#not very good at character design but here we are !!!!!!

[bogleech]

So I said in tags that I actually read this webcomic in my teens and that it had some strong worldbuilding, in particular its take on the seven deadly sins as demons, but that somebody would have to ask before I go infodumping again about such a hot mess.

OKAY here we go, I'm just gonna go over the sin demons because they're where all the imagination was concentrated and they sum up the setting in themselves really

Wrath: the sin demons in this are actually the damned souls guiltiest of their respective deadly sin in all of history (past or future because hell exists outside of time and all that) and Jack, the title character, is Wrath because he was Furry Hitler. Not literally Adolf Hitler in a furry timeline mind you, but a furry who became a genocidal dictator with a bunch of awkward Hitler parallels. He canonically genocided all humans, because at some point humans create furries only to treat them as slaves or something.

Anyway the sin of Wrath is also the Grim Reaper in this universe, and his punishment is that all memory of his evil deeds and why he did them were taken away from him, except for the factual knowledge of who he is. So this makes him a completely different, kinder person tormented by the act having to reap every death there will ever be, but he does know who he was and why this is his fate. I think you can see why people bothered to read such a fucked up messy comic because that's a pretty damn strong hook, for a character or story at all. Like imagine being your regular self but knowing you were someone as bad as hitler, and now you have to be the one who witnesses every death there is and rip families apart a million times a day. Would you deserve punishment at all for deeds that have been wiped from your mind? Are they still "your" sins in that scenario? These and other compelling questions raised by this premise.... would never actually be explored, as far as I can recall. All it really amounts to is the same as any sad antihero, and kind of a direct ripoff of Todd Mcfarlane's Spawn.

So then there's Greed, who was some kind of religious cult leader who built like a whole brutal Roman style empire, or something, until he was turned on and mutilated by his followers? He's the least interesting really, and his backstory, along with many other backstories in the series, completely contradicts Jack's backstory where humans invent furries through biotechnology. Other characters were definitely already furries during historical events centuries before then.

9/11 even happens during the events of the comic, but the world was already all furries at the time. By the way one of the towers themselves goes to heaven with all the good people who died in 9/11 and the other one goes to hell with all the bad people. This was not meant to be funny at the time but it is obviously VERY funny. Writing this has forced me to remember that I did do this infodump before. Oh no. I don't remember when. I just remember that I did. JUST LIKE JACK!!!!!!!!!

Gluttony is two characters, a husband and wife couple who were serial killer cannibals. They are also some sort of dinosaur or pterosaur that was brought back in furry form by furry society's biotechnology, but in furry society everyone of a carnivorous species lives on lab-grown meat, and these two couldn't stand that because it didn't satisfy their hunting instinct, or something. PERSONALLY I feel like this should not really count as the most sinful possible gluttony, I mean, these predatory lizard birds didn't ask to come back into existence and be cursed with unnatural sapience. Just feels kind of bullshit to me. They are the coolest concept design-wise for any of these sins though, and they fuse together into one body when they eat, with one of them becoming a face on the crotch like some of those old medieval depictions of devils.

Envy looks like a big fucked up Todd Mcfarlane Orangutan but is actually supposed to have been the last surviving human and was like, a mad geneticist or something. The artist could not draw humans, hence the plot about them being extinct and the only human character being warped into a demonic ape. If I'm remembering correctly (I could just check a wiki but I don't feel like it sorry) he's Envy because he hated furries for taking over our society even though most of them had nothing to do with the genocide and were just freed slaves and whatnot, and one thing I do remember clearly is that he engineers a furry zombie apocalypse that ends the furry world further in the future.

Vanity/pride I don't think was ever fully explained but she wears a cloak because she's skinless, and she goes around skinning other damned she thinks are beautiful to wear the pelts until they rot.

Sloth was revealed many years after I stopped paying attention to this series, but turns out to be the entire ground of hell, with a malformed tree as his seat of consciousness, making it impossible to get a moment's peace or rest. That's a neat concept but apparently no backstory happened before the comic stopped so we're left wondering how someone was as bad all these various Hitlers through slothfulness. I guess someone who could have easily prevented a bunch of suffering and didn't care enough to bother maybe.

