#but in this game its a lot easier i think. they made pieces that work together a bit better i find!

[woolieshubris]

please excuse my dreamy angel swag <3

[kromato]

Hey what's up it's me with a special interest in weapons and I wanted to share my thoughts about Nikto's machete (no that's not an innuendo for once)

Had a bit of a solo-mandela effect going on because for the longest time I thought it had a modified 'billhook'-like feature on the back of it for whatever reason (but smaller than what would be considered a traditional billhook, more like a hoof pick blade).

I kind of enjoy still HCing that it does have it because a) it looks kind of cool and b) a terrifying thought to think this man whips this giant intimidating blade out, flips it deftly in his hand to the hook side, just to sink it into flesh and yank people back in when they try to run. Also it allows me to think about a scenario where, resident karambit knife enthusiast Sebastian Krueger, can teach proper blade hooking techniques to our beloved plural man. Anyway back to the knife - It's like a cross between a coup coup and a bola? But has a cool flare like a Tapanga for his newer mwiii model. Also like a vintage Senegalese french machete, which were known for their high quality (might technically be the same thing as the coup coup, just with the locale specified I think, both entrenchment machetes). That curve also kind of reminds me of parangs but it's not particularly drop-pointed.

I HC Nikto as a very brutally pragmatic but particular man, so it doesn't feel too far off to think that he went out of his way to acquire something niche like that. Some kind of custom-made machete that fits his needs just right. The length of it, as well as the curved, ergonomic grip makes me think he's gotten it to do some serious chopping, so it's also probably heavy and weighted forward to make that easier when swinging. I don't see him as a flashy fighter personally, and though maybe it was a stylistic choice for the game devs/artists, I think it's a neat feature that speaks to his character. I do think it's made of hefty steel; weight is important in chopping knives, and though steel rusts, it's sturdy compared to a lot of other metals. Not to mention - I feel like oiling and caring for his weapons, machete included, would be a ritual source of peace for his sometimes loud and chaotic mind. Grounding when he can feel the weight and texture where his nerves aren't completely damaged, smell the oil, have tangible proof that it's reality when he sees the maintained blade even after he becomes unmoored.

Now this is just me WAY reading too much into it, but it gives me a little giggle - The hole at the end of the handle is for a wrist lanyard, so you can loop a piece of paracord rope to secure it around your hand. It's an important safety feature just in case the machete goes flying out of your hand while chopping, lest it hit people in your vicinity (accidentally...?). In his 19 model, he doesn't have the paracord rope attached; Nikto says "Fuck your safety" but also huge ego of "I would never accidentally fling my knife!!"

Could also be because it gets caught on stuff if it dangles off his hip though - he's got one on his newer model where he wears the blade on his shoulder, which looks like a place where it's less likely to snag on things. Could also be because he's been increasingly featured in larger factions, so he works with more people and was asked to have one on hand maybe?? I don't know. In either case the knot in the middle of the rope makes it too small for his wrist which could also be read as a passive-aggressive "Here's the fucking safety rope it's on there ALRIGHT" and yet he's also made it nonfunctional for its intended purpose lmao Okay that's all byeeee

[disabilityreminders]

Tips for Cleaning

Cleaning is one of those tasks that a lot of us find exhausting, overwhelming or just overall daunting for a number of reasons. It could be related to executive dysfunction, disabilities or just feeling overall burnt out. 

While it’s a good reminder that your space not being clean doesn’t affect your worth in any way, sometimes being in a mess makes us feel worse and we really want to fix it. The question is, where can you start when it’s already so overwhelming? 

Please keep in mind that a lot of my suggestions might not work for you personally. And if that’s the case, that’s really valid but hopefully they can help you come up with your own ideas! 

This might be more overwhelming for some, so don’t do this if you think this wouldn’t work for you. But for me personally, I like to go into a room and make a list of that room. This list might include wiping things down, sweeping, moving garbage, etc. I do this for any and all rooms I have the energy for. Having a written list makes it feel less overwhelming to me. I can just pick an item and cross it off. I tend to cross off the quicker/easier items first because making my list look smaller makes it seem more manageable. You can break the tasks down as much or as little as you want. I personally like to have “wash dishes”, “put away dishes” as two separate tasks while others might just want to put “dishes.” 

If you can’t think of things to put on the list, I find that googling some generic cleaning lists helps me get started and reminds me of what tasks to include. 

Now I’d like to share some general tips for cleaning when it’s overwhelming that help me! 

Break it Into Little Steps

There aren’t really any major rules for cleaning. Things got a lot easier for me when I realized I don’t have to do it all at once. When I’ve had the dishes pile up in the past beyond a point of manageable for me, I made a deal with myself. Every time I went to use a new dish, I had to wash that dish and one other dish (or a couple utensils). This ensured that the pile gradually got smaller each time I used a dish but made it a manageable amount for me. 

The same can be said for things like folding laundry. I would fold a piece anytime I walked into my bedroom. I would pick up garbage anytime I walked by it and toss it. Over time, it felt like it looked more manageable and I was able to just focus and get it all done. Sometimes we find this helps us jumpstart the task because for me, starting is the hard part. But once I start, I’m able to keep going. Telling myself I only have to do “two dishes” or “dishes for 5 minutes” made it seem a lot more manageable to look at it as a small thing. But often I’d find as I got going that I was able to keep going. 

Combine it With Something You Enjoy

For me, cleaning while doing something I enjoy has helped a lot! I love to fold laundry while I watch my comfort show. It’s one of those tasks that I can do while still doing something I love. I find I don’t focus so much on the folding and the pile is getting smaller before I know it. 

Some other ideas of things you can do: 

Listen to a playlist that makes you feel pumped up (maybe even have a dance party if you're up to it.)

Listen to an audio book or podcast

Have a show playing in the background that you enjoy

While it’s considered its own thing as “body doubling” sometimes, having company helps. Even if that’s just talking to a friend on the phone, or even texting with a friend while we both clean our own spaces. It’s kind of like an accountability buddy and leaves me feeling like I’m not doing it alone. 

Make cleaning a game! This might include things like picking a colour and then only dealing with things with that colour like only folding blue clothing, washing blue dishes, etc. This might include rolling dice and assigning certain tasks to certain numbers. Or it might be something silly like cleaning while pretending you're your favourite character or even something like a robot. You could use mannerisms or phrases that they would use and react to things how you think they would. (It might be fun to pretend to be a villain having to do your own chores because your "minion" disappeared for the day. How unimpressed would they be? What would they say while they folded laundry?)

Adjust the Tasks to be Easier for You

One thing that holds me back from cleaning is I’m in a lot of pain usually. Things got a lot easier for me once I realized that I can make adjustments as needed. For me, even though I can’t do it all at once, I found sitting to sweep was really helpful! 

Other ideas:

Use disposable cleaning wipes. There are even disposable options for toilet wands and things like that! I found the act of filling up a bowl with hot water and cleaner to be the thing that would freeze me. Just grabbing a wipe, or using a spray and paper towel was a game changer for me. 

While a lot of people do this already, I’ve heard others that don’t but I definitely recommend soaking your dishes in hot, soapy water. It makes them significantly easier to wash. 

Get a duster with an extendable handle so you don’t have to get up on chairs or things like that. 

Invest in a grabber tool. This is a tool that can be used to grab things in hard to reach places, or if you have difficulty bending. 

Get a chair that's easy to move around. This can allow you to do tasks like sweeping or wiping stuff down while sitting. I personally have a rolling chair!

Some General Tips 

If you’re finding it too overwhelming to start, try setting a timer for something like “10 minutes” and then see what you can get done in 10 minutes. You could start by grabbing all the garbage, or clearing a table or something that’s straight forward and can help you start. 

Don’t overdo it. It’s okay to pace yourself. In fact, you should. Take your time getting caught up, and once you do, try to do something small every day rather than trying to cram a lot into one day. 

It’s okay to just do one thing. This kind of ties back into how I caught up on my dishes. My friend has to pack to move and she’s having to organize her things into what she’s packing, donating, or discarding. She made a deal with herself that each day she would handle a set number of items. (A number like 5, 10, or 15). If you need to de-clutter, planning on finding just 5 items a day to get rid of might be a good place to start. 

Find some structure. I personally like printing a cleaning planner that breaks down my weekly, monthly and sometimes tasks that are every few months. It also helps me because I’m not sure how often I should be doing things like cleaning out my fridge, or bigger tasks like that. Having a check list and when I should be doing it helps a lot. 

It’s okay to ask for help! I know that we often feel ashamed of asking for help, or showing someone our space if we don’t think it’s clean enough. But it is absolutely okay to ask a friend for help. My friend regularly found laundry exhausting and overwhelming. When it fell behind on her, it paralyzed her. I would go and fold her laundry for her. And it helped her feel less bad about that when she’d do me a favour. (For example, she loves to cook and I’m often too drained to, so she made me some meal prep.) 

Find products you like! I love using certain scented products and while I never get excited about cleaning, there is something I enjoy about smelling them! 

Focus on one room at a time if you can. When it’s overwhelming, I even just pick a corner of the room and work my way out. 

Reward yourself! This might not work for everyone, but I love doing this. If I do this one task, then I get to do something fun. I’ve actually assigned tasks certain point amounts because I love seeing my “points” climb up and then I get a bigger reward at bigger numbers. (Also I always recommend cute stickers for your lists!) 

Take a before picture or video. Sometimes, we find that we can’t see progress despite being at it for awhile. It’s easier to forget where you started and seeing the progress can be really motivating! 

You don't have to follow a set of rules! What I mean by this is it's okay if you don't put away your dishes. Just because you've been taught that's a part of doing dishes doesn't mean you have to put them away. If it doesn't bother you, it's totally okay to leave the clean dishes in the sink and use them as needed! Try and get it out of your head that you need to follow a certain set of rules and do what's right for you.

Cleaning is overwhelming. While a cleaner living space can make us feel better mentally, I do want to remind you again that living in a mess is not a moral failure. You aren’t less worthy if you’re in a mess. You are still worthy, valuable and enough as you are. 

