#i have like one more major addition and that's IT

[thankskenpenders]

Thoughts on two specific areas of the writing in Sonic X Shadow Generations

The best new 3D Sonic game in over a decade (or even two, depending on who you ask) dropped late last year. And I didn't write anything about it! Sometimes life happens. Well, I've finally sat down to finish Shadow Generations, and by now everyone has already been singing its praises for three months. This is the rare instance where the entire Sonic fandom, and even mainstream reviewers, are in agreement on something. The level design is the best it's been in a long, long time and the cool factor is off the charts, embracing Sonic's peak cringe era in an incredibly confident way. It's great. If you're even reading this post, you probably don't need me to tell you that. So I won't!

No, what I'm really interested in here is the writing. Because this is me we're talking about. But I actually don't want to talk about the main narrative of Shadow Generations, which is really solid little story about Black Doom trying to mold Shadow into his perfect soldier. No, I'd like to zero in on two other aspects of the writing here: the revisions made to Sonic Generations, and Gerald Robotnik's unlockable journal.

The updated Sonic Generations script

The new package mostly presents Sonic Generations how you remember it. There are some tweaks, but it's not a major overhaul. Graphically, I don't think the game has been touched much, if at all. I certainly can't notice any difference without a side-by-side comparison, despite playing it on a PS5. The most notable update is that the game's script has been rewritten by Ian Flynn.

Naturally, this caught my attention. Generations always had a nothingburger story, so with Ian rewriting Pontac and Graff's lame dialogue there was nowhere to go but up. (I don't like to pin the blame for those games' stories entirely on them, as a ton of it was dictated to them by Sonic Team, but, well, I don't think they're very good dialogue writers.) But it's less a complete rewrite and more like Ian was brought on as a script doctor for some minor touch ups here and there. Many lines of dialogue are completely identical to how they were originally written in 2011, and many others only have slight wording changes. Ian was clearly not allowed to request additional scenes or extend the ones that already existed. He has to match the original beat for beat so that they can reuse 99% of the cutscene animations. Don't expect it to be a whole new experience compared to the original.

Still, I think the new script is an improvement, albeit a minor one. Various things have been tweaked to maintain characterization consistency. Cream calls Sonic "Mr. Sonic" instead of just "Sonic." Instead of calling Sonic "buddy," Rouge uses the pet name "Blue," like she tends to do in things like the IDW comics. Espio doesn't have to remind you in the dialogue that he's a ninja, and he no longer has a line making it sound like he has some kind of soul reading power. I also like that Modern Sonic now actually has responses to what his friends say when he rescues them, rather than being silent like Classic Sonic. They won't blow you away, but they make Sonic feel a little more engaged with everything.

In general, the altered dialogue just seems tighter to me, and some of the more childish or trite wording of Pontac and Graff's script has been altered. Here, let's actually make a direct comparison, just because this stuff is interesting to me as a writer. Here's a couple lines from after the Egg Dragoon fight late in the game, in the original script:

Modern Eggman: Ooooh... I can't believe this! I was supposed to beat you this time. Modern Sonic: Aw, I'm sorry! I didn't get that memo. I beat you every time! [Turns to Classic Sonic] No, seriously, we beat this guy every time. It's like it's our job or something!

This is a simple exchange. Eggman is mad that he lost. Sonic is unflappably confident because he always beats Eggman, and he explains this to his younger self. But the wording here isn't particularly good. Eggman's simple and direct wording makes him come off like a little kid who's mad because his older brother beat him at Mario Kart, rather than a mad scientist who just had his plans foiled. It's making light of the situation.

And I've never liked Sonic saying "It's like it's our job or something!" That doesn't feel like a thing Sonic would say, it feels like a thing an outside observer would say about Sonic. This is a frequent problem with so-called "MCU dialogue," where quips meant to echo the commentary of a casual, somewhat disinterested audience are inserted into the story itself so that the writers can be like "See? We get it. We're genre-savvy, too!" It also just reminds me of bad Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric lines like "Rings! It's like they're made for me!"

And then here's Ian's rewrite:

Modern Eggman: I recalibrated everything! This was supposed to be my time! Modern Sonic: Oh, please, keep dreamin', Egg-head. I beat you every time. [Turns to Classic Sonic] No, seriously, we beat him every time. Our score card's flawless.

Eggman's still mad about his defeat, but the line "I recalibrated everything!" makes it more specific. He put all this work into the engineering side of his latest scheme and got tunnel vision, thinking if he got his creations just right there'd be no way he could lose. "This was supposed to be my time!" also turns it into a time travel pun, which is a bonus. He's still pitching a fit over losing, but it feels more like Eggman pitching a fit, rather than sounding childish.

And then instead of saying that beating Eggman is "like his job or something," Sonic says he's got a flawless score card against Eggman. He doesn't take Eggman seriously as a threat—at least, not to his face. He acts like it's all a game. But he conveys this in a way that feels truer to the character, rather than feeling like the words of a real world observer poking fun at the tropes of the Sonic series.

Is this amazing, A+ dialogue that blows me away? No. Again, it's not a completely different scene from the one we already had. Ian had to fit the beats of what was already there. He couldn't go all out and write an all new story confirming his longstanding headcanon that the Time Eater is a remnant of Solaris or whatever. But the wording here makes the existing story land a little better and feel truer to the characters in subtle ways.

But to me, the main change is that the Sonics and Tailses seem to have a more solid understanding of what's going on with the timeline and the Time Eater, compared to how idiotic they sometimes seemed in the original game. Which is good! No more standing outside Green Hill and wondering why it seems so familiar. Thank god. As part of this, yes, there are a few more references to past games in the dialogue, like Sonic briefly being confused about the fact that they're time traveling without the Time Stones, or South Island and Westside Island being acknowledged as the normal locations of Green Hill and Chemical Plant. Yes, ha ha, insert joke about how Ian loves references here. Look, it's Sonic fucking Generations. It's a game built entirely out of nostalgic references. Just own it! And, again, in this instance Sonic and Tails come off as less stupid when they make it clear that they do, in fact, remember their adventures from presumably less than a year ago in-universe.

Eggman, too, seems to have a better understanding of the powers he's toying with. Where in the original vesion his focus was simply on going back in time to undo his previous defeats and he seemed kind of oblivious to how much the Time Eater was actually fucking up the universe, here Eggman says he wants to use the Time Eater to give himself complete control over the entire timeline. Eggman also makes way fewer references to his own failures and shortcomings. Of course he won't admit that Sonic has defeated him time and time again. To him, he's never truly lost—Sonic just keeps delaying the inevitable total victory for the Eggman Empire.

So, yes. The new Sonic Generations script is better. It won't blow anyone away, but it's better than it was. It's been elevated from "kinda lame" to "fine." No, if you really wanna see Ian flex his ability to breathe new life into old Sonic stories, look no further than...

Gerald Robotnik's Journal

Hoo boy.

