#didn't find a link to this one so i had to post it manually. very sad!

[neo-the-indigo]

Here it is finally....

Okay, so I've been debating on whether or not I should make this post debunking one of TheBadJoe's theories, and I'm finally making it (yay!) If you haven't read the post, here is a link to the theory post I'm mentioning. You should also go to Episode 15's YouTube comment section to find his comment too.

The reason why I'm debunking this theory in the first place is because it sucks. A lot.

Disclaimer: This post is not hating or discrediting TheBadJoe and all his hard work. I'm just debunking his claims/shaky line of reasoning. I'm also aware that this post was made after episode 15 was released and before episode 16 was released.

Now, on to the theory debunking. This is probably the longest post I've ever written. (spoilers)

Let's start by summarizing the post in question. Basically, TheBadJoe is saying this:

"Charles mentioned the use of barehanded strangulation, meaning strangling without a weapon. But, Arei has no marks on her body other than her wrists, and Charles couldn't have known that if he didn't see the body. Therefore, that is a huge contradiction/discrepancy, and that means Ace isn't the culprit."

Well. I'm not sure how he reached that conclusion. Here's what I think.

This is NOT a discrepancy/contradition, for 2 main reasons.

I will explain these in detail below.

How did TheBadJoe misinterpret Charles's statement?

Mixing up terms and definitions.

TheBadJoe incorrectly assumed that barehanded strangulation meant not using a weapon. If you're wondering how I got that from the Tumblr post, I didn't. I initially found this theory in the YouTube comment section of episode 15, where I argued with him about this not being a discrepancy.

What he didn't realize is that barehanded strangulation isn't actually a strangulation term (and he proceeded to correct me while being loud and wrong lmao). What he's talking about is manual strangulation, which is defined as, "applying pressure to the neck using hands, arms, or legs." (If you want more info I read this article.) Why is this a mistake? I'll get to that, bear with me.

2. Misinterpreting Charles's character.

You're probably wondering, "What does Charles have to do with this, besides not seeing the body?" Well, he's the one who made the comment in the first place (ignore my sloppy highlighting lmao)

Charles is a character that prides himself on being pragmatic, logical and specific (heavy emphasis on specific.) If Charles were talking about Ace strangling Arei without the use of a weapon, he would actually say "manual strangulation". But he doesn't. He says barehanded specifically, which can be taken at face value. Charles is talking about Ace using his hands specifically. A little bit before this, Charles directly mentions Ace using his hands.

Charles is only talking about the usage of hands to knock Arei out, so why would he imply otherwise later? If another character had said this, that line of reasoning could work, but it's Charles. He's doesn't give vague descriptors, ever. Also, the cast has been mentioning that Arei didn't have marks on her body other than her neck, so Charles definitely knew about the evidence previously.

Okay. Now that we've covered how TheBadJoe misinterpreted the quote, let's move on to why what he pointed out is not, in fact, a discrepancy/contradiction. The reason is really simple, actually.

Ace used his forearm, not his hands, to strangle Arei.

I brought this up when making this claim to TheBadJoe, and he pointed out that this was an assumption made by Teruko.

Is is true that Teruko made an assumption? Yes. However, this is a very valid assumption, for quite a few reasons. I will list them below.

There's no evidence that Ace strangled Arei with his hands.

This is the most obvious reason that TheBadJoe missed somehow. If Ace used his hands, there would be proof of that on Arei's neck, such as bruising or maybe some swelling. Like he pointed out, Arei has no other marks on her body besides the red marks on her wrists. (I used this article btw)

2. You don't strangle someone from behind using your hands.

Also a really obvious reason. Even Ace is smart enough not to do that. Smh.

3. Strangling someone with your hands is a lot harder and more time consuming than using your forearm.

Like I've mentioned before, Arei had no signs of struggle. If Ace used his hands, there would've been more evidence of that, not just on Arei's neck, but possibly on Ace as well. Arei isn't the type of person who would go down without a fight, as we all know, so it is highly likely that Arei would've injured Ace further if there was a scuffle. Plus, the dev would've written something like that in if that were the case.

4. It ruins the goal of stealth/element of surprise.

If Ace had strangled Arei with his hands, he would've had to do so from the front, which lowers his chances of being successful. Again, Ace isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he isn't that dumb.

Let's move on to one of the counterpoints that TheBadJoe mentioned.

He has a great point, and the turpentine is a great example.

Here's the thing though. The DRDT universe and the real world are pretty similar, so things that are different in the DRDT universe have to be established as different before applying it to something else. The turpentine is a great example of that (it works like chloroform in the DRDT universe, unlike the real world. That was established by Teruko in episode 7, as mentioned in the inital comment.) However, this does not apply to strangulation/Ace's strength. Why Ace's strength specifically? Simple. The only character that has been presented to have an abnormal amount of strength is Xander (and he's dead.) And even then, Xander's Hulk-strength (exaggerating) was established previously before being applied to the chapter 1 trial. Xander specifically could probably leave a mark, but Ace? It's safe to assume that's not the case. And before you go, "No it doesn't!" yes it absolutely does. Otherwise, it's bad writing, and DRDT is far from poorly written.

In other words, it's not a discrepancy because strangulation wasn't established as something that works different from the real world previously.

Okay, now to the final part of the debunking.

Most importantly, how does this prove Ace's innocence, and Eden guilty?

This is my biggest issue with this theory post. How did he intentionally leave out what actually ties Ace to the crime (the stretch band? His confession?) Even if this was a discrepancy, the evidence would still point to Ace! There also isn't a single piece of evidence that points to Eden and Eden alone. I'm super unsure about where his brain was going with that one.

Okay that's it! This totally didn't take me almost a month of procrastination! I hope y'all like it. If there's a discrepancy in my analysis please let me know so I can fix it.

Thanks for reading :)

[abarbaricyalp]

I thought there was a Post-TFATWS space, but there's not, so have another Free Space fill! @sambuckylibrary

Based on a Daily Fluff Diary post! // cw: injury in the last section // AO3 Link

Knock Before Entering

It's not that Joaquin hasn't seen them make out before. It comes with the territory of spending long amounts of time with two people not only deeply horny for each other, but also just deeply in love. He tries not to think about it. Tries to forget that Barnes clearly needs an outlet for adrenaline after a fight. Tries not to pay attention when a closet door shuts on the jet. Tries to ignore the eyes Sam shoots Barnes that has them both vacating a shared space.

They're good about it. Don't get up in each other's space intentionally when he's around. Barely even touch if they're all sharing a room. One time, Barnes had even slept on the floor instead of sharing a bed with Sam. Though Joaquin had woken at some point in the night and found Sam's arm hanging off the bed and Barnes's arm reaching up so they could hold hands anyway. At least it was his prosthetic arm, so Joaquin assumed he didn't need to worry about a blood rush.

The point is, it's not a secret that Sam and Barnes are together. And they're usually pretty good at keeping to themselves.

Which is why it shouldn't be surprising but certainly is when Joaquin walks back into Sam's office from hunting down the new drone prototype he'd been reporting on and finds Sam half sprawled across his desk with Barnes crowded between his legs, following him down.

Joaquin smacks a hand over his eyes like a child. It means he drops the drone, but it's live, so it just hovers next to him. "Guys, gross!" he snaps, also like a child. It did kind of feel like seeing his parents making out for the first time.

_____

He can hear them spring apart, like it's a surprise that he's back. He'd literally been gone for five minutes tops. He just had to run to his room and get this. He'd told Sam where he was going. He hears a slight exchange of shoves and elbows before Barnes says, "Drop your hand, kid."

Joaquin does after several more seconds, when he's sure the coast is clear. Sam's behind his desk again, Bucky leaning a hip up against the side of it like he belongs here.

"Where did you even come from?" Joaquin asks finally when it seems like no one else is going to volunteer anything.

"World War II," Barnes answers like the smartass he is. "Brooklyn."

“I was gone for three minutes," Joaquin clarified through his teeth. He wants to sit down, thinks better of it, stays just inside the doorway. "What if I was someone else?"

Barnes's mouth quirks a little. It's as much a confirmation as Joaquin will ever get from the man that they are kind of their own little triumvirate. If it had happened under any other circumstance, Joaquin would be elated. Right now, he is not. “But you’re not, so relax, Tweety.”

Joaquin rolls his eyes and walks into the office, giving that side of the desk a wide berth. He sets the new drone down, along with a makeshift manual.

“Don’t go gettin’ attached to that side,” Barnes says.

“Don’t,” Sam warns.

But Barnes pushes on. “I’ve hauled him up on that side too.”

Joaquin doesn’t even both to groan. He just leaves the room again.

. . .

“Ready or not!” a small, but very loud, voice calls from somewhere else in the building.

Bucky ducks into Sam’s office because AJ is fast and if he doesn’t take cover now, he’s going to get caught. There’s a gorgeous wardrobe with a false back in the far corner, but Cass had hidden in there two rounds ago, so it’s likely to be one of the first places AJ looks. The desk is too much on AJ’s level for Bucky to hope to hide well under. By design, Bucky is too big to fit into the vents.

The curtains that hang from the windows don’t quite make it all the way to the floor, but Bucky figures his dark boots will blend into the shadows if he stands far enough to the corner. He can hear AJ’s sneakers on the tile, hurrying down the hallways and checking doors, so he jumps behind the curtain and tries to hold it still.

He jumps behind the curtain and directly onto Sam’s feet.

“Ow! Hey! I’m already here. Go find your own hiding place!” Sam hisses, shoving at Bucky’s shoulder futilely. Bucky intentionally digs his heels down into the ground. Sam glares at him, then takes a deliberate step closer. “If you don’t move, we’re both gonna get caught,” he threatens. “And you know AJ will go after you before he comes after me.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow in doubt. He was almost positive AJ and Cass were teaming up to find Sam, who had not been tagged ‘it’ yet in this game. Mostly because he kept cheating by using all his flight training to get up into the rafters where, even if he was seen, no one could climb up to tag him. Well, Bucky could, but it was too much work, honestly.

