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thetempleofthemasaigoddess · 1 year ago

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How I long for the time, when your lips would kiss mine

Mihawk x reader.

This fic is part of the Beast in Black series.

*****

Three months later.

You smile, more satisfied than greedy, as Vice-Admiral Garp slids a parcel across his desk, close enough to let you take it.

"Thirteen million berries, including the bounty you were owed since last year." he explains as you lift the parcel to stash it in your satchel, without bothering to open it to count the bills neatly stacked inside: you know you can trust the Marines - regarding the money you are due even if not about everything else "Don't take it the wrong way, (name), but I was surprised you had decided to take on this assignment: it is quite a bit below your usual level."

"I am aware. I have been... in poor health, which is why you haven't seen me in a while, and I wanted something simple to make sure I had gotten back to full fitness. From now on I'll be only taking on level three bounties, as usual."

Garp nods, promising to call you when your services will be required. "Got plans for tonight?" he idly adds, leaning back in his chair as he observes you rising from yours.

"I am flattered, Vice-Admiral, but I never mix business and pleasure."

"That was not what I meant. I was simply wondering if there was a reason why a certain man who never spends a minute more than he has to here at our HQ has been sitting in the waiting room for almost two hours twiddling his thumbs."

The mental image makes a smile blossom on your lips; you don't bother trying to deny it, since it would be clearly pointless. "Figuratively, I imagine."

"Probably. Still..."

"Still, thank you for your time. I'll see you soon, Vice-Admiral."

Garp laughs; he seems to find the whole matter highly amusing, which means it is probably a good thing he is discussing it with you and not with the other interested party.

"He was very worried about you; I could feel it in his voice." he suddenly adds, almost as an afterthought.

A simple, inscrutable smile is the only answer he receives, and a moment later you have left his office and are walking down the corridor toward the room Garp mentioned.

Mihawk is alone in the room most of your (less memorable, but still dear to your heart) meetings have taken place in, an half-empty glass of red wine in front of him. He is perfectly still, sitting and apparently lost in his thoughts, but the moment you appear at the door he turns to look at you, relief evident in his gaze... or maybe, just maybe, it is you who are able to perceive it.

"Hello."

He reaches you at the door a moment later, Yoru hanging from on his shoulders, and for a moment you remain face to face, silent as you simply relish being in each other's presence once more. His hand brushes against yours; holding back from hugging him is the hardest thing you have ever had to do.

You happily follow him when Mihawk suggests you go outside to talk, but once you have reached the plaza facing the Marine HQ neither feels the need to actually speak; night is falling, a beautiful sunset painting the sky of a hundred shades of red.

"Has your leg healed?" he asks after a while, as you unhurriedly walk down the pier, the salt-laden air making you feel at home; after all, you were born on an island.

"Perfectly, thank all the Gods. And I took down the pirate i was sent to kill in two days, which means I haven't gotten rusty despite fifteen months of indolence." you happily inform him "I have started with something easy, so as not to overexert myself, but I am tired of sitting around doing nothing; I am ready to get back to business."

"That is good to hear."

You smile, finally taking his hand. "I have missed you." you murmur; it is easy, even pleasant, to utter those words, because no matter how usually strict Mihawk is in judging others, you know you don't need to hide from him, not even the most fragile, most painful part of you "I am so sorry I never called or wrote, I... I needed to be alone. To come to terms with what I had discovered."

"I know, (name). I am not crossed, and..."

"And?"

He sighs; for a moment you simply know he wants to ask whether those three months actually helped, if your heart healed along with your leg or the pain of knowing you will never be a mother, never raise the children you have wanted for nine years, is still part of you, slowly gnawing at your heart like waves gradually wearing away the sturdiest rock. If he did, you are not sure what answer you would give, because you don't have one for yourself. Rationally, you know the passing of time will help, at least a little, and since you have always thought suicide is not the answer you can't help moving on, or at least going on, by inertia if nothing else, and the occasional moment, hour, or even day, of sadness and complete despair doesn't prevent you from cherishing the small and great joys life still throws your way, from the gentle, protective hug of your mother to the pleasure of seeing your bullet, shot from half a mile away, hit the bullseye in the middle of the target's skull... to being finally back in the presence of the man you have never stopped thinking about, even though you had forbidden yourself from using him as an incentive to get back to what you had been. You don't want to be the sort of person who needs her loved one's affection to carry on; you want to be better than that, for yourself first of all and for him as well.

"It is good to see you." Mihawk says after a while; he can't read your mind (or at least, you have no reason to suspect he can; on the other hand, you wouldn't be too surprised...) but you could swear he knows what you are thinking, what you are feeling, or maybe he simply has the gift to say what the person in front of him needs to hear "I have missed you. Again."

"I'm sorry..."

"You don't need to apologize. I just meant..."

"I know, Mihawk. And... I feel the same."

Silence falls between the two of you, and while it is not uncomfortable or tense, as usual when you are with Mihawk, you perceive you can't simply enjoy it as you let time pass you by. You have already wasted so much of it, fifteen months after your first night together (a night thinking back to which makes you still shiver in such a pleasant way; a night that was the beginning of something marvelous, even if not what you hoped) and three after you had quietly confessed to each other you both wanted to be more than simple acquaintances and drinking buddies. You are still young, and rushing things rarely helps, at least when feelings are concerned; but as you said, you have been idle for so long, and you want, you need, to regain control of your life.

"A new restaurant has just opened not far from here; it is pretty good, I am told." you mention after a moment, suddenly thinking back to Garp's conjectures "Would you let me buy you dinner?"

Mihawk grimaces. "I'd be more than happy to dine with you, but you have to let me take the bill."

"I have earned thirteen million berries twenty minutes ago. I think I can afford a dinner for two." you point out, relieved that scowl was not due to the prospect of spending the evening with you.

"That changes nothing. I would have imagined a noblewoman would have been keen on respecting traditions."

You smile; Gods, you are so happy to see him your heart is singing. "Then..." you begin, lowering your voice to an intimate murmur as you take both of his hands in yours, the distance between your bodies reduced to a breath "What if I let you pay for the dinner, and then I take care of dessert? In my inn room?"

Mihawk sighs, his usual serious demeanor betraying his actual feelings: amusement, and relief, and desire. "I suppose an after-dinner drink wouldn't hurt."

"Great."

He kisses you - on the forehead, since you're still in public; when you raise your eyes to his, you can see him smile. "Let's go, then."

The descending night hides you in its dark mantle as you set off along the pier, your fingers still interwined.

#One Piece #One Piece Live Action #OPLA #Dracule Mihawk #Mihawk #Dracule Mihawk x reader #Mihawk x reader #Steven John Ward #Bellona's stuff #100 notes

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guided-by-stars · 4 months ago

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Do you like ISAT? ⭐️ Are you looking for more media to get into? Did you stumble across this post because you’re into one of the other projects mentioned here? (If yes, play In Stars in Time!!)

I’ll be dividing this up into sections based on the content in various Acts, so spoilers for each individual section below! I’ll be trying to avoid as much spoilers as possible for the other projects referenced here, for obvious reasons, but some concepts and thematic threads will be mentioned in order to give context.

This isn't a complete list, I'm sure I'll think of some perfect things to add here after I've posted it...Also sorrry most of these are video games.

Long post, so it'll be under a cut (But PLEASE PLEASE take a quick glance at the visuals/pictures I've provided and see if anything looks cool!)

If you’ve played up to Acts 1 & 2:

⋆ ˚｡⋆౨ৎ˚ Madoka Magica ⋆౨ৎ˚⋆ ˚｡

Okay, this one's a little obvious if you know a bit of anything about both of these. It's definitely the most well known piece of media on this list. Puella Magi Madoka Magica, also known as PMMM or Madoka Magica, is a magical girl show. Directed by Akiyuki Shinbo & Yukihiro Miyamoto and produced by Magica Quartet, it centers around magical girls who have to battle witches, and only gain their powers through contracts with an alien being. This also gives them one wish. ***MINOR spoilers for Act 4 of ISAT, skip if needed...Wishes, huh? Powerful and dangerous wishes, huh?***

The writing has a lot of depth to it, the bonds between the characters are interesting, and the narrative weight they have placed on their shoulders to save the world...well!

I have an important other reason why ISAT fans may really enjoy this series, but it would spoil a lot of the series... so first, some visuals, because this show is beautiful.

Okay, now spoilers for Episode 10. These are pretty big spoilers, so avoid if you care about that sort of thing. I don't personally think it ruins the series to know about beforehand, but you do lose some of the surprise. ***Spoilers for Ep. 10 of PMMM, skip if needed: Well! It's a timeloop show. Specifically a timeloop centering one person who's terrified of loosing the person they love and prone to obsession.***

You can watch it on Crunchyroll, or you could watch it illegally on a few different pirating sites, it's not exactly obscure. There's the series, but also multiple movies. There's also a new movie coming out in 2025! Exciting!

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ 1BitHeart ˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

1bitheart, created by Miwashiba and produced by PLAYISM, is a ?visual novel? I suppose. There are other mechanics besides just talking to people (mystery solving, gifting, walking), but that's the best way I can describe it. In 1bitheart, you experience the world through Nanashi's eyes, a severely agoraphobic guy. I feel like if you like Siffrin, you'll probably find him interesting. Honestly, I don't have much more to say here...just that the vibes of this game feel like something many ISAT fans might enjoy.

If you like dialogue and character building, then maybe give it a look! There's one more spoilery reason why you might find it interesting, but it's a major spoiler for BOTH games...so. I'll leave that for you to discover.

Visuals:

You can buy 1bitheart here:

☆ The Endless Empty ☆

The Endless Empty, created by Erik Sheader-Smith, is another artistic RPG game with themes of suicidality, imagery of stars, and a fascinating battle system. It's very...scrapbook diary nightmare anatomical textbook, if that makes sense. It's short, inexpensive, obscure, and delightful, in my opinion. Guys. This is good.

Visuals:

Buy it here:

𓐟◇ OFF ◇𓐟

I see a lot of people around who are into both ISAT and OFF!, which I find supremely unsurprising. Both are created by French devs (OFF by Mortis Ghost), steeped in that background, unique RPG battle system (many enemies in this game are basically Sadnesses), limited palette (and often black & white) and [killed for spoilers].

I find the translation writing fascinating, personally. There's a lot you can dig out of here.

Visuals:

Get it here:

๑ï🌧Mr Rainer’s Solve-It Service🌧๑ï

Easily the most obscure game on this list, Mr Rainer's, created by Etherane, is an incredible game that's more of a visual novel than a text based adventure. The worldbuilding of the story is fascinating, and the characters are compelling. The story ends with SO MANY unanswered questions and mysteries, which is another reason why it fascinates me so.

Like ISAT, Mr Rainer's is a game pretty much entirely in black, white, and red, about an amnesiac hooded figure who doesn't remember their past and is INCREDIBLY fucking hungry constantly, a story with multiple endings, a story about identity and belonging and being the only one of your kind in a strange land, a story about grief and life and touch and connection and cycles of pain...

Please give it a chance, I have absolutely nobody to talk to about this game. It's only 5 hours and it's only (around) five dollars...

Visuals:

You can get it here!:

If you’ve played the whole game + 2Hats (DO NOT READ ON IF YOU HAVE NOT DONE 2HATS!!! I AM WARNING YOU!!!):

⚂ ⊹.🂱 Yugioh (Specifically the Toei series and Duel Monsters)⊹. 🂱 ⚂

Well! Here it is! The series about friendship, "other you's", "you see everything I do and you know how my body reacts to things", "you’re me but also not me but also another me but also you’re NOTHING like me", "facade sees facade in the eyes and Knows" and [spoilers for Yugioh redacted].

