#my fp doesn't even give a shit about me

[fitzhastoomanysideblogs]

DUDE WAIT even on twitter and instagram people aren't really interacting with me anymore. Oh god this actually is happening huh. I'm going to be mass abandoned by literally everyone

[angeltism]

I should deactivate actually

[seaurchin0]

MAKE A FULL GUIDE BRO PLS PLS PLS PLS PLS I WOULD EAT THAT SHIT UP!! /nf

oh man, this gonna be a long one but ty for letting me infodump about my interests </3 my overall advice would be to be creative, and DON'T underestimate how intertwined social media is with everyday life. Experiment, see what works, and good luck <33

so a lot depends if you know the person in question irl or online and i'll go over both but first, here are some things that help in both cases: -names are not necessary to find people, useful af but info like what school they go to, class they're in, clubs they're in etc do better -look at their friends, their friends' friends, family, tagged photos, followers and following list (if they're active online), info doesn't just come from them, if you can't get in contact with them you can learn a lot from family, friends classmates etc

-intelius.com

-please PLEASE keep track of what info you found out and what they told you, don't accidentally drop that bombshell

-i have a folder where i keep my fp's information saved, all the "useful" images they sent me, link to their social medias, school website and more so i'd suggest making one of those

if you only know them online, here are some cyberstalking tips that don't rely on being close and location (all this assuming they're active online):

-look up their username(s) and variations everywhere. literally every platform you can think of, i had to sign up to 3 platforms i never used just for that

-look up their friends' usernames

-look at tagged photos, mentions and interactions they have with others in the comments under their posts to find out who they're friends with

-if you can see previous usernames (like on instagram) look up those too

-you might get lucky with wayback machine

-if you can find their reddit, twitter or any social media that shows their post and comment history study that shit

- if they haven't shown their face but have photos including any other part of their body that isn't usually covered up, even in colder climates (like hands most commonly) save those too, if you manage to find a school website or something later on that might have photos of their face you could match them up. it's difficult af but never give up, if there's a will there's a way

-reverse image search all the images they posted

-try images on geoimgr.com. photos taken on phone or camera will sometimes have GPS coordinates stored in the metadata of each file, but there are some websites that encrypt this

-anaylze the background of images, especially if they're taken outside

-trying to pinpoint a location (town or country they live in) would be good but not necessary: • if they posted screenshots that aren't cropped and include the time, it will be easy to figure out the general area because of timezones • use google maps to match up the background seen in images

if you wanna figure out an email or number: • log out of your account, put their username in in the login section, press "i forgot my password", the next part may vary from platform to platform but select the option for their the recover of their password to be recieved through email and it will display the first and last characters of their name, as well as what domain they're using. same with the phone number

next, in real life, i'm not really an expert in this since i've never stalked anyone irl for as long and as much as i have online but hope these help too!:

-eavesdrop

-if you're not close or to them (as in not in the same class, school, workplace etc) look for someone that knows them in any way.

-assuming you found that person, don't directly ask about them. let's say, your fp likesa art, so you ask that person about art clubs. chances are, they'll mention the one your fp is in. very vague example but it works with almost everything

-ask your parents about your fp's parents, works well if you're younger and still in school

-VERY carefully try to glance over at their phone's screen as much as you can, it could make finding social media accounts 10 times easier

-use all the info you manage to get for cyberstalking. don't follow them around, especially don't follow them home, you don't need to do that to figure out more about them. again, don't underastimate how ingrained social media is in our lives. Cyberstalking is much more easier and safer.

[genericpuff]

Rachel "Retcon" Smythe Strikes Again!

Okay, so I've been seeing pictures of Volume 4 of Lore Olympus floating around, and people are ALREADY FINDING RETCONS.

Most notably so far, some added panels in the Hades and Apollo confrontation that happens outside Artemis' house (when Persephone steals Apollo's lyre) in Episode 81.

This is the original scene, for anyone who needs a refresher:

Aaaand here are the panels that were added.

(all pictures of Volume 4 are courtesy @iwannagutyou on IG!!! thank you for giving me permission to use these! <3)

First of all, the art. It's so noticeably bad. You can tell Rachel has completely lost her ability to draw these characters in the S1 style, I'm fairly certain she took the panel of Hades from the old version and just copy pasted it to try and get around it (look at the posing) but it's incredibly obvious looking at that third panel that LO is not and can never be what it was back in 2017-2019. Those first two panels seem like they were copy pasted from the previous ones, which is just sad if those are the lengths she has to go to to come even close to replicating the older style.

Now, this just might be due to camera translation, it could very well look better IRL, but the colors just look so incredibly desaturated and the lines blurred out, to the point that people are doing double takes over whether or not panels have been directly changed - they haven't been, they've just been so sucked dry of their colors that they look off enough to cast suspicion.

If anything it's a harsh reminder that LO has kinda always had art problems, especially with its lazy humor and stupid meme faces.

Of course, to be fair, color loss can happen in print, but seeing how slapped together these books tend to be, I wouldn't be surprised if they just didn't put in the effort to convert the page art to CMYK or at least tinker with the saturation in editing some more to ensure it would come out more vibrant in print.

Now. Excuse me while I go on a bit of a crackpot rant here. Newbie puff pals beware, because this is gonna get dicey and you're about to learn where my tinfoil-hat rep comes from but I just have to talk about it.

Back to the added Apollo panels, where Persephone asks Hades not to hurt him and he looks nervous before she says "I just want him to leave".

Maybe it's just me, but it's a little weird that THESE are the panels they decided they needed to add. It's weird that she's asking Hades not to hurt Apollo when she's about to break into his car and steal his lyre just a few moments later. It's weird that the implication seems to be that she's referring to Hades' act of violence towards Tori... but Persephone doesn't know that's happened yet. So this feels like an unnecessary retcon that's doing more harm than good.

But I feel like the timing of this is kinda messed up as well, as this book released just days after the release of the last FP episode in which Apollo has his 'side' of the assault story told through his perspective, which is often considered a HUGE no-no in writing assault stories because it often comes with the implication that it's asking for empathy from the audience. We already know Apollo is delusional, we already know he thinks him and Persephone are meant to be despite her constant rejection of him, we didn't need a flashback from his own warped perspective explaining that very thing, the only purpose to do such a thing this late in the game would be to try and get the audience to 'connect' with him (it's giving S3 Bryce from 13 Reasons Why vibes). Now we have this scene of Persephone asking Hades not to hurt him (despite the structure of the episode being literally fine before, this change wasn't needed) getting snuck into the physical book release just a couple days after the newest FP tried to present Apollo in an empathetic light (and let me tell you, that's a whole essay and a half that I'll be getting into eventually).

Shit, if I wanted to get REAL Pepe Sylvia with it, I might say that hypothetically, the whole point of the random Leuce abuse episode - despite Persephone having no way of knowing what she attempted as Hades hadn't told her and she wasn't there to see it and we weren't shown her overhearing them in any way - and the following episode that was mostly padding of Hades and Persephone having sex - no consequences or follow-up whatsoever to the Leuce scene - was just to pad out the episode release schedule and buy time until the book came out so that Rachel could release that Apollo POV episode right before the book came out and revealed those new added scenes of Persephone asking Hades not to hurt Apollo, in what could be a sly artificial attempt at minimizing the SA plot so Rachel can finally just brush aside the one major plot point she regretted writing the most. After all, it wouldn't be the first time Rachel's controlled the pace of her comic to release certain moments at certain times that line up with IRL events.