“I’m faster than you,” he points out. “And I’m not above tripping you.”

Sam rolls his eyes, leans in, kisses Bucky. It’s enough for Bucky to stop digging his heels in, but Sam gets just as distracted. Actually, instead of shoving Bucky out of the hiding spot, he halfway tries to climb up Bucky’s body. It sends Bucky stumbling back, the curtain getting tangled under his foot, and they both end up crashing against the window, curtain falling away in time for the office door to get pushed open.

“Ugh,” AJ says with so much disdain Bucky kind of can’t believe it. “I knew that’s what you two were doing instead of actually hiding. It’s no fun if you don’t try!”

“It’s all Sam’s fault.” Bucky accuses. The elbow into his ribs exacerbates the ache from falling into the window sill too. Still, he puts himself between Sam and AJ. “Go find your brother.”

“Nuh-uh,” AJ insists. “I found you two. I’m gonna tag you two.”

Sam snickers behind him, squirming away from the pinch Bucky’s trying to land on his hip. “You only need one of us,” he points out.

AJ’s mouth curls to one side with frustration. “I can’t find Cass,” he admits. “I need help.”

“Alright, alright,” Bucky concedes. He steps away from Sam, towards AJ. Waits for Sam to relax. Then he grabs Sam around the waist, holding him still so AJ can run forward and tag him as the next seeker, much to Sam’s loud protests.

“Cheaters!” he cries between laughter. “Betrayal!” But it is ineffective in the long run.

. . .

There should be no one else at the compound, so Bucky’s lazily making out with Sam in his desk chair, Sam across his lap. Joaquin is doing Air Force stuff, the other young heroes are out of state or busy, the older heroes don’t really hang out there. There are no meetings scheduled, no tours, no new introductions. It’s just him, Sam, and the sunshine streaming in from the window.

It’s been a while since they’d been able to do something like this. Cap duties had taken Sam away and Bucky had been pointedly kicked off of the jet. He was still piecing it together, but he thought it might’ve had to do with Hydra. Why he was kept out of the loop with those things, Bucky couldn’t begin to guess, but whatever. In the time Sam was gone, Bucky managed to get himself hurt (which is why he should’ve been allowed on the jet) and Sam had come back so exhausted that, even when they were alone, they mostly just took the security of each other’s company to pass out for hours at a time.

But a quiet weekend and a, so far, quiet week had done wonders and now Sam is getting handsy as Bucky absently pets his chest, over his shoulder, and back down his arm. Contrary to what Joaquin thinks, they haven’t ever actually desecrated the office, but Bucky’s willing to break the streak. Especially when Sam’s fingers fall to his waistband and begin to rub out the indentions of his jeans from his hips.

“Come on, let’s break in the desk,” Bucky cajoles, opening his mouth, deepening the kiss as he licks into Sam’s mouth with more intensity than the afternoon had called for.

Sam laughs unexpectedly, sits back, stares. Bucky can tell when the answer is going to be a straight no. This is not necessarily a straight no, which is almost hot enough to get the job done on its own. Sam’s a daredevil. An adrenaline junkie. People think Bucky’s the bad influence, but it’s not always his fault.

Sam’s just about to pass his judgment, is already moving off of Bucky’s lap to sit on the desk, when the door opens. There’s no one there, which has Bucky pulling Sam away, halfway tossing him towards the window for a fast escape. His mind is already racing with the potential threat–a smoke bomb, a grenade, some other small danger that he can’t see over the width of the desk. He hears Sam grab the shield, a sure, defiant presence behind him.

No bomb goes off. Instead, an orange cat jumps up onto the desk.

“Goose?” Sam asks, lowering the shield.

“Danvers’s cat?” Bucky clarifies. “Oh, shit. No, get down!” he shouts, lunging for the cat sitting on top of Bucky’s leather jacket. But it’s too late. The cat vomits tentacles and ray guns and a glove (or maybe a hand) and slime all across the desk.

“Argh!” Bucky shouts, yanking his jacket free, which makes Goose hiss and jump down. Too late for that, Bucky hisses back in his head.

It’s only a split second later that Danvers appears, just as Goose is running out. She watches her with surprise, then looks at Sam. “Cap, I need your help,” she says. Then her nose scrunches and she looks to Bucky and his jacket. “You need to get that cleaned.”

Bucky really considers throwing it at her.

. . .

The reporters are following Sam, who is trying to answer their questions but it’s weirdly difficult to when they’re walking on his heels. The smoke of the battle is still wafting off of him, which he can’t even smell because of the concrete dust in his nostrils. The cameras flashing in his face are doing nothing to help the migraine digging through his head. He needed a med crew to tell everyone he was probably concussed and to leave him alone.

“Captain Wilson,” someone calls. It still sounds weird to hear it. That’s not really his title, but he’d stopped fighting it after the first few months. “You saved more than a dozen people in midair. How did you react so quickly?”

Sam’s shoulders and back ache at the reminder. “It’s my job,” he says. “I’m supposed to save people. These wings aren’t just a fine accessory, y’know.”

“Captain, how did you figure this plane would be attacked?” someone else asks. His office is so close. The door locks now. He has a couch with a weighted pillow that he can put over his face and drown out the lights and the noise.

“When we realized the target wasn’t physical riches, but riches of the soul and mind, it was a quick hop to the plane carrying the summit awardees and delegations.”

“Mr. Wilson, you saved lives and hope tonight. How many future conflicts do you think you stopped tonight?”

“What?” Sam asks. The words just will not slot into a logical order in his mind. “I can’t tell you anything about the future. Very good people were targeted tonight to stoke division and fear. They were targeted by bad people to get back at other bad people. It was a wholly unfair situation. I am grateful for the lives we were able to save. The damage was still large and there’s yet more clean up to do that affects hundreds of other good people. Please turn your attention, time, and resources towards doing something productive too. You don’t need wings to make a difference.”

The reporters mutter amongst themselves and Sam uses the opportunity to get a hand on the door knob, a foot halfway into his office.

“Sir, is there any update on Sergeant Barnes?”

The image of the building coming down on Bucky as he evacuates civilians flashes through Sam’s mind like a hot sword. The crackle of his comm device as it went dead mid-sentence. The silence that followed. Sam’s heart begins to thrum uncomfortably in his chest, rising up to choke out his throat. He can’t cry on camera.

“As far as I’m aware, no one has made contact with Sergeant Barnes as yet,” he starts to say.

Then the door opens. Bucky’s standing there, looking like a sight. There are bandages wrapped around his head and half of his face is bruised into a sickly black and purple. He’s covered in gashes and scrapes. His right arm is wrapped in a sling. He’s hobbling with one boot on and the other foot and ankle wrapped in even more bandages. He’s clearly in so much pain that all Sam wants to do is shove him down on a bed and keep him asleep until the serum can repair everything.

“I was dug out by the same people I had just gotten out of the building,” Bucky chuckles at the camera, like this is a normal press conference. Actually, that’s not true. If this was a normal press conference, he would be in a back room somewhere, glowering at every reporter and cameraperson he saw. He did not like public speaking. But here he is, looking like it’s his natural calling. “They made quick work of it too. Dragged me off to a med-tent. Felt right at home, huh?” he says, directing the last bit at Sam, since it’s usually Sam dragging him to medical.

Sam can’t answer. Can’t breathe. Bucky’s alive. He’s moving. He’s swollen six ways to Sunday, but he’s making jokes. He was in Sam’s office. Waiting for him.

“Excuse me, guys and dolls,” Bucky says with a wry look at the media. Wry, even though the bruising. So unfair. “I gotta do something real quick.”

And then he’s kissing Sam. It’s awkward and too warm. Both of their faces are different landscapes after the fight. They both smell terrible. Sam keeps getting medicinal alcohol in his mouth and Bucky accidentally peels off two of the butterfly bandages on Sam’s cheek as he holds his face.

It’s one of the best kisses of Sam’s life.

This time, he doesn’t let anything interrupt them.

If you enjoyed this, please consider leaving a note or kudos on AO3

[p-redux]

Follow up to #samarah aka the two SH's aka Sam Heughan and Sarah Holden...

Thanks Team for the multiple DMs here and on X/Twitter letting me know that Sarah is posting she is back home in Scotland with her son. Even though she posted part of his face, I'm choosing not to since he's a minor, and I don't need the drama from my haters.

👇

And Sam posted from Austria 👇

As someone pointed out in DM, if Sam's recent trip to the Canary Islands had been a work or charity trip, he would have tagged he was there, but he did not. He is tagging his Austrian location, but he didn't tag his Canarian location...because it was a personal trip. And we know there is proof positive he was staying WITH Sarah Holden. More on that later...

One of the Team also pointed out to me that on the new social media app, Threads, Sam is ONLY following 16 people and Sarah Holden is one of them! AND she is the ONLY woman he is following on there. 👇

Threads is linked to your Instagram account. When you sign up for Threads it asks you if you want to import all your follows from Instagram. Sam didn't do that. He follows 2,911 people on Instagram. If he had clicked on Import your Instagram follows, he would be following those same 2,911 on Threads. But he didn't do that, he CHOSE who he wanted to follow on Threads...and Sarah Holden is 1 of the 16 accounts he manually chose. The last time he posted on Threads was 13 weeks ago. So, he doesn't use Threads very often. Make of it what you will.

Sadly, I have to get ready for a dental procedure. I won't be back for a few hours. But when I return, I'll post more info that I don't have time to compile and post now. But I'm finding this SH SH #samarah romance verra interesting. Could Sam have found something special with a Scottish lass who is also a mum to a wee lad? I do love me a good plot twist. Stay tuned...

