#her game mechanics are simple yet complicated

[momo-shut-the-fuck-up]

So i ve done the main story in infinity nikki and im gonna stop playin now, before i squeeze the game dry of content and have nothing (new) to do on release.

Time for a lil review/thoughts post

I m not gonna review every single mechanic in the game, simply things that stood out to me or that i wanna talk about. I also wont add more images, i kinda want ppl to see the world for themselves... i ll share more when the game comes out tho.

There s a lot of text under this. Tldr, i like the game i think it's a solid, enjoyable experience with a good gameplay loop, the story isn't for me, and i'll keep playin of course. And u should try it too if ur device wont blow itself up tryin to run it.

Dress up

The bread and butter of Nikki games... it's good as usual. Game doesn't shy away from long skirts or coat tails or complicated ballgowns just cuz nikki can run and jump and dash now and i'm very happy bout that. There's some clipping issues once in a while, but it's nothing major and the clothes we do have in the game are lovely. There s an evolution system for some of the sets, which makes em a diff color.... usually they can evolve once, but i saw Three extra evolutions for one of the UR sets and that scares me. Bcs to evolve them u have to craft the suit again. So u have to pull 4 copies of a suit to max it out..

Combat

Game's definitely succeeding in its quest for being cozy. There's no real stakes, combat isn't difficult in the slightest but i do welcome it- super simple but it's pretty fun regardless. The boss fights were surprisingly creative and fun for what they are, it's just unfortunate that you have to do them more than once or twice (crafting mats)- but they do change what the boss does so it's different depending on what mat u are farming for... and u can claim double or triple or however much stamina u got-le of the mat after u complete it once. So that s rly nice.

Exploration

I actually think it's really really good. Again this isn't a difficult or complicated game, not yet i guess... but with the major goal being "get new clothes" and "take pretty pictures maybe", the open world feels actively engaging to participate in. There's collectibles everywhere, little challenges you can do that are diverse but quick, styling battles, collecting everythin from animals fur to bugs to fish, and allll of this brings u closer to that never ending goal of woo more clothes.

However even if a challenge doesnt give you a blueprint, it's still just. Really Nice to exist in this world. It's very whimsical, as expected of Lilith, and the world has a combination of realism and cartoon artstyle that is just soso appealing to me. It's genuinely how i would've imagined miraland to look in 3d. Shame it's not the same miraland we know..

Story

Hmm... silly is one word i could use for it. Cute also. The story isn't doin anythin bad per se, and i did start skippin dialogue near the end w the pieceys because i want to keep at least Some part of the story for the game's release... but i get the gist of it, and it s just not my thing.

It feels like a story made for children, and it definitely would get a G rating. Easy and simple to follow, there's moments of tension or sadness sure but with the antagonist bein a literal babie lookin cutey fairy with a grown man's voice, or the creatures that i'm interacting with are a bunch of. Fuckin weird lookin big eyed balls of fabric that look closer to plushies than somethin Alive... it's all so silly and dramatic sometimes i can t help but cringe.

Part of it is a me problem, if u just open ur heart and free urself from the cringe the story is fine. It's just a little too kiddy for me and i so desperately hope it won't stay like this forever. My prayers might be answered though, there's a whole war beyond the borders and we have refugees around... shit's lookin bad for Umbrosa.

Other things i noticed that i liked:

The effect on nikki's skin when it's raining, she actually has water dripping down her face... its so cool

Momo capes are actually kinda neat ngl. Especially cuz the fucker follows u around everywhere, at least i can bedazzle him

Npc models look really good im a fan. They do suffer from "everyone is very beautiful" syndrome, which makes some of the npc villains look/sound ridiculous, but they have kid-teen-adult-elderly versions of models (i never see teen models in these games! Its cool!) And some body variation. The grandmas look so lovely i cry

The dark skin tone is really dark, and it looks quite nice and natural.

The lighting engine in this game is just rly good in general. God bless UE5

The edges of the map where there s forest, which u obv cant go thru, the forest is made to be darker, thicker.... i m a huge fan of this idk y. It's not just *invisible wall in front of an open field* nopee cant go there lets explore that area later tee hee. And it looks good to boot.

Camera function is p robust, has more options for changin brightness/saturation/contrast etc which i feel Shining Nikki lacks.

Some of the creature designs are so good man i looove themm <3.... the pieces are awful tho. Ok creature design is a hit and miss sometimes but the stray hatty? Peak. All the weirdy fashionable animals? Peak.

Bein able to quick switch thru ur saved sets while in the overworld is real neat

Oke that was it. Bye

[faultychips]

Old and New; The Moon, and 24 Killers

MOON. A classic “anti-rpg”, Influencing some of the most popular video game artwork of recent history, from Toby Fox, who said he... didn’t play it, but “(the game's) concept was an inspiration for UNDERTALE”, to Tony Domenico of Petscop, who doesn't know anything about it but notes perhaps he “saw a screenshot of that "catch" text somewhere and forgot about it”.

…In all seriousness, it’s really fascinating how even the vague idea of moon, in screenshots and summaries, has changed the landscape of video games. It’s hard to tell exactly how much it’s responsible for when the influence of its initial Japanese-only release in 1997 was of course very concentrated in Japan, and I wasn’t around to experience that era of video games myself… but there’s just so many novel ideas in moon that you can’t help but feel a spark of inspiration light up in your brain the more you know about it. The good news is that in 2020, they translated the game to English, and many people who only knew of the game from forum posts and anecdotes can now play the actual thing for themselves. So, let me tell you about my experience playing "moon" for my own self.

In moon: Remix RPG Adventure, you play as a young boy who gets sucked into his television and transported into the world of the stereotypical RPG videogame he was just playing. You don't have a proper body in this universe, but an old lady tells you that she is your "Gramby", and she happily welcomes you "back" into her home and gives you clothes to wear, allowing you to interact with the world around you. Now is when the game introduces it's main gameplay mechanic - a ticking clock, with both a daily and weekly schedule that advances whenever you're not in a dialogue or cutscene. There's a little arrow on this clock, and when the ticking hand reaches it, you will pass out and be given a GAME OVER. As a little bird Yoshida tells you in the town square: "If you ain't got love, you'll stop breathing and pass the heck out." If you want to be able to move around for longer before having to rest in a bed, you'll need to interact with the citizens of "Love-De-Gard" and catch the souls of the animals slain by the HERO to gain love and grow stronger.

The time limit is pretty harsh when you haven't gained any love yet, but thankfully there are a few easy ways to get around it and raise your level. Gramby gives you a task you can complete for love right away, and she will also give you a cookie every day. Eating food will move your time limit forward, giving you more time to move around, so you don't want to miss your opportunities to stock up here in the early game. There's also plenty of animals around to catch, though you'll have to follow the HERO around for a little bit first. Don't worry too much about the weekly schedule - it's really only important for getting all of the NPC related love, and you'll probably need an external guide for those anyway.

Speaking of guides, it should be noted that moon is pretty much impossible to play without one. You can go for a pretty nice long time without any help (I think I lasted about 5-10 hours on my own?) but inevitably you run out of answers, and to be honest, the game doesn't provide a way to get all of information you need to complete events or progress the story, so I don't think you should bother trying to struggle through figuring out everything on your own. That being said, I would go as long as you can without one, since lots of the things you can do in the early game aren't too complicated to figure out by yourself. When you do need one, I personally found this generally spoiler-free guide very helpful, and when I needed to understand how to progress the story (the Mushroom Forest in particular gave me some trouble) this speedrun worked nicely. There's a translated version of the official manual, too, which you can read before you start playing since it's good for a simple introduction.

One thing I appreciate about moon is that while it has some frustrating elements, the game sets itself apart from other obtuse titles from the same era in that it never absolutely requires you to do anything besides the main plot line. Once you reach the end of the main quest and reach love level 22, you are free to go straight to the ending, and there is no "true" ending to be gotten from catching all the animals' souls or doing everything the game has to offer. Still, I figured this was the case and rescued all 51 animals anyway, and stopped just a few hearts short of the max love level. Barring some few particularly annoying sidequests, moon is compelling enough that you want to experience and enjoy as much of it as you can. (...With a guide, of course.)

If there's one ultimate negative about moon's daily/weekly schedule mechanic, which causes certain events to happen only at certain times of day or even certain days of the week, it's that you will often be sitting around around waiting for something to happen, potentially for multiple in-game days...especially if you miss your cue and have to wait for the event to occur all over again. Thankfully moon has a really delightful way of making waiting pleasant: your character has a portable "MD" (Moon Disc) player, which you can get songs for and make a tracklist to listen to while you walk or sit around. I wish I had access to more MDs sooner, but save for two random discs, you can't get the majority of them until you get past the Rainbow Rocks area, so I recommend exploring that area as soon as possible and solving its puzzles so you can advance forward. You'll be able to get most of the obtainable tracks at an MD store afterwards, and thankfully, all the songs on my tracklist of favorites are sold there. You should give all of the tracks a try eventually –you'll have plenty of time to do so, trust me– but I think these are some nice, reliable ones to get you started. There were many times that the forced waiting, laying back while the music plays, was actually really enjoyable...it can be nice to slow down and pause sometimes, and not many video games take the initiative to actually abate tediousness like this. It should definitely let you use the MD player in more areas, though, since too many of them disable it completely, and still others allow it to play but have distracting background noises.

...Of course, you can only stand so much waiting before getting bored of even your favorite tracks, so when you start checking your phone during these musical breaks, it may be time to start wrapping up. When you are satisfied with your time in moon, you can probably go right ahead and see the main quest through to the ending. I had more than enough love to meet the endgame requirement when I was ready, so I went straight in, not looking at any guide for the final section. That...may have been a mistake. In "anti-RPG" fashion, the game throws a bit of a curveball at you in this part, giving you a choice to make after about 20 minutes of (unskippable) cutscenes. I chose effectively the wrong option, and the game ended abruptly. My first conclusion was that the last 20 minutes of dialogue was actually telling me that I had to 100% the game first before I could get a satisfying "true" ending, so I spent about a half hour in deep frustration thinking about all the things I bounced hard off of that I would have to return to, before checking an 100% playthrough and realizing that the game ends exactly the same there as it did in mine, and the ending depends entirely on that final choice from earlier regardless of your completion percentage. Ahhhhhhh. After going through the final cutscenes again, the true answer is a bit more obvious, but if you want to skip doing this ending twice, maybe check the guide before you lock in your answer. Regardless, the cinematic buildup is really well done here, both endings are fitting for the game, and on a broad level I like them both.

...So having played it, what is moon, and why does even just the idea of it inspire? It's a game about subverting the tropes of typical RPGs with knights in shining armor, calling into question the "inherent goodness" of an almighty, violent hero and the "inherent badness" of scary looking creatures. At the same time, it clearly loves the RPG genre; the world of moon is brimming with life, full of silly animals and goofy characters, all playing out their role in the narrative of the RPG, and it wants you to love and care for everything in it. I think I do love a lot of what moon is. You can feel its dated-ness in many, many ways, but there is –if you'll excuse me for this– a lot of love for videogames in its heart, and it offers new ways to think about and experience those games.

