#i know like a very minimal amount of actual lore for this game and have only played it once

[starch1ldz]

@warofheartz request post from a hot minute ago that's been sitting in my drafts

[quinngefail]

So apparently at 19 Lawrence got institutionalized for 6 months from a psychotic breakdown. I’m pretty sure it’s mentioned in one of the video games. Do you think he’d tell Adam about it? How you you think adam would react? (Also why do you think he even had a breakdown?) love you!!! 🩷

Omfg okay okay I haven't played either of the games yet but I intend to. I did not know about that little bit of lore, though..... But tbh it slides in so perfectly with what I've been formulating for backstory headcanons,

I haven't actually written any of this out in my Google doc yet but. I feel like rambling and just laying out the relevant parts of what I've been brainstorming for him-

Putting a cut because this got longer than I thought it would. Also- tw for talks of emotional abuse, alcoholism, and a brief sui mention- nothing super detailed, though.

So uh. I've been imagining him growing up in this wealthy, very controlling, catholic household. And even from a young age it was extremely rare for his parents to even glance at any of his problems.., One part because they were absolutely the types to guilt him with the whole "THERE ARE CHILDREN IN AFRICA STARVING AND YOU'RE SITTING HERE CRYING ABOUT SOMETHING THAT IS SO TRIVIAL" and another part because I imagine his mother was diagnosed with cancer when Lawrence was just a kid. Which was hard on everyone, of course, but this also meant less attention being put on him and his problems (ft. more guilting because you should be grateful that all you have is a scraped knee, stop crying). Basically the response to any of his struggles would very often be Stop Moping and/or Go Pray About It y’know-

Sooo even at a young age, he quickly developed this mindset that none of his problems were actually 'real', because he had it drilled into his head again and again that he was in a far more fortunate + blessed position than others. Which yeah obviously he had a great deal of privilege on his side from the get-go, but he's still allowed to express hurt and his need for love and care, y’know,

So he just starts repressing everything, holding it all inside. Internally minimizing and invalidating just about anything that made him upset. He does this for years, and years. And by the time that first year of college rolls around, he now has the most independence in his life that he's ever had, finally away from that very, very controlling household... And I very much imagine him as the type to just go off the rails almost immediately, especially in the drinking department. His grades rapidly slip, and he knows there will be hell to pay when his parents inevitably find out about all of this- but it's easier to just sit back and drink, and let his cares about everything slip away.

And of course, his parents do indeed find out. And there is indeed hell to pay. More so from his father, though, as his mother's condition has been rapidly deteriorating, which was certainly just one of the many motivators for Lawrence's drinking. And it's not long before she does pass away, which I think was a final straw of sorts for his mental health.

Between the bottles and bottles of repression he's been holding in for years, the drinking, the fact that he's fucked up so badly with college + absolutely fuckin wasted an amount of time and money, the sheer outrage and disappointment from his parents, his mother's death, and the shattering of his already shaky faith (because evidently, praying for his mother's health didn't do a goddamn thing)... It's a wonder he didn't break sooner,

So then this is where him being institutionalized just SLIDES IN SO EASILY... And I do think right before this happened, he had attempted to take his own life, unable to deal with it all. The treatment helps him back onto a straight path. And maybe he'd already been interested in the medical field, but the loss of his mother was sort of the final push towards wanting to pursue oncology specifically. So after being released, it's college take two: and it goes far better than the last time.

However, he develops this fear of losing control again. He finds comfort and necessity in order. He almost needs it to feel okay. He still has a hard time voicing and downplaying his problems, though, still feeling like they're not 'real'... This being a particular souvenir from growing up that he just can't seem to overcome.

He's also not at all surprised to get a call (in either his late 20s or early 30s) that his father had drank himself to death. Just seemed inevitable.

Then, to cut to the Becoming Closer With Adam Era, I don't imagine he has a hard time explaining that both of his parents have passed away, and why. But he has a very hard time disclosing everything else that happened. Because his problems aren't 'real', of course, and it's just an extremely touchy subject for him in general. Been imagining for a while now that he has this whole Thing where he's far more focused on helping Adam with his own problems- and y’know, part of that is just the fact that when they finally reunite in my AU, Adam is obviously deeply in need of help, because things have gotten bad for him in the months following the bathroom trap. But another part is just Lawrence still having troubles with expressing his own struggles; whether they be traumatic incidents of the past, or the more current Jigsaw related traumas.

Adam eventually catches onto this, especially as his problems become less urgent. And while he's not necessarily going to interrogate Lawrence over anything, he does begin to more frequently urge him to talk about things when he's obviously upset. Lawrence still isn't as good at masking as he thinks he is, much to his dismay. Something specific that I imagine Adam reminding him, with a earnest voice of kindness and patience, is that "this isn't just about you helping me, it's about me helping you, too."

Lawrence does eventually start to open up more about his more current struggles, but it takes a good, long while before he begins scratching the surface of that period of his life. They would be upsetting conversations for the both of them, of course, but the fact that they happen at all are just testaments to the trust they've built together. They feel safer and safer being vulnerable with one another, and it brings them closer together.

And maybe, it brings them closer and closer to things finally just feeling okay.

...WOOH If you are here, thank you for reading- didn't think I was going to ramble this much, but EVIDENTLY I HAVE MORE THOUGHTS ON THIS THAN I REALIZED LMAO..... WHEN I SAY I HAVE A SMALL NOVEL WORTH OF THOUGHTS ABOUT THESE TWO I'M NOT LYING HRKSKGK

A lot of this is also still in the brainstorming stage at this point, so things may be subject to change :] WE SHALL SEE...

And thank you for the ask, and the kind words!!! I hope you enjoy my brainrot HSKGK

[cellarspider]

Since I’ve been thinking about it all morning: here. A partial introduction to my favorite villain.

In the days of yore, when I was a teenager and video game hype was almost exclusively magazine-based, I saw a kid reading a copy of Game Informer.

“Hey,” said I, “could I see that for a second?”

The kid, not knowing what they were about to unleash, handed me the magazine.

I had seen this on the cover:

I had no idea what this was, but I knew that I wanted whatever it was selling.

I found out that this was an advertisement for City of Villains, an expansion to the previously-released MMO City of Heroes. I’d never played WoW with its Alliance and Horde split, so the idea was new to me. WoW also failed to present me with anything like the vibes of the newly-introduced lead villain, Lord Recluse.

Yes, they liked this art so much they did it twice, and I’m glad they did. More below the fold on why he was so appealing for a young queer kid, for those who are intrigued.

I’ll keep this focused on a single topic for now: The intensely queer vibes that Recluse acquired over the course of the game’s plot. Keep in mind that this game came out in 2004, so the actual amount of openly queer content was very minimal. However, CoH/CoV developed a reputation as an extremely queer-friendly space, with a community Pride event becoming a semi-official yearly celebration, complete with the devs showing up as major NPCs, custom assets, and spawning in unique raids that tanked everybody’s framerate. Equivalents of this have carried over past the game's tragic shutdown in 2012, with community-run servers still staging their own Pride events.

If the art above doesn’t make it clear, Recluse had a much-beloathèd archnemesis, Statesman. If the art above doesn’t make it abundantly clear, this was always an extremely fraught relationship, with a complicated backstory that became more and more tragic the deeper you got into the game lore, eventually bordering on cosmic horror. But one thing was for certain, this was Hark A Vagrant levels of obsession over a nemesis.

The game at first seemed to backstep on that: oh, it turned out, Recluse had once been villainous life partners with a woman who went by the villain name Red Widow. She died decades ago in the collateral damage of one of Recluse’s nigh apocalyptic confrontations with Statesman, and her death left him with nothing but his obsession. So sad.

And then when Statesman died in the course of the game’s plot, Recluse spiraled into depression and nihilism that was only halted when someone managed to dig Red Widow’s soul out of storage and resurrected her.

It was always deniably presented, but the implication was very much that the two were functionally equivalent emotional anchors to his psyche, and losing both of them was something he couldn’t survive.

Also, there was that one time that the game’s Valentine’s Day event was advertised with a heart split down the middle, half Statesman’s iconography and half Recluse’s, topped with a banner that read “AMOR OMNIA VINCIT”, meaning “LOVE CONQUERS ALL”.

And that’s without getting into the first tie-in book. A prequel starting at the end of the 1920s, it was a delightfully and deliberately pulpy book, which… centered around a complicated man slowly dying of lingering health problems after his exposure to mustard gas in WWI, and his very good friend, estranged from his family for unknown reasons, who’d devoted the last ten years to caring for the protagonist, and helping him seek a cure. This has carried on year after year, even though the man’s illness has made him unresponsive to the emotional needs of others, something they both know is going to culminate one day in the two parting ways.

…And then they get superpowers, and their relationship does not get any healthier from there. But what it does gain is a surprising trans metaphor as our now-antagonist slowly metamorphoses into the spidery villain I know and love.

I completely missed this back in the day. I have no idea if it was intentional. But there’s a scene where this man looks in the mirror and sees the first signs of his oncoming physical transformation, and he likes what he sees. He has no idea where he’s going, but he’s excited for it.

…And he’s started killing people who refer to him by his former name, in the most literal case of “dead naming” I’ve ever seen.

Throughout the rest of the series, Recluse is unapologetically who he is, putting him in that category of queercoded villain that doubles as a power fantasy. He’s grown physically monstrous and loves it. He has respect from everyone around him, either legitimately for his capabilities or out of fear of what he can do to those who don’t give him his due. A new demigod who is only matched by the man he’s never stopped obsessing over. He wins just as often as he loses, and often salvages something from his defeats in ways that nobody expected.

He is terrible. And he is wonderful.

[rpgchoices]

Dark Urge fixed some of the problems I had with act 3

This post has SPOILERS. BIG SPOILERS for both Baldur's Gate 3 and Dark Urge. If you check my tag dark urge I previously wrote an act 1 + act 2 summary of what to expect from it, without any spoilers. Without spoilers, very briefly: expect to have a past you cannot control (of course), your character will say some messed up stuff, you can give in the urges or resist but there are at least two scenes you have no control over, you do get loot for giving in the urges, the story has more mystery and lore, act 3 is the culmination of Dark Urge story too and you can have a happy ending.

Now with SPOILERS

I will go over the acts and write down what extra content happens when you compare Dark Urge to Tav, with BIG SPOILERS. If you want to see why I think Dark Urge is so much better for the story, skip everything and go directly to act 3. A general big change is that as Dark Urge you automatically get the "Baldurian" dialogue because you are from Baldur's Gate.

