#it has a lot of interesting lore and character tidbits not found in the game

[bottlecap-joe-spooky]

How bad is the extent of Miles Edgeworth's mental state in rise from the ashes?

Tw: suicide, implied self harm

Obviously he ends up essentially leaving a suicide note of "prosecutor edgeworth chooses death", but that could be symbolic. He HAD already quit his job (one of the only things that had held his life together possibly since his father died) so him as Prosecutor edgeworth had essentially "died".

There's also the ambiguous definition of "dying" in the note. Did he mean it as in he would not be coming back (from death or to prosecution or to japanifornia or whatever) or as he would never come back as the same person (the "demon" prosecutor) or just to fake his own death for a little moral/mental break or whatever (everyone's allowed a little gay panic break every once in a while).

Who knows, and I genuinely love the ambiguity the game leaves.

Obviously, phoenix takes it as a serious suicide note, and is obviously absolutely wrecked by it for the next year. This is a topic often touched upon in fanfiction, though not in the game quite as much. Obviously it is hard to talk about mental health issues in a lawyer game, and they do it really well for a game not technically focused on it and from the early 2000s. Specifically for Maya and Edgeworth I think, as they both have loads of trauma that they deal with in fully different ways. Miles is more worrying though, as most of his coping skills are absolutely horrible, he has very little emotional support, and he's been pretty messed up in the head.

I honestly wonder a lot which people and relationships are meant to mirror the main characters, like phoenix saying shit like "that's so romantic- he saved you- I guess I'd fall in love too-" for the Delite's love story or edgeworth saying Adrian andrews codependent situation is very similar to how Franziska operates with her father or definitely Lana and ema reminding Phoenix of Mia and Maya or him literally telling Adrian andrews to kill herself in court. Specifically that last one. He specifically phrases it as "if you're going to say you would 'choose death', that is of no concern to me."

There is some especially worrying evidence in rise from the ashes, when he was at the most mentally unstable he's ever been. The only time that would compare was when his dad died when he was 8, but even then he had a new foster family to rely on (more or less). He's at his very worse, because, after 15 or so years, all of his past has just been dredged up and solved (by "that man" no less. Also, side note, does he only start saying Phoenix "saved him" after he came back from the dead?)

I really don't like any implications of why edgeworth would have traces of blood on the ground, especially at this point in his life.

So the options here are 1) it's someone else's blood, and maybe he fucking slapped someone so hard they bled or 2) it's his blood on his office floor for whatever reason. Neither imply anything remotely good for his mental state.

At this point it really could just be coincidence and ema is right or whatever. It's an easily missed peice, completely unrelated to the case and just an interesting tidbit for lore maybe. But sadly I found more evidence to support that that is not indeed the case.

I can't remember what the plot point for edgeworth's knife besides the fact that he had it in the car for Lana to find.

Mmm yeah ema. What is that little fruit doing with a knife? Very low chance that gay man knows self defense tbh.

Ema goes on to suggest he spends weekends "roughing it in the wild" and Phoenix basically laughs in her face (does this girl not understand what a homosexual man he is) as Edgeworth has probably never been in "the wild" a day in his life.

This doesn't feel like a coincidence anymore. There is cleaned up blood on his floor, enough for a nosebleed, and there is a knife in his car. One which he would probably never actually use on another person. This and then added to the fact that he had just quit his job and "died" shortly after. it's pretty obvious he is doing worse than even what he says, as he actually is kind of open about how he is doing throughout the games. Obviously he's always trying to hide his feelings (which Phoenix always sees right through), but during the case he does mostly explain to them exactly what is happening. Not that they do or even can help.

His entire career was based around punishing himself for something he didn't actually do. There is no way he isn't harbouring a lot of self loathing, and it's hinted at throughout the games (again, hard to touch on in a lawyer game). This game is so hard to tell what the writers originally meant, both beacause of it being looked at through translations and it being written in the 2000s (like how fruity they 'accidentally' made them in the first game lol) so that's not an angle I can look at this from.

So, to recap, he

had all his past dredged up, obviously very painful

he is open about talking about it, but doesn't show the true extent of how it effects him

has a knife in his car that no one has any real theories on why he has it (and the blood)

There is traces of blood on his office floor

he has spent his entire life punishing himself, and then can't forgive himself for it

he then chooses death

when he comes back, he repeatedly projects onto Adrian Andrews

No wonder he's always saying Phoenix "saved him" he sure needed a bit of saving.

This poor, poor man. His story arc is so beautiful to me.

[ohsunnyboy]

zerobase1 and how they play genshin | zb1

WHALE | META | CASUAL | NOT A GAMER

TAGS: headcannons, crack-ish, lowercase intended

A/N: as a genshin player and zb1 enjoyer, i own a wealth of knowledge. if you don't know what i'm referencing or talking about then i'm sorry lmao i get rly into genshin

WORDS: ~600 (~100 each)

WHALES 🐋

GYUVIN - ok puppy dog has no spending sense and would swipe swipe swipe until he got the character. or somehow get his account robbed and card details stolen. wouldn't swipe for c6 on characters but would swipe for all the skins.

plot goes soaring over his head. though, he'd get 100% completion completely on accident bc he runs from chest to chest completing everything bc ooh shiny. (it's what i do)

definitely hops across different coop worlds to be an absolute menace. steals all your starconches, beatles and cor lapis and leaves.

a whale so team comp doesn't quite matter, but i feel like cool burst animation is a must.

RICKY - need i explain? he doesn't even play the game often, he just sees a cool looking character and swipes. feels like he would c6r5 a character if he really liked them. would get surprisingly into event content just for the exclusive items etc. cares mildly about the plot and zero for the exploration.

would play cool and pretty characters bc when you're a whale, team composition just doesn't matter.

META 🎮

MATTHEW - a confirmed nerd by his sister so you bet he's an enthusiast. pays attention to kqm, twitter and future patch leaks. grinds out for the spiral abyss and has op asf team combos. would spend but only if he knows it's worth it.

enjoys the plot and characters, but not massive on exploration. still enjoys all the characters thoroughly and knows more lore tidbits than most. is the sweetest coop friend.

GUNWOOK - okokok he'd be apprehensive at first until he pulls like c5 benny and a eula then the world of dps (damage per screenshot) awakens. fights wars in the trenches of the honeyhunterworld comments section. stays updated and dips in and out of the game.

secretly stays about for plot. finds exploration boring but can admit it's pretty. the dude who refuses to swap characters when doing coop domains. does a boss blitz when bored.

CASUALS 💫

HANBIN - ok only got it bc the kids said he should. (gyuvin uses him to get the coop achievements) actually ended up staying bc wow everything is gorgeous, the plot is engaging and the characters have depth! and it's all free ?? goes about it at a decent pace, doesn't do spiral often, just finishing floor 10.

tcg enjoyer and event player.

ZHANG HAO - TEAPOT MAIN god yeah hella into the teapot. only completes the story and everything for the teapot. comes on sometimes to help hanbin out or bc someone else needs mats from his world. has a solid overworld team for collecting mats etc.

mildly enjoys the plot but exploration is where it's at.

NOT A GAMER 🌱

JIWOONG - only got it bc everyone else did, found out it took too much space on his phone, deleted it. tried playing it on gunwook's pc but had to play zhongli with his shield up 24/7 bc mechanics are hard okay! does see it as pretty and that yeah some characters are worth spending money for but there are better ways to find enjoyment in life.

TAERAE - doesn't mind it. he just doesn't see the hype over online characters. if and when he does play, it's on someone else's account and on the tcg. man loves the tcg, making decks and sweeping the floor with everyone.

has insane pull luck.

YUJIN - hmmm he sorta thinks it's cringe but gyuvin makes him play it. defo a valorant kid. tried to make a gun didn't work. plot doesn't matter much to him, interested in some character backstory but dips out when it comes to exploring. yujin defo thinks childe, xiao and alhaitham are cool. paimon gets on his nerves the most.

i had lots of fun doing this so i hope you enjoyed ! leave a like or reblog if you did :) ⭒ masterlist

[yukidragon]

Hello Yukidragon, I've been following your headcanons and theories for a while, thanks to a friend I have a question and it's not about the game something's wrong with sunny day jack but about another game that will come out in the case the game, The Groom Of Gallagher Mansion .

The game will have another ghost as a love interest, but this time it's a ghost of a beheaded groom. and I would like to know if you also believe that the game will be like the movie Corpse Bride. and what is your theory about the plot of the game, do you think his death has anything to do with Elias' family jewels?

Ah yes, Elias Gallagher, the other super hot and tragic ghost male lead in the SnaccPop Studios roster. Kudos to Sauce for designing such an interesting character who instantly catches the eye with such a striking detail that tells so much of his story. Their artwork and ideas are really awesome.

Fun fact - apparently the game is going to be more of a supernatural romance story and not a yandere-themed game. This suggests that Elias is only going to be scary in appearance rather than because something is twisted up inside him.

Though I’m sure there’s going to be angst and horror elements. I mean... poor guy got his head chopped off, and on his wedding day no less!

While the story of the Groom of Gallagher Mansion has had a lot less teasers about the lore, as I recall, it was mentioned that he was murdered by his bride on his wedding day because she wanted the family jewels. Of course, this was mentioned before Elias went from being an interesting OC to the star of his own game, so I won’t be surprised if that changes in the story.

But man, if the teaser tidbits of the lore stay the same, can you imagine how that might have gone down? Elias, being a sickly guy finally had someone who wanted to marry him despite his health problems. He’s giddy, thinking he’s finally found true love. Maybe he’s so excited he has to take a seat, exhausted after their wedding, when suddenly the bride he was gushing over just swings an axe into him from behind while he’s not looking and takes his head clean off! Whoever his first bride was, they had major upper body strength. Look at just how clean that cut was.

Then again, they could have used piano wire and shoved Elias through it at top speed or maybe the family has a bunch of non-jewel treasures that include a guillotine, and the bride tricked him into showing her how it works. Who knows really.

I suspect the Groom of Gallagher Mansion is probably going to be a sweeter sort of game, with a lot of fan service and some macabre touches. A game that’s all about being romanced (and seduced) by a sweet ghost with a bit of an Adam’s Family spoopy vibe sounds really cool.

Of course, this is all wild speculation at this point. It’s way too early to be sure of much of anything, but I’m curious to see whatever direction the dev team has in mind for this spooky yet charming groom.

