#having SO much fun. especially because the fair folk au is pretty heavy at the beginning and there's not much humour in it anyway

[good--merits-accumulated]

current knight/bard anderperry au has only two moods:

1) knight experiences gay longing so hard (ha) he has a divine revelation

2) knight (twenty-one on the outside, several middle ages at once on the inside) just trying to have a good quest has to deal with cringefail nobility. pour one out for this fucking guy lads

[sazorak]

Every Game I Played in 2020, Ranked

2020. Boy, what a garbo year huh? Didn't actually play that many games this year all-in-all. Happens! My backlog is getting pretty big, but I just find it hard to focus on games when I could be working on something. Or put off working on something, as it may happen to be at times.

My arbitrary decision from years ago to only attach a numbered ranking to same-year releases is getting increasingly silly, especially given my propensity to wait on playing games until I’m in the right mood, but whatever. That order matters than the dumb numerical numbering anyway.

2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019

Later Alligator – 2019 – Steam – ★★

The style of this game is very cute, and the jokes are funny enough. But… ok, look, I’m not one to be precious about what is or isn’t a game. But this really isn’t a game. It’s a series of disconnected, unrelated challenges clipped from Atari Free Mini Game Collection 100, wrapped in a very non-interactive adventure-game. It’s cute, it’s kind of sweet, but it’s dull. Dull dull dull. There’s a pointless, mandatory sliding block puzzle early on that infuriated me by its mere existence. Them giving the ability to skip it because “wow you’re bad at this huh”, which, while accurate, also just sold the whole point meaningless of the “““interactive experience”””.

Also: when a huge part of your game is WOW WE ANIMATED EVERYONE REALLY GOOD, text boxes that reveal word-by-word, far away from the animations that occur when said characters talk? Kind of stinks!

8. Carrion – 2020 – Steam – ★★

What Carrion does well— the whole “You’re controlling The Thing and just rippin’ people apart!” shtick— is really neat. They made that bootleg The Thing animate real-ass good.

The actual game as a whole though? Kind of garbage. Imagine a Metroidvania with zero actual exploration, where every opportunity you have to venture off the path instead results in immediate railroading with constant, utterly inexplicable one-way pipes. It’s not that it’s linear, it’s that it actively slaps you when you attempt to explore. It’s very frustrating! Add the fact that the tentacle-monster-shtick makes challenging to actually, y’know, move around and control all your bits…  the only reason I finished the game was due to foreknowledge of its extreme brevity.

I think if the game were more open and less obsessed with constantly handing out upgrades, as well as having less of a focus on pure combat, I think I’d have enjoyed it more.

SD Gundam G Generation Cross Rays – 2019 – Steam – ★★

It is well documented at this point that I am both an active Gundam fan, and as well as an on-again-off-again tactical RPG aficionado. A SD Gundam game appearing on Steam with a good English translation and localization is… exciting, to say the least. That said, I have never had much context for this game series beyond the basic facts that the combat tended to be pretty well animated CG, and that it’s vaguely similar to Super Robot Wars. Turns out… it’s really different from SRW? I dunno how the rest of the series fairs, but Cross Rays is weird as hell.

For one, there’s zero tutorialization at all. None. Almost all of what I’m going to explain here is me figuring stuff out by trial and error, or by reading junk online. Gundam is insanely popular, you’d think they’d be interested in explaining how it all works, but… nope. Even Super Robot Wars has multi-level introductory bits for new folks to show them the rope these days.

So: Cross Rays is a tactical RPG where you can playthrough the storyline of various Gundam AUs. You can play through them in any order. These playthroughs are fairly literal translations of the stories. You take control of the lead mecha from those series, fight enemy mobile suits that show up in SRW-like tactical RPG combat, until all reinforcements cease. Pretty straight forward. There are occasionally mission variants like “prevent enemies from reaching X” or “prevent enemies from destroying Y”, but even those can be just reduced to “kill everything very quickly please.”

But here’s the thing: while there is a story progression, the characters in the story itself actually have no character progression. These characters and mecha are actually considered guests, despite it being ostensibly their story. Instead, you are able to field “permanent” mecha and pilots of your own choosing, which do have progressions. There is no plot justification for this or anything like it. The game does not recognize that it’s weird that during Iron-Blooded Orphans intro where nobody knows what a Gundam even is, you can have 25 Gundams show up at once and just fire lasers at everything. That’s because this game is actually about repeatedly grinding the same set of missions over and over.

Pilots are recruited by completing certain in-mission requirements. Mecha are acquired by either by getting enough kills with the progression-less “guest” mecha, combining mecha you already have gashopon-style, completing certain quests, or by leveling up mecha and then “evolving them”. This is the actual core of the game.

SD Gundam G Generation Cross Rays is basically Disgaea, it turns out? You’re grinding story missions at various difficulty levels in order to complete missions, try to recruit specific pilots, equip them with stats and levels to make them stronger, and then hitting mecha together in a sort of quasi-SMT fusion system until you get all the powerful mobile suits you desire.

The combat itself is kind of… bland? There’s a lot of systems, but they mostly seem in service of making an already easy game easier, or burning through tedium. There are four different difficulty modes, because there’s not actually that many different missions you can play through. The expectation is you’ll just work your way through every story beat while ramping the difficulty up over time to where the “guest” mecha would not be able to handle on their own. In fact, letting the story mecha act out the story beats is actually bad after a point, unless you’re still trying to get those lead mobile suits, or if you’re trying to complete some mission requirement in order to recruit Named Wing Grunt Pilot #246.

There is something to the notion of “I want to get N and N and N and N on a team, piloting weird but powerful mobile suits, and just solo every Gundam AU in a row,” but the whole premise seems kind of against purpose. Why bother recreating story beats at all, then? It’s not like the game even acknowledges any of that going on.

