#anyway i had a lot of fun and the trailer drop was so exciting!!!

[coomerclones]

i had a FEELING the entire time that it wasnt going to be it idk why but the entire time i felt like the way they announced it was a little off ? like it didnt feel Real to me?

i predicted (elsewhere) that it would be half life RELATED and maybe have an announcement in it, and i was p much right ! :-o i did not expect it to be a whole breaking bad thing though DFnVDFKHB but it was so fun to watch

[foxglovegames]

Trouble Comes Twice - the Postmortem

We celebrated Trouble Comes Twice's anniversary around a month ago! We'd hoped to post this postmortem back then as well, but it's taken us a moment to find the right words haha.

Anyway, we hope that this postmortem can give our players and other visual novel devs some insight into what the development process looked like for us. It's also a great way for us to look back at what went well and what went less well.

We'll be taking about the ideation phase, our (lack of) marketing for the Kickstarter, and also sharing (what we can) on our earnings from the game!

Coming up with Trouble Comes Twice

The original tone of Trouble Comes Twice was a lot more comedic and packed to the brim with anime tropes we enjoy. Most didn't make it into the final game, but some stayed and evolved e.g. all of the love interests are based on popular visual novel archetypes - the childhood friend, the tomboy, the shy girl, and the bad boy. 

Some, like Cameron and Zoe, changed a lot from their concept while Adrian and Stephanie stayed quite loyal to our original ideas of them. Cameron's character actually underwent the most changes after the initial reception to the demo, where a lot of people felt like he was too much of an ass haha. (Fortunately, he became a fan favorite when we dropped the new demo!)

The premise with the bet was something we invented to create some drama and establish a common plot thread throughout each route. Honestly, looking back, we would probably have approached the bet differently if we wrote it today and a lot of our pre-planning was... clumsy, at best. Still, it was a labor of love and I'll never forget the fun and excitement we had everyday balling ideas for the characters and coming up with their designs.

As Melli and I are just writers with limited coding experience, we worked with a past game jam friend to code the GUI and set up the base for the game (though the actual scripting was done by us and Melli put everything together in the end). Our biggest expenses pre- and post-demo was the character art and CGs, meanwhile we relied on free music and BG packs to save money.

Why a bisexual romcom?

So, this was sort of a no-brainer to us. We had decided right from the start that both twins could date both the male and female love interests, and (at the time) we feel that a lot of similar games had playersexual MCs rather than established bisexual/pansexual MCs. While playersexual charas are also awesome, we wanted to write a romcom where the main cast are always queer regardless of who you end up romancing. 

At the same time, bi/pan people don't all approach romantic relationships the same way e.g. Cameron is confident and has experience dating people of all genders, while Adrian's demi and Jace still struggles a bit with his attraction towards men. We know that some of our players felt like that made certain routes less romantic than others and we hear you on that feedback and have 100% taken it into consideration for our future romance games. But anyway, that was our thought process behind Trouble Comes Twice's romance dynamics!

Preparing for Kickstarter & the actual Campaign

Our Kickstarter launched at the start of August and let me tell you, we were nowhere near as prepared as we should have been. 😭 We hadn't set up a Steam page yet, we were trailer-less, and we only had a couple of hundred followers across our socials at best. I feel that there's a lot more successful Kickstarter projects to refer to and even a lot of marketing guides and advice now, but mostly it's on us for not researching more. 

The Kickstarter campaign did surprisingly well despite the lack of promotion and only having a rough alpha demo - we were even able to double our goal! - but we  wouldn't recommend what we did for other devs.

You should invest time into making a good demo, spend time building an interested audience before launching your campaign, and research so you've got some kind of marketing plan. We were lucky with word-of-mouth and that other visual novel devs with larger followings helped share our game, but we should have made more effort reaching out to bloggers, streamers, and game sites. Some crowdfunding successes may seem like they came out of nowhere and were just pure luck, but there's usually a lot of grinding behind-the-scenes that you don't notice.

The post-Kickstarter era, at least for us, was the harder bit. We now had 353 loyal backers who had expectations based on promises we had made and we had to make sure we met those expectations while also staying true to our wants as the devs. It was a learning process for sure, but we're fairly proud that we always did our best to keep our backers in the loop. It's frustrating to write an update explaining that the game has been delayed again, but backers are more open to being understanding than you think as long as you communicate!

A tip we'd give to new devs considering Kickstarter: Don't overestimate what you can do, but overestimate what you need. There's always hidden costs, unexpected taxes/fees, and other unknown obstacles that might eat up your budget. In our case, we made enough to make the game as planned, but had to change CG artists around halfway through development which meant our original budget didn't cut it anymore. Fortunately, we had earned a decent amount from our Patreon and pre-orders that we were able to use to complete the CGs, but that isn't always going to be an option for everyone and that also meant we were unable to use that money ourselves. (We didn't take any money from the original Kickstarter campaign, so whatever was earned through patreon and pre-sales was our only "salary" at the time.) 

Writing the game

Writing is, for obvious reasons, one of the most important parts of a visual novel. Melli wrote Jace's routes and I wrote Hazel's routes, which removed some pressure off our shoulders compared to trying to write over 300,000 words all on our own. 

It's fun working with another writer, but there are also some unique issues and considerations that come up when you're writing a game with two protagonists split between two writers. Especially because at the time, there weren't many visual novels with a similar set up to refer to.

The main things we learned, were:

Consistency. We wanted each couple to have their own dynamic, but the characterization needs to remain consistent between routes. You don't want Adrian in Jace's route to feel like a totally different character in Hazel's route. Additionally, we had to be careful that the tone and writing style of the protagonists' POVs still felt like you were playing the same game. Some routes can be more comedic than others, but we've got a problem if Hazel's routes are all (unintentionally) more serious/angsty in tone than Jace's or vice versa.

Watch out for your word count! Longer does not always equal better and writing eight routes, we had to put some restrictions in place. Even when writing on your own, it can be tough to guess how long your story should be, and it was important to us that the routes were roughly the same length so that none felt more "canon" than the other. However, with two writers who have different writing styles and ways of planning, it was tricky to compare our outlines and we struggled at times when it came to matching each other's word counts. Moving forward, we're probably going to be more lenient when it comes to word counts - some routes have to be longer than others, it doesn't mean that route is automatically more "important". We're also doing more regular meetings and frequent check-ins to make sure we're on the same page. In the future, we hope that should save us a lot of trouble when it comes to pacing! 🙈

Balancing your own wants with the wants of your players. In theory, these overlap most of the time. But making a commercial game (that people had already "bought" through the Kickstarter), there is some pressure when it comes to meeting certain expectations. We can't always just write what we want and assume everyone else is going to love it, but we also don't want to neglect what we personally like. We had a survey for the beta where we were able to get regular feedback and a lot of helpful advice. We definitely want to continue with surveys in the future - they are a great way to gather opinions from different players and figure out what works versus what doesn't! 

We took on too many tasks outside writing that distracted us. This bit is sort of inevitable for indie devs like us. 😅 Working with a limited budget and limited resources, you just end up having to wear a lot of hats! We think we did quite well sharing these duties though, and moving forward (thanks to you guys) we can afford more hands on deck to help us out. 

Marketing

The bane of every indie game dev's existence... although secretly, I kind of enjoy marketing but don't tell anyone that!

Having learned a thing or two from promoting the Kickstarter, we spent more time researching games marketing but in the end, trial and error was the best teacher.

As we got closer to the release date, we were posting almost daily on social media and grew our Twitter to over eight thousand followers. We didn't have any viral posts, but we saw a consistent growing interest in our game and it was such a motivation boost to see comments from potential players being excited for the game. We know a lot of devs have said that Twitter didn't help their game much but according to our stats, a decent number of our players found us through the platform. 

We saw less success here on Tumblr. Perhaps we haven't cracked the code here yet or maybe we're just comparing our numbers from Twitter unfairly! We're not hung up about it though, we love it here because it feels easier to connect with our followers and other devs there, and it's nice because we're able to write longer posts like this one! 💓

Aside from posting on social media, we reached out to several streamers and some bloggers prior to release to send them free game keys. 

We also commissioned some art from other artists to share, as we obviously couldn't reveal ALL our CGs before the release lol and visual posts tend to do a lot better in our experience. It was so much fun to see the characters in other art styles and we hope we can afford to commission guest art pieces a lot more frequently in the future!

In hindsight, we definitely regret not releasing a trailer sooner! We underestimated how much interest a good trailer could garner and delayed setting up our Steam page because of it. Steam was the platform where we sold the most copies and most of our buyers found the game through Steam itself.

Also, posting your trailer on youtube adds another site where you're promoting your game so there's really no reason not to get that trailer done as soon as you can. 

