#but i based this off from what i've seen

[mattodore]

birthday boy 🎂

[daily-dose-of-dopamine]

ok he looks less like a corpse now 👍

[fullscoreshenanigans]

Joking aside in the previous post, I do actually like how a lot of those little instances highlight how the dissolution of the farm system wasn't the result of a single individual character's efforts.

Sometimes I'll see greater focus on the contributions of certain characters—usually Norman and Ray, for a variety of reasons—elevating them a bit as a testament to how much they appreciate them, maybe with a bit of hyperbole how the escape or another event hinged on them above others, when one of the main themes Shirai wanted to stress is how it's through collective effort and solidarity that systemic change is accomplished.

One of the better escape outcomes—all the orphans of plant 3 who could be shipped in a two-year time period fleeing Grace Field—is possible because of the combined strengths of the full score trio in concocting and executing a viable plan, and Emma putting her trust in her family after seeing how capable Don and Gilda were. (Going further, Isabella was convinced that if she took out the leaders of the plan, that would be the end of it.)

The Grace Field escapees are able to survive out in the wilderness much more comfortably due to the combined sacrifices of Mujika's clan and Minerva's followers.

The destruction of Goldy Pond is due to years of planning and sacrifice by the Goldy Pond Resistance.

Λ7214's destruction and the subsequent establishment of the paradise hideout is due to a collaboration between the cattle children, them benefiting from the network of intelligence constructed by Minerva's followers, and them taking advantage of what remained of a long-lost demon colony's architecture to provide them seclusion and safety away from demons that would eat them.

The fall of Legravalima's court is possible due to the alliance between Norman and Geelan's clan.

The raid on Grace Field headquarters is possible due to a united effort between the cattle children who weren't captured by Peter and the moms and sisters uniting against Peter.

I want to say this plays into the mythologization of the individual that's common in many narratives, also for a variety of reasons, including practical convenience and scope of focus. But all of this is also tempered by these being mostly informal discussions and serve as a testament to how much affection is held for these characters, and there is something to be said about how sometimes it just takes the right personality, the right metaphorical spark, to take advantage of the kindling provided to it through those collective efforts, as alluded to in "Touch off."

[the-busy-ghost]

Me normally: Let people love what they love

Me, after a Test Match Special commentator expresses their belief that the new All Creatures Great and Small is somehow "better" than the 1978 version: This is pure insanity and TMS can no longer be trusted on anything, how can they even be trusted to know about cricket, do they have no TASTE

[mercymaker]

with the pride month slowly approaching its end, i'd really love to see less casual misogyny and biphobia just thrown around in queer spaces

[sevenspoonfulsofsugar]

hm

[shoechoe]

also no offense but a lot of the time you can really easily tell when an IHNMAIMS fan knows nothing about harlan ellison or his other work

[arolesbianism]

Sits in shambles I didn't read maybe Jorge's id correctly in the mysterious hermit logs the first god knows how many times I read them and only just now realized that it's the same id as the scientist that speaks in the agricultural notes log why must I be so bad at reading

[ct-hardcase]

.

[sanstropfremir]

I saw the comment on your last ask and wanted to ask what's your 5th gen theory? I know that for me actually looking at the years 5th gen should have started already but it feels like we're still in 4th gen because no one other than a few girl groups have blown up the way that 3rd groups both boy and girl had and anyone who has gotten popular has been in last year or two. Making a big three comparison exo in their 3rd or 4th year was in a very different place than stray kids or treasure now

fifth gen HAS already started! just not where or how you would think. and for clarity's sake: i don't categorize gens by group popularity, and that would be a moot point anyways because the success of previous gen groups is never going to be replicated on the same scale because of how dramatically the industry has changed.

my fifth gen theory is this: there's already starting to be a generation change in the last year, but it's being lead by smaller companies who are unable to sustain the current fourth gen performance model, and subsequently there's either going to be a delayed transition where the big four companies will be the last to debut fifth gen groups, OR there's going to be a full split where big four and other well funded companies can keep producing groups in the fourth gen method, while every other smaller group has an entirely different performance method.