The story of what happened aboard the ARK has always been... a bit confusing, to say the least. Fans with encyclopedic knowledge of the script for every route of Shadow '05 may disagree, but it's the truth. We've had all the pieces to understand the story for a long time now, but that info was given to us out of order by a pair of unreliable narrators—Gerald, who became a vengeful lunatic shortly before his death, and Shadow, who was subjected to multiple rounds of amnesia and altered memories. Some of the ambiguity left by Sonic Adventure 2 was cleared up in Shadow '05, but that game also retconned in a bunch of new elements to Shadow's backstory (aliens!) that lead to further confusion. Not to mention the fact that that game had multiple routes and only revealed the truth about Shadow if you sat on the ultimate final boss battle for WAY longer than the fight would normally last. Or the fact that Sonic X made its own tweaks in its telling of the story. Or the fact that none of these things ever had the best English translations. I can't blame anyone who hasn't played those games in two decades for not remembering the truth about these characters and getting some details mixed up.

What we needed was something to piece together all of the info we have into one coherent backstory, told in chronological order. And thanks to Shadow Generations, we have that, in the form of an official journal tying together what we knew from Sonic Adventure 2, Shadow '05, and Sonic Battle into the tragic tale of Gerald's rise and fall.

Ian Flynn was the perfect man for the job here as the guy who started his career by tidying up the mess that was the first 159 issues if Archie Sonic. This is what he excels at: taking disparate bits of weird Sonic lore from multiple different sources, boiling them down to their most interesting elements, and connecting it together in a way that will make the audience see the dramatic potential he's always known was there. Rather than feeling like a cynical exercise in franchise building, going back and explaining things that never needed explaining so that people can add more bullet points to the wiki, he puts a new spin on things that retroactively enriches those past stories. The story here means something to the characters involved and gives us a better understanding of them as people, rather than as plot devices to motivate Shadow.

(And, of course, Ian didn't do this journal alone. He wrote the story, but I also have to give a huge shout out to Evan Stanley, who made the final product. All of her handwritten journal entries, sketches, and "photos" included throughout. The physical damage done to the journal over the course of 50 tumultuous years, passing from Gerald to Eggman to a certain special someone at GUN. The way Gerald's handwriting gets less and less legible as his mental state declines. So much love was put into what could have been a mere text dump in a menu, and it really elevates it to the next level. Congrats on officially getting hired by Sega, Evan, you've sure as hell earned it!)

The main idea the journal conveys is that Gerald was under a lot of pressure from a lot of different parties—GUN, the President, his colleagues aboard the ARK, Black Doom, even his own family—and boy did it get to him. The known incidents aboard the ARK mentioned in previous games are put together here to form a story where everything slowly spirals out of control as Gerald keeps compromising his morals to further his research, thinking he'll eventually find some way out of all this because he's a genius. I won't recap that whole story here (if you haven't already played the game and read the journal entries, I would highly recommend at least reading it on the Sonic wiki), but I'd like to highlight my favorite elements of the story, as Ian tells it here.

1) The Eclipse Cannon

Here's something that never quite made sense in Sonic Adventure 2: why does the ARK have a laser that can blow up the Earth built into it? It was supposed to be a peaceful research colony. Sure, Gerald went crazy and swore revenge on the Earth, but, like... when did he have an opportunity to go back up to the ARK and modify it? Did he have someone else do it? How? The ARK was raided by GUN and shut down! And then they arrested him, held him in prison for an unclear period of time, and executed him by firing squad when he was no longer useful! It doesn't add up. Shadow 'the Hedgehog '05 would give its own answer by introducing the Black Arms and saying that the Eclipse Cannon was always supposed to be a secret trump card against the Black Comet. But, like... we know that's kind of a bullshit answer, right? You don't need enough power to blow up a whole planet just to destroy a comet.

Well, the new journal retains what we already knew, but it paints a much more complete picture.

See, long before Gerald ever made a Faustian bargain with Black Doom, he had already made one with an even greater evil: the military. GUN gave Gerald much of the funding for the ARK, Gerald's personal utopian research station in space, but it didn't take long for GUN to start pressuring him to design them weapons. Gerald tried to get GUN off his back by personally contacting the President of the United Federation, and the President gave him an alternative: how about, instead, you just use your genius brain to figure out the secret to immortality for us, so our soldiers can be immortal? Gerald was initially sickened by the notion and found it completely absurd, like chasing a shadow... but given no other option, the sarcastically named Project Shadow soon began in earnest. (Maria would later put a more positive spin on the name after Shadow's awakening, pointing out that a Shadow can show us the direction of the light, like she says in the game itself.)

Of course, this search for the ultimate life form didn't go very well, and without any results on that front GUN kept hounding him for weapons. Gerald would throw them a bone here and there to get them off his back. His research on Chaos resulted in the Artifical Chaos prototypes, which he worried would be used for warfare but could at least theoretically be used for search and rescue missions in floods, in his mind. But that wasn't enough. So he gave them Chaos Drives to power their mechs. And that still wasn't enough. He's got Emerl. He'll give them Emerl. They're not impressed by Emerl. They'll shut the whole ARK down if Gerald doesn't give them something big.

Fine! GUN wants something big? Gerald builds a huge fucking laser cannon into the ARK. However, as a middle finger to GUN, Gerald makes it so powerful that it would destroy the Earth if it was ever fired at any target on its surface. In other words, GUN now has their ultimate weapon of mass destruction, fulfilling his contract, but they can never actually use it. Oh, the delicious irony. (And also Shadow will blow up the Black Comet with it in 50 years yada yada yada.) Is this perhaps extremely shortsighted and naive of Gerald, to believe that such a weapon would never actually be used just because of the risk? Of course. But hey, that's Gerald for you. And I love this as an answer.

(Also, this, uh, kinda echoes something from real life! Remember the bit in Oppenheimer where he says all nuclear war will become unthinkable, and Edward Teller responds "until somebody builds a bigger bomb"? Yeah, Teller went on to conceptualize a superweapon codenamed Project Sundial that would have been able to kill all life on the planet, as the ultimate deterrent for war. This was never made for obvious reasons, but hey, there's a basis for this sort of thinking outside of heightened sci-fi! There's a whole Kurzgesagt video about this if you're interested.)

2) The Biolizard

The Biolizard is, of course, brought up as the initial failed prototype of the ultimate life form, from before Gerald met Black Doom. We don't really learn all that much about it that we didn't already know, but I just love the way it's framed in the story.

As you can see above, we actually get to see a picture of Maria holding up the cute little salamander that would end up mutating into the Biolizard through Gerald's experiments. (Researchers want to figure out how to replicate salamanders' regenerative abilities for humans in real life, too, so this was a natural starting point for the project.) And then, after it grows to a monstrous size and goes out of control, Gerald has to lock it away in an unused sector of the ARK. He needs to keep the poor thing alive for his research into harnessing Chaos Energy, building life support systems directly into it, but he doesn't have the heart to tell Maria what happened. So it just becomes this first dark secret weighing on his conscience. The Biolizard becomes Gerald's Tell-Tale Heart beating beneath the floorboards of the ARK. I love that.

