#he got WAY more active on this site right after the New Zealand shit

[briony-poisoned]

The Neil Gaiman shit is horrendous, and I’m furious that he has been using this website in particular to build up a support network. Do not fall for it. He has been charming and engaging on Tumblr so that he’d have an army of dedicated stans who will defend him.

[italicwatches]

Animal Sentai Zyuohger - Episode 01

That’s right, lords and ladies. It’s time. We have journeyed far and wide, we have seen many things…But at last, it is TIME, TO, DO A TOKUSATSU SERIES AGAIN! And we’re picking up right where we left off with 2016’s Super Sentai series, Zyuohger! It’s Animal Sentai Zyuohger, episode 01! Here we GO!

-40TH ANNIVERSARY

-Some educational stuff about how there are estimated to be as many as 8 million animal species on Earth, but only 1.2-ish have been discovered…Then into the woods, where one Kazakiri Yamato is leading a group of children and families in watching some animals…I mean, until his colleague Mario is sneaking around in a deer costume. And we get to see Yamato put an egg back into a nest way up in a tree to show he is a Good Guy.

-Oh no, his good luck charm fell out of his bag! And sends him flying down the side of the hill to try and retrieve it…Only for the odd cube to start to glow. And then there’s a massive one floating over the water, with an opening for his cube in turn! IN a flash, this giant thing spins, tumbles, and cracks open, sucking him in…!

-And spilling him out in front of a bunch of animal-headed people.

-…So the background animal folks are wearing those internet horse masks.

-I’m just gonna…I’m just gonna put that out there. So these four color coded noteworthy people are…Leo the lion, Sela the shark, Tusk the elephant, and Amu the tigress. Talking animal people! And that’s when Yamato realizes that all their structures are very cuboid. Is he in Minecraft?!

-Opening! ANIMAL SENTAI, ZYUOHGER!

-Man, I missed translated lyrics so much.

-Episode 01: Thrills in Animal Land!

-Cut to…A giant space station…That’s a bow and arrow.

-DAMN, these villains don’t fuck around. So we’ve got Genis, the man in charge, and then each of his generals…And they’re looking to Earth as their 100th conquest…Damn it’s just celebratory numbers all around.

-Meanwhile, Yamato is getting to see Zealand, the land of zyumans. And also that giant box gets the name the Link Cube. These four protect it. But without the Champion’s Symbol, they cannot open it…Ever since that symbol was stolen…And that’s when Yamato remembers. When he got his lucky charm…A figure put it into his hands when he was but a child…

-Which Tusk promptly pulls out, having plucked out of his things, to ask where the hell Yamato got it. But back on Earth, hey, it’s one of the villains! Who summons up mooks, called Moebas, and starts kicking up fire! Ohhh dear.

-Back in Zyuland, Leo is furious…When the Link Cube starts to react viciously! This is bad. This has to be bad. But Yamato, with no other options on the board, grabs his cube back and shoves it into the slot just as he did to end up here…

-Which sends him, and the four guardians, through the portal, where they find the forest being attacked and lit aflame…And the guardians feel the fury, the hate, deep in their bones. It locks them up, puts terror deep into them…While Yamato sees one of the kids from his tour group go down, and get cornered. His legs are moving before he can think, and he snatches the boy right out of the line of fire…

-And the monster introduces himself. They are the Deathgaliens, and this planet is the site of his people’s new Blood Game…He fires wildly, viciously, and one of his shots hits the Link Cube, damaging it! The guardians, faced with no choice, take up their remaining Champion’s Symbols…

-And they react to their will, ancient shells shattering to reveal incredibly toyetic transformation devices! Which even snap open to reveal phone screens! INSTINCTS AWAKENED! With a turn, they bring them to life, and are forged in armor!

-Champion of the surging waves, ZYUOH SHARK! Champion of the savannah, ZYUOH LION! Champion of the forest, ZYUOH ELEPHANT! Champion of the snowy drifts, ZYUOH TIGER! Animal Sentai, ZYUOHGER! Out go the mooks…

-And with roars, the four leap in, unleashing their wrath upon those who would threaten innocent life! Wrath sufficient to quickly kick something on…Namely, BEASTS UNLEASHED! A weapon born of their inherent power as zyumans. For Shark, a fin to cut through the air like water. For Lion and Tiger, claws as sharp as any blade. And for Elephant, mighty boots that can shatter the ground underfoot!

-Of course, we also have the Zyuoh Buster, the nifty combination sword/gun with toyetic gimmicks. You’re gonna hear that a lot here if you’ve never seen a Super Sentai series. And Yamato grabs up his own Champion’s Symbol, deciding he can’t let them fight alone…While a sixth is recovered by a hooded figure…

-Some of the Moebas have gotten up into the air on jetpacks, and they manage to throw enough chaos into the fray that the villain can blast all four Zyuohgers right in the chest…Until Yamato races in, grabbing his cannon and forcing it off-mark! He of course gets beaten for his trouble…But dammit, innocent people, innocent lives, are in danger. Humans, animals, there are lives at stake…And he doesn’t dare stand idly by while that’s happening!

