#i'm sorry i had a lot to say about hades game and then not so much about ygo this time

[omaano]

HELLO IT'S ME AGAIN and i think i overdid it with this one, so i'll probably split this into separate parts, there should be five! this one, boon givers, non-boon givers/npcs, weapons, and aspects :D in reference to who you've got as who from hades game--- so i'm going off the (hopefully accurate) assumption that those with boons are the 'gods' of this au, so-- barriss, kit, shaak, cobb, boba, ahsoka, quinlan (!!), leia, anakin/vader & maul. this leaves… literally EVERYONE else as NPCs, which i love and adore (the rancor [?], cody, satine, echo&fives, aphra, paz, bo-katan, sabine, omega, rex, wolffe, ezra, obi-wan, luke and the armorer!) okay this is just me trying to connect the dots (and from memory i think you've got a fair few more characters than the game does, so bear with me), but: (next ask)

Hello!

First of all, omg, you really put a lot of thought into this, damn! And you have so many insights and good ideas I could have never come up with (and a few assumptions I will have to correct as we go along, but that's mostly about things I haven't yet talked about, and thus cannot expect anyone to know) - especially about the weapons and aspects because... let's be honest I only got so far as "darksaber" and "spear" and the rest is not my problem lol XD

I will make a whole different post to reply to your asks about those (that one will be a LOT shorter, mostly because I will just be excitedly gushing over your ideas), but this one is getting so long I feel like I should offer something in compensation to anyone who'll read to the end ^^; (You'll see more art by mid-August when it will be time for the next monthly update, don't worry!) But I felt like that the FULL layout of all the characters would be better kept together in one post.

Waking up to all these messages had been so unspeakably good, thank you so much for taking the time not to just think these up but to type them out and send them to me as well, because omg your brain and enthusiasm!! I cannot say how much that means to me, I cannot say THANK YOU in big enough caps to encapsule that! ❤️❤️

I had so many things to reply to and talk about, please excuse me that I've taken this long to get to all of them ^^;

So, half of the replies and answers under the cut ->

BOON GIVERS

hades has ten, you've got ten! current associations-- you've said leia is a hermes adjacent character, which checks out. maul is chaos adjacent, as you've also said anakin is zeus, ahsoka is athena? ties into the parent-child/master-padawan relationship? barriss as artemis, kit as poseidon, shaak as demeter? quinlan as dionysus perhaps? cobb and boba are both boon-givers/deities and also romanceable--- boba as ares and cobb as aphrodite? vibes only man.

So the first assumption I need to correct here is that Anakin is most definitely not Zeus, but Demeter (I likely only hinted at that in the tags I think)! That was kind of the reason and realization that's wormed into my brain first and paved the road for my willingness to extend this AU with TCW characters as well. So this applies for later with your NPC adjacent ask too, because Luke is not in fact cast for Hades' but Persephone's role, as the one who needs to be found at the end of the whole mighty quest - and whom Din can also visit on the regular until he gets 75% custody of his kid back (that's a joke, but you know it checks out to a degree). So Anakin is suited for an overprotective parent figure (on a good day) who also doesn't know how to go about it without swinging in the other direction as well. (Plus in my humble opinion Demeter is stronger than Zeus anyway. This is not an objective statement, I just feel stronger with her boons with my game style XD)

I've also switched Fennec back from Barriss (I'm so sorry that I keep doing this, I hope noone's got their hopes up too high D:) because I'd taken a look at the lineup, considered my options for dialogue (since half the Mando cast has no clue about the other boon giver characters) and decided that I needed to bring back more Mando-adjacent characters. (A Boba-Fennec duo boon would be so good!) This way Fennec could technically still carry over to a potential Hades2 AU, and Barriss can appear there as a new character (I haven't watched Tales from the Empire, but I have the feeling that she would go very interestingly with Ventress).

So... they don't line up perfectly with their godly roles, but that leaves Fennec for Artemis (sharpshooter ayy!), and... Shaak Ti for Zeus, Ahsoka for Athena (your reasoning for master/padawan relationship thing kind of convinced me of this, even though Ahsoka has never been Shaak's padawan per se, but I like it when Shaak mentors her as another female togruta in the Order). You are pretty spot on with the rest, good job! :D (The guess at the Boba and Cobb vibes was great, I went with vibes too, but they check out pretty good imo :D)

NON BOON GIVERS

bo-katan is meg, and her night owls are tisiphone and alecto (given) aphra is charon (given) cody is achilles, obi-wan is patroclus (definitely heavily implied if not outright stated, i can't remember)

yes, absolutely spot on!

luke is hades (implied if not stated)

As stated above, Luke is not Hades but Persephone, except that he makes an appearance after the final boss fight to take Grogu off Din's hands (maybe even help out) as he does in the show. Hence why I'm planning to draw two versions of his character art: one for his stylish black Jedi Master getup with the lightsaber, and one dressed down to a "farm boy" and looser, happier and less serious (like how Persephone has her serious queenly look, and the one where she is just at home in her garden.

paz & axe are theseus & asterius? specifically paz as asterius i think (implied?)

Axe double times it for two boss roles (lol, although technically he exchanges one for the other to hang out with Paz later), and Paz also pulls double shift for ThAsterius (Asterius's size but Theseus' mouth and piss poor attitude XD) and Hypnos (I feel it very fitting that he would be the one to greet Din every time he crawls back to HQ, and be less kind and encouraging about it than Hypnos. It's their love language to be mean to the other, that's just how it is XD) All the same, a little bit subtly (at least while I don't have a drawing for Axe) but I'm pushing the Paxe agenda and you cannot to anything about it :P

Fun fact tangent: I think I've mentioned it in the tags for the helmeted Paz post that in order to have to two-character boss battle in the arena of Elysium before Axe can be bothered to drag his ass over there, it would be fun to have a father-son 2v2 fight like with Grogu v Ragnar and Din v Paz. Grogu can 3-shot Ragnar eventually, and then they would disappear from the field, done with their own little rivalry, but Din would have to avoid so much as brushing up against Ragnar, because if he does he's immediately lost dishonourably and would have to crawl his way back to beg for forgiveness.

din is zagreus (uh duh)

omega is melinoe (given)

Omega is Melinoe for a Hades2 AU*, but in this version that is mostly based on Hades (the first, and the only one that I'd actually played) she is leaning more towards Dusa - she's a friend, and is making friends while she stays in the halls, looking for the Bad Batch (and whatever time fuckery makes Rex look like that sometimes while Cody and Wolffe are eternally 20-somethings) and looking for ways and means to help her find them... as well as fleecing any- and everyone in cards. Gotta gather up the credits to hire a bountyhunter if necessary XD

*The next time I lose all my chill and black out for a weekend I'm planning to draw out just Omega, Ventress, and maybe someone else in the Hades2 style. I'll just have to pinpoint exactly where and how I should adjust things with the art style. I swear I never get overambitious, and know full well what's good for me (he said lyingly)

fennec is artemis but specifically in hades 2 (based on the fact that artemis plays a slightly different role in hades 2) rex is skelly (given)

As stated above Fennec has made her way back to being a boon-giver - but I didn't know that Artemis plays differently in Hades2 :o (I haven't played actually, I got overwhelmed by all the magic options when I watched my partner play OTL) Only that she's got a thing for the Moon??

the rancor (?) (i can't ID animals that well don't give me that look) is definitely cerberus

It's a mythosaur, actually. (or at least that's the intention behind it. I'm not entirely sure if there is a proper canon look to a Mythosaur, we mostly only see its skull after all, so I tried my best here with what references I could find on the internet.) He started out as Boba's rancor (so you're not entirely wrong there), but since it felt bad to separate it from Boba, I changed it to a more Mando specific creature. If I were ever to redraw the whole level that is the House of Hades (one can dream), there would be a little pool of water in the corner where Cerberus chills on his pillow, and the Mythosaur would rise from there on occasion.

the armorer i think fits the nyx role, as she's the mother figure of the main character, but she might also fit better as persephone? toss up between her and satine for that i think hang on now i am thinking, because the point of din's journey isn't to escape to find his mother, but to escape to help find someone to train his son, hence why luke is the final "boss". so, the persephone figure in this doesn't necessarily have to be his mother, but someone who can train grogu? in that case, i nominate sabine as persephone (MANDALORIAN JEDI, if you go by ahsoka canon) so: sabine as persephone- but wait. i just had a thought. sabine and ezra as platonic (?) orpheus and eurydice, i AM a genius. okay sabine works as orpheus and ezra as eurydice i think (based solely off the fact that sabine is the one actively looking for ezra, like orpheus is the one actively wanting to reconcile with eurydice [?]), so. i think the armorer works as nyx, because she's kind of a symbol of din's past.. not sure who to put as persephone yet. i mean… persephone symbolises a kind of peace in the underworld, so you could maybe slot satine in? satine as persephone, go

Okay, so first things first: that is such a fascinating theory, (and yes, yes you are a genius <3) I love it! It is all such good logic, and so much more galaxy brained than what I could have come up with, so I hope I won't disappoint with what i have in mind for these characters.

