#at this point they're inspired by it not based on it

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

For Child of a Wandering Star I'm so curious what kind of research you did for Tyk's people. What kind of arthropods did you reference as a starting point? How did you construct the society?? Will Tyk get a cool sword and adorable animal sidekick to go with her status as chosen one on a journey of destiny???

I was hyperfixated on evolution and reproduction for about fourteen or so years through high school and uni and hymenoptera was a specific fixation of mine for several years, so you might say that the inspiration to fuck around with creative genetics (as well as making Tyk's people bugs, possibly) is inspired by that order. However, Tyk's people aren't based on any given Earth species, and if their style of reproduction is similar to anything on Earth, I've never heard of it. A lot of people have tried to make guesses about her people based on Earth biology -- I've seen people theorise about haplodiploid determination a la hymenoptera, or theories that their government system must somehow be based on having a queen because ants have a queen, and then seen counterarguments that ant queens don't control the nest and that's a reason why Tyk's people wouldn't have queens controlling the nest... all of that's just nonsense. Tyk's people are not based on any specific kind of life on Earth. I designed her people by going "hey wouldn't it be cool is some species reproduced like this" and then designing the sort of people that could evolutionarily result from such a strategy.

I'm sure they do have a lot in common with a lot of Earth species, but this is coincidental. They're not modelled after any specific one.

Tyk's already got an adorable animal sidekick! Her name's Smon!

[applealchemist]

i think i see a pattern here with my favorite characters...

[romanticatheartt]

Under every post related to Bridgerton posted by Netflix people are crying for Michael. Just stfu omg... Get over it, they won't change it and it's been decided for more than one year now. Whether they knew what they were getting themselves into or not, the chances of them changing this storyline is zero. So I suggest you to stop throwing tantrum like a toddler. Either you'll watch their season or you don't easy as that.

Specially don't go after the actors as well. They didn't write the script...

[lunarin64art]

That feeling when he can't stand to see you that way, no matter what you do, no matter what you say😩😭💔

[crystalleoi]

glass

[jalo-parker]

I finally drew some dragon forms for them that I like..

They might change again in the future who knows (and yes they're long noodly guys)

[caramelmochacrow]

"Beating so fast, seems like it'll burst..."

[chat-dank]

If you’re not into Angbang for the "In a world where I hate everyone and everything, against all odds, I found acceptance / love in you” dynamic and the ancient, poetic intimacy of order and chaos, of creation and destruction, I’m not really sure what you’re here for.

[omarwolaeth]

Might be strange sounding, but the card reveals/banlists always come in 2 different perspectives for me, irrelevant of which banlist I'm playing under; because I write fics, I have to contend with the banlist at times (a majority of the time it's based on the sort of half-tcg, half-ocg Master Duel banlist with Anime Specific Additions.)

So when new cards come out I have to judge them not only by what I can figure out from their effects and traits (combined with what's currently meta, and if there's anything that wants to play the new cards, whilst being mindful of banlist differences), I also have the joy of internally discussing the value of a deck when its in a fictional setting.

I don't think anyone normally thinks about if a deck's theme is strong enough to tie a character to it, let alone if a deck's theme is too strong and tying a character to it is like Akihiko Sanada's obsession with protein in anything that isn't mainline persona (Like the Q games.)

Also makes engines less appealing.

[shevr]

never feeling right in saying any of whatever i got going on is due to some kind of burnout because it always feels like burnout implies you actually tried & managed to do something cool & impressive to get to that point

[theokusgallery]

God I've been listening to Wolves Run Together today and I'm back to thinking about the lines

If all the good in me is because of you // Are you to blame for the bad, too? // 'Cause I've walked holes inside my shoes for you

Because like??? Oh my god????? I feel like it's something that could be said from either Nick or Sun's perspectives, like how the whole song is almost like a duet between the two of them

Nick knows how far he's gone but doesn't quite care, but I think it'd be interesting if he's very aware of the hole he's dug for himself. No way but down for him in his mind; besides, he's happier for it, so why the hell not?

And for Sun, its like he knows he's surrendering himself entirely to Nick, but chooses to anyways. Much like his partner, this is something he finds happiness and comfort and safety in. He would rather have this known environment than taking his chances without him, even if this environment is very much a toxic one.

