#even if player thought something bad is about to happen they probably didnt expect THAT

[zan0tix]

Any general thoughts on/relating to the Brobot?

Have my half awake scrawlings...

I really love the brobot!!!! People really misconstrue it and also leave it out in a lot of dirkjake talk? Its a big player in not only how dirk expresses his affection/desire towards jake but also in their multi year spanning unspoken game of gay chicken 😭😭(all of dirks splinters are but Not about them rn)

It was sent yknow under the pretense that jake loves wrestling and wished so bad to have somebody he could wrestle with. But at the same time it protects jake from the horrors of hellmurder island (seen before they strife), pushing jake into the Damsel in distress role he wasnt expecting to play even before all the shit in the game, with Dirk being his hero.

Jake says he keeps it on a high difficulty because apparently in the Novice mode he says their interactions become "too tender" and doesnt want to elaborate, Friendly reminder! His convo with jane on the SAME DAY dirk pulled off that big romantic overture and the kiss happens and him and dirk begin "dating".. is the same day he asked jane if it didnt make him weird for wanting to date dirk. And he also says hed joke around with dirk about how theyd soo make a great couple if dirk were a girl haha.

I imagine the brobot and well. Getting physical like that with a robot that supposedly looks like dirk probably gave jake his internal gay awakening at 13 but he just never wanted to actually confront it and instead just wanted to brush past everything 😭😭 (See: every single time sexuality or romance comes up in relation to jake he is literally always thinking about dirk somehow and he never directly talks about his attraction to men or how that reflects/contradicts on his self image of the Movie Star Hero guy)

and jake doesnt actually hate the thing either, he tells jane he thinks it genuinely did improve his fighting capabilities (Which we see it did in collide! he beat basically the whole felt with guns and fisticuffs alone, no hope powers.) Which serves as a pretty evident parallel to dave who also is good at fighting, even if he doesnt want to be. (see dirk + dave convo)

This one comes from hussies authors notes in the aradiabot and equius scene (which equius imagery being invoked with dirk. something i could totally rant about another time haha) but yeah. Jake was being selfish asshat in that log forcing jane into a corner and wringing what he wanted to hear out of her, and also not giving a shit about the brobot (Which served as his protector and only other semblance of human connection since he was 13 and was a BIRTHDAY GIFT FROM DIRK) KILLING ITSELF? But hes so preoccupied talking about dirk. THE REAL DIRK. And immediately after jake loses the dirk splinter that protected him, HE (AND DIRK) CREATE A NEW ONE FOR HIMSELF USING THEIR COMBINED POWERS/?

Hussie is lying.. somebody Does care about dirks feelings. a whole lot to the point they activate their powers unwittingly Because of it. and its jake. but jake just cant admit that himself. (He cannot admit his real feelings until given permission to, dirk would have to concede the game of gay chicken first using his words and not just actions)

ANYWAY. hussie is so right its so easy to get sidetracked times one million talking about this comic. BUT AHH!! BROBOT. his existence.. tragic.. Jakes really smart in knowing that all of dirks splinters enlighten aspects of himself he doesnt oft share, and the brobot served as another dirk action on the pile of dirk actions he engineers to signify his deep immense care for jake, where he lets these grand gestures and implications sit out in the open without ever actually saying what they mean and where his feelings lay.

EVEN IF ITS SUPER OBVIOUS. The d man cant use his big boy words to actually describe his feelings despite how much a yaps! so jake doesnt know if hes even allowed to say anything about his own. Fellas: Is it gay if you labour for supposedly an extended period of time to create a custom robot in your own image to ship in pieces to your best bro guy crush who is HUNDREDS OF YEARS IN THE PAST because you cant be there yourself?

I think this hal message says enough about how bad dirk wished he could visit jake 💀💀

[satanswrathussy]

mystic messenger playthrough day 5 i think??

this is literally just a thought dump there's no need to read this unless you want to read my ever spiraling confusion while playing this for the first time !!

TL;DR I DIDNT GET THE DAY 5 BAD END !! I'm on Jaehee's route and I'm terrified of messing up lmao

Word Dump

I already forgot how i've been formatting these- but i'm mobile so i doubt it matters anyways :,)

Anyways I discovered I have to start from Day 1 every time I get an ending, and I didn't want to do all of that just to see the Day 5 bad ending- so I looked up transcripts of the dialogue and ... I'm definitely getting ddlc'd because what the fuck bro

I think my favorite part is how Zen talks about his freaky dream, and SOMEHOW if you don't pick someone by Day 5- Yoosung gets woke then JUST DIPS????? WITH SOME RELIGIOUS CULT PPL?????? HUH?????

I'm assuming this isn't canon, like it was just thrown in to shame the player for not choosing lmao, bUT I'm also convinced the cult is involved in the story- and I'm absolutely blaming Rika for it even though i have like..... minimal evidence............. and that she's dead............ i still don't believe she's dead

Also I know this is a game so real world rules don't apply- but I didn't expect THAT to be the bad ending? I'd expect something like that to happen in a Yoosung exclusive bad end, not necessarily just a neutral "oopsie you're indecisive!" ending. I think it would make more sense if- because MC didn't get enough hearts for anyone -the RFA decides "actually let's NOT trust this random person to replace our dead friend."

So I'm on Jaehee's route- which may have been a bad choice, because the internet says the story makes the MOST sense if you play Zen/Yoosung/Jaehee ... but since I chose Jaehee when I started, I decided I'll just .... work backwards or something lmao.

OH ALSO I FOUND OUT JAEHEE IS NOT ROMANCE-ABLE AND IM SCREAMING CRYING AND THROWING UP

Anywhooo I'm not sure how I feel about this route so far, because it kinda just feels like a Jaehee pity parade? Like the devs decided "yes. she shall be a punching bag.", because so far it just seems like I have to keep reassuring her? Which I don't mind- but like please just let her be hAPPY SOON???

Predictions

Although I think the Day 5 bad end was meant to be a cop out, I think the cult ACTUALLY has something to do with the game.

is it bad i wanna invite the cult to the party

I think Rika faked her death and then started that weird Yoosung snatching cult. I don't care I REFUSE to trust her.

I'm also convinced Rika is Unknown and she's gonna make MC convince the RFA to join her weird Yoosung snatching cult.

I am very anti Rika despite never seeing her (outside of the cutscene before Day 5)

I bet Rika is just THE WORST. Like the way everyone talks ab her??? No one is just NATURALLY that nice unless they're covering shit up.

Theories

Would saying "Rika is the worst" count as a theory?

I JUST CAME UP W THIS- BUT I WOULD BET MY RIGHT HAND THAT RIKA WAS EMBEZZLING THE FUNDRAISER MONEY TO START HER WEIRD CULT

okay i forgot anything else i was wanting to say. it's only 5:30 so there's probably more day 5 chats coming up (i missed a lot bc i slept until 9am >:( )

[single-malt-scotch]

w the last of the episodes for the crossover rolling in i just wanted to write a mega long blog about my thoughts from the past two months of it!

well the last two months has certainly been a Lot more than i expected, after thinking i wasnt going to follow the crossover too hard. but i guess it was hard to avoid if i wanted to watch any new content from the people i typically watch so.... yeah, i mean i dont regret that nor did i dislike doing that-- the Empires server was certainly not my type of thing but i managed to find people i enjoyed watching, and has people got more comfortable i was more eager to see them play together anyways.

it seemed like the last two months were a bit chaotic in many ways though- its a shame some folk didnt get videos out due to being sick, but there was so much happening anyways i think i would have felt even more overwhelmed if there was much more happening already.

but anyways... on the specific sides of the crossover and what my take away has been...

I have come away from Empires with a few new subscriptions- primarily i expect to check in w people like fwhip and pixlriffs, i enjoyed their styles and the way they leaned a little less on in character banter and their live streams were things i popped into during all this. there are people i dont think ill watch consistently but i enjoyed their personalities a lot- mythicalsausage being one for sure, and there were definitely others i found very funny alongside other players too. overall it was great exposure, even if i dont expect myself to watch loads of new people now, i do look forward to potential collaborations.

For the first half of the crossover i really loved the concept of the hermit tower, and a giant collab between everyone was really great to see- my only gripe is that i wish we actually got to see some of the planning and discussion around the conclusion they came out. i think early on i mentioned collabs, and how in old smp i loved the live building/planning together. while i get a lot of that is cut for videos, i think wished we'd seen a bit of it in streams or something- most streams i watched (and i did catch a lot) had people on their lonesome when adding to the tower. despite that- its not to say it was a bad idea, it was fun see everyone make that monstrosity. Everyone meshed pretty well with the RPing side of the empires in a way that wasnt unnatural, and i liked seeing some folk get more into it as well. i know i tend to say i dont like "RP" in mcyt, but it just has to do w the audience intended, or their style. Empires has a variety of tone.... some ppl are very aimed at children, some not as much. so it just depends on who I want to deal with lol.

the timing of going back to HC was well timed because i was definitely at the point of wanting to see normal HC again. and while it felt shorter (even though it wasnt, exactly- maybe by a week) i have probably enjoyed it far more just because its the casual meta kind of smp i am used to. i liked that pretty much every empires person was able to drop the hard RP stuff during this period too- mostly lol. i mean in the sense that, even those who did were still very casual overall.

i think the second phase still suffered a bit from... lack of actual content regarding the village being built (which yes again, i know of the stuff that was on stream. but that still wasnt all of it), but coming to to xmas i can see many ppl are not able to squeeze in videos right now either. i feel the timing was good and bad-- fun holiday stuff to do in game, but also lots of IRL stuff, and also sick season...

regardless its been a wild two months to follow- it was exciting getting exposed to so much stuff i wouldnt normally look into. and i could just tell how much fun everyone was having, which made it all the more enjoyable.

[stumblngrumbl]

Do you believe there's any ethical way to share anymore? I know even basic things like Gmail or (especially) Discord are terrible with privacy, and even independent websites ask for cookies and probs use ai.. Do you think we'll have to go back to mailing eachother letters? Or accept that theres always a risk when it comes to putting urself out there? Sorry if this is dumb, your ai post said a lot of things i didnt know how to put into words.

I think right now there's actually more than lip service being paid towards privacy by most of the big players (Google etc), at least insofar as actually keeping your actual thoughts private. Obviously they scan your gmail to see if there's something they can advertise to you, but they literally don't keep copies of our email for other nefarious purposes (unless there's a government warrant, of course).

I don't expect this to remain true for long though (and it's easier and easier for the gov't to grab your stuff, too). I've got a pretty bleak view of the future, and rather than get you and any of the other 11 (heh heh) readers of this down, I'm going to put further thoughts under the jump.

Don't read more of this, it's probably depressing.

I'm serious. You don't want to be this serious too.

I already talked about what I expect from AI re: surveillance. The impact of AI really doesn't end there, though - we're able to do more and more with automation and mechanization, and while some people say "there's always going to need to be farmers" and what-all, but the question is how many workers will be actually need in the future?

In the Star Trek utopia - a post-scarcity utopia - there's more than enough for everyone, and society has room for everyone as a result.

Do we really think our society is moving in that direction?

I'll tell you where I think society will end up at the rate we're going: spoiler, it's not a utopia.

At some point mechanization will be so complete that everything that the very top class (the 0.0001%, billionaire class) needs can easily be provided by a small number of… we'll keep calling them workers, for now. The rulers will tire of the endless petty problems that all the rest of us have - it's too hot, there's not enough water or food, there's too much water, asylum seekers, diseases from deep in the forests are cropping up too much from too many people having to go into them, ancient plagues coming from the thawing permafrost, etc.

They'll realize that everything's getting to a boiling point, hole up somewhere behind their walls, and let the rest of the world crash down. They'll pull the plug. There'll be such privation - mass starvation, people dying of diseases, storm damage, wars between smaller states; mass migration will be attempted, but the rulers will just not care any more.

They won't need to. They can let it all fall down and there's nothing we'll be able to do with all their drones and automated war machines - it's not quite Skynet because there's still people running it, but the effect is the same. Keep the rulers' area secure at all costs, ride out the chaos.

In the meantime, they'll have all of their minions under lock & key (very literally; you don't want to know what's in the ankle bracelet, and it's probably not on the ankle any more) and they're under the same surveillance to keep track of what they're doing. AI will be able to read what they write, hear what they say.

You'd hope that their minions would see that their overlords are no better than the worst Bond villain, but seriously - what can they do? One person acting out alone is likely to be killed by other minions because they can't even begin to conspire. It's all or nothing, and things outside will be so bad that the minions will see their lives and what happens if we try to kill the bad guys and succeed, but then we have to deal with all the zombies rest of humanity? We've got it pretty dang good here.

They won't need us for long, the way things are going. Well, they'll need a few of us for entertainment and to do the few things that still need a bit of a flexible human brain, but it won't be that many. Meanwhile, we'll set things up so that they can go their own way.

[kareofbears]

persona 5 royal: my thoughts after finishing it five minutes ago

disclaimer: the only reason im writing this is because 1) i have a lot of thoughts and feelings that i need to write down and if i dont ill explode and 2) i want to be able to find this when p5s eventually drops so i can compare my thought processes. if you do not agree with what i’m going to say, that’s cool! just block me or ignore this post. 

now for the sake of sanity, i’m going to try and narrow down this entire list into chunks because this’ll probably be very very long and very much about me just screaming about stuff that i liked, loved, and don’t like. i will be spoiling both the original persona 5 and persona 5 royal, obviously, so i hope you finished both!

1) Akechi

so yes. Goro Akechi. Everyone’s favorite murderer. I’m going to by spewing a lot of hot takes, and this is probably going to be the spiciest: i am in the most intense love-hate relationship with this brown haired antagonist because jesus christ is he a complicated son of a bitch. I know i’ve complained in the past about how much Atlus often struggles with utilizing a character well, but that does not at all relate to Akechi in any way, shape, or form. 

I’ll say this now: He is a character I genuinely, truly hate, yet he is the one I want to hear from the most. He is someone who is a bad person (yes, he is a bad person) but whenever he comes on screen he makes me sit up, he makes me pay attention to him because that’s just the aura he exudes. He is a character who i would never, ever waste my time defending or justifying his actions, but every minute joker spends with him is a minute i want to stretch out as long as possible because he is just that good of a character. He is interesting, he is well defined, he is smart, he is clever, he is sassy, he’s a motherfucking asshole who’s never had a vibe check in my life and i still hate him. Goro Akechi is what Star Wars wanted Kylo Ren to be, and that allegory may not make sense to many people but it works for me so i’m saying it. It’s to the point where writing akechi in a fanfic makes me sweat because in my opinon capturing the essence of akechi is near impossible unless you know what you are talking about (i do not mean that in anyway to discourage people from writing him, im just saying that I am a coward because i will never be able to write a good akechi). Anyway, bottom line is: i despise him but my eyes are always glued to him at all times.

back to the main point-- Atlus absolutely nailed this character and every single addition they put in for Akechi. I’m so damn thrilled that you actually have confidant hangouts with him because every single time you talk to him, it services not only the plot, but it perfectly does what it is supposed to do: it makes you like him, but also leaves the player slightly unnerved. they do it so casually that I might have trouble explaining it, but bear with me: everytime you hangout with him, he always does or say something that unhinges you just a little bit, it leaves you asking ‘wait why?’ or ‘but how did you know that’ or ‘why are you saying that?’. akechi is constantly playing mind games with you. and not only that, adding backstory to akechi (moreso than in the original) is just fucking fantastic. he’s always been a fully fleshed out character but after playing royal, goro akechi actually exists in my mind, and i still hate him (but also i dont. but also i do. anyway)

2) the ending

just finished the game and this is the point where i am at odds with p5r for the first time. the ending to p5, in my opinion, was flawless; everything was perfect and had meaning. from the shot of akira being shown to not wearing glasses anymore because he no longer feels the need to wear a mask (character development: he was very unhappy at the beginning of the game and now he’s happy with his friends--i love it), to his friends being the one to drive him home (amazing, he left his home town and came to shibuya alone via transit, and one year later he’s now leaving with all of his best friends in a van they rented just so they could stay with him as long as they can--it’s perfect, i love it), and also all of them seeing how large and infinite the ocean is (because now there’s unlimited options for them because they all have a new perspective on life). 

