#i only recently started watching zam

[paddysol]

I’m very intrigued by the lifesteal stuff on my dash courtesy of you but I have no idea where to start with it. any chance you could share some recommendations for getting into lifesteal?

I've actually had this question answered before and I'm still just as unsure if I'm the best person to consult (I am going to just copy most of what I said with minor changes bc Ive learned more ✨)

Ok so disclaimer time! I pick favorites and stick with them and have accepted the consequences of not knowing anything outside their povs (also I'm a yt girlie at heart so i lowkey rely on videos than livestreams)

So Lifesteal is still very much a half foot in, half foot out deal due to most of the events usually happening on livestreams so I’m always a bit late on the current happenings.

If you dont mind just throwing yourself into the lore without knowing jackshit, I'd recommend watching PrinceZam, Kaboodle, Pangi, or Derapchu (for livestreams specifically) - I'm sure there's other folks, but I do know that they tend to stream fairly often.

In terms of youtube videos (and slightly being able to catch up on lore) I'd recommend Squiddo (who is a personal favorite of mine, most of her videos tend to be within the half hour mark and are incredibly entertaining the whole way through) as well as Rekrap, JumperWho, Roshambo (though not much for s6), Spokeishere, and Flamefrags. (There are others, as well I'm just listing who come sto mind that)

If you want to get into older seasons I'd recommend watching Branzycraft as he had a fairly regular upload schedule. A lot of lifesteal folks also tend to post longass videos detailing their server journey - though this is often towards the end of seasons or even a bit after. I also recently discovered that saints exist within the fandom and some important events of arcs (such as the eclipse fed/wormhole from s4 have been clipped together into one video).

I have realized (and this may be my own doing) that there’s usually gonna be unexplained gaps in knowledge which is something I’ve just kinda accepted tbh. (Like in general, especially considering the nature of the server and everyone playing 5D chess)

I also tend to doomscroll through character specific tags on tumblr and usually people can be found rambling about events/characterization which is a bit like putting together a puzzle but it slowly comes together (which a piece or two missing)

Again, I hope this was helpful and if anyone has any additional info please feel free to add on!

[goldenseresinretriever]

You Catch More Bees With Honey: Chapter 1

Pairing: Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw x Reader

Part of the San Diego Dogfighters universe

Summary: Bradley Bradshaw, blindsided by a team he trusted like family has been traded to the San Diego Dogfighters. Across the country from the place he calls home, Bradley feels lost and betrayed. Not to mention the familiar faces and ghosts from his past that he now has to face every day at work. Bradley’s caught between wanting to show his former team the mistake they made in double-crossing him and wondering if it’s time to hang up his skates after one final season. You’re living your dream as the PR representative for the Dogfighters. When Coach Maverick made a bid to bring his godson to the team, you hadn’t batted an eye. Bradley was a good teammate, and a good player. Unfortunately, the Bradley that shows up in San Diego is nothing like your research suggested. He’s moody, irritable, aggressive, and angry, throwing a wrench in all your careful planning. What’s caused such a drastic change in him? And can you figure out how to help him before he makes a mistake you can’t fix?

Series CW: 18+ ONLY, swearing, dead parents, drunkenness, alcohol consumption, violence, sports violence, blood probably, angst, fluff, eventual smut, age gap (28 and 38), enemies to lovers, suggestive language, hockey inaccuracies etc. There will be individual chapter warnings. No use of Y/N.

Word Count: 3.5k

A/N: This is a repost of my completed series, You Catch More Bees With Honey. It was originally posted in November-March 2023, and was lost when my blog was deleted.

Previous Chapter // Series Masterlist // Next Chapter

“BRADLEY! BRADSHAW!” The flush that started on Cyclone’s neck has crept up to encompass his whole face much like a glass filling with fruit punch. You fight the urge to check your phone for the time. He might actually break his record for the longest screaming session yet and there’s a pool in the staff room riding on it that would definitely cover those new heels you’d been eyeing. Next to you, Dare Mitchell, the head coach of the San Diego Dogfighters as of last month, blatantly checks her watch and if you weren’t already enamored with everything this woman did, you definitely were now.

Cyclone’s still yelling, but the two of you stopped listening a long time ago it seems as Dare stands before looking down at you. “Come on Zam, let’s go.” If you weren’t so good at maintaining a poker face you think your jaw might have dropped. You get to your feet and follow Dare as she marches towards the door of Cyclone’s office and he finally pauses his tirade and you glance at your phone. New record indeed. “I am NOT finished!” He snaps and Dare turns in the doorway to face him coolly.

“Beau you were finished the minute this stopped being a conversation. When you’re ready to resume said conversation, you know where to find us.” She doesn’t wait for him to respond before turning on her heel and walking off down the hallway and you’re right behind her. When the elevator doors finally close behind the two of you, you feel the obligation to say SOMETHING. In your few months in San Diego, you haven’t met a lot of people with the balls to stand up to Beau Simpson. Until recently, the list began and ended with the Dogfighters’s Captain, Jake Seresin. Admittedly it only extended to when Cyclone was threatening his now-girlfriend Bugs, the assistant team physician but it was nice to see that at least someone was willing to do something about the man’s unchecked temper.

Now it included Dragon, the new goalie development coach who also happened to be Cyclone’s daughter. When she’d joined the staff, everyone had been apprehensive at best. One Simpson was already tough enough to handle but she’d surprised everyone by being congenial and even fun. She truly became one of the team, however, the day that she placed a crisp hundred dollar bill into the betting pool against her father’s temper. While Cyclone was a storm with no eye, Dragon was an eye that only seemed to blow into a storm when she stood toe to toe with her father. At least that was the word through the grapevine. Bugs had been going to drop off some paperwork in his office last week and said she’d been able to hear their shouting match from the other end of the hallway. Good for her.

The third entry was the woman standing next to you. Dare Mitchell was NHL royalty. She had been the league’s first female assistant coach and then head coach, going on to coach the Pittsburgh Penguins to no short of five Stanley Cup victories. Her nickname, Dare, stands for Definitive Authority on Rink Education, or Referee Ejection depending on who you ask. The fact that you were working alongside her still had you pinching yourself when you walked into work every morning. There’s definitely been a shift in the energy of the team since she took over the Head Coach title from Maverick after Game 3. This is just one of the many side effects and you can’t say you’re not grateful for the change.

There are unpopular whispers that Maverick asked Cyclone for the demotion himself but you know they're probably true. While Pete Mitchell is a talented hockey player, and he’s spent the years since his retirement coaching rec leagues, he’s not exactly on the level of the NHL. Why would he willingly pass the title to someone else, people ask. Well, it probably begins with the fact that she’s his wife. Dare and Pete Mitchell’s marriage is anything but common knowledge. In fact, the only people on the team that know are you, Bugs, Jake, and Maverick’s girlfriend, Penny. Sure they share a last name but Maverick’s been publically dating Penny Benjamin for the last few decades, so no one would even consider that he’s married to someone else entirely. According to Bugs and Jake, Maverick claims they separated amicably, not feeling the need to finalize a divorce but sometimes you see the way Dare stares at him when he’s not looking and wonder if that’s just his version of events.

“Thanks,” you say, awkwardly breaking the silence as the elevator travels back down to the ground floor. You never know how to talk to Dare, the temptation to make a fool of yourself by accidentally letting slip that you’re her biggest fan is a hazard you have to avoid every time you open your mouth. “Not many people are willing to stand up to Cyclone like that.”

She snorts, “It’s hard to take him seriously when every time I look at him, I just see the snot-nosed kid whose lunch money I used to steal.” You feel like you’ve been hit by a truck as you try to imagine Beau Simpson as a snot-nosed kid while also trying to process that Dare has known him for that long and used to steal his lunch money.

“You’ve known him that long?” You stammer as the elevator jolts to a halt and the two of you step out, walking side by side towards your respective offices.

“Beau and I grew up in the same town. We were never really friends but we were acquainted in the way that you know everyone in a town that small.” She shrugs. “He wasn’t always so full of hot air but maybe that’s why he is now. Needless to say, I have zero tolerance for childish tantrums in the workplace, regardless of who’s throwing them, my players or my colleagues.” You nod in agreement as you reach your office door. “And Zam? I think it might be in your best interest to have a word with Bradley Bradshaw.” The corner of her lips is teasing into the faintest hint of a smirk as you roll your eyes.

“You think?” She chuckles at that, before turning to continue to her own office.

Entering your office, you drop into your desk chair, letting out the frustrated groan you’ve been holding back all morning. You pull up Bradley Bradshaw’s profile on your computer and absently think that you should update the photo you have to his official Dogfighters’s headshot because he’s smiling in this photo and you’re pretty sure in the three months that you’ve known him, you’ve never seen him smile let alone show any expression of joy or even happiness. You jot down a note on your pink sticky note pad to update player photos. Heaving a huge sigh, you open the team portal and put in a request for a meeting with Bradley. One of the coaches will send him your way when he has a moment so in the meantime you read over his profile yet again. When Maverick first entertained the idea of trading for Bradley you hadn’t really batted an eye, even considering him a decent pick, all things considered, but now you wish you’d pushed back that day in the conference room because this man has been the beginning and end of all your problems ever since the season started. Sure you have other problems that you’re juggling. Despite your best efforts, Javy Machado continues to sleep with anything with tits, but right now it’s the least of your worries. You’re more concerned with the fact that Bradley Bradshaw’s almost spent more time in the penalty box this season than the rest of the team combined. He’s been irritable, to say the least, and while he used to play the role of enforcer more often, preferring to retaliate than provoke, ever since coming to San Diego he’s done nothing but pick fights on the ice. To the point that Cyclone’s yelling at you and Dare about it instead of Bradshaw himself. Dare because she’s his coach. You because this is doing disastrous things for the team’s reputation. Just because “fighter” is in the team name doesn’t mean it needs to be taken literally, apparently.