[cinderflower]

Had an epiphany last night while plotting later chapters for FoR and why I always feel so at odds with the broader fandom's characterization of Godwyn (beloved) compared to how I've always interpreted his character (controversial). Turns out, it comes down to the very concept of Death and how it ties in with the Golden Order, the Greater Will, Gold, and the very ecosystem of Life.

This all ties in as well with how I interpret Miquella's goals and what it is he hopes to achieve.

In summary my belief is simply that three concepts hold true: 1 - Godwyn had to die to begin the downfall of the Golden Order. 2 - Godwyn still has to die a True Death to free the Lands Between from stagnation. 3- Miquella intends to introduce the concept of True Death back to the Lands Between.

More below the cut:

I'm going to try and keep this as lore-compliant as possible for my analysis.

Before anything else let's take a look at when the death of Godwyn occurred in the game's timeline based on Rogier's dialogue:

"It happened during the Golden Age of the Erdtree, long before the shattering of the Elden Ring. Someone stole a fragment of the Rune of Death from Maliketh, the Black Blade. And on a bitter night, murdered Godwyn the Golden. That was the first recorded Death of a demigod in all history."

This tidbit is very interesting since I know I've see (and misinterpreted at one point) the timeline of events in relation to Godwyn's death and believing Marika broke the Elden Ring right after Godwyn's death, when Rogier's comment actually indicates that there was a lot of time between his death and the destruction of the Elden Ring and the subsequent Shattering War.

For Godwyn's characterization, to start I'm actually going to dive straight into the Golden Epitaph because this has been the catalyst for the beloved Godwyn interpretation (largely through Miquella's characterization)

The description on the sword is as follows:

A sword made to commemorate the death of Godwyn the Golden, first of the demigods to die. Infused with the humble prayer of a young boy; "O brother, lord brother, please die a true death." Particularly effective at laying to rest Those Who Live in Death.

I think the knee-jerk reaction of a lot of people on reading this was to read the humble prayer line from the perspective of Miquella as a sort of plea to "save" Godwyn. I don't think it's the type of "saving" that the broader fandom believes it to be with bringing him back to life somehow. I think Miquella wants to do exactly as the prayer says - give him a true death.

But what exactly is a True Death? What is death for Demigods in Elden Ring and how does it tie in with the Rune of Death/Destined Death?

Miyazaki: "But the Demigods' immortality stems from having their fated deaths removed from the Elden Ring. I don't expect that to make much sense right now, but as you play the game, I think you'll gradually come to understand."

After Killing Maliketh, Finger Reader Enia: "The Rune of Death is unbound. and the Lands Between are shrouded by Death's dark fate. But the flames will also burn the impenetrable thorns. Farewell it is, then. You'll be Elden Lord, yet."

Finger Reader Enia: Doing so will unbind Destined Death, and slay the world itself.

Stranded Soul: "A proper death means returning to the Erdtree. Have patience. Until the time comes...and the roots call to you."

Finger Reader Enia: "A remembrance of gold has found its way into your possession. Demigods, and even the greater of the champions, are hewn by the Erdtree upon their end, into remembrances."

Notable in the above is the Stranded Soul. Notice that it calls returning to the Erdtree a "proper" death. Not a "true" death. I'll be coming back to this at the end.

We also know that the Rune of Death (or the fragment that was stolen at least) caused the uprising of Those Who Live In Death based on the Deathroot & Militiamen Ashes description:

Later, the Rune of Death spread across the Lands Between through the underground roots of the [large tree], sprouting in the form of Deathroot.

These are the spirits of militiamen who live in Death, and will continue to rise again until properly finished off. This is the grotesque fate of those who come into contact with Deathroot.

This seems to be in contradiction to those who believe Those Who Live In Death do so entirely voluntarily (some may but if it's caused by coming into contact with deathroot then there's likely just as many who unwittingly became undead), which also seems to be backed up by the conversation with Rogier:

"You may find this peculiar, but I discovered something in my examination of the Night of the Black Knives. These souls have committed no offence. They have every right to life, only, they happened to touch upon a flaw in the Order."

And, it's worth noting here again, that the Golden Order was founded on the removal of the Rune of Death in the first place along with the birth of the Erdtree which didn't come to be until the war with the Giants. The concept of Order as enforced by the Greater Will seemingly pre-dates this decision by Marika, yet when the player attempts to burn the tree, Enia declares it would be against the Greater Will's wishes to permit the Rune of Death to be unbound.

Melina, recalling a memory of Marika's words: "Put the Giants to the sword, and confine the flame atop the mount. Let a new epoch begin. An epoch glistening with life. Brandish the Elden Ring, for the Age of the Erdtree!"

Finger Reader Enia: "The Rune of Death goes by two names; the other is Destined Death. The forbidden shadow, plucked from the Golden Order upon its creation… Unleashing the rune now would be unthinkable... The Fingers would never permit it. Nor would the Greater Will."

Hyetta also comments on the original introduction of the Greater Will and it's introduction of life by fracturing the previous One Great (which the Three Finger seeks to return to):

"All that there is came from the One Great. Then came fractures, and births, and souls. But the Greater Will made a mistake. Torment, despair, affliction. Every sin, every curse. Every one, born of the mistake."

But we also know from Enia that the Greater Will - or at least the Two Finger's representation of the Greater Will's desires at the point the game takes place - still wishes to preserve life.

"Across the realm, life lies in ruin. Fallen to pieces[...] Foul curses and misery spread, unabating[...] But the Greater Will has not abandoned the realm, nor the life that inhabits it."

But let's talk about life for a moment, because life in Elden Ring seems to be very tightly coupled with the concept of grace and gold:

Hidetaka Miyazaki: The Lands Between are blessed by the presence of the Elden Ring and by the Erdtree, which symbolizes its presence, and this has given grace or blessing to the people throughout the land, great and small. What this represented in them is this sort of golden light, or this golden aura, that's specifically shown in their eyes. And this symbolizes the blessing or the grace of the Erdtree.

This is all the more apparent when considering the concept the Tarnished, those who were stripped of their grace and banished to beyond the Lands Between until the shattering of the Elden Ring when they were summoned to return, brought from beyond death to serve the Greater Will and restore the Elden Ring.

But what about those without grace? Those denied that same concept of rebirth? We know very well how they are received through the game lore. Whether Omen or Albinauric, those who are born at odds with the Golden Order's vision or outside of it, are graceless.

Though born one of the graceless Omen, Morgott took it upon himself to become the Erdtree's protector.

Albinaurics are lifeforms made by human hands. Thus, many believe them to live impure lives, untouched by the Erdtree's grace.

But Cinder, what does any of this have to do with Godwyn? Good question. Let's consider again that line from Miyazaki above equating Gold with Grace. Now let's also consider Amber as a derivative of gold and the correlation between Amber and life in the game. We have the description of vitality granted by the Erdtree's sap and and the Amber Egg holding the Great Rune of the Unborn which allows for the creation of life.

Talisman depicting a drop of the Erdtree's sap, a blessed boon. Gradually resores HP. It was once thought that the blessed sap of the Erdtree would drip from its boughs forever-but that age of plenty swiftly came to a close, and with time, the Erdtree became more an object of faith.

Amber egg clutched by Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon. Great Rune of unborn demigods. Perfects those who have been born anew. Children born anew by Rennala are all frail and short-lived. Imperfect beings, each and all

We also have the curious description in the Prince of Death's Staff which speaks of amber from Godwyn's living body, considered sullied:

Staff embedded with sullied amber, said to be a very part of the Prince of Death. Enhances death sorceries.

The last curious amber description comes from the amber starlight shard - more on this shortly:

If the stars command our fates, then amber-hued stars must command the fates of the gods.

So we have Godwyn the Golden who is part of the Golden Lineage, the same Golden Lineage that Godrick belongs to - who notably uses a grafting technique to splice limbs together to make new life. Godwyn is also, notably, not an Empyrean. There isn't much about Godwyn in the actual lore itself so let's put together what there is in the game.

We know he was the brother of Morgott and Mohg, Omens who were made to live confined to the subterranean shunning grounds beneath Leyndell. While many people want to infer that there was a positive relationship between Godwyn and the Omen twins, there's not a single thing I could find to possibly give credence to that. In fact, if you look at everything related to Mohg and Morgott, especially their shackles and remembrances, it infers at best a complete detachment by Godwyn and everyone else.

Though born one of the graceless Omen, Morgott took it upon himself to become the Erdtree's protector. He loved not in return, for he was never loved. But nevertheless love it he did.

Shackles were used to bind the accursed people called the Omen, and these ones were made to keep a particular Omen under strictest confinement.

We also know that while Godwyn did befriend Fortissax and the remaining dragons, it was only with agreement to conform to the Golden Order. They disguised their red incantations with gold and took on the forms of humans:

It said that this golden lightning was wielded by Godwyn, who befriended Fortissax.

Lansseax was the sister of Fortissax. It is said that she took the form of a human to commune with the knights as a priestess of the ancient dragon cult.

So Godwyn the Golden is a character based on the above can be interpreted as a character who very much follows the line of the Golden Order.

Who better to make a martyr in the fight against the Golden Order and the Greater Will?

Let's talk about the siblings I haven't mentioned yet: Ranni, Rykard, and Radhan. There's three different schools of thought between the three of them. Rykard was an Inquisitor who eventually fell to Blasphemy and fed himself to the Great Serpent, but not before conspiring with Ranni in the Night of the Black Knives to stand against Maliketh. Keep in mind, this isn't a decision that would have been taken lightly since the demigods knew that Maliketh wielded Destined Death and could kill them.

On the night of the dire plot, Ranni rewarded Praetor Rykard with these traces. Should the coming trespass one day transpire, they would serve as a last-resort foil, allowing Rykard to challenge Maliketh the Black Blade, the black beast of Destined Death.

Long ago, Gurranq was a beast of such terrifying ferocity that his former name meant "Death of the Demigods."

Ranni is an Empyrean who ultimately organizes the Night of the Black Knives and kills her body in tandem with the death of Godwyn's soul to free herself from the body that gave the Greater Will influence over her through her ties to the Erdtree and Elden Ring from being born to Radagon (Marika).

