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carriagelamp · 4 years ago

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Art of Aardman

I found myself a cheap copy of the Shaun the Sheep movie, so I was rewatching a bunch of Aardman films earlier this month and decided to hunt down some books too. For anyone that doesn’t know, Aardman is a British stop-motion studio that does fantastic work like Wallace and Gromit, Shaun the Sheep, Chicken Run, Early Man… tons of cool stuff. They’re always quirky and funny and warm-hearted. This was just a very nice art book for anyone that’s a fan of Aardman stop motion and wants to see a bit extra; it shows some cool concept art and blows up the neat details in Aardman work, especially in their intricate stuff like The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!

Asterix and the Picts (Asterix and the Chariot Race, and How Obelix Fell Into The Magic Potion)

I decided to try a couple of the new Asterix comics that were done by the new team, just to see if they stand up to the old ones (that and How Obelix Fell Into The Magic Potion cause I’d never read that one before). They were pretty decent! Asterix and the Picts was my favourite of the two though I wouldn’t say either are going to contest for my favourite Asterix comic... but still! The art looks good and the stories felt like what I would expect, they made for a pleasant couple evenings of reading especially since it’s been so long since I’ve read a new Asterix comic. If you’ve never read Asterix it’s one of the biggest name French comic series in North America, as far as I know and very worth the read. It’s about a single Gaulish village that’s holding out against the invading Romans through sheer force of will, slapstick hijinks, and a magical super-strength potion brewed by their druid. Lots of fantastic visuals and cute wordplay, even in the English translations.

Bear

I found out about this bastion of Canadian literature via tumblr post that was losing its collective mind over the fact that some bizarre bear-based erotica novella somehow won the most prestigious literary prize available in Canada. Since I too found this hilarious and unspeakably bizarre I had to give it a read, obviously. And yes, the flat surface level summary is... a librarian moves out into rural Ontario and falls in love with a literal for-real not-supernatural-not-a-joke bear. And I have to say… it is actually worthy of an award, which I was not expecting given that I was there for a laugh. It has beautiful writing, and the subtextual story is pretty interesting… it kind of makes me think of The Haunting of Hill House actually in terms of themes. (Womanhood, personhood, independence, autonomy partially achieved through escaping the male gaze by claiming non-human lovers... listen if I were still in university I would right a paper comparing the two novels).

I dunno man, it’s fucking weird. Actually a well-written book, but sure is about a woman falling in love with a literal bear. Give it a read if you want something bonkers but like… high-brow bonkers.

Hunger Pangs: True Love Bites

Best book I have read in like… a while. A long while. I am not a fast reader, and I consumed 90% of this book over a weekend. It’s not at all like Terry Pratchett, but at the same time it scratched an itch for me that I haven’t had satisfied since Pratchett’s death. A very clever, hilariously funny poly romance between a disabled werewolf, an anxious vampire lord, and an incredibly powerful woman, with heaps of social satire, political commentary, and sinister undertones. The whole thing reads a bit like fanfiction and I say that in the most flattering way possible -- it is so easy to jump right in and be immediately taken over by the characters and the world and the plot, you never feel like you’re fighting to engage even though the world-building is fascinating and expansive. It welcomes you in right away, it was the book equivalent of a quilt and a hug which is something I sorely needed with all this pandemic bullshit. If you read any of the books on this list, go read that one while I sit here in pain waiting for the sequel.

Kid Paddle

I watched the cartoon of Kid Paddle as a kid and was thinking about it recently, so I decided to hunt down some of the original comics online. They’re fun and weird, with a cute art style and fantastic monsters designs. (My favourites are always about Kid either daydreaming or playing games that involve Midam’s weird warty troll creatures. It’s like a cross between Calvin and Hobbes and Foxtrot with the fun sort of quirks that I love in Belgian comics. Unfortunately, unlike Asterix, I’ve only come across these ones in French, but if you can read French it’s totally worth popping over to The Internet Archive and reading the ones they have available.

The Last Firehawk: The Golden Temple

The lastest Firehawk book. Despite being written for quite young readers, I did enjoy the early books in this series quite a bit. They’re about a young owl and squirrel who found an egg for a magical species that was believed to be extinct. With the newly hatched firehawk, the three of them head off on a mission to find an ancient firehawk magic that could save the entire forest. Very basic adventure story but a good intro to the tropes for children. Unfortunately the quality really feels like it drops with each subsequent book; this will probably be the last one I bother reading.

Lumberjanes: The Moon Is Up

I honestly think I enjoy these Lumberjanes novels even more than the comics just because it really gives time to delve into each story and examine how the camper are really thinking and feeling about everything. (Also I’m always weak for novelizations of anything.) The Moon Is Up is a book that focuses more on Jo, and takes place during the camp’s much anticipated Galaxy Wars, a competition between cabins that goes over several days. While the campers prepare for these challenges though, they also run into a strange little creature with a penchant for cheese and theft. Roanoke cabin needs to keep ahead in Galaxy Wars and somehow deal with the fearsome Moon Pirates that a closing in...

Lumberjanes v4 (Out Of Time)

One of the Lumberjanes comics, a cool, girl-focused, queer comic series. Honestly, this is just a fun series that I never got as into as I should have. My advice is honestly to skip book one because it gets better as it continues, and I’ve really been enjoying the later books now that I’ve given it another go. It follows five campers at Miss Qiunzella Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s Camp for Hardcore Lady Types (Jo, April, Molly, Mal, and Ripley) as they handle all sorts of challenges, from friendship to crushes, camp activities to supernatural horrors, getting badges to not being brutally killed. Great if you liked the vibe of Gravity Falls but want it to be queer-er.

Mooncakes

Another queer graphic novel, but unfortunately not a very good one. It really looked appealing and I had high hopes, but the book itself really didn’t hold up… I actually couldn’t even finish it, the plot was just too… non-existent. The art is fairly mediocre once you actually look at it, especially backgrounds, and it feels very… placid. Not much conflict or excitement or even a very compelling reason to keep reading. If you just want a soft queer supernatural you may get more mileage out of it than me, but it didn’t really do it for me. There’s better queer graphic novels out there.

New Boy In Town

One of the worst books I have ever read. My girlfriend had ordered a very different book online but through a frankly stupendous error was sent this 1980s pulp romance instead. Absolutely nauseating on levels I couldn’t even begin to enumerate here. Naturally we read the whole thing out loud. Probably took us 10 times longer to finish than it warranted because I had to stop every two sentences to lose my mind. If you like bad decisions, baffling hetero courting rituals, built-in cultural Christianity without actually calling it that, and gold panning then boy howdy is this the book for you.

(seriously, you better have patience for gold-panning if you attempt this one, because I sure learn that I don’t)

Piggies

This was a picture book I enjoyed as a kid and had a reason to reread recently. Honestly it’s just very cute and simple, and the art is completely mesmerizing. Wonderful if you know a young child that would enjoy a simple goofy boardbook.

Shaun the Sheep: Tales From Mossy Bottom

Related to my Aardman fascination earlier this month. I tried reading a varieties of Shaun the Sheep books — most of which are mediocre at best — but the Tales From Mossy Bottom Farm series is genuinely good. Just chapter books, of course, but the illustrations match the series’ concept art and each story feels like it could have jumped directly out of an episode. They’re just cute and feel-good! Kinda like Footrot Flats but more for kids, and from the sheep’s perspective moreso than the dog’s.

#aardman animation #shaun the sheep #lumberjanes #kid paddle #asterix #the last firehawk #hunger pangs: true love bites #marian engel #bear #canadian literature #canlit #queer lit #book review #book reviews #chatter

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duhragonball · 4 years ago

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Hellsing Ch. 70-76

I guess anything I say here is a spoiler, so yeah, this is “Heart of Dreams”, “Relics”, “Heart of Iron”, and the arc “Finest Hour”. Oh, and “Lunatic Dawn”. Gotta lotta ground to cover. Treacherous ground.

Not a whole lot to say about Anderson’s death. He tried to become a monster using one of the Holy Nails from the True Cross, and then Alucard defeated him anyway, once Seras gave him a little help and a reason to go on living. Alucard was pretty upset about Anderson’s demise, but Anderson says a few soothing words, and reminds him that Al only became a vampire because he couldn’t stand being a human, so it doesn’t make a lot of sense for him to cry now.

So yeah, as determined as Anderson was to kill Alucard, he’s a pretty good sport about losing this fight, and he seems to genuinely pity the man. He wonders how long Alucard will go on living with his regrets, and Al replies “Until my expansive future shatters my expansive past.” So, if we want to take that literally, I guess he’s trying to find redemption by being a good guy to make up for his years as a bad guy. Well, he’s been a vampire for 523 years, and a servant of Hellsing for 101 of those years, so I guess maybe he figures if he trucks along for another 321 years that’d balance the scales?

And maybe I’m finally starting to appreciate some of the complexities of Alucard’s character. The Team Four Star Abridged series spent some time on his desire for redemption, but I couldn’t tell if it was based on the original material or something they came up with for their own version. For instance, the Abridged!Alucard rejected the forgiveness offered by God himself, but later Anderson spoke of his desire for redemption and Alucard didn’t dispute that. It seemed contradictory to me at the time, but the manga does seem to support that. As Vlad Tepes, he refused to ask God for anything, preferring instead to fight and drive himself and his followers to the limits of endurance and decency as proof of their faith.

I find that idea heretical, because it suggests that a person can “earn” God’s favor, or God’s forgiveness, or a place in heaven. Arguably, Anderson tried to do the same thing, but I think he was coming more from a place of doing zealous deeds out of gratitude for the Lord’s grace, rather than trying to earn anything he didn’t already have.

The difference with Alucard is that he seemed to be really wrongheaded about his faith, trying to use violence to become a good person. Then it didn’t work, and he became a vampire, devoted entirely to his own selfish desires, and I guess he’s spent the 20th Century realizing that he’s back where he started, trying to fight his way to redemption, only now he has centuries of red in his ledger instead of mere decades.

Oh, anyway, while this is going on, Integra takes a sword and stands it upright so it looks like a cross to mark Anderson’s death. It’s like this quiet sign of respect. I’m not sure whose sword that is, but it looks like the one Alucard was using in his Dracula persona.

Anyway, fuck all that, because Walter finally shows up and stomps the ashes of Anderson just as everyone was having their final farewell with the guy. Rude.

Young Walter just looks kind of stupid to me. Why is he still wearing the monocle? He’s trying to be 14 and 69 at the same time and failing at both.

Seras asks what Millennium did to him, but Walter makes it clear that this isn’t some brainwashing trope. He’s doing this of his own free will.

He also doesn’t consider himself loyal to Millennium. They turned him into a vampire, but he’s doing this for himself, and he’s only cooperating with them because their goals are in alignment.

Yumiko Takagi tries to kill Walter for... Was she mad at him for stomping on Anderson’s remains? I mean, Alucard’s the one who actually killed Anderson, so shouldn’t she be mad at that guy?

It doesn’t matter, because Walt just slices her into pieces with his magic filaments. Now Heinkel Wolfe wants revenge, because she was her long-time partner in assassin stuff. The TFS Abridged series implied that they were lovers, too, which seemed authentic at the time, but I’m not sure there’s any confirmation to be found in the manga itself.

But before she can take the shot, the Captain shows up and shoots Heinkel in the face. Like, through one cheek and out the other, and the only thing saving her from serious injury was that she happened to have her mouth open at the time.

Side note: I caught myself referring to Heinkel as “him”, which frustrates me because I’ve known she was a woman for like five years now. When I first watched the OVA, I was confused, becuase I could tell it was a female voice actor, but maybe that just meant he was really young, like with Schrodinger. But the Hellsing Wiki set me straight, or so I thought. I didn’t think I’d still be making this mistake.

On the other hand, Yumiko sometimes looks a lot like Goemon from Lupin III, so her wearing a nun’s habit isn’t as heteronormative as it might seem. I’m getting off-track.

You’d think this would be leading up to some big double-team on the Hellsing group, now that the Iscariots are out of the picture, but the Captain’s only stopping Heinkel so Walter can have a clear shot at Alucard. That’s the sole reason Walter turned traitor, you see. He wants to fight Alucard and win, and for the last 55 years they’ve been on the same side.

But is that all it is? I never got to read or watch “Hellsing: The Dawn”, the prequel manga Kouta Hirano created after Hellsing. I’ve heard that it never got finished, but also an anime adaptation was released with the home video release of Hellsing Ultimate Episode VIII. All I really know about it was that there was this time where Alucard and Walter were fighting the Nazis, and the Captain showed up, and Alucard ran away because he didn’t think he could beat that dude. Presumably, he left Walter to fend for himself? But all three of them survived until 1999, so I’m not sure what the outcome of that was. I always wondered if Walter held a grudge over that. But maybe I’m reaching.

There’s also a suggestion of professional jealousy. Walter was a rockstar vampire hunter in his youth, but he’s been overshadowed by Alucard, who is--let’s face it-- a living legend. This would be doubly true in the 90′s, when Integra reawakened Alucard, and Walter having to step back even further from the spotlight. The only way for him to reclaim his former glory would be to challenge the greatest of all vampires and win. He’d go down in history as a traitor, but at least he’d be cemented as the absolute best.

Or... or, you can go with the TFS version, where Walter hints at his motives, only for Alucard to take the wind out of his sails and announce “because you wanna fuck me!” And I love that theory more than any other explanation, because it just brings everything together a lot more neatly. I guess you don’t need Walter to have had a crush on Alucard for 55 years, but it’s a lot more compelling than revenge or professional jealousy. Those things have weight, sure, but they work better as distractions, the things Walter might admit to because they hide the deeper reason that he can’t bring himself to say out loud.

And it’s not entirely rejected by the manga. Alucard remarks on how much more beautiful Walter looked in his old age, compared to this treasonous knockoff vampire look he’s sporting now. The last time he spoke this way, it was when he flirted with Queen Elizabeth II. The next time he does it, it’ll be with Sir Integra when she’s in her early 50′s.

Speaking of QE2, she’s safe and sound, because the Secret Service evacuated her to a fortified location in Dover before Millennium attacked. If things get really hairy, they’re prepared to send her to Canada, and if London can’t be secured, they’ll nuke the whole city, though the Queen is certain that Integra and Alucard will win the day. The vampires acting as Millennium agents outside of London are being contained and destroyed, so things seem to be getting under some semblance of control.

However, the Royal Order of Protestant Knights, also known as the “Round Table” is down to just three surviving members. Integra’s in London, but here we have Rob Walsh and Hugh Irons, reflecting on the death of their fellow Round Tabler, Penwood.