Guys if you don't gaf about card games, in the Toei series they are an extremely small aspect of the show and other games (like Tamagotchi) are similarly important!

It's got a fucked up by grief and trauma guy who does morally grey stuff and is fixated on his own past and really does just deep down Want to be Useful!! It's also got a codependent protector who really needs to be protected! It's got GAMES!!! SO MANY GAMES!!! and DRAMA!

Visuals:

(Toei)

(Duel Monsters)

Watch Toei series here: (WARNING!! THE EPISODES ARE NOT IN ORDER! BE CAREFUL!)

You can watch Duel Monsters many places, both legally and illegally.

⟳⏱︎ Start Again, duh! ⏱︎⟳

If you've only played ISAT but not Start Again (You know who the dev is...), you might think there's little of value there besides additional dialogue, but you'd be entirely wrong. Not only is this LOOP's story (and valuable to examine because of that), but the House is quite different, there's unique art, and there's different endings as well. PLAY START AGAIN START AGAIN START AGAIN: A PROLOGUE!!! YOU WILL NOT REGRET IT!

Visuals:

Get it here:

✧♥ Hello Charlotte series ♥✧

Hello Charlotte, also created by Etherane, is an incredible series, and one of the three most impactful game series I've ever encountered. The amount of unexpected developments that happen...I couldn't possibly understand where the game was going until everything clicked at once. Personally I think it's a masterpiece of storytelling.

Another artistic RPG maker game- so of course the art is beautiful. There's a battle system...in one of the games...yeah it's rudimentary. It's more of an exploration/puzzle game than anything. It's more of a STORY than anything. I would really really really hate to spoil this game, but what I will say, is there's a reason why I put it in the 2hats section. A very good reason. Pleaseee check it out it's so much content for so incredibly cheap. Criminally cheap. You will become incredibly attached to Charlotte.

Visuals:

Get the first game here (name your price!):

EP 2:

EP 3:

#isat #in stars and time #puella magi madoka magica #yugioh #hello charlotte #off game #soliloquy #1bitheart #the endless empty #sasasaap #mr rainers solve it service

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nightprompts · 1 year ago

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&. 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐩𝐢𝐞𝐜𝐞 (𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧) 𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬.

( dialogue prompts taken from episodes 3 & 4 ( "tell no tales" & "the pirates are coming" ) of the netflix live action one piece series. feel free to edit and change as you seem fit. )

❛ when are you gonna stop wasting your life? it's pathetic. ❜

❛ it's our jolly roger. every pirate crew has to have one. and now we do! ❜

❛ why did i have to get dragged along for this? ❜

❛ you think you can do anything i can't do? ❜

❛ i was just... i was trying to help. ❜

❛ you got to be kidding me. that clown was worth 15 million berry. we should've stuffed his head in a bag and brought it with us. ❜

❛ who would pay you that bounty anyway? you're kind of a wanted man yourself now. ❜

❛ well, it's about time one of my sorry excuses for a supporting cast showed up. ❜

❛ arlong wants a word. ❜

❛ well, you can tell arlong... that i don't take requests. ❜

❛ how much do these cost? ❜

❛ if you have to ask, you can't afford it. ❜

❛ listen. we are going to need something a little less flashy if we want to sneak out of here. ❜

❛ you want to steal a ship? ❜

❛ a ship is not just a ship. it's a part of our crew. ❜

❛ real beauty, huh? ❜

❛ wait! wait! wait! i can help you. ❜

❛ our experiences don't define us. it's what we gain from them that matters. you learned, and you survived. ❜

❛ we've had this discussion. you mustn't show up unannounced. ❜

❛ have you come to tell me another story? i do love hearing about your adventures. ❜

❛ when are you ever going to get the opportunity to wear things this nice? ❜

❛ all this stuff. all this space. it's gotta make a person feel... lonely. ❜

❛ i know i can be a tad overprotective at times, but it's just because i couldn't bear to think what i would do were something to happen to you. ❜

❛ have we met before? you look familiar. ❜

❛ being a pirate has been my dream for as long as i can remember. and i'm finally making it a reality. ❜

❛ i'm sorry. am i interrupting something? ❜

❛ is this the best way to ask for an autograph? ❜

❛ i'm here to remind you of your place in the food chain. ❜

❛ you bore me, clown. ❜

❛ so we're friends now? you don't even know me. ❜

❛ wo what do we do now? have a sleepover? do each other's makeup? ❜

❛ i don't want your pity. ❜

❛ have you ever lost anyone close to you? ❜

❛ you're not very good at this friends thing, are you? ❜

❛ you don't think she, like, like likes me, do you? ❜

❛ if you're gonna talk about feelings, i'm really gonna need a drink. ❜

❛ i knew i'd seen your face somewhere. on a wanted poster. ❜

❛ i guess some fruit gets so bruised, it can't help but to be rotten at the core. ❜

❛ let's fight with real blades to see who's best. ❜

❛ but if you want to beat me, you'd better be ready to kill me. ❜

❛ i don't think you know what the truth is anymore. ❜

❛ i'm done running. i'm not leaving your side. not until i know you're safe. ❜

❛ if we stay here, we die. we have to leave now. ❜

❛ two swords not enough? maybe you should've brought more. ❜

❛ if you just give up, what has all our training been for? ❜

❛ let's fight every day. we'll keep getting better and stronger until one of us becomes the greatest. ❜

❛ you'd do that for me? ❜

❛ now, i need you to be strong so we can get out of here. ❜

❛ a dead pirate weighs the same as a live one. ❜

❛ let's not make this more difficult than it need be, hmm? ❜

❛ you'll never get a peaceful night's rest because someone's always waiting to slit your throat. ❜

❛ i've killed more crewmates than i care to remember. they're expendable. every single one of them. ❜

❛ being a pirate is not about raiding villages or perfect plans. it's about adventure. and freedom. ❜

❛ you gave up on your dream. no one who does that can ever call themselves a pirate. ❜

❛ i'll see you again someday. ❜

❛ from now on, it's all gonna be smooth sailing. ❜

❛ you had to open your mouth. ❜

#one piece #opla #sentence starters #roleplay memes #roleplay starters #rp memes #inbox memes #rp starters #dialogue prompts #ask memes #tv

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mama-qwerty · 4 months ago

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Thinking about Dread again.

Was going through my saved images and came across these, from the third season.

My deranged beloved has become a sad little meow meow.

So pensive. So frustrated. So defeated.

(My favorite image of him in this scene. I love that pose, it's so natural and conveys so much about his mental and emotional state.)

I still think the way they handled his 'redemption' completely missed the mark, and could have been done much better had they planted a few seeds to begin with. But the pacing of the whole series felt so odd, and I wonder if they had something different planned before Netflix (possibly) cut their time shorter.

(For the record, I think that's part of the problem with the Knuckles series. It felt like there should have been more in that, but Paramount told them they only had 6 eps to do what they wanted in 12.)

But Dread? My beloved little gremlin of a pirate? Oh, he had so much potential. He could have been this wild card, this character who continued to be him despite everything, who was so anti-Knuckles it was entertaining and fun and just a joy to watch him have so much fun being a bastard.

I get that they couldn't keep a Knuckles as an absolute asshole, but watching this delightful character go from this

To this

without seeing anything in between was jarring. The last we saw of Dread before season 3 started was him fighting with Ren as Sonic and Nine took the shards away. He was enraged to have lost his Beauty. Again. We have no idea what happened after that, but this descent into depression seemed sudden and out of character.

But considering how he behaved after his first loss of the shard (when he lost his first ship and crew), maybe this isn't that much of a stretch. He ran before, jumping nose first into denial, and tried to cover his feelings of defeat by being a party pirate. Now his Beauty is lost once again, and he's in a strange city, on another planet (in another universe!) and has made himself at odds with the people there. (With his other him.) He couldn't even contact his crew because he'd turned on them before leaving.

So here's Dread, completely out of his element, the one thing he'd lusted after his entire life gone. It would figure that he'd maybe have a bit of Ren's depressive state, and fall into a "What's the point? What I want always seems to be just out of reach. I'll never have my one true desire." mindset.

And maybe, since the shards were all gone, he's feeling some kind of mental shift. I've theorized that the shard's energy was what made Dread so batshit, and now that it's gone, maybe he's starting to think a little more clearly than he'd ever done before. Instead of that drive to "FIND HAVE KEEP" that gem, he's feeling like a failure for not being able to fulfill that quest. That duty. Because maybe to him, it didn't feel like the normal greed of pirate plunder, the urge to just take and steal and collect as much booty as possible. Maybe to him, because he's a Knuckles and they're hard wired to protect, it was something more personal.

That shard, according to his instincts, was his to protect. And now that it's gone, he's a failure and feels empty. He's coming down off that energy, the inexplicable hold the shard held over him, and is essentially going through a withdrawal of sorts, and dealing with the possibly conflicting emotions it dredged up.

There was so much potential for him. And the writers wasted it, by having him simply join in on the attack on Nine without examining his (very likely) ulterior motives. I don't like that they used that Jack character to draw Dread's selfish desires back out - those should have still been there! The whole agreement to join in should have been a plot to simply get him near his Beauty so he could pull a double cross.

This made it seem like Dread didn't even think about his Beauty during the whole battle. WHAT?? Being near it should have made him almost feral with the want to get to it. I would have loved to have seen him be another obstacle to the shard, so the heroes didn't only have to deal with Nine and his endless army of bots, but also this deranged pirate who was overcome with treasure lust.

Missed opportunity.

Ah well.

Just lookit this handsome bastard.

My beloved. Dread is possibly my absolutely favorite variant of Knuckles. I just love him.

#knuckles the echidna #knuckles the dread #sonic prime #character analysis

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moonstone-vibe · 13 days ago

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SUNSET

Hello everyone! Here's another shortfic based on a Tumblr prompt from @starsmadeinheaven . My muse likes these short things as of late and even though I've made a series on AO3, it seems they're kinda too short so I'll be posting here mainly.

“I wonder, am I truly safe here?” Carriedo asked with a casual tilt of head.

He was standing by the large stone window, seemingly contemplating the bustling crowd in the street below. There was sun in his hair, tinting his dark curls and glowing onto his tanned skin. Dressed like a mere merchant save for the crimson ribbon holding his locks into a long, loose ponytail, he looked clean, and proper and honest – everything he was not.

Lovino crossed his arms, only half-facing him, his back turned at the lively view. “It is a public library,” he said flatly.

If anything, he was good at being stern, and looking the part too. He may not have had quite his father and his brother’s head for business, but he certainly had the stomach and the steely resolve to deal with what they would not. So here he was, straight-backed, all black velvet with no adornments save for an austere silver cross around his neck.

“I don’t know if I should trust that you won’t pull out a dagger and gut me, even in front of all these honest men,” the Spaniard shrugged. “In all my life I’ve met many dangerous fellows, and I daresay dealt with them. You, signor Vargas, must be one of the worst. You know, I saw you in church the other day, with your family. You… appeared like a very pious, innocent young man, but I have seen that you are a fiend.”

Was this godawful pirate trying to aggravate him? Lovino could guess what the man was saying - that he was in truth nothing like his family. Not kind, not cheerful, not a patron of arts, not inclined to beauty and good spirit. Only, he knew that to face the world one needed not cheer and birdsong, but grit and a touch of ruthlessness.

“Your servants are still alive.”

Carriedo laughed, and he was much too beautiful when he did, his smile too bright, his eyes too gemlike in the dwindling rays. Lovino inhaled sharply, making an effort to hold his gaze and not to visibly swallow the knot in his throat.

“Your quarrel wasn’t with them, after all. You knew they were only there to test your skill. Anyway… what are you really going to do about it?” he asked, motioning towards the ledgers open onto the nearby table. “Your family tried to cheat me out of a lot of money, how do you plan to sort it out? My merchandise-”

“But it wasn’t your merchandise, was it?” Lovino hissed, leaning forward. With the corner of his eye, he spied some curious glances coming their way and did his best to keep his composure and his voice in check.