With this in mind, it's not at all surprising that moon was so influential - and clearly I'm not the only one who felt a spark of imagination light when they played it. Here’s a game that came out just last year that is truly, concretely inspired by moon, while being unique and quite modern; let’s take a look…

24 Killers initially caught my eye because, as the game's Steam page explains, it was inspired by moon. Since I was in the middle of playing moon when I heard about it, it seemed like a great followup title. And while 24 Killers implements some solid game mechanics and style from moon, like the daily energy allowance that refills with food, and progression centered around helping funky monsters, I found that the game's vibes and aesthetics also remind me a lot of something like Earthbound; it's a vibrant and whimsical world where anything can happen, and you're just settled in for the ride. There's almost a toy-like feel to how everything looks and sounds; it's got this upbeat "fun" energy at its core that's extremely charming. I have to admit I've never fully completed any of the Mother titles due to the grinding and the external guidance necessary, but 24 Killers offers up the same energy without either of those barriers.

In fact, one of my favorite things about 24 Killers is that I didn't have to look at a single guide to figure out any of the puzzles for my entire 11-hour initial playthrough. Everything in the game is pretty self-evident and figured out quickly through some decent thought and trial-and-error. moon offers a good point of comparison: for many puzzles there, you would have to open your inventory, select the specific item necessary, and then use it while standing close enough to an NPC to get them to react, requiring the player to guess at what item they would need to use to progress...assuming they had the item they needed in the first place, or that using an item is what they needed to do at all! In 24 Killers, you simply can't offer items randomly like this; if you talk to someone and you have the item they need, the game will ask you if you want to give the item. If you don't have the item, the game won't prompt you. Usually if characters need an item from you they'll also make it very clear when you talk to them. This, among other adjustments to old formulas, cuts out a lot of potential fumbling and blind guesswork, and I much prefer it above checking the guide for moon over and over. In this way and many others, the game feels very anti-esoteric, meeting the player on their level and making sure that even the grand exposition and lore doesn't go over your head. Even in the dialogue the characters regard you pretty plainly; "Bro please ferry me to the afterlife" is probably my favorite line from the whole game.

In moon, you would appease or disturb a monster, and then catch its soul so it can be revived and rescued. It's delightful to discover all these different creatures in that game, but you don't interact with them much besides grabbin' at 'em. In 24 Killers every monster is its own sentient person--and every one has something they'd love to yap to you about. You'll run laps, bounce balls, play games, and drive cars around with these guys, and I found that to be another much welcome deviation from moon's formula. moon frames its monsters as adjacent to wild animals, but the monsters of 24 Killers are just genuinely guys hanging out, and if you engage them, they can be your chill buds.

But why are you befriending the monsters? Because you are HOME, a cursed spirit doomed to wander in limbo until they are dragged into the corpse of a soldier and given a chance at escaping their affliction--as they befriend the monsters inhabiting the remote island of the game's setting, they lose the resentful bitterness that caused their curse to develop in the first place and can slowly heal themself. Basically, HOME is a lonely bro, and could use some good friends. We've all been there, you know how it is. Honestly, HOME is probably my favorite character of the whole game; their dual mixture of sarcastic attitude that can flip to genuine goofy dramatics and flair, based on essentially "if it would be funny, do it", was great and really made my time with the game; their personality a worthy selling point in its own right.

Now, I should mention the two small hiccups I encountered with this game. Somehow I made an extremely similar mistake to the one I made with moon - I assumed that "completion" of the game required a lot of extra steps and took a break, when in fact I was right at the finish line and just needed to step over it. To explain with relatively few spoilers: you need to collect three "Echoes" to reach the end credits. I collected two Echoes, which gave a cutscene with almost identical dialogue each time. I assumed that the repetition meant that you would be required to gather a lot more echoes to finish (maybe 24 echoes in line with the games namesake...?) but it takes a long time to get just one Echo, so I stopped playing that save file in order to check out the others. Whoops. Don't make my mistake; you just need three.

A quick explanation is also necessary for the save file gimmick; this is where the 24 in 24 Killers is actually relevant. You start the game with four save files, each offering a "blessing" that you obtain once you "meet the Husbandman" (i.e. progress to a certain point) on that file. Then, you can use that blessing from the start of your next fresh save file. For instance, I chose the file C-4 which has the "fast-forward" blessing; once I met the Husbandman in that playthrough I was able to start new games with that benefit, where it caused cutscenes and general animations to play much faster. If you get all the way to the credits on a save file, you then unlock another save file slot, with a limit of 24 available save files - 24 parallel universes with 24 "Killers", hence the title.

Once you know how to beat the game, you can get far enough in each save to get its blessing in about 3-4 hours each. I did this a couple times to see if there was anything new in these save files; aside from a few minor changes, the save files are identical to each other. I think the idea of having multiple different save files is fun, and the concept of creating a new "universe" (extra save file) every time you beat a session, which you can then also beat and then create another universe and repeat the cycle, is delightful fiction. However, I feel like it's mostly only substantial for the storytelling of the game; I can't really recommend playing the game over and over unless you genuinely just want more of the same experience you already had. Which is a legitimate draw of this title! I enjoyed playing around in 24 Killer's world quite a lot, enough to just go straight to replaying the game a couple times without extra fuss or worry that I was doing something wrong or right. I'm disappointed there wasn't much new to find outside of a few extra blessing-related lines of dialogue, but I don't regret the sidetracking; 24 Killers is just nice to play. Not necessarily “24 times over for 90+ hours” nice, but “extra time besides what's absolutely required” nice. ...Oh, and the other hiccup is that there's a little too many constant flashing lights in the game! Thankfully there's a "photosensitivity mode" option in the settings that works perfectly. Just worth mentioning because I think just about anybody would get bothered by the constant blinking lights in the UI.

Altogether, in its directness, (good) simplicity, and general vibrance and whimsy, 24 Killers is a genuinely "casual" game. It's a lot more appealing than many games I've seen that have grappled for the "cozy" brand; I hesitate to apply the same label to 24 Killers because it's usually reductive and honestly not that fitting here, but instead I found 24 Killers to be another game, like moon, that you can really enjoy just being in. If I had any extra criticism, I wish some dialogue and cutscenes played out a little slower, giving time to soak everything in just a little longer. I never really had this experience (my consoles growing up were all just Nintendo handhelds) but I can imagine it being the kind of game you could have purchased for your PlayStation back in the day, and you'd come home after school and plop down in front of the TV to mess around in it for a while to blow off steam. I hope that sounds like high praise, because it is, at least in my eyes. It definitely helps that the game picks up on the good bits of its predecessors, while making much desired quality of life changes to the old bits that needed work.

It can be a little hard to recommend moon for how old and hard-to-follow it can be; you might be better off watching a long-play online. I have no such issue with 24 Killers, and I encourage anyone who's remotely interested in the things I've mentioned here to check out the game on Itchio. (It's on Steam too of course, but the Itchio download comes with a Steam key anyway...!) Also as a final note, if you've got a switch and/or steam deck, both of these games are great candidates for handheld gaming; being able to pick these up whenever compliments their gameplay styles nicely.

moon: Remix RPG Adventure is available for $18.99 on: Steam, Nintendo Switch

24 Killers is available for $19.99 on: Itchio, Steam

[higanbana-games]

Hints in Point&Click Adventures. How not to make players feel stupid?

The Point&Click Adventure genre implies a very simple gameplay from its name. Whether it’s a 1st person or a 3rd person game, players are meant to click in various areas on their screens. And that click calls many possible actions: talk to an NPC, pick up an object, use an object, examine some area, trigger an event/action and many other possible variants.

Story is what gives such games a meaning. Detective stories, romance novels or even horrors. However, a good story can simply go unnoticed if the gameplay doesn’t complement that story.

I’ve played many games of different genres, but when it comes to a story quest I often stumbled on one thing that unites such games as Syberia, Fran Bow and even Elden RIng. It’s the lack of in-game hints.

Every story is unique and has its own deep meaning, and I absolutely love every game I mention in this post. So, the following examples will just show some hard parts in the games I mention.

“Fran Bow” - ticket to the Club

The overall game is a masterpiece! Yet, I had a really hard time trying to understand what I was supposed to do to get into the Club in Ithersta.

(The following might be a spoiler if you haven’t played the game yet)

What the quest is about:

you have to find a hidden passage from the back of the club and send your cat in there,

you play as a cat too steal a ticket from one of the guests and bring that ticket to Fran,

Fran shows the ticket to the security guy at the entrance but he can easily tell she’s lying to him and doesn’t accept the stolen ticket,

Fran takes a smeared pest control specialist’s card she picked up ages ago and a green crayon she had got even earlier than that. And she draws herself a ticket on that card.

Fran gives that ticket to the security guy and he lets her enter the Club.

The main problem here is that Fran has had the objects she needs in her inventory all that time, but the quest makes players find a way to steal a ticket and try it first. Only after that sequence of actions can she fake her ticket. Of course, it can be explained like Fran had to see the real ticket before she could draw the one for herself. But this idea wasn’t emphasized in any way, which makes it extremely hard to figure the logic out by yourself.

No chance to skip the mini games

Another concern I had was on release of a wonderful game called “Children of Silent Town”. The game has stunning art and gives pretty but creepy vibes. The story felt so smooth that I did not even once think of looking into guides. Yet, some mini games were relatively hard. Though they had basic visual hints explaining how to play, some of the games took me too much time to enjoy them. And there was no button to skip it nor the more precise instruction showing how to complete it.

“Rusty Lake” - good visual hints

As a good example of guiding players through the game, I would call the “Rusty Lake” series. There are good visual hints following through the gameplay. And when there are no such obvious hints and players feel stuck, it’s up to players whether to try and figure everything out by themselves or press a button and see a thorough visual instruction.

My point here is simple. Hints should be balanced.

If you have to use a head of cheese to open a door with a complicated mechanism and there are no hints on such a unique usage - players might feel too stupid to solve it.

If a player character or an NPC comments on every action with phrases like “The door is locked” or “The villain ran over there”, it might frustrate players. For such comments are too basic and don’t give any extra helpful information while on the other hand they don’t guide players nor hint at what to do next.

The balance between making players feel too smart or too stupid is really delicate. 

The main idea is to make players feel smart when they solve another puzzle or listen to an NPC carefully and follow the implication; or just let them enjoy the game in a simple way they choose by directing them smoothly and letting them skip the hard parts.

There probably isn’t one correct answer or a universal solution on the subject (should there really be one?), and I just shared my thoughts and observations.

