#i've started literally just skipping all the combat

[grtivas]

man i really wish they'd remake origins because playing this game is so tedious

[copperbadge]

Immediate Writer's Block

Had a comment on another post where I thought I'd probably need more space than the notes in which to respond, so:

constant-state-of-self-discovery Oh I get the envy I feel it right now how the fuck do you manage to write without impassable writers block after 5-9 sentences because I haven't fucking figured it out lol

I do have some advice on this!

I think most writers get blocked from time to time, it's normal and my general strategy is just to wait it out, but if you're frequently blocked after only writing a very little bit, I think the problem is one of two things: either you don't know what you want to achieve with the scene you're writing, or you don't know what should happen next within the scene to achieve that goal. If you frame "I'm blocked" as "I don't have an answer I need" then often you move from just sitting there, sweating and staring at a blank page, to thinking productively about how you're going to get where you're going. It's the difference between not knowing an answer and not knowing an answer but knowing where to look for it.

An invaluable piece of advice for this, which I think I picked up from someone who got it off a National Novel Writing Month messageboard, is "When in doubt, ninjas attack." It's not meant to be literal, you don't need to have ninjas or fight scenes just because you don't know what to do, but it helps to get the creativity flowing again. If you don't know what should happen next, or you know but you're having trouble actually writing the scene, it can be very helpful to induce a moment of uncertainty or surprise -- to have a metaphorical ninja attack. One time I did this literally -- the POV character was just on the road somewhere and I didn't know how to get them from a pastoral country road to their actual destination in an interesting way, so I had them get attacked by highway bandits and have to fight them off, which also allowed me to demonstrate that the character had significant unarmed combat skills. But it can also just be like, two characters who are having a boring conversation can be interrupted by a third person, even just a stranger asking for directions, or there can be, IDK, an explosion, or something goes missing, or etc.

Sometimes it also helps to leave it alone but keep it in your mind and go do something else -- listen to a podcast, take a walk, read a book, not because those things are distracting but because all our inputs eventually feed into our brain and come out as reactions. If you're thinking about your book while you're wandering around a park, something you see in the park might have an impact on it. If you've got YOUR story in mind while reading someone else's, you might be more inclined to look at what they're saying and see what you think of it, how it might play into your work.

And honestly, sometimes you just gotta go past it. I'm working on the next Shivadh novel right now and it opens basically with Simon the chef getting into a spat with his love-interest-to-be over some cheese. He want the cheese, she won't sell him the cheese, so they get off to a very contentious start. But I suck at writing conflict especially when it's basically "A character I like is being pompous and another character I want people to find likable is being stubborn and somewhat unpleasant". I've been stalled on it for a while. But I know where the scene ends up, like I do know what the goal is, so I just...skipped it and went on to writing a scene I like better, where they meet a second time and actually discover each others' identity and that they're about to be forced into the grownup equivalent of a school project. Once I've gotten dug deeper into the story I'll come back and write it, and by then I'll have the benefit of knowing the love interest a bit better.

So yeah -- I think a lot of breaking a writer's block, especially when you don't need rest but are just stumped about what to do, is to twist and look at it from another angle. It's not that you don't know what to write, or don't want to write what you know you have to -- it's that you don't have the correct answer to a question, or you need to leave that part alone to ferment and come back to it later. At least, for me.

[seeminglydeathlessredshirt]

Ramblings on Bioshock Infinite

So, I've decided to start writing down how I feel about what I'm playing here rather than wait for my friends to be online so I can infodump at them.

Anyway, Bioshock: Infinite. The original was pretty alright. I didn't get all the way through it because I was getting a bit tired of Rapture and some other little annoyances, but it was a perfectly decent experience. Skipped past 2 because once again, not in the mood for spending a dozen more hours underwater, and went right to the one that people fuss about all the time to see what the fuss is all about.

I shouldn't have gone out of my way to see what all the fuss is about.

Spoilers for an 11-year old game will follow, but I do not recommend going out and checking this out yourself.

To its credit, the game does have a very strong opening. The welcome centre/church you arrive in offers absolutely gorgeous visuals and a strange yet interesting blend of Christian motifs and the weird sort of reverence built up around the founders of America. "Gee," I thought, "maybe this will be a game that finally tackles religion in an interesting and nuanced way that doesn't just feel like it was written by a 14-year old who just discovered Reddit." Unfortunately, it doesn't(if anyone knows a game that does, please let me know.) After a level where you walk around and take in the sights of Columbia(an experience that feels like walking into a veritable wasp nest. Either one, take your pick), you're thrust into your standard action game plot shenanigans. Kill a bunch of guys while someone rants at you over an intercom, go through various setpieces, all that good stuff.

Is the killing actually all that fun? For a certain stretch of the game, yes. You have some okay abilities, a good selection of weapons to choose from, and takedowns are pretty cool as well. The skyrails scattered around some maps are gimmicky, though a welcome addition(the irony of a game like this leaning heavily on what are basically rollercoasters is not lost on me.) But somewhere past the halfway point, it takes a steep nosedive. The weapon list gets bloated to hell and back, and a combination of the carry limit of two plus the tendency to only ever give ammo for everything you don't want to use drags it down. Enemies also seem to get substantially spongier and more numerous, which makes fights incredibly unsatisfying. Bioshock was already firmly in that grey area between immersive sim and combat sandbox, and Infinite is neither of those. Everything feels so much less versatile, there's no thinking outside the box to be done here.

As for the rest of the story, you may have heard about how centrist it gets, and I am sad to report that everything they said was true. What really gets me is how it's already setting up the "both sides are the exact same thing" even before the characters would have any reason to think that. They're literally basing this entire viewpoint off of "oh, the workers are being violent about overthrowing their oppressors, that's super bad, right????" This game also does try to tackle things like racism but I don't exactly have a good eye for whether or not something tackles that matter maturely, so all I'll say is that it feels very surface-level and inconsequential. "Inconsequential" can sum up everything else in this paragraph too because it's all eventually abandoned for !!Dimensional Shenanigans!! This is what the last few levels are taken up by entirely and all it accomplishes is covering over a weak attempt at social themes with an even weaker attempt at sci-fi themes. The ending is certainly a bit more batshit than you'd expect for your standard seventh-generation slop, but it can't salvage this. The fanservice just reminded me of a somewhat better game. I would make a joke about this game only having two characters, but then it goes out of its way to say "yes, there really are only two characters."

I am not playing the fucking DLCs.

[magical-regical]

Y'all okay,

I started playing 'What in Hell is Bad', it's basically an 18+ version of 'Obey Me' and yea this game is spicy.

Anyway, big surprise, out of all the sexy demons I've interacted with so far, two of them I've done the sideways tango with, my favorite character is this guy

Who's not even a demon. He's the childhood best friend character.

But plot wise he takes care of the MC before the whole demon thing, knows how to cook, and I'm pretty sure was ready to search through the entire world to find them when they had to take and extended visit to Hell.

What more could you want in a man? A decent dic— according to MC he has that too so check mate.

More thoughts about the game itself under the cut if you're interested.

I just finished chapter one, and can I just say this game is hard, in every sense of the word.

It's a new game by a smaller developer so it's full of bugs but I've heard the devs do try their best to patch them ASAP so I don't hold that against them. Aside from my boy Satan not hitting water enemies, even though devs said they patched that a few updates ago, it's mostly QoL improvements that can be made to make the game just overall more enjoyable including but not limited to:

A pity system? Maybe? I don't know if this game has pity or not on their gacha machines and if they do I'd like to know how screwed I am because I have no self-control and have been doing single pulls on the hot boy gacha instead of saving up and doing 10-pulls so I wanna know if it's better to do 10-pulls or if it literally makes no difference because I just go until I hit pity like in arknights.