But....none of that is there in p5r. it feels impersonal. no one drops him off at his hometown, he was still wearing glasses, and there’s no grand metaphor about what they all achieved. 

Now, i am not a (complete) moron. I know why they had to change it: it’s because of persona 5 scramble (i think). they wanted to set up a plot for the next game and i feel like thats the reason why persona 5 royal’s ending suffered for it: they were too focused on the next plot that they forgot to focus on the sentimental ending for p5r. don’t get me wrong, seeing akechi in the train station absolutely made me lose my shit and made me scream at one in the morning, but i think they lost the core meaning in doing the other stuff. i did not like the focus on maruki and kasumi (will be talking about them later), cause i feel like it took away from the ending, and i also didn’t like the fact that the whole joker outfit in the reflection thing (but i will be letting it slide since it was during the after credits anyway). So while i do love one (1) new aspect of the final cut scene, i still adore and stan the one from persona 5. 

3) the entire last semester 

i’ll be quick: the final palace? the best palace. fight me. it’s fantastic, it’s innovative, it’s interesting, and most of all, the palace ruler is actually the best one in the entire game and i know i wont be the only one to say this. maruki is not a villain: i know for a godamn fact that im not the only one to say that i almost agreed with his deal of allowing the reality (damn i almost agreed twice) because why wouldnt you?? it’s literally a perfect reality! the only reason i didnt agree is because i knew the game wouldnt want me to agree and would force me to have the bad ending! anyway, i love the last section so much. the palace design is interesting, the antagonist is brilliant (who doesn’t love a morally gray antagonist?), and finally, the payoff of kasumi happened and it made me silent for ten minutes. the entire reveal of her being sumire and kasumi being dead is just so genuinely shocking to me that it nearly broke my neck.

what actually broke my neck was the initial incident for the third semester. seeing everyone in this wild alternate reality made me so unsettled that i literally got a stomach ache. i saw morgana as a human and nearly passed out. shiho in the underground? wig. ryuji saying he’s on the national pedastal for running? literally my eyebrows just popped off my head. fucking WAKABA? FLATLINED. brilliantly executed and i love the initial akechi and akira buddy cop movie vibes in the beginning it was just so fun. 

one huge part of the third semester for me though, was of course, akechi. seeing him completely throw away his ‘charming ace detective’ speil was the most refreshing and interesting and not to mention, hilarious part of the game. he does not give a fuck about anyone and he is not afraid to let you know. he is the biggest savage and the most insane person on the phantom thieves group. he’ll roast you, he’ll roast your boyfriend, he’ll roast fuckin anyone and it’s fantastic. not to mention his dialogue is killer: he says the most bat shit insults ever and my favorite example is when you go up to him near the end of the game, you know, to hangout with him and be a nice guy, he just does not hesitate to say ‘what, you came just to see me? just the sort of brainless sentimentality i’d expect from you.’ i LOVE IT because why the hell would he try to be nice? the jig is up, he’s got nothing to hide. and he owns it. atlus seriously nailed akechi in this last semester and it’s brilliant and i love it.

4) everything else 

- one small thing that pissed me off in both games (but especially this one) is how many godamn fake out deaths there are. Morgana has one, Akira has one, Ryuji has one, Sojiro has one, Maruki has one, motherfucking Akechi has two. it just hurts me!

- sumire is an amazing character who has depth and she is lovely and my biggest complaint is that it feels like atlus shoved her in. like, she feels like a new addition to the game, you know what  i mean? maybe its because ive played the original p5 first, but you know, it’s not a big deal. but i love her so much

- on the topic of sumire, i cant say that im completely super duper happy with how different she felt from the other thieves? im sure that’ll be explained in p5s but she just got so much screen time that it just truly made me confused?? maybe im just a horrible person, or that’s just a really hot take. but anyway, yeah maybe im bitter because i really wanted to see extra hangouts/school trips during royal, but didn’t really.

-baton pass? literally orgasmic. it made turn base battles so damn fun and the addition of darts and billiards made me foam at the mouth it was SO SMART AND INNOVATIVE AND I LOVE IT ATLUS I LOVE YOU ATLUS YOURE SO SMART SWEETIE

-small thing, but making spells like ‘dormina’ actually useful just made the game so much more fun and dungeon crawling became something i truly, genuinely looked forward to

-being able to give gifts to my bros? absolutely incredible. thank you. side note: seeing akechi happy from giving him a multi vitamin cracked me up. side side note: giving ryuji a fuck ton of weights and him just smiling made my heart so happy i love that boy so much

- ah this game just looked so GOOD! i thought the original looked good but they really went all out. im not kidding, the smallest details in everyday life or even just normal cut scenes were out of this world. especially stuff from the third semester its just OOF good JOB atlus i love you buddy

-ahhh thieves den! how can i forget? i love it. at first i was a bit iffy with it since it really felt like persona 5 (undoubtedly the biggest game atlus has created) was just jacking itself off. but as time goes on, it became a huge addition to the game and seeing characters’ insights and extra lines of dialogue became super duper interesting and a highlight of the game for me. and don’t even get me started on how much i love love love the photos they added of them hanging out! so lovely, a bunch of them made me tear up

- i know it’s literally impossible, but i feel like the game just forgot that akechi is a person who can wield multiple persona and i just wish that could’ve been messed around with during Palaces

- showtimes are so, so crazy and i get so embarassed whenever they play on my tv because they are just outlandish and unashamed but i love them so so much it just defines persona’s personality 

-because i love ryuji: i prefer the final conversation you have with him aka ‘whaddya mean? you’re there’ but there’s still a lot of really tender and sweet moments like akira genuinely telling him that he’ll miss him, and also the fact that ryuji wants you both to send each other your times through the exercise watch so you can still race ahhhh i love him so much yall

so, overall, this game is better than the original p5 because of the extra content we get. if persona 5 was the perfect dinner, persona 5 royal is that same dinner and you get to enter the dessert buffet. it’s brilliant, it’s smart, it’s hilarious, it’s heartwarming, and it’s undoubtedly my favorite game of all time without exaggeration. while i do prefer the final cut scene (and final dialogues with some characters) in the original persona 5, in the overall experience, persona 5 royal is superior in my mind. i would willingly get amnesia to play this game again. 

I didn’t get to cover everything, but this is definitely most of what i wanted to say. if you actually get to reading all the way to the end, thanks! it means a lot. i hope we can all enjoy persona and look forward to persona 5 scramble together :-)

[hockeytrashgoblin]

High ~Part 10

A/N: This one is a long boi. Lots happens lol enjoy

"Babe? Some of the guys are going to be coming over later today if that's okay?"

"Yeah of course, love. They're always welcome."

"I just wanted to make sure."

"Why-oh! Auston's coming too right?"

"Yeah he is. He was whining that I only ever went to his house. I don't want you to be uncomfortable though."

"I'll just go out. I've got to do a bit of baby shopping anyway. I'll take Gray too. When are you expecting them?"

"In a bit. Like maybe 15 minutes before they start getting here?"

"Okay we'll go now then. Do you need anything while we're out?"

"Maybe some snacks? Sooooomebody ate all mine."

"Hey no fair I'm pregnant. I'm starving all the time." I pouted as he hugged me.

"Here I thought the big new kitchen would have enough food for us all."

"It doooes. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry baby. I don't really mind at all." He gave me a kiss before Gray started pulling my leg.

"Mommy I want to play."

"No baby we're going to the store now. Daddy's friends are coming over."

"I wanna stay." He pouted. I was so amazed at my little guy. Once he figured out words it was so fast to him talking in full sentences. He was one and a half now and on track to be fully understanding and talking by two. Much like me as a child. He was really smart.

"You can't stay, love. We'll be back soon and uncle Willy will be here to play with. Maybe uncle Freddie too." Mitch nodded to him and he finally agreed to go with me. We got to the store with little trouble and only one tantrum. 

"Do you want to pick out something for the babies Gray?"

"Yeah!"

"Okay buddy-boop, whatcha wanna get?"

"Hats!"

"That's a good idea. It'll still be pretty cold when they get here. What ones do you want to get?"

"The blue bears!"

"You're sure you want the blue ones?"

"Yeah! Blue like daddy."

"Okay sweet boy, blue it is."

I tried to stretch out the shopping as long as I could but I had a cranky toddler who needed a nap and would only sleep in his bed right now. A phase I didn't appreciate. I got to the house quickly thanks to GPS. I still didn't always remember how to get to the new house fast. I took Gray out of his car seat and just brought him inside without thinking. He had been screaming for 20 minutes and I just wanted him to nap. I didn't take into consideration that there were hockey players all over the living room that I had to walk through to get to the stairs to his bedroom. Including Auston who had still never even seen his son except in pictures from Mitch's insta but there wasn't very many on there. I didn't realize until everyone was staring at me and the boy.

"Hey guys sorry to interrupt." I just kept walking through.

"Mommy I wanna play with uncle Willie."

"After your nap Gray. Right now you need to sleep."

After I put him down for his nap I sat outside his door and cried. Mitch came up to check on me and he sat down next to me rubbing my back.

"I can't believe I was just so stupid. I brought Grayson right through in front of Auston. He's never seen him in person Mitch. I was just so tired of listening to a screaming sleepy baby that I brought him in."

"You're not stupid. This is your house and that's our son. If he didn't want to risk seeing him he could've just stayed home."

"I didn't want him to see him. He doesn't want to see him, hes going to think I did it on purpose."

"He won't." He brushed the hair our of my face and gave me a gentle kiss. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah I'm just frustrated. Probably hormones are playing a role too. Its dumb I'm sorry."

"Don't be baby. Do you want to come down and hangout with us?"

"No I think I'm going to have a nap."

"Okay you can come down anytime you want. Love you, have a good nap."

"Love you."

I ended up sleeping for about 30 minutes. I woke up to Gray jumping on me.

"Baby, why are you jumping? How did you get out of your crib?"

"I climbed. I wanted to be with you mommy."

"Aww my sweet boy come here." I lifted up the comforter and he crawled in cuddling up with me. "We'll have to get you a big boy bed soon."

"Okay."

"Go back to sleep for a little bit okay Gray?"

"Okay mommy. Goodnight."

"I love you."

"Love you."

I stayed awake for a while just soothing my baby and getting him back to sleep. Eventually I fell asleep too. I was woken up a little while later by Mitch.

"Morning sleeping beauty."

"Hi love, how long have I been out? Where's Gray?"

"Probably around 2 hours? He had been asleep to long so I woke him up and brought him downstairs. Auston already left with Morgan and Zach."

"Sorry I've been sleeping so much. I'm just so tired all the time."

"I know, it's okay. Your body is working hard to make two healthy babies."

"Yeah that's true." I said feeling my belly.

"I can't believe you're showing so much already. It took you so long to show with Grayson. Are you feeling them yet?"

"Yeah but it's just light. You won't be able to feel it yet."

"Damn it."

"Sorry baby."

"Says sorry as if it's her fault." He said rolling his eyes. "Come on let's go back downstairs and see the guys."

"Okay." I gave him a kiss before we made our way back down. "Hey guys!"

"Well look who could finally be bothered to come see me." William said sarcastically giving me a hug.

"I'm sorryyy. The twins have me so fucking tired all the time."

"Hows everything going?" Freddie asked from the floor building blocks with Gray.

"Its all going good. The babies are a little on the small side but they're healthy so it's okay."

"That's good I'm glad to hear it." He said with a small but genuine smile.

"Thanks I'm glad too."

"Do you know what you're having yet? Marns said you were finding out this time."

"We don't know yet." I saw Freddie get out his phone but I didn't really think much of it until Will spoke up.

"No you don't but I do." William said with laughter in his voice.

"What?! You know? They called?" I asked getting excited.

"Mhm."

"Well what are you waiting for tell me, tell me, tell me!"

"Mitch looks like he's gonna barf." Freddie laughed.

"Babe come here." I sat him down beside me. 

"How wild is it that I'm the only one who knows what you're having?"

"Willyyyy come on." I whined stomping my feet.

"Okay okay fine. Are you guys ready?"

"Yes for God sake!" Mitch said groaning.

"Okay so you're having another baby boy first off, and baby number two is a little girl."

"Oh my God!! Oh my God. Will for real?"

"Of course for real. I'm not about to lie." I ran up and hugged him and then went back to Mitch.

"Mitchie!!"

"Baby this is incredible. I'm so fucking happy." He held my face and gave me a kiss before lifting me into his arms and spinning me around. I started crying of course.

"Mitch this is so great. We get both."

"Stop crying you sweetheart, I'm going to cry." He kissed me again and wiped my eyes.

"Oh my God this is so awesome.. a little girl! And another boy! I'm so excited." I covered my eyes and started stomping my feet again in excitement.

"I'm so happy for you guys." Freddie said coming over and giving me a hug first then Mitch.

"Thank you Frederick. That means a lot." I said smiling wide.

"Thanks man." Mitch gave him a big hug.

"Cant believe you're going to have three kids soon. How do you feel man?"

"Excited. I'm so excited man. I can't believe I'm having two babies, let alone a boy and a girl. That's wild. Oh my God babe! We're having a girl!"

"I know lovey."

"God I'm not scary enough to have a daughter. Who's going to intimidate the guys trying to date her?"

"(Y/n)." William and Freddie said at the same time. Everyone laughed at the appalled look on Mitch's face. Even Grayson thought it was funny.

"Babe you've got a whole big bad team that can intimidate boys. Plus she's got two brothers. And you can be plenty scary when you want to be."

"Such a liar." Freddie said chuckling. "He literally got into a fight and hugged someone to the ground."

"Yeah but did I win though?" He asked getting worked up.

"Mitchie-"

"Babe no. Did I win though?"

"You did I guess in the broadest sense of the word." William said.

"No I won the fight. I didnt get hit and I got him to the ground. That's a win."

"If you say so."

"Ya know what? Fuck you guys."

"Fuck you guys." Gray repeated causing everyone to quiet down.

"Good going Marns." Freddie said trying to hold it together. William couldn't, he had to leave the room. I could still hear him laughing but I dont think Gray did. He did hear Mitch though.

"Fuck you." Grayson squealed laughing.

"Mitch cut it out." I said hitting the back of his head. He wouldn't stop at all and this is not what I wanted Grayson to start saying all the time and I felt a mad mood swing coming on. "Mitchell get out. Now."

"What?"

"Get. Out."

"Fine." He said scoffing at me and leaving.

"Grayson you come here." He came over and stood in front of me. "You don't say that anymore, you hear me?"

"Fuck you." He giggled but Freddie picked him up and sat him on his lap.

"Listen up bud. That's not a nice thing to say. It's mean."

"Daddy said it."

"Daddy was making a mean joke. You don't want to say mean things." I told him sternly.

"I want to say."

"Gray you listen to your mom. Who's the boss little man?"

"Mom's the boss."

"Right. So we're not gonna say that again right?"

"Right."

"If I hear that you're still saying it I'm gonna come back and we're gonna have to have a talk about listening to mom."

"Okay."

"Say sorry to your mom."

"I'm sorry mommy." He said coming over and giving me a hug.

"It's okay baby boy. I just don't want you saying those words. They're bad ones."

"I won't mommy."

"Good." 

The rest of the evening was spent with the guys. We all played out in the snow with Gray then we came inside and cooked dinner together. The night ended with us all watching spongebob with Grayson until he got tired. I put him up to bed and read him a story after saying bye to Willy and Fred.

All night Mitch had been off. I was worried about him and I was worried that it was my fault for yelling at him. I decided I'd have to talk to him but I wasn't sure he'd want to talk to me. I found him in our room sitting on the edge of the bed. I climbed in on my side and crawled over to him. I gave him a kiss on the shoulder.

"I'm sorry for yelling at you earlier. I didn't mean to."

"It's okay babes."

"You seemed upset and I just wanted to apologize. It wasn't your fault that he repeated things."

"Do you think I'm a bad dad?"

"What? Mitch no!"

"Really?"

"Oh course hun. You're such a good dad to Grayson."

"But I made him swear."

"Mitchie anyone could've done that. We've all been swearing around him."

"What if I'm a bad dad to the twins?"