Sabine as a Mandalorian Jedi would be such a cool teacher for Grogu - but I don't think Sabine is up for the existential crisis of "ohmygod, I'm barely a jedi myself, and I'm definitely not old enough to be some 50+ year old baby's master!! D:" She would definitely have more than some insight to share with Luke though. Also just imagine Grogu looking at Sabine like she is the coolest aunt he could ever have (sorry, Fennec). Also also, as stated above and what you have also theorized, Sabine has been cast for the role and spot of Orpheus, looking for Ezra (through Din).

Okay, okay, hear me out: the Armorer as Hades. Her forge would work great as a center of gathering, same as Hades's throne/main desk, and it would be very natural that Din would go there first after arriving back to those halls. (I have so many thoughts about this and how I would want to redraw these halls... someday.) And while she is not the first final boss to beat once Din gets there (just before handing Grogu over to Luke), once Gideon (a temporary final boss) is defeated the Armorer can more than return to her Hades role for beating Din up as "training". Same as Hades and Zagreus do once they reconcile their differences.

And now, that I'm nearing the point why I want all these characters to be forced to gather/hang out in the same spot: Satine is Nyx. I know that she is dead, and we don't care for those tiny details, and I'm not planning to draw her as a shade/Force ghost like Fives, we're just going to ignore this little lore tidbit the same way how we accept that Rex can look both like his gloriously bearded Rebels self, and the fetching captain from the clone wars. We're just not talking about all this.

I deeply love the steel in her spine and her dedication in her ideals and beliefs, and I want to see her clash with the Armorer on what makes and Mandalorian with Sabine and Din (whose idea of what it makes a Mandalorian and to wear Mandalorian armor suffers a great blows through his meetings with Cobb and Boba, and Bo-Katan and her ilk) in the middle. I also feel like the clones would have their own opinion on the matter, even if it would be something like "you all have never cared for us, now leave us alone, we have our own culture".

I would need to do deeper research here for this (as much as I'd be willing to touch this ideological debate) because my knowledge of Mandalorian (or Star Wars, really) lore is all that I occasionally try to google and what I'd picked up from fics and the occasional meta post here on tumblr. But the same way that Nyx disagrees with Hades on some matters, she is still an (if not the most) important pillar of what holds up the underworld; and the same way Satine is just as important in what it makes to be a Mandalorian as the Armorer is to the Children of the Watch.

So I want them to clash (with the added drama when Bo-Katan starts hanging out there around her sister on occasion as well), and then come to a more inclusive understanding of what it makes to be Mandalorian, like what I believe Sabine and Din represent.

I know that Satine is super controversial in the fandom, but I'm willing to die on this hill, even if I'm not very good at articulating my opinions.

okay uh. we have more hades characters than star wars characters, but: echo & fives as sisyphus & bouldy, wolffe as thanatos?

Echo&Fives are to be understood as one character (there has been a thought to cast them for Orpheus and Eurydice, but then gave that storyline to Sabine and Ezra since it fits them so much better, especially after Ahsoka), and they are in Thanatos' spot (no other reason than that I wanted to include them, and they should be hanging out around Cody, Rex and Omega. I know that Thanatos doesn't make it through to Hades2(?) but you see, I don't want to line everyone up 100% with the already existing roles/characters).

With that mismatch it's actually Wolffe and Plo as Sisyphus and Bouldie. Wolffe needs quite a bit of extra work to be won over to become friendly, but once he gets to the world weary sigh of "you are okay, I guess, you can be allowed to meet my General" that's basically a shortcut to finding Grogu an alternate Jedi master, because Plo would just take him on, no problem with attachments and other concerns. There, game won, Din didn't even need to find Luke for that.

this leaves hypnos and dusa- i would like to nominate c3po as dusa, which leaves R2 as a slightly more chaotic hypnos. chopper, of course, is Tiny Vermin. (non-droid characters could be qui-gon as hypnos [idk man, something about the vibes], and… yeah, no, i think c3po fits dusa quite well) on an alternate note, i think padme and her [shade] handmaidens could fit the role of the queen/persephone quite well-- but maybe that's just me being a little padme-biased. anyway! not all of these characters quite fit, and i am in fact aware that you probably don't intend to match up all the characters exactly, but this was a fun little exercise for me!

I ADORE the idea of Chopper as Tiny Vermin XD

I wouldn't want to make Din face the horror that is regular interaction with C3PO (although I'm sure it would work in his favour if they could commiserate with Wolffe on the matter XD), he would never get over his anti-droid sentiments XD So no, sadly no appearance will be here for our favourite (?) gold plated protocol droid,but R2 would definitely be the one to wheel in and project Leia's hologram for Din to interact with, because she is a busy lady after all, he should feel lucky that she would take his calls in the first place when he needs help with getting out of trouble with the X-wing patrols.

And double sadly no Padme either, because I refuse to turn this AU into another Skywalker drama, sorry ^^;

TBC...

[littlesislovesyou]

Mmmph...a little...I can't help but get a little jealous over my sister >:3 can you blame me? It's okay I got it under control lol are you an early Disney watcher? I just imagined hades from Hercules raging and then going it's fine I'm cool we're good lmaoo and I remember him literally screaming to Meg that he owned her...calmly not so calmly of course XD

I'm happy you feel the same as I do though... my pretty baby sis~🤭🔪

Aww no worries I understand if you're a little high. I hope you're enjoying yourself at least sweet girl? Maybe I should make you take some more hits and see how horny and willing you are to be raped and fucked unconscious by your masked mutual stranger~ 🖤 I'm happy you love all my asks and I LOVE driving you crazy~

You can use this to respond if *ahem* the other ask is too spicy and fucked up that you wanna keep it...🤫

I missed you though I hope you're feeling better and sorry for responding so late my internet went out briefly and I was gaming in the meantime while waiting for it to return.

I've got PC and switch but I've been playing alot of Zelda recently lol playing the warriors and remembering that the main antagonist is just an obsessed fangirl of link that loves him so much that she'd summon monsters and kill anyone in her way to have him all to herself...kinda hot ngl lol

I would hope I'm okay but all I can do is sleep more and take meds to make sure I'll be as okay as I can be! And me too but ty for your concern hun, you're so sweet <333

It is very easy and hey sometimes all you need is a reminder and a helping hand to relax yk? I can't help but be that kind of person hehe. And I hope so I love talking to you when we both can 💕

Hhhh I won’t even lie I find jealousy very hot<3 I don’t know there’s just something about the possessiveness of it that just makes me so unbelievably wetttt ahhh<333 so I could never blame my big sibling for getting jealous;’) 💗 and also I know what you’re talking about! Hehe

Just know I always belong to my big sibling~ even when dads around hehe

That’s meee! Always your baby sis;’)💗💗 always here to make my big sibling feel better~

Ah yess I did very much! ☺️ It was very much needed after today but I’ll admit I wouldn’t have minded your help at all💗

Hhh you’re literally just melting my brain anymore 🥺💗 sometimes I just get so needy when I smoke, I’d probably be all blazed out and wet~ just seeing the mask, not knowing at all who’s behind it, I can’t help it, I would seriously let you do whatever you wanted to me, not that I would have a choice of course, I’m genuinely so helpless when I’m high, my brain would melt if you forced me to smoke more, turning me into such a obedient fuck doll~

I absolutely will be keeping that one just for me 👀💗 it’s so long and detailed and ugh.. just absolutely perverted;’) and it’s mine, just for me💗💗💗 I love it so much💗 I’ll probably mm be touching myself to that later 💗☺️

Ah no it’s no worries my lovely mutual<3 you never gotta apologize for that, im glad you’ve been having a good night at least! I also have both a pc and a switch:0 Zelda games are always some of the best, I had a lot of childhood memories of that game, and oh yeah? ;’) is that what I’m going to have to do for you? ~ hehe

Awe well I hope you start feeling better and just remember to breathe and take it easy on yourself🥺💗 too bad I can’t cuddle you to sleep!