This whole scene struck me as a complete non sequitur when I first saw it in the anime. Walter’s betrayal seemed to sudden and poorly explained that it felt like the author was just winging it by this point, and now we have these two dudes struggling to provide some justification for the twist. But reading this manga in 2021, I find that it makes a lot more sense. We’ve already seen tons of Britons in rather lofty positions, all willing to sell out their principles for a chance to become a vampire. Walter is no different from any of them. It’s just more personal when he does it because we actually know the guy.

But as Walsh discusses the utter debacle of this Millennium invasion, he deduces what we’ve just learned back in London. There must have been a traitor in their ranks, because that’s the only way Millennium could have made it this far. I mean, they just flew a bunch of giant blimps full of rockets right into British airspace. That only worked because they had traitors sabotaging the U.K.’s defenses and communications, and Hellsing was especially vulnerable at the same time.

The only thing Walsh can’t figure out is who the traitor was, since it had to be someone at the Round Table, but they’re all dead now, except for Integra, Irons, and himself.

But Irons fills in the missing pieces. It doesn’t have to have been one of the Round Table’s members, but someone close to one of the members. Years ago, Irons warned Walter about Richard Hellsing. Irons knew that when Arthur died, Richard would try to make a play for the Hellsing estate. But when Irons’ fears came to pass, Walter wasn’t there. It’s like he wanted things to play out the way they did.

But why would Walter want events to play out that way? On her own, Integra had no choice but to unseal Alucard to defend herself, and she’s kept Alucard active ever since. And now, lo and behold, Walter reveals that he turned traitor just so he could take on Alucard. It’s like he arranged for all of this to happen years in advance. But how many years? Fifty-five, Irons wonders.

It’s never explicitly confirmed, but Irons’ reasoning makes too much sense to ignore. Earlier, the Major said that he decided back in ‘44 that Walter “Angel of Death” Dornez would have been a good “get” for his side. Now, Irons is suggesting that Walter might have agreed in the same year. So maybe Walter and the Major made a secret agreement even then. It’s possible that they might have done it later, but why not in 1944?

I mean, the whole backstory here is that Millennium is a continuation of a secret Nazi Vampire project that Walter and Alucard destroyed in 1944. Except they didn’t destroy it at all, which sure makes Walter and Al seem very bad at their jobs, unless Walter let them escape and covered it up.

Meanwhile, the Captain tosses a first aid kit to Heinkel, kind of like he’s saying that he doesn’t want to kill Heinkel, but he can’t let her interfere either. We’ll talk about the Captain later.

As for Alucard vs. Walter, Al wants to check with Integra before he goes through with it. He asks for orders, repeating his big speech from when he killed all those cops in Brazil. Yeah, Walter’s a traitor, but he’s been a close mentor and advisor to Integra for all these years. Does she really want Alucard to killerize his ass?

Yes, she does. If Walter stands against them, then he’s the enemy, and Integra has already ordered Alucard to destroy the enemy, no matter who (snif!) they may be. Integra doesn’t relish this command, but she refuses to compromise over sentimental feelings.

Man, fuck you, Walter.

Then the Major lands his airship near the battlefield and invites Integra to come aboard and fight all of his remaining guys. Alucard orders Seras to join her while he deals with Walter. I can appreciate Seras’ concern here, because the last time she watched Alucard fight alone, he took a flaming bayonet to the face. She probably doesn’t care for Integra and Alucard splitting up like this.

Before she goes, she thanks Walter for all of his support, which disarms Walter for just a moment. Man, fuck you, Walter. Seras is so nice and grateful and polite and cool and you just go right ahead with your 55-years-in-the-making Nazi Vampire Jilted Lover scheme. Fuck you, Walter. You don’t deserve to be in Seras’ life.

So the gals go on board the airship and Schrodinger’s there and Integra just shoots him right between the eyes without bothering to slow down. This is maybe my favorite Integra moment in this thing. I sort of wish Kouta Hirano had done a spin-off of Integra and Seras doing cool shit like this for 30 years.

Alucard taunts Walter with the fact that he no longer gets to be a part of Inegra or Seras’ lives anymore. It sounds kind of petty, but when you think about it, it’s a pretty sick burn. Walter may have been planning this for 55 years, but he still had to live that double life, and it’s not like he can just say he was faking it the entire time.

So they fight. Walter’s magic wire powers seem to be amplified, either because of his restored youth or maybe the boost offered by vampire powers, or maybe he’s always been this strong but now he no longer needs to hold back anymore. For instance, he can make mesh screens with his wires to deflect Alucard’s bullets. And when Alucard summons that dog creature he used to dispatch Luke Valentine....

... Walter just bisects it with a flick of the wrist. You really begin to see why he was “The Angel of Death” back in his heyday.

I never understood what this dog familiar was supposed to be. Walter refers to the Hound of the Baskervilles, but as far as I know that’s just a legend confined to the Sherlock Holmes novel of the same name. But apparently that concept was based upon “black dog” folklore of the same region. There’s a whole laundry list of “black dog” apparitions in Britain alone. Black Shuck, Padfoot, Hairy Jack, Bizarro Snoopy, and so on. So I’m not sure if Hirano is saying that Alucard was the source of these legends, or if they were all based on a single creature which Alucard eventually defeated and absorbed into himself.

Al tries to use the Jackal to kill Walter, but that’s kind of stupid, since Walter designed the gun in the first place. In the anime, I thought Walter somehow triggered a bomb he had planted inside it, but maybe he used his wires to make this happen. It doesn’t really matter, because we already saw that the Casull was useless against Walter’s defenses, and not because it had smaller ammunition.

Then Luke Valentine emerges from the black dog’s body. This part never made any sense to me, but I loved how the Major recognized him, but barely. “Oh yeah, it’s that guy from Volume 2! The guy with the brother.”

The doctor suggests that when the dog was killed, this allowed Luke to reassert himself from inside the dog. Something about a “control ratio”, whatever that is. Like, he was absorbed into the dog’s mass, but now that the dog is no longer conscious, he can think for himself again. Notably, only half of Luke actually makes it out . It’s like he’s half-Luke, half dead dog monster.

But before he can do anything else, Walter puts his wires into Luke and starts controlling him like a puppet, mostly so he can use the dog half to attack Alucard.

Alucard seems more impressed than threatened. Keep in mind, Walter was doing pretty damn well against him early on. You’ll notice Alucard’s missing his right arm along with one of his guns. This is better than Anderson managed to do. So why does Walter even need this Luke-dog puppet thing in the first place?

Well, it’s because Walter’s body is giving out on him. Earlier, when the Doctor was performing the procedure to turn Walter into a vampire, he spoke about how rushed the operation was. I mean, he had to finish the whole thing in one night, after all. And Walter’s a lot more powerful than Dandyman, whom the Doctor considered his finest artificial vampire work. So maybe Walter’s just too powerful for this, and he can’t sustain this form. The Luke-dog-thing is just to keep Alucard busy while he coughs up blood.

The Major sees this development, and likens Walter to a high stakes gambler who’s mortgaged everything for a single hand at a high stakes table. Walter’s risked everything just to tangle with Alucard, and it still isn’t enough.

Alucard does manage to finish off the dog-Luke thing, and this sets him up for Walter’s next attack, and then he goes to finish him off, so things seem to be going Walter’s way...

But Alucard used a decoy, disguising Luke’s severed torso as his own, all so he could sucker-punch Walter in the face. As it turns out, Walter’s physical breakdown is making him younger, which amuses Al to no end.

So Alucard follow suits and assumes the form he once used when they fought the Nazis in 1944. Yeah, say hello to “Girlycard”. I’m not sure why Alucard looked like a 14-year-old girl during World War II. I’ve heard this form described as a Japanese 14-year-old girl, and I can’t dispute it, but it also makes Girlycard seem even more random somehow.

I mean, I guess the idea here was for Walter and Alucard to be able to move inconspicuously through enemy territory. No one would suspect a couple of kids until it was too late. I’m imagining a similar scenario to the ones presented in “Cross Fire”. Heinkel and Yumi would play innocent bystanders, then whip out their guns and swords and go ham on the bad guys. Knowing Hirano’s style, maybe Girlycard and Young Walter operated the same way.

And this further supports the Walter-had-an-unrequited-crush-on-Alucard theory. He might have understood that Girlycard was a disguise. On an intellectual level he might have known, but maybe he still carried a torch, and told himself that there was some way that they could be together. Was he just in love with this disguise, or does he love the real thing? Alucard says that he told Walter the truth decades ago, and claims that this is the reason Walter turned traitor, so yeah, it sure feels like Walter couldn’t handle Alucard’s true nature, one way or another.

I mean, let’s assume that this isn’t just about Alucard not being a cute girl. Maybe Walter fell in love with Alucard in all his forms, whatever that means for his sexuality. The bigger issue is that Alucard’s a vampire, and he’s just fundamentally different from Walter, and maybe that was the problem all along. It’s interesting to think about, but the point here would be that there was some kind of problem, and Walter couldn’t let it go.

Meanwhile, Seras and Integra are busy looking like total BMFs. Just HBIC’s. What’s better than this? Two gals bein’ pals.

Hell yeah!

Bad ass!

The vampires on board this airship are happy to meet their doom, and Integra recalls what her father once told her about how vampires want to die on their own terms. Seras doesn’t get it, because if they want to die so badly, they could have just died in the war they were already in fifty-odd years ago.

So the Major gets on the PA system and explains to her that they want more than just a glorious death. They want bigger, better, more perfect battlefield, so as to make their deaths as meaningful as possible. That’s why I don’t understand that airship captain from a while back. Everyone else in Millennium seemed to understand that they weren’t necessarily fighting to win. Britain is prepared to nuke London if they have to, so it’s hard to imagine anyone in Millennium surviving past today, even if they won.

Anyway, as the Major explains all of this, the Captain appears before the gals. It looks like he’s here to stop them, or is he?

#2021hellsingliveblog #hellsing #alucard #seras victoria #walter c dornez #alexander anderson #heinkel wolfe #yumiko takagi #the major #the captain #warrant officer schrodinger #sir hugh irons #lt general rob walsh #luke valentine #really? luke valentine?

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izumisays · 4 years ago

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dear yuletide author

Thank you so much for reading this and taking part in this wonderful annual conspiracy! 

First of all, I hope you have a lovely time! If any of the fandoms below pique your interest, I’m delighted already, and ready to hear all the stories you want to tell.

Fandoms: Chihayafuru, Nirvana in Fire, Thunderbolt Fantasy

As for reading preferences, I’m happy with a wide variety of tones and genres, of any rating, ranging anywhere from lighthearted antics to dramatic casefics. But the core of all the stories I love has always been character interaction and interplay of their competences.

How the characters play off each other and bring out their best/worst, how they’d react to a divergence of events, how true they’d stay to themselves in a different setting – I love fanfiction for allowing us to reconnect with our favourite stories time and again by asking these questions. And there are so many ways to do it! To name a few favourites, I’m always game for POV hijinks, a missing scene, a casefic, canon expansion, backstories and what-ifs.

You may notice that quite a few of my requests lean towards shipfic – those, too, are welcome in a variety of tones – but I also tried to include openings for gen ideas if that’s your jam. Additionally, while it is not usually my top interest, I don’t have anything against AUs if there is something that you are itching to explore: I tend to enjoy them for a new aesthetic that fleshes out the favoured character dynamics in a new light, or a fusion that redefines the playing ground to allow the characters to exhibit their core competences in new and exciting ways.

I would be very grateful if you could avoid a/b/o and similar kinktropes, played-straight soulmate fic, and character interpretation that runs contrary to their core values. If in doubt, please reach out to me on anon - the askbox is open!

CHIHAYAFURU: Mashima Taichi, Wataya Arata, Suou Hisashi

You don’t have to include all three characters, but I’d love to see a fic that explores the connections between them better. I’m up to date with all manga scanlations.

Wataya Arata/ Mashima Taichi

In the immortal words of Henjin Meijin, Arata is that person for Taichi whose opinion makes or breaks him. (His wording may have been different, but if I go rummaging into the chapter archive to find the exact quote, I’ll end up binge-rereading year three into the night again, and then where would my Yule sign-up be?) (On that note, what kind of a MASSIVE LOSER waxes poetics about Taichi’s boyfriend problems to Taichi’s MOTHER, whom he JUST met? Suou Hisashi, that’s who.) Needless to say, that paramount opinion was not always great, and neither was Taichi’s general wellbeing.

Good news is, Arata is confident in his manliness, and he has no problem acknowledging Taichi’s ridiculously pretty and not too bad at karuta these days, and he’s also moving to Tokyo. Taichi’s definitely pretty and has an apartment in Tokyo, where a country bumpkin of paramount importance may possibly stay over until things are sorted out… eventually. Hint hint.

Jokes aside, I pine for the dynamics between the two of them. I nearly lost it, reading the Meijin semifinals — and if you can show me a person who saw them bawl as they crawled into each other’s laps on Japanese national television and didn’t bawl in response, well, that person is sure not me.

I’d like to see a story that lets them build and explore that connect. I do not object to eventual OT3, but I think Chihaya is on a quest to find her own footing and pursue other goals at the moment, and I’d really like it if she was allowed to do this (join forces with Shinobu to drag karuta into a professional league, girl!). I’d like to think that in that space, different bonds and relationships can develop and strengthen, starting with Arata and Taichi.

Taichi the overanalyzer, the hardworker and the looker, the golden boy who at some point surely hit that red button, meme-style: you will be perfect at everything, you will have everything, except the one thing that you want above all. Arata appears to be his perfect foil: steady and serene where Taichi’s scrambling and flawed, adorably awkward and disarmingly sincere where Taichi’s groomed, smooth and miserable about his own deceptions. But they don’t see it like that! And they keep tripping each other up so beautifully!

I’d love to read your take on them growing closer and hopefully smooshing their faces together. Roommates in Tokyo? Long-distance friends? Figuring out how to tell your flatmate you’ve been in love with him since you were 12? Established relationship while hijinks happen? AWKWARD THIRDWHEELING WITH SUOU?!

On that note:

Suou Hisashi & (or / - wejustdon’tknow.gif) Mashima Taichi

I cannot believe that ridiculous man. Did you see a grown ass adult swoon because his unrequited disciple I mean not-friend I mean Taichi just up and went to meet his relatives??? To help reconnect them?? One can do things like this?? What next, being able to make phonecalls like an adult??

Does not compute.

