#i started playing victor creed and he is SO MUCH FUN

[welikeimagines-andfandoms]

Kinktober Day 22: Bondage- Victor Creed

Summary: You and Victor have fun with some rope and a little game

Word count: 1, 407

Tension began to form in your body as the position the ropes forced you into began to hurt. You tried not to squirm too much as Victor circled you. He has a devilish smirk on his face as he could see and smell how desperate you were for him. Your eyes were covered by a blind fold and a gag in your mouth. Though you couldn’t see him, you could hear his heavy boot steps.

Suddenly his steps came to a halt as you heard a chair being scraped across the floor. Next came the sound of his heavy body taking it’s place on the chair. Suddenly you shuddered with arousal as the knuckle of one of his clawed fingers grazed the length of your soaked pussy.

“You’re so desperate for me, aren’t kitten? Just want me to fuck you’d already.” He taunted you, the speed of his finger never increasing.

You can’t help but let out a desperate muffled moan at his action and words, your sounds making him chuckle darkly.

“Look so pretty tied up for me. I know you’ve been trying to be a good girl, trying to stay still for me, but I love when you squirm. Come on, kitten, squirm for me, try to break free.” He ordered, loving to see just how weak and submissive you could be in comparison to him.

Wanting to be good and follow his orders, you began to move your bond body, twisting and pulling where you could. Both you and Victor knew that it was hopeless and that your weak squirming wouldn’t do anything to the strong rope or the expert way they had been tied. You made sure to huff and moan out in your play attempt of escape, knowing he loved it when you played into the fantasy.

Your display making him moan out, knowing he was aroused by your bound struggle. Once you started pushing your ass and pussy out and towards him in your performance you heard his zipper being drawn and the sound of skin being worked. From the way he moaned and grunted you could tell he was touching himself, getting off to your struggle.

His movements stopped as he chuckled, now moving to sit in front of you on your shared bed. Removing your blindfold you can now see him shirtless in nothing but his boxers, a darker patch in the front, no doubt from his pre cum.

You made sure to give him begging eyes and wiggled a bit more as his palm held your cheek and his clawed thumb grazed your jutted lip. You knew he loved how you played along with his fantasy, tying you up and you both acting as captive and captor. He loved the game and you loved the way he fucked you from it.

“Such a pretty little fawn and you’re all mine. No escape for you, little one. Can’t wait to fuck your tight little pussy.” He tells you with malicious sweetness.

Playing along you begin to struggle even harder, trying hard to beg through your gag.

“Ah-ah-ah, no begging, kitten. You’re gonna take my cock and you’re gonna like it.” He growls as he pulls your hair harshly, forcing your head back.

He lightly slaps the side of your face and you try not to moan, wanting to stay in this little fantasy. Though Victor was a dangerous man and sometimes both of your kinks could get a bit dark, he never actually likes hitting you hard, even if you beg him to.

“Gonna take your gag off now and you’re gonna be a good girl and not scream.” He warns, his eyes becoming dark as his hand wraps around your throat.

With the gag now removed you take in a deep breath and really start to play along.

“Please sir, please let me go, I won’t tell anymore. Please don’t fuck me, I’m still a virgin. Please.” You falsely beg, both of you loving the layers you add to this game.

“Oh fuck I love a virgin pussy. Gonna be all nice and fresh for me. It’s gonna hurt too and I won’t be gentle. I’ll have you screaming from my cock, little one.” He taunts you, his hand back around your throat, slightly tighter this time.

Whimpering, you roll your eyes to the back of your head, loving the way his power turns you on.

“Maybe you’ll like that. Want to get fucked by daddy’s big cock? Be his good little girl.” His taunts continued as his hand reached over you to toy with your clit.

You couldn’t help the moan that escaped as his finger finally made contact with your throbbing clit. He’d been teasing you this whole time and to finally feel him touch where you needed him most was breathtaking. Desperate and loud moans escaped as your bond form pushed into his fingers, desperately trying to get more friction.

“Oh you are a dirty little girl, kitten. Just want to be touched so badly. Everyone thinks you’re a good little girl but we both know better don’t we?” His voice making you start to reach your peak even faster.

“No, no, no. I am a goood giirl. Aaahh. Pleeeaasse.” You managed to moan out, wanting to play along but unable to stop your body from reacting to how good it felt.

“Yeh you’re gonna be good at taking my cock.” He laughs as his fingers retract and he gives your sensitive pussy a light slap, making a loud yelp leave your body.

Quickly he removes his underwear and takes his spot behind you, lightly grazing the head of his cock along your folds.

“You ready for daddy’s cock, kitten?” He asks as his large head makes its way to your entrance.

“No please, youll hurt me. I can’t take your cock.” You falsely plead, your hips thrusting towards his body giving you away.

Chuckling he leans his body over yours, his hot breath tickling your neck as he whispers into your ear.

“Scream as loud as you need to, little one. No one will hear you out here.” He falsely taunts, knowing that it was more of a reassurance to you.

Straightening up once again he roughly grabs onto your hips as he thrusts in all the way, his large size causing you the scream out in pleasure and a little pain. You were no virgin but with Victors size it still caused a little pain sometimes.

He wasted no time in picking up the pace and starting to fuck you rough and hard. You couldn’t help the loud moans and screams as he filled you up, his harsh thrusts forcing you further into the bed each time.

“This is daddy’s pussy now, kitten. Ruining your little virgin fucking pussy for anyone else. You belong to me now!” He declares, accentuating his point with harsh thrusts.

The sounds that leave your mouth are nothing less than pornographic as he thrusts into you harder and harder. It didn’t take long before you could feel yourself reaching your peak, the familiar warm tingling feeling starting to build up once again.

“Are you gonna cum on daddy’s cock? I feel your pussy grabbing me, kitten. Come on then, milk daddy’s cock, make him cum deep inside you.” He encouraged, one hand leaving your hip to reach down and rub your clit.

With the added pressure on your clit, it all became too much. You let out a deep scream as your bound body shook and wakes with your orgasm running through your body.

As your body shuddered, Victors grip on you intensified as he gave you a few more harsh thrusts before he let out a loud moan, cumming deep inside you.

Both you a Victor stayed that way for a while as you both started to catch your breaths. Gently he pulls himself out of you, all traces of his roughness gone.

With a clean wet cloth he cleaned you off, gently as to not hurt you. Next came your ropes, kissing your sweet skin each time a piece of rope was removed, telling you how well you did between each kiss.

Once you were fully free from your bounds, Victor laid you down gently on the bed.

“I’m gonna run a bath for you, sweetheart. I’ll be back in just a moment. Did so well for me.” He gently coo’s as he kisses your temple.

[honey-minded-hivemind]

Glad you liked the art!

Honestly for me, the biggest appeal of Creed Reader (Cave Bear or otherwise) is the connection they have with the other characters. Because it's fun to speculate where things went wrong.

I can totally see Victor's resentment starting early. He's gonna be the first person people compare Creed Reader to and it rubs him the wrong way. He had no control of Creed Reader's creation...and instead of getting a worthwhile asset out of his struggles, he gets them.

Victor sees Creed Reader as a defect. They lack all the things that make him such a killer (heh) in the field. They waste their strengths and talents to play with soft things or read or some other nonsense. (They were just a kid...but that doesn't matter.) He sees every difference between him and Reader. Sees their roundness and softness as weakness. Attributes their kindness to fear. Assumes their ignorance is malicious or petty. And he can't stand to see "a part of himself" be so pathetic.

On the other hand, Logan sees all the similarities Creed Reader shares with Victor. The rougher bits, all claws and brute strength, make him wary of his nibling. Any accident with another kid or slight misjudgement on their part is taken as a slight because "it's something Victor would do to mess with him." He looks at Creed Reader and sees a mini Victor, bloodthirsty and uncontrolled.

I think it's another cause of tension between the brothers. Logan thinks that Victor is making Creed Reader act too beastly and thoughtlessly. While Victor thinks that Logan is encouraging weakness in his "ward". The tension between the two leads to more and more resentment toward Creed Reader from both sides, ultimately culminating in the incident that left them scarred and ready to run.

Now that they've had some time away from Creed Reader I think they've both managed to see the good parts of Creed Reader they missed initially. And they want to make that known...but they once again mess it up by treating Reader like they would the other brother. Once again they put force above thought and try to drag reader back...which is way harder when they're as big and strong as Cave Bear Reader. They uh...they might need a few more tranqs and some extra sets of hands to get Cave Bear back home. (i'm in an essay mood ig <3)

Those are all good points!

The two have a problem trying to see Reader as their own person, not just an extension of Victor, or their worst parts. While they do get better, they're still going about getting Cave Bear Creed Reader the wrong way. They're trying to force it, trying to ask for too much too early, and would rather have Reader with them NOW than actually waiting for them to wander in (which wouod possibly never happen).

They miss Reader, and want to make up for everything, but they're a bit too intense and a bit too manic about, well, everything.

Cave Bear Reader wants space and would preferably want to see them never. Victor wants his child back amd wants to prove that he's changed and that he loves them. Logan wants to earn their forgiveness and try to see them beyond being related to his brother.

Logan and Victor and the X-Men and Brotherhood are going to need several tranquilizers, some safety gloves/armor, and a lot of sedatives and a whole team picked by hand to actually have a chance of getting Reader.

Not to mention a way to contain them or sedate them once they're back with everyone (if they manage to catch them initially)...

But that's what any family does for their own, right? Apologize when they're wrong, make it up to them, then bring them home amd be family... Isn't that what Reader always wanted?

So why are they fighting them now? Why not give in? Let them love on them? Just give them a chance, is all they're asking...

[callofdudes]

Dropping all my AU thoughts on you. (Lovingly) pt1??

Hunger Games AU: All of 141 bring previous victors from their games who find solace with each other in the capital. Would go through what they experienced in their individual games and how they won. But when the victors face off comes they all have to work together to end the games permanently.

Skyrim AU: Ghost works with the Dark Brotherhood. Johnny is 1000% a Companion. Gaz is a bard who is also attending the College of Winterhold to become a mage. Price is either a leader of the Companions, or he's a captain of the Imperial Guard. Don't exactly have a proper plot. And Gaz is obviously a redguard. Price is definitely a Nord. John is probably a mix of either Breton and Nord or something. It just makes sense. And Ghost is an Imperial. It just makes sense and I can't explain why!

Or, another Skyrim idea: Johnny as the dragonborn and Simon as a Daedric Prince of Akotosh who chooses to serve Johnny after doubting Alduin's reign.

Transformers AU: It could go either way, I envision it with Ghost as a Tranformer. He's the last of his squad who escaped captivity (I hope you catch on) and is sent to earth to protect Intel and find a place to stay. Runs into the annoying Scottish mechanic when his paint is dinged up. Or Simon as the angry mechanic who does not want to fix this alien thing that keeps yapping all day.

Rise of the Guardians AU: All the characters are there. If Y/n was present in this I'd make Ghost the angry easter Bunny who "hates his job". But if they weren't he's hands down Jack Frost. Sorry. Gaz can be Sandy (sandman) we all know who Price is, and Johnny can be the tooth fairy. If you know why, you know why.

Obviously a httyd AU: because everyone needs one. I'm already conjuring up things for Ghost's backstory it's insane.

Gaming AU: Price is a moderator for a large gaming community channel and streaming platform. He greenlights a lot of games that go through and plays them occasionally. RDR games and those likes. Johnny and Gaz definitely play the sims together. They'd play those games like Lethal Company and such. They try to play horror games but it doesn't always go well. Simon, (known to fans as Ghost) wears his mask or has one of those cool avatars. Plays horror games religiously and first person shooters which has attracted a glamorized following. Friends with Price and that's how he ended up getting together in the streaming group with Gaz and Johnny. They're annoying, but ok, they're cool.

Assassin's Creed AU: I've been working slowly on this for a while but Johnny as a sword/bow for hire whose work has slowed in the city he's at. So he packs up with friend Gaz who is going to a different city to study as a medic. Price is probably the king of said place. (I'm thinking of setting up in Greece or we're going to old Britain.) And Ghost is our famous assassin. And they meet and some stuff happens!

Not sure what to call this one (AU) As a young kid Johnny was diagnosed with ADHD and went to weekly day camp for kids like him. It wasn't particularly boring and Johnny had lots of fun. Until a new kid who is very socially awkward and reclusive starts coming. He's quiet and fidgety and doesn't make much eye contact. Johnny wants to be his friend. The story where Autistic Simon and ADHD Johnny become inseparable childhood friends.

Winged AU. I did a little thing on this a couple months ago. Some 30% of the popular are born with wings. Johnny is one of them. He's incredibly proud of his wings and it gives him some advantages and disadvantages in the military. Simon seems to hate Johnny for the sake of it. But every time Simon sees John's wings, he remembers the scars on his back and the pain of when his wings were torn off...

[lorata]

OKAY, this is a long one but I've been mentally playing around with another absolutely ridiculous AU that would ruin the timeline and makes no sense! BUT! I think it's also a fun way to play with the characters so I thought you might like it. Let me know where any of my thoughts here go wrong but here it is:

This all started on two things I remember:

At some point way back, you said tribute!Joseph would be an Adessa boy (your mind, I love it)

 In the injured Creed AU, I noticed when Alec was in full Callista-tribute mode, all vicious and predatory, both Creed and Joseph thought he reminded them of Adora which made me think as a trainee Adora must have been at least a little bit feral

So a few notes of what I imagined this might look like:

Joseph and Adora are back-to-back victors (I aged Adora up a year because I didn’t think it would affect too much)

Adora wins a year earlier so when Joseph wins she sees him as The Village Baby ™ at first even though he thinks she’s ~pretty~. This is simply because I enjoy laughing at Joseph.

Adora, I think, is mentored either by Hera (if you’re willing to also push her age up) or Caius otherwise. This is purely vibes-based.

