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millennialzadr · 5 years ago

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WHY I LOVE ZADR!!!

HEY GUYS WHASSUP? LMAO

So this is a whole ass giant long post of me absolutely spewing my feelings of love for ZADR, it was the very first thing I wrote when I made this blog and I think it’s a nice, positive thing for my fellow shippers to inhale and enjoy 👌👌

it was originally a reply to mitarashiart’s post about why HE loves ZADR (link in replies) but I decided to delete that and make my own post since MY WHOLE ENTIRE TEXT WALL WAS SHOWN IN THE REPLIES and drowned out anyone else who was trying to talk (thanks tumblr mobile u fuckin idiot)

I had also posted a summary of an AU that I’m working on in the original post, but decided to remove it since it just about doubled the length (I’m thinking about posting it separately along with the wips I’ve been putting together, we’ll see 👀)

But ANYWAY, here is about a million reasons why I think ZADR is the fucking best, so if you like reading gushy gay ship feelings, please enjoy ❤️❤️❤️

[Posted June 2019][WARNING, LONG ASS THOUGHT BARF]

SOOO, holy hell y’all my journey back into this fandom has been a wild and unique experience for me, i went from adding invader zim to my bookmarks on kisscartoon, rewatching the series, finding out theres a movie coming out, finding out there was a shitload of content i’d never seen before (commentaries, lost episode scripts and audios, panels, the COMIC, episodes i’d never seen because the dvd i used to watch was scratched!! and a FUCKLOAD of quality modern fan art like oh my GOD) and finally curiously googling ‘zadr’ (which i was way into when i was maybeee 13/14) to see if there was any interesting new art, and holy hell, mita (the artist above) singlehandedly THREW me down the hole into modern zadr hell, first with his absolutely stunning IZ art (all his art is dope tho check him out yo), then reading the above explanation put the final nail in the coffin like, 100%

so i wanted to add onto his post here on why this ship got me so fucked up, both for anyone who might be wondering why on earth i’m shipping two characters from a kid’s show (i’m very aware how weird that is at first glance trust me) and also so i can get some ideas down for possible future reference (will i ever draw them? maybe)

(first of all, a disclaimer, and this is not pleasant to write but it’s important to address for clarity’s sake: I have no interest in romantic or sexual relationships between minors, and do not ship zim and dib as they are presented canonically in the show (as children). what i’m interested in is the conceptualized relationship they may have as modern adults, and i view zadr more as taking the concepts of existing characters and experimenting with them with different interpretations, which i personally think is a constructive and fun creative outlet, especially if these characters hold personal significance for you (childhood faves of course). growing up together is an important facet of their relationship, and certainly they were important to each other even as children (see: mopiness of doom) but as an adult i’m personally curious about what kind of adults they might’ve become, and that’s the focus of my interest. i’ll still be reblogging regular IZ art because it’s dope but if you see shippy looking art of them as tiny lil beans its either friendship or chibis (and i personally headcanon zim as getting taller with dib but some people stick with his canonical height when drawing them as adults, which is super short. it still doesn’t mean he’s a kid). aaand i wish i didnt have to write this and it would just be obvious but we live in a sick sad world and it is sourced from a children’s cartoon so i feel its necessary. end of disclaimer)

NOW THAT THAT’S OUT OF THE WAY

- ok, first reason’s a bit obvious - the nostalgia. holy hell, the feeling of rediscovering a ship that was popular when i was a preteen during the mid 2000s and discovering a totally new perspective on it as an adult comes with an almost totally overwhelming sense of nostalgia and comfort, as well as inspiration!! the kind of art that seems so common for zadr, these sketch pages of scenes and expressions and visual gags where artists would just scribble every idea they had and LOVE doing it, this was exactly the kind of art that made me so passionate about drawing as a kid, and it still sparks such a powerful feeling of love and admiration for me to this day. fan content of iz and zadr is simultaneously achingly familiar and totally new and fascinating, and it just makes me SO damn happy to consume, it is most definitely my new comfort content. and just, GOD. THE ART!! SO GOOD. FUCK

- now for the characters themselves: for some reason i just really love the thought of a mid twenties, modern Dib?? lanky goth dork, disaster bi, depressed as shit, uses bad sweaters and memes to cope?? when i was a kid i didn’t even LIKE Dib, but now i totally sympathize with him! he’s just a hyper obsessive nerd wishing there was more to life than the situation he got stuck with, how wildly relatable. he was a pretty big asshole as a kid (even to people besides zim) but he was also totally isolated and constantly bullied, so there’s a lot of room for growth. i feel there’s a lot of juicy character development potential for that boy, and there’s always been a special place in my heart for characters who are totally sad and screwed and hopeless, but there’s one thing, or person, that means the world to them and could possibly save them…

- aliens. Zim. i love nonhuman characters, i love monsters, i love aliens, i love characters that don’t understand human shit (and thus have much less room for shame or fear bc theyre just totally oblivious the negatives of modern society) and need guidance (bonding!!) from their human. i also love morally grey characters and characters with skewed logic, they’re always really interesting, and Zim himself just has such a unique personality and set of mannerisms, he contradicts himself a lot and you can never quite expect how he’ll behave, and i love that in a character, it makes them super versatile and fun, especially since there’s so many different possibilities for their development. Also, Zim is a gremlin, a little shit, and a disaster. I also love those traits in a character. And don’t even get me started on his character design?? big sparkly eyes? expressive antennae? monster teeth? complimenting colors? he’s adorable.

- mutual obsession. for someone like Dib, who seems almost repulsed by how boring and slow the people around him are, Zim quite literally personifies Dib’s escapist fantasies, both as an inhuman entity from beyond the stars, and as a person who’s knowledge, charisma and mystery far exceeds that of anyone Dib has met in his entire life. (so basically what i’m saying is that for a shunned, jaded misanthropist, an actual alien is terribly alluring, even if said alien is dangerous, stupid, and possibly insane). not to mention Zim vindicates Dib’s entire life passion, the supernatural! Even when their relationship is totally negative, there is not a single inch of room for Dib to get tired of Zim. as mita explained, they validate each other. for Zim, WHO AGAIN, IS TOTALLY SHUNNED, ISOLATED, AND HATED BY EVERYONE HE KNOWS, Dib is the only person in the universe who gives a single shit about him!! he gives Zim credit as a threat, a capable invader, which if you ask me is the sole thing Zim is after (he’s hellbent on his mission because it would win him the approval of the tallest, all he’s ever wanted is recognition from the people he thinks so highly of). He literally gets depressed when Dib isn’t around to pay attention to him, not even the tallest were enough to motivate him before Dib came back. these two have no one and nothing without each other, and while lifelong nemeses is fine and dandy, i personally prefer friendship, affection and love, cause i’m a softie like that. how could they possibly get there after years of actively trying to kill each other?? well, i think under just the right circumstances it could become a possibility after a long, long time.

- growth. i. love. me. some. good. character growth. especially for characters with trauma/mental illness, bc again, relatable. these boys have issues, and as mita mentioned, their canon stories are actually INCREDIBLY sad! but the happy thought is, they could recover! they could help each other recover, for little reason other than the two are the only source of happiness for each other. now of course this also opens the gate for angst lovers, but at the same time offers potential for comforting, uplifting content of the boys supporting and inspiring each other, maybe even to the point of becoming happy and healthy enough to create the lives they want for themselves (as in appreciating life and doing things that make them actually happy instead of the delusions of grandeur they both sought when they were younger). gimme that positive shit and let the poor beans be happy щ(ಠ益ಠщ)

- LITTLE THINGS. LITTLE THINGS THAT ONLY COME WITH CHILDHOOD FRIENDS. WITH HUMAN/NONHUMAN. WITH THE SHOW’S WEIRD LOGIC. Zim being the person Dib knows best and vice versa. Zim having an involuntary respect/admiration for Dib because he’s tall. Learning each other’s needs, limits, and communication methods, both emotionally and biologically. Sensitive antennae. Affectionate bickering. Being less insecure bc your partner literally has no idea why you see your flaws as flaws. Laughing at the flaws they do notice because they make no sense. Zim only wanting to eat waffles and chow mein. Dib being forced to overcome his depression lethargy and stay hygienic/keep the apartment clean because Zim has a sharper sense of smell and is afraid of germs. Endless conversation about anything and everything because they’re from literally different worlds, and endless intrigue. TOUCHING. TALKING. DOING EVERYTHING LIKE ITS THE VERY FIRST TIME AND ALWAYS NEEDING THE OTHER TO GUIDE THEM. HOLY HELL THERE IS SO MUCH POSSIBILITY FOR TINY LITTLE MOMENTS THAT MEAN THE WORLD. FUCK. GOT ME FUCKED UP.

so that wraps up the why. fuck man. its just such a good ship. if you read this big ass text post, thank you for indulging me, i hope you enjoyed it! because i enjoy it very much 👀 so stick around if you’d like to for a shit load of IZ and zadr content on this blog, possibly (MAYBE) even from me!! come roll around in alien hell with me why dontcha ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ its a fun time! thanks for reading!!!

SO THAT’S MY MANIFESTO Y’ALL, FEEL FREE TO REPLY WITH YOUR OWN REASONS!! I WOULD LOVE FOR THIS POST TO JUST BECOME A BIG GIANT PILE OF LOVE AND YELLING!! GO NUTS! SCREAM ABOUT IT! INFODUMP! DO WHATEVER YOU WANT! I’LL READ EVERY LAST REPLY! Y’ALL DESERVE TO ENJOY YOUR SHIP BC IT’S LITERALLY THE FUCKING BEST!!! LOVE Y’ALL!!!!!!

#in this trying time of shippers being stressed over discourse #i offer a gift<3 because i love you guys #and we should spread the love #i want yall to go OFF #tell me every little fuckin thing about zadr that makes ur heart doki OK #LETS GO 👏👏👏#invader zim #zadr #text post #my post #long post

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jaybug-jabbers · 4 years ago

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My Favorite ACNH Villagers by Species

Hey all. I recently was gifted the new Animal Crossing game and have been playing it like mad. I decided to judge all the characters in the game and choose my favorites.

This list is extremely opinion-based, reflecting only my personal tastes. Also, I’m very picky. You’ve been warned.

As a final note, the list may be subject to change as I play the game and meet villagers and experience new stuff. Thus, this is a snapshot of my current impressions.

Alligator: Drago

Standing out among all the other gators, Drago’s appearance as a mythical beast plus a laid-back attitude wins my affection.

Anteater: Anabelle

Anteaters are cool creatures, but pangolins, which Anabelle is based off of, are even COOLER. Her cheerful peppy personality is also a plus.

Bear: Klaus

The designs for all the bears, for some odd reason, seem to universally repel me, except for Klaus, who somewhat intrigues me. I’d never have him in my village, but I appreciate the distinctive design.

Bird: Piper

Finding a Bird that I like is surprisingly difficult. Sparro’s design is nice, but he’s a Jock, which is kind of a killjoy for me. Piper just seems like a nice standard bird.

Bull: Rodeo

While the bright-blue Bull Stu is also a very pleasing design, Rodeo has to be the winner here. His terrifying appearance is at odds with his relaxed personality.

Cat: Raymond

Yes, he’s the super-popular among the popular; the truth is, I love him too. He’s a very striking character.

Chicken: Ken

While Becky and Egbert are also nice-looking chickens, Ken must win for his beautiful dark coloration and the fact he’s a ninja chicken.

Cub: Maple

Judy is immensely popular, due to her beautiful gradient coat and her intensely sparkling eyes, but I’m not sure she’s won me over. I think I prefer the plain, ordinary-colored, cute little Maple. Stitches is another popular Cub, but the stitch-eyes unnerve me terribly.

Deer: Erik

There are so many Deer characters I love! Erik, however, is the sweetest for me.

Dog: Shep

Most of the Dog characters don’t do much for me, just being rather ordinary dog designs. I’m not much of a dog person, anyway. Shep has that cool sheepdog fringe, though, and seems like a pretty cool dude.

Duck: Molly

I’m repelled by all the Duck designs except for Molly. They really went a little nuts with the weird faces for the duck characters, y’know? The popular Ketchup was not selected because I don’t usually like food-based creatures.

Eagle: Amelia

There are a ton of cool Eagle characters! I basically love them all, but I need to pick Amelia because she’s based on the fabulous Caracara.