Aghhh I love how just genuinely sweet you are but you can say some of the most hot fucked up things to me;’) and I love it💗

[solarmorrigan]

Hello! I was tagged for this by the marvelous @paperbackribs about... *checks watch* four months ago! I'm so late, I'm sorry, time is meaningless and slippery!

How many works do you have on AO3? 300 (!)

What’s your total AO3 word count? 976,101

What fandoms do you write for?

At the moment, I'm only writing for Stranger Things, but I've written things for about 40ish fandoms over the years.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

In Phony Matrimony [Fantastic Beasts]

Shared Space [Homestuck]

Simple Association [James Bond - Craig movies]

Made with Love (and Yarn) [Stranger Things]

These Days I'm Fine (These Days I Tend to Lie) [Stranger Things]

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try to! I used to get fewer comments, and it was easier to respond to each of them. Having recently been in some much larger fandoms, though, I've kind of been getting overwhelmed and have fallen behind. I'm so grateful that people take the time to even just send a little heart--to tell me that they read this thing and enjoyed it--and I'd love to respond to everyone, but at this rate I'm not quite sure I'll manage to catch up D:

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Probably either For the Love of You (James Bond, established 00Q, in which Bond is forced to go after Q when he turns out to be a traitor) or either of the fics in the Forever and Ever, Amen series (also James Bond, 00Q, in which Q is a necromancer and won't let Bond die). I've written other dark things, but I tend towards hopeful endings even with those

What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Most things I've written! I'm a big fan of happily ever after and I write a lot of short fluff pieces. But as far as fics where the happy ending is sort of earned, I'd say maybe He Dreams, Until Such Time (Hades game, gen, in which Hypnos is the Elysium boss fight after having been banished from the House, and Zagreus finds a way to get him back in) or We Have Surplus If We Need It (Pacific Rim, established Newmann, in which Newt tries to figure out who he is in a post-kaiju world and cooks a lot about it)

Do you get hate on fics?

Not particularly. I've gotten a few randos trying to tell me off for writing slash, and one or two people who were clearly just mad at a specific trope and happened to land on my fic, but I've been very fortunate to get largely positive feedback

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do! I'm not sure it's exactly my strongest suit (and, in fact, often worry that it's not very good at all), but I guess I keep at it?? I've written PWP and plotularly significant smut before; whatever serves my purposes at the time

Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Not often, but I have! The first fic I ever tried writing on my own was a Buffy/Scooby-Doo crossover, and I've written a fair bit for Gravity Falls/Over the Garden Wall. Not sure how wild either of those are, though?

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I've been alerted to, but I've been posting fic for something like 20 years now, so it wouldn't surprise me if at least one of them has cropped up elsewhere under someone else's name

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yyyyyes...? Pretty sure I remember that happening! I think it was over on ff dot net, so I don't remember which one it was. Good odds it was one of my Criminal Minds fics, though

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

A few times! I've done RP-style co-writing, round robins, half-and-half, and just plain collaborating. Most of them never reached the point of being able to publish, but they were still fun

What’s your all time favorite ship?

Gotta confess: I don't think I have one. My favorite is usually whatever I'm focusing on at the time; I don't dislike ones I've shipped previously, but they tend to settle fondly into the background once I've left a fandom

What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I had a whole Stranger Things fic planned out exploring the potential relationship between Steve and his mom, and I'd love to get at least the bare bones of that done, but there's something about it that just kind of refuses to come

What are your writing strengths?

Characterization and emotion. Emotion is something I feel like I don't identify particularly well in real life, but I think I'm pretty good at getting the intended response from people in my writing. (Also maybe dialogue, but that's just so fun to write)

What are your writing weaknesses?

I! Am! Impatient! I tend to rush through things sometimes and screw the pacing up or skip over important details because I worry writing it out in full will take too long and I'll lose interest. I can also get a little too rigid in trying to achieve a particular outcome, instead of letting the story flow

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I don't tend to do it, but that's because I'm only fluent in English and don't want to jar anyone with a bad auto-translate job. If someone is speaking another language, I usually try to find a way to signify that based on whether or not the POV character also knows that language

First fandom you wrote for?

It was either HP (forgive me, this was over 20 years ago) or Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Scooby-Doo (crossover fic I wrote when I was, like, nine?)

Favorite fic you’ve written?

Ever?? In my life?? My dude, I could pick a favorite per fandom maybe, but just straight up favorite?? I cannot. Of things written more recently, I'm very fond of Under My Skin (Steddie, exploring the possibility of Steve with physical scars). Of things written slightly less recently, I still have a complicated soft spot for We Have Surplus If We Need It

Gently tagging (if you've already done this, I'm sorry, just ignore me): @spiritofcamelot @ato-the-bean @puppy-steve @emchant3d @lexirosewrites

[a-single-slice-of-toast]

Imma talk about Side Order

Now, I've only got 7 hours of playtime so far so take what I say with a grain of salt, but I've completed 3 palettes in around 7 or 8 total runs.

As someone who loves roguelikes and has played a ton of games in that genre, I do have to note to other roguelike fans that Side Order does very much lean towards being a rougelite. Each time you die, you get Prlz to spend on hacks to improve your base stats, add new features like rerolls, guarantee shops on certain floors, etc.. You don't unlock a whole lot to throw into the color chip pool sadly, which is something I would have have liked to see more of. You can unlock extra ability chips for the Pearl drone, but that's about it. You do unlock new palettes using keys that you get by progressing through the tower with other palettes, which is similar to unlocking weapons in Hades. One neat thing is that each palette has a bias towards certain classes of color chips, but you need a hack to improve this bias.

In terms of gameplay overall, I would describe Side Order as "What if you made Octo Expansion a rougelite and a hoard-shooter." Each floor is a randomly-selected map with one of a handful of objectives. Hoards of enemies will quickly start spawning, and they'll spawn more frequently depending on the floor's difficulty. At times, it did feel like playing singleplayer Salmon Run on Octo Expansion stages. Some floors come with bonus objectives that give you extra Membucks the better you do at them. My issue comes in that there isn't much initially to spend your Membucks on. You have to spend a ton of Prlz to unlock floor rerolls, shop rerolls, continues, and shop price reduction, not to mention reducing the initial cost of rerolls and continues after you unlock them. There are bosses every 10 floors, but for floor 10 and 20, the game only picks from 3 bosses. The bosses do get slightly different movesets depending on which floor they appear on, but again... 3 BOSSES. AND ONE OF THEM IS JUST AN EASIER VERSION OF GIRL POWER STATION FROM OCTO EXPANSION. For my first three runs in a row, the ball boss was on floor 10 so I just thought that it was the dedicated boss for floor 10 and for some reason they only decided to randomize floor 20 or that Parallel Canon would like a boss that could randomly invade on boss floors, but no. It's because the game ONLY HAD 3 BOSSES TO CHOOSE FROM.

