#her outfit is her canon outfit ingame

[katfreaks-hidyhole]

Busted out Pokemon X again recently and got the urge to draw her and the crew again

[chaossmith2]

Refs of Zoe for those curious/interested btw!

[sogol]

FRANKA SKIN &LING L2D SKIN BUT BETTER IM SO WINNING

[m4g0hun]

in stars and time x dungeon meshi

(extra thoughts and ideas below!)

closeups!!

so this is more of a isat in dungeon meshi kinda au than the opposite, the idea is that the King is the dungeon lord/mad mage, his desire being to be able to freeze the dungeon and the country in time

The change belief still exists, and Mirabelle is still a housemaiden destined to save the counrty, so she goes to seek out companions who can help her on her journey

Everyone's reasoning to join is still the same as it was in the game

Also this isn't a redesign of them, more like a dungeon meshified version of their clothes + colors so they could fit in better (imo!!)

ok now onto some design notes!

Siffrin

originally he was just gonna be a half-foot, but i realized his wish to be able to stay with everyone would hit harder if he would outlive them, so i made them a half elf- halffoot

i removed his hat purely for aesthetic reasons lol, i think he would stand out too much in the dungeon meshi universe with it, but i suppose its true for ingame too so maybe ill give ut back to him if he behaves well

i also wanted to remove his hat so i could see the top if his beatifiul head

his poncho is a bit different, just a few small details so it would better in universe i think

he lost his eye in one of the previous dungeons they were going through

Mirabelle

she's still part of the change religion

i felt like her being an elf is pretty much perfect, no notes on that

i did have marcille in my mind while designing her outfit, and also theyre kinda similar overall i think?? idk but i love both of them

i gave her braids because its canon in the dungeon meshi universe that taking good care if your hair+unique hairstyles strengthen your magic and also i think its cute

Bonnie - the senshi of the group!!!

i wasn't sure what race i should make them at first because they're a kid so theres no point in chosing a shorter race to show their size i thought, but then i remember how cute gnomes are in the verse with their big ol ears so thats what they are haha

their design is probably my favorite out if anyone as well

i imagined they would join pretty much the same way senshi did

Odile

her race was also pretty much immediately decided

her clothes were the biggest struggle for me, not only figuring out how to make them look a bit more medieval-like but also the colors

i decided a while ago in my head that odiles color palette would be blue but it was still a struggle making her coat not look like a lab coat lol

maybe that was the intention but i really just wanted her to appear like a normal adventurer

Isabeau

as you can see on the page i have the least amount of ideas for him lol

i pretty much just had laios in my head while i was designing him

i do feel a bit bad for taking away his stripes and silly looking belt thingy but i felt its a bit too much for the dunmeshi verse

thats pretty much it i think!! not sure if i will draw more of this au, i just mainly wanted to get it out ot my head cus its been rotating in it since i played the game

[littlesliceofimmortality]

hey henry i was going through ur circus au tag and i was wondering do u have any lore for this specific au??? im VERY curious i really like the designs esp mingus and norm (worlds most predictable phrase) :-)

HII MICH :-) smile! my circus au started as "lol wouldnt it be funny if cowboys instead of clowns were a separate species & went extinct". & now it makes me sick

ITS NOT EVENthat much different than the canon story ingame!!!! its just flashier & showy-er & LOUD. mingus demands attention, especially. her being a lioness does in fact mean callum had a pet lion. Alot wrong with him

she had callums ringleader outfit retailored to fit her, fun fact! (shes VERY large, almost scraping 7ft). its different cloth though & the gold studs had to be replaced & coattails needed lengthening & etc... so maybe it really isnt the same

(GINGIs made up of the same cloth as callum, however! the original CIRCUS tent, with polka dots and all !!! and who am i to argue that callum didnt embody the entire city of dialtown?) (mingus is very mad about this fact & actively denounces it)

rather than living on the outskirts of town, norm was found as a lone ranger out in the open prairies of Wisconsin (i cant elaborate here. thats another rant & theres too many parenthesis already) . instead of being immediately executed As is normal procedure, mingus recognizes him as a fragment of history & essentially forces him to join the ragtag rundown circus she runs

since dialtown is already a group of misfits, not many of the cast oogled at the new rodeo clown (it was a HUGE fight on what he'd "star as", & mingus finally relented to him keeping the cowboy hat & paper bag) (if he acts up she threatens to categorize him as a "freak show" and shred his bag)