Elephant: Cyd

Tia is a very popular Elephant, for her adorable design based on a teapot. I admit she’s very cute. But Cyd is … I’m not sure what Cyd is. He’s really weird. I can’t help but be drawn to him. LOOKIT THOSE EYES MAN.

Frog: Jeremiah

The frogs look kind of bad to me, overall. Their gigantic bulbous heads unnerve me. I know the art is a chibi-style, of course, but the heads of the frogs seem oversized even for chibi. Maybe I’m crazy. I dunno, I just don’t care for them much. Ribbot is a popular frog, and I kinda dig the uniqueness of the robot concept, but he’s a Jock, so ehhh, pass. I chose Jeremiah simply for his appealing colors and his name.

Goat: Kidd

I love goats in real life, and I thought I’d like more AC goats, but I don’t really. Sherb is a very popular goat right now, and while he’s cute and all, Kidd seems the coolest to me. He’s purple with nice hair and a well-contrasting horn color.

Gorilla: Boone

I do not like monkey and ape characters. I never have. So I’m very biased here. Boone seems the best of the Gorilla bunch, though, with his bright, eye-catching baboon markings and almost dignified presense. I wouldn’t have him on my island, but he’s the most tolerable.

Hamster: NOPE

There’s something about all the hamsters that troubles me greatly. I could never have any on my island.

Hippo: Bertha

I think it’s hard to make a stylized Hippo character that isn’t at least kinda ugly. They have oddly-shaped honkin’ faces, and it’s awkward. But Bertha is a pretty sweet hippo gal.

Horse: Victoria

There are a lot of horses in the game, including a Zebra, a sparkling Unicorn, a creepy dark horse, and a princely Colton; but I’m choosing Victoria soley for the racehorse motif. This may change over time, but for now I find it charming.

Kangaroo: Walt

While they experimented with a number of eye-catching designs for the Kangaroos, Walt’s understated slate blues and intense face wins me over. Also, he has a cool scar and is a cranky boy.

Koala: Yuka

The enormous noses and widely-spaced eyes of the Koala characters make it difficult to make them cute, but Yuka seems pretty sweet.

Lion: Leopold

I definitely do not care for any of the Lion characters except for Leopold. Leo is a magnificent, regal-looking fellow I would want to have a cup of tea with.

Monkey: Don’t like any of ‘em

I mentioned previously my bias against ape and monkey characters. I can’t possibly choose a favorite from them.

Mouse: Chadder

As with the Hamster characters, I also do not like the Mouse characters. I don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with the body design, but … hm. Most of the faces for them are unpleasant. Chadder’s face is actually quite neat, though, and I like his little suit. The cheese motif is kinda cute, too.

Octopus: Marina

I love the idea of having an Octopus villager. Octopi are awesome. It will take me time to adjust to the mouth they went with here, though. I think I would have preferred a beak, which is what actual octopi have.

Ostrich: Flora & Julia

I adore almost all of the Ostrich characters. I would be thrilled with any of them. (Except for Queenie. Yuck.)

Penguin: Hopper

Penguins are sweet birds, adored by many, and rightfully so. Hopper is definitely king of the bunch, though–based off the crested penguin, the eye-catching, cranky little fellow will waddle his way into your heart.

Pig: Boris

I’m not normally a fan of pig characters. But there’s something about Boris! What presense he has! What magnificent fangs! What lovely colors and impressive attitude!

Rabbit: NOPE

They sure went all-out on trying out a wide variety of wild faces on these rabbits. I honestly hate ‘em all. Mira comes closest to being OK, but no.

Rhino: Merengue

I previously noted I don’t really care for food-based characters. So I feel quite mixed about Merengue. Animals that are also food disturb me. But her design is admittedly well-done and very cute. She won’t be on my island, but I understand why people like her so much. She’s certainly the most interesting Rhino character.

Sheep: Dom

OK. I know I said how much I dislike Jock personalities. (The reason is simply because it gets tiring to hear them talk about nothing else but working out.) But Dom gets a pass. He’s the only one I will tolerate a Jock personality for. His character design is screamingly adorable and pleasant to look at, and the contrast between a tiny, fluffy cute little sheep wanting to get crunk is hilarious.

Squirrel: Marshal

There are several cute Squirrel characters, including the very lovely Poppy and the skunklike Tasha, but the highly-popular Marshal is popular for a reason. His sweet little grumpy face and simple but effective colors are wonderful.

Tiger: Rolf

There’s something rather dull in the Tiger designs. I don’t know what it is, exactly. Rolf seems to have some attitude and toughness about him, so I chose him, and white tigers are pretty. But overall, the Tigers underwhelm me. This is surprising since I am a big cat fan. I dunno … I think it’s the snout in the big cat design I don’t like. It looks weird.

Wolf: Skye & Kyle

The wolves look really nice in AC, and I like a surprising number of them. I could not settle on a single one, so I chose both Skye for her gorgeous coloration and cute eyes and Kyle for his pretty Wild Dog colors.

#animal crossing #acnh #mycontent #video game favorites

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0poole · 4 years ago

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The Best and Worst parts of past Pokemon games

I’ve watched ShayMay’s 7-hour analysis on Omega Ruby and as you’d expect it’s getting me to think about what are actually the best and worst parts of Pokemon in the past. I’m still glad he literally goes through the entire game going into both the good and the bad of the game, and I’m basically only bringing it up because of the sheer amount of effort put into it. Obviously the video was made before Sun and Moon came out so thankfully some of his quandaries have been solved, but still it’s interesting to see the on and off of certain things throughout the series. Most of the time it gets better as time goes on, but still, it feels like you could get an amazing Pokemon game just by piecing together the features of past games (even if you’d definitely need a few additions to get it perfect, if that’s even possible).

To be honest I really am slowly falling out of favor with Sword and Shield, and it kind of makes me hope that Gamefreak can still get better. Even though the games sold like hotcakes, hopefully they have the heart to realize a ton of people didn’t really like the direction, even though it still isn’t “bad,” just worse than it feels like it should be. Even though bad direction can’t be remedied by other things, the fact that they are a multi-billion dollar franchise really makes it feel like they could afford to make it better, especially when past games did do what people wanted...

Since it’s the most relevant...

DLC/”Enhanced” Versions:

I will genuinely take DLC over “enhanced” versions any day. Even though you’d think a lot could be improved between the base versions and enhanced ones, that’s usually not the case. The only ones that truly changed the game were Black and White 2, since they were treated more like sequels. Even golden games like Platinum didn’t divert much, even if it is an objectively better version than Diamond and Pearl. Considering the games are now going to be a solid 60$ each, it would be even crazier to expect someone to buy the base and enhanced versions. Only paying 30$ for multiple expansions (at least two, could be more) with the content of said expansions being put out as a free update otherwise is a much better deal. The only people this hurts are the types who reasonably wait for the inevitable enhanced version and only buy that instead, since it’s always better, even if only a little. As far as I know, however, Pokemon is one of the only game franchises that releases enhanced versions of games soon after their release (as in, not years later when technology advances and they can profit off nostalgia), so really they’re just becoming more normal by doing this.

Of course there’s the argument that there shouldn’t be any DLC or “enhanced” versions, and all the content of the game should be included in the base game. It would obviously be preferable to not pay for it, but as is painfully obvious, even the richest groups can still be money hungry. Considering they’re inevitably going to make one or the other, DLC is going to be the better choice overall because it’s much more expandable. You rarely got to see a substantial amount of content added on in the enhanced versions. If they made us pay 30$ for the Isle of Armor and Crown Tundra separately, that would be crazy. But, since it’s 30$ for both, they could easily insert more bits alongside the rest of the Expansion Pass, maybe allowing them to carry a game for multiple years under less resources on their part compared to trying to make a whole new game. That way, maybe they can devote even more resources to future generations and remakes. That’s all just speculation though. I’m kind of impatient, writing all this before the day it releases and when we get more info for the future, so basically just take this as my opinion the whole time before the DLC came out.

Honestly, though, I almost always fall into the camp of gamers completely misrepresenting the concept of DLC, saying they just cut off some of the content and made you pay extra for it. A few bad apples really soured the bunch in this case, because, even though Sword and Shield did feel kind of lacking in some places, saying the Isle of Armor or Crown Tundra would’ve been a seamless part of the game no matter what is just obviously wrong. The games felt “complete” in the sense that it is all they wanted it to be, and it has a clear start and end. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s unfinished. Again, obviously it would be better if it was free/included already, but that’s just a given.

In a similar vein…

Remakes:

Basically, I love the usual formula for remakes. I actually really liked ORAS, and I feel like it improved on so much, making me actually like Hoenn as a region. Even though I played them closer to when they game out, RSE feel like a slog compared to modern stuff, especially with the lack of the physical/special split. I can definitely feel some nostalgia for the originals still, but 90% of the time I go back to those games looking for nostalgia, getting bored by the time I get to Rustburo, and turning it off. As mentioned by Shaymay, there’s still a ton wrong with it, but I’d much rather play them all the way through compared to the originals. I do still want to force myself through them eventually, though.

Heartgold and Soulsilver are widely considered to be the best games in the whole franchise, so I don’t have to say much. I’m not a Johto nut so I’m not the best at selling it, but I will say it feels so much more colorful and polished visually than the rest of Gen 4.

Firered and Leafgreen have the same problems that make me dislike RSE, but Let’s Go Pikachu and Eevee are the strange cases that make the future so uncertain. I liked them for what they were, but I swear God if they do that one more time it’s going to make the fanbase erupt. The Let’s Go formula worked for Kanto because a lot of the people playing Go are people who knew the original games but not the newer ones, making Let’s Go a good entry point with mostly familiar territory and slightly dumbed down gameplay. It may work again if they do a Let’s Go in Johto, but if they do it for Sinnoh, since it’s the next one on the chopping block, it’s going to fall insanely flat. Barely anyone who only loves Go also seriously wants to play through Sinnoh. There’s little nostalgia there, and the nostalgia with Sinnoh resides in everyone else who loves the games as they are/as they originally were. Plus, people say they’re some of the hardest games, so dumbing them down ruins part of the appeal more. Since remakes pretty much entirely profit off of nostalgia (and partially from people wanting to experience a region without the limitations of its origins) they really need to just, you know, remake the game. Same deal as any Pokemon game, just with better (if you’d call it that) graphics and modern sensibilities. Considering all remakes (IMO) look better than their originals, I don’t think we have to worry an insane amount about them looking as iffy as SwSh. I don’t think they look THAT bad already, but I definitely think they’re some of the ugliest in the series.

I will say that I do still want remakes to happen. I’m a sucker for nostalgia, and I love seeing graphically enhanced versions of past regions. Also, my favorite region is up next, so I really just want to see what happens. I’m a shill so it can’t make me hate the originals more. Or, you know, maybe that just makes me a normal, reasonable person...

Graphics:

Obviously we just want texture quality, model quality, etc. But, I think there’s something to be talked about with the overall art style.

I’m not gonna lie, I was kinda into the chibi-esque models of X/Y and ORAS. It did feel like it trivialized the more serious characters, like the villains and major legendaries, as they looked too cute, so it’s probably for the best if we stick to “normal” proportions. It felt weird when I first saw Sun and Moon, but I got used to it. I always wanted to make my character look as cute as possible so the chibi style helped with that, but I have gotten some good results from Sword and Shield.

For character customization (if it even counts as “graphics”) I think Sword and Shield really hit the nail on the head. I’m kinda biased, because Moon and Ultra Moon had a really shitty shade of purple as their designated “purple” clothing, and SwSh really got my favorite shade of it right. I do think it’s great to have one style of clothing under different, generally standardized colors. But, I definitely think we need more body types. Like, one of the main reasons I play as a girl in games like this is that the boy character doesn’t even look like me anyway, so there’s really no good reason to play either. Even if it’s just one separate character option for each gender, like a Skinny male/”Round” male/Skinny female/”Round” female I’d be fine. Obviously I’d want some character sliders at some point, like pretty much every other game with character customization does, but I can settle for one more generation. The alts could even be more shoehorned rivals like in X/Y, so they basically have the design cut out for them.

One weird graphical thing I want brought back is the little circular platform your Pokemon lands on in a battle. For some reason, I really liked that. It does make the battle feel more in tune with the overall environment without it, but sometimes the battle fields look really bland and flat without it. I’d at least want the floor to be designed in a way to look like there are devoted spots for each Pokemon to stand on, even if it’s not a separate thing like in X/Y. It just feels more satisfying. Not really a big deal though, since I’ve been able to ignore it for this long.