You don’t get it. Maverick asked for Bradley specifically, and he’s his godfather, you’d think Bradley would be ecstatic to be here. After all, his father died when he was just a kid. You’d assume that he and Maverick are close. You wonder if Dare knows anything about it. If things get dire enough you may have to ask her, even if she doesn’t know that you know about her and Maverick. Sighing, you click away from Bradley’s profile as you move on to other work while you wait for him to show, sparing a glance at the clock on the wall before picking up your phone to text the group chat labeled Cyclone Relief Fund. “19 minutes,” followed by a partying emoji. Mama’s getting a new pair of heels.

~~~~~

It’s a little after noon when there’s finally a knock on your door. You call for the knocker to enter and Bradley Bradshaw opens the door, taking a seat across from your desk. You fight an amused chuckle at the way his giant body dwarfs the petite pink armchair across from you. You have a feeling he won’t find it as funny as you do. He’s wearing a black Dogfighters’s tee that’s gripping his muscular arms for dear life over sweats, his curly hair still damp from the showers.

His whisky eyes are studying the space around you with curiosity mixed with thinly veiled disgust. You try to see it through his eyes. The boring white walls have been meticulously covered with adhesive wallpaper in a soft baby pink. Hanging on them is a carefully curated collection of art prints in matching white frames. Floating shelves on the wall are decorated with various tchotchkes in various shades of pink and white. A bright pink shag rug sits under your white wood desk, housing the pink faux leather desk chair you’re seated in and the plush pink armchair that Bradley’s spilling out of.

“Something wrong?” You ask when it’s been too long with him just blatantly ogling your decor.

“This looks like Barbie’s dream house.” He states, unamused, as his eyes come back to you.

“Actually I was going for more of an office or career Barbie than Malibu but it was probably on the vision board too.” You say, turning to your computer as you pull up the folder of articles that Cyclone sent you this morning. “Glad you like it.”

“I don’t.” His voice is flat and you peer up at him over the top of your screen. Your eyebrow twitches with annoyance at his blunt rudeness.

“Well if I ever get a suggestion box, I’ll make sure you’re the first to know, Bradshaw.” You snip as you turn the screen you’re looking at so that Bradley can see it. “So I think you can guess what you’re here to talk about. In the last fifteen games you’ve played, you’ve spent more time in the penalty box than any other player.”

He arches a dark brown eyebrow, “Hockey is a contact sport, honey.” Your eyebrow twitches again at the nickname.

“I’m sure the occasional bump is considered contact but throwing down your gloves to punch your opponent in the nose has very little to do with puck handling don’t you think?” Your voice is civil, and reasonable, as you pull up the video of Bradley’s fist making contact with the face of the Jets’s defenseman. That had handed him a five-minute major penalty for fighting.

“You’re not on the ice. Sometimes they’re asking for it.” You say a silent prayer for patience.

“You realize that you can get suspended for this right? You’re lucky you only have one instigator penalty so far out of all those fighting penalties.”

“I know that, honey. Three instigators earn you a two-game suspension, and it increases after that. I’ve read the rules.” You clench your jaw at how nonchalant he’s being about this. He’s got a smorgasbord of minor penalties, a couple of majors for general fighting, and one blatant instigator penalty. He’s on thin ice, pun intended.

“Regardless of the official NHL rules, what are you going to do if your coaches decide to bench you?” You raise an eyebrow at him and watch as he stiffens. It seems you’re finally a move ahead of him. You like it. “And given that Cyclone just yelled at me and Dare over the state of your performance? I’d say it’s bound to happen sooner rather than later.” His fists clench in his lap, but he doesn’t say anything. You decide to plow ahead while he’s not fighting every word coming out of your mouth.

“While your performance on the ice isn’t my department, how it reflects on the team is. Currently media outlets are describing you as a loose cannon and bordering on a danger to other players. If this keeps up, the team could be forced to bench you indefinitely or even let you go completely.” You purse your lips in a thin line. “I’m doing what I can in terms of damage control but we have to work together here. I can’t promise that you’re working on it if we don’t see any actual change.”

He snorts at that, sitting back as best he can. “You want some advice, honey? Stay out of it. It’s none of your business.” You clench a fist in your lap. WHY DOES HE INSIST ON FIGHTING YOU?

“Actually, it is. This is my JOB, Bradshaw. Just because you don’t feel like doing yours doesn’t mean I’m going to follow suit just because you want me to.” His honey eyes flash with warning but you don’t back down, meeting them with yours, steel in your gaze. “I didn’t get this job by letting people like you walk all over me, Bradshaw and I don’t intend on starting now.” Your fingers fly over the keyboard and you pull up some paparazzi photos from the last few weeks. “You’re getting drunk and causing trouble in public,” you click through photos of an intoxicated Bradley leaving a bar and getting into a shoving match with some guy. You sigh, fighting the urge to pinch your nose as a dull throbbing takes up residence in your temples.

Bradley just gives you a cold look. “What? So a man can’t go to a bar and have a drink anymore?” The throbbing intensifies and you fantasize about launching yourself over your desk and wrapping your perfectly manicured hands around his enormous neck.

“Look,” your voice is pure ice to hide the vitriol threatening to take over, “if you’re not going to change your behavior, at least do me a favor and be a train wreck in private from now on.” You could hear a pin drop as you barely hold back from spitting the words at Bradley. The two of you glare at each other, the white expanse of your desk a no-man’s-land between the wars in your eyes. “You’re free to go.” Your voice is the exact opposite of your face. It’s prim, proper, congenial. It matches the rest of your persona. Your bright butter-yellow suit makes you look like sunshine incarnate even as you burn underneath with the fury of a thousand suns. Bradley’s still glaring at you as he extricates himself from the armchair and stalks out the door without another word, letting the door slam behind him. You want to scream but the walls in the place are far too thin, so you do the next best thing, launching yourself out of your chair not bothering to push it back as you storm out of your office.

***

You barge into Bugs’s office and she looks up from whatever chart she’s currently perusing as you grab a handful of gummy bears from her candy dish and throw yourself into the chair across from her. She raises a single eyebrow at you but doesn’t say anything as you aggressively chew the green confections.

“I’d think you’d be happier since you just won the betting pool but what’s up?” She says finally when it’s obvious that you won’t be volunteering any information.

“Bradley. Bradshaw.” You spit as you pop another gummy bear into your mouth and her eyes soften in

understanding even as her mouth tightens into a tense line. You know she knows what you’re talking about, especially since she’s been the one patching him up. “Cyclone asked me to do something about him because he’s dragging the team through the mud, and you know what he said? He told me to stay out of it! As if this isn’t MY JOB! He doesn’t care about his reputation, he doesn’t care if he doesn’t get to play, I don’t get it! What’s got his panties in such a twist!” You’re fuming as you continue to shred through gummy bears. “This is an amazing opportunity! Why is he so eager to throw it away?”

“Maybe he doesn’t want to be here?” Bugs asks, brows furrowed in thought. “He did exclusively play for the Flyers for the last sixteen years.” You shake your head.

“That doesn’t make any sense. The Flyers have been trying to pawn him off to the highest bidder for the better part of the last two seasons.” Bugs’s eyes raise in surprise and you shrug. “He’s getting old and they would much rather have a good draft pick for rookie talent. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks and all that. At least that’s what their manager told me. When Maverick asked them for a trade they practically threw him at us, they couldn’t believe their luck.”

“Maverick asked to trade for Bradley?” She asks, confused. “Isn’t it usually the manager’s job to do that?”

You nod. “Normally, yeah, but Maverick asked for Bradley himself. Apparently, he’s his godson.” Bugs’s eyes widen in surprise.

“Bradley is Mav’s GODSON?!” You nod.

“It makes sense actually, given that he’s Nick Bradshaw’s son and all.” You watch the realization hit Bugs’s face.

“Oh my god, I never put it together.” She whispers. You can’t blame her. Bradshaw is a common enough last name and no one’s first instinct is to tie someone to a tragedy as well known as that of Nick “Goose” Bradshaw.

Nick “Goose” Bradshaw played for the Philadelphia Flyers back in the 80s, at the same time as Maverick. The two were best friends, inseparable on and off the ice. Nick Bradshaw got his nickname, Goose, because he was always sticking his neck out for Maverick and it ended in one of the most infamous hockey tragedies in NHL history.

While hockey is one of the most violent of the contact sports, it’s highly regulated to ensure that fatal injuries don’t occur due to fighting, but every now and then something slips through the cracks and that’s what happened in the case of Goose Bradshaw. Maverick got into an altercation on the ice and when another player tried to get involved, Goose tried to interfere to keep the numbers even, which resulted in him losing his helmet in the fray and being thrown into the boards, hitting his head. While the physician on duty deemed that Goose was fine, he sat out the rest of the game. Two days later he died of a brain hemorrhage, widowing his wife Carole and leaving his two-year-old son, Bradley Bradshaw, fatherless. The Bradshaw family disappeared from the public eye until Bradley caught the media’s attention when he joined the Penn State Nittany Lions in college as a left winger, following in his late father’s footsteps.

“So you’d think he’d be happy to be here, with Maverick.” You muse and Bugs nods, still frowning.

“Family doesn’t always get along, though,” she says with a shrug. You know she’s close with hers and you’re as close as you can be with yours. “But still why would he throw his whole career away like this? It doesn’t make sense.” She’s right, it doesn’t and so you’re left to ponder the enigma that is Bradley Bradshaw.

***

You’re still thinking about it as you get ready to leave for the night. Unsurprisingly, you’re the only one left. The sky has long since darkened outside, but you’re married to your job. You need to do the best you can to keep Cyclone off your back for long enough for Bradley to figure his shit out. You step into the arena proper, the lights are on as the Zamboni drives around, cleaning up the ice after practice so it’ll be perfect tomorrow morning. You gaze at the rink as the machine drives back and forth across the surface and your heart aches. A part of you longs to step back out onto the smooth surface and feel the cool air radiating off the rink kiss your cheeks just one more time. You aren’t sure when the tears filled your eyes but you blink them out as you whisper. “I miss you, Mom. I wish you were here. I wish you could see this. I’m in California now, and it’s so different from home, but you were right. As long as there’s ice, it’s not that different after all.”

[lifestealupdates]

Lifesteal Season 6, Week 15 Update

So. This has been an eventful week. This recap is accurate up to the 21st of October, as usual Lifesteal members should be blocked but just in case please DNI, and major spoilers under the read-more.

The End of Zam's Pacifism

Early this week (15th Oct), Zam had another moment of crisis over his pacifism.

He debated trying to chunkban Wemmbu but decided against it.

While flying around spawn, he accidentally came across Derapchu banning Midmysticx off the server (a result of her selling enough Makeship plushies).

Derapchu told Zam that he did this because there were "no repercussions".

Those two words changed Zam's outlook on pacifism completely.

He then fought Wemmbu and Flamefrags with Mapicc and Spoke, and lost, with Mapicc and Spoke dying, but Zam was still happy.

After, he told Poafa about how Minute's words to him in Season 5 (about s3!Zam being Minute's inspiration for heroism) had influenced a lot of his current Lifesteal arc.

Zam rewrote his oath to prioritise protecting innocents, and is now willing to fight and kill players who hurt the server or innocents.

Later in the week, he decided to build an arrow cannon to hopefully kill Wemmbu in the session, and Poafa agreed to fire it.

California Girls

On the 17th of October, Bacon decided he wanted to betray Wemmbu for killing Planet.

After debating for a while, he told Kaboodle, who agreed to help him trap Wemmbu.

Zam is also aware of Bacon's thoughts on Wemmbu, and also the fact Bacon doesn't trust Kab.

Kab was concerned Wemmbu might kill them in revenge, and Bacon agreed that it's likely, but he won't spare too much effort on killing them, so they'll probably be fine.

Kaboodle

As part of her scheme to get closer to Woogie, Kab has been building an IKEA to prove her peacefulness. (This has led to her being jumped by Mane last week - I forgot to put this in the recap)

The day before the session, they met with Woogie at his tower and told him to get Reddoons online to duel them, otherwise she will destroy everything he loves, starting with blowing up one floor of his tower for every day Reddoon's doesn't log on.

Zam and Squiddo were secretly listening to this, although it is uncertain if Squiddo is secretly working with Kab.

Kab is apparently aware that Zam has been watching some of her conversations with Woogie, as someone was "watching him" too. This made Zam suspect if he can't trust Bacon, or if they are secretly working with Manepear.

After Kaboodle left, Zam and Woogie talked, revealing Redd was planning to get banned during in the duel but withdrawing all bar one of his hearts.

After, Squiddo and Kaboodle talked, with Squiddo accidentally revealing they'd been giving Kab ideas for dealing with Mane.

“If the only language that Mane knows how to speak is violence, then I’ll start learning it”

Kaboodle is going to place "landmines" everywhere to mess with him.

October 19th Session

The sessions started with Zam and Pangi afraid Clown was about to go on a killing spree, as earlier that day Clown had lost five hearts in punishment for combat-logging in Rekrap's trap (see Rek's most recent video)

Reddoons refused to fight anywhere but the top of Woogie's tower, and eventually Kab agreed to it. The plan was to have Hannah and Clown nearby in invis in case anything went wrong.

Originally, Kab was going to have Hannah fight Redd, but after finding out he was on one heart she agreed to fight him.

Kab was also untrusting of Hannah during this, as Hannah didn't give them a screenshot of Redd being on one heart, and expressed their doubts to Clown while Hannah was deafened.

Zam tried to watch the Redd vs Kab duel but missed it as he ate a chorus fruit that teleported him to the bottom of the tower.

The duel took place and Kab killed Redd in one hit, banning him.

Immediately, Subz logged on in the tower and started attacking her.

Clown killed Subz, then Flamefrags, Manepear and Pentar appeared and attacked Clown (wanting the mace).

Kab jumped in and hit Mane off Clown, getting Mane's attention on her and allowing Clown to escape.

Bacon and Kab then died to Mane, and Leo, who was also at the tower (and on three hearts), fell from the tower and died.

The Empire and the Blindfold Brothers then had a fight at spawn, with Leo asking to join the fight alongside the Empire.

During the fight, Flame killed Leo, then Mane killed him again, banning him off the server.

This upset Zam, who joined the fight to buy the Empire time to escape, then hid until the Blindfold Brothers left.

While Zam was talking to Pangi, Minute was killed by Mane (we later found out the Blindfold Brothers knew the Empire's base location and ambushed him).

While speaking to the Empire later, the server crashed with really bad lag, and time reversed a couple of minutes, leaving them all in their original locations.

This unfortunately put Minute back in the Empire base with the Blindfold Brothers and no gear. They killed him again.

These events made Zam doubt the efficiacy of his new morals.

As this was ongoing, the California Girls team (minus Wemmbu, who didn't log on) read Reddoon's eulogy, a book he left her.

Kab feels like killing Redd was a false victory, but nonetheless she trusts Hannah and Bacon more than anyone else on the server other than Clown.

They also said they don't regret getting killed for Clown, as his life is more important than their own.

Time Travel Plans

On the 20th October, Zam revealed he, Mapicc and Spoke have a tenuous plan involving abusing the time-travel glitch that the lag during the session caused to give them an advantage against their enemies.

Zam is considering using this technique to basically dupe a revival beacon, as there is no way he can get the materials to revive all three banned players (Reddoons, Leowook, Midmysticx).

He told Mapicc about this plan, who was hesitant because of the potential to dupe hearts, and Spoke would possibly want to exploit that.

When the trio attempted to test the glitch, Mapicc considered telling Minute what they were doing, as the PMC betrayal was caused by a lack of communication.

Mapicc was originally anti-duping because of his status as a server admin, but then changed his mind, with the condition they keep it secret who has been reviving people.

[casinoquartet]