[quirekey]

MATCHUP FOR @eldritchsp00ks

You have got FIXIT RID2015

[ Transformers x Human!reader ]

INTRODUCTION

You were a friend of Denny Clay, a pretty close one at least. You both have pretty differing opinions and likings but you both like to embrace that, it’s easier to make conversations and debates with it anyways. Over time, you guys got closer and you both were unstoppable.

After a usual while, you saw Denny pretending to be a famous adventurer, stopping cars from going over the bridge. You went up to him and saw some massive robots of various sizes, colours and patterns fighting off another bunch, you were obviously worried and asked Denny what in the world was going on.

“Denny, what in the world are you doing?”

“Don’t worry about me right now, Nex… I got some work to do- I’ll explain later! Just stay by me!”

You complied and stood by him, trying to stop the other cars yourself.

When the battling stopped and seemingly the loud, clanking metal had reached its end, Denny gave it a few minutes then opened the bridge back up, leaving into the forest. You followed behind him and were understandably confused but you didn’t question him till you guys arrived at his junkyard. Oh boy, you haven’t seen this piece of… this masterpiece in a while!

Denny lets you in the junkyard with hesitation and you see the whole crew of massive robots. They seemingly don’t see you because they aren’t reacting, until Denny coughed loudly to gain their attention.

They were understandably surprised but friendly enough for you to get along. They all varied in bubbly personalities and you enjoyed their company. Bumblebee, Strongarm, Sideswipe, Drift, Grimlock and Fixit, then the two cute ones, Jetstorm and Slipstream.

One of them seemed very needy and friendly around you, they were really clingy and always wanted to talk to you ever since you met them. Fixit. The ‘mini-con’ that was seemingly the engineer and technician of the group. He definitely made it obvious that he gained feelings for you almost immediately.

You accepted his feelings but didn’t date just yet, you two were more like friends with romantic tension, why not give him a chance?

HEADCANONS

Either platonic or romantic:

- You like to talk to Fixit about your love of aliens, how freaky and cool they look! You show Fixit most of the alien merch you own and Fixit is definitely confused. Aliens are interpreted as these weirdly headed guys, cartoony looking limbs and just have a strange aura, at least the typical alien does. Fixit does feel a little insecure but also thinks it's hilarious that humans see aliens like that, but you are able to reassure him.

- He loves to run his mouth to you about his stories and says a lot of dumb crap that makes you laugh. He likes to tell stories that relate to the things you like, like aliens, horror, cats.

- Fixit sometimes over-does his talking and you definitely run out of social batteries. Fixit isn’t a guy to push so if you do mention that you are tired, he will leave ya alone. He understands boundaries!

- When Fixit goes on the tablet to just play a game or something for a break, sometimes you like to scare him and download those iconically old games like granny or something.

- You really enjoy Science so Fixit and you really like to do simple and dumb experiments in your free time with the random chemicals and items you both find in the junkyard. Sometimes there are explosions…

Romantic only:

- You like to watch horror movies with Fixit and seeing a scared mini-con shiver on the couch while covering his optics is amusing. He usually grabs you and puts you in front of him, he’s pretty scared of basically anything. Or he would hug you and shove his faceplate on your shoulder. Nuzzling himself against you while you watched the movie silently.

- Since you guys are very similar in height, Fixit really likes it when you give him little head scratches and pats, it feels funny on his metal. Though you don’t like scratching the metal on his head, patting it was okay with you. If you don’t wanna scratch, he usually says a simple kiss would do for cycles!

- When you daydream, Fixit likes to admire you no matter where he is. He won’t look for long because he feels like it’s wrong but he will admire your face for a bit.

- Fixit really likes your little space buns and when you guys are cuddling, he loves to just bury his face into your shoulder while squishing the little space buns. He describes it as those stress toys that those kids like.

Ngl I just wanted to point out that your love for aliens is so large that you even have space buns dude, pop off ✨ — to eldritchsp00ks

[666writingcafe]

Life and Blog Update

So, there's going to be one more post, and then that will be the end of season five of my Obey Me rewrite (which is season two of the Nightbringer mobile game).

I think what I want to do next is to go back through my version of Season One and write proper entries for it, because a fair chunk of it is essentially author's notes, and while it served its purpose at the time, I want to actually make one long-form story out of it. The ultimate goal is to post my work on AO3 so it (somewhat) resembles a book rather than a bunch of posts grouped together. Plus, it might make it easier for people to save my work for future and repeated consumption.

It will also allow me time to figure out how I want to go about rewriting OG's Season Four and NB's Season Three, especially with the recent news from Solmare. I know that I want OG Season Four to come before NB Season Three, but I'm not sure if my version of NB Season Three will serve as the absolute final conclusion of this rewrite series or if I essentially create new content out of thin air.

Plus, a goal I have for 2025 is to dip my toe into my desired career by volunteering as a digital transcriber for the Smithsonian once a week during one of my days off work. I have my Bachelor's in English (I know, shocker /s), but ever since I was a freshman in high school, I wanted to get a Master's in Library Science and become an archivist of some kind. However, freshman year of high school was a whole ass decade ago, and a lot of life can happen in that time. So, I'm using this as a way for me to figure out if it's still something that I want to do as a 25 year old (because in this American economy, I'm not about to spend money on something that won't bring me personal contentment, especially when it comes to further education that doesn't have nearly as many scholarships as an undergrad program does).

The point of all this is to say that it may be a while before you receive any fresh content from me, and what does come will come slowly and in pieces. While I will try to do something once a week, I don't want to fully commit to that and work myself to exhaustion and/or miss real-world opportunities to connect with people outside the confines of my job and the internet. That isn't to say that I don't value the connections I've made with you guys, because I do; I'm just trying to maintain a reasonable balance. I've experienced burnout twice before in my life, and it's an experience that I don't want to repeat if I can help it.

So, yeah. That's the general direction things are going for the foreseeable future.

Taglist: @lost-in-time-wanderer, @fuzztacular, @dianedancer18, @sweetbrier2908, @flare-love, @completelyshatteredbrokenmschf, @thunderlightning351, @l3v1chan, @anxious-chick, @5mary5, @expressionless-fr, @tenkobitch, @budbuddnbuddy

[ganondoodle]

Hey there, just read your concept for how you would replace building in TotK with Hookshot mechanics and it sounds really cool!

Like, sure Building was fun, but as you said before, it really doe not fit this game/world and just broke to many parts of it.

To get to my actual question, would the Hookshot be aimable in slow-motion while falling, similar to how Bow & Arrows work?

Because I am now imagining Sky-Islands surrounded by lots of small floaty rocks, some of them so far from each other (or moving) that the player has to hook to the closest one, climb up, get a run up, jump, glide towards the next one, and then let go of the glider, whip out the hookshot, and hook onto the next rock.

Heck, you could have an entirely airborne Gleeock Bossfight this way, similar to som of the Bosses in Twilight Princess!

Thanks as always for sharing your ideas with us!

yeah! its not too hard to imagine right? and i feel like it would have fit so well and be much easier to balance for botws world

maybe you have seen it before but i did make an ability concept for it before (some info on this wouldnt be for the botw2 style rewrite im focusing on now bc i made this originally as part of the villain rauru idea, but the abilities and how they work remains the same)

maybe the way to pull yourself towards somethign or it to you wouldnt be a single button press but instead a holding one, so if you wanna hook and immedaitely be pulled there you can just streamline it via holding the button until you are there (i know holding down a button can be rly straining but botws control scheme doesnt have a lot of it so i think using it here wouldnt be too bad .......... less painful thatn the totk arrow menu thats for sure lol)

(can i just say i really like the the infusion idea for abilities too, like ... wouldnt it be so cool to find broken shiekah tech and using it just because and then it WORKS, like theres a guardian wreck and you get on top and use infuse and it springs to life to move out of the way of a doorway for example, other structers you could use similar to twilight princess copy-staff but in a more modern interpretation??)

the building jsut breaks the game too much, and imo not in a fun way like cheating in a way definitely not intended or glitched, its like a 10 piece picture puzzle but you are also given a button that assembles it for you and you get the same reward anyway, that doesnt count as multiple solutions like it worked in botw, its like they gave up and just gave you (multiple) skip buttons, since not only rocketshields but also the 'move thing and reverse it' are like that, and you cant tell me they didnt realize that (also id argue that even without skipping puzzles, alot of them arent fun either, like its mostly either insultingly simple building tasks the game tells you outright what to do .. or just hands it to you .. or you know what to do immediately and the puzzle part comes from you having to deal with clunkily glueing stuff together until it works, which i found pretty frustrating)

ANYWAY thanks for liking what im doing!!! if i wasnt so slow and art blocked so much id have way more to show already, and text alone usually isnt that interesting :,)

[hivefleet-hellbender]

Out in the desert, no one can find you... (Hex Tiles 1)

A sharp wind whistles through the desert dunes, bringing no reprieve to the travelers following the thin paths left out in the sand. Don't drink from the river — the plants that grow along its shores contain toxins that could leave a grown man coughing up blood, and chemical spills float through the current. A faraway road carries the rare drone-tank, long abandoned from any sort of human use.

My newest hobby, to distract myself on months when the purse is a bit too tight to be buying plastic crack from Games Workshop, is to build modular hex tiles! It's super easy — I pick up a hundred of these wooden MDF tiles from Amazon for $10 (they're advertised as 2", but they're 1.75" from tip to tip, and each side is 1"), grab any spare craft supplies I have lying around, and get to work! They're super quick (this first batch of one hundred took me around a week) and they open the door to a lot of cool experimentation. A lot of this is inspired by the work of u/Marcus_Machiavelli over on Reddit, who makes these fantastic modular hive city components that I hope to someday be able to emulate. 

I'm making these for two purposes, neither of which I've put in practice yet but I'm hoping to get to do at some point. They're for:

Any mass-battle games played at 6mm. This could also work for Adeptus Titanicus or the upcoming Epic reboot that Games Workshop is working on. 

Tactical TTRPGs like Lancer that are played with large beings, who can operate on a 6mm scale.

Once I get some games in with them, I'm sure I'll encounter future problems and reassess how I approach them. But for now, this is what I've got!