Every story-driven game is unique, and game designers choose the best way that suits every single project to reveal its potential and touch people’s hearts. <3

[tothepointofinsanity]

Do you have any super into detail thoughts on kyosaya? I know you've drawn a few art pieces for the ship, but I haven't seen any written think pieces about it from you.

I know there are some who don't like to use ships as a way to tie to a characters personality, so I guess I'm curious what your overall thoughts are on it and how it ties into sayaka as a whole.

"Think pieces" is a pretty neat way to put it...The primary foundation of KyoSaya to me revolves around a uniquely sapphic relationship that I hope would be expanded upon in future shows in the series.

↑ Yet, what are all these words supposed to mean? Sayaka has always done things for the sake of others. Her sense of justice elevated to the point where she views herself as a knight, someone who kneels in the face of goodness in respect of whatever is honourable to maintain it. But a knight is just another form of a pawn, just a stronger one whom everyone perceives has the ability to: 1) protect others 2) kill The Enemy.

Sayaka used to only ever have been able to interpret this in an extreme and binary vision. If she has to defend others, she has to devote herself fully to the cause. To her, the notion of self-care and self-preservation is difficult to comprehend since she feels as though she always has to be a monolith of one singular thing, of one side of things. To her, everything is like a chessboard. There is no way to play knight for both teams at once: either you prioritise yourself, or you prioritise others.

I understand that it is also a realistic depiction of how individuals like Sayaka constantly push through their own struggles alone while always uplifting others, a demonstration of unbalanced relationship dynamics. When this vision is challenged, Sayaka does not know where and how else she is expected to just "move forward" when she realised reality is not a simple game of chess. So she shrinks her view of the world further by clashing with Kyoko, since Kyoko is The Enemy who obstructs Sayaka's own perception of all that is Good and Just. Sayaka knew she was manipulated by Cubey™, but it was not only in the later movies that she comprehended the full extent of it. Something like that feels too complicated in her mind, so it's easier, much less burdensome to just lock onto one person to be angry with. This mentality is almost a sort of fallacy for Sayaka given she becomes a Witch in every cycle she becomes a magical girl.

Sayaka wants to feel relied on by humans. Kyoko does not desire nor expect anything from people, and thus balances out the extremes of Sayaka by being detached from worldly expectations - at least, that is what's consistent with Kyoko's perception of herself. A puppet without strings. She is not a pawn, not a knight. That's why she was angry when she realised the wish-granting alien omitted information on magical girl mechanisms and their life cycles. Instead of shovelling forward headstrong like Sayaka, however, Kyoko reconsiders her childhood memories and her desire, and it was to die with Sayaka so that Sayaka would not have, in Kyoko's eyes, perished for the sake of The Greater Good, because Kyoko believes still in the Self, not the vague promise of a better future.

Uhm. It's probably nonsense now that I put it in legible words. Some other KyoSaya fans who are big brained enough should educate me more on their dynamic, but I find their relationship to be interesting. It's very fallen angel x demon coded. I feel...as though Sayaka and Kyoko are hard to separate given they exist as characters that neutralise and support each other. Perhaps not codependent, but Sayaka was unhinged enough for Homura to not threaten her once, but twice whenever Madoka's feelings are involved. Meanwhile Homura was more...tolerant of Kyoko. Kyoko is there to keep Sayaka in check to make sure she doesn't piss off the Devil to the next century, and to me that is also funny.

[Although, it is tragic that since Sayaka embodies the sea, the only way Kyoko can only be with her "in death" due to the theme of Ophelia, her lover and the flame of the witch. Who could have predicted the doomed yuri is doomed. A sinking ship, even.]

[havesomepoems]

on au jus, gravy, and sauce

I've created a personal ranking system that ostensibly, allows me to communicate how profound a piece of media has been to my person. It doesn't work very well because the silly terminology stops my friends from understanding it. oh well.

au jus: a chef worth her salt pairs a good meat with a good au jus. au jus is basic, not in quality but in complexity. it is supposed to compliment the dish, enhance flavor and add moisture without making the whole thing so busy. Au jus media are just the same. The writers of au jus clearly had a cohesive theme in mind and they executed it well. There is little thematic or moral ambiguity with au jus. If there are complicated implications to weigh against each other, then you aren't simply preparing au jus anymore.

gravy: imagine an american gravy. sorry I'm a fucking colonizer. gravies are physically dense additions to meals to add moisture and simple, rich flavors. In this addition, however, they mask original flavors. I would argue that this is intrinsic to gravies and is not necessarily detrimental. Take a potato or poultry, natural pairs with gravy, as example. The distinct yet subtle flavors of the potato and poultry dont quite matter so long as you have a good gravy. Thematic cohesion isnt so important if you can get lost in the mechanics and lore.

The universality of the gravy flavor can also be attributed to the feeling in the stomach. gravies are dense. warm bellies are comforted and beget slow movers. stomachs churn gravies not with existential pontification, but cozy contemplative grounding in the familiar.

sauce, stylized to The Sauce if particularly profound: where au jus dwell in basic additions and simple explanations, and gravies thrive on density for density's sake, sauce is another beast entirely.

first off. There is complete cohesion between all components in sauce. the spices match the vegetables match the meats match the pasta match the sauce.

'match' does not imply that there is a finite way to correctly pair things. on the contrary. there are infinite pairings. the sauce has to sell me on it. the chef delights in experimentation.

second. A sauce is the dish. you dont call it alfredo because it has alfredo in it. you call it alfredo because it is alfredo. but you also wouldnt spoon alfredo solo. the addition of extras, the medium of delivery is necessary to sell and also be sold by all component parts.

third. sauces are highly textured and adaptable to fit their needs. a complexity of spices selected and synthesized together. creams and cheeses and vegetables and broths and wine, charring, deglazing, scraping the fond. vegetables in different stages of browing. aromatics and herbs. fucking. spicy peppers. they all have different applications.

what especially titillates me is when genres and norms are subverted by new, innovative applications. This is How You Lose the Time War by gladstone and el-mohtar is the sauciest that comes to mind regarding this.

sauces leave imprints on the folds of your brain. I've said this before, but I do not think fiction is real. Theres no such thing as fiction if the sauce succeeds. isnt it so much more rewarding to abstract reality, make a game of it, and then use our brains to piece things back together in the real world? truly digesting fiction means you have to actually apply it to your life. it is an active process. the activity makes us stronger, more emotionally intelligent. and it helps us empathize with other people.

What is fiction if not some creator's most intimate truths about the world? sauces show you new things about the world. gravies will never show you new things. they congeal somewhere nostalgic. sauces can hurt. sauces can comfort. sauces can confuse and surprise, innovation beyond mere novelty. au jus will never err from a destined conclusion of flavor.

anyway thats my rant. try my ranking system for yourself.

[jadeoxfordrose]

OTP asks: 5, 10, 11 for your favorite ship that has you in a stranglehold!

So I'm gonna answer these for one of my TTRPG OCs, Thea, and her paramour Adelaide (an NPC). For a little context, the game where I play her is Court of Blades which is a Forged in the Dark system focused on interpersonal relationships, political intrigue & the interplay of the noble houses as you play a retainer for one of said houses. It's very Game of Thrones meets the Borgias in fantasy renaissance Venice.

I won't go into full details of the backstory but while Della is *mechanically* Thea's paramour, the two of them are still in the longing/yearning part of the relationship - yes they are both in love with each other, no they haven't actually said those exact words to each other yet. It is complicated of course by the fact that Della is currently married to Thea's former husband who did try to kill her 12 years ago and until very recently believed he had been successful. And Della is pregnant with his baby. Like I said, it's complicated lol.

With that in mind, I'm gonna approach answering these as if the two were already at a more established point in the relationship :))

2. What would they do if the other woke in a manic state after a nightmare? Of the two, Thea is the one who struggles with nightmares more often. I can see Della putting Thea's arms around her, letting Thea hold on to her as tight as she needs to, hands resting over Della's heart and the two of them just breathing together until Thea feels ready to talk (if she wants) or fall back asleep. Then Della turns to face her, hands wrapped around one of Thea's, so she can fall asleep knowing Della is there.

5. Describe their cozy night in. Baby settled for the light, the two of them curled up together on a big pile of cushions or a conversation pit style seating arrangement. Thea working on some embroidery or sewing something, Della working on research or reading aloud to Thea.

10. Describe their first date. Arguably it was Thea bringing Della a picnic that they got to share in the vineyard in late summer, the heat of the sun kept at bay by the shade of one of the trees that are peppered through the arbor.

If they were to do an official first date? A walk through the artist's quarter, listening to music and watching performers, small gifts being bought and a meal as the sun goes down, making the canals look like they are shining pink and gold.

11. Do either try to hide their emotions if upset? Can the other still tell? Thea definitely does, a habit born of necessity, and while she isn't there quite yet, Della will get to that point soon. Roles reversed, I think Della does it less/is less practiced at it and Thea can usually tell right away. (Her inability to realize Della was in love in her is due to other factors, Thea is usually pretty emotionally perceptive.)

20. Choose one song that perfectly describes their relationship. I don't know if I have found the song that does it perfectly but if I think about them while listening to First Light by Hozier, it's like being body slammed with feels lol.

30. Your OTP gets to pick out each other's outfits; what is each wearing? Thea for Della: Long floaty dress in a light but rich colour, soft outer layer, well worn boots. Comfort is first priority, but also a mixture of pretty and practical. (Della has had to dress to social expectations for a long while, Thea doesn't want or expect that from her.) Della for Thea: Genuinely not sure, I kind of want to ask the GM lol. I could see it being something simple, without all the layers of (mostly metaphorical) armor Thea wears, a sign that Thea was safe enough to not need them.

44. Who would dance in the kitchen making dinner? Would the other join in or watch from the doorway? Della is making dinner and dancing, Thea would watch for a little while (probably until she's spotted) then join her because Della would absolutely hold out a hand to her and Thea is always going to take it. Thanks for the questions @emilykaldwen and @homosociallyyours <3

OTP Asks!

[teachingfeelingblog]

Teaching Feeling: A Deep Dive into the Visual Novel

Teaching Feeling is a unique visual novel that sparks both curiosity and controversy. Created by developer FreakilyCharming (FreakÜyâ), the game dives into themes rarely explored in mainstream titles. With its psychological undertones and intense narrative, Teaching Feeling invites players to ponder choices, ethics, and the human need for connection.

What is Teaching Feeling?

At its core, Teaching Feeling is a simulation game with strong visual novel elements. Released in 2015, it garnered attention due to its unconventional premise. The story begins with the player character, a doctor, receiving a girl named Sylvie. Her past is marked by trauma and abuse, and your role is to guide her toward recovery. The choices you make determine whether Sylvie heals or falls deeper into despair.

Visual Design and Atmosphere

The artwork in Teaching Feeling stands out. The character designs are expressive, capturing Sylvie’s fragility and gradual transformation. The environments are simple yet effective, using muted colors to reflect the game’s somber mood. Subtle visual cues—Sylvie’s eyes, posture, and reactions—respond directly to your actions. These details make the experience intimate and engaging.

