#crappy little demo

[artic-star]

Sharing Art while eating a bunch of moldy raspberries that my mom gave me 🤤🤤🤤

[ask-the-rpg-3]

hiiii besties can i ask for some good vibes please

[happylandfill23]

i actually think the ability to release music would fix me maybe possibly

[vanityluvsme]

listening 2 demos bc it makes me look cool (←90% of msi demos are so much better than the produced ones)

[deuxadeux-if]

WELCOME TO DEUX À DEUX.

Hi all, I’m Ray, and this is the official Tumblr of the WIP interactive fiction game “Deux à Deux."

This post contains:

Socials

Current Demo Status & Patreon Status

Short Synopsis

Long(er) Synopsis

About the Game (ROs and a basic “things to do” summary)

Content Warnings

Demo

***The game is planned to have some mature content, so 18+ only from here on out, please :-) ***

Socials: Pinterest | Spotify | COG Forum | Patreon

Demo & Prologue Status (10/05/2024):

| Public Demo |

Prologue is available. You should also see an ending page which allows you to restart/share game, you should have a stats screen, and you should have 4 save slots.

| Patreon |

Prologue is available. R Burns POV #1 (for prologue scene) is available for free & paid members on Patreon. Erin Pinsky Diary #1 and T Lyons POV #1 are available to Obsession tier on Patreon. Two free drabbles are on Patreon (you can find them here, too, though).

Short Synopsis:

You’re barely scraping by your dead-end job when a couple leaves a note as they leave: “Quit your job—we’ll take care of you.” Calling the number on the note throws you headfirst into a world of luxury, intrigue, power, and lust. Tread lightly.

Long(er) Synopsis:

As a server at a self-proclaimed “upscale” restaurant in New York City, most of your shifts end with exhaustion, total rage, or vague annoyance. When a beautiful couple leaves you a note with their receipt (instructing you to quit your job and let them “take care” of you), along with a $500 tip, you’re intrigued.

You don’t expect much from the note, but it quickly becomes obvious that you’ve caught the Lyonses attention. They’re persistent as they are mysterious, but you soon realize there’s a dark underbelly to their glamorous, luxurious lifestyle. Whether you stay in it or not is up to you.

Will you become part of (or break up) the Lyons couple, or will you find another path with their permanent “house guest”? Maybe you’ll be the fourth piece in their puzzle. You could stay at your crappy serving job and get closer with one of two coworkers, to the horror of the Lyonses—or maybe even your boxing coach.

Whatever happens, it won’t come easy.

About the Game:

-----------------------------ROs---------------------------

T Lyons.

T (Tom/Tess/Tory) Lyons is wealthy, mysterious, and cold. They’re married to N Lyons, and the two of them are the very picture of a New York City “power couple."

T takes an immediate liking to you when they meet you at La Table (the restaurant you work at). Their interest is what sweeps you into the Lyonses life, into their own luxurious, illicit, private world.

Appearance: T Lyons is American and black. They have black hair, sharp lips, and cold brown eyes.

N Lyons.

N (Noah/Natasha/Nico) Lyons is T’s devoted spouse, and is in turns alluring and terrifying. N is apprehensive to have you join their world, despite their immediate interest in you, because the Lyonses only ever have one “house guest” at once.

N Lyons will be a little harder to win over, but they may prove a more loyal ally. You also wonder how much they pull the strings of the Lyonses’ lives behind the scenes. Only time will tell.

Appearance: N Lyons is Mexican-American and brown. They have very dark brown hair, long eyelashes, and calculating black eyes.

M Nguyen.

M (Mason/Molly/Mars) Nguyen is the current house guest of the Lyonses, and you immediately wonder if they find you an unwelcome intrusion or a possible savior.

M is more reserved than either of the Lyonses, but then again, they don’t have much to talk about. They don’t leave the house much, but they want for nothing under the Lyonses care. You just wonder if they’re in a gilded cage, or truly satisfied.

Appearance: M Nguyen is Vietnamese-American and tan. They have black hair, angular cheekbones, and thoughtful black eyes.

R Burns.

R (Ronnie/Roxanne/Rainn) Burns is one of your closest almost-friends in your “real life.” They’re your boxing coach, the best around, and you consider them mostly (or completely) to thank for your combat skills.

You’re always entertained with R, but you’re torn between deciding if there’s real care beneath the easy amusement on the surface. Do you want to get closer to R, or leave them in the dust?

Appearance: R Burns is Punjabi-American and brown. They have black hair, a prominent nose, and dark brown eyes.

Erin Pinsky.

Erin Pinsky (genderlocked) is your almost-almost-codependent coworker. She’s a very talented server, always lighthearted and charming … if you cared more about your job, you might be jealous.

She seems to really like you, too. The question is, is that affection only surface-level, or could there be something more there?

Appearance: Erin Pinsky is American and white. She has poorly bleached hair, always-on black eyeliner, and bright brown eyes.

Theo Ferreira.

Theo Ferreira (genderlocked) is another of your coworkers, but you can’t really tell if he thinks anything about you … like, at all. He doesn’t really give a shit about La Table or his job, so he’s more stern than charming as a server.

