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callistolivia · 4 years ago

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Sun w/ Venus Romantic Types

*this was mostly just for fun, so don’t take it too seriously if it doesn’t fit you. It also doesn’t take into account aspects in one’s chart, the Moon, and Mars.

*The Sun and Venus are never more than 48 degrees apart which means there are only five possible Sun-Venus combinations. It also means that most people, but not all, born with Venus in the first and last sign Venus can fall into (per Sun sign) will have their Sun in the first or last decan of a sign. These extra layers can really colour Sun/Venus interpretations; so while decans are not mentioned in every interpretation below, it would be worthwhile investigating the decan your Sun is in along with Venus’ description. ❤️

Aries Sun

With Aquarius Venus - The Pickup Artist If you have this combination, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Aries which expresses the very assertive, passionate, and active nature of Aries. Combined with an Aquarius Venus, it makes for individuals that love to chase when it comes to romance. They have a way with words too, absolute effortless charisma. The initial impression and connection with people is very important to this type of Aries, it ignites the most passion and excitement in them. This type tends to go for people who strike them as unique and exciting. They are not usually in it for the long run when it comes to relationships and may even appear aloof when things get too comfortable. They also feel comfortable going long periods of time just being single and may even value their platonic relationships over their love life. However, what keeps this type of Aries interested is a constant change in scenery because they are often pleasure and thrill seekers. This also plays a role in what this type of Aries is drawn to aesthetically. Their eye is often drawn to innovation and provocation– those who are artistically inclined with this combo may emphasize those two conventions in their art quite a bit.

With Pisces Venus - The Hopeless Romantic If you are this type of Aries, there is an obvious softness to you. The curious and innocent nature of Aries is prominent in this combination. There is an openness and optimism towards romantic opportunity with this type. These individuals spend lots of time daydreaming romantic or uplifting scenarios; they ponder a life stumbling upon them or a perfect meet-cute. The firsts in a relationship are very important to them, any sort of relationship milestone must be celebrated. They would do well with a partner who is also sentimental in this aspect and will also take the lead in making these milestones happen. They are very attracted to knight-in-shining-armor and princess-like characters; people who will play a role in their true love fantasy. They are very giddy and excitable over all pleasant things– overall this is a bubbly variant of Aries. This type is usually adored by all of their friends because of their sweet personality. Venus being exalted in Pisces, there is considerable ease in terms of creativity for this type of Aries. When the rose-coloured glasses stay on, they can actualize their daydreams through creative mediums. Their artistic endeavours usually involve projects that are grandiose in nature. Sometimes unachievable ideas, but the achievable ones end up being masterpieces.

With Aries Venus - The Unapologetically Infatuated If you are the double Aries, you are not going to waste your time when it comes to getting your needs met and you have a lot of needs that need meeting! If this type of Aries has a crush on you, you will know. This type of Aries is extremely forward when it comes to romantic and sexual intentions. If they want something serious, they will tell you; if they want to play games, they will literally tell you this is a game. They are looking out for what they want and do it with confidence. This type of Aries, similarly to the type with Venus in Aquarius, is also very much a thrill seeker. Their eyes are drawn to excitement, anew-ness, and spontaneity; they lust over the bad boys, the bad girls, and challenges. They want pleasure that’s risky and new to them. In relationships, this type retains excitability throughout. Relationships remain steamy and passionate even several years down the road. If you ask this type why they fell in love with you to begin with all those years down that road, they will surely give you an answer and a gaze that will makes you melt. If this type is artistically inclined, their work will likely be provocative or inspired by unorthodox conventions.

With Taurus Venus - The Boy/Girl Next Door If you are this type of Aries, you are literally like the lead protagonist’s romantic interest you see in movies. There is a general coolness, headstrong, and heart-throb worthy nature to you. Underneath what one might sonder to be the Martian persona is the tender, loyal, and reliable Taurus Venus heart. This is an Aries that is in it for the long run because they figure one in the hand is worth two in the bush. Venus being at home in Taurus will make this type of Aries definitely favour life’s luxuries and comforts; they are drawn to comfort and familiarity more-so than the other Aries types. They are usually attracted to others with a similar persona and similar interests as described. In relationships, this combo really knows how to facilitate romance, probably better than some of the other Aries combos. Massages, home cooked dinners, date nights, thoughtful gifts out of nowhere, vacations... They know how to keep things ignited several months or years into the relationship. This is an Aries that will take care of you for life. This type of Aries may also be drawn to artistic endeavours because their Taurean Venus will likely bless them with an eye for beauty.

With Gemini Venus - The Eloquent Flame If you are this type of Aries, there is a good chance your Sun is the last decan of Aries which is ruled by Jupiter. The jovial decan gives an extra layer of optimism and curiosity to this Aries. People are very drawn to this type’s way with words. This is the most flirtatious of the Aries types, even if most of their interactions are not intended to be flirty, they often come across as warm, articulate, and alluring to others. They also have a wicked sense of humour; they know this is the way to anyone’s heart (and bedroom). If you have this combo along with the Jupiter decan, Jupiter really draws out the curious and explorative nature of Aries; this type of individual may particularly seek out adventurous partners to satisfy their need for new experiences. There is no lack of wildness with this type of Aries as well; their idea of comfort is fast-paced fun. They want to drive down an endless highway with the car roof down, the sun kissing them, and their favourite songs on to sing along to. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour where they can utilize their voice and words; particularly creative writing and acting suits this type extremely well.

Taurus Sun

With Pisces Venus - The Soul Hugger If you’re this combination, there is a good chance that your Sun is in the first decan of Taurus which is ruled by Venus. It actually doesn’t get much more elevated for Venus than this combination because Venus is also exalted in the sign Pisces! This ultra Venusian individual loves all things pleasure and comfort. People are often drawn to this type’s beauty (this type is literally drop dead gorgeous, even when they don’t think they are) and natural grace. In relationships, the physical aspect is very important to this type of Taurus, they are major cuddle bugs. This type of Taurus sees physical connection as the way to soul connection. They have the softest hands, the softest touch, and the calmest voice; they want their partner to just sink into them. This Taurus has the lowest energy of all the Taurus types which means they prefer low energy or calm activities, low maintenance relationships, and harmonious environments. Spirituality can be quite important to this type; they often enjoy meditating, manifesting, and aromatherapy (for evoking spiritual mindfulness). This is a great combo for the artistically inclined– this individual would be great at anything they put their mind to in this aspect, whether it be visual arts, music, dance, or anything hands-on.

With Aries Venus - The Selfish Pleaser This contrasting combination of a Venusian Sun with a Martian Venus is exactly how its “Selfish Pleaser” title might indicate. There is an immense impulsiveness and indulgence when it comes to love and pleasure. It’s paradoxical in that they can be very other-focused when it comes to fulfilling romantic needs; They can be so aggressively eager to fulfill other’s needs it’s almost, or rather is, their form of self-fulfillment. These individuals love to give love, but may need to loosen their grip a little bit. Luckily, Taurus are good listeners though they can be stubborn, so they will tame the smothering, hot-blooded Arian Venus to their partner’s liking, maybe. They are clearly extremely affectionate, especially physically. This type really likes to play up the Aries innocence; they desire to be adored by their partner. They also tend to do really well with partners who wear the pants in the relationship which may be surprising for an Aries Venus; they need someone they can look up to and depend on. Unlike the other Taurus combos, this Taurus is more open to trying new things to keep relationships and the world around them exciting, the Aries in them demands it. Not always artistically inclined, but can be as Taurus have their eyes and hands in the natural world, the Aries Venus can provide a more fiery, raw, and bold essence to this type of Taurus’ aesthetic expression.

With Taurus Venus - The Slow-burn The double Venusian warmness from this combo makes for slow-burn mutual attraction. Their interest in people and things grow with time and consideration. Once their attention is caught though, they are locked in and possibly even obsessed. Their expression of love is unconditional, surrounding, and sometimes even smothering. People are drawn to this individual’s softness and glamour. The double Venusian can seduce with their melty-caramel gaze. People feel a sense of security and predictability from this combo. In relationships, this type tends to be quite possessive. They hate being out of the loop on plans, instability, and unpredictability. They would do well with a partner who is reliable, honest, and possibly as equally paced as this type. This combination is likely artistically inclined and very good at hands-on artistic mediums such as painting or any sort of craftsmanship. They may also have particular interest in singing, even if they are not skilled or looking to sing professionally. Singing is a Taurus’ lozenge to the world. They soothe themselves and the environment this way. Taurus want to beautify the world around them like a flood of molasses; slow and caressing.

