#i’ve not finished it yet but the lore?? intriguing

[unravelingthread]

so i may have started playing a game and i am ENAMORED with these little dudes

[anime-grimmy-art]

It’s this time of the year again, folks. Time to wrap up the art Ive made in the last 12 months in another Year in Review! I’ve noticed that this is my fifth Year in Review in a row, so I’ll be making an extra post looking back on the progress in those last 5 years!

I've got a lot to say about this year, but purely art wise, I've gone all when it comes to comics, damn! I've kinda found a format that is messy, and therefore more time efficient, yet still looks good. I even made 2 animatics and lotsa shorts/reels! All that on top of opening coms twice, and, oh yeah, MAKING A WHOLE ASS 4MIN ANIMATION ON MY OWN.

How is my hand still alive.

2023 has been….interesting, to say the least. The first half year I was working on my thesis project, aka making an animated short all on my own (in the art department), which makes it honestly surprising how much I managed to churn out between animating. Trigun rly did have me in a choke hold.

Summer was a bit more spotty, esp. with me not being able to draw anything during August as I was writing my thesis (and doing commissions). And towards the end of the year, Kingdom Hearts tried to save me, but alas, Genshin Impact has finally sunk its teeth into me and dragged me to the bottom of the rabbit hole. It all started with me watching a story summary and lore videos while I was sick after my thesis and I was too intrigued to not dig deeper and well, first I fell in love with Kaeya and then the ships started dropping in left and right.

I’m not gonna lie, the last few months have been weird. I finished my masters in October, and have been on job hunt since, sadly without success so far. I’m existing in this weird limbo of still not grasping I’m not a student anymore after 18 years in education, not really being able to accept I’m an adult, yet desperately trying to find something so I can make a routine, cos rn Im too scared to build a rhythm as I know I’ll have a so much harder time readjusting again. It’s left me in a weird emotional state, where most of the time I feel fine, but when it counts, there’s just, nothing. No joy at getting my diploma, no anticipation to finally go to a convention again, neither any sadness hearing my grandfather died. It frustrates me that it extends to my art as well, there’s excitement over ideas and concepts, but no motivation to pick up the pencil, which makes me either not finish art at all or making so many shortcuts and just ending up with sth not satisfactory to me since it’s not the idea I sought after.

Tho, not everything is doom and gloom. I DID finish a whole ass short animation and got my masters degree, that IS sth to be proud of. Also, while Im struggling at drawing, I’ve also kinda started integrating my shortcuts into my style and some stuff I’ve thrown together actually turns out real good nowadays. Also, and this might be a bit of a weird one, I’m so fucking happy to know I can still enjoy gay ships. I’ve been a bit uncertain over the last few years because when I was around 16-18, I had a real big yaoi phase, which mostly came from the fact so much stuff came out that tickled my brain in the right way (Free, Haikyuu, etc.). But over the years, my enthusiasm died down, and I even started to resent some ships because it’s all some fandoms produced. I often found myself liking a hetero ship more than the popular gay ship, which really made me not wanna stick around because I did not care for most fanart and you can only go through a tag with art you don’t care about so long before you lose interest. I think in retrospect that it rly had nothing to do with the ships being gay ships but rather cos the fans just shoved it in your face when you didn’t care (and shipping culture nowadays also can get real scary). But I’m so happy to see I can still get obsessed with a ship and it’s all thanks to Haikaveh/Kavetham. It really just needed the right flavour for me to dig in again. And oh my god, I FINALLY like a ship with a SHIT TON of art and fanfictions, no more scrounging the crumbs from the bottom of the barrel. 

Anyways, enough lamenting. Here’s to hoping I can bite my tongue and get shit started properly in 2024, and that my brainrots may make me obsessed enough to churn out an obscene amount of fanart again.

[hbyrde36]

Self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 🖤

oh! so fun, thanks anon!

In no particular order because they are all precious to me:

Steve Harrington: Vampire Hunter

Vampire Eddie Munson, Vampire Hunter Steve Harrington, P.I. Robin Buckley, bad-ass gun toting Nancy Wheeler, VAMPIRE DUSTIN!, Stripper Chrissy Cunningham, and so much more.

My ‘steddie as Anita and Jean-Claude from the Anita Blake novels’ fic. I fucking love this thing. It’s SO FUN. The book series it’s pulled from start out in the 90’s (yes I’m old and I read them when they were originally published🙈) and as much as I love the idea of Vampire Hunter Steve having a beeper, I decided to bring things up to present day (along with quite a few other changes to make it my own, and to fit the steddie vibe). It’s weird and a little challenging writing a fic intermingling two different pieces of media, but I love weaving in and combing elements of each universe's lore, while still maintaining the main beats of the story. If nothing else, read this one for the dream sequences!

2. Caught in the Undertow

Post season 4, Canon Divergent – Eddie lives and Vecna has been defeated.

AKA the sad Eddie fic, or, as i used to call it in my head, 'the passively suicidal Eddie fic'. This was my first foray into the ‘giving my own issues to my blorbos’ thing, although it still seems to be in character for them, I think. Don’t worry, I spread it out between both Eddie and Steve, so they’re both a little fucked up. I loved and hated writing every word of this fic. It was so hard sometimes and I made myself cry more than once, but it was incredibly cathartic. This is the fic I go back to and read parts of more than anything else I’ve written.

3. Times Like These

Time loop, Eddie POV

TLT was my first brain worm, my first ever fanfic, and the first thing I’d written period in a very long time. I had no idea what I was doing, but I was so intrigued by the idea and there weren’t many (any?) Eddie POV time loops on ao3 at that point so it was definitely a little bit of a “fine I’ll do it myself” moment. I was just so curious how it would play out if Eddie, the new guy who knew so little about the upside down, who got thrown into the mix and died all within a single week, were to be the one stuck in a loop. What would he think was happening to him? Would he trust the party enough to tell them? What would he do or change to try and fix things? I think I’ve improved quite a bit as a writer since I finished this, just through sheer practice, but I’m still so very proud of my first baby and think about it often.

4. Life is a Game (and True Love is a Trophy)

Canon was just a crazy homebrew D&D game, sort of.

My second brain worm, this fic lived in my head for 8 months before I had written a single word of it. It all started with the idea that, 'what if all of the events from the show had just been a D&D game played by the boys in Mike’s basement?', and then I ran with it from there. It’s a work in progress and we have still have a ways to go (I’m not sure we’re even at the halfway point yet) but I love how it’s turning out. The response from readers, in comments on ao3 and tumblr, to this one has been very kind and encouraging. It makes it SO easy to work on knowing others love it as much as I do.

5. Thank God we didn’t peak in High School

Friends-with-Benefits to Lovers, Modern Au, life after high school au, no upside down

I wrote this series at the last minute for Steddie Week. Last minute, as in I didn’t even start until several days into the event. I’ve never put out so many words so fast. This fic is loosely based on my own marriage’s origin story, although our beginnings were even more dramatic than this (I felt like I had to tone it down to make it believable). This is the first project that made me realize how fun writing from prompts could be! It’s definitely not my best writing, but the story is fun and cute, a little dramatic and angsty, and as always the boys get their happy ending!

[thiswasinevitable-rwrb]

I hope you’re doing okay!

I loooooooooooove Salt Follows The Moon… I love your vampire lore and how well you balance the characters and the plot and the supernatural elements.