[long] U TURNED ON ASKS YIPPEE!!! hi i’m that recent anon, i love ur posts so much :))) thank you for everything, and the fic you linked was incredible! that facet of swagdoons in which red is so so painfully genuinely in true love with ash, under all the layers of power plays, through the real pain of each and every one of ash’s betrayals… i will die!!!! and thank you (& your friends) for posting about the casino quartet, i am soooo thankful for the introduction to the best polycule ever. one thing i love about the casino quartet is how clown and branzy are obnoxiously public (people know so many details that they really did not need to know) (hence people feel so confident that they’re genuinely devoted & reliant on each other that they’ll try to use one against the other) (prime example: the season 3 obsidian trap), while ash and red are obnoxiously private (no one understands what the fuck is ever going on between them) (no one knows how to manipulate their dynamic, no one can properly account for their incomprehensible relationship while trying to strategize) (prime example: boosfer’s phobias video). i like to imagine that clownzy are the closest people to the internal workings of swagdoons (they see the domestic arguments & the intimacy behind closed doors, listen to their private rants about each other, were present for some of the loaded swagdoons history that ash and red don’t even really talk about themselves). also i watched zam’s first stream of the hardcore smp yesterday [8/21/2022] and i find it so funny how ash will bring up clownzy and clown will bring up swagdoons. (ash announces he’s going to recite “the bible: part 2” and reads aloud a clownzy angst fanfiction; clown says in the middle of a formal meeting that red should sit on ash’s lap because they’re swagdoons). why are they always like this. and idk if you feel much interest in the latest season of the kaboodle smp but i’m really hoping for some clown x ash homosexualities, to fill out the casino quartet dynamics. as of now, we’ve got clown immediately showing vaguely gay interest towards ash, the mysterious teleporting guy in a suit who violently glitched into a server-wide campfire meeting out of nowhere. (clown: “ooh, who are you~?” ash, who otherwise doesn’t show interest in anyone or anything besides gaining riches: “…where do i know you from?”) (ash: teleports in, kills someone’s pet cat, teleports out. everyone, rightfully: WHAT THE FUCK?! clown: shocked delighted laughter.) (everyone is stuck unable to interact with ash, who keeps ignoring all conversation to ask for valuables. but clown swiftly catches on to ash’s rhythm and uses an emerald to try to bribe ash to follow him & tell him his name, as if ash is a cat. it somewhat works.) (after ash leaves, clown tells the others that he’ll “keep an eye on” the new stranger, who will be “safe in [his] hands”.) i watched this all go down from our beloved ivorycello’s POV [7/1/2023]. anyway uh. hiiii and thank you & all you other regular swagdoonsers on tumblr for the friendly reception :) i’m so excited for lifesteal season five plotlines. for some reason i’ve been Thinking about the intro to season 5 in which everyone gathers around in a circle waiting to start, ash sees this and places himself at the center to make an impromptu dramatic speech LOL, and red is the first to step in with him to tell him to go back to his spot. i’m choosing to imagine this as another instance of the god complex bf with enough power to back it up x the only guy who can rein him in and is bizarrely casual & familiar about it dynamic. ok i’m out ✌️ love you /p

[very long response under the cut]

HI ANON!!! glad that you enjoyed my post and the fic i recced in the tags!!! it’s one of my fav fics and your post Really reminded me of it so!!! i’m glad you enjoyed it!!!!! (loves reccing fics) me when reddoons and loyalty and how it plays into swagdoons . (<- i remember i made a post responding to something i found on lsheadcanons about vampire!ash and human!red that Could be used for a metaphor about swagdoons and loyalty . something something about red Literally fueling ash out of choice)

anyways!! WELCOME TO THE CASINO QUARTET ENJOYER GANG!!!! they r my absolute beloveds, god bless. and you’re SO RIGHT clownzy would do so much pda in public and be all mushy (but in the Worst times possible . i am talking about mushy flirting while they are being chased down by the authorities while ash and red are screaming at them to stop and focus on running away. anyways) but i think?? you’re referring to the trap where branzy is held ransom by purple duo and heh as to get clown to “save” him? but yeah . they’re always so closely associated with each other that even in small things (ex someone in the start of s5 warning someone that branzy “knows a guy” in reference to clown) and since branzy is the “weaker” of the two tbh i’m not surprised if someone holds branzy for ransom again this season (i’ve heard whispers of them teaming up again this season so !!!)

but even though there’s been a lot of acknowledgement by other cc’s, there’s not any. record of someone taking advantage of their relationship yet? like you said the closest thing is the one of them is lying video but like, that video was arguably where swagdoons showed their trust the Most (esp with cheating during spilt or steal . that was SO them) but. yeah the way their relationship is very subtle . there’s no real massive declaration of love but small moments (which. i think why there’s SO many swagdoons clips that r just small gestures but swagdoons enjoyers still go BONKERS over <- big enjoyer of their streams for that reason) (and as a result i associate the song “no big deal (i love you)” by dodie with them . a lot of the one is about not verbally saying i love you but. yk. the love is still there and strong . love that song in general so <3) but Yeah i do also like the idea that clownzy r one of the Only people who see swagdoons be domestic with each other in full . something something about casino quartet being domestic and trusting each other so much here willing to stop all of the facade and be vulnerable with each other

but LMAOOOOO that hardcore stream goes so hard . the bible part 2 caught me so off guard when i watched it like LMAO????? it’s fantastic . also in that same stream zam is like “the bible part 3: ash nd red were walking down the street” and swagdoons are INSTANTLY shutting him down and telling him to stop (this is a recurring thing for some reason apparently zam mentioned swagdoons during vidcon and got hit with a ball i response but also zam did say swagdoons made out in the dennys so ???? idk anymore) but ooooo i didn’t know about clown mentioning swagdoons . maybe i should check that out (i was only skimming through the void so…that is something for me to check out)

and i am watching kemp rn too! except i am only watching from ash’s pov, which is. a time for sure. he has already made a deal with god and figured out how to exploit his glitching thing. but ash WAS looking at clown when he teleported into the campground and defrost was like O_O at clown so. tbh i’m kinda excited to see where they go since they might have a “hold up…do i know you?” moment (and if ur interested there is a fic of them …….clown and ash my beloved) (and here’s the clown and ash meowing clip if you so desire . this clip is the clip of All Time) but hearing what the rest of the conversation with the ksmp members afterwards is INTERESTING when i just watched ash teleport away and go “i hate it here’ LMAOOO ……..that is interesting of clown though……..i wanna see them together more ……like an enclosure

AND S5!!!! i am so excited for s5 of them …..idk who’s pov you watched but in ash’s pov he Did mention wanting to team with branzy, red, and clown SOOOOOOOO ………. <- he also said this last season and that didn’t end up happening . i am going off of copium /silly

but i Do think swagdoons r gonna have a more power dynamic-y relationship this season esp with the whole free market stuff (and at least. according to red’s stream today he Said that lala legion were trying to look for camelot’s old base so…….. eyes emoji. what’s up with that) BUT YEAH!!!! lots fo exciting stuff bc i’ve also heard clownzy might team up again. …….. casino quartet nation is winning

IDK IF ANY OF THOSE RANTS MADE SENSE hopefully i didn’t miss anything and i was. semi on topic BUT !!! YEAH!!!!!! love u 2 anon /p ur asks r lovely :)

[citrusinicake]

snowsancuary evidence collection

some of these may not be as significant as the rest but whatever

warning for mild horror, mentions/implications of stalking, and scopophobia

header: link (can get a copy by replacing edit with copy)

header with brightness, saturation, and contrast turned up, doesn't seem like anything's hidden but maybe i did it wrong idk

actual doc has a prose in playfair display font that i will call the mesite poem, it has generally proper punctation with the exception of a few misspellings which im guessing are not intentional (unless they are?), strangely placed commas which im not sure are intentional or not (i dont read poems idk how they work lol), and a few strangely capitalized letters: R U E T H E D A Y M E S I T E (RUE THE DAY MESITE)

it references a few things from the castle arc such as a snow abode which is later referred to as a cage (zam's base, his safe space later turning into a hostile one), the bird singing to those it should not (zam talking and teaming with ppl dualityduo dont approve of or even actively hostile towards), the bird going out to eat bugs and worms then hiding in the dark (the eating is possibly(?) a reference to zam only ever killing ppl when he needs to/when he thinks theyre evil and then hiding away in his base for the rest of the time), the dog lifting the bird with its two bruised hands to its heart (could be a reference to ro and mapicc and team awesome but maybe im reaching), a feeling of freedom and confidence due to being flightless and therefore disadvantaged and having nothing to lose (zam losing like 14 hearts or something), the bird that starts fearing the dog that stalks outside its cage (mapicc literally stalking zam in mc and zam slowly getting increasingly paranoid each time)

it also specifically mentions the 30th (i didnt watch the streams and havent caught up with the vods yet so idk if thats referencing anything) amd a red house on the street

mesite according to wikipedia (made the interesting parts bold):

"The mesites (Mesitornithidae) are a family of birds that are part of a clade (Columbimorphae) that include Columbiformes and Pterocliformes. They are smallish flightless or near flightless birds endemic to Madagascar. They are the only family with more than two species in which every species is threatened (all three are listed as vulnerable).

"The mesites are forest and scrubland birds that feed on insects and seeds; brown and white-breasted mesites forage on the ground, gleaning insects from underneath leaves as well as low vegetation. The subdesert mesite uses its long bill to probe in the soil. Other birds, such as drongos and flycatchers, will follow mesites to catch any insects they flush out or miss. Mesites are vocal birds, with calls similar to a passerine song, used for territorial defence. Two or three white eggs are laid in a stick-built nest located in a bush or on a low branch. The Mesitornis species are monogamous while Monias benschi is polygamous and, unlike the other two, shows significant sexual dichromatism.

"Historically, mesites’ phylogenetic relationships were not very clear; they have been allied with the Gruiformes, Turniciformes and Columbiformes. Recent phylogenomic studies support Pterocliformes (sandgrouse) as the sister group of mesites while some more recent studies place this clade with another clade constituted of Columbiformes and Cuculiformes (cuckoos)."

mesite according to rankred.com:

"Brown Mesite is a flightless bird species found only in Madagascar’s humid evergreen forests. The Brown Mesite is classified as a vulnerable species. Due to its preference to remain in low altitude regions of the forest, where dogs and other common predators are widespread, they are an easy target to prey upon. Loss of habitat is also a major factor for their declining population."

bio: binary code

[01001111 01100011 01110100 01101111 01100010 01100101 01110010] translates to [october]

log 24: weird smiley

the fact that this is the first log implies that the first 23 logs were writtenon the walls which i would honestly like to see

log 25: morse code

[- …. . .-. . … / … --- -- . - …. .. -. --. / -- .. … … .. -. --.] translates to [theres something missing]

the tag before it says [i cant put my finger on it.], idk if tag order was intentional or not, probs doesnt matter either way lol

log 27: cheating scandal

idk just thought it was something to take note of for later

log 28: crown

the only log so far with the crown symbol

could just be because of the competition

log 29: only one with 1 dot at the title rather than 2

milk post: red, first evidence of stalking

log 31: binary code

leads to this link which leads to this picture (poated for those who cant access it):

original vs edited

no idea what the text behind says, interesting that this is specifically on the log that mentions getting robbed and "him"

to watch post: purple, idk theres just something weird about it

the fact its not a log and the fact that zam seems irritated in the drawing means theres a non-zero cahmce he didnt write it

[scarletiswailing347]

currently stuck on deciding if i wanna keep watching ls or not considering how much of my interest in it hinged on being interested in zam specifically and now that ive decided to lessen my interest in him its getting really difficult to keep up

like i like ls and all but the reason im not super interested in it in general is cause of how much is stacked against it in terms of what i look for in a series:

its primarily a livestream-based server and i Do Not have the time nor energy nor attention span to watch streams esp on a consistent basis

while lsers do make vids esp recently, they Really suck at storytelling in a way that isnt extremely subjective which means that if you dont watch the streams you miss out on a Lot of context (like i didnt even know what m.o.b. stood for for several vids) (and thats not even getting started on the amount of miscommunication between them 💀)

a significant number of them are still minors, not to harp on minors making content or anything cause they have every right to but i am an adult and i def prefer watching adult ccs

most of the fandom resides in twitter and ill be honest id like to spend as little time there as possible

all the ccs also primarily or only use twitter which wouldnt be so bad if it werent for the fact that a lot of significant events spawn from there (the parrot and ash wedding is the most recent example but theres a few more examples of this and im sure there will be even more in the future)

and the thing is i probs could theoretically keep getting interested in ls if it werent for all that cause of how interesting the gimmick is and the servers dynamic in general, but as it is i might have to make it yet another series that ive abandoned

[coffeegnomee]

I love this. Thank you for adding your analysis!!

I will say off the bat that I was being a bit dramatic in the original post, I wrote it basically immediately after watching Bacon's second stream and the team, needless to say, is just dysfunctional. And I was feeling dramatic and poetic. Romanticizing the past you could say.

I started thinking too much about how important team dynamics are. So I recognize it wasn't super thorough. and quite biased fr. I'll get into it.

"By honor, I assume you mean regarding the creation of videos and other content? If so, I generally agree here too(with some exceptions, that I won't get into in this reblog). Showing up to events they know are likely traps, agreeing to in-game meetings instead of insisting on discord calls, participating in things even if not planning to make a video out of it, all of this and many other things they do are about helping each other to make better content."

Yea I meant it that way. I have like a core memory from one of the earliest s4 streams I saw, don't remember which one or what was going on but Mapicc did something and I was like, 'woah that was actually, like, super honorable of him, despite the absolute bs that they pull off on this server. That's so awesome, you love to see that.'

The fact that I remember it so distinctly as being Mapicc but not at all what the situation was is so funny to me, but it is something he would do. Like he in particular always shows up to stuff, and he can be quite nice to D6. It just stuck out to me so much in that moment and made me fall in love with the server that there's this balance between the bs and the people making it. There's humanity behind the shittery.

But yea, then your laundry list of the bullshit they pull on each other in the context of the videos made me laugh. They really have pulled a lot of shit. And I love it too. Anything to get the upper hand.

The context about bringing the wormhole up for the lying to others was definitely just me being a Zam-first fan, and how he kept the secret to everyone and anyone, lying to Planet and Bacon about it, despite how much he was unsure of it. Lol. Eclipse my beloved and how fucked up they were. And Spoke to Parrot.

And you're absolutely right about me projecting it onto people that people use Zam as an excuse to betray. Idk where I got that one either. I was thinking about it the day after I posted this and was like.... has anyone said that or has Zam just felt so much guilt about betraying everyone and has talked about how he's trying to move past that reputation so much recently that I also internalized that lol.

Oh I found it, it was on 9/11/24 about 5:08:00 “Most betrayals in a season, that’s me. That’s the reputation I’ve built for myself. And then I immediately decided I was going to kill everyone, right after. That’s um, the reputation I’m trying to escape."

So evidently it was on my mind lol. And I was thinking about reputations and the new members's perspectives of the server coming in from a viewer perspective (in some cases watching a lot, in some only knowing some things) and then becoming a member. And how that influences their preconceptions about what the server is about.

Versus how the old members molded it as they went and had the inside part of building that reputation. And how Youtube videos differ so much from streamed content. You're going to edit the betraying and scheming differently for a fast paced video in a way that can never express what it's like living it in real time. And living it real time will make it so the reputation grows at the same time you grow, as opposed to entering into that reputation down the line. That's more what I was trying to get at. And then my PrinceZam brainrot got the best of me lol.

About the betrayals before s5. I did completely forget about Branzy. I was listing the people who tend to betray, rather than the number of betrayals they have done? If that makes sense. I was trying to think of the semi and less active members and remember if they individually pulled off a purposeful "get into a team and betray them", or "decide to betray a team that I was fully on" and my mind was pulling up nothing besides more recent stuff, Jumper being the one I was implying for things happening in s5.

Now I am thinking of more, like it was Parrot who betrayed the... Dirties? Because he was conveniently added to the group chat at the right time and took full advantage of it?