I Hate Sand

The first set of tiles I made, to serve as the backdrop for the rest of them, are these sand tiles. I chose to make this a desert (and thus make a bunch of sand tiles) because I already had some sand lying around, and because it's really cheap and easy to work with. Be careful though! Anakin was right; sand sucks. Try and pick up a finer grain than what I went with, apply the sand in a more-controlled location than I did, and secure it better than I did too. But here's how I did them:

Coat the surface of the hex with a mix of PVA glue and water.

Sprinkle on a light dusting of gravel or small rocks.

Apply a thick coat of sand on top of the gravel.

Knock off excess sand and recycle it for next time.

Spray with 1-2 layers of varnish. (I would recommend a sealant instead, but I didn't have any at the time)

For the ones with little paths on them, I painted the path on with White before applying the gravel or sand, and it shows through well enough! The paths are unnecessary — they're a fun experiment, but I don't think I'll be making more of them in the future.

The Gurgling Creek

Making the river tiles was a bit more involved, but still pretty easy. The method I came up with I think looks a lot better than just painting on water, and is a lot easier to work with than resin or water effects. 

Use some kind of texture gel to build up the riverbanks, trying to have them end around 1/4" on the sides of the tiles where you want your river to connect.

Paint a strip Black where you want the river to flow, running from one edge to another.

Apply sand as before, everywhere except where you painted the black. (If you're worried about fucking this up, you can swap the order)

Varnish (or use sealant) as before. 

Take some gloss mod podge and mix it with a light blue paint, and apply in large goopy quantities everywhere you want water to be. Leave overnight to dry. (If you want the river to be less cloudy, apply many thin coats of mod podge instead, letting each layer dry before applying the next)

As an extra, stipple green along the edges of the water and use a dark green wash to create patches of vegetation.

The river pieces are my favorites, and I'm the most proud of them. The tiny bridge was a thin strip of balsa wood, painted white and then washed black. It turned out fine.

I did a solid mix of straight river pieces and curving river pieces. If I was going to do it again I'd make more curving pieces than straight river pieces, because the curving ones make more sense for how rivers work.

The Road To Nowhere

These road tiles turned out really well, perfect for a run-down highway in the middle of nowhere. Here's how I made them:

Take a piece of corkboard and cut it down to be 1.75" long and 1" wide.

Glue it on a hex with the two edges of the corkboard touching two sides of the hex.

Go at the edges with a knife, making it all worn down and busted up.

In some of these spots, I fucked up and glued the corkboard on wrong. To fix that, break off a chunk and reposition it so it'll connect correctly. This will look like a big fat crack in the middle of the road, which is perfect.

Coat in a layer of mod podge or PVA glue. Leave to dry.

Once dry, paint the cork entirely Gray.

Drybrush White onto the corkboard, focusing on the edges and exposed spots.

Paint two thin yellow lines along the middle of the road. (These are optional, but they do a lot to make the 6mm scale convincing)

Apply sand, as before, onto the ground and up the sides of the road, so it looks like the road is emerging from the sand. Maybe apply some sand in a couple spots in the cracks to make it look like the sand has gotten in there.

Varnish and/or sealant, as before.

Apply a Black wash to the road. (There's a lot of tricks here! If you want the yellow stripes to be more vibrant, you can only paint them on after the first black wash. You can also target spots of sand on the road to make it look like it's asphalt runoff, soaking black into the cracks.)

Apply a second Black wash to the road. 

The bridge was a bit more complicated, and took some finicky positioning and a trip to Kung-Fu Tea.

Take a boba tea straw and cut it into 1" segments, then cut them in half, gluing them to the middle of the hex as culverts.

Take corkboard and glue it over the culverts, bending it so it meets the two edges you want the bridge to run along. If it breaks, that's okay — this is a crumbling, middle-of-nowhere bridge.

Use texture gel and spare corkboard to fill in the gaps.

Use texture gel to define the steep edges of the river. Apply a little bit in between the culverts.

Do all the road steps to the road part of the bridge, and all the river steps to the river part of the bridge.

I'm exceedingly proud of the bridge hex. It turned out perfectly, and feels very emblematic of what I want this project to be like.

Why You, Too, Should Make 6mm Terrain

6mm terrain is amazing to make. Mistakes look like part of the landscape or the brain smudges them over due to the small size, and small changes look like fascinating little details. It really opens the imaginative space and I absolutely adore working at this scale. Plus I'm developing a ton of experience with various materials I've never worked with before, so I get to enjoy the triumph of carving foam or corkboard. It rules! I might even try to make a 28mm bridge after the success I had making a 6mm one.

My future plans for this project include cliffs, craters, 3D-printed shantytowns, and overpasses. But all that is for a later date — for now I'm gonna rest on my laurels, and spend the rest of the evening reconfiguring various tile combinations and cackling like a mad scientist.

[rosegardenofeden]

As creative tools grow in usability and ease, it's easy to think that we're going to lose "true artistry" on the way, technology replacing humanity or whatever. But I fundamentally don't think that's true! These tools allow a lot of artists to work faster, easier, and create some truly impressive stuff, and I think tools like synthesizing software, brush stabilizers, or engines like Game Maker or RPG Maker making art more accessible for those who don't have the time or mind for every aspect of creation is only a net positive.

But I don't think we're ever going to fundamentally lose the wonder of something crafted lovingly from scratch! Even nearly two-decades on, the fact that Cave Story was made basically from scratch by one man working over the course of five years while working an office job, being so dedicated as to make his own music software for the soundtrack, still impresses to this day. There's a reason it's basically the forebearer of the modern retro indie game. Cuphead has been one of the most remarkable games of the last decade on the back off its beautiful hand-drawn animation!

I grew up with a mother who is a professional oil painter. She spends months making even one painting sometimes, putting excruciating detail into every leaf and piece of bark. Her works are genuinely breathtaking, and all the more so for the effort put into it. People are regularly shocked when I show them the work and tell them it's a painting. They think it's a photograph. I think we as humans see and know effort as something valuable, and that can lead a lot of people to fear new technologies. People fearmongered about cameras, and said it would be the death of art, but that's hardly true. It just created new forms of art, and I doubt anyone today would say cameras were a net negative to the world.

[hawkogurl]

Ok, I know I get on insomniac a lot because I think a lot of their writing is deeply flawed and I'll no doubt eventually end up critiquing this one scene that singlehandedly made Insom Harry go from "good!" to "fine" in terms of writing quality for me, but! I would like to sing the praises of one scene I think is genuinely really well executed to me.

Coney Island.

I know a lot of people see it in largely a ship lense, which is fine and valid, but there are so many aspects of it that I think make it go from good to great that I never see talked about. And "If nobody else is going to do it, I will" is basically my ecological niche in the harry community. So here I am.

As a general plot beat, it is perfectly timed as an early game moment before much of the main plot begins. I don't think it could work anywhere but there. Part of the reason it functions so well to me is because it is the calm before the storm: It is a very well done moment of quaint existence before the plot of the game, which, if done the best it could be, would leave this moment as a piece of normalcy the characters cannot ever truly return to.

I think what I mean by this will be more clear when I get into it more, but I also think the fact that it is specifically Coney Island. I don't think any other location in New York would work so damn well. Coney Island is pretty much a theme park, but it's also a theme park specifically made to draw off of the motifs and vibes of a carnival. Carnivals are normally brief events, most local ordinary carnivals will only last a couple weeks at absolute most. Coney Island is basically a permanent carnival, an indefinite version of an event normally designed to be brief by nature. I hope I don't need to get all flowery about how carnivals sort of cannot last by nature while Coney Island has made itself a permanent version of a normally ephemeral concept for my point to get across.

That's not the only reason I think the setting is so vital here. While Coney Island is itself the sort of thing kids and adults are both allowed to enjoy, the concept of amusement parks and carnivals as sources of entertainment are things that, especially in the modern age, are connected more heavily with kids as a demographic. It's the sort of thing that many people are going to consider childish or see as more of a nostalgic memento of their childhood. Connecting it with youth, nostalgia, and easier, more innocent parts of life experienced before adulthood is also pretty vital here. This is a point in the story very soon after Harry re-enters Peter's life. Harry, a person in his life who he was connected to most in his youth, particularly his high school and college years. While college itself is normally very much a part of adulthood, it is often still sort of viewed more closely with youth. If I recall correctly, Harry also disappeared from Peter's life at a point very close to Peter's more "official" transition to adulthood: leaving college and entering the workforce. Especially because Peter's arc in insomniac is in a lot of ways connected to adulthood and learning how to be an adult, I find that in this regard Harry can be a very effective symbol for youth and parts of Peter's life he might be nostalgic for before the constant stress that being a self sufficient adult brings.

I could probably get a lot into how a lot of my favorite moments of Insom Harry's writing as a character are moments where he functions as a symbol. I swear to god its a good thing.

Getting back on point, while their emotions are very much a lot more complex than that, the moment of nostalgia and normalcy that this story beat provides something very useful. If Harry gets to symbolize youth and Peter's (and MJ, I have a lot to say about her) want for a more normal, quaint life his responsibilities as Spider-Man--and as an adult--mean he can't have, you're having a moment where the personification of Peter's nostalgia for simpler times brings him and MJ to a location that represents childhood and youth to experience the sort of normal, stress free life they will never be able to live. But I think on a mental level, MJ and Peter engage with this moment in a very different way than Harry.

MJ had a more chaotic childhood than Peter or Harry did. In the sort of spectrum between the three I am about to try and express, I think that fact is important to remember. Part of the reason she can handle Peter well as a romantic partner is because she has been used to instability and chaos since she was a kid, her father and the numerous issues that plagued her household basically training her to be able to handle the instability that Peter will always bring to her life. Even if I don't doubt that for her, Peter is very representative of freedom from that and the sense of peace and power that adulthood has given her, being away from her unstable childhood and having the power adulthood brings to choose what chaos she's going to allow in her life, Spider-Man still causes instability in her life. Her complicated feelings on this aren't really something I have time for in this post but... *motions to Scream*. With that being said, if it isn't already super clear I have a lot of love for what Harry symbolizes here, Harry still is very much connected to the parts of her childhood that WERE good. Being her friend and disconnected from her family, for her there's no doubt a massive connection between him and the pieces of that time that were peaceful and that she can look back fondly on. She isn't immune here. But she's also got a much lighter tint on her rose-colored glasses: I think she does want normalcy and that she does wish for simpler times like that, but I also think that how many painful times were associated with her youth have done a lot to make sure her nostalgia can't overcome her. She is the person here best equipped to know that things were not as great as the three of them want to think they were before they became fully realized adults. And I don't think she'd be willing to give up the life she's built if it meant she could have something peaceful. She knows that things weren't as great as nostalgia paints them and she made her choices as to what she wants in adulthood, as rough as they might often be. I don't think she'd give that up for the world.