-Please…Please, let him fight. Let this damn thing WORK! What’s the difference between a human and a zyuman?! Humans are but animals, evolved apes…

And that’s all they need to be. Yamato’s will reaches into the core of the Symbol, and it too breaks its shell, forming into his own transformation device…! With a turn, it activates, and grants him the power of the EAGLE! Just as the figure who granted it to him….INSTINCTS AWAKENED! Champion of the soaring sky, ZYUOH EAGLE!

-BEAST UNLEASHED! With crimson wings he soars, going after the airborne Moebas and carving them out of his skies! The power is overwhelming, like nothing he’s ever felt before…A freedom like none other.

-By the time he’s grounded, Eagle’s got his Eagle Riser, a classic Red-style extendomatic sword with some slick whip action. In seconds, he’s bound the villain, the monster of the week, unleashing a RISER SPINNING SLASH to cut him apart! He shatters into nothing but colorful squares and explosions, and Eagle has made his claim clear. The Earth, is under his protection.

-Back up in the ship, Genis has suddenly found himself intrigued. He cracks a Continue, and passes it to the one lady of the team, Naria. Go deliver this to him. See what he does with it.

-And indeed she arrives, popping the token in the slot…Aaand he gets big! In the first episode?! Jeez, we’re not fucking around. The Symbols react, and when given the go-ahead by the Zyuohgers, begin to glow, summoning massive cubes! ZYUOH CUBE! Cubes that unfurl into Minecraft-looking giant animals, with the Zyuohgers piloting them! CUBE EAGLE, CUBE SHARK, CUBE LION, CUBE ELEPHANT, CUBE TIGER!

-More and more arrowhead-ships come pouring out of the Big Bow, firing upon the Cube Animals…This whole fight is a new scale, as they have everything from disaster rescue to raw combat to worry about…Until three flaming portals appear, more strength from the Link Cube’s power. In go Eagle, Shark and Lion, hyper-charging their Cube Animals…For a three-way Animal Combination!

-EAGLE, SHARK, LION! The cubeslink…THREE, TWO, ONE! And a post is driven through their cores, as they unreal into a very minecraft-looking ZYUOH KING! Fuck yeah giant robots. Zyuoh King strides forth, no-selling everything this Monster of the Week-ass fucker can throw at them, until it’s blade versus cannon…And the cannon just doesn’t have enough to match up to a sword ablaze with three wills! They charge, and unleash the ZYUOH SLASH! One solid strike through the core, and this MotW falls!

-And when it’s over…Well, they still can’t go back to Zyuland. Because now a different Symbol is missing. So, Leo’s not happy. Like, at all. Yamato volunteers to try and help them figure out a plan…And Leo finally comes around to the guy.

-Oh, and they also have one more useful trick from their Symbols…A disguise. Human forms. Well, mostly human. Ignore the tails. …And then Tusk dramatically refuses Yamato’s help, not wanting to be in this human’s debt?! …Well shit, guess we got out first plot arc.

-Credits! Gather around, animals! Here on Mother Earth!

Ohhh man I missed this shit. Just big ol’ goofy melodrama and fun. Of course, any toku series is a big commitment, often around 50 episodes…So strap in for a long ride, my friends. We’re gonna be here a while. But first, we’ve got to make Tusk quit being such a prick, next time in episode TWO of Animal Sentai Zyuohger! Wait for it!

[lumsel]

TF2 is a cutting parody of Overwatch and I can prove it

And when I say parody, I don’t mean it as in one of those “Minecraft Parodies” you see on the youtubes where they switch some lyrics around and call it a day without really commenting on the source material, I mean it as in TF2 is a biting deconstruction of Overwatch and everything it represents. Now I’m sure you have all sorts of questions involving release dates and, I dunno, logic, but bear with me here for a moment because this shit runs deep:

Overwatch’s characters have a diverse range of origins and personalities, presented as the best of the best from all over the world. Artists, Innovators, Heroes, Overwatch lets you play as great people who fight for great causes. Granted, there’s a bit of some weird dissonance between how they act and how they play, we’ve all made jokes about how weirdly cheerful Mei is about killing people, but overall they’re just a bunch of lovable goofs. Hell, even the so-called bad guys are impossible to hate, because they just have so much personality baked into them.