"But I would not acquiesce to the Two Fingers. I stole the Rune of Death, slew mine own Empyrean flesh, casting it away. I would not be controlled by that thing."

She also has a lot of ties into Carian beliefs, more than any of her other siblings. One of these beliefs is in astrology and in fate being guided by the stars and is part of why Radagon was sent to bring Caria to heel and bring them back in line with the Golden Order.

They read fate in the stars, and are said to be heirs of the glintstone sorcerers. But alas, the night sky no longer cradles fate.

Lastly we have Radhan who stands apart from the other two because rather than fall inline with his Carian upbringing, he went the opposite direction. Radhan admired Godfrey, the first Elden Lord, and shows a pattern of his own stagnation over the course of the game. The most notable of which is his mastery of gravity magic to move on from using his beloved horse. But most importantly, Radhan is responsible for holding back the stars, earning him the title of Starscourge.

The mightiest hero of the demigods confronted the falling stars alone—and thus did he crush them, his conquest sealing the very fate of the stars.

This brings us to the eclipse which we hear about at Castle Sol and Miquella's plans, primarily through the nearby stranded spirits:

Ohh great sun! Frigid sun of Sol! Surrender yourself to the eclipse! Grant life to the soulless bones!

"Lord Miquella, forgive me. The sun has not been swallowed. Our prayers were lacking. Your comrade remains soulless... I will never set my eyes upon it now... Your divine Haligtree..."

As you can imagine, with the stars being held and their fate sealed, the eclipse will never come to pass and thus Godwyn will never be restored, which brings us finally full circle.

Godwyn is the reverse of Those Who Live in Death. Rather than Souls lingering to dead bodies, Godwyn is a body without a soul. We can infer from both this and from what Ranni achieved, that to truly die, both body and soul together need to die together.

Now there's one last thing I want to consider here with Miquella, Godwyn, and the cycle of life and death. We know Miquella is associated with the graceless and everything detached from the Erdtree itself through his attempts to grow his own in the Haligtree and the graceless who come to shelter there. We also know through the connection with Trina and the relationship between the Dream World and Spirit World that there's a strong chance at a relationship between Miquella/Trina and spirits (and Torrent the spectral steed).

If we take a look at the Regal Ancestor Spirit Remembrance, I think this provides the best insight into Miquella's intended goals - to restore the natural cycle of life and death, to break the stagnation and closed ecosystem that was created by the formation of the Erdtree:

Ancestral spirits exist as a phenomenon beyond the purview of the Erdtree. Life sprouts from death, as it does from birth. Such is the way of the living.

Now consider again the line from the talisman:

It was once thought that the blessed sap of the Erdtree would drip from its boughs forever-but that age of plenty swiftly came to a close

The Erdtree and creation of the Golden Order stagnated the Lands Between by instilling a system of life and rebirth of life from the same life all through the Erdtree. But a closed ecosystem that cuts out the "bad" parts (predators, decay, death) is always doomed to fail.

To me, Godwyn has always served first and foremost as a narrative tool to represent the Golden Order and the subsequent stagnation of it. His death is the metaphorical death of the Golden Order as the decay of the Golden Order slowly spreads across the land the same way the deathroot does. We want to ascribe goodness with being golden because that's such a prevalent concept elsewhere, but I think that's misguided in the context of the broader narrative. Godwyn the Golden (Order) as a character, to me, would have a characterization that reflected the Golden Order's beliefs - granting blessings/favor on those who fell in line and conformed with the Golden Order's goals and beliefs and standing firmly at odds with those who went against it.

As I stated in the beginning, I believe this is the crux of Godwyn's role: Godwyn had to die to begin the downfall of the Golden Order. Godwyn still has to die a True Death to free the Lands Between from stagnation.

If Miquella intended to bring back Godwyn and restore his life, he will have accomplished nothing at all. He would only succeed in restoring the Golden; the bastardized concept of life unending and stagnating. And who better to understand the concept of stagnation than Miquella who has known nothing but stagnation?

The Golden Epitaph tells us a lot of what I perceive to be Miquella's goals and intentions, to break the cycle of the Erdtree, of grace, and restore Death back to the land. Not the concept of Life granted by Grace and the Golden Order. Not the concept of Life within Death.

True Death.

O brother, lord brother, please die a true death.

The fact that he is twins with Malenia along with the relationship between them the game implies, I believe lends credibility to this theory. Malenia is rotting, but the whole concept of her character is around decay and rebirth.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my obscenely long Ted Talk.

[ryyylaaaiii]

LOADING ... YOUR LIFE IN TWISTED WONDERLAND ( @obsoleteozymandias )

𝜗𐑞 DORMITORY : pomefiore

pomefiore, founded by hard work of the beautiful queen. i actually believed this one resonated to you the most! it was just a feeling in my gut, and i went for it. pomefiore is home for all artists—in pomefiore, you are expected to have a taste for beautiful things. and thus, your creative mind fits right into this dorm! self improvement and developing as yourself is part of pomefiore’s values, by extension fighting prejudice itself  is pomefiore’s values. looking down on people and blocks their growth  isn’t beautiful, helping each other grow is. ( i do believe you might fit happiest here, hehe )

𝜗𐑞 SIGNATURE SPELL : echoes of enquiry

a spell that draws forth hidden truths and secrets from the environment, manifesting as ethereal whispers and shadowy apparitions that float around your character. these ghostly figures engage in playful banter, sharing intriguing tidbits of information, local gossip, or forgotten lore. the more curious you are about a particular subject, the more vivid and animated the revelations become, turning the act of uncovering secrets into an enchanting, almost whimsical experience.

𝜗𐑞 CIRCLE OF FRIENDS : pop music club

consisting of cater, kalim, and lilia !!! i generally just think that the three of you could get along well together, especially with your shared tastes in interests, which is music! you fit in rather well in the club, and i just thought that you would be happy there hehe. i believe that you would get along best with lilia—seeing that the two of you enjoy adventuring and video games.

𝜗𐑞 LOVER : ruggie bucchi

i believe that you two could resonate with each other quickly. you try to be kind above everything else, especially to those in a rough place—and ruggie admires you for that. i just generally thought that the two of you shared some similar personality traits, and he does seem to fit your type! it can be hard for him to trust people on a personal level, but after some time he warms up to you a lot. he's especially grateful for your gifts, and always tries to pay you back. i think that this relationship has lots of potential! (cater is a runner up, but i ultimately chose ruggiee)

FINISHED EARLIER THAN I EXPECTED OMG this was sooo fun to make !! i wasn't quite sure on the last bit ... but everything drew back to ruggie huhuuu !! i hope you like ittt -v-;;

[frayed-symphony]

Since Twitter might not be a thing for much longer I wanted to move the trivia threads for my picture books to tumblr.

OC lore dump and sketches for my first self-published picture book Hurricane Lane under the cut;

The number one thing I'm worried about is people thinking my book is related to the hurricane of the same name. I wrote this in 2010-2011 which predates it and the title is meant to convey Amelia's life in her suburban town and how she views it more dramatically then it is.

The name was also inspired by this beautiful song by The Hush Sound which I was listening to a lot whilst concepting and really influenced aesthetics (more subdued colour, the inclusion of the piano being an important story point etc).

I started getting interested in children's illustration when I saw the Penguin Design Competition advertised at my uni in 2010. I didn't make the cut but figured I'd go ahead and finish my book anyway because at that point I was invested in my story and wanted to complete it.

The contest called for an ebook with interactive pages so I made Hurricane Lane have seven special pages of  'wonders' Amelia finds throughout her story. Unfortunately with flash player gone the interactions don't play but they're still found online here;

I based Amelia's design on a Mii I had made which was supposed to represent a human Pikachu. You can see the Mii on the bottom left here. I really liked how it looked and she gradually evolved into what she is today.

Initially the dinosaur suit that her brother has was going to be worn by Amelia but I preferred her without it and thus Bailey was born. The dinosaur itself was based on a purple stegosaurus keyring I had when I was younger and loved even though I had no keys at the time.

Here are some more initial outfit designs for Amelia but in the end I went with the one on the right, inspired by Miku Hatsune's 'Out and About' module from Project Diva.

The family's father Rupert was partly based on my own dad (definitely the dress sense) but in 2010 I was also really obsessed with the BBC show Merlin and may have tried to age up Colin Morgan a bit to make this character.

The mother's design was a little based on my own Mother's and a little the title character of the film Amelié (she evolved beyond this quite early so there's not too striking a resemblence). I was also obsessed with the music in that film which inspired this book a lot.

I kept it vague whether she worked at the hospital or was staying there as a patient because at the time I had an idea for an overarching narrative where the families of Hurricane Lane and 256 Postcards Ago meet. This didn't pan out so feel free to have your own interpretation.

Here's some initial concepts of the logo which I was mostly scribbling during my Uni classes.

One more random tidbit is that I based the background of their journey home from the Toad's Turnpike track in Mario Kart 64. I really loved that game and it holds a lot of childhood memories for me so the nostalgia felt fitting. Maybe that's too weird to mention!

Towards the end I was concepting the protagonists of Hurricane Lane and 256 Postcards Ago meeting in a connecting rpgmaker game but sadly that never came to be. I'll talk about it more in my thread for the next book though!

I also made a little soundtrack for my book here

1) Kiara 2) Cornflake Girl 3) Indaco 4) La Valse D'Amelie 5) 春よ、来い (kites) 6) The Heart Asks Pleasure First 7) Lotus (dragon hunters) 8) Nightbook 9) Reverie 10) Hurricane

I listened to these songs a lot while reading and the final track inspired the title.

And final last tidbit- Hurricane Lane takes place in my childhood hometown. It doesn't have too many standout locations but I took photos for background references and anyone who lives there may recognize the small nods to it.

(Almost forgot links to where you can read my book) Amazon paperback; https://amazon.com/dp/1475009097 eBook; https://frayedsymphony.gumroad.com/l/LuNug

Thanks for reading!

[riftdancing]

Just some Sasavi tidbits...

Because I have absolute dragon brain rot right now.

First and foremost, since Mihli's story originates in FFXI loreverse, I'll be delving into a little bit of that game's lore and history. I love that in both XI and XIV's universe there exists within each dragon the capacity for good and evil or light and darkness.