It should be obvious Peter is the middle point here. Much of his arc is symbolic of coming of age, adulthood, and maturing. His character beats often include things that either draw on the imagery of or are metaphors for various aspects of maturing and becoming an independent adult. But this is only the second game out of what seems like will be three, and very early on at that. Peter has experienced the disillusionment of realizing idols and mentors will often fail him and the loss of innocence that comes with losing May, his parent, something that I like to see as symbolic of becoming truly independent as an adult--especially because he had to make that choice himself, out of maturity rather than the childishness of trying to cling to her. But many of those beats are very painful: becoming an adult is in a lot of ways, it can feel like losing a lot of yourself to let go of childhood. He's on the path there, but he's at a point where a lot of him resents that. Spider-Man is responsibility, is maturity, is adulthood. He has matured enough to know he can't reject it, to know the consequences it would bring, but he would yearn to live a normal life--feel that nostalgia for simpler and more peaceful times--much more than MJ does. When he looks back on times without Spider-Man, on his youth, most of the painful and hard times are going to be connected with Spider-Man, our metaphor for adulthood here, rather than his youth itself while MJ's painful memories are far more connected to childhood itself. MJ feels pain towards childhood and sees being an adult as freedom from that. Peter sees adulthood as painful and sees youth and nostalgia as his potential freedom from that

As I have no doubt nailed into your heads, Harry and Coney Island are both heavily symbolic of just that. Harry comes back into his life when the weights of Spider-Man are at their worst and when he would be wishing he could have normalcy more than anything. Peter knows that he can't have it. He's much more resentful of that fact than MJ is, but he does know. And as much as he knows that, he is repeatedly and constantly attracted to parts of his life he feels like will give him that. MJ seems to see this moment as a briefer indulgence, much like most people would see any sort of weekend lapse from the stresses of life. She is happy to have those on occasion, as a treat if you will, to bring her joy. Peter knows he cannot have it forever, but he hasn't accepted that he can't ever go back to that place, so much of the early game, especially moments with Harry, shows Peter seeming to chase after moments of nostalgia and normalcy as a method of running from the fact he can't go back. I think if it was best executed, the plot would have resolved with something relating to that very idea: It's hard, it's painful, it's never going to be easy, but you can't go back, and maybe the things you yearn for aren't as perfect as you remember them.

So MJ has accepted and come to terms with her metaphorical adulthood, Peter is on the path to accepting it but still yearns for and chases it, so what is Harry? Well, where is he in this moment in a narrative sense? Prior to his time in stasis waiting for a cure, assuming my memory serves me correctly, Harry hadn't actually experienced all that much independent adulthood. And what adulthood he had experienced was, when not plagued by the stressors of his terminal illness, also tethered to his rich father. I think enough people have dissected the weird writing of billionaires in insomniac games, but I think there's still an argument I could make about the fact that having the amount of money the Osborn's do can serve as a sort of barrier from the earliest, most stressful, and most rapidly maturing aspects of early adulthood. I don't intend to discredit the stress of chronic illness whatsoever, but a lot of aspects of Harry's life would delay much of the development that happens in a person emotionally in early adulthood without even getting into the two years he lost. I do think we need to remember Harry is a grown, adult man, considering that my least favorite moment in the game is a sudden moment in which they write Harry to not behave like an adult man when he was not established to behave like that, but that is off topic. Harry has been deprived of a lot of the normal experiences of youth and early adulthood by chronic illness, his father's sheltering, etc, but has had the experiences of early adulthood diluted enough that he can't entirely see that the way he thinks of things is unrealistic and overly idealized. While he very much behaves like an adult, a lot of his optimistic view of things can read as somewhat childish in a way.

All that to say that in the sliding scale of MJ-Peter-Harry, Harry has lost so much of his chance to experience a normal life and has lacked the normal maturing experiences most people have enough that he wants the normalcy and nostalgia ridden ideals of life that MJ and Peter yearn for, seeing regular life with the same rose colored glasses Peter does, but unlike Peter, still thinking he can achieve that. Peter and MJ are, at least in some capacity, aware of the fact they can't ever go to the place they yearn for and it would be hopeless to try--but Harry doesn't think like that. And alongside that, MJ and Peter all will, by nature, have a better relationship with that ideal because they both, in some regard, got to choose the parts of their lives that are chaotic and painful. Harry lost a lot of his youth to chronic illness in many regards and then lost more of it to Norman's hollow, desperate promise he could cure him if he was willing to give even more time up. MJ and Peter chose the chaos of Spider-Man, each in different ways, while Harry doesn't get to choose the chaos that terminal illness brings. The combination of that barrier from maturing experiences, idealism, and the fact he never got to choose result in the fact that Harry will pursue his ideal and is willing to give up so much more than MJ or Peter to achieve it, to "heal the world" and achieve that existence because he never got to choose that. And hell, because it's terminal illness, it would cut his life short if he wasn't willing. MJ and Peter will always have the reassurance of the existence of the rest of their lives being waiting. For them, normalcy gets to be an indulgence, something they only get to partake in on occasion, while Harry wants that to be their norm and is willing to pursue that with his everything. They are, even if it's more complicated than that, willing to let it be the exception and not the rule, while Harry wants it to be the rule and assumes they want the same.

As I referred to prior, this moment gets to be the calm before the storm, a moment symbolic of those mentalities and how the characters interact with that theme in the other moments I think are best executed. Peter slowly walks the path to accepting that he can't go back and reconciles his adulthood, while Harry consistently clings to it. Hell, a lot of my favorite uses of Harry are uses where I really get to see the value he brings narratively as a symbol. I think, if they couldn't commit more fully to his character in relation to chronic illness and venom and let go of the pieces of his character they've already written out, they should have committed to this idea. Hell, in an ideal world I would get both. And I know it conceptually sounds off putting, but I swear that Harry functioning as largely a symbol more than a character is actually a really good thing and really good for his character as it stands, that's not an insult. I am genuinely enthusiastic about that idea.

[centrally-unplanned]

Wack question but do you think an increase in artworks from AI that aren't necessarily that creative or original results in the overall diminishment of creativity or originality we as a species have?? To me it seems the bar would remain the same?? Talented people will keep creating good/original works regardless of whatever tools (AI or not) they're using innit.

I would first say upfront "way too contingent to tell!" - the technology is too new, and the pipelines for "art" too insanely diverse, for anyone to make an actual, solid prediction. Not to mention the word "creativity" doesn't have a single meaning. Just getting that out of the way.

To provide some ~thoughts I think things will probably be fine because of a sort of "conservation of effort" that goes into things; when you find you can radically reduce the time it takes to do one part of a job, you do often reduce the amount of net time on the job; but just as often you increase effort in other areas because now you can. So if we make some arbitrary assumptions about AI art getting better and more controllable in its output, you would almost certainly see a higher % of "images of art" on your feed or w/e being AI art. Based on your definition, that might be less creative than the past. But you will almost certainly also see a net increase in the number of webcomics! Combinations of many pieces of art & text, with the art in particularly being very time consuming to make, now much easier to do so your previously "eh if I get time" webcomic idea can now surface. Again based on your definition that is a definite increase. Dynamics like this will abound in creative industries - from that lens art will shift but not reduce.

However, I do think there is an argument for a creativity reduction. Commercial art is generally made by large teams of creatives & non-creatives, and this comes with a lot of compromises by everyone involved as they push and pull. And a lot of times the financial side of things would ideally want to make "the most marketable thing", but can't really implement that vision because they need the creatives who execute on board and they have their own zany predilections as artists. You can very frequently see in "new" artistic fields that early on, some really crazy shit gets funded because only like 50 guys can make video games or anime or w/e, and you just sort of have to do what they say. Over time that fades as production grows and lots of new trained staff emerge and the people involved become relatively "replaceable", and so balance shifts to the financers. All relative ofc, other dynamics are going on here as well.

Here you can see AI art as a sort of accelerant of "optimized" art - by making the art much easier to make, commercial ventures can more effectively "force" a production to be exactly what they want it to be. It lowers the bargaining power of artists, who typically do want to do more adventurous things. Again relative ofc, plenty of indie arthouse business types and staid, workhorse artists exist. But still, I could see a world where commercial art becomes more predictable as production pipelines get better at "tamping down" on the human variation in the product.

Again do I think that will happen? No clue, tech is way too young, and a bunch of other stuff will happen too. Just some ideas to watch for.

[manysmallhands]

Top Albums Of 2024: #20 - #11

The second post of my albums of the year! The first post also exists!! More will follow!!! Now read on!!!!

#20. Fred Thomas - Window In The Rhythm

Indie rock

It’s been 6 years since his last proper album and much has changed regarding how much I bother with DiY indie, but I go back a long way with Fred and so I’ll always be excited when he brings a new record out. And all told, Window In The Rhythm is really very good! Most closely resembling 2015’s All Are Saved of his many previous albums, it consists of 7 largely lengthy art rock grinds that take the minutia of relationships and picks away at them remorselessly (there are one or two softer songs in there but most of it is pretty unforgiving stuff). The appropriately titled “Hours” is a bit of a drag but everything else here sounds fantastic and works very well for drifting away to on the grim winter afternoons. Given how the songs kinda melt into each other, I tend to engage with it all as a series of classic Fred set pieces, with my current faves being the way the gentle, ringing guitar arpeggios of "Season Of Carelessness" at first gradually and then suddenly give way to its fizzing, intense electronic coda, and also the bit in opener “Embankment” where Fred does his fast talking about 90s acts party piece, singing  “I made you a tape - withthesamesquarepushersongonitfourtimes - but not in a row” and I know that my favourite indie dude is back for real.