You said you've been around since s2 started. That will pretty much do it. I will fully admit I found Lifesteal mid/late season 4 right after the Eclipse Betrayal and pieced things together and struggled greatly at figuring out which youtube videos went with which seasons and generally gave up in favor of watching streams. So I also don't have as much emotional attachment (and memory) to the betrayals of s3 and before, (not to mention "lore" didn't start until the end of s3 and that has shaped the old members a lot. At least the ones that played into it) and it was such a notable moment with Zam betraying so many people s4 and also spending so much time thinking about it that that really became my baseline for a story well told: Not betraying for the sake of betraying, but really thinking about it because the concept of "team" means something beyond your individual goals.

Which yea. #bias. Oh well. It's really good encountering someone who just knows more about the server than I do. I used to get so nervous about having an opinion about anything if I didn't watch every single episode of a show regardless of how many hundreds there were. I gave up on that with Lifesteal because it's simply too many hours. I genuinely appreciate your perspective.

It's actually so interesting though. How are new fans vs old? How has the lore effect of s4 has made a whole new category of fan that is just extremely different in mindset to fans who have been around since the start?

It fascinates me actually how much the server changed in 4 and/or 5 seasons. Because like, my comment

"But the new members just do not understand what “for content” means. They just kill randomly. They don’t defend each other. They don’t tell the other teammate to give the heart back bc it’s been proven enough that they’re innocent. They’re constantly suspicious and will only meet if there are no enemies online. "

is entirely based upon season 4 and season 5 members (cough Mapicc cough. And Zam and Bacon.) who do tend to gentleman's rule it up with making sure their teammates have enough hearts and gear and taking care of each other. And like with Zam giving out gear left and right. And even with Zam's paranoia, he's so strategic about it at this point that it's just fun to watch.

They've changed a lot since their early days, and they're almost facing the living memory of what they were like three years ago in the person of each of these new members. They're just as volatile as they were in s2, but now they've grown out of that volatility to some extent. Oh how I wish I could watch s1-3 vods.

I have actually wondered a lot about how similar the new members's choices are (when it comes to things that make me feel like they're not getting how this server runs) compared to the old members in their early seasons. You've basically confirmed my suspicions. Everyone has done shitty things to each other and the extent that they don't do that anymore is formed though experience and knowing the boundaries of what the other members will and will not tolerate.

And now they're facing new people who think how they thought.

The comment about "for content", I should have said "in the service of content" maybe. It's not just "the things that are for my video" (which they all succeed in creating) but rather "things that are interesting for myself and for the whole server" which, as a viewer, is "content" for me: the things that make a year long ever-evolving story.

I don't think I'm explaining that right. I think I might just meant like, for improv actually. Maybe? Like Lore: things that continue the Story rather than just make it stop? But in the context of what I said, I was thinking of something specific.

Wemmbu being like "i don't give a shit if you give the heart back or not" was just annoying, like have an opinion bro, take a side. You're the leader, decide the result. That was one specific line I was thinking of when writing that.

The killing randomly.. I am a Bacon supporter that killing innocents for the sake of killing innocents is not it. It has to have some sort of meaning behind it for me to be on board. Killing the new member over and over teaches them something. Idk maybe I don't agree with that anymore. Kab killing Planet had the effect of making Bacon think about getting involved so it really was useful. I was thinking about Hannah killing Bacon without Kab talking to him first, like that instantaneous kill that doesn't involve talking. I hate those. But I'm also a lore goblin.

And the not meeting if the enemy is online is, yea, like you said, it is fair. I just find it grating and annoying when they stop the conversation based on it. But even so I can remember multiple times someone has been told that if someone logs on and they don't spam message them to log off they die. So it's hardly unique to Kab.

so yea. idk. That stream was making my head hurt.

I also meant it in the context of the team. Like in the service of a team's goal, we work as a team and don't do things that make it harder to do content with each other. So that's my bad for being not clear at all. And my poor little heart got too caught up in how frustrated Bacon was with the team and wanting to leave it that I was like, can we have one thing, one little thing? Like save the betraying for later, just work together. Make some content. But they'll be fine. Either Bacon stays or he doesn't. Either will continue the plot forward and it really doesn't matter. And this is quite an interesting interaction all of them had.

It will never not fascinate me how much every encounter has some positive effect come from it. Like something might happen to grind the story to a halt, but that in and of itself is its own launching point for another plot. I usually just need like a day or two to realize how the development will still be interesting even if it didn't measure up to my expectation. Like even Flame dropping the spawn griefing made Zam frolic which means his character abruptly have nothing to fight or win against, and his frolicking got Bacon thinking of ways to make the server interesting. All from Flame just dropping that bit of story right as people were thinking of more and more ways to oppose him. It's so intertwined. And it seems (so far so good) to be that the server cannot destroy itself (like in the "we aren't doing a new season" way.) Someone always has something to do from something else's actions. They always bounce back.

And I do love that every person is uniquely themselves. That is something that I've absolutely loved about streamed minecraft, everyone is unique and you get to see exactly how because there are so many hours streamed.

But I do have a tendency to try and compare members to each other as a part of understanding them and when I do that before I understand what makes them uniquely them I'm just doomed to be disappointed. Because they aren't like someone else. That would be ridiculous. And yet my stubborn brain will still tend to expect similarities.

And I got waaaay too excited by the prospect of this team being a team. It's such an interesting group of people. And so when they "ruined" it (the stream ending with Bacon saying he would not work with them) instead of taking the risk and exploring the possibilities and making it into content, that's where I got dramatic about teaming.

That is what I meant "for content" actually. I think. The concept of random people teaming up and seeing what comes of it. Maybe just saying "they don't know how to take risks for content" is the best way to say it. idk apparently I also don't know what I meant. Not my greatest writing moment I'll admit.

What you said at the start:

"The team bonds are only so strong because of the way the constant conflict and stress of the server drives people to depend on each other."

That basically sums everything up. Driven to depend on each other despite the risks involved. That is the core of the server.

Thanks again! I loved this. You always have permission to make a reblog with analysis. I'll let you know if I'm ever like, this is stressing me out please don't do it again.

Ok just caught up and like. What the fuck man. 

I literally all can do is just sit here and hope and pray that the old members stick it out and help the new members understand what lifesteal is actually about.

Because lifesteal has the reputation of being the lying and betraying and killing people server. 

But it is just Not That. Like obviously those things have happened on the server, fine. 

But lifesteal is far far far more about teammates. Believing that they will have your back. Working together to do cool shit. Trusting each other. 

It’s about commitment and honor and respect and working together on an interesting goal. 

It’s about not screwing over your teammates for a cheap moment that ruins the rest of your relationship on the server. (Mapicc showed this perfectly this week too! He ended the experiments because he’d rather have a teammate than execute a crazy emotional manipulation arc on Zam and really push him over the edge.) 

They sacrifice for each other. They protect each other. They pick each other up when they get killed by their enemies. They encourage them when they’re down. Help them be strong against their fears. Get each other gear and hearts and make sure they’re safe. Spend hours on each other’s arc together in vc all night. 

They lie to OTHERS for their team. They protect the wormhole for months even when they don’t want to or believe in it at all.

They do tiny little things that they know the other person will like just so they know they love them and appreciate them being on the team. They say it too, to each other’s faces. 

It’s about loving each other bro. There’s a massive fucking reason why there’s so much shipping fanart man. They fucking love each other platonically so damn much and so damn perfectly that you can make it romantic and it’s like not even like all that weird.

It makes me so fucking mad that you could boil down this beautiful server into lying and killing and go on it and be like, I heard princezam betrays every team he’s on obviously we should betray everyone and be on the lookout for every single person being a betrayer. 

Zam fucking lost his mind over betraying team awesome and eclipse. He AGONIZED for MONTHS before pulling the trigger for eclipse and he didn’t betray team awesome until after their massive arc together that he was completely loyal to, finished it out as a team, and only when they looked like they weren’t going to give up their unfair advantage did he seek to leave them. And he fought them and left.

The fucking respect he has for a team is insane.

And same goes for Bacon and Mapicc. 

as for others:

Ro only betrays if he gets a better offer (from mapicc) 

Leo betrays when it’s interesting for the story to have a juggernaut.

Spoke betrays only when he has his own bigger plan to execute that will create something interesting for the whole server to encounter. 

Clown only betrays when you go against his morals of creating content by chaos. 

I can’t even think of any notable betrayals from before s5. Most of the server does not betray ever. Most of the server never lies. 

They only lie and betray when it’s for the benefit of the content. 

And that’s what fucking makes me so upset about this. Bacon is doing this arc for the BETTERMENT of the server. He literally says he’s doing it to make other people’s lives on the sever more interesting. It ain’t even about him. He’s not even making a video about this. He just likes to do cool shit on the server because it’s fun to craft an overarching story for everyone to play into.

It’s never been about hearts man. 

The most valuable resource on the server is content. 

And Bacon understands this. In a way that quite possibly could make him a worldender like spoke and clown. He’s really getting into the role of strategizing fun things for the server to do for no other reason than someone has to do it and that it’s good for the server. 

But the new members just do not understand what “for content” means. They just kill randomly. They don’t defend each other. They don’t tell the other teammate to give the heart back bc it’s been proven enough that they’re innocent. They’re constantly suspicious and will only meet if there are no enemies online. 

It’s not about the hearts man. 

It’s about the team.

[solbit-fox]

1. Who is that?

Zam the elf, the filly, a character who only appears in a recently released tv-series known as ‘Filly Funtasia’ (ukrainian: ‘Філлі Фантазія: Академія чарів’ (Filly Fantasy - The Academy of magic), chinese: ‘ 小马菲莉之缤纷仙境’ and ‘ 小马菲莉‘; it has a russian name too but it’s an unofficial one, Филли Фантазия).

I love him, he’s one of my favorite characters. He’s not in the main team of fillys but he’s in the show and doesn’t seem to be a background character as he appears in the episodes quite often.

2. What is that?

A show known for having beautiful and impressive concept art pictures, complex story and lore (nobody except for the authors knows what letters fillys use for the written language means but there’s an official answer that they have a sense, just like ours). This show got a fandom even before it had a premiere. It also managed to stay on the ground after the animation studios that worked on it went bankrupt. The latter doesn’t say anything about the cartoon, because it’s random, anything may went unlucky, and I know for sure other franchises have this too, cancelled or delayed projects. Or just like how sometimes we have unlucky days too, right?

3. ‘Filly’ characters aren’t horses, they only look like those. It’s also not a copy of ‘My Little Pony’ and it’s not german by its origin; only the company that was making the toys in the past is german and is known as Simba. Simba, however, didn’t create the idea and soul of the franchise, it was always Dracco, and they are not from Germany either. However, ‘Filly’ is incredibly popular in Germany and its main books and magazines (comic stories) are published there. Although, the franchise is popular pretty much anywhere it goes to - and it’s a lot of places. It means: so many different languages and translations.

4. A lot of official media and materials is here, from magazines, books, audio stories, video games for phones, to flyers that come with each and any figurine.

5. I’m happy to learn about such a treasure, and I’m sadden it’s in the shadow of ‘My Little Pony’. These both are unique, creative, unforgettable - in their own ways. I can’t choose just one. Plus, one person can love different things, and fans of various franchises can be friends. There’s a lot of space for both, in one’s heart and in the world.

6. What’s with this, did you start to watch 'FF’ only because the fillys look like horses and ‘Friendship is magic’ had its final season?

No, there’s a lot more to ‘FF’ or ‘Filly’ than just horse like creatures, and I can’t replace love for any franchise or series in my heart for another, see the part under the number 5. And ‘MLP’ with ‘FiM’ are more than alive to me, the final season doesn’t mean they aren’t.

‘FF’ and ‘Filly’ may have a not very big fandom but everything has its beginning, good stories aren’t always popular, it’s random. Same as how I didn’t have friends when I was one year old or when I’ve got my talents, it was needed to look more and to wait more. Or something like this, really.  However, the cartoon (like every other) has a soul, a lot of efforts went into the creation of it, and it’s not cheap.

To be more clear, here are some notes:

I included a little bit of explanation while mentioning ‘My Little Pony’ because the fandom of the latter said many negative words on ‘Filly’ and ‘FF’, there are also rumors, but it’s always heartwarming to know somebody is talking and thinking about ‘Filly’, no matter the context. Although, we all may be friends, there’s no reason for negativity, we can just love our favorite shows and stories. We can be respective of each other, we can be friends. Plus, speaking about the ‘Filly’ fandom - it’s not this small and it’s welcoming.  

I’ll tell about what ‘Filly’ is later, same as how I want to draw and to write fanmade pieces for the fillys.

But before that, just know it’s a very big, deep world of the stories and if you’d ever want - you may watch the show and support the authors, I recommend the series and every other story of the franchise. It’s innocent, cute, yet not as simple as it may appear.

Have a good day.

[lagroupie]

Interview : Frankie and the Witch Fingers

Frankie and the Witch Fingers at Le Romandie, Lausanne through my Olympus Trip.

After missing them on their Euro tour last summer, I was looking forward to finally be able to catch Frankie & the Witch Fingers live in my little town Lausanne. Before the show, the guys agreed to have a little chat with me about their amazing new record ZAM, what it means, their lives in Los Angeles, going to concerts alone and more.

The show was so good that I decided to take the train to PALP festival a couple days later - and not sleep in order to finish an assignment on time for uni - to watch the band once more, in a small cave in Wallis this time. It was the last show of their tour, and the setting made it pretty epic.

Many thanks to Frankie and the Witch Fingers, their manager Tony, and Le Romandie as always for their kindness!

What’s your life like in L.A. nowadays?

Josh : It’s pretty chill actually! When I’m not on tour I love hanging at home, relaxing… working on the other side of music, like the writing and recording rather than the performing. So for me it’s like a distinction from being on the road and being at home. It’s not the same for everyone.

Alex: Shaughnessy and I go wild. I mostly sit on my laptop at the place he works at. Then we go out and get fucked up!

Shaughnessy: I have a couple day jobs. I work at a café for now, and at a bar. So I divide my time between the two.

Dylan: I sling bagels in the morning. It’s chill. We have normal lives in Los Angeles.

That’s funny, when I was younger I always imagined bands living together in a giant house, making music all day and partying.

Josh: That would be cool!

Alex: If someone wants to buy us a giant house in L.A….

Dylan: That would be the dream. I don’t know if my girlfriend would be stoked on living with all these dudes though! (laughs) Other bands do that. The Stooges used to do that.

Alex: Shaughnessy and I do that.

Dylan: Yeah. They share a bedroom, so there’s that!

Could we talk a bit about ZAM now? What is the title – and maybe the song – about?

Alex: It means anything that gets you excited, like coffee is ZAM, good news is ZAM. It’s like energy.

Josh: It’s like an invented slang.

Dylan: We wanted a word that didn’t necessary have an association to something. You hear ZAM, your mind doesn’t automatically go to a definition. You have to fill in the definition yourself.

Alex: It’s a made-up word. You think of something when you hear it, but it doesn’t actually have a meaning or a definition.

Dylan: At least in English. Until now.

Josh: We would say ZAM for two years, like “cold coffee- ZAM, get some ZAM!” And then we were making this album and didn’t have a name. It was a joke at first, “why don’t we just call it ZAM!”. It became reality!