The big thing is animations. I am getting extremely tired of the X/Y models. That’s 3 generations so far that use them, and some of them aren’t even good. I’ll never hesitate to drive this point into the ground, but I really wish Pokemon like Xatu, Charizard, Dragonite, and Salamence are permanently floating/flying in air. If it isn’t obvious, this is the way it is because of Sky Battles in X/Y, since they didn’t want to do extra work for the Pokemon permanently suspended in air. The problem is that those four Pokemon (and probably many others) really don’t feel like they are supposed to be in the air 24/7. According to their official art and sprites, they’re all on the ground. Xatu especially was made to look super tall and stout with its geometric wings flatly put on his torso, like the totem pole it’s supposed to be. In the air, it basically just hovers with his wings out, and for some reason it looks like there’s a large gust of wind keeping it afloat. It looks really weird. Salamence is also in the same boat, since its wings are so weird and not wing-like that making it constantly fly just looks so unnatural. Mega Salamence was at least designed to look like it’s supposed to be flying, but normal Salamence really should just rest on the ground. He’s too fat to be permanently lifted by his weird wings. Charizard and Dragonite aren’t as severe, since both are clearly shown to be otherwise super capable of flight, but they do feel better on their feet. I remember watching TyranitarTube’s series on one of the Extreme Randomizer hacks of the game, and in there somehow they made a Dragonite use it’s Amie/Refresh animation of sitting still on its feet in battle. It seriously felt so much better to look at, instead of this giant, poofy dragon being carried by its comically small wings. Basically, the way you should tell whether to keep them on the ground is based on the official art/sprites. That is the way the designers intended them to be depicted, so that’s the way they should be. Some exceptions that I’m actually fine with are pretty much all the regional birds, except Unfezant. They all look pretty decent flying, since flying’s basically all they do… Even Swellow, who has the same strange gust of wind as Xatu, feels more fitting like that because it seems so much more aerodynamic.

Apart from that, I just wish they were at least a little different. I’m not super against the muted colors they have compared to the sprites, but I wouldn’t be against more saturation. Considering how much work was put into all the different animations of the battles, Refresh, and both walking AND running animations, I unfortunately don’t think they’re going to change any time soon unless they explicitly say they’re going to change them for quality improvement. I would say the Pokemon from Gen 6 up are still pretty fine, since they were more meant for 3D.

As for battles, one of my favorite Pokemon games is, in fact, Pokemon Battle Revolution on the Wii. Not only was it super Sinnoh-focused, but it had multiple body types (even if I still look like none of them) with character customization for all, and great graphics for the time. People always look to it after citing the lacking Double Kick animation from SwSh, saying how animated the models were and how they liked the Pokemon actually running up to their target when using a physical attack. I will say that the model quality for a lot of them were still kind of iffy, and that some of the animations were a little too much. Specifically Pidgeotto, who was on one of the rental cards, was super energetic so as to seem a bit crazy, and felt a bit low-poly for the otherwise high quality of the environments and humans. However, going back to such a formula would be extremely welcome. I’m totally fine with the Pokemon not running up to their targets, but I wouldn’t be mad to see it put in, especially since the walking and running animations are already in the game. They would need to be balanced in terms of speed, though, since some of the animations in PBR felt really, really slow with that animation in there. Plus, some moves just need speed, like Quick Attack.

In terms of the move animations themselves, I do think some of the water effects in PBR felt too realistic compared to the rest of everything. Also, people say Double Kick looked bad in SwSh (like it ever looked good), but a hell of a lot of Fighting type animations in PBR were literally just the Pokemon walking up to their target, smacking them with nondescript flashes, and that’s it. So many of them could hardly be pieced apart depending on whether they were kicks, punches, or whatever. It would’ve been better either way if they put the physical move attack animation in for Double Kick, but PBR has its fair share of shitty move animations too. Moves like Seismic Toss looked fucking insane though, and I loved it. Seismic Toss specifically is the true test of move animation quality.

Also, it’s kinda irrelevant to anything, but I could totally get down with the Announcer from PBR returning for major battles like Gym battles or League battles. He was so much fun, even if a bit repetitive. All you need for that is a setting to turn him off, and bam. He’s a true classic.

More generally, though, I think Sword and Shield is a seriously mixed bag of graphical quality. I give the SwSh haters a lot of flack, but the one thing I 100% agree with is the texture of the trees from the Wild Area. They are god awful, even if it was in a game a decade ago. I seriously don’t know how they messed that up, since you can download better bark textures for free on the internet. Surely someone at Gamefreak could’ve done better there. If this was just a random tree in the background of some random route, then who cares, right? But no, this is practically every single tree in the Wild Area, the biggest selling point for the region and the game, where you would always spend the most time. You see so many of these trees everywhere, and they look horrible. I also hate the look of the berry trees, since they don’t seem to use the same lighting effects as everything else (just a guess though), but even apart from that the batch of lighter leaves on top of the bottom ones just looks so artificial. It looks as if they dumped a sphere of leaves on top of another sphere of leaves, like it was ice cream. Maybe some trees in the real world look like that, but sometimes it’s an artist’s job to take what sucks about reality to make it better for fiction.

On the other hand, I think locations like Motostoke look genuinely amazing. The brick textures are pretty good (compared to the tree), and all the colors and shapes of the place look really good. Also, when they go into full-on cutscene mode, the models, scenery, and everything else really shine. Obviously I’m not the king of all visual media, but it’s just weird to see that. It’s hard to compare to past games, because everything else was either 2D or on the 3DS, which wasn’t as powerful. Even though the Wii is definitely less powerful than the Switch, it doesn’t really count since there’s infinitely less content to worry about in PBR. Much more of the work could’ve gone into the graphics. Really, there doesn’t feel like there’s any excuse unless crunching is involved on the business side of things, which I really hope isn’t an issue for their sake. I would honestly love to see them announce that they’re taking a year or two off to devote themselves fully to a new generation, instead of trying to keep a yearly schedule. Something something Miyamoto quote something something.

Stylistically, it’s also a mixed bag, but at least this time it’s all just subjective. It feels like a lot of the game is meant to be somewhat blobbed together in some ways, like its a painting meant to be looked at from afar. It feels like there aren’t major outlines for things. Specifically with the Pokemon, they don’t have that outline they’ve had for the 2 generations before. It’s never been a big deal, and I really hate how low quality the outline made the models feel, so I don’t really know which style I want. Even though it’s still decent, I feel like most 3D models made to have a super notable outline on them look a little funky sometimes with it, so I don’t know if I want that, but without it they just don’t feel as solid. I really just don’t know there.

Music:

It feels like, even if a franchise is kinda iffy, the music is still consistently top tier. Like, no one thinks Sonic games have objectively bad music, even if they don’t like it. If they do, they’re just wrong. Pokemon’s the same, so thankfully this isn’t a test of which past game had the highest quality music. I do think the Wild Battle theme in SwSh does feel like it has a weird melody, but that is super outclassed by universally acclaimed bangers like the Slumbering Weald, and the battle themes of Marnie, Bede, Oleana, and the Battle Tower. Those aren’t just the best the generation has to offer, they’re seriously amazing themes.

Back in Gen 7, we have the Kahuna Battle, all themes of Team Skull and the Aether Foundation, Lillie’s theme, the Ultra Beasts (which might be more contentious but I like it) and Hau’oli City at night. In Gen 6, I at least liked the themes of Laverre City, Team Flare, and ESPECIALLY the Xerneas/Yveltal battle theme. Don’t even get me started about Pokemon Battle Revolution. I could go on and on, but I at least want to spotlight ORAS here because they knocked it out of the park with Archie and Maxie’s battle theme. It was the perfect drop, because the intro felt super muted and boring, and I was afraid they completely snubbed it, but the drop completely blew me away, and absolutely perfected the theme with the crazy trumpets Hoenn is known for. Also, Zinnia’s theme is amazing, as well as many other themes that are just improvements over the originals. The one thing I’m semi-iffy on is the Regi theme, an amazing theme for my favorite trio, but I never think anyone really makes it feel as lumbering and deep as it should, considering what it’s supposed to represent. The beat is arranged as it should, but it never feels punchy enough for me.

I’m really just praising the music here. Frankly, I see no reason to think the music is getting any worse.

Difficulty/EXP Share:

They’re basically the same thing, at least according to Gamefreak.

I always keep the EXP share on, but I do think that making it a permanent addition to the game was a major mistake. As explained in Shaymay’s video, it actually increases the overall experience you gain in battle, at least before. That seems absurd to make a permanent addition (although they likely changed it in SwSh because of that). I honestly just use it because I’m not into a challenge in games, but it should definitely be optional, if for no other reason than to be a bootleg difficulty slider. However, What about the difference between the Gen 6+ version and previous versions?

I think it’s easy. Make it like pre-Gen 6, but give you multiple shares. So, if you want to train up two underleveled Pokemon, make it so you don’t have to swap it between them. That way, if you really want to just spread the EXP thin, you can give one to everyone you have, and that’s that. Also, I think it should perfectly split the EXP, not adding anything onto it. If everyone on your team has one and you get 120 EXP, that’s 20 EXP for everyone. Of course, I do actually love the mechanic of being able to switch the share holder in to give them a disproportionately larger amount of EXP compared to everyone else. It just doubles the effectiveness of switch training, and makes it better for when you want to train them up but specifically not the higher level Pokemon you’re using to fight.

Some part of me wants to keep my precious easy mode in, but then I realize… Just make actual difficulty differences. Just give us a choice. Even if it’s just a “How well do you know the Pokemon world?” with a “I know all about it/I’m a bit unsure” text box in the beginning. In the harder variant, tutorials will be skipped automatically, trainers will have higher AI, and better teams. However, I don’t think higher levels is a perfect foil, because that can just be beat with grinding, and grinding is boring. Also, I’d have to guess the main reason why Gamefreak didn’t do this in the first place is that trading Pokemon would differ a bit between difficulties with different level curves, although apart from it just sounding like a bad thing I’m struggling to think of a genuine reason why it is. But, for the sake of playing, grinding sucks. It’s not fun, and I honestly think you shouldn’t just bump up levels and call it difficulty, because you don’t actually need skill to beat a higher level, just a better level and maybe RNG. But, if you actually had to effectively train a team of more than six, with Pokemon you swap out depending on your opponent, you would actually need to think of how you play the game. I think the main reason Pokemon games are so easy is that you can basically choose whatever you want and do almost whatever and still win. Some fights, as far as my playstyle goes, are still decently challenging because I just choose what Pokemon I like and not as much what’s good (unless something genuinely just sucks), and those battles, even though I would probably get annoyed at losing over and over, feel so much more rewarding to beat. And, of course, that’s only like a few major fights. I’ve never had any real trouble with trainers. I only think I’ve had a bit of trouble with the elite trainers in Let’s Go because I always try to use my lowest level Pokemon first to level them up, and keep my team at completely even levels. If I always just switched in the foil to my opponent, which I inevitably had, I would almost never lose a single Pokemon, mostly because of the “switch” battle setting.

But of course that begs the question of Pokemon being balanced for children and inexperienced players. I know way too much about this game, so obviously it’s a piece of cake for me no matter what, and what I want is supposedly what would frustrate everyone else. But… again, just put in the choice. People can choose whether they want to be challenged, or if they just want to play Pokemon, and if they choose wrong that’s on them, not anyone else. They could just reset the game and try again on an easier difficulty. It’s crazy to have to vouch for this, since it’s a staple in pretty much every other game in existence. Even in my casual state, I want to play a harder Pokemon. I want to test myself. Online competition is a bit much for me, but the AI is too little. Even in me replaying Pearl right now, I’m trying to use weirder and weaker Pokemon than I usually use for difficulty, and even that game was mostly a cakewalk. I’m only stuck at the Elite Four because I was somehow super underleveled. In the generation where I experience the AI switching out the most, they still just do that at random and keep in certain Pokemon that get completely walled by what I have out, only for me to stall them to death. AI definitely should switch out (and I honestly can’t remember it happening once since Gen 5, if even then) so if anything, just give them a more solid switching ability. Considering we have the opportunity to switch in whatever we want when they are about to send out something, they really need to take advantage of the power of switching.

