#i mean who else lol

[if-mirrormine]

Your netflix edits look really cool but it got me wondering who you would cast to play the ros irl👀

hmm this is pretty tough ngl. just keep in mind that none of these perfect...

for grayson, i couldn't find any french or polish actors that truly fit him, perhaps i just didn't look hard enough, but i think robbie amell is at the very least a good face claim.

i had the same problem for kennedy, there weren't really any actresses that looked like her or fit her vibe. i think i'd probably go with candice patton.

alex was definitely the easiest lol. for f!alex, i'd say seo ye-ji and for m!alex, kim soo-hyun.

[vaguely-concerned]

lucanis is a 'I could sit in our quiet kitchen on a grey tuesday afternoon drinking coffee and talking with you about nothing much in particular forever and be the happiest man who ever lived' romantic, not a 'classic tropes and grand gestures' romantic. this is a distinction and conceptual gap I personally feel is crucial to understanding what's going on with him when romanced. for all his almost painful sincerity and clear depth of feeling he's not a very effusive guy by nature, but in the history of time no one has ever, with their whole soul, chest and being, been so genuinely and openly happy to just do laundry and taxes with you.

[pidgydraws]

IMO

i make a lot of very fluffy, sentimental, art~ but i need everyone to know just how much i fucking hate these two (adoringly. with all my heart.)

[bunnieswithknives]

Thanks.

Prev

[burningcheese-merchant]

I think more ppl need to see this

Yeah for real lol. That's exactly what it is with him. Not to toot my own horn too much but I believe this post I made ages ago hits the nail on the head haha

"I'm bored" is... technically true. In a sense. Personally, I think it's a very simple and vague allusion to the real problem. That thin sheet of snow coating a massive, freezing cold iceberg. Just barely obscuring it from proper view.

imo it's been a bit disappointing seeing people take to extremes with Burning Spice's character. I've seen people either woobify him, downplay or excuse his actions by saying "he's not evil! He's hurting! He's depressed! He doesn't hate people, he's lashing out because he can't internalize his pain anymore!", or just demand he be put to death immediately on sight without trial. You can like a morally repulsive character and sympathize with their issues while also acknowledging that they're repulsive and need to face justice for their crimes. Burning Spice is one of my favorite characters, I love everything about him, he's sexy as fuck, I understand why he's the way he is, I'm still happy to see his ass beat because he's a piece of shit and he deserves it lol.

Not to throw shade at "simpler" villains ofc. I love me some assholes that are assholes just because they can be. Like Jack Horner in Puss in Boots 2. But Burning Spice isn't Jack Horner and he honestly shouldn't be. The deeper, sadder, more complex reasons governing his actions suit him better than just "I'm bored fuck this shit" and nothing else ykwim

and of course, he's still wrong. Burning Spice's view of the world is wrong. Does a book begin just to end? Does a song play just to finish in a few minutes' time? No. They begin so that we may read, listen, and enjoy. So that they may make us laugh, or have us shake our heads in disappointment, or tell us some hidden truth. Make our days and lives a little more interesting than they were before. Life is beautiful BECAUSE it is fleeting. Born, grow, wither, born, grow, wither. Yes, that's how it goes. But there's so much more to those things than just what we can gather from those three words. Every day is different. Though the sun rises every morning without fail, it's never quite the same color, is it? Always a bit of a different shade of yellow, orange, red, bleeding into the sky a little differently each time. There are so many things to see and do, games to play, people to meet and love and cherish. Maybe some of those things and those people won't be here someday but that doesn't mean their existence never meant anything. We are not born to die, we are born to live. We must die for those who are to live, and live for those who have died. Regardless, we must never lose sight of the intrinsic value of all that surrounds us. Burning Spice very much did. Underneath his bitterness and anger and (not unfounded, to be fair) lamentation for the unstoppable cycle of life and death is a deep-rooted selfishness and fundamental lack of understanding and appreciation for life and other people. In the face of despair, he gave in and chose evil. He was and is wrong for doing so, regardless of why he did it. He could've stepped down. He could've just admitted he didn't have what it took to be the Herald of Change. Hell, if he really hates being alive so much, he would've committed suicide a LONG time ago. But he never did any of that; instead he chose to inflict an equal or greater suffering on everything and everyone else, even the undeserving. And for that he MUST pay. And Golden Cheese, with her personality and her experiences and the wisdom she came to attain when faced with the exact same despair as Burning Spice, is exactly the right person to make him do that

[gravitysoda]

if you love him, let him go!

