#like it as a concept isnt bad in and of itself but in this specific case yes it is

[sapchats]

still not over tommys mom publicly discussing a private dm and acting like dream was in the wrong for sending it and then also publicly saying he apologized and acting like she's some bigger mature person for accepting it and for calling out his "behavior" in the first place like no bitch youre just as much of an immature idiot as your son. moving on

[bulbabutt]

so im white, lets just get that out of the way, but i wanna talk about the orientalism in windblades design.

this doesnt feel like my place to talk about but if no one brings it up then no ones gonna learn about it or second guess it. im tired of other white people not noticing this problem or thinking its fine. if anyone asian (specifically japanese) has any thoughts or personal input it is SUPER fucking welcome! its hard to find people talking about this.

so transformers has a women problem in general. they set up women in the 80s in one episode and never elaborated on it in that show. they added arcee in the movie. they put a couple in the beast wars era, but outside of blackarachnia (becoming a literal succubus) we dont really get any of those characters adapted (besides arcee) over iterations. never any new ones really.

then the comics get windblade. i havent read the comics, this isnt about anything that happens in them. this is about her design how she comes off as as shes been adapted into cartoons. i wont comment on events from the comics outside of her origin, as i know fuck all about it.

so she was supposedly a fan-voted character, but her 'fan-voted' aspects have nothing to do with the problem (in fact the fan-vote was more of a suggestion because a few things dont end up being true) the voted aspects are as follows:

autobot. jet. fights with swords. red & black. named windblade. female. valiant. telepath. from Kaon.

so here's what that ends up looking like.

so they took some liberties. there was other concepts where she was a european knight etc, but this is where they landed. she has this extremely feminine figure, complete with makeup and sculpted hair. many people immediately mistake this look for a geisha (though supposedly being kabuki) she gets little pump heels, it makes her very human woman shaped. birthing hips and all. thats classic girl robot stuff. its the specifics of it that are an issue.

so thats kind of a lot of japanese motifs. the makeup, the swords, the hair... why does it look like human hair? thats a very specific hairstyle on a character who doesnt have hair...

on its own, having a japanese inspired aesthetic isnt the problem. i mean, coding characters to be from different places is fine. having characters coded as a specific race could be fine. jazz already exists, and despite being taken by racist creators sometimes (cough michael bay cough) its not inherently bad that he is black coded, specifically when in the hands of black creators/voices. thats key.

so having a transformer who landed in japan and took on some culture from there. you could see that happening. that could work if in the hands of people who were japanese.

but thats not even her backstory. shes not even from Kaon (as was voted), instead she's from another planet entirely, a more spiritual one, which narratively makes her alienated from cybertronians. this alienation adds to the problem. "shes not from here." "shes not like us."

you'll see many people look at this design and think "is that geisha transformer?" and as the character isnt from japan and knows nothing about the culture that inspired her, the media itself never corrects anyone. no one in the text goes "no shes not a geisha shes actually based on a kabuki performer", no one says any words about it, its just how she looks, its just aesthetics without explanation or cultural background. shes not literally japanese, she just looks it. its easy to mistake without cultural context from a western perspective, so calling her a geisha becomes a rampant problem. general audiences arent looking at forum posts form 2014 where someone correctly explains what the motifs are. shes made by white people, and white people are largely the ones consuming the media. its unfortunate, and could have been avoided if the culture shes inspired by was relevant to her character.

so she's clearly heavily inspired by japanese aesthetics, which codes her as being an asian woman in this media but written by non japanese people. and then she becomes so popular that she has to start making appearances in shows.

she shows up in robots in disguise first. lets compare her to strongarm (the only other girl in the show)

having this japanese woman be far more thin and feminized than the other girl characters is the problem. strongarm is literally the first non feminized main girl transformer (not counting strika) she is much more in line with the men around her, square and broadshouldered, shes the largest car of the bunch. that was an upgrade finally. and then we get windblade. she has ruby red lipstick, human hair, heels, jewellery. on its own? thats fine. but keep in mind, shes heavily japanese coded already. then shes immediately seen as a romantic conquest for sideswipe (though he never gets anywhere, he literally claims ownership) it leans into tropes of sexualizing asian women because she stands apart from strongarm. shes the flirt, shes the very feminine one. is this on purpose? its not their fault windblade looks like that in the comics and strongarm looks like this. but side by side what is it saying? did they intend to say this about their asian woman? no, probably not intentionally. its kind of unconscious bias that tends to happen when you dont have a diverse writers room. no one notices until it hits the audience.

but lets just jump in here with the other weird problem in RID, because shes not the only one who jumped from the comics.

drift (who while being a samurai in the comics (literal?) doesnt.... LITERALLY wear a suit of samurai armour) shows up. with his two minicons who act as his children (who hes very strict with). theres a heavy overuse of the word honour. he owes a life debt, hes very humourless etc... they also never explain why he wears this armour. he came straight from space. he doesnt even turn into anything big that warrants it, hes just another sports car. bumblebee and sideswipe are sports cars too. but why is drift a sports car? tokyo drifting. drift. you get it.

so drift also is a comics original character. he, however, looks nothing like that

i will assume that drift looks different for one reason....

i mean. i shouldnt have to tell you why that was bad, right? you guys get why michael bay movies are bad? (if you genuinely dont please enjoy this series as a starter) ill just assume you do. knowing that that drift is bad, can we also say windblade is suffering from a similar problem?

this show brings in these FOUR new characters and heres how they look side by side.

so. okay the minicons are raised by drift, they share his aesthetic, okay. we dont know where he got that aesthetic but yeah they share it. windblade.... its unclear in this show if she shares the being from another planet like idw part. shes on a mission from god to be here and thats all we know. but the point is they have no similar origin. yet they all look like they could be from the same place. that they shares a (japanese inspired/coded/stereotyped take your pick) culture. meanwhile our from ep1 mains look like this:

so that feels. specific.

its not inherently bad to code robots as japanese, however its a problem when it seems to be for aesthetics alone. its stereotyping. they look nothing like the rest of the cast, everything like each other, and are from completely different backgrounds. they literally have the same colour palette? theyre not even like that in the comics.

sidenote, if you add sideswipe (who's alt mode has kanji on it and an asian voice actor so we can assume some coding there too) they look like this. yes they all have swords.... no one else does!

yes, windblade is the only character with a white face. makeup. yes sideswipe claims ownership over her to fight off one of the minicons. its not wrong to show windblade being harassed by a man, but it is wrong that no one ever says "leave her alone" you know? like thats just whats to be expected of her. it sucks. but at least her voice actress was asian! that wont happen again.

so. moving on to cyberverse, she becomes a central character. character wise? shes great. she gets to do a lot, no one sexually harasses her here, we're free of that era.

comparing her to the other autobot women, shes more in line now. if thats a good or bad thing overall is less the point (ie theres no autobots built like strongarm was, they are all just as thin and curvy as windblade is) but to me its still very apparent that shes still implying human hair. even with how simplified all these designs are.

like you can see how these red lines around her eyes get lost at a distance, same with the clips in her 'hair'. its clearly just trying to adapt her original design and im not saying thats a wrong choice they made, but i am saying its really busy in comparison

maybe thats a nitpick. but here it seems much more pronounced just how specific her head piece is because we can compare her to chromia, who is from the same place. do these two characters look like they have the same culture? not really. chromia and arcee look more alike. maybe thats just because they were designed later, but its unfortunate none the less.

even comparing her head to the seekers, what she is kind of supposed to be, they get the same old starscream mold. maybe she'd look better if they just did that? or something similar? like, give her a helmet. no one has hair. please stop implying hair. we all know what youre doing.

none of this is me saying i find these shows bad or that i hate windblade, i genuinely love her! and i love both these shows! it just feels hard to love her because of how she was designed. its not a problem with having a japanese coded character, its how stereotyped the look is. how othered it is. it leans into racist tropes. its orientalism, using japanese aesthetics to make her look interesting and different. you can tell she was made by white people.

how is it that despite being around for 10 years now, no ones tried to redesign her?

also look at the toys! look at the god damn toys!

she can take that head piece out to have a FAN. why does she need a fan?? shes got fucking WIND JETS ON HER BACK! its very obvious why they did this. shes a japanese woman, she can fight with a fan to complete the aesthetic! despite her character never having even been there! and no other transformer using a fan weapon! shes so COOL AND DIFFERENT like that isnt she?? holy fucking shit

to go back to those original voted concepts for a second? if we went back to the drawing board?

a telepathic valiant female autobot who can fly, has a red/blue/black colour combo (with yellow accents) uses swords, and maybe even with canonical asian heritage....

could they even do that? is it possible?

