#i wouldn't say it's impossible

[thelonelyshore-if]

Don't know if you will see this, but the drabbles are making me think about the ROs a lot, so I wanted to do question about something that probably won't come up in the actual story (...unless?). Say that the MC proposes to the ROs, how do they each react?

Ohhhh I love this prompt. Thank you Nonnie!!

Beck- is nooooot ready for that kind of commitment. Dating is already almost too much for them. Idk if they'd say no in the moment--they care so deeply for MC and want them to be happy. They would WANT to be ready for it, if that makes sense. They'd have a total deer in headlights type expression. But I think they'd get more and more skittish about it as time went on. Unless they had done a lot of growing as a person I...don't think it would end well.

Croft- flustered and surprised. It's something that they would literally never see coming, regardless of if they and MC had been together for years or for months. They'd say yes, but after a lot of "wait--are you sure?!". They wouldn't want to actually get married until they're out of Easthaven--they want their parents there--but they'd be an absolute beast at wedding planning. Would be very very happy about it all.

Jay- surprising nobody they'd be absolutely over the moon giddy. So long as they'd been dating MC for long enough that it didn't seem too soon Jay would be all over it. They love the thought of being married and would say yes on the spot. I could also see it being a "MC proposes and Jay brings out their own ring they were planning on proposing with" sort of scenario. Regardless--a lot of laughing and crying and kisses.

Perri- completely shocked for several long seconds before they'd instantly break down into tears lol. Would probably just be like "You want to marry me?!?" Definitely a lot of asking MC if they're serious and if they're sure. But once they got over the surprise they'd be so goddamn happy about it. Perri is a romantic, they love being in love.

Ravi- is the only RO who might actually say no upfront :) Not out of lack of love or desire to get married though. He just...doesn't know if it would be a good idea. He doesn't want to break MC's heart someday. He doesn't want his own heart broken. Would be completely stone-faced and cold, very distant. And then he'd break down crying later, in the privacy of his office.

Yasmin- she'd also be hesitant but would be equally as thrilled. She's done the wedding thing before and once she got over the trauma of it all I think she'd just be like "okay let's do this right now". She's happy to do a big white wedding again but would personally just want to do the thing. Would definitely kiss MC on the spot when they asked though.

[bacchuschucklefuck]

species medley ft. gorgug and riz

[project-sekai-facts]

How are we feeling about ensekai’s emu3 translation!!! (I’m mad)

(if you remember the 3 whole posts i made when asahi got de-gayed on EN you'll know i am mad too and that this is probably going to get long)

i don't like to be too cynical but it was so obvious that they were going to change that line, i had a feeling since the event first released on JP and after the incident with Asahi where I went through and tracked down multiple other examples of EN removing queer subtext it became clear to me that in no way shape or form was "emu-chan really loves nene-chan" making it to EN without getting changed. what i didn't expect was them changing Nene's line after Luka's comment, which actually makes this whole situation far worse than many of their other instances of toning down queer subtext.

for anyone who isn't aware of what happened, in chapter 5 of the current Emu event, there's a scene where Nene, Rui and the Virtual Singers are talking about what would cheer Emu up. The vsingers all talk about how much Emu loves spending time with Nene, leading to the following exchange

If you look for them, any fan TL of this scene will be something similar to this:

Luka: ...Fufu. Emu-chan really loves Nene-chan, doesn't she? Nene: Th-that's nothing special...

EN's official translation is this:

So what's the issue? I'll start with Luka's part. In the original text, she uses the word daisuki, which can mean to "like a lot" or "love". It's a word you will see frequently in the idol/idol-adjacent genre of games, due to its ambiguity in that it can be read as either platonic or romantic when used towards a person, and often will be used in ambiguous situations so that it's harder to confirm the writers' intentions either way. so here, fans of the emu/nene ship could view the fact that emu loves spending her time with nene as more on the romantic side, but people who don't like the ship could view it as platonic and move on.

while they didn't translate daisuki directly, Luka's line still works, and still contains the ambiguity that works as ship tease in the original text. it's a perfectly fine localisation that still conveys the original intent. despite that, there is something to be said about EN's consistent refusal to translate daisuki as love in most instances when it's not used on An/Kohane (but then again, EN has literally teased An/Kohane on their twitter account so is it all that surprising?).