But, y'know. I'm gonna quit on that thought while I'm ahead because it's probably making my credibility meter drop into the red. My ADHD has been real bad lately and it's really starting to show LMAO All ima say is that IDK who Rachel thinks she's fooling here, this kind of shit is stupid easy to fact check when the digital version of the comic is available online to read.

To end on a much funnier and lighter note, remember how Rachel tried to retcon the Demeter/Hera/Hestia relationship by changing the line "I miss my sisters" to "I miss my friends"? Well, there was one panel that had been missed in the webtoons version that still refers to them as sisters. You can still find this unedited line in Episode 78.

And uh. They forgot to fix it again for the book.

It's permanent now. That's permanent marker. It would have cost them nothing to find this in the webtoon version and fix it before it got sent to the book editors. Now it's gonna cost them thousands because the book editors didn't bother (or know) to check.

There's also this... weird shit going on with the speech bubbles. Like, they're REALLY FUCKING OVERDOING IT with the speech bubble outlines. I don't know who made this choice but it was a bad one. Gross. Don't do that. It looks so cheap.

But let's be real, at this point I feel like the book editors are just outright sabotaging Rachel because who the fuck calls themselves a professional when they do this shit-

Oh, and there's no bonus episode, just sketches. Which is fine. But it makes me chuckle to think that Rachel just didn't have time in her already razor-thin buffer to draw up a new episode to pass off as "cut content".

[ego-meliorem-esse]

Public Figures AU

The fantastic and very fuckin funny @sunnylolli reminded me of my own au where the countries are public knowledge and people have known about them for a while.

In my au the countries have been public knowledge forever. In my humble opinion it's very hard to hide immortal being from humans. There would be too many questions, too many stories and too much effort in hiding such a thing. The public is used to them and treats them like any B-list celebrity

ALFRED IS MADE FOR THE SPOTLIGHT! That boy is so comfortable in the spotlight its actually an issue. He posts so regularly on social media that one could consider that one of his hobbies. Being that famous of course, he can't really work for NASA or have a normal engineering job (like in my regular universe) so he has a big social media presence. Be that instagram, twitter, tiktok, youtube or even twitch.

Alfred streams on twitch with Gilbert. They play some FPS and talk about some historical event completely unrelated to the game.

Arthur has a personal instagram account where he only posts pictures of his garden, his books an his kids. Every once in a while he posts a picture of Zee or Jack while they were younger during the victorian era in those frilly dresses and one of them will just be like: "dad delete this or im rebelling"

Arthur is active on facebook and so is Francis

Francis only follows cooking channels, fashion blogs and philosophical content. He constantly endorses brands and takes part in commercials for Vogue, LV, Dior... He is a sort of sponsor/face for some brands and is asked to promote them online. You'll see his face in every third magazine and fashion articles follow him on a regular basis.

Matt is the one who avoids the spotlight the most. He will answer interview questions and do a QnA on tv or youtube but will hybernate for the rest of the year afterwards. He is also the one who is most secretive about where he lives. De has a huge fear of doxing himself and wants more than anything to keep his privacy. In my universe Matt is still a doctor and has a clinical doctorate in medicine but can't work as one due to being a sort-of celebrity. That's why he still gives lectures on college campuses and publishes papers regularly but doesn't work in any clinic or hospital.

Smaller countries have an easier time with fame and being public knowledge. They can walk around in their own countries on the street and pass of as a normal human being while, for example, Alfred has a harder time doing the same. Being himself, he is lucky he hasn't doxed himself yet and doesn't have paparazzi follow him from his home to work.

There are some meetings held by personifications that are broadcasted to the world to see and people online make compilations of cringe and funny moments during those meetings. (That would be my fat ass in that au)

"10 minutes of Francis being himself at the UN" the youtube video

Countries are often asked to help and aide with the makings of history books and are often cited as a source at the end.

Countries are legal citizens and have rights. Not all rights but the ones that the do have include: right to life, right to freedom from torture and inhumane treatment, the right to equal treatment before the law, the right to privacy, the right to freedom of thought (religion, opinion and expression), the right to work, the right to education, the right to social services... While not having certain rights like the right to marry but all the while having a right to have a family.

Gilberts diaries are considered a valid source of historical information unfortunately for us

I have so many more hcs for this au holy shit

[kob131]

Lily Orchard and Pokemon: Gen 4

Yay, we get to hear Lily bitch more from now on.

"Gen 4 runs like shit because the game is trying to process 3D graphics all the time, like with battle transitions, health bars and movement!"

Then how the fuck do you explain Platinum, which ended up fixing all these issues then?

"Also I'm modding the game to remove the FPS cap and give myself a Ralts as the starter-"

W-w-wait, what?!

Why the fuck are you modding the games...in a retrospective all about looking back at the games as they hold up? Your complaints and footage WON'T line up, thus weakening your arguments!

Also, I don't give a fuck about how much you like Gardevoir. Ralts doesn't get an attacking move until Level 6. Starters start at Level 5. And Ralts is INTENTIONALLY weak to compensate for how strong it is fully evolved. Modding in a Ralts WILL affect your gameplay because the games aren't built for that.

For fuck's sake- USE A DIFFERENT TEAM!

"I encourage Barry to try and jump over the grass because I wanna see him get mauled by a Bidoof-"

Wait a minute. Was-was that fucking Peanut Butter from Pokemon Rusty?

...Oh great, Lily Orchard is probably taking her takes from Dorkly. That explains a lot.

"Well Ralts doesn't get an attacking move so I 'threw the match-'"

Sounding pretty salty there, Lily. Maybe you should try diversifying your teams and actually ENGAGE with the Pokemon by using a damn starter.

"I'm getting stopped all this time like a small child in a brony conve-"

I will call Taka in here to maul you, Lily. You were kicked out, deal with it.

"Uh oh! My Ralts is worse than a Magikarp! Whoopsie!"

Keep this in mind. It will be important later.

"Oh no! It takes a whole minute and ten seconds for me to get through an encounter with Team Galactic! TOO LONG!"

Speaking as someone who has played every Gen of Pokemon...as well as playing a few games with Pokemon's older, edgy brother SMT- You are making mountains out of mole hills Lily.

Games, especially RPGs given how they don't tend to be very interactive games, tell stories to stimulate the player's brain. This requires time, Lily. I know that you like being lulled into a silent stupor as evidenced by your love of Team Aqua/Magma and later Lysandre (No I am not joking) but most ACTUAL people like having some kind of engagement with the game. Pokemon, even at it's most verbose, is fucking SMALL POTATOES compared to your usual JRPG.

I brought up SMT for a reason Lily- that series compensates for having a less engaging battle system than Pokemon's by having a more robust story. If you played any SMT, even one like Nocturne- your brain would likely shut down.

JRPGs like having stories. You signed up for this with Pokemon. Now judge it accordingly.

"People gas up Cyrus as one of the best villains-!"

No they don't. They gas TEAM GALACTIC as one of the best villains because they fuck with the fundamental forces of existence, giving them an air of a series threat. I don't agree, I like Cyrus for being the only one with a reason for doing what he's doing. But people usually like him for the stuff OUTSIDE his home game.

"Reading Pokemon stories is just like watching subbed anime: reading the most inane bullshit!"

... Lily, you hate anything anime, don't you?

"Sinnoh ugly because grey and mud and forest gross!"

... 1- Lily, you literally show a grey tiled route being dyed orange in evening light.

