#my current impression which is based on reading their comics and then reading fan discussions and fics

[aingeal98]

No one asked so feel free to ignore this, but I think it’s a little bit reductive to view Willis as an abuser when nothing really states that in pre-flashpoint comics.

Like Cathrine getting “drug abuser” pushed onto her while her introduction just called her sick, and Willis being a criminal (working illegal street gambling), and getting painted as an abusive father/husband, paints a ugly picture on people’s bias towards poor families.

It’s kinda how people assume Steph was dirt poor like Jason when she’s stated she’s from the suburbs multiple times. (And while there are suburban ghettos it doesn’t really seem like her financial situation was ever as dire as Duke and Jason’s growing up.)

Very true! I do agree with all of this tbh. There was classism involved in how Catherine's initial illness went from just "sick" to drug use, and same for Willis. When I knew nothing about Jason except from reading wikis, batfam fics and Cass comics, I just thought Willis had always been the way Lobdell wrote him, and then when I actually read Jason's Robin comics I was like hm. That's a bit odd, maybe there's something I'm missing because he seems pretty absent but that's like. It. Jason clearly cares about him! But he can't be around because Batman and Robin need to be a thing.

Since then I've read a lot of good meta from Jason fans on the topic, most of them were along the lines of what you're saying, pointing out the classism at play that's always damned Jason since he was first rebooted from a circus kid. However I've also seen good meta about Robin Jason's anger towards abusive men, and how bitter some of his speech is, that made me a bit more open minded towards the idea of bad dad Willis. I don't really mind when fans want to explore how Willis may have contributed to that mindset Jason had, but it crosses into ick territory for me when they use it as an excuse to prop up Bruce, who's canonically a much worse father. Ultimately I think what it comes down to for me is if the headcanon is done in a way to reinforce the classism at play in the narrative, or if it's aware of what Jason's up against and not trying to paint Willis as naturally abusive due to being poor and a criminal. YMMV on whether the person writing the meta/fic manages to land the headcanon well, but whereas before I used to have a "ew" gut reaction to seeing bad dad Willis, nowadays I'm willing to wait until I've read the full meta/fic to decide if I like it or not. In the comics though? Yeah fuck that, no thank you. I don't trust them to do it in a way that doesn't glorify Bruce for "saving" Jason from a doomed destiny.

It's interesting that you brought up Steph though because I do see her, Jason and Duke as three different perspectives of growing up Not Rich in Gotham. Jason obviously had it the worst, dirt poor. I do think Steph was meant to be in a bad financial state at the start of her appearances, despite living in the suburbs. But there was a clear progression in the comics of her and Crystal getting better and more stable, which is an interesting contradiction of Dixon's. He hated women and poor people and it showed in how he wrote Steph, but he also liked Steph, as much as he could like a female character while being so misogynistic. So she was given the rare opportunity to escape from the poverty he initially wrote her in, to be one of the 'good ones' who worked hard and got out. And then DC killed her, because even if she managed to make it out of poverty, she couldn't escape from being a girl.

And then there's Duke, who's from the Narrows and who's dad was a non union worker at one point (the monologue Duke gave about the shadow crews was so good PLEASE dc give me more of that Gotham worldbuilding from Duke's pov). There's so much there that still hasn't been fully explored and I'm hungry for more because despite everything going on during Zero Year, when we first meet him he and his family seem stable. It's almost like a reverse of Steph, where location wise he's in a poor area of the city but in terms of how his house looks like it seems fine! Whereas Steph is in the suburbs but her house initially looks... not great. So I'd put him at around the same level as Steph financially just based on living in the Tracy Towers and what we know of his parents careers, but with a much less toxic family situation, which meant that they were probably more secure in their finances even when the Riddler was around pulling some fuckshit. And obviously after the Joker attack he's in the foster system and then in the Manor and then living with a cousin. I need DC to give us more on the Thomas family like we don't even know if his dad is well or still Jokerized! And he stands to be such an interesting contrast to both Steph and Jason. Robins two four and six, three different ways of growing up in Gotham when you're not rich as hell, the similarities and differences between them... I don't trust DC to write it well but I want it all the same.

This turned into a big ramble lmao but thank you for the ask!

[ectonurites]

ik you weren't psyched about the robins comic (the dc round robin one), but did you read the new preview pages? Thoughts?

Still not psyched about it lmao. I still have my same problems with Seeley being the one to write it, like that hasn't changed

In general though putting opinions about the writer himself aside, I really wasn't impressed by the preview. I've said before I do think the concept of the story (Robins meeting to discuss the role) is interesting but everyone feels kinda... off. Out of that group Dick's not who i'd peg as the one to start making very specific D&D references out on the field, ya know? (Especially considering two other characters in this book have been shown to play RPGs before at least once in previous comics) Like... I'm just not a huge fan of 'the whole gang is here to quip at each other the whole time!' which is the vibe this preview gives off, but that's definitely a very subjective thing.

Also though, my bigger issue: I'm very confused on when this could even be happening, like is this even supposed to be in-continuity because based on costumes and things said in these pages there's literally nowhere this fits? Which is super lame for something that people had to vote for like... a story concept like this and it's not even gonna be something that fits in anywhere for real?

Why is Tim in his original 90's Robin costume when everyone else is in Rebirth era costumes, but he's being called Red Robin, and also they’re making reference to him having been Drake? (Also why does Damian say he was 'The Drake' there was no 'The' with that title) None of that lines up at all!

And if Tim has already been Drake... that happened during the Ric Grayson era, and if we're post-Ric, Steph should have a bat symbol (since that also happened during Joker War when Dick got his memories back), Damian wouldn't be associating with any of them and wouldn't be in that costume anymore, and Jason absolutely wouldn't be in the costume he hasn't worn since before Heroes in Crisis. Like, man, I'd get it if one or two costumes were a little off to give a fan favorite look instead, but literally NONE of these costumes make sense together with what's said on the page. (and its not like 'oh maybe they're gonna switch to these costumes now!' bc that would make zero sense with how recent some of the costume changes were) So right away that's bugging the shit out of me.

Like, fan stuff can mix and match costumes as much as they want bc like its for fun go off, but actual published comics that want to talk about canon events (because that's the whole thing! the purpose of this comic is to discuss their times as Robin, things that are... actual past canon events) should... perhaps display some understanding of current events in the timeline? But Seeley has already written a story with these five that disregarded it so idk why I'm surprised 🤪 (the one in Batman: Gotham Nights #12 that had Tim as Drake with Dick as Nightwing, a combo that didn't really happen anywhere else because all of the Drake stuff happened while Dick was Ric. But like that book was already mostly established as not strictly canon so it didn't phase me as much)

So yeah, was not 'wowed' by the writing and the choices of costumes is annoying the crap out of me, so still unexcited ✨

Looking way more forward to how the solicits that just dropped revealed in August in Robin #5 we’re getting an actually for sure in-continuity story with this exact group! This looks a lot better to me:

[metasnkpotato]

Why Jean is still in love with Mikasa

 To avoid spreading too much on this ask, I decided to make a little recap / analysis here of the relationship Jean - Mikasa, and of all clues it raised, showing that Jean's still in love with Mikasa currently in the manga. Hope it’ll interest some of you !

*

Tbh, I've never been a fan of this ship in a serious way because it was written as a light and comical story at first. More than comic, it’s even a kind of satire. It wasn’t really a relationship made to be found of it, but rather to deconstruct the myth of love at first sight, as Isayama very often likes to break the most common codes of fiction.

Love at first sight is something very widespread and sacred in fiction. It’s supposed to be a form of sudden love which evokes the destiny and inevitability of love, in its greatest strength as in its weakness. It’s supposed to be enigmatic, full of meanings, of conflicts / obstacles between the person loved and the transmitter of this love... But here, what's funny is that the magic of the moment is immediately ridiculed and turned in burlesque humor :

So, why be interested in the Jean - Mikasa relationship since it isn’t serious or important scenaristically ? Well, Jean himself wasn’t a serious and substantial character at the very beginning. He was a character belonging to the comic register especially. He didn’t have a particular traumatic past like the trio EMA, RBA, the vets and so on, he had no particular philosophy like Marlowe who pushed him to act for a noble cause ... He was just a boy who wanted to comfortably live his life out of worries.

But, to quote myself :

Jean’s development was precisely that of turning him from adolescence to adulthood by making him realize what is the world in which he lives.

Firstly, by the confrontation with Eren, who made him understand that living eyes closed to the world when he had taken a path that implied responsibilities in it wasn’t possible. Secondly, by realizing that he had a potential to serve humanity, a greater good, and that he now had comrades to protect, an individual good. And lastly, by taking the irreversible path of those who are ready to take away lives for the necessity.

And the same goes for his relationship with Mikasa. From a comic love that was based only on "she's my dreamed girl with whom I have no chance", it must has moved on to a deeper and purer love that has matured over time and Jean’s evolution. That's why, while the evidence of his crush was more obvious and juveniles before :  

these have become discreet with time, and especially with his change at Uprising Arc.

One could even have the impression, since he crossed the baptism of fire to kill people, that he's no even longer “in love” with Mikasa because he’s more realistic maybe and alongside, his crush have stopped. But, as the anon of the initial ask raised, there are in fact a lot of hints in current arc this story isn’t extinguished yet.

When SC discovered Eren’s letters, he looked at her :

When Mikasa proposed herself as the next heritor of Eren’s titan, he bounces immediately because already guessed she would, and had already proposed a counter-argumentation :

For him to already have prepared his sacrifice :

When they discussed the Eren case, one of the first things he pointed to was Eren's surprising lack of care for her :

And kept his eyes on her many times :

When she came out wrecked of her conversation with Eren, he kept looking at her and and didn’t let her claiming that her despair didn’t matter :

Even though he could have tried to take this opportunity to his advantage to comfort her and pick up the pieces, he reassures her on Eren. And if he managed to see immediately through Eren, it's probably because he's able himself of something comparable (hiding his true feelings for her well-being). Jean's ability to empathize thanks to his common experience with others has always helped him to read situations.

So... Yes, he’s probably still in love with Mikasa.

*

As the anon of the initial ask noted, it's been a long time since Jean integrated the fact that Mikasa loves Eren and that he can’t do anything for that. But the impossibility of his love to be reciprocal, if it's sincere, doesn’t prevent it from existing. His love for Mikasa, like the one she has for Eren, is irrepressible and unconditional. A very mature and profound love in sum, since Jean places the happiness of Mikasa far before his (for someone who always placed his comfort as sovereign, it’s a remarkable change) and doesn’t seek to derive any glory of it.

*

Now, about how it's going to end ... Logic would say that if this relationship was neat and kept until the end of that kind, it's to make the story close on it. Many fans, and rightly, see as survivors certains of the story, Jean and Mikasa (imo Armin, Levi, maybe Hanji too, but that remains to be seen). Mikasa, because to make her survive to all of it would be meaningful for her development, and Jean because there were several times elements that told he had an important future in front of him.

Perhaps they'll “finish” together, but will love be reciprocal? Probably never. But that's not really what matters after all, since one of the main characteristics of love is to be free, and unconditional, even if it does not bring happiness. But we’ll see what it gave afterwards !

[theonyxpath]

Our Legendlore KS only has days left to run, and actually ends on Thursday this week, so as my final push for folks to check it out, I’m not going to try and convince you like last week. I’m going to let two excellent writers do that!

Here’s a great description of Legendlore, written, as only he can, by our own Matthew Dawkins:

But why should you back it? Well, in this time where some gamers are clinging on to the notion that “all orcs are evil from birth”, “disability has no place in fantasy adventures” and “there’s no such thing as a good drow” (they haven’t heard of Drizzt), Legendlore says the opposite.

Legendlore is a fantasy setting where diversity is a strength, we don’t shy away from complex societies and cultures, and where you can damn well buy yourself a wheelchair especially designed for dungeon crawling, or sit on a bloody floating disc! This is a game that embraces the fact that it’s magical, it’s wondrous, and yes, there’s evil out there in need of vanquishing, but there’s also a brilliant world to discover and enlightenment and wisdom to be found.

I’m in love with the art, the writing, and skilful design of this game, which uses the 5th Edition system to amazing effect. I’m impressed by the effort and energy Steffie De Vaan and her entire team of writers have poured into it. It’s a game I want to play, and if you feel orcs are better only as black and white villains, I invite you to read the manuscript – which is available as a free download from DriveThruRPG.com – and feel as impressed as I do.

And here’s developer Steffie De Vann’s excellent take on why she loves the game:

Legendlore offers a rich and layered world. No one is born good or evil, nor does it have ‘evil races.’ People come in all colors, genders, orientations, and alignments. You can be a black trans feminine elf & be right at home in the Realm. Our iconics put our ‘money where our mouth is’ – our elf is a trans black woman, our pixie a non-binary person, our dwarf is a combat veteran in a wheelchair, and I could go on. This is a game that believes diversity is strength. It’s an isekai/portal game, and we created Backgrounds ranging from ‘Activist’ and ‘RPG Aficionado’ to ‘Working Poor.’

The world of Legendlore is home to a sentient 1974’s Ford Mustang, parasite mushrooms that try to kill you by YELLING VERY LOUDLY (trust me, it’s effective), sacred Chipmunks, and the descendants of Amelia Earhart running an aviation nation. It pairs this whimsy with a genuinely complex world. For example, the orcs used to live in what’s now the nation of Drohm. Orcs ambassadors are petitioning the other nations to recognize their sovereignty, but doing so would give Drohm the excuse it needs to go to war – and make no mistake, Darkoth the Darklord *wants* to go to war. Are the orcs right? YES. Should the other nations help them out? HECK YES. Is it understandable that the nations are dragging their feet because war is good for no one except the Generals? Also yes. If that sounds like a conundrum you want to tackle, and sway the fate of Azoth, this is a game for you.

If that sound good to you, go check us out on KS. And if you’re still on the fence – there’s a link in there to a free preview manuscript.

In fact, Steffie has been posting examples of the Legendlore characters she mentions above:

This is Aaliyah, our elven iconic. She’s a Black trans woman who uses a mix of ASL and forestspeak signs to communicate. She’s a peaceful ambassador foremost, but doesn’t back down from a fight when it comes to that.

This is Najda, our dwarven iconic. She is a Muslim army vet who was wounded during her tour in Afghanistan. She now works in a Los Angeles comic book store, where she discovered a crossing into the world of Legendlore.

Here’s Jada, our pixie iconic. Pixies are born agender, and choose a gender as they grow up. Feminine pixies have 2 antenna, masculine pixies have 0, and non-binary pixies have 1. Pixies are as fierce as they are small, they love laughing and hate bullies.

There you go, and here’s the link to the Legendlore Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/339646881/legendlore-rpg-setting-for-5th-edition-fantasy-roleplaying-0

Let the Streets Run Red art by Oliver Specht

Besides Legendlore, What Else?

Just a warning, and it may just be a short-term issue, but right now it seems that we can’t ship anything to Canada or Mexico. We haven’t yet heard whether we can receive packages from those countries, but since our most prolific printers are based in Canada, we may experience some delays in our traditionally printed projects.

Right now, we’re only having issues with getting the physical printer proofs sent back and forth for approvals, and not the actual books themselves.

You’d think after all the panels and Actual Playing I did during the Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Con a few weeks ago that I’d be all talked out. Well, that does not seem to be the case. Ever.

Naw, I love telling folks about what Onyx Path is and the game worlds we make! I just can’t help myself, we have so many exciting and fun things going on!

Last week, Mike and the gang over at the This Week In Geek podcast interviewed me about WW and Onyx Path, and it turned into a sort of oral history of how the companies transformed into each successive version, and just where game lines branched off to different companies and editions.

If that sort of stuff is interesting for you, here ya go: http://thisweekingeek.net/news/interviews/fan-service-interview-rich-thomas-onyx-path-june-2020

Then this weekend, I sat in on a retrospective of the Art of Mage at Ascension Con 2020 along with Satyros Phil Brucato and artists Mark Jackson and Echo Chernik. Echo took on the slideshow duties and we all discussed the Mage art that came up as it appeared.

That was pretty great, and it was certainly a treat to chat with folks I haven’t talked to in years. Hopefully, that recording will show up on YouTube soon and we’ll get you all a link.

Cults of the Blood Gods art by Thomas Denmark

What wasn’t great last week were a couple of issues that we needed to deal with. While we dealt with them as best as we could, we realized that at core our little crew of folks here are simply not HR experts. And more importantly, we shouldn’t try to be.

We need to concentrate on making great games and amazing worlds, like we do.

Which means that tomorrow, I’m interviewing our current best prospect for an HR point-of-contact for the company. Someone who is HR trained and has worked in HR at other companies. And very important for us, someone who is unconnected to Onyx Path and has never been a gamer or in the TTRPG business.

We need someone who doesn’t have the connections or baggage that might make it hard to be objective when they review HR concerns. Hopefully, my interview is the one, and once everything is good to go we’ll include info concerning them prominently on our website so folks know who to contact.

I mean, it’s important that our worlds are all about excitement, and fear, and victory, and defeat. What our creators and community go through in the real world shouldn’t also require all those moments. We want everyone playing our games and reading our books to be safe while they explore our:

Many Worlds, One Path!

Blurbs!

Kickstarter!

The Legendlore Kickstarter is in its last few days and ends this Thursday, and now we’re really building towards Stretch Goals: the GM’s Screen, and starting the Legendlore Companion book PDF!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/339646881/legendlore-rpg-setting-for-5th-edition-fantasy-roleplaying-0

Grab your friends and escape to another world!

You’ve found an enchanted portal — a transition point — between worlds. The portal, called a Crossing, takes you to a world you thought only existed in novels and films: a magical land where dragons roam the skies, orcs and hobgoblins terrorize weary travelers, and unicorns prance through the forest. It is a world where humans join other peoples such as elves, trolls, dwarves, changelings, and the dreaded creatures who steal the night. It is a world of fantasy — of imagination.

It is the Realm.

It is Legendlore.

Next Up On Kickstarter: They Came From Beyond the Grave!

Onyx Path Media!

This week: the return of the return of the Scion Actual Play as Eddy and Dixie’s characters dig further into the machinations of the gods!