Here's some examples:

Aibou no koto ga daisuki de / he loves his partner -> he cares about his partner very much (The Power of Unity chapter 7 when Kaito is comparing Arata to Akito and Toya)

HARUKA-CHAN, DAISUKI DAYOOOO!!! / HARUKA-CHAN, I LOOOOOVEEE YOU!!! -> You're the best!!! (Dear Me, As I Was Back Then chapter 4 when minori is at an ASRUN concert. this one isn't actually that great of a localisation)

Honachan no koto daisuki dakara. Kore de iinda yo. / I love Honachan, so this is fine. -> I want what's best for her. And this is it. (Leo/need main story chapter 14 after Saki tells Honami she won't bother her anymore)

Minna daisuki de - taisetsuna tomodachi na no / I love them all - they're my dearest friends -> They're all amazing, and very dear to me. (Leo/need main story chapter 17. this isn't good either)

What's particularly amusing about that last one is that there's a second official translation for it that I assume was done by JP staff (since EN never promoted doing the Journey to Bloom subs like they did back when they provided subs for Petit SEKAI) that actually keeps the word daisuki as love.

Yeah. I love all my friends - and they mean the world to me.

It's a better localisation than the official EN team one.

Questionable localisation choices aside, Luka's line is fine and is actually in line with the original. The issue with this localisation very much lies with Nene's part, because that is an entirely new line.

In the original text, Nene's "that's just normal" or "that's nothing special" or however you choose to TL it, is meant to be her questioning Luka's statement, since all the things that the other vsingers said that Emu liked were pretty normal things like going shopping and playing video games with nene. To Nene, these things are normal activities for them to do together, so she gets embarrassed by the fact that Luka concludes from that information that Emu loves Nene. When I dissect it like that I think you can really tell what the writers were going for here lol.

"That's just us being friends" does still convey the idea that Nene thinks these activities aren't anything out of the ordinary and she isn't sure why the vsingers are picking these out as some of Emu's favorite things to do, but it's very different from the original line. "But those are just normal things we do together" is something I just came up with on the spot, but it's a lot closer to the original text and still conveys the same meaning. The fact they changed the line to "that's just us being friends" is, honestly, not even subtle that they're covering up queer subtext. The original scene was very clearly written in as ship tease, and EN mentioning "friends" for no reason, especially since the word nor anything close to it was not used in the original, is instantly a red flag because it's like the go-to for queerbaiting and censorship. This was intentional. There was no need for them to specify that the relationship is platonic, Luka's part is ambiguous for a reason so that fans can view it how they like.

Just to top all this off, here's Rin's original line just before that Luka+Nene interaction:

Oh, and! And! She said that playing games with Nene-chan is also super fun!

And here's Rin's line from the official EN translation:

That's not the same thing, but even more weirdly, the incorrect part (super fun->really loves) is a correct translation for the part changed in Luka's line. So, they can do it, they are willing to say "really loves", just not in the right places. Maybe because Rin's part is less personal than Luka's part? It's strange actually, this isn't the first time they've done this either. Off the top of my head I can think of an example from Shiho's Varied Kindness 2* story where they translated the word "suki" as really loves, despite that being much stronger than the original word used (and the fact that daisuki is used a lot in the Leo/need stories and it's incredibly rare if not entirely unknown for them to translate it correctly).

It's not subtle that they're trying to remove implications of the characters possibly being queer, they did it in curtain call and they did it in walk on and on, and multiple times before then too. And considering some of the content in this year's events and the amount of times they say daisuki alone, it's gonna keep happening. honestly i hate the fact that i keep trying to justify the translations in these posts. these translations are intentional. what happened in the curtain call translation back in october says enough. when a character who uses explicitly romantic language towards another guy passes as a straight character in the translation you know they're doing it on purpose.

oh and once again, it's only the EN server that has this issue. The scene in question was translated almost word-for-word on the TW and KR servers.

read fan translations. they're better than what EN gives us and people put a lot of effort into them.