Skipping the cut scene that plays when you gacha because I swear that's one of the main reasons you can't play this game in public no matter how discreet you try to be lmao

Opening multiple chests at once and levelling up multiple times in one go because as far as I know, right now you need to click one by one for both of these.

Maybe a thing where it just takes you to the part of the story you're currently in instead of making you click through chapter select and scrolling to it.

A shortcut button to the gacha screen, secret club, and dark sanctuary (resource grind stages). They're core aspects of the game yet you can't get to them without going through the home screen.

Auto deploy and auto play for the resource grinding stages

Setting an L-rank character (side note, it's really funny that the highest rank of cards is rank 'L') as your homescreen boi is really awkward because it always ends up zoomed in on one part so you can't actually see the full boi.

This last one I feel like is just a personal thing but why is it three red keys per single pull for the hot boy gacha? Three just feels like such a random number lmao. Ig they mostly want you to use the red gems, which are grind-able to some extent, to buy the keys from the store.

Overall tho, I enjoy it. I like the tower defense like combat system and being able to move units around is actually pretty fun. So yea give it a try, see if it's your cup of tea.

[deusexlachina]

This game took fifteen hours to play and upset me! (good)

In Stars and Time probably wins for most upsetting video game I've played. It makes other games about depression feel like the fun roller coaster version of depression in comparison. Even Start Again, the game it's an extension of, looks extremely tame in comparison.

There's a number of things I've seen that are Trapped In A Time Loop. I don't think I've seen one this dark since Russian Doll. ISAT isn't as gritty as that, but it's as least as dark. It really puts the "trapped" in Trapped In A Time Loop, while still being fun. For me, not for the protagonist, Siffrin. He is not having fun.

One of the things that makes it work so well is that the characters (and to a lesser extent, the settings) are really lovingly made. I like Siffrin's party. If they were in a straight fantasy story, they'd work. That's what's missing most in a lot of Edgy Depression Games and cartoons - the sadness is real, but the joy is not. So it feels more hollow than sad. A good example is with magical girl shows: Madoka is a guilty pleasure and all the ripoffs are just execrable - you can feel them wanting to go straight to the torture, so they make characters just to be tortured, ensuring that not even the writer is invested in the cast.

ISAT, in contrast, showed me a cute, engaging adventure with terrific characters, and then forced me to watch as it all got stale and stagnant and twisted. With plenty of new parts scattered around, reminding you of what it's like to be curious and excited. At a certain point, I was skipping through dialogue less because I'd memorized it and more because it was painful to go through these tender scenes again, knowing they lost their impact on Siffrin long ago.

There's a few mechanics that didn't work for me. Having to fight monsters to loop forwards in time didn't feel necessary. Looping around is already monotonous; this mechanic doesn't add anything. As the game progresses, you end up looping forwards quite a bit, long after combat has ceased to be a challenge. Not being able to completely skip seen conversations - instead having to fast-forward through them - is also tedious but feels much more necessary to the story being told. The little animation you get of Siffrin nodding blankly as they metaphorically and literally mash through a conversation remained funny for me even to the end. Be sure to have dialogue speed set to instant and running set to always (why indie RPGs ever have a "walking" setting continues to confuse me).

Anyway, if you're looking for a game with great characters that's very sad without relying on a shitty ending, this is definitely worth checking out. Really not kidding about the heavy stuff, though. Caveat emptor, fuckers.

[zeesodacan]

"I have no clue"

Zee x Reader

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

this one's kinda cringe to be honest, i wrote it for my old td account but oh well!! it's still kinda sweet

i remember this being a request, but i've completely lost the ask, since it was on my old blog

☄. *. ⋆

fluff

word count: 1,575

proofread: yes but i'm tired so i might have skipped over something

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Ever since you got to the island, you'd been a confident and straight forward kind of gal. Whenever Ripper opened his mouth to say anything, you were able to combat his statement and shut him up for 5 minutes. Better than anyone else on the island could, at least.

Most of the other contestants enjoyed your attitude and your willingness to speak your mind. You helped lead your team to victory many times and worked hard.

There were moments when you 'lightly' berated a teammate for slacking off, but there was that one person that you just... let slip under your radar.

Zee.

You hadn't truly realized your feelings for the boy until Bowie said something about it. You two were walking in the forest alongside Emma, as you all had formed a little alliance due to hitting it off on the first day on the island.

"So," Bowie began. "Y/N. You and Zee?"

This caught you off guard, quickly looking over at Bowie. "Ex-Excuse me?" You felt your heartrate pick up and your face go red, your eyebrows furrowed trying to figure out what he meant. "Oh my god, it is true!" Bowie laughed, holding onto Emma. "You so totally like Zee."

"No, I don't!" You objected. Where did he get such a stupid idea from?

"You definitely do." Emma butted in, laughing alongside Bowie. "It's so obvious! You're harsh on everyone but Zee! Even though he's the easiest to be harsh on."

"I mean, just yesterday during the catapult challenge you literally cheered for the guy! We aren't even on the same team as him!" Bowie added on. "You do not do that to anyone else. There's some love goin' on and I'm gonna get to the bottom of it."

"No, you will not. And, if you do, so help me I will beat your ass tenfold." You threatened, staring straight into his eyes. "Ooh, feisty." Bowie snickered, waving you off. "Listen, girl, he totally likes you back. You just gotta, you know, push yourself out there! I know you can do that, at least."

You breathed in and sighed. Maybe… just maybe… Bowie was right.

"I'll... think more about it. Can we drop the subject? Thanks." You pinched the bridge of your nose in an attempt to release the tension building up in your face. “Alright." Bowie shrugged, sneaking a glance over at Emma and smiling.

A few more challenges passed and you'd slowly managed to grow closer with Zee, especially after the merge. It wasn't much, just a simple friendship. To say the others were shocked by this was an understatement. Someone as straightforward and determined as you, friends

with the chill, laid-back Zee? It was unheard of!

Today's challenge Chris said you all had to canoe across a river, walk through a field, climb a mountain, and ring a bell! Easy, right? Wrong. While the challenge had hardly started, you were already being plummeted with jumping salmon! Disgusting.

As the taste of salmon filled your mouth every time you were hit in the face, your canoe was being assaulted by said salmon even more. You hadn't even noticed you started sinking until you felt water on your ankles, causing you to look down and take notice of your canoe flooding.

You tried to keep a calm head, but there was no one in your alliance close by, so you slowly accepted your fate. You could try to swim to shore, but that would only end up in you drowning from the salmon and the extreme waves of the river.

You braced for impact with the water when the canoe flipped, and you desperately held onto what was floating as a last attempt.

Just as you were about to go under, you saw someone’s oar appear in front of you, signaling you to grab on. Immediately you grabbed it and watched as your canoe fell into the river, never to be seen again for hundreds of years...

You looked over to your savior and your eyes widened when you realized who it was. Zee! You smiled at him gratefully as you climbed onto his canoe, sighing.

"You looked like you were in trouble." Zee chuckled, looking over at you.

"Man, those stupid salmon destroyed my canoe. If it hadn't been for you I would have been fish food." You laughed along with him, the familiar feeling of fuzziness appearing in your stomach. “I can't thank you enough."

"Nah, it's nothing, man. Anything for a friend." He smiled at you. Friend. Right.

"Well... let's continue the challenge, alright?" You stated, looking towards the ever-looming fields Chris mentioned.

You both sat in an awkward silence before you made it to the field, noticing there were already a few other contestants ahead of you two. Not a moment later, the ground started shaking, and out poured water from the ground.

"It's a geyser! Sorry, geysers!" You exclaimed, looking all over at the small indentations with holes in the field. "How are we supposed to get through without being blown sky-high?"

