#its fine if you ship it but it's my art and I don't

[tumbleweedsthesecond]

Tophvan post yayy... I wanna explain why I ship it or whatever. Why its silly to me or like how I view their dynamic or whatever. This is gonna cringe so probably ignore this if you don't like tophvan I'm not trying to say its like the best ship in the world or they have a great dynamic or whatever I just wanna explain how I view them. This will probably sound delusional but yk whatever. Cringe and free I guess. Here's some old art

Basically me going on their interactions sorta kinda plus my own headcanons.

Okay so hc wise I've always kind of imagined they wouldn't get along in some way. For obvious reasons, Topher tries too hard and Ivan doesn't try at all. So obviously Topher would at least try to seem like he didn't know him s1 and I don't think he does really know him s1 I feel like they would've followed each other on Flipflop(gah I hate saying that) and Topher just didn't care to block him because he only has two followers and doesn't want to lose one. Anyway I think with s3 I imagine the bleacher creatures met during summer school mayhaps because they all failed gym or math or something? That's my hc on it. I think they do seem close? At least good friends I think that jackée Ivan and Topher are the three main(vlad and lizzie I still loveee but its harder to get a read on them they don't talk much) anyway I don't think that Ivan and Topher would immediately get along obviously Topher let loose more because he's happier with his friends but still I don't think its perfect obv. so going to actually get into the analysis now I yap so much

Cringe part

I think that based off lines of dialogue like "its a fuck no from me" "a simple no would've been fine Ivan" that Topher kinda keeps him grounded at least a little bit???? Ivan doesnt seem to retaliate I think he does sort of view Topher as the leader in a way. Because Topher talks the most and tbh he does seem a little bit bossy. There's also that one time that I immediately think of when I think tophvan the part where he looks over at Topher as if to see if its approved or not before he agrees with jackée.

Like hes like 'is this funny? ' though it could be because he doesn't listen to jackée because female and he's a dumb teenage boy(throws tomatoes at him) I still think that its funny cause he doesn't even look at all the guys in the group to approve it first he just looks at Topher. you can tell by the animation

Anyway before that I think these two do talk more off screen Ivan looks at him when the others don't (even in other scenes though I don't really think that's a big deal imo) okay full headcanon time I think Ivan knows about tophers supposed crush on joan. I don't think Ivan likes Joan but I think he was like "give it a shot because Topher or whatever 🙄😒' but I also feel like he had a bet that she wouldn't be any help. Don't get me wrong I do think ivans dumb obviously but I also do think he just doesn't like Joan. He doesn't full on hate her or anything just don't think he completely trusted her. He does trust her in the vip room thing he thought that was coll but he is also the first to say she ditched us straight up. Ivans very blunt

We are standing in a closet!

Past that I think they do get closer or whatever afterwards. Kind of. We see them in the shower but I kind of ignore that episode and scene altogether so. That's not rlly a big thing I think abt so anyway

Dumb thing incoming I think its also like the way they look at each other or whatever. Like. whatever dude. I think they'd be kind of sweet or whatever. I don't know. Idiots who caresbro.

Overall I think Topher is a complete idiot too like obviously that one scene where he gets bitten by the snake and jackée says to suck the poison out and Ivan sucks the snake because he's a stupid stupid idiot. Dumb. Tophers stupid too very stupid but that's why I think they're fun together.

Forgot abt that scene where they highfive Topher laughs at ivans dumb jokes. They highfive. (I think Topher laughs way too hard at it like we get it bro. You think its funny. I would say it kinda sounds like forced like haha you're so funnyyy but that's probably a bit of a stretch 😔😔😔💔💔)Edit: I think he genuinely finds that stuff funny cause he's so stupid like bone high is not that funny he just has dumb humor. Anyway another hc I have Topher does like his jokes alot and at first I van laughs along with him but then Topher laughs too much so Ivan just like stares at him

Akso the thing where he sees Topher as the leader of the group I don't think that's too serious or anything I think its just like okay ill listen to you sometimes they're still a dumb high school friend group.

ALSO THIS ISNT ME TRYING TO BE LIKE ITS BETTER THSN OTHER SHIPS OR THAT "OH THRY HAVE SO MUCH DYNAMIC" they're background characters basically I just want to point out some canon stuff! Its fine if you don't ship them who cares anyway if anyone has any tophvan hcs please comment them I love seeing tophvan stuff!!!

Also I love all the bleacher creatures I'm ocifying them too.....sorry to single out the ship I just wanted to explain stuff

Also is this reaching? Probably but they're two characters with low screen time so. Shrugs

[morphogenetic]

Interest Call for Raging Loop Official Merch at the Pop Up Shop

From December 13th to December 22nd, 2024, there will be a Raging Loop pop up shop in Tokyo to celebrate its 9th anniversary! I happen to be going to Japan during this time, and will be buying merch for myself. Several people I know were interested in me purchasing extra merch for them, and given the sheer rarity of Raging Loop merch, I am more than willing to oblige.

To facilitate this, I have set up an "order form" of sorts (more of an interest form than anything) so I can figure out what people want. I don't need immediate payment or anything, but I will be requesting payment for the items you bought (+ shipping) once I do buy them for you. There are so many items that I'll put most of them below the cut, but I'll put the primary interest for most people above the cut. That is....

...the plushies! They're ¥‎4,800 per plush, ~$32 USD each at the time I'm writing this. No I don't know why they made Nosato and not Haru justice for my girl please

Rest of items/prices under the cut - in yen only, I can't be bothered to convert everything. (They're also in the order form, lol.) All of these are rough names since I have abysmal kanji knowledge to rely on Google Translate for a few of them. Full post contains spoilers, you have been warned!

"Japanese-Style Werewolf Card Game" (probably just werewolf...) - ¥‎3,000

Feast Photo Playmat (used for e.g. Magic the Gathering) - ¥‎4,000

Prayer to Shin'nai Music Box - ¥‎12,000

T shirts - ¥‎4,400 for the wolf shirts, ¥5,500 for the sheep shirt

Reversible Bomber Jacket - ¥‎33,000 (no, that is NOT a typo...)

