#i mean i'm still not playing the game (mostly because i'd be shit at it)

[skinteresting-enough]

Unsure if hating on James Cameron's Avatar is popular among my followers - please don't put me in the iron maiden if it is - but I do like the extraterrestrial environments the franchise provides, and Secrets of the Spires does definitely not disappoint in that regard. Like, damn.

[spocks-husband]

✨Axel's Ultimate Batman Video Game Play Guide and Reviews

You guys seemed to enjoy the previous version of this I did with all the Batman Animated shows, and now that I'm done with all the Batman games I thought I'd post my thoughts on those too! I decided to do this one in just like. Regular text format. Bc I didn't feel like editing all these into images like I did for the last one. So uhhh lemme know which format you prefer lol.

Anyways, please enjoy my comprehensive thoughts and feelings on (almost) every modern Batman game, five months in the making because I have no life. Enjoy!

🦇

Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009)

My Personal Rating: 7/10

My Total Hours Played: 17.1 

Steam Rating: Overwhelmingly Positive (96%)

Description: The first game in the Batman Arkham Series. Based off the iconic Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth comic from 1989 (aka the only good thing Grant Morrison has ever produced in his entire feeble life). The inmates at Arkham Asylum have begun a violent riot, and as Batman goes through the hospital to stop them, he uncovers a sinister conspiracy involving his greatest enemies.

Play If You're Looking For: An intro to the Arkham Series, a very different interpretation of Arkham Asylum compared to other versions of Batman, and some really dark aesthetics. Also, this isn't explicitly canon, but according to this series’ timeline, this game takes place in the space between Jason's death and Tim’s arrival, so if you're interested in a very dark, brooding, traumatized Bruce, playing this game with that information changes it a lot. 

Things I Liked:

Genuinely really scary

Incredible atmosphere 

Both Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamil are featured in their iconic roles

Really well written

Birthed a bunch of really iconic Batman memes (go to the r/Arkham subreddit, it's so funny unfortunately) (OFFICER BALLS.)

This was actually my introduction to Oracle and I love her more than anything in these games

Things I Didn't Like:

The graphics aren't fantastic but to be fair it was 2009 so

THE FUCKING BANE BOSS FIGHT. GOD. FUCK YOU BANE. THAT SHIT TOOK ME SO LONG.

The Killer Croc boss fight wasn't super difficult but it was so scary that I cried the first time I played it so. Keep that in mind.

Batman: Arkham City (2011)

My Personal Rating: 9/10

My Total Hours Played: 27.5

Steam Rating: Overwhelmingly Positive (95%)

Description: The second game in the Batman Arkham Series. After the riot at Arkham Asylum, Sharpton ascends to the mayor's office and cuts off about 6.4 acres of Gotham as ‘Arkham City’; a walled off portion of the city where crime runs rampant and mostly untethered. 

Play If You're Looking For: Agonizing Brutalia angst, a fight with pretty much every Batman villain who's ever existed (except for Scarecrow but that's for AK), a tiny sprinkle of Brucie Wayne right at the beginning, and an INCREDIBLE story that is generally agreed to be the best in the series. 

Things I Liked:

TONS of collectibles

Taliaaaaa my angelllll <<3

The side missions are really great

If you get the DLC, there's a special game section focused around Harley where you play as Tim’s Robin and it's super fun

The story is just. My god. It's so good. It's SO good. 

The map is massive and there's so much to do, I was still playing weeks after I finished the story

Things I Didn't Like:

As much as I loved the collectibles there's like over 400 of them in the game and I couldn't get all of them and it still pisses me off 

You have to play as Selina a few times in order to progress and she's like super weak compared to Bruce (not in a misogynistic way on my part I mean like she genuinely dies after like two good hits) and her dialogue annoys tf out of me. Sorry I'm a hater. 

Batman: Arkham Origins (2013)

My Personal Rating: 9/10

My Total Hours Played: 27.2

Steam Rating: Very Positive (89%)

Description: The third game in the Batman Arkham Series– but this one is a prequel! I actually played this one after Arkham Knight but. Shhh. Anyways, this game is based loosely off the world presented in the Batman: Year One comics, and follows a younger Bruce in his early days as Batman, including the origins (lol) to many of his greatest enemies as they try to hunt him down, with their efforts spearheaded by a certain someone behind the scenes. Also it's Christmas!

Play If You're Looking For: Little baby angsty Bruce being a problem child, a game where you get to punch cops, and tiny tiny tiny baby Babs being adorable (she's like twelve and she's so cute).

Things I Liked:

I don't usually care about the soundtracks for video games but. FUCK the music is good. It's all based on Christmas/Nutcracker music and it's really really cool

This game genuinely helped me get over a lot of really deeply ingrained trauma surrounding Christmas /gen

Fun little Mad Hatter side mission!

Batman and Riddler argue like teenage boys (because they are)

Alfred and Bruce's relationship has some genuinely really beautiful characterization in this and their arch is really enjoyable 

Things I Didn't Like:

FUCKING. BANE. HE HAS LIKE THREE SEPARATE BOSS FIGHTS AND THEY'RE ALL SO HARD AND SCARY AND AND AND AHHHH 

The graphics are a little iffy but to be fair my view was skewed bc I played this right after finishing Arkham Knight

Batman: Arkham Knight (2015)

My Personal Rating: 8.5/10

My Total Hours Played: 47.9

Steam Rating: Very Positive (91%)

Description: The fourth and (kind of) final installment of the Batman Arkham Series (not counting Arkham Shadow because idgaf). Scarecrow is back, and threatening Gotham with a new fear toxin compound, resulting in a mass evacuation… but something else is going on here too, and Batman has a new enemy who may be his most dangerous yet. 

Play If You're Looking For: agony, pain, suffering, nightmares, tears, emotional exhaustion, etc. 

Things I Liked:

Really well written story (it's just really traumatizing)

Some of the most beautiful graphics in any video game like. Ever.

The DLC suits are SO COOL, you can play as Flashpoint Batman….

Really really great fighting mechanics that make combat actually really enjoyable even though that's not really what I'm here for

Amazing side missions; there's basically a side mission for every mechanic in the game, so whatever your favorite part is there's a little section where that's pretty much all you do

Things I Didn't Like:

This game took me WEEKS to get through because the story is so painful it was genuinely not fun half the time 

The ending isn't very satisfying (to me)

You know the concept of the “all is lost moment” in story telling? Yeah, this game’s “all is lost moment” is like 80% of the game. Everything is lost like. Most of the time. 

Oh we're just not gonna talk about Talia. After all that shit in Arkham City. Okay. Cool. 

Selina is so annoying in this game, there's this whole side mission that's basically just her and it's really irritating

FUCK YOU EDWARD NYGMA THAT DRIVING COURSE WAS BULLSHIT AND I COULDN'T GET THROUGH IT NO MATTER HOW HARD I FUCKING TRIED

I actually just kinda hate driving games generally and there's a LOT of driving in this game but you get used to it eventually and it becomes easier

Gotham Knights (2022)

My Personal Rating: 10/10

My Total Hours Played: 46.9

Steam Rating: Mixed (68%)

Description: Batman is dead, leaving Dick, Jason, Barbara, Tim, and Alfred to pick up the pieces and finish what he started. 

Play If You're Looking For: Batfam content, a perfect mix of “holy shit I haven't cried this hard in years” and “this is the funniest thing anyone has ever produced ever, goofy dialogue and one liners, and casual queer rep.

Things I Liked:

The map is HUGE and genuinely feels so unbelievably alive in a way that I don't think any other Batman game even comes close to in its depiction of Gotham– like I could write ESSAYS about how well this game captures the experience of living in a big city like Gotham (let me know if you want me to make a post about that actually lol)

Collectibles that are actually reasonable and fun

Super fun side missions

Absolutely gorgeous graphics 

The characters can emote and all the Batkids have their own dance moves :( and Jason dances like he's 70 years old it's really cute :(

Even after completing everything in the entire story it's STILL fun to go patrolling because it keeps generating new crimes– premeditated or otherwise– for you to fight and it's really fun

The Batkids have a pride flag in their house ☹️ and Dick has a bi flag mug ☹️

Things I Didn't Like:

Literally everyone hates this game for NO FUCKING REASON it's genuinely fantastic you guys are just losers

Talia is unfortunately characterized kinda shitty and it makes me sad bc her design is incredible but she does some OOC stuff :(

You can customize your suit but not as extensively as I would've liked 

This game gets kinda hard to play at points because it's really hard to see your screen through all the tears (cough cough the last boss fight cough cough)

Batman: The Telltale Series (2016)

My Personal Rating: 5.7/10

My Total Hours Played: 9.1

Steam Rating: Very Positive (86%)

Description: A 5 episode point-and-click adventure following Bruce Wayne as he faces some of his biggest challenges, both as Bruce and as Batman. 

Play If You're Looking For: Minimal combat and story-centered gameplay.

Things I Liked:

I love love love the character designs in this game, this is actually one of my favorite versions of Bruce possibly ever

You get a lot of opportunities to make Bruce and Selina kiss in this game and I said no every single time and it was very gratifying for me 

Alfred and Bruce have an incredibly sweet father-son relationship (if you play your cards right, anyway) and it makes me really emotional because Bruce literally loses EVERYTHING over the course of this game and Alfred is there at his side the whole time

The ending was really satisfying overall and actually made me enjoy the game a lot more

Things I Didn't Like:

Chapters 2-4 are INCREDIBLY stressful, especially for me because A) there's an involuntary psych ward commitment and B) there are a lot of themes around the Wayne's developing a bad reputation and being hated, which are massively triggering for me personally and because I don't have the spoons to play through the whole thing at once I had to sit in that stress for a while before it concluded in-game

Batman: The Enemy Within (2017)

My Personal Rating: 4/10

My Total Hours Played: 10.2

Steam Rating: Very Positive (91%)

Description: The sequel to “Batman: The Telltale Series”. John Doe is let out of Arkham and seeks to take you up on that favor you promised him.

Play If You're Looking For: BatJokes, Angst, and a lot of “Is Batman Good For Gotham?” Stuff.