I think it really fits the song, which is like a giant jam.

Dylan: Jam Zam.

Alex: Yeah, it is actually a jam!

Yeah, and the album was recorded live right? Yet I think it sounds really clean. How did it go during recording, did you have to re-take the songs several times or did it just flow?

Dylan: Well, ZAM is one take. But everything else is multiple takes, not too many.

Josh: I don’t think we ever did more than three or four takes.

Alex: We rehearsed it a lot before we went into the space.

Dylan: But even though we’re playing in the same room, a lot of stuff is isolated in other rooms like the amps, and that gives it a cleaner sound. There’s not too much bleed or anything.

Alex: There’s only one guitar amp in the room, the bass would just go into the board- Josh had an amp in a closet in a different room in the house!

Shaughnessy: I think ZAM has more definition than previous records, the fidelity is stronger. And then Josh put a ton of work mixing it afterwards! That was a huge proponent as well.

I also wanted to talk about my favorite song from the album, Purple Velvet. What’s the story behind it?

Dylan: Hmm… There’s an older song that we had worked on before we started writing the record. As we were recording, we thought “we have these extra songs that we never recorded”. Josh and I had made a demo of it. It’s such an easy, simple kind of song.

Shaughnessy: This song is the last one we did.

Alex: I think you just played the song twice and then recorded it!

Shaughnessy: Right! We just went through it and then that was it!

Now I have a more general question- when I started going to concerts, I didn’t have many friends who liked the same music as I did, so I often had to go alone, which was a bit hard at first. Do you have any advice for people who want to go to concerts, but are too scared to go on their own?

Dylan: I think it’s hard, because everyone is different. Some people are outgoing, some people are not. I mean, it’s hard for me to go to a show on my own sometimes! I’d rather go with friends and stuff. But I think if you’re passionate about seeing live music, then you should follow your passion.

Josh: There’s always something to connect with people about. Like, you’re all seeing the same thing!

Dylan: It’s a great way to meet people too, because you’re all there for the same reason. It’s not like you go to a bar- yeah everyone is there to drink, but there’s not as much commonality. If you go to a show, everyone at least likes the music. So that’s a common ground to start a friendship.

Alex: I’m a pretty naturally introverted person, and I just recently learned how to go out and do things on my own. Just realizing that you’re the only person that’s actually focused on yourself – so if you’re worried about being the weird person that stands alone, nobody else is going to be thinking about that. Maybe they will just be like “oh, that person is here”. And that’s the end of their train of thought. They’re not like “look at that loser, they don’t have any friends!!!” (laughs) They never do that.

That’s exactly what I thought the first time I went to a show on my own! “Look at that loser, she has no friends!” (Laughs)

Josh: That’s cool, I respect that you do that.

Thank you. And finally, what can we expect from Frankie and the Witch Fingers in the future?

Dylan: We’re touring quite heavily at the moment. We’re going to come back to Europe in September, and we’re doing an August run in the US before that. Then we’re doing some festivals in the US and Europe, and a new record will be around the corner. We’re already writing so we’ll have that ready early next year hopefully. We don’t want to stop doing what we’re doing because it’s fun.

[cecilspeaks]

115 - Council Member Flynn, Part 2

Paint a picture. It’ll last longer. Welcome to Night Vale.

Councilwoman Tamika Flynn announced this week that she got a new dog. It’s her 17th birthday in just ac ouple of weeks, so her Dad DeAngelo Flynn said she could adopt a puppy. They went to the Night Vale Animal Shelter and Discount Tire Shop. Tamika thought about this sweetheart pitbull named Rosie, but worried about the need to walk and exercise such an active dog regularly. Same with the Blue Heeler mix named Hydrant. The shelter manager suggested a German Shepard named Vincent, but DeAngelo said no daughter of his would have a German Shepherd. He added that even the German Shepherds with all of their hateful teeth and ignorant rage could not save us from the robot uprising. Tamika said she wanted a smaller dog anyway, and she settled on a Pomeranian, whom she has named Lucky. She brought Lucky to City Hall. Standing atop the front steps of the building Tamika, wearing a long black coat adorned with chevrons, a Sheriff’s badge, infantry cords and little flanks of uncooked beef, held Lucky proudly above her head, the way a person who just got a new car might hold it above their head.

Lucky is a light brown dust bunny with hollow yellow eyes and a shrieking little laugh of a bark. Ah, a real cutie! Happy early birthday, Councilwoman Flynn!

An update on the recent spate of robberies and the related deaths of Tristan and Camilla Cortez. The Secret Police have no new leeds toward suspects, but since the 8 PM curfew has gone into effect, there have been no robberies or major crimes of any kind. They have arrested six people in the last two days for being out after 8 PM. But those people were all angels, who were unaware of the curfew and were just walking around trying to ask people for ten bucks. Now that acknowledging of angels is legal in Night Vale, the angels have been making a fortune, by just asking people for cash they don’t actually need, because they’re billionaires. But people are so happy to be able to acknowledge them that it’s worth the few bucks the angels are asking for.

And now sports. The Night Vale Scorpions wheelchair basketball team lost the state pre-season tournament last weekend 81-72 to the Pine Cliff Lizard Monitors. Pine Cliff forward Helen King led all scores with 30, and Night Vale point guard Janice Palmer set a state record in assists, with 22. 22 assists in a game, that’s empirically the most helpful game a Night Vale player has ever had. Y’all, Janice is my niece.

It’s a shame to lose, but it is only the pre-season. There is still a chance to win the division. Unfortunately, I heard from Janice’s dad Steve that Janice is not handling the loss very well. Steve said Janice works really hard to get assists, because she wants to be a leader to help other people score the points, and even though she set a state record in assists, they still lost. Steve said Janice is working even harder on her passing skills and on running the high pick and roll, which is a basketball term that Steve explained to me, and I knew I wouldn’t understand it, so I wrote down what Steve said verbatim. Let’s see. Here’s what he said a “high pick and roll” was. Quote: “So the defender’s guarding, right? Like this! And then an offensive player comes over here like whoosh! And then the ball handler goes like zam! And then they go all and then, whoom!” Well. Best of luck in the regular season, Janice.

Michelle Nguyen, owner of Dark Owl Records, said that her store was robbed several weeks ago, during the height of the robbery spree. She remembers a person coming in wearing a mask, holding a gun, and smelling like fertilizer. They asked for gas, and Michelle gave the thief a velvet sack full of Item nr 4 bank-run gravel, which is her preferred currency these days. The robber then grabbed a stack of LP’s from the new release section and left. Michelle said she didn’t report the robbery because she didn’t really feel like it was a robbery. “It’s not like anyone listens to music anymore,” she said. “Music is dead! If they had stolen the sound of traffic and sirens and low-flying aircraft, I would have felt truly violated. But who’s gonna miss Keith Urban on vinyl?” Michelle added that everything is music and music is nothing. And then she closed the store for the day to go shout poems at passing trains with her friend Maureen.

Tamika Flynn and her new dog, Lucky, have been making appearances across town at local businesses assuring the owners that the town is safe. In addition to her dark coat with its many pins and stripes and medals and cow flesh, Tamika has begun wearing leather riding boots, a tricorn and spike studded knuckle rings. She’s really taken to the politics of her job, bringing along a camera crew to record these positive interactions with her constituents. It should be noted that there have never been elections for City Council in our town’s history. Even Tamika joined the Council through coercion, not campaigning. Perhaps this isn’t just a photo op, perhaps she really does care about the wellbeing of each of her citizens. She might be my new favorite Council member.

Frances Donaldson, owner of the Antiques Mall, said she was so happy to see Councilwoman Flynn in her store. Tamika shook her hand and told her everything would be OK, that she would not let anyone rob Frances of her antiques. “I mean these antiques are cursed as all getout. Anyone tries to touch one of these things, they’ll be living in a psychological terror-scape,” Donaldson said, “but it was nice of the young lady to say so.” Frances then sat by the window and thoughtfully watched the distant plane plass against the sky.

Liesel Schmidt, who owns the auto-body shop near Summerset and Gray, said Tamika stopped by her shop and told her all about how Tamika’s father worked at an automobile factory for decades, until he was laid off five years ago. He’s since run his own dent repair service. Liesel said Tamika really wanted to impress on her the importance of independently run businesses. “I like Tamika,” Schmidt said, “and her little dog too! He ate some of my socket wrench heads, which made him walk slow – ah, that made me laugh. He’s a good dog!”

Well, I’m certainly happy to see Tamika winning over the people of Night Vale. She’s done a lot for this town. But I know the curfew and travel stoppage has been a real strain. It’s good to see her out there, keeping our spirits up.

It’s time once again for Citizen Spotlight. Today’s Citizen Spotlight is on Megan Wallaby. Despite only being born four years ago, Megan just celebrated her 17th birthday this past spring, and will graduate Night Vale High School with honors next May. Megan enjoys athletics and biology classes, and hopes some day to run her own clinic. She wants to go to a university and major in physical therapy next fall, but she’s not sure where that will be just yet. Megan was also on my niece Janice’s basketball team and was the team’s leading scorer. But after the preseason tournament, she has decided to quit basketball to join Tamika Flynn’s Secret Citizens’ Secret Crime Patrol force. Megan never had an inclination toward law enforcement, but she’s not she can afford college. Even if she gets a scholarship, she says there are still books, dorms, food, beer, pet tarantulas, and clothes to buy. Her parents Tuck and Hershel can’t pay for any of that, so she is taking on part time work patrolling the streets after curfew. The team will miss you, Megan, but our streets are safer with you out there. This has been Citizen Spotlight.

A new report from the Mayor’s office shows a significant drop in crime the past two weeks, since Tamika Flynn took over the Secret Police. Councilwoman gave credit to Deputy Sheriff Sam, the entire police force including the Secret Police, Double Secret Police, Obvious Police and Dog Police, and even the Citizen Patrol Force for their extra efforts. Also Tamika said the bloodred buildings everyone helped paint look gorgeous and intimidating.

But it’s not all good news. The Mayor’s report shows a significant increase in traffic accidents, as the police are stretched so thin. Also, since most of the city’s resources are focused on stopping armed robberies of businesses, there have been unrepaired water main breakages, damaged street signs, and understaffed municipal offices. With few available funds and zero economic activity after 8 PM, city-run departments like the Hall of Public Records, the Public Library, and the abandoned mine shaft outside of town, sit empty most days. 

The Mayor’s office expressed concern in the deterioration of these buildings for lack of huge, not to mention the inconvenience their closures pose. “Councilwoman Flynn is a tough and decided leader, but how far must we push ourselves away from comfort in order to preserve safety?” Mayor Cardinal said. “Our infrastructure is at risk of erosion if we continue to ignore everything, except law and order. Our emotional health is at risk if we close ourselves off.”

And here the Mayor paused to take a bite of a whole fresh butternut squash. Or, as the Europeans call it, a “yam balloon”. She continued with her mouth full: “I ask Councilwoman Flynn to call back the rest of the City Council from wherever they are so we can hold an emergency meeting to explore better solutions toward reducing crime.”

Listeners, I agree with the Mayor. While I love that there have been no robberies or deaths or arsons in the past several weeks, I would also like to point out that a culprit has yet to surface. The police, under the control of Tamika Flynn, do not even have a suspect. Whoever has done this has certainly been stifled by the strict city ordinances, but how long must we continue hiding in our homes every evening? If the person who has committed these crimes is still in this city, they will certainly start robbing, and maybe even killing once again. Tamika refused the Mayor’s request, saying that the other City Council members do not do well under stress, and that they’ve never been of any help in situations like this. Tamika continued.. Oh! Oh, listeners, I – I’m sorry to break into my own story but I am getting reports that Deputy Sheriff Sam and their Secret Police are in a standoff in the Tepid Sands housing development at the intersection of Skillman Boulevard and Dubois Avenue. Shots have been fired, uh I’m going to find out and report further what is happening. But first, let me take you to the weather.

["TMI" by Josey joseyofficial.com]

The good news is that all of the police officers in this afternoon’s fracas are uninjured. The bad news is that two young women were severely wounded by a librarian. A librarian, in their own home! The girls, Lisa Robertson, 18, and her younger sister Marcia, 15, were at home quietly reading their new copies of Patricia Lockwood’s 2017 spectacularly crafted memoir “Priest Daddy”, when they heard a window shatter. A librarian had smelled the humorous and deft poetics of Lockwood’s impeccable writing and broke in to devour the readers of this sharp and emotional story of religion, family, and toxic masculinity. When the librarian found the two sisters, it attacked. It was not the Robertson sisters’ first fight against a librarian. They, along with Councilwoman Tamika Flynn, survived the summer reading program at the Night Vale Public Library three years ago. They nearly did not survive today’s attack.

It was thanks to Sheriff Sam’s quick response that police were able to stop the librarian from further damage. Unfortunately, the librarian, whose name was Dan McDowell, escaped police custody and is still on the loose.

Tamika Flynn, on behalf of the City Council, still away on vacation until this whole thing blows over, expressed sadness for her injured friends and fellow bibliophiles Lisa and Marcia. The Mayor doubled down on her earlier statements and blamed this tragic attack on a city-wide failure to pay for upkeep of municipal buildings. “There was no one there to lock the librarians’ cages, to feed them regularly,” the Mayor said. “As a city, it is our responsibility to protect life, yes, but also protect a life worth living.” Councilwoman Flynn thanked the Mayor for her comments, but then promptly called for a closing of the port authority. No ships in or out of town. Night Vale has no body of water to speak of, but the occasional freighter or cruise ship does arrive.

Flynn also moved curfew to 6 PM and said no one is allowed within 100 feet of the library, or any bookstore, for that matter. “These days my father only talks about the robot uprising,” Flynn said. “For a long time, I thought he was just being weird. There’s no robot uprising! I have seen advanced robotics, and those things can barely walk. Even my phone struggles to load a basic Google image search for “vaping sloths”. But what if there were robots we do not know about? Metaphorical robots. What if the things we cannot see, cannot predict? Why not be prepared to protect ourselves against –any- enemy?” She added her regret that people would not have access to books anymore, but added that maybe, the city should get everyone a nook. “Is nook still a thing?” Flynn added. “Whatever. Mayor Cardinal, let’s have the city buy everyone an e-reader.” Flynn concluded her speech with: “I know curfew is early, but curfew doesn’t apply to law enforcement. You’re all welcome to join my new Vigilante Citizen Squad. Help us beat the hell out of crime after dark!” Lucky laughed, or barked, it was unclear which, and they both left, Tamika’s spurs rattinglina dn long cape swithing.

The Mayor has appealed to the public for support, stating that once we have a full coroner’s report on the bodies of Tristan and Camilla Cortez, we can engage iun a true investigation, rather than martial law. But given Tamika’s success in eradication the robberies, most people still trust her ability to stop librarians. I mean, battling those things is her specialty. There’s no one better. I’m not really afraid of robbers who target businesses, I mean, who’s gonna hold up a radio station? Or a science lab, where my husband works? But if librarians start believing they can wander anywhere, attack anyone reading any old book by one of America’s foremost poets or word smiths, then they could attack me, or Carlos. Or Steve, or Abby, or Janice. I-I know it seems like I’m scared, but I’m not. Like you, I’m just – wary. Wary of lurking disaster. Plus there’s so much to keep me entertained at home after curfew. It’s not like the 1990’s when the only technology we had was putting on politically satirical puppet shows using rocks with cartoon faces drawn on them. It’s actually enjoyable to turn in early each night. I’ve got an Xbox, a VR helmet, some vegetation that is tootally legal, and Susan Wilman’s HBO Go password, which Steve gripped for me. It’s great!

I don’t know how long we ca keep this up,but for now, I just want to feel safe. Stay tuned next for.. wait, hold on. Oh.. I just received a fax that the coroner’s report has been completed, Night Vale and.. huh. Oh wow! Ooh, you’re not going to like this! You know what, let’s save it. 

it’s almost dark, Night Vale, curfew is almost upon us. This will pass as all things will pass. We’re in good hands in Tamika’s hands. If there’s anyone who knows how to protect us from librarians, she does.

