#i am really trying to understand

[gooboogy]

Every day I write up posts about my gripes about TMA (specifically how everyone is so consistently mean and uncharitable to Jon for no discernable reason and how I fail to understand the message being put forth) and then I save it all to my drafts because I'm sure there's a perspective of looking at it that makes sense but I just can't figure out what the hell that is

[bacchuschucklefuck]

while teen while goblin while aroace while injured while doing your best

[gemsalive]

re: that HEFTY siffrin sweep on id5’s isat favourite blorbos poll — this might sound silly but i do actually think it’s kinda fascinating that isat, as a game so inseparably steeped in (for lack of a better way to describe it) queer fandom culture, managed to so completely sidestep the common Fandom Phenomenon that i suspect was behind the poll in the first place by creating a main character that is also overwhelmingly the fan favourite character for once.

obviously there are any number of factors we could point at to explain the extent to which siffrin nomiddlenames nolastnames manages to grab people and absolutely not let go, but personally i think one of the most interesting ones to consider is the one specific to the medium — that is, how siffrin subverts the “silent blank slate video game protagonist” archetype in such a way that happens to be primo brainrot breeding grounds.

like, when a video game dev makes a silent protagonist it’s usually a bid to maximize immersion by closing the aesthetic distance between player and character as much as possible, right? which is especially true of rpg video games — players find connection in the generic, as that is what gives you the freedom of motion to insert yourself into the story in whatever unique shape suits you best. you are your character and your character is you.

(as ever, post ran long. yall know the drill. tossin in a quick header pic before thoughts on blank slates & blorboification continue under the cut)

and then you’ve got siffrin, who is expressly pointed out to be the taciturn type; who when initially giving the player exposition about their journey so far doesn’t seem to hint at a life or history or even really any motivations outside the journey; whose every thought and action is narrated in second person so as to keep tracing and re-tracing the connection between him and you.

even their design — all darkless and shapeless, bundled up in that big cloak, as if an invitation for you to fill it in with whatever lets you relate to them most! at this point they are their own character for sure, but they also have enough very clear parallels going on with the silent protagonist archetype to feel more than accidental.

of course, as you keep playing you start to recognize that his blankness is much, much more than just a grab at immersion; his apparent lack of backstory, itself a fundamental piece of backstory. this is where he flips dramatically in the player’s perception from “generic vessel for story delivery” to “thoroughly multidimensional character trapped within endless torment nexus custom-built to target and exacerbate all his very specific worst traits rooted in very specific traumas”.

yknow, the good stuff !

but by then you have also been playing enough to be feeling the effects of the thing isat’s design does best of all. i’m talkin bout that ludonarrative lockstep baby. every piece of isat’s gameplay is designed to make you feel what siffrin is feeling — you understand by now that he is not a stand-in for you, but all the same you share in his frustration, his grief, his rare moments of joy and the subsequent heart-in-your-shoes devastation when that joy is inevitably poisoned — and through it all, the desperate grasping for anything new — all as if they were every bit your own.

so in this way the connection is maintained, even if you were someone for whom siffrin’s particular traits & struggles might not otherwise cause you relate to them at all if you had encountered them elsewhere, in a setting where you weren’t actively controlling them as a player. siffrin still gets to carry all the “just like me fr” impact of the blank slate protagonist in the tropes he embodies and in the game mechanics’ design, while totally free to evolve completely into his own character and keep you relating to closely them all the same. now toss back in the fact that said traits & struggles very much ARE of a flavour that a great many people Would Tend To Relate To and just like that you’ve got a perfect storm cookin.

too individual and compellingly written to be an empty vessel for plot delivery. too closely connected with the player’s emotional state to be a story observed impassively from the outside. he has 92 mental illnesses and for the low low price of free u can give him yours to carry too. nobody is doin it like him. congratulations on your well-deserved nose sniffrin nomiddlenames nolastnames <3

[benevolenterrancy]

"Heavens, he doesn't understand again." "Every time he says 'I don't understand', Lui-shixiong grabs someone to demonstrate until he understands..." Ji Jue quietly complained to Shang Qinghua. No wonder the injuries at Bai Zhan Peak had only increased!

so this is obviously Liu Qingge's entire love language, right?

[rainbowxocs]

Well, you really gotta learn to not treat humans like they're lesser than you. The whole "oh a human just isn't capable of the same things as a god" rhetoric is the thing that makes you a prick in my eyes. I like everything else about you, but that nonsense really makes me want to deck you. <3

Well.. I am.. a narcissist.. so.. do I get a pass… for being an asshole…?



[markscherz]

I… do not understand tumblr live. Like, are there actually only about 50 people streaming across the whole platform at any one time? And why are so many of them just… people smoking? Or unoccupied desks? And why is nobody talking about frogs?

[prolibytherium]

Just in general I think trying to look to pre-late modern period history for validation of LGBT+ identities is an absolutely useless venture. Every single underlying human experience defined through the lens and framework of LGBT identity has always existed, but it's impossible to pin down Exactly who and what a figure might have been if they existed in this contemporary context and decided to self identify via these labels.

It's also a wildly reductive lens that flattens the complexity and variety of how sex and gender has been constructed across time in different cultures, how sexual norms have varied, etc. This is not a constructive approach to learn about history and you're never going to be able to fit historical figures neatly into little identity categories.