"I have an idea,” Zee said nonchalantly before grabbing your wrist and running off into the field.

"Zee, what the hell are you doing?" You yelled, trying to be louder than the geysers exploding behind and in front of you.

"Trust me!" He yelled back. "Just gotta run fast so the water doesn't find you!"

You couldn't help but furrow your eyebrows in confusion. Why your heart chose this man, you had no idea.

After a few more seconds of blindly following Zee, you guys actually made it to the end of the field. You sighed in frustration, knowing this wasn't the end.

Emma had caught up to you two and exchanged glances at you both. She gave you a tiny wink and a grin, which you returned with a glare, before looking back at Zee.

"I gotta admit, Zee. You're way sneakier than I thought."

"I don't know what you mean?" Zee replied, clearly confused.

Emma just responded with a sarcastic "right" before being blown up by a geyser. Karma truly is real in the world.

You looked away for a couple seconds to take a look at the mountain and gaze at its beauty. Nature truly was magnificent when you tried to forget the fact that you were on an island for a few more weeks with a sadistic psychopath for a host.

And yet, you looked back to Zee stuck in a geyser, and you couldn't help but groan as he got flown into the air. At least he was enjoying himself, you thought.

After that, you two got separated for the rest of the challenge. Nothing truly eventful happened to you, other than some small bee stings that were mere minor inconveniences. You pretty much knew you weren't going to win after becoming so far behind with the little canoe incident.

In the end, Julia ended up winning, to your alliance's dismay. That girl really needed to be gone and put in her place. But alas, not today...

In the short time between the end of the challenge and nightfall, signaling the beginning of the elimination ceremony, you decided to talk to Zee.

"Hey, Zee." You caught up to him, apparently today he decided to take a stroll across the beach. He had his signature soda in hand, taking a few sips here and there.

"Oh, Y/N! What's up?" Zee's face brightened when he saw you, smiling.

“I... had something I need to talk to you about." You muttered, taking deep breaths. You fiddled with the hem of your shirt, closing your eyes for a moment. The worst he can say is no.

Suddenly overcome with a wave of confidence, you look him in the eyes and confess these feelings that have left you sick for the past weeks. 

"Zee, I've really been wanting to tell you that... I like you. Like, like like you. It's weird, I don't normally do relationships, y’know? But like, you're the only person that doesn't constantly frustrate me and that I don't have to put in their place like, ever." You took one big deep breath before finishing, "What I'm trying to say is, will you go out with me? Once the show is over?"

You looked back at Zee awaiting an answer, but he just looked at you absolutely dumbstruck. "Zee? Please say something..."

After you said that, a grin appeared on Zee's face, causing you to release some of the tension in your body. "Sure, I mean, yeah!" Zee nodded. "You're super cool and awesome. I'll be honest, I've kinda like you for a while. I didn't realize until Chase told me how obvious it was. Was it obvious?"

"If it was obvious, it wasn't to me. Probably to everyone else, though. I mean, Bowie and Emma figured it out before even myself." You laughed. "It's so weird, being able to just relax around a person. I like it."

"Me too." Zee smiled. "I'll be honest I... don't know much about relationships. Never been in one myself."

"Me neither..." You admitted. "But I suppose we could figure it out together." You smiled up at him, taking his hand in yours.

"Cool." Zee grinned, taking a sip of his soda.

"I've always wondered... What flavor is your soda?

“Like what kind?"

Zee pondered the question for a moment, staring at the can, before looking back at you.

"I have no clue."

[bamber344]

Behind The Curtains (Andreas Intro)

prev/next

masterlist

Hey so, before we begin, I've got to apologise. I completely forgot to mention that there would be explicit NSFW in this story up until now. If that's not your thing, I apologise! You can feel free to skip those scenes, and i can summarize anything important at the end. You don't have to worry just yet, though. No NSFW in this chapter, I just so happened to remember about needing to warn for it here lol.

ANYWAY with that out of the way, i hope you enjoy the chapter!

CWs: non-sexual nudity, lab whump, human experimentation, unethical surveillance. Let me know if i missed anything!

Behind The Curtains

Police Captain Andreas de Vygon fastened and unfastened his cuffs over and over again; a nervous habit he’d never been able to shake. Despite his long and illustrious career, full of accomplishments and accolades, public speaking was still just as daunting as it had been in high school. Today, he was going to reveal the project he’d been working on for the past 12 years to the rest of the Tombguard police. It had been a long, difficult road, full of trials and setbacks, but he had finally made it to the final phase of the plan. The hard part was over; now, he just had to keep his creation on track, and everything would turn out as it should.

7 years spent developing the technology; the likes of which the world had never seen. 4 years of suffering through the trial and error of the process after finding a Source, losing subject after subject to mistake and miscalculation. Finally, one year spent training the successful subject to fighting form. G-7 had passed her final combat exam just a few short hours ago. It was finally time to reveal her to the world.

An assistant walked up to him. “They’re ready for you, sir.”

He nodded. “Thank you.”

Andreas took a deep breath and slicked his hair back, stepping out onto the stage. Before him was an assorted crowd of Tombguard’s higher ranking police from each precinct across the city. Fellow captains, sergeants, lieutenants, and a few detectives chatted among themselves, some looking up at him expectantly. Even the deputy chief and the commissioner were here. He cleared his throat, taking his place at the podium.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for taking the time to be here today. Now, I’m sure you’ve all heard whispers through the grapevine by now; the murmurings of a secret project known only as Project Genesis. Well, today, the veil will be lifted as to what it is that we’ve been working on. As some of you may be aware, over the past few years, the 23rd precinct has been looking into methods to capitalise on the use of powers in police work. Up until recently, this has been difficult thanks to certain legislation, and the presence of the Union drawing away potential candidates from our program. However, thanks to the new revisions in the Powers in Policing Act of 20XX, new breakthroughs have been made in regards to our project.

“Recently, we were approached by a young woman with powers, interested in joining our department not as an officer, but as a superhero who works in tandem with the police, following our commands and regulations, but also able to unleash her powers as an extended arm of the law. For the past year, she’s been training hard in one of our facilities, and today she passed the final exam, and is now eligible for deployment by the standards set in the new Powers in Policing Act. Starting tomorrow she will begin patrolling our streets under my command, joining in on police operations and hopefully improving our rate of success tenfold. That is what Project Genesis is; a revitalisation of the police, quite literally the genesis of a new world of crime-stopping.

“I’m sure you’re all curious as to who this woman is. Unfortunately, for her safety in the face of recent anti-police movements, she is choosing to remain anonymous. Publicly, she will be going by ‘Seven,’ and I can share no more details about her identity other than that. What I can share is a demonstration of her prowess as proof of concept towards the efficacy of her ability. Please, observe.”

The projector at the top of the room came to life and displayed an image on the blank wall behind him. It was a recording of one of G-7’s recent runs at the advanced obstacle course, where she made an absolute joke of her previous personal best. As her handler, Andreas had to admit; he was quite proud of it. Once that was done, the image switched to one of her better performances during combat training. The actual exam was too violent to be shared, and certainly toed the line a bit too hard in regards to the ethical treatment of prisoners for public viewing. That would just have to remain confidential, lest human rights organisations get all up-in-arms over the treatment of their poor serial murderers and rapists.

Andreas watched as the faces of the crowd grew more and more impressed by the second. Satisfaction and pride filled his chest as they ate it all up. His hard work was finally paying off.

He stepped back up to the podium as the video ended. “Now, I want you all to think about how many police lives have been lost to criminal activity in the past few years. With Seven’s assistance, we could reduce that number to almost nothing! After all, why should our noble boys in blue have to put their lives on the line, when we have a literal superhuman to lead our charge? Of course, she is just one woman, but hopefully, in time, her presence in Tombguard will inspire more young, brave, powered people to join our program and bolster our city’s police force! Instead of joining the Union and sitting around all day, soaking up our tax dollars until a monster attacks, they would be out there, fighting for the safety and liberty of our citizens. Think about that!”