“But I got my hands on it,” the pirate pointed, keeping his voice low in turn. “And once I get my hands on something, it’s mine.”

Lovino did not want to think of that. Or of the man’s hands.

He turned around at last and glanced in the distance, over the low rooftops, to where the water was visible in the distance. It was interesting, how the sky became suddenly green and the sea a weird shade of pink, glinting faintly under the setting sun.

“Mr. Carriedo, as fearsome as you might be out there, amidst the high seas, in this city you don’t have much leverage and you know it. My father is not considering paying the full price, absolutely not. But we could facilitate an expansion of your distribution channel. Maybe. But if you insist on a compensation-”

“You will compensate me.”

Lovino blinked, opening his mouth to state the contrary, but his wrist was captured without warning and he was pulled towards the other. His reflexes kicked in, all his muscles suddenly taut at the danger, and the hidden blade slipped from his sleeve and into his grasp, being pointed at Carriedo’s throat in the blink of an eye.

“Dios mio, qualquier hombre perdia su cabesa por ti…” the Spaniard murmured, his green eyes shining with mirth.

The bastard!

“You don’t seem that scared though,” Lovino observed dryly, tilting the blade a little closer.

Carriedo continued to hold the wrist of his free hand, doing nothing to avert the dagger nearly touching his collar. The grip of his fingers was light, almost gentle, even as he pressed his thumb into the younger’s pulse point.

“Surely not as scared as you are. You asked me here, where you thought you’d be safe with so much people around, and you still came armed to the teeth. You have more of these, don’t you? And yet, no matter how much steel, it’s not enough.”

Damn him! His words poured, like honeyed wine, drowning Lovino in his own vulnerability. Much too soft, much too sweet.

“Of what?! Of you, signor Carriedo?” he almost spat through gritted teeth, lifting his chin.

The Spaniard’s smile only softened further. “Of yourself. Of who you really might be beyond all this darkness – a man who wants to live, to take even one free breath, not a mad hellhound to be unleashed upon the enemy at his master’s convenience, distained and getting but meagre scraps off the table.”

Lovino blinked, his mouth impossibly dry, his lips pressed much too tightly, barely drawing enough air. His hand only fisted around the handle of the dagger, struggling to keep it steady in the onslaught of pure anger. Only, he was something else entirely beyond the darkness, and wondered with fright whether this wretched man could glimpse it too, and bring about his absolute ruin.

“You don’t know anything-”

“What do I not know? Your father could have sent one of those ordinary assassins for this job, since he has no real desire to negotiate. I have killed many men, I have plunged my blade into their flesh with no qualms whatsoever, he knows it too well and he still sent you.”

Lovino forced a deep breath and the corners of his mouth into a grin. “If you harm me here, all the compensation you can expect will be a noose around your neck. And if you know me so well, then you can imagine that a mad hellhound like me has no taste for crafty words!”

With that, he lowered the dagger and yanked himself free from the pirate’s grasp. He became aware that some of the people around had been staring at them rather pointedly and he sighed, annoyed.

Carriedo pulled back in turn, crossing his arms and bowing his head. “Lovino, of course I will not harm you here. But your father is a thief, so he will either pay me or he’d better hire an entire army, lest I harm him and his whole family, elsewhere.” When he looked up, his eyes were suddenly sharp and predatory. “Two million.”

“That is four times what we-…!”

Lovino looked away, out the window, at the darkening horizon. Clouds gathering, tinged purple. Foolishly, he wasn’t afraid anymore. Not of a fight, whatever the outcome.

“We are gentlemen, after all. If you still have a grievance, despite what we offered, the two of us could duel.”

He knew it wasn’t much of an offer but his father was stubborn, and much too bold for his own good. ‘I am not a gentleman, and I will kill you’ he expected the other to say, but Carriedo just picked up his ledgers and collected them to his chest calmly, entirely unhurried.

“Tell your father to pay me the two million, signor Vargas,” he said serenely. “And quickly, before they become four. Oh, and-…” he stopped in front of Lovino and leaned in, his nose nearly brushing the younger’s ear. “It would have been only one if you hadn’t drawn the knife on me, querido.”

#spamano #shortfic

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bluegalaxygirl · 1 year ago

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Hello. Could you do a zosan hc where the reader has fear of abandonment and therefore avoids all and any forms of intimacy? Thanks in advance

This may not be exactly what you wanted but i hope you like it and i deiced to make it a story instead of a headcannon. I also just want to let everyone know that all the series that i'm doing will be on hiatus until i can get round to doing them, theres a lot going on this week alone (Two funerals and a hospital appointment) so i haven't been able to do too much. I'll still do requests though. Thank you all for the love and support <3

Zoro X Sanji X Reader, non-established relationship, reader is GN, Poly relationship

Warning: Abusive past, angst and Bad language.

Everyone leaves eventually, its only a matter of time. It doesn't matter if they promise forever or say how much they love you, it won't last, they'll either get board or tired of you. That's how its always been, it started with your mother, after she had you she decided to do something else, so she left, One by one your siblings left too never looking back, they said they where sorry but that doesn't make up for them leaving you alone. Some went on to collage and others just left because of Dad's anger problems, you understood why he was upset, you were upset too. Even though your farther was an angry man and sometimes took that anger out on you, you clung to him since he was the only person left in your life but everyone leaves and soon he did too. You worked hard and made friend's but the small town you lived in didn't create enough opportunists, so they left too, they said they would write but soon the letters faded away. You didn't mean to Join the straw hats, it just happened, Luffy saw the way you kicked out a bunch of men from the shop you were working at and asked you to join his crew. You said no, the fear of being abandoned again stopped you form doing a lot of things, you stopped making friend's and focused on your job. The pirate captain was head strong though and most of his crew seemed happy to have you, something about them and their stories made you agree.

It took a lot of getting used too and it took you a while to open up and trust again, it even led to you falling in love with two of the crew, Zoro and Sanji were your close friends and even though they argued and fought each other you knew they liked each other's company. There where a few times when you wanted to confess only for something to get in the way or the fear of abandonment hitting you hard. When the two boys got together you were so happy for them but a part of you broke, knowing the two people who you loved more than anything would never be yours was hurting but you still couldn't help but be around them. You couldn't help but think back to your farther and how this feels so much like the old days. When Zoro and Sanji told you how they both felt about you it brought you so much joy and yet the only word that left your mouth was "No", the fear of abandonment taking over again, you loved them with all of your heart but you were so scared of them leaving you, having friend's leave you was hard but having those you love more than anything would tear you apart. They respected what you said and you three stayed friend's but as the fear got worse you started to withdraw slowly, hoping to distance yourself from the crew.

You couldn't help yourself, sitting in the closet on the floor all you could do was cry, your heart and lungs hurt feeling like you couldn't breathe. Only one thought ran through your head, maybe you should leave before they abandon you. The door to the closet opens while you try to stifle your panting and little groans of pain as Nami steps in looking you over with wide concerned eyes "Oh Y/N, I heard you crying from down the hall.. What's wrong?" The navigator rushes over to kneel in front of your placing her hands on your red tear stained cheeks, you try your best to explain between gasps for breath and sniffs. How the people around you leave, how you love Zoro and Sanji so much that it hurts, you want to be with them but you can't help but think about them leaving you. "I'm just gonna go" You finally finished now looking up at Nami who's crying slightly with a shocked face "w-what? N-no you can't leave us" The navigator speaks pulling you into a hug which you stiffen at "I know its hard, things haven't been easy lately, but we'll never leave you, not willingly" Pulling away the navigator panics seeing your expressionless face "Everyone leaves in the end. Some by chose and some are forced" The words you speak break her heart so in a last ditch effort she makes you an offer "Give me a week, I'll prove to you that we won't leave you and if your still not convinced then... I'll give you 10,000 for a boat and stop Luffy from going after you" The offer was too good to pass up, you knew if you left Luffy would be mad, you didn't care too much about the money though.

After agreeing Nami set to work, she tried everything she could think of but after 5 days your mind still wasn't changed, so she went to Sanji and Zoro and told them everything. The two were thrilled that you felt the same but heart broken over your reasons for not confessing and wanting to leave, Nami kept all of this hidden very well so Luffy didn't catch wind of it, but she couldn't do it alone anymore. The two agreed to help and the perfect opportunity came that afternoon when they stopped off on and island full of trees and waterfalls, there wasn't a village, and they knew you would get off the ship to do some foraging. Stepping off the ship with your basket in hand you scanned the beach before looking into the tree line spotting a natural path that would be good to follow "Y/N, wait up" Sanji yells with a smile running off the ship and dragging Zoro along "We'll come with you" The cook stops next to you holding into Zoro's belt "It's ok, i'm fine on my own" You sigh starting to walk only for the two to follow "it's been ages since we've all spent time together.. Come on" Zoro pats your back hearing you groan but give in walking down the path into the forest with the two behind you. They tried to make conversation with you but you'd only give them one word answers or a hum in response while picking berries and herbs that you knew were ok. "What's been eating at you lately?" The swordsman snaps earning a glare from Sanji not wanting to say anything outright in case you shut down completely, they only had two more days to convince you to stay.

Stopping in your tracks you look over at the river next to you bending down to pick some herbs and put them in the basket "tired" You lie standing back up and grabbing your basket "Bull" Zoro growls, his tone of voice made you stop and turn to look at the two "Nami told you i'm leaving, didn't she?" You ask realizing what's going on, it didn't exactly surprise you that she would get the two involved to stop you from leaving but it somehow warmed your heart knowing she cared. Sanji sighs and nods his head letting go of Zoro to walk closer to you "She told us more than that" The cook place a hand on your cheek, it was warm and soft and you so desperately wanted to lean into it but you couldn't instead you took his hand off your cheek and placed it back at his side "What i said was part of mental breakdown." You try to lie your way out of this not wanting them to say they love you or beg you to stay but a part of you did want that "So your not gonna leave?" Zoro asks stepping closer crossing his arms over his chest. "That parts still true" you state turning and walking down the path heading to the waterfall to see what's there. "We know your lying" Zoro yells after you as Sanji grabs the swordsman's hand following you down the path but you don't answer just trying to ignore them for as long as you can. Stopping by the edge of the river near the waterfall you bend down to pick up more berries and place them in your basket.

Soon catching up with you the two try their best to convince you to say "I heard it all before" You state trying to focus on what to pick form bushes and flowers before standing back up "We love you Y/n, and we know you love us back, please just give us a chance even if-" Sanji begs only for you to cut him off by turning to face him, your face now very close to the cooks, your eyes lock with his as you speak "That has nothing to do with this" Your heart aches at hearing those words, its something you didn't hear too often growing up and hearing it come form someone you truly love makes you feel right but again that fear is back and you have to make it stop. "So you do love us" Zoro states with a smile placing his hand on your cheek finally getting a break through, your eyes widen in realization as Sanji smiles taking your hand in his "Please, don't leave us. I-I will do what ever it takes to convince you to stay. I-i promise i won't leave you" You had hope as Sanji spoke until he said those last words making you push the two away and stepping back "Promises don't mean anything... everyone leaves, I won't be abandoned again" You keep stepping back until you feel comfortable with the distance between you and them, Zoro sighs pinching the bride of his nose "So, what? You gonna spend the rest of your life alone? You think thats better than actually being with people who care?" The swordsman steps closer making you step back a little only stopping when you reach the edge of the river.