San d'Oria (one of XI's three starter city states) and Ishgard share a lot of similarities. San d'Oria has had a long and often violent history with dragons, a conflict between the Elvaan (Elezen) and the wyrms much the same as Ishgard's Dragonsong War. However, being a deeply religious nation at heart (again, much like Ishgard) a group of brave knights took the words of their goddess, Altana, to heart and sought to find the light in Dragons.

These knights did not seek to indiscriminately slay dragons like so many others before them but instead opted to forge spiritual pacts with the younger dragons so that they may both better develop along side each other. These knights became Vana'diel's first Dragoons.

Its important to note that these dragons would only typically form a connection with the righteous and not with those who merely sought power for their own sake. Even despite this bond being made pure in the start, they are capable just like any other of being corrupted by evil or darkness. While Mihli was never typically a member of San d'Orian society, nor a proper dragoon in her own right... she and Sasavi still share a very interesting history and further more, the spirit pact. Mihli found Sasavi moments after she'd been orphaned. It was the cat's unprejudiced care, concern, and love shown for the small dragon which forged the pact between them. And from that day forward Mihli has cared for her like she would her own child. From day day forward, Sasavi became Mihli's daughter.

The trauma of what occurred before Mihli arrived to swoop in and care for Sasavi has left the small dragon mostly non-verbal. Savi is a mute. Though she has her own ways of communicating, mostly through clicks, chirps, and churrs (like Miqo'te are capable of), or through her own body language. She is also capable of some doodles when supplied with the right mediums to work with.

All in all, Sasavi is definitely a good aligned and light bound dragon. A major part of their storyline for the better part of the last 20 IRL years has been geared towards educating other player characters about both the light and darkness dragons are capable of. That not all dragons are bad and that many are capable of a great deal of good and wonderful things, just like any Hyur, Miqo'te, Elezen... ect.

Since this is starting to get a little long... ask me about how the two pair in battle sometime if you're interested. I have some really interesting head canons about a dragon pact boosted dancer class. Think of it as a neat combination between dragoon and dancer. 's essentially Mihli's job/class. It's also why Mihli's dancer aesthetics are all dragon themed, such as her chakrams and other items being shaped to look like dragons.

Bonus Head Canon:

Since learning the origin of Dragons while adventuring with the WoL, Mihli quickly adopted 'my little star' into her booklet of endearment terms for Sasavi.

A lot of my information on XI's dragons is referenced from this video and also my own experiences playing FFXI! If the topic interests you, you should definitely give the video a watch!

[randomnameless]

Still the anon about Petra here! Since I follow #fe16 I often see your posts and they're interesting but I was wondering about how you feel about this game? you seem passionate according to the time you must spend writing about it but you also sound like you really hate it with your guts at the same time ("3nopes"?)

Lol

I used the sandcastle allegory earlier - but I like the Fodlan verse for what it could have been, and not what it actually is (hello Nopes) - ?

Everyday - rather every week - I discover some tidbits and nuggets here'n'there and what makes everything so annoying is how the verse had, imo, the potential to be something great, but it ended up like an english muffin.

There's also all the lolcalisation woes/issues to be found, I wasn't that gung-ho about Fates or interested in it so I couldn't despair with everyone when the lolcalisation was revealed to have been crap for reasons that are still a mystery nowadays - but the lolcalisation for FE16/3 Nopes? Sure, it doesn't alter the game like what happened to Fates, but where I could somehow understand some excuses thrown here'n'there for Fates, for FE16's they can't work anymore.

Just like some people pointed out, Fodlan's subtext is really interesting and you can feel the devs/whoever worked on that specific part of the game, frex I really loved what they did and put their heart in it - I love to write and overthink about meta stuff and all, so all this flavor text is a godsend to write/think/meme/fanfic about! Random stuff like Willy's statue, or Rhea's golems having names?

That's good shit - extra random stuff in the support convos that explain or shed a new light on main events happening ? Sure, give it to me! I love it!

Garreg Mach's recipe book? I love it! It brings so much to the world... or so it is supposed to because, in the end, the Fodlan verse is an exercice in frustration.

We are shown things, here and there, but told the inverse, and whatever you discovered or saw is... irrelevent. The game follows a certain narrative (with variations here and there) and ignores a lot of what is "shown". It's as if someone has two perfect eggplants and three tomatoes in his fridge, saw them in his fridge, and closed the door, saying he has no ingredients to cook a meal and is forced to eat a steak with fries.

Frustration it is, because I love those useless lore trivias, statues and books, but the plots of both games just, ignore it. I've joked quite a bit about the Supreme Replies (tm), but it's all about missing the point. You see this stupid cookbook, you get seeds and plants from other countries, but bar shouting at your screen it doesn't matter because character X and Y will say something - that is contrary to what you've just seen - and the story will follow the narrative of character X and Y until it ends.

Regarding the tag though, it's more of something to organise the blog and while there is a lot of negativity because i usually talk about discourse (including the lolcalisation) I think I wouldn't be as frustrated as I am with the verse if I didn't had (still have?) hopes about it and some affection.

So, as weird as it sounds, I like the Fodlan verse, but just, not the Fodlan games.

I hope that answered your question ?

[deflare]

Day 4, and today’s little guy is a Blood Raven!

Knowledge is power, guard it well.

The Blood Ravens are a successor chapter of... someone. The records are unclear. This isn’t terribly uncommon in the Imperium; 10,000 years is an absurd length of time, so information gets lost all the time. Several chapters don’t know who their daddies are. But it gets a bit more interesting in the case of the Blood Ravens; I’ll get into it more in a second.

The Blood Ravens were created to be the main characters in the Dawn of War series, by Relic Games. So they have a lot of ‘standard’ Space Marine qualities, so the player can have access to all the usual toys in the video game. Their standout features include an unusually large number of Librarians*, an unfortunate risk of turning to Chaos (depending on the player’s actions), a general quest for knowledge (especially about their origins), and a tendency to steal other chapters’ relics. The last bit isn’t really canon, per se, but they DO sure have a lot of ‘gifts’ from other chapters in their vaults that the player can equip characters with. The Dawn of War games are good, and the Blood Ravens look really cool, so they’ve become pretty popular outside of that game series.

Now, the Blood Ravens’ background. One of the legions that turned to the side of the traitors was called the Thousand Sons (they didn’t want to turn traitor, they were betrayed by Horus and by hubris, it’s a whole tragic Thing). The Thousand Sons were noted for being a legion full of psykers, wearing red armor. They divided themselves into a number of different cults that specialized in different fields of psychic study; one of them was called the Corvidae. Therefore, there’s a lot of speculation that the Blood Ravens were created from the genetics of the Thousand Sons. This would explain why their origins were kept secret, as the Imperium isn’t supposed to b make new chapters from the genetics of the traitor legions. But hey, if they’re in the gene-bank, why let them go to waste? As more tidbits come out about the Blood Ravens, the writers seem to enjoy teasing this connection even more, but are unlikely to fully confirm it; the mystery is more fun.

*What’s a Librarian (in the context of fanatical supersoldiers)?

So, psykers. An increasing number of humans in the Imperium are exhibiting the ‘psyker gene’ (which is a misnomer, since no one has found an actual genetic link yet). Psykers are vital to the running of the Imperium; the only ways to send messages faster than light are by sending a spaceship (slow, real expensive), or by having psychics send telepathic messages to each other. But also, psychics are dangerous. They have wild, uncanny powers (basically, they’re space wizards), and a momentary lapse of willpower can make them a portal to the Warp, with bad times for everyone involved. Also, a thousand psykers a day are fed to the Emperor to keep the Golden Throne alive. It’s fucked up.

Once in a while, a psyker gets inducted into the Space Marines before their power is discovered. These special Astartes become Librarians. In addition to being lore-keepers and general nerds, Librarians are powerful battle-witches. The average psyker is a twitchy, half-insane weirdo who’s constantly at risk of their head blowing up. Librarians are made of sterner stuff due to supersoldier nonsense. Some chapters have special flavors of Librarian based on their local culture, and a few others don’t use them at all (like the Black Templars, who take their creed of ‘abhor the witch’ to an extreme). The Thousand Sons, as mentioned, were a legion made entirely of psykers. This ended badly for them. Being a space wizard in 40k sucks. But then, being anything in 40k sucks.

Master post here

[felidaeng]

You’ve inspired me to adopt a pokemon protag and create extensive headcanons and lore about them. I would love to hear your SV takes on the other characters btw

aw, that means so much to me! i hope you're having fun!!

like i said i'm sort of waiting until i've gathered all the lore tidbits out of sv's game canon i can as well as for everyone else to catch up to the story so i can avoid ruining any plot twists for anyone (because sv's are a doozy!) but i have stuff in the works! mostly regarding professor sada and her whole situation, though geeta is showing a lot of potential to make herself into something interesting come dlc, so there's a high chance i'll return to her when that time comes.

i've yet to do any in depth thinking regarding team star's individual characters but it's pretty evident to me that they were all bullied, then vilified, for being outwardly and unapologetically neurodivergent (and potentially lgbt+, as eri has subtext with another girl and cassiopeia reads as transfem to me). i avoid using the term "found family" as much as i can because of how loosely it's thrown around these days, being applied to situations where it isn't appropriate and what not, but with these guys... yeah, their self-established closely knit community of social pariahs qualifies.

there's also the subject of koraidon but again i'll have to come back to it later. its name is olim though :)

[strahdapologist]

Out of curiosity, what Ravenloft game books have you read? I'd love your thoughts on them.

i have yet to finish the war against azalin as i'm balls deep into my master's currently :( but i do really enjoy how elrod writes strahd. you can tell how she struggles with the mess that is ravenloft/forgotten realms lore which isn't a fault on her or her ability to tell a story but rather how TSR/WOTC has treated the material and tie-in novelists (which she alludes to often in her facebook posts). i found both her strahd novels to be enjoyable from what i read, but like i said she's stuck between a rock and a hard place when it comes to the lore that is ever changing. but she makes strahd a very likable character, far more than vampire of the mists which i hate for so many reasons beyond just how they write strahd.

if you mean the campaign/players' guides i have a friend who gave me access to almost all of the published material going back to 1st edition. 3rd edition has some very interesting stuff! and a lot of the gazetteers and world guides are superior to VRGTR imo, giving the player a lot more to work with. that being said, TSR had a lot of issues with racism lmao which is most clearly seen in anything in reference to the vistani. unfortunately WOTC isn't much better so lore wise sadly that's where they are most consistent with ravenloft. lol

i have not read through all the adventures set in ravenloft, however, as for my own campaign i've been most preoccupied with building the world. for that i found the gazetteers and player's guides most helpful esp. in regards to dark powers checks and little tidbits like culture and language

[evecolourshock]

Because Tron is both a weirdly niche fandom even on Tumblr (surprising, I know), and deceptively older than it seems - most people know about Tron Legacy (2010 film, usually either because Daft Punk did the soundtrack or "cool glowy aesthetic"), but a lot don't realise Uprising exists or that it's actually all based off a 1982 film (Tron) that Disney made when they were still feeling adventurous enough to make good and unusual films (keyword there being unusual - it's less an action film and more an exploration of humanity and faith, with a side helping of innovative-for-its-time CGI and found family).