[uncanny-tranny]

Part of my experience with abuse is hoping I get a kid like me so I can know how easy it can be to love them, how easy it is to not treat them how I was treated, and breaking that cycle. It was only hard for them to love me as a child because they didn't love me in the first place. They wished for me to know the hate they had, and I refuse to carry their water for them like that. It was never hard to love me.

[arrowmaker15]

(in the manor)

Jason: But why can't I eat them?

Tim: For the LAST DAMN TIME, Alfred did not make them, and those are not the cookies I'm talking about!

Jason: Why call it cookies if you can't eat them, though?

Tim: Goddamnit, Jason-

[corvid-language-library]

.

[gin-juice-tonic]

Debating on putting a part in the ford game which would have required the player to make a map in an earlier section of the game with little warning

On one hand, I'd feel bad if people were getting screwed over Sierra style

On the other hand... get good

[harrowscore]

why are you, as an adult in 2024, still hung up on reylo. why are you still mocking the shippers. why do you believe yourself to be superior only because you dislike a stupid ship from a fucking space fairytale. girl (gnc) get a grip

[psynom]

purpled practicing for dodgeball (he needs it)

//click for better quality

[ninashiki]

i feel like almost everything in utena has sort of already been extensively discussed in the last two (almost three) decades of utena's existence (not that there aren't new interpretations to be made, there always are) besides black rose arc (mikage+mamiya+tokiko). which is why they're so much fun to think about. i think the need to read between the lines makes it unfortunately easy to misunderstand or look past obvious stuff if you don't pay attention, but to me it's always been really obvious that mikage's arc is a literal representation of the erasure of queerness in ohtori (society?) by akio/everything he represents. and that's so fucking tragic! nemuro was never able to find a name for his desires. he lived and died as a puppet in the shadows.

[sesshy380]

New WereKat AU character refs!

First up, we have Fae Yugi, a Seelie Prince!

Yugi doesn't really enjoy all of the pressure of his status. He doesn't feel he's anyone special just because of a title. He'd much rather just enjoy the little things in life, and not have to worry about all the trivialities of the Fae Courts.

Thankfully there's one Fae that is of a similar mindset, and helps him to sneak out into the lower levels of the city on occasion.

Meet Unseelie Atem, a noble and member of the Unseelie High Court!

Atem is devilishly free-spirited. Court? Boring. Tedious. Snore. The Geal’drache, most popular casino/hotspot in the city of Dominus? Fun! Exciting! Been kicked out by the Elven CEO, Kaiba, more times than he can count but it doesn't stop him from coming back!(Seriously though, despite their rivalry, he knows Kaiba enjoys having him around for the entertainment)

That's about all I have for these two. Not much, I know, but they are more plot movement characters than anything.

I just felt like drawing them and showing them off. I had to laugh when I first did Yugi's outfit, because it has strong Han Solo vibes lol.

[morningmask27]

Honestly I'm also not fully happy with what they did with Whis this book

[torgawl]

can we talk about sukuna and rika and why the king and queen of curses having a dispute is also narratively fitting? if sukuna is an heian era sorcerer with an antipathy and disregard of human emotions and the weak's will to live, blind to love and unable to comprehend the value of relationships with others then rika, as his counterpart, works especially well. rika is just a kid, or was just a kid. an innocent young girl who ended up dying tragically and saw herself transform into a vengeful spirit after being cursed by love. not only does she represent the weak (remember when sukuna's slaughter of women and children was implied?), she represents love itself. with her feelings lingering after death, she clinged onto her existence with the sole wish of protecting yuuta. it counteracts so well with sukuna's selfish will to kill time before his final breathe, which he admitted to be his will and motivation.