He breathed out, letting that statement stew on the audience for a second. “I believe that is everything. Thank you all for coming. If you happen to see a superhero in black armour patrolling our streets in the coming days, please, come say hi. She’s on our side.”

With one last ‘thank you’ to the audience, he stepped down, walking off-stage into the wings as the cameras started flashing and the crowd broke into rapid conversation. A smile reached his face.

Everything was going according to plan.

—

The buzz of pride only grew through the next day as Andreas took G-7 around the city and showed her off to the public for the first time. The presence of the Union heroes was unexpected, but ultimately it didn’t amount to anything, and gave him a good opportunity to warn his weapon to stay away from them. It was clear from the way she obviously stared that something inside of her was drawn to the Widow. Now that he’d planted the order in her head, though, she would be unable to disobey. Madeline Garcia-Holmes’ presence would not be an issue.

They returned to the facility underneath precinct 23 late in the afternoon, and Andreas sent G-7 back to her quarters after letting her stop by the mess hall for food. He had a meeting with the commissioner planned, so he didn’t stick around, heading out after a quick shower and freshening up in his quarters.

They ended up meeting over dinner. It turned out that the commissioner had caught wind of what he was really doing down in the facility, and of G-7’s true nature. That wasn’t very surprising, though. After all, it was his money that was funding a large portion of the project. Their discussion was long and quite fruitful. The commissioner ended up approving of his admittedly underhanded tactics for the furtherance of Project Genesis’ heroes in policing initiative. The use of manufactured human weapons to fill out the police force, while expensive in development, would ultimately save money for them in the long run. You didn’t need to pay wages to your own property, after all. Of course, he didn’t know what Andreas’ actual plan for Project Genesis was, but it was better that he remained ignorant. What he didn’t know couldn’t hurt him.

And so he returned once again to the facility later that night, bottle of champagne in hand, heading down to R&D to celebrate G-7’s successful deployment. The boys down there hadn’t had much to do lately, on account of G-7’s relative lack of developmental problems, so it felt prudent to give them a pat on the back, and push them in a new direction now that the main work was done.

The initial room was dim when he entered, illuminated mostly by the surveillance screens covering one wall. George Sadler sat at the chair in front of them, looking at his phone and not paying them any mind. Andreas could hardly fault him for his distraction; he could tell with one glance at the bedroom camera that G-7 was asleep, and none of the other cameras were observing anything important right now. Other than him, the room was empty.

Sadler noticed his arrival and shot up to his feet, saluting. “S-sir! Didn’t know you were coming down here!”

“At ease, Sadler,” he said. The man visibly relaxed. “Where is everybody else?”

“They’ve all gone home already, sir. I pulled the short straw and got assigned nightwatch duty.”

Oh. That was a shame. Andreas shrugged, holding up the bottle. “I suppose they won’t get to enjoy this champagne with us, then.”

Sadler’s eyes lit up. He rushed to get some glasses from the adjacent break room. They weren’t proper champagne flutes, but there was no need for extravagance here. It would taste the same regardless. Andreas popped the cork with his multitool as he waited for his employee to return.

“What’s the occasion, sir?” Sadler asked as he set the glasses down.

“Celebrating G-7’s successful deployment, of course. Everything went off without a hitch.” He filled both glasses with a generous helping of champagne before setting the bottle down in a safe spot, taking a seat.

“Yeah? How’d she do?”

“Good. Today was mostly getting her used to the outside world, but she did manage to catch a shoplifter, too.”

Sadler nodded, taking a drink. “That’s good. None of the other subjects have made it outside before - well, aside from Five and Six, but they don’t really count, since we can’t monitor them. Did she take it alright? Not too overwhelmed? Seven’s always been a bit of a soft one, despite her successes. …Y’know, it’s fascinating how differently their personalities have developed, considering their nature. I was expecting them to all be identical. Maybe the formation of their different powers has an effect on their psyche? Something to look into, I suppose.”

Andreas frowned at the reminder of the two subjects who escaped before G-7’s Birth, ignoring the rest of Sadler’s tangent. That had been a particularly dark day for the project. Thankfully, nothing had come of it yet, and he’d already planted an idea in G-7’s mind that should nip it in the bud if it ever became a problem.

“She was certainly fascinated, but overwhelmed? No, not at all.”

Sadler nodded, but his mind still seemed elsewhere. He sighed. “I have to admit, I still feel bad about what happened to Four. What did we name her again? Gwen? She was doing really well, and-”

Andreas cut him off. “It was a training accident, Sadler. No one’s to blame. Besides, don’t waste your breath mourning for a being who had no right to exist in the first place. We’re spitting in the eye of God here; we can’t be surprised when Divine Intervention strikes down one of our subjects. Their very existence is heretical.”

Sadler shrugged. “Yeah, I suppose. It was just more disappointing than anything. Her death set the project back over two years. Felt like a waste. She was our first promising subject, then it all went down the drain.”

“She provided valuable data that helped the project along, even if her demise slowed us down. This was never going to be easy; you knew that when you signed on.”

He chuckled, taking another drink. “Yeah, but for that pay and those benefits? How could I say no?”

Andreas had to concede that one. He raised his glass towards the door in the far wall. “What’s the status of the rest of the backup subjects?”

“Oh, come see!”

They left their drinks behind and walked into the next room. A row of metal cylinders lined the walls on either side, each with their own display showcasing the vitals of the subject within. Sadler walked up and pressed a button on three of the displays, lifting the metal curtains and revealing the vats of green liquid underneath. Inside each vat was a woman, floating lifelessly, totally bald and completely nude.

“Subjects G-8 through G-10 are completely matured and ready for Birth,” Sadler explained, moving further along and opening up more vats. The women in these ones grew progressively younger down the line until G-16, who was still just a foetus. “G-11 through G-16 still need some more time in the oven, and formation hasn’t begun yet on G-17 or any past that. G-11 should be ready for Birth within the next month or so, though.”

Andreas observed G-9, who had opened her eyes slightly and was staring through him listlessly. A vestige of consciousness in a world of non-existence. “Begin mental and physical habilitation for the matured subjects. I want them to be ready quickly after Birth if we need them.”

Sadler blinked, surprised. “S-sir? Are you sure? That’s never been done before pre-Birth, I don’t know if it would work.”

“With G-7’s successful deployment, we’ve given ourselves some wiggle room to experiment.” He glanced over to the younger subjects. “Speaking of which, why don’t you get creative with the ones still in development? Start tweaking things here and there, see what happens. I’ve been wanting a subject with titanium bones ever since G-7 broke her shin in the obstacle course, and there’s no reason to stop researching just because we’ve reached a milestone.”

“Sir, with all due respect, tweaking things is what caused Five and Six to come out so wrong. I understand where you’re coming from, but it could be risky if we mess with the wrong thing and the programming doesn’t set in right. While the subjects’ personalities are distinct, the Source’s natural curiosity and self-righteousness has definitely lingered between them. We need the programming to steer it in the right direction, or we’ll just have another repeat of that incident.”

He waved a hand. “If you’re so concerned, just insert them all with kill-switches. If anything goes wrong, you can just pull the plug. Besides, who knows if any of them will actually reach Birth? G-7 is doing well, and we have no reason to think she’ll falter. This is just a precaution.”

Sadler made a sceptical face, but he conceded, closing the vats one by one. “If you say so.”

They returned to the surveillance room. Andreas reached for his glass, but movement from G-7’s bedroom camera caught his eye. “Hm.”

“What is it?” Sadler asked. 

