#i hate being mediocre

[bigothteddies]

anyways the smut I’m reading is really good I’m completely invested

[judeharoldvich]

i want to be a broadway tenor boy so bad it's disgusting i am going to kill myself

[quixoticanarchy]

going about my ordinary life: i wish things were different

contemplating the approach of Life Changes: aahhghhghghahh!!! !!!

[atopvisenyashill]

god that person is soooo full of brain worms or something because like even as a dany lover, i see everything you’re saying about her as great observations based on the text. She’s young, she’s traumatized, of course when she gets over to westeros it’s not going to end as well as she hopes. The only thing I can pray for is that George writes her end better than D&D did because it was atrocious how her most trusted advisors went from being her biggest supporters to acting like “no actually her grief from losing her best friend and two of her dragons who were as much like children to her as anything could be means she’s just as mad as her father”, especially when Tyrion never knew Aerys!! I would love to see her descent into madness, see how all of her losses stack and utterly break her, but the way those two switched up real quick was honestly disgusting to me

YEAH like I think the biggest issue with the show is that she’s surrounded by characters who are pale imitations of their book selves or characters she’s just NOT supposed to be interacting with like that. There’s no doubt in my mind that Tyrion is going to flip sides & it’s probably going to spell her doom, but the Tyrion in the books is in a vastly different, much darker place currently than the Tyrion she met in the show and that’s going impact their dynamic MASSIVELY. Varys is NOT some monarchial marxist aksjdj he’s a mad scientist trying to hand make the perfect king bc he’s seen the destruction caused by bad ones and he thinks he’s Above It All when in reality his traumas as a slave inform his bad behavior just as surely as they inform Melisandre’s. The show doesn’t want to engage with all of that though so Tyrion & Varys just kind of nonsensically flip on her for *checks notes* acting the exact same way she’s been acting for years when they never had a problem with her stupid behavior BEFORE s8.

And i go back and forth on what I think is going to happen but ultimately YEAH i do think george is going to write an ending that is much more fitting and also, despite what the targ nation people insist upon, TRAGIC than what we got. It’s going to hit harder, it’s going to be thematically interesting, it’s not going to be george going for the ~cool~ or wow shocking plot line the way those two idiots did!

But definitely the thing that hit my rage button on that one is this idea that like first of all, dany isn’t somehow mentally ill or that the presence of mental illness is a weakness or moral failing. I don’t know how you even exist on terros without developing something deeply unhinged in your brain, and dany meanwhile has a conga line of trauma and some ancient blood magic and incest cooking in HERS, i don’t think i’m saying anything out of pocket by saying “yeah i think she displays some patterns of behavior that are worrying when you essentially have a pet nuke.” but two it’s also like - ALL of these people are insane!!!! lannister, stark, tully, martell, baratheon, targaryen, greyjoy, on and on, they’ve all lived through at minimum one but some of them several wars that completely upended their lives and killed a lot of their family, and then got thrown into stressful situations that require a much more delicate hand than any of them are capable of. that’s the whole series!!! it’s just a bunch of insane people going “yeah exactly girl let’s do it” and “it” is usually war!!!

[asketchydomesticatedgremlin]

standard sketch turned colored with effort story up here uhh

I'm also a bit let down by the immmortalis trailer, but I'm still hopeful for it being at least a little fun. I think it's gonna be an AU or a post queen ending where the protagonist gets off the island somehow. either way I do like to think it's taking place in a completely different kingdom.

anyhoo silly headcanons and doodles below

soooo i think they'd all have slightly different fighting styles

- The Beheaded (in game) has the most varied style, jack of all trades type of guy, though they're the most cautious of the bunch with encounters, knowing when to run unlike the rest. - Bobby (trailers) uses the meme builds and pets, though they're ok with most weapons, they've got a deadly proficiency with pans. Bobby also rerolls for biters on all their weapons. - Official art, for them its kill or be killed, relentless and constant bloodshed. they never use shields and bows are only used if they can't reach their next victim. - Flame (immortalis) from what the trailer showed, he strangely keeps mainly to fist to fist, he used some light weapons but most of the trailer had his hands empty. He seems the kind to beat an enemy to a pulp with his fists and feet than any weapon.

also flame being the only one that can speak is funny to me

one laaaaaast little thing

little little silly guy silly scrunkle tiny

tiny man (derogatory to the highest degree)