3) Lost Impact was the breaking point for the ARK

Remember the level Lost Impact in Shadow '05? The flashback level on the hero path where Shadow is running around fighting Artificial Chaos enemies on the ARK 50 years ago? Yeah, that wasn't just a random incident. That was important, as we now know due to its placement on the timeline.

See, Emerl's rampage aboard the ARK that was chronicled in Sonic Battle and Dark Beginnings set off a domino effect. Emerl riled up the Artificial Chaos, causing Gerald to lose control of them. They became violent, and so Shadow had to stop them, as depicted in Lost Impact. The thing is, that incident sent an SOS signal to GUN telling them that shit was going down on the ARK. Gerald didsn't fully understand the trouble he was in and assumed that he'd simply be reprimanded by the higher ups, or maybe face legal action. But, well... the next time he heard from GUN, armed troopers were raiding the ARK.

So Lost Impact was the straw that broke the camel's back. I just really like that detail.

4) Maria

And, of course, there's Maria herself. Maria has often been more of a symbol than a character, this perfect embodiment of everything that's good and pure in this world who gets killed to motivate Shadow and Gerald's revenge plots. But I really like the wrinkles this journal adds to her and Gerald's story, and their relationship. This is the most fleshed out they've ever felt.

For one, the journal leans into the idea of Maria's intellectual potential. The rest of the Robotnik family is all geniuses, after all, and she was proving to be a really bright kid. She excelled in her studies on the ARK, and she even helped design Shadow's jet skates and inhibitor rings. When Maria died, the world didn't just lose a symbolic personification of purity. She genuinely could have been a hugely influential scientist who did so much good for the world. That's what Gerald wanted for her. But we'll never know, because GUN killed her.

Speaking of her family, their presence isn't just mentioned for the sake of fleshing out the Robotnik family tree. It's mentioned that as Gerald struggled to find a cure for Maria's illness through his genetic research, he faced mounting pressure from his family. They didn't want Maria to be up on the ARK forever. They wanted Gerald to hurry up and find a damn cure, or otherwise just send her back home to Earth so she could be with her family again. She'd been up on the ARK for so long that Gerald's coworkers started thinking that she had been born up there. Eventually she gains a baby sister on Earth who she's never met. A rift forms between Gerald's two sons, and he's unable to really deal with it because he's so consumed by his work. There's this sense that the family is falling apart, and that everyone is dreading the possibility that Gerald will never find a cure and that Maria will just spend her final years up in space and die far away from her family, because Gerald just couldn't let go. If that happens, it'll break the whole family. But he can't stop now. So he just keeps working. Curing Maria is the only way to win his family back, in his eyes. It can't all be for nothing.

But my favorite detail regarding Maria is this one paragraph:

Maria is growing into a lovely young woman. It breaks my heart that someone as bright and energetic as her is diminished by disease. There are no visible effects, and I've caught my fellow researchers muttering to each other, doubting her illness. It is infuriating. I find all my reason and restraint vanishes when she's slighted.

This is SUCH a great addition to the story! It's always been true that Maria doesn't really seem all that ill, just looking at her in cutscenes. With this one little comment, Ian flips that issue on its head and turns it into a story about invisible disability. She doesn't act like she's in chronic pain, so she must not be, everyone thinks. And this really, really gets to Gerald, as does the pressure from his family. He's dedicating his whole LIFE to saving her, and they think she's faking it?! It's such a small addition, never referenced elsewhere in the journal, but it adds so much flavor to the story, as does the implied family drama. It grounds Gerald and Maria and makes them feel more like real human beings, rather than being pure archetypes. It's just enough info to let my imagination run wild filling in the blanks.

You also get the feeling that Maria being such a walking ray of sunshine was the only real source of joy Gerald had left in his life before Shadow was awakened, and the only thing keeping him from snapping under pressure sooner. All this stuff just keeps piling on, everything's spiraling out of control, but at least Maria is keeping her chin up, right? It makes so much sense that losing her would make him go off the deep end when it's framed like this.

It's just... man, I never thought I'd care so much about Gerald and Maria. But that's the Ian Flynn touch. After years of less than stellar Sonic writing that seemed to be embarrassed of itself, I'm so happy to have new games coming out that fully embrace the history of the series like this, making its world feel so rich and real instead of just serving as an excuse for a string of platforming levels. I don't even like Shadow '05, but I'll be damned if Ian and the rest of Sonic Team didn't make something amazing by "yes, and"-ing Shadow's cringe past here. Sonic has truly reached levels of "we're so back" never thought possible.

[gorgonstaringcontest]

Prev tags from @mlmxreader

I used to live with a vegan that I would often cook for because she found it extremely overwhelming.

I found the trick with turning carno meals vego is to make sure you're not just replacing nutrition and structural function, you gotta replace what it contributes to the flavour profile.

In things like cottage pie, not having meat removes a lot of the hearty umami flavours that give a depth of flavour. You're not getting that maillard reaction on the meat as it browns, and if you're making a mirepoix or soffritto to incorporate, the vego side is going to be all limp and meh because it's not being backed up by the flavour from browning meat.

So how do you fix it? Firstly, if you're incorporating vegetables, roast half of them in the oven until a deep colour develops. Then sautee the rest as normal, and once done, mix in the roasted ones. Make sure to deglaze the roasting pan as well, I'd say with some red wine, and scrape up all the fond that developed from roasting and then add that wine mixture as part of the liquid for the final sauce first to reduce and cook off all the alcohol before adding any other stock liquid. You can also use caramelised onion to give the flavour another dimension.

Also, your sauce/gravy needs some other additions. I'm Australian, so I add a bit of Vegemite. You can also add a dash of soy sauce or boullion or whatever stock base you prefer. But the real kingmaker is just adding a touch of MSG.

And before anyone gets up in my business about adding MSG, understand that firstly - it's naturally occurring, and secondly, the majority of concerns about MSG are actually based on racism so, leave that at the door. MSG is a salt, so you have to be mindful of your overall salt additions but adding a pinch will really bring back a lot of those flavours.

In a dish that requires minced meat like cottage pie, I'd opt for TVP as the replacement - textured vegetable protein. Rehydrate it with flavourful stock and don't be afraid to add more herbs and spices to the dry TVP so it soaks in all of that flavour before cooking it in the pan. You want to go a bit broader than you usually would for herbs - I would usually use rosemary and thyme for something like this with meat, but for vego I'd add a bit of oregano and smoked paprika as well in smaller proportions. Spend the extra time to really reduce the stock to concentrate as much flavour as possible.

Meat also brings fat, and fat often adds a lot of flavour but you can actually get it in via the mash. If you're vegetarian it's easier than vegan - vegetarian, you can use high fat cream and butter instead of milk for the potato, but vegan you'll need to mix different fats that don't have any strong flavours.

For a really bougie touch on the vegetarian one, you can add a really thin layer of bechamel under the potato as well.