“Has she ever done that before?”

He looked at the screen. “Oh! N-no, not that I’m aware of, at least. I… I mean, she was going to figure it out sooner or later, right? She’s an adult. Well, technically, anyway. What’s the problem?”

Andreas frowned. “It could just be a coincidence. It could just be the highs of her first day out, I suppose. But, she did have a brief encounter with the Widow today. I don’t want to rule anything out.”

“Oh… Oh!” Sadler’s eyes brightened, as they always did when he got a new idea about the science of what they were doing. “Do you think meeting her could have triggered some sort of imprinted residual memory from the Source?”

“She did seem quite enamoured with her upon first glance. It’s very possible.”

“How fascinating… Maybe it goes with those imprinted personality traits I mentioned earlier; something so crucial and formative to the core of her being that it transcends between physical bodies.”

“Or…” Andreas said, adopting a deadpan tone. “Jordyn has just inherited the Source’s rampant lesbianism, and was overcome with desire upon seeing the first woman of her life that was within her age range.”

Sadler snorted. “Yeah… So, uh… what should we do about this?”

Andreas thought on it for a moment. He shrugged. “Turn the camera off for thirty minutes. We don’t need to see this, and I can hardly see how this would undermine our plans at all.”

“You got it, boss,” Sadler replied. The screen went black, affording G-7 a rare little slice of privacy.

Andreas sat back down, taking a sip of his champagne. He smiled.

“Now, how about a game of cards?”

Taglist: @steelandblood @sapphicwhump @urnumber1star @alsolucakairomi @idkwhattodowiththisaltiamsorry @iamheretohurt

Poor Jordyn doesn't even know...

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you thought :)

Next chapter we return to Jordyn's POV, and the NSFW warning will definitely apply there. Stay tuned for that!

lemme know if you wanna be added to the taglist :)

[sally-mun]

OH BOY MY FIRST RAMBLE SINCE MY RETURN, now I'm really getting back in the swing of things

SO!

I noticed something about myself today

I have a history of getting to the very end of a video game and then just inexplicably just not finishing it. Like, literally I've made it to the final boss, this is THE LAST thing left to do, and I just... wander away and never return. I always attributed this to the weird amount of stress/anxiety I get while fighting bosses, as though I'm -actually- in danger in real life.

HOWEVER, it occurred to me today that it has nothing to do with that, and everything to do with another side of myself that I've known about for years: I fucking HATE having to do combat in video games. I know a lot of you guys live for it, but for me, it is just the fucking WORST. It's a shitty chore I have to do in order to get back to the things I actually like, such as the storytelling and puzzles and exploration. Low-level fights with average goons or minions don't particularly bother me, but anything that's meant to be a 'challenge' can fuck right off in my book. I'm not here for that, and I've often lamented that I wish boss fights could be skipped the way so many games give you the option to skip the story. Lots of players don't care about story and just see it as a delay to get back to fighting monsters, and I simply want the reverse. I want a button that'll let me bypass the bosses and skip straight to the next cut scene before turning me loose in the world again.

Anyway, I realized today that this... approach? Philosophy? POV? whatever it is, it's probably the real root of why I get to the end of a game and then fuck off. I only tolerate boss fights because I want to get back to the good stuff, but once you get to the end? There is no more good stuff. After the final boss you get one more cut scene and NO MORE GAME TO PLAY. Why would I want to bookend my experience with a game I've otherwise enjoyed with a chore that I hate?? I can just look the final cut scene up on Youtube and be just as satisfied.

The only time I'd really have significant motivation to do it is if the game actually does offer a post-game reward of some kind. For example, in Arkham City, you go back out into the overworld and can finish up any side quests you hadn't completed yet + get a couple extra quests that ONLY unlock after you've finished the main campaign. That's good shit, that's worth putting up with the final fight! Arkham City is also the type of game to offer a second quest/new game + scenario, where you get to replay the main campaign with different challenges and you start out already having all your equipment. That's also very cool, I'll put up with an annoying boss fight for that!

But for games where the game effectively never 'remembers' that you beat it? No thanks, I'm good, 99% is all I need.

[todayimgonnaplay]

Today I'm Gonna Play: Persona 3 Reload

Phew, this took a pretty long time to complete! This was one of the many awaited games of this year that I've wanted to play, and I've finally completed it today! This isn't my first time playing P3, but since I only have experience with Portable, that's the only version I can compare it to when I talk about P3R.

I'm probably in the minority that liked Tartarus in the original versions. The randomly generated dungeons and amount of them didn't bother me at all. Each floor felt it had a short and even length to explore, and the shuffle cards encouraged me to fight every single enemy (or Shadow) that appeared. Reload definitely improves on a couple aspects in that the floors look more appealing in terms of design, and are also varied per set/block that you traverse through. In addition to that, there's even additional dungeons for more challenge or encounters that spice up climbing through these floors. Despite that, I kind of felt myself getting pretty bored about 20-30 hours in the game grinding through them. I'm not sure if it's because I've been playing Persona games the past 6+ months that I'm starting to hit a fatigue, or if there's something I don't like about this revamped design. In the end, I had to switch to playing Peaceful to just get through the game. One thing I do miss and wish were in more RPGs that do dungeon formats was being able to split your party to search the floors. This made clearing them much more faster, and also helped with leveling up too. Although I think leveling in Reload is a lot more lenient, and there's a new scouting feature instead where you send 1 party member to move up a floor in advance, which is probably why they removed splitting. But this occurs randomly rather than something you can do by choice, and is mostly for item collection.

In terms of non-combat or the social aspect, I definitely liked seeing familiar and new faces, yet also didn't like them at the same time. Seeing them fully voiced in a 3D environment compared to P3P is like night and day and makes it much more immersive! Being able to see their stories as these characters struggle and change really pays off well when you finish the game. Compared to Persona 4 where I loved how tight-knit the main cast was, I couldn't really get into the social links individually (but I loved the detail of many of them being acquainted with one another). With Reload's theme of Death, it beautifully illustrates how death can be both literal and metaphorical, and how people can overcome or accept it, while looking forward to a better tomorrow. That being said, some social links definitely felt infuriating to go through, which made it hard to sympathize with those characters. 4 on the other hand at least made them bearable at most (except two that I really disliked). One really neat aspect that Reload added were link episodes with male characters and even antagonists to flesh them out more, as well as activities with the main cast. Not only were they enjoyable and added more characterization, they still provide gameplay benefits just as much as the regular social links do, so they didn't feel like a waste of time.

This is probably a nitpick but one thing I'd REALLY like to see improved upon in future titles (or maybe I'll change my mind with 5 Royal) is to allow for more time to socialize. For a game about time management, they're really brutal with how often can you hang out considering the amount of holidays, exams, and even time skips that block your progress. It makes this one unique aspect of this series so stressful to go through if you want to max all social links, unless you use a guide and follow it strictly. Fortunately, multiple playthroughs do solve this apparently as these stats can carry over. But personally, to think about going through a second playthrough when I've technically played this entry 2 and a half times, it can get really exhausting.

Apart from gameplay, the best highlight for me is the UI. Portable's UI is one of my favourite (if not my most) in all video games. I love how minimalistic yet stylish it is. Reload completely revamps it by using a water motif as a reference to the sea of souls, while also propping the protagonist. It never gets tiring to look at!

A mixed opinion I have is about the music. The new music is always great, which I think only P3 has been able to pull off compared to the others regardless of version(for e.g. I'm not a fan of Shadow World and whatever 5 Royal's opening and battle theme are). But the old singer is definitely someone that is hard to replace. Although she performs amazingly in the new songs, and I have come to accept some of the remixes; She carries a sense of monotony compared to a relaxed yet somewhat carefree style that the old singer had. Maybe monotony fits with how the protagonist is, but this is just preference.