Die-cut Sheep Cushion - ¥‎3,000

Kaori-san's Special Furikake - ¥‎1,980

Kiyonosuke's Darjeeling Tea - ¥‎1,800

Yasunaga's Financier Cookies (comes with a can badge) - ¥‎1,800

Haru's/Mocchi's Cookies (comes with a can badge) - ¥‎1,500

Various types of Acrylic Keychains - ¥880 each

Family Crest Can Badges - ¥550 each

Large Acrylic Standee of Haruaki & Chiemi - ¥2,400

Various Character Standees (original game art & special art created for the pop-up!) - ¥1,800 each

Full sets of the Character Standees with Special Background Pieces - ¥30,600 each

Character Fine Graphs (fancy art prints) - ¥16,500 each

"Store Shopper" (...probably just a bag, will likely be difficult to mail this if it's just a paper bag) - ¥550

[cipheramnesia]

Like, I don't really know what else to say. Twenty producers' notes in a trenchcoat. Visible seams from where the parts of Aliens and Alien 4 got stitched in. 1979 Alien without the brain or the heart, hollow echoes of ideas passed through bloodless marketing department hands, relics with some long forgotten purpose. "Get Away From Her You Bitch" reverently inscribed as a holy talisman of protection. Characters wander through a dead ship, unknowingly echoing their journey through the dead script of Alien, lost and yearning for something they can't understand while they travel to their inevitable conclusions - to be whole characters, complete in and of themselves, rather than vacuous ghosts trying to sustain themselves on your memories of that time the same thing happened in Alien.

It would almost be brilliant if it were intentional. A digital fake of Ian Holm creating a fake version of a fake person that's used to lie to the characters in the film and put a fake personality into the film's android. There's too many bitter layers of metaphor. The ship meant to remind everyone of the Nostromo forcibly attached to the shitty falling apart facility for mass producing Aliens. No one who's supposed to care for Wish-Ripley actually cares about her. The creature barely has enough energy to make it on screen and has to go through a second round of incubation before it's revealed as yet one more generically underwhelming version of the creature that somehow hasn't had a better version made in almost fifty years now. Look at how hard it had to work just to be some figment of the original. Everyone is surrounded by swarms of ambulatory dicks trying to fuck them over. The alien's most frighting appearance is before it's born. I don't know, it's this Rube Goldberg contraption fully unaware of what a great job it's doing explaining why it's so bad at doing its one simple job. There's nothing there. There's no movie in this movie, it's a bunch of stuff that's supposed to be on screen for Alien movies, and it ends with a third grade play about vegetables version of repeating nearly the exact same final dialog as Alien. It's fine, it's horribly, awfuly depressingly fine, a shrug in the infinite void of sequels, another average blended smoothie of unflavored cinematic protein, a profit margin in someone's accounting software somewhere, checking off a box, a pizza hot pocket that's all crust.

It's a draining movie to watch, as if somehow my sense of joy and wonder has measurably dropped, and I need to go find sustenance in better works of art to regain that spark. Not a movie that hates its audience but a movie that exists only to extract money, time, and memory. It wears its middling vampirism on its sleeve and has no ulterior motive besides making you worse for having seen it.

I have had an opportunity to see Alien Romulus for free.

[rapidhighway]

Guys you cannot be tagging my art with ships you imagined you cannot do that

[cheswirls]

so lucky i have friends that will occasionally show me sa art they see on socmed since it's so rare for artists to cross-post their sa art on here anymore

[3liza]

i mean the truth is that we do not need and should not have all this stupid plastic clutter in or houses. no one should be producing or selling this shit. everyone make your own merchandise and charge a living hourly wage to sell it 🤷 sorry to be so simplistic about this but it's one of the results of the lack of class unity specifically in the means of production-owning creative class, who is not mentioned or dealt with by the core Marxist texts as far as I know (i asked about this earlier on here, did marx ever address in his analysis people like, for example, a professional photographer who owns a camera ans prints his own dagguereotypes? or a portrait painter or idk, independent milliner or seamstress? these people all own the means of production and do not employ anyone, and the answer from better educated people than I was that no, Marx didn't mention them), I'm not well read on this at all, there is just a big void where leftist analysis of what modern economists call "the creative class"

I'm getting off topic. my point is make your own keychains in your kitchen. it's actually not hard. you can even mass produce (on a small scale) little plastic crap if you want, with resin and a UV lamp, or a 3d printer, or a laser cutter and acrylic sheets (or just use balsa wood damn, at least its biodegradable and less tacky).

all this stuff is available to little creators AND there are hundreds of people who already own these machines who will take work for you and produce your designs. you just have to actually find them and know them and email them. that's what I mean about the class unity issue with creatives. we have no large scale union, we have no large scale class consciousness, and we're all sending our orders for little plastic crap to sweatshops instead of emailing a guy with a laser cutter in his garage and saying "hey Keith can I get uhhhhhhhhhhh 50 laser cut keychains of this twerking Diggler design I made, like how much would that cost" and he's like sure here's the work and materials cost and tbh it's always always less than i think it's going to be. you just have to do some basic arithmetic and then order shipping, and I hate order fulfillment with my life but you can actually pay or barter with someone to do that for you too. learn to delegate and then factor that into your unit cost. this is basic shit every commercial creator needs to know. they should teach you this in art school but they dont

don't give me crap about "I can't afford a laser cutter" either because I just told you to email Keith. and all these machines get sold secondhand when a manufacturer or hobbyist needs to upgrade. i got a color laser printer perfect for making zines and wheatpastes and shipping labels from a retired lesbian on capital hill for $75 and it was still full of ink. my friend gave me her 20 year old canon dslr because she just didn't need it and didn't want to bother selling it. it works fine because I spent the time finding the right drivers and shit for my computer. and card readers exist. Craigslist. Facebook marketplace. nextdoor sales section. eBay. everyone always forgets eBay. eBay lets you save searches and will email you when it finds a guy selling his vinyl plotter in your city with local pickup. I'm serious

[ultrasharpy12345stuff]

SUCCESS STORY (manifesting)

OMFG you guys! I did it! I made it to my desired reality! I'm living my desired life!