I was there, Gandalf. I was there when the story first indicated that we might be getting an unlikely team-up of the world’s weirdest Meijin and Tokyo’s most miserable overachiever. But even in my wildest dreams I did not dare hope to see them sprawled on the carpet on a humid summer afternoon, Taichi comfortable in his own skin and Suou, erm, probably not very comfortable with his fascination :D He did not sign up for this. He, a grown ass man in what must be his early twenties, is too old for this youthful seishun sakura bullshit. And yet it is he who mournfully accosts Taichi’s mom to talk about how this other boy is paramount in Taichi’s universe. He who gets offended because Taichi knowing how to adult and work the social ropes is too sexy and competent. He who finds something compelling in the painful struggle of genius and skill.

Arata - Taichi - Suou

For maximum indulgence of yours truly, bring those into one place. Arata coming to Tokyo and finding Suou a fixture in Taichi’s life how?! Suou being infinitely pissy at the Fukuyi upstart and yet dragging himself to socialize with the boys regardless like a totally-not-pathetic adult with a social life of his own? Arata being mildly puzzled about the antagonism, but in there for the sweet snacks?

You tell me! I delight in my anticipation.

NIRVANA IN FIRE: Mei Changsu, Xiao Jingyan

Is this a complex, narratively inevitable historic tapestry strangling people with its treads, full of delicious politicking and identity porn? Yes, it is.

Is my burning – nay, primal – desire so simple as to smoosh two faces together and watch them kiss? Yes, it is :’)

I mean, I will obviously not say no if the kissing is giftwrapped in the said tapestry of beautiful, politicky plot, but the fever I can’t get out of my system is this: LET THEM KISS, GODDAMMIT. LET THEM BE HAPPY. I welcome canon divergences, alternative endings, fix-its, insert eps and codas where it looks like they would have kissed (erm, or at least confronted each other in a way that would inevitably end with them making out) if only Mei Changsu wasn’t so caught up in self-loathing and fluffy foxfur coats, and Jingyan didn’t talk too loudly about his so dead, so very dead beautiful ex to hear Mei Changsu weep stoically into his beautiful white furs.

I adore Prince Jing. He is 90% cheekbones and 20% heartbroken pouting over his so very dead friends, and all of it noble and awkward and stubborn and deserving of happiness. Mei Changsu is ridiculous, and capable, and twisted into pretzels of his own creation: not above gloating over his enemies while daintily dipping cookies into his tea, he gets too caught up in weaving the tapestry to notice he is a part of it. Pull him off his high horse, Jing! Render him helpless by being yourself! Do something about being hopelessly charmed with each other, through resentment, loss, bitter pining, and narrative inevitability! JUSTKISSALREADY.gif!!

THUNDERBOLT FANTASY: Rin Setsua; Sho Fukan

I LOVE THIS SELF INDULGENT WUXIA NONSENSE AND I CANNOT LIE!

Sanfan is a mixture UTTER GLEE and deep fondness for the genre staples, self-aware and masterful playthrough of all the wuxia tropes in the book, and one goddamn well-constructed story. It plays the tropes straight, calls them out with a knowing wink, walks the tightrope between the two with panache, and just as you are relaxed and enjoying this trapeze show, it grins cheekily at you, sets the discoball on fire and pulls a bunny out of a hat. It’s DELIGHTFUL and fun and lovingly crafted, just like a good passion project should be.

I want anything that capitalizes on the absolutely hilarious dynamics between Rin Setsua and Sho Fukan (and while personally I end up using the Japanese versions of their names more often, please feel free to go with the Chinese names if you prefer). Sho Fukan does not want any of those heroic quests, he’s the human equivalent of been there, done that mood, and he just wants to REST and hopefully dump a bunch of magical murderswords someplace safe. Rin Setsua is a Totally Respectable and Non-Villainous Member of Society, of which he will inform you firsthand in the most high spoken and verbose way possible, and maybe even produce paperwork that has definitely not been tampered with. He harbours no ulterior motives, ever, and does not trail behind Sho Fukan for any reason beyond the pleasure of his company, and his mission to personally victimize and cockblock every morally derelict villain in two countries, by no-one’s request.

Whether you go shipfic (yiss!) or canon levels teamup circus (also yiss!), don’t hold back your horses. Everything about this is Extra, and should continue to be so <3

I am okay with both expanding the canon and playing with AUs/crossovers/fusions for this one, provided they retain the character dynamics. I love the extended cast as well: any characters including the Seiyou gang (and on that note, if you want to write the Seiyou backstory for Shou’s gang that has no Rin in it, you’re welcome as well), reappearance of the familiar faces from Touri (read: Rin’s victim list, past, future and present), original characters lined up and waiting to be screwed over (guaranteed) and rescued (the administration does not bear any responsibility etc etc).

Thank you for taking the time to read the letter, and I’m greatly looking forward to reading your story — and hopefully, getting to chat about these ridiculous and wonderful characters post-reveals :)

#dear creator letter #yuletide #yuletide 2020

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zdbztumble · 5 years ago

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Build A Better Buu Saga

Oh, the Buu Saga...from initially getting passed over in Kai to almost getting passed over by TeamFourStar, it’s almost as if the collective understanding of all corners of the Dragon Ball community is that this is a saga that just...didn’t. It didn’t give a proper cap to the overall series, it didn’t stick the landing even on its own terms, it didn’t have the best fights or villains or character moments...it just didn’t.

For myself, the Buu Saga actually has my favorite beginning of any storyline in Dragon Ball. Gohan being my favorite character in the series, I was happy to see him take up the mantle of Series Lead (a fact that the manga pointed out in asides multiple times), and the huge shake-up in the status quo made for some exciting possibilities. Videl and Goten were wonderful additions to the cast, the current timeline’s Trunks was quite the contrast with his future self, I think the Great Saiyaman was amusing, and the lead-up to the World Tournament is some of the best material out of the entire series. The middle section of the saga, while uneven, is a fun and wild ride too, with Majin Buu being a very distinct villain from his immediate predecessors and concepts like the fusion dance giving a jolt of new energy (no pun intended) to battles. Gohan’s development as he tries to regain the power he’s lost since the Cell Games during this part of the story doesn’t get enough credit either.

Yep - the Buu Saga, in my books anyway, is a solid arc full of fantastic characters and moments...in its first two thirds. The moment Super Buu becomes Buutenks, the story rapidly deteriorates, as Akira Toriyama decides to arbitrarily reject or ignore every bit of set-up and development he’d laid down up to that point and goes on auto-pilot, ending the conflict with tired retreads of old ideas while using characters whose story this has not been. It’s not even that anything in the ending of the saga is all that bad; it’s just such an about-face, such a divorce from everything in the story up to that point - material that I really liked - that it feels more disappointing (to me, anyway) than if it had been more poorly produced.

I’m not the first, or the last, to think about how the Buu Saga might have had a stronger ending, and more coherence overall. Over on the Kanzenshuu forums a few years ago, I even wrote up some my thoughts on what I would’ve liked to see. Thanks to TeamFourStar’s release of their “Day of Fate” remix, though, I’ve been thinking about this more lately, and my ideas have changed quite a bit from the last time I wrote them down. With that, I figured I’d lay out my outline for an alternate Buu Saga, one that I think would’ve given the series a stronger cap and paid off its initial set-up.

Before we get started, I’ll make three caveats plain:

- Goku isn’t here. This isn’t out of any dislike of the character. I'm actually quite happy with Goku serving as a supporting figure, and a mentor to Goten and Trunks, in the middle third of the Buu Saga. But I think it’s ultimately detrimental to a story that purportedly follows the successor protagonist to have the original hero pop up as early, and for as long, as Goku ultimately was in the saga as-is. To see what Gohan and the others would make of a world totally devoid of Goku is a more interesting idea to me anyway.

- No Old Kai. He may be fun, he may have unique abilities, but Old Kai and his powers offer too many cop-outs. Which is not to say that there isn’t a place for a mentor figure like Old Kai in the saga, but...well, keep reading.

- I don’t care about post-manga interviews. Yes, I am aware that Toriyama retconned Buu’s origin, among other things, in interviews he gave after finishing the manga. I am ignoring these, and I’m ignoring anything from Super. What was in the manga, and the anime, back in the 90s is all the material I’m drawing from.

- You know the story, right? For brevity’s sake, I’m just going to point out where I would’ve made changes, not writing up the full series of events. I assume anyone crazy enough to read this knows at least the gist of the Buu Saga anyway.

All that said - here we go:

There isn’t much I’d change about the very beginning of the Buu saga. Gohan’s high school days and Great Saiyaman antics are both a great change of pace from the heavier material preceding them. If I were to change anything, it would be to have the manga expand on this section slightly - no more than the anime did, but just that little bit extra to mine the concept for all it’s worth.

Assuming that expansion happens, then the impression can be given that a significant number of months pass - let’s say an academic year. Thus, when Videl learns the truth about the Great Saiyaman and blackmails Gohan into competing in the World Tournament, they’re right at the start of summer vacation, with the tournament set to begin at the end of summer. This provides three months of training, not one.

Removing Goku from the story doesn’t require as big an adjustment to Vegeta’s character as you’d think on first glance. Remember that in the saga as-is, Bulma tells Gohan early on that Vegeta wants to make Trunks stronger than him, Vegeta chides Gohan for not training during peacetime, and when news of the tournament reaches him, Vegeta’s keen to enter to fight Gohan, before he knows that Goku’s coming back. Just push all this a little further, and you get a Vegeta who’s transferred his great rivalry with “Kakarot” onto Gohan - whose lack of interest in combat for its own sake or in feeding that rivalry really gets under Vegeta’s skin. The tournament, in Vegeta’s mind, is his first chance in seven years to compel Gohan to duke it out.

The extra months for training gives real opportunity for Videl. In the series as-is, her ability to learn to fly in a day is considered remarkable, and she expresses an interest in learning more about ki. With more time, she actually could. It’s straining credulity to expect her to be at Krillin or Tenshinhan levels by the time of the Tournament, but she could at least pick up the Kamehameha. As I would like her to stay action-relevant once the real conflict emerges, however, I’d go ahead and give her some unique ability too, to off-set her limited raw power. Perhaps something akin to re-directing lightning in Avatar - she could figure out how to channel and re-direct ki attacks aimed at her. I don’t think that’s too ridiculous - again, the series as-is has her figure out the basics of ki control and flight in a single afternoon, so using that as a springboard for her demonstrating unusual ki manipulation is a fair expansion on that IMO.

Videl’s curiosity about ki (and the cute dork she’s learning from) could also lead to her learning about the dragon balls during her training. This could amount to a brief, lighthearted ball hunt that doubles as as a more active training regimen, with Goten and Trunks coming along as well. It would be the four members of the new generation off on a fun-filled adventure, like the opening of this saga seemed to promise. Gohan and Videl’s bond is strengthened, Goten and Trunks’s friendship is shown off, and the dragon balls are conveniently collected and ready for use later on. And this would also be the way that news of the World Tournament spreads to the other Z Fighters - assume that each of them holds onto one of the dragon balls as a safety measure. A tad more time could be spent at Kame House and the Lookout, and through the eyes of Videl - the new human character and a great candidate for a reader/audience stand-in - we could be introduced to the new status quo for all the old cast in a (slightly) expanded way.

The World Tournament would play out largely the same, with the odd minor to adjustments due to Goku’s absence. The senzu beans would get delivered via Mr. Popo and his carpet, for example. Probably the most significant change I would’ve made would be to have Gohan’s anger at Videl’s pain cause a flash of power that, while brief, tells Vegeta that Gohan’s potential remains as boundless as ever even despite his lack of training, feeding into Vegeta’s frustrations with Gohan.

Without Goku, Yakon would be cut from the line-up of Babidi’s warriors; we’d go from Pui Pui to Dabura. Vegeta’s anger at Gohan’s sloppiness would remain, though he’d be shouting at Gohan directly, instead of at Goku about Gohan. In this case, Vegeta gives in to Babidi not to acquire sufficient power to defeat Goku in a limited time frame, but because all the preparation for the World Tournament, Gohan’s “unworthiness” as a surrogate rival for his father, and disgust that someone uninterested in fighting has the potential that Gohan has, all fuel Vegeta’s midlife crisis about finding himself settled on Earth. Basically, the ticking clock of Goku’s 24 hours is replaced with a slow burn of identity conflict and irritation.

Of course, this means that instead of a Goku/Vegeta rematch, we’d have Gohan vs. Vegeta. I would leave the immediate set-up for it largely untouched in the broadstroke, but of course the details would matter. I can’t imagine Gohan feeling so determined to fight that he’d be prepared to blow Supreme Kai’s face off, for example. I would have him ask to be brought back into the ship, to give Supreme Kai a better chance at getting at Buu’s pod. It would also give a backdrop for the fight other than Generic Wasteland #47. The fight itself would naturally have a different character. I imagine Vegeta being more unstable and manic while Gohan remains evasive, trying at all times to minimize the energy released. As in the series as-is, Vegeta’s words spur Gohan to realize the price to be paid for not staying prepared for danger in the seven years since the Cell Games, but in this case, Gohan’s evasiveness keeps shooting Vegeta’s anger and irrationality higher and higher, and it’s through this process that his motives come out. At a moment when Gohan’s pleas to look at the big picture fall on deaf ears, Vegeta calls Gohan “Kakarot.” Hearing that name, and fully appreciating how much Vegeta has projected his old rivalry, Gohan snaps for a second, gets the drop on Vegeta, knocks him out, and heads deeper into the ship to help Supreme Kai.

From there, things would largely play out as they do as-is, with minor adjustments. Vegeta would come to inside the ship, get a sense of what’s going on up above through ki detection, and have a quiet moment of realization of what he’s done before he heads up to try and make amends. And when he sacrifices himself...that’s it. That is the end of Vegeta’s character. This is a point I feel strongly about, because nothing that’s been done with Vegeta since justifies undercutting his sacrifice here IMO. To fully appreciate what he’s done, to recognize the one tactic he has left to try and set things to rights, and to be aware (thanks to Piccolo) just how total the price to be paid will be, and still go through with it for the sake of his loved ones, is as fitting an end to Vegeta’s character as I can think of.

Instead of Bulma summoning Shenron, she collects the balls from Chi Chi’s house with the intent of summoning Shenron, until someone in that group - possibly Yamcha, possibly Videl, possibly even Master Roshi - perceive that they might be needed for an even greater emergency, and the decision is made to retreat to the Lookout to try and get news of what’s been going on. They bring the balls with them, sparing the need for the radar incident later on. Piccolo and Krillin are tasked with filling everyone in.