Sanji walks closer grabbing Zoro's arm trying to calm the green haired down "I know you care... i not say you don't but it doesn't matter" You're trying to get them to understand maybe then things will be easier, looking at the two you sigh with a heavy feeling in your chest "It doesn't matter if you love someone with all of your heart, it doesn't matter if you do everything you can to please them or make them like you. They'll just leave when they feel like it, they'll leave and never look back, even if they promised you a thousand times" You tear up but try and stop them from falling, your kind and giving, you have so much love to give so why does everyone leave? Your thoughts are interrupted by strong arms around you, the two boys pulling you into a hug your head in between there's as they hold you. "We won't promise then" Zoro rubs your back to try and comfort you "We're never going to leave you and i know the crew will feel the same" Sanji looks over at Zoro with his head on your shoulder both giving each other a nod, pulling away Zoro cups your face forcing you to look up at him as Sanji holds your hands in his holding them close to his chest "We're telling you... We won't ever leave you." The swordsman's eye shows he telling the truth and it feels like a weight has been listed off your shoulders, for once you actually believe someone when they tell you that.

Sanji brings your hands to his lips giving your knuckles a kiss "Please love... we want you around even if we just stay friends" The cook breaks the long silence, you had no idea what to say or do but the word friend's made your chest hurt, you really do love them but you know it will take time for your mind and body to fully except it "I- i, I'll stay" You manage to get out soon seeing the big bright smile on Sanji's face before he pulls you in for a tight hug, you can feel him relax in your arms as your wrap them around him. Zoro lets out a sigh of relief before placing his forehead against yours while wrapping his arms around you and Sanji to keep you three close. The three of you stayed there for a while enjoying the feeling and silence other than flowing water around you, until the swordsman places a kiss on your forehead, you don't know why but you craved more. Physical affection isn't always something you let happen, over the years you've become used to hugs but kisses were very different. Looking up at the green haired man your eyes begged for more, it felt nice and you wanted more even though before you couldn't stand stuff like that, Zoro seemed to get the message though placing another kiss on your forehead but letting it last a lot longer. You closed your eyes and leaned into it your chest starting to hurt less as your body relaxes. Sanji pulls back a little while rubbing your back seeing your relaxed figure lean into the swordsman, it made the cook smile leaning over and placing a kiss on your cheek.

You stiffened a little at his touch but soon relaxed when the cook did it again and again. Zoro removes his lips and hands from you watching you lean into Sanji a little more "Feel better?" Zoro asks getting you to open your eyes and look at him, the cook pulls away moving some hair out of your face with a small smile as you nod "I'm still scared you'll leave me but... i believe you" You wipe your cheeks and eyes taking a deep breath to calm yourself down "Come on lets head back, I'll make some tea" Sanji takes the basket off you and puts an arm around your shoulders as the three of you walk back down the path. You reach out and grab Zoro's sleeve pulling him along, the swordsman lets out a small laugh before taking your hand and holding it "We don't know much about what's going through your head so i was thinking you could tell us" Zoro squeezes your hand a little as you look up at him "It'll help us understand" Sanji speaks up rubbing your shoulder but you only shrug not sure what telling them will accomplish but maybe getting it off your chest will help.

Back on the ship you sat with Zoro, Sanji and Nami in the aquarium bar, the relief on Nami's face when you told her you would stay shocked you. The navigator hugged you tighter than ever before and you froze not knowing what to do, it also didn't help when she refused to let go of you when you sat down, she clung to your arm sitting next to you. With some encouragement you told the three what your life was like and what's going through your head, most of it was just you rambling but the three listened to you and Nami started to loosen her grip to help you feel less uncomfortable. "I understand why you feel that way now" Nami looks down at her drink, she knows what its like to be alone but it was her chose to do that, she had to, to protect her family and love ones but you. You were just straight up abandoned "Your right, promises don't mean shit, especially when you have shit family" Zoro growls hating how the people around you at such a young age had no care for you, Sanji sighs and rubs the swordsman's arm while leaning close to him "I'm sorry you had to go through that, but we won't leave you none of us will." You smile at the cooks words feeling more confident that they mean it. "I'm guessing the whole confessing thing is what made things worse, right?" Zoro asks calming down a little now feeling more concerned than angry, you nod and look down at your hands "It's not your fault, i'm just not used to all this. I can deal with the hugs and stuff but... getting too close means that when they do leave it hurts more" You sigh feeling Nami rub your arm before standing.

The navigator looks you over before placing a hand on your shoulder "I'm happy to help in any way i can but i think this is a conversation for the three of you" Nami looks over at the two boys then back to you giving you a small smile before leaving. You knew she was right, maybe you should have been open about it form the start but you had no idea how they would react. Sanji and Zoro move to sit next to you the swordsman placing his arm over the back of the booth behind you while Sanji leaned into the green haired man "You don't have to do anything you don't want too but if you'll let us, I'd like to show you what love actually is" The blonde gives you a light smile, his eyes kind as he reaches a hand over and holds it out to you hoping you'll take it. Looking down at his hand you don't know what to do, the fear is still there but the kindness and love they are showing you is starting to force that fear away "You won't be mad if i don't want something?" You ask looking at the two who nod "Of course not, we'll take it slow and in the end if you don't want us three to be together then, we'll still be friends" Zoro's small smile makes you smile back reaching over and placing your hand in Sanji's.

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lividria · 6 months ago

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Everything You Need To Know For Metroid Prime 4

I finally have an excuse to use all of my Metroid knowledge for something. Metroid Prime 4 is a BIG deal, but we've waited for it for so long, so people might not know/have forgotten some important information they're gonna need beforehand, so here's a big post detailing basically everything you definitely need to know or may need to know, depending on what happens in the game. I'm of course assuming a familiarity with the series, though, so I don't have to explain what Metroids are or who Samus is, but even if you're still really into it, maybe you missed one or two things I'll hopefully be able to explain.

This is mostly off of memory, and I am very confident in my memory, but I checked a Metroid wiki for multiple points, so hopefully I'm accurate, but if I miss something, get something wrong, or you just have something you want me to add, let me know, since I want this to be comprehensive. Alright, let's do this.

This is LONG, so all the facts (& idle speculation) are under the cut.

One caveat I almost forgot about, I have a confession, I... Haven't played any of the Prime games besides the remaster of the original. I tried to emulate Hunters, but it didn't end well, and I was led astray into believing that ports of Metroid Prime 2 & 3 were going to be ported to the Switch "soon"... Last year, and now I don't have nearly as much time on my computer as I'd like to play them on an emulator. I can only hope they get ported to the next console, or get released with 4, or something. I'd like to think I know about as much as I need to, though.

A "Brief" Summary of the Metroid Prime Series

So far, the entire sub-series has taken place in-between Metroid 1/Zero Mission, and Metroid 2/Samus Returns. It's relatively self-contained, and only acknowledged in the main series once (to my knowledge), meaning you could be a big Metroid fan and still know nothing about Metroid Prime, so just to be sure, here's a summary of the Metroid Prime games we've had so far.

Metroid Prime 1: Samus responds to a distress signal from a Space Pirate research ship, discovering they were performing genetic experiments with a mysterious mutagenic substance. The ship is destroyed by an escaped Parasite Queen, but Ridley, injured after Metroid 1 and enhanced with cybernetics (now dubbed Meta Ridley), escapes to the planet the ship was orbiting, Tallon IV. Samus gives chase, discovering that the planet is also being effected by that same mutagen, named Phazon, that the Space Pirates are experimentig further on the planet, and that the Chozo once thrived here before dying out due to the Phazon's destructive effects. Samus confronts Meta Ridley, who is shot into submission by Chozo technology and launched down a pit, and enters a passage in that temple into a Leviathan, a living asteroid filled with Phazon that spread it onto Tallon IV in the first place. Samus finds a Metroid mutated beyond recognition, the Metroid Prime, and confronts it, eventually destroying it, though it consumes her Phazon Suit upgrade that made her immune to Phazon, and Samus escapes the Leviathan as it explodes, leaving Tallon IV behind. However, it's shown that the Metroid Prime reanimates in the image of Samus. Dark Samus is born.

Metroid Prime Hunters: Though it was released after Prime 2, it chronologically takes the place of a 1.5, so yeah. A mysterious message is sent out from the Alimbic System, claiming that ultimate power can be found in said system. The Galactic Federation dispatches Samus to claim it, who finds that multiple other characters are hunting for it, who I will get into in great detail in a second. However, it was a trick by the malevolent entity Gorea, who was sealed away in the Alimbic System and freed by Samus & her rivals in their search. Gorea is blown up, and everyone leaves.

Metroid Prime 2: a group of Galactic Federation soldiers are lost on the planet Aether. Samus goes to investigate, finding that the arrival of a Leviathan has split it into two alternate dimensions: Aether and Dark Aether, and Dark Aether's inhabitants, the Ing, have almost driven Aether's, the Luminoth, to extinction, and could threaten the galaxy in the future. Dark Samus is here, and has allied itself with the Ing in order to feed on the Phazon on the planet. The Space Pirates are here, too, but are getting destroyed by Dark Samus & the Ing, and those GF soldiers are dead. Samus ends up destroying the entirety of Dark Aether after a climactic showdown with the Emperor Ing & Dark Samus, the Luminoth are saved and presumably repopulate, and Samus leaves. However, Dark Samus reforms in space, and finds it's way on a Space Pirate ship that escaped Aether with a bunch of Phazon.

Metroid Prime 3: Dark Samus has brainwashed the Space Pirates, Ridley included, and together they're throwing Leviathans all over the galaxy, so the Galactic Federation has enlisted Samus and 3 other bounty hunters to help stop them. However, Dark Samus infects all 4 of them with Phazon, resulting in all of them but Samus turning evil, and, as Samus travels across planets to destroy the Leviathans, she is forced to kill off her allies. Eventually, Samus confronts Dark Samus on the living planet Phaaze, the source of all Phazon that wants to infect the entire universe. Dark Samus is defeated, but they fuse with the stolen Aurora Unit 313 (Aurora Units are basically Mother Brains but used by the GF) that was being used by Phaaze for the entire Leviathan campaign. Samus blows it up, the entire planet explodes, Phazon as a whole just kinda... Disappears, and she escapes to go on other missions. However, in a post-credits scene, a ship owned by Sylux, one of the rivals from MP:H, is stalking Samus.

Metroid Prime Federation Force: The Federation has made it's own, clunky armor suits that are much worse than Samus' but better than whatever else they were doing at the time. Space Pirates are doing things, so you go stop them. They have a beam that makes things bigger, and they use it to take over Samus' suit, trap her in Morph Ball mode and make her bigger and make her fight the armor guys, who defeat her and blow up the Master Brain, which is just a lamer Mother Brain and the head of the operation. The Space Pirate bases are destroyed, the day is saved, but it's shown in an unlockable post-credits scene that Sylux stole a Metroid egg from the Federation and hatched it. Uh oh.

Who To Worry About

Characters, wahoo!

Samus: It is unknown if she will return in Metroid Prime 4... No, obviously she's the main character.

Dark Samus/Phazon: I sincerely doubt they're bringing Phazon back, it was shown to have been thoroughly eradicated in Prime 3 and they're clearly open to Prime games not involving Phazon judging from H and FF, so, unless they come up with a damn good explanation as to how Dark Samus is still around, I wouldn't hold my breath.

The Space Pirates: They're shown to be back in the trailers, duh, but note that throughout the entire Prime series, besides for Federation Force, they're shown to be a secondary threat. One of the rivals in Hunters was a Space Pirate, and they were of equal importance as everyone else, too, which is... Not really. They're shown to be with Sylux, who has been built up for years now, and are like... The main part of the trailer, so I'm not saying they aren't going to be important, I'm just saying that something else might crop up we haven't seen yet.