So the last one is Lust, and Lust is a giant rat (who looks nothing at all like a rat) named "Drip" who was a violent misogynistic sexual predator, the worst one that would ever exist in our whole reality for him to be the demon of lust. This was the first piece of fiction I ever saw where Lust was someone like this instead of a Sexy Seductive Lady demon, which makes a shitload more sense yet it still isn't common.

Anyway this guy is the biggest reason why you may not want to go looking for this comic because the kind of shit he does is fully shown, and it's played for horror, yes, and it's also just drawn too sloppy to come across as the author's fetish, but for some time this character was supposedly the author's main "Fursona" he roleplayed as. His wife actually mentions the character by name in the MTV call. I'm not writing a callout here or anything, I mean this was like 20 years ago, I don't know him and haven't heard anything recent about him, these just aren't details you can rightfully leave out about this character.

Edited to add that Drip is also supposedly the father (without knowing it?) of what was the focal character in the beginning of the comic, the soul of an aborted fetus, who ends up wandering hell but protected from it up until Drip does something to him (thankfully off screen) that leads Jack to shred Drip into a million pieces and leave him as a screaming tortured severed head which I do believe Drip never recovers from before the comic stopped updating. I could be wrong? There is obviously a lot to unpack in all that, including the fact that, in a setting where an aborted fetus becomes a sapient child forced to wander hell, God was still written as a completely righteous entity and specifically a cute child-size lamb furry we were supposed to find endearing. In its heyday Jack was treated like a "culturally important" webcomic, like, hailed as proof that webcomics were a serious adult medium, which is also very funny on multiple levels in our current online culture. I know it was a big big deal in some furry circles, but I was introduced to it by just horror fandom at the time. It ran from before I ever even owned a computer to sometime in the 2010's, I think it was actually published at one point and it influenced a bunch of other webcomics to varying degrees of success.

So yeah, it IS internet history and I'm sure there's video essays and stuff about it if you want to know more because I still probably only ever saw a third to half of it at best.

[sgiandubh]

Delulu vs. trululu

As expected, promo for the overall stodgy TCND just started in NYC, including with this released and then quickly deleted Instagram pic, shared by the Sassenach Spirits' account:

Not the cleverest marketing & sales move, if you ask me. Knowing this fandom's usual bigot and/or scoffing triggers (which I tend to think S & team do, and rather very well), why even entertain lurid speculation and, by the same token, an unnecessarily juvenile image of The Co-founder? Oh, how I wish they'd step up their game a bit and perhaps be more coherent with that fresh, witty sales approach that first caught my eye!

Why. A rhetorical question that never grows old, as far as SC are concerned. Take for example the latest interview released yesterday by the Fangirlish.com website, which is barely a blurb in the great Instagram tapestry. 6k followers do not a great media outlet make, I believe and they've been around since 2011 (!).

Perhaps on design or perhaps because both of them DGAF anymore, we were treated to these parallel public statements on a rarely brought about and carefully censored calibrated topic: personal lives.

[Source: https://fangirlish.com/2025/01/12/interview-sam-heughan-and-caitriona-balfe-on-jamie-claires-growth-in-outlander/]

While C ambiguously mentions what Claire's character brought to who she is now, she is probably throwing to the scrapheap that constipated but convenient braggadocio that she was 'totally able to separate between Claire and herself'. Something we kept on reading ad nauseam from EFH to the Remarkable Week-end and beyond. She now readily acknowledges she has led 'this project alongside S', all the while - which is even more telling - 'assuming everything that implies'. For some reason, I doubt she simply meant the rather decorous EP functions, but also the entire emotional burden of it all, to which this damned fandom is not exactly a stranger. As we have long surmised, they are in this thing together and they did it together (been together, loved together, lived together, lied together...) all along this tortuous path. Cue in the usual venom that they can't stand each other anymore, I don't really care, at this point in time.

S dutifully obliges as C's sounding board and takes it the needed (but completely unnecessary, Narrative-wise) extra mile: JAMMF has given him 'an incredible relationship, one I never thought I’d have'.

Surely he does not mean Flukenzie Floozy or the entire Fitness Harem panoply, Ha-wa-wee 🐰and Dubai Burlesque included. And she could have rectified on the spot or poked fun at him or anything in between. Yet, she did not: surely Tracula is again the 'very understanding' character of that plot!

Why even bring it up all of this now? Why even mention personal stuff both of them have a rather appalling PR management of, from unnecessary exposure to gaslighting an entire fandom and probably also the kitchen sink?