...

OH! wait it SUPER IS! who'd have thought!?

im NOT saying "we dont need windblade! we have a better girl with the same concept!" cuz thats stupid. do not misunderstand, theres room for WAYYYY MORE TF GIRLS! the literal 1:13 ratio is FUCKED! i know windblade had to fight to exist too and that sucks!

i just think it's CLEARLY possible to do this better, and it SHOULD be entirely possible to have windblade (who was LITERALLY holding court as the MAIN girl transformer for years) to be, i dont know, not so racistly designed? i think its entirely possible to fix, i just wish they would have tried already.

and this is just what my white ass has thought about since meeting her and not seeing anyone else bring it up. like going hunting for a real take about it just meets you with the rampant misogyny problem in fan spaces. its hard to find people talking about it in a normal way, but if they have before id love to know.

i just wanted to put my thoughts about it down, maybe get people to think about it more or talk about it more. cuz jeez, i would really like them to fix the problem. like they fixed the arcee problem in idw, right? can they fix windblade next?

[running-with-kn1ves]

Walla....kn1ves....genius big brain yandere writer....i just (re)found your Yves work (im sure you saw me freak out in the tags lmao) if you have the time/energy/inspo pls i beg you for a speck, a crumb, a droplette, ANYTHING of my baby Yves x fem!reader. I'm not sure how specific is too specific but I have a truckload of daydreams and prompts for this man dc im down BAD BAD for the way you write him. I'm not sure if this is too specific of a request but can it be yves holding himself back constantly because he wants to *romance* the reader but its so obvious he's itching for more until one day he finally snaps and takes her (specifically him giving her his virginity and whoops maybe going crazy when he finds out she isnt one)? I'm just obsessed with his characterization and want to see him in a ton of situations and feeling/reacting to different things. The stern dom undertones his whole vibe has disguised by a friendly foreign guide 🥵 The drabble of him was sooooo good and such a tease of his personality, it's so enticing hahaha. If that prompt is no good or doesn't inspire you then anything else is fine and ofc if you have no inspiration for Yves at all then that's a-okay too!!! Thank you sooooo much for thinking up that beautiful man and sharing him with us!!! Hope you enjoy your holidays💞💞💞

A/N: Ugh I'm so sorry I took so long in answering 😭😭 I was gonna write like a whole piece but my time has been cut dramatically, so please accept this poor little piece!! I was honestly so overjoyed at seeing your tags, it makes me so happy to see people's reactions to my stuff ┗( T﹏T )┛I wish I could have more time to write for this because I love the concept, I'm a huge fan of the "mysterious foreign guide who's just a little too friendly" kind of trope. Thank you so much for your support anon and I hope you enjoy this!! OG piece here for any of you nerds!

TW: Kidnapping, implied dubcon/noncon, manipulation

It wasn’t hard to notice Yve’s shift in behavior. Well, this shift out of many. When you first met him, he gave off a kind, well-meaning but nervous vibe. He did his best to show you around, to make you comfortable and converse with you in english to the best of his knowledge. That kind persona shifted into something more… desperate; obsessive, once he brought you back to his apartment. He was still kind, still well-meaning and observant to your needs. He apologized profusely when you got upset from how he kept you from leaving, promising that you weren’t missing anything important in class and that he could show you real culture instead! What could you learn from a textbook that would be better than seeing the country itself?

But time and time again, Yves made excuses to keep you inside, to make you stay by his side whether through photoshoots or studying, with him as your “teacher”. You had to learn the basics before taking such a “big” step out into his country, right? Unfortunately for you, Yve’s only taught information on the most trivial subjects. From words like “textbook” to “glass”, you were able to make meaningless sentences that wouldn’t serve you well in conversing with native speakers outside of Yve’s little apartment. Sure, it might help you occasionally, but it got you no where closer to understanding Yve’s rushed mumbling and incoherent rambling. 

With your sudden move to his apartment and his new change in conduct, Yves had slowly become less generous. He didn’t make as much of an effort to talk in english anymore, and made far less points to explain himself. You couldn’t tell what caused this new change-- a change that you were soon starting to accept as Yves showing his true colors. The man was still attentive to your needs, still caring and kind-- but the posessiveness that had slipped out almost entirely seemed to be taking hold. And while you’d think that a growing obsession would make it more beneficial to you-- it in fact, made your difficulty increase tenfold. Yves began to direct you on what you should wear, when you should eat, what you should do for the day.

 Not only that, but his attentiveness to…more intimate needs were far more prevalent as well. Whether it was bathing, or the need that pulsed between your legs, Yve’s was there to try and take care of it. You pushed him away multiple times, awkwardly trying to tell him that you were fine-- but it never seemed to stick. He always just looked at you with a tilted, confused expression, muttering in his native tongue as if he didn’t understand. So when the foreign guide began to sleep next to you instead of the cot on the floor, and began to press his morning erection agaist your backside sleepily, you knew your protests weren’t having any effect.

You would have walked right out of that teensy apartment the moment you felt he didn’t listen-- if you weren’t so afraid. If you weren’t afraid of the loaded handgun in his locked nightstand drawer, or how easily he could destroy your life at your new university-- which he mentioned offhand multiple times in a casual manner-- you would have walked out. The power he held against you, a foreign student with failing grades and no money, was too much for you to ignore. So, you decided to bide you time. It was only a matter of weeks until he got bored with you, you decided. But his new actions didn’t seem to prove that. 

In fact, the lustful, mischievous look he gave you that evening was the complete opposite. His scrawny frame jumped atop yours, hooking his hands behind your neck and leaning in to try and kiss you. He had planned an unusually fancy dinner, lighting candles you had never seen in his apartment before and bringing a bottle of wine with some italian takeout. You tried to question him about the mound of pillows and blankets on his balcony, the sudden romantic lighting, but the male only gave you a broad statement on how it was a “celebration” of sorts.

Yves’ sudden prowling mood after dinner wasn’t a complete shock-- considering you felt his eyes on you the entire evening-- but it still caught you a tad off guard. You tried to reject him, to push him away after each kiss, but it was done with such little effort and such great fear that you stayed silent once he muttered in an annoyed tone in his own language. Yves took your silence as a surrender, friskily lowering his hand under your shirt to caress your abdomen. He rambled against your flesh in half-english as he kissed you up and down, not afraid to let out vocal little noises of pleasure, or grunts of satisfaction ones he heard your breath hitch or a hum of desire come from your lips. 

But it wasn’t until he uttered a sentence with a familiar word, did you actually reply to him. You recognized the term from messing around with your friends, when you jokingly learned dirty words from your textbooks and the internet to use when you finally entered the country. You never expected to actually utilize them unless you went to a club or bar and happened to meet someone. One of those words, was ‘virgin.’ A more tame term compared to the bunch you had memorized, but one that you and your friends had idiotically decided to research. Though, it seemed your stupid endeavors had paid off. 

As Yves repeated himself, you began to understand the sentence a bit more. The man was seeming to imply… you were a virgin? Something about you both no longer virgin-ing? Maybe he was saying that he was going to ‘virgin’ you? You couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say, only mustering up the courage to poorly explain your sexual status to him, first in english and then in a broken version of his language. You tried to repeat yourself, thinking you might have said your statement wrong-- but Yve’s shocked expression and sudden lack of kisses seemed to prove you wrong. 

“You have…. Sex?” Yve put a hand to his mouth, eyes begging you to respond.

“Uh….yes?” You said with an awkward expression; you hoped he was asking what you thought.

Yve’s let out a choked gasp, looking as if you had crushed his heart in your palm. 

He looked down, voice cracking as he mumbled something incoherent, and likely not understandable to you in the first place. 

“I….I i’m sorry?” You tried to apologize, seeing how shaken Yves had become at finding out you weren’t as inexperienced as he. Despite his eagerness, you could tell he was new to trying to initiate something you had already grown long accustomed to, new to being so intimate. It was actually in part of his eagerness that you realized he wasn’t of the same sexual history. He was full of anticipation and desire, throwing caution and logic to the wind to fulfill what he had read in books and seen in films.

 Yves seemed to treasure the act of losing ones virginity far more than you had-- but you had only noticed it now. The candlelit dinner, the mood-fitting music-- your first experience was nowhere near as romantic. 