#19. Aespa - Armageddon

K-pop

I tend to struggle to focus on k-pop - i can never remember who's who, partly a function of not being able to buy them here on CD - but mercifully Aespa did a cheap retail version of Armageddon and i've managed to give it more time than most things. And their first full length album turned out to be a game of two halves: the first five songs feature a harder, hip hop influenced sound, full of drama and flash but with a hint of Britney here and there, while the remainder takes a lighter, more girlish tone, with "Bahama" coming off like a kind of k-pop "Kokomo" (which is good, not bad like you think) while "Live My Life" goes full pop punk but with a characteristic, slightly restrained quality that makes it all the more charming. A strong debut and an entertainingly distinct calling card that'll make it easier for me to distinguish them from their peers from now on.

#18. Beabadoobee - This Is How Tomorrow Moves

Indie rock; Singer-songwriter

Bea’s third full album was recorded in LA with Rick Rubin and often seemed as in thrall to America as that would suggest, with the guitars rocked up for a 90s alt vibe and her accent set to a mid Atlantic twang. "Take A Bite" and "Beaches" were both terrific anthems that confirmed her status as burgeoning indie icon but it was her more delicate material that came off best, as "Girl Song" and "This Is How It Went" showcased her huge talent as a singer-songwriter of the old school mode.

#17. Doja Cat - Scarlet 2 CLAUDE

Rap; RnB

Last year’s Scarlet was a terrific album but one where its massive hits failed to carry it to general success. Continuing the era is a brave move but one suspects that this might be a final hurrah for Doja in the rap game before going back to paying the bills. The tone is similar on Scarlet 2 but perhaps a little more lowkey, with songs like "MASC" exuding a melancholy rarely seen on the more bravado infused OG record. But there’s still a lot of fun to be had here too, like on the poppier "OKLOSER" where Doja uses that cute, mocking voice that she does so well and takes it all to some hilariously petty places

#16. Taylor Swift - The Tortured Poets Department

Pop/rock

“How much sad did you think I had in me?” Taylor sings after about 20 minutes here and ngl, there’s quite a lot. Her 11th album has been divisive and understandably so: there’s a sense in which the Antonoff and Dessner partnerships feel a bit played out and its often lugubrious and downbeat tone can get a bit exhausting at times, especially when you tie in the 15 (count 'em!) bonus tracks (which I have mostly tended to avoid). But once you warm to its themes a little, Taylor is still a terrific songwriter and "I Can Do It With A Broken Heart", "But Daddy I Love Him" and the sparkling title track are among her best in what’s largely a strong set, at least til the occasionally lacklustre final third. At heart, TTPD knits together an engrossing narrative which plays on the loneliness of breaking up when yr the most famous woman in the world. Whether you have much sympathy for that is yr own call but for myself, I still think it’s pretty fascinating

#15. Remi Wolf - Big Ideas

Funk pop, rock

I came to Remi Wolf’s second album for the funk bangers but stayed for the hooky indie rock tunes too, at least after I’d gotten over how much i wanted there to be more funk bangers. The most immediate material here is definitely in her sunshine RnB pop style, with "Cinderella", "Pitiful" and "Frog Rock" being some of the catchiest songs I’ve heard all year. But, given time, the rockier "Alone In Miami" became a huge favourite too, with Remi’s diaristic lyricism adding a dimension beyond the hooks and riffing. Big Ideas is comfortable reaching across the stylistic spectrum, being the first record i've heard for a long time that takes in both Prince and Daniel Johnston as notable influences. In summary: there are two Wolfs within this album and both of them are good!

#14. Jessica Pratt - Here In the Pitch

Singer-songwriter; Folk pop; Retro

Her third album Quiet Signs felt a bit hazy and nebulous at times but Here In The Pitch returned to the strong melodies of Jess’s earlier material, a mid century pop record that frequently feels like a warm summer night somewhere in Latin America circa 1962. Tho it’s sometimes as minimal as its small hours vibe might suggest, Here In The Pitch contains plenty of pop energy, full of Spectorish rumble and swaying bossanovas as well as being as packed with hooks as any of this year’s big sellers. While the atmosphere does sometimes tend twds eeriness, Pratt's distinctive babyvoiced coo always feels welcoming on an album where she sounds like she's really enjoying herself.

#13. Tyler the Creator - Chromakopia

Rap; Hip Hop

I’ve never managed to connect much with Tyler before but Chromakopia really blew me away. I'm a sucker for the kind of upbeat funk and soft soul beats that he tends to use here, but his extremely in yr face, percussion heavy approach is also a big draw and the way this album comes at you right out of the gate is hugely impressive. Lyrically, there’s some of the usual bragging that I’d expect but Tyler also gets into the kind of awkward personal and moral quandaries that make up life's grey areas too. Songs like "Hey Jane" and "Take Your Mask Off" have a real depth of character to them, exploring issues like unwanted pregnancy and personal disillusionment in a thoughtful way that doesn't look for neat answers.

#12. Lizzy McAlpine - Older

Singer songwriter; Folk-rock; Retro

Lizzy’s third album, while coherent enough in its focus, finds her stylistically split between a Laura Marling type singer songwriter vein and something more obviously retro focused. In all truth Older is rarely a cheerful record - a young woman’s odyssey thru a time of change type of thing - but it is beautifully rendered, either in rich Fleetwood Mac-esque arrangements or spare, delicate solo accompaniments which reinforce the desperation at its heart. I’ve struggled a little with some of the final third, where the backing tends to drop to a bare minimum and that’s probably kept this out of the top 10 here. But the strength of the melodies and the real character and power of her delivery are getting me now to a point where I’m more consistently enjoying all of it: it’s just the kind of record where some parts of it take a little longer to come into full focus than others. This sort of folky, soul bearing singer songwriter is not always the kind of thing that i can get along with but, far more than most albums of its kind, Older is an absolute gem.

#11. Halsey - The Great Impersonator 

Pop/rock

The Great Impersonator was largely inspired by Halsey’s struggles with life threatening illness and much has been made of her “main character syndrome” by some, regarding the way she places her fears and trials at the centre of the record. In truth it can feel quite jarring at times - and occasionally exhausting - but what it actually made me think of is the way that I, as someone with long term disabling illness, often don’t bring things up, in fact make myself small and don’t talk about the basics of my life, for fear of not being heard or accommodated. So when Halsey talks about her issues here, then it really does feel genuinely moving to hear someone making that space for herself and refusing to be silent.

None of this would matter much if The Great Impersonator sucked but - lucky for us - it’s absolutely fantastic. The multi-decade concept feels a bit hard to parse but generally you can just ignore it and focus on the songs, a clash of genres to rival her masterpiece Manic but with an even greater depth of emotional turmoil to draw upon. Aside from illness, there are the usual self hating bangers like "Ego", and a mix of the two is often welcome too: “Dog Years” especially bristles with fury as Ashley growls “they say all dogs go to Heaven / well, what about a bitch?” and indeed the record is well stocked with good one liners throughout. It's fair to say that the consistently downbeat focus can make for a grim listen and also that the returning "Letter To God" songs can come off as a bit repetitive and boring. But there’s sweetness here too as well as harsh reality - especially on the glorious, featherlight title track - and I suspect a bit more time with this would have shunted it into the top 10.

And that Top 10 is coming soon! i have actually written the posts! Maybe starting tomorrow! Bye for now!

[saturnsources]

✦ * ・　　⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯　　𝐦𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐝𝐝𝐬 𝐛𝐞 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐢𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐚𝐯𝐨𝐫. a random assortment of sentences taken from suzanne collins' "the hunger games" and its sequels. also includes movie quotes. change pronouns if needed.

‘ as long as you can find yourself, you'll never starve. ’ ‘ you don't forget the face of the person who was your last hope. ’ ‘ why don't you just be yourself? ’ ‘ destroying things is much easier than making them. ’ ‘ remember, we're madly in love, so it's all right to kiss me anytime you feel like it. ’ ‘ stupid people are dangerous. ’ ‘ i always channel my emotions into work. that way, i don't hurt anyone but myself. ’ ‘ i am not pretty. i am not beautiful. i am as radiant as the sun. ’ ‘ my nightmares are usually about losing you. i'm okay once i realize you're here. ’ ‘ you've got about as much charm as a dead slug. ’ ‘ it's the worst torture in the world, waiting, when you know there's nothing you can do. ’ ‘ it takes ten times longer to put yourself back together than it does to fall apart. ’ ‘ they'll either want to kill you, kiss you, or be you. ’ ‘ hope is the only thing stronger than fear. ’ ‘ there's no one left that i love. ’ ‘ i do. i need you. ’ ‘ your job is to be a distraction so people forget what the real problems are. ’ ‘ a little hope is effective, a lot of hope is dangerous. ’ ‘ i am done being a piece in his game. ’ ‘ it's the things we love most that destroy us. ’ ‘ if i'm going to die, i want to still be me. ’ ‘ i wish i could freeze this moment, right here, right now, and live in it forever. ’ ‘ you know, you could live a thousand lifetimes and not deserve him. ’ ‘ you've got to go through it to get to the end of it. ’ ‘ i realize only one person will be damaged beyond repair if he dies. me. ’ ‘ you love me. real or not real? ’ ‘ why? do you find this distracting? ’ ‘ here's some advice. stay alive. ’ ‘ you're not going to die. i forbid it. all right? ’ ‘ i remember everything about you. you're the one who wasn't paying attention. ’ ‘ i noticed just about every girl, but none of them made a lasting impression but you. ’ ‘ so now that you've got me, what are you going to do with me? ’ ‘ yes, it's your fault i'm alive. ’ ‘ i just want to spend every possible minute of the rest of my life with you. ’ ‘ see, this is why no one lets you make the plans. ’ ‘ i must have loved you a lot. ’ ‘ well, you're a piece of work, aren't you? ’ ‘ i think ... you still have no idea. the effect you can have. ’

[blueskittlesart]

hi! im really curious about your thoughts on oot, i'm trying really hard to like it and i wanna see what you enjoy about it