If the point is that I’m supposed to be, like in other grind-heavy tactical RPGs, breaking the systems to my own end in order to proceed… why not make the missions you play challenges focused towards that? The story progression literally only exists to facilitate the mission-based unlock conditions, which makes all the energy put into making them JUST LIKE THE ANIME really damn pointless.  

I like tactical RPGs, I like breaking RPG systems so as to beat hard challenges (I beat all the insanely hard extra bosses in FFXII for crying out loud), I looooove Gundam. I should like this. But I don’t really have the “god, I NEED TO FILL THIS LIST” gene that some folks have… except as an excuse to continue to engage in gameplay I enjoy. The gameplay here seems in service of the collection, rather than the way around.

7. Pokemon Sword: The Isle of Armor – 2020 – ★★★

Pokemon’s first foray into actually doing DLC is… a mixed bag. As a positive, they’ve improved the Wild Area concept I liked from the main game, and even brought back buddy Pokemon walking behind you. That’s neat. On the other hand: the actual progression in it is completable in like an hour, it doesn’t scale with you, so you’re bound to be over leveled for it, and all the raid stuff, while still conceptually neat, is just as flawed as in the base game. And so, you’re just left with even more new Pokemon to RNG grind on to continue to catch-them-all. Nah, I’m good.

Astral Chain – 2019 – Switch – ★★★

Platinum knows how to make good character action games. They’ve made a bunch of them. Bayonetta, Nier: Automata, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. They also know how to make some kind of mediocre character action games. Transformers: Devastation, Wonderful 101, their various shovelware character action games like Korra. Astral Chain falls somewhere in the middle, I guess?

Astral Chain has all the production of their good games. It has some stylish, cool action. It has a neat core mechanical idea, in that it’s essentially a two-character action game where you control both characters at once. It has a lot of the old mechanics from some of their best games brought in; witch-time last second dodging from Bayonetta, Nier’s shooting-and-slashing combination, the Zandatsu mechanic from Metal Gear Rising, even Wonderful 101’s multi-unit shenanigans. The setting is different, and there’s some neat world flavor all in all.

But, of all games I’ve played over the past few years, Astral Chain made me more vividly angry than any other. It’s not that it’s too hard— far from it, really, I found its combat incredibly mashy. No, the problem is that it has so many shitty mechanics slathered on that it become a chore to get to the “good bits”.

Why would you put forced stealth sequences in your character action game, especially when your movement controls are not suited for it?

Why the HELL would you put platforming sections in your character action game, constantly, especially when your stupid ghost buddy can accidentally yank you off the edge, your auto-combos can just throw you off the edge, or literally anything can knock you off the edge and make you lose life?

Why would you put so many constant excuses into the world to force me use the digital sensor in the game, that also makes it miserable to walk around while using it?

WHO THE LIVING FUCK THINKS THESE SHITTY BOX BALANCING MINI-GAMES ARE FUN???

These games are supposed to encourage me to perfect everything, right? Why keep putting fucking fights you need to complete in order to get an S rank behind backtracking, or Legions I don’t have yet? That isn’t adding replayability, that’s just wasting my time. There are even in-level missions that have fail conditions that you never even know about. Surprise!!! A lot of them involve chasing after guys and catching them with your chain, which is really obnoxious to do!!!! SURPRISE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The story is just Bad Evangelion, straight up. Every story beat from Evangelion is here, executed worse. They also make your character have a twin just so they can have a character who can talk and feel emotions, because your boring-ass protagonist is stuck being an emotionless audience cipher. Cool!!!

Tetris Effect – 2018 – Origin – ★★★

It’s drugs Tetris. I personally don’t use, or have synesthesia for that matter. I imagine this game is better if you do. It’s an enjoyable enough experience but it feels incredibly slight for what I was expecting from it, or even compared to something like Lumines, which has tons of replayability by way of its difficulty. Tetris just isn’t that hard, unless you’re forcing yourself to do weird shit to get points. I WILL NEVER LEARN HOW TO T-SPIN. Never.

Castlevania Anniversary Collection – 2019 – Steam – ★★★

Kind of an unremarkable Castlevania collection. Neat that it has an official translation of Kid Dracula in there, but also… look, I prefer Metroidvania Castlevanias, OK?

6. Spelunky 2 – 2020 – Steam – ★★★

I’m not entirely sure why this doesn’t click for me where Spelunky 1 did. More annoying intro levels? Too many fiddly requirements for different ending-progression? Gameplay additions that just make things more annoying? Spelunky 1 was hard, but there was a kind straight-forwardness to it, even with its weird secrets, that made it much easier to grok and continue banging your head against. I’m just not having as much fun with this. Difficulty should be challenging, not a hassle.

5. Stellaris: Federations – 2020 – Steam – ★★★

This is the year that Stellaris just broke for me.

Federations itself is a good DLC; it adds some really interesting mechanics tied to various types of multi-national unions (the titular federations, as well as the Space UN), as well as the addition of unique “origins” that allow you to further specialize your gameplay. The origins in particular are a great addition that allows more specialization and roleplay.

I’m just tired of the sheer amount of busywork Stellaris forces you to do. Every DLC adds more junk you need to keep an eye on, and the fact that the AI doesn’t even bother with it (compensating with copious economy boosts in order to keep up) makes the whole thing frustrating. It’s like playing fetch with yourself; you just get tired of chasing after your own ball after a point.

I have to wonder if they’re pivoting towards a notional Stellaris 2 at this point? Might not be a bad idea for them, though it is weird with all they talked up adding more origins when Federations came out.  

