#its real and so damn heartwrenching lol

[sea-buns]

I'm always a bit on the fence about how I feel about Peter Lukas, because while he most certainly is a scummy man, I do really like his voice and the diction he's played with

But it's shit like describing Jon as a "grubby Jesus" that makes it reallyyy hard to fall on the dislike train

[less-than-three-3]

Cereza and the Lost Demon is so beautiful

I’m going to be totally honest, I partially bought this game out of spite because people were being really annoying about how “it didn’t look worth the price” and “it isn’t bayonetta so it’s bad :/” (I was interested in it too but that definitely catalyzed it lol)

Were they right? Ok, I think it’s kind of a cop out answer, but I think “if this type of game looks up your alley” then it totally is worth it, and it really carves its niche out fairly well. No it’s not bayonetta but like.... obviously not lmao? Funnily enough, actually, amidst the revival of the dumb “give me back old zelda” with totk on the horizon, I think this game hits a lot of the notes of the more linear temple-centric zeldas... 

It’s also a very pretty game in many ways, honestly possibly one of the most aesthetically appealing games on the switch overall, though I do have my gripes with gameplay. Full thoughts below, with minor spoilers so be warned.

I’m just going to start with what I loved about it, because if I dig into the gameplay first it’ll come off worse than it is, because my only real complaints were gameplay-related. The music was absolutely gorgeous and always so fitting, and the adaptations of music from the mainline games to this new aesthetic were done excellently. It might honestly be my favorite bayonetta soundtrack, and I really like those soundtracks. From fully orchestrated, lush environments, to more jovial lighthearted moments, to serious heartwrenching developments, the soundtrack covers everything so well. 

The art, too, was great. In addition to the painted artstyle, they do the thing that I fucking love in animation where there’s like a still textured background, and as the characters move, they like, move past the background? I don’t know what to call it, and the internet doesn’t know what to call it, but if you’ve seen Chowder or Gankutskuou you know exactly what I’m talking about lol. The painted aesthetic also lends itself to like actually creative uses more than just looking pretty too, most notably a part at the very end that was so touching, when you play it you’ll know what I mean. If there’s any small nitpick it’s just that the storybook format of cutscenes leads to just a few “stiff” moments? But it’s like totally understandable. 

That said, I loved the cozy storybook narration and framing, and I honestly don’t really get when people say it’s tonally inconsistent with bayonetta (I’m going to avoid the worst case explanation of this). The mythological vibes, for lack of a better word, are still extremely present, so people must just dislike that it’s a story about Cereza as a young girl? Because like obviously she isn’t going to be a badass, sexy witch as like, a 12 year old, but it’s not like the game moves the needle in the complete opposite direction and becomes a super cutesy wholesome 100 vibe. The vibe is, like I said, cozy, mythical, maybe whimsical, and yeah it’s at a slightly slower pace than the mainline games, but it’s not so out of the question, especially for a game exploring the journey of a young Cereza.

Her journey is not the deepest thing in the world, really, and it is kind of in part due to the set up of the game, where you have to collect these four elemental cores to unlock powers and get to the heart of the forest. Kind of like zelda, in a way. There are a couple twists and turns, but I think the main element is the growth of Cereza and Cheshire, independently and together. There are some tropey elements for sure, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t still tear up after certain events occur.

And speaking of zelda, I really felt like the overall gameplay loop was very reminiscent of that kind of style, but with a twist. As you traverse through each region, there are obstacles that serve as “puzzles” to solve to continue your path forward, sometimes using some mechanic that you may get in the future (there are literally bomb flowers lol), and then you get the upgrade, and solve more puzzles or traverse new types of land with the powers you unlocked. And of course, there are Tir na nOgs which, like literally everyone says, are pretty much semi-required shrines from BotW. Many of them presented interesting puzzles, some of them were just like tests of strength?? (like botw!) And of course this is all on top of the unique control scheme of controlling both Cereza and Cheshire with each side of the controller which certainly takes a good bit to get used to. The parts where you have both characters separately doing different tasks were really fun.