As I already wrote, Joseph is mentored by Adessa

TBH I think as a mentor-victor pair, Joseph+Adessa  would have a lot fewer problems than Nero+Adessa

Adora mentors Callista, which is deeply funny to me lol good luck

For Victor!Joseph, I grapple with what to do with him. Does he get a victor? Who?

It would be fun to have Adessa pull Nero later but leave Joseph as one of the first to never bring one home. Joseph grappling with that sense of ~faliure~ would be fun to play with + seeing him as Nero’s older victor brother would be deeply funny. Have fun getting buried under a very large, sweater-wearing, cuddle puddle!

Alternatively, Joseph mentors Nero. Both because this plays off Adora and Calli but also, it makes things so interesting to me

Weirdly,  I feel like Joseph is probably better with Nero’s touchiness than Adessa? He’s not cuddly by any means but to me, he’s also never seemed touch-averse? Anyways maybe here Nero gets A Hug more often once it becomes clear he needs one. It does make me a bit sad because I love Adessa + Nero mentor moments.

The big thing that makes this so interesting for me is to see Joseph grapple with his sense of Loyalty and Duty when Nero’s deal gets struck. Like Adessa, he’d be devastated but now you've got the added issue of having his entire worldview/purpose getting thrown in his face

Maybe we don’t get an…entirely loyal Joseph here, at least not to the president.  I imagine that much like Adessa he fantasizes about the things he could do to Snow’s kidneys if he got the chance but alas, district and country before self

Also on a lighter note, it’s 10/10 funny to have Joseph accidentally being the baffled start of the absolutely feral Nero line

All of this may culminate in a crack fic when poor grandpa mentor Joseph gets saddled watching a fresh-out Misha because again, I like bullying him.

Entirely unimportant note, in any Frigga AU I get intense vibes that she could be a Joseph tribute for zero reasons.  This would also probably go better for everyone because say what you will about him (and there are many, many things), when Frigga makes the same offer as she did with Odin the only reaction I can get from Joseph is “Oh Dear™ N O  thank you”

One more thing, I could be entirely wrong here but I wonder:

I feel like both Joseph and Adora are more adjusted in this universe. They would have arena trauma like the other victors but nothing like Joseph’s residential thing + all those years in the force. Here they also have mentors + support + therapy and I imagine they’re better off for it?

Maybe (?) they’d have a chance to be decent parents here? Could be wrong but I feel like a big majority of their Issues, at least in THG universe, stem from a combination of intense trauma with no therapy or support + all the things they witnessed in the peace force of a totalitarian murder government. I don’t think they’d ever be… amazing parents but maybe also not bad ones either? IDK I’d at least like a universe where Alec and Creed get a slightly healthy time.

this is incredible and I want it to exist so bad

i'm only vaguely coherent today so here are some point-form thoughts:

every time I think I have made a decision on Joseph as Nero's mentor or mentor sibling I change my mind AGAIN because they're both so fun thematically and provide different opportunities so I really will have to think about it

Joseph as Frigga's mentor MUST happen because honestly "oh dear. no thank you" has made me laugh for two days

I agree that any universe with Victor Joseph & Adora automatically creates a better parenting environment (sad but true) and I do think a double universe would do the same

everything about Joseph's loyalty is fascinating (I've played with it a bit in a Victor Joseph AU where the powers that be demand Creed as a volunteer after everything he tries to do to keep him out) and I love it, I want to see more of this

the one thing I've been rolling around in my brain is that I don't ... think ... Adora would mentor? I think she'd go back to the Centre (like Frigga in the AU) and work with the Residential kids, help prepare them as much as possible

also re: bb Adora, I think her thing was less out-of-control wild and more ........ ruthless? she saw what she wanted and she went for it, which is what Alec managed to unlock in the Injured Creed AU and Callista highly encouraged before the Arena

so Arena-Adora would have been the same, she's got that sort of wicked charm at first but the longer the Games went on the more the smooth edges start filing away to get to the feral underneath

Joseph would definitely think she's out of his league which I find VERY funny (I also like to bully him)

[sammysdewysensitiveeyes]

Sabretooth and the Exiles #5 - Too much Sabretooth, not enough Exiles.

I'm sure it's weird to say that about a book where he is literally the title character, but I am only reading this book for the Exiles and Victor LaValle, Creed himself can get thrown into the sun for all I care.

The main Exiles group gets dragged down into a research chamber under the sea where six super-powered babies are freaking out:

Apparently the babies react badly to any adult coming near them, due to Orchis torturing them. Nanny has a plan! Maybe not a good plan, but a plan!

And it works! Nanny reduces everyone except herself to a childlike mental state, and this calms the mutant babies. This picture is so adorable, I love Oya hugging the teddy bear. And I love Third Eye's pose, like he's not holding a toy or anything, but that is a very child-like expression and way of sitting.

Of course, Nanny has a part 2 to her plan:

Nanny and Peter stay behind with the babies, I'm sure Nanny raising six extremely powerful infants will be totally fine and not cause any problems at all. I'm really loving Nekra in this series, btw, she really seems to want to take care of people, and is embracing a more heroic, leader role.

Meanwhile, Sabretooth fights Graydon Creed, who has been killing Sabretooths across the multiverse, with the help of a few AU counterparts. Graydon gets tossed into the multiverse portal, which puts him out of play for now, and Sabretooth makes plans with his counterparts to raid Krakoa, and specifically go after Wolverine. Oh, and he now has a whole army of headless Sabretooths that he can control via remote, because that's what Graydon did with all the dead Daddy Creeds. This best part of this storyline is the Re-animator joke:

We leave the Exiles in an uncertain state. Sabretooth is doing his own thing, and they are now on a ship with about a thousand mutants that they have pledged to look after. And they are presumably not going back to Krakoa, even though the mutant refugees would easily be accepted there. (Heck, the Exiles themselves might be welcomed back for rescuing so many kidnapped mutants, even though they haven't stopped Creed yet.)

A data page suggests that they will settle in a swamp, and that Sabretooth will come back in a very big and bad way. I think there is one more mini coming after this:

I'm probably not the best person to read this series, given that I really despise Sabretooth, but I think LaValle does a good job of writing him as a villain protagonist. You can kind of root for him while he's being tortured by Orchis, or fighting Graydon Creed, and he is instrumental in rescuing all the kidnapped mutants, but he's clearly not a hero. Not even really an anti-hero. There's no redemption suggested for Creed, and he clearly doesn't care about the Exiles or the refugee mutants, they are just tools for him to use. I expect he'll play a role in Fall of X, when he presumably attacks Krakoa.

I think LaValle also has done a good job in this series of using Nanny and Peter, even though they weren't part of his original group and came into the pit via Hellions. Nanny is a fun, even sympathetic character (especially when she threatens to shank Sinister), but she's also dangerous and not entirely trustworthy. Like, maybe Nanny will show up in the next series with her six incredibly powerful mutant babies and save the day, but she could also just cause complete chaos. Peter seems to be starting to distrust her as well, a rift that started back in Hellions; it'll be interesting if he decides to leave her and join the Exiles group.

I also liked the use of Toad so far, another character tossed in the pit from another series. He hasn't done much, but I appreciated him seeing through Sabretooth's bullshit last issue, when Creed was giving a manipulative and self-serving speech to all the refugee mutants, trying to turn them into his own little army. Toad's got a lot of experience being fanatically devoted to a leader, and I'd like to see him be the voice of reason.

To be honest, my biggest fear is that Toad might get killed off, and not resurrected, and the fact that he got framed and condemned to the Pit as an innocent man will not be acknowledged in any other comic, or at best will be a brief scene where Wanda or a resurrected Magneto express some regret over Toad's fate then quickly gloss over it, because Toad's innocence is really Williams' plot point, it's not something that any other writer seems to want to deal with. Even LaValle hasn't really gotten into it, but I don't really blame him, it's Williams' mess, and he's just finding ways to use Toad in his cast. Technically you could say Toad's innocence doesn't really matter - ALL of the Exiles got screwed over in some way, and none of them really deserve to be outcast from Krakoa. (Except Sabretooth, yes he was also screwed over, yes that's the whole point of the series, but he's such a vicious, destructive piece of shit, it's fine to keep him away. At least most of the other villains have been willing to play nice.) But Toad is the one who really sticks in my craw, because it was so badly done in ToM, because this character who has always been treated like garbage got sacrificed as a pawn in the scheme of two more "important" and more conventionally attractive mutants, and neither have them have lifted a finger to help Toad, and Williams seems to think that was just fine and dandy. I really, really want there to be a reckoning for Toad, ideally one where he is still alive.

This book had better not touch Oya, Nekra or Third Eye, either.

Madison appears to still be "dead," but given the way he died, I fully expect that he'll come back in the next series. Either he'll have downloaded his consciousness into the ship, or he'll have found a way to create a body out of inorganic material. In the first series, when the group was manifesting themselves around Krakoa, Madison was talking about how a body made of micro-plastics felt "right" to him, so I half-expect we'll see Micro-plastic Jeffries rising out of the ocean.

Damn, this wound up being a lot.

[kaypeace21]

Will’s fear of clowns

*Ps -not mine. this is a submission from an anon. tw: for s.a. It’s an interesting submission. ANON-please make a tumblr account already . I’m begging you XD

Hi! It’s me, Lonnie Meth Anon. Back with more depressing thoughts about Lonnie!

I just read your post on Jonathan’s ab*se at the hands of Lonnie, and I second it all. It breaks my heart. But it also got me thinking deeper about Will’s fear of clowns. I think you’re right that part of the horror for Will is that the clown attacks in bed. The bed is, obviously, like you say, a common site for s*xual assault. (Doesn’t El’s picture of “three legged Brenner” also have a bed in it? In a picture with not much else?) The fact that Will needed Joyce to sleep with him for a week suggests he was specifically feeling unsafe in bed, or at night. 

But maybe it’s not just the location of the attack in Poltergeist that Will found so harrowing. Maybe it’s the combination of that location with the fact of a clown being the attacker. 

I think Lonnie might have dressed up as a clown for Will’s birthday one year, and something happened. 

In this instance, I don’t think Joyce would know what happened. I think the incident in her mind would be something like “Lonnie dressed up and Will was scared of the costume”. She might even have thought it was cute. Just a typical little kid fear of something mundane. When she teases him about Poltergeist, she doesn’t actually say the movie was the START of his fear of clowns. Just that he was afraid of that particular clown. The general fear of clowns could have been an older one, going back to when Will was even younger.

Maybe Will even liked clowns, before whatever happened with Lonnie turned them into a source of fear for him. Will has a lion plushie (lions are commonly found in the circus) and the circus seems like the kind of vibrant, colorful environment full of outcast, that a young gay kid would really enjoy. If Will did like circuses and Lonnie poisoned that for him, that’s just another reason to hate Lonnie. But it definitely seems possible. 

Lonnie is a deadbeat dad in general, but we’ve seen before that he’s capable of faking the “family man” act in front of Joyce and their neighbors. We’ve also seen that even though he treats Will horribly, he would also try and keep Will on his side with father son bonding activities, like baseball. And Will’s birthday is one of the few occasions Lonnie makes a half-assed kind of effort, even when there’s nothing directly in it for him. He sends that card, even though it’s late. Maybe Joyce made called him up and made him send it, but she always seemed happy to keep Lonnie out of the picture. She didn’t even want to involve him when Will went missing. And we know Jonathan would never try and facilitate more interactions between Lonnie and Will. So it seems like Lonnie did this of his own accord, when he realized he’d missed the day. Kind of weird. And it���s classic abuser behavior, to make contact on an anniversary date, reminding you they exist and you can’t escape them. Reminding you to keep quiet. Or hoping you’ll miss them, remember the “good times” when they made an effort, and let them back into your life. (Ugh.)

So, anyway, back to my theory. Young Will likes circuses, and the Byers family are poor, so they can’t afford to take him to one, or throw him a party at an ice cream parlor or a bowling alley, like other kids. It makes sense that they would have a party at home instead, and that the family themselves might dress up. We know Joyce made Will’s Ghostbusters costume in season two, and a clown is a pretty easy costume. Most of it is just make up. It’s possible the whole thing was Joyce’s idea, and she made the costume, and Lonnie just went along with it to look like a good dad in her eyes. 

Remember how we see Bob (Will’s new father figure) dressing up in costume for Halloween? Joyce loves it. This is a thing good dads do, to have fun with their kids. That’s also the same episode we see Will scared by a guy in a clown costume, and Jonathan is hyper-protective of him that night. School is okay, but he doesn’t want him trick or treating. (Like he knows that school is a safe environment, but in other contexts, costumes and parties might be a trigger for Will.) Jonathan is convinced to leave Will and “let him have fun” and what happens? The clown attacks. Later that night Jonathan goes to a costume party himself, where he finds Nancy upset and takes her safely home.  Maybe this is how Will’s birthday party ended - with Jonathan finding Will upset, and trying to comfort him. The whole night could be playing out like a parallel to that birthday party, from Jonathan’s perspective. 

What actually happened with Will and Lonnie is up for debate. It’s possible there was a s*xual assault, and that’s why the clown scene in Poltergeist was such a trigger for Will. Or maybe Lonnie thought circuses weren’t “manly” enough for his son to like, and actively tried to scare Will, so he wouldn’t like them anymore. It’s hard to know. Something would have happened though, and probably something pretty formative, because the fear of clowns lasts a long time. 

Something else interesting is that when Mr Clarke is talking about the Upside Down in season one, he uses the metaphor of the flea and the acrobat. Acrobats are a main act in the circus, and, well … fleas. Flea circuses. That’s a thing. Maybe it’s a hint that the trauma that created the Upside Down was circus / clown - related?

Kali, El, and their gang wear clown masks too, when they’re going to confront their childhood trauma, and the child-like Alexei is surrounded by clowns when he is killed at the fair. 