As always, this Friday’s Onyx Pathcast will be on Podbean or your favorite podcast venue! https://onyxpathcast.podbean.com/

All our panels and games from Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Convention are still available on twitch.tv/theonyxpath! All you need to do is head on over to the website and subscribe. If you have an Amazon Prime account, you can do so for free and access our entire catalogue of videos!

Legendlore‘s Kickstarter is coming to an end, but Jen Vaughn’s actual play is still going on our Twitch channel every week on Friday night! Lost in the Crossing is an amazing story played through by a fantastic GM and excellent roleplayers, and handles the Legendlore world from the perspective of visitors and native inhabitants of the Realm! Make sure you’re tuning in every Friday or catching up afterwards by subscribing.

That’s not all for Legendlore, as we have actual plays by Steffie de Vaan and Corinne McCrory over on our YouTube channel, which you can find here https://youtu.be/UaQXSlEatDw and here https://youtu.be/RRvnJOrmNzM! Please give our GMs some support and tune in!

This week on Twitch, expect to see:

V5 – Chicago by Night

Realms of Pugmire – Paws & Claws

Legendlore – The Metal Scourge

Dystopia Rising: Evolution – Thieves of Old York

They Came from Beneath the Sea! – They Came from Devil’s Reef!

Changeling: The Dreaming – The Last Faerie Tale

Mage: The Awakening – Occultists Anonymous

Legendlore – Lost in the Crossing

Scarred Lands – Purge of the Serpentholds

Chronicles of Darkness – Tooth and Claw

Deviant: The Renegades – A Cautionary Tale

Get watching for some fantastic insight into how to run these wonderful games.

Come take a look at our YouTube channel, youtube.com/user/theonyxpath, where you can find a whole load of videos of actual plays, dissections of our games, and more, including:

Legendlore – The Metal Scourge: https://youtu.be/ECRrErPLm64

Storytellers with Coffee – Safety Tools: https://youtu.be/FjG-YbG_Q1k

Mage: The Ascension – Technocracy Reloaded: https://youtu.be/9Al7ZdkLGiM

Even more Legendlore – The Metal Scourge: https://youtu.be/RRvnJOrmNzM

#OnyxPathCon | How to Write for TTRPGs [Panel]: https://youtu.be/UKmJQEhInP8

Subscribe to our channel and click the bell icon if you want to be notified whenever new news videos and uploads come online!

Occultists Anonymous continues right here with their excellent Mage: The Awakening chronicle:

Episode 108: Car-V Heist While Songbird prepares for a dangerous summoning, Atratus and Wyrd hit the junkyards with an overly elaborate plan to make an overly elaborate gift. How very Mage of them… https://youtu.be/wSy3c74jkfM

Episode 109: Crown of Blood Wyrd and Atratus enjoy the joy of a well-made gift and the good vibes that comes with that. Songbird joins together with Hadramiel to summon an Angel of Death to anoint a Vampire Prince in power. https://youtu.be/QxB6Ml6uStY

A Bunch of Gamers continue their actual play of They Came from Beneath the Sea! and conclude it with a mini review: https://youtu.be/qIMwcOZmR8k

The Botch Pit have released a wonderful new guide for Changeling: The Lost right here. Do give them a like and a subscribe: https://youtu.be/Bd0UZQZt2OM

Please check these out and let us know if you find or produce any actual plays of our games! We’d love to feature you!

Electronic Gaming!

As we find ways to enable our community to more easily play our games, the Onyx Dice Rolling App is live! Our dev team has been doing updates since we launched based on the excellent use-case comments by our community, and this thing is awesome! (Seriously, you need to roll 100 dice for Exalted? This app has you covered.)

On Amazon and Barnes & Noble!

You can now read our fiction from the comfort and convenience of your Kindle (from Amazon) and Nook (from Barnes & Noble).

If you enjoy these or any other of our books, please help us by writing reviews on the site of the sales venue from which you bought it. Reviews really, really help us get folks interested in our amazing fiction!

Our selection includes these latest fiction books:

Our Sales Partners!

We’re working with Studio2 to get Pugmire and Monarchies of Mau out into stores, as well as to individuals through their online store. You can pick up the traditionally printed main book, the screen, and the official Pugmire dice through our friends there! https://studio2publishing.com/search?q=pugmire

We’ve added Prince’s Gambit to our Studio2 catalog: https://studio2publishing.com/products/prince-s-gambit-card-game

Now, we’ve added Changeling: The Lost Second Edition products to Studio2‘s store! See them here: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/all-products/changeling-the-lost

Scion 2e books and other products are available now at Studio2: https://studio2publishing.com/blogs/new-releases/scion-second-edition-book-one-origin-now-available-at-your-local-retailer-or-online

Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Try this link! http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Onyx-Path-Publishing/

And you can order Pugmire, Monarchies of Mau, Cavaliers of Mars, and Changeling: The Lost 2e at the same link! And now Scion Origin and Scion Hero and Trinity Continuum Core and Trinity Continuum: Aeon are available to order!

As always, you can find Onyx Path’s titles at DriveThruRPG.com!

On Sale This Week!

Available this Wednesday, we present Dystopia Rising: Evolution shirts and posters on our RedBubble store!

Conventions!

Though dates for physical conventions are subject to change due to the current COVID-19 outbreak, here’s what’s left of our current list of upcoming conventions (and really, we’re just waiting for this last one to be cancelled even though it’s Nov/Dec). Instead, keep an eye out here for more virtual conventions we’re going to be involved with:

PAX Unplugged: https://unplugged.paxsite.com/

And now, the new project status updates!

Development Status from Eddy Webb! (Projects in bold have changed status since last week.):

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep.)

Exalted Essay Collection (Exalted)

Adversaries of the Righteous (Exalted 3rd Edition)

The Devoted Companion (Deviant: The Renegades)

Saints and Monsters (Scion 2nd Edition)

Trinity Continuum: Anima

M20 Technocracy Operative’s Dossier (Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary)

Squeaks In The Deep (Realms of Pugmire)

Redlines

Dragon-Blooded Novella #2 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Hundred Devil’s Night Parade (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Novas Worldwide (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Exalted Essence Edition (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Wild Hunt (Scion 2nd Edition)

CtL 2e Novella Collection: Hollow Courts (Changeling: The Lost 2e)

Second Draft

Many-Faced Strangers – Lunars Companion (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Mission Statements (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Contagion Chronicle Ready-Made Characters (Chronicles of Darkness)

Trinity Continuum: Adventure! core (Trinity Continuum: Adventure!)

Dead Man’s Rust (Scarred Lands)

The Clades Companion (Deviant: The Renegades)

V5 Forbidden Religions (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

M20 Rich Bastard’s Guide To Magick (Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary)

V5 Children of the Blood (was The Faithful Undead) (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Development

TC: Aberrant Reference Screen (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Across the Eight Directions (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Contagion Chronicle: Global Outbreaks (Chronicles of Darkness)

Exigents (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Assassins (Trinity Continuum Core)

V5 Trails of Ash and Bone (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Kith and Kin (Changeling: The Lost 2e)

Manuscript Approval

Crucible of Legends (Exalted 3rd Edition)

M20 Victorian Mage (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Under Alien Skies (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

N!ternational Wrestling Entertainment (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Post-Approval Development

Editing

Lunars Novella (Rosenberg) (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition core rulebook (Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition)

Player’s Guide to the Contagion Chronicle (Chronicles of Darkness)

Contagion Chronicle Jumpstart (Chronicles of Darkness)

TC: Aberrant Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Trinity Continuum Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum)

Masks of the Mythos (Scion 2nd Edition)

LARP Rules (Scion 2nd Edition)

Heirs to the Shogunate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

The Book of Lasting Death (Mummy: The Curse 2e)

They Came From Beyond the Grave! (They Came From!)

Scion: Dragon (Scion 2nd Edition)

Scion: Demigod (Scion 2nd Edition)

Dearly Bleak – Novella (Deviant: The Renegades)

Post-Editing Development

City of the Towered Tombs (Cavaliers of Mars)

W20 Shattered Dreams Gift Cards (Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th)

Cults of the Blood Gods (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Hunter: The Vigil 2e core (Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition)

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant core (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Deviant: The Renegades (Deviant: The Renegades)

Monsters of the Deep (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Legendlore core book (Legendlore)

Pirates of Pugmire KS-Added Adventure (Realms of Pugmire)

Tales of Aquatic Terror (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Terra Firma (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

One Foot in the Grave Jumpstart (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2e)

Indexing

Art Direction from Mike Chaney!

In Art Direction

Tales of Aquatic Terror – Handing off to Meredith to AD.

WoD Ghost Hunters (KS) – Prepping KS assets.

Aberrant – AD’d. Sketches from HIVE in.

Hunter: The Vigil 2e

Mummy 2

Deviant

Legendlore – KS running.

Technocracy Reloaded (KS)

Cults of the Blood God – Rolling along.

Scion: Dragon (KS) – Waiting on art notes.

Masks of the Mythos (KS) – Pinging potential cover and fulls artist.

Scion: Demigod (KS) – Art rolling. KS assets AD’d.

They Came From Beyond the Grave! (KS) – Prepping KS assets.

TC: Adventure! (KS) – Shen Fei cover art finishing.

Geist: One Foot In the Grave – AD’d.

In Layout

Yugman’s Guide to Ghelspad

Vigil Watch

TC Aeon Terra Firma

V5 Let the Streets Run Red – working layout now.

Pugmire Adventure

Scion Titanomachy

Proofing

Trinity Aeon Jumpstart – Errata gathering.

Lunars: Fangs at the Gate – Page XXs.

Contagion Chronicle – Backer PDF out to backers, gathering errata.

Cavaliers of Mars: City of the Towered Tombs

Magic Item Decks (Scarred Lands)

Yugman’s Guide Support Decks (Scarred Lands)

Dark Eras 2 Screen and booklet

At Press

Scion Companion – Awaiting errata from devs.

TCFBTS Heroic Land Dwellers – PoD files uploaded.

TCFBTS Screen and Booklet – Files at press.

They Came from Beneath the Sea! – Press proofs signed off on, PoD files uploaded.

Creature Collection 5e – PoD proof ordered. Traditional files sent to printer.

Pirates of Pugmire – Files at press. PoD proofs ordered.

Pirates of Pugmire Screen – Files at press.

Pugmire Buried Bones – PoD files uploaded.

Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition Dark Eras Compilation – Creating PoD file.

Today’s Reason to Celebrate!

This coming week is a big one for our household with the birthdays of two of our widdle kiddies (really not widdle at all any more), and the July 4th celebration of the American colonies’ independence from Great Britain! “And just as Tom here has written, we say To Hell With Great Britain!” Sorry, Matthew…

In sadder news, we acknowledge the passing of Jim Holloway, noted artist for Paranoia and Star Frontiers and many early issues of Dragon Magazine. Personally, I very much enjoyed his style, and he brought a technical expertise and a sense of humor to the early TTRPG business that it sorely needed.

[theindiegamereview]

Meet the developer: "Space Pilgrim” series

We caught up with Noel Clay of Pilgrim Adventures - yes, the very same beloved creator of the famed Space Pilgrim series - to discuss some of his recent games. We also took the opportunity to ask about his upcoming game, The Deadly Facade, which is an exciting departure from his previous works. Read on for more!

  TIGR: Hi Noel! We see you've been really busy, with a couple of new games released in the past year! Tell us more about them.

NC: Sure! A Sceptic's Guide To Magic is a '90s style point-and-click adventure game that follows Lester Chapman, a forensic investigator who discovers a secret underworld of magic and mayhem after becoming involved in a grisly case of ritual murder. A pair of witches named Fi and Val guide him on his journey, and you also get to play as those two characters at different points in the game.

Sceptic's Guide is chiefly inspired by the classic LucasArts games - there's humour, but it also gets quite dark at times. The story takes place in Birmingham, England, near to where I grew up. Most of the locations in the game are based on real-life places, and I had a whole lot of fun trying to recreate them.

The gameplay involves a mixture of traditional puzzle-solving and spell-casting. In order to cast spells, you'll need to gather all the appropriate ingredients as well as correct apparatus, a clue for which is normally given in the form of a riddle. It can be a bit silly and lighthearted, but the game does also delve a fair bit into magical history, mythology and folklore. People who are interested in those things will probably get a kick out of it.

Screenshots from A Sceptic’s Guide To Magic:

The Deed II is a follow-up to The Deed and The Deed: Dynasty, and explores the same basic concept: you need to commit a murder, and then get away with it - usually by planting false evidence to frame someone else, then convince the police of your innocence.

Deed II takes place at a 1930s French brothel, where an Englishman named Kenneth Miller recognises one of the orderlies who had cruelly abused him during his time at a mental asylum. He decides it's time for revenge... but which of the patrons or employees of this establishment should take the blame for his crime?

Although the basic formula of Deed II is the same as its predecessors, there are also a bunch of new features: a new game engine, improved graphics, and an in-game clock. Whereas in the previous games, time would advance as a result of your actions, now it moves forward naturally, and you have one hour of in-game time to commit the murder. The NPCs in the brothel will also move around according to their own individual schedules, which affects a lot of your choices. As always though, there are a whole bunch of different endings and ways that you can approach the game - more than ever before.

Screenshots from The Deed II:

TIGR: Wow, both games sure sound exciting, and I'm sure your fans will be thrilled to try them out if they haven't already done so! And you've got another game coming out very soon right?

NC: Yes! The Deadly Facade, which will hopefully be released later this year, is my first crack at a full-blooded visual novel. In a setting inspired by 1950s' Hollywood, you are an actor about to star in your first major motion picture. Things seem to be going well, until you get tied up in a shocking murder mystery. Can you solve the case while also delivering the performance of a lifetime?

Here are some exclusive images of The Deadly Facade for TIGR:

TIGR: Very interesting! Tell us more...

NC: Deadly should offer something a bit different from the typical visual novel. Among other things, I've been developing a fairly complex relationship system, as I wasn't really interested in the simple like/dislike variable which seems to be quite common among these types of games. Over time, through your actions and conversation choices, every character in the game will develop a sense of your personality and morality. That will ultimately determine how they feel about you.

As for the setting, I'm hoping it will allow people to live out the fantasy of being an up-and-coming Hollywood star in the olden days, while also delivering a sense of the fear and paranoia that was rife during this complicated era.

TIGR: Deadly sounds like it's going to be amazing! It's also made with a different game engine from what you usually use. What motivated this change?

NC: All my previous games have been made with RPG Maker. Although I really enjoy working with that engine, it can be tricky to market RPG Maker games even though they may not resemble the typical fare. So I figured it was time to try something different - in this case the Ren'Py visual novel engine - if only to convince more players to give my games a chance.

TIGR: Well, we at TIGR would happily play another thousand (and more) of your games even if they continue to be made in RPG Maker - it's all about the gameplay and content, right, not the platform?! :) 

But moving on, tell us more about how you craft these fantastic stories of yours. Where does all this imagination and creativity come from, and what are some of your sources of inspiration?

NC: I've always had a lot of creative energy. When I was a kid, I was constantly writing stories and drawing comics. I wasn't making any video games back then yet, but my older brothers John and Edmund were - throughout the '90s they created numerous adventure games for the Amiga from their very bedrooms (The Lost Prince, Starbase 13, Lethal Formula, Epsilon 9, The Experiment).

As an interesting side note, Edmund also developed a program called GRAC (Graphic Adventure Creator) for the Amiga in 1994. It was designed to allow people to create their own adventure games with a minimal amount of programming knowledge. GRAC was probably the first program of its type in the western world. Meanwhile in Tokyo, unknown to my brother, Enterbrain were already creating the early versions of RPG Maker.

I tend to consume a fairly varied diet of media – movies, TV shows, comic books, novels, board games – from a wide range of different genres. Not much of my inspiration actually comes from video games, but rather from these other sources, which I suppose is one way of maintaining some originality!

The universe of Space Pilgrim owes a large debt to Joss Whedon's Firefly. Another of my games, Sentience: The Android's Tale, is a love letter to Philip K Dick, whose writing also inspired elements of the main Space Pilgrim Academy storyline. Ender's Game also played a role there.

TIGR: We are seriously impressed! It certainly sounds like you and your brothers were born to make video games! So do you do everything alone, or do you have a team to help you? Take us through your development process.

NC: I pretty much work alone, although I do often commission work from artists or use commercial art and music assets. This has been the case with all my games except for Sceptic's Guide - for that one, I had some help from a friendly witch when it came to writing the spellbook. I'm currently collaborating with an artist named Llyrel on developing some characters for an upcoming magical fantasy game, which should be my next project after Deadly.

I'd also like to mention my publisher, GrabTheGames, with whom I've been working for nearly five years. They handle a lot of the marketing and promotion so that I can focus on the game development side of things.

These days, I usually start with a tonne of research. The first month or two mostly just consists of reading books and taking notes. For Sentience, I read about AI; for Deed II it was 1930s Paris; for Deadly, it was 1950s Hollywood as well as the biographies of some major stars of the era. I also watched more than 50 movies from that time period, partly for inspiration and partly because I just love movies. After that, my time was split between scripting the game and creating the 3D renders. I tend to only have a loose plan for the story at the beginning, so that things can continue to evolve along the way.

   TIGR: One last question for you before we end - what's something we should know about you?

NC: Tyrkisk peber. It’s awesome.

  We thank Noel for his time and look forward to playing The Deadly Facade when it's released! In the meantime, check out all of Noel's published games on Steam here.

[daresplaining]

With the shows finished, I'm curious what you think were the high and low points of each show/season (if any).

    Ooh, good question. I’d say: 

Daredevil: 

    The first season was quite solid. I tend to be the pickiest about Daredevil, because Matt is my favorite superhero, and I did have a lot of complaints about the first season, but it was exciting and well-executed. The MCU version of Karen Page in particular was incredible. DD Season 1 Episode 10 (”Nelson v. Murdock”) is my favorite episode in any season of any of the shows, though Luke Cage Season 2 Episode 10 gave it some serious competition. Daredevil Season 2 was my favorite DD season, and switches off with Iron Fist season one for the status of my favorite Netflix MCU season overall. As a comics fan, it felt the most familiar to me and therefore the most fun, and Elektra was fantastic. The Hand were poorly developed, but in general, it was a high point. Season 3 was enjoyable but mostly a disappointment (it was basically a re-hashing of Season 1 plus pseudo-Bullseye. Maggie was the best part), which is why I was perfectly happy this show ended where it did: with a proper conclusion, and just as the quality was starting to deteriorate. 