All I did was decide it's done. More specifically, I just did Angel's fulfillment challenge (which you don't have to do). Everyday I just decided to live like I was in my desired reality right now as often as I could and whenever I wanted to.

If I vented, I vented. If I ranted I ranted. If I sabotaged my manifestation I just decided it wouldn't matter and that nothing would ruin my manifestation and everything was ok and fine.

And this is totally optional but I affirmed sometimes. I just did to remind myself that it was done.

My affirmations were:

-I'm living my desired life

-Nothing can ruin my manifestation

-I'm in my desired reality

-I'm in my desired reality in my penthouse in Tokyo

-I have all my desires

-The 3D conforms instantly

And it worked! And now I'm happy! I woke up today IN my penthouse in Tokyo! The view of the city is amazing. I checked my bank account and it turns out I'm super rich! Like I literally have BILLIONS of dollars. And it's like I always get millions of dollars out of nowhere! So it's like I get paid just to exist!

Also life in this reality is soooooooo different than on Earth. Like the people in the city are nice... but they aren't just humans beings. I'm seeing Japanese monsters walking around wearing uggs! I can also see Godzilla walking around in a place in the city it's so cool! (don't worry, they made a place in the city specifically for her)

I can also enter the void anytime I fall asleep. Like everytime I go to sleep I wake up IN the void state completely aware. I know this because I just decided I would go to sleep and I did! (one of the things I also manifested, to fall asleep instantly)

And guess what? I also revised my ENTIRE life. Like all the shitty, terrible things that happened to me and all the awful things I've done are GONE! They never happened. All the arguments I had with people on Youtube are gone, they never happened. I never met those people. All the people who I argued with on Discord, well I never argued with them. All the problems with my family are gone.

I also have new memories of me being in Highschool. It went great! I made some friends, they never got angry at me, I got to play my videogames, and I never had to deal with any kind of stress. And I also have my college degree even though I never went to college.

Also let me show you what I look like:

This body:

This is my hairstyle (except it's white colored):

This is my face (trigger warning: AI art, also dw I'm black):

And I'm like popular on Twitter. I'm as popular as @rariatoo. People follow my art and they love drawing my OCs and characters, it's so much fun. Plus I have a patreon and a redbubble. I get to make my OCs as plushies and stickers and ship them off.

And the best part is that there's no wars! No covid, no genocide in the Congo or Palestine, no racism, no problems. And there never will be, everything is fine! Its literally a Utopia.

Summary of what I manifested:

-Desired life & reality

-Freezing Time

-Revising entire life

-Different family (same soul but different looks (slightly) and better personality)

-Entering the void whenever I fall asleep and at will

-A butler friend who I can summon and make disappear at will (he's super nice and never have any problems, perfect personality, kinda shy, and we just had some woopie 🥵🤪)

-Magic (I can do LOTS of crazy stuff)

-Being able to shift realities at will

-Visiting my family through a magic door (my family lives in what I call, "Reality # 3 and I can visit them anytime I want)

-Spawning groceries and food whenever I want (I still go out, dw)

-Friends on discord and some IRL

-Money money monayyyyyyyyyyy

-Perfect health and mental health, no problems with my body

-Never getting yelled at ever again or abused/nobody gets abused/abuse doesn't exist. Yellers don't exist.

& a lot of other personal things

You guys got this! You can get your dream life! Go for it! *I didn't get my dream life yet, that's why the title reads:

"SUCCESS STORY (𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗳𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴)" When you put "manifesting in the title it means you haven't gotten your desires yet but you're doing it to help you live in the end. SO please don't be angry or offended.*

[grub-hut]

I don't use Tiktok, never will, In my opinion I think the app should shut down. [ But that will never happen... So I will cope.] But god are ya'll are insufferable on there. The fact you have this strong par asocial attachment to Sebastian and claim that Zerum is ""ruining the character"" is just blasphemy and shows you guys know nothing to zero about writing and do not play the game whats so ever. I've talked to Zerum; Ive talked to the devs and mods ; and all the false claims and misinformation that's being spread like a wildfire IS CRAZY. Everyone's so exhausted. It takes just a couple of minutes to prove it's false but that would actually require these people to literally sit down and fucking read. Zerum never banned anybody. Zerum doesn't handle the bans in the server. If you got banned or muted, it was most likely the automod in the server that they have implemented to avoid people saying anything weird or sexual... [ A friend of mine got muted because they sent a gif that had a weird name to it; nothing related to the gif, the gif was fine and they filed a ticket and got unmuted. Its just the bot doing its job.] and even then the mods probably banned you for something completely unrelated...

and even then, can we STOP normalizing this??