I’m also super into Codename: Rapunzel! The premise is super intriguing and I’ve reread the chapters you’ve posted so far several times!

Thanks for sharing your writing with us!

❤️🤍💙

Thank you 💗 nothing conclusive yet but the medical journey has begun haha

Thank you for following Salt Follows the Moon this far!! I understand a fic pushing 70 chapters is....a lot lol

And Codename: Rapunzel!! omg I miss it haha I do intend to return to it after Salt is finished. I'm actually working on a long-awaited Burning chapter but nobody get excited.

Thank you for reading my fics <3

[ihateliterature]

Sariel Route Review

So I finished Sariel's route yesterday and here are my thoughts on it. Obviously spoilers for Sariel, Clavis and Luke’s routes

A lot of people disliked Sariel's route for its apparent lack of romance, but I love it. Now, that's probably because I am in the incredibly funny position of being an aro playing otome games and making myself gag with how sappy they are, so for me the romance is not a part I enjoy in most routes, just something I have to deal with.

"Why do you even play then?" Says the clueless alloro.

For the characters, soft porn, one liners and, of course, the LORE! Give me a YouTube channel and call me MatPat cause I'm all about that lore.

Back to Sariel.

For me Sariel’s route was basically perfect, it had intrigue and suspense and didn’t stop the action in its tracks just so the characters can make googly eyes at each other for half the chapter.

First for the things I didn’t like. I don’t like Sariel’s backstory, it’s much too cluttered. They wanted to make him this super accomplished person before he came to the palace but also have him grow up with the princes. So they made him a famous 10 y/o gang leader. It’s so fucking weird and I’m amazed I didn’t see more people talking about it. It would have been fine if he had a group of five or six other kids and they were known in their own town for beating people with pipes and small robberies and the like. But the scale we are shown is just ridiculous, they could have fixed this very easily if they would have made him arrive at the palace just a few years later. A famous 15-16 y/o gang leader is still ridiculous but not as much as a kid that hadn’t even started his puberty yet. 

I liked the MC. She is smart, a quick learner, adapts easily and she’s a good improviser, all of this coupled with being really knew into that life and having little to no experience makes her pleasant to follow, she is probably my favorite MC, closely followed by Clavis’. She didn’t ride on her status as Belle and took her responsibilities as Sariel’s apprentice very seriously even if it was only a cover. I really liked that she proved herself to be not only a competent Belle but also a skilled Minister with the potential to greatly help the country in the future.

Hot take but I really like Sariel and MC’s dynamic. A lot of people hated it but I like it. I’ve seen people say that they felt like the romance kinda came out of nowhere at the end without any built up, but I disagree. There is definitely A LOT of pinning between them during the route, on MC’s part but also on Sariel’s. The reason why they only acted on it at the very end was because both of them, and the story, recognised that there was no time for romance and it wouldn’t have been appropriate.

Relationships between a superior and an employee in the workplace are complicated. Now, I’m no moral crusader and I would’ve adored to have Sariel fuck MC on his desk between lessons since Chapter 2, and frankly the whole game toys with power imbalance in relationships because that’s just the nature of royalty dating commoners. Unfortunately Sariel is not the type to abuse his position in that way (regardless of how hot it would have been, I should write a fic about boss!Sariel and secretary!Emma). Sariel was keenly aware of his position the entire time and acted accordingly. At the end MC becomes Sariel’s apprentice for real and they start dating but at that point I see them as colleagues more than master and apprentice, even the princes treat MC as a full on Minister by that point.

Here comes my favorite part . . . the KING.

I fucking hate the King. He is just like every pathetic guy I’ve ever met.

I think Cybird made a good job of portraying someone who is so shit, through the idealised lense of the one singular person who liked him.

Sariel had a toxic father-son relationship with the man. They’ve known each other since Sariel was 10 and the King was more of a father to him than to any of his children. But even keeping that in mind, Sariel still had to essentially care for the emotional needs of a man child, becoming his only confidant and carrying on his desires and hopes for the country alongside his own grief, because Sariel was the ONLY one that actually grieved for that man.

Look, I don’t like saying bad things about Jin’s mom, but she chose wrong. We are told that there were no complaints about the King before the previous Belle was chased out but I highly doubt this. We are told this by Sariel, who wasn’t there and has probably found out about this FROM the King. The man was also full of shit, he claimed to love the country but he never showed it. He let Sariel and his sons rule his country WHILE he was alive. I can understand the very end, when he was too sick to move, but there was Blood Stained Day. Not even an invasion motivated this man to get off his ass. The princes had to go and fight themselves and I don’t think that we, as a fandom, realise just how young they were. Most of them were in their teens, only Chevalier and Jin were adults, Chevalier, the guy who sacrificed war prisoners was 20 or 21 and Clavis, the mad man who ran to save them and almost died in a fire because of it was 19 or 20, only Jin could have been considered an actual adult at the time, and he was 22. And what was the King doing during all of this? Throwing himself a pity party, like usual.

He did this in basically every flashback, called himself incompetent and a bad King, and he was right. 

Not only was he a bad King and a bad father, but he was an atrocious husband. Anita is the clearest example of that. I can understand why he didn’t like the Queen and the other two marriages were purely political, but he wanted to marry Anita, this was something that he WANTED, no one could have or would have forced him to do it. Regardless of that he completely ignored her after she gives birth, he pitied her, sure, but he never extended a hand towards her. He saw how her mental health was going to shit and he cried when she died, for her and the twins, but he did nothing to prevent this, he could’ve but he didn’t.

The King was not a broken man, he was a pathetic one. He spent his entire life after his girlfriend was chased out throwing himself a pity party, ignoring his duties and hurting people. He was most likely depressed, yeah, but that doesn’t excuse abandonment, neglect and rape.

Oh yeah, let’s talk about the two giant pink elephants floating around in Sariel’s route, the two KNOWN sexual assaults inflicted by the King upon Leticia Lelouch and Luke’s mom. 

They are not mentioned, which is weird considering that two princes are the product of that and one happened WHILE Sariel was at the court. This man was utterly despicable. What he did to Luke’s mom can be argued as the King quite literally losing his mind out of grief and because she looked like the previous Belle (a stupid argument, but fine, I’ll take it), but what he did to Leticia was downright monstrous. He wanted to hurt her; he wanted to torture her; he did that out of pure malice, because a maidservant pestering him to have tea with his wife from time to time pissed him off so much.

Sariel is not stupid, it’s not that he is unaware of all of this, he is just consciously choosing to not think about it. He never tries to argue against it, he never tries to convince Luke that the King was “a good guy, actually”, because he knows what kind of man he was. When a loved one is proven to have done something horrible, many people are more inclined to ignore it, excuse it or deny it, because they love that person too much to abandon them, even after something like that. Sariel does the same thing, for him it doesn’t matter that the King was a horrible person, it only matters that he was good to him.

Sariel’s route portrayed this dynamic perfectly, it might have been infuriating, but I enjoyed this direction and the care the writers took to tell the audience just how shit that man was while maintaining just how dependant Sariel was on him, to the point of ignoring his wrongdoings any chance he got.

[artbookisland]

What I’m reading these days #5

Previously:

* What I’m reading these days #01 * What I’m reading these days #02 * What I’m reading these days #03 * What I’m reading these days #04

Hey everyone, I hope you're doing all right! It's been a long while since I wrote one of these posts, almost 5 years actually... Yeah, recently I've been more focused on sharing scans than texts like these or artbook reviews, sorry!

