it. Remove Karlach from the game and I have next to nothing to really attach myself to, personally. I definitely get why it's many people's favorite game of 2023, though, and I do think it's a bit of a wakeup call for what can be accomplished by just making a GAME instead of struggling to contort it into a service etc.

Street Fighter 6 is fucking fantastic but it could still use some more actual fighters and incentives to keep playing besides monetizing its players in weird ways. I love it, and it will be the game from 2023 I end up playing the most (it already is, I think). But if it ended as it is, I would be very satisfied.

Hi-Fi Rush is oozing with originality and style and I adore it to death, and when I finished it, I was very satisfied.

Resident Evil 4 kept me addicted for over 100 hours, had an amazing DLC expansion, oozes replaybility in the specific ways I like for a single player action game (rogue-likes besides). I am extremely satisfied by it.

Tears of the Kingdom is so massive and fun to just explore that I know I will continue to play more in the months to come. Will I ever revisit it entirely? I'm actually not sure! That massive length does lend some repetition, even if it's the kind I find therapeutic and satisfying.

And that's what made me realize something. My personal GOTY did not just satisfy me. It made me hungry. It filled me up in a way I didn't think was possible and yet I still hunger for more, because I enjoyed it that fucking much. I played through it twice and still hunger for more. I know I will play it a third time eventually, but mainly I just have not been to remove from my brain the particular ways it made me feel, ways that only a video game can. Nothing about it felt like it needed to be overlooked.

SF6 and RE4 had dubious monetization, TOTK had a story I found to be like 90% boring and it still maintains many of the flaws of the original. And Hi-Fi Rush, while amazing, just didn't scratch the particular itch this game did for me.

1) Lies of P

If you told me that Lies of P was a game developed by some sub-division of FromSoft, I'd believe you. Which is to say I would also believe that it was made by people who wanted to break free from some of the shackles of the now infamous 'soulslike' genre.

A narrative that actually makes sense by the end? Opening up options for the player without requiring specific stat levels? Encounters and boss fights that feel ravenously challenging without just feeling like cheap bullshit? Music that crosses borders beyond 'angry chorus, angrier orchestra'?

Lies of P doesn't quite eclipse Elden Ring, but that's an absolutely unfair comparison given the utter scope and scale and variety that game packs. But Lies of P improves at the FromSoft formula in specific ways, while making concessions in others, and as a result it's just an experience that seeped into my brain like no other game this year, not even Tears of the Kingdom, despite that I put half the hours into this one.

I love all of the games I have mentioned here, you could honestly swap around the order of this top 5 and I could mentally meander a way to justify why, no, actually, this one was my favorite game of 2023. In a year so awful for the people who make games, yet so amazing for games themselves, Lies of P is exactly the kind of game I needed. I needed someone to show me that you can make something directly inspired by someone else's work, yet fine tune it in all the right ways to make it stand just as tall in terms of quality and design. Lies of P made me feel things in ways only a handful of games ever do -- and I would actually count Hi-Fi Rush among those in a regard.

But Lies of P also told a story I found compelling. It had mystery, tension, buildup, it started off seeming like it would do the vague FromSoft schtick only to 100% come together, make sense, be rewarding, and offer a 'true ending' that I got on the first playthrough, organically, without looking things up, because it just... felt right. Not only is the game adapting FromSoft's formula into something its own, it's also doing that with the story of Pinocchio. The gameplay and the story congeal together not in the 'perfect' way that it does with games like Celeste or Undertale, but rather in a more... messy way, like a puppet aching to become a real boy.

The game is full of loss, in its world and for you as the player, who will die many times. But unlike much of FromSoft's catalogue, I never once felt like I died because of bullshit. Was I trolled? Sure, the game definitely 'trolls' you in classic FromSoft fashion, lulling you into a sense of security only to sweep you off your feet. But unlike how FromSoft does it, these circumstances can always be avoided if you're cautious. And if you're not? Hey, 'We got you! We gooottt youuu, haha' and you lose a couple minutes of progress, rather than like fifteen minutes and also an entire level's worth of souls because oh right, this section you just got through is kind of bullshit cheap.

Don't get me wrong, I love Dark Souls. But the thing is, Lies of P takes the parts I love about Dark Souls, admits it can't pull off quite the intricate web of level design, but then throws away everything I do not like about Dark Souls, improves on the things I already liked, and then pushes me to meet it on its level.

The satisfaction of being a boss you spend an hour, two hours on, cannot be understated. It's a feeling unlike any other, and one only this medium can provide. And Lies of P kept me motivated, like Sekiro before it, to keep improving, keep growing, keep trying. And unlike Sekiro, it gave me so many more tools to play with, to learn, to balance in an arsenal with intent. Enemies have elemental weaknesses if I so choose to exploit them, the moveset of one weapon's handle can be applied to a completely different blade, my robotic arm can leverage things in a pinch, or be the backbone to dealing with a boss. Mastery is rewarded with practice. A vicious boss that annihilates you in five seconds can be defeated without a single scratch if you practice enough. Mastery, creativity, quick thinking, and reacting are all rewarded here.

I am more than the hands pulling the strings, I am more than a puppet, I am human. And games like this can only be made by humans, who get that specific itch that only video games that challenge us can scratch. It's not an itch everyone has, but that's why it's my GOTY and not yours, innit?

With its unique setting, its wonderful music, its cozy hub area, its narrative that offers just enough to make me care, but not so much that I am bored or feel misled, its amazing boss designs, and its wonderfully tactile and engaging combat, Lies of P is a game I just can't stop feeling something about whenever I am reminded of it.

It epitomizes so much -- not all, but much -- of what I love about what video games can do, what adaptations can do, and much like how Toby Fox was inspired by Mother 3, what people can do when they are inspired by someone else's work.

As far as I can tell, this is developer Round8's debut game, and just. Holy hell, what a way to come out swinging. I haven't seen a debut game hit this hard since, I don't know, Bastion.

Close your eyes. Come to me. Feel all right.

I did, and I do, and given what you teased at the end of this game, I have extremely high hopes of what you come up with next. And in a landscape where things feel more difficult to get excited for with each passing year, much less new IP, it's so damn refreshing to have both Hi-Fi Rush and this game standing out as signals that, hey, some folks are still willing to invest bigger budgets into new games, new ideas.

Again, a battle of centimeters here and at this point I should wrap this up and go to bed.

But yea, Lies of P reminded me of what makes me, specifically, human, in a very particular way that only it has. And I honestly think out of all of single player games of 2023, I think it will actively stand out in my heart the most in the years to come.

#GOTY 2023 #goty #video games #gaming #Mother 3 #scarlet hollow #super mario wonder #future redeemed #Pikmin 4 #Hi-Fi Rush #re4 remake #TOTK #LOZ TOTK #Tears of the Kingdom #Lies of P #long post #Sea of Stars

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jbk405 · 1 year ago

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I’m finally going to lay out my thoughts on the “Battlestar Galactica” revival series

The 2003 BSG relaunch is apparently seeing something of a resurgence right now. I’ve seen more and more people discovering it online over the past few months and beginning full-series watches. I’m happy for any old TV series to get rediscovered (Although the thought that a show I watched as it aired is now considered “old” is disheartening), but I’ll be honest that I was never as in-love with the series as others seem to be. And after seeing so many people talking about how it’s one of the greatest underappreciated shows of the ‘00s I’ve got to get out my thoughts.

It's not a BAD show, not by any means, but I do honestly think it was much more impressive at the time it came out than it is now. It tried to do new things for TV sci-fi in the early 2000s, and now that other shows are doing those same things better it doesn't stand out. It was the novelty that made it seem so amazing at first.

One of the things it is praised for is that it brought in long-form storytelling from the beginning. The standard for ‘90s sci-fi was to slowly introduce ongoing plotlines into episodic standalone stories, and BSG had direct episode-to-episode continuity starting from square one. Except that BSG had no plan for what the ongoing storyline would be, despite frequent on-screen references to “the plan” (And even the eventual release of a film called “The Plan”). The writers have admitted that they did not start the series with any idea where they were going, so plot threads would drag on and climax with no buildup or any emotional oomph. The exemplar in the beginning was Helo’s entire story on Caprica in season one: He wasn’t supposed to reappear after the pilot miniseries, but the staff liked him so much they brought him back for the series and didn’t bother to figure out why the Cylons were observing him and sparing him until season two. So all of his scenes are filled with pseudo-mysterious conversations from the observing Cylons to cover up the fact that there was no plan. The eventual reveal that they’re trying to see if “love” will allow Cylons to bear living children was just bizarre and nonsensical in my opinion.

Babylon 5, which aired 10 years before BSG, was conceived with a clear arc for the entire plot so they could put things in the first season that foreshadowed what was to come in the last. But BSG, despite being praised for ‘pioneering’ serious serialization in TV Sci-Fi, couldn’t even foreshadow the rest of the first season from the pilot.

The series is also praised for its character development, when almost all prior TV shows had a mandate to keep development to a minimum so as to make all episodes accessible even if viewed out of order or without context. And the characters definitely do change over the course of the series. Except, just like with the main story plotline, the character arcs were not planned in advance. The writers have admitted that the reveal at the end of season three that four recurring characters have been Cylons all along was not planned in advance at all. They specifically said they picked these characters based purely on who would be the biggest surprise. There was no foreshadowing at all for the audience to have picked up on earlier in the series, since until they made the decision while writing those episodes the characters weren’t Cylons.

In fact, they even needed to put in retcons to patch over this twist, since it directly contradicted their own canon and the in-series mythology.

This end result was that the show was “pretty good”, and it had some individual episodes and arcs that moved up to “great”, but it was dragged down as a whole. It had meandering plotlines, “shocking” twists with no logic or emotional foundation, and a general lack of focus. Season three is where I lost interest, and season four is just a mess. Even the more devoted fans of the series are heavily critical of the finale, and personally I think the ultimate fate of the characters was just plain bad.

And -- again -- it’s still not a bad show overall. I saw much worse shows on TV in 2003, and I’ve seen much worse shows on TV right now. None of these faults take away from the phenomenal acting that the cast put into their performances, or the truly beautiful soundtrack (The soundtrack is the one area that I think surpasses the hype for this show). Even the CGI holds up pretty well twenty years later. But I just can’t get behind the “This was one of the greatest shows of the era” brouhaha that’s bubbling up.

#Battlestar Galactica #BSG #BSG 2003 #Hype backlash #TV

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tripstitan · 1 year ago

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Yee Gods Yes

Found this on Harvard Health while I was thinking up a reply to a post about which hypersensitivity a person has the most of. (Hint, for me, it's all. Tactile, light, sound, crowd-overstimulation... Every sense of mine is heightened except smell, which I do not have as a sense. I'm anosmic I think is the term.)

Holy hell that would have been useful when I was trying to "be normal" for most of my life, trying to act as if I were neurotypical and not disabled, trying to work within the bounds of society's expected rules. Way to go Harvard Health. This sorta stuff needs to be seen more often by more people, especially employers.

I don't even realize that I'm stimming when I have to "even out" the pressure on either sides of my cuticles. Like if my right thumb gets pressure along its left half, I have to tap/press the right half of the cuticle thingy in response. Sometimes I just have to hit both sides, then eventually, all my fingers need evening out on both sides of my nail(which, once I notice, can become a near endless spiral, because I use my other finger edges to even out the pressure on my other finger edges...)

Don't even get me started on how wearing denim feels like my flesh is on fire. (Tactile hypersensitivity + fibromialgia = NO JEANS PLEASE.)