mingus doesnt treat him as a thing with feelings alot of the time & moreso a thing to help get her pawpaw back. since right now hes. kind of a statue. shes opened up & put back together his head so many times & had to repair him & ward off rust so often that now ALL of his head is golden. not patchworked, but rather, polished

the city is only KNOWN as a city & NOT a travelling circus anymore is because of this, actually. its too much work to transport callum around in the state he is. so mingus dug her heels in & hammered in the tent poles hard. immovable force. not going anywhere til she can step down & let her pawpaw lead again

he was objectively better at it, anyhow. she knows this but WILL bite you if you say it to her face. callum was a magician too, after all! had tricks up his sleeve. much sneakier when hes pulling strings behind the curtains. he had his "assistant" too (aka the other half of the entire show) , which mingus TRIES to replicate, which... i love tango, but nobody can compare to marla

all of this is very upsetting to norm. everything about it, really. worst anyones ever done it. however hes just as stubborn as mingus and will NOT be used as a tool! (thats the ONLY reason, trust) (theres totally nothing about how he'd rather idolize crown in his mind & is a little terrified of whatd happen if he came back & saw the state of everything)

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

MIKAN TSUMIKI (DANGANRONPA 2: GOODBYE DESPAIR) (CW: Mind Control, Bullying)

1.) She is literally the saddest side character I know out of the series. She canonically went through severe abuse and bullying, oversexualizes herself as a defense mechanism, and has really bad anxiety that interferes with her interactions.

Does she get better? No.

Even though the whole theme of Danganronpa is overcoming despair, she never gets the support she needs despite having a lot of supposedly nice classmates. She CONTINUES to get verbally abused by another classmate nobody really bothers to stop, and one of her best friend even ENABLES some of her bad coping mechanisms. She's also the main source of fanservice for the second game.

Then she gets fucking brainwashed into one of the main villain's henchwoman. Yeah, the writers did NOT let her catch a break.

2.) The first two chapters are obsessed with having her do that stupid 'oh nooo all my clothes came off :"( u can see my panties :"(' shit and her free time events especially drift into the 'I'm accidentally saying something that's sexy but I don't know the connotations' brand of jokes. Idk what the spoiler policy is so I won't say much about her actual good points, but when she gets a chance to shine, she's really really interesting! For sure one of my favorite characters in the game! She's got nuance and character and relationships and motivations and interests and all that good stuff! She's even gay! It's just that its almost completely eclipsed by mediocre at best horny jokes for the first 2/3rds of her screentime in game and it drives me actually insane.

3.) You could put nearly all of the dr girls in this bracket, actually. But I picked Mikan because she's such a clear example. They just put her in there to sexualize her and her trauma. There were many ideas that could have been executed well with Mikan (I can relate to the aspect of her sexualizing herself, but the fact that they use it for fanservice is. Wow! And not in a good way) but they use her for fanservice instead. And she had the WORST execution or at least it was somewhere in the top 3. They unceremoniously cut off her development with the "despair disease" (hate that motive btw) and basically made her whole personality in what was supposed to be sorta love her 3rd act villain breakdown into "oooh my beloved ahaha I can't wait to be reunited with my beloved." I don't know shit about the anime but she seems to have been treated just as terribly there if not made worse! If it weren't for the fact that I refuse to acknowledge the animes existence it might have made me dislike her during the time I still actively liked the franchise. All the outfits they give her also feel like they were made just for fanservice shots (most of the outfits themselves aren't really bad at least not the ones I've seen it's that they were made with the intent to sexualize her and not to look good and fit her character) which is super frustrating. Oh and she was treated terribly in the game by Hiyoko but when she killed hiyoko it was just whoops she saw me kill ibuki gotta end her instead of giving her an interesting motive for even one of her kills. Honestly what makes me says she's screwed over by misogyny specifically is the fact that shit like this probably would not have happened if she were a guy. She wouldn't be written perfectly but her writing would be so much better. Like she was reduced to fanservice so so so many times and treated awfully.