Act 1: In act 1 there is little Dark Urge content but an introduction. I kind of wish the game had just gone with DU (Dark Urge) instead of Tav directly, to hide the secret better, but I also like Tav a lot and I don't always want to play as an ex-murderer. Still, if you roleplay well the idea is that DU has these violent urges and think they are caused by the tadpole. So you will have to ask your companions about it, and the suspicion remains for half of act 1, at least until you give in the first obligatory urge. The narration oftens tells you that DU wants blood and carnage, wants to feel life slipping away and, well, wants to murder, and you can give in these urges (ex. attack people, bite someone's toe off, kill Gale?? or at least cut his hands) or avoid these urges. Everything else is exactly the same, a part from the fact that DU has a REASON for being on the Nautilus. While Tav is just one of the random people the Nautilus has taken, DU is the one who was put there on purpose.

There are two big events in act 1 and some smaller ones. You can kill a squirrel, but it did not trigger for me, so I don't think it is an obligatory event, but you will kill a bard. Alfira will come to your camp after you sleep a n amount of nights, and she will want to join your party. This happens even if you had not met Alfira in the game. During the night DU will brutally kill her and at this point you can hide the body, or confess your crimes, up to you how open with them. I always chose the option to confess. If you confess immediately you will have a group chat with your party and you can defend yourself (ex. I don't know how it happened but I must have been the one who killed her), or you can wash the blood and then volunteer the information the next morning when the body is found. There is actually a metagaming way to save Alfira… when you get the night scene, reload to the save before, go to Alfira, use the incapacitate instead of the killing option (in actions) and knock her out. Because she is knocked out, the next night a new bard NPC will come to your camp and will be murdered, but not Alfira.

After the murder you will meet the butler. It is immediately clear this is a magical being, and he knows you. He knows DU likes to kill, and he is surprised if DU refuses to give in the urges or even feels guilty for what he had done. You will also get an amazing cloak that turns a character invisible after a kill (it is great for Astarion's sneak attacks).

For the rest of act 1 there is little more content. You can talk minimally with your party about what happened or your urges, but that is it.

ACT 2: In the underdark and during the mountain pass there is no real content, but stuff starts happening at Moonrise Tower. You will meet characters who suddenly knows who you are. They are pretty cryptic about it, but they talk to you as if you were one of them who suddenly disappeared. It really feels like coming, well, almost home. Ketheric remembers you, even the jailer remembers you. There is also a cat in Moonrise Tower who is scared of you and if you talk with them DU WILL kill the cat, so be mindful to avoid talking with cats in the Tower. The skeleton dog from Ketheric room? He also remembers you and your smell.

When you put your hand in the cracks of the wall and hear the brain you will also get new and different dialogue.

After you meet Isobel, you will see your butler again and he tells you that to have a real gif this time you will have to kill Isobel. The quest will be there but you do not need to complete it. If you do not complete it, the butler will come back at night after the Moonrise Tower fight. This is where he asks you to kill your lover (in my case it was Astarion). He tries to convince you and if you say no, this is also where you find out that you cannot really control the urge - you will have to pass a wisdom check to take enough control to wake up your lover and tell them what is happening. At this point, they will tie you up because you are not in control anymore. You can pass 3 wisdom checks to try and thank them, or you can give in the urge but it does not look like there is any difference here but dialogue. The next morning you will have an extra talk with your lover and the party as well.

At this point it looks like the butler abandoned you because you failed your Dark Urge quest.

Another small thing, while under Moonrise Tower you can explore a bit and you will find one of the pod that smells like your blood and other small traces and hints to the fact that someone wanted to get rid of you and that is why you ended up on the nautilus.

Act 3: Act 3 is where most of the stuff gets resolved and things really come together. Orin targets you because you are family, you are her brother. She hates you because you were the Bhaal chosen one. My favourite part is that this really explains why the Chosen three's plan is failing. You were supposed to be Bhaal's chosen, not Orin. Multiple characters (Gortash and Sarevok) comments on how you were such a better Chosen because Orin is fickle, that is why she turns against Gortash. Gortash and Orin against each other always confused me during my Tav game, mainly because it felt so unexplained - like, they were so close to their goal, why is everything crumbling? Because she was never supposed to assume that role. She grew jealous of DU, chosen of Bhaal, and got rid of him by inserting the tadpole in his brain and discarding him.

When you talk with Gortash you also gets even more insight. It is clear that Gortash likes you, that is why is asking for an alliance. Not to a random adventurer called Tav, but to his old ally and friend. You and Gortash basically devised the whole plan, YOU took the crown, you were a fundamental part of it. And suddenly you stopping it (or taking control of the brain) for me had so much more meaning. While playing Tav I always wondered why is Tav even in charge, but when I played DU it really seemed like this was THEIR mess to fix. The confrontation at the temple of Bhaal is the end of the DU storyline which also wraps up why Withers was even with you.

You confront Orin and after you kill her you will meet your father Bhaal, who will ask you to become his chosen again. You can agree, and then at the end you will be able to claim the brain in Bhaal's name. But if you refuse, and give in the guilt for having murdered so many people (before your amnesia), Bhaal will take back his blood and leave you dead on the ground. At this point Withers will come in (and we know Withers is Jergal, the god of death before the Three) and will revive you. You will be born anew, your past is lost because the urge in you had been taken away but the memories with it. You can ask him about those memories too and he says that he can show you the names of your victims if you so desire. You are also a blank slate, a new person born from what you have learnt in your journey instead of your past. So yeah, you can have a good hopeful ending.

More importantly, this fell so well in the themes of BG3 especially the ones of being born again, changing and gods fighting for their chosen. Like Selune and Shar were fighting for Shadowheart, your character was also in the middle of a play of gods. Given Withers was with you since the start, it really feels like he was aiding you not at random, but because you were an escaped chosen one who could be stolen from Bhaal. And being born again and getting rid of your master/tormentor/powerful god/dictator fits so well. ALL your origin companions are in a certain measure subjected to absence of freedom or imbalance of power.

(Also before the Bhaal mission, but after the lover's personal quest you will have the option to break up with them and worry about the danger of killing them, which gives you an extra cute scene).

After the Bhaal mission there is no more content for DU and everything else seemed the same!

[antisocialxconstruct]

You already made me play shadowrun, convince me to play elden ring as well 👀

oh HMMMM an interesting challenge :o

In one sense it might be an easier sell to you personally, I know you're more into fantasy than scifi to begin with and Elden Ring is definitely a familiar "swords and dragons and magic" kind of setting, albeit with the gothic and eldritch sensibilities you'd expect from FromSoftware. In my opinion this is a major selling point, it feels distinctly high fantasy without just feeling like, y’know, Skyrim But Harder. (And considering I'M someone who's definitely way more into scifi than fantasy, I feel like it's noteworthy that I was still really compelled by the setting.)

The infamous Soulsborne Difficulty is obviously the big sticking point for most people. I can't confidently compare it to other Fromsoft games, but I can say that as someone who doesn't have a ton of experience with soulslikes and generally doesn't think of them as a genre I'd actively seek out, I DID eventually get extremely comfortable with Elden Ring. It can be challenging if it's not a gameplay style you're familiar with, but especially early on you have a lot of opportunities to experiment and mess up long before mistakes start feeling really costly, so it's a good time to try a lot of things. Look up guides, read the wiki, skim some recommended builds... that way if you realize you picked a starting class that doesn't have optimal stats for the skills and weapons you want to use, you can reroll early (unlike me, suffering with a steep faith handicap despite it being like the second or third most important stat for my build =_=) Also, just approach the game with the knowledge that you WILL die and you WILL have to try things more than once, especially if you're not well versed in the genre. I feel like it's much easier to have fun with this kind of game if you approach the challenging fights as earnest attempts and experiments to build a strategy on, rather than "failures" that just mean you have to Do Better. And of course, if something is just too hard to be fun... you can go somewhere else 🤷 hardcore fans might be horrified by my approach but often I would drop one thing that was too hard and wander off somewhere else, get caught up in some other quest line or dungeon or something, and come back to the first challenge so long later that I would be comically overleveled and just get the satisfaction of steamrolling it.

The equally infamous Oblique Soulsborne Storytelling is probably the OTHER major sticking point, and on that I have to say... it is extremely oblique lmao I think @axperjan got way more out of the lore than I did because they actually stopped to read item descriptions and such, so I guess my advice there would be take the time to read item descriptions if you want to know who the fuck everyone is and what they've been up to. But even with the minimal amount of lore I was actually absorbing, I still felt like I was absorbing the ~vibes~ and a lot of the time, that was enough for me to feel like I understood the kinds of struggles and conflicts I was dealing with and how I was meant to feel about them. I got very invested emotionally in several specific characters, and actively want to play the game again in order to absorb more about others and understand them better. Overall I really enjoy the tone of Elden Ring's narrative: there's an unavoidable sickness and despair to the world you're exploring, but an equally clear and distinct note of hope and optimism, a feeling that everything is on the brink of a dramatic change and an earnest desire for that change to be for the better, even if the cost is high.

The game's soundtrack and art direction are beautiful, and MOST of the combat encounters (especially boss fights) feel elegant and satisfyingly structured, so even if you never engaged with the story or lore even a little bit you would get the pleasure of playing through an expansive and competent work of art. There are definitely some recycled maps and enemies that can feel a bit tedious after the first couple times, and some sequences that feel just a little too mean-spirited to be fair, but maybe that's a bit inevitable and in my experience even the ones that made me rage-quit for a night were never enough to sour my opinion of the game as a whole.

I think Elden Ring is a great soulsborne game for people who WANT to like the soulsborne genre but are intimidated by its reputation. It's not so much "easier" that it feels like a disingenuous introduction, but it allows you to be a little more patient and go at your own pace long enough to understand what the genre is actually asking of you and start engaging with it on its own terms. I'm only two boss fights away from finishing the core game and I'm excited for the dlc, which is further than I've ever gotten and more time than I've ever invested in any other soulsborne/soulslike.

Also you get a cool goat-horse and you can feed him snacks while you're riding around 🐐

[illarian-rambling]

Can I request niche changeling lore for the Q&A game? I’ve already read the post you made on them but if there’s anything else I’d love to hear it :)

Sure thing! I'll just toss out some tidbit fun facts :)

What will and won't kill a changeling varies wildly. They're basically like if a water balloon was sentient, so they're very bendy and can take about any amount of bludgeoning damage with minimal injury. If they get cut though, that's when things get rough, because the downside to being basically a sentient water balloon is that you bleed out fast. The only way to stabilize a bleeding changeling is to get them hydration faster than they can bleed out. Sterile water does the job well enough - just put one of their hands in and they can absorb it. Diseases are also rough for changelings since medicines designed for humans or elves rarely work on them. Again, water being very important to their biology, changelings are very susceptible to dehydration.

Changeling concepts of gender are predictably all over the place. Many, like Elsind, use the pronouns of whatever form they're wearing while defaulting to whatever they're most comfortable with while in their true form. Other changelings hold one gender identity no matter what, while others still think it's all nonsense anyways and don't care one way or another.