Stay tuned next for the sound of two men cuddled up in bed watching the new season of Insecure.

And good night, Night Vale, Good night.  

Today’s proverb: Pull this lever. Don’t worry, you will never know the result.

[irrealisms]

Thank you so much for the rooting for us and the positive words!!! This has been such a wild ride for lifesteal fandom and it's really nice to see all the positivity :DDD I was absolutely not expecting us to make it this far, given our size vs the size of a lot of the fandoms we've been going against, but I'm crossing my fingers (and considering voter fraud...) for a lifesteal final and/or an Eclipse Federation win!!! Mods, you've been fantastic throughout this whole thing, thank you for running it and for everything else!!!

Wrt watching lifesteal:

Lifesteal s4 is the most recent completed season (s5 started a few months ago and is currently-in-progress) and the season that both of the trios in the bracket (3 heart trio & eclipse federation) came from!

Each season is basically completely independent of each other, aside from occasional references, and each takes place on a different world (so, more like empires/hermitcraft/traffic life seasons than dsmp 'seasons'); s3 and s4 have the largest fandoms, especially clownpierce/branzy s3 and eclipse federation s4.

@aroaceacacia has a playlist with Literally Every Lifesteal S4 video, which is how I personally got into the fandom for it; that said, while this is the most Complete way to get into lifesteal s4, it's quite long (50ish hours), and most lifesteal videos will typically explain the premise of the server, relevant characters or events, etc., in every video, so you can also jump around or start halfway through or generally speaking do whatever you want and you'll do fine. There's also the "choose a POV and watch start to finish from that POV" strategy, which also works!

HOWEVER, not only this, but I've actually created a couple propaganda playlists for this tournament specifically: one centered around 3 heart trio, and two centered around eclipse federation, for those intrigued by seeing them in the trio polls!

Here's the playlist for 3 heart trio, which has all the videos made by three heart trio during s4, plus one video of the finale. It's about 14 hours total, because Baconwaffles is very prolific, but the videos are on average only 10 minutes each, so they're fun to check out even if you don't have a ton of free time, and as mentioned you can always jump around and skip things. I'm thinking about also adding a couple videos for context on certain serverwide events but tbh it is also kind of fun to only know the things that come up in 3 heart trio POV! This one's got lots of silliness and shenanigans :D

Here's the short version of the playlist for Eclipse Federation, which includes only their official edited videos, starting with Zam's betrayal of Team Awesome and continuing through the finale. It's also got a few videos not by them that serve as backstory, context, or which affect some of the eclipse federation members but not all of them. It's the shortest of the three playlists (6 hours total), and with a fairly short average video length (15 minutes).

Here's the longer version of the playlist for Eclipse Federation, which includes a mix of their edited videos, my favorite VODs, and fan-edited clips of VODs. Because it includes VODs, it's got the most content and context, but it's also by far the longest of the three playlists (35 hours total) and has the longest average video length even when you include the one with Literally Every Video (about an hour, but there's a huge variation, since it's a mix of 15-minute videos and 3-hour VODs). There are cinematics in this one (wings of freedom + pits of hell)! Check them out!!

(You may notice that this is labeled the 'medium' playlist. The 'long' one is one for my personal use; it has 150+ hours of exclusively VODs and assumes you have pretty extensive context on lifesteal, so I'm not linking it here.)

I will also add, as a content warning for both of the eclipse federation playlists: the story of eclipse federation draws very heavily on themes of in-game suicidality, suicide, and grief; c!Subz and c!Vitalasy both kill themselves in very plot-relevant ways, c!Vitalasy's suicide is made fun of by other server members and seen as him "just doing it for attention", and c!Zam is frequently suicidal, consistently takes actions with a reckless disregard for his own life, and attempts (but does not complete) suicide. Vitalasy also has moments of being OOC upset over how things are going IC, which personally got to me at times. The three heart trio playlist has a lot more moments of lighthearted silliness, whereas eclipse federation tends more consistently angsty.

(Also, if you do end up wanting to see more lifesteal after watching s4, @aroaceacacia has a playlist for s3 too, plus Branzy has a one-hour video recapping his entire season 3 which is tbh a really good starting point!)

!!!!!!! LIFESTEAL IN THE SEMI FINALS LETS GO!!!!! I can't belive we've managed this LIFESTEAL 🔛🔝 GOOD LUCK IN THE NEXT ROUND I'M HOPING FOR A LIFESTEAL FINAL BUT WE'LL SEE!!

(Mods: thanks a lot for running this poll its been such a blast, looking forward to next round (but no pressure, take a break if you need to) hope you have a good day)

Good job to the lifestealers out there!! Mod Skater has decided that if one of them wins the bracket that she'll watch season 4 (thats the recent epic one, right?) of lifesteal! I'm rooting for you guys!!

And thank you for the kind words, this has been just a project that was for fun between me and Mod Artie. We never expected it to get this big! Hopefully the semifinals should be up Friday morning!

[nofliight]

NAME: Somari.

STAR SIGN: Cancer.

HEIGHT: ONE OF THESE DAYS I’LL REMEMBER HOW TALL I ACTUALLY FUCKIN AM--

WHAT’S YOUR MIDDLE NAME?: russell

PUT YOUR SPOTIFY ON SHUFFLE. WHAT ARE THE FIRST 6 SONGS THAT POPPED UP? the fuck is a spoofy.

EVER HAD A POEM OR SONG WRITTEN ABOUT YOU? no but they should. when my goal to become immortal finally starts panning out they’ll have to start making shit about me,

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU PLAYED AIR GUITAR? ... recently. Look, sometimes i’m alone, listening to a song with a Sick-ass guitar riff and i just

WHO IS YOUR CELEBRITY CRUSH? that life ain’t for me, sorry

WHAT’S A SOUND YOU HATE; SOUND YOU LOVE? Can’t think of any particular sounds I hate, and sounds i love is just... generally soft and melodic sounds that are pleasing to the ears. idk

DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS? Not really. At least in the sense of poultergeists and such, it just doesn’t make much sense. Given my personal belief there’s nothing after death and that “spirits” don’t actually exist, too, there wouldn’t be room for ghosts, now would there?

HOW ABOUT ALIENS? I believe aliens are out there, yes. This universe is fuckin’ huge, there’s gotta be some other life-sustaining planet out there somewhere. I do not, however, believe in any potential space invaders or extraterrestrials, or at least not that there are aliens being kept from us by the government. UFOs, flying space ships and shit, uh uh. Not buyin’ it

DO YOU DRIVE? I do! F U C K the written test I had to retake like a hundred fucking times to finally get my license because the questions they ask are so arbitrary and horseshit and some weren’t even in the fucking driver’s manual, but I do drive now! Don’t use it too much outside of getting to work, but the option’s great either way

IF SO, HAVE YOU EVER CRASHED? Not a proper crash, but I did accidentally pull out in front of someone in a roundabout. My car only wound up with a few dents, but the other car... oof.

WHAT WAS THE LAST BOOK YOU READ? uhhhhhhhhhhhh some shitty high school literature book. scarlet letter I think??

DO YOU LIKE THE SMELL OF GASOLINE? ... Yeah, I do. Don’t know why I do, but I do.

WHAT WAS THE LAST MOVIE YOU SAW? Sha-zam! Not a bad movie, though you have to get past a pretty hard-to-watch beginning before it finally starts getting good. When it does, though, it is a good time.

WHAT’S THE WORST INJURY YOU’VE EVER HAD? When I was a really small kid - too small to remember it happening now - I was bouncing on my Nana’s bed. Bounced so high I hit the ceiling fan. I don’t know if the ceiling fan itself did the damage or if it knocked me into something that did, but, uh - I needed stitches beside my eye. There’s still a scar there. It’s shaped like a star. I’m practically an anime character--

DO YOU HAVE ANY OBSESSIONS RIGHT NOW? Right now I’m busy juggling so many fucking obsessions I’m more obsession than person. Special shoutouts to Pokemon, though, I love Pokemon. Of course, Kid Icarus: Uprising is always my life. And I’ll die for Hyperdimension Neptunia too as one of the only five people not in it for the fanservice--

DO YOU TEND TO HOLD GRUDGES AGAINST PEOPLE WHO HAVE DONE YOU WRONG? Way longer than is probably healthy. I still have things against my own parents I still wish I could call them out for for years. Keep in mind, I have very non-toxic and loving parents--

IN A RELATIONSHIP? I have a gf, yeah! And of course, still married to Neptune,

Tagged by: n o p e Tagging: n o p e

[irrealisms]

hi i have been TAKING NOTES and doing quick summaries of the streams i watched starting with void arc! they're not perfect notes or anything esp if you have different priorities than me but should give you an idea of what happened when and which are important vs grindy, which ones you can skim for a specific conversation/battle, etc. here's my notes on void arc (i also have notes for the more recent arcs but my notes on presidency arc are pretty sparse & my notes on the current arc include notes on jumper+minute streams which i don't want to put on zam's post, so if anyone wants those just hmu privately):

1/8/24 : baconwaffles stream, void hole yayyyyy. build base in parrot hole. planetlord is there. this is i think the first void-relevant stream?

1/10/24 : baconwaffles stream, recruiting jumper who + trying and failing to trap a couple people and getting a bit bitchy about it before successfully trapping 4C

1/11/24 : baconwaffles stream, jumper pretends to hire PMC to see if they will betray her, however she staged it, other void ponies plan to confront her tomorrow.

1/12/24 : baconwaffles stream, confronting jumper. it works out though yayyyyy. 

1/13/24 : mapicc & roshambo streams; mapicc pro-void roshambo anti-void

1/15/24 : baconwaffles stream, recruiting pentar, doing the jepex video. pentar stuff is relevant to void arc but jepex video recording isnt rly

1/16/24 : pangi stream, mentions recording the ending of the ro video yesterday and losing a bunch of hearts, zam is So Mad abt the foundation taking all his armor sets that he ~reconciles with pangi (pangi was anti-void). only relevant timestamps are 8:00 - 38:38. the first 8 minutes are maaaybe worth watching also but everything after that is just grinding hearts

1/17/24 : pangi stream, pangi grinds hearts some more. then FIRST SQUIDDO TUMBLR LIVE (tumblr imagine)

1/20/24 : baconwaffles stream, void ponies frustrated that they keep getting targeted, still don’t trust jumper. try and fail to do traps. also squiddo was live on tumblr live again and actually did lifesteal activities. our first and last lifesteal lore on tumblr live

1/22/24 : baconwaffles stream, minute has filled all the void traps at spawn up with water to Very High Up, bacon + zam + mapicc watch parkour civ, try to clear it out. bacon mapicc zam take a 3v3 w minute wemmbu and spoke. abyss gets frustrated a lot

2/1/2024 : vitalasy stream, vitalasy gets tour from 4C, flies with elytra for the first time, kills a couple of zam’s villagers

2/2/2024 : bacon stream, argument with ash about whether ash has to give bacon hearts back? might be the one zam referenced the next day, might not? note: i didn’t watch this one i just skimmed the vod. i should go back and watch it

2/3/2024 : pangi + mapicc streams. gordon ramsay IHOB bit. mapicc digs around in the floor carting and kills some people (mostly pangi). zam dies a bunch. nothing void-related but it's cute and fun if you are a Lifesteal Shenanigans Enjoyer

2/7/2024 : zam + vitalasy streams, zam + vitalasy meeting :DDD in which zam mentions that void ponies might want to end the server with this? also zam grinding stream in which he and bacon admit to reading tumblr

2/9/2024 : zam stream, making a depressing carnival for the void trap. mostly grinding and complaining.

2/10/2024 : zam + roshambo streams. this one’s kinda rough ooc, no one's plans work out. foundation tries to do a thing with withers but it doesn’t work out. carnival doesn’t work out either. nothing much happens. squiddo has an edited video of her pov of this!

2/13/2024 : vitalasy stream, vitalasy moves wardens, lies a little to jumper about heart count but promises to the viewers it'll make sense soon; mapicc was live but idk what he was doing?; zam is live on leowook’s account but doesn’t do much

2/23/2024 : zam stream, zam collects materials for a redstone machine, panics a little bit abt whether they might take the server off fabric, blows up some stuff for getting rid of All Of Spawn, talks abt editing his wormhole video. mostly just grinding

2/24/2024 : zam + vitalasy streams. on zam stream planet+minute jump zam+mapicc. session is interrupted bc the server goes down. void hole at spawn is coming along well. they play golf. void ponies all still think jumper is sus. on vitalasy stream, vitalasy does some terraforming, says his plan will Happen Tomorrow

2/25/2024 : zam stream + vitalasy stream + another zam stream. zam writes signs, void ponies take vitalasy hostage, jumper kills vitalasy, jumper goes live on vitalasy’s account with a book + scavenger hunt, vitalasy explains his plan of being with void ponies all along, gives jumper all his stuff, explains that he’s quitting lifesteal, and asks jumper to kill him; 3v5 void ponies vs foundation, foundation loses, planet kills himself; zam writes signs some more, void ponies decide to do a puzzle to give the foundation more hope. basically everything that happened on this day was important and lore-dense

2/26/2024 : zam stream, zam tries to make a sand duper

2/27/2024 : zam stream, zam builds detective agency. but pink this time :3 pretty kitty detective agency :3 also makes some paths. its nice but not much Plot happens

2/28/2024 : zam stream, more blowing up spawn lol

3/1/2024 : two zam streams, zam crafts pistons, uploads to VOD channel, watches more parkour civ, plays various non-minecraft games periodically. wemmbu and squiddo crash the server; wemmbu + zam confrontation, minute and zam feel each other out for an uneasy alliance against wemmbu while still being very much against each other <- first stream. second stream (might start after midnight/on 3/2 depending on time zone?): wemmbu + zam + minute at void hole, singleplayer testing

3/2/2024 : SO MUCH HAPPENS. wemmbu nukes. abyss scavenger hunt starts. etc. vods: 4c (pre-session), zam, minute, reddoons

3/3/2024 : zam stream, bedrock breaking slash valorant stream

3/4/2024 : zam stream, ash blew up the pistons Sadge. another grinding stream! in the evening ash and zam have a fight

3/5/2024 : minute+zam streams. REKRAP IS HERE. also jepexx trolls zam. and then zam goes on a healing arc and writes Positive Signs and gives himself a pep talk as an image of wemmbu

3/7/2024 : zam + rekrap + reddoons + poafa + roshambo. more puzzle solving. linear algebra clue is created. lots of grinding the machine and machine breaking. rekrap was live on his alt for a while also yippee! and then raided red who raided poafa who raided roshambo. stream chain :D i just watched zam for most of it though even though it was mostly just grinding. sorry to the actual puzzle solvers

3/8/2024 : zam + rekrap streams; once again i only watched zam. happy international women’s day! we get some eclipse federation mentions due to the clue which is awesome for me personally. also, wemmbu is unbanned & working on something; clown+minute+zam find a new orbital strike cannon, play around with plugin to see if he’s put stuff in it; wemmbu crashes the server a few times. imo primary interesting thing here was finding the orbital strike canon

3/9/2024 : minute + zam + jumper streams. zam and minute stream end of void arc. ashswag fucking HATES the linear algebra clue. foundation solves the puzzles with 5 minutes left before the bedrock starts breaking; void ponies all jump into the void except jumper, who reveals that she’s been a double agent for the foundation the whole time. then jumper goes live and does a qna!

hi princezam/princesszam/beingzam /ref

Where should I start for s5 for lifesteal, because I haven't caught up on it AT ALL. T_T.

well if you’re willing to vod watch I’d start at the beginning of the abyss arc. The streams happened from January 7th onward so if you have the vod spreadsheet made by the awesome archivists that’s where you’d start. You probably don’t have to watch every stream a lot of them are insanely long, but unfortunately I don’t know which ones are the important ones and which ones aren’t.

but if that’s not your style, I also have this massive recap that I wrote one time it’s like on my page somewhere. Once you’ve read it you can basically jump into any recent stream although it is missing a few more recent details unfortunately.

lastly if you like YouTube videos I’m starting to post highlights on my 2nd channel starting at the beginning of the void arc! They’re like kinda daily I finished the 2nd one today I’m just waiting until tmrw to post it. Hoping I can keep this up until it becomes too much and then I’ll try and pass it off to editors ideally.

[symbianosgames]

Video Game Deep Cuts: Hitman vs. Edith Finch - Go!

The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

[Video Game Deep Cuts is a weekly newsletter from curator/video game industry veteran Simon Carless, rounding up the best longread & standout articles & videos about games, every weekend. This week's highlights include Hitman level design, What Remains of Edith Finch, and much, much more.

As I battle jetlag after my return from Asia to a sunny California spring, I've been thinking a lot this week about discoverability for games again. Shouldn't there be more niche game subscription services out there for those looking to support underappreciated/'different' titles? I love Humble Monthly, but some of the more mainstream subscribers seem to get grumpy about the quirkier indie titles in it at times - much like PS4 players litter indie YouTube trailer comments with fist-shaking.

And how about adding context to the games in a subscription with dev interview videos, 'Let's Play'-style playthoughs, or even analysis videos? Would any of you sign up for something like this? Curious...

- Simon, curator.]

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