before i move on to my next idea, which let me preface by saying that it might be a little out there and dives into theory territory, i'm going to contextualise it with some information on the symbolism of "king and queen" that might help understand why this thought may make - at least some - sense.

in alchemy the king usually appears in conjunction with the queen, representing the sun-and-moon duality. in accordance with the theory of sulfur and mercury, which together, after alchemist purification, form the philosopher’s stone (also called the elixir of life, associated with rejuvenation and immortality), usually represented by the crowned hermetic androgyne (the union of the complementary male and female, achieving perfection or completion in the human state). according to jung, the king and queen also signify the spiritual conjunction that takes place when the process of individuation is complete, with the harmonious union of the unconscious and consciousness. jungian psychology has subjected the alchemistic tradition to extensive analysis and views the king less as an image of paternal authority and more as an archetype of higher insight and wisdom.

with that in mind, i think it's easy to understand where i'm headed but i want to add something else. remember jjk 0? geto's plan at the time was to obtain rika so he could use her power and move forward with his plan to annihilate all no-sorcerers. he believed her to be the key to achieve his goal and was willing to risk his own life for it. furthermore, the story is highly based on buddhist concepts and one of the core aspects of jujutsu kaisen is the cycles of suffering the characters are subjected to. in buddhism the goal is to become free of the samsara (continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth), eliminate suffering and achieve nirvana (enlightment). this ties withe the name of the series as kaisen is comprised of the kanji 'kai', meaning cycle, and 'sen', meaning battle, which combined with jujutsu (which means magic/sorcery but contains the word curse) describe the story as an endless battle of curses. and in a sense, the story also repeats itself, between generations and storyline-wise with the events circling back to how it all began. yuuta managed to land a fatal strike on geto once again, but now rika is pointed to be in a direct confrontation with sukuna as the queen of curses. now that i went through all the context needed to understand this, is it possible rika is once again in danger of being taken away? the idea of achieving a state of perfection with the unity between king and queen is quite intriguing. sukuna finally addressing yuuji as a worthy rival because of his unshakable resolve and unbreakable soul, is almost directly implying yuuji to be the one with whom sukuna has his last battle. an ultimate power-up (or the equivalent to), would be veyy cathartic before a final fight where yuuji would have the opportunity to finally go all out and have his well awaited and deserved protagonism (in my eyes, at least).

[oveliagirlhaditright]

Kingdom Hearts 4 Challenge Day 6: A World to Revisit

Atlantica

(So, I swear all of my posts really aren't meant to be about Kairi. Like, I was going to make this cool manip where it looked like Sora was saving Melody from drowning, but my Sony Vegas refused to open for some reason? So I just decided to post these similar images of Melody and Kairi instead. That being said... while I don't need Kairi to be the one to go to a The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea world if we ever got one--I'd be more than okay with it being Sora--that would be cool. I'd love to see mermaid Kairi, since Kairi is named for the sea. And Kairi's name can even mean "melody." And she has a lot in common with Ariel. I even suspect she was somewhat based on Ariel, but anyway.)

The reason I would want Atlantica is honestly just because I would want a pretty underwater world again with the Unreal Engine graphics. And that can be a world that we've never been to before, like, Atlantis: The Lost Empire. But if we don't get a new one, then I would want an old one like Atlantica here. Plus... even though I don't think this movie is the greatest. At all. I feel like it's okay... and depending on how they handle it, the KH writers could potentially make it better, with what they add to it. Also, I feel like if we go to Atlantica one more time--with better swimming controls, and in an attempt that isn't a musical--we could finally redeem the world. And that would be great to see.

And now, for whatever reason, I'm going to list some other worlds I'd be more than okay with returning (even though I think we were only supposed to list one. Shh.)

Wonderland: But only if the world is expanded and it's a "sequel," via it being based on Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland.

Deep Jungle: I know this will surely never happen, since I know Disney has lost the rights to Tarzan. But on the off-chance they ever got the rights back somehow, I definitely wouldn't mind seeing this world back again, perhaps adapting some of the stories from the TV show, like the stuff with Princess La.