Gyms are a big piece of difficulty that falls apart 90% of the time. The gym puzzles are rarely hard, with only a few notable exceptions requiring major thought, like the Circhester, Snowbelle, Snowpoint, and Sootopolis gyms. See a pattern? Why the heck to Ice types/themes get the worst resistances yet the best gym puzzles? Otherwise, if you’re not just fighting trainers (which you were going to do anyway) you’re bashing your head against a wall until something sticks. The Trials of SM/USUM were universally a joke, and were it not for the Totem fight they would’ve actually made me mad by how easy they are, considering they had the opportunity to revamp the whole system and knock it out of the park.

As for the Gym Leader, assuming we have to stick with the idea that they can only use one type still, they really have to cover their bases. Like, a Water gym leader would really have to have Flying type moves or Pokemon to counteract the easy Grass weakness, or something. You can’t get to the top with just one single type and nothing else. I do kind of think a master with no specific type speciality should only be reserved for the Champion, since it makes them more special, and because it seems like any old trainer can become one if they beat the last one, meaning it’s illogical for too many of them to have one special type. I can appreciate the choice philosophies of the Gyms like Raihan and Volkner, and Flint of the Elite Four, where they do specialize in one type, but they have a lot of different Pokemon involved who only have moves of that type. It still feels consistent, but also more varied. Also, I love the 1v2 dynamic of Totem fight. Not only does it blatantly put you at a disadvantage, but since the battles aren’t explicitly type based, they can put together some seriously unique strategies, like the Sunny Day Castform partner to the Totem Lurantis. It’s literally the most basic plan you can formulate, but it sure as hell made that one of the hardest early boss fights in the series, at least for me. It was pretty good stuff. Too bad other bosses like the Ultra Necrozma fight was just kind of cheap, with a +1 to all stats and super high level… Better than nothing though.

Versions:

I get that it’s a staple of the franchise, but I really hate version exclusives/differences. They’re just dumb. Specifically the differences of Black 2 and White 2 pissed me off the most, because guess what? They did have difficulty options! But… they were version exclusive. Like White Kyurem more than Black Kyurem? Or, maybe Reuniclus is your favorite Pokemon? (not bitter) Well, too bad. You’re only allowed the expressly easier mode of the game, which you only unlock after beating it normally????? That’s just stupid. I’d sort of be okay with it if you unlocked easy mode after normal mode, then unlocking hard mode after beating easy mode (like how I thought it was before I looked it up), but limiting stuff like that is just ridiculous. I mean, it’s dumb to have to unlock an easy mode after beating the normal game to begin with. I’m honestly considering trying to beat easy mode without evolving any Pokemon though. Self-imposed difficulty is fun sometimes, but yeah…

Also, the differences of Sun and Moon also are dumb. Like playing in the day, but like Lunala more? Maybe Purple is your all-time favorite color and you want to wear it? Well, too bad. Go ahead and flip your 3DS’s internal clock around, messing up all other time based games you play. It’s a gimmick that transcends Mega Evolution, Z-Moves, and Dynamax.

Now, there’s a completely new problem: Some people bought the wrong expansion pass for their game. Because there were two versions, people literally just wasted money on absolutely nothing. To be fair, those people are blind idiots, but still. I really just want one version. Please.

The whole semi-in-grouping that happens when the version exclusive Pokemon are first revealed is kinda fun, but 90% of the time people have to settle for a few Pokemon they like and a few they don’t. For example, I bought Sword specifically because I like Zacian more, and the legendaries would be much harder to come by than other version exclusives. In the meanwhile, I preferred practically every other version exclusive over Sword’s, including but not limited to my boy Reuniclus. I don’t use old Pokemon in newer generations anyway, but it still sucks to have to choose like that.

It was obviously meant to give people much more to look for, since they physically can’t get some Pokemon, and have them interact with others to get them. The only problem is that we just have the Internet now. It doesn’t help to just ask someone online for a trade for a version exclusive. It’s just an extra stepping stone that really isn’t that fun to deal with.

I was originally going to say that the games/console cost more so less people would buy them, but considering SwSh absolutely knocked it out of the park, overselling even the highest selling games from the past, that’s clearly not an issue. My sister even bought Let’s Go Pikachu after buying Let’s Go Eevee for herself, since we both initially got Eevee. Thankfully she seems relatively into buying the games now, so we can coordinate and get different versions. That’s how I was able to complete my Pokedex for the first time in Sword (although obviously there’s less Pokemon to find). I think she even bought a separate Sword version for herself too… Is this what the average consumer is like?

Honestly all of this is just sort of subjective because really it’s not a big deal, but it would be so much less of a deal and make the games much more perfect and reasonable story wise if they just used one version. For example, Circhester is clearly an Ice-themed location, but in Sword you face a Rock gym leader, instead of the Ice one. And, the opposite is true in Stow-on-side, because Sword has the more logical gym with the boxing gloves punching you around and the tough city that feels as Fighting as Fighting could be without being a literal dojo. But, in Shield you face some Ghost kid. To be fair, I do like that version exclusivity is bleeding into some of the characters too, so if there is to be version exclusives at all let there be version exclusive characters, but it would just feel so much better to have it all sorted into one place. Also, to consider past installments, Ho-oh is clearly more important to the overall plot of the world than Lugia is, as shown by Ho-oh always being an important, mystical lore figure in the Anime and such, while Lugia is just like “Wow, there’s Lugia! So powerful!” Thankfully the plot didn’t entirely revolve around them, but it could’ve if they just focused on Ho-oh.

Story:

Pokemon has definitely had its fair share of dumb stories, which is excusable because it’s not actually the focus of the game, but it doesn’t hurt to have.

You obviously can’t talk story without talking about Black and White. Also, you really can’t talk a Pokemon story without talking about the evil Team in each game, because they’re basically the entire motor for plot. Still, though, Team Plasma is easily the best Team in the franchise for story purposes. The biggest thing is that they seem like the most reasonable team, making them seem like people who are just so into their ideals that it looks like a cult. Also, in B2W2, they actually split up into the friendly division of Plasma, where they actually carry out their goals of wanting Pokemon to be happy and free, while Neo-Plasma does all the Team Rocket-level shenanigans that mess everything up. Not only is it just reasonable, but it answers a question that comes with the overall concept of the franchise: How can Pokemon want to battle for the sake of humans, etc? It doesn’t make sense, and naturally someone in the world would take that to the extreme when they realized it. It also makes sense why the grunts are so hellbent on wreaking havoc around Unova, because they are each led to truly believe what they are doing is right for the world. Other villains like Archie and Cyrus are just like “humans are bad, let’s destroy them” which is like a lite version of this idea, but it feels almost too supervillain-y to take seriously, and the grunts just feel like henchmen. Plasma feels just real enough, with somewhat level-headed people like N making it seem like they’re almost not crazy.

People always say Team Rocket is the best, but even though their motives are so simple enough so as to seem real and good story-wise, they do feel like they don’t really add anything to the overall idea of Pokemon. At the time it was just “Pokemon are strong so bad people can use strong Pokemon for bad” which makes sense, but really doesn’t feel like it extends beyond that. Don’t get me wrong, I would say they’re objectively second best (because subjectively Galactic is my #1) but I do think Plasma is better.

Since they’re the most recent, Team Yell is the most nothing out of this list. That only makes them second worst, above Team Flare, who felt like they were trying to do something big but fell flat. Team Yell as the resident “evil Team” feels weird, because they do almost nothing. They are only similar to Skull on the surface, that being all rough-and-tumble teenager types, as underneath them being a toxic fanbase is somewhat interesting, but they, again… just felt like nothing. The plot wasn’t even close by to them, like with Skull was, being tied in with the Aether Foundation. They’re just there to be goons and go away. At least they did lead to the first Dark type gym leader, but again… their leader is a Gym leader. We would’ve seen him no matter what he did, so it feels less interesting. I do want the Team to actually do something.

The problem is that, since Plasma already did good, how do you do something that’s original but still good? To be honest, I want it to involve Foundations, like a morally good alternative archetype to the evil Team. Our first run-in with a Foundation was led astray by a crazy leader, but it seems like they’re still good overall, so I at least want to see more of them. Maybe instead of the Team searching for world domination by using the box legendary, maybe you and the Foundation have to search for the box legendary so they can help you defeat the Team, who may or may not have the third/another legendary on their side, and you have to prove yourself to it to get it to trust you. Sort of like Sword and Shield, but more involved. Zacian and Zamazenta just sort of appear when things go bad, and that’s it. You just hear stories about them before that. That’s at least better structure-wise, although the motives and themes would still have to be dealt with. There are so many possibilities there it’s hard to choose.

One thing, though: I definitely believe that Pokemon was never even close to an open world game, and people thinking the new games are too linear compared to the old ones just have rose tinted glasses on. Kanto had bad crossing over, where you’d sometimes find yourself severely overleveled when interacting with a story event, and beyond that all other games were pretty linear too, with only a few slight special, optional areas that aren’t involved with the plot. Of course, I still think the game would benefit from being open world. Some games don’t have to be open world, and that makes them feel sort of empty, but Pokemon as an idea is exactly perfect for that. They were toying with the idea a bit with the Wild Area, and I do think if they really went crazy with that idea it could be fun. Everyone always wants to compare it to Breath of the Wild, but I do love how seamless everything is in that game. Even with the enemies popping up out of the grass/flying down from the air/just romping in a set area like Pokemon would. Gym leaders could just use different teams based on how many badges you have, like how they imply it works in that Pokemon Origins series. Then, you might be able to scale up the Pokemon you can find too that way, like with the Wild Area. BotW’s story was very light, but if you just either use a quest system/map markers you can still manage a decent story in an open world. Plus, Pokemon has a ton of side quests anyways, like all the ghost quests they always seem to put in. You can literally “get” the quest, get distracted, and completely forget you were even doing any sort of quest because they don’t remind you in any way. Side quests could even get you extra doses of EXP for your team, giving them a use.

The Gimmick:

I don’t want every generation to have a gimmick. Ideas are severely limited in that front, and when everyone’s special, no one is.

Mega Evolution was kinda cool, as it improved on old Pokemon without making them another part of an evolutionary chain. Also, it lets some Pokemon get different forms with entirely different strategies to them (even if they’re version exclusive…) But, as someone who plays Pokemon for the monster designs themselves, I actually kinda don’t like it. No, not because Mega designs are bad, but because they completely trump the designs they evolve from. For example, Mawile isn’t just “Mawile” anymore. It’s more of a “Not-mega Mawile.” It feels so much less complete now that it has a form on top of it that isn’t permanent. Same goes for starters like Sceptile, who feels kind of boring compared to its Mega. It always sucks when a Pokemon you like evolves into something you don’t like (Popplio for me) and you have to deal with the fact that, even if you like a Pokemon, you aren’t supposed to keep it like that, and it’s brought down because of it. I mean, I guess this is all just personal. Obviously it’s easy to like an early evolution, but it feels so much better to like a final evolution. Since Megas are both temporary in battle, not available outside of battle, and limited to the very late game usually, liking a Mega feels kinda pointless for in-game purposes, where you interact with your Pokemon the most. Plus, for Pokemon like Mawile, you’re using an “incomplete” Pokemon for as long as you don’t have the right Mega stone. It’s obviously fine when all your other Pokemon are incomplete as well, but yeah… Just kinda sucks sometimes. Plus, anything achieved by Mega Evolutions could just as easily be achieved by normal evolutions. The only issue is Pokemon like Beedrill not being able to evolve again, and Pokemon like the starters or legendaries who are already too good to get another stage. I feel like weak, 3rd stage Pokemon like Beedrill deserve that kind of treatment the most, but no one else. If they can evolve normally, evolve them normally, and if they’re already too good, just let them be.

Then there’s Z-moves, which solves one problem of Mega-Evolution: All Pokemon can get involved. No matter what, your Pokemon can unleash super cool but sometimes questionably named moves. And, apart from new animations, the special Z-moves aren’t so insanely preferable to the normal ones. It’s cool, but if every Pokemon gets to use them, it kinda gets old after a while. Also, it’s a one-time use, so if you fuck it up it’s wasted. It’s definitely not perfect, but I will say I love the special Z-move animations, mainly because it’s not just Pokemon doing stock animations for a quick little attack. They animated that Pokemon specifically for this attack, which is basically a cutscene, and it always looks better. It is a bit strange, though, that even though Z-moves are seemingly named after Zygarde, it doesn’t even get a special Z-move of its own. That dude really got the shaft when it comes to 3rd legend attention...