With Gemini Venus - The Carpe Diem If you are this type of Taurus, you generally know what you want in terms of relationships and romance. There is a lot of quick decision making with this combo– they have a now-or-never attitude which goes both ways in that if they desire something or someone, they don’t beat around the bush, but they also don’t linger on attachments or relationships that are not right for them. The instant decision making can occasionally bring about regret when they drop things too quickly, but this Taurus ultimately knows what’s best for them. In relationships, they are very hyper-focused on their partner and the journey that is the relationship. They express romance through the documentation of the relationship, whether that be capturing every picturesque moment or writing down memories. They are invested in romance as if its activity or hobby rather than an aspect of life. They pick it up and put it down at different chapters in their life. This type of Taurus is the least somber out of all of the combos, there is a lightness about them and they often have a great sense of humour. This combo may have some artistic inclination to any sort of creative writing or visual arts.

With Cancer Venus - The Eternally Devoted With this combo, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Taurus which is ruled by Saturn. This type of Taurus is the most devoted, sentimental, and locked-in when it comes to relationships. This Taurus is also very cautious in choosing a partner– lots of consideration of the future and longevity of the relationship is involved. If you are this type of Taurus, you find comfort in familiarity and predictability. This equally describes this individual as well, as they are one who can be depended or counted on. This combo is the least driven towards glitter and gold, they are very much content with the simpler things in life. When life isn’t complicated by huge desires, there’s ease– and ease is very important to Taurus. This type also finds themselves attracted to people who express this same value or people who seem simple or classical. The artistic eye that comes from this type makes for great culinary artists, pastry chefs, beauticians, and painters. There’s often a love for presentation and creating or following recipes. This type has a large capacity for patience and a great attention to detail which is why they enjoy activities such as baking, hairstyling, painting, and so on. Venus in Cancer individuals tend to also have a love for what is timeless or of antiquity. Their idea of a perfect date is watching nostalgic movies or thrifting!

Gemini Sun

With Aries Venus - The Firecracker If you are this combo, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Gemini which is ruled by Mercury. There is something particularly seductive and enchanting about this combo as they tend to be charismatic and outspoken. This individual knows how to win someone over using wit and humour. Additionally, they do have a tendency to play games in their romantic endeavours. It’s all in good fun, but the other person involved may feel frustrated or feel as though Gemini is immature or ill-intentioned. This individual loves mingling and new relationships, but isn’t always too keen on anything long term as they tend to get bored or distracted easily. This is a Gemini with hungry eyes, as Aries Venus folk tend to have large desires– this combo has a sense of fearlessness and strategy towards obtaining their desires. They will go to the extremes for art, pleasure, and beauty. In relationships, this type doesn’t like when things get too serious, they like things to stay casual and carefree. They need a partner who won’t be bothered by this type juvenile antics; who is childish, fun, and has a good sense of humour. If artistically inclined, this Gemini would do well in any artistic endeavour that celebrates their youthfulness and light heart.

With Taurus Venus - The Poet This type of Gemini has a way with words, whether it be articulation or the sound of their voice. They may have a natural muse in music, poetry, or creative writing. This combo is easily inspired by the natural world and beauty, there is a great appreciation for both of those things. People are drawn very drawn to this combination as it may be quite romantic to fall in love with an artist. Venus being at home in Taurus will make this type of Gemini more pleasure driven– they prefer ease and comfort over wildness, excitability, and unpredictability that a Gemini is usually inclined to. Dating this type of Gemini has all the benefits of their charismatic and sharp mind without Gemini’s tendencies to get bored or distracted. There is much more commitment when Venus is in the soft and passive sign, Taurus. In love, this combo expresses themselves through their natural creativity. They will sing ballads, write poems, and talk about dreams with their lover. Obviously artistically inclined, they would do well exploring their talents for words and prose.

With Gemini Venus - The Sitcom Heartthrob The double Gemini is a unique and lovable combo. This individual is goofy, off-beat, campy, and clever. There is something truly authentic and magnetic about a double Gemini that has nothing to do with conventional beauty or romance (though they can be these things as well), but rather their persona, expression, humour, and intelligence. In relationships, this type often ends up with their best friend or someone who falls for their quirkiness. The double Gemini is quite a talker, they will have a lot to say to their partner, as Gemini tend to be sponges for information and they want to share that information. This type does make room to listen to their partner, they can be very attentive and emotional bonds are almost exclusively formed from verbal communication. These individuals are also great story tellers and if artistically inclined, make for fantastic fiction writers. This type does have a love for traditional conventions of romance. They have a huge capacity for loyalty and longer term relationships as well, despite Gemini’s tendency to get bored easily. There is something about the double Gemini that finds comfort in the rhythm and monotony of life; stability is beneficial to them as well, as it aids the Gemini nerves.

With Cancer Venus - The Unassuming Sensitive This type of Gemini plays it off like they are just a care-free intellectual, but their Venus in Cancer demonstrates a hidden soft side to them that really appreciates romance, sentiment, art, and beauty. This type is really good at hiding this side of them, it only really comes out once they find a partner they really trust who they can let their guard down to. In relationships, they are very attentive and much less talkative than other Geminis. They would rather be a listener first before lending their mind to the matter. This type expresses love through vulnerability and their ability to protect or care. This type also has a great sense of humour, though it tends to be dark. There are a lot of layers to this Gemini which will continuously surprise or shock others as they get peeled back– a Gemini with mystery. If not particularly skilled in art, this type still has a deep appreciation for it, especially historical fine art pieces. They are easily moved by all forms of art and identify themselves in fine art and music especially.

With Leo Venus - The Lost Boy/Girl This combination is like a picture with the sharpness and saturation turned up. This combination emphasizes Gemini’s wildness, playfulness, curiosity, and curls. If you are this type of Gemini, there is a good chance that your Sun is in the last decan of Gemini which is ruled by Saturn. There is a magnetic strangeness to this type and they use that to their advantage! This individual’s glamour, wit, and charisma can be a showstopper– they often turn heads everywhere they go. In relationships, there is a playfulness to them and a bit of naivety. Just as the Gemini-Aries type, they too like to play games in relationships. This, however, does not reduce the amount of fawning and adoring that is paid to their partner. Words of affirmation is their go-to love language; it’s not uncommon to hear this type brag about their partner. The Saturn decan find longer term ones more fulfilling; they fancy the concept of being an item and think of life in extension to their partner’s. This type rarely gets bored in relationships, this is a Gemini that knows how keep themselves entertained and the relationship fresh. Flirting never gets old and the honeymoon stage is never ending. Artistically speaking, this type of Gemini would do well in performative arts, whether that be stand-up, acting, or dance. They are fantastic at putting on a character.

Cancer Sun

With Taurus Venus - The Westley If you are this type of Cancer, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of the sign, which is ruled by the Moon. This makes for someone who is extra aware of their own presence and actions as well as others. One might consider this type to have a very worried or cautious disposition based on the amount of care and consideration that goes into how they carry themselves through life. There’s often a sternness or strictness about them as well, like how a parent advises a child on what they can and cannot do for the purpose of keeping them out of trouble. Out of all of the Cancer types, the Taurus Venus type is the most protective of their relationships– sometimes they can even be quite possessive of their loved ones. They are extremely devoted too, this type often seeks out long term connections over short. This is the most physical Cancer type as well, physical affection is very important to them. They are often the big spoon, but need to be the little spoon at times too. There is something very healing about this type of Cancer’s touch, they are quite the natural healers with hands that heal and kisses that cure. With Venus at home in Taurus, there is a natural inclination to artistic endeavours. Like most artists, their art is inspired by emotion– this is heavily translated through fine art and music. Even if it isn’t particularly their feelings, they often like to explore darker, complex, or more intense emotions through art.

With Gemini Venus - The Rockstar This is a very complex combo because it is as if on paper they are extremely romantic, express love and what it means eloquently, and perceive the world through a lens that is possibly the epitome of beauty, but their relationships generally don’t demonstrate the same amount of “fairytale” depth or vulnerability very openly. This is because their artistic mind and their romantic mind rarely collide; they like to keep these things separate and feel more authentic when they aren’t being serious and sappy all the time. They are very playful and carefree in their relationships. While others may fall in love with their art or perception of beauty, people are also drawn to the real person that is this combo; the real person that is sarcastic, humorous, and laidback. This type generally doesn’t view commitment as exclusivity and may be more drawn to open relationships or a relationship that isn’t labeled. With this said, they are very considerate of what their partner wants in the relationship. While this type doesn’t usually do stereotypical romantic gestures, they are the type to write a song about you or create a playlist for you. This type may be musically inclined and would be great at anything to do with writing or composition.

