#i'll never not be salty about this
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inventedfangirling · 11 months ago
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just realizing that i can forgive shows if it's bad from start to end for whatever reason (the creators aren't very experienced/ the premise/characters/acting is not for me or i just don't get it) and i'd drop it halfway through at least it is actually so much better than painstakingly crafting a masterful story, luring in the audience with compelling characters, important messages and representation along with excellent actors and then ending up completely botching up everything in the last stretch. that's like making a perfect multilayered creamy decadent melt-in-your-mouth gooey-goodness level cake and then pouring tar all over it.
WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU DO THAT!?!?!?
WHY???????
WHY!?
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blackkatmagic · 5 months ago
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OTP: Kycina/K'Sheek, the ship of canon mothers with fascinating motivations and hinted-at backstories who deserved so much more than the handful of references made to them, or dying due to their unacknowledged trauma.
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weedle-testaburger · 1 year ago
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so, in conclusion: summer camp island good
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Okay I thought I was done but apparently I'm not. I need to talk more about this banter you can get during the Legacy DLC between Aveline and Warden Carver because it makes me want to scream.
Aveline: I'm glad you found a place with the Wardens. Carver: Well, it's not the city guard, but it'll do. Aveline: Carver... it wasn't the place for you. Carver: No, it's all right. It is. It cost a lot, but I get it. I really was a bit of a tit those days, wasn't I? Aveline: Well...
In my last post, I talked about how Aveline had no place telling the guard to refuse Carver's application, regardless of if he was "right" for the job or not. But I believe he would've made a great guard, and getting that job not only would've provided for him and his family during a desperate time, but would've prevented him from either fate of becoming a warden or a templar. He was unfairly robbed of a chance to prove himself because Aveline believed he wasn't right for the guard.
This is one of the banters I brought up but didn't go too in depth about. At this point, it's been between 3-6 years since Act 1, depending on if you decided to do Legacy in Act 2 or Act 3, and every line here is important.
Carver's response to Aveline saying she's glad he "found a place" with the wardens is so telling. Not being accepted by the guard is still on his mind after all this time. He wouldn't bring it up if it didn't still bother him, and implies that he still would've preferred the guard over the wardens.
Which... yeah. Listen, I'm a dedicated "Carver joins the Grey Warden" player. I don't like leaving him behind to become a templar, and I certainly don't like him dying. For me, the Grey Wardens are the best outcome he has. It’s where he seems the happiest and finds the most fulfilment, and it fits well with how I play my Hawke. But it obviously has some tragic issues.
Like the fact that becoming a Grey Warden only delayed his inevitable death within the Deep Roads. Eventually his Calling will come, and Carver will go back down there and fight until the darkspawn eventually kill him. I'm sure that's not traumatic to think about given he was a soldier at Ostagar and then watched Bethany die at the hands of an ogre. Oh, and there's the whole nightmares and voices thing.
Carver didn't choose this life for himself. It was either this or death, but a "what if?" still lingers in his mind about the city guard.
Something Aveline ruined for him.
And continues to ruin.
Aveline: Carver... it wasn't the place for you.
You hear that? In the distance? That's me screaming.
I must reiterate; what makes Aveline believe it's her place to tell Carver whether or not the city guard was right for him? Why did she think she should get a say in whether or not the guard takes him? What's made it HER call?
And still, after all this time has passed, she believes it wasn't right for him and she's unwilling to consider otherwise. Maker forbid she do some reflection and question if she was in the right for interfering at all, too!
Carver is standing right there before her, proving everything she said about him wrong, and she just doubles down. There's no reason to say this to him unless she's trying to remind him of his place; he's a Grey Warden, and she's Guard-Captain of Kirkwall's city guard. But c'mon, Aveline, he's hardly a threat to your precious guard anymore given the whole dedication to killing darkspawn thing he has now.
Maybe if you paid more attention to the threats within your guard, Kirkwall would be a safer place with less murder going around? Just saying!
But isn't that how it's always been? Aveline putting him in his place, making sure Carver remembers she's always outranked him?
Carver: Did you approve my application? Aveline: I can't make you a guard, Carver. Carver: We were both soldiers. Why won't they take me? Aveline: I was an officer. And I follow orders. Carver: [laughs] No you don't. Aveline: I also think of others before myself. You seem tired of that, and that's dangerous. Carver: Just when it's not my choice. You told them not to take me, didn't you? Aveline: Yes.
That he should remember who he's talking to?