Jessica Jones: 

    Season 1 of Jessica Jones was brilliant; tightly-plotted, well-acted, and absolutely terrifying. The first episode is another of my absolute favorite episodes ever, and probably the strongest opening out of any of the shows. Since Jessica as a character was only introduced about twenty years ago, she has much less source material than the other characters, and so this show had to do more original thinking and content creation, which I think hurt it in the end. The second and third seasons, while perfectly solid, didn’t feel nearly as polished, though I absolutely adored Alisa and thought the revamping of Jessica’s backstory was really interesting. I also loved Trish’s character arc and the richness of her MCU-specific sibling relationship with Jessica, until it was torpedoed with what I considered some poorly-executed character development in Season 3. 

Luke Cage:

    Luke was given a personality make-over in the MCU, and I’m torn on how I feel about that, but I really enjoyed his show. It was bold and rich and utterly unique. I thought the pacing in Season 1 was wonkier than normal (most of the shows had pacing issues), but I still really enjoyed it. Its reinvention of most of the comics characters was masterfully done, in terms of both writing and acting, and Misty Knight in particular was perfect. And Season 2 was a masterpiece. Where the hell are all of the awards for Luke Cage Season 2? Where is the hype? Mariah Dillard is the best antagonist in the entire MCU, and you can quote me on that. The way this show wove together classic Power Man goodness with elements of real-world black culture and current events was really, really cool. And, as I mentioned… that Power Man and Iron Fist episode was magic. Everything a PMIF fan could have ever dreamed of. 

Iron Fist:

    Iron Fist Season 1 got off to a shaky start with an awkward first episode (which I discuss in-depth here) but it moved on from that to become either my favorite or second favorite (depending on my mood) season of all of the Marvel Netflix properties. It combined rapid-fire pacing with beautiful character moments, and its reversal of Danny’s revenge quest was, to me, the best engagement with the source material out of any of the shows. I am about to finish up my deep dive into this season over on my Iron Fist blog, if you want to see more specific gushing and shouting. Season 2 wasn’t quite as strong, which I partly blame on the derailment of Danny’s character arc in The Defenders, but I still mostly really enjoyed it. The brilliant variation on the source material continued with a further development of Danny and Davos’s dynamic (which is completely different than the comics version but managed to be my favorite MCU sibling relationship) and an awesome new version of Typhoid Mary (Dex wished he could be what Walker was). And then the writers had some kind of collective mental break-down in the final few episodes, which I’m not going to go into because I discussed it here and would rather not think about it again. Essentially, Danny and Colleen were disrespected, and I’m angry about it. The season was only saved by the final few minutes, with an exquisitely-wrapped gift to Iron Fist fans everywhere, which promised an incredible third season based on one of the best IF comics plotlines… which was then ripped away from us, and I’ve been mourning that loss ever since. But anyway. If I had to pick a favorite Marvel Netflix show, it would probably be Iron Fist. It’s my comfort show, and makes me happy in ways none of the other shows quite managed. Look how long this paragraph is. My love is (mostly) free-flowing. #SaveIronFist and all that. 

The Punisher:

    I should mention that while all of the other shows featured characters who I was big fans of already, I haven’t read that many Punisher comics, so I went into his show not quite as knowledgeable or invested. That said, I very much enjoyed both seasons of it. I thought the first season had a stronger plot and much more polished writing (this was true of pretty much every show, which is interesting). Jon Bernthal was a fantastic Frank, who perfectly embodied both the extreme violence and intense compassion inherent in the character. I loved his dynamic with Micro in Season 1 and with Amy in Season 2. And his alliance with Karen Page was a surprising deviation from the comics (616 Karen and Frank never even met, or had any reason to interact) that I found fascinating. 

The Defenders: 

    I was surprised we only got one season of The Defenders, but I was also okay with it. A second season wasn’t necessary, especially since the characters started cameoing more frequently in each other’s shows after that. I really enjoyed The Defenders. The poor showrunner was forced to do a lot of reverse-engineering of the worldbuilding thanks to undeveloped hints in previous shows, which meant that the Hand plotline was a little bit clumsy, but the plot wasn’t important. The Defenders existed for the team-up, and the team-up was a lot of fun. Most importantly, we were treated to some beautiful Power Man and Iron Fist and Daughters of the Dragon goodness, which was all that really mattered. I also loved the dysfunctional family dynamic of the Hand leaders, which I was not expecting. In some ways, their bickering and back-stabbing was even more fun to watch than the protagonists’ antics. My biggest complaint was that Elektra and Danny’s character arcs were sabotaged, which was very disappointing.  

    Overall, I was really impressed by the high quality of all of the shows. They were pretty much everything I’d hoped for, and quite a few things I never knew I wanted. I feel really lucky. 

[recentanimenews]

Bookshelf Briefs 5/19/20

After-School Bitchcraft, Vol. 1 | By Yu Shimizu and Kazuma Ichihara | Yen Press – Afterschool Boobcraft would be a better title for this supernatural romance about Ririki, a ditzy high school student who accidentally discovers that her chemistry teacher is a sorcerer. Though Ririki quickly realizes that she, too, has hidden powers, nothing about her giggly, helpless behavior suggests that she’s competent enough to tie her own shoes, let alone cast a spell. Renji, her teacher, is even less of a character, defined primarily by his brusque demeanor and perma-scowl. Anyone reading for plot will find the the crude, obvious fanservice irritating, while anyone reading for fanservice will find the series’ pedestrian efforts at world-building an unwelcome distraction from the parade of costume failures and panty shots, all of which are drawn in salacious detail. Not recommended. – Katherine Dacey

Animeta!, Vol. 3 | By Yaso Hanamura | J-Novel Club – Miyuki Sanada is making gradual improvement as an inbetweener, though she’s been told that if she doesn’t pass the key animation exam within a year, she’s fired. Meanwhile, her fellow new hire, Maria Date, seems to be leaving her in the dust, is actively campaigning to take her place with the prestigious Studio 7, and gets invited to enter a character design contest by the big boss. I appreciate the sports manga feel this rivalry evokes, but the most compelling part of Animeta! for me is the plight of Yuiko Fuji, the inbetween checker who once tried to become a key animator but had no flair. She’s amazing at her current job, but seeing new talent getting promoted over her is tough. This series has really grown on me, now that its been fleshing out its characters more, and I reckon I’ll stick with it for the long haul! – Michelle Smith

A Certain Scientific Accelerator, Vol. 10 | By Kazuma Kamachi and Arata Yamaji | Seven Seas – Last time I said the cliffhanger was chilling, this time that extends to much of the book. The Index series has usually been too concerned with action and harems to get into pure horror, but its spinoffs have no issues with it, particularly this one. Cannibalism of a scientific sort continues to be the norm here, with our tragic villain continuing to be sympathetic. As is Yomikawa, possibly the nicest character in the whole Indexverse. For those who aren’t reading this for nice, the good news is that Accelerator is back in action by the end of this and ready to beat villains up while continuing to state what a villain he is. Index fans will enjoy this, though may also be creeped out. – Sean Gaffney

Cocoon Entwined, Vol. 2 | By Yuriko Hara | Yen Press – Yes, it is still tempting to review these volumes by just saying “hair” and being done with it. I mean, the start of the second volume seems to be narrated from the POV of a former schoolgirl’s hair, which is now made up of the uniform of our heroine. But there is a bit more to it than that, as we cycle back a bit and get more insight into the mysterious Hoshimiya, whose hair drifting down in single hairlets (hairlets?) continues to be an emotional gut punch for most of the school. There’s also discussion of traditions, why they’re kept and when they might have to be broken for the sake of moving on and fixing things. It’s quite an emotional drama. And rest assured, it’s filled with hair. So much hair. – Sean Gaffney

The Golden Sheep, Vol. 3 | By Kaori Ozaki | Vertical Comics – The third volume of The Golden Sheep is its last, and while it was nice that the four friends at the center of the story ultimately resolved their differences, it all felt rather too easy and anticlimactic. I did like that Yuushin finds purpose in striving to achieve enough independence to live with the stray kitty he rescued, though. (It is an extremely cute kitty.) The volume is rounded out by a twisted short story called “Love Letter” in which an unborn soul chooses to be born to a teen runaway and ends up dying from neglect, but loves its mother so much that it opts to return to earth in any guise that allows it to see her, including another cute kitty who soon meets a tragic end. It left a weird taste in my brain. – Michelle Smith

How Heavy Are the Dumbbells You Lift?, Vol. 3 | By Yabako Sandrovich and MAAM | Seven Seas – The first volume it was the fanservice that got my attention. The second volume it was the advice on keeping fit. And in this one it’s the comedy that’s really reaching out to grab you, taking the series in places I was not expecting it to go, like turning the main girls (including their teacher!) into a muscle-bound idol group, something that is impressively different but goes over like a lead balloon. Zina has fit in well with the others, and moreover she knows Satomi cosplays, so can cheerfully use that for blackmail. There are also hints that romance may come into this series—Hibiki has always been attracted to Machio when he’s not bulking out, but there’s a suggestion that her feelings may run a bit deeper than that. That said, I expect comedy to prevail. This is fun. – Sean Gaffney

Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 14 | By Aka Akasaka | Viz Media – The first half of this book is almost all dedicated to Kaguya and Shirogane finally, finally, confessing—not through words, but through actions. It’s the payoff everyone has been waiting for, and it’s handled perfectly. The second half of this book then drags it all back to hilarious comedy, with the chapter about Kaguya french-kissing Shirogane being the highlight of the volume and possibly the series. Of course, there’s the question of where do we go from here—Kaguya ends up breaking her brain so much over this that she reverts to her old icy persona, and there may be a new love triangle developing around Ishigami. So don’t stop reading just because Kaguya got confessed to—there’s still plenty more fun. – Sean Gaffney

My Hero Academia: Smash!!, Vol. 4 | By Hirofumi Neda and Kohei Horikoshi | Viz Media – The gag series has caught up to the main storyline, or at least wants to avoid the Overhaul Arc, so for the most part this volume is original material. Sometimes that’s good—the author shows a surprising taste for very dark character-based jokes when they want to, including one with Todoroki talking about his mother that made me gasp. There’s also a parents’ day again (it goes a bit better than the one in School Briefs), which allows us to see parents we forgot existed, like Uraraka’s mother. That said, there’s also a sense that the series is starting to get a bit tired. The next volume is signposted to be the last, and that’s a good thing. Go out while you’re still flying high. – Sean Gaffney

Nori | By Rumi Hara | Drawn & Quarterly – Born in Kyoto and currently based in New York, Hara has been creating comics for about a decade, but Nori is Hara’s graphic novel debut. The volume has its origins in a series of self-published mini-comics which earned Hara multiple award nominations. Nori collects six short tales of varying lengths which feature the adventures of the titular Noriko, an imaginative three-year-old, and Hana, her grandmother and caregiver. Except for a surprise trip that takes Nori and Hana to Hawaii, the stories are largely set in Osaka in the 1980s. All of them are incredibly charming. Hara effortlessly blends mythology and legends with the characters’ day-to-day lives and Nori’s fantastical imaginings. Some of my favorite moments are Nori’s interactions with older kids—some of whom really aren’t sure what to do at first with a precocious toddler hanging about as they explore the natural world together. Nori is an undeniable delight. – Ash Brown

That Blue Summer, Vol. 4 | By Atsuko Namba | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – Rio Funami is a Tokyo girl who’s been sent, along with her bookish little brother, to stay with her grandmother in the countryside for the duration of her 40-day summer vacation. She’s fallen in love with a local boy named Ginzo Izumi, who initially rejected her, believing they belonged in different worlds and valued different things. However, as time has gone on, Ginzo has come to see that’s not true. In fact, Rio seems enraptured by the village he calls home and understands the calling he feels towards graphic design while simultaneously feeling obligated to stay and take over the family liquor store. This is more than just a generic romance—it’s about passions versus practicality and finding reasons for joy in any situation. I’m enjoying it a lot and isn’t that cover a beauty? – Michelle Smith

Yowamushi Pedal, Vol. 14 | By Wataru Watanabe | Yen Press – The race that would never end has ended! And yes, our hero manages to capture first place, The first half of the book is really fantastic, showing off how good the author is at wringing drama and emotion from every last meter. The second half pales in comparison mostly as it’s setting up the next chunk of book, though seeing Onoda suddenly fail so hard simply as his mentor has left (transferred to another country) is poignant, and I suspect he needs another race or two before he can get back into form, so I expect more failure. Oh, and Kanzaki shows up briefly to remind us she exists and also help the core team get new bikes that work to their strengths. Still excellent shonen sports. – Sean Gaffney

By: Ash Brown

[davidmann95]

Some Kingdom Hearts future thoughts

Have to get ‘em out! Went into some thoughts with my psuedo-review of III, but I’ve got others and stuff worth expanding on. I’ll put them under the cut since it clearly goes into spoilers, except for my boldest, most controversial guess: along with being announced either this year or next (since Kingdom Hearts has never reached the end of a calendar year after a release with nothing on the horizon) I think Kingdom Hearts IV is going to be a 2022 release. I recognize that sounds like an intensely generous timeframe, but I have several reasons:

1. Above all else by far: once again, Square Enix and Disney are going to be on Nomura’s ass, nose to the grindstone, to get him to start delivering these on a consistent basis again. Do you think they’re looking at Kingdom Hearts III topping sales charts and thinking “well, it sure was worth the wait”, or do you think they’re going “gosh, these are some nice sales, sure would be nice if it came out years ago and we had a bunch more similarly-selling titles by now, let’s try and aim for something closer to that in the future”. Especially-especially since Nomura and the actors aren’t getting any younger and the series is at a point where the core fanbase for the franchise as-is is going to be the primary target rather than new audiences, which means it has to wrap up in a timeframe where that’s still a viable market. So rapid, priority development and few if any more spinoffs. I mean, not as if there’s really a handheld platform for them to be on anymore.

2. My understanding (and this is going somewhat into the technical side of things, so I’m going thirdhand here based on what I’ve heard from others) is that the lifecycle of the current console generation isn’t going to run out for quite a bit yet, so they can reuse a lot of the assets and whatnot from III.

3. A big deal was made about Dream Drop Distance coming out on the 10th anniversary of the franchise, and given 20 is a much wilder number for this series than most equivalents when it’s about a single cast of characters going through a single story, I can’t imagine they won’t want to push that as at least a similarly big deal.

4. Finally, when things don’t go as catastrophically off the rails as III did, these games seem to have a fairly consistent 3-4 year development span (even III, once they announced the beginning of development in 2013, would have come out 2017-early 2018 if not for switching from Luminous to Unreal Engine), and for the reasons I listed above I think this is going to be on the speedier end of that.

* Firstly: the main discussion I’m seeing at this point regarding IV is “it’s gonna be a Kingdom Hearts/The World Ends With You/pseudo-Final Fantasy Versus XIII crossover!”, and I really expect and hope that isn’t the case. Not that I’ll be pissed if it is, I’m sure it would still be rad, but it strikes me as both unlikely and the lesser outcome. I don’t know that I see the powers that be diverting resources in one of their biggest cash cows towards a sequel to one of their minor games - one that’s already been in Kingdom Hearts, meaning its inclusion here wouldn’t reasonably be a huge enough deal to base a lot of the full story on - and a way to reimagine another project. And for that matter it strikes me as conceptually small-scale given the setup. Nomura went with a name in Yozora that doesn’t just have the bent meaning of Sora’s name but actually literally sounds like him, went with a setting that aside from the one cameo sign mainly screams to viewers “Sora’s suddenly in the real world, holy cow”, and unless I entirely misread it Verum Rex was presented as a total self-roast in Toy Box. It doesn’t strike me as spot-the-reference (even though that’s 100% in there) nearly so much as establishing a tonal contrast to Kingdom Hearts.

I joked initially about this being a Flash of Two Worlds! (linking to a description for non-comics readers who are here because I tagged Kingdom Hearts)/’Kingdom Hearts goes to war with its own gritty fanfic’ setup, but...I actually suspect that’s pretty close to what’s going on here? This seems like a send up of Final Fantasy’s relative self-seriousness and over the top Super Cool characters, as a contrast to Sora’s goofy open-hearted sincerity and optimism. It’s the Secret Movie aesthetic that some want not just more prominent but as the actual main tone of the series morphed into an entire universe all its own, and Sora, out of place, has to find his way through and back home even as the real threat mounts, and probably has to save this world and get through to its heroes who aren’t likely prone to grinning through off-the-cuff monologues about the heart. That is not only entirely my kind of ridiculous meta jam, it feels like a logical next step for the series: if the first trilogy was in part about growing up, the next (and I suspect last, as the Master of Masters and his Foretellers have been set up as the primordial antagonists of the entire mythology and this is where they’re coming to the fore; my old theory of Eraqus being the big bad of an intermediary trilogy looks solidly shot to hell) could very well be about reaching adulthood, in which case it makes sense Sora would have to pass through a near literal fire of Adolescent/Adult Cynicism.

* Speaking of where Sora ends up: I kinda doubt he’s literally dead, or that if he is it’ll last past the opening of the game. They’ve already made a big theatrical production of Sora dying twice now, the second time in the most literal way possible and just a few hours prior to this, so while third time’s the charm I think there’ll be more to it than that. The again common thing I’ve been seeing is that he’ll have to play the Reaper game to win his life back (not something I’m much familiar with but I think I’ve got the basics), but again, while it’ll certainly be part of the game I don’t think TWEWY is going to be the big thing here (like they’d really make that a bigger deal than the Final Fantasy elements have been), and he just dealt with the afterlife and had to essentially play a game to win his soul back, and this wouldn’t even be a game he’s unfamiliar with. My impression is he’s incorporated back and whole - if likely powered down from the ordeal to justify him being back at level one - and the mystery is less whether or not he’s truly alive so much as how he ended up here and how to get back.