Passing Through Ghosts in Pac-Man (John Harris / Gamasutra Blogs) "This is an excerpt from my book Bug Voyage: A Tour of Classic Game Glitches, available in the current Rogue Souls Storybundle [SIMON'S NOTE: which I curated!]. The book also contains information on pseudorandom number generation, doing low-level math in binary and decimal, and how you can crash any Galaga machine without even putting money in."

Writing Indie Games Is Like Being a Musician. In the Bad Way. (Jeff Vogel / The Bottom Feeder) "Over the last couple years, I've gotten a fair amount of attention for my articles about the Indie Bubble and the Indie Glut.  (And even a GDC talk.) At last, I can complete the trilogy of articles. Now we can look around and see where we've ended up, a phase which I suspect will be permanent. [SIMON'S NOTE: Please read this.]"

Legendary Game Maker Peter Molyneux Talks Regrets and What's Next (Chris Suellentrop / Glixel) "That enthusiasm for the unknown is the hallmark of 57-year-old Molyneux's long career. He stopped by the Glixel offices in March to talk – barely – about his next game, Legacy, as well as to speak at length about everything from No Man's Sky and Pokémon Go to his aborted Kinect experiment, Milo."

toco toco ep.49, Yoko Taro, Game Creator (toco toco TV / YouTube) "In this episode, we spend the day in Osaka with Yoko Taro, director of the famous Drakengard and NieR series. Our first stop will be at PlatinumGames, the studio that was in charge of developing Yoko’s most recent title: NieR: Automata."

How Hitman’s Hokkaido level was made (Alex Wiltshire / RockPaperShotgun) "The latest Hitman['s]... levels are a jetset tour of places you believe could exist, but these aren’t just credible environments, they’re also machines for killing in. And the first season of Hitman closed with one of its best. Hokkaido is at once compact and expansive, melodramatic and credible, and I talked to IO about how it was designed."

Game Over, Uwe Boll (Darryn King / Vanity Fair) "The man known as the world’s worst director is now retired and running a Vancouver restaurant. But he’s still not done waiting for the world to give him his due. [SIMON'S NOTE: you really should read this one, if only for Boll's random Chris Kohler diss, haha.]"

Inside the Resilient ‘Team Fortress 2’ Community on the PlayStation 3 (Aron Garst / Motherboard) "To say that PS3 players got a raw deal is one hell of an understatement. But they've managed, and made friends along the way."

THOTH, And How I Talk About Games (Errant Signal / YouTube) "Just a little thing I made at the end of last month while fighting off some sickness. [SIMON'S NOTE: an interesting - if a bit self-doubt-y - meta-analysis from one of the better YouTube game analysis folks on how you should approach mechanics-led games in terms of commentary.]"

Valve has cut Dota 2 royalties, and workshop creators are crying foul (Arthur Gies / Polygon) "There’s unrest in Dota 2’s community this week, as several artists responsible for many of the free-to-play game’s popular cosmetic items allege that Steam owner and Dota 2 developer Valve Software has systematically reduced their earnings and may be permanently damaging the long-term viability of Dota 2’s business model."

Magic: The Gathering's Head Designer Has A Damn Hard Job (JR Goldberg / Kotaku) "“Magic is secretly, not really … it’s not one game,” head Magic: The Gathering designer Mark Rosewater told me. “It is actually a bunch of different games that all have a shared rule system. Every time I make a card set, I’m making the game for everybody, but for each person, it’s a different game to them.”"

Roam free: A history of open-world gaming (Richard Moss / Ars Technica) "Open-world video games bear the impossible promise—offering compelling, enjoyable open-endedness and freedom within the constraints of what is, by necessity of the medium, an extremely limited set of possible actions. These games provide a list of (predominantly violent) verbs that's minuscule in comparison to the options you would face in identical real-life situations. Yet, we can't get enough of them."

Tom Clancy's Inherent Silliness: Why Ghost Recon Wildlands Couldn't Escape Its Fate (Cameron Kunzelman / Paste) "Ghost Recon Wildlands is a silly game. One might be tempted to think that it’s an intentionally silly game bordering on satire. I mean, after all, it’s almost a parody of games in its genre: it’s a third-person shooter game where four operatives, a handler, and some almost-Communist rebels take on and fully dismantle the infrastructure of a country that’s been fully taken over by a drug cartel."

The Game Beat Weekly: The pressure to stay in line (Kyle Orland / TinyLetter) "These apologetic quotes both get at a truth that's rarely explicitly acknowledged in the world of game criticism: being out of step with the critical or fan consensus on a big-name game or franchise is often not an easy thing to do. At best, having a contrary opinion about a big game these days means being subject to a huge stream of nasty comments, tweets, and e-mails about your view."

The Last Game I Make Before I Die: The Crashlands Postmortem (Sam Coster / GDC / YouTube) "Crashlands was developed by a team of three brothers in response to one of them being diagnosed with late stage cancer. In this 2017 session, Butterscotch Shenanigans' Samuel Coster tells the parallel stories of one family's battle with cancer and the creation of a cross-platform crafting RPG, and find yourself inspired to continue your great work no matter what life throws at you."

The Growing Indie Game Development Scene of South Africa (Lena LeRay / IndieGames.com) "South Africa's video game development scene has been through a lot of ups and downs since it got started in the mid-90s. The indie scene in particular got its first big break in 2010, with the entry of Desktop Dungeons on the world stage."

Destiny's meta shifts are fascinating (Cole Tomashot / Zam) "A meta shift is usually the result of a content release, player discovery, or patch. What makes these meta shifts interesting, is that while they are occurring a push and pull relationship between developers and players reveals itself as both parties play a role in a game’s meta."

Meeting Andrzej Sapkowski, the writer who created The Witcher (Robert Purchese / Eurogamer) "Andrzej Sapkowski has something of a reputation. To start with, he's a big deal. He invented Geralt, witchers, Triss, Ciri, the whole thing - it all came out of his head. He has won awards and his work is revered, especially in Poland. More than once I've heard him described as the Polish Tolkien. But I've also heard he can be difficult - and I'm on my way to meet him."

The sound of SID: 35 years of chiptune’s influence on electronic music (James Newman / The Conversation) "Fortunately, Yannes did know something about music, as well as semiconductors and designing chips. And so in 1981 he began work on what would arguably become the most important milestone in videogame music and one whose influence still resonates to this day: the MOS Technology 6581, also known as the Sound Interface Device, but much better known as the SID. [SIMON'S NOTE: quite a few game soundtracks analyzed in this neat piece!]"

Balancing Cards in Clash Royale (Stefan Engblom / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2017 GDC session, Stefan Engblom, game designer on the Clash Royale team, talks about the philosophies and principles used for balancing cards and gameplay in Supercell's Clash Royale."

The Ten Most Important Early Computer and Video Games (Jaz Rignall / USGamer) "Today's gaming industry is a massive, multibillion dollar entertainment juggernaut. But what are its roots? I thought I'd take a trip back to the very dawn of gaming history and take a look at the devices, inventions, and innovations that gave rise to our favorite pastime."

Mike Tyson's Punch Out NES Nintendo 30th Anniversary (Gajillionaire / YouTube) "30 years ago on March 31, 1987, Little Mac defeated the Super Macho Man for the W.V.B.A. World Heavyweight Title. We look back with YouTube personalities from all over and remember back to that epic night. Then, sit back and watch the original “broadcast” of the classic Championship title fight!"

Three reasons streaming is replacing the Let’s Play industry (Michael Sawyer / Polygon) "YouTube personalities recording themselves playing games is big business, and it seems to be the dominant way for gaming influencers to make money on the platform. The art form is known as “Let’s Play,” although that term doesn’t have much in the way of a set definition. But why does it seem like so many personalities on YouTube are moving to livestreams?"

Jonathan Coulton - All This Time (Official Video) (Jonathan Coulton / YouTube) "From his new album Solid State, out April 28. The album has a companion graphic novel written by Matt Fraction and drawn by Albert Monteys. It's a science fiction story about the internet, the future, artificial intelligence, and how probably only love will save us. [SIMON'S NOTE: this song is wonderful, but the music video is what permits its inclusion in this roundup, heh.]"

Why Video Game Guns 'Feel Good' (Emmanuel Maiberg / Motherboard) "Six out of the top 10 bestselling video games in February heavily featured guns and shooting. The same was true in January and all of 2016. Like it or hate it, video games and guns have gone hand-in-hand for decades and there's no reason to assume that this will change in the near future. [SIMON'S NOTE: part of a series - also see Veteran Developers Remember the Weirdest Guns in Gaming, heh.]"

The sublime horror of the unknown: Ian Dallas and What Remains of Edith Finch (Kris Ligman / Zam) "Director Ian Dallas, as it turns out, was more than willing to discuss the artistic and literary influences behind What Remains of Edith Finch with me -- as well as chat about a few paths the game did not end up going down."

The Game Archaeologist: How DIKUMUD Shaped Modern MMOs (Justin Olivetti / Massively Overpowered) "Even though there are hundreds and thousands of MMOs spanning several decades, only a small handful were so incredibly influential that they changed the course of development for games from then on out. DikuMUD is one of these games, and it is responsible for more of what you experience in your current MMOs than you even know."

The art and joy of video game photography (Simon Parkin / Eurogamer) "Now, when facing up against a Hyrulian monstrosity, my first thought is not, 'Which sword should I use', but rather, 'To which spot should I lure the beast to make the best use of the light?' In 2017, in my game at least, more Links have died taking compendium shots than in encounters with sharks (and not only because the sharks in Hyrule are talkative, handsome and kind)."

Classic Game Postmortem: Maniac Mansion (Ron Gilbert / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2011 Classic Game Postmortem, Maniac Mansion developer Ron Gilbert revisits the classic adventure game and recounts tales from the game's development process. "

Strange Beasts, a sci-fi short about an augmented reality game (Jason Kottke / Magali Barbé / Kottke.org) "Magali Barbé wrote and directed this short sci-fi video about an imaginary augmented reality game called Strange Beasts. It starts off with a “hey, yeah, cool, augemented reality games are going to be fun to play” vibe but gradually veers down the same dystopian path as a lot of augmented reality fictions (like Keiichi Matsuda’s Hyper-Reality)."

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

[REMINDER: you can sign up to receive this newsletter every weekend at http://ift.tt/2dUXrva we crosspost to Gamasutra later on Sunday, but get it first via newsletter! Story tips and comments can be emailed to vgdeepcuts@simoncarless.com. MINI-DISCLOSURE: Simon is one of the organizers of GDC and Gamasutra, so you may sometimes see links from those entities in his picks. Or not!]

[symbianosgames]

Video Game Deep Cuts: Hitman vs. Edith Finch - Go!

The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

[Video Game Deep Cuts is a weekly newsletter from curator/video game industry veteran Simon Carless, rounding up the best longread & standout articles & videos about games, every weekend. This week's highlights include Hitman level design, What Remains of Edith Finch, and much, much more.

As I battle jetlag after my return from Asia to a sunny California spring, I've been thinking a lot this week about discoverability for games again. Shouldn't there be more niche game subscription services out there for those looking to support underappreciated/'different' titles? I love Humble Monthly, but some of the more mainstream subscribers seem to get grumpy about the quirkier indie titles in it at times - much like PS4 players litter indie YouTube trailer comments with fist-shaking.

And how about adding context to the games in a subscription with dev interview videos, 'Let's Play'-style playthoughs, or even analysis videos? Would any of you sign up for something like this? Curious...

- Simon, curator.]

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

Passing Through Ghosts in Pac-Man (John Harris / Gamasutra Blogs) "This is an excerpt from my book Bug Voyage: A Tour of Classic Game Glitches, available in the current Rogue Souls Storybundle [SIMON'S NOTE: which I curated!]. The book also contains information on pseudorandom number generation, doing low-level math in binary and decimal, and how you can crash any Galaga machine without even putting money in."

Writing Indie Games Is Like Being a Musician. In the Bad Way. (Jeff Vogel / The Bottom Feeder) "Over the last couple years, I've gotten a fair amount of attention for my articles about the Indie Bubble and the Indie Glut.  (And even a GDC talk.) At last, I can complete the trilogy of articles. Now we can look around and see where we've ended up, a phase which I suspect will be permanent. [SIMON'S NOTE: Please read this.]"

Legendary Game Maker Peter Molyneux Talks Regrets and What's Next (Chris Suellentrop / Glixel) "That enthusiasm for the unknown is the hallmark of 57-year-old Molyneux's long career. He stopped by the Glixel offices in March to talk – barely – about his next game, Legacy, as well as to speak at length about everything from No Man's Sky and Pokémon Go to his aborted Kinect experiment, Milo."

toco toco ep.49, Yoko Taro, Game Creator (toco toco TV / YouTube) "In this episode, we spend the day in Osaka with Yoko Taro, director of the famous Drakengard and NieR series. Our first stop will be at PlatinumGames, the studio that was in charge of developing Yoko’s most recent title: NieR: Automata."

How Hitman’s Hokkaido level was made (Alex Wiltshire / RockPaperShotgun) "The latest Hitman['s]... levels are a jetset tour of places you believe could exist, but these aren’t just credible environments, they’re also machines for killing in. And the first season of Hitman closed with one of its best. Hokkaido is at once compact and expansive, melodramatic and credible, and I talked to IO about how it was designed."

Game Over, Uwe Boll (Darryn King / Vanity Fair) "The man known as the world’s worst director is now retired and running a Vancouver restaurant. But he’s still not done waiting for the world to give him his due. [SIMON'S NOTE: you really should read this one, if only for Boll's random Chris Kohler diss, haha.]"

Inside the Resilient ‘Team Fortress 2’ Community on the PlayStation 3 (Aron Garst / Motherboard) "To say that PS3 players got a raw deal is one hell of an understatement. But they've managed, and made friends along the way."

THOTH, And How I Talk About Games (Errant Signal / YouTube) "Just a little thing I made at the end of last month while fighting off some sickness. [SIMON'S NOTE: an interesting - if a bit self-doubt-y - meta-analysis from one of the better YouTube game analysis folks on how you should approach mechanics-led games in terms of commentary.]"

Valve has cut Dota 2 royalties, and workshop creators are crying foul (Arthur Gies / Polygon) "There’s unrest in Dota 2’s community this week, as several artists responsible for many of the free-to-play game’s popular cosmetic items allege that Steam owner and Dota 2 developer Valve Software has systematically reduced their earnings and may be permanently damaging the long-term viability of Dota 2’s business model."

Magic: The Gathering's Head Designer Has A Damn Hard Job (JR Goldberg / Kotaku) "“Magic is secretly, not really … it’s not one game,” head Magic: The Gathering designer Mark Rosewater told me. “It is actually a bunch of different games that all have a shared rule system. Every time I make a card set, I’m making the game for everybody, but for each person, it’s a different game to them.”"

Roam free: A history of open-world gaming (Richard Moss / Ars Technica) "Open-world video games bear the impossible promise—offering compelling, enjoyable open-endedness and freedom within the constraints of what is, by necessity of the medium, an extremely limited set of possible actions. These games provide a list of (predominantly violent) verbs that's minuscule in comparison to the options you would face in identical real-life situations. Yet, we can't get enough of them."

Tom Clancy's Inherent Silliness: Why Ghost Recon Wildlands Couldn't Escape Its Fate (Cameron Kunzelman / Paste) "Ghost Recon Wildlands is a silly game. One might be tempted to think that it’s an intentionally silly game bordering on satire. I mean, after all, it’s almost a parody of games in its genre: it’s a third-person shooter game where four operatives, a handler, and some almost-Communist rebels take on and fully dismantle the infrastructure of a country that’s been fully taken over by a drug cartel."

The Game Beat Weekly: The pressure to stay in line (Kyle Orland / TinyLetter) "These apologetic quotes both get at a truth that's rarely explicitly acknowledged in the world of game criticism: being out of step with the critical or fan consensus on a big-name game or franchise is often not an easy thing to do. At best, having a contrary opinion about a big game these days means being subject to a huge stream of nasty comments, tweets, and e-mails about your view."

The Last Game I Make Before I Die: The Crashlands Postmortem (Sam Coster / GDC / YouTube) "Crashlands was developed by a team of three brothers in response to one of them being diagnosed with late stage cancer. In this 2017 session, Butterscotch Shenanigans' Samuel Coster tells the parallel stories of one family's battle with cancer and the creation of a cross-platform crafting RPG, and find yourself inspired to continue your great work no matter what life throws at you."

The Growing Indie Game Development Scene of South Africa (Lena LeRay / IndieGames.com) "South Africa's video game development scene has been through a lot of ups and downs since it got started in the mid-90s. The indie scene in particular got its first big break in 2010, with the entry of Desktop Dungeons on the world stage."