Now we have Dynamax and Gigantamax. I just want to say that, when it first was revealed that you can turn your Pokemon into Kaiju I was extremely hyped. More hyped than I had any right to be. Considering nothing else, Dynamax definitely is the winner in terms of visual concept. Not only does it just look cool, but I love how Gym stadiums are designed specifically to accommodate them. It’s a nice touch of worldbuilding (even though it’s basically necessary). Unfortunately… It’s easily the Jack of all trades, master of none in terms of gameplay. It’s like Mega Evolution in how you change the appearance and power of your Pokemon, and it’s like Z-moves because they have super powerful moves with special effects. Sounds alright I guess, but I really just wish they kept the previous two gimmicks instead of just making a new one that checks them both off. Also, Gigantamax actually annoys me. They try to make it seem like your Pokemon changes, but the vast majority of them either look worse or hardly change at all. Specifically, Copperaja looks like an absolute joke, even though normal Copperaja is one of my favorites of the region. But, ones like Hatterene, Corviknight, Garbodor, and Grimmsnarl hardly look any different at all. Even Appultun and Flapple have the exact same Gigantamax. Who cares? Even their moves have almost exactly the same animations as their type’s counterparts, with a slightly different particle effect. It’s so much less interesting than they make it seem, and it has all the problems of liking Megas over their base, but worse, since they’re more temporary and only allowed in certain areas. Plus, Gigantamax isn’t even a thing possible with all members of a single species. Obviously now they’re introducing a way to change that, but at that point why not just do it Mega style? It’s not even that much better, but there’s so much more work in it. It’s like less rare shinies. It did bring about a decent event in the games, those being the Max Raid Battles, which both have good rewards and good challenge to them. I don’t have friends so they suck for me, but with friends it looks awesome.

I feel like the worst part is that they probably are just going to retcon these gimmicks in the future, like they did with the Pokedex. It makes sense, but each thing was made to be such a massive deal in their respective regions, it feels lame that they’re just gone now.

But, oh my god. You have no idea. Regional Variants are the best thing to happen to Pokemon since, I dunno, whatever. They’re amazing, and something that should never leave the franchise ever. Like a Kantonian form more than an Alolan form? Sure. It’s still there with all its power, it just has a different style in this region. That is not only biologically logical, but it brings back interest in a Pokemon without outclassing the classics. Plus, now it feels like every single Pokemon has a possibility to shine that is both permanent and preserving of the original. I just can’t get enough of it. Then Sword and Shield introduced the idea of Regional Evolutions, which can be both plain evolutions and split evolutions from the normal form like with Cofagrigus and Runerigus, meaning the possibilities are endless. Then, even further, regional LEGENDARIES. It doesn’t make sense lore-wise but who cares, the new birds look awesome as all hell and I actually like them now. It’s so perfect, I don’t want anything more than this in future games. I would kill for some Sinnoh variants of post-gen 4 Pokemon in the remakes. Hell, I hope Sinnoh gets revamped with a ton of different options across the later generations so it feels significantly different from the originals.

As for things like Primal Reversion, I honestly don’t even know. It’s even less significant than Gigantamax, but since it has more interesting lore I’m sort of fine with it. I do hope they use it for other legends too, especially since Palkia and Dialga are just asking for it, with their respective orbs, and Dialga already having the “Primal” title elsewhere. And yes, I know he’s called “Dark Dialga” in Japanese.

If I may be so bold, I think a neat gimmick that can be both unique, interesting, and completely alter the strategies of battle, would be some sort of temporary type inversion. That is, everything going out of and coming into the inverted Pokemon will have reverse effectiveness. It’s like the fringe little Inverse battle you can go through in X/Y, but turned into a mechanic that’s inserted into normal battles. Visually, it would give the Pokemon a negative look, as in inverting their colors and shading. I don’t see how this could single out certain Pokemon in a special way, like with a form change or anything, but maybe there could be one specific Pokemon that has an ability that does something special when it inverts. Maybe items could be made for a special use too. I was sort of half-using it for a fan region I’m half-devoted to that will likely not be a full fledged idea, but I do like it.

Roadblocks/HMs:

I’m entirely fine with the way things are now, where you just get the HMs as key items you use whenever you want, but I can sympathize with the small contingent of people who like using their Pokemon to traverse the world, instead of anything else. I definitely think anyone who prefers HMs beyond that reason is an absolute lunatic, but I think there is some sort of a point to be made, and I think a combo of Let's Go and Sun and Moon have the answer. It is so much more fun to ride your Pokemon around than it is to get a bike (and put on some seriously ugly clothing, mind you), and I think Let's Go with giving you the option to ride your Pokemon instead of using a bike is seriously fun. I used a Rapidash almost exclusively for that purpose in my run of that game. Who the hell wouldn’t want to ride a Rapidash, assuming you weren’t going to catch fire? Plus, it’s YOUR Rapidash. Ride Pokemon in Sun and Moon were still pretty good, because they served functions you wouldn’t normally expect from HMs, like Tauros being both your bike replacement and Rock Smash, while Stoutland is a dowsing rod. It does get a bit weird when you “ride” a Machamp just so it can push rocks for you, but it’s better than forcing you to teach one of your team members a normal type move at the very end of the game since you absolutely need it to move on, and having to keep it until you can fly back to the move deleter. Honestly, if you could just delete HMs on the fly, they would be so much more acceptable. Still would be worse than what we have now tho.

Basically, I think Pokemon should have inherent HM abilities in them. That is, every single Tauros you catch can smash rocks, and every single Machamp you catch can push rocks. Each Pokemon would either be capable or incapable of a task, and you only need that species to go through it. That way, you’re both using your own Pokemon, while also not limiting their moves. It also makes it easy to tell why birds like Starly shouldn’t be able to carry you and fly you around, while birds like Staraptor can. I also think any road blocks using Rock Smash or Cut should be entirely optional, and for secrets only. In order to make Fly a limited option, maybe only fully evolved Fly-logical Pokemon can use it, so you can’t just fly somewhere in the early game. But, another thing: if you can fly early, so what? It’s not like you get extra options, you only can go back to places you’ve already been to. Even though it doesn’t make sense logically, it’s a very fair piece of game design that really doesn’t have a super obvious reason why it’s limited to the middle few gyms. If you have a strong bird that can pick you up, you obviously worked enough to get some convenience.

But then, what would be a roadblock to keep you from going too far? A horde of dancing men? Honestly, that’s just one of those things fixed by my open world idea. Maybe some areas can be super strong so as to tell you that you shouldn’t be there, and maybe implement the idea of the Wild Area where you can’t catch the strong-looking Pokemon, but apart from that make most of the world scale up with you. Surely some areas would be slightly higher leveled then the rest, though, for the sake of variety. The Wild area does get a bit stale when literally everything you encounter is exactly lvl 60. Obviously there could be some pointless story-focused roadblocks that only clear when you progress, because that is how it is in real life. You can’t just walk into some business’ office unless you have business there. Of course, you can’t exactly walk into random strangers’ houses either, but still.

I do want to praise ORAS again because the Soar feature with the Latis was extremely cool. It was like Ride Pokemon but using the objectively coolest possible HM to control. If they sort of nerfed the Fly mechanic and made it so you did have to ride your Pokemon and fly them there like the Latis I wouldn't mind that at all. Although, surely some other people would...

Other Bits:

- I still think that, even though having every Pokemon in the game would be great, I think if it can improve the game elsewhere I wouldn’t mind them saving some space. The problem is that Sword and Shield really wasn’t the best way to suggest it would vastly improve anything. I’ve gone on ad nauseam elsewhere about that so bleh

- I love seeing Pokemon in the overworld. I do think it would benefit from the Let’s Go treatment, where you can at least see if a Pokemon is shiny or not. Either way, it gives them so much more personality, like how some charge head-first at you while some walk up and casually examine you.

- I don’t really care too much about Pokemon following you to be honest. It would obviously be preferred over the alternative, but I’m not gonna riot if it doesn’t happen. It did give a lot of personality I didn’t expect in Lets Go, like Bellsprout being so darn speedy.

- I could probably make a whole nother giant rant about the overall designs of Pokemon but needless to say I’m fine with it overall. I do sort of wish they’d do something else with the starters though, since I haven’t genuinely loved a starter since Gen 4. Honestly Chesnaught was pretty close, but I still get the urge to replace him with something more interesting. Outside of them, though, I think things are going good. Some are duds, but some are bangers like Corvinight, Grimmsnarl, Hatterene, Frosmoth, and a bunch of others which I could easily list but this is supposed to be succinct comments so

- There definitely has to be some sort of endgame content, but everyone already knows that. Seriously though, what if the colosseums from PBR become the replacement Battle Frontier? That would be dope. Although the normal Battle Frontier would be fine too, I guess…

- PBR PBR PBR. PBR is great for it’s realistic sizes of Pokemon. If you’re going to use full-size models of humans, the Pokemon should match. Or, at least make it a little more true to reality. Yes, Wailord is too damn small.

#Pokemon #sword #shield #rant #rambling #dlc #isle of armor #opinions #it seriously took me 5 hours straight to write all this #ideas

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mysticdragon3md3 · 5 years ago

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So I just found out about Figuarts Mini, and...

BENDABLE INVISIBLE JOINTS?! O.O!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Talk about competing with Nendoroids. The one thing half of Nendoroid collectors complain about is visible joints. Of course, those tend to be the collectors who also prefer static scale figures, and Bandai's previous attempt at invisible jointed chibi figures "Chibi-Arts" didn't really take off... But if Bandai Spirits can do better advertising (like they told Forbes they would) and get more licensed characters for their line than Bandai Tamashii Nations did with Chibi-Arts, maybe it'll do well.

And these Figuarts Mini are similar in size too: 9cm, vs Nendoroids' 10cm. I heard from Imaginary Worlds Podcast that figure licenses are usually distributed by figure height. So if Figuarts Mini are claiming the 90mm height, then it doesn't matter if they double up on characters already made by Good Smile Company's 100mm Nendoroids. *o* Is this why Good Smile has recently been able to get licenses for series from Bandai/Sunrise/Toei? Bandai was always notorious for hoarding their licenses. Especially away from Good Smile Company. GSC even lamented about it during an Anime Expo panel once. That's why you never see Nendoroids of Dragonball, One Piece, Magi, Sailormoon, and other series with licenses from Sunrise and Toei Animation chained to Bandai. ...Even if Bandai hardly does anything with them! I mean, sure, Bandai will make Gunpla for Code Geass, but only 2 Chibi-Arts for Code Geass, and neither are of the main character Lelouch?!? Anyway... But in recent years, Good Smile has gotten licenses from Bandai/Sunrise/Toei series, like Dr. Slump, Doremi, Escaflowne, etc. Are Bandai letting them have some licenses for thier 10cm Nendoroids, because they got out of the 10cm chibi figure market and now Good Smile using their licenses won't take those characters away from the 9cm Figuarts Mini roster? *o* Good glob, that means we may get all those Sunrise and Toei Nendoroids that used to be locked up with Bandai!!! *O*!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Still, I think Figuarts Mini make the same mistake as Chibi-Arts. Chibi-Arts were posable chibi figures, but they weren't articulated nor were their parts compatible between characters. You could change a Chibi-Arts figure's pose, but only to pre-designed alternate poses, and not much else. And you could barely change parts between figures. Maybe within the same series, characters could exchange faceplates, like Code Geass Chibi-Arts and Kamen Rider W Chibi-Arts, but that was about it. Eventually, Bandai phased out the switchable parts and alternate poses in their Chibi-Arts, like in their static Tiger & Bunny Chibi-Arts. One of the best things about Nendoroids is their customizability. I have several customized Nendoroids of characters not officially offered by Good Smile, and I never even had to re-paint or re-sculpt anything. I just switched some parts between different characters---from different series too. And even within one character in and of itself, their parts are so articulated that I can customize poses with more variety, regardless of whatever figure photography concept I'm trying to shoot.