In terms of story... Man, I'm sorry, but you guys hyped this thing up for yourselves waaayyyy too much. (I did too, to be honest.) Acht sadly doesn't contribute a lot to the story, other than giving little snippets of backstory for them and Marina. Agent 4 doesn't really show up other than their palette. (I heard the center Inkling in the Parallel Canon cutscene is based on your Agent 4 if you have Splatoon 2 save data but I couldn't tell.) Most of that lore is dumped in Marina's diary that you unlock with keys.

I haven't completed Side Order yet, still got a lot of palettes to reconfigure, but when I do I'll probably do another post talking about my thoughts afterward.

[rudeboimonster]

What are your thoughts on Bonerattle Arena? Or Side Order? Or Riot Act? Or just this season of Splatoon 3 as a whole

CHRIST SORRY THIS ENDED UP IN MY DRAFTS AND I SPACEDO UT BADLY

looks up like an animal caught eating from a carcass with face covered in visera prlz

shout out to Frankie and Bugs bc the two of em bought Side Order for me

OHGHGHGHGHHGHGH SIDE ORDER

im working on clearing out the prlz store. i just have to to take breaks bc it turns out i forget to blink during levels. this tires my eyes after 2 runs. edit: successfully cleared out prlz store.

interesting note, i can do full clears of Side Order in a similar amount of time as Hades runs! each full run is about 30 minutes, i wonder if thats normal for rougelites i really should play more of them

overall i've been having just an IMMENSE amount of fun with Side Order and it makes me wanna both play more splatoon and more roguelites in general. once i have a computer up and running, i really wanna get back to playing warframe so i can mess with the roguelite mode they put in there, i think that'll help me get back into it. edit: COMPUTER BUILT AND RUNNING but i think i gotta do other changes so i can like, get back to streaming bc i'm running into issues with the OS we had on hand

there's a lot of fun stuff this season in splatoon! iunno if i have much meaningful to say about it all?? i frankly mostly play salmon run and now side order so the whole. rest of the game i have to be really hankering to play it or with friends.

[thefreelanceangel]

Top 5 Relationships (romantic, familial, canon, HC, whatever!)

...oh you would do this to me, you wench.

-stares at the wall- Ugh, does this mean RP relationships??? Canon ones? What we see in game??

!(*%^&!(%*!*$!%&$)!*%(

(1) Dulia-Chai & Chai-Nuzz

Do I really have to explain why I love them? No? I will anyway.

I love love love seeing a happy, healthy marriage in media. Especially when they could've been treated like the typical sitcom marriage of "miserable man run roughshod by his overbearing wife." Nope! Dulia believes in her husband wholeheartedly, supports him, pushes him to succeed when his anxieties threaten to lock him up in place. Chai-Nuzz clearly adores her, lets her push him when he needs it, and looks to her for support and confidence. They're happy together, they're good to each other, and they accept each other, not blindly, but with an awareness of each other's faults that is accepting and loving and supportive.

(2) Feo Ul & the Warrior of Light

Yes, the WoL gets manipulated by the little lunatic. Yes, Feo Ul had how many layers of Plans™ prepared to yank into action at a moment's notice. Yes, we have to suck up like crazy when we need their help.

And I absolutely love it. I love that they're fascinated by mortals, that they appreciate the beauty of a brief, brilliant life. It charms me to hear them call the Warrior of Light "our sapling" while scolding the WoL for being so neglectful. They're charming and funny and demented and I just love it.

(3) Hades & Hythlodaeus (& Azem)

We don't get much of this (not nearly enough) and a lot of what we do get is subtext, a short story by SE, and what little encounters we have with the two Ancients in Endwalker.

And honestly, I can see why Hades would spend aeons mourning the love he lost after that. Having not one but two people who know you so deeply, who can tease you out of a bad mood when you don't necessarily want to be happy but oh well, they're there now, and then losing them? One to what he felt was his highest duty and the other to a disagreement that spiraled into losing them forever?

I'd be mourning that for the rest of my days, too.

(4) Annalei & Seifer d'Latu

Well, the ask doesn't say it can't be RP characters!

They're terrible, and I love them. They're absolutely atrocious people with basically no redeeming qualities, and I love them. They've fought each other tooth and nail for years, have killed each other's lovers, refused to admit how they felt, competed with each other in basically everything, fought back to back, side by side, and with each other all with equal fervor.

Anna is a psychopathic bitch and Seifer is a manipulative, sadistic jackass. They're horrible apart, worse together, and would bring on another Calamity for each other without hesitation. Neither would leave the other behind, even while teasing (in Seifer's case) or complaining (in Anna's) about having to help the other.

I find them endlessly inspiring, fascinating, and a little terrifying.

(5) Thancred Waters & Urianger Augurelt

...they're married, I'm sorry, I can't be persuaded otherwise.

And not even necessarily in a romantic sense (although I'd 100% believe it) but in that they are life partners and friends and support each other, tease each other, have worked together enough to know how to offset each other's weaknesses. It doesn't surprise me at all that they're always pairing up to go adventure.

Wouldn't you choose someone who knew you almost better than you know yourself to be your support, protection, and companionship on an adventure?

(Also c'mon, they're Ryne's dads! IT'S SO OBVIOUS. THEY'RE SO MARRIED.)

[cryptid-pet]

If you don't mind, can we have (some of) the diaboys spying on azushin date?

I got a liiiiiittle confused on how I wanted to answer this (considering I did post the third part of the twitter au xmas based on @azusamarryme idea of there being a reveal to azusa and shin dating which i love them for that idea so THANKS LOL) so here's what I'll do for this: I'll put the top five diaboys who WOULD spy on this azushin date and how they feel (if they are yay or nay and why) and how they spy//how did they find this out (I am not sure if this is what you wanted so I do apologize!!)

5) Shu

This is a little stupid but to be honest, I think Shu and Azusa fairly get along, they aren't like best friends or friends in general, but he's alright with him. As for a relation between Shu and Shin, he finds him annoying, so the reaction he has when the words of them dating (Azusa and Shin) gets around, he honestly could care less

He isn't yay and he isn't nay about it, Shu is neutral

The way Shu found this out was through media, mostly through Laito and Kou.

Does Shu really spy on Azusa and Shin on their date? No, not really, he might show up to the place by himself and sit afar to get a good vision, but he might fall asleep if he's bored

4) Ayato AND Laito (Duo thing baby)

Ayato HATES Shin but they do get along with minor things (drugs, im sorry, both of them smoke and get high so that is there hobby, you are free to leave LMAO) Ayato's relation with Azusa is nothing much, Azusa will bother Ayato to beat him and shit and Ayato gets weirded out, that's all

Laito actually likes Azusa, he'll flirt with the kid to be a tease and Yuma holds his urge not to put Laito six feet under with Hades. He isn't very fond of Shin but does make dirty jokes with him which sails poorly

Ayato is not yay or nay, he's nosy and that is clear as DAY

Laito is yay about this, he thinks it's a very...Odd yet interesting pair to see a Mukami with a Tsukinami, so he'll support it anyways!

Both Ayato and Laito hear about this rumor through media and it's Ayato's idea to go full ninja to see this Azushin date for himself, dragging Laito with him (They're both not very sneaky and suspicion rises when they try to spy left alone)

3) Ruki

Of course, Azusa and Ruki have a strong bond, they're brothers, they've been through the trauma, AMAZING BOND! Ruki and Shin don't even talk to one another a lot, so it's a very dull and shallow relation socially

This...This is a shock, he doesn't believe for a minute UNTIL Azusa himself says he's going out, so Ruki doesn't even know HIMSELF if he wants to support this or not, it is Shin and he is the First Blood. He leans more to the nay because he wants his youngest brother safe, Shin is a powerful guy (we've seen the games or played them i'm sure) and Ruki knows what Shin is capable of. If it makes Azusa happy, he will try his best to support them

Kou comes SCREAMING about this when he finds out and this is how Ruki catches onto the rumor

He doesn't dare to eavesdrop, that isn't his style, he let's someone else do it for him (whether that may be one of his other brothers or even sending Yui to do it herself)

2) Kou

Yes...Kou is second in this, him and Azusa have a WICKED good bond! They'll do things together and if anything, Azusa likes to be around Kou the most in school (this is just my own idea) Kou and Shin don't clash but they don't mix into a good paste of being friends, Kou likes to tease Shin and Shin does it back, it's nothing huge

