#good thing there's the wayback machine! ;D

[britishchick09]

it sure is hard being a cec researcher nowadays! :/ ;)

[obscuretobyfox]

Pictured below is an actual image Toby Fox made for starmen.net's 2007 Fun-Fest! ..I have no words.

Upon further inspection, going to the link found in the image leads to a now-deleted page.

However, through the power of the Wayback Machine, we're actually able to see what this page said all the way back in 2007! "Everyone's named their favorite food "Poop" at least once. But do they understand the effect it has?

"Pokey, would you like some Poop? You don't like Poop? Well T-O-O B-A-D!"

What does this line mean?

Does it mean that Pokey is forced to eat the Poop? Is it that he has to watch his friend eat feces in front of him, while he watches in horror and embarassment that everyone seems to be enjoying themselves except him?

This is why he does all the terrible things he does. This is his motivation. Admist all the snake-slaying, dog-fighting heroes, if the good guys eat poop and laugh at you, wouldn't you turn to the evil side?

This is Pokey's true motivation.

"Poop."

This picture chronicles that fateful event.

ps - I have terrible organizational skills. This was also made entirely in MSPAINT. This entire picture is MUCH better viewed at 200%, unless you have really good eyesight. Trust me." - Toby Fox

(submitted by @spark-eee)

[jakowskis]

torchwood resources

just some stuff i've accumulated during this fixation :) hope it proves handy :D

ianto's-desktop (livejournal) - archived most of the things found on the torchwood website during season 1 and season 2; the only thing missing is the videos. / note: click the headers of the posts to see the full thing, or some stuff with appear incomplete. took me a sec to figure out, lol

speaking of the website...

season 1 website (archive.org)

season 2 website (archive.org) - unlike the s1 website, the bulk of the s2 site's content is pretty inaccessible through the wayback machine (at least for me; maybe i'm doing something wrong), so thank g-d for ianto's desktop

there's also a good amount of rebloggable site content in this person's tumblr tag.

season 1 declassified (youtube)

season 2 declassified (youtube)

season 1 commentaries (mega.nz)

torchwood books (google drive) - gonna be honest, i haven't tried to download any of these myself

border princes audiobook (read by eve) + all of the radio plays (archive.org)

torchwood magazines (beta.reddit) - download links for all of them! p fuckin kewl

torchwood official yearbook (archive.org)

herecomesthedrums (youtube) - account that started posting before the show came out and is chock full of promos, trailers, interviews... some real fun goodies in there

torchwood: up close (youtube) - handful of bts videos with the cast + crew

season 1 unreleased tracks (soundcloud) - the end of days ones hrhghgh

out of time unreleased tracks (soundcloud) - i absolutely adore the music in this ep so i was so happy when i found these

the torchwood fanpop - this has sooooooo much content like i scrolled for a loooooong time and never reached the bottom. lotta stuff i hadn't seen before, too. there's fun hd promo pics, pics of the cast, and a lot of extremely early 2010s edits, graphics, and fanvids. / note: i also had this page bookmarked + it's got different content than the main page so i'll link it

aaand under the cut i'm gonna dump some silly stuff i've collected of the cast. but yeah, there ya go :-)

gally 2015: zip files of someone's pictures of eve, naoko, and burn (livejournal)

gally 2015: someone's account of the torchwood panels + meeting the cast (everyone was there but gareth!) - naoko & burn's solo panels / autograph table chats + barrowman photo-op + the naoko&burn&eve group panel / barrowman solo panel + burn&eve joint panel

dragon con 2013 (flickr) - i found two albums: this one, and this one, which has torchwood cast images on the first and second pages.

burn at chicago tardis 2012 (flickr) - ehehe 2012-2013 burn gorman w his classy little outfits my beloved. this is just hq pictures of that event. burn's in a bunch at the top and some at the end of the second page

the hub 2009 (flickr) - some kind of torchwood event. gareth, burn, eve, kai, and tom are all there. i dunno

hvff 2018: 'insights from the whole cast'

hvff 2018: video of everybody goofing off (twitter)

gareth endorsing owandy teehee (twitter) - this is getting dumped here bc im gay

sigh. (blogspot) - pics from that one fuckin 08 panel where gareth & john made out like 5 times + gareth took his jeans off for some reason. i don't even go here but i feel like this is unfortunately historically relevant. also the fujoshis in the comments are really funny

incomplete but sizable lists of cons gareth's been to and john's been to, in case anyone wants to dig around for photos/footage of any of these. the other cast members (excluding burn, for some reason) all have pages on this site as well, but theirs are super incomplete so i won't bother linking

[thistlecatfics]

Do you have any early fandom blackcest fics? I feel like they’re all lost in the LJ wasteland :(

You know when you want to do something really well that you put it off until you have time? And then you keep putting it off until you're like ahhh this is way too late? Sorry anon you asked such a good question <3 <3

Sirius/Regulus

Five Fragments of an Obsidian Heart by bitterfic on LJ (2006)

There was never a first time with Sirius.  We had been in love for years before we ventured far enough away from the comfort of each other to learn that it was wrong.  That boys were not supposed to love boys, that brothers were not supposed to love brothers. 

This dark Regulus-centric story has my heart. Bitterfic was my favorite author, and all of her stuff is excellent (and still on LJ!)

With No Spine Intact by xylodemon originally on LJ, now on Ao3 (2008) (3.5k)

You can't always get what you want, even when you're Sirius Black.

Sirius/Regulus, Sirius/James, Sirius/Remus!! I love these three pairings together with maximal angst and minimal healthy communication.

7 Loves/7 Lives (i called you brother 7 times) by xylodemon originally on LJ, now on Ao3 (2006)

This is a thing that never should have started.

Absolutely iconic Regulus/Sirius which shaped my understanding of these characters so thoroughly.

Sense Memory by acidpop25 on LJ (2007)

This is the moment where the love story goes wrong, transcends star-crossed and becomes something different, becomes galaxy-crossed, universe-crossed; this is where the loving gets all tangled up.

PG rated Sirius/Regulus

Bellatrix/Sirius

i cannot run from my family (they're hiding inside of me) by mind-conundrum on LJ via wayback machine (2012)

Bellatrix would say he ruined her, but that would be giving him far too much credit.

Gorgeous short Bellatrix/Sirius.

Perfection and the Lines We Cross by formerlydf on LJ (2006)

Bella commits incest like it's a hobby, and she prefers having the beautiful to being beautiful.

Such a good Bellatrix! and includes SO many iconic lines.

Le Morte by Alyx Bradford on LJ (2005)

Bellatrix, the oldest daughter, was sixteen when her father and uncle informed her that she would wed her cousin Sirius.

Arthurian legend Sirius/Bellatrix

Narcissa/Bellatrix

A Sister's Mercy by kethlenda on IJ (2007)

What she does not expect is what she knows she should have expected: sunken cheeks; matted, tangled hair; bloodshot eyes in deep-shadowed circles. For a moment she thinks that Bella has lost her beauty. But then she smiles. Smiles, and speaks. “Cissy.” A sibilant whisper that is both name and title.

D/s Narcissa/Bellatrix with Domme Narcissa

Dear Narcissa by bitterfig on LJ (2008)

The tangled skein of love and hate among the sisters Black.

Narcissa tells Andromeda about Bellatrix at her funeral.

100 word Blackcest drabbles & more of them here by bitterfig

[vimesbootstheory]

U, V

Ooh yay, thank you for sending this :D

U: Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much.

I'm gonna stick with CK/KK fic writers because that's where my mind is immersed right now and also it is particularly impressive when CK/KK fic is good enough that I can sit and read and enjoy it and not get stupidly competitive, which unfortunately is my default mode.

GoldStarGrl -- For their compelling emotional arcs and character exploration, and really excellent dialogue and character moments that feel very real. They have not once given me the "HE WOULD NOT FUCKING SAY THAT" feeling, which is pretty rare in this fandom.

mostpeculiarmademoiselle -- Manages to write lawrusso in an emotionally satisfying way every time, whether it's sweet romance or ngl very hot smut. A go-to for a quick read.

pinkgrapefloyd -- So fucking funny AND wonderfully in-character. We've all read Anti-Hero but don't sleep on Ambidextrous, either. I almost never laugh aloud while reading but these fics make me laugh multiple times per chapter.

V: If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

I mean, if I wanted to do that, I would probably just do it.

Okay, I've scoured my bookmarks and my old diigo account and the only answer I've come up with is a prequel to the due south fic "All the Comforts of Home", which awwww man it's offline! I bet I could find it on the Wayback Machine but oh man that makes me paranoid about old favourites. Anyway it's a fic that has my favourite version of Fraser and RayK living together in the NWT, from the perspective of Vecchio, and for reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture (ha) Fraser and RayK aren't allowed to talk to each other for some predetermined time, in order to follow some cultural convention for getting married. Anyway, I could see a prequel to that being fun. But that's the thing, it's also wonderful on its own.