"You won't be. Love, where is this all coming from?"

"Auston and Zach where saying some off hand comments. Jokes probably. Some of them just really stuck with me."

"What did they say?"

"Just that I wasn't doing a good job basically. Aus was making fun of me for Grayson crying when you brought him in because I'm not raising him right. Zach said I was too young and dumb to have kids. He said I'd fuck em up. That we were stupid to go through with having the twins because it'll make my career harder."

"Okay new rule. Ya know who isn't allowed to ever critique your parenting? Auston fucking Matthews. You literally adopted his son and have been taking care of him so well his whole life. Auston ran away from me and pretty much never spoke to me again. As for Zach, he can fucking bite me. You aren't a bad parent and you aren't going to fuck them up. Our twins are going to love you with just as much intensity as Grayson."

"Thank you (y/n). You always know just what to say."

"I don't know what impact it'll have on your career and I'm sorry I was so selfish as to not think of that."

"What? No dont apologize for that. I thought of that." He said rubbing my arm that was around him. "I thought a lot about that before I brought up having another baby. I don't see how it would effect my career negatively. Or really at all."

"Maybe they're thinking concentration and stuff?"

"I don't know but this whole season you've been pregnant and we've had Gray for a season and a half before this. I've played my best hockey this year."

"I know I'm so proud of you." I said kissing him.

"I just want to have a big happy family. And it's not like I'm leaving it just to you to raise them. I'm just as involved. And it's not like I'm ditching the guys either. I just don't get it."

"Don't get upset about it baby." I leaned back and brought him back so he was laying on my crossed legs. I started running my fingers through his hair. He sighed in content and closed his eyes. 

"It's just hard."

"Maybe they're just jealous."

"Why would they be?"

"Well I mean just look at you. You've got love, a beautiful family, twins on the way, you're playing better hockey than them, you have a house of your own. What's not to be jealous of?"

"I guess. I'm just really bothered that my best friends would say that kind of stuff about me. I love you guys so much and I just try so hard to show it every day."

"You do show it every day Mitch. You've shown it every day since we found out I was pregnant with Grayson. You're the most loving person I've ever met."

"I just want to do a good job."

"You do, you will. We can do it together."

"I love you so much."

"I love you Mitchie." The babies kept moving around as we were talking and I decided to try and distract him. "Hey love, do you want to see if you can feel the babies?"

"Are they kicking?" He asked excitedly turning over to face me.

"Yeah pretty hard actually."

"Where? Where are they kicking?"

"There's one down here. And the other is over here." I said moving each hand to the spots on my stomach.

"Alright babies kick me. I wanna feel it. I want to feel you move." He spoke to my belly and they started kicking.

"Do you feel it?"

"Shh I'm trying to concentrate."

"Pfft good luck." I said running my hand through his hair again laughing at the look he gave me.

"Stop moving."

"Sorry." I stopped and just sat quietly.

"Was that them?" He asked after a hard kick.

"I felt it over here for sure."

"Me too." He said smiling. "There's one of my babies. Finally. I didn't think they'd ever want me to feel them."

"Oh come on lovey, you knew they'd be felt eventually."

"Yeah I did. Come on other baby, get me." We stayed like that for a while waiting but he didn't feel it again which bummed him out.

"Mitchy it's okay you'll feel them both soon."

"I know I will. After Gray goes to bed I'm gonna sit here with you for hours just holding you and being kicked."

"Gonna take your baby bump naps again?" I asked wrapping my arms around his neck.

"Oh fuck yes. I loved those so much during the beginning of the season. I felt so close to you and Gray that way. It's the closest I could get connection wise since I can't feel them all the time."

"Awe babe, you can feel for them any time you'd like. And take your naps. You can do whatever you need to to feel connected to the babies."

"Can we pick out baby names?"

"What right now?"

"Yes why not? We already know the girl's gonna be Marly right?"

"Yeah I was thinking of giving her my mom's middle name Dawn too but I'm up for discussion on that."

"Marly Dawn Marner. I like it."

"Me too. Do you have any boy names in mind?"

"I don't know. I was kind of throwing around a few."

"Tell me."

"Okay these are just a few that I like. Andrew, Lucas, and Dexter."

"Aaww Dexter it so cute!"

"Yeah I liked it." He said with a shy smile while rubbing his neck.

"Don't do that. You look hot and I'm going to get so distracted."

"Oh my God whatever. Do you have any names?"

"I've been liking Toby. I also like Lucas. Josh, Kyle, Ethan too. I like Ethan."

"Those are cool."

"Now that you've said Dexter though I'm really liking Dexter."

"Well we've got time to decide still. We're only halfway there."

"You've got a point." I gave him a kiss before we laid down and he tried feeling for the babies some more.

[losangelesvalorant]

interesting things from tactical crouch’s interview w toronto assistant coach/analyst barroi on 1/19

barroi talks about why the team failed last year, the atmosphere/coaching of the new team, beast and nevix and why he believes in them, and the meta. [link to the full podcast]

on why the team failed last year

team atmosphere was biggest problem which lead to stellar retiring, tried to "better" atmosphere by trading envy to shanghai. going mixed roster didnt improve atmosphere and it just spiraled

Said toronto was beating everyone in scrims in stage 1, barroi thought they were a 4th place team and just got unlucky w getting shock in playoffs. Emphasized this several times during the podcast

team wasnt built for atmosphere, "long-term sustainability," was built to perform well but exploded "sooner than expected" and they HAD to make changes which was where they made bad decisions and it spiraled.

biggest thing he learned was coaching was all abt psychology, keeping morale up, small things to do to keep everything working, learned its HUGELY important

last season toronto's structure wasnt as great as it is this year

barroi was part of the roster building, thinks building a roster the way they did will always fail

implied toronto scrimmed way way too much last year and burned everybody out

noted specifically that ivy was nervous onstage even in later games

on the new team’s atmosphere/chemistry:

new team made for morale and high team atmosphere, all personalities will mesh well. that was the most important thing and its been working insanely well. everyones not best friends but its working well. 

happy with the players and environment they have, thinks adding an extra element might disturb that not in current plans to add anyone else. they are thinking abt contingency plans tho, have plans in case of emergencies

some competitiveness in the roster, but not a high level. Doesnt like the idea of an a and b roster bc every day is a high pressure environment where the better squad will start

Toronto scrims 2 blocks a day 6 days a week. do 3 blocks sometimes but not every day. def lower than highest hours of scrims in the league since some teams do 3 blocks a day.

when asked if fefe drives the coaches/players differently responded with "YES." 

fefe is rly good at motivating people, rly knows how to "get to people." may not be the biggest brain but knows his stuff and knows how to create a good environment. "hell of a difference" compared to last season (sounds like drama w bishop to me!)

everyone in coaching staff has their own role, like a venn diagram, bc of how specific their structure is. everything is really efficient

there's never been any discipline things on toronto yet, theres rules for scrims but no ones broken any of them yet

doesnt think toronto is gonna be a top 5 team. thinks maintaining a top roster + taking team psychology into account is very difficult

its possible that toronto could hit a really high high, but its a low possibility

last season barroi was worried abt pressure on stage bc everyone was silent, atmosphere was different, is not at all worried now. thinks the team drives itself very well, points to kariv and beast as motivators and nevix and logix as people who will never perform bad under pressure

on beast and nevix

beast is a huge motivator and a really fun guy for the team, keeping the team atmosphere up. has a huge competitive drive, learns REALLY fast and takes any and all feedback. theyre putting more and more emphasis on beast's role and more responsiblities bc theyre really satisfied w how he performs and learns. thinks beast is a very good pick for them

people on roster were chosen for specific reasons, beast was chosen bc he's super competitive. 

beast is kind of person where having a backup mt would motivate him even more, he wouldnt shut down if he was benched he would fight for the starting spot

nevix is "not the best player in the world" (in response to reddit saying he is the best player in the world). has been a good asset to the team, goes to the coaches/teammates most w questions. rly wants to prove himself

on the meta

in scrims sometimes offtank plays orisa now since mt is playing something else

"2 big archetypes" everyone is running in scrims. poke and rush comps. rush is reaper/mei/orisa/rein/lucio moira/bap. poke is mei hanzo, dif flex sups, orisa, no lucio. variation within those comps but its only those 2. the comps play very differently despite having similar heroes bc of dif win conditions and styles. poke is map dependant, wins over rush when speedboost cant close gap fast enough. theres not a core meta comp thats as ridiculous as goats, tho rush is similar to goats. 

teams playing junk, widow, probably double sniper, more diverse than past but again 2 archetypes of comps. running one or the other is very team/style dependant, for instance shock is probably sticking to rush and nyxl is probably sticking to poke based on their histories. wont talk abt what toronto runs

dive is map dependant, not smth you want to do all the time bc the other two comps are very good, rush is a natural counter to dive. doesnt sound like hes scrimmed dive comps often. sees dive having a place and being good at times but thinks its very team and map dependant. map and team both have to be good for it for it to work. dive is not the third archetype. if you have a good sombra vs poke, dive could work but was kinda like /shrug

havent scrimmed any teams in asia, which makes sense

thinks this season is exciting bc of scrim bubbles, nobody knows whats happening on other regions. each bubble conforms to one thing, may be different may not be, one may be superior but nobodys gonna know til they play each other.

yiska thinks theres gonna be some wild meta diversity since some teams have long breaks and can afford to grind out new comps, also bc there will be patches

misc things i thought were worth including

theres a german player coming to owl who hasnt been announced

apparently not a lot of other teams have that kind of good structure. Also mentioned that toronto’s scrimming outlaws

yiska brought up the csgo(?) team moscow 5 as an example of how the best teams can crumble completely and become bad under the stress of travel

roky is the person who grinds ranked most on the team, nevix is 2nd

barroi thinks defiant will place better than 13 (in response to tactical crouch thinking theyll place 13th), things would have to go “seriously wrong” for them to place lower. Thinks theyll have a strong first half and is sure if they do that the 2nd half will be even better. Convinced theyll at least make playins

barroi thinks chengdu will do fairly well especially w the scrim bubbles. Thinks they’ll be one place below defiant maybe. 

difference between coaching completely mixed roster and a 1 language roster, dont have to put as much emphasis on making sure everyone understands each other. depends mainly on the philosophy of the head coach, which changed so its different. probably the same without the head coach factor tho

[tomiyeee]

finished the story quests for bl3 (but barely any of the side missions yet) and i got...Opinions(tm)

(sorry if this doesn’t cut on mobile! also if you want to hide spoilers i’m tagging all my bl3 posts as “bl3 spoilers” so ny’all can blacklist it)

in no particular order:

i honestly wanted to give gearbox some slack and try my best to like this game bc i know people had probably unfairly high expectations for this game given all the build up, but they really just kept letting me down in everything but the graphics

said this before but overall, the characters are all Quite lackluster

^^ tyreen and troy included. adding the word "bitch" to every sentence does not automatically make it funnier

that being said, i super love their backstory + relationship with typhon/nekofeyo-whatever

the character designs are equally boring. moxxi was the only one who got a real improvement imo. lilith and maya are okay. rhys...i dont think i have to explain. lia...i dislike her hair; the black felt like it balanced out her design better and the white streak was interesting and cool but full white just looks bad tbh. zer0 feels less sleek and more bulky which doesnt fit him much. tina lost her pretty color palette and cute outfit. where are all the bright pretty color palettes in general???? there are other colors besides brown and black???? use them?????

ending of pre-sequel: “you will need all the vault hunters you can get” me: “ooh does that mean all the vh’s from previous games are back? i can’t wait to see everyone meet each other! :D” bl3: only nine of them come back, 3 of them die, the rest are involved in maybe one mission at most

boss fights. super. boring. and tedious. i mean this could be partly because i was playing on ps4 which made it extra not fun but if the only reason the fight is difficult is because they have a lot of health...it's not fun or challenging. i want fights like handsome jack with interesting mechanics. i want fights like angel with emotional impact. i want fights like the pre-sequel final boss that i forgot the name of with variation that isnt just "now they have an attack that shines bright lights in ur eyes, covers the whole arena, and can knock you down in one hit im looking at you traunt and killavolt". tyreens fight was the only one that i somewhat enjoyed because of this. all the others were just like "ughhhh again?"

im really enjoying melee amara playstyle. taking out badass enemies in four hits is my jam. this is just my fallout 4 playthrough all over again babey heck yea

typhon just wanted to be a good dad!!! he called tyreen starlight which is adorable!!! he did the best he could and tyreen hated him for it!!! i don’t blame either of them for that tbh, it makes sense from both their perspectives. tyreen definitely should have been more understanding, but she’s a dick so :/ (not saying this is a writing flaw, just a character flaw)

hammerlock needs higher standards in men but i really appreciate the undeniably in-your-face "fuck you" to all gamer dudes

i really. hate. how little the player character seems to matter in the story. in pre-sequel the vh's all had unique dialogue AND npcs would respond, sometimes even with character-specific lines. even when it was the same across vh's, it still felt like the npcs were interacting and speaking directly to them. the player character felt like a character of their own, rather than just a vessel for the player to do quests and kill enemies with or an errand runner for the important characters. i thought that was the direction they were going in with bl3 too but this just feels like bl2 only worse. there’s a separation again between you and the story and it feels like you’re just watching things happen. now ur not just a silent protagonist, but instead your a speaking protagonist who gets completely ignored. whats the point of including unique dialogue if it's not even acknowledged beyond an "uh-huh, moving on"?

sometimes the logic just feels kinda dumb. the twins killed/disabled maya and lilith in a heartbeat, they can literally disintegrate the most powerful beings in the universe, but the vault hunters? absolutely not. they must fight them for 40 minutes and then die.

after the fight with troy, no one even touched tyreen. there's no way they could have thought "yup she's definitely dead, no need to shoot her in the head or anything just to make sure. we didn't do anything to even hurt her, we just assumed." turns out she's 100% alive and gets up to start the apocalypse. who'da thunk! i know they wanted the end to seem more dramatic but it just seems stupid that they could have stopped tyreen like 5 missions earlier had they even the slightest bit of common sense.

lilith was one of the biggest threats to tyreen and troy's whole plan. of course they should leave her alive and simply steal her powers. let's kill the monk siren instead.

i know they didn't include this to give all players a fair experience instead of favoring sirens, but it kinda sucks playing a siren character and it's just completely ignored outside of ur action skill. tyreen and troy are sapping siren powers left and right, but they choose to leave you with yours. when you enter the eridian place with typhon tannis starts glowing because it has "something to do with sirens". what about the one standing right next to her? this applies to bl2 as well...jack i would willingly charge ur vault key for u pls why do u take lilith instead :'(

oh yeah speaking of tannis! i LOVE that she got angels powers. for some reason it just makes me really happy. maybe it's bc i think it's sweet that part of angel survived. maybe it's because it makes for cool fanart. maybe it's just cool. idk. also like that we got a solid explanation of what angel's powers were (influence over technology). i always thought her having control over it in bl2 might've been cuz it was hyperion tech and she had access to it same as she had access to the satellite from bl1. it wasn't super clear since it seemed like she could also materialize things like the ammo during her fight.

that also reminds me: all the dramatic reveals in this game felt kinda badly done.

the very first one with zer0/katagawa. like the whole time i was walking around looking for him i was trying to think why he might've turned/something must have happened to him or rhys. everyone was saying it was undeniably zer0. i finally meet him and take one look at his bright ass maliwan armor and its like. really. you couldnt have made it anymore obvious that thats not zer0. and then his helmet gets knocked off and surprise! it's not him. i totally didnt already figure that out with one glance 10 seconds ago. (maybe even earlier when you got glimpses of him around the building but i always missed it cuz i was looking at the fish tanks n shit)

also the tannis reveal. she was speaking to me in the same way that only known siren characters could. weird unexplained things were happening and seemed to be related to tannis. i wonder if she's a siren? surprise! she's a siren.

tyreen and troy knew about the great vault through some unknown means. typhon was talking about having a son and a daughter who he told stories about the great vault. typhon calls tyreen his daughter a while later and lilith acts surprised like honey ur a little slow, i figured that out several lines ago.

basically i'm not saying they were so obvious that i knew from the beginning of the game; i only figured them out a little before they were outright stated. but it was enough that it kinda ruined the effect and the characters acting surprised only when it was blatantly spelled out for them just made it annoying.

i feel like most of this is pretty negative, but i don’t mean that i hate the game and was miserable playing it. it was honestly okay...like i said i wanted to like it, but gearbox hates me specifically and killed/ruined all my faves just to spite me sooo...*waves hand back and forth in a sort of “ehhh” gesture*. i think my opinion on bl games from most to least fav would be: tftbl, bltps, bl2, bl3, and bl1. so it’s not the worst, but deeefinitely not one of my faves. i mean jack’s not in it (or if he is he doesn’t have a big role) so it’s already at a huge disadvantage. the ending was ok, it was all dramatic n stuff and it kinda makes sense i guess, but it was just about as okay as the rest of the game really. i don’t hate it but it’s not great either yknow?