But, honestly, I felt like there wasn’t enough of that. Like I said there was a lot of combat trials, and honestly, even though I really did enjoy the combat, I almost wished there was less of it? There is a lot of fluidity possible between the 5 different stances Cheshire can get, and light and heavy combos, as well as bind combos, but besides that the enemies were hardly really that threatening (outside the bosses, which were certainly very cool fights) so it just felt more like an annoyance beyond the honeymoon period after I unlock a new skill. And it felt like it took away time from doing puzzles, which I wouldn’t call sparse but I would call just a little deficient. Maybe it’s because it’s relatively short, or the difficulty was designed to a younger audience? And as a result, I really didn’t feel like I wanted to go back to find the other Tir na nOgs, because their main reward was getting spirit orbs fragments of health, which I didn’t really feel was super necessary. And that’s a shame, because maybe I did miss out on some really cool puzzles. There are also upgrade materials for special skills Cereza and Cheshire can get, but I felt like I more or less got the ones I got from the materials I could get more conveniently. Overall it just kind of felt, both from a combat and puzzle standpoint, that they could have and maybe should have really fleshed it out more and get those gears turning. 

I also just would like to mention that the opening of the game felt glacially slow. Not just like introductory stuff, but pretty much everything until your skill tree gets unlocked (and you get your first elemental core relatively soon thereafter). I think I get why, because they not only want to actually set the exposition and I felt that was paced fine, but also let people get used to the dual stick movement once you get to control Cheshire. But man the base combat without any additional upgrades is not that interesting, and the very early puzzles were, obviously, pretty simple to ease you into it. I absolutely think after that part, things start to really open up and feel much much better, but that opening segment has gotta be like, a couple hours or so. 

Besides those gripes, though, I do think it’s at least a very visually pretty game with great music and a cozy story and setting, and the gameplay, if you’re vaguely interested in a game like this, definitely works well. While the extra chapter of this game does tie into Bayonetta 3, a game that I actually still haven’t played and am not planning to play soon, oops, the actual main story is fully independent. So regardless of if you’ve played a bayo game or not, if you think you’d like it, or if you’re one of those people who just really really wants old dungeons back in zelda, then I’d recommend it. Not my favorite, but a solid spinoff that I think they could really expand upon.

[yaboylevi]

Vivi~ Eren’s head tumbled off, ooooof. Where do you stand in the sea of theories about it? Is he chillin’ with Ymir in p a t h s? (And we’ll be told his plan while she reconstructs the abs™️? ) Did he manage to transfer his consciousness à la Reiner? (I mean, consciousness transfer must have been introduced for a reason. Right? Probably not.) Did the Jaegers pull the good ol’ classic memory alteration, or is Isamama just very tired and making lots of mistakes? Your thoughts, お願いします！

Hiii!

Unfortunately, I am a bit bummed about all of this.

I was really HYPE when I saw people discussing the “memory alteration” theory, because it’s so freaking cool?! I’ve been waiting for some really messed up magical stuff to happen since forever, and I finally got some when Zeke was brought back to life. This would be so amazing, as well. Also, since I jokingly paralleled Eren to Itachi with some friends literally a year ago, I was shook by the idea of Eren pulling mind games on people because it would be like a genjutsu, lol. sorry, my Naruto weeb phase resurfaces sometimes.

That being said, Isayama commenting on how he barely managed to make it in time this month means that he probably knows of the inconsistencies and the weird pacing. That’s why I’m bummed, I don’t know how to theorize on this chapter. I don’t know which ones are to be considered mistakes, which ones are clues (and there are always some clues in every chapter). I’m looking forward to the corrected version in the volume. And I wish Isayama would write a blog post about his mistakes. He already did something like this in the past, when he redacted what he mistakenly said about Levi’s age.

I wouldn’t be that against Eren making a trip to the Paths, because there’s still a lot to explore about its mechanisms and the little girl, for example, but then again we just got the same thing with Zeke, and I think Isayama would come up with something completely new. 