[areyouscaredyet]

following his assassination, it was made illegal to speak his name :o(

[bixels]

The more I think about it, the more I question Arcane S2's politics and themes, which were so foundational to S1. Like, a tiny example [SPOILERS AHEAD]:

Singed wins. He gets exactly what he wants in the end. All his "efforts" are rewarded. What does that say about people who share his ideology of eugenics? He is the source of nearly every horrible thing and conflict that happened (Shimmer, the factory deaths, Jinx, Vander as Warwick, the corruption of Viktor), and he gets a happier ending than any other character. Not even a 'he got what he wanted but he has become completely unrecognizable/monstrous to his daughter' tag at the end. You can say they're setting him up and need to open his daughter to future shows, but the way you end a character's story says something about what you think about that character. What does it say when the eugenicist war criminal gets the happy ending he doesn't deserve?

[mutable-manifestation]

Ghost Chirps AU Part 5

Part 1 & 2

Part 3

Part 4

***

While “Jason” (i.e. Alfred with an empty jet that Jason will meet up with later in order to “arrive” in Amity) hops a private jet, Red Hood is busy searching the Fenton home from top to bottom.

The local police move slowly, and by the time they arrive Jack and Maddie Fenton are both tied up and disarmed in their living room under heavy guard.

They hadn’t been restrained immediately, Batman talking him into giving them a chance to implicate themselves first.

Hood let him take the lead, but he didn’t even get a chance to ask a question, being cut off at the first indication he might want to talk about their “work.” Less than 60 seconds in, and the pair had outright confessed to violating the meta protection acts - and in tedious detail.

The questioning didn’t suffer any from them being tied up.

Far from the mulish silence or crocodile-tear laden denial of most criminals, they instead doubled down, insisting that nothing they had done was illegal, then jumping to the assumption that they were “possessed” - and boy had it been a nasty surprise when the whole house came alive trying to attack them with a quick verbal command.

Well, trying to attack Hood. And only him, for some reason.

One laser also freed the Fentons, who turned out to have even more weapons built into their suits. 

Somehow. 

Despite them being skintight.

That had been a pain, but Red Robin was able to hack the system using one of the couples’ own devices while Hood dodged - and kept the stray fire away from the others - leaving everyone else to recapture the pair. A blessedly simple task once they found out the lasers would splash harmlessly off of their armor (save for a gross film of green goop left wherever they grazed).

They take turns knocking each unconscious to change them in order to properly disarm them - Batman and Nightwing taking Jack first, followed by Orphan and Spoiler dealing with Maddie. 

The only non-weapon laden clothing they own turns out to be pajamas. 

This is around when the police show up, looking hesitant.

They, too, cite the “Anti-Ecto Acts.”

Oracle had debriefed them on the supposed Acts and “Ghost Investigation Ward” on their short drive over. Both were utterly bogus - the Acts had never even been proposed, let alone been approved as law, and the so-called “GIW” had no ties to the government.

The Fentons had been furious and denied the information intensely when told, but the cops mostly just looked relieved.

Apparently there’d been a lot of property damage by the GIW and Fentons both that had supposedly been dismissed under the Acts as “necessary in the pursuit of ecto-scum.”

For the Fentons, half of this damage was in the form of broken fire hydrants, cracked sidewalks, and totaled cars - they’d never been good drivers, before, the cops disclosed, but they’d become even more negligent since the ghosts began appearing, to the point they had to have a news segment warning when they would be on the road.

The lack of fatalities thus far had been nothing short of a miracle, they claimed.

“Of course there haven’t been any fatalities!” Mrs Fenton defends. “Our work is to protect people from those things, not make more! Officers, listen to reason-” Hood snorts disdainfully -”The Red Hood is clearly a ghost! All our systems targeted him the moment they came online - and they only target ecto-entities. He’s clearly taken these heroes under his sway - why else would they be working with a murderer!? You have to do something before he starts up his killing here in Amity!”

The officers look at him a bit hesitantly, but Batman is unmoved and gives the cover story Hood had outlined back in the alley.

Any concerns the locals have are quickly assuaged.

But for the whole explanation, Jason is trying not to shake even as he falls apart in place.

Their little website called them ghost-hunters, making it pretty clear what “ecto-entities” meant. 