Lastly - make sure to thicken the fuuuuck out of the gravy. While you've got it in a pan on medium heat, add a mix of one tablespoon cornflour and two tablespoons cold water. Make sure there's no lumps in that slurry before adding to the pan. Stir it in and mix it through vigorously, and it will thicken in about 60 seconds. You may need to do it two or three times before it gets really thick - you want it thick enough that you can drag a spoon through the mixture in the pan and make a divot an inch deep and it only very slowly collapses back in on itself.

Good luck!

What’s a food from your culture that u HATE #hatersonly

[ps-cactus]

Headcanons for the Gaunts in the early 1890s

...and for Ominis staying at the Gaunt Manor, a place he calls "there."

Disclaimer: These are headcanons that work for me in my writing (recently posted a chapter of Ominis at home and my head nearly exploded of everything I had to keep in mind for that, so I'm 'clearing my storage') Of course I don't expect these will work for everyone.

CWs: Any you would expect from these people. Primarily - Toxic Family Dynamics, different forms of Abuse. General darkness.

The Gaunts

General

The family is still recognized for their pureblood lineage, but they're far less financially comfortable than they'd like people to believe. They rely on old connections rather than building new ones.

They had some issues with Aurors, with certain conflicts becoming personal for a while. Investigations have put more pressure on the family and forced them to spend a lot of money buying their way out of trouble.

Other pureblood families are growing more hesitant to marry into the Gaunt line—especially when it comes to the Gaunt sons.

Innate abilities, in addition to Parseltongue, can include Legilimency and/or Occlumency. More about Ominis in his section below.

The transition to Parseltongue can be unconscious, reflexive response to hearing it.

Ivraxus Gaunt (Father)

Works at the Ministry, Department of International Magical Co-operation, the International Magical Trading Standards Body, handling inspections, audits, and licensing. He will last there few more years while his 'friends' let him.

While he maintains a polished front at work and formal gatherings, his methods at home are far harsher, relying on intimidation to keep others in line.

He arranges (or tries to arrange) marriages for his children to maintain sacred alliances.

His wife’s declining health disturbs him—not out of love, but fear. Her loss would represent the crumbling of his already fragile household and it reminds him of his own eventual end. This fear alternates between withdrawal and bursts of anger.

Disapproves of Ominis holding a wand in his hand unless it is absolutely necessary for navigation.

He has a collection of expensive firewhiskeys and usually drinks after work.

Merope Gaunt (Mother)

Her voice is frail and ghostly, and her presence seems to fade into the background. Chronically ill all her life, and her health worsened with every child she bore. She was unable to have more children after Ominis.

She never blames her children in her state and avoids conflict at all costs—not even for her children’s sake, but to protect herself.

If some fight breaks out, she leaves, never offering comfort to anyone involved.

If forced (typically by her husband, if he’s busy) to intervene, she will do the bare minimum to diffuse tension before hurrying away. She prefers to turn away and forget.

Yes, Marvolo named his daughter after her. No, he never loved either of them.

Marvolo Gaunt (Older Brother) sighs

Volatile and aggressive, quick to issue threats or escalate conflicts.

Since graduation, he’s spent much of his time abroad; because of this, he didn’t meet Ominis for a year and a half.

Engaged to Miss Burke, he shows no real interest in the marriage but never opposes it. It’s possible he has feelings for someone else.

He was openly hostile to Ominis from the moment his younger brother was born, seeing him as competition for attention. Marvolo also felt unnerved by Ominis' perceived 'abnormality,' a term whispered frequently at home.

Korentha Malfoy, née Gaunt (Older Sister, the oldest child)

Embraces the family's traditions and social obligations, enjoying all the gatherings and taking pride in her pureblood status.

Quick to lecture Ominis for his "manners." For her, he is an unfortunate disgrace in the family, that affects her as his relative.

Married shortly before the mentioned major conflicts with Aurors. Her marriage into the Malfoy family is seen as the Gaunts’ greatest alliance in years, one their father takes immense pride in. It won't last, though: the marriage will 'cease to exist' within a few years. She also has a son who will never have children of his own.

Side note for their names: The same "alphabetical distance" for father and kids: I-K-M-O

Property

The Gaunt Manor is large, drafty, and perpetually cold. Ominis is constantly freezing despite fireplaces (that are too small for the vast rooms), and warming charms that seem to wear off too quickly.

Noctua's house, the family's second and last property, was left to Ominis in her will. He deeply resents how his parents treat this inheritance like a tool to control him. He has no intention of living there and plans to sell it the moment he gains true independence (after graduation), using the money to start a new life (tells himself it's to not feel like a burden to anyone ever again)

Noctua-Marvolo-Ominis side note (Korentha didn't like her): Noctua was kind to all children, including Marvolo, who loved her back. Until Ominis was born. With Ominis needing protection the most, Noctua's attention shifted to him. Marvolo's jealousy soon turned into violence toward Ominis and their aunt. Their father subtly encouraged Marvolo’s behavior, leading him to think, "Daddy loves me and loves me more than them." He'd kill and maybe die for his father's approval.

Ominis at home there

Keeping Appearances

He rarely spent much time there during summers, usually staying just long enough to prepare for school: he had to buy new clothes, books, etc. He had to maintain connections to use them (like saving Sebastian from detentions).

After fifth year: For the first time since starting Hogwarts, Ominis was forced to endure an entire summer break there.

While there, Ominis is obligated to attend all the dinners and gatherings, where he must act polite and respectful to the honored guests.

He is aware that every move he makes is monitored. Sending or receiving owls while at the manor won't go unnoticed. Ominis avoids it, and his friends understand to do the same to avoid questions and more threats.

Traumas & Coping

He flinches at loud sounds and tries to hide it (by shifting his weight or clasping his hands tightly).

Doesn't allow himself tears, even when he's alone.

Keeps a countdown of how many months/days remain until he’s free of his family.

Has nighttime anxiety and sleeplessness that worsens there.

Dissociates during punishments, struggles to recall them afterward.

Has an innate ability for Occlumency, it comes from a strong instinct to protect himself and stay safe within his mind. This powerful mental resistance once injured his father when he attempted to access Ominis' thoughts.

Some of Personality & Inner Conflict

Mr sarcastic remarks.

Skilled at masking his emotions, maintaining control during conversations. However, this control can slip if his anger is repeatedly triggered. (When alone and spiraling, he may physically lash out by punching things. When it happens near someone he doesn’t feel threatened by, he raises his voice or shouts.)

He's adept at giving his father the answers the latter wants, or at least enough to deflect suspicion (works only if his father is willing to listen, of course).

Would feign indifference toward people he cares about to shield them but feels physically sick afterward for saying things he doesn’t mean.

Deep down, he feels unworthy of help, friendship, or love. These thoughts overwhelm him when he feels he’s made mistakes.

Even so, remembering the voices, presence, and touches of his friends, calms and grounds him.

