#like musically it's fucking great. banger after banger

[thievinghippo]

So I promised a postmortem and it’s finally time! Here’s the TL:DR. I loved it. I can already tell I’ll probably have more played hours in this game than Inquisition, and I fucking loved Inquisition! Good, bad, and ugly beneath the cut and there will be heavy spoilers for the entire game, so read at your own risk. (This is also long, because I have a lot to say!)

THE GOOD

Rook. Once I let go of my preconceived notion of how Rook was (mid-40s and serious but kind) and accepted Rook for the young, sarcastic character they are, I fell in love. Edda is going to be an A possibly even S tier OC for me

The dwarves. We were fed so well, y’all. So much lore and dialogue choices. There was even a Grey Warden dwarf specific dialogue choice. I love the confirmation of what we all suspected with the Titans. I just wish that a dwarf Rook had the opportunity to confront Solas. He apparently apologizes to Harding. But what about a dwarf Rook?

Exploration. I’m an idiot when it comes to figuring out in-game puzzles and such. I’ve read some complaints that everything was far too easy, but for one of the first times I remember, I could do a vast majority of puzzles and finding treasures without consulting a game guide. And I was actually proud when I figured things out. When I play Edda again, I’m going to 100% the world and I cannot wait

The Companions. Bonus points for Emmrich Volkarin. I ended up loving all of them. Even the ones I was very ‘meh’ on before playing the game. Like Bellara. She was on my list to romance second to last. And she has moved up to third, after Emmrich and Davrin. 

Emmrich Volkarin. Yes, he gets his own special mention. I love him so much that I created a second Rook to romance him. That way I have one Emmrich that is not a lich (Edda’s choices) and one Emmrich that is a lich (Sonnet’s choice). I love his compassion, his kindness, his reverence of the dead. I adore his romance and how clear it is that Rook has bewitched him, body and soul. The fact that they lean into the age gap and it becomes entwined with his own fears of death. He has my favorite personal quest. I loved the music, the atmosphere. How it pertains to his own journey, facing his mortality (plus Johanna Hezenkoss can get it). Plus it has the banger line of ‘Show them what a real necromancer can do!’ I even can’t wait not to romance him and see what the friendship is like and encourage him to hook up with Strife

The backgrounds. Granted, I’ve only played through the game 1.5 times, but there have been so many background mentions. Especially for the Grey Wardens. Mourn Watch has some great ones too. I mean, there was Grey Warden romance banter during a fight. In a side quest! I can’t wait to discover more

The character creator. I love how inclusive it is, especially when you compare it to previous Dragon Age games. The hair is beautiful (but where is my braid crown! my kingdom for a braid crown!) and I have overweight OCs, which make me very happy. Varric's shaving mirror is also amazing, and because I want EA to know that people are using these options, Sonnet is a trans woman who will save Thedas

THE BAD

Weird tonal switches. Emmrich and Harding are going to Ferelden so she can show him around but the South is being razed by darkspawn. Harding’s mom sends her back with pie and gives great hugs. How in the world are they getting to Ferelden? Rook was amazed to see the Inquisitor in the North so why would the members of the Veilguard be able to go to the South? Some of the codex entries are so dark and yet everyone is happy in the Lighthouse 

Give Rook a problem, please! I kept waiting for Rook’s LI to go up to her and ask if there’s anything distracting her. If there’s any problem they could solve together. But that never came and Rook is apparently the only person on the team that can’t be distracted by their own problems. How amazing would it have been if Rook had some sort of personal quest. Maybe based on lineage. Or background. Something that shows that she matters as much to her companions and they mean to her

The Act One Choice. Still mad about it. Are you telling me that two extra people would have saved Minrathous? That a city full of the most powerful mages in the known world couldn’t take down a fucking dragon? It didn’t feel earned and it did annoy me a great deal

Let. Rook. Mourn. While I appreciate that Rook was able to mourn Varric and Davrin (in my playthrough) privately, the fact that it immediately jumps to a sex scene sort of bothered me. Especially Emmrich’s taking them to the Necropolis so they can bang in a coffin. This was not the time to leave the Lighthouse, Emmrich! The rest of the team got to mourn Davrin and worry about Neve together. I wish Rook could have been a part of that too. 

Let’s talk Varric’s death. I didn’t see it coming. I actually ranted to a friend before I knew what happened that they should have killed him in the prologue if this was how they were going to use him. Oops. I hate how callous the truth about his death makes Rook look. I hate that Harding and Neve didn’t even really seem to mourn. Hate how the Inquisitor or Dorian or Isabela don’t mention him at all. I hate how obvious his death is in my second playthrough. I will have to fix this all in fanfic

THE UGLY

Assuming there is another DA game, where do we go from here? I really dislike the concept of the Executors in the secret ending. One thing I’m optimistic about is that by basically wiping the south off the map, we might be able to have more games there. Because everything will have been reset, so to speak. How does the South deal with the mages when they’ve all been fighting darkspawn for their lives? Put them back into Circles? I think not

I’m also not sure about what choices would move forward into a new DA game. Not talking companion choices, but choices that actually affect the world. No matter what we do, the Blight is over and the Veil is safe. If BioWare couldn’t be bothered to have the Well of Sorrows choice matter, I can’t imagine they’ll care how Solas was bound to the Veil, whether it be by choice, trickery, or force. Minrathous or Treviso is the only other non-companion choice I can think of that might possibly matter

But honestly, it doesn’t matter, because who knows if we’ll ever get another Dragon Age game? I know I would love one, but I have this sinking feeling there won’t be (please let me be wrong!)

So there you have it. I really love this game, good, bad, and ugly. And I found so much more to love than to dislike. I have a feeling I will be yelling about this game (and Emmrich!) for a long, long time

[pulsar-1919]

I saw a clip from the London 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony earlier, got nostalgic and myself and my roommate, being the adhd fuckers that we are, ended up spontaneously watching almost 4 hours of it

[cinnabread]

I'm tipsy and dancing in the mirror and this is the best I've felt in sosososso long

[butchlifeguard]

primrose's ch3 is GOOD btw

[stupidvoltmain]

How the fuck Warframe is just there.

On the landscape of AI art-apocalypse, major gaming studios crumbling, gaming enshittification, great games being milked to death, Warframe is just there.

Like DE is releasing banger after banger and their music department is literally on the fucking fire because how good it is what the fuck?????

[bestanimatedmovie]

Choose your favorite!

Vote in the other polls!

What fans say:

The Lorax:

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse:

It had a very big impact on meme culture. And a really catchy soundtrack. Plus it has the silly sexy green man. What more could you want from a film.*

The Once-ler and the let it die song. This movie is glorious.

It is legit the mother of all great animated movies nowadays. From Mitchells vs the machines to the new mutant mayhem movie! The plot is so good and you can really see character development from almost all of the characters, plus the designs are BANGER.

THE MUSIC?? TOP FUCKING TIER. THE CASUAL DIVERSITY? IT ALSO HAS LITERALLY THE BEST SHOT IN CINEMATIC HISTORY (Miles rising after taking his leap of faith)

BRO THE ANIMATION IS SO SICK. The amount of sheer effort put into this movie is insane. The character growth was so amazing to watch and such a great movie to analyze. Best scenes are obviously the leap of faith. Actually gorgeous. And also the scene where aunt May sees Peter b after her Peter died. Her “you look tired, Peter” is just so heartfelt

Where the hell do I even start. The visuals are incredible and the plot is engaging. Every scene is perfect.

This film has EVERYTHING. Humor, action, inspirational scenes, kickass music, absolutely killer animation, an art style that is an homage to comic books, loveable characters, a talking pig, DR OLIVIA OCTAVIUS, I could go on

This is the best superhero movie ever made, the leap of faith is one of the best movie scenes of ever

The animation style is better than all the others, and makes the movie funnier too! The representation is also good, and the romantic storyline isn't too prevalent in the movie. Probably the best animation Marvel has made. My favorite scene is when the villains show up to Aunt May's house -- its my favorite fight scene!

I’m sure this movie’s been submitted already because it’s arguably the greatest animated film of all time. I have a personal connection to it because I saw it in theaters on opening night with my late father, and we both loved it and I still do. The animation is revolutionary and it’s one of the only 3 movies that make me cry.

gsksvbsvsbsvs I love everything about it, I love the animations, the story, the soundtrack also the style of animation AAAAAA its so beautiful its art it belongs in a museum i get goosebumps everytime I rewatch it

It’s just so good. All the characters are amazing and I love Miles dad. It’s hilarious and sparked my love for spider-man. It’s such a sweet movie about finding yourslef and has such a powerful message. I totally recommend it so I’m not adding spoilers, but like. Ohhhh, it’s so good.

Interesting villains, well-developed character arcs, a fresh take on Spider-Man, unique use of animation, funny, good use of multiverse that adds to the nature of the story being told, complicated character dynamics

It's the best animated movie because A: it takes one of the most well known comic characters of all time, kills him off in the first few minutes, and then shows you every cooler version of him. B: Has a large amount of representation in its main cast, considering that they're all versions of Spiderman, and that requires a white guy by default. C: everything in it is so well done I can't pick a favorite scene, but the most iconic is the jump off the skyscraper window.