Carver: I'm surprised you still travel with us, Aveline. Aveline: Carver, don't. Carver: You're ever so busy with the guardsmen. It must be a burden to slum with the refugees. Aveline: It's oddly comforting that you insult me like I'm family. Carver: That wasn't... no, I didn't mean that. Aveline: I know. But you should be glad that's how I took it.
That she's in charge?
Aveline: Your form's sloppy, Carver. Stiffen up or the darkspawn will take your blade. Carver: Right. I'll keep that in mind. Aveline: And you're angry, why? Carver: You didn't fare any better than I did the last time we faced darkspawn. Aveline: If they take your blade, people die. That's not happening again. Stiffen up. Carver: Yes ma'am.
Oh, and she used to spy on him [and Hawke].
Aveline: I don't like some of the people you've been associating with, Carver. Carver: Talk to my brother/sister. He/She's the one in charge. Aveline:  Maybe, but I know you get around. This city's full of people who are dead set on ending badly. I don't want to see you end up the same way. Carver: Would asking you to stop spying on me help in the least? Aveline: No.
That's their banter.
But sure, she's glad he found a place in the wardens. I don't think she's being ingenuine when she says that, but I think it's a little more complicated than a mere "congrats on doing well, I knew you could do it."
But Carver's response? Oh Maker's ass. It actually hurts me.
Carver: No, it's all right. It is. It cost a lot, but I get it. I really was a bit of a tit those days, wasn't I? Aveline: Well...
I... what can I even say?
He accepts it, but you can tell it hurts to do so. It DID cost a lot. More than Aveline will ever understand. And it doesn't matter now! He can't become a guard now anyway, so what would be the point in him disagreeing with her? Carver acts as the bigger person here because he does get it, even if Aveline doesn't.
But it's that last part... that last damn part... Don't be alarmed, that screaming you hear is still me.
Here's the deal; Carver acknowledges that he could be an ass back in Act 1. Hell, he acknowledges it IN Act 1. For example, when you talk to him after finding your grandfather's will, he's an ass to you about Bethany no matter what you say.
But y'know what? You can be the biggest piece of shit to him and have Hawke literally call him a "lazy brat with a chip on his shoulder," and Carver will still be the one to be apologetic for what he said and attempt to explain his feelings.
"Brother/Sister... I feel... I don't know. It's like Mother taking things out on us. She was just scared. I don't have a place in the life she's trying to bring back…"
Carver can be an ass, but he's aware of that and actively tries to change his behavior. If you bring him and Fenris with you on the Mark of the Assassin DLC, there's a moment where Carver says, "You still don't like me? I've tried to change." And if you bring Varric, he once again acknowledges that he used to be an ass.
BUT... that being said. If you don't remember, "I really was a bit of a tit those days, wasn't I?" is referencing back to this conversation in the barracks of Act 1:
Hawke: This must be a very different pace from serving King Cailan. Aveline: It's just one more change, though. The real end for me was Ostagar. What about you Carver? You were there. Do you feel something similar? Carver: No. Aveline: All right, then. Bit of a tit, your brother.
Now, I've already expressed my beef with Aveline over insulting Carver in the middle of the barracks just because he doesn't agree with her view point on Ostagar... but consider the fact that Carver says nothing. He just lets her insult him without a complaint! Carver Hawke, who tends to complain! And he says nothing!
Not only that, but he actually internalized that insult enough that years later he's able to repeat it back to Aveline word for word, and all she has to say is, "Well..."
This isn't the same thing as him reflecting on his past behavior and acknowledging his flaws. This is Carver accepting a snide jab Aveline made that hurt him because apparently he was wrong for not wanting to discuss any trauma Ostagar left him with as openly as she does.
Oh, and don't forget that any other companion you brought along dogpiles on, too!
Carver: No, it's all right. It is. It cost a lot, but I get it. I really was a bit of a tit those days, wasn't I? Aveline: Well... Varric: No shit. Fenris: Insufferable. Isabela: Legendary. Anders: Maker, yes. Sebastian: I've heard as much. [If Hawke has a humorous/charming personality] Hawke: Spoiled, annoying, thick-headed, brattish little nitwit of a... oh, have we stopped?
Y'all ever wonder why he's so on edge or hostile with the other companions?
Also, I have to point out that Merrill is the only companion who doesn't say anything in agreement if she's there. In fact, across all their banter, Merrill's never been rude or insulting toward him. All she does is ask him if he's talking dirty to her and compliments him on what a great sworder he is. It's pretty obvious why Carver develops a crush on her, c'mon.
But to wrap this up-
This banter strikes a nerve due to how telling it is about both characters involved.