For the sake of an ending series?

Oh, come on - give me a break, here. We are neither delulu, nor stupid.

PS: Thank you for the pic. You know who you are ;)

Later edit: I am told with good reason that is was not Sassenach Spirits which posted that pic, but the Instagram user @stevieme88 - a bartender at that last SS event in the US. He then proceeded to go private again, but the pic was downloaded and shared by that very well informed vigilante account, which then chose to tag Sassenach Spirits (why?).

Gracias a ti, siempre.

[woosh-floosh-art]

Bits and Pieces: 2024

Went through all my 2024 files and here's all the stuff I didn't post!

Dragon Quest slimes... The idea was to do a slime gacha of some sort but... there's so many slimes man I can't draw them all.

Teeny Sanguini variations. The idea was to make a keychain of each teeny sanguini variation but.. that would cost a lot of money and I don't even know how well does keychains would sell. Maybe people just want basic teeny sanguini and I'm wasting my money buying other keychains.. Oh well. The basic teeny sanguini keychain I ordered has sold well, we'll have to see if I decide to order one of the variations.

Various Ouioui's. I think the goal was to eventually draw them all? I just needed something simple but with some room for experimentation to draw everyday. Early 2024 was a rough time for me.

Fan Ouioui design. This one is good. I would imagine the body of the thing would be a scrunchie so you can put it in your hair or on your wrist.

CMY(K) and spring dango themed galumpin dops.

PEARL DRONE!! The goal was to make stickers, that didn't happen lol. Still cute though...

Various little doodles I thought were cute. Badniks, two headed minecraft calf sticker concept (I didn't think it was very clear in it's design..), kirby :D, alien cow, and a true fact about aphids.

SA2 animal sticker gacha. Like I said, in early 2024 I was really looking for something simple and repetitive to draw with just enough variation to keep things interesting. Like the slimes and the ouiouis this one fizzled out. There was just TOO much variation. I ended up doing all of those gyroids which was perfect for the time and also sold really well as stickers! I also did all those damn kirby stickers which did NOT sell as well.

Okay enough about the grief and depression, let's talk about SONIC OCS!! I really loved the periodical cicada emergence this year so I wanted to make a sonic oc based on them. Her wings are crumpled (like many cicadas I saw this year, unfortunately her and the other cicadas will never fly) but she was some wisp powered roller blades to let her zoom around! I used to do a lot of character design as a teen but now I struggle with it. But I don't think this is that bad of a design? It's fun, she's fun.

Every year for artfight people make new characters based on the theme, and this year I wanted to try as well! He's supposed to be an anthropomorphic ray, a prince that must set out on an adventure! The eyebrow design is cuter but I think the widows peak design better conveys that he is supposed to be a ray. Bottom right is my favorite but I would switch the cutlass for the rapier. It's just a bit more of a princely sword.

Blue eyed cicada sticker concept. During the cicada emergence this year someone found a blue eyed cicada!! This is the mock up if I made stickers of that. I didn't because I was soooo sick of handcutting those damn cicadas, they were not easy to cut. Also they did not sell very well. We need more cicada fans in this world...

Lastly... two pages to a comic I never finished. It was supposed to be the prologue to my oc story but... it's a little scary making comics about original characters! There's a lot more to think about and manage over doing fan comics. I would still like to return to my little world and characters but I just haven't been in the mood for it. Ironically there was only one page left in the prologue but it's been so long I don't think I'm going to finish it!

Also, to try and combat the anxiety that comes with making an original story I didn't plan the layouts at all?? I guess to make the process faster and not worry as much?? The thumbnails in my sketchbook are just loose unconnected panels next to the script. That is not how I typically plan comics... and for good reason! Looks at the paneling in page two! It's bad! It's really bad!! When I come back to my characters I going to have to swallow my fear and put some more time and care into the layouts.

Okay that's all for 2024! I have a couple more things to post from December and then that's a wrap on 2024! Thanks for reading! ^_^

[artificervaldi]

If Louis is Lucifer, then Satan is...?

[NOTE: this post will contain spoilers for Metaphor: ReFantazio as well as various SMT games and I guess Dante's Inferno if you care about spoilers for that]

So, it's not a secret Louis Guiabern (AKA Louis Charadrius. AKA Louis C.) is very clearly based heavily on Lucifer, specifically SMT's version of Lucifer. Of course he has Satan elements, though these are mostly Dante's Inferno cues rather than SMT's version of Satan.