Clowns are just so associated with birthday parties and little kids, that it doesn’t seem like a coincidence to me they’re Will’s biggest fear. Especially as the show keeps dropping hints about Lonnie and Will’s birthday. It feels like there’s more to the story. I have a horrible feeling SOMETHING happened. 

RESPONE (kaypeace):

I think it’s very possible-that maybe he did dress as a clown for Will’s birthday and something happened. We have alexi (paralleled to Will) playing carnival games with kids. Then he's attacked by the Lonnie-look alike : and alexi looks at his wound then stares at all the clowns laughing around him. Joyce and Murray find Alexi bleeding/dy*ng next to a clown statue. As joyce looks in horror and Murray says to her, he was “only gone for a second” (which sounds like something you’d say in relation to a kid you were supposed to watch-running off ). We also had sarah at age 7 die while wearing a gown with clowns on it (Will: it was a 7 the demogorgan it got me). Death of innocence symbolism? Hopper also describes his depression as a cave- he goes through the carnival ride where it mentions a "cave of horrors", which had decor of a tiger and a clown painting. So yeah... whatever happened probably isn't good. So- there may be some symbolism there in relation to Will’s past. Not only because (like I and you have mentioned before) Lonnie is highly associated with birthdays. And canonically we know he mentally scarred jonathan on his b-day. But also, s4’s ‘victor creel’ may be an easteregg to the xmen character victor creed- who had a tradition of tra*matizing family members specifically on their bdays

As another alternative:I could also totally see Lonnie “ruining” circuses for Will because it’s not “manly” to him. Like how Jonathan liked thumper the rabbit-from the film bambi. in the film, Thumper is bambi’s bff, and the hunters are the bad guys who k*ll Bambi’s mother and terrorize all the wildlife. SO yeah- making Jonathan become a hunter, and k*ll a rabbit ,despite this fact, is really messed up. And shows Lonnie has already tried to ‘ruin’ things the boys like. By mentally scarring them in one way or another…

I also mentioned how Will’s bday could even be a trigger for jonathan in a diff post.

if the s4 bts calender hinting it’ll be near Will’s bday and easter it could be relevant to Jonathan.we know in s1 el has tra*matic flashbacks when seeing certain things- coke, closet, cat, etc. And Will in s2 has his ‘anniversary effect’ where memories flood back based on the time of year.But like … Easter has bunnies - could seeing rabbits jog stuff up for Jonathan? El seeing a cat made her have a flashback of brenner trying to make her kill a cat. Would Jonathan seeing like Easter bunny decor jog up a flashback of lonnie making him kill a rabbit? (It happened on his bday too). So Will’s b day being around easter would only fuel that memory. (heck even popped balloons may trigger gunshot symbolism idk). And then for Will there is clowns that could be a tr*gger at a party.

The flea and the acrobat analogy (in relation to Will and circuses is very interesting) and could be foreshadowing- it’s even a title for an episode so I feel like it’s narratively an important hint to …something. similar to a s1 ep being called “the bathtub”.  Also, Will was compared to a circus flea- which were placed in an enclosed space, where heat was applied as they jumped  and tried to escape the increasing temperatures as they burned .Which could relate to my theory about Will having a se*zure due his body overheating due to Lonnie injecting him with m*th.

 If Will’s bday is in s4- I feel like Lonnie will come back in some capacity (flashback or literally). The ‘sorry, I forgot you b day’ card from Lonnie in s2, in Lonnie’s shed Joyce mentioning Will’s b day, the rainbow ‘happy birthday cup’ placed next to Will at Mike’s -while Will explains the supernatural, Lonnie already tra*matizing Jonathan on his bday, etc…

[cosmiciaria]

I finished playing AC Unity

And I wanted to write a review, just for me, because I write reviews for fun, but I realized I couldn’t. At least not now. 

Spoilers. 

I am devastated.

Even knowing the end, because I spoiled it for myself - even without liking Élise so much after reading the novelization (the whole feeling of “Arno, you deserve better”) - even after all that, I can’t believe a bunch of pixels impersonating two fictional characters can have such an impact on me. 

I know how a story works - I do write myself, so I kinda know what’s going on in the background, whenever a writer or a creator plants some kind of red herring in a story, among bigger things that seem more important - a tiny, minuscule thing that later may come in handy to complete the full circle. I know the process behind creating a character, a compelling character, a fleshed out fictional person that may strike a chord or two with the public. I know how it all works. And yet I’ve fallen again for another story with unreal people that have entrhalled me for at least forty hours, and may spend more time in my head afterwards. My thoughts are lingering with them.

I loved AC Unity.

I loved the drama, the story, the personal vendetta - this story isn’t about saving the world or retrieving a magical artifact from yore, no. It’s about Arno’s personal growth. Arno, Arno Victor Dorian, Arno. My dearest Arno.

I loved the intricate connections laid down by the creators. I loved the constant contradiction between Arno and his desire to discover the man behind De La Serre’s death. I loved that he went all out because he only wanted Élise (All I wanted was you). I loved that his motivations relied solely on personal interests, and not at all on “helping humanity” or whatnot. He’s an anti-hero at the end. He’s no hero. He’s human. He went through so much bullshit during his life, and not a single one of his actions, good actions, have been rewarded. Not a single one of his decisions have had a good outcome. He’s so full of bad luck that it’s a wonder that he hasn’t tried to take on his own life. 

And that goes to show how strong he actually is. I can’t believe people hate this game because of the gameplay or the bugs - this game goes beyond just a playable experience. It wants to tell this story. It wants to show you how strong Arno is. You can’t overlook this. The plot is so personal, it creeps under your skin, it makes you care for characters, it makes you trust those Arno trusts, only to be stabbed on the back. This game isn’t about Assassin’s Creed at all. The AC is just an excuse for Arno to know parkour, but that’s just it. This game wants to tell the story of a tragic man in the middle of the French Revolution. And I am thankful for it. 

I always love a story that makes me feel things, good or bad. This game made me feel bad. Sad. My chest is a knot right now. I can’t go back to Versailles, to the De La Serre’s state and see Élise’s portrait in the library. I can’t go sit on Arno’s room and read her letters. I can’t. There’s this crushing, overwhelming, looming feeling that whatever I do, there’s no point. And it’s so well conveyed. That is the magic this game brings. Not everything is about going on a videogame rampage and killing people. Sometimes a story needs to be told through everything it has at its disposal, and that’s why I think a videogame is a perfect medium to convey a character’s struggles. Music, immersion, time spent, characters, dialogues, playability. It has everything. 

I know games should be fun. I know games are meant for entertainment. But right now, for me, a well thought story, with this many twists and turns, with this gut-wrenching fatality and inexorability that binds the whole plot - it’s perfect. For me.

I loved AC Unity. I hope more people start seeing it that way too.

[creedslove]

Headcanons on anal with victor? I’m sorry I’m a Thirsty wh*re

AHHHHHH OMG DON'T BE SORRY ANON! I AM A THIRSTY WHORE TOO! I LOVE TALKING ABOUT THAT, BUT I DON'T INCLUDE IT VERY MUCH IN MY STORIES BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW IF PEOPLE LIKE IT?

Let's get dirty anon 😈

- Victor LOVES having anal sex with his frail for quite a few reasons: it is primal, satisfies his animal and it is the ultimate way to mark a frail as his. That way he would have claimed all her holes with his seed and no other (feral) men will get near her!

- And it is dirty af

- Victor likes everything about it, not only the act itself, but also all the prep he needs to get you to through

- He starts with the foreplay which in normal circumstances is enough to set your whole body on fire but with some other things that can be added to the fun!

- He likes spreading lube all over your body, making you all slippery and excited by minute

- Victor eats you out for hours, he keeps on feasting on that pussy until all your honey is flooding and slipping through your butt cheeks

- And then Victor eats your ass! Even if it isn't really your thing, you gotta try it, he's really good at it. He likes having you on all fours, so he can get comfortably between your legs, spreading your cheeks and taking his time with your special hole

- BUTT PLUGS OMG! Victor Creed would buy you so many plugs he would make Mr.Grey jealous. All shapes, colors and sizes! His favorite of course would be a tail one hehehe

- He'd help you with the plug so while you have it in your ass, he'd be fucking your sweet, juicy cunt so you can have some fun too

- But he wouldn't let you cum just yet, instead, he would finally remove the plug and insert his cock inside your ass - slowly and nice - so it wouldn't be too painful

- He'd give you some time to get used to it and start with his thrusts right after

- Victor doesn't take long to cum when he's fucking your ass, but you gotta cum as well, so he'd be playing with your clit until you find your release

- He cums all over your ass and a little bit on your back too

Aftercare:

- With a warm towel he wipes all your cum from you and cuddles your tired body while a bath is being prepared

- He carries you to the bathroom in case you are sore, and then bathes with you

- He helps you dry yourself and applies lotion to your body, softly kissing your back and your ass

- He snuggles you closer until you fall asleep

[aion-rsa]

50 Best Fighting Game Final Bosses from Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Tekken, and More

https://ift.tt/2N1eIZQ

When it isn’t about rage-quitting against your best buddy sitting next to you on the couch, or some guy playing against you across the country, fighting games are all about beating the arcade mode. Doing so means defeating the pesky final boss.

We’ve fought so many final bosses over the last 30+ years. Whether they’re godly megalomaniacs or bloodthirsty loners out to prove they’re the best, there are pleny of cheap-ass villains standing in the way of character-specific epilogue cutscenes.

So I’ve decided to rank the 50 best final bosses in fighting game history. This ranking includes both default final bosses and special secret bosses, but they have to be the last guy you fight. That means characters like Goro, Cervantes, Apocalypse, Vega, and Antonov don’t count. I’m also not counting games like Street Fighter Alpha and Vampire Savior where there’s no real set boss and different people have different final opponents, which is why Jedah isn’t on the list.

Now let’s face it straight!

50. JINPACHI MISHIMA

Tekken 5

I think this is the moment when Tekken’s story started going off the rails. Don’t get me wrong, I still love the lore of the series, but after doing a game about Heihachi vs. Kazuya vs. Jin, they decided to go further and bring in Heihachi’s dad. And he’s possessed by a demon because why the hell not.

But really, the reason he’s possessed is because otherwise he’s the one member of the bloodline who isn’t a jerk. That doesn’t make for a good boss design. In Tekken 5, he takes over the Mishima Zaibatsu and sets up a new King of the Iron Fist tournament ASAP just so somebody strong might be able to kill him before he completely loses control and wipes out all life on the planet. His ending cutscene even has him cry blood over this because he’s that hardcore.

The tragedy is that, in the end, he was killed by his great-grandson Jin, but Jin came out of it learning the wrong lesson. Jin, suffering from his own possession problems, went and took over the Mishima Zaibatsu and started a world war as part of an elaborate plan to commit suicide by putting a giant target on his back. It took two more games for him to finally get his head on straight.

49. SILBER

Buriki One

SNK shamelessly ripped off Akuma, but at least the studio did it with style. Coming from the lesser-known fighter Buriki One, Silber is a Victor Creed-looking urban legend who is obsessed with increasing his power and challenging worthy opponents. At the end of the game’s big MMA tournament, when the player is ready to face his fellow finalist, your opponents’s busted carcass is instead knocked through the entranceway like a punted football. The mysterious Silber takes their spot.

Win or lose, Silber’s response is to just quietly jump off and exit the arena. The endings are mainly about the winners being asked by the press what the hell that was even about. And if you unlock Silber and beat the game with him, he just leaves the press hanging by jumping off into the distance.

Silber also appeared as a hidden mid-boss in King of Fighters XI, but his fighting style lacks anything really bombastic. No fireballs or energy explosions or anything like that. Just brutal karate with his flashiest move being a flipping legdrop.

I do really get a kick out of how one of his King of Fighters intros has him throw a non-descript martial artist to the ground before jumping into the fight, like it’s his regular thing to kick some schmuck’s ass and take their spot in a tournament.

48. SHANG TSUNG

Mortal Kombat

Mortal Kombat’s attract mode sold the game by going, “Yo, check out this huge claymation beast with his four arms and topknot! He will break you in half if you even blink!” But this unstoppable monster was actually second to some floating geezer. Surely, that at least had to mean that Shang Tsung was a special kind of threat in his own way.

Indeed he was. A shape-shifter was a fantastic gimmick for a final boss, especially since it jibed with his tendency to eat souls. Even though he was turning into other playable characters, the insinuation was that you were more or less fighting all the dead warriors from the years that he had absorbed into his being. Then Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa played the HELL out of him in the movie and his legendary status was solidified.

While lesser on the totem pole in later games, Shang Tsung regaining his youth made for a good trade. It’s just too bad that once games were on discs and had loading times, Shang’s tendency to morph mid-match took a powder. As one of the final bosses in Deadly Alliance, it just didn’t feel the same. He was just some guy.

47. SOUL EDGE/INFERNO

The Soul Series

As far as I’m concerned, the Inferno concept peaked in the first game. Cervantes was an evil dude, but he was still just a pawn. As shown at the end of that fantastic CGI intro that still holds up to this day, the swords were really running the show. So after taking down Cervantes, the swords came to life to fight you as a more powerful version of Cervantes with a flaming skull head.

The development of Siegfried wielding the Soul Edge and being transformed into Nightmare was a wonderful twist and selling point for the sequel’s storyline, but it made Inferno look a little redundant. The flame body was neat, but he was just Nightmare with a weaker design. Inferno never really had a personality of its own. Then Bandai Namco started having Inferno adopt random movesets, but there are like a dozen characters like that in SoulCalibur.

The concept of Inferno did translate well in SoulCalibur V where they showed that the Soul Calibur sword has its own counterpart in Elysium. It appeared in the form of a scantily-clad Sophitia in order to manipulate Sophitia’s son, Patroklos. Man, Inferno may be evil personified, but at least it didn’t try to seduce Siegfried by turning into his dad in a speedo.