The two make each other happy, but they also know they're slowly killing one another with their horrible habits. It's not like they'll stop though, they're too far gone.

God I love dynamics like this HDHSHDHFJF

(also I think Nick and Sun would make for fantastic OCs given how far their personalities are being pushed from canon. You don't have to, of course, but I think it could give you a lot of freedom!)

YES YES YES THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THEM

The thing is that... Especially for Sunny, but for both of them— they know they're not... healthy. They're horrible for each other, but that's why they're good for each other, they're— they fit together. They'll both go to terrible, terrible lengths for one another, but at least they'll do it together. It's unhealthy, but it's... consensually unhealthy. If that's even a thing. They're both like candles constantly fueling each other's flame, and they are melting, but boy do they love the burn. They're horrible for each other because they fit so well together.

They make each other so so much worse but they fucking love it (for Sunny, despite himself; for Nick, completely by choice).

[insertdisc5]

📚 A List Of Useful Websites When Making An RPG 📚

My timeloop RPG In Stars and Time is done! Which means I can clear all my ISAT gamedev related bookmarks. But I figured I would show them here, in case they can be useful to someone. These range from "useful to write a story/characters/world" to "these are SUPER rpgmaker focused and will help with the terrible math that comes with making a game".

This is what I used to make my RPG game, but it could be useful for writers, game devs of all genres, DMs, artists, what have you. YIPPEE

Writing (Names)

Behind The Name - Why don't you have this bookmarked already. Search for names and their meanings from all over the world!

Medieval Names Archive - Medieval names. Useful. For ME

City and Town Name Generator - Create "fake" names for cities, generated from datasets from any country you desire! I used those for the couple city names in ISAT. I say "fake" in quotes because some of them do end up being actual city names, especially for french generated ones. Don't forget to double check you're not 1. just taking a real city name or 2. using a word that's like, Very Bad, especially if you don't know the country you're taking inspiration from! Don't want to end up with Poopaville, USA

Writing (Words)

Onym - A website full of websites that are full of words. And by that I mean dictionaries, thesauruses, translators, glossaries, ways to mix up words, and way more. HIGHLY recommend checking this website out!!!

Moby Thesaurus - My thesaurus of choice!

Rhyme Zone - Find words that rhyme with others. Perfect for poets, lyricists, punmasters.

In Different Languages - Search for a word, have it translated in MANY different languages in one page.

ASSETS

In general, I will say: just look up what you want on itch.io. There are SO MANY assets for you to buy on itch.io. You want a font? You want a background? You want a sound effect? You want a plugin? A pixel base? An attack animation? A cool UI?!?!?! JUST GO ON ITCH.IO!!!!!!

Visual Assets (General)

Creative Market - Shop for all kinds of assets, from fonts to mockups to templates to brushes to WHATEVER YOU WANT

Velvetyne - Cool and weird fonts

Chevy Ray's Pixel Fonts - They're good fonts.

Contrast Checker - Stop making your text white when your background is lime green no one can read that shit babe!!!!!!

Visual Assets (Game Focused)

Interface In Game - Screenshots of UI (User Interfaces) from SO MANY GAMES. Shows you everything and you can just look at what every single menu in a game looks like. You can also sort them by game genre! GREAT reference!

Game UI Database - Same as above!

Sound Assets

Zapsplat, Freesound - There are many sound effect websites out there but those are the ones I saved. Royalty free!

Shapeforms - Paid packs for music and sounds and stuff.

Other

CloudConvert - Convert files into other files. MAKE THAT .AVI A .MOV

EZGifs - Make those gifs bigger. Smaller. Optimize them. Take a video and make it a gif. The Sky Is The Limit

Marketing

Press Kitty - Did not end up needing this- this will help with creating a press kit! Useful for ANY indie dev. Yes, even if you're making a tiny game, you should have a press kit. You never know!!!

presskit() - Same as above, but a different one.

Itch.io Page Image Guide and Templates - Make your project pages on itch.io look nice.

MOOMANiBE's IGF post - If you're making indie games, you might wanna try and submit your game to the Independent Game Festival at some point. Here are some tips on how, and why you should.

Game Design (General)

An insightful thread where game developers discuss hidden mechanics designed to make games feel more interesting - Title says it all. Check those comments too.

Game Design (RPGs)

Yanfly "Let's Make a Game" Comics - INCREDIBLY useful tips on how to make RPGs, going from dungeons to towns to enemy stats!!!!