[go-to-the-mirror]

@a-mag-a-day

(taking the quotes from the official transcripts with all "John"s changed to "Jon"s because it's more reliable and... stuff. there's also cws at the top of them)

Anyway, this is mostly a stream of consciousness ramble as I listen to the episode, featuring being sad about Jon Sims, talking some more about how the fear entities work, some Lines that I am very eyes emoji towards, and Lorell St John defending.

Also here's a meta that I really like that is sorta related to this episode. Here is is on the wayback machine, and here is the previous meta.

"iT wAs SuPPosED tO bE a GlOriOuS dAY" sorry ive heard this ad so much-

I like Georgie, I just wish that she liked Jon. Like, I understand why she left, but it just makes me really sad, like couldn't she just give him a chance?

ARCHIVIST (weakly) That's a very good question.

HE MAKES A GREAT ENTERANCE! DRAMATIC BASTARD :3

ARCHIVIST Six... Uh, the others? T-Tim, is he...? ... Oh.

:(

ARCHIVIST Honestly, I, I think I'm alright. (Georgie sighs deeply) ARCHIVIST I mean, that's... good, right? I- GEORGIE After a six-month long coma? No, it's not. This isn't how it's supposed to go, Jon. ARCHIVIST I- What? You'd prefer I was brain damaged? D-Dead? BASIRA Jon... ARCHIVIST What? BASIRA Georgie, could you give us a minute? There are some things we should probably discuss? GEORGIE (Irritated) Fine. ARCHIVIST Georgie, I- GEORGIE Jon, if this really is a second chance, please try to take it. But I don't think that it is. ARCHIVIST Georgie, I don't--! GEORGIE Take care of yourself. (The Archivist sighs and attempts to speak.) [Door opens and closes as Georgie leaves.] ARCHIVIST What about you? Disappointed to see me alive? Basira? BASIRA We can deal with it later. ARCHIVIST Yeah, okay.

HE WOKE FROM A COMA LESS THAN FIVE FUCKING MINUTES AGO-

Like, this is my worst fucking nightmare, two people I'm reasonably close with saying or heavily implying that they'd prefer I was dead what the fuck. Just the way he sounded like he was yk, making a joke asking Basira and she doesn't respond, and he asks again and she just says they'll deal with it later and-

WHAT THE FUCK ITS BEEN LESS THAN FIVE MINUTES. I-

[Image ID: A drawing of someone leaning forward in a chair, horrified. /End ID]

ARCHIVIST (The Archivist takes a deep breath) Statement of, uh... uh... Lorell St John, regarding, uh... (small chuckle) zombies. Original statement given 1st February 2015. Recording by Jonathan Sims, the Archivist.

I remember I LOST MY MIND at that part, at him calling himself the Archivist, but I didn't message anything to my friend, and I didn't share it on my story, but I was VERY abnormal about that. Oh boy. Just um. OH BOY

People always used to tell me I was solipsistic. They said that I never really engaged with other people, never acted like they really existed or mattered, at least not in the same way that I did. And I suppose in many ways they were right. It’s hard to explain without sounding stupid. Obviously other people are real, obviously the, the way a building is real or my watch is real. They exist. If people weren’t real, I’m, I’m sure I would find them much less of a chore. So no, I don’t “not believe in other people”. I just find it very difficult to feel for others. I can’t understand them and they’ve always seemed… Well, there’s no tactful way to say it, they’ve always just seemed a little bit pointless. I know what my pain feels like, and I know what my joy feels like, but when I see those same things on the faces of my friends or my enemies, I feel… Well, that’s it, isn’t it? I don’t really feel anything

Like... same. Yk, low empathy. Just... makes you feel more distant. And it's fine, it's not a bad way to be, it's just a way to be. But... yeah I mean. Yeah. I relate to the statement giver. Lorell St John defense club. She did a lot wrong, but she isn't... a terrible person, she just did some stuff wrong. She hurt people, but like, she isn't irredeemable and... I like her. Like okay, if we're going to defend Jon even if he's hurt people knowing full well they'd be terrified, relying on them to be terrified, then I'm pretty sure we can defend Lorell for hurting people who she didn't think were people. I have feelings about her.

I like the idea that they are actually real but that her fear of them not being real manifested in something actually not being real and, in her mind, confirming that she was right, that she's the last real human out there.

There's a lot of stuff here that can point to different fears because Smirke's 14 isn't ,the end all be all, yada yada, gender. Maybe The Spiral, because she thinks she's the only one that can see them which could have led to her doubting her own perception of things, but she doesn't. Could be The Lonely, because she sometimes found herself alone, in a room only with those zombies, similar to MAG 108 - Monologue, which is similarly iffy on its placement in Smirke's framework. Word of God says it's The Stranger, which it could very well be, things that are not human infiltrating society, that's pretty Stranger. I have also seem the interpretation that they're The Extinction. Fear of humanity being gone, and something else in its place. I... I think that it's a mix of The Lonely, The Stranger, and The Extinction, but there are plenty of different interpretations, and the author is dead, so take its placement in The Stranger playlist as canon or not, your choice.

I first saw him in the street. It wasn’t difficult to guess what he was, half the people around him were just as hollow and soulless, but there was something else to him.

This could point to all the other "zombies" being just Lorell thinking they were zombies, and not actually being soulless. Perhaps.

Had he taken Norma’s self, her, her soul? Or had she always been a zombie, cramped into her little open plan desk, patiently listening to client complaints, and I just hadn’t noticed?

I can see why The Spiral could be an interpretation of this. Not trusting her own perceptions, could Norma have always been a zombie? Can Lorell trust any "real" people if she didn't notice that Norma was a zombie?

They’re all like that now. You’re all like that, I suppose. I have no reason to believe anyone will read this who would be any different, no reason to believe you’ll be able to read this, that you won’t simply stare blankly at this page before performing your response, your artificial opinion. There is every chance that I am the only one left, and the whole world has fallen to a soulless horde, devoid of life and feeling.

And here's where The Extinction comes in. Is she alone in like a different world, a domain of The Stranger, Lonely, Extinction, or whatever? Just surrounded by the empty shells of humans just like she feared. He fears manifested by The Fears, and turned into "[her] own private hell" (bonus points for anyone who knows where that's from). And that leads me on to the point of... well, Avatars aren't the only ones who can shape The Fears. Her fear of being alone surrounded by empty soulless husks seems to have manifested into being alone surrounded by empty soulless husks. I think that's really interesting.

Even so, thank you for pretending to care.

This line just makes me sad. She knows -- or believes -- she's completely alone, and the only interactions she can get are from things she knows -- or believes -- aren't human, aren't even alive, not properly. I'm just... really sad about Lorell St John. God, get her a hug, and a real life human friend, and some actual help from a real life human person... But it's too late for that, isn't it. Either they're not real, and she's in the real world, and she believes wholeheartedly that no one around her is real -- which is actually the better of the two situations -- or she's in a different world, surrounded by people who aren't people, and... well, her fear at being the last one left, her fear of the people who aren't people surrounding her, her isolation... well, I'm sure it's a feast for The Fears. I don't think they're likely to let her go any time soon.

It can be hard, though, sometimes, other, other people. Feelings. I-I’m trying to focus, trying to make sure I’m the same me as before, but how can anyone really remember that? How do you know you’re the same person that went to sleep?

Low empathy Jarchivist rights?

This gets me thinking about the whole teleportation thing, and not being the same person, just being killed and reconstructed exactly the same. What makes you you? Is it your memories? The actual, physical stuff that makes up your body? Is it something else? Is it just a feeling? I like thinking about stuff like that. Metaphysics is interesting.

ARCHIVIST I don’t… Music. Everything was wrong. Gertrude was there and then… dancing? I think? Then… pain, and I was somewhere else. Dreaming

You were somewhere else you say. Interesting. I'm sure that turn of phrase won't come up ever again. /s

To transcribe from messages to Jay Mapleejay (follow owl pls ty)

KILLING AND MAIMING "Somewhere else" EE And that's like his spooky dream hellscape Obviously you know, you've listened to the same podcast i have AND THEN LIKE OBVIOUSLY THE SOMEWHERE ELSE IN EPISODE 200 LIKE 👀UHH UH UH UH

So, that's interesting in a completely normal way.

(Oh funnily enough in an earlier message on that topic I said "I'm gonna make a tumblr post about this. At some point." so. yep)

Oh and some other thinking about the first 3 episodes about season 4 things:

what RIGHT did the first three episodes of tma [season 4] have to be: 1. Emotionally damaging 2. HAVE UH THAT??? THAT??? [referring to the somewhere else thing] 3. *dying in parallels* 4. low/no empathy character <3 she's just like me fr 5. FUCK YOU FUCK YOU DID YOU THINK YOU COULD GET AWAY FROM THE BRAIN THINKING HAHAHAHAHAH L

Jay said "relistening to tma is a form of torture /hj" and I have to agree tbh. I'm in emotional pain.

ARCHIVIST (Darkly) What did he do to Martin?