I used to be more heavily synesthetic, or have synesthesia to a higher degree. (Maybe I still do, but I've avoided the main triggers for a long, long time.) To me, voices and sounds have/had flavor. Too many voices/too much sound ends up just tasting like vomit, just nasty worst flavors combined coming to the fore. Yuck. Crowds suck. School assemblies SUUUUUUUCKED. I know I was a weird creepy kid, and the few things I remember from my past (yay trauma blanking out memories for me,) I'm pretty regretful of. I was sheltered, and I was an idiot... but I... anyway, let's just say I'm glad I'm in a position in life where if I don't want to, I'll never have to enter a crowded/loud space ever again.

As far as sound, and/or light, it depends on the day, because I do get photosensitive migraines, but I'm hyperaural/hyperaudiosensitive all the time. Depending on how I focus my ears, I can hear things, usually further away things, more clearly. It feels like I'm turning an internal radar dish in a crowded room, picking up other people's conversations, unable to hear the person right next to me trying to speak over the noise. ... I can also hear the thrum of electricity in power lines, and, with enough familiarity, can tell you whether or not someone has more appliances running than normal at the end of a segment of power lines. (I could always tell if dad was watching TV before I made it the 200 yards home down our long-arse dirt driveway basically out in the woods, based on the static hum in the power lines. It was just a tiny bit more audible, or a slightly different pitch. I think I probably could have also learned to guess if he'd opened the fridge and it had to kick in to cool things, or was using the microwave, but the easiest one to prove was the TV being on, or not, as based on the sound when I arrived home from school.)

Sarcasm suuuuuucks to try to detect. I trained myself to learn inflections and so on, and some people deliver without inflection! Or use it online, where there is no inflection! I... yeah I went undiagnosed most of my life, my therapist and I are proud of how far I'd come without help, without even knowing what I was facing. I grew up pretty poor, raised by a single parent, in the 80s and early 90s into late nineties and early 2000s, before there really was a ubiquity of internet access, before anyone could even reasonably be expected to have access to information, especially when living in such a rural area, or areas, as we did.

Anyway, sort of like Ren's admission in Hi Ren, as I got older, I learned to be less rigid about attempting to fit into society, and I honestly lucked out by landing on my feet in the way that I did. It was a pretty long, multi-year fall, a tumble if you will, to the outskirts and edges of society. Not quite as graceful or eloquent as Ren's "an eternal dance, a pendulum swinging between the light and the dark, and that the harder the light shone, the deeper the darkness that followed it" or such. I'm paraphrasing. (Seriously, if you haven't watched it, Hi Ren puts a lot of feelings to words that peeps in our situations feel and deal with. Impostor syndrome, depression, intrusive thoughts, struggling with disabilities and getting the help we need, and so on. I guess content warning for it, since it's pretty personal and deep. I dunno what TW to say, maybe uh... bpd? Ren acts out two different internal voices in the song.)

Gods, I'm letting all this stuff get way too personal. It's just supposed to be my webnovel ad blog thingy. Then again, AAoMM is a huge part of me, it's a chunk of almost everything that I am, in a lot of ways. It's already pretty darn personal, carrying so much of me with it.

#sensory issues #sensory overload #sensory processing disorder #stim #stimming #neurodivergent #neurodiverse stuff #neurodiversity #disability representation #disability #disabled #disabilties #acceptance #hi ren

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 1 year ago

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For a while, I’ve been telling myself I’m too focused on the specific Chocolate Milk Gang era, and even when I watch later comedy it tends to be stuff by people who originated in those early 00s, and I should get into more recent stuff made by younger comedians. This week, I decided to ignore that entirely and actually go to the generation before the CMG.

There’s a bit of a gap in the comedy I’ve seen, covering, approximately, the years between Blackadder and the beginning of the 21st Century. Not that nothing is in that gap. My Armando Iannucci obsession has taken me through On the Hour/The Day Today/every other Alan Patridge thing, some of which were in the 90s. Then there were Iannucci’s other 90s radio things. Brass Eye was 90s. Spaced was 90s. French and Saunders/Vicar of Dibley/Absolutely Fabulous was 90s. Technically Mr. Bean was 90s, though that still feels too much like a children’s show to count alongside the rest of this comedy. So I guess when I put that all that together, it’s clear that it isn’t a complete gap in my knowledge.

But still, there are a bunch of really fundamental 90s things I’ve never seen or heard. Various Chris Morris things. Everything Eddie Izzard’s ever done. All of those things with Adrian Edmondson and Rik Mayall and those other related people, which I think was actually 80s, but was entirely left out when my dad spent my childhood introducing me to 60s, 70s, and 80s Britcom via audio CDs and DVD boxsets. And until last week, everything by Lee and Herring.

There are a few reasons why I’d never sought out the Lee and Herring stuff before, all of those reasons being easily summarized by the words “Richard Herring”. Of my few reasons to not go looking for Richard Herring things, I’d say one is defensible, and the others are not really.

I’ve never really liked him. I first saw him on season 10 of Taskmaster, which came out in Fall 2020. It was the first season that came out after I got into the show, so the first one I watched as it aired, instead of all at once. And I didn’t have any good reason to dislike him. I just found him annoying.

I think I found him annoying because he was trying too hard, which is weird, because normally the Taskmaster contestants who try too hard are my favourites. I love the overly competitive ones who take it really seriously and care too much. But it felt forced with Richard Herring. Like he was trying to play a character of a guy who’s trying too hard. Which I think made me dislike him even more because of how partial I was to the overly competitive contestants, since my attachment to that style made me more annoyed about someone taking that style and doing it falsely.

I don’t even think it really was false. He’d been trying to get on the show for ages, I think he actually did care a lot about winning. But it’s like he needed everyone to know how much he cared, and the fact that he actually did care meant he really wanted to be seen a certain way, so he was forcing it too much. I don’t know, that’s the best way I can explain it and it probably still doesn’t make much sense. He also just wasn’t as funny or as likeable as Johnny Vegas or Daisy May Cooper or Mawaan Rizwan, which is how we’re actually supposed to judge Taskmaster contestants.

But it was fall 2020, I had still only recently had COVID rip actual sports away from me and was using Taskmaster pretty hard to cope with that, so I was watching it half like a comedy show and half like a sport. And I disliked Richard Herring both as a comedy character and as a contestant in the sport called Taskmaster. I so wanted him to lose. When Daisy May Cooper’s bridge fell down in the final seconds of the final live task to lose her the task and therefore the season, I swore at the TV exactly as I would if I were watching a real sport and the person I supported conceded a point, which was both extremely frustrating and rather liberating, making me remember that I could still access that feeling even in the depths of 2020 when sports were gone.

Then Richard Herring turned up on the Taskmaster podcast, as the winner always gets to after the final episode, and he was so cool about it that I almost felt bad for rooting against him so hard. He fully acknowledged that Daisy May Cooper was the people’s champion, the fans liked her more and justifiably wanted her to win, she’d been really entertaining all season. He had some nice back-and-forth on the podcast, some good explanations for some things that had annoyed me, and was funny.

Later on he came back on the Taskmaster podcast, was again entertaining and good with Ed Gamble and had some interesting analysis, and he talked about how he’d recently had cancer, and what it was like to think he might not see his kids grow up. That made me feel bad again for having disliked him so much, because he was just a bit annoying on a TV show once, obviously I don’t want him to die of cancer.

And then… you know what? I can’t be bothered to find the source again, so I'm just going to find my old post instead. A couple of years ago, I came across something, and I already wrote about it here so I won’t write it all out again. It’s an issue I’m particularly sensitive about, because I coach teenagers, and I see how common it is for creepy adults (almost always creepy adult men – in my many years of coaching teenagers, I can think of maybe two instances of adult women being creepy toward them, and more instances than I could begin to count of it happening with adult men) to be interested in them, and I see it from their side. I’m the one they talk to about how uncomfortable it makes them, I’m the one who sees how it makes them anxious about just living in the world, I’m the one who gets to know them as people and wants to protect them and it makes me have a probably over-the-top powerful hatred for anyone who could ever see them the way creepy adults see them.

I mean, I think it’s an entirely reasonable view for me to think that adults trying to fuck teenagers is wrong. But I also know that there may be some grey areas that I don’t recognize because of my experiences. Grey areas like it might not be the end of the world for an adult man to just look at some girls who are legally of age but technically teenagers (ie. 18/19, what he called them in the original post, though as I said I’ve absolutely seen adult men look at a girl they don’t know and intentionally overestimate her age, they guess that maybe she’s 19 even though she’s clearly younger, because if she’s 19 they’re allowed to stare at her, even though 19 is still young enough for it to be creepy if adult men stare at them, just because they’re old enough so you won’t get arrested for it doesn’t mean she’s old enough so it’s actually okay). I'll go so far as to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he was joking in the second quote, about thinking they might be even younger, charitably assume the reality is they were clearly 19. But even if I do that... still not okay. Still not okay. Still not okay that the fact that they looked like teenagers is what he liked, unless that in itself was some sort of joke I'm not getting.

So that’s not much of a grey area, but it is one a bit, I guess, as the story didn’t have him actually approaching the girls or anything like that. The actual grey area here, I think, is whether it’s fair to hate someone forever because of one story they wrote in one blog post over fifteen years ago, and repeated once, in just one page out of their entire autobiography (a page that was, to be fair to Richard Herring, taken out of context – though the blog post fucking wasn’t). Not even something he did fifteen years ago, since he didn’t actually do anything in the story. Just something he wrote about thinking.

So… there’s my sole defensible reason for disliking Richard Herring. It joins a number of other, less defensible reasons, all similar to why I originally took against him on Taskmaster. Since then, I’ve seen him on a few other TV shows, I’ve heard bits of his stand-up in various other contexts (never seen a full show, he just sometimes turns up on stand-up shows with multiple people), and I’ve never much enjoyed his presence. I don't find him particularly funny. I find him annoying for reasons I can’t quite define, and therefore can’t defend, and stopped feeling the need to defend when I came across that old blog post and then had a defensible reason for my dislike of him.

Oh, I do have another reason why I never sought out old Lee and Herring stuff, despite how much I like Stewart Lee’s stand-up, and this is the least defensible one of all, even worse than “I found one of them mildly annoying for no good reason”. Which is that when I got into On the Hour and The Day Today, I was looking up the team behind them. Saw some names I knew: Armando Iannucci, the reason I was there. Chris Morris, Brass Eye guy whom I know has done other exciting stuff but I’m not familiar with much of it. David Quantick, guy I’ve heard on Radio 4 sometimes. Peter Baynham, guy I know from some other Iannucci radio things. Graham Linehan, let’s just pretend I didn’t see that name so I can go on enjoying this stuff.

And Lee and Herring, on On the Hour but not The Day Today (actually I think Linehan and the other Father Ted guy replaced them for The Day Today, as I recall in a memory that I can’t be bothered to Google so I might be wrong), they were on the team but left due to “disputes”. Which put in my head the idea that there was a split between the rest of that writing team and Lee and Herring, and I think my brain subconsciously took away from that: “Armando Iannucci was on one side of a dispute, Lee and Herring on another side, Armando Iannucci has never done anything wrong, therefore I don’t like Lee and Herring”.