Ridley: Will our beloved purple dragon bastard come back? I'm gonna go with... No. For one, he wasn't in Prime 2, but was in 1 & 3, and bringing him back multiple games in a row would be kinda lame, and Nintendo already seems to be phasing him out if you look at later titles. I doubt they would've made him a 3 phase final boss in the Metroid 2 remake if they had big plans for him elsewhere (But then again, I have no idea if MercurySteam and Retro Studios are on the same page about lore), though he is shown to still have the Meta cybernetics there, so Prime is probably canon to the main series, at least, if it's not just a red herring reference that doesn't mean anything in particular. There's also another thing I'm going to bring up later that's another point against him showing up.

Kraid: I have no reason to believe they'd bring him back, but I just wanna note Meta Kraid was a scrapped Prime 1 boss and he was brought back in Dread for no clear reason, so... Mmmmaybe?

Galactic Federation: You're shown to be at a GF Research Facility in Prime 4, and obviously these guys are important again, especially after their bigger role in Prime 3 & Federation Force. I know they introduced a new captain character in Prime 3, I think his name was Dane? So he might show up. Sylux has a huge grudge against the entire organization, and stole his gear from them, so there's a possibility we'll see the same darker side of them we saw in Fusion and Other M to justify that. Worth noting that Fusion had a translation error where it was supposed to be specified that the bad actors were part of the "old Federation army", or something to that effect, so it isn't the entire Federation that's sketchy, but if they were active in Fusion, the current penultimate game in the timeline, they almost definitely could've been active for whenever Sylux's grudge began. Other M also has dubious canonicity at this point, but still, it shows Nintendo isn't opposed to showing a darker side of the GF.

Federation Force: It seems Prime 4 takes place after FF due to Sylux having Mochtroids, the GF are being directly attacked by Space Pirates in the trailer, the FF have previously taken on a Space Pirate attack on the GF and won, and have even collaborated with Samus in the past. Maybe they'll be the equivalent of Prime 3's bounty hunters, minus the turning bad part. Probably. But FF is also the lowest rated Metroid game in the franchise, so...

Sylux: One of the rivals in Hunters, and as mentioned, shows up in Prime 3 and Federation Force post-credits scenes. He's the blue & green guy in the Prime 4 trailer. All we really know is that he hates the Federation (and by extension Samus), and stole his armor & weapon, the Shock Coil, from them. His species is unknown (People assume he's human but it's unconfirmed), and his homeworld, Cylosis, is also not elaborated on anywhere, giving us no leads. We see some kind of snowy wasteland location in his Hunters intro, but we don't know if that's Cylosis. (Cylosis seems to derived be from the word Cyclosis, which is something like cytoplasm getting circulated throughout cells, so... No idea.) He inexplicably changed ships between Hunters and 3, and is shown with Metroids in FF, but in the Prime 4 trailer has Mochtroids. He is also seemingly allied with the Space Pirates, and is absolutely going to be a big problem. (By the way, I tried to keep these summaries relatively brief, but @ postal-ech has a great post going over each Hunters character in detail if you're interested... hey wait why is that underlined none of the other usernames I've added here got that, is that actually gonna notify the guy? oops, spacing it out just in case because I know they already saw this post lol)

Mochtroids: Yes, I'll elaborate. Weak, failed Metroid clones made by the Space Pirates in Super Metroid, distinguishable by only having one nucleus. Sylux has Mochtroids in the Prime 4 trailer, which is probably why they aren't lashing out at anyone yet. It's unclear how important they'll be, but they haven't shown up anywhere besides Super Metroid, and even then were only in Maridia, so... Neat. Unclear what this means for the Metroids, especially Sylux's in specific. Fun fact, Mochtroids were in Hunters' demo, but not the actual game.

Weavel: A Space Pirate previously encountered by Samus in Metroid 1/Zero Mission, almost killed, and brought back as a cyborg guy, which is how we see him in Hunters. He obviously has a strong hatred towards Samus because of this. If they're bringing Sylux back, another Samus hater from Hunters, and bringing the Space Pirates back, Weavel's faction, I'd wager it's a pretty safe hope to have that Weavel may show up again.

Trace & the Kriken Empire: Trace is another Hunters rival, a representative of the Kriken Empire, described as "space cockroaches" so problematic the FEDERATION AND SPACE PIRATES WOULD TEAM UP TO ERADICATE IF NECESSARY. At a certain age, a Kriken is sent out to claim a planet for the Empire, which is presumably then conquered, though Trace specifically set his sights on the ultimate power from the Alimbic System, which he failed to collect. It's unknown if he was then disgraced, orrr if he claimed a planet after the fact. Maybe one we saw in Hunters? I could see these guys serving a similar role as the Ing in Prime 2, but I have no actual evidence they'll have a major role beyond it just being a logical choice based on what we already have.

Noxus & the Vhozon: Noxus is another Hunters rival, of the Vhozon species, who wanted to secure the ultimate power so that it didn't fall into the hands of evil, as their species places a lot of emphasis on peace and balance. Their homeworld, Vho, is also called out as having subzero temperatures, for whatever that's worth. In case it isn't obvious, I'm just listing off every Hunters rival because at this point it's a coin toss on whether or not they'll bring back more besides Sylux and who it'll be.

Spire & the Diamonts: Spire is another Hunters rival, and the last of the Diamont species, some weird, golem-like things that went extinct at some point. Spire was a good guy, and wanted the ultimate power to figure out what happened to his people. This is like, the fifth extinct/near-extinct race, isn't it? I did the math, there's like 8 now, actually.

Kanden & the Enoema: Final Hunters rival, Kanden is a lab experiment from his species, the Enoema, in an attempt to make essentially an ultimate life form for combat, though Kanden escaped and got a big ego. He wanted the ultimate power just for power's sake. He's essentially the wild card of the crew. He has an electric field around him, whatever that means.

Gorea: The final boss of Hunters, some random creature that just showed up in the Alimbic System to kill the Alimbics before being sealed away. It's shown to be immensely powerful, and we have no idea if there's more. If there is more, though, there could be another Gorea in Metroid Prime 4. But I wouldn't count on it.

What we Knew About Prime 4 Before the Trailer

Side note, most of this is from this Metroid wiki's timeline segment on their Prime 4 page, but it's also mostly after a certain point just people being hired by Retro Studios who may or may not be working on Prime 4, so I'm leaving all that out because it's incredibly unimportant and boring.

Metroid Prime 4's first look video only gave us the logo, but the video depicted the screw attack symbol forming out of space dust in space, the letter 4 appearing in blue flame and then the blue & black original Metroid Prime 4 logo as the Metroid Prime 1 title theme played. I'm too lazy to find the video, but that sounds like Dark Samus reforming at the end of Prime 2, who was also blue & black. Phazon returns?

There's a chance that multiplayer, or unique Morph Ball gimmicks, may show up, as they were brought up in an interviewer with Kensuke Tanabe, the main director of the Prime games, when he was talking about future Prime installments. If they're bringing back at least one rival from Hunters, one of the games with multiplayer, and also gave each rival a Morph Ball equivalent, hm... Hunters released before that interview, by the way.

It was also said in a different interview (I think) that Prime 4 might focus on a single planet again, and a time travel gimmick might be involved. I assume it'd work similarly to the dimension hopping from Prime 2 but I dunno, it was left vague.

BUT, development reset at some point in 2019 after all of this was shown and said, so I have NO CLUE how much of this is still applicable or now a red herring. However, due to the logo change, I will say that logo in specific probably no longer means anything.

The guy behind Hunters in specific mentioned in a 2020 interview that they have a backstory for Sylux written up that has "a lot of threaded storytelling" and thus made using him in future games "a good fit". He specifically called out wanting to talk about what's under his suit, so make of that what you will.

There was a specific job posting for Retro Studios that mentioned writing emotional scenes that will resonate with people, and given that the main trilogy gradually ramped up that kind of thing... I dunno, I don't want to plant ideas in people's heads before I write my big post where I just make shit up based off all of this as a part 2.

There was also a Retro Studios Twitter banner of MP4 concept art showing Samus in some weird blue & black hallway... Hey, wait a minute. We don't know if this concept art predates the development reset, though, but since it's Retro Studios which came on after the development reset, so... May be a coincidence, but I'm calling it out anyways.

THE IMPORTANT PART: Trailer Analysis

Quick side note, huge shoutout to all the people who dissected the trailer on their own pointing out a bunch of individual observations I bring up here all together (Plus my own field work). I won't be able to track down all the posts to credit them all and it'd feel unfair to only link the one or two I can probably find, but still, thanks, guys.

COSMIC YEAR 20X9 Galactic Federation Research Facility

Pause right here, right now. This is IMPORTANT. The research facility is just the setting for the trailer, it doesn't matter too much, but THERE'S A DATE. One of the rarest things in the entire franchise, even rarer than Samus leaving a planet without blowing something up on it. Or just blowing it up in it's entirety. So, what does this tell us? Well, I had to fucking to find a list of every mentioned date, mostly coming from instruction books & the like, so have it all. Get ready for contradictions!

2000: The Galactic Federation forms. One specific thing says it was 2003, but 2000 is neater.

20X5: The Space Pirate attack on a GF research vessel that prompted Samus to go to Zebes in 1/Zero Mission, also in 20X5. Metroid 2/Samus Returns supposedly takes place less than a year afterwards, but it's unclear if this'd overlap into the next year, as we're only given years, not months.

20X6: Federation Force occurs, but somehow takes place several years after Prime 3. It's also mentioned somewhere Prime 1 also takes place years after Zero Mission, so, uh... I dunno. The X in the format when we had 2000 earlier already throws a wrench in just about everything we know about calendars. X in roman numerals means 10, so maybe it's representing a decade? That'd work.

20X7: Super Metroid. This came from a random Japanese ad, so, uh, I dunno. Especially since it's supposed to happen, like, immediately after Metroid 2?

20X9: Metroid Prime 4.

So, look, I don't know if this is accurate anymore, because that's... A lot of dubious sources, but it's all we have. If that is accurate, especially 20X7, that is FUCKING HUGE. This means, among other things, that the Metroids are wiped out, Ridley and Mother Brain are dead for real (unless...), Zebes is destroyed, the X are beginning to propagate again, and this is after Federation Force. Unclear if this is before or after Other M, though, if anybody cares about that game being in the timeline, but it's obvious from Samus' suit in the trailer (We'll get to that) that this is before Fusion & Dread, unless Metroid 6 has her regain her old suit somehow.

Samus flies into a rocky region with her ship from Prime 3 & Federation Force, with slight design alterations, such as Samus popping out the top instead. This... Doesn't make sense, since she had a separate ship for Super... Unless this is actually after Fusion where that ship got destro- Wait, no, she has the purple ship, after. So, that may mean the date inconsistency is actually a red herring. Up to you. For a split second, when Samus is jumping out, you can see these ships in the sky. Are these Space Pirate ships, or GF ships? I don't know, I haven't looked into fucking spaceship lore. Let me know, if you know.

(@codylabs has let me know that this is a type of Space Pirate warship shown in Prime 3, just without that game's version's indications of Phazon fuel, and also clarified that Samus probably owned the Prime 3 ship used here and the Super ship simultaneously, thanks, go read their reblog for more detail on all that and detail on all of Samus' ships in general if you care)

(I'd have used more screenshots, but I'm writing this on an iPad, so it's a lot more annoying when you can just go find what I'm talking about in the trailer. If you're here, you've probably watched it already. I might go back and add more if I edit this later.)

I saw someone say that Samus' suit is slightly different, too, but I... I don't care. I'm here for the notes about story & gameplay, not every little design differences (Same goes for pointing out the new intro jingle & the visor redesign). I know some of you are, so if somebody gives me, like... A comprehensive list of all those little things, I may add it if I'm not lazy, but that's not my point here. (@nathaniel-prime reblogged this pointing a ton of the design changes out, but they had... A lot to say, so just go read all that yourself.)

