#like at least the music they're playing is a banger BUT STILL

[lrdvyke]

you'd think with all the work you have to do in order to even get to the cathedral of the forsaken, vyke would've figured it out sooner that what he's doing is Bad bad. a dozen omens, three lobsters, corpse after corpse, walking infected wraiths, BROWN WATER— like c'mon man.

[two-dolla-bills]

Top 10 mechanisms songs that you can get away with playing at a retailers without too many side eyes

I got a job in retail and I felt inspired lol

Disclaimer: this is not a list of the best mechanisms songs/the ones I think deserve to go "mainstream", they're just the ones that would blend in the best

1. Sirens

This song is probably the mechanisms' least "centered" song. It doesn't mention any characters, it has no narration, and out of context it just sounds like A Song that you might hear on the radio. Sirens is to the mechanisms as you're the one that I want is to grease, you know?

2. Trial by song

THIS one. It's in the same category to me as Sirens; you can listen to it by itself and not suspect much. Unlike Sirens which can be completely separated and still make sense, this one is more like a whole new world from Aladdin. There are parts that make it obvious that it's from a larger whole, but if you just so happen to catch the "safe" parts you won't suspect much.

Points were deducted due to Mr. Soldier's unique vocals. (Unique as in not very common in mainstream music)

3. Empty trail

This is no offense to Dr. La Cognizzi, but sometimes when she sings it's hard to make out what she's saying, which works in her favor in these circumstances. It sounds country/rock, which help it blend in with some dad rock songs. If I remember correctly, the melody was actually taken from a Led Zeppelin song, so if you aren't paying attention to what's ACTUALLY being said you can get away with claiming it's a cover.

4. Ties that bind

Although this one does mention many plot points, many fans have stated that they had no idea what the fuck was being said until the have looked for the lyrics (myself included) this, combined with it's jazzy rythm, make it able to blend in with other songs, similarly to empty trail

5. Odin

The most "normal" song out of the entirety of The Bifrost Incident. This song made it to the top five because it has similarities with Roam by the B-52's, but had points deducted due to it clearly being about an awesome space train

6. Lost in the cosmos

This might just be personal opinion, but it sounds like a church song. You can pull off the effect of it being about earth Jesus and not space robot Jesus if you have particularly bad quality speakers and a busy store w/lots of noise. Again, the lyrics kinda give it away as to not being entirely main stream

7. Stranger

Look it's a banger, ok? Many of the lyrics could be taken as just being metaphors, but I feel like you have to squint to "see" it. Pay too much attention and shit gets a little weird. Also, points deducted because it's two men singing together and not a man and a woman, which throws a wrench into the works. At kohl's it might raise some eyebrows but in like hot topic it'll blend in a little better

8. Redeath

You would think a song about a sphoenix (space phoenix) would be lower on the list but you'd be wrong. It's a really pretty song with a good original melody, and it's something that can be drowned out by a particularly rowdy crowd. Like Stranger, it would blend in better at a hot topic than at kohl's, but only slightly.

9. Elysian Fields

The melody in Elysian Fields is taken directly from the song wayfaring stranger, which has been coverd by Jonny Cash, Ed Sheeran, Poor Man's Poison, and The Longest Johns, AS WELL HAS having been featured in the movie 1917 and in the video game The Last of Us II, which make it very recognizable. Because of this recognizability, people who know the original song may be caught off guard by hearing it in a Walmart with completely different lyrics. It was originally in 7th place, but the popularity of the original takes off many points

10. Once and future king

It's a banger, don't get me wrong, but it also very heavily and clearly mentions plot points from the album, which itself is heavily base on Aurtharian mythology; something very well known in the western world (also the names are not common at all and most haven't been in fashion in centuries). In a crowded, busy space with not very good quality speakers it could potentially blend in, but one or two names might sneak out. The only reason it's on the list is because of the instrumental outro, which sounds normal enough

[soaps-mohawk]

Oh my gawd WHY IS IT STILL SO PAINFULLL. This chapter was still so sad to read. 'mega clearly didn't want to watch the whole thing or kill him(even if the freak deserves it(coming back after the hiatus was quite the contrast after spending months fixated on that stupid Texas bastard)) like Simon himself said way before the kidnapping that she's not a soldier, she hasn't been condition to live with that pain and guilt, AND THE LACK OF COMFORT OH MY GOD. It's something I noticed from the start of the fic that always gave this air of things never being quite ideal but it takes center stage now(even if mega is still now willing to forgive them, rightfully so) is the way they don't notice the small things?? Especially now when they're realizing how little they knew about poor 'mega. Johnny nudging her inside despite not wanting to, the hovering John's insistence on doing everything himself. Like even when they finally took her out to the sea this unwillingness to be truthful. Especially in this chapter when 'mega finally said outright that she doesn't like surprises and they'd known if they would have paid attention. like yeah it's small things BUT THOSE THINGS ADD UP, AND JUST MAKE THE SITUATION EVEN MORE PAINFUL(like John not even telling her why they brought her there until the last moment like JESUS. That was a red flag for me.) but the Convo with Dr. Keller and the set up that 'mega will finally confront them about this GOT ME SO HYPED. The girl deserves to shed those pushover habits, it's probably the most frustrating part of reading this series personally as someone who's also putting a lot of effort into unlearning them. What an emotional banger, that I've been obsessed with for like 2 months now. I even made a playlist for it, combining vocaloid, video game music and Tchaikovsky so here that if you're interested

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdvKg781XoUfaZkGXLmqVLsbj4UD2y-C6&si=Z8iLaV--w0-nTVQv

(also will we ever get a bad ending au where the bond does break..? I know it wouldn't happen soon with everything in the world rn and the angst marathon that we had before the rewrites.. but I'm still a sucker for guilt angst. Things turning out to be unrepairable, the 141 left to live with a hole in their heart, and 'mega trying to move on without them.)

Things really have been tense in the fic, huh? You're so right though, the whole fic has kind of revolved around the idea that things really aren't ideal and all of them were kind of forced into this situation without any chance to really get to know each other first. Even the 141 had to learn about each other on the fly. There's a lot they don't know, especially about 'mega. They haven't really been paying attention, relying on 'mega to kind of adjust and be the one to tell them everything instead of learning themselves. Which we know babygirl isn't going to just outright say something, or at least she wasn't going to at first. Now...now things have changed a bit. I'll say that much.

I'm so going to listen to that playlist! I love when people make playlists omg I've never had that done before this fic.

I don't think I'd ever write out the full angst-filled version where things don't turn out as ideal. I do have an idea for how it would play out, but I'm not sure I could actually write it.

[the-bloody-sadist]

please I wanna hear more about your thoughts on sweet pool, it was such an odd vn to me but at the same time i'm so happy I played it

DUUUUUUDE!!!!!! THAT SHIT WAS SO WEIRD!!! (POSITIVE)

Lmfao so first of all, I'm a huge audiophile (and I say that to mean any audio, most of all voices and VA performances and sound design), and JESUS CHRIST THE CAST THEY GOT FOR SWEET POOL????? HELLO??? God, I adore Youji's VA, and I'll never NOT be impressed by his ability to play both the character for Sweet Pool as well as Doumeki in Saezuru wa Tori Habatakanai TO SUCH PINPOINT ACCURACY....

I'll ramble too much if I let myself. But the ART, the MUSIC, the ROUTE CHOICES, the PORTRAYAL OF CHRONIC DEPRESSION, the HALLUCINATIONS, the BODY HORROR...THE PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLS!!!!!!!!! DAMN!!!!! It just had everything I hoped for, EXCEPT FOR LIKE ONE GOOD ENDING WITH TETSUO. CRIES EXPLOSIVELY. COULD I NOT JUST HAVE ONE. FOR HURT COMFORT'S SAKE.

It's been YEARS since I played that game but damn I was fucked up for weeks after finishing all the Tetsuo routes especially, and Sweet Pool I think was the only Nitro+Chiral game where I liked every character's route and enjoyed playing through them. Makoto a bit less so, but he made up for it in the end because WOW WHAT A BANGER on his bad route.

Again, it was my first Chiral game, so everything I played after was like "oh...this is just a copy of Makoto's type in a new setting. Oh....this is the same outcome as Zhenya with a new face. Oh...Chiral just really likes these tropes and uses them over and over again....okay." BUT HEY, I LIKE THOSE TROPES SO AT LEAST THAT.

I think my favorite part about SP though is, ironically, the fake omegaverse rep. Since I'm such a hater of A/B/O, you'd think I'd hate SP, but it's actually exactly what I'd want instead of the real omegaverse stuff I see. Please miss me with that shit on slick and pregnancy and alpha scenting, I want blood and freaky organisms living in your stomach like parasites and hallucinogens from the weird stalker guy at school. IF ONLY ALL OMEGAVERSE WAS PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR! AH....SO SAD.

Anyway, Zhenya had my favorite route at the time I played it (I cannot escape the kidnapping trope...Shiki from TnC was why I played TnC and he's my favorite Chiral character aside from Youji....), but looking back, I think all of Tetsuo's are my favorite, now. Once I got over the crippling depression of how sad all the endings were, I remembered how fucking intriguing Tetsuo's character was to me. I really like the types that are freakishly alien with their emotional expression and you never know if they're trying to hurt the MC or harm him until several layers into the story. And even then, you still don't know, because they just come off as creeps either way. It's terrifying.

I think the only element I didn't like was the fact that made the meat babies and whatever ACTUALLY REAL. I didn't want the supernatural shit or the annoying ass priest or whatever he was (I wasn't listening to DOUKA....DOUKA!!! every scene) confirming the reality of what was going on with Youji, I just wanted the psychological insanity and for Youji to actually be experiencing all this because of mental illness. I just hate supernatural or religious shit in my horror, though, so that's my own pickiness.

ANYWAY. OTHER THAN THAT! Sweet Pool will always stand out for me because it was my first, and it truly disturbed me because I didn't know people could make VNs that catered to exactly what I wanted, and at the time I was a baby to yaoi, so imagine my surprise when I discovered there was a whole world of people making the exact content I thought only I wanted to see.

THERE, WAS THAT ENOUGH OF MY THOUGHTS FOR YOU??? YOU'LL NEVER WANT TO HEAR FROM ME AGAIN!!!

[pokekaito]

You know I don't think Because You're Here by PinocchioP quite counts as a "response" to Sand Planet/DUNE by Hachi/Kenshi Yonezu in the way that Blue Planet, HERO, or Jackpot Sad Girl do, but I do feel like its message feels like it was made in response to, at least in part, the same atmosphere that created Sand Planet.

Sand Planet notoriously made A Little Bit Of A Stink™ in the Vocaloid scene on account of one of the biggest, most talented producers making a song about how the Vocaloid world had "dried up" and then straight up leaving. I feel like there's nothing to say about it that hasn't already been said but I do feel like it's important to clarify: this song really STILL feels like a massive elephant in the room for any discussion of Vocaloid TO THIS DAY.

I think this song just left a lasting discomfort for a lot of the community, a resounding feeling that the music we love is fleeting in some way, as if Hatsune Miku herself was going to somehow die. It's a scary thought, especially for people who feel they've found so much community and love and understanding in the Vocaloid fandom.

I feel like this 'fear-of-lacking' also really shows in the sound of Sand Planet itself. I absolutely think Hachi nailed the sound of "dryness," the way Miku's vocals stay monotone and unexcited until exploding in the chorus, as though she's manifesting Hachi's final cries as a Vocaloid producer, the undertone of vocals looping inscrutably, as if they're searching exhaustedly for something that just isn't there, and the way the song ends on a note that doesn't really feel satisfying or resolving, despite the song being really intricate and unique, it all just points to something lacking in some way.