Without Goku, how is the Fusion Dance brought up? Well, Namekians practice a form of fusion (more like assimilation), and Piccolo has (in the anime, at least) demonstrated knowledge of Multi-Form; what if it’s a technique he and Dende have devised in the seven years since the Cell Games, making use of natural Namekian abilities and Earthling ki manipulation techniques? “But wait!” you say. “What about Piccolo’s embarrassed reaction to the dance in the series as-is?” Simple - don’t have him be embarrassed. I never found that “gag” to be all that funny anyway - it’s not like the dance looks that ridiculous. To whet Buu’s appetite for the fight the way Goku did, Piccolo could just communicate the promise of a fighter telepathically.

So, we still have the Z Sword, but no Old Kai. What to do about Gohan’s power then? Well - what if the Z Sword was sentient? Similar to the Byakko from Dairanger, it can talk once drawn. I imagine it having a cantankerous and impatient personality, but in addition to being heavy enough to serve as a training tool, it can also bond and manipulate Gohan’s ki, letting it serve as a power-up device and a mentor. Part of that mentorship involves helping Gohan through his hang-up at not keeping his strength from the Cell Games. As Old Kai does as-is, the Z Sword could feel that the strain of transformations isn’t worth the power boost, and could also conclude that relying on saiyan rage and battle lust isn’t the best course for Gohan. So as they train, the Z Sword works to rearrange Gohan’s ki to bring all his power into his base form - so yes, there still is an Ultimate/Mystic power-up.

The Z Sword could also suggest a strategy for defeating Buu, and here’s where it becomes necessary to ignore Toriyama’s later statements. To go just off of the original manga, Bibidi created Buu. So if Buu is a magical creation, a force of chaotic evil energy - roll with that. Don’t treat him as a flesh and blood creature who can be killed. Treat him as negative ki manifested, that can be manipulated and dispersed. Videl’s ability helps Gohan grasp the concept, but it’s the Z Sword that will be key to him being able to pull the same manipulation on Buu.

The process of Gohan’s training would involve taking a look inside his own head. Imagine scenes where, while Gohan’s body performs fencing maneuvers, his inner self communes with the Z Sword and reviews and experiences these concepts in visually interesting ways. Besides being more dynamic than sitting on the ground while an old man holds his hands out, this could also sell the idea that this process would take a while.

Things on Earth would play out largely the same once Goten and Trunks are taught the dance. My one change would be to have Videl unaccounted for along with Dende during Buu’s candy attack.

Nothing against Goku, but when Gohan returns to Earth, I’d have him keep the Kai get-up; I really like that costume on him. Gohan’s demeanor would be more cold and silent in fighting Buu than brash, and instead of just treating Buu like a punching bag, he’s focused on catching Buu’s attacks with the Z Sword and turning the blade on Buu. When he does this, the wounds don’t regenerate. Buu finds this horrifying, and it’s this realization that triggers his self-destruct feint.

Videl’s with Dende. They got away together. Why? I’ll tell you why: I like Videl. But there is actually a reason, that we’ll get to in a second.

Buu absorbing Gotenks and Piccolo is less to do with getting stronger than Gohan (though there is that); it’s on the calculation that, if Buu absorbs people that Gohan loves into his being, then Gohan can’t channel ki to disperse Buu. Remember, that isn’t the same as being killed, so who’s to say the dragon balls could revive them? Gohan essentially has no choice but to get into a conventional fight with Buu - a much more even fight, but one he knows is ultimately fruitless. To make things worse, the grouchy, insensitive Z Sword keeps insisting that they finish Buutenks off anyway, and Buutenks keeps targeting Dende and Videl. That’s partly a distraction tactic, but he’s also looking to neutralize the dragon balls. Dende is protected in part by Gohan’s efforts, and in part by Videl’s redirection abilities. This would also open up comic moments, with Mr. Satan gaping in shock at his daughter’s skills. But a hard limit on those abilities becomes quickly apparent, when dealing with that much raw power at her level starts to destroy her body. Eventually, it proves too much, and saving Dende causes Videl to pass out - and in the second that Gohan is distracted by that, Buutenks seizes the Z Sword and breaks it.

The heroes look screwed now, but when the fusion runs out, Buu starts to react strangely, as if he’s getting beat up from the inside. Cut to inside of his body and, sure enough, the fusion running out has caused Goten and Trunks to be freed from Buu’s control. They wreak havoc inside of Buu in an attempt to find away out, and end up finding Piccolo and Fat Buu. Severing Fat Buu sets off the chain reaction leading to Kid Buu, and the kids make it out with Piccolo just in time.

Kibito teleporting in is how the heroes get off of Earth once Kid Buu decides to blow it up. And he actually saves everyone. Without Goku there, that bit of faux drama and guilt is even less justifiable, so don’t bother with it. The entire planet being lost is enough of a gut-punch to the heroes as it is.

As Kid Buu rampages through the universe, Kibito restores Videl and Piccolo. As bleak as things look, a conversation happens that triggers memories of Namek, and Gohan and Piccolo quickly devise a plan. They ask Kibito to bring King Kai to the Sacred World of the Kais, to facilitate communication, then send him to Namek. Those dragon balls (which cannot suddenly revive as many people as you want and still grant three wishes) are gathered. Gohan wants Porunga to restore the Z Sword, but that is a feat beyond the dragon’s power. Instead, he restores the Earth (and other destroyed planets) and, with the second wish, assembles Earth’s dragon balls at the Lookout. Kibito returns to the heavenly realm, takes Dende back to the Lookout, and Shenron is used to revive everyone (who Shenron can still revive) killed by Buu. Shenron also can’t mend the Z Sword, but Gohan and Piccolo expect that Babidi was revived with the first wish. They have Kibito track Babidi down and bring him to them. Both dragons are kept on stand-by.

Gohan wants Babidi to cast a spell to get rid of Kid Buu - not seal him up again, but to decreate him entirely. Unfortunately, Babidi doesn’t know any such spells - if they ever existed, they went to the grave with his father Bibidi (again - forget the later interview retcons. All we’re told originally is that Babidi was Bibidi’s son.) What Babidi can do, however, is reforge the Z Sword with his magic. Not unlike Buu’s awakening, it’s a spell that requires a tremendous amount of energy be released, and meanwhile, Kid Buu is laying waste to worlds. To gather the energy, and to keep Kid Buu from destroying anything else, Gohan, Goten, and Trunks all power up to lure him to the World of the Kais. While Piccolo stands guard over Babidi and the others watch, Gohan and Gotenks keep Kid Buu occupied. The effort doesn’t go as smoothly as Gohan and Piccolo had hoped - partly because Kid Buu is so violent and unpredictable, and partly because Gotenks gets carried away yet again, resulting in far more damage to the planet than necessary.

At a certain point, Videl has to re-direct a blast, and Mr. Satan yells at Kid Buu for endangering his daughter. Kid Buu targets them both, but can’t bring himself to attack, and expels Fat Buu. Just in time, too - Gotenks’ carelessness gets Gohan seriously injured, and the fusion wears off. Goten (and, after some hesitation, Trunks) continue to fight on with Fat Buu while Dende tries to heal Gohan. Babidi, meanwhile, has one last bit of treachery up his sleeve. He tries to take control of Gohan in a moment of anger. A lot happens all at once - a fierce blow by Kid Buu that puts Fat Buu down for the count, Gohan reacts to Babidi’s efforts, Piccolo slays Babidi - and the Z Sword re-forges. Kid Buu, recognizing the re-forged blade, panics, but Goten and Trunks keep him distracted, and Gohan is able to disperse Buu’s energy, finally ridding the universe of him for good.

Everyone returns to the Lookout, where unfinished business remains. Vegeta, Krillin, Roshi, and Chaotzu (and technically, all the people who were killed by Cell) are still dead, and for Krillin and Chaotzu, there's bad news: no dragon can ever grant the same wish twice, so even with Porunga around, they're still dead. Roshi sends word through Baba that he's ready to move on; Vegeta’s spirit has already met its final judgment. So, with the last Shenron wish, the memory of Buu is taken from the world; with the last Porunga wish, someone gets something stupid (Goten gets an ice cream sundae? Something comedic.)

Gohan has a conversation with Piccolo that basically summarizes his journey through the arc: that even if he doesn’t like fighting for its own sake, power like his carries a responsibility, and he has to be prepared for future threats. Fast forward to the same year that DBZ ends, only instead of another Tournament, there's a reunion at Capsle Corp. Some new threat comes, and the new lineup of Z fighters, led by Gohan, go into action. End of show/comic.

#z's crits #dragon ball #son gohan #buu saga #dragon ball z #headcanon #critique #commentary

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shonijoni-blog · 5 years ago

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Amazon Alexa: We'll investigate Alexa all the more completely when we diagram the job of brilliant speakers. With 7000 outsider incorporations and with Alexa now coming incorporated with TVs (Fire TV) and indoor regulators (ecobee4). Alexa can convey an expansive spread of savvy home gadgets and apparatuses. Speaking with all these brilliant gadgets implies the least complex and most flexible approach to begin controlling your home with voice directions.

Google Assistant: While you may get less outsider snare ups with Google's Assistant, receive the rewards from the full weight of predominance of search. Precision is commonly superior to anything you'll discover with either Alexa or Siri. From Philips and August to Nest and Belkin, most significant savvy home brands offer sensible coordination with Google Assistant.

Siri: For Apple changes over, there's the smooth Home application that permits you to control HomeKit frill utilizing Siri. Regardless of whether you need to tweak the temperature utilizing your MacBook or mood killer the lights from your iPhone, the world's your shellfish. More than 50 worldwide brands offer full Siri similarity along these lines, as usual, you're in safe hands with Apple

Before we leave advanced partners and take a meander through other must-have shrewd home gadgets, we'll take a brisk look at Alexa.

2) Smart Speakers

The keen speaker advertise is light, and the undisputed pioneer is the strong Amazon with its impressive scope of Echo gadgets.

A shrewd speaker gives you the accommodation of playing your preferred music playback while likewise offering you the full administrations of a computerized right hand.

You'll have the option to start up the entirety of your preferred gushing administrations utilizing only your voice, and the sound nature of shrewd speakers keeps on improving.

It's the incorporation of Alexa that truly causes brilliant speakers to sing. With most fair shrewd speakers, you'll have no issue making yourself understood even over a swarmed, boisterous room.

Regardless of whether you decide to utilize your savvy speaker and Alexa to discuss legitimately with other perfect gadgets or you use IFTTT, the best brilliant speaker is about unmistakably more than music. Include one of these Bluetooth monsters to your war room and you'll begin completely acknowledging exactly how advantageous home computerization can be.

3) Smart Home Hubs

With a computerized associate set up to comply with all your directions, don't get excessively energized at this time…

Contingent upon what aspirations you harbor for your savvy home, all there's odds you'll have to put resources into a center point. A shrewd center point can guarantee savvy gadgets can discuss appropriately with one another.

Think about a shrewd home center point as a passage or interpreter prepared to cross over any barrier among gadgets and machines that don't communicate in a similar language.

Clearly, on the off chance that you just mean to slip in a keen bulb or potentially update your indoor regulator, you won't have to consider a center point.

On the off chance that, then again, you need an increasingly careful and interconnected keen home, consider Samsung's relentless SmartThings Hub. Every single primary correspondence conventions are upheld including both Z-Wave and Zigbee just as any IP-associated gadgets. Samsung has a comprehensive frame of mind except for Nest. All bases are secured with the SmartThings Hub.

You have a lot of different alternatives if SmartThings doesn't work for you. Ponder your savvy home today yet in addition of how you'd like things to create. Similarity is vital so ensure any center point you're thinking about offers all the help you need.

Smarthome is loaded with Insteon sweethearts. Not just in light of the fact that it's the world's most dependable innovation but since of the cost-viability and pending new application refreshes. The Insteon Hub doesn't hinder your Wi-Fi systems like other innovation and you can control many shrewd Smart Homes and Devices on your center point without dormancy,

4) Smart Lights

While it was conceivable to robotize lighting as far back as the good 'ol days. Unfortunately the correspondence convention X10 was based was generally questionable.

Today, savvy lighting comes in numerous masks from the straightforwardness of a fitting and-play shrewd bulb through to assuming responsibility for all the lighting all through your home utilizing basic voice directions.

For what reason would it be advisable for you to waste time with savvy lighting when it's so natural to just flick a switch?

Try not to belittle exactly how helpful it very well may be? Attempt to enter a foyer that lights up as you enter as opposed to bungling in obscurity for a switch. You will see less scouring the messy divider plate. Kiss farewell to feeling your way to the washroom in the night. Watch out! Quit stubbing your toe as you find a workable pace darkness. Let reviling yourself for not putting resources into shrewd lighting end today!

Vitality productivity is maybe the driving explanation an ever increasing number of individuals are rushing to keen lighting. Did you realize power represents 19% of all vitality utilized around the world? What about the normal American power bill is $100 every month? Wouldn't you concur any reserve funds right now extraordinary for your ledger?

From a fundamental gadget like the Insteon Remote Control Plug-In Lamp Dimmer Module that permits you to change splendor levels remotely to LIFX or Philips Hue bulbs, shrewd lighting is a tremendous field. You could likewise explore different avenues regarding Insteon's unbelievable on/off switches or go for a dimmer switch contingent upon what you need to accomplish.

Set aside the effort to consider what you require from robotized lighting and it will be well beneficial. Surge in without thinking ahead and you're probably going to commit a costly error.

5) Smart Lock

While you may accept keen entryway locks make your home more secure, it's progressively about accommodation. Let's be honest, with a brilliant lock you're simply supplanting one type of a lock with another. The most positive advantage of shrewd entryway locks is keyless section. No compelling reason to locate an open entryway or pull out your key, simply enter the code…

Keyless comfort ought not be disparaged, however. On the off chance that your youngsters regularly overlook their keys or you like to go out running toward the beginning of the day unhampered, savvy locks are the perfect arrangement. They additionally function admirably in the event that you have an investment property and need to streamline get to while keeping things secure.

Savvy locks can utilize WiFi, Bluetooth or Z-Wave to speak with other keen gadgets in your home. You can mastermind the lights to come on and the AC to tighten up as you enter. Similarly as with all parts of home mechanization, getting discrete segments and frameworks working in congruity is the way to progress.

Some keen locks like those from the incredible August space over your current equipment. Notwithstanding, some others require a deadbolt substitution. On the off chance that the lock you pick calls for swapping out the deadbolt, you ought to take care of business mind

#Smart Homes and Devices Bradenton FL #Smart Homes and Devices

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gordonwilliamsweb · 3 years ago

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Veterans Push for Medical Marijuana in Conservative South

RALEIGH, N.C. — Each time Chayse Roth drives home to North Carolina, he notices the highway welcome signs that declare: “Nation’s Most Military Friendly State.”