4. GranBlue Fantasy Versus – 2020 – Steam – ★★★★

This is probably the fighting game I got most into over the past few years. There’s just this nice, almost Street Fighter-esque ease of execution to the controls, and that Arc Systems Works 3D-as-2D style continues to just do work. I don’t give a single shit about GranBlue Fantasy (frankly, I think I’d enjoy this game more if it wasn’t attached to a property) but the characters are fun enough to play and look at.

The big problem here is two things: no crossplay, and no rollback netcode. In the span of a month, this game became a total ghost town on PC, and it doesn’t sound like PS4 faired that much better. 

Ring Fit Adventure – 2019 – Switch – ★★★★

I’ve fallen on-and-off this game all year. At its heart: it works, it’s a fun exercise game. I don’t think it really feels like a “game” (in the sense that I’m not really coming to it for riveting gameplay or anything) as much as just a guided exercise experience, but… that’s fine? The in-game story is kind of flat, but funny in the fact of it existing at all. Buff Nicol Bolas and all.

XCOM 2: War of the Chosen – 2017 – Steam – ★★★★

XCOM2: War of the Chosen is a great answer to what XCOM2 struggled with. As I discussed back in 2016 (Jesus Christ), XCOM2 tried to push against player’s worst instincts by incentivizing them to keep being aggressive through a whole bunch of timers— which, kind of just weren’t fun given how much accidentally walking into an ambush could “ruin” dozens of hours of play. War of the Chosen dials that back in some intelligent ways, by instead making the encounter designs themselves, as well as much more grab-and-bail mission types, encourage players to push ahead instead. Smart!

The addition of the Chosen makes the game feel more alive, and they really do make missions harder— particularly early on. But they’ve somehow accidentally fell into the hole, where XCOM just… isn’t that hard? Early on it’s challenging, particularly with the resource restrictions and all. But they keep giving you more and more options (that aren’t especially meaningful choices) that make your team more and more powerful, without increasing the strength of the enemy as time goes on. By the five-hour mark, you basically know if you’re going to steam roll the game or not.

The amount of additional character and variety in the gameplay is great, I just wish it had a more challenging difficulty curve. Maybe make the meta-layer of when enemies show up more targeted to where players are at. If a player is doing well, ramp up the difficulty, if they’re struggling, pull it back a bit. I should always feel like I’m just barely keeping ahead with XCOM, not like I’m bored. And by the end of War of the Chosen, I was kind of getting bored, really. Oh well.

3. Animal Crossing: New Horizons – 2020 – Switch – ★★★★

This is probably the video game that I spent the most time with hours-wise this year. I’m not entirely sure why? It’s a nice evolution of New Leaf, in that the crafting, environment shaping, and general quality-of-life improvements made are quite nice. There’s clearly been some thought on how people play these games, and ways to make the experience less frustrating.

… and yet, they kept so much tedium in the game. Like yes, the schedule stretching is the point, I get it. As someone who for some reason decided not to play with the clock, I only just recently finished the fish, fossils, and insects for the museum. But there’s just so many weird, little things that just make it hard to keep coming back to it. It’s like… to what end? When I’ve unlocked everything, and basically seen the entirety of the item list at this point, and the holiday events all being the game meaningless collectathons…. Why? I’m not going to try completing the collection; the museum stuff is about my limit, really (and even the paintings I can probably pass on).

I guess even an idealized, digital representation of a quasi-domestic life has the spiritual emptiness of consumerism-for-consumerism sake. Thanks???

Hypnospace Outlaw – 2019 – Steam – ★★★★

I grew up on the internet of the early 00s. I had an AngelFire website, mostly consisting of shitty sprite webcomics and hosted Gundam pics. I remember when Google wasn’t really a thing and you would heavily rely on website compilation sites like the Anime Web Turnpike in order to find anything of value online. It was weird, it was wild. It was exciting!

The internet seemed so different back then. There was a ton of garbage online, but also, like… there was a sense of optimism to it. Folks were shitty, there was plenty of bad stuff online, but it felt so disconnected from the fabric of the physicality of real-life that it was at the same time a perfect escape.

I was young when I first got “online”, something like 12. I remember having this notion that the internet was going to be this great equalizer, that it had infinite potential to change how people behave and interact. Boy, huh.

Hypnospace Outlaw is essentially a splendid alternate universe GeoCities recreation, where you’re a volunteer moderator of a grouping of websites on HypnOS, an internet-analog you access while you are sleep. At the surface level, it’s mostly about poking around the weird alternate-historical version of the internet they created, full of kids feuding, bizarre historical divergences, and plenty of amazing bespoke weirdness. All of this is great; there’s an incredible amount of content that’s just great to poke at, listen to, and explore.

Below the surface, there’s also a rolling plotline about the ethics of this industry-owned platform, those who run it, and the way corporations handle new technology, new platforms, and emerging digital societies. There’s a late game turn that’s pretty damn affecting. And as someone who has moderator his share of internet forums in his time, trying to balance ‘do it for the community’ and what your ostensible ‘bosses’ require of you, it was kind of a weird throwback in more ways than one.

Minecraft – 2011 – PC – ★★★★★

Turns out, Minecraft is really as good still who knew??? Started playing a bunch more of it this year due to Giant Bomb deciding to do so, and yeah: still good!

2. Hades – 2020 – Steam – ★★★★★

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again— Supergiant makes damn good games. I’d been holding off on checking out Hades until its full release due to my tendency to burn out on games easily, and I’m glad I waited. Hades is a fantastic rogue-lite experience. The way it makes narrative progression part of the reiterative, randomized rogue-lite structure is just perfect.

It’s got all the usual Supergiant bullet points. Great characters, voice acting, narration, and music. In terms of gameplay, it’s probably their least ambitious game— playing something like a cousin to their original game, Bastion— but it’s also been polished to a mirror sheen. It just feels really damn good to play, over and over and over.