Carver has grown and done what he can to improve himself, but there's regret that lingers, a longing for a better life he could've had if given a chance. Maybe he would've failed, maybe he would've succeeded. But there's nothing he can do now, so he looks forward, just as he's always wanted to do. He's a damn good Grey Warden who wants to do right.
Aveline remains stagnant. She hasn't changed, nor has she improved, and maybe she would if she could figure out how to dislodge her head from her own ass. She still believes she was in the right to tell the guard not to accept Carver's application despite knowing the Hawke's were desperate and that Fereldan refugees couldn't find work. She knew Carver's a skilled soldier who fought at Ostagar just as she did. The guard wasn't the place for him so she's in the right to deny him any chance. Aveline knows best.
And y'know what, I think all I have left to say is...
Fine, Aveline. You're right. It wasn't the place for him.
Carver was too good for your city guard.
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nitrozem · 3 months ago
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My original plans were ruined by the implosion of my old save so I just made a side save to just do them with Ajay for the rewards
Too bad I get no pop ups or alerts about the event, it's as if it isn't even active on my end 😑
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jamiethebee · 5 months ago
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I don't know what to think, but of the League who made it to the second half of the manga, Spinner is the only one who's family backstory/circumstances we never hear of.
Dabi is a Todoroki
Toga's parents rejected her
Twice's died
Compress has his family legacy
Shigaraki is a Shimura
Spinner is ??? Does he have siblings?? Parents? Grandparents? Anyone? No one? An orphan? We get nothing about him specifically, nothing that can't be related (or parallels drawn) with other characters.
And with the weakest quirk of the League, he's left alive? Like he's not even a threat to the heroes as himself? The complete lack of care that he's given in the story is...
#the bee talks#shuichi iguchi#sorry idk where im going with this.#he was inspired by stain - he's experienced discrimination - the hate groups - but nothing about him personally.#everything we know about him is shared by other characters.#despite being the narrator of MVA despite being there till the end despite his relationships with the other League members#all we get of him is how he relates to everyone else in the story? i - i - .... im feeling something but idk WHAT#there's something all this is pointing to that im just not grasping at the moment#not to mention compress getting sidelined for the whole last fight with his ass missing but we know more about his personal#circumstances than we do spinner. (still salty about compress not getting to be The Drama ✨)#listen we know he was a hikikomori but NOTHING about the circumstances! was he with family? squatting somewhere?#unfortunately for everyone involved idk that i'll ever stop thinking about him. there was a chance but since he's unresolved in the final#chapter there's nothing to stop my brain from what if-ing and and-ing all of my thoughts.#unfortunately he is going to live on in my brain for a long time yet and it is horikoshi's fault for not being concrete about him.#i did not include magne or gigantomachia with this because they're not part of the “core” league (magne i love you but u died early on)#alSO! speaking of gigantomachia: there was a theory about gigantomachia being Crimson Riot or smth and it was never disproved. just saying#bnha manga spoilers#bnha spoilers#bnha#unless i'm missing something but we just know he was a country boy right? and the pesticides and that's it?#but again he shares that discrimination with other characters (shoji) and it wasn't even the “worst” example of that#spinner you might've been made to be “mid” in every aspect but wow you captivated me. what a guy.#sorry to my non-mha followers for being... like this the past few days asdfghj block one of the bnha tags if you need to shut me up some
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maleficore · 1 year ago
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Y'know.. I don't really see people acknowledge in fanworks that Arthur did not crawl out of the womb a good artist and probably was a bit shit when he started. By that I mean, even in fics where he's in his 20s his art is almost always described as Really Good, on par with what we see in the game and like... there's 10+ years of practice between those. You probably wouldn't be able to tell a horse from a deer back then lol.
Overall people tend to hype him up into this Da Vinci type figure and while he IS really good, no one's perfect. He's best at drawing environments, buildings, nature. His animals are great, but you can tell he doesn't draw people as often. To me it makes him seem more real as an artist. I can draw a dog with my eyes closed, but if you asked me to draw a cityscape, I would probably cry. The fact Arthur seems no different makes him seem so much more real and it makes me sad when people erase that bit of humanity from his art :(
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hyp3rfixation-h3ll · 1 year ago
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Ok,but hear me out
Baby pac purring when he is held by one of his folks.
Or him teething,and zac is just cry bc his son is growing up...and his finger hurt bc pac is chomping him.
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you had me at "hear me out" yugo
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pawseds · 3 months ago
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I guess I have a writing/update schedule for @sparrow-flight now! New stories every Saturday/Sunday I guess? We'll see if it'll last over 2 weeks?