Hi!!! I'm going to do my best to explain exactly why I like oot but there is a TON of ground to cover. i have already written a bit about the story and my thoughts on it in this document, but this is a much more in-depth analysis of the symbolism and implied narrative which i think may be more helpful to you if you're struggling to get into the story and gameplay!

oot is my favorite zelda game of all time and was what made me fall in love with the series, but I will concede that it shows its age, especially with the insane advancements that video games have made over the past 2 decades or so since its release. Try to remember when playing it that it came out in 1998, when a game with any sort of 3d graphics at all was still new and exciting. some of its gameplay is going to be a bit dated, unfortunately, and it's totally reasonable to dislike that aspect of it i think! If you really find yourself struggling with gameplay, i recommend zeldadungeon.net for dungeon walkthroughs. they have very concise and easy-to-follow walkthroughs for the entire game which make the gameplay MUCH smoother for first-time players! there's no shame in needing walkthrough help in these dungeons, ESPECIALLY some of the later ones which get notoriously convoluted and difficult. that being said, even if you use walkthroughs, I'd encourage you to still pay attention to the dungeon's designs and details as a lot of thought was put into these designs and I think they're still some of the strongest in the series! gameplay-wise I'd also say that there are a lot of little collectibles that will seem like they're way more important than they are to new players. you don't need the skulltulas (they get you a bigger wallet), you don't need to complete any trading sequences, you don't even REALLY need to go out of your way to collect any of the extra heart pieces, the game is perfectly beatable with just the hearts you'll get from dungeons. Knowing all these things going in will really streamline your gaming experience and make things easier for you if you're getting put off by the 90s-style game design.

As for what i really love about the series, it's the story. And i understand that if you're not someone who makes a habit of analyzing media to an obsessive degree, at first glance oot doesn't seem to have a lot of story. A simple fact of old game design is that more dialog and cutscenes meant more storage space was needed, and the biggest constraint in game design at the time was the limited amount of storage a disc or cartridge could hold. What this means is that storytelling in older games like oot takes a very different form than the cutscene and dialog-heavy storytelling that games tend to use nowadays. the storage restrictions on the game meant that a lot of oot's story had to be told implicitly, via details and worldbuilding and actions carried out by the player. I know this can make it difficult to grasp at first glance! that's why i love to analyze it and talk about it, because I want people to understand how rich and well-told oot's narrative actually is and i know that most people aren't as willing to put in the work as i am, lol. with that being said, this is where the spoilers are gonna start! i'm gonna recap and analyze most of oot's story here, so if you're not looking for spoilers scroll away now and experience the game for yourself!!

oot is at its roots a story about adults failing children. i will elaborate on this point a bit more later, but for now let's look at our opening segment. We are introduced to our link, the youngest link in the franchise, at nine years old. From the get-go, we as the player are told that link's hylian parents died in a conflict very shortly after he was born, leaving him in kokiri forest to be raised by the deku tree, among the kokiri.

The kokiri are a race of eternal children. what this means, essentially, is that we begin the story with a link wearing rose-tinted glasses. the kokiri live forever without aging or dying, and they never leave the forest. Link has grown up isolated and without any concept of aging or death. he has been told by the deku tree, his father-figure, that he IS a kokiri and therefore will never age or die. Despite this, link does have a crucial difference from the rest of the kokiri that even he is aware of--he has no fairy. If you talk to the kokiri in the initial kokiri forest segment of the game, many of them will talk down to you or make remarks about you finally getting a fairy, reminding the player that link knows SOMETHING is wrong with him, that he's different from the other kids somehow, but he's not yet been able to pinpoint what.

we come to our first dungeon segment, where the deku tree summons link and tells him that he's dying and that link must defeat a monster to save him. when the player completes this objective, the deku tree dies anyway, revealing that he knew all along he couldn't be saved and lied to link about it in order to get him to do the dungeon. with his dying breath, he tells link to leave the forest and find princess zelda. (worth noting that up until this point, link has been told that leaving the forest will KILL HIM.) this is the first major failure of an adult we see, and as the inciting incident of the game it sets the tone very nicely for the rest of the shitshow. The deku tree lies to link his entire life about who he is, and then spends his dying moments lying to link AGAIN, specifically in service of a greater plan to turn link into the savior of hyrule by sending him to help princess zelda. this point is crucial--the deku tree has clear-cut, understandable reasons behind acting the way he does. It would have been much easier on link to allow him to grow up isolated among the kokiri, and it removes a lot of the potential danger he would have faced as an orphan in hyrule in the aftermath of the war which killed his parents. (we will later see that hyrule is in no way a safe place for a child on their own.) Explaining all the magical-destiny lore to a nine year old had the potential to scare him away from the task ahead, as did admitting to him that there was no way to save the deku tree. But lying to him about it all still ultimately deeply hurt him. this is the stage upon which the rest of the game will build.

Link, freshly traumatized by the death of his tree dad, leaves kokiri forest. he goes to castle town and meets princess zelda, a girl no older than him. Princess zelda tells him that she fears for the safety of her kingdom, but that no one will listen to her when she tries to warn them of the danger. this is our second adult failing--the entire conflict around which this game centers could have been prevented if only any adult was willing to listen to zelda's concerns about ganondorf. But because she is a child she is dismissed over and over again until she finally turns to ANOTHER child for help. her plan for link involves him retrieving objects needed to open the gateway to the sacred realm within the temple of time, which i know sounds like a bunch of confusing lore shit but all you really need to understand is that there's a gateway to what is essentially godlike power inside this temple, and zelda wants link to open the gateway and claim the power before ganondorf can. link already has one of the 3 keys he needs--it was the reward for killing the deku tree beating the first dungeon in kokiri forest, and zelda takes this as proof enough that he will be able to find the other two.

in these first three dungeon segments, link is confined to his nine-year-old form. His sword is wooden and deals considerably less damage than it will later in the game, and in each of the dungeon segments there are reminders of the way being a child affects his autonomy in hyrule--the guard at the gates of death mountain won't let him pass, the zora princess berates him for not being enough of a man, several collectibles are clearly visible but impossible to reach with his current size & ability, etc etc. this section of the game is deliberately juxtaposed against the initial segment in kokiri forest, in which everything was built for someone of link's size and strength and no part of the map was unexplorable or all that challenging. What you're supposed to realize here is that being a kid in hyrule is HARD. you have very little autonomy and are constantly condescended to. One of the few hylian npcs your age, Malon, is a good example of this--in her mini-quest she vents to link about how her father can't see that his stablehand resents him and she's constantly having to look after him without being listened to. She is being given adult responsibilities (looking after her father & the animals on their farm) without adult social status. Her situation is a deliberate parallel to both link and zelda's, though during this 3-dungeon segment of the game it's not immediately clear yet just how much adult responsibility link is actually shouldering. in any case, this is our third example of adults failing children, and the theme begins to be echoed in the worldbuilding of hyrule during this stage as well.

now we come to the initial confrontation, the scene which alters the trajectory of the game and divides what i consider the first and second halves of the gameplay (although the second half is probably much longer lol). Link, having found all 3 keys to the sacred realm, returns to hyrule castle, only to find that ganondorf has attacked, forcing princess zelda to flee with her attendant. He catches one final glimpse of her where she throws him the final key needed to unlock the temple of time: the ocarina. although no words are exchanged between them, it's clear that she's asking link to carry out the rest of her plan on his own and claim the power sealed in the temple before ganondorf can. and so link goes to the temple of time and opens the gateway, but link is nine years old and so link doesn't notice that ganondorf, a trained thief, is following him. When he opens the temple, ganon siezes the power zelda was trying so hard to keep him from finding.

we then pan down to link again, but different. he's changed, he's older. notably, he isn't an adult. he is sixteen years old, physically, but mentally, for both link and the player, no time has passed at all. this is important to keep in mind for the rest of the game--no matter how link may look, he is mentally still nine years old. he wakes up to essentially a lecture from the world's biggest dickhead, the sage rauru. Rauru places the blame for ganondorf's rise to power squarely on link and zelda's shoulders, noting that if link hadn't opened the temple of time in the first place, ganondorf would have never been able to sieze power. he tells link that he placed him into a deep sleep for the past seven years because, at nine years old, he wasn't strong enough physically to take on ganondorf and win. But now, he says, link is old enough to be a real asset. it's time for link to defeat ganondorf.

Once again, we have a clear-cut case of adults failing children. Link and zelda took matters into their own hands BECAUSE of the adults in their lives. for link, it was the deku tree (HIS FATHER)'s dying wish that he help zelda. for zelda, her plan was a last resort after begging every adult in her life to see what was coming and being constantly ignored. now that what she predicted has come to pass, she and link take all the blame for it, for being kids in a difficult position doing the best they could with NO ADULT HELP WHATSOEVER. you can't place the fate of an entire kingdom on the shoulders of two nine year olds and expect it not to fall. but that's what hyrule's adult leaders did, and when the kingdom fell they let the nine-year olds take the blame for it. zelda hasn't been seen for years. she's either dead or in hiding out of shame for her mistake. meanwhile, Link has once again become a pawn in someone else's game. The sage rauru decides for him, without ever consulting him, that he can't be trusted to remain conscious for the seven years between gameplay segments. that he will be safer and happier to remain asleep. anyone who stops for a moment to consider what this might do to link's mental state would have not done this, but rauru sees link as a child, which in hyrule is synonymous with an object to be controlled, with no feelings of his own. he needs to be protected and hidden, regardless of what effect it has on him when he wakes up. nothing else matters as long as he can be kept alive and unharmed. this is a deliberate parallel to the way the deku tree treated link while under his care in kokiri forest--he doesn't need to know the truth, because it's easier and more convenient for everyone else if he doesn't. its effect on his mental state doesn't matter. what matters is that he is kept in a position which is convenient for the adults in his life. this is another reminder of the way in which being so young hurts link, and if I can diverge into real-world relevance for a second, it's an obvious metaphor for the way trauma steals one's childhood. Link was never allowed to grow up normally. he went from being a kid one day to an adult the next, with no time in between to figure anything out. his childhood, his coming-of-age, was stolen from him by greedy adults who needed him to be a pawn in their war.

the dungeons in the adult segment of the game can technically be completed in multiple different orders, but the usual order (and what i think is probably the way the narrative is intended to progress) is to get to the forest temple first, which requires you to reenter kokiri forest, all grown up. it's important to note that up until this point in your gameplay, link still has plausible deniability about his race. sure, he didn't die when he left the forest, but maybe that was a lie told to ALL kokiri. maybe he's still a kokiri and he won't grow up. but now he's got solid proof that he was lied to, and that the safe, beautiful sanctuary he's spent the majority of his life in was never actually meant to be his home. When you return to kokiri forest as an adult, you find that it's nothing like the safe-haven you remember. it's been overrun with monsters that are taller than you now, as an adult. This is a metaphor, obviously, for returning to someplace changed. link goes back to his home and it doesn't feel like his home anymore with all that he knows now. And if the monsters weren't enough, if link talks to the kokiri, cowering in their little kid-sized houses, not a single one of them recognizes him. they address him as an adult they've never met before. to them, it's been seven years, and they've never known a kid to grow into an adult before. but to link, it's been a few days at most, and inside he's still the little boy they knew.

the dungeons in this segment of the game are mostly straightforward training exercises to give link the necessary skills and assets he needs to fight ganondorf. I'll skip over most of them, but there are three things i DO want to highlight about this section of the game: malon, sheik, and the water temple.