Things I Liked:

The opening chapter with Mori was kinda fun

I think Amanda Waller was written pretty well overall

Things I Didn't Like:

Fucking any of it lowkey 😭

Same as the other Telltale game tbh

For me, it was emotionally exhausting and really upsetting, but that's just kinda because I HATEEEE the “impossible choice” trope in any almost any media, I just never enjoy it, and there's a LOT of it in here

The ending made me wanna kms because there's literally no good option here what the fuck

Like I get that's the whole point but. Okay what if I kms what then. 

[theamityelf]

Wait. I just realized. In the Mini SDR2 AU, is Nagito there for everytime Makoto gears up to beat the shit out of Monokuma? Like his nice soft boy of an underclassman took a 180 in personality SO FAST it gave him whipwash!

At least I think it would be funny.

Also if he's more protective of Makoto would he try to warn Makoto about Kyoko lying to him or pointing out that she deliberately put him in danger with the closet stunt to see if the room was important to the mastermind (or something it's been a while since I've rewatched a let's play of it)?

MAKOTO'S TRIAL AND EXECUTION

Oh, yeah!

When Makoto tries to hit Monokuma, I'm imagining Nagito saying something like, "Whoa there! You're full of surprises, aren't you?" and laughing a little.

As far as being protective, I think initially he would mostly just say things like "You're very forgiving," and at most restate what just happened (like, "I see. So, she used you to see if the mastermind would defend the room.") to try to get a reaction from Makoto, who continues to kind of just roll with the punches.

When he foresees actual danger, he for some reason opts to encourage Makoto to take precautions rather than communicating that he foresees danger. For example, if he believed someone was planning to get Makoto alone to kill him (just an example) he would suggest, "Why don't you bring Asahina with you?" instead of telling him he thinks someone wants to kill him.

He doesn't trust Kyoko or Byakuya, but as his priorities shift from everyone's hope/potential to specifically Makoto surviving, his preference also shifts from Kyoko (who keeps proving herself again and again to excel in this game) to Byakuya (whose selfishness can at least be trusted to keep Makoto safe, once it's clear he cares about Makoto).

Makoto noticeably has a crush on both, and Nagito is very worried about him as a result. He keeps going back to them, no matter what they say and do. It isn't that Nagito doesn't see that Kyoko and Byakuya feel something for Makoto in return; he sees that they do. But just because they're endeared by him doesn't mean they pose no danger to him. It might mean the opposite.

Makoto's loyalty, his trust...Earlier in the game, Nagito would have been glad that his kouhai was willing to be a stepping stone, but now he's pretty stressed about it. I'd say the irony isn't lost on him, but honestly it probably is.

He prefers for Makoto to hang out with Hina or Taka. They both seem unlikely to harm him and capable of physically defending him, whereas for everyone else he isn't certain of at least one of those things. Makoto does hang out with them a lot. But he also hangs out with everyone else.

So, the trial and execution!

I'd say that Nagito would adamantly testify that he was with Makoto the whole time and he didn't kill anyone, but that makes things a little too easy, so I'm going to say that when Junko went to kill Makoto, she also took Nagito, chloroformed him, and left him in the middle of the hallway somewhere. So, when he wakes up, he has to take the time to make his way back to Makoto's room, at which point he can't get inside (because if the senpais can get under the doors, that's game changer), so he waits outside the door until Makoto comes out.

He doesn't let anyone see him, because he suspects someone is trying to frame Makoto for something, and he will not help them.

He's still going to insist that Makoto didn't kill Mukuro.

I'm going to say that when Makoto passes on calling out Kyoko's contradiction, Nagito actually tries to point it out himself, but Makoto speaks over him so he can't.

When Makoto is convicted of the murder he didn't commit, Nagito is angry. The mastermind is lying, the game is lying, the battle between hope and despair is reduced to meaningless nonsense, and the most hopeful person here is being sacrificed in its name. He wants to keep insisting that the verdict is wrong, but doing so wouldn't save Makoto. It would just mean that everyone else dies, too...which he's almost angry enough to want, but instead he just asks to be allowed to stay with Makoto in the execution.

Makoto shouldn't have to go through that alone. Nagito would be glad to go with him, and comfort him until the end.

But they don't let him do that.

Ibuki tries to comfort him while they watch Makoto near the block, but Nagito is stone-faced.

And when Makoto survives, all of the tension leaves Nagito's body at once, and he almost falls over.

And you know, I almost want to say that since Alter Ego hacked the system to save Makoto, it also hacked the pods in the basement so normal-sized Nagito wakes up and he can rush to the garbage room and save Makoto himself, because I think that would be really dramatic and fun.

[steddieas-shegoes]

The top of your blog says you're still taking requests,no pressure though of course: Eddie lives through the events of s4 and heals in the hospital, his name is cleared, Eddie spends his time with his uncle and his friends, plays games. He notices that Steve sort of remains on the back burner, shows up to little gatherings but keeps himself at a distance, busies himself with small tasks. Keeps the focus on Eddie, and is content to sort of stare at everyone, and not join in. Eddie gets worried and asks Robin whats up with Steve, why does he keep just standing in the corner or the kitchen smiling instead of joining in, I think he's bumming the kids out, Robin. And she has to calmly, and frightfully, remind him that Steve died over spring break. What are you talking about he's right there! I'd love a Ghost Steve who doesn't want to move on, wants to stay with his family. Doesn't want to be alone. Eddie is the only one who can see him at first(?)

OKAY SO THIS WAS SAD AS SHIT AND I LOVE THIS PREMISE. I especially love it because I have read A LOT of ghost Eddie fics, some where he was actually dead and some where it was a weird Upside Down thing and he was alive. I'm a big believer in happy endings so I went full speed ahead with the latter option for Steve. But since you requested ghost Steve not wanting to move on, I had to switch it up a bit to where Eddie couldn't just let it go. Still plenty of sad, but I had to make it hopeful and happy at the end because I am me. - Mickala ❤️

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

While Eddie was in the hospital, it felt like he was in a bubble. His uncle was the only one allowed to visit for the first week, and then the kids were able to come by when his name was cleared.

They weren’t themselves, a cloud of sadness around them, but that was to be expected with everything that had happened.

Dustin, especially, clung to him more than he expected.

He figured it would be rough, he did almost die, after all, but this was on another level.

Dustin was with him every day for hours, sometimes had to be dragged out by his mom who understood, but only in the way a person who doesn’t know about the Upside Down could.

Robin came by sometimes, a haunted look on her face, none of her usual energy anywhere to be seen.

He managed to get her to crack a small smile twice.

When he left the hospital, things somehow felt worse.

The government had provided him and Wayne a new trailer, nowhere near the trailer park, even managed to get Wayne a new truck since Eddie’s van had been destroyed and Wayne’s truck was on its last leg for the last year.

His name was cleared, but that didn’t mean people changed their mind about him.

He mostly stayed at home, didn’t even attempt to go to the store with Wayne or anywhere but Dustin’s house or the Byers’.

The kids started begging for normalcy in whatever ways they could: meeting up for movie night, bringing Hellfire back, dinner at the Byers’ house.

Eddie was on board with it, wanted to put everything in the past just as much as they did.

He went to movie night, at Robin’s house while her parents were out of town instead of at Steve’s.

Steve, who hadn’t visited him once while he was in the hospital, hadn’t made it to any hangouts with the kids, apparently was coping with everything by ignoring everyone.

Eddie would have to do something about it soon because the kids were clearly missing him.

Movie night was okay, but he decided to have the next one at his house.

He told Dustin to let everyone know, didn’t think he had to be specific about everyone.

Steve didn’t show up on time, which was unusual since he was usually Dustin and Lucas’ ride. They rode with Nancy and Mike.

Everyone settled in, Eddie started the movie and passed out popcorn, waved goodbye to Wayne on his way out the door to his night shift.

Everything felt okay, but without Steve, it didn’t feel right.

Eddie could admit to himself he had a crush on him. He had one on him in high school, but that was easy to ignore when he was an asshole.

Now, he knew Steve was a good guy, protected these kids and Robin and Nancy with his life and didn’t hesitate even when he should.

It wasn’t just a crush anymore, he realized that while he was in the hospital. It was full blown feelings. Love.

Eddie sat in Wayne’s recliner in the corner, keeping an eye on everyone through the movie. He glanced over to the kitchen and saw movement, but didn’t think anything of it.

They paused the movie halfway through for bathroom breaks and refills on snacks and drinks, and Eddie followed all the kids into the kitchen to get his own beer.

He was startled when he turned the corner and saw Steve smiling at him from the corner.

He didn’t want to say anything, figured the kids had already said hello and he was just letting them get their stuff first.

But it was kind of weird that he’d come in the backdoor of a trailer he’d never visited when he easily could have come in the front door. Eddie watched as Steve leaned against the wall of the kitchen, watching everyone move around without saying anything.

It was weird, especially because the smile seemed to transform from a genuine one to a sad one quickly.

He didn’t want to draw attention to it, didn’t know how much Steve let the kids see usually, so he turned to grab his own snack from the counter.

Robin was standing there, staring at him, eyebrows pinched together.

“What were you looking at?”

“Uh,” Eddie glanced back over and saw Steve frowning now. “Steve? Looking like a kicked puppy in the corner?”

Robin’s face went from confused to worried in a millisecond.

“What? What do you mean?”

“Steve.” Eddie gestured towards where Steve was still standing, but now he looked panicked, like he wanted to interrupt. “Please feel free to make me not look insane, Steve.”

Robin glanced over to the corner, then back at Eddie, tears in her eyes.

“Eddie,” she said, voice sad, like she was about to break the worst news in the world to him. Then, she did. “Steve died. Remember? We had to leave him.”

That can’t be right. He could’ve sworn Steve was there when he was being pushed through the gate, when he gained just enough consciousness to look around and take inventory of the people around him. Steve was there.

“When did he die? He was at the…with the bats…he was at the trailer…right?”

Eddie looked back in the corner and saw Steve looking down at the floor.

And then Robin was pulling him into a hug.

“Nobody told you. They were supposed to tell you. And we-” she let out a sob. “We just haven’t talked about it. It’s hard to. Last time we tried, Dustin had to be given anxiety meds. I’m sorry, Eddie. He’s gone.”

She was crying through the explanation, almost too much for him to understand what she was saying.

But he watched as Steve wiped at his eyes in the corner.

Like he was crying. Like he was there.

He knew Robin wasn’t lying, she would never lie about something like this, and it would explain a lot of the behavior of everyone and Steve’s absence up until this point.