Final Notes

After the initial stress, we were pretty happy with our release! Although there were some things we would go back and change if we could,  that's just the nature of these kind of things. For the most part, we're proud of what we achieved and happy that we have learnt so much from Trouble Comes Twice that we can take into consideration for future projects.

We can't share exact numbers, but we wanted to open up a bit about our earnings for the game to help other aspiring devs: As of writing this, Trouble Comes Twice has earned close to 85,000 euros. This counts our profits from 2020 to now (the Kickstarter, Patreon, pre-sales, and actual sales). Removing fees, taxes, the salaries of our talented artists and other freelancers, as well as the money invested into our next game, our personal pockets did not see anything close to those numbers. But we're super proud of how much our little game has made and so grateful that it's allowed us more creative freedom with our next title! 

So, what's next?

You might have heard but for the past year, we've slowly been working on the demo and upcoming announcement for our next visual novel:

A 17+ supernatural neon-noir romance game about monsters, love, and other horrors. 

Play as vampire detective Circe (female protagonist) or hellhound cop Dante (male protagonist) and delve into the mysteries of North Haven, where demons, vampires, and supernaturals hide in plain sight among humans.

The game features six routes, with three romance options available to each protagonist. Dante only has male romances and Circe has both male and female romances. 

The game tackles a darker, more angsty tone compared to Trouble Comes Twice. Still, we hope that those who decide to check it out will enjoy it! We plan to announce the game this coming Autumn. Follow our Twitter (we're still not calling it X sorry) or Tumblr to stay up to date.

[yullalightk]

WOTFI IS HERE!!!!!!! WHOOO!!!!!!

I'M SO SORRY I'M LATE! But! I watched it after the livestream countdown, and, BOI! Do I have a lot to say!! and I'll make a part 2 of the WOTFI review cause, I don't think I'll be able to fit everything in one post. And with a lot of school projects on the line. So, I'll work on pt 2! and post it tomorrow!

!Also, spoiler warning!

So... we good? Okay! strap in!!

First off the thumbnail looks AMAZING!!!!! It really got me excited as soon as I woke up at 1 in the morning lmao😂

As soon as I watched it I was actually surprised they decided not to go with the horror route like in the trailer.. But personally, I'm not gonna complain I mean that should've been expected imo.

Also, the poster is soo fricking cool!!!! Like, I can't get enough of this art style and THE WAY IT WAS ANIMATED WAS LIKE A MOVIE INTRO!!!! IT WAS BEAUTIFUL!!!!!✨

The intro/Puzzles' backstory

So, I'm glad that Mr Puzzles gave us a more clearer explanation to his backstory. Even though it was something a lot of us knew already. None the less it was nice! I'm curious about the mother though, like, what was she like to Puzzles? Was she someone who didn't believe in her son's dreams as well? Or maybe someone who encouraged him to keep trying? Idk honestly, but maybe we'll get that answer in next year's WOTFI!

I also don't think he just sat in his room all day to adulthood, maybe he left his home to chase his dream but failed on multiple occasions. (Kinda like in the series where he tries to kill the crew but fails all the time) or, he watched TV all day as a coping mechanism. Trying to escape the cruelty of the world he lived in.

Also, wdhm when he said "The rest is history" like, we need more. Like how you got godlike powers? maybe that'll be explored more in WOTFI 2025!

Side note: Leggy's face when she dropped little Puzzles was funny for some reason help! IT HAD NO REASON TO BE THIS FUNNY!!😂😂

HE SWORE!!!!! YESS!!!!!!!! I swear he needs to let his anger out more, You gotta give kudos to him for enduring Mario's chaos😂

The casts!

I really LOVED the character designs! I can see how they are freaks now!

My all time favorites are SMG3, Bob, and Karen! They're designs stick out the most in the cast and I do like how they are all under Puzzles' control, like the PV movie!

Wish Saiko had more screen time though, I'm just a little disappointed at that. They could've done something interesting for her. Heck, they even gave the rest of the main cast more screen time than her.

But, maybe we'll see that in the next WOTFI? Hold up- wait a sec, I'm seeing a pattern of sorts... are, the stuff that felt lackluster in the 2024 WOTFI coming back as something better in WOTFI 2025?? That could be a possibility. I might make a theory on that, but hopefully when I'm not busy.

Side note: I swear this episode made me ship Mario and Puzzles so much!!😂😂 I mean- It's just hilarious to me!

Like when he said "Dear Mario" I know he hates him but like the way he says it made it feel like he likes him, or just toying with him!! Marware fans are eatin' good today! And he also complimated Mario on his performances on the fire perfomance!!! I know... he was doing what a judge does, try say something nice to the performers. But! That won't stop me from shipping them! And don't forget! Mario also still wanted to stay despite the hell Mr Puzzles put them through, in the rap Mario still wanted to have some fun in the amusment park! But, also glad he attacks him when Puzzles harms Mario's friend. And can be scared of him sometimes.

Now listen, I know he was trying to get Mario back so he won't ruin his show again but to me it also looks like he wants Mario to pay attention to him! kinda like a yandere😂😂 I'm just letting Marware infect my brain at this point haha.. it's becoming a curse.

Anyway that's part 1 for now. Part 2 will hopefully come out tomorrow as well, and I also have some projects to do so I know I said I will post every Saturday but that may be a little difficult, I'll get part 2 out tomorrow and I really hope that'll be the end of my review of this year's WOTFI!

Thanks for reading! hope ya'll enjoyed my WOTFI 2024 review pt 1.

[hopelesslyromanticgay]

An Americano Please PT. 7

Word Count : about 2K

TW: Percy🤮, mental health, and descriptions of malnourishment (not ED related) and smoking(not done by anyone in first person)

Jenna's POV (finally)

Oh my god she kissed me. She actually kissed me!

I can't believe I've known her for two weeks and I'm already down this bad. 

The walk home from Y/N's apartment isn't a bad one, just a few blocks away, so when I get to my complex, Percy, my other costar is waiting for me in the lobby.

"So, how was your walk with that girl?" he asks, implying so much with his tone.

"Really nice," I smile, unable to hide my excitement.

"Cool, cool. Emma tells me you all went for pizza together?"

"Yeah, we would have invited you but you were filming."

"Maybe you can take me there some other time. Anyhow, tell me about the walk?"

"Well if you really want all the details..." I start.

"I do," he interjects.

"She and I kissed," I confess, a blush rising in my cheeks.

"Congratulations," he says, his tone coming off a little forced. It's been pretty clear from the beginning that he has some form of feelings for me, but I've made it clear I'm not interested in anything more than friendship.

"Well..." I say awkwardly, "I'm gonna go up to my apartment, get those few hours of sleep."

God that was so awkward.

...

My wake-up alarm blares, causing me to jolt awake. 4:30 already?

I rub the sleep from my eyes, slowly making my way out of bed and into the shower.

My driver comes to pick me up at 5:15, there's no time to visit Y/N for coffee today.

I'm in the makeup trailer by 5:30, getting my hair done as soon as I arrive.

"Morning Jenna," Joy smiles from across the trailer.

"Hello," I wave.

"Percy tells me you had a lot of fun last night," Georgie winks from a few chairs over, his gorgon headdress being carefully placed on his head.

"He told you that?" my jaw drops in disbelief. Georgie nods. Wow Percy, That's really none of your business to share.

And look who it is, Percy Hynes White walks into the trailer.

"What the fuck Percy!" I exclaim, "you told them I kissed Y/N?"

"Jenna, I need you to sit still so we can get your eyeliner right," the makeup artist tells me.

"Okay, give me one second."

"Yeah, I told him, so?" he rolls his eyes

"Percy, it's my right to say who I kiss. Not yours."

"Well last I checked I had the right to freedom of speech," he retorts.

"Look, I don't want to start a fight, Percy," I say, trying to be calm, "but you can't do that again."

"Okay, fine," he sighs exasperatedly, "I won't go around telling people about your stupid barista girlfriend." He dramatically exits, slamming the door behind him. What a diva.

"To be clear, guys, she's not my girlfriend," I clarify.

"Not yet anyway," Georgie winks.

"Don't get my hopes up."

Every day of the week my schedule piles up more and more.

I have cello in between shoots, fencing after work, and archery with Percy every few days. 

It's Saturday already and I haven't seen Y/N once! I hope she doesn't think I'm ghosting her.

I just got onto set and immediately I'm rushed into the costume trailer to get into my fencing gear. It's such an action heavy day and I already feel so light headed. I want to tell the director that I can't do it. I know it will just absolutely destroy me, but before I can get a word out, I'm practically pulled onto set.

My breakfast of a small fruit salad churns in my stomach. I can't so much as focus for twenty seconds as the stunt choreographer starts to debrief us on the scene.

I look over at Joy, the person I'm fighting in this scene, she seems to be taking everything in perfectly.