While Metaphor is meant to be it's own thing/a third pillar for Atlus there's no denying the SMT DNA present in the main antagonist. From his boss forms' titles matching races in SMT (Archdemon we'll get into in a moment, Destroyer being 破壊神 or Hakaishin matching the light-chaos race of Fury), to his very ideal of the world matching the Chaos alignment well.

But within SMT2, Atlus proposed Satan as a sort of opposite to Lucifer, a Law aligned being to the Chaos shown before. So does Metaphor have any character that matches up to that Satan? The Angel of Judgment and Servant of YHVH?

To figure that out, I want to touch on a few things about Louis, specifically the Archdemon and Destroyer forms we see him in in the game's final boss fight.

It's pretty obvious that there's a lot of Kaneko-cifer in the DNA of the design of Archdemon Louis Charadrius, albeit with eight wings rather than six (though a few times SMT and its spinoffs have shown Lucifer with more than six wings)!

Interestingly, Dante's Inferno contained 9 circles with Satan at the center. There are 9 tribes including the elda and he is at the center of his wings. Given the wings represent the other tribes and notably skip 4 to make it 9, this shows Dante is at play even here with regards to his design.

See below for reference.

1) Anger - Clemar 2) Pride - Nidia 3) Deceit - Roussainte 4 skipped 5) Greed - Mustari 6) Fear - Ishika 7) Gluttony - Paripus 8) Lust - Rhoag 9) Sloth - Eugief

One final thing to touch on with this form is the title of Archdemon. In JP it is 大魔王 or "Dai Maou." This is also used by Atlus in SMT as a race title, but unlike Destroyer/Fury, this one is specific to a certain someone...

Specifically, Lucifer, though in Nocturne and Vengeance it was translated as "Devil." Do pay attention, this will be on the quiz.

Now, Destroyer Charadrius.

We know his design is based heavily on the Lucifer/Satan of Dante's Inferno. His first form and the way it eats the puppets calling to Satan chewing on those Dante considered the worst sinners especially comes to mind.

Honestly speaking, the second form to me is a bit of that SMT-influenced Lucifer coming through. Once again doing their own spin on various mythologies.

Notably, by the by, is that Satan in the Inferno is frozen from the waist down. This is even mimicked, somewhat, by Louis's lower-half in this form being the Charadrius itself.

But this isn't the first time a frozen devil has been featured in an Atlus game. It's actually been used in story at least twice for Lucifer and is otherwise often reflected in his moveset.

(Worth noting in both of the above cases, he does eventually canonically have to get out of the ice at some point. You don't have to release him in NINE, but given he's around in 2 he definitely gets out at some point.)

As for gameplay he often has ice skills (along with others, though the tendency towards ice is very notable) or, in the case of Raidou 2, they're a good thing to use AGAINST him in battle.

As we move into talking about SMT Satan here... It's notable that he usually is associated with fire, but P5R and Soul Hackers 2 specifically pivot him to a more ice-based skillset.

...Interestingly enough, Louis has a small association with fire. Strohl even says that he believes Louis is still stuck in "that night of flames," leading him to the choices he made in the end.

Now back to Satan. Compared to Lucifer his story roles in mainline SMT are farther and fewer between. So while Lucifer we can pull from more games than not, Satan-wise the only one I feel is really comparable to is the one from Shin Megami Tensei 2. Namely because of the human element of Satan.

Zayin is a temple knight and one of the artificial humans made by the Archangels in their madness from TFW no YHVH. He is, in fact, an aspect of Satan and the one meant to judge all life in His name. He starts the game loyal to the center, the theocratic nation you live in, but thanks to the protagonist begins to question and fight for what he believes is right.

This ranges from starting a revolution among the lower classes to attempting to fight the elders (leading to his own frozen/petrified moment -- albeit one more meant to be an homage to Star Wars than anything).

Hell, if you take the Law Route he ends up turning on his very creator and judging him as he judges all other life. But at his core, Zayin is a good man who sees the value in "weaker" life but also value in being able to stand against leaders who do not have your best interests in mind.

Also worth noting as part of the Satan equation, however, is Seth. The demonic half of the angel.

A dragon that sleeps but spells destruction for many/all when he awakens and finds his other half... Surely that's not gonna come into play here later (it is, keep an eye out).