“Robbie, I-” Eddie didn’t know if it would help or hurt her to know he could see Steve right now. He made a decision based on the way Steve was watching them now, his eyes wide and sad, like he would be crying if he could. “I can see him right now.”

Robin pulled away, looked at him, then over at the corner.

“Right now? He’s there right now?”

Eddie nodded.

“Can you hear him say anything?”

“No, he hasn’t said anything. I don’t think he can.”

Steve was still just staring at them, and Eddie knew he was stuck.

If he was truly dead, he wasn’t moving on the way people do. If he wasn’t dead, then something super weird was happening and he would have to get help from everyone.

But he didn’t want to involve the kids, not for this. Because if Steve was dead, like they thought, and they went through the trouble of trying to find him, they’d be hurting all over again.

But if he wasn’t.

“Robin, were you sure he was dead? No pulse or breathing, no movement?”

Robin’s eyes widened.

“I mean, I guess as sure as we could be with how rushed and emotional we were? Nancy couldn’t find a heartbeat and he wasn’t moving, and we waited as long as we could, but he didn’t wake up. Do you think he isn’t dead?”

Steve was watching them, his fingers tapping against his arms that were crossed over his chest.

“How long can someone survive down there?”

“Eddie, look. I already talked to Hopper about it. He said even if somehow Steve managed to survive his injuries, they were bad enough that he would have probably been found by something and attacked. And even if he survived that, he’s been down there without food and water and clean oxygen for a month. The fact that Will survived a week was a miracle.”

He didn’t push. He could hear it in Robin’s voice that she’d already thought of every possible outcome, probably even tried to plan a rescue mission at some point.

She couldn’t take the disappointment either.

Eddie dropped it for now, but he watched as Steve watched him.

He just had a feeling that this was more complicated than Steve being dead.

—-----------------------

He let himself mourn that night.

While he didn’t feel like Steve was dead, he knew that no matter what, Steve had been missing from all their lives for a month.

He cried for hours, he cried for Steve, for Dustin, for Robin, for Max, for everyone who Steve loved so much that he died for them.

Himself included.

Because that’s what it came down to: Steve died protecting them.

They all took a risk, but Steve paid the price.

It wasn’t fair. The guy who put everyone first was the first one gone.

Eddie finally fell asleep, but it was restless. He kept getting flashes of Steve in his dreams, his face bloody, his body bloody, his screams loud.

Which was weird for a lot of reasons, one of them being that he didn’t know what injuries Steve even had when he died. The ghost he saw in his kitchen earlier had just been Steve, not bloodied or broken or scared.

When he managed to get up, he went through the motions of his day: brush his teeth, shower, eat breakfast, do his stretches, play guitar, eat lunch, clean up, talk to Wayne.

But by dinner, he felt like he had to do something. He had to figure out why he felt this buzzing energy around him.

He waited until Wayne left to get their dinner at the diner and bring it home, then he called Robin.

“Robin, is there a gate open somewhere?”

“Seriously, Eddie.”

“I just need to know! Maybe you’re right, in fact, you probably are. But what if you aren’t? What if he’s stuck down there? What if he’s too hurt to find a way back here?”

Robin was silent, but Eddie didn’t let that deter him.

“I know you guys were pretty sure. And I know you wouldn’t have left if you didn’t believe he was dead. But you said yourself you were emotional and overwhelmed and feeling rushed because of everything happening. It’s not that far of a stretch to believe that he could be alive.”

“Eddie.”

Her voice was broken.

She didn’t want to believe him.

“Okay,” he sighed. “Okay.”

“I know it’s hard. It’ll get easier, I hope. His parents just sold the house, and his car, so. He’s gone. We have to accept that.”

“Okay.”

But it wasn’t okay.

He hung up with Robin, promised he would try to get some sleep, take care of himself. It was a lie.

He ate dinner with Wayne, pretended he was doing alright, pretended he didn’t still hear the echoes of Steve’s screams in his head.

Wayne left early for work, claimed he was picking up some overtime due to them being short staffed still after the quake. He said he wouldn’t be home until nine the next morning.

Eddie nodded and pretended to head to his room for the night.

He did a lot of pretending until he was alone.

Then, he got on the phone with El.

El had gotten attached to him while Max was in a coma, stopping by to talk to him after she’d spent an hour or so with Max. She saw him as a cool older brother, especially when she realized Hopper wasn’t his biggest fan.

“I need to know if there’s a gate open.”

“Eddie, I do not know if I can help with that,” El responded slowly, carefully.

“What if I say it’s for a really good reason?”

“I am sure it is, but I promised Dad I would not open one.”

“But what if there’s one already open?”

“There is not. I would feel it.”

Eddie sighed. He didn’t want to make El break a promise, but this was worth it.

He knew Hopper would forgive her and him if he was right.

“Has Will mentioned feeling anything weird?”

Sometimes Will felt things that even El couldn’t, usually things happening only in the Upside Down. Everyone’s running theory was that it was because of the time he spent down there.

“No, he just feels the usual.”

“What’s the usual?”

“It is just there. Sometimes it is more there than other times.”

“And right now? It isn’t more than other times?”

“I think it is just always more than other times since Vecna.”

Hm. That could be something.

“Why does it feel like more sometimes?”

“It is hard to say. Sometimes it is nothing, sometimes it is because something is moving and trying to get out.”

“Is it always a creature?”

“It always was before.”

“El, I think Steve’s alive.”

There, he said it. He said it to someone who could probably actually help him, who would would help him if she believed him.

“Why do you think that? They said he was not breathing.”

“I know, but, look. Robin even said that they were being rushed and were crying and could have missed something.”

“But it has been a month.”

“I saw him. In the kitchen.” He hated saying this to one of the kids. They all loved Steve so much and if he was wrong, he really didn’t want this to hurt her. “At movie night. He was there, but only I could see him. Robin said maybe it was a ghost, but it seemed too real.”

“It was Steve?”

“Even if he’s de-,” Eddie stopped. “Gone. If his body is where it was left, it should be put to rest here. And if it isn’t, and he’s alive, then we can save him.”

“But we will get caught.”

“Not if we do it tonight. Hopper works nights this week, right?”

“Yes.”

“So he won’t be home to know you’re gone. Will is over at Dustin’s. Jonathan is so high, he won’t notice you’re gone. Joyce will be asleep by ten. You can sneak out.”

“What if you get hurt? I cannot go down there.”

That was a valid concern.

They defeated Vecna, and the Mindflayer hadn’t been a problem since, but that didn’t mean the other creatures weren’t still prowling around down there.

Out of all of them, he had the least experience with them, and she had every right to be worried.

“I can handle it. I’ll bring Steve’s bat.”

—------------------------

He met El in the woods behind the cabin they were staying in. Hopper had redone it, adding two bedrooms and a bathroom so they could all fit more comfortably.

They silently hugged and kept walking further, away from any chance of being seen or heard.

El warned him that opening the gate was risky in other ways too. She had a lot of control over her powers, but sometimes using this much strength would leave her too tired to close it again, and they couldn’t leave a gate open for longer than it took for Eddie to get in, check for Steve, and get out.

They also ran the risk of her using a little too much power and making a gate that was too big for her to close at all.

But these were risks Eddie deemed worth it, and with some convincing, El did too.

They found a small clearing, big enough to make a gate that Eddie could fit through.

He didn’t let himself stop to think about the last time he was being pushed through a gate, how he was bleeding out and barely breathing. He only thought about how Steve was down there, dead or alive, and didn’t deserve to be.

“Are you ready?” El asked him, her hands digging into the earth below her.

“Ready.”

“Two hours. If you are not back in two hours, I call Hopper.”

That was the deal. That was the only way she agreed to do this.

He knew if it came down to him being gone for more than two hours, he’d probably be grateful to see Hopper.

“Got it.”

El nodded and closed her eyes.

The ground started shaking, Eddie held back the panic, and suddenly El was staring up at him, blood dripping from her nose, smiling.

The ground had opened between them, just big enough for Eddie to slip through, small enough for El to cover with sticks and leaves if someone came looking before their time was up.

“You will come back in two hours.”

“Sure thing, supergirl. With Steve, hopefully.”

“With Steve,” she added with a small smile.

Eddie didn’t think anymore.

He dropped himself down, ignoring the sinking feeling in his stomach when everything turned upside down on him.

He didn’t let himself hesitate, even though he wanted to.

He had a lot of ground to cover in a short amount of time, and if Steve was alive, he could be anywhere.

But he walked towards where Robin and Nancy had left him. It would at least confirm if he was dead, his body hopefully would still be there if so.

It was only two miles, but Eddie was never a very fast runner. The first mile went surprisingly well, much faster than he expected to be able to do it. But during mile two, he felt his legs shaking.

He was still technically healing, the physical therapy stretches he did every morning further proof that he still had a long way to go before he was completely recovered.

But he pushed through it, knowing that the way back would be worse and he couldn’t waste time now.

But when he got to the area between the Creel house and the trailer park, he saw no sign of Steve, or anything for that matter.

There weren’t even vines or dead creatures around.

He tried to remain calm.

Steve had been alive when they left him here.

He may not be now, but he had been.

That felt worse.

He pushed that aside and decided to run to the trailer park.

Steve wouldn’t have gone in the direction of the Creel house, and he wouldn’t have wandered aimlessly no matter how much blood he’d lost.

He would have gone to the place he knew they would be in hopes the gate was still open.

The trailer park had always been kind of eerie, even in broad daylight, so the Upside Down version was downright horrific.

Eddie ran directly to his old trailer, hoped that somehow Steve found shelter here.

It looked worse than what he remembered, blood on the floor from when they were half dragging, half carrying him after being a meal for the bats.

The door had been kicked in at some point, and he wasn’t sure how or when that could have happened after they left.

He almost didn’t want to know unless-

He could hear movement in the back bedroom. His bedroom.

It could be anything. Wind blowing through a broken window, a creature he wasn’t entirely prepared to kill, Steve.

God, he hoped it was Steve.

He slowly walked towards the bedroom, his hands shaking where they were holding on tight to the bat.

The door was open a few inches, and he could hear the movement more clearly.

It sounded like someone was in bed, shifting in the sheets.

Holy shit.

He pushed the door open.

Holy shit.

“Steve!”

Eddie dropped the bat and ran to the bed, only stopping himself from jumping onto it when he saw the blood.