There's a few other bits of source material I'm less familiar with, such as the novelizations, Tron: Betrayal comic or the storytelling games Tron: 2.0 (later made non-canon) and Tron: Identity, and the teased-at third film in development known as Tron: Ares (done by Jared Leto, and viewed either with wariness or disdain on principle by many fans of the franchise).

I would suggest checking out anything tagged @alwaysyori, as Cindy Morgan (one of the actors in the 1982 film) was on here before her death under that handle and there may be some findable posts - however her account has since been deleted, to the outcry of many, so this may be more difficult than it was. Searching for tronblr will usually find you at least some members of the community as well.

There is a fledgling hub blog run by @spaceandthedigitalfrontier, called @unofficial-tron-rpc, that is intended for use by anyone involved in or interested in the Tron RP community. A lot of us have interesting takes on different characters, or use OCs within the Tron universe - I can think of at least one amusing thread where two different versions of the same character meet and get into plausible Shenanigans.

Most of us in the community are pretty friendly (if starved for content), and happy to discuss our headcanons, theories, or found lore tidbits - I'm notorious for delving deep into theorising how things would work, or providing stories based on someone else's throwaway comment - but this franchise hints at so much yet gives us so little that you're unlikely to find the same interpretation twice.

I began watching the animated show called Tron: Uprising on Disney+ and it’s like… Really Good ? Like yeah it’s generally geared towards kids, but that usually doesn’t stop Tumblr. Why have I never heard of it before ?

[lovecolibri]

Things that did NOT Spark Joy-4x05

 Fam, I am struggling this season and I don’t know if it’s just because it’s the last season and I’m losing my patience, or if things are getting worse, but I am...SO confused, so much of the time. Which isn’t always a bad thing in shows! They can’t tell you everything in the first episode, you’re supposed to have questions, it’s what keeps people coming back to watch. But RNM has a habit of not giving us answers to the questions we have and after 3.5 seasons I’m losing hope I’ll ever get answers so it’s to the point that having so many questions is no longer fun. On top of that, a lot of the question I have are not about the plot so much (okay they ARE but those are more “why TF didn’t we do/learn this ages ago” or “why is this person involved instead of someone else”) as they are about the mechanics of how LITERALLY anything is supposed to work. The show keeps contradicting it’s own lore, or just, having things happen with no explanation, or we’re randomly TOLD things and not SHOWN them, or pacing issues giving time and place no meaning which affects the audience’s ability to orient themselves with the story. Watching this isn’t like enjoying a good mystery where every new clue gives you more questions (BRB gotta go watch OMITB), it’s like playing a game with a 5 year old who keeps changing the rules to fit their needs leaving the adults to flounder trying to adjust what they already knew to fit the new, contradictory information.

The issues with season 4 seem to be mostly the fault of multiple seasons of bad choices culminating in the mess we have right now. Part of the pacing issue is this needlessly complicated set up for the main group to find out these tidbits of info about Dallas and his history, and these alien pieces, meaning we need 6-8 new and recurring guest characters, and everyone spread out doing different things with the new characters instead of each other. They should have had all these alien prisms as things already in possession by the main group. Eduardo could have the stone tablet thing (instead of sending it to Mexico and us finding out all about his family casita but not why Tezca was even IN Mexico and necessitating that to be a whole storyline in the first place, when Clyde said they were all on the ship with Jones. But also somehow didn’t know about Michael being his son with Nora? ANYWAY), Alex and Kyle could have had the prisms found in stuff from their dads/dad’s bunkers and on the reservation (maybe Gregory had a piece and says mom was holding it for Alex or something last season), or one is something Kyle pulled from Caulfield while he was gathering things up before it was destroyed. 🚗 said she pitched the show with a 5 season arc, and IDK how much Chris deviated from the alien part of the plan but with “the alighting” and “Ophiuchus” being name-dropped every season I feel like we’re still pretty on track, and changes were mostly made around personal drama stuff. So it’s not a stretch, again since things from season 1 are still being mentioned now, to think that they could have been setting this up all along, AND it would be the PERFECT way to keep Kyle and Alex connected to the main story, even though it should never have been a struggle but the show apparently hates joy, and interesting, fan favorite characters. They could have NOT killed off Jones and done *something* to wake him up this season (MAYBE having 1 guest star) and let him do the faceoff with Max. Jones specifically said he was going to go after Alex to get Michael to cooperate and this would have fulfilled that narrative promise they set up on a massive tee and then just....failed to hit, at all. Apparently Liz needs yet another rando scientist or two to work with instead of letting her work with Kyle and Michael again like she did to fix Max’s heart in season 2 even though we NEVER got to see it. We don’t need all these extraneous characters and backstories about them!

All this to say, this is REALLY long, and I have some salty shit to say and I’m going to be bitching about a lot of things I don’t understand and I’m annoyed about so I’m going to put it under a cut. If you happen to have answers, because my brain is swiss cheese about some events in this show (especially when they info dump for a whole episode), let me know! Then I’ll at least have some answers!  If you’re only interested in the joy this show inspires, you can catch up on all that goodness here, otherwise lets dive in to the “clear as a muddy swamp” water. Who knows, maybe we’ll find a tunnel to whatever hole Alex has been kept in for the past month! (or you can go read my life reactions under my “roswell spoilers” tag since I’ll probably be reiterating a lot of it here, but those posts sometimes have memes attached!)

Link to previous episode posts: 4x01, 4x02, 4x03, 4x04

First bit of confusion right off the bat! Tezca saying the blue flame was a Power Jones had and she was able to access the power from Max even though it was dormant. HOWEVER, we never saw Jones use that power. We saw him quite often using regular fire. If we were going with some kind of blue fire, shouldn’t we have seen that at least once last season instead of retconning that it’s something Jones can do that we’ve never seen or heard about? Again they killed Jones too soon and without ever letting us learn as much as we should have from and about him.

Speaking of, NO JONES RESSURRECTION?! *throws phone*

So, Isobel found Cam, half naked in the desert and she was last seen with Max, who no one can find, and Isobel just....drops Cam off with Liz and fucks off to Mexico?! Without even trying to go look for her brother?! Season 1 told us Max could find Isobel even when she was in the middle of the desert and had no idea where she was, even though Max didn’t think he had the same mindscape powers as her, but she can’t rally the troops to go rescue her brother from the clutches of evil which, for all they know, could include Jones since they just found out his body went missing?! The show sidelining Isobel and Max’s relationship is one of their many, many crimes. 

Max says he’s just waiting for the handprint to fade and break the connection. Everyone been knew he was lying about something and apparently Liz is...just going to trust him even when she acknowledges he’s lying to her face which, okay, but Michael doesn’t say anything either? About both the lying which you know he clocked, OR the fact that the handprint fading didn’t stop Jones from accessing that old connection and trying to kill Liz with it so why is ANYONE assuming the print fading will do anything? Or is this just more lore changes we’re supposed to ignore like we had to do last season when suddenly the faded handprint could still come back and kill you?

Michael has once again left someone who was kidnapped to their own devices but at least Eduardo told him too and it was okay though I did think Michael had gotten him untied and he was on his way out into the desert. Clearly he was found by Bonnie and Clyde again, but at the time, no one knew that yet. He could have been back at Deep Sky taking a shower and having a nap for all anyone knew. And yet, after a few hours since he saw him last, Michael is saying they need to stage a rescue op, while no one has heard from Alex in DAYS, even after they called him about a friend’s mom he knew well DYING and no one seems to think it’s the slightest bit odd? Not one single worry about Alex not calling to tell Michael good night, or answering Michael’s texts when Michael asks if he’s still up?! After showing us last season that they call each other just to chit-chat and check in and when Alex didn’t answer Michael went over and when he didn’t find Alex he went to Secret Government Agency headquarters to get to Alex?! *screams into pillow*

WHAT was the deal with the woman in the pod needing surgery?! I couldn’t see any injuries that would necessitate surgery in an unsterile environment with an untrained tech and no medical equipment! Kyle would know better than that and wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t a life or death situation which we are given NO indication that it was! This isn’t even just telling and not showing, it’s not telling OR showing! WHY was that even needed when she’s up and looking just fine? Did Kyle smuggle medical tools and anesthetics (which, he’s a surgeon not an anesthetist) into Mexico? Did he perform supposedly emergency surgery with NO  anesthetics?! No monitoring equipment?! What kind of surgery was it?! Where did the find the silver goo to get her out of the pod?! WHY DID THIS NEED TO HAPPEN when all they needed her for was to tell them about the vault? We could have seen them pulling her out of the pod and her thanking them for rescuing her and doing the vault thing, and then showing them all the journals and stuff! It was SO unnecessary. And if they wanted Kyle and Isobel to do the investigating on their own, why pull her out of the pod at all? She could have been evil for all they knew! Why not leave her there until the figured out who she might be and then have the vault explanation? Also, how did the man who runs the distillery owned by Kyle’s family NOT tell him the casita was ALSO owned by his family?! Uuuuuuuugh!!!!!