The animation is incredible, the movie has so much story and heart, and there’s a perfect balance between humor and seriousness. And the soundtrack slaps

This is probably the best animated film I've ever seen. The animation is definitely the highlight, the way they blend comic book art styles and 3D animation is an absolute joy to look at and is so overwhelmingly creative, every frame of this movie is gorgeous. The impact this had on the industry is undeniable, as we start to see more and more movies getting more creative with their animation styles. It's not just the animation though. All of the characters are entertaining, all of the jokes land and the story is really well done. It leaves me blown away every time I watch it.

This movie kind of changed the western animation industry from the ground up. Apart from being expertly written, funny, and heartfelt, it is also stellarly animated, with a unique visual style that takes direct inspiration from the comic books it adapts and mixes 2d- and 3d-animation in a way and to a degree that hadn't really been seen before in western mainstream. Its critical and monetary success paved the way for mainstream 3d animation to open up to new and excitingly stylised movies that were like a breath of fresh air between the generic Pixar-style animation that had been the largely unchanged norm in the industry since Toy Story circa twenty years earlier**. ITSV divides the screen like panels on a comic page, it uses dots and lines for shading and gradients, doesn't shy away from lowering framerates for stylisation, and makes liberal use of onomatopoeia, both to comedic and dramatic impact. Impact frames and SFX are often hand-drawn and stunningly colourful, and even the simple dialogue scenes astonish with an expressiveness and realism in their depiction of emotions that makes me rewatch a two-second scene of Miles laughing fifteen times in a row. My favourite scene has to be the What's Up Danger scene, the emotional climax of the movie. Set to an absolute banger of a song, it is the moment the entire film has been building up to. I won't spoil anything plot-wise in case you somehow haven't seen this movie, but both from an emotional and a visual standpoint it is Fucking Dope. Conclusion: Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse is my favourite movie of all time and I could talk about it for hours. If you haven't seen it, go watch it. Thank you.

Have you SEEN the Whats Up Danger/rising and falling scene? it's a work of art that makes me fall in love with storytelling all over again whenever I see it. Also the impact that it's had on animated film is absolutely being felt at current, if incrementally. Incredible film.

It has an amazing art style based on comics and mixed up due to genre differences. It's really fun and the characters are great, even the side ones. The story line is great and I love Miles and his family.

*Mod note: errr, quite a lot more than memes and music actually

**Mod note: amen

[shapelytimber]

Wdym it's been 5 months ? Anyway, here is the end of my little comic serie about this niche Skyrim mod

*Insert me 100%ing the 4th arc of the hit mod 'vigilant' for the elder scrolls V Skyrim with little difficulty having a grand ol' time*

I messed up my files so Teldryn divorced me while I was away ckgkckkc And you know what good for him, he got a cottage and a kid out of it

[PART 1] - [PART 2] - [PART 3]

[COMMISSIONS]

If you're interested in my thoughts about this mod, you can read that below (it's fucking long so I'm sparing you all just here for the art to have to scroll through all that) vvv

A fantastic mod for sure ! I had so much fun, the voice acting was (for the most part) quite impressive, the music !!!!!!!!! Excuse me who gave this mod permission to have this fucking banger of an ost ???? Loved the new environnements, and there was so much of them !! Especially in act 4, I felt that all the locations had a unique and gorgeous aesthetic (frankly it was the most fun I had doing dungeons in skyrim... the bar is on the floor tho- if I ever see another nordic tomb or draugr I'll not be responsible for my actions), and fucking impressive mise en scene.

And the fights were so fun ??? In skyrim ?? Incredible.

But I still have some problems with it- first let's get the elephant out of the room : act 1 and 2... Boy oh boy were they not so great- I get that the begining is a slow burn to 1) get to know the vigilants of stendar, and 2) drive home the fact that the vigilants are quite incompetent and stendar hates them. Ok this is cool ! And they definetly were some highlights, like with the story of the three kajiits (I'm not good with remembering names (forshadowing for later-)), the ending of act 1, and uuuuuuuhhhh underground windhelm looked sick in act 2 !

But the quests in general were not very fun, at least not fun enough to distract me from the parts of the scenario I understood- which were kind of sexist and not that interesting (the sexism doesn't get better with act 3 and 4 but at least I'm having fun)- like I don't expect great women characters, this is still a tes mod, and it definitly doesn't get to "the man writting this is a fucking creep and I'm not playing this any longer" territory... But all the women we interact with are either : prostitutes, mothers/wives, or abuse(it's nearly always rape) victims- like I don't really mind that the first quest is to track down a vampire prostitute who propose to show me her sweetrolls, but it gets pretty tiresome after a while (and kinda ridiculous, like do all the big musley men I'm fighting in act 4 have to angst about their wives ? Can't a big musley woman angst about her partner too...). The worst one is Lamae Bal. From the charadesign, to the dialogues with her, to her story- hated that.

And also we don't have much dialogue choices and ways to influence the story in these 2 (3) first acts. Which I understand like this is a lot of work for fan content, but it's such a stark contrast to act 4 it's a bit jaring.

But speaking of the story... I get this is a very thoughtful and well researched story. A lot of work reading the tes wiki as been done by the author... But I, on the other hand, did not read the entire extended lore wiki- and I admit I was not understanding any of it during Act 4. Like I got a general idea, and the epic, dramatic and emotional moments were still impactful ! But I really don't think the author did a great job getting the story accross, and the more the mod progress, the more this problem becomes relevant. The recuring problem of tes games is that they have really deep interesting lore that we rarely get to see in the games ; the problem of this mod is that we get presented with this lore as if we already knew it.

And after watching an explaination of the story, it's such a shame because it's really good !! And well written ! But I don't think I should need a youtube video to understand it...

Also omfg I am not good with names mod please- everything has like 2-3 different weird fantasy names (but it's never explained it's the same thing, and what the thing is is never explained-), there is a billion men characters with weird ass long names, and the mod expects me to remember them all 5-6 hours after they got killed ??? I don't remember them 5 seconds after I'm done talking to them-

But I had fun playing it, and that's what matters <3 and I'll never get other twink molag bal <3

Also, my mage dragonborn is even more op now omg I can summon an army of 8ft musle men + molag bal + Jyggalag ??? The only fight I had a bit of trouble with was Pelinal's, the rest got obliterated easily (by Pelinal) kgkgkfjfifb

I'll probably need to nerf Elaris at some point in the future-

[milgram-tournament]

MILGRAM Best Song Tournament, Round 2, Match 2 BRING IT ON vs. THIS IS HOW TO BE IN LOVE WITH YOU

Propaganda for both options under the cut!

Propaganda for BRING IT ON:

"Reasons why Bring it On should win:

- Just by starting the song, the instrumentals are BANGER. Like his more rock style is very cool, even better than After Pain’s more mellow style - Arthur’s voice (Futa’s va) had bills due because have you HEARD his singing?? His raspier voice fits Futa so well - It feels so explosive and like a call to action in a sense, which very much matches Futa’s mentality during trial 1. He also wasn’t playing victim like a CERTAIN girl… (jk, love you mu!) - SAA HAJIMEYOU USOTSUKI KARIDA - UNDEAD HEROOOI YES SLAY KING HIS HIGH NOTE HERE IS HEAVENLY - His scream at the end. Oh my god. HE LITERALLY ATE THIS NOTE. AFTER PAIN COULD NEVER. BRING IT ON FTW 🔥🔥🔥" - His range goes WAAAAAY higher than Mu. She would end up like PHG if she even tried hitting any of his high notes in the last chorus /j

---

- The vocals are amazing, those growls are so well done - You’re able to get Fuuta’s crime and motive pretty succinctly, only based on the visuals - But it still leaves a lot up to interpretation, like how he only attacked once in the final fight scene. It lead to some cool theories. - On that note, the game aspects are so cool!! Especially when paired with him going after people online, just good synergy with awesome style! - Fuuta’s scared face after he realizes what he did. The great contrast of other foes simply being knocked out then being met with blood splatter. - The tempo of the song changing with his mood is a really good touch as well. Make the song more chaotic which highlights his character traits well

---

"propaganda for bring it on: the music FUCKS it genuinely slaps so hard listening to it. song style is incredible its perfect for fuutas personality and gamer vibes. also the way the mv frames everything as a game? the only time real blood and real gore happens being when killcheroy dies? the little details of all the usernames, the different monster designs, the generally distorted feel of everything being too lighthearted?

okay i could go on about the mv for hours but lets not. aside from that: the FEEL of the song!!! the vocals!!!! it really feels like fuuta putting his whole heart into it, into this point of view that both blows problems out of proportion and minimises them, and DEEPLY fucking up. my darling little hypocrite gamer boy twitter user. he makes his witch hunt genuinely sound like something that could sweep people up into it. also the instruments goddddd. the guitar and synth the bass and the drums the DRUMS. im relistening to it to write this propaganda and it keeps making me headbang when i should be writing. if you arent headbanging to bring it on you are LYING.

the way the lyrics are written is wonderful too!!!! they feel so brash and brave and powerful and like. cocky about it. and it fits PERFECTLY. its gets someone swept up into it and it FUCKS. vote bring it on im serious. lets go!! a victory march!! dan da dan!!"