*points* GAY

Well, I guess we should probably let one of the nurses know I’m awake. I’m sure they have all sorts of tests to do, make sure I’m not a zombie or a…

Or a what Jon?

ARCHIVIST (Calling) Oh, or a cup of t- ... Okay.

AND HERE WE END, VERY SAD, JONS HAVING A BAD TIME, SOMETHINGS GOING ON WITH MARTIN, AND NOTHING IS OKAY! Perfect start to season 4 :) depression, the season.

[lord-of-the-ducks]

Ok so I had already been thinking about doing this for a while, but I guess the confirmation that the season 4 leaks are real pushed me over the edge. Long story short, my dumb ass decided that today would be a great day to research the timeline of production for What We Do in the Shadows in an attempt to see if I could spot any patterns, and then use that information to predict when season 4 will be released. I don’t know why I thought that this would be a good idea, given that I hate math, but I did it anyway.

This entire endeavor took me a minimum of six hours. I didn’t keep track, but it was something like that. 

Before I give any estimates, I’d like to make a few disclaimers:

1. I am currently taking a statistics class, but it’s the easiest one available at my school. I’ve always been more into English and history, math and science have never been my strengths. So, it is pretty much 100% guaranteed that I fucked up somewhere. I’m willing to bet that if someone who actually understands statistics were to take a look at my process, they would cry.

2. I had a pathetically small data set. There were only three seasons to work with, and sometimes, I either wouldn’t have anything for a certain season or I would have to exclude obvious outliers. Speaking of that last one,

3. The past two years have been a fucking nightmare and have screwed up a lot of things, especially tv production, so this wasn’t as easy as just calculating the average amount of days it took from the end of one season to the beginning of the next. 

I’ll be including everything I used at the end of this post in case anyone does actually want to double check everything I did, and perhaps make their own calculations without spending 2 hours watching every single WWDITS video on the FX channel.

So, into the juicy details:

We’ll probably get an official teaser around the end of February or the beginning of March. Probably the beginning of March

The official trailer for season 4 will come after that, probably in mid March

Season 4 will hopefully start airing sometime in mid April. I’m more confident about this than the dates for the teaser and trailer. Mainly because the variables that I used to calculate this felt much more consistent. 

Again, these are all estimates based off of somewhat shaky numbers, but I think it’ll be really cool to see if I was correct. Also, now that I’ve gotten a lot of this busy work out of the way, I can hopefully use all of this data for potential future seasons and make better predictions about when we can expect them to arrive. 

DATA (DM me if you have trouble opening something)

Calendar: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-1Fps43nBgV2ZIK-9BhfMLwiM3hC64OEgW7ORqZSZbE/edit#gid=935356133

Calculations: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Dbk_6XQycls7UG-n4iASZK4Wuu3KyFs5TKdlqqnd-F8/edit#gid=0

Production Timeline: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NYkgXEOKKmSyjA7Es27rgp87oc3r-RrkVEvjmwbumRU/edit 

I got all of the dates for the timeline from social media accounts of people involved with the show, and the filming dates in particular from using the wayback machine on the IATSE 873 website, which basically shows who’s filming in Toronto and when. 

Also, by the time this goes up, it’ll hopefully have the amount of days between each of the days so that anyone who actually does like statistics can just do some simple addition and not have to spend like, 30 minutes plugging everything into a website that counts the days between dates. I want it to be as easy as possible for people to check my work

[avaantares]

I have been involved in online fandoms since my mid-teens, which is when (dialup) internet access became widely available in my city. Fandom then consisted of newsgroups, listservs, the occasional AOL chat room, and paper mailing lists. Zines were photocopied and stapled packets that you paid for by check or postal money order (remember those?). I still have a few from the late '90s.

Back then, I wrote fanfiction and doodled fanart in my school notebooks, but I was so busy with class and extracurricular activities that I never found time to finish them. Now, I own my own business and have more control of my schedule, so if I want to write a 330K fanfic based on a video game or create works of fanart or run an Etsy shop with fandom-inspired merch, I can do it.

Should I be kicked out of fandom participation just because I'm over 40? The thousands of readers who have left comments on my stories on AO3 don't seem to think so. The people who buy my prints and stickers on Etsy aren't complaining about my age.

My mother, who turns 70 this year, is also a fan of many things and frequently attends Gen Con (the world's largest gaming convention). She raised me on Star Trek episodes (which she manually recorded on videocassette from their rerun broadcasts in the early '80s) and rock concerts (she was an industry journalist for many years).

Guess what? She's also on Tumblr.

Gatekeeping for any reason is not a good look, but it's especially petty and self-centered to try to kick out the group of people who walked so you could run. The older individuals involved in fandom are the ones who literally coined the terms you still use today ("slash" fic? "Mary Sue"? original Star Trek zines, circa late 1960s-70s) and built the fandom platforms and community infrastructure you now rely on. Even my generation -- which is not the earliest, by a long stretch -- started out manually coding HTML fan pages and transitioned through webrings, site builders, early blog hosting, the invention of fanfiction.net, the rise and fall of LiveJournal, the development of CMS, the advent of social media, the establishment of the OTW and AO3, and more to get where we are today in online fandom.

(My Tripod fan pages from 1996 on are still archived on the Wayback Machine. I ran a desktop wallpaper site, among other things; the largest images were 800 x 600 resolution, because that's the biggest screen size that was available then.)

We did not fight the Great Viacom War of 1995 (look it up, kids) to be told that we are not allowed to participate in the very fandom spaces we defended from corporate lawyers and their C&D orders. We built this city to house our interests, and we intend to enjoy it to the fullest as long as we can.

But don't worry -- if you're a younger fan, you're welcome to play on our lawns and join us in the fandom realm. We won't kick you out just because you weren't there in the beginning. Everyone should be welcome in the fan community -- young, old, different, diverse. Even old grannies, if they want to.

You're not embarrassed being an old woman and being in tumblr? I would rather die that my grannies have an actual account on tumblr for celebrities rho

Why would I be embarrassed for having interests I enjoy? My guess is that you’re really, really young. And that maybe you don’t actually have solid relationships with adults who have lives outside of parenting or work. But I hope for you that when you’re my age you have hobbies that bring you happiness. And that by that point you realize that trying to shame someone for being an adult only makes you look too immature to be in adult spaces, which Tumblr is.

When I was 20, I loved music, making art, writing and reading good stories, fashion, talking about popular culture, making friends, going to concerts… You’d be surprised how little changes when you’re my age. I just have way more money and time to enjoy those things now. I’m only 55. I’m not dead. I’m also not a “granny”, but even if I was, I’d probably still like all of those things.

Ageism isn’t cute, love. And I sure don’t ever see people telling men they shouldn’t go to football games or have their little “fantasy football leagues” or wear their favorite player’s merch. For every comment you guys like to say is misogynistic (but isn’t), this is one that really reeks of it.

[britishchick09]

claudie from the ag website last night! :D

[n-brio]

What A Crash Bandicoot Character Can Teach Us about Toxic Relationships

This fantastic article by Cole D from plumjuicegaming unfortunately went down with the site it was hosted on. Luckily, the Wayback Machine archived a copy, which I now share with my fellow N. Brio fans on tumblr. ^w^

Note that it was written in Aug. 2019, before the announcement/release of It's About Time. Text in (italics and parentheses) was a caption for an image that is no longer viewable.

Video game platforming villains are repetitive, predictable clowns.

As much as I love them—and I do—these characters do the same thing every single time. They kidnap a princess or steal a MacGuffin or attempt to seize power in some kingdom, and they never. Change. Course.

Of course I'm mainly talking about the ones who appear in more than one game, so I can't be too hard on the Lord Fredriks or the Sorceresses of the world, however one-note they may be. You know who comes to mind when I say "platformer villain"—Bowser, Eggman, Dr. Wily, King K. Rool...all of these jerks try the same thing over and over, and they just never seem to truly give up, even when their skin melts off in a pool of lava.

It's sort of an inevitability of the genre, you could say; most platformers don't have super involved stories, so when you need to crank out an Excuse Plot for the ninth installment of your jump'n'run franchise, you usually don't feel the need to pull out all the stops in the villain department. You stick with what's familiar, with what the fans will recognize. It's why the Mario series never branches out with new bad guys anymore. It's why we're still seeing Dr. Wily after all of these years. It works, people like these characters, so the developers keep on using 'em! No problem, right?

Well, no, not really. I mean, I freaking love Bowser. And when King K. Rool was replaced by a walrus copy of himself, that decision was met with cold disappointment. Usually, there's no problem with using the same villain over and over again—not at all.

But the way the Crash Bandicoot series does this is...interesting. On the surface it fallows the same practice as your Marios and your Mega Men: you've got Neo Cortex as the main villain in nearly every game, with a rotating cast of misfits serving as henchmen for boss fights. But there's one dork who stands out as the one guy who called it quits, seemingly, for good. Of course, I'm talking about Dr. Nitrus Brio.

(He doesn't have one screw loose, but he is a little nuts.)