For some reason, the customers eat this up. Sometimes he’ll sneak you stolen food from the back and insist you bring it home, but otherwise he’s pretty quiet. Still, he’s very handsome.

Appearance: Theo Ferreira is Brazilian-American and brown. He has buzzed brown hair, expressive eyebrows (though he hates this), and shrewd black eyes.

----------------------THINGS TO DO---------------------

In Deux à Deux, you can romance several people at once (whether there will be consequences or not is anyone’s guess … mwahaha) or devote yourself to one RO. You can also date nobody, I guess, but that will be a lot less fun in this game, sorry!

You can throw yourself wholeheartedly into life with the Lyonses, including going clubbing, eating fine dining, going on impromptu vacations, etc.

You can also reject their frivolous lifestyle entirely, avoiding them when you can (although they’re quite persistent) and spend time boxing, hanging with your coworkers, or trying to get M out of the Lyonses lives.

Or, if you’re feeling ambitious, you can try to balance both.

This game will have:

Romance (duh)

Stat checks with consequences (there will be 2-3 majorly game-defining stat checks, so choose wisely)

Combat (everyone has a few skeletons in their closets, right?)

A fair bit of drama.

Content Warnings:

These will be updated more as I continue writing and completely solidify things, but this is a start.

Combat: knives, guns, street fighting

Violence: blood, bruising, unconsciousness

Stalking (not by ROs or MC)

Swearing/cursing (your MC can choose not to curse, though!)

Sexually suggestive content

Sexually explicit content (can opt out via “fade-to-black”)

NOTE: there is no sexual violence or allusions to it, EVER. There is no human/sex trafficking or allusions to it, EVER.

The Demo:

Link: https://dashingdon.com/go/17086 OR click here.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much for your interest in my game!! So excited to continue sharing this with you all.

XO

Ray

[msiconfessions]

Hi, same anon here that said Jimmy isn't racist. I've come to talk a little more about that.

He's talked about and posted so much about equal rights, all the time. He was always going to protests and things. The only reason he ever said the n word was because he wanted to take the meaning from the word, to take the hurt from it. And we know this not only because he's talked about it, but also because of the last track on Crappy Little Demo.

And I honestly agree with him on that. I feel like slurs in general wouldn't have so much power if we didn't let them have so much power. If the only time you ever hear a word is in a hateful way, of course that's gonna be a hateful word. As much as I'd love to say "everyone should just stop saying these words forever!!" that obviously wouldn't work. So the next best thing is to take the hateful meaning from the word, and make it something new.

Sorry this was pretty long-winded. Just needed to get that out there.

yeah, i think that’s why a ton of queers say faggot to try to reclaim it, in a way. thanks for clarifying anon

[tsunderecat413]

here is a collection of miscellaneous audio that i never finished. maybe these ideas will be revisited someday. probably not. most were unfinished due to being saved in a demo version of fl studio, so i will instead mention why i likely won't revisit them.

1. "Beautiful Homestuck Medley": an unfinished cover of sean kingston's iconic "beautiful girls" in the "style" of various homestuck songs. or, in this case, three.

reason for being scrapped: it sucks

chances of being revisited: 3/10

2. "Battle! Cirno": an unfinished cover of tomboyish girl in love from embodiment of scarlet devil in the style of a battle theme from pokémon gen 5. i actually really like this idea, but i need more practice making pokémon styled arrangements.

reason for being scrapped: idk how to make a good pokémon battle theme

chances of being revisited: 6/10

3. "GBAtastic Voyage": a sequel to my previous "snestastic voyage" from sample pack contest xvi this was meant for sample pack contest xviii, but i couldn't figure out how to finish it beyond the intro before the deadline. how unfortunate. i do intend to make a full gbatastic voyage for spc one of these days, but it will not be based on this one obviously lol. this is also the only one that was unfinished for a reason that wasn't being created in the demo version of fl studio.

reason for being scrapped: ran out of time

chances of being revisited: 8/10 (concept), 2/10 (this specific version)

4. "Genesis Does Back": a ym2612 cover of toby fox's "megalo strike back." the intro really doesn't sound that bad. i think this has a lot of potential, honestly.

reason for being scrapped: "megalo strike back" is a bitch to transcribe

chances of being revisited: 7/10

5. "Hammahclobbah": a "bonetrousle" for king dedede. those of you who follow me on soundcloud might know of an abandoned undertale au i created called "kirby: the great underground offensive." this was meant to be for that, but at the time, i had no idea how to get the proteus soundfont that toby fox uses, so i used a crappy sample. i think in this version i actually swapped the sample for the actual soundfont. it's still horribly mistranscribed in the latter, unfinished half.

reason for being scrapped: it sucks and it's irrelevant

chances of being revisited: 2/10

6. "Icecap": an unfinished cover of "ice cap zone" from sonic 3. hey, remember when people thought "ice cap zone" was based on "smooth criminal" for some reason? that was really weird, they don't even sound similar or use similar chord progressions. i think people back in the olden days of the internet were just idiots ;P. anyway, this references that. otherwise, it kinda sucks after the intro.