My head starts to ache with dizziness.

"Jenna, are you okay?" the AD asks.

Say it's fine. Like you always do. Be easy to work with.

"I- I think I n-need to sit down," I stutter quietly. My legs practically give away the second a chair is brought over to me.

The on set nurse is quick to bring me a glass of water which I drink gratefully.

"Are you feeling nauseated, Jenna?" she asks me.

"No, just a little lightheaded," I force a smile.

"You look a tad pale, did you have breakfast this morning?" she inquires.

"Yeah, I had a fruit salad."

"Is that what you have every day?" she asks.

"More or less," I answer truthfully.

"That's not nearly enough protein and nutrients for someone with a schedule like yours. Do you ever have eggs?"

"No, I'm a vegan," I explain.

"Oh right, well in that case you need to find a way to get more protein and iron or else it's only going to get worse," she tells me.

"O-okay," I say. God Jenna, you've really messed up this time.

"You should go home and get some rest, I'll get the producers to move your cello class to tomorrow."

"No!" I exclaim, "I need to do this!"

"Jenna, I can't let you do this today. You need to rest and recover."

"No, I need to be on set!" What kind of lead in a show DOESN'T show up to set when she needs to be there. What kind of person does this make me?

"Jenna, you need to rest. How about a compromise, you can do your cello lesson, but you need to go back to your apartment and get rest."

"Fine," I sigh, disappointed in myself.

"Do you have anyone who can take you home?" she asks, "all of our drivers are on break right now."

"No," I say half heartedly. I could ask Y/N, but I don't want to burden her. I don't want to burden anyone.

"Okay, let's get you to your trailer and you can lie down there for now." I nod cautiously. Standing up is worse than usual. Immediately, I can feel myself getting dizzy.

We walk back to my trailer, I find myself lying down on the couch. My head spins with worry What if production is delayed because of me?

I hear a knock on my trailer door, "Hey Jenna, it's me, Emma.

"Come in," I say happily. I love being around Emma. She's such a positive person.

"Joy says you're not feeling too good."

"Yeah, I guess," I say.

"I'm sorry to hear that," she sits down next to me, "you wanna talk?"

"It's just a lot," I confess, "all of these classes, and shoots, and work in general. It's just so much. And now I have to change what I'm eating because apparently I'm not getting enough nutrients!" Tears start to fall down my face.

"Hey, I've got you," she soothes me, stroking my hair, "it's gonna be okay."

It's about then that I slowly fall asleep.

Y/N's POV:

God, I hope I didn't fuck up with Jenna. The last time I was Tuesday night when we kissed. I haven't even gotten a text since.

I'm scared, what if she doesn't like me anymore?

"What's got you so upset? " Nessa asks between drags on her cigarette. I cough on the smoke coming from it.

"I just wish I could talk to Jenna," I admit.

"Man, just chill, it's normal to go a few days without talking to someone."

"Yeah, but normally if the last interaction was a kiss, it means that relationship is over," I point out.

"Just chill out, okay, acting's like, a hard job."

"Fine," I say, getting up, "I'm gonna drive home. See ya tomorrow."

The walk from the coffee shop to my car is less than two minutes. I only drove to work today because I was coming from Nessa's apartment and didn't want to leave my car there.

As soon as I get into the driver's seat, my phone starts to buzz with a call from a number I haven't seen before. Curious, I decide to pick up.

"Hello, is this Y/N?" the voice behind the phone asks.

"Yes, who is this?"

"Hi! This is Emma from Tuesday night, Jenna's not feeling well today, and I was wondering if you could drive her home from set?"

"Shit, is she okay?" I inquire. Fuck, I hope everything is alright!

"She'll be fine," Emma assures me, "can you drive her?"

"Sure, is she okay with that?"

"In all honesty, she's asleep right now and I found your number on a piece of paper on her counter."

"Isn't that an invasion of privacy?"

"Shut up, I was doing what I thought was right."

"Okay, fine, I'll come pick her up, but I don't want her to be surprised to see me."

"Deal." I hang up the phone. This day just got a lot more interesting.

I pull up to set about thirty minutes later to see Jenna and Emma waiting for me. I can see immediately what Emma meant by Jenna not feeling well.

There were heavy bags under her eyes, but the rest of her skin was so much paler than usual. I could see her twitching a bit, and it seemed like she was struggling to stay alert. Seeing her like this immediately replaces any resentment I may have had for her for avoiding me with pure concern.

"Hey there," I roll down the window to talk to them.

"Thank you so much for coming," Jenna says, smiling weakly.

"Here, let me help you into the car," I say gently, getting out to open the passenger seat door for her.

"I'll let you two be on your merry way then," Emma says cheerfully, "Feel better, Jenna." Leaving me and Jenna alone in the car together.

The silence between us is anything but comfortable. The radio went to static from low signal, and neither of us know what to say.

After a painfully awkward twenty five minutes, we pull up next to her apartment. 

"Can you help me up?" she asks, clearly a little embarrassed. I smile, and offer her a hand which she gratefully takes.

"Thank you so much, I don't know how I can repay you."

"Consider it a random act of kindness." She laughs a little.

The two of us walk to the elevator quietly, not really knowing what we could possibly say.

"So what's got you feeling so sick?" I ask curiously.

"Not getting enough protein, I guess."

"Oh that makes sense. Film sets probably don't have the best vegan options."

"On that, we can agree," she laughs weakly. The door flies open, revealing Jenna's apartment floor. I've never been in her place before.

"I'm right down the hall," she directs me.

I nod, and start walking with her.

She quickly disappears into her room to put on some more comfortable clothes, coming out in sweatpants and a white t-shirt.

"Here, let's get you some food," I say, bringing her a pb&j sandwich, "I know its not a gourmet meal or anything, but peanut butter's really good for you."

"Thank you so much," she smiles, "I don't deserve you."

"Hey, don't say that," I say. 

"But I don'ttt," she whines, "I don't talk to you for days after kissing you and yet you come to take care of me as soon as you hear I'm not doing too good!" 

"Jenna, please just eat your sandwich," I laugh, "we can talk about it when you're doing better."

She nods, "okay."

A few minutes later, she's done with the sandwich, and I can tell she's getting tired.

"Hey, do you wanna try to get some rest?" I suggest. She nods quietly.

I help her up from the couch, and guide her to her room.

She goes to the bed to lie down, pulling the covers over herself to stay warm

I turn to leave, my plan is to go home, but it's quickly thwarted.

"Can you stay?" she pleads, "I don't want to be alone."

"Sure," I smile, sitting down on the opposite side of the bed. She slowly repositions herself to be cuddled up to my side, laying her head in my lap.

"Good night, Y/N/N," she says softly.

"Good night," I smile, kissing her forehead. 

I can see her vibrantly blushing in the dim light of her room. She's just so insanely cute.

I run my fingers through her hair, trying to soothe her. It doesn't take long before she fully falls asleep.

The two of us are gonna have a lot to talk about when she wakes up.

[ni-kol-koru]

Hayama news dropped, you know what that means? I am back to posting (with an essay) 🧡⚡️

I remember the day when KuroBasu official Twitter account posted an announcment of a new mobile game and openned another Twitter account that they called Street Rivals. I was sooo excited to see what the game would be about and I thought I finally had a chance to play a KnB game! The trailers looked so good and the game looked so promising and I just couldn't wait for it to drop! I was so excited to make different team combinations and try out my favorite characters and, well, just have some fun! ⭐️

Then the game dropped. JAPANESE SERVERS ONLY. I was so disappointed because playing Street Rivals was something I was really looking forward to. I quickly saw that a lot of people were unhappy with the Japan only servers and that they were sending requests for the game to drop globally. I figured and hoped that maybe the developers would listen to the fans and that they would give all of us who live outside of Japan a chance to play the game. I still have hope thay I will be able to play it one day, but I was praying that the day would come before Hayama comes out in the game (because I, very obviously, want him). HE IS DROPPING SOON AND THE GAME IS STILL NOT AVAILABLE OUTSIDE OF JAPAN. Even if it dropped outside of Japan today, I would have no time to get ready to obtain Hayama, because he will be a high rank character and I would need a lot of materials to get him...

Even though it made me kinda sad, it also made my day better because hey, at the end of the day, Hayama will get some appreciation! He will get a cool splash art, he will get rendered again and he already got a really cool trailer! I really hope that people who get him will enjoy having him on the team, that he will be fun to play and that they wony regret obtaining him! ⭐️🧡

Anyways, here is his trailer, in case you didn't see it (apologies for the bad quality):

I can't wait for his gameplay tutorials to drop, I am really curious to see just what they have in store for him! How fast will he be? Will he have all 3 levels of Lightning Dribble as a part of his kit? Will he come with the Double Clutch? There are so many things that he could do! I also can't wait to see his splash art! I just really want to see him in the Street Rivals style, it's so new and polished, it is pretty detailed and cool, too! 🧡💫

[thankskenpenders]

So I'd recently said that the only thing I was particularly worried about with Sonic Superstars was the music, mainly because the words "Jun Senoue" and "classic sound" make me immediately think of Sonic 4 - which the extended gameplay footage was using recycled music from as a placeholder. Even with Tee Lopes confirmed as a contributor (but not the lead composer), I was concerned about what the bulk of the music would sound like.