The need for alien powers to open the vault was kind of cool but how did the not-alien Valenti’s do it? Did it require 3 of them to be in agreement to open the vault together? If so, why didn’t we hear about that?! Also, how did Tezca (who apparently named herself after an Aztec god even though she’s from outer space and wouldn’t know about them) even know it was in there? Can she sense alien things like Rosa even though this had no alien glass in it? It was smuggled down from Roswell fairly recently so was that something Jim took from Caulfield and gave to Eduardo? Instead of answering any of these questions, we had a whole thing about surgery. 🙄🙄🙄 But hey, at least one of the things the dark triad took was in Kyle's family! Which begs the question(s), why didn’t Kyle or Alex's family have the rest of the glass pieces? Oh right! Because otherwise m*ria would have nothing to do and no connection to the story so everyone else's story has to not make sense to squeeze her in 🙄 We should have been getting hints about this last season when we met Eduardo at LEAST. The main group should have found one or two of those glass pieces and been investigating them in the background (just a mention, some hints to build up to this) since at least last season as well, and they should have belonged to the Manes family/found in Jesse’s bunker, Eduardo/something else Jim left for Kyle, and maybe one on Alex's mom's side of the family from when Louisa lived on the reservation, instead of Patricia having all of them. Because when did Nora make the board? On Oasis? We didn’t see it with her when her and Louisa escaped! In Caulfield? How would Patricia have gotten it then? Why was it not a family legend passed down for m*ria's family if they were the guardians like the Valenti family? Mimi clearly thought Jesse and Jim just got mixed up in something and didn’t know what it was. It's just suuuuch a mess with no build up when it could have been teased from the start! Maybe Kyle found a piece in Caulfield while he was gathering stuff up before it exploded! 

As much fun as learning about Dallas has been, m*rai did nothing this episode but drag his scenes down. She basically served as a rubber duck for Dallas to bounce info off of for the audience. Too bad Lucky isn’t still around, that would have been just as useful but at least enjoyable to watch. The whole symbol conversation was ridiculous given how instantly recognizable it is. As they both point out, before acting like it’s brand new information literally a minute later so m*ria can have an idea about it 🙄  I’m surprised they didn’t end up going to every Christian church in the area (there are hundreds in Roswell actually) because that symbol is everywhere. Apparently everyone and their mother know about the abandoned “church” but somehow it’s still miraculously empty of people or kidnap victims when they show up (guess they didn’t poke around enough to see the chair with rope around it?), and somehow everyone knows about the building but NO ONE knows about the SHED with the big ass TREE in it that grows STRANGE FRUIT?! REALLY?!  And don’t even get me started on the Dallas backstory bit which, while sweet, makes zero sense with the other info we have about the time period and people involved. Did his dad put him in a pod and drive to a different town and put his pod in a lake before he was captured? Did someone else do it? If so, who? How was he out and freely living so long without reconnecting with his triad who were in the area? Clyde says he can feel Bonnie so clearly there is a triad connection! Why didn’t the military confiscate everything in that barn when they took him? Who knows! Not ever, ever us. Again, more questions that only arise because they contradict the stuff we already know.

Should have put in my Sparks Joy post that I would be delighted if m*ria and Dallas end up related? Because as much as I need them to stop using him as a reason to give m*ria screentime, I would absolutely cackle about that development. Everyone wanted her with Iz and they turned out related (but somehow still never addressed how close of relations that made her and Michael), so this would just tickle me to death. 

As much as it’s nice getting SOME pod siblings moments, especially Max and Michael not ending on a fight, Max is STILL using every opportunity to throw Michael’s relationship with Alex in Michael’s face and I haaaate it. Also, why did they not have this discussion at the house? Because they drove out to the middle of the desert to look for Eduardo, and Michael suddenly decided Max needs to be back with Liz. Where he just was. Did Michael kick him out of the car and make him walk back to his house? Did he drive him back the way the just came and then drive all the way back out to the middle of nowhere to keep looking? (With THESE gas prices?!) It’s like they stage these scenes in a place that looks cool without any thought about how they characters got there, who all is there, when it takes place, how they end up where they do next, how long it takes to get anywhere, there is just no continuity!

So apparently squeezing their (alien?) organs produces enzymes that help powers manifest? Does everyone on Oasis palpate their kids organs to make their powers grow? Would doing so to Michael manifest any other powers seeing as how he’s also got DNA from Jones but only ever had the same telekinesis that apparently all aliens have until he found out he was immune to fire. Which apparently also now means he can summon it at will? Would have been nice to see that happening or talked about. Also, with as, frankly frighteningly poor control as Max has, I can’t imagine he’s had all these abilities from Jones and WASN’T basically Jack-Jack from The Incredibles going absolutely haywire all this time. And if all aliens have telekinesis, why did Max and Isobel have to work so hard to do it, when Michael had to work so hard NOT to and still many years down the line slipped up enough that he got branded as having demons?! (they were 7 when they came out of the pods? and 13 at the exorcism?) I want to be more excited about the alien stuff but it just feels like the writers don’t know anything about their own show or lore.

As fun as it’s been watching Liz and Cam have scenes together I’m once again asking why Liz isn’t having these heartfelt scenes with someone closer to her, like, oh IDK, ROSA! Yes Amber wasn’t available at the start but they could have done phone calls and just filmed Liz’s part and filmed Rosa’s later. The show wrapped before it started airing it’s not like they had the episode out before Amber was back on set. Or Michael who would also encourage pushing Max. Oh right, she did get to have her once per season 2.5 minute scene with m*ria to remind everyone they’re BFFs I guess 🙄 Also Liz brings up m*ria losing her visions means she can’t see Mimi anymore, but m*rai lost her visions BEFORE mimi died, and also, she died YESTERDAY. Not that you would know it based on literally anything happening. Also her “seeing the future” has literally never come in handy before so IDK why everyone is so distraught about it now 🙄

Clyde’s character continues to be all over the place, suddenly opening up to Michael, and being chill with Bonnie’s choices, not pushing about what happened with Eduardo, just, GIVING Michael the sky map, like??? Also sticking with my theory he and Bonnie should have been a couple. Also are we just supposed to....forget? that he AND BONNIE joined forces with Jones to commit genocide against their own people? But we’re supposed to buy wide-eyed, innocent Bonnie and Clyde saying the “first time” is always the hardest about her while 10 minutes earlier Bonnie was just saying she didn’t want to hurt people anymore? 

I haaaaate that they are having Max and Cam talk about how she was in love with him (is it past tense if she’s still wondering what could be?), and how much he cared for her too. This should have happened in season 1 or if Cam wanted some space to get over it first, it should have happened in season 2 at the latest. She wasn’t even IN season 3, we are well past the time for having this discussion and now it’s just eating up screentime.

I guess Alex getting kidnapped by Eduardo and then, I don’t know, sitting back and getting his additional soda flavors from the Deep Sky lab techs while Eduardo bonded with the team and helped take down Jones makes him “really important” to Alex. The thing is, I WANT him to be really important to Alex! Alex deserves a good father figure! But we haven’t SEEN it or even been TOLD about it until this moment, when everyone is looking for Eduardo while Alex is currently eating dirt in a hole and no one cares. 

The bandana is still a thing so why did we have to watch Alex take it off and them walk off alone through what looks to be a dystopian-ly empty town square while Jesse’s statue takes up the entire frame if they haven’t talked about it, and Michael’s still wearing it. If Rosa can come back as a Catholic miracle to Arturo and as Rosalinda to the rest of the town, SURELY Michael could get “miracle” surgery?

Max exploding in anger, what else is new? But even worse than him exploding in anger and hurting Liz and then the writers having HER apologize to HIM and decide to take equal blame, is the fact that the danger barely has a chance to register before it’s over. Instead of Max passing out after his outburst, or Tezca knocking him out and Liz getting hurt and Max waking up to Cam trying to keep Liz alive, and being worried that his fritzing powers are going to hurt her more, he just heals her in a blink and everyone moves on. THIS is the kind of drama we actually WANT to see, not the same cyclical patterns of them lying to each other and fighting about what avenue needs to be taken to fix whatever big problem is currently happening. That first healing where Max wasn’t even sure he could do it?! That moment is still amazing, and every time they have him heal her and brush it off it cheapens the power until it becomes mundane and I hate it.

Liz saying they want things to be simpler than they can be just rubs me the wrong way because things SHOULD be simple! Look at Malex! They loved each other even as broken teens with poor coping mechanisms and walls a mile high. Their separation came from outside forces, compounded by their trauma responses and them stopping communicating effectively with each other. Once they moved past all that? It was simple! They still have to work at it, but Michael sounds SO excited and content when he says he regrets not letting Alex in every time he shuts him out, because he KNOWS how good it feels, how much easier it is to let Alex it. But that has never been Echo’s problem. They don’t have outside forces keeping them apart, they have fundamentally different ideas about how to do nearly everything and when they should be pulling closer and working together they are ALWAYS lying to each other and shutting each other out. It’s not “simple” because they...aren’t compatible. And I hate that because I LIKED Echo when the show first started and I wanted to keep liking them but the writers make it SO HARD to root for a couple that can never tell the truth and work together on anything. Also Max is....who they decided Max should be. Remember when he fell all over himself when he saw her for the first time and when he begged her not to die and every time he looks at her with heart eyes when she’s being incredibly smart? If they had leaned into that instead of the “brooding, dark, tortured hero” aspect, he and their relationship would be so much better and more interesting. 

.Supposedly Michael tells Dallas the fruit from the alien tree is fuel, not food? Even though he took a bite? Fuel for...their ships? For their minds? Did Clyde say that? Is this another thing they just pulled out of the air and put in a throwaway line to come back in 4 episodes where we’re expected to remember?

At least according to the preview for next week, that kiss from Bonnie was good for something besides proving that Michael is loyal to Alex, but honestly we should have seen Clyde say something to Bonnie by the end of that episode asking her like, a vague "did you do it?" and her saying yes and looking upset about it, and then seen Michael cough or something. Then this whole episode we should have seen a little something in each of his scenes, not much, maybe a sniffle here and a cough there, or a shiver, but something so that when he collapses at the end it all comes together. But we only saw his powers flicker once before that last scene and that was it! I honestly thought when I saw that, that we would find out there were alien flowers or something in the cave damping his powers. Instead they just had a kiss happen out of nowhere and then circled back 3 weeks later to make it into something different. As heavy handed aa RNM can be they somehow fully missed out on foreshadowing this. Like yeah it's a day or 2 in show time, but 3 weeks for the audience.   Also, Michael hasn't really been physically hurt since the shed and Alex isn't even there to catch his boyfriend when he passes out?! Alex isn’t there when Michel gets to sit and look up at the map to his home planet?! This is Michael all alone after finding out Sanders wanted to adopt him all over again.  