The largest changeling community is in Nace. Lucky Lin Han is the husband of the Veiled Queen, leader of the Veiled Fleet, which serves as the main competitor to the Tunnel Wasp smuggling ring. Lucky is also a changeling. Through his wife's targeting of slave ships, Lucky has been able to rescue many changelings that would've otherwise been sold into bondage. Some leave, however, many other rescued changelings stay with the Veiled Fleet either as sailors or clerks. Oftentimes, this is many of the rescued changelings' first encounter with others of their kind, so they're tempted to stay for that alone. I'd say the Veiled Fleet is made up of a solid 15% changelings, and they frequently spend time together as a community, with Lucky acting as their de facto leader.

When changelings get old, they have a harder time keeping up a disguise. A changeling lifespan is around 200 years (so shorter than and elf, but longer than a human). It's very rare for changelings who grew up in isolation to know their own lifespan.

If a changeling wants to reproduce asexually, they must first ingest some specialized salts on the regular to prepare the body. Then, after about a year of this, they'll be able to create a sort of soft sphere resembling a frog's egg via budding. The sphere must be kept moist, but not too wet, until it develops into a baby changeling in a matter of weeks. It'll take about a year until the baby is able to keep consistent solid form. After that, they mature at about the same rate as human children. Most changelings can't hold a face with any skill until after puberty, though there are some prodigies out there.

It seems to be an inborn trait that changelings find all faces beautiful. You'll find every face from the most scarred and wrinkled to the most perfectly symmetrical in their art. Indeed, many famous portrait painters across Illari history were changelings in disguise. They just seem to find a beauty there that the human eye can't detect.

Not that they'd have any metric for it, but Elsind is actually sort of a prodigy when it comes to taking on faces. Even though they grew up around only elves, they can assume a human or dwarven face convincingly and with ease. They're naturally good at picking up mannerisms and mimicking voices. Also, they can hold a face decently well in moments of pain or stress, past the point where many changelings wouldn't have been able to keep up the mask anymore. So, good on you, Elsind!

Can you tell by now that I love to infodump about these guys lol? Thanks for the ask!

[connectionxterminated]

So, if I may take the liberty of refreshing your memory, in my AU, instead of Light and Dusk being in the same position as the player, it’s the Entity, who was, in a way, their predecessor in an ancient cycle created by Light and Dusk in the desperate attempts to replace the being that created them (and possibly also the Valley), whom they accidentally caused the death of an immeasurable amount of time ago. The game would have multiple endings:

- The One Of Us Ending would be the game’s bad ending. In it, the player does not deviate at all from the path set by Light and Dusk and has extremely minimal interactions with the Entity, leading to them not learning any of their companions’ story. Therefore, Light and Dusk would ultimately convince the player that the Entity is the enemy holding the Valley in its static state, and the final boss battle would be against him. The player can win or lose this battle; winning results in a cutscene in which the player takes the Entity’s power and continues the cycle, but both outcomes end on a black screen with the text ‘At least one of us could be free.’

- The Cyclebreaker Ending is the game’s ‘neutral’ ending. In it, the player sees some of the companions’ story, just enough to know the Cycle exists, in which case the option to ‘break the cycle’ appears just before the confrontation with the Entity (completing the One Of Us Ending at least once will cause this option to appear automatically on all subsequent playthroughs). Upon pressing this option, instead of backstabbing the Entity, the player uses their weapon to break the chains binding him to the cycle, initiating a boss battle against Light and Dusk with the Entity as your ally. Upon defeating Light and Dusk, the Entity thanks the player for breaking the cycle, tell them he’ll take care of the Valley for now and sends them home to their original world, while cryptically implying that, if they were ever to come back and look really closely, perhaps they could give everyone the ending that was truly meant for them…

- The game’s true, good ending is the Constellation Ending. It can be accomplished by exploring as much of the game as possible and collecting a series of hidden items relating to Light and Dusk’s past. When the ‘break the cycle’ option is selected with all of these items collected, final battle against Light and Dusk does initiate like normal, but instead of attacking the player is able to use each of the hidden items and convince Light and Dusk that it’ll be better not only for everyone else, but for them as well to stop living in the past and to move on with their lives (the Entity also refuses to attack in this ending and will focus on supporting the player instead). The game ends with a montage of the player, the Entity, Light and Dusk taking care of the Valley together and repairing the damage caused by the cycle.

WAHAHHGG YES YES YES I STILL LOVE ALL OF THIS SO SO SO MUCH. its actually kind of funny because for a while my brain kept relating this exact au of yours to the canon storyline, I kept going: 'nono. isn't the entity trapped in the cycle??' and I kept mixing my lore up with yours so for a while that's how it went, and then when I looked back at the canon storyline I had a sense of deja-vu where I was all like: 'hold on. wait a minute.' but I just, augh, your whole au of this still holds a near and dear special place in my heart so so much, I care it, very, very much!!! its so important!!!!/gen

[umbramatic]

Trust The Fungus

This is a review ramble thing of The Super Mario Bros Movie (the 2023 one, not the one from 30 years earlier the title is joking about, but more on the 1993 one later). There will be spoilers.

(You will see me using the word "cringe" a lot in this. Disclaimer: I do not actually believe in cringe culture at all in the slightest in ANY form, it's just a useful shorthand for a special sort of deep revulsion within the soul. Anyway.)

So like, we all went into this expecting cringe because Illumination, right? The animation studio that peaked with their FIRST MOVIE, Despicable Me, and has put the low in lowbrow ever since. The animation studio who actively animates on the cheap for profit margins. Those guys. 

But I, to start, want to report there are minimal amounts of cringe! Sure, "look at us, we're adorable" was cringe in the trailers and it's cringe here. Sure Mario hating mushrooms was a specific flavor (mushroom flavored?) of unnecessarily ironic that made me roll my eyes a bit even when the REST of the unnecessarily ironic humor didn't. But overall, it was good! Honestly I genuinely liked this movie a lot! 

You probably haven't heard of Monster Hunter: Legends Of The Guild, a low-budget animated Monster Hunter movie Capcom quietly pushed to Netflix when the live-action one turned out to be shit. I always thought that one wasn't that great as a movie on its own but unlike the live action one was fantastic at actually being a MONSTER HUNTER movie - sort of an inverse of the Dark Knight Trilogy's modern "good movie bad Batman movie" reputation. This one is honestly quite similar, even though I at least personally think it stands on its own better than Monster Hunter: Legends Of The Guild does. 

A large part of this is one of the movie's biggest strengths: the fanservice. And no I don't mean "Princess Peach in a bikini" fanservice. I mean THE LORE. There is soooooo much Mario lore here, and Nintendo homages, and different characters popping up left and right. 

Every time I saw a reference or cameo I, like many, was like

And that in a way being the main draw over the plot and characters WOULD be kind of a bad thing but it's just so much fun and there's so many of them I don't care. On a related note everything's so on brand, it again genuinely feels like a MARIO movie. We all know Nintendo's kind of the Disney Lite of the video game world in terms of being overly controlling - lost ROM sites and fan projects and such sure are testament to that huh - but here it kind of worked in their favor because they very obviously kept Illumination in line. You can bet your bottom dollar that Shigeru Miyamoto poured over every frame of this movie and if there was something he didn't like it got the Paper Mario treatment. 

Granted, we do start the movie with the Mario Bros living in real-world (if Nintendofied) Brooklyn, a take Nintendo is still apparently okay with despite Odyssey kinda sorta retconning it, and we see the Mario Bros having JOBS and a (a VERY Italian American, can confirm) FAMILY and it all feels akin to my gender and body dysphoria (Charles Martinet is Mario's dad though, that's really cute) but also it makes sense for the story they're trying to tell and it doesn't last long. 

I should talk about the cast. I was pretty chill with how everyone did. Sure they shouldn't have been stuntcasted this fucking hard in the first place. Sure Fred Armisen as Cranky Kong took some growing on me. Sure I have noted Sociopolitical Problems with Crisp Rat and they should have cast literally anyone who is less Problematic(tm). Burt everyone did fine for what they were. 

(Also say what you will about the Ironic(tm) humor, despite that kind of stuff Mario and Luigi's relationship feels real and genuine and I am here for it. I'm normally not THAT into same-gender sibling relations because that's not what I grew up with and NOW the gender situation is complicated but c'mon, they were cute.)

Also Jack Black got to sing. That alone made this movie worth seeing for me. The music was SUPER good when it's stuff like Bowser's singing and the cool remixed Mario tracks. The licensed music was a lot less necessary and in one case apparently replaced a perfectly good Donkey Kong remix  and almost all of it could have been cut... Aside from the I Need A Hero sequence, that was inspired. 

Speaking of Bowser. I like that they basically nudge nudge hint hint at Mario and Peach being an item but never actually do anything about it (just like the games!) whereas Bowser is UNDENIABLY horny on main for Peach and sees Mario as competition (also just like the games!) . Speaking of the references, they even use Bowser and Peach's Odyssey wedding outfits, which is cute. 

(Also can we make Girlboss Peach game canon please?)

This movie does have a sense of... "This world operates on video game logic. We will try to explain it but we will not JUSTIFY it" and I think that's neat. At first I thought that was a factor as to why this movie was less popular with critics than fans, but I went with my mostly non-gamer family (more on them later) and not only could they follow it fine, my mom told me after the movie she understood video games and video game logic BETTER after seeing this movie so I dunno. 

I will say. For a movie that is trying to distance itself from and replace the 1993 one as much as possible there are a lot of funny parallels. The Brooklyn origins leading to a secret portal beneath the city, Bowser's minions trying to isolate and strand our heroes, having One Toad In Particular help our heroes, the funky ass cars/karts, the princess of choice being more serious and also an isekai victim, the final fight being taken BACK to Brooklyn...  It's amusing. 

But overall I had fun. I want to see it again. I went to see it with my family and they enjoyed it too. Though if I had a nickel for every time a video game movie I saw on my birthday with my family that had a wedding scene that gets memed on by said family due to an upcoming wedding in said family I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot but it's weird it happened twice. Damn. Now I want Hollywood movies for every major Nintendo franchise that hasn't gotten one. And by "major" I mean "important enough to get into Smash". ROB and Game And Watch movies when? (More seriously I want Zelda and Fire Emblem and full-length Pikmin movies. God please.)

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hiya! Love your analyses and writing! I’m watching playthroughs of twst since it’s not available in my country, but reading through your analysis of the manga… do you think people like me would find more enjoyment in waiting for the manga to come out? I think you’ve said before (or someone else), that there’s more content regarding the house wardens backstories (or more nuance and portrayal of Riddle’s past). I can see lots of flaws in game (from the play though), but the way you showed us how much character is portrayed through the manga… I don’t know, maybe twst is better served through a different medium than the game?

Hahahah, I’m actually trying to write my own yuusona into getting isekaid into twst and I already know trying to adapt chapter 2 is going to take a lot of effort because it is by far my least favorite of all the chapters, that’s why I’m asking.

Thank you so much for your insight and I hope that you have a wonderful day!

[Referencing this post, this post, and this post!]