Well, fast forward a couple weeks and my fears have been abated!

First up was the trailer at the Nintendo Direct, which features some new Tee Lopes music (as confirmed by him on Twitter) that sounds phenomenal. I keep going back to this just to listen to the music:

Later, the extended overview video made for Sonic Central features this track and more, which continue to sound like they were written by Tee Lopes. The poppy early '90s style is very similar to the Sonic Mania sound (as well as other work by Tee, like the incredible TMNT Shredder's Revenge OST), and it's exactly what I'd want. If this isn't all by Tee Lopes, then Senoue is trying really damn hard to mimic his sound. These just sound like melodies and arrangements that Tee would go for, not ones that Senoue would write. Even underneath the wonky instrumentation of Sonic 4, Senoue had a distinct sound. You could tell it was the same guy who wrote the Sonic Adventure OST.

Curious, I decided to dig deeper, and found a video interview I'd missed from IGN. On the subject of the music, Iizuka (as translated by Sega of America's Austin Keys) said:

"The Classic Sonic music has always had this real fun pop vibe to it, and we wanted to stay true to the roots with the Classic series and go and create some great new music for Sonic Superstars. So what we did is actually, we're working with Jun Senoue, who was the music director on Sonic 3 and he's also worked on Sonic Mania. But we're using Jun, and he's partnering with other people who also worked on Sonic Mania music, and creating this new kind of sound and this new music that's going to be a perfect fit for a Classic Sonic game. Lots of fun, lots of pop."

I am perhaps a little peeved that they go all in on Senoue here and don't actually name Tee Lopes, almost implying that Senoue was the main composer on Mania (he was only credited as an audio engineer). On the flip side, it's a little funny to name drop Senoue and not acknowledge, you know... Crush 40? Sonic Adventure? But I get that they're trying to win over the Classic purists and not make people think Superstars will be full of butt rock lmao

Anyway yeah, it sounds like Senoue and Tee Lopes are collaborating pretty closely on this to create music that fits the Classic vibe without literally going for fake FM synth. It's possible a little of that is still in there, but every single track they've presented so far matches the style of Mania, not Sonic 4. That's the sound they want us to associate with the game.

I couldn't be more excited for this soundtrack now.

[un-pearable]

okay post sonic symphony post recap :D

1st mezzanine sweep (could see both the orchestra + the singers excluding when they went in the audience at one point) + we were right next to the projector (cool!!!!) and some of the speakers (ouch)

orchestral:

setlist (as best i remember, i wasn’t writing it down, PLEASE correct me):

sonic 1

sonic cd

sonic 2

sky sanctuary

sonic mania

“welcome to 3D”

believe in myself/it doesn’t matter medley

chao garden

“three new ones”

rooftop run

aquarium park/planet wisp

frontiers medley w/ stuff from third DLC

i was so excitedly surprised to see the new visuals!!! they did a really great job combining the new origins cutscenes with gameplay and the timing was INCREDIBLE esp for a live show. infinite kudos and honestly i can appreciate them waiting two years to actually do this since the cutscenes really tied to first few medleys together

conductor absolutely CRUSHED IT dude was very understanding that the audience was going to be Losing It consistently and he made it work. so much love to that orchestra they did a stellar job and im so sad they’ll get overshadowed by the vocal parts (which. yeah obviously. but they did SUCH great work and the conductor did a great job directing the audiences applause to them)

felt bad they had to stop between every single medley for applause but such is life . also experiencing live audience reactions for stuff like the chemical plant zone drowning trap and amy being playable in the metal sonic race was amazing

enjoyed the sky sanctuary medley even though it took the place of the sonic 3k music overall, so much kudos to the video team that was SO cool (AND IT HAD THE FRONTIERS ANIMATED SPECIAL!!!!! YEAHHHH WIN FOR KNUCKLES FANS EVERYWHERE)

the believe in myself/it doesn’t matter one’s are always so sweet to me i love how they frame them using the cutscenes from each of their respective stories + the end card 🥺 now do that for everyone else’s themes!!!!!!!!!!

i’m definitely forgetting at least one bit in there but it was so delightful all around, the new arrangements were so fun, unleashed sweeps as always but one guy near me was SUPER passionate about aquarium park im glad he was happy. the frontiers medley ended w/ the new supersonic form and having not watched that trailer this was the BEST possible way to see that new content holy SHIT!!!!!!!!

intermission: that was the single most positive bathroom i’ve ever been in and i mean that in the least weird way possible. everyone was so so so excited and complimentary (ty to the person who liked my pins and whose fiancé liked the tails one. i like it a lot too :]) also kudos to the stunning wave cosplayer i saw she was killing it!!!!! molly whoever you were i hope you enjoyed the second half as much as i did

vocal tracks:

setlist (i actually did write this one down):

i am all of me

what i’m made of

open your heart

knight of the wind

escape from the city

(new!!) superstars intro theme

his world

reach for the stars

fist bump

endless possibility

(fake out ending)

break through it all

undefeatable

live and learn

the fake out of having only the orchestra on stage and then l having i am all of me just START even before johnny + jun got on stage. incredible. we were all so distracted i have to find a clip of the audible chaos when the music started going and everyone clocked it was SHADOW FIRST. anyway so so so funny they only showed cutscenes from shth . no gameplay. gee wonder why

interesting structure too, compared to the order of the OG one in 2021 (which focused more on ramping up to the classics + live n learn at the end) this order bookended some of the less popular songs (reach for the stars and the new superstars theme particularly) with the BIG names

you should have heard how much people lost it when johnny said “you are… what i’m made of” i’m so proud of you sonic symphony audience. we are all sonic heroes appreciators

oh also johnny + everyone’s clumsy attempts to name drop/imply song names in their inbetweens. hilarious. astounding. i’m glad we’re your knight johnny

^ re: prev i NEED a recording of that it was glorious. if anyone has one hmu

literally two minutes before the second half started i was telling my beloved friend i dragged along that all i needed to be happy was for them to have kept knight of the wind and it was the FOURTH SONG . WIN FOR JAY. 3 of my top fives within the first twenty mins of act 2. incredible

obviously escape from the city floored everyone. i think that got the most people singing but we were all already exhausted vocally it was very funny hearing what lines people mumbled. but it DID have the most call and response, with the biggest songs they would really just shut off the mics and let the audience sing a lot of lines it was so so fun

johnny took his leave from the stage (and complimented + thanked dave vives and also the fandom), said goodnight, and sometime around now tomoya ohtani was brought on (he deserved more applause and did eventually get it)

superstars theme was cool!!!! but right after city escape was funny bc . no one knows it. you go from most singable theme imaginable to everyone sitting as upright as possible and the half that wasn’t already recording to whip out their phones to capture it especially as they introduce it as “the first time this song has EVER played on this side of the ocean” lmao. hope you liked it london i’m glad you took us down a peg

his worrrrrrlddddd we all love it. we were all so tired. also we kept fumbling the lines bc we all like the zebra head version and rappings hard. i get it. video team did a fun job remixing the visuals for sonic + shadow + silver focus sections though it was really cool

reach for the stars really had people peetering out over the length partly bc we were all exhausted vocally and partly bc it’s sadly less iconic

i could not take fistbump seriously bc they had our beloved ian jr front and center for the whole video. it was glorious. they started w gadget for the opening bit and then bam ian jr everywhere. amazing . got a whole games worth of cutscenes with his beautiful face you did your creator (who was IN THE AUDIENCE) proud

good break before endless possibility though

possibilities are endless. ‘nuff said

jk the video was STUNNING and a lot of it was the opening cutscene which remains some of the best sonic animation ever to this day. and this song REALLY showcased how well the orchestra worked simultaneously with the band it was glorious . the use of the werehog transformation scene in time with:

mwa. stunning choice. and once again damn the band’s vocalist (dave vives) CRUSHED IT. johnny gave him a shout out for being a worthy successor at the shows he can’t attend and it was so so so deserved y’all are in for a treat

around here my ears + voice started genuinely feeling weird. the sacrifices we make for an absolutely wild experience (it’s all fine now though dw <3)

at this point they thanked everyone for coming + the band walked off stage and they turned all the lights off for a joke. me knowing they wouldn’t leave w/o live and learn was skeptical <- totally forgot they had a whole other guest star who hadn’t done his signature contribution yet