In other words, the next story is ready! :) it just needs its last round of editing in the morning. It's the story that's been through the most change and has had the most work put into it, since I submitted it for my short story class. It's one big character sketch of the dysfunctional family that the Vorobyevs are as they are try their best to not be dysfunctional in their own ways. I think there are some fun dynamics in there, espscially with Hrodwyn being the eldest child? I can't wait to put it up tomorrow :D
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ahlaway · 1 year ago
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okay one thing about the men from another zip code losing their minds over a teen doing yard work they didn't approve of.
the thing that drives me crazy about it is...how surprised everyone acted? like, Tubbo didn't just plop himself down next to spawn and decide to take over.
Phil pointed that spot out to him, and from the very beginning he's been clear to anyone who asks: he's building a factory district. no one at any point has said that was a bad idea, or he shouldn't do it near spawn or anything like that.
until he's made a big move in doing that.
then suddenly everyone's mad at him for doing the thing he's been saying he was going to do since the beginning.
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keeps-ache · 1 day ago
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good morning and merry christmas !! aesthetic photo of my cookies be upon ye
#just me hi#i put them on the plate and then the little devil and my shoulder said Hey what if we spent the next 20+ minutes editing it#and they were right that was fun lmfvshgh#Except for looking for a glitter brush on ibis! why are all the thumbnails so blurry it hurts my eyes Ghfksfjvk#yea the phone is working out good :) i'm gonna be taking pictures of everything now ehehehgh#also forgot to eat these for the 20+ minutes i was playing w/ the pictures#my breakfastttt: (went to go count but i have eaten some now. ouh) ✋10 🤚 christmas cookies :3#they're little ones- oh hey these pretzel one are kinda salty! yaaay#i like the swirly/horseshoe ones the most though. nyum#/we have pozole my mom made last night but i think that has to be warmed up hfhsvh#we got back from christmas midnight mass and everyone- Everyone (crazy) went to bed as soon as we got home lmfhvshg#i don't think that's ever happened. usually a couple are still awake until dawn and Then they go to sleep lol#yea but we didn't even get to try to the pozole last night <//3 helped to strain it last night though :D it smelled kinda sweet+spicy so ou#//we're waiting til i think friday or saturday for presents this year because of the Events so noo wrapping cleaning today 🎉💥 kfsvh#and i've been asked what i wanted. see i don't have that trouble of suddenly not having a want in the world: i just kinda don't have that#already for some reason lmao ?? so yea default state. do you think i'll get socks kfshvfh#//do love having to go back into my tags and add the topic slash bc every topic is related All the time Forever lmfsh#//hey but i DO need socks HEY i'm not joking anymore. don't want any with patterns though they will bother me lol#cuz unless i like the patterns i am not going to wear them :/ that is unless i think they're silly then they pass#are they holiday-themed? i'll prolly still wear them during the fourth of july so we can guarantee 1 whole day of use lhfshvjg#however during the warmer days (anything above 55 degrees) i wear chanclas w/o socks. so maybe not so much guaranteed#and also if i can't find it's match i will just never wear it again. truly tragic#i'm painstakingly matching my plain white socks i can Not handle patterned socks again#/wait was this post about cookies. dude how did we get here Lmfjvskfhvahfhvj#//Okay i'm gonna ummm#Ummmmmmmm#uuuuhm. draw :3 Toodles !! merry christmas !! <3
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kyouka-supremacy · 10 months ago
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Mmmhh...
#(Basically rant on my last two posts)#I know I've said it before and sorry for coming off as annoying–#but I really wish we still had a central bsd blog on Tumblr like fy-bungoustraydogs or bsd-central or things of the kind.#I think now everyone rushes to post news first. And although there's merit to it in knowing news as soon as they happen‚#in the long run the death of this kind of central official content ***fan*** blogs is such a huge loss of fandom spaces‚#especially for the archiving purposes they solved. Especially today that T/witter and G/oogle have basically become unusable.#Literally. Literally. I've been doing official content archiving since I was 11#(because that's the very specific kind of mental illness I have)#and let me tell you that the quality of web search and especially reverse image search only got worse–#in a way that is very evident and noticeable. Which is crazy tbh and not how things should work.#If anyone would like to start a bsd-central kind of blog I'll be the first one to follow.#Actually if anyone actually wants to establish it feel free to contact me and I'll be more than happy to share the resources I have!!!!#It just needs to be something multi-modded for a series of reasons I won't get into right now#I just can't personally do it (not as main admin at least) because that would be modding my FIFTH active bsd blog–#and that's a little too much even for me.#On top of some ethical concerns I have regarding whether it'd be fair for me to mod a fandom central bsd blog–#when I feel like I can't genuinely share the same amount of love for the franchise other fans share#On top of. You know. Getting a degree eventually hopefully.#Then years after the blog has been solidly enstablished and aquired enough credibility it could even open a free donations found to invest–#in buying and scanning and releasing bsd content that hasn't been shared yet like the guidebooks or illustration books or everything else–#for everyone to see...#The dream. (Is realistically never going to happen) (Won't stop me from daydreaming about it every day)#((Still salty I couldn't afford the guidebooks only due to the shipment prices. I *would* have scanned and uploaded them.))#That was a long and idealistic rant. Kyotag out#Edit: *Modding my SIXTH bsd blog#Apparently I mod so many blogs I lost count of them
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xanderable · 1 month ago
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I understand not wanting people to add certain kinks to your posts (that's me with detrans for example) but not wanting people to interact at all if they ever post about it is weird to me.