46. MISS X

SNK Gal Fighters

The Neo Geo Pocket Color game SNK Gal Fighters features an all-female roster in a comedic story about a mysterious Miss X putting together a Queen of Fighters tournament, with some kind of wish-granting talisman up for grabs. When you reach the end of the game, you discover that Miss X looks an awful lot like Iori Yagami wearing a mask and a dress. While many of her opponents aren’t fooled, nobody outright says Iori’s name, and Miss X insists she isn’t who they think.

But also, please don’t tell Kyo about this.

Of course, she still fights exactly like Iori Yagami and is flanked by Iori’s former King of Fighters partners Vice, Mature, Billy Kane, and Eiji Kisaragi. Miss X is REALLY committed to the act, but it’s never really explained why she’s created this whole disguise.

Miss X made a few more appearances too, including when Dimitri performs his Midnight Bliss attack on Iori in SNK vs. Capcom: Chaos and as a DLC character in SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy.

45. SAGAT

Street Fighter

As the boss of the first Street Fighter game – which nobody really cares about – Sagat being on this list is more of a courtesy. While a difficult opponent, Sagat’s position as a final boss isn’t really that memorable. If anything, he’s defined by his defeat here. It’s why he has that cool scar on his chest, why he suddenly has a Dragon Punch knockoff in the sequel, and it’s the crux for his redemption story and frenemy relationship with Ryu.

Sagat’s spot as the original Street Fighter boss actually helps build up M. Bison and Shadaloo in general. He returns in Street Fighter II, scarred both physically and mentally, while physically stronger and more driven. Yet he is still only the penultimate boss, showing that this time he’s outranked by a big-chinned dictator.

44. ZEUS

World Heroes 2 Jet

World Heroes 2 Jet doesn’t have any character-specific endings. Instead, the endings are based around Zeus, a jacked behemoth who watches your penultimate victory from a balcony, acts jazzed about finding a worthy opponent, then makes the grandest of entrances by flexing off his suit (revealing body armor underneath), walking down some stairs, and kicking the doors off the entranceway.

A regular old pain in the ass, Zeus’ reaction to his defeat is decided by how much health the player has left. If it’s a close match, he’ll berate you until realizing that it was a fun fight. If the player has half a life bar left, he’ll threaten to kill them the next time they meet. If the player has almost all of their health, Zeus will mope as his henchman Jack tries to cheer him up. He insults the player, then cartoonishly cheeses it across the image of a map.

What makes this so golden is the iffy English translations. Here are some of Zeus’ lines from his endings:

“Why you, you, YOU… YOU CRAZY FUNSTER! To think that you were this strong!”

“YOU FILTH, YOU SLIME, YOU LAWYER! To think you had such power… But, heh, heh, heh…it was a crazy, hip time!”

“Hey, you. Still can’t walk and chew bubblegum at the same time? Oh, nooooooo!”

Classic.

43. DARK KAHN

Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe

Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe felt like a joke someone made about Marvel vs. Capcom that someone else took as a serious suggestion. Quality of the game aside, the two worlds meshed well together, which is why we’ve seen the two parties meet up again a few more times. Mortal Kombat and DC, for the most part, didn’t so much match up as they complemented each other.

One pairing in particular matched up perfectly. Darkseid and Shao Kahn were both evil overlords, two peas in a pod. Rather than fight each other or team up, they did one better: they merged.

Dark Kahn isn’t exactly better than the individual characters but this modern Amalgam design still kicks ass. Darkseid’s stony flesh mixed with Shao Kahn’s skull face to create a lava beast who lives to blow up the multiverse.

Dark Kahn IS…OUTSTANDING.

42. MISTER KARATE

Art of Fighting

Just because someone is designed as comic relief doesn’t mean they can’t have their moments of serious competence. See also: Deadpool, Mankind.

Mr. Karate started as the original Akuma type. In Art of Fighting, Mr. Karate was a mysterious mob enforcer who happened to look and fight just like protagonist Ryo Sakazaki, but with a different head and more damaging attacks. In another light, Mr. Karate’s tengu mask could be seen as silly, but considering how brutal he was, it was easy to see it as a threatening symbol of martial arts dominance.

After that game, where it was established that Mr. Karate was Ryo’s father, Takuma Sakazaki, who’d forced to work for the mob, he became a secondary character. He showed up in King of Fighters regularly as just Takuma, but became something of a joke. When he appeared in the Mr. Karate mask, he acted like a total goof and everyone rolled their eyes at his lack of self-awareness. But comedic or not, there were still moments here and there that made him look tougher than the rest of his family combined.

But it was SNK vs. Capcom: Chaos that revitalized him. Depicted as Akuma’s SNK counterpart, Mr. Karate was given both a silly base version and his “serious” boss alter-ego, who reminded the world of what kind of force he was in his Art of Fighting days. Right on.

41. ASMODEUS

Mace: The Dark Age

The Nintendo 64 was lousy when it came to compiling a fighting game library, so we had to do the best with what we had. Mixed in the shallow pile was Mace: The Dark Age, which was like if the guys who made Mortal Kombat were tasked with making a SoulCalibur game. The basic story was roughly the same: an insidious, medieval weapon of ultimate power falls into the hands of evil and everyone wants a piece. The difference was that while the Soul Edge brought demonic chaos in its wake, with its wielders just wandering around destroying stuff, the Mace of Tanis brought demonic order, as its wielder used it to rule Eurasia and its corrupt council.

This created a conflict where everyone wanted a shot at holding the Mace. Not just the heroes, but also conniving members of the Council of Seven because they’re evil and power hungry. And wielding the Mace of Tanis? None other than Asmodeus. His name popped up in exposition dumps but he didn’t even have a pre-fight profile image. You didn’t get to see him until you actually faced him in the final battle and, all in all, he met the hype.

For all of the limitations of the Nintendo 64’s graphics, Asmodeus looked amazing. He appeared as a gigantic, reptilian demon so big that only his upper half was peaking out of a portal. His offense wasn’t much to talk about, as it was mostly just swiping attacks and pounding at his prey, but damn if he didn’t look like how a final boss should look.

40. MUKAI

King of Fighters 2003

The 10th and 11th King of Fighters games released in the final days of the franchise’s classic art style, and included some great designs, like Oswald. But while the bosses in these games looked and moved exceptionally, they were mostly really lame otherwise.

Mukai from King of Fighters 2003 provided a great balance, though. He didn’t have much going on besides being the harbinger for lesser villains, but he looked totally sweet and his stone-based motif led to a fun boss fight that wasn’t too hard to figure out. Admittedly, I’m a sucker for the glowing lava design usually reserved for rock creatures, but making that classic design monochrome feels fresh and absolutely badass.

Too bad he died like a punk in a random cutscene several games later.

39. KULL THE DESPOILER

Way of the Warrior

It’s disappointing to me when a ridiculous and/or stupid fighting game doesn’t have that final boss that just pushes it further into hilarity. I’d love to discuss ClayFighter here, but it’s not like N. Boss or Dr. Kiln were anything to write home about. Tattoo Assassins is a total trip, but there’s not much to say about its big bad Koldan. Death from Time Killers is just lame and ugly to look at.

Way of the Warrior is an extreme piece of garbage and sweet Jesus does that translate to its final boss, Kull the Despoiler.

This 3DO classic is one of several Mortal Kombat knockoffs that tried to cash in on digitized graphics and bloody violence. Other features included a White Zombie soundtrack, hideous backgrounds, a character who just a regular guy’s sprite but enlarged to look like a giant, and a couple boss characters brought to life by mid-‘90s CGI.

After the player has gone through the main cast and a CGI dinosaur named High Abbott (with another CGI dinosaur watching from a throne in the background), we take a trip to the citadel graveyard stage. There’s a memorial statue of the great warrior Kull that suddenly breaks apart to reveal that his living, 8-foot-tall skeleton is inside.

“Not even death shall keep my name from the Book of Warriors!”

You must fight this silly skeleton warrior, who is armed with a bloody hammer and iffy voice-acting, all while the guy who made Devil’s Rejects is singing. A fitting finale for such a game.

38. HEIHACHI MISHIMA

Tekken Series

In terms of pure power, Heihachi is one of the weakest boss characters in relation to his series. He’s played the final boss a few times in the Tekken series, but these fights are always less about him being the ultimate force of destructive evil and more about his importance to the story as a scheming bastard with the occasional redeemable moment as a human being.

It’s also about how he measures up to his son, Kazuya, the would-be protagonist who is ultimately more evil than Heihachi. The first game’s plot focuses on Kazuya as a vindictive monster who smiles at his father’s assumed murder, and Tekken 4 finally brings the three-way generational conflict between Heihachi, Kazuya, and Jin to a head for the first time. Then in Tekken 7’s story mode, Heihachi gets his final battle with Kazuya in a war that’s been ravaging the whole world.

Despite being hilariously unkillable in the past, Heihachi appears to be dead for real now and it’s solidified his true purpose as a final boss: to pass the torch to his son, who is both stronger and straight-up worse as a human being.

37. ATHENA

SNK vs. Capcom: Chaos

If there’s anything resembling a story in SNK vs. Capcom: Chaos (not counting the completely bonkers Hong Kong comic adaptation), it’s that all the street fighting going on in the world has caused havoc on time and space. Beings from the past and future have ended up in the present. By the end, it gets so out of control that by defeating Shin Akuma or Serious Mr. Karate, you create a rift that sends your character to Heaven or Hell.

(Let’s rock!)

If you’re in Hell, you fight Capcom representative Red Arremer from Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins. If you go to Heaven, it’s SNK’s Athena, but not the annoying pop star from the Psycho Soldiers team in King of Fighters. It’s the original SNK Athena from the sidescroller where she’s a bikini-clad goddess. Funny enough, despite there being pre-fight dialogue specific to each pairing, none of the King of Fighters crew pay any lip service to this.

Rather than annoying you with constant screams of, “PSYCHO BAAAWWWWW!!!” this Athena uses lots of summoning and shapeshifting powers to get the better of you. If King of Fighters Athena brought out a giant baby chick to destroy her opponents, I’d probably choose her more often.

If you lose the fight, she transforms you into an animal specific to the fighter. If you win, you get to meet God. Either way, it’s a pretty eventful day.

36. ABYSS

SoulCalibur III

I was thinking of putting Algol on this list before realizing that I have absolutely nothing to say about the guy. He was fine. Nothing especially memorable about him.

In terms of end bosses wielding both the Soul Edge and Soul Calibur, Zasalamel’s final form, Abyss, is where it’s at. Mainly because Zasalamel is one of the last great SoulCalibur characters (along with Grizzled Owl and Harley Quinn Gollum). He’s a fantastic neutral warrior who ironically uses a Grim Reaper scythe despite being cursed with immortality and wanting a permanent death.

Read more

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After Zasalamel is transformed into Abyss, you actually begin rooting for Zasalamel to come through. This is his chance to put a stop to his endless cycle of resurrection, but it’s unfortunately turned him into an uncontrollable demon.

In the end, Zasalamel comes out of it better. During the experience, he sees a vision of the future (our present), and after reverting to his normal self, he goes from, “I must use the two swords to kill myself for good!” to “I have to prevent the two swords from ever killing me because the future looks fun as hell!”

Which reminds me, where’s my Zasalamel in Tekken, Harada?!

35. ONAGA THE DRAGON KING

Mortal Kombat: Deception

After Shinnok disappointed Mortal Kombat fans, Midway decided to introduce a new final boss who was a Shao Kahnier Shao Kahn. Fortunately, Onaga worked.

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance made an effort to clean the slate and start fresh, removing Liu Kang, Shao Kahn, and Goro from the board. Having Shang Tsung and Quan Chi share the final boss spot went against that attempt for freshness, but Midway made up for it by planting the seeds for the sequel.

The whole plot was about introducing the Dragon King – the most Mortal Kombat villain name possible – who ruled Outworld before Shao Kahn. They built up anticipation through the game’s lore without showing him or even outright naming him, and we just knew the heroes were on a collision course with something monstrous. Reptile’s ending, in which his body was possessed and mutated by the Dragon King’s soul, made it definite.

Deception revealed that Shang Tsung and Quan Chi defeated the heroes, but it didn’t matter. Onaga was back and he made the two look like jokes. Things were already dire after the good guys lost, but now there was also this 10-foot-tall tank covered in scales with gigantic dragon wings just sauntering around.

Unfortunately, he got stuck being archenemies with Shujinko and that dude straight-up SUUUUUCKS!

34. NECROSAN

Primal Rage 2

The holy trinity of almost-to-completely-finished fighting games that didn’t get released are Thrill Kill, Tattoo Assassins, and Primal Rage 2. Primal Rage 2 is a fascinating unreleased game that not only had action figures, but a novelization that I would love to read one of these days. It’s always crazy expensive on eBay, though.

The first Primal Rage didn’t have a final boss, but legend has it that Atari Games originally planned to introduce Necrosan in an updated version. Instead, the studio saved him for the sequel, and while the game never saw the light of day, he simply rules too much for me to ignore. Much like King Ghidorah, Necrosan is an alien invader in a world of Terran kaiju. An extremely well-animated winged dragon skeleton coated with muscle tissue, Necrosan looks metal as hell. His backstory complements his look too: he singlehandedly kicked the asses of all the beasts from the first game.

Also cool is the twist that the big meteor that caused the first game’s post-apocalyptic origin was actually an egg housing Necrosan who planned to conquer the planet for his race.

33. KRIZALID

King of Fighters ’99

After spending several years doing the Orochi storyline, King of Fighters finally moved on to something different: mad scientists. The NESTS Cartel was a neat idea in theory, but the further the story went, the more they revealed themselves as dorks. In other words, don’t expect to see Zero or Ignis on this list.

Krizalid had a great look…er, well, his first look. That coat with the fur top covering his jaw was great. The more flexible S&M garb from when he burns it away, not so much. He made for a great first threat in this new story, especially due to how the endings painted him as a tragic figure and made NESTS look like bigger dicks because of it.