[rukafais]

I played Never Grave's demo so I could see if it had any ambition at all beyond smashing a bunch of popular things together to create something kind of interesting and in short:

no lol

The unique mechanic, possession, is so sidelined you might as well be playing as the Cutesy Witch Character that is the mascot despite being a hat that possesses corpses, because it's not actually a hollow knight style metroidvania, it's smashing hollow knight's style and pacing into dead cells' room generation and enemy placement and creates an unhappy compromise that makes me wish it would shit or get off the fucking pot. It also has drops which are supposed to incentivize replay so you can get upgrades and whatnot, but what it mostly does is make me resent how transparently shoehorned the mechanic is.

also why is the build mode so crusty

Oh also this area is like 50% of the demo (since it is the area you actually do all the combat exploration in):

If you have a game that is making me think, at all times "man i wish i was playing another, better game that looks like this/plays like this that I enjoyed more" you've failed to give your game a unique identity and that, more than anything, irritates the shit out of me. The video game industry is built on clones, at least make it a fucking GOOD clone that isn't creatively bankrupt.

Also they have the whole roguelike random upgrade thing going on but they all feel pretty meaningless because there's no real indication or sense of balance. Everything feels like it's there because it has to be there, because it's popular, instead of trying to have some kind of creative identity and stand on its own. It's deeply, agonizingly mediocre. It feels like it was designed by a fucking marketing team because This Is What's Popular, Right?

Which sucks. Because I would play a game about being a fucked up little creature that possesses corpses to get around! But it doesn't even commit to that premise enough to get me interested, DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH OF A SUCKER I AM FOR EVEN THE SLIGHTEST BIT OF AESTHETIC PANDERING?

Also there's no flavor text or lore or plot which like, if there was SOMETHING i could be interested. There is fucking nothing. It feels like someone slapped this together from a bunch of premade templates and expects you to get excited about it.

ALSO IT'S GOING TO BE ANOTHER EARLY ACCESS GAME, FROM A STUDIO THAT SEEMS TO PRODUCE NOTHING BUT EARLY ACCESS GAMES THAT NEVER MAKE IT OUT OF EARLY ACCESS, JESUS CHRIST POCKETPAIR

[wolfhednn]

　𝐚 𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐝 　/　drabble ₊

growing up, he'd never been made to feel the lesser of the sons of fraldarius. often, he'd wondered if it was all in his head.

he couldn't be said to have received any less attention. though his memories of his mother are sparing, their father had been equally rigorous with them both. their education had been equally complete. their training equally emphasized. it made sense——the name fraldarius wasn't a small one, or easy to live up to. the arm that filled the king's shield, young or old, needed to be strong, peerless, unflinching.

he couldn't be said to have received any less love. as the youngest of their entourage, many would've said he'd had anything but.

maybe it had only been in his head.

maybe it was him who saw glenn's skill in both lance and sword when he just wanted to exceed him in the blade.

maybe it was him who noticed how glenn cast with their father's talent in the goddess' magic when he showed no interest in those lessons.

"you're too narrowminded, felix," his father told him. his tutors told him. his mentor told him. "what happens if you're disarmed? your sword gets taken?" they proceeded then to do just that——schwing!——sunlight glinting sharply off steel as it sailed tip over hilt to clatter to the ground, leaving him defenseless at his enemy's lancepoint. at the other end of it was any number of those who'd built him and honed his skill, made him who he was today.

. . .

like he said, his father was like that too. skilled in faith magic, that is.

they say that magic came to him before the lance did, even before riding did. that when he was a boy, he used to struggle to match his peers in steel, and would be mocked and laughed at: what kind of king's shield can't even land a javelin! but that he made up for it in the strength of the goddess' smite that would silence them.

glenn, too, harnessed the same terrifying aurora that spilled from rodrigue's deft hand: a roar of brilliant light, the memory of dark waves bloodstreaked from horseback burned into a foe's eyes, more than enough to make repentence of apostasy.

for his father, it'd been faith in the goddess. his brother, faith in his loved ones.

in turn, felix had never sought out magic, never felt or welcomed its spark. his father said nothing——even after glenn had died, he said nothing, for all that he said to him at all at the time. and with glenn's death had died the last of any desire he might've had to pursue it: to better match him maybe, or live up to some imagined expectation ; to please his father maybe, or shirk off the voices saying he was too stubborn. instead, the blade was where he found himself, the same where he had always found himself. the blade was where he found his brother, and the pieces of everything he'd once held sacred. and so there he'd stayed.