* On the other end of things - and I realize it’s a risky prospect to suggest after her getting a shockingly small role compared to everyone else in III was the damning weak aspect of its otherwise basically perfect finale - I think this is where Kairi is actually going to start to come to the forefront. She and Riku would be at the head of a search that everyone would be a part of (they were there when it happened, they know death is negotiable in their world, and they’re good people who all owe him), her especially since he’s her boyfriend - they may not declare it outright but there’s clearly no ambiguity between the two of them as to their situation anymore - and the one he sacrificed himself for, and she’s out there fighting now even if she’s inexperienced. And Riku seems like he’s going to end up lost himself on the search, leaving her behind as the sole Destiny Trio representative. So even if she isn’t a playable co-lead I wouldn’t be surprised if she was the one going on a more traditional Kingdom Hearts adventure searching with the rest while Sora and later Riku deal with the genre mindfuck. On the bright side if nothing else, she’s died twice now too and they’ve both been presented as dead in a “maybe this time for real” way for a finale, so while again third time’s the charm, I figure she and Sora are relatively bulletproof from here on out.

* Speaking of Riku, while this seems more like an old-school proof of concept trailer from I and II rather than the more recent actual scenes, meaning his appearance might well change just as Kairi was different in I’s Secret Movie than she really was in II, it’s very notable that he hasn’t aged at all. So likely instead of another tragic I to II scale timeskip of Sora being lost from his friends, it looks like IV will be picking up immediately and the search for him won’t take long to succeed. Also speaking of Riku, I seem to see people thinking he’s with Namine now? Not that that seems impossible, but while the scene as a whole is romanticized in that it’s basically a princess being carried away by chariot to her happily-ever-after, it reads to me less as an actual romance than Riku fulfilling his ‘brother’s promise. Though if Square/Nomura does want to really get into romance with the next trilogy, since Sora/Kairi is locked down maybe they’ll just say fuck it and do a whole Riku/Namine/Xion/Roxas Love Square situation.

* Actual prediction rather than analysis of evidence: I suspect this is the last major time the Destiny Trio is going to be split up, at least in the searching-for-each-other, not-knowing-if-everyone’s-alive sense. I was the search for Kairi, II for Riku, and now IV for Sora - that cycle looks to be completing. Wouldn’t be surprised if V and/or the finale was finally the three of them as the adventuring party as fans have wanted for so long, with III as the grand finale to Sora/Donald/Goofy.

* It seems early to predict the main villain, but at the same time everyone was accurate in assuming a Keyblade-wielding Xehanort would be the final boss of the trilogy circa 2006, so I’m gonna go ahead and say Xigbar/Luxu is gonna be the end-all with IV. The Master of Masters is still the end of the road, and perfect for it because he’s a real-world normal savvy guy who can manipulate this world of straightforward classical adventurers with ease, while Sora at the opposite end of the scale is silly and sweet even by that world’s standard. But Luxu addresses the same ideas in a way that’d be perfect for this game in particular as it seems to be set up, he’d be the villainous connective tissue as this game moves from one trilogy to another, and he has the dangling personal thread of the ‘reward’ he suggested was coming for Sora. Or hell, since now it looks like she’s at least somewhat privy to what’s going on, maybe Maleficent will finally step back up.

EDIT: Ooh, just remembered, speaking of what Xigbar says to Sora, his Olympus conversation also predicts Sora’s fate? The whole “if you leap in to save somebody, you might just end up in the clutch needing to be saved yourself” lecture, i.e. the premise for IV. Maybe his teach isn’t the only one privy to future events?

* Not both, they’ll wanna space it out, but I’m like 70% sure this is where Marvel or Star Wars are gonna happen.

* Finally, while I’ve heard speculation that the Mystery Star is one of the Foretellers or the person who died in that Union X game, I don’t think she’s one of them given it’s a new voice actor and she cites a name Sora knows. More likely she’s ‘Subject X’ (I went ahead and looked up the Secret Reports, haven’t gone back and done all the bonus challenges myself yet and won’t I imagine for some time), who does seem to be from that time but is I think someone new.

[tigerlover16-uk]

Do you think that Dragon Ball Super is going to hold up better than Dragon Ball GT did long term? Or do you think it'll eventually fade into the background for most of the fandom as well and become a niche thing?

Part of that I think is going to depend on how the movie and the inevitable follow up series(s) are received… but most likely, yes.

Here’s where Super has the advantage over GT in that regard… it’s canon.

Or at least, it’s being treated as canon and is being used as the foundation from which modern Dragon Ball stories and products are going to be built off of for the foreseeable future. We can get into debates about semantics and this fandom’s rather annoying “There is no canon except maybe the manga!” mantra that I’ve never been in favour of, but Toei is treating it as the current canon for the moment and so does Toriyama, it seems.

The upcoming movie is going to be a follow up on Super. FighterZ, the recent fighting game that blew up and became a huge success recently to the point of bringing in a lot of new fans, has it’s story take place sometime during the events of Super, has beerus and Whis show up in the story, and includes characters like Hit and Goku Black on the base roster while Merged Zamasu and Vegito Blue are DLC, while no GT character has been added yet. 

Even the Xenoverse games treated the events of Battle of Gods and Resurrection F as canon events, while GT was an afterthought in both, having DLC packs for the first game and it’s characters only appearing in side quests in the sequel, and it’s timeline treated as an alternate future on par with the old movies.

Even the upcoming PR anime for Dragon Ball Heroes is adapting an arc that’s more or less a follow up to the Future Trunks saga in Super. And when a ongoing “Canon” Dragon Ball show does get made (And it will. Toei aren’t going to keep it off the air for too long, Dragon Ball’s gotten too big and profitable again since Super started for them to want to let the franchise go dormant again for too long), it will inevitably be a sequel to Super.

Unless Toriyama changes his mind and decides to scrap everything from the last few years and start over with another new continuation of the manga (Which is unlikely considering how involved he’s been in Super’s production as well as the upcoming movie, and he’s shown no signs of wanting to stop putting out new stories), then it’s likely that for the foreseeable future, all future Dragon Ball series, movies and spin-offs are going to be made with the idea that Super and it’s follow ups are “Canon” events.

And that’s going to inevitably influence how hardcore fans, casuals, and the portion of general audiences who consume Dragon Ball content view things.

Whatever people’s perception of the Prequel Trilogy was initially, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that more people have watched those, and new fans getting into Star Wars for the first time are ENCOURAGED to watch them, than have watched, say, the Star Wars Holiday Special or the Ewoks cartoons and specials.

Why? 

Because love or hate them, the Prequel Trilogy is, now and forever, a crucial part of the Star Wars saga and the foundation for a large, important era of the franchise that has spawned a large number of spin off works, from comics to at least two cartoons, one of which is basically the predecessor to the most current Star Wars animated series, Rebels, and a number of it’s events and characters are followed up on in that show.

The Prequel Trilogy is an essential cornerstone of the Star Wars franchise, and even casual fans who aren’t interested in all the expanded universe stuff are going to watch them, because they’re episodes of the main film series that are the backbone of the entire franchise and whom millions and millions of people watched in theatres when they came out. For all the controversy and handwringing about “MY CHILDHOOD IS DEEEEEAAAAAAD!”, there’s no getting around the fact that the Prequel Trilogy will continue to have an overarching presence over the rest of the Star Wars franchise going forward. And over time, the movies have also been increasingly vindicated with more and more supporters feeling safe to express their support of it publicly.

As for the Holiday Special and Ewoks cartoon and movies? They’re not canon, never had as big a presence and impact in the first place, and the former is especially reviled among the fandom and is treated as a laughingstock that people only watch ironically, and considering it’s reputation for being terrible, not a HUGE amount of people are going to be inclined to watch it these days or in the next few decades because of that. I’ve never watched it, for example, and I never intend to.

No one is going to tell you that you have to, or even should, watch those products if you’re getting into the franchise. The general public who only care about the most mainstream installments of the Star Wars franchise, I.E the films, doesn’t even realize the Ewoks HAD their own cartoon and made for TV films. I’ll bet there are going to be people reading this post shocked about it.

This goes for the rest of the Star Wars expanded universe too, the old one and the new. If you ask people on the street or people who are generally casual Star Wars fans for the most part, they’ll probably be able to tell you who Darth Maul and Captain Phasma are… but significantly less people will know what you’re talking about if you bring up Thrawn, Asajj Ventress or Savage Opress. 

Not because they aren’t good characters who are memorable and interesting in their own right, heck they’re more developed and interesting than Phasma ever was. But because they’re not mainstream, and in Thrawn’s case he wasn’t even canon to the current EU anymore until Rebels introduced their own take on him (I haven’t seen the 4th season, so I can’t discuss how that worked out).

I think GT has, and is going to have a similar issue to a lot of those expanded universe and non-canon Star Wars works going forward.

Let’s not kid ourselves, while it might have had some support when it was first airing, GT came out at a bad time both in Japan and in the West, and here in the West especially didn’t leave a good lasting impression.

In Japan, franchise fatigue for Dragon Ball as a whole was starting to set in around the time of the Buu Saga. While the saga was well received there and is looked back on fondly, Z’s ratings were continuously declining after the Cell Saga, and they declined more sharply during GT’s early run because the majority of people found the Black Star Dragon Balls saga boring.

While GT did pick up momentum again with the Baby saga which restored some interest, it didn’t actually do a thing to help the gradually increasing sense of fatigue. Ratings still steadily declined later on in the shows run (Admittedly not much more than they were during the Buu Saga, to be fair), but merchandise and revenue for Dragon Ball was going down really fast, which caused Toei to hastily pull the plug on the series, recognizing the fatigue and that Dragon Ball needed a bit of a break. (This is likely why the ending felt so rushed and sudden, BTW).

 So while it wasn’t viewed as a disaster or anything and a lot of elements from the series are still well regarded and promoted in merchandise and video games like Heroes (Super Saiyan 4, some of the villains, etc), it’s never been as well regarded as the rest of the series and certainly wasn’t as successful in terms of profit and renewed interest in the franchise as Super has brought forth.

In the West, it’s case is even worse. The Buu Saga was much more controversial when it aired in America to the point that for years a significant segment of the franchise ragged on it as being the worst thing to come out of Z. Buu was supposedly the worst villain, Babidi stinks, “THEY RUINED GOHAN!”, etc. (I personally always thought that was nonsense and I love the Buu Saga, and in recent years the general consensus has improved, but these reactions were common and a lot of people still resent the saga to this day or at least hold it in less regard than the previous ones).

Dragon Ball Z’s popularity and the initial hype the show had gained after finally catching on in America (And here in the UK) had started to wane by this point, and a large portion of viewers who had been watching jumped ship by that point. While GT enjoyed some acceptance by the fanbase at first, by the time it finished and in the years that followed, it became regarded as the black sheep of the entire franchise (Until Evolution came along, anyway), with loud and vocal hate thrown at it for years. 

People were quick and eager to declare it non-canon and shoot down the possibility of it being so, to the point that even before the franchise itself started gradually downplaying it’s significance in favour of the newer works, pretty much the majority of people were in agreement over it’s non-canon status. 

And the fact that it came out at a time where Dragon Ball Z was starting to slowly lose it’s hype among casual fans and the general public (And then became an internet laughing stock until roughly the start of the current decade when Kai’s dub came out and starting a gradual renaissance where the series regained a lot of respect in the West), means that GT, while a lot of people do know about it, has never had as much of a mainstream presence in the West (Kind of like the Original Dragon Ball, sadly), being mostly something the hardcore fandom was invested in enough to watch and discuss… and again, for years the consensus was that most people hated it.

It’s true that GT hate has calmed down in more recent times among the fandom, and while it’s still not well regarded it’s defenders are more vocal and comfortable about supporting the show than before. And there is a common consensus that the show had a lot of good ideas, even if most of them weren’t executed as well as they could have been. 

There are definitely people who have revisited the series and appreciated it more nowadays… and people like me who used to defend it but immediately started hating it after re-watching it :P.

But here’s the thing a lot of those defenders might be surprised or try to smugly lecture me about how wrong I am over… GT these days is, like you suggested anon… a NICHE.

GT’s fans may be vocal in a lot of places online, but in the grand scheme of things… people generally don’t care much about it either way. And the fact that it’s non-canon and has officially been replaced as the “Official” Dragon Ball follow up means that in the years to come, it’s only going to become less and less relevant.

Regardless of how much of a broken base there might be over the series in the fandom, you can’t argue that Super isn’t a big success for Toei and the Dragon Ball brand in terms of promotion and profits.

Here’s one of several graphs I can find online demonstrating the revenue the Dragon Ball franchise as a whole has been bringing in for Toei over the last decade.

Notice how when Kai first aired, it barely made a blip in merchandise sales and overall income for the franchise, and by the time it ended it’s initial run in Japan revenue kept falling until the year after Battle of Gods came out, and then in 2015 after Super was announced suddenly everything started to explode and it’s become super profitable, peaking this year even with Super’s conclusion?

Heck, it’s Toei’s most profitable franchise again nowadays, bringing in slightly more than twice as much as One piece even in Japan, which is a longtime juggernaut franchise. And general enthusiasm from both the public and fandom is at a high not seen in years.

It’s certainly not to the level of when it first aired. Super is also significantly less of a mainstream hit in Western Countries that aren’t Latin America than Z was aswell, certainly (Probably doesn’t help that the Toonami Block it now airs in is a late night slot that only fanboys stay up to watch).

But it’s still popular and watched by a lot of people, and the fandom is especially deep into it.

Heck, bringing up Latin American countries again where Dragon Ball has historically been extremely popular and a staple of pop culture, Super and the movies it spawned from are huge hits, to the point that across various countries including Mexico, huge public events were held in many cities and community centres where large crowds of people, many numbering in the THOUSANDS, gathered to watch the streams for the last two episodes of DBS. Which were huge hits, of course.

All things considered, Battle of Gods, Resurrection F and Super left more of a positive impact for the franchise starting out since, regardless of Super’s… very bumpy start and production, these works have been big hits that caused a franchise renaissance that generally brought Dragon ball back to a level of prominence and success it hasn’t seen in a long time.

A far cry from GT which pretty much signalled Dragon Ball’s leave of absence from the mainstream, during which time interest in the series waned for years even with Kai helping to restore it’s rep a fair bit (At least in America, said series was met with more of a meh reaction in Japan).

The results of this can’t be understated. Worldwide, Super has brought in a number of new fans. For many children and teenage fans, it’s going to be their introduction to Dragon Ball, or at least a cornerstone of their formative experiences with the franchise. 

Many casual fans who had long drifted off from Dragon Ball were drawn back into the fold when Super came out, many people becoming bigger fans of Dragon Ball than ever as a result of that. I’ve talked with a number of people on this site who have admitted that Super actually helped them to appreciate Dragon ball in general a lot more whereas they only had a casual interest in the franchise before.

And a lot of those people are probably going to stick around rather than drift off again in favour of other series, considering we have the movie coming up, potential new shows in the near future, and other high profile Dragon Ball products like FighterZ to keep them occupied.

For every fan who complains about Super or is put off by it, I’ve seen as many, actually more, express a lot of thanks to it. Right before my recent break I remember reading a post from someone who admitted to never liking the Dragon ball franchise, being a Naruto fan before that started to disappoint them later on to the point they felt nothing when it ended (A feeling I find tragically relatable).

Said person said they started watching Super at some point as a joke… and by the time of watching the last episode, they had become a big converted fanboy, loved the majority of characters, had watched the previous series (I think, I might be remembering that part wrong), and even cried at the last episode due to being so emotionally invested.

For as many fans as there are who like to pick apart Super (And to be fair it is a flawed series and I do think it’s fair to criticise it’s missteps, I have issues like anyone else despite overall loving it), it IS generally a well liked series.

It’s true that a lot of that could fade with time. Heck, I’m sure a lot of people will like it somewhat less with hindsight and the hype wearing down.

On that note, I think some people might also like it more after a while.

Did you know that earlier on in Super’s run, people actually complained A LOT about the Slice of Life episodes, finding them a waste of time and no different to DBZ filler? Even by the end of the Champa saga that opinion started to soften and everyone started realizing how fun the slice of life episodes were, to the point that everything between the Future Trunks and Universe Survival Sagas is some of the most beloved content from the show now.

Even the potaufeu arc, widely despised when it first aired, has a bit of a better reception now. it’s not considered particularly GOOD, mind you, but people generally regard it as okay and at worst harmless now, compared to the hate it got earlier on. Helps that Brian Drummond was cast as Copy Vegeta for the dub, I guess.

A lot of other elements of the show have been viewed more fondly over time too, in addition to the stuff that gets more flak.

So it’s highly possible that, if the upcoming movie and any Dragon Ball series that follow up on Super in the near future are generally well received, opinions on Super from people who are critical of it now might gradually soften over time, at least to the point that a lot of people complaining about how the franchise is supposedly being “Ruined” might stop and realize they might have overreacted a little.

The opposite could also be true, we could have another series that’s a complete trainwreck and that could sour the fandoms opinions over modern Dragon ball as a whole, lead to a great decline in public interest and probably put us back on a franchise hiatus.

Which would stink a lot, let me tell you, and Super probably wouldn’t be remembered THAT fondly in that case… but to be honest, I have faith things will turn out at least reasonably well. Everything I’ve heard about the recent movie and it’s production suggests that Toei have put a ton of care and effort into making it right, and giving us the best product possible for a milestone movie like this.

And that suggests to me that they’ve learned from their missteps.

The big issue with Super, both in terms of it’s production values and writing, was ALWAYS down to it’s rushed production. The show was rushed to be aired, and that had a catastrophic effect that the show never completely recovered from, even when it did mostly stabilise later on.

But between the big increase in it’s production quality later on, the care that seems to be going into the movie, and the fact that behind the scenes Toei and Shueisha seem to be restructuring a lot of stuff to better focus on producing Dragon ball content and planning out new directions for the franchise… it feels like Toei are making all the right moves to keep Dragon ball relevant, and more importantly, GOOD into the foreseeable future.