Their system supposedly only targets ecto-entities.

The system had only targeted him.

The system only targets ghosts.

Jason had died.

A lot of his family members had died, too, granted. 

But Jason was the only one who seemed to come back wrong - anger sticking in his throat and never quite fading, an inclination towards violence even when he wasn’t angry well beyond what he’d ever felt before, and a sea of other emotions (that he would never acknowledge aloud) and triggers for those emotions that he always struggled to make heads or tails of.

He doesn’t have the meta gene. He knows that. He knew that.

He just assumed that the test missed it, because he knows he doesn’t know magic - the All Blades being the only exception - and he couldn’t think of another explanation at the time.

But he came back wrong.

And as he stands there, he wonders if he came back at all, mind on Solomon Grundy.

Wonders if he isn’t just some ghost, wandering around possessing his own corpse.

He jolts, as the thought strikes him: what about Danny?

If he’s a ghost and chirping is a ghost thing then what about his KID!?

Absently, he notes that Bruce has started interrogating the cops on what they meant by “ghost attacks.” 

He ignores the discussion, hustling for the door in the kitchen down to the lab.

He slams and locks the door behind him - in Red Robin’s face - as he descends, making a b-line for the computer he’d seen when the Fentons had dragged them all down there to start bragging about their crimes.

The only thing Oracle could get out of the whole building was things that were openly available online; direct connections were impossible.

Opening up the screen, he gets to cracking.

Going for the surface level files first, it turns out he doesn’t even need so much as a password to find what he wants.

One of the video game sub-files has an unrelated file in it: ghost notes.

There are plenty of other notes, of course, but he’d only been skimming to start, looking for anything hidden.

The Fenton parents were too open to bother, of course, with plenty of more obvious files strewn haphazardly across the home screen, but it’s always better to check. That there is a hidden file means it was likely made by either Danny or Jazz.

And it’s a treasure trove.

Sub-files for rogues, allies, conditional allies, and “halfas” were what greeted him.

The last being the only term he didn’t recognize, he clicked.

6 files: Clones, Danny, Dani, Dan, Vlad, and Red Hood.

He clicks his own file.

What greets him is a picture of himself 4 days ago, looking just to the left of the lens in an alley that he distinctly remembers searching for the kid in.

Just below is text.

~~~

??? Name: Red Hood

Species: probably a halfa

Status: Nnnneutral? I think? I know, I know, heads in bags. But Valerie tries to kill me all the time! And we’re allies sometimes! Hood- uh- looked for me? Okay I guess I can’t really judge this yet but please read the first met section before you judge please you guys?

First met: Aug 17, 2005, was in Gotham to bother Batman, stopped to think a bit on some fire escape - decide on the first prank yknow - but then my ghost sense went off. It felt like a halfa so I thought “oh cool, must be Dani” so I chirped, but then Red Hood - who was chasing some guy down an alley at the time - froze and looked around. I dropped visibility and chirped again and yeah, he definitely heard it. Humans can’t so he’s definitely a halfa - no glow so he can’t be a full ghost and it felt nothing like an overshadowing. 

Ended up following Hood around the rest of week - forgot to prank Batman, damn - and playing hide-and-seek with the chirps. It was really funny. But he very obviously doesn’t know he’s a halfa. But the guy is, like, scary levels of smart, so I’m sure he’ll figure it out on his own now that the chirp thing made it clear that something is up. Hopefully.

I figure I can go back in winter break - he should have it figured out and let his emotions process enough by then to at least hear me out when I explain the AEA and GIW and everything, then it won’t matter so much if he can, like, track me by voice or something if I talk since we’ll have MAD by then.

Despite his reputation, the people living in his haunt seem to love the guy. I can see why. On top of the whole smart he’s actually really nice to people he’s not shooting in the knees (which only even happened one time in the week I was there? It was actually pretty relaxing - most quiet week I’ve had since the portal opened THANK YOU TUCKER for hacking the portal hatch to be inoperable for a week). 

Where was I? Oh yeah, he’s actually surprisingly nice to people? So like, I think he’ll probably hear me out if I go back and be polite? I hope. Hate to leave the guy in the dark and him end up on the GIWs dissection table for “lots and lots of painful experiments.”

Not that those guys could even catch the Box Ghost. But uh, Hood doesn’t seem to have powers either? Or if he does he doesn’t know about them I don’t think - he only used the chirp the whole time I was their - not even to cheat with moving around.

Seriously. That guy's acrobatics could make Freakshow’s contortionist green - er, red??? - with envy. Actually wait, aren’t contortionists and acrobats different things?

SAM NOTE: help^?

Powers: 

?