I say this happened subconsciously, and that’s important, because I want it clear that I’m not stupid enough to have decided this consciously, because it makes no sense whatsoever. Mainly because it was presumably some sort of legal or management dispute, not a fight with Armando Iannucci directly. They were clearly still on good terms with those guys, I’m sure there are many examples proving this but the first to come to mind is that years later Armando Iannucci and Chris Morris were both significant features of Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle. Also, okay, I guess there’s an argument that Armando Iannucci may have done one or two things wrong in his entire life, Charm Offensive had its high points but also some low points, Avenue 5 had great moments but fell far short of its potential especially in season 2. Consciously, I know all this. Subconsciously, I think I may have seen they were on the wrong side of a dispute with a creative team that made something I liked, and decided I don’t like them then.

So that’s an incredibly indefensible reason to have never sought out the Lee and Herring stuff, while I was going through what I thought of as Britcom “staples” throughout 2020/2021/2022 – that when I think the term “Lee and Herring”, I have a vague and undefined aversion to it in my head, that I think might have originated from that. From a dispute I know nothing about that probably came down to some legal or financial technicalities that have nothing to do with anything personal or creative.

There's my list of reasons. Some are good, some are not. Really, one is good and the others aren't. Last week, I heard a recording of some of the jokes from the Lee and Herring catalogue, thought it was very, very funny, wanted to get the jokes properly and hear what else came from there, so I've decided to watch Fist of Fun, and then This Morning with Richard Not Judy. And just, you know, not think about the teenage girl thing. Like I do when I watch Noel Fielding. It turns out everyone in the world is terrible, we try to enjoy comedy anyway.

...I started writing this post several days ago now, but I kept stopping because I've been sick and didn't have the energy to write a bunch of stuff, and then I had to go to work and things. This took me so long to write that now, as I get around to actually posting it, I've actually finished season 1 of Fist of Fun. And have downloaded the radio series of that and Lionel Nimrod, because my sense of completism is already telling me I can't skip those. And I'm going to write about what I thought of it, but first will post this, to have a record of what I was thinking before I started it and when I didn't really know what to expect.

This is going to be a thing now, though. That's what I'm doing next. Not finding younger comedians. Finding double acts consisting of two old white guys from the pre-Chocolate Milk Gang generation. First Ince/Legge and now this. God, I hope Michael Legge has never written a blog post about wanting to fuck a teenage girl. He's written a lot of blog posts over the years. Someone tell me right now if any of them were about wanting to fuck teenage girls, so I can know that before I get any more attached to him than I already am.

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thestobingirlie · 2 years ago

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So much fic seems to miss how different things were in the 80s compared to now (also seem to forget how long ago stranger things is set... like season 1 is set 40 years ago this year.)

One thing I notice it a lot in is the talking about video/ the setting with Steve and Robin working at family video and just how home media worked.

First part of it, you can always tell when someone only grew up with dvd/ bluray/ video on demand. Because VHS did not have home menus, scene selection, or an additional features menu. You put the tape in and the only options were play, pause, fast forward or rewind. And when people write DVD instead of VHS for what family video offer. Like that format did not come out until the mid 90's and didn't overtake VHS until the early-mid 2000's, which lead to the monstrosities that were the combo DVD/VHS player. (I even saw one fic where Steve and Robin had to rewind returned DVD's. That is just not how it works.)

A lot of the time I think people don't understand is how new accessible home video/ home media was. Like when Steve and Robin start at family video, VHS was less than a decade old. Home video that was accessible and available to the masses only really came about with Betamax in 75 and VHS in 76. And because of that it was expensive, which is why rental stores were such a big thing. In the mid 80's a normal single-tape VHS could easily cost $80-$90, which is the equivalent of over $200. When Back To The Future was released on VHS in 86 it cost $80. So when its written that someone (often Eddie) has rented the same movie a few times, and they have Steve or Robin say that it would be cheaper to buy a copy, it just doesn't make sense.

Then its the time between theatrical release and home release. It could easily be a year between theatrical release and VHS release (Using BTTF again, theatrical release date was July 3rd 1985, VHS release was May 22nd 1986. So nearly 11 months.) And film companies didn't just release their entire back catalogue onto VHS right away. They looked at what was in demand. (Disney didn't finish releasing their "classics" onto VHS until well into the 90's). The one I see people getting wrong the most in fic is The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Now I could see Robin and Eddie loving Rocky Horror, but they probably weren't all that aware of it. It was released in 75, but it wasn't available on VHS until 87 in the UK, and 1990 in the US, and it wasn't broadcast on TV until 93. Yes, there were midnight screenings in a lot of cities, but it was rated R, and they just might not have heard of it. (Sorry, but Rocky Horror is my other hyperfixation/ special interest and I could talk about it for hours on end). But, yeah, unless they'd managed to get hold of a bootleg copy, they probably hadn't seen it.

Sorry for the long ask, but this is just something that bugs me a little, because it would take just a few seconds to google it to find out if what they've written actually makes sense with the time it's set.

i read a fic that mentioned they were all watching a dvd and i literally stopped reading the fic. it just totally took me out of it.

obviously if you’re younger you won’t know as much about vhs, but it’s not that hard to find out (also, someone had to rewind dvds??? come on man, never having actually seen a vhs, sure. but have these people never watched a dvd??)

$80? that’s so expensive! i had no idea! i do love how you know so much about this tho lmao

people focus on the rocky horror picture show too much. i think it’s the only queer media they know from around the 80s, and while it’s fun, i really don’t think robin/steve/eddie would’ve known much about it, and if they did watch it, would probably be post st canon.

don’t worry about long asks! small things like that bug me too lol, especially because they’re so small it would take two seconds to look it up! but i guess if you’ve never really experienced 80s shit, you don’t even know you have to look stuff up.

#steve harrington #eddie munson #robin buckley #stranger things #asks #anon

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fic-history · 2 years ago

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90's Fic Fandoms: The X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer

This post, we’re exploring the advent of online fandom in the 90’s!

Without further ado,

The X-Files

First premiering in 1993, The X-Files was in a league of its own in the television sphere as it was both a supernatural thriller and a will-they-won’t-they investigative procedural. Well, it was mostly a won’t they since show creator Chris Carter himself was very anti Scully/Mulder (NoRomo). Speaking of the main pairing in the show, The X-Philes (X-Files fans) invented the term “shipping” to describe their support for Scully/Mulder, or any relationship pairing in the show. Thus, the term was shortened to “ship” both as a verb to describe the act of shipping and as a noun to describe a particular romantic pairing. As anyone who is vaguely familiar with fandom culture is aware, the “ship” family of terms is now used across fandom.

Digital fan activity surrounding The X-Files began primarily on Usenet, with two major mailing lists (one for general fan activity and another for creative works) that spawned many others specific to certain subtopics. Over time, this expanded into mailing lists, specialized fic archives, blogs, websites, and more, all dedicated to one show about two FBI agents and the possibility of alien life. Of this fan activity, a large percentage of it was dedicated to fanfiction, and which ships (or lack thereof in the case of NoRomos) were superior. The most popular ship was obviously Mulder/Scully, but other popular pairings include Mulder/Krycek, Mulder/Skinner, and Scully/Skinner. Another unique feature of the X-Philes is that they decidedly did not embrace RPF.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

The Buffy TV series first premiered in 1997, and like The X-Files, it was unique due to its severe genre bending and role reversals. Buffy was the only show where you could watch horror, high school drama, and supernatural romance all in one place, complete with a tiny blonde valley girl who happened to have immense power and immense responsibility.

In terms of fandom activity, the Buffy fandom was unique because it was one of the first TV fandoms to be active on the internet, and because of the unusually high amount of interaction between the show creators and fans. The official website for the show had an interactive comment space named after the club in Sunnydale, The Bronze, where fans could discuss the show. The thing was, the show’s creators and staff also had access to this page, so fans sharing their opinions and theories were sharing them with the people whose opinions determined the source material, most notably including Joss Whedon himself (Jamison 2013).

At the beginning of the Buffy fandom, the show creators and FOX were fine with the fansites and other fan activities happening on the internet, but as time went on, many fanworks were lost due to the network’s crackdown on fansites in the early 2000’s.

What’s so special about these shows is how hard they work to disrupt the gender norms that are attached to our society to this day. Mulder is the touchy-feely believer, while Scully is the clinical skeptic. Buffy is a stereotypically girly valley girl who is also incredibly strong, dedicated, and competent; all things not normally associated with traditionally feminine girls and women. These traits, plus the unique things fans brought to the table, created the dominant fandoms of the 90’s that shaped fannish culture and activity forever.

Happy reading,

-KP

#buffy #whedon #btvs #xfiles #x-files #mulder #scully #mulder and scully #usenet

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cglenwilliams · 5 months ago

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You're not going to find Midnight Mass or Haunting of Hill House on physical media, true, but physical media is still out there, there are still new titles being released, and even as Sony announces they're going to phase out their optical media releases, sales numbers have started trending up.

You know what you will find out there on disc? The Sandman, Season 1. You can also find both seasons of The Mandalorian. (None of these are affiliate links, by the way -- I'm not getting paid off of this post) As I write this, Star Trek: Discovery is taking pre-orders for the complete series on disc and every season of Lower Decks to date has gotten a blu-ray release.

If you're a 90's kid, how about the short-lived TV series of The Flash from 1990-1991? It's just gotten a brand new, remastered blu-ray release. Viz has been doing new releases of every season and movie of Sailor Moon for the anime fans, or you could pick up the first ever American release of Chie the Brat.

I'm not foolish enough to believe we can drag the studios back to physical media first and foremost -- they're all-in on streaming even as they're realizing that nobody knows how to make money off of it. But I am saying that there are still new physical media releases and if you want to start building a library of the titles you love it's not too late. Hey! Look at that! A brand new DVD release of Dexter's Lab!

Here are a few of my favorite sites to look for new movies that don't give money to Amazon -- since Amazon is pushing streaming over discs these days, anyway.

This is not a drill. Kino Lorber is mostly known for high quality releases of classic cinema and art movies, but you know what else they have? All of Columbo on blu-ray.

I'm going to repeat that, because it bears repeating.

You can get the entire 1970's run of Columbo and the 80's-through the early 2000's revival on blu-ray right freakin' now.

Gruv is run by Universal, who are still releasing a bunch of new titles every month (they're slowly releasing ALL of the extant original series of Doctor Who on blu-ray).

They also have a little series called Murder, She Wrote. Maybe you've heard of it.

They ship quickly and their sales are great -- just be aware that if you pre-order something from them, they'll take the payment right away instead of waiting until the pre-order is ready to ship.

If you like the cult side of things, Vinegar Syndrome puts out high-quality releases of older cult movies -- and their site also carries a massive selection from their partner labels, who release everything from older cult titles to brand new animation and LGBTQ+ cinema. They're a little slow to ship -- don't buy anything from their Black Friday sale that you expect to give as a Christmas gift, for example -- but they're working to speed up their infrastructure.

Sci-fi, anime, and a brand new 4k release of Weird Al Yankovic's UHF -- if you're not buying direct from Shout! then what are you doing with your life?

It's not too late! Get a 4k player and start building that physical media library now!

seriously FUCK netflix and most other streaming services!!!! i miss physical media so much!!! behind the scenes footage, bloopers, interviews, cast/director/producer commentaries etc… bring this back, damn it!!!!

#physical media #dvd #blu ray #movies #television #build your collection #to save mankind Netflix must die #columbo #murder she wrote #star trek #The Falcon and the Winter Soldier has been released on disc too #I swear if you guys convince Disney to stop releasing discs before She-Hulk gets a 4k I will burn down the building

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rabbitcruiser · 4 days ago

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World Television Day

For those of us who grew up in the western countries, the television is almost taken for granted; it has always been there in the corner of the front room, entertaining us with bright colors and sounds, or satisfying our need to learn something new. The television, invented by an assortment of individuals in the late 19th and early 20th century, but often attributed to John Logie Baird, has revolutionized the world.