reason for being scrapped: it also sucks

chances of being revisited: 1/10

7. "One-Winged Angel (Chrono Trigger Cover)": self-explanatory. on the subject of abandoned soundcloud projects, i was once working on an album of video game songs in various different soundfonts. i abandoned that project for... a plethora of reasons, including 1) agood number of the songs were from undertale, and 2) i would rather make actually good covers and mashups than transcribe random video game songs by ear with little to no regard for hardware limitations. anyway, this isn't a bad idea, per se, but it could use a bit of an overhaul.

reason for being scrapped: i don't feel like transcribing the entirety of one-winged angel with snes hardware limitations

chances of being revisited: 4/10

8. "The Final Prelude": a rather fitting end to this thread, not only because it is called "the final prelude," but also because it's the only one that's actually finished... i think. the thing is, i don't even remember why i made this, what it was for. my guess is that it was intended to be for a theoretical homestuck act 8 or something? maybe i could repurpose it for my pseudo friendfic series.

reason for being scrapped: it technically wasn't lol

chances of being revisited: 2/10

[where1endandyoubeg1n]

Okay, so I listened Apollo 18, and...

I liked it!

I definitely had a few problems with it, though: The voices, whether it was Linnell, or whomever the other singer was, were really nasally and bothered me a lot. Less so than I thought they would, but still. The female singer was great, though! Some of the instrumentals were really flat, too. One of them(don't remember off the top of my head) sounded straight up like a keyboard demo and it irked me. I also didn't like that slight echo effect on their voices, it took me out of the songs with how often it was used.

As for positives, some of the jazzier, more varied instrumentals sounded really snazzy! Space Suit was by far my favorite song on the album, that was awesome. The best songs were the ones where the singers would shut up for a little bit and just let the music speak for itself. I used to be a big fan of Lemon Demon, and I can see these guys had a massive influence on him. They're very lyrically out there, and that's an aspect with lyricism I can fawn over time and time again. Sometimes it gets to be a bit too absurd for my liking, but I enjoy music that goes past your typical affair.

Overall, a nice, rounded-out project that while I will likely give few relistens to, it has me intrigued at what else TMBG can pull off. Totally buying tickets to a concert near me tho, they seem fun as hell to see!!

6/10, here are my track ratings: (crappy screenshot ik, hypnotist of ladies is supposed to be 2 stars not 5)

(Listening Log: Album #93) (Listened to 6-30-24)

[mindlessshirleyindulgence]

rank da msi albums+eps NOW!!!!!!

Oh great heavens ….OK !!!!

1. Frankenstein Girls Will Seem Strangely Sexy

I mean this was to be expected, even LJU himself put frankenstein girls at the top when asked his to rank his own records. It’s a classic. You never get bored of it.

2. How I learned To Stop Giving A Shit And Love Mindless Self Indulgence

ok this one is SEVERELY overhated. It’s so good. its like the classic msi sound combined with elements of Jimmy’s solo work, it’s like the theme song to an existential crisis if you focus on songs like hey tomorrow fuck you and your friends yesterday, stalkers, the logical song, and i am not here to make any friends. A++++ a bunch of my favorite songs are from this one

3. Self-titled and PINK

I feel like Jimmy revealed a lot about himself by releasing PINK. A lot of it has to do with religious and sexual trauma ….I don’t know what was going on in his head in the 90s when he wrote all those songs but he was getting whatever was bothering him out of his system and turning it into art and I love that 💗

4. Crappy Little Demo + Igor’s Secret Stash

No MSI demo can ever go wrong, U know what I mean. Especially Royally Fucked, Royally Fuckwd is my FAVEEEE . I also love the last track on Crappy Little Demo, it’s controversial but makes such an amazing point. If you don’t understand it just say you’re an idiot and move on.

5. <3

Just a really good EP I don’t know what else to say about it, it covers some serious topics aswell, love love love. Make Me Cum is my fave

6. Tight

It’s classic you know! and i listen to panty shot on repeat a lot ….it has a lot of funny stories that go with it and around the time that it was released

7. Despierta Los Ninõs

I don’t want to be the one who’s stuck with me when I whip my meat out trapped in a room when I start to beat it I don’t want to be the one who’s touchin me when I whip my meat out jugglin muh balls little sucka gonna beat now

8. You’ll Rebel To Anything

All I have to say is: weeooweeooweeooweeoo

9. If

If was my favorite for a LONGGGGGG time, I would listen to Mark David Chapmen and Issues on repeat for like ….hours. I listened to it so much that I made myself not able to stand it anymore 😭 a handful of songs on it are very underrated. Justice for If now

10. Another Mindless Rip Off

Ok some people are gonna be VERY mad at me for putting this one so low and i’m very sorry but it’s not the best. That and I did the same thing with it that I did with If, listened to it too much

[sheepyazi]

Ok, I have a little head canon here, so bear with me.

So, the mercs fight with each other sometimes over silly things, they're passionate, eccentric and completely different from one another, so they're going to end up having differences of opinion on things they like or have arguments over who broke the latest appliance. But one thing that sparks fights without fail is losing a match.