Like this GRINDS my gears, it fucking rusts, it makes me want to break down and combust into flames- Stop. Stop. YOU ARE THE ISSUE. Creators want to create. Either for ourselves or for others, whatever it maybe people enjoy letting their creativity flow because ITS FUN. IT SHOULD BE--- FUN!!! We are giving you literally something free and something to ENJOY because we enjoy it just as much! This stupid fucking mindset being so normalized makes me SO SICK. " whatever is put on the internet is free reign!" you guys have ZERO respect for any creator; even yourselves and its so BLATANTLY OBVIOUS. You guys preach about "respecting artists/creators" till it doesnt fit with your agenda, because we should just "expect" our works to be disrespected and used. Like our feelings never mattered. Are we going to ignore the discussion of AI art too? Or copyright, or literally anything of that sort here? Yes, its the internet, there WILL be people who are so drastically cruel and do something you will not like. I do agree its best to ignore those kinds of people but that does not mean we should just LET it happen. It does not mean we should suck it up and take the blows. This is how people stop creating, youre killing artists, youre shunning them away because "its the internet, lol, dont get mad if ppl -" Stop it, you're teaching younger generations that it does not matter if you have boundaries or not and that your voice doesnt mean anything. I mean fuck, you put your oc here I can use it however I want then! Because you shouldve expected the moment you click post for other people to use it! Who cares right?! its OUR oc now >:)!!! No matter what the character is from, by a indie game, a comic, a book, yadda yadda. If youre gonna be scum, you are gonna BE scum. Artists should be respected and be listened to. If Zerum ships her oc to her oc, so fucking what? She created him. YES. SHE CREATED HIM. Just because she is a """co-owner" You forget she wrote and designed him. You forget its STILL HER CHARACTER. WHICH BTW, HE WOULDNT EXIST IF IT WASNT FOR ZERUM!! ITS HER CHARACTER- Not yours, and if your first thing that comes to mind " oh but shes ruining her character" then so what, its not MADE for you. Hell, Sebastian is only like 1% of the whole entire game! ENJOY THE GAME, ENJOY THE ACTUAL LORE. MAKE YOUR OWN OCS, GO WACKY WOOHOO AND ENJOY IT WITH OTHERS. If you make headcanons for Sebastian or any other characters! Great! As long as you are respectful who literally cares. HAVE FUN! Stop harassing and bullying and literally spreading misinfo; I am so sick of people with this mindset! This is why the internet is such a shit place to begin with because we just let this stuff happen. Grow up! Like PAInter said.." YOURE NO FUN AT ALL!"

[nose-rice]

Guys I NEED to rant about my thoughts on Nuru because i love her <3 ramblings ahead

Like I feel like in almost every fic i read, she's just like, a side character that's there to make whitty remarks to Hugo and be the levelheaded one. If she has an insecurity or problem it's usually pretty surface level and solved quickly, or only mentioned once or twice. I think there are SO many aspects of her character that are so cool.

Okay first, I think we sometimes forget that she's a nerd just like the rest of the gang. Yes, on the outside she's definetly the most 'normal' one, but I think we should concider the fact that she's the only girl in the group, and she's literal royalty. She was raised with a completely different set of standards than the other three. I don’t think I've really ever seen anyone cover that. I feel like she would get called "mature for her age" when she's only 15/16, and almost always gets critisism when she talks back with her own ideas (like her concerns about the meteor shows for example). I feel like out on her journey, she would finally get the freedom to just be herself, and be a kid and be able to rant on about her intrests with the rest of the group. It could be a struggle at first, but it would be awesome to see her getting more comfortable with the group the longer they spend together! Nerds encouraging nerdy rants lol

Since she is a kingdom figurehead, you could also argue that she always has a lot on her hands (especially since she's very proactive when it comes to science and solving problems). This could bring up a need to be productive, or always feeling like she needs to make the right decision, even for the littlest things.

I also feel like a lot of the time she's potrayed as the "right" one, who is 100% right when it comes to stuff like arguing with Hugo. Since they're opposites when it comes to class, they often are compared through that lense. I think it's cool just having Nuru tell Hugo off for judging a book by its cover, but I feel like they have a lot more in common than they realize. I think it would be interesting to see Nuru judging a book by its cover too. Maybe not to the degree that Hugo does, but I feel like calling out both their judging would not only call out character flaws, but it also enforces that even though they hate eachother and would never want to be like the other, they have a lot of the same flaws.

Also, being sheltered in a palace her whole life, I think she might think kind of black and white sometimes, and while she knows when people are just being mean as an act, she might struggle when it comes to people like reformed criminals.

Maybe she's able to be meaner to Hugo because she justifies it by telling herself he's criminal, and therefore bad, possibly glossing over the reasons he might be like that (maybe it crosses her mind, but she tells herself it's not a good enough reason, because stealing is still stealing, and he literally steals EVERYTHING. Even little trinkets and stuff he definitely doesn't need!). When they find out about Varian's criminal history, maybe she reexamines her views on morality and how she used to see people, because by her standards, Varian is a 'bad guy' who's caused harm to SO many people, but he's also the kind, caring, helpful friend that she's been traveling with who would never willingly hurt anyone.

Moving on to Amber x Nuru, I honestly never find myself liking the ship because Amber isn't developed enough which is fine. I don't think every character has to be a magnificent work of art. Side characters are side characters, but their romance is usually written like: "wow that girl is cute! I have a crush now!" Which is cool, but then that's about as far as it gets, then timeskip! Or offscreen they're a couple now. I know it's a side couple so it won't have as much devlopment as something like Varigo, but I never really see their dynamic play out in different situations. Like I don't know how to explain it, but it feels like they solely exist to be a couple? Amber sometimes just feels like an extention of Nuru, and their relationship feels surface level a lot of the time.

I feel like too often she's just watered down to the nice, smart, grounded friend, and I don't know I just think there’s so much more to explore with her. She’s not just some side character. She's literally part of the main cast! Even in fanart I feel like she doesn't really get a lot of stuff besides funny art and just like, pictures meant to look pretty. Unlike something you get a lot with characters like Varian or Hugo.

And honestly I get it. Some characters you just don't take an intrest in. I know I find Varian, Hugo, and Nuru more relatable than I find Yong, but I feel like part of that is developing their characters rather than just seeing them on a surface level. Ofc there are exceptions and there are some stories that dive deeper into Nuru's character out there! I just happen to see this A LOT.

Wow i said "surface level" a lot didn't I 😭😭

Anyway thank you for reading my rant i wanna know what you guys think!!