You may not remember if you haven't played the games in a while, but this guy was once just about as important as Cortex. The two doctors stood side-by-side and worked together to create crazy mad scientist stuff like deranged kangaroos and gun-toting weasels, and Brio even served as the penultimate boss in Crash 1 instead of siccing another mutant on the poor bandicoot. The problem was that Cortex never really seemed to respect the contributions that Brio made to their work—he took credit for the Evolvo-Ray, the device that mutated all of Cortex and Brio's minions as well as Crash Bandicoot himself. Brio never had the self-esteem to step up and claim ownership despite the fact that he invented the thing.

Fast forward to Crash 2: Cortex Strikes Back. We see Brio again, via hologram, and he finally airs his grievances out loud to a very confused Crash. We learn that he invented the Evolvo-Ray, and that he's now developed an intense hatred for Cortex as a direct result. Brio gets his revenge on Cortex by having Crash gather up the gems, and the frenemies use their energy to destroy his spaceship.

And that...was the end of N. Brio's story.

Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, the most popular game in the franchise, did not feature N. Brio in the slightest. Crash Team Racing doesn't even offer him as a racer. His and Cortex's union was now just a memory, like a middle school friendship that fizzles out before ninth grade. It's strange, too, because CTR even brought back some characters who had been long abandoned, like Papu Papu and Pinstripe. But they didn't think to include the guy who created Crash?

The thing about the Crash Bandicoot series is that villain characters are rarely retired. You'd be hard pressed to find a game after Crash 1 that doesn't feature Tiny Tiger, Dingodile or N. Gin in some way, to say nothing of Cortex himself. So why did this once-prominent figure go gently into the night? Why did Naughty Dog throw him away like a broken beaker?

Well, I believe that Nitrus Brio was less a villain in this scenario, and moreso a victim. A victim of a toxic relationship with Dr. Neo Cortex, who stole his inventions and never showed even a modicum of respect for his colleague. That's why after settling the score in Crash 2, Brio removed himself from the situation—there was no longer anything to be gained by involving himself in the affairs of Cortex or Crash or Nitrous Oxide because he'd had enough. He'd done everything there was to do at this point—playing the villain? Didn't go so well. Siding with Crash? Worked out pretty great, but now that was done. Brio never really had a reason to return to center stage of a Crash game, so like any autonomous human being would do, he decided to end his involvement with all parties.

This might seem silly given that, well, this is a silly series—a series where most of the villains you fight are mutated animals who speak with accents or broken English. A series where you collect fruits to get extra lives like you're some kind of ape with a tie. In other words, it's a cartoony platformer—the developers Naughty Dog probably weren't intending to include subtext of an abusive partnership, were they?

I would argue that this doesn't matter.

Regardless of authorial intent, N. Brio's story is inspiring. Have you ever been friends with someone who never seemed to care about you or your accomplishments? Has anyone ever taken credit for something you've done, whether that be at work or in your personal life? N. Brio was in a situation just like this, and he...just left.. No coming back for round three, not even coming back for the fun kart racer where even the Japanese bootleg character was invited! Why would he want to race go-karts with the man who stole his inventions and wasted years of his life? No, as far as Naughty Dog was concerned, that was where Brio's tale ended. That was the last we were to see of the Simpsons-looking scientist, and that was for the best. Perhaps he went on to become a bartender, or a disc jockey, or even a well-regarded inventor in his own right—as long as he was away from Cortex, I'm sure he was happy.

It's just too bad that the other developers didn't pick up on this.

Now, I know: this is all just fan interpretation to begin with. There's no real evidence that Naughty Dog strictly intended for Crash 2: Cortex Strikes Back to be Brio's final appearance for the rest of time (though I could argue that leaving him out of the all-star kart racer was pretty damning). This is just how I've come to understand the character over the years, but regardless of what I thought or wanted, N. Brio would go on to appear in several games after the Crash Bandicoot series left the hands of Naughty Dog.

And I think that's kind of a shame.

The very first post-ND game was Crash Bash, and wouldn't you know it—Brio's back, aligned with Cortex once again like nothing ever happened. Yeah, it's a party game, but it still has a story justifying its events in-universe, and with only eight playable characters it would have been so easy to throw in Pinstripe or Komodo Joe or the freaking hog from the first game to take his place on the roster. But as if to intentionally poke a hole in my entire theory, Eurocom reintroduced N. Brio and deleted any kind of progression he might have made in his past two appearances. He was Cortex's buddy once again, fighting for the evil side! Woohoo!

Next was Twinsanity, and this game has the decency at the very least not to partner him up with Cortex again. Instead, he works with Dr. N. Tropy to find...treasure, or something, and gets defeated by Spyro (this was a weird game). It's not an awful portrayal, but frankly, unnecessary. Why is Brio involving himself with these rejects again? When has he ever been motivated by wealth? Didn't this game have enough villains already? At the end of the day, I can only be thankful that he and Cortex weren't buddy-buddy again—although partnering up with someone who was still allied with Cortex is...an odd strategic decision.

Brio's final appearance, and likewise the series's final appearance for about eight years was in Mind over Mutant, an even weirder game than Twinsanity that has South Park cutscenes and self-aware humor. For once I believe he was actually done a little bit of justice. He's back with Cortex, but this is actually portrayed as an anomalous development in the dynamic of the characters—it's made clear that Cortex and Brio were not on good terms prior to the events of this game.. He's gone slightly mad like any good scientist should be, constantly taking credit for things he didn't invent in a humorous over-correction of his previous passive nature. It's also pretty funny that drinking from strange beakers, something he did in his original boss fight for practical purposes, is now something that he just does for fun. It could just be his portrayal by the always-fantastic Maurice LaMarche, but I really like this take on Brio. If they couldn't leave him be, at least they gave him a continuation that made sense for his character.

(All of these screenshots are from the same game.)

Personally I tend to ignore Brio's appearances in later games (but I don't ignore the games themselves—how does that work?). I think his story was told best in the span of two games, and also by nature of his absence in the following two. There's no need to bring back every single character who's ever appeared, whether you're in charge of a dumb video game franchise or an HBO original series, just because you want to have fan service and continuity nods in a shallow attempt at recreating the good old days. A healthy balance of old and new is always best, and if something seems to be a relic of the past, maybe that's for a reason.

So what can we learn from Dr. Nitrus Brio? I think it's important to realize that if you find yourself in a toxic or abusive relationship, whether it be personal or professional, it's always best to leave that relationship behind. Of course, this is sometimes hard for those who rely on their abusers for financial support. Some don't even know that they're in an unhealthy situation until it's too late. Whatever the case, it can be a complicated, sticky mess; but at least N. Brio shows that if you're given a clear out, you should just take it. That's advice I live by, and N. Brio deserves all the credit for that.

[no-disco]

Sounds, 27th June 1981. Photos by Virginia Turbett

transcription under the cut

photos and article taked from sacreddm.net on the wayback machine

  Five months ago the prospect of doing an interview shut inside an airless, sterile studio would have made Depeche Mode run all the way home to Basildon. But then five months, as Wowington Woy would say, is a long time in the wacky world of wock and woll. One look at Vince Clarke sitting confidently behind the mixing desk and shorts-sporting Martin Gore’s welcoming smile and I knew things would be hunky dory.

  Dan “The Man” Miller quickly ordered Martin back in front of the mike to contribute his part to the now characteristic Mode quasi-barbershop harmonics on a new track which might be the new single, or possibly the start of the (gasp) album.

  “I just can’t get enough, I just can’t get enough,” sung Mart.

  But he had, and stopped for a cuppa and a chat.

  Les Moders, as I’ve hinted, are now 100% more confident, talkative, witty and brighter than all other known brands of washing powder. (Shurely shome mishtake?) Vince set his synth onto random programming to break the icky atmosphere and we commenced. How appropriate! With one record set straight – ie Depeche Mode aren’t shy, incommunicative, fragile young things at all, here’s the official mode of pronunciation: Depech-ay, if you please. “It’s probably grammatically wrong,” said Vince. “But we like it that way.” [1]

  Okay. Depecheeee Mode are laying down lotsa new tracks, having come to a halt after mucho gigging around London following the surprise success of “Dreaming Of Me” and even bigger surprise of “New Life”. Up until now Andy and Martin have had day jobs so the touring principle is only now an ongoing viability. Offers of the calibre of Classix and Toyah had been pouring in, but Vince reckoned it wasn’t the best thing for them to do at the time. Martin considered that the Classix tour may have tied them irrevocably to the futuromanticism tag which they’ve steadfastly been trying (unsuccessfully) to avoid.

  But of the bands who secured deals following the “Some Bizzare” LP, Depeche have fared the best: their simple, uncomplicated synthi-pop tunes are terribly hard to dislike, after all.

  “We had a sad day on Tuesday, though,” said David Gahan, crest suddenly fallen, “we expected “New Life” to go up a bit more. I think we all thought it wasn’t gonna do much at first, but inside… You can’t tell.”