Speaking of Alex and the show missing opportunities, we are 3 full episodes and a month for the viewers past Alex getting quicksanded and you STILL want me to believe Michael isn’t the slightest bit worried about not hearing from Alex? I get that they need Michael to go nuts at the right time since apparently Alex is missing for quite a bit of the season and they needed Michael to be doing other things, but that’s like, SUCH an easy fix?! We JUST saw Michael being worried he messed everything up and Alex saying he trusts their relationship to be okay even if he’s gone for a bit. Michael being worried but forcing himself to push it back because he thinks he’s overreacting makes PERFECT sense for him! We should be seeing him leaving a couple messages every episode, updating Alex on what’s going on and sometimes just inane things like making fun of something Max said. We should see him talking with Dallas, and Liz, and Max about being upset Alex isn’t answering but how he thinks he’s overreacting until finally he says something to Kyle and Kyle validates that Michael’s not overreacting and he’s worried too. We should be feeling like the Jaws theme is playing in the background and watching the knowledge that something has happened to Alex getting closer and closer to their realization. Even if for some reason we couldn’t see Alex (though it’s the same thing as with Rosa, if he’s in a hole, they could shoot him alone in whatever space they are keeping him at a later date since the whole show wrapped before airing), we should be seeing everyone else, but especially Michael feeling his absence in every single episode.

Finally, and much as I’m ready to FINALLY get the Kybel train moving, I was absolutely correct that it would be rushed and either they wouldn’t get together until the end, or they would shove them together RIGHT after the breakup and either way it wouldn’t feel like the story Kyle and Isobel deserve. I guess this is the better option as we have more episodes to enjoy Kybel content (that is, if they don’t decide to be awkward about it and Kyle doesn’t get quicksanded with Alex to keep them apart), but BOY does it feel cheap to not only have them getting together within about 24 hours of Isobel breaking up with Anatsa, but also to have IN THE SAME EPISODE, in the span of a few hours, Isobel going from crying about driving the best relationship she’s ever had off a cliff to “she wasn’t my person”. And Isobel brings up something Kyle said two full seasons ago as like, a reason she never thought he was an option, but she was off hooking up with someone else that night, so how are we the audience supposed to connect that blip of a moment that I do not remember to Isobel liking Kyle this whole time but thinking he didn’t like her? AGAIN, this is something we should have been seeing hints of since that episode or at the very least had Isobel mention something last season before going out with Anatsa about thinking he’s not an option for her so she’s going to take a chance on someone else. It’s just so frustrating that all the tiny crumbs are being held up like, “look this has been here all along!” because the writers are bad at their jobs and can’t seem to hit the broad side of a barn-sized emotional beat to save their lives.

Finally finally, here is a live reaction of us waiting for literally anyone to care about Alex because if I don’t laugh a little Imma tear my hair out

[inkdemonapologist]

hiiii! i just wanted to ask a quick question: what's TIOL about? ive been trying to find a summary for a while but ive found nothing (you dont have to if you dont want to btw) -coward anon

The Illusion of Living is basically written as an in-world book, the autobiography/memoirs of Joey Drew. There isn't a standard plot, which is maybe why it's been hard to find something that feels like a summary; it's essentially Joey sharing a few different events from his life that he found significant towards developing the way he approaches life now, his philosophy of the Illusion of Living.

I have a liveblog of it over here if you want to see my reactions to it, though obv that means it spoils some stuff, if you'd rather discover the book's tidbits for yourself.

In the book, Joey tells a couple short stories from his childhood, talks a little about his time in the military, talks about his friendship with Abby Lambert and the way she got him interested in art and storytelling, shares a murder mystery he tagged along for that he took some pointers from, talks about the first time he saw Henry’s art and got the idea for the Studio, describes his take on how Bendy was created, reflects on the night that Sammy and Jack were hired as the music director and lyricist for JDS, describes his meeting with Bertrum Piedmont and rambles a lot about his hopes for Bendyland and his desire to make something lasting enough to impact the world so that he will never really die. He closes out with a timetable of a day in the life of Joey Drew, and the whole book has footnotes from Nathan Arch with little comments on whether Joey might’ve been stretching the truth a little.

Essentially, it’s a character study of Joey Drew. There's a lot of lore tidbits here and there, and if Joey as he is in canon is your big fav it's ABSOLUTELY worth reading, but most of the book isn't focused on game characters, and there's literally no supernatural stuff. I just enjoy that it's Joey Drew describing himself and his life from his perspective, and how WILDLY unreliable it is, and what an interesting picture you get of this guy and how he thinks because of that, from the choices he makes on how to present these events. Sometimes when he’s not being honest it’s super obvious -- since Joey overhypes himself constantly -- but sometimes it requires reading between the lines to figure out what Joey's not saying, or where he doesn’t realise how much he’s accidentally revealed.

I GENUINELY LOVE The Illusion of Living and was constantly delighted while reading it and am still tremendously impressed with it, but I know some folks in the Bendy fandom struggled to get through it because listening to Joey talk a bunch wasn't fun for them, or the more slice of life genre wasn’t what they were here for. So ymmv, THATS MY SUMMARY I GUESS!!

[snowwhitelass]

New Outlander Game Coming – Talking with the Game Designers

By:  Erin Conrad, June 15, 2021

Gamers Corner, TV News

Outlander game, Sony, Starz Outlander, Variable Outcomes

Who wouldn’t want to dash around the Highlands with Jamie, trying to be his favorite, and rescuing him from trouble on the way? That definitely sounds like a fun time, even if all you can do is dream about it. Or IS that all you can do?

NO! Sometime this fall, a brand new board game will debut – Outlander The Series! Designed by the husband and wife team of Matthew and Ashley Killeen, the game will let you play with a bunch of your friends, meeting familiar faces along the way, and getting in and out of all kinds of scrapes. The game will be available for holiday shopping, so you can start to set up your Outlander game nights now. I had the opportunity to talk with Matthew and Ashley about the development of this new game, and learned some details.

From the game’s marketing information: “His fate is in your hands! Step through the stones of Craigh Na Dun and run through the Scottish Highlands with the handsome Jamie. The year is 1743, and the outlaw James Fraser is at your side as you navigate the thrills and dangers of the Highlands. Use your wit, reach the right locations, make the right friends, and gather the items you need, all while keeping Jamie out of the hands of the many who would do him wrong. The gallows await fair Jamie (or worse!) should you fail. Fulfill your destiny, and win his heart. Only then will victory be yours!”

Outlander is the Killeen’s first big franchise game. “From a business point of view, it’s something I always wanted to do,” Matthew said. “I enjoy games with an IP license attached, TV show or movie, and I have designed prototypes that might be good for Ghostbusters or Star Trek. I really wanted to get into that.” Ashley knew Matthew was interested in trying a licensed game, and said “I’ve been watching Outlander, you should make a game based on that.” Matthew hadn’t yet seen the show, so he said “you do it” – and she did.

Ashley didn’t get into the show until season three. “The first version (of the game) was based on the book, because I thought that might be the avenue to go. But it ended up being more layers to secure the book rights than TV. We heard back from Starz/Sony quickly, and the show and book were similar enough that I didn’t have to change too much from initial design. I swapped out characters and items that didn’t translate from one to another. Jamie still has same event encounters, the same enemies. It’s nice to look at both sides, to really put in all those little hidden tidbits from show. I’m hoping that fans of the show will enjoy all those subtle things that I’ve put in. But the other thing we wanted to make sure was that it was not dependent upon being familiar with the show, because the last thing you want is a game with Outlander masked on top of it that doesn’t play as anything on its own. And having a lot of friends who knew nothing about Outlander, how could I get them to the table?”

Matthew said, “One of philosophies for the board game stuff was that I’ve seen games that were maybe like a movie spin on top. Is this fun or exciting because of the game, or just because of the movie or tv show tie in? And one reason, the biggest reason why I got excited was when I first played it, I had never seen the show. I knew nothing about it. I had never seen the characters, and yet, I still enjoyed it. It was a good game.” Ashley added, “He has since seen the show.” Matthew continued, “That’s another thing that’s always bothered me. I feel like if a certain publisher or game designer makes something but doesn’t know the back story, that’s lazy. As soon as I found out we were going to do this, I watched the show. I know all my lore now. I was obviously able to play the game again once I knew the show and the lore, and it made the game play better.” “You understood my decisions,” said Ashley. “Exactly,” said Matthew. “Whether you know the show or not, it’s a good game.”

Ashley discussed their process: “I started December 2019. This past December, we were finally able to go forward. We got the contract from Sony in November. It was a long process! We got approvals for the design of the game, and access to the virtual library. We could figure out images that would go with the components we had.” Once they had that, Matthew figured out the graphic design for the game.

Was Sony/Starz helpful? Enthusiastic? Ashley said, “They were enthusiastic. They didn’t really have a board game. They had Destiny Dice, but that wasn’t the same thing.” (For my review of Destiny Dice, a game that came out a couple of years ago, click here.) I’ve had reservations about this previous game, so I asked how they overcame the failings of that one to make this new game. My concern with a platform like this is that the show is so big and layered – a group of women will come together over a glass of wine or three, and are they going to be able to figure it out easily enough to have a good time in an evening? Ashley feels that the new game will let us do that. “The idea behind this was that we wanted to bring everybody to the table – people whose board games lives consisted of Scrabble for their whole lives, and those who have played campaigning, like Mage Knights, epically, every week. We want to bring both those sets to the table. It should be intuitive enough once you’ve figured out the first turn order. It’s the repetition of that, it’s just your personal strategy that changes on what you choose to do, but the game play isn’t going to change on you as you go.”

She added, “But there’s enough in there that if you are an experienced board game player, you’re not sitting there bored waiting for the next thing to happen. That was our goal, as many people at the same table as possible enjoying it at the level they’re at. You can have the game player who knows nothing about Outlander, and you can have the Outlander fan who doesn’t play board games, and they will have a good evening. We also tried to be strategic about the length, because you don’t want to have just a tease of a game, because then you can’t be really invested and immersed in that world, but we also know, especially being parents now, you don’t have time to spend four hours on a game. That’s not going to happen any more. What’s a good length? If you can watch an episode of Outlander, you can play a round. So we wanted to find something that made sense. A lot of these pieces, once you apply a little logic to it, they fell together really nicely.”