Enter, Magical Mirai 2020, and the release of Because You're Here by PinocchioP.

Now I won't pretend that this song shifted the opinions of the Vocaloid community entirely, that DUNE-shaped elephant is very much still in the room, but I absolutely think PinocchioP offers the perfect insight on the state of the Vocaloid scene that the community really needed.

Like I said before, I don't think Because You're Here is a DIRECT response to Sand Planet but they ARE both songs made for Magical Mirai, both made with ultimately the same goal of saying something important about Vocaloid in some way.

But, where Sand Planet is scratchy-sounding and harsh, Because You're Here is soft, melodic, and celebratory. A piano play peaceful, introspective melodies before Miku's voice sings a cascade of joy until the first verse, where she meditates on the nature of her existence before an explosion of celebratory drumbeats and electronic melodies erupt in the chorus. Despite serving the same purpose as a Magical Mirai song, it almost couldn't sound any different from Sand Planet.

And nothing shows this more than in the lyrics, where Miku proudly states that even if she's not loved, she'll still stay as herself. As long as she can sing for us, Miku will never die, she will live on in the songs we make and the community we've built.

And that's... Wonderful. So wonderful I feel like I can finally let the DUNE-shaped elephant out of the room and see Vocaloid for what it is: good music and a community that both make me happy, and that will both continue to make me happy well into the future.

MAYBE the Vocaloid world is "drying up," but really, what's changed? Vocaloid went from niche to... Slightly more niche, so what? PinocchioP is still making bangers, to say nothing of all the other talented producers still very much in the game.

I love Hatsune Miku, I love Vocaloid music, so just as Hatsune Miku will stay as Hatsune Miku as long as she can sing, as long as I can hear Miku sing I will stay as a Miku fan.

[splashink-games]

Cassette Beasts?

Cassette Beasts is a creature-collecting game by Bytten Studio! Record monsters on tapes, become a Ranger, and find the way off of New Wirral in this amazing adventure!

Spoilers below the cut!!

So I had a plan to write this review before I even finished the game. It was just that good. But! I managed to hold off until I at least finished the main game. Next goal: 100% and DLC! And also buying the OST when I have the chance.

Now, I'm not putting this off until the middle of the review: every musical track in this game is a certified banger. I absolutely loved the music of the game. As one person put it (while I was looking for the OST), I just didn't get tired of the music. And that's a pretty big win for a game where you have so, so many encounters and only a handful of tracks to play.

The way they implement the music is also impressive because it's narratively important. The lyrics work their way in when a fusion happens and during big story battles. The town theme's music plays when you're indoors. Plus the lyrics just feel right with its tones and atmosphere. Also the difference between the few main battle themes is just enough for one to feel more tense/exciting than the others. Just an overall great thing they have going on with the audio.

Okay with that out of the way!

Cassette Beasts is a solid game, actually pretty high tier.

Mechanically, I've seen people compare it to Pokemon. I feel like it's like a mix of Pokemon and Persona. You can record the monsters, remaster (evolve) them at five stars, with some having having special evolution requirements. Monsters can show up as bootlegs, where they're a type other than its base type, which is just like shiny hunting but more (cause there's like 12 types). And I've already killed a plastic bootleg by accident...

The moves (stickers) are mix and match, mostly according to typing. I'm pretty into it cause I love giving my party members all sorts of type coverage. I haven't particularly gone into finding weird strategies yet other than AP Refund, but I can see some cool ones thanks to needing to battle all 12 Ranger Captains.

And then you can fuse! Which I thought was interesting, and it adds an ace to go to when you're in a pinch. But you fusing means that wild monsters (and other rangers) can fuse too. Those provide some fun challenges and opportunities to find bootlegs, plus progression in post-game.

Did I mention that this game is also like a Metroidvania? Capturing certain monsters gives up to 6 overworld movement abilities and I think that's pretty neat. All of them have their uses and none of them are niche, which is a win.

The story was pretty interesting! Dropping in onto a mysterious island and trying to find a way back home is nice and simple and all the detail added around it make it engaging. The Archangels are wildly uncomfortable which I didn't expect and I loved it. Despite loving it, it still did come out of nowhere but greatly forgiven because it was right at the start (and not some random turn in the middle).

The pacing was a bit off for me though because I got like 5 out of 8 song pieces before I even defeated 4 captains or even met all the partner characters. I also don't know how relationship progress works other than fight things and rest. Thinking about it now, there's probably a reason why there a speedrun timer in that you don't have to play through all the content (8/9 archangels, no captains?), I guess.

I liked the references to all sorts of topics throughout the story and I think it's pretty interesting for the characters to be from different timelines. It makes it easy to explain weird inconsistencies.

Funny thing I did by accident for end game's story: I switched out Meredith's Regensea with an Aeroboros cause I wanted her starter in my party. And boy did that choice bite back later lol.

Graphics are also solid. The 3D world with 2D sprites reminds me of Octopath Traveller. I appreciate the non-pixel portrait art for the characters, but I would've liked it either way. The designs of the monsters and the characters are all great! Honestly, I should take some notes from them since even if there's 15+ characters, they still all have very specific designs and personalities to match.

The detail in the world is great too, like the light reflecting off the puddle or the fog that rolls in and the rain. So like weather in general.

Also, as a note just for me, I liked the fonts and font effects that they used. Very cool.

Cassette Beasts is a quality creature-collecting game! If you need another Pokemon/Digimon/Persona, here's a game for you. Or if you just want a cool turn-based RPG with cool music, that's cool too.

As always,

Enjoy gaming!

[zalrb]

I Took My Mom to See Gladiator II so, she took me to see Wicked. My Review:

OK. I'll start with the obvious: epic way to end Part I. They closed out on a complete banger. Cynthia was phenomenal, her rendition of "Defying Gravity" was stunning (I say this like I'm an expert when I saw the musical once years ago). I had chills. I can totally understand how and why some people ended up crying/teary-eyed. The direction, the cinematography, it all worked together for a flawless ending. That was 10/10, no notes.

Elphaba and Glinda's dance was also very touching, and was the second most emotionally resonant part of the movie for me (no, I didn't record the movie, it's just already on streaming sites with relatively not-too-shitty quality and horrible subtitles)

(honestly, subtext was basically text)

Now, if those two sequences + Popular were the entire movie then I would be like, it was brilliant as a whole. As it is, they're not. So, I left the theatre being like, those were three really great moments in an otherwise pretty standard movie that, for me, teetered on being boring, but that is to be expected when, for the most part, I'm not a person who likes musicals onscreen (I kind of ended up chuckling to myself during "The Wizard and I" because I was like, you sang all of that, ran around and now look, you're in a field how far outside of Shiz, and you have to run back to school, Elphaba).

But, I know, I know, it needed to be epic! Larger than life! We need to see the scope and scale of what she was feeling! I get it.

An anon said Wicked was like Barbie but stuck the landing better when it came to the messaging. I can see that. Was the messaging easily digestible? Yes. Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily. With everything that's going on in, you know, society, and Elphaba also being played by a Black actress, I can understand why the movie would strike a chord with people. Elphaba, who genuinely wants to enact change and Glinda, who, well...

It's timely.

Writing-wise, I still struggled with her as a character, though.

In my opinion, Glinda is the more dynamically written character, while Elphaba carries the emotional weight --- which honestly, I think is more a testament to Cynthia than the writing. Obviously, we get interiority with Elphaba through her songs, but "Defying Gravity", as much as Cynthia really made us feel what Elphaba would be feeling in that moment, it illuminated, why for me, it felt like writing-wise, Elphaba got lost in her own movie.

Something has changed within me Something is not the same

Like yes, technically, there is a shift and a change. We see that emotionally, like with these lyrics:

And if I'm flying solo At least I'm flying free

Because, we see at the party, when she's "flying solo", how alone she feels and how sad that makes her

compared to the end where she's celebratory about being on her own side

However, do I feel like we actually see in the writing how she got from Point A to Point B? Mmm, I don't know.

At the beginning, "The Wizard and I" is about her personal stakes, it's about wanting to be loved, wanting to fit in and then when she reaches the Emerald City for her heart's desire to be granted, it's not about her personal stakes, it's about the greater good i.e. the animals because she learns of their subjugation.

And yes, in the beginning of the movie, when Madame Morrible is encouraging of her power and says it's a pathway to The Wizard, it's the first time she's felt like her power can be a source of hope and good, only to realize at the end of the movie, that the wizard wants to instrumentalize this power to further the oppression of animals, which is a heartbreaking realization; believing that a system is there to help only to realize it's corrupt and then choosing to stand against the corruption is an arc, I get that, but this all feels thematic and conceptual, and ironically, Elphaba feels like a tool for the message rather than a character, and I think it's because she's written as pretty passive and fairly consistent.

I'm through with playing by the rules of someone else's game

Like I don't think we ever see her play by the rules of someone else's game?

The only thing I can think of is when Morrible tells her to harness her emotion so it can translate to power and the end she chooses to unleash her emotion because it's the source of her power; that doesn't really work for me though because harnessing something isn't the same thing as suppressing it, it's making use of it.

With the exception of her unwittingly creating the flying monkeys when she's already in the Emerald City, it's not as if she's learning that what she's been taught at Shiz has been used, from Day One, to further the wizard's agenda and she had an inkling that something was off but didn't quite question it because she's finally being accepted only to learn why everything felt off and choosing to stand against it.

Maybe it's because when Dr. Dillamond is arrested and she asks if they're going to be silent and when she's told to sit down, she does, but again, once she sits down, she isn't silent,

and then her powers put everyone to sleep and she helps Fiyero free the lion cub.

And I'm not saying that Elphaba should've done all of the things I mentioned above, I'm just not really sure what the shift in perspective is meant to be. No one thought that when she learns the truth in the Emerald City that she would waver even for a second because she never has wavered her

Too long I've been afraid of Losing love I guess I've lost Well, if that's love, it comes at much too high a cost

OK, and the thing with this, is we see that Elphaba is put upon; we see her father berate her, we see her classmates scorn her, we see her sister shun her, and we see that she's unhappy but it's not like we see an active desperation to be liked or loved --- Glinda wants to be a sorceress and she stalks Morrible, she sees Elphaba hold her textbooks, which prompts jealousy. With Elphaba, for these lyrics to be in a song that indicates a significant shift in perspective for her, I'm still unclear on what the shift is, what point A was to get to point B. Is it that she allowed her father to mistreat her for so long in an effort to entreat the possibility of his love and now she is no longer afraid of being unloved? That doesn't quite work for me because that's still quite passive (it would work better in a book and this kind of made me want to read the book, which I've heard is quite different from the musical). Like, when she dances alone, it's through a conversation between Fiyero and Glinda that we get Elphaba's interiority i.e. "She doesn't care what anyone else thinks." "Of course she does, she's just pretends not to" (paraphrasing) whereas Glinda is active.

She is also fairly consistent but there are various points throughout the movie where she is presented with a crossroads, whether big or small; she could knowingly humiliate Elphaba with the hat or she could let it go,

she chooses to humiliate her;

she could let Elphaba weather the humiliation alone or she can stand beside her,

she chooses to befriend her -- that feels like the beginning of change;

she is friends with Elphaba, vowing to make her popular, which feels like a genuine albeit misguided attempt to be a friend, going down the path she started at the party:

and then, when alone --- "But just not quite as popular as me", so that complicates the growth we think we saw in her.