YAY, YAY, YAY ALL THE FUCKING WAY- KOU IS SO HAPPY THAT AZUSA IS GOING ON A DATE, HE SUPPORTS IT! He was a little nay when Azusa only tells him it was a date with Shin, he has the big brother instinct and, sam as Ruki, is a bit unsettled with it being a Founder, but he hardly cares

Kou finds out by Azusa telling him (the bby had no one else to go to who would really understand) and Kou is actually the whole damn start over the media posting about this event, HE WAS SIKED FOR HIS BROTHER

He does eavesdrop BUT from afar, he keeps his distance, Ruki told him not to but he wasn't in much control because it's Kou (he wouldn't really listen)

1) Carla

Carla and Azusa do not have a bond socially, Carla sometimes is scared of Azusa based on his masochist behavior but that subides easily. Carla and Shin, obviously, are close, they aren't tight like normal brothers, but they do care for each other as the last Founders alive

What? Azusa and Shin have a date? This was a joke to Carla, it really was, he didn't believe this line of shit fo a SECOND on the media. He started to believe when Shin said he was going out for plans he made, THAT was the kicker for him. It's a huge, FAT NAY for Carla, for a Founder to be in love and go on a date with a vampire made him sick, of course he was against it- it ruins the overall plan to bring up the bloodline again and the whole population that once succumbed

This is how he found out ^^^^

Carla sends familiar EVERYWHERE, they track down Shin's scent and watch from a safe distance, they'll even report every FIVE MINUTES with what is going on currently and when Shin gets back, he is in for a TALK

[mbabol]

GAMES I'VE PLAYED RANKINGS (2023)

STORYTELLING

Disco Elysium - The complexity of the writing of this game is stupid beyond. It's thematically rich, well-researched, deeply interrogative, engaging, and well-crafted. Also it's funny. It's not my favorite novel but the fact that it's up for comparison speaks volumes.

Pentiment - I'm so sorry to say it but Pentiment feels like Disco Elysium but about 16th century Bavaria. It is similarly well-researched, thematically rich, and well-crafted, but is a little more restrained in its political statements and therefore doesn't reach its full potential in storytelling, in my opinion. Still interested in making political statements, however, and interrogative about them, which is appreciated. Could have gone harder on the complexity and ambiguity of their writing, but I understand that might not have been the audience they wanted to reach. Still a Fucking Good Game of Writing.

Undertale - Could be the nostalgia talking, but sorry I'm not immune. Everyone's already said what there is to be said about Undertale's writing. Only thing I'll say is that I think Toby Fox has actually managed to improve his writing for Deltarune, but Deltarune is an unfinished game so I'm going to leave that one in the Honorable Mentions.

Hollow Knight - Sheer detail. Complexities and ambiguities in the writing, rich for interpretation. Don't love the weird hints of orientalism, but not as egregious as it could be. The craftsmanship of the writing is the real star of the game I think, it's deeply dedicated to the quality of its storytelling.

Portal 2 - AGAIN. COULD BE BIASED. AND I WON'T LIE I HAVEN'T EXACTLY PLAYED A TON OF GAMES. SO THIS MIGHT JUST BE BECAUSE I LOVE LESBIANS. But goddamn. Lesbianism. Cartoonish capitalism. Craftsmanship. It captures my imagination .

Honorable Mentions:

Deltarune (Unfinished, Disqualified Until Completion)

Hades (Sheer Volume of Shit To Read)

Warcraft III (Really Racist yet so detailed and effortful in it's writing quality that it offers the most interesting look at written manifestations of whiteness, cisheteronormativity, the enduring literary tradition of the imperial imagination of The North, ET CETERA its the horrible horrible gift that keeps on giving. Rich for tearing apart in frustration.)

GAMEPLAY

Hades - Controversial pick but I've never felt so feverish trying to learn the mechanics of a game. Had the perfect learning curve and yeah, the replayability is insane. Engaging, rewarding, effortful, yet not overly frustrating.

Overwatch (1 and 2) - ANOTHER CONTROVERSIAL PICK. I WON'T EVER DEFEND THIS SHIT-ASS DOG-TIER GAME FROM ITS MANY, MANY, MANY, MANY DESERVED CRITICISMS. BUT I CAN'T DENY THAT ITS MECHANICS DO SOMETHING TO ME. I love the blend of FPS mechanical skills and almost MMO-like strategization. Love the emphasis on movement as part of the gameplay, love how many characters are movement-based. Love that despite being a "competitive FPS" it's still full of Really Stupid Silly Moments. <- all the words of someone out of their mind

Portal 2 - Finally a normal answer. I like puzzles. I like fun movement. Wee. This one's pure personal preference. I just like Portal 2 gameplay.

Hollow Knight - IF I WAS BEING OBJECTIVE THIS WOULD BE HIGHER. SO, SORRY. Complex, well-tuned, rewarding gameplay. A lot of depth to the learning curve as a metroidvania combined with challenging boss fights that all have unique attack patterns. Customization via the charms. The only thing that pushed it down the rankings is that I'm Bad, and when I got stuck on boss fights it was The Worst. Part of the frustration might have also just come from the downtime of walking back from a bench to the boss fight. I assume that's a mechanic that's Meant to be frustrating and add to the competitive/hardcore nature of the game, but I didn't really find any satisfaction from that mechanic, especially when the walk back was particularly long and full of mobs. It just felt like a chore and got in the way of any exciting momentum from learning the boss fights. To compare it to a game like Hades, which arguably has a similar mechanic from having to redo a run, something that kept those repeated runs from getting stale or frustrating was the RNG of the rooms, enemies, builds, and character interactions. I was still invested in getting to the boss fight to try again, and having to competitively retrace my path to add to the difficulty of the fight, but that time in between was also consistently engaging in its own right for various reasons. As I write this I'm realizing that my gameplay rankings are kind of in order of the amount of frustration I felt throughout the game.

Deltarune (?) - I had to disqualify Deltarune from the storytelling category because I don't feel like it's fair to judge an incomplete story, but I think the two chapters we have of Deltarune are enough gameplay to rank the overall gameplay system. And goddamn. It's way better than Undertale's. The combat system got an upgrade in the form of it now being an RPG style party system, there's new combat options unique to party members, the bullet patterns feel more complex with more variations of attack types even for regular mobs, THERE'S A POKEMON STYLE COLLECT MOBS TYPE MECHANIC, there's bonus boss fights! Per chapter! That are more difficult than the normal chapter boss! There's puzzles! It's got it all! I have to rank Deltarune lower than the others because it's not quite as novel, engaging/challenging, or focused on the gameplay as the others, but for ME it was still GREAT. I got a lot of enjoyment out of fighting even regular mobs, which I didn't feel in Undertale, and I don't even feel at the same level for games like Hades or Hollow Knight.

Honorable Mentions:

Stardew Valley (I have So Many Hours In This Game. It Has to get points for that. The feedback loop is insane. And I love fishing.)

Minecraft (I Also have So Many Hours In This Game. It just works. Humanity just like building thing. Also you can collect pets.)

Pokemon [Esp Gen 3 & 4 games] (Sorry. It just works. I honestly considered giving it the #5 spot but figured that was mostly nostalgia talking. I fucking love collect creature. And I love chill, no time constraint, strategy turn-based combat. I don't love open-world games which is why I haven't really been as in love with the recent versions, but goddamn those early ones. I still replay them. I love finding fakemon games. I love this formula.)

VISUAL ARTWORK (note: this list is even more subjective than the others. EXTREMELY influenced by personal preference than any kind of rigorous ranking of quality)

Disco Elysium - Yeah. Sorry. The quality? Untouched. The interaction with the rest of the game? Genuinely some of the most intertwined with the storytelling/gameplay of any game I've played. It's a central element of the game. Every piece of visual art produced for this game was thoughtful, meaningful, and can be analyzed for meaning as much as any piece of text or gameplay. A little unfair to other games, since this is a game that has as one of its central themes the meaning of art (of all mediums). Jesus christ. I'll think about Disco Elysium art until my dying day.