This is the first “franchise” game the Killeens have designed. The fascination with board games started in 2004, and in 2011, Matthew began to design games as hobby. “I enjoyed playing, but in between then I was going to school and forgot about it. As school was winding down, I really got into it. I created an educational game called Witchful Thinking. We’re both teachers, and when doing practicum, the teacher (that he was working with) had kids doing games for math. but they were really boring, and the kids didn’t like it at all. I remembered I had a game that worked for this! I started looking at my business from a professional point of view, filling in gaps in the market. I wanted to bring people to a table they hadn’t been to yet. Witchful Thinking is a card game – witches brewing potions, teaching math – subtraction, addition, pre-algebra, and more advanced math. It was a great educational tool.” The company has more ideas – they have an upcoming Kickstarter for a game called Tennessee James, an Indiana Jones parody (learn more here). Matthew says that the company expects to bring out many more titles – “Between the two of us, we have a backlog of designs.”

When do they expect to have this out? Matthew said definitely for the Christmas season. “I am working with manufacturers right now, trying to iron out some of those details, but we’re going to be moving into manufacturing right now. It depends on how long it takes to do the mass production plus shipping, but I would estimate this would maybe in stores (or online retailers) by October. That’s probably a good estimate.”

Did they do a lot of testing? “We needed especially non-Outlander fans to play this game. The Outlander fans, it didn’t take a lot of convincing to get them to play,” said Matthew. “Even before there were pictures on the cards, they knew the board, they knew the characters. So even if you had a blank piece of paper that just said Murtagh on it, they know what it means. I wasn’t worried about the Outlander fans, and the game play is pretty intuitive, once you go through the steps. So once you’ve done a round, you can keep going around, no problem. So we were just like, ok, you don’t know what these names mean and where these places are, but you’ve got a bit of the information, are you on board? And so far the reaction has been, yes, I feel like I’m playing a game, even if they don’t know who Jamie is or anything like that.”

He continued, “The tall and short of it is that this that this has been play tested thoroughly. It’s not broken, and the most important part is that it’s fun.” Ashley added, “It’s a nice balance of cooperative, nobody wants Jamie to come to any harm, but you still want to be his favorite. So you can get a little catty, and that’s what makes the fun. You’ll be adding something a little stronger to your tea nights once you start playing that way.”

Matthew said, “One of my strategies for play testing is that I like to try different strategies each time and see what works and what doesn’t .Ashley laughed, “You played mean one time.” “Yeah, it’s my wife, I’ve got to play nice, right? But one time, I didn’t play nice, and I took a competitive edge, and it was awesome,” he said. So players, remember that!

“When I was working on Witchful Thinking, I was looking to put it into Walmart and Target. But they don’t want to talk to the independent company, they want to make sure they’re getting multiple products from the same distributors. So we want to make sure that the distributors that we get are also trying to get the game out there. I do have distribution in the US for Witchful Thinking, and they’re excited to take on this one.”

What was your favorite part of the game, as you play it, I asked? Ashley said, “I like the QuickSave. This is a component we have because Jamie is always going to move in a predictable pattern, and the three villains he’s trying to avoid – Black Jack Randall, the Redcoats and the Watch – those are all the Meeples that are going to be moving around. As you are collecting friends along the way, if you happen to be en route to an Encounter, you can use the special abilities from your friends. So maybe it’s Dougal who is going to be discarded, and that will be a Quicksave to put Jamie back in hiding, so the game’s not over, you haven’t captured him yet. I like that idea, the Quicksave. So you’re strategizing, not just for what’s going to give you a lot of Favor from Jamie to try to win his heart in the game, but where are these people going to help me if Jamie is in a pickle. Because he’s going to get himself in a lot of pickles.”

As he does on the show, I said! Ashley continued, “And as a designer, that’s a fun way for me to tie in the personality of the characters. There’s a reason why they have the values that they do. There was a little argument between us in the design phase, because I made Willie – Willie Mackenzie from the first season – he has this hidden kind of superpower that most of the time, he’s a bit weaker, but when the danger level’s up, he’s strong. Matt was criticizing that, ‘he’s a minor character, why is he so strong?’ But you haven’t been paying attention. Because when Jamie’s in Wentworth, it’s Willie who’s willing to go. So that’s his power, when things are toughest, he’s the one that can save the most. I was having fun finding those little nuggets, the lore, that fans love, and if you’re paying attention to how I’ve designed it, you’ll start seeing like why you get more Favor in some places, or more Wit, or why you have the saving abilities.”

The women playing will like seeing that, I agreed. “I think that we’ve got it so that your favorite characters, from S1 at least, this is just in the Highlands, you’re going to see them, I think they’ll do you proud,” Ashley says. “We’re still excited about it, even though it’s been a year and a half doing it, so I think that says something about it, that we can still be passionate about it, little choices like that, I think the game has life.” Ashley told me that she has ideas for additional Outlander games to follow each season, so this may go on for quite a while!

As their cute kids came into the room, I asked if game design was full time, or is this an extra job? Ashley said, “I’m a full time teacher, so I’m squeezing this in between the report card writing and the classroom stuff. With a bunch of changes with Covid, it’s made more sense for Matthew to stay home, so we decided to go all in, make this run for itself.” Matthew said, “I can speak from the graphic design standpoint – I didn’t design the gameplay, Ashley did that, but I offered suggestions here and there, it was her decision on things, and she made some great decisions. And between that, I did the playtesting and the graphic design in January and early February, I’ve put in hundreds of hours, not just with the graphic design, but also the business stuff too, figuring out social media posts, getting things approved by Sony, talking with the distributors. So this has been not just like a full time job, but overtime, I’ve put in some serious hours for this.”

Since this is the company’s first big license, I asked if is this something they want to continue. “Absolutely,” Matthew said. “And I knew that when I turned this into a hobby back in 2011. I enjoy making board games. I enjoying making movies, watching movies, reading books, all that stuff. I needed some sort of creative outlet. And this was it. I enjoy tabletop games, so I found a business that I’m passionate about. But I found over the years, since I am a small business, I had to learn everything. I can do the game design, I can do the graphic design, the IP stuff, social media, the PR, distribution. I have all those experiences, so if I can continue this, I’ll be very happy.”

Price point for the game should be $48.99 CA (US equivalent is about $40). And it will be available in the US, and more – Matthew says, “The territories we have with Sony are Canada, USA, UK, Australia and France. We’re a small family run company, but at the same time, this is a big license. So we want to do the fans proud, we want to do this IP proud, so we want to give the biggest reach that we can.” Ashley said, “We’re limited because we’re not the distributors, so once we put it in those hands, it’s really up to those stores that want to put it on their shelves. So until we know where they’re placing it, I can’t tell you ‘oh, pick it up here.’ ” Matthew agreed. “I have experience with all of that, so when I made Witchful Thinking and released that, I had a hard time getting distribution. So I went store to store, city to city, and I made those contacts myself. For me as a business owner, I’m not just one of those owners who throws money out and does it. I have experience in all these aspects. So when this game comes out, let’s say that distribution doesn’t have as far of a reach as possible, I’ll make it happen. With Covid especially, the online market is important.”

“From a business standpoint, we’re a new company,” Matthew said. “It seems that we’re very new to this but that’s not really the case. This game has been been in development for a long time, and between the two of us we have 20+ games in prototypes. So we definitely know how to make games, and make games fun. And the fact that we’re both teachers, I think makes it even better. Because as teachers, we have to know how to sell to an audience.” ” And explain the games,” Ashley added.

PRE-ORDER THE GAME RIGHT HERE! Three if by Space has the game available for pre-orders in our Collectibles shop!! Click here to go to the pre-order page!

[grinningjackal]

Tea and Book Asks: 5, 10, and 17!

5) Do you have a favourite film soundtrack?

I want to say yes, but the answer is probably no. I have a lot of individual tracks that I really like - such as Oogway Ascends by Hans Zimmer and John Powell, The Shire by Howard Shore, and The Sixth Station by Joe Hisaishi - but I’d be hard-pressed to say there’s a film soundtrack that I absolutely love.

On the other hand, I have a ton of video game soundtracks that I adore (Journey, Sayonara Wild Hearts, and Crypt of the Necrodancer come to mind). I think this is because I’m more likely to notice the music in something that I’m actively playing a part in the story vs something I’m passively consuming.

P.S. I realize I completely ignored musicals, somehow. I guess I tend to think of them in terms of theatre and not film.

10) Do you have a favourite classic novel?

Ah, my least favorite not-genre. I’ve always found the sentiment behind classics to be ludicrous at best and pretentious at worst.

This is going to be a little wild, by I really enjoyed The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux. I think the musical does it injustice. There’s a lot of interesting historical tidbits hiding in it and it has good potential for a really dark adaptation if people would stop being cowards about it.

I also have a soft spot for Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein. It’s a clusterfuck of problems and bigotries, but it compels me. Not a bad read.

(P.S. Ask me about my least favorite classic for a very angry rant.)

17) Who is your favourite author?

You’re lucky you’re my friend and I love you so much, because I despise the favorites game. This question made me sit in front of my bookshelf and stare for three hours straight, just weighing the merits of each author I like. I’m going to pick four, just to spite you.

Neil Gaiman - An old favorite of mine. Some of the first books I ever read when I was first really getting into reading were his: Coraline and Stardust. The Sandman comics were the first comics I ever actually read consistently. I love the way Gaiman makes magic feel both unusual and mundane. My favorite of his: Good Omens (GNU Sir Terry Pratchett, you will be missed.)

Sabaa Tahir - The author who reminded me that there a gems hidden in the YA section. My gods, can this woman write. I don’t think I’ve ever devoured books as quickly as hers (especially in the last decade). I adore her character work. My favorite of hers: An Ember in the Ashes, naturally.

Neal Shusterman - This man could kill me with the fine print of his novels. I firmly believe most of his books should be placed outside of YA as his themes are dark as fuck and he pulls no punches. The only author to give me an emotional breakdown in the last five years. Good shit. My favorite of his: Unwind.

Ursula K. Le Guin - The queen of worldbuilding. I don’t care what pretentious twat says Tolkien is the master of lore - they’re wrong. There is not a book of hers in which the world is not rich and realistic and familiar. Her stories cut deep and keep going. My favorite of hers: The Word for World is Forest.

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