[blookmallow]

and now we return to outlast 2, where- 

THINGS KEEP GETTING SO, SO MUCH WORSE

(i have... a LOT im trying to process about this whole section sorry for upcoming text walls. really nasty #blood / #gore in here as well though) (i didnt realize i was This far behind on liveblogs lmao i drafted this. a while ago and didnt get back to it until now) 

---

so i fell off the bridge (shock. horror. who could have predicted this) and right into the scalled village

what.............happened to you 

fuCKING GO D

so it turns out “the scalled” are... some kind of leper colony banned from the town and left to fester and rot out here alone 

most of them are just lying around suffering and dying, i dont know what the fuck happened to them, there’s some mention of like. wildly untreated syphilis/potentially other stds they’re being told is their curse for the sins they’ve committed but does.... syphilis do that to you. it might actually be leprosy i dont know i dont want to research this. all i can think about is when i watched jesus christ superstar in high school and the leper colony song where they’re all crowding around jesus all trying to touch him REALLY freaked me out for a while

i mean its like. probably a combination of disease left horrifically untreated and massively infected given the absolutely appalling conditions these people are living in (everything’s run down and full of blood and shit and who knows what else), starvation, who knows what they’re even finding to eat out here so that’s probably causing even more disease but still jesus christ

at first it just made me really sad, sure these people came from temple gate too so they were. fucked up cultists to begin with but a lot of this is like... result of longterm emotional and mental abuse and manipulation, some of these people might not have started out as depraved evil murderers, and like. nobody deserves to live like this. except knoth lmao throw him down here, but

so i thought maybe it would turn out that you realize they’re human too, they’re just in a fucking LOT of pain and maybe you can’t do anything to help them (i dont think there’s any hope for anyone down here at this point) but maybe they’d turn out to be on my side and do something to help me fight back against the leader who abandoned them, “the most absolutely fucked up looking people are actually the most human” kind of thing but uh. that is not how things went. at all, 

ill get into How Fucking Bad this got in a second lmao but like

most of them dont really do anything to you other than bleed on you and beg you for help, some people lash out but thats like, understandable given the horrifying state they’re in, but

as it turns out, being the “scalled messiah” is a VERY bad thing, they went from occasionally lashing out at me to outright tracking me down to murder me to death which, like, honestly kind of disappointing

bc one of the things i liked the most about the first outlast was how many of the prisoners were clearly just victims too, some of them (lookin at you, naked twin guys,) were just evil and murderous but some of them were just very very mentally unwell (exacerbated by horrible living conditions and the fact that the people who were supposed to be protecting them and helping them recover were actively, intentionally working to make their symptoms worse) and couldn’t really be blamed for acting violently toward you, but

then sometimes there’s people who warn you about dangers ahead, people sitting in corners hiding and scared and wont hurt you unless you give them a reason to think you might be a threat, people just trying to stay alive, people who need help 

but that’s. not the case here, and there’s definitely a particular kind of horror in “absolutely no one in this hell town can be trusted, nobody will help me, everyone here wants to hurt me and every time i think ive made any kind of progress it gets so much worse” (except that ONe guy who tried to protect me. im still sad about him) but. i dont know i feel like there’s a missed opportunity here. im not sure if im supposed to feel like the scalled deserve to be like this because of the kind of people they were before, but i dont. i feel like the “what the fucking shit HAPPENED to these people” horror is heightened by the realization that they’re people, and just kinda using them as attack zombies is. missing something, somehow. i dont know, i cant figure out how to word what i want to say here 

i mean its absolutely fucking horrifying, i was scared out of my mind going through all this, and i still gotta give props to a video game experience that left me legitimately feeling like i needed to go take a shower and crawl under a blanket for a while 

i guess ultimately with outlast im coming here to be scared shitless more than anything else and boy did they ever fucking deliver

ok im gonna stop bc i will keep talking in circles about this forever if i dont, moving on

WHAT EVEN ARE THESE GUYS, APART FROM COMPLETELY TERRIBLE

im guessing theres some kind of... inbreeding birth defect situation going on here but i cant even process what im looking at 

that and its hard to look at them at all considering the only times i see them im getting murdered to death. my panicked screenshots hoping to get a better look later did not help 

PRETTY SURE THEY JUST MADE HIM DRINK THEIR BLOOD, 

how the fuck has my dude not thrown up like 90 times already. im glad he hasnt bc im bad emetophobia but outlast 1 did it so im honestly surprised that hasnt happened unless ive just forgotten it in the blur of nightmares im going through here 

OH

THAT���S... NOT GOOD

THAT IS REALLY, REALLY NOT GOOD

FUCK SHIT MOTHERFUCKING FUCK

i gotta say im impressed with how FAR they GO with this one, i have no idea how much game i have left but considering this isnt even the ending i am HORRIFIED to see what the fuck is gonna happen next 

i mean outlast 1 has you getting your fucking fingers sliced off and whistleblower has. That Scene (even though like. it stops before waylon actually gets cut its REALLY CLOSE)  

this whole time i kept thinking something would happen and they’d get interrupted, I’d escape somehow, they aren’t really going to have the player character get literally fucking crucified from your own perspective,

but then the nails go in 

and you’ve got one hand literally nailed to a cross

and then they start the other one 

and i was like, WOW FUCK, THEY ACTUALLY DID IT, BUT NOW HE’LL ESCAPE... SOMEHOW.... RIGHT ??? 

but they lift it up 

and you’re hanging there 

and for a second i legitimately thought it was gonna end there for him, i thought he was actually just going to die there and the game would continue with lynn or something (which, to be fair, would be a pretty cool twist, but i dont WANT blake to just die here like this) 

ANYWAY!! FUCKING GOD, THAT SURE HAPPENED 

but against all odds HE SOMEHOW DIDNT FUCKING DIE, and managed to find the strength to rIP HIS HANDS OUT OF THE NAILS AND FALL DOWN

i cannot fucking IMAGINE what that would feel like. i dont want to imagine it but i sure the fuck am now 

i dont know if its possible to like. die from bleeding out in this scene if you dont find the bandages fast enough but it sure felt like i was going to 

fucking hell i can practically feel it in my real hands i HATE THIS i HATe it

god. fuck. im gonna be thinking about this scene for the rest of my life i didnt think anything would ever be worse than the finger slicing scene in outlast 1 but this. i think this wins

wHAT THE FUCK IS THAT!?!??? THERES SOMETHING CHASING ME IN THE SCHOOL FLASHBACKS NOW IM NOT EVEN SAFE HERE ANYMORE

WHAT *IS* THAT??!??

w OA h

i still have no IDEA whats going on with these flashbacks either, clearly his classmate hung herself and he feels subconsciously responsible for it because he didn’t do anything to stop her (though it doesn’t sound like he Could have done anything, and. they were kids), there’s definitely some buried trauma he never dealt with thats resurfacing now but

i still dont think its just a manifestation of trauma, because like. the recordings are still coming out as fucked up static, if he was just having really intense hallucinations there wouldn’t be any record on the camera, it would just be him filming nothing and talking to himself through a panic attack, it wouldn’t be getting consistently corrupted ONLY during the flashbacks so what the fuck is happening 

COLA

DRINK IT

i m losing it its the cola machines from the first game i diD NOT EXPECT THESE TO BE HERE 

what the fuck is christian salad 

you didn’t think i would see this, outlast devs, you thought you could hide this on the menu board and i wouldnt notice. i did notice and i demand answers

NO!!!! THAT IS THE OPPOSITE OF OKAY THIS IS THE LEAST OKAY I HAVE EVER BEEN IN MY LIFE 

WELL!!!!! OKAY!!!! ALRIGHT!!!! NOW THAT I’VE BEEN LITERALLY FUCKING CRUCIFIED, FELL DOWN A HILL AND STRAIGHT INTO A FENCE OF BARBED WIRE, GOT DRAGGED OUT HERE AND BURIED ALIVE, CRAWLED MY WAY OUT OF MY OWN GRAVE AND NOW HAVE HOARDS OF DISEASED ZOMBIE NIGHTMARE CULTISTS SEARCHING FOR ME SO THEY CAN DEVOUR MY FLESH, LET’S GET GOING, SHALL WE 

THIS IS FINE!!! EVERYTHING IS FINE I CANT SEE SHIT AND THERES NOTHING BUT TREES AND BARBED WIRE EVERYWHERE AND NO INDICATIONS WHATSOEVER OF WHERE I NEED TO GO BUT IT’S F IN E IM DOING GREAT 

[abundantchewtoys]

HS Epi: Meat p12 reaction

Back to Earth C presumably.

I gotta say, I'm curious to find out the final page count of Meat. The way we liveblog, the experience is stretched out, so with theories surfacing and such, we might be caught off guard when things are really over. There's only so far that things will be taken, though I guess we're still in for those "original Male/Female characters", I guess. :P That shouldn't refer to the new Reload timeline John created, I think, with copies of all the people mentioned in the rest of the character list. So, uh, yeah, guess the reason Arquiusprite wasn't mentioned in there was because he remained unseen, voided out if you will. And I guess we shouldn't expect an alternate Equius to have a talking role, either?

---

==>

Well! Talk about jumping straight into the action, this page opens with a dialoguelog! Back to Dave, Karkat and if my eyes didn't deceive me, we'll get some lines for Jade, too! Supportive Jade will be supportive.

"hit jane right in her neoliberal austerity measures" ... Hah. Well, I didn't think that would get referenced again at all, but it seems after all these years since John's 18th birthday Dave still has issues with the ol' N.A.M. So, Jane's a neoliberal AND a fascist now, Dave? Is that... even feasible?

"DAVE: now shes gonna spin some shit about supply side economics but we cant let her control the narrative on that one cause the first thing thats gonna happen once she begins deregulating the baking industry is that some sweet dumb crocodile down in consort land is gonna start putting sparkle glue in the cupcake mix which isnt even the real issue thats just surface issues KARKAT: RIGHT. JADE: definitely" ... Like, Dave I admire you're getting so into this, but you realize they aren't following, right? Also, why would Jane want to deregulate the baking industry if she's the leader of the foremost power in said industry, as well as running for president? Plus, Jane can't control the narrative because Caliborn is already controlling it! :mspa:

"DAVE: i mean earth c has just been play acting capitalism the last five thousand years while we timeskipped ahead to live rad lives as gods without bothering with any of the boring shit that goes into making a civilization DAVE: which is fine i mean you cant really expect a bunch of teens who didnt finish middle school to set up a sustainable form of social democracy that isnt just blatantly ripped off whatever we incorrectly thought obama god rest his soul was doing back in the day" ... Gee, Dave's given this a real lot of thought. Props to him, but I hope that aside from becoming 'an activist' he's also got some legitimite action points to improve Earth C's situation.

Guess Sburb really does a number on players, huh? "Congrats, you won, you're all gods now, and also, here's this whole civilization on the brink of collapse, have fun with that. Don't mess this up, I need those people to start the apocalypse in say, 2000 years, k thx bye." (The fact that this civilization, being outside of the Green Sun's influence, may never implement Sburb, is a bit besides the point since I think the trolls would have had the same issue tossed onto them had they actually gone through the victory door.)

Right, but the trolls had their home planet already effectively run by children, I wonder if that will come again? Even though they had carpenter droids at their disposal to run some things for them, they might actually be a bit more self-reliant than the humans!

"DAVE: but janes got this old school mentality you just know she wants to restrict grist alchemy for the sake of “growth” and when that goes down itll take three seconds flat for some nobody in new dersetown to drop the earth c communist manifesto" ... New Dersetown, I like the ring of that. Would call it New Dersey for short, though. :P Again, valid points there, Dave! If any revolt started, it doesn't have to be in the troll community, it could just as much be an angry carapace uprising! They're only docile if there's no one to rally behind.

Blaperile has this idea that the new society in a universe is not supposed to be seeded with the remains of the session nor the universe that came before it. That's actually a valid point; the only reason this society got kickstarted was through the cloning apparatus that was on the meteor! The consorts and carapaces seem like they would be able to reproduce biologically though, so I'm not sure how Sburb normally ensures the planet is a clean slate for a new species to emerge. ... Okay, so the planet itself doesn't really need to be the place where a new Sburb-playing species rises, true. There's a whole new universe out there.

Maybe through "importing" old Sburb technology, the "alpha" planet designation went to Earth C automatically, though.

Or maybe First Guardians are expected to 'cleanse' the planet from outside influence normally, but since this society's outside of the Green Sun's influence, that ain't happening. And Jade won't be going Thanos on Earth C.

"KARKAT: OH YEAH. JADE: of course DAVE: are you two even listening or are you just making noises with your mouths" Dave realizing he's monologuing? What character development is this. :O

"KARKAT: I CAN’T BELIEVE I’M BEING ACCUSED BY DAVE STRIDER, REIGNING EMPEROR OF SPEWING ENDLESS VERBAL DIARRHEA DIRECTLY INTO MY INNOCENT HEAR DUCTS EVERY DAY OF MY FUCKING LIFE, OF MAKING THOUGHTLESS MOUTH NOISES. KARKAT: JADE, ARE YOU HEARING THIS? JADE: im scandalized JADE: especially when JADE: there are much better things we could all be doing with our mouths....." ... Jade, your animes are showing again. ... I think that maybe Jade doesn't want this relation to be going where Dave and Karkat want it to go.

"It’s been a really nice day they’ve been having, and then Jade had to go say something like that. The air in the hive changes in a way that is palpable, in a way that she can’t seem to accurately gauge despite having both superhuman and superdog senses." ... Ah. So I guess maybe Jade just can't get a lid on some of her more... canine inclinations, at time. Welp!

"Elements of her outfit resemble her god tier jammies: peasant skirt, sparkly flats, and a bold choice in striped tights." Nice! That's only the third person who created an outfit based on her god tier outfit that we know, aside from Meenah and Rose.

"the couch where she crashed last night, and the night before that, and the better part of the seven years before that." It would seem Jade has the wanderlust then, she's more like the vagrant dog that comes visiting from time to time? More GCAT in demeanor than Becquerel, in practice. Heheh. Good for her, after being isolated on an island and then a battleship for so long, she's finally going out & seeing things!

"There are other personal effects of hers in the living room too: plants on the windowstill, her bass guitar sitting in a corner" Cool, so when she comes over, she typically lounges here then. Guess the flute never made it over, though. :p

"a horrific-looking periodic table that Dave made her for her seventeenth birthday pinned above the stairwell. He typed it in Comic Sans, and then deep-fried it to oblivion with JPEG artifacts." ... Next up, on For Fans By Fans...

"And Dave, with his preternaturally perfect timing, sweeps a hand over his tablet to bring up a new PowerPoint slide on the TV. He returns to his Comic Sans-written political presentation, gruesome artifacts and all" Dave, Dave that isn't professional at all!

", with the grace and proficiency of a man who has diffused an awkward situation in his own household many times per day, every day, for many years." Well, okay, that is really mature. But when Dave is the adult in a situation, the situation is very awkward per definition.

"DAVE: alternia: brutal eugenics based space dictatorship KARKAT: NOT UNTRUE." Succinct, brutal, but not dishonest.

"DAVE: troll homeworld: lord of the flies nightmare scenario where kids murder each other just to get the chance to get to grow up and murder other aliens instead KARKAT: IT WASN’T THAT BAD." Karkat. Karkat that isn't a valid rebuke.