Hello, hello ^^ Thank you for enjoying my works~

I think each medium that Twisted Wonderland comes in has its own unique strengths and differences. I know that I’ve talked about how the manga excels at visual storytelling and conveying character without the same amount of dialogue as the game, but I wouldn’t necessarily say that the manga would provide more enjoyment than the game (though is it slightly more accessible) or that the manga is “better” than the game.

It’s true that we’re able to go into a little more detail about Riddle’s past, but I’d say it’s namely in new visual elements (like actually being able to see kid!Riddle, Chenya, and Trey, as well as a general idea of what Mama Rosehearts looks like; these are just silouhettes in the game). The manga does not provide any significant new information that the game lacks; the dialogue itself is largely the same. The manga is predominantly a lot of new visual information. I’d like to also add that the manga has the benefit of coming out after the game, so people already know what to anticipate from it, and thus are already primed to like or dislike the manga based on how well they received the same plot in the game.

There is a lot of content that the game has that the manga will not cover, such as event stories, vignettes, and homescreen lines, all of which serve to enhance the world and give more lore on each character. That alone is worth keeping up with the game’s content too!

Another thing to make note of is that the manga releases one chapter every other month (not counting for unforeseen or planned hiatuses and breaks), and we’ve only just started on Savanaclaw. With each subsequent episode getting longer and longer, it’s going to take literal years and years to catch up to TWST’s main story in the manga adaptation.

The manga also has a weird quirk where the protagonist seems to change every episode; if you get too invested in a certain Yuu, know that they won’t ever get a full character arc/they won’t be sticking with you until the final episode (Diasomnia). It’s not very good for those wanting a more consistent protagonist to follow.

I would say the manga also isn’t for people who prefer a medium that is more interactive or allows for more self-projection; the game is better for this, as though Yuu’s involvement is minimal, it does allow for players to imagine themselves doing basically whatever in the world of TWST. Of course, the game itself isn’t perfect and has its flaws. It’s definitely not a style of game for everyone.

Ultimately, whether you consume the game only, the manga only, or both… that’s up to you. You know yourself and your tastes the best, not me. I hope that you find my advice helpful and that you can make your own informed decision with it! ^^

[adelle-ein]

lace's xenoblade 3 review/thoughts

So I finished Xenoblade 3's main story. I'm far from done with the game, but I did all the main character side stories and a lot of side quests, and I do have all the heroes. Most of them aren't ascended yet, and I have many other misc sidequests and places to explore on my list, but I'm going to be doing that here on out while enjoying the post game perks.

Overall it was really good despite some glaring issues. Spoilers, obviously!

Just to make thing clear: I have only played Xenoblade 1. 2's character designs, weird-ass grooming love triangle, treatment of women, fanservice, and obsession with sex and dirty jokes are such massive turn-offs that I refuse to pay money for it. If someone would like to give me a copy of 2 as well as the money for its allegedly amazing DLC then I'll play it, but that's literally the only circumstances I can see that happening in. Also, to be totally honest, the fandom tendency to bully and harass people who don't like 2 has ruined any interest I might have otherwise had. I am generally familiar with 2's lore and how it connects to 1, though, having read up on it while deciding whether to play 2 and in advance of playing 3 -  no expert, but I do know stuff.

My biggest issues with Xenoblade 1 were that a) it didn't seem to like its main cast very much and b) it absolutely hated women to a frankly comedic extent. 1 literally is just The Shulk Game, periodically featuring Melia and Dunban. Every significant scene, major moment, iconic line, act of bravery comes from Shulk. Every characters' thoughts, feelings, and motivations revolve entirely around Shulk. Every woman revolves around her love interest (who, uh, is generally Shulk.) Reyn effectively vanishes by midgame, Sharla really served no purpose in the plot whatsoever and was largely there to be a love triangle point, Dunban is pretty much just a mentor, and while Melia gets a lot of plot focus and characterization, it ultimately amounts to a lot of suffering and minimal payoff (slightly rectified in Future Connected.) But it could be worse - Fiora, despite all her setup as Shulk's foil, despite her arc setup about disability and mortality and a literal god in her chest, is nothing more than a love interest, who has no motivation beyond being at his side, who at the pivotal motivation-stating moment has nothing more to say than "Shulk!" And of course there's also Riki, who is literally just a comic relief character and is unceremoniously written out of the game every time a cutscene gets emotional or plot-significant (only to reappear shortly after asking for food at inappropriate moments.) If it weren't for the Heart-to-Heart unvoiced text convos — which take for-fucking-ever to unlock — that would literally be all there is to these characters, and even within the Heart-to-Hearts, there isn't that much to go on. Ultimately, I enjoyed 1 a lot more for its gameplay and potential than anything else. To me, a story that doesn't care about its characters is pretty much never an enjoyable one.

Long story short, Xenoblade and I have a tenuous relationship. I pretty much exclusively play turn-based games due to a variety of disabilities. Xenoblade's combat, however, is forgiving enough on easy mode that I can get by thanks to auto-attacks and not relying on button mashing, so it's pretty much the only one of its kind that I've ever played. I'm including all this context to make it clear going in that I do not consider myself a Xenoblade fan, or hardcore player, by any stretch of the imagination.

My point here is that 3 absolutely blew me out of the water. 3 loves its characters. It adores its characters. It wants the absolute best for its characters. Which, uh…is sometimes an impediment, but most of the time it's great. Every cast member actually plays a role, gets an arc, gets backstory and development, and most importantly of all, they maintain a consistent web of friendships that have nothing to do with Noah. Every duo of characters gets some kind of cute interaction once in awhile, even combos like Eunie and Mio that don't hang out much, and it not only makes things feel organic, it prevents both love-interest-trap and the Shulk Obsession effects that 1 suffered from. Everyone gets a side story, everyone gets big boss fights, everyone gets a big piece of the screentime pie even though Noah is the main focus, and it's the high point of the game. The characters are all, genuinely, really good — Eunie and Taion are far and away my favorites (duh…) but they all overall feel well fleshed out and well loved. Noah definitely gets preachy towards the end, but he doesn't get every single good one-liner the way Shulk did.

Sena, unfortunately, is the only real exception to this rule. The poor girl starts and ends the game as Mio's cute accessory that she sometimes lends to Lanz. While she still gets way more character work than, say, Sharla, and isn't reduced to a love interest, her ascension quest has absolutely nothing to do with her and her "development" makes  no impact on her behavior for the rest of the game. Taion changes visibly as a person after the events at Colony Lambda, but while Sena says a few things about being true to herself, every subsequent story scene still has her using her perky, happy-go-lucky persona and being Mio's hype girl. The writers clearly had an idea in mind for her, but really fell down in executing it. This shines in Mio's side story — apparently Miyabi also saved Sena before her death, and yet Sena has never really seemed affected by this the way Mio is. It's never even mentioned before this side story that Sena had any involvement in Colony Omega. I have no idea what went wrong with writing Sena, but it's pretty sad, honestly. All that being said, it's really not THAT bad — it just sticks out compared to how the other five are treated. More of a "five great, one mediocre" type situation, you know?

Honestly, gameplay is great. The combat is insanely confusing and overcomplicated and everyone is yelling constantly but like. That's a given. Xenoblade. If I hadn't played 1 I probably would have just had no idea what to do, but I was able to fumble through despite getting bombarded with "tips" such as "Celestial Arts are special Arts triggered by filling up the Star Gauge and properly timing your Moon Attacks. By triggering a Punch -> Fly -> Burst -> Shine combo, you can turn off the enemy's Rage Meter and Shatter them, thereby executing a Shattershimmer attack. Try it for yourself! Also half those moves don't actually work on most bosses, but we won't tell you that." That gives you an idea of how every single "helpful tip" that pops up in Xenoblade feels to me. Again, though — a lot of this is on me. I don't have the processing skills or memory to be Good At Xenoblade, and easy mode negates the need to know most of this anyway, but man is it silly sometimes. I have some nitpicks about smaller stuff, like how the class unlock system works (luckily the postgame options render this effectively obsolete, whee!) and steering the boats (sound of me getting stuck on a stray monster and crashing sideways into an island.) But the exploration is so much fun and the sidequests are a lot more engaging than 1, and that's what really matters to me in Xenoblade gameplay.

Plotwise, things really do just drop off after the chapter 6 opening. Everyone said so and I was skeptical. I am no longer skeptical. Not sure the writers had any idea what they were doing beyond that point. It's not as bad as some (TEAM ASANO) but it sort of feels like they might have run out of time a little — the last dungeon really just feels like padding, X and Y don't even get death cutscenes, and Z feels unfinished. The basic concept of Z being the personification of everyone's fear and inertia works really well, but — and I can't believe I'm saying this — it wasn't as well executed as the similar final boss in Persona 5. Just not enough time spent on Origin and what its whole deal is, and things stayed a bit too Noah-centric at the end for my tastes. Also that final boss needed to have skip options in the cutscenes, if I hadn't cleared it my first try I would have cried from sheer fatigue lol. I also think the "side stories" are pretty meh, with only Taion's and Lanz's really working for me — I actually quite liked Sena's, but it isn't remotely about Sena and really should have been just a Ghondor quest. Eunie's felt purposeless, Mio's just absolutely destroyed the very concept of death in the entire game, and Noah's was…terrible.

And this brings me to my biggest plot complaint: death has become absolutely meaningless. The rebirth thing, I could get behind. The execution of Taion's side story, for example — while Nimue is drawn to and admires Taion for the same qualities that led to her past self mentoring him, she never regains her memories, and things will never actually be the same again. But that's okay, because she gets to live her own new life now. That can work for me. I can get behind that. Similarly, Eunie found her old husk and remembered her previous death, but she doesn't gain all the life experience and memories of that version or anything, just lives with the burden of a trauma she didn't experience. Moebius recruits gain memories of all their past lives, but they also become evil and warped under the weight of repeated bitterness and loss. All of these approaches worked. Not perfectly, but they worked for me. And then Miyabi shows up and just ruins everything. She's the age she was when she died, she retains all of her memories, she's exactly as she was. She might as well have never died at all. So…what's the point? That sacrifice that shaped Mio's life and outlook — it was pointless, in the end. Miyabi gave nothing up to save Mio (and Sena.) So it wasn't even a sacrifice. These aren't as bad but: Why is goddamn MWAMBA back, that's the silliest thing in the world, he's the Tutorial Party Member and those should never come back (unless you do something cool a la Fiora, and that sure wasn't the case with him.) His Agnus equivalent from Mio's squad whose name I don't even know is back. Cammuravi is back, and while he seems to be retaining his amnesia, he acts exactly the same, he's back to his previous age, and he's ~naturally drawn~ to Ethel (which…their relationship wasn't explicitly romantic or anything but I do feel a little weird about him hanging out with her as a child in this life when they were equals and the same age with some romantic subtext in the past one…) I do know however that some future quest will age Ethel back up, but that was all very weird. I don't think anyone should be coming back at the age they were previously, but even if we're doing that, they DEFINITELY shouldn't be regaining their memories.