Pentiment - THIS IS A LITTLE BIT CHEATING. BC VISUAL ARTWORK OVERLAPS A LITTLE WITH STORYTELLING JUST BECAUSE OF HOW VISUAL ART AND TEXT INTERACT WITH EACH OTHER IN VIDEO GAMES ESPECIALLY. YOU KIND OF CAN'T SEPARATE ARTWORK FROM STORYTELLING IN THESE KINDS OF GAMES BECAUSE ALL OF THE VISUAL ELEMENTS ARE COMPONENTS OF THE COMPOSITE STORYTELLING. Anyway Pentiment is also a game that has as one of its central themes the meaning of art, so of course it's going to be really thoughtful and evocative in its visual elements. The way the text is varied calligraphy (or print!) and communicates character information like class and occupation because that's literally what handwriting was in that time period, literacy in general actually, communicative of your class background. How there are so many "typos" that were actually such a unique and real trait of old and middle English because there was no standardized spelling of words for most of its existence. The bolded or color-printed words that were also a defining trait of old and middle English texts, AUGH. THE DIFFERENT STYLIZATIONS OF DIFFERENT CHARACTERS IN ART STYLES EVOCATIVE OF THEIR RELIGIOUS OR CULTURAL BACKGROUNDS MY GOD. The way that the older pagan townspeople/peasants are drawn differently from the younger Christian townspeople/peasants, the way that the stylization is all evocative of artwork from that time period, whether it was Bavarian/European-Christian or Ethiopian. It's good.

Undertale/Deltarune - Sorry. This is a lot less meaningful than the first two. I just like it. It sticks to a theme. It's charming. It's beautiful. It's funny. It's haunting. So versatile and memorable. The artwork of these games also adds so much to the storytelling and characterization of the game, the ambiance and emotional resonance. Thank you Temmie Chang and all the other artists, and, of course, Toby Fox.

Hollow Knight - AGAIN I FEEL BAD GIVING IT SUCH A LOW RATING BC IT'S STILL REALLY FUCKING GOOD. LIKE INSANELY GOOD. Also so communicative, thematically appropriate, charming, beautiful, well-crafted, flexible. I love looking at stuff. And I Love Ghost.

Hades - Cheap answer, but I can't deny that without the art I don't know if I would've picked up the game. There's easy and justified criticisms of the character designs tending towards fatphobic and without enough body diversity, though that's a criticism that I don't think any of my top ranked games avoids. I love the color, I love the dynamic compositions, I even love the particle effects. There was stylistic effort and I liked it.

Honorable Mentions:

Validate (REALLY good art, lovely and vibrant and personal. Just maybe not as large a scope/individually purposeful)

Baba Is You (No real justification. Just think it's fun and cute. I enjoy stylized art.)

OFF (A story I can't make sense of, gameplay that's admittedly kinda cool just for the novelty but not anything obscenely entertaining, I think the artwork of OFF still really sells it and makes it memorable.)

[iturbide]

Sorry you don't mind me asking a few 5, 9, 11, 18, and 23 from the video game ask.

Thank you.

I don't mind at all! 💖

Game(s) coming out that you’re looking forward to

You know at one point in time I would have said Final Fantasy XVI, but everything I've heard for months about it has been a never-ending trash fire so now I'm mostly looking forward to it to see how bad it is.

I'm kind of interested in the new Prince of Persia game that they just announced, though? That could be interesting -- it's the first Prince of Persia they've put out in more than a decade at this point, since the Sands of Time Remake has been mired in development hell, and while I'm forever bitter they didn't continue the story from 2008, this one looks very stylish and could be worth looking into.

Also: Hades II.

A game you played completely blind with no prior knowledge of and enjoyed/loved

For recent games, I might actually have to go with God of War 2018 and God of War: Ragnarok again for this one, because it's very hard to go into games blind anymore. It used to be the norm, but spoilers are everywhere at this point: I knew the time travel twist of Awakening years before I played it, and the same is true of Breath of the Wild since I was so late to the party there. But God of War isn't a franchise I followed, so I knew nothing about the 2018 installment before I picked it up, and was blown away by what they did with it -- then I started Ragnarok on Release Day and blazed through it as fast as I could. I had no idea what was coming, and it was a glorious experience.

For older games, though...I'm going to say Assassin's Creed III, in part because of the tutorial chapters and how that reveal five hours in that you've been playing as a Templar sets up the core ethos of the game so well: that the Assassins and the Templars aren't as different as they claim to be. No heroes, only flawed and complicated human beings doing what they feel is right to try and make a better world, and how they don't always succeed despite their best intentions.

Do you prefer ‘blank slate’ main characters you make yourself or otherwise project onto, or characters with a set personality and backstory?

I think it really depends on the game. Some stories really benefit from having a character with a set personality and backstory because it informs how they interact within the setting: Kratos with his history in Greece and his war against the pantheon is ideally suited for the story of God of War 2018, because those experiences guide how he interacts with his son -- and growing out of that mold, learning to be more open with Atreus and be better than the man he used to be is part of the game's emotional core. That wouldn't work with a blank slate character, because they won't necessarily have that baggage to work through that makes the story so impactful.

By contrast, there are games where a blank slate protagonist is a great choice. Games with dialogue options are a great place to explore this because they let the player project themselves or their vision of the character into the world better than set scenes would otherwise allow. My understanding is that Dragon Age does this well, but I haven't played that one, so I have to fall back on Elder Scrolls and my boy The Worst Dragonborn who keeps forgetting about the main questline because he'd rather read every book in the Whiterun Library and get suckered into helping every little old lady that needs to cross the street rather than. Y'know. Figure out what the deal is with the dragons. Very fun having so many options for what to do and who to join, lots of great character-building potential.

A game location you really like

There are so many places in games that I really love. Honestly one of my oldest favorites is probably the first Assassin's Creed, specifically Jerusalem: the golden glow of that city, especially compared to the cold and dreary grey of Acre, was just glorious, and I loved the view of the Dome of the Rock.

Honorable mention to basically all of Wind Waker, though. I love the sailing in that game, the water has so much character in that game (the stormy seas, the way you'll rise and fall with the waves, the texture changes between little white wave caps and still dappled waters). I've never had as much fun sailing in another game, and I was hooked on the Assassin's Creed: Black Flag sea shanties -- sailing in that game was just a chore that the shanties made more bearable.

A “Wow” moment of awe

All of Journey? So much of journey. That sand slide passage, silhouetted against the setting sun against a sea of shining gold...and the ascendance at the end, too, from the top of the mountain up above the clouds (something that's even more glorious with a companion).

Also: end of Okami, with Issun spreading his paintings and restoring mankind's belief in the gods to give Ammy the power to defeat Yami. I have my issues with the ending of Okami and the sudden tonal shift from Japanese folklore to high-tech aliens, but that particular scene hits perfectly even now. I inevitably tear up at that part.

🎮 Video Game Asks 🎮

[marshmallowloves]

🧵🎵🩺🕯️ for Cordula!! (@frankmillerturnonyourlocation :D)

@frankmillerturnonyourlocation

HELLO FRIEND I am so sorry I got to this so late 😭 I was gone for the whole week and my brain's kinda fried... but I'm trying to get back into the swing of things again skjdfg okay umm! Cordula! Haven't thought about her in a minute actually... or a billion sdjfghdf lemme see if I can't come up with some answers for you 👀

🧵Thread: What would you/your self-insert wear in the source your f/o is from? It can be multiple outfits or just one! Bonus: Do you have a weapon? If so, describe it or show it!

oh wait hang on this actually gave me the perfect opportunity to update/draw a new ref for her!

I've tried to design her a couple times, but she still always had some sort of white dress and red ribbons. I'm really liking how she turned out this time!