For the first time moving images could be adequately projected from around the world into the homes of ordinary people, bringing a new level of access to information and entertainment previously only dreamed of. The social and political changes brought about by this innovation were so profound that it was decided to appreciate the medium formally, on a global scale.

The first World Television Forum was staged by the United Nations in the mid ’90s, and it was out of this event that World Television Day was born. The forum brought together leading figures from the media industry to analyze the growing impact that TV had on decision-making and public opinion when it comes to issues of peace and security around the planet.

History of World Television Day

In December 1996 the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed the 21st of November World Television Day, the same year the first World Television Forum was held. According to the United Nations, this decision was taken in order to give recognition to the increasing impact television has had on decision-making by bringing various conflicts and threats to peace and security to the world’s attention, as well as its coverage of other major issues, including economic and social.

Prior to this people received information via radio broadcasting, if a household was equipped with a transistor radio, and the newspapers. Early television broadcasts followed the same format as radio, with a man reading a simple bulletin on a black and white screen. The technology however soon evolved to include images of events and interviews with people. The monochrome style was abandoned when color technology was developed in the mid to late sixties, and TV technology continues to advance with evermore sophisticated optics and digital enhancements.

However, World Television Day is not meant to be so much a celebration of the electronic tool itself, but rather of the philosophy which it represents–a philosophy of openness and transparency of world issues. Television has long been thought to represent communication and globalization in the contemporary world, but not all of the government representatives present saw matters quite that way.

The delegation from Germany said, “Television is only one means of information and an information medium to which a considerable majority of the world population has no access… That vast majority could easily look at World Television Day as a rich man’s day. They do not have access to television. There is more important information in the media and here I would mention radio in particular.”

Despite this understandable objection, the television has still been an instrumental innovation for humanity, in the same category as the printing press, radio communication, and the internet. World Television Day is a chance for us to appreciate not only the extraordinary technological ingenuity of the scientist and engineers who made seemingly impossible things happen but also to understand the social and cultural implications that such a unifying medium has had on our global communities.

The internet has connected us in ways we didn’t expect and perhaps could not have imagined, but on World Television Day we remember that television was there first, and paved the way for what was to come.

How to celebrate World Television Day

The most obvious way to celebrate World Television Day is by watching television. But what? Surely not vulgar reality shows offering little to no value of any kind to their audience? World Television Day is a time to rewatch and relive some of the greatest moments of television that helped bring the reality of a rapidly technologically advancing world into people’s homes, forever changing their lives and how they perceived the world.

1954 marked the launch of Disney’s “Wonderful World of Color”, a family-friendly variety program that mixed iconic cartoons, drama and documentary programming. The very first televised presidential debate between Republican Vice President Richard Nixon and his challenger, relatively unknown Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy in 1960 changed the presidential elections forever.

For the first time ever, American voters actually saw the candidates present their ideas, which worked greatly in favor of the young and handsome Kennedy, who went on to win the election. And few moments, if any, in television history could ever surpass Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Ed “Buzz” Aldrin’s moon landing in 1969, which many people consider to be a pivotal moment in their lives until this very day–after that, nothing was going to be impossible again.

World Television Day was established as a way of bringing the focus back to these issues on an annual basis. In years gone by, major TV stations have come together on the day to broadcast tributes to the importance of television in people’s lives. The obvious way for anyone to celebrate is to turn on their TV and watch.

But you don’t have to rely on broadcasting networks to bring you ideas of what to watch on World Television Day. These days our television sets are also internet compatible, allowing us to access a range of content suitable to our specific interests, whether they be educational or for entertainment value. It’s easy to use your television set to look up a historical documentary giving you a window into the past or choose a cultural figure who was influential in her time and changed the world in some way. In doing so you will be in keeping with the true purpose of television media, to educate and inspire.

But if you would rather be entertained, why not select a classic film from the Hollywood archives and imagine you are watching it for the first time, as a member of the original audience. Feeling adventurous? Go all out and dress up in period costumes as well, turn World Television Day into an annual event that you and your friends can enjoy planning months in advance.

Those that want to become more involved and have ideas about how to honor the day are welcomed to send their thoughts to the official website.

Source

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lilythehopelessromantic · 2 months ago

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I’m Too Young to Be This Nostalgic

As a member of Generation Z or even younger millennials, I often find myself in a charmingly ironic position: I’m too young to be this nostalgic. The feeling is almost bittersweet, a mix of yearning for experiences I never fully lived and an awareness that my memories exist in a reality that isn't mine. Yet, as I scroll through social media or engage in conversations with friends, I can't help but feel a twinge of nostalgia for things I barely experienced firsthand. How can this be?

The Echoes of the Past

Nostalgia is often associated with older generations who reflect on their childhoods, their innocence, and the simplicity of earlier times. However, with the rise of technology and the vast availability of content, nostalgia has become a cultural currency even for those of us in our late teens or early twenties. Platforms like TikTok and Instagram are flooded with throwback trends that showcase clip after clip of past fashion, music, and even childhood television shows from decades past.

When I see a video of someone wearing butterfly clips or raving about the latest Tamagotchi, I'm struck by a feeling that’s hard to articulate. It’s a yearning for something that feels impossibly distant yet intimately familiar, as if those moments are somehow imprinted in my collective memory.

The Influence of Pop Culture

Our pop culture is a treasure trove of nostalgia, largely because of its cyclical nature. TV shows and movies from the late '90s and early 2000s are getting reboots or sequels, and the music is being reimagined or sampled in songs that top today’s charts. For someone who wasn’t even alive during the original releases, this begs the question: Why do I feel connected to it?

Perhaps it’s because of the way these pieces of art are marketed today. Series like “Stranger Things” tap into the aesthetics and cultural nuances of the past, providing a nostalgic lens through which we can engage with eras we didn’t truly experience. The fashion and music are cleverly curated to evoke a sense of wistfulness for an era that many of us associate with icons like Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys, despite never living through it.

The Melancholy of the “What If”

There’s a unique kind of melancholy that comes from nostalgia when you’re too young to have lived the moments you romanticize. It’s a “what if” scenario playing in the back of your mind—the “what if” of simpler times, carefree summers, and laughter-filled hangouts with friends. The sepia-toned filters of our childhoods glimmer with what could have been, leaving us to wonder whether we missed out on something monumental.

I often find myself imagining what it would be like to have grown up in a world before smartphones, a time when friendship meant face-to-face interactions rather than group chats. While I know that loneliness and heartbreak existed then, too, my mind drifts to the idealized moments, desperately longing for connections that felt more tangible.

Finding Nostalgia in the Present

However, while I may feel too young to be nostalgic, I can embrace the power of creating my own nostalgic experiences. Rather than wistfully looking to the past, I can focus on crafting memories in the present that I'll reflect on fondly in the years to come. Whether it’s hosting a ’90s-themed party, styling outfits inspired by the nostalgic eras I admire, or diving into the music of my parents’ youth, the nostalgia I crave doesn't have to center around what I've missed—it's about what I'm experiencing now.

In a way, our generation has the best of both worlds. We can access the past while living in the now. We can cultivate our own nostalgia-filled moments, enriched by appreciation for eras we might never see again but can still celebrate.

Conclusion: Embracing the Cycle of Nostalgia

So, yes, I’m too young to be this nostalgic, but instead of feeling burdened by that sentiment, I choose to embrace it. Nostalgia can serve as a reminder of the beauty in moments we get to create, an opportunity to look back fondly while continuing the cycle of memory-making.

As we navigate our young lives in a world filled with echoes of the past, let’s create our own experiences worth feeling nostalgic about. After all, in the end, nostalgia doesn’t just belong to those who lived it; it can also be the thread that connects generations, enriching how we understand ourselves and each other. So here's to the nostalgia yet to come!

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lifebyyounews · 7 months ago

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April 30, 2024 Ask the Team Q&A

All of the questions from the ask the team q&a with King can be found below the cut:

Q: Can you talk about any plans for a more involved wants and fears system? A popular play style is following your characters wants. These wants are context dependent and related to your character’s personality and aspiration. The wants are also medium- to long-term and progressively build on each other in a wants chain. A wants chain is when completing want A unlocks the ability to roll for a greater want B that has as a prerequisite. Any plans for something like this? A: We believe that our current system is capable of this over time. Our needs, traits, skills & quest systems are quite powerful. Its a good question. Long-term desires and autonomous behaviors are important.

Q: Can we have humans from multiple households in our active characters palette? A: Yes, your active characters are who you've interacted with most recently

Q: Will we be able to change the length of a day? I would love to be able to slow down how fast the day passes so that the libbies will have more time each day to get things done. A: Currently, we have time speed-up and time skip. Time slow-down is definitely something we will be experimenting with during Early Access.

Q: Will it be possible to mod the text on the UI menus? For example if we wanted to mod the text that appears on the character creator screen? Or if we wanted to edit the "Humans" tab in the town menu to say "Elbys" or "Youmans". A: While we don't have an editor for this currently, it is moddable. Our localization tables are .csv files for moddability, so if someone wants to make a mod to update labels, you just need to create an appropriate loc file (matching the directory layout of the base assets) and add the line you'd like to be modified.

Q: Will pregnancy be in the game at launch or will it be added later once all life stages are available? A: We have unhooked 'Pregnancy' for the start of Early Access - with that said, modders can go in and see how it works. With that said, 'Pregnancy' will be added during our Early Access period and will be available at full-launch.

Q: Are characters able to multitask? (Eat and watch TV at the same time, talk and eat at the same time, watch TV and exercise, etc)? A: Currently, this isn't something that they can do - and I suggest you drop this into ⁠requests

Q: I just want to confirm something. The recommended limit for characters in a region is currently 90. So is that the overall limit for a save file or is it possible to have multiple regions? So then if you had 2 regions you could have up to 180 characters in the one save file but only 90 of them would be loaded at once, is that correct? A: It's per region at the moment. When we add a new region, we will roll out cross-region agent populations and cross-region behaviours as well as cross-region travel.

Q: Just the same question from last time! But are we able to customize needs per character? For example can I create a vampire type character with no sleep need and a custom need to feed on blood, but still have normal base needs for everyone else? Expanding on that can we alter the amount of needs if I want to remove one or add an extra? A: Yes, we have a Needs editor! In principle, you could make that mod. But in practice, we will almost certainly need to add extra support. Part of our aim for Early Access is to extend our mod-support to make gameplay mods like this possible!

Q: My first question is, can you toggle the grid in build mode? A: Yes! And it's good practice to do this a lot - particularly placing furniture to get the angles just right.

Q: Will characters be able to cook larger serving size meals? Like for example, a group serving that other characters can grab from. And would they be able to put away leftovers? A: Not currently, but we have noted this request!

Q: Do you plan to tackle culture representation and if, how? For example, can we expect clothing, habits or objects from different European and non-european cultures (like hijabs, no shoes inside and so on)? A: We've laid out a foundation for inclusion with regards to gender, sexuality, and demographics and please let us know if there's anything more you'd like us to add in these regards. As far as cultural representation, we have added hijabs and are absolutely open to adding other cultural wearables (please add your requests in the channel!) -- That said, any religious symbols, books, and iconography will remain with modders.