“one more” chanting ensued and my bro says he thinks they definitely had someone planted to say that but like. they did way more than one more. no way that was an intentional phrase

the band returned!!!! KELLIN QUINN KILLED IT

it’s dead. it’s dead and gone . my hearing and also the ability to play sonic music it’s been forever changed . hearing those incredible songs from frontiers + a full live orchestra backing up the astounding vocals (HOW) was incredible. this is when i could feel the literal balcony shaking . my vocal chords are going to kill me tomorrow

obligatory “just one more” was undefeatable and ngl im so glad they did it second, the hype up with break through it all made it even better despite them going the opposite in the game . should have used the cooler going supersonic clip from the trailers rather in game though . no one is immune to undefeatable + the extending music video was crazy good

ANOTHER “one last one” in which johnny was called back on stage, pretended to not know what people were asking for/what he was supposed to sing, got the ENTIRE crowd yelling the name of the song, and then and he + kellin absolutely crushed live and learn

it’s live and learn. it’s the perfect end note ft. quinn’s unparalleled vocals. what more do you need

they showed the really funny still shot of shadow overlaid on the moon for the last shot of the video and i know it’s the actual ending but it lingered for like 15 seconds and i couldn’t stop laughing . they showed all the dialogue captions leading up to him dying so i though they were going to show him falling to earth but nah. stock render brain store ass pose

still COOL AS HELL!!!!!!! they had us congratulate EVERYONE and all the individual band members and the orchestra and im so so so happy with how it went . one million thanks to these wonderful people they did a great job

a couple literally got engaged in the lobby. one group started belting sonic underground on like the third floor of the stairway. it was incredible. the oscar’s could never top this ty dolby theaterrr

absolutely incredible all around . special shout out to: the people lowkey cosplaying while still in formalwear (woman in a beautiful white dress wearing a rouge hairpiece i salute you. guy in blue suit and guy in orange suit you’re amazing. woman in the fanciest amy rose dress i’ve ever seen im in love). the people with awesome t-shirts i am among your ranks we love a fandom with cool shirt designs. people in full on cosplay i am so so happy for all the diversity in characters i saw. the line for merch that stretched all the way back into the theater at the end: what was the theater staff doing that was bonkers. the people handing out stickers that i missed i Will be stalking your online stores. all the people in normal formal wear carrying their plushies? amazing. the world is beautiful. goodnight everyone

[itsmeangelaa]

I enjoyed red, white & royal blue SO much btw!! I’m one of the fans that started reading the book AFTER nick and taylor were casted. I’d seen nick in cinderella (which I thought I was cute), handsome devil (also very cute) and I’d ofc seen taylor in kissing booth so I figured yeah this is gonna be cute lil movie! Then I saw the criticism…

People were NOT happy lmao!!🤣 I remember scrolling the twitter tag and not seeing a single happy person. People were not feeling taylor and nick at all😭 When that first look dropped and everyone was complaining that taylor was too tall and nick wasn’t giving henry 😭

Like I was in the TRENCHES trying to enjoy my lil book and scrolling the tag for cute updates because there was just SO much negativity. Complaints about the height, the lack of chemistry (although I don’t know you can suss out chemistry from still images and silly behind the scenes insta stories), the fact that they weren’t giving the ‘aura’ of alex and henry like it was just a lot.

I feel like when the teaser clips and the full trailer dropped is when people’s opinions started changing. I was seeing positivity!! For once!! Happy days haha

Seeing the positive reviews from people who had seen the early screening and the rotten tomatoes score being so high?? I was so so happy omg.

And now to actually watch the film and it be so fun and enjoyable and the chemistry just sizzling ahhh I was smiling the whole time!! Felt like me and all the other fans who were just so excited for the film had been vindicated!! Yay us!!

Anyway hope everyone has enjoyed the film and sorry for the storytelling 🤣

[rawliverandgoronspice]

I love totk, love it with all my heart. But even I feel a bit disappointed with a lot of the aspects.

The one that gets me the most is just, the Zonai in general?

When I think back to botw, I remember all the wild and exciting theories and thoughts about what the Zonai could be.

I remember theories that they were some iteration of the Kokiri because the spiral symbols were similar, and a lot of the structures were in forests. I remember everyone being so sure that they were a warlike race because the Barbarian Set were found exclusively in the Lomei Labyrinths. Everyone was wondering what the owls, boars and dragons meant to them.

Then we actually get to see the Zonai, the big mystery of botw and there's just.

Nothing.

All we learn is: there’s 2 of them, they had advanced tech, and they had magical macguffins.

It feels so hollow knowing there was so much potential for another race to be introduced to the Zelda universe and we essentially get Sheikah 2.0 with some Mesoamerican vibes.

We don't even learn anything about them as a race, like where the rest of them went or how they were accepted so easily as rulers or why they're called "Secret Stones" when it seems like everyone knows what they are.

The only real upside to this total lack of info is that it lets people with actual creativity create headcanons and fits without having to worry about being canon compliant.

Just rings hollow.

Yeah, I absolutely feel that. I think the Zelda theorists, and I both include myself and say this with all the love in the world, tend to overhype the specificity of things that tend to remain vague in Zelda (and sometimes that vagueness is great, because it's exactly what fuels us next!), but.... I have to agree that Zonais really didn't deliver on that aspect for me either.

To be frank, I was never super into Zonai lore (because I was never super into BotW lore, but it's really on me and not at all a criticism or anything, the community and I missed each other on the hyperfocus moment), but I got super interested to see the Mesoamerican vibes going on in this game to the point where, when Nintendo dropped the Gameplay trailer and I got... honestly pretty underwhelmed (like design wise that sounded great and fun but it kind of cemented the sort of playground direction they were going with, and it got me pretty worried about other aspects, namely the story :) ), I decided to spoil myself with the leaked artbook just to give me... something to latch onto I guess? Because I really wanted to get excited! And the Mesoamerican vibes did the trick: I got super curious about what that could mean, what the Zonais would bring to the table culture-wise, what sort of cool legends involving them would be investigated, etc... Also it just wasn't a kind of setting that Zelda ever really explored (and still has not, in my humble opinion), so it kind of quieted down my worries of having a game that looked so similar to BotW in terms of artistic direction, to the point where I became afraid it wouldn't have anything different to say (which... ended up kind of being my final opinion, unfortunately).

I think the Zonais both lost a lot of their mystery while not really clarifying anything? I kind of would have loved them to remain otherwordly figures, almost? Or maybe to just have hints of a culture that would be very different to Hyrule's, instead of basically the same thing but with robots and things fly around also --I would have loved deeper implementation of Mesoamerican mythos or cultural elements, instead of it remaining.... kind of a costume, honestly? Like, what even is zonai culture, beyond the automation (which was already kind of the Sheikah's thing anyway?) Where do the stones come from? Where are the other zonais? I'm not asking for direct answers, but just enough vagueness, murals, legends, ancient spirits to set the theorists' brain on fire. The Depths would have been amazing to hint at more (and doubly so for the Sky Islands), but right now, in spite of having spoken to two different live (kind of) Zonais, I still have zero idea what their deal is. They could have been hylians and nothing would have really changed.

So, yeah! Agreed! And sorry for the late ask aaa

[kooldewd123]

thoughts on the pokemon presents:

path to the peak seems really cute. probably too corny for me to handle, but a really nice little animation for kids wanting to get into the tcg.

ok, i'm not one who really cares much about graphics or performance, but detective pikachu... well, it looks rough. i really think it must've gone through some development issues. it was announced all the way back alongside LGPE, and it doesn't seem to have any paldean pokemon like you'd expect for a gen IX spinoff title.

a new trailer for the horizons dub which says nothing and doesn't even commit to a release date. god, netflix fucked the anime up so bad. at least we got a brand-new shot of the pendant turtle at the end, so we can hopefully expect more of that soon. we don't have an episode title for the 18th, and Tomiyasu is on storyboards, so maybe it'll show up there?

the go, cafe, unite, and sleep stuff doesn't particularly interest me, but the masters news is fun (even if we already knew it all from the datamine). more types of sync pairs, and an event for spectrier, which is one of my favorite legendaries. i was hoping nemona would have at least a slight spanish accent, but at least she accents her own name.

tcg and stadium coming to nso are cool, but i never really had any interest in them anyway.

paldean winds is really exciting. it seems like a twilight wings style with a more focused story. way more hype than the actual anime news.

i see a lot of people excited about the mew/mewtwo event, but... god, just let me catch my own mew. let me shiny hunt it. randomizing all its attributes for the mystery gift is a cool gimmick to personalize it, but i can just never care about freebie pokemon like this.

huh, i felt much more positive watching the presentation, but writing it down makes me realize how mixed my thoughts actually are. whatever, we're on to the mostly positive stuff now.

i'm glad that we do actually end up returning to paldea for the dlc story. it felt really weird that "the hidden treasure of area zero" takes place in a place completely separate from area zero. on a similar note, i really hope we rejoin with at least arven, since he's the character most connected to area zero.

not sold on the new characters yet, but sv had strong enough writing i have confidence in their ability to pull them off. the idea of a second elite four in particular is a lot of fun.

dripplin and archuladon are exciting just in concept, since they show that likely do intend to continue forward with giving new evolutions to old pokemon. and these are very recent pokemon, too - it doesn't seem like there's a limit to how they'll innovate old designs, and i can't wait to see what the future holds.

scarlet stays winning with its paradox designs. iron crown is... whatever, but i love raging bolt. never been the biggest fan of raikou, but give it the exeggutor treatment and i'm all over it. i'm just keeping my fingers crossed that these guys (along with walking wake, iron leaves, and the inevitable paradox entei and terrakion) aren't shiny locked.

one odd absence - we still haven't heard about any way to get old legendaries. i think a lot of people expect it based on precedent, but there's been no sign of it thus far. i wonder whether they're waiting to unveil it or if the feature is missing this time around for whatever reason. praying for news about it whenever our next big news drop rolls around.