until——

until. . .

a drop of ink disturbs clear water. someone tells him: magic will make you a stronger swordsman.

it's an echo of the voices from the past. "you're too narrowminded, felix" chases him forward in time like a hydra, grabbing him again in these cloistered, dust-smote halls where they'd never walked and had never seen him. his expression sours at first, and he swears, he swears. . .

but this time, he listens——because the voice that has chased him is none other than glenn's. airy and teasing, always flippant, who used to say to everyone else: "lay off him. he'll pick it up or he won't." now he says:

give it a try, felix.

give it a try, felix.

so felix finds, with enough time, that his faith is the faith that splits like lightning. born not from the goddess, nor in the belief that in memory he will never die, but something else. some third thing he doesn't know, but which howls and thrashes and bites even him, which would claim his life if he wasn't strong enough. and it feels like him. it feels like him like the blade feels like him, an extension of something he lives by and vouches for.

after all, thunder isn't too far off from faith: a flash of light, a smoldering crater, a scar for the departed.

　 FELIX has mastered:⠀ dread fighter.

[no1ryomafan]

*rotating in my head how magical girls have a similar issue to mecha in which majority of west speaking anime fans brush off the genre for stereotyping it into one thing besides the popular shows but magical girls have had it significantly worse because madoka actually effected the genre into becoming unnecessarily darker for a period and it’s also a reflection of how media aimed at women has more negative biased to it then media aimed at men*

Wow this is so fucked up and objectively more worse then mecha just getting brushed off for being “robot fights”.

*proceeds to continue not have a strong interest in magical girls even after this realization*

[cryptids]

ok sorry to rant out of nowhere but why is tender is the flesh on every book youtuber's top 10 (or whatever) best horror books ever list 😭 it was so bad, I couldn't even finish it bc it was so uninteresting... like I would get it if a few people loved it bc people's tastes are always gonna vary, but the fact that its SO popular just baffles me like am I missing something or am I crazy or what lmao??? and one of the best books EVER?????

[bigothteddies]

I think that part of what like. kills me about the whole media literacy and critical thinking aspect of enjoying media these days is that people refuse to like. contextualize that

A. Bad media can still hold significant meaning to people

B. Media made for a demographic you aren’t apart of is not inherently bad media

C. Media made for and consumed by the opposite demographic is not inherently shallow or flawed nor is it above criticism for its media tropes either.

[gunsatthaphan]

wait, i'm out of the loop, why does new sticking his nose in gmm business mean? which show will you not watch?

I don't get it, what is Studio Wabi Sabi and who is New? Why is it a bad thing that FK will work for them?

---------------------------------------------

New Siwaj is a director who's with Studio WabiSabi, a bl production company, and subjectively speaking his shows are extremely cheesy, tropey and lukewarm lol. His works tend to polarize because his shows do have big fanbases and admittedly Between Us was decent but personally his other shows are insufferable. He directed the Star & Sky series in 2022 and Boss and Babe for gmmtv this year both of which were extremely mediocre lol so sorry for being dramatic but him working with FirstKhao would be a disaster lmao.

I'm gonna trust them to not sink to that level but only time will tell. It makes sense that he would want them but I hope to god they declined lmao. He can go off with other actors but not A-listers like them. I would be so mad.

[puthyflapps]

Swifties prove everyday that they’re the dumbest people on the internet and that’s really saying something cuz I’ve dealt directly with blarkes

[swan2swan]

Rick and Morty is on before Toonami.

I thought it was last week's episode (as usual), but the voice sounded off. I figured "Oh, right. New Rick actor. Ian will sound a little off."

Then I realized.

It was an older episode.

That was Justin.

And the Rick voice was TERRIBLE.

[golgafrincham]

Having now watched a few episodes of Portrait Artist of the Year I never want to draw or paint again. Except maybe blobs of color. Or scribbles.

[forcebookish]

the only reason i deleted my last xander rant is because giles does indeed often find xander annoying, but i will still argue that it is on another level with cordelia and she has never done anything even half as stupid and dangerous as xander has

[fromtheseventhhell]

Daenerys after getting to Winterfell