The interface is straightforward, focusing the player’s attention on interactions rather than complicated mechanics. This minimalist approach supports the game’s emotional weight.

Themes and Narrative Depth

Teaching Feeling delves into heavy themes. Trust, recovery, and morality sit at the center of the story. The game challenges you to consider how you treat someone who has suffered trauma. While controversial for some, the narrative pushes players to reflect on responsibility and empathy.

Sylvie’s character development depends on the player’s choices. Do you build a safe environment for her? Or exploit her vulnerability? The game doesn’t force you to take a moral high ground, which has led to mixed reactions. This freedom of choice is both the game’s strength and its most debated feature.

Gameplay Mechanics

The mechanics are simple but effective. You interact with Sylvie through dialogue and actions. These interactions impact her trust and mental state. Over time, Sylvie’s reactions change based on how you treat her. Small actions—like offering a gift or having a conversation—have significant consequences.

This design keeps players aware of their behavior. The lack of complex gameplay puts the focus squarely on emotional engagement. Every decision feels personal, making the experience immersive.

Controversies and Criticism

Teaching Feeling has faced its share of controversy. Some critics argue the game’s premise is problematic. They claim it blurs lines between helping and exploiting a vulnerable person. Others praise it for handling trauma with care and nuance.

The game’s freedom to choose darker paths unsettles some players. This discomfort is intentional, forcing players to confront their decisions. Whether this approach is ethical remains a hot topic.

Why Teaching Feeling Matters

Despite the controversies, Teaching Feeling holds significance in the visual novel genre. It experiments with moral ambiguity and emotional depth. The game shows that interactive fiction can explore themes as complex as any novel or film.

It also highlights the power of choice-driven storytelling. Unlike traditional narratives, your decisions shape the outcome, making the experience personal and reflective. This is why Teaching Feeling continues to draw attention years after its release.

Conclusion

Teaching Feeling is not a game for everyone. It requires emotional investment and a willingness to engage with difficult themes. Yet, for those who give it a chance, it offers a thought-provoking experience. The game’s strengths lie in its raw exploration of trust, healing, and choice.

[lovelywingsart]

If Emelia was in the game, where would she come in? Would she be a mini boss like the Demi sisters or just a side character you would see on occasion? Like with Vixen, she would replace that fight with Sturm and be a mini boss for Karl (also if you're curious, i'll tell you how the fight would work) - Lu

HHHH IVE BEEN WANTING TO GET INTO THAT FOR SO LONG- Buckle up Buttercup, here we go 👀 This is gonna be long because I've been holding this to myself for MONTHS. But also note, this isn't all the details. There's alot more, and i DO plan on writing/drawing alot of this out!!

SO

The answer is... Kinda both! But definitely similar to the Dimitrescu sisters but with a /much/ longer fight!!

So, you know when you go to make the Large Gear in the Foundry? That's when you physically meet her. Beforehand you actually find a journal page or two that you know is obviously NOT Karls from difference of writing and the fact that she calls him 'Lord Heisenberg' in the first entry. (you can actually read all the entries you find here!! I wrote them out and posted to twitter~ uwu)

Anyway

When you go to make the gear, the casting machine... stopps. It gets stuck. Ethan, obviously, fuckin panicks- and then Emelia shows up. She actually simply brushes past him, unsticks the machine, and... hands him the gear.

See, despite watching her friends get fucking murdered by this man, she's still willing to try and HELP him because she knows their end goal is the same- kill Miranda. She also does NOT agree with Heisenbergs plan at ALL. She despises the idea of using a child, especially considering she's always wanted one of her own, and she straight up tells Ethan that. So she offers to help Ethan and talk to Heisenberg to change his plan so Rose is safe and, yknow, NOT used as a weapon, and they can all escape and Kill Miranda. Ethan actually agrees despite her saying she's also a Cadou mutant, and they almost shake hands on it;

Until he mentions killing Karl too.

But why? Well, to him, he sees a form of Stockholm syndrome. Which... I mean, yeah, kinda... Thats an understandable viewpoint if you've JUST met her and don't know their 30+ years of history. So he says, Kill Heisenberg, and she'll be free too.

That, uh... that doesn't go over well. It actually enrages her to the point of picking him up and throwing him across the Foundry, and before he can shoot her in defense, two Soldat Zwei appear and she runs off when they attack him. (They would actually USUALLY attack her too, but they don't this time... for a reason that I won't quite reveal yet. 😏 Its not exactly a fun reason, either, and one that's already made two people cry because I've only TOLD 2 people.)

You see more evidence of her around, more journals and whatnot, but you don't actually physically see her again until her fight starts. The problem? You do still fight Sturm. Sturm IS still a fight, and she's literally RIGHT after him. As in, when you get to the Lift to get to the surface to meet Karl again, she drops down infront of it, already partially mutated, and goes after you.

Her fight is a tad complex- You start off shooting, of course. Its pretty simple, but incredibly claustrophobic, because you're stuck in that small area until you shoot her enough so she stumbles over the edge;

And then she Fully mutates and jumps back up, and chases you down.

Thus starts the sequence which I like to call the 'Cat and Mouse' or 'Hide and Seek' sequence, where she's fully mutated and chases/forces Ethan BACK down a set route. The game mechanic here would be that there's set places you can hide (VERY much like the closet in Beneviento), and you HAVE to hide- if you don't, she WILL catch you, and she WILL kill you. After every successful Hide, you get a chance to Shoot. Fun fact, she's the only one who you are almost NOT safe in with the Duke, because she tries to get into the ficking elevator. She only doesn't because Duke is still there, but he will comment that you've 'angered the 'Lady' of the House'.

She pushes and pushes back until you get back to the Foundry or another large area, and then you FIGHT fight her again while she's still fully mutated. The usual shooting is involved until you get her weak enough to where she mutates back to the partial mutation, and then the events of 'A Crystal Heart' happen. (her running to find Karl, and her death) You then continue as normal, but as you're on the lift back up to the door, you hear... a scream. You hear Karl scream, because Emelia just died with him, and now he's going to fucking kill you.

And then you meet him again as usual and the game goes on as normal.

Also, when you kill Heisenberg, you get BOTH crystals- because her own crystal is in the 'chest' of his mutated form, because he didn't let it go the entire time. Giving them both to Duke at the same time will result in a similar comment to 'Romeo and Juliet, only together in death' as well as his normal comments about Heisenbergs crystal, and another comment about Emelias strength from her crystal.

So, she IS a 'mini' Boss, but also a pretty big boss at the same time because of how long you're fighting her! The big reason for the Hide and Seek is to give you a chance to get your health and ammo up and buy time since its literally right after Sturm.

You'll need the ammo. 😂

[hopeymchope]

Loooong final thoughts and lingering questions regarding A.I.: The Somnium Files - nirvanA Initiative

Even moreso than the first game, this game is really hard to discuss without digging into spoilers. Yikes. But I’ll try for a little while, I guess.

1) One the one hand? I loved this game, and I really hope the series gets a third entry so it can be another great Uchikoshi trilogy alongside the “Zero Escape” games. On the other hand? These characters are insanely overdue to get their happy endings, and I’m saddened to see them get delayed for YEARS on that. :P

2) I know I’ve already mentioned this, as did an ask I received before even playing the game. But it bears repeating that the lengths this game goes to in order to avoid spoiling the first game REGARDLESS of whether you already played that game are truly absurd. If they ever DO make a third game, I hope they can find some way around this mess (which would only get even MORE complicated after the events of this sequel). Might I suggest doing a prequel adventure, perhaps... ?

2) Looking back, it’s HILARIOUS how incredibly, deeply wrong my initial speculations were :) 

3) ....okay, but it seriously drove me FUCKING NUTS that nobody in-game even commented on the shape of Komeji’s head. Or why he has a big dot on his forehead where his “third eye” would be, for that matter. That’s all just... normal to the people of the AITSFverse, huh? Really?

4) I’m so very grateful for being able to adjust the difficulty of the somniums. I sucked so bad at somniums in the first one. 

Okay, SPOILER COMMENTARY BEGINS NOW.

1) The first game built an effective mystery out of information our lead doesn’t know, but the sequel builds a mystery out of information that only the player doesn’t know. The characters themselves really had plenty of information that should’ve made them capable of solving the case before SIX YEEEEAAARS had passed, IMO.

2) Can’t say I’m a very big fan of “Tama” and her personality/design. She’s HYPER-sexualized in a way that Aiba wasn’t and isn’t, really. It’s.... kind of uncomfortable sometimes. I have to wonder how an A.I. eyeball decides to generate such a holographic body type or gets so into sexual references anyway? What experiences developed her in this fashion? Hrrrrrm.

3) AS SOON as we started talking about “genetic editing/engineering,” in the game’s second chapter, I said, “Oh man, I really hope they use this plot point to retroactively explain Mizuki’s crazy strength and Date’s wild porn-induced powers.” And hey, one out of two isn’t that bad! I *love* that they went to this trouble to go back and logically justify something that was just a goofy gag in the first title. And after Date provides everyone with a detailed explanation for how his “porn mag = enhanced strength and speed” thing actually works, I was convinced that part of it was still yet to come! Sadly? Not to be. Hey, maybe they can still retroactively introduce an origin for that in part 3! Suffice it to say that I LOVE the idea of going back and retroactively explaining the silliest parts of the series using actual logic and lore. LOVE.

4) Lien’s huge “DANGER ZONE” tattoo is something that amused me from start to finish. I’m simple sometimes. Give a Japanese thug a tattoo referencing a Kenny Loggins classic, and I’m happy. And yes, I absolutely do believe it’s a reference to that seminal Top Gun anthem.

4) More than the first game, this game has the cops just... not even try to negotiate or coerce or otherwise even ATTEMPT to get reticent suspects to tell their secrets. Instead? Everything always comes down to “sync with them,” and if that doesn’t give you the answer you desired? You give up and let them go and never ask about it again. Admittedly, this because game mechanics gotta happen, and the first game isn’t completely innocent of this problem either, but the “drop the issue like a hot rock” element is definitely unique here. .............................. God DAMN do you guys suck at this ‘policing’ business. And that’s not even getting into information that you keep to yourselves when you ABSOLUTELY should be sharing it with your colleagues and superiors.

Y’know, like when a suspicious figure it somehow obscured in your vision while you chase them, and you don’t know why your cybereye is blocking out what they look like, but you just don’t tell anyone it even happened AT ALL........... fuuuuuuuuuuuck

5) Ryuki getting chewed out and threatened with losing his job unless he could hit some arbitrary deadline just because a suspect appeared and escaped within the underground cathedral? Really pissed me off because it made no sense. This has never happened to any cop, ever. I guess we can kinda excuse it because it fits with some old-school movie tropes about cops, maybe? But once the timeline is “corrected” and we see that that didn’t even HAPPEN in the past? IT MAKES EVEN. LESS. SENSE. He is literally never seen or known to do ANYTHING wrong that would warrant such a reaction from Boss!!!! Furthermore: Since he DIDN’T catch the HB Killer back then, does that mean he’s not a cop with ABIS by the later timeline? Because that certainly does not appear to be true! He seems to still be operating as one, just a fucking crazy one due to circumstances beyond his own control that nobody seems to have discovere/addressed in the interim.