2- Yes Lily. Mountainious regions and marshlands have mud and rocks.

And 3- The forest looks dark and damp because that's a fucking FOREST. If you paid attention the BGM in the previous forests, you'd notice that is what the developers intend the forest areas to be like. You basically just said ''the previous three gens completely failed at their jobs!'

*Lily proceeds to have a fake existential nightmare about Pokemon and Youtube*

Cool Lily. Too bad you mention these minor things and not...you know...the strewn path of broken lives you've left in your wake on this planet.

Could have had some kind of respect for you.

"Pokemon games hold your hand like a creepy uncle with a MLP collec-"

@takashi0 get in here! Lily's being an ass about bronies again!

"Oh my god! So many forced tutorials! Why won't they let me skip everything like the Underground tutorial! POKEMON BAD!"

Lily, the reason why the game won't let you skip the Bike is because you NEED it to progress the game and it gives you an improved movement option. It also won't let you skip the Egg tutorial because Pokemon breeding is necessary for getting certain Pokemon or helping you get certain Pokemon (like multiple starters). And this is why you can't skip the catching tutorial: you'd just be throwing Pokeballs at random and failing constantly.

These are necessary aspects of the game. A game for kids who may have never played a Pokemon game before. Deal with it.

"I don't know why I'm here, I just keep ignoring the dialogue."

So you talk about the story being ass...while acknowledging that you aren't paying attention to said story...

Like, I know that Lily is implying she's long since gone through the game and experienced the story, hates it and is now skipping over it but you are now making a retrospective of the games. Now would be a good time to pay attention and possible reconsider your stance.

"HMs are so cool! You can use your Pokemon to transverse the region! People are so dumb for bitching about them. You have 24 moveslots, just set aside some and forget coverage, dumbbnuts!"

So what you're saying is that we should have random required HMs in Pokemon Gyms to challenge them properly? You know, like Chuck's Gym? That you couldn't complete without backtracking?

Or that maybe we should have moves like Cut, Rock Smash, Flash, Whirlpool and Defog (which you basically call useless) be necessary! After all, who cares about player expression? It's just 20.8% of your moveslots!

... This is why you use your BRAIN Lily.

"You need to adapt to roadblocks, you useless clowns!"

Remember this, it will be important later.

"Archie and Maxie were charmingly stupid but Cyrus is completely crazy!"

A- That's intentional with Cyrus and UNINTENTIONAL with your favs.

And B- You outright emphasized that they were gonna blow up a volcano to try and expand water/land for Pokemon. How is THAT not crazy?

"Barry demands yet ANOTHER Battle-"

It's the fourth fucking battle Lily. Just because you cut yourself anytime a rival shows up doesn't make it excessive.

"*another 'cobs bad' joke*-"

Yeah yeah, you want cops gone because your abuse victims keep calling them on you and you have a bad experience with them.

Move on.

"Hey I'm not a cop, it's not unethical if I go on a rampage-"

You REALLY don't know when to keep your mouth shut, do you?

"Cyrus can no be cult leader, HE HAVE NO MOTIVE OR PESONALLITY!"

...

"Fellow members of Team Galactic! Hear me! My name, as I appear to you today, is Cyrus. This world of ours is a crude one. In a word, it is incomplete. It has been, and always will be, a struggle to survive in this world. We humans and Pokémon are likewise incomplete. Because we are all so lacking, we fight, we maim... It is ugly. I hate the incompleteness. That we are all incomplete, I hate it with my entire body and being. The world should be complete. The world must change. Then, who will change it? Me, Cyrus. And Team Galactic. Yes, all of you. Together we pored over myths and exposed their secrets. Together we captured legendary Pokémon. And now, Team Galactic has obtained the energy to change the world! The power of dreams is within our grasp! Understand it, fellow members! My long-held dreamworld is on the verge of becoming reality. All those headed to Mt. Coronet, and those who remain here... Though our missions may differ, our hearts beat as one. Let there be glory for Team Galactic!"

-

"But, I must say... You are a remarkable specimen. Those Pokémon have nothing to do with you, do they? But still you come to rescue them out of pity? Such pitifully useless emotions... It's illogical and irrational. Pity and compassion are products of the weak and faulty human heart. You were compelled to come here by such vacuous sentimentality! I will make you regret paying heed to your heart!"

Perhaps pay attention to the fucking dialogue, Lily. Because these are pretty blunt and obvious examples. Cyrus appeals to people feeling that the world is harsh and unfair, promising them a bright tomorrow if they listen to him. Then he explains how he believes emotions have caused these problems so he wishes to erase them.

"Oh really Looker? You think I'm so dumb that-"

Lily, you just got done humiliating yourself by being outsmarted by a children's game and will continue that streak throughout this video.

Yes, you are that dumb.

"Cyrus has double the dialogue Maxie and Archie have in these games but it is so stilted and devoid of personality! Archie and Maxie are SOO much better by being stupid and trying to better the world-!"

Lily, those guys were not intended on being stupid. They were intended to be well intentioned extremists. They seem stupid because the games made their acts so dumb that the intentions are overshadowed by their stupidity.

Cyrus does more than try to be evil, you can tell from comparing his dialogue to Giovanni's-

"Blast it all! You ruined our plans for Silph! But Team Rocket will never fall! <Player>, never forget that all Pokémon exist for Team Rocket! I must go, but I shall return!"

And his so-called 'stilted' dialogue would probably fit a man who is OPENLY TRYING TO RID THE WORLD OF EMOTION. If your assessment is correct- that would be good writing.

Archie and Maxie are badly written. You are praising bad writing over good writing.

"Platnium has gotten away from the feeling of adventure that makes Pokemon good-"

You know what helps with a sense of adventure Lily?

A story. Something to give structure and stimulation to the player.

You praised one of the dullest games in the series in Emerald and are going to praise THE dullest game in the series. All while demonizing the games that actually stimulate.

You're full of shit.

[stateofcharles]

Did you see what Toto said post race to sky Italy: ⬇️

https://www.tumblr.com/dellovestorant/759799148222529536/toto-at-sky-italy-confused-max-with-lewis-and

He’s actually unhinged and full of red flags at this point. So much going wrong within the team and he’s just obsessed with Max and Kimi, at the expense of George. I genuinely think that George does not have a seat at that team in 2026, it will be Toto’s wet dream of a lineup.

Also a a side note I cannot bear the idea of Lando overtaking George in poles and wins, which looks likely to happen giving the performance of the McLaren & Mercedes….

ok so, let's talk about it seriously for once:

toto wolff wants max verstappen in his team, but a contract is two-sided, what makes him so sure that the latter will accept his offer? (is redbull in such deep shit? if yes, i'm throwing a party)

verstappen said just this weekend that he doesn't plan to stay forever in f1 like alonso is doing, therefore he might even have retired when toto gets to him, who knows

mercedes might have great history but it's thanks to lewis and who designed the car between 2014-2021, surely not thanks to toto. they remain incompetent when it comes to strategy and management - see today. if verstappen chooses to sign the infamous contract, he will likely find himself amongst idiots, he will not like it, will throw a tantrum (understandable here) but he'll soon learn that things are not like they are at redbull where everyone is at his feet, because toto (idiot) doesn't want to change his management. consequences: tension within the team, driver who will look elsewhere.

i already said briefly why i think the whole kimi-mercedes is not gonna work like everyone hopes, so who knows where he will be by 2026

(HUGE personal opinion) verstappen-antonelli is a dynamic that doesn't work in my head. don't ask me why, i can just sense it and i normally get it right on these things

george is a talented driver, that's beyond question. he of course needs to keep his options open. when the occasion arises, he will leave mercedes and go where he believes it's better. between him and mercedes there is not a destructive relationship that reaches the charles-ferrari level (fortunately, i should say), although it's true that he grew up in mercedes, aiming the spot he has now. i hope he knows that he's worth being prioritised and that mercedes (read: toto) right now is not doing it properly.

lastly, from a huge and proud hater, norris will never reach the level of george. just consider that a real talented driver would dominate every FP and grand slam every weekend with the current mclaren. what does he do? loses pole on turn 1 because he has not yet learnt how to start a race in 5 years?