the main characteristic of fourth gen has been very strong and heavy dance skills paired with difficult choreography, on a scale that's much more extreme than previous gens. although a lot of third gen choreography was probably harder on its idols' bodies thanks to the acrobatics, third gen idols were still trained as well rounded performers and were able to transition smoothly out of their stuntmen eras and still be able to maintain their group's artistic identity. in order for companies to ramp up the spectacle factor from this, instead of tricking + stunts they prioritized technically difficult dance, which has translated into the bulk of fourth gen idols being by large, probably the most technically skilled generation of dancers. however, like i've said in previous asks, that has come as a detriment to pretty much every other skill that used to be trained into idols. making the sacrifice of dance vs singing is fine for companies that have the funds to support having big spectacular cbs and have large stable fanbases that consume uncaringly, but it's more of a problem with smaller companies who are getting priced out of being able to afford cbs to even hope to match the scale that fans are coming to expect. so as a result, they're going back to training their idols as more holistic performers and simplifying choreography. i know a lot of people are not paying attention to the rookie bgs but a lot of the ones from the last year and change have been a totally different calibre of performer than the established fourth gen groups, and it's likely to continue that way. my hypothesis is that the last company to catch on fifth gen is going to be the next jype bg, and how they perform is going to be the indication of if there's going to be a staggered transition or a full split.

[eggmeralda]

I wish there was a way you could put like. every song in the world on shuffle

[perfectblve]

10 characters/10 fandoms/10 tags

tagged by @disasterdrvid to name 10 fav characters from 10 fandoms thank u!!!

marcille (dungeon meshi)

parvati (the outer worlds)

fig (fantasy high)

nikaido (dorohedoro)

choso (jujutsu kaisen)

shinobu (demon slayer)

wen qing (mdzs)

sebastian (stardew valley)

billie lurk (dishonored)

gale (baldur's gate 3)

tagging @bixiaoshi, @aloyssobek, @cardinalvalentino and anyone else who wants to do this~

[benetnvsch]

Skk shippers act like the whole fandom hates them for no reason and they're so oppressed, lol.

Yea :'') Some of them (a lot of them) certainly are Something. I think A Lot of them just underestimate just How Much of the fandom is skk dominated when skk's role in the official media is just.. proportionately Not That Large (even I before starting bsd thought that it's be a central thing and was pleasantly surprised when it was not)

skk shippers have Everything and then some (see tags) so ig it just surprises me how often you see skk shippers shitting on or leaving backhanded comments on Literally Every Other Dazai ship's posts for not being/comparing to skk and then getting pissy when the ppl complain abt that behavior when they could just? ignore it and turn to the gold mines of skk content instead-

And I understand it isn't all shippers who do that but those denying it's happening entirely are also quite silly to me-

anyway, look at this screenshot of some skk shipper losing their shit after the sigzai dancing scene came out LMAO

'someone comfort me pls, I'm so pathetic' gives the same energy of the people who are like 'heh, I guess nobody here actually like me.. i'm such a loser aren't I?' lolz

[thedevotionaltour]

marvel should hire me to write bc i'd pull the funniest thing on earth where i am wiping his catholic slate CLEAN and i would explcitily have him go ehhhh i've never really been religious me and my dad went some easters and christmases and attended a few services outside of that but that stopped by the time i was around 10 and my dad just kinda gave up on it because he didn't particularly want to go by that point either. and even then we hadn't gone every year for easter and christmas in that time frame. and then we never bring that shit up again in the story. he is only catholic in the sense he went a few times and it's the only church experience he knew and his dad probably grew up going to church more in his youth being dragged in by his family but he never felt particularly compelled to go back to it once he moved out on his own. catholic only in the fact that his family was irish catholic but his dad is a lapsed catholic who did not give a fuuuuuck

[keira-draws]

have officially watched 2/3 original evil dead movies 👍

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

Do you think some of the backlash Engage got came from Edelstans who were salty that the game didn't adhere to their narrative of "FE is all about all dragons bad, humanity good"?

I wasn't aware Engage got backlash tbh. I know it wasn't particularly well loved and that players moved on from it pretty fast (I similarly moved on pretty fast and didn't even bother finishing the DLC because it felt pointless to do so. It was too difficult too early on, but if I finished it late game when it'd be easier, I'd have the DLC units for so short a time in that run it would be pointless), but I didn't see it get any specific backlash.

If it did then yeah, I can only figure it came from Those Stans. Anyone who has played FE for longer than Three Houses (most people either started at FE7, FE9/10, FE13 or FE14 prior to Houses) doesn't give a shit about that stuff that because we all know that's not the narrative of the franchise. In fact, usually it's an internal conflict between dragons.

