#don't get me started on how I've fallen down the baldur's gate 3 rabbit hole after I saw clips of astarion

[streettealee]

Not to out myself as PB Choices: Stories You Play trash because I've been in a love/hate relationship with that app since I was like 13 and began with The Crown & The Flame (I feel like we should count online visual novels as able to shape the stories we write because somehow Choices has), buuut the way Prince Aerin in Blades of Light and Shadow reminds me of James Herondale fucks me up. My guy is literally a major antagonist of the first book and, admittedly, I did not spend the diamonds to track him down and bring him to Whitetower prison, so now I'm hoping he turns up later in the game (alive), AND IF HE HAS A REDEMPTION ARC AND THE ROMANCE THAT WAS AVAILABLE IN THE FIRST BOOK COULD PICK UP AGAIN, I WILL NOT COMPLAIN. Except maybe about how I committed myself to romancing Tyril and so then I'd feel awful about pursuing Aerin, but then if Aerin is available... IDK what I'll do. It's like he was designed to be the guy that worms into my heart. He has honey golden brown eyes, the most lovely dark mess of curls, godforsaken pale vampire skin, and he's a nerd and I truly believe he was once a good man with good intentions before the Shadow Court got to him.

Anyway, I hate the direction PB has gone with most of their books and it's why I wasn't on the app for ages again (always a dry spell). Someone's probably already said it but they really went from having diverse genres coming out all the time to leaning heavily into the NSFW category (as a genre rather than simply an element of another genre if you paid diamonds for those extra choices in romantic moments). I think they're just following the trend though of smutbooks in general and which of their books have been most popular (if I have to see any more The Royal Romance promotion, I'm going to kick a man) but even that wasn't NSFW in genre, just cheesy romance. But it's no secret booktok trends favour the spicy books traditionally published and so it makes sense why PB writes their own. I mean, they literally have a spicy fae one now (I played The Cursed Heart, yes, but for diamonds so I wasn't spending on the actual NSFW scenes that the book intends readers to indulge in).

I replayed Endless Summer and I will forever be mad that Kele was only a romance option for Quinn and not MC. Jake is my love and I adore Estela (but honestly female!Lancelot in Guinevere (a book I became obsessed with) made me well and truly fall in love with the muscly-woman-with-long-dark-hair-and-stoicism character type that I think they both share) BUT KELE. HE IS SO CUTE. WE WERE ROBBED.

Anyway, Endless Summer demonstrates I have a history of falling for the character that shows up halfway through books/series, and it does not help that Aerin's appearance reminds me of James Herondale, my greatest fictional crush. I don't know what to do. Hell, I'm tempted to replay Book 1 so that I can get that scene with Aerin in Book 2 Chapter 2 that I saw someone else had. For now, my fingers are crossed and I'm hoping to see him again later on in the updates.