Anway, these days I'm reading four cool books at once so I figured I could make you (re)discover something, so let's go!

What a surprise, yes, I'm reading Dragon Ball again, last time was 6 years ago so I thought I could revisit this cool universe that always brings me back to my childhood. In France we have a "Perfect Edition" which has a bigger format than usual mangas, a new translation and all the original colour pages so it's a great pleasure to read! I'm always in awe when looking at Toriyama's watercolours, they were absolutely beautiful.

I'm not going to dive much further into Dragon Ball because I've already talked about it a lot, maybe take a look at this old article. 

///

Now something completely different, if you are an avid TV show enthusiast, you might have watched the sci-fi show The Expanse. I discovered it after a few seasons had already aired and really enjoyed it (except maybe the last two seasons which had some flaws in my opinion). I quickly learned that before being on TV it was a very good series of books by a couple of authors writing under a single name: James S.A. Corey. So naturally I started buying and reading these books, loved them and realised that the adaptation was quite good. It took some years but I eventually finished reading the nine books and at that moment, just when I thought I was out of this amazing universe, I saw that there was a collection of The Expanse short stories published under the title Memory's Legion.

So that's what I'm reading right now and just like the rest of the series, it's very cool and definitely fills some interesting holes in the Expanse's lore (plus I always enjoy good sci-fi short stories)! You will learn a little bit more about the guy who came up with the Epstein drive that made space travel a lot easier in the story, the backstory of a cruel but intriguing character (Cortazar), the life of a young Amos (even before he was called Amos), etc. It's a very good read if, like me, you've finished the main series and still want more!

///

Let's keep our heads towards the sky for this next book: Moonfire by Norman Mailer. I stumbled upon it in a bookstore in Lyon, France and the cover immediately caught my eye. It's a small but thick book which contains as much text as photos from NASA's Apollo 11 mission (the first time humans beings walked on the Moon back in 1969). Being an astronomy and space exploration fan I just had to buy it and I'm glad I did!

Actually I thought it would be a historico-scientific recollection of this incredible event of the XXth century but that's because I didn't know Norman Mailer! I will let you read his Wikipedia page but he wasn't "just" a writer, he also was a journalist, a poet, an essayist and so on. So instead of simply telling us what happened in that important period of human history, he includes himself in the story as a character and shares his thoughts about the situations, the people, the technology, etc. It makes for a surprising yet very interesting read as he takes this unique opportunity to analyze, criticize even our modern society and more specifically the USA's society of the time.

I'm about halfway through the book and I really enjoy Mailer's way of telling the story but also the incredible photos of the event, most of them taken during the mission itself by astronauts Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins, I cannot stop looking at these shots and wonder what their experience was like. They freakin' walked on another celestial body (actually only two of them did while Collins was busy being the loneliest person in the history of Human life, flying above the far side of the Moon)!

///

A couple of my friends work at a local comic book shop and thanks to them I often discover very cool comics, mangas and bandes dessinées (what we call european comics in France). Also it's worth mentioning that the french publisher Urban Comics (they publish a lot of american comics here) is trying to make a selection of their books more affordable and compact for people who don't have much money or space in their home that they can dedicate to comic books. And so in this effort they have started a collection called "Urban Nomad" in which all prices are below 10€ (approx. 10 USD). The first one I picked is Watchmen.

I have watched the movie adaptation when it came out... 14 years ago (ouch!) and really liked it but kind of forgot about it, which is a good thing because now I can re-discover the story in its original format: on paper!

And what a story! Since the first pages I was sucked in by the strength of writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons and colorist John Higgins. The story is so good and feels so contemporary that I have to keep reminding myself that this was made in 1986-87! If you don't know anything about Watchmen I won't spoil it for you but the story takes place in a version of our world where masked vigilantes are already has-been, one of the reasons being the accidental transformation of a man into a God-like version of himself. Because of this event, the course of history is different from the one we know and live in, and in this context one of the few remaining masked vigilantes (pictured on the cover) is investigating a series of murders among his former colleagues. This is all extremely well integrated into the politico-historic context of the time (though once again it's somewhat different from our reality) and it's easy to recognize the quality of Moore and Gibbons' work!

///

Well, that's it for now, I hope you've discovered something, if so let me know! And I'll try not to wait five more years to write a "What I'm reading these days" again. See ya!

[bakersstreetirregulars]

In the Shadows of the Dunes - The Editor’s Hot Take

Okay… the update is over and we’re gonna see more Lotus lore soon, but in the aftermath of this burning mess of an update this March… LET’S GET THIS OVER WITH. No Cookie commentary. No seasonal things like Trophy Race and Guild Run. This is all talk with your Editor Meringue, AKA DerpyToad the blog mod, about the temporary main events and the Cookies as someone who’s been playing since August 2018 and slowly getting more burnout. If you want more of these hot takes from me in the future, or have follow-up thoughts and comments about what I had to say, do let me know.

Main Event- Village of Mirages

The concept of this event was recycled from last month. Just get the ranks using the new Cookies, then get the S rank to unlock hard mode. The primary difference was their execution of bonus content and rewards in the hard modes, which did- to their merit- award a Legendary Treasure which I’ve yet to examine: the Lamp of Endless Dreams. The Jobs seemed interesting, although some did take a few tries to do if you missed the mark by *that* much. Normal Mode basically dictates two options: get the new Cookie, or use GingerBrave. As we all know, score-wise, Brave can’t do much even if he’s maxed out. The story content was decent enough (no, this isn’t concerning the individual Cookies, I’ll get to them later) as a whole, and it was rather easy to unlock entire segments in one sitting. The minor rewards were substandard. What can you even buy with a whopping 20 Crystals from getting the rank? Absolutely Nothing.

April Fools- Doughnut Ball Invasion

Intentionally-shoddy MS Paint graphics and choppy music aside, this year’s event was the most intriguing of the lot yet (also counting stand-alone events like Brave’s Trial, Bright’s Trial, Brave’s NEW Trial, and Invocation Card Matching). The addition of an actual story (and making Mic Mac canon in CROB as a “coach” with his own voiceover commentary) makes it more engaging to a point until you finish it since the rewards besides the Costume, story cutscenes, and Title were a combination of 1s and 4s, which could make it either very high or very low. It put the running concept in a new light since you aren’t auto-running like Donkey Kong Country’s minecart segments. You have to punt your now limbless Brave with accuracy (blindly without crosshairs, I should add) so he lands where you want him, and so he doesn’t roll backwards down a hill and lose you progress. The challenges were reasonable to a point, but anything at 3-2 onwards was trickier to get due to intense platform-punting under the risk of rolling back down a hill or into a hole. Fall in the hole, and it’s Game Over immediately. Add the low gravity in area 4, and you’ll have yourself one helluva time trying to regain control while not falling in said holes while your energy ticks down.

The Cookies- Centipede and Peppercorn

*sigh* Once again… that’s a double yikes. Did they even bother to hire a historian or something to fact-check their work for sensitivity in SWANA culture? Bet not. The outfits are a considerable problem in stereotyping. The fact that Centipede has a whip and Peppercorn has bombs *ahem* smoke bombs doesn’t make it any better. Heck, Peppercorn having anything remotely similar to a cartoonish bomb 💣 (see that emoji for example) while being part of a Yogurca update (which dropped during Ramadan, I should add) makes it all a big red flag, clan’s assassins and rogues or not. I shouldn’t have to explain why this is a problem besides referencing tragedies that happened in the last thirty years that stemmed from explosions. Also add a BOMB JELLY SET to this mix, and that’s Strike Three and You’re Out!