[babylaptop]

setting up an ipod is harder than you fucking think

just spent the last life four+ hours setting up this ipod classic 4th gen. here's a summary of all the problems i ran into:

(1) ipod had files in it. they appeared as gray and un-editable on itunes, so i thought reseting the ipod to factory would be the fastest and easiest solution.

turns out the last step of the process is connecting ipod to a wall power source. i do this. nothing happens for at least an hour. ipod is stuck in "connect to the wall" icon screen no matter what i do. the internet says it needs to connect with an actual apple firewire wall connector, which i do not have. tried using my ipad's charger with a usb-to-usb-c adapter that i own. didn't work. eventually figured it out the problem had to do with the amps it needs to get defibrillated. i remember that i own a pretty hefty power bank with a 5v/2.1a output. it works. ipod is reset. i have a nice fun time adding the 6 or so songs i have downloaded on my computer (:

(2) i had downloaded soulseek a while ago and gotten frustrated with it but decided to give it another spin since piracy experts on reddit sing it many praises. it seems to have a heavy culture of egalitarianism: a pop up window informs you that a lot of people's download's are restricted only to other people sharing files.

__(2.1) it prompts me to enter my account and password but i don't have one. there isn't an immediatly visible 'create account' link. i google this. eventually i find this soulseek forum where a ton of normies are asking questions pretty regularly. excellent. i search my problems and someone else has already made a post and had the question answered. thank you normies. also: google groups is still a thing???????

the inability to create an account is a weird bug. someone's answer tells me how to circumvent it.

__(2.2) i still can't search for anything. there are no files in this wasteland. i turn on my vpn. put my humble six songs in a folder and share it. voila!!!!!!!

soulseek is actually VERY cool. you can browse other people's music folders, which opens an incredible secret world of possibilities re: finding new music similar to your tastes. EXTREMELY exciting. feels like i'm in a cool secret club of the internet. feels like the old internet.

i download one (1) lana del rey song that's stuck in my head. choose .flac (a lossless audio file) because i want to be fancy.

(3) ...........itunes doesn't read .flac files

__(3.1) searches: what files does itunes read? > which of these files is best for lossless audio? > how do i convert .flac files to itunes-compatible file types? > download foobar2000 > click around till i figure out how to convert .flac files to .wav files.

__(3.2) it works! (: the songs are now in itunes! (:

............but the metadata (album cover, genres, artist, album, etc) doesn't transfer. i don't want to manually input it again. searches: how to keep metadata when converting files? tutorial is slightly different from the version of foobar i have, but i eventually find the setting to keep the metadata.

(4) it works! (:

.............but it won't transfer to my ipod ): i get the message: your ipod can't read this file <- paraphrasing.

okay. searches: what kind of files can an ipod classic 4th gen read? (perhaps they are different from the files itunes can read. this is, after all, the last version of itunes ever released, many years and itunes versions after the ipod classic 4th gen.)

this information isn't in the wikipedia page. this isn't in the ipod wiki. can't even find this model in the official apple pages. it's mentioned in several reviews but it's the wrong model. christ almighty. ok. here it is. found it. allegedly it should be able to read it. ok. why isn't it.

read through forum threads. some people say older ipods get fussy with high bitrates. (search: what is a bitrate? oh ok. higher bitrate > higher audio quality. got it.)

bitrates reccomended by foobar: 180-300something. lossless file bitrate: 2000 and change. hm. surely that's a huge difference.

i convert the .flac file to .mp3 instead.

__(4.1) it works! (: the files are in my ipod! (:

.....but goddamnit, i'm stubborn, and this goddamn ipod is supposed to be able to read apple lossless files (basically a .flac file, but designed to be used with apple products. lol.) i don't want a lameass mp3, i want lossless goddamn quality! even if this brick of an ipod won't be able to play it! it's the principle of the thing!

______(4.1.1) okay. try to fuck around with bitrates in the settings of the apple lossless conversion on foobar. foobar is like "you don't have the right encoder pack, bitch" <- paraphrasing.

oooh. surely, this is the problem. i download encoder pack.

______(4.1.2) foobar is like: "you don't have the right encoder pack, bitch" <- paraphrasing.

me: [crying] but i did.

foobar: bitch.

______(4.1.3) search: why is foobar calling me a bitch? > reddit thread: look closely at the sphynx's riddles three: it doesn't say "you haven't downloaded the encoder pack." it says: you haven't installed the encoder pack. (<- NOT A JOKE.)

go to C: > program files > foobar > find the encoder pack i downloaded > click on all the .exe files. powershell windows appear and dissappear. basically: stuff happened. i'm certian.

_____________(3.4.3.1) i'm STILL getting the riddles three message, but the same reddit thread says: if you know you solved th riddles three, you can just ignore it (: so i do.

__(4.2) .flac files seem to have been successfully converted to apple lossless files !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

....but i am back to "your ipod can't read this shit!!!!!!!!!"

do some more searches > turns out it's a weird itunes glitch. the thing is just moody. try turning it on and off. try disconnecting and re-connecting. try resetting your ipod again.

try uninstalling and installing again.

(5) "iTunes Library.itl cannot be read because it was created by a newer version of iTunes"

.......................to be continued. if i don't kill mysuelf first.

[hananoami]

[05/12] Deepspace Trials Progression

I'm a day late to post my weekly Deepspace Trials Progression recap since it was late by the time I finished all my runs yesterday (a delayed maintenance happened), but overall this past Sunday was a very good prog day! ☆ Xavier : 3/3 - cleared stages 110 to 112; going on stage 113 ☆ Zayne : 3/3 - cleared stages 117 to 119; going on stage 120 ☆ Rafayel : 0/3 - currently stuck on stage 110 ☆ Open Orbit : currently stuck on stage 120

𝚇𝙰𝚅𝙸𝙴𝚁

Stage 110

FINALLY. AFTER WEEKS OF TRIAL AND ERROR AND INVESTING SO MANY RESOURCES INTO PROTOCORE FARMING! The game decided to bless me with 3-Emerald CRIT rate deltas. Sure, a couple of them weren't the most ideal substats but one of them was decent. I tapped one to +12 and two to +9 to replace 1-DMG to Weakened and 2-CRIT DMG protocores I was previously using. I also replaced a CRIT DMG with one I replaced for a CRIT rate. I also tapped that +9 CRIT DMG to +12 and a beta core to +12. Lots of upgrades and protocore shuffling were done, but that seem to give me damage I needed to clear the fight! I will upload my clear vod in another post and will update the link here.

Stage 111 + Stage 112

Stage 111 required 5-Emerald + 1-Sapphire. Apparently my highest level sapphire memroy for Xavier is lv 30 LOL... I don't want to upgrade it right now cause I'm saving upgrade resources for Xavier's Shimmering Moonlight banner, but it's fine. I was able to clear the stage without any trouble on auto battle. Stage 112's Protofield Stellactrum is the same as Stage 111 so I didn't swap out my team set up or make any changes to their protocores. It was a very close one but I was able to clear it via auto battle with 1 second left on the timer...

𝚉𝙰𝚈𝙽𝙴

Stage 117

This stage had no protofield stellactrum to match so I used highest leveled memories. I probably could have done this on auto with ease, but watching MC hold ALL of Zayne's stacks just made my soul die a little. A side note, I also leveled up Zayne's affinity here from 87 to 88!

Stage 118 + Stage 119

Stage 118 is a break crystal stage. It required 5-Ruby + 1-Violet. If you've been following me for a while then you probably know how much of a struggle my ruby build is for Zayne. So I opted ignore the Protofield Stellactrum and go off color. Having a perfect match for this type of combat stage doesn't matter since my goal is to break the 2 crystals, not defeat all of the wanderers. Stage 119 had the same stellactrum as 118, but I also ignored the colors again to just manually brute force it for the clear! No changes were made. The same team set up and protocores were used in this fight. We do 120 on Tuesday!!

𝚁𝙰𝙵𝙰𝚈𝙴𝙻

Stage 110

I'm still at a loss here... I tapped beta core to +12, swapped a +9 CRIT DMG with a different one with better substats. Didn't see any improvements from the last time. I'm thinking I need to find better delta cores, so that'll be my focus going into this week after I level up Xavier's new solar myth pairs.

𝙾𝙿𝙴𝙽 𝙾𝚁𝙱𝙸𝚃

Since my Rafayel Violet build is still lacking (as mentioned in his Directional Orbit: Fire - Stage 110 notes) I didn't bother trying any attempts for this.

[asherlockstudy]

Grinding coffee with Rhett and Link

The coffee grinding episode was very sex coded. Moreover, I think it was actually rhink lore sex coded. (I have analyzed what that is in several previous posts. If this already concerned you, this post is not for you. Consider this a disclaimer, scroll and go on with your life. If you are interested but don't know what I am talking about, check the links in the end of this post.)

Although the level of symbolism I found seems a bit much to be expected from the Mythical crew (let alone, how involved in this could they potentially be...?!), I will still write down the suspicious parallels I detected. Let's consider "coffee grinding" as a parallel for "having sex" to make this easier.

The whole episode is about old versus new coffee grinding techniques.

Rhett and Link start by trying straight-forward conventional methods. Link has the traditional manual coffee grinder while Rhett has a more convenient electric grinder. Link is verbal about how boring and tiresome grinding coffee is. Rhett is not so negative about it after all - he finds positive qualities; it is not tiresome at all and it smells nice. Link keeps raving about how boring it all is, how finding new ways to go about it is pressing. Rhett actually remains silent and does not offer any argument against traditional coffee grinding.

As if the symbolism was otherwise light in this episode, Stevie makes her call to them pretty late in this one, after the traditional grinding, and calls them "pain in the butt 1 and 2".

The first alternative test is with anvil and hammer. ("Anvil" is in fact also the name of a sex position.) Rhett is the only one who does the hammering in this test - Link does not even ask to try. They also roleplay as a tough blacksmith (Rhett) and a cross between medieval youngster and old lady??? (Link), who initially asks for a "short sword". (Why short really? It's not like we know stuff about Rh- oh wait) Rhett's hammering produces underwhelming results - worse than the traditional methods. They both agree however that at least they had fun...