(also, i like to remind that it was george (and charles and oscar🙃), not norris who won GP3 and GP2 back to back during his first year in the category, so everyone should think it twice before calling someone a generational talent❤️)

[jackhues]

So on Sunday, I watched the Grand Prix for the first time and oh my god, that was so much fun! I know you're a huge F1 fan... I was wondering if you could give me a little rundown of F1?🫣

ahhhh you saw charles' monaco win!! dw girl, i gotchu-

so basically, the races are every 1-3 few weeks (except the break in the summer, and end of season). there's a whole weekend building up to the main event, which is the race. now generally (on a non-sprint weekend), the friday is free practice 1&2 (fp), and it's when the drivers go on the track and they're figuring out where they are in standings compared to other teams on the track bcz they're all different from each other. saturdays will be fp3 and qualification (quali). in quali, the drivers are eliminated based on slowest laps, and it basically decides everyone's starting positions for the race. (that's a very watered down version, but you kind of have to watch quali to fully understand it). and then sunday will be the race, where the drivers fight for points. there's a lot that goes on with strategy/pit stops/overtakes/potential flags, but i'll go more into detail about that below. the top ten drivers at the end of the race get points based on their position, and the driver with the fastest lap will also get a point (can be any driver at all, even if they're not top 10). and then all the points are tallied up, and the driver with the most wins the wdc (world drivers championship)

(more stuff under the cut)

the format i talked about is usually a non-sprint weekend (but the race might be on saturday, so it's moved ahead a day). so a sprint race is just a short race, and the drivers get less points than a regular race. so stuff gets shifted around a bit, and the sprint's on friday or saturday. the sprint also has it's own quali.

now that's all the basic format of a race/race weekend.

a yellow flag happens when there's a crash/debris or something that can be cleared out quickly. the race doesn't need to stop, everyone just slows down for a bit, and the race continues - no overtaking while there's a safety car. a red flag will stop the race - the barriers need to be fixed/car needs to be lifted out with the crane, etc. after that, the race will restart.

i'm a lewis hamilton girlie no matter what - he races for mercedes this year, but next year he's going to ferrari. leads f1 in most categories, stats-wise. a 7 time wdc, which is tied for the most. doesn't have an amazing car rn, but we're holding out for next year, and just enjoying all the drivers

but lots of other drivers are fun to watch and cheer for, like max, charles, oscar, logan (will destroy you because his team's shit, but idc i love him), yuki, etc.

i don't usually watch fp bcz it's in the middle of the night for me usually and it doesn't contribute to standings, but if it's the daytime then i'll usually watch while doing errands or smth. the things i pay attention to are qualies and races/sprints.

so i think i got most of it, but if you have any specific questions, feel free to reach out! my inbox/dms are always open <333 most of this stuff, you have to actually watch to really understand it, but this is a good base to get into actually watching the races :))

[borderline-culture-is]

Vent //

BPD culture is trying so hard not to fall back into being nothing but numb but once you get sick and are in pain, it's starting to consume you

But you try, despite everything going haywire

But then your family looks at you like you're nothing but a stain. Annoyed by your existence. So...why not just let yourself go numb? Not like it'll matter anyways. You already have an 8 year old hating your guts and admitting to lying to get you yelled at, so, being numb won't do anything other than make it more bearable. Maybe.

I miss my friends. I had to stop talking to them for now so that I could focus on the shit storm happening over here but it's unbearable. My FP just went through a natural disaster that's fucked his entire family over too (they're safe, just trying to get things situated) so I don't want to burden him.

I don't wanna give in to being numb again, but maybe it'll be for the best. I can't even buy tickets to concerts either to cope any other way now that my dad doesn't have a job. I had to miss out on one I was hoping to go to and now I'm about to miss another that I was begging to be allowed to go to for months (the Bleeders tour and The 10 yr anniversary tour of Let The Ocean Take Me by The Amity Affliction). God, and my birthday is gonna be in like...2 months. I hate that day, I don't think I'll be able to even "spoil" myself to make it bearable.

Maybe letting myself be numb for a while will make it easier until I get to see my FP in October...

- 🪡🎶 (I am absolutely fucking losing it here but we ball-)

.

[the-gay-trashmouth]

here's a list of random homestuck/humanstuck head cannons because these lil guys consume my every waking thought:

Eridan would vape but only the super fruity disposables (he's me)

Sollux would vape but only those horrible rigs with weird flavors like "diesel" and "monster piss" or whatever

Aradia loves sailor moon but specifically the later arcs

Karkat hates Adam Sandler personally and thinks his romcoms are the worst in the field (his guilty pleasure, however, is the wedding singer)

Nepeta and Equius definitely would apply for those "domestic partnership status" and basically be common law married as best friends <>

If they played DND, Nepeta would be a barbarian, Eridan would be a warlock, Vriska would be rouge, Terezi would be a bard (specifically so she could have vicious mockery), and Tavros would be a druid

They would all be in a party and consistently die because they keep splitting up right before boss fights.

Feferi is an incredibly petty person, like give your number to every spam caller she can find petty, but no one other than Eridan actually knows that because she keeps most of it to herself.

Feferi doesn't use her pettiness for evil though, mostly for justice. At least, it's justice in her eyes (we love her)

Eridan has BPD and Feferi was his FP, and even after everything, he still finds himself falling back into that codependent way of thinking

After erisolsprite however...

Dave is a car guy but he hates telling people because it just pushes the Texan stereotype even more

June watched Willy's wonderland and couldn't decide if she loved it or hated it (Dave loved it)

Roxy, Eridan, and June became a strange little friend group during their transitions, trading clothes and in general just talking about gender shit.

Speaking of gender, I think Eridan trans femme in an any pronoun kind of way and Roxy is trans masc in a butch kind of way. They both use they/them most often.