Report Card

Here’s what I thought of it all using this grading scale, with F being the worst and L being the best:

F, E, E+, D, D+, C, C+, B, B+, A, A+, S, S+, SS, SS+, SSS, L

Village of Mirages

Gameplay: B

Maps: B+

Minor Rewards: E

Main Rewards: S

Side Challenges (Jobs): A+

Story: B+

Scoring Requirements: C

Fun Factor: C+

Overall: B

Doughnut Ball Invasion

Gameplay: SS

Map: B

Minor Rewards: D

Main Rewards: C+

Side Challenges: C

Story: A+

Scoring Requirements: B

Fun Factor: A+

Overall: B+

Centipede Cookie and Peppercorn Cookie

Gameplay Skill: C+

Story: D+

Appearance: F

Accessories: F

Pets: C

Overall Gameplay Utility: B

Timing of Release: F

Fun Factor: D

Overall: D

Final Grade: C+

Could Be Better, But Eh…

So… do you think I was too harsh? Not harsh enough? Do you want me to do more of these hot takes? Any suggestions for the future? I’m all ears for your input, and I hope they do better next time.

[the-halfling-prince]

Abe please gimme Harlow lore (I’ve seen snippets and am Intrigued)

The Harlow fans are getting FED tonight. (Idk how many of those there are, but there's at least you)

So just so y'all know I've got the basics of the series all planned out, but ive only got the first book written (draft 2 is almost finished). A lot of things I say here may contradict with things ive said in the past or will contradict with things I say in the future. Anyway let's go.

The main setting of the books is The Alavenik Archipelago, a small group of islands who's culture is inspired by (but not super directly) Norse (and a little Celtic) aesthetics. Of course most of the stories take place in the main character, Harlow's, home island of Drakenvel (the southernmost island in the archipelago.) The other islands are called Njotidan, Yfgusti, Krowethia, Nihdrikah, and The UnNamed Island. The islands are home to mostly humans, deer, birds, fox, rabbits, wolves, and oh yeah dragons. There's dragons in my Nordic inspired fantasy books don't look into that too much. (I'm a huge fan of httyd and skyrim what can I say?) The culture around how the Alavenikians treat dragons is basically just they avoid them like the plague. The dragons have human intelligence but they don't speak the same language. Our main character, luckily, is autism and thinks it's weird to not try and befriend the creature of equal intelligence that live in their home. This obviously gets her into trouble.

Drakenvel Island is very small. It's got cliffs all along the western shore, and forests covering most of the island (minus where the village is). The archipelago's islands trade with eachother regularly, and the Drakenvellians have mostly livestock and crops to offer. Their land is good for farming, with the main farm being owned by the Freyrson family (Wintergrow Freyrson is the head farmer. She's not super important to the story but her oldest kid is, just wait).

Another important thing to note about Drakenvel is that epithets are important to them. Almost all of the Drakenvellians go by an epithet/nickname of some sort. It can change later in life but typically it doesn't. The exception to this is the chief and his heir, who go by their real names (aka Harlow and her dad. I didn't bother giving him a name tho ngl). Like Harlow's best friend Tiger, who's real name is Björn. Or his dad, Inkwell, who's real name is also Björn. (Also until very recently in Drakenvel history, all the families had patriarchal last names. But slowly they've been transitioning to just having last names. Some of them have previous family members' epithets as last names, such as the Stormrages and Crowthornes, and some of them kept the patriarchal last name they had when making the change, for example the Freyrsons. Inkwell and Tiger's family hadn't made that change yet, but they basically decided they were going to stick with Björnson, since the past three generations have had that name. Hence Tiger's unfortunate full name being Björn Björnson the Second)

The chief is in charge of the village, but there is a council. This council consists of: Chief Stormrage, Wintergrow Freyrson, Inkwell Björnson (who owns the library), Halvor (the children's training leader, more on that later), Spiderweb and Bloodfell Crowthorne (more on them later. Hate them, tho.), and of course, Harlow. (Cause why wouldnt you have a 12 year old on your council.)

Real quick wanna mention Harlow and Tiger's mothers, Harlow's mother (who doesn't have a name yet I'm working on it) and Bullseye Björnson where adventurers who went missing when Harlow was four and Tiger was two. Harlow was basically raised by her mother's mother, and Tiger was raised by Inkwell (who is the best dad ever btw take notes y'all I love him)

Now I mentioned earlier that the kids have training. So on that: Drakenvel is a mostly peaceful village. But after Halvor first showed up from Yfgusti (a not very peaceful village), he suggested that they start a training program for the youth to learn to fight in the odd chance that they do go to war, just like they had on Yfgusti. The chief wasn't sure, but his wife thought it was a good idea so he agreed to it. From ages 10-18 the kids train in swordfighting, archery, wilderness survival, hunting, etc. They do that a few times a week. Harlow is great at it. Tiger is not. It makes for fun dynamics idk

Okay okay enough of Harlow and Tiger (never) what of the other kids? So glad you asked! There's four other kids in training. Catface Freyrson, Darkwind and Burnchaser Fjordson, and of course, my boy, my main man, the motherfucker himself: Careless Crowthorne. Careless is constantly described as an expert archer. I really like archery so I talk about him and his archery a LOT in the books ngl. Careless and Cateface have a history similar to Harlow and Tiger, extremely loyal childhood best friends, but as circumstances changed Careless and he became a jerk, that rubbed off on Catface (and Darkwind and Burnchaser) and in the words of Catface himself, they "became less friends and more 'the bully and kids who followed because they didn't want to be a victim'". Unfortunately, even after Careless had his half-assed redemption (it gets better in later books but his initial redemption was so bad even Harlow talks about it, he really just wanted to clear his own conscious) the rest of the boys we're still assholes.

Holy shit this is getting long

oh btw Harlow's dad doesn't like Tiger. This bitch has beef with a 10 year old fuck OFF i hate him.

Wait, hold on, aren't there some more important main characters in this... Hmmm... I talk about this all the time who am I forgetting... ah yes.

Daliah. (And another I'll get to next just wait, Cloudstorm fans)

Daliah of Krowethia. A mysterious girl who just showed up on Drakenvel one day. She's secretive, but doesn't really try to be. She just never talks about herself, and everyone else assumes she doesn't want to talk about her past. Anyway, they find out later she mysteriously showed up on the docks of Krowethia as a child, not remembering anything, and being taken in by the owner of a boarding house, a woman named Meilani. More of her another day. But Daliah had an urge to see the rest of the archipelago, and taught herself how to sail, and survival skills, and she went island to island, enjoying the landscapes (and avoiding dragons, which she was deathly afraid of)

Oh yeah there's one more member of their little gang. Another outsider from another land. A little dragon, an Amber-Winged Wyvern by the name of Cloudstorm. Harlow is obsessed with Amber-Winged Wyverns. In the same way someone who will never see their favorite animal IRL would be. Seeing an artic dwelling dragon is an unattainable dream for poor Harlow (me too girlie when do I get to see a caribou just out in the wild. Except her seeing an animal native to the artic is more likely than me seeing a Caribou so damn I guess.) She's only seen illustrations. But yeah then she finds on on her island???? The fuck??? (When will a Caribou show up in the Southern USA come on man. Sorry I got distracted. Anyway.) She talks to the dragon (because of fuckin course she does) and desperately wants to befriend him. Cloudstorm wants nothing to do with this weird kid. The rest of the gang wants nothing to do with this dragon.