[lady-raziel]

hilarious that with each new day that passes a new bit of dirt from JD Vance's past gets discovered and plastered over the internet...it's almost as if this is why presidential campaigns have always announced their running mates well before the convention...so that if glaring issues with a candidate came to light quickly there would be time to replace them on the ticket before they were officially locked in...it's almost as if certain things in political campaigns were done for a reason, donald...because the very same critical failures had happened before...but no i'm sure you and your guys attempt to recreate a fantasy version of history while ignoring all the reasons that history was a disaster will work this time...because you are built different and the 10000th time trying fascism will work like a charm...

[jaybirdscoffee]

i don’t think i’ll ever get over the way optimus’ voice breaks just slightly when he says “and you betrayed me.” optimus felt the need to make a distinction, because yes, d-16 betrayed cybertron, but somehow worse than that, he betrayed orion. and never in a million years would orion have thought his best friend would go that far. cybertron be damned, how could d-16 betray him? optimus reserved a small piece of selfish anger, just for them. he’s mourning his best friend, himself, and the life that they could have had.

[expectiations]

I still find it funny that people call eleven a "deadbeat husband" and their marriage "toxic" but twelve is the "perfect husband" and their marriage "wedded bliss" all because of the few moments we'd seen between 11 and River were them being "toxic". yes of course! let's ignore how the minisodes show how that description isn't true and even how little moments in the episodes themselves – "what? that's it?" (why haven't you kissed me goodbye? are you being sly on purpose so I'd kiss you first?) and "they wouldn't bury my wife out here" and the music room is the heart of the home and it's not a ghost story, it's a love story – show 11 cared and put in the work and yes, they're going to have disagreements like the ones in TATM because duh who doesn't but it does not mean it is the entirety of their relationship but people have taken it and made it the entirety of their relationship.

[steelthroat]

When did people in this fandom start writing Prowl like a black butler character, impassive, logical and emotionless when, at least in the comics, both marvel and idw, he was literally always on the verge of an aneurysm and making weird faces once per issue AT LEAST????

Guys not even in the g1 cartoon when he had a sheet of paper for a personality (my favorite sheet of paper but still) he was like that.

So genuinely where does this "stoic prowl" come from?

[thekittyokat]

you ever just have a lot, a LOT of feelings all at once about a character and not even remotely enough words or brainpower to FORM the words to describe everything you're feeling. so it feels like you may explode. yeah

[moeblob]

What if I straight up didn't explain myself? What if I just said trust me on this? Would you?

[thranduel]

astarion, the man who was dying and offered eternal life, but had no idea that it meant becoming a slave to a sadistic master.

astarion, the man who had his freedom and bodily autonomy ripped away from him.

astarion, the man who was forced to befriend, seduce and sleep with people to lure them back to his master, resulting in severe sexual trauma and the struggle to form any sort of intimate relationship.

astarion, the man who was horribly punished whenever he refused his master’s orders (one punishment being sealed away in a dusty tomb, starving, for an entire year. he scratched his hands raw trying to carve his way out).

astarion, the man who was forced to eat rats.

astarion, the man who hasn’t even been able to see his own face since he turned.

astarion, the man who had his body mutilated as cazador carved scars onto his back, which he later found out was to bind him to a ritual.

astarion, the man who is so severely traumatised that he admitted he doesn’t know how to say “no” or ask for help (and he feels guilty when he does).

astarion, the man who waited two centuries to be helped and freed from torture, but no one came.

astarion, the man who was always treated like a monster when all he wanted was to be treated like a person.

astarion, the man who came up to you in the middle of the night just to thank you for defending him and allowing him to make his own decisions.

astarion, the man who said that no one ever looked out for him or showed him kindness, and that you’re the only one. “other people don’t have a heart like you. you’re you. no one is like that.”

astarion, the man who broke the cycle of power and terror that started centuries ago thanks to the love, care and compassion that you showed him when no one else did.

astarion, the man who confessed that he loves you and feels safe with you; something he has never felt with anyone before.

[bixels]

hey um. u sure make a lot of art about lesbians for a man. you're normal about us, right? ;;

What? Yeah, I’m normal about y’all.

[lovelyrotter]

ill probably delete this in a minute but ive just been fuckin boggled by what ive seen across tumblr in the last few days in particular. its why i havent really been around. like holy fucking shit, its really like some of yall just dont want a chunk of the trans community to exist. like some of yall are thisclose to saying it verbatum. way too many already have. 'shut up sit down be quiet and smile for us' type shit, gee where have i heard that before. oh yeah my entire life cause i was forcefully gendered as someones daughter. shock horror i know. you might be surprised to remember and/or learn that very few trans folks know theyre trans before we're 5, or even 10, and that that gendered experience stays with all of us in both/either small or large ways. either bc we literally dont have a solid identity yet (bc we're very small children), dont have the words, we're repressing it out of fear from how others will treat us, we're actually enjoying or enjoyed being another gender in our childhood, or we just genuinely didnt fuckin know until shit lined up later in life. weird isnt it that transmascs dont pop out as 6'1 brick shithouse cis men when we're born so yall know for certain that we're confused lost girls/women oops i mean big dangerous scary men. its almost like we're transgender too. none of yall actually know what intersectionality is or means