She could let Elphaba have her moment when the wizard invites her to the city, she kind of does, but when Elphaba invites her to join, we aren't sure how genuine her support is but it is genuine support!

Until it really matters.

Because she could choose to help fight the system with Elphaba or uphold the system with the wizard, she chooses the latter.

She is a character who is presented with various moral dilemmas and makes a series of choices, which then makes her active, and that makes her feel like she's written as a lead character and not simply as a central main idea or theme.

I don't know if I'm making sense and I'm sure anons will let me know, so I'll move on.

Besides "Defying Gravity", my favourite Cynthia moment is definitely her crying at the dance, she exuded such emotion during that scene. Outside of those two moments, I'm not going to lie, I wasn't particularly moved because it just felt like this face

all the time? That isn't to suggest that Cynthia didn't communicate emotion throughout the movie. As I said, she breathed life into the writing, but I think I expected more because I know she can do more and in the scenes mentioned she does do more. And the response could be that Elphaba plays things close to her chest and she has few moments of genuine expression, which is also why "Defying Gravity" is pivotal because, as Cynthia says, she gets bigger and bigger and comes more and more into her own, but rather than feeling as though Elphaba was playing things close to her chest and suppressing her emotions, it kind of just felt pouty.

I think Ariana was competent. I didn't think she was bad but I didn't think she was great either, she was believable, she did her job. I think my favourite comedic moment of hers is when she dramatically collapses onto the bed.

It was cool seeing Kristin Chenoweth and Idina Menzel do their cameos.

My favourite character was Pfannee.

Fiyero was funny to me because he literally did not need to be there since his romantic entanglements with Glinda and Elphaba seem perfunctory and almost shoehorned in, because I found that the movie put more weight in the romantic subtext between Glinda and Elphaba. It is funny that as of late, Jonathan Bailey finds himself in a love triangle in which he is obnoxiously terrible at concealing his true feelings.

That's all for my review, of course I am open to discussions and to answering questions any of you may have :)

[emo-hermit]

Emo RD Rambles 3: Patient Playlist

Welcome back to Emo Cannot Write For Shit So You All Get His Rambles. With an additional thing at the end winkwink. This is really really long so let's get cracking.

Today's concept: Ian and Ada approach the idea of creating a Patient Radio - a playlist made of the long term patient's favourites songs to 'maximise comfort'.

As a beta for the Radio, they leave a sheet of paper in the connecting hallway for patients to list suggestions of their preferred music, around three or four songs maximum. Some already have ideas in mind, while others struggle.

This is just a silly idea I had when wondering what type of music the main RD cast listens to; excluding the songs they're actually involved in. This also created some funny writing prompts that I may use for a small comedic anthology. For example:

Hailey is the first person to write anything down: and she's pretty basic (sorry). Her style is very mainstream, involving those pop songs you'd hear on the radio. From there, a few folks follow, with varying genres and tastes. The next day, however, more folks have added some ideas, including Logan. You can tell Logan has visited - because there is now a messy heart drawn next to Hailey's suggestions.

Also, Logan suggests similar stuff to Hailey, with the addition of maybe an anime opening or two.

Cole... suggests his own music. For the sake of both his ego, and the declining state of the patients, he's given a stern 'no'. Of course, it's Cole, so he angrily scribbles out his suggestions and leaves the paper be. He's surprised when 'Unreachable' comes on via the Patient Radio - and, sure enough, someone's written it down past his scribbling. More specifically, Samurai. He even signed it! (By that, I mean the writing is just "Unreachable- Cole Brew (SAMURAI)". All of Samurai's suggestions are signed this way.)

Insomniac writes down only one suggestion: a traditional Japanese folk song (or 'hōgaku'). This would be fine - if he wrote the song's title in Romaji. Instead, the song is written in pure, specific kanji characters.

Ada returns to Ian come the night with a new version of the paper: "Hey, so, uh- I got the paper back today and there's some new stuff from the swordsmen. Any idea what this is?" Ian turns, "Hah?" before seeing the kanji. There's a slight pause before he just casually goes, "Oh! This is (insert Japanese title here)! That's easy, I'll type it up." Ada learns that Ian learnt how to read kanji entirely just for the songs he listens to that are in Japanese.

Oh yeah: the moment this song plays on the radio, the Insomniac falls asleep. Hell, he sleeps like a baby. Unfortunately, they can't play it on loop, but now they know he appreciates a lil' lullaby.

Speaking of Ian and Ada, they decide to add some of their own songs to the mix (Ian mostly - he felt it was a little unfair that the patients get to listen to banger tunes). Ian adds quite a variety, but we cannot ignore the fact he adds maybe one or two vocaloid songs.

Ada, unfortunately, is a little embarrassed of her status as a former theatre kid, still musical lover. She, instead, uses a few common songs from the radio to add to the list. Ian convinces her, after a little while, to add a really popular song from her favourite musical. I do not know what musical this is.

There's a surprising amount of patients that add jazz to the radio, or at least music from the 1950 to 1980's era. For one, the Stevensons' accidentally add the same song to the list twice, given Mr. Stevenson can't read his wife's handwriting that well anymore (I'll elaborate on why later). This also just so happens to be a song that played in their wedding. They have a ball dancing to it.

Additionally, the Miner also includes a bit of Rock 'n' Roll or otherwise jazz into his suggestions. They're very old for the 30-something nut, but it adds up. He also, thanks to Cole, includes a little chiptune.

Hugh somehow adds the tutorial theme. You know, the tutorial song from Rhythm Doctor. Nobody recognises the title, or the artist, but everyone in the ward has a mutual moment of "I swear I've heard this before". Hugh doesn't comment.

There's a slight cultural shift once Insomniac includes his traditional tune. It's not the only Non-English hit, and Ian/Logan do add a couple of Japanese songs to the pile.

In Nicole's case, she ends up not sure what to suggest, but still wanting to take part. So, she ends up adding a Chinese pop song, quote: "I don't know any Chinese myself, but my mom would put this on a lot, and I didn't have anything else that'd be good for a hospital radio."

Lucky adds two jazz, and a rock song to the radio. The biggest issue is that he originally aimed to add a Spanish song from his childhood, but got caught in his own head, scribbling it out halfway. The good thing? Miner is able to read bits and pieces, writing what he could make out - angering Lucky into writing the full title. He jumps when it plays on the radio days later.

I believe that's everything I had listed. Thanks to RDL for allowing me to compile all of my thoughts before adding them here, as these are now far more conjoined.

Oh, right! The bonus thing! Considering the song suggestions were taken on a piece of lined paper, I thought it would be fun to visualise what I believe the main casts' handwriting would look like:

If you have any thoughts/additions you want to make, you have full reign to send me asks/reblog this with whatever you like. Have a good one, lads - EMO

[atticcreationz]

💙🍀🥳

💙 favorite character from tgwdlm and why?

God I love Bill. He's so sweet and kind and dear god my man is trying so hard to be there for his daughter. Or maybe I just relate to him because I too would find it hard to threaten someone convincingly and would be drinking Shirley Temples in a bunker scenario lol. Bummer that due to the nature of the story (singing = danger/bad guys) we don't get to hear Corey sing as Bill coz I looooove his voice but man his performance is so warm. And his story breaks my heart, whenever I see fanart of him and Alice I just 😭 Runner up character, Charlotte, because Jaime Lyn's character voice and performance cracks me up 😂

🍀 favorite song?

Mmmmmm ok so High School Is Killing Me has some recency bias but god I still feel the same amount of hype when I hear that modulation into the final chorus as I did the very first time I heard it, the whole song is just impeccable (yes including twenty wern). But it ties for first with Show Stopping Number. We all remember where we were the first time Hidgens sat down at the keyboard. When I show friends this musical (why do I say friends plural when you dearie and my partner are the only ones I've watched TGWDLM with 😂) I absolutely REVEL in waiting for the moment this song starts because I know the journey they're about to go on ahahahaha. Sometimes when I'm absentmindedly singing to myself when I'm doing chores or in the shower, I will realise that I've been humming show stopping number (Pokotho would get my ass so fast)

🥳 least favorite song?

Off the top of the dome, gut instinct, I'll say Tied Up My Heart. Funny character moment, but I don't vibe with the music itself at all for whatever reason, it feels almost like it goes on a little too long for me, and I always skip it. Besides, it's followed up by the absolute banger Join Us And Die, so unfortunately it never stood a chance.

the ask game for anyone who wants to play it too!

[astralartefact]

Placeholder Name for Atarase's Media Diary

Entry 005 - Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door Remake

<<Prev: Unicorn Overlord

Synopsis

The Only Plumber I know is made to visit Fantasy America to collect yet another set of mystical stars - and we gladly do it all over again.

How much did I know before playing?

I played the Original and I liked it very, very, very, very, very, very much. One of my favorite games ever.

Did I like it more than I expected?

It was everything I hoped for <3

If you say you like Turn-Based RPGs and own a Switch you owe it to yourself to play the Classic.

Since I liked it, here's what I hated about it

I would be hard pressed to find anything really.

I guess they could have added more things (the Luigi fight we all crave and the rest of the Paper Mario 1 cameos that were even hinted at in the game files of the original) - but I think what they added is good enough. They added Super Bosses, they added non-intrusive QoL - I don't need them to change the face of the game, I like the OG for a reason.

(and also a thought I had was - I don't know how many writers from the OG Games (both PM1 and TTYD) worked on the Remake and if there isn't much overlap I could see the Remake Devs feeling weird about putting those fanservicey kind of things in on their own)

Also the Thinking Music is punishing don't stop the banger while I'm over here being stupid navigating the UI q_q

What did this game make me think about?

Similar to what I said in my Entry on Unicorn Overlord, I kept thinking that this game - at least in this day and age - isn't even all that groundbreaking - it just does the thing you're supposed to do, the normal Turnbased RPG Overworld-to-Dungeon-to-Boss Loop really really well and it's kind of weird that people don't do it more often.

I guess Thematic Takes on RPG Staples aren't interesting enough for the Unique Selling Point Crowd anymore :/

Specific Impressions that will stick with me

the soundtrack

The Excess Express was the Progenitor of my love for Train Levels.

Specifically for this Remake - How having Vivian's Trans Moment* makes Mario's actions more heartwarming.

*look forward to hearing about this in the ramble section

Outstanding Audio

Very non-exhaustive List because Goddamn. This Soundtrack.

vs. Shadow Sirens

vs. Atomic Boo

Moon Battle

vs. Magnus Von Grapple 2.0

There is one single "bad" thing I have to say about the Soundtrack and it is... that I think Origami King's OST is still unbeaten as my favorite. The banger ratio of that game is simply unbeatable.

All the Partner Themes they're all so good and they're used like twice each

Edit: ___the bonetail theme, goodness___

Besides that they did exactly what I wanted them to do. The Paper Mario Sound Team is just amazing, they do not get enough credit. I'm so excited to see what's next - whatever it is the entire team decides and/or gets to do.

btw there's nothing quite as irritating to me than people complaining about remake soundtracks, even in the off chance that i agree with the sentiment its always voiced in the most condescending tone possible and it drives me up the walls. and sure, ppl can voice 'valuable criticisms' and disappointments or whatever, but i also can read them and be baffled why you thought you needed to share it sounding like you're the only person on earth who understood the original, especially when - like it is in this case - the remake sound team is the same as the original, they literally made the thing you like so much and you thank it by calling them names for daring to 'not get' one specific second in their own work as much as you do.

especially now that we don't really have technical sound quality to improve on there's always going to be changes you like more and less because any remaining difference is closer and closer to a lateral move and the only 'value' difference is subjective opinion. and regardless, the original keeps existing, you hear the new soundtrack in context for a playthrough at most, afterwards you can just listen to the og again.