For all his posturing, he’s just a deranged clone, pitied by the heroes and exterminated by his bosses at the first opportunity. Then again, maybe they were also annoyed that he got rid of the coat.

32. SHINNOSUKE KAGAMI

Last Blade

The Last Blade games are some of the most underrated titles in the SNK library. Despite only having two installments, the series features plenty of interesting moments, including a redemption arc for its initial villain, Kagami. Originally guard of a portal to evil and darkness, the high-and-mighty Kagami lost his faith in humanity and decided to use that portal to wipe out life on Earth and purge mankind completely. Using his refined swordsman skill and ability to wield flame, he killed a lot of people to help pull off his scheme.

In the end, he was defeated by the hero character Kaede and banished himself into the portal to be tormented. But was resurrected to fulfill his original role as guard of the portal as well as help take down Kouryu, a former victim of his whose reanimated body was possessed by evil from within the portal. This made Kagami second guess his role in the initial adventure, deciding that humans aren’t bound to evil after all and may even be good.

I always liked how he’d have a normal stance in the first round, but after taking a loss, he’d levitate half a foot off the ground. It’s just ominous enough without having to completely change his style.

31. SUPERMAN

Injustice: Gods Among Us

“Evil Superman” has been done to death. It can be used well, but a lot of the time you just end up with Brightburn. Injustice: Gods Among Us did a decent enough job by taking an interesting episode of the Justice League cartoon and leaning harder into it. The main difference between the two Supermen was that, while the animated version was driven, he wasn’t as mentally cracked as his video game self.

The animated Superman still had Metropolis and Lois, but Injustice Superman lost them both at the hands of the Joker. As shown in the better-than-it-has-any-right-to-be comic book tie-in, Superman began his reign of terror by killing the Joker in a fit of anger, and bitterness, time, and betrayals caused him to become obsessed with order and a world where there was no war because he said so. It didn’t help that so many of his superfriends sided with him.

Superman is so regularly pushed as the top guy at DC that it’s not that surprising he’s the final boss in a DC fighting game. In fact, the only way to beat him was to get the good version of Superman to do the job.

30. NU-13

BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger

When I played through BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger’s arcade mode, I made sure to use Ragna the Bloodedge last. The fact that he was the protagonist, yet very rarely appeared as an opponent for everyone else’s arcade mode path made him seem special. This ended up being the right way to play the game as his dialogue with Nu-13 hit me like a train.

BlazBlue’s plot of, “Wait, I think I understand, but… No, you lost me,” means I can’t fully explain what Nu-13’s story is but the gist of it is that she’s some kind of experiment gone wrong and she’s showing up around a portal that’s messing with the time-space continuum. Everyone comes across her in arcade mode and she usually greets them with extremely dry robot talk throughout the boss fight. When she meets with Ragna, she suddenly acts like an excited schoolgirl who has been pining for this guy and writing his initials in her diary. It’s extremely off-putting and unexpected.

As a boss, she’s a great fit for the game, which takes place about 200 years into the future, but Nu-13 is the only one truly diving headfirst into the futuristic look. Even the game’s resident cyborg Tager comes off lacking compared to all the crazy sci-fi shit Nu-13 has going for her.

29. KARNOV

Fighter’s History Series

There is a holy trinity of ’80s video game asskickers who are remembered fondly due to a mix of genuine nostalgia and internet irony: Abobo, Mike Haggar, and Karnov. The latter fighter is a fascinating bloke. Not only did he star in his self-titled platformer game, but developer Data East also decided that this dadbod adventurer should just show up in several of their games like a mascot. This is why Fighter’s History is treated as a sequel to the original Karnov game in which the bored treasure hunter holds a fighting tournament with lots of his money on the line.

Fighter’s History is such an obvious Street Fighter II clone that Capcom tried suing Data East. The game’s only real saving grace is the use of Karnov as the carrot to lead you to the end. And while the sequel/update of the game is just the same cast with the bosses playable, Karnov looks completely different. In the first game, he’s completely jacked, albeit extremely short. In the next game, he’s taller and fat with a nasty stomach scar and has moves that allow him to morph his body like Jake from Adventure Time.

I suppose if it wasn’t weird, it wouldn’t be Karnov.

28. PYRON

Darkstalkers Series

When the gimmick of your game is that all your characters are Japanese takes on classic monsters, it’s only logical that the biggest threat is extraterrestrial. Pyron is far from the best alien in a video game, but he does the job here as both Silver Surfer and Galactus wrapped in one.

Seriously, look at his ending. If he can turn as big as the sun, he probably could have saved time by leading with that. But what do I know? I’m just a human who hasn’t been murdered by a vampire with stupid hair.

Pyron gets by with his design, which looks absolutely beautiful in that mid-‘90s Capcom arcade animation. The rippling energy waves of cosmic flame almost make you forgive him for what he was like on that terrible Saturday morning cartoon show.

27. MASTER HAND

Super Smash Bros. Series

Chucking a bunch of Nintendo icons into a game and trying to make a narrative out of it is a fool’s errand. Luckily, Nintendo didn’t overthink it too much and just decided, “They’re figurines or something having an imaginary battle.” It’s Lego Movie meets Secret Wars.

And after so many dream fights like Mario vs. Link and Kirby vs. Yoshi, who would be at the top of the ladder to threaten the heroes? Bowser? Ganon? Andross? King Slender?

No. It’s a hand. Just a big, disembodied glove dead set on crushing the player. I suppose Nintendo didn’t need to have a recognizable final foe. The four-way Nintendo slugfest was enough. So why not have a big hand that can do silly big hand attacks? It’s just the bizarro icing on the cake at this point.

I love how random Master Hand is. It’s a boss fight version of the Toy Story toys revolting against Sid the bully. With every new game, Nintendo had tried to add needless context, and this has caused Master Hand to expand into transcendent final boss concepts like Crazy Hand and Tabuu. That’s just a special kind of weird. Imagine creating a giant hand as your villain and then in each sequel thinking to yourself, “How do we build on that?”

26. KRONIKA

Mortal Kombat 11

Despite rebooting the series’ winding and convoluted storyline, Mortal Kombat 9 ended on a low note. Sure, Shao Kahn was dead, but so were most of the heroes just as Shinnok was preparing to make his own move. Meanwhile, Mortal Kombat X, while not having the happiest ending, culminated with most of the major threats taken off the board. Kahn was still dead, Quan Chi was dead, Shinnok was just a head, and Onaga’s resurrection was prevented. Things were looking up for once!

But in Moral Kombat 11, a cosmic Tilda Swinton appeared as not just Shinnok’s mother, but as a meta representation of video game designers at odds with the story. Kronika wants good and evil to war with each other on equal enough footing forever. The status quo doesn’t allow enough juice for what she wants, so her plans include bringing back dead characters with a hand wave, reverting characters who have developed farther than she cares for, and even rebooting the franchise itself.

Even her kind, the Titans (higher up on the chain than the Elder Gods), play into this. Scorpion’s ending shows that reality simply won’t exist without the backstory that his wife and child were killed, all because the Titans deemed it so. These games are getting dangerously close to the fourth wall.

Meta or not, Kronika is a fantastic addition to the Mortal Kombat mythos. That endless time-reverse Fatality of hers is one of the highlights of that game’s many kills.

25. ULTRON SIGMA

Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite

Despite its huge roster, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 didn’t have much in terms of Capcom-based villains. Plus, the big boss was Galactus. Where do you even go from Galactus in a sequel? For Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite, bringing Galactus back was a no-no due to Disney being stingy with the Fantastic Four property at the time.

But Capcom had a pretty good solution. First, introduce Sigma from Mega Man X into the world of fighters. Second, bring in box office superstar (at the time) Ultron. Third, take a page out of Dark Kahn’s book and merge the two into one being. They’re robots. Robots love that shit.

For the record, the most hyped I got for this game was the stinger on the announcement trailer where they showed a shadowy Ultron sitting on a throne with Sigma’s glowing eyes appearing on his torso.

Not only do you get each meatbag-hating robot on their own and in merged form, but then there’s the over-the-top design of their final form. Transforming into a nightmarish and gaudy final form is Sigma’s MO, so it’s nice to see Ultron just go with it.

Yeah, Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite didn’t have staying power, but it did have a giant Sigma head with Ultron’s body sticking out…as well as that head-scratching plot point where Thanos made a gauntlet powered by Ryu’s inner evil for the sake of throwing fireballs at Death. See, that’s why you need arcade mode endings in games like these. Let your crossover freak flag fly.

24. VICTOR ORTEGA

Ring of Destruction

Saturday Night Slam Masters is remembered well enough, partially due to its SNES port, but few talk about its sequel Ring of Destruction, which had more of an emphasis on fighting game mechanics. Players of only the first game would still recognize Victor Ortega, as he’s the Billy Graham/Hulk Hogan guy in the intro, tearing his shirt off. Though not part of the game’s roster, his identity is revealed if you’re able to beat the game without losing a single match.

This mountain of muscle was a previous CWA champion who was so dominant in the ring that he left out of boredom. Getting the first game’s best ending has Ortega return to challenge your wrestler, ending in a cliffhanger.

The sequel is about the Capcom Wrestling Association being invaded by heels representing the Blood Wrestling Association. This situation piques Ortega’s interest, as hewants the last man standing to challenge him for the title. He proves to be a pain in the ass to take on — not only can he uppercut so hard that fireballs fly out but he was busting out jumping Yoshi Tonics all the way back in 1994!

23. ZANKURO MINAZUKI

Samurai Shodown Series

In fighting games, having a katana means getting some extra range and damage. In a series like Samurai Shodown, what does one do for an extra range advantage when everyone is armed with a sword? Easy. Create an 8-foot-tall Brock Samson samurai guy with a katana befitting of his size.

Zankuro is one of the rare examples of a character who talks about “the demon within” but isn’t actually possessed by one. Ryu is a good person despite having a magical dark force inside him threatening to turn him into a rage zombie. Zankuro is just an asshole. He slaughtered villages of people because killing people is his vice. And really, who’s got the skill to get in his way and tell him to stop?

But the outcome is inevitable. He has to die. In Samurai Shodown III, Zankuro had a fake-out death followed by a real death, just as he lamented his horrible acts. He was be sorry about his sins, but sidestepped having to live with them.

Except…he keeps getting resurrected.

22. DIO BRANDO

Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure

It’s kind of crazy how popular Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure has become in the US in the past few years, especially when you look back at how niche it was in the late ‘90s when Capcom’s Jojo fighter hit the arcade, Dreamcast, and PlayStation. Back then, the best you could do was find some low-quality manga scans and hope that someone online could translate them. All Capcom had was the manga and a few episodes of an anime, but they still managed to turn those into a kickass video game adaptation.

Dio was a major part of this. His moves and animation set him up as someone who could be cold and collected one moment and a slinking psychopath the next. The way he’d jump off-screen, return with a steamroller, and smash you with it while laughingly clawing at the vehicle defined what kind of series-carrying villain he really was.

The biggest mark against him is that regular boss Dio is not nearly as cool as his faceless counterpart Shadow Dio, based on the stretch of the manga when nobody knew what Dio’s powers actually were but understood that he was scary as hell.

21. WOLFGANG KRAUSER

Fatal Fury Series

SNK did Krauser dirty. His appearances in Fatal Fury 2 and Fatal Fury Special made him the most epic boss fight of the era. First off, the dude was so jacked that he was able to burst out of his chest armor with a mere flex. Second, he got this epic line:“I’ll chisel your gravestone! Sleep well!” Most importantly, his background music was only a version of “Dies Irae” but it was played by own personal orchestra during that fight!

Dude wasn’t even up to no good. He was just an intense man who wanted a good fight. Even in defeat, he stood back up to dramatically yell, “You were perfect! I have met…my match…” before collapsing. Legendary presentation.

Unfortunately, then we got the second Fatal Fury anime, where SNK inexplicably got rid of Krauser’s amazing purple mustache. Why would you do such a thing? That mustache never did anything wrong.

He was almost completely forgotten by the time King of Fighters rolled around. He appeared in King of Fighters ’96 with a lanky redesign that made it look like he had a swimmer build, but everyone knows that Krauser needs to look like 2003 Triple H.

Oh, well. At least they didn’t get Ray Park to play him in a movie.

20. FERNANDEZ

Waku Waku 7

Waku Waku 7 is one of the liveliest and enjoyable fighting games that nobody has ever heard of. With one installment to its name, this Sunsoft creation has a handful of anime archetypes and knockoffs fight to free a magical fairy and earn a wish. In order to release the fairy, they have to grow into a giant and take on the kaiju known as Fernandez.

Known as Fernandeath in Japan, Fernandez is a large, black ball with a smiley face, bat wings, ball-shaped limbs, and a glowing aura. The giggling beast seems cute at first, but the more time you spend with it, the creepier and more malevolent it becomes. Its eyes turn red, it sometimes has pointy teeth, and at times it’ll turn full-on demonic.

There are some silly move animations thrown in there, but getting devoured and then shot out of its butt like a cannon can’t be the most enjoyable experience out there.

19. JUSTICE

Guilty Gear

Guilty Gear gets a lot of flack for its confusing plot and ridiculous titles, but the gist of the story is unique and surprisingly simple: Once upon a time, humanity took part in a devastating war called the Crusades, where they fought against robo-mutants (a cross between SkyNet and the Age of Apocalypse) and barely survived. Now, with the world reaching borderline utopia, it’s constantly threatened by the possibility of going back to the bad old days. In other words, we missed out on seeing the exciting, explosive, action-packed era of this fictional world, but we absolutely have to prevent that from happening again.