With Cancer Venus - The Sweet and Sappy The double Cancer is a double dose of sentiment. This type feels love deeply and may be a bit of a hopeless romantic. This type loves seeing love, especially if its accompanied with tragedy or star-crossed circumstances. This is because they enjoy feeling moved and expressing compassion. This is definitely the type to fantasize about unlikely scenarios just for the drama of it. Romantic gestures are very important to this type, they will go to a lot of trouble to demonstrate their love and care for their partner. If the gesture is reciprocated, they will literally be over the moon about it and may even get teary eyed. Commitment is also valued quite a bit and this type tends to move quickly in relationships to secure them. They want to be able to plan ahead with whoever their with so there’s a track to follow and a bit of predictability. It also adds comfort in knowing their partner is on the same page as them in terms of life plans. Those who are artistically inclined with this combo do well with visual-focused art, especially photography. They are great at capturing an idea or feeling through their art.

With Leo Venus - The Sugar and Spice This type is a Cancer with spunk and allure. On the surface, everyone gets to know this individual as bubbly, timid, and sweet, but in relationships there’s definitely a wilder and excitable side to them. Their wild side is accompanied with a willingness and curiosity; they are all for trying new things in relationships, in fact they welcome it. There’s nothing this type loves more than their partner demonstrating enthusiasm towards the relationship as it feels like more attention– another thing this type loves almost more than anything. This type wants to be showered in attention, they might even nag a little bit or get frisky just to get some! Overall, this combo is extremely loving and needy of their partner. Pampering this type goes a long way. This type may be artistically inclined, if not, they are usually in awe or have a deep fascination for art. This type usually does well in fine arts or visuals arts; they often make for a great painter or sketch artist.

With Virgo Venus - The Star Gazer If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Cancer which is ruled by Jupiter. This is an extremely complex and fascinating combination with a Jupiter decan involved as it makes an individual somewhat poetic and philosophical in their personality. This type of Cancer thinks very deeply and often goes for partners who are this way also. This is the type who will lay under the stars with you and talk hours upon hours about life; this is how they really connect with people and it’s often a deep-soul connection that they want. They aren’t very outwardly affectionate a lot of the time, much like the Cancer with Gemini Venus combo– they are much better at expressing affection through their words or writing. They will have a lot to say about their loved ones as there’s often a keen attention to detail. They flatter others with their ability to remember their interests. This type usually has a very ironic or sarcastic sense of humor which is sometimes accompanied with underlying negativity. Overlooked though, this type is hilarious and fascinating to be around. They always have something thought provoking to say. If artistically inclined, they often do well in visual arts or writing due to their attention to detail.

Leo Sun

With Gemini Venus - The Adonis If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Leo which is ruled by the Sun. There is something truly magnificent and glowing about this combo. This type embodies a young, naive angel tempted by the mortal pleasures in life and is filled with curiosity. With this sort of personality in mind, this type gets into a lot of interesting romantic entanglements and may break a couple hearts here and there, but this type also has a huge heart, a lot of determination, and plenty of room for growth. In relationships, they may be a little difficult to hold down and keep interested because of their forever curiosity. There’s generally a playfulness and enthusiasm that comes from Leos, this is especially true for this type. They certainly know how to keep their partner excited and entertained. The individuals with the solar decan tend to have a powerful voice. They will speak up for their loved ones and the underdogs; they often have tremendous courage. It takes a lot to hurt this type, and when one manages to, the magnificent angel that is this combo becomes a fallen one. A bruised ego can be difficult to fix here. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any sort of writing or acting because of their bright and attractive personalities.

With Cancer Venus - The Melodrama Leos are often known for their exaggerations and drama– this combo is probably the most dramatic out of all the Leo combos. The two placements really feed into each other, where Venus in Cancer desires sentiment and compassion and the Sun in Leo often draws these desires from drama. This type’s love life is often a self written epic. Every step of a relationship is a profound experience for them and every breakup is a tragedy. In relationships, this type can be quite needy; they love physical affection and being doted on. This is very much reciprocated back as they are very caring and protective lovers. They get really into “through sickness and through health” modes which is all a part of the draw towards drama. This type really needs a partner who can play along with them, but also be their rock and place of rationale. This type does have the ability to switch modes and be calm and collected, especially if their partner is in a state of panic. This type also has a particular calmness around children and animals. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in anything that can release that exaggerated energy– so perhaps stage acting or music.

With Leo Venus - The Kitten Leos don’t get any more cat-like than the double Leo combination. This type generally has a great level of independence and don’t particularly feel like they need a relationship. With this in mind, their standards are usually high or they prefer more open relationships. In relationships they can be incredibly uplifting individuals to be around; they love building their partner’s confidence and overall making them feel good about themselves. They are also very physically affectionate, this is their primary love language– being a literal cuddly kitten (or seductive and wild). Though a huge component of the relationship with this type is building their partner up, there is somewhat of an expectation to be a queen/king and treated like one. They need constant reminders of how important they through their partner’s words and actions. If their partner fails to meet the standards of this Leo, things will fizzle out and hearts will be broken because after all, relationships aren’t a necessity for this Leo! The double Leo is also often artistically inclined, they do well in almost anything that requires creativity. They would do particularly well in design or performance art.

With Virgo Venus - The Queen/The King People with this combo know exactly what they want and only settle for exactly that. Their standards aren’t super high/unrealistic and they don’t have the same neediness as the other Leo combinations, but they are very particular in their interests, desires, and relationships. This type can often seem distant or up in the clouds because they keep their pursuits or love interests at an arm’s length for quite awhile until they are certain it’s a worthy shot. In addition to this, in relationships they demonstrate affection through what they can do for their partner to make their life easier or happier, unlike some of the other Leo combos that express affection a lot more through physical means. They need to be with someone who really understands this aspect of them, isn’t very needy, and perhaps shares a similar love language . In relationships, there isn’t a lack of playfulness– this type has a great sense of humour, they love to tease, and they often playfully nitpick just to rile their partner up. They also tend to give off a vibe that they are “above it all,” but after getting to know them, they are actually the most humble of all the Leo combinations thanks to their Venus in Virgo. This type is very stoic and the least flashy of the other combos. If artistically inclined, this type would do particularly well in illustrative arts or painting.

With Libra Venus - The Biggest Flirt If there is something to be said about this Leo combination, it is that they LOOOOVE to flirt! It could be that if you have this combo, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Leo which is ruled by Mars. They are all about the passion, the excitement, and the game of the dating world. They are often great at wooing and charming people since their Venus is domicile in Libra as well. This type is really fun to be around, there is something about them that feels lavish and alluring. It wouldn’t be uncommon for this type to become popular and have an abundant amount of friends because they are so likeable. With this all said, they can still be guilty of being a heartbreaker. There is a level of indecision and inability to commit with this combo. They often don’t know what they want in the long run, but rather just for the moment. This type is best off spending their youth without any long term commitments so they can really learn and grasp what it is that they want down the road. This combination is often artistically inclined and would do well in almost any artistic endeavour that interests them. Particularly illustrative arts tends to be the muse of Leo/Libra combinations; they have a keen eye for colour theory and beauty.

Virgo Sun

With Cancer Venus - The Nest Builder If you are this type of Virgo, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Virgo which is ruled by Mercury. This type is particularly organized and has set-in-stone plans in mind for their life and desires. They may be a bit of a homebody– they definitely like to be in control of the household and know the ins-and-outs of how it functions well. This type looks for a relationship with someone who shares similar goals, specifically in the context of building a foundation. They love people who really understand and are compatible to their “system” so-to-speak. While practicality is the most important aspect of a relationship, this type doesn’t lack romance or affection. This type is very protective and nurturing and equally loves being cared for in this way as well. Holidays and celebrations tend to be quite important to this type, though the events are usually quite close-knit. This type may be artistically inclined and would do particularly well in writing or culinary arts! The combination of an earthly, Mercury decanate Sun and a water Venus gives this individual very clever, practical, efficient ideas balanced with magical, flavourful, flowing creativity.

With Leo Venus - The Serendipitous This type of Virgo often surprises people, in a good way. Initially this type may be perceived as cold, shy, or unapproachable, but after getting to know this type, people realize they are quite the opposite. In relationships, this type is extremely warm, affectionate, and playful. This type may even be much more reckless, spontaneous, or less self-restrictive in comparison to the other Virgo types. This type dispels a lot of the stereotypes of Virgos being rigid, compulsive, cynical, and closed-off. This unexpected personality is what attracts more fiery, rebellious romantic interests to compliment this Virgo’s wild side. This type of Virgo likes a lot of attention, but may not directly communicate that. They may indirectly make little complaints or nudges in that direction as a Virgo does, but often in a playful, non-resentful manner. This combo loves to show off and talk about their partner– they often take great pride in their choice of partner, especially when the relationship is having a ton of highs. This type likes people who push them out of their comfort zone and build their confidence. Having Venus in Leo is a great placement to have if you’re an artist. This combination would do particularly well in illustrative arts or painting.