In a game that's literally supposed to be about life and death, the value of each cycle, of each life no matter how temporary, where the characters repeatedly insist that each of their lives have value no matter how many times they're reborn — "death" becomes less than a slap on the wrist. I also don't know why Nia revived — probably just a 2 reference, as I understand from the wiki, and if so that's totally fine, but the timing of that after Mio's side story just blew the concept of death off a cliff was really not ideal. Would have been better to have her not awaken until after D was killed, as it just adds to all the resurrection in Mio's story and makes things feel very silly and death extremely cheap. The one good thing is that so far Miyabi seems to be the only cartoonishly bad no-consequences-at-all example, but that could change in other side quests, and frankly, once is bad enough when the game's themes so heavily revolve around the value of life and death.

Moebius is insanely hammy. It got old really fast, and then got funny again when I realized that literally every single one of them is like that. There's a certain refuge in audacity there, imo. They're just all complete weirdos who won't stop chewing the scenery, I can respect that. Although D's "true identity" being treated as a big reveal ("wow! You're a serial killer that has literally never been mentioned in this game before!!") was pretty ridiculous. Also kinda disappointed that we didn't get E, T, L, and S alongside N and M…while it makes sense, and the implication is that this is the first life in which these six got together, I wanted evil Eunie :( N is kinda hilariously pathetic, which may not have been the intention. I got off so many daze->bursts on him during his last battle and he was just bouncing around like a fucked up plinko horse it was goddamn hilarious. Also his armor has a booty window. I can't take this guy seriously. The big M/Mio reveal is really well handled and great, though, and the absolute peak of the plot. I just laughed at N a little during it. Can you really blame me.

I will also say that M/N's story did, personally for me, ruin the idea of Noah/Mio as a romantic couple — seeing a version of them that reached the peak of codependency to the point of genocide taints every version of them. Even though the versions we play as can reach acceptance and part for the greater good, it's hard not to think of N and M and their arc. Again, that's for me — not judging people who do love the couple or anything, I'm just a little repulsed by them together now :') I will also say that while some of the "life cycle"/"yay babies" stuff feels a bit hamfisted, it's really not too bad, especially with the focus being more on babies and life than "everyone's purpose is to make babies." And the language seemed surprisingly non-heterosexual (I'm so glad that Lanz/Sena stayed platonic.) The game sort of glosses over N and M (or some other version of them, but I got the impression that was them)'s teen pregnancy as well as Monica's (Ghondor is 18 while Monica is 33 — easy to miss but Monica was a teen mom) and I do feel weird about that. Not the end of the world but the material sometimes teeters on the edge of…not so great?

Side note: Now that I think about it, why are Nopon entirely outside the cycle and just living their merry lives completely consequence free in whatever parts of the world they want. Why was there no Moebius nopon i am so disappointed. Not to mention they keep inventing shit that just completely shatters all of Z's plans. Nopon are canonically more powerful than Moebius this is a very funny concept to me

All of this being said, the ending itself actually works okay for me. I always have mixed feelings about "but then it never happened!" type endings, I always prefer "let's rebuild the world with the tools we have." I don't like it when "bad/flawed/noncanon" timelines get erased without a trace and become meaningless. This is why my favorite time travel game is Radiant Historia. Have I mentioned I fucking loathe act 3 of Dragon Quest XI, to this day have refused to play it, and actually regret buying it at all solely thanks to act 3's existence? It's a MASSIVE pet peeve. Anyway, the ending narrowly subverted pissing me off — it manages to stay bittersweet by treating the Agnus/Keves separation as a consequence of restarting the world. You could argue that the ongoing "oh, they'll meet again somehow" reassurances ruin this, but to me it just barely manages to work. It might, admittedly, undermine some of the messages about moving on and forward and avoiding the endless now — but I think it's okay, in the end. Even if baby Noah runs into that alley and immediately trips over baby Mio and they get every single memory back, I think the ending as a whole is well-constructed enough that it can work. It wasn't a huge, universal retcon — either the effects of what happened will linger (they'll regain their memories and have to live with that knowledge) or the consequences of their choice will (they'll never meet again, or they'll meet but not remember) and that ultimately works for me. Subjective, though, and I get why some are disappointed with it in one way or another -- I would also have personally preferred a "rebuilding the world together without any Flame Clocks" ending. It's better than "Fiora's just all better and a Homs again with no lingering effects at all" or "Pyra and Mythra just are alive and have separate bodies bc Reasons now" though. *JKR voice* You solved it, Ginny was perfectly happy again!

The characters are what really carry this game's writing as opposed to the plot, and that's generally okay with me. Really, my big outstanding complaints are the death thing, mostly as it applies to Miyabi, and that things are a real slog in the final fetch quest and then dungeon, with that classic "padding an already too long JRPG" vibe. Seriously, I finished at 62 hours as a fast reader with a whole ton of side content left to do — that dungeon could have been ¼ of the length and equally effective, guys. Why.

Miscellaneous commentary — the VA work is great/terrible in exactly the ways I wanted it to be, Nia and Melia's new designs are great (and Melia's really suits how her VA's voice has changed, which is a strong improvement over Future Connected - not anyone's fault, just a weird side effect of things being recorded a decade apart. Getting to properly see and hear adult Melia really feels like it fixes up those issues though.) The Nopon are way cuter than they've ever been, fluffy and big-eyed, and their speech is definitely my favorite from the three games (toning down the mehmehmeh was a very good call, especially since this world is supposed to be a mix of 1 and 2.) Giving Riku that extremely deep voice in the English dub is a hilarious choice and I have endless respect for them for that. The main cast all sounds great, Sena being an American stereotype is so funny, Noah's VA handled his multiple roles really well, and Eunie was just hilarious at all times. Seriously I adore her. Music sounded great, but I was mostly listening through switch speakers so that obviously affected the quality a lot — it sounds way better when I listened on the PC through headphones though so I'm slowly making my way through. Should have won at the game awards but we all knew it wouldn't lbr :') The character models are great and this is definitely my favorite artstyle from any of the Xenoblades — everyone is a LOT more expressive than 1 but not, well, ugly like in 2. Much more facial feature diversity too which is sorely appreciated. Jiggle physics were kind of ridiculous (Mio should not have those!! She's like a b cup!!! why) but at least the outfits and angles weren't too wild, and Monica is the only one who looks outright cartoonish proportions-wise imo. I really enjoy the class system and getting to do wild/fun stuff with it, but I also like that significant cutscenes have everyone using their "traditional" weapons — it strikes a nice balance between gameplay and character fun for me. In general all the fight cutscenes were really well choreographed and lively, with lots of cool touches that made them actually worth watching -- stuff like Lanz blocking a huge long hit while Eunie and Taion use an ongoing sustained heal to keep him alive longer, it's neat.

Also That Photo is so dumb and so poorly timed but hey that's why i'm not playing 2

Anyway, yeah, I have my gripes but it's overall a really good and heartfelt game that feels like a lot of love was put into it! Really good! I…will still be avoiding the larger xenoblade fandom bc What The Hell Is Going On In There. eunie's the boss. why is this so long i just wanted to write a few paragraphs not the fucking iliad sobs

[dmclemblems]

Kinda curious: what aspects of GW's/Hope's overall rendition of Claude do you like, if there are any? What do you think are the biggest missteps? And what are some small details that you just either like or are annoyed by, however minimally? If you don't mind me asking!

Sorry this is so late, nonnie! I wanted to give a full answer and this is loooong.

Parts I liked:

Tbh I liked Claude fine in the first half of the game. Some aspects I was really fond of was him second guessing himself more often as well as really feeling the impact of being a 19 year old running an army and essentially being the “leader” of a country. You can see how much it weighs on him in a way that we couldn’t have seen in Houses because the circumstances were too different in Houses.

We also got to see him actually interact with Erwin, and I liked seeing him making plans with someone who he knows doesn’t like him but they both understand it has to be done if they want to protect the Alliance. Imo it shows a part of how he operates and makes plans besides the way Houses showed it to us, which was just with his immediate allies making plans on the spot (for instance, the infiltration into Enbarr during VW, which was basically done then and there versus us seeing a battle plan stretched out between a couple/few chapters in Hopes that Claude wouldn’t outright discuss with people until it was out in the open).

Even though I know a lot of people were unhappy with the amount of Almyran lore we got, I did like the way they handled him with Shahid. In Houses we almost never see him being being so emotionally broken down that he literally gets drunk over it and is too depressed to be part of a celebration/party. It’s interesting considering it’s very clear Shahid absolutely despised him and had nothing good to say about him, so in my mind I would think Claude has no reason to feel bad about killing him.

I wish they went over it in more depth because we’re not really given any reasons for why Claude is so upset about it beyond having killed his brother. Like sure, yeah, they were siblings, but... it didn’t seem like there was any reason for Claude to care about him. I would’ve liked to hear more about why Claude was sad, because from my perspective he’s just sad about a guy who hated his guts and wanted him dead, family be damned. There’s a point where you’re family and there’s a point where someone can hurt you so bad that people wouldn’t even consider that person family anymore, but for some reason Claude seems to care enough that he gets that depressed about it.

For example, even though Dimitri is bothered about having to kill Rufus, his own family, it doesn’t really hurt him. He doesn’t linger on it. They weren’t close, Rufus has tried to murder him on multiple occasions, and he was a problem for Faerghus. Dimitri has no real attachment to Rufus outside of just being blood related. With Claude, it seems like he’s a bit too emotional considering Shahid was basically his Rufus. This could mean that even though he and Shahid weren’t close, Claude is just a highly sensitive person and having to kill family is too much for him, but throughout the rest of the game and prior we’re given no indication that he is a sensitive person. Of course he has feelings about things and wants to be liked, but I feel like there was a disconnect between how hard he took that whole situation and what we know about it. I liked seeing that side of Claude, but it felt half done to me.

Parts I didn’t like: (get ready because it’s a lot)

Throwing his intelligence and truth seeking out the window, as well as having him choose all the things that would prolong war and take more lives despite him saying he wanted otherwise. The whole “Rhea BaD” thing going on with Claude is extremely forced considering in VW he didn’t like Rhea but he changed his mind about things related to Fodlan, the Church and Rhea herself. There are points where he considers what Fodlan would be like if she died, but he never indicates wanting to kill her with his own hands. It’s one thing to make Claude more cunning in this game and more likely to do underhanded things and explore that side of him more, but there’s a difference in writing that out and making him heavily involved in starts fights that will kill hundreds more people than one person he has a problem with. It’s just not his way of doing things. For example, Dimitri and Edelgard are written as the same general person they’re written as in Houses, just in another story/timeline/etc. Dimitri is just the person he would be in a different circumstance, with the war having began later and him being surrounded by friends and allies. Claude though doesn’t even feel like the same person.