~~~

Jason leans back, breathing deeply.

“Not a full ghost,” “not 'overshadowed'” - a term that sounds likke some kind of cousin to possesision - “definitely a halfa,” “humans can’t hear chirps.”

Halfa. 

Half. 

Ghost. 

Half Ghost.

It should sound absurd - you can’t be half alive and half dead.

But Jason has seen the Lazarus pits, has met Solomon Grundy, has met aliens and bullshit magic and can pull magical swords out of his own damn chest.

Half alive. Half dead.

Hopefully not just a fancy way to say possessing his own corpse.

He doesn’t have time to deal with every file - he’ll “confiscate” one of their USBs with a copy of everything for himself before leaving the rest to Batman & co, of course, minus the halfa files (a small part of him wants to shove his condition in Bruce’s face and demand he kill the clown again even though he knows it’s a futile hope, but the rest - the same part that snapped and denied and refused to say he was a meta less that a day ago now - cannot stomach the thought of even more rejection. Of a Bruce that believes he’s a monster. Of a Bruce that mourns him even while he’s right there. Or at least, more than he already does.) - but while the files copy he take the time to look at Danny’s.

The image has two people, Danny Fenton on one side and a version of the kid in a black hazmat suit with white hair, tanned skin, and painfully familiar green eyes. And floating.

~~~

Human Name: Danny Fenton

Ghost Name: Danny Phantom

Species: Halfa (half-human, half ghost)

~~~

It’s the section after that that makes Jason’s breath catch in his throat.

~~~

Death: The Portal Accident

So like, there was no audio (thank GOD I do not want to hear myself screaming) so. Details: When the portal didn’t work when they plugged it in mom and dad left for fudge, Jazz went to try and talk them into a more realistic career choice than ghosts. Sam and Tucker came over and Sam dared me to climb in and check it out - it was broken anyway so no harm. Except it wasn’t broken, just that my parents put the on button inside. Which I caught myself on when I tripped on a wire.

Anyway, electrocution! 

(T - Danny for the love of god be more serious, the cheerful tone is creepy)

(D - Hey! I’m the one who died! Shouldn’t I at least get to write my own epitaph)

(S - …Danny this is not an epitaph. You don’t even HAVE a grave)

(D - wow way to rub it in Sam)

(T - yeah Sam)

(S - ugh! Whatever, just stop with the chatting in official files)

(T - “official”)

(S - Tucker.)

(T - shutting up now)

Electrocution! I got zapped to death, but the ectoplasm from the portal was also opening up on top of me and a lot got bonded to me I guess (S - probably because of the electricity with how you ended up with some of Vortex' powers for a little while) at the same time said electricity was reviving me? - probably getting my heart beating again or something, I was a little busy screaming to pay attention (T - yeah okay we're going to Nasty Burger after this. And playing Doomed) - not that it would’ve mattered without the ghostification preventing me from melting me all the way to death.

Status: Me!

Powers:

Chirps! (ghost echolocation of some kind! humans can't hear em - halfas can, of course, in either form)

Form Change (really Sam? This barely counts)

Human form

Ghost form (no need to breathe)

Flight (last clock speed 210mph) (T - and climbing. Dang dude)

Invisibility (S - don’t forget shareable.) (Shareable. sigh)

Intangibility (Shareable)

Ecto Rays (eyes & hands) (T - and butt) (D - dude! I’m deleting that. Tucker why can't I delete it. TUCKER) (T - bow down in awe of my ksill) (S - ksill) (D - ksill) (T - yeah okay it’s permanent now) (D - aw man!)

Ghost Sense (S - why do we never test your range?) (D - no need? They always make themselves obvious or are being sneaky specifically to annoy me so *shrug*) (S - I still think we should test it)

Power Absorption (that time with Vortex’s weather powers)

Cryokinesis (Wayyyyy to much ice. NOT testing max output on that) (T - yeah frozen city was enough, let’s not cause an ice age. Tech needs some cool but too much is still bad and I just upgraded Patricia)

Ghostly Wail (cone of destruction, very exhausting - always at max output. Not to be used)

GHOST FORM ONLY (but really just never)

Cartoon Body (D - what???) (S - Freakshow literally turned you into a puddle and you just turned back and were fine. I don’t know what else to call that) (D - okay fair. but:)

GHOST FORM ONLY

Physical Enhancement (better strength, speed, stamina, durability, reflexes, balance, etc much better than human) (T - why does this look like dnd knockoff stats haha)

GHOST FORM ONLY (S - obviously mr last place in PE)

Resistances (pretty solid on the overshadowing, avoided being taken in by Ember until targeted, didn’t get turned to stone during the Medusa thing) (S - which was pure luck! Be careful!)

Ecto Electricity (ghost stinger, but I really don’t think this counts Sam. I mean I just. Make my ecto zappy. But it’s still just ecto) (S - so is your ICE and you don’t just call that "just cold ecto") (D - fine, but it feels overly specific) (S - maybe writing it all down will make you stop. Forgetting. POWERS!) (D - come on Sam that was a lucky hit! I was distracted! And it turned out fine!) (S - Fenton…) (D - oop okay doing fire now)

Ecto Fire (made Dash’s shoes melty that one time by make the ecto hot) (T - really needs more testing)

Tech possession (chasing Technus into computers, not very tested)

Ghost form only, i guess?

Overshadowing (control people, copy their voice, invade dreams - the control one erases the person’s memory so they don’t know they were overshadowed just lost time. I hate Walker. SO much) (T - rip Danny’s reputation, you’ll be missed)

Probably ghost form only

Duplication (T - That’s optimistic) (D - I’M WORKING ON IT OKAY!?) (S - pretty sure it just falls under cartoon body until you can actually separate) (D - :( betrayal)

Probably ghost form only

More? (D - ugh I hope not) (T - hey don’t say that, maybe you’ll get a power to make the JL give a crap about Amity) (D - honestly I’m getting pretty close to letting Boxy loose in Gotham) (S - Danny, don’t stoop to their level!) (D - it's only box ghost!) (T - I mean he has a point)