Also, I've always pictured her using the Angel Bow from the game! Maybe some other time I'll play around with the design to fit her more specifically, but honestly, it's quite fitting already~ (sorry this is just the whole AR card, it's the biggest image I could find kjdhfg)

🎵Music: If you/your self-insert had a theme song, what would it be? Bonus:An extra song that fits you/your self-insert and your f/o!

honestly I kinda struggle thinking of songs for my self inserts specifically -u-;; it's hard to find lyrical songs that I like! Though for both Cordula and Pit, I will say I have thought about Stupid Cupid a non-zero amount of times kjfhg

🩺Doctor: What is the worst injury that you/your self-insert has sustained in canon? If so, what was the cause and did you recover? What was your f/os reaction?

I have not actually thought about this before 🤔 so I kinda just. made this answer up just now for this ask sdkjfg

Cordula isn't as strong as Pit, so when Mistress Aphrodite suggests that she help him and Lady Palutena when Hades starts causing problems, Cordula does her best to lend him her (largely non-combative) support without getting too close. But after Hades tricks the humans into fighting each other, her job becomes much more dangerous - she's tasked with trying to soothe the warring humans by hitting them with special arrows crafted by the goddess of love herself.

During one of these trips below, as she's frantically flying about and trying to pacify as many people as she can, one of her wings is struck by a stray projectile. She loses control and tumbles to the ground, narrowly avoiding getting trampled in the chaos...but soon, one of the frenzied humans catches up to her and backs her into a corner, thinking that they could use an angel like her to turn the battle in their favor. But before they can hurt her further, Aphrodite sends some of her power to her little cherub, which dazes the human long enough for Cordula to escape to a safe place where Aphrodite could retrieve her.

Naturally, since they had known each other for a while at this point, Pit worried for her until he knew she was safe back at her home (and encouraged by both Aphrodite and Palutena to help while she recovered... but he really didn't need to be encouraged to do that anyway dkfjgh). But they both understood that hers was an important job she still had to do, so they got right back into it... after they made each other promise to be careful dkjfg

🕯️Candle: Do you/your self-insert have a secret? If so, what is it and why do they keep it to themselves? Is it dark and mysterious or something small, yet impactful?

Cordula's only real secret, which is barely a secret to anyone at this point, is how she feels about Pit. Aphrodite was the first one to learn it - naturally, as the goddess of love and Cordula's boss, she'd know when her little love cherub was...well, in love ksjdfhg

But the way Cordula would act around Pit the first few times they spoke to each other - kind and sweet as always but clearly held back by an unusual shyness - didn't escape Palutena's keen eye either. The two goddesses have lot of fun not-so-subtly trying to set their favorite angels up together and watching the awkward magic unfold as Cordula and Pit continuously fail to realize they like each other 😂

[skarlitt]

hii !! i wanted to ask what tarot cards you use? i dont know where to get any from, i think i can get them from amazon right ? do you know if i need to charge them with incense or anything ? would making my own be an option ? if so, what do i draw onto the cards ? sorry if this is overwhelming, im fairly new but wish to use tarot to communicate w my deities hahdjsbdkndj

OooOOOOOo I love this question!!! I can finally rant about my tarot hehehee

I had decks upon decks upon DECKS on my altar for years! (I only had so many because I got new decks of cards from friends and family pretty much every year for my birthday and what not lol) but I've recently gifted and donated all of them except one, and I now just use the Rider-Waite deck.

I will say firstly: EVERYONE will tell you different things about tarot. Some will say to only buy second-hand. Some will use them as a medium to communicate to their deities, others believe the deck IS the deity. And some people even use the deck to answer yes/no questions despite them not being intended at all for that lol. It is entirely up to you how to use the deck and what you believe it is capable of. And sometimes, you have to let the deck itself teach YOU how it wants to be used.

The simplest deck to use would be Rider-Waite, it's the most widespread and probably least expensive. But any deck you connect to intuitively will do- you are essentially establishing a spiritual relationship with it, so you may as well get whatever deck you like best! Amazon is ok, but I would honestly recommend going to Indigo/Barnes and Noble or a metaphysics shop and getting a real-life feel for the cards they have. How they fit in your hands and make you feel is extremely important! (if you go to B&N or Indigo, tarot cards are in the New Age/Spiritual section!)

A great book on Tarot (if you have extra cash) is The Only Tarot Book You'll Ever Need by Skye Alexander. I read it when I was 12 and it's such a great tarot reference! If you can't buy a book or need to hide your tarot usage, go to Biddy Tarot's website. They've got all sorts of great stuff there too :)

Making your own is definitely an option but it can be expensive depending on how you do it...I've been thinking about making my own too actually! I'm honestly not sure how to answer that one yet, still trying to figure that out myself 😅

If you need to charge the cards with your intention, you can do a LOT of different things. Incense/sage is good to cleanse them (which you should absolutely do after taking them from the store!), but charging is different cuz that's essentially how you bind the cards to you. There's lots of enchantment/charging spells and rituals on Pinterest if you wanna be fancy, but honestly? You can just reach out to your deities and ask them to bless your deck, if youre using them as a medium for communication to them. A simple visualization meditation is also useful- just hold them in your hands and visualize yourself projecting your power into them. There's no wrong way to do it! Follow your heart :)

Lastly: as I mentioned before I currently just use Rider-Waite cards, but! I recently pre-ordered a copy of a fan-made Hades Game tarot deck. Only because I really love the game, and the cards feature art of the gods! Unfortunately I have yet to find a specific Greek God tarot deck though. But once I do, I am taking a copy IMMEDIATELY lmao! Some decks I've had in the past that I've loved are the Triple Goddess Tarot (my first deck, they were stolen on me and I miss them dearly), Yoshi Yoshitani's Tarot Of The Divine (100/10 my absolute favorite deck ever personally, each card reflects a fairy tale or myths from around the world), and of course the Rider-Waite deck (Classic and simple to understand, really great if you don't want any extraneous vibes from any flashy art other decks might give you). The links might be to the Canadian websites, sorry about that 😅

Hope this answers your question! Just remember to not overthink it, and follow your heart :) sending you good vibes ✨

[ocegion]

7, 8, 14!

thanks for asking uwu and sorry for taking so long to answer :(

7 - Favorite actor of the year?

I'm not gonna lie I haven't watched many movies this year and my brain is also kinda foggy about what came out this year or last one, but I'll be a normie and say:

Oscar Isaacs did a terrific job in Moonknight (despite my skepticism towards MCU at this point)

Millie Bobby Brown is still my favorite performance of Stranger Things

Paddy Considine was GREAT in House of The Dragon

I don't think he's a truly great actor objectively speaking, but I saw Smiley recently and I'm still thinking a lot about it, so I'll say that Carlos Cuevas made his character pretty endearing to me.

8 - Game of the year?

Elden Ring won it, as far as I know, I wouldn't know though since i haven't been able to get my hands on it yet

The game I spent most time in this year has been by far Hades. Honorable mention goes to Dragon Age Origins, though, since I'd been stuck on it for a loooong time (not so much due to difficulty as just being anxious about Making Choices) and I finally finished it a couple months ago

14 - Favorite book you read this year?

Probably Howl's Moving Castle and its sequels. Quite different from the movie, but really charming as well. You can definitely see that Diana Wynne Jones had taken notes from Tolkien and specially CS Lewis.

end of the year asks!

[northernscruffycat]

I wanna know more about your thoughts on Zagreus/that Edgeworth looking guy! Also DMG/Anzu and Dark Magician/Yami.