Propaganda for TIHTBILWY:

okay so like the thing im most in love with: the VOCALS!!!! this song has an absolutely AMAZING singer and AMAZING vocals!!!! the way the conversational talk-singing lines still feel so musical!!!! the cute cute cuteeeee mahiru voice!!!! it brings you so much energy!!!! its a song sung with so much love!!!! mahirus va brings such an amazing feel to the song with such amazing talk-singing!!!! its very skillfully done and it happens in i love you too!! mahiru songs r the QUEENS of musical talk singing

the silly phone call bit. kurururu~!

the little vocal flourish and the way her voice raises up like an excited exclamation in the final prechorus!! daijoubu nante kirai DA!

its such a fast song but everything flows so well!!!! it makes it feel so bright and cheery and peppy!!

the instrumental is so underrated just LISTEN to that catchy bass line thats so pretty in the verses!!!! no for real even if u dont vote this is how to be in love with you go listen to the bass line in the verses it works to move both the song and the listener forward at mahirus sweeping breakneck pace. and the cute keyboard sounding and synth instruments!!!! its SUCH a danceable song!!!! i cant listen to it without bopping along in my seat

the way the ominous bits are subtly hidden? it all sounds so cute but there are just these Things that she sings that are really kind of concerning and unhealthy when she sings them!! and the veiled desperation to be in her relationship- listening to that and the cheery tone and breakneck, quick song pace, it really does represent mahiru SO well. she throws in all these little bits that just go noooo teehee the relationships just fine!! when it REALLY isnt

i would listen to mahiru talk for hours

the MV!!!!!! HER FASHION SENSE THE MAGAZINE STYLE!!!! the magazine style especially works so well with her character!!!! its so cute and stunning and just looking at it you have a blast. also her birdcage!!!! her birdcage and the bright orange and the pink bars!!!! the way everything desaturates and becomes more sickly looking when she wakes up at the end!!!! its such a happy carefully curated and designed dream and then it drains away!!!! also god all her outfits are stunning. mahiru call me

the way she sings "overheat de~!" cutest thing in the WORLD.

the little faces she makes!!!! godddd shes so expressive

actually the whole songs so expressive!!!! shes putting her all into it!!!! her words have so much expression in them!!!! once more praising mahirus va the way her voice can soften and become bright or subtly desperate so quickly is MASTERFUL control of expression when singing and its so underrated. join me in being insane over miho okasaki delivers her lines. shes such a perfect mahiru.

funniest es cover. hands down. funniest es cover.

this is how to be in love with you is FREE serotonin!!!! free energy right there!!!! this is how to be in love with you sweep!!!!!

---

-The song is so cheerful!! I always feel like dancing and singing when this one comes up in my playlists!! Absolute banger, mood definer, kicking sadness in the shin with those high-heels and then hitting its face with a cute purse -THE HIGH-HEELS STEPPING TO THE BEAT OF THE MUSIC IN THAT ONE SCENE (0:50). SIMPLY ICONIC. NO ONE DID IT LIKE HER. -👠💅👝👗 -She is slaying. Look at her outfits. She put so much effort there. She gave it her all. Absolutely serving. -SUKITTE KIMOCHI WAKATTA TSUMORI? NARA KONO MAMA FUTARI O-VA-HI-TO- DE -The storyline of the mv MAKES SENSE and you can form a COHESIVE TIMELINE OF EVENTS (unlike other unspecified contestants' mvs you know 🙄) -look at herr 🥺 she beby 🥺 all she did was love too much 🥺 we all love mappi don't we 🥺 she deserved more let her win this pleease 🥺 -No medical malpractice happened in the making of this mv 👍

---

I care so much about This is How To Be In Love With You- it's visuals are brilliant in the ways it conveys its themes and narrative. I'm never normal Ever about the "Love as marketing" symbolism that is brought in by the use of magazines. It's a lovely upbeat song but the Horrors are Always Lurking under it, the breakup Ritual line is my Favorite Line cause its so horrifying but its said so casually and its so good oh its so good-

[merakiui]

I stumbled upon your Ruggie fic where he accidentally knocked up MC and I was like "oh my god that's a banger." Then I scrolled to your tags and I short-circuited.

AS A RIDDLE STAN??? YOU'RE SO BIG BRAINED??? LIKE ok yeah with him being the perfect kid and all and his mom I always wondered (a perfectly healthy and normal amount) what would happen if he got MC pregnant?

That Ruggie fic was so real!! So well done!! If you don't mind, could you elaborate what you think would happen with Riddle? You don't have to write a whole fic or anything! Just briefly share your thoughts with the class (me) if you would be so kind please!! 🤓

Frothing at the mouth,

Riddlelover69

Hello, Riddlelover69!!! Allow me to share the thoughts. >:D

(cw: brief nsfw, female reader, accidental pregnancy, mentions of alcohol/intoxication, riddle's mother, fwb dynamic, mentions of abortion)

Riddle is floored when you break the news to him. He's in so much disbelief even after you've provided him with physical evidence (the pregnancy test). He insists you take another one just to be sure because he's so certain that you can't possibly be pregnant. He has always been so careful and responsible when the two of you were intimate; he made sure to wear protection each time and he never did anything reckless. But then the second test comes back positive and he's absolutely stunned. Where did he go wrong? How did this happen? He's never been careless. This must be a mistake!

Riddle lives in denial for three days before it occurs to him. Weeks prior to this discovery, the both of you were attending a stargazing party Cater had thrown in the Heartslabyul rose maze. He'd practically begged Riddle to let him host it. Apparently it was going to be "super cammable" and a "perfect opportunity for lots of stupid fun." Riddle should have known his angle when he slipped vodka into the fruit punch Trey made, and he should have realized the wine Cater had been discreetly serving everyone. "Stupid fun" must have meant stupid drunk. Where he even got the alcohol from was beyond Riddle. He had intended to scold him; he was ready to sever his head for breaking so many rules. But then you were passing a glass into his hand and he knew it would be wrong and inappropriate for him to drink when he was meant to be the upstanding, always obedient Housewarden.

You were smiling, nudging him playfully, saying something teasing. The two of you are close friends (fuck buddies, according to Cater), not lovers, and Riddle really shouldn't have entertained your blatant rule-breaking. But lately he's wanted to impress you; he wanted to show you that he can be cool—that he's not always so stiff and formal and boring. Great Seven, he nearly died from the shame when you had jokingly said that to him. He doesn't want to be boring. He wants to be fun and not so awkward all the time. He wants to branch out and have a lot of friends. He wants to be effortlessly relaxed like you.

He's not, but with the music swelling in time with his heart and your own melodious laughter in his ears he could delude himself into thinking so. And foolishly Riddle broke his own moral compass, NRC's rules, Heartslabyul's rules, and even the unspoken rules put in place by his mother. And for one night you thought he was cool and so did he. And for one night he was not boring. For one night he could kiss you silly without worrying about perfecting the technique or the placement of his hands on your hips or what to do about his reputation should anyone find out (not that it mattered to you, but it meant the world to him).

One night, under an inky canvas of stars (they looked more like chips of glass to Riddle, but then his mind was foggy and his senses were all tangled and he was so obviously intoxicated, but that didn't matter; ironically enough, he was having fun breaking rules with you), he did away with formality and fucked you raw in a shadowed corner of the rose maze, far enough from any prying eyes but close enough where you could still hear the music, feel the thrum of it between the both of you.

And now, weeks later, the result of such a reckless night rears its ugly head. And oh is it ugly. He's not sure what he should do. For once in his perfect, well-tailored life, he is completely lost. He tries not to panic—tries to act like everything's normal, but he has never been a particularly convincing actor and it doesn't take long for those close to him to suspect he's stressed. How you can be so calm about all of this is beyond him. You're pregnant! Aren't you worried what everyone will say and think? Aren't you even a little concerned for your future? His schedules are already complicated and cramped enough. Fitting a child in there is impossible!

And beyond all of that, past NRC's gates and all the way in the Queendom of Roses, his mother waits. He absolutely can't tell her. It's one thing to devote oneself to a no-strings-attached relationship (she would definitely disapprove of you); it's another to impregnate said friend with benefits, especially when he isn't even finished with school yet or married. He's meant to be perfect (he's not; no one is), but how can he look and be perfect if this is hanging over his head like a guillotine's blade?

His mother will definitely disown him. He can already hear her shrill screams. She'd probably say something like, "If you have the time to fool around, then you can spend that time acting like one." She wouldn't offer any support or comfort. It would just be harsh and cruel scoldings. She wouldn't acknowledge him or you. It would be so easy for her to snip him out of her life as if he was nothing more than a paper person on a chain of paper people, entirely useless and flimsy in her eyes. A failure—that's what he would be. She couldn't boast about him to friends and coworkers. Not after this.

You have to get rid of it. He tells you this a week later when the both of you are cooped up in his room to discuss the issue at hand. Riddle has never truly argued with you, but the both of you are going back and forth over what to do with the baby and his temper is rising. For some reason you want to keep it. He's so stressed and panicked and livid. No, you're not keeping it! He tells you to stop calling the baby a "them" because it's an "it" and that's all it will ever be. You look genuinely hurt when he says that, and his chest is heaving wildly as he catches his breath, throat raw from yelling.