Whatever's happening here, it's happening big. A massive purple laser blows up a turret shooting into the sky at those ships (probably), there's fire, there's more gunfire in the distance, you get the idea, there's a big fight. There's even a Space Pirate shooting at other Space Pirates. Can enemies get angry at each other due to AI shenanigans, or is that plot relevant? Will that mean anything for Weavel?

In the bottom left, where there'd usually be the beam selection, there's the missile launcher, instead, meaning you're probably going to have different weapons down there instead of just different beams. Maybe the Affinity Weapons of the Hunters rivals? There's 4 slots, one taken up by missiles, so that'd leave... 3 rival weapons. Will that happen? Probably not, but I wouldn't be surprised if Sylux's Shock Coil is added here. Or they do something like Prime 2's Beams that have ammo.

Space Pirate theme remix, new Space Pirate designs, destroyed buildings (Presumably the Research Facility), wounded Space Pirate scan like with Prime 1's Frigate Orpheon (Scan Visor's back), so it's a fight between the Federation and Pirates.

You can see an Energy Tank, those are back, you see the Morph Ball is obviously back, Federation scientists are wheeling something away when Space Pirates break in (may or may not be relevant depending on what they're researching), the Space Pirates launch themselves into the building with capsules... Is it just me, or does some of this building look like the concept art from earlier? (I later rewatched it and no longer see the resemblance.) Also, there's Federation soldiers in armor resembling the Fed armor seen in Other M, so there's that. I wonder how much else they'll take from Other M.

Now for the moment. Cutscene where Samus rolls onto the ground as a wall explodes in a big room perfect for a boss arena, revealing 4 Space Pirates, 2 Mochtroids, and our boy Sylux, who gives Samus a stare. Samus gives a stare back. You could see that the room was mostly empty besides for some random thingies in the corners, so I'd assume this is where the first Sylux boss fight would take place, as that's the perfect reveal cutscene for him.

Then we get the logo, Metroid Prime 4: Beyond. Looks sufficiently space-y, but it also resembles a black hole. Now, if this is after Super, when the Space Pirates are pretty much backed into a corner now that all of their leaders besides fucking Kraid (and maybe Phantoon) are dead (unless Zebes wasn't actually a big deal for them), I could see them doing something drastic, like, I dunno... Building a black hole generator? Or weaponizing one? Wouldn't be the first time black holes are a big plot point in a space-themed Nintendo game, though I don't remember if Bowser made the black hole in Mario Galaxy (Or was it Galaxy 2?), I never played it. If time travel is a gimmick, I could see you having to go back in time and preventing it from being used... Or the black hole is just for a space-y graphic, or it's used as this planet's native race's symbol or something. (Future me here, I'm stupid and didn't think about the whole time travel gimmick here even though I brought it up despite black holes and time travel being discussed together all the time, the black hole could be what's used for time travel to some extent. What if Beyond in the title means beyond the black hole? Or, like, the future?)

After the logo, you see a lush forest environment with bird-like things, green mist, Samus walking out of a PORTAL (The time travel gimmick?), giant trees (one has a big opening to walk into it at it's roots), giant cliffs revealing nothing but clouds, one REALLY BIG TREE. Probably a major landmark. No architecture in sight, too, so maybe it's the past? And the date 2025, for our release window. I saw something in the Metroid Prime 4 info timeline from earlier that was Reggie, former Nintendo of America president, saying (I'm paraphrasing) that Nintendo likes to do extended reveals of the games six to nine months before the game's release. Is this an extended reveal? I personally don't think so, but I may be stupid.

Conclusions

in no particular order, here's the main takeaways. Of course, I could be wrong about all of these, we don't have much to go off of.

Phazon is probably not around anymore.

Space Pirates & Sylux are (two of?) the big bads, and the Galactic Federation is probably important. Space Pirates may be in-fighting?

The game may take place after Super Metroid, which has all sorts of implications.

Time travel & black holes may be relevant.

Out of all of of the other rivals from Metroid Prime: Hunters besides Sylux, Weavel seems the most likely to return, but it's unknown if any others will return at all.

Mochtroids return, whatever that implies.

The beam swapping system seems to be replaced with different weaponry, but the core Prime gameplay seems in tact (Though the state of visors besides the Scan Visor are entirely up in the air).

It may be released in early 2025? Maybe? Probably not.

Hopefully this helps at least one person out there. Again, let me know if I should add or change anything or anything like that. I plan on making a part 2 where I just baselessly speculate about what could happen in the game with all of these crumbs, so if this post pops off, I'll probably do that. (Hey, I did that.)

#metroid #metroid prime #metroid prime 4 #nintendo direct #if this game sucks upon release i will unironically cry

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enrychan · 1 month ago

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so I finally beat DATV and I guess I'll write something about it while downloading BG3 (an early Christmas present from my best friend, a couple of days ago <3)

light spoilers under the cut

my main thought at the moment is just "meh". Thankfully DATV isn't a trainwreck like Andromeda, but it never exceeds the 6 or 7 out of 10 that I gave it while I was still playing it. The ending is good, but the results of such world-shaking events feel too rushed and not completely earned.

That's far from my main issue with the game, though. I don't think I can put all my thoughts in order at this time, so I'll just make a list of things that stood out to me, in a semi-random order.

I feel like I'm beating a dead horse at this point, with all the people already talking about it, but this story is completely toothless. In previous games Thedas felt real because of all the different struggles between its factions, and even many in-group rivalries/prejudices. But in Veilguard Rook's allies are all completely devoid of conflicting characteristics or problematic aspects. The Crows are fearless freedom fighters without a trace of all the very dark traits they had in the previous games. The Lords of Fortune are Good Pirates that raid in a 100% culturally conscious way. Even giving Minrathous to the Threads - a literal crime syndicate - has no major impact on anything, not even your own relationship with Neve. You don't even see any trace of slavery in the literal capital of the Tevinter Imperium.

On the other hand, the Wardens still retain at least some of their most "problematic" aspects, for which I was grateful. They were a small pinch of salt on an otherwise very bland meal.

Rook's companions were for the most part treated the same way, devoid of any real conflict whatsoever. I was hoping to see some fights between Lucanis and Davrin, or between Taash and Emmrich. but everything solved itself very easily in the space of like. one conversation, maybe. And I'm not even mad about that, specifically. In Mass Effect, Shepard solved some conflicts by just inserting themselves between the two bickering companions and telling them to shut the fuck up. Rook doesn't have that kind of charisma, though. Luckily for them, their companions apparently don't have strong enough opinions to sustain any kind of serious discussion. I mean, I always thought that one of the most interesting aspects of this series was having strongly opinionated companions, each representing a certain way to see the world and its problems. but maybe I'm wrong.

I'm not saying that the companions were bad. actually they were nice (a little too nice tbh) and sometimes some conversations rang true and heartfelt. Which frustrated me even more! At least I just disliked the Andromeda companions. These though... they had so much potential! Urrgghghghghhh

The Rivaini/Qunari and non-binary stuff about Taash was painful. It was written so badly. I could almost hear Bioware asking if it was politically correct enough from behind the courtains. And I was like. Man idk. Aren't these pirates? Why must you defang and declaw them to this point? It sounds so fake.

Isabela, my beloved, what have they done to you? like 99% of the pirate!Isabela headcanons that you see on tumblr is better than this. I could cry, but I'll just pretend that that was a lookalike. The real Isabela was out there on the sea, pirating with her crew. And a really big hat.

To steal Hbomberguy's words, "it's a smooth and palatable pebble that isn't particularly disagreeable, but slides out the other end completely undigested". He used this phrase for Deus Ex: HR but I think it fits DATV perfectly.

On the same topic, I romanced Lucanis, because of course I did. A dark, deadly, tortured spanitalian assassin abomination? That's basically My Trash(TM). Unfortunately, with the exception of a single moment where the whole thing risked getting almost interesting, for the rest it was a pretty boring romance. Which is INSANE to me. How?? How do you screw up something like that?? Where's the drama?? The passion??? Anders was a sad wet man from the sewers and he managed to be more passionate than this???

Some conversations between him and Rook were still cute, though. I just wish there was more to it.

I loved the environments, in general. They were very beautiful, sometimes even stunning. I didn't particularly like Arlathan, it felt cramped and it was excruciating to explore with all those doors and barriers and magic bridges. But the other maps were lovely. My favorite were the dark and creepy ones, of course. I loved the Grand Necropolis, and also everything relating to the Wardens.

On this note, I loved IN THEORY the idea of bringing back the darkspawn hordes. I've always loved those, they remind me of Origins, which is always a good thing.

I said "in theory" because in practice I HATED the new combat system. I can live with the Mass Effect-like combat, but the fact that the two companions are immortal while the only one to take damage is Rook is just complete bullshit. My squishy mage was constantly bombarded by enemies' attacks on every possible front, to the point that in the tougher fights she could only run around and sometimes give orders on the fly so her companions could maybe kill the creatures in her place (and they were bad at it). I tried for many hours to make it work, and I did get pretty good after a while, but I HATED every single minute of it and in the end I lowered the difficulty level just to get to the end more quickly. Just awful. I'm guessing that's what remains of a previous "live service" version of this game. Ugh.

The music was another complete disappointment. This series had an incredible record of banger after banger ever since Origins, and I'm one of the like. Five people that actually loved most of Inquisition's soundtrack. But this time it's just generic_RPG_music.mp3, apparently. Hans Zimmer my FOOT.

I'm a fan of Hans Zimmer, and that's NOT him. Or maybe it's him when he has 0 ideas head empty idk.

Bioware should have just asked Trevor Morris again. The only times in Veilguard where the music tugged at my heartstrings, it was Inquisition's soundtrack. It's a real shame, because a good soundtrack can really elevate even a mediocre experience.

The result of all these factors, is that in the end I didn't really care much for these characters, so I wasn't that worried to lose them. This version of the "suicide mission" was rather relaxed for me.

(In ME2 I thought I would panic and die IRL at some point)

There were a couple of moments near the end where I actually Felt a lot of Feelings, not because of Veilguard, but because of everything from the previous games. Nevertheless, they added something to a generally dull experience, so those were good.

I loved Assan. I loved griffons in general. They reminded me of my dogs, and i live for my dogs.

Also I loved the hair physics. My Rook had beautiful red curls. And freckles <3

#enry plays DATV #well not anymore #DATV spoilers #(very light spoilers)

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crying-fantasies · 10 months ago

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Declaration of a robo-fucker

I think everyone has noticed to this point in my work that, as it is obvious, the many pieces of different transformers media are blended together.

Because every piece of media is valuable, be it north american, asian or whatever that comes, it feeds the little girl that once found something incredible in her uncle's pirated DVD collection when she was 5 years old, the very same little girl that learned English while watching with subtitles in bad quality how Optimus Prime declared that every life matters.

The very same girl that said how much she loved Optimus Prime in school and was bullied for it, with classmates harassing back an forth saying that she wasn't normal for liking a robot, her own teacher telling her parents that the original series for kids wasn't adequate for her age and it was giving strange ideas with inadequate romance.

A kid that was banned from her favorite series, had her poor and innocent uncle be reprimanded for showing a disrespectful cartoon that was giving strange ideas to his way too impressionable niece, an incredible uncle that only wanted to let her know of an alien species that fought for what was right and saw something special in earth and it's people.

A kid that was banned by herself to even think about it again, and if she did, she would do it with shame, one that tried to think about other things while at it because she could still hear the jokes about her and how she would be mother of a microwave.

A little girl that tried to forget but once again found a figment of her interest in the live action movies that, while not the pinnacle for majority, was enough to be accepted in some way, that got every penny in her possession to buy a ticket for herself and still be denied to use it because her parents said it wasn't normal she liked it so much, taking her to the psychiatrist instead of the movie theater while her mother asked God why her daughter couldn't be normal.