Part of this is a symptom of the game pandering to “we can’t possibly kill Edelgard in this game!”. When Lorenz makes the very legitimate suggestion that they leave her for dead and end the war, he’s completely brushed off because “she was their classmate”. Meanwhile that didn’t stop them from invading Faerghus and killing people, presumably simply because they weren’t their classmates so who cares, while also basically inviting Sreng to invade which could kill their classmates and cause a lot of damage. To put it simply, Claude was made to be very stupid at times for the sake of the writers not wanting Edelgard to die. He was also much more intent on starting fights that would cause death despite saying within this game itself that he doesn’t want people to die.

Essentially I think the biggest missteps are the second half itself with Claude. There’s literally no reason for him invade Faerghus and then be like “I just wanna talk”, because that’s literally how it goes. He barges in, kills people, kills one of their most important men in protecting their land from invasions, and literally just... wants to talk? I think Dimitri would be willing to talk just to stop the bloodshed, but considering how much Sylvain seemed to despise the Alliance and Empire after all that, I can’t imagine beyond “smoothing things out” talks to prevent more war that Faerghus would ever really... be on good terms again with either country for at least this generation.

Part of my problem here is that Claude goes back and forth with the whole “I don’t want people to die” but keeps choosing the option that will have the most bloodshed, from the Randolph thing to attacking Faerghus who was minding their own business to saving Edelgard to fighting the Church just because he didn’t like Rhea. Every choice he makes in the second half of the game is him saying one thing and doing the entirely exact opposite. It makes the things he claims feels empty and meaningless. No amount of “this is who Claude really is though!” from people is going to change my mind that Claude keeps claiming nice things for Fodlan while running around killing people in every which direction.

Similarly, SB’s bad ending. While I fully agree with him betraying Edelgard because in both routes it’s never his intention to keep up the alliance with her (he doesn’t expect her to stop after Rhea is killed. He expects that she’s out for conquest of Fodlan, which includes the Alliance, and if they don’t agree to be vassals of the Empire then she’s just going to war against them again anyway), all they had to do was have him break the pact with the Empire. Instead, he declares war on all of Fodlan and essentially becomes Shahid 2.0. Ends up an Almyran noble coming in trying to take over Fodlan because ??? I mean in Shahid’s case it’s at least clear that it’s a sign of strength/power and would show the Almyrans what he’s capable of. For Claude it’s just because ???

Normally I’d agree with his plan in GW with the Randolph chapter. Generally speaking I do think he made the right choice there because his plan was to protect the Alliance when he made that pact to begin with. It was basically a means to stop the fighting against the Empire. By leaving Empire soldiers to die, he was weakening their army, and ultimately, again, the Empire would end up being his enemy anyway. Unfortunately the game hates anything that goes against Edelgard so he’s reprimanded for it by Shez and Judith heavily, and everyone gets mad at me for betraying the Empire’s trust. Then they all turn around and go “oh we’re invading Faerghus, that’s fine honestly”. Like... what? The Empire started the war and attacked the Alliance and when their soldiers die, you’re upset, but when you attack Faerghus who has no bad blood whatsoever with the Alliance, everyone is pumped and wants to kill people???

Beyond the Randolph stuff, again, back to SB’s bad ending, he just suddenly decided Faerghus is in the wrong while literally knowing jack shit about what’s going on over there. In the “good” ending of SB, he actually argued that they were so caught up in trying to find Rhea at Ailell that they didn’t even consider Dimitri’s motivations for being part of that fight. For some reason in SB’s non-Byleth ending, he just... decides none of that matters and that Faerghus BaD even though he has no idea what their power system looks like. He basically is this foreigner who walks in and goes “oh your way of life is obsolete so I’m going to kill as many leaders here as I can and change your whole structure”. I don’t care if he has a bloodline in Fodlan. He didn’t grow up in Fodlan, and to come in as a total stranger to them just two, three years prior, now acting like he has any right to do that just because of his mother’s side of the family is awful.

Imagine if I went to another continent just because I had blood from there and told them I didn’t like their way of life and just decided to wage war because of it. Imagine that I decided to just walk in and take over their land and place myself at the top because I didn’t agree with their power structure or what have you and behaved like I was entitled to that simply because I have blood from there. There’s no amount of ??? that I can express about that writing decision because it’s absolutely stupid to write Claude that way. If I have to look at Erwin and be like “damn u have the gift of prophecy”, then you know something’s wrong with the writing for Claude (and I don’t even hate Erwin).

Hopes in general and GW:

Overall, GW Claude is a mess in the second half and I’ve been informed by more than one person that’s apparently a thing in the fandom where people pretend Claude was just killed by TWS and replaced with one of their guys using his face because he’s written so poorly that people refuse to accept that as Claude. All the writing for him is saying one thing and doing another. In a Byleth recruit run, I kinda hope that Claude feels like shit after taking to Dimitri in Zaharas for what he did because that would really come off as a total “oh I fucked up” situation and realizing he literally should’ve just talked to Dimitri before engaging Faerghus in war. Since when does Claude choose violence before peaceful talks? Baron Dominic should slap him, and honestly he probably would.

SB Claude is ??? Bad ending Claude is an infinite number of question marks that could’ve been solved just by him fighting back against Edelgard and leaving the rest of the continent (Faerghus and the Church) out of it. Byleth recruited SB Claude is ??? but in less of a super bad sense and more of a wtf are you even doing sense. That version of him is just like... he goes to Faerghus and chases Dimitri around the block and is like why r u running I will stop chasing u if u stop running, and Dimitri’s vibe there is really just ??? 😔 like I’m pretty sure Dimitri has no fucking idea why he’s being chased around and honestly at that point I think Claude has no idea what he’s doing either because neither of them have an army with them, it’s literally just Claude following Dimitri and Dimitri like STOOOOOP and Claude like NOT UNTIL YOU STOOOOOP and it’s just highly confusing from a writing standpoint and seems like it’s done for the sake of allowing Zaharas to happen with just the lords and nobody else. Otherwise it really has no reason to exist lol. Also the whole “you’re the one put yourself in this-- (situation)” is like ??? wut. u chased him, he fled, and therefore it is his fault? W O T.

What I mean to say is GW and SB Claude are so confusing and make no sense that Claude is basically written to work into the plot and make it go how the writers wanted at the expense of any logic and his entire character. I’ve mentioned this before, but I enjoy AG because the story follows the characters. The characters don’t follow the story. They’re not altered to fit a specific story. The story is altered to fit them. Claude just unfortunately got the worst of being butchered for the purpose of having the story being very specific (ex. SB Zaharas).

AG Claude is generally fine aside from them constantly implying Claude isn’t trustworthy. They’re trying to make nods at GW/SB but it just doesn’t work in the context of AG’s story. There’s no reason at all for anyone to suspect him. By that point the Alliance had never engaged in combat against the Kingdom. If they made an alliance of any sort in like, say, GW or SB after they’d had conflict, I would understand being wary of him/the Alliance, but in AG that just never happened. In AG it’s just that two sides that were fighting the same enemy were like hmm maybe we should help each other deal with this since they’re targeting both of us and we don’t have anything against each other.

Zaharas in AG was just lazy. Again, it’s using GW Claude in an AG setting, having Dimitri seem to distrust him despite immediately after Zaharas stating that he trusts Claude, is completely confident that Claude will show up to help him and has literally zero distrust of Claude. Even when everyone else is suspecting that Claude might not be so trustworthy (again, useless to have there in AG), Dimitri is unwavering in his belief that Claude will help them because “he’s never known Claude to be a liar” and since Claude said he’d help, he’s going to help. So why then, if Dimitri is so confident in Claude, did he seem to not be so confident of him in Zaharas? Because the writers didn’t feel like writing them an alternate support for AG, despite that it really has no substance in AG. Out of nowhere Claude talks about his problems with the Church despite being just fine with them earlier and never once otherwise indicating he had GW plot based plans. In AG his plans didn’t get written to at all reflect GW’s plot, so this whole Church thing is nonsensical in AG. They did fix the post Zaharas conversation to still reflect the correct route, which they actually do in the other routes as well (Dimitri specifically addresses the lord of the route you’re on and the dialogue is altered to fit the route you’re on, so it’s unique to the current route and is written to fit in). Unfortunately it also just makes Claude’s support with Dimitri in Zaharas extremely confusing and more of a hindsight “oh they were just too lazy to write something different for Claude in a different route”.

Also, AG Claude at the very end is shown to look at Rhea as if he has a problem with her still, even though in AG there’s no reason for him to feel like that when he’s met her on good terms and even made battle plans alongside her. You could say maybe he looked at her suspiciously because prior to meeting her he had concerns about her, but then he just drops that look because he’s finally decided maybe he was wrong and everything is fine. Technically that could be the case and maybe he’s just moved on from those thoughts, but it’s ultimately still a nod to the other routes’ versions of Claude, and its purpose is specifically that because it otherwise makes no sense in that route (basically if AG was a standalone game or you only played that route/played that route first with zero context of the other routes, it would make absolutely no sense why people regard Claude with such suspicion and why Claude is so side eye-y toward Rhea).

So, ultimately, AG Claude? I’d say like 95% okay or more on his own. The nudging toward non AG Claude was annoying, but he himself as a character wasn’t a total disaster and AG wrote basically all of its characters very well so that’s not surprising. I don’t say this because I’m a fan of Faerghus and yadda yadda, but because I’m a Claude fan too and as a Claude fan wasn’t happy with how they basically treated him as an object to be used as needed for plot’s sake and throwing his characterization all over the place as a result of that. It’s not as present in AG, but it’s there.

the only part of byleth recruited sb claude that works for me is that he seems like he’s just trying to get himself a boyfriend and has decided he wants this one and no other one so he is going to chase him until dimitri dates him by which i mean, only in a kinda fucked up shippy sense does that work LOL in actual story context it makes no sense and was definitely just an excuse to make zaharas work bc where tf are their armies and why are they by themselves

[amyisherenowitsokay]

''before you delete your account'' Sweeti, you gave me the push to make an actual one. (i forgot all the info i made for tht throwaway lolz i didn't write anythin down)

I have a fun question now. You already did one for writing, so. What's your worldbuilding like? How do you do, organize, think up new bits?

Obviously IZ already has a massive canon/lore/worldbuilt to pull from so what's inspired you from it, or from other things entirely? What are/where your ideas? Go off, I want to hear your brain tick, if you don't mind. :D luv hearing ppl's worldbuilding.

welcome to tumblr and rip your old account lmao

OOoh worldbuilding! That IS a new question for me, ooh, okay. Well, you asked for a long reply, and a long reply you shall get.

I have gotten a lot of very sweet comments from people telling me how in-character I make the main cast, which brings me a lot of joy, because the amount of work I put into respecting and establishing my principles on the source material is substantial. My first well for sourcing info for my worldbuilding is of course the show, including the unaired episodes. How the characters interact, why they react the way they do, and any lore I can dredge up is usually based around me exploiting some pattern of reactions that I can use to justify a result I want.