  Funny, ’cos “New Life” is definitely even more instant than the debut… Vince: “It’s really up isn’t it.”

  David: “We learned a lot from “Dreaming”, came in here and just did a better job on the next one.”

  And that riveting little synth riff is still locked in my head, reminding me of God-knows-what. Just an old r&b riff, said Vince. No, it’s a good job they do have insistent hooks – David reckoned people have beaucoup de trouble remembering the name:

  “I bet they get to the shop and forget the name. They go on, hum the tune and say oh, can’t remember the name, I’ll have that Duran Duran one instead!”

  Andy Fletcher suggested Dep Mod as an abbreviation in fine Orch Man tradition. An imaginary lightbulb above Vince’s head suddenly fired him with a cracking good idea.

  “When your photographer comes,” he smirked, “can we have a picture taken in the back of Dan’s Renault? Just like Spandau Ballet? Only there’ll be five of us in the back, and we’ll all be squashed up like this…” (David imitates dead sardine)

  OK, wrench those tongues out of yer cheeks, boys. Mutemobile, indeed? It is true that they did well in the US Disco charts and have great appeal for Europe too… deals are currently being set up with several different majors to get Mode released in France, Germany et al. Many doubted the ability of Mute and Miller to break the Modes, but for an indie they’ve broken the required barriers.

  David: “We would much rather have had points than big advances, and we’ve got that with Daniel – he’s proved he can get us what we want, there’s nothing he can’t do – that we haven’t found out yet!”

  Andy: “Indies are at their height, they never used to get in the charts before.”

  David: “And radio stations are more likely to play indies.”

  Vince: “They have to pay less royalties!”

  David: “Radio One have been very good to us – 3 plays a day on this one. They said they’d stick with it, give it lots of airplay.”

  So from the insecure, nervous and unsure start, things have actually turned out as they’d hoped?

  Vince: “It has really. You learn things very quickly. With Mute we know everything that’s going on, we’re in contact with distributors, pluggers and promotion people every day.”

  Andy: “What we don’t know is what a major is like. We’re quite happy with our set up, but we don’t know if the distribution could be better.”

  Aah, but Rough Trade gets you into those little shops that the hordes of independent buyers frequent, you lucky boys.

  Andy then proceeded to go off at a tangent (this is not unusual), musing about how the band’s audiences had changed, become much younger. No-one else agreed.

  David: “We get a varied audience, you can’t say that at all!”

  Vince: “In clubs an’ that, the audience is already there, they haven’t come to see us.”

  David: “Don’t be silly! You can’t say everywhere we play has a fixed audience!”

  Andy: “You’re getting worse than Martin now… Martin hasn’t said one thing yet!”    Martin woke up. “I’m saving it up, it’s all going to come out in a minute, I’m just waiting for the right question.”

  We launched into a discussion about clubs, people not dressing up as much as they used to and the sight of Midge Ure sending lace-clad young girls into the water and into a frenzy at Crystal Pal last week.

  This caused much amusement.

  Andy: “That’s what Martin does!”

  Martin: “You’re asking for it, Fletch…”

  To avert a full-scale war, I mentioned my liking for the “Rio” mix of “Shout!”, B-Side of their first ever 12”. They love the rhythm, but the song? David loves it, Vince hates it, Martin says so-so. Humph. It’s the first dancefloor oriented thing they’ve done tho’, eh?

  Andy: “Apart from the things we did when we were Light Of The World…” Silence… laughter!

  They all paused to watch Daniel frowning in the control room, doubtless searching for that stray note out of tune. A conspiracy brewed. “What was that thing we wanted in Jaws about Daniel?” they whispered. “Nooooo – don’t put it in, he’d know it was us… if you say it, Andy, you’re the one – we all tried to stop you!” [2]

  Andy turned to me with a probing question. “Who told you about the folk group and church hall thing?” (Referring to a gossip item about their acoustic past). “We practised in a church hall, that’s all.” [3]

  And they’re recording in a deconsecrated church now! [4]

  David: “Yeah, we just love churches.”

  Martin: “You wait till you hear our new single – it’s a gospel song.”

  David: “It’s called “Have You Got The Sunshine Smile”.”

  Andy sung the words, gesticulating his finger at his smiling lips in Sunday School teacher style.

  David: “On the picture bag, there’s Andy’s face, and when you press his nose, a finger comes out and there’s Martin inside showing the actions. Martin doing the Mode!”

  And they chorused: “Have you got the sunshine HA-HA-HA HEE HEE.” I think this is what we in the trade call a joke…

  On entering studiospace, I’d noticed Darryl, Fan Club President and original Silicon Teen, scribbling away replies to D Mode fan mail. Are they getting lots?

  David: “Not really. We were just trying to impress you! We were s’posed to have this Postman come in just after you with a great big sack!”

  Andy: “Yeah, binfuls of used biros, hard skin on our fingers where we’ve been writing so much!”

  Well, I saw at least ten letters.

  David: “A lot of them are really young. This 13 year old boy wrote us a story using words from the singles and sent us some badge designs.”

  Vince: “We’re pop! Ultra pop!”

  Andy: “People write to us from up North but they haven’t seen us. We want to branch out from London, but first we must rehearse new material, we’ve been doing the same set for 4 months. The live show should be better, more danceable.”

  Daniel looked quizzical again. The boys told him to stop listening in.

  Andy: “He’s a great man. Look – the ultimate picture of Daniel Miller, father of electronic music…”

  Vince: “Grandfather, more like.”

  Daniel the scolding father retorted, “I can hear you.”

  A man from ITV arrived to discus Dep Mod’s appearance on a 20th Century Box prog on the Essex music scene, past and present. Depeche are to be filmed live at Croc’s in Rayleigh, and filmed au naturel around Basildon, all to be shown sometime in August.

  “You can film my usual Saturday morning routine,” joked David. “Have a sauna, go to a brothel, then a commando course… Nah, it’ll be Andy waking up at 5am, having ’is toast and going down the newsagents for his paper round. Boys next door!” He concluded, sensibly: “It doesn’t matter if we’re sitting on the loo – a minute on tele is better than a thousand radio plays.”

  Andy came over all pensive again, wondering why so many of their interviews spent more time talking about Daniel than the band.

  “There’s nothing really that people can say about us is there? All other bands go on about political things, we don’t talk about our views.”

  Dave: “We don’t have political views, I don’t think.”

  Andy: “There’s always an extrovert member of a band with strong views.” [5]

  Vince: “We don’t stand for anything united do we?”

  Andy: “We haven’t got a person who’s domineering.”

  David: “That’s good!”

  Andy: “On the other hand, that’s why our interviews are very empty, ’cause usually the loudmouth of a band goes on about what the Labour party are doing or something.”

  Martin: “Sexism always comes up too, especially with HM bands.”

  David: “They always talk about sex.”

  Vince: “It’s all that macho stuff.”

  Macho. Dep Mod certainly aren’t Macho. Now they were in a more reflective mood, I asked what their immediate hopes for the future were.

  Chorus: “Ultimate success!”

  David: “We’re happy as it is, we’d just like some money.”

  Vince: “We want to change our sound, get some new stuff together, get a good live show.”

  Vince: “We don’t want to get like Kraftwerk, we don’t want to use tapes any more. We’ve got a rhythm unit with a TV screen that plays Space Invaders as well!” [6]

  Andy: “We want to give the show more of an aura.”

  David: “Down the Bridgehouse?!”

  Now there’s a thought… anything else?

  David: “Yes, Andy would love to have a cult following, be underground. We have gigs in here when Vince is getting down on the mixer, and Andy sings! Things get on top of you in the studio – you have to do something to let it all go, so we come in here and scream and shout.”

  The lads played me a tape of impromptu raw electro-punk with Crass-style vocals by Andy, featuring a cover version of “Simple Simon Says”, “You’re Gonna Lose That Girl” and a sensitive rendition of a popular school hymn. There’s that religious influence again… But they need this relief valve from the precise orderliness required to produce their brand of neatly-packed pop songs – operating, generating new life for our pop kids.

  A lot of people know the name Depeche Mode now. Now you know who they are, what they are. Like their boss, they’re all heart – boys next door who turn into Ultra Popsters at the flick of a switch. Mode: strictly not avant-garde.