They seem to have learned from their mistakes. And considering Super DID have a number of talented animators and writers working on it who did do a lot of good even though they were in far from suitable conditions… I for one feel confident that Toei could produce a much better follow up to Super down the line.

And if that’s the case, and Super does continue to be the launching pad for future stories in the Dragon Ball franchise for years to come… that’ll help it’s image to an extent. 

Because even if the series itself is continuously acknowledged as having problems, if Dragon Ball is still relevant two or three decades from now and still producing moderately well received series… fans are going to encourage newcomers and casuals to watch Super to “Get the full story”. Just like Star Wars fans these days unanimously agree that, whatever the quality, you should watch the Prequels and yes, they do count (Even if begrudgingly to a lot of people).

GT… will never have that.

See, as much as it’s fanboy’s like to pretend the support for GT these days is bigger than it is… most people who watch Dragon Ball either haven’t watched it, haven’t watched it in years, and probably aren’t going to watch it anytime soon.

Heck, half the people watching Super these last few years haven’t watched Dragon Ball Z since it was initially airing. I have a mutual who’s a BIG Dragon Ball fangirl, who writes fanfiction (Usually Vegebul related) and is one of the most passionate and positive people you’ll see on this site when it comes to Dragon Ball… she also regularly admits that while she needs to get around to it, she hasn’t actually watched Dragon Ball of Z since she was a kid, just clips of it and I think Kai. (On that note she didn’t watch GT because she couldn’t get into it, she did watch the first two episodes recently but seemingly hasn’t found the time to get further into it).

This is actually surprisingly common among the fandom. I remember when the first episodes of the Super dub were airing someone who had clearly only watched the dub of Kai before was confused while watching Super and Kai: The Final Chapters back to back, wondering if Elder Kai as seen in Super was the same character as Shin The Supreme Kai. There’s a ton of people out there who’s only experience with Dragon Ball was watching Kai’s dub years ago and getting back into it now because the franchise is putting out new major installments.

FYI, this is also one of the big reason that memes, particularly TFS related, have taken over the fandom and warped the perception of the series and the characters so much over the years. A majority of people who call themselves Dragon ball fans are actually casuals who don’t re-watch the series often and look to the fandom side of things to refresh their memories and base their opinions off of since they probably never thought too hard about the series other than “This show is fun, and these characters are my favourite!” before.

And no, that doesn’t make those people less of a fan than people who re-watch/read the series yearly and are obsessive about it, because screw that elitist noise. I’m just pointing out that… well… many people’s interest in Dragon Ball, as with many mainstream franchises, is very much in the “Here and now” variety. Especially in the age of Crunchyroll, Netflix and online streaming, where anime fans are constantly binging and hopping around from one series to the next.

Hardcore fanboys and people who have nostalgia for it are the only people who actually care about GT more than enough to casually acknowledge it’s existence from time to time. And while you might get the impression by browsing the internet, fansites, forums, comments sections, etc that the hardcore fandom is most of the people that watch and talk about Dragon Ball… they’re really not, in the grand scheme of things.

Going by Star Wars comparisons again, this video by Moviebob should explain what I’m talking about better than I can. 

To sum everything up nicely though… GT is non-canon and hasn’t actually been relevant for two decades. It has long had a reputation as one of the worst things in the franchise, and while there are certainly things the fandom likes about it and plenty of people willing to go back and watch and then defend it (And people like me who re-watch it and end up hating it where we used to defend it, too), it’s status as non-canon and the fact that it has officially been replaced by a new ongoing continuity means that it’s only going to become more and more niche over time as the fandom grows and changes.

And about two or three decades from now, new fans aren’t likely to be encouraged to watch it when there are various other sequels to Z starting with Super to get through, even before you take supplementary material like the movies and video games into consideration than only people looking to go hardcore will want to look up.

However Super is viewed in the future, it seems highly likely to me that it’s going to be held in at least higher regard by a significant portion of the people who are really into Dragon Ball over the next few decades if only because it was the necessary flint that sparked the era of new content more ambitious than the occasional OVA we’d been getting every few years before Battle of Gods came out.

Heck, even in terms of content, I think people in the fandom are going to look back on Super more fondly than GT because it gives people more stuff that appeals to them.

Think about it, Super has given us a plethora of popular characters. Beerus and Whis and Jaco are holdovers from the movies sure, but the former two are easily more popular than literally any character to come out of GT.

And in Super itself? We have huge fan favourites like Hit, Caulifla, Vados, and various characters from the universe Survival Saga. Super arguably has introduced a lot more popular characters than GT did, which included… uh… Baby, Nuova Shenron and maybe Omega Shenron to those who don’t find him unremarkable.

And be honest… unless you intentionally go looking for it, when was the last time you really saw fanart or anything about Baby or Nuova Shenron floating around here? Now when was the last time you saw stuff for Frieza, Cell, Beerus or Broly?

There’s probably a big gap there. Sure is for me.

And Super did a lot more for the supporting cast too. Krillin and Gohan got their own character arcs, Android 18 was a highlight in the Tournament of Power and saw the most action she’s seen in any series (Plus a ton of extra insight into her and Krillin’s relationship and great shipping moments, plus new interactions with her brother and other characters). Frieza may have hit a rough spot with the RF saga, but the Universe Survival Saga showed him at his very best and made the fandom fall in love with his character all over again.

And Android 17? He went from being the least appreciated of the trio of him, 18 and Android 16 to being a huge fandom darling and is regularly agreed to be the MVP of the universe survival saga, if not Super PERIOD. 

I could go on too, because for all it’s missteps, Super actually did go out of it’s way to do things with the characters and expand the universe in various ways, leaving tons of potential for new stories for years to come in it’s wake…

GT though? Let’s be honest, the most popular thing to come out of that was super Saiyan 4. And while I love that form… in the grand scheme of things, transformations are actually one of the least important things about the Dragon ball series, so that right there is a sign that somethings off there.

GT really is designed to be a series that appeals to certain subgroups of fans, and feels alienating to many others. It starts off with an arc that jettisons the majority of the cast in favour of a trio featuring Goku reduced to a kid again, a grown up Trunks, and Pan… who’s portrayed as an annoying brat who’s more of a detriment to the group than anything. Plus a cute robot sidekick to boot, and they all go on boring space adventures for a while.

It has all of one arc that’s all around good (…mostly…), followed up by what’s almost unanimously considered a trainwreck of a mini-arc that, as I’ve said before, looks worse than ever in light of Super due to it’s mishandling of Android 17′s character and the past villains, in comparison to how 17 and Frieza were handled in Super’s last arc. And then we get a final arc that had an awesome premise that devolved into a huge mess due to poor writing and most of the villains being annoying, underwhelming monsters of the week and the final boss being very unsatisfying, capped off by an ending that’s always been wildly divisive.

I’m not going to say that GT, as a what-if spin-off like it currently is, was a complete flop. But it’s definitely a series that I think takes a certain kind of fan to appreciate, whereas I think that Super, for all it’s own faults, in general is a show that captures a lot more of what gave the previous series their wider appeal and generally gives more people what they want.

Not everyone of course… but unlike GT, which really isn’t going to have any continuations anytime soon to do any course corrections or make up for any lost potential, a lot of Super’s missed opportunities can easily be made up by whatever series and movies come after it.

In general I just think that Super has more stuff that a wider group of people are going to be inclined to want to come back to.

Heck, on that note, a lot of people only like GT because it’s pretty much their only resource for Next Gen, post EoZ official Dragon Ball content. People starved for content about Uub, Pan, Bulla, Marron etc especially still use their GT designs as a basis for aged up fan art, and a lot of people who are fans of said character look to GT because outside of a few video games, they don’t have a lot of content for them.

I guarantee you though the minute a new series is made someday set past EoZ again which does more with those characters or otherwise portrays them better than GT did, those holdovers will gladly jump ship, because who in their right mind is going to buy bread crumbs from a shady street vendor when that new bakery across the street is giving away whole loafs?

I could really go on and on talking about this subject, because I actually find this interesting to discuss and speculate on, but it’s getting late and this is getting ridiculously long, so I’m just going to leave it here for now and give you my conclusion.

Yes. I think for most people, Super will be remembered more fondly than GT in the long run. Whether Super will be viewed particularly well in of itself years from now is another matter entirely, it’s probably always going to be a big base breaker at the very least. But on the whole… regardless of how you feel about the two series, I think it’s safe to say it has the advantage.

[wickedbananas]

How to Write Marketing Case Studies That Convert

Posted by kerryjones

In my last post, I discussed why your top funnel content shouldn’t be all about your brand. Today I’m making a 180-degree turn and covering the value of content at the opposite end of the spectrum: content that’s directly about your business and offers proof of your effectiveness.

Specifically, I’m talking about case studies.

I’m a big believer in investing in case studies because I’ve seen firsthand what happened once we started doing so at Fractl. Case studies were a huge game changer for our B2B marketing efforts. For one, our case studies portfolio page brings in a lot of traffic – it’s the second most-visited page on our site, aside from our home page. It also brings in a significant volume of organic traffic, being our fourth most-visited page from organic searches. Most importantly, our case studies are highly effective at converting visitors to leads – about half of our leads view at least one of our case studies before contacting us.

Assuming anyone who reads the Moz Blog is performing some type of marketing function, I’m zeroing in on how to write a compelling marketing case study that differentiates your service offering and pulls prospects down the sales funnel. However, what I’m sharing can be used as a framework for creating case studies in any industry.

Get your client on board with a case study

Marketers shy away from creating case studies for a few reasons:

They’re too busy “in the weeds” with deliverables.

They don’t think their results are impressive enough.

They don’t have clients’ permission to create case studies.

While I can’t help you with #1 and #2 (it’s up to you to make the time and to get the results deserving of a case study!), I do have some advice on #3.

In a perfect world, clients would encourage you to share every little detail of your time working together. In reality, most clients expect you to remain tight-lipped about the work you’ve done for them.

Understandably, this might discourage you from creating any case studies. But it shouldn’t.

With some compromising, chances are your client will be game for a case study. We’ve noticed the following two objections are common regarding case studies.

Client objection 1: “We don’t want to share specific numbers.”

At first it you may think, “Why bother?” if a client tells you this, but don’t let it hold you back. (Truth is, the majority of your clients will probably feel this way).

In this instance, you’ll want your case study to focus on highlighting the strategy and describing projects, while steering away from showing specific numbers regarding short and long-term results. Believe it or not, the solution part of the case study can be just as, or more, compelling than the results. (I’ll get to that shortly.)

And don’t worry, you don’t have to completely leave out the results. One way to get around not sharing actual numbers but still showing results is to use growth percentages.

Specific numbers: “Grew organic traffic from 5,000 to 7,500 visitors per month”

Growth percentage: “Increased organic traffic by 150%”

We do this for most of our case studies at Fractl, and our clients are totally fine with it.

Client objection 2: “We don’t want to reveal our marketing strategy to competitors.”

A fear of giving away too much intel to competitors is especially common in highly competitive niches.

So how do you get around this?

Keep it anonymous. Don’t reveal who the client is and keep it vague about what niche they’re in. This can be as ambiguous as referring to the client as “Client A” or slightly more specific (“our client in the auto industry”). Instead, the case study will focus on the process and results – this is what your prospects care about, anyway.

Gather different perspectives

Unless you were directly working with the client who you are writing the case study about, you will need to conduct a few interviews to get a full picture of the who, what, how, and why of the engagement. At Fractl, our marketing team puts together case studies based on interviews with clients and the internal team who worked on the client’s account.

The client

Arrange an interview with the client, either on a call or via email. If you have multiple contacts within the client’s team, interview the main point of contact who has been the most involved in the engagement.

What to ask:

What challenge were you facing that you hired us to help with?

Had you previously tried to solve this challenge (working with another vendor, using internal resources, etc.)?

What were your goals for the engagement?

How did you benefit from the engagement (short-term and long-term results, unexpected wins, etc.)?

You’ll also want to run the case study draft by the client before publishing it, which offers another chance for their feedback.

The project team

Who was responsible for this client’s account? Speak with the team behind the strategy and execution.

What to ask:

How was the strategy formed? Were strategic decisions made based on your experience and expertise, competitive research, etc.?

What project(s) were launched as part of the strategy? What was the most successful project?

Were there any unexpected issues that you overcame?

Did you refine the strategy to improve results?

How did you and the client work together? Was there a lot of collaboration or was the client more hands-off? (Many prospective clients are curious about what their level of involvement in your process would look like.)

What did you learn during the engagement? Any takeaways?

Include the three crucial elements of a case study

There’s more than one way to package case studies, but the most convincing ones all have something in common: great storytelling. To ensure you’re telling a proper narrative, your case study should include the conflict, the resolution, and the happy ending (but not necessarily in this order).

We find a case study is most compelling when you get straight to the point, rather than making someone read the entire case study before seeing the results. To grab readers’ attention, we begin with a quick overview of conflict-resolution-happy ending right in the introduction.

For example, in our Fanatics case study, we summarized the most pertinent details in the first three paragraphs. The rest of the case study focused on the resolution and examples of specific projects.

Let’s take a look at what the conflict, resolution, and happy ending of your case study should include.

The Conflict: What goal did the client want to accomplish?

Typically serving as the introduction of the case study, “the conflict” should briefly describe the client’s business, the problem they hired you to work on, and what was keeping them from fixing this problem (ex. lack of internal resources or internal expertise). This helps readers identify with the problem the client faced and empathize with them – which can help them envision coming to you for help with this problem, too.

Here are a few examples of “conflicts” from our case studies:

“Movoto engaged Fractl to showcase its authority on local markets by increasing brand recognition, driving traffic to its website, and earning links back to on-site content.”

“Alexa came to us looking to increase awareness – not just around the Alexa name but also its resources. Many people had known Alexa as the site-ranking destination; however, Alexa also provides SEO tools that are invaluable to marketers.”

“While they already had strong brand recognition within the link building and SEO communities, Buzzstream came to Fractl for help with launching large-scale campaigns that would position them as thought leaders and provide long-term value for their brand.”

The Resolution: How did you solve the conflict?

Case studies are obviously great for showing proof of results you’ve achieved for clients. But perhaps more importantly, case studies give prospective clients a glimpse into your processes and how you approach problems. A great case study paints a picture of what it’s like to work with you.

For this reason, the bulk of your case study should detail the resolution, sharing as much specific information as you and your client are comfortable with; the more you’re able to share, the more you can highlight your strategic thinking and problem solving abilities.

The following snippets from our case studies are examples of details you may want to include as part of your solution section:

What our strategy encompassed:

“Mixing evergreen content and timely content helped usher new and existing audience members to the We Are Fanatics blog in record numbers. We focused on presenting interesting data through evergreen content that appealed to a variety of sports fans as well as content that capitalized on current interest around major sporting events.” - from Fanatics case study

How strategy was decided:

“We began by forming our ideation process around Movoto’s key real estate themes. Buying, selling, or renting a home is an inherently emotional experience, so we turned to our research on viral emotions to figure out how to identify with and engage the audience and Movoto’s prospective clients. Based on this, we decided to build on the high-arousal feelings of curiosity, interest, and trust that would be part of the experience of moving.

We tapped into familiar cultural references and topics that would pique interest in the regions consumers were considering. Comic book characters served us well in this regard, as did combining publicly available data (such as high school graduation rates or IQ averages) with our own original research.” - from Movoto case study

Why strategy was changed based on initial results:

“After analyzing the initial campaigns, we determined the most effective strategy included a combination of the following content types designed to achieve different goals [case study then lists the three types of content and goals]...

This strategy yielded even better results, with some campaigns achieving up to 4 times the amount of featured stories and social engagement that we achieved in earlier campaigns.” - from BuzzStream case study

How our approach was tailored to the client’s niche:

“In general, when our promotions team starts its outreach, they’ll email writers and editors who they think would be a good fit for the content. If the writer or editor responds, they often ask for more information or say they’re going to do a write-up that incorporates our project. From there, the story is up to publishers – they pick and choose which visual assets they want to incorporate in their post, and they shape the narrative. What we discovered was that, in the marketing niche, publishers preferred to feature other experts’ opinions in the form of guest posts rather than using our assets in a piece they were already working on. We had suspected this (as our Fractl marketing team often contributes guest columns to marketing publications), but we confirmed that guest posts were going to make up the majority of our outreach efforts after performing outreach for Alexa’s campaigns.” - from Alexa case study

Who worked on the project:

Since the interviews you conduct with your internal team will inform the solution section of the case study, you may want to give individuals credit via quotes or anecdotes as a means to humanize the people behind the work. In the example below, one of our case studies featured a Q&A section with one of the project leads.

The Happy Ending: What did your resolution achieve?

Obviously, this is the part where you share your results. As I mentioned previously, we like to feature the results at the beginning of the case study, rather than buried at the end.

In our Superdrug Online Doctor case study, we summarized the overall results our campaigns achieved over 16 months:

But the happy ending isn’t finished here.

A lot of case studies fail to answer an important question: What impact did the results have on the client’s business? Be sure to tie in how the results you achieved had a bottom-line impact.

In the case of Superdrug Online Doctor, the results from our campaigns lead to a 238% increase in organic traffic. This type of outcome has tangible value for the client.

You can also share secondary benefits in addition to the primary goals the client hired you for.

In the case of our client Busbud, who hired us for SEO-oriented goals, we included examples of secondary results.

Busbud saw positive impacts beyond SEO, though, including the following:

Increased blog traffic

New partnerships as a result of more brands reaching out to work with the site

Brand recognition at large industry events

An uptick in hiring

Featured as a “best practice” case study at an SEO conference

Similarly, in our Fractl brand marketing case study, which focused on lead generation, we listed all of the additional benefits resulting from our strategy.

How to get the most out of your case studies

You’ve published your case study, now what should you do with it?

Build a case study page on your site

Once you've created several case studies, I recommend housing them all on the same page. This makes it easy to show off your results in a single snapshot and saves visitors from searching through your blog or clicking on a category tag to find all of your case studies in one place. Make this page easy to find through your site navigation and internal links.