FOR EXAMPLE, I've been working into my fics that Gaz is really into robotics and programming, and it's her 'genius' niche that distinguishes her as brilliant.

In "Gaz, Taster of Pork" (a favorite of mine), Gaz forces some demented-looking robotically modified stuffed animals to attack her brother for putting a curse on her. Due to their design, that doesn't look very Professor Membrane-esque, and later with Gaz announcing that SHE programmed them to eat human flesh, we can ascertain that Gaz came up with the design and engineered them herself. That's incredible for a presumably 9-ish year old child to accomplish.

Furthermore, in "Nanozim," Gaz being able to defeat Zim fairly easily also supports a savant-level understanding of robotics. The show more makes it a joke about her talent and obsession with video games, especially when she makes a point to give Dib the "cheat code" to make his robot transform, but I'd argue that it's both. Gaz is obsessed with video games, but her foundational comprehension of robots and programming allowed her to predict and maneuver a robot with such skill and precision that she defeated Zim, a trained soldier, presumably in what was supposed to be his element. Zim is blinded by his own ambition, and his own ego frequently means he's chronically underestimating his foes (usually to his detriment), but he's not actually stupid.

Dib is a genius in his own way, and more obnoxiously vocal about his own brilliance. Gaz obviously gets far less screen time, and is more reserved as a character in general. While she never announces her brilliance, she does make a point to minimize her brother's. Overtly, we're led to believe that it's because she finds him annoying, but secondarily, let's consider this from the viewpoint of siblings. Siblings get competitive and jealous, especially since Dib, as the problem child and simultaneously Membrane's presumed heir, gets more attention from their father. That's one interpretation. The other could be that Membrane isn't worried about Gaz because he already KNOWS she's showing an interest and exceptional talent in a field of his approval.

All of this to justify that I think Gaz likes robots and I can 'prove' it.

Ideally anything I do that's not explicitly laid out in the show, unaired or otherwise, I try and do something to that effect. In my brain, there's an imaginary audience whom I'm presenting my findings to, and an imaginary opponent I need to argue against, and if I don't leave the debate feeling confident, I'll usually scrap it.

So it's not so much as thinking up 'new' bits as it is re-interpreting the source material. I'm essentially trying to expand the lore rather than reinvent it, if I can. Of course I take liberties sometimes for plot sake, what with RE:MHNY being like "well the PAK is kind of brokennn . . . .? yeah" to justify why Gaz wasn't just swallowed whole by Larb in 10 minutes. In which case, I work from plot-premise backwards. In this case, the premise is that Gaz doesn't get PAK-possessed because it's broken. Well then I need to start asking how its broken, and how it GOT broken. What even is PAK? How does it work? I was satisfied with the simpler explanation that PAK's are really complex pieces of machinery that even Irkens don't really understand unless you're a technician/specialist like Skoodge, and it also left the more open-ended, fun prompt of "Well okay, if you're Zim, and you don't understand something, but don't want the other person to know you don't understand it, how would you react?"

In terms of organization, I use google drive to house all my writing content. Everything is separated by category of fandom, then deeper by series, then deeper by which installment of the series. No matter what I'm writing, if it's not a one-shot or a mini-fic like That Thing on Your Wrist, there's a file named "Randoms" that is strictly for writing something I know needs to happen in the story, but that I don't know where to put yet. Otherwise, there's a bunch of other documents with labels that are associated with the event, or if I have one, chapter title. 90% of the storyline and events I'm able to keep in my head, but I'm also trying out this program called Aeon Timeline. Since I'm technologically inept, it's a little confusing, but I think I'm getting the hang of it and may decide to fully integrate it into my workflow.

MOVING ON, aside from the show, some of my friends also ready the comics, and have sent me some good ones. If I think it's funny, or doesn't contradict anything, sometimes the comic lore sneaks into my work too. Aside from that, I do take a lot of insp from other media, shows, books, movies, music, etc. Sometimes music is just the background noise that supports the vibe in writing I'm going for, and sometimes it inspires entire scenes. All of my fics, even my WIPS and unpublished projects, have playlists. It's usually not a direct 1:1 link to any phrase of chapter, it's more of just a mood-setter, with some exceptions. For example, for the Re:MHNY soundtrack, Bells in Santa Fe by Halsey did inspire this line from Gaz in chapter 11.

All of this is temporary/ All of this is temporary

Dissimilarly, Lavenders by Rivals was just something I imagined as a Zim's perspective panic over Gaz being in danger, as a reference to her hair lmao. There's craziness going on, he's having existential crises, and all the while all he can think about is Gaz.

Cause all I smell are lavenders/ As the world / Burns down around me

But I usually use media to answer questions. I don't think Re:MHNY is a reference to anything but its original, but Paradorx and Dead Weight definitely take reference from other sources. Paradorx, for example, has some The Haunting of Bly Manor, Stranger Things, Bee + Puppycat, Scooby Doo, Charmed, etc. and was originally entirely inspired by a visual animatic I pictured listening to Ed Sheeran's "Bad Habits." One day I will post that animatic, but for now, it's one of many things I have that I haven't finished lmao. Dead Weight as a concept is its own, but I do use other media to answer questions. Like, I for one know nothing about soldiers, or what their training would look like, let alone alien genocidal ones. Similar to music, there's no 1:1 scene copies, but some of the psychological torture was insp'd from shows like Evangelion, Squid Game, Sabrina, etc. I like to watch how other people tackle answers to questions I have, or ideas. How do characters reaction under pressure before and after they realize failure could mean death? How does a character handle the shame of not meeting the standards of societal pressure? What about pressure from a more personal source, like family? What if it's coming from both? Etc.

I use media to fuel my stories when needed, and I use my stories as elaborate tools to justify a story I want to tell. I find it really helpful during development to ask myself "what's the point of this?" Dead Weight, for example, is ultimately a deep dive into Irken society, militarism, and how in spite of the very specific, streamlined efforts to root it out, individuality, friendship, and love can still blossom within it. Re:MHNY was about Zim finally answering his own question of what could possibly be more fulfilling than servitude to the Armada, and recovering from a lifetime spent under the thumb of the Tallest, and all that it entailed. For Gaz, it was forcing herself to change, to accept the affection and support of someone who wasn't family, and opening herself up to vulnerability. (Dib's story arc actually ends on a half-note, and is finished up in 2, so I'll forego discussing that one for now).

I hope this was a sufficiently long answer lmao. This was a lot of fun, thanks for indulging me.

[inthezoyne]

Let’s take a moment to talk about: DEEMO II

if you aren’t aware about DEEMO, it’s a rhythm game developed by the Taiwanese game developer Rayark. The first game was released for IOS and android mobile platforms in November 2013.

But I’m not here to talk about the first game I’m here to talk about the second game.

I want to talk about DEEMO II because it’s ridiculous that the few people who seem to be talking about it are being negative even though it just got set out for release a few months ago. this isn’t the final version of the game.

As of January 13th 2022 DEEMO II is now available to be downloaded on iOS and android for free with (minimal) in app purchases.

I want to start talking about the visuals along with the story of the game and how much the visuals match the atmosphere of the game both tone wise and story wise. I’ll try to not get too off track but as always, no promises.

I’m very tickled with how whimsical it is. I don’t think just talking about the visuals and showing a few pictures so you watch the release trailer here - x

I know I said I wasn’t going to talk about the first DEEMO game however I’d like to bring up how different DEEMO II is when in comparison to the visuals. I don’t mean that in a bad way when I say that.

Although some returning fans may find the change in visual design and aesthetic choice to be jarring.

I personally found it to be quite relaxing and familiar and fit with soft relaxing tone of the game. As you can see in the art below, DEEMO I had a more rough angular style in comparison to the current in game visuals.

The visuals are a mixture of hand drawn 2D animation for cutscenes and 3D landscapes that give the new exploration feature accompanied by the rhythm game to feel more intrenched in the world and I love it.

(Concept art for The Statue Room) vs final product

Now I want to talk about the story because of how much potential it has for future updates.

I’ll start with the initial plot and try not to include any spoilers in case you really want to play the game for yourself.

Content warning: mentions of death ahead

The game takes place in a rundown train station where all the trains have either stopped or fallen under water by the sheer amount of rain. This leads to the gloomy rainy atmosphere that the game helps provide.

The rain is deadly to those taking shelter in the rundown trains station and is called “Hollow Rain” if anyone is touched by Hollow Rain you “Bloom” which is type of death.

(Inanimate objects can Bloom too)

(This isn’t a game mechanic it’s a part of the lore)

So everyone is depressed because they’re stuck in a train strain trying to survive with minimal shelter, food and hope since some of these people have seen their loved ones “bloom” and be turned into petals which you can see around the station.

As to where the Rhythm Game part comes in, you play as a girl known as Echo. She believes The Composer, The Creator of the world they exist in will come back and make the Hollow Rain go away with the use of his pianist skills.

Echo is convinced of this because of how she came back after Blooming and heard The Composer.

Of course many have given up on The Composer and believe he has abandoned them this apart from Echo and Deemo who look for The Composer’s charts to play to clear up the rain.

After you play music for a certain amount of time you can unlock different areas in the Train Station by clearing away the rain. Such as The Balcony, Cafe, North Courtyard etc.

The more rain you clear up the more sunshine shines through in areas which I find to be an amazing visual detail.

While the story for the game is short at the moment there’s tons of potential here and tons of music which you can unlock through playing the story or be an impatient person like me and buy the multiple albums that are unlock-able via micro transactions.

A lot of people seem to complain about the micro transactions or bundles but they’re actually quite cheep and nothing is pushed onto you. if you don’t want to buy them just don’t buy them it’s that easy.

There’s nothing else I have to add hear except DEEMO II is a wonderful game both visually and audio wise it has amazing songs and developers. I can’t wait to see what else there is in future updates! I’m very excited!

if you haven’t tried playing it you should try it out. Just for fun at least it’s free to download.

[300iqprower]

FGO just has this bad habit of memeing on itself and then when it tries to take itself seriously it can't because the serious things you have turned into jokes. The community is no help either since everyone loves the meme that is archers don't use bows, etc.

Sorry for the long response time but I wanted to compile a not even comprehensive list of times FGO has done this because you bet your ass I notice every time those shitheads try to be cute about their bullshit and only end up admitting they know damn well what they're doing and don't care about actually listening to criticism.

No male swimsuits

Encouraging pulling all nighters over events

Fauxzerkers (Berserkers with incredibly weak reasoning for their class that usually boils down to muh waifu)

Avenger Boudica

NP Skip

Content Drought/Lack of Reruns

Raikou being a bad character

NotSkadi being a lazily designed moefied Scathach

Year 1 servants having very little when it comes to interlude/valentine/etc writing.