Overall, I think this remake was made with a lot of hard work and passion, trying to bring fresh ideas yet being faithful to the original version of 3. Although I felt tired of playing it at some point and started rushing, I'm still glad I had the opportunity to go through this journey one more time. I think it's going to take a lot longer now to check out Persona 5 Royal, but I will be looking forward to Episode Aigis this year!

[shyacross]

I've been playing ssa 3ds and holy cow itz such an underated gem. even if you aren't a fan of Skylanders I highly recommend it. just the levels with the challenges that build off each other for replayability, the perfect mix of combat and platforming in gameplay, the characters switching system still keeping the idea of multiple chars in a level but limiting so u have to adjust to the challenge, its actually all amazing. I do wish so I didn't get my touch screen dirty w my grubby hands that could switch w the d pad bc it literally does nothing but whatevs

anyways what I've done to deal w there being 32 lander's and not figuring how how to pace them, I'm only using half the cast, but only start off w two and (skipping the first 6) unlocking a random lander each 6 crystals til 90

i began w sunburn and stealth elf (I didn't originally start w this idea so I had used zap but shushh)(also this is my first time using sunburn and let me say he is BEAUTFIUL) and now have 18 crystals so I've spun a random spinner and unlocked dino rang then voodood. what's nice bout this is is gets me to go back and replay levels if I couldn't do a certain elemental gate

if u🫵 want to try this, heres what I did said more coherently (hopefully): get 16 landers for playthrough, start off w two of your picking (or randomize them), and at each 6 crystals(besides first) spin a random spinner with the picked lander's besides one u already got and add them to your cast, and u would do this up to 90 (bc you have 16 but minus 1 for 1st level and up to 90 crystals so you get one for each 6 but your gonna need a 2nd lander before you're able to get 6 crystals)

[marcilled]

According to the votes on that poll, at least 70% of you want to hear about my FFXIV ocs (meanwhile, only 12% think i should sleep. so i'm awake still, typing this.) I'll ramble about them under the cut, but for the ~7% that said they don't know what ffxiv is, I ended up rambling quite a bit about what ffxiv even is, and why I personally enjoy it/what i recommend for anyone who's interested in it. (I made it easy to skip over if you don't care to read about that, though)

Gonna put this under a readmore since it got really long;

Cassern Qestir! my main girlie. she/it pronouns. lesbian .

she's the warrior of light. if you don't know what that means; it's the protagonist. if you still need more context:

(skip to the blue text if you don't want to read me explain ffxiv and why i think it's worth playing, i didn't expect to ramble this much about it...)

Final Fantasy XIV is a MMORPG by Square Enix. Most other final fantasy games aren't MMOs, but this one is. That means it's a multiplayer game with RPG elements. It's also heavily story-driven. While you might hear people complain about the story at times- and I'd be one of them- it manages to really leave an impression in spite of any contrivances, awkward writing, or plotholes. That's due to the fact that the player character is... well, whoever you want them to be.

Your WoL (Warrior of Light), the player character, is the protagonist of the story. And it really must be emphasized... They are so, so fully the protagonist, it's hard for other protagonists to even compare to the protagonist energy the warrior of light has. That might seem... dull or uninteresting to some, but eh, it's not like you can please everyone- the point is for you to get into character, and if that doesn't interest you, then hopefully the other characters in the story will. Personally I love this aspect- I've made the WoL my own oc with a really, really detailed backstory. Which brings me to my next point;

The Worldbuilding... The worldbuilding is probably the strongest point of ffxiv, aside from the STELLAR soundtrack it boasts. The worldbuilding is incredibly detailed, and is there to encourage roleplaying, as well as to help the plot along (tho, really, it works best as a means to encourage roleplay). I suppose I should be more specific here; it's the setting that's really the key point here- the world, the cities, each and every river and valley... But also the time period, the history, etc etc etc... There's a lot of material to work with, and I suppose you'll just have to believe me that it's really quite in-depth (if you're interested in that depth! totally fine not to engage with it, too.)

All of this isn't... going to grab or interest everyone, certainly, but eh, I've accepted that at this point lol. Don't force yourself to keep playing it if it isn't grabbing you, but for me, I started playing it for the social aspect- doing something in the game with friends, socializing in the game, making new friends through it... it's been great for that. What I didn't expect is how much the story would grab me.

FFXIV's story is very slow to start, but gradually builds on the humble roots of your adventurer until you're literally saving the entire universe. It's very, very gradual, and this slow pace might turn people off as well. Especially if you hear people say "it really gets good at heavensward!" "shadowbringers is unforgetable!" "just wait til next expansion--" these sorts of things are common to hear, but it's the same as touting that a game gets good "after the first 20 hours of gameplay", it's poison. Just try it out and see how you feel about how it plays. If the style of doing quests is interesting to you, if the combat feels engaging or shallow. etc. hey wait this was supposed to be about my ocs. ok i'll finish talking about the story and then get back to my ocs.

Anyhow. The story is really shallow at first, it's true. Even within the whole base game itself, (A Realm Reborn, aka 2.0), it can be a bit dull and contrived, and boy oh boy is the voice acting completely awful... It's rough around the edges. But if you're like me, you can really appreciate a series that starts out rough around the edges, and slowly evolves over time from humble beginnings into an epic tale that really blows away your expectations... It's about growing with the narrative, to me. If that sounds interesting to you, maybe you'll like it. I certainly did. In fact, ffxiv might be like... top 10 games to me, in terms of how its story affected me personally. Particularly the shadowbringers and endwalker expansions. But you can't skip all the way there, either- the context of everything that happened before it is crucial to understanding where you're at once you get to those expansions. The more you skip, the more lost you'll likely be. Take your time. Don't rush. And ignore anyone who tells you "it gets really good at (x) part!!!", it's a great way to set yourself up for disappointment if you end up not personally connecting with a certain plotline or character moment. I think, the thing that makes ffxiv really special... is.. it's YOUR story. The story of you- your warrior of light. And the parts that are going to connect for YOU, and for your warrior of light, are not necessarily the same as what connects for anyone else. You may end up loving the slow, humble beginnings of ARR, and feel alienated by all the saving-the-world stuff that comes later. Who knows! It's what you make of it. That's kind of the beauty of it. Now, I could talk all day about how I personally connected to shadowbringers and endwalker, (and some smaller moments, scenes, & questlines from earlier in the game), but you didn't come here for all this, you came here to read about my ocs. SORRY.

I'm done talking about FFXIV as a game now. It's time to ramble about my OCs.

FFXIV is really great for making OCs, if you like its setting. Square Enix doesn't like when you talk about it, but there's a pretty big modding scene that lets you customize your characters way beyond what the vanilla game allows for. This is often used for horny purposes, but more interesting to me personally is the gender euphoria I get from seeing my own body reflected in my own character. I gave Cassern wider shoulders, made her taller than any other au ra woman can be in vanilla, and gave her the horns that are typically only on male character models. She is so transgender. i love cassern.

Cassern Qestir is the warrior of light, meaning she's the protagonist that goes on to save everyone and everything. But at the start of her story, she's a budding new adventurer, completely new to Eorzea- her home is far to the east, in the Azim Steppe, where most Xaela Au Ra hail from. It started out casting spells, but picked up ninjitsu along the way, and quickly became one of the most skilled shinobi there is.

(she kills fascists lol)

she's also pretty socially awkward, in spite of her unparalleled combat capabilities... it lacked a lot of confidence early on in the story, too, but over time it got a lot of character development, and gained confidence. my little beepo. i have a lot of photos of it, but I don't want to make this TOO long... plus, it's difficult to give a spoiler-free overview of her character that's still approachable to people that don't know anything about the game. I suppose I could talk about her backstory, because most of my writing for her actually happens before the main game... but, eh, I'd still need to introduce a lot of settings and topics that wouldn't make sense if you haven't played before. tricky to do. maybe I'll attempt that one of these days. Anyhow... onto my next oc...

