#anyways people should check out this game

[riverintheunderworld]

JUST PLAYED BEYOND THE BET!! thank you to my lovely friend poppy who bought it for me and my other friend!! she's an absolute dear <3

Anyways, check under the cut if you want to see me ramble about Casper and MCs relationship like its a queer allegory!! Minimal spoilers, I'll be talking about it very vaguely!

As a very, very, queer person, I couldn't help but become so emotional at Casper and MCs storyline, ugghh.

Their relationship is so dangerous for the both of them. In theory, it would be so much easier for both of them to just follow the roles they were made for; for MC to die, and for Casper to be the one who makes it happen. They have roles, and they were built to follow them.

But it's not easy. It's supposed to be easy, but it's irritatingly not! Because they love each other dearly, and it would be harder to seperate now knowing that if they turn around, they would've missed out on a life filled with each others presence.

Grim Reapers and Mortals should not be together. It's not safe, and it wouldn't just cause them harm, but it could cause them death. But they stay together anyways, because they can't see it any other way -- because they love each other.

They find a way to make it work! They try so hard, and they know they're risking their own lives. They should feel helpless, because honestly, it feels like the world is against them. Actually, the world IS against them.

In what they assumed was their last days alive, Casper and MC spent it protecting each other (even if it meant risking harm on themselves) -- and they spent it loving each other, indulging in sappiness that was too much for my poor, gay heart.

I couldn't help but like see them as two queer teens, trying desperately to survive in a (previously lonely,) homophobic household -- homophobic world that was not built for those types of relationships, and would punish anyone for even trying to fall out of line.

Two queer people who only had each other, managing to survive through pure determination and spite and the need to experience life with each other.

Euughh this game makes me SICK!! i hope you enjoyed me regurgitate the same 2 points over and over!!

Cough, cough, I also write stuff, sooo.. send me a request!!! if you'd like :3

[foofyarts]

Tosses you various doodles of The Upturned

[hrokkall]

Minos and Sisyphus Prime but they're both core files from hit 2016 game Pony Island

[the-sunlit-earth]

a lot of clipping to fix, but hey I got it moving at least! I'll get the Telvanni robe properly physic'd if it's the last thing I do >:0

[purpleshadow-star]

Here's a reminder that ANDREW DOES HEAL AND LEARN TO FEEL. Nora never said that Andrew never heals or that he doesn't get less apathetic. She said the opposite, actually. If you don't like the extra content, that's fine, but please actually read it before deciding to spread the incorrect assumptions people have made up about it. Just because Andrew never gets to the point where he smiles and laughs all the time doesn't mean he doesn't heal.

(Also, Nora never said Andrew never smiles, just that it's hard to imagine, and if he did, it'd be with only Neil around)

[icewindandboringhorror]

boy in silly sitting positions compilation

[no-light-left-on]

So the Death of the Outsider lacks a chaos system and it makes perfect sense

(I recommend reading my other post on how chaos works in the DH universe first but it is not mandatory.)

The point of the chaos system is, at its core, a reflection of how a world already at its tipping point reacts to the player's actions: Dunwall ridden by the plague and oppressed by the Lord Regent’s rule, Karnaca bloodfly-bitten and slowly torn to shreds by the Duke with people scared after the recent coup.

Billie, however, simply exists as a person once the world has been tipped towards the better, Emily having reclaimed her throne and Karnaca slowly but surely steering towards better times. Her quest is not motivated by politics or by a falling empire. It is entirely personal to her, Daud, and the Outsider.

Billie is an ex-assassin. She puts the world on a tipping point, but she does not decide whether the world rights itself or comes crashing over the edge. She takes jobs from the black market, sometimes killing people for money, because that is all it is to her - a job. And while she may kill innocent people while at it, there is no more terror it can bring atop the cruel rule of the Duke and people dying in the mines. In the end, she will disappear into the shadows. It is just another mugging, another unfortunate murder of a father coming home in the evening. Nothing more, nothing less. No responsibility to take over it after.

She is dedicated to her quest, and that quest is not even hers - it is Daud's, and she is just going along with it out of maybe guilt, maybe old times' sake. She is not even that interested in killing the Outsider herself, has very little stakes in it, and decides to go through with it because it's what Daud wanted. There is no world that can react to her because she is the world that is reacting, in a sense, to Daud's wishes and the Outsider's subtle interventions.