For anyone less aware of the dragons' story in previous titles:

Basically you've got Naga in one continuity (FE1-5 and the remakes) who made a call that a group of dragons didn't agree with and they turned against her, refusing to forgo their pride as dragons (i.e. they could stay as dragons and eventually go insane because of the decline at the time (something not present in FE4-5 which happens before FE1-3's timeline), or they could switch to a human form and live as humans and stay sane). It ended up in a long running feud between them.

Some of those dragons were bad apples and those are your endgame villains. Since the timeline starts with the Jugdral games, you get Loptous first who doesn't vibe with Naga (who at this time doesn't interfere with humans and doesn't believe in dragons doing so) and they're enemies. Loptous is the big baddie because he wants to conquer the continent, so his motivation is basically just dragon!Edelgard (nice irony at least), and he surrounds himself with people who are loyal to him and kills the rest (Edelgard lol).

During this time you're in gen 2, and during gen 2 the protagonist is led by a human loving dragon who never even announces his identity as a dragon and assists the human in surviving against the big bad dragon. Since the big bad dragon wants to kill the bloodlined people and enslave the rest as part of his conquest, you could say it technically falls right into his war with Naga. Conquer a continent, get a bunch of mooks to fight for you and have the power of a whole ass continent behind you. It would help him in fighting the dragons who sided with Naga. Thankfully we have mister human loving dragon who won't let that happen.

Later in the timeline is FE1, where we have big bad Medeus who is in a similar boat (except this is like 1000 years post Jugdral). Doesn't agree with Naga and wants to fight her. Starts conquering a continent with his little human mooks. By this point Naga has realized that isolated the dragons from humans was a mistake and enlists Marth's help. Medeus is defeated but comes back for FE3.

FE2 was about dragons among humans and the pros and cons of it. Happened between FE1 and FE3. There was no mention of All Dragons Bad because each dragon was seen as a god to the humans and they respected them (similarly to Jugdral's part in the timeline, where all the characters' gods are actually dragons).

Come FE6, that timeline is ditched entirely until FE13. FE6 and FE7 are about dragons and humans living in peace, and how a war broke out between them because humans got too fucking greedy and started killing them (so the dragons retaliated, got defeated and went into hiding behind a sealed door so the humans would leave them the fuck alone). The general idea behind these two games is, similarly to other other titles, about human greed.

Jugdral expresses this by Naga shutting out humanity because she saw how greedy they were after saving them once, seeing humans fighting each other again and again and again - especially the ones who got greedy because they had the power to conquer, which was given to them by the dragons. Basically the dragons in their goodwill gave humans losing a war the power to survive the war/fight back again, and then years later humans used that power to start more wars. Naga decided nope and stopped interacting with them. Mind you, in no part of these games does Naga personally ever try to help humans. She stuck to her guns regarding no helping humans and in background info from the creator apparently made it law not to interact with them.

FE8 ditches the concept of dragons almost entirely, having a manakete character who is pretty much completely irrelevant to the main plot.

FE9/10 don't focus on dragons as the Big Picture and are instead equally incorporate into the story with everything else. The racial issues aren't between humans and dragons, but instead just humans (referred to in these games as beorc, with "human" being used as an insult similar to a slur due to sub-human being used for laguz) and laguz. Dragons are a sub species of laguz and are generally neutral in conflict, with only some individuals acting with motivation.

So that all said, older fans with awareness of all this (especially prior to playing Houses, i.e. Houses wasn't their first game) don't look at Engage through Houses tinted lenses. We look at it as any other entry and base it accordingly. Nobody who has played the older titles prior to Houses seems to have any backlash against it. Most seem to find it mediocre as best as a game, but overall have no issues with the story and just mainly see it as much more lighthearted than most FE stories.

That said, yeah, the only people I can imagine giving outright backlash are people who are angry that the formula didn't follow its roots because in their ignorance, all they know being pixel waifu, goes against their beloved Agarthan/humanity/Agarthan-brainwashed-Edelgard narrative.

Engage follows the story of good and bad dragons, and the good dragons being friends with humanity while the bad dragons get fought by the good dragons and their human friends. It didn't continue CF's narrative because CF was the outlier in Houses in the first place, literally intended to be the villain route, and surprise surprise, the villain route is when dragons are the enemy.