As soon as that "You failed" message plays in their base they immediately start pointing fingers. Scout, Soldier and Demo usually blame Medic, Medic would point the finger right back at them for expecting him to be able to keep up with them and their special mobility methods, and if it was a really bad loss, everyone else as well for expecting him to be in 100 places at once.

Heavy doesn't usually blame anyone, he just sees losses as a learning experience, same with Engineer, although he'd still have a go at Pyro sometimes for not helping him with the enemy Spy or a sapper. Pyro just doesn't understand what's happening, but if someone tells him he did a whoopsie he'd still apologize and try to not repeat the mistake.

Sniper usually stays out of these fights, he doesn't really care since he was just doing his own job and what the others do doesn't really affect him.

And then there's Spy. His immediate response is to just blame himself for everything. His usual bravado and "I'm better than you" kind of attitude he has just vanishes like smoke as soon as shit hits the fan. He hyper focuses on his own mistakes and almost refuses to believe anyone else could be at fault.

It could still be seen as egotistical to just hoard all the blame like your the center of the universe, but he doesn't like seeing his team fight about this. And usually as soon as he opens his mouth everyone else stops arguing. Most just don't want him to put himself down like that, since they're all friends despite all the arguments, but Scout just wholeheartedly agrees with him.

Everyone knows Spy is a weak link in the team, nothing admin has done to balance things out within teams when it comes to class strengths and weaknesses has ever been in his favour really, at least not lately. And Spy himself is very aware of this, so whenever the blame game for losses comes around he'll shift blame onto himself, everyone can agree that the weak link is usually the one at fault.

Even when he hadn't done anything wrong, he'll still find something. Maybe he didn't get the right kills? Maybe he got into an accident and wasted too much time in respawning? Maybe he just spent too much time with his boyfriend in his little sniping spot rather than on the ground with everyone else? Maybe he just wasn't good enough in general? In his mind, there's always something he did wrong.

And since it usually immediately ends the argument and the only one that speaks up agrees with him, he gets stuck in that mindset, and isolates himself a little without really realizing it until Sniper or someone else pulls him back in to join whatever it is they were going to do. They weren't going to leave their friend all alone to sulk while they had fun to forget about their crappy work day. That just ain't right.

Usually chocolate and some wine is enough to liven him up again, but a bit of retail therapy and cuddles from his beaux are a bonus and speed the process up a little.

[dreamy625]

This rockstar life - 3.18 Mixtape

Words: 801

Content: just some words. *insert self-indulgent fic writer waffle about writers’ block, feeling mopey, blah blah blah* 

—-----------------------------

“Um...so this is the...third go at recording this thing. I couldn’t think of anything to say. So I’m just going to play a few things, and maybe read something. You said… you said you wanted my voice so…”

I had, and just thirty seconds in, even through these crappy headphones, my eyes are already welling up at the sound of that familiar soft accent. I’d promised myself I would save it for as long as possible, until I really, really missed him. I lasted all of… thirty-five hours and seventeen minutes. Pathetic. It’s not like we’ve never been apart before, he’s always coming and going, but maybe it’s worse because I know I won’t see him for three weeks this time (‘No girls at rehearsals’). Of course there’s phones, but we suck at timing and end up just with snatched minutes as he’s dashing off to a photoshoot, or messages left on the answerphone at 2am. 

“Anyway… I think you’ll recognise this one from the album.”

I do recognise it, but it takes a few bars because I don’t think I’ve heard it on an acoustic before. It’s a little Zeppelin-ish done that way. It’s a real power ballad on the record, but I think I prefer it this way. It’s funny, I hear Steve playing all the time, but very rarely a whole song; usually it’s just the same bit over and over while he’s trying to work something out, or a screeching Jimmy Page solo to blow off steam! He doesn’t practise as such, I don’t think he needs to. Music runs through him all the time and he just picks up a guitar when he needs to let it out into the world. 

“This next one is one of Sav’s… I dunno what we’re doing with it. We did the demo but… too many ballads I guess. But it goes sort of like this.”

Partway through he breaks off - “There’s a solo… my solo… goes here. But I don’t think I can do it on this, so you’ll have to imagine.” There are some scraping noises which I guess is him fiddling with the microphone, then all I hear for a minute or so is breathing.

“I didn’t know what to talk about - you know me, not much of a ra-con-teuuur - so I thought I could read you something instead. So this is what I’m reading… trying to read. The Odyssey. It’s about this Greek king who fought in the Trojan war and then has all these adventures trying to get back home. It takes him ten years, and I think it might take me as long to read it, heh-heh.”

When he starts to read, his voice is whispery, hesitating over the Greek names and longer words, but he gets a little bolder as he gets into the rhythm of the story. If you’re a boy and you grow up on a Sheffield housing estate and go to the local comp*, reading is not exactly encouraged. At all, let alone classical myths. He has read a lot since then, in a rather scatter-gun, autodidactic fashion, but he’s not exactly had the chance to engage in literary debate, so he’s always afraid he’ll be mocked for misunderstandings or mispronunciation. But I love listening to him talk, about books, about anything. Sometimes I make him tell me stories when I can’t sleep, lying with my head on his chest hearing his heartbeat in one ear and tales of childhood escapades in the other. Oh god, this is not helping! I miss him more than ever now. I pull the pillow from his side of the bed and hug it to my chest, hoping the lingering hint of his smell and the even cadence of his recitation will soothe the loneliness. 