Favorite Character

Toadette. My All Time Fave, she steals the show everywhere she goes <3

Also Mini-Yoshi, Vivian, the Rich Bob-Ombs, Kammy Koopa,...

Favorite Arc/Story Line

The Excess Express, I know it's relatively short but I just really love Train Levels

Also Glitz Pit, I guess I just like when the Dungeon is the RPG Chapter Location.

Favorite Set Piece

The Remake is so beautiful I could really put anything in here.

Honestly I love all of the Chapter 6 locations, the train in the different atmospheric lightings, the Sunset train stop, Poshley Heights,... (Bad Glimmerich in german, one of the reasons I will allow Fluffy)

Favorite Scene

The Excess Express being covered in the Smorgs (is that the name, they're called Fluffys in german which is kind of lame but I will allow it)

Best Performance

I'm leaving this in here because they didn't replace Charles Martinet for this one and they got me too often with random Luigi Dialogue sounds there's a really good one where they talk about luigi and when they show his picture he echo-ey goes 'wahoo!'

Also the new voice sounds they gave all the characters were too cute, some of them sounded really really nice.

German Localization Notes

I can happily confirm that Barbara is Trans in German too! I can't tell you with certainty how the situation was with the original but I'm pretty sure it was also removed there.

Honestly the German Localization for this Game is and was so good, you people have no idea. I don't know how similar the text between the two is (I haven't played the OG in years) but they kept all the names from the old Localization - which I was a little bit worried about since the german names are so wildly weird (in a good way) I could have seen them go back and 're-align' some of them.

The OG Localization didn't give that much of a damn about keeping in line with the source material when it comes to Character and Location Names, but also they got the Vibe so well they honestly did a better job at it in certain places.

For every weird thing like calling Petal Meadows Fire Valley (which makes more sense when coming from the japanese name but still mischaracterizes the 1-1 world of this game in a way that's honestly fascinating to think about) and boring names like Fluffy we have things like calling "The Great Gonzales" Bomba Luigi, a change I will defend with my life, that's such a funny name, it even makes that Bowser Scene with Rawk Hawk funnier when Bowser is perplexed who the fuck Bomba Luigi is supposed to be. (mini yoshi calls you bomba throughout the game and nobody remarks on you being called like your brother - not even luigi himself, which makes it funnier)

Also the Grandma Bubu (Puni) yells the phrase "Soll ich mir in der Kälte hier Gicht holen!?" (do you want me to get gout in this cold) at the Boy Bubu and that's just. I'm still laughing about it. I hope you have a similarly fun-to-shout sentence in its place.

Ugh, I love it. I know if I looked it up people would complain about how much they 'changed'.

--- ENTERING THE PRETENTIOUS SECTION OF THIS ENTRY ---

What about this game gives me Hope for the future of gaming?

I just want this game to be a sign to let future Paper Marios break the character design regulations again. (if you didn't know, these are an actual thing and are why post ttyd has either fully unique looking npc or entirely non-unique npcs, it's for brand integrity reasons so new characters aren't confused as 'official' and like all brand integrity stuff it sucks the fun out of everything)

I'm even one of the four people in favor of letting them do whatever they want with the gameplay if they don't want to do Standard Turn-based RPGs anymore - by which I mean to say I was fine with Sticker Star - but the texture that only PM and TTYD have, the Texture we all want and crave so much, comes squarely from the unique Toads and Goombas and Koopas and Bob-Ombs..., all the ones they're not allowed to do anymore because the Brand Integrity Manager says no.

(okay so to put this a little more thought out: specifically the unique npcs make the paper mario style less about 'haha paper pun' (which, as funny as they might be once in a blue moon, not a single person cares about) and more an abstracted story book-esque depiction of the mario universe. it makes the entire thing work better by just being 'real but less detailed' - which also makes the plot work better with fewer details - instead of... well, a paper(thin) joke.)

What about this game makes me scared for the future of gaming?

The Unique Selling Point will be the end of me.

Ever since Dexit (yes i'm specifically blaming that hot mess) awakened the worst type of Gamer to the fact that complaining about Problems caused by Capitalism means nobody can disagree with you, Nobody gets to have fun anymore. Not gamers, Not devs, Not anybody.

Everything has to have Value now, everything has to have a reason to exist, a unique take and always also a quantifyable improvement on what came before. If it isn't as good as 'it should be' it's an insult to the people paying money for this! You need to fix this, I paid for this! I know what's good and need to share my intellectual opinion on this minor detail that you clearly don't have any idea about! What in god's good earth are you smoking that you thought this was acceptable?

It comes with this "Customer can do no wrong" mindset (which is often enough wrong btw, you're very much responsible for your own goddamn actions) and it always belittles the thoughts and decisions of the developers who more than likely have to fight higher-ups for those to actually end up in the video games they produce.

Sticker Star really is a good example of that, aside from the Brand Integrity stuff that made us lose unique NPCs the other thing people endlessly complain about is that the Sticker System disencourages Battles which i'm pretty sure they just heard someone smart say once and that therefore the system sucks, who could ever have thought of pivoting to something that stupid???

Well, it's actually a really creative idea on a very foundational RPG problem: Turnbased RPG Battles and the Overworld are for the most part distinctly seperated from each other. For a standard TRPG what you do in the Overworld has fuck all to do with your battles. This is an attempt to make Overworld Exploration a meaningful part in the Battle Gameplay Loop. It has its downsides and it didn't work out perfectly, but I think it was an interesting idea to put to the test!

But I guess that's not allowed. The Devs simply were too stupid to realize you would just end up doing a lot of backtracking to get good Stickers. They just simply don't know what they're doing and we have to make that clear to them by lambasting the game whenever it comes up. (and also to prove to everybody that you have very smart opinions)

There's a thing I learned in school and you might have heard that too before: You shouldn't tell people negative feedback (first). And that might sound like "a nice thing" to do, you "shouldn't hurt anybody's feelings" after all, but here's the thing why I think we should do that: Most of the time People already know what they did wrong, but they don't know what they did right - what they can capitalize on.

Maybe keep that in mind the next time you share your "Valuable Criticism" underneath an official Instagram post (btw who in their right mind does that)

The Ramble Section where I get to actually talk about what I thought about

Let's talk about 'Nintendo adds Transphobia.' I know it's just a meme. Still don't like it :) I liked that they added the Transphobia! I just don't like the meme.

It's like bnuuy. I don't get the joke. It's not fun to pronounce. If the joke is that u and n are upside down, then you could also type pnuuh, that's the entire word upside down. Why are you all finding this so funny. I just don't get it. And just for the record, it's fine you find it funny. I hope you feel validated that I'm okay with your choice of meme. I just don't get it.

But with 'Nintendo adds Transphobia' there is this undertone of "What they did is good" (that's the happy reaction gif in the background) - but the thing they added, the Transphobia, is some amount of bad, or else it wouldn't be funny to be happy about it. We would prefer if you added the Trans Character without including Transphobia after all. But would we? Would that be "better" - whatever that would even mean?

And just to get it out of the way, yes, for a lot of people it's probably haha just a joke about how it sounds funny to be happy about adding transphobia - but then i still don't know what you people think you're doing when spreading a haphazard joke about 'nintendo does a transphobia' in a day and age where nobody checks any of the news they receive when nintendo is literally doing the thing they are supposed to be doing, like come on guys i do have the moral high ground here and i am firing shots

Fully aware that I'm taking this too seriously - If this is what's resting at the heart of some these jokes then I would guess this comes from the "It shouldn't be a huge/integral part of their character!"-BS that people (on both sides) have been peddling for years (because assholes really want that and well-intentioned people rightfully don't want to be fetishized) - but regardless of what you're using that sentiment for, clearly it's not that easy. Like, it should matter to the character or else it might as well be a JK JKRO "Dumbledore is Gay" Tweet and never be talked about again.

It's not like Beldam bullies Vivian just because she is Trans, Beldam bullies everybody, she almost bullies Doopliss more than her. It's just that 'her bullying feels meaner ever since she realized she was a sister, not a brother.' You know, exactly what they state in game and exactly like somebody would probably feel about it even if Beldam's Transphobia didn't play any part in the bullying at all, Feelings don't really care about Facts after all and it creates another dimension to Vivian, a tangible relationship between her and her bullying.

Sure, everything about her story would work without her 'being trans' - but a little change like that goes a long way to color all of her interactions. Even just the simple fact that Mario is nice to her hits a little different knowing that her sister treats her differently since she lives as a woman.

But that's all kind of besides the point because while they wrote a Trans Character facing a struggle that hopefully people will at least feel a little represented by - that's not the only thing they did. They put a Canonically, Directly Stated Trans Character right next to the best plumber you know. And that's kind of the thing that annoys me the most about "They Added Transphobia." Like guys. She's a main character. She's not some weird side quest character that appears one time, doesn't even have a name and says a weird line about it before disappearing forever like that one quest people bring up to say FF14 has Gay Representation. You Can Have a Fully Canonically Trans Woman on Screen for 50% of this Game, Right Next to The Mario Man, And He's Like "You Rock Girl. Love Wins." He doesn't even wince when she implies she has a crush on him.

This is a much bigger deal than some of you make it out to be! This is a serious occassion and you made the social blunder to show up wearing "They added Transphobia"!

And for the people that missed it: Origami King also had a Trans-affirming Birdo Moment where they used her for a Secret Drag Show at the Coffee House at the Rainbow Spring. The Paper Mario Writers know what they're doing with Mario's Image and even Nintendo's Brand Identity Manager can't stop them. You look foolish and don't know who you're talking to. These people made Mario canonically visit a gay bar hiding as a coffee shop. Fix your wig.