Furthermore, Eren’s real self is in his head and it was separated from his spinal fluid (where his powers are), so I really don’t know how that could work. Unless he did what Reiner has done in RtS. But this is my least favorite outcome.

When it comes to exploring Eren’s real thoughts, I would love for his head to end up in Zeke’s hands. We would find out about Eren through Zeke’s eyes. It would be so damn cool, and heartwrenching. And if Zeke saw EVERYTHING, I believe he could understand Eren and change his mindset on his whole mission/life. He may have a major breakdown but he’d decide to trust in his little brother.

And then he’d save Eren. Because maybe the Paths Girl saved his life in that way so Zeke could gain the knowledge on how to cure such life-threatening (lol) injuries! And there’s plenty of titan bodies to use at the moment…

[tumblunni]

Today's HMM KINGDOM HEARTS THOUGHT

Shadow Globs!

What on earth are Shadow Globs?

They've appeared in various games but were only named in 358/2 Days where they were a mission objective one or two times. It seems they're just a catchall name covering any "destroy this generic badly textured button blob thing to stop the infinately spawning enemies", which is kind of a standard action rpg thing so yeah. But really when you think about it, how do they fit into the kingdom hearts universe?

The manga tried to explain them a lil bit by saying they're "collections of dark energy that hasnt taken form", somehow theyre summoned just by grudges and greed and stuff. It show captain hook turning his own treasure chests into heartless by accident cos of just how much darkness he has, and the queen of hearts creating so many shadow globs that her whole castle is sculpted from them and it falls apart when they "hatch". Also seriously they "hatch"?? I guess this is how you get the some heartless who were never human? Cos that was always confusing how some of them arent human, and also how sometimes a human can turn into a heartless witout being killed by a heartless, just dying normally while being really evil, or sometimes apparantky turning heartless while still alive and then for gaston his heartless split off from him and he still existed separately and just WHY ARE THE RULES NOT CONSISTANT LOL! Especially with how emblem heartless are all meant to originate from xehanort's experiments yet several heartless have appeared who are classified as emblem not pureblood despite not being made by xehanort or made by one of the xehanort-made heartless infecting someone else LIKE WHY DO SOME OF THEM JUST POOF UP EMBLEMIZED WHEN HE NEVER TOUCHED THEM

Kay thats enough rambling about Confusion lets get to Headcanons That Might Make Sense Of One Slightly Small Thing

Shadow globs!! Are heartless babs!! This is my thinking now! If we widen the origin of heartless a little more vague then itd avoid a lot of the questions, honestly if theyd introduced them as "they come from negative emotions" first BEFORE "they come from being killed by one of them" then it would have been a lot less confusing. Its just confusing to retcon their origins to be less specific in the sequel, lol!

So yeh my thought is that some heartless werent originally a dead person, they can be summoned from any place where too many dark feelings gather. Those places would have a shadow glob appear, and its like a baby heartless egg. Lots of enemies swarm around them because they instinctively want to protect and nurture the new shadowlings, and of course the glob sunmons new enemies because it hatches thos babs. But they just happen to be very globby eggs like a frog, i guess. Srsly its actually a real chapter in the manga that the queen of hearts did goddamn masonry with shadow globs squished into brick shape, and then her castle went all wibble wobble jelly cos she was being so evil that it made the babbies grow up too strong and healthyful. Luxord had to battle her to save her cos she refused to believe her cool new aesthetique castle was dangerous, and then she ended up getting a crush on him after he swooped in and rescued her princess style and gave her a new castle made of cards. IT WAS WEIRDLY CUTE!!! Petition to give luxord cute shippings with every other card themed villain ever. (I love the person who did fic of him x dr facilier!)

ANYWAY i felt sad for the shadow bebby tho.