He...went too far. He shouldn't have said that, and even when he sees the tears in your eyes he knows right away that he's doing everything completely wrong. And you admit in a hushed, broken voice that you're scared, too. That you feel so horrible for being reckless. That you know this isn't ideal. And it occurs to Riddle then that you have never been the calm and collected person he's often admired. You are just as frenzied as him.

He exhales a slow, exhausted breath, allowing his shoulders to deflate. He apologizes for raising his voice, for saying those terrible things, for panicking. He can give you time. It's your body; you're the one carrying the baby. Naturally he thinks it should be your choice, even if he's adamant that you get rid of the baby, but Riddle hates to see you so distraught. Arguably, he hates that more than he hates this situation. And he likes you. It's always lingered in a crevice of his mind, a romantic attraction that was getting harder to snuff the longer he stayed with you, the more he got to know you, the more he allowed himself to open up to you.

He walks you back to Ramshackle Dorm. It's the polite thing to do, and the both of you are silent during the walk. He bids you a stiff, boring, hollow farewell. It's more than fleeting admiration, Riddle muses as he turns on his heel and begins the trek back to the Hall of Mirrors. But regrettably he finds himself shying away from you in the following weeks, too frightened to touch you. He can't. He doesn't want to, and he thinks it's because this mistake is too life-altering for him to confront.

He broaches the subject to Trey some time later with a vague, yet extremely convoluted hypothetical: "If you did something wrong and another person was affected by it and the both of you were left with a difficult decision, would you let the other person make the final choice?" Trey considers it, always so level-headed and logical. He asks what this difficult decision entails. Riddle chews his lip, peers into his teacup, and mutters something about life and death and embryos and the science behind reproduction and how long it takes for something to be considered human—to be considered conscious and alive—and what one should do when contemplating such a thing and...he's rambling.

Trey gives him that look—that hardened stare that pierces his soul and seems to know of every secret he's kept buried (Cater calls it the "dad stare"—whatever that means). He knows. Riddle is a poor liar. Trey doesn't say it, but when he asks, "Who?" Riddle knows what the question means. He wrings his hands under the table, clasping and unclasping them. They're shaking; he's on the verge of tears. He whispers your name.

Trey lets the admission settle like sediment on the sea floor. He nods, hums, stirs the batter for the cake he's currently baking, and then hums some more. "I can't give you an answer," he eventually says, offering a sympathetic frown. "Sorry." He tries to say more, but nothing comes out and instead he returns to whisking, allowing the silence to console Riddle instead. It doesn't work as intended.

Riddle holds his head in his hands, elbows propped on the marble surface of the island. In the Heartslabyul kitchen, where everything smells so sugary sweet, he cries. He's never felt more lost.

Riddle can't avoid you forever. That same day he approaches you and tells you that if you're so determined to keep the baby you will have to convince him. Whether that's by powerpoint or bribery (at this point he's desperate to adopt your views, so please, by all means, bribe him with sweets and let him drown in sugar so that he can ignore the looming threat of his mother back home), he's willing to hear you out. It's only fair, and if the two of you can reach a decision (preferably as soon as possible) he can start planning ahead. You're not sure how you should go about convincing him, so in the meantime Riddle resolves to read up on pregnancy, if only to further educate himself.

He scours the library for information and finds Lilia who is, arguably, as ancient as some of these textbooks and might be a reliable source of information. Riddle doesn't intend to tell him anything, but when Lilia offers to aid him in what he notes looks like a "very important search" Riddle submits.

It doesn't take Lilia long to put a few clues together when Riddle tells him he's looking for books about child care and pregnancy. It also doesn't take him long to theorize who might be carrying a child. For some reason Riddle feels ashamed as he quietly admits the truth, thus confirming all of Lilia's suspicions. Somehow telling Lilia this feels like telling a parent or an adult or some authority figure; he expects a scolding. Instead Lilia smiles warmly and tells Riddle that children are like miracles: sometimes you can plan for them and other times you cannot, but what's most miraculous is the bond forged between those who raise a child. They are tough work and you might encounter many troubles and doubts along the way. But if you can look for happiness in miraculous, magical mistakes, you will find love. Riddle stares at him, dumbfounded. Is Lilia really just a third year?

The first time you try to convince him is with a poorly assembled slideshow displaying the benefits of keeping the child. "Think of the cute clothes we can get!" you say, to which Riddle responds with, "Think of the expenses, (Name)." You are not one to give up, puffing your cheeks out at him. He rolls his eyes, but he sits up straight and continues to listen, watching as you click through images of firsts. First loose tooth. First day of school. First drawing. First handprint and footprint. First word. First laugh. The list is endless, apparently, and so is Riddle's sanity as he endures it. But he's smiling as he watches your wild gesticulations.

The second time you try to convince him is just as bad, if not worse, than the first time. "Riddle me this, Riddle," you say while he's in the middle of studying. He does not want to riddle you anything, but he listens anyway. He always does. "You plus me equals..."

"That is not a riddle. That's an equation," he corrects, not yet taking his eyes off the page. "And it equals trouble. Nothing good."

You're silent for too long, so finally he turns to look at you. Your eyes are glued to your phone. Riddle furrows his brow. Did he say something wrong? Was he too mean?

"All right, I got it! Riddle me this. One plus one equals three."

"Again, another equation."

"Not true! This article says it's a pregnancy riddle, not an equation."

"Did you...look up riddles?"

"Pregnancy riddles, yes. They're not really good."

Riddle scrubs at his face, suddenly weary. "Three is too big a number."

"Maybe for you, but not for me."

There should only be two, he thinks. You and me. But even that is a troublesome combination.

The third time you try to convince him is with a box of mini tarts, all in various flavors. He peers at them and then at you. You're rocking back and forth on your heels, eagerly awaiting his reaction. When he doesn't immediately give one, you groan and sink into the chair beside him. "Can I please keep the baby?"

Riddle snorts through a laugh and then clears his throat, neutralizes his amused expression, and says, "Resorting to begging already? And you were so confident last week."

You huff and slouch in your seat. He intends to correct you, but then you're stuffing a tart in his mouth. "I would look cute pregnant, wouldn't I?" you ask, batting your eyelashes and catching him so off guard he chokes on his bite of tart. Riddle sputters, his face the color of roses, and stands from his chair, promptly excusing himself.

You are a nuisance, but he agrees. You would look very cute.

The fourth time you try to convince him is with the help of Trey. "Trey can make the sweets for the baby shower," you say. Your grip on Trey's forearm suggests he is not a willing participant in...whatever this is, but it has Riddle quirking a fond smile.

He folds his arms across his chest and glances between you and Trey, his next words addressing the latter. "You would do that?"

Trey grins boyishly and responds with, "If I had to."

You tut at him. "Trey, we rehearsed this. You're supposed to say, 'I'll make a strawberry tart so big it'll need to sit on two tables.'"

Riddle's laughter surprises both you and Trey, and as he wipes an invisible tear from his eye, he says with a playful smirk, "I'll hold you to it when the time comes, Trey."

As he makes his graceful departure, he hears your disbelieving exclamation: "Do you think it worked?!"

The fifth time you try to convince Riddle is in the bedroom. You're lying on your side, peering at him with a silly, sex-drunk smile. "What if we got married?"

"We have to," he mumbles absentmindedly, his mind replaying the past few minutes in a loop. He wonders if he was too rough. He doesn't want to hurt the baby... What is he thinking? There's still time to get rid of it. It doesn't matter if he was rough (it does; he's worrying).

"Really?" Your eyes are blown wide. "You'd actually marry me?"

Riddle gazes at you, collecting context clues to comprehend your angle. "I should be asking you that question."

"Why? I would marry you, not your mother."

"You might as well be, though," he mutters bitterly, glaring at the canopy that envelops his bed. "I'm aware she is not an ideal in-law."

"Then we'll run away. You, me, and Baby Riddle."

"That is a horrible name." He peers at you, his features softening. "We're not calling the baby Baby Riddle."

"Why not? It's cute."

"Hardly." His gaze travels to your stomach. Soon you'll show and when you're round enough it'll be impossible to hide this secret. "Well... Humor me. Where would we go if we ran away?"

"Anywhere you'd like." He opens his mouth to stop your wild imagination, but you beat him to it. "'Think of the expenses, (Name)!' Just hear me out. Anywhere could mean anywhere, but it could also mean nowhere. And maybe nowhere is our anywhere."

Riddle chuckles. "You sound just like Che'nya."

"Do you think he knows?"

"Possibly."

"Really?"

"He's anywhere and nowhere."

"Cheeky..." You shuffle closer to him, pressing your forehead against his. "So cheeky."

Riddle wants to say it. He wants to empty his heart right here, right now. He loves you and, though it took some time to warm up to the idea, he wants to start a family with you. He wants to be more than friends. He wants to marry you and experience all of your child's firsts alongside you. It doesn't matter if his mother disapproves because this is arguably the best mistake he's made in a while. A miraculous, magical mistake.