[idontwanttospoiltheparty]

“but my Hot Take is it totally was worthy of Album of the Year BEFORE John got killed.” Yes! As far as the songs are concerned it does kind of feel like an incomplete play because how do you go from I’m Moving On to Yes I’m Your Angel?? (I started out ironically liking this one now tralalala is the default ringtone in my brain). How would you rate the songs? :)

Just listened to the whole thing again to give a better answer. Fun birthday morning activity before I go brunching B)))))

(Just Like) Starting Over: Gorgeous. Fun. Beautiful. Immediately became one of my top John songs. The chords on this are gorgeous; masterful use of an augmented. Also the "but when I see you, darling" melody is perfect. This song just makes me incredibly happy. Also the bass is good :) 10/10

Kiss Kiss Kiss: I LOOOOOVE how much this messes with the previous vibe. It works so well. The opening guitars are v cool. Yoko's side 1 sound is so varied and does such cool blending of genres. Like there's a ska thing going on here? I am also lowkey um. kind of into her noises. 9/10

Cleanup-Time: this is definitely a silly-goofy song but it is suuuuuuuch a banger. I love the moments of high tension. "Now it begins" and the "well, well, well." bits. It adds a darkness to the song. The horn section went offffff. 9/10

Give Me Something: Absolutely Insane. the best use of Yoko's vocals and style imaginable. The production is immaculate. 10/10

I'm Losing You: Absolutely Insane Pt. II. The bridge bit "Now in the valley of indecision" is sooooo devastating (+ it's an obscure biblical reference! literary beatle At It Again). This song builds so well, I love how genuinely upset he sounds towards the end, breaking down on "Don't wanna hear about it!!!!" and generally how his voice gets nasty at certain moments. The song feels like slowly and extremely painfully discovering irreconcilable differences. The guitars in each verses breakdown moment sound like alarm bells. It's an immaculate breakup-or-almost song. The sound is so good, the harmonies are great. The guitar solo is crazy!!!!!! (it actually reminds me of George's work on How Do You Sleep? but without the cringe!!) THE PRODUCTION IS CRAZY OKAY?????? 10/10

I'm Moving On: the most insane follow-up to the previous song. He laid his deepest fears bear and she said "And What Of It???" The lyric "When you were angry you had love in your voice" keeps me up at night. But BANGER of a bassline and funky fresh nonetheless. Most effective song transition on the album and most of them are good to great! 9.5/10

Beautiful Boy: Absolute devastation aside, I must confess I find this song a little more boring musically. Though I do appreciate the adventurousness of the vocoder and the bridge is gorgeous. The outro is nice and really relaxing. 7/10

Watching The Wheels: I love John Lennon and I want him to be okay :( also the way the song slows down at the end of the chorus is soooooooo much to me. Like it hurts my heart. I like his talk-singing here, it really works for the vibe. The lyrics are kind of depressing despite the fact they're on the surface positive. But I think the question of what constitutes a happy life is interesting and deep at its core. 8/10

Yes, I'm Your Angel: I love that John is sharing an album with a granny song again. Nature is healing. I vibe with this and it suits Yoko surprisingly well. Tralala, as you say. But it's insane of Yoko to call John her fairy. Girl. STOP. 7/10

Woman: It's distinctly more boring than anything else John wrote for this album but I do enjoy it and find it sweet for the most part (aside from the horrors). The production reminds me a lot of Here, There and Everywhere. 6/10

Beautiful Boys: this is the least good one. It is just musically pretty uninteresting and the lyrics are kind of clunky. But the intro and instrumental bits sound cool tbh and I like how the production builds. "You've got all you can carry / And still feel somehow empty." OKAY???? 5/10

Dear Yoko: cute!! The sounds are very fun. "Even when I watch TV / There's a hole where you're supposed to be / There's no body lying next to me" is soooooooo much. I like the silly voice he puts on and I LOOOOVE the spoken bit at the end :((( 7/10

Every Man Has A Woman Who Loves Her: The production is good I just wish the song itself was better and it's too long. I like John providing backing vocals because it makes sense given the content. I feel like if this was just FASTER it would be great. The solo reminds me of ABBA. 6/10

Hard Times Are Over: I like this song!! It's sweet. The melodies are good, very cool playing between minor and major. I also like how the "over" ties back in with Starting Over. It works well as an album closer. Though Of Course, one begins to wonder what these hard times were exactly when the album cut off mid-conflict. Makes You Think. (This album gives me brainrot!!!!) Anyway I like Yoko's vocal here a lot and I like John joining on the refrains in the background :) 7.5/10

In conclusion: Double Fantasy good

[schmeap]

do people on this website post tierlists for fun idk does anyone care about my opinions on pokemon and miku probably not but I'm finally giving into the urge to be really annoying about music (not a music analyst) (doesn't know how to identify a lemotif) (Was in High School Marching Band)

Anyway gonna be real fuckin annoying about this one its called i talk about rankings that are mostly personal bias

Let's just go in release order lol

Songs linked in their "titles" (video embed limit is. less than 18)

DECO*27's Volt Tackle

ok so i have a confession. when this song came out, I knew it was going to end up pretty low on the list lol

Deconina (i can't. type that every time guys) is one of my favorite producers and almost every song he makes I nod my head at and go "yeah. that's a banger." But. BUT. He's started mixing his harder rock styles with his poppier hip hop styles and it comes to a head in this song. The bridge is really really distracting lol, feels like a different song and tone entirely from the kind of intense, battle like ferocity of the main part to a cutesy pop chant... It has a purpose, I'm sure, but there's something too dissonant about it for me to like.

The like, rest of the song is Deconina at his Deconina-est, I love the cute take on love (as he always does) with a pokemon flavoring... The visuals are also quite cute and fitting. It's really solid, but that one point holds it back from Funky Fresh, which is my baseline Very Solid.

Electrical Forecast by inabakumori

The second song, by a producer I don't follow nearly as closely as Deco. Uhh I did listen to lagtrain as homework before this and yes it bangs. It's always nice to see people using people other than Miku and Kaai Yuki actually has a real solid appeal to me.

This is a song that slaps. It bangs, even. I don't know enough about inabakumori to comment on its relevance to their personal stylings or themes but we were still in the romance period with pokemon puns and tie ins so I was already tempted to put it higher in the list. In actuality, every song does an excellent jobs integrating game sounds and puns so no extra points are available for that stuff lol

Taking the idea of catching pokemon is always dangerous, I think, because pokemon fans aren't really here to catch things, we're mostly interested in battles and the journey with our faves, not completing the pokedex (because it's hard, and kind of chore) at least, to me. This song feels like a journey through the tall grass, scouring the lands to find pokemon... I just like the inabakumori style man. It gets points for getting on the playlist, but not really speaking to me.

Mitchie M's What Kind of Future

Silly songs.......... my weakness and Mitchie M's strength oh no.........

Yeah Mitchie M really plays to his strengths, using cute visuals and nonstop puns to ooze a charm you can only get from haplessly indulging in the most whimsical of vibes. It was also quite surprising how well their TL team did with all the puns given some of them barely work lol.

"I love them all" is the type of pokemon fan I am, so that might also help explain why two of those songs are up so high...

Pinocchio-P Kills You with The Pokemon Inside My Heart

yeah i cried what're *you* gonna do about it huh

Im a pinocchio-p fan. I don't always like everything he puts out, but when he really hits its insane how hard he does.

1) i fucking love his little pinomikus... having them all in a costume is so fucking cute they're little slit eyed freaks and by far my favorite trademark a producer's ever had lol My favorite. is lapras...

2) This isn't the first song to fuck me up by him lol 2:30 Life Remaining also damaging as hell, so it wasn't surprising to see him go for a quieter angle but man when its something you grew up with, a nostalgia you could relate to, an experience you lived, its way worse. It's such a soft song, with an upbeat backbone, I've no idea how he got the music to scream "nostalgia" so hard but the reverberating "aah"s are so cool too...

Anyway this song would be the best song if I weren't horrendously biased. It should honestly be up their with the top two but it was funnier to keep it in the crying tier.

Battle! by cosMo@Bousou-P

I honestly did not like this song all that much when it first came out, but that was almost certainly because it was right after Pinochhio-P's lol

The high concept of people in the comments talking about some sort of Miku AI champion that was tired of winning got me more into the song now that I'm not directly comparing it to a song that spoke way more to me, there's just something a little unhinged about it in the way that cosMoBousou does well with machine intelligence/the meaning of digital media.

He also plays p well into his strengths with the breakcore fast bpm lol this song screams GO GO GO! I think it makes total sense why he'd go for a battle theme, and I really like the way the pokemon sfx are incorporated into the backing... drums? Unfortunately, I like battle songs not that much, and the lyrics leave a little to be desired because the story's a bit... confusing lol Maybe it's cheap of me to prefer nostalgia baits over whatever strange original story cosMo's thought up but that's how it is.

A little evil with Kasamura Tota's I'll Fly in the Sky with You

Another producer I've not heard of before! No one talked about this song either, in my circles, I actually missed it until I came back for Giga and Jin's. I passed over it on first watch, put it on in the background and said "yeah, that's a nice soft song," thinking nothing of it. Boy was I fucking WRONG

edit (not an edit I'm writing this all in one sitting), I LIED I *have* heard this guys stuff before!! Araki covered one of his songs lol ok I'm getting the sense their skillset is Violently Sad Songs and goddamn are they good at em.

Anyway this song's MV is adorable and uses mudkips status as an adorable fave as a double shot directly to your sadglands as it tells a story of a pokemon that stays the same to continue to fly with its friend. Its fucked up, and a little evil, and totally took me by surprise because I was a fool. Little Guys Deserve Love Too is something you don't always remember as pokemon fan and it takes the implication of evolution seriously its really some pokemon Mystery Dungeon type heartstring pulling that got me good.

Musically I love the quiet backing that really lets the vocals (the story) breathe, its a musical narrative. The back and forth between Luka and Miku is done really well, plus having it based entirely around an existing pokemon song really helps it achieve its heart punching effectiveness.

Also I have a horrible bias toward piano please don't look up at the tierlist and where I placed Marasy

(Hilarious it got a kids rating on youtube btw. Another youtube kids L, probably)

We couldn't draw miku at a fucked up angle this time guys: Giga's Gotchu!

lol yeah they had to sanitize this one's visuals a little bit, probably worked with a different artist than usual... It does show, a bit, in the kind of bouncy visual style Giga's used to being flatter and less 3D than usual. This leaves the music video a little lesser than the others that move... I also don't know if I've ever been a huge fan of Giga's recent animation style.

In terms of actual song: it's good! Giga puts his swing on classic pokemon motifs and it feels very him, with a nice mix of hip hop beat and electrical edge.

But uh, remember how I said before "catching pokemon is the weakest element of pokemon"? That point stands here, especially since the song itself is just simple and peppy. It's stylish as hell but doesn't give me a sense of journey or scouring like inabakumori's.

Sorry, but someone had to be last.

Jin's Secretly Miku the whole time: Juvenile

Trans miku real or whatever

I'd like to say this is the first full on deadass whole animated story. I should be right. Also I don't think I've followed Jin since Kagepro lol (but I did hear Neo, and I did scream really loudly at it!)

dude the eevee is drawn so fucking cute im rhhdghh im not even a huge eevee fan (too mammal) but man when he do the lil paw to cheer up their trainer it got me. I also really like the compassion of the story, the trainers just want to support each other even though they fight... It's like, that's kind of what pokemon is, it's not necessarily about winning, even if Every Voice on the internet Ever (including myself) tells you otherwise. Turns out all you need from a friendly rival to make them better is to lose against them and not let them speak (im joking.......)

I just realized I never looked up the lyrics, actually, but I totally got the emotions through the fantastic MV and the general upswings of the music. It's a bold swing to take a trainer through their whole journey, but both songs that try this hit it justtt right, actually. Building yourself back up after a loss is like, The pokemon story, because turns out you can't win them all. Plus it takes time to focus on the mundanity of the pokemon journey, the stuff you don't really think about in game but is the meat of any fanfic... depicting hanging out w your pokemon is a huge bonus points.

The music combined with the visuals made me cry what can I say, I don't cry easily so it deserves it.

Syudou's I'm a Ghost Type

I honestly don't know a whole lot about Syudou, not to say I don't know who he is, i do, i play pjsekai, but none of his "popular" songs really captured me.

I can mostly say the same for this one lol This is the first one where I have to actually explain the Funky Fresh tier: it means they play well to their strengths but they don't have a whole lot of staying power to me. This is where my pickiness starts kicking in, they just weren't swanky enough to make the cut.

The lyrics and visuals scream joy of ghost types though, I really dig how much energy is in the song... I think it's just personal preference for electric beats that puts the song the highest in Funky Fresh.

BIPPA!! Wonderful Opportunity with Go! Bidoof Group!

Wonder Opp never fails me they got my back every time. I was hoping for something silly happy peppy fun and oh boy did i get it. A feverish dedication to a silly not strong pokemon, a basic rat you can get in any route that the pokemon company loves making fun of, BIPPA!!