It's not like somebody who posts about detrans 99% of the time reblogging my post does anything at all to me. At worst I'll look at their blog, decide I never want to see that again, and block them.
Possibly it exposes my post to their audience who add detrans things to it in which case I'd be really uncomfortable but I assume most people in the kink space have enough respect not to do that and I will just block the ones who do
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punkrockisafulltimejob · 3 months ago
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Chronic fatigue syndrome is both aptly named but also inaccurate bc they don't talk about the flip side of it where you're so exhausted you can't sleep at all
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waywardsalt · 2 years ago
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thoughts on totk now that i’ve beaten it
under the cut bc of length and bc there is honestly a fair bit of negative stuff
i don’t really think i can say that i liked totk.
it’s fine, it’s genuinely fucking incredible from a technical standpoint with ultrahand, recall, the three map layers and with how smoothly it ran for me. as a game it’s fine.
i’ll start with the things i dislike and end with what i actually liked
i honestly didn’t really like ultrahand? i disliked how much the game leaned on it, since so many puzzles and whatever just boiled down to ‘make something that’ll work’ and it just... it was far too clunky for me to really enjoy using it, outside of using some of the same few designs for traversal. there were a few times when i could see what the game wanted me to do with ultrahand and the given zonai parts and sometimes it just... didn’t work at all. more often than not ultrahand was frustrating for me to use so the game’s reliance on it just made it into a chore sometimes.
in a similar vein the dungeons were serious letdowns. i mean, don’t get me wrong, they’re fine, they had good themes and (mostly) had good aesthetics and general looks and identities to them, but the fact that they were just... basically twenty-ish minute little things was kind of disappointing. i hate that they all had the exact same ‘go hit x number of switches’ gimmick. it really limited what you could do and fucked with the dungeon design, too. the only one where that really worked for me was the fire temple, which was my favorite overall. the water temple was especially dismal, with the least inspired look and just being an astoundingly easy experience. the puzzles in those dungeons were so awfully easy, too, especially since half of the time they just hand you what you need so you barely need to really assess the situation and put a plan together
i hated the water dungeon’s little mini-areas where you do a single piss-easy puzzle to automatically get your prize, i hated the wind temple’s god damn ‘pull a lever and get your prize’ kind of puzzles, i hated how soul-crushingly disappointed i felt when i took a look at the lightning temple’s map and realized that every fucking floor had a singular room just for the switch puzzle. god forbid it’s as fun as the lowest level of that temple. i really miss stuff like mini-bosses or rooms where you have to do a puzzle in order to just... progress, i miss dungeons that i could get lost in or spend a while in or just had... something more interesting or some more substance so that i can’t just breeze through like it’s a glorified shrine. most of the puzzles in those dungeons were simpler than some shrines i did.
i didn’t care to do much exploration since there honestly isn’t much motivation to explore the surface map if you’ve already played botw, and the scarcity of materials this time really got to me, it took me a while to have a half-decent stock of materials, and i still had trouble not running out of stuff even though i was using amiibos to stock up on some things. the money situation was rough, too... a lot of things are cheaper to sell, but some armor is still really expensive plus you have to pay the great fairies to upgrade your equipment in addition to having the correct materials. that especially felt odd- having to grab a handful of (goddamn hard to get) lynel guts is hard enough to upgrade the soldier’s armor, but you want me to cough up 500 rupees, too??