[drenched-in-sunlight]

Your genuinely one of my favorite elden ring artists, what would you say is your favorite aspect of elden ring just in general

this might be a big revelation but i think my favourite part about Elden Ring is i... actually don't really like it until the DLC.

the way the base game presented a kinda basic and fragmented story, one i'd even say i were underwhelmed about. because i went in expecting Sekiro-level of character driven writing (they did promise that in an interview) and what i got... ehhhh. that's why my fanarts for the base game is literally just fluff pieces and shipping Malenia with another character altogether that isn't even in the game. meanwhile my AC6, Sekiro and Bloodborne art... i think you can tell i have a very deep emotional connection to those games from the kind of work im putting out for them. (hell, before the DLC i actually was thinking "well i'll probably only draw some general fanarts after the DLC then go back to draw more JJK stuffs lol" famous last words)

but holy mother of God the way the DLC completely blew everything tf up.

sorry Fromsoftware, i were not aware the Sekiro character-driven part is actually about the DLC. im sorry im still not familiar with your game yet 😭

(this turns into a mini rant so imma put it under cut OTL)

before, i were pretty "...." about Elden Ring female cast. i think Melina appears too little, i think NPCs like Fia and Roderika... i can't figure out the significance of them within the narrative at all. and it kinda upset me because it feels like they regress back to the helpless / fanservice maiden trope that was usually seen in DS franchise for no reason. i don't like how Rennala ends up as and i don't like not knowing why Radagon did that to her (which turns to me not liking the way it became a popular fanon that he actually loved her he was just bound by duty etc etc...i mean what?), i actually don't even really like how Malenia's barely-there story turns out (but that's a rant for another day).

as standalone characters, sure, i'd say they all have their own merits, but if they don't play any role within the narrative... what's the point then?

but all of that is because back then, we literally did not know what's Marika's deal either.

and so she became this cardboard that everyone pins all the crimes and bad things in the world on, which is... fine? makes sense. but the following line of reasoning that she did all that because she's just...like that drives me up the wall. if i want another "woman bad" story i'd just replay DS2 😭

and that line of thought also distance her from other characters in the game. those stories are not lining up, so we literally see no point in anything.

but by giving us Marika's story in the DLC they:

shine light on the possible division between two Numen factions (Anna & Jolan story + Sword of Light & Darkness // no one is left in Marika's home (those embraces Light/Gold/ Greater Will and its Stars children) vs the Numens in Eternal City (those embraces Dark/ Black Moon/ opposing GW and its children)

the discontent with the Moon and how there are those who will never accept it as being equal to the Stars

the other half situation

the Marika's eye colour possible reveal (link her to Roderika - Roderika as a reflection of the maiden Marika once was and probably still is deep down)

give Godwyn more agency in his ending (his personal knights are on a quest for Age of Duskborn) -> link Marika to Fia (Fia as a reflection of the mother Marika is)

draw direct parallel between Messmer - the child carrying Marika's vengeance for the past, to Melina - the child carrying Marika's hope for the future

Marika as a God full of human flaws >< Miquella as a God devoid of all human emotions. both are bad in different ways. but share a same gentle origin of a simple wish for a kinder world.

the DLC singlehandedly swipes clean every problem i have with the base game. like im actually in awe they managed to do that so efficiently 😭

all that is to say. my favourite aspect of all is truly how one's perspective of this one character could alter the entire story.

i still dislike the interpretation that Marika is cold and heartless or that's she's cruel for no reason, but at the same time, i can see how ppl viewing her that way affect how they see other events in the game. just like how my view of her changes my entire view of the story itself too. and i just love how the writers pull that off really skillfully. man. and i think that's sth so unique to videogame storytelling. it's amazing!

[clarekirener]

I read a post claiming fan engagement doesn't matter. Fan engagement is a factor in 2024, and especially for Amazon Studios, a reactive company. I watched Marvelous Mrs. Maisel on Amazon Prime give into their biggest fanbase after years of saying it wouldn't happen.

Amazon has a consumer research department that gives Jennifer Salke head of Amazon Studios feedback about TROP consumers (screenshot below).

McPayne have said they listen to feedback and that S2 was shaped by S1 response- they also make note that S2 was written before S1 (screenshot below).

Just last week, Amazon sent out TROP surveys through Amazon Preview asking opinions on characters, storylines, and what people would like to see in future episodes. They said this feedback would be passed along to the writers.

Amazon has other shows that have responded to fan demand. The rumors around Mrs. Maisel were that Amazon execs mandated making Lenny/Midge canon after years of denial because of the Midge/Lenny fanbase (screenshot below).

The Artful Dodger's showrunner came out citing the show's fan engagement as the reason they got renewed.

I'm plugged into metrics as a PR professional so if anyone wants me to make a post detailing positive engagement for Haladriel via TV publications like The Hollywood Reporter highlighting Haladriel in s1 and missing their scenes in s2, Reddit (yes), Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter, I will.

If you don't want to engage in this aspect of fandom, don't. No one can force a stranger on the internet to do anything. And the ship does fine on its own. I disagree with some of the frantic messaging about producing content because we don't need it!

And by the way, no one pays attention to Tumblr or AO3, other than the fairly young on these teams. Social media analytics for entertainment typically include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tiktok, and of course all official accounts. TROP also pays attention to Reddit and Tolkien influencers, as well as TV critics. These all matter just as ratings do. They might not listen to every voice but yes it matters.

Haladriel art is getting 67,000 likes on Instagram in 4 days (screenshot below). Haladriel content consistently goes viral on Twitter, Tiktok and Insta. Interviewers were constantly asking about Haladriel in pre-s2 interviews and the TROP cast and showrunners got questions about them at SDCC in July.

We're fine.

Correction to the original post: It was The Artful Dodger's showrunner who cited fan engagement and TikToks as the reason the show got renewed. Not My Lady Jane.