Before you can swallow the words in a kiss, he blurts them hastily. "I... I love you." But there's more, and perhaps he's confined himself in a misleading dream when reality and encroaching worries melt away. But he needs to tell you. "And I... I really want to be a father. A-And I want you to be a mother! I don't care about what others will say anymore. Admittedly, it was...fun to misbehave with you that night. It certainly wasn't responsible, but I enjoyed it. Far more than I should have." That last part is murmured, but you catch it. Riddle finds your hands under the covers and squeezes them. "You've convinced me. I'd like to start a family with you."

You smile and then tears are spilling and then you're smiling again. He knows he's crying because his eyes are wet and glassy, and for a while the two of you cling to each other, sobbing about everything and nothing, laughing through blubbery cries.

And Riddle realizes three isn't a big number. Rather, it's a pleasant number. Not perfect because nothing truly is, but it's more than enough for him. And that's really all that matters right now.

[winwintea]

WayV as my favorite songs

AUTHOR’S NOTE ↬ no one asked for this but i can do whatever i want lol. i need to flesh out every single nct member and this is the easiest way for me to write for them: music

PLAYLIST ↬ here just in case you would like to listen to any of them lol

OTHER VERSIONS ↬ dream | 127 | wish (when i post them eventually lol)

LIU YANGYANG ↬ 火 - A-Mei

yangyang is a certified y2k baddie. i'm fully convinced he was born in the wrong era. like he would've rocked the 2000s so much, if only he was born 10 years earlier. 火 is quite literally yangyang, don't tell me other wise, like yangyang is🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥the lyrics are so him coded. HE JUST LOVES MUSIC DON'T TELL HIM TO STOP! in true wayv fashion the song is probably about sex

XIAO DEJUN ↬ 爱 - 小虎队

my god. dejun....... literally such a romantic, but he's like the youthful style romantic?? (does that make sense) 爱 just fits him so well cause it's like young love, peaceful vibes, literally i'm in love with this man. I BET YOU ANYTHING HE KNOWS THE SIGN LANGUAGE TO THIS SONG BY HEART. heartthrob dejun of the 90s. LIKE CAN YOU IMAGINE HIM IN THE 90s???

QIAN KUN ↬ 你是我永远的乡愁 - fei yu-ching

you know the guy that sings the xue hua piao piao song? yeah this is one of his songs. another way for me to call kun a boomer but am i wrong??? is this man not a boomer??? i'm sorry. nah but i got a feeling that kun really likes old old music. i'm talking teressa teng, all those classics. and i can't blame him they're bangers. couldn't go straight with a jay chou song bc that'd be too easy i wanted to challenge myself.

DONG SICHENG ↬ 我愿意 - faye wong/王菲

i love love love faye wong....... all of her songs. she's so talented bruh. and i love winwin! wow those go great together! jkjk, i have reasons for this too. this song is quite literally so special so romantic like damn. i have a feeling that winwin, whoever his partner is, he would literally worship the ground they walk on. HE WOULD DO ANYTHING FOR THE ONE HE LOVES. these are literally all love songs but my wayv boys... i picture them in love all the time okay.

WONG KUNHANG ↬ 失戀 - grasshoper

everytime i hear this fucking song i laugh so hard bc WHO WROTE THIS???? WHY DID YOU MAKE IT HAPPY??? hendery is such a comedian, we all know that. he just has this extremely playful vibe to him. the lyrics of this song... are certainly tragic.... it's about a dude who's chasing after girl who doesn't like him but also talking to another guy who likes the same girl and they both cope with their misery together. LIKE... hendery gives me the vibe that for all his misfortunes and troubles he would just laugh it off. which is not okay, but it's how he is. :((

CHITTAPHON LEECHAIYAPORNKUL ↬ play/我呸 - jolin tsai

literally do not know any thai songs i apologize, but if you got any good recs. really any jolin tsai song could fit ten's vibe tbh, like especially 舞孃 could work too. i chose play bc the gays like it (this is a joke but also kinda true) i could say that she's basically the "lady gaga of cpop" (not my words okay) play is just so sassy, and playful, really fits the vibes that ten has going on there. gay.

perm taglist ↬ @lyvhie

[kimberlyeab]

Undertale Yellow - Thoughts

Do you ever touch a piece of media and it hits you so hard that you just decide to drop all your artistic responsibilities for a day and write something to get your thoughts down into a single coherent place.

Well, uh… let’s talk about Undertale Yellow.

Please avoid if you intend to play and do not want spoilers as this delves heavily into topics laid down in the pacifist route. Also please note this contains content warnings for child death, so don’t touch if that ain’t your cup of tea. Like all Youtubers would say, please play the game before you read this, because this experience is best enjoyed in its original form.

The first issue i am struck with before getting too deep into this topic is that this is a fan project. While i, as a fan creator, enjoy feedback on my work; even if it is a little biting at times, i don’t know the pulse of the team in this regard. After all, this had no price tag and was purely a labour of love with seven hard years of development behind it.

i also don’t know how the development of this project was handled and if it was a collaborative effort from start to finish or different teams worked on different sections with an overarching goal. All i have is my own experience of modding for Hearts of Iron IV where my efforts were focused on singular nations and not overarching plots. If different sections were handled by different teams, please don’t take a critique or praise of any singular section as a slight against your work, it was all fantastic just some areas were more fantastic than others.

i enjoyed the mod, immensely, it stuck with me to the point that i had to come here and discuss it for what seems to be close to 2000 words. This project is something truly special, not only in terms of a fan game, but as a piece of media in general. It managed to make me feel that sense of magic I felt two years ago when i first played Undertale. And i can’t think of a higher praise than saying that.

The sprite work was amazing. The battles were fun and just the right amount of challenging… except Axis… fuck Axis. The music was a genuine banger to the point where i even liked some of the songs better than some of Toby’s work (i’m looking at you, the person who composed A Mother’s Love, that Hopes and Dreams drop ruined me emotionally for the rest of the run and i hold you and the writing team responsible for that).

And the story, gosh the story was just a real treat.

The mod in general is a bit slow to start, i’ll be honest, i did enjoy the tease at the beginning with Toriel and i think it was genius to cut us off from her entirely at that point. To me, a Undertale mod doing the ruins is like a Batman movie watching Bruce’s parents get gunned down. So, getting something refreshing here was a great foot forward.  Actually, I think that the fact that this mod does not use the OG cast as a crutch is an all-around strong point that i really appreciate and helps set it aside as its own independent thing, different from Undertale. Even though I did find myself craving at least a cameo at times.

On my first day of playing, i witnessed everything that the ruins and Snowdin had to offer. i enjoyed Dalv and Martlet immensely. As I went into the start of the Wild East, I was having a lot of fun. Yet, something felt off, something wasn’t quite sparking the magic i felt with Undertale. So, I left off my first session in the Oasis, having beaten the third boss. All in all, an enjoyable time but not quite clicking.

i couldn’t describe why the game felt off up to this point. Until i watched a friend stream xeyre own first run of the game.

Xey said something during it which made me realize what the issue with these first three areas was. They felt safe, they felt fangamey. These were fun experiences with great atmosphere and enemies but Dlav and Martlet (up to that point) were not characters who grabbed me and made me feel as invested in them as say Toriel, Sans, Papyrus, and Undyne (all characters we would’ve met at a similar point in OG Undertale). Sure, they were nice, and were immensely fun, but i didn’t feel that drive to get to know them better and care about their greater story. These were not the characters of ask blogs and video essays.

At this point, i went to bed, content to get back to it tomorrow but still very much feeling like “this is a fangame.”

Then i woke up…

And let me telling you about Starlo and the town on the edge of the Wild East.

This is where Undertale Yellow grabbed me, this is where the story became something special. This wonderful cast of six unique characters who left me wanting to consume every piece of dialog they had available. These six characters managed to crackle to life that little fanfiction voice in the back of my brain. It was these characters that planted the seed of this sprawling text i am currently writing.

Starlo, himself, is a wonderful character, very fun, very well written, just a treat to experience and spend time with. His missions were comedic gold to a degree where I was cackling in VC because of how good they were. And the fights, oh jeez, the two fights in that area are where the mod really showed off what it could do when it came to combining fun gameplay, great music, and just top tier sprite work that helped give these characters so much substance and life.

And it was also in this section where i started to get invested in the characters. This is where the fangame vibes withered away and gave birth to that same experience i had playing Undertale for that very first time.

It was hinted at with Starlo, a monster putting on a façade to hide from the cold reality of being a member of a broken species living in an equally broken land. His reasoning is so tragic, yet through the tragedy, he is just trying to distract people and bring them whatever joy he can manage. His methods are faulty but his goal is good.

And Ceroba is just amazing, as well, hinting at something darker in the narrative, weaving her story into OG Undertale by experiencing loss to the same experiments that would haunt Alphys. She is something familiar, a mother in pain like Toriel, but also someone who didn’t let that pain keep her in hiding. She uses that pain to try and help this world. And it plays on me so well, making me genuinely ache as my mind idly wonders which amalgamation in the lab was once this monster’s little girl. I wanted to know her story and experience it.

Then the game was all high points from here.

The adventure in the Steamworks where we see the remains of a shattered legacy and the pain that Ceroba goes through when she realizes that her husband was never respected in life. It resonates as we learn how much he just wanted to help Monsterkind and his legacy was just thrown away and left to rot. It made me hate Asgore.