So, who from Metaphor would make a decent fit for Satan, keeping Zayin's arc in mind? First thought might be, say... Gideaux.

Warrior Monk fits Temple Knight fairly well and he does have a (let's be honest, rushed) arc about realizing the corruption around his religion and trying to do right by it.

But he's just... Not a good fit. He's willing to do some of those corrupt things (remember, he's the one who suggested pillaging the relics of the mustari!) and only comes to realize the mistakes when Rella broadcasts them to the world.

Not to mention he's too passive. Yes, he turns a new leaf, but he doesn't lead a charge. Doesn't judge if someone is fit for their role in the world, doesn't rally the people behind a common goal, doesn't even have a connection to Louis outside of a pissing match with Glodell!

...You know, Zayin at one point broadcasts to all of Tokyo Millennium about the corruption. He rallies the people behind a common cause, behind the protagonist.

Doesn't something similar happen in Metaphor?

That's right, I'm presenting the following candidate for the Satan of Metaphor: ReFantazio.

Rella Cygnus herself is the character I want to present as in fact a perfect stand-in for Zayin/Satan. She hits so many of the marks too perfectly not for me to present her as my choice here.

A devoted member of the theocracy's faith of choice? Check. Aware of the horrors behind it at some point and working to better it? Check. Battle against the protagonist and then rally the people behind them when they prove worthy? Check. Willing to die for what they see as right? Check.

Hell, she even has a related dragon with an S-starting name! (And remember, this is the only dragon ever fought alongside a person in their right mind. The rest are on their own or with a Human!)

Does this mean Rella had more planned for her that got cut? Probably. Does this mean she could get thawed out if we get a sequel and we get another proper Law Antagonist? If Hashino loves me, yes.

And uh. It's not very big but. You know how Louis has a few Satan-like traits here and there? You know how Rella's darkest magic presents as thorny vines? Just thought this line from Lucifer in the Freedom ending of SMT3 was interesting.

Anyway, yeah. Rella gets hit with the Satan beam agenda. Thank you for your time.

[stitchwitchsapprentice]

Wow. There so much to unpack here, and as a HS teacher, I feel like I need to.

First of all, comparing pre-1970 English literature to German is ridiculous. Simply put, The Outsiders is not written in a different language. Neither are I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, The Autobiography of Malcom X, or The Lord of the Rings. Also according to this claim, we should translate Fahrenheit 451, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?", and the entire Beatles canon.

But if your point is actually about Shakespeare (which it seems to be), then let's talk about Shakespeare.

While technically considered modern English, Shakespeare and his contemporaries are difficult to read because English has changed a lot since the seventeenth century, and we no longer have the context to understand all these words. For example, Shakespeare wrote a lot of dick jokes which are often lost on a contemporary audience that doesn't understand seventeenth century English slang.

But Shakespeare also used a lot of words and phrases that we use today. In fact, Shakespeare invented a lot of words and phrases that we use today. So being exposed to the original text not only helps students to better understand the language they are using, it shows them just how fluid language is--and always has been! Shakespeare coined new words all the time. You can too. The works of Shakespeare are a great example of linguistic productivity.

All this being said, we do translate Shakespeare. Sparknotes' No Fear Shakespeare editions are very popular in schools because they show the original text and a modern version side by side. So the students are exposed to the original text, but they're also not bogged down in it. When I was in school, I also had multiple teachers give us the assignment to make our own translations, either independently or in groups, depending the play and student skill level. And it's pretty easy to access hi-lo versions for struggling readers (some of which are just very very abridged) as well as graphic novel editions. There are options, and we use them.

But the age of a text isn't the only thing that makes it difficult to understand. Jane Eyre is a far easier read than Heart of Darkness, despite being published about 50 years earlier (which also happens to be about the same distance between today and 1970). Personally, I think Jane Eyre is also an easier read than No-No Boy, which came out in the 1950s.

Shakespeare uses a lot of poetry and uses figurative language. But half the English language is figurative language. Which is why exposure to Shakespeare is good for students--it can help them to understand idioms and metaphors, which we use all the time, many of which, as previously stated, originated with Shakespeare.

Finally, Shakespeare is difficult to read because, well... it's not meant to be read. It's meant to be performed. Which is why good English teachers do things like bringing in a box of props for students to incorporate into readers' theater and design costumes for the characters. Because studying a Shakespeare play by reading it is a little like studying Van Gogh through only written descriptions of his paintings.