[bogkeep]

Would you recommend the SSSS comic? I know little of it beside the very beautiful artstyle and premise

to answer the question of if i would recommend SSSS as a comic: yes, yes i would.

a description for those who don't know: Stand Still Stay Silent is a post-apocalyptic horror + adventure webcomic set in the nordics (norway, sweden, denmark, finland, iceland) that have been isolated from the rest of the world and gone back to their old gods. the the world outside of safe zones is full of trolls and beasts - humans and mammals that got infected by a horrible virus and turned into monsters. the story follows a ragtag crew that ventures into the old world (derelict denmark) on an expedition to collect books.

the comic updated every workday until it concluded in 2022, and consists of two Adventures. the creator had plans for many adventures with these characters in this world, but ended it after two when she wanted to take a new direction with her life.

what i love about it:

- the art is GORGEOUS. it's been a huge source of inspiration for me. open any page and it's a masterpiece, and you will ask yourself "how the FUCK did she update this FIVE DAYS A WEEK"

- the characters are wonderful and endearing. i just, i love them so much. i am so thankful lalli hotakainen exists he is one of my #1 blorbos forever

- the world is so cool. the blend of chunky sci-fi and norse mythology fantasy magic slaps. it goes so hard. i fell so hard for this comic when i got to the big ferry ship with a viking style dragon head prow added to it. it's everything

- it really really gets nordic cultures. it's difficult to explain all the dynamics and nuances but it just gets it. it brings me as a scandinavian a lot of joy to read a story that speaks to my heart this way. the attitudes, the language barriers, the cultural differences... it was so refreshing to me in a media landscape dominated by american stories. when the pandemic hit, i decided to reread the comic because i found such an odd comfort in seeing how it depicted the scandinavian countries reacting to, well, a pandemic.

- there's kittycats

what i don't like about it:

- the most glaring and obvious flaw is that everyone in the comic is white. there's not a single character of color anywhere, not even i background shots or the prologue. there's no mention of the saami people (the indigenous people of northern europe), either. i believe this was done in ignorance more than malicious intent, but the implications are Extremely Bad and it's been bothering me (AND MANY OTHERS) since day 1. that is the number one caveat i will give to anyone wanting to check this comic out. i've been in the discourse trenches and i am not going to excuse this. it's just bad!

- you can tell in the middle of adventure 2 that the creator has kind of lost interest in the work, around the time when she found jesus i guess. like, very few people can keep up work on the same creative project for years and years and years and i think it's fine that she wanted to drop it, but it's a bit sad to see the comic dragged to its end like a limp corpse, and feeling like the creator no longer really cares about the characters.

- minna sundberg has said and done some questionable things, presumably gotten somewhat radicalised over time, and has also converted to hardcore christianity which is what her new works are about. there's nothing about this in SSSS - there is a moment of christianity represented in the story in a sort of mythological sense, just like the other religions, but this was written before minna's conversion. her new works... are a Choice. i have much to say about them, and i have, and im not gonna rehash it now.

SO YEAH hopefully this will help you take an Informed Choice! i got into this comic in 2015 and was deep in the fandom and it's for better or for worse part of my soul foundation now.

i also recommend A Redtail's Dream, minna's "practice comic" before SSSS, based on finnish mythology and the kalevala.

[olderthannetfic]

Sending this to you specifically because I feel like you're the only normal brained person about this series.

I read Captive Prince a couple of years ago and liked it fine, as someone who doesn't have a strong preference for or against m/m and therefore isn't well-versed enough in its clichés to notice whether it reads like something full of cliché fanfic tropes. I really liked the use of language, some of the historical/political stuff, some of the ways that the characters are made complicated or unreliable.

The problem is, I've since coincidentally read most of the books that were Pacat's inspiration and. Well. Like 80-90% of the stuff in there has direct parallels in one of those. I'm not sure if there are more than three original thoughts in there.

I am not joking, if you read 1. The Lymond Chronicles and House of Niccolò by Dorothy Dunnett; 2. The Nightrunner series by Lynn Flewelling and 3. The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice, you will find that some of the scenes were ripped off beat for beat, many jokes were taken and just lazily reworded, a lot of the character beats and arcs are at best a mashup of 2 or maximum 3 things from those books with the serial numbers filed off really poorly. There's a scene where some characters discover a suicide victim whose structure and descriptions are completely ripped off from another series, except Pacat fails to see what made the original scene so impactful. A lot of the pretty use of language is also directly copied from those, including some really really specific descriptors. It's so blatant!

And I don't see how people are okay with this! I know people who are fans of several of these works and they're totally cool with it! And honestly if it were some rando's unpublished original project I'd be cool with it too, but as a published beloved worldwide phenomenon with rabid fans? C'mon.

And another thing is, all of the other series mentioned above are balls to the wall insane. She just... she just made it bland. She took off most of the edge and reshuffled the elements into a fairly straightforward MLM love story with some light kink thrown in. It's not a BAD series, but I feel like I'm disappointed that someone read all my favourite books and THAT was their takeaway?

--

I started reading, got to the name of the series and burst out laughing.

And, wow, you brought up something totally new that I hadn't thought about! I'm impressed. Genuinely. Usually, I rant about all the reasons I hate the series while debunking the standard anti talking points.

--

I've read the Vampire Chronicles, but that was in the 90s and I read Captive Prince in like 2016 or after. I had zero recollection of common points. I haven't read The Lymond Chronicles despite years of hurt/comfort fans bugging me to do so, and I think I got like a chapter into the Nightrunner series before getting distracted...

The reason I found Captive Prince annoying and derivative is that it also reads exactly like the original m/m that was available when it was first being written, most notably the work of P.L. Nunn who was extremely famous for horny fan art but who also wrote some original m/m fantasy novels. The scene where they finally bone reminds me heavily of the one from... uh... what's the P.L. Nunn one where the prince creeps on that archer dude and he gets raped because of course and then the prince has to be ~patient~ and it's peak boring 2000s rape recovery tropes?

The rape backstory is not only lifted from Fushigi Yuugi (the author's fandom at the time) but is shared with basically 100% of original m/m from that era. It's sometimes the uncle, sometimes the stepfather. One single time that I can think of, it was the foster brother, but mostly it's that "funny uncle" type. Unless it's gang rape from a bad Gundam Wing fic. That was also everywhere.