OCHETTE (OCTOPATH TRAVELER 2) (CW: Racism, Ableism)

1.) SO. actually she's combod by the heavy anti-pasifika racism in ot2 but one of the strongest elements of that is that ochette herself is infantilized to the point of a 20 year old woman, who is a fully trained adult warrior and ingame stated to be like a week away from replacing her island's ultrabeast white lion guardian, being characterized by cool normal things like "having the white catholic inquisitor character promise to teach her backward people human language(the fantasy pasifika tribe she's from are kemonomimi because of course they are)", "haha ochette no understand human custom and have funny naive misunderstanding", "ochette draws the catholic inquisitor character a cutesy kiddie drawing", and being completely removed from any discussions around sex because octopath has this sexism problem where the only two types of women are innocent babies and femme fatales which is so cool AND normal. so ochette gets actually written to be essentially a "mental child" or sometimes an actual animal and is never, ever, ever allowed to have any dynamic with a human that is not paternal in nature because she is Baby. so she's also fighting the ableism. and despite all odds being stacked against her she manages to fuck super hard in a way that makes it so obvious that if ot2 was just less sexist and less racist and less ableist and someone suplexed the non-pasifika dev team and brought in at least a sensitivity reader, she could have fucked SO much harder. honestly imo the fact that the racism against her is superficially gender neutral is not proof that it's not sexism but proof that it IS, as a major part of racist sexism is treating the womanhood of woc as either unimportant or inferior compared to white womanhood, where pasifika woc specifically are often treated as eternal innocent girls who just can never understand an adult woman's relationship with gender. ochette not being allowed to be a woman and trapped at "child too young to even have a gender" is sickeningly sexist. she should have been allowed to have zest for life and be literally the "my daughter might have autism but god damn she can work a grill" lady and be unsure about taking on a hugely important position without it being used as shorthand for her being a toddler in the body of a notably very skinny girl considering she is canonically jacked enough to carry an iguana the size of a bus but WHATEVER. she should also have been allowed to hunt the white catholic inquisitor whose story climaxes with him killing an indigenous woman who secretly infiltrated the church in order to get revenge for them massacring her entire tribe that confirms ochette's people are kemonomimi because an ancient wizard cursed the brutish natives for their violence. actually fuck it i would put kaldena in too but thinking about her actually makes me depressed im so fucking sorry girl. they should BOTH have gotten a ten minute cutscene of beating hm to death with hammers

[goldensunset]

ok ok khml beta spoilers (part one of whatever this is going to be idk i'm just gonna ramble about my thoughts and observations)

waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh wah awa wahhhhhh i want this game now i won't lie to you this looks really cool i can't believe it's real. or a mobile game for that matter. imagine this as a full console game. imagine khux and khdr as this. insane

remus... nice!!! can we like. see him in full lighting though so i could get a good sense of his color scheme. ok i like this guy already i like his casual/rude vibes and the way he talks

i hope he has a brother named romulus and i hope romulus kills him it needs to happen sorry. idc whether it's shock value or something very narratively heavy i need fratricide in this game idc

so they're doing the good old 'every other character in the cutscene is gonna be voiced except the protagonist whose dialogue just shows up silently but their mouth still moves' thing huh. can't wait to see how this plays out. looks like player is still gonna have limited dialogue overall so that works. but like man i kinda wish they'd just give player a canon voice or two or three. imagine that being something you could choose

i'm gonna read too deeply into player's amnesia including their name but not including their fighting ability. like they could've had you type in a name during the character creation screen and had player respond to the question later but nope we specifically establish that they don't remember and have to make one up on the spot. you know what they do remember though? combat. weapons. carrying out their missions as a keyblade wielder, all they were ever meant to do. gonna be normal about this for sure

the scala world card... DUDE...

so after multiple joke posts we finally have a real freya... i don't know why i'm surprised. dunno if i vibe with her full outfit yet (i think the red jacket uniform is kinda overbearing and might get old fast if both she and remus and probably at least 20 other characters will have it but in a cleaner or more stylized render i'd love it probably) but like dude the cat ear accessories... were those there last time? did i not notice them last time? those are perfect

literally ALL of this music is so cheerful... the dearly beloved is super upbeat, the new field theme for scala and the astral plane and combat and the tutorial menus etc etc... it's so strange. i KNOW they're hiding the absolute tragedy from us. goth aesthetic combined with whimsical peaceful tunes. what's happening here

the. the pit... that's their portal?? when you wanna go to the astral plane you jump in The Machinery Hell Pit? absolutely not you would never convince me to do that

so begins the gacha/microtransaction hell. i sure hope it's easy enough to get whatever ingame currency there is through other means

i'm actually loving the amount of customization options dude that's so cool

[gen4grl]