More dragons come into the story later, but the first book is very much about the main group becoming, well, a group.

Also the dynamics between Harlow and the other main characters are so fun to me. Harlow and Careless and both headstrong leader types, but Harlow more boisterous, and Careless is more idk menacing is the only word I can think of. Harlow and Daliah are both adventure seekers, but Daliah is a play it safe survivalist, and Harlow is way more spontaneous. Then Harlow and Tiger are almost complete opposites. With Harlow being the boisterous, headstrong, adventurous, spontaneous leader, Tiger is a shy, weak, careful pushover and follower. Yet they're somehow best friends. Harlow and Cloudstorm are basically the same which makes their dynamic so funny. He treats her like she treats her own authority figures. (Not that Harlow is Cloudstorm's authority figure that was just the comparison I had)

idk if I have anything else to add RN but I'm willing to answer any about specific things

[wondereads]

Weekly Reading Update (06/19/23)

Reviews and thoughts under the cut

Fire and Ice by Erin Hunter (7/10)

This book is probably my least favorite of the first series of Warriors. I feel like there are a lot of easily avoidable conflicts and some very bad decision making by Fireheart, Graystripe, and a bunch of other characters. Also, there isn't much progress towards the overarching plot of the series. A lot of stuff is set up, but, particularly when it comes to Fireheart's suspicions of Tigerclaw, we're mostly just back where we started. I will say that I really like the introduction of a lot of characters, namely the WindClan cats, Silverstream, Cinderpaw, and Cloudkit. Also, Sandstorm gets a lot of character development in this book, and I really like how she is gradually warming up to Fireheart. On the other hand, Graystripe is definitely on the outs with me. I always remember that Fireheart was basically Brackenpaw's mentor.

Exile by Shannon Messenger (8/10)

Another second in series, and another with some dubious character decisions. While I really like this series and think the plot progresses significantly in this book, the way Sophie is treated just makes my blood boil. You're telling me that you brought a thirteen-year-old to one of the most dangerous places in your world to help with an incredibly delicate process and then got mad when she messed up?? Are you kidding me? Alden's insane for having her do it, the Council is irresponsible for approving it and then getting on her back, and Fitz in particular really needs to shut his mouth. I did like that we got to see the real beginnings of Sophie and Keefe's relationship, one of my favorites in the series, and I love how complicated yet genuine Grady and Edaline are.

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black (9/10)

Guys, I don't think you understand how much of a chokehold this series has on me. I have a whole plan for how my summer reading's gonna go, and I throw it all out the window because I can't stay away from Folk of the Air for so long. Jude has to be one of my favorite protagonists ever; I love how ruthless and dedicated she is, and I love her and Cardan's relationship. It's super toxic and unhealthy, but it works for them. I love dark faerie lore, and the way Black uses it to trick the reader and make engaging intrigue is just so good.

Twisted Love by Ana Huang (DNF @ 60%, 2/10)

I just really couldn’t make myself continue this book, but I did make it past my threshold to rate a book (halfway). Contemporary romances are really hit or miss for me, and this was a definite miss. It was boring, unreasonable in a way that defies even romance logic, and the toxic masculinity from the male lead was horrendous. The main character had no discernable personality traits other than sweeter than sugar, and the whole plot was disjointed and forced.

Forest of Shadows by Erin Hunter (CR, 15%)

This book starts with one of my least favorite scenes in the whole series, just sheer secondhand embarrassment, but I remember the rest of this book being quite strong. And also tragic. So we’ll see!

Everblaze by Shannon Messenger (CR)

I’ve technically yet to crack this one open, but it’s on the list to be finished this week!

[fluffyprincereviews]

10 Games Releasing 2023 That I'm Most Excited About

2022 was a wonderful year for games for me. I've played a lot of games in my backlog, as well as new releases as they came out. It can be tough keeping up with all the games that are releasing, but there are quite a few that I have my eye out for this year. Some big, some small, and some in-between! While I won't be talking about all of these extensively on this blog (mayhaps in smaller posts though, who knows?), at the very I want to gush about these in the turn of the new year.

Like a Dragon: Ishin (PS4, PS5, Steam, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S) February 21st 2023

To think that it's only been a few years now since I've first jumped on the Yakuza bandwagon. While there's still a few of the games that I need to finish, I'm excited to take on this spin-off game. Will I absolutely die because I insist on button mashing? Yes. Will I lose my mind the minute I see Majima? Also yes. I’d love to finish out the rest of my backlog with Yakuza before February comes around, but I know that’s but a lofty dream. 

Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Switch) May 12th, 2023

If there is one thing that I have always enjoyed when it comes to Legend of Zelda, it's the lore and styling of the series. Link knows how to make an impact, even in his simple tunic. While I never finished Breath of the Wild due to my attention span being really bad at the time that this game released, there is a hope inside of me that I'll see this game through to the end. That and, I'm also hoping that they improved on the open world aspect to tie in more story.

Master Detective Archives: Rain Code (Switch) 2023

When it comes to adventure games, my absolute favorite genre are mysteries. I love being able to solve the big question behind what's happening. So while I should know better than to put all of my eggs into one basket, my hopes are very high that this game will scratch my ever constant mystery adventure game itch. Given that the people behind Dangan Ronpa are behind this game, it should at the very least be an interesting experience.

Fire Emblem Engage (Switch) January 20th, 2023

Like a lot of the Fire Emblem fandom, when the first official trailer for Engage came out, I was not sold on the designs at all. It just felt too...gimmicky. But after the deluge of new character designs that have come out, along with just allowing time to settle in, I realize that I am generally excited to see what Fire Emblem has in store for us. Of course, it is still a mild excitement, given the disappointment that was the gameplay/map designs for Three Houses. Say what you will, while the story was very good, the tactics gameplay left quite a bit to be desired.

Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection (Switch, PS4, Steam) April 14th, 2023

I have a soft spot for Gameboy RPGs. Growing up on Yu-Gi-Oh games, I just really love the styling of isometric views. While I don't have any nostalgia for Mega Man at all, I do want go play as many older RPGs that I can, especially those from the GBA era that I wasn't able to play in my youth. And perhaps, if I end up enjoying these games, it can show that fans want more from Capcom in terms of Mega Man RPGs.

Final Fantasy XVI (PS5) June 22nd, 2023

I'm not what you would call a Final Fantasy fan. That's not to say that I hate the series or anything, but more that I've just...never completed a Final Fantasy game. The furthest I've gotten was with Final Fantasy XIV and I haven't played Endwalker yet (and probably won't, just because I'm burnt out on MMOs for the foreseeable future). But something about XVI is drawing my eye and I find myself very intrigued. Perhaps its the gruff main character, or the fact that his charge is unexpectedly murdered, meaning that some intense angst is bound to occur. Who knows?

A Space for the Unbound (PS4, PS5, Switch, Steam, Xbox One) January 19th, 2023

I remember playing this little indie demo about a year ago and loving the atmosphere behind it. The pixel art was gorgeous and I followed one of the developers of this title as they were posting about the game on Twitter. To see it finally be released has me very excited, especially so soon too.