Rhett: I think with practice I could get better. I just think I needed to hit it a little be harder. A little bit more. I just didn't know. I didn't want to overdo it. (????????????????????????????) Link: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's your first time.

Please notice how much what Rhett says DOES NOT make sense in the context of coffee grinding. He's supposed to turn whole beans into fine powder with a hammer. How on earth could he "not know" and "not want to overdo it" in this scenario?! He could be still hammering the beans and it would still probably not be professionally processed fine coffee powder! In short, the overdoing possibility simply does not apply here.

It does make sense in other contexts though. Sex of course is also an area in which you totally don't know and are afraid to overdo it the first time anyway.

The second test is the wood chipper. This one provides different challenges. Rhett turns the wood chipper on and Link tries to catch coffee powder from the end of it. Strangely, Link claims the velocity with which the powder comes from down there is painful and he keeps emphasizing on this and how "he does not love to feel it".

"He didn't love the feeling of it" - Rhett

I have lost count on how many times Link has proclaimed himself an advocate of slow sex, especially early in the sexual relationship.

Furthermore, I think it is interesting that they apparently make some commentary about not finding the correct container to gather the produced powder. Due to their omission, the wood chipper creates a brown mess everywhere on the floor.

I don't know about the soiling (although there have been perhaps relevant jokes they have made repeatedly i.e a little dirt makes it feel more real, in Rhett's words, some time ago, then they alluded to this a lot of times "stink make me horny" etc) but the pain thing for Link is constantly included in all the Rhink first sex lore content.

The third test is Dance Dance Revolution. Rhett said he had always thought and hoped he would never have to do this. Other than this, I am not sure I see anything important here. The results were bad and they didn't have fun. The biggest challenge here was likely "not feeling cool, feeling stupid", especially for Rhett. Stevie teased them that they should be on heels. So maybe the third test was not about practical challenges but about stereotypes, hang-ups, which are never fun. But I don't know, this one was difficult.

By the way.... were Rhett's pants unzipped?

The fourth test was the Bat and the Bag. The plan was to repeatedly hit with the bat a sack full of beans that has a ball attached to it (...). Rhett now goes hard with this, so hard that he massively busts the sack of beans in the second hit. The premature ejectment of the beans from the sack leaves Link utterly, deeply disappointed and defeated. He feels like it was all over before he had any chance to participate in this. (He took it way too much to heart for me to truly believe it was about beating the coffee beans - as a comparison he never even offered to hammer the beans in the beginning.)

Rhett: I had fun! Link: I didn't even get to do it!

This is totally on board with ALL of the Rhink first sex lore content, needless to say.

Rhett tries to soothe Link's disappointment and theatrically through a new dad-son roleplay he tries to make this work for Link after his own big fail. He talks Link into thinking it's not about the result so much but about the process itself. Link is still very disappointed though. Rhett goes crazy with the encouragement.

I don't know how conscious things are in GMM but Rhett said "Oh, I love you so much, Junior!" and the crew member that adds the subtitles simply chose to not include the name despite it being very audible.

"Rhett: "I want you to do what you feel is right. There is no right or wrong, okay? It's "are you having a good time"?" - Rhett

Okay, this goes too far out of the context of trying coffee grinding methods, right? It gets too intentional and specific.

Rhett then asks whether Link is upset with him for shattering his hopes too early. He apologizes for his mistakes, amongst which I found this one mistake particularly interesting:

The full line though was: "I make mistakes. One of them was not having you when I was young. And not really knowing how to be a dad. That wasn't one. That was (laughs)"

I think Rhett messed his line or what he was trying to say in there somewhere. However the beginning of the phrase in my opinion remains correct. Of course if we nitpick it, it once again doesn't make any sense, neither with the coffee grinding nor with the dad and son roleplay nor even from a biological standpoint. (You can't tell a kid it was a mistake you didn't have them earlier, because if you had a kid earlier, it would be a different kid, not the same.) But in the context of a romantic / sexual relationship it makes total sense. Additionally, based on everything I have theorised and I generally believe, one if not the biggest factor of Link's sadness, regret and any issues associated even indirectly is the time that was lost. The thought of the lost time haunts his very existence and it is the root problem of a lot of things, it seems to me.

Rhett's acknowledgement of the mistake and owning up to having the biggest responsibility helps Link admit that this coffee grinding would have indeed finally been mindblowing to him... if the beans had not left the sack so early. With a new surge of enthusiasm, Rhett suggests that they should reload the bag with beans and try again. (Which is something that at face value they never do in GMM.) The whole point of this was to show the disappointing first attempt and the decision to give it another try once the "sack" was "reloaded".

So they go at it again but this time Link takes full control of the situation. There is also the detail that they now do wear the heels, even though there is no explanation how and why this could affect beating the bag. It doesn't help practically but obviously it means something. Anyway, Link starts beating the sack and Rhett offers vocal encouragement, a little too excited, a little too specific sounding. Go back to the episode and listen the series of "yeahs" Rhett makes during and after Link's grinding. Rhett on heels sexily picks up the bag once Link is done and Link just openly makes a flirtatious compliment. Rhett keeps "yeah-ing" it except the real-time experiment doesn't help them a lot with the allegory. Alas, the beans remain almost intact. Despite that, they overlook it in order to say that they had a lot of fun and Rhett expresses his certainty that if they kept going at it and practicing the whole afternoon they would get even more mindblown.

I think this gives some insight to a still dark corner of the Rhink sex lore; the first good time. I have said before how we always get parallels for the first bad time but never for the first good one. I think this is it and it points to two possibilities: a) bottom!Rhett, which I find unlikely and b) power_bottom!Link with a lot of guidance from Rhett, which I think it is what it is and many fans speculate on this for fanon shipping, except I have explained multiple times why I think it really is the case.

If you are not shaking in anger or disgust so far and you do not yet know what the "Rhink sex lore" refers to, it is my "It has always been one story" theory. Check the following posts:

They dug a hole

It has always been one story

PUZZLE: The recurrent Rhink storyline is not even new!!!!!!!

Why did the chicken cross the road

PS. Because I don’t remember if I mention this in one of the posts above, the “Rhett guidance” has been spontaneously implied in a random video, the vlog where Link straightens Rhett’s hair. Link at some point defends himself by saying “I am teachable!”. Rhett laughs under his breath and mutters “Yeah... I have tried a lot” and Link responds with a “You should learn to shut up more”. Now, this on its own could be about anything but if you read the posts above and get a feel of what I am saying, take also my word for it that it was not about just anything. I base this on a reasoning as well but it’s too much work to analyze this too.

[jayessar]

Instead of fully being an annoying boomer loser who isn't happy about the new things, I'll make some sort of a masterpost about cool JSR and JSRF information sources and other neat thingies. Probably will be updated if i find anything else worth including.

So, first of all:

•Official websites for JSR and JSRF. JSRF website has an English version, but it's barely archived and doesn't have much information on it anyway. JSR one is really awesome though, a lot of cool tidbits, character bios(they include one new trivia for some characters ) and game tips!!

•A whole bunch of guidebooks, meaning JSR Perfect Guide, JSRF Perfect Guidebook and the JGR Sybex's Official Strategies & Secrets . Only one of them is in English, but they're still useful for maps and Graffiti Soul collecting. If you can read these then even better lol. Keep in mind, that the JSR Perfect Guide only covers the original Japanese release, which is different from the later one's.

• Sexy as hell manuals for JGR, De La JSR, JSR for GBA and JSRF. Always good to know about these.

•The JSR and JSRF articles on Sega Retro. You probably noticed me linking them for the manuals and whatnot. If you want to find out stuff about these games, this is second best source for it (first one is playing the games lol). But it has some weird statements like saying that Beat is the leader of the GGs, even though it doesn't make any logical sense, and claiming that JSRF is a sequel game, but then also saying that it's not in the actual JSRF article.

It's probably the obvious thing that could've been noted, so now to less obvious one's.

• Jet Set Radio Wiki. Okay, this website had a bad reputation and all and was filled with creepy comments and lies, now it's all good. I swear. New admin didn't just remove all the misinformation, but also regularly writes new articles! Like how we have Ollie King related pages there now(while it's a different game, making a separate wiki for it would be kind of an overkill so it's there). Anyways yeah, it's good now. But still always check the sources! It's good to do no matter where you are.

While these little things suck, they're completely overshadowed by the sheer amount of fucking information included. Scans, art, documentation of which magazine had articles regarding the games and on which page AND EVERYTHING IS WITH SOURCES AND IMAGES. This is really strong and you'll be there for hours just staring in wonder at all this compiled info.

• JSR Archives. This is a community dedicated for archiving and categorising all the stuff JSR related. One of their members was the one who posted the Sybex guide on the internet.(whoahaaa they got a tumblr FOLLOW THEM!!)

• TCRF article on JGR. While this article wasn't updated in quite some time and is missing a whole bunch of stuff (like the leaked prototypes), it's still a very nice read.

• A whole bunch of prototypes. I included only those i consider noteworthy, if you wanna get the other's, they're there as well.

• JSRF Inside. A certified hood classic if we're talking about JSRF modding.

• Best source for JSRF speedrunning information.

• An extremely really detailed playthrough/guide of JSR. Includes cool trivia like regional differences and instructions for character unlocking.

• Less detailed, but still very useful video guide for unlocking all of the secret JSRF characters.

• Playlist of JSR/JSRF music, and anything related to them, like different remixes and stuff. Read the description for more details. It also has a link to a text document containing a lot of cool trivia about the artist featured in the games and other JSR related media.

• Video with all the dialogue and special interactions in JSRF.

• Kind of a joke entry, but also Hideki Naganuma's twitter account is worth checking out. Not his new tweets, but really old one's. In the past he was more involved with the fanbase and shared some neat trivia. Not related to him but one of the Castle Logical ppl confirmed that the lyrics in Mischievous Boy say "chameleon machine" and it fucks me up so much.