Q: Will there be group activities between three and more characters? A: At the launch of Early Access, not yet. It's on the list.

#replies #reply #discord #faq #mods #modding #gameplay #general #feedback #suggestions

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rametarin · 2 years ago

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An explanation about Kuei-Jin, the 90s and other World of Darkness stuff.

Sooo. Yeah. If you watch H:tP stuff, you may have heard in the audiolog where Marckus goes pubbing that the resident weeaboo (”Grimmaline SMITH from NORFOLK, EYUU KAAYY”) is wrong about the, “special cool Asian vampire” type.

First, the bad/ Why Kuei-Jin from classic World of Darkness are so fucky.

It was the mid-late 90s. I believe, about.. 1997? 1998, maybe? Definitely between 98 and 2000, that-odd. While the more wealthy kids and more connected, worldly kids had more access to Japanese media in the US and Europe, the rest of us had no real interaction with it, and wouldn’t, until the mid-late 90s. The Sci-Fi Channel’s Saturday Anime block slowly helped introduce the idea of a translated Japanese animated phenomenon where it’d show movies and series’ of the time, going back to the 60s and 70s. The language barrier was bigger then, and sources to learn that stuff were fewer, and farther between. There wasn’t the big market for it, like today.

To most Westerners, especially former European colonies and Western Europe, Hiragana and Katakana were completely alien. The language itself was entirely incomprehensible because it didn’t function the way an Indo-European derived language worked, at all. That only added to the foreign mystique. It was like an entirely unsolvable puzzle. And in an era where the internet was just arriving at lower income bracket households because access was limited to using your phone lines (making you choose between having a phone and using the internet for hours of the day) and before the era of easy file sharing like Napster, Limewire and such, the world of anime was just plain not in everybody’s common vernacular. It wasn’t on TV, it wasn’t in most stores, nobody knew what the fuck you were talking about if you asked for it, and you had no basis of even asking for it, since it wasn’t around you.

But the culture was here, with some enlightened few even having access to Dragon Ball manga and anime translations or at least, subtitles, in the early 90s.

So in the span of a relatively VERY short amount of time, 7 years, culturally, the world of Japanese media and its misc. tropes became things western audiences became more familiar with. And, really. Speaking as someone that was a teenager in the 90s, it was a godsend. Violence and sexual themes were somewhat suppressed, socially. Legally speaking, you could have scantly clad 90s girls and guys everywhere, and hyperviolence had little to no taboos in western comics that children could read, outside how realistic it could look. But the sexual taboo remained. Yeah, the taboo among the western religious fundamentalist types, of course..

But also, western feminists.

The same western feminist that would demand free and exposed nipples on a thing because the female body was not an object to censor, would also say you weren’t allowed to ‘objectify’ and depict female bodies as a source of tittelation and fingerwag at “western society” for “sexualizing” the female body, “for profit.” They weren’t as openly criticial of capitalism for the sake of capitalism, at the time- they knew that was a hill that they’d die on trying to fingerwag morally and spread their message to other girls, so they kept it to being about female class autonomy and bodily integrity and how evil men were “exploiting iconic femininity for their own profit,” so it was kind of a tangential thing. The invisible conclusion. Instead they focused on how all the sexy female bodies (and they focused EXPLICITLY on THEIR bodies, female bodies, because transgenderism was not even in the conversation yet, because they didn’t care about male bodies but also ‘because WOMEN are the oppressed sex!’) were drawn and depicted by “cigar smoking old white MEN in a male dominated, female hostile, Old Boys Club industry.” And that meant those whom sentimentally agree but don’t do anything but regurgitate other peoples objections and vitriol would parrot those lines. That meant if you were a young lad buying a comic book with some big Lady Death boobies on it, and anybody in your community saw you buying it, they could assassinate your character by gossiping about how you were buying those, “sexist booby kids books” and that was their signal to lower your standing on the grounds you were a “sexist.” (synonymous with misogynist.) This war on comic boobies and the readers that enjoyed them drove a massive wedge between many young comic readers and comics, and it’d be some time before that stigma lifted.

So you had to leave it up to omission when dealing with girls your age. If they thought you read, “those childish, juvenile, nerdy, maladjusted comic books written by old, perverted, misogynistic white male trash,” then you were as good as a fedora wearing Nice Guy today. The stigma against Marvel and DC comics readers as pre-teens and teenagers as things explicitly for maturity stunted manchildren was rampant as a sentiment, and was impressed on those girls that wanted to seem mature for their age.

So, that meant you walked a minefield whenever you spoke to girls about comic books and many videogames, because all it took was a sort of verbal bee-dance from one before suddenly girls you knew that a few weeks ago LIKED those things, after meeting with the Problem Glasses and hearing her mean spirited tangent about how NO western comics were good because they all disrespected women and were run by men, would perform outrage and hating them now, and everybody that liked them. Whomever they knew liked them were given a silent grace period of omission from judgement before they might circumstantially check in to see if they’d, “grown up” in that time, and stopped actively buying or consuming that media, and if they happened to be in a situation to learn about a persons literature buying habits and learned you still bought comic books, or “bad videogames,” they’d de-person you and avoid you for a while. The same as they’d avoid someone they thought was a Ben Shapiro listener or a Mens Rights Awareness person. Whether or not that was true.

It was very rough. ANY depiction of a woman doing anything in a comic could net criticism and an eyeroll and hostility, whether it was playing to an unflatteringly vague trope, or it was upending and breaking the trope, it was “misogynistic white men” again. You couldn’t color inside the lines, that was wrong. Deviating outside of them, they’d call you out as just being the same evil creature trying to “lure unsuspecting women in by false change.” The absence of women in higher positions of writers or CEOs was all the proof they needed that western comics and media was misogynistic garbage, and they would not hear ANY word of the opposite.

But then something magical happened.

Japanese media. Where many mangakas were women, none of them were white, and as it was indigenous foreign media, you could not attribute that absolutely horrible sense that all misogyny and patriarchy they attributed to, “western society.” They could not aikido flip foreign comics because of their depictions of women, because, “that’s their culture.” They couldn’t patronize the story or source for just being inertia from judeo-christian western hegemony, because these were stories and arts explicitly from outside that trap. They couldn’t say Japan was “colonized,” and perpetuating western -isms and ignorance, because Japan objectively isn’t. Any objection they might have with Japanese culture, they’d have to raise as being purely criticisms of Japanese, and thus, Asian cultures. And they weren’t prepared to do that.

And then the icing on the cake; Japanese media’s depictions of femininity, the saccharine sweet, rainbows, crystals and girlish wands and big neotonous eyes, was eaten the fuck up like it was a vitamin that western women were deficient in. That nauseating Rainbow Briteness mixed with unrepentant Lisa Frank 3-Ring Binder style girlish femininity. Where if western comics did that, it was shit on as being patronizing and condescending to women, based on whom produced and created it.

Suddenly the rabblerousers that wanted to perch on media and hoot about capitalism and evil patriarchal white men objectifying women to iconically depict their bodies for profit and give them eating disorders and insecurity, and everything else rooted in cigar smoking Old Boys Clubs run by white men, had to do the unthinkable; White girls weren’t allowed to criticize foreign cultures, non-white people and especially not foreign cultures with indigenous populations and languages that they didn’t even know. They couldn’t speak from a rightously indignant and smarmy condescension about the cultural roots, because they opened themselves up to that aikido flipping and having their guts torn out around the water cooler, or at the swingset, by some other social clout jackal in a race to the bottom over whom could be the most progressive and conscientous and protective of oppressed minorities and their good name in the face of ignorance, that’d get on a soap box and point at her, make an effigy of, “her kind”- speak broadly about, “those kinds of western white people that just disregard foreign culture because it’s not English speaking, white or done by men,” and it didn’t matter the ACTUAL gripe of the person, the nodding group would collectively decide calling out a cultural supremacist white person was what was taking place here, that’s how they were going to perceive it, that’s how they were going to remember it, and at this point the person complaining about Japanese misogyny could do one of two things: 1.) Keep talking, insist they were right, try to explain themselves as in the right, and doubledown while everybody around them just saw them proving harder and harder that they just, “hated foreign cultures and non-whites,” and considered them inferior 2.) Stop talking, possibly talk about how they were going to see the error of their ways and, “be better” from now on.

The rabblerousers that would shit on and stigmatize western comics, were at a loss on how to shit on Japanese media, its often sophmoric and infantilizing depictions of female characters and femininity, and not seem like hypocrites in doing so. Plus, a lot of the stuff was so cute and pretty.

The voices quieted by the stigma of whites not being allowed to even comment on the prejudices and insensitivities of non-white foreign cultures because they weren’t European or necessarily patriarchal, and an entire population of folks that liked Japanese media in the west, flourished. They still retained the right to party poop on Marvel and DC and demand unless more women got to be western comic writers and artists and hammer at the industry from the inside for their values, but they could do absolutely nothing about the bottom shelf accessible, dime store hyperviolence, sexy Japanese manga and anime that any pre-teen could reach and enjoy under the noses of their parents.

Well that’s a big mouthful, but where do the Kuei-Jin fit in?

I’m getting to that.

So Sailor Moon and Magic Knight Rayearth and a bunch of anime made it cool and acceptable, even in the niche cartoon loving community, to like foreign media. First among the sort of hip and with it kids that could just watch foreign media because of close proximity to it, and then when some of them got the bright idea to slowly introduce it to primetime American broadcasting. First with things like Sci-Fi’s Saturday Anime, and then with Cartoon Network’s Toonami and Adult Swim.

So you had a culture where suddenly the sexual ratio of female roleplayers and writers got much larger and more fun. Anime was by nature more cavalier with how you could safely depict female bodies and sexuality- and by nature, it could get away with a HELL of a lot more things than western culture was allowed to do- socially. Not legally, in the tolerances and sentiments of the readership and audience. Norms in manga and Japanese comics and why it was okay in one thing, were different than norms from western ones, where a more, “critical lens” (wink wink) would be used, and conscience would scrutinize the legitimacy. The same kind of “boobs pop out” joke that was funny and cute and harmless and innocent in a Japanese comic book, might reap a frown and a casting down if it was so cavalierly done in a general audience western comic.

It was an unspoken atmosphere and a hypocrisy. Everybody knew it. Talking about it was not something that was going to be easy, or occur in any sort of centralized place, since many didn’t even want to acknowledge that there was a double standard and different tolerances and expectations. Because that’d admit racism was taking place here, where everything west was wrong and evil and because of “corporations and business and greed,” to be avoided, but anything Eastern was wholesome and valid and made with the best of intentions.

Enter: The Rationalizer. Powered by white guilt and a love of naked nipples in their cartoons, “very cultural” despite the fact the only other culture they care about is Japanese, they try to maintain that western feminism was right and appease them and their theories and their broadbrush generalizations of patriarchal cultures, while also stanning and steelmanning Japanese media, hard. By talking about how just so much better and more honest and more valid it was. Boob jokes in the west? Degrading, sexually objectifying, misogynistic trash poopoo immature yucky. Boob jokes in Ranma 1/2 and Tenchi Muyo? FUNNIEST SHIT I EVER SAW.

And they were just like that about everything and wanted you to know it. Sorta superfan that’d take up doing tai chi in a public park just to be watched and witnessed and asked about what they’re doing, so they can talk with authority about tai chi in the park. Because y’know, they’re so worldly. And in some cases, picking up Buddhism, Taoism or Shintoism, because they’re just, so spiritual.