(the scarcity of monster guts also got on my nerves, but i’ll just chalk that up to just some kind of really weird difficulty thing. it was annoying until i tracked down the stronger monsters.)
the story is probably the weakest part of the game to me. it’s really hard to have a baseline investment when you don’t care about these characters, anyway, and what i saw in this game’s story still failed to endear me to hardly any of them. link’s role frustrated me; he just comes off like a tool rather than a character this time through, he barely has any actual relevancy to the story segments beyond being the guy who can use the master sword and being the player’s vehicle to get from point a to b in the story. the blank stare and limited emoting worked in botw because... there’s a given reason for his lack of outward emotion in the past, plus he has no memory in the present. it makes sense. but this time around, he’s gotten memories in the years between this and the last game, but he just feels like a background character in most of the story beats. 
he has no role in the memories and in the present just exists to gather some stuff for other people, he gets the master sword from zelda and then helps the other sages get their secret stones, but he’s barely addressed as his own character in the grand scheme of things unless he’s being directly spoken to. he’s just the swordsman capable of wielding the master sword and zelda’s chosen protector as far as the story is concerned. he has no opinions outside of doing what he’s told and looking for zelda. at least not as far as i could really tell. at least in botw, the story directly concerns him, and it’s his story we’re following. this time around zelda and the sages seem like the most important characters, link’s just... there, doing what he’s been told to.
the new sages are fine, none of them really endeared themselves to me, and i will say that making the player watch essentially the exact same cutscene each time you finish a dungeon was BAFFLING. they were long and you learned almost nothing new after the first one, and there was nothing done to make them very distinct to each individual pair of sages or their respective regions; at the very least, it could have been interesting to meet the ancient sages not in the exact same stone garden, but perhaps at the top of a snowy mountain for the rito, near a volcano or something for the goron, maybe in a shallow pool of water for the zora, and in the desert for the gerudo- but no, they’re all effectively the same thing just with the speaking character swapped out with some minor changes.
(the sages themselves are a pain in the ass to use, having to chase them down to activate their power or accidentally activating a power when you don’t want it; yunobo was honestly my favorite, but because i generally defaulted to having them all activated at all times, i had a lot of trouble with tulin blowing shit away from me when i was trying to grab it while midair. they’re half-decent for combat)
i didn’t really care for rauru or sonia, either. rauru in the present as a ghost was fine, he was kind of interesting and seemed to have changed from his time in the past, but he never managed to be a character i particularly liked. i wasn’t really a fan of his... arrogance? or something in the past scenes, and he never really came off as very interesting. sonia was nearly completely uninteresting which is a shame since she has an interesting design, she just felt delegated to the role of supporting rauru and zelda and then dying to motivate them.
ganondorf is a character i was really looking forward to seeing, and it really fucking sucks that he’s so god damn one-dimensional this time! the story can’t be fucked to delve into him beyond just giving us scenes that just tell us that he’s evil and wants to rule hyrule and get the secret stones and nothing else because fuck having complex villains, i guess. especially frustrating because within the game itself you can draw more interesting motivations up for him, but the game really just doubles-down on him being evil for the fuck of it and wanting to end the world because uhhhh... he’s evil don’t fucking worry about it
the ignoring of the triforce in this game sucks in that way, too, because the way the triforce works and how it can grant wishes made it a much more interesting goal for ganondorf to attain, rather than some poorly-named ‘secret stones’ that do nothing more than just amplify power or something. it sucks how black-and-white this damn story is and how it seems like it just wants to do away with any possible nuance or gray area. no one but the bad guys or side characters are flawed in any actually interesting or significant way.
at least ganondorf was still the most interesting character in the flashbacks.
and then zelda, oh god ZELDA. i honestly really liked her in botw. i liked how you saw her as a flawed, insecure, pressured teen, and how you saw her struggles to relate to link and how she eventually warmed up to him. you saw her as a flawed person who develops and as someone who cares deeply about her friends and her duties and gets frustrated by her failings.
and then in totk a lot of her more interesting traits- her interest in sheikah tech, her excitement over field study and research, her more defining traits as this incarnation of zelda- are basically sanded down and she’s just this perfect flawless princess with great power and an insanely passive role in the past beyond finally taking some kind of action after one of her friends dies and she’s pushed to the brink. cool. great.
she has practically no flaw in totk. if anyone in the present talks about her, they have nothing bad to say and just want to please her and follow her orders, she is right in telling the gerudo how to train their troops she is right even when misheard to tell people to put themselves in danger and she is hardly meaningfully questioned when her imposter is doing very clearly suspicious shit. neither the story nor any of the characters wants to let her be flawed. she’s just perfect in damn near every way and barely retains any interesting characterization she got in botw. there are some interesting snippets in her being a teacher and setting up memorials to those who died in the calamity, but there’s hardly any more than that, and it makes it really hard for me to give a damn about her. she’s not interesting this time.