“That’s a powerful thing to claim,” said Roth, a former Marine Corps gunnery sergeant who served multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Now he says he’s calling on the state to live up to those words. A Wilmington resident, Roth is advocating for lawmakers to pass a bill that would legalize medical marijuana and allow veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder and other debilitating conditions to use it for treatment.

“I’ve lost more men to suicide since we went to Afghanistan in ’01 than I have in combat,” said Roth, who said he doesn’t use cannabis himself but wants others to have the option. “It’s just unacceptable for these guys to go overseas and win the battle and come home and lose the battle to themselves.”

He is among several veterans brought together by a recently formed advocacy group called NC Families for Medical Cannabis. These veterans have testified before the legislature and visited lawmakers individually.

In a state that’s home to eight military bases, one of the largest veteran populations in the country and a Republican-controlled legislature that prides itself on supporting the troops, they hope their voices will act as a crucial lever to push through a bill that has faced opposition in the past.

“If we really want to be the most veteran-friendly state in the union, this is just another thing we can do to solidify that statement,” Roth said.

From California to Massachusetts, veterans have been active in the push for medical marijuana legalization for decades. But now, as the movement focuses on the remaining 14 states that have not enacted comprehensive medical marijuana programs or full marijuana legalization, their voices may have outsize influence, experts say.

Many of these remaining states are in the traditionally conservative South and dominated by Republican legislatures. “The group carrying the message here makes a huge difference,” said Julius Hobson Jr., a former lobbyist for the American Medical Association who now teaches lobbying at George Washington University. “When you’ve got veterans coming in advocating for that, and they’re considered to be a more conservative bunch of folks, that has more impact.”

Veterans also have the power of numbers in many of these states, Hobson said. “That’s what gives them clout.”

Successes are already evident. In Texas and Louisiana, veterans played a key role in the recent expansion of medical marijuana programs. In Mississippi, they supported a successful ballot initiative for medical cannabis in 2020, though the result was later overturned by the state Supreme Court. And in Alabama, the case of an out-of-state veteran arrested and jailed for possession of medical marijuana incited national outrage and calls for legalization. The state legalized medical marijuana earlier this year.

To be sure, not every veteran supports these efforts, and the developments in red states have been influenced by other factors: advocacy from cancer patients and parents whose children have epilepsy, lawmakers who see this as a states’ rights issue, a search for alternative pain relief amid the opioid epidemic and a push from industries seeking economic gains.

But the attention to the addiction and suicide epidemics among veterans, and calls to give them more treatment options, are also powerful forces.

In states like North Carolina, where statewide ballot initiatives are banned, veterans can kick-start a conversation with lawmakers who hold the power to make change, said Garrett Perdue, the son of former North Carolina Gov. Beverly Perdue and a spokesperson for NC Families for Medical Cannabis and CEO of Root Bioscience, a company that makes hemp products.

“It fits right in with the general assembly’s historical support of those communities,” Perdue said. “For [lawmakers] to hear stories of those people that are trusted to protect us and enforce the right of law” and see them as advocates for this policy “is pretty compelling.”

Gary Hess, a Marine Corps veteran from Louisiana, said he first realized the power of his platform in 2019, when he testified in front of the state legislature about seeing friends decapitated by explosions, reliving the trauma day-to-day, taking a cocktail of prescription medications that did little to help his symptoms and finally finding relief with cannabis. His story resonated with lawmakers who had served in the military themselves, Hess said.

He recalled one former colonel serving in the Louisiana House telling him: “They’re not going to say no to a veteran because of the crisis you’re all in. As someone who is put together well and can tell the story of marijuana’s efficacy, you have a powerful platform.”

Hess has since started his own nonprofit to advocate for medical marijuana legalization and has traveled to other state and national events, including hearings before the North Carolina legislature.

“Once I saw the power my story had,” he said, “the goal became: How do I expedite this process for others?”

Experts trace the push for medical marijuana legalization back to the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and ’90s, particularly in California’s Bay Area.

As the movement tried to expand, medical marijuana activists realized other regions were not as sympathetic to the LGBTQ community, said Lee Hannah, an associate professor of political science at Wright State University who is writing a book about the rise of legal marijuana in the U.S. They had to find “more target populations that evoke sympathy, understanding and support,” Hannah said.

Over time, the medical marijuana conversation grew from providing symptom relief for patients with AIDS to include such conditions as cancer, pediatric epilepsy and PTSD, Hannah and his colleagues noted in a 2020 research paper. With each condition added, the movement gained wider appeal.

“It helped change the view of who a marijuana user is,” said Daniel Mallinson, a co-author on the 2020 paper and the upcoming book with Hannah, and an assistant professor at the Penn State-Harrisburg School of Public Affairs. “That makes it more palatable in these legislatures where it wouldn’t have been before.”

In 2009, New Mexico became the first state to make PTSD patients eligible for medical marijuana. The condition has since been included in most state medical marijuana programs.

The movement got another boost in 2016 when the American Legion, a veterans organization with 1.8 million members known for its conservative politics, urged Congress to remove marijuana from its list of prohibited drugs and allow research into its medical uses.

“I think knowing an organization like the American Legion supports it frankly gives [lawmakers] a little bit of political cover to do something that they may have all along supported but had concerns about voter reaction,” said Lawrence Montreuil, the group’s legislative director.

In Texas, when the Republican governor recently approved a law expanding the state’s limited medical marijuana program, he tweeted: “Veterans could qualify for medical marijuana under new law. I will sign it.”

It’s smart political messaging, Hannah said. Elected officials “are always looking to paint laws they support in the most positive light, and the approval rate of veterans is universally high.”

Nationally, veteran-related marijuana bills seem to be among the few cannabis-related reforms that have gained bipartisan support. Bills with Democratic and Republican co-sponsors in Congress this session deal with promoting research into medical marijuana treatment for veterans, allowing Veterans Affairs doctors to discuss cannabis with patients in states where it is legal and protecting veterans from federal penalization for using state-legalized cannabis.

Rep. Dave Joyce (R-Ohio), who has co-sponsored two bipartisan bills concerning veterans and medical marijuana this session, said the interest of veterans is “what drew me to cannabis in the first place.”

In North Carolina, veterans like Roth and Hess, along with various advocacy groups, continue to drum up support for the medical marijuana bill. They know it’s a long battle. The bill must clear several Senate committees, a full Senate vote and then repeat the process in the House. But Roth said he’s optimistic “the veteran aspect of it will be heavily considered by lawmakers.”

An early indication of that came at a Senate committee hearing earlier this summer. Standing at the podium, Roth scrolled through his phone to show lawmakers how many of his veteran contacts were now dead due to suicide. Other veterans testified about the times they had contemplated suicide and how the dozens of prescription medications they had tried before cannabis had done little to quiet those thoughts.

The hearing room was silent as each person spoke. At the end, the lawmakers stood and gave a round of applause “for those veterans who are with us today and those who are not.”

The bill later passed that committee with a nearly unanimous vote.

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

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stephenmccull · 3 years ago

Text

Veterans Push for Medical Marijuana in Conservative South

RALEIGH, N.C. — Each time Chayse Roth drives home to North Carolina, he notices the highway welcome signs that declare: “Nation’s Most Military Friendly State.”

“That’s a powerful thing to claim,” said Roth, a former Marine Corps gunnery sergeant who served multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“If we really want to be the most veteran-friendly state in the union, this is just another thing we can do to solidify that statement,” Roth said.

Veterans also have the power of numbers in many of these states, Hobson said. “That’s what gives them clout.”

But the attention to the addiction and suicide epidemics among veterans, and calls to give them more treatment options, are also powerful forces.

Hess has since started his own nonprofit to advocate for medical marijuana legalization and has traveled to other state and national events, including hearings before the North Carolina legislature.

“Once I saw the power my story had,” he said, “the goal became: How do I expedite this process for others?”

Experts trace the push for medical marijuana legalization back to the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and ’90s, particularly in California’s Bay Area.

In 2009, New Mexico became the first state to make PTSD patients eligible for medical marijuana. The condition has since been included in most state medical marijuana programs.

It’s smart political messaging, Hannah said. Elected officials “are always looking to paint laws they support in the most positive light, and the approval rate of veterans is universally high.”

The hearing room was silent as each person spoke. At the end, the lawmakers stood and gave a round of applause “for those veterans who are with us today and those who are not.”

The bill later passed that committee with a nearly unanimous vote.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

Veterans Push for Medical Marijuana in Conservative South published first on https://smartdrinkingweb.weebly.com/

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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Immortals: Fenyx Rising Review

https://ift.tt/39stySp

A few weeks ago, I demoed Immortals: Fenyx Rising and liked what I saw: a new IP from Ubisoft with colorful visuals, an expansive open world steeped in Greek mythology, and a comedic story that presents the Olympian gods in a new way. Sadly, the game’s strengths quickly waned, and its plethora of weaknesses began to wear on me over the 25 hours I played Immortals for this review. While I have no intention of picking up this game again, that’s not to say I didn’t have fun with it at times.

The adventure is set in the Golden Isle, where Fenyx, a shipwrecked warrior (male or female), discovers that every mortal but them has been turned to stone by a monstrosity named Typhon, who was once banished by the gods but has returned for revenge and seemingly wiped them from existence. Only Zeus and his disgraced cousin Prometheus remain, and to his dismay, Zeus must listen to Prometheus as he narrates Fenyx’s journey to restore the gods’ power.

The game’s story and dialogue are amusing at first. The banter between Zeus and Prometheus is fun, and Fenyx’s interactions with the handful of characters she encounters are written well enough. But there’s an underlying issue with the material that becomes increasingly evident as the story unfolds. While the writing can be funny, the story aims for comedy way too often, which is to say none of the story beats feel sincere because the humor is so incessant. And because the humor is so incessant, the dialogue stops being funny rather quickly. Every character is made to look like an idiot in one way or another, which undermines any drama or stakes the story tries to introduce. I appreciate the Saturday morning cartoon vibe, but I would have liked to see a little more depth.

Another issue with the storytelling is the fact that there are, as previously mentioned, only a handful of NPCs to talk to. This makes the game world feel empty, lifeless, and lonesome, despite its beauty. All of the island’s denizens have been turned to stone, of course, but I would have still have preferred for the game world to be populated with more characters to talk to, especially since the game is so dialogue-driven. In open worlds I love, I find myself exploring just to explore because I simply enjoy being there. But in Immortals, I never took the long way to objectives—I fast-traveled like crazy because after the island’s beauty faded there wasn’t much left to draw me into the world.

The lack of NPCs is a shame because the island is so spacious and scenic. As you explore its six zones (each dedicated to one of the Olympian gods), its vastness is immediately striking, largely due to the near-limitless draw distance. You can see for miles and miles around when you climb one of the gigantic statues of the gods, and the game’s visuals pop with color. At times, the environments can lack a little visual depth due to the passable lighting system and the cartoony aesthetic, but overall I found the environmental design to be appealing.

As with every other aspect of this game, the more time you spend with the visuals, the more blemishes become apparent. The character models look okay at a glance, but the facial animations are woefully wooden and inexpressive to the point where they undermine the dialogue and look borderline silly. This comes as a surprise since artists typically choose a cartoon-like aesthetic to allow their characters to be MORE expressive. Sadly, Immortals’s characters look like they’re two console generations old.

Release Date: Dec. 3, 2020 Platforms: PC (reviewed), PS5, XSX/S, PS4, XBO, Switch, Stadia, Luna Developer: Ubisoft Publisher: Ubisoft Genre: Action-adventure

Immortals’s gameplay is—surprise—a mixed bag. There are several ways to traverse the island. You can climb almost any surface (limited by a stamina bar), tame a mount, or glide around with Daedalus’s wings, which you acquire early on. These all work well enough, though the gliding mechanic can be finicky. There’s no way to move backwards, which can become incredibly frustrating during the game’s many air navigation puzzles.

Speaking of puzzles, let’s talk about the Vaults of Tartaros, which are scattered across the game world in great number. These challenge areas can be combat-based, navigation-based, or puzzle-based, and the latter two are just awful to play. I can’t tell you how much I loathed spending time in these vaults, and there are so many reasons why that I don’t care to list them all for fear of popping a vein in my forehead.

But here are a few. Worst of all is the look of the vaults. They all look the same: stone structures suspended in a generic-looking cosmic backdrop. Everything is blueish or purplish, which makes clues almost impossible to see at times due to the lack of visual contrast. And everything is square—virtually every component of the structures in Tartarus is a cube or a square, which becomes mind-numbing and frankly infuriating.

And then there are the puzzles themselves, which are inelegant and uninspired. You’re pushing blocks, pulling blocks, breaking blocks, shooting targets, rolling spheres. The puzzles are mostly physics-based, and they almost always feel janky in some way. Without going into detail, I’ll just say that 90% of the time, when I solved a puzzle, I was unsure whether the solution I arrived at was the intended result or if I’d randomly stumbled upon a wonky way to cheat my way through. And on too many occasions I had no clue where I was supposed to go next during a puzzle. I’d hit a switch and I’d hear a sound, but the camera never moves to show you what the switch actually activated.

In games with good puzzles, you’re stumped for awhile but you’re compelled to solve them because they’re visually attractive, or the puzzle is designed in a way that captures your imagination and pulls you through to the end. Immortals’s puzzles feel like putting together a jigsaw whose pieces don’t quite fit flush, or a jigsaw that comes with extra pieces just to troll you. Really messy stuff.

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Assassin’s Creed Valhalla Review

By Bernard Boo

Thankfully, the most prominently featured aspect of gameplay is pretty great. The game’s combat reminds me of Darksiders, which I consider a huge compliment. You use quick sword attacks to chip away at enemies’ health, sweeping axe attacks to rack up stagger points, and bow attacks for ranged damage. The action feels quick, responsive, and dynamic most of the time.

There are mythical boss fights to be found all over the island as well, and these legendary encounters were enjoyable not just to play but to find. I loved spotting a hulking cyclops in the distance and making my way over to them, readying my inventory for the epic battle at hand. The combat is a huge plus for a game that suffers in most other areas.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

You have myriad god abilities at your disposal to help you in battle, like a massive hammer swing that breaks through shields; Apollo’s arrows, whose trajectory you can guide manually; and Phosphor, a bird ally who can attack baddies alongside you. Potions play a major role as well: You’ve got health and stamina potions, and attack and defense potions that increase your stats. All of these tools and skills can be upgraded via the game’s central hub, the Hall of the Gods, where you can spend various currencies and improve your Fenyx as well as complete rotating tasks for Hermes (essentially the same as the Vault challenges).