That being said, the second (final?) ending feels kind of…. Tacked on? It’s fine as a goal to go for while continuing to do the game’s relationship mechanics for additional story bits, but it ends up feeling kind of unfulfilling compared to the payoff of the first one.

1. Crusader Kings III – 2020 – Steam – ★★★★★

I never could get into Crusader Kings II. Despite my interest, the sheer mechanical heft and unintuitive interface made the game a wall that I just couldn’t get over. I’m sure if I’d dedicated myself I probably could have learned it, but… ehhhhhh.

Crusader Kings III, on the other hand, has a good tutorial, a cleaned-up UI, and a very helpful highlight and tooltip system that make it much easier to understand how to actually play the game through resources inside the game itself. And, as it turns out: I rather love this game.

I mean, conceptually it’s an easy sell, isn’t it? Historical politics is something I enjoy broadly. I liked Stellaris but wish it had more narrative, roleplaying elements. They outright say that “winning” isn’t really the point of the game. Instead, it’s more about emergent storytelling and playing with the different systems and seeing what you can do with it.

My current game has had me taking the Haesteinn dynasty from its Viking origins into England, forming a London-seated Northern Sea Empire that encompasses all of Britannia, Iceland, Holland, Norway, and Denmark. I am currently working on hegemonizing Norse religious control over enough Asatru holy sites to finally reform the religion, such that more unified feudalization can occur. To that end, my current ruler’s predecessor invaded West Francia and conquered the whole of its territory, substantially reducing the foothold of Catholicism in mainland Europe… which seems to have kicked the hornet’s nest, given the Crusade I’m going to need to contend with next time I boot up the game.

Of course, a complicating matter is that my current ruler— the Emperor of the North Sea, King of Ireland and the Danelaw, liege of the King of Denmark, was elected from the extended Haesteinn family via Thing, the Scandinavian council of his erstwhile vassals. Where the previous emperor, the one who manufactured the invasion of Francia, was quite religious and beloved for his adherence to the old ways, I discovered as I took over as his successor that he really, really is into just boning down across Europe. We’re talking constantly attempting to seduce neighboring Queens and Princesses. His vassals are not thrilled with this. They also don’t care for his propensity for torturing people to death, constantly.

I had no real say in this; attempting to stay on top of a dynasty is kind of like riding a bucking-bronco, so many things are only tenuously under your control that some weird shit can happen. This is especially true when you use the systems that make it easier to maintain the coherency of your domain. The Norse religion encouraging concubinage results in you having a lot of kids, which means there’s a lot of domain partition going on (someday, primogeniture, someday). Naturally, using Thing election reduces that, but also makes you sometimes end up having to play Emperor Stabbo-Fucko because they thought he was the best candidate at the time. Hell, I thought he was the best candidate at the time until I discovered just how many people he’d be laying with on the low. But you just have to roll with it.

The way the game forces you to play ball with character traits is great. Doing things that match with the character’s traits makes them lose stress. Doing things against their character increases stress. Too much stress can force you to make the character take up vices (which can make them suffer health or opinion maluses, as well as altering their aptitudes), or even die outright. And sometimes those vices and attitudes can be boons, given they open up opportunities for different character interactions.

Emperor Stab-and-Fuck-Kingdom is perhaps the most relaxed person alive, it turns out, because his sadism makes him really enjoy sacrificing infidels, which makes the gods happy. It also freaks the fuck out of all of his vassals, so they’re a good supplicant mix of both appreciative of my religious sentiments and also utterly terrified of my skull piles. Some especially brave vassals occasionally try to assassinate me, but my lovers keep jumping in front of the knife and saving my life mid-coitus. Iiiiiit happens! :D  

The game can be incredibly fun to just watch, as it becomes emergently weird. Georgia right now is incredibly Jewish in game. I’m not sure how that happened; I guess someone made a random Jewish guy into a vassal, who somehow moved up enough in the world to make it a movement? The Byzantine princes elected a Coptic as Emperor, which over the course of the decade resulted in very accelerated balkanization as Byzantium just lost its shit. The Middle East and notional HRE haven’t really unified in a meaningful way, so I’m curious how things are going to go if/when the Mongols unify and roll-on in.

It’s one of those “Just one more thing” games that can completely devour time. I have more than a few times checked the clock mid-game to see that it’s 4AM and that I’ve totally ruined my sleep schedule in the process of play. Oooooops.

I highly recommend checking it out if you’re curious; the introductory, pre-release video series Paradox put out showing off the game does a pretty good job of showing the core gameplay loop and also how weird it can get.

[forestwater87]

Ok this is super embarrassing but you’re one of my favorite writers in this uh.. whatever this blogosphere is so!! I wanna try and take a crack at writing my own fanfic but.. I got no idea where to even start. Any advice?

Oh man, I feel awful about this! I didn’t know my inbox had any new messages, so some of these asks have been sitting here for . . . some time. 

Anyway, first off thank you very much! Secondly, the most obvious advice is just, you know, “do it.” But that’s infinitely easier said than done. I started writing fanfic when I was around 10 years old, so overthinking it wasn’t an issue, since I thought I was the world’s greatest writer. Assuming you’re not 10 years old and as blind to the concept of literary criticism as I was . . . well, the first step is obviously getting an idea. EDIT: Holy shit, this is long. I’m gonna have to break this bad boy up with headers, like it’s a real blog post or something.

Getting Ideas/Inspiration

I don’t know if you already have something you’d like to write about or if you’re still at the “gee that looks like fun” level of fanfic ruminating, but if you’re having trouble coming up with ideas, turning to the existing fandom is a great place to start! 