TF2′s cast is comprised of foolish, incompetent mercenaries, who are explicitly not the best of the best but rather a bunch of idiots the Administrator got to fight her pointless battles without any motivations beyond the money they earn. They aren’t lovable; entertaining to be sure, but they aren’t exactly the kinds of folks you’d sit down and have a beer with. Examining them at an individual level reveals further criticisms:

The Soldier’s name is a clear reference to the Overwatch hero Soldier 76, and further comparisons can be made from there. Soldier 76 is a disgraced war vet who takes the world into his own hands, travelling the world to fight evils and save people. The Soldier amps it up to 11; a mentally ill civilian who becomes convinced he is fighting Nazis in a war that ended years ago, and is in actuality blowing up innocents. No one man can understand the complexities of worldly conflicts enough to actively fight for the “right side” without screwing everything up, and the Soldier personifies this notion to an extreme, portrayed as not only insane but also highly jingoistic, alluding to an undercurrent of american exceptionalism that exists in 76′s All-American Hero stylings.

Pyro is a take on Bastion. They’re both unintelligible and gender-indeterminate cuties who retain their innocence in a cruel and brutal environment. Of course, Bastion’s dissonance between its purpose and its personality is played for drama, for how tragic it is that this adorable robot is built only to kill. The Pyro, by contrast, portrays innocence in spite of violence as twisted. Compare their promotional shorts: Bastion’s ends with it deciding against its original purpose (and the purpose it serves in gameplay) and exiling itself to the forest to care for a cute bird, while the Pyro’s portrays the violence and innocence as a symbiotic relationship, showing that they hallucinate the carnage they cause as spreading love and cheer. TF2 tells us that the innocence of a DPS character in a shooter is not endearing but terrifying, because the two aspects cannot coexist without extreme cognitive dissonance. The Pyro can delight in violence because, in their limited understanding of the world, they see violence as delightful.

The Medic lampoons Mercy and to a lesser extent every support character in Overwatch. There is something faintly hypocritical about a character claiming to want to help people as they serve as an accomplice to a violent, bloody war effort. Mercy may rarely score any kills herself, but she enables the continued destruction caused by every combatant she heals. The Medic puts up no such pretense of being a good person, he loves the pain and violence perhaps more than his compatriots who actively dole it out. He is no harmless doctor, he is as great a threat as the men with guns, if not even more dangerous - and he doesn’t even have a damage boost on his medigun. The Medic's habit of experimenting on his teammates for shits and giggles is, too, a joke about Mercy, this time referring to her canon involvement in turning Genji and Reaper into killing machines. 

The Sniper is, like Roadhog, an Australian who is actually a New Zealander who sounds like nothing like either. I don’t have anything insightful to say here, I just think it’s funny.

But the one thing that binds them - the one thing they have in common? They are all sadistic assholes. Every character has a cackling, evil laugh they let out when they’re on a kill streak, they all bask in the glory of slaughter unashamedly and unabashedly - they are guns for hire, after all. In a way, they aren’t so different to the Overwatch cast in this respect; even the bright and peppy tracer has a host of voicelines cheerily mocking the people she has just murdered with her twin pistols. But what TF2 does differently is make this obvious. The nine classes have no purpose in gameplay beyond causing and enabling murder, and rather than distract you from this fact with charming personalities, it lets you pity them as the mean, cruel bastards that they are. These are no “heroes” to be looked up to, they are the waste product of a world better than them.

Overwatch’s map design is beautiful, to be sure, with a clean, futuristic aesthetic and a wide diversity of metropolitan locales to explore. But when you think about it, the levels don’t make a whole lot of sense. The payload maps are all cities that tend to have only one road in them, they’re peppered with hazardous falls despite being mostly innocuous metropolitan areas, and the architecture is often questionable at best. While some maps have a clear goal that the two teams are fighting over, i.e. Volskaya’s factory, some are just places where a fight is happening for no reason. Illios is the perfect example, you go to a well, a lighthouse and an excavation site but there’s nothing to be won in any of the areas. Of course, asking “why are we fighting here” was a mug’s game to begin with - the gameplay in is non-canon, after all.

TF2′s map design is specifically engineered to draw attention to its own senselessness.  The payload tracks aren’t roads, they’re literal tracks, on the ground, which just happen to lead directly to the enemy team’s giant stockpile of explosive barrels. Control points aren’t just game abstractions, they’re giant metal discs on the ground, marked out with hazard tape and set up to display a giant holographic team emblem. One place where they differ is TF2 is not content to allow a map to have no valuable resource in it to be fighting over, even when said dedication raises more questions than it answers. That granary isn’t just a granary, it’s actually concealing a secret spy base. The lumberyard? Secret spy base. Hydroelectric plant, which actually might be tactically advantageous to own? ALSO A SECRET SPY BASE! “Secret spy base” is the punchline to every map’s visual narrative, and serves as a challenge to the philosophy of Overwatch’s design, by implying that those innocuous locales you visit, all those wells and lighthouses, they were actually just secret spy bases this whole time.