[mack3030]

This advice comes from the experience of a good friend of mine, who is a recolorist and converter. She creates all of her content either by recoloring the meshes of others or converting things from other 3D games and posting them with proper credit for FREE. She has a very specific taste and tends to convert or recolor items into things she would use for her own unique gameplay style, so needless to say most of her items are pretty original. [Also the person being spoken of will not be tagged anywhere in this post. :D] However, she recently decided "Hey, my pantry is a bit low in game. I'd really like to have some IRL food items in the Sims 4." So she made a few things, like Velveeta cheese, etc. Real brands, recolored from other people's meshes, that she wanted in her game. So she released them for free because she thought other people might want them. She is far from the first person to do so, I can think of plenty of other creators, free and paywalled who have done the same such as beansbuilds, yourdorkbrains, and others. This isn't new, and nobody can "copyright" this idea right? Hahahaha. Wrong. In comes this paywaller, who in addition to paywalling "food" items that multiple other creators could make and release for free, also paywalls things like store signs and other things that bill-l-s4cc and beansbuilds easily can make and release for early access. Oh, and she uses adfly, so if you want any of her "free" releases you have to risk a virus. 🤢 She sends an "ask" to my friend, saying "Hey is it just me or are you making the exact same stuff as me?" Thankfully, my friend can answer this ask privately so she does saying "Hey, no I'm not. I made items for my own game, and they're items that are food items bought en masse around the world in stores, and I'm not the only creator that does this so...thanks for the concern I guess?" Only to get another ask from that creator who was like "Oh I guess I'll believe you but I'm a small time creator trying to get my name out there, and it's hard when bigger creators make the same things I make my things." [Paywaller translation: I'm butthurt that you made recolors of items I made because they are typical grocery items, because now people will come to you for them since you offer them for free, and I can't charge people for them behind my paywall!] Can the audacity get any higher? Oh yes it can. After my friend responded saying "Uh. Sorry to burst your bubble but branded grocery items aren't original and lots of creators are doing them and I've already got people in my inbox who have requested other items that are grocery items and when I have energy I do plan to get to them..." The paywaller has to raise the snark level higher "Oh and I saw you made *insert specific food item here* right after me. But then you deleted it. Just reminding you if you do take ideas from others it's not okay!" At which point my friend was REALLY confused because she had not made that food item and didn't delete any posts. She of course responded "Uhm. I didn't make that food item, and you must be confusing me with another food creator because if you look back at all my posts there's nothing there, and my blog is archived in the wayback machine so you can confirm I didn't make those items. Good luck I guess?" So what can we learn, new creators? First, CC that involves making "food items" that have real life brands is not a new thing. Multiple creators do it. It's not a niche market. This also goes for signs for businesses, as well as other items related to certain brands. {Ex: a mcdonalds set with mcdonalds food items and outfits}. Also, those brands have copyright over THEIR logo and trademark. This goes for paywallers AND free CC creators. Anyone putting that logo or trademark into the sims 4 game is putting themselves at risk of getting copyright striked in general. Now chances are those brands are going to be LESS likely to copyright strike you if you are releasing your stuff for free or early access because you are not actively trying to profit off their brand. But

paywallers beware, as you're showing intent of trying to profit off their brand. And if the right people are notified...that could be a bad day for you. Second, you probably shouldn't bully more experienced creators just because you are butthurt that they are releasing similar things to you. The only way you can have a real claim against them is literally if they use the same mesh/model you converted, steal a model you made, or they are stealing your textures/graphics. {Or in a recent case I can think of, trying to make their advertising graphics look uncannily similar to your unique advertising/preview graphics intentionally.} In the words of a pretty wise book, "There is nothing new under the sun." In communities like this people will have similar ideas and do similar things. But unless there is actual texture/graphics/model theft going on, or the person is literally releasing a very SPECIFIC and NICHE item right after you do {ex: a cat shaped yarn bowl}, it's probably just a funny twist of coincidence. Anyway, needless to say, don't be this way. Period.

[chaotic-tired-bastard]

hi! i've known about the existence of spg for years now, but i never bothered to look into them more until now and they seem really cool, but also i feel kind of overwhelmed because of the lore and all that. do you have any advice or tips for how to get into them and where to start?

Hi! I'm just gonna dump this out, so yeah. Hope this isn't too much! Everything's beneath the cut so I don't clog up anyone's screens.

I'd recommend the Official website, first. There's an explanation of the base lore as well as two timelines- One for some overall lore and trivia of the bots as well as some of their history, and one for the Vice Quadrant lore. There's also a rundown for the current band members, including the Walter Workers, and a comic for base introductions in a picture format!

Next I'd say the SPG fandom Wiki! The pages on there are usually pretty good and you can find some things on there that aren't on the official website, as well as some things for the past band members! Just search a character and you can usually find a page on them!

There's also some good rundown explanations on @a-flickering-soul's blog that aren't too long and are pretty comprehensive

If you want some extra info on past members, there's some archived versions on the Wayback Machine that's been pretty helpful to me :D Some of these feature Rabbit from before her transition, so be careful of that if it's triggering to you.

If we're talking music-wise, I'd start from the beginning. Album One (either the 2009 version, which has Upgrade, or the 2012 one without her), The 2¢ Show, Mk III, The Vice Quadrant (1+2), Quintessential, and finally 1986. If that sounds kinda boring, just look at a few songs from each album that catch your eye and go from there :)

If you just want to know the characters better, Fanfiction can be your best friend!!!

Buuut there's always a catch to everything :( Two ex-members, Michael Reed and Steve Negrete, are in a lot of the pre 2020 lore and things. They're not in the band anymore because they both were pretty sleazy and did some bad things that I don't want to emphasize on, so fair warning before you dive in. (But Reed's not been in most/all of the Vice Quadrant things so far I've seen, so there's that)

[destielficarchive]

Hi! I'm sorry to bother you, but I noticed you posted about Miss_Lv's deleted fics, and I about cried when I saw suitable was gone. Can I ask you to elaborate on you ' saving as much as you can' ? While ao3 is my #1 fanfic site to read on (god bless everyone who keeps that beautiful sanctuary running perfectly), I don't know much about it. Are you saying there's a way I would be able to read it again?

Sorry for the long ask. I hope you are well, stay safe!💛

Hey!

Miss_Lv is my personal favorite kink author, so when I saw they deleted a bunch of works I went on the rampage and grabbed as many of their deleted works as I could find on Wayback, even non-Destiel which I don't normally archive, cause, archive or no archive, I personally want copies of Miss_Lv's works. For "save as much as I can," in the case of a work like Suitable, I actually already had it as a PDF, so it was a non-issue. I'm not sure if it's on Wayback, cause I didn't need to check, but yes, if it's backed up on the Wayback machine you would be able to read it online again, wouldn't even need someone like me to send you a copy. I went through all the deleted works I didn't have already and grabbed them from Wayback, making .docs that at some point I'll theoretically get around to formatting and converting into e-books.

Lemme check on Suitable for you rn...

*drum roll pleaaaaase*

Tada!

https://web.archive.org/web/20170214003905/http://archiveofourown.org/works/9654125

There it is! Miss_Lv is so heckin' popular that a lot of their stuff is on there. :D It was a relief, honestly, I'd have been so sad to lose Good Boy, I love that series.

Also...I'm feeling like this is maybe the moment for me to write up a post on Wayback, since it keeps coming up now that I just like doubled in followers in the space of a week. *sweat drop*.

(note that none of this is functionality offered by AO3 itself; a work deleted from AO3 is gone from AO3. Wayback is the Internet Archive, it's an entirely separate thing, it spidercrawls the 'net and just backs up literally everything it finds...I'll write more in a few.)

(eta: actually no I won't write more just now, I really shouldn't take the time to put together a blog post rn, but I'll try to do it soon, maybe over the weekend?)

-unforth

[rolotouto]

Banjou no Geass Gekijou

Before I post a list with all the games Rolo’s been featured in, here's more about my favorite one: the Nintendo DS board game, Banjou no Geass Gekijou. These are some of the lines you get when you land on Rolo’s squares.

へぇ、すごいですね、ライさんって。　何人もの人の声を、同時に聞き分けられるなんて…僕が必ず分かるのは兄さんの声くらいですよ… Wow, you are amazing, Rai-san. To be able to recognize the voices of multiple people simultaneously... The only one that I recognize without fail is Brother's...

すごいですね、ライさん。人を簡単に笑わせるなんて…僕にはできそうにありません。 You are amazing, Rai-san. Being able to make people laugh so easily... I don’t think I could do it.

ライさんはどうして、そんなに簡単に人を笑わせることができるんですか？ あ、いえ…　別にうらやましいとかそういうことではないですけど…　ただ、すごいなって… Rai-san, why are you able to make people laugh so easily? Ah, no... It's not that I am jealous or anything like that... It's just, that it’s so amazing...

I think lines like this show how strong Rolo’s true self is despite being trained as an “emotionless” assassin. The sight of someone making another person happy makes him feel admiration. He had the potential to be a really good kid...

やった！僕の勝ちですね！あ、ごめんなさい…　僕ばかりが楽しんでしまったみたいで…　��、あの…　また遊んでください！ Yes! I won! Ah, I'm sorry... It seems I ended up being the only one who had fun... U-um... Let's play again next time, please!

And he isn’t just in touch with his own feelings, but also those of the individual he’s interacting with. I wish these pretty scenes with Rai could lead to a Good End where, having gained another person he can trust, Rolo actually started believing in his right to be loved simply by being Rolo, instead of assuming his value is tied to his usefulness as an assassin. But yeah, the Good Ends have him killing Rai, so I guess deep-rooted beliefs take long to change...