1: Filling in fandom gaps: I’ve found a lot of my best fic ideas by looking through what already existed and seeing where there was something missing; when I first started writing for Camp Camp, literally only @raenbowsofficial created anything for Gwenvid -- it didn’t even have a ship name yet, and I’m pretty sure the 3 people into it were still throwing “daven” and “gavid” around as well -- so there being zero other fics for it meant that if I wanted it to exist, I’d have to be the one to write it. (That’s also nice if you’re kind of insecure, because when no one else has tried the idea you’re interested in, you have no pressure to compare it to anything else.) 

Also, you could take a popular/already existing concept and write it the way you’d like to see it, if the existing fanfics do something with the story or characters that you’re not thrilled with. That’s handy because it gives you a general blueprint to work off of in terms of tropes and broad story beats, while letting you explore something new. Obviously, don’t rip off someone else’s fic note-for-note, but being inspired by someone else is a great way to kickstart your creativity! If you do have a specific author or story that you’re using as a jumping-off point for your own writing, I would strongly recommend linking them in your author’s notes at the beginning or end of the fic, and maybe gifting the story to them! You don’t have to, since the creation is entirely your own, but it’s still always nice to acknowledge the people who inspire you the most.

2: Fandom inception. If you want to be a little more direct and literal, there’s always the option of writing fanfic of a fanfic or fanart that you really love, if there’s a universe or story idea that you like, and you want more of it. As long as you give credit and notify the original creator, I think you’d have no issues in terms of fanfic etiquette, and I imagine they’d be honored to have inspired your own writing. Fandom is a very collaborative experience, after all, and we’re all in this together! :)

3. For more general “I have a vague idea of what I want to do (the ship, or maybe a tiny plot bunny) but I’m not sure where to go with it,” my biggest recommendation is music. Especially folk indie-rock music, which is 90% angst and 100% haunting. And again, looking at fanfic/art is a great way to get inspired -- I have a tendency to put up a particularly good or emblematic piece of fanart/fic in another window when I’m working on something tricky to write, just for something to stare at when my ideas start running dry (shoutout to @doritofalls, @ellohcee, and the aforementioned RA for being my go-tos when I need to stare at something pretty to feel inspired; there are absolutely others, because this fandom is filled with absurdly talented people, but those 3 are my heroes of inspiration and if you SOMEHOW don’t already know them, fix that immediately). 

Wow, that’s a lot and it’s literally just all about getting an idea . . . which you might already have. Yikes. For the sake of people who have to scroll past this, let’s put the rest under a cut:

Fleshing Out the Idea: An Ode to Outlines

Some people are able to just sit down and write something incredible from a vague idea, and the story just builds on itself without any sort of planning or organization to guide them along the way. These people are named Cipher/Campernetics, and we hate her for being unfairly talented.

For the rest of us, outlines are essential.

My outlines tend to be insanely specific, because I’m very afraid of letting a single idea slip through the cracks, and I build on them over time as I get increasingly sure of where the story’s going. The early outlines tend to be extremely vague, with lots of “and then something happens” connecting major plot points. An example for a current WIP I’m doing right now:

(Seriously, “Julia and everything”? Future Forest is going to be so pissed at current Forest when she reaches that point and realizes she has no idea what she’s doing)

And as the story starts to take shape and a plot eventually forms -- they tend to take at least 10 chapters to materialize, but they do generally show up! One of the great things about fanfiction is that plot is largely optional, though, so no worries if you’re starting without a full story idea -- I find myself writing more and more details down, if for no other reason than that I want to make sure I remember what I was thinking when I finally get to that scene (because I have absolutely gotten to a point in a story and forgotten what I’d had planned. It sucks). Here’s an example from another fic with pretty significant spoilers if you can figure out which one it is oops:

I’d recommend keeping your outlines pretty simple, at least to start with: words and phrases, rather than whole-ass sentences like the above. The complexity will develop as your ideas do, so no need to wrack your brain trying to write out the entire story in bullet form.

I use the bolded ideas as stepping stones, more or less; I’ll write out the piece of the story that each line represents, which can be as little as a sentence or as much as 4 or more chapters (RIP my most recent long-running fic), then delete that line and move on to the next. 

Bolding them isn’t necessary, but it does make it easier to differentiate at a glance what needs to be written. If you keep everything in the same hundred-page Google Doc like I do, this is very important.

Your outline doesn’t have to be well-written, and you can 100% use fillers like “and then something happens here.” I do that all the time -- again, another completely different story:

Now, the vaguer things are, the more annoyed Future You will be when it comes time to write whatever it’s bulleting -- there’s a reason I haven’t updated this fic, and it’s because I have zero idea what the everliving fuck “Pinky-and-the-Brain-ing all over the place” means -- but it’s really good for when you’re first getting started sketching out the vague outline of your fic. The more you panic trying to figure out all the twists and details at the very start, the less likely you’re ever just going to sit down and write the damn thing.

(This might be why I don’t write plot-heavy stories, to be fair. Mystery writers very well might have to have it all planned out from the get-go, and I’d recommend chatting with someone who’s a bit less “coffeeshop AU” and a bit more Agatha Christie for that kind of advice.)

Knowing When to Post

There are people that exist, who have amazing self-control, who can wait until their entire story is written and then release it in sections, at regular intervals, until the story is completed.

I am not one of these people, though I try to be with literally every single fic I’ve ever written.

Personally, I do this until I reach a point where I get stuck and need validation, and then post what I have in a giant chunk and then don’t update it for several months. This is almost universally known as the worst way to write fanfics, both in terms of getting interaction from fans and keeping readers from wanting to kill you, and if you have the ability to write the entire thing and sit on it until it’s ready to be shared, you are a hero.

Alternatively, if you can actually stick to a set schedule of writing it as you go and still update with a new chapter every X days, you are not human and I’m terrified of you, because if you find a way to weaponize this power you will rule the world.