Yves seemed shaken, his low, almost sob-filled words growing heavier. He grew more aggressive, seeming to realize something now that he had processed this unexpected news. He had assumed you were just as much of an amateur as him-- that he’d be the one to “deflower” you in an act of passionate romance-- a bubble fantasy that had just been popped. But the male realized-- if he couldn’t have his desired outcome, he’d have to make due with what he had. Which was to make sure you’d fall to your knees, experiencing the best night of ‘passion’ that would make you never want to crawl to another man again. 

He was going to claim you-- to make it so those nights you spent with others never counted. 

You could only understand a fifth of what Yves breathily moaned into your mouth, once again jumping your bones though this time much more roughly. Before you could say anything further you had felt his quick hands unbutton your pants, his own thrown to the floor. He didn’t listen as you begged him to atleast let you move to the bed, where you would no longer be visible to prying eyes on the balcony. But he didn’t care-- Yves had already taken off his shirt, intent on ripping yours away too. He didn’t care anymore if this wasn’t going to be special for the reason he expected-- he was going to make sure you would be left with a night you wouldn’t forget.

[bananonbinary]

gonna kick the beehive here but i really don't understand the plagerism argument against ai. the chain of logic seems to be

it has my art somewhere ->i dont want that->thats stealing->stealing is bad

but. i dont actually agree with some of those steps? traditionally, having a copyrighted thing stored somewhere isnt stealing in and of itself. if it was, then home recordings of tv shows and burned CDs would be illegal (and oh, the corporations would dearly love to make them illegal). the harm caused is in the *reproduction* of the IP. you can dvr a tv movie, chop and screw it all you want, but you cannot show it to other people. the crime is declared when actual harm is done to the victim (in this case, monetary harm from loss of sales).

so like, when people talk about not wanting ai to be trained on their publicly-viewable artwork, i don't really think that's IP theft in any meaningful way? i mean, i'm sorry your art is being looked at or even stored by people you don't want, and i do sympathize on a data privacy level, but...it's not reproducing anything. there is no measurable harm on a copyright level. you can make an argument maybe that it'd be more polite to ask first, but the argument that it should be ILLEGAL is just begging corporations to do what they've been wanting for decades, and completely destroy the concept of being able to "own" copyrighted material.

(also "ai is stealing jobs" is a different and more complicated argument, this post is about the validity of a copyright argument specifically)

[juni-ravenhall]

sso vs the concept of good gameplay. yeah its another fucking book length post >:3

thoughts from someone with a brain full of what good game design means and tons of years of studying and analysing that topic etc, bc of game design being one of my main interests.

basically the major thing i want to say about the hollow woods update aside from "yay forest kinda pretty :)" is that most of it doesn't really consist of what i would call gameplay. this is ofc something u can argue back and forth that im also open to, bc respectful analytical discussion is healthy.

the firefly stuff id personally call something more like "satisfaction play" than gameplay (idk if there's a widespread term that anyone else made up already). there is zero challenge to gathering fireflies - it's on the level of poking a glitter slime simulation app. it might feel satisfying to collect them, but there is no practised skill needed, no thinking or planning or anything. so i don't consider this "gameplay", but "satisfaction play" in itself isn't a bad thing, either. it's not that "gameplay" would be inherently better than "satisfaction play" in every case.

the puzzles are gameplay, i think - not very challenging gameplay (the answers are right there as soon as the puzzle is presented), but it *is* arguably gameplay, since we do call puzzle-solving "gameplay" in general. there is some argument there to be made about what a "puzzle" really means, and what is a simple "request and task" rather than a "puzzle", or what "knowing a real life fact" (what is 180 degrees?) versus "having to figure something out using information available inside the game" might mean for how we view what is or isn't a puzzle. but that's not specific to sso at all (a question for tons of various "puzzles" as seen in tons of various games).

there's nothing wrong in itself with satisfaction play, or with easy puzzles. sometimes that's exactly what an audience wants. but sso has a bigger issue, in that the main gameplay until now has been races (or courses, tracks, but let's say races) and that those races are not especially well designed. that there is very little of really challenging, fun, satisfying, rewarding gameplay in sso - in the terms of what people usually expect from videogames (of the gameplay-based type, not satisfaction play-based).

don't jump to conclusions here, but: i often make a comparison to mariokart, a game with a primary race mechanic. i used to play mariokart a lot because it was just really fun. it was fun alone or with friends or strangers, and it was fun to try to beat my best score, and it was fun to explore different ways of beating the same track. when you design a game, you have to think really heavily about: is the core gameplay loop fun? what makes people want to play this? to *re*play this? does it feel satisfying and exciting? is it better or at the same level as its competitors? what kind of things appeal to the target audience? and so on.

somehow sso has never felt like mariokart (except that one rainbow race, obvs), and i don't mean that sso could just "copy mariokart", this isnt the point. what i do mean is that there has to be a way to make your racing mechanic (if it is a primary mechanic of your game!) actually fun, engaging and challenging in the right way - the good game design way, not the clunky, frustrating and broken way. (yes, i know the engine is spaghetti garbage. no, i don't think that's a get-out-of-jail-free card for every problem that sse has.)

they made some progress with this when they added a completely out-of-place, more challenging race in one of the more recent story quests (i forget exactly when that was, but the race was in hollow woods). the problem then was that within the context of sso and what they have taught the players about their game, this race was thrown at us with no preparation for its challenges, which is bad game design. you want to introduce your player to different challenges and allow them to practice and learn, which didn't happen when we jump from "races with basically no skill needed to pass" to "a race with new things happening everywhere you need to react to while also successfully following a new path" out of nowhere. the intent was good - more challenging and exciting, dramatic races - the execution wasn't great.

they also made some progress with this when they revamped a few of the champs. the revamps aren't perfect, but they're good, and it was a good step towards improving core gameplay mechanics, that not only are genuinely enjoyable to many players but also *fit into the theme of the game* (as in, beating others at horse sports is a common theme within the equestrian theme). (i'm personally in shock that we don't have more champs across the map since all of these years, and that they aren't better already, since it's one of the most "regular videogame quality" content this game has and it shouldve been relatively easy to add more as well as maintaining and improving what was there).

so, back to the new valedale stuff.... sort of. there have been some puzzles in sso before, and some random gameplay (the click timing of searching for gold). the stuff we've had before: it's usually very basic puzzles and random gameplay, partially on behalf of that - for a long time - there doesn't seem to have been that much resources put into fighting with the engine to create new things that weren't in the code before, and partially because of a view held by some people at the company that games for young girls don't need to have any actual well-designed challenging gameplay, and that it's better to make it ridiculously easy so that nobody ever really loses or gets stuck on anything. you don't have to practice to beat any of the races - you might have to practice to get a top score or win a champ, but none of those are required for progress. similarly, there wasn't any real challenge that i remember to the absolute majority of non-racing quests, either. you might have to hit a thing with the right timing once in a while, but it's always easy (other games do this too - see QTE in certain AAA games!), or you might have to remember a number or a word for a minute and answer a question or type in a code correctly.

more or less everytime that there were puzzles in sso, they held your hand through it - whether you wanted to or not. the same is true for the rune puzzles, which have their solution blatantly in front of you as soon as they load. there is no changing actual difficulty level to make it more fitting to the player (which doesn't necessarily have to be a literal level setting - it can come organically, such as giving extra explanations, or slowing a timer down, after a player has failed a task 3 times, etc). yes, you can make the rune puzzles more complex in some sense - a bigger grid, or choosing the type of moves you are worse at - but the solution is always right in front of you, regardless. they hold your hand whether you like it or not, by the type of puzzle that they introduced.

races in sso have a "gold, silver or bronze" system, but we don't actually see that the races have been correctly playtested to properly reflect what a time worthy of each medal should be, and we also don't really gain anything from reaching any medal. i never feel a thing about getting this or that medal, because they mean nothing. it might be a good thing that we're never asked in a quest to "complete this race with a gold medal" or "complete this race under a certain time" or "complete this jumping course with no faults", since that could lock some players out of completing quests (while this is the case for most other games, there is also an important discussion happening around accessibility in game completion).

there are ways to make the medals in races matter, feel accurate, and feel rewarding. there are ways to make races more challenging or more interesting without just being more clunky or frustrating. there are ways to do that while keeping them more or less grounded in reality, and ways to do that while incorporating non-realistic elements that are fun and feel fitting (remembering that this is a game with magic and fantasy from the start). they could have added faults to jumping courses forever ago, they could have added dressage forever ago, and improved on gameplay like pole bending and barrel racing, and so on, and all while allowing players at all skill levels to still complete tasks and complete races, but also allowing players to challenge themselves for rewards.