Suikoden I and II HD Remaster: Gate Rune and Dunan Unification Wars (PS4, Xbox One, Switch, Steam) 2023

I'm very late to the classic RPG train, due to the fact that I never had the opportunity to play these games growing up. And I'm sure I'm not the only one who had thought this, but over the past...decade or so, Konami just left a bad taste in my mouth. From my perspective, it was the fact that they had so many IPs that they underutilized and those that they did milk (Yu-Gi-Oh) felt like low effort cash grabs. So seeing them actually putting an effort to developing and publishing games over the last few years has been a bit surprising. But hey, if it results in them opening their vault of old games and bringing them to more audiences, I'm all for it.

Have a Nice Death (Switch, Steam) March 22nd, 2023

Roguelikes are a genre that I never imagined myself exploring until I played Hades. Now, I'm on the search for any other roguelikes that can scratch that satisfying itch of slashing through enemies, failing horribly, and getting back up and trying again (with some leniency since I'm bad at games). I'm not quite sure what to expect when coming into this game as I like to know as little as possible about new games I'm interested in (outside of the basics to make sure I'm actually interested in it).

Mineko's Night Market (Switch, Steam) 2023

This is another indie title that I've had my eye on since it was first revealed in a Nintendo Indie Direct a couple years ago or so. Since then, it's been remaining low key, trickling out information every once in a blue moon. But now, it seems as though we are at the end of the tunnel, with a potential release date coming this year.

Those are just some of the games that I’m excited to play this year. But what games have your interest peaked? 

[augustallosaurus]

Tag Game

RULES: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it.

I was tagged by @ogsimpgoose and then accidentally forgot abt it for a few days LMFAO. I was reminded tonight hence the poor formatting of the post because I’m doing this on my phone before I pass out.

I’m fairly certain @pastel-skulls hasn’t been tagged yet :) suffer

world building works

“The Myceal Desert” — originally a world doc dedicated to a cat civilization heavily inspired by Ancient Egypt that I’ve been considering adding into my Big Project (tm)

“The Origins” — a word doc dedicated to the scribbled down notes I have surrounding what was originally Wolvden Lore but has since grown into something much bigger. It’s currently mostly about the Parthenon of Gods that rule over my various wolf packs.

“End / Elytrian Lore” — a doc I have that’s similar to the Origins doc in the sense that it’s filled with what is mostly mindless notes and scribbles. Though this one is about my Minecraft Au and the History and Biology of the creatures of the End Dimension.

“The ARK” — admittedly my most empty word doc that is going to be scribbles of ideas for my AU based around the game Ark: Survival Evolved with the slightest hint of Horizon: Zero Dawn.

original character works

“The Afterwood CYA” — a choose your own adventure style game I’ve been working on and off over the past year. Essentially you play the part of a wolf (yes, within the Origins universe) that wakes up within a world of eldritch horrors and must do what you can to survive.

“Afterwood CYA Prologue” — another choose your own adventure game that would act like a prologue to the above. Unlike the above, though, it would have a ‘canon’ ending that would be alluded to throughout the main CYA game. It’s meant to be like a tutorial level for the larger CYA.

“Ghast loses her wings” — an original character of mine (more specifically, an elytrian minecraft oc based off the Origins Mod) gets her wings ripped off a la Maleficent style and has to come to terms with the consequences of that, both mentally and physically. The story is actually told through the eyes of Goose’s (tagged above! :D) OC.

“Lord of the Rain” — a God within ‘the Origins’ Universe, Thunder Weaver, comes face to face with his murderer; the woman who loved him more than anything.

Abandoned Works

^ I do not plan on finishing these fics, but I would be more than happy to answer questions about them :)

“In the Beginning, there was Nothing.” — a short, “introduction monologue” style fic that would have introduced the Parthenon of the Origin Universe as well as the reasoning behind their creation.

“Into the Night Sky” — another wolf fic but it was more of a ‘filler’ than anything else. Originally meant to be a short little scene explaining the beginning of a massive shift within one of the packs and was heavily inspired by dialogue from the show Grey’s Anatomy.

“Driftrot” — “My parents named me Vulturekit, for the markings on my face. My father always seemed proud of it, some sort of sign from Starclan, but as I grew it just felt like a bitter reminder.”

“Dying” — “Frosted was never an optimist, so when he realizes that Badger Bite doesn’t have the herbs he needs to help his friend recover from influenza, he goes to extremes to ensure Whispering Wood’s survival.” Set within the Origin universe.

[redshoes-blues]

Reading The Priory of the Orange Tree 🍊🐉🗡

Yesterday I started The Priory of the Orange Tree, and I’m LOVING it so much, so I’ve decided to start a tag on my blog to share my thoughts and theories as I read, since I have nobody to rant to. Might as well rant on here. Sort of a liveblog, but not exactly “live.” I’ll be putting all spoilers under the cut for people who haven’t read the book yet. If you haven’t, you should. It’s really fucking great :)

Here are my thoughts up to Ch. 9, aka the first 100 pages of the book.

Do you ever start a book and know it’s going to be your new favourite book? Because that’s how I felt starting this one. And that feeling has only grown as I’ve read onwards. Oh my god.

I’m someone who takes ages to finish a book these days, because I get distracted or don’t have time to read, and so I struggle to get absorbed into the books I’m reading like when I was a kid. When I was a kid I would be transported into books and feel like I was there. Which is exactly how I feel as I’m reading this book, and it makes me so excited!

First of all, I ADORE how we’re seeing both the East and West perspectives, because it adds so much nuance to the story and helps to show the biases inherent within especially the West’s view of dragons and the events surrounding The Nameless One. The two sides have such different worldviews, though both stemming from the same legend, and I find that fascinating and very realistic to how the real-world operates. Dividing the story up this way is also a great way to show how different the two regions are, and I’m loving the contrast. I’m also interested to see how the stories continue to connect, as so far, Niclays is quite connected to the plot in the West, but Tané isn’t.

West

WHO/WHAT ARE PRIORY! WHAT IS THE ORANGE TREE! Don’t answer that. I’m so intrigued.

A magic order of some sort??? Idk. But Ead’s backstory is so interesting and I need all the details. Already, the fact that she has to pretend to be a convert of another faith (love how this is revealed), has to hide her magic, which seems to be dwindling (magic oranges?), etc. is just damn. Girl tell me everything. Spill the details.

Also. OKAY. The suggestion of the iconic privateer lady that Sabran may have some sort of powers and that’s why the Queens look the same and only have one daughter. I have so many questions. Because at first I assumed there was some sort of divine intervention playing into this. But now I’m wondering if she truly is hiding magic (along with her probable lesbianism).

I adore court drama. Seriously, I’m a period drama girlie through and through, and these dynamics are a blast for me to read. The way the religion functions in Virtudom is especially fascinating to me. I could read pages of lore on that alone. And seeing the contrast in Ead’s beliefs, how they treat her because she’s a convert (though not actually a convert in terms of belief), hurts my heart. There’s so much bias in Virtudom. Ironically, despite them seeing Seikii as this closed-off place, they’re closed-off in an entirely different way.

It’s SO very interesting and realistic that Virtudom would wind up worshipping a male Saint rather than the woman who actually put The Nameless One to rest. Sigh. And how she’s depicted as a damsel in distress in their version of the story is very sad when in actuality (at least according to Ead who I very fully trust right now) she is the hero of the story.