"KARKAT: YOU MADE THAT LAST ONE UP. KARKAT: ALSO, IT WAS DISGUSTING?? KARKAT: GROW THE FUCK UP, YOU UTTERLY CONTEMPTIBLE, POTTY MOUTHED *CUNT*." ... The irony is stark.

"JADE: also you know trolls dont actually have two dicks dave thats an offensive stereotype" Are we really doing troll anatomy? Well, I guess it's good to know that the fan theory about Sollux at least isn't applicable to the entire species.

"DAVE: trolls: literally ate babies KARKAT: ONLY THE DEFECTIVE ONES. DAVE: like you my dude KARKAT: ...YEAH. DAVE: so thats why our campaign can work" Yeah, Karkat ate grubs, though they weren't troll babies. Also, yeah, Karkat was a mutant, but I wonder if that would really help his case here.

"DAVE: btw im gonna be giving a long form exam at the end of this to make sure youre retaining info because this is only like the most important thing weve ever done collectively" Well he ain't wrong.

"KARKAT: ARE YOU ASKING ME WHETHER I’VE HEARD THIS EXACT SPEECH ALMOST WORD FOR WORD, INCLUDING REHEARSED VERSIONS OF BOTH THE COLORFUL METAPHORS AND “JOKES,” TEN OR TWENTY TIMES ALREADY? KARKAT: BECAUSE THE ANSWER WOULD BE KARKAT: YES, OF COURSE I FUCKING HAVE." Poor, poor Karkat.

"Karkat elbows Dave in the thigh, a move that is obviously meant to be an action of pure, brotherly jest. But instead it comes off as affectionate and overly intimate. Jade’s clever eyes don’t miss this. Her pupils follow the motion of Karkat’s arm, and then they follow the movement of Dave’s mouth as he smiles in what he probably thinks is a totally neutral expression that reveals exactly 0% of his true feelings toward Karkat Vantas. In reality, his veneer is as thin and transparent as cellophane. He is the only person who can’t see through it.

Jade does some calculations in her head. Two kinds of calculations, in fact: mathematical ones and personal ones." So, is Jade reading too much into their relationship, or are the dudes just... Both too shy?

"JADE: soooooo JADE: do you want a projection of her first years hit on the economy down to the decimal with a 0.3% margin of error JADE: because thats a thing i can do if itll make you stop talking about this stupid election for ten minutes" I didn't know that were First Guardian powers! :p I suppose it might be her natural intellect though, but we've only known her as the hands-on science type until now.

"She proceeds to dazzle the two boys with explications on complex math utilizing taxation rates, GDP figures, and some damned thing called the “Laffer curve,”" Dang, Jade is as much committed to this as Dave! (Or maybe she learned all this because it means so much to him, that could be it too!)

"The thing about Jade Harley is that she’s not as good at personal things as she is at other things. Like science, or mastering fraymotifs, or kissing, the last of which she has definitely put a lot of levels into over the past few years because, well, what else are you supposed to do with immortal godhood once you hit the age where the dog hormones start kicking into overdrive?" Guess for dogs, kissing isn't that personal. :p And well, I guess Jade's only now learning the real consequences of turning into a real-life furry. At least she won't have had lack of candidates to practice kissing with. She might even have become the Witch of Spacing Out Young Adults.

"Her high-prescription lenses make her eyes look anime-huge. They might literally be glittering, she’s so completely serious about the issue she is trying to stress." And the fan artists rejoiced for all the new descriptions they have to work with!

" JADE: im about to lay out some cold hard evidence so pay attention! KARKAT: OH, HANG ON, LET ME GET A PEN." You can't live together with Dave for years without learning when it's time to start taking notes and grab a fucking pen.

"JADE: evidence about..... JADE: our relationship! KARKAT: FUCK" Pfff, okay, never mind. I think Jade might have hit a wall several times over before, trying to either define their relationship or take it to the next level. These dudes are really sensitive about their feelings, after all.

But it would be interesting, learning Jade wants to know where they stand just as much as the outside world does.

"JADE: you let me live in your hive when im in town KARKAT: I CAN’T BELIEVE... JADE: im preeeetty intimately entwined in both your lives KARKAT: THAT YOU’RE JUST TALKING ABOUT THIS? JADE: AND you dont disengage from about 86.234% of my flirtations KARKAT: WAIT, WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU KEEP TRACK OF SOMETHING LIKE THAT? JADE: so....... are we doing this or not?" So, just like with taking on Lord English and acknowledging the lit fuse that is Earth C society, I guess the coming around of April 13th 2019 is when Jade had enough of all this silly business and wants to know what's what. (Also, I suppose the level of intimacy they shared on beforehand will be left to speculation.)

"KARKAT: DOING WHAT?! JADE: dating dummy!!!!!!!! KARKAT: OH. KARKAT: THAT IS KARKAT: THAT IS... A COMPLICATED TOPIC IN MY CULTURE THAT I’M NOT SURE HUMANS ARE EQUIPPED TO TALK ABOUT." Smooth, Karkat, real smooth. Maybe Karkat fears commitment will lead to some of their relationships shifting into other quadrants. And he wouldn't like to be moirails or auspistices with either of them.

"DAVE: also totally unrelated to the economy" ... Nice try Dave, but I think this can't be steered back into that track.

"DAVE: which not gonna lie is the only thing i want to talk about for uh DAVE: for however long it takes for this other conversation to stop happening JADE: so say no!!! DAVE: well KARKAT: UHHHHH JADE: im not just forcing this conversation for my sake! its for you two as well JADE: i mean after all this time have you two even kissed yet?????? DAVE: wha" I think Dave and Karkat might actually have been both content to stay uncommitted and fearful to put a label on it. Also Jade's question will presumably remain unanswered, it's already surprising it's confirmed she hasn't seen them kissing. And that is ignoring the matter of whether either Dave or Karkat kissed Jade before. I guess it's only fortunate for this situation that this instance of Jade never dated Davesprite, it would only complicate things further.

"DAVE: wha KARKAT: WH-WHY WOULD DAVE: uhh KARKAT: WHY WOULD WE KISS?? DAVE: thats KARKAT: THAT’S... YOU... I MEAN, HE’S... HE’S DAVE. DAVE: we KARKAT: AND I’M KARKAT." PFffffffff, hilarious! I can just see them blushing like tomatoes right now. Can't keep staying in denial bros!

"JADE: yes hes dave and youre karkat and everyone we know always calls you that JADE: “dave and karkat”" Hah! Yeah, but they also think you're part of the item, Jade. Care to shed some thoughts on the subject?

"JADE: i cant remember the last time i heard anyone mention one of you without the other JADE: the two of you have basically been together since your days on the meteor its SO obvious" Jade has turned this from a personal matter into a fandom matter. "Everyone and their dog knows you're dating, guys! Stop pretending otherwise!" It's interesting to note the different ways Dave has been seen handling relationships. When he dated Terezi in the GO timeline, it went south due her troubles in the black quadrant. When Davesprite dated Jade, it went south due to unresolved Dave issues, presumably having to do with his bros. With Karkat, Dave's been in a stable-ish thing for the longest time, though.

" KARKAT: VERY CLOSE FRIENDS WHO UNDERSTAND AND SUPPORT EACH OTHER ON A DEEP AND EMPATHETIC LEVEL THAT GOES BEYOND HATE OR PITY. YOU COULD EVEN SAY THAT OUR RELATIONSHIP... KARKAT: ...TRANSCENDS QUADRANTS." ... PFfffffff, so this could have been what it was like for the Sufferer and the Disciple, then! They were just never ready to commit? That would actually be funnier than it being this deep and fulfilling relationship. It would also make Doc Scratch' misgivings on the relationship even more hilarious.

"JADE: yeaaaaaah not gonna lie karkat but that sounds totally kinda gay KARKAT: UGH YOU HUMANS AND YOUR UNFATHOMABLE GENDER BASED QUADRANTS." ... Heh. Actually. Too trolls, the whole gender-based romance thing we have going must indeed be as unfathomable as leprechaun romance.

"Jade faceplams." Well that's a new verb. ;) What part of the body is the 'plam', exactly?

" KARKAT: ANYWAY WEREN’T YOU... DATING THAT CARAPACIAN COUPLE? LAST TIME WE CHECKED?" Lolwut. Jade. Jade are you... are you being a Ms. Casanova, a paramour or two in every city you frequent? If WV and PM turn out to be alive for the sole purpose of dating Jade, I'll choke on my drink.

" DAVE: wait you saying we arent fun JADE: whens the last time either of you left the house??????" I know Jade means it as in, she'd like to date them for keeps. But I also fulheartedly believe Dave and Karkat can sustain themselves on delivery pizza and chinese chow.

"In her other hand, she tries to grab Dave’s wrist, but he flash-steps to the other side of the couch." Well that's a new use of the power, guess Dave must really have felt alarmed. :p

"JADE: i wanna try dating for real KARKAT: HAVE YOU EVER CONSIDERED KARKAT: SORRY IF WHAT I’M ABOUT TO SAY TOTALLY BLOWS YOUR MIND KARKAT: DATING A SINGLE PERSON, FOR MORE THAN HALF A SWEEP, FOR REASONS OTHER THAN INITIATING THE CONCUPISCENT EXCHANGE OF FLUIDS?" Karkat is trying to throw the issue back into Jade's face by saying she should try dating for a longer period of time. But that's exactly what she's trying to do here! She knows who she wants that with! That poor little troll, he's not getting out from under this.

"JADE: third of all karkat arent you from a culture where people are expected to engage in romantic relationships with up to like five people at a time?? KARKAT: THAT’S NOT KARKAT: THAT’S NOT THE SAME THING AT ALL." If he's trying to avoid getting dragged into quadrants with people, he should stop upholding the validity of the quadrants to hold people off. :p

"DAVE: ok jade i think theres a flaw in your approach here cause you seem to think winning an argument on super clever logical grounds is gonna get a couple dudes to break down and fling themselves at you in like, a sexual way JADE: wellll it usually does ;B DAVE: oh my fucking god" So she swoons people by way of her big brain. Jade's got CLASS.

"This earns Dave a look. A long, sad one that has Jade messing with her glasses again so that she can peer right at him and apply some more of that faulty personal math to his facial expression." Just confirmation here that Jade isn't necessarily correct in all her assessments due to not being objective.

"JADE: dave are you in love with obama? DAVE: jade jesus where do you get this shit from JADE: is it about jesus then??????" Aaaaaand this has been derailed again.

"DAVE: no! DAVE: jesus wasnt even real JADE: i know he wasnt real! JADE: wait... JADE: are you saying JADE: obama was real? DAVE: ... DAVE: yes" Wut. Wai- I- Jade. Honey. Please. Guess for all her involvement in politics since, those isolated years on the island sheltered her WAY too much.

"DAVE: obama was real DAVE: he was the president KARKAT: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA JADE: all this time i thought obama was like JADE: an aspirational fictional character that you modeled your life after KARKAT: AHAHAHAHA I CAN’T AHAHA BREATHE... JADE: like snoop dog or nicolas cage" ... Jade. Jade no. You're just making this worse on yourself. For Jade, there would have been almost nothing in Homestuck she'd have seen as a reference to 'real life', would there?

"senary numeral systems that allow me to do complex equations in my head" ... Why is Base 6 good for complex equations? I'm probably not good enough at math to know.

"KARKAT: WHY IS IT LIKE SOME SORT OF *TRAGEDY* HOW SHE WAS RAISED? KARKAT: BECAUSE SHE WAS RAISED ALONE BY AN ANIMAL?? KARKAT: *I* WAS RAISED ALONE BY AN ANIMAL!" There! It's getting acknowledged again, how Jade's upbringing more resembles a troll than a human's! Becquerel the lusus.

"There’s a ripple in the room that makes it clear their god tier powers have just clashed against each other. He shifts his arm through time and Jade warps the space around them so that she’s the one holding the tablet. This is not the first time that they have rearranged the fabric of reality for a petty reason like this. Karkat has permanently sworn off playing board games with them." ... Lol. First real use of the god tier powers in Earth C, and it goes like this! Wait, couldn't Jade have snapped... Right, no, she actually wouldn't have First Guardian powers anymore now, I forgot. Still, what did Dave try to do, move the tablet to another point in the timeline?

"The moment Jade brings the paint program up on the television, Karkat stops laughing. KARKAT: NO!" Oh boy. Time for the Penis Quadrant scene, this time with three people. ... This would actually fall under both definitions of a "sketch", actually.

"He tries to grab the tablet from her, but she’s hovering well above the ground and he simply is not tall enough to reach. With a shit-eating grin and deliberate care, Jade begins to draw a grid." He's going to jump up to grab her leg, to disturb the drawing, isn't he?

"She gives Karkat a pair of fuzzy, angry eyebrows" Now I'm starting to think of the Karkat expressions in that one Paradox Space.

"all he accomplishes is turning the redrom trajectory between her and Dave into a redrom loop-de-loop." This is all I could want from a reprise of this scene.

"JADE: see me and karkat have great black chemistry! KARKAT: IT IS NOT BLACK CHEMISTRY YOU HORRID NON-CHITINOUS WINDBAG!" A+ denial there, Karkat, props on the response.

"JADE: and now that daves all chill hed make a great auspistice" Jade just wants all Karkat's quadrants filled by the three of them, somehow.

"JADE: because you and karkat are kind of like moirails DAVE: no JADE: and you and i JADE: well yknow its always been pretty flirty DAVE: jade JADE: EXCEPT!

Jade finishes drawing a shaky heart directly into the paint program. It’s so big and bright on the TV that it fills the entire room with red light." She's putting all these names and symbols to the relationship, it might just be too much for these poor boys to handle. :p

"JADE: i call this political arrangement: JADE: fully automated luxury polyamorous space-time communism!!!!!!!" That is not the shipping name I would've chosen, but it's the shipping name we deserve. And hey, communism! Get it? Cause Karkat had a sickle.

I wonder what Karkat's take on polyamory outside of the ashen quadrant is, actually.

"Jade rolls her eyes and tosses both the tablet and pen over her shoulder. Dave flashes across the living room to catch his very expensive computing device in both arms. The pen bounces off his forehead." This. Entire. Scene.

"JADE: i have to go talk to roxy and callie about the election anyway" Well, she's going to let them stew on this for a while. But I'm eager to find out who Roxy & Calliope would back. You might think Jane's a given, but if she's been busy maybe they have grown closer to Jade & Dave!

"Jade clicks her heels together to propel herself back into the air and actually winks at them before absconding through an open window." Think happy thoughts! Also, I just realized becoming a god sadly never gave Karkat the powers of flight.

"Dave and Karkat both stare after her, silently caught in their own private rationalization spirals.

Karkat needs to verbalize part of his out loud." Ah, but can they stay in that spiral or will they have no choice but to break out of it?

"KARKAT: WANNA PLAY SOME TROLL TONY HAWK? DAVE: hell DAVE: yeah" Yyyyyeaah, they are not going to have changed when Jade comes back, will they?