On the other hand, there are those static figure collectors, who hate visible joints. And there are a lot of figure collectors who don't even care for posing or customizing their figures. Plus, I do hear from a lot of collectors who hate dealing with small parts and have trouble getting joints to stay in their pegs. These are the people who say authentic Nendoroids "fall apart", even though bootlegs are the only ones with that type of bad quality. But I will have to admit, if my hands wasn't inherently adept and/or conditioned throughout the years with fine motor skills, I'd probably have trouble putting together Nendoroids too. Actually, even with my hands, there are a few non-bootleg Nendos that still give me trouble. ^^; So if Figuarts Mini goes for that market, they may just survive.

Honestly, I'm kind of excited to see, in person, the type of material around the bendable parts. Is it silicone rubber? How many years will it stay flexible? This could be really exciting, even if its sacrifices some versatility/customization. It'll at least be interesting. I should at least get one, like I did with Kotobukiya's Nendo rival, Cu-Poche. Now make a Lelouch!

#figure collecting #bandai tamashii nations #bandai spirits #nendoroid #comparison #chibi #articulated figures #figure line

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detectivesebcas · 6 years ago

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Evil Within Tag Game

I was tagged by @supportivepsychopath (Thanks!):

When did you first play it? October 2014- right when it came out. I’m a huge survival horror fan, so it was on my radar as soon as it was announced with Shinji Mikami’s name on it. I enjoyed the first game so much that the announcement of the sequel was what prompted me to finally get a current gen console. Played the second game October 2017, again right after it came out.

Which part did you play first? I played both games from beginning to end, having only seen the first trailer for each (to avoid spoilers).

Which DLC is your favorite? The Assignment. I don’t particularly like Kidman, but I did enjoy the emphasis on stealth.

Who’s your favorite character? Sebastian Castellanos, of course :)

Which character do you hate the most? Probably Jimenez. There are other characters who did much worse things than he did, but he seems like he did the wrong things for the most selfish, superficial reasons.

What creature do you like more than the others? The Keeper- I was so disappointed that the canon explanation for why he exists is so boring. I thought they could have done a lot more with him as a representation of thoughts or memories that we repress but that Ruvik has access to because he’s linked to everyone’s mind. His visual design wasn’t anything special for me, but I loved the concept of a safe-based enemy in a game about the mind.

What creature scared you the most? I had a very visceral reaction to Shade, mostly because of how she moves and the creepy voice. Can’t really say that anything else in the games scared me, but Shade definitely got me my first time through the DLC.

Ruvik or Stefano? Both have their moments, and I think they’re both utilized well as villains who still give the player reasons to sympathize with them. Both of them also influence the STEM environment in visually interesting ways. I guess I’d have to say that Ruvik has a more interesting backstory, but there is something so compelling about Stefano, especially in his death scene.

Which chapters from the entire game did you like most? I’m answering this from a gameplay perspective, as there might be some storyline or artistic reasons to prefer other chapters. From the first game: Chapter 2 (still early enough in a new game that stealth is required and tension is high), Chapter 9 (sort of a throwback to the early Resident Evil games with exploration and puzzles). From the second game: Chapters 3, 7, 11, 13 (I enjoyed the comparatively open world of these chapters, especially on Classic mode, where decision-making and strategy really became important). I think all of this goes back to my old school survival horror background. I need some tension in my games- not just limited resources or difficult enemies but having to make meaningful choices about how to interact with the game world.

Favorite ship? Sebastian/Stefano <3 I may never understand why, but they got me to start writing fanfiction again after a 7-8 year break. While I can appreciate Joseb or Ruseb, SteSeb is the only ship that I regularly write/read.

Something you want to change about the game? More decisions. Not like an RPG where text comes up on screen and you have to decide something, but alternate paths, more side objectives, alternate story events depending on player actions. Unfortunately in a STEM environment the possibilities could be literally endless, so there would have to be some arbitrary limitations to keep the assets down to a manageable level, but anything that gives the player more agency would be nice.

Top 3 lines that were said in the game and you liked? I might be paraphrasing a little bit here:

“It’s just a theory, but I’d say he wants us dead.” Jimenez

“Trying to make me feel sorry for you?” Sebastian

Basically the whole exchange between Sebastian and Myra at the end of Chapter 12 of the second game.

Do you call Ruvik Ruben or Ruvik? Pre-STEM I’d call him Ruben; post-STEM Ruvik.

What’s your favorite weapon? Well, the question is “favorite weapon”, not “most useful weapon”, so I’m going with the shotgun. (Most useful weapon would be the crossbow.)

Favorite place you went through? In the first game, the village in chapter 2, but especially the dock where you can look at the lighthouse. In the second game, the whole City Hall sequence.

I will tag: @whatsanapocalae, @ruvikkin-art, @chibi--raiden. Anybody else who is interested, please feel free to participate!

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zedrin-maybe · 7 years ago

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Commissions - XMas Speshul

EDIT2: Alright, putting some thoughts on this, I might’ve jumped the gun. Given the volume of commissions I’m not going to be accepting any more, until maybe after I get this first batch done.

After buying and building the new PC parts my paypal is basically empty.

So I’ll be doing a few commissions for a week only, at a reduced rate!

There are no limits to how many I’ll take, but I’ll stop taking new ones after 12/20.

(EDIT: PROBABLY SOONER BECAUSE HOLY SHIT THERE ARE A LOT OF YOU)

These are meant to be speedy, so no backgrounds this time (abstract backgrounds are okay). (Edit: I want to stress that these are meant to be speedy, quick commissions. That’s why they’re cheap. Please keep it limited to more simple ideas. Big works are something for another time.)

RATES: This shows the base cost of a full body, and then the cost of an additional character or a bust shot in parenthesis. Max of 3 chars in a pic.

Sketch: $10 ($6)

Lineart: $15 ($9)

Flat Color: $20 ($12)

Cell Shaded: $25 ($15)

Patreon Discounts: all patreon supporters can knock $1, $2, $3, or $4 off the total cost (based on sketch to lineart).

Character discounts: Additionally, if you commission something of my own characters, you can also knock off $1-$4 off the extra character cost, or twice the amount if it’s a solo pic.

Generic characters: One other thing I want to offer: the character discount above can also apply if you have a nonspecific character in mind. E.g., if you just want to see a drawing of a random lamia doing something, and you are fine with ANY character as long as they are a lamia, you can request this. (You can also specify a few vague traits as well, such as maybe a main color or two or body type. And yes if you like the character you may keep them when done. Just do not select this option if there was a specific character you had in mind, however.)

Some examples:

A lineart bust shot of your OC would be $9

A sketch bust shot of two characters would be $12 ($6 + $6)

A flat pic of just Flux would be $14 ($20 - 6)

A flat pic of your OC + Pivot would be $20 + $12 - 3. ($29)

Picture references are required. They just need to be images that have been done before, they don’t necessarily need to be a full ref sheet. I will not be doing character concept art this time around. (The exception to this is if you decide to ‘adopt’ a generic design you commission. It’d basically be like “Can you come up with an [X] OC for me? With [Y] color and feature [Z].”)

sure let’s do it:

nsfw (even fetishy stuff as long as it’s not in the no-no zone)

furry, robot, monster, etc.

nsfw of my own characters is okay within reason

complex designs may need to be slimmed down / simplified. I’ll let you know if this is an issue.

If you wanna request something stylewise (e.g., ‘binary brush,’ chibi proportions, or want me to aim for a certain style), let me know

Want alt versions / edits? Sure. There’ll be a surcharge for these that scales with the complexity of the edit.

No-no-zone:

no unsanitary fetishes (scat / watersports / farting / burping)

no vore / feet etc

no MLP or FNAF. No altering these types of characters to ‘not’ be part of their fandom

nothing illegal

nothing hateful

if it’s something of my own chars if they’re acting out of character I’ll probably need to decline.

this is not an exhaustive list. I’m usually open to a wide variety of ideas, but if there is something that I do not feel comfortable with doing, I will not do it. (And trying to force me to do it would result in a subpar job anyway.)

Payment is through paypal. I’ll send an invoice and start work once it’d paid. (As I send an invoice, I need the email you use for paypal. Do not send me money directly.)

To order, send me a message over messenger, or shoot me an email at

pv02.pivot [at] gmail.com

Additionally, if you have any limits with presentation (e.g. you don’t want it streamed) be sure to let me know

#zedtext

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armorbirdpress · 7 years ago

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Armor Bird Reviews: Black Panther

Heyo, it's been so freaking long since I've done a movie review! But in the wake of all the positive reactions, hype, and feels surrounding the Black Panther movie, I knew for a fact that I HAD to give it a review after seeing it this past weekend. I’ve already posted this review on the PPC Board, so if you want to check it out, the alternative link is here!

Black Panther is a 2018 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, and is the eighteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Directed by Ryan Coogler, and written by Coogler and Joe Robert Cole, it stars Chadwick Boseman as T'Challa/Black Panther, alongside Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, and Andy Serkis. As with any MCU movie, a lot of fanfare and attention has been drawn to this film, and I was dying to see it to determine if it lived up to all the hype; I am so very glad that we got tickets in advance to watch this movie, because otherwise all the seats would’ve been taken by the time we got to the theater - there were just that many people who wanted to see it. And just as well, because good golly, it is an absolute masterpiece. Spoilers under the cut!

Starting things off with the writing and characterization, I have to say that almost all the characters in the film were enjoyable and engaging to watch, and there were plenty of great moments from everyone concerned. T'Challa, despite being the obvious star of the show, actually feels kinda stoic compared to the liveliness of quite a few of the secondary characters which I'll get to a bit later, but he still has a compelling storyline, and while I was worried that he'd remain somewhat static throughout the movie, there were quite a few gut punches that ensured that he'd grow as a person and also as a ruler. The movie did a good job of demonstrating that he had big shoes to fill in a metaphorical sense, and also that even if T'Chaka had tried to be the best example that he could be for his son, his past mistakes would still come to light eventually and force T'Challa to reevaluate his worldview. This is especially apparent when it becomes known that T'Chaka, when he had donned the Black Panther suit, had been forced to kill the Wakandan traitor whose son would grow up to become Killmonger. It was a split-second decision driven by the impulse to save the life of the other Wakandan spy present, but the urge to keep up appearances for the sake of the nation ended up having far-reaching consequences that would've resulted in far more unnecessary casualties if T'Challa and later M'Baku and his tribe hadn't intervened. That kind of split-second decision is mirrored in the story in general, when T'Challa's lack of information regarding Killmonger's origin story almost costs him the throne and even his life, only being saved by the intervention of M'Baku and his remaining allies' delivery of the last Heart-Shaped Herb. Eventually, after fighting his way back to his own kingdom, he's forced to deal with Killmonger using the only remaining option left after the failure of diplomacy and civility, through violence and possible death. This history essentially repeating itself is one of the biggest contributions to T'Challa's character growth, and also his decision to make Wakanda a more publicly open nation willing to use its resources to aid the world at large in the end. It shows that he's realized how much impact even very short-term decisions can have in a sort of ripple effect, as well as the major setback of trying to lock Wakanda as a whole behind figurative closed doors: that sort of isolationism prevents you from interacting with the world around you and, like it or not, making the kinds of mistakes needed to move forward.

Naturally, since T'Challa sets a pretty high bar, the secondary characters and antagonists kinda have to settle for being second fiddle, but they all have traits of their own that help move the plot forward. The main antagonist, the aforementioned Killmonger, is interesting among the other Marvel villains in that instead of the typical "KILL EVERYTHING" or "take over the world" MO (or sometimes both) without many reasons other than "MWAHAHA I'M EVIL", he actually has a rather valid and understandable reason for his actions. The recent instances of black people being persecuted simply for their color, even in the modern day and age, are a strong force of motivation grounded in a sad reality, although the means by which Killmonger was planning to achieve that goal - by waging war on every other race - were undoubtedly going to cause as many problems as they'd solve if not more. Another interesting factor is how Killmonger's rule essentially divides up the entire nation; while Shuri (whom I'll get to later) is loyal to T'Challa through and through, and goes out of her way to help him and his cause, other characters like Okoye (initially) and W'Kabi simply serve the man in the throne whether or not he's truly fighting for the force of good. This actually threatens to tear the nation apart during Killmonger's campaign, and again, it's only because T'Challa and M'Baku's tribe join forces to stop him that things don't escalate into all-out carnage. As a wise man once said, hate begets hate - whether you think it's justified or not, the total extermination of people who are different than you, even if a few gave you grief in the past, is the wrong way to act, and only makes you like those very people who attacked you first. I have to give props to T'Challa for not falling into the same trap that his father did and offing Killmonger directly; instead, he attempted to show mercy, as well as a Wakandan sunset like in the tales Killmonger had heard as a child, but rather than spend life in prison with his reputation in shambles, Killmonger chose to essentially commit suicide and end the cycle. Even if he nearly caused an all-out civil war within the Wakandan borders, Killmonger is still a tragic figure, and that makes a big impact on all of us.