More microphone fumbling noises rouse my mind from its dreamy state. There is some mumbling, ‘how much tape…? Okay, let's give this a go’, and then strumming. Now this I recognise instantly; it’s my favourite Zeppelin song. That is so sweet of him. He starts to hum the verse and then, so low and quiet I almost miss it, ‘someone told me there’s a girl out there…’. Oh. Did I really…? Quickly I press rewind and spool back a few seconds. Steve doesn’t sing. Ever. He says he can’t. He mimes on stage. He doesn’t even sing in the shower. But that… that is most definitely Steve singing. Just a few lines, then he la-la-las the rest. I replay it three more times, then get scared I’m going to stretch the tape or something. I’m so… it’s like I’ve been given a precious jewel, just for me. Oh my heart. 

“G’night love. I’ll see you very soon.” and then the click of the recorder being switched off. 

—-----------------------------

* Comp = comprehensive school. Standard type of school for kids aged 11 - 18 in the UK

—-----------------------------

And that’s the end of part 3. In part 4, Lepps on tour!

[jase-is-ace]

-is holding my right arm has a lot of pain is hard to walk due to fighting the ink demon and getting seriously injured noticing the demoness walks up to her even though. I know I shouldn't I can't really run anywhere due to the pain. is sorry for trespassing as my arm is bleeding out and I fall near her -Elena

Elena slumps down to the floor and gasps for breath as she tries to figure out how she got out of that predicament alive.

One rule everyone followed was to stay away from the Ink Demon. The first thing she did was stumble into his line of sight and causing all hell to break loose.

Now she’s got to treat an injured arm and put up with the new potential threat that was the second most feared monster, the Ink Demoness.

Elena swallowed as the ink being kneeled before her and huffed.

When Twist gave little to no reaction, Elena tried her luck and took a shuddering breath.

She apologized for crashing into Twists domain and requests to be let off the hook.

Elena prayed to whatever God was out there that this being could listen to reason better than the seemingly soulless Ink Demon.

Twist tilted her head slightly before rising to her full height.

She walked away but not before parting with a poorly scratched message on the wall.

“Leave.”