With Virgo Venus - The Eyes of the Room The double Virgo is a double dose of Mercurial energy influencing this type’s interests, values, and desires. This type is observant, practical, and careful when it comes to dating. The type of partner they seek must meet this Virgo’s standards which are often high or carry some sort of expectation that the relationship is low maintenance or drama-free. In relationships, the double Virgo makes for a great partner because of their observant qualities– they are amazing listeners, they remember the little things, and go out of their way to make their partner’s life easier. This combination is very attracted to tidiness and uprightness– people who really have their shit together, that are reliable and can give this Virgo peace of mind. With this said, this type is very attentive to their partner’s emotional needs. They express romance through what they can do for their partner, especially if it’s something their partner has forgotten about or has been stressing over. They will go out of their way to help their loved ones during lows. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any sort of design, especially interior design.

With Libra Venus - The Art Kid This Virgo’s domicile Venus in Libra gives them a little more desire, pizzazz, and maybe even eccentricity. The Venusian influence really makes this type explore a very self expressive, show-offy side to their Virgo sun. This combination really likes to dress to the nines, especially for or with their partner. In relationships, this type is one of the more romantically expressive Virgos. They love to go on dates, even well into the relationship, and are very attentive. They really put in the extra effort even when things have settled in. They constantly are checking in with their partner’s needs and feeling for how they’re feeling. Spoiling their partner with lavish or thoughtful gifts is common with this type. This type doesn’t mind spending a good chunk of coin on their partner. They also wouldn’t mind the same treatment in return! This type is often artistically inclined and would do well in any artistic endeavour they choose. They also like to express their love through their art!

With Scorpio Venus - The Insatiable Spirit If you are this combination, your Sun is more than likely in the last decan of Virgo which is ruled by Venus. There is suppressed desire within this complex combination, as both the Virgo and Scorpio archetypes are very much to themselves and often secretive, but with Venus in Scorpio and and Venusian Sun decan comes insatiable desires. This combination is not obvious at all with their interests or pursuits which can be difficult for potential relationships. They tend to open up more as they spend more time with an individual. Eventually they can reveal their interest which often comes as a surprise. In relationships, this type values intimacy the most. They feel loved when their partner shares with them openly and when there is a close physical bond. They really desire unification. Without those things, this type can feel extremely hurt and will close themselves off again. This type is usually in it for the long haul, especially if the chemistry is right, but they really need to be with someone who can really understand the level of desire that comes from Venus in Scorpio. The overwhelming and surrounding love this type has to give can sometimes be too much for people, especially since this type is so unassuming! If artistically inclined, this combination would do well in areas that allows them to express complex feelings such as shame, guilt, and desire.

Libra Sun

With Leo Venus - The True Aphrodite If you are this combination, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Libra which is ruled by Venus. The mutual reception in this combination makes for an extra creative and artistically inclined individual. This type of individual often loves art and is drawn to events and venues for art. This type also tends to have a great sense of style and loves dressing up! When it comes to seeking out a partner, this type, unlike other Libras, knows exactly what they want. This type is seeking out someone to be their muse. In relationships, they really know how to dote on their partner and show them their pride in them. This combo is very charismatic and flirty. They can be very showy and don’t mind a little PDA to celebrate their love to the world. This type has an inclination to settle down, but if the attention isn’t on them consistently, their eye may wander! Keep this Libra inspired by taking them on dates to art museums and the great outdoors. As described, this type is often naturally creative, so they would do well in any sort of artistic endeavour.

With Virgo Venus - The Friend to Lover If you are this type of Libra, you may be somewhat shy around love. There can be a lot of indecisiveness coming from Libra’s influence and a lot of criticism coming from Virgo’s influence which can be quite difficult for this individual to confess their feelings. Usually this combo befriends their love interest and just hopes and prays they will take the initiative to confess feelings for them. While romance isn’t their strong suit, this type is really great at making friends. They can really hold a conversation and introduce new ideas to the table. People often fall for this type’s interpersonal skills and it’s up to the other person to warm this combo up romantically. Since this type is so indirect with romance, the “I love you”’s will hold a lot more meaning and should be cherished, along with other moments of vulnerability. The shyness definitely carries through even in the relationship. This type would do well with someone who can really open them up and encourage them to fulfil their, often neglected, desires. There can be a bit of shame around desire, something that is not uncommon for Venus in Virgo. If this type is artistically inclined, they would do well in any sort of writing. Their ability to express feelings is often stronger and more graceful through writing than it is through words.

With Libra Venus - The Evening Star If you are this type of Libra, you have a double dose of Venusian energy coursing through you. All that is Venusian is intensified and significant, therefore romance and relationships will play a dramatic role in this individual’s life. Whether that be one big love story with a singular person, or a journey through several relationships, each one with a lesson, big or small, to be taught. In relationships, this type is often tested on some of their traits, specifically the Libran traits of indulgence and superficiality. This type is so involved in consuming what is desirable and being social in a way that fits their environment that it can draw in some quarrels with their partner. This type can sometimes behave like a leaf in the wind which is frustrating to their partner and people close to them. People will often question this type’s genuinity and frankness as they can be people-pleasers. Aside from that, this type is a real charmer and people are undoubtedly drawn to this combination. People fall for this type left and right as the Venusian influence is all-encapsulating like the evening star itself. They have a very pleasant and peaceful presence. In relationships, this type loves to be spoiled with dates and gifts. This type loves all things romance, beauty, luxury, nature, and art. They would do well in almost any artistic endeavour, especially illustrative art or anything that really captures their love of beauty and nature.

With Scorpio Venus - The Obsession If there is something to be said about this combination, it is that they are COMMITTED and they do not move on easily! This type can be quite flirty in their social circles, but when it comes to an actual relationship, they are completely obsessed with their partner and loyalty is of utmost importance. Venus in Scorpio gives this Libra the intensity you’d expect from Scorpio placements. The intensity can be dramatic– the highs and lows of relationships can be quite turbulent with this type. This type can’t handle being with people that provoke boundaries and break trust; people who could be described as out of control don’t mesh well with this Libra. This type really values stability and dependability. Additionally, it must be recognized that Venus in Scorpio is Venus’ detriment placement which adds an extra layer to the Venusian sun. This type may have a large appetite of desire and sometimes prone to selfishness which is quite a contrast from a typical Libra. This type also tends to know what they want in contrast to Libras typically being indecisive. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any art form that allows them to express their intensity and desires.

With Sagittarius Venus - The Life of the Party If you are this type of Libra, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Libra which is ruled by Mercury. For these individuals, this puts communication as a theme at the forefront. This type usually has a large social circle and they are the most flirty of the Libra types! This type also may be open to open relationships or non-monogamous relationships– commitment or exclusivity isn’t huge for this type unless Saturn is prominent in the birth chart. With that said, this type is often a believer in soul-connections and will remain a strong presence in the lives of their soulmates. The Venus in Sagittarius does gives some spiritual inclination as well, but pleasure and reality tend to outweigh its importance particularly in this type’s youth. Experiencing life at its fullest before pondering it and God is the order in which this type tends to live. This Libra values fun the most when it comes to dating and relationships. They get bored easily, so new experiences and people are what keep them interested. You can expect to go on some very interesting dates with this type! This type is great at conversation, they are usually quite charismatic, warm, and humorous. They may have a more excitable presence in comparison to the other Libra types; they are best described as the life of the party, truly. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any art form that allows them to express their wildness and excitability.

Scorpio Sun

With Virgo Venus - The Paradox If you are this type of Scorpio, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of the Scorpio which is ruled by Mars. This intensifies the Martian sun’s need for action as well as desire. Accompanied by Venus in Virgo, the need for action feeds into Virgo’s desire to serve. There’s complexity to this type’s personality; strong themes of autonomy in the paradox that is them serving their own desires through their desire to serve others. This type’s love language is, well, acts of service of course. This is incorporated in mundane aspects of life as well as intimate ones. This type is an excellent homemaker, but wouldn’t do well with a partner that doesn’t share the work of a household. There may be some shyness or coldness with this type even after they have, what they would consider, opened up. Their attentiveness intimately makes up for being difficult to read or unaffectionate. This combo’s capacity for big desires and fetishes may be of intrigue to those who are equally secretly freaky... Typical with Virgo in Venus, this type can be picky when it comes to starting and sustaining relationships. Imperfections in their partner can often be deal-breakers so this type either puts off relationships entirely or only pursues casually. This combo’s ability to understand complex concepts would make for a great writer or poet, if artistically inclined.

With Libra Venus - The Femme/Homme Fatale Of all the Scorpio types, this one is the most flirtatious and one of the more out there Scorpios. This type is sizzling and charismatic– don’t be surprised when you fall for this type’s charm. This type doesn’t play games, they get straight to the point when it comes to pursuing someone. In relationships, their loveliness and charm doesn’t fade, they retain and express their mysterious allure forever. Very affectionate and warm; they never let their partner feel confused on where they stand in the relation and they really know how to make them feel secure. With that said, this type is a very different person when you’ve hurt them, Scorpios hold grudges after all! This type is very artistic and will often incorporate their artistic mind and abilities in their romantic gestures. For example, they really know how to create a great atmosphere for dates through the classic mood-setters like food, scented candles, certain fabrics, colours, etc. The senses and art go hand in hand greatly with this Scorpio. As this type tends to be artistically inclined, they do well in most artistic endeavours, especially those in which Scorpio’s provocation and Libra’s beauty can go hand in hand.