if the core gameplay - around races and championships, around horse care, horse bonding and horse training - or around magic and protecting what's dear, or around rescue missions with the rangers, or tons of other stuff i can think up that would fit this game - if that stuff felt like actually well designed gameplay, something fun, not frustrating and buggy, challenging in the right ways and rewarding. if all that was done well, then adding some "satisfaction play" with fireflies or some simple puzzles with blatant solutions wouldn't be as easy to criticise.

the closest thing we got to challenging gameplay that you can really clearly *lose* at - that there is a risk and a skill involved - were some of the druid training missions. they still suffered from some clunky frustrations and non-ideal design decisions, but it was an attempt at more regular gameplay (among the non-racing gameplay). comparing the new gameplay in valedale to the druid training, you can see that the risk of failure has gone down a lot or been removed completely, rather than being built upon any more. they also didn't continue to update druid training in any way afaik or to build upon that foundation for other gameplay. (i'm open to that druid training may have been too difficult for a small subset of players, and that's a valid discussion. but i also think it was optional?)

i don't have a really nice tidy thought to end this with, and im really sleepy rn and going to bed. but the overall point is that if sso had other, well-designed and well-functioning gameplay that felt satisfying and rewarding for players, the flaws of the new valedale stuff would be less glaring. as things are, the lack of challenge and the lack of fun gameplay are really glaring problems with it, as well as the lack of reasonable rewards. (it makes very little sense that you have to purchase the items you unlock, but this is the same company that charged whatever x starcoins it was for those recoloured balloon pets, so.)

[lazaruspiss]

Ok I’m gonna shoot my question here while you are in a analysis red hood mode (??): what do you think about his mommy issues (and fandom’s making it a trope)?

ooooo oh ok ok. this ones touchy. while i dont think its that present in canon i do think its there and worth the however many fics there are about it. like obvi theres probably a lot of boring and/or bad takes about it but the concept itself isnt running contradictory to canon or anything. i reread aditf a bit for this and had some tangents ill put in another post, but back to mommy issues.

jason had very little parental presence in his life at all. dads in prison, moms sick, he has no one looking out for him. probably why he and bruce seem to have bonded fairly quickly and jason accepted him as a father figure faster than any of the others. jasons bar for what makes a decent parent was nonexistent bc hed never really had someone dedicated to taking care of him. (even damian was hesitant, bc bruce being his dad would create distance between him and dick bc dick would no longer be his mentor, and hed gotten a bit attached)

jason accepted bruce as a father, but still missed his parents. he loved and grieved for both of them and most likely missed the idea of having normal parents in general in addition to missing his parents themselves. his love for his mom is still there when he realizes shes his step-mom instead, but it's accompanied by the hope that he still has living family out there.

the fact that jason went on a mom hunt in the first place is already enough that im like, yeah, i see where the mommy issues talk comes from. but i think you can go a few different directions with it

so theres catherine todd, who we only really know as being sick and a substance user throughout jasons childhood up until her death. iirc she died while willis was either already dead or in prison and so theres a period of time where jason (10-12ish?) would be taking care of his mother alone. being your mother's caretaker when you're still in elementary school does not make for a normal relationship.

and sheila haywood was uh. an illegal surgeon of sorts who fled the country and started a new life. apparently had an existing connection to the joker when she lived in gotham. he knows who she is and he knows how to blackmail her. while sheila describes it to jason as an operation gone wrong, joker calls it an "illegal surgery that killed a teenage girl" and sheila didnt seem to dispute that. probably watered down a lot of details in her explanation to jason. (the combination of 'illegal' and 'teenage girl' feels like it could imply an abortion? but it's left vague) and THEN it turns out she was stealing money meant to be used to save starving refugees before the joker even showed up. she sure is something. she still tries to help jason after he helps her, but don't skip over the part where she helps him after he helps her. she is still a person, but she is a fundamentally selfish person in every way. her final words include her commenting on how jason was a good kid who loved his mother. ive seen people take her final moments as a show that she still loved him, but i don't see it. one of those "a person doing a fraction of a good thing doesnt absolve them of everything else" kind of deals.

in both cases jasons mother(s) were relying on him. he never had an opportunity to be cared for and treated like a child. i don't think jason would have specific "mommy issues" about either of them, i think that he'd have some heavy feelings about the concept of a mother itself. what's it like to have a mom? does he still have a chance to be cared for and nurtured? his childhood was over before he had even met batman. becoming robin and being murdered is just tripling the issues he would've already had about his childhood regardless.

this is starting to veer off topic but

yes im finding a way to make this about Brothers in Blood. bite me. but even the first time i read this something that really stuck out is how jasons imaginary version of dick refers to him as a kid. dick doesnt really... do that. he did back when jason really was a kid, but this page says a lot about jasons self perception. he still wants to be taken care of, even if its not specifically "mommy issues" he definitely yearns for a chance to be treated like a kid again, after having rarely gotten that kind of care when he was a kid. (this page in particular is the first page of nightwing (1996) #121, which is one that i have a physical copy of <3)

[unlimitedhorsepower]

i know t&b doesnt make it fully clear whether yuri petrov actually has a scar on his face or not but to say its impossible is because people have a limited idea of what burn scars can look like and how they may be treated or covered up.

cropped image of his refrence sheet from official hero book 2 displayed on the wiki page.

the way its portrayed and the initial injury itself operate on looser logic than in real life (due to the length of time mr. legend held onto his face) but its possible for him to have a burn scar on his face and still retain his eyesight, hair, and eyebrows.

the clear shape of a hand and the way it cuts through his perfectly-preserved eyebrows are obviously fictionalized, but given that he already has superpowers, i think his scar being slightly unrealistic isnt an issue or proof that it only exists in his mind as a form of trauma.

from the colour and texture given to the scar, we can adhere that its a hypertrophic scar: the skin has thickened, raised from the unaffected skin, and turned purplish as part of the healing process.

the portrayal of scars in media isnt exactly good and different disfigurements people can go through are often portrayed only in very specific manner and often in a very bad light, but theres nothing inherently ugly, scary or wrong about having facial disfigurement.

hypertrophic scars can look very different depending on the person and the severity of the initial burn. heres a real-life person whose scar, in my opinion, has a similar quality to it as yuris does.

cropped image from a paper called “Pulsed dye laser in burn scars: Current concepts and future directions”

ive cropped the image because even if its censored, i dont feel comfortable using someones real face on a tumblr post about a fictional character.

even if yuris scar is fictionalized, i think its clear what its supposed to represent. i also think the way its portrayed was specifically chosen to pursue a certain aesthetic/conventional beauty standard, which is disappointing but nothing unusual in media.

im of the opinion that the initial portrayal of his scar in the anime and various panels in the manga shows that it was supposed to be real, even if later material has now displayed it suddenly appearing/disappearing.

its also entirely possible to cover it with makeup. many people with different kind of facial disfigurement make content on the topic! this article links to some youtubers with facial disfigurement who create makeup videos.

[yeahx10]

we have got to let young adult and ~new adult~ writing be good again... i do kinda blame the concept of purple prose and specifically the rise of bloggers/booktwt booktok bookstagram users levelling this against any book that isnt just the narrator going on thought spirals every other paragraph. it rly lowers the expectation for books. there are books with 'simplistic' writing that it is still heartfelt and often their heart is in the dialogue. but there's also no need to underestimate ya audiences!! not everything is overwrought and/or opaque. you end up with books which might have a good concept but the prose is clunky if not egregiously bad. and then there's the influence of passages being excerpted for social media which will probably be something about loneliness or desire with a bonus if it is prescriptivist about language and/or culture. andd i doubt that these authors are bad writers though some probs are, it's more likely a lack of editorial resources (time/money) and then pressures to first be a promising young writer and then to be prolific once you have a following. idk disheartening. and like everything will always be comp'ed bc that is how books get contracted to begin with but everything feels SO formulaic pretty much across genres and then when a book markets itself as doing smth exciting and fun the prose at the very least needs ironing out why thissss

[xenosaurus]

NO OKAY BUT THANK YOU FOR GIVING ME THIS CHANCE BECAUSE I NEED TO TALK ABOUT THIS ALWAYS (and this ask will immediately identify me to anyone who knows me bc im literally the only person in the world who cares) but please never read N.K. Jemisin's "The City We Became." She's won three hugos in a row and thats very impressive, nothing but love and respect to my sister who has Made It and Paved the Way for more of us to go forward. I haven't actually read her hugo winners and i'd like to, but unfortunately i started with The City We Became and now i hold a Grudge.