While it probably goes without saying, make sure to optimize this page for search. When we initially created our case study portfolio page, we underestimated its potential to bring in search traffic and assumed it would mostly be accessed from our site navigation. Because of this, we were previously using a generic URL to house our case study portfolio. Since updating the URL from “frac.tl/our-work” to “http://ift.tt/2AgWZDi,” we’ve jumped from page 2 to the top #1–3 positions for a specific phrase we wanted to rank for (“content marketing case studies”), which attracts highly relevant search traffic.

Use case studies as concrete proof in blog posts and off-site content

Case studies can serve as tangible examples that back up your claims. Did you state that creating original content for six months can double your organic traffic? On its own, this assertion may not be believable to some, but a case study showing these results will make your claim credible.

In a post on the Curata blog, my colleague Andrea Lehr used our BuzzStream case study to back up her assertion that in order to attract links, social shares, and traffic, your off-site content should appeal to an audience beyond your target customer. Showing the results this strategy earned for a client gives a lot more weight to her advice.

On the same note, case studies have high linking potential. Not only do they make a credible citation for your own off-site content, they can also be cited by others writing about your service/product vertical. Making industry publishers aware that you publish case studies by reaching out when you’ve released a new case study can lead to links down the road.

Repurpose your case studies into multiple content formats

Creating a case study takes a lot of time, but fortunately it can be reused again and again in various applications.

Long-form case studies

While a case study featured on your site may only be a few hundred words, creating a more in-depth version is a chance to reveal more details. If you want to get your case study featured on other sites, consider writing a long-form version as a guest post.

Most of the case studies you’ll find on the Moz Blog are extremely detailed:

How We Ranked #1 for a High Volume Keyword in Under 3 Months walks through the 8-step process used to achieve the impressive result called out in the headline.

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study offers much greater detail and insights than the case studies featured on the Conversion Wizards site.

The Roadmap for Creating Share-Worthy Content with Massive Distribution used one of our campaign case studies to illustrate our overall process for creating shareable widely-shared content.

Video

HubSpot has hundreds of case studieson its site, dozens of which also feature supplemental video case studies, such as the one below for Eyeota.

Don’t feel like you have to create flashy videos with impressive production value, even no-frills videos can work. Within its short case study summaries, PR That Converts embeds videos of clients talking about its service. These videos are simple and short, featuring the client speaking to their webcam for a few minutes.

Speaking engagements

Marketing conferences love case studies. Look on any conference agenda, and you’re sure to notice at least a handful of speaker presentations focused on case studies. If you’re looking to secure more speaking gigs, including case studies in your speaking pitch can give you a leg up over other submissions – after all, your case studies are original data no one else can offer.

My colleague Kelsey Libert centered her MozCon presentation a few years ago around some of our viral campaign case studies.

Sales collateral

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, many of our leads view the case studies on our site right before contacting us about working together. Once that initial contact is made, we don’t stop showing off our case studies.

We keep a running “best of” list of stats from our case studies, which allows us to quickly pull compelling stats to share in written and verbal conversations. Our pitch and proposal decks feature bite-sized versions of our case studies.

Consider how you can incorporate case studies into various touch points throughout your sales process and make sure the case studies you share align with the industry and goals of whoever you're speaking with.

I’ve shared a few of my favorite ways to repurpose case studies here but there are at least a dozen other applications, from email marketing to webinars to gated content to printed marketing materials. I even link to our case studies page in my email signature.

My last bit of advice: Don’t expect immediate results. Case studies typically pay off over time. The good news is it’s worth the wait, because case studies retain their value – we’re still seeing leads come in and getting links to case studies we created three or more years ago. By extending their lifespan through repurposing, the case studies you create today can remain an essential part of your marketing strategy for years to come.

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[brokehorrorfan]

Conjuring Up Annabelle: Creation: Part 2

Annabelle: Creation, the next chapter in The Conjuring universe, opens on August 11 from Warner Bros. I sat down with director David F. Sandberg (Lights Out) and actors Talitha Bateman (Geostorm), Lulu Wilson (Ouija: Origin of Evil), Stephanie Sigman (Narcos), Anthony LaPaglia (Without a Trace), and Miranda Otto (The Lord of the Rings) to learn the real story of Annabelle. Don't miss the first half of our conversation here, then read on for the conclusion.

Sandberg, an unabashed horror film aficionado, was a fan of The Conjuring universe - which includes The Conjuring, The Conjuring 2, and the first Annabelle - long before joining it. "If anyone had told me before, 'You're going to direct an installment in that universe one day,' I wouldn't have believed them." But what attracted him to the project is that it stands on its own. "That's what got me excited, that it wasn't a straight-up sequel to the first one with the same things happening again, that it was a very different story with different characters. We didn't have to pay that much attention to the continuity." There is, of course, connective tissue that ties it to the events of the previous film, which he admits he loves.

LaPaglia didn't realize the legacy attached to the film. "I had no idea that it was such a big franchise! I'd never heard of [The Conjuring director/producer] James Wan," he chortles. "I'm like a dinosaur." Sigman knew of The Conjuring movies but was "too scared" to watch them until she signed on to appear in Annabelle: Creation. One might expect joining such a successful franchise would come with pressure, but rather it instilled assurance in Otto. "I didn't feel a pressure at all. I just felt like the whole team that had worked together before, they knew what they were doing, so that actually makes me feel really confident. I felt very confident with David. I think it's kind of a exciting to be a part of a family."

Despite being younger than the target demographic, Bateman and Wilson have seen all three of the previous installments in the franchise. However, both actresses cite their recent appearance at San Diego Comi-Con as the moment when it sunk in that they were actually a part of it. Bateman explains, "I knew what I was filming, but it didn't really hit me until I was at Comic-Con. I was like, 'Wow, we're in The Conjuring universe. Pretty cool!' But most of the time while we were filming it just felt like its own film. Even though it's all related, it felt like its own standalone project."

Unlike The Conjuring and Annabelle, no unexplained phenomena occurred on the set of Annabelle: Creation - but the cast was ready for it. "I was expecting something to happen," Wilson confesses, "Because there's that true story of the real Annabelle doll, so if it could happen to one doll it could happen to another." Even though Bateman doesn't believe in the supernatural, she concedes she was "relieved" that nothing happened, citing the fact that the set was blessed by a priest may have helped.

That blessing was performed at Sigman's behest. Upon learning that the set of The Conjuring had been blessed following strange occurrences, she requested theirs receive the same treatment as a precaution. "They blessed the set for me, so I felt better." She continues, "The energy on set was different from every other movie I've done. You're just dealing with a darker energy in general. It feels different, but nothing crazy happened - except for my fingers," explaining that she accidentally closed her hand in a car door. "The whole movie I'm acting with these huge, purple fingers." Sandberg sarcastically cracks, "We had to create all the scary stuff ourselves. Damn it!"

Everyone involved in the production reveled in the 1950s setting. "I love that time period," declares Bateman. "It's one of my favorites." Wilson adds, "It was so much fun to do a period piece. I just thought it was really cool, especially the wardrobe and the hair," though she's quick to mention that she "kind of dreaded" having bangs. Sigman appreciates those aspects as well. "I loved it because the wardrobe made me feel so much more in character." For Sandberg, "The fact that it was a period piece inspired me to shoot it more classically, to have these longer takes and to really stage and block things, plan it out more, rather than just shoot a bunch of coverage. And not having cell phones is a plus."

An integral piece to sell the period setting is the film's American Gothic-style farmhouse, the interior of which was built on the Warner Bros. backlot. Sandberg "let this great set sort of inspire the movie. You get inspired of ways of shooting it." He references the addition of a dumbwaiter by production designer Jennifer Spence as motivating a memorable scene. The attention to detail helped Bateman get into character. "When we actually got to walk around the house in the 1950s, it was just like, 'Whoa.' I think it really helped with my character." Sigman calls the set design "absolutely gorgeous." Otto cites the light shining through crosses carved into her character's bedroom as her favorite facet of the set, while LaPaglia was impressed by the detail of his doll-making workshop. "It was perfect. There was every tool, everything in there to make it feel completely real."

Bateman's face lights up when she's discussing stunts. "I actually did all my own stunts! They had a stunt person, and she did some too, but they actually ended up using mine. I thought that was really cool. I have this scene where I'm on the stairlift. I fly up at one point, and it was so much fun!" LaPaglia admired the chairlift as well. "I thought that was very cool. I wanted to ride that!" he jests. "They wouldn't let me." Wilson was also thrilled to learn she would get to do her own stunts, as she had in Ouija: Origin of Evil. "I had so much fun!"

Sandberg will bring the skills he honed on Annabelle: Creation to the DC Extended Universe for Shazam, which he recently signed on to direct. "The big takeaway is that even though the budgets change, the ways of telling stories are still the same. It's not that different. It's just that you have more expensive toys or more days to do it, which makes me not feel that worried or freaked out about the bigger budget." Wilson and Bateman have bright careers ahead as well. Wilson is currently shooting HBO's Sharp Objects, based on the novel by Gone Girl author Gillian Flynn. "It's with Amy Adams," she beams, "Which is really cool because she's one of my role models." Bateman has Geostorm coming out in October. A fan of The Phantom of the Opera, the young actress was excited to work with Gerard Butler. "He's just such a kind person. It's really cool to meet a role model when they're actually humble and they're nice. It just makes you love them more and respect them more."

Sandberg "loves to scare people," as Sigman puts it. "He's so passionate about it." The director certainly wastes no opportunity to scare the audience in Annabelle: Creation, yet he's meticulous in his approach to each one. "Sometimes, especially in Hollywood movies, they have a tendency to lead you too much with the sound," he points out. "Like, 'Oh, here comes the scare!' What I try to do is really build to that. You can make anyone jump with just a loud noise coming out of nowhere, because you don't expect it. The hard part is building up to it and still getting a scare. It becomes a matter of timing as well. I try to have you glimpse the scary thing a couple of beats before the big sound, so that your brain has that split second of 'What is that?' and then comes the sound. It's a science!" he proudly exclaims.

See Sandberg’s science of scaring in action when Annabelle: Creation hits theaters on August 11.

Several years after the tragic death of their little girl, a dollmaker and his wife welcome a nun and several girls from a shuttered orphanage into their home, soon becoming the target of the dollmaker’s possessed creation, Annabelle.

[hehashivemind]

Just saw this in my @timefiddler feed. 

...so, I used to have a similar impression of the word until I spoke with more people on the subject who are queer persons and who love the genre. I’d associated it largely with porn that’s tagged as such, and less so the larger, broader body of work that would be categorized as yuri, let alone the history of the word (and yes, there’s a history).

It was up until very recently that I had honestly stuck with “Girls Love” as the the logical step with how pervasively ubiquitous the “BL” genre was on comic sites like Tapastic (Tapas) or Webtoons. My intent with the use of GL was to signal that “there hasn’t been any sex yet.” In my head, yuri was more like Yaoi in its equivalence and connotation. 

I’d gone back and forth with a friend who’s a big yuri fan on the genre name itself and its categorization, but it wasn’t until I’d read some of Erica Friedman’s writings on the subject specifically that I changed my mind:

“[History] Why we call it Yuri”

“On Defining Yuri”

Full disclosure, Erica is a professional acquaintance of mine.

The historical nature of the genre and name, as presented by Friedman, argues the value and importance of maintaining the use of Yuri as a genre name. Due to the nature of the Japanese manga market and its own history, the term has more or less come to represent all works of fiction that are related to female x female relationships that are intimate, romantic, or physical, regardless of the gaze it falls under. Its in fact reinforced by that gaze that provides the collective framing device for the genre. The origin of the term is the most fascinating part (from “On Defining Yuri”):

[2.5] The year 1971 also saw the creation of Japan's first commercial gay magazine, Barazoku. The editor, Ito Bungaku, included a page for lesbians, which gave information on how to get in touch with lesbian organizations. In an editorial, he named gay men barazoku (rose tribe) and lesbians yurizoku (lily tribe). Yuri is the Japanese word for "lily," and so the lily flower became the de facto symbol for lesbian-themed media (note 3).

But we’re not in Japan, and we’re not in the 1970′s. So, let’s head straight forward to today, right now, and in the west. She has a rather nice summary on that as well:

5. Yuri overseas

[5.1] Once yuri leaves Japan, the term stops needing definition at all. Audiences that compose yuri fandom have adopted yuri as a term that means any narrative of love (romantic, sexual, intimate or not) between women. European anthologies of comics about lesbian romance have tagged themselves as yuri without need for further explanation (see, for instance, the Kickstarter Web site at Indiegogo for "Freya Sequential Love Stories" 2015).

[5.2] The concept of yuri has spread from Japan to overseas and from overseas fandom to non-Japanese creators who want to express their own lesbian narratives. While commercial publishers have stuck with more broadly appealing nonidentity narrative, there are leaks driven by internal pressure. Morishima Akiko's work in Comic Yuri Hime, Takashima Hiromi's work in Pure Yuri Anthology Hirari, Takemiya Jin's work for Hakusensha, and Nakamura Kiyo's autobiographical manga, all have forgotten to shy away from explicitly lesbian discussion.

[5.3] Yuri in 2016 is a genre created from mutually exclusive desires and different needs. Manga creators tell stories based in manga culture tropes rooted in 20th century lesbian community and life; commercial publishers sell to nonlesbian audiences; researchers seek to codify from a distance; and fans want stories of their own fantasies and realities. New waves of lesbian identity, with new storytellers, shape and reshape the genre as culture shifts. Yuri is constantly in flux.

I personally don’t think there’s anything wrong with GL or Girls Love, and will continue to use that alongside other qualifiers. In some markets it doesn’t make sense to use Yuri, such as the South Korean-based Webtoons, and general global markets as a whole that don’t have Japanese manga and anime as an inception point for bodies of work that would otherwise be defined specifically as Yuri.

Its just that the Japanese-made stuff is so ubiquitous and influential for people who grew up on it in one fashion or another. In terms of the current shared headspace of people who either consume or make content labeled “yuri” on the internet are much closer to what I actually do intend with Time Fiddler than I originally imagined.

[reviewsbysam]

Again, but Better

No Spoilers in this section!

Again, but Better is the debut novel of popular booktuber Christine Riccio aka polandbananasbooks. It is a fun, fast read and overall I found to be enjoyable. 

Without giving too much away, this is a story about Shane. She is an introverted 20 year old who feels as though she has been denied the full college experience due to her introversion. She decides to try and turn this all around by going to London and studying abroad.  

I feel as though Christine still has room for growth for her future books, but from the cover art, to the concept, to the title I thought this was a clever and impressive attempt at a first book.  

For a more detailed look of what I loved (and what I didn’t as much) scroll to below this picture. Spoilers below!!!

This section is full of spoilers!!! You have been warned!

I have watched Christine’s youtube channel for years so I was a tad nervous going into this book. I was nervous that I would not enjoy this book by a newbie author, but that was (thankfully) not the case. While reading I did find things that bothered me within the writing. This included the reoccurring use of describing Shane’s talking as “squeaking” at one point in the book and the constant use of exclamation marks in the dialogue. At first, these things seemed to stick out to me; however, once I got immersed into the story I noticed none of it. I was focused on the content rather than her writing style, which I personally believe to be the sign of a good author. I have seen that others disagree, but I enjoyed the flow of her writing. Overall, I was impressed by the writing itself. 

One thing I did not like as much were some of the times in which Shane was portrayed as clumsy. Immediately upon arriving she falls down the stairs and almost walks out into traffic. Both of these instances felt a little too cliche. I understand that it is a rom-com and cliches will be present to an extent, but I felt as though more subtle or creative ways could have been used to drive the point home.

I found Shane to be a likable character. It is clear that Shane is based upon Christine herself. She even admits in this in the authors note. I know some people have found a problem with this, but I didn’t at all. It felt like an easter egg hunt while reading the book to spot the similarities, which made it all the more enjoyable. It also made Shane feel more like a genuine character.

Many many many references were made to music/books/tv that Shane (and Christine) was a fan of. There were references to Lost, Harry Potter, Cassandra Clare, Taylor Swift, The Hunger Games, The Beatles, and more. As someone who is a fan of many of these topics I was excited when they were mentioned. When Pilot and Shane discuss All Too Well by Taylor Swift I felt like I might explode. My inner dialogue was somewhere along the lines of “Omg Taylor Swift again, cool. All too well? All too well! I can’t believe they are talking about the masterpiece that is All too well in this book!” That being said, I feel as though there were possibly too many references in the book. I understand why they were included, but they probably are not as fun to read for people who are not fans of those topics. This is especially true because so many of the references were part of major plot points. An Albus Dumbledore quote written on the inside cover of the Prisoner of Azkaban was a huge part in reigniting the motivation of Shane. The climax of the book in which Shane and Pilot decide to stay in 2011 is marked by him randomly appearing and playing State of Grace, Stay Stay, Stay, and You Belong With Me on the guitar. These were critical moments within the story. I also worry that having so many current references wont age well if people decide to read this book later down the line. However, having Pilot serenade me with Taylor Swift songs would also be a major swoon moment for me, so I am not complaining. 

One of the highlights of the book for me was the travel. Reading about our characters’ time in Rome left me googling pictures of it for hours after reading. The Palace of Versailles is a major point on my bucket list and reading about it was wonderful. Christine did an excellent job painting a beautiful and enticing picture of what it could be like traveling abroad and visiting different countries on the weekends. For people who love to travel, or dream of doing so, living vicariously through Shane is a delight. For this reason, I favored the front half of the book. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, the way those parts were written. Now, don’t mind me casually looking up the study abroad options my college offers. 

Somehow I have made it very far into this review without mentioning the romance at all. In reality, Pilot was mostly likable because of how we saw him through Shane’s eyes. Their witty banter was fun and I truly did feel the connection between the two of them. That being said, he had a girlfriend!!! He put Shane in the horrible position of falling for him (because yes he could have put a lid on it right in the beginning) and then making her feel guilty and hopeless because she didn’t want to be “the other woman.” It was upsetting considering he didn’t even feel much for Amy and stayed with her for six. more. years. Then, he goes MIA when Shane needed him most. He did try to keep her parents from finding out about her lying to them, but then after the fact, when the damage was done, he didn’t give her the support she needed from her friend. Pilot is not all bad though and I did like him throughout the book. It’s just in hindsight he handled things poorly. Although, that was probably the point considering this was all during Take One when things went badly and hence why they needed to be done again, but better. In fact, it made for a much clearer juxtaposition between their first time in 2011 and their 2011/2017 selves, because the second time around Amy was (for the most part) out of the picture. Additionally, I loved how much Pilot really did seem to care for her. He shined in the moments that he tried to distract her when she was upset and helped her through crisis (such as when she lost her purse and almost got mugged).