Still, he clings to the idea of leaving home forever, refusing to become like the rest of his family. Noctua's voice in his memories encourages him, saying, "You’re nothing like them." He's not interested in any kind of revenge, he just wants to be free.

[irradiatedsnakes]

little billy is an existential threat to dialtown's very universe and i can prove it: a game theory

i dont trust this little beast.

prior to the roger dlc i didn't think a whole lot of him. he's fun, he's funny, the whole colossal billy bit is great. but i didn't consider him much, his greater role in the story. his whole fabron-virus deal in the roger good route got me to reconsider..basically everything about him, including stuff on the extras pages & his appearances in mingling scenes in ch3.

i think that little billy is aware of dialtown's universe/reality on a level most characters aren't, more similar to gingi and god. colossal billy, on some level, i believe is absolutely real, and has connections to the nothing beyond the edges of dt's reality. a few points, ordered from (imo) least to most substantiated:

1. billy is one of few characters that ever break the fourth wall

dialtown has a lot of fourth wall breaks. gingi, in some fashion, is aware of the various branching routes the game can take, it references other routes frequently, they're aware of the merged-ch3-timeline being weird in some sense. they're responsible for the vast majority of fourth wall breaks in the game. god, of course, does, like his UI-hijack during one of the mingling scenes. other than those two, fourth wall breaks are few and far between (i think norm does one?), so i think it's significant that billy does it at least twice.

firstly is the mingling scene where he keeps interrupting mingus from having the last word in, specifically referencing the screen fading to black:

secondly, and i think more notably (since mingus does kind of do it herself there), is in the roger route, in the ending where you swallow the usb stick and shit yourself and die. in addition to all the other ominous bullshit, there's this line:

which, yeah, end card. not much else to say there.

admittedly, i do think this is the weakest point here on its own- as mentioned before, mingus and norm do break the fourth wall on their own at some point in time, i believe once each. that being said, i do think it helps build a case for billy's awareness of dialtown's reality as we move forward to the next points, and is very relevant in the context of the rest of billy's everything.

2. god is afraid of little billy (and given who else god is afraid of, that worries me)

okay, so, god. fascinating guy. i think some of the most interesting stuff about him is what unsettles him. according to god, time in dialtown's universe works like a straight line- rather than how we might usually conceptualize the branching paths of time (or, say, branching routes in a visual novel) like a tree, time in DT is a straight line. a timeline begins, happens, ends, and another begins, happens with minute differences, and ends, so on.

god isn't omniscient, he's just a guy whose been around for an unfathomable amount of time, experiencing timeline after timeline, start to finish. he knows things that are about to happen (mingling gravel bit) because he's seen so much shit that basically everything becomes predictable.

ergo, the things that scare god are things that he can't predict, things that he doesn't understand. case in point, he finds gingi's existence as being exclusive to dt's timeline unsettling:

what else is god scared of? well, callum crown, of course.

whatever callum did to enact the dialup is something that messed with the very fabric of reality- so much so that god himself is beholden to the objecthead rule- and that "scare[s him] shitless".

yknow who else god is scared shitless of?

yeah.

3. billy is directly linked to enc0unter, plus the whole event in which he Hacked An Entire Man

firstoff, just to go over the enc0unter connections here.

most obvious is the eyes and teeth motif, and the images in the background (seen on the monitors in fabron's room and omair's shop) being THE enc0unter image, which has been said to be representative of weak spots in dialtown's (crumbling) reality. keep this passage in mind for later.

worth noting, fabron's font while possessed is special elite- the only other time in the game this font is used is in enc0unter's scene. in addition to the literal eyes and teeth images being used, the motif is reinforced in fabron's dialogue, further drawing a connection between colossal billy and enc0unter:

("many eyes always watching", notably, also being something scrawled on the side of norm's shack, presumably by norm, alongside the warning about not drinking the water (on account of the lead). "many eyes always gazing" is also one of the possible menu quotes that can appear.)

keep the big blink line in mind for later.

i think the severity of what billy was able to do with his little virus is also notable. like, and i don't think i can put enough emphasis on this, little billy hacked a man. he hijacked a human person's entire shit. he made images appear on broken monitors that weren't plugged in. he made a virus so powerful it instantly spread to every computer in town. it fucked up the radio, it fucked up the phone lines. you shouldn't just be able to do that- billy has a frightening amount of power.

3.5. a couple other scattered observations

3.5a in dietown, little billy immediately goes full eldritch. additionally, regular-timeline billy appears to be in some way aware of this, as his codename in the ransomware is xXBelothXx, little bel'oth being his name in dietown. worth noting dietown tracks are also used for the ransomware scenes.

3.5b color symbolism is extremely important in dialtown, chief among that being the use of purple (and green, but especially purple). all of the members of the mingling (save for god) have some element of purple in their designs- for most of them, that's clothing: stabby and shooty and abel all have their suits, bunny has his shirt, while theoroar has his bandana. billy's head is purple- the only one whose purple element is PART of them and not just something they're wearing. given the significance of purple in the rest of the game (glados voice) i just thought that was interesting

4. pulling it all together

so, what does this all mean?

well, dialtown's reality is in trouble. the constitution of dt's universe has been in trouble for a long time- hell, the wormhole existed even before the dialup. but i think it's safe to say that whatever fundamental rule of reality callum grabbed and fucked around with to enact the dialup in the first place has had knock-on effects for the stability of the timeline (remember that whole thing about how timelines have definitive starts and ends? yeah).

i believe billy is a symptom of this breakdown. when fabron is possessed he says "the big blink" is coming.. now, i don't know if billy is truly something From Beyond or if he's just some shithead kid who somehow got a glimpse into things people shouldn't see (i favor the latter, personally), but the way i see it.. i think what little billy calls colossal billy, is, or is closely related in some fashion to, enc0unter.

enc0unter is nothing. it's beyond the edge of the universe, all the Somethings, it's the opposite of things existing.

which, imo, is why it's represented by eyes, teeth, and faces.

when the dialup happened, eyes, teeth, faces- these things ceased to exist. they were deleted from reality, they became nothing, so that's why the nothing IS the eyes and teeth of everyone on earth, why it's eyes and teeth that appear where reality wears thin and begins to crack.

i don't know exactly what enc0unter is Doing, or what the culminating event, the bomb-under-the-table exploding, the big blink is going to actually look like. but i don't think it'll be good, and i think that billy is very interested in that eventuality.

now, billy's own personal motivations? pure malarkey. i don't think he's part of some big plan, or anything like that- his favorite activity is tormenting the cashier at the local cinema, and his big scary hackerman deal was intentionally foiled by just removing a usb stick from a computer. he sets the town on fire just for fun. little billy just wants to see the world burn for a laff, and i fear that when "the big blink" does come, that might be exactly what he gets.

thanks for reading. bozo

[transfemme-shelterdog]

I was an active participant in the ace/aro discourse on the side of aces and aros and tbh the reframing of it as “mean stinky asexys bullying trans women” is… this wasn’t history so historical revisionism isn’t right. Tumblr lore revisionism?