Malon is introduced in the first half of the game as an example of another child with very little agency and power. Seven years later, if link visits her again, he will find the ranch in an even worse state, with the stablehand having taken over and kicked out malon's father. Malon stays purely out of fear of what will happen to her horses if she leaves them in his hands. She is an adult now, as you are, and yet she has even less power than before. So much of the first half of oot is framed in such a way that the player wishes link was older. It wants you to think, wouldn't this whole thing be easier if I was an adult? Wouldn't I have more power, more agency? but now that you ARE an adult, you're confronted with the fact that nothing has changed. you are still a pawn in a war against ganondorf. Malon is still trapped at the ranch, forced to endure daily abuse or leave her animal friends to die. however, this segment is also the first time you as the player are given the option to fight back. If you, as a child, have taken the necessary steps to befriend malon and epona, one of her horses, you are able to use the bonds you forged in childhood to run the stablehand off the ranch and return power to malon. this mini-arc with malon is a teaser for the overarching arc of the game--having no power in childhood, believing that adulthood will be your savior, but finding the same powerlessness in adulthood, and ultimately returning to pieces of your childhood in order to finally reclaim your power.

next up is sheik, who is deliberately a mystery for the majority of this segment, but. well. we all know he's zelda, so i'm not going to beat around the bush. Sheik is what has become of zelda in the years since ganondorf took power--where zelda was once strong-willed and refused to stand down in the face of danger, sheik now moves among the shadows, darting in to offer link a bit of help or advice but never getting too close. My reading of this is that zelda, after growing up in the aftermath of her failed plan, was afraid of what she'd done to link. She saw her influence as the thing that brought hyrule to ruin--after all, link never would have opened the door in the temple of time if not for her. The way she sees it, her choice to use him back when they were nine destroyed his life and her kingdom. This is why she's largely absent in this segment of the game, only stepping in for brief moments and disappearing the second link tries to reach out for her. Her character at this point is essentially representative of self-isolation as a coping mechanism.

finally the water temple, which I promise i didn't single out just because it sucks, but i will warn any potential players that it sucks. it's the most convoluted ass design in the world and even with a walkthrough it gets confusing and hard to navigate at times. this is not the point of this paragraph, though. the point of this paragraph is that there is a miniboss in this dungeon that is INCREDIBLY important to link's character and to this day is one of the most well-done and impactful battles i've ever had the pleasure of playing. (side note, why the hell did the himekawa manga make this battle happen at the bottom of the fucking well?? ive believed for years that he was a shadow temple boss because of that. whatever. anyways)

about halfway through this dungeon, you come upon a room that looks like an endless sea of water, with bits of ruins and a single rotting tree in the middle. when you walk into the room, you'll be attacked by a mini-boss that takes the form of link's reflection, black and translucent with glowing red eyes. the miniboss dark link will mimic your attacks and block when you swing, requiring players to be crafty and strategic in order to beat him instead of just swinging with the right weapon at the right time. from a purely gameplay-based standpoint, this fight is sick as hell. it rewards you for thinking on your feet and forces you to come up with real time strategy to beat a foe who genuinely seems to think the same way you do, which is REALLY cool, especially for a game released in nineteen fucking ninety eight. narratively, though, there are symbols upon symbols upon symbols to be picked apart in this fight alone. there's the obvious metaphor of fighting onesself--representative of an internal struggle of some kind. pair that with the set dressing for this arena and the information we already know about link, and things start to fall into place. Link was raised in a lush forest, surrounded on all sides by walls of trees that kept him safe and isolated from the world at large. the minute he left that forest, bits and pieces of his worldview started to fall apart--he learned his identity as a kokiri was a lie, experienced the hardships of being a child in hyrule, and now he's grown up and become a pawn in the fight against ganondorf, losing what little agency he had along with the ability to return to his home in kokiri forest. He finds himself in this illusion room, with a shadow version of himself waiting to attack him, clearly indicating that this room is representative of his state of mind. an endless, desolate landscape stretching out into infinity. no walls to keep him safe, no cover at all save for that one single, ROTTING TREE in the middle. This tree is a symbol of link's mental state. (my evidence for this one spans across a couple games but just trust me when i say this interpretation is grounded in reality it would just take too long to explain) and the tree is not looking good. it is dying. and from this dying tree springs a reflection of himself that link must fight to progress. I think there's an obvious message that's being conveyed here: link regrets leaving kokiri forest. he regrets the way he's been used, the hard truths he has had to learn about the world since he left. He is still mentally nine years old, and as a child he still yearns to return to that safety he was promised in kokiri forest despite knowing that it's no longer there for him to return to. Dark link is representative of all link's fear and regret and turmoil surrounding his destiny and what has been done to him over the last seven years. Because this is a video game, he is able to physically fight those feelings, to defeat the reflection of himself that torments him and walk out of that room at peace, having faced his fears and confronted his true feelings. Narratively, this battle is representative of the ongoing internal struggle link is grappling with over the course of this segment of gameplay, and shows the player how link must overcome those feelings of fear and inadequacy in order to gain the power to defeat ganon.

now we finally come to the ending segment of the game. this is where the lore gets a little bit convoluted and trips some people up. if you're not a lore slave you can basically ignore the triforce thing. the only affect it has on the narrative is that it gives ganondorf a reason to need both link and zelda, since they have the other two pieces of the powerful relic he's after. this is why he kidnaps zelda and taunts link to come rescue her instead of just like. hunting them both for sport in the wilds of hyrule.

the final battle with ganon is the culmination of all your efforts throughout the game. in the leadup to it, the final dungeon reminds you of this by having each of its rooms be a mini-version of one of the previous six temples you completed in the second half of the game. once you finish this final dungeon, you're able to get into the castle. I have to mention one of my favorite design choices in this whole game here, which is the fact that the background music in the castle gets louder the closer you get to the final room, and when you finally get there it's revealed that ganondorf was playing it the whole time. the details in this game make me crazy they're all so well-done. anyways. to discuss this battle we first need to discuss a crucial character who i realize i've forgotten to mention this ENTIRE time somehow: navi.

I love navi. i hate the way she became a joke among fans. this is not the point of this post. the point is that narratively, navi is one of the only GOOD adult figures we see in the entire game. (one could argue that she isn't an adult, but she takes on a guiding and mentor-like role for link so i consider her one despite some of her more childish mannerisms.) Navi is the one character who has been at link's side since the very beginning, the only consistent good influence on his life. the only adult mentor who hasn't somehow tried to fuck him over or manipulate him somehow. She is INTEGRAL to his survival through all the crazy bullshit he gets caught up in. the game makes her importance clear to the player in two ways: the first, obviously, is that she's the tutorial character--she tells you where to go, what to do, explains mechanics and puzzles, etc. The second, and the detail that's gonna be super important in our discussion of the final battle, is that she's tied to the game's targeting mechanic. It's subtle enough that I actually didn't notice it my first time around UNTIL this final battle, but every time you target an enemy to attack them (which with the way the camera movement is designed in this game is basically a required element of combat) navi flies to their weak spot and hovers there, which is the in-game explanation for what targeting is--navi is showing link the monsters' weak spots. in the first phase of the final battle with ganondorf, he erects a forcefield which prevents navi from entering the battlefield, removing the player's ability to target completely.

i absolutely LOVE this battle in terms of both gameplay and narrative. removing the targeting mechanic is a genuine handicap that makes the battle genuinely difficult for the player, and narratively it serves to remind you of the importance of navi, a positive adult influence, in link's life. without her, dealing damage is so much more difficult, but as soon as you have her back the battle becomes super intuitive and you're able to strategize much more effectively. Eventually, you deal enough damage to get navi back and flee the castle with the princess, before making one final stand against Ganon, a mutated beast-form of ganondorf. with navi by your side, his massive weakness becomes easily targetable, and you're able to defeat and seal him for good.

the end-credits scene of the game shows link time-traveling back to his nine-year-old self, before any of the events of the game have come to pass, and re-entering hyrule castle to warn nine-year-old zelda about what is to come. this is a time paradox, i know, but i LOVE this ending thematically. As I mentioned extensively earlier, link and zelda's stories are both representative of the way trauma robs you of childhood. they were both stripped of their chance to be children and grow up and come of age due to what happened with ganondorf. Allowing link to go back and prevent those events from ever occurring is a promise of healing. it's a promise that he and zelda will be able to reclaim the childhoods that were stolen from them by war and by adults who wanted to use them as pawns in it. it's a reclamation of the agency that these characters have been consistently denied throughout their stories. it's. a good ending. it's a really good ending. I like it a lot.