6) I absolutely adore that the terrifying visage of Gen’s mask is ultimately hiding... the sweetest, most noble person you can possibly imagine. I am *always* here for someone to subvert the expectations of your first visual impression. ALWAYS down for that shit. Wonderful, thank you, no notes.

7) Although I eventually expected what was under the mask of the mysterious woman in the cool cloak, it also feels like one of the most overt examples of making the story jump through hoops just to suit the twist they wanted. I feel like Uchikoshi definitely thought up the “We told you the story in the wrong order!” twist before he ever came up with the existence of a second Mizuki to explain it all. The fact that they dress exactly the same and act the same and both have that name and both use Aiba but AIba forgets about the first Mizuki by coincidence and... YEAH, it’s pretty forced. 

8) I was both horrified and delighted by the reveal that Amame is one of our culprits. I never once thought that a character we met in the first game - someone who was portrayed as just a quiet, good-hearted, sweet kid - would actually go off and murder someone in our sequel, and I LOVE that twist. In truth, I kind of wish she’d killed Tokiko too as Aiba originally theorized. Just let her go all the way off the deep end! But uhh... that would really make our relatively happy ending a lot less happy, because then Amame wouldn’t be getting that light jail time, huh? So maybe not... lol.

9) Because these games tend to ultimately be so hopeful by the end, I thought Kizuna might even get some futuristic cure to her paralysis by the conclusion and be up to dance by the big finale. But it’s probably better that she didn’t. There have to be SOME consequences to these events, after all. 

10) I wish Mizuki would actually show some concern/affection for her long-missing adoptive father after he finally resurfaces. Like, instead of just insulting him and treating him like shit?? The brief moments when she ISN’T insulting him and belittling him are heartwarming, but they’re SO few and far between. And there’s no denying how much he’s done for her and how much he loves her. Mizuki even took his family name eventually. But from her actual words, you’d be hard-pressed to know that she even likes him at all. Girl needs serious psychological help to learn how to communicate properly, because kee-RY-st.

11) Given how utterly fucking psycho Kizuna’s dad goes in at least one route — particularly with how he sends a massive army of thugs that have no compunction about even KILLING Lien — I was really hoping we’d see Mr. Chieda taken down and arrested for his connections by the end. Alas, there is no ending where he pays for his cruelty and associations. He always just walks the hell away. Meh. :P

12) What... on EARTH.... was the point of Boss pretending like Ryuki died in the final battle?! Only to reveal to EVERYONE that he was alive/fine the whole time... ?!?! So clearly there wasn’t even a need to hide that he lived at all?!? I guess she really just likes fucking with everyone by devastating them for no reason. Jesus Christ, Boss. What the actual FUCK is wrong with you. I guess now I can finally appreciate why someone as whip-smart and hot and utterly girlboss as her is single... it’s because she’s secretly a goddamned SOCIOPATH.

13) The introduction of the “The Frayer” and the unlockable Secret Ending is in keeping with Uchikoshi’s other works, sure, but it also raises a lot of problems that I think I’d rather not contemplate in regards to the universe of the game series. I’ll have to try to compartmentalize that as “stuff that cutely refers to the fact that you’re playing a video game” and not consider that information strictly, y’know, canon. 

Ultimately, I obviously have far more plot/writing concerns than I did with the first. I would still say the first is better. But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t having a DAMN good time throughout. I’m still very happy this exists. And here’s hoping for some more adventures down the line...

[breaddaerb]

hi bread!! how are you? and can i please request killjoy, viper, and sage’s favorite date to take you on c;

<3, elle

[ sage, viper, and killjoy x reader I ]

✎↷: i’m good!! i went out on a run today for some Gains and it was honestly refreshing to do before my exam today! which went well, i think? wasn’t expecting this honestly LOLL i read it this morning and i was like oh?? getting the ladies? on another note— wow you guys are so sweet wishing me good luck;; someone said best of luck (misspelling the best so, beat) on your exams and i thought it said beat the fuck out of my exams… which i will! don’t worry guys— although, do expect posts to slow down a bit, i’m doing this post between my reviews <3 (and these hcs are in second person because i’m not about to say ‘yeah, sage and i go on dates every week’. although i wish i could!)

sage

sage is a simple woman, and judging by said simplicity, it’d be easy to turn everything into a date. i hc that she’s someone who shows her love with quality time, and that’s exactly what she does. sage’s preferred date (with me, so my interests are also included here actually) is staged on a sunny day, featuring probably a small business’s food of some kind, or even homemade! trying new foods and eating it with others as the company falls into one of her favorite activities, and it wouldn’t be any different if it was with you!

for that day, you and sage had ended up flying kites and going through a few rounds of volleyball. it was nothing crazy, it was just a simple outing. but filled with joy and love and laughter, you both had ended up falling asleep on a checkered picnic facing the blanketing sun from above. it’s not much, yet around her, it never has to be. in another life, you would’ve loved doing laundry and taxes with her. (hehe.)

killjoy

killjoy’s preferred dates are definitely something of a night in. although she’s generally extroverted as a person, being placed in vibrating raves or bars don’t make for the best environments to really get to know someone. instead, the evening is spent posting video games and watching movies and documentaries and basically anything nerdy under the sun. for the record, killjoy looked like the epitome of sex— mismatched socks and a hoodie and some torn up jeans. you end up spending the entire night like that, huddled against each other and wordlessly holding hands beneath the blanket.

(most times, killjoy would go on to ramble about computer software, the types of camera angles used, and the equipment used in the films you watched. and despite not understanding, her insanely detailed nitpicks put you at a comfortable ease.)

on the few occasions where you two would actually go out, an arcade turns out to be frequent stops. killjoy isn’t insane at video games despite understanding the mechanics, so instead the outing is spent like a competition. and then also losing most, if not all of your funds on claw machines. your losses might feel like a waste, but buying ice cream for her and seeing her smile certainly wasn’t one!

viper

viper's dates are a little more complicated. she’s not your stereotypical romantic, and probably far from it. the whole “art of courtship” actually turns out to be a game of cat and mouse, and by the time dating has solidified, she has no idea what to actually do. so she ends up resorting to the traditional, highly spoken of things. she’s been recommended dinner places, coffee shops, parks, all kinds of places that detail some kind of chatting environment.

it’s a lot of trial and error, figuring out what the perfect date spot is. viper gets so into dissecting which place results in the best chemistry that she nearly forgets that it’s a dare in the first place, honed in on agenda over enjoying herself. it had taken a careful reminder for viper to snap back to reality, although, what can she say to explain herself? perhaps trying all of these new spots had really made the perfect adventure of all.

(except for hikes. hikes will forever remain removed from the adventure list.)

[pinacoladassmau]

13 🍹

The rest of the week carried on in much the same way. The faxes always came at night, when Stede’s colleges had long since vacated their cubicles and offices; the man on the other side of line having enough common sense not to send through anything incriminating during business hours (only once did Fuckface - surely there was a better name he could use- shoot off a rather professional memo during the day; a memo that was simply a rambling account of his day, if anyone had cared to look for longer than five seconds.)

With all the overtime he was pulling, Stede was making a rather sizable dent in his workload, even with all the distraction. And it was very distracting. One night they played tic-tac-toe over and over again (Stede continuously lost. He wasn’t sure how, or exactly what it was, but he knew Fuckface had a winning trick).

The next night they rated their top movies of the decade (The Breakfast Club reigned supreme on Stede’s list, but the other made a compelling case for The Princess Bride- a surprising choice) Another night they played a chaste game of 20 questions ( What’s your favourite colour? Purple - Blue. What’s your dream job? Motorcycle mechanic - Captain. What’s your favourite drink? Piña Coladas - Piña Coladas!)

—

Mary brought up the overtime one night at dinner. “They don’t treat you well, Stede.” She said, rolling a roasted potato around her plate absently, as though this thought had been weighing on her mind for quite some time, “it isn’t fair of them, to keep you from your family like this.”

“I know,” Stede acknowledged quietly.

“Why don’t you quit? We can figure something out.” Mary said. The words were gentle and kind, but they settled oddly; a knife twisting strangely in Stede’s gut.

“It’s not that simple, Mary-”

“I know it’s your fathers company, but-”

“That’s why it’s complicated. I won’t find a job that pays this well anywhere else.” ( Nepotism, Baby Bonnet) “ And if I quit, the perks go away. The car. The holiday home. The bonuses. The mortgage payments.” ( You’re useless. You’ll always need my handouts.)

“But you’re unhappy,”

“I’m not not happy.”

Mary relented, shifting back to her dinner; an understood sadness hanging, heavy, between them, pooling at the centre of the table.

Stede knew his working conditions were less than ideal. Stede knew he’d have to break free from his fathers iron grasp eventually, if he was ever going to be truly happy and fulfilled. Stede knew he’d have to quit, one day.

He didn’t tell her that the only friend he’d ever known lived in the Bonnet Industries fax machine, and that he wasn’t willing to give that up quite yet.

Start here 🍹

[salami-dono]

I’ve been renaming some of my Sonic OCs.

There was a mechanical Echidna named Nintendo. Nintendo was evil. (Bold!) I haven’t settled on a name yet. I’m slowly getting used to the name, Saturn. It matches his counterpart named Genesis. (Sega Genesis and Sega Saturn)

Saturn is the ancient warrior resurrected by the engineer, Dr. Jester. Those two will become romantically involved somehow. (It would probably seem more like a queerplatonic relationship.) It’s simple. Dr. Jester fell in love when Saturn awakened and punched him, sending him flying across the lab. He was very impressed by his strength.

Saturn as a mechanical monster has poor memory and his body sometimes malfunctions. His movements aren’t as fluid as Dr. Jester’s. He patrols Dr. Jester’s lab like a horror game monster. With time, memories of his previous life reemerge and... Itzpatli(?) gains more awareness. It complicates things.

His real name is still up in the air. Saturn is an ancient echidna. Itzpatli was a name that I made up based on Nahuatl sounds I knew. It was very close to Itzpactli, or obsidian medicine. It was an accident! Itzpactli was a potent drug given to those sacrificed to the gods, or so I’ve read. It dulled their senses...

On to the next character, finally.

Beatle the Hedgehog looked suspiciously like Sonic and sometimes used it to his advantage in the other universe. Normally, he wouldn’t like to trick others. He’s an honest guy. It’s just nice to be popular. His appearance has changed a little.

