#is that a personal choice of the fanbase or is there no fat option?

[crimisonpetrichor]

I must know, can you make fat characters in Baldur's Gate 3? Is it worth buying? I need to know, can I make my fat dnd characters, or is this a waste of my time? Are you all making thin characters out of choice or are you forced to

[tetrakys]

About Uncoven...

I said I would not make posts about Uncoven (other than replying to asks) and I didn’t. But the game is now out and I gave it a chance so that I could make an informed opinion. Because yes, I’m the first to admit to have been biased from the beginning due to the whole Priya/Koori misandry situation, but I tried to be fair and take an actual look before making my final judgement on it. Here are my thoughts:

The MC

The main complain about Nyx the MC so far is that they are of male sex and non-binary gender, so then usual Beemoov fanbase has not been able to relate. Also customisation is non-existent and you can only choose between three avatars which are identical except for their clothes and haircut. I personally don’t care too much about this because I don’t self-insert (although I do prefer having a female MC). I can look past this, the problem is just that I don’t like the design at all. Personal taste. I also dislike the fact that their personality is very meek, all their friends are overpowered, and we keep hearing about how cool and perfect their are, while Nyx is the poor lost soul who doesn’t know what they want from life etc etc same old story.

The Characters

Other than Nyx, there are 6 friends. Again, personal taste but I don’t like the art style, as mentioned before they are all presented as perfect with no faults, I don’t know how many times I read how amazing each of them is in the half chapter I played. 

They are also VERY stereotyped. Like Silas, for example, is the black fat guy who only talks about food, drinks and partying. Will, the ‘crush’, is the most basic white popular rich boy all the girls swoon for but with nothing really interesting going on for him (apparently). Kristen is the always cheerful extrovert gay best friend. Basically, I’m bored. Oh and there’s also Mavka, the pretty, feminine girl, is clearly one of the writer’s self insert (she even gave her her same birthday), and we keep complimenting her. I don’t like self-insertion, but it feels so icky to me that a writer would make the player compliment and swoon for a character that represents her? Feels like a creepy power move. 

Nyx: “Mavka, her musical laugh, her eyes that shine with joy. Her fragile beauty almost makes me want to cry.”

She also seems to be into the only LI, constantly touching and complimenting him, so this looks like a love-rival situation.

The Cost

During the beta, people could get 100 free APs per day meaning reading 50 lines of dialogue for free every day. They must have thought it was too generous because we now get only 70 making up 35 lines (plus you can get 12 additional APs by watching ads). This is worse than Moonlight Lovers where you can read 50 lines per day. I didn’t play the whole episode, but checking with beta testers and other people, it seems that if one were to buy APs, one episode costs between 10-20 euros, the whole game is made up of 7 main chapters + 3 endings, meaning that the monetary equivalent of this game is around 150 euros. (+/- 20 euros I’d say).

Art and Music

I already mentioned I don’t like the characters design, however I absolutely love the backgrounds, I think they are very well made and give charm to a setting that had basically already been recycled from Moonlight Lovers (spooky manor in the woods). Also, the music is beautiful and, together with the animations, really sets the mood. My only issue is that it’s barely at the beginning of the chapter and had no sound other than some effects throughout the game, but maybe it’s a bug that will be fixed, I don’t know.

Gameplay and Writing

This is the part that upsets me the most and ultimately will prevent me from playing this game. Despite Beemoov advertising the game as an otome, this isn’t one, there is only one crush, and the 3 different routes/endings available are: 1 romantic, 1 friendship, 1 solo/personal-power. There are many choices throughout the game, each option leading to one of the endings, it’s exactly the same system as Moonlight Lovers. The problem is... that it’s INCREDIBLY easy, but easy in a really childish way. There is no complexity in this writing, no ambiguity, nothing that makes you pause for a minute wondering oh dang what am I going to pick? I have spent the past two years testing ML and literally LOSING MY MIND trying to figure out the routes. Yes, it was difficult, and frustrating, but entertaining as hell, and at the end of each route you feel like you have accomplished something. Uncoven is basically the child version of that. Example:

There is no need of guides in this game because there is zero doubt on which path each choice is leading to.