Elena promptly jumped up much to her aching body’s dismay and proceeded to find something to help her wounded arm.

~~~ So sorry for the shortness of this, school is making my life hard. 😔

Anywho, Twist was not in the mood to be a healer and had a crappy day, you’ll have to excuse the moodiness. She’ll get over it eventually…

[donnerpartyofone]

Does anybody remember several years ago, while the MCU supremacy was still on the rise, when people briefly complained that Marvel movies were either imitating or actively ripping off fan fiction? Like obviously there were development executives who figured out that fandom was happening, and that fan-created content offered an easy reference guide for what kind of thing would best separate fools from their money, and some fans were reasonably annoyed by being exploited and condescended to like that? I guess whatever outrage popped up then was defused by the pleasure the target demo felt when they saw approximations of their own work brought to big-budget life by no less than the Disney corporation (and to a lesser degree the US military-industrial complex for which it stans). Too bad though, because now the fans who fed the success of the MCU and neo-Star Wars stuff have to deal with the irony of Disney attacking them for copyright infringement--not that that stops any of those people from continuously defending their abuser whenever anyone suggests that it's just a greedy corporation that chews up its underpaid employees to churn out formulaic garbage whose main purposes are securing subscription fees, and templating the production of overpriced merchandise.

But uh anyway, the reason I'm thinking about this now is because of corporate ads I see that utilize actual fan art. It's so crazy what they choose! Recently there was an ad for some Marvel thing that I first assumed was just some tween's blazed post for their little webcomic or whatever; the graphic was really crude and nothing about it stood out, so I was stunned when I finally looked at it long enough to notice that it was a piece of fan art that had been commissioned or acquired to promote some new Marvel show. Now I'm seeing that Teen Wolf ad every four or five posts, and I had that same experience where I went from thinking it was just some random crappy fan art, to realizing that it was crappy fan art offered to me by MTV to get me to watch a professionally-produced television series based on a successful existing property movie based on a TV series based on a popular film (JFC!). The art tells you absolutely nothing; it's just two generic white guys standing stiffly in front of a jeep. There's no style or flair, and it's like...well I remember being at the age when I drew like that, like I was competent enough to draw proportional bodies, but I had a hard time with things like fists, upturned faces, differentiating one character's features from another, and just getting a figure to look like it was standing naturally. So there's this kind of rigorous boringness to the image, and if it weren't for the corporate logos, I'd never have guessed that it wasn't JUST a cruddy no-reason drawing of two anonymous guys. The kind of thing somebody drew just to practice drawing clothes, or cars, or whatever. Not much going on. (Shouldn't there at least be a werewolf or something??)

What I mean to say is that it's interesting what a dysfunctional relationship large scale entertainment companies have with the fans they rely on. Like, the corporations know enough to take their cues from fan content, so we get movies and shows that are patterned on shit from AO3 and we get ads featuring actual low level fan art...but that seems to suggest that the companies think that fans are more interested in fan content than they are in the source material. Is this actually true? Maybe! I'm an outside observer, so I really have no idea if the average fandom member actually prefers awkward drawings and jerkoff prose written by 12 year olds (or people who write like them), to whatever professional comics/movies/shows that stuff is based on. They might genuinely prefer the former by now, or they might just not see any difference anymore. But the choice of fan art for these Tumblr ads is really shocking to me. It's like the marketing people decided it was a good idea to pander to fandoms by using their own content against them, but then they were too afraid to use anything with real personality, and they definitely weren't going to use anything really homemade-looking. So, they just went with something that wasn't too good, and wasn't too bad, either. The graphics chosen don't look remotely as good as some of the stuff that turns up regularly on Tumblr Radar, and are also not as interesting as the truly raw, perverted children's fan art that circulates here all the time. Personally, I think they should go with the latter, and start buying up seriously primitive kid drawings and disgusting fetish art and all that real deal fandom shit that makes fandom so repulsive to the rest of us. If corporations wanna pull that "we're just like you" trick by feeding fan content back to the fans, they should really lean in. Get all that popular rapey, incest-y, queer baiting, mpreg weirdness into the ads and just watch the money roll in.

All that said, I do feel concerned about corporations making a product out of fandom to be sold back to the fandom itself--and assuming that we're ALL potential fans and stans--because I think it identifies a mistake being made re: what professional production should look like. And I don't mean to suggest that "outsiders" don't make great art or write interesting stories ("outsider art" is a suspicious label anyway but you know what I mean); any time something truly inspired and original emerges, it doesn't matter where it comes from. But as a consumer, when I'm asked to pay full price for something, I expect it to be made with a greater level of talent and sophistication than what it takes for a young amateur to get a lot of notes on Tumblr (or wherever) from other young people exactly like themselves. Like I remember being a kid and drawing loving portraits of Fox Mulder, Over and Over and Over Again...but if I spent my precious allowance on the latest X-Files comic and found that the inside looked just like my sketchbooks, I would have felt pretty disappointed. If those comics were advertised using that type of art, I would have felt sad and confused about why a comic based on my favorite popular TV show was no better than what I make for myself in my school notebooks. And it would have been fair for me to feel personally ripped off, too, considering the fact that I made that kind of art for free, and now I was paying some entertainment company to sell it back to me.