Unfortunately, for every one thing Immortals does right, it does five things wrong. The various armors that you collect are all pretty cool looking and come with unique stat buffs, but unlocking them often requires you to solve tedious puzzles, which again, are no fun for a litany of reasons. I really wanted to like this game—it reminded me of ’90s games like ActRaiser with its art style and arcade-y action. But over time I was bludgeoned by the game’s shortcomings and came away seriously disappointed.

The post Immortals: Fenyx Rising Review appeared first on Den of Geek.

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scarletjedi · 7 years ago

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*chin hands* So what's that fic idea you want to enjoy as a reader?

well now, the thing is: those thoughts don’t hang around long before it’s 4am and I’m making chocolate pudding, because I’ve lost all control of my life and delved into yet another long-fic.

See: Pineapple 2, COMES AROUND AGAIN, Old Man Luke, Two Weeks...

BUT

The circumstances that get me thinking, that make me want those long, epic, sink your teeth into them fics (that are just *SO* expertly written, like HOLY SHITBALLS) are journeys of self-discovery. I want the slightly-felt of cannon, where small changes early on have huge ramifications.

Give me Luke Skywalker, actively involved in the slave resistance. Have his showdown with Jabba more than just a footnote. Give me tatooine politics.

Give me Snape who survived the last war and now has to figure out: What next. Put him in new places. Send him to America, or Japan, or fucking CORUSCANT.

Give me my Queer Captain America--

Oh, that was it. This is the FIC I HAVEN’T WRITTEN:

cut for length, whoo boy.

Steve, after The Avengers when he’s trying to figure out his life--perhaps while he’s in his Shield apartment, working on his list--he stumbles across Logo TV. (I think some “well meaning” shield agent would have blocked the channel, but maybe Tony visited, and Jarvis hacked his cable to remove the child safety locks because Tony find that kind of censoring personally offensive).

Steve, after a brief moment where he realizes this is the *gay channel* (and how scared/excited he is, because for the first time he sees *himself* on screen, as he really is) and he begins a new list of Queer History that he begins to research (at the library, in books because they can’t be traced, and *that’s* a revelation as well, and it leads him to a LGBT bookstore and the staff are BOGGLED that Cap is there, using the lingo of the community-as-it-was, but at least one of them is like “I KNEW IT” and we get a compelling group of queer ocs to get involved in PLOT) but

BUT

But he also finds *RUPAUL’S DRAG RACE* and he’s fucking SHOOK becuase--

well, because it’s a DRAG BALL, and it’s TELEVISED. He’s been to balls before, word of mouth secret parties that were the night of his life--

and it’s 2012, so it’s season 4, with Sharon vs PhiPhi, Willam, Chad, and *Latrice* and he’s *hooked* (it’s so familiar, it aches), and orders the previous seasons on DVD, disappearing into his apartment to bing-watch when they arrive on his doorstep in discreet brown packaging (or maybe he goes to Target, or has Jarvis help because he’s pretty sure SHIELD is watching his mail...)

and it’s a thing, while Winter Soldier is happening that he’s also watching Drag Race, and discussing the episodes with the gays at the book shop, and HAS HIS FIRST KISS SINCE 1945--

Then Bucky.

BUCKY.

(And it’s the bookstore that gets Bucky back, because Bucky *knows*, Bucky was THERE with Steve, every inch of the way, and when Steve walks into the shop, and sees the (fucking jacked) man with the long brown hair wearing a glove in DC summer heat, his heart fucking STOPS, but it’s BUCKY, who’s broken but is putting himself back together and it’s a fucking LOVE story, and--)

And the Avengers need some good PR. So, Cap makes a suggestion, and soon enough, they’re getting a call from the Drag Race producers.

The kids at the shop are *shook* when they turn on the next season to see episode 10, the makeover episode, filled by the Men of the Avengers (with Black Widow and Pepper guest judges, of course). But you have Tony (who is pretty sure he’s been in drag before, but he doesn’t really remember the 90s, so...) and Thor (I have been dressed in women’s vestiment’s before--I have to shave??), and Clint (Girl, I grew up in the Circus. “nuff said), and Bruce (who can’t walk in heels to save his life, and how did he end up here?) and Sam (Man, I can make anything look good), and Steve, who all the queens both want to dress (because who DIDN’T have an epic crush on the Captain, am I right?) and don’t (because everybody knows how people were about THE GAYS in the 40s, and...)

And Steve fucking KILLS it--he knows makeup, he’s worn heels and dresses. He knows the fucking *protocol* and first he says it’s because he’s a huge fan and watches the show regularly, but then he starts talking about the past and the queens he knew and what it was REALLY like back then, and his fella

(I was a medical experiment at the height of the eugenics movement--you think they were gonna pick someone they didn’t think was *expendable*?)

And you get the heartfelt moving moment in the workroom where the queen (the one who’ll win, probably) gets all teary, and then Later Steve talks about HISTORY while looking FABULOUS and RU gets all teary and--

Well, Fox News is pissed, and the conservatives are calling for blood because “How dare he sully the uniform/america/the flag, etc” and Steve is all, like, “Fuck you, dudes. I got more unbridled patriotism in my little toe then in all of you combined.

Then they find out about Bucky and it becomes....

THE TRIAL OF BUCKY BARNES.

*deep breath*

You see what I mean? That’s probably, like, three stories right there, and there’s NOT REAL ENDING. The way I’d want this written out, it’s be at least as long as Harry Potter. THE WHOLE SERIES. This is the kind of expansive plunny that makes me want to read rather than write.

(If anyone wants to tackle any part of this, you are free to it.)

#pop is awesome #the fic i wish someone else would write #stucky #captain america #you can pry my bisexual steve rogers from my cold dead queer fingers #bunn adoption #poplitealqueen

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theofficialautisticgamer · 5 years ago

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To Hell and Back A "Doom (2016) Review" Played on PC Beat in 5 Hours, 22 Minutes, 6 Seconds Review by The Autistic Gamer (Michael) PROS AND CONS DOWN AT THE BOTTOM This is the definition of an overhyped game. I was unfortunately part of the huge hype train when Doom (Now implanted in our brains as Doom 2016) was announced. A True Successor to Doom 1 and 2 and Final Doom, the game was met was overhwelming praise and many calling it one of the best old school FPS Games EVER. However, I would say that's bullshit. Doom 2016 is a good game, don't get me wrong, I don't hate it by any means, but this mentality that it's better than Doom 3, a shooter inspired by Half-Life while still being Doom is true? I don't think so. The thing that made Doom 3 one of the best shooters ever was it's groundbreaking new version of the ID Tech engine that was mindblowing using dynamic shadows and lighting making for an eerie atmospheric game that is unforgettable with some of the best gameplay imaginable. Doom 2016 doesn't do anything revolutionary with it's new updated ID Tech Engine. It looks better than RAGE, don't get me wrong, but the entire point of ID Tech was to push the limits of gaming. How is this pushing the limits of gaming? I don't think it even is. So what is Doom 2016 improving? While, I wouldn't say improving, but it refines what made Doom 1 and 2 great classics. That becomes a contradication of itself throughout unfortunately. Basically, each level consists of Doomguy (Who is now pointlessly named Doom Slayer) trying to eliminate the threat of demons in the UAC Mars Research Facility. He goes from trying to cool down some reactors, to destroying a dangerous hell energy, to going to hell and back and fighting many bosses throughout. Doomguy's weapons are what you would expect, a pistol, a shotgun and super shotgun, plasma rifle, chaingun, rocket launcher, of course, who can forget the BFG (Or the Big Fucking Gun as Dwayne Johnson put it in the Doom 2005 movie?) But there are some new weapons as well, mainly the Gauss Cannon and Light Machine Gun/Heavy Assault Rifle. The Heavy Assault Rifle is ass and gets replaced with the chaingun later due to it being much more reliable. The Gauss Cannon however, was the big surprise of the game. It's super fun to use in most cases. Doomguy also has a progression system. Now, he can use suit tokens for his Preator Suit (Which is a stupid name, why not just call it the armor or space armor?) to upgrade a bunch of things, he can find robots carrying weapon upgrades that change how weapons work and of course, Argent Energy Balls that upgrade Health, Ammo and Armor. This works out pretty well for the most part and I really enjoyed getting more ammo along the way. The Chainsaw is also back, but here is the difference. In Doom 1 and 2, it was useless to me, the purpose was just to kill Pinky demons. That's it. Doom 3 had you using it to get out of corners before the enemies gang banged you to death, here, it's a gas fueled chainsaw that is a ammo drop machine. Basically, use it on small enemies, the less gas it uses, this also is part of the ammo upgrade system as you get more gas later on. There are also a bunch of secrets to discover like hidden throwback levels like Underhalls and Live Moving Models of Enemies throughout the game. Super Turbo Turkey Puncher 3 from Doom 3 also makes an appearance which is great and one of the highlights. There are also easter eggs to be found including one of the Dragonborn from Skyrim. So all together, this comes to a highly frantic action gameplay which is very good. There is much more of a challenge to the game than Doom 3 as the enemies are unpredictable. Enemies include Possessed, Imps, Pinky Demons, Revenants, Hell Knights, Barons of Hell, Soldiers, Lost Souls, Mancubus bosses including Spider Mastermind and Cyberdemons, and a new boss called Hell Guards and new enemies like Cyber Mancubus and Summoners (WHICH I ABSOLUTELY HATE) but gone are Arch Viles and Pain Elementals and Chaingunners. Also, power ups are back like Berserk and Quad Damage. Glory Kills are one thing I forgot to mention and this is where we will start getting into the negatives of the game. Basically, these Glory Kills can be performed to get more health and a tiny bit of ammo in gruesome ways, but the problem is because there are a limited amount of ways to kill demons, you'll be seeing the same Glory Kills over and over and which gets incredibly tiring and redundant. The boss difficulty is also a problem. Boss Fights should at least get progressively harder and harder. challenging, hard as ass and then a total pushover. The Cyberdemon fight was perfect, but the Hell Guards sucked ass and were totally cheap and then the Spider Mastermind was too easy. If the bosses were actually balanced, this would make for some fun challenges. The story is my biggest problem. Doom should not have much of a story, it should just throw you into the action and keep going and never stop. But somehow, ID Thought that throwing unskippable in game cutscenes that last way too long would be a totally okay idea. It's not. The beginning is a good example of this, you kill three possessed after getting out of chains, you put on the space armor and then a 90 Second unskippable cutscene occurs that you can't skip. The point? To show a satellite is off. Another good point is in the third level the Foundry, where the main villain of the game, Olivia Pierce, (Who is incredibly useless and is barely in the game and is a stupid villain) tries to prepare a portal to hell. All you needed was for VEGA to say that Olivia Pierce is fucking something up and you need to stop her. THAT'S IT. What Happens instead? A two minute unskippable cutscene of her preparing a hell portal then walking..... super..... duper.... slowly.... out the door. Don't even get me on when you go into Samuel Hayden's office, it's another two minute unskippable self monologue he does and is incredibly annoying. This shouldn't be happening in a Doom game. Doom is about being awesome and splattering demons into thick red paste. "BUT MICHAEL. HOW CAN YOU DEFEND DOOM 3 WHEN IT HAS THE SAME PROBLEMS!?!" You bellow. Because while Doom 3 is still technically a Doom game, it takes many other story elements and gameplay inspirations from mainly Half-Life. So the story was a bigger part of Doom 3 because it was inspired by Half-Life and it's expansions. Plus, Doom 3's story is campy, fun and compelling while Doom 2016's is boring, unnecessary and not fleshed out. Also, Doom 2016 tries to be like Doom 1 and 2 but keeps on ruining that promise with horrid amounts of story and in game cutscenes. So yeah, the story in Doom 2016 kind of sucks, it's just ripping off the story from The Lost Mission expansion from Doom 3, you have to shut down a teleporter and kill a shit ton of demons. There is some stuff about a artifact here and there, but overall it's nothing special. Also, compare Olivia Pierce to Dr. Betruger. Betruger was a menacing villain who cackled evilly and was a total insane man who wanted nothing more than for all of Mars and Earth to suffer, Elliot Swan and Jack Campbell coming to Mars to investigate pushed his buttons so hard that he said fuck it, and went completely batshit crazy and started a portal to hell. He was a fun villain and one of the most memorable parts of the game. Olivia Pierce? Her motive seems to be becoming a cult leader because she doesn't like Samuel Hayden. That's it. Also, you don't see her at all again after the fifth mission is over until the very end of the game. Also, what does opening another portal to hell benefit for you? What? Are you just going to ruin the UAC even more by opening another portal to hell? What the hell is her motive? But there is one shining light in this beacon of a dark story. Samuel Hayden. The over seven foot tall robot man is incredibly interesting to look at character wise, but he has some of the best moments in the game. He wants the best for Earth, but Doomguy's awesomeness ruins that, so in the end, he has to send Doomguy away to try and fix his own problems. He isn't a good guy or a villain, he is just some person trying to do his job as the head of a huge base. And that my friends, is all I have to say. Doom 2016 is a very good revival of the Doom 1 and 2 formula, with classic throwbacks, great weapons, awesome hell levels, some decent music (Although Iron Maiden or Dream Theater is more appropriate listening for this game), highly frantic action and is a good challenge throughout. I recommend it to people who liked the older Doom Games. 8.2/10 PROS: -Highly Frantic Action Throughout -Better Challenge than Doom 3 -Samuel Hayden is very memorable -Great Weapons that feel good to use -Lots of gore and blood for a Doom game -Lots of Secrets -Good Progression System -Decent Music -Callbacks to previous Doom games -Good Length for the campaign NEUTRALS: -Story is just borrowing from The Lost Mission CONS: -Story feels the need to stop dead in it's tracks with unskippable in game cutscenes -Boss Difficulty is all over the place -Olivia Pierce is a stupid villain

#doom 2016 #game review #the autistic gamer #how long to beat

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magzoso-tech · 5 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://magzoso.com/tech/give-inkinds-smarter-giving-platform-brings-in-surprise-1-5-million-in-pre-seed-funding/

Give InKind’s smarter giving platform brings in surprise $1.5 million in pre-seed funding

Helping out a friend in need online can be surprisingly difficult. While giving cash is easy enough, that’s often not what people need most — so Give InKind aims to be the platform where you can do a lot more than write a check. The idea is such a natural one that the company tripled its goal for a pre-seed round, raising $1.5 million from Seattle investors.