Also i headcanon that the Possessor enemy is the shadow bebbys! Cos in the main series you only fight it in various artificially power enhanced forms- it possessing armoured doors and a combo form of a hundred of them into a boss. But in khux you do get to fight them individually and theyre actually the only enemy weaker than Shadows! So maybe that means theyre "less evolved" so to speak, and Shadows are only the weakest form of HUMANOID heartless? Thatd explain why their design is more complex than Darkballs and Operas and etc yet theyre less powerful. Shadows are essentially just an alternate appearance of Possessors that retains a few stray traits of the creature they used to be when they were alive. Also darkballs are totally the "default form" of non-human heartless, they make SO MUCH sense as an evolution of possessors consideribg everythin about their design and all. And lots of other pureblood heartless look like either a design that evolved from a Shadow or a Darkball, and we even have the canonical case of Dark Thorn which looks just like a darkball with chains and great hair until it hits its second form. Also it possesses stuff! We dont see other darkballs doing that but that seems to be a pretty canon evidence that posessors are a weaker version of the same thing!

Also just posessors and darkballs are two of my alltime favourites so i want an excuse to draw them as a cute fambly. And the shadow glob = egg headcanon has so much more fambly potential!! It means that heartless could actually reproduce without killing, so hypothetically non evil heartless are slightly more plausable. Look i know the whole premise is that theyre pure evil creatures but theyre so damn cute!! Also imagine some evil villain creating a shadow glob through their evilness and being all "oh no im a parent" and then cute scenes of goofyness with them trying to look after their mischievious new darkball bebs~ Or even could be heartwrenching, like what if mother gothel was being an abusive mom to all her heartless minions too, and her sacrificing them in battle could be a truly evil moment?

Look i just really like the darkballs okay theyre just really round and softd and DESERVE MORE

[darke15]

Good morninggggg Anna @itsarussian

" It wanted to rage and rampage and take what it was owed. "

UnhingedGhost IS COMING BABYYY

Yessssssssssssss 😈

Its awesome to see some scene from a different perspective, now all these key moments from oliver pov while hes one hydra side they just hit different

Yay 🖤 i’ve been having a lot of fun writing them and giving him such an attitude and inner dialogue that we didn’t get to see in the og flashbacks

*just realized.. are we gonna see ghost AND ollie povs in good doctors care? 😳

Hmmmmmmmmmmm maybe 😈

shooting through the door, ripping from its hinges.. damn she mad

Girl she mad mad 

LOOK AT HER STALKING TOWARD OLLIE LOOKING LIKE A FERAL ShNACK, GO GET HIM TIGER!

😂😂😂

AHAGSHAAG DUKE LAUGHING i just know ollie felt so little and a little panicked

He def felt like he was back on the og Alpha One team and Ghost was going to be the shit out of him or throw him out of a plane again

" (F/N) wouldn’t let anger consume her this terribly unless Walsh had done it. "

and him thinking of the call and assuming jacks dead STAPH he's moslty fine.... he's gonna be fine.... Hopefully.

😏😏😏

Throwing the knife aydgaush poor duke had his head scrambled real good

He tried his best 

Hi angry russian man :3

Angry boiiiiiiiiii 

“Your mom.” BOOONEEE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

🤣🤣🤣 of course i had to bring her back with a your mom joke, it’s their thing 🖤

DONT YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN its been one too many heartattacks bc of you, pls staph it

Oops 😂

THE WAY BELOV JUST BOLTED AND WANT TO HUG HER i love them so fucking much it hurts

It’s his little sister 🥺all he wants is a hug 

Earlier, much earlier and earliererest lol i love this

😂😂😂

Look how soft and scared for boone he is.. damn this man, he's gold.

I want one 

HE KNEW?! WAIT WHAT¿¡¿¡¿ WHAT THE HECK HE'S AN ACTOR THIS LITTLE SHIT

As much as i think he wears his heart on his sleeve, he’s got another side to him that he picked up from Natasha 

But also of course boone would be the genius and pull a nick fury.. aaaah these damn spies and their fake deaths

Of coursssseeee 

THE BODY BAG SITTING UP IM DYING why is that so funny ahshahsh

It is one of the funniest visuals in my head rn 

“Have you dipshits been stressing out Christopher?” Boone frowned, eyeing him worriedly, “His accent’s gotten stronger.” “Shut up, Беда.” “Christopher, it's becoming an issue. I can hardly understand you.”