As an adult horror fan, I'm part of a community (whether I like it or not!) that produces tons of fan content, and also lots of deeply homemade cinema. Some of it is made with real ingenuity, but like, that makes up a predictably tiny minority of what's out there. Once in a while I see a new-to-me title for rent on a major streaming platform, and after I've paid a normal-movie amount of money to satisfy my optimistic curiosity about it, and I find out that it's just, you know, a no-budget ripoff of EVIL DEAD shot on an iPhone in somebody's mom's basement...then I feel pissed off. And I have a right to feel pissed off! Context is important, and part of the context of a movie is where it is offered, and how much you pay to see it. Like, the world has a seemingly endless supply of shot-on-video movies about vampires starring suburban douchebags in wraparound shades and vinyl clothes from Hot Topic, drooling and slurring around mouthfuls of plastic fangs...and don't get me wrong, those guys have a right to make those things, but if I accidentally paid $20 to see one of them in a theater that was otherwise showing what I will shamelessly call Real Movies, I'd be mad. And more to the point, if I had shed the blood sweat & tears required to make a Real Movie myself, which is an almost miraculous feat even for something that comes out bad, and I saw my title on a marquis next to one of those mall goth camcorder movies, I'd probably feel like I failed somehow.

I'm thinking of something I saw recently about a new author who debuted on the NYT best-seller list, who had been plucked from fan fiction obscurity by the business minds at a mainstream publisher. Obviously the execs realized what kind of traffic fan fiction did online and figured they could just skin and repackage that shit as an original romance novel--and they were right. There was nothing apparently special about the book except that the author enjoyed some preexisting fandom community recognition, and the book fit with preexisting fic formulae. The article that described this event included a writer's statement that was itself incredibly primitive, basically saying (inarticulately) that they felt like they had no idea what they were doing but their editor was really helpful in hammering their raw, amateurish writing into something recognizable as a book you'd see in a real, normal bookstore. And like, you can really imagine what happened there, when you read that. And I don't think that should be happening.

I'm sure that for some people, writing and drawing fan content is a great gateway to perfecting a craft, along with formal education, studying lots of different kinds of art and reading lots of different kinds of writing besides the one thing that's your favorite, suffering regular rejection letters and painful criticism, seeking mentorship with experienced pros, gaining your own professional experience, and just plain old making sacrifices and putting in the hours. And that's fine. But, I just don't think publishing houses and production studios with even a modicum of reach and power should put a cap on quality at "rando who gets a lot of traction on deviant art dot com". Call me elitist all you want, I don't think we should put grownup price tags on shit kids make for free to amuse each other. I don't think we should suggest to creators and producers of all kinds that nobody has to try any harder than that. And we shouldn't suggest, by proxy, that audiences don't deserve any better than that, either.

[eggman-is-fat-mkay]

Okay, but where do we draw the line? Are YouTube Poops harmless fun but the second a neural network is involved (regardless of how crappy it sounds) it becomes Evil™? Is it only evil if the thing being said is particularly heinous? Is it okay if the audio quality is bad enough and it's blindingly obvious it wasn't the actual VA that said it? Is any use of someone's voice without their consent Evil? If so, where does that leave YTPs? Do I need to track down every voice actor in a movie and seek their permission before making my silly little edit where their character says naughty words?

What about "Demo finds Spy's fursona"? That was made with AI, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't run past the original voice actors before being published. By any definition in this post, then, it should not have been made. Are we saying that's the case? If not, how can we say that without being hypocritical? We can't give it an exception by virtue of being hilarious.

What if I take an existing voice line (something the VA said, pulled straight from the source without changing it at all) and take it out of context so it sounds suggestive? Is that still bad? If so, how do we solve that? Who decides what use is acceptable? Do we ask the VA for permission every time their line is used? That seems awfully tedious, both for the VAs and the content creators. Do we disallow any use of anything a VA has said outside of its original context and original medium? I think that seems a bit extreme, and it seems that at least one of the VAs quoted above (Bryson Baugus) agrees.

If we took this argument to its logical conclusion, fan content would be illegal. Clearly nobody wants that. Where do we draw the line?

listen I say this with patience bc some people may genuinely have not thought about this before but if you firmly say “AI art is terribly unethical and steals from artists” (which is correct) but then turn around and use voice AIs to generate songs/voice lines that sound like your favourite voice actors or singers……………………………………that is also AI art and it is also terribly unethical

[briarridgerp]

WES PARKER (Luke Grimes) is looking for their SIBLINGS.

CONNECTION NAME:

UTP, but surname should be Parker. It would be nice if all the siblings had western / country sort of vibe names, but completely up to you!

CONNECTION:

Siblings

AGE:

These ages are approximate. Obviously it will depend on the face you choose and what makes sense for their age according to Wes! Wes is 36, and is the second eldest of the four siblings. Sibling 1: 38-39 Sibling 2: 33-35 [ TAKEN ] Sibling 3: 30-32

FACECLAIM:

Up to player, of course, but here are some suggestions for each sibling.

Sibling 1: Adam Demos (39), Travis Van Winkle (41), Boyd Holbrook (43), Matt Barr (40), Charlie Hunnam (44), Chad Michael Murray (43), Jesse Lee Soffer (40), Luke Mitchell (39) Sibling 2: Scott Eastwood (38), Sam Claflin (38), Austin Butler (34), Brenton Thwaites (35), Liam Hemsworth (35), Jake Weary (34) Sibling 3: Daisy Edgar Jones (26), Kennedy McMann (27), Abigail Cowen (26), Meghann Fahy (34), Jessica Rothe (37)

BACKGROUND

Just going to do dot points here for the sake of keeping it easy lol. Feel free to hmu for more deets!

The Parker fam were born and raised on Silver Creek Ranch, located on the outskirts of Briar Ridge Hills. It spans a thousand acres ish. Wes lives there now for the last six months- a year with his mom and his grandparents, and I imagine the eldest brother and their nephew living there. Perhaps the grandparents live in a separate cabin somewhere on the property, and maybe the eldest sibling does too.

Wes is the second sibling of the four children. There are three brothers, and the youngest is their sister.

Their dad was a famous bull rider who was away more often than not. He was kind of hard on the kids, and I feel especially Wes for some reason. He left them when Wes was about 11 years old for another woman. He was never really faithful towards their mom, and kind of always a crappy husband and father. The kids don't have that much contact with them, Wes - none at all. But it's up to you what youd like for your character!

The eldest brother is a father. Whether he is married, divorced, co-parenting or a single parent raising his son on his own, he has a little boy. I imagine their nephew to be about 7 or 8 years old, but I'm more than happy to change this! I just headcanon that Wes' nephew helps him read, so at least five years old would be amaaaazing! The eldest brother probably helps to run the ranch and very much gives cowboy vibes.