So even Karkat calls it "Troll Tony Hawk", not whatever absurdly wrong name it'd have on Alternia, and not whatever Tony Hawk's duodecimal name in Alternian would be. :P

[avakwn]

- ̗̀ ❛ kang seulgi, she / her. ❜ ̖́- did you hear about the monaco trip ? it’s legendary at ucla. ava kwon is going, i’m so jealous. their instagram makes it seem like they’re pretty alluring and they’re all about lipstick stains on wine glasses & wilting roses. can you believe they’re only twenty-three and they’re going on a free trip to monaco for the summer ? hopefully they don’t let their fiendish side show too much on the trip.

hey x its me....so basically ? ava is my little monster<3 first of all....she’s soojin’s older cousin so if u thought one devil was bad....................here’s another ! they’ve got a very cat dog kind of relationship so im sure everyone who knows either of them would be aware of the way they sabotage each other but are also weirdly protective over each other....think serena & blair hehe

so some backstory ! ava’s mom was a retired beauty queen who did what pretty social climbing women do best and married rich ! they had two kids, gabriel (who is ava’s older brother of six years) and ava ! she was never really close with he brother growing up and now he’s got a wife & kids so she really felt as if she was on her own her whole life /:

she grew up in manhattan ! during high school she kinda played the typical queen b role just because that was what was expected of her, but she didnt......really care about status ?? she was always a little too crazy and impulsive to really fit in with that type of crowd but her family was loaded so everyone just....let it slide for a while

until her senior year when her father was arrested.....turns out he was caught in an embezzlement scandal that had been going on for YEARS so the kwon family reputation really just went to shit and everyone stopped pretending to care abt ava

which if u ask her ? it was the best thing that ever happened to her ! she was finally free to do whatever she wanted which most of the time was something no good...she went pretty crazy that year just partying even getting arrested a couple of times for stupid shit just generally not giving a fuck

which was great for ava but not so great for ava’s mom</3 who developed a cute lil drug habit to cope with her husband’s arrest and her teen daughter gone wild ! ava didnt catch on though

BUT she did feel a little guilty so she kinda did try to settle down for college acceptances

which speaking of ! a bitch got into julliard for music ! ava was *lana vc* fucking crazy but she’s also one hell of a piano player literally she was a child prodigy /: and she really loves it so she was happy to go study it

all good things come to an end though<3 her mom came to visit her during her freshman year to say she was planning on moving to cali bc she wanted a fresh start and ava was all for it....until she realized her mom was high as a kite...long story short they had a huge fight in ava’s dorm and he rmom stormed out and neither of them realized she dropped a coke baggie

which was later found by an RA in ava’s dorm and guess what ! she got kicked out of julliard bc as it turns out u cant keep a bad girl down and ava was already on probation bc of other mishaps<3 

after everything that happened in nyc.....ava was like huh perhaps i too should move to cali....and so she did ! instead of trying to enroll in college ava decided hey . whats a girl to do when her dads in jail and her moms an addict and shes just been kicked out from school ? oh yeah . go crazy x

personality wise.......she literally just cares abt having as much fun as she can in the moment. she’s easily bored which just leads her to make VERY impulsive decisions which dont always turn out the best for her /: honestly its high key an issue how self destructive she can be at times but point it out and u will be the one getting destroyed x

she generally doesnt play well with others just because shes unpredictable and self involved but if she cares about you and if you’re close to her.....shes the most loyal person in the world even if shes got a hard time being vocal abt it ):

shes got a soft vulnerable side..................somewhere.....maybe

she just ...doesnt take much seriously.....reputations and pretenses are such a joke to her like nothing is truly THAT deep for ava & if u act like something is in front of her she’ll laugh perhaps its a coping mechanism so she doesnt have to deal with everything going on....so what

truly believes she can do whatever she wants at any time and most of the time ? shes right ! a big fan of being a general bad influence for those around her....also owns a motorcycle and has probably crashed it more times than u can count but that wont stop her x the one thing in the world anyone can say ava cares abt for sure is her cat maisie who is back in cali and maybe....a nice bottle of red wine<3 

in summary......i based her off this quote from this book series which is “ you wanted something to get through your exams, (s)he had it. you wanted a fake license, (s)he could get it. you wanted something to hurt you, (s)he was it. ” so lets get those sexy plots everyone ! WOO x

[throwness]

Saeran/Ray Route. AKA THE UGLY CRY ROUTE. Spoilers Ahead!

Alright where do I begin. . . If you thought 707’s route hurt you, nope. Ray’s route I can almost guarantee will make you ugly cry.

Lets talk about rays route shall we?

So we’re not gonna ignore that Saeran kidnapped you from the very beginning but I mean MC what kind of basic lack of home training do you have that you legit iust followed a yolo text telling you to get into a car to be taken to an undisclosed location.

Oh yes enter Ray persona. “Test my game for me you beautiful creature that I’m already admittedly probably in love with because I have no reference for what it feels like to be loved or in love. But you make me feel less lonely so please don’t leave me.”

Ray is a princely figure throughout your first couple days with him. Only to later realize that Rika has utterly adopted his mothers tactics to manipulate him into doing what she wants out of what is essentially pure spite. Rika also adopts the persona of being Saeran’s true mother as she calls herself. Oddly enough, you actually get more insight on what type of person Rika is and how she perceived herself in Ray’s route than V’s.

Even in everyone’s else’s route before Saeran I never found myself actually attracted to Saeran. Rather, I found him to be someone that was grossly similar to Rika in the fact that he simply wanted to be accepted and loved by anyone. No matter what love meant to the other person. He was willing to devote his entire being simply for the other person to achknowledge him as a person. This becomes even more clear if you get Rays bad ending. It’s clear to see why even in past routes Rika was more than just Rika, she was a godly being for Saeran. Albeit through means of heavily drugging him and manipulative tactics but that’s how he saw Rika. Just as he named you his goddess, Rika was the all mighty savior.

Ray is already very upset that he has to take the elixir. It causes him to undergo pain beyond measure. Which is why he goes so out of his way to do everything he can so that the player doesn’t have to take the elixir. He even goes to make a fake exilir in case Rika asks for MC to drink it to prove herself.

This poor sweet child has been nothing but continuously abused and used as a tool.

He himself thinks he’s no good. BECAUSE LITERALLY HE HAS BEEN CONDITIONED LIKE THIS HIS ENTIRE FUCKING LIFE. LIKE PLEASE I JUST WANT TO PROTECT YOU AND LET YOU BE HAPPY. LOOK AT HOW FRAGILE HE IS. YOU CAN STILL SEE THE OLD WOUNDS HIS MOTHER GAVE HIM ON HIS BODY

Like this poor baby STOPPPPP. When they released Ray’s route I did not expect myself to cry as much as I did going through this route.

NOW let’s transition to Saeran persona. We’re also not going to ignore that Saeran abused MC for literally days. Both trying to manipulate her and physically starving her so she’s weakened. I think we all knew from the beginning that Saeran was projecting all his fears and feelings onto MC in hopes of personifying his perceived weaker self and dominating them. I’m not excusing any of this AND NEITHER SHOULD YOU. Someone being mentally ill does not give them any rights to abuse others around them because they are damaged. But this is also where I was very emotionally driven. This arc stirred an anger in me towards both Rika and V. As most of us know it has been about six months since Rika had disappeared. But thing is Saeran was taken in by Rika and V a LONG while before. Like Rika you literally killed his mom how has this not come up anywhere in conversation????? LIKE REALLY DID YOU LEGIT GET AWAY WITH MURDER??? I digress. What makes me so angry is that ONLY FKING RIGHT NOW does V actually realize “maybe....I waited too long and should have helped Saeran and protected him LIKE I PROMISED SAEYOUNG ALL THOSE YEARS AGO AND NOT LIED ABOUT IT UNTIL HE WAS SO TRAUMATIZED THAT HIS PERSONALITY SPLIT”. LIKE V???? YOU JUST SEE THAT NOW? RIGHT NOW????? WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DIDNT REALIZE WHAT RIKA HAS DONE TO HIM??? YOU BEEN FOLLOWING HER SINCE SHE FOUNDED MINT EYE SHE HAS A ENTIRE FOLLOWING OF PEOPLE???? YOU KNEW SHE WAS MENTALLY ILL LIKE??? HUH????? Okayyyyyy. . .

Back to Saeran. Even as MC is getting tortured by Saeran this is the scene that broke me in this route.

His complete breakdown after being unable to cope with his feelings and being unable to break MC. This is the scene where he says something along the lines of “I’ll just kill you now so you can’t torment me; only I can torment you” and where he desperately tries to get a response from MC.

I’m not sure how everyone else responded but when it came to the choose I chose to say nothing. The following line of Saeran saying “why aren’t you saying anything? Tell me! TELL ME IT’S PAINFUL!” Completely broke me. I realized here he still just wants someone to accept him....in the form of him as their abuser...but accepting him nonetheless. Also props to Saeran’s VA. You screamed a lot in this my dude. It paided off. You made Saeran become really alive delivering all your lines the way you did. Honestly even above Rika’s VA, you did....amazing. You’re both amazing but DAMN YOU MADE ME TOO EMOTIONALLY ATTACHED.

Anyway,

The line is delivered so desperately. He just wants a response any response. Silence is just the same as death for him. What good is a toy that won’t respond to you? Validate me as a person that is strong and not useless. Only my toy makes me feel whole.

Saeran and Ray are entirely the same. “Please don’t leave me. I’m scared. ”. Of course Ray and Saeran are the same person. After this....his decision to tell V to take MC away from here seals the deal. That’s Saeran’s way of saying he loves you enough to let you go. That sounds cliche af but that’s what happen. The difference is the deliverance of how it went about is what made it worthwhile.

He spent 9 days trying to do one thing. And that was to get you to not leave. Now he just wants you to be okay even in his madness.

I wont lie. V did save redeem himself a little when he came clean. And the proceeded to of course OF COURSE sacrifice himself and be putty in Rika’s hands. Yes Rika is a monster. Granted I still stand by my opinion that she isn’t the monster that some people make her out to be, but she’s still a monster. When Ray/Saeran become one and shows Rika all the receipts I mean I was Z-snapping everywhere tbh.

Both Saeran and Rika became what they hated most. Their mothers. The difference is Rika believed it made her strong, Saeran realized that’s what made him weak.

Overall I think Ray’s route was the most impactful for several reasons. But I’ll just name two.

1. The entire story has VAs. The delivery of the lines make a difference in how we perceive the characters. A lot of the times we have to imagine how they said it. Here we actually get to hear how it was intended. It made it that more immersive to the point of sometimes I forget this is just a game.

2. The story was well driven and you don’t get the complete satisfaction of everyone’s happy ending. This was intentional of course. Someone has to lose their life. You spend most your life hiding with Saeran and Rika has V wrapped back in her fingers...Continuing the cycle of their toxic relationship. Until we get an after ending for both V and Ray. I have to say these reviews are incomplete.

You made it to the end. Thank you!

Enjoy happy pictures.

Honestly I think Saeran has the best kiss out of all.

[matazz]

My Feelings on Roy Endoza

sooo i wrote this basically after a big thing happened in our campaign. it was basically a way to vent to myself and i never ended up sending it until now. anyway, here’s a couple of ramblings.

It’s Carter and it’s finally getting to the end of Campaign 2. It’s been over a year since Roy Endoza has existed as my character and he’s so different to how I originally imagined him. Anyway, I have a lot of thoughts and feelings so I’ll divide it up into categories. I’m writing this as how I’m feeling so it makes sense its whatever comes to mind first and makes sense chronologically but you can read it how you want but this is gonna be definitely from the most impactful things to the least.

Basically my Thoughts on how I wrote Roy

For starters, he was this unempathetic doctor who stole corpses from hospitals to practice necromancy for fun, and lies about being dead because its hilarious. I eventually evolved him into this gentle guy who adores the people he loves because I decided to give him a boyfriend; Milo Corazon (his name is cute because it means “My Heart”. Roy’s name means nothing symbolic). Milo was just meant to be there to make him have more depth as a character, and that’s exactly what I did. I got really attached to him though, and I came to the realization that I need to seperate Roy from Milo for the campaign to start.

And as tropey as it is, I decided to kill him. And I didnt just want him to die from illness or an accident or get “murdered by a syndicate”. Milo is soft, he’s innocent and gentle and sweetness and sunshines and thats exactly why Roy Endoza fell for him. So I made Roy kill him through the irony of his own necrotic practices.

Since even before the campaign started I’ve been threading it along that Roy is dead. He’s a corpse who was brought back from the gods mysteriously. I even faked being a cleric. It’s a fake backstory I made to counter the real one, and everybody believed it. It didnt counter anything, it made sense.

And even before that, I’ve known he was going to lie and I’ve known he was going to try to use necromancy to bring his boyfriend back and I’ve known he was going to continually lie to keep himself safe.

Basically my Thoughts on Royce

At the start of the campaign he got the letter. An opportunity. He met Fox only a while after his accident and he got attached.. to this lost confused boy who was just as lost as he was. And then we met all of you.

Shortly after, I told Ayce about my “lie” first... and then Ayce had the exact same thing going on and I took it as an opportunity. I saw the opportunities with Roy betraying Ayce and using him. And I thought about how fucking beautiful it would be if they were a romance and how much more impactful it would be if they were. Not only did it make sense with Roy’s motives of finding a way to bring back Milo, but it made sense for Roy and Ayce to “empathise” with eachother after going through “the same thing”. And holy fuck I took that opportunity and RAN with the wind and I’ve not regretted it.

I absolutely fucking adore Royce even for those messed up reasons. It just works. Ayce is absolutely the type of boy that’s Roy’s type. Kind of small and good for hugging, has fluffy hair and a nice smile, a bit cheeky and dumb but still clever and really charismatic.. and the relationship between the necrotic boys and bonding over that was a bonus. It probably would have worked in a universe where Ayce’s life wasnt fucked and Roy chose not to do necromancy. It was sweet and cute and perfect without the angst but it was heartbreaking and tragic and awful WITH the angst. I loved the potential for the love and cute bits and even more so I loved the potential for all the heartbreak and the angst.

Endoza loves Milo Corazon with every ounce of his heart and he was interested in Ayce because it was Ayce that made him know it was possible. Truly, and really possible, to bring back someone from the dead.

I know that’s evil for me as a player to continue this plotline but it made sense in character. Roy was interested. And it was mistaken for romantic interest.

And Roy... didn’t mind. He genuinely loves Ayce. More than he expected to for just a person he was going to use as a stepping stool for his goal (it sounds awful, I’ve KNOWN this). And I as the player loved it.. I loved Royce because not only did I get to attach my character to something else but it just worked so well narratively. It was unexpected and it was beautiful and it was tragic and I’ve known that the honeymoon phase of Royce was only going to last for a few months before it collapsed into this deep well of never turning back and yet I kept pushing and chugging for this relationship to happen bc I really wanted the drama that I knew would come along with it (also it just WORKS narratively)

Basically my Thoughts on The Gods / Being a Champion

To be honest I’m unsure how none of you ever found my story to be bullshit when Roy himself never had faith in the gods. He has absolutely no relationship with his god and he only used them as a stepping stone for his lie and it worked, even though I messed up so many times and admitted I never trusted them.

Which.. why would Roy trust a God who doesnt know him at all? Or even more so, if the God supposedly knows “everything about Roy” yet didn’t attempt to stop Roy on his endeavour of necromancy despite being heavily against necrotic magic. Or why the Gods who are so against necromancy would choose a boy who was bought back to life and a necromancer himself. It was silly and Roy thinks the gods were stupid in their choosings.

In his mind Roy believes that the gods have no power. They’re weak and that’s why they make people to their gritty work, because they can’t do it themselves. In his mind, Roy doesn’t quite believe everything their saying. Roy Endoza doesn’t care about about being a champion, but he’s curious...

Beshaba was obviously wanting the keys because of their immense power, so he thought that maybe he can use it for himself. Unlock a power that nobody else has or could, use it not for anyone but himself and Milo. He wasn’t on anyone’s side. Neither the gods or Beshaba. He only wants to save his loved ones and himself even if it meant committing blasphemy.

The first time I ever talked to Lathandar he was already so far down the rabbit hole. Roy already had no respect for the gods and was going through with his plans anyway, so his god trying to talk him out to it just felt like a massive joke to him. Why do you care now when you never cared before?

But yet I asked him questions anyway. To use him, to find out more. I asked him about the magic readings and I asked him about the keys and I asked him about the world beyond Sanctuary and I asked him about Beshaba.

All to find out that the gods are.. basically inefficient and that they were evil once. That beyond sanctuary they were corrupt and then they suddenly “grew a conscious” (Roy finds it hard to believe that people, even Gods, can just “stop being corrupt”) and when they got embarrassed of their actions, closed off the rest of the world. They do nothing except sit and let their champions do things and are scared of Beshaba; one God vs the four of them. But why are they scared when they have collective power and the keys? They could banish Beshaba themselves with their power alone. This is why Roy doesn’t (and has never) believed in what the gods stand for. He is only using them, and the only reason he stayed was because of Ayce and Fox.