the whole thing with zelda becoming a dragon too, is... it’s fine. it’s ok. but the fact that she turns back at the end with no problem whatsoever is one hell of a fucking misstep. why talk about draconification being forbidden for a good reason anyways if it doesn’t actually matter anyways??? if you never actually see any of those fucking repercussions why even bring them up??? i really feel like it would have been more effective for there to have been actual consequences for zelda beyond just fucking flying around half-conscious for a millennium or whatever- have her lose her memory when she’s brought back! there you go! there’s the reason why draconification is forbidden! there’s the thing about losing yourself! plus, zelda losing her memories as a result would mirror link having lost his memories in botw! that has so much more weight and significance then ‘oh uh ignore the warnings from a while back she’s completely fine dw abt it’ i hate that she’s back just like that without any of the consequences that the game suggests.
the dragon’s tears in general kinda just felt weaker than botw’s memories anyways bc you’re more just. watching stuff happen then actually learning anything. it has less characters and yet i feel like you only get to know like half of the important ones. like three of them are all about the same event. a few times they just replay parts of old memories in new ones. if they ever reference a past memory they just show you what they’re referencing instead of leaving you to piece it together. just play the voices or something don’t break the flow of things to play a clip of something i’ve already seen.
plus the fact that totk... barely acknowledges that it’s a sequel to botw really rubs me the wrong way. i understand that loz is extremely loose with its lore, but totk is a direct sequel set in the same world a few years later, and yet the events and characters of botw have might as well been forgotten and its all either ignored, brushed aside, or straight up replaced by something else for no good reason. the continuity between these games is absolutely dismal and to see the different ways in which the events and concepts or botw are just... disregarded really just left a bad taste in my mouth.
just- i love good stories and worlds in video games, and while some games can coast by for me by feeling good to play, having a good and engaging story and characters is usually essential to my enjoyment of a game, and when i don’t care about to the point of disliking the story and characters, and when none of the important areas are fascinating or distinct enough from each other, and when the game even fails to really reel me in with the gameplay...
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i wanted to like totk, but it really just did not work for me. i just ended up feeling frustrated and disappointed and even sometimes bored with all of the major stuff and man. totk is really, REALLY, not for me, and it just left me wanting to play older zelda games instead.
...
HOWEVER! there were actually some things i really loved about totk! it’s not all doom and gloom! (well, not all doom, at least)
so! the music was great! not all of it really fit or made a lot of sense with the context in which they played or failed to evoke the feeling they were meant to, but the new tracks in this game were great! i especially love the first two phases of the fire temple’s theme, the depths music, and most of the new battle and boss themes. zelda games almost never fail when it comes to the music.
i did genuinely like the fire temple- yunobo’s ability was used the best in this dungeon, and it had the best five switches gimmick, i loved how you had to hit the gongs (sometimes having to construct a path to account for the weaknesses of yunobo’s ability) and how it then ‘scared’ each of the five statues holding a part of the gate- it was very cute and fit in very well with the general feel of that part of the story. it was the best in terms of difficulty and complexity, but it didn’t have the best boss- the lightning temple had the best boss, and i will admit that even if most of them were easy, i really enjoyed the mirror puzzles, as well as the process to unlocking the dungeon. the wind temple had my favorite visual identity and aesthetic, though, i liked it being a part of this old rito song, and how it was the most distinct in looks from the other dungeons.
the sky islands were honestly fun, even if they weren’t all that interesting. getting to some of the harder-to-reach islands were some of my favorite times i had to use ultrahand, and stuff like the zonai forge island and the one orblike island with the mirror puzzle, and pretty much all of the more complicated parts of the sky islands were a lot of fun to explore and figure out.
being able to ride on the dragons was just really cool, and the fact that they come out of the chasms was fun.
the new horns for the monsters were cool, it helps differentiate the different monster strengths and i just thought they were really neat.
the quest with lurelin village was fun, even if the pirates just being monsters was a real let-down.
the stable trotters were also a fun bunch of characters, that was a good, new way to open up fairy fountains.
all of the new stuff with the yiga was really fun, like getting their outfit and being able to pretend to be one of them and learning the blademaster attack- so much fun it was so cute.
most of the new outfits are really good and useful, and while a bit janky and not that great, the house-building bit near tarrey was endearing.
while none of the main characters interested me, i really, especially liked tauro and yona and penn. for some reason they just appealed to me and i really wish they had bigger parts in the game because they’re interesting and they have good designs and i’d really like to know more about them.
the underground gerudo shelter was pretty cool, to be honest, and the look of the caves was really cool.