And then comes the plot twist, the moment the shoe drop, as we approach Hotlands and Starlo confronts us. He knows Ceroba’s secret and is there to keep us safe. I had never been so invested in finding out what any of this meant, craving to know what could possibly bring these two into conflict with one another after being so close just two sections prior.

And that’s when we go to Ceroba’s home. That’s where we experience the empty abode that used to house a family. It’s where we learn how this tormented world of captivity that broke them, one by one, killing father, daughter, and yes, even the mother. It’s where we learn about Chujin, a figure of mythos, this mod’s Asgore in a way. A man who knew that escaping the Underground wasn’t the end goal unless Monsterkind could assert itself and prove that it had a right to exist upon the surface. This moment was so compelling, asking questions that fans have had for years and answering them in a way that felt downright satisfying.

And it put a fire in my breast going forward. i feel bad for the individuals who wrote dialog for optional areas after this reveal because i was a woman on a mission at this point. There was no endearing encounter, no fun moment that would distract me from finally finishing this with Ceroba.

And as we reach New Home and face the enemy, a mother who has lost everything, with our friends by our side, that’s when we play the best boss fight, I’ve had the privilege of enjoying in a very long time. It was the right amount of difficult with perfect music, amazing phases and forms, and a wonderful use of the yellow soul to its full capacity. It was long and slogged out, fought tooth and fucking nail, all while the music perfectly weaves together Ceroba’s struggle with the adventure we’ve been on and also a little nostalgia just to remind you what’s at stake. i have slept and i still remember her piano bits combined with those little western twangs, bringing together two childhood friends before dropping Hopes and Dreams just to show you how epic it is. It is… HOLY SHIT… it is something.

And with every phase we see a little more of what this monster lost. We watch her husband wither away, we see her risk her daughter and fail, and we see every last thing this obsession has cost her. And we know that this is a family broken by a collective scar left upon a whole species. We know that humanity is at fault, subjecting a whole race to torment for something that’s generations old. This family is just one of many who our species has wronged, just one trauma on a whole ledger.

And as we finally dispatch her and feel victorious, the reality of the situation slowly settles in.

This is a prologue… we know how this ends.

Asgore has five souls right now. Yet, by the events of Undertale, he has six.

i knew on a logical level that this would happen but the mod still managed to destroy me with the reality. As our friends try and figure out a way to keep us safe, we, the Spirit of Justice, a child with a pure heart, know that we can’t let this slide. We saw what humanities punishment has done to this species and we know that we can help them.

So, Clover sacrifices their Soul. And its at this moment that i started bawling like a child, watching their friends bargain with them, then plead, then seeing them slowly come to terms with it. And the game slowly ends from there, watching our hero make this sacrifice and then send away their friends so they don’t have to see them die. It’s just us, alone, knowing that we did the right thing and it cost us everything. It’s beautiful and tragic, the perfect ending that still chokes me up thinking about it.

And it pays off as the credits role and we get an epilogue that shows all the monsters we’ve touched and made their lives better.

It was special.

This was the special that i felt after Undertale.

And like Undertale, i will never touch it again (unless i speedrun it). The story was completed and the sacrifice was beautiful. It would be wrong of me to erase the deeds that i’ve done to better these lives. i don’t want to erase their happy ending just to tinker around and extract every ounce of life from this game.

So uh, yeah, sorry to the people who worked on geno-run. i’m sure you did a great job but i can’t bring myself to hurt these characters.

All-in-all, sitting there in a VC, bawling at 3:30 in the morning, i knew this was unique and I knew that i wanted to share my thoughts with the fandom and maybe even the developers if they get around to reading this.

Dear devs, if you read this, you created something out of this world, thank you.

Sincerely, thank you.

Would I recommend this mod?

Let me tell you what I said after the credits rolled.

“Fuck this mod.”

Err… text kind of loses the translation of those words being spoken through the warble of a tear-stricken voice that was fresh from sobbing for ten minutes straight.

So, uh…

Yeah, it was alright!

Hey, y'all should join my Discord! It's multifandom and queer as fuck (Please be 18+ though).

Visit my website to see where else you can find my work, follow my socials, or support me!

[bestgameostcrownduel]

Round 1, Side A: Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers (2019) vs Kingdom Hearts 3 (2019)

FFXIV | Kingdom Hearts

Campaigns under the cut!

Campaign for FFXIV:

oh my god where do I start. Final Fantasy XIV (FFXIV) is an MMORPG that's been going on 2013, or 2010 if you count the trainwreck that the current FFXIV replaced (the 2010 version's music was composed mainly by Uematsu, 2013 onwards is mostly Soken). Thus its OST is FUCKING HUGE and spans a whole lot of genres. If you like any kind of music at all you can probably find at least one track that speaks to you in this game. FFXIV has a category of incredibly difficult fights called Ultimate, comprised of multiple short phases that each have their own music. Because of the nature of how Ultimates are structured, they're the only fights in FFXIV where the music can actually be timed to the mechanics. If you're not afraid of story spoilers, look up any ultimate's BGM and you can see how cool this effect is. (I can't listen to Under the Weight without also hearing the sound of every mechanic and tankbuster.) (My personal favorite ultimate, music-wise, is The Epic of Alexander. Back when I was progging the fight I used to fall asleep listening to the BGM.) To The Edge is so so special to everyone who loves FFXIV. It's the theme of a boss in Shadowbringers; I can't give details without also giving major spoilers, but I will say that the story and this song deal with the themes of death and loss. If you look up the lyrics, which aren't too spoilery without context, you'll get what I mean. What makes this extra emotional is that FFXIV's main composer, Soken, was in the hospital fighting cancer when he composed this song. (To be clear: he kept working because it provided him with a desperately needed sense of normalcy, not because he needed to.) No one on the dev team knew aside from Yoshi P, FFXIV's producer + director as well as Soken's personal friend; the rest of the team found out the same time the fans did, months after the fact when Soken was in full remission, at the 2021 FFXIV Fan Festival (FanFest). To The Edge was already widely beloved prior to this because it's an incredible banger tied to an incredible story moment, but knowing what was going on behind the scenes during its composition, in addition to the story and song's own themes surrounding death, turns it into a piece that no one can listen to without getting wildly emotional about it. At the same FanFest, before Soken announced that he fought cancer and won, he performed this live: https://youtu.be/aBt4zT_PBmw?si=SgzTV9BvINfA0b-U Absolute king shit. With Hearts Aligned is also so so so special to me because it's the song that plays in the 'victory lap' second phase against the final boss that caps off a nine year long story arc. It features a leitmotif from The Maker's Ruin, a song from 2013, that represents the player and is often used when we overcome seemingly insurmountable odds. There are no words that can describe the sheer fucking emotion of fighting the final boss of a nine year long story arc while listening to the leitmotif that represents YOU, a leitmotif that you first heard however many weeks or months or years ago when you first started playing this game. The ultimate triumph, and the ultimate song of hope. Also if you like leitmotifs, FFXIV has /so many leitmotifs/. Have a spreadsheet of them: https://x.com/EENlX/status/1686043012353396736?s=20 Also also, Alex Moukala on youtube does more in-depth analysis of some of the best tracks in FFXIV! Great videos, I highly recommend checking them out.

I would put the entire game's soundtrack if I could but there's a LOT. The album I listed is for the "postgame" of Shadowbringers. Of particular note is the song "To The Edge" which was written while the composer, Masayoshi Soken, was battling with cancer.

Campaign for KH3:

yoko shimomura, the GODDESS, the LEGEND, her composing skills never fail to amaze! kh music is so so goodddddd

I’m not good with propagandizing but the OST for this series is so good. For KH3, I love so much of the soundtrack. The Disney worlds have some great tracks, but the endgame and dlc has almost nothing but bangers.

[shutit-haha]

Rocker Bakugo pt.2

Rocker Bakugo who writes a song about you. He's angsty and pissed, rather than to admit he's in his feels he just composes this whole piece about not needing you. Low-key it's a fuckin banger.

Rocker Bakugo who keeps you as his manager. You're good at your job, he was lying about people being better than you. No one is better than you. You're the best at everything. Your great with contracts, and his temper, great at loving him, and pushing him to do better.

Rocker Bakugo who says it's only until he can find a replacement but he misses having you around. The apartment's so fucking empty and after about a week he gets fed up with only seeing you for work stuff. So he demands for you to stop by the studio, to watch and listen. (Like you used too.) You know he only misses you, but you'd be damned if you let him off easy.

Rocker Bakugo who plays the song in front of you. He's smug about it too, like he didn't practically plead for you to watch him. (Again.) You're pissed, because what an ass! So of course you make him play it again, and again, and again. After about the third time you let the rest of the band leave but not Bakugo, he has to stay.

Rocker Bakugo who's grumbling and playing shitty now because he's pissed. He's growling and playing harder than he need too. If he keeps this up he might just break something or drain himself entirely. You're a jerk though, you keep poking him and poking him.

"Do you know what you're doing?" You're being condescending. You speak to him as of he were some incompetent child, stare doing little to help negate that idea.