There was a lot, though most of it looked old, like maybe Steve had crawled here and then couldn’t quite find his way back out.

Steve was pale. It was dark, and hard to make out a lot of details, but he could see that he was deathly pale.

“Steve?”

“Eddie?”

“Holy shit, Jesus Christ, Steve. Where are you bleeding from?”

“Um, I think my leg? And my stomach.”

His voice was raspy, sort of nasally like he was coming down with a cold. Could you catch a cold from being down here? Probably.

Eddie’s hands hovered over the sheets, ready to move them so he could try to help, when Steve suddenly turned on his side and threw up.

“Shit. Hold on, let me help you sit up.”

“Sorry. Sorry.”

Steve was crying, and Eddie didn’t know what to do.

He took a deep breath.

“You don’t have to apologize, Stevie. I’m sorry you’ve been stuck here. Can I check your heartbeat?”

Eddie needed to see if it was ridiculously fast or slow, needed to determine how quickly he had to move them out of here, if he could take a few extra minutes to try to patch him up or if he just had to put him on his back and run.

Steve held his wrist towards him and Eddie quickly found his pulse.

He counted like a kind nurse showed him while he was in the hospital, filed away for future emergencies so he could be useful.

“It’s a little fast, but I think that’s normal for the situation. Let’s get you up and we can go.”

“Go how?”

“You can hop on my back.”

“I-”

“Steve, it’s not up for debate. You’re coming back with me and I don’t care if it means I break my back.”

Steve nodded once, his eyes closing as if he was just too exhausted to fight.

Eddie was sure he was.

Even if he managed to sleep here, it couldn’t have been well. It’s hard to rest when you know scary monsters are just outside the door.

“Tired,” Steve said, almost like he could read Eddie’s mind.

Hell, maybe he could after spending so much time down here.

Something to test later.

He checked his clock. Still had almost an hour and a half to get back to the gate.

“Have you had anything to eat or drink lately?”

“Found some water four days ago I think? Maybe five. Managed to stretch it until yesterday. Food’s been gone for days.”

How was he not passed out?

“How much of this blood is yours?”

“All of it.”

Awesome.

Eddie felt his forehead. He had a fever.

Even more awesome.

He probably had infections, which can be treated if you get them taken care of quickly, but he could have had them for weeks by now.

Cool.

“Alright, on three, wrap your arms around my neck and your legs around my waist. I’m gonna lift, and I just need you to try to keep leaning forward while I get you on my back.”

“Mkay.”

“And you cannot close your eyes. You hear me, Steve?”

Steve didn’t answer.

“Sweetheart, I need you to talk to me.”

“Mhm. Eyes stay open.”

“And mouth keeps moving. Alright,” Eddie helped him out a bit by placing his arms around his neck. “One…two…three.”

He lifted, and huffed out a sharp breath when his ribs started aching almost immediately.

“Okay?” Steve whispered against his neck.

“I’m okay. You?”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” Eddie let himself take one calming breath, just enough to get himself back on track. “Talk to me.”

“Hurts.”

“I know, love, but I need to know you haven’t passed out,” Eddie said sympathetically.

“Wanna hold your hand.”

God, okay. He could handle that.

He could.

“Okay, one hand for a minute. I need them both to hold you up though.”

He moved one hand up to his chest, where Steve’s hands were sort of dangling. He let his thumb run along the side of Steve’s hands, then Steve grabbed it and squeezed, surprising strength behind it.

“Is Dustin okay?”

Jesus Christ, this guy was half dead and still asking if others were okay.

“Yeah, he’s doing okay. Misses you, though.”

“Miss him.”

“Max is gonna be mad you came back from the dead in a more impressive way than her.”

“She can win.”

Eddie let out a laugh and tugged his hand back to adjust Steve on his back.

They had barely made it out of the trailer park and Eddie’s legs were shaking. He could do it though, he had no choice.

“How long?” Steve asked.

“A month.”

“Robin?”

“She’s hurting. She thought I was crazy. Didn’t wanna come because she didn’t wanna see you like she left you.”

“Not dead though.”

“Nope, not unless dead people can talk down here.”

Steve’s breath was hot against his neck, tickling him and sending chills down his back.

“You?”

“What about me?”

“Hurt?”

Steve’s voice was getting more strained, like he was doing his best to still talk but it was causing a lot of pain for him to do so.

“I was really hurt, yeah.”

“Still?”

“Not as much. Just a little.”

“Love me?”

Eddie knew he was losing it. The pain, the dehydration and hunger, the deliriousness. Steve didn’t have a clue what he was saying.

“What?”

“You love me?”

“Um.”

Steve squeezed his legs around Eddie’s hips.

“Came back. Love me.”

When it was put like that, yeah, Eddie guessed it seemed kind of obvious.

“Just a little.”

He could sense the eyeroll Steve wanted to give, but didn’t quite have the energy.

“I saw you. In my kitchen. Were you there?”

“Dunno.”

“Did you dream about it?”

“Just you. Kids. Robin. Missed you.”

“We all missed you.”

Eddie was making more progress, his determination to get Steve medical attention far outweighing any weakness or pain he was feeling.

“Ow.”

“What hurts, sweetheart?”

“Stomach.”

“Bites?”

“Mhm.”

Eddie could feel where the blood was soaking through his shirt, but he knew it wasn’t so much that he couldn’t at least make it through the gate before bandaging it up. He’d made it this long with them out, another 30 minutes wouldn’t kill him.

Hopefully.

Steve was quiet again, but he was breathing against Eddie’s neck steadily, so he didn’t push.

“Man, you won’t believe the place they gave me and Wayne. It’s got two bedrooms. And we have a whole kitchen instead of just a small counter area with a stove and fridge. Maybe you can cook us dinner when you’re better, you know, as a thanks for rescuing you.”

“Not a good cook.”

“I don’t believe that. Robin said you made her chicken parmesan from scratch for her birthday.”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, so chicken parmesan, my kitchen, soon.”

“Soon.”

They were close, creeping into the edge of the woods, and Eddie was trying not to panic at Steve’s silence.

“Stevie, just a few more minutes. Tell me about the first thing you wanna do when you’re back.”

“Mmm.” Steve’s head rolled back and forth like he was trying to focus. “Kiss you.”

“That can be arranged. What else?”

“Hug Dustin. Love him.”

“Yeah, he could use that.”

“Hug Robin. Love her.”

“She could use that, too.”

“Hug you, love you.”

He wouldn’t hold Steve to this, he wouldn’t. But it would hurt so much when Steve forgot about this whole conversation.

He bit his lip and nodded.

“Yeah, I could use that.”

Steve’s lips were pressed against his neck, most likely accidental, but Eddie let himself pretend for a moment it was a kiss.

When he reached the gate, he whistled to get El’s attention.

“Oh! Eddie, is that…”

“He’s alive. Really hurt and needs water and food. I need to get him through.”

El was prepared with everything and it only took a couple of minutes for them to get through the gate, Steve whimpering slightly as they moved him around.

“You were right.”

El seemed surprised, like she had only done this to give Eddie closure. She hadn’t expected Steve to be alive.

“He loves me,” Steve said.

El looked at Eddie, then at Steve, then back to Eddie.

“You love him?”

“I do. And I’ll love him a lot more if he stays alive. We have to get him to the hospital.”

“I can call Hopper?”

“Tell him to meet us at the cabin with an ambulance.”

“Jus’ need sleep.”

Eddie looked at Steve, mouth open in disbelief.

“You’re going to the hospital.”

“Sleep.”

“I’m not arguing with you. You can barely form a sentence. You’re going to the hospital.”

“You come?”

“I won’t leave your side.”

Eddie put him on his back again so he could walk towards the cabin, hopeful that Hopper wouldn’t ask a lot of questions until they got Steve taken care of.

“He is on his way!” El yelled from the porch, Joyce coming up behind her, hair a mess from being asleep.

When she saw Steve, her eyes widened and she nearly tripped running down the stairs.

“Oh God, Steve! Honey, are you okay? Of course not, you can’t even walk. You’re bleeding!”

“Mrs. Byers, can you get him some water maybe please?”

“Yes! Oh my God!”

She was running back up the stairs, mumbling to herself the whole way.

El giggled as she watched.

Eddie loved her.

He could hear sirens in the distance, and he hoped he would be able to ride with Steve.

He shouldn’t have to be alone anymore.

Steve’s eyes were closed, but Eddie kept his fingers on his pulse, making sure he didn’t have any changes while the sirens got closer.

Hopper’s patrol car arrived first, barely in park before Hopper was jumping out and running to where Eddie was cradling Steve.

Joyce came out with the water and handed it to Eddie.

“Dammit, why would you go down there alone? You know the rules.”

Eddie ignored him, just focused on getting some water past Steve’s lips.

“C’mon, sweetheart. Just a few sips.”

Steve’s lips moved, then he swallowed some of the water.

“There ya go. Good job.”

Hopper was watching in silence now, Joyce with her arm around him.

Eddie knew they were wondering how the hell they would ever get over leaving Steve behind.

The ambulance pulled up next, EMTs rushing out and asking Eddie question after question.

He had to keep it simple: found him in the woods, must’ve been out there since the quake with the injuries and level of dehydration. They took him at his word.

When they loaded Steve up, they let Eddie in only because Hopper insisted.

“I’ll be right behind you.”

And he was.

Eddie kept his eyes on Steve the whole time, but he could see the lights of Hopper’s police car in the window next to him.

Steve’s eyes fluttered open a few times as they hooked him up to oxygen and an IV, kept checking his vitals.

Eddie smiled at him each time, made sure he knew he was there and he loved him.

—---------------------------

It was two days before Steve woke up again.

The wounds weren’t bad, but they were infected, which was why they kept randomly bleeding despite not being very deep.

The infection was actually the worst of it, but it had potential to be life threatening if they couldn’t get it under control.

They pumped him full of pain relievers and antibiotics, fluids and nutrients.

Eddie sat by his bed the whole time.

None of the kids were allowed in yet, doctor’s and Hopper’s orders, but he heard Dustin in the hall multiple times a day giving it his best shot.

Robin hadn’t come by yet. Eddie knew she felt guilty, immensely so. She left her best friend down there, suffering, and didn’t even think to double check when it was safe to do so.

Eddie didn’t blame her, and he knew Steve wouldn’t either, but Robin would.