Why:

on the surface this book is a Cool Woke Twist on lovecraftian horror set in new york city. the basic premise is fun: the avatars of the boroughs of new york forming together to help their city become a fully fledged cosmic entity of a sort. the villain here is the literal spirit of gentrification, and while theres a lot of good things that could come from that set up, the actual execution makes it an absolute agony to get through. everything is so hamfisted and somehow smug about recognizing the most basic ideas. its too smug and condescending to appeal to anyone in the center, its ideas too juvenile to appeal to anyone in the left, and its weird flat characterization of the villains as The Most Cartoonishly Evil Cops/N*zis You Can Think Of kind of makes the conflict feel... empty. It's hard to explain without experiencing it, but i cannot recommend anyone actually read it. or maybe u should just so i can finally talk to other people about this, maybe im insane for feeling this way.

some favorite moments of mine, in no particular order:

-the multiple instances of a side character being introduced, having their race and tragic backstory exposited in one sentence, and then they vanish, never to appear in the narrative again

-white supremacists attack the indie art museum on twitter. thankfully they start a counter hashtag and the entire situation wraps up in under 24 hours. they go from "we have to fire all of you bc of pressure from these assholes" to "actually its fine" bc of twitter. i dont even think its supposed to be part of the magic of the city or whatever. its an incredible sequence.

-"he shot out of the pool like a child fired from a hot buttered child cannon"

-theres a bit where the author sets up a neat fight between a character who does a cool transformation and a REALLY neat monster. u will not see that fight play out. that scene isnt in the book. just the leadup and the aftermath. why even bother.

-one of the main characters has a tumblr but its obvious the author hasnt like... used tumblr. this isnt a major sin but it is funny

-really have to state again that theres a line in this book that reads "hot buttered child cannon." this also isnt a sin, this is maybe poetry.

-its labeled as adult fiction, it feels like its trying to go for grit and gore and sex in places, but its also weirdly shy about engaging directly with a lot of that stuff. this one might (MIGHT) actually be a style thing, admittedly most of my nitpicks surround one specific character who has a reason to be Like That, but i also have issues with her as a whole that i do not have space 2 get into here. regardless, a lot of this book feels like ya somehow, but the concepts its playing with and some of the scenes DO also make it feel too adult to really suit that either. its... weird.

its kind of a mess in a lot of places, and honest to god it sort of drags in the middle. if you DO pick it up, i recommend the audiobook. the narrator does a fantastic job, and they do some fun sound design in a few places. unfortunately the story itself is kind of hollow. it has a lot of diversity, but the way so many of those diverse characters are tossed out for brownie points and discarded, the way so many characters go into these preachy little rants about VERY basic ideas like "white supremacy bad" its just...

im sure that the author meant well. this book wouldve raised the bar for its representation in like... 2014. maybe thats when she started writing it, idk. unfortunately it came out in 2020 and i think it just feels Dated in a very strange way.

u dont have 2 publish any of this also ofc, im just always here to Unrecommend this book. unfortunately theres a sequel and some part of me is holding out hope that the author fixed some of the things i took issue with in the intervening years, so im bound to this series via curse. even if i hate this one, i know theres gonna be at least one more, and maybe *that* one will fix it-

do not be like me.

This ask was a ride from start to finish. I feel like I was shot out of a hot buttered child cannon.

[vyrim]

Having put 30+ hours into Fear and Hunger 2 with two completed runs amidst the carnage, I can say the game is a strong "I fucking hate it and love it" kinda deal.

The world involved in both it and its predecessor are so cool, and are a great blend of fucked up but really beautiful art. Alot of the designs are wonderful range of horror and gore, but theres also some really cool ideas of how the gods are portrayed by man and what they look like in physical form. If you dont find all the penises and weird coochie monsters running around unbearable to look at its a pretty great gallery that you wont really find anywhere, let alone a video game.

The concept of gameplay is also pretty brutal, every action has a risk to it, a price. You see this the most in combat. Most enemies are equipped with weapons or magic capable of outright dismembering your party if they dont simply die, and this has real implications because it stops you from sprinting or holding weapons. Both of your characters legs are gone? Crawl. Arms gone too? You dont die, you lie there and have to CHOOSE to die. It makes every combat against a new enemy a huge danger since you have no idea if a single attack from one of their limbs is gonna reduce you to a meat cube.

This isnt even touching on the fact that alot of enemies and the overworld itself have insta kill mechanics that can only be circumvented by a calling the right side of a coin flip, which in turn can only be reduced in rng by adding a lucky coin you may find to the coin toss. Theres nothing as humbling as having a well equipped character simply die because a coin flip failure led to a giant ghost owl pecking there head into a blood mist, or realizing that theres no coin flip for a pitfall so failing to see past the fog and camouflage is just insta death.

The game is a learning experience in the harshest way possible, you are expected to die, and even then it doesnt tell you shit about anything. Some stuff outside of death are hinted at, but even those are easily miss-able. Theres nothing that tells you that getting 16 agility gives you two actions a turn, or that theres not one but two different types of fast travel that need to be unlocked by gaining favor with the gods through scarcely designated ritual circles.

This brutality is its biggest flaw as well though because youre punished for doing anything and everything, this includes saving. You have three days to beat the game, each day divided up into a morning, afternoon, and night. There are only three means of saving: resting (which transitions the game to the next part of the day), a rare book, and/or using one of the special ritual circles to summon a specific god (which gives up a fast travel point), both being a one time use (or three times for the ritual on easy mode). You are punished regardless the method of saving, and alot can happen when the day transitions. The only way you'll know something bad has happened to a potential party member is through trial and error, and that means the game demands an immense amount of your time and patience. This translates to inbetween events too as party will stay dead after combat unless using a very specific ability, and they can lose limbs as well.

All this compounds into how problematic the engine is, everything follows a single script. If anything is done in contrast to that script, like saving a character or doing an event out of order, alot of the programming will react poorly. My last playthrough had a guy outright vanish until the ending screen because I told him about the newly discovered safe zone too early. So its outright possible to miss things because of how unstable the game can get from your actions.

RPG maker also just kinda sucks for overworld stuff. The angled perspective of the game and the various props littered around the overworld make it very easy to get caught on things when youre moving around, and can outright doom you when youre trying to outmaneuver dangerous enemies. Movement itself is also clunky as hell, good luck trying to move diagonally consistently, and that really puts you at a disadvantage against the ai that can move without issue most of the time. Its also buggy as hell, I watched a character die despite saving them from another npc because the game still played out their death scene had I ignored them instead. I remember being a serious problem with the the first game too, and I really wish they were both on a different engine because it was alot of frustration for very artifical difficulty.

I wont complain too much about the rng. I hate excessive rng in general, and this game makes literally everything rng, even the items you get from random containers. Theres nothing that takes the wind out of your sails than finally managing to commit to a run only to find out that you were unlucky enough to not get a single recipe book, bible, or even the ingredients to make fucking necessary healing items. It sucks, fuck that.

Anyway, final run I managed to get the best items, and while I didnt manage to solo my desired ending that allowed everyone to survive, the people I wanted to live on through my sacrifice did. The only guy who didnt deserves to be a fucked up monster in the sewer because hes a child killer and a rapist so good riddance.

The game sucks in the early half, but once you figure shit out, or do the smart thing like me by looking at the wiki because I cherish my mental health, then you can spend the time admiring the actual presentation of the game's art, music, and writing. I hope if another one comes out that its no longer in rpg maker but thats a little bit of a pipe dream given how complex the game is. Oh well.