This is Samga Mol! they/them. bi.

Samga is a touchy, standoffish Xaela dragoon. (Dragoon means they fight with a lance- it's one of the many jobs in the game, like Ninja is. I'd need another long tangent to explain that in full.) Samga was actually close friends with Cassern in their youth, having also grown up on the Azim Steppe- but the two of them haven't spoken in years... I wonder what happened between them?

They're very edgy, as dragoons often are- but they also have a softer, gentler side that they don't often let show... They also get grumpy if you say they're cute. (Which is just even cuter, by the way.) They actually have a soft spot for animals, particularly chocobos.

But shhh, don't tell anyone you saw them like this... they have a reputation to uphold, you know. Tough, menacing dragoon that kills in the name of dragonkind and all that. Most feared heretic in all of Ishgard, strikes fear into the hearts of the temple knights... Wait, weren't they from the Azim Steppe? How did that happen?? Hmm, I wonder...

---

I have a lot more OCs, but most of them don't have cohesive designs and intricate backstories like Cassern and Samga do- and more often than not, mostly exist just to add more depth to the story between the two of them. There's a few others I have, like this mad scientist catgirl named Dr. Frankie. I'm still working on her. She's completely unrelated to Cassern and Samga's story;

stay tuned if you enjoy morally dubious scientist women with an ephemeral grasp on social etiquette. i'm already obsessed with this little freak, i just need to develop her a bit more before i start showing her off all the time. she also has an ... "assistant" that i'm excited to design. more on that later.

Anyhow, this was a really, really brief overview of my ocs, and I have SO many more thoughts on them, that I post about with much more frequency over on @azimsteppe ... when I remember to... (I usually use twitter for ffxiv stuff, but I'm sure you're all familiar with how that website is faring these days...) just be aware that there are spoilers on that blog, and although i try to tag them, you'll likely run into some spoilery stuff if you browse there long enough.

please let me know what you think!! it always makes me happy hearing what people think of my ocs and what interests them about them... :] and!! big thank you for reading all of this!! it was a lot of fun just to ramble lol, my ocs mean a lot to me. so i'm glad it interests at least some of you. take care!!

[rottingraisins]

Also. andrea adams !!!

ADAMS beloved. another scp character that i like a really disproportionate amount there is arguably not all that much to her but i love funny fail bi woman

fav thing: she is so fucking funny and bounces off every character she shares the page with wonderfully. resurrection is unfortunately such a fucking slog to get through sometimes but all her scenes are literally so good whenever she appeared i internally started cheering

least fav thing: author clefs writing is very. how do i put this. michael bay action movie-esque when it comes to women sometimes. its not egregiously bad but why does her combat suit need to be skintight

favorite line: Admit it, Doctor Clef. You're just jealous that I've accomplished something you never could. I decommissioned a Skip… and stayed within my budget.

brOTP: Ive already talked about both her and iris and her and clef already so shoutout to her and foxx. Theyre so code geass im at soup video to me.

OTP: /

nOTP: /

random headcanon: its canon that much like lament she doesnt remember anything about her past before joining the foundation and i do think although she tries not to she gets melancholic about that sometimes. shes a very affectionate sort of person so i think the idea that she has a family and friends out there that shes functionally abandoned forever gets to her and is also why shes very overbearing to her foundation-era friends like roth and elliot. its also an interesting contrast to iris who gets very hung up on her life pre-foundation

unpopular opinion: /

song: /

fav pic: i love like all your designs holly but your adams is probably my favorite take on her ive seen shes so aerodynamic

[jinxviolets]

tell me about ur comfort shows, movies and video games plsss 🥺🩷🩷🩷

ooooohhh okay i will try to be concise but i can have lots of things to say lol

shows:

the good place - i just love this show. it's about ethics and morality and also choosing to be good to others. and it's funny. what's not to love??

elementary - elementary is like a warm blanket i wear. it was the first show i ever started watching when it premiered and stayed on top of for the entire time it was airing. sherlock & joan are literally everything to me and i fell off my rewatch at the last season bc i didn't want it to end (again)

ted lasso - this one is pretty self-explanatory but much like the good place, it's about kindness and being good to others and it's hilarious. whenever i feel like shit i rewatch the christmas episode from s2 lol

movies:

the princess diaries 1 & 2 - i just love these movies so much. the humor in them is so good!!! i missed so much when i was younger. they're just as funny, if not funnier, as an adult now. maybe they're comforting bc of the nostalgia but i just love how familiar they feel

into the spider-verse - if i want to be entertained by a Quality Film, this is what i'll watch. when i saw it in theaters i wanted to see it again and when i bought it i watched it and then literally started it over to immediately watch it again. it's just phenomenal and i love every second, every frame. this movie has a special pedestal in my heart next to peeta mellark

captain america: the winter soldier - aside from movies i watched as a kid, this may be the film i've seen the most. i just think it's great. the music is so special, the pacing is perfect, and the dynamics between everyone.... this was top-tier moviemaking, particularly for marvel, bc it was before every mcu movie felt quite so formulaic.

video games:

animal crossing - i kind of don't want to count new horizons in this bc it doesn't feel the same but i spent soooo much time playing ac games on my nintendo ds lite and my 3ds. i just love going into the games to talk to all my adorable ass villagers.

the last of us part ii - so this kind of comes with a caveat. i only count this if i skip all the cutscenes. i really really like how the gameplay feels so sometimes i'll just hop into chapters or combat encounters to mess around bc i know exactly how they'll go and i challenge myself to harder difficulties (or just go OP with all the cheats on). the content itself throughout the story isn't particularly comforting sldfjksdfl

skyrim - i have a tough time playing it these days (i just got it again and am playing for the first time in like 10 years) because of motion sickness stuff that hurts my eyes but i love skyrim so much. this was the first huge open-world game i ever really loved and i credit this one and portal 2 for kind of opening the door to gaming for me.

portal 2 - i can't go without mentioning this one bc even though i haven't been able to play it in a LONG time bc i have it on xbox 360 and my laptop can't run it, this game is the first game i remember REALLY loving. it's so special to me. i don't remember how many times i played through it but i know it was at least twice if not 3 times, which is a lot for me as a teenager. it's a quality game with really clever levels, fantastic voice acting, hilarious lines, and a really fun style of play.

it's sleepover saturday! send me... whatever?

[writinandcrying]

I'd like a Match Up if you wanna! .o. Preferably for Rise but I'm familiar with every TMNT verse starting at '03 and forward if u thought of any others.

I'm just a gay/demisexual (a guy match plz!) demiguy (he/they) who's kinda short(?) I'm 5'5" at most but I haven't checked in a few years ngl. Appearance wise I shift between pastel or alt stuff is all.

I'm an ENTP and 9w1! I have a lot of trouble properly expressing or understanding emotions due to my Autism but I try to battle that by being blunt and asking questions! I'm also constantly stuck battling between people pleasing and my anger issues that make me wanna snap. To kinda combat that my anger is now p much pointed at myself so I don't hurt anyone or their feelings. But I'm trying to better myself with the "Do No Harm but Take No Shit" mindset. I generally make myself do my usual "im the funny friend" routine, but that lead to a lot of ppl assuming I'm stupid, so I'm trying to find a balance between that and showing other sides of myself :') I show my love through Physical Touch and Acts of Service! And I think I respond well to all Love Languages? Except I can be bad at accepting gifts bc of a dumb inner voice going "Oh so u manipulated them I to giving u smth" ...oop. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Ahh I really like Animation, Horror, and Comedy shows/movies, especially analyzing them. I kind of want kids in the future? I'd be more willing if I trusted my partner with my Lows (hopefully they trust me with theirs too ofc) or if I could skip the baby part tbh. I really enjoy baking, reading, and video games, but I like physical activities when there's a sort of clear goal? Like playing Volleyball or Soccer, but not just a general run or jog. But I'd love to travel the world in moderation too, I just want to make sure there's always a great place to come back to.