~~~

Jason changes his mind, seeing the commentary, and deletes the entire hidden file from the computer as soon as his copy is made. He can go over everything and bring any important info to Bruce separately, the bat’s can just chew on the parents’ files for now.

Once the original files are thoroughly and irretrievably removed he pockets his shiny new USB, makes a second one with all the official files, and heads back up and out - carelessly brushing past a thoroughly irate Red Robin with a pair of firemen and broken jaws of life. And not a scratch on the door; impressive - just in time to get Oracle’s text that he’s got 2 hours and 16 minutes to be at the location on his HUD so he can “arrive” to Amity.

And a fresh set of civilian clothes will be waiting in the plane, Alfred as reliable as ever.

“Files,” he says, tossing the safe USB to Batman and interrupting his interrogation of the police officer.

He catches it effortlessly of course, but the officer stops paying attention to him to jolt at Hood’s reappearance - even outside of Gotham his reputation is fierce.

“I sent a copy to myself. I’ll review them and give you an overview, but other than that consider this the end of my involvement in this little shitshow,” he says, continuing smoothly to the door. “I’m heading back to Gotham.”

Now, he has a little over two hours before Jason Todd needs to arrive in Amity Park. He only needs to lay hands on a laptop that he can isolate from Babs’ influence and he should be able to review the Halfa files in full before he "lands" - after he figures out just why the kid has a grudge against the JL.

[sparta369]

I bought slay the princess but haven’t started it ‘cause it kinda intimidates me, can you convince me to play it?

Ok now I know you just asked me to convince you to play it but hear me out

Don't play it yet

There's a huge, Free Content expansion coming out on the 24th of this month, in just 8 days called The Pristine Cut, which is going to expand the game by about 35%. The Devs themselves have said to wait for the expansion release if you haven't played it already lol

That being said, I'd never pass up an opportunity to gush about one of my favorite games ever created

I realized far too late that I'd accidentally written far more than either of us probably wanted. So I'll try to sparknotes it, and leave the full thing below the cut.

The less you know going in, the better. However, it is still a horror game. You can find a list of content warnings here. It's just a list, so it doesn't really reveal very much.

A single playthrough lasts about 3-4 hours on average, though I can guarantee you'll want to do more than one. The game is positively dense with choices. It's impossible to see everything in one playthrough, and one would be hard-pressed to have the exact same playthrough twice.