But when Steve’s eyes finally opened, bloodshot and glassy from his IV concoction, he smiled at Eddie.

“Love me?”

“Just a little.”

He fell back asleep a few minutes later, holding Eddie’s hand like a lifeline.

—------------------------

It took another four days before the doctors said he could be around others. His infection symptoms had gotten better and they believed the worst was over.

Eddie called Robin and told her to bring Dustin, no arguing. Steve was asking for them.

It wasn’t a lie, but he may have exaggerated it slightly just to get them here.

And when they did show up, everyone cried.

Robin collapsed next to the bed while Dustin folded himself against Steve the moment he was given permission to.

Eddie just watched from his chair, took in the way Steve comforted them despite the fact he was still in the hospital after spending a month alone in the Upside Down.

That was just who Steve was.

It probably wasn’t healthy, but it’s why Eddie loved him. Just a little.

[flo-zoinks]

Merry Christmas Zoinky!! 🎄🫂❤️

I would love to hear you yap about your thoughts on Reverend please 🙏🙏

MERRY CHRISTMAS AOIOOZORA❤❤❤❤❤❤❤🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 SORRY IM A BIT LATE I LOVE UR ASKS

I've had such a moving relationship with Swanson as I've played - I started by HATING him because of the interaction he has with Javier (I'd only caught about some of it and thought him telling his 'Mexican friend' as he says to repent was for being Mexican). But I've defo grown to love my boy so I'm very grateful for this ask thank you!!!

One thing I adore about his character is his parallels with Dutch - how both of them seem to be in always completely opposite situations. Whilst at the start Dutch is seen as loving, respectable and driven, Reverend on the other hand is presented as shameful, shallow and hopeless (essentially the complete opposite.) Dutch knows and is confident in his ideals and how he will lives accordingly, whilst Swanson is shown multiple times in almost comedic oxymorons with his actions to beliefs, like when his bible opened to contain recreational drugs.

However, as Dutch comes down, Swanson goes up. As Dutch falls and betrays his own beliefs on family for instance, such as leaving Arthur to die, Swanson instead finds truth in his faith and gets sober, doing actions such as preaching to people like Arthur wisely. I think this is to show perhaps the effect of their characters different mindsets, or just overall views. Dutch believes his problems are not him, but everyone else. He believes hes somehow perfect, and will change his ideals to make himself feel perfect - ultimately becoming his downfall as he goes against everyone and runs to live in a cave. Swanson, though, is only harmful to himself, and takes full accountability for his own actions. This means he is able to see his problems, and when he can stop the shit he throws at himself and solve them. So Swanson is able to heal, and become the best version of himself learning from his mistakes and changing accordingly.

If I'm being honest too, his relationship with his Faith is one I've always related to a little. He struggles in the beginning to understand why a God would cause his life to go so astray and horrendous while he, in comparison to so many others, chose to become a man of the cloth and dedicate himself to his faith - proven as he makes comments like "I feel like if God really loved me he would've struck me down years ago" (paraphrasing). But growing and healing himself to a newer version allows him to refind that security in his God, becoming someone with so much to be grateful for (like his own Church) when he commits to changing. But that's just me.. - yet because of that hes always had a little place in my heart 😭❤❤

I personally love his character in the camp, whilst at the start I struggled to understand why the game (and mostly Dutch) would add a reverend with no criminal skills or monetary skills to the camp, rendering his character quite useless in a good number of missions. Continuing however, and seeing his character as one representing much more than just a 'drunk gone sober yipee', I think is very poetically tied in with the main plot. He's a prime example of the layers in every character in RDR, as hes so much more than just that. Even whilst a drunk, whilst still sometimes causing harm to those around him, he purposely tries to prevent everyone else being wrapped in his issues, and tries to be a help during Colter in the ways he can. I had no idea during my first play though that the Reverend reading passages to the gang and helping John with his morphine (now I sound like an idiot) would be a 'low life' addict, and that definitely shocked me. Even whilst he's considered healed, when Strauss tries to talk to him about his own worries Swanson is a little ignorant, and instead yaps about his own journey and ignores Strauss trying to talk. That little interaction though had me surprised at how well he had changed as when Strauss asked to talk his immediate reaction to shut his book and say "yes, of course", getting up was starkly different to their other interaction in chapter 2 in which he calls Strauss a horrible man for not giving him money for drugs. Especially since Strauss by all holy books is perhaps the definition of sin, preying on the poor and showing little empathy, Swanson sees the good in him that other's don't and turns the other cheek to kindness as his Holy book preaches time and time again. It also presents how much he actually took the beliefs to heart, as many people who identify themselves as Christians (no matter where you go, trust me I know) will often be ignorant of some rules to hate on "those who deserve it", or do the bad thing when it's easy. But Swanson doesn't, and works hard to take in and do the option according to his beliefs, even if the harder option like showing kindness to the face that insult you. Yet of course, hes still not perfect at the end, which to me solidifies him as an examples of the amount of depth in each rdr2 character

Finally can I just say

🙏him in chapter 6..😔Zoo..wee...mama...

Thanks for letting me yap!! What do you think about him??? I would love to know 😚😚 HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

[fierceawakening]

So I was poking around YouTube and I came across a vid from someone I used to watch periodically entitled "How I Stopped Being Anti-Woke" (or something to that effect).

It was fascinating.

Those of you who've known me for a long time know I used to be an outspoken atheist who never missed an episode of The Thinking Atheist and watched presentations from cons with envy.

(Influenced in part by some things I read by Jews on Tumblr about how you can find meaning in religious practice without believing God exists, I ultimately went back to the church I grew up in. I still think God is a story, but I always liked the way they used that story to tell you to be kind and patient, and only left because I thought they didn't want people around who didn't think God was real. Since I went back I've mentioned I'm not sure and I tend to just get shrugs, so I figure I'm welcome until someone gets mad at me.)

I had a bit of a... I won't say front row seat, as by that time I wasn't as intense about consuming everything anyone put out, I was mostly just a fan of Seth and sometimes watching things he recommended because I thought he had good judgment, but I did kind of observe the shift rightward from the sidelines and not like it.

The video I watched the other day brought up the whole brouhaha about Anita Sarkeesian, and how a LOT of the people who were offended by her very existence happened to be content creators in the YouTube atheist community.

I don't have my dates exact here, but around the time Anita was big, I'd been part of and left a feminist online community that I now feel was leaning pretty culty. I'd been in a community that was very aware of Messages in Media, and there was still a bit of me that thought they had a point, but I was also very aware of how people could use what fandoms you were in or what you said about them to get you shunned and purged. (People may or may not believe me on this, but there was one LiveJournal communiy, feminist_rage, where when someone got banned an announcement went out to the whole community, and people would frequently make fun of that person in the comments to the ban announcement. When you think you're saving the world, you do terrible stuff very routinely.)

So I didn't like Sarkeesian much. I loved video games and nerd shit, and as a (probably?) girl I'd been sad at the lack of playable women all my life so I couldn't despise her utterly, but I did sometimes just feel tired and like "sure it's not ideal, but please stop telling people I can't abide playing as a grizzled taciturn white man whose wife was killed. It's not THAT bad."

But I noticed something in my YouTube recs that was... distressing and confusing.

It used to be I'd watch the Thinking Atheist episode for the week or catch up on some I'd missed and get recommended videos I really liked about critical thinking or logical fallacies or how you could spot when someone trying to Help You Find Jesus was saying something that sounded convincing but wasn't rational. I'd watch these with great interest. I liked thinking about thinking, and I'd been taken in by religion when I was too young to feel comfortable asking the adults when THEY'D seen Jesus, but also taken in by high control feminism when I SHOULD have been old enough to feel comfortable asking how we'd be able to tell when the patriarchy started ceding ground. I wanted to be as rational as I could make myself.

But I started seeing recs for people... talking about Sarkeesian.

They started out using that magic word rational and rationality, arguing that Sarkeesian wasn't demonstrating it. And I'd kind of agree. Some of her vids annoyed me too!

But then a funny thing would happen. The guy in the video would lose his temper. He'd start screaming, and he would not stop.

And I'd sit there thinking, "Toto, I don't think we're in Rationality anymore. "

I was shocked and horrified. We were supposed to know betetr! We were the ones constantly making, reviewing, and putting into practice guides to critical thinking! We were the ones who didn't want comforting stories about gods "as a crutch!"

(Nota Bene: I now absolutely think telling yourself comforting stories is fine, and am baffled by my former belief that there was something wrong with them. I came closer to suicide in 2016 than I ever have before or since, and I ABSOLUTELY went to church EXPLICITLY BECAUSE I knew I needed someone to tell me a comforting story and needed it too much to let my pride get in the way--and I don't believe I'm any weaker today than I was then.)

And yet here we were screaming for 45 minutes at a go because some lady wanted more playable women in video games.

At first I thought it was just this one guy, Thunderfoot. Erotically obsessed with someone he couldn't have, I figured, as he'd have to admit feminism had a point or two to have a chance and his pride wouldn't let him do that, so the next best thing was letting his rageboner overflow on camera.

But there started to be more and more of them.

To the point where, by the time I bothered to look back... they were MAGA. The most irrational, social herd, emotion driven, movement I had ever seen in my lifespan.

I dunno. I feel like I should have a lesson here. I don't have one.

Years ago I would've called it "don't lose your empathy." Or "don't forget that if you try to turn off your emotions, they start messing with your reason and making what they like look rational."

But people pushed back so hard on those things and mistreated me so much I'm just tired now.

I guess the thing is: look out for the angry people. If you keep them around, make sure they're the catalysts, never the brains of your operation.

[nightofnyx8]

Does spy x family/ twiyor give you fma/ royai vibes? I don't know if my brain is just addled by royai fic love, but they feel similar somehow.

Maybe it's the tragedy of war in both stories, the forbidden love (that's bound to happen between twiyor and if it doesnt I'll be mad) between two people with blood on their hands.

I've seen hilarious (sad) comparisons between Nina and Anya of cute girl and big white dog, but that's not really what gives me the vibes.

I'm now diving into the manga but I saw some spoilers for Twilight's rough past that made me go 'oh shit... things can get dark'.

I just want someone who's better at analyzing things and studying characters (love ALL your fics btw) to tell me if I'm out of my mind or point out what I'm missing.