My favorite character by far, however, has to be Shuri. It's established very early on that she's not only a child prodigy, but also a youthful, spunky teenager with a wholesome sense of humor (and in at least three instances, a penchant for memery, trolling, and cringe-inducing puns on almost the same level as Chibi Yang). While she seems to be a light-hearted comic relief, though, she also plays one of the most critical roles in the story - rescuing the Heart-Shaped Herb that would later be given to T'Challa for his second wind - and her humor is offset by a dedication to her responsibilities as well as her intimate knowledge of the ins and outs of the Black Panther role as well as his loyalty to T'Challa regardless of the situation. It's probably this that leads to her being so important in helping T'Challa recover, and I'm proud of her for being both the heart of the movie (T'Challa, of course, being the soul) and a nuanced and lovable character in her own right.

The writing of the movie is also quite well done due to the points noted above and much more. Racism, prejudice, loyalty, and the impact of even the smallest things are themes that are prominent throughout the entire movie. I was very concerned that the sole major white character, Everett Ross, would turn out to be a villain (though thankfully that wasn't the case, and he gets an awesome support role in the climax that Han Solo would be proud of), and Ulysses Klaue IS a secondary antagonist, but it's interesting that ultimately, the conflict is waged by blacks, among blacks. This ties into the concept that there is no such thing as reverse racism - even if it's blacks persecuting whites, it's still way over the line if it isn't in self-defense. The conflicting solutions proposed by T'Challa and Killmonger - coming to terms with the outside world and reaching out to lend aid to it vs. only looking out for your own and forsaking all others to keep them from harm - are an uncomfortable mirror to a lot of real-world politics in recent years, but in true MCU tradition, it's the idealistic approach that wins the day in the end, although as expected for a conflict as intense as this, there are still quite a few casualties at the end of it all, and unlike many other instances in the MCU and beyond, most of these are impactful and placed tactfully enough to move the story forward.

I dont' even need to say that the graphics and visuals of this movie are absolutely gorgeous. Wakanda as a city is stunning, the various African landscapes breathtaking, and the vehicle design and choreography as masterful as a Star Wars movie. The costume and character design as well are splendid, and it is at this point that I'd like to call attention to the costume designer for this movie: Ruth E. Carter, who's also done work for such films as "Malcom X" and "School Daze" - plus she's African, and has done extensive research for this movie's designs, drawing from a wide variety of African cultures. Really, this entire movie is a feast for the eyes and absolutely worth seeing for that fact alone. My one gripe is that the war rhinos seen early in the movie and then in the climax are notably CGI, and could've been improved with some animatronic work like in the first Jurassic Park movie (or heck, they could even have used real rhinos, but IDK how much hassle that would've resulted in), but that's a minor quibble that doesn't detract from an otherwise spectacular feature.

I'm well aware that complaints about this movie have had to be filtered extensively on RottenTomatoes to prevent Internet Racism(TM) from marring the reviews unnecessarily, but that's a can of worms I'm not going into for the sake of my dignity. On my own terms, however, I do have one suggestion for improving the movie: instead of murdering Klaue just halfway through the movie, Killmonger could've just as easily pounded him into submission and forced him to work for him as a sort of Dragon (in TV Tropes lingo). T'Challa and Ross vs. Killmonger and Klaue would've been interesting to see, especially considering how threatening Klaue was with his cyborg arm and what it could do to both T'Challa and those poor innocent vehicles involved in the car chase in Korea. He'd have made an interesting secondary antagonist that could've opportunistically interfered with the warring parties and stirred up tensions just to tear down Wakanda out of spite. I'm not about to suggest an "Everett vs. Klaue" scenario - which was actually what Everett was planning in the first place when he entered this movie - but giving Klaue a bigger role before he gets offed would've made said murder more impactful and karmatic after all he's done. That's largely splitting hairs, though - I'm sure there are people who instead feel that Killmonger getting rid of Klaue early prevents competition. Who knows?

On a final note, here are two things I really want to see in future MCU films: 1) a movie with a predominantly Asian cast and setting, and 2) a movie starring Devil Freaking Dinosaur. I'll admit that both of these are kinda self-centered, but the first one in particular is probably more desirable at large because there aren't that many Asian characters at all in the MCU (Mantis from Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 and Colleen Wing from the Iron Fist TV show are probably the only ones I can think of off the top of my head, though I may have missed a few more), but one of the big things I'm noticing from the Black Panther release is that African-American and black children have come to look up to him as a hero in the same way that a lot of girls look up to Wonder Woman with the number growing since her own film release - so if the same thing could happen with an Asian superhero, that would be amazing. A quick look at the Marvel Comics online archives presents me with Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu, who has actually joined the Avengers in the comics and would make a very interesting and cool addition to their MCU incarnation. As for Devil Dinosaur, I don't even need to explain why he'd become beloved if he ever shows up in a MCU movie, even as a minor character... just keep him away from the palaeo-discourse and he should be fine.

All in all,

Black Panther

isn't a perfect movie, but it's very close to being one and I'm so happy for its success. While there are a few minor things I feel would've been worth fixing here and there, I don't see any obvious faults and certainly none that detract from how amazing it is. Do yourself a favor and give it a spin - I can promise that you'll be in for a visual and auditory treat from start to finish.

Grading Scheme:

96 - 100: A+

93 - 96: A

90 - 92.9: A-

87 - 89.9: B+

83 - 86.9: B

80 - 82.9: B-

77 - 79.9: C+

73 - 76.9: C

70 - 72.9: C-

67 - 69.9: D+

60 - 66.9: D

Below 60: E

Grades:

Writing: 9

Characterization: 9

Pacing: 8

Creativity: 9

Consistency: 9

Cinematography: 10

World Building: 9

Music and Sound: 10

Effects: 9

Engagement: 9

Final Grade: 91 (A-)

#Armor Bird Reviews #Black Panther

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crystalelemental · 7 years ago

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Good morning, and I hope you all prepared yourself for this inevitable gripe-fest that’s about to occur! That’s right folks, I am Back On My Bullshit and ready to rant! It’s been so long since I’ve been this intensely irritated about something, but I guess Sailor Moon season 3 wanted to remind me what this was like. Hysterically, they’re even keeping with the theme of 2017 that’s been ongoing since Atelier Shallie: I get it, you’re trying to market as a light-hearted fun adventure, but you can’t fuck up your heavy plotline on purpose because you’re trying to maintain an image goddammit!

Let’s start with this: season 3 is, by far, the best in the series so far. Uranus and Neptune are spectacular characters, I finally get to see Pluto in action, and Saturn...god, we’ll get to that, but best. No contest. They even salvaged Chibi-Usa’s character. Chibi-Usa! Who was among my most disliked characters by the end of season 2! She came back and was great! That shouldn’t have been possible, but here we are. The Professor and the Death Busters actually seemed entirely unique, and were a huge step up from previous villain groups.

But you’ll notice I started using past tense there. Yes, unfortunately I have to use past-tense. They’re still better than the others, but no longer as interesting. It’s another issue of excellent setup but terrible resolution. At the end of the day, the Professor is just infected by some virus monster, and his motivations are as vacuous as any enemy that came before. Unleash strong nebulous evil force, ???, profit. For such a goofy and fun character, his motives...pretty much didn’t exist. I’m all for the whole parasite thing to establish drama, but it’s going to be a lot less engaging than if a character had their own agency and motives. It’s like my issue with the “Lusamine was just infected with Nihilego’s toxins” argument. It removes Lusamine as a character entirely, and insists that what we see was not a person, and their actions had no bearing on anything they personally wanted, it’s just things that happened. And that’s way lamer than having the character be in control and acting for their own ends. For the professor, it’s unfortunately just the infection working toward infecting the entire planet.

Which leads to other, major issues. (1) Why is the holy grail there at all? It can’t be designed for this inter-dimensional virus creature. So what’s the point? (2) If there was no point in that, what was the point in Uranus and Neptune’s quest? I guess if the Messiah they were looking for got it, things would immediately turn in their favor, but... (3) What’s the point of the Silence? Why is this a thing we have a name for? I had assumed the whole time that there was precedent for this. Like, someone knew what was going on, approximately, because something similar happened before. Given they know what to do to combat it, it seemed like everyone had an inkling of what was going on, but were lacking in specifics. But this nonsense about a Messiah of Silence? It’s just a virus. It might not even be sentient, beyond manipulating the sentience of those infected. I doubt the virus is like “Ah yes, the Messiah of Silence, who will draw us into this world so we can do vague but evil things to it.” None of these elements make a lick of sense anymore. They were cool as a setup, but I feel like it’s wasted potential. Especially considering that the outer scouts gave you the optimal setup already.

...you know, before we even started watching this, Callie told me that Hotaru would be my absolute favorite. And when we finally get there, what do they give me? A sickly child, who tends to dress all in black, has burns all over her body from an accident she was in, idolizes an athlete who was also sickly in his youth because precious, just wants to make friends but has weird blackout moments where people around her get hurt so they shun her, and has turned around from being almost completely closed off from the world to making close friends with Chibi-Usa and the sailor scouts. She’s the best. Easily my favorite. Not even a contest. Well, turns out, she’s Sailor Saturn, and the Guardian of Destruction. Can apparently blow up planets, so...that’s awesome. Her weapon is apparently even called the Glaive of Silence, or at least that’s what Michiru had called it at one point. For the latter part of the season, the outer scouts are basically shitting themselves, knowing that they either manage to kill Hotaru before she awakens as Saturn, or the world could be destroyed. Obviously, since the other scouts are friends with Hotaru, it creates that conflict again between inner and outer planet scouts around an “ends justify the means” approach, or the altruistic “We have to save everyone” mentality. And that’s great! I love that setup. I’m all for this kind of conflict, and how it hits harder because Chibi-Usa and Pluto are on opposite sides. Excellent setup!

...terrible execution. Hotaru’s issue wasn’t that she’s Saturn, silly! It’s that she’s also infected with the virus, and becomes Mistress 9! She’s a vaguely evil mastermind trying to summon the nebulous Pharaoh 90 virus, which is apparently a planet from another dimension?, into this world to infect the whole planet and...not really destroy it, but eliminate all life or make everything a host for its virus self? Which Mistress 9 and the Daimons may be a part of? Objective unclear; listen, why not roll with Hotaru as the final boss? If Saturn is so intense and terrifying, that’s a better angle. You keep building the conflict for Chibi-Usa and the inner planets vs. the outer planets, and your resolution is easy to make a happy one since Chibi-Usa and Hotaru are friends. The outer scouts can still insist this has to go with conflict, but ultimately it’s the friendship the inner scouts developed with the Messiah of Silence that causes her character to make an active choice to keep things as they are, and avert it. I’m all on board for Uranus and Neptune acknowledging that there was no Messiah of Light, and that the good ending had to come about from their own actions. That’s fantastic. But you know what would’ve been also great? If there was no messiah for either side. If the whole Messiah thing was just both sides trying to pinpoint a champion with the power and ability to carry out their own goals. Give the professor an honest reason to want the world to reach its end, and you’ve got the ideal setup: a father who manipulates his child to destroy the world for his own ends, massive conflict among the two groups of scouts, a positive and happy resolution with Saturn through connection and friendship, and a legitimate reason to seek the grail and to have a name and concept for all this stuff since it happened in-universe.

We do not get that. Obviously. I wouldn’t be here if we had. Instead, we run with the virus angle, the grail calls Pharaoh 90 to their world, and the only thing that wins the day is that the Professor and Usagi call to Hotaru and get her to awaken as Saturn, who then blows up the virus planet. (1) Not Chibi-Usa? The one pretty much designed to be the point of connection for Hotaru? ...alright. (2) This could’ve been avoided by just...not handing over the Grail, Usagi. Callie said Uranus and Neptune were being jerks for fighting Usagi over her decision here, but they’re super in the right. Had you not done that, the human connection still would’ve made it to Hotaru, only the death virus planet wouldn’t have been called, and Saturn wouldn’t have had to die and be reincarnated, which is really my biggest issue here.