More to come probably

[argentsunshine]

anon with the add on back :

yeah, now that you explain it does make a bit more sense but it. just hurts because whereas they acknowledged yusuke blantantly lying about madarame stealing his work, they seem to just completely kind of ignore akechi's warnings and that doesnt even make sense to me.. they dont even really acknowledge it, all because they dont know who he's working for until the last minute, and that doesnt make sense to me at all. but ty for taking ur time to ramble: i actually do it myself a lot, and i have so many thoughts abt so many things that i'd like to explore more in depth but can't put in words myself .. i'd just wish theyd atleast acknowledge that akechi is being used the same way everyone else was instead of ignoring it, even if they still cant continue to aid him: it feels like they didnt try (to me), even with ryuji's ... hatred for him, i'd atleast think that ryuji would atleast try to acknowledge it and want to do something but being unable to instead of still being an ass, even if goro is one as well (and i think, speaking of mental illness, as someone with npd and aspd and avpd, goro has both symptoms of npd and aspd: futaba has symptoms of avpd, but thats a topic at a later time.) and i think goro's not truly being himself in 3rd sem when he's blunt and mean, that he's still constantly masking, as people with npd and or aspd do like myself, and he's tired of being nice on tv so he has to pull thin insults when in real life because as much as he masks, it gets annoying, and he (along with myself and many others) likely has low empathy and just thinks of others (especially those of ryuji's caliber, as much as i love ryuji and everyone else) as , well put, idiots, because they dont know as much as he does, and the fact that they know more than him in the metaverse has likely made him crash (his engine room was essentially an npd crash, i think), but them not knowing "basic information" (as my brain puts) likely gives him a narc high, which also leads to thinly veiled insults.. adding onto the npd goro akechi, i think akira is his ep (Equal Person-- people w/ npd hold them to high standards, higher than they hold for themselves, and expects them to challenge eachother-- essentially akechi's rivalry with akira.. in alternative, bpd akira tells me that akechi is his FP, but i can discuss that at a later time)

regardless, and apologizes for this long paragraph, tysm for responding because that does make things a little clearer, and no one's really talked to me about it before, so thank you :D

yeah, i absolutely get where you're coming from - although i think the statement "they're ignoring his warnings because they don't know who he's working for" has the flipside of "by the time those warnings are given, the thieves already know he's the black mask and is presumably being manipulated by someone, so he's not actually warning them about anything they don't already know"

but yeah, the only reason i don't think they should have reached out to him pre-engine room is that i don't know when in the story that would have been an option: their plan to find out who his boss was wouldn't have worked if they'd tipped him off to the fact that they knew he was the black mask, and after 11/20, he thinks Akira's dead, and i doubt he would gave listened to any of the others. i think Ryuji's treatment of him us also kind of a result of Ryuji's general main story characterisation - in game the vibe is very much that ryuji doesn't like him because he's popular and smarmy and talked shit about the thieves on live tv, rather than the fact that he's a murderer, but they don't let ryuji have complex takes on things in the story ever. now im thinking about their relationship in my palace au lmao. if i were to frame it in more. terms. idk. ryuji hates the detective prince. but akechi doesn't respect ryuji so ryuji has no reason to try harder

and on the npd/aspd front - I'm not super familiar with npd but i can absolutely see that (i think akechi has a bunch of obvious Mental Illness Symptoms that are common to a lot of things, which is why i think mentally ill bitches latch onto him no matter what's going on. people saying he has npd have always sounded right to me i think he's autistic also because -- well you heard what i said about unsympathetic symptoms of mental illness last time) but as someone who has some symptom overlap i think youre 100% right on stuff i know about. low empathy bitches rise up.

but yeah, i think a lot of stuff is kind of the result of the writers seeming constantly all over the place with him. i think it's especially bad in the section from 11/20 to the engine room, because while i think in royal there was some vision for who he was supposed to be, everything in vanilla is far more over the place, and in some cases vanilla's contradictory writing of him is made worse by its interactions with royal's akechi content. because 11/20 isn't designed to accommodate for the possibility that this guy could be your actual friend rather than a guy you've spoken to a few times turned tenuous ally turned traitor. i don't think akechi ever would have acted differently in a way that mattered, but the way the thieves talk about him is in line with his flatter villain characterisation in that period in vanilla. he's a terrible irredeemable evil person until just before he dies, and then he's a tragic victim to the point that in the shadow shido fight, they talk as if akechi wasn't responsible for any of his own actions, despite the fact that he was demonstrably doing it of his own free will. and then he dies and you're not supposed to care because he's a Bad Guy so they barely bring him up again in vanilla. all that rings a little strange with the royal stuff

anyway all this has got me thinking about the dynamics between akechi and the non-akira thieves. i should really keep writing my akira's palace fic

[lesser-mook]

Metro Exodus is a well made game, with an annoyingly unnecessary mechanic, the moral point system *Recommendation* (FPS, Action, Post-Apocalyptic, Story Driven, Horror Elements)

I took my time with this game, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Wish I had better hardware so I could record every moment of my first time with it in 4k, but-

the moral point system is garbage, pretentious, obnoxious, unnecessary. And not for the reasons you think.

It's not getting the bad ending that's the issue, you reap what you sow (I guess? Literally didn't put down anyone that wasn't tryna shoot me first), but more importantly, I got what I wanted, a certain characters survival.

I didn't give a fuck about what happened to me. I wanted them to fucking live, I smacked a Blind one in the face, killed another one with bullet spray, threw a can in another ones face, kicked one in the balls & Triangle choked out another (Because the stealth system is full of shit, you'll throw 5 cans in an opposite direction and these mfs will STILL go in your direction).

ALL so that this person would live.

So i was 100% content. And it was an ending fitting the games tone. But that was considered *Bad, not alternate ending but BAD lmfao. OK.

And it's funny, because I notice these "good" endings are littered with cheesy asspulls and plotarmor and the "BAD" endings have better storytelling because there's actual consequences and committed stakes that fit the situation more organically given what's actually going on.

So the non-canon versions are actually, unintentionally, better stories than the timeline that's actually canon. Almost as if "the point" is fucking irrelevant if the story isn't matching the energy of the set up and Or the narrative and messages gets in the way of a better story. And it usually does. No one wants to play a PREACH simulation.

Anyways, EXODUS is well produced, well acted, good stories, fun new mechanics, good level design, enemies are a threat, feels like a movie but not too much.

Most of the Characters are meh, but Anna is cool, Katya was useful, Olga was cool, Giul was cool, Yermak underrated.

But for the moral system, some of the characters and thus the game lowkey passive-aggressively throws digs at you throughout the rest of the game IF you didn't obey the narrative like a passive drone puppet- is the absolute WORST part about the game.

The game offers a different experience and then lowkey antagonizes you because you dared to waver from the canon narrative, super pretentious.

All these opportunities to spare NPCs, GREAT, but do they really matter? If in the end, killing the wrong Npc at the wrong time in the wrong mission, renders the ones you spared null and void anyway? That's the shit I'm talking about.

Why even offer an alternative, just make it one singular story/experience. It'd be a better execution, better experience. CONSISTENT with the previous 2 games.

I shit you not, Last Light I got the one where mc dies and Anna had his Son and she told the legend of his father. That shit would make an STier movie....buuut I find out that Exodus is a thing, and I'm like: Why is Artyom alive? Wheres my son? OH! that wasn't the canon ending?-- wait metro was multiple endings????? (Played Last Light first thinking it was the final game)

And because Artyom is silent, you just have to sit there and take this bullshit the others are vomiting when they do have something to say about your choices, meanwhile they're killing just the people they deemed as "bad" or the "right" people to slaughter. lmfao.

So It's not just the moral point system, that's the worst part about THE GAME itself: The post-op lecturing.

Because I repeat, WHO the fuck decides who's lives matter and who's doesn't in a post apocalypse where its literally anything goes.

Not Khan, that's for damn sure.

Kill the fanatics, that's a problem. Why? They're not trained soldiers, well neither are the bandits as far as i'm concerned, both parties had guns, thus a threat.

You do nothing, those fanatics will kill you, trust me, I tested it. So they're not helpless.(You kill the Volga fanatics that's a nono because they're not soldiers)

The fanatics who don't pose a threat, like the praying dudes on the shore, dozens of people I leave alone, they're spared because logically they're not a threat.

 But apparently that wasn't enough for the "good boy" points. Corny as fuck.