The company was selected for inclusion in the Female Founders Alliance’s Ready Set Raise accelerator, at the demo day for which I saw founder Laura Malcolm present.

The problem Malcolm is attempting to solve is simply that in times of hardship, not only do people not want to deal with setting up a fundraising site, but money isn’t even what they require to get through that period. Malcolm experienced this herself, when she experienced a personal tragedy and found that what was out there to let others help was simply inadequate.

“My friends and family were trying to support me from around the country, but the tools they had to do that were outdated and didn’t solve the problems for us,” she explained. “There just wasn’t one place to put all the help that’s needed, whether that’s meal drop-off, or rides to school for the kids, or a wishlist for Instacart, or Lyft credits. Every situation is unique, and no one has put it all together in one place where, when someone says ‘how can I help?’ you can just point there.”

The idea with Give InKind is to provide a variety of options for helping someone out. Of course you can donate cash, but you can also buy specific items from wishlists, coordinate deliveries, set up recurring gifts (like diapers or gift boxes), or organize in-person help on a built-in calendar.

These all go on a central profile page that Malcolm noted is rarely set up by the beneficiary themselves.

“90 percent of pages are set up by someone else. Not everyone has been impacted by one of these situations, but I think almost everyone has known someone who has, and has wondered how they were supposed to respond or help,” she explained. “So this isn’t about capturing people during a time of need, but about solving the problem for people who want to know how to help.”

That certainly resonated with me, as I have always felt the cash donation option when someone is going through a tough time to be pretty impersonal and general. It’s nice to be able to help out in person, but what about a friend in another city who’s been taken out of action and needs someone else to figure out the dog walking situation? Give InKind is meant to surface specific needs like that and provide the links (to, for instance, Rover) and relevant information all in one place.

“The majority of actions on the site are people doing things themselves — signing up for meals, or to help. The calendar view is for coordination, and it’s the most used part of the site. About 70 percent is that, the rest is those national services [i.e. Instacart, Uber, etc.],” Malcolm said.

Locally run services (cleaners that aren’t on a national directory, for instance) are on the roadmap, but as you can imagine that takes a lot of footwork to put together, so it will have to wait.

Right now the site works almost entirely on an affiliate model; Helpers make accounts to do things like add themselves to the schedule or help edit the profile, then get sent out to the merchant site to complete the transaction there. The company is experimenting with on-site purchases for some things, but the idea isn’t to become host transactions except where that can really add value.

The plan for expansion is to double down on the existing organic growth patterns of the site. Every page that gets set up attracts multiple new users and visits, and those users are far more likely to start more pages even years down the line. Between improving that and some actual marketing work, Malcolm feels sure that they can grow quickly and could soon join other major giving services like GoFundMe in scale.

Ready, set, raise… a lot more than expected

Give InKind came to my attention through the Female Founder Alliance here in Seattle, which hosted a demo night a little while ago to highlight the companies and, naturally, their founders as well. Although some of the companies focused on female-forward issues, for instance the difficulty of acquiring workwear tailored to women’s bodies, the idea is more to find valuable companies that just happen to have female founders.

“Ready Set Raise was built to find high potential, dramatically undervalued investment opportunities, and translate them into something the VC community can understand,” said FFA founder Leslie Feinzaig. “Our last member survey results were consistent with findings that women founders raise less capital but make it go further. Give InKind is a perfect example. They bootstrapped for 3 years, found product market fit, grew 20% every month, and still struggled to resonate with investors.”

Yet after presenting, Malcolm’s company was honored at the event with a $100K investment from Trilogy Ventures. And having originally kicked off fundraising with a view to a $500K round, she soon found she had to cap it at an unexpected but very welcome $1.5M. The final list of participants in the round includes Madrona Venture Group, SeaChange Fund, Keeler Investments, FAM Fund, Grubstakes, and X Factor Ventures.

I suggested that this must have been something of a validating experience.

“It’s super validating,” she agreed. “The founder journey is long and hard, and the odds are not in favor of female founders or impact companies, necessarily, and consumer is not huge in Seattle, either. We really sort of defied the odds across the board raising this round so quickly… Seattle really showed up.”

She described the accelerator as being “incredibly unique. It’s entirely about creating access for female founders to investors, mentors, and experts.”

“We spent so much time turning my model upside down and shaking everything out of it. Turns out it was much more defensible than I thought. We didn’t change the business, and we didn’t change the product — we lightly changed the positioning,” she said. “This combination of access with coaching and mentorship, getting the ability to present the business in a way that’s compelling, you realize how much of this is held back from people who don’t have these opportunities. I’ve been carrying around Give InKind for three years in a paper bag, and they put a bell on it.”

Feinbaig cited the competitiveness of the application process and quality of their coaches, which give lots of 1 on 1 time, for the high quality of the companies emerging from the accelerator. You can check out the rest of the companies in the second cohort here — and of course Give InKind is live should you or anyone you know need a helping hand.

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aaronheatonwords · 7 years ago

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Tacoma

It's difficult to separate a work from its creators, despite the intention of the work itself. While Tacoma isn't a direct sequel to Gone Home, Fullbright's previous release and the breakthrough into the mainstream that these character-oriented experiences have become, it certainly follows in the footsteps of the groundwork that Gone Home has laid in its wake. Where many games would opt for a setting that feels believable enough to be a real place but “gamey” enough to occupy and traverse, Tacoma and other games in this genre trade in a deliberately slow, measured pacing that takes pride in the realism of their settings. Where many games reference and idealize settings for the effect of creating and enjoyable level, Walking Simulators (as much as I hate that term, it isn't entirely inaccurate at this point) trade in environments that are realistic to truly inhabit.

In that regard, Tacoma is a resounding success. By daring to break away from the willfully indulgent nostalgia that many of these games have occupied, whether it's through a time period or a well-established setting like a national forest or a haunted house, Tacoma steps outside of those boundaries in a way that forces the creative boundaries outward. Where the player could before assume the general state of the world, Tacoma raises the challenge of creating an entirely new reality to inhabit, but one that has the same believability as an abandoned mid-90's mansion. There is a tactile, realistic feel to picking up and examining recorded VHS tapes of the X-Files that would be challenging to recreate in a setting that almost literally does not exist, but Tacoma grapples with that problem admirably.

The space station Tacoma, which operates as a glorified shipping and receiving factory, is an incredibly essential character in the game. As it isn't a simple real-world location gone creepy, it requires as much setup as the actual human characters. The player, a third-party contractor named Amy hired to board and investigate the Tacoma, is free to walk and poke around Tacoma as they gain access to new areas. Though only being a setting, it serves as a microcosm of the outside world; before you can begin your adventure proper, you're required to grab a special pair of AR augmentations and sign off on a user agreement which sounds actually pretty scary when you read it closely, though not unlike many of the EULAs we blindly agree to nowadays anyway (use of image in perpetuity across the universe? Really?). From there, the reality of the fiction that Tacoma places itself in becomes horribly real. There is a pervading sense of corporate ownership that runs through the game, hinting at the obsoletion of currency in favour of a system called “Loyalty,” which can be traded between various companies for less than desirable rates that aren't entirely clear to the person making the decision to convert. There are fictional holidays about the advancements (or stagnation, depending on how you view it) of the workforce, which the contractors of space stations take part in. Whether they actually enjoy the holiday or even understand it is played with, and many simply use it as a free day off. Fictional (and real) corporations are named and given histories, and even the technology that powers the station is given realistic uses and limits (try turning a stove or a treadmill on, go for it).

For all of that work, it would have been unfortunate for Tacoma to drop the ball on the human characters which act as the core of the experience. The most realistic space station in the world would be boring to explore if the humanity in the station didn't hold up its end of the bargain. (Mostly) Fortunately, Tacoma delivers the good on its human crew members. Despite being only a couple of hours long, Tacoma boasts six crew members to experience during the journey, and each with their own ambitions, problems, goals, and worries. The amount of characters who seem actually real seems like an odd thing to praise, but in the context of a short video game, it's not something that's seen very often. Fullbright explored plenty of options to bring these characters to life and they're all handled well.

One of the chief ways to explore and learn the characters are the AR recordings, which play out as coloured silhouettes that roam about the environment, almost like a stage play. As you watch these play back, you're presented with a timeline that informs you of how far along in a recording you are, which events of interest are happening, and the ability to scrub through the recording as you see fit. What first seems like a very basic twist on the audio log formula (the ability to manually track your position in a recording) quickly becomes much more complicated, as characters congregate and branch out during the recording. Being a real-time recording of the events of the station in a given area, the recording is not simply of a single character but of whoever was present in the zone during that recording. This leads to many instances of pausing and forwarding tracks to keep up with moving characters, navigating the environment to figure out who was standing where and when, and how to access the AR terminals the game presents.

Right, so another way the game presents characters is through a very indirect method, which is the AR terminals that everyone on board (including Amy herself) has access to. They open in front of characters like a digital book, and have area for email, web browsing, video calls and other computer-like interactions. Any time that a character is using his or her AR terminal during a recording, the player is free to poke around in it as well, though some interactions are locked off as corrupted or otherwise inaccessible. On top of the mostly passive AR recordings and the usual ability to poke and prod and twist and turn every item in the environment, the AR terminals act as a welcome addition to the usual formula of these games and give much needed context to certain characters. Like any media, sometimes there were characters who seemed to be acting entirely irrationally only for me to find well-earned justification in their email log or through a conversation with their partner or child. Adding a layer of context that isn't outright shown is a realistic way to add layers to characters. After all, how many times have you thought someone to be acting irrationally in real life, only to find out later that they were going through trauma or issues in their lives? The AR terminals are a layer of reality, despite being a digital item.

The conventions that Tacoma chooses to engage with and subvert do define a significant portion of my opinion of the game. Being the next entry in the genre from the creators who worked to popularize it, there's a certain notion of conventions being challenged and problems being addressed. With the popularity and advent of this genre, from Firewatch to SOMA to Layers of Fear, comes an expectation of improvement and expansion. Tacoma puts forth ideas that don't always pan out, though a lot of that does come down to individual opinion.

The prevalence of audio logs in the game seems like a very conscious design decision, rather than a creative freedom like Gone Home. Telling a story which has already happened is fascinating in its own right, not entirely disassociated from the strange voyeuristic tendencies that people might have, but because it allows a freedom to explore and inhabit an environment that was very lovingly crafted. While a game like Bioshock (which members of Fullbright have worked on) leans on tension to keep the player moving, games like Gone Home are fully propped up by their narratives and environments. In this case, Tacoma is full of very compelling people who participate in an event which seems equal parts terrifying and thrilling, guided by an AI whose intentions are not entirely clear (as is the case with so many AIs in fiction). Despite the joy of picking through drawers and bookstacks on the space station, I found myself something wishing that I could have inhabited a character who lived through the events of the space station. It speaks to the strength of the dual narrative style that Gone Home and Tacoma utilise that I want to experience both stories, though whether or not your story is the more interesting one is entirely a matter of personal opinion.

Similarly, the world around the Tacoma is so well-realised, even through snippets of emails and advertisements and AR terminals, that there's a part of me which wants to dive deeply into the universe outside of the airlock and find out who the tertiary characters and big players in the ecosystem are. Subtle hints like the faded American flag in a certain character's office or the constant reference to a competing company within the Tacoma stoke the fires of my interests so much that being a passive observer feels like a step back from what could have been. The art design is immaculate and the trail of breadcrumbs left for the player to follow through the station paint such a vivid world that I wish I could have either taken a step down, into the events of the Tacoma itself, or a step up, into a more wide-reaching political thriller.

Despite this, Tacoma succeeds whole-heartedly at what it does. It exposes an extremely believable world in microcosm, one that seems to respect all current avenues of political and social reality while presenting a very real picture of where it might go, and fills that opening with characters who feel motivated and clearly grounded without degenerating into two-dimensional caricatures of what a person in space might look or act like. As a follow-up to Gone Home, it smartly engages and subverts what it needs to by twisting the environmental storytelling model into an interactive and immersive space while ditching what isn't required, which is a faithful recreation of a time that's already passed us by. That's not to say that it diminishes what Gone Home accomplished, but it stands to prove what can be done when you look at a genre as a feeling and an idea, instead of a list of bullet points that need to be hit. I come away from Tacoma disappointed that its world isn't more immediately accessible, but very happy with the story it tells within the confines of its universe.

#review #reviews #video games #fullbright #tacoma #walking simulator #2017 #sci-fi #pc #steam #xbox one #words #4 stars

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wickedbaggins · 8 years ago

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2016 In Review - Games

Wow did I not finish much. But here they are!

Ladykiller in a Bind - This here visual novel is probably game of the year for me. This would mean more in a year where I hadn’t failed to finish nearly everything I started, but still. It’s funny and dirty and drawn with skillful personality (for those who dislike dirty, there’s now a Christmas sweater mode, although I’m not sure how much that’s really going to help). What makes it especially memorable is the hard-dropped relationship insights and the neat-o conversation systems. I love that you can hold out for a better option, I love that you have to negotiate suspicion. Christine Love is a game designer I admire, but I’ve found her work a little heavy and strident in the past. This mingles a few difficult themes with a lighter touch and also jokes. And, y’know, sex. I enjoy the side stories more than the main romances, but good stuff all around. Just don’t expect a treatise on consent or anything as carefully lecture-like as Hate Story. It’s a sex comedy first.

Undertale - Maybe should be my game of the year, it’s something, it really is, this beautiful, surreal, unnerving little game with skeletons and cow-dudes and jokes, jokes!! But I am really bad at bullet hell and my frustration with the mechanics made it a very nearly miserable experience for me. Still worth it, though. When it goes all late-stage what-the-hell Earthbound, totally worth it.

Solstice - Another runner-up for game of the year. Moacube’s latest is beautiful and fascinating, a lovingly nuanced and complex murder mystery with a whole lot of character-driven philosophy stuff. It’s a little short and opaque, but every moment is wonderful.

Tyranny - Half of it threatens to be Obsidian’s most interesting game (and that’s saying something). The other half is tediously under-developed. The good stuff is wonderful, though. Your party may not have any quest lines to follow, but they, like most of the characters, are fascinatingly awful people, except when they’re not, and then it’s even sadder. The dialog ranges toward the rich, dense. I could’ve personally gone without the combat and just wandered around talking to people and hovering over the green footnotes. Next time, Obsidian, next time.