1. We saw multiple TERFs admit they became TERFs after becoming ace exclusionists because they found the arguments they were making for kicking asexuals and aromantics out were also arguments they could use against trans people.

2. I can think of multiple transfems who supported aces and aros. This may be a blind spot on my end, but the only transfem exclusionist I can think of was discourseprincesa who later turned out to be lying. She claimed to be an Afro-Latina Jewish intersex trans lesbian and every time someone tried to call her out from the perspective of a different marginalized group she’d suddenly reveal she had a connection there too. She was infamous for being a raging ableist who regularly suicide baited and harassed people, sometimes to the point of panic attacks and mental breakdowns, but her accidentally posting on the wrong blog where she’s honest about being a cis perisex white woman was what got every exclusionist to finally stop supporting her.

3. Wait, I almost forgot the other transfem who was an ace exclusionist. She was best known for dating the person who accused aces of stealing the color purple from bi people. Aside from those two, the majority of aphobes I saw and encountered were cis women, transmascs, trans men, and nonbinary people who either didn’t list their agab or were afab. This is not surprising when you’re on a website that is predominantly those who were afab. These demographic numbers would look a lot different if it took place on Reddit.

4. The entire ace discourse was nothing more than a site-wide bullying campaign against asexuals and aromantics, with any Ace or aro who was too open about their orientation risking getting mountains of anon hate and harassment, suicide baiting, etc., and even something as harmless as “cake and dragons” was open to receiving a slew of aphobic bullshit, to the point where aces and aros basically couldn’t have anything. We saw a lot of aces and aros go from being out and open about it to suddenly being so much quieter and hesitating if they even wanted to go to queer events at all, as they learned from years of harassment that they weren’t welcome there. Given how one post that sticks out to me is a person saying that if they saw an ace lesbian holding an ace flag at pride they’d punch her for it, I can’t say I blame them.

So, that’s all entirely from memory! I’m sure someone else can fill in additional details if they’d like.

Important history right here

[giantimp1]

This all mostly very good advice but i have some additions

Ask people who were there before

Each major and uni and even year is a bit different so if you can ask someone who was there before, preferably a year before you rather than 10. For example, while most readings are mandatory, I had a couple of courses where readings were an absolute waste of time which you couldn't afford that year

Next up and this is really important

Unionize

Nah I'm just kidding, but kinda do.

Make a group chat for the class, add everyone who you possibly can, communicate with them.

Reasons are uncountable but mainly

Learning is more fun together, you could organize study sessions and make friends more easily(connected to being friendly acquaintances with your classmates)

Learning is more effective together, even if you like to learn alone you will encounter a breaking point, and now you can ask the group chat, or other times be the one that answers

If something is fishy in the class, something doesn't seem right, the professor is trying to cram way too much material or way too much assignments, nobody understood a certain topic because they skipped teaching it entirely, the assignments are changed last minute, anything really. It's way easier to check if it's just you or the whole class

Actual good first-time college student advice:

Wear jeans/pants that “breathe” and bring a sweater, even if it’s scorching hot out, until you know which building blasts the AC to 60 degrees F and which feels like a sauna

Backpacks with thick straps are your friend!  Messenger bags are cool and all but if you’re commuting with a lot of stuff, symmetrically styled backpacks are better for your back

You are your own person and you can walk out whenever you need to or want to, so long as you’re not disrupting the class.  Meaning you can go to the bathroom without permission, take a breather if you’re anxious, answer an important phone call, etc.

If you don’t like the class on the first day, if you can- DROP THAT CLASS AND TAKE ANOTHER ONE!  It’ll only get worse from there!

If you can, take a class outside your major; it’s a good break from your expected studies.

You are in charge of your schedule.  Your adviser and guidance counselor is there to ‘advise and guide’ but if you don’t like certain classes and you can substitute for others, that’s your choice.

Consequently, if you are changing anything drastic in your plan, talk with your adviser and instructors.

Pay attention to your credit hours and grades.  Never leave this to the last week of school, you will be sorry and stressed beyond belief!

Unless it’s a lab book or otherwise specified, go to the class for a week or so before buying an expensive textbook.  Some classes, while having it on their required list, do not actually use the textbook a whole lot and you might find some of it scanned online.  Rent if you can or buy used online (schools actually don’t give discounts).  Use your best judgement on what you think you need.

Tell the people who go up to you selling or advertising things you are not interested in that you are in a rush to class and don’t have time to listen to them.  It’s less rude and they’ll leave you alone.

The smaller the class, the better it is to have some sort of acquaintanceship with a couple classmates.  They might save your ass if you are absent one day or need to study.  And talking with them makes the time go by faster without it being so insufferable.

You don’t need to join a club or sport, but internships are cool and useful!

If you can afford it, take a day off once or twice each semester if you’re too exhausted.  Just be aware of what you missed and if it was worth missing!

Your health is the most important, this goes for mental health too!!  Note: College-age/upper teens is when mental disorders like depression and anxiety are most commonly diagnosed.  Most schools have therapy services, especially during exam time.  Look into it if you need to!

Communicate with your professor if you are having trouble with something.  Anything.

Eat and stay hydrated.  Bring a water bottle and snack to class.

All-nighters will happen but never go over 36 hours without sleep.

It’s going to be hard and there will be times you might think about giving up.  This WILL happen.  You just have to make sure what you’re doing isn’t making you absolutely miserable and/or there is something rewarding and positive to look forward to at the end!

[technofeudalism]

i made a long post about how traditional media coalescing around Trump is scarier than social media for me and i included some news/media sources i recommend at the bottom. here they are (plus some additions) in a shorter post so that it is easier to share.

the objective is to build a network of local, national and global sources that you can count on. preferably completely independent and free from editorial or corporate oversight.

note: all media is flawed, including the ones below. never rely on one source. do not immediately accept something as the truth from any single source. everyone is capable of accidentally getting a detail wrong, or even deliberately misleading. the fact is that even reading something as inflammatory as Fox News can give you information you wouldn't be able to get anywhere else, the key is not to take any of it at face value.

Dropsite News - ran by Ryan Grim, Jeremy Scahill

The Intercept - sadly running out of money, alleged CIA ties

Democracy Now! - more center-left, better domestically

Jacobin - wide variety, sometimes shitty takes, Alex Press is great

The Grayzone - this one is controversial (mainly just to liberals) and they make no qualms about being committed to reporting from an anti-imperialist view of the world

Black Agenda Report - perspective from Black leftists. founded by Glen Ford (RIP), a Black Panther and accomplished investigative journalist

Hasan Piker - hate him, love him, neutral, doesn't matter. he's the largest independent political commentator on the left (by far), covering news and misinformation 9 hours a day. you can think he has shit takes, but he's still a reliable source and has been insanely accurate with his opinions

The Majority Report - been around forever, Sam Seder & Emma Vigeland are amazing, once home to the incredible Michael Jamal Brooks (RIP)

International Viewpoint - monthly English-language magazine of the Fourth International

Left Voice - socialist news site and magazine

It's Going Down - news, opinion, podcasts and reporting from an anarchist viewpoint

Sludge - investigative journalism on lobbying and money in politics

Socialist Alternative - democratic socialist news organization.