Zagreus/Thanatos: I’ll start off with the tl;dr version - I like it, I’m just fussy (same as EdgeWright, i guess) Now that’s out of the way, let’s get into detail. A big reason why I bought the game was for these two. I’d been told that Hades has a fleshed out mlm option and very few games give you that. It’s something that I want to support, so ofc I picked it up. Then I spent hours fuckin looking for Thanatos. This was down to two factors: 1. Thanatos doesn’t spawn until you reach Elysium (the third area in the game) and I took a looong time to get even okay at playing this game. 2. Even after you get there, his spawn is random. Most players find him early, I just got incredibly unlucky. SO EVENTUALLY I FIND THE GUY. Then it was time to romance the guy. Now, I’m saying here that I fully intend to replay the main game (beginning until true ending, at least) very soon. Because first impressions and second impressions are very different. All of this is obviously based on that first impression. And their romance route is cute. I can see why so many people adore it. I mostly got a laugh (as in the “screeching in frustration” kinda laugh) outta every scene they have together basically going like this: zag: hey than i think i like u than: i think i like u too, zag. what could this mean??? zag: could it mean we like each other??? than: let’s not jump to any conclusions. anyway if u figure it out let me know than: *disappears in a puff of smoke* zag: :’) idk even as I write this I have mixed feelings? It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy it myself, but I wasn’t quite as invested as I expected I would be. To the point that after romancing Thanatos, I found myself more intrigued by Zagreus’s romance with Meg (I mean, there’s a legit poly ending for the three of them, so this is fine). I went into the game expecting not to care about MegZag at all, but they ended up becoming my fave, not ThanZag. After that, I was ready to be like “Oh well, ThanZag is fine, I’m just not invested” and call it a day. But then I started RPing some Hades game stuff with my flatmate and neither of us were that invested in Thanatos, but then when I started writing from his POV I realised that I actually enjoyed it a lot and I retroactively started to like both Thanatos and ThanZag. As it stands at the moment, I like it more than I thought I would! There’s a bunch of other Zagreus ships I like more, but I do think it’s good and I tip my hat to Supergiant for providing a good mlm romance route. DMG/Anzu: This is one of those ships where they look great together and it’s very easy to get nice-looking caps of them looking shippy together from that one episode. But beyond that I don’t have a lot of thoughts about it. Dark Magician/Yami: I like this one a lot and I wish it was as popular as Dark Magician/Yuugi is. I mean, we saw the lengths that Mahaado went to in his love for Atem and I’m sure that this carried over into the Dark Magician.

[gamesbyalbie]

Hey, everyone! ☺️

Sorry I've been so quiet on here, I've been going through some stuff which put me in a weird headspace (plus, I wasn't sure what to say after taking a break so I've been postponing writing this update). Anyways, here's some of what I've been working on:

Hades' Kitchen - working really hard on the UI (trying to build it from scratch), getting to a point with the demo that I'm really happy with, also debating doing something for K's birthday on March 3rd (what would you like to see?)

Mousetrap - Working hard on the next update (will include new story up to leaving for the second locations, more in-depth character interactions, expansion on the nightmares available, potential encounters in the tunnel for all six nightmares - not just the "escape" one, and a quick character creator that'll allow you to skip the prologue), this will hopefully be ready by March 5th, but I may have to push the date back a little bit since I have midterms this week

Zorlok - Working on the demo and UI for this one as well, also writing a few snippets about the main characters and getting the intro post ready to drop on March 4th (which will also introduce you to the two main characters and the central conflict of the story)

As a side note, as a way to practice coding/UX design I took a vampire dating simulator I made a while ago and revamped it (get it... revamped it... I'll show myself out). It's really short and was originally done as an academic project so it's mainly focused on channeling the source materials, but if anyone's interested in it, I'd consider releasing it.

Under the cut you'll find screenshots of a lot of this stuff.

(Hopefully, I'll also be less intimidated to interact on here now that I've ripped this proverbial bandaid off 😅)

Nothing for HK that I'm comfortable showing yet, that's all a lot more complicated and doesn't resemble what I'm going for yet.

ZORLOK:

For a little context, this setting takes a lot of inspiration from the 80s/90s so the color palettes are all based on retro posters and graphic designs from these periods (these are just two of the themes and we're still a ways off from the finished product). The choice of symbols is meant to be reminiscent of VHS/movies. Also, that little D20 actually rolls and displays the number when you click it, really proud of that one.

NOTTIVAGO - A VAMPIRE DATING SIMULATOR:

MOUSETRAP [SPOILERS, I GUESS?]:

Here's a little sneak peek at how your dreams will be expanded upon and how you can customize which recurring nightmare your intern will suffer from.

There are six nightmares your intern can be haunted by (four of which you choose from at the beginning of the story, two of which you must lie about to acquire), I'll post more about them on the Mousetrap blog soon if you're curious.

When the update launches a new interaction will be included in the bus scene where Alaric/Aria will ask if you were dreaming. You can choose not to tell them, tell them the truth, or lie about the dream you had.

(It's also worth noting that current save files should still work due to some fancy variable footwork but there will also be the option of the quick character creator)

(Debating whether or not to keep this second bit in the game, lmk if you have any opinions on it)

[chrysanthemumgames]

Hello! I’ve been thinking about sending a message and the latest update just gave a me a lot of feelings and I really want to share them. I hope you don’t find my message too forward and if it makes you uncomfortable I apologize and please delete it.

I’ve been following your game for a while and it has been like my safe little nook on the internet. You’ve spoken about how you designed it to be accepting and much like a safe space and … well, it is one for me. I’ve always had trouble with self-esteem and just accepting myself the way I am in general, so when I played your game I was blown away at how … easy everything is? Easy in the way that I can play as any character I want to be (except for the mean ones because I personally cannot choose those options) and not have, idk, be perceived as acting in the wrong way? Especially when I choose the more shy and taciturn options. Everyone in the game is so accommodating I feel really validated.

The one scene that really stayed with me ever since I’ve played it is the scene where Hades took us to see the field. It really resonated with me how it felt like my PC was shown that they could belong somewhere and that just by existing they affect their surrounding in a good way. It comes to my mind quite often.

The latest chapter is also a delightful experience to play through! I haven’t really explored the options and have only played through Hades’ outing, but in all honesty (and no small measure of embarrassment) I cried a little after playing it. Hades is such a dear and the general tone of interaction with him is so calming. Idk what this says about me but I fear it implies a whole lot more than I am willing to say lol.

That was … a rambly mess of word-vomit. Sorry about that. As a conclusion I just want to say thank you for creating this safe little space on the internet for me, and for countless others. I’ll be sure to keep up with news about this game—no pressure though! I’ll be fine with whatever.

Stay safe, and have a great day!

Anon, seriously, it's this kind of message that really goes right to my heart. I almost don't even know what to say, except that I'm so glad playing FoA feels like that for you!

I think, sometimes, I write people saying what I want or need to hear. Or at least, having the attitude towards difference that I want or need more people to have, heh. Reactions like this remind me that I'm really not alone in that at all. :)

[aeronbracken]

Heheheh so I adore the idea of the 3 of them being insanely close together that it shouldn't even be something they had to talk about u know? They kind of slide in the romantic zone and everybody is like "wait is that news? I thought it has been happening for years now" but also I'm just so into teasing emet and his emotional constipated ass I'm like 100% sure he'd deny whatever he's feeling until one of them grab his face, kisses him senseless and goes like "You're a idiot." My background for them is that hythlo and my azem (their name is atlas!!) kind of got to the conclusion that they love each other at the same time, but it became like 10x harder (and funnier) when emet starting to pretend he wasn't jealous of their relationship... i adore the idea of him being like "oh you two are dating now? That's a thing? And I had to learn it from fucking Miltron?" And azem and hythlo are staring at each other like .... you're in it buddy ..... anyway they kiss a lot in front of Hades until he gets like really mad and atlas starts laughing like "ok go ahead dear" and then hythlo gives him a kiss and emet 100% stops functioning for an hour or two. It's all fun and games until azem goes goes insanely mad at emet for him allowing hythlo to go through with the zodiark wish :) they will forever blame themselves about not being able to fulfill hythlo's wish to return to the stars together, hence why they both end up fighting for different reasons (azem wants zodiark gone so hythlo can rest and then they can meet again vs Hades wanting to bring hythlo back so they can be back together). Sorry for the rant I just love them so much :(

"emet and his emotional constipated ass" SDSHJDKSLŞD I AM DYING

I think you really got his character by saying he would be jealous but pretend like he is not while they are aware of the situation and teasing Emet-Selch... give him kisses...

Also, I was reading your ask with a big smile on my face until the last part :') Such a tragic and unavoidable ending I feel so bad for them but at least now Hythlodaeus must be in peace.