*takes a huge breath*

OKAY SO LIKE I was totally against watching Spy x Family at first because it was "mainstream" (it was a very stressful semester of college in my defense) until I saw this fanart by @mochidoodle, twiyor paralleling that royai moment in fma. From that point on, I was a goner. So while I do mostly write twiyor fics at the moment, my love for them is largely colored by my love for royai.

First up, Loid and Roy. On the surface, very different people. One overthinks everything and plans to the tiniest detail, while the other lives off of 99% pure impulse. Loid is a very serious and private person by nature, and while Roy definitely has his solemn moments, it's kind of his whole game to act like the immature colonel playboy of the military before he brings down the entire government with his real motive ("surprise, bitches!"). The main difference I'd say is that Roy knows what he wants, and has a very clear goal how to get there. Loid doesn't. He's still torn between his mission and his family, and doesn't even know who he really is. Like we don't even know his real name lol.

Yor and Riza are also very different. Riza is the voice of reason with Roy (and he definitely needs it). Her personality is actually more aligned with Loid's in that way--quiet, serious, and reserved. Both are them are very good shots. However, she and Yor both don't very highly of themselves at all. Both of them are very compassionate and kind in their own way, and both of them have a soft spot for children. However, Riza's overwhelming guilt comes from her choices in the Ishvalan War, whereas I think Yor almost...intentionally blocks out the brutality of what she has to do to keep her brother alive.

Which brings me to the topic of war in both series (spoiler alert).

Both FMA and Spy x Family are very antiwar. Neither of them glorifies warfare. Casualties and consequences are not treated lightly. Progranda plays a huge role. Both series are trying to prevent another war from happening. For the sake of the argument, I'm going to refer to Yor as a soldier as well as Loid because she is still putting her life on the line for her country (she even says her job is comparable to that of a soldier in the manga). The biggest difference is that Roy and Riza chose to do the things they did in Ishval. Loid and Yor did as well, however it was more their circumstances that pushed them into that decision. Loid lost his mother as a child and crawled around in the streets for years before finally joining the military, only to lose everyone he ever cared about. Yor did it because it was only way to save her brother from literally starving to death. The war between Ostania and Westalis forced literal children to become soldiers (and that's kind of Endo's shtick--what war does to children). Roy and Riza...I mean, there's a reason why their fate is so tragic. They literally committed genocide. Yes, their reasonings are far more complex than this little lecture has room for, but it sufficeth to say that their burden is immensely heavy (I'm not even going to get into how Riza's burnt tattoo fits into the tragedy of their relationship and their choices because it's going to make me cry). But that is FMA's whole thing: Choice. What makes us root for Roy and Riza despite everything? Because despite impossible odds, they are working for a future where something like the Ishvalan War will never happen again, even if they end up being sentenced to death along the way.

Now going back to Spy x Family, the plot doesn't center around a global scale like FMA does. Yes, the tension between the East and West is a huge part of it, but most of the story is centered around one little family. It's important to remember that FMA isn't royai's story--it's Ed and Al's. Roy and Riza's character arcs are mostly complete even by the beginning of the manga. Loid and Yor's and Anya's are not.

But you really did hit the mark when you said royai colors our love for twiyor because both couples are two people who care very deeply for one another but can never be together. Roy and Riza can never get married due to military regulations. And the fake marriage between Loid and Yor will end once Operation Strix is finished (or so Loid thinks). But it's not really the mission or the military that's keeping them apart. One of my favorite royai authors @lantur wrote such an amazing royai fic outlining the fact that Riza being Roy's subordinate isn't actually the thing keeping them apart. Those two have such a painful, shared history. (I mean, he literally burnt the tattoo off her back after using the knowledge of it to commit genocide, for which Riza feels partly responsible). And yet they are fiercely loyal to each other. They don't need to kiss or fuck to know how much these two love each other. (On screen I mean...you cannot tell me they didn't at least have one night together).

With Loid and Yor, it's not nearly as heavy. But Loid (or rather, Twilight) does carry the weight of the world on his shoulders. He feels it's his sole responsibility to bring about a world full of peace, and he will not deviate from that mission. But of course he's getting more attached (who wouldn't) and he's eventually going to have to choose between his forged little family and the rest of the world. To most, maybe that's a simple decision. But you have to remember that Twilight is one who is going to have to change the most out of the Forgers. His decision to love them changes everything. It actually brings up an interesting point if royai did have a child. Would they still choose to put themselves on trial if it meant the possibility of leaving their child an orphan?

Spy x Family is about, well, families. The strength that comes from when broken people decide to heal each other and create a future for their child that's bright and safe and warm. And that directly parallels with FMA because it doesn't always have to be blood-related families, but the bonds you choose to forge (pun intended). And though I hope for royai to have a nice, quiet life in the country somewhere, laughing and growing old together, it's left ambiguous for a reason. Twiyor on the other hand, well let's just say that my heart keeps telling me that their happy ending is coming, but they're going to have to go through a lot of pain and angst and denial of feelings to get there. It's a comedy, so I expect Endo will get them together eventually, it's the when that's the mystery.

So I guess to wrap up this very lengthy answer, while royai and twiyor are different on the surface, they are similar at their core. Fighting for a better world, creating their own families along the way, and sharing little moments of devotion through their daily lives. Because though the series is nowhere near being done, you know Loid would look at Yor like she's the moon and the stars once he finally realizes he loves her.

Thanks for letting me rant about something I feel very passionate about, and I'll probably add to it if I think of more reasons lol. I'm glad you enjoy my fics, that's very sweet of you to say! Have a wonderful weekend! <3

[isagi-fan-page]

HOLY SHIT THERE'S AN ISAGI FANPAGE??

..sorry lol. anyway, im a big big isagi fan, so i was wondering: what are (in your opinion) the best/worst takes or characterizations you've seen about our beloved striker isagi yoichi?

YES THERE IS AN ISAGI FAN PAGE!!! I love making fan pages <3 I have many

Uh quick note tho: most of the characterization of him I've seen has been via fanfics so I'm not 100% sure about how Tumblr views him, so when I say "the fandom" I mean the fandom I've seen from tag searching ao3

From what I've seen there's 3-4 main ways the fandom takes him and thats: 1 uwu soccer boi twying his best, 2 RAHHH SEX GOD, 3 [insert love interest] omg I live for you never leave meeee, 4 shy boy whos good at shit. Which isn't that bad tbh, other fandoms wouldn't even get close to his character, so while I kinda tear at those interpretations they aren't so far from the mark.

1 I think is mostly from anime onlys because at the start of the anime he's kinda like that and people tend to run w/ their first grasp on a character, also his low self esteem and repetitive losses throughout the season can very easily feed into that. However in the manga as the series carries on he gets more and more skills, he gets more egotistical and confident in his own abilities. So seeing this version annoys me because if anyone in this series is gonna be like that it's Igaguri I mean

Look at him, but even then that'd be a stretch.

2 is just frustrating to see everywhere like calm down

3 stems from wanting to ship characters but not knowing how to write individual ships, so the writer defaults back to a cookie cutter dynamic and sorta fits the characters. It happens in every fandom, with every ship. At least once. It's like rule 34 but the porn is optional.

Ah but it doesn't fit Isagi because he's more than capable of leaving people behind if that's what's best for him, it wouldn't be personal for example him and Bachira play against each other all the time and they play to win but they're both still close after the game. He's able to detach emotions from leaving someone behind which is why when they show up again later he's genuinely happy for them, he still likes them. So for Isagi to be like "nOoOooooo I neeeeeeeeeeedddd youuuuuu" it doesn't make sense. And in regards to the 3v3 game against Rin. He was upset about Bachira being taken I think if Bachira had chosen to be on a different team he wouldn't have been so pissed.

4 is just episode 1 and 2. He outgrows his "shyness" immediately, but it is the closest to canon imo. Because Isagi isn't shy per say but he is aware of his limitations (most of the time) which means he does change his plans to accommodate that, not exactly shy but I can see how one could read it that way.

As a bonus I don't mind the chatfics but I'd like if they gave them text accents. I think Isagi is a no punctuation but uses capitalization For Emphasis kinda guy.

Sorry if I didn't answer this how you wanted but I love yapping about characterization.

I was gonna say how I'd personally characterize Isagi but this is already several paragraphs longer than I'd planned so. another day.

[y-rhywbeth2]

Yanno, you're the person I thought to turn to first when confronted with this. We've never spoken, but hello, I love your lore dives to death.

So. Just. I'm trying to do some crazy shit with my fic. I've been deep diving. And well... The Second Sundering. Are we just... did that happen in BG3? XD It seems like a big deal that happens a few years before current day, which is during things like Blood in Baldur's Gate, and all the stuff with Durge and Gortash. And just... eh?

I'll leave it there for now and ignore all the smaller side questions I'd love your opinion on sometime.

Hi! So BG3 is very shrodingers canon, and FR video games - while official licensed products - have a very vague and loose relationship to main canon (are the events of, say, Hordes of the Underdark or Icewind Dale II canon, or no? Hard to tell though it mostly seems to be no. The outline of the original Baldur's Gate games is, for better or worse canon (most original players traditionally vote 'worse'), but the actual game 'Baldur's Gate' and the published canon 'Baldur's Gate' are different beasts.

So official canon says that we had the Second Sundering, the dead three are back, Torlin Silvershield became Chosen of Bhaal for a brief period of time before his murder, and the Dead Three are back together and walk the world Time of Troubles style in order to get around Ao's new restrictions on divine interference for [mysterious reasons]. Ed Greenwood suggests that despite being the self-styled leader, Bane is unlikely to have come up with the idea himself, which makes me wonder which one did.

BG3 seems to have had the Second Sundering: I'm pretty sure there's a book that mentions it in-game, and Bhaal and Myrkul are showing too much power for vestiges. We also have a line from Withers, if it's still there, that the three are walking Faerûn in 'mortal' form (which, based on the last time they did that is not to be confused with no longer being gods or being at all easy to kill, just means they're hanging around in physical form and their power and divine senses are limited).

But it says that and then doesn't actually seem to think about it. It's like the Sundering happened, but not necessarily exactly the way it happened in canon? Mmm I don't know.

The manifesting and power we see is a little to high imo.

Like Myrkul taking full avatar form through Ketheric requires a ritual and for him to sacrifice and burn through the souls of many of his faithful to start and sustain it, Ketheric alone shouldn't be sufficient I don't think? - and I'm not sure Myrkul can even pull it off anymore, because he may no longer have the requisite claim over the souls of the dead due to Kelemvor being in office.