With Scorpio Venus - The Hungry Like a Wolf A double dose of Scorpio makes for an individual with an ocean of depth and intensity. There isn’t a love that’s deeper than a Scorpio’s. However, with this said, Venus is in detriment when in Scorpio which may add a layer of complications. There’s a tendency for this type to be untrusting, secretive, and stingy with their vulnerability. This type demands a lot of attention and focus on them, exclusivity is a must. The double Scorpio can be best described as very love-hungry. They really need to be with their partner constantly and may even be borderline obsessive at times. This type values a spiritual/emotional connection either as equally as or over an intimate/physical one. The passion and intensity this type exudes is consistent in highs and lows. They can be particularly cruel and punishing when hurt by a loved one. It wouldn’t be wise to get caught in a lie with this type! Their affection feels all-consuming and maybe even a little aggressive. This combo would do well with someone who doesn’t mind or even enjoys being with someone who’s quite possessive and protective over them. They really need to be with someone who is always on their team, so to speak. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in artistic endeavour that allows them to explore the complexity of a detriment Venus; endeavours that are emotionally and spiritually explorative.

With Sagittarius Venus - The Bloom from Gloom While it’s common for Scorpios to be quite secretive, this type is the quickest to become an open book for the sake of love. The fiery, gregarious Sagittarian Venus can really aid to making this Scorpio appear sunny, warm, and extremely approachable. This type is loud and forthcoming, it will be very obvious if they like you. This type can also be considerably more social and pleasure driven than the other types– they are very much party goers like the Libra type unless indicated in their chart otherwise. In relationships, there is no lacking in the fun and physical aspects. This type values the physical aspect of relationships quite a bit and tend to have a very carefree and relaxed attitude towards sexuality. This type likes to be quite goofy and humorous with their partner, there’s really no bigger turn-on than making their partner laugh! As with all Scorpios, the intensity is still there with this type; you can expect as much passion in this type’s love as the others. Their value in spiritual connections or spirituality in general may be more prominent with a Sagittarian Venus. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in an endeavour that honours their value in spirituality.

With Capricorn Venus - The Dark Side of the Sun If you are this type of Scorpio, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Scorpio which is ruled by the Moon. This Scorpio is the most emotionally expressive and focused out of all of the types, which may seem surprising as a Capricorn Venus is so readily labeled as cold and calculating! There is actually nothing calculating about this combo; there may be a bit of coldness or rigidity, but as lovers they are very considerate and adoring. In relationships, this type may be a bit controlling– it stems from their feelings of foresight and protectiveness. This type definitely needs to wear the pants in the relationship. Financial security can be particularly important to this Scorpio. As mentioned, this type is quite emotionally focused, therefore they may be quite sensitive and have tendencies to lash out when hurt; obviously this type’s Moon sign will be more telling in terms of sensitivity. This type values exclusivity and predictability, they can’t handle people who are aloof, hard to read, or in need of constantly indulging in their freedom/free will. This Scorpio desires long term, deep connections with a foundation that facilitates vulnerability. People find themselves attracted to this type because they have a very sure and safe presence, like you know you’re going to be well taken care of. This combo’s ability to be in touch with lunar dwellings makes for a great artist; they would do well in anything that allows them to express lots of emotion such as writing, music, or acting.

Sagittarius Sun

With Libra Venus - The Mystic If you are this type of Sagittarius, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Sagittarius which is ruled by Jupiter. This is Sagittarius in its true mystic expression. This type is magical, extravagant, and fair. Venus is in its ruler with this combination, so the themes Venus holds importance over will be prevalent in this type. That means themes of relationships and values are quite strong. This type is very spiritually attuned and values very deep connections with people. With this said, this Sagittarius is difficult to hold onto. They are always onto the experience in their life despite being committed to the moment. In relationships, this type’s attitude is very optimistic and diplomatic. People are very attracted to the overall vibe this combo gives as it tends to rub off on others. Their extravagance comes from this types desires for big and luxurious things. This Sagittarius manifests big time since they have a lot of dreams of luxury. This type’s love of spiritual and philosophical concepts may give urges to go on journeys to further explore their curiosity; their partner, of course, is invited to this spontaneity. This is how the deep connection is fostered; being spiritually on the same page and experiencing things together. Being inspired by the natural and supernatural world, this type is often quite artistically inclined. You can get a glimpse of their mystique through their artwork.

With Scorpio Venus - The Sultry Sage If you are this type of Sagittarius, then you might get mistaken for a Scorpio a lot! The intensity of Venus in Scorpio really feeds into this type as they much more dark, brooding, and desire hungry compared to the other types. While still retaining the deeply spiritual qualities Sagies tend to have, you will notice with this type that they are much more needy of affection and closeness. In relationships, this type can be a bit aggressive or jealous over their partner; they need a lot of reassurance and affection to keep this at bay. Exclusivity and long, committed relationships are often valued in this type. People find themselves attracted to this type’s seductive personality– their desire for deep discussions, their cleverness, and charisma. If you’re looking to lay under the stars with someone, this is the one, but there probably won’t be a whole lot of star-gazing! They also tend to have something completely unforgettable about them, whether that be their gaze or perhaps their voice, just something to not be forgotten. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any artistic endeavor that expresses the sultry darkness within their Venus in Scorpio.

With Sagittarius Venus - The Brightest Star This type of Sagittarius is quite similar to the Libra Venus type, but less materialistic and a lot wilder. This is the double Sagittarius; a double dose of Jupiter! All the joy, mystique, and abundance of the Jovian planet is apparent in this type. If there is something to be said about this type, it is that they are extremely passionate about their values/interests; they literally love their joys to death and become the brightest person in the room when talking about them. In relationships, this type is very spontaneous, excitable, and optimistic. They love nothing more than goofing off with their partner or loved ones and fulfilling urges of wanderlust. In relationships, the pursuit of just feeling happy is most important. They want to be with someone who can make them laugh and vice versa, someone who is open-minded and with a hopeful outlook and willingness. While this type tends to have a high tolerance, they don’t stick around negative crowds or relationships. When this type isn’t trying to make you laugh, they can seem quite philosophical as Sagittarius tend to be. If you’re looking for both silliness and deepness, it can be found within this type. This type can get bored easily, but they are also easily committed– they just need someone to keep feeding the fire so they don’t blow out. If artistically inclined, this type should find an endeavour that captures their love of abstract ideas, philosophy, culture, and spirituality.

With Capricorn Venus - The Breadwinner This combination really slows down and brings a Sagittarius back to earth. This is a Sagittarius that lives in the present (and maybe a bit in the past as well..) and one most people can easily keep up with! People are drawn to this type for their stability and dependability. In relationships, this type is much more cautious and conservative compared to the other combos. They may even be a little bit opposed to PDA or a bit rigid when it comes to expressing affection. This type still lives up to the Sagittarius’ stereotype of needing freedom; the freedom they want is control over their life. They often want to be the one to wear the pants in the relationship and make the big decisions. A plus to this icy Venus is that this type is actually quite good with money– far better than the other types! Sagittarius dream big and this combo knows how to save for those big dreams. Because of the nature of Capricorn energy, this combo tends to have two types that they are attracted to; people they can take care of and people with status; bonus if someone happens to fit into both these types! This type likes to express love through acts of service primarily whether that be completely spoiling you with gifts and quietly doing the dishes after an argument to show they’re sorry and that they love you. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in the makeup or fashion world as they really know how to take things to the next level with professionalism, sophistication, practicality, and attention to detail.

With Aquarius Venus - The Freedom Chaser If you are this type of Sagittarius, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Sagittarius which is ruled by the Sun. The cocktail of this combination of solar influence and an Aquarian Venus can give some complexity, especially for this type’s attitude towards relationships. The solar decan really makes this type stand out and for others to be drawn to their light. While shiny, attractive, and unique, this type is hard to get with! Extremely independent and always on the move; they always have an excuse as to why a relationship won’t work or how it isn’t right for them at the time, which is totally fine. This type’s autonomy and value over freedom is very commendable. They know what they want and they aren’t desperate! With this said, this type is attracted to people who share the same dreams or ideals as them. If they find someone who is running in the same direction as them, it may spark some romance. They also like individuals who are unique like themselves. In relationships, this type may be a little bit hard to read and their mind may seem like it’s elsewhere when affection is being requested from their partner. This type still retains the silliness Sagittarius tend to have, letting loose and having a good laugh can really bring them back to earth. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in endeavours that allow them to express their value for freedom and demonstrates their glistening uniqueness.