Piers and/or Raihan for the character ask

ooo thank u for the ask, and i’ll do both since i’m a chronic talker! like the last one, i’ll only do questions i feel like i can answer (or understand the prompt lol)

raihan first!🐉

why i like them: i have been drawn to dragon trainers ever since playing hgss so of course i love this man. also absolutely love his cocky attitude, i think he has such an alluring personality. on a real note he’s so fine he gets me blushing lol oh and his lil tooth that sticks out :33

why i don’t: epitome of every gimmick i hate in battles LOL absolutely hate double battles and hate weather affects even more.

fave episode/movie: didn’t watch the anime after johto and definitely didn’t watch journeys so … no answer and i don’t feel like he appears enough in twilight wings to give an answer lol I’m gonna go with the microsecond he was in gotcha lol

fave line: “i look this good even when i lose. it’s a real curse” oh absolutely sir 🫡

fave outfit: absolutely love his normal ingame outfit purely because of the the incorporation of lances hgss outfit ahhhh. gamefreak needs to sell clothing items of famous trainers because i need that man’s hoodie. also love his black and white suit in masters so niceee and classy

otp: multishipper!!! so my first ship was raihan and leon - which i still really enjoy but my all time fave is raihan and piers 🖤🧡 they have rotted my brain so badly

brotp: sonia and raihan. like how he calls her miss clever clogs. i wanna be around to witness their leon gossip sessions lol. hc but i love the idea of them growing up in the gym challenge together and sonia always finding raihan super hilarious while her best friend nessa thought he was so full of himself lol. honestly i think he’s just super popular and social so gets along with every gym leader pretty well

headcanon: talked about this briefly in my tags, but a very special hc to me is that all dragon trainers come from a singular clan before splitting apart where they now live in the different regions. lance and raihan are cousins and are considered the most esteemed and powerful trainers in their clan and have had a friendly rivalry since being kids. despite bickering due their completely different attitudes and outlooks on life and what it means to be a dragon trainer, they also bring out positives in eachother. lance made raihan appreciate the culture of their clan more (which in turn helped him appreciate his vault job even more) and raihan taught lance how to loosen up and not feel so pressured by the very strict johto branch of dragon trainers. oh and he’s also great with kids and kids love him for how goofy he can be lol

wish: definitely wish we saw more of the gentle side of him that’s hinted to be there both via the game and anime.

my nickname for them: rai-rai🥺 ever since seeing that piers calls him that in the manga. fuels my shipping brain and overall just a super cute name

piers 🦨

why i like them: omg. my all time favourite gym leader and in my top 3 galar characters. love that they fed into the concept of alt people being teddy bears despite outwards appearances, reminds me of alot of people i knew growing up in the scene myself. loveee how protective he is of marnie and in general how much he loves his hometown and people around him. just an absolute sweetie 😭

why i dont: actually cant think of one reason or element i dont like, perfect character imo!!! is it basic to say the scene of him singing with no background vocals? why do him like that😭😭😭

fave episode/movie: same answer as raihans but seeing that one microsecond in twilight wings of him saying he doesn’t do encores changed me as a person lmao

fave line: this whole interaction always gets me lmao

fave outfit: not even a canon outfit but i see so much fanart of him without his jacket on and i vibe heavy with that lol

otp: kbnz everydayyy, despite minimal interactions (lol the shippers struggle) every interaction he had with raihan had insane undertones it got me feeling like i shouldn’t of been watching lmao (to be a fly on the wall tho LOL).

brotp: piers and …. sonia too lol (this girl needs more friends!!!). really loved them with hop + the player in post game and think stressed and overwhelmed sonia could benefit from calm and collected piers… so cute. i’m so attracted to the opposites attract trope, both platonically and/or romantically and they fit that perfectly lol

headcanon: while always on the more reserved side, i love the idea of younger gym challengers piers being more boisterous (in his own way) and loved the party and gig scene in early spikemuth* - much to the suprise of those who only know him in his adult years. however, when the responsibility of raising marnie came into the picture, he relaxed quite a lot and now his old man tendencies tend to come out even with his fully adult friends and in his relationship. he’s the first people come to when they need advice cause despite being overly cautious and a worry-wart when it comes to marnie, he is quite grounded which comforts a lot of people. what a sweetie!