i adored the proving grounds shrines- easily my favorite shrines in the entire game, i had no problem spending a decent amount of time in those kinds of shrines, they were fantastic.
the new ingredients and recipes and new weapons were cool.
the way you basically return to the area you started at on your way to ganondorf is pretty cool, that whole path is really neat.
ganondorf in general was a pretty cool boss, even if he ended up being kind of easy for me. the whole final boss sequence was neat.
by FAR, though, my absolute favorite part of this game was 100% the depths. the fact that there was just an entire second layer to the map that was the same size as the surface, just inverted and dark and filled with new bosses and locations... i spent hours down there without going back up to the surface and absolutely had a BLAST screwing around in the dark, lighting up my path with brightblooms and tossing together little vehicles with lights so that i could get to the next lightroot off in the distance. the depths was probably where i ended up using zonai vehicles the most, and it was honestly pretty fun to go around spotting and reaching every lightroot, coming across different mines and weird little landforms and coliseums and yiga camps. the music and plantlife and look of the depths were so good, and it really felt distinct from the rest of the game in a very good way. doing all of the lightroots and getting enough zonaite to max out link’s energy cells was definitely a good move since it made finding shrines and dealing with later zonai machine stuff easier.
overall, tears of the kingdom was a severely mixed bag for me, and while there was stuff i did like, i don’t think it’s enough to really get me to say that i really liked this game overall- after all most of the stuff i disliked was unavoidable parts of the games, and it definitely put a hamper on my interest in the rest of the time. totk is fine, but it’s really not my thing. 
#i just- *slams head into brick wall* bro i did not have a good time with this game#going back to my silly little comparison point; totk was $70 and my copy of phantom hourglass was $70#$70 is a bullshit amount for a game but thats no the point here#totk from a technical baseline standpoint as a GAME is worth $70#its story and the amount of enjoyment it gave me was not worth $70 tho. the story and enjoyment i got from ph was more worth $70 to me#salty talks#loz#legend of zelda#totk#'zelda games almost never fail when it comes to the music' if you talk shit abt ph's soundtrack i'll kill you. i like the dungeon track#i partially have the shinji chair image saved for this but i did also initally save it yesterday when i finished nge#listen this was fine on a surface level but it just wore me the fuck down#link was just some flavor of stonefaced or surprised or determined in any given cutscene and like. idk. wasnt too interested in him either#look i know about the silly little dialogue options. still didnt do it for me#link getting his arm back only makes sense to me bc i got every last light of blessing and heart container and stamina vessel#the gloom in his body is 100% gone hes squeaky clean for me. whyd you take his shirt off tho. at least keep his hat. cant take it seriously#put him in the archaic set or smth his arm is fully visible that way at least and its full circle thats what he wears at the start#couldnt take the whole grabbing zelda sequence seriously bc i missed the (hold) prompt and link flew away lol#totk spoilers#also wasnt really a fan of most of the voice acting yeah sorry. kinda rough all around aside from like ganondorf and dimitri- i mean rauru#mineru and the rito sage were fine too ig. im not going to bother watching any vids or whatever to check again#riju and sidon were fine too#sonia was cool too but everyone else was a lil rough tbh esp with having to say 'secret stone' that name sucks shit#my switch died in the middle of the credits. i had like 25% when i started fighting ganondorf.#it died twice actually cuz i charged it for a few minutes and what like yeah 5% should be good and nope. died again#anyways whatever. im not giving it a rating im tired of this game i dont think i'll be replaying or even just touching it any time soon#music was top notch again tho. made me feel stuff more than the actual story did. cool ig#bitching abt totk
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invinciblerodent · 5 months ago
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one little fear-ish feeling i have is that Veilguard, with the whole "dwarves are kind of able to access the Fade now" and "magic is more ubiquitous and accessible and generally more present now" deal, will necessarily sort of infect my characters with some measure of magic powers (unlike the Anchor in Inquisition which was a separate thing) and make the protagonist sort of mage-adjacent regardless of their actual class and race.
i don't want to play mages, thank you very much, i want to play a jumped up soporati chick, two rando dwarves who know absolute shitfuck about magic and are dropped in the thick of all this magical sludge, and a middle-aged dude whose connection to the Fade is restricted to him being mysteriously alive because at one point as a teen he wanted hard enough not to die for a spirit to be like "aight bet"
if it's like, available to choose but dodge-able like the biotics in ME:A I'm cool with it, but I really hope they won't make magic, like, necessary for a character to have, and I can just keep hitting things with sharp sticks if I'd like
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