She was normal, I'm normal, Just because I like different things doesn't mean I'm that different, maybe not everyone writes about romance between alien robots and humans and that's okay.

So it's okay if I use fragments of the live action movies, be it from the Bumblebee ones or the Bayverse ones, because those were what I could get, especially the BV since my uncle was a fan too and he kept on giving me pirated DVDs under the table during family reunions where we should be normal in their own standards; I remember how the soldiers of NEST risked their lifes, their careers and their future as a whole to bring back Optimus Prime and protect the autobots from other humans, I saw Cade Jaeger risk everything to help the autobots while others said he was a traitor and wasn't normal, I saw Jetfire leave the decepticons for something better, give his life to save a planet in the middle of nowhere just because it was the right thing for him, and in his own words traduced to Spanish: ¿quién quiere vivir una vida llena de odio? (Isn't that what legends are made from?)

No one here is, but we also are, we just don't cut in their correct way of seeing things.

And, yeah, I like some things of the Bayverse, so what? The whole thing isn't perfect, hell, there is no media that's perfect so far because the 100 percent of our community can't agree in the same one, everyone has their own tastes, so don't go shaming me for liking these movies, and I'll keep on using some references in my works with them, you can ignore it or you can just stay away from my Tumblr, is as simple as that, there is no necessity to put the anonymous button to tell how lame my taste is or how ridiculous I'm for bringing up things in the movie or even dare to tell me my work sucks for those little things or to put it down from internet, because internet is eternal, nothing in there can be deleted forever, and it doesn't matter how many times you tell me that you like my content but hate those parts and even have the gall to insult me for it or tell me you'll steal my account to make it right to your tastes, my work will be safes somewhere of that im sure, and why do you want this account?! It isn't even more than a girl trying to create something she likes while other people also like it!

I love the live action movies because those reconnected me with something dear for me, I love the animated ones and I love the comics! All break my heart when someone dies, of course! Who didn't cry at least once when a loved character is gone?! But this is my fiction, this is my alternative universe, and I just want them to be happy and if I can then so be it.

So yeah, I've posted more than ever to spite you, because grow up or whatever, people won't do what you demand them for just because you want it, and yeah Cade and NEST and Lennox and Epps and many other characters of the movies exist in my AU! One way or another because I liked their characters and how they stay with the transformers because I would do the same if I could, help them as I could.

But everything is fiction and even now I'm facing and struggling to help people in a war that doesn't have feet or head and that's miles away from me, and it makes you ask how I can't do better or what the hell I'm supposed to do, which is stronger nowadays since I saw someone post a beautiful drawing of Optimus Prime (you know who you are and let me tell you again, your work made me cry in my path to work because yeah my life suck to it's down degree but there's people out there that are really suffering and need more help) declaring the freedom of every sentient being, and everyone should have freedom to do what they want for as long as it doesn't damage someone else, I just realize that there are better things to do and focus your energy on than harass me when you don't even know who I am.

Everyone has the right to post what they want as long as it doesn't hurt someone else, I don't want to hurt you, whoever you are, I just want you to realize how wrong it is to pester someone in what they are interested just because it isn't your taste, I'm sure you like something similar and that's great, but you can't force me to be like you, and I'm not forcing you to be like me, you can go to other places to search what you like and that's fine.

This is a safe place, I want it to remain like that by deleting every message of yours and be done with it.

#transformers #crying screaming sliding down the wall #crying crying crying

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pimenita · 1 month ago

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I finished DATV so here are my thoughts:

First a bit of context: I became a dragon age fan around ten years ago, after playing Fable and looking for games that had a similar feel (and my 2 GB RAM PC could run) I knew DA Inquisition was out but there was no way my PC could take it, so I got Origins and holy shit… my 2010 PC could barely handle it too. When I tell you that the game craawwwled, that the best I could squeeze out of my computer was a stutter and that every quest must have taken me at least 3 times the normal amount of time they should have taken.

Dragon Age Origins is still one of my favorite games of all time, and as someone who joined the party very late, I'll admit experiencing that month of waiting for DATV was very exciting. After completing the game, I'll say the enthusiasm hasn't died down but not because the game is amazing, it's because DATV worked for me: it gave me what I wanted while avoiding most (most!) of the pitfalls of working on the 4th installment of a series that is close to being 20 years old.

We all know how turbulent the development of DATV was and how close to being cancelled for real it got. Is nothing better than the game we got? Not to me, I enjoyed it, I had fun, I'm still playing it (on my 2nd playthrough right now)

What saved DATV for me is what saves most everything for me: the characters. Some had good arcs, some had great arcs, and some were… there. But I never felt like they were a drag to be around. I like how they interact with each other, I love that nobody is calling anybody a slut or crazy (finally) because I get conflict, believe me, it's always fun to have your little guys wanting to kick one another's ass, but there was something so insidious in the way some conversations would go (Aveline and Isabela, just about every chat with Sera) that had me thinking it was more than just two characters tearing into each other. It was like the writer's barely disguised actual beliefs, if you know what I mean.

That being said, I know I'm not the only one that felt like some chats were too hamfisted, too on the nose—someone called the game Dragon Age: Friendship is Magic and I'm still laughing. I've seen the idea of "therapy speak" being used in books in ways that break immersion and I couldn't help feeling like some interactions the companions had were clear examples of this. What makes it weirder in my opinion is that the guys at bioware know how to write compelling conflict that makes sense and has a satisfying resolution. Let's take for example Lucanis' and Davrin's spat after the team fails to kill Ghilan'nain: they throw barbs at each other, then when they cool off they realize they were being asses, so they talk it out and make peace. Like adults, like a hardened assassin and warrior would. It adds to the conflict, it adds to the story, and it informs us of the type of people they are. Then there's Emmrich and Harding discussing a camping trip and waiting for my Rook to pick a side, and I'm like: dude you're both old enough to compromise? Also why do I care what you do with your time when we aren't fighting gods? Appalling stuff. Scrap it, think about better banter.

Then there's the huge elephant in the room: why is Thedas so sanitized? Is this the result of new writers not knowing enough about previous games?—it could be, they don't even know who Zevran is.

Or is it executive meddling?—maybe, there's a screenshot going around of the writers on bluesky (I think) where they vaguepost about critics of the game being right and how they (bioware team) fought against stuff that was included regardless. So, who knows.

On this front I will only reiterate that I'm glad Zev didn't show up. I already side-eyed Isabela (and also Taash) for her ideas about "treasure hunters" (read: pirates) and how they are actually good guys if you think about it (please, don't think about it too hard). Which, fine, let's say they really believe this, the same way the Crows believe they are freedom fighters or another vaguely Latin American coded thing; I understand that people entrenched in a system can truly believe what they're selling, but where's the other side of the coin? Where's the chats about the hurt they inflict on others to achieve what they want? The Crows have that one guy that ends up being a corrupt politician, and the Lords of Fortune… well, they are there.

Dragon Age is such a centrist series that I have heard just about everything about it. That it loves elves, that it hates elves, that it's pro-mage, that it's pro-templar. And it's because it has so many different factions that defend their ideologies that you can't say for sure what the writer's feelings are on the subject (and also because it's centrist, both sides are wrong bull most of the time). I swear I love Dragon Age; it's only because I care that I point out this stuff.

But that's the thing, I'm ok with both-sides-are-wrong fiction if it means it won't be a black and white take full of good guys telling me how good they are, while the bad guys twirl their mustaches evilly. And, unfortunately and except for a few cases (Solas) I feel like DATV dropped the ball here. Actually, I'm also fine with bad guys going full camp (Hezenkoss is one of the best parts of the game) just, you know, it has to be intentional, otherwise it feels like bad writing.

tl;dr DATV has very high highs, and very low lows, and I would've loved a more polished game, but I enjoy what we got and I will keep replaying it because of the companions and because it's a fun little game… most of the time at least.

#datv spoilers #now to keep waiting for BG3 to go on a hefty sale :3 #people say so many good things about it #and i know i'm going for the twink vampire #because of course

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icy-watch · 1 year ago

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Well, that was certainly an ending to a season.

I can tell what inspired the Hageman Brothers for the ending of Rise of the Titans (2021). It’s pretty much the same ending beat for beat.

I'm not really sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't that.

I really don't have too many thoughts on the finale, it's mostly just "at least this was the ending to the season, and not an entire series". Was it the best? No. Was it the worst? No. Just meh.

Had I seen this 2 or 3 years ago, I might have felt differently, but RotT really did a number on me. (If you haven't seen any of the Tales of Arcadia series, please consider yourself lucky. It started off very well but ended Badly.)

I'm glad the the sky pirates turned out to be pretty ok in the end. I really grew to actually like them. I'm going to be sad if they don't show up again.

And Echo! Oh, gosh Echo. Sweet baby boy. I loved the little bit of time we got with him. I hope he comes back again.

I haven't looked to see what the next season will be called yet, but I'm hoping we learn more about the previous Elemental Masters. We've been getting a little bit here and there, but it feel like there's more to their story than we've been told so far.

Tomorrow, I'll be watching the Day of the Departed, and maybe the Wu's Teas shorts, if I can find those. Until tomorrow!

@ninjamelissajulien

Below the cut are the predictions I got right and wrong.

Correct

The ninja will be caught at some point by the po-po. And get thrown in a jail cell with one bed.

Nadakhan will pick them off one by one.

The wedding is inevitable. It sure was something.

Mutiny from the crew. Better late than never.

Jay will recruit Echo Zane to help him rescue everyone. He did and he got more friends.

I'm going to cry bc of the wedding thing and everything surrounding that. I cry at things very easily, so this wasn't really a surprise on my end.

Incorrect

Cole will get cured of being a ghost this season. He sure didn't.

Pixal will get a new body. RIP queen.

Nadakhan is going to use Wu to draw out the ninja and make them retrieve the Realm Crystal. This is such a great AU idea.

Going The Mummy (1959 & 1999) route to raise a loved one from the dead -- to bring back Delara. She was brought back via wish, not an entire sacrificial ceremony.

Nadakhan will be trapped in the sword once he's defeated. *disappointed noises*

Flintlocke had a thing for Delara. I'm actually surprised that this wasn't a little subplot. It actually felt like something they would have done.

Jay will be forced to help piece Djinjago together. There were other plans.

Cole, Nya, and Lloyd are going to spend the whole episode planning on how to save Jay. The used that time to try to leave the island. I completely forgot that was something they needed to do in order to even start planning for a rescue mission.

Ronin will help in the rescue mission for Jay. He really didn't.

Jay knowing the ins and outs of the Keep will help them navigate their rescue mission. Yeah. He did all that cleaning for nothing.

Flintlocke swiped the poison and the dart from Clancee. Clancee told Jay where he hid it.

Partially

No one from the Cursed Realm will come back. Sort of? Clouse wasn't in the Cursed Realm when it collapsed, but he was a resident there for a while.

They won't lock Misako up. The didn't even get a chance to finish questioning her before she was kidnapped by Nadakhan.

Kai will be needed to collect the Tiger Widow Venom, and without him the team will struggle. They did struggle without him, but I'm not sure how much help he would have been given the circumstances.

We're going to learn how Jay lost his eye. Sort of? But not really.

#liveblogging #ninjago #skybound #season 6 #episode 10 #the way back #s06e10 #ninjago predictions

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lightninghikaru · 10 months ago

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Hello again! First of all, I just read Ch. 4 and i am shaking with anticipation! Also thank you very much for answering my last question. I hope you don't mind me asking this, but reading your "Turning Tides" series has unintentionally inspired me to try to make a story(or possibly series i don't know yet) similar to this. You know the "Chaos Born" lore you know. However, I wanted to get your permission first before getting started.