There are moments of the book I wish we could have expanded upon more. I loved when the whole gang would get together. Babe seemed like an amazing best friend to have! I was left wanting to know more about Leo and his story. I thought it was a very good little twist when Shane messaged him back the second time around and we found out he needed her more than she needed him. His character became much more 3 dimensional, but I was still left wanting more of him. Also, when Chad (more on him later) kissed Shane, I felt like that was a big moment. I felt as though the story kind of brushed by it. I couldn’t believe that Shane wasn’t more upset with how poorly her first kiss had gone or that Pilot wasn’t more upset about it. 

I though the touch of magic in the book was nice, but could have used a tad more explanation. I guess that’s the thing about magic, its a mystery. 

Now, circling back to Chad. He was the most stereotypical douche guy ever. This felt intentional on Christine’s part so it didn’t bother me. His character seemed to even border on satirical. The fact that she used the name Chad which is often used to make jokes about frat guys who say “bro” and just care about drinking... hilarious. It felt like an inside joke with the reader. 

Another really comical thing from the book were the deleted scenes. The cover of Wrecking Ball was already funny, and the girls who were fans of it scoffing at Miley Cyrus’ version made it even better. It felt like a good choice to leave it out of the book, but I’m glad it was included at the end. 

Overall, the thing that made me happiest in the book was that although it was a romance it did not make romance the center of Shane’s life. She was a driven character with dreams and ambition. She wasn’t just a brainless lovestruck girl sitting around thinking about Pilot. When Shane began not putting enough focus on her career because of Pilot, she left him. During this time we didn’t read about Pilot at all. She worked hard, was focused, and flourished. She spent more time with her friends and continued to travel. It was such an amazing message for girls and is one of the main reasons I thought Shane was a great main character. Pilot also valued her success over their relationship. When he saw that she got published he continued to stay away from her so that she could continue killing the game without him as a distraction. In the end they were able to find a balance between romance and work including reading dates (something I loved because I regularly do it with my boyfriend) which I thought was really important. Her becoming a successful writer was just as big of a deal as her ending up with the guy. She also cared about his success which was sweet. Shane motivated Pilot to start a Youtube channel and gain exposure. Apparently it worked because when he stays with her Pilot ends up achieving his dreams, unlike when he ended up with Amy the first time. 

All in all I was happy with this book. i obviously had a lot to say about it and forced myself to stop here. Overall, I give it an 80%. I can’t wait to read Christine’s next book and to see how she improves as a writer. 

I’d love to know what you though about it!

[tainghekhongdaycomvn]

How to Write Marketing Case Studies That Convert

How to Write Marketing Case Studies That Convert

Posted by kerryjones

In my last post, I discussed why your top funnel content shouldn’t be all about your brand. Today I’m making a 180-degree turn and covering the value of content at the opposite end of the spectrum: content that’s directly about your business and offers proof of your effectiveness.

Specifically, I’m talking about case studies.

I’m a big believer in investing in case studies because I’ve seen firsthand what happened once we started doing so at Fractl. Case studies were a huge game changer for our B2B marketing efforts. For one, our case studies portfolio page brings in a lot of traffic – it’s the second most-visited page on our site, aside from our home page. It also brings in a significant volume of organic traffic, being our fourth most-visited page from organic searches. Most importantly, our case studies are highly effective at converting visitors to leads – about half of our leads view at least one of our case studies before contacting us.

Assuming anyone who reads the Moz Blog is performing some type of marketing function, I’m zeroing in on how to write a compelling marketing case study that differentiates your service offering and pulls prospects down the sales funnel. However, what I’m sharing can be used as a framework for creating case studies in any industry.

Get your client on board with a case study

Marketers shy away from creating case studies for a few reasons:

They’re too busy “in the weeds” with deliverables.

They don’t think their results are impressive enough.

They don’t have clients’ permission to create case studies.

While I can’t help you with #1 and #2 (it’s up to you to make the time and to get the results deserving of a case study!), I do have some advice on #3.

In a perfect world, clients would encourage you to share every little detail of your time working together. In reality, most clients expect you to remain tight-lipped about the work you’ve done for them.

Understandably, this might discourage you from creating any case studies. But it shouldn’t.

With some compromising, chances are your client will be game for a case study. We’ve noticed the following two objections are common regarding case studies.

Client objection 1: “We don’t want to share specific numbers.”

At first it you may think, “Why bother?” if a client tells you this, but don’t let it hold you back. (Truth is, the majority of your clients will probably feel this way).

In this instance, you’ll want your case study to focus on highlighting the strategy and describing projects, while steering away from showing specific numbers regarding short and long-term results. Believe it or not, the solution part of the case study can be just as, or more, compelling than the results. (I’ll get to that shortly.)

And don’t worry, you don’t have to completely leave out the results. One way to get around not sharing actual numbers but still showing results is to use growth percentages.

Specific numbers: “Grew organic traffic from 5,000 to 7,500 visitors per month”

Growth percentage: “Increased organic traffic by 150%”

We do this for most of our case studies at Fractl, and our clients are totally fine with it.

Client objection 2: “We don’t want to reveal our marketing strategy to competitors.”

A fear of giving away too much intel to competitors is especially common in highly competitive niches.

So how do you get around this?

Keep it anonymous. Don’t reveal who the client is and keep it vague about what niche they’re in. This can be as ambiguous as referring to the client as “Client A” or slightly more specific (“our client in the auto industry”). Instead, the case study will focus on the process and results – this is what your prospects care about, anyway.

Gather different perspectives

Unless you were directly working with the client who you are writing the case study about, you will need to conduct a few interviews to get a full picture of the who, what, how, and why of the engagement. At Fractl, our marketing team puts together case studies based on interviews with clients and the internal team who worked on the client’s account.

The client

Arrange an interview with the client, either on a call or via email. If you have multiple contacts within the client’s team, interview the main point of contact who has been the most involved in the engagement.

What to ask:

What challenge were you facing that you hired us to help with?

Had you previously tried to solve this challenge (working with another vendor, using internal resources, etc.)?

What were your goals for the engagement?

How did you benefit from the engagement (short-term and long-term results, unexpected wins, etc.)?

You’ll also want to run the case study draft by the client before publishing it, which offers another chance for their feedback.

The project team

Who was responsible for this client’s account? Speak with the team behind the strategy and execution.

What to ask:

How was the strategy formed? Were strategic decisions made based on your experience and expertise, competitive research, etc.?

What project(s) were launched as part of the strategy? What was the most successful project?

Were there any unexpected issues that you overcame?

Did you refine the strategy to improve results?

How did you and the client work together? Was there a lot of collaboration or was the client more hands-off? (Many prospective clients are curious about what their level of involvement in your process would look like.)

What did you learn during the engagement? Any takeaways?

Include the three crucial elements of a case study

There’s more than one way to package case studies, but the most convincing ones all have something in common: great storytelling. To ensure you’re telling a proper narrative, your case study should include the conflict, the resolution, and the happy ending (but not necessarily in this order).

We find a case study is most compelling when you get straight to the point, rather than making someone read the entire case study before seeing the results. To grab readers’ attention, we begin with a quick overview of conflict-resolution-happy ending right in the introduction.

For example, in our Fanatics case study, we summarized the most pertinent details in the first three paragraphs. The rest of the case study focused on the resolution and examples of specific projects.

Let’s take a look at what the conflict, resolution, and happy ending of your case study should include.

The Conflict: What goal did the client want to accomplish?

Typically serving as the introduction of the case study, “the conflict” should briefly describe the client’s business, the problem they hired you to work on, and what was keeping them from fixing this problem (ex. lack of internal resources or internal expertise). This helps readers identify with the problem the client faced and empathize with them – which can help them envision coming to you for help with this problem, too.

Here are a few examples of “conflicts” from our case studies:

“Movoto engaged Fractl to showcase its authority on local markets by increasing brand recognition, driving traffic to its website, and earning links back to on-site content.”

“Alexa came to us looking to increase awareness – not just around the Alexa name but also its resources. Many people had known Alexa as the site-ranking destination; however, Alexa also provides SEO tools that are invaluable to marketers.”

“While they already had strong brand recognition within the link building and SEO communities, Buzzstream came to Fractl for help with launching large-scale campaigns that would position them as thought leaders and provide long-term value for their brand.”

The Resolution: How did you solve the conflict?

Case studies are obviously great for showing proof of results you’ve achieved for clients. But perhaps more importantly, case studies give prospective clients a glimpse into your processes and how you approach problems. A great case study paints a picture of what it’s like to work with you.

For this reason, the bulk of your case study should detail the resolution, sharing as much specific information as you and your client are comfortable with; the more you’re able to share, the more you can highlight your strategic thinking and problem solving abilities.

The following snippets from our case studies are examples of details you may want to include as part of your solution section:

What our strategy encompassed:

“Mixing evergreen content and timely content helped usher new and existing audience members to the We Are Fanatics blog in record numbers. We focused on presenting interesting data through evergreen content that appealed to a variety of sports fans as well as content that capitalized on current interest around major sporting events.” - from Fanatics case study

How strategy was decided:

“We began by forming our ideation process around Movoto’s key real estate themes. Buying, selling, or renting a home is an inherently emotional experience, so we turned to our research on viral emotions to figure out how to identify with and engage the audience and Movoto’s prospective clients. Based on this, we decided to build on the high-arousal feelings of curiosity, interest, and trust that would be part of the experience of moving.

We tapped into familiar cultural references and topics that would pique interest in the regions consumers were considering. Comic book characters served us well in this regard, as did combining publicly available data (such as high school graduation rates or IQ averages) with our own original research.” - from Movoto case study

Why strategy was changed based on initial results:

“After analyzing the initial campaigns, we determined the most effective strategy included a combination of the following content types designed to achieve different goals [case study then lists the three types of content and goals]...

This strategy yielded even better results, with some campaigns achieving up to 4 times the amount of featured stories and social engagement that we achieved in earlier campaigns.” - from BuzzStream case study

How our approach was tailored to the client’s niche:

“In general, when our promotions team starts its outreach, they’ll email writers and editors who they think would be a good fit for the content. If the writer or editor responds, they often ask for more information or say they’re going to do a write-up that incorporates our project. From there, the story is up to publishers – they pick and choose which visual assets they want to incorporate in their post, and they shape the narrative. What we discovered was that, in the marketing niche, publishers preferred to feature other experts’ opinions in the form of guest posts rather than using our assets in a piece they were already working on. We had suspected this (as our Fractl marketing team often contributes guest columns to marketing publications), but we confirmed that guest posts were going to make up the majority of our outreach efforts after performing outreach for Alexa’s campaigns.” - from Alexa case study

Who worked on the project:

Since the interviews you conduct with your internal team will inform the solution section of the case study, you may want to give individuals credit via quotes or anecdotes as a means to humanize the people behind the work. In the example below, one of our case studies featured a Q&A section with one of the project leads.

The Happy Ending: What did your resolution achieve?

Obviously, this is the part where you share your results. As I mentioned previously, we like to feature the results at the beginning of the case study, rather than buried at the end.

In our Superdrug Online Doctor case study, we summarized the overall results our campaigns achieved over 16 months:

But the happy ending isn’t finished here.

A lot of case studies fail to answer an important question: What impact did the results have on the client’s business? Be sure to tie in how the results you achieved had a bottom-line impact.

In the case of Superdrug Online Doctor, the results from our campaigns lead to a 238% increase in organic traffic. This type of outcome has tangible value for the client.

You can also share secondary benefits in addition to the primary goals the client hired you for.

In the case of our client Busbud, who hired us for SEO-oriented goals, we included examples of secondary results.

Busbud saw positive impacts beyond SEO, though, including the following:

Increased blog traffic

New partnerships as a result of more brands reaching out to work with the site

Brand recognition at large industry events

An uptick in hiring

Featured as a “best practice” case study at an SEO conference

Similarly, in our Fractl brand marketing case study, which focused on lead generation, we listed all of the additional benefits resulting from our strategy.

How to get the most out of your case studies

You’ve published your case study, now what should you do with it?

Build a case study page on your site

Once you've created several case studies, I recommend housing them all on the same page. This makes it easy to show off your results in a single snapshot and saves visitors from searching through your blog or clicking on a category tag to find all of your case studies in one place. Make this page easy to find through your site navigation and internal links.

While it probably goes without saying, make sure to optimize this page for search. When we initially created our case study portfolio page, we underestimated its potential to bring in search traffic and assumed it would mostly be accessed from our site navigation. Because of this, we were previously using a generic URL to house our case study portfolio. Since updating the URL from “frac.tl/our-work” to “http://ift.tt/2AgWZDi,” we’ve jumped from page 2 to the top #1–3 positions for a specific phrase we wanted to rank for (“content marketing case studies”), which attracts highly relevant search traffic.

Use case studies as concrete proof in blog posts and off-site content

Case studies can serve as tangible examples that back up your claims. Did you state that creating original content for six months can double your organic traffic? On its own, this assertion may not be believable to some, but a case study showing these results will make your claim credible.

In a post on the Curata blog, my colleague Andrea Lehr used our BuzzStream case study to back up her assertion that in order to attract links, social shares, and traffic, your off-site content should appeal to an audience beyond your target customer. Showing the results this strategy earned for a client gives a lot more weight to her advice.

On the same note, case studies have high linking potential. Not only do they make a credible citation for your own off-site content, they can also be cited by others writing about your service/product vertical. Making industry publishers aware that you publish case studies by reaching out when you’ve released a new case study can lead to links down the road.

Repurpose your case studies into multiple content formats

Creating a case study takes a lot of time, but fortunately it can be reused again and again in various applications.

Long-form case studies

While a case study featured on your site may only be a few hundred words, creating a more in-depth version is a chance to reveal more details. If you want to get your case study featured on other sites, consider writing a long-form version as a guest post.

Most of the case studies you’ll find on the Moz Blog are extremely detailed:

How We Ranked #1 for a High Volume Keyword in Under 3 Months walks through the 8-step process used to achieve the impressive result called out in the headline.

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study offers much greater detail and insights than the case studies featured on the Conversion Wizards site.

The Roadmap for Creating Share-Worthy Content with Massive Distribution used one of our campaign case studies to illustrate our overall process for creating shareable widely-shared content.

Video

HubSpot has hundreds of case studieson its site, dozens of which also feature supplemental video case studies, such as the one below for Eyeota.

Don’t feel like you have to create flashy videos with impressive production value, even no-frills videos can work. Within its short case study summaries, PR That Converts embeds videos of clients talking about its service. These videos are simple and short, featuring the client speaking to their webcam for a few minutes.

Speaking engagements

Marketing conferences love case studies. Look on any conference agenda, and you’re sure to notice at least a handful of speaker presentations focused on case studies. If you’re looking to secure more speaking gigs, including case studies in your speaking pitch can give you a leg up over other submissions – after all, your case studies are original data no one else can offer.

My colleague Kelsey Libert centered her MozCon presentation a few years ago around some of our viral campaign case studies.

Sales collateral

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, many of our leads view the case studies on our site right before contacting us about working together. Once that initial contact is made, we don’t stop showing off our case studies.

We keep a running “best of” list of stats from our case studies, which allows us to quickly pull compelling stats to share in written and verbal conversations. Our pitch and proposal decks feature bite-sized versions of our case studies.

Consider how you can incorporate case studies into various touch points throughout your sales process and make sure the case studies you share align with the industry and goals of whoever you're speaking with.

I’ve shared a few of my favorite ways to repurpose case studies here but there are at least a dozen other applications, from email marketing to webinars to gated content to printed marketing materials. I even link to our case studies page in my email signature.

My last bit of advice: Don’t expect immediate results. Case studies typically pay off over time. The good news is it’s worth the wait, because case studies retain their value – we’re still seeing leads come in and getting links to case studies we created three or more years ago. By extending their lifespan through repurposing, the case studies you create today can remain an essential part of your marketing strategy for years to come.

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[lawrenceseitz22]

How to Write Marketing Case Studies That Convert

Posted by kerryjones

In my last post, I discussed why your top funnel content shouldn’t be all about your brand. Today I’m making a 180-degree turn and covering the value of content at the opposite end of the spectrum: content that’s directly about your business and offers proof of your effectiveness.

Specifically, I’m talking about case studies.

I’m a big believer in investing in case studies because I’ve seen firsthand what happened once we started doing so at Fractl. Case studies were a huge game changer for our B2B marketing efforts. For one, our case studies portfolio page brings in a lot of traffic – it’s the second most-visited page on our site, aside from our home page. It also brings in a significant volume of organic traffic, being our fourth most-visited page from organic searches. Most importantly, our case studies are highly effective at converting visitors to leads – about half of our leads view at least one of our case studies before contacting us.

Assuming anyone who reads the Moz Blog is performing some type of marketing function, I’m zeroing in on how to write a compelling marketing case study that differentiates your service offering and pulls prospects down the sales funnel. However, what I’m sharing can be used as a framework for creating case studies in any industry.

Get your client on board with a case study

Marketers shy away from creating case studies for a few reasons:

They’re too busy “in the weeds” with deliverables.

They don’t think their results are impressive enough.

They don’t have clients’ permission to create case studies.

While I can’t help you with #1 and #2 (it’s up to you to make the time and to get the results deserving of a case study!), I do have some advice on #3.

In a perfect world, clients would encourage you to share every little detail of your time working together. In reality, most clients expect you to remain tight-lipped about the work you’ve done for them.

Understandably, this might discourage you from creating any case studies. But it shouldn’t.

With some compromising, chances are your client will be game for a case study. We’ve noticed the following two objections are common regarding case studies.

Client objection 1: “We don’t want to share specific numbers.”

At first it you may think, “Why bother?” if a client tells you this, but don’t let it hold you back. (Truth is, the majority of your clients will probably feel this way).