Baldur’s Gate Enhanced Edition - I finally dragged all the way through it. The high points are really high, as in Sarevok’s got some actual depths, Durlag’s Tower is a great dungeon, and it was terrific to pretend to be a cat while robbing that one guy. The rest of it is fine, but maybe I’ve played one too many games with real time with pause. I just couldn’t get into the combat, and if you’re story-moding your way through that, it is an awful large part of the game to be disengaged by.

Baldur’s Gate Siege of Dragonspear - The new expansion! There’s more line-by-line writing than in Baldur’s Gate and it really ain’t bad, but the story bothered me a lot from a thematic perspective (our opponents had perfectly good points and were needlessly villainized) and was railroaded in such an obvious way as to be frustrating. I don’t expect a lot of choice and consequence in a Baldur’s Gate, and the game as a whole was fine, but I wish the greater amount of text had done it more favors.

Pillars of Eternity - White March - Pillaaars. White March is neat. A little more polished than Tyranny, if not quite as compelling. The new companions were good (up golems, man) and the worldbuilding exquisite as always. I think a lot of folk didn’t get around to playing it, though, as I still have achievements on my showcase everyone should’ve gotten by now.

Witcher 3 - Heart of Stone - I think I finished it this year. I think! Neat expansion, more focused and interesting for my tastes than the bigger Blood and Wine (which I still haven’t finished). Terrific villain, a lot of great weirdness, the guy I was supposed to redeem (and I guess did) was a loser, though, and his wife needed a little more— something.

The Shivah - Early Wadjet Eye game. The first? Very short, but good. Depressed rabbi solves a murder. Includes conversational boss battles with rabbinical answers and some theology. One of those things where I don’t agree with the protagonist’s perspective (we don’t need to), but he’s presented with a lot of nuance and personality.

It’s Spring Again - You can finish it in ten minutes and it’s only challenging if you’re two, but beautiful. Everything’s done up in dense patterns. Sun, tree, dirt. Snow is beautiful, fall is beautiful, it’s all beautiful.

12 Labours of Hercules - A click-click-click time management game with a tiny touch of opacity, but mostly just nice, colorful fun, not too taxing. Prettily designed. I enjoy that Hercules doesn’t do squat 90 percent of the time.

Sorcery, Part 1 and 2 - I had a hard time with these games, which is sad, because they seemed up my alley. They’re nifty, the writing is good, the art is charming, but some of the gamebookiness in 2 I found frustrating and arbitrary. Missing one piece early on was enough to make the game unfinishable at the very end, or near enough. I have 3 and 4 left to play, which everyone is very glowing about, but I’m hoping for less old school “guess what, you never looked in the right place at the right time and now you don’t have that telescope!!” Rewinding can only help so much.

OZMAFIA!! (one route) - I got so excited by the art and the premise, but this was just dire. Maybe dire’s too strong a word, maybe, but all I can remember of it is a staccato, confusing sense of time, thinly drawn characters and— that’s it. The big sin is that it’s dull.

Little Lily Princess (two routes) - The crime is I’ve only done two routes. Hanako’s work is always very solid, and this light yuri take on A Little Princess is immensely charming. My problems with it are the problems inherent in the source material, but the game manages to wring some legitimate pathos from these relationships without feeling quite too sweet.

Psycho Pass Mandatory Happiness (one route) - Man, I know I need to get more than one of at least a half-score of endings here, but I found this really disappointing. Can I really expect too much of the creator of Madoka? Can I? The premise (your ability to exist in society is predicated upon your ability to perform mental health) is killer, but, man, I just didn’t care about anyone. I know from personal experience that writing a purely thinky narrative risks turning all your characters into cyphers, and Psycho Pass suffers hugely from this. I’m not sure the pleasures of the thinky bits are worth it.

One Way Heroics (bad end) - Cute little harried-retro thing where you have to outrun the Nothing— well, the darkness, anyway. You outrun the darkness to kill the dark lord. I’ve finished, but I haven’t won. Premise prompts some lovely bleakness. If you do defeat the Dark Lord, is there even anything left to save, or has it all been devoured behind you?

Epistory - Typing Chronicles - You’re a cool gal who rides on a cooler fox. You, the player, get to type a lot for the sake of murdering murderous insects. It’s appealingly designed and fun, even if the story is a bit of a nothing. It’s a typing game, y’know?

Planetarian - the reverie of a little planet - Short little weeper from Key. A good test of whether you dig their style or not. I do, if not passionately. Post-apocalypse thing about dude rediscovering wonder after finding a still-functional robot in a planetarium. The star bits are pretty darn effective.

This Book is a Dungeon - Cool, if cludgy game book with some entertaining bad endings. It’s cludgy because it has no real save system and making a mistake means replaying, replaying, replaying.

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thelmasirby32 · 5 years ago

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Five ways to get more product exposure with high powered influencers

30-second summary:

With marketers and brands alike losing trust in traditional advertising, alternative promotional channels need to be used and the numbers stack up in favour of influencer marketing as the solution for product exposure.

We’ll examine the concept of high powered influencers and case study successful influencer promotions.

What is influencer marketing and why should your brand rely on it?

To adequately take advantage of influencer marketing we’ll go through the best ways to partner with influencers and understudy partnerships that worked and why such collaborations succeeded.

How do you generate brand awareness and product exposure without traditional advertising? Influencers.

These days trust in advertising is the lowest it has ever been, and for this reason, you need to look beyond regular promotional methods.

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Influencer marketing can foster goodwill towards your product. But more than that, high-powered influencers can boost traffic, engagement, and awareness.

Because of how tough it is to get product exposure, you’d want the satisfaction of achieving the feat all by yourself, right? Not just to prove people who had doubts about your ability wrong, but for that feeling of accomplishment that you succeeded alone. It’s truly an enticing thought most entrepreneurs can’t resist.

Dictating the game and calling the shots is great and all. But at certain stages of your business, you need a helping hand. Your reach has limits.

By connecting forces with people who have identical goals to yours, you gain their reach and create a symbiotic relationship for mutual growth and potential audience maximization. Your brand and product’s exposure is paramount, and by engaging, interacting and intriguing your target audience alongside individuals with similar ambitions, the possibilities are endless.

With that said, let’s proceed.

What are high powered influencers?

An influencer is someone who turns the heads of your target audience. A person with a social presence so powerful that they can put your product in front of thousands to millions of consumers.

A great example is Subaru’s #MeetAnOwner campaign that used influencers videos to promote its new Impreza with the objective to pull in millennial buyers. One of such videos was Dan Graham, a new YouTube influencer with over five million subscribers using a slip and slide to leap off a 500-foot cliff.

While there were no mentions of the facts and figures that make the car great. It simply focused on the emotional aspect of consumers, which was the thrill of adventure consumers would associate with the car as a result of the influencer promoting it.

Influencers majorly achieve such goals as Dan did via social media platforms, which is where they showcase their influence.

But you need to ensure that your chosen influencer is the right fit for your product or brand.

You may come across a person with millions of followers, but if their goals aren’t identical to yours – for example, using a hip hop artist to recommend your new software – a boost in engagement isn’t a possibility. Defining context is the most crucial aspect you can focus on when choosing an influencer, so ensure that’s the pillar of your decisions.

Why use an influencer?

1. Increase in credibility

Influencers increase your brand’s credibility, which naturally extends to your product. By collaborating with people who already have credibility in the industry, you boost your own.

Sun Peaks, a ski resort, experienced this. In order to raise awareness about their various winter attractions, they involved Instagram influencer and Canada’s leading adventure photographer Callum Snape.

With amazing Instagram stories, images and short Facebook videos he drove over 200,000 people to Sun Peaks landing pages. Which sparked a huge interest for Sun Peaks from their target audience.

The consumer’s conclusion was simple – “If Callum Snape loves it, then it’s got to be great. ”

2. Influencers add a new perspective

Do you know that feeling? The one where you write or talk about the same topic repeatedly, and at some point, you feel redundant.

Repeating the same thing you’ve always said, to relay the same information from a fresh perspective, and a different sound.

That’s tough, but if you bring in someone else to speak on the same subject, they’ll have something new to offer. People vary. Each person’s life choices and experiences give them a worldview different from yours, even if they’re in the same industry.

FIJI water knew this, so they teamed up with influencer Danielle Bernstein and her trainer Eric Johnson.

The idea was to expose their product to their target audience in a subtle way and from a fresh perspective.

Now, in the post-Bernstein promoted her own brand Bernstein but she reminded her followers about the importance of staying hydrated and included FIJI water bottles.

This took the attention of forced placements off FIJI water since the post was about promoting her brand. The result was that it appeared to the audience as a reflective recommendation to stay hydrated rather than a promotion of FIJI water.

With high powered influencers, you can present your product from a fresh perspective to your target audience consistently.

3. Influencers offer massive exposure

In the business world, it’s all about giving and receiving. You scratch my back I scratch yours. It’s a system that you can’t override because it’s powerful.

Think about it. Why would a guest blogger pen down a post on your page? It isn’t because they love your brand so much, they just want to help. All actions in business are for personal intentions. They do it to get access to a bigger audience. Yours.

And in exchange, they pull their audience to your doorstep, and it’s a win-win situation for everyone. With influencers, that’s what you achieve.

Tom’s of Maine, for instance, is a brand that makes toiletries using natural ingredients only. To build exposure for their products, they decided to have influencers compel their followers to make posts about Tom’s of Maine products for a chance to win a gift package.

The strategy initiated a snowball effect that got across to 4.4 million people in three months of the campaign.

Some high-powered influencers have followings in millions, and a single recommendation of your product can drive an unbelievable number of leads and conversions to your offer.

They have traffic, exposure, and influence, and you have the cash. So you make a trade, everyone’s happy.

How to find relevant, high powered influencers?

1. Google search for Instagram influencers

A simple Google search can reveal individuals influential in your niche on Instagram. Input a related keyword and pick the top posts. Find out who’s behind them, learn about them, and then reach out.

You can use the search keyword code: site: platform.com “k followers” niche.

2. Buzzsumo

This is such a great tool for locating influencers. All you need to do is enter your keyword or niche related phrase in the search.

For instance, if your product is a content marketing tool. Type in the keyword “content marketing”, and you’ll see a bunch of buzzing posts will pop up.

Look up the persons behind the posts. Check out their social media profiles and followership. If they match up with the influencer type you’re gunning for, reach out to them.

Best ways to partner with high powered influencers

1. Run a referral program

Remember when we mentioned that the business world is all about mutual benefits? Well, referral programs are a perfect demonstration of that principle.

During Airbnb’s expansion to Asia for example, a single influencer’s referrals resulted in 5000 signups and hundreds of bookings in the campaign’s first month.

Offer influencers a nice payout, discount or relevant product for them throwing you a few hundred thousand customers isn’t a bad idea. Influencers invested an immense amount of time and effort into gaining those followers and desire to receive rewards for it.

There are a bunch of tools for automating your referral program, you just need to set and forget. You can even find quality influencers via these tools as they reveal people that are part of your program and are driving the highest traffic to your brand.

A referral program offers influencers a solid incentive to link people to your brand. The importance of this is even though a top influencer had an excellent experience with your product, without an active nudge they’d most likely not reference your product. And you may never know that someone with such an influence loves your brand.

2. Gift them

Seen an influencer you like? Perhaps you’ve found that they have a similar passion and you’re convinced they’ll be all in with your brand or product.

By sending them a product gift, they can test out your product and create exposure by sharing it with their followers. It’d be a good approach to drop them a message before sending over your product to them, as they may not be willing to tell the world about your generosity as you think without a nudge.

Here’s a great example of what the influencer’s product exposure post would look like:

3. Freebies giveaways contest

The idea behind this is like giving gifts, but instead of giving your product to the blogger themselves with the aim of them promoting it, the blogger runs a contest with your product targeted at the audience.

It’s a lot more direct in terms of the market of approach. As the influencer’s audience fights for an opportunity to win your product, it spurs a desire to have your offer before they’ve even gotten it. That’s a priceless effect to have on potential customers.

Check this example out:

Keep in mind that this method works great with influencers who own a blog, as the stats show that 90% of bloggers love to engage their audience in contests. So it might be easier getting a blogger to agree to this method.

4. Run influencer events

There’s no greater way to empower and educate your Influencer about your product than to host an event that allows you to interact with them in-person.

Sure you can send the influencer a box of your products and request that they feature it in their subsequent post. But imagine the depth of insight and content they could come up with if you invited them to where you make the magic happen.

For example, if you run a makeup brand, you can invite beauty/makeup influencers to an event where you show them how everything comes together. You allow them to get their hands involved in the making procedures and walk them through the entire process.

This is what ecommerce mattress brand Casper did. They got in touch with various Canine influencers that had a combined following of 3.5 million dog lovers to promote their new product for dogs.

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The influencers were invited to a lunch party in New York, with “pupperazzi”, a green carpet and lots of food. The results were phenomenal. Different positive perspectives of their product at a go and 3.5 million people reached with ease.

You may have to include travel expenses into your budget, depending on your brand’s location. But the result is giving the influencer the ability to produce brilliant imagery that represents everything good about your product.

It allows the influencer to communicate your product to the audience in the most elaborate way possible.

5. Social media posts

Instagram sits high on this approach and is an excellent place to locate influencers to partner with. But ensure that you find users that not only have large followings but engagements proportionate to their follower size. The danger signs should go off if you come across an account with 300,000 followers, but only 12 likes per post.

When you identify the best influencer for you, create a campaign that delivers multiple posts that appeal to various aspects of your target audience. With that approach, one post is bound to stick. You can ask them to try out your product and take a video or snapshot showing the features of your product.

6. Blogger review

If done right, your influencer’s blog posts can rank on the top search results. Blog posts are an excellent way to boost product exposure.

Partner with powerful influential bloggers known for their credibility and trustworthiness. You could send them a free product or pay them in exchange for crafting a blog post with an honest review of your offer.

For example, if a web user is searching for “golf gloves” on Google, your influencers post could show up on the search results and as they visit the page, you’ve got a limitless flow of potential leads.

Conclusion

Influencer marketing is powerful in driving product exposure. You just need to find the right influencers and build a solid relationship with them. Try out various methods, track your performance, and determine the right approach for your brand.

Raul Galera is the Partner Manager at ReferralCandy, an app that helps ecommerce stores run customer referral programs, boosting their word-of-mouth sales.

The post Five ways to get more product exposure with high powered influencers appeared first on Search Engine Watch.

from Digital Marketing News https://www.searchenginewatch.com/2020/05/18/5-ways-to-get-more-product-exposure-withhigh-powered-influencers/

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