Attack Patterns - A nice post on enemy attack patterns, and what attacks you should give your enemies to make them challenging (but not TOO challenging!) A very good starting point.

How To Balance An RPG - Twitter thread on how to balance player stats VS enemy stats.

Nobody Cares About It But It’s The Only Thing That Matters: Pacing And Level Design In JRPGs - a Good Post.

Game Design (Visual Novels)

Feniks Renpy Tutorials - They're good tutorials.

I played over 100 visual novels in one month and here’s my advice to devs. - General VN advice. Also highly recommend this whole blog for help on marketing your games.

I hope that was useful! If it was. Maybe. You'd like to buy me a coffee. Or maybe you could check out my comics and games. Or just my new critically acclaimed game In Stars and Time. If you want. Ok bye

[bingsoo-jung]

my funny controversial veilguard opinion is that while i get why people are saying the 'sexy lof' armor is orientalist and i do think there's a convo to be had there... that armor is also based off of actual clothes people historically wore in southeast asia. like this

is absolutely based off of these

and while these are stylised forms of the outfit it's not because of the skin being shown. the women wearing shirts underneath are not wearing it as thai people wore tabengman historically. because historically we didn't really wear a lot of shirts, shirts were not legally mandated clothes until the 1940s. my thai grandmother is older than that. in fact a lot of asia didn't get around to stigmatizing and sexualizing breasts until the 1800s or later (like you can find photos of korean women in the 1900s with their breasts out and that was fine and normal culturally). the reason these are stylized though is bc they're made of silk and they're wearing brocades. most people would've worn this in plain fabric without gold brocades bc silk and gold are expensive.

and, to be clear, a lot of both the LoF and qunari armors and fashion is based off of historical southeast asian fashion. isabella is straight up wearing a hmong necklace.

the qunari ropes are also almost certainly based off of muay boran kard chuek which is this old way of binding your hands with hemp ropes in thailand for boxing. you can also see that in qunari concept art they've drawn them with intricate knots that are very chinese in origin, they're wearing armor in rattans weaved patterns. (i'll also point out that it was explicitly said in the past that people from east tevinter, which is closer to seheron, look like dorian, and dorian's va is half indo-fijian and half malay. that man belongs to the south pacific.)

and yes, we could have a whole conversation about specifically choosing to look at these armors instead of other southeast asian armors. but i think a lot of people think the armor is based off of western fantasies of belly dancer costumes... which while may have played a part, it's also very clear to me that the devs have used a lot of southeast asian inspiration for seheron, rivain, and part of tevinter.

[arolesbianism]

I need to find new eternal gales songs right now I cannot keep living with most of the playlist being shit I listened to in 2018

[pomidaea]

Part 3 of my ghoul designs featuring the air girlies (and Zephyr as a bonus). I've officially made it through the halfway point and now have 4 ghouls left to design for the impera era woo

Previous designs here: Part 1 | Part 2

As usual, headcanons under the cut:

Air Ghouls

I'm taking inspiration from Dante's Inferno because I remember there were harpies in one of the circles of hell. Hence, the bird design.

They're often seen accompanying earth ghouls. In Inferno, harpies feed upon the leaves of souls who turned into trees. Based on this, air ghouls stick around earth ghouls because they care for the plants they use for food and shelter. Air ghouls in return warn earth ghouls of any danger and lead them to resources they could both benefit from. (This doesn't really apply on topside but the ghoulettes still like to hang out with Mountain)

Besides birds, I also wanted to add a butterfly/moth motif to give the characters a more inhuman look. Air ghouls have false eyes to confuse and intimidate other ghouls in the pits

These ghouls, especially those with long hair, have their hair braided by other air ghouls as a social custom (also so hair doesn't get in the way while flying)

Females have dull colors while males are colorful

Cirrus

Sharp features, long wispy hair similar to cirrus clouds

Often has her hair braided by Cumulus when they're on duty

A fast flier and very energetic with her movements

The 2nd in command of her pack

Cumulus

Like the cloud she's named after, she has more softer features than the other ghouls. Don't let that fool you because she's just as aggressive as the others.

A silent flier and not as fast as cirrus

Tends to stare at people with her large round eyes. She likes making people feel uncomfortable with her stares.

[crystalleoi]

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