#better about my playing overall

[leciraofthewilderness]

So, despite some faults, I really enjoyed totk, and on its anniversary I want to say something about it. Other people have said similar things before but it’s really important to me and actually a big part of why the story of totk was meaningful to me, so I want to also say it:

Zelda needed to come back from draconification. The story needed that. It wasn’t lazy and just ignoring “consequences” because (imo) that was the *point*

The point is to feel like there are going to be terrible consequences and then say actually, no. You can come back from this, with the help of other people.

To me at least, that was the theme of the whole story.

If botw was about how the world goes on past loss and grief and starts to heal (how flowers grow in the ruins and the world can be beautiful again, be worth saving, even if it has changed)…then totk was about a more personal kind of healing.

The weight of the world should not be on your shoulders alone…you, alone, should not have to fix everything…you should not have to sacrifice yourself, but when you do, someone will be there to save you from it.

This turned into a really long ramble so:

You (Link) gained so much and now it’s gone. It feels like you’re back to where you started and yet you know you have to do it all again…you were weak and you failed and you’re weaker now…but

You go down to the surface. Monsters swarm across it once again. Other people are fighting them too though. You help, but it’s not just you…

You go to the Rito, the Gorons, the Zora, the Gerudo…just like with the divine beasts, there are friends who help you save each region. But this time, part of them comes along with you when you leave. It’s nice, you realize, the first time one of them protects you from a monster you weren’t prepared for. You’re still weaker than you were before, but someone has your back…

When you go up to the sky you see a strange new dragon there. There’s something about them that feels familiar. You try not to think about it.

You go down to the depths too. It’s terrifying at first. You hate it. You only want to get what you came for and get out of the dark….but slowly, the light grows. You get stronger. The dark feels like a challenge you can face (and someone has your back).

There are spirits down there. You don’t know when they’re from, but some part of you wonders…are these all the people you let die in the Calamity? (You help them find rest from their wandering. The weight on your shoulders feels a little less heavy).

There’s so much gloom. The first few times the sky turns red and hands chase you (a reminder of what you’ve lost, how you failed) you just run. Eventually though, you have to fight. It feels like the (second) worst day of your life again. But you manage to get free of the grasping gloom and stand and fight, as wild and desperate as it is. Beneath the manifestation of your worst fears, there’s another thing to fight, but this time it has a face (a voice in the back of your head says…you know this isn’t all on you and your failure…it’s really Ganon’s fault right?). You get through it.

At every turn in your travels, it seems like something reminds you of Zelda. Her passion, her curiosity, her kindness. You miss her.

At first, the tears you find reassure you. She may be in the past, but she’s safe. She’ll come back somehow…but then you hear the word draconification for the first time. You want to believe she wouldn’t do it but you know her and the fear sits cold inside you. (Zelda is a lot of things. She’s been allowed to be more of them, since she was freed from her hundred year battle, without her father holding her back. But deep down inside her, there’s a vein of self-sacrifice that still runs strong. It’s what saved the world before, after all).

She did it. She really did it. She’s gone from you (from Hyrule) forever, and it’s all your fault. If only you hadn’t failed so utterly in the battle (you can hardly even call it that) under the castle. If only you’d caught her. If only you hadn’t let the sword break. You should have protected her you should have been better it’s all your fault and now she has to live with the consequences, forever. Everything really is on you, you should have been better.

(Zelda POV: you couldn’t call upon Hylia’s power in time, you were too content to let it wither and fade away from you, ready to be free of it. You shouldn’t have. He got hurt, the sword got hurt, it’s your fault…Sonia and Rauru help you channel it again, Sonia helps you learn how to turn back time…but you don’t save her. She dies because you couldn’t save her. Rauru dies not long after. There is no one left to guide you, once again. You could spend years trying to figure it out on your own. But you did that last time. It didn’t work. Self-sacrifice, stepping in front of someone you love, that worked. (You do what you can, to call upon the sages, to help Link in the future, first). And then you swallow the stone. You’ve come a long way, in the past five years, allowing yourself to exist. But in the end, self-sacrifice worked last time. It’ll work this time too.)