Rocker Bakugo who feels like one. He can see his Mother's gaze right after five year old him has thrown a fit. He sees it in you and it irks him. "Of course I know what the hell I'm doing, I made the damn thing!"

"Let me see the sheet," you're in front of him now. You're standing centered in front of his drum set hand out stretched for the sheet music. Now he really does feel like a little boy. And isn't that what he is? A huffy child who misses his mommy.

"I've got it," he snarls at you, snapping slightly.

You snatch the sheet anyways returning to your spot on the wall. "Play."

"Ain't shit to read."

"You don't got it memorized," you cock a brow. "Play."

"I will dammit!"

Rocker Bakugo who fucks it up. "Do it again." You command him knowing that the poor boy is tired.

"I can't," he mumbles.

"What?"

"I said I can't!" His chest is rising and falling way too quickly, his hair covers his face as to prevent you from seeing his eyes. His arms sag from how sore they are, and there's a slight shake too him. "I'm fuckin' tired, can't keep doing this shit."

"Then I need a new cash cow."

His head snaps forward, eyes meeting yours with a nasty glare. "You know damn well I can't play when you take away the sheet music."

You took a step forward, "you made the damn thing. Figured with how proud and confident you were in it, it'd be hard to forget."

"You're being a b-" He sucks air in through his teeth, slamming down his sticks and tilting his head back so he can breathe.

"Oh but you can turn me into a song? I don't want to be some jingle for a monster energy can Bakugo." You're halfway to him, only a couple steps left. "Do it again."

"I can't."

"Again Bakugo."

"I'm fuckin' tired."

Rocker Bakugo who knows you're still mad at him. He doesn't know how to make it up to you, he doesn't even know how to start.

Rocker Bakugo who tries anyways. He picks up the sticks and starts playing your favorite song. Your gaze softens, it isn't enough but it works for now. The both of you are so tired, you hate sleeping alone and that scene just keeps playing in his head.

His voice is hoarse and dry so when he sings its awful, but it makes you laugh. You're humming with him, just content to be in the same space without all that tension. "I know you're not out to get me, I trust you. Sometimes being at the top-"

"Means you forget to be grounded," the two of you speak in unison.

"Works the other way too," you start. "When you're always looking up, you forget there's trouble even in the stars. Constellations tell stories of heartbreak and death, and all I can think of is-"

"Walking on the clouds," he finishes for you. There's a smug little smirk on his face, pleased that he can still remember that line of yours.

"You gonna behave drummer boy?" Your hand cups his cheek, "gonna keep playing the beat to my heart."

He kisses your palm, and sets the sticks down. "Read over the thingy, was a lot better than I originally thought it was."

"I don't know who told you it wasn't."

"Kaminari had overheard something from the other negotiation team and made a dumbass assumption."

"And you believed it?"

"Was blindsided, sweetheart."

"You owe me."

"I know," he grabs at your waist. "Just come home," his other hand covers the one you have on his cheek.

Rocker Bakugo who has to have make-up sex with you. It's part of your dynamic. When the two of you were in high school you used argue over the smallest of things just so that you could bang afterward. As you guys went to college it became a little more difficult, having to learn that sex didn't make up for communication. Though the two of you struggle with words, you've definitely gotten better. And well any progress is progress.

Rocker Bakugo who some how ends up underneath you. When you said he owed you he didn't expect edging to be the price. Yet here he was in a dopey cow headband, with leather cuffs on each wrist as you edge him till he breaks.

Rocker Bakugo who's too lost in his orgasm to notice you taking a picture. It's deserved though, you'll just count it as part of the punishment.

[sunnychuuya]

Cutely sobs knowing om nearing the end of sally face

I finished it.

Hey so guess who's looking up a toturoail

Whys the screen so fuckn dark

Me when I forget my lefts and rights do I start going never eat soggy waffles

I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD I DID THAT LAST NIGHT

"we are the shadows of a sleepless dream" fucking banger line??

I cannor handle seeing Diane rn I'm gonna sob

H9LY SHIT SUCH COOL ARTSTYLE

Guys I don't actually think I like the cult I kinda died cuz of them !!

having thr t

Guys this is not girlpop

ash wt Oh yirl WHAT THE FHELL DONT DOT AHT

GUYS I JUST TOLD MT FRIEND THIS DOESNT HAVE GRAPHIC SEWERSLIDE FUCK

GUYS WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED

ARE WE JUST GONNA FUCKING

BRUSH PAST THAT?!

WHAT THE FUCK

THE FUCK FUCK THE FUCK SHIT?!

-"how many loved ones will you kill to save the world. What will be Left worth saving" crying sobbing screaming throwing up

Also am I hallucinating or was that not grammatically correct

No it was

It just doesn't sound like it

"They deserve happiness after all the shit they've been through" me when the entirety of this fucking game

"Do you.. do you think anyone could ever love me like they love each other?" I'm gonna bawl my fucking eyes out sal you're amazign

STOP.

THIS IS NOT FAIR.

NOT THE MEMEORY COMING FROM THE FUCKING BOTTLW

THTA WAS LIKE THE WORST LARRY COULDVE DONE IT TOO

God

Fucking damnit

Larry was sposed to move in with them.. they were sposed to be happy.. nghehhe

NOT THE FUCKING CORPSES

SHIT

QHY

Hmm. Another textbook case of: I hate the characyer until they fucking die tragically

Sal no we're not defending her she still kinda ducked

WHAT THE FUCK

HAH?!

Woah ghsotie arm

Cofnused as shit ngl and this music is terrfyding

oh no! Why is everyone gone!

Giving "why is boss music playing" vibes

UHH GUYS FUCKKKK

SHIT THIS FAME COLLECTING ART STYLES LIKE POKEMON

stop. I love this. So cool.

Yea I don't quite like that. Kinda uhh sus thats like the things that humans grow in in movies

cutely Google safe combination

FUCKKK BRO THE REASON KENNY SHOT SAL IS BC OF THE PROPHECY THING... DAMN GOOD THING HE SUCKS AT SHOOTIJG PPL TOO (the like 300 ppl who died:)

Wait what Jim's latter

JumPSACRW

Guys! Thats so not girlypop!

What rhe fuck!

"You killed them" NO SHIT?!

Me after game over immesirlat

Oh wow thats so cute murder great

CHAT MY CONTEOLLERA DYOPEED AORKING HELPPPPP

OH KENNWTH WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT HOE WHYXDID YOU GOOPIE

MA BOY LARRY WHY U LOOK LIKE THAT 😭 💀

guys oop I apparently missed the thing where u see sal get shot lmao

Its fine I already knew what happened

I just looked it up and what the florp bro

chat I hate this like they all die and they can't even live happily ever after in the afterlife its just not fair.

YAYAYYAYA GHODT GUITAR

Hol up- lemme clean my glasses for this.

"eat mt ass, you red eyed birch!" ILY larry

TRAVIS LWTS FUCKING GO

YES

UES

YES

FUCK

LETS FUCKING GooooOOOOOOOO

WAIT SHIT DID JE JSUT DIE 💀

...

Fuck.

ITS NOR WORKFING

Yeah okay I knew it wouldn't be thst easy but. One can hope.

AHHHHH PIXEL SAL

Yeee guitar blasts

Pew

Pew

FUCK YOU CANT GO FROM SILLY PIXEL SAL TO

EVERYONE WE LOVE IS DEAD BRUTALLY

I diedieidid

Chat have we considered I suck at video games

I just died 3 tomes in a row

fifth death (end me)

I DIDING IT

Oh fuk pixem sal

WHY IS MY ARM GOING NUMB

SAL UR SPOSED TO POSSES ASH NOT ME

NOT THE GREATEST TIME LOWKEY TRYNA PLAY THE GAME

Ooh chairs

Oh duck that scared me

God damnit Terrence

SHUT UP THIS GAME IS SO FUCKING COOL

When I started playing sally face, would I ever have thought I would be whisper screaming "VOMIT YOUR BALLS TERRENCE!" at 12 37 am, he'll fucking no. But it happened.

This is why I am unloved.

What da fuck

Polyrgorns

THE FUCKING MICKEY MOUSE

GLITCHY SAL

Uhh I don't like how the teeth skin is closing in

UNBELEIVILBLY HYPE

Sal really said with the power of music and friendship

wdym it don't feel like over

LARRY DOUBLED DIED WHAY THE FUCK

"Maybe we see him again someday. On the other side of oblivion. If there is such a place." then it just fades out. This game is absolutely amazing.

I love it but it also lowkey felt so incomplete

Like

Idk the ending felt a little fast.

like very satisfying but it felt rlly fast.

But also sf2 is a thing in progress I know

@mypinterestgotbannedsoimherenow

[slavghoul]

Full article from Metal Hammer 12/2022 that I posted an excerpt from in the previous post. BTW, Impera landed #1 on Metal Hammer’s list of best albums of 2022!

--

It was January 2022, and we found ourselves sitting in the empty lobby of a snug Seattle hotel, overlooking the sunset over Puget Sound while soft rock wafted through the PA system. Across from us was Ghost frontman and mastermind Tobias Forge, and we spent nearly two hours talking about music, family, dogs and the steady ascension of Ghost from spooky Swedish underground band to arena filling titans. But mostly we were there to talk about Impera – their fifth album, then still two months away from release.