(... random off-topic but honestly I'm now thinking that the Rite of Ascension would've worked better for me if it was trading 7007 souls to the Dead Three for fuel...)

I can kind of excuse Durge's (rather unnecessary in light of the Second Sundering) existence as Bhaal prefering to work from the shadows, so using his child as a figurehead works... But then Sarevok says something about how Bhaal lives again through Durge and they will enable him to walk the planes once again and... First, Bhaal is already resurrected, and secondly, he deliberately chose to leave the planes. None of that made sense! We can almost wave the first bit as metaphor (unless Bhaal is inhabiting Durge as a host-avatar 'he lives through you' makes no sense because he lives again as himself right over there in the corner) but the second bit nah.

Bane enjoys personally leading his own armies and such, which makes Gortash playing figurehead a little less likely than Durge doing so, but he has been noted to have learnt caution after the first fiasco... And/or the other two have put him on a leash or something.

There's also the possibility that the original Chosen are serving as hosts for the deities, which is a headcanon I'd enjoy being true, but the fact that their consciousnesses aren't being repressed while their gods assume direct control makes me think it's unlikely... Although the feral ending does kind of support the idea for Durge, at least. Technically hosting the Lord of Murder should kill you, but being not entirely mortal does give you an exuse.

As ever; basically, just make your own canon. 'Your realms' as it's termed. God knows I'm working from 'my realms' for the BG3 in my head and I'm still considering just porting the events of BG3 back to the 1300s where neither the Spellplague nor the Sundering happened so I don't have to deal with this headache.

[prismatoxic]

little known tox facts, because some of them were on my mind and it turned into a 10 item list

i have never personally played a fnaf game but have been closely following the lore for years, i love watching gameplay breakdowns, lore theories (not from fucking matthew patthew, i like notrealname notatall mostly), and longass video essays about what went wrong with the series. i will not give it money because of scott's politics but like i wasn't playing the games to begin with

in general i'm insane about video game tech and will gleefully watch anything talking about game design, channels/series like design delve, illusory wall, boundary break, tech rules, and game maker's toolkit are my SHIT

every single skill i have that i'm any good at is mostly or entirely self-taught. this isn't a humblebrag however, i frequently lag behind other people, don't perform these skills efficiently, and straight up am useless in imparting wisdom about them. writing is my best skill overall and at least some of that must be from my school years but i didn't understand how paragraph breaks worked until i got really into fanfic, so.

i'm so easy to please with media. i will walk out of most movies, shows, games, and works of literature feeling like i had a pretty good time. frequently i don't fully recognize what about it disappointed me until i've taken time to reflect on it, and this can alter my entire view of a work. if i intentionally bail on something before it's over, it fucking sucks and the likelihood of me giving it another chance is low. i do however just forget to go back to things a lot.

i'm a furry because of sly cooper. every other furry media i've gotten into is just a bonus. balto might also be slightly to blame but that's more of a general love for cartoon animals. speaking of furry video games i think star fox adventures was really good actually

i've moderated and/or been a part of so many profic spaces now that i have repeatedly had people spot me somewhere and go "oh my god of COURSE you're here" and it delights me every time

i was closer to the forefront of the cipherhunt back in 2016 than i've ever actually discussed in public. the at-the-time owner of r/gravityfalls was frustrated that the discord i became staff for had a larger userbase than his ~official~ gravity falls discord, as i recall. the reason i don't discuss any of this is because it's mired in bad memories, but it was fun to be a part of such a big community when shit wasn't going sideways. i owned that discord a while after the hunt ended, eventually passed it off to someone else, and have since either been kicked or the discord was deleted. i have no idea, lmao.

i met one of my best friends and my partner in the phineas and ferb fandom. i still have a scattered handful of other friends from those days too. my partner and i ran an "ask phinferb" blog, and yes i do mean the ship. it had such lore...! sadly it's been lost to time (was deleted). i do have all the old art but he'd kill me if i shared it.

i was already a fallout fan when new vegas came out (3 was my first, and i poured over every existing page of the wiki), but new vegas was extra special to me because i actually lived in nevada for several years--in the area new vegas takes place in, even! which isn't just the strip but a lot of the westernmost part of the state. i was so giddy recognizing places i'd been to, like bonnie springs, which... is a bombed husk of nothing in new vegas, but hey, i know that name!

i'm obsessed with canids (wolves and domestic dogs especially), but i've owned far more cats than i have dogs, so my knowledge of the two is comparable even though i'm only obsessed with one of them. (don't get me wrong, though, i fucking love cats.)

[utilitycaster]

I know you mentioned being unsure if you’ll play more games - do you think you’ll do a second playthrough of datv? I only ask cause I know you’re interested in writing Neve meta and I found that it was really cool to see the different aspects of her characterization when Minrathous was saved vs. saving Treviso, and also I think there’s another layer of her character that really only gets explored in her romance route. I’d highly recommended it, but also it probably can be mostly gleaned from videos if you aren’t interested in playing again. I'm still unpacking it all, they really put the Good Stuff in her character

Hey anon,

Short answer: I do not know, and I'm going to just ask everyone to, very nicely, back off, and to please let me approach video games the way I do most new things, ie, treat me as a newly adopted shelter cat and let me poke around independently on my own terms. You may comment or ask on my current playthrough but any future plans re: literally anything are a subject I would like to close off for the time being. This is not your fault or a thing anyone would realize about me from an internet interaction, so I'm not mad or anything; I'm saying this just to set that boundary very clearly and very thoroughly.

slightly longer answer/elaboration. First is that I think there's something interesting to be said about how video games allow you to stop and rewind and see different facets, but I try to tread very carefully with meta in places where I am new, ie, I'll talk about my playthrough of Neve, but you'll notice I don't say SHIT about Solas or Morrigan other than shitposting. This is also why I didn't say much about FMA:B when I watched it, because I am not familiar with anime generally. I should stress again I didn't write meta for Critical Role until I'd binged the entirety of C1 in addition to being caught up with C2 and had been lurking for at least six months. I write meta, ultimately, for myself. Which ties into the second part, which is that, to continue to be very obvious here, I bought both the game and the system on which to play it the morning of November 6th for reasons of "I was going to do this later, but I feel terrible and I'd like to do something that I think will be enjoyable and a forcible block on doomscrolling." And so to that end, there is something deeply...I don't know if "cathartic" is the word since she hasn't really experienced any catharsis in my run yet, but something very...helpful about watching Neve say "I think Minrathous is broken, and it's gotten more broken, and I feel angry and betrayed about that, but I still hate how Aelia says it's broken because she and I mean very different things when we say that and I am still going to do the work I've always done despite it all."

[daincrediblegg]

Flagship and knots for the Terror ask game

🚢 (Flagship) - Would you have eaten the human meat, knowing what (or who) it was? I mean... yeah. Like fundamentally if it was about survival I would for sure even if I'd be grossed out by it or morally repulsed by it. That being said lmao I honest to god think that it also is the wrong move and that it'd probably be better to eat boots before resorting to cannibalism because I mean??? bruh if you all have lead poisoning from the food you've been eating for years your body is still storing it so I don't think there's a net win at least where mental states/chemical taintedness are concerned. Like cannibalism is probably no better than the tins and I'd still probably rather huff down the tins if that was the case. (then again I'm no scientist. who knows if there's concentration differences all I know is that neither is really a good option if that's what you're trying to avoid by doing that).

🪢 (Knots) - Favorite Terror fic(s)? oh boy buckle up because I have some feelings and thoughts about certain fics that I have literally never ever talked about and now I have the opportunity I'm gonna flip shit about them all. Presented in no particular order and with no specific genre/ship agenda but it is mostly smut because I'm a horny bastard through and through. Also tagging authors if I know they're on here because I need them to know how deeply they have impacted my psyche. First that comes to mind is At Both Ends by @gullbones which I think is just. genuinely one of the sexiest fics I've ever read in my life. I love the characterization at play and also the descriptions of things that are happening (which is something I think is woefully absent from a lot of smut fic these days) and it's just... fucking delicious and indulgent from top to bottom. Then there's Crozier Visits a Dockside Whore by @anthosphilos which. like dude I genuinely couldn't have done a better smutty character study if I tried. Nail on the head this is how that would go down exactly. I know it. also I just love seeing that man get some pussy and I'm deranged about it. A classic that I return to in times of trouble (that I will likely revisit tonight for obvious reasons) is the Crozier chapter from kittensmctavish's If You Want To Know if He Loves You So from the kiss bingo prompts that were going around over a year ago. I literally requested this one. I could not be more delighted by how good and beautifully written this is. I will never be well about any sort of austen style romance implications with some of my favorite characters and I absolutely ADORE how it's written out here for Crozier because he deserves it. They are no longer on tumblr and I mourn that every day but also like all their fic ideas were so good you should read up on their catalogue. They have good taste. I'll read just about any Crozier/Blanky fic you put in front of me but one of my all time favorites is The Sweetest Fruit in the Garden which gives me two of my favorite things: guys longing to eat pussy and also giving each other handjobs about it. Fucking perfect. Also anything by @theboarsbride is just. Chef's kiss. Bear wife is immortal. to me. (also low-key there's a lady terror cameo in their fantasy au that I still cry about sometimes but like. nbd.)

THE TERROR ASK GAME

[cat-mermaid]

So this post awakened an old memory of mine, from back in the days when everything and anything had a Serebii type dedicated website all of its own

i remember waaaay back in like the year 2000, there was this Zelda fansite that i swear was called "The kingdom of Hyrule" and it was crazy unique because it had these big complex interactive flash animated banners at the top of every page. I'm talking hand drawn, then had a little series of animations that played if you clicked or moused over them

Somthing this advanced on a fan website from back then? A website put together by probably one guy? This was big, this was not the norm! I used to go to school every day and it would be one of the first websites i would log onto once i got computer access, because they were vigilant about updating with even the tiniest scrap of zelda news. And of course it had just about all the documentation about every zelda game at the time, each game got its own page

I remember the last time it updated was right after Wind Waker was announced at the 2001 Space World event, but before it was released in 2003. There were a few updates, mostly about the negative response to the cel shaded toon look (you have no fucking idea how angry people were back then, people thought this was going to be a game for preschoolers) and then.....

nada

years went by and then around 2004 the animated flash images became replaced with those old school red x icons that indicate the image is broken or whatever

i remember being really bummed out because that website was still one of the most amazing labors of love i'd ever seen and probably haven't seen anything by one fan that came close since

i mean it even had an animated intro you could watch every time you first entered the website that had zelda link and ganon having a showdown! That shit was hard to do back then, combined with coding it to a website?

anyways i've tried to find it again since, but nothing. Do any older zelda nerds remember this site?