As I’m writing this, it’s just after the Gala episode. I’ve put my heart and soul and emotions into Roy so a part of my kind of has a distaste for them too (I’m so fking sorry Keiran but theyre just so lazy I cant 😭)

Anyway, it's weird. I've been playing this entire campaign knowing that everybody puts their entire faith and trust into the gods but I just never have.. (or at least Roy doesn't so it's hard for me too). I'm really only following them to benefit myself, and that's exactly what happened but I can't help but feel like Beshaba might actually be trying to save us from this prison of the world they've made (or something poetic like that). I guess I also just think it's because it might be cool that the main villain was the good guys all along and we were the bad guys. Maybe it turns out that I'll be wrong, and I won't even be mad for it. But maybe I'll be right and I'll be the smuggest bitch in the world. Who knows what will happen.

I guess some insight on how I feel abt Roy and the PCs

I guess it doesn't really matter bc at this point in the campaign I've already made my actions and set myself as a villain. Whether or not you guys see me as one is a mystery and I'm both dreading and excited what your pinions on Roy will be as he's made his downfall into a villain.

It's funny, to be honest. With the way I wrote him, I always was going to make him progressively more hatable. He starts off as a trustworthy guy but you eventually find out that he was lying about his past to cover up for himself. He breaks the trust of the players and he uses them for his own progressive goal. But when I wrote him, I thought playing a character like this would be hilarious. I've played him exactly how I imagined, even better than I imagined, but I didn't think I'd feel so attached and heartbroken breaking your trust.

I think for the entire campaign I've believed that it was possible to save him.. maybe just talking to him and getting him to open up a bit more. It might have made all the difference. I'm not blaming my actions as Roy on the players not helping him, bc it definitely was Roy's fault, but I like to think of the alternate universe where I felt less lonely bc despite having friends and a boyfriend there was so many points where Roy just feels so alone and I just felt this deep pit in my chest from that lonliness. It's so dumb and stupid how much love I've put into Roy that I can feel what he feels.

And so all that fighting after Solardome when our friends got kidnapped, all the arguing and the stress and disagreements and then eventually Fox leaving and Ayce not interacting.. it was all just little pieces of sadness and loneliness trickling down and then by that point it was just too late to save him.. I like to think that maybe if it was a bit earlier then he could have got over it. Changed his mind, maybe.

Despite that all and desite feeling stressed and lonely and mad and everything that Roy ever felt, I've absolutely loved writing and playing this genuinely good person and seeing him turn rotten and become a villain on his own without realizing it. I never thought I would ever write a character go from the top and fall to bedrock, or even that I'd do it

well

, but he's so much. I think right now I love it. I love the drama I love the suspense and I love seeing what you'll all think of when you discover the Fall Of Roy.

Basically my Thoughts on Miss Winters

So the campaign moves on and I meet Miss Winters pretty shortly and we make a deal to "Discover How To Bring The Dead To Life". It was shortly after I met Ayce so I was aware it was possible. Roy absolutely had nothing to lose at this point, and he would do anything so he said yes. So for the duration of the campaign we helped each other trade information and most importantly look for a spirit stone.

At Solardome, the President Medeanne asked us to eradicate the witch and her skeletons and provide proof. And Roy wrecklessly put himself at the forefront without thinking. At that point I thought maybe she had lost her mind or something.

And then we unmasked her and she was dead. A rotted corpse.

And after making you all leave; I killed her.

Roy Endoza’s never had difficulty putting down the undead and so one more wasn’t a huge deal, but at the time it felt like such a loss because it was his only connection to information. In the end, it hadn’t of mattered because we retrieved a spirit stone anyway.

It was really only about a session or two later when I realized that I never actually killed Miss Winters. I only killed the corpse she was controlling and that real Miss Winters ran off with two spirit stones.

And so it took a LONG time (or at least in real time lmao) before we ended up going back to Origin, which was the only place I knew where to contact her and she was.. gone.

[survivormetaverse]

Episode 12 - "i'm baaaaaacckkkkk 😈" ~Jodi

An iconic moment happened today and I accidentally voted my closest ally out of the game. So Brayden got sent home and he is going to hate me when he finds out what happened. I did kind of get him out on accident I did not mean for Brayden to go I wanted Jay gone but I was blindsided by Colin and Josh and Elle AND AMY!!??]£[_[3 Omg. Im really upset that hes gone i miss him so much and I dont know how Im gonna go on without his brain. I dont trust Jay but Jared and Jay were both messaging me about how they already forgive me and stuff so thats a little crazy. I think it could be fake or they are just desperate for numbers. But I am with Josh and Amy and Colin and Elle now. I want to be with their numbers. I talked to all of them individually and they said they all were sorry for lying to me and causing me to get my friend out. I know its just a game but I just feel awful and so guilty right now. This has probably been the worst day of my life. He probably will never play another org with me again and hes the only reason i play orgs its boring without him. We are best friends increal life and I hope he can forgive me. I havent said anything to him because thats breaking the rules. But when he finds out im literally so scared of what he'll say to me. I pray he will forgive me I am literally so dumb af.

i'm baaaaaacckkkkk..................... 😈

This is literally worst case right now with jodi winning the play back like throughout the day she has won back her allies including anastasia since she swapped coins with her. Elle, colin, and josh all gave me all their coins to grab immunity before the other side to protect me but also it makes me a bigger target lol plus I gave elle some swapped to get the second thing the leftover because I THOUGHT it could give us an extra vote since that was ony menu but I was tired and drunk and it was a LOT of words and it was just the hunts which I knew didn't have any and I feel terrible bc 150 tokens and my actual alliance is going to be so mad when they realize THAT I HAVE THE LAST ONES and fucked up in suggesting it at all. First they were going for info. So now I think Jodi got all the other sides tokens and they are pooling for something idek. It's literally worst case like we were set to be up 5-2 or at least 4-3 and now it looks like it's 4-4 again hahaha neat. And it looks like colin is chatting with jodi again and they are making deals lol like tbh if she gets to the end I am voting for her to win I've said it many rounds. Turns out anastasia and brayden not only know each other irl they are besties so she mad mad. And Josh looks to be making deals and thinking about flipping so I am on borrowed time but tbh I never expected to make merge. I am glad I have immunity bc I physically couldn't do the challenge anywU here lol and I fucked that up too hahahaha. Good times all around. Like I want to tell them about my steal a vote to have official numbers but now they'd just be mad hahaha literally colin and I had every advantage except jared's idol now. Ahhhh idk what to do but it remains hilarious. I'm expecting Raffy to give my info in these in the market and that is no bueno ahahahaha. I am tempted to just give colin everything bc it's funny. Also jodi talked to me until 1am just trying to guilt me into being back with her I said I have to sleep goodnight like 5 times minimum. Her social game is so good that's why I think she has them all back with her and possibly josh. The problem is that I was keeping her close bc she had the info from others and from my game. I really never had a number one lol bc I was just vibing and I guess now colin is bc I flipped with him lol and I think it's hilarious he grew his army from 0 to 5 almost.

~

I have a suspicion colin and anastasia have actually been closely aligned this whole time and she knew everything all along. Colin sure loves giving out info haha. And apparently deals are happening all over, none of which I have made 😂

Jodi's backkkkk, wild wild wilddddd. The challenge went poorly, darn thats like 20 minutes wasted. We bought the refresh and there was nothing there 💔 that's 150 tokens wasted 😅. But! We got Amy immunity✨ and then Colin won the challenge so tbh everything's still going great lol. Wonder how we're gonna vote this round :/ we'll see how this goes! I've stopped worrying whether I'm going completely, it either happens or it doesn't 💖 xoxo, gossip girl (this is misleading I HAVE NOT SEEN THE SHOW i just know way too much about it because i have friends that did lol)

So after I voted my showmance Brayden out of the game I was left with an interesting situation. I had cried to Josh Colin and Amy that I was alone now and that my whole alliance hated me. With Jodi back in, I dont think they believe me. I literally flipped sides so I could be in their alliance because I didnt trust Jay and Jared and Jodi. But they literally lied to me about the vote and said it was nothing personal to me but they didnt tell me the plan because they wanted to see if I was lying. Which sucks for me because I then voted Brayden out :( Now that they know that im truthful they said they would work with me now. But all of them have been pretty inactive today. I talked to Amy the most and a little Colin and a little Josh. But I wasnt in their alliance. So I asked Amy if I could be added into an alliance chat since I was apperently in their alliance now. And she said sure. And they added me to a vote block. That is not an alliance group chat btw. So I was like wow thanks. But inside I was like screw this. So before this all happened, Jodi, Jay and Jared put me in a true alliance group chat. This morning I was ready to work with Colin and Josh but not anymore. Not after they put me in a vote block chat clearly saying to me that I am just a number to be used. They don't even need my vote either because Amy has an idol and Amy and Colin are safe. So I'm obviously voting with Jay, Jared, and Jodi. And I know they probably have a final three without me. They could call it something really cool like the three J's. But I called Jay and explained everything to him. (Also Jay forgave me for literally trying to get him out. He umderstands that its a game and all of my motives about not trusting him anymore.) He said he would be a hypocrite if he didnt forgive me because he told people my name in the chaos vote. So I actually think we are cool. And I told Jay that I am his number one. Which is true. He told me a lot of things about how Amy is actually really smart and stuff (I thought that girl was just a goat that I could take to the end with me) But her and colin are tight and both immune. This is bad. Basically we will go to rocks unless Elle flips to our side. Jay is giving his pitch to Elle tommarow. And maybe I will apologize to her correctly tomarow too. ALSO SPELLING THE WORD TOMARROW IS THE HARDEST THING IN MY LIFE. Also I took 62 minutes to complete a puzzle today so thats kind of emberassing. Anyways bye everyone this was so much fun to type omg.

Lol I woke up to a text from jodi asking if anyone was taking about votes yet and I said no because I went to sleep early bc I almost passed out from heat yesterday and had just woke up and she responded "ummmm lol...." 🤣🤣🤣 Sorry I sleep. She's in Colin's dms saying how I was legit her number one and now we can't even talk about votes. Like yeah girl we worked our asses off to get you out of the game sorry I'm not happy you are back. Also I'm still at disney world so I don't have the time for a million conversations. I know I'm going to be the Russell Hanz of the f3 /if/ I make it. So what's jury management lol like she was already pissed I voted her out and I plan to do it again. Anyway it looks like it's hilariously about to be a unanimous jay vote tonight but I am thinking we throw one vote somewhere else in case of an idol. But if jodi did get anastasia back we can't do that. Anyway lol I'm immune so whatever. Elle and Colin discussed like if it's on elle (which apparently jared proposed an alliance of 5 which included myself lol!) Then we could go to rocks and have only josh as a possibility and statistically he won't go if he is willing to go to rocks that it. All this to say I'm f7 and I want to keep my extra vote to f6 if possible so I can use the idol for fun at f5.

https://youtu.be/snpKevncc44

My quest has come to an end. I joined this game to be someone who could be there for Jodi. Jodi and I played survivor subrosa together and we both had rough experiences due to a player in the game who harassed jodi and tried to convince everyone I was misogynistic. As much as I love Survivor, I didn’t play this game to win. I played this game because Jodi told me she was playing it and I wanted to be her body guard. I wanted to be someone who could be there for her both as a number but also as an enforcer, anybody who ever dared to do anything to Jodi would’ve had to have dealt with me. Tonight, Amy and Colin have immunity, and either amy or josh or elle have an idol, so there’s no point in making any noise tonight and wasting Jared’s idol. None of those 4 trust me, and I doubt any of them like me. It is what it is, it’s best for Jodi, Jared, and Anastasia’s game to move forward without me, and it’s smart for Jared to keep his idol. Tonight, I will be voted out, and I am 100% at peace with it. 

Since Elle, Josh, Amy and Colin pooled their tokens for immunity and advantage refresh, it means all the advantages and disadvantages are on our side. Plan is to send Elle a disadvantage and let Colin know because honestly it’s not hard to find out anyways. Jay doesn’t mind getting booted at some point cuz he wants to stand for me on the jury, but I don’t want to boot him right now. Obviously they won’t boot Elle, so I’m going to see if Jared will propose Anastasia. The thing right now is me/Jay/Anastasia/Jared also know next round is invisible. So I want Jay or Anastasia to send Colin and Amy disadvantages because if they’re paranoid seeing me Jared/Jay/Anastasia have advantages and they have disadvantages, they might be paranoid enough to play all their idols. I also wanted to keep Jay for this round as it’d be unanimous and something everyone can settle on. Jared wanted to do me/Jared/Josh/Amy/Colin as an alliance but has concerns about the 3 of them being in top 5 in the majority snd also Colin having his ideal f3. I told him my plan has the best shot at flushing all idols and hopefully we can either get Josh to flip or at least have Amy/Colin vulnerable at 5/6. Last thing is Jared is worried he’d be blindsided this round. I told him my plan and I said even if he wanted to flush his idol this round, next round should be ok if we all vote out Jay and the rest of them flush idols. Good to be back in the game! I genuinely believe Colin wants me as a shield at least for this round, and if I can make it through, I have a game to play. 

Not everyone saying they only bought an advantage lol what about those other 70 tokens 👀👀👀 Like it must be jay unless someone is lying haha i am hoping people are just busy bc these answers I'm getting from Josh and Colin are concerning 😂 It looks like only elle and got disadvantages ☠️ I am really hoping not to be a target next round even though I know I will be haha. Next round is only 7 and I'd love to take out jodi and jared before they turn on me ☠️ especially since colin creeped on jodi's insta and it is possible they know each other from sports irl. And she was so concerned about all these pregame connections 😂 and here it was likely to deflect. Anyway I just swapped my position of having jodi do all the social work with having colin do all the social work knowing full well I'm not gonna get those end votes. I'm just trying to pull up my placement average now 😂. I hope everyone sees me as having no social game to take me to the end lol bc realistically I don't bc I don't care to put in that time this game. As I write from the pirates of the caribbean line 😂 So anyway if I'm not being lied to which I might be it looks like unanimous jay tonight but also I think the other group was talking split on jay like a 3-3-2 and I'm like wait the 2 wouldn't help. Elle are you okay with that? So I think they must have figured out I have stuff ☠️ I wonder what people REALLY bought haha okay bye

Jodi is back, not just Jodi Jodi, but player Jodi. Player Jodi thinks a LOT. When I was out, the entire time I was hoping somebody caught on that Amy flipped because they knew to put a stray vote on Colin to protect him from chaos idol, but they left Josh exposed. Why? Because Colin knew Amy was going to throw a vote on Josh. Also, Colin tied with me for closest ally and that set off an alarm too. Onto the next. So Colin won immunity, Amy bought immunity, but this could possibly be good because it means they are playing knowing they are not at risk themselves. Anastasia is voting with them this round, but she's actually working with us. She told us that the actual plan on that side is: "Jay, Jared, Jodi vote elle and Elle, Amy, Colin vote Jay and Josh and Anastasia vote Jodi" Anastasia will vote me here to continue "working" with them for the next vote. Essentially, they thought that Jay had the merge idol this whole time and Colin was weary about it, and that's why he got nervous about sending out Jay last round. That told me Colin did not have the merge idol. Josh came to me too about Jay having the merge idol. But the way they're splitting the votes this round shows me now that somebody has stepped forward to mention they have it (likely Elle) because if Jay idoled, Elle goes in this split vote plan. Therefore, somebody must've been like "ok let's just be safe and split the votes, I have the other idol". That's good and bad because now Colin has no merge idol paranoia, and they're also able to use it together. It also did confirm to me they've talked about it. Here's where things get tricky. Player Jodi is so tempted to run with it and do a 4-3-1 Josh-Jay-Jodi but it's so risky and could possibly destroy the long term social game, especially if they idol for Josh and Jay goes anyway (we are not idoling for him here). So instead, I'm going to use Jay's vote out to the best of my advantage. Hopefully flush an idol if possible, maybe a steal-a-vote, something. Knowing about next round being invisible is good info for us. Having this info is so key and usually I would think that immunity for a round is bigger than this but being able to plan ahead for a GAME-CHANGING twist is crucial here. My move here is to play the game through psychological distress. I have no advantages! Since they're out of tokens from buying immunity, me/Anastasia/Jared/Jay bought advantages for ourselves and also sent out disadvantages to Colin/Amy/Elle. Seeing that not only we have advantages but also them having disadvantages, they probably still feel like things will be ok because they'll just split votes or whatever and one of them needs to win immunity. But given this is an invisible round, I think Amy is honestly paranoid enough to just play her idol, hopefully Elle does too, and then between me and Jared, we'll idol for one of us. I also plan on bluffing an advantage coming back from Jury, and say something along the lines of having to survive one round before the advantage got activated. I'm going for the win, everyone, I know that if I get to the end with anybody, I have a solid shot at winning. I just need to get there and to do that, I must play an adaptable game – more than ever. PS I am holding onto Jared's idol right now. Power (temporary) feels amazing. Dw I'm giving it back....😈

this has been the most chill round in a while. which is really weird consider JODI IS BACK AND WE BLINDSIDED BRAYDEN LAST ROUND this round is turning out to be what I WANTED last round to be. everyone is talking with everyone, people are trying to disband the sides and all intermingle. it's really interesting how no one else was on board with this until after they lost majority. seems like people don't like playing from the bottom. weird huh now these bitches know how I felt >:( anyway. jodi is back. it's weird. she knows that amy flipped now and everyone is playing very carefully my ideal boot this round was either jay or josh, in that order. so when my gay ass WON IMMUNITY I immediately put out jay's name. we already have the numbers, but I also like said my piece to jodi and jared, this is yalls chance to prove to me that you're really with me and sides don't exist. the ball is in their court do i trust them? no. am I worried? no. i have immunity, the scariest thing rn is that I think Jay is voting Elle, and if Jared and Jodi are with him then that's scary, bc Jared has an idol. The ONLY people I would play my idol for is Amy and Elle, and Elle being in trouble means I might have to play my idol on her if Jay idols himself. We have enough to split, so I'm not worried, I just hope all goes according to plan. sorry my confessional is lame. its the weekend now so i have time uwu. I'll write more the next few days