Adding to the terror is that Justice was never fully destroyed in that war. She was simply sealed away for all eternity, which never lasts in fiction. In the first Guilty Gear, losing to this lizard mech meant endless death and destruction. But through her defeat at the hands of Sol Badguy, we not only got a tragic origin story for our main hero that explained what the hell a “Guilty Gear” is, but Justice opened up this world to the possibility that the Crusades could return in various ways despite her death.

18. BRAINIAC

Injustice 2

When your first game is all about Batman taking down an evil Superman, where do you go for the sequel? Easy. You figure out a threat so huge that both Batman and Superman have to put their feud on hold in order to save Earth. The logical choice is Darkseid, but NetherRealm went in a smarter direction with Brainiac. Even though he’s an established character in other continuities, Brainiac had yet to show up in any form in Injustice canon, so the studio could treat him as a brand new threat.

He was the perfect fit, too. Since he was the one responsible for blowing up Krypton, the game used this backstory to also introduce Supergirl and gave us a villain that Superman would hate just as much as the Joker. Even in defeat, Brainiac’s plan created another violent moral argument between Batman and the murderous Superman.

Above all else, Brainiac felt like a big deal. His moves during the boss fight made him seem like an even more advanced take on Doc Ock. The inside of his space ship added to his cyber nightmare aesthetic, too. Last but not least, he was voiced by Jeffrey Combs, whose chilling delivery made him sound like the most menacing threat in the universe.

Sorry, Darkseid.

17. THE GENERAL

Kaiser Knuckle

Kaiser Knuckle is your average Street Fighter II knockoff from the early days of fighting games, and there’s only one reason anyone remembers it at all. That reason is the General.

At first glance, he’s little more than a blatant ripoff of M. Bison. Then you fight him. Without a doubt, the General is the absolute hardest boss in fighting game history. He’s unbelievable. Not only are his attacks unfair variations of Bison’s offense, but he has a move where he releases Green Lantern construct projections of himself in various directions.

He’s an afront to God and when he wins the round and calls himself a perfect soldier, it’s hard to argue.

16. RYO SAKAZAKI

Fatal Fury Special

Some time after Mortal Kombat gave us Reptile and mere months before Street Fighter gave us Akuma, Fatal Fury Special introduced a very special hidden boss: Ryo Sakazaki. Sure, King of Fighters ’94 would be released within a year, but this was our first time seeing a major SNK fighting game crossover. This was the first Terry vs. Ryo matchup.

One of the reasons this debut hits so hard for me is that Ryo and the Art of Fighting crew never seemed to be too prominent in the King of Fighters games. There are two main continuities when it comes to SNK’s fighters. King of Fighters puts everything together and says it all coexists in the same era. Meanwhile, Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury, Buriki One, and Savage Reign are on a staggered timeline. With Art of Fighting taking place in the ‘70s, it means that the Ryo in Fatal Fury games and Buriki One is a hardened, middle-aged legend and not just another young upstart like he is in King of Fighters.

In other words, Ryo showing up in Fatal Fury Special isn’t just an early crossover, but a passing of the torch.

15. EYEDOL

Killer Instinct

Killer Instinct always valued character designs first and everything after. Ninja, robot, dinosaur, T&A secret agent, boxer, Native American, skeleton, werewolf, ice creature, and fire guy. Then came the story.

To that effect, Eyedol, much like Spinal, is a tribute to the stop-motion fantasy movie monsters of the old days. Specifically, he’s a two-headed version of the cyclops from the 7th Voyage of Sinbad. He made for a memorable final battle, thanks in part to the cheap-ass healing ability that he’d spam while the other fighter recovered in between rounds.

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Eyedol was the last classic character released for the Killer Instinct reboot, and they redesigned the HELL out of him. Depicted as a holy chosen champion turned demonic and ogre-like due to his own ego, Eyedol’s two-headed cyclops look was explained as the result of having his head cleaved in half down the middle, then being resurrected. The wound is healed, but not undone, resulting in some gnarly body horror.

Much respect to his old ending, which was not only a parody of Blanka’s Street Fighter II ending, but by having his would-be mother refer to him as “Billy,” it becomes both a sly reference to Double Dragon (Billy and Jimmy) and musician Billy Idol.

Get it?

14. GILL

Street Fighter III

Following up on M. Bison was never going to be easy. For a long time, he was the poster boy for fighting game final bosses. For the third major installment, Capcom needed to introduce someone who felt different but also as big a threat as his predecessor. Rather than introducing “M. Bison’s boss” or “M. Bison’s dad,” the studio instead went in a completely original direction with Gill. Was he powerful? Yes. Did he use street fighting tournaments as a front for some kind of maniacal scheme? Yes again. Was he the ultimate evil? Well…I guess that depends on your thoughts on organized religion.

Rather than a villain delusional enough to call himself a god, Gill might as well BE a god. And he both wants to be virtuous, but he’s also an egomaniac about it. It’s definitely a fresh take on the mustache-twirling monsters in these games. Even Alex, the main character of Street Fighter III, only wants to fight him to get revenge after for his mentor, who Gill beat so bad in a street fight they had to send him to the hospital. Alex doesn’t seem to really care about the whole new world order cult gimmick.

With Street Fighter III being such a beautiful-looking sequel, Gill also brought the novelty of an asymmetric 2D character who wasn’t just mirrored when he looked in the opposite direction (i.e. Sagat’s eyepatch switching eyes depending on where he’s facing). That fit well with Gill’s mastery over fire and ice.

Screw him for that cheap resurrection power, though.

13. KING LEO/TRUE KING LION

Savage Reign

A lot of times in fiction, futuristic designs are based on the decade when they were conceived. That’s how we got King Leo, a villainous champion in the future of the Fatal Fury/Art of Fighting timeline, who looks hilariously try-hard ‘90s. The angular mask/boots/codpiece combo, the boxing gloves with sword, the ridiculous flat-top mullet, the cap, the ab window, etc. He has it all. He is pure extreme.

In both Savage Reign and its sequel Kizuna Encounter, he’s playable but not really. King Lion is selectable from the beginning, but it becomes apparent that he and the final boss are two different entities. Playable King Lion is an impostor meant to test the challengers, while King Leo is the far more powerful real deal.

Even when Jyazu appears in Kizuna Encounter as the actual final boss by impaling King Leo with his giant sword, King Leo is still able to later shrug off that major wound in a post-credits sequence. God, I wish that game had a follow-up.

12. GALACTUS

Marvel vs. Capcom 3

I’m surprised it took Capcom so long to bring in Galactus. The studio had the giant boss thing going in its Marvel games with Apocalypse, Onslaught, and whatever the hell Abyss was, and probably should have gone with Galactus for Marvel vs. Capcom 2, but I guess Capcom wanted to do multiple forms for the battle and that’s what Abyss brought to the table. Fortunately, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 finally brought in the Eater of Worlds.

Galactus isn’t the kind of guy who is supposed to get taken down by Ryu and Wolverine, but considering Capcom made a Marvel fighter where Spider-Man can take down an omnipotent Thanos, and that there’s an in-story reason that Galactus isn’t at 100%, one can give this story a pass. He still fights like Galactus should with cosmic energy beams flying all over the place.

Probably the best thing about him is his silly appearances in various endings, like being put on trial with Phoenix Wright as his defense lawyer or an annoyed Wolverine telling X-23 to get Galactus’ defeated body off his lawn.

11. MARIE KORBEL

Skullgirls

The Skull Heart from Skullgirls is terrifying and interesting enough to build a fighting game story around. It’s a demonic relic powerful enough to grant you any wish you’d like, but it will possess you in time. How fast it possesses you depends on how selfish your wish is, but the sad fact is that no matter how altruistic or heroic your actions are, every wish is selfish on some level. To use the Skull Heart is to damn yourself and doom everyone else.

That’s the tragedy of Bloody Marie. She grew up an orphan, abused and treated as a slave. Her thirst for vengeance was justified, but it didn’t make a difference. As the all-powerful Skullgirl, it was only a matter of time before she lost herself completely and slaughtered everyone. This struggle translated to her appearance, which seemed normal enough…until you notice the glowing, bare ribs peeking out the side.

Marie has several forms, and each one depicts her as being less in control until she’s just scraps of bone being manipulated by the Skull Heart. Defeating her not only means wiping out a young girl who really doesn’t deserve it, but for some of her challengers, it means they’re walking towards their own tragedy with the Skull Heart.

10. ONSLAUGHT

Marvel vs. Capcom

Capcom pulled off a miracle when it made Onslaught cool.

In general, Onslaught is like the Star Wars prequels. A solid idea in bullet points, but terrible in practice. The idea of an insane Xavier/Magneto/Juggernaut hybrid commandeering all the Sentinels and becoming such a threat to the Marvel heroes that the only way to stop him is to send a purified version of the Hulk after him sounds so awesome, but…well, ‘90s comics are ‘90s comics.

Marvel vs. Capcom’s Onslaught makes for such a sweet boss fight and is a big improvement over Apocalypse, who bypassed the normal-sized battle for the sake of immediately turning giant. Onslaught is Magneto on steroids, who turns into Apocalypse on steroids, and works because ‘90s Capcom was so damn untouchable.

We’re at a point in pop culture where War Machine is a mainstream superhero and “Lethal Protector” Venom made more in the box office than the Justice League. Onslaught is still considered a very specific time capsule that’s yet to be redeemed, which makes Capcom’s use of him here that much more impressive.

9. OGRE

Tekken 3

Tekken is like WWE where it’s so much better when isn’t focusing on the old man running things and his shitty family. When the bosses aren’t part of the Mishima bloodline, they’re usually some kind of unearthly being. You have your Egyptian demigod, you have your goth lady wearing sludge overalls, and you have your Aztec God of Fighting.

Ogre is the one Tekken boss who doesn’t directly tie into the Mishima family. It’s refreshing and makes the whole world feel bigger. He’s a completely unrelated force who reveals himself by beating the crap out of different mainstays in between Tekken 2 and 3. Granted, it was more impressive early on because Ogre got credit for wiping out so much of the early cast. But those guys returned in later games, and it seems Ogre only really killed the first King and MAYBE Jun, who sucks so good for Ogre.

Outside of non-canon stuff, Ogre didn’t last long in the Tekken series, but his death brought forth the rivalry between Heihachi and Jin, springboarding the Mishima war into a new direction. It was also explained that the Ancient Ogre form was defeated by Paul Phoenix, which is sadly one of the last times that character was treated like an actual threat.

8. OROCHI

King of Fighters ’97

Nailing the landing on a long-running story isn’t easy, and it’s truly impressive when a franchise pulls it off. Fans of Avengers: Endgame know that feeling well.

While the first King of Fighters game was all about Rugal, his return in King of Fighters ’95 built on the idea that he was tapped into a greater power that dwarfed him. Then King of Fighters ’96 continued that by showing us Goenitz, who was also a player in Orochi’s game. Even Iori Yagami – an antihero who wanted nothing to do with the evil god – was powerless to be anything but its bloodthirsty pawn.

King of Fighters ’97 not only acted as the climax to this whole saga, but it really felt like the peak of the whole franchise. There were great King of Fighters games afterwards, but this was where everything really felt like it lined up. And so, after all this build up, we got a team of Orochi worshippers, two insane pawns slaughtering in his name, and one guy so insane and bloodthirsty to start with that he shrugged off the magical need to go feral. Then by the time you got to Orochi, he felt like a true final boss that they spent several years building towards. He was the right level of malevolent celestial being and, while challenging, was never too hard compared to other SNK bosses.

As the exclamation point, most endings in the game warned that he’d be back someday. The only way to truly do away with him was to beat the game with a very specific trio of fighters, which happened to trigger one of the coolest endings in the series. The following arcs of King of Fighters would try to build towards other masterminds, but none of them held a candle to Orochi.

7. DIZZY

Guilty Gear X

As I said earlier, the true conflict of the Guilty Gear series is that shit was bad long ago, and the heroes have to keep the world from unwinding back into that chaos. When it came to the villainous Justice, things were pretty cut and dry. Justice had been released from her prison, cloned, and even resurrected at times. But Dizzy was a deeper take on the idea. She is the daughter of Sol Badguy and/or Justice and is an omega-level threat who could very well relaunch the war between humans and Gears.

It just so happens that she’s also an innocent, young woman who just wants a peaceful existence, someone who just wants to be left alone where she can’t hurt anyone. Despite being possibly the most powerful character in the series (give her Instant Kill attack in Guilty Gear Xrd a look), Dizzy is left alone in the end. She ends up finding friends, love, and even has a son.

6. THANOS

Marvel Super Heroes

Marvel Super Heroes is a very loose adaptation of Infinity Gauntlet, and that’s part of the reason the final battle with Thanos work so well. You spend all game accumulating Infinity Gems, adding more power-up options to each fight. Then Thanos steals them away and you have to take on a fully-Gauntleted Mad Titan in front of a backdrop very reminiscent of the big heroes vs. Thanos fight from Infinity Gauntlet.

Now, for those of you who haven’t read the comic that inspired Avengers: Infinity War, Thanos got the Infinity Gauntlet and became omnipotent. A bunch of heroes dogpiled him, and Thanos even gave himself a handicap to make it the slightest bit challenging, but the heroes still lost BADLY.

So here you are, playing as Spider-Man or Iron Man or whoever, having to have a kickass one-on-one brawl with Thanos and having to do alone what almost 20 superheroes couldn’t do in the comics. But because fighting games exist in a reality where everyone can win (and not just Jim Starlin’s Jim darlings), everyone — from Psylocke to Juggernaut — stands a chance at dethroning Thanos and truly earning the Infinity Gauntlet.

5. RUGAL BERNSTEIN

King of Fighters Series

I’m a huge fan of this character despite his tendency to be a bullshit SNK boss. Fighting him in King of Fighters ’94 should be banned by the Geneva Convention. It’s just that…man, the dude has so much swagger and radiates such coolness that I can’t hate him. He’s Rugal Goddamn Bernstein and we’re better for knowing him.