Enter the whole, “superior Japanese culture,” meme, and using the katana as an example of the artisanship and romantic combination of world and spirit that was their manufacturing process. “Superior Nippon steel, folded a million times! They could cleave armor to pieces, not like crude European steels that weren’t folded at all and took no care in their creation!”

Yeah. An entire generation of young people went through this Cringy Culture Obsessor fan stage. Together. Superfans of Studio Ghibli, Shonen Jump and more.

Year of the Lotus was World of Darkness’ foray into this mental space when they tried to make like D&D and put Oriental Adventures into their otherwise urban fantasy modern roleplaying game. Where they took a million different names from a million different Asian cultures, languages and communities and made these Frankenstein’s Monsters of the Kindred of the East.

Kuei-Jin are not Cainites, per se. They’re not descended from Caine. Instead, Kuei-Jin in World of Darkness are more like Wraiths in form and function than western Vampires, but they’re also eaters of flesh, blood and soul, like vampires. Zombies and ghosts and why they exist and how they operate are very different from ones derived from European folklore and mainstream religious interpretations, in countries largely rooted in majority headspaces of Buddhism, Shinto and Taoism.

So Kuei-Jin have elements of the Hopping Dead, hungry ghosts and similar, simultaneously being different creatures from different folklore. They can spend the energy gained from drinking blood, like western vampires, but more painly can shift between Yin and Yang with time and experience to be more alive or more dead and reap the benefits of such. They can’t ghoul mortals (far as I know?) and they aren’t Embraced the way western vampires are. Rather, a mortal has to die to come back as a Kuei-Jin, and go to hell. Their own personal hell. Where their soul bisects itself into a self-destructive shadow, and the humanity. They claw their way back to the material world, inhabit their old body, and then hunt for flesh for the vital energies of the human living. Where other Kuei-Jin retrieve them and civilize them.

They aren’t like western vampires, at all, and they aren’t like Cainites in World of Darkness games.

Their powers are just so much more elegant. Unlike western vampires, they can harmonize with nature and the supernatural world around them. They don’t go from the hierarchy of how close they are to Caine for their ultimate power, they go from another kind of ladder entirely. The concept of their own personal enlightenment; their Dharma. And it functions like a Mage’s Arete.

A Kuei-Jin gaining a level of Dharma is like Pyotr, lowering his generation through Diablerie. Their chi pool gets bigger, how much they can burn in a turn gets bigger, the ceiling of mastery for their Disciplines gets larger (so rather than being limited to a 5 in a discipline, they can hit 6. Or higher, depending) and in all ways, a Kuei-Jin as depicted, is capable of more harmony, enlightenment and general spiritual goodness than any evil western poopoo Cainite foreign gaijin vampire..

And that’s kind of why people didn’t like them much. They overachieved making them so different that, quite simply, they made Asian lands dominated by a different set of supernatural rules. They made Asian Vampires and Asian Hungry Dead (wraiths) and Asian Changing Beasts (Hengeyokai) so much better than the evil, barbaric and stupid European counterparts. Talked about how Western Vampires were like that partially because the Consensus of Reality, made up of different cultural majorities and time giving regions their own cultural spheres, were limited and stifled and stagnant because of how oppressive and dogmatic and wrong Judeo-Christianity is compared to how spiritual and pure and wonderful cultures that practiced Buddhism and Taoism and Shintoism, how more Asian cultures were easier on the enviornment and the spirit world- and it was only western modernity, industry and “western style pollution” that was ruining Asia.

So after the Year of the Lotus, after the fans kind of played for a while, worked through the self-hate they were being fed from the high muckedy mucks in the counterculture (whom are, ultimately, no different from the mainstream muckedy mucks and their Disneyfication of social matters, they’re just indie and hipster about it and opposed to capitalism, durrdurrdurr) folks started complaining about how they couldn’t really mix the splats of Asia with the non-Asian ones, because when you mixed the fantasy spheres, the Asian ones always look like they have sunshine flying out of their assholes and are just more spiritually pure compared to the gothic horror and fuckups of everywhere else.

White-Wolf kind of walked back from Year of the Lotus material and made the creative decision to be agnostic about mixing the splats again, but they couldn’t totally walk back from what they made, so they just sort of marginalized the Eastern material and do what they could with it.

Now, having said that..

Yes, Year of the Lotus was an entire generation of pulp readers and gothic urban fantasy/horror readers cringy Weeaboo Phase, written by Alpha Weebs and consumed by westerners. Today we regard it as very culturally insensitive tripe, written and produced by privileged assholes that had no idea how terrible they were being by using the names for religious and spiritual concepts and characters without having been born in and raised by that culture or being part of it.

But many of the names and titles in it are NOT like plucking up names from Native American Mythology. You can’t gatekeep “evil westerners” from depicting, say, Makai and traditional Japanese ghosts, because the Japanese depict those in their media. And similarly, many Easterners that are part of a religion like Buddhism and Taoism would not object to comic books depicting their mythology, be they whimsical folklore ghosts or tales from their religious texts, would not say doing so is bad purely because the foreigners doing it are not of their religion, or aren’t Asian, making it bad.

Kuei-Jin could use a rethinking, I quite agree. While Hunter: the Parenting has chosen to completely eliminate them from their depiction of the franchise (as is their right to do as creators of their own story, using elements of World of Darkness lore as the basis) that’s quite a large step.

And ironically, this is one of those 90s things that happened through overcompensation and, attempts at representation, if you can believe it. Because ghosts and walking dead across Asia, with their historically dominant folklore and belief systems and magic, are most definitely different from classic European concepts of death, life and unlife. When Kindred of the East were first conceived of, they weren’t Kuei-Jin. They were Cainites, the same as any others.

However, they didn’t like the very Eurocentrist idea that all vampires should have to be descended from Caine, as their initial concept depicted. That would mean Vampires could be no older in mythology than Hebrew myths, which themselves were only a few thousand years old, compared to many Asian civilizations, which were comparatively older and had their own cultural myths of genesis and originators and founders. And instead, tried to make the Hopping Dead of Asian myths their own distinct creature, not bound by the ideas of western irredeemable sinners and unlife. More Buddhism, more Shintoism, more Taoism in the functions of how they functions.

In short, they wanted to do what they did with Christianity for Vampires and elevate Eastern religions to as important to the meta story and the metaphysics, as Judeo-Christian ones operating with V:tM. Believe it or not, this was an attempt to humble and marginalize the very Eurocentrist, Judeo-Christian perspective on being undead and supernatural, with the Eastern religions’ views on redemption and the difference between life from the supernatural.

And the mishmashing of names? Western ignorance, but with the intention of applying the same consolidation ignorance and insensitivity to Asian folklore and culture, that they did to European ones. The vampire clans of V:tM are all different cultures’ different and distinct depictions of vampires and blood drinking supernatural creatures, blended into one animal they decided would arbitrarily be descended from the first vampire, Caine.

We recognize what was done to Asian cultural diversity and myths and religion as a travesty, making salad out of so many different peoples folklore and naming conventions and merging things that shouldn’t be made the same creature. And yet a great many of you fuckers that say Europe has no culture and that whites themselves have no culture, would not say the same thing about combining a German Nosferatu with an Eastern European/Slavic Strigoii into the same creature, making them just variations with differing mechanics of the same kind of creature. A vampire.

You cannot reconcile the two. Either what was done to European myths of the walking dead was insensitive exploitation of culture, or what they did to different Asian myths wasn’t. If one is acceptable, so is the other. And at the end of the day, just because something is culture, does not make it untouchable or beyond criticism. Especially not if you say, “Well, white people don’t get to criticize Asian culture/mythology.”

So it’s okay to dislike the Kuei-Jin/Kindred of the East. Absolutely. They mix thematically with the rest of the World of Darkness like putting X-men in the same toybox you’d find Goku and Guyver, and to similar and predictable results of trying to play with them together in the land of make believe. The conflicting way they operate is just irreconcilably different.

But please keep some idea in mind exactly what your issue and problem is with the Kuei-Jin/Oriental Adventure type stuff. If your issue with Kuei-Jin is that they weren’t created or balanced in the meta with the rest of the World of Darkness, and seem more like some bridge towards the Exalted tabletop game that’s hinted to be related to World of Darkness spiritually, okay.

If your complaint is that white people shouldn’t be allowed to put Umbrella Ghosts from Japanese mytholgoy in their games or stories, or depict elements of Yokai or Makai or any religious figures from Buddhism, Taoism or Shintoism, kindly be quiet, the adults are talking. Your race and your culture should not be able to stop you from putting fictional creatures in your fictional work. Some dude in Japan shouldn’t need Europe’s or any sort of European group council’s permission to add a Slavic or Medditeranian monster like a vampire into their videogame or manga, any more than Fred from Ohio should need Japan’s official Ninja school’s permission to have Ninjas in his dime store comic book. And the fact some of those characters and mythological creatures play into real life religion’s figures means nothing; European style mythology and folklore about the Fey shouldn’t mean we refuse to make fiction about the Fey, and the reason that’s okay for us is NOT because, “well we’re colonizers and we colonized the world so that’s their culture anyway. So they can write stories about the Sidhe but we can’t write about Rakshasa.” I reject that nonsense. Unless you also think non-Christians shouldn’t be able to make demons in the vein of European mythological demons (animal horns, hooves, red skin), kindly walk back this terrible point of view.

Anglophone fans of World of Darkness that live in and descend from Asian cultures and populations, living in Asia, would be especially helpful to reimagine Kuei-Jin so they can retain the thematic folkloric elements and the blending of cultural and religious spirituality, without losing anything. It’s kind of what they’re doing with their reimagining of the Assamites into the Banu Haqim from the less than flattering interpretation of Arabian assassin vampires, and the very problematic Ravnos- previously described as “Gypsies” and now tied tentatively to Romani and India.

At their core, they’re just humans that died, went to a horrible netherworld and afterlife, and came back from the dead by splitting their soul into a self-destructive part and their own humanity. At the game’s core, Kuei-Jin are just supposed to be affected by the religion and culture of where they came from and what surrounds them- which is what shape regional depictions of supernatural creatures native to a region in the first place!

And at the end of the day, all of these depictions of folkloric monsters are rooted in ethnographic culture anyway. A Greek vampire will not be the same as a German vampire. And similarly, a Laotian Kuei-Jin may not be the same as a Viet Namese Kuei-Jin. How they’re named and the funny mechanics and nuances of how they work will change, but in spirit, they’ll be the same creature.

To be honest, I think the choice might be interesting. For those that think they’d rather Cainites just be the standard kind of vampire in the World of Darkness. Whether they play normal Cainites, or whatever name that will be chosen in place of Kuei-Jin that’s more culturally relevant and sensitive. Some people may prefer that no such creatures as what the Kuei-Jin are, exist, and everything just be more compatibly V:tM, but set in Asia. Others may like the idea of the vampire as depicted as a returned from the dead creature with a more Buddhist or Taoist point of view. Some people would just like to be included and not have the baggage of Asia just being obligatory Kuei-Jin territory.

Whatever the solution, we kind of need more game fans internationally. People that know their own homeland and language and geography and regional folklore and what sort of metaphysics and mythology it’s based on, and if they’d prefer the conventional antediluvian vampire clans, or the Hungry Ghost types.

To date, the reason why V:tM avoided even talking about Cainites even going further into Asia is because of the stigmas associated with Westerners writing fiction in Asia- to do so opens the author up to all sorts of criticism, real or knee-jerk, that they’re just doing it wrong. Sometimes by actually doing it wrong, sometimes it’s considered wrong on the basis of it being a white person doing it, whether educated and culturally sensitive, or not.