Agrabah: I definitely want to go here one more time and to have the "Aladdin and the King of Thieves" story depicted. (I probably would even prefer this even over Atlantica, actually, even though I want that pretty underwater level). This was one of the better Disney sequels, after all. And Sora most definitely deserves to be there for Aladdin and Jasmine's wedding.

Neverland: I wouldn't be opposed to the second Peter Pan movie being adapted.

The Land of Dragons: I'd be all for us having Mulan II, actually.

The Beast's Castle: I've always wanted "Beauty and the Beast and the Enchanted Christmas." I want to fight Forte. LOL. While I doubt it will happen, for obvious reasons, I feel like they could find a way to do it: like Belle writes Sora and the gang a part of her and the Beast's story that they don't know about (the Enchanted Christmas story) and sends it to them as a gift (maybe even for Christmas?), and once Sora opens it, he somehow gets pulled into said story.

Pirates of the Caribbean: I wouldn't mind a "Dead Men Tell No Tales" world.

The Lion King II: Simba's Pride would be awesome.

I would also kill for Cinderella III: A Twist in Time.

While part of me is loath to mention this one... I feel like no one was completely satisfied with the La Cité des Cloches world in Dream Drop Distance (because of lack of NPCs and that kind of thing). And there is a "The Hunchback of Notre Dame II" that Disney made. Absolutely no one likes this movie, and for good reason. But I don't know... I would be willing to tolerate it, just to see this world in the quality it deserves. And maybe Square Enix could somehow make it better... actually, surely not. But like I said: I could tolerate this just to run around Notre Dame in pretty Unreal Engine graphics.

I know that originally with DDD, the plan was Sora to go to all of the original Fantasia locations and for Riku to go to the ones in Fantasia 2000. But then they realized there were enough locations in the first movie for them both to go to, and they didn't need to crank out the sequel after all (or something like that). So I certainly wouldn't mind getting Fantasia 2000 now, in KHIV.

Tangled I'd love to go here again, if we get to see some of the cool plots from the TV show, that I've watched on YouTube. LOL

Arendelle We all know we'll be going here. It isn't even a question. I just hope that this time, Disney gives Square Enix much more freedom (let Elsa and Anna be party members, please). Since Frozen II is kind of hit and miss. Square Enix could really make something cool with it--like they could have with Frozen in KHIII--if they're allowed some creativity.

Wreck-It Ralph Because no one, and I mean no one, wanted us to first experience this world in KHUX, tbh.

Radiant Garden I just really want to finish some of the plot threads there that are still hanging.

Destiny Islands I just really want to be able to go back here and play, dangit! And maybe finally get to explore the main island!

Shibuya Just let us meet Neku, Shiki, Beat, Joshua, and Rhyme in their Shibuya (even if it's an in the credits thing), if Quadratum isn't theirs and we're not going to meet them (or the Wicked Twisters) in the game, otherwise.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

billions also comedy gold presenting winston as a scapegoat for abuse culture fans when it's like but hey it can't be actual scapegoating if you Enjoy It or consider it Justified or experience Reassurance from Its Opportunity For A Group Cohesion Substitute For A Cohesion Based On An Inherent Equal Degree Of Belonging, The Absence Of Which Allows For, Encourages, Reinforces, & Rewards Scapegoating

it can't be Bullying if someone's Weird or you Just Don't Personally Like Them or Nobody's Actually Stopping You, Maybe At Least If They Don't See Too Much Of It, Maybe Others Are Supporting It

it can't be Abuse if you're just doing things Normally or are Following Rules or Aren't Feeling Malicious And Aren't Getting Divine Revelations Otherwise and probably it's just that a lot of abnormal people are being whiny &/or unfair &/or the Real malicious ones. kinda just like how that scapegoat is the real person ruining everything and really just forcing you to treat them like this

[cringelordofchaos]

"OMG! Did you know that pigs would easily eat a human? How scandalous! Outrageous! Disgusting! Pure proof of their immorality!"

- average Jessica, who eats porkchop with their family once a month