Now, second point about the writing: the romance route is written in a way where Nyx has zero thoughts in their mind other than Will and falling in love. They seem to be completely blind about anything else. And I’ve seen this before, albeit with much better writing: this is Raphael’s bad ending. Eloise used to act exactly in the same way there, with Raphael being her only interest and believing him about everything and following like a puppy. The difference is that was a bad ending for a romance that had 3 options, including a good one where Eloise could be more independent and call out his bullshit. Here there’s no such option unless you want to renounce the romance completely. This is a cautionary tale: there’s gonna be no happy ending with Will as this is a toxic relationship. If you are jumping into this game for romance don’t do it, pick the power route instead, Nyx may end up betraying everyone and taking power for themselves. Much more entertaining than being lectured.

And this brings me to the final point. Yes, again, the blatant misandry: romance = bad, white cis men = bad. I have been showed this rhetoric twice in half chapter already. First, when Will buys groceries for everyone and is mocked for it instead:

and the second is when Rose is telling Nyx that she broke up with her boyfriend with this random assertion out of nowhere

So, here we go, these are my thoughts. I have heard people complaining about other things like the description of magic and wicca (of which I know nothing so I am not in a position to comment on it), or bad representation of poc and queer characters (again, I can’t exactly comment on this, so I’ll leave it to people better informed than me).

All in all, I think the game could’ve had potential if it weren’t for these factors, but I can’t even comment on the plot because between complimenting all the friends, the only thing that happened in half a chapter was a broken mirror. I guess spookier things are going to happen in the future but I won’t see them because my journey with this game ends here. If anyone is going to keep playing please let me know your impressions :)

[colorisbyshe]

did u see that dumb ass shit that happened with jamila jameel? 🙄

the one where she was criticized as a straight non-black woman with zero ballroom experience and she dealt with the criticism by going “oh, i mean i’m still a non-black woman with no experience but actually i’m QUEER (no definition given to what she means by that) and I bring a FANBASE to this SUPER OBSCURE CONCEPT. I QUIT TWITTER!”

i was chill with her taking up the body positivity shit, even though she’s no longer fat and tbh… was never actually like Fat Fat, just like… mildly chubby.

but then she did a ~body positivity at all sizes shoot in a fashion magazine that didn’t offer anything plus size

and then she unleashed some… side eye worthy comments that have come off as anti-black and frankly were

and then she supported ellen being besties with george bush because “I was in england and didn’t know he was that bad” (bitch you were in your 20s??)

and now this

and it’s like……… you should’ve just stuck to being on the good place and calling out celebs for selling teenagers laxative tea

also i am SO fucking TIRED of celebrities entering lgbt spaces (whether it be about singing about ‘teehee when i get drunk i wanna kiss girls!’ or doing shit like this) and then being like “WELL I GUESS YOU CRAZY GAYS FORCED ME TO COME OUT!!! I have been given NO CHOICE but to SAY IM MAYBE INTO THE SAME GENDER BUT WILL NEVER EVER ACT ON IT, JUST SO YOU GET OFF MY FUCKING BACK”

like mAYBE don’t do things that you can only do if you are L G B or T if you are not L G B or T or ARE L G B or T but do not feel comfortable saying so

i’m against pressuring ANYONE to come out but if you are in a context where you HAVE to be lgbt to do what you’re doing, don’t be fucking surprised when people are upset when you seemingly aren’t lgbt and your two options left are either take the criticism or come out. like… FUCK.

but then to use the “being FORCED to come out” bit to get away from the criticism of also being in a space where you don’t belong (ie a historically black space) makes it even worse. like don’t fucking leverage the ‘uwu i’m gay too’ shit  when that’s not even the primary issue.

i haven’t watched the last season of the good place yet but i SWEAR i’m gonan be thinking of this shit every time i see tahani because it’s so obnoxious

“i bring in a fresh perspective as a person who doesn’t know jackshit about this” shut UP