Socialist Project - Toronto-based organisation that supports the rebuilding of the socialist Left in Canada

The Progressive - leftist magazine operating since 1909

Truthdig - independent source for original reporting from a progressive viewpoint

Workers World - marxist news organization run by Workers World Party

Breakthrough News - untold stories of resistance from poor and working-class communities

Labor Notes - media and organizing project amplifying union activism

Ben Norton @ Global Political Economy

Erin Reed

Caitlin Johnstone (AUS)

do not rely on "media bias" sources like Ground News. they are part of the problem with making false equivalencies between left and right. this insightful blog post published a few days ago proves my point: "The data collected here shows that left-leaning stories tend to have far better sourcing than right-leaning ones, and are less politically polarized. The process for selecting, grouping, and summarizing these stories does not seem to take these differences into account, and there is little transparency into how that process works. This leads the platform to publish dodgy stories from the right, with the appearance that they are just as valid as high-fact reporting from the left or the center."

[fluffyglass]

Hey, remember my charts? I'VE UPDATED THE CHARTS!

As a refresher, this ^ chart is from before Lizbert disappeared

This ^ chart is after all the main quests (minus Eggabell) are completed

And this ^ chart is endgame, AKA after doing all sidequests + DLC but BEFORE Major Celebration.

Chart additions under the cut:

Patch Notes:

Added The Sentiment Indicator (that's the little colored circle in the top left) which represents a character's general feeling about another character, from most negative (red) to most positive (purple). It was added so there's an easy way to reference who feels what about who, with the text adding nuance to the relationships.

Attached to the Sentiment Indicator is the Romance Indicator. It's the little hearts dotted around. It signifies whether a relationship is (gasp) romantic, whether mutual or one sided. The yellow question mark is added when a romantic relationship is complicated or has further nuance that I don't have room to include in the chart.

Added the Interaction Bar (that's the little set of three squares in the top right) which signifies how much two characters realistically interact. A full meter means they interact a lot, an empty meter means they don't often interact. If meters are inconsistent between characters, take it as the characters "willingness" to interact with one another. A fuller meter means the character will initiate interactions more than the other.

Dead lesbians and Journalists do NOT get Interaction Bars. Because for the Journalist it's completely arbitrary, for Eggabell she only interacts with Filbo and the Journalist to begin with, and for Liz... you get the point.

As a reminder, these charts were made for the primary purpose of my own writing reference, therefore it includes a lot of my headcanons and views of these characters. While this chart is perfect for me writing my little Wigglefunny fanfictions, it may not be applicable for everyone. I just wanted to share my charts for anyone who'd like to use them as references themselves :)

[real-fire-emblem-takes]

All the Corrinsexuals in Fates drive me up the wall cuz besides like Anna and Izana, they all have so much going on and it's like, how do you not have full support chains? At least with each other?

Flora technically has one with Felicia but letting her express some of her pent up resentment that she has towards the Nohr Royals, please that'd make a really fun support with Shura or Yukimura. Also Reina grandma-moding and recognizing how important Flora and the other Fortress Fam members are to her lady's child, and now her child, kind of.

Speaking of Reina, in addition to the classic Grandparent pairing with Gunter, I want to see her dynamics with Orochi and Yukimura in more depth. Especially Yukimura because while Mikoto is a major part of both Reina and Orochi's lives, Yukimura doesn't actually seem to care about her or her desires, at least in terms of Corrin, his dialouge in Revelations is the most aggressive anyone gets in that path, and he seems the most nationalistic(?) of all the (playable) characters in Fates.

Gunter and Shura could have an interesting Support on either Shura kidnapping Azura or Gunters reputation as one of the few knights with the balls to tell Garon no.

Like my full list of extended supports would be something like

Flora- Felicia, Rinkah, Reina, Beruka, Camilla, Shura, Gunter, Silas

Gunter- Flora, Felicia, Jakob, Reina, Shura, Nyx, Xander, Silas

Shura- Flora, Gunter, Azura, Saizo, Niles, Kagero, Yukimura

Reina- Flora, Gunter, Azura, Hinoka, Orochi, Nyx, Yukimura, Takumi

Yukimura- Takumi, Reina, Shura, Ryoma, Orochi, Silas

Izana- I dunno man give him Saizo, Leo, Takumi and Beruka and see which one kills him first

Anna- Charlotte, Oboro, Selena, Hinata, and maybe Kaze

👀

[edenfenixblogs]

Oh dear.

So, for the first time since I made my additions to this post, I noticed that @the-chickenshit-oddity posted these delightful tags before 10/7.

I thought I’d check in on if they kept any interest in learning about Jewish culture and practices since then. The answer is a resounding no.

Unfortunately @the-chickenshit-oddity posted, among many other posts, this:

I want to make a plea for understanding directly to @the-chickenshit-oddity without any ill will and in total good faith. Please read what I am about to write with an open mind.

While I am annoyed to have to say this yet again, I am not a Zionist.

That said? Most Jews are. It is Holocaust inversion to call Jews Nazis, and it is incredibly callous and dangerous. Nazism’s foundational principle is that Jews are evil vermin who should be exterminated. People who support bad things can be bad in other ways without being called the worst possible thing on this planet.

Also, if the vast majority of Jews are Zionists, is your conclusion that the vast majority of Jews support killing children? Or is it more likely that your understanding of Zionism is inherently flawed and could benefit from further study.

You went really quickly from “I don’t understand the basics of what rabbis are and what they do and how Jewish communal knowledge works” to “the vast majority of Jews are not human.” That’s disturbing. Because in your own words that is what you have said here. Zionism is Nazism > Nazis are not human ergo the vast majority of Jews are not human.

The uncomfortable truth here is that Nazis were and are human. It’s comforting to divorce your own humanity from the monstrous things that Nazis did. But the thing that makes what Nazis did so horrific is that these things were done by humans. And the vast majority of Nazis weren’t the ones carrying out terrible atrocities. The vast majority of Nazis were the ones who watched as atrocities occurred and pretended not to notice. And it was those passive Nazis that gave the violent Nazis power. Dehumanization is a tool of Nazis, and it is a tool you are currently using against Jews and that is foul.

Note: nowhere in this post have I said that I support every action Israel has taken since 10/7. And I have said elsewhere that I oppose many of the actions Israel has taken since 10/7. I am a pacifist and an advocate for peace at all times. I support a thriving and sovereign Palestine. I have spent the past 15 months developing deeper relationships within my Jewish community, learning from Palestinians and Muslims, and doing my best to educate about Judaism as a culture to help reduce the amount of hatred and violence in the world.

You seem like a person who WANTS to do good and make the world better. I respect that a great deal. The things you share on you blog have not helped Palestine, but have almost exclusively harmed Jews.