The younger brother (third of the siblings), most likely doesn't live on the ranch and is off doing his own thing/own career. Think Beau from the Chestnut Springs series. Now I do have a really fun potential plot involving Wes' ex girlfriend now dating this brother 👀 the more chaos the better, but if you're interested in this plot I'm down to discuss deets.

Their sister is the youngest of the clan, and the one who resembles their dad the most. She and Wes are as thick as thieves, and she's probably the only sibling/family member who actually supported his bull riding career. The brothers constantly feel the need to protect her because she's their baby sister, but she's feisty in her own right!

EXTRA

You can check out this pinterest board of their family, and also this one of their family ranch for some inspo!

Here is Wes' bio for more reference.

CONTACT

Please contact the TEE on this blog.

[lady-laureline]

Another ramblepost.

After mulling it over for a few months, I am ~97% sure I'm autistic. As this is the second neurodevelopmental label I've acquired after adhd, I'm somewhat more familiar with the whole revelatory process - i.e. the "so that's why I do that" and "no wonder this keeps happening" moments that are a significant part of why said labels feel justified (others have been explored & rejected).

I have all these little anecdotes about weird misconceptions that have kept me from spending time on the things I find worthwhile, such as feeling like I was too late to the party to be considered a legitimate part of a subculture, or taking my crappy memory as evidence that I don't care about this thing as much as I think I do. One notable moment was realising that I hadn't gotten myself a poster I wanted because of some subconscious narrative that personalised décor is for "real people".

All of this is to say that I've always been aware of several degrees of separation between myself and the general public, and not just because I wanted to be special.1 Growing up neurodivergent means you can never quite close that gap, and that shapes the way you interact with the world: studies on the social perception of autistic individuals basically say that being "a little off" is enough to ruin a first impression, which is, in turn, enough for most people to write you off as undesirable.2

×

And I'll be honest, I wasn't nearly as excited about figuring out my autism as I was about my adhd before I even thought to look at the evidence. The stereotypes are notably less palatable: at least adhd gets the manic pixie dream girl, but ask someone to describe an autistic person and there's still a good chance they'll default to a stubborn six-year-old boy with encyclopedic knowledge of the Cretaceous and zero interest in making friends.3

Even representation that is halfway decent tends to portray autistic characters without any inclination towards concealing their atypical traits, often lacking the self-awareness to even consider it, so people get confused by the thought of us operating somewhere between social grace and social oblivion. Then again, people also short-circuit when they see a wheelchair user stand up for 0.2 seconds.

Some things you don't understand until you're forced to. I'd be lying if I said I hadn't listened to someone's lived experience with unfamiliar symptoms while trying to conceal my doubt. There was a time when I wouldn't have believed my own claims, what with my warped sense of time and my hyperacusis, is thAt even a tHing lol

There's something I really want to pin down about trying to exist while everyone around you keeps sending you signals that your very perception of reality is just wrong. It messes with your head, undermines your identity. I've been working so hard at unraveling trauma bundle after trauma bundle, and I'm only just starting to believe I'm even allowed on this planet, you know? Some people aren't so lucky.4 I'd love to be at ease with myself without needing to justify it to some imaginary audience.

×

This brings me to my next point: cringe.

I am one of many who treat self-censorship like a necessary evil for the sake of appearing adjusted enough. Whether it's self-soothing with the hand-flappy thing, going off on a tangent about a topic of interest, or feeling the overwhelm creep into my nervous system, there are plenty of impulses and reactions that I've learned to stifle so that people will be more inclined to talk to me.

What's the problem with that, you might ask. Isn't learning to adapt a good thing?

I hear you, but this isn't adaptation, this is assimilation. We don't get to choose how our bodies process information, no amount of discipline that will rewire our brains to be "normal". We have a natural way of operating, but most of us have been moderating ourselves for so long that we don't even know what that is. We only know that bad things happen when the mask falls, when composure is outpaced by stress. Looking at it this way, it makes a lot more sense that the world only recognises autism at its worst.

Setting boundaries would ease the pressure, but when it comes to voicing smaller issues the assumption is that we're playing them up for attention. For those unprepared to imagine having to live with chronic discomfort, calling it a lie feels rational - which leaves us not calling for help, but embarrassing ourselves for some reason.

×

As a cherry on top, we still don't know what autism is, despite decades of research. Autistic brains are characterised by both hyper- and hypo-connectivity in different areas. There is consistency in certain functional deficits, however studies keep getting conflicting results while trying to map these out.5

While elusive in origin, our differences put us at measurable odds with the scattered demands of a modern environment. Sensory sensitivities are a giant handicap when we live in a flood of sensory information, and without the ability to develop the standard tolerance it becomes a constant battle to just feel okay on a day to day basis. But if we can outmanoeuvre the bad stuff, we can focus; and if we can focus, we can excel.6

I mentioned beforehand that a lot of the behaviours commonly recognised as autistic are linked to distress. My hope is that, with the growing awareness we're experiencing, we'll be able to normalise happier traits as well.

× × ×

1 Which I won't deny, but my secret teenage wishes had a lot more to do with being whisked away to the fairy realm than being bullied at school.

2 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5286449/

3 It's the "lack of empathy" in particular that gets under my skin. There are a whole bunch of steps between feeling an emotion and expressing it in a way that translates well. We're not always good at those steps - doesn't mean we don't care.

4 The suicide rate of autistic individuals is roughly sevenfold that of the general population. (International Research Priority Setting Exercise 2021, "Where do we go from here?")

5 https://embrace-autism.com/autistic-brain-differences-connectivity/

6 The other option is putting the bad stuff on hold - intoxication & other dissociative methods can offer temporary sensory reprieve. Without other accommodations available (as is all too often the case), this can easily turn into a destructive habit.