Compared to, say, DH2 which takes place months before the events of DotO, Billie has very little to lose, no place to reclaim, no world to save. The results of her actions, no matter what they might be, won't change how the world is at the end of the game. Emily can choose whether a brilliant doctor lives so she can save lives, she decides whether the Howlers or the Overseers take over Batista, dictates who rules and with how much power, with what level of cruelty. Billie is killing a god, no matter what it takes, and there is little need for consideration of how this result is achieved.

The game does not even have targets, save for one, the Outsider himself. All the missions are about gathering intel and preparing for the job. The structure of the whole game is very different to serve the purpose of the plot and honestly it's a clever choice so that the focus remains on the one thing only - killing the Outsider.

One thing I did not mention in relation to chaos in my other post is that the chaos also influences the Outsider and his speeches at the shrines. Which, fair enough, it is just one more change in dialogue among many. But in the case of DotO, he is directly involved. He is not an observer anymore. He has real reason to be emotionally invested in what is happening and what Billie is doing. He needs to bait her into murder, or change her mind to spare him and free him from his eternal imprisonment. There can't be a change from interest to cynicism as Billie kills more people to get to him, because in the end, he is the target. He wants out of the Void by any means necessary, which means he has to be fully invested at all times. He has no reason to suddenly go soft and make subtle comments. He comes across as so much more malicious in this game, maiming Billie and being so incredibly cruel when he tells her that Daud has passed while she was away. All this because he can't risk her changing her mind, thinking to herself, “Hey, maybe he sucks but he’s not That Bad” and then turning on her heel to leave. He is trying to influence Billie instead, which he didn’t do with his Marked (unless you count his mentions of multiple possible outcomes as influencing, or him telling Daud about Delilah).

So no, the world won't change for you, the player. It won't change because you chose not to kill anyone, not even the contract targets, because if you don't do the dirty work, someone else will. And the Outsider cannot change either, because Billie is not changing the fate of an empire. She is changing the fate of Him, personally, and he cannot afford to let her choose the only bad choice - indifference. So there is no point in a chaos at all.

No matter what Billie does in the end, the outcome will be the same - the Void will change. sShe will change the universe as they know it, but no matter how she goes about it, the change will come. She is not faced with a question of what she wants the world to be. She was guided there by others, expected to do one thing - kill a god. The world has set her up, and now she has to react.

And so she comes to the Void and is met with the only choice that will matter: Is she going to show mercy, or remain the same?

[carcarrot]

having another one of my job-related crises

[catallarii]

random art dump from uhh lets see... 2022

[xxswagcorexx]

grabs u by the shoulder. hey. hey u. have you've ever wanted to learn about a mcrp arc with themes about violence and the death of innocence, scary arcane experiments, political murder, and interdimensional travel where u meet alternative versions of urself?

well if any of that sounds awesome to you, BOY DO I JUST HAVE THE THING FOR YOU!!! midmysticx's egg arg in lifesteal season 4 has all of that!!! it had to be cut off short because of meta reasons, but with what was released so far, it was. So Cool .

now i HIGHLY recommend checking this out for yourself (a curated playlist that i made can be found here! it's pretty short but. imo the themes of it carry it in SUCH an interesting way), but if you don't have the time/want more. propaganda reasons why you should watch it, there's more under the cut!

(mild cw though for the "having a voice in your head through magic items/powers" trope! it plays a very small part in the story, but i'd figure i'd give a heads up just in case 👍)

ok so like. this arg happens in the canon of lifesteal season 4 (lifesteal seasons fully reset like hc seasons) and the main "progatanist" of this arg is c!midmysticx/c!mid, and most of the "lore" is told in the format of vhs tapes

that being said, c!mid is a little confusing in the way that s4!mid is implied to be a different character that c!mid from other seasons

i say that bc s4!mid made an "application video" for lifesteal, citing about how shes excited to join (even tho cc!mid has been a part of ls since s2)

also. very interestingly, mid excludes herself from the s4 start in a replay shot (even tho cc!mid was present during the s4 launch)

and interesting enough, s4!mid seems a bit. naive in the application video? like she mentions she's "good at editing" as one of her attributes on why she should be added to the server and mentions. nothing about the violence of the server (other than introducing the mechanics of the server which is LITERALLY about killing people to gain hearts and losing hearts when you get killed)

halfway through her application video, though (after a few months passed according to the date on the bottom of each video) she sounds very. bitter

the video changes to be all in black and white and she starts asking: "why? why do you all kill and ruin friendships and betray? all for hearts?!"--a MUCH different demeanor than what she had when she started. bitter and resentful, almost, compared with the excitement she showed earlier in her "application", and it ends with her announcing she stole the dragon egg and she's made 4 trials for people to look for it

anyways, moving onto the first tape that takes place ~around 2 months before the shift in demeanor, s4!mid starts to record video tapes about experiments she's doing with the dragon egg, eventually combining a heart with the dragon egg and opens up a portal

she doesnt know what on Earth it is so. shes testing it out right. like any person with safety concerns would

and well uh.