[unproduciblesmackdown]

so i saw your post about artists still drawing willc, and i understand the viewpoint (i am also disappointed by lack of willr content) but i felt i should maybe provide an artist's perspective! personally, while drawing characters i like, i fall into a groove with it. they obviously became fans (perhaps far) before willr was jerm and they cultivated willc in their style already. i've gotten to a point where i don't even reference characters anymore, how i draw them Is That Character for me

i don’t follow you and just peeped your blog realizing you make art and shit that sounds condescending now cause i didn’t know you were an artist! and also although i have my Main Base characters i draw, i like to branch out to explore newer actors in the roles, so it’s still kind of disappointing there’s almost a rift between jeremys. (also ps your art is very good and cute i hope you have a nice day)

i really accept no Good Faith arguments about why there’s a noticeable lack of Specifically Roland Jeremy depictions. like, this isn’t even about individual artists; i don’t need every single person who draws a conn-style jeremy to justify it or Prove that it’s not about rejecting roland jeremy. the issue is the emergent discrepancy between them + the fact that we Do see people make adjustments for visual changes and new castings seen in 2.0/3.0, even allowing for jeremy’s new costume (or voice…..) while still retaining Will Connolly’s Appearance. which in itself is not necessarily the work of the devil but we Do see that it is A Choice that people make 

there’s never any reason someone is Actually Incapable of learning how to draw anything differently. god knows we all wish that we really Could settle into a routine with the way that we draw and feel comfortable at home base but even if you do draw the exact same characters all of the time, your style evolves and your abilities improve and you really Can’t not adjust the way you draw. and inevitably we have something new we have to learn how to draw and yes it’s frustrating not feeling like you “know” how to draw it but like. if you try to learn you can. and artists will keep pulling out the “well i don’t have as much experience drawing _____ so i’m never going to draw that way” to justify some kind of nonsense about why they can’t possibly depict a fat person and it’s so totally reasonable to just imply they can’t even Make An Effort……like, not drawing some Unusual Perspective or not putting realistic folds in clothing b/c you don’t have much practice / don’t really feel like it isn’t the same as “i shouldn’t have to learn how to draw people with characteristics i’m not already used to drawing” b/c obviously a Lot of issues crop up with this that aren’t relevant with stuff like “i’m not used to drawing shoes so i’ll draw them the exact same way always”

in this case there is the way too pervasive issue that people have honest contempt for will roland because he does not look or sound a way they consider adequately Cute / attractive and that is the entire nuance of it. we’ve got people out here imagining justifications and making up objectively false arguments about why actually It’s Bad And They Dislike Him /(As Jeremy) Because ___ but then you really do have people flat-out owning it that they don’t like him b/c of how he looks. this is the Entire Issue. if this wasn’t a factor then we’d see a more balanced ratio in terms of The Way People Are Willing To Imagine This Character. there’s only two guys to have played this role (and only very recently several appearances by alternates) and while the fanbase exploded on the connolly look and sound, there’s been like. a whole Year of will roland jeremy and if the only issue was “it’s difficult to learn how to draw a new person” then, well, there’s been time to practice. 

again i accept no arguments that so many people are refusing to draw will roland jeremy In Good Faith. this isn’t about individual artists; the Trend or Pattern inherently requires looking at a whole group to be discernible

like, i don’t really search out bmc fanart, so what i come across is a pretty random selection of recent-er works, and i’ve very very rarely seen Only 1.0 Cast fanart, yet i’ve also very rarely seen Clearly Roland Jeremy fanart. people are willing to learn to draw characters in a new / multiple ways, but there is this unwillingness to imagine jeremy the way he looks as played by will roland because yknow. god forbid you compromise the mental image of a willowy conventionally prettier jeremy

honestly and it also feels like a rare occasion when i see a jared that looks all that much like will roland in particular. obviously there’s a lot more options re: people who’ve played the role and so like, okay. but at the same time it’s wild that like, the Collectively Imagined Usual Depiction Of Jared does not share that much in common with will roland besides being a white short-haired brunette in glasses. it’s like, wonder of wonders when someone’s fanart of jared is clearly based on Either of the two principle broadway actors for the role. stuck between a rock (non conventionally attractive white guy) and a hard place (he’s totally skinny! but he’s black, too!) on that one i guess