Anyway, I can’t use that name!! His name will probably be Ramón. Ramón is a lover, not a fighter.

There is a character whose name was changed to Dorothy. She prefers to be called Dottie. I can’t tell you her original name. It’s personal. :) She is an average girl with a strong interest in chaos magic. She is the one who frees Chaos the Hedgehog from the Dark Emerald.

Dottie is a bit of a chatterbox. She enjoys reading romance novels. She also likes vampires.

I have another one that could use a new name, Jet the Fox. I’ll come back to this post later.

[busghost]

Dudu getting Abyss Flower PRI... they love Dudu this much huh? More than any Kallen, Sakura and Theresa :( i don't mind they loving a lot a character but when they shove this much love to one and neglect others it feels bad. But something came to my mind, do you think they treat Fu Huas the same as Dudu meaning they put more effort into them, or nahh, because i feel like while they do love a lot Fu Huas too, it's not as forced as Dudus, i guess.

They certainly did put a lot of effort into making Fu Hua work, especially since she has combos that use more than one attack button and basically all her battlesuits she has different combos as well.

Durandal certain seems like a lot of work but her battlesuits are less mechanically complicated. Not to say something stupid like simple = bad or anything, that's not my point.

The reason Fu Hua doesn't feel forced to me is definitely because there are reasons for the new Fu Hua battlesuits to come out. A Fu Hua battlesuit is released when she becomes relevant to the story. Admittedly her first one came outta nowhere but everything else has had relevance to the story. For the rest however, NS came out when she appeared in Bronya's recovery coma in the Bronya chronicle. SK came out when Fu Hua was fighting our protagonists in chapters 7-9. AE came out when the story started to/was about to focus on Fu Hua and HoS was very important in the story. Also Fu Hua is a f2p goddess.

When a new Durandal battlesuit is released when has it been relevant to the story? VG came out when we were properly introduced to her as a character in chapter 15 so that works. BK came out in-between when she was introduced and her next appearance in chapter 18 so that fits well enough. These two aren't really the problem. DA came out of nowhere and she hasn't even appeared in the story proper using those powers yet.

It probably also feels forced because it's as if they are desperately trying to make her part of the meta. For example, BK wasn't good when she first came out but then SA was added and she made her better. So she had a few uses, nice. BUT then they game her Abyss Flower and basically made her one of the best physical damage battlesuits in every situation that FT can't be used. And now, even when she's already on top of the world, she's getting two PRI-ARMs at once, Hler PRI and Abyss Flower PRI.

Personally what annoys me is that they've taken a character who they haven't really given much importance or a personality yet, and are making her battlesuits completely meta defining. What has she actually done so far to make her so important? And I don't hate Durandal at all! I'm just miffed that I keep getting told she's the strongest most important Valkyrie at Schicksal by mihoyo's actions and then them not backing that up. I really hope they develop her character more in the future. I want to like her, or at least have a reason in the story to not like her.

[melonthesprigatito]

The Great Pokémon White/White 2 TM Psyshock Quest: aka Melon makes teaching one move to one Pokémon ridiculously overcomplicated and frustrating.

So, a few days ago I decided to blow off the dust on my DS Lite and start a new playthrough of Pokémon White 2, a game I had not played since The Beforetimes, aka the distant past of May 2019. I had previously finished my playthrough of Pokémon White in December of 2021, mere days before I got to play Pokémon Shining Pearl for the first time. I figured since I had already played White a few months prior, it would be the perfect opportunity to play it's sequel.

I had a great time, breezing through the first couple of gyms until I reached Nimbasa City. My current objective as of now is to get my entire team to Level 30 before I fight Gym Leader Elesa. It was then during my training that it suddenly dawned on me that there was a problem. And it's all because of this bundle of purple, fuzzy adorableness:

This is Sunbeam, my Espeon. Freshly caught as an Eevee in the Castelia Gardens, just before fighting Burgh, evolved shortly after on Route 4. Honestly, that was probably one of the fastest times it's ever taken for any Pokémon to evolve via the friendship mechanic. Her current moveset is Return, Bite, Quick Attack and Dig. A very Eevee oriented moveset, not all that great for an Espeon. She needs to learn a Psychic Type attack to make use of her new evolution. But when does Espeon learn a Psychic Type attack? She's Level 26, so it's bound to be soon, right?

Nope.

Oh god, nope.

Sunbeam's evolution was simultaneously early and too late. In White 2, Esepon learns Confusion at Level 9 (impossible without breeding, wild Eevee are found at Level 19) Psybeam at Level 21, and Future Sight at Level 25. Eevee evolved at Level 26. I had missed all of Espeon's psychic attacks. But wait, what's the next one Espeon learns? Psychic at Level 37.

Level 37.

To put that into perspective, if you're keeping your Pokémon evenly levelled with the progression of the levels of the Gym Leaders' Pokémon, you're not going to reach Level 37 until the 6th or 7th Gym. I haven't beaten Gym 4 yet. I thought, to hell with that! I can't wait that long to have a Psychic Type attack on my Psychic Pokémon! I know! I'm gonna cheat the system! So I slapped a Heart Scale on Sunbeam and planned to use crazy time travel shenanigans. And by that I mean I was going to trade her over to my already finished copy of White (set 2 years before White 2 if you weren't aware), take her to the Move Relearner, relearn Psybeam and trade her back. I have my brother's 2DS that I used to trade an Eevee from my 2019 playthrough of White 2 to my 2021 playthrough of White which I then took to the Daycare on Route 2 and bred a Level 1 Eevee with my Trainer's ID for me to use on my playthrough team, so I know for a fact that these two games are compatible with each other. Simple! Completely simple! Absolutely no further complications from this point onwards! The end! Good bye!

Yeah, there were further complications. When I looked it up, it turns out that Espeon's move learnset is completely different in White. Wanna see it?

···

WHAT EVEN IS THIS?????? Psybeam at 36???? Psychic at 64????? Your Pokémon aren't going to be Level 64 until well into the postgame! But Melon, why didn't you just trade it over anyway and have her learn Confusion instead of Psybeam? Yeah, I completely overlooked that part of the learnset. I was too busy going WTF????? over how late Psychic was learned. I didn't even realise that I could have done it until well after the fiasco was over. Honestly, I wish I had've noticed. It would have spared a whole lot of heartache.

So I couldn't trade Sunbeam over because it didn't learn any Psychic Type attacks in White until ten levels later, exactly the problem I was trying to avoid by trading in the first place. So what's a Trainer to do? You saw the title. You know where this is going. Well, on the app I was using I tapped the TM/HM tab to see if Espeon could learn a good move via TMs. And yes, she could learn TM Psyshock. I obviously couldn't teach her Psyshock in White 2, because as far as I can remember, you don't get that TM until the postgame of both games. But wait, I reached the post game in White! Surely I already have the Psyshock TM in that ga- no I didn't.

So I had to go look for it.

Remember when I said I had completed White just a few days before I started playing Shining Pearl? That detail turned out to bite me in the ass in a way I couldn't have predicted. When I started playing Shining Pearl, I stopped playing White. Meaning I hadn't done much of the postgame stuff in White, aside from a little bit of level grinding. So much of the eastern part of the Unova Region wasn't explored yet.

Here's where I was VS where the TM Psyshock is:

The long trek through Route 14, Undella Town and Route 13 to get to the Giant's Chasm was gonna be ROOOOOOOUGH. Black and White is infamous for having one of the most unfairly brutal post games in the entire series, purely because the levels of the wild Pokémon and Trainer's Pokémon skyrocket by about 20 levels. My Team was Level 45 when I beat the game, and everything else after that point is Level 65 and above. I spent a few days grinding my team to Level 60 just to survive the postgame. The level jump is ridiculous and I hate it, why would they design the game like this, what were they thinking and is definitely why I pretty much always drop White after I finish the main story.

Here's the team I have to work with in White:

And here's my team when I finally reached the Pokémon Center in Lacanosa Town:

Samurott got killed by a Krabby, Liepard got atomised by an Octillery's Hyper Beam, and Leafeon got murdered by a Bounce from a Buneary. Embarrassing.

When you reach the Giant's Chasm, it's blocked off from the other side by a boulder. Fun fact, in my first ever playthrough of White (aka my first Pokémon game ever) I could not for the life of me figure out how to get into the Giant's Chasm. What you're supposed to do is backtrack to Route 13 and Surf past this rock, but it took me weeks to figure that out. I just assumed that the rocks marked the boundary of the map and there was nothing past it. Boy, did I sure feel like an idiot when I finally surfed past that rock on a whim.

So, I've finally reached Giant's Chasm. Problem solved, right? Nah. First I have to play the world's worst game of treasure hunting and search the entirety of the cave and the forest to find this TM because, guess what: I don't know where it is! To rub salt in the wound, my Max Repels weren't working because the wild Pokémon are at a higher level than my team. So now every 5 seconds I have to run away from a wild Pokémon encounter. Peachy. Just peachy.

And then, after 15 minutes of stumbling blindly around the forest, trying to find this god damn TM, guess what. Guess f*cking what.

I accidentally walked into the pond that triggers the encounter with Kyurem. Now everything is buried under a metric f*ck ton of snow and it's impossible to find ANY items. In order to get the snow to go away, I now have to catch Kyurem. Well, f*ck me six ways to Sunday!

And you know what?! IT. GETS. WORSE. Kyurem slaughters my entire team faster than I can revive them. I am now in Kyurem Catching Purgatory. Or, Kyur-gatory, if you please. I can't just not catch him, I need that TM! Several failed attempts of catching that frozen rubber chicken dragon later, my Emolga finally manages to survive a Dragon Pulse and pulls off a Thunder Wave, paralysing him and stopping him from eating my team for breakfast enough to get him in an Ultra Ball.

For being an annoying pain in the ass to catch, I hereby sentence you to having a silly nickname.

I found the Psyshock TM in a spot that I had ran past several times already and had somehow managed to miss. Every single time.

Why.

It turns out my Trainer in White 2 shows up as a Parasol Lady in the Union Room. A fitting metaphor for the rain of tears that fell during this painful, 2 hour long ordeal.

And here is the fruit of my labours. I discovered that trading a Pokémon away resets it's friendship level, so I have to raise her to max friendship all over again. The pain cherry on top of the F*ck You, You Suck cake.

Was it worth it? Eeeh, kinda? I guess that there's a few Team Plasma grunts with Poison Types coming up that it would be good to have Psyshock for? Would I ever do it again?

HahahahahahahahahahahAHAHAHAHAHAHA

NO.

[zedecksiew]

Kriegsmesser

When I received Kriegsmesser in the mail I finally googled "kriegsmesser", and found out it meant "war knife". Which makes sense; Gregor Vuga's ZineQuest 2021 project is a tribute to "roleplaying games named after medieval weapons".

I love Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay's piss-renaissance Old World setting. I tend to pick up WFRP-a-likes sight unseen:

Warlock (quality);

Small But Vicious Dog (yesss);

Zweihander (which I have come to hate); etc.