If it helps, I'll be adding my own twists and differences especially to how certain aspects of The Chaos Born. There will be some similarities but I'll be adding something new.

Instead of the name "Chaos Born" I will be calling them "Chaos Sparks."

Chaos( or at least the mention of him), Chaos Sparks, Creatures of the night, and quite possibly pirates will be included.

Shadow will be a creature of the night, but his origins will be vastly different.

Huge difference-Sonic and Shadow have already known each other at the very start of the story... But it's complicated and very angsty.

Sonic has always been aware of what he is, but that does not take away his adventurous spirit.

Instead of Shadow already knowing Rouge and Omega, you'll get to see Shadow develop his friendship with them after meeting them. Same with Sonic developing his friendship with Tails and Knuckles.

A lot of Johnny Depp movies helped inspire this fic (Not just "Pirates of the Carribean".)

Sonic is NOT the last of his kind. (I have OC's planned).

My girl Amy is going to be an interesting character indeed. With strong ties to Sonic and Shadow.

Sticks the Badger will be involved. 'Nuff said.

While the story mostly focuses on Sonic's world-lol "His World"- There may or may not be some small crossovers with a few other video game characters. Not a lot though.

The whole thing about Chaos Sparks finding Chaos Emeralds will be in there, and they are in danger of being hunted because of the gems and their gifts. But the story is mostly about Sonic and some of his friends trying to find what they're looking for.

I am currently in the process of making a pirate OC. But I promise they will not be a cheap knock-off of Leven, Grey, Jorah, and Scaro. But especially Leven and Grey!

If you would like I could drop in a reference from your story.

"Oh strong and silent type. Yeah I once knew a bear who was like that to."

"Oh what a brawl! Kind of reminds me of that time I fought with this really huge wolf!"

Lol, I'm just chuckling as I think of Sonic saying these things so casually or excitedly.

Anyway I hope this gives you assurance. But if you don't like, I will shelve this and it won't see the light of day.

Hello!

I'm honored that my story inspired you! I love the name Chaos Sparks! I appreciate the ask and I think that even with the different race elements being in there it still sounds different enough that people won't get the two AU's confused.

I'd say to keep the two AU's separate, maybe no reference to Tides within the story. Only because that might confuse people. If you would like to comment that Tides inspired you that I don't mind.

Please keep me posted! This sounds like an exciting story full of drama and angst and pirates! (all my faves)

Thank you again for asking and good luck!

#sonadow #pirate au #tides of chaos #fanfiction #shadow the hedgehog #turning tides #sonic the hedgehog #pirates #ever turning tides #ask

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mediocre-shark-tales · 11 months ago

Text

Qsmp x Streamer reader (2)

Summary - After finally joining the QSMP, it was time for you to figure out what and where your home was going to be. Yet those plans were quickly side tracked by a fun mini tour around the island.

Warnings - None for this part

There is a chance for this to turn into a love trope of some kind but for now there is focus on fluffy platonic-ness

This series will not be 100% lore accurate, but it will be pretty close to it. If certain people don't log on soon, I may change things around until they do actually log on.

Masterlist

Smiling at my chat, I watched as they 'yelled' for me to spend the day on the qsmp. "okay chat, I know what you guys want." They watched as I pulled up Minecraft and stayed on the server list screen. Seconds later my chat was full of 'YES' and 'you better click that button!'. "I mean, I guess we could play some qsmp today, I probably need to figure out where I am gonna live." Then I finally clicked on the server and watched as it began to load up.

As soon as I was on the server, the messages were filled with their usual o7's and o/'s. I spawned in at the spawn as I had yet to set a real spawn point, I mean I literally joined yesterday. When I looked at the list of those who were online, I saw it was almost the same as yesterday, just minus Mouse and Pac.

'want to come hang out for a bit y/n?' popped up from Phil on the bottom of the screen.

'Yeah sure, how do I get there?' I responded quickly. a minute after clicking send, I heard Phils voice as it slowly increased in volume. When I looked around I couldn't see anyone, until I looked up. I watched Phil, Cheyenne and Talulah slowly glide down from the top of the wall. "hey guys!" Once they landed, I got two signs plopped down in front of my face, both saying hello in their own ways.

"So what are you up to today y/n?"

"Well I was planning on building my house, which I think it would be fun to turn that island into my home." I told Phil as we began to walk around.

"Yeah what do you think you're gonna build on it?" he asked me.

"Well I don't think I should build anything at the moment, Instead I was thinking of turning the pirate ship into my upstairs home where others can come by to see me. In the small hut I could fill the hole to the basement with water, also filling the basement with water." I explained, Phil slowly came to realize why I wanted to fill the basement.

"Oh that's smart, since you are the only one that could actually survive going down to the basement for that long, then you can hide your valuables down there." I nodded in game. "Yep that's the plan, then I can also maybe create a market for myself. Like monopolizing the retreival of anything in the ocean, however instead of making it something only I can do. I would get a bunch of underwater goods and store them away so that if someone needs something they can come to me instead to save time. Oh and they can also hire me to go get something." Phil agreed. "That is smart, you'll make yourself useful for those who want it, but also not take away from the fun of the game if someone wants to do it themselves."

Soon we arrived on the island. "So I think we need to get you a few things to help you start out easier. If you want I can grab you a bed, and way stone stuff. It will make it easier for you to get around the island later on." Phil offered. "Okay sure, if there is anything you can think of that I need now and is hard to get then I would love the help." Phil chuckled, "No worries y/n, I'll be back real quick. Chayanne and Talulah?" The eggs turned to look at him, "You can either stay with tia y/n or come get her stuff with me."

Chayanne left with Phil to get me things, while Talulah stayed behind to help me get started on building. We walked up to the pirate ship together, inside we found some chests left behind with a few goodies and also rubbish. I did find enough iron to make a few buckets later, so that was good. Talulah and I had decided to make the top deck a small garden area, since the rest of the island was mainly sand. Talulah plopped down a sign telling me to wait for her to be done before I could see it. So I let her there to do her thing while I went back down into the bottom deck. Down here I would make a few small rooms, one would be a small kitchen and another could be a small farming room. Finally the last room would be for enchanting. My bedroom would be put in the 'captains quarters'.

While I built the rooms with the small amount of wood that had been left in a chest, I heard Phil and chayanne return. They talked to Talulah for a bit before Phil came down to find me. "hey y/n! I brought some stuff." He handed me a backpack and inside I found a grappling hook, glider, some spare armor, a bed, and some more chests. "Thanks Phil" I heard his smile as he spoke again "We can go set up your waypoint if you want to." I followed him back up the ladder, and made sure not to look to where Talulah was currently building as we passed by.

"Alright, I think I want the way stone at the front of the island. Later when I collect some more goods, then I can make it look prettier." I watched Phil place down the stone and we both right clicked it.

"How about we let everyone come click your way stone and then they can all take you around to theirs, like a mini island tour?" I agreed, I was currently renaming my way stone to 'Shark Island'. Phil went ahead and typed in chat that I now had a waystone if everyone wanted to come get the waypoint. He also added that they could give me a mini island tour too, that way I can also get more waypoints.

Within the next few minutes, we heard more voices slowly coming closer as everyone was boating towards us.

"Hi guys! Welcome to my humble home, though it's not quite anywhere near finished!" Everyone responded with hello's in return. I saw Foolish, Niki, Bagi, BBH, and Tubbo had come to see my home. "I heard you need some more waypoints to add to your list, How about we start with my house!" Niki said happily. "Sure!" After everyone had clicked onto my waypoint, we set off back to the main island again. Everyone rode in their boats while I of course turned on shark mode and zoomed through the water. We weren't too far from the island but it was enough for everyone to take boats instead of swimming back.

Climbing on to the land, I followed niki along side everyone else who had joined us. Looks like right now, Talulah, Chayanne, Sunny, and Leo were the only eggs awake. We were only missing Dapper and Empanada amongst the parents here. I noticed that Talulah had sick close to me since they had come to hang out with me. The made me smile, I was glad to be someone she was so comfortable with.

While we walked we made small talk, "So y/n I heard you are moving?" I heard Foolish ask. "Yep, I got into MetFilm school, they only have campuses in Berlin, London and Leeds. Obviously I would love to be closer to a majority of my friends, so I'm moving to London." I heard turbo yell. "YES!" While Philza sighed "But Leeds is closer to me" I giggled. "Sorry Phil, but Tubbo and Tommy were already doing their best to convince me to be closer to them. Both of them want to be able to vlog or meet up with me. Philza replies with understanding as we walk up to Niki's Huge pink castle. Using the grappling hook, we all climbed up to the top where her waystone sat.

I quickly got the waypoint then went to look at the inside of the walls. "It's not quite done but I'm slowly getting there." Niki told me. "I think its looking great already Niki, its very much you. Both pretty and gothic vibes at the sametime." After a few more minutes of looking around someone else spoke up. "I think we should hit up the tubbo chunk, get the annoying out of the way." I laughed, "Oh yeah, your home is supposed to be really lag-y right?" I asked. "Yep so might as well get it over with."

We were off again, at least until we found a train track where a test trial dirt train sat. It had enough seats for all of us so turbo hopped into the drivers seat and off we went.

"This is too fun!" I said before making race car noises with every twist and turn. I heard an arrange of giggles and laughter around me. Soon we pulled up into Tubbo's area. Instantly my game began to heavily lag as my computer tried its hardest to catch up and load in the chunks.

"Goddamn you guys weren't lying when you said this place sucks." I said, earning a gasp from tubbo. "Hey it doesn't suck here, you just need a better computer." I laughed before replying "I don't mean this place sucks like that, I mean it's sucking for me to try and load right now."

Everyone began to laugh again as they told me I was in fact standing still since I entered the tubbo zone. After chatting for another few seconds, finally I was able to move again as my computer had finished loading all the missing chunks.

Walking around his home, I found out the extent of why his area took so long to load. His home was full of create mod machines. "So basically my home is just a giant factory, I probably build a new machine every other day." all he got from me was a wow.

I clicked his waystone. "I think I just got told that I will forever be poor on this server in about 5 different ways over a matter of 2 minutes." This caused everyone to burst into laughter. Soon thought we were off to Phil's wall home. However I had to say goodbye Sunny and Tubbo since they both had been on the server for a while and were ready to call it a day.

We decided the fastest way to get there would be to TP back to the spawn. Once we all loaded there, Phil took me to the big waterfall from the top to the bottom of the wall. "Y/n do you think you can climb it faster when you are in the mer-shark-person mode?" Phil asked. "Yeah that's a good question!" Foolish said. "Let's find out losers." I said as I jumped and hit the button I bound to switch modes easier. I began to swim against stream up the waterfall. While it wasn't the fastest it was at least probably double to triple the speed of a regular person climbing the stream.

Finally we made it to the top, and I snatched the waypoint as the eggs and boys and niki made it up as well. They showed me around the place for a bit, once again I was reminded how far behind I was compared to everyone else. But at least I knew my underwater gathering job would be useful as no one had much noticeable items from or made with ocean items.

Niki and Empanada now had to say their goodbyes as they had their own plans to get back to. After they left, BBH said he actually also had to go cause he had plans with friends. So he asked Phil and Foolish to take me to BBH's home so I could also get that waypoint.

Now it was just me, Foolish, Philza, and the 4 corresponding eggs, Leo, Pepito, Chayanne and Talulah. That left us with going to see Talulah's Main home, Foolish's home and BBH's as well.

To Be Continued...

#qsmp chayanne #qsmp foolish #qsmp tallulah #qsmp tubbo #qsmp #philza #wilbur soot #empanada #x reader #qsmp pac #qsmp fitmc #qsmp bbh #nihachu

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