Even the art direction in OW’s fascination with a vaguely utopic golden age is reflected in TF2′s usage of idealised 60′s-ea illustration as a clear inspiration. The visual language utilised by a people who were proud of the world that they shaped, despite the festering problems lurking deep within it, is perfect for the ugliness of the TF2 universe. The painterly, illustrative style isn’t used for white picket fences and well-kept lawns, but ramshackle shacks, industrial monstrosities and machines of war. This is no better time nor a better place, it is a war. It is blood and gore and fire and pain and all the worst parts of humanity condensed into bite sized 10 minute matches.

And the war they fight is pointless. Not pointless in the sense that it is non-canon, but that it is canon and yet it still means nothing. It’s a pitiable battle between two brothers over their ancient, useless gravel estate, with all the lasers and rockets only existing to claim more useless gravel. The fights don’t mean anything, the story isn’t important, and the resources aren’t world-changing, they’re just pointless bloodshed for pointless rewards, a hauntingly accurate summation of the philosophy of a competitive shooter.

Overwatch’s world is one like our own, but... different. Set in a fantastic and wonderful future, it portrays a world coming off of the heels of a great robot war. It is populated by robots called omnics, who are either a metaphor for all marginalised groups ever or evil badguy robots depending on the what the writers need right now. In addition, Overwatch likes to add it’s own additional spice to real world locales: South Korea is threatened by a giant badguy robot and has hired professional gamers to fight it, Australia has been devastated in a nuclear holocaust and is now a desolate wasteland, and The Moon has recently been overthrown by sentient gorillas(?) who now rule its colonies. It’s all a bit silly, to be sure, but it’s made with love, and it’s all just so earnest you can’t help but love it back.

In the TF2 community, there is some debate over whether or not Abraham Lincoln inventing stairs as an alternative to the rocket jump is canon information or not. What is definitely canon, however, is that spaceflight was invented in 1900, New Zealand is a once legendary sunken metropolis destroyed by an incompetent scientist, and Amelia Earhart was a hotdog mascot. The world isn’t just quirky, it’s gonzo, with ghosts and charismatic war profiteers and rocks that radiate pure intelligence all being mentioned in the same sentence with nary a wink. 

You can tell TF2′s lead, Robin Walker, was an Australian man angry about the nation’s treatment in Overwatch, because in TF2 Australia is a world leader inventing all of the major technologies in the setting and is the main catalyst for most of the world’s politics. Tellingly, you never actually go to Australia in-game, because the conflict that TF2 portrays is as stated earlier completely removed from anything remotely important in the setting. Of course, Australia is also said to be populated entirely by idiots who get in barfights all the time and choose their king by boxing with kangaroos because if there’s one thing that TF2 avoids like the plague it’s the genuine idealism that Overwatch so loves.

And Overwatch’s incredible technology levels, showing the world of 60 years from now being populated by megastructures, holograms and hovercars, is parodied with the setting of TF2 having all the same, but 60 years into the past. Because Australium, you see. The quaint interpretation of global politics is now extended into full-on alternate history wherein the Space Race was just the US and Russia feebly attempting to measure up to Australia’s impossible standards and Musician Tom Jones is murdered by the Soldier for being his wizard ex-roommate’s new best friend. It shows the inherent arrogance OW painting its own picture of what the world is like by painting that picture onto the past instead of the future, allowing us to immediately understand the contrast between how the authors portray the world and how it actually was - and letting us laugh at just how different the two really are.

This theory would be completely perfect with no holes in it whatsoever, were it not for one key issue: TF2 came out seven years before Overwatch was announced.

There is only one explanation for this: this is a case of analogous evolution where the Overwatch team made many of the same gameplay decisions as the TF2 team but TF2 understood the absurdity of said gameplay and decided to emphasise it whereas Overwatch elected to ignore it and justify its fiction through supplemental material, combined with TF2 actively parodying tropes that predate both games that Overwatch somewhat coincidentally indulges in due to the developers of one intending a dark satirical tone and the developers of the other trying for something more optimistic TF2 was engineered by Valve at some point in the future and sent back in time like a videogame terminator to destroy Overwatch before it was ever born in order to ensure CSGO’s dominance in the competitive PC shooter field. Valve failed to take the key moral lesson away from the first Terminator movie, however - any endeavor involving time travel is doomed to fail from the start, as whatever action you take has always been taken and the past cannot be changed. Just like Robot Arnold Schwarzenegger, TF2 not only failed to prevent Overwatch’s existence, it ultimately proved instrumental in the game’s conception when the spark of inspiration (here representing Kyle Reese) made sweet, sweet love to Jeff Kaplan’s brain before dying in a dynamite explosion. For shame, Valve. I thought you would have learned from Skynet’s mistakes.