Capricorn Sun

With Scorpio Venus - The Master If you are this type of Capricorn, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Capricorn which is ruled by Saturn. There is an inquisitive and clever nature to this combo. They are very smart and never easily fooled! It can be difficult to break down the walls of this type, particularly because of the crystallizing Capricorn Sun accompanied with a detriment Venus; vulnerability is hard to come by unless the Moon tells otherwise. If one were to actually get to know the secrets this type holds and be in a relationship with them, they’d discover a surprisingly needy and amorous side to them– maybe even a kinky side! Martian Venus’ have quite the capacity for desire, after all. What people love about this combo is their loyalty, dependability, and wit. This type is very committed in relationships and isn’t the type to stir things up; keeping the peace (and quiet..) in the relationship is important to them. While they strive for steady sailing, it can lead this type into somber and cynical moods; they tend to sink into stillness and are prone to seriousness. A partner who is more cheery and optimistic will keep this type afloat. This type expresses love through their demonstrating deep respect for their partner and physical closeness. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour that can express their provoking thoughts and ideas.

With Sagittarius Venus - The Philosopher This combo is the steady head of a Capricorn and the endlessly wondering Sagittarius. This is a Capricorn with optimism and joviality; the glass is always half full with this type. This type is very fascinated by the world, as Sagittarius influence tends to express; they love learning about different cultures, philosophy, theology, and spirituality. People are attracted to this type’s curiosities and likewise this type tends to be attracted to those who walk an off-beaten path and have plenty of stories to share. Venus is quite comfortable in Sagittarius, so it can really warm up a Capricorn’s iciness. In relationships, this type values honesty and happiness the most. They approach relationships with a particular openness and energy. You can expect the most adventure from this one in comparison to the other types! This combo can get bored and move on from interests rather quickly, so relationships that are dynamic are a must to keep this type hanging around. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour that expresses their love for different cultures and philosophy.

With Capricorn Venus - The Chivalrous Lover The double Capricorn is a combo of coolness, chivalry, and classiness. You can expect to be blown away by this type’s respect and politeness to others, especially the people they care about most. Venus in Capricorn however does have its iciness; this type can be quite difficult to get in touch with romantically. Warmness is overshadowed by chronic seriousness and concern for their responsibilities. Sometimes this type prioritizes their their career, goals, or projects over relationships entirely. When this type is in reach, they express their love through planning their future with their partner, their protectiveness, and actually letting go and having a good laugh with their partner. This type is surprisingly humorous, especially when it comes to cynical or dark humour. This type tends to be attracted to people who seem to have their shit together, who are quite traditional in some way, and present themselves with the same seriousness or classiness that Capricorn has. Capricorn looks for stability, it is one of the things they value most in relationships. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour that harnesses their sophistication and professionalism, such as fine arts, cosmetology, or fashion.

With Aquarius Venus - The Unconventional This is the quirky and odd Capricorn. There is absolutely nothing traditional or predictable about this type; this combo really takes the Saturn energy to the next level with Venus in the rebellious and unique sign, Aquarius. This combo is truly the manic pixie dream girl (or... whatever the male version of this is) of the Capricorn types. People will be drawn to this type’s uniqueness and incomprehensibility. This type can be rather confusing and hard to read; they often have very odd ways of gesturing their attraction to people. This type could literally write a song about you with no romantic intention, but in the same vein do something entirely unnoticeable as a gesture to show they like you. This type is equally attracted to unique individuals. They also like people with a coolness, independence, or stand-offishness. It works well for this type if their partner is equally a puzzle to be figured out. With this all said, this Capricorn does value its independence and does have a tendency to not seek relationships at all (it won’t stop them from flirting though!). If artistically inclined, any endeavour that demonstrates their oddness would be optimal for this type. Mixed media and anything experimental would be great for this type.

With Pisces Venus - The Musician If you are this type, your Sun is more than likely in the last decan of Capricorn which is ruled by Mercury. As Capricorn comes to a close, we see the magical concoction that is this type. With the influences of a refined Capricorn in a Mercurial decan and an exalted Venus, this type is particularly blessed in the realm of art and love. This type values true love, sacred love, or higher love. They may be particularly spiritual and attuned to the natural world. This type is extremely sacrificial and would carry the world on their back for anyone they considered deserving of that. In relationships, this is the most attentive and expressive of the Capricorn types and in some ways they are similar to the Sagittarius Venus Capricorn, but in contrast to that type, this one does have a tendency to negativity and catastrophic thoughts. This type has a tendency to be attracted to “broken” people or people that need “saving,” so there should be some caution or warning for this type to stray away from people that may take advantage of their selflessness. This type can be quite sensuous, again thanks to earthy Capricorn accompanied with an exalted Venus, they love physical affection and care. This type is usually artistically inclined and would do really well in practically any artistic endeavour– however this type would do particularly well in music because this combo is naturally poetic and refined. They are fantastic at communicating love and beauty through music.

Aquarius Sun

With Sagittarius Venus - The Traveller If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Aquarius which is ruled by Saturn. This provides extra uniqueness and wisdom to the already genius that is Aquarius. With Venus in Sagittarius, this Aquarius fulfills their desires abroad and as far away from familiar as possible. This type loves to be the foreigner and often gets attention for being so. While broadening horizons in far away lands, this type falls for people who are totally different from them or from a completely different background. They love people who can share a good story about their life and teach them everything they’ve ever known. This type’s overall presence is that of someone who’s happy-go-lucky and positive to be around. They’re often quite wise and well versed in multiple worldviews. In relationships, they value honesty and integrity the most. Additionally, communication is quite important with this type because there is some level of obliviousness with this type. An authentic connection with this type can often feel absent unless there is dedicated time to discuss feelings. They are always very much in the moment and striving for the peak of experiences. They express their love through living through experiences with their partner. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour that demonstrates their vast knowledge and wisdom.

With Capricorn Venus - The Gentleperson This Aquarius tends to be quite a bit more formal in their expression and conservative. They like things clean cut and refined. There is a tendency to really like modern design (especially in terms of living space, work space, and how they dress) and enjoy tradition (in the sense of values and nostalgia) simultaneously. The very industrial and professional vibe this type gives off obviously has some difficulty translating into their romantic life. While they can be very polite and gentlemen/lady-like, there is some rigidity, coolness, and difficulty winning the heart of this type. They typically don’t play the dating game, they prefer people who fancy the word “court” and people who go out of their way to impress them with their morals, values, and efforts on this world. This type tends to be very rational and may have difficulty being around people who are the very opposite. Reserved, but blunt; they tell things like it is. People often find themselves attracted to this type’s strength, stoicism, and intelligence. In relationships, this type will kick off their boots and let their hair down sometimes– and it’s encouraged as this type would greatly benefit from relaxing every once in awhile. Their biggest expression of love is being comfortable around you. This type would do well with someone who’s independent, clever, and able to make this Aquarius laugh. They prefer lasting relationships over short ones, but they know what they want and don’t want. They won’t keep a relationship going or lead someone on if it isn’t what they want in the long run. If artistically inclined, this type would do really well in any sort of design, particularly interior design, drafting, or architecture; anything that peaks their interest in modern aesthetics.

With Aquarius Venus - The Storm The chaotic and misunderstood combination that is the double Aquarius forever puzzles most. The double Aquarius lives their life paradoxical and shifts gears experience to experience. It is true that this type can be a bit wild– they do go after all of the boys/girls, are at all of the parties, indulge in all of the conspiracies theories and yet simultaneously if you actually ask this Aquarius what they want, they will tell you something along the lines of one true love, stability, and truth. This type actually does value commitment, settling down, and they are extremely intelligent, confident, and well-spoken. With that said, it is not without this type having feelings of doubt and suspicious of themselves and others. While being outwardly strong, this type can have some tendencies towards imposter syndrome. People find themselves attracted to this type’s hidden talents, their trippiness, quirkiness, and unconditional acceptance for others. This type will put others before themselves and will go to great measures to protect their loved ones. They are often drawn to people who are also natural weirdos themselves; people who are youthful and fun; people who they feel like they’ve known forever. This type values honesty, open-mindedness, and quality time the most in relationships. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any endeavour that expresses their uniqueness such as crafting, mixed media, or abstract artforms.

With Pisces Venus - The Alien This type is unusual and magnetic; otherworldly even. This type tends to be the “weirdest” out of all the Aquarius types. They have particular tastes, whether that be in music, values, foods, or romantic partners! They just have a liking towards kooky things. This type is also the most humanitarian driven as Venus in Pisces encompasses unconditional love and immense compassion for others and the world. Very spiritually driven as well. This Aquarius is very emotionally expressive, particularly so if the Moon’s position agrees. They are attracted to equally sensitive people; they need to be with someone who can facilitate their main outlet of catharsis which is wallowing about the world’s pain and flushing emotions out like a toilet! To be in a relationship with this type means going on a mission and using love to benefit the world. Moreover, this type tends to have some unusual talents which people will be drawn to, whether it be their beautiful voice, synesthetic mind, or their attunement to the supernatural. They are often artistically inclined and tend to do well in any artistic endeavour. Particularly music and fine arts are the most rewarding for this combination.