There's multiple times in the game where there's supply stashes, but to get to them, you have to kill the bandits who were literally just minding their business before you pulled up and massacred them unprovoked.

Buuut despite not being soldiers either, their lives somehow didnt matter to the message, soooo fuck them i guess =D Last Light, killing the bear was a no no. Which i didn't, she was beaten, and wasn't a threat anymore.

Buuuut the bear in Exodus, their life according to the plot apparently boiled down to a B movie monster, this bears life didnt register to the moral system, cause how that went down was definitely brutal enough for a bad ending.

But apparently not all Bear lives matter. We have a mountain of bandit, soldier, beast, regimen corpses behind us but those lives didn't matter.

Literally there's a demon nest in VOLGA , the thing was minding its business in its home, I burned it alive via molotov right? I GOT A TROPHY for it…..uhh message?

Burnt to a crisp. Soooo that didn't register to the moral point bullshit?

Why Not? Because Khans eternal wisdom said so? Writers want you to feel empathy for a bear that attacks you, but a Demon minding it's business is irrelevant???

Mercy for them didnt matter huh, we clearly see little baby Bats floating around later, what if that demon was a momma huh? Fuck off. PRE-TENTIOUS, no consistency, want to push this hippie shit, be consistent.

Only the lives the game vaguely hints matters, are the lives that actually matters. Thus defeating any legitimacy the games little message possessed.

PLAY Stealthily, kill the right people, or you're the bad guy, its a sandbox yet wants to put you in a box.

And its funny because the game doesn't really make anything clear, it vaguely pushes a direction but doesn't get blatant until AFTER you make up your own damn mind.

All these guns to kill, but there's only ONE main method to non-lethally k.o enemies, not even a sleep dart, or knockout gas, yeah thats not redundant.

FUCK I even tried just shooting knee-Caps & arms to see if that'd neutralize, to make em drop the guns. Nope. Gotta hug them from behind like a lover or punch em out EVERY SINGLE TIME. Same animation. Bioshock Infinite: Burial At Sea* gives the player more non-lethal options to fight.

Fallout 3 doesn't pull this shit to this extent. Fallout knows what it is and what a post apocalypse is in reality. Gray.

You kill a vendor to steal, guess what? No lecture. But the consequence is NOW you one less person to trade with. One less person to provide you Stimpak.

One less friendly, sassy mf that you feel safe around.

That's fucking reality. You kill just to kill, you lose connections, you need people, thats reality.

Even my Lonewolf ass was HUMBLED by Fallout 3, because this game, even for an antisocial-- This game will MAKE YOU appreciate people, humans, human society, networking. In all the right ways.

All that time in creepy ass caves, ghosttowns, dungeons, mountains of corpses, mutants, demons, Vaults where horrible experiments were done, whispers in the walls etc. Horror Horror HORROR

When you see a person thats friendly in the desert? You run to that mf and see if they wanna trade or just say hi! You might even catch yourself sigh of relief that a mfing person was even around, not tryna shoot you, and alive.

Thats what Fallout 3 can do. Makes you grateful that you still have: People

Kill everyone in the wasteland? now you have no one to work with when you need it. No network. And sometimes regular, nice vendors are murdered by NPCs and you never see them again, ever = Cold hard REALITY, brilliant game design

At the wrong place wrong time, POW. Shot dead. Or eaten alive by beasts.

That's Karma done right, because it ISN'T a solely moral system, its just (cause and effect) in nature.

In Metro? Its obnoxious. Bioshocks karma system was leagues better because you could tell when and where the "moment of truth" was, it wasn't vague and the game didn't beat you over the head a million times about it like a naggy spouse.

I would've played Exodus immediately again after I finished it, and I WANTED to, but that passive-aggressive shit leaves a bad vibe. It nags & antagonizes you for making your own fucking choice.

And unlike Fallout 3, there's no option to speak back.

Again, NOT THE ENDING itself is the issue, because the bad ending is not even bad, it's bittersweet.

The characters being annoying saying slick shit a hundred times and you say nothing back is where I started tilting my head.

That doesn't smell right, the game gives you another path then penalizes you for exploring what it made available, sometimes accidentally, cause how tf would a normie know?

For THIS story? It was unnecessary. Especially for Exodus. Linear stories meant to be linear should be linear, for the continuity if anything else.

You want a certain narrative, then axe the bad ending and just make the ending you want to be the narrative. And yet something like Last of Us pt2 that should've had multiple endings, didnt get any lmfao Devs are sleeping man.

TL;DR yes Exodus moral system is laughably infantile, finished it last night (Jan 2024) and I WILL NOT be playing it again for a while just because its pretentious with the message bullshit, I binged the 3 games just to be lectured. Naaaah fuck you. I'll gladly take my blackass right back to Fallout, WAY more content anyway.

I understand the overtones, the "diamond in the rough/being the exception/", the Bioshock 2 "Mercy is victory" message, but in this game? It wasn't executed well at all. And seriously, at the end of the day, Fuck the writers, play your fucking way.

Otherwise, Metro Exodus is a good game, crashed once (chalking it up to my shit-ware), it's the best of the Metros, excellent production, buy it anyway. It's moral grandstanding is cringe, but don't rob yourself by not playing it at least once.

Its fun as shit mechanics wise, scout for all the loot, you'll need it, this game will punish you for being reckless, good.

[richardsondavis]

I'm still bothered by the Drinker recommending Arcane. A little peeved but checking out his recs, it has some great stuff. Dredd and Event Horizon he gives his recommendation and approval.

Don't know why I should take his word for it cause I did try his other recs and they weren't doing it for me so yeah.

Guess I shouldn't really put my trust in people like him.

But I also ask? Why do I like Gigguk's recommendations and not The Critical Drinker's?

Well, for starters, Gigguk is anime and I like anime so I get where he's coming from. The Drinker doesn't really have much for me aside from the anti-woke ranting every now and then.

Gigguk breaks it down when he recommends something with a tad of memes thrown in the mix and it makes for an enjoyable viewing experience.

The Critical Drinker just makes some quips and, to be honest, a tad obnoxious use of some memes and sound effects, especially "The Message" in his vids. That isn't really something I particularly enjoy.

And when I do say this out loud, it would be considered as trolling or something and that really isn't what I'm trying to do.

And then they would say vile stuff to me and I have seen some shit and read some crap that would even destroy people like me and I really fear that.

Gigguk steers clear of controversy as much as he can and he does poke jabs at woke culture like cancel culture and Twitter ranters but that's about it and that's how much I can stomach.

The Critical Drinker comes off as too strong and when I can't stomach it, I'll be considered a wimp and that's not fun. Even fucking 4chan is not that toxic, the movie and tv boards I mean.

Politically Incorrect and R9k and random is a given sure but you expect that from there. I just want the Drinker to present why the movie is shit instead of calling it woke and using surface level literary stuff that's probably not up to snuff with a Tumblr post.

Dumbsville, an equally anti-woke dude is leagues better than The Drinker in reviewing. He likes Arcane, okay, but I want to fucking reject Arcane because of that now cause I feel like he tainted it with his "approval".

I am so fucking glad, Gigguk convinced me to watch it first before that esteemed gentleman whom I have been referring to as The Critical Drinker had the chance to taint it for me. And have you seen his review, dude doesn't know the difference between an MMORPG and an FPS. Gigguk's review of Arcane is superior for the sole reason that he gets the culture and the memes.