All these dumb mfs so relatable to the Len that wants to evolve for utility, to the Rin that loves him as he is, to Miku who thinks all pokemon have their appeals... I've seen some people say WonderOpp's songs border on just speaking over beat, but I don't really see what's wrong with that. The comedic timing is solid (Len getting shot down is so funny) and the setup is inherently funny, a team of bullies that go after Only Bidoof. Team Rocket but Bidoof.

Joy radiates from this song and who doesn't want to hold a pokemon in front of your friends and go "Look!! this is my favorite child!!!" I think that's the real essence of pokemon. Pick your faves and then be really annoying about them. That's why this is the best one.

Huh? Muddled... (Weird title... it's sfx, really) by Kuriyama Yuri

This project got me digging around in new producers libraries, quite fun. In this one I found Jitterbug! I love a good Meiko producer... But I don't particularly like their style, sorry to say.

I do like it though! It's fun, spooky and very stylized! I love the rhythm it gets into and the expressions on the people, even if I'm not entirely sure what's going on besides some good ol fasioned spooks. I think it accomplishes what it sets out to do, which is make a spooky ghost house experience song. Just doesn't appeal to me enough to rank it higher.

Orangestar's Encounter

Look. This is pure bias. But I also think it's good!

I've gone on record (no record. just talking to friends lmao) saying Orangestar's music feels like running alongside a ocean during a sunshower. All their music is kind of same-y but by god does it hit that niche so good for me, using vocaloids to go way above what any human would sound good. In this song the synthwave really elevates it to something I'd recommend a non-Orangestar fan, it really carries you up, gives the song a rising energy... just like Lugia.

Breath is a key of Orangestar's songs, besides being very high, there's a lot of running vocals and held notes, meaning singing them is again, very difficult (if you're trying to copy miku) and I think the breathlessness of the vocals and synth really works with the concept of a legendary encounter. It's always so cool when you finally run into the thing on the box... and in the surrounding media, everyone always oohs and aahs. The lyrics support this, but I'm not very good at reading, so I actually just skim them to make sure they aren't total nonsense lol

Eon Ticket by Marasy

I saw somewhere an author's comment about this song, something to the effect of "I always chased Latios and Latias"... So this is just a song about your faves, just like pokemon should be. It also has Kaito, which is *my* crypton bias.

Uhh I'm always back and forth on Marasy songs, I love him as a pianist, but his compositions don't always speak to me working with the others on em. But? I think this one hits nicely. It's a little toothless still, not as emotionally impactful as those on the top, won't make me scream in excitement but I do think this is one of my favorites in a while.

Kaito and Miku... it's always nice to have duets in this Miku focused project lol. I think the Eon ticket, Latios and Latias in particular was a good pairing for Marasy's flighty fluttering piano trills and runs, they're the kind of pokemon that dash around the skies like the music does. Part of what makes me rank composers higher in these miku songs is whether they play to their strengths or not, because you're already adding the twist of subject matter, and I think this does. I also think the framing device of the newscasters is cute

Party Rock Eternity by Hachioji-P

Ahh Hachioji, another name I know and don't really listen to on purpose... Rad Dogs goes insane though an all time fave (but I say that about half the VBS commissioned songs). Maybe that's why I biased it higher, because it's a style of music I really like. A lot of bias is probably involved in this lol (poison type fan)

I like the perspective of a rocket grunt a lot, leans extremely well into the harder rock of Hachioji's natural lean, but the lyrics don't really tell us much, it doesn't quite lean hard enough into character for me to give it a funky pass... plus I find it's missing a POP that makes it appealing. It's extremely pleasant, but I can't give it a pass.

Iyowa's Journey's Prequels, Journey's Traces

Hmm, I think the only producer I know truly nothing about, didn't even really recognize a song on their page. Doesn't matter since this song's extremely cute and appealing on its own.

The button mashing making up the backing track I almost didn't like but it totally grew on me, it gives the song more life. Visually the MV compliments the cutesy subject and the wonder of a child's first pokemon. But... it's just pleasant. It suffers the same fate as Party Rock Eternity before it, there's just nothing pushing it beyond musically, likely in part because I'm not as familiar with the composer. I like songs that go somewhere, and this one stays in the same place, which doesn't make it bad, it just makes it less interesting to me.

Esper Esper, Psychic Psychic! by NayutalieN

I don't listen to a whole lot of NayutalieN's stuff outside the Rhythm Game Staples (most of which I like, at least passively), but it's enough that I know generally what I'm getting.

Musically this song doesn't stand out to me all that much, I like the rising tones during the chorus, but it actually doesn't use as many of the kind of flourishes on the top of vocals I really like about Nayutalie's tuning. The sfx in blend with the background are also really fun but for me, theming tops out anything.

When I went into the song, I wanted a cute silly fun song about psychic type pokemon that LOVED psychic types. I wanted to see them clap. And they did! There's just so many psychic types doing the classic flip back and forth dance, and isn't that, really, what makes a NayutalieN song?

Kairiki Bear's Melomeloid

So Kairiki Bear I actually spent like, a day lying in bed listening to their entire lineup on their channel lol I wanted to determine whether I liked them as a producer or if I just really liked Bug. Turned out I just really liked Bug (and venom). That's to say, I wasn't expecting something standout in this song.

I was not disappointed, but I wasn't blown away either. That's ok, I think the most important part of Kairiki Bear songs are their texture, the rhythm of the vocals mixed with the instrument. I like Bug because of its punchiness, its extremely harsh tones, and Melomeloid's are a bit softer. It's good for a song about fairy types, but it doesn't make up that loss in musicality through the melody, which makes it average to me. But! I think it really hits where fairy types lie, a cutesy "I love you" mixed with the signature sharp, kind of off tune vocals with a harsh, present beat... It screams "cute but dangerous."

A Glorious Day for Miku Yuri by EVE (it's Glorious Day)

wh what if u were a dragon type trainer and and I was a fairy type trainer and uh uh hhhhh and we were rivals............

Um ok, I just have to say, before I talk about Eve or whatever. The fact that they animate Every Miku in Voltage's art run and place them in this mikuverse where they all fight together is like, dude talk about an excellent finale. Deadass that touch alone put this to its ranking by itself.

That's not to say the music's not pulling its weight. It's Eve, and though I think is one of his weaker compositions, not being able to play into his more off beat rhythms (and having to use miku) it's still got all the bones of an extremely solid hype journey song. But to be honest, I think the music is the weakest part of Glorious Day, even if its flow is perfect for the story they're telling.

But the story..... God I do love a fully animated MV, there's just so much they put in it to make a pokemon fan happy, from the sakuga of the battle and the possible red cameo. Plus YURI!!! I love miku miku relationships I just think this one has the most potential to live in my brain rent free, so it goes up a tier. As a pokemon fan, this one's got the most for me, even if as a vocaloid fan, I wish Eve would just sing all his songs forever lol

Uh anyway thanks for listening like and comment if you want me to do this for commissioned songs for sekai i guess

[blazehedgehog]

As someone who I know is intricately familiar with Genesis music and the FM synth it uses; why is it that many people (including myself) enjoy the Genesis era Sonic music but when Jin Senoue tries to emulate that sound using Genesis synth samples (Sonic Superstars being the most recent example) it just doesn't sound very good? I know it's literally become a running joke in the community that Senoue uses the Genesis synth too much but it's not like Sonic 1 or 2 had bad soundtracks even though they used the same instrumentation, and Senoue is obviously a very talented composer, so I don't really understand why his attempts to emulate the Genesis soundtracks always turn out so mid.

The general theory I subscribe to is that with the soundtracks to Sonic 1, 2, and presumably even Sonic 3, those games were composed by people who were just writing "real" music. They would pick out real world instruments and write for that sound.

If you've never heard it before, for the 20th Anniversary, Sega put out a compilation soundtrack for Sonic 1 and 2, which included the original demo tracks Masato Nakamura wrote for those games.

Now these are basically just MIDI files, because they didn't need to be anything more than that. But you can tell he was thinking in terms of horn sections, bass guitar, and so on.

Nakamura would submit these MIDI songs on cassette to Sega, and Sega's sound engineers would transcribe those instruments into something that sounded appropriate for the Genesis hardware.

Now, Jun Senoue did the same thing, to a degree. Jun's first major Sonic soundtrack was Sonic 3D Blast on the Sega Genesis, and Jon Burton (of Traveler's Tales) revealed Jun's own demo cassette. If you listen to Jun's tracks, they're all done on the Honky Tonk/Rhodes piano. There's no attempt to utilize real world instruments or have any kind of sound diversity. [1] [2] [3] [4]

Instead of writing music for a band, he wrote music for an individual playing a keyboard.

Worse still, it has eventually been revealed as of Sonic Origins that Jun Senoue had very little awareness of how to make Genesis sounding music. Again, he only submitted his songs on cassette. He was not responsible for the FM Synthesis conversion, just the raw notes, which were all written on, and for, a keyboard.

(throwing the rest of this ask under a "read more" tag because it embeds a lot more videos and even some images)

So when it came time for Sonic 4, and they had Jun Senoue do the retro style soundtracks for those games, he was probably pretty out of his depth. He was writing for style of music he did not really have a nuanced understanding of.

So we get this crunchy, grating, disassociated "this is what the Genesis sounded like, right?" sort of sound. The musical equivalent of one of those early 2000's "How to Draw Manga" books: somebody who thinks they know what they're doing, has actual talent in other adjacent areas, but doesn't actually get this particular niche.

This is one of the reasons why I'm actually a little warmer towards Classic Sonic's music in Sonic Forces -- it's not Jun Senoue. Somebody on that project understood enough and had Naofumi Hataya handle a lot of Classic Sonic's music. He has actual experience with chiptunes and wrote something that feels like it belongs in a Sega System 32 arcade game or something.

Not every single one of Classic Sonic's songs are stone cold bangers in Forces, but at least they sound more authentically retro than Jun's attempts, because they were written by someone who knew what they were doing.

Beyond that, I don't know why Jun doesn't just, like... do better, in a sense. I suppose I don't know his composing environment and how easy or hard it is to slot in what he'd need to sound more "authentic." I just know from my own perspective how easy it is to grab a VST or a soundfont for common Genesis/Yamaha instruments.

But even then, more authentic instruments aren't going to solve the problem that this style of music doesn't seem to be his strong suit, even if somebody at Sega keeps pushing him to do it. Thankfully, I think somebody finally realized it, given how Sonic Superstars seemed to be full of his Sonic 4 style fake-retro music and most of it got replaced at the last second.

[jjsanguine]

Rules: list 10 of your comfort shows and then tag 10 people

Tagged by @bengiyo . I actually don't rewatch shows very often, or at least not the same ones every time, but here's some shows I've watched a lot of in no particular order.

Alien Biospheres. This is a YouTube series but I've watched it a lot. If you watched James Cameron's Avatar and don't care about the plot but would watch a documentary on how they designed the creatures + plants this is the webseries for you. If you like spec bio then I would also recommend Serina.

Cherry Magic. I write songs for fun and my life is too boring to be great inspiration, so most of them reference scenarios in shows I'm watching that I find funny or just stick with me for some reason. Kurosawa's personality inspired one of my best ones.

Coffee Prince. This got me into kdrama + so much of it still holds up. Like, remember how homophobic the 2000s were? That's a feat.

The King's Affection. This is like the best girl disguises as a guy kdrama since Coffee Prince, and I watched a lot of them before I figure out I was nonbinary. I was glued to my seat. My writing project @the-prince-is-not-a-woman was partially inspired by me watching this so many times.