[sumeria]

idk why people ignore any notion of social media etiquette when it comes to riverdale because they leave these same tired tags and comments and replies on like gif sets people spent hours of their time making it's enraging

i genuinely dont know. i think its a combination of like. 80% of the riverdale fandom being shockingly full of hatred towards the show despite continuing to watch it often for 1 of 4 reasons:

1. they decided they wanna fuck cole sprouse

2. they feel like they invested too much time and its sunk cost fallacy now

3. bizarrely obsessed with specific ships established in s1

4. hate it but think its funny so they keep watching

and also like people assuming its purely a grimdark archie comics au show taking itself very seriously from marketing/s1 being much less overtly camp compared to later seasons. though if you know where to look, you will see the hallmarks of self-aware camp (cliff-hanger.)

it also isnt big enough of a cultural touchstone to reach the status of supernatural, sherlock, homestuck, etc, where the mocking is affectionate at this point because of COURSE it was an important part of some peoples adolescence/early adulthood and helped them make friends 🙄 yeah its cringey at points but theres still some really good stuff and thats why i started watching at one point, its not all bad. it got bad at (x point)...etc etc etc.

because on the face of it seems to be something hated by watchers and of poor quality with a 'bad' concept, its low-hanging fruit to mock without desire for further context. someone making a gif/photoset/amv/fanfic/edit is obviously doing it as a joke. its crap. nobody actually likes it, right? its fine to mock. its fine. its Fine 🫡🫠🥴🤪🙃🫥🔪🔪🔪🔪

[shai-manahan]

YIPPIE HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALONZO MY FAVOURITE CHILD AND ALSO MY ONLY HAPPINESS IN LIFE HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOUUUUUUU !!!!!!

and regarding my thoughts on Alonzo as of now, i have a feeling that they may play a much larger role in the future than we think, by looking at our circumstances i have a vague theory that they too are walking towards a similar goal to that of MC, maybe not saving the city but perhaps cleaning it of its pests? or maybe they're aiming for something much higher than we can even think of as of right now, BUTTTTT WHATEVER it dosnet matter because they do seem like someone we can trust even though they're so cold with us 😅 but this shall not deter me from romancing them because who dosen't want the perfect enemies to lovers trope plus they give me the vibes of an unwilling mother of the group who just happened to be at the wrong and at the wrong time and now have to deal with an asshole (or two) who have the energy of a handful of nasty goblins, in a nutshell they give me big mommy of the two vibes and it's just my gut tell me that but whatever 😃

as for the theory thing, it's just a casual theory but i believe that MC was somehow involved in either possibly running their normal life (maybe they got tangled with one of their family members who was into some shady business) or indirectly caused them great pain which our little MC isnt aware of (or has forgotten) and maybe that's why both Alex and Vincent are so concerned about them. maybe the event was too traumatic in itself even though they no (or a little) hand in it which drove them down the alley of self loathing , OR JUST MAYBEEEE it wasn't MC's fault at all and they were just at the wrong place at the wrong time and spotting them Alzono just automatically had a misunderstanding and blamed them for the whole shit, whatever the reason is Alonzo hates our guts but i shall not be deterred! come at me you ice cold bastard!!

p.s. may i hug them once??? PRETTY PLEASEEEEEE I SWEAR IM SO SHORT I WON'T EVEN REACH THEIR SHOULDERS (plus i hope they won't kill me :P) , btw , a couple of questions regarding them (its strictly for research i tell you!)

1. what's their height?

2. their favorite colour?

3. favorite flower? and does it have some sort of symbolism behind it?

4. favorite animal? do they have a pet or intend on doing so?

5. what's their comfort food? or maybe their guilty pleasure?

6. do they like celebrating their birthdays?

7. do they perhaps have a family member or sibling? (i would gladly have them as my uncle!)

8. are they a red flag or na? :)

p.p.s by the time i learn how to draw properly you're all screwed :D *secretly holds an Alonzo and Wesley plushie closely*

AND FINALLY I JUST WANTED TO THANK YOU ONCE AGAIN FOR MAKING SUCH AN AWESOME IF AND WONDERFUL CHARACTERS WITH SO MUCH DIVERSITY I HOPE YOU HAVE AN AWESOME DAY AHEAD !!!!! ❤🎉

here's some apple pies that i baked virtually 🍰🍰🍰 as a thank you :D

and oof the ask got lengthy, AGAIN 👁👄👁

unwilling mother of the group who just happened to be at the wrong and at the wrong time

This is so funny to me help 😭 Quite accurate, though. Alonzo has that vibe, indeed.

These are interesting thoughts btw! I love those theories as well. There are actually quite a few hints in the game now with regards to Alonzo's reasons for hating the MC, though I suppose they're not easy to find as of the moment. When they get revealed, however, I suspect tears will be shed (more than the flashback and reunion scenes with Wesley combined). It's just that bad tbh.

And yes, you'll get the chance to hug them :'))))

For your questions--

1. what's their height?

Okay so, I'm gonna shamelessly admit that I forgot the specifics 💦I can tell you they're tall, but I literally answered an ask about this once and now I can't find it lmao so... let's leave it at that for now.

2. their favorite colour?

Hmm... black. Yeah, I think that's what they like the most.

3. favorite flower? and does it have some sort of symbolism behind it?

Ah, man :'))) Their favorite flower would probably the Sampaguita. Mostly because it reminds them of their early childhood. The flower also symbolizes hope and humility, concepts that Alonzo treasures a lot.

4. favorite animal? do they have a pet or intend on doing so?

They like bird-watching, if that counts? Alonzo doesn't have a pet, but they used to take care of stray cats when they were a kid. Sometimes they still do.

5. what's their comfort food? or maybe their guilty pleasure?

Alonzo loves spicy foods!!! (some of their faves are laing, sinantolan, and shrimp bicol express)

6. do they like celebrating their birthdays?

Their birthday is actually a very, very sensitive topic to them jdkasjdkajka It brings back a lot of bad memories, but at the same time, some of the memories also comfort them? It's a bit complicated.

7. do they perhaps have a family member or sibling? (i would gladly have them as my uncle!)

You'll meet their mother in Book 2 :)))))))) that's all I can say

8. are they a red flag or na? :)

I've mentioned it here, but especially in Alonzo's case, I honestly think the MC's the one that should be considered a red flag if we're labeling people lmao. Alonzo also has a very caring side to them, so I'd never classify them as one tbh. But idk. It's very subjective, and I feel like it's your prerogative whether to view them as such or not.

Thank you! I'll never get tired of answering long asks haha

[suzakushimon]

i hate it when im bothered by something on the internet so whenever i come across a take or ship that i really dont like i psychoanalyze myself to try to find the reasons why i dont like it. anyways the reason why i dont like the most popular ship from star railing

be warned im a hater down below

i already blocked a bunch of variations of the ship name but somehow it keeps jumpscaring me so ive been forced to analyze the ship objectively again

it looks sooooo SOOOO incredibly ooc to see dan heng blushing bc of blade, or blade and dan heng being lovey dovey. like, THATS NOT MY FAV CHARA BRO.... DAN HENG!!! GET BEHIND ME!!!!!!!!!

BUT after thinking abt it i realized i could and would eat a hatefucking fic between the 2

so the thing i dont like isnt necessarily the ship itself, but the circumstances they r pictured in

so in my mind they can be enemies with benefits (that will NOT turn into enemies to lovers) and they can hatefuck and try to kill each other until one of them is dead

but they can NOT be in love. canonically there is no affection between the two so any depiction otherwise is SUPER ooc to me and i get pissed seeing my fav charas personality warped so bad bc if blade was some rando enemy then like fine but dan heng has been living in fear of this one specific dude for years so i forreal cannot imagine any sort of secret love or whatever. (dan heng GET BEHIND ME!!!!!!!) i for the life of me can NOT imagine blade harboring any positive emotion towards dan heng, and the same goes for the reverse. ESPECIALLY the reverse.

so what i actually dont like isnt the ship itself, its the most popular fanon interpretation of the ship which is that dan heng has residual emotions from dan feng and secretly likes blade/blade has residual emotions from yingxing and secretly likes dan heng...... bc i rly like canon which strongly pushes that they both are separated from their past lives and tht the only bond that ties them together is blades ongoing vengeance and elio's script

99% of fic and art tends to lean towards the happy side of things (what if they were secretly in love, love that persists through death/reincarnation, happy endings, etc) and the same goes for hsr meaning most blade/dan heng stuff. like yeah a lot of it is angst but its angst w a happy ending. instead of just enemies its enemies to lovers. instead of the sins of the past have been washed away its we'll fulfill the unfulfilled wishes of our past. like...... the core concept of what would make the ship good to me is not there at all in most of the fandom stuff....

plus i just rly dont like how even though the game reasserts dan hengs identity as an individual again and again ppl still mix him into dan feng just for ship material... i might be projecting onto him or smth bc idk why i take it so personally but it feels so wrong. ingame he keeps repeating again and again "i'm not him", "i'm not dan feng", and then the fandom goes "actually, 30% of u is dan feng and that 30% is in love w blade" like what???????

so thats why the ship bothers me so much. the OOCness + the OOCness + the OOCness + if they like each other then its OOC + the themes the game present are ignored in favor of another bland gay ship formula