Have i ever expressed how much i love these two?

🖤🖤🖤

I stg if she doesnt tell him ..

Hehehhehehehehehehhehe 😈

"And there was another part of you that was creeping up your spine. A darker part, one that wanted the end of Oliver Walsh to be up close and personal. "

*summoning and manifesting Feral and UnhingedGhost*

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS 

You just love stabbing us all with those heartwrenching dannyGhost moment, admit it darke

*sigh* I love stabbing y’all with heart wrenching Danny x Ghost moments 🙂

He wanted you to play with your prey before you finished the job.

Ghost sniping a target on the wall, drawing blood and just staring at Ollie angry, furious and ferocious from afar is so fucking sexy, i dont know to express what this scene does to me.. i just.. 🏃‍♀️🧍‍♀️🚶‍♀️🧎‍♀️

🤣🤣🤣 good to know that does it for you

Shes like, you wanted my team dead? You want me bloody and broken? Just know you can bleed too.

Oooooffffffffff Annnnnnnaaaaa that’s dope as hell 

YELENA ?! YELENAAAAA

YELLLLLLEEEEENNNAAAA!!!!!

and mama?!?!

MELIIIIINNNNNNNAAAAAAA!!!!!

YELENA AND MAMAAAA 🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️

I’m so excited to have the widows back in action, it’s gonna be great 

Damn this was beautiful, i really missed the action and forgetting how to breath bc of it lol

😂😂😂

IM SO FUCKING PUMPED FOR GHOST VS OLLIE AND GHOST REVEALING HER SELF AND BUCKY AND GHOST AND AND AAAAAAAAAAAHHH

😈😈😈

Honestly i kinda thought she would snipe ollie while he was gonna shoot duke, but DAMN this was 1000000times better.. my gOD.

Loooooollllll that woulda been interesting 🤔

Also.. what the doc doing?

Brooding 

he's been real quiet.. but i know he so fed up with ollie shenanigans lol

He’s so over it, it’s kinda funny 😂

Chapter 73 // KILL SWITCH

To all my live reactors,

Please, please, please, hide your reactions under a Read More cut. I don’t want any spoilers floating around. 

&

To all my Anonymous Avengers, 

If you want to react in my asks, feel free. However, I won’t be answering any of them until at least Wednesday if they contain spoilers. 

Thank you,

Darke

┍━━━━━━━━ ★ ━━━━━━━━┑

You could have lost them. You could have lost all of them. All because you were too blind to see through Wraith's charade. 

You were supposed to be better than this. You were supposed to be the best of the best. That’s what you were trained to be. 

You felt something shift deep inside of you, bringing with it a familiar certainty. Something you hadn’t felt in a long, long time. 

It was cold and calculated and focused. It knew exactly what it had to do and when to do it. 

It had been cooped up inside you for so, so long, shoved to the back of your mind to never see the light of day again. You’d let it slip through the cracks a seldom few times but, now?

Now, it wanted out. 

It wanted to rage and rampage and take what it was owed. 

Revenge. 

It was aggressive, yet charming. Exactly what Commander Weston had trained it to be. It was reckless and vigilant. It was impulsive and deliberate. 

Ghost.

┕━━━━━━━━ ★ ━━━━━━━━┙

Chapter 73  // KILL SWITCH

✪ Bᴀᴛᴛʟᴇ Sᴄᴀʀʀᴇᴅ : Aғᴛᴇʀᴍᴀᴛʜ

♜♠ Tʜᴇ Sᴏʟᴅɪᴇʀ & Tʜᴇ Sᴘʏ

⧗ Tʜᴇ Rᴇᴅ Rᴏᴏᴍ

» Jᴏɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴀʀᴋᴇ sɪᴅᴇTᴀɢʟɪsᴛ

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