• This goofy ass official IGN guide for JSR. Why i didn't put it with the rest of the official guides? Well, the reason is that the writer for this thing, Aki, is a real silly goose and they decided to spice up some of the character descriptions. While these are probably based on some legitimate information, like Beat being from Fukuoka(which was confirmed by a Beat TUBBZ figurine of all things), you can't trust these due to its silliness. Like they gave DJ K a backstory, which just ruins his whole deal AND contradicts the game manual. They also consistently get the names for locations wrong. As a game guide it's pretty good?? You can use it. Just don't go around calling Gum a "brownface girl" after reading it.

That's everything i can remember so far, hope this helps.

[hms-tardimpala]

Years ago, I went to an elementary school that was legit run by a museum. Like, they would display collections at our school when it wasn't on display at the museum and we learned a lot of weird and random things through hands-on projects. The one that always gets a big reaction is our 1st grade science project had us mummify a duck.

Anyway, one of the things we learned to do was very basic bookbinding, but it was taught to us sort of as a historical, people don't bind books like this anymore, type of thing. I stumbled upon some dead blogs last year showing finished, bound fics and I was so excited to learn that, no, this is still A Thing That People Do

Now, I've been pointed to you as someone active in the craft and your work is lovely. I particularly loved your binding of A Complete Kingdom by absolute legend Komodobits. It was so clean and the colors were lovely and your lighthouse motif was spot-on.

I want to learn bookbinding, too, but I'm not sure where to start. Any advice? How did you get started? What tools or materials do you wish you'd invested more in sooner? What did you wish you'd known before you got started? I would appreciate your insight and perspective.

First of all, thank you so much for reaching out. I apologize for the time it took me to answer you: I was overwhelmed. I didn't know I'd really been noticed. Thank you for your lovely compliments, they filled me with joy <3

I'll try to answer your questions to the best of my ability, even though I still see myself as a beginner (I started in july 2022).

I started by stumbling upon this video. It served as an introduction to some basic bookbinding steps and gestures, and the stitch shown here to sew the spine is still the one I use to this day. It will only show you how to repurpose an existing cover to bind a fic in, however.

Wanting to make the whole book myself, I looked for another way to learn and found this book. And it's so good that I haven't needed to find another source of information since then. At the time I bought it, it was easy to find and not to expensive in my country, but I don't know what its situation is today where you are.

I know others learned through youtube tutorials like Sea Lemon's or DAS bookbinding's, but I didn't go that way, so I don't have recommendations.

What I can recommend is checking out ArmoredSuperHeavy's blog (their pinned post contains a link to the free bookbinding manual they made, which seems to contain the same things I learned from my book). They created the Renegade Bindery discord server. It's a wealth of knowledge and a very welcoming place (I tried it but left because I'm not good at navigating big servers, but that's just me). That's the beating heart of the bookbinding community, in my opinion.

You can get started with very rough tools, if you're not sure you want to invest right away. There are perfectly decent bookbinding kits online that will generally contain a plastic bone folder, an awl, needles and thread, and that's enough to get started. A simple cotton or linen thread waxed by pulling across a candle works great. I bought pieces of pleather made for home decor to start with, and I'm glad I did because you're always gonna make mistakes when you start, and ruining good fabric feels terrible. But now fabric is the thing I invest in the most. I buy my bookbinding cloth from Schmedt (warning: it's expensive, and may not be the most practical for you depending on where you are in the world) and I'm slowly gathering a collection of varied colors.

If you buy good tools and good fabric from the start, don't be disappointed when your first creations don't look as good as the ones you see on tumblr. You'll have to learn and get good in order to use your tools and materials to their full potential.

The great thing about bookbinding is that you learn at least one new thing every book.

I'm thinking about your questions. There's not really something I wish I'd known before I started, I think I elvolved in the most organic way as a bookbinder. As dumb as it sounds, my best advice is: try stuff, and make plenty of mistakes. Mistakes are the most efficient and fastest teachers.

Don't waste money on a small shitty guillotine if you think you're gonna buy a real one in the future (my ream cutter cost 100€, it's very good, I needn't have bothered with a 50€ one before), you're under no obligation to trim your books.

You're under no obligation to buy a Cricut to make your books look like those you see on tumblr, with vinyll titles.

WATCH OUT! SCALPELS AND BOX CUTTERS ARE HUNGRY FOR YOUR FINGERTIPS AND THEY'LL FOOL YOU INTO THINKING YOU'VE DOMESTICATED THEM. NEVER EVER TRUST A BLADE.

I don't quite know what to add. I hope this was at least a little helpful, and not just useless rambling. Thank you againg for your lovely message, and I hope you have lots of fun <3

[iviarellereads]

System Collapse, Chapter 4

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which Murderbot gets a taste of vindication.

Murderbot is pretty sure this is just from the initial terraforming engine setup. The humans are a bit disappointed, but it's not, it swears. It just keeps thinking about how it might still be connected to a pre-CR structure. Then it tells itself to keep its mind on its job.

Tarik and Iris have come down to look, though MB made Ratthi stay to control the shuttle because he's so good at finding dangerous things to poke.(1) The colonists didn't say anything about dangerous native flora or fauna, but humans tend to assume that if they know a thing, everyone else does as well. Still, colonists who aren't expecting visitors after thirty or more years alone are danger enough. When Ratthi asks how he's supposed to fight off an attack on the shuttle, MB tells him to keep the door closed and have the bot pilot fly back out to make contact with Art-prime.

Iris says they couldn't have been living this close to the engines, but Ratthi points out over the comm that people do weirder things. MB thinks it would probably try to live inside the engines, even.

The work finally pays off, and the control panel for the hatch lights up. Tarik and Art-drone have to catch MB's attention before it remembers to warn everyone back because it's its job to open it.(2) Iris tells it to be safe, and it still doesn't know how to respond to that sentiment, since it's always been its job to get hurt first.

The opening is all rather anticlimactic. MB sends the two drones not in the shuttle into the void, and finds it's a very standard cargo area with two offshoot tunnels but no signs of habitation. The hatch is opening wider, letting dirt in, and Iris asks if MB is okay with stopping it. MB sends her an affirmative instead of saying yes, and lets Tarik go cut the power again.

Then we all kind of stood there for a second. Iris looked at me and I saw her hesitate, because her hesitation looked a lot like Dr. Mensah’s hesitation. And I realized I really didn’t want to go down there.(3)

MB knows it's best suited, and someone has to go, and if it can't do this much, it can't do its job. So it tells them to wait here while it goes. Iris smiles and goes along with the pretense that nothing's wrong.

Down the manual access tube it goes, since the lift will be too much of a pain to get working. It sends its camera feed to the others, and Ratthi asks what the second tunnel is for. MB keeps Drone2 and sends Drone1 to investigate. The rail system leads into a tunnel going west toward the terraforming engines, the second tunnel goes northeast at a weird angle.

Tarik is just asking if there might be storage or admin offices down the second tunnel, when everyone notices something in Drone2's(4) video feed: faint light. MB notes that there's an obstruction, and worries about a contaminated bot, but it's just a vehicle. Just past it, the smooth sides of the Adamantine tunnel end in an opening to another space.

The building crew for the terraforming cargo installation had encountered an existing tunnel, larger, square, made of smooth gray artificial stone that was mottled just a little for what had to be aesthetic reasons. I could see that, because there was active emergency lighting, little blue flat squares of it about three meters up the tunnel walls. My risk assessment finally caught up to what was happening and hit the roof. We were looking at a Pre–Corporation Rim site. A Pre–Corporation Rim site that was drawing power.(5)

The team doesn't know what happened to the pre-CR colony that was here. They know only that they'd encountered contamination, it was severe enough to cause "compulsive construction" over their original colony site, and nobody was there when Adamantine arrived. They can't do a survey of the site, because the site got blown up, and the contamination is still under the rubble. Another redacted section goes here.(6)

MB goes on to explain that not all alien remnants are bad. There are some known as "strange synthetics" and you can get licenses to work with them in the Corporate Rim and some other polities. But, a contamination incident isn't hostile per se, there's no intention behind it, it's just something like a poison left behind.(7)

It even cites(8) a whole-assed Volume I of a series on the history of colonization and expansion by humans to explain how not all pre-CR planets are alien contaminated at all. But, sometimes a site is abandoned for good reason, and for a long time humans didn't know they needed to be careful with remnants… or they did, and they exploited them anyway.

At any rate, during planning stages of this mission, Thiago pulled some research about contaminated sites being disproportionately underground, as if perhaps someone was disposing of the contaminants by burial. MB isn't sure why that's better, but it feels better if someone wasn't just laying traps for future unsuspecting visitors.

Art-drone asks what the fuck MB is doing for its stats to drop like that, and MB admits it was thinking about alien contamination. Art-drone commands it to stop immediately. MB wishes it were that easy when it's standing in front of a pre-CR site.

So, MB tells us, this is where we started in the intro to chapter 1.(9) Iris says the colonists were right, and they have to check it out. Tarik agrees, sighing. MB says Ratthi needs to stay in the shuttle, so Iris tells him to follow them from the air. Ratthi also sighs.

They discuss whether to drive the vehicle or leave it and walk. MB thinks how, if it were still corporate property, it would absolutely be doing this alone, but the humans expect to go and it's not going to argue today.(10) They'll need to talk to anyone they encounter anyway, since MB is in no state to pretend to be human, even if they don't recognize a SecUnit on sight.

Iris records a quick check-in report for a pathfinder to fly out of the engines' interference range for Art-prime and the rest of the team, while Tarik gets the vehicle running. MB takes a seating position where it can grab Iris if she starts to fall out of the vehicle, and Art-drone takes up next to Tarik. MB knows this is a sign of Art's faith in it, that Art trusts MB with Iris's safety without question.

A bit more than forty minutes into the drive, MB tells Tarik to stop. On the camera feeds, Drone2 has found an even bigger space, which looks like an aircraft hangar. One of the platforms is occupied.