You (Link) go down beneath the castle. You were supposed to bring the sages but you didn’t. It’s nice, for someone to have your back. But no one else should get hurt to fix your mistakes.

They follow you anyway. They fight with you, against the hordes, against the greatest enemies you defeated together, along the way. They’ll have your back, even if you don’t think you deserve it.

You fight Ganondorf, and then the demon king, in the hardest battle of your life. You think it’s over and then the demon king decides it’s better to lose himself completely than let you win. You’re exhausted and afraid of yet another battle, but up there in the sky, when you’re falling, the Light Dragon catches you (you wonder why she changed her path to catch you, you wonder if there’s still something of Zelda left in there to save). With her help, you win.

And then you’re in some other realm. The spirits of Sonia and Rauru are there. You remember how the two of them and Zelda channeled such incredible power together. You think about Recall. Turning something back to the memory of what it was before, like Sonia said. You stand with them and you allow yourself to hope. Maybe the Light Dragon can remember the form she took so long ago, the person that she was.

And then you’re falling, and Zelda is falling, but this time you catch her. You catch her. She’s back home with you, finally, finally.

And maybe, one mistake doesn’t have to be the end of the world. You don’t have to be perfect. Sometimes, someone else can stand with you, and it’ll all turn out alright. (You can put the weight of the world on your shoulders, you can sacrifice yourself, but someone will be there to catch you, someone will be there to pull you back to yourself, when all is said and done).

[sskk-manifesto]

Bungou Stray Dogs: Dead Apple and how “ability users” (opposite to “normal people”) learning to accept themselves through the acceptance of their own abilities is a queer metaphor of acceptance of own's sexual orientation and gender: an essay by me

[spacedlexi]

maybe if i just put these screenshots together youll understand why i think their relationship just Works so well as it pertains to the characters and themes of S4 in general

neither of them know what theyre doing, but theyre figuring it out Together. the old ways are dead. and together theyll build a new future thats worth fighting for

[sotc]

I FINALLY BEAT TRESPASSER AOUGHHHHH i am feeling so much. I LOVE YOU DORIAN. I LOVE YOU SOLAS. I LVOE YOU BLACKWALL. I LOVE YOU COLE. I LOVE YOU JULEIC. I LOVE YOU TRESPASSER MUSIC. I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE MY INQUIZZY AGAINNNN

[aq2003]

omfg . radio play version of much ado with david as benedick from 2001

[sillyabtmusic]

Louis as "Dark Days" by Heathen Apostles

[lu-polls]

wait op 👀 can i ask who your favorite boy is? 👀👀 (sorry im too shy to reply to the post and im curious now because of your tags)

4️⃣

[no1ryomafan]

Not to talk about fucking mega man again but every time I remember star force and I am FOREVER sad that the two of the prominent antagonists from the game that’s considered the best in the series are NEVER talked about:

Not only cause “wow these designs are fucking fantastic” but even if I think Pat is the better written “villain”-in quotations cause he’s not really evil-especially in the sympathetic light, these two are still written well and have a nice dynamic. There is hardly ANY fan content of these two-i once saw someone complaining omega xis barley gets art when BUDDY hes more fucking known by people who never touched the games then these two-and I can’t begin to understand why when people love tragic siblings in this series given Pandora and Prometheus are so loved and these two are basically them just less tragic happy ending and everything but still go through angst and I can’t begin to understand why they are so IGNORED in the game that is again consider the best in its own sub series-

Until I remember the only fucking thing people talk about from this game universally is a character death that gets SPOILED BY EVERYONE cause the general mm fandom has to sleep on star force sighhhh.

[nabaath-areng]

I got stuck in bed entirely because my pulse went haywire, but now I finally got a window of enough energy to get downstairs and grab whatever the machine is called that checks your blood pressure and pulse. And the thing that's so confusing is that technically the numbers would indicate that everything looks completely healthy and normal.