she puts a pig through and it fucking died

so . Erm! not a good start

anyways she eventually feels a voice/urge calling her to go through the portal even though she knows its risky, but she's been having such bad headaches that she goes through the portal anyways, ditching her plans to figure out how to control the power of the egg before going through it

and uh. heres where things get confusing again because this is where. the interdimensional stuff comes in

she arrives in an unknown location right. and. jumpscare . it ends up being a manor (and i'm just gonna call this mid "murder mystery!mid" bc the manor is the same one in one of her other videos, a halloween special where mid + co do a whodunit)

and basically, s4!mid witnesses a mayor election (which is a big part of murder mystery!mid's story), and after s4!mid explores for a little, s4!mid and murder mystery!mid eventually . make eye contact

and um. you see. s4!mid accidently eavesdrops (im assuming so? there's a tape of that and its been established that s4!mid films all of them herself) on murder mystery!mid's plan to kill the mayor and Uh. s4!mid. ends up also witnessing murder mystery!mid's murder as well

s4!mid gets chased and has to go back to the portal to escape, but the issue is. the portal doesnt bring her back to lifesteal. it brings her to eclipse smp

AND FUCKING BRINGS HER TO ECLIPSE!MID'S GRAVE

she eventually sees someone crying over eclipse!mid's grave before going away into the woods before hearing a sound and running away

that's where the arg (unfortunately) had to be cut off but like. Still. the part that makes me constantly rotate this arg in my head is the fact mid literally saw her own death. the different versions of her. her witnessing a version of her that was Willing to commit murder. the whole change in demeanor in the application video in such a short time .

anyways, if i had to homebrew an "ending" to this arg, i think mid would have traced back and started to Learn more about the other versions of herself, and eventually had a character arc where she just. witnesses all of this destruction and pain and suffering

and just. Realizes how much of that there can be and realizes how much stuff like that effects lifesteal and how. pointless it is in the end.

and eventually, in a last ditch effort to have everyone work together again and despite all she's been through, makes the egg arg

also on a meta level it would make sense i think (since a lot of the actual arg puzzles involved trust and working together and trusting your teammates)

and on the topic of the egg arg meta, it fucking worked. the lifestealers did work together and put trust in each other even when threatened with death to solve the arg.

it did bring lifesteal together. even just for a little bit

and i am just. man thats fucking cool!!!!!!

not to mention just. the cool character study stuff you can do on c!mid. the thought of seeing yourself throughout all of this. realizing about how these things can effect you in different ways. witnessing your own death TWICE. and by the time to come up because of it, you're a changed person on a fundamental level. and in the end, looking at the thing that caused all of this, and throwing it out there in a last ditch effort to make things right again. in the worst scenario. even though you're bitter and angry now. you try anyways.

that concept is so. cool to me . i wish more people talked about it but yk. this is me throwing my hat into the ring

egg arg my beloved fr <3

[leafy-m]

So I hit my 700th edit for the WHA wiki today, because I am a totally normal person

[claitea]

local 20 year old almost gets teary eyed over a mario game

[puppys-rhythm-heaven]

i am being so fucking autistic about a video game i've only played an hour and a half of and have absorbed like 99% of my information about through osmosis from my bestie(s. it's complicated) and fanfiction. catastrophic levels of autism. i can't stress this in words i don't think y'all understand. or care honestly sdflkjfdskdfsjsfdkj-

[outeremissary]

So it turns out that I have so many tabs open on my computer that one of them is from right after this was originally posted and preserves the post that I deleted and didn’t look at since in shame. Now that I’ve been forced to see it again it’s Literally Not That Bad. Maybe it’s just that I’m sleep deprived and looking at it again on the monitor with the most fucked up color ever but it’s not deleting bad. And thus. It shall be restored.

Apologies for the delay... @dmagedgoods​ and @silversiren1101, y’all tagged me in this. Thanks for the tag.

Blank here or under the cut.

[wayfinderships]

Just finished G.host T.rick and have been reminded of how gender Black cats are-

[obeymeow]

have devolved into begging on social media but this is driving me up the WALL. I relatively distinctly remember a line of dialogue in the original game, paraphrased obviously, but to the extent of "asmo's charm doesn't work on a few rare exceptions but they're usually people with great magical power so it's strange that MC is one of them". does anyone else remember this or have I been trying to headcanon something into existence