Hokusai Saber’s """parody""" of Shonen protagonists

The Exclusivity and Story Lock systems

Lack of story replay

Pedophilic pandering

Scarcity and RNG of materials

QP grind being way too high and scarcity of Crystalized Lore

Everything in "Learning With Manga"

Oh and always remember: Lack of NP Skip is intentional and there to make the game that much more of a grind. It makes farming take that much longer and more importantly significantly increases the amount of time farming lottos takes to minimize the degree to which players can gain the system. A huge part of Gacha is the sunk time cost creating a sense of investment and all the little things seriously add up; the amount of time NP animations use is the bulk of your playtime at high level farming but no amount of player end efficiency can actually get you through something like Spishtar's NP at an efficient pace. When I say every single thing about these games is tailored to emotionally manipulate to a degree that sounds like a conspiracy theory when you actually lay it all out, THAT is exactly the degree of "tailor made for encouraging addiction" design that I mean.

[thecrazyanimegirl]

Fall anime 2020

And wow, it’s the last season of 2020! May the new year be a lot better, not just anime related!

{ Winter ‘18 }  { Spring ‘18 }  { Summer ‘18 }  { Fall ‘18 }  { Winter ‘19 } { Spring ‘19 }  { Summer ‘19 }  { Fall ‘19 }  { Winter ‘20 }  { Spring ‘20 } { Summer ‘20 }

Alongside the continuations and new seasons like fire force, danmachi,  mahouka koukou no rettousei, golden kamuy and so, these are the new shows that we started:

100-man no Inochi no Ue ni Ore wa Tatteiru 

It is pretty typical isekai anime, just that it has twist and they can go back to their world every time they do a quest. I could see potential in characters and their development, but they aren’t kind of characters I would care about or watch something with meh plot for. Maybe they are building up for something cool, but for now, it was kind of boring for me.

Akudama Drive 

Overwhelmingly cool show about criminals in a dystopian future world. There is not much to say about the story without spoiling other than being so unnecessary cool that I loved it an unnatural amount! The characters, the setting, the action scenes, the animation and conversations, everything is just so aesthetic! I looked forward to it every week! Gonna miss them a lot. Just beware of a lot of violence and blood scenes (even though they are mostly censored).

By the Grace of the Gods 

A really soft isekai with a boy who tames slimes. This is that one (at least) show of the season where you can just turn off your brain, watch some cuteness and forget about everything. It comes with no strings attached, you can drop it halfway and not think twice about it, it won’t make you feel bad in any way, just happiness and rainbows, and sometimes that’s what I need.

Hypnosis Mic -Division Rap Battle- Rhyme Anima 

Women rule the world and pretty boys rap to assert dominance. That’s it, that’s the premise and if you think that ridiculous, yes, it truly is haha If you want to have a laugh, listen to some rapping (can’t say much about the quality of it, but I enjoyed it immensely, good va’s!), go watch it. The plot quality is debatable to say the least, but it’s not really an anime about the story, rather about the 12+ guys and their friendships and rivals and well... rap.

Ikebukuro West Gate Park 

Although a little bit on the improbable side to happen IRL, Ikebukuro WGP showcases multiple situations where we dive behind the back of many realistic happenings in bigger cities. There is always some company in conflict with another thinking solving it in their way is the best possible choice, not taking into consideration what happens to the little people bearing their consequences. It is of course up to the “good mafia” guys to solve it. If you are reading the Webtoon Weak Hero and are in search for some more realistic gang divisions, then feel free to give this anime a try. It has a pretty lovable and crafty MC minus the high-school setting.

Jujutsu Kaisen

Ohh my where to start xD yes, you are looking at the fan favorite anime of this season and there is no doubt about it having that title. I can go on and try to convince everyone saying it has the perfect animation, soundtrack, appearance of the characters and so on but to truly experience it, you will have to watch it. Character development is on the slower track but it is understandable since it is obvious that the series will be a “long distance runner”. What impressed me the most is the perfect balance of humor and tragedy, so if you are one to typically enjoy shonen anime, give it definitely a try through the 3 episodes rule!

Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear 

A girl got isekai’d in a game and now finds friends and people she cares about. Oh and she’s in a bear suit. This was one of those shows I watched for relaxation. There are no bad emotions coming from it and you can just relax, watch something that doesn’t need you to turn on your brain and try to be happy. If you are looking for something serious, you won’t really find it here.

Majo no Tabitabi 

A witch that travels the world, visiting many cities and meeting a lot of people, hearing their stories and moving on. Not action packed, but has things happening throughout the eps. I thought it would be another happy show, but it turned to be quite dark in some episodes. Most episodes have their separate story with minimal connection to the previous ones and some are heartwarming and some are downright grim. Overall, the plot is interesting and the MCs development and way of thinking is interesting too! 

Maoujou de Oyasumi

I KNEW this one is gonna be good when I first read the description of the manga in the bookstore 2 years ago xD What you see above is a small princess who wishes nothing more than a good sleep and a bunch of demons who decided to capture her. It becomes clear early on that she isn’t your typical prisoner as she sets out on quests to find stuff to make her rest more comfortable and NOTHING is gonna stand in her way. Your time watching this anime will be filled with heartfelt laughter and love for the all the characters. Yes, some people might be triggered by her actions and personality but I do believe since I (as a person who prefers to watch shonen) am impressed with it, a great number of people will like it.

Munou na Nana

I really love this anime. MC is an antagonist, pretty much an antihero, but she was made to believe that she is the hero. She is very smart, so anything she plots end up interesting. This show always keeps me on the end of my seat. And it’s a great combination of everyone has supernatural abilities + high school setting, but with a darker twist to it. It’s one of my favorites this season! 

Noblesse

I read the webtoon and I am fan of it, so I am really happy to see Noblesse became an anime! Characters are really awesome and plot is action packed. I’m sure you won’t regret watching it! The humor, the lore and the action is very well balanced and it’s just a good story. If you feel like you really like the anime, but something is missing and you have some time, the webtoon is amazing! Of course, they actually did the anime quite well, but some jokes or additional train of thought that goes in the characters head cannot be all transferred into the animation. Oh and - watch Noblesse: Awakening before this! That’s like the crash course of the first arc of the story.

Taiso Samurai 

A MAPPA anime about a japanese gymnast on the verge of retirement, his daughter and a ninja they adopted! That about covers it! It’s a soft and heartwarming story that really leaves a good feeling after watching it. The characters are lovable and the drama side of the story levels out with humor pretty well, without glossing over stuff too much. I can’t say much about the sports aspect since I don’t know much, but it was worth the watch even though it isn’t the most amazing action-packed anime ever. But it was a solid story, good charas and was just soft.

With a Dog AND a Cat, Every Day is Fun

One and a half minute of a lady with a cat and a dog being incredibly relatable.

Yuukoku no Moriarty

Ah yes, I’m a sucker for every possible variation of sherlock homes, so it’s no wonder how much I enjoyed this. It’s centered about Moriarty, but Sherlock has his time in the later half of the show. The animation is just so beautiful, I loved the stories and mysteries and the way they handled Moriarty as a character. Also a good mixture of mystery, people being hideous creatures, main characters being pretty af and humor. I should continue to the manga now.

Dropped: MAGATSU WAHRHEIT, The Day I Became a God   

[nikplaysdnd]

I’ve been dming for a year straight, with my campaign now over thirty sessions in. Most of my attempts of dming crashed and burned after the first few attempts, and I gave up on D&D entirely. This blog actually logs that period pretty well.

So what changed? I’ve been wondering as my campaign’s one year mark is drawing closer, and I think I’ve come up with a few answers.

First, I took it way too seriously back then. I kept a whole five sectioned college notebook with a hand written table of contents like a fucking nerd! Not to say others shouldn’t do that, or that it’s a bad way to organize. But that’s not how I organize. It doesn’t work for me, but that’s how I thought the game worked. I tried to change myself to suit the game’s needs.

And that applied to the dming too. I tried to plan everything out in the same amount of excruciating detail, all long before it was even close to mattering. I overwhelmed myself with lore no one cared about, and I found the prep to be a stressful nightmare.

And so it wasn’t interesting, because I didn’t know how to make it interesting, I was too busy approximating the capital of the neighboring country. And so my players weren’t enthused, and so nothing really happened because none of us were really playing.

This time I tried to figure out how I should do it. My first decision was to format my notes like an internet wiki, because I remember absorbing page upon page of information through those and retaining it as a kid. It was how I’d study hyperfixation outside of just rewatching the source material. It’s kind of embarrassing when I say it like that but essentially linking related concepts together in a way that I can easily click through just works better for me than a school textbook.

Also, I prep much more minimally, relying on player feedback and decisions to decide how to prioritize my planning. Steering in the direction that gives the most enthusiastic response from my players usually keeps the story more engaging, and when they’re interest is so invested in the story, I get the motivation to do even more polishing to the story, ironing out details and making something I’m more proud of.

I personalize my writing inspirations too. My main dming inspirations are the Visual Novels of Ryukishi07 and long running shonen anime. Because of this, my campaign kind of seems like a character driven emotional intrigue story, but with shonen fights and the power of friendship. It’s much easier than the more High Fantasy Epics that I taught myself to emulate, and because it’s something I know better, I present it much better than I would something else.

In shonen, a lot of combat is simplified to rule of cool, where the characters featured are more powerful than anyone else by a significant margin. I use a lot of basic shonen logic when blurry on combat mechanics, because I think checking rules during session can drag encounters on. Most of the time I will allow for creative moves in combat with relevant and fair skill checks, sometimes rewarding them for their creativity with a bonus or advantage or something. It encourages them to think about what they’re doing a little more which makes it more engaging and exciting, and my combat descriptions are often lack luster because the math is difficult for me, so having the players describe their own turns and making them sound cool keeps it fun. As for how to keep it balanced when I regularly give them advantages and things that make them op? I make the enemies crazy op too. Shonen laws apply to the bad guys too, those are usually the ones with the most insane powers.

And the the visual novel works of Ryukishi are a major personal inspiration. The idea that a kinetic novel with no interactive elements being treated as a game, as you are genuinely challenged to take notes and put together information and learn is a really fun storytelling style, and the fact that his expertise is in complicated but utterly very human characters who you learn more about as you unravel the mysteries of the game itself, makes it even more powerful and personal. He writes his novels at a slow pace, taking his time with the small moments and the down time, things that help us to see ourselves in the characters, and to understand them, even when they’re not good people. It’s always amazed me about his works, especially considering how small his group was when he started. He created an entire universe because he wanted to tell a story in a game, and thats how it feels sometimes to be a dm, hearing my friends excitedly speculate on what might happen, or what they need to do, like I did as a kid reading those novels. It makes me get why someone could write the same series for 20 years, and keep enthusiastically making more.

So yeah, I basically just wanted to rant that I learned that the hole I fell in as a DM was forgetting to have fun myself, and I created a game where no one had fun. So this time I created a game where I would have a lot of fun, and I was lucky enough to get great players who have fun with me.