[communist-cat-girl]

i wrote way too much shit so ima paraphrase what made me block someone a minute ago

if someone rewrites a story and makes the characters gay, thats fine if you think doin that shows that you have “gay blinders”, just block me

if youre mad about that, keep readin. if you dont wanna read, block me. its a bad faith take thats on par with “representation is pointless” and “i wish modern media would stop shovin gays down my throat” type 4chan shit

if you dont know what i mean, be thankful! its a pointless bit of discourse that doesnt matter to any real world person except queers online who want to gatekeep every aspect of bein a queer. be gay and free, fuck these hos

“just because its gay doesnt mean its better!” feels a little bad faith? like ya, its obviously not necessarily better, but the thing is ... im gay ... so i have a vested interest in if whether or not they get together; not to mention it recontextualizes stories as one’s of aggression against oppression (if they werent already) that makes me doubly interested as an anarchist.

if we look at, say, Alice Isnt Dead we can see this in full swing both ways. not only is the core audience and creative team behind Welcome to Nightvale openly supportive or queer themselves, so too are those who’ve worked on Alice Isnt Dead. Not only does this mean that the queer audience will feel catered too but the queer staff will be more likely to *want* to work on this, to put their whole ass into this project and make it better than if they were just paid to make some mlw piece of media.

and would the mlw idea rly work when the end of part 1 and all of part 2, spoilers by the way, of alice isnt dead are about the gov’t doin absolutely everythin it can to keep them apart and how *keepin them apart, even as alice is part of this shadowy institution, didnt make them happy and didnt solve the wider problems of the world anyways*

im sorry, but if that story wasnt gay, if its gayness didnt put into focus the issues real gay people face, then that story is ostensibly weaker, its prose less profound, its themes less touchin

now, to talk about the post that made me want to write this ...

im not gonna link it or even directly phrase it, i dont want anyone comin onto me or comin onto anyone else over this (not like my small follower count would)

the tldr is that, the hades and persephone myth is ... well, its kinda shit. its a kidnappin, its a possibly a sexual assault, its a woman forced into a bad circumstance; and so if you made this myth wlw and say its better you “have blinders because its gay” or somethin; which ive never heard anyone suggest EVER but sure, whatever

disclaimer, i am a hellenic pagan, more specifically of roman traditions, so my opinion on the *story itself* is complicated. so im not gonna be sayin much about that.

what i really care about is how somone brings of the Hades Game and i *think* lore olympus retellin where persephone is kidnapped, lowkey on purpose possibly, and eats of the pomegranate to like ... get at her naggin mom, or w/ever. thats not actually the story of the Hades Game nor of the more popular modern helpol retellin but its close enough.

the person who relays this paraphrased story says that if its wlw its better than it would be if it was mlw (and, in gnrl, this retellin is far more palatable to a modern audience; which isnt even rly debateable) and the person complainin say somethin about “gay blinders” says “no it wouldnt be” and a cry emoji.

now, ignorin how ... perhaps accidentally homophobic that comes off as ... like ... it would. mlw forbidden love doesnt really strike the same chord like it used to. in a time of arranged marriage and loveless lives, this concept was REALLY important and was the framein of most myths about a couple in the Mediterranean durin antiquity. problem is, these days, while expectations are hard even for mlw couples, youre still largely goin to get reluctant parents go “*sigh* fine, you may”

and unless youre under a rock you may have forgotten that us fags have a habit of gettin shot for lovin who we love

so ya, the story of forbidden love between a fem hades and a sapphic persephone bein a story of gay love in which they fight against all odds and become happy with each other is substantially more *touchin* (and thus “better” in the common parlance) than the same milk toast mlw forbidden love thats been shoved down queer people’s throats since day one of our birth. 

whats rly annoyin is that op doesnt explain WHY “gay blinders” are such a bad thing anyway? is it genuinely so bad to enjoy gay stories more? to see yourself represented in a piece of media, esp one that you already connect so strongly too?

the worst outcome is “because its gay people think the story is good” but ... i dont think anyone is confused about the story of hades and persephone anyways? like, the ancients werent fuckin morons. zeus was a tyrant king and a story of how despots, even one’s who gain it thru noble means, will inevitably abuse their power. athena was dedicated to protectin women but when a woman needed her most she turned her into a fuckin monster. hera, in her hetero jealousy, harms WOMEN more than men when it comes to vengeance because she believes *the harmful actions of men against women are the fault of women.* and WHO suggests that the ancients thought otherwise?

do you think they would be allowed to spread such horrific and grotesque tales without approval from religious or political authorities if this was not an intentional and integral aspect of their faith? is it not curious that most ancient writers dont rly talk about these tales but only speak of the gods in a Vague sense? is it not curious that the details are obfuscated? ignored? its because while the gods love us and care for us they are also fickle and jealous and violent and they must be, in the ancient view, respected OUT OF FEAR

they clearly understood that these were representations of natural causes (a commonly held belief by ancient philosophers) and so their stories show that the natural outcome of things like LIGHTNING STORMS or EARTHQUAKES happen to everyone because the world is just Like That Sometimes; givin names to these causes just makes it easier to explain them. it helps them figure out the Shape of their trauma, far easier than the existential horror that we experience in our hyper objective world of today

so no, i dont think your modern liberal minded fag is gonna go “oh hades and persephone is so romantic” and even helpols on this site pretty famously go for the stories that resonate more with them on a personal level than the ancient stories men told other men to make them feel good about bein men

yes, even if the story is about two gays

if you think a story is bad on a personal level and think gayness wouldnt solve it ... Okay. thats subjective, movin on.

if you think its bad because makin it gay is a superficial bit of representation, im sorry you live a borin life? all representation is superficial then, if you wanted to be that kindve a jerk about it.

if you think makin it gay harms the original script, im sorry to tell you that oral history has changed most scripts so beyond their original form that we will NEVER be able to know that that original story was (and very likely, from an anthropological point of view, the origin of these stories could be as old as 5 to 10 thousand years ago told in different times with different gods and different circumstnaces; we will NEVER know the original story)

changin the story to fit your modern sensibilities and makin it gay is not bad, dont let anyone tell you otherwise. it even might make the story infinitely better! who knows, who cares! write what makes you happy, fuck these hos

[gayspock]

okay tldr im just kinda ... eye twitch at that whole parter LOL

like ehrhgh. SO preface: i think its always the case with "cliff hangers" wherein the reason why they fall flat so often is, like, if the actual cliffhanger itself is so... perfunctory. like they just do it because they felt like they had to leave us hanging on some tense situation - but the thing is, like? you dont NEED to orchestrate that, man; you already had our attention. so its so stupid then if like... they just resolve the situation in 0.2 seconds in the next episode. but its like yknow... its sth a lot of shows do unncessarily and ultimately if it is just a really weird blip when transitioning between eps its like. whatever.

BUT thats all to say... the end of s3 COULD have been a good use of a cliffhanger, yeah? because it's establishing, like, a pretty specific situation with longer lasting consequences than just saving someone from immediate danger in the first scene. but then they FUMBLEDDD ti like...

ough you set up sth genuinely kinda neat. i dont know why they walked it back so fast AND also made the things they did right less effective. like they open up s4 with john sooo alone and its genuinelykinda tragic but then by the end of the ep chiana's already back and its like so what... and then they all IMMEDIATELY reconnect next ep and its like- they dont even really get a proper freaking reaction, when its implied john's been out there alone for god knows how long on a dying ship like... its like nothing happened and

its like. i just feel like if ur not going to utilise the situations you construct - bc this is fiction, and you do construct the situations - why.... construct them? bc if you were gonna reunite everyone with so few consequences, we could have instead spent more time where it was worth instead. but no... and tbh that makes the cliffhanger thing even WORSE bc now u have to waste time walking it back to reset it... and its also a loss of momentum, you know? like- i know im bingeing this, so its a different viewing experience so maybe momentum isnt the right word, but yeah...i guess it just sort of sets the expectations and tone totally out of whack with what they initially establish and not in a good/intentional way

especiallyyyy bc then these two eps after ep 1... arghh!! bc of that they already are building off a strange foundation - but then with these, everything feels so rushed and sloppy. i genuinely had to check- did they kno abt cancellation, pre-production? bc i thought they were trying to speed through it but... naur, like...