also i have one resounding complaint to make about people drawing Ostensibly-Will-Roland

the roles he’s played which receive the most fanart are obv jared kleinman and jeremy heere………….these are both canonically jewish characters……..would it absolutely kill people to ever ever ever draw a nose like how will roland’s nose actually looks Especially in these cases. sometimes we Do get examples of people drawing not-will-connolly jeremy but The Nose Looks Nothing Like Will Roland’s and it’s like oh. well that’s fantastic. we’re just defaulting to generic white brunette with “acceptably Cute small narrow upturned nose” some more then, okay, i cannot condone this

gods sake when i see a would-be 2.0 / 3.0 jeremy like

that honestly hurt me to make btw…..look noses are a challenge to draw and basically all of us simplify them but if your Shorthand Nose For Absolutely Everyone looks like the above please think about this. noses that are deemed Too Wide / Flat / Big / Hooked / Downturned are also deemed bad / ugly and like, get over that and don’t subscribe to it or propagate it. there’s no such real thing as ugliness or Objective Attractiveness and the concepts are Not at all apolitical liiiike

please everyone be conscious and analytical towards how you draw people and whether you think you have to “censor” certain physical traits and don’t use the justification of “it’s hard to learn how to depict ____” like yeah it’s hard drawing is always hard we’re all trapped in hell together, learning how to be better drawing something that we didn’t use to have any practice drawing is how anyone ever draws anything at all ever so like. it’s not an argument about why someone Can’t draw something. you only Won’t draw something and you can have good / neutral reasons behind this or terrible reasons and plenty of people won’t draw will roland looking like will roland because they think don’t think he looks cute and that’s it.

[golden-redhead]

Insanity

Ouma is Momota’s unhealthy coping mechanism.

Oumota, post-game Virtual Reality AU (with a twist). 2203 words. Spoilers. Dedication for @tricky-leader

Read on AO3.

Insane.

This is the only word that comes to Momota’s mind as he watches Ouma paint himself to be the villain of this season, a tablet with Team Danganronpa’s logo on it grasped tightly in his hands.

He is watching that scene after the very end of the fourth trial, just after Gonta gets executed. He watches it over and over again, to the point where he can almost trick himself into thinking that he doesn’t feel nauseous anymore. His eyes hurt and he is fairly certain that they’re bloodshot, but he stubbornly stays where he is, hands clutching the tablet close to his chest with enough force to make his knuckles turn white. The faint bluish glow of the screen hits his eyes as they search Ouma’s face when he says all those horrible things, lips stretched in a sickening smile of a madman. Momota himself isn’t sure what he’s looking for, but he knows for a fact that he’ll know once he finally finds it.

Maybe he’s hoping to notice some crack in Ouma’s act.

Anything that his tortured brain would use against him to prove him that all of this was avoidable, that if only any of them noticed sooner and Saihara figured it out faster, if only someone knew… The truth is, he doesn’t know what would have happened if that was the truth. Breaking through Ouma’s endless walls of lies and distrust and deftly masked fear sounds like a mission impossible to anyone.

Sometimes, Momota wonders how would it feel to be a part of the audience of Danganronpa’s fifty-third season, just one of those people who get to enjoy the game from the outside, blissfully unaware of the trauma and the empty feeling in your stomach that haunts you long after you make your big comeback to reality. Would it be easier to decipher Ouma if he was simply watching him act like a character on a show, safe and sound on the other side of the screen?

He remembers himself from the times when he was simply one of the fans. He remembers himself from the times when the idea of this senseless suffering would excite him, make his heart beat faster, face flushed and eyes wide and fervent. He was never quite on the same level as Saihara who was one of those hardcore psycho fans who jack off while watching the executions, but he still enjoyed the show, his pulse quickening whenever he saw it airing. The more bloody the season, the better. He remembers the elation he felt when a big fat envelope with a familiar logo on top found its way into his mailbox, stuffed with a short ‘Congratulations, you’ve made it into the 53rd season of Danganronpa!’ note and a contract.