I found the Drinker back in the day cause of my anti-woke attitude and I still have an anti-woke attitude, just that I've mellowed out. I will admit though that his video on what is woke is one of the best videos on the topic to date and for that reason I will salute him but aside from that, I'm not a fan of him.

Although his podcast interviews are not too bad, he seems chill when he's not unhinged.

So if you guys like the type of content where it's Sargon of Akkad but for movies, TV, Pop culture and Western culture war with a side of snarkiness that's too much for my sensible sensibilities, then The Drinker is for you. I recommend starting with his Why Modern Movies Suck series. A good start.

Then Gigguk for the animes. And I have a lot to say about some anitubers but that's for another post here.

If you're confused as to where I stand with the Drinker, I'm in the middle of the fence that leans into the dislike team more. Like my feet is on the dislike team's side of the fence but I also hear the like and revere side and I understand some of what they're saying but not really getting into it, y'know? If it weren't for The Drinker making that one video defining woke, which I have been looking for years and where he was not a tad bit unhinged, I would've hated the guy and my past self for even liking his videos and his talking points.

I guess I just need someone to break down the woke movies of the modern day in a not so strong way. Dumbsville and Filmento come to mind. And they're a much more interesting watch than The Drinker is for the modern me.

I just can't help but think as to what the anti-woke internet would say about my opinion. Would they cancel me?

Would they label me a troll?

Would they see me as a threat that deserves termination?

Will they bully me?

Will they harass me?

Will they kick me out of their groups and circles?

So many questions that all hinges on what other people would think of me. They say to try to listen to your side but I tried that before and tries their recommendations and that just didn't do it for me. I have bad taste according to someone online but my brother also says that to me and I think I'm okay.

I just have to consume more media before I get the urge to move to more thought-provoking media.

I want to keep talking here but I should stop now. Let me check. Okay, checked. Not long enough.

So about my anti-woke past, I started my internet journey on Pinterest and then Tumblr and then Facebook before I was introduced to 4chan and Reddit.

I was seeing these posts on Pinterest about gay stuff and trans pride and all that without knowing what it all was but I do remember my reaction to it, it was confusion and a bit of not too fond of what it was.

I still had a very favorable view of Pinterest as a whole of course. Then I went to Tumblr where the porn was still all the rage back then. Loved the things I discovered there. Didn't really had the capacity of higher thought to make posts like this back then. I was just existing and that's okay.

So I was not aware of what anti-woke was or what Gamergate was or why it was happening but I know that there are some things I dislike in Pinterest that I wanted to say something about and Reddit and 4chan came to me. Introduced to me by a friend, these two were my go to back in 2018 to 2019. I was also starting to develop an anti-woke sentiment based on the things I see. I already had a dislike of strong stuff so things that sound like The Critical Drinker I steered clear off.

I discovered KotakuInAction (Gamergate), TumblrinAction (Anti-Tumblr but quite nuanced) and SocialJusticeinAction (unhinged but less interesting brother) and I enjoyed and lapped up all the things they said. How gays are ruining media (one can argue that it is true, new characters are more favorable than rewrites and I have a lot to say about rewrites) and how the ESG focused companies are bowing down to the woke mob (which I pretty much agree, I have the idea that if the people crying doesn't know what the thing they're trying to change is then they're not worth jack and is best to be ignored or provide a polite reply that says no).

I started with the news article reviewing sites like Mr. Obvious or No Bullshit. Obvious was better and he had this humor I liked. He was just repetitive and that really wasn't doing it for me then I started looking into anti-woke media analysis cause I always saw woke media analysis like that one Meduse and Athena are feminists and such (Yas, beotch slay!!!!; sorry I had to).

So I found the Drinker through that. He was still under a million subs and stuff but he scratched an itch.

Then the pandemic happened and the lockdowns, I got to thinking about things and I realized that being anti-woke isn't all that. How? I tried their recommendations and I wasn't really feeling them.

I tried the ones they dislike or the ones I know they will dislike and I got to enjoy those.

I still remember reading my first true LGBT webtoon called Acception and it still is my standard for LGBT media.

I had some things to go through during those years and I guess the strong opined individual is something I'm not very fond of developed greatly during that time.

I know I'm weak and I want to understand how to get better. I've been trying ever since.

I know that I went kinda off topic but hmmmm.

That's all from me for now. Go away now.

[genericpuff]

One thing that has always irked me about LO is that Smythe will more or less sideline or otherwise forget plotlines.

Like, I hate that this latest FP chapter was a bland wedding (where Persephone wasn't able to even choose/create her own dress??? I'm sorry, that makes me so mad. She's just a doll for everyone to dress up with no agency whatsoever. If instead of Hera giving her the "perfect dress," she showed Persephone a selection of dresses, and Persephone picked one out and modified it to be dark magenta/black with her signature crown and chose to make her eyes red, that would've been better. At least then one could argue this chapter served to show Persephone's growth in terms of taking ownership of herself. Smythe could still insert Hera into the scene but then at least Persephone would have a say in HER wedding).

If Smythe absolutely HAD to have HxP get married immediately just to spite Demeter or whatever, I wish she would have inserted a scene or something with Apollo and Leto hearing about the wedding and realizing their plans were foiled or that they'd have to come up with a different way to overthrow Zeus, maybe even incorporate that espionage thing Psyche has going on, or even better, have a Demeter-centric episode in which we see more of her backstory when she hears about Persephone marrying Hades immediately, structured so that we hear her internal monologue while she mourns and fears for her daughter's well being and we see the beginnings of winter. (Not that I trust Smythe with Demeter or her story, but still.)

Like. Somehow Smythe managed to make HxP's relationship the most boring part of the retelling, and this wedding episode was a testament to that. It literally had no substance, nothing new was added, and the story was not advanced in a meaningful way. I highly doubt their dynamic or anything is going to change either. It's just now they're contractually obligated to each other? (Another point of contention. This is Ancient Greece... Smythe couldn't have bothered to google Ancient Greek wedding traditions and incorporated elements from whatever popped up first in the search? I know this is supposed to be "modern" but that increasingly feels like an excuse to just not do research (using that term here loosely).)

I feel like Smythe truly doesn't care anymore, and I think she's just winging the plot and story at this point. (I'm not sure if anyone feels this way, but if I reread the first few chapters of S1, I feel like LO was supposed to have a completely different trajectory and we only got here by accident.) This comic could have been so good and interesting, and it's just disappointing.

I know this ask is already pretty long, and I appreciate you taking the time to read it. I just want to add one last thing.

Your Lore Rekindled?? Amazing. Top tier. Chef's kiss. I love your interpretation of Dionysus, and I LOVED how you ended Ep5 with Persephone calling Hades terrifying. Like. So good. So excited to see where you take Rekindled. Thanks for being the hero we need as LO becomes an even bigger trainwreck with each passing week. You're awesome, and I hope you have a nice day 😁

That's the thing, I would have been fine (still a little upsetti, but I could cope) if LO went for the "Persephone was trying to get away from her mom and the Mortal Realm" take. Because it can come with the positive of having Persephone and Hades' relationship be consensual (even if it ends up being at the cost of her relationship with her mother, considering the fact it also requires the endless winter it's pretty much unavoidable LMAO). But like... it's the fact Rachel can't write anything consistently and will randomly retcon shit or dial the mildest character traits up to 100000 with NO consideration for motives or intentions that boils my piss. It's incredibly manipulative writing and the more it happens, the more I start to get the sense Rachel doesn't have a lot of emotional maturity herself to understand other people's perspectives outside of her own. I know that's probably a harsh assumption to come to but it's hard not to come to it when she keeps doing shit like this (as Demeter isn't the only one in LO to get this treatment). Rachel will basically just make her characters do whatever she thinks needs to be done to get her audience to feel a specific way about them. It's like a lawyer asking leading questions, it's manipulative and cheap writing.