In my platonic and romantic relationships I can be frustrating bc I tend to bottle stuff up so I don't bother anyone. If I felt comfy enough and knew I didn't have to worry about my Big Fear(tm) of Abandonment then I would slowly get better at talking about things. I'm also really forgetful when it comes to my own things, like forgetting to eat, drink, or sleep or if there was anything I needed/wanted to do.. I think the only pet peeves I have is if I feel Not Heard or listened to? Or just Disregarded? I've been told with how I analyze situations but focus on emotions help others when they're in their worst moments? Like helping calm my little brother down from when angry or helping my mom or friends out of their depressive moments.

Thank you for your time! <3

hi there! sure thing <3 ill go towards rottmnt cuz it has literally consumed 70% of my brain lately lmao i match you with...

Mikey!

Honestly i can see both of you helping each other out into maturing and personal growth, Mikey knows he's clever and also still learning along the way, don't even consider yourself a bother into asking him questions cuz he loves to answer them, and if he doesn't know something, he can just asks his brothers!

Dr. Feelings make frequent visits in your hangouts, he constantly reminds you to unwind and has relaxing exercises if he notices you are bottling too much, and if someone ever tries to take advantage of your "people pleasing taste" Doctor Delicate Touch will also show up to yell tell the person to bug off

he understands the feeling of only being seen in "one light"- all mikey's (i mean in any version) suffer from youngest sibling syndrome - struggling with not being taken seriously, so he does gives you extra attention in everything you say, do, your feelings, thoughts, and if you mean business, so does he.

Honestly for Rottmnt Mikey i think he enjoys all love languages as well lmao, his top 3 are def words of affirmation, physical touch and quality time, he loves gifting you stuff as well, but if you ever mention those "oh i manipulated them into giving me these" thoughts he will fight /argue with you, like, every-time. He doesn't really get it, he tries to be as gentle as possible with your feelings, but on this topic things might escalate, he really likes you and wants to show it as well!

he ADORES that you like animation and horror too!! i headcanon that later on Mikey becomes a fan of horror/thriller movies and video games, everyone @ the lair gets scared to watch/play with him so he's more than thrilled to play and hangout with you, Mikey never really thought much about volley or soccer, but after meeting you he gets so addicted to it, even start to watch volleyball matches (specially woman league cuz they are the best mwah mwah chef kiss)

Mikey knows its hard for you to open up, so when you finally feel comfortable to, all eyes and ears on you, you are the main priority at the moment. He begins to notice you sometimes go non-verbal lke his brother Donnie (Canonically diagnosed with autism) so he knows how what to do to make you feel better or more comfortable depending on the situation

overall: your relationship is compassionate, full with hugs, kisses, snuggles (he loves to shower you with affection fr fr) and loads of fun dates! lucky you!

hope you liked it! match ups are closed for now

[allianaavelinjackson]

HAPPY BLORBO BLURSDAY LIA!!! *pops a party popper right in your face

What would your characters do if they received a love confession? (from someone they don't like in return, from someone they DO, or both. yes this is free reign to rant abt anaya and raylen I wanna learn more about them)

*collapses dramatically like I've been shot*

well actually I want to answer this so

*gets up and dusts self off*

this is a Very Interesting Question because I too am Deeply Invested in my sapphic children but I'm also excited to answer this for the others so it's gonna be a long one

ok so I'll start off with kyri because I feel kyri is actually on the aroace spectrum or she's just straight up aroace, and she's more on the queerplatonic angsty relationship side than the actual romance side, so if someone confessed to her then rip said person most likely, get them a tissue for the brutal rejection. ordinary sane ppl probably would not have a crush on kyri tho

Julien? I'm not sure about him but he gives Gay Repressed and honestly its a toss up between him running away blushing and screaming or his heart skips one (1) beat and he's an asshole to love interest for the next 2 weeks. good luck getting him to divulge anything until he's ready, which is probably sometime next century. if he gets a confession from someone he doesn't like back he'll probably be nicer because he has No Feelings Involved he'll just be like aw that's nice :) with his Formal Ass Manners and be like I Appreciate The Admiration Thanks For The Courtesy

KALLAN??? oH BOY. ok so you know those screenshotted Tumblr posts of Beautiful Dumb Bisexual Boy. yeah that's him in the romantic world. that's literally him. his responses range from a finger gun to the cheesiest pickup line, and it's so cheesy youll wish you never confessed in the first place. that's for if he doesn't like you back tho so like rip. I feel like kallan would literally be the crush of every single straight girl in the academy and then he ends up with a boy as his first kiss or smthg so like yeah he probably gets confessions regularly but ppl think him and Raylen are dating for like months and it is a great source of internal pain to Anaya (poor girl) but really they're just a couple of bi af besties. anyway if he does like you back he'll probably have this v serious face and insist on talking it all out and stuff he's cute af

Ok RAYLEN,,

I feel like she's got the like. top vibes. but she's a simp. but top vibes. and she'd like play it cool. and she'd be the type to go LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOO in private after they kiss or whatever and Anaya would be looking thru the door and laughing. if she doesn't like you back then she'd probably let you down really gently and seriously cuz Feelings Are Important to her. I won't go too much into detail but I'll talk about Raylen and Anaya as a ship later on

and Anaya. ok this is probably the one I have the most thoughts about, because I want Anaya to be a really emotionally complex character. so she'd probably also let you down very gently because one thing for Raylen and Anaya is that emotions are very important tm and they're both very emotionally intelligent. but if she receives a confession from someone she liKes? bro would combust. bro wouldn't be around for the next step. bro takes her own feelings wayyyyy too seriously. she's obsessed.

I feel Anaya is more of the person to drop hints and do the whole confession thing and MAKE the moves tbh. and Raylen somehow manages to evade every single one while trying to tell anaya as well, because she's Dumb.

them as a ship? would be a really interesting dynamic because they both are simps in different ways, like Anaya is the shit she wore xx item today help and Raylen is the I don't know what color your shirt even is but I'll die for you in combat rn if you like

and Anaya suffers greatly bc of this. neither of them would make any moves at first tho like it would be a really really really really really really really really really slow burn, and Anaya just ignores it until she just Cannot and Explodes. she's the aware one and raylens the dumb one. not in the sense that Raylen doesn't notice, she just notices and thinks Oh Friendship :) idk what the blushing is for tho maybe it's just the weather.

Poor Dumb Queers, the lot of them.

I would do more for Zophie and Chase but I think this post is long enough as a debut writeblr post

this was actually rlly fun even tho I accidentally deleted it once and cried for half an hour so THANKS SER I appreciate it looking forward to More Asks!!!!

[ohmrcrow]

Hoyoverse hell

tbh i've been starting to loose intrest in genshin, so much so i completely forgot there was an event going on and i had to do all the activities last minute, and just skipped half the dialouge because I literally didn't care about the six darshans in sumeru.

lately I've been more sucked into star rail, the settings are refreshing, the dialouge is alot more entertaining especially the MCs dialouge ( alot of the choices can lead to really funny interactions.), the combat system is a lot of fun and even challenging at times, and the character desgins are peak.

I honestly don't mind how linear the game is, it make's it less overwhelming and balances the content.

Ig it could just be me experiencing burnout from genshin, im not sure if im the only one who think's this.