Once somebody told me the author had previously shipped Tamahome/Nakago, I realized that they'd taken what would be a kind of unusual anime ship and made it a thousand times more boring by dumbing down the scary, tall general with the tragic backstory into an uke-appropriate waif.

So I guess what I'm saying is that there may be some inspiration you aren't familiar with, but it's the same story as what you said above: this is the blander remix.

--

As for why people are okay with this... honestly, most of the people who really adore the series whom I've talked to point to how it encapsulates the exact tropes and tone they loved in anime fic circa 2000.

As a fellow weeb, I loathed the tone of said anime fic circa 2000 and could not wait for tastes to change, so Captive Prince is a hideous blast from an unlamented past for me.

I think most people who love the series aren't familiar with its inspirations. Those that are may have consumed them quite a while ago and don't realize quite how direct the parallels are. Or, for the inspirations that aren't overtly canon m/m, the lure of it being Exactly Right may overshadow other things.

(They also mostly haven't read 90s fantasy doorstops that actually contain political intrigue, tactics and strategy. Captive Prince is a piss poor entry into this genre and should be recced for m/m, not this other stuff people constantly think is in there. None of these characters can reason their way out of a paper bag.)

More than any of that, there's a lot of love left over from when the series was a serialized original story on Livejournal in an era when we had vanishingly few original m/m works, especially long ones in a fantasy alternate world.

I think that is what gets it a pass when a new m/m novel presented as "m/m romance" or posted on one of the webnovel sites would be mocked for unoriginality. Many Captive Prince fans aren't (or weren't when they read it) all that familiar with the smorgasbord of original m/m available today. Many are unfamiliar with anime fanfic circa 2000, so this feels adjacent to the fic they've read but a little fresher... instead of like the week-old sardine tin I found it to be.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

Aita for not making any of my characters, that I have to crank out daily, pansexual/polysexual/omnisexual specifically and only making them bi?

🏳️‍🌈👶🏼 so i can recognize this later lmao also I'm not panphobic or anything, this isn't about the validity of the label, pan is fine.

So i (20snb bi) have a project I'm working on where I take all the characters from a specifc media I'm into and pair them up with each other to make every possible ship kid from every possible ship(excluding characters who are kids themselves or are related or something, that shit is gross). Basically taking every character and pairing them up with another and creating a kid I think they'd have. Its a big project with lots of characters and I'm easily over 400 at this point. I really enjoy this, even if I'm not even 25% complete.

However I set a schedule for myself that at least one ship kid needs to come out each day which, considering I draw them, color them and give them some development and some even have siblings, (The refs themselves easily take me an hour to an hour and a half) I have to make lots of them quickly to keep up with my daily grind. I've been doing this project for over a year and although it's stressful, I can get them out quickly with breaks for myself.

Their character sheets all have some pretty basic info like their name, gender, pronouns, personality and more but it also includes their sexuality/orientation. I have a pretty basic list of options for what their sexuality will be: straight, lesbian, gay, Enbian, bi, Aro, ace and aroace with a few random things like polyam, WLW and a good amount of the something-loving-something/juvelic terms. I did this because, well, there's not many entirely unique orientations outside of them and although I love mogai/xenogenders and complex identities, I dont want to potentially drag up discourse or bring problems to my budding art blog over it. Its just not worth it to me to turn something I really care about on its head, even if I like microlabels.

In this case, I'm using bi as an umbrella term as most of the other terms share the same definition with slight variations in wording or action but not much difference in practice. We all like everyone, it's basic stuff. However, apparently this is a problem.

I've gotten one or two anons asking me questions about my guides asking some kind stuff like is this lesbian ship kid a butch or femme or Is this picture of them now or just at the age you put on the ref and other harmless stuff. Then things got rude with some Nbphobia but thrice now I've gotten asks:

1. Asking snarkily if im a panphobe

2. insulting me for not specifically writing pan or Omni and just writing bi.

3. Saying that I "clearly dont care about pansexual representation." Then brought up how my primary oc is native american so i clearly care about representation but that oc used to be a sona and I'm native?? Its confusing. (And Lowkey racist shit to just assume any native character is a "diversity quota" character instead of just a person existing but I digress-)

Im not pan, im bi so ig these people assume I'm not cool with pan people which isnt true? I have nothing aginest them, they are just pretty similar and I dont feel like it matters if they are specfically bi or pan or poly or any other label. I don't go into details like that for any other sub-group, not even pronouns and I included combinations and some common Neopronouns. I understand the importance of representation but my project has less than 50 people looking at it every day, Im not netflix or something. I'm one guy on the most LGBT blogging site with a big project and very little audience, I'm not showing people who wouldn't already know what pan is that pansexuality exists.

This project isn't that deep considering the characters in question aren't human/dont have human characteristics.(no it's not hazbin/helluva) Also ive never spoken about lgbt discourse or stated anything remotely close to it beyond the guides just passively having characters who are an LGBT identity. I've not even mentioned all the potentional orientations they could have so I'm not sure where/why this came up in the first place. The most politcial things ive said are calling out a creator in my fandom who outed themselves as a transphobe and mentioning im pro-palestine. That's it.

I mean this is pretty low stakes, I can just block these people and be done with it and this some seriously online shit but I just wanna check.

Am I being an asshole for just writing bi instead of specifying their mspec label because I have to produce characters quickly and I don't see enough of a difference to warrant a change/specification that would ultimately slow and clog an already stressful and complex project?

I dont think I am but idk lol

What are these acronyms?

[ask-train-trio]

~.~.~𝐀𝐒𝐊 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐎 ~.~.~

INTRODUCTION MASTERPOST!!!!!

(ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ɪs ɴᴏ ᴀᴜᴅɪᴏ ɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴠɪᴅᴇᴏ, ɪᴛ ᴡᴀs sᴜᴘᴘᴏsᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴀ ɢɪꜰ ʙᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ꜰɪʟᴇ ᴡᴀs ᴛᴏᴏ ʙɪɢ ᴏᴏᴘs)

This is an askblog for @lunozapp 's Indigo Park OCs! This post contains everything you need to know about this ask blog/AU and its characters! Context, boundaries, references etc. Asks are contextualised a little differently here, so check the blog description for the tl;dr on the context.