[lurkinmerkin]

I think you could do something very fun with “when you have nothing to say, set something on fire.”

So there was a slight delay as I got my shit together but here's a little fic inspired by this line!

In retrospect, Steve felt that he shouldn’t have set Eddie’s trailer on fire. The impulse had been there for him since Eddie’s “death” and it only grew when Eddie finally crawled out of the gate on its ceiling a year later. He had been covered in gore, arms shaking as he dragged himself out, El on this side screaming and covered in blood as she tried to close it behind him. The lifeless thump of his body hitting the hard floor the only thing that had shocked Steve out of his stupor and made him head towards him. He had a sword these days, a strange gift from Hopper that he didn’t want to use on Eddie but would if he ended up being some sort of bizarre Upside Down threat.

Instead, it had just been Eddie, mysteriously alive and desperately confused after a year in the Upside Down, his body in suspension and seemingly unconscious for all the horrible events of ‘87.

After that, after seeing El with blood pouring from her ears, for gods sake, and Eddie vomiting up leaves as the gate howled into non-existence, the only thing Steve could think to do is drag them both out of there and throw a Molotov at the hollowed out trailer as he left.

He probably should have asked Eddie first.

Steve leaned Eddie against the side of the BMW and held El in his arms, her whole body shaking with tears, as the trailer burned, the metal sides crumbling like they were made of paper between the accelerant in the Molotov and who knew what sort of flammable qualities Upside Down gore had. He let El put her nose in his neck, let her rest, because they still had so many more little pocket gates to track down and close tonight.

Steve hoped the rest weren’t as difficult to shut down as this one had been. That there were no more surprises crawling out of what should be dead zones now that Vecna slash Henry slash One was gone.

Steve jiggled El’s shoulders to get her attention. He had to know for sure and this was the only way. “Is he Eddie?”

El looked at Eddie and then at Steve point blank and nodded. “Yes.”

When the roof cracked down the center and tumbled into the walls of the trailer, Steve finally let El down and went to check on Eddie. He was breathing, which was insane, and he was covered in puke and black ichor, but his eyes were tracking and he was soundlessly forming words.

“Eddie?” Steve asked. His grip on the sword was tight and the pommel creaked.

“Did we get him?” Eddie asked. “Is Vecna gone?” He was shaking and his hands were pushing against his stomach like he still had to throw up.

“He is dead. I killed him.” El said with her usual solemnity. She was wiping at her ears and eyes which were still sluggishly bleeding.

Eddie’s eyes bugged out at that and he looked to Steve for comfort like he had any to give. Steve just nodded and leaned against the BMW himself, his sword dragging in the dirt of what had once been Eddie’s front yard.

“Where did you get a sword?” Eddie asked with awe in his voice. There was something else in there, maybe envy? Steve snorted and reached out to El, hugging her in on his free side.

“A lot’s happened, Eddie.” Steve said. He dropped the sword gently in Eddie’s lap. He cradled it like it was a precious treasure. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Eddie grew quiet, his hand going back to his stomach. “Dustin. I remember Dustin. Where is he, is he--?”

“He is fine.” El said quietly, her face buried in Steve’s chest. “He will be excited to see you again. It has been a long time.”

“A long time? How long has it been anyway? And no offense but who are you, random girl?” Eddie seemed to have found his voice again, his mouth going a mile a minute while Steve just wanted to sit down and figure out how to tell Dustin that Eddie was somehow mysteriously alive again, that he’d been vouched for by El, but that Steve had no idea how or why or what had happened. Without some sort of answer for those intangibles, Dustin was going to be impossible to calm down and Steve was exhausted just thinking about it.

Too bad he couldn’t Molotov cocktail that conversation like he had Eddie’s trailer. Speaking of…

“Sorry, I burned down your home, Eddie.” Steve said, his hand reaching out to squeeze Eddie’s shoulder. What a fucked up move on his part.

Eddie looked away from Steve and El and back over to the melting trailer, his eyes going wide at the sight. His mouth dropped open and he chewed the air for a bit.

His hair was matted and flat and oily and Steve was itching to take his bandanna and toss it into the fire. Even as disgusting as he looked, he was a sight for sore eyes. Steve felt himself flush after that thought and he decided not to chase it down and pick it apart just yet.

“I can’t say I’ll miss the old dump too much, Steve.” Eddie finally said. He brought his hands up to clutch at Steve’s wrist, his grip was tight and bruising.

“We need to close the other gates,” El said, her shoulders already firming up as she clenched her fists and pushed away from Steve.

Steve nodded and moved his hand in Eddie’s grip so he could help him stand up. The sword clattered to the ground and startled the two of them enough they fell into each other’s personal space.

Impulsively, Steve pulled on Eddie’s hand and pulled him all the way in for a quick kiss. Eddie bolted back, his eyes going wide in shock, his mouth dropping yet again.

“Shotgun.” El said, making both of them turn to look at her bemused face.

[rookie-critic]

The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023, dir. Aaron Horvath & Michael Jelenic) - review by Rookie-Critic

We no longer live in a world where video game adaptations can be written off as soon as they're introduced. Modern adaptations like Paramount's Sonic the Hedgehog films or HBO's The Last of Us series have started to change the landscape and the expectation for what these adaptations can do and how good they can be. So, when Illumination announced they had partnered with Nintendo to put a new Super Mario Bros. film project into production, naturally hackles went up. The Mario franchise does house one of the most classic examples of a video game film adaptation gone bad, but there were also a fair number of people who wanted to wait and see what happened. I, at this point, was unsure. I was excited at the prospect of a new film starring some of my favorite video game characters, but at the same time Illumination doesn't have a fantastic track record with me. I love the first Despicable Me film, and I think the second one is ok, but since then I almost actively despise the Minions as a thing that exists and think a lot of Illumination's other films have this really cheap and obvious humor that only children and middle-aged moms would find funny. I also get that this is the exact audience they're trying to please, but I could easily point to animation studios like DreamWorks and a film like Puss in Boots: The Last Wish that manage to be naturally hilarious without ever feeling forced or cringey. Regardless, I was worried. My uncertainty was only deepened when the cast list was announced and I saw that Chris Pratt would be voicing Mario. The plucky, Italian plumber was going to be voiced by Star-Lord, but the rest of the cast looked perfect, so I still held out hope. Then the trailer dropped and my whole outlook changed. It looked good. Really good. Now, after having watched it, I'll come out and say that it was... just fine.

My worry about Illumination injecting their sense of humor into it was well-placed, because they absolutely packed the film with it. Characters deliver one-liners that are neither funny nor clever in places where it completely disrupts the flow of the scene (seriously, sometimes it almost felt like they paused to wait for the laughter they assumed they would get), and there's even a Luma (a little star creature that was first introduced in the Super Mario Galaxy games) that is, in my opinion, a really poor and unnecessary attempt at edgy dark humor that I immediately hated. This thing gets a massive amount of screen time for something that actively detracted from the film's quality (in its defense, I will say I've talked to a handful of people that thought that Luma was the best part of the movie, so maybe it's just a me thing), and every time it showed up to say some really cringey line about the only escape from suffering being death or whatever, I would audibly groan. A lot of the film has an air of an Illumination film that just happens to have Mario characters in it as opposed to a true blue (or red, rather) Mario film. To me, nothing makes this more apparent than the incessant use of licensed songs throughout the film. With a library of music as vast as the Mario franchise's, why would I ever need to hear "Thunderstruck" or "Holding Out for a Hero?" What's weirder is that they do a very good job of working classic themes and music from the games into the film's score already. Why even bother with the licensed music when you clearly are adept at doing it the better way, anyway?