Destiny's meta shifts are fascinating (Cole Tomashot / Zam) "A meta shift is usually the result of a content release, player discovery, or patch. What makes these meta shifts interesting, is that while they are occurring a push and pull relationship between developers and players reveals itself as both parties play a role in a game’s meta."

Meeting Andrzej Sapkowski, the writer who created The Witcher (Robert Purchese / Eurogamer) "Andrzej Sapkowski has something of a reputation. To start with, he's a big deal. He invented Geralt, witchers, Triss, Ciri, the whole thing - it all came out of his head. He has won awards and his work is revered, especially in Poland. More than once I've heard him described as the Polish Tolkien. But I've also heard he can be difficult - and I'm on my way to meet him."

The sound of SID: 35 years of chiptune’s influence on electronic music (James Newman / The Conversation) "Fortunately, Yannes did know something about music, as well as semiconductors and designing chips. And so in 1981 he began work on what would arguably become the most important milestone in videogame music and one whose influence still resonates to this day: the MOS Technology 6581, also known as the Sound Interface Device, but much better known as the SID. [SIMON'S NOTE: quite a few game soundtracks analyzed in this neat piece!]"

Balancing Cards in Clash Royale (Stefan Engblom / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2017 GDC session, Stefan Engblom, game designer on the Clash Royale team, talks about the philosophies and principles used for balancing cards and gameplay in Supercell's Clash Royale."

The Ten Most Important Early Computer and Video Games (Jaz Rignall / USGamer) "Today's gaming industry is a massive, multibillion dollar entertainment juggernaut. But what are its roots? I thought I'd take a trip back to the very dawn of gaming history and take a look at the devices, inventions, and innovations that gave rise to our favorite pastime."

Mike Tyson's Punch Out NES Nintendo 30th Anniversary (Gajillionaire / YouTube) "30 years ago on March 31, 1987, Little Mac defeated the Super Macho Man for the W.V.B.A. World Heavyweight Title. We look back with YouTube personalities from all over and remember back to that epic night. Then, sit back and watch the original “broadcast” of the classic Championship title fight!"

Three reasons streaming is replacing the Let’s Play industry (Michael Sawyer / Polygon) "YouTube personalities recording themselves playing games is big business, and it seems to be the dominant way for gaming influencers to make money on the platform. The art form is known as “Let’s Play,” although that term doesn’t have much in the way of a set definition. But why does it seem like so many personalities on YouTube are moving to livestreams?"

Jonathan Coulton - All This Time (Official Video) (Jonathan Coulton / YouTube) "From his new album Solid State, out April 28. The album has a companion graphic novel written by Matt Fraction and drawn by Albert Monteys. It's a science fiction story about the internet, the future, artificial intelligence, and how probably only love will save us. [SIMON'S NOTE: this song is wonderful, but the music video is what permits its inclusion in this roundup, heh.]"

Why Video Game Guns 'Feel Good' (Emmanuel Maiberg / Motherboard) "Six out of the top 10 bestselling video games in February heavily featured guns and shooting. The same was true in January and all of 2016. Like it or hate it, video games and guns have gone hand-in-hand for decades and there's no reason to assume that this will change in the near future. [SIMON'S NOTE: part of a series - also see Veteran Developers Remember the Weirdest Guns in Gaming, heh.]"

The sublime horror of the unknown: Ian Dallas and What Remains of Edith Finch (Kris Ligman / Zam) "Director Ian Dallas, as it turns out, was more than willing to discuss the artistic and literary influences behind What Remains of Edith Finch with me -- as well as chat about a few paths the game did not end up going down."

The Game Archaeologist: How DIKUMUD Shaped Modern MMOs (Justin Olivetti / Massively Overpowered) "Even though there are hundreds and thousands of MMOs spanning several decades, only a small handful were so incredibly influential that they changed the course of development for games from then on out. DikuMUD is one of these games, and it is responsible for more of what you experience in your current MMOs than you even know."

The art and joy of video game photography (Simon Parkin / Eurogamer) "Now, when facing up against a Hyrulian monstrosity, my first thought is not, 'Which sword should I use', but rather, 'To which spot should I lure the beast to make the best use of the light?' In 2017, in my game at least, more Links have died taking compendium shots than in encounters with sharks (and not only because the sharks in Hyrule are talkative, handsome and kind)."

Classic Game Postmortem: Maniac Mansion (Ron Gilbert / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2011 Classic Game Postmortem, Maniac Mansion developer Ron Gilbert revisits the classic adventure game and recounts tales from the game's development process. "

Strange Beasts, a sci-fi short about an augmented reality game (Jason Kottke / Magali Barbé / Kottke.org) "Magali Barbé wrote and directed this short sci-fi video about an imaginary augmented reality game called Strange Beasts. It starts off with a “hey, yeah, cool, augemented reality games are going to be fun to play” vibe but gradually veers down the same dystopian path as a lot of augmented reality fictions (like Keiichi Matsuda’s Hyper-Reality)."

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

[REMINDER: you can sign up to receive this newsletter every weekend at http://ift.tt/2dUXrva we crosspost to Gamasutra later on Sunday, but get it first via newsletter! Story tips and comments can be emailed to vgdeepcuts@simoncarless.com. MINI-DISCLOSURE: Simon is one of the organizers of GDC and Gamasutra, so you may sometimes see links from those entities in his picks. Or not!]

[symbianosgames]

Video Game Deep Cuts: Hitman vs. Edith Finch - Go!

The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

[Video Game Deep Cuts is a weekly newsletter from curator/video game industry veteran Simon Carless, rounding up the best longread & standout articles & videos about games, every weekend. This week's highlights include Hitman level design, What Remains of Edith Finch, and much, much more.

As I battle jetlag after my return from Asia to a sunny California spring, I've been thinking a lot this week about discoverability for games again. Shouldn't there be more niche game subscription services out there for those looking to support underappreciated/'different' titles? I love Humble Monthly, but some of the more mainstream subscribers seem to get grumpy about the quirkier indie titles in it at times - much like PS4 players litter indie YouTube trailer comments with fist-shaking.

And how about adding context to the games in a subscription with dev interview videos, 'Let's Play'-style playthoughs, or even analysis videos? Would any of you sign up for something like this? Curious...

- Simon, curator.]

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

Passing Through Ghosts in Pac-Man (John Harris / Gamasutra Blogs) "This is an excerpt from my book Bug Voyage: A Tour of Classic Game Glitches, available in the current Rogue Souls Storybundle [SIMON'S NOTE: which I curated!]. The book also contains information on pseudorandom number generation, doing low-level math in binary and decimal, and how you can crash any Galaga machine without even putting money in."

Writing Indie Games Is Like Being a Musician. In the Bad Way. (Jeff Vogel / The Bottom Feeder) "Over the last couple years, I've gotten a fair amount of attention for my articles about the Indie Bubble and the Indie Glut.  (And even a GDC talk.) At last, I can complete the trilogy of articles. Now we can look around and see where we've ended up, a phase which I suspect will be permanent. [SIMON'S NOTE: Please read this.]"

Legendary Game Maker Peter Molyneux Talks Regrets and What's Next (Chris Suellentrop / Glixel) "That enthusiasm for the unknown is the hallmark of 57-year-old Molyneux's long career. He stopped by the Glixel offices in March to talk – barely – about his next game, Legacy, as well as to speak at length about everything from No Man's Sky and Pokémon Go to his aborted Kinect experiment, Milo."

toco toco ep.49, Yoko Taro, Game Creator (toco toco TV / YouTube) "In this episode, we spend the day in Osaka with Yoko Taro, director of the famous Drakengard and NieR series. Our first stop will be at PlatinumGames, the studio that was in charge of developing Yoko’s most recent title: NieR: Automata."

How Hitman’s Hokkaido level was made (Alex Wiltshire / RockPaperShotgun) "The latest Hitman['s]... levels are a jetset tour of places you believe could exist, but these aren’t just credible environments, they’re also machines for killing in. And the first season of Hitman closed with one of its best. Hokkaido is at once compact and expansive, melodramatic and credible, and I talked to IO about how it was designed."

Game Over, Uwe Boll (Darryn King / Vanity Fair) "The man known as the world’s worst director is now retired and running a Vancouver restaurant. But he’s still not done waiting for the world to give him his due. [SIMON'S NOTE: you really should read this one, if only for Boll's random Chris Kohler diss, haha.]"

Inside the Resilient ‘Team Fortress 2’ Community on the PlayStation 3 (Aron Garst / Motherboard) "To say that PS3 players got a raw deal is one hell of an understatement. But they've managed, and made friends along the way."

THOTH, And How I Talk About Games (Errant Signal / YouTube) "Just a little thing I made at the end of last month while fighting off some sickness. [SIMON'S NOTE: an interesting - if a bit self-doubt-y - meta-analysis from one of the better YouTube game analysis folks on how you should approach mechanics-led games in terms of commentary.]"

Valve has cut Dota 2 royalties, and workshop creators are crying foul (Arthur Gies / Polygon) "There’s unrest in Dota 2’s community this week, as several artists responsible for many of the free-to-play game’s popular cosmetic items allege that Steam owner and Dota 2 developer Valve Software has systematically reduced their earnings and may be permanently damaging the long-term viability of Dota 2’s business model."

Magic: The Gathering's Head Designer Has A Damn Hard Job (JR Goldberg / Kotaku) "“Magic is secretly, not really … it’s not one game,” head Magic: The Gathering designer Mark Rosewater told me. “It is actually a bunch of different games that all have a shared rule system. Every time I make a card set, I’m making the game for everybody, but for each person, it’s a different game to them.”"

Roam free: A history of open-world gaming (Richard Moss / Ars Technica) "Open-world video games bear the impossible promise—offering compelling, enjoyable open-endedness and freedom within the constraints of what is, by necessity of the medium, an extremely limited set of possible actions. These games provide a list of (predominantly violent) verbs that's minuscule in comparison to the options you would face in identical real-life situations. Yet, we can't get enough of them."

Tom Clancy's Inherent Silliness: Why Ghost Recon Wildlands Couldn't Escape Its Fate (Cameron Kunzelman / Paste) "Ghost Recon Wildlands is a silly game. One might be tempted to think that it’s an intentionally silly game bordering on satire. I mean, after all, it’s almost a parody of games in its genre: it’s a third-person shooter game where four operatives, a handler, and some almost-Communist rebels take on and fully dismantle the infrastructure of a country that’s been fully taken over by a drug cartel."

The Game Beat Weekly: The pressure to stay in line (Kyle Orland / TinyLetter) "These apologetic quotes both get at a truth that's rarely explicitly acknowledged in the world of game criticism: being out of step with the critical or fan consensus on a big-name game or franchise is often not an easy thing to do. At best, having a contrary opinion about a big game these days means being subject to a huge stream of nasty comments, tweets, and e-mails about your view."

The Last Game I Make Before I Die: The Crashlands Postmortem (Sam Coster / GDC / YouTube) "Crashlands was developed by a team of three brothers in response to one of them being diagnosed with late stage cancer. In this 2017 session, Butterscotch Shenanigans' Samuel Coster tells the parallel stories of one family's battle with cancer and the creation of a cross-platform crafting RPG, and find yourself inspired to continue your great work no matter what life throws at you."

The Growing Indie Game Development Scene of South Africa (Lena LeRay / IndieGames.com) "South Africa's video game development scene has been through a lot of ups and downs since it got started in the mid-90s. The indie scene in particular got its first big break in 2010, with the entry of Desktop Dungeons on the world stage."

Destiny's meta shifts are fascinating (Cole Tomashot / Zam) "A meta shift is usually the result of a content release, player discovery, or patch. What makes these meta shifts interesting, is that while they are occurring a push and pull relationship between developers and players reveals itself as both parties play a role in a game’s meta."

Meeting Andrzej Sapkowski, the writer who created The Witcher (Robert Purchese / Eurogamer) "Andrzej Sapkowski has something of a reputation. To start with, he's a big deal. He invented Geralt, witchers, Triss, Ciri, the whole thing - it all came out of his head. He has won awards and his work is revered, especially in Poland. More than once I've heard him described as the Polish Tolkien. But I've also heard he can be difficult - and I'm on my way to meet him."

The sound of SID: 35 years of chiptune’s influence on electronic music (James Newman / The Conversation) "Fortunately, Yannes did know something about music, as well as semiconductors and designing chips. And so in 1981 he began work on what would arguably become the most important milestone in videogame music and one whose influence still resonates to this day: the MOS Technology 6581, also known as the Sound Interface Device, but much better known as the SID. [SIMON'S NOTE: quite a few game soundtracks analyzed in this neat piece!]"

Balancing Cards in Clash Royale (Stefan Engblom / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2017 GDC session, Stefan Engblom, game designer on the Clash Royale team, talks about the philosophies and principles used for balancing cards and gameplay in Supercell's Clash Royale."

The Ten Most Important Early Computer and Video Games (Jaz Rignall / USGamer) "Today's gaming industry is a massive, multibillion dollar entertainment juggernaut. But what are its roots? I thought I'd take a trip back to the very dawn of gaming history and take a look at the devices, inventions, and innovations that gave rise to our favorite pastime."

Mike Tyson's Punch Out NES Nintendo 30th Anniversary (Gajillionaire / YouTube) "30 years ago on March 31, 1987, Little Mac defeated the Super Macho Man for the W.V.B.A. World Heavyweight Title. We look back with YouTube personalities from all over and remember back to that epic night. Then, sit back and watch the original “broadcast” of the classic Championship title fight!"

Three reasons streaming is replacing the Let’s Play industry (Michael Sawyer / Polygon) "YouTube personalities recording themselves playing games is big business, and it seems to be the dominant way for gaming influencers to make money on the platform. The art form is known as “Let’s Play,” although that term doesn’t have much in the way of a set definition. But why does it seem like so many personalities on YouTube are moving to livestreams?"

Jonathan Coulton - All This Time (Official Video) (Jonathan Coulton / YouTube) "From his new album Solid State, out April 28. The album has a companion graphic novel written by Matt Fraction and drawn by Albert Monteys. It's a science fiction story about the internet, the future, artificial intelligence, and how probably only love will save us. [SIMON'S NOTE: this song is wonderful, but the music video is what permits its inclusion in this roundup, heh.]"

Why Video Game Guns 'Feel Good' (Emmanuel Maiberg / Motherboard) "Six out of the top 10 bestselling video games in February heavily featured guns and shooting. The same was true in January and all of 2016. Like it or hate it, video games and guns have gone hand-in-hand for decades and there's no reason to assume that this will change in the near future. [SIMON'S NOTE: part of a series - also see Veteran Developers Remember the Weirdest Guns in Gaming, heh.]"

The sublime horror of the unknown: Ian Dallas and What Remains of Edith Finch (Kris Ligman / Zam) "Director Ian Dallas, as it turns out, was more than willing to discuss the artistic and literary influences behind What Remains of Edith Finch with me -- as well as chat about a few paths the game did not end up going down."

The Game Archaeologist: How DIKUMUD Shaped Modern MMOs (Justin Olivetti / Massively Overpowered) "Even though there are hundreds and thousands of MMOs spanning several decades, only a small handful were so incredibly influential that they changed the course of development for games from then on out. DikuMUD is one of these games, and it is responsible for more of what you experience in your current MMOs than you even know."

The art and joy of video game photography (Simon Parkin / Eurogamer) "Now, when facing up against a Hyrulian monstrosity, my first thought is not, 'Which sword should I use', but rather, 'To which spot should I lure the beast to make the best use of the light?' In 2017, in my game at least, more Links have died taking compendium shots than in encounters with sharks (and not only because the sharks in Hyrule are talkative, handsome and kind)."

Classic Game Postmortem: Maniac Mansion (Ron Gilbert / GDC / YouTube) "In this 2011 Classic Game Postmortem, Maniac Mansion developer Ron Gilbert revisits the classic adventure game and recounts tales from the game's development process. "

Strange Beasts, a sci-fi short about an augmented reality game (Jason Kottke / Magali Barbé / Kottke.org) "Magali Barbé wrote and directed this short sci-fi video about an imaginary augmented reality game called Strange Beasts. It starts off with a “hey, yeah, cool, augemented reality games are going to be fun to play” vibe but gradually veers down the same dystopian path as a lot of augmented reality fictions (like Keiichi Matsuda’s Hyper-Reality)."

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

[REMINDER: you can sign up to receive this newsletter every weekend at http://ift.tt/2dUXrva we crosspost to Gamasutra later on Sunday, but get it first via newsletter! Story tips and comments can be emailed to vgdeepcuts@simoncarless.com. MINI-DISCLOSURE: Simon is one of the organizers of GDC and Gamasutra, so you may sometimes see links from those entities in his picks. Or not!]