Back then, he celebrated.

The copious amount of alcohol, music blasting at full volume and girls, many girls, who would pass through his bed, moaning and writhing under him, only to be followed by another. He was at the top of the world.

None of that matters anymore. None of that is important now.

He wonders who would have ended up being his favorite character.

Akamatsu, while entertaining to watch, was just a goody two-shoes, so sweet that it was almost nauseous. The only thing that he would have found even remotely interesting about Akamatsu was her ending, but it simply happened too quickly.

Saihara also wouldn’t have been his typical choice, too meek and cautious. Too innocent. Momota was always more into the potential culprits rather than heroes. To think that he ended up being one of them… If there’s one thing he can say for sure about the writers working for Team Danganronpa it’s that they’re sick fucks. The absolute worst. He wonders if it gives them some sense of perverse satisfaction, all this twisting of their original personalities into people that they barely recognize, people who feel so distant and yet so familiar.

Then again, Momota has no right to complain. If anything, Team Danganronpa actually fixed him. He feels a shudder crawl down his spine just thinking about the Momota from before the game. This angry creature he used to be, not caring for anything or anyone. He was so full of shit back then, always ready to lash out, ready to attack, eagerly awaiting for any chance to feel provoked just to have an excuse to fight. This person is still inside him, trapped somewhere under the thick layer of ideals they stuffed him with. Still, he got lucky. Being stuck with this new identity might feel weird, but between the old and new one he would choose this new Momota without a moment of hesitation.

Not everyone can say the same thing, though.

His mind flashes to Korekiyo and he grimaces with distaste. This whole incest subplot, especially when paired with the fact that he was a murderer even before the game started, was a bit of an overkill, even by Danganronpa’s standards. He almost feels sorry for the guy. There’s no redeeming trait Korekiyo could rely on. His personality was reduced to being a fucking creep and Momota feels an intense sense of unfairness everytime he thinks about it. There’s also some relief, though. This nagging voice muttering good thing it wasn’t me at the back of his head. Even though the villain characters tended to be interesting, Korekiyo had a fairly small fanbase and would always end up at the very bottom of every favorite character poll. Momota has no idea how Korekiyo is doing now but he can’t imagine him being happy with what Team Danganronpa had done to him.

So yes, Momota considers himself lucky, at least in this one aspect.

Momota Kaito, Luminary of the Stars might be a fake name, a fake persona, but it’s the one he fully accepts and chooses to embrace, if only so he can keep some resemblance of sanity.

Anyway, now that he thinks about it there’s no way that he would choose Saihara as his favorite and Korekiyo is obviously also a definite no.

Out of his two sidekicks Harukawa seems like a much more likely option than Saihara. Old Momota would have been overjoyed. Pretty girl? An assassin? What a delightful combination. Sexy, too. Good looks on one hand and the promise of some professional and well-executed bloodshed on the other - what more could one ask for? The fans must have been ecstatic when her real talent - none of that boring caregiver or whatever bullshit - was exposed. Of course, if things went like they did in the end, he would have been pretty disappointed that ultimately Harukawa became one of the survivors and never actually got the chance to kill anyone. With how much of a deal they made out of her hiding her talent it was probably frustratingly underwhelming to never see her in some bloody action.

Well… that’s not entirely true, he still remembers the sting of an arrow piercing his arm, but that’s besides the point.

He briefly wonders what he would have thought about his own role in the killing game but quickly dismisses it. Momota Kaito from the game was way too heroic for his liking, a tragic hero who would literally let himself bleed to death just to save everyone.

Pathetic.

Weak.

Lame.

He really should have wrapped his hands around Saihara’s throat once he gained his trust.

And then there’s Ouma.

The trickster.

The antagonist.

The mastermind.

The martyr.

There are so many words that one could use to describe Ouma and none of them would ever be good enough.