In this instance, you’ll want your case study to focus on highlighting the strategy and describing projects, while steering away from showing specific numbers regarding short and long-term results. Believe it or not, the solution part of the case study can be just as, or more, compelling than the results. (I’ll get to that shortly.)

And don’t worry, you don’t have to completely leave out the results. One way to get around not sharing actual numbers but still showing results is to use growth percentages.

Specific numbers: “Grew organic traffic from 5,000 to 7,500 visitors per month”

Growth percentage: “Increased organic traffic by 150%”

We do this for most of our case studies at Fractl, and our clients are totally fine with it.

Client objection 2: “We don’t want to reveal our marketing strategy to competitors.”

A fear of giving away too much intel to competitors is especially common in highly competitive niches.

So how do you get around this?

Keep it anonymous. Don’t reveal who the client is and keep it vague about what niche they’re in. This can be as ambiguous as referring to the client as “Client A” or slightly more specific (“our client in the auto industry”). Instead, the case study will focus on the process and results – this is what your prospects care about, anyway.

Gather different perspectives

Unless you were directly working with the client who you are writing the case study about, you will need to conduct a few interviews to get a full picture of the who, what, how, and why of the engagement. At Fractl, our marketing team puts together case studies based on interviews with clients and the internal team who worked on the client’s account.

The client

Arrange an interview with the client, either on a call or via email. If you have multiple contacts within the client’s team, interview the main point of contact who has been the most involved in the engagement.

What to ask:

What challenge were you facing that you hired us to help with?

Had you previously tried to solve this challenge (working with another vendor, using internal resources, etc.)?

What were your goals for the engagement?

How did you benefit from the engagement (short-term and long-term results, unexpected wins, etc.)?

You’ll also want to run the case study draft by the client before publishing it, which offers another chance for their feedback.

The project team

Who was responsible for this client’s account? Speak with the team behind the strategy and execution.

What to ask:

How was the strategy formed? Were strategic decisions made based on your experience and expertise, competitive research, etc.?

What project(s) were launched as part of the strategy? What was the most successful project?

Were there any unexpected issues that you overcame?

Did you refine the strategy to improve results?

How did you and the client work together? Was there a lot of collaboration or was the client more hands-off? (Many prospective clients are curious about what their level of involvement in your process would look like.)

What did you learn during the engagement? Any takeaways?

Include the three crucial elements of a case study

There’s more than one way to package case studies, but the most convincing ones all have something in common: great storytelling. To ensure you’re telling a proper narrative, your case study should include the conflict, the resolution, and the happy ending (but not necessarily in this order).

We find a case study is most compelling when you get straight to the point, rather than making someone read the entire case study before seeing the results. To grab readers’ attention, we begin with a quick overview of conflict-resolution-happy ending right in the introduction.

For example, in our Fanatics case study, we summarized the most pertinent details in the first three paragraphs. The rest of the case study focused on the resolution and examples of specific projects.

Let’s take a look at what the conflict, resolution, and happy ending of your case study should include.

The Conflict: What goal did the client want to accomplish?

Typically serving as the introduction of the case study, “the conflict” should briefly describe the client’s business, the problem they hired you to work on, and what was keeping them from fixing this problem (ex. lack of internal resources or internal expertise). This helps readers identify with the problem the client faced and empathize with them – which can help them envision coming to you for help with this problem, too.

Here are a few examples of “conflicts” from our case studies:

“Movoto engaged Fractl to showcase its authority on local markets by increasing brand recognition, driving traffic to its website, and earning links back to on-site content.”

“Alexa came to us looking to increase awareness – not just around the Alexa name but also its resources. Many people had known Alexa as the site-ranking destination; however, Alexa also provides SEO tools that are invaluable to marketers.”

“While they already had strong brand recognition within the link building and SEO communities, Buzzstream came to Fractl for help with launching large-scale campaigns that would position them as thought leaders and provide long-term value for their brand.”

The Resolution: How did you solve the conflict?

Case studies are obviously great for showing proof of results you’ve achieved for clients. But perhaps more importantly, case studies give prospective clients a glimpse into your processes and how you approach problems. A great case study paints a picture of what it’s like to work with you.

For this reason, the bulk of your case study should detail the resolution, sharing as much specific information as you and your client are comfortable with; the more you’re able to share, the more you can highlight your strategic thinking and problem solving abilities.

The following snippets from our case studies are examples of details you may want to include as part of your solution section:

What our strategy encompassed:

“Mixing evergreen content and timely content helped usher new and existing audience members to the We Are Fanatics blog in record numbers. We focused on presenting interesting data through evergreen content that appealed to a variety of sports fans as well as content that capitalized on current interest around major sporting events.” - from Fanatics case study

How strategy was decided:

“We began by forming our ideation process around Movoto’s key real estate themes. Buying, selling, or renting a home is an inherently emotional experience, so we turned to our research on viral emotions to figure out how to identify with and engage the audience and Movoto’s prospective clients. Based on this, we decided to build on the high-arousal feelings of curiosity, interest, and trust that would be part of the experience of moving.

We tapped into familiar cultural references and topics that would pique interest in the regions consumers were considering. Comic book characters served us well in this regard, as did combining publicly available data (such as high school graduation rates or IQ averages) with our own original research.” - from Movoto case study

Why strategy was changed based on initial results:

“After analyzing the initial campaigns, we determined the most effective strategy included a combination of the following content types designed to achieve different goals [case study then lists the three types of content and goals]...

This strategy yielded even better results, with some campaigns achieving up to 4 times the amount of featured stories and social engagement that we achieved in earlier campaigns.” - from BuzzStream case study

How our approach was tailored to the client’s niche:

“In general, when our promotions team starts its outreach, they’ll email writers and editors who they think would be a good fit for the content. If the writer or editor responds, they often ask for more information or say they’re going to do a write-up that incorporates our project. From there, the story is up to publishers – they pick and choose which visual assets they want to incorporate in their post, and they shape the narrative. What we discovered was that, in the marketing niche, publishers preferred to feature other experts’ opinions in the form of guest posts rather than using our assets in a piece they were already working on. We had suspected this (as our Fractl marketing team often contributes guest columns to marketing publications), but we confirmed that guest posts were going to make up the majority of our outreach efforts after performing outreach for Alexa’s campaigns.” - from Alexa case study

Who worked on the project:

Since the interviews you conduct with your internal team will inform the solution section of the case study, you may want to give individuals credit via quotes or anecdotes as a means to humanize the people behind the work. In the example below, one of our case studies featured a Q&A section with one of the project leads.

The Happy Ending: What did your resolution achieve?

Obviously, this is the part where you share your results. As I mentioned previously, we like to feature the results at the beginning of the case study, rather than buried at the end.

In our Superdrug Online Doctor case study, we summarized the overall results our campaigns achieved over 16 months:

But the happy ending isn’t finished here.

A lot of case studies fail to answer an important question: What impact did the results have on the client’s business? Be sure to tie in how the results you achieved had a bottom-line impact.

In the case of Superdrug Online Doctor, the results from our campaigns lead to a 238% increase in organic traffic. This type of outcome has tangible value for the client.

You can also share secondary benefits in addition to the primary goals the client hired you for.

In the case of our client Busbud, who hired us for SEO-oriented goals, we included examples of secondary results.

Busbud saw positive impacts beyond SEO, though, including the following:

Increased blog traffic

New partnerships as a result of more brands reaching out to work with the site

Brand recognition at large industry events

An uptick in hiring

Featured as a “best practice” case study at an SEO conference

Similarly, in our Fractl brand marketing case study, which focused on lead generation, we listed all of the additional benefits resulting from our strategy.

How to get the most out of your case studies

You’ve published your case study, now what should you do with it?

Build a case study page on your site

Once you've created several case studies, I recommend housing them all on the same page. This makes it easy to show off your results in a single snapshot and saves visitors from searching through your blog or clicking on a category tag to find all of your case studies in one place. Make this page easy to find through your site navigation and internal links.

While it probably goes without saying, make sure to optimize this page for search. When we initially created our case study portfolio page, we underestimated its potential to bring in search traffic and assumed it would mostly be accessed from our site navigation. Because of this, we were previously using a generic URL to house our case study portfolio. Since updating the URL from “frac.tl/our-work” to “http://ift.tt/2AgWZDi,” we’ve jumped from page 2 to the top #1–3 positions for a specific phrase we wanted to rank for (“content marketing case studies”), which attracts highly relevant search traffic.

Use case studies as concrete proof in blog posts and off-site content

Case studies can serve as tangible examples that back up your claims. Did you state that creating original content for six months can double your organic traffic? On its own, this assertion may not be believable to some, but a case study showing these results will make your claim credible.

In a post on the Curata blog, my colleague Andrea Lehr used our BuzzStream case study to back up her assertion that in order to attract links, social shares, and traffic, your off-site content should appeal to an audience beyond your target customer. Showing the results this strategy earned for a client gives a lot more weight to her advice.

On the same note, case studies have high linking potential. Not only do they make a credible citation for your own off-site content, they can also be cited by others writing about your service/product vertical. Making industry publishers aware that you publish case studies by reaching out when you’ve released a new case study can lead to links down the road.

Repurpose your case studies into multiple content formats

Creating a case study takes a lot of time, but fortunately it can be reused again and again in various applications.

Long-form case studies

While a case study featured on your site may only be a few hundred words, creating a more in-depth version is a chance to reveal more details. If you want to get your case study featured on other sites, consider writing a long-form version as a guest post.

Most of the case studies you’ll find on the Moz Blog are extremely detailed:

How We Ranked #1 for a High Volume Keyword in Under 3 Months walks through the 8-step process used to achieve the impressive result called out in the headline.

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study offers much greater detail and insights than the case studies featured on the Conversion Wizards site.

The Roadmap for Creating Share-Worthy Content with Massive Distribution used one of our campaign case studies to illustrate our overall process for creating shareable widely-shared content.

Video

HubSpot has hundreds of case studieson its site, dozens of which also feature supplemental video case studies, such as the one below for Eyeota.

Don’t feel like you have to create flashy videos with impressive production value, even no-frills videos can work. Within its short case study summaries, PR That Converts embeds videos of clients talking about its service. These videos are simple and short, featuring the client speaking to their webcam for a few minutes.

Speaking engagements

Marketing conferences love case studies. Look on any conference agenda, and you’re sure to notice at least a handful of speaker presentations focused on case studies. If you’re looking to secure more speaking gigs, including case studies in your speaking pitch can give you a leg up over other submissions – after all, your case studies are original data no one else can offer.

My colleague Kelsey Libert centered her MozCon presentation a few years ago around some of our viral campaign case studies.

Sales collateral

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, many of our leads view the case studies on our site right before contacting us about working together. Once that initial contact is made, we don’t stop showing off our case studies.

We keep a running “best of” list of stats from our case studies, which allows us to quickly pull compelling stats to share in written and verbal conversations. Our pitch and proposal decks feature bite-sized versions of our case studies.

Consider how you can incorporate case studies into various touch points throughout your sales process and make sure the case studies you share align with the industry and goals of whoever you're speaking with.

I’ve shared a few of my favorite ways to repurpose case studies here but there are at least a dozen other applications, from email marketing to webinars to gated content to printed marketing materials. I even link to our case studies page in my email signature.

My last bit of advice: Don’t expect immediate results. Case studies typically pay off over time. The good news is it’s worth the wait, because case studies retain their value – we’re still seeing leads come in and getting links to case studies we created three or more years ago. By extending their lifespan through repurposing, the case studies you create today can remain an essential part of your marketing strategy for years to come.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

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[recentanimenews]

INTERVIEW: Lodoss Creator Ryo Mizuno Discusses Inspirations and Bringing Record of Grancrest War to Mobile

  Ryo Mizuno is a legend in the realm of fantasy anime, from his work on seminal classic Record of Lodoss War to his return to those themes in Record of Grancrest War. The latter recently came to life in the form of mobile hack-and-slash action game Record of Grancrest War: Quartet Conflict, and we had the opportunity to speak with both Ryo Mizuno and one of the game's producers, Yurika Tsukita, about the project. Dive in below for a closer look at Mizuno's inspirations, the Lodoss-Grancrest connection, and what it takes to bring his wide-eyed fantasy concepts to the world of video games.

  ***

  The spirit of Record of Lodoss War lives on in Record of Grancrest War, and your works along these lines have attracted a ton of attention for decades now. What is it about Lodoss and related material that keeps you inspired and motivated to create? 

  Ryo Mizuno: In the end, I enjoy writing about how, in extreme situations like war, people push themselves to their mental and physical limits in order to uphold their principles and achieve their goals. In reality, it unfortunately seems like most wars happen for more base reasons, but in fiction, the story really comes to life when different characters with different end goals and viewpoints can only resolve their differences by clashing on the battlefield. I don't actually give that much thought to who's right or wrong; I simply write about how they are forced to fight because of their differences and how that resolve pushes both parties to do their best to win on the battlefield. I feel these are the kinds of stories that especially need to be written during times of peace.

    For Lodoss fans who have yet to dip into Grancrest War, can you elaborate on how the two are connected despite being set in different worlds? Are there grander connections beyond the RPG roots of Lodoss and the RPG sourcebook for Grancrest War? 

  They may not be connected in terms of worldview, but Record of Grancrest War is designed to allow for easy tie-ins with all sorts of other worlds and that definitely includes Lodoss.

  I did also plan both Grancrest and Lodoss's worlds to be easily adaptable for tabletop RPGs, so in that sense they may well have that in common, but of course their systems and settings are quite different. That said, unlike my other works, Grancrest's world is explicitly designed to enable crossovers, so official collaborations can certainly happen that way.

  What is the secret ingredient for capturing the unique feel of a tabletop role-playing campaign in the form of anime series like Lodoss War and Grancrest War?

  I think it has to do with not overtly leading the viewer down the path of the scenarios I've come up with too much. In tabletop games, game masters come up with a variety of different situations for their players and it's the actions the players take in response to those situations that move the story forward. When running a game, you don't want to lead players by the nose down the story you've already prepared. It's more fun for all involved if you only lay down some ground rules so they don't disruptively exceed the bounds of the game, but otherwise let them run around freely and do what they want within those bounds, meeting them halfway with the story.

    How involved were you in the development of Record of Grancrest War: Quartet Conflict? Did you pen original scenarios for the game?

  No, I let other people handle that, so I only saw the finished product. When it was done, I tried it out and enjoyed it. *laughs* I did pass on some requests I had for things I wanted to see afterwards, though.

  Back when Record of Lodoss War was originally created, documenting and adapting a tabletop role-playing session was a novel concept. Today there are podcasts, video series, and many other examples of turning these RPGs into a narrative experience for an audience. How do you think you would have approached the Lodoss material differently today?

  Well, videos are really big right now, so if I were my younger self in this day and age, I think I'd try to become a YouTuber or even a virtual one. Virtual YouTubers can still use their natural voice, which makes for really interesting results. I think it's especially well suited to replays.

  You're one of the undisputed kings of fantasy anime. What are some of the essential fantasy stories—whether it's in the form of books, movies, games, or tabletop RPGs—that inspire you? 

  The Lord of the Rings. Even more so than the actual story, it's the world it describes. I've re-read its dictionary countless times; I always appreciate and enjoy how much detail went into its setting.

  For science fiction, I enjoy Dune and I generally like works with a firmly established worldview. In Japan, I've been impressed by the Locke the Superman comic and really any work with a long-running history of its universe.

  Of course, when you get to something like Perry Rhodan, there are far too many examples to list, but again, in terms of world-building I enjoy works with detailed settings; it's the kind of style I aspire to in my own writing.

    For the producers of Quartet Conflict, can you tell us a little about the process of taking Mizuno-san's series and turning it into an action-RPG? What did you find was most important when attempting to capture the spirit of Grancrest War?

  Yurika Tsukita: I feel like the highly detailed characters are really the heart of this work. They all think and act in their own ways, just like real people, and they express themselves accordingly. So for the game, we're focused on highlighting each character's individuality and also pay special attention to their skills. We're also working on scenarios that delve deeper into the characters, which I hope players will enjoy as an opportunity to better get to know and like them.

  Can you elaborate on the game's ongoing Faction War and how it will develop over the course of the game?

  Guild battles take place every weekend and offer some really nice rewards based on how much players contribute and how well their faction does. I hope they lead to teams coming together and fighting some really intense battles against each other. Players can also get better and bigger rewards as they get stronger and contribute more. We're planning to add more maps and rules to guilds as time goes on, so I hope the players look forward to that. 

  Are there other regular updates players can look forward to after the game launches? 

  We're planning to add special login bonuses and expand the game, so I hope that players are excited about its release. 

    This is for both Mizuno-san and Tsukita-san: Beyond the obvious choice of Record of Grancrest War, are there any other recent anime or manga series you keep up with?

  Mizuno: When it comes to properties available overseas, I've enjoyed things like Land of the Lustrous. That one works both as fantasy and as its own unique world. For comics, I thought Delicious in Dungeon was really interesting. To me, it felt nostalgic, like Wizardry's world coming to life as a manga. In recent chapters, it's been going its own, darker way and I can tell it's doing so intentionally. Ms. Kui, the writer, had never really written anything dark before, so I'm excited to see where she takes it from here.

  Tsukita: I've been keeping up with the new SWORD ART ONLINE anime series, Alicization, along with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind. Manga-wise, I love Weekly Shonen Jump and never miss an issue, but I'm currently really into Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. That one has an anime starting in January and I can't wait to check it out.

  ***

  I'd like to thank Mizuno-san, Tsukita-san, and the fine folks at Bandai Namco Entertainment for setting up this interview! If you're at Anime NYC this weekend, they have a few activities you can check out, including an interactive photo booth—with the option to choose between Union or Alliance-themed photo frames—prize giveaways, game kiosks featuring Quartet Conflict, and an in-game promotion that offers up rewards for players who log in between 11/16 and 12/25. 

  -------

Joseph Luster is the Games and Web editor at Otaku USA Magazine. You can read his webcomic, BIG DUMB FIGHTING IDIOTS at subhumanzoids. Follow him on Twitter @Moldilox. 

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com