That commentary on how stories have immense power is brilliant. The way we tell stories, the perspectives we tell them from, IS incredibly powerful. And when we look at who is telling much of this story, that becomes clear. Ead is an outsider in the court—from her lack of noble blood, her religion, where she is from, to her magic. Niclays is an outcast from that same court. Tané is from a place that Virtudom stereotypes and really knows nothing about. Loth may be from the court, but he’s about to learn a whole lot about what he doesn’t know about the people who supposedly worship The Nameless One.

I love when the structure of a story supports its thesis. God, Samantha Shannon you are a genius.

I fully expected this story to be told mostly by Sabran, so seeing that she doesn’t have a POV at all (at least yet) has been surprising but also refreshing. It’s clear there’s a lot we don’t know about Sabran, and I’m interested to know more.

Another thing, I knew this book would feature a relationship between Ead and Sabran (I assume those two. I know there’s a main lesbian romance), because it’s widely discussed online. Clearly this isn’t knowledge we’re meant to have at this point in the story, but the hints are definitely there.

Also. I fucking love Loth. And Kit!

One silly, tiny thing that has been plaguing me. Inys has tea. Where do they get tea from? I assume tea doesn’t grow there given the historical inspirations for various countries in this book. Obviously the tea doesn’t come from Seikii. That makes me think they have some trade with the Empire of the Twelve Lakes, which has yet to be mentioned. This is such an inconsequential thing, and I’m probably the only one concerned about the trade relationships allowing them to have tea lmao, but here we are.

East

I know this is high fantasy and not a one-for-one with historical periods, but the inspiration of Seikii seems to clearly draw from Japan’s policy of Sakoku, aka their period of isolation wherein they only really traded with China and the Dutch. This is one of my favourite historical time periods, and not one I’ve seen shown in fantasy before, so that has been great for me, a former history major.

Oddly, one of the main complaints I’ve seen towards this book is that lots of people weren’t interested in Niclays’ POV. This surprises me, as I’ve really enjoyed his POV so far. He’s so whiny and grumpy, which is very valid of him considering what he’s gone through. The bit of his love story I’ve seen so far pulled at my heartstrings and had me feeling for the guy. I’m very sad he’s been captured and hope he’ll be alright. I shall miss his silly alchemical endeavours.

Okay. The way Seikii reveres their dragons is sooo interesting. The selection ceremony way very beautiful and god those descriptions of the dragons were everything. Love how the prose for Seikii is different from the West, with more watery imagery and so forth. It really helps paint a picture of two separate places and I love that.

I don’t have much to say about this part of the story yet, just that I love the prose and descriptions and how it differs from the West, and how the culture is being shown so far. Aside from that, I definitely have questions about the dragons. The West really is fearful of them and hates them, even viewing them as evil, their worship as heretical. But on Seikii they have a very peaceful and symbiotic relationship with their dragons. That contrast is interesting. Is the violent nature of some dragons due to their biological differences? Is it projection from Inys and Virtudom? Is it a consequence of how they’ve treated dragons—aka their hatred of dragons and lack of respect for means the dragons don’t respect them in turn? Dragons in Seikii seem to be sentient creatures, as in the story of The Nameless One. Could the dragons hate Virtudom for how they’ve treated them?

🍊🐉🗡

That’s about it for now!! I shall return with more thoughts :)

Ps: I FORGOT TO MENTION THE MAPS! I fucking love maps. And glossaries. And the name chart at the back is so useful. Gah. I love books that come with that sort of thing.

[mkayswritings]

WIP Tag

Rules: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous.  Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it! And then tag as many people as you have wips.

Black OPs Kim Ga On

Briggs Edward Elric

D2 Flinching

Kitsune WWX

Whumpril Day 1

Febuwhump Day 1

Whumptober 2018 insomnia (cause I never finish things on time)

Kitsune Sanji - Lore written only so far

K&H Cultivation AU that I will need to write up

 Drabble List 2 -  “I’ve never felt stronger than when you’re with me.” (I haven't plotted it out yet though)

Thanks for the tag @clawbehavior!

Tagging: Anyone who reads this, I am not for sure who to really tag lol.

[tharizdun-03]

86 Part 2 Review

I am moving some of my Twitter threads over to Tumblr as well. This is one of them.

Part 2 was a bit better. We didn't focus too much on the world-building issues that Part 1 has, which was immediately an improvement, but the foundation is still wonky with some underdeveloped characters, but it has its moments here and there. It ended well.

Let’s talk about Shin, cause he’s really the main character in this part. I often found him quite bland tbh. I do still think that most of his intrigue was in his backstory with his brother, which wasn’t much of a story, it was just back. It was that underdeveloped.

I mentioned it in my thread for Part 1, but as that part of his character is finished, he’s just really fucking boring in this part, my God. There’s the nice little, you know, don’t really have a purpose but fighting and am suicidal thing, which, neat, but it was so rarely really touched upon. Most of the time he just didn’t do much, or say much, anything. 

The second to last episode finally got into his head, and, it was mostly just stuff we already knew, so still not the deep dive I was looking for, but the visual presentation was pretty nuts. 

It was probably my favourite episode just for that tbh. This is Toshimasa Ishii's TV directorial debut, I just learned. Maybe a guy to keep an eye on in the future, at least from this episode alone. It's a pretty well-directed series, in general, tho, I'd say.

Then Lena comes in, and, I've mentioned it before too, but their relationship is just too under-developed, she shouldn’t be as inspiring to him as she is. 

The first ”hint” throughout the show, of romance, was Lena walking in on some couple flirting and imagined doing that with Shin as she was talking on the phone with him, and that's like, alright, 16-year-old girl, fine, she can think that, but we have barely anything from Shin. 

You have to build up romance. They're really trying to present this as if Lena gave him something that his friends couldn't, that she was of special value to him, but we don't get much of that in the actual show. Well, there’s a bit, of her being able to live on which is new, cause he’s the Reaper, but it doesn’t warrant all this, for me. Her boring, redundant lines shouldn't change Shin's entire worldview like that.

The payoff doesn't feel earned when the writing that went into their relationship doesn't warrant it. And then they just shove the romance in our face in the finale too, as they all tease about Shin and Lena (their guardian even says ”boy meets girl”), like come on lol.

Then it’s also that the characters, having been on the battlefield all this time, have it ingrained in them that they want to go back out there and fight, and it's just, kind of... I dunno. It makes sense? Yeah, yeah it does. It's just a bit annoying cause the audience knows they're completely wrong and their guardian is correct, they deserve a normal life, but it gets the plot going at least? They could've really delved into this with them all in a more tragic kind of way, but well. Oh yeah, there’s Frederica.

Yeah…

She’s nine years old. She can drop complex lore on us or tactical strategies, yet can’t pull her hat from covering her eyes.

She’s really annoying, and the narrative finds any excuse it can to force her to the battlefield, where she has her little moment with Kariya (who does nothing but yell btw, give the "antagonist" a bit more meat pls 86). I don’t really like her much. Her voice grates me.

I actually missed Lena this season lol. 

The side characters don’t really get much. You know, the Kurena is still crushing on Shin, Anju is still scaring people, and the spiky-haired guy is, mostly the same, tho there was a nice confrontation with Shin. 

And, I’m gonna address a critique people brought up last time. Yes, of course, there are examples in the real world where oppression started suddenly and seemingly out of nowhere, but no, that doesn’t justify the show’s execution of this. You misunderstood my point.