I have not seen acknowledgment from your posts (perhaps I missed it and if so I apologize) that Jews were attacked and raped and murdered and taken hostage on 10/7. I have not seen any concern for the Jewish community at all from you. I have seen concern for Palestine, which I share.

But your blog gives the impression that you view Palestinians as morally pure and Israelis as incurably evil and that dehumanizes both groups.

Palestinians did terrible things to Jews on and since 10/7. Israelis have done inconceivable damage to Palestinian life since 10/7. These are both tragedies. There are human beings on both sides. Neither side of the divide is made up of inhuman monsters who don’t deserve to be heard.

I have lost the vast majority of my non-Jewish friends because—despite my never saying a word against Palestine and despite my criticism of Israel’s tactics—they started to say and do things that resembles what you post about. They stopped seeing me as a human being simply because I expressed sorrow and rage about the events of 10/7. They stopped seeing me as a human being because I refused to call for the dissolution of the state of Israel. And then they stopped seeing me altogether.

It is an unarguable fact that antisemitism has been worse worldwide since 10/7, with diaspora Jews like me facing daily aggression in online and IRL spaces. Attacks on synagogues and Jewish communities have quadrupled. Jewish girls as young as 12 have been raped and told that “this is for Palestine.” Jews have been forbidden from participating equally in pride events. Professors have refused to accept assignments from Jews that mention Israel, even when that mention is about their own family. People have been forced to change schools and move cities due to antisemitism. I am one of those people. Students have been violently attacked for wearing Jewish star necklaces on campuses. Multiple synagogues have been firebombed. People have started organizing “Jew hunts” in European cities.

It gets worse for us literally every day. And the way you post about us is a major contributing factor in those behaviors. Your words are actively harming us. Your posts are making the world less safe for us. I have done nothing but advocate for peace and nonviolence for all. Yet I have much more in common with the Zionists you vilify than I have with you. Because nothing in Zionism requires violence, and if you spoke to more Jews you would know that. I see everyone as human. Even Hamas. Even Hezbollah. Even Nazis.

You can become defensive about this if you want. But that will only protect your ego at the expense of every Jewish person suffering from antisemitic violence and isolation right now.

Or you can apologize and try to do better, which would be the correct response.

Or you could pretend you don’t see this at all, which would make you have much more in common with the Nazis you referenced than with the brave activists you aspire to be.

Or you could allow my response to make you turn violent and aggressive toward me. Which would make you more closely aligned with the other, more famous kind of Nazi you’re imagining.

And if it makes YOU feel uncomfortable to be compared to a Nazi, imagine how awful and traumatizing it is for Jews when you do it to us.

The Holocaust is not your tragedy to weaponize or universalize. Do better. The ball is in your court.

pleaaaaaase y'all the process of having a manufacturing facility declared kosher has nothing to do with a rabbi blessing the food

pleaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase stop

you can literally google what is required

[lorelune]

i quite literally dont' think ive ever worked so hard on a piece of writing in my life

[lemongogo]

college … wasted on the youth (me)

[kick-a-long]

When I was in college in Ohio I had many different science majors talk about how theology and science were additive to each other. In fact many religious people find science a kind of worship and celebration of gods work, not just Jews. Like, if someone makes you this incredible thing by hand, inventing all of it by themselves, what greater compliment can you pay them than by marveling at how it works? And how little faith do you have in them that you think tinkering with it, examining it, studying it, would break it or disprove they made it?

I took a ton of science classes and I’ll say I personally reconcile the two (when I flip flop between believing and doubting in god) is that no matter how much you learn you always find more questions than you started with. Everything relates to everything else and all these things (from equations in physics to lil peptides and chemical signals) get reused in really interesting ways. I don’t think it’s a matter of a clock maker that starts a watch and leaves, I think of it as a creation that is perfectly fine with singular negative and positive outcomes but wants a general move towards sustaining life despite allowing for and even leveraging the powerful effects of discomfort and change.

There’s mysteries like the lack of life away from earth anywhere we can see it. It’s basically the only evidence of human specialness to the universe. No one can figure out why we’re so alone. We can see pretty far away. So many systems big and small keep earth alive, that don’t exist on other planets that could have life larger than a bacteria. We should see city lights and hear or see some kind of waves. The universe should be bright and loud.

As far as a god that created everything I’m less convinced by a spark that creates life. That could be accidental and, if it’s god, a spark requires only an impulse. To make so many different things work together, share so much, adapt and evolve together without the whole thing falling apart long long ago shows deep love, commitment and care. Life should have already burned out because it’s a weird use of energy that could dissipate into a less ordered system pretty quickly. It shows real omniscient and omnipotence. I don’t know if god would still be meddling with it now, vis a vie Guadiana angels and prophecy, but the systems behind existence seem to imply human life is kind of unlikely and uncomfortable for the rules as they are.

Only someone who has no faith would be worried that studying the world would disprove a god. People should get over scriptural literalism. they might feel real euphoric celebratory faith of seeing why this place is so unlikely without some sort of exception to the universal rules for everything else.

One thing I wish more people understood is that being religious and believing in science are not mutually exclusive.

Throughout all of recorded human history, including over the course the last century, some of the most important scientific advancements came from religious people and religiously funded institutions. Often it was Jews and Muslims leading the charge of scientific progress, but despite what you might think: it was also Christians and Catholics (both separately and alongside each other).

An example of these contributions (though there are many more) is that in Medieval Europe, erroneously referred to as "the dark ages", the Church heavily funded scientific research; in fact, they were one of the only bodies in the region that had the kind of money to put into something like science on a major scale.

The idea they are two things that cannot coexist comes from the "enlightenment", and then later Victorian era, which sought to frame people in that past as inherently stupid and inferior.

More recently, a trend towards fundamentalism and anti-science rhetoric, found on the fringes of many religions, is used by antitheists to reflect poorly on religious people as a whole. The many more religious people who are able to make science syncretic with their religious beliefs just aren't deemed interesting enough to make the news or entertaining enough for a non-religious audience to challenge in debates.

Atheism is not more compatible with science than theistic belief is.

[spotaus]

Coda and Ichor! (Catacombtale Style!)

These two don't have a *ton* of interaction in the Main story, but since Ichor and Balance are the only two characters I've fully designed, Coda gets stuck next to him, haha!

BONUS art jumpscare:

These two actually exist in another project I'm working on too called Codex, which is basically just removing the UT aspects of Catacombtale and doing a lot more worldbuilding and character design!

Coda is older in Codex and is marked by an old God (which should get him jailed or killed, as it means for everyone else) but he hides it for years and years before he finally flees the complex he's living in to go confront the gods and stop their destructive path. Meanwhile Ichor is much the same, only he's much more ready and willing to help Coda without much prompting. Here he's also sort of a Koi Fish! (His brother is a Betta Fish)

[icewindandboringhorror]

Recent game related things .. hrmm...

[graham--folger]

*through gritted teeth* what the fuck do people want from a resume