With Aries Venus - The Wild Thing If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Aquarius which is ruled by Venus. This additional ray of Venus can really benefit a Venus in detriment, which Venus in Aries is. The natural sextile between the Sun and Venus in this combination compliments this too. We see the nativity and curiosity expression of an Aries Venus really come out in this combination. There is a thrill and desire for anew-ness and discovery; this attitude is what dominantes this type’s realm of romance and art. This type is drawn to anything and anybody that is new and exciting to them. This type has a willingness to try everything at least once. Relationships tend to be quick and short-lived as the next big thing seduces this type away. However, in relationships this Aquarius always gives 100%. This type imprints a loveable unforgettable-ness onto others with memories of good times and pure fun. This type pioneers with their partner and shares experiences of adrenaline. This type is one of the more physical Aquarius types; they are very passionate when it comes to intimacy. This Aquarius is warm and very connected or attuned to their partner. They, however, don’t lack independence; they do need their space and they like having the challenge to fight for or chase affection. This type is quite creative; they are filled with innovative ideas and would do well in any artistic endeavour that demonstrates their talents.

Pisces Sun

With Capricorn Venus - The Guru If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the first decan of Pisces which is ruled by Jupiter. There is a sense of maturity and wisdom from this combination; they are a capsule of knowledge open to everyone around them who wishes to be bestowed with this Pisces’ teachings. Even young individuals with this combo seem way beyond their years– they are old souls. This type’s sense of knowingness tends to draw in lots of people who are eager to learn or could be characterized as having some naivety. For that, this type tends to attract people who are much younger or older than them or people who come from a completely different background (culturally, religiously, or educationally). Relationships can often feel like teacher-student relationships as there can be a particular sense of mentorship or overfunctioning coming from Pisces. Relationships aside, this type is somewhat of a recluse. They dedicate their time and love-energy to learning or spirituality. They can even be somewhat detached romantically as they are always invested in the bigger picture whether that be the meaning of the relationship or future plans or even financial aspects of the relationship! There’s somewhat of a seriousness about them. They tend to have high morals and expectations for themselves and others. If artistically inclined, this type would do well in arts that require great skill and patience (as if all art doesn’t require this...), particularly music and illustrative tends to be this type’s muse and talent!

With Aquarius Venus - The Dream Drifter This combination has some complexity to it. While this type truly seeks deep love connections, they repetitively have difficulty finding contentment in relationships, dreams, and desires. People and places get old fast. They drift from one direction to the next trying to find identity in something. This type tends to be attracted to people who inspire them and feel like a “new leaf” to their life. They also seek acceptance and have deep desires to fit in somewhere; they dread being alone. This type’s love language is primarily acts of service; they feel immense love when people go out of their way to do something for them or teach them something. It’s what gives them that sense of acceptance they are looking for. In relationships, this type expresses love through their creativity. They tend to have a talent for some sort of craftsmanship or a way with words in an artistic sense. They try to search deep within themselves that feeling of a deep love connection and put it into whatever they’re creating. This type loves to write letters in this way. This Pisces is very difficult to hold onto; even when they feel like they’ve found themselves in a relationship and years have gone by, the discontentment creeps up on them and something shiny, new, and far away looks like the cure– and poof, they’re gone. This type is often artistically inclined, clearly, and often do well in music, fine arts, and film.

With Pisces Venus - The Healer The double Pisces is comparable to the deepest parts of the sea. Mystical, deep, all encompassing are just a few words to describe this potent Pisces combination. This type is deeply spiritual and filled with compassion and charity. They are a fighter for free love and unconditional love. This type tends to attract people who are in deep need of help or misfortune; it is because the double Pisces is a natural healer. They should be cautious of people who will use this type for everything they’ve got. Pisces are extremely self-sacrificing, even to those who don’t necessarily deserve it. This type equally tends to go after people who may need helping or “saving” and caution should be practiced here as well as not everyone can be saved. This type values a spiritual connection with people the most and desire long term connections (but not necessarily exclusivity). They often have deep fantasies, especially in the realm of love. Escapism is common with this type. Sometimes their fantasies involve some unrealistic expectations of their partner or life in general so this type should find someone who can gently take the rose-coloured glasses off when necessary. Venus being exalted in Pisces, this type tends to be artistically inclined and would do well in any artistic endeavour they choose.

With Aries Venus - The Siren This Pisces is seductive, passionate, confident, and forward in the realm of love. The harsh Venus in detriment is completely masked by the Pisces’ soft voice and calmness. It gives way to the Martian Venus to pursue their desires and be openly flirty– and boy does this Pisces love to flirt! They have a spectacular way of facilitating chemistry with just about anyone; they are very attuned to others and curious. They pursue interests very quickly and move on just as fast. This Pisces is that one friend that has a new crush every week. Excitement and passion in relationships is important to them, as typically expected from Venus in Aries. They need joy, warmth, and anew-ness to stay interested. It’s easy for this type to fall into a pit of misery and insecurity which is why a bubble of optimism is necessary for this type. They also deeply value the physical connection in relationships; not just sexually (though that is important), but just general physical closeness and affection is what makes this type feel very loved. This type has some tendencies of being impulsive and naive, so a partner that can keep them level-headed would be very beneficial to them! If artistically inclined, this type would do well in any artistic endeavour where the can utilize their intense magnetism.

With Taurus Venus - The Daisy, Daisy If you are this type, there is a good chance your Sun is in the last decan of Pisces which is ruled by Mars. In a lot of ways, this type is quite similar to the Aries Venus type; very passionate, intense, and flirty. However, this type is a lot less on-the-nose when it comes to their pursuits; they prefer to draw people to them with a bit of mystery (it also has a lot to do with the fact that this type is a bit lazy, but hey, there’s nothing wrong with that!). This type often has a natural beauty to them anyway, they don’t need to say much for one to be completely enthralled by the nature of this combo. Additionally, in comparison to the Aries Venus type, this combination is not impulsive at all. They really like to weigh out the validity of their decisions and desires before doing anything. They like relationships to last and exclusivity. Relationships must provide some dependability and stability. Unlike the other Pisces types, this type can very well be impressed with luxury. The Venus in Taurus does create some desire material things and value for hedonistic lifestyle. This is a Pisces that wants to be spoiled and doted on. The physical connection in relationships is also important, especially if the Sun is in the Mars ruled decan. Being sexually compatible sometimes sits at the top of their list when it comes to relationships. This type is typically artistically inclined in someway; they are often great singers, dancers, or artists thanks to Venus being domicile. They have incredible voices and graceful movements; very in tune with the rhythms of the earth.

#astrology #venus #okay i know i have this issue where ill start writing small and then each preceding paragraph will get bigger and bigger #i tried my best to make them all the same amount of words lmao #sun and venus #star-astrology #the signs #zodiac #decans

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jadethest0ne · 4 years ago

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35! Go for it! ✨

Oh right, for this ask game! I had nearly forgotten about it XD

35. Ramble about any fic-related thing you want!

If there was one fic-related thing I’d want to ramble about it’d be specifically being a comic artist, and the different things I experienced going from the Pokemon fandom to the RotTMNT fandom as a comic artist.

I spent 5 years creating a Pokemon comic called “Liberty”, based on a nuzlocke playthrough of Pokemon Soul Silver (basically pokemon on hard-mode with permadeath involved for those of you who don’t know what a nuzlocke is). Meanwhile, it’s been just over a year since my first foray into creating comics for the Rise fandom.

The Similarities

The Disparity between Fanart and Fanfiction

Being a comic artist is odd sometimes because I basically do both fanart and fanficiton at the same time. I can understand and vibe with what a lot of both fanartists and fanfiction writers go through and deal with. This is why I feel like I can answer a lot of these fanfiction questions despite a good chunk of my story-telling being visual.

I am also aware of the disparity between fanart often getting a lot more eyes and attention than fanfiction. Deciding to write a piece of fanfiction instead of draw it out in comic format is often a calculated choice on my part, because writing prose takes more energy from me and often gets less rewards via views and interaction from readers. But despite it taking more energy, it takes less overall time for me to write something out than draw the same story, so I often factor that in when deciding which medium to create a story in.

I feel bad that a lot of fanfiction writers don’t get the attention that they deserve because of this disparity, so may I remind readers to please please PLEASE support your fanfiction creators and interact with their work! It seriously means a lot to them! Even a little message or a reblog will do! The main similarity between these two fandoms is this disparity, and I think it’d be awesome if we could get the number of interactions between fanart/fancomics and fanfiction to be more equal.