Words cannot really capture how much I love this game. It's story masterfully crafted with a vast ocean of choices for the player to make, all of which make a true and profound impact on the narrative. If you enjoyed Disco Elysium or The Stanley Parable, You'll like Slay the Princess. The game was lovingly hand-drawn, pencil on paper, and the music was beautifully composed. The voice acting, featuring the talents of Nichole Goodnight and Jonathan Sims, are also, in my opinion, phenomenal.

I truly cannot express the emotional impact this game has left me with. It's a game I'll carry with me for the rest of my life.

Whether you intend to stop here or read on, I'll leave you with this one screenshot. It's only text, and it's literally the second thing you see upon booting up the game, so don't worry about spoilers lmao

"Whatever horrors you may find in these dark spaces, have heart and see them through."

"There are no premature endings. There are no wrong decisions."

"There are only fresh perspectives and new beginnings."

"This is a love story."

Oh boy you clicked the "keep reading" button :o) I wrote this over the course of most of my day today before I realized exactly how long it was. Besides a small change to the end, I'm going to leave most of it un-touched, just for the sake of preserving whatever the hell was going on in my head at the time :o)

Slay the Princess is one of those games where, the less you know going in, the better, So I'll do my best to convince you without revealing anything.

Still, though, It is a horror game. If you would like to look through it just in case, you can find a list of content warnings on their website here. It gives a list of many things you may encounter, but there is a 0% chance that you will encounter all, or likely even half, of the things described in there. In addition, they present these things in a way that reveals as little as possible. Still, I would personally recommend against reading through them, but there's no shame or judgement if you go dig through it. You know yourself better than anybody, if you think ya need it that's fine.

There's also some flickering image effects & a parallax effect that has caused motion sickness for some players, but both of these can be disabled in the settings.

With all that out of the way...

Words truly cannot explain how much I love this game.

It is an absolute masterwork of interactive narrative storytelling. No other game I've played or heard of in my life gives as much weight to every single choice you make, every little thing you do. There are so many choices and possibilities, and not once does the game ever make you feel like you've chosen "wrong." It's impossible to see everything in one playthrough, and you would be hard-pressed to get the exact same playthrough twice. Quite literally, every time I've watched somebody else play the game, they happened upon something I'd never seen before, despite me having 100% of the achievements.

One playthrough usually takes around 3-4 hours, but you will almost certainly want to do more than one.

There are also a number of places where you can safely and logically pause and come back later, should you need to.

The narrative itself is expertly woven. The storytelling is phenomenal, interweaving paralyzing fear with heart-aching beauty, while also carrying a healthy amount of comedy at carefully chosen places. The themes carry through beautifully. I've cried actual tears on more than one occasion, and it's not easy to get that out of me. Slay The Princess is a story that will be a part of my heart for as long as I live.

If you've played and enjoyed Disco Elysium, you'll enjoy Slay The Princess.

If you've played and enjoyed The Stanley parable, you'll enjoy Slay The Princess.

I know that I often struggle with games that require a lot of reading, and that includes a lot of visual novel type games.

Thankfully, the game is, for the most part, fully voice-acted :) The very few bits that aren't voiced are that way for narrative reasons hee hoo

The voice acting itself is, in my opinion, phenomenal. Both actors put their heart and souls into their roles, and their care shows in their performances. The Princess is voiced by Nichole Goodnight & the Narrator is voiced by Jonathan Sims (Who you may recognize from The Magnus Archives, if you were ever into that).

The art of the game is beautiful. It is all lovingly hand-drawn, pencil on paper. Thousands of images, and even a few animations, all coming together to form a wonderfully unique visual style that lends itself well to the game itself.

The soundtrack of this game, composed by Brandon Boone & with vocal performances by Amelia Jones, is absolutely breathtaking. It does a phenomenal job setting and supporting the tone of the game, whether it be tension, fear, hope, joy, or anything between and beyond. I can't put it's beauty into words.

Brandon Boone actually just recently won the "Game Music Award" at the World Soundtrack Awards for his work on Slay The Princess, and I deeply believe that it was 100% deserved.

This is... probably far more than you ever asked for. But I mean it when I say that Slay the Princess is one of my favorite games of all time. I mean it when I say that Slay The Princess is a story that will be a part of my heart for as long as I live. I'll take any opportunity to make more people play it, in hopes that it might impact them even a fraction as much as it has impacted me. I've bought a total of 11 copies of this game (1 for myself, 9 which were distributed to friends, and one that's coming with the Collector's Edition)

As my final word, I'll once again remind you:

"Whatever horrors you may find in these dark spaces, have heart and see them through."