As with most early villains of fighting games, Rugal is overshadowed by his replacements. Shang Tsung works for Shao Kahn. Sagat works for M. Bison. Heihachi is the son of Jinpachi. Eyedol is the rival of Gargos. Geese is the weaker brother to Krauser. Rugal got the ball rolling in his own way as a way to build to the Orochi storyline, which practically defined all the following King of Fighters storylines. Yet in the end, despite being the first step in the saga and being killed for good during the second entry, Rugal has solidified himself as THE villain of King of Fighters. Dream match games and non-canon adventures tend to just go with Rugal as the final boss by default, usually with some extra bell and whistle, my favorite being God Rugal from Capcom vs. SNK 2. A coked up Rugal with Akuma gimmicks is my kind of boss battle.

Rugal is mostly a collection of awesome motifs and special attacks, but I also love that he’s just as defined by his number one weakness. Yes, he’s good enough to crush a team of three like nobody’s business, but he has his physical limits and his downfall is that he doesn’t see that. In canon and as God Rugal, he loses because he absorbs and uses up too much power for his body to handle. It’s nice when a villain is done in by their inability to leave well enough alone.

4. SHAO KAHN

Mortal Kombat Series

The worst thing I can say about Shao Kahn is that, while I dig the way his latter appearances lean into his “painted on the side of your van” metal design, he will never be as completely rad as he was in Mortal Kombat 2 and 3. Probably because loud growling doesn’t hold a candle to his eerie whisper and proud laughter.

Kahn is more intimidating than most bosses. The attract sequence in Mortal Kombat 2 showed a silhouette of Kahn reading Shang Tsung the riot act followed by a more direct look at his appearance, and it was immediately clear that this guy was absolute trouble. The first game tried to make Goro seem terrifying, but we knew that he was still second to Shang Tsung. Shao Kahn was THE boss, and we knew that, even if we climbed up that ladder (with Kahn STANDING ON TOP A MOUNTAIN), Kahn would be the end of us.

And a lot of the time he was. He would beat you with a war hammer, kick you across the room, and taunt you and you’d love him for it. He was so perfect as a boss that Midway simply had to bring him back for the next game.

Even after taking a backseat in the subsequent games, Mortal Kombat Armageddon’s story revitalized him by making him the winner of what was essentially the Mortal Kombat Royal Rumble. It was such a tragic turn of events that Raiden had to go back in time to stop it. Even with nearly all the good guys dead, it was all deemed worth it just because Kahn was killed. At least for a few years.

3. M. BISON

Street Fighter Series

As a kid, I was always confused about why this bus driver was running his own fighting tournament, but that feeling was replaced by my rage at his damn slide kick and arm-hook throw combo. You have fire-hand powers. You don’t need to be that smooth, dude.

Bison isn’t as deep a character as Sagat or as hardcore as Akuma or as naked as Gill, but he is possibly the hammiest final boss in the history of fighting games. All the various actors who have portrayed the character seem to be taken by the infectious fun that comes with playing him, whether it’s Raul Julia in the first live-action movie, Gerald C. Rivers and Kenji Utsumi in the games, Richard Newman on the cartoon, and, hell, even Neal McDonough had his moments in that crappy Chun-Li movie.

As the first final boss that anyone ever cared about, Bison is a wonderful pile of escalating craziness. Over time, he’s become a comedically-jacked guy with a constant smile whose plots involve Buddha statues with laser faces, running over Ryu with a bigass truck, shoving his soul into gender-swapped clones, and dropping satellites onto civilization for the sake of causing chaos. Capcom can try to write him out of the series, but he’s just too iconic to destroy for good.

2. AKUMA

Street Fighter Series

It’s crazy to think how Electronic Gaming Monthly did an April Fools’ joke about there being an enhanced version of Ryu as a secret final boss in Street Fighter II and Capcom decided, yes, that’ll do. That’s how one of the most iconic fighting game characters ever was born.

“Ryu but darker and more powerful” could have ended badly, but Akuma’s always shined as the X-factor of Street Fighter’s roster. He’s more than just an evil final boss. He’s a malevolent force that is somehow neither good nor evil…which is for the best, considering Capcom eventually labeled M. Bison as literal pure evil.

What’s funny to me is how Mortal Kombat introduced the idea of the hidden boss fight with Reptile, then gradually turned him into the biggest jobber in Mortal Kombat lore. Akuma showed up, wiped out M. Bison with his so-powerful-we-can’t-even-show-you super move, gave you a nigh-impossible boss fight, and then Capcom made sure to keep him going as the guy who will make you shit your pants every time he shows up. When SNK made its SNK vs. Capcom crossover game, the team even put an ending in there where a bored Akuma challenged God to a fight.

1. GEESE HOWARD

Fatal Fury Series

As fighting games are ensemble pieces, so are their storylines most of the time. Fatal Fury, not so much. Fatal Fury is really the story of Terry Bogard vs. Geese Howard with a bunch of supporting characters. Even Andy Bogard, who has just as much a reason to be the protagonist as Terry, is relegated to being “the guy who is reluctant to sleep with his hot girlfriend.” Fatal Fury is really about Terry and Geese and everyone else is, at best, an extension of the two of them.

Geese is everything you could ever want in a final boss, unless you’re looking for a giant shooting lasers out his eyes. He’s slick as oil and tougher than brick, with a moveset that’s based around throwing you like a ragdoll or blasting you into the stratosphere. He’s the right balance of difficult enough to make you curse, but not cheap enough to make you throw the controller through your screen.

Not only is he unique in battle, but he just has so much personality. His cockiness is on another level. His every gesture makes him look like he knows he’s superior to everyone else in every way, but kicking their ass is a better use of his time than whatever else he has planned. Even his counter moves (“PREDICTABLE!”) make him seem untouchable.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

His canon death scene in the Fatal Fury games is also second to none. Hanging off a tower rooftop, he sees Terry reach his hand out. Rather than be saved and maybe even forgiven by Terry, Geese chooses to smack it away, let go, and fall to his death while looking up at the winner and laughing maniacally at him. What a boss way to go.

The post 50 Best Fighting Game Final Bosses from Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Tekken, and More appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[ran-satori]

RE: Stranger Things Characters Getting the X-Men Treatment

I’ve really enjoyed graphic artist's @bosslogic's giving the Stranger Things characters an X-Men makeover. And I bet we fans can’t also help but give our own input on the matter. So here’s my take of/reactions to it:

Eleven/Jane Ives as Jean Grey/Phoenix - I guess this was a no-contest to begin with. Part of me was also wondering if the Phoenix part meant more of Jean Grey’s daughter Rachel Grey/Summers who also went by that name for a time. Well, Jane’s bitchin’ look towards the end of the second season does resemble Rachel’s back when she still sort of had an unlimited access to the Phoenix Force’s powers. She currently goes by the code name of Prestige in the comics these days. Either way, I bet when we first saw Eleven’s abilities, most of us were reminded of this iconic X-Men’s character sans the nosebleeds.

Mike Wheeler as Scott Summers/Cyclops - This was a no-brainer too IMO. Scott Summers and Jean Grey were an item in the X-Men comics to begin with although it wasn’t immune to bouts of infidelity and separation anxieties. Heck, the X-Men characters did grow up with the times - for better and worse for us avid fans. And I sooo like what the artist did with Mike’s hair. On a different note, IRL Finn Wolfhard has curly hair whereas Millie Bobby Brown’s hair is straight. So it’s kind of amusing that these two actors had to sport hairstyles that mirrored the other.

Dustin Henderson as Hank McCoy/Beast - I honestly had to chuckle at this since it was most likely based on a first impressions perspective. I hope it wasn’t because Dustin does look the part. Dustin IS smart and tends to be the more diplomatic one in the party which reflects how Beast is in the X-Men. And both characters do share an immense scientific curiosity - which does get the better of them at some point, e.g. Beast experimenting on his appearance and turning blue and furry and Dustin adopting and treating “Dart” like a pet.

Lucas Sinclair as (Lucas) Bishop - I guess this one did get me thinking that there’s only a handful of X-Men that are POC. Thunderbird, Forge and Bishop being one of the more notable ones. At least it was obvious from the get-go that Lucas would end up being drawn as another Lucas. My speculation, while waiting for the rest of the characters to be re-imagined (only 3 of the re-imagined characters began surfacing at the start) , was that he’d be David Alleyne/Prodigy.

Will Byers as Bobby Drake/Iceman - Well, the Mind Flayer did say that he likes it cold... so I’m guessing that that’s just beside the fact that the two of them are LGBT characters - Will is being hinted at as being LGBT and the younger, time-displaced Iceman arrived at the realization that he’s gay through team mate Jean Grey’s help. Here’s hoping that Season 3 should at least address Will’s sexuality one way or the other.

Max Mayfield as Emma Frost/White Queen - I was really surprised that the artist went with Emma Frost instead of a spunky rendition of Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat. Max and Kitty are quite smart for their age. I was quite impressed with her portrayal in Season 2 and I’d like to see more of her  

Steve Harrington as Remy LeBeau/Gambit - I’m not really surprised that Steve got re-imagined as Gambit. It’s a perfect fit.

Jonathan Byers as Sam Guthrie/Cannonball - This was more of a lead-in to the upcoming “The New Mutants” film but it does baffle me a bit because Charlie Heaton plays such a meek character on “Stranger Things” but he’ll be playing a literally loud character like Cannonball. So psyched for April 13 next year.

Nancy Wheeler as Anna Marie/Rogue - Honestly, I think Natalia Dyers’ dyeing her hair blonde was part of the inspiration to her being re-imagined as Rogue. I even speculated that she’d be Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat since she’s quite smart - something that she also shares with Max.

Jim Hopper as Victor Creed/Sabretooth - I had to LOL at this when I first saw it. I thought @bosslogic would portray him as Cable but David Harbour is a dead ringer for Tyler Mane (the actor who portrayed Sabretooth in the first X-Men film).

I’m guessing that there’s still more to come. I haven’t seen Joyce Byers’ yet. If she does get re-imagined I’m thinking she’d either be Lorna Dane/Polaris or even Neena Thurman/Domino. Heck, she can be even be Mystique or Sage.

The overall look of Kali/008 is reminiscent of a pre-Siege Perilous Psylocke. The purple streaks and her psionically-induced illusions were somewhat of a giveaway for me.

Billy Hargrove reminds me of Arkady Rossovich/Omega Red. But if he’s ever up for some redemption he could be Sean Cassidy/Banshee.

Martin Brenner could easily be Max Eisenhardt/Magneto or my personal fave Nathaniel Essex/Mr. Sinister.

I’m looking forward to other characters getting re-imagined. 

This was so much fun.

As always Bob Newby, Benny Hammond and Barb Holland are all in a league of their own.

[smokescreen24]

50 DND Questions

1. What do you think your d&d race would be? Proabably human. If I get the choice, I’d like to be either an Elf or Dragonborn. I’d be cool with either of those. 

2. What class? Mostly likely a fighter? I’m not religious enough for a cleric, and not smart enough for a sorcerer or wizard. I like the idea of being able to throw hands. 

3. What two feats would you have? I’d want the Alert feat, and more than likely the Lucky feat. Alert means my initiative gets improved, and Lucky means that I can reroll a bad throw. Those would get used a lot. 

4. What has been your favorite d&d character you've played? (NPCs count for DMs) I’ve only got the two for now, but Liander’s been getting the most love. She’s probably my favorite. 

5. Which of your d&d characters has been the most like you? Oh, Liander, without a doubt. She’s pretty close to my baseline personality.

6. Which of your d&d characters has been the least like you? And that would be Cade. Cade is just this side of Chaotic Evil, so she’s a little harder for me to get into the right headspace for. Playing her takes a lot out of me, to be honest. 

7. How do you go about making a character or NPC? That’s hard to say - I give the session about an hour or so to feel it out, and let the personalities develop naturally over time. My playing style is reactive, so I let the situation dictate how said character would respond. 

8. What is the most memorable natural 20 you've ever experienced? That would be with Cade. I’d rolled to take out a stone giant, suplexed them (because she’s a barbarian and her strength stat is wild), then chopped his dick off with my battleaxe like I was swinging a golf club. It uh, made an impression on the rest of the party, and the rest of the enemies. 

9. Has one of your d&d characters ever died? How? Not yet, so don’t jinx me! I’m still attached to both of them, and would like to keep them around! 

10. What is your favorite class to play? So far, it’s been my ranger. She’s fun, and I’m digging the whole ‘animals as companions’ thing she’s got going. 

11. Have you ever fought a dragon? Yes. Between Cade and Paileous, we cut it’s head off. It’s currently a trophy back at home base. Got a lot of gold for our trouble, too. 

12. Have you ever fought a beholder? NO. Not entirely sure I wanna, either! 

13. Have you ever fought a mind flayer? No, but it’s coming up. My buddy is having us roll new characters for the Underdark campaign. I might try a cleric just for funsies. 

14. Have you ever had a romance with an NPC or another PC? Nope. I am here to tell you that neither of my characters is looking for any of that. Liander’s too busy, and Cade is a halfling barbarian surrounded by equally questionable Drow paladins and rouges. No thanks. 

15. Do you prefer to DM or play?  I have no desire to DM. I’ve only been playing for a little while, and I’m not creative enough to attempt it. I’ll stick to playing. I’m good at that. 

16. What is your favorite D&D pod/vodcast? I’ve been listening to Critical Role - I’m relistening to the Whitestone/Chroma Conclave arcs. I love No Mercy Percy so much. 

17. Who is your favorite "celebrity dm?" I only know the one - Matt Mercer. 

18. Do you use props/minis/terrain in your game? Very rarely. I think we’ve only had like, two sessions that actually had terrain and mini’s. 

19. How did you discover D&D? My friends. I sat in on one of their games, and just for the hell of it, they rolled me a character, and thus Cade was born. 