Tarik asks why the colonists thought this was a good idea. Iris suggests maybe they didn't know how dangerous it was. Ratthi says they must have known, from the style of the existing structures. MB is slightly gratified that it's not alone in finding the architecture discomforting, and it's not just because of what it went through.

MB tells Tarik and Iris to stay in the vehicle, though it's not sure that's the proper procedure.(11) Tarik says they're certified in hazard exploration, but Ratthi says so's he, and that didn't stop him from nearly getting killed on planet: MB did. MB starts to catastrophize about not being able to do its job and protect them if they won't listen to it.

That's when Iris says Tarik was once "in a corporate combat squad." MB and both its drones turn around, though MB can't see through Tarik's visor. Tarik, for his part, raises his hands palm-out and says he doesn't want to fight anyone. Ratthi makes a noise on the shuttle that MB doesn't explain. Tarik asks Iris if there's anything else about him that Iris wants to tell them, and she says yes: Tarik also hates corporates more than any of the others, because they made him kill.(12) Silence falls over the group, and Iris apologizes to Tarik, but she wanted it all out in the open so MB understands that Tarik has experience with first-contact like this, and they should work together. Though, her father(13) and Art were agreed that MB would take point on all issues related to security.

In the private feed, MB asks Art-drone if that's true, and Art-drone says of course they agreed, as if it's obvious.

MB knows it needs to say something, so aloud, it says "Okay." At least the talking gave it a chance to stop and think, and ask if it really wants to go alone, which it absolutely does not. It says they'll all go to the hangar entrance, and Iris thanks it for listening. Art-drone tells them they can have "emotional reactions and phatic communication"(14) after the vehicle's in motion.

Tarik offers that they should talk about this later, to MB specifically. MB thinks that's absolutely not going to happen. It does, however, realize that Tarik was probably Art's security specialist before MB, so MB may have taken a human's job, which would be funny under other circumstances.

MB lets the humans chat for the rest of the drive. In the private feed with Art-drone, it accuses Art-drone of knowing that about Tarik and not telling MB. Art-drone says yes, it and Seth both objected when Tarik was assigned to the team. They thought that being trained to show aggression toward humans might be something he'd revert back to under pressure, but it's all been working out… so far.

It's that last bit that leaves MB thinking. It doesn't know how Art experiences or processes emotion. Then again, it doesn't understand its own emotions, either, most of the time. But, it has a bit of jealousy toward Tarik. It asks Art-drone if Tarik was its security consultant, but--

ART-drone interrupted, He’s not a security consultant, he’s a mission specialist. He has a good knowledge of the tactics that corporates like Barish-Estranza employ. You are a security consultant. That would have been encouraging, before redacted.(15)

=====

(1) Iris is Art's Ratthi, which means Ratthi is Murderbot's Iris. As much as it can roll its eyes at Art's overprotectiveness, MB has zero shame about wanting to do the same for its humans. It's just so cute. (2) I feel so much for poor MB here, getting lost in its thoughts and anxieties. (3) After literally everything it's ever done, but particularly Network Effect, WHO CAN BLAME?! (4) I think this might be a typo, because it implies it's the drone that went down the tunnel, but it names the one MB listed as staying with it. /nitpick (5) VINDICATION! MB knew it. (6) I dunno about you, hypothetical also reading this for the first time friend, but I feel like the redacted incident is a red herring for the events of Network Effect, especially with the redacted bit in a couple pages where MB could be referring to being stuck with the contamination after being taken captive. It could be something that happened between books, but either way it had to have been fairly recent for the feelings to still be so fresh. (7) I'm thinking here of how humans can eat garlic and onions, but they're extremely toxic to cats, so humans might leave scallions laying around, and a cat could get very sick eating some with no intention on the human's part. (8) CITING SOURCES?! When was the last time Murderbot cited a source? Art is really rubbing off on it, isn't it? <3 (9) D'OH! It's so easy to forget little things like a line stating explicitly "Planets where you have to investigate the probably-not-empty, possibly-alien-contaminated Pre–Corporation Rim occupation site while wearing an environmental suit instead of armor". (10) Both "it's pointless, they'll come anyway" and "I don't want to be alone here" make perfect sense. (11) I'm sure that its trauma is the main root cause here, whatever it keeps redacting, and we know it had bad experiences in that storage area under the original colony. But, don't count out how disorienting it must be for MB to be accustomed to having dozens of inputs and feeds on the go at all times, now down to just the sensors on its three drones and the humans' suits. (12) No, how dare you give MB a reason to empathize with him when he's stalling and being a jerk? (This is me being silly, I live for the drama of it all.) (13) She doesn't specify which one, and I don't remember them distinctly enough to be able to clarify here, though it's probably Seth since he comes up in a few more pages. (14) Phatic is "relating to social connections", more or less. So, the conversations that will reinforce their social relationships in the end. (15) You keep doing this to meeeee.

[vinbee631]

What Our Parents Didn't Teach Us

chapter 2 time and only a little behind! if the writing gods are on my side (which they are usually not) the rest of this should be posted only like- a day behind schedule! new personal record!

enjoy the fic! day 2 prompt is childhood btw!

ao3 link if that's how you prefer to consume the content!

Patton and Roman had the pleasure of meeting Virgil for the first time the day after Remus got arrested.

They had planned out a lazy weekend, since Patton didn't have work and Remus was not in the mood for any moderately strenuous activities, still reeling from the events yesterday afternoon.

Breakfast was closer to lunchtime as they all slept in fairly late, but by noon, they had gathered almost every blanket in the house onto a king-sized blow-up mattress in the living room. Their first movie choice (of the many they had planned) had just started playing when their cozy moment was harshly interrupted by a set of rapid knocks on the front door.

Roman let out a dramatic groan, slumping further into the pillows. Remus rolled his eyes at the antics, ambling his way out of of the mess of blankets. “Fine, exploit the youthful and his resilience in the face of manual labor. I don’t mind.”

Roman just laughed, waving his hand in the direction of the door as the frantic knocks continued.

“Where’s the fire?” Remus started, stopping in his tracks as he made eye contact with Virgil. “Oh, fuck. Hi, Vee.”

“Language,” Patton called, but his nephew’s shock was enough to get him to shuffle out of the blankets himself, despite the noises of betrayal Roman let out as he walked to the door.

One of Remus’ friends stood at the door, fidgeting anxiously. “Well, goodness, come on in. Remus, would you care to introduce us?”

His nephew reached for the other boy, and they interlaced their fingers as ‘Vee’ stepped into the house. “This is Virgil. He's… uh, the one I mentioned yesterday.”

Patton let out a little ‘ah’ of understanding. “It’s very nice to meet you, Virgil. And we’re glad to see you’re alright. I can imagine yesterday was as stressful for you as it was for us.”

“So, Remus isn’t in trouble?” The boy blurted, seemingly surprising himself with his own words.

“No,” Roman insisted. “I mean, we’re not thrilled that you boys were incarcerated, but we’re also not thrilled that you were harassed, so it evens out.

His teasing smile melted away when Virgil slumped in relief so harshly that his legs almost gave out in front of them.

“Jeez, Vee, it’s fine. Told ya I was fine.” Remus caught him effortlessly, scooping the smaller boy into a tight hug that he leaned into gratefully.

“I know,” Virgil huffed into his shirt. “I just… had to be sure. I didn’t… you should have to be punished for something that was my f-”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Remus insisted, perhaps a bit too loudly. “It wasn’t. He was being a dick to you, and that’s never your fault.”

“Langauge,” Patton insisted, much more softly this time, “but Remus is right. Neither of you should be in trouble for getting mixed up in something like that. Well, I don’t know how your parents feel about the arresting bit, but you’re certainly not in any trouble here.”

"I will be in trouble if they find out I’m here,” Virgil grumbled, peeking his head out from where it was buried in Remus’ shoulder. “They grounded me for a week for the whole- getting arrested thing… And then another week for hanging out with ‘those degenerate friends of yours.’”

Remus rolled his eyes. “Whatever. We’ll break ya out whenever your parents aren’t looking. Er-” Remus shot an exaggeratedly sneaky look in the direction of his uncles- “we will definitely not do that at all, and we will stick to communicating with you through text for the next two weeks, and only text and never in person.”

That managed to make Virgil chuckle. “That would work if I still had my phone.”

“You seriously don’t have a burner?

“You don’t have a burner,” Virgil pointed out.

“Oh, yeah. Huh. I guess I’m lame too. Oh well, I’ll just have to handwrite letters, then. I’ve always wanted to cosplay a 1940s housewife pining for her husband at war.”

Virgil snorted, swatting at his arm. “Stop it. If my parents see me getting handwritten letters, they’re gonna think I have a pining suitor or something dum and hetero.”

“If it’s a pining suitor they want, I do happen to swing both ways. And I am not picky about age,” Remus teased, shimmying his shoulders suggestively.

Virgil outright laughed, squishing his forehead against Remus’ chest. “Terrible, awful human. If you start flirting with my parents, I will never be allowed to haing out with you again.”

“Ugh, that’s the last thing you need, another reason for your parents to exploit so you never have any fun,” Remus grunted. He also happened to remember, as he propped his chin on Virgil’s head and made eye contact with his uncle, that they were not having a private conversation.

“Welp.” Roman dusted invisible dirt from his pajama pants as he stood. “As lovely as it was to meet one of the friends my nephew never stops talking about, I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble for coming all this way to check on Remus. Do you have a ride home?”

Virgil shook his head at the disguised offer. “Nah, it’s just over a five-minute walk, and my mom sleeps for like- an hour or so after lunch. But, uh- thanks. I’ll hopefully- er, definitely not see you on Monday, Rem.”

“Won’t see you then!” Remus grinned, walking him to the door and waving as he walked off. He stood in the open frame and watched him make his way down the street and out of sight, and it took long enough that his uncles started chuckling behind his back.

“Do not start.” Remus flopped into the middle of the mattress, bouncing Patton slightly on his end of the mattress.