So far, I'm making it seem like I hated it, but that really isn't true at all. I can almost forgive a lot of the very blatant cheap humor because the film is incredibly fun. For fans of the games, it throws a ton of references at the screen, so you're never at a loss for a good dose of nostalgia. Between a fun play on the classic "The princess is in another castle" line, to taking a shortcut on Rainbow Road, to the ringtone on Luigi's phone, to a massively meme'd rap song about a certain red-tie-wearing gorilla, you're being bombarded with beautiful callbacks and hilarious references. The playful ribbing at the fact that Bowser is hopelessly in love with Princess Peach while also constantly in an attempt to take over the kingdom she rules over was very cute and fun, and, while the film's story is very formulaic, the characters feel dynamic and fully realized. The loving, brotherly relationship between Mario and Luigi is very touching, and I loved that they took the baseline personalities the games give the brothers and molded them into this loving sibling unit that always has each other's backs. It's the sibling dynamic I've always wanted out of the duo, and I love that this film gave it to me (even if there could have been way more Luigi, but I feel that way about most Mario properties).

The last two compliments I'll give the Mario movie before I wrap up this incredibly long-winded review are these: the animation is gorgeous. They brought so many set pieces from the games to wondrous, big-budget animation life and it was great to see all these locations and characters that I've grown up with on the big screen. Lastly, the voice acting in the film is impeccable. Chris Pratt did better than I thought he was going to (my main concern was that it would just sound like Chris Pratt coming out of Mario's mouth, which it didn't), and Charlie Day, Jack Black, and Seth Rogen steal every single second of screen time they get. I really do hope they give Luigi a larger role in the sequel, because Charlie Day needs to be this character more. Ultimately, I'm glad that The Super Mario Bros. Movie exists. Sure, it has its flaws, but for fans of the games and fans of Illumination's films in general, this is a fun time. However, if you're not a fan of Illumination or Mario, this isn't going to convert you.

Score: 7/10

Currently only in theaters.

[morallygreyvigilante67]

what made you leave the fandom? it's perfectly fair, but you keep mentioning that you've come back so i'm a little curious

No worries, I'd be curious too.

I'm not entirely sure when exactly I left the fandom to begin with, because I know I was still clinging onto it even when I stopped paying attention to new game releases but it was kind of a gradual thing.

When the teasers for FNAF 4 started coming out, I was pretty excited. There were still so many mysteries left to solve and, while I couldn't tell exactly what the fourth game was going to show us, I had a good feeling about it.

The actual trailer was dropped & the game was described as "the final chapter" which only increased that hype. I was kinda sad in a way cause I loved this franchise so much and, at the time, I wasn't ready for it to end but it had to at some point y'know?

Anyway the game itself was perfectly fine and, while not all the mysteries/plot points had been neatly rounded up, it felt like a pretty good note to end things on. Except it didn't...

Because FNaF World was announced, which is when my interest started to wane.

Don't get me wrong, when that "thank you" image Scott uploaded to his site started to change and the animatronics started to be replaced by cutesy versions of themselves, I was curious. FNAF 4 was supposedly the end, but here was this new thing that was slowly being shown to us.

I hadn't been too sure what to expect at the time, whether we were getting a new game or whether it was just gonna be one last little image for us to see unravel before he moved onto something else. I don't know, it's been a while.

And then the trailer came out. I thought it was a joke at first, the tone shift was so major that there wasn't really any other explanation I could think of...at least until the game actually came out.

I gave it a chance, I really did. But I couldn't help but think that the series was starting to be milked a bit too much, it started to feel like I was dragging my feet.

Then Sister Location was announced. This game looked to be more in-line with what we'd come to expect with the series and I thought the animatronics were pretty cool in the trailer. I was excited.

Then when the game came out I just couldn't get into it, I don't know what it was, but I didn't feel that same draw towards it that I had with the others.

But, I didn't think much of it. People were already making videos about it going over all the details and theorising, so I figured I'd just watch those...except, keeping up with all the new lore fragments and theories was starting to become more tedious and less fun.

So, I got to the point where I'd think about looking up some videos only to think "I don't feel like it today" until eventually it just stopped occurring to me to look into it.

I think this was around the time when The Silver Eyes came out, which I did read and very much enjoyed, so I figured I'd just stick with the books (specifically referring to the TSE trilogy because I haven't read the others) and maybe give Sister Location another try in the future.

Except that didn't really end up happening, because by the time I first started to think about catching up on what I'd missed, a couple more games had come out and the thought of going over all that lore and all those theories was pretty daunting so I didn't.

I still periodically checked in for new fan songs, because FNAF had the best fan songs out of all the fandoms I've been in, but for the most part? I was more or less done with FNAF.

...At least until the movie came out.

I may not have really been in the fandom anymore, but I remember I was so excited when it was first announced that a movie was under production, so I figured it was only right to check it out now that it was finally happening. A nice little thing to finally close the FNAF chapter of my life with.

Though, of course, if you've been paying attention to my blog lately...you know how that turned out haha.

There's still a lot for me to catch up on, but yeah, it might have taken a couple of years but I'm back now.

[bergeronprocess]

Pokemon Presents was so lit today

I marked out big time when they revealed Paldea Pokemon will be joining Pokemon Go. That was a cute segment too with the different shoes to represent each generation of games.

Paldea Winds looks really good - I enjoyed Twilight Wings - so I'm looking forward to that. Path to the Peak or whatever the TCG themed series is called, that looks cute too. The live-action documentary about Worlds got me back into playing TCG after 20+ years, so why not check out the animated series about it too, right?

And speaking of TCG, I played the Game Boy game way back in the day and then again on 3DS virtual console in 2020, but I'm excited to play it again on Switch! It's SUCH a good game. I recommend it!

I may even download Masters again (I ran out of room on my phone and deleted it a few years ago lol) though I might start with a fresh new account because it sounds like a lot has changed since I stopped. PKMNcast makes references to how it's got some sort of dating sim element now?! Anyway I liked the voice acting for Nemona there.

It is good that Mew is more easily accessible these days. Back in my day (extremely old lady voice there lol), you had to hack one in using a Game Shark. I think it's nice that you can get one with a mystery gift code or the save data from another game. Beats having to rely on in-store distribution events.

And then the DLC, ooh the DLC. It looks like a ton of fun. All the new characters we got introduced to seem so cool. I do wish the trailers showed us where Nemona and the other pals will be during the DLC. Are they coming to Kitakami or Blueberry Academy? It would be great to see them there. I'm also excited about the photography elements...I took photography in high school and so I feel very connected to this lol but it also has shades of Pokemon Snap and that's great too. Oh and!!! A club room you can decorate! Let's go! All kicking off next month too with the first half of the DLC dropping... these are good times to be into Pokemon...

[eyrieofsynapses]

Redemption Panel Highlights and Reactions

GATORS

i.e., Beth Riesgraf and Christian Kane (mostly Beth) talking about filming the scenes in (what I presume is) The Rollin’ on the River Job, where they’re pulling some stuff out of the water, and finding out the next day that there was an absolutely massive alligator pulled out of the same place just a little while after they filmed it

Beth’s impression of the wildlife folks warning them about the alligators

Beth scaring the hell out of Noah Wyle by yelling “GATOR” at him just after he finished his scene

seriously that was an absolutely WILD part of the panel

Everyone showering Aleyse Shannon with literally all the love!

Aldis Hodge in particular big-brothering her, and also the older actors calling her out for not giving herself enough credit, and Dean Devlin talking about how she blew him away at the auditions with her ability to turn on a dime

Seeing Kane with his glasses off wiping at his eyes, momentarily thinking “you okay dude?” and then realizing that he was laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes

(same)

The The Bucket Job clip! I’ve been a bit meh on a lot of Redemption, just in how it didn’t feel quite right, but that is possibly the absolute closest I’ve seen it get to the original in the best way. Brilliant

Which comes as no surprise since BETH RIESGRAF directed the episode!!! And apparently put an insane amount of effort in!

Beth’s utter delight and joy at both directing the episode and having the crew behind her

THE CHAIR

So apparently she and Christian went to town on the fight scene and he winds up tied up in a chair somewhere along the line and there’s a whole wild scene, which I am really looking forward to

Beth knowing how insanely particular he’d be about things like zip ties vs rope and what kind of rope e.t.c. e.t.c.

Apparently this is also tied into a VERY DEEP scene with Eliot? It sounds like they’re going to go super hard on his backstory, which is terrifyingly exciting

Just. Beth and Christian going very hard on that episode together

Speaking of: the panel’s going amazingly, I’m laughing so hard my stomach hurts, things are relatively light, and then, of fucking course—

Kane hitting us over the head about Eliot being a mass murderer who can’t be redeemed, is trying to stay static so that he can maintain the place he’s in, and is thus LIVING VICARIOUSLY THROUGH HARRY

What the FUCK. This is of course incredibly insightful and perfectly on point (because it’s Kane) but also, EXCUSE ME, OUCH, why would you DO THAT to us?