In FE7's case in particular, there are only good dragons and they fight the big bad human who is obsessed with dragons because of their power. The final boss is a dragon who came out of the gate because Nergal tricked three dragons out basically, and in seeing humans the dragons reacted violently (which like, can you blame them? After everything humans put them through for pure greed?). Ninian had to kill them to stop them from rampaging, but she said it "wasn't their fault" (it wasn't), and she was only strong enough at the time to take two of them down, so you're left to fight the last one.

In FE8, the only dragon you get isn't bad and is just from a place got attacked and destroyed, so she's the only survivor who Ephraim helped, so she joins your army.

In other wordssss... every single FE has had the same general theme for each story. CF is intentionally the only outlier and while yes the devs 100 percent fully intended to make Edelgard lovable and were they themselves obsessed with her, it doesn't change the fact that it was made to specifically be the route where you sided with the bad guys. They do acknowledge her as the villain, they're just so obsessed with her that it comes across as her not being a villain. They also can't seem to handle becoming attached to a villain they wrote because then they don't want them to be a villain and suddenly can't commit to the route properly anymore. Wah wah.

I wrote about that stuff recently more than once so I won't do it again beyond that, but... yeah, anyone who knows the standard FE formula knows Engage is the same as all the others. Nobody who understands that is gonna complain about the overall story or be mad that it's not some humanity-is-best fantasy (when even irl most people are aware that it's not and that humans are literally destroying the planet lmao...).

Honestly, seeing how detached from reality those stans are is utterly baffling but also disgusting. That is, of course, assuming they're not all imperialists irl and yadda yadda, which I'm sure some are even if not all (as an American I can say that tends to be the average American straight white man mindset, and like Edelgard considers Fodlan "the world" in both games, said Americans also tend to view America as the world itself and conveniently forget other places exist). Most are probably just so detached from the reality of what they're defending so intensely and taking so seriously that they don't see or realize how horrific it all sounds.

Again though, being that detached and obsessive is just... insanely unhealthy to points those words alone can't describe. Also, to play a totally unrelated-to-another-timeline-in-the-franchise game and yet still judge it based on less than a fourth of the content in a previous timeline-isolated entry is pretty deranged (and I say less than a fourth because CF is several chapters shorter than all the other routes, so it's not even a fourth of a game with four routes).

If people are genuinely going to judge all other FE titles based on their imperialist pixel waifu, I'd prefer them to just not play the franchise at all. FE as a franchise is not CF The Franchise.

Also, that fictional/dragon race hating mindset feels like something that's the beginning of something much worse, i.e. actually being racist toward real people because it gets you thinking a certain way that may stick with you, you know?

These people are why the FE fandom has such a horrible reputation nowadays. They're also the reason why Edelgard as a character is as controversial as she is. Many people who hate her hate her because her stans have shoved their bullshit down their throat when people weren't even talking about her or were peacefully on their own space of the internet (i.e. their own Tumblr, Twitter etc). I've seen several people actually admit to this - that they didn't originally hate her but the stans made them actually hate her.

Stans have literally tried to go at me for posting things that I didn't even tag outside of my standard DCB Comments tag. The second they find something from the For You section (or back when Tumblr search for some reason showed posts based on the content in it and not based on the tags (which iirc they fixed?)), they can't hold themselves back and continue scrolling and ignore it. They can see it's not tagged and interact anyway, ridiculing and attacking people for posting "hate" (read: usually just literary criticism) that isn't even posted in any variation of Edelgard's tags.

See, here's the thing. I love Dimitri and Claude and I've seen plenty of shit takes about them that I loathe with my very being. But like, I know people with opinions that strong already are not going to agree with me. Ever. I'm not gonna bother wasting my time trying to change their mind or argue with them because it's just going to be an irritating back and forth. I see a bad take on them and I keep scrolling and ignore it, because interacting with them/the posts gets nobody anywhere at all. Unfortunately stans don't have this mindset and feel they have to attack anyone they can find. Funny really, how much like their imperialist waifu they really are.

So tl;dr as an answer to your question: yes, I do think any backlash for the game was from Edelgard stans, because anyone else playing this franchise has more than zero brain cells and can figure out that Engage is a very standard and normal addition to the franchise. Many people don't really care for it, but there wasn't any outright backlash from anyone else that I've seen.