"There are no premature endings. There are no wrong decisions."

"There are only fresh perspectives and new beginnings."

"This is a love story."

[deoidesign]

One of my first digital pieces (2010) versus one of my recent ones (2024)

We all start somewhere!

[brawlite]

i posted about this on twitter with the comment of "lol, lmao, even," but i got this silly comment on ao3 yesterday:

and i'm sure there's something to be said about hate comments and bait like this, but all i can think of is: the peerless cucumber energy of it all,

[inkskinned]

so one time i got bit by a brown recluse which is one of the only types of spider in my area that's actually dangerous and at first i didn't know what had happened to me, only that it was nasty. the swelling wasn't going down and the wound started to get ugly. i don't want to like get into the details because that's gross but it got to the point 2 weeks later that i was worried enough to go to the doctor, which i hate doing.

i am not afraid of spiders but other people are so i'd been covering it with this big ole square bandage (i needed more landscape coverage than a simple bandaid) and sat in the university medical waiting room, kicking my heels and playing BOTW. the nurse who admitted me was like, oh, we have got to get Tom to cover this one. she wrote spider bite under my ticket.

i waited in the near-empty building for like an hour and then nurse tom shows up in spiderman scrubs, out of breath. "sorry," he says, "i saw - your slip - and I had," he heaves in a breath, "to run home and. get. these scrubs. i literally. ran. felt like a job. for. spiderman."

i laugh. he puts his hands on his knees, thumbs-ups at me. fishes a pamphlet out from under his clipboard that basically says spiders can be scary but you don't need to be scared, there's very few dangerous spiders in new england. "honestly," he wheezes, "we probably don't need to get you into an exam room. just..." he waves his hand at the pamphlet, "read that."

i look down at my arm. then back at him in his scrubs. and then down at my arm. i like that he made an effort to make a joke, but now it does not feel like a good joke, because they are mistaking my calm for a lack of injury. "can i. like. at least show you the bite?"

he gives me kind of a weird look, which is fair, but then says. "if. i mean, if you have to."

i peel the bandage off. his face goes green.

"oh," he says.

"yeah, man."

"a... spider bit you?" his voice is high and tight and trembling. he backs up a few steps.

"i think a brown recluse," i offer. "i know it's nasty, sorry."

"excuse me for a moment." he looks over to the administering nurse on the other side of the small room. "i need to find someone else to take care of you."

the administering nurse smiles over to us with a degree of pleasure that is almost salivating. for a moment, like a window opening, i am briefly aware of what must be a psychic message floating amongst the in-between. her jaguar teeth all say this is like a party for me and i know exactly what i'm doing.

"oh no, tom," she says, grinning. "i gave her to you specifically."

[anistarrose]

"sex and love are what make us human" well luckily for your pathetically limited worldview, i don't actually mind roleplaying as an elf. fetch me my ancient and gnarled magical staff, boy

[thursdayinspace]

I think when they get married, it's going to be just like this. Private. They will get their piece of paper, say the official vows -- maybe they will even dress up for it. There won't be many people there, if any. It's a formality, the official part. It's a nice formality, there may be a happy tear or two, a gentle kiss; it's a special day, after all.

But the real wedding, that is just them. At home. Nobody else present. They know their own vows, they have all the words in their heads, in their hearts. They go home, change back into their casual clothes and go for a walk. Enjoying the peace and quiet, the comfort of each other's company. And in a patch of sunlight, they'll stop, take each other's hands, look at each other the way they have from the very beginning, and speak their love to each other. For their ears only.

Ever since they met, they have been a unit of two. Even before they were a couple, they'd stand close together to talk, using their bodies to block out the outside world, creating a private universe contained only in the space between them. What they have to say to each other isn't meant for anyone else.

They don't need to shout their love out into the world, they don't need to promise undying loyalty and devotion where other people can hear. What they share is so intensely private, and it always has been.

It's the two of them, hands joined, looking into each other's eyes, and that is all there is. That is all they need. That is all they want. Each other. Nothing else.

[akkivee]

FOOLS GOLD TL IS LIVE!!!! ENJOY THE BAT FLAVOURED ANGST!!!!!!