So uhhh wow that was a lot! what it comes down to is that i think oot is a story a ton of people can relate to. being a kid with responsibility but no agency and longing to be an adult, but then growing up and wanting nothing more than to return to the childhood you lost... that's something that really resonates with me, at least. and yeah oot has a lot of quirks and convoluted story and stuff but at its core it's a really beautiful coming-of-age that deals REALLY well with trauma and childhood and growing up!! tldr it's just. a genuinely incredible story and it means a LOT to me lol

[ninjapaste]

dude your art is so GOOD!!! Do you take any classes or have any tips to share? that resource post you reblogged the other day was helpful but i've felt so stuck in my art. I don't know if you have anything u learned that just made something click for u or anything like that?

Tysm anon!!!👍

In terms of your questions, I apologise i advance for the long answer im about to give and possibly things you already know haha:

I guess in terms of what classes i take, Ive gone from GCSE to A level Art and design (Fine art), and both courses have helped me to learn the importance of observation studies.

However, its moreso all the art i practice in my own time that has played the biggest part in my art improvement journey. I adopted art as a big hobby around 2018, and really ever since then I tend to draw/create for myself every day, however big or small it may be.

I guess my first tip would be to indulge in a 'sketchbook' or space to work in freely, it could be any form but the importance is that its personal and can be picked up whenever. I find that having a sketchbook to draw in has really helped with productivity and creating new ideas. I think you can go into a sketchbook space with any mindset and it can work wonders, like for example if you wanted to focus purely on challenging yourself, you can do that! If you just, want to doodle without thinking, go ahead! After all, its a sketchbook for you and nobody else, so go wild!

My next tip would definitely be, when you are feeling stuck in art, to take inspiration from a wide range of different things be it in real life or on the internet, a building or a really cool tree, since I find it defintiely fuels the creation of new ideas/concepts that can provide a path out of that creative rut. I guess to an extent there may always be periods where you have that 'I have no idea what to draw!' Feeling, and thats okay! Sometimes its refreshing that helps the most. But I often see that the solution to being in a rut is usually REFERENCING, wether it be trying to accurately draw the anatomy of an arm or if I just saw a cool design/pose/style on Pinterest and i drew a bunch of wacky characters from it. In fact, I find that places like Pinterest or Resplash are such good resources to hone imagination and generally most art skills by looking at and drawinf from all the cool images (and get some of that inspo!). And if im not using Pinterest, im usually using an art book as reference! (The itsv and splatoon art book helped me so so much lol)

On the topic of REFERENCING, its mega important! Depending on imagination/memory feels pretty good at times but its always beneficial to have image references in your process when you find its good to have them. I woudl always recommend having a reference when drawing poses/expressions/anatomy because the more you use them, the more you learn about how an object like a face muscle, a torso or even light behaves and looks and the easier it is to draw/depict them.

The next tip is uh YOUTUBE, or any account/person who's art inspires you in particular. I found that certain channels like Ethan Becker, Marc Brunet, Marco Bucci and more have helped me the most to gain confidence in drawing and learning how to practice it better. Of course, theres a lot to learn from a plethora of other channels too, even ones that dont specifically promote themselves as teachers! Also, if theres a certain style/art approach or an artist that appeals to you, study it in any way you like! Analyse an artist's work or ask/find out about their personal process (or even watch a speedpaint/art stream)! Sometimes it can be a big inspiration booster and skill boost to do just that (plus the 'artist' could be any piece of media/thing too!! Like a game or something).

Ok ok last paragraph haha, on the topic of your last question. Thinking back, its hard for me to define any specific moment or thing that gave me a 'click' moment. Its more like a process of growth that starts with learning and understanding a new thing, then familiarizing myself with using it successfully/'correctly' by studying and practicing, so that eventually its like muscle memory or easier to use in my work.

Hope this helps!!! If theres anything else you want to ask, dont be afraid to dm or send another ask!!

[disparition]

Whether you approach arts and media as a creator, a fan, a professional, or a hobbyist, you are probably very well aware of the rapid growth of AI in many areas of creative life and the conversation surrounding it. Whether we are talking about fiction or text of any kind, visual arts like painting and drawing, music composition and performance, sound design and audio editing - in all of these fields AI is something we now have to deal with, and there are many unanswered questions. How do we protect our livelihoods and practices as artists? What control can we have over our own work and its incorporation into machine learning tools and datasets? How do we as lovers of art and music determine if what we are reading, watching, or listening to is made by humans? Or how do we denote the particular degree of involvement of humans in a work of art?

It’s a complicated issue because it can be hard to say exactly where to draw the line. For example, well before the current conversation about AI, composers like Brian Eno were incorporating generative and algorithmic elements into their work. Does this mean such work is not “essentially human made”? Does it matter if the non-human components of a piece are created by randomness, or by natural elements gathered in e.g. a field recording, vs. being created by a computer program?

Those kinds of questions are more about the philosophical side of the issue. There are more pressing questions to do with how AI affects our ability to actually survive as artists. And, as the technology grows more powerful and the distinction between AI-generated or AI-enhanced material and human made material or basic documentation of reality itself, what methods do we use to signify that a given piece of media is or is not AI made, and what are the exact qualifications of that? Should the label “AI art” apply to work that is entirely generated by a computer, or should that label also be applied to any art that uses AI tools in any context - e.g. the new tools in Photoshop that make it easier to remove a specific object from an image and fill it in with background. What about the world of video games, where AI has been used for decades for things like pathfinding but is new and controversial when it comes to using it for story/dialog elements or certain visual assets?

We are, I think, still very much in the early days of all this, so it’s hard to come up with firm answers as the field changes so rapidly, but this is an essential conversation to be held now. I’ve been talking to a friend who put together a survey for an organization called Verified Human, who are looking specifically into the issue of how do we determine - going forward - whether a piece of art or media is “essentially human made”, and the question of how that should be communicated.

The idea of this survey is to gather as many points of view as possible for this conversation. I know a lot of the people that follow me here are artists and lovers of art, of all different kinds, and to me it is absolutely essential that creators of all kinds be involved in this conversation from early on. Please take a few minutes and fill out the survey via the link below, and if you are interested in helping out, please spread the word. And if you have any questions or would like to discuss, please feel free to contact me directly. Thank you.

https://forms.gle/BrSbGyq9wAyzwTa88

[dazaisnecktie]

Bungou Stray Dogs vs Bungou to Alchemist

People have always seemed to compare Bungou To Alchemist to Bungou Stray Dogs because they see the name along with the characters and think it must be a copy-

It isnt!

Both are stand-alone and are pieces of media based on writers of the creators' choosing! Bungou Stray Dogs is a manga written by Kafka Asagiri while Bungou To Alchemist is a game made by DMM Games.

Yes they do share character names but that is because they reference similar writers that held a large influence on the literary world.

Take the Buraiha ('Decadent School') for example:

Sakaguchi Ango, Dazai Osamu and Oda Sakunosuke are characters in both Bungous, and are some of the most prominent figures in the Buraiha movement during post-war Japan. It makes sense to have them in both medias no? Similar things apply to characters such as Akutagawa Ryuunosuke, Natsume Souseki, Mori Ougai and many others.

We see characters such as 'Sherlock Holmes' in many pieces of media- Sherlock, Enola Holmes, Moriarty the Patriot- but we don't see them as copies, even if they are inspired by the same stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. They have different names so it's easier to not compare them. 'Bungou' refers to 'Literary' and 'Literary master' so the Bungou in the titles refers to the writers in each series.

I do see why this happens though as in the west these writers aren't as well known. Hell even I'll admit I hadn't heard of many of them until watching Bungou Stray Dogs!

___

Bungou Stray Dogs is a Seinen manga that follows Nakajima Atsushi who soon unwillingly becomes a detective of the Armed Detective Agency- that despite its name doesnt actually use armed weapons that often- and becomes involved in the grey underworld of Yokohama. Each character has an ability named and based off of one of the authors works ie characters like Dazai and Akutagawa having abilities with the same names as their stories ('No Longer Human' and 'Rashoumon') and characters like Atsushi with abilities based on the stories but with differing names ('Beast Beneath the Moonlight'= 'Moon Over the Mountain')

Bungou to Alchemist (the game) follows you, the player, also known as the Special Duty Librarian, in the Imperial Library of Japan as you transmigrate the souls of authors of the past to protect their books from 'shinshokusha' also known as 'taints'. Essentially they embodiment of the author's negative emotions and aim to destroy their literature.

___

The Anime though follows its on plot, a lot like how the bungeki’s also follow its own story lines

The anime follows Dazai Osamu and secondarily, Akutagawa Ryuunosuke. After being trapped in his book 'Run Melos', Dazai is saved by his idol Akutagawa Ryuunosuke. He is brought back to the library as a transmigrated soul and must fight the taints aiming to destroy their literature.

('Transmigration': the act of passing into another body after death)

Another thing is that the libraries the game and the anime take place in are different. The game takes place in the ‘real world’ of its canon while the in the anime, the library is sort of its own plane of existence only the writers, neko and alchemist can exist in.

___

(To simplify this, Bungou Stray Dogs has characters based on real writers and their literature while Bungou to Alchemist has characters that are the fictional reincarnations of these writers)

___

People that have watched the Bungou to Alchemist anime may not be aware that its based on a game by the same name. Since the anime has a much smaller cast, this is usually what is compared to Bungou Stray Dogs the most. The game however has a lot more characters and a lot of them don't yet exist in the canon of Bungou Stray Dogs. Examples include Tokuda Shuusei who was apart of the 'Ozaki Clan' with Izumi Kyouka and Ozaki Kouyou, both of which appear in Bungou Stray Dogs.

(Did you know Izumi Kyouka and Ozaki Kyouka are men in real life? Yeah so thats a thing if you didn't know.)

Alternatively, Bungou Stray Dogs have a lot of characters that doesn't appear in Bungou to Alchemist as well like Fukuzawa Yukichi and Yosano Akiko.

___

If you like Bungou Stray Dogs then I highly suggest you watch Bungou to Alchemist! If you're interested in the lore but don't necessarily want to watch or play it thats okay too! You can look into the fan wiki for any information you might want to know as the game doesn't have an english translation-

https://bungo.fandom.com/wiki/Bungo_to_Alchemist_Wiki

Even though I play the game, I don't know japanese and so the wiki was a really big help for me when I first started playing as they have a page dedicated to translating screenshots of the game which includes also instructions.

___

(If there is anything else you'd like me to talk about on this page please let me know!!!)