Honestly, a good rule of thumb? Post it when you’re ready for people to read it, whether it’s done or not. Not all works will get done, and it seems mean to deny people the delicious little stub you’ve written even if you’re not going to finish it. When you’re happy with what you have -- or are so tired of looking at it that you need to post it or you’ll throw your computer out the window -- just do it and let out a sigh of relief, then either take a few days before going back to writing or just jump in immediately like a goddamn masochist.

(I have tried to get far enough ahead that I can start posting the already-written stuff on a schedule, figuring by the time I’m caught up I’ll have completed the entire story and won’t have any awkward gaps. Ahahahahahahahahaha that has never once worked.)

If you’re not certain about your writing, get a beta! The fandom is full of talented people who’d be happy to read over your work, and if the person you ask doesn’t have the time or spoons, they probably have a few ideas of other people you could reach out to. You don’t need a beta, but it always makes me feel better to have another set of eyes look over my writing before posting, and my beta always catches things I completely missed. Plus, you get a nice taste of that sweet, sweet validation we all crave.

This . . . is a bad guide. Just in general. The advice is . . . not good, and I think it’s largely useless. But I keep trying to think of useful things to add to it and coming up empty, so I hope something in here helped, and if you’d like to bounce your ideas off of someone, feel free to shoot me a message! Talking ideas over with friends is a great way to flesh them out as well, and I am happy to be anyone’s fandom friend.

[panickypeachboy]

RULES: Answer the questions you’ve been given, then write your own and tag 11 people. 

//Under le Read More, because 11 answers for 11 questions is long!

1. What’s your favorite thing about your muse(s)?

Oh goddess I’ve answered this twice already, but here’s me gushing over his clothes, cuz the face is just cute. There’s just surprisingly okay/good design with Momotaro that is overlooked because of all the pretty ladies that do the fan-service.

2. What’s your least favorite thing?

About Momo? Or ever? I would say losing close friends, over drama. That’s impacted me a lot, and why I can get really anxious over rping. But if you mean an actual object/show, then disposed (but there’s still notable remnants) food. Y’know the stuff in the trash. I’m allergic to bananas and that’s the most common thing rotting in the there. Makes it real tough to breathe, particularly when it comes to class too.

Don’t worry, I do have an inhaler for those sorts of things but...it’s only one inhaler and I end up mixing up where I last placed it. I just hope to the goddess that I don’t have to deal with a disposed peel during class...

3. Seeing how they’ve lived their lives - if you were in their shoes, what would you do differently?

Honestly, I’m not too sure. I would’ve said I wanted to speak up against the others (i.e. bullies, the girls) more often, but that’s just against Momotaro’s nature...and how Japan culture works. Also I would totally try to (re)tame Momotaro’s mutated friends. Come on, that Chimera is awesome! Let the boy have an awesome steed!

4. How independent is your muse(s) from your control? How much do you approve of their actions? 

Hoh boy, usually I’m like “Momo no”, so that’s pretty clear that I don’t have all le controls over him. He’s simple minded so there’s not much I would need to fuss over, I suppose. HOWEVER, I do have to restrain ourselves from doing too much in the subject of triggers/pstd, because I’m still learning about that...and not many folks are fine with muses suddenly attacking their precious muse just because they tried to be affectionate.

5. If you were friends with your muse(s), what would you do together?

We’d probably go visit animals at shelters and zoos...and befriend the crud out of them. Help care for those buggers, if possible! Also I would try to learn how to cook with Momo too, if he had my headcanon-trait of being a good cook.

6. What’s one of your favorite fandoms, and why?

H.ow to K.eep a M.ummy is one, out of the sheer fact that no one has produced r34 of it yet...or at least something that’s easily found. Also the fans are pretty cool with their enthusiasm and arts. I’ve seen some cute plushies of the main critters that are fanmade! ...I probably ruined that streak didn’t I?

Also the anime is adorable, and I look forward to reading the manga. I just don’t like the heavy focus on the protagonist. I wanted to learn more about the other peeps in the gang, AND THEIR MYTHICAL FRIENDS. Especially the baku and dragon.

7. Are there any fandoms that you want to interact more with? Any AUs that you haven’t gotten a chance to try out yet?

Utapri, and kinda Idolm@ster??? I don’t know I’m working on interacting with folks in this fandom because they’re neato folks, and I fallen in love with the idols! Gah! I had this headcanon for the longest time that Momo’s guilty pleasure is idol music, but he’s only remember how melodic the voices are, and not the names or faces! It would be really cool to well, have the boy be weak but not in a depressed manner, ya know? Actually I wanna see more muses fangirling over each other, particularly if one has a publicly known job.

An au I haven’t tried out yet is actually...Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. I did rp Momo as a pokemon...ONCE, but nothing mystery dungeony. Just a “what if he was reborn as a pokemon” or “experiment gone wrong” thing, and he had a human trainer too. Now I wanna actually find a better Pokemon to suit him and do them mystery dungeon stuff...maybe someday. There was this cool group verse!

That and I wanna try out a verse where Momo is a live-in servant/butler. Seriously I gave him too many traits that fit that sort of job...and I watched too much gakuen babysitters which has the amazing Saikawa. I hear Black Butler is cool too.

8. What was one of your favorite video games as a kid?

Lemme see, Melee is VERY popular, but I loved fooling around in that game, not being a competitive smasher with all them wave dashes. Actually there’s a fair amount of games I liked that are still popular amongst the internet so let’s go something more obscure:

Mario Party 3

Dunno how the fam got it, but that was the game me and my sister played a ton of as kids, and we still came back to it when the Gamecube was around. It was part of our like strange pseudo rping thing to jump around the games to emulate the activities our characters partake in. Start in smash bros, kick some rivals butts and go on adventure! Then visit Mario Party 3 to celebrate with a giant pizza! Oh no, we need to collect some goodies, let’s go do a round on one of the boards! Kick the impostor star’s butt again! Jump to another Mario Party to run through the dungeon and ride the bus! It was kinda our way of playing pretend...I think. Good times, which is why I see the appeal in rping, ya know?