But I have naturally low blood pressure and yet I get those intense spikes where my pulse will go from like 70 ish to 100+ without warning and leaving me immobilized for however long it decides to race. And the only reason I could check now was because it calmed down enough for me to actually stand up and walk without fearing I might collapse, I have no idea if it was actually higher than what the machine is telling me now.

My pulse always caused me issues (especially during sports) growing up, but I never got wrecked to this level before. I feel a tiny bit better now but I can feel that it's not completely over yet, and I don't know when it will be. Laying in bed makes me feel fucked up in the head from despair but I have no other choice when it's the only thing that doesn't make me feel like I'll crumble and fall over.

I guess the upside is that the pain flares I had this morning is giving me a break now, and that the racing pulse helps me keep a bit warmer than usual so I won't need to turn the heater on lol. Nothing bad that doesn't bring something good I guess.

[musubiki]

how was playing hsr? was there anything that you liked in the game and the story?

ITS BEEN AMAZING AS EXPECTED!!!!!!!!! i actually havent played genshin in a while since starting it, i have no motivation to do the filler event while a perfectly good star rail is sitting there waiting to be played :')

but for mechanics, i love they have auto battle so you dont have to nessecarily sit there and invest in every little battle you gotta do....and i love that the resin (resin??) system is a lot more forgiving with a higher cap, lower cost, and allow for overflow...thats nice...i also love that the mc and starter units are very useful. im so emotionally attatched to the star rail crew so im glad they never have to leave my team !!!!

storywise im LOVING IT SO FAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i started playing it at the beginning of spring break 2 weeks ago and im almost all caught up!!! i went through belabog and penacony and now im just doing those leftover intermission main quests which im only now realizing i shouldve done before going to penacony LMAO

and of course.....danmarch....im so soft for them......and also i love sampo i cant wait to see what they do with him

[junonreactor]

just did all the party sidequests. that was really cute

[sweetandglovelyart]

A little art/comic announcement: While Knightfall in Dream Land is still in progress and I’m still working on that I’ve also started plotting out the storylines for both the Daroach backstory comic and the Susie redemption arc comic that I want to do.

Before I started drawing Knightfall in Dream Land I did some very simple pencil sketches with dialogue written on them to get an idea for the direction the story of the comic would go in and get an estimate of how long the finished comic would likely be/how many pages it would likely have. That’s the stage I’m at right now with the Daroach comic and Susie comic. I’m planning to start posting actual pages for both of these comics in January 2025, because I want to get a little bit further into Knightfall in Dream Land first before I launch the new comics. The final length may vary a little bit depending on whether or not I decide to add more stuff or change some of the dialogue I’ve plotted out, but when Knightfall in Dream Land is finished I’m estimating that it’ll be around 34-36 pages, so I’d like to maybe get to page 20 or so before I start posting the new comics. Knowing how slowly I update I’ll probably hit page 20 around late December of this year so January is likely when I’ll be launching the new comics.

Like I’ve mentioned before I’m also still very busy with grad school stuff (I’m working very hard to finish up my PhD in the next year and hopefully get a job lined up if I can so I don’t have to live with my parents when I graduate) so comic updates might get even slower than they already are in the coming months. Thank you to everyone who’s been reading the comic even though I update it really slowly, it really means a lot to me to see people enjoying what I’ve created, and I hope you’ll enjoy the new comics too when I eventually start posting them.

[moreeels]

breaking my silence I THINK DOORS IS BETTER THAN PRESSURE......!

[ahalliance]

i need to do exposure therapy with purgatory i think the fandom experience at the time instilled the unpleasant dread and despair i still feel whenever i think about the event

[claitea]

went to an inperson pokemon event today where everyone would be talking about the tcg and i'm somewhat interested in the cards so i thought it would be fun to go and learn how to play

brought all the cards i've collected over the years, got told a lot of them were fake BDJBFJ

[cyanidas]

Hii I'm still alive! I went out to Iowa for bio family reasons and have been... recovering... 🥲