*purely based off the quote “times like this—when tension and passion run high—remind me of spikemuth in the old days. some right wild concerts we had back then. but no encores!"

my nickname: not mine but i hc everyone around him especially raihan call him piersy. definitely gets under his skin but kinda just accepts it now lol

[the-clay-quarters]

🧍‍♂️⚰️ for silverstein and pembroke!! >:3c

🧍‍♂️— What stats would they provide as a companion? Where would you obtain them?

For Pembroke I couldn't decide which option I liked best so you get all of them yippee

Cordelia: [Available in Veilgarden, via fascinating. You can visit her shop and also invite her to a society party :D] The Amiable Collector. +Persuasive +Respectable. She's a welcome sight at any soirée and knows her way around fabric. Consider all your tailoring needs accounted for, though she may choose some outrageous colours.

Theodore: [Available in Watchmakers/Wolfstacks, via a card. He challenges you to a duel and on a alt/rare success, he thinks you fight interestingly enough to keep in touch with] The Energetic Ruffian. +Shadowy +Dangerous. An overly enthusiastic monster hunter. Surprisingly good at his job and at staying out of trouble, but you might still want to keep an eye on him.

Both: [Fate locked, via the ES idea I mentioned in another ask] The Twofold Confidant. +Persuasive +Dangerous +Respectable. She lives quite the split life. You've learnt some intriguing facts about him, and now he'll great you in any outfit.

Silverstein: [Available via a single-step storylet in various locations. You can hire him for work, each location offers a different price/item cost as well as showing different text for what you're actually hiring him for] The Reserved Factotum. +Dangerous +Dreaded -Shadowy. He may not actually be your bodyguard, but everyone seems to think he is. Interesting company, if not the most talkative.

⚰️ — What's their most common cause of death? Ingame neither of them have been to any (non-mandatory) menace location bcus I'm just swag like that 💪😎

Pembroke's is probably tied between drunken duels and monster hunting. Theodore Will challenge anyone to fight him once he's drunk enough and that is both a promise and a threat. He'll do this while sober too but he's Slightly more reasonable with his opponents then lol

Silverstein has yet to canonically die! Man is Paranoid about wounds, even managed to pick up a horsehead amulet at one point. It may seem a bit odd for such a big guy to be afraid of death but… What happens when a clay man dies? Would the boatman even want him? He doesn't like to think about it…

[Ask game]

[serenofroses]

wish I could replay Agent story, esp chapter 1, on Ania to see and review all of the outcomes to note some ideas for Ania and Marr within my verse. also make edits or gifs.

though, youtube videos will suffice for now because I don't have a lot of slots to roll another Ania or level her as preferred status. plus, without having to buy unlocks for the outfits.

edited undercut to add a thought from tag to here

the outcome route where agent disable or fire the eradicators + fighting Jadus ingame gave me a thought for my canon divergent.

Marr rushes to aid Ania (and save her from Jadus) but the result ended up with the two Sith Lords get into a violent duel. Ania can't fight Jadus but was ordered by Marr to take cover or figure a way to shut down the Eradicators until reinforcements arrive.

the duel ended the moment Tenebrae was forced to intervenue to break up the fight and thus the two were forced to stand down.

[this-should-do]

Fallout ocs 37: Favorite armor/ outfit?

My courier always endgames elite riot gear :)

ooo honestly kinda hard to answer since i tend to design canonical looks for my characters outaide the armor thats actually ingame, but as far as what my characters tend to wear ingame,

my sole survivor, audrey, tends to wear the minutemen general armor (tho she sides with the railroad for maximum people saved)

my lone wanderer, samuel, i recall wore a lot of powerarmor when i played the game once back jn high school in the 360, but i couldnt tell you specifics

and my courier, jules, i genuinely couldnt tell you either becuz i played more of that game modded woth custom armor than i did vanilla, but honeslty yeah she prob would nick the ncr ranger armor and scratch off the metaphorical ncr branding cuz it kicks ass and she loves a good trench coat, makes her look bigger than she is which is important for intimidation when ur barely hit 5 foot in ur youth and only shrink with age, it also ingratiates her with ncr which is jmportant when ur running an independant vegas

[astralshepherds]

while im currently working on toyhouse pages for my main cast, and more specifically on the appearance description section, ive decided to write a detailed description of aya's appearance since she's not in the main cast! i have drawn her multiple times now and have her ingame model too but I like to have features described clearly

without further ado here is aya's appearance description:

6'2 (188cm) tall

skin is medium to dark brown with a warm undertone

has a rectangular and generally lanky figure, broad shoulders and some muscle on arms, chest is between an a and b cup. early in her story she can be considered underweight but she gradually gains more weight as she becomes healthier

has a round face. eyes have monolids and are downturned, upper lid is round while lower lid has a straighter shape, giving her eyes a half-circle look. has big dark brown eyes and long, dark eyelashes which can blend together (+ during shb her sclera gains a permanent shadow, which doesn't make them completely black but overall her eyes end up looking a lot more dark). prominent lower eyelid/smile lines/aegyo sal. thick, rectangular eyebrows. nose is round and wide. lips are full, round, heart shaped and two-toned

usually portrayed with gyaru makeup, most prominently on her eyes (elsewhere it's actually rather light, for example her lips only have a slight gloss). she has especially thick eyeliner and her long eyelashes are also prominent. white eyeliner on lower eyelid. droopy eyeliner can be stylized as part of her eyes

hair is dyed pink, naturally black. during shb her hair gains permanent blue highlights, which grows wherever her hair ends (including her bangs). her hair can be in several styles but her canon/"default" one is long (waist to hip length) locs with straightened wispy bangs

has some scars across her body as expected from her lifestyle as an adventurer, however these don't have a permanent/definitive placement. has some body hair on legs especially, she used to shave it but doesn't bother anymore. interestingly her body hair is blue like her highlights, though her eyebrows and lashes are still black...?

she is a hyur, midlander from her mom's side and highlander from her dad's side, which in non ff terms basically means she does not have any crazy fantasy features; she is a regular, average human (except like. really tall)

she is intended to be blasian, specifically black west asian from her dad's side and japanese from her mom's side. she mostly has her dad's features with the exception of her mom's eye and lip shape (though aya's lips are more full)

while she does not have a finalized outfit yet, here are some photo examples of what aya would wear:

[ozfi]

enstars is an interesting case in the department of how it handles transfemininity in a lot of ways, but especially in contrast between the first and second games.

es! releases in 2015, and starts early in the school year. these are highschool students in 2015 being both transphobic and misogynistic separately and also together to arashi (and anzu), functioning as the game chastising arashi in this early stage by shutting down her attempts at being seen as a woman but also as the characters being... highschoolers in 2015, seen clearly in the way that as the game/timeline progresses, the characters who were rude to her treat her better and more appropriately, and even apologize for their actions & fix the way they talk to and about her. this also functions as a way for the game to gradually handle trans issues more progressively than at launch (though, unfortunately, because of being a mobage with essentially a year-long story, it has to go back and fill in the timeline at times.)

then it introduces shu (2016), who is openly and obviously more intentionally feminine than any of the other "male" characters, has a part that is represented and often speaks through an extremely feminine doll (shu's own stated gender goals), and the writers gave her the trait of being especially fond of the first years/nazuna (because they have a young androgyny/femininity that puberty took from her) which was taken very badly by en fandom at the time and exacerbated in translation in ways that made her seem a lot more creepy than she actually was, though often the game treated the idea as though it was possible through nazuna's reactions, and, while when she eventually addresses wishing she was more feminine and talks about how puberty ruined her life it isn't demonized or punished in the text like arashi's wishes were, she still exists in a very murky grey area where nothing gender-wise is confirmed in the way arashi's is.

but this means in es!! (2020 jp/2022 en), when the official en tl is removing arashi's pronouns entirely and rewriting all instances of her expressing her thoughts about her gender, including explicit lack of comfort with being called masculine and disliking being shunted into male roles, shu is less punished for her femininity in the game because she exists in that grey space where she isn't canonized as a trans woman, still functionally uses he/him, is still referred to as a man by fandom, etc. even in being compared to her clearly transfeminine grandmother, the grandmother is referred to as a grandfather ingame. if you look at her es!! valkyrie outfit, it has actually gotten more gender affirming than it was in es! (she canonically makes her own unit uniforms. and most of the valkyrie outfits in general)

while arashi herself has gotten no less feminine, and in ways jp es!! tackles the issues of transphobia and transmisogyny a lot more head-on, it doesn't remove the problem of an official branch of the game trying to erase this aspect of her character and leave it not only to ambiguity but obscuring it fully (this is an example, but it's far from the only one). both shu's grey area and arashi's censorship are pretty blatant examples of "men" being able to express things that are extremely gnc and complicated in regards to their gender, but they can't go so far as to actually call themself a woman - and even if they do, officially or fandom, People Will Still Insist They're A Man.