Whether you prefer Kuei-Jin or some more modern, cleaned up, less Weeaboo version of them as they are, or you’d like to see more Cainite style vampires making history in the World of Darkness across Asia, and supernatural night life across Asia, we could definitely use more Asian player and gamers input on this. The vast majority of the writers and staff for this western game will, unavoidably, be white and derived from Europeans. Just by virtue of the majority population where they live, and whom are already fans of WoD. But this just means fans internationally are needed now, more than ever. If only to put your input into it, and if you like it, rubber stamp the initiative. The loudest voices that will decry a thing will be doing it largely because it’s a western depiction of anything Asian in culture, and reason it can’t be done properly, only exploitatively and abusively, based purely on that fact.

That’s kind of the problem the game faces right now, and it’s one I think we, in the era of social media and multinational tabletop gamers, fiction and pulp readers and appreciators from a plethora of backgrounds, can work out.

But that’s the issue the Kuei-Jin face in modern WoD, and kind of what worked up to why they didn’t function with the rest of it. It can’t all just be attributed to insensitive white westerners. Some of it was just being swept up in a trend, some of it was well meaning respect towards native folklore to not justmake it Eurocentrism elsewhere, some of it was limitation of experiences.

Hope this helps. It’s by no means definitive and I encourage further research on your own about the subject.

#Kuei-Jin #World of Darkness #Vampire: the Masquerade #90s #old games made modern

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ficsnroses · 4 years ago

Text

Ultrasound; - John Wick x Reader

4.3k words

summary : you’re 4 months pregnant, and your husband john is everything you’ve ever wanted. however, he misses your ultrasound appointment, leading to you being upset with him.

warnings : pregnant reader. angst, but also lots of fluff! x f! reader.

notes : requested by lovely anon! I really hope you enjoy this, lovie. I know you had asked for a heated argument, however, I just couldn’t bring myself to write John being angry at his s/o. he’s too much of a softie :) as always, please do leave comments and feedback, it means so much! I’m a little nervous for this one aH be kind pls ily xx

At the glass paned, brittle white front door, you stand, a cautious hand placed to the swell of your growing belly, a stray strand of hair falling to your eye as your husband John, kisses a gentle goodbye to your cheek.

“Are you sure you have to go?” You ask, off put, shining eyes with your lip bitten, as if you’d wanted to say more. John had been leaving on early mornings such as today often, far more frequent as of late; you’d be lying if you’d projected it didn’t chip off a small shard of your heart each time he’d leave you for the day.

He’d be back, later. In the evening perhaps, after you’d settled into the cozy depths of the living room couch, a sickly dessert in hand and your preferred 90’s sitcom portrayed in reruns on the blue TV screen, or as you’d retire to bed, awaiting his body to come occupy the vacant spot beside.

“Yeah.” John heavily sighs, briefly announcing his downcast glare to the floor, before reverting those much familiar, chocolate eyes to yours. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. But I really do.” Subtle guilt pinched at his darkened features, beard groomed fresh to a handsome trim. His hand smoothes over the small of your back, quietly waiting,

for you to end your farewell.

“It’s just…” You trickle, eyes focusing anywhere, but on his. You didn’t mean to press; you’d reminded him of today’s upcoming events much in the last week. “We have the appointment later this afternoon.” You allow, a final time, blinking back guilt for perhaps, over doing it with the constant reminders. “Are you sure you’ll make it in time?”

-an exchange for the true feelings that had been brewing inside, as of late. On the tip of your tongue they twirled, bubbling, bubbling, boiling, and you’d known, perhaps to the slightest mishap, they’d spill over.

But for now, as your husband holds you, tentatively sure he’d return in time, you bite your tongue, choosing to trust him.

Trust. It was the band that held your marriage together.

John softly smiles, offering a squeeze to your palm. “Promise.” Assuring, his Mustang 69’ keys fish out of his pocket with a jingle, equipped to his stockier fingers. “You’re still okay to meet at the doctor’s office?” With every cell in his being, John would have preferred to stay home, with you, awaiting the appointment time.

Yet, odds never worked in his favour. He’d have to go, he’d have to be reminded of the dark that wouldn’t let its best man go easy, even on the most joyful days, such as today. A day that should have been reserved for his loving wife, who meant the world to him and more, and their baby, who would come into the world in a mere 5 months. When nimble fingers reach for the collar of his brown leather jacket, his love nods, faking her best executed smile in return.

John knew you, well as the back of his hand. He knew you weren’t pleased with the idea of him leaving, wherever he was off to today. Yet, he knew you’d often

bite your tongue,

for him. John knew he’d struck gold when he’d found you, when you’d fell in love with him, and him, immensely with you. In your relationship, there had been much darkness. Much obscurity, much ambiguity to the life John lived separate from the one you shared together. You know about John’s profession, and the hurt he’d caused to many wretched souls. When he was home, with you, your John is a daydream, in human form.

Soft, gentle, caring. Words fall short of the mountain that is your man.

Yet the day he’d told you, of the culpability, the shame that resides within him; claws through each regret ridden seam, each sorrow droned bone in his body,

nothing changed within you.

You didn’t fall out of love. You didn’t fall less. The same hands that held yours, held knives and guns, slaughtered the lives of many. But they’d given life to you. The day your John told you he’d lost count of the souls he’d taken, you’d vowed to love him regardless. To accept him with whatever baggage he came with. He kept the details of his whereabouts, and the deeds he’d succumb to scare.

Mixing you with the life he so desperately wanted to escape was the last thing he’d wanted to do. So you let him, you let him keep mum on scattered details and fine points of who the famed Boogyman was,

You promised to see in him, just John.

John Wick, your husband, who deserves more than anyone the life you’ve built together. A beautiful home in a secure neighbourhood, a house filled with love, a house feels warm, painted with white crisp walls that hold no dark, enveloped in the anticipation of tiny feet sputtering down the open halls someday soon.

“I’ll meet you there, then. Drive safe, and call me if you change your mind, I’ll send a taxi your way.” He quietly reminds, still holding the hand that had painted colour to his black and white guarded walls. You’d opened long drawn curtains that closed to all that came; you were the first to let sunlight in, allow it to kiss his skin for the first time, in a long, long time.

“I love you.” John smiles. “So much. Stay safe, okay? I’ll call you.” He adds, a final time, before instilling a soft kiss to your plump stained lips, your own hand smoothing a wrinkle off his shirt clad chest.

“Love you too.” You quietly smile, holding your bump as you gaze him out the white paned front door, off to somewhere you’d never asked.

You’d bit your tongue, for him,

Yet again.

The doctor’s office air proves cold, chilled to an icy, unsympathetic hail. With a hand to your bump, and a much growing pierce to your now aching temple, your brows frown and an uneased anger surfaces inside.

John promised.

One minute to appointment time.

‘He’ll come. He’d walk through the door any second,’ muses your heart.

‘He won’t. He hasn’t responded to any calls, or messages.’ Punctuates your mind.

He didn’t forget. Something must have come up. He wanted to be here.

Thoughts, ponderings, half attempted assurances to your own worn out mind.

He shouldn’t have gone. He shouldn’t have left. He shouldn’t have let anything come up. That was his job as the father of this child.

He needed to be here today. He knew how much this means to you.

It should have meant enough to him to be here.

You, your baby,

should have meant enough.

“Mrs. Y/N Wick?” The call of your name disrupts your whirlwind of destructive thoughts. Perhaps it was your emotions that had been working overtime as of late, perhaps it was the distance between you and John.

Perhaps it was the scars burned into your tongue. The toxins that burned being bitten down.

Gnawed, bitten,

concealed,

covered.

Sat in the cold leathered office bed chair, your OB-GYN spins you a warm smile, and you smile back best as you can, although reluctantly so. Masquerading joy had proven tough, when the hand that should have been holding yours right now proves absent. You sink further into the bed, hem of your top rolled up just below your breasts to allow the doctor access.

“How are you today, Y/N?” She shines, layering on a pair of blue latex gloves, prior to smearing a cold, frigid gel to your tummy. The chill of the balm had always sent shivers peppering down your spine, you’d clenched John’s hand firmer to the feel at your previous check ups. “I’m doing well.” You lie, you bite the truth. Wispy fingers thread together, placed on your lap.

“John’s not here today?” She wonders, preoccupied with the transducer probe equipped in her left grip, her right still smearing the cold gel to your bump. The sound of the radiology machine powering echoes your ears, and you relieve a soft exhale, sure not to cast your dreary emotions too much.

The last thing you needed right now, was to spill your long shielded, buried emotions to your OB-GYN, who was solely trying to do her job. “No, he’s not.” You dryly return, swallowing thickly in declaration more to yourself, than to anyone else.

Her eyes gloss over your features, eyes focused on the beige office walls, fingers twiddling in your enclosed grip. “Everything alright?” She wonders, to your half lost execution, a noticeable dread on your mind, weighing.

“Of course.” You lie, you smile with an emptiness void of usual warmth, through untruthful teeth. “I would appreciate it if we could get started as soon as possible.” You request, wanting none more than to be left alone.

To sift through long pent up feelings, frustrations and worries that brewed inside; to allow hostage feelings pleading to be let free, overtake your mind.

The couch feels colder than normal; or perhaps it was the room.

A room, that fell cold, longing for someone else to be in it.

John.

The appointment concluded a little over an hour ago, a full pot of mint tea sits brewing on the coffee table as you await his arrival. The clock ticks in the distance, your mind shuffling a million thoughts a minute.

He’s not home. He hasn’t been home.

You’d bit your tongue, far too long.

He’d seared a cut. He’d butchered into a part of you, and you wonder when you’d forgotten the way you used to be.

You ponder; when you’d started to settle for his absence. A fire boils inside, lathers, toils. The scorch of long concealed feelings pent up, brewing in secret. Had the sound of a heavy door closing shut not broke your contemplation, you’d perhaps shed a few warm tears, unannounced. Unwelcomed dew that may have just glided off your cheeks, the weight of a million bricks released.

You’d heard his heavy footsteps on their way in, the sound of Dog’s excited paws trotting along the floor as he runs towards his bestest friend.

John-

the one person you’d thought you could share anything with. Count on for anything, had left you deserted. He’d been building a wall around, leaving you left all alone, in the grey dark. Shackled with dread, the conversation that you knew would follow tonight, is something you’d prayed would never rehearse between you and your John.

Yet, perhaps that was the problem. Your John, seemed to be lost. The man you fell in love with, would leave the world behind if you’d asked him to.

He’d made it clear; you and him against the world.

Nothing was larger, nothing was sweeter than what he’d made with you. He’d been ecstatic when you’d found out you were pregnant, promised to never leave your hand the entire way through.

You yearn for that John again;

Beg.

Hope.

Plead.

Yearn. You yearn for your husband, again. Burn, crash, crumble, the feelings become too much, the anger pounds inside. Indignant, blue, muddled, hurting, hurting, hurting-

“Y/N,”

His voice. A confliction at it’s finest. To fall into his arms and pour out your heart, or to fight. To make him feel the ache he’d doused your heart in.

The toxins on your lips threaten to burn; they’ll sear your cheeks, drip a dark tar with each syllable, each vowel that falls. The sharp edges will only cut further. A faint frown lingers the planes of your face, and you shake your head, gaze downcast when he inches further into the room, stance preparing to kneel in front of you on the hardwooden floor. He smells faintly of the air outside; crisp, winter auburns and sharp wind. Yet there’s that familiar, warmer spice. Something that kisses his skin, reminds you of home.