He escapes all the definitions, remains a mystery even after the game is over while the rest of the participants get to go home, rest and - hopefully - heal. Even weeks after the game ended Internet forums and websites continued to speculate about Ouma’s character. It’s been quite some time since a character made such an impact. Danganronpa has been going for fifty-three seasons and even despite having many devoted fans some of the appeal started to fade. Teenagers being thrown into a world in which their only choice is between hope and despair can become boring after some time, especially with such a defined structure of the show. Unexpected culprit in the first chapter, double murder in the third one, unclear situation in the fifth … Momota knows it all.

Still, Ouma managed to do something that no character did in a long time. He brought back something that made Danganronpa so alluring all those years ago, when it was still a new concept that would provoke outrage and controversy. Hell, some people even say that he single-handedly saved the name of the entire franchise. There’s no guarantee that there will be any future seasons, but even if there won’t be - Danganronpa definitely went with a bang. And all of that because of some purple gremlin with a death wish.

The same gremlin who was now trapped in a coma with no means of escape, enslaved by the very contract he signed with his own hand.

Team Danganronpa made good use of all the loopholes in the law, exploiting any ambiguity they could find to keep Ouma in the simulation as long as they deem it necessary, possibly long enough for them to revive Danganronpa and put him in the next season. It wasn’t clear what exactly they were planning to do, but as long as Ouma was involved, it was sure that they would definitely make profit off of him, seizing the opportunity to its maximum potential.

No one ever won against Team Danganronpa, despite the fact that many tried. If what the press has been reporting was to be believed then the company was basically drowning in lawsuits. And yet, they managed to evade every single one of them and keep the biggest sensation they ever created clutched tightly in their grasp, using Ouma as leverage to achieve their goal, bending both the law enforcers and fans to their will. There would always be fans begging for more, defending the series with blind adoration, their thirst for blood never quite satisfied. They were the precious children of Team Danganronpa, the ones who didn’t know the life without Danganronpa in it and couldn’t care less about Ouma’s future as long as they got what they wanted.

Danganronpa created the society so obsessed with killing that it lost all traces of humanity.

Even though Momota was once part of it, all of them were, it doesn’t feel right anymore. None of it feels right. The fact that it took him so long to realize, the fact that they literally had to screw with his brain to make him see that… it doesn’t feel right, either.   

And so Momota watches as the fourth trial, because there’s very little besides that that he can do, watches as it comes to an end and Saihara utters his infamous line. The one that fans quote all the time.

The one that marks Ouma’s even further descent into madness.

You’re alone, Kokichi. And you always will be.

And almost as if tapped with a magic wand, Ouma’s face turns blank. For a long second he just stares at Saihara, for once quiet and still, and it’s a second that lasts a lifetime.

Momota thinks about how scary it looks.

Ouma’s blank face is much scarier than any of his masks, much scarier than those twisted faces that barely look human anymore as he slips into the role of a bloodthirsty villain. Momota has scrolled through many threads filled with screenshots of Ouma’s most horrifying expressions, but that one that shows a complete devoid of emotion is by far the most dreadful, yet hardly ever recognized by fans as what it truly is. Momota feels stupid, really, when he realizes for how long he remained blind to it himself, how he was too focused on Ouma’s intentional misleadings instead of on cold hard facts. In his defense, however, Ouma is good at this. Maybe even too good. After all, even Saihara fell prey for his act. Ouma’s a skillful liar, exploiting any weaknesses he can find and never showing his true face, always hidden behind carefully planted lies.  

It’s not a surprise that Team Danganronpa doesn’t want to let him out of their grasp.

And maybe, just maybe, Momota from before would have fell prey, too.

Maybe in all of his brashness he would have become obsessed with this boy who looked like Momota could snap his bones in seconds. Maybe he would have been rooting for him against all odds, simply to see what would happen.

Instead, he’s stuck rewatching the game until it all becomes a blur, until he has it all memorized, imprinted behind the eyelids.

Ouma taunting and lying and smiling. Ouma being the one who, in his own strange way, saved them all.

Somehow he’s even more of a mystery after the end of the game, even if the truth slowly unfolds itself before their eyes.

There’s a weird sense of insanity to it all.

And so Momota finds himself re-defining this word, insanity, because it sure as hell isn’t what he thought it to be.