Everyone talking about having their families on set and their kids!

Beth’s son growing up on the original Leverage set and now going into being a director himself!

Gina’s daughter also growing up on set!

Noah Wyle’s daughter is playing Harry’s daughter I REPEAT NOAH WYLE’S ACTUAL DAUGHTER IS PLAYING AS HARRY’S DAUGHTER

Gina Bellman remaining relatively stoic throughout much of the panel (seriously, this woman, how the heck does she do it) and then losing it when they’re asked about running/inside jokes

A lot of them are, of course, apparently not appropriate to be spoken on-panel

(A lot of the others are the little inside ones that are special enough not to be ones they want to share, which is sweet!)

Everyone collectively losing it over having LeVar Burton on for The Bucket Job

Devlin and everyone laughing about collecting the various Star Trek people on Leverage

Beth talking about Burton coming over while she’s getting ready and asking her if she’s living on coffee and water, her laughing because he was absolutely right, and then him gently reminding her to remember to eat, which is the sweetest thing in the world oh my gods

Kane apparently choreographing an intense scene with Burton and being scared out of his mind, because Burton really wanted to go for it, but to Kane it was like he’s a figurine that’s not to be messed with because he was so worried about hurting him

Kane choreographing a massive amount of the show, which I knew already, but seriously, this guy blows me away

Gina and the crew talking about how he’d be away for a day of shooting a fight and all of them would be missing him and thinking about him

Family Vibes

Everyone talking about how they’re very noisy and loud together on set and it’s a bit like walking into a group of people having Christmas dinner (or something to that effect) because they’re just Like That together

Aleyse being the most surprised by Beth when she met her because she was like a little angel of light during the auditions but turned out to be an absolute ball of wild energy on set

Gina going “wait you were a MODEL” at Beth

Aldis talking about how much he loved how Parker and Hardison’s relationship had developed and grown!

Also, Aldis apologizing when the New York (iirc) background noise got loud and everyone going “no no we get you”

His outfit is ON POINT today

Gina saying that Christian is the goofiest and wildest out of them in terms of humor

(she goes “some of you may not know this,” which, fair, but also, if you’ve seen more than ten minutes of this guy outside of character you know he’s an absolute ball of sunshine)

Gina, Beth, and Christian talking about how they’d challenge each other to stay off sweets back on the original set, because they knew they needed to stay in shape and also just because they’re competitive (apparently all of them are major sweet tooths) and hide brownies and things from each other, while Aldis is just. doing pushups. eating all the healthy stuff. and then wanders into the room with a literal cupful of chocolates

(and Aldis going “well yeah I have to work off the sweets SOMEHOW”)

Beth explaining that sometimes they’d order a “Kane burrito” from Christian and he’d alter it slightly

Like, you know, chopping up hot jalapenos super fine and mixing them in, and Beth practically not being able to talk after the first bite

Apparently Aldis still went back a lot even after that

(Christian just seems very pleased with himself over it)

(THESE PEOPLE)

Gina goes “hey we should have an episode where we all swap roles,” Devlin going “WAIT FOR SEASON ONE TO BE DONE,” and then somebody (maybe the moderator?? I don’t remember exactly) going “uh actually. We did that”

Cue immediate scramble of “WAIT WHICH JOB WAS THAT”

(paraphrasing) “Yeah you remember the bit where you put on Parker’s harness and went off a building?”

Turns out half the cast had actually forgotten that that existed and only remember when reminded

The original cast all think of the episodes as “jobs”!!!!

Everyone talking over each other, Devlin going “it was with Sterling when we blew up the offices,” deciding that it was the season one finale, and then trying to figure out what episode title it was (eventually they figure out it’s the David jobs)

Moderator and Devlin accurately commenting that the fans know the show much better than they do

Noah Wyle very correctly explaining how Electric Entertainment is like a family and Devlin just. Keeps people

Aleyse and Aldis talking about typing when they’re hacking and going “WHAT THE HECK DO WE TYPE”

Aldis goes “yeah I just type all the bad words that we’re not allowed to say”

Aleyse saying that she’s always a little worried they’re hiding a Word document behind the blue screen and they’re going to pull up what she’s typing at the end of the day and print it out and put it in her trailer going “what the HECK is this”

Noah talking about filming The Golf Job and just getting to direct Jason Marsters and Christian together

Apparently their dynamic in that episode accurately mirrors the one with their characters in Angel!

Which promptly goes straight to the comment that it was very hard to make Marsters look like a golfer (pfft)

(Also apparently Christian plays golf for fun with his friends? Not necessarily something I would’ve thought of!)

Aleyse happily talking about how she loved the dynamic on set and it was very different from what she was used to

Also Aleyse talking about doing stunts and everyone else praising her for going whole hog

Beth especially praising her for the bit where she’s hit with the paralysis injection (I don’t remember which ep it’s from) and her acting for it, because it was incredibly hard to drop off screen in the particular way she did

Aleyse promptly answers that she was terrified with some of those, especially one where she had to keep a clock from falling and breaking

Everyone discussing how they see a new aspect of Breanna’s character in The Train Job

Also, to get serious for a moment, Kate Rorick in particular talks about how Breanna’s part of Gen Z and how we didn’t get the “days of yore” where everything was chill. We’ve basically been living in a world of hostility the whole time. It’s something I deeply appreciate, as someone who’s part of that group, and I love how they emphasize that for us.

This panel was pure chaos and I loved every moment of it! My stomach was actually hurting from laughing so hard, I swear. They had me cackling well over half the time. I would happily take panels double or triple the length of this, this was amazing. I also adore how the second you drop these six people in a room together, they immediately take off and literally just run and give you everything you wanted and more. (It is also evidently very hard to get them to STOP talking.)

I’m also just going to stop and take a second to fawn over the effects for the 3D room. It’s gorgeous—I love how they replicated the headquarters, especially with the stained glass ceilings! Super impressive, especially with all the photos, and I just love the whole thing. Kudos to whoever put that together.

Anyway, I’m definitely missing some stuff too; seriously, there wasn’t a second wasted in this thing, they were cracking some kind of joke or dropping some really interesting piece of information practically every thirty seconds. (And I haven’t even gotten into the clips OR the bloopers. I miiiight do a separate reaction purely for those.) It’s still up right now if you missed it and you want to watch it! I’ll probably watch it again, honestly.

[shohokubasket]

So, personally I am really looking forward to The First SLAM DUNK (2022) and think it will be a lot of fun! I think it's great that they are incorporating a new story and approach. I like the new voice actors as well and love how excited they are to be a part of this project. Also I like the character design (Mitsui's missing scar is my only confusion lol) and the CGI! Anyway, I will not be getting into criticism about the appearance of the movie lol.

One thing I WILL say though: I do kinda agree with some of the opinions that I've seen surrounding the marketing of the movie. I think whoever was in charge of the marketing (presumably Toei) dropped the ball on how to advertise the movie when they found out Inoue wanted to get new voice actors, try a different animation style, and kind of take a new approach to telling the story.

I just think that it would have been cool if they had actually used this to their advantage to say things like "this is a whole NEW slam dunk!" and "look forward to a new generation of voice actors telling this story!". This way they can still keep further details a mystery while also being clear about the goal and expectations for the movie. It's not like they promised maintaining any of the elements of the old anime at all, and I think people understand that, but I do think the huge reputation of the original anime and lack of clear info until kinda last minute really contributed to some people feeling bamboozled. I kinda imagine maybe some of those people were disappointed because they had already purchased a voucher, but idk that for sure of course.

Even if I personally expected them to take on new voice actors and songs, because I feel like most reboots do lol, I can empathize with people who hoped that they would maintain some of those elements (for whoever is still active in the industry, of course). I also think it would have been cool if they maybe spaced out the announcements: show an interview with the voice actors one week, interview the music artists the next week, show the trailer the following week, something like that for people to either warm up to the movie or not.

I can even understand people who feel like they should have maybe waited to sell vouchers, that they feel like Toei "purposely hid" information. However, it's kinda hard for me to fully sign on to this argument when I think about how the general delays in the production may have contributed to this conundrum, but I digress.

Anyway, that's just my two cents on this matter. I know that with reboots like this you can't please everyone, plain and simple, but I just think the movie team missed an opportunity to try and spin things more in their favor and have fans (old and new) be more open to this new approach.

Anyway, I'm SOO excited to see the boys again!! While it will be nice to get an update on REAL one day, I gotta put my family first ✌