Students don't hate literature because it's hard to read. They hate it because it's not salient. Therefore, we need to present texts in a relatable way, which can, but does not have to, include translation. For example:

--a college theater program presents "Shakespeare on the Rails" because when the characters are commuters on the train with you, the language is surprisingly easier to understand.

--A high school in the Marshall Islands puts on a production of A Midsummer Nights Dream, changing the setting and some of the charcters to fit Marshallese mythology, and translating the mechanicals' lines into Marshallese while keeping the nobles' lines in the original Shakespeare

--An HS teacher in the rural US uses the No Fear Shakespeare editions in her class and frontloads Romeo and Juliet with the knowledge that the characters are teenagers.

This last one was one of my co-workers and resulted in half a dozen ninth graders, in my classroom, complaining not about reading Romeo and Juliet, but about how immature and stupid the characters are. Does he really think he's in love? He thought he was in love with Rosalind yesterday! And the Friar told them they shouldn't rush to get married. They should have taken his advice. They're so stupid! (I had a similar event this year with eleventh graders complaining about what a b**** Abigail Williams is, even though The Crucible was not translated for them.)

Yes, translation is one tool we can use to make a text more accessible, which is why it's already actively being used in classrooms. But to assume it the either the only tool or the best tool (or that it's always necessary for something more then 50 years old) is both an insult to the intelligence of our students and an excuse for educators to be lazy.

We need to stop blaming the texts and start blaming the curricula, which, more often than not, use a read-the-text-answer-the-question method which is liable to bore anyone to tears. I didn't fall in love with Shakespeare in high school because I answered dozens of comprehension questions. I fell in love with Shakespeare in second grade. Watching Wishbone (which uses the original language).

Our school curricula are not designed in such a way as to make the texts relevent, nor do they invite students to engage with them on their own terms. Likewise, many teachers are never given the toolkit to do this (I know I wasn't!). But if we take the time to make the characters real and relevent, students buy into it. Sure, use the translation. But also show clips from The Complete Works of Shakespeare abridged or other adaptations. Invite students to create their own adaptations. And definitely, definitely, teach the dick jokes. Contrary to popular belief, teenagers like learning. They just don't like being talked down to.

(On that note, this is the same problem with the math curriculum. Students don't hate math because they "want to play with blocks." They hate math because abstract equations are not salient information. And quite frankly, playing with blocks sounds like a great way to teach geometry in a salient way. Blocks are, in fact, geometry.)

Novosad is an econ professor at Dartmouth btw

[divorcedwife]

Im especially interested in your opinion of the companions! Did you like any, how would you rank them, how did they compare to other games.

I did enjoy veilguard myself cause admittedly im a combat enjoyer (boo me now) and the combat was great to me. But what is usually good in dragon age/bioware even if everything else sucks are characters and their stories and interactions and that was so bad in veilguard imo.

Still I liked Davrin and Emmrich and Bellara myself, rest were very mixed, and these three also suffered from bad dialogue and Bellara also from some overt cutesiness.

hehe noooooo i wouldn't boo you! this game really made me realize that i prefer video games as a form of interactive storytelling rather than purely for gameplay, but i mean, i feel like im the weirdo here if anything. video games are games first... as much as i like the combat (especially when it's in big open fields, with opportunities for cover ; god is it satisfying to slowly take down a mob of enemies through clever dodging and hiding, i wayyyy prefer that to spamming the flashy special moves), it feels empty to me if i dont feel connected to the world. ideally, i'd love to play games where i enjoy both, but if i have to pick, i'll prefer a game that i find unfun to play but where i like the writing