“Oh don't mind us. We wouldn't wanna get in your way! Virgil is a really special friend, isn't he?" Remus groaned at the teasing. “I know you did not just quote Hearstopper as a way to tease me about a nonexistent crush, a crush that does not exist, and that you are making up on purpose so you have new material for once.”

Roman rolled his eyes as he joined them on the floor. “Oh honey, that was not a platonic stare. I know what a platonic love stare looks like, and that was so much more. Gay eyes to the max. You are whipped, dear nephew.”

Remus continued to groan, drawing out the noise to drown out his uncle’s laughter. “I hate it here. This sucks. You suck.”

“Not sure I believe that,” Patton continued brightly, ruffling his hair, “but I suppose we can let it go for now. Movie time?”

“Yes, please.” Patton giggled a bit but he did restart the movie, opening an arm for Remus to huddle up next to him.

It was… good to see Virgil, even with his currently depleted social battery. The lack of visible bruising was reassuring, and he hadn’t flinched at all when they hugged, so he couldn’t have been in too much pain. And, after being reassured that Remus was just as alright, he hoped Virgil’s mental state had improved over the last 24 hours.

Remus couldn’t say he was happy with the way the situation turned out, but it was better than what could have happened. Virgil could have gotten seriously hurt, or one of their other friends could have taken things even further than just punches. So, it was- fine, things were fine.

He wished he could protect Virgil more. Not… not yesterday, he did plenty of protecting yesterday. Just, in general. It was summer now, but he couldn’t go to school with him in the fall, not if he wanted to avoid talking to his parents. And speaking of parents, he couldn’t keep Virgil from facing the bullshit he dealt with at home. It was… frustrating, to say the very least.

He would do anything to keep his friend safe, and okay, he could sort of tell where the teasing earlier had come from.

As he continued to drift through his thoughts, missing almost the entirety of the movie (thankfully, he’d already seen it), he glanced over at his uncles to find Patton was fast asleep and Roman was in a similar state of absentmindedness that he was.

He nudged his shoulder, grimacing when it made his uncle flinch. “Hm?”

“Just wondering what you’re thinking about,” Remus admitted, reaching over to pause the ending credits.

“That obvious?” Roman huffed quietly. “It’s nothing major. Just… I’ve been thinking a lot about my childhood. And… well, my parents were quite similar to yours, so I suppose I know where my sister gets it from. I just…” Roman tapered off, not even able to laugh at his own joke.

“I wonder how different our lives would have been if we’d had friends like yours. Up until I was in college, I still dealt with a lot of internalized homophobia. I didn’t have any gay friends. In fact, I had many friends that bullied others for acting too gay, or dressing like the opposite gender, which either made you a lesbo or a twink, and they threw those words around like they meant nothing more than a normal insult.

“I didn’t partake in any of the bullying myself. I was insecure enough to not stop it, but I wasn’t shallow enough to intentionally bring someone else down, thankfully. But… it wasn’t because I thought being gay was okay. I didn’t know that, not for a long time... All the time, I wonder if- things could have been different, if there were other kids like you when I was young. I wonder if I could have- been better..."

Roman trailed off for a few moments. Remus, mostly struck by curiosity, gave him all the time he needed to collect his thoughts before he interrupted. “But, at the same time, I don’t think I would change things. Many of my lifelong friends, whether straight allies or gay like myself, even in the times when we weren’t sure of the idea, are the best friendships I could have ever asked for. I… I married Patton before he came out, and went from a happy straight relationship to an even happier gay relationship.”

“I guess… it doesn’t matter how it starts out, but how things end up. But, I am glad you have the friends that you do. Certainly seems better than any of the nonsense you had to deal with back with my sister.”

Remus nodded, taking in his uncle’s thoughts. “We did live in very different times. The olden days were not a place of acceptance, especially for other marginalized groups. You didn’t… if you could hide a part of you that was different, you did. Even if that was just a woman that liked to wear shorts, or a guy who was really into arts and crafts. Like, people were super judgy then. Or at least, that's my impression of it.

“And the thing is, there are still shitty people now! Obviously, they're still around, but… there’s a lot more active encouragement to not listen to them, a lot more people that fuck with the status quo. And like, the first part of my childhood was shit because I was one of those people, so maybe your straight era had something going for it. Except for being around Gram and Gramps, no offense but they kind of hardcore suck as people and as parents."

“No,” Roman laughed, “I understand. Hence why I haven’t visited them in years and they continue to bitch about it. They did not make my childhood easy, but I managed. Nine times out of ten they weren’t making my mental health actively worse, but… now they are, so here we are instead.”

Remus nodded in agreement, giving way to more comfortable silence. Roman started to mess around with the remote until he found he didn’t really want to put on another movie and risk waking his husband.

And then, he noticed the silence turn a little more sour with anticipation.

“You got something else you wanna add?” He prodded as he nudged Remus’ arm.

“I… kind of? It’s not quite related to the whole childhood thing. Just… something I’ve been thinking about- doing, soon.”

“Yeah? Well, you don’t need my permission to ask, you just might need my permission to do the thing, depending on what it is,” Roman reassured him.

“Uh, yeah. I… was thinking about- going back to, maybe try and convince Mom and Dad to sign off on me switching schools,” he blurted after his initial hesitation.

Roman let out a slow breath. “Okay. As- awesome as that idea is, truly, I would love for you to be able to go to school here, I… I don’t want you to put yourself through that. I… hm, I suppose if you want to do it yourself, I would be content to go with you for emotional support. But, honestly Rem, I would be more than happy to talk to them for you. If you want.”

Remus frowned as he processed the offer. “I… we could do it together? I’m not afraid to talk to them anymore, but I guess it would be nice to not go alone. I wouldn’t want you to do it for me, mostly from personal preference, but- if you are offering to come, that would be… nice.”

“Sounds good,” Roman decided, ignoring the awful implications of that ‘anymore.’ “I suppose we’ll have to let Patton know and plan so that you don’t have anything going on. It’s about two hours to drive up, so we could probably do it in a day, get some dinner out on the way back, and bring Patton back a to-go order.”

“Bold of you to assume Patton’s gonna come.”

“Bold of you to assume Patton’s not gonna come,” said Uncle chimed in, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Dunno where we’re going, but if it’s important to you, I’ll take the whole day off if I have to.”

Remus stammered, and tried to come up with an excuse, that he didn’t have to cause a fuss and miss work just for him. But, the more Patton stared patiently, waiting for his rebuttal, the more he realized… he didn’t really want him- not to come, per se.

“That’s what I thought,” Patton hummed, rubbing a soothing hand up and down Remus’ arm. “Welp! Whenever you do decide when and where we’re going, just lemme know and I’ll make arrangements, ‘kay?”

Remus blinked, still processing what that conversation meant. He had to go see his parents, now that he’d committed to asking about it. But, at the very least, he wouldn’t be alone.

So, that was… something. Yeah. A good something, too.

[technicjelle]

Planes Tower Defence - "Pathfinding"

In the last post, I wrote about the creation of the level, so now in this one, I'll be writing about how I prepared for the "pathfinding" for the enemies.

On each corner and split in the road, I placed an Empty game object. This is an object that has no information about anything, except for its own position, so they're a very nice base to work off of.

I placed all the Empty route points in a group called "Route" and named them:

Then I wrote a script for the Route, that draws a little sphere and a label for the name around each node, but only when I'm editing the level; when the game is exported, it doesn't do anything.

To have a nice base to pathfind on, we need what is called a Node Tree, which is simply a network of linked nodes. So I had to link each node to the next one. There aren't too many nodes here, so I could totally have done this by hand. That wouldn't be any fun, though, so I wrote another script that automatically links nodes together!

This script loops through all the Empties, and makes them check all other Empties. If there's an Empty to the right or to the bottom of this, we link that one as being a possible next node in the tree.

Due to the way I laid out this level, there are a couple nodes in this network that either have dead ends (10 and 13), or neighbours that shouldn't actually be connected (5 and 16). So those nodes, I set up manually, but the other ones all connect themselves automatically!

The Route Nodes then draw little debug arrows, so we can easily see which nodes point to which other nodes.

Node trees usually don't have directional links, like I have here (as you can see by the arrows). Instead of having directional links, they just throw all nodes into one big, fully interconnected tree, and use a proper pathfinding algorithm like A* ("a star") to calculate the best route to get from one point to another. A* is used in many, many games, due to its versatility and relatively accurate and speedy performance. I've programmed A* before, but I didn't feel like doing it again (because it's kind of annoying) so I went for something simpler for this game.

The enemies in this game don't plan a route beforehand, but instead chooses where to go on the fly: When an enemy arrives at a Route Node, it can see which other Route Nodes this current one connects to, and then just choose one of those as its next destination. As long as all the nodes are connected properly (which you can check by following the arrows), this is a fine enough method in this case.

The reason this works here, is precisely because my nodes aren't fully interconnected, but have a direction to them. If they weren't directional, the possibility for enemies to get stuck walking in circles would arise (which you can, in fact, sometimes see happening around nodes 10 and 13, where there are arrows one way and the other over the same road)

The way enemies choose their next destination is by looking how often each potential next destination has been visited, and it'll choose the one with the least amount. This means the enemies in this game all choose the least trodden path. I found this a quite elegant solution and in fact I prefer it over just randomly choosing a next destination, as this is surer to evenly distribute enemies over each different route.

So this is the reason why I wrote pathfinding with quotes; it doesn't actually find a path it wants to go along at the start with a proper pathfinding algorithm, but it just chooses between some predefined path segments.

The next post will talk more about the enemies themselves.

As a bonus, here's a video I recorded during this process, when the node linking didn't work all too well yet...

Source code available here: github.com/TechnicJelle/PlanesTowerDefence

[uneasedregrets]

@askganondorftobadragmire asked a question ... What do they commonly misinterpret because of their own upbringing / environment / biases? How do they respond when realizing the misunderstanding? ( still accepting ! )

*slaps the Hero of Time* this boy got so many misinterpretations but I'm gonna keep it brief here.