WHY IS HOTARU A BABY NOW?! I HATE this reset-button shit, and I’m having trouble thinking of a time I’ve been more upset by it. Hotaru is the best character for me, bar none. The struggles she has going on, the difficulties she’s faced, and her entire arc being about establishing those connections and making friends to overcome loneliness and fear, all of it is excellent. And their resolution? Their big way to fix this? Let’s have her die and come back as a baby who is fine now. Also her dad’s memories are all gone, except for the ones about how he has a kid, so no one will even know the difference! Hooray! Fuck you. Fuck you, that’s stupid and awful. You not only killed the best character, which is something that’s happened to I’m pretty sure everyone in the series at this point and they got better from, but you reincarnated her as a baby so there’s no hope to get this character back even. All in the name of “We had to have a happy ending for this character, so we just got rid of all the bad stuff that happened to her.” It’s lazy, it’s stupid, and it’s a complete rejection of a far more interesting conclusion where Hotaru gets to recover and move on. Not to mention, if Saturn’s so damn strong, bringing her back as a completely healthy baby means she’s gonna be absurd. Haruka and Michiru were already stronger than the inner scouts by a noticeable margin, and Saturn apparently had enough power to make them terrified of her just waking up, even when they had Pluto on their side. Keeping the injured version of Hotaru not only keeps the difficulties she had and her character in tact, but also serves as a limiter. She’s not an instant-win condition; she has physical limitations and isn’t always going to be at full strength. But no, baby version now. Maybe because she’s younger she’ll be weaker or can’t use her full power or something arbitrary like that.

I am so goddamned salty about this. I get really attached to my favorites, and this seriously feels like we’ve just removed the best one. I know she’s alive. I know a lot of traits are probably going to stay the same, and when she inevitably comes back and is a regular scout I will love her to death. But this is such a bad way to handle the resolution for this character’s conflict. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a figure to find.

#sailor moon #hotaru tomoe

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tumblunni · 7 years ago

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Also it still makes me Super Sad to know they were at one point considering giving Viera a similar remake to the Mithra and having them be a both genders race with like.. actual normal people and it being the player’s choice if you wanted to wear sexy armour or not. Seriously i hate ‘they are sexy race’ as a concept for a ‘culture’, it’s like finding the planet of everyone has the same job in some star wars thing, except the creepy version...

Tho also these more ‘sexy race’ designs for them still work MILES better than FF12 when they have sexualized dudes too! Apparantly this concept evolved into (ugh) the Au’Ra, so you can kinda see here how they decided to go ‘nah, extra buff power fantasy dudes and even more over the top fanservice women that also look 12′ instead of like.. fanservice kind of muscly man, at least... :( srsly he looks like that sexy armour guy they censored in that spinoff game or that sexy armour they censored for Ringabel yet nobody seemed to care and instead whined about 1 singular additional belt being added on the sexy costume for girls T_T why do the worst of the worst internet douchebros always throw a fit at the slightest bit of equal ass for all??

wow this ended up going into a big ol lol image heavy post so lets have a cut!

also this sexualized lady armour at least has a different and visually interesting design, and they were thinking of more hairstyles too! like the FF12 viera were even more bad for how they all looked like the same person in 1-3 minor variants of the same xenomorph lookin metal thong atrocity. (and like.. one robe model for npcs that somehow managed to still sexualize a robe?? wtf?? leav whit mag alon)

Another beta viera design that just appeals to me a lot, somehow! I think its the interesting idea of having a fully furred head and then just a quiff of human hair on the top, it feels more like an actual animal man instead of a human in cosplay. Same for the idea of them having big black cute button eyes!

Also look at these other really cool designs for different beast races, even stuff thats not based on anything we’ve ever seen before It’s hard to believe that the Au’ra were even conceived as a ‘beast race’ concept, like holy fuck it should be illegal to throw out 47 Actual Designs and just go with Human Again But More Fanservice...

also they made this april fools thing as a fake Au’Ra reveal and like... it doesnt say much good about your designers when this could legit pass as real like the joke here is apaprantly just that Sexy Bangaa looks ugly, not that having a race with a monsterish man and a sexy lady is a dumb idea, cos they just went ahead and did it anyway...

the au’ra concept art shows pretty much EXACTLY the same ‘sexy bangaa’ principle and I’m glad they at least fuckin toned it down to the man having AN ACTUAL HUMAN FACE, even if its also a lazy fuckin design change. i’d be so fuckin mad if we got a legit cool only-nonhumanoid-race-in-the-game and it was men only!

also like Wow, I am actually getting excited about just the same super tiny demure unfitting lady to a massive man except Less Sexualized And More Magical/Ethereal ...unless that isnt meant to be a dragon familiar but actually another design for the men or something, that’d be going WAY too far! XD

Hello Welcome To Bottom Of The Barrel With Bunni, wouldnt it have been nice if the weird succubus-y ladies like.. looked in their 20s or something i am actually advocating for big fanservice titties cos it would be 99% less disturbing than the same damn camera angles on a ‘childish’ design... also seriously 99% normal fanservice lady with bigass actual monster horns on top would be better than same thing sans the horns

oh sorry they do have ‘horns’ but they look like fuckin this

and i fuckin can’t even.. i jsut fuckin... they don’t even let us have THE MOST BASIC TINY BEASTIE THINGS! why does it bug me so much that male au ra get to have black schelera along with the black horns like even this super minimal actual dragon trait isn’t allowed?? even when removing it makes no sense?? even when its supposed to be a nationality indicator in-universe cos you put a really nice amount of worldbuilding into each ‘race’ having actually two races of sun and moon based designs. which are EXACTLY THE FUCKIN SAME FOR FEMALE AU’RA, seriously why not just make horn colour an option in the editor then... actually is this a thing that has ever existed in any real world country, is there a place where men have [visual trait] and women don’t? I mean aside from like.. cultural or religious outfits, where only one gender’s is different to the west but its not like the west is default anyway lol. But seriously imagine EYE COLOUR! Imagine if blue eyes only happened to american men and like.. american women couldn’t have blonde hair and all looked identical to.. I dunno.. west indian women. Just a whole country where dudes have all the abstract concept of ‘race’ and the women don’t. That’s how nonsense it seems when you make a fantasy species where only the women look human!

tho also i’m still pissed off too that the human nationality thing actually comes with a different body build (FOR DUDES AT LEAST) and different hairstyles and starting outfit, instead of only a colour change. it stands out a lot that they only did this for their first attempt at the concept. also it makes male au-ra make even less sense cos you can already have a muscle human and an even more muscle human who has a dumb ogre face and also elf men are muscular somehow and you kinda only have miquote if you wanna be a skinny dude.. or even just an average dude...

also it kinda sucks that you can’t turn off or choose anything about the weirdly complicated scale patterns on their neck and upper arms only. like why is that even there except to be like ‘hey we did the bare minimum to be considered a dragon’...

ALSO LIKE EVEN MORE BOTTOM OF THE BARREL I would have STILL been happier if we got this fuckin terrible fanservice lady design but she at least had ears and claws as well as we-say-its-horns-but-it-looks-like-cute-hair-decs. like seriously throw me a fuckin bone here, give them SOMETHING to justify the ‘beast race’ category... also did i mention that its really fuckin stupid how they did the worldbuilding too? these guys are meant to be nomads and warriors yet the women look like this. its just.. never explained. its just that all the Lore applies to the dudes and the women are just for ~cyooooot anime girl who does the stubborn kiddy pose with her tits hanging out~ (SERIOUSLY THEIR ANIMATION SET IS REALLY CHILDLIKE AND ITS SO CREEPY! theyre like the sex appeal of miquote with the lalafell animations...)

seriously holy shit looking at this pic makes them it look like dads taking their daughters to soccer practise like seriously fuckin christ

and ALSO on top of fuckin everything else we get to see they even had designs for the same creepy loli fanservice ladies but if they had Some Sort Of Actual Unique Features and Cool Aesthetic Choice like wtf you even abanded like 40 cool horn designs and just gave them plain gross triangles in only one of two colour choices... T_T also like.. that loli lady at least gets to wear an actual gothic lolita fashion style, and i love the aesthetic of armor plates hanging as accessories on a non armour outfit. Do they jingle like windchimes? or does this mean Au’ra were meant to be fully scaled below the neck, so this kinda IS a skimpy outfit but you cant tell? XD

Also l kinda like this aesthetic of this other equally lame and super humanoid design with overly sexualized females. Like i dunno if this is just shading but if they actually had this colourscheme it would be super distinctive! And it reminds me of amarant’s trance form, The Amazing Battle Banana Hammock. Even if it also suffers from the same problem of technically showing a man in a skimpy costume but like his design is supposed to be monsterous and badass instead so it still doesnt deliver the same as the female equivelant. The top left version could kinda be a fanservice guy but like.. only if he was naked like that? like drawing someone in a style that’s supermodel body shape and has giant boob outlines and super sexualized poses and doesn’t look monsterous despite being a monster and ET CETERA, that’s what we mean about a character design being sexualized rather than just sexy. If you put some pants to cover this guy’s impressive bulge then he’d just be another scary boss guy. I mean Ifrit is a nearly naked guy with horns in every damn game but he’s very VERY rarely sexualized! The FFXV version is like the first damn time, except when we had a female version of him. It sucks cos ifreeta has a pretty damn cool design but still its really weird how she’s so much more humanoid and has attention drawn to her having boobs in a way they never did with ifrit’s constantly-on-display pecs and loincloth... Man why is it so hard to explain these weird nuances of how people draw ‘topless monster’ characters like this? its like they go out of their way to try and backpedal on the fact they made a topless guy. he can show more skin but its supposed to be less appealing by the artist, thus its less offensive cos it isnt boxing a character into this one sexualized role while the plot says ‘no, they’re a monster, honest!’ YKNOW?? god am i making ANY sense here? XD

nakey man, not meant to be arousing to audience

nakey lady, suddenly just because she’s ‘the lady version’ she looks like this

the same nakey man, redesigned, this time indeed meant to be just as sexy

and like it sucks that there aren’t many good examples of nakey ladies who ARENT meant to be arousing in this series cos I mean that lady ifrit design is so much more sexualized despite being in a chibi art style game for kids?? this was really not the right time or place!

Also it sucks that ‘is nakey’ is a common trait of monster man characters, because well there’s been an established history of dudes being topless and you’re not meant to be aroused. So then whenever they try and make ‘monster man race’ they go for a topless dude and are like ‘then the woman needs to be topless too!’ except the only way they can draw them is sexy??? except its like a false premise to begin with, you can totally make a beast race that isn’t topless, you guys! or even a beast race that isn’t buff, so you don’t need to be all ‘what’s the female equivelant of buff? oh yeah, sexy!’. or, yknow, just draw a buff woman. it could work... or like just have neither and make a beast creature that’s supposed to be cute or mysterious or comical or whatever.

completely random moment of interjection to say that nu mou are pretty neat

Actually, FFTA’s version of the ivalice races was pretty good about this, aside from the dumb thing of ‘theyre all male except viera, and just coincidentally viera are the only humanoid and sexualized race’. (Tho it was funny that somehow they accidentally made all humans male only too??)

Also another reason the Au’ra’s version of fanservice bothers me more than the simple option to wear a bikini as both genders for every other race: like none of them are DESIGNED FROM THE GROUND UP to be ‘they are all biologically born in an idealized supermodel shape and also look twenty years younger than they really are and also all culturally do j-pop poses for fuckin everything’. Even if you picked the sexy catgirls and catboys race you can choose to play a perfectly covered up version of either. And none of their animation sets or voice lines were inherantly fanservicey. Thats kinda what bugs me more than the Au’ra’s designs, its that they’re all ~uguuu senpai~ anime fanservice lady poses and squeaky voices even if you make their design not sexualized in the customizer. Even tho like.. at least a character in full armour doing j-pop poses is kinda funny/cute, so that’s one consolation. But couldnt you have just made them simple emotes for all the characters instead? I WANNA SEE IDOL ROEGADYN OMG :D

ANYWAY UHH BACK ON TOPIC

we almost got a dreadlocks hairstyle? That looks cool

ok.. okay.. I’m done Okay I’m Done sorry i just saw these concept art pics and got really fuckin wistful for what we could have had...

#blunni thoughts #TOO LONG #TOO THOUGHTS #why did u release this concept art oh man i didnt even know what i was missing...

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