The world-building in part 1 is just that under-explored. Even in real life when there are sudden turns like that, it’s not really that sudden under the surface. There’s a history of propaganda, events; build-up that lead to that sudden switch. We don’t get anything of that in 86. I mean, I don’t even believe that fiction is automatically a-okay in its exploration of events if the same things happen in real life, but it doesn’t even happen here. The anime literally misses all of that. So, that was my point. Comparing it to reality doesn't do much here.

Anyway, the dialogue is really repetitive, they recycle a lot of thematic points and lines all of the time (they all harass the 86 with the exact same retorts each time, the 86's reasons for still fighting that they keep repeating, the side characters shticks being repetitive who besides that mostly just talk about Shin, every time we delve into Shin we get what we already knew in a slightly different but basically the same way, etc.) And it always has to be so on the nose, like the guy who wants to pay for his sister's education, of course, he loves her so much his entire room is filled with pictures of her, like come on, don’t shove it in my face (or Shin and Lena's romance being teased by the other characters as previously mentioned). They also bring Fido back, after that beautiful farewell in Part 1, which kinda pissed me off. Overall tho, it’s just boring, predictable, uninteresting, unoriginal, etc. It's stuff I've seen before, and here explored as little as possible, and when it does so also does it in such a redundant manner that it's difficult to believe it has the impact it has on the characters. But, a lot of the time when it is all these things, it’s fine. Not outright bad, just fine, and occasionally good. If you asked me if I think the show is any good, I’d say it’s just alright. 

Score:

Original Twitter Thread: https://twitter.com/Tharizdun03/status/1528093097183297536?s=20&t=zrQ61ygZkLcbEWXQzq0K2Q

86 Part 1 Review: https://www.tumblr.com/tharizdun-03/701000254353506304/86-part-1-review?source=share

[sparkletastic-cookiedough]

I am conflicted! Torn between good and bad!

I love stop motion animation and this is gonna have stop motion.

Tim Burton tends to do a good job directing, and he’s made movies I like.

That being said, attributing a films quality exclusively to the director is a move that I don’t really like. Film is a collaborative art, and it requires a lot of skilled individuals to work.

And Burton has directed some not good movies before as well.

It looks good from the trailers. I’m intrigued.

But…

I’m worried that the new film is going to dominate the fandom space once it’s released

I’m worried it’ll mess with the way the audience thinks of the character. That it’ll change how the musical is watched after the new film is released.

I absolutely love the musical version, and think the cartoon is pretty good.

The original film is confusing, a bit messy, but generally funny and pretty cool. It has neat effects.

Considering how recent the WGA strike was, I’m a little concerned the overall story may have problems.

There’s also this weird issue I have.

I’m really prideful over my own creative work. About two years ago, I started writing up a pitch and ideas for a reboot of the Beetlejuice tv series. This would be more in line with the musicals canon. Episodes would be animated adult comedy, but with musical numbers added.

Even though I never ended up finishing the episode screenplay, I still love my creation with all my heart.

( the reason I haven’t released some of it on Tumblr or Ao3 yet is because it’s stuff I want to use professionally. I’m in film courses at university.)

There’s so much worldbuilding. Lots of original characters, some obscure ones, and many we know and love. More original characters than would be acceptable for fanfic, but for a tv spin off would be required.

I kinda dampened down on it with school getting busy at times, and building controversial scandals on the media company that is most likely to be associated with the work.

I’ve kinda gotten distracted with other fandoms in the meantime too.

The point is, I put a lot of time into imagining my own canon for this story. Pages and pages of lore. Like 10% of a screenplay.

So it’s sorta weird to be thrust into something that goes against my canon.

Also, the release of the new movie might murder my dream of the Beetlejuice tv show adaptation of the musical. People are gonna want to see Astrid, and will be disappointed when it’s a different version of Beetlejuice at its core.

That being said, my ideas are still good. Parts of my OCs can be recycled into new projects. The basic premise of an episode can be stretched and formed into a film. Parts of it are too tied up in the lore of Beetlejuice, most parts are almost entirely original.

So in total, I am excited for the movie, but I also feel a strange amount of sadness in the death of a dream.

Thoughts on the upcoming Beetlejuice Movie sequel?

Hi! I'm a bit of a Beetlejuice the Musical first kinda person (not for any reason in terms of not liking the movie, just that I watched it a little younger than I maybe should have and the stop-motion animation really scared me 🥲)

I do need to rewatch the original movie as I've not seen it for ages, I think the trailers for the sequel are looking promising, and apparently Burton has said he's really focussed on practical effects for the movie? (IDK if that's true I haven't seen sources but it'd be cool if so)

How are u feeling about it?

[dkniade]

Critique on the Game Design of Genshin Impact / Praise for the Dragonspine Region

Genshin Impact’s music and visuals are beautiful (though at times inaccurate), and I’m sure the story is amazing too... if I had the chance to experience them.

I saw some fanart of Sumeru characters today and felt a sense of intrigue yet also emptiness, but this isn't the first time I felt empty at a region’s release. I started playing in spring 2021, but was very casual about it, so currently I’ve only finished the Mondstadt Archon Quest and a few characters' Story Quests.

Really, ever since last year’s release of version 2.0 and Inazuma, I’ve felt a huge disconnect with Genshin Impact’s story due to the game design and the prerequisite-based restriction of regions. Initially I was excited for the new content, and that’s fair because Genshin Impact does an amazing job promoting its content through videos, but ever since I learned of the prerequisites, I lost interest and could only watch from the sidelines as a casual player.

The game was marketed as an open world RPG, yet players must follow the game’s design to access the newest and most important content, where the main story is kept. Without doing all the prerequisites, no matter how well the promotional content is, only a group of dedicated players can access the new content. And I haven’t even started talking about the limited time events yet, especially with the decision of putting important lore in time-limited quests (looking at you, versions 1.2, 2.3, and 2.7). Genshin Impact’s story-focused player base is only successful because of its excellent start prior to version 2.0.

For this reason, I’m the happiest not when doing the main quests, but when exploring the lands of Liyue myself and accidentally stumbling upon World Quests. Is that not what an open world RPG is supposed to be like?

This is why Dragonspine remains my favourite region. It was released back in version 1.2 in winter 2020, yet there is no Archon Quest so there was no pressure to go there. During the 2.3 event prerequisite, I finally decided to step into the mountain. I knew I wouldn’t be able to play the event but I was still happy I got to do Albedo’s Story Quest. From there, my intrigue in the snowy mountain region grew due to my love for the beautiful visuals and music instead of pressure from the quests.

In terms of what we get from promotional videos, Dragonspine isn't anything flashy, but it’s a region that everyone can access after its initial release. There are no Adventure Rank level requirements nor quest requirements, meaning a wider group of players can explore the region.

The environment and level design of Dragonspine is praiseworthy as well. It’s a very small region on the map, but because it’s a tall mountain, the level designers took full advantage of its volume and made the interior of Starglow Cavern huge along with the spiraling paths up the mountain, leading to the summit of the Skyfrost Nail. Through the World Quests with no time limit whatsoever, we venture into the mysterious and dangerous mountain of Dragonspine with only our companions to keep us warm, and we discover bit by bit the secret past of the fallen kingdom beneath the ice and snow.

This is the open world RPG that I love. As for the Archon Quests… The further away they are from Mondstadt, the less interest I have in them.