So this whole token twist thing has really annoyed me. Because of me wanting to show my loyalty to my alliance, i gave away all my coins to Amy so that she could but immunity. And against my wishes, Elle wasted her coins on the “advantage” which turned out to be a dud. I wanted to get coins together to buy game info or better yet, trade coins with other people. But i was left with nothing, while all the people on the other side used their coins to buy advantages in the next immunity challenge making it even harder for me to secure my safety. Maybe this new 2 Gays and a Jared alliance might actually pan out but im tired of getting the short end of the stick with everything.

~~~

Edgic:

Power Rankings:

Anastasia: She is in the middle of the two sides. They both need her for the rest of this game before a side is terminated. She is the most powerful because she is in the middle.

Jodi: Has regained a lot of her footing in this game. Is being used as a shield by the people who voted her out. The decision to vote out Jay is questionable, but she still has a lot of power thanks to the knowledge Anastasia and Jared feed her.

Colin: The head of the opposing side. Seems to not know what is really going on with Anastasia. But his allies are willing to take him to the end which is good. Needs to avoid falling into a Jodi pitfall.

Amy: Her rat behavior has been exposed, but her allies are still willing to defend her. Second in command on the Colin side. She is being handed these immunities.

Jared: Jodi’s new #1. Will probably make it to the end of this game. However, he isn’t calling the shots and is in danger of being targeted as an “easy” vote or being called a goat at the end. Needs to start taking fate in his own hands.

Elle: Lost a lot of footing because of not telling Anastasia the truth. This move caused Anastasia to go back to Jodi’s side which will hurt in the coming round. Is the next target for the Jodi side.

Jay: Died on the sword for Jodi. I am confused why they didn’t just stack 4 votes somewhere else, but it is whatever. Has basically given up.

Josh: Left out of a lot of discussions. Is on the outside of his alliances and from the opposing side. Is the most in danger of getting targeted or being a casualty of an idol.

[survivesalem]

Episode 2 - “AHAHAHAHAHA 😂 -screams -” -Jessie

My plan worked, mostly. Czern left and I felt bad but it’s survivor. Raffy (I believe it was Raffy at least) voted with Czern which I don’t like tbh. Raffy has a lil target on my back and I’m sitting pretty with me being the least likely to go home at this point on my tribe. 4D chess, I don’t play chess but it’s hot. I hope my tribe and Liam’s tribe don’t lose any more challenges so we can dominate. I miss Liam 🥺🥰.

Originally I'm from tengaged so the way a social game is played and how you communicate with people is really different. Unfortunately I'm bored with a lot of people on my tribe. Austin is someone I like... I want him to view me as someone new and someone who'll make a good sheep. I can kinda sense he's gonna be trouble in a way, he doesn't seem super trustworthy. Jessie is a big question mark for me. IDK where I stand with her but I think we can get along but I also think she feels comfortable. At first I didn't like Dylan all that much but now they're really rubbing off on me. Dylan stans Avatar, I stan Avatar so in my eyes Dylan is a good person. Paolo is super friendly, he's also new to the ORG community so I feel him & I could make a good duo. Zach is probably my favourite person on the tribe idk why I just feel a good energy from him and I like it so I feel like if Paolo, Zach & I could link up and form a tight 3 and just knock off someone like Jessie that would make me feel good. I really wanna prove myself with the scavenger hunt challenge I feel like I've done a lot with the challenge but I feel like I can do more so I'm ready and willing to fight to keep my tribe safe.

Omg okay so I never made one of these but I will right now! So basically I like my tribe. I know a few people on here and the other ones seem nice. I would LOVE to avoid tribal, as I think I am not in the *best* standing, but I think if I attend tribal I mayyyy be able to survive. I LOVE THAT THERE IS NO TWIST THANK FUCKING GOD. Here are my thoughts on my tribe: Brien - I have hosted Brien and he is super talkative 24/7. He is a great guy and I really want him to trust me, but I have heard he created an alliance without me. I think if I just have some more activity we might be in the clear w him. Eve- I LOVE EVE. I played with Eve in BBPokemon and they were an incredible force. I know they tend to be villainous and make a splash every season, but hopefully I can them on my side and I won't be at the receiving end of their chaos. Cameron - Don't know them and will hopefully make them the first boot. Gizmo- Awesome! They are super nice to talk to and I can tell they are a good ass player. I want to align with them on this tribe, but I am not that passionate about it. Keegan- I. LOVE. KEEGAN. Keegan is super a sweetheart and such a good guy. He is SO good at orgs and I want to go far with him. Def my #1 fav on this tribe!

UM HELLO TRIBE WHERE ARE YOU ? Legit only me and Liam are submitting for the scavanger hunt and the clock is tick tick ticking . Like guys we aren’t winning if only two people submit . Do they not realize two tribes go to tribal ? It’s literally as quiet as the movie the quiet place . On the bright side maybe me doing stuff for the tribe means they’ll keep me because wow I’m active !

Here's the problem: my tribe is half inactive. Ben and Alex truly do not give a fuck whether we win or lose. This means they will be very easy vote offs during this phase of the game, but I don't want to risk having to repeatedly go to tribal over and over again. I am starting to get frustrated. They are literally not responding to any of my messages at all. I've tried reaching out to Ben twice now, and he hasn't replied back to either of those messages. I am so sick of it. For Alex, I don't know what his problem is either. This tribe truly is cursed in part due to them all being men. I need a swap to happen soon so that I can actually be put on a competent tribe. I am terrified that we are going to lose the challenge because it doesn't even seem like Ben or Alex know that it's even going on. Ugh. I'm so over this.

This scavenger hunt has been fun. I was thankful to already own most of the items between my apartment and my parents house. What I didn't have I had to drive around to find. What gave me the most trouble was the Magic 8 Ball. I ended up finding a mini 8 ball that was fully functioning. Given that 2 tribes are going to tribal counsel, and the current state of our sheet, I'm pretty sure Good is going to tribal council. I hope I'm wrong! But hope for the best, prepare for the worst. I think I'm safe this vote. I seem to be in the majority so long as I can trust them. I just hope we are all loyal until at least tribe swap or merge, whatever happens first. If we go to tribal, I'm pretty sure Eve will be getting the vote, but who's to say.

I do not believe we are winning this challenge. But I don't think I'd be the one voted out in any case. Alex and Ben both seems like they're not even going to submit for the challenge, so I will just ride this tribe out until we get rid of the both of them. I predict that there is a swap after this round because then it will be 15 which is the perfect time to swap into 3 tribes of 5. If not, I believe that we'll go till 14 to swap into two tribes of 7. Then, we'll merge at 11. I predict that Mac, Jay, and I will be able to survive till swap, but I'm not sure how I could begin to survive a merge. Maybe if I'm put on a tribe with either Dylan, Paolo, or Austin. I can make a pull on pre-existing relationships, but I will definitely have to give up control to them.

My tribe is filled with people who never learned how to read rules properly. Alex really said "I didn't know I had to put them in a doc." Like,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, I am exhausted. Why can't people rise to my level? Is that too hard to ask? And! Alex said something in the tribe chat which means he's actively ignoring my messages and for why? This doesn't make any sense to me at all. Are they purposefully throwing their social games down the toilet? This is what I get for being on a tribe with all men.

There’s an hour left in the challenge. I feel like we have a chance but also think we will lose. I’m worried but I know if we go back to tribal I’m the least likely to go home. That’s king shit. ✌️😙

I am sad because I know Czern wouldn't have disappointed me like this. Jay told me that Mac or Alex allegedly said that Ben was good at challenges. Where is that? Such bullshit.

Also Alex really didn't even attempt the videos nor the high point items, huh? Ugh

Yay we flopped again x IM GETTING TRIGGERED FROM MY LAST SURVIVOR ORG!! Anyways. I am the swing vote without people realising which is hot. I’ve decided Ben needs to leave since he costed us the challenge by not submitting. I have to break it gently to Alex since he’s good mates with Ben. This also means people won’t see me as playing both sides. Woohoo. I’m not going home.

Ben is leaving because he didnt do the challenge and he doesn't talk to anyone and if Raffy wasn't on this tribe I honestly have no idea what I'd do. Pls swap soon thanks

WE WON AGAIN. wow I’m so proud of this tribe. I truly did not expect us to not go to tribal just because it’s a double tribal. Wow I’m just so proud of us. I feel like we are a very cohesive tribe too. We really vibe.

WE WON IMMUNITY *Happy dances* I feel really good about my tribe now! I really like Jessie now which I didn't think would happen but we've clicked finally. We made an agreement not to vote each other out for now. Zach is such a sweetheart and I love him. Paolo is a lil inactive because he's busy but I love his determination to contribute. Dylan is a literal fucking genius They are super intelligent and I'm so impressed. Austin is like a big ? for me if we lose I'll probably vote for him... I'm praying for a swap right now, I would like to meet new people and make more bonds before merge and then I can make some moves!

AHAHAHAHAHA 😂 -screams - so after me complaining a lil last confessional about my tribe being missing in action they came out of no where and we snagged the win. I’m currently vibing with Liam who seems to be as big of a book nerd as me . I love just finding people I get good vibes from . Still searching everyday for advantage items I’ll never stop looking for those because I never know when people will decide I’m no longer an asset. I will keep trying my hardest in each challenge 💕 we got this Tituba tribe . I’m lowkey proud of us all for snatching the win . Also my hair smells like milk I need to shower .

So we have to go to tribal I’m a little nervous bc there is always a chance you can go when you’re at tribal but it gives you the rush you crave. I have my 4 person alliance with Gizmo,Cameron and Keegan leaving Eve and Lukas in minority and I would love to stay loyal to it if they are loyal to it as well. I trust Gizmo he seems like a stand up guy Keegan seems sketchy but I trust him more then Cameron tbh. I know Gizmo has a good relationship with Lukas so I’m hoping he can keep Lukas from saying my name. I was wanting to Target Eve this tribal however I’m sure things are bound to get messy and with me and eves history she might just be petty and try to get the votes on me but I told her that if the vote is based on the challenge it should be Keegan and hopefully Keegan is the Decoy vote and gets 1 or 2 votes but ideally right now the 4 person alliance sticks together and votes Eve and Lukas can vote with us too so we can look unified and everyone can feel unified going into a potential swap. I’m gonna keep my options open come swap time bc the only person I trust 100 percent on this tribe is Gizmo idk if that’s his social game being so good but I don’t think he is playing me. So right now it’s looking like Eve will go but I’m sure if eve even has an inkling that she is getting votes then she will stir up trouble and I’m ready for trouble

Well everything has been super slow since we keep winning lol. I mean k love winning but it sometimes doesnt show where you stand really on your tribe. Jessie I trust 100% and I wanna work with liam and dylan too. I know zach paolo and dylan all know each other tho so I wanna break that up if I can before swap guess we will just have to see what happens after tribal

My alliance is voting out Ben. It is the easiest and least complex vote. I do not believe anyone would want to do anything else. It's really just that simple. I doubt this boy is even going to vote lmao

Tonight is first tribal. I hope everyone *sticks to the plan.* Eve is supposed to go home as far as I know. I had to lie to their face today....I don't like it. But! Its how the game is played. Its not personal, its drag.

[holidayjoecoffee]

Varcity Blues

This movie is a bit of a headscratcher. It’s like it wants to have it all. It wants to be a sports movie. It wants to be a teen movie. And it wants to be edgy and somehow be North Dallas Forty or something. Look we get it, there’s some not so nice stuff that happens behind the scenes sometimes. Some coaches are assholes. Yeah, that’s all true. But it wants to cram all this messagey stuff rather than embracing what it should be- a high school football movie.

So before I go any further I should identify the players. James Van Der Beek plays the second- string quarterback, who gets no gametime whatsoever. I guess this is true of football. You’d think during a game or so during a season they’d play the backup, but I guess it depends on how good the team is and other factors. ANYWAY before I derail my review with minutiae let me stop right here. The quarterback, Billy Bob, Tweeter, and James, they’re all friends. James is also friends with pretty much everyone. He is a nice guy, and he really does come across like such a sweet guy and he’s a golden boy. He is very likable in this role, so it was easy to be all in and wanting him to do well.

His girlfriend is a real pill. She’s some gloomy pretentious girl. She and James seem to see football as merely a way to escape their town, which is pretty depressing when you think about it. And the townfolk seem to have nothing else on their mind, even the police, to their dereliction of duty. This does not portray small-town Texas in a very pleasant light, and if I were a Texan I would be a little displeased with its depiction. Not being a Texan (my wife says I have a long way to go to qualify), but having a fondness for this state, feel a little offended on their behalf.

Anywho, so bad boy coach (played menancingly by Jon Voight) treats his players poorly, has a win-at-all-costs mentality, and uses his players like they’re expendable. He’s got records for coaching, he has a statue. The stadium is named after him. He’s got most of the team’s respect, if grudging.

Okay maybe that’s too much of the plot. The movie gets a little hamfisted at points, and yeah James’ girlfriend is such a drag. James must even be a little bored by her because he takes the blonde girl up on her offer for time alone despite her, and her boyfriend. Blondie was the original quarterback’s girl. Well that’s kind of gross that he’d consider fucking her behind his back doesn’t make him quite as nice a dude as you thought, though. “hey (James’ character’s name) thanks for not fucking my girlfriend when I was still in hospital!!!”. Well it’s his one moment of weakness. He has a dick. We get it. Hormones.

The sporty moments are good, fun stuff. It’s melodramatic at times. THere are titties.

It could have been a burger, but instead they forced you to eat a little kale or some equally gross green vegetable along with your hot dog.

I give it 3 1/2 New Caanans out of 5.

(Oh and at the end James’ character narrates that they didnt’ remove the statue of the coach. Why would they? He still has those titles. And he never coached again. Okay, I guess. And James’ character never played football again. Wait, so the scholarship to brown wasn’t for football? For a sports movie, that makes me scratch my head. Most people play sports because they love it, and this kind of trashes the love of the game. Just using sports to get his way- he never loved football. Kind of an odd message in a sports movie, but typical of the kind of hamfisted edginess. Like the shoehorned in racial stuff. Oh that’s why he doesn’t play you. It has to be about race. I mean maybe, I don’t know, but that wasn’t really established, and then BOOM we’re expected to know that’s why. I don’t know, that felt very forced to me. And then he acts mad because James didn’t know that, but wouldn’t he be pissed if James HAD known all along that Brown was getting shafted? I’m probably way overthinking this movie.