[kafus]

if you ever feel up to it, i'd love to hear how you got the mew. hearing stories about people and their pokemon is really fun.

SOMEONE TOOK THE BAIT LET'S GOOO i wanted to talk about thisSDFFDKS

anyway i got my hadou mew through basically a miracle encounter - back in 2020 i was buying a lot of older pokemon games to fill holes in my collection, either games i never owned or games that i lost over the years from childhood, and as for my missing gen 3 games, i ended up going for japanese copies of firered and sapphire instead of english because having foreign carts is neat but mostly they're just a lot cheaper. buying secondhand pokemon games is always fun because often times the seller doesn't wipe or even check the save file and especially if the save file has a lot of playtime, they're like time capsules from a stranger right. so both games come in and the sapphire has nothing interesting but i'm perusing the boxes of this firered and uhhh

LMAO my initial reaction says it all, i literally just found this thing on a completely random firered cart i bought! it was not advertised to have mew in it on the ebay listing, in fact the seller i bought from sells a LOT of imported japanese pokemon games (and other gba titles) so i imagine he just has a pile of these and he picked out a random one to mail me without so much as checking what was on it.

of course mythical pokemon on gen 3 carts are dubious, it's not like it's particularly hard to gameshark a mythical pokemon, especially considering that i've gotten a secondhand file before with shit like a box full of Deoxys caught at level 2 on the first route in hoenn LOL... so i was pretty serious about checking for legality on this thing as best i could - backed up the save file and inspected it in pkhex, all data was 100% accurate to the event and also reasonable RNG wise, like normal random IVs and stuff... checked for archived versions of this event mew, none of them were identical to online injectable ones, which means the owner couldn't have downloaded and injected it... and most of all, context clues

here's ancient pictures of this mew traded to my english leafgreen so it's readable for everyone - i had not done anything with this mew yet so it's completely untouched from how i found it here. we can tell from looking at this that whoever owned this mew was training it with the exp share as its still holding it and is level 23 despite being met at level 10, and the moveset... solarbeam, mega punch, dragon claw?? very random moveset that i can only imagine a child using. this mew looks like it was played with by its owner legitimately. additionally not shown here, the firered cart had a lot of playtime and like 2/3 of the dex complete, the boxes were full of pokemon that the owner had been breeding and a few unhatched eggs, like i hatched one and it was a completely normal eevee so they may have been getting extra eevees for pokedex purposes etc.

basically i cannot 100% confirm this mew was obtained legitimately without teleporting back in time and getting that japanese movie preorder bonus myself, but there is literally nothing strange about this mew and the save file it comes from is well loved and appeared to be played by a child doing normal pokemon stuff. so for all intents and purposes, this mew is definitely legit to me. actually insane happenstance. i have never gotten anything this crazy from a secondhand file before

think of it this way. some japanese kid in 2005 preorders a pokemon movie > he goes to the store to redeem it for a mew in person. in 2005. in japan. > he plays with the mew a bit > at some point he stops playing pokemon > he sells the game to some random american seller after never wiping the save or removing the mew > the american seller buys jp pokemon games in bulk to resell on ebay so he has a ton of them and probably doesn't check them for what's on them or the old save files > when i order it from this random ebay listing, the american seller picks a random fire red cartridge out of his bulk stash and mails it to me > it ends up in my hands 15 years later after the kid first got this mew

like holy shit it's a small fucking world huh

another old convo from the RM discord because i'm nostalgic about it, i had just started talking here at the time... i'm gonna be honest the ribbon master challenge and the people i met through it genuinely changed my life and this mew came into my life at the perfect time so it means a lot to me on top of being insanely cool

anyways i went on about that longer than necessary but yeah bless my mew i love him

[jadagul]

Finished Final Fantasy XIII tonight. (Might go back and do some of the hunts etc. postgame, but I'm Officially Done.)

I liked it but was kind of disappointed. I'd rank it above XII and also I think above X-2, but definitely below 5,6,7, 9, 10. (I hated VIII, unfortunately.)

Interestingly, my core complaint is the exact opposite of my complaints about FFXII. The core story was quite good! There were six characters, they all made sense as characters, the main story was tight and compelling and all the beats basically landed. (Except I have a specific complaint about the ending below the cut.)

But there was essentially no side content, at all. They imagined this big world but you never get to see any of it. Presumably because developing all that out would be extremely expensive, but Watsonianly because you're all fugitives on the run and so need to hide from people.

But it makes all the environments feel incredibly artificial. All of them are straight-line paths that never take you past anything you could interact with. There's less side questing than any game since at least four, and I think fewer side conversations with NPCs since the Famicom and possibly since ever. Everything feels so thin.

Compare this with, say, FFX, which my girlfriend is playing through right now. There's so much thought put into how the environments would work. Obviously they're somewhat artificial, but all the temples have side rooms whose only real purpose is to look like the sort of rooms that the temple would have to have. Lots of characters you can chat with who say the sorts of things people in the world would say. The story in FFX is just as linear as the story in XIII, and the dungeons are honestly about as linear too. But the world feels real because you can poke around and talk to people.

And the combat system in XIII is moderately cool but at some point started just feeling long. I did mostly the same thing in every battle but they all took like two minutes, which made stuff toward the end feel like a slog. There was a window in like Chapter 11 where everything felt great, but then it slowed down again. Combined with the shit-to-nonexistent fast travel system, it makes messing around feel really unrewarding.

Specific spoilery ending complaint below the cut:

One thing I didn't like about this story is that it falls really, really hard for a classic JRPG problem: you spend the entire story advancing the villain's plot.

I commented before that I appreciated some of the lampshade they hung on this. But they never really moved past it: you're just following Barthandelus's plan the entire time, until literally partway through the final boss.

And that means that none of your fights are actually accomplishing anything, and that makes everything feel empty. This happens every time you face Barthandelus. The first two times, you fight him (in fairly challenging fights), then when you beat him he monologues at you, gives you a thing, and fucks off. Literally nothing in the story would change if you just skipped the fight sequence entirely—it's not even a "Ah, I see you are stronger than I thought, but I will return". The narrative doesn't acknowledge the fight at all!

And this builds up to the ending. You fight a two-phase boss fight, and in the second phase I spent the entire time going "wait, wasn't the whole point to avoid killing the dude we are currently killing?" And then you win, and you get an extended cutscene full of good character beats. But (1) you have no agency in these beats, and (2) they're basically unrelated to the fights you just had.

And then you get a third phase boss fight, and when you win you get a shorter cutscene with a couple more good character beats. But again, these beats are unrelated to your ability to win any fights. The story would be exactly the same if the fights just didn't happen at all.

And like, the story is still good! But it is the story for a game and it makes the game part feel super anticlimactic, with none of your actual gameplay events mattering. Was just kind of a letdown!

[snickerdoodlles]

Timeloop for the wip game 👀 (I love me some time shenanigans)

me too!!! a timeloop story is the doomed hero trope on steroids and it's so good ❤❤

(*other timeloop ask for friends catching up)

besides the angst fun, what i'm most excited about for this WIP are the POV changes!! this fic is in three parts: Kim POV, Big POV, and Chay POV.

Kim POV: the angst. the fun. the drama. obviously because it's me, there's so much KimChay in this section, because Kim's awkwardly flirted with Chay before this and while he's telling himself all his hanging out with Chay means nothing, Chay's rolling out his big romance guns and Kim is being so swept off his feet. not only does he exhaust every reason to hang out with Chay, he also starts letting go of those excuses to hang out with Chay, because if everything resets come morning, it doesn't matter what he does with Chay now. except, of course it does, he is falling deep and his already weak excuses for why he certainly doesn't like Chay are crumbling under the weight of each loop. his days with Chay just get better and better until he has the perfect day with Chay. it wasn't even planned, things just fell naturally into a full day date where they played hooky and enjoyed their time together and a day full of spontaneity and genuine connection.

and it crushes Kim. that is a day he will never actually get back, not even in his memory, because Chay doesn't remember it. there's no point in even trying to recreate it, not only because a second time would ring hollow, but also Kim literally wouldn't be able to (i'm not explaining my timeloop physics in this post, but it's not groundhog day). Kim has the most perfect day with Chay and then gets absolutely run over realizing he has all these memories of and secrets from Chay that Chay will never be able to share with him again, and it rips him to shreds ❤

...okay, i didn't mean to just gush over the KimChay part of his POV like that, i'm just super pumped to write that angst. but actually tho, the first scene i wrote for this AU was the scene where Big gets a bullet in the head as the price for Kim's recklessness, because Kim's primary goal thru all of this is still to uncover Korn's secrets. in fact, this story had actually started shortly after i'd written like. two? lines of Kim & Big almost-friendship in my Silver for Truth fic draft, gone "hey, wait, omg" and then those musings bumped into my love for timeloop stories...some time shortly after that, and i just had. so many shenanigan ideas for these two in this context. then i immediately dived head first into the angst, but this was originally Kim & Big shenanigans.

i also did not realize i still have this many feelings to gush about Kim's POV alone tho so in the interest of trying to keep this post from getting too long, only teasers for the Big and Chay POVs because i'm evil:

Big POV: Big gets sucked into the timeloop sometime after Kim's mostly given up. Big is way too much of an overachiever to do nothing for eternity and decides he doesn't give a shit if Kim's being weird as shit, he's gonna damn well investigate this nonsense around Porsche himself because Kinn's fucking him already and Big does not want another fallout as bad as Tawan's, thank you very much. this eventually leads him to Chay, who is, much to Big's despair, not only the secret subject of Kim's affections (Big didn't even know Kim had those!), but also more insane than Porsche, Kim, and the entire timeloop combined. he also keeps making Big ponder the big questions like what he wants from life, Chay is just Big's personal handcrafted hell, someone save him.

Chay POV: Chay never enters the timeloop. writing his outside POV is so much fun 😈

[ WIP game ]