9. What’s the best song you’ve heard for the first time in the past few months?

S.O.S, by Weaver. Holy cow it’s catchy, but like so amazing in its beats. A close second would be Nijiro ⭐ Over Drive! by Otoya Ittoki...I mean his va. I love me some energetic beats man.

10. What’s the best meme you’ve found in the past year?

Okay maybe it’s not exactly a meme but it can be a culmulation of memes...of sorts... Anyways, there’s a channel called “ColeyDoesThings” and she has a series of videos where she visits a room containing a representation of a fandom...represented by her donning various personas based off of personalities found in a fanbase. This series is called “Entering the ___ fandom”. While she can’t catch all the quirks of a fandom (because some are so freakin huge), this woman catches a lot the traits I’ve seen in the places she visits. It’s hilarious to me at least.

I highly recommend the Ship Wars video, at the very least!

11. Is there something you’re looking forward to in the next few months?

Yes. Hatchimals Season 3...oh okay, not a lot of folks are into the collectible toy things. Fair enough, YouTube has fostered the growth of creepy toy channels! I am hyped for obtaining Bayonetta for the switch sometime soon, the end of the semester...I think Blade Strangers is coming out within that time period and I’m hyped to see Curly Brace in that games! Also MORE AMIIBO. That’s all I can recall, at the moment.

Eleven questions for everyone else!

1. What’s your favorite toy from childhood? Do you still have it around?

2. Do you like to collect anything? If so, what is it?

3. Who’s one of your favorite YouTubers?

4. How did you first encounter your main muse?

5. Are there any headcanons for a muse that is related to a trait/experience of yours?

6. What’s your favorite thing to look up when it comes to researching for your muse?

7. Are there any characters (or muses) that influence your muse?

8. What is your favorite, very random, headcanon for your muse? Like something that seems improbable in canon, but is too hilarious/good that you gotta keep it?

9. A memorable, but sweet moment in rping? Could be a thread, or having fun with another mun ooc, or whatever!

10. Are you more keen on rping older muses, or younger muses? Are you fine with rping your muse at different ages?

11. What’s your favorite meme-related song? (i.e. Caramelldansen, Numa Numa, Levan Polka, Momotaro, Kobini Store, etc.)

Tagged by: @notevenjupiter, thanks a lot!! :D Tagging: @maracanight, @ultimate-impostxr, @plumeriaxskull, @patixntia, @gattaimuses, @pinkdressed, @yesfxckyxu, @inkybluez, @embersiisms, @niji-iro-melody, @zoolinguistics, @queenxfjustice, @ahogedetective, @hopeprevaiils, @jabberwockis-lupus, but anyone can do this, or not!

[dlamp-dictator]

Allen Rambles About Fate/Extra & Extella (Allen’s Rambling XXXV)

Usually, when I do an “Allen Rambles About [Video Game]” post I wait until I’ve gone through roughly 20-30 hours of it since I mostly play JRPGs and it takes quite a bit of time before I can safely say I’ve seen everything about the game and have an informed opinion it, but... I’ll be making an exception for the Fate series.

Originally, I was going to talk more about Extra and Extella in a Video Game Update, a monthly post about the video games I’ve played and plan on playing, but since these were the only two games I was playing this month, I think a Rambling going in depth about them is more appropriate. 

And so here we are, the Fate/Extra series. I’ve spent about 15 hours on both games, so I think it’s fair to make a Rambling about them now. And I have to say, I’ve got some conflicting opinions about both these games.

Now, I’m a casual fan of the Fate series, and I plan on going deeper into that in December, but I’ve watched the original Stay Night by studio Deen, the UBW movie by Deen, Fate/Zero, The Ufotable adaptation of UBW, and all four season of Prisma Illya. The only thing I haven’t done Fate-wise is invest into Grand Order, and that’s mostly due to my hatred/weariness of gacha/mobile games. When it comes to Extra and Extella, I was treading new Fate territory. It heard it was basically an AU of the Fate series with more technology and technobabble in it, and Extella looked flashy as hell, and published by Xseed and Marvelous, the folks that made Senran Kagura, and I love Senran Kagura, so I figured “why not?”

And... well, let’s talk a little about that, starting with...

Fate/Extra

With Fate/Extra, I’d say that this game has a good story, but bad gameplay. I originally picked up this game solely so I could have context to Extella. I originally thought Extella wouldn’t be trying to have much continuity in it since Extra was a  story-heavy, visual novel/RPG game on the PSP of all things, that handle literally no one has anymore, and Extella was a Musou-clone where you could take out legions of enemies and typically had very simple stories because you were too busy mash the attack button and throwing lasers and fire magic to care about said story.

But I was wrong.

Oh, how I was wrong.

Not that Extella directly talked about stuff in Extra, but there were a lot of winks and nods to it that had me lost. The Moon Cell Grail War, how Nero was so affectionate toward the player character to the point of being a typical waifu, and the technobabble, dear lord the technobabble of how the Regalia and Moon Cell operated was just sleep-inducing. 

Most Musou-style games outside of Dynasty and Samurai Warriors are usually pretty simple, and even Samurai and Dynasty Warriors is pretty easy on the story stuff. But Fate/Extella was pulling no punches with it’s technobabble and visual novel-style cutscenes (more on that later). I felt I needed to play Extra just to have a decent grasp of what was going on in that story. Thankfully, the game was only ten bucks on PSN, and works as a download on my Vita, so I bought and was playing it side-by-side with Extella.