this can be expanded upon by analysing the way gender is treated in the rest of enstars. okay, transphobic teenagers in 2015. it happens. but akira has said he considers the way he writes enstars' idols more neutral, and in a lot of ways he does write them more like women (given his previous writing experience). even aside from that, there's a lot of controversial and socially important things he clearly wants to address, and does! to varying degrees of success. there's a lot of enstars characters with complicated relationships with their gender (kuro, obviously. tetora. tori. madara. adonis. nazuna. hinata. midori. should i go on?? its most of them, if not all.) and they're pretty thoughtfully addressed (past a certain point. sorry early tomoyan.), but the only character that goes far enough to strike the violent transphobic chords is the one that is canonically stated to not be a cis man: arashi, the trans woman.

additionally, mayoi on release was treated much the same as misinterpreted on-drop shu, because her initial blurb mentioned being fond of anything "young and child-like", phrased in the worst way possible. ...... incidentally, it ended up being about her lost childhood and finding comfort in younger, smaller, and cuter people because she never really got to be like that. though this isn't the only way this trauma manifests, as she also experiences intrusive thoughts about this exact thing. she has at least one story where the joke is that you Think she's being weird, but surprise! she was helping! you thought she was being gross with shinobu's ninja outfit, the way the story framed it in the first place? nope! she was just making another one to match. Don't you feel bad that you fell for our... really weird bait and switch? (hello again to every instance of nazuna hearing about something vaguely wrong happening to one of ra*bits and taking it as badly as possible, mostly towards notably more feminine characters like shu, mayoi, and izumi). you've probably already noticed mayoi is clearly exceedingly feminine in design and also in narrative role, with tatsumi calling her his wife and the mother of alkaloid. weird how that lines up!

though i do have to note this does often depend on the specific writer in charge of specific stories - akira has a better track record with a lot of the serious social issues (and, as main writer, general characterization) than, say, kinosei or yuumasu. said story with that mayoi gag, King of Thieves, was written by kinosei. not that akira is perfect - the very idea is laughable - but stories with the other writers are generally more likely to either be bland or have characterization bits people really don't like in them.

there's a lot of things about enstars i like, and there's a lot of ways it genuinely excels, but the flip-flopping of how gender is treated by the game/narrative as a whole, how it's officially erasing arashi's transfeminine identity, and has intermittently dipped back into """feminine men""" being predatory as a gag especially at the same time akira is talking about legalizing gay marriage and the lgbt community being awesome, is more than not good, its actually regressive as fuck. the ways in which it excels are actively belittled by having their progressive points pushed back on for the sake of pandering and easy money. does it mean anything to have stories about supporting the lgbt community when other content leans back on stereotypes that paint trans women as predators? does it matter that mayoi clearly has ocd when her intrusive thoughts are things the writers want her to act on? what does it mean to have stories about how troubled adonis is by colorism and racism in japan when hes showing more skin than others in every single 5* he has? and sure, its a mobage, its intended to make money. its just another example of capitalism putting profit over people, much less having stories with meaning that it can actually maintain.

[chargetrick]

ok some details about these under the cut because i like talking ^_^ and also once again, graded work so i had to actually consider why i was making the design choices i was

ragna:

- nothing much to say here story wise, he's just minimum wage ragna from long running groupchat Bit™️

- he's a line cook and casually he dresses about as goth as he can manage while being incredibly tired and low motivation all the time.

- no powers here, so he's just missing an arm for... still jin related and abnormal reasons, but less abnormal than they could be and he just had to go to the hospital about it instead of a vampire appearing to him about it

- design wise i really needed to keep that silhouette thing that his hakama pants do for him so the baggy tripp pants and sweatpants are both meant to carry that across

- the missing arm (azure grimoire) specifically having the crest tattoo is very on purpose. he still has the inexplicable body pillow womb tattoo but obviously you can't see that

- i keep doing this thing where i give him a baseball cap and then make his ahoge poke out from under it because it's cute. actually got it on the correct side this time though lol

tsubaki:

- she's a law student at NOL University which is supposed to be super prestigious but the faculty is like. at best kagura at worst relius so really nobody should want to be there

- i was initially just trying to make her outfit ingame translate into relatively normal clothes but actually i really like the vibe this outfit came out with. feels like it really conveys "rich enough to buy expensive probably somewhat personalised clothes, sheltered enough to not realise how much they stand out" which feels pretty accurate to tsubaki's life

- the pins on the hat are an eye and a wing because i desperately wanted a way to reference izayoi stuff while still technically keeping on brief and i was in a little bit of a hurry. not totally happy with it relative to the rest of her outfit, but I'll live.