えっ！事故に遭ったんですか！…兄さんはッ！にィ~さ~んッ！！ Eh! You had an accident?! ...Brother is...! Bro~ther!!

There’s a driving minigame where you play as Rivalz and Lelouch, and this is Rolo’s reaction if you crash Rivalz’s motorbike. Before playing the minigame, Rolo had asked you to please accompany Rivalz-san and Niisan because he(Rolo) doesn’t trust Rivalz-san’s driving skills. I find it amusing that Rolo actually went through the process of learning how to drive a bike and that he probably understands about vehicles (and mechas), while Lelouch likely has no interest or knowledge whatsoever. His fakememory!self was probably initially totally confused by his little sibling’s ability to drive, and it’s things like these that make the time he spent with Rolo be memories with Rolo rather than “with a Nunnally replacement”. Anyway, if you play the driving minigame when Rolo has come to like Rai as well, he will be calmer and say something like “I’m glad Niisan and you are safe”. Rivalz doesn’t even exist for Rolo.

あれ、失敗ですか。もしかしてオモチャのハンマーじゃ本気になれないですか？僕のナイフ…　貸しましょうか？フフフ… Oh, you lost? Maybe it's that you couldn't take it seriously using a toy hammer? Should I lend you... my knife? Fufufu...

This is what you get when you lose on the whac-a-character minigame. Sadly for Rolo, one of the rules in that minigame is not to hit Nunnally.

あ、ライさん。ほら、見てください！兄さんからもらったんです、この回転パズル！ねえ、ライさん。一緒に組み立ててみませんか？ Ah, Rai-san. Look, look at this! I received it from Brother, this rotation puzzle! Hey, Rai-san, why don't we assemble it together?

思ったより簡単にできましたね、ライさん。でも、せっかく兄さんがくれたものなんですから今度はひとりでやってみます。じゃあ… You were able to do it more easily than I thought, Rai-san. But since it's something that Brother gave me, next time I'll try to do it on my own. Well then...

Rolo allowing others to play with something given to him by Niisan? And poor Victor from the OSI had to get killed after touching his locket...

The next part needs some context first. This is from when you overhear his conversation with Villetta and Lelouch at the basement. Once he notices you there, he'll normally just kill you instantly, but if you visit them after he's already grown to like you, he hesitates and, seeing how neither Villetta nor Lelouch noticed you, offers to spare your life with the condition that you don't tell anyone what you heard. You can answer "yes" or "no". As one can guess, saying that you won't keep the secret leads to a game over.

First, "yes": じゃあ、これは…　僕らだけの秘密です…　そう…　兄さんにも内緒の…

Then, this is... a secret that is only ours... That's right... a secret even to Brother...

And "no":

なるほど…　僕がバカでした…　やっぱり信じられるのは…　兄さんだけ…　他のヤツなんて… …ライさん。　あなたならわかってくれると思ったのに…　残念です… I see... I was stupid... Indeed, the one that can be trusted... is only Brother... Of course there would be no one else... ...Rai-san. I thought that you would understand, and yet... It's a shame...

It might be because it’s a game and he’s merely letting the player know what’s going to happen, but still, I like that Rolo doesn’t kill Rai right away and instead expresses his emotions to him/her first. Like Rolo barely talks to people he doesn’t feel a connection with, but once he does feel it, the love he has for that person is really important to him. Enough that he’d die mainly to honor those feelings that made him feel human. Lastly, there’s a conversation between Rolo and Lelouch that you get right before Rolo’s route is completed. (Lulu)やあ、ライ。 Hi there, Rai. (Rolo)あ、ライさん。 Ah, Rai-san. ほらな、ロロ。やっぱりライはここに来ただろ？ See, Rolo, Rai did come here after all, didn’t (s)he? う、うん… Y-yeah... 今、ロロと賭けをしてたんだ。ライが15分以内にここに来るかどうかをね。 結果は、俺の勝ち。　ロロ、今日の洗濯当番は代わってもらうぞ。 I just made a bet with Rolo on whether you'd arrive here within 15 minutes. The result is I won. Rolo, today you do the laundry instead. う、うん…　あ、で、でも！夕食当番は兄さんだからね！ Y-yes... Ah, b-but! Don’t forget that Brother is in charge of dinner! む、そうだったか…　じゃあ、こうしよう。俺が今からライと何かのミニゲームで対戦する。俺が勝ったら、ロロ。オマエが夕食当番だ。 Hm, was it so?... Well then, let's do this. I'm going to compete with Rai in some minigame now. If I win, Rolo, you take care of dinner. え、また賭け事？ Eh, betting again? そうさ、わかりやすいだろ？ライ、何て対戦する？オセロか？パズルか？何でもいいぞ。 That's right, isn't it simple? Rai, what will we compete in? Othello? Puzzle? Anything will do. 兄さん、水泳はどう？ Brother, what about swimming? なに！？なぜ体力勝負を…！ What!? Why a trial of strength...! 何でもいいって言ったじゃない？ Didn't you say that anything would do? クッ！いいだろう！速く泳ぐ理論はわかっている！負けるわけがない！ライ！水泳で勝負だ！ロロ！オマエは夕食の献立でも考えておくんだな！ Tch! Fine! I know the theory for swimming fast! There's no way I'll lose! Rai! It's a swimming match! Rolo! Start thinking about what to cook for dinner! It’s adorable how Rolo is so comfortable with Lelouch that he isn’t afraid to show him that he wants him to lose. Lelouch is hilariously slow at the swimming minigame despite “knowing the theory” (lol), so usually you’ll win without trying: やった！これで兄さんの手料理が食べられるよ! ありがとう、ライさん！ Yes! Now I can eat Brother's home cooking! Thank you, Rai-san!

チッ…　しかたないな…　晩御飯はビーフストロガノフだ！いいな！ Tch... There's no helping it... Dinner will be beef stroganoff, okay?!

うん！ Yes!

I’m laughing at how in-character it is for Lelouch to loose his cool when he doesn’t win. And notice how Rolo didn’t actually mind cooking dinner himself, he just wanted Lelouch to do it so he could eat his home cooking ♥ You can also just do nothing at all during the minigame so Lelouch can beat you, in which case the conversation goes like: 水泳で兄さんに負けるなんて…ライさん、遅い… To lose against Brother at swimming... Rai-san, you're slow... ロロ、夕食は何か凝ったものが食べたいな…そうだな…流しそうめんなんてどうだ？ Rolo, for dinner I want to eat something elaborate... Let me see... What about flowing noodles? 兄さん…たしかに凝ってるけど…それじゃ昼食みたいだよ…大丈夫、もっと栄養のあるものを作ってあげるから。 Brother... That's certainly elaborate but... then it would be like lunch... It's alright, I'll make you something more nutritious.

頼むぞ、ロロ。 I leave it in your hands, Rolo.

A Japanese person will probably find this funnier and be able to explain it better, but I think the joke is that flowing noodles are really plain in terms of what the food itself is, and that what is elaborate is the process to prepare them (you have to make noodles slide down a structure of bamboo pipes). So Lelouch seems to be deliberately choosing something Rolo can’t possibly prepare just to feel a bit evil? On the other hand, it’s really cute that he will eat Rolo’s cooking. He isn’t disgusted by it or anything, as much as he’d want to convince himself that he hates Rolo… And that’s it. Afterwards you get the endings, in which he kills you. Yeah, he spared your life at the basement, but now he stabs you out of respect, because he wants your ghost to protect Niisan. And he smiles and laughs when saying so too!? Well, to be precise, that’s the ending if you are playing as male!Rai. As female!Rai he seems more pained and doesn’t want you to leave, and it’s not so clear whether he kills you or not. Maybe he kidnaps you, since you simply disappear after Rolo took you to the airport. Creepy stuff... Someone uploaded a video of Rolo’s route, where you can see everything we’ve been talking about. ---- By the way, the official blog for this game was run by staff members who seemed to like Rolo a lot. The blog isn’t available anymore, but you can find the original texts in Japanese through Wayback Machine: part 1, part 2, part 3.

For example:

“I’m now playing through the previous game LOST COLORS and I was chased and killed by Rolo!”

“By the way, I wear Rolo on my employee badge.

It’s cute how Rolo’s charm is shaped like a heart!”

“So, since the anime’s last episode aired, there’s a new DS ‘Banjou no Geass Gekijou’ advertisement. We tried changing Lelouch and Rolo’s lines! Rolo 'Niisan... is cute' You are the one who’s cute-!”

“Good... mor   ning. It’s No... zawa... First, um, yeah, I haven’t posted updates. U.... Usui san is the only one who... was... writing... If you’re... wondering... why, on 17th August’s broadcast... Rolo  Rolo d... died”

“You can see Rolo in the advertisement... (tear)”

“Lelouch’s emperor outfit... I wanted Rolo to see it”  ----- It’s nice to know the staff was allowed to openly fangirl about their favorite characters. Although we already knew that from Sakou-san...