Check out issue 1 here!

CONTEXT:

This is DappleTilez24, also known as Tilez. He's a relatively small streamer in his universe's indigo park community, and is known for tirelessly completeing run after run, trying to beat his personal records (with.... varying sucess).

One day, he tries to speedrun a build of the game that he's never seen before...

...and stumbles across 2 MORE Rambleys than usual, much to the surprise - and confusion - of the Rambley we know and love!

Naturally, our hero Tilez is pretty damn confuddled... so he (mistakenly) asks his live chat for an explaination.

This is where YOU fantastic askers come in!

You act as Tilez's live chat. This means you don't even have to answer his queries, just say whatever you want to this interdimentional triplet of trash pandas, just like a REAL insufferable livechat would!

...within reason, of course (jokes aside, please read the boundaries)

[updated as of 04/07/24] CHARACTER REFERENCES: (in the animation i forgot twimbly's GT badges lol)

CHARACTER BOUNDARIES:

I want to make it entirely clear that i see the raccoon trio as brothers, especially with their very similar origins.

This is to say that I would not feel comfortable with any of them being shipped with eachother and I forbid the public sharing of that kind of content. If you see that kind of stuff around, please just mention this to the OP and block them if they refuse to respect it.

FURTHERMORE, please keep in mind that I ( @lunozapp ) am a MINOR. SO DON'T PUBLICLY POST NSFW/FETISH ART OF MY CHARACTERS, PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

However, shipping Twimbly, Ranglore, Rambley and Tilez with other characters that aren't related to them is fine by me (e.g. any of the original indigo characters x any of them, since they're not related)!

Again, please just keep it sfw.

ASK BOUNDARIES:

Pretty basic criteria, really. Just please don't spam the same ask over and over, I will guaranteed see them all unless this thing gets an explosion of attention out of nowhere lol

if i don't answer, its probably because either the question doesn't really fit the kind of story i have in mind for these characters or i just don't feel comfortable answering it. please respect that.

If you have a question for me specifically, start your ask with '[OOC]' (Out Of Character) or just ask me directly: @lunozapp

FURTHER INFO:

Asks are moreso used here as a prompt for conversation rather than the basis of an entire issue. More often than not there will be more than 1 ask in an issue, so going forward I'll make sure to tag everyone who asks without annonymity.

Also, please TRY to keep them as actual questions and not goofy 1-word sentences, the asks help me actually formulate a coherent premise for an issue

I don't OWN the concept of making ocs based off lore.mp4 and the GT thumbnail. if u see someone doing the same, try not to be all like 'OMG TWIMBLY/RANGLORE!!!! THEY ALREADY EXIST THIS IS PLAGARISM YOU CAN'T DO THAT!!!!!11!!11' unless it is blatant plagarism. Just use ur common sense ig

In terms of fanart/other fanworks, A MILLION THANKS IF YOU FEEL CALLED TO MAKE THAT!! The stuff i've gotten so far is genuinely so awesome, make it all you want if you feel called to do so. I'll try to reblog any fanart I find on here. If you want to go straight to asks, just click on the tag '#train trio asks'

alright, that's everything. Now what are you still doing here? Throw 'em a question! Or a compliment!! Or an insult.

or don't idrc just have fun here haha

fun fact!! putting everything together for this took a WEEK

[iamnmbr3]

'why do you ship drarry, malfoy bullied him'

malfoy should have been redeemed and they are absolutely OBSESSED with each other. It might as well be romantic

And ppl seem pretty sensible. If a bit too horny

I have thoughts on this. Because the thing is, no one should feel like they need a reason to dislike a ship or to not engage with it. They can have a reason. But it's also just fine to...not vibe with something. That's ok too. There's content and ships that make me super uncomfortable or that just plain dislike. Sometimes for clear specific reasons and sometimes just...because. Sometimes to the point that I hate even scrolling past it on ao3. And that's all ok. What's not ok is harassing other people over or it dictating what other people like or engage with. Wish more people remembered that. It would make fandom so much nicer if people could all do that.

And yeah. I feel like Draco's story needed more closure. I mean, canonically he does get a redemption arc - he changes his views and becomes a better person - but JKR somehow both wrote that and also doesn't acknowledge the implications. Also, after being such a central character and being literally the reason Harry wins his duel against Voldemort it feels weird for him to not at least have a final conversation with Draco where he gives his wand back etc. (And then they fall in love and get married epilogue whom?!)

Also I am more than on board with super dark highly toxic enemies to lovers ships. They aren't for everyone but I like them. To me personally though, drarry doesn't really fall into that category, at least as it is presented in canon. What Harry and Draco have to me feels like a rivalry - a very intense, very hostile one (I mean they do literally end up as soldiers on opposite sides of a war), but a rivalry nonetheless. And there is obviously a grey area between bullying and rivalry. My point is not to dismiss all the ways Harry and Draco have hurt each other. But merely to point out that to me the dynamic feels very different than shipping Snape and Sirius for example, or Draco and Ron for that matter, where it feels like there's more of a clear past bully & victim dynamic. This is not a reason to ship or not to ship any of these ships. To each their own. It's merely a commentary on how I tend to view drarry.

As to the last point. I don't think people can really be "too horny." Sex and sexual desire are just as valid to explore or depict in fiction/art and just as valid a reason to create fiction/art as any other reason. Generally speaking I find that the best and most creative and diverse fandom environments that lead to the greatest quality and diversity of content are the ones where people who want to be 'horny on main TM' in their creative endeavors can be without fear of any type of negative repercussion. That's not to say everyone has to create, enjoy or even engage with that type of content. But its presence is usually a sign of a healthy fandom ecosystem.