Mortel. It's like this show was made for me. Vodun, found family, polyamorus subtext, mystery, despising someone but having noone else to turn to, trauma, comedy, banger music. It was made by Netflix though, so of course it was cancelled on a cliffhanger.

Power Rangers 2017. This film is objectively goofy but I love it so much. Billy was the first explicitly autistic character I think I saw ever, and he set my expectations for canonically autistic characters high.

Extraordinary Attorney Woo. Apart from being a good show, Attorney Woo is the only other character on my list of canonically autistic characters that I like, which is funny because both attorney Woo and Billy were played by allistic actors.

The Path. I enjoyed seasons 1 & 2 but I've rewatched season 3 many times for my baby Caleb. I talked about a pastor's son and he's like the perfect example. If the show hadn't tragically been cancelled I would have loved to see what they did with his character, because after leaving his family for his boyfriend and by extension his boyfriend's daddy's apocalypse adjacent cult (which is a positive if you can believe it) socially speaking he was essentially in the same position he started off in, minus worrying about homophobia. He could have blossomed or spiralled, who knows. That's quality side character creation. This show also inspired the list "cheating on your girlfriend with your wife" which has to be the best of my lists of niche tropes.

Triage: time travel and time loop stories can so easily swerve into being terrible when there isn't enough thought put into the time travel mechanic but when they're good they're really good.

Shelter 2007: so many of the queer films I watched as a teenager were depressing, I could have given up on ql entirely if I didn't watch this heartwarming film.

Honourable mentions:

Be My Favourite. It finished airing literally 2 months ago so it really hasn't had time to gain the status of old reliable but yeah. I've watched episode 1 probably 10 times at this point, because I would pore over the whole show waiting for the next episode. I was writing essays.

Nowhere Boys: I love forced proximity + conspirationality. It's one of the reasons I love Mortel. It's a quality teen drama.

Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Chat Noir, aka Miraculous Ladybug. This show is my Riverdale. It's ridiculous and I don't recommend it and I can't watch the english dub because I'd cringe too much so I watch it in French, but I started watching when I was like 15 so I'm locked in forever. It keeps dragging me back.

Going to try my hand at actually tagging people so,,,

@anotherlovr @writerwithoutsound @dudeyuri @irritablebovinesyndrome @gillianthecat @threezoz @sparklyeyedhimbo @respectthepetty @one-ghogh@heretherebedork

[beauty-and-passion]

Eurovision 2024: 38 songs, first impressions

Wake up, bitches, it's that time of the year again.

No, not Christmas. It's Eurovision time, aka the time when we can verbally destroy each other and call our neighbors "filthy traitors", but in the end we would still be united against the real enemy: the jury.

As we all know, last year Sweden won but Finland caught the Snitch or, to put it simply, Finland won our hearts, but since the newly crowned King of Europe Käärijä was too busy being majestic and Finland was too busy being precious, Sweden graciously offered to host the competition for its neighbor.

Yes, this is what happened. No, you don't remember something different.

And yes, I ultimately decided to follow this year's competition. As someone said in some old post, Eurovision is a bit like that toxic relationship you can't escape from. And maybe you don't really want to escape from it.

So, since we're trapped in this hellhole, at least let's enjoy our time together with a heavy dose of sarcasm and a sprinkle of wholesomeness. Eurovision might have flaws, but nothing is perfect in this world after all.

As per every year, I always do my first listening while doing my chores, so the songs are in the background and I have no idea who sings what or from what country they're from. I just let them flow and see if something gets my attention.

And this year a lot of them did! I couldn't identify a clear winner, but I found a ton of small, beautiful gems everywhere. Oh, this year seems very, very promising.

As always, this is my first listening: many more will follow and my opinions may drastically change. So please, don't take my comments too seriously: this is all for fun.

__________

ALBANIA

Pretty nice song and pretty nice rhythm, I really like it.

But also... I've been to Tirana in January and I've listened to the songs they have there. And even if this one is very good, I would've loved more true Albanian rhythm.

Still, this will probably end in my personal playlist, so that's a plus for me.

Vote: A Titan in disguise? *Greek mythology intensifies* *Cronus intensifies*

__________

ARMENIA

We all stan a song in Armenian and if you don't, you will start doing now because yes, we have Armenian and yes, it sounds great.

So let's all thank Armenia for bringing its beautiful language - along with some nice Balkan rhythm that kept slapping me in the face.

But you know me, I'm a simple Mediterranean: I hear Balkan rhythm, I love it.

Vote: I will always be a slut for Balkan rhythms

__________

AUSTRIA

If Armenia slapped me with Balkan rhythm, Austria bitchslapped me with the whole 1990 decade.

But you know me, I am a simple Millennial: I listen to something that seems to come straight from the 90s, I dance.

Vote: We! Will! Rave!

__________

AUSTRALIA

This was... good. Just good. And the singer is good too. Maybe even too good.

Sigh, Australia forgot again that this is Eurovision. Please, someone, remind them this is the show of fire, sparkles and insanity.

Vote: "What ya gonna do in the real world?" Easy, WE! WILL! RAVE!

__________

AZERBAIJAN

Luckily Azerbaijan remembered that hey, they're the country that delivers good stuff! They should bring a good song!

And so they did and delivered us a good song, with good verses and a wonderful chorus in Azerbaijani.

The only problem is that the chorus is much better than the verses and if the song was entirely in Azerbaijani, it would've been a banger. Unfortunately, it's just good.

Vote: great job, Azerbaijan. Next time, ditch English entirely

__________

BELGIUM

"Are you still playing the game?" If you mean The Game, I think we all lost it.

Vote: +1 for the power move of making everyone lose The Game

__________

CROATIA

As soon as I started listening to it, I was assaulted by a sick rhythm. Then by a guy who tells me he's a big boy. Then by his anxiety. Then by more sick rhythm.

Then by what is probably the greatest line ever said in the history of music:

One last thing: the singer's name is Baby Lasagna. Baby Lasagna. He's speaking to my Italian heart and, even more importantly, to my Italian stomach.

And you know me, I'm a simple Italian: food is mentioned, I vibe.

Vote: my cats will vote for him

__________

CYPRUS

Oh no, please help this young lady! She forgot she's from Cyprus and she should send sick bops in Greek!

Vote: it's not a bad song at all. It's just not Cyprus-worthy

__________

CZECHIA

Oh, sorry, I didn't know this was a therapy session. I'll wait in the hall.

Vote: it's not bad, it's just... nope

__________

DENMARK

After a lot of disappointing years, finally Denmark brought a great song! The singer is good, the rhythm is good and it deserves a place in the final.

Vote: it's not in Danish, but we can't have everything

__________

ESTONIA

This song is an instant favorite. Native language, sick rhythm, adorable weirdos, all in one package.

And let me repeat that: Estonian! Beautiful Estonian language! It was such a wonderful surprise to listen to it! I literally stopped what I was doing and perked my ears because mmmh, it sounds like Finnish, but it's not exactly Finnish... what's that? And it was Estonian.

I am in love <3

Vote: pure Moldovian spirit in Estonia? I approve.

__________

FINLAND

So, let's recap:

we have a singer named Windows95man.

He wears a blurred Windows logo and no pants.

He comes out from an egg made of jeans.

The other singer isn't always in tune and he's dressed in pieces of jeans that make him look like a paperman.

He has the balls to ask if there's anything wrong with how he dresses.

The song screams of the 90s.

And then, during the performance, a pair of shorts literally fell from the sky.

With fire.

If that's not pure Eurovision, I don't know what it is.

(And before you ask: of course they cannot use Finnish, only Käärijä can and only the next Käärijä will be allowed to use it.)

Vote: Even if Finland sent the worst, most boring singer ever, for this year I would've given it a free pass. But Finns are such bosses, they decided to send this. Respect only

__________

FRANCE

And here on the right, you can see the French Frenching harder than ever.

Vote: a song named "Mon Amour". Seriously. Seriously. What will be the next one about? La Tour Eiffel? Oh wait, you already did that

__________

GERMANY

I'm mad because I already know this song will get zero points just because "iT's GeRmAnY", even if it's actually good.

Vote: thank you Germany for still sending good songs. You deserve more

__________

GEORGIA

You're "rising from the ashes like a phoenix"? Well, now I remember Conchita Wurst with Rise like a phoenix, which is way way WAY better than this song.

And since Conchita is Austrian, I also remembered the memo we got this year, which is one and one only: WE! WILL! RAVE!

Vote: more rave, less this

__________

GREECE

What? What? What do my ears hear? Greek rhythm? Greek language? And it comes together with a more modern vibe?

See, Greece? SEE? This is how you do things well. This is how you choose a good singer to represent your country. Thank you, Greece, for finally picking someone competent and not the umpteenth child.

Vote: finally, a song Greece-worthy

__________

ICELAND

I don't know why, but this song reminds me of another, more famous song. Can't exactly pinpoint which one, but it's way too familiar and I don't like it.

Vote: as soon as it was over, I forgot it

__________

IRELAND

And here on the left, you can see Ireland coming back to their roots, aka the most insane, batshit crazy stuff they have, stuff that will make you question what the heck happens on that island and if everyone's okay.

Vote: not a favorite, but it's definitely something I've never heard before. So that's a plus

__________

ISRAEL

I still have no idea why Israel is here, but I suppose that some have a free pass for killing innocents.

The singer isn't bad either, but the rhythm keeps reminding me of another, more famous song. Just like Iceland, I don't remember exactly which one, except that the famous one was better.

Vote: you shouldn't even be here

__________

ITALY

I already made a post commenting the Italian songs from this year and told a couple things about Angelina Mango and this song's meaning.

Here I can only reconfirm that this song is still a huge bop, the southern rhythm is still my Roman Empire and we may still have some chances of winning this year's Eurovision.

Vote: her southern accent my beloved

__________

LATVIA

The rhythm isn't so bad, but it's just so. Very. Forgettable.

But hey, I suppose it's good for re-listening, because I listened to it twice and both times it was like listening to it for the first time.

I didn't like it both times, but that's a detail.

Vote: just as forgettable as the Icelandic one

__________

LITHUANIA

You know, I respect Lithuania. Their songs are not my favorite, but they keep using their own beautiful language. Hence why, they deserve a place in the final.

Vote: keep showing us the beautiful Lithuanian language, I believe that one day I will find I song I like

__________

LUXEMBOURG

Do you know what I feared the most this year? That Luxembourg came back after 30 years and the song was shit. That they showed us something stale and boring.

But Luxembourg stepped in like the queen of the party and said: "Please, hold both my French and my English, because I can and I will drop something sick". And so they did.

Amazing rhythm, amazing singer, amazing return.

Vote: Luxembourg is back and wants to win

__________

MALTA

Malta is my personal Sweden. Even when they send a song I don't really like (like this one), it's just weak. I don't remember a song coming from them that I considered truly "bad".

I don't know what kind of sorcery Malta does, but it works on me every year.

Vote: Malta has too much power on me

__________

MOLDOVA

Don't worry, Moldova: you can't always be the best every year. You deserve to relax once in a while and this year you've been covered by a lot of other countries.

Vote: it's not the huge bop you would expect from Moldova, but that's okay. I'll let it pass, because Moldova always does great things for Eurovision

__________

THE NETHERLANDS

This song has a lot of amazing things.

First, the language: thank God, the Netherlands are still sending songs in their native language as it should be. It's beautiful to listen to it and I love to hear words that kinda remind me of both German and English.

Second: despite what it seems, this song isn't a satire/parody of Europe. On the contrary, it's a celebration of how open Europe is and how easy it is to travel without borders.