Probably the biggest one was the realization that no one outside the forest knew who the Great Deku Tree was. Not only was he Link's father, he was what Link would later describe as a god. ( Probably after he heard zoras calling Lord Jabu-Jabu, a similar being, their 'patron deity' ) Because of this he finds the worshipping aspect of most other species in Hyrule to be very strange. To him, god is simply your parent. This misunderstanding of godhood and parenthood changed when he himself became a father... a decade and a half later. He was never one to worship in a temple, and finds himself estranged from the seemingly all-powerful Golden Goddesses and Goddess of Time in a way he isn't with more nature-based gods.

There are also some cultural ones. Growing up in what was essentially a commune ( yeah they had a store but shush ) he had little idea about money being practically what ran the world. That was quite the shock when he tried to get food for the first time after leaving the forest... he was forced to quickly adjust to this new world he found himself in, otherwise he'd starve. He also found it odd initially that people didn't bathe together, but after returning from the future and especially after he returned from Termina, he found himself preferring privacy. There were often times he'd wish things would be simpler, like it was in Kokiri Forest, but those thoughts only lead to pain.

Finally for this post is his misinterpretation of the voice of the goddess. For those unaware, the Link to the Past manual claims that Hylians have pointed ears to hear the voice of the gods. ( It's on page 4 of the manual if you wanna check for yourself ) Since there aren't many omnipotent gods in the rest of Zelda lore, I change it to be the voice of the goddesses. Which goddess speaks to the Hero of Time? I unno I like it being mysterious. I could see it being either the Goddess of Time, Farore, or Hylia. During his adventures, it would steer him on the right path and keep his spirits up, but also give cryptic warnings about his fate. It spoke like a whisper on the wind, quiet yet loud enough to be heard. For a long time he thought it was either him going crazy or the spirit of the forest ( it couldn't be the Great Deku Tree, his voice was masculine and this was a feminine voice. ). Upon returning to Hyrule, he spoke to a priestess in the Temple of Time who told him that Hylians could hear the voice of the goddesses, but only if they were 'very good'. As Link grew older, he heard the voice less and less. He would often wonder if he was no longer 'good' enough to hear her voice.

[gay-jesus-probably]

At the very least, PLEASE stop harassing people for sharing pirate sites??? Jesus christ. A while back I reblogged ONE post talking about video game preservation, recommended Vimm's Lair as a good emulation archive, and then talked about how they had loads of volunteers helping them fill out their game archives, almost nobody bothered to contribute to their OTHER project, which was saving an archive of the manuals for all those games, so I suggested that people should go through their old game stashes to look for manuals they could scan and send in.

Within hours I was swarmed with anons yelling at me for daring to breathe the name "Vimm's Lair" in a public space online, what the FUCK was I thinking, didn't I know I was summoning the internet cops to nuke them off the face of the planet??? How could I be such a selfish, evil bastard!! It was a lot of yelling, and every single anon felt the need

Here's the thing though. That wasn't MY post. It was my addition to a post. People reblogged it with my addition before I deleted it. I have zero control over the fact that it's still being spread around. There is literally nothing I can do at this point.

That was two years ago. To this day, I am routinely getting anon messages informing me that they saw my post about Vimm's Lair, and so now they must deliver an angry lecture about how I'm an idiot that's going to ruin everything, and I must take immediate steps to contain the unspeakable damage that I've done, unless I want to destroy video game emulation forever.

About a post that I deleted. Two years ago.

Vimm's Lair has been up since 1997. It has its own subreddit. The owners appear on podcasts and do public interviews openly discussing their emulation work. They encourage users to share the existence of their site to get more people to use it. There's an entire page on their site exclusively for sharing links to a wide variety of other pirating sites. I really don't think me discussing it on Tumblr is going to be what kills it, especially since they've put some of their emulators in the Apple app store, and got enough download traffic from it to crash their site.

Just talk about the damn sites. Everyone knows already, trying to hide them just hurts the people that want to use them. And if one pirate site goes down, there's always two more ready to fill the gap. Pirating is eternal; share those links.

Anyways, speaking of just talking about the damn pirate sites to help each other out, does anyone know where to pirate M*A*S*H? It's been years since I've been able to find a site that has it, it's driving me crazy. The show is like 50 years old, it should NOT be this hard to find.

I feel like this stuff is part of some kind of psyops.

I've had people give me a hard time for posting about how to pirate / encouraging people to pirate and it's always when I'm not even talking about niche sites. I've gotten it over me posting about like fmovies or yts or 1337x (all of which are so well known that Wikipedia has articles about how they've already been sued or removed from google search results for copyright infringement).

Any copyright holders that are looking to curtail piracy are already aware of what's out there. The only person who isn't aware is that random friend or follower who still thinks it's reasonable to pay $15 to "buy" a YouTube streamable copy of a Hollywood movie.

Also! If they get shut down then that's fine! There are already alternatives! And if they're shut down too then those alternatives can be replaced! Possibly by something more resilient!

[madameocotillo]

I've come to notice a major, personal benefit from using a basic tagging system, not only for my original posts, but to the posts I reblog as well

This might seem like a "baby discovers object permanence" level discovery to some, but it helped me solve a major headache on Tumblr.com/themobileapp; You know how sometimes you come across a really thought-provoking opinion in a reblog chain, or flash fiction that makes you contemplate the nature of humanity, or a piece of IRL news that you know your parent is not ready for yet but maybe someday?

So you do the instant reblog because this doom ain't gonna scroll itself, then time passes, and the day comes when you have need for That One Post, but uh-oh! You have no RELIABLE way of finding it again, and are haunted by the one time you spent 15 minutes at a party frantically googling increasingly desperate word combinations to try to dredge up a joke image that would have been SO FUNNY if you had actually managed to find it? But you didn't, and so it wasn't, and you won't be making that social misstep again?

Your opportunity to feel like the Sovereign of Tumblr References (also other benefits) is WITHIN YOUR GRASP, and it is called "Pick a few words that apply to broad groupings of things you reblog, take the extra 5 seconds on mobile to manually reblog, and apply the relevant word as a tag." An example is that I use "IRL" for posts that deal with news/current events, because it's easy for me AND (I hope) intuitive for others that might want to either dive-deeper OR block the tag and free their dash! Do NOT get clever do NOT use complicated puns YES the tag you use for queued posts is very funny but Do Not Try That Hard here; the goal is to make your system as simple as possible so that it is quick and easy to use FOR U, your life's main character.

Of course this method is not fool-proof because (say it with me folks),"Tumblr's search function sucks big time," BUT there is a real peace of mind gained from not feeling pressured to immediately screenshot/save links from (and then later organize files) any interesting post, or risk loosing it to the Tumblr Search Void(TSV).

In any case, starting to play around with your own individual tagging system is Easy & Free, has Many Benefits, and is probably a good practice to have in these ongoing Unprecedented Times, but also like. You do you or whatevs i'm not your mom end rant

[vocaloidfactoftheday]

do you think you could dig up anything on the allegedly leaked vocaloid4 voicebank "vivi"? the boxart photo i saw had zero g on it and she looks extremely similar to anri for synth v, but i haven't been able to find an actual source or any other information on her.

i know about vivi! i don't know all the details, though, just that she was allegedly a trilingual vocaloid4 voicebank from an independent developer. i didn't realize her similarity to anri until you brought it up!

(image + screenshot from vocaverse network)

it doesn't look like anything's been confirmed, but considering this and that anri's team apparently has/had intentions to develop a japanese voicebank for her (i'm not sure if that's changed since the cross-lingual synthesis update in synthv) it's very possible that anri is the final version of vivi.

more talk about this below!

there doesn't seem to be much public information about vivi and her fate. i do think the japanese vivi voicebank was real and leaked though, i noticed it when i stumbled across a list of vocaloid torrent download links. i don't like torrenting vocaloids anyway so i don't have any desire to download it and see if it's real, plus i don't remember exactly where i saw it anyway.

edit (like 2 minutes later) ok actually that link to torrent her voice data is one of the first things that comes up when you search "vivi vocaloid4." the page is in spanish though. i don't have time atm to try and decipher a google translation and also i don't want to link directly to the vocaloid torrent site on this blog

edit 2 (about previous version of this post): i was wrong about the alternate vivi design!! i think it's just a vocaverse mascot, that someone used for a cover using vivi's leaked jpn bank. it wasn't a demo. i'm very sorry for my confusion!!

the leaked voicebank apparently is not complete and has broken phonemes. it also cannot be opened in the normal vocaloid4 editor. here's a google translation of what the torrent site says:

"Three versions of the voice were included in the voice leak (BETA 1, BETA 2, FINAL). However, only the version called "FINAL" is included in this package.

Although it is called "Final", it is clearly not finished. Expect to find errors and broken phonemes.

To change singer settings (such as BRI/BRE/GEN), you need to edit the "DB_Dev.ini" file manually.

It can only be run from "VOCALOID4_Dev.exe" included. "VOCALOID4.exe" will not open this voice.

The voice has no compression and includes redundant files, so it is oversized (6GB once installed)."

i also found this photo (shared on vocaloid amino) of boxed versions of her voicebank, english and japanese. they both use the anri lookalike design.

it's speculated that vivi was made with an unauthorized vocaloid dev kit, which is supported by the fact that 1. yamaha was not approached with the idea of vivi, and said vivi wasn't a real vocaloid when they were asked and 2. most (if not all) of the development news came from someone's personal twitter account that they used for fandom stuff (purinxpop). (the current account with that handle is empty and privated, so i'd assume it was deactivated.)

this also led people to think she was a hoax, however, from what i can tell, someone from powerfx (or maybe zero-g since they were meant to distribute her. but i remember it being powerfx) confirmed she was real, so there must've been some level of legitimacy to her production, i think.

most of what i can find online is just speculation, though. if anyone has any more info, let me know!