farscape in the past has been one of the few shows to pull off the "just fucking throw EVERYTHING IN THERE!" bc it knows how to move quickly, and matter of factly but here its just like... stuff was just weak. i think, usually, when it DOES introduce a lot fast it knows how to really build them up. it uses super simple concepts and then layers them really well. here, not so much... i feel like the whole planet situation was, eh, contrived? is that the best word for it? its introducing a lot of weird mechanics to how it works- and maybe that'd be fine, usually, but again with everything else going on its like they introduce way too much, too fast. like oo-nii, also- i really loved the design, actually, loved the colour, but also kinda a really strange addition in here.

and i hthink its worsened with grammy granola grime bc i SAID I LIKED HER, I DO, but ive always felt with the more "spiritual aspects" (for lack of a better word) such as stark and zhaan they come close but also they kinda ... dont... pull it off ever. SORRY lol. i mean stark- actually stark did have some really good stuff in his first introduction, but i feel like its always so ill-defined in the bad way where it sort of feels like their nebulous abilities are used moreso to plaster over places in stories where they didnt know what to do rather than an actual exploration into something more interesting . like theres always a very shaky core to them- and that kinda sucks, bc you do NEED something even if you are trying to go for mystery or surrealism bc theres a difference between that and just kinda. yeah. anyways

thats all to say like. all of these issues and again entrenching some really important and heavy subject matter... EEK...!

like even just the minor shit. jool and d'argo. eh, man. just burnt through the whole damn thing in this ep... OK, LOL. IDC ABOUT IT? sorry... i just think its so weird how they handle other romances bc johnaeryn are so fucking organic and well-paced and claudia and ben do such a good job with the intimacy between them that just makes it real as fuck whereas like... everyone else is strange, man... eh. why'd you do it. come on man. its a shame bc i praised them in s1 bc they were pretty normal about zhaan and d'argo- kinda saying "oh, there's tension sometimes but otherwise its like eh theyre not super into it theyre just chilling as friends tbh" which is a dynamic that i actually find refreshing tbh... the more casual nature of it, yeah? as its told moreso through subtext and interactions whereas its like man what the fuck. everything with dargo otherwise has been, like, just so tell not show wtf...

and the major shit. i know the confirmation that jool's species are related to humans somehow is important. but its like... amongst this whole ep that whole thing really didnt have any impact bc like i said. its kinda all over. uhm. idk how i feel abt that. uhm well ... i dont like it. ok. SORRY. LOL.

but thats less so about it being done here even if it wasnt so good andmoreso i dont really want... them to be related... i dont know. what i liked about farscape was how it treated humans- john was never something special in the way trek always put "HUMANITTYYY" on a pedestal and forced the universe through human's perspective and culture and morality etc.... i really fucking hope it isnt some, like, "humans are their great ancestors" type of thing, that'd be the worst - ive had enough of that through shitty dw fan theories

and also just, like, in general ughghghg i DONT LIKE it when like.. there's a whole univers,e yes? its so infinitely huge and... well idk if it's coincedental, yet, but i dont like how small it makes the universe feel when it just so happensss that its humans like... AGAIN i think it detracts from whats established already, about how crichton is so far away from everything hes ever known ... it makes everything so much smaller in perspective and its just... ssorry to 🤓 but its soo 🤓unrealistic! AND YES YES YES its a damn fiction show- but i mean... within the established show, is what imean, bc i dont really care about technicalities USUALLY until then yeah its actually affecting the narrative where i think it is here and anyways thats speculation bc

AND OK

CANT SKIP AROUND IT

HEAVY SUBJECT MATTER

right the thing is i said it yesterday. i am not against them deciding to have *that* happen to john, in any capacity. there are respectful and meaningful ways you can explore that type of thing with care.

and its odd. bc i look at the time period this was done - and fucking hell, even comparing it to now - and theres stuff with the execution here thats... and i hesitate to say it, but it's almost... good... like.. im talking specifically about john's reaction and performance bc- god, even nowadays i feel like in media it doesnt always... get handled, well? but god- john doesnt take it well, and it isnt brushed off by the *narrative* in some parts (ehrm).. like i meanthe show knows that thats really fucked up, it acknowledges johns pain, and god like. i dont know; mauybe ben browder's performance was carrying, there, but what i mean is like.. even now i feel like with men, this type of thing isnt taken seriously or depicted like this with the grace given in PARTS of this, but also like...

GOD WITH EVERYTHING GOING ON. AND ALSO... D'ARGOS REACTION. UHM. LIKE EVERYONE ELSE'S- that just felt so fucking wrong, man. like jesus. and i mean, well, i think sometimes people do project a morality onto characters - expect a perfect reaction to things like this, when thats just not how people are, yknow - and i wouldnt want that either if it wasnt true, as i think an important aspect of this conversation IS reaction/others' perception but.. THIS? COME ON, MAN.. that whole bit is brushed off andits... icky which... again if d'argo and co misunderstood/brushed it off normally i'd be fine but its also like- the show itself brushes off them brushing it off, is my issue? no rumination on their reaction, which as i said an important aspect of that but... yeah. yeah.

and yeah. the thing in the first place- its also just sort of... ugh. like unnecessary. like- bc it isnt really reflected on much here it jsut... i dont think its shock-value territory, but it just feels like kind of a pointless jump to make - something a bit needlessly..,cruel... to approach such a serious topic when you really dont have the space to properly handle that kind of thing right now. and also its not- like from a story perspective it isnt... establishing anything, man, like... you could still have grayza domineering and even have her still like manipulate people through some similar means without that added layer (or hell, even everything up until that part with crichton i was kinda unnerved by but it didnt cross a line for me) and it would still be as effective. its not like the aurora chair or the neural clone wherein the consequences of them both have longstanding implications and do actually properly escalate-escalate, here its just like... alright lets just.. yeah. ok....

anyways

im kinda annoyed jool is now leaving like did her actress wanna go i mean thats okay if thats the case but like i dont like the revolving door character situation we've been having with regards to introducing new people like i just think it'd be fine man if you didnt. LOL

anyways

this isall so negative nancy SORRY LOLLLL im still having fun ofc its just OUGH... i swear, every opener i go through kind of a . ughhpart. at least it feels that way- maybe im misremembering

[smute]

didnt want to add this to a stranger's post like some kind of asshole so im making my own:

the (willing) suspension of disbelief does not mean "this is a poorly composed narrative so i'll just ignore its flaws and then i'll be able to enjoy it"

the phrase itself is very old. samuel taylor coleridge first used it in his biographica literaria (1817) and the term later found its way into pop culture where its meaning has been expanded further and further over the past 200 years. my boy sammy was mostly concerned with poetry though, and he proposed the concept to explain how modern audiences of his time might still be able to enjoy the more fantastic elements in poetry just like their less enlightened ancestors (very oversimplified). the thing is... scholars today don't really use the term in any other context. what most people mean when they refer to the (willing) suspension of disbelief (i think) is part of the concept of aesthetic illusion.

in narratology, aesthetic illusion describes the mental state that we, the audience, enter when we become immersed in a text or performance. think of it as an ideal position on a sliding scale between complete rational distance (observing something without interest) and total immersion. ideally you want to be closer to the latter but not quite all the way there. we want to experience a represented world in a way similar to real life, not identical to real life.

the experience is different from dreams, hallucinations, psychosis, etc. because it starts with a concrete representation (text, performance, movie, etc), not out of the blue, and because it's not a perceptual error. it's something we want to experience on purpose. and this is where the word "willing" in willing suspension of disbelief comes in. this sort of interaction requires an unspoken contract between author and audience, in which the creator of a work provides the audience with a story, and they agree to accept the reality of that story as it is.

you suspend your disbelief the moment you pick up a novel or press play on a movie, but the rest (and this is the important part) is up to the creator of the work. it is not the responsibility of the audience. violations of internal logic, a lack of detail, a lack of clarity, contradictory information, and unrealistic or improbable events (e.g., deus ex machina) can all impair verisimilitude and cause the aesthetic illusion to fail (again, oversimplified, this depends on genre conventions, your own cultural background etc.) but that burden lies with the author. and there's not really all that much you can do about it as a reader/viewer.

so when people say stuff like "you gotta suspend your disbelief a little bit"... they usually mean something entirely different: dont be overly critical. give this book/movie/play a chance. stop searching for flaws. and yeah! i think reading in bad faith is something that's becoming more popular, and that's a problem. cinemasins brainrot if you will. it just doesn't have much to do with the thing that "suspension of disbelief" refers to.

anyway this isnt a "shame on you for using this very specific term wrong" kind of post. it's one of those terms that's used very differently in popular culture--i just wanted to give a simple (ish) explanation for anyone interested in media analysis etc.