[monkey-network]

Crash Bandicoot the Series Episodes

52 Episodes; To stop N Tropy and Cortex’s Plan Z that puts reality in jeopardy, Crash and Coco must travel between dimensions to gather crystals necessary. Along the way, the duo meets familiar faces and it’s a guess of whether they’re friend or foe. Then again for Crash, an enemy’s just a friend you haven’t made yet.

Method of the Marsupials: Spelunking down an ancient temple, Coco slowly feels inferior compared to Crash’s spontaneity always lucking out. Then again, Crash has never been one without his sister.

The Titanfields and Mucoltants: A chase after a baby mutant leads to a universe where two different clans have been feuding for generations and it’s up to the Bandicoots to finally put an end to it, or make the fighting feel different.

Crash Cultivation: Our siblings split up momentarily and Crash’s adventure involves helping a farmer confront a curse that prevents anything from growing on his land.

In My Element: Coco’s adventure is a puzzle room, literally a room full of puzzles she has to solve to get out. She’s having a blast, but comes to realize that the joy could be endless.

Breakfasticoot: Taking a break from gathering the crystals, Crash decides to go into the morning wilderness to get his sister breakfast in bed. Needless to say, it isn’t easy for our unbreakable hero.

Tense Theory: In order to get the next crystal, Coco needs to show that she can relax like her brother.

Tales as Old as Tiny: The Bandicoots encounter Tiny Tiger, depressed and very lacking in muscle. Crash wants to help, leading to the two entering the wildcat’s mind.

Minuscule Madness (Part 1): The Bandicoots reach a dimension that has everyone in it out to kill them. The problem is that the “everyone” are too small to be noticeable by the duo.

Minuscule Madness (Part 2): Crash’s body has been invaded by the small people and Coco must figure out how to save her bro before he dies or the small people die first due to Crash’s surprisingly volatile insides.

Jake and the Crashman: Crash is split from Coco and is thrust into a noir story involving wumpa fruit, cars, and a hidden conspiracy.

War the Game: Crash and Coco face off against a supercomputer possessing a crystal where losing will mean the end of that world, the heart and mind of our Bandicoot siblings truly at unity this episode.

Coco Kaijuu: The next dimension our siblings enter have them transformed into giant monsters and while Coco wants to be peaceful towards the civilians, Crash is having fun with his new form which unleashes a force trying to stop them.

Rip Roo Ca-Choo: Ripper Roo is alone after his original defeat from Crash, rejected by Cortex and with no direction. He then sees Crash again and becomes determined to exact his revenge.

Crash the Bachelor: A hopeless romantic Skunk finds love when Crash is the one being that isn’t driven away by his putrid stench. And while Crash enjoys being friends, our bandicoot doesn’t care about getting closer.

Tawna Comes to Tango: Dimension hopping Pirate Tawna shows up to help our Bandicoots win the crystal at a casino but her love of risk soon gets in the way.

Bookbrain: Our new trio visit the library where a crystal’s hidden and the former two decide to get Crash into more advanced reading. Crash loves it at first, but when the three discover the comic book section, it’s a challenge to keep that and Crash separate.

Animal House: Crash, Coco, and Tawna have to strengthen their teamwork to face a chicken, a monkey, and a shiny jellyfish in order to get the crystal.

Ghostdusters: Tawna doesn’t believe in ghosts, but a trek through a haunted house suddenly has her scared sneezing. The three try to make their way in and out, but finding the crystal will mean cleaning things up.

Crashket Ball: A game so complicated for Tawna and Coco leads to Crash helping them understand things his way.

Why Love Him: Tawna is separated from her friends into another dimension and stumbles across a dejected Crash that’s been through what she went through long ago in her dimension. She tries to cheer him up, and comes to realize what she saw in him originally.

The Messiness of Music: Our trio have to confront N Gin in a music contest in three days but instruments aren’t their forte, Crash and Tawna can’t and won’t sing, and Coco is overwhelmed in making the best song. However, music doesn’t have to be flawless to feel good.

Crashcading Fury: Crash wakes up angry and on destructive rampage for the next crystal. A scared Coco and Tawna do what they can, desperately trying to get their more cool, easy-going buddy back. 

Lunchtime: Crash, Coco, and Tawna have the chance to relax and get sandwiches and the Komodo brothers are sent out to kill them.

Ahoy Baby: A young group of aliens claim Tawna as their mom and she joyously comes to teach them how to live her way.

The House of N (Part 1): Knowing the trio’s progress, Cortex comes up with the idea of bringing multiple versions of himself to come up with ideas in stopping them.

The House of N (Part 2): A battle of the one true Neo Cortex ensues, leading to our main scientist at odds with himself of where everything went wrong.

Aku Uka Alone: Uka Uka and Aku Aku mentally link and argue over the faith they have in their hero/villains.

Dream Reaper: In this silent but musical episode, N Tropy sends a villain capable of killing people while they’re dreaming to the trio, only for our villain to underestimate all three’s imaginative capabilities.

Pace and Test: Crash is challenged to a simultaneous physical and academic exam for a crystal which is where his sister and bestie put their all into making him the best of both worlds.

Ferally Feud: Crash and Tawna get into an argument, leading Coco to try moderating and sees why she loves them both.

It Takes a Bandicoot to Save a Village: Former chief Papu Papu asks Crash to help rebuild his village after Cortex’s meddling might force them to leave the island.

Crate Minds Think Alike: Cortex manages to weaken the trio to the point where they can’t bash crates anymore, leading to them pushing each other to get stronger in the real way.

Dial D for Dingo: Meeting up with an old chum at his “established” restaurant, the Bandicoots take a stand when health inspectors have come to shut down the place by ANY means.

Two Times Tropy: While Cortex is out, N Tropy and his female alternate are working on repairs but are ignorantly making things worse with their constant ego stroking.

Crash The Banditoon: The trio reach a blank dimension where things feel different, more animated and that’s saying something. Crash isn’t complaining though.

Juicy Juiced: A special wumpa Crash finds gives the trio enhanced ability but at the cost of sleeping for days. So they keep eating it in order to come up with an antidote to null the effects at the risk of an eternal sleep.

Lab Rat Revolution: The trio arrive at a place populated by a majority of Brio’s rejects and helps them get revenge.

Wayback Brio: An encounter with N. Brio has him and Coco stuck in a cavern. While Crash and Tawna figure out a way to their freedom, the two inside are forced to rewalk their former relationship.

The Skinner (Halloween Special): Crash is possessed by an evil spirit that’s known for desiring the skin of its victim, unbeknownst to Tawna and Coco though, an unstable spirit can’t control an unstable body.

You’re a Bad Man, Dr. Cortex: Cortex arrives in a dimension where he’s the leader of the world, only this version is a good guy. Naturally he replaces the other Cortex and tries to spin the world into his image, but is conflicted that he’ll destroy a utopia he technically made himself.

Nurse Bandicoot: Coco catches a high fever after a trip through the arctic dimension, and the others do what they can for her. Crash surprisingly takes things slow while Tawna is frantic in making things better.

Do Mursupials Dream of Magic Sheep?: Crash suddenly gets nightmares and it affects him while awake. One night, a figure appears in his dream and the two adventure to found out how to resolves these bitter feelings.

Cocomotion: A trip to the future has Coco visit a successful version of herself. As such, it’s the age old case between future versus family. 

Crunched Kindness (1/2 Hour Christmas Special): Infiltrating Cortex’s castle, the trio frees a disheveled Crunch Bandicoot and helps him see the beauty of the world.

High School Bandicoot: The Trio are stuck in a video game dating sim where Crash has to win in one go or get deleted forever.

Fishing for Crystals: A fish eats a crystal, a bigger fish eats the little and so on, forcing our heroes to fish differently in the effort to get it back.

Continue?: Crash finds himself alone in a dreary world where it turns out he's dead. He meets a little possum girl and her big bodyguard as they help him uncover a way back to life.

The Trials of Crash Bandicoot: Crash is framed for multiple interdimensional crimes in space court, all of which are Cortex’s doings, and while Coco and Tawna play defense, everyone he’s encounter over the series comes to either his aid or prosecution, and Cortex has something up his sleeve, Crash himself is seemingly out cold during everything.

The Dimmer of Hope: After the events of the previous episode, Cortex has all the crystals and the trio’s banished to the end of the universe. All feels lost, so all that’s left to do is reminisce of the adventures the three got to have.

The Dimensional Dance (Part 1): Cortex and the N Tropys have everything set for multiversal domination but argue over how they want to do things. Meanwhile the trio get back to reality and figure out a way to destroy the crystals. 

The Dimensional Dance (Part 2): Crash has absorbed all of the power of the reality machine to make a universe in his own image. Tawna, Coco, the N Tropys, and Cortex are aware and find out that this won’t be stable for much longer and have to save Crash to reverse the effects.

The Never Ending Story (Series Finale): Crash is alone again, not dead, this time in a plane outside all existence and, given the chance to speak for the first time, reflects on his life and everything he got to have to a being he’s familiar with.