#been a while since i used this tag...

[phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing]

It could just be bias, however I did like Kiana and Mei's interactions in chapter 32 as their time wholesomely bonding when they connected their minds felt really deserved after they both had suffered for 15 chapters. It made me feel genuinely happy to see them holding hands. I feel like while Kiana would accept her immediately even after she committed literal war crimes, as I think Kiana came to understand and respect her decision over time, however I felt it was unrealistic how Bronya accepted Mei despite her joining World Serpent. I think it would have been really personal to Bronya because World Serpent did a lot of the same shit Anti-Entropy did with trying to blow up an entire city in order to awaken a herrscher. I honestly did not like how they did Bronya during and after the moon arc with having her superglued to Kiana and Mei for no other reason than nostalgia baiting. Also with Mei becoming the Herrscher of Origin, it felt like Elysia straight up groomed and brainwashed Mei during Elysium Everlasting with how often she bothered Mei with compliments and how Mei somehow grew from finding Elysia annoying to being head over heels for her just because she 'died' as well as how it showed in chapter 34 that Elysia uploaded herself into Mei's brain which could lead to a Sirin type of situation if the writers could commit to Elysia having even the slightest flaw. What do you think am I reaching?

You're totally entitled to your feelings on the reunion (it WAS meant to make the players feel fuzzy!) and mm personally neutral on Bronya accepting Mei back and sticking with them, I think it's believable because she was very close to Mei. Remember when she blew up her brainchip?

Talking about brainchips, Elysia didn't upload herself in Mei's brain or anything. Mei got the signets voluntarily, and who showed up was dependent on who Mei wanted to see. Could've been Kalpas lmao. If you're gonna blame anyone, blame Kevin for getting Mei into ER.

So yeah, you are reaching on Elysia. I'm honestly not sure how to unpack "groomed and brainwashed Mei during Elysium Everlasting with how often she bothered Mei with compliments and how Mei somehow grew from finding Elysia annoying to being head over heels for her just because she 'died'" but I'll give it a try?

First off, Mei's way too old to be groomed by the time she meets Ely, she's in her 20s. She is not a child? The relevant definition of grooming is:

To attempt to gain the trust of a minor with the intention of luring them into a sexual relationship.

So let's hold our horses a bit. You may be looking for the word "manipulate", which, fine whatever, but it's not grooming. Mobius manipulates Mei too, Elysia's not special (and significantly less murdery) and she isn't doing it to "lure her into a sexual relationship". She is very open about being attracted to Mei('s horns), no luring is happening here. Try to think of why you find an adult woman openly flirting with another adult woman so predatory you'd compare it to pedophilia? Sounds like something to, uh, unpack.

Second off, while Elysia compliments Mei all the time, she never touches her horns without permission. That's why she's asking so much! The horn touching embarrasses Mei, and she's even more embarrassed about people learning she let Elysia touch them, but they are touched with her consent. Elysia asks again afterwards, but Mei says no, and she doesn't touch the horns again when rejected, it just becomes a running gag that she wants to.

TLDR Ely's an insistant flirt to Mei's more bashful ways, which one can find annoying, but not a molester. (Mei agrees to touch her elf ears as well, so the attraction may not be all that one-sided, either.)

Third off, Elysia is gone during most of Elysium Everlasting. Mei's shift in attitude towards Elysia occurs around chapter 3 of Elysian Realm's story, and is especially notable in the Pristine Memory dialogues that were added for it. For example:

Elysia: With that said, I’ll present you with this book! But don’t take my efforts for granted! Elysia: Isn’t it wonderful? I asked a bunch of people to help me out! Mei: The long credits on the blurb definitely shows… Mei: It’s exquisite alright, each page is a recreation of a scene, faithful enough to evoke vivid memories… Wait, Elysia, have you been wanting to… Elysia: Mm-hmm♪ Mei: …Thank you, I’ll cherish it. Elysia: Is this real? Mei has finally opened up to me! Elysia: If so, can I touch your… My, that was a joke, don’t run♪

(Excerpt from Pristine Memory 10) (Read all Flame-chaser texts here)

Originally suspicious and hostile, Mei warms up to Elysia over time, she spends months in the Realm. By the time Elysium Everlasting starts, she still finds Elysia a lot to deal with, but she trusts Elysia doesn't want to hurt her, and they are friends.

Then Elysia dies just before revealing her deepest secret to her, just before giving Mei what she came for, she disappears at the pinnacle of the trust they've built all this time.

Seems very understandable to me that Mei is terribly shocked and upset that her friend died, especially since more people die afterwards (her accusatory voice at Vill-V after Pardo dies haunts me), so much so that she's much softer when she gets Elysia back for a few minutes.

You don't appreciate what you have until it's gone. You don't realize how attached you are to your annoying friend until they're murdered. You don't cherish your time with your loved ones quite as much as when you're about to never see them again.

Mind you, I did NOT like the last couple acts of Elysium Everlasting. I fucking hated them so much I didn't get HoHe! But you know why I didn't like them?

I thought Mei would insist on saving Elysia. She refused to let Kiana sacrifice herself, and Kiana refused to let Hua sacrifice herself, but suddenly it was fine for Elysia to go off and die heroically? Uh?

Not to mention I kind of felt like the way Elysia was written in EE wasn't really her, because Elysia had always been hiding sadness underneath her flirting and positivity, but that's a whole other can of worms.