- i maybe should have given her glasses but now i think about it i kind of really like the idea of her wearing contacts to try and hide that her vision is getting worse because she's worried about potentially showing "weakness". she's got big things in store she can't let people know she's probably going to be legally blind in a couple years or so

makoto:

- also at NOL University minoring in sports science and majoring in something I'm not totally sure on? but definitely something that people don't initially expect of her.

- she works part-time at a coffee shop that tsubaki frequents to do homework but they are NOT carrying out their romance there. they have to do it elsewhere because makoto's awful terrible boss (hazama) will know if she's slacking off to flirt with a beautiful woman and he'll be a dick

- this is kind of a soft redesign of her terrible awful canon outfit but if i were to do that fully i wouldn't make it in the context i was doing these for so it's just her gym clothes. she doesn't wear this all the time but i think she does lean into sporty fashion both to show off her epic muscles and throw people off a bit when they find out she's doing like political science or some shit for her major. I'd like to have done a more casual outfit for her as well, like ragna, but i ran out of time

- once again, silhouettes! i largely ended up doing her as my third character for this task because i felt like i had the best vision for how to translate her magical aspects across. the big fluffy backpack is an obvious stand in for her tail, and the buns fill in for her ears

- i didn't really get to convey the materials too well on most of this but makoto's socks aren't like they are in canon with the weird folded over fabric and stuff, they're just gym socks. some of those specialised ones you can get with the big blocky colours on them

tentative beginnings of a blazblue modern/"normal" au that i handed in for a grade recently

[somethingaboutmint]

My sole Živa Marsh...she is my muse my everything

[commander-gloryforge]

A little Aurora timeline because they are always on my mind heehoo

i had recently said that i wanted to work out Auroras looks throughout the story and i’ve settled for a few things! here’s a hair and armour timeline!

( in case my handwriting is unreadable: 1. Pre Personal Story; 2. Personal Story - Season 1 - Season 2 - mid HoT; 3. HoT - Season 3; 4. PoF - Season 4; 5. Icebrood Saga - EoD )

Aurora had the most hair before any of the story started… she had plenty of time to keep her hair pretty and she probably had all kinds of beautiful hairstyles this is how her general natural hair looked like! As soon as the story started, I imagine her putting it into protective hairstyles, also to keep it out of her face. She had her hair open for whatever reason during HoT, that doesn’t have any specific reason but it’s just how I decided it to be long ago so I kept that! It was all cut off during PoF and stays like this until today. I have often wondered if I should give her longer hair again but I like the short style the most on them!

Also the eye scar happened during a certain moment in IBS, and while she technically always had blue eyes in-game, i now decided that the blue eyes are a sign of the connection between Aurora and Aurene, and they canonically changed colour during the last battle of EoD.

( 1. Personal Story - Season 1; 2. Season 2 - HoT - Season 3; 3. PoF; 4. Season 4 - IBS; 5. EoD )

The first set was one of my favourite heavy sets and Aurora wore it a lot in-game, also during HoT and PoF. She wore Priory Armour during some acts, but this is her Commander Outfit in canon. The Second fit was one of my faves too, they started wearing it during the Silverwastes story chapters. I’m considering her wearing the Mistward armour sometime during the end of HoT as well actually? During PoF she got her first proper armour change but a large part of that Outfit probably didn’t survive a lot of the… happenings, and she wore a broken version of it during Season 4 as well. It was replaced with the Elegy Armour after All or Nothing (where they also lost their arm), which also, while not shown here, includes a prosthetic arm made from asuran tech. that armour once again got broken down a bunch with the airship crash into EoD, and while spending some time in that broken pretty much useless old elegy armour, Aurora would soon piece together her newest armour, as well as replace the now malfunctioning asuran arm with a brand new jade prosthetic created for them by Yao!

while these are all the canon outfits and looks, Aurora wore all kinds of different outfits throughout her time as my main, had had plenty of makeovers and completely different faces even. i think out of all my characters, she’s the one that changed the most drastically… one day i shall work on some more non armour outfits as well as a general guide on auroras looks that can’t be portrayed through their ingame model :)