In the run-up to an album coming out – particularly one with a highly acclaimed predecessor, like 2018’s Prequelle – artists tend to convey palpable anxiety as they prepare to relinquish control of their work to the world. Not so with Tobias, who radiated ease and comfort. Impera had not yet seen the light of day, but he had already moved on. Looking back at that period today, he explains, “As soon as I am done making a record, I’m pretty much fed up with it. I don’t want to hear it, I don’t want to know about it, I just want to forget about it. Once it hits the ears of people, depending on how it’s being received, that’s where you start from scratch again.”

Following Ghost’s North American tour with Volbeat and Twin Temple, Impera was released on March 11. It seamlessly blended pop-savvy songwriting with elaborate arrangements and steady torrents of anthemic pop metal riffage that created a wormhole back to the lighter-raising, arena-rock majesty of the 80s. From the glass-shattering scream that opened Kaisarion to the synth-rock squall of Watcher In The Sky, it delivered one guitar-powered banger after another.

It was enough to land Ghost their first No.1 position on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart – their fourth Top 10 overall. Even bigger, in terms of vinyl and CD sales, Impera scored 2022’s biggest first-week sales for any album, of any genre. With more than 62,000 copies sold in the US alone, it easily bested The Weeknd’s February CD release of Dawn FM. In fact, Impera claimed the biggest first sales week for hard rock vinyl since Pearl Jam’s Vitalogy in 1994.

Critics united in swift and lusty praise. It might have felt heretical at the time, but many early reviews rated Impera as besting Prequelle on all fronts. Our very own Dave Everley wrote: ‘Impera wins on bolshiness, bravado and skyscraping songs alone. Ghost have turned in a modern metal classic with an arena rock heart. It turns out the Devil doesn’t have all the best tunes. Tobias Forge does.’ It’s safe to say any plans of “starting from scratch” were shoved to the back burner.

Ghost’s official Imperatour headlining run took them back across North America and then to Europe. Despite the lingering ravages of Covid across the live music industry, they thrived. “I am very happy that we managed to orchestrate a somewhat functioning but very successful album launch”, says Tobias. “We managed to nail 70 shows with just one cancellation. I think in this day and age in this year, that’s fucking great!”

Across the globe, stages were filling up with shows that had been booked many years prior. “We had to cut and paste a little with our touring schedule, because this past summer was basically filled with 2020’s line-ups,” says Tobias. “That made our scheduling a little… I wouldn’t say sparse, but we had breaks that were longer than normal. There are so many bands that are doing these weird dances. The last year of releasing an album into the void, with no touring and cancelling here and there and everywhere, and people having to rethink their lives, basically… We’ve been blessed not to have done too much of that.”

Logistics aside, somewhere along the line, that cultish little band from Sweden – the one with the creepy frontman singing about Satan and plagues and empires – went mainstream. Propelled by Impera’s momentum, the band tapped into new levels of cultural saturation thanks to appearances on mainstays such as Jimmy Kimmel Live.

“TV always brings you in front of new people”, says Tobias. “We did [The Late Show With Stephen] Colbert a few years ago, and every time you do something like that, you obviously expose yourself to a new scene of viewers. And that’s always great, unless you completely shit the bed on the air. Ha ha ha! I think we did do a few things this year that brought in a whole slew of new people into our fanbase.”

But ever the realist, he adds, “You might have a spike of people checking you out… but you don’t really notice if things like that had any effect. It’s not like the day after, all of your shows are now sold out and there’s a double night booked into every show you’re doing. It’s such a slow process that you don’t notice until a half year later when new fans come in and say, ‘I saw you on Kimmel’ or ‘I saw you with my dad.’ I wouldn’t say that being on Kimmel changed everything. It’s been slow, step-by-step, but it builds new branches onto the same tree and you keep growing higher.”

And higher they grew. In July, Mary On A Cross – originally released on the 2019 EP, Seven Inches Of Satanic Panic – was used in a Tiktok tribute to the show Stranger Things. The ripple effect was staggering. The song landed in the Top 10 of Spotify’s Viral 50 Global chart. As of this issue, the hashtag #Maryonacross has notched up well over one billion views. Ghost eventually released an official, slowed-down version of the song and the two versions combined now claim more than 180 million Spotify streams and counting. “For us, the Tiktok thing was or is just a giant bonus”, he explains. “That was never something that we planned.”

Surely the unplanned waves of publicity will ferry over legions of new fans, for whom an embarrassment of riches awaits. “One thing that I felt proud over, was the fact that we’ve been around for 12 years,” says Tobias. “We’ve made five records, a bunch of EPS, and I am glad that there seems to be a song that has a way to suck people in. And if they go into our world and like it, there is plenty to find. If you like Mary On A Cross, you can just jump on the train and go where we already are heading.”

It’s been an uncommonly good year for heavy music, but for Ghost it’s been more than a success – it’s been a coronation. Despite their demoniacal appearance and transgressive lyrical themes, they have negotiated the near-impossible task of attracting mainstream audiences while holding fast to the diehards in metal who have been there from the start. It creates the enviable problem of facing a new year with new pressures and heightened expectations. But Tobias has a plan.

“We’re doing a lot of touring again”, he explains. “On previous album cycles we’ve done four legs in America and two or three in Europe and repeated. We’re going to go into every territory next year, but there’s going to be one European tour, one American tour. We are going to do a little bit of everywhere. There’ll be a little bit of something up in upper Asia, on the far end there – a very well-established country with a lot of pop cultural fascination, and the home of videogames. And there’s going to be something in the Oceania world, and there might be something south of Panama, and there might be something slightly north of Panama. It feels pretty solid.”

He cryptically adds, “We’re going to come out with a little bit of change before that – good change. We’re not going to go silent. Some things are public, other things not in public view, but there are a lot of things brewing.”

We are journalistically bound to inquire about the next album and, unsurprisingly, Tobias remains mum. In January, he told us, “Everything I’m doing now is for the next record. I have a vague idea what that will be like and a vague idea of the title and the colour scheme.”

For now, that will have to do, but rest assured that as we all continue to enjoy the masterpiece that is Impera, Tobias is already hard at work, figuring out dramatic new ways to blow our minds. But he still allows himself the odd moment to stop and take it all in.

“To be able to make all of the shows that we’ve done, and to have a record that did fairly well, I think the sum of it is pretty fucking awesome,” he smiles. “I’m very thankful. It was a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck.”

[mystic-myrtille]

What did you think of Jagged Rock being revealed to be Luka's father?

Oh I have a lot of thoughts on that. As most things in the show, the execution is shit but the general idea is cool.

I mean, a plot line where the guy with daddy issues finds out that his deadbeat father, who left his mother behind with not one but two little kids and never even trying to reach out to them, is in reality his number one idol with whom he had interacted in the past.

That is fucking juicy.

There is so much potential for angst there. They could've explored Luka's trauma and the effects it has on his life, how he reacts to this reveal and ultimately how he tries to deal with it. Would he act out and cry over how shitty Jagged is?Would he let his friends and family comfort him? Or does he try to keep things to himself to not burden anyone? Does Jagged feel regret? Will he try to redeem himself? How do they move forward? Would Luka want to keep in contact with the man who abandoned his family? How would that affect Jagged's relationship with the rest of the cast? What if, for example, Luka doesn't want contact but Juleka does? The family dynamic is super messy and there's a ton of stuff you can do with that, develop characters further and have them grow.

And canon... yeah. The reveal is shoehorned into the Luka//nette breakup episode. It's not the main plot, not even a b-plot, it's just like a fun fact thrown in to justify Luka's reaction to Marinette keeping secrets.

Jagged then waits before the boat and just goes "Hey we can make dope music together:)" and Luka just fucking forgives him. Instantly. No questions asked. After Jagged has the audacity to say him leaving his family inspired some banger songs, one of which is Luka's favorite. After Luka yells at him with so much hurt in his voice why he abandoned him.

And then the show sets Jagged up as so great and cool that he came back to his family and stepped up as a loving dad who made amends with his ex gf (with whom he randomly flirted pre reveal but then had a bad relationship with her??) in order to have a happy family, completely ignoring that he only did all of that when he was specifically called out for being a deadbeat. Like had Luka not been akumatized into Truth, Jagged wouldn't have come back into their lives.

This whole thing ruined canon Jagged and are pretty clear indicators that the writers don't care about writing complex characters with complex feelings. It's all shook value and plot device.

But if the writers really didn't want Luka and Jagged to have a bad relationship, they could've just left it at "Jagged and Anarka were in a band once". Jagged learns that his old band mate has kids who are into music and have a band, so he decides to invite them to his studio, show them some cool stuff on the guitar, become their mentor. He doesn't have to be their bio dad to take care of them and love them. Of course, the show could've dropped some ambiguous hints that he might be, but then never confirm it because at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. Or if they confirm it, it's also a surprise to Jagged, so he wasn't there as a dad because he didn't even know he was one and now everybody adjusts their life according to this new revelation.

And I like those wholesome plots. I love fanworks about Couffaine family shenanigans, they're chaotic and awesome<3

So yeah, in conclusion, everyone involved deserved better.