i think it's a pretty weak cast, yeah. individually, but also as a group, they lack chemistry to me. most of them get along just fine, but not in a way that's particularly fun or exciting. their relationships aren't interesting to me because they're very samey, both in that most people are friendly and also that they start out friendly and end up friendly. dai isn't a game i love, but for all its flaws, it definitely had fascinating character interactions to me. blackwall's friendship with sera is so different to his friendship with cassandra or with solas, and he's initially wary of cole but grows to like him after a while. and these people all have their opinion of blackwall changed forever by revelations. that's what's lacking to me in companion relationships! growth... change... i did enjoy davrin and lucanis's bickering at least. i also did like how emmrich talked to companions, his therapy talk was actually charming every time i liked emmrich and davrin the most! my only problem with davrin is how often he felt shackled to assan, like the writers felt the need to remind us that he has a cute griffon every three seconds in case we were losing interest. but as a character, i found him really cool. i like how level headed he is, i love how he can't tell when lucanis is messing with him on purpose, those feel like great warden traits. emmrich, i really liked that he had the flaws to match his qualities - i love it when he complains about needing to teach TEN students (gasp!), or when davrin asks him if he knows how to wash dishes and he responds like someone who hasn't washed a dish in ten years, and so on. that's definitely what i found lacking in most companions - actual flaws! it's mind boggling to me how much of the lucanis banter i heard was spent clarifying how unproblematic he is. like he doesn't kill children, doesn't kill people who acted in self defense, doesn't kill innocents. what??? he doesn't even have flaws from growing up rich in a mansion... or being the ultimate nepo baby.................... that made most of the companions feel pretty shallow to me, like they were born right before the game began and had lived nothing

lucanis has enough little things about him i like that i would still say i liked him, but he's not getting honours from me. i like his design (it's very satisfyin to draw somehow), i liked spite, i liked the idea that he's trapped in the ossuary in his mind, i loved going to the mansion and seeing how barren and sad it is there. but i think his romance is my least favorite of any i've done in any dragon age games, and i would say that he was a worse boyfriend to have than the one who tried to kill me and also than the one who turned out to be an axe murderer in disguise, cause at least these two liked talking to my characters! lol

i'd put neve next but if im being honest with myself, i disliked more about her than i liked. i liked her bitter cynic pessimist traits, but i found her somewhat inconsistent on that and generally too friendly. the remaining characters, i didn't find anything compelling about them, i dont remember any moment that i liked with them :-( i really wish i did! i gave everyone as fair a shot as i could, i didn't start out this game looking for things to hate, but they really didn't do anything for me. i think bellara suffered from the fact that i dont really like all the technology in this game, i prefer low magic sad unwashed fantasy. at least she was very beautiful so she does get point for that

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Hey now, Let her cook!

[aseuki]

His gorgeous beefcake charm and funny tactical boba holster have captivated me

[phewgitoid]

something something ,, human design ,, something something ?

[blueskittlesart]

*sigh* thoughts on Nintendo's botw/totk timeline shenanigans and tomfoolery?

tbh. my maybe-unpopular opinion is that the timeline is only important when a game's place on the timeline seriously informs the way their narrative progresses. the problem is that before botw we almost NEVER got games where it didn't matter. it matters for skyward sword because it's the beginning, and it matters for tp/ww/alttp (and their respective sequels) because the choices the hero of time makes explicitly inform the narrative of those games in one way or another. it matters which timeline we're in for those games because these cycles we're seeing are close enough to oot's cycle that they're still feeling the effects of his choices. botw, however, takes place at minimum 10 thousand years after oot, so its place on the timeline actually functionally means nothing. botw is completely divorced from the hero of time & his story, so what he does is a nonissue in the context of botw link and zelda's story. thus, which timeline botw happens in is a nonissue. honestly I kind of liked the idea that it happened in all of them. i think there's a cool idea of inevitability that can be played with there. but the point is that the timeline exists to enhance and fill in the lore of games that need it, and botw/totk don't really need it because the devs finally realized they could make a game without the hero of time in it.

[c6jpg]

Hunters fight not for fame, but to aid the people whenever they are summoned.

[luck-of-the-drawings]

OH ARTHUR BENNETT.. such a gorgeous and intriguing character. terribly burdened by a GRUESOME set of crimes, his light suffocated by a HEAVY century of GUILT. so tragic, so dark and broody, and yet PAINFULLY awkward in any social setting ever

[thoughtpeek]

I'VE FINALLY FINISHED BROTHERSHIP IT WAS SOOOOO GOOD!!!!!!!

[3amsnek]

just a lil guy,,,, who has been trapped in my drafts for three months. oh dear.

click for better quality

reblogs >> likes

[discoreptile]

As of yet unnamed game card art!

[tankgotstuckinthecircusgate]

my biggest dissonance is how robert de niro in once upon a time in america actually looks like young carlo (but more handsome than carlo) but noodles character is nothing like him like max is a certifed carlo core. he would do everything max did