So yeah you reaching, maybe because it's been such a long time that you've kind of warped the canon through the Elysia-dislike filter? Look inside yourself whether you have a bias and reread the source material.

[brotato-chibs]

Kaito(u KID) doodles

[lucabyte]

Different standards

[humming-fly]

Happy Don’t Forget Day from beyond the Gate

[dreamsy990]

you know i used to think it was weird how sora and roxas have such different personalities for supposedly being 'the same person' but after playing a few games i sort of realized that they do have similar personalities, because roxas acts how sora does when he's under extreme stress.

compare roxas to sora in, say, kh1. that's where a lot of peoples idea of sora's personality comes from. sora is generally very upbeat and optimistic in that game. not very similar to roxas, right?

but let's switch the game and talk about a game where sora is ABSOLUTELY GOING THROUGH IT. chain of memories.

sora's resting state is melancholy in com. he only ever cheers up in short bursts, usually when he's joking around with friends. just like roxas.

he's quick to anger, and tends to lash out at the organization members. best example of this is when larxene makes him 'remember' namine, and he swings at her repeatedly, even after she's gone. he only stops when jiminy is able to snap him out of it.

you know what scene that resembles?

sora, while a bit more on the angry side and less sad, continues to act like this in kh2 when he's in stressful situations. (he also has a tendancy to insult people which, while it's not very related to the point, is very funny and sora saying 'gonna cry?' to xigbar is great.) i cant comment any further than that about kh2 off the top of my head.

so, roxas acts like sora does when he's stressed, right? but why is roxas always acting like that? to which i say, he isnt!

he only ever acts like that when he's also in fucked up and stressful situations, which happens to be a CONSTANT in his life. but when he's hanging out with axel and xion, a decidedly NOT stressful situation, he's a lot more like sora. he's teasing his friends and insulting his coworkers and joking around and acting like a normal kid. not really important, but unless i misremembered some sora lines which is VERY possible, both roxas and sora respond to friendly insults with "oh thanks!" a lot. just a funny little detail that felt relevant.

the biggest differences between roxas and sora boil down to environment and... i dont know how to put it besides volume? roxas is very quiet and tends to keep most of his thoughts to himself, while sora is very loud and expressive in comparison.

there is one other huge difference i noticed, which is less character based and more story. sora wanted to get off destiny islands and explore with his friends, but roxas just wanted routine. sora wants adventure, and roxas wants things to stay the same, for days where he gets off work and eats ice cream with his friends to last forever, to keep having conversations about nothing and watching the sunset. roxas wants normalcy, sora wants excitement. it's just interesting seeing their contrast.

not sure if this is very well said or anything i just wanted to talk about my boys

[ontosgold]

future vision

[stuckinapril]

I genuinely love not having a crush like I’m not over here feeling physically sick over some mid guy being dry to me I’m literally chilling

[bumblebeebats]

Must scifi be "good"? Is it not enough to watch David Tennant and Catherine Tate run about, yelling? and also a nonbinary transwoman is there?

[coffeeisfortheresponsible]

lloyd age and hair timeline :))

aka watch him loose his whimsy more and more with every season

[asexual-shelly]

hi *throws this at you and runs headfirst into a lamppost*

[killjoy-prince]

House M.D. but it's when a character says the name of the episode

[aegis-vamp]

Lilia in Riddle's dorm uniform edit

[your-fave-is-being-blended]

Woe. Blender be upon you.

He's gone now.

[hinamie]

doodles

[ffc1cb]

happy to announce i’ve finally lost it and spent a considerable amount of time making a dragon age inquisition mod that lets your inquisitor use they/them pronouns. if there’s anyone out there besides me who wants to use it, here it is on nexus.

detailed description and personal commentary under the cut

update: as of 3.05 (may 3rd), the mod has been uploaded to nexus. see download link above for any future updates.

this is a mod for frosty mod manager 1.0.6.1. you MUST install the bioware localization plugin for it to work, otherwise the game won’t start. on fmm 1.0.6.2, the plugin is already built in, so you don’t need to worry;

this mod is a simple overhaul of the game’s base text; no changes were made to the actual voice lines. this mod also does not affect default romance flags (just like in vanilla game, you can only romance sera with a "female" inquisitor (or dorian with "male"), but the mod should, hypothetically, be compatible with other mods that edit romance flags);

you can install it at any point of the game. starting a new playthrough is not necessary;

works for all races and with all available dlcs;

along with the pronouns change, this mod changes all gendered words used to refer to the inquisitor to be gender neutral, i.e man / woman have been replaced with person or contextual variants. my lord / my lady and other similar titles have been replaced with messere (on the basis of this reddit thread);

some of the dialogue could've been mistakenly changed, since context was not always easy to parse. if you try this mod out, i’d greatly appreciate any help with pointing out my mistakes (blackwall’s romance in particular has given me the most trouble); additionally, i might have missed some lines in the codexes, since i skimmed through them very briefly.

i’ve no previous modding experience, so i went with the easiest option and, like i mentioned above, brute forced it and made a complete overhaul of the base game text as opposed to a pickable option i’d like it to be. ideally i’d love for this mod to be bundled together with this other one that switches pc pronouns (which was a partial inspiration for this mod). if anyone here has any knowledge on whether this is something that could be done, please hmu.

also, since in order to make this mod i had to read through the entire game text (it was torturous. not gonna lie) i collected some of my personal favorite bits and pieces along the way. if anyone’s curious, you can look at them here. there’s surprisingly many developers’ notes in there.

[sparklingpax]

good afternoon