And after about 15 or so hours, I can honestly say I’m more invested in Extra’s story than Extella’s by a mile. I’m invested in Hakuno’s struggle in the Grail War, how she’s slowly coming to terms with killing people for her own survival. I mean, goddamn, after winning the first match, when you saw the 128 active/living participants drop to 64 in an instant... damn, it was chilling. The world-building is nice too, I’d say even simpler than Extella. The Moon Cell is basically a virtual world where the Grail War takes place, and all the bits and particle effects tell that. These people aren’t mages, but gamers and hackers with magic circuits and whatnot. Really, this is leagues easier to grasp than Extella. And while Nero was more insufferable if anything in Extella given her forcefulness on you, in Extra I get the chance to see our relationship grow to that point. While I despise the fact that she looks like Best Girl Artoria and has a god-awful voice to show her inferiority to said Best Girl, I love her personality, her haughty and explosive natural is really endearing... I just wish she had a different design. I think this story and characters alone is enough to play through and even recommend you guys buy this if you have a Vita and the memory space for it.

However... when we talk about the actual game, I have some issues.

Let’s start with the gameplay. I’ll be frank, this game plays a little too slowly for my liking. The load times are fine, the frame rate is fine, but I hate the rock-paper-scissors, turn-based style of attacking, and I especially hate how you need to grind on enemies to read patterns and pray you’re right until then. I thank God I resisted choosing Best Girl Emiya!Archer went with the more Physical-focus, high attack power of Nero because the grind in this game... goddamn. Dying in the arena isn’t fun when I’ve grinded for an hour to gain three levels only to die and restart from outside the dungeon because I faced a new enemy type with a pattern I didn’t know about. Seriously, quick save would be nice to have, but this is the main reason I’m playing this game with a guide for both story progression and enemy patterns.

Speaking of story progression, gathering information matrices and how hit-or-miss that process can be is worrisome. Again, these enemies rely on know pattern recognition, and collect Servant matrices is top priority so I don’t get wasted in boss battles. I’m using a guide solely for that reason, but... to give credit where credit is due, the game is giving me hints about where and how to learn more about enemy Servants... so far anyway, I’m only on week three, we’ll see how it goes when things pick up. 

Again, I’d say that Extra is the better story, but the has lacking gameplay. I recommend buying if you like visual novel-style games, but Lord alive, please find a guide for this game, both for enemies and story. 

Fate/Extella

With Extella, I feel like this is the opposite case. I love the gameplay of Extella. It’s a little repetitive, and I swear Servant enemies have little to no hit stun, but it’s not bad. The story... well, I went over that for two paragraphs in the Extra section, but there’s a bit more I want to talk about. 

I... really don’t like the visual novel style of storytelling in this game. It’s fine for Extra since the gameplay isn’t engaging enough to play the game solely for that, but Extella has great gameplay and a lot of fast-paced action. The long story cutscenes and My Room events just bog down the pacing and have me waiting longer and longer to get to the next stage and bash more enemies. Honestly, the story could just be summarized as Nero and Tamamo fighting over territory in the Moon Cell and possession of the Regalia with Altera playing both sides and being the final boss... oh, and something about an meteor and Colossal Titan with Archimedes rubbing his hands together and evilly chortling. I dunno, I’ve still gotta’ play through Altera’s story mode and the true ending, so maybe I’ll get some context to why all of this is so complicated, but I don’t think I’ll like the answer given how much time is spent trying to get me to care about anything but using Emiya!Archer in Nero’s campaign.

Also, Archimedes being the Chessmaster in the background does nothing but annoy me. Liz making a sudden Heel Turn makes sense, especially in Tamamo’s story where she’s constantly abused by the group. But Archimedes? Honestly, he could be cut out entirely, Altera could had been the final boss and a third faction holding the Body of Hakuno hostage, and nothing would be lost story-wise. This stuff about the Umbral Star, Velber, and all that... just... makes me skip all the story cutscenes because I don’t care. I care about Nero and Tamamo and how they want the best for Hakuno. I care about some of the side characters since I like a lot of their designs. I care about Altera and her deal in this situation and why she’s holding Hakuno’s Body hostage. But outside of that... I could care less about this technobabble about the Regalia, the Moon Cell, the Umbral Star, it’s just... pointless to me.

But again, it’s the gameplay that attracts me to this. The chance to take out thousands of soldiers with Emiya!Archer and Medusa, beating the stuffing out of that prick Gilgamesh, using all the cool and flashy Noble Phantasmas? Did you guys see how badass UBW looks in this game?

Seriously, Emiya!Archer is the best.

My only real critique gameplay-wise is that some more characters in Extra should had appeared. I think Francis Drake would had been a great addition to Tamamo’s faction as a mercenary unit, and honestly, Medusa has no range in her moveset, so having a gunslinger would be nice. Having Robin Hood replace Emiya!Archer, while tragic to my inner Emiya!Archer fanboy, would make more sense since the game is assuming you used Nero in Extra, and Robin Hood and Nero had some pretty fun banter in Extra, seeing more of that would be fun.

But again, I’m on the opposite end of Extella in terms of my opinion. A fun game with fun gameplay, but a story that’s more suffering to go through if anything. If it was a little simpler and pulled back on all the technobabble about the Moon Cell then I’d be more engaged, but even Extra has less exposition than this game, and that’s a goddamn visual novel.

So yeah, those are my opinions on the Fate/Extra series so far. I’m looking forward to seeing Extella Link come out, and I’m praying its story is simpler to grasp. I’m actually going to be taking a break from Extra for the rest of October and most of November to play Dangan Ronpa V3 (more on that later), but I’m glad I got into this series, and I hope to complete it by the end of the year.