You don’t remember when you started looking at him, and seeing home. It’s been far too long, and now, it’s all you know.

It’s tough being angry at someone, who loves so deep;

John loves with his entirety. John feels with each inch of his battered skin; his bones remember the chill of feeling null.

Stare melting into the crackling fireplace, you avoid his gaze, ignore his touch when a heavy hand rests to your thigh. Warm, comforting, a reminder of the way his touch had the ability to stitch each ripping seam inside you; to mend, and adorn flowers all over.

But his touch, holds no triumph today.

The flowers didn’t bloom,

the slits only gushed.

“Baby, I’m sorry-”

It comes in flashes. Bold, like a lightening bolt.

Boom

Boom.

“Don’t.” You whisper a grit, jaw tightening with a pounding ache to your temple protruding. “Do not try and explain yourself.”

Firm; like a lightening bolt. Much to your dismay, his cocoa kissed hair falters in hues; long, curtained along the frame of his face. Coffee eyes show repulse, a certain sadness you remember from long, long ago.

A sorrow you hadn’t seen often since you’d given him your heart, for his in return. “You don’t get to explain yourself.” You speak; firm, assertive, tears pricking in watery jewels in the corners of your orbs. Perhaps it was the high of pregnancy hormones, or the dire of the situation. For the first time, with John, today marked the start of something you’d never felt before.

You felt forgotten. Less than.

“I told you how much I wanted you with me. I told you how important today was to me.” Tone dreary, John’s heart practically sliced into a million pieces, at mercy of the dagger that was your wounded voice.

Grim, an aching pound stings his nerves, crinkled lines of stress embroidered to his forehead, and his spine unravels in a lean into your skin, his hands coming to engulf around yours in a tender hold. “Baby, I know and I’m-”

Lightening. Swift; sharp.

“No!” You almost shout, hands pulled out of his larger, rougher ones. “You do not get to explain yourself.” The words had come out harsher than intended, the cuts had been deeper than thought. They pour, and a river streams. A flood of built up emotion, a cry your tears won’t bear hold.

“Baby, don’t yell.” A quiet John speaks lowly, barely heard with a gaze avoidant of yours. “It’s not good for our baby girl.” He seems tense. He feels, he feels with each inch of his bones. Still, his hand never leaves your thigh, resting, reminding you that he’s there now. And he will be.

He will be, for good.

Yet, his words only pierce into you further; the blade twists in your skin. Huffing a sneered chuckle, your eyes blink away unwanted tears, the moment needing your assertion more than a wave of vulnerable grief. “Our baby?” Veins course with something so icy, so frozen; an agonizing burn claws away at your temples, features far from forgiving. You knew the words that threatened to brew up on your tongue were far from the truth. You knew they held far more weight than he deserved to bear.

“Because I feel almost as if she’s just my baby with how absent you’ve been, John.”

After thunder, after lightening, comes rain. Perhaps the worst, of them all. Cold, condescending, long pouring rain; it pelts in darkness, loud, leaving its mark on the drought terrain. It pours quietly, yet stridently all at once. It seeps, and it seeps, and it seeps, until it stops.

Only, no one knows. When it’ll stop.

“I’ve been alone. I’ve been feeling alone. You’ve made me feel alone.”

Rain. Pelting, and pelting, and pelting.

This stream of misery, these awful words, declarations. You know he’s hurting. You’re hurting him. You’re doing the one thing, you promised you’d never do to him. His breathe remains calm, collected, his eyes seldom avoid yours. His hand leaves your thigh, allowing, respecting your space. Those cocoa kissed eyes hold a weight heavier than the sear of a million burns.

You almost want, plead for him to say something back; to anguish the fire.

It’s hard getting mad at someone who doesn’t raise their voice. Its tough being angry at someone,

like your John.

You’ve knew you were lying. You knew your words held zero truth. He hadn’t been making you feel alone. He’d been waking up curled into your skin, holding your hand through the dreadful nights. He’d been sacrificing sleep, putting himself second to make sure you were alright.

To make sure his baby was alright. Yet, his efforts had proved unsuccessful, nonetheless. Because as of late, he had been coming home later. He had been leaving earlier, he had been away. He had left you alone.

Quiet, filled with regret, his voice carries a burden; the burden of hurting the only person that had ever truly mattered to him. Of hurting the women who he loves, adores, more than the stars adore the moon. “I’ll make it up to you, sweetheart. I promise.” John speaks, eyes insistent with guilt.

Make it up. He’ll make it up. Another broken promise, your mind threatens, yet your heart whispers. It whispers, that he will. John had a way, John has an inherent kindness. Your lips pursue, the words needing to come out. You needed to be heard today. You needed to know he understood.

Laced with aggravation, your voice flows off your lips in rougher tides than intended. “I don’t need you to make it up, John.” You explain, calmer, collected. Firm. “I just need you to be here. And if that’s something you can’t do, I need you to tell me now.” Twisted with agony, your heart feels heavy in your chest. “My child needs a father who will be there.”

“Our child.” John interrupts, correcting, quietly, respectfully.

He knew better than to argue with his pregnant, hormone loaded wife. Nonetheless, that didn’t mean he would let her abdicate the fact that he is the father of their child. Although they hadn’t met yet, John knew. He could feel it in his bones. She would be the payoff. His baby would hold his entire heart, along with her mommy.

Each part of John yearns for nothing but his wife and child. They are all that matters. They are the payoff; the decades of grim sin that conjure on his fingertips would finally, at last lay to rest because of them. For them.

Quietly, a muffled sigh, heavy, tense, leaves your mauve stained lips. A faint frown lingers the depths of your face, something filled with melancholy confession. A heaviness fills the silent room still, occupied with nothing but your two worn out souls, desperately longing for nothing more, than for this nightmare to be over.

John and you don’t argue. Despite small disputes over shoes left at the front door, or a towel left discarded without care to the bathroom floor, this isn’t something John and you do. It isn’t something small. It isn’t something you can brush off, forget about a minute thereafter.

John and you, complete each other. You compliment each other. You fight for each other.

His heart and yours, are old, old friends.

The water rises, a river flows from your mouth. Steeping thoughts the stitched seams even, cannot bear hold. With a lingering sadness peppered to your tenor, you sigh heavily, head falling downcast to gaze the floor below. John watches you, in a drown of his own guilt; sadness of his own.

He longs to hold you; it had been far too long without.

“You’re always away in the day as of late, and I hate that the only time I really see you is when you come home to sleep.” You begin, voice cut with sorrow. “Sometimes I lay awake in the late of night, savouring the feeling of you just holding me. Touching me. Because I’ve began to get comfortable with knowing moments like that only happen during the night.” Deeper and deeper, each cut wounds into your skin. “I hate it John.” You confess, longing for those strong, toned arms to scoop you up and assure you everything would be okay. That he would tell you what’s been going on, let you in. “I don’t want to be comfortable in knowing you’re not around.”

A slight chuckle shines through your raspy throat, yet the utter sorrow never fails to paint each feature as the words continue to fall. There’s a certain vulnerability in your tone, a certain weakness you wish you could hide. “My body is changing, and I’ve been feeling low. I’m scared of not being what she deserves when she comes.” You barely whisper, tears pricking, a hand resting on your growing belly. A small drop falls, the pent up weight of a billion timid thoughts. “Feeling like you’re maybe not all in anymore makes me feel,” If a word, could even portray the density, the sheer torment of the thought of life with John being anything less than what you hoped. “..Awful.” You cease, a lip quivering. “I feel so awful, John.”

Downcast, your eyes scan the floor, heart pounding, the stillness killing you. John watches you, eyes doused with remorse. Quietly, he’d barely heard your words, strung together. A pair of beautiful eyes dilate with nothing, but blue, as they search his dark orbs.

“John, are you falling out of love with me?”

Sharp.

Shrill.

You swore something inside him broke. Something twisted and turned, left a deep puncture; wounded him for good.

Like a lightening bolt. You’d sunk the needles where it hurts the most.

Weary of his silence, you continue. Unsure of the outcome, yet allowing the river that falls your lips, to flow free, full, at last. “I just…I miss you so much. I don’t need anything but you right now.” Bitten to your lip, a choked sob threatens to surface, although you manage to keep yourself collected. “I don’t want anything but you; I never have.”

And with those words, John’s weary limbs resist the hold no more. Kneeling in front of you as you sit still on the grey couch, John pulls your frame close, so close, that you hear the steady rhythm of his heart. His body is warm, brimmed with love; you feel the soak of a few strayed tears from his eyes seep into the supple skin of your neck.

He holds you so close.

And you hold him; the way it was always meant to be.

With your arms firmly wrapped around his body, you sink into his skin, melting in the touch of the man you love most. Eyes closed, you breathe in his scent, and he threads his fingers in tender strokes to your hair. Honey drenched kisses press to your shoulder, your neck, the side of your head as he quietly finds the right words to surface; nevertheless, feeling as if anything at all would fall short for what he felt in this moment.

John Wick, sees nothing in this world, but you. As a few more moments of silent relish pass, he pulls his head back a mere few inches, still holding your body so close. With his callous thumb brushing a gentle stroke just under your eye, his thin taut lips kiss a tender, soft peck to where a tear had once fell from your cheek, his eyes still soaking in gloom. With his voice, deep, rich as butter, yet rasped, he speaks softly, silked into your ears, never breaking eye contact.

“I’ve been trying to get out.” Velvet. He speaks, as if the finest of velvet. “And I did, I left that part of me behind today.” Swallowing thick, John inches in closer, kissing a soft, gentle kiss to your eye, that had been haven to nothing but drifted tears earlier. “For you, and for our baby girl.”

Close, proximate, he holds you. His touch alone, fixes everything. “You are all I want. Here, is where I want to be. I’m so sorry I made you feel that way.” He whispers, his forehead resting to yours as you cup his perfectly groomed, bearded cheek. “I didn’t want you worrying; I needed you to stay happy. You’re carrying our baby, I wanted you to be carefree, and nothing else. I never wanted to hurt you.” His heart pours, his heart sears. “I will never hurt you, or our child.” Looking down at your belly, his hand rests to your bump as his lips press a gentle kiss to the top.

And with his lips, holding the only remedy you’d ever need, he kisses you with all the love he holds, all the love he feels for no one, but you. “You are my everything. Please believe me when I say it. I wanted you then, I want you now, and I will until we take our last breath.” His words hold sincerity, something reserved for no one but you.

“From today on, baby, I’m all in. I’m all yours, and hers. I’ll be here for it all, the sleepless nights, the cravings, the aches, everything.” He pours his heart to you, never letting go, as if he’d been scared you’d disappear. “You are it for me, Y/N. I love you more than I could ever tell. Please believe me when I say it.”

And with your eyes, shining into his, you keep his cheek cupped, and your foreheads locked. You stare, and you stare, and you stare, into the eyes of your world. Into the eyes of the man who you knew would become the best father; perhaps greater of a father to your child than he is a husband, if only it was possible.

Your husband, deserves the stars. And if you could, you’d pick them out of the sky like apple blossoms in summer, and decorate them in his hair. And with every ounce in your being, you smile, and you kiss him tender, you hold him so close, so near.

“I do.” You smile, holding on.

“I believe you. I trust you.”

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#john wick x reader #keanu reeves x reader #john wick imagine #john wick fanfiction #john wick x y/n

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