20. If you run a homebrew game, give an out of context spoiler. I’m not running it, but smuggling is a thing, and the dude we’re smuggling for is someone whose face is on a wanted poster in my pocket. 

21. Drop a picture of a mini you painted (if applicable) Sorry, I don’t have any minis. They’re all with my DM. 

22. Write a brief scene centered around one of your characters! Uh, hang on -  "That was nice. I didn't ask you to get it for me, and I distinctly remember telling you I can get my own. Not my fault you don't listen worth a damn." Liander says with a slight grin. She doesn't know why, but she likes poking at Chancel. Not many folks react the way he does, and the scowl he sends her just makes her grin wider. "Come on. I cannot possibly be the only one who's pointed that out to you." 

 "Yeah, me. Two minutes ago." Zulth mutters into his mug.

23. Do you have any art of your characters? Yeah, one of my more artistic friends drew a sketch of Liander for me, complete with her cat on her shoulder. It’s pretty cool. It’s also huge, which is why I’m not posting it here. 

24. Have you ever played any TTRPGs other than D&D? No, this is my first foray into TTRPGs. 

25. What is your favorite snack for d&d? I reach for Cheetos or Doritos usually. They’re good, crunchy snacks. 

26. If you could have one potion from d&d, which one would you choose? If I could just load up on superior healing potions for life, I’d be a happy woman. 

27. If you could cast one spell from d&d, which would you cast? Fireball. That’s a nice equalizer, I think. 

28. What is the most memorable natural 1 you've experienced? Oh man. That would be with Liander this time. She was trying to sneak into a well fortified part of the city, and tamper with the water supply for one family. Well, I had to roll to hop the fence to do so, rolled a natural one, my foot caught in the fence, and there was a dog right in front of me. Landed on my face, and got bitten for my trouble. Still got the mission done, though. 

29. Have you ever been drunk playing d&d? I’ve been buzzed. Does that count? 

30. Homebrew or prewritten? Both? Both. Both is good. 

31. Tell me about your current party! Which one? Well, for the Alagaesia campaign, there’s my character Liander, a dwarf named Thorin, a rouge(?) named Zulth, an herbalist named Liam, and the man who hired us, an NPC named Bjorn. We’re actually trying to accomplish something with this campaign, or so the DM says. 

For the Guardians of Gravenhollow campaign, I’m a halfling barbarian named Cade, there’s a drow Paladin named Varis, and another Drow rouge named Paileous. This particular campaign is just chaotic evil fuckery. 

32. Most memorable NPC you've encountered in a game you played in. Victor. He built a clock, I wanted his tinkering kit, and wound up buying both at a just criminally low price. I kinda feel like I ripped him off, tbh. 

33. Do you listen to music while playing? What kinds? Mostly the Skyrim soundtrack with a little Witcher soundtrack thrown in for funsies. Atmospheric stuff. 

34. Favorite accent to do for characters? I don’t really have one for either of my characters. Mostly because I’m bad at keeping it up. I forget. 

35. Favorite classic d&d trope Tragic Backstory(TM). Only one of my characters has it, but it’s damn fun to role-play.

36. What was your first d&d character you made? That would be Cade! She started out as kind of a throw-away, but she got mixed in with Paileous and Varis and she’s living her best chaotic life. 

37. What is the most recent PC or NPC you've created? That’d be Kahtri, actually! I haven’t played her a whole bunch, so I’m not really familiar with her yet, but it’ll be interesting to play a Drow cleric who doesn’t actually worship Lolth. (I don’t do spiders.)

38. Goblins or Kobolds? I actually haven’t dealt with either yet. I’m slightly more familiar with Goblins simply because of CritRole. 

39. Favorite villain you've defeated? Uh, I dunno if I’d classify her as a villian exactly, but Cade’s killed an NPC named Creed who was a servant to the god Grotz. Pretty sure he’s out for revenge now. 

40. What d&d deity would you be a cleric of? I am a cleric of the Drow deity Elistraee. (I had to double check the spelling on that) 

41. Give an out of context quote from one of your games! Liander - “I tried to stop him, but he fucking yote me across the room like I wasn’t even there. Is it weird I’m bitter about that?”

Thorin - *emerges from the wreckage of the crate we were smuggling holding dragon eggs* “I FOUND LIVING ROCKS!” 

Liander and Zulth in tandem - *knows exactly what he’s holding* “Oh for fuck’s sake!” 

42. Have you ever rolled turn into a potted plant on the wild magic table? No, I don’t think I know anyone who plays that particular class, so I’ve never seen it happen. 

43. Minis and terrain or theater of the mind? Theater of the mind, good sir/madam. 

44. Mulligan, Mercer, Murphy, or McElroy? Mercer! Mercer! Mercer! 

45. What is the longest session you've ever had? Oh, jeez. Like, fourteen hours, give or take?

46. What is the longest battle you've fought or run? Uh, that’d be the fight with Creed. It took us like two hours to beat her down with three of us. She was stupid powerful. The bounty was great, though. 

47. Have you ever played at level 20? No, my highest level character is a level 11. I’m working on it, though. 

48. Does your dm say "How do you want to do this?" Oh yes. The table just blows up when that happens, not gonna lie. It’s fun to hear, especially if it’s aimed at you. 

49. Have you ever played an edition other than 5th? No, I started playing last year, so 5th is all I know. 

50. Will you try to convince others to play? Already done so. I’ve added a couple people to the group - my husband, whose character is the best straight man to our fuckery, and one of our mutual friends whose lunacy works with our brand of crazy. 

[lorata]

Any interest in kicking off the new year with some Alec and Emory mentor feels?

HAPPY NEW YEAR, ANON

(Also found here)

Emory slides her spatula into the bowl of batter, folding it with smooth, expert strokes until the wet and dry ingredients combine. She let Alec try first but no matter how he struggled, chunks of white flour stuck out between strings of egg yolk as the batter stubbornly refused to come together. “I don’t know how you do it,” Alec says, pulling his feet up onto the rung of the stool and resting his chin on his knees.

She favours him with an indulgent smile. “Same as anything. Practice and dedication. You didn’t walk out as a baby knowing how to chuck a spear, did you?”

“Ha.” Alec can’t help but be transfixed as Emory sticks her finger into the botl, the batter now thick enough she can pinch a piece of it with thumb and forefinger and test it with a light squeeze. She hums to herself, then sprinkles a little more flower into the mixture. “How do you know how to do things like that? You’re not looking at a recipe.” 

Emory reaches over, takes his hand and sticks his finger into the batter. “Feel,” she says. “See how it sticks to your fingers, doesn’t wanna come off? If you try there’ll be bits and pieces stuck to you. We want it to stick to itself when we roll it, not to the sheet or to our hands. So we need more of the bonding agent. Flour helps keep it all together.” 

Alec stares at the batter stuck to his fingers, but he can’t exactly put it back now that it’s all over his hands and it seems wasteful to throw it away. He hesitates, but then Emory winks at him like she can read the absolute nonsense of his thoughts, and so he gathers up his courage and licks his fingers clean.

“You don’t wanna do too much of that,” Emory says, taking down a block of dark chocolate from the cupboard. “They say you can get real sick from the eggs, even the flour. But you can’t cook without tasting along the way, so sometimes you gotta take that risk.” 

The idea of raw cookie batter posing a risk after Alec lost an entire arm to sepsis from a mutated monkey creation is quite possibly the funniest thing he’s heard all year, but at the same time, he’d rather not have people killing themselves laughing at his untimely funeral. Alec tries to recall whether Aunt Julia ever baked cookies, and if so whether she would have let him taste any of the raw batter, but those memories, if they existed, hide behind a fog. 

“It all seems like magic to me,” Alec says. Except then Emory hands him the chocolate and a thin knife and tells him to shave off small pieces for the cookies, and he might not know baking but he knows knives so at least he’s not entirely useless. 

(He does remember Aunt Julia’s hands, the fearless curl of her fingers around the knife handle as she made quick work of any vegetable that made it across her cutting board. Sometimes she and Dad had competitions to see who could cut the most vegetables the fastest and into the prettiest pieces while Mom and Uncle Paul sat back with drinks and rolled their eyes when they thought the kids couldn’t see. Aunt Julia almost always won — and that’s how Alec found out she’d been in the Program too, back in the day, but only until Transition. Funny how no one ever talked about it.)

“Everything is magic when we don’t understand it yet,” Emory says. “The trick is not leaving it there. Not knowing how to do things should be exciting, not an excuse.” 

He shouldn’t stare, except sometimes Emory said things he swore would be a joke or a trap if it were anyone but his mentor speaking. Emory catches his expression anyway and cocks an eyebrow, and Alec’s throat flushes. “I’ve never thought of it that way, that’s all. I can’t imagine what it would be like, even. I’ve always been scared of not knowing things. Like I’ve failed before I started.” 

Most of Alec’s life had been spent playing catch-up to Creed and Selene, who’d been older, faster, braver. They’d done everything first, and all their knowledge was meant to osmose down to Alec so he’d have it before it was his turn; by the time Alec got there, he should already have practiced and perfected everything with them, no mistakes allowed. Why should there be when he had two living examples to learn from right in front of him? He should know better. 

It took the thrill out of discovery, leaving him to follow in their footsteps, afraid to deviate from the well-trodden paths in front of him. Sure, he could try something new, but then all the mistakes and first attempts would be his as well. He could either take the safe path through the forest or forge on through the thorny bracken, and while Selene would not have understood the question or even seen a dilemma being posed to her, Alec had definitely chosen to play it safe.

Emory rests her hand on his shoulder, squeezing lightly before letting go. She takes the bowl from the counter and covers it, then sticks it in the fridge. “Do you know why we have talents, Alec? The unofficial ones, I mean, the ones we don’t share with the Capitol.” 

He blinks. This one seems like a baby-Victor question, the kind of thing a mentor has to run through when a fresh Victor digs their heels in, except that Alec has never questioned Emory about anything so fundamental. “So we know we can be more than killers?” he hazards. It seems straightforward enough. “So we have hobbies that have nothing to do with swords or weapons or the Games. To give us something else to focus on when we have bad days. And to remind us that we’re capable of creating things when we spent our whole lives learning to destroy.” 

Emory’s mouth quirks a little, and Alec hopes he didn’t come off as sarcastic. He used to have that problem, being so steeped in Centre culture through his parents and their friends and with Creed and Selene being older and siphoning down the answers that by the time the trainers asked him questions they thought he sounded glib even when he meant it. “How do you think we choose them?” she asks instead. 

Again, it feels a little like a trick, but then again Dad liked to ask obvious questions all the time and Alec still managed to give the wrong answer. “You find something you like that you’re good at and you stick with it?” 

“The exact opposite.” Emory’s eyes are soft and warm even as she corrects him. “You find something you’re interested in that you’ve never had the chance to try before, and you do that. Start over at the very beginning like you’re a kid again and learn how to get good at it. Let yourself be terrible and have fun.” 

Alec fights the instinctive surge of panic. “But why? Why not start with something you’re already good at?” 

“Because every one of us has spent the last ten years before the Arena doing everything we can to avoid failure, and it doesn’t get easier on the other side,” Emory says. “We practice and perfect and hone our skills and after a while if something isn’t working, the trainers tell us to drop it, don’t waste our time. When was the last time any of us were allowed to be bad at something? Or figure out how to do something new on our own, without pressure or trainers telling us how to do it? There’s freedom in discovery. I had to learn that. You will, too.” 

All of this sounds like a fairytale written in a giant book engineered to snap shut on his fingers when he tries to read it, but — okay, sure. New things to learn, no pressure, and he’s allowed — supposed — to be bad at it when he starts. “You know that sounds terrifying,” Alec says. It comes out accusing but he can’t help it. Sometimes this mentor stuff is too much.

Emory laughs. “Believe me, I hear you.” 

It’s all a lot to process and not a little overwhelming, but Emory brought this up for a reason. She never starts talking to hear her own voice, and Alec runs through the conversation backwards until he finds the junction. He chews on the inside of his lower lip. “You think I should learn to cook?” 

“I think you’re learning already,” Emory says gently. “What do you think we’ve been doing, every time you sit with me while I make food? But yeah, eventually you’ll be doing this on your own. Making food for yourself is a powerful feeling. Making food for other people is a great way to say you love them without having to say it — you know, in case there’s anyone in your life who spooks easy.” 

Alec laughs at that. Emory would have had to figure out how to handle Artemisia long before Selene came into the picture, so she must be well versed in the signs. “That’s a good point,” he says. “Maybe I’ll start paying more attention.” 

“Can’t hurt,” Emory says, and slaps him on the back. “Also maybe we’ll finally get a favourite food out of you. Important step in the Victor self-identity process, that one.” 

“How long did it take you to get one?” Alec asks. Emory told him she had a rough recovery, but he still has trouble making it rea. 

She snorts a little. “Longer than it should have, for stubborn and nothing else,” Emory says. “Which is why I’m starting you off early. Let’s get supper started while the dough chills.” 

For a second Alec blanks before his brain catches up. “Is this a bad time for me to admit I’ve been calling it ‘batter’ in my head the whole time we were cooking? I don’t think I actually know the difference.” 

“This a bad time for me to tell you it’s actually ‘baking’, not ‘cooking’, when you’re making cookies?” Emory grins and slings an arm around his shoulders, pulling him in for a quick hug. “Don’t worry. First step at being good at something is being bad at it. We’re off to a great start.” 

“I think my mentor just insulted me.” 

“Think you must be imagining things.” 

Alec tackles her, and Emory knocks him to the ground and pins him right there on the kitchen floor. “Cheeky, cheeky,” she says, shaking her head in mock concern, but then she laughs and claps the side of his face with her massive palm.

When she lets him up Alec weighs a hundred pounds lighter. “I think I want chili tonight,” he says. “Can we make it spicy?” 

Emory smiles, big and proud and warm enough to make his chest glow. “Sure can do. Run down to the pantry and grab me that bag of dried beans.”