Anyway: I backed Kriegsmesser without really knowing anything about it. So Kriegsmesser surprised me.

+

Kriegsmesser grew out of a Troika! cutting. Its 36 backgrounds are compatible with that system: each come with a couple of lines of description; a list of skills and possessions; an a visual cameo cropped from actual 16th-Century woodcut art.

Cohesive and competently flavourful. My favourite is the Labourer, who always starts with "an empty pine box":

"You've spent your life breaking your back, working hard for other people's profit. You have nothing to show for it but a spectre of the future."

(The obligatory ratcatcher-analogue , called the Vermin Snatcher, is here -- check that box!)

+

Kriegsmesser also comes with its own ruleset. Hits all the notes it needs to, with lots of orientation and advice for how to run a game -- but ultimately super-simple, mechanically:

Roll d6s equal to the value in a relevant skill, look at the highest result. 6 means you get what you want; 5 or 4 means you get what you want, at a cost.

It's not quite a dice pool, since only the highest result matters. No opposed tests.

+

Kriegsmesser intends to have this base mechanic handle fights, too. The combat rules - with armour, toughness and weapon values -- are nested in an optional section.

For a WFRP-a-like, this feels like a purposeful departure.

Many of WFRP's most celebrated adventures are celebrated for bits that their underlying ruleset does little to support: the investigative structure of "Shadows Over Bogenhafen"; the complicated timetable of "Rough Night At Three Feathers".

Ludwig von Wittgenstein never needed a statblock to be memorable.

Not to say that lethal, hyper-detailed fights isn't super Warhammer-y. (Kriegsmesser includes an injury table, broken down by body-part -- check that box!)

But here it feels like Gregor is saying: "I'm not Games Workshop and Roleplay isn't an ancillary of Warhammer Fantasy Battle; we can evoke grim-and-perilous-ness even if we fork away from heavy combat rules."

+

It has become ritual for me to read my partner Sharon to sleep.

Sometimes I read her RPG things. The other night, after I read her Kriegsmesser's introduction --

" The Empire wages an eternal war against Chaos. Its priests preach of Chaos as an intrusion, something unnatural ... These men see Chaos in anything that does not buttress their rule. They call it disorder, anarchy, corruption. They say that to rebel against their order is to rebel against god and nature. That the current arrangement is natural, rather than artificial.

" Meanwhile, the common people look to the Empire to deliver the justice that they were promised and they find none. They look to the Empire and do not see themselves reflected in it. They look around at what they were taught was right and good and see only misery.

" Their world begins to unravel. Chaos comes to reside in every heart and mind sound enough to look at the world and conclude it is broken. "

-- Sharon remarked: "Nice one."

The RPG things I read her generally leave Sharon lukewarm. She has enjoyed a couple -- but, yeah: for many of these books, text isn't their strong point.

Kriegsmesser is the only time I can recall Sharon praising the writing of an RPG book without my prompting.

Nice one.

+

That introduction surprised me. It underlines Kriegsmesser's biggest departure from its WFRP-a-like pedigree: how it characterises Chaos.

Corruption, a mainstay of most grim-dark-y games, is made an optional rule, like combat. Explaining this, Gregor writes:

" Kriegsmesser partially subverts or deconstructs the traditional conceit of Warhammer where the characters are threatened by the forces of Chaos. In this game it is the player characters who are the agents of 'Chaos': they are likely to become the 'rats' under the streets, and the wild 'beast-men' in the woods bringing civilisation down. It's the Empire and its nobles and priests that are corrupt ... "

Describing the Empire, Gregor writes:

" The Empire encompasses the world yet is terrified of the without. It enforces itself with steel and fire yet considers itself benevolent. It consumes the labour of others with bottomless hunger yet calls its subalterns lazy, or wasteful, or greedy. "

Holy shit this is the first time I've seen the word "subaltern" in an RPG thing, I think?

I love this.

+

Rant incoming:

With every passing decade Warhammer abridges its Moorcockian roots more and more; nowadays it is "Order = Good" and "Chaos = Evulz", pretty much.

Gone are the days when chaos berserkers are implied to grant safe passage to the helpless (because Khorne is as much a god of martial honour as he is a god of bloodletting); Or that the succor of Papa Nurgle is a genuine comfort to the downtrodden; Or that Tzeentch could unironically embody the principle of hope, of change for the better.

As Chaos is distilled into unequivocal villainy, Order goons get painted as Good Guys by default --

Giving rise to Warhammer's contemporary problem, wherein fans are no longer able to recognise satire.

+

When I was introduced to 40K, it seemed pretty clear that the Imperium was a Brazil-esque absurdist-fascist bureaucratic state: planets are exterminatus-ed due to clerical error; the way it stamps out rebellions is the reason why rebellions begin in the first place.

Tragi-comic grimdarkness. That was the point.

Nowadays that tone has shifted -- and you're more likely than not going to encounter a 40K fan who argues that the Imperium's evils are a justified necessity, to prevent worse wrongs.

We went from:

"Space Nazis because insane dumbass fuckery, also chainswords vroom vroom rule of badass!"

To:

"Space Nazis because it makes sense actually, and also chainswords make sense because [insert convoluted rationalisation here]."

+

Even Fantasy Flight's Black Crusade line, which ostensibly offers a look at 40K from the perspective of Chaos, never truly commits to its conceit.

With prep you could play a heroic band of mutant freedom fighters, resisting the tyranny of the Evil Imperium --

But I don't remember Black Crusade giving that kind of campaign any actual support. Its supplements service the relatively more conventional "You can play villains!" angle; the Screaming Vortex is a squarely Daemons-vs-Daemons setting.

+

This tonal drift culminates, in my mind, with Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop's heroic-fantasy replacement of the old WFRP / WHFB setting.

Here's the framing narrative for AoS's recently-launched Third Edition. Let's see whether I've got things right:

A highly professionalised, technologically-superior tip-of-the-spear fighting force (the Stormcast Eternals);

Backed by an imperialist military-industrial complex (Azyrheim);

"Liberating" rich new territories (Ghur) for exploitation by a civilised settler culture (Settlers of Sig-- I mean, Free Cities);

Justified because the locals are irredeemable heathens (Chaos and Kruleboyz).

I mean, that's a sweet-ass Warhammer setting. It's contemporary, laser-guided lampoon. Except it is played totally straight.

In AoS, a literal crusade is justified as the moral good.

+

I think Kriegsmesser surprised me because its framing of Chaos -- as a promise, as the light of hope shining through cracks of a broken world --

It feels so fucking right.

Yes: its a subaltern deconstruction of the conventional moral universe of Warhammer -- but it is a take that is also already implied / all but supported in the various depictions of the setting: from WFRP to the modified title-crawl of Black Crusade.

I'm annoyed I didn't think of it, myself. Damn you, Gregor!

And I'm annoyed that more Warhammer fans aren't thinking it, also.

+

lmagine if Kriegsmesser's perspective stood on equal standing as the GW orthodoxy. Imagine if, instead of simplifying stuff into "Order = Good" and "Chaos = Evulz", GW did a Gregor Vuga.

You'd have a Rashomon-ed Warhammer, where villainy depends on perspective:

You are fearful villagers, huddled around your priest, muttering prayers against the wild braying coming from the trees beyond your gates.

You are Aqshyian tribeswomen, defying the thunder warrior towering over you, the foreigner demanding you bow to his foreign god.

You are a Tzeentchian revolutionary cell, desperately trying to disrupt a Inquisitor's transmissions so your home planet isn't destroyed by fascist orbital fire.

+

Get Kriegsmesser HERE.

+++

( Image sources: https://theenemywithinremixed.wordpress.com/2021/05/21/thoughts-on-the-4e-death-on-the-reik/ https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/59-brazil https://www.deviantart.com/faroldjo/art/Warhammer-40k-Black-Crusade-273596035 https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/06/09/fancy-a-new-life-bringing-order-to-the-mortal-realms-join-a-dawnbringer-crusade-today/ https://www.nme.com/blogs/the-movies-blog/team-america-15-anniversary-south-park-2558750 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Palestinian_children_and_Israeli_wall.jpg )

[hitoshiikigai]

Foreign Feelings

anon request: Hiya there Sen!! I love your blog and i would love to read more of your writings. Can i request an imagine for being like a first year european shy student and becoming Nekoma’s manager, she slowly develops a crush for kenma but doesn’t know how to express her feelings because of language and because she thinks kenma won’t return her feelings

‪(o_ _)ﾉ彡☆ a/n 「i made it gender neutral, i hope that's ok and if it's not, i can change it to your liking! also, this is my first romance fic in my whole life, i hope it's satisfactory(ᗒᗣᗕ)՞ i feel like i just forgot the slowly part-」

‪pronouns used: they/them

‪word count: 2.8k

You continuously repeat your introduction in your head as you wait for your turn. It's ok, you can do this, you've learnt this in basic Japanese lessons, it's just a few lines. Nothing too complicated!

The voice of the person behind you breaks the chant in your mind, "I'm Haiba Lev and..." Your thoughts block out the rest of his introduction. Is he a foreigner too? That name definitely does not sound Japanese but you note of his perfect pronunciation- a screech of a chair moving startles you and you're suddenly aware of the eyes of your new classmates staring right at you.

Sucking in a deep breath, you stand up, doing a bow, the Japanese words tumbling clumsily out of your mouth, "I'm (Y/N) (L/N)- no wait- (L/N) (Y/N), please just call me (y/n). Nice to meet all of you." You keep your eyes on your desk as you bow once again before sitting back down. You pretend not to notice the murmurs and sounds of interest about the two foreign students in their class, busying yourself by preparing your things for the lesson.

Mechanical pencil on the right. Pencil case right above your notebook. The ruler-

"Psst... Hey, you're not from Japan, right?" You turn around to meet glowing green eyes that somehow made you feel like you were looking into a cat's eyes instead. You nod and he grins in what you could guess as excitement. However, before he could say any more, he was cut off by the teacher signalling the start of class.

Maybe he's a potential friend?

After a few lessons of trying to keep up with the lessons taught in Japanese, your brain's finally granted with a break from trying to translate and you can't help the sigh that escapes you as you rest your cheek on your table, closing your eyes.

"Hey Y/N! Wanna have lunch with me?" You open your eyes to see your tall classmate looming over you- right, his name's Lev. Or should you call him Haiba?

You quickly weigh the pros and cons of eating with him. He seems like a nice person to be friends with and having a non-Japanese friend in this less-than-familiar country could definitely do you some good, maybe your Japanese can improve faster as well. But... you were planning to just find some nice quiet spot to listen to music in hopes of preventing the growing headache, a result of an overwhelming first day.

Well, there's no harm, you suppose... "Sure, I don't mind," you agree and you search for your wallet in your bag as Lev waits patiently.