And honestly, that's LO's worst crime among everything else - it's boring. I can handle stories that are spicy around the rim, I can handle problematic protagonists or otherwise plotlines that would NOT fly in real life due to how morally heinous they are, so long as they're entertaining. LO isn't even entertaining. Like, people will tell me LO shouldn't be "taken seriously", that you should consume it the same way as you would trash TV or a telenovella, but I don't get how I can do that either when it's so painfully BORING. A relationship is only as strong and interesting as the characters in it. If your characters are boring and uninteresting on their own, sticking them in a relationship together isn't gonna be much better. Now you just have two boring people being boring together lol

IDK where Smitty's head is at but I do get the feeling she's checked out. LO wasn't even supposed to go on this long in the beginning. But it can be really easy to drag things along for the sake of the money and fame and I feel like that's where we're at, like Rachel's just buying herself time before LO inevitably comes to an end. I definitely don't envy her position there. But she wouldn't be the first Originals creator who essentially "gave up" during production and started phoning it in thinking no one would notice. They do notice though. The sucky thing is that people are noticing what's up with Rachel and she's still like... pretending she's still into it, when she very obviously isn't. And if she is, then... whoof.

Hot take but LO just isn't a comic that should have become popular. Not that the concept itself couldn't have been popular, but like, my take on it in general is that people shouldn't be so concerned with "getting rich quick" especially in the arts industries. Like, to get across what I'm saying here, let me pose you a hypothetical: which would you rather be known for in the end? The first-time comic you got lucky with that reeks because you had no experience managing a longform series and lost your dedication to it years ago and it was literally your "first try"? Or the comic that came after you learned the craft and know what you're putting out is the best version of what it can be and proven to yourself it's what you really want to do with your life?

LO wasn't Smythe's first webcomic (she also created The Dr. Foxglove show which... I'm pretty sure she doesn't want anyone to know about because she's already starting scrubbing her ArtStation of it, oop-) but LO was her first foray into longform serialized storytelling. It might seem like a hot/harsh take, but no one should become instantly famous off their first project like that, as much as it might seem like a "dream come true". Because most of us aren't ready for that sort of responsibility yet. Your first, second, even third project should be learning experiences as a main priority. Getting famous off the first thing you do just because it got lucky or it scratched a certain itch in the market? Doesn't always bode well if you have no prior experience in that industry. Rachel has stated she has imposter syndrome in the past and while I feel like an asshole for saying this, it's one of the few times where I'll say "maybe the imposter syndrome has a point". Some people really do fail upwards. It's not to say Rachel doesn't deserve to be where she is (because god knows she probably isn't enjoying being there now with all the eyes on her that she didn't expect to have when she started out) but like... just because someone is famous for what they do, doesn't mean they're actually skilled at it.

But that might just be me being jaded. I used to want my first comic to become big and famous too but now, looking back at it, I'm so fucking glad it didn't LMAO I still don't know if I'm actually legitimately ready for that sort of thing, if it ever happened. Lucky for me it probably won't but I also didn't expect to end up with any sort of audience here the way I have so... that's been pretty neat LOL A little weird because I've been spending over a decade already just kind of creating for the void, and it's weird that it took an LO rewrite comic to do it, but w/e, the universe does what the universe does.

Sorry, I'm getting sentimental now LMAO This was really just my weird way of segueing into my big thanks for reading Rekindled <3

[neerikiffu]

headline (i am very creative indeed) ((27.02.24))

i bingewatched the entirety of hamefura in 3 days and playing the game now

it doesn't go with turnip drivers so i have to sacrifice all of the quality and smoothing just to not get stutters, with the system driver

which is something like <480p and i can't even use the smoothing that makes the text readable cause that chops 10 fps off immediately and yet the screen still flashes black every ten seconds

painful for the eyes to be honest the game doesn't have anything in it that's worth so much gpu power (ui sucks!!! the pause menu should cover me up and it doesnt!!! the shortcuts don't make any sense!!! how the hell am i supposed to play in class???)

playing geordo and well i never liked him, im on 5th or 6th chapter rn i think the recommended route order and my willingness to maxx the game out didn't go anywhere, i can't just skip him

brawl stars servers are dead again (too many people like the update) and tbh im getting kinda lazy to play… still have to finish up the season though… how much time has left

they renamed ranks into tiers???????? tf 8 days left and 2k XP left and then im tier 50 (not rank tier, but bp tier)

alright i have enough quests to pull this off

BUT NOT ENOUGH HANDS THEY HURT THEY GET TIRED TOO FAST AND THEN HURT LIKE CRAZY

tbh not like crazy but annoying as hell man

so i already paid for the coolest left-handed mouse ever (i give up on my right hand, may it rest in peace LITERALLY I AM GIVING IT REST) and now am trying my best to not buy half of aliexpress accidentally cause the keyboard now tires me out as well

i wanted to buy keycaps too, but will just buy switches decided on gateron g pro whites v3

that's like $40 for 110 pieces… that's like a whole new keyboard off of the same aliexpress… but the money is burning some gaping void pits in my pockets while setting the entirety of me ablaze and i can't wait to spend it because i have no goals or aspirations i am not geordo, though there is little hope left

all my career paths kinda presume me being in front of my pc for 10h+ a day, and my hopes and dreams do too

it's in my best interest to make the job easier for self (自分)

on an off note, i think that if i spoke japanese i'd use the atashi pronoun, and occasionally jibun lmao that's literally pronouns huh

i haven't studied jp for a week because i gave in to burnout

but today i managed to start and let's just hope that after writing this post out i'll be able to come back to it

talking about giving in to burnout that's supposedly called living without the grind and constant feelings of guilt huh

tbh it went as far as to make me a little bit more suitable for reality

i probably dissociated too hard this time, because school isn't painful anymore, and i am even able to enjoy and live through it (presuming i am distracted 100% of the time)

some people even hug me

crazy stuff

but talking about school - there's no hope (note: hope that would align with MY PREFERENCES) for me if i don't get my shit straight

please give me powers and HANDS to come back to gamedev

i have to work

nothing will work if i wont work

[xb0rder-7inex]

Lol. I think I just fell out of love with him. At the very least he is no longer my FP. He blocked me AGAIN two days after I tried to kms and I had NO REACTION. I am anxious a little of course but I have no desire to chase him. Even though I don't know how long he'll be gone. I presume not long. What a disgusting human to do that to his "girlfriend."

I can never forgive him for this anyways. Not being here for me while I'm suicidal?? He told me he was "going to come see me this weekend" even though he didn't tell me that and then decided not to see me this weekend as some kind of punishment or something and then blocked me when I was asking him very reasonable questions about our relationship. Both of which are EXTREMELY emotionally abusive.

I very much understand that he does this for space when I get in my head, but the problem is that I have communicated SEVERAL times throughout our relationship that that is a huge trigger for me and he has never ever respected that. That principle alone is now enough to give me the ick. I've accepted this part of him. I literally give up lol.

I've split way too many times on him to not realise now that he is never going to change. He doesn't give a shit about me or how I feel and he honestly never will. Not worth being suicidal for this douchebag.