And it may seem normal for us because we're used to it now, but I visited Albania this January and there were a shit ton of controls and checks to do. While last time I went to Greece, all I had to do was walk down a corridor, show my ID card and everything was fine. The open borders truly are a victory for everyone who likes to travel - and a sign of how much better Europe is. So a song celebrating them is very much appreciated.

Third: the song isn't just about open borders! It's about a man remembering his parents, about how much he still misses them. And it's about his victory. In the end, he's literally telling them: look, dad and mom, I finally made it to Eurovision.

And these soft, wholesome things always get me in my cold heart <3

Vote: top of the final chart, no questions

__________

NORWAY

Let's all thank Norway for bringing the folk theme, along with their beautiful language.

I don't know what happened this year, but we are blessed by so many beautiful languages it truly seems like Eurovision and not Englishvision.

Vote: a bit too many screams, but I appreciate the enthusiasm of speaking in your native language

__________

POLAND

Poland learned from last year and instead of bringing another ball of nothing, they brought a song more fitting for their vibes.

It's in English tho, and that's very sad because Polish is a nice language. But at least the singer is good and in tune.

Vote: She built the tower. If it's the one from Stephen King's series, then we should have a chat

__________

PORTUGAL

Portugal did a miracle last year, by bringing a song I actually liked. So in order to be coherent, this year they brought another boring, forgettable song.

Vote: nothing good lasts forever

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SAN MARINO

Don't worry, people, San Marino will bring all the party vibes we need. It will take them some time to come, because they took a detour to Spain, but the vibes are still great.

Vote: maybe this year they won't be the usual traitors and give us 12 points

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SERBIA

Serbian lyrics? Yes, please!

And even if this song has some ballad vibes, it's not the umpteenth boring ballad. It's a very nice, soft song and the singer's voice is good too.

Vote: great job, Serbia

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SLOVENIA

A song in Slovenian? We stan! We all stan!

I'm not sure I like the "rrruaph!" sound, but the use of a native language and the dark vibes are very appreciated.

Vote: all these countries are spoiling us with their beautiful languages and I'm here for it

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SPAIN

Spain rarely disappoints and once again they proved it: instead of bringing the umpteenth young gal, this year they chose a more mature singer and not only she has a wonderful angelic voice, but she sings in sexy Spanish and her song is perfect dance material.

Vote: We're all zorras

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SWEDEN

Since Sweden refuses to bring something else besides the same generic pop music in English, I want to start a new trend: the Swedish Suggestion Box. Here we can all suggest much more interesting Swedish songs (or artists!). There's only one rule: they shouldn't be boring, nor generic stuff you can hear on the radio 24/7.

This year, I would like to suggest Nanne Grönvall: she's a pop singer, but she mostly sings in Swedish. I particularly recommend the songs Håll om mig, Den Vilda, and Vi är dom tuffaste.

If you have other Swedish artists or songs worthy of attention, please recommend them in the comments/reblogs! Even if the songs are in English, they're still fine! As I said, the only rule is that it shouldn't be generic and boring.

And I know Sweeden can do better than generic and boring.

Vote: Suggestions are open!

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SWITZERLAND

Switzerland is my second Sweden: even if other people might hate the songs it brings, I've rarely hated something coming from it. And if I did, it was with fiery passion. Yes, I'm looking at you, devastatingly boring 2022's entry.

So I'm very happy that this year we can all agree this is a great song, because wow. WOW. Mixing electropop with opera singing made something truly amazing to listen to and I can't wait to see if the singer manages to do it live. If he can, it will be magnificent.

Vote: fine, Switzerland, I'll forgive you for the 2022's entry. But only if you keep sending amazing stuff like this

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UKRAINE

Ukraine = quality and no one can deny it. I'm not a huge fan of this mix rap/Ukrainian rhythm they have been brought in these last years, but as long as I can listen to some nice Ukrainian language and some new vibes, I am all for it.

Vote: thank you, Ukraine, for always bringing amazing stuff

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UNITED KINGDOM

And here it is: the only country (with Ireland) that is legally allowed to use English in a song. Even if I dream that, one day, the UK will send a song in French and blow up the entirety of Europe.

The song per se isn't bad: very 90s' vibes, very dancey. But if I have to choose something with 90s vibes, I prefer the rave.

Vote: not bad UK, but could be better

[aftokrator-official]

FOR THE ASK MEME!!! hmmmmmmmmmmmm. tsuru on primes (and 1, for funsies) (2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23) andddddd kasen on squares (1, 2, 4, 9, 16, 25). Also who's your favourite precure (Laura not inluded)

TSURU!

1. Why do you like or dislike this character?

I love characters that are outwardly sociable and cheerful but are actually pretty lonely and self-isolating under the surface - Myu cranks this up several notches and gives him extra trauma, but I think it's there to some extent with any version of Tsuru. Myu in particular also puts him in a situation of taking on far too much responsibility all on his own, putting pressure on himself and being very bad at letting others help him with it, which is delicious. I also love characters who are just kind of, bad at being people and that's a trait all the Heian blades share to varying degrees, I think.

(Also he's really pretty. There's definitely that.)

2. Favorite canon thing about this character?

Just, myu!tsuru in general honestly, his arc there has been really, really well done. Okamiya Kurumu is one of the best performers in myu and he knocks it out of the park as Tsurumaru every single time. Also the fact that we have an entire duo musical featuring him and Ookurikara??? WHAT a gift, thank you toumyu. Imagine being a kuritsuru shipper since 2015 and then seven years later (i think?) you find out they're doing that. I can't even imagine.

3. Least favorite canon thing about this character?

It's probably an unfair comparison because myu Tsuru is so good, and the two stage adaptations try to avoid overlapping arcs, but I do think he's misused (or at least underused) in sute. A lot of the stageplays he's in, he doesn't really seem to have much to do beyond being occasional comic relief which is... ehhh. I don't mind silly Tsuru in light-hearted stuff like Hanamaru, Tsuru shenanigans are fun, but when sute gets good it's REALLY good, and it's just kinda too bad that Tsuru tends to get more surface-level characterization in comparison to some of the others. I REALIZE it's probably an unfair complaint, it's a huge cast and they can't give central roles to every single sword, but still. Sute and Myu just handle their side characters very differently and I prefer Myu's writing in that regard.

(I will give them points for Iden though. Still was mostly a comic relief character in that one, but he and Nankai - who's another fave - getting along like a house on fire, WONDERFUL, and his gasp of delight over getting to set off the bombs is hilarious and adorable.)

5. What's the first song that comes to mind when you think about them?

Probably would always be one of his songs from myu. In this moment, the one that started playing in my head was ZANZOU, which is a banger.

also, Two Shadows from Michihasu, which he doesn't sing, but it's about him (in part), so like. uuuuuu

7. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

I always go kind of insane over death/grave imagery in fanart of him. ALSO him being portrayed as a sort of little brother to the Sanjous, it's so so cute, and Mikazuki as his older or twin brother figure is my favorite take on their relationship.

11. Would you date this character?

ABSOLUTELY not, I do not have the mental fortitude to handle Tsurumaru's idea of fun date activities, and making Ookurikara jealous feels... unwise. Not gonna risk it.

13. What's an emoji, an emoticon and/or any symbol that reminds you of this character or you think the character would use a lot?

oh he'd use emojis SO MUCH, and in a completely incomprehensible way. I get the feeling that 💥 and 🎉 would frequently be in play, for emphasis, or just to add excitement. He'd use 💀 a lot and nobody can quite figure out whether it means something good or bad.

17. What's a ship for this character you don't hate but it's not your favorite that you're fine with?

To an extent, I do like mikatsuru, even though I prefer them platonic. The problem is often the Mika characterization tbh I'm just. Not a big fan of top Mika and the way people write "seme Mika" isn't something I generally vibe with.

19. How about a relationship they have in canon that you don't like?

Hmmm I can't really think of any tbh.

23. Favorite picture of this character?

oohhhh man I don't think I can even narrow it down to just one, but shoutout to this artist because their style is SO good and I love how they draw him. I have a couple of their kuritsuru doujins and they're soooo pretty

KASEN!

1. Why do you like or dislike this character?

I picked him as my starter knowing basically nothing about him except that he shared a VA with Izumi, and in true saniwa fashion I got Attached. I love his gap moe combination of being all literary and refined, but also full of... well, Kanesada brashness and a hot temper, haha. The way he wants to be known for his association with culture and literature, but the death and violence is also inextricably part of his story, and he has to reconcile those parts of himself as he grows and learns how to be a person... I just think he's so endearing. A wonderful first sword for Haruaki Honmaru!!!

2. Favorite canon thing about this character?

the way he haunts the narrative in myu just.... makes me completely insane tbh. it's REALLY good. The way he's never been mentioned by name but we all know the first sword was Kasen - not just process of elimination (even if it's also that lol) but in everything he's left behind, the traditions of his honmaru, the personality of his saniwa who absolutely seems like someone who would've chosen Kasen, the impact he made on the swords who knew him... The oldest sakura tree, tucked away in a quiet part of the garden "like it's shy" ;--; The fact that the sakura trees were his idea in the first place! They gave Sakuranoue some of his lines in Michihasu and it TAKES ME OUT, okay. Whenever they end up mentioning him directly or even having him on stage in myu, it's going to kill me and I will be dead o(--(

oh, oh, and that thread of Tsuru's character arc in datesouki and michihasu about "understanding why people write poems" - god. goddd. I have this strong impression that Kasen and Tsuru butted heads a lot, they have pretty conflicting personalities, and Tsuru after he's gone trying to figure out how to grieve this person he cared about deeply but never completely understood. ok i'm veering away from both Kasen and canon now but IT'S REALLY GOOD OK. MYU IS REALLY GOOD

also, to be fair since I talked shit a bit in Tsuru's section, I loooove tousute Kasen, he's absolutely perfect. The fact that his actor just starts improvising punches when he accidentally breaks his prop sword is so fucking funny and the most Kasen thing ever.

4. If you could put this character in any other media, be it a book, a movie, anything, what would you put them in?

Maybe it's just proximity because i'm playing it right now, but Kasen in Infinity Nikki would be funny as hell. He'd be living his best life and training to become the Sovereign of Elegant but not making much progress because he's got this bad habit of getting violent over styling contests and that isn't very miyabi of him.

9. Could you be roommates with this character?

Could Kasen be roommates with me, is the question. I am not a tidy person and I think I'd drive him insane. That said, if I could get him doing the cleaning, that might be a pretty sweet deal... I think we would enjoy similar amounts of quiet and solitude and wouldn't get in each other's way.

16. What's your least favorite ship for this character?

Ookurikara. I don't... really know why it's so popular 😭 I just don't really like shipping Kara with anyone but Tsuru in the first place, but even beyond that I just don't see it tbh. (Seriously, why did this take off? Is it just their antagonism in Hanamaru, because if Kasen having an ostensibly shippable dynamic with someone in ONE adaptation is enough to blow it up then let's all stop sleeping on kasenba who have so much to chew on in toumyu AND a very cute dynamic in hanamaru-- *cough* anyway)

25. What was your first impression of this character? How about now?

When I started playing, I picked him because he shares a VA with Izumi and I liked his design, not knowing anything else about him. I LOVE that he turned out to be one of my faves and that he retroactively made toumyu that much more emotionally harrowing for me personally. Classic touken ranbu experience. I love it.

AND MY FAVORITE CURE is probablyyyy Cure Felice, i love her and her lesbian witch moms and she's SO cute ;u;