Once he sees you're ready, he smiles widely and starts walking to the cafeteria most likely and you follow him, having to walk slightly faster to keep up.

"Where are you from? I'm half-Russian but I can't speak Russian. Oh! I know a few people here already! I visited the school before the school year started and made friends with people from the volleyball team. I'm actually gonna join the team once they start taking in applicants and-" Lev rambles on and you could only hum or nod, insert a few words of your own when he asks a question until you reach the cafeteria.

"Lev! Here! You're late!" You see a student with black messy hair that spikes up everywhere except for the fringe that covers his right eyes waving his arm. Lev bounds up to the table with you in tow and you can already see a few curious eyes examining you. Your gaze sweeps across the table, an uninterested guy playing with a switch catching your eyes a tiny fraction longer than the others before you look down at the floor, shuffling just a bit behind Lev, your current shield.

"This is Y/N, my new friend! They're not from Japan and I thought I could show them around," Lev claps his hands on your shoulders and moves you forward, putting you right in the spotlight.

Oh no. Ok, deep breaths. A simple introduction, no big deal. It's definitely a smaller group, better than a whole class.

"H-hi..." You clear your throat, cursing yourself mentally for the stutter, and repeat yourself with what you hope was a stronger voice. There's a chorus of greetings and before you even realise, you find yourself squished between Lev and a friendly-looking guy with a buzzcut, who you soon come to know as Kai, after a round of introductions.

How did you end up here? In a gym full of flying balls that could accidentally hit your face anytime? With your arms full of water bottles that you just filled up? You definitely did not sign up for this... Ok, well technically you did, you just didn't know what was in store. Try being a manager just for one practice, they said. Somehow, it feels like you were tricked somewhere along the line.

You hand the water bottles to the boys, jolting slightly when your hand unintentionally brushes against Kenma's. He thanks you quietly and you only nod in acknowledgment, avoiding any form of eye-contact with him and quickly moving on to hand the rest of the water bottles out before going back to the sidelines to watch.

It's really amazing watching them play. Everyone seems so coordinated with each other and the teamwork is seamless. Despite that, there are a few individuals that pique your interest: Yaku who seems to be able to teleport anywhere in the court, Lev with his tall and powerful stature, and more importantly, Kenma with his smart plays. It's like he calls the game, dictating where and how the ball goes and it's a whole experience observing him. Of course, the other members are amazing in their own ways, watching the team play is like watching a well-oiled machine working.

"How are you, Y/N?" Kai asks from beside you, wiping his sweat and giving you a warm smile.

You peel your eyes away from the quiet setter to answer Kai, and also to make sure you aren't caught staring at the certain player, "It's..." You try to find the correct words in your brain as Kai waits patiently for your answer. "It's nice... to watch. Everyone's good." You blush in embarrassment at the simple words you used, not having the full vocabulary to communicate what you really want to say. Kai, being the angel he is, makes a noise of approval and gives another warm smile which at least make you relax.

"If you need help with anything, you can ask any of us," he tells you before going back to the courts. You bow to him which he only waves off, laughing amiably.

After attending a few more practice sessions and having lunch with the team almost every break, you've grown a bit more comfortable with them, especially with Kai and Yaku, along with Lev. The team always tried their best to use simpler words whenever they spoke to you and you're definitely grateful for their efforts. However, there's just one person you've barely interacted with:

Kozume Kenma.

The third years obviously noticed the lack of interaction, especially Kuroo and he made it his own personal mision to try to get the two of you to talk to each other more, albeit with many difficulties.

"Come on, Kenma. You don't think I don't notice you paying attention anytime Y/N talks? You're not exactly very slick, you always pause your games just for Y/N," Kuroo nudges Kenmas side with his elbow which Kenma slaps away in irritation.

"Shut up Kuroo."

Kuroo leans in closer to Kenma, "You can't tell me you don't notice Y/N staring at you during practice? Blushing whenever you're 5 metres away from each other? Or when-"

"Kuroo, please just shut up," Kenma groans and glares at his switch, clicking away at the buttons and suppressing the urge to scream in anger as the words 'GAME OVER' flash on the screen. Instead, he closes his eyes, inhaling deeply before letting out a long sigh.

Kuroo smiles knowingly before his eyes shift over to something behind Kenma.

"Kuroo-senpai? Kenma-senpai? Has Kai-san arrived yet? I need to ask him something..." Kenma stiffens as your soft voice reaches his ears. He bristles at the 'senpai' title attached to his name, wanting you to just rid of the honorific altogether. He was supposed to tell you, in fact, he had been wanting to tell you to just refer to him casually just like everyone does but he never got the chance. How could he when your conversations only last 30 seconds long each time?

Jump. Jump. Duck. Ju- GAME OVER.

He pressed down his buttons more aggressively, a frown slowly forming on his face. Why couldn't he be more talkative? Why is talking so hard? Why is talking to YOU so hard? Lev does it so easily, Kai too, and Yaku and... and just everyone in the team but him.

You stare in concern as you watch Kenma play angrily with his game and you look to Kuroo for answers only to be met with a shrug.

"Yaku will be running late, some class meeting or something," Kuroo stands up and stretches, walking out of the gym, "Meanwhile, I'll go get my things."

The sounds from Kenma's game filled up the awkward silence and you take a moment to steel yourself, walking towards Kenma. "A-are you okay, Kenma-senpai? You look... angry?" At your question, Kenma's fingers still and the sounds suddenly stopped.

Kenma looks up at you and places his switch on his lap before looking away. "I'm okay... I'm not angry." He mumbles and you smile in relief at his words. "Do you want to play?" He suddenly offers his switch to you and you blink in shock, never really having known or seen him to ever share his switch with someone, simply rejecting anyone- save for that tangerine boy from another school- who tried to even get their hands on his beloved switch.

Noticing your hesitance, he places the gadget on the bench, between the two of you, letting you take your time. You look back to search for anything that will clue you in if he doesn’t actually want to do this, but finding none, you gingerly take it, careful not to drop it or at least try to not leave any embarrassingly sweaty fingerprints. You feel Kenma shifting closer to you to get a closer look at the screen and you don’t know if you feel lightheaded from him being the closest he has ever been that you can actually feel body heat radiating from him or from forgetting to breathe. Trying to focus on the little digital character instead and your fingers clumsily hitting the buttons, a contrast to the way his nimble fingers moved with muscle memory.

And if you felt butterflies in your stomach as he occasionally positioned your fingers on the correct button, the butterflies immediately flew away the moment Lev walks in the gym and you were left with just tingling fingers.

You cradle the box of apple pie you bought in a rush from the bakery, trying to tidy up the ribbon you tied around it to make it more presentable. You had asked Kai about what Kenma liked because you knew there was no way you could write or even say anything close to romantic in Japanese, so you figured out you could give him little gifts, you know, actions soeak louder than words, that kinda thing? As you think of the many ways you could say something wrong by declaring your feelings to him in a foreign tongue like unknowingly saying something ridiculous, or stupid, or even worse, something dirty! Lev’s incessant teasing and mock-kissing noises only stopped when you reached the gym.

“Oh? Y/N-chan, who’s that apple pie for, I wonder,”Kuroo gives you a knowing look and blatantly stares at Kenma, who just seems unbothered. You try to reason yourself that he was only concentrating on his game. Ignoring Kuroo, you take a tentative step towards Kenma, making sure you’re in his line of sight before thrusting the box to him, “For you Kenma… Uh, enjoy it!” You blurted out before brisk walking to the equipment room to take refuge, not even waiting for his reaction.

You hear the muffled shouts of the boys and you can imagine them crowding Kenma. You wince in sympathy.

During the whole practice, you had to deflect the many looks and questions the boys gave you. Thankfully, Kai managed to stop them before it got too much. A godsend. Before any of them could corner you after practice, you zoomed past the gym doors the moment you were done with your manager duties, forgetting that you had barely paid any attention to Kenma the whole time.

“Lev, do you know who’s this from?” You ask Lev, holding up the canned drink that was left on your table.

“Oh, that’s from Kenma. He came here earlier to place it there. He honestly could’ve just asked me to pass it to you but he said I would lose it or something. How mean,” Lev huffs but you can only focus on the fact that Kenma went through efforts to make sure you received it.

“Thank you for the apple pie yesterday. It was really nice,” Kenma took a seat beside you, on the same bench you first played his switch together.

“T-thank you for the drink! It’s my favourite,” you smile shyly. The corner of his lips curl up, just ever so slightly, which you think was the trick of the light.

Kenma gives his switch to you, now a weekly routine for the both of you on days he finishes class earlier. The distance between you and him grew smaller and smaller until your elbows brush against his at any slight movement.

This is it. This is the moment. You made a mental deal with yourself a week ago. If you win this level today, the one where you always lose, you’ll confess to him and if you don’t, you’ll simply leave your feelings hidden and buried deep in the safe in your heart.

Your eyebrows furrow in concentration, refusing any help from Kenma (Kenma just ignored the tiny sting in his heart when you did).

In the meantime, Kenma takes the chance to watch you, sharp, feline eyes studying your features. The stray baby hairs peeking out after a long school day, the slight sheen on your skin from the hot and humid gym, the determination in your eyes. Determination? To beat the level? He restrains himself from chuckling at your cuteness. This felt very different when he watches Shouyo play his video games. Kenma just really feels different any time he’s around you.

You abruptly stand up and cheer, “I did it! Kenma, look!” You show him the screen with the words ‘MISSION COMPLETE’ flashing repeatedly on the screen. You grinned widely at him and he smiles back in fondness.

Suddenly, you go all quiet, which concerned Kenma. “I have something to tell you.” At that, he tilts his head, urging for you to go on.

“I… IlikeyouKenma!” Your words end up being stringed together but from the widening of his eyes, he mostly likely understood.

“You do?”

You nod with pink dusting your cheeks, your fingers fiddling with the ends of your blouse. You’re prepared to get rejected, maybe even move back to Europe and never show your face to him again. And if not, at least you could quit the manager position to avoid any future confrontations with him.

“I like you too, Y/N,” he replies softly, but it was definitely audible in the quiet gym.

And if all else fails- wait what? This time, it’s your turn to look at him wide-eyed, processing what he just said.

“Y/N! Did you leave me for your boyfriend?!” The doors burst open with Lev boisterously shouting, Yaku walking calmly behind him with a twitching eyebrow.

You backpedal away from Kenma, dropping the switch in surprise and you scramble to pick it up, saying a stream of apologies to him, wiping away the dust and checking for any cracks.

Yaku, being more aware of the mood, kicks the back of Lev’s knees, adding a smack to the back of the head for good measure, hissing, “Shut up, you idiot!”

You make eye contact with Kenma before bursting into giggles, him just letting out a snort. You’re just glad you managed to confess before Lev could confess for you.

[1 New Message]

Kenma: wanna beat the next level after practice? you can come over to my house for dinner

You: yes! i’d love to!