The Differences

I’m more popular as a Rise artist?

So, as I said, I spent 5 years making a Pokemon comic and 1 year creating a bunch of Rise comics. And yet I think I got more (or at least the same number of) viewers on my Rise comics in that one year than on my Pokemon comics in 5 years. I certainly got a similar number of followers, despite the differences in time. One of the main reasons for this is likely due to the social media platforms I posted on. I posted “Liberty” on deviantart and on the Pokemon Nuzlocke forums, the latter being particularly niche. As for my Rise comics and artwork, I branched out to other sites including here on Tumblr, Instagram, AO3, and Twitter (though insta got fewer comics due to the image size restrictions). The number and popularity of the sites I posted Rise artwork to are more than deviantart and that is likely a big reason. The other reasons for my increase in popularity may be for some of the other differences...

There aren’t that many comic artists in the TMNT fandom

I could probably name only a handful of consistent comic creators in, not only the Rise fandom, but in the TMNT fandom. And I mean the long-running, over-arching story type of comic creators. There aren’t that many of us. There are tons of artists and fanfic writers out there, yes, but very few that combine the two.

Meanwhile the Pokemon community has TONS. Especially the nuzlocke community. Heck, the Pokemon nuzlocke community started and was named because of a popular comic detailing the events of the creator’s nuzlocke challenge playthrough of Pokemon Emerald. You get a little bit more lost in the crowd amongst so many other comic artists in the Pokemon community, but at the same time have more people to learn from and relate to in that way.

My involvement with the Fandoms has been different

There’s been a lot of collaboration and working together among creators within each respective fandom. I feel like personally, a lot of my collabs with Rise creators has been a lot more direct and more personal than the kind of things I did in the Pokemon fandom.

For example, in the Pokemon comic fandom, it was really common to cameo each others’ characters in your comic, or include each others’ comics or characters in memes. This wasn’t always a planned thing, though we would ask each other for permission. I joined a Pokemon comic discord, but most of my interactions there and on other platforms involved brainstorming help. Not only that, but sometimes the community was a bit more competitive as well. For instance the Nuzlocke Forums would hold an “extravaganza” every year where folks voted on various categories to vote for the best nuzlocke (I won “Best Pokemon” and “Most improved” in 2018 :3 ).

Meanwhile with the Rise fandom, I did more things like art trades, collaborative art pieces, and zine work. These were a lot more direct and planned out and involved a bit more trust and interaction with other artists. I also became close friends with the folks in the discords that I joined as part of a Rise server, beyond just “fellow creator”.

As a result, I found myself doing a lot more serious artwork and even created other fics for the Rise fandom beyond just my comics, while when it came to Pokemon I stuck mainly to my “Liberty” art/comics.

More eyes, less interaction and visa versa

Again, this could be mainly a differences in what social media I’m using, but a big difference I found between readers of my work is that I got A LOT more people commenting on my Pokemon comic than on my Rise comics. I may be getting more views on my TMNT comics, but boy did I get more interaction with my Pokemon comics. I would get at least 5 people leaving these in-depth analysis or guesses of what would happen on each page for my Pokemon comic, not to mention the dozens of other reactions I would get in the comments. And despite that comic being on hiatus for a year, I still get some comments on it!

So, unless I know the commenter personally, I feel a little less involved with my readership with my Rise comics than my Pokemon one. Which is a little sad. I do appreciate you all who appreciate my work, but I feel like I appreciate you from afar and can only go “awww” at the things y’all leave in the notes or on the anonymous asks I get, instead of being able to thank you more directly.

Rise readers are a bit less patient

I get lots more people asking me “when the next page is coming” on my Rise comics and fics much more often than on my Pokemon comic. This virtually never happened with my Pokemon comic. Granted, I was way more consistent with “Liberty” and it had a set schedule, whereas my Rise comics/fanfics never have. But still.

I really DO NOT like those kinds of asks/comments. Please do not ask me when the next one is coming out. It makes me feel stressed and ashamed and pressured, which can create negative feelings around my work and make me less likely to finish them. I get that you’re excited, and that’s cool. But literally no one likes those kinds of comments.

For perspective, “Liberty”, my Pokemon comic, has been on hiatus for nearly a year and I’ve gotten maybe two comments to that effect, and they were newer readers who weren’t around at the time that I announced my hiatus and the reasons thereof. My “Liberty” readers have been so patient with me (bless them), and I feel a real loyalty to that kind of readership. I don’t know when, yet, but I really want to get back to “Liberty” someday, not just for myself or that story that I lovingly crafted, but also for them.

Pokemon was a hobby, Rise is a passion

Likely due to the fact that I have made a lot of close friends within the Rise community, and the fact that it has helped me immensely through this really tough year, I feel so much closer with the Rise creator community. Pokemon was a thing that I did for fun as a side hobby. My TMNT related comics and art have pushed me so much further in my art, gotten me involved in various projects, gotten me into creating animations, holy heck was I sucked into this fandom in such a short amount of time, and I love it so much.

I have been a fan of Pokemon since I was a kid, and I never thought I’d find a piece of media that would capture my attention and adoration as much. I think at a point when I was shifting from the Pokemon to the Rise fandom I said something along the lines of “I feel like I’m cheating on Pokemon with Rise”/j but it’s kinda true, haha!

In the end, both fandoms and the people in them mean a lot to me, and I’ve grown a lot from them as an artist and a person. I will be forever grateful to the other creators, readers, artists, writers, friends, collaborators, etc in both.

Thank you all very much!

#ask #ask game #ramble #long post #pokemon #rise of the tmnt #rottmnt #fandoms #fandom #community #thank you #jadethest0ne #nuzlocke #willowaudreykeyes

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homespork-review · 4 years ago

Text

Homespork Act 4, Part 1: Blight of the Paradox Clones

BRIGHT: Act 4 opens on a loading sequence titled ‘GATE 1’, and then there’s a short pan down through firefly-dotted clouds to a dim blue landscape called the Land of Wind and Shade. John manifests at ground-level and it’s time for another walk-around game!

The icon in the upper right corner opens a conversation with Nannasprite, who’s still back in the house. Apparently she can’t accompany John around the Land, but she can certainly give him puzzling half-answers to any questions he might have. John asks her point-blank if she was always cryptic and evasive or if that’s a sprite thing, but she predictably avoids answering.

John wanders around the Land, getting into fights with (oddly non-aggressive) imps for grist. The Land is very atmospheric, with glowing blue mushrooms and odd pipes everywhere. It’s also inhabited by large, excitable, bipedal orange salamanders who blow bubbles and dispense information about the Land. One of them has acquired John’s bedsheets and is now calling itself a wizard.

A salamander standing by one of the pipes explains that it’s called a Parcel Pyxis. If you need something, you can chisel a picture of whatever it is into a stone tablet and drop it into a Parcel Pyxis. If you find a tablet, and you have what’s carved into it, it’s polite to drop it into the Pyxis and the Breeze will take it where it needs to go. (Just what the Breeze is isn’t explained yet, but given the name of the Land, it’s fair to assume an explanation will be forthcoming in due time, and it’s thematically consistent.)

While wandering, John finds a telescope. Looking through it, he sees his house, perched waaaaaay at the top of a very tall, very narrow rocky crag. He also finds a very large pipe sunk into the ground. He can hear something very, very big breathing at the bottom.

There are definite pros and cons to these games, but on the whole I like them. They’re more immersive than the usual comic panels, and it’s nice to do some self-directed wandering. On the other hand, it’s easy to miss something in a walk-around game, which hardly ever happens with comic panels…

FAILURE ARTIST: The Salamanders crack me up. Good parody of NPC chatter.

CHEL: Comic panels of the walkaround are included later on, so if you really hate the games you can read it straightforwardly.

John is confused by now being below his house when he went through a portal above it; Nanna cryptically claims that “To ascend, you must first descend!”

BRIGHT: With the game out of the way (it doesn’t really have a defined end point), we return to normal comic panels — and also to the future. AR is embroiled in a shootout with the snakes from PM’s ship, which are now firing laser beams. A stray blast decapitates the frog temple. AR returns fire with a rocket launcher. His first shot takes out the snake. The second knocks WV flying. WV lands behind a rock, and the carved pumpkin lands on his head. AR lines up his next shot...and pauses.

The carved image of Bec’s head seems to mean something to AR, because he immediately ceases fire and comes down to start yelling at WV. This turns out to be a poor move on his part: PM still has her sword, and she is not pleased.

I really, really like PM as a character. She has no dialogue whatsoever and still projects massive amounts of integrity.

The comic returns to Jade. She’s retrieved Dave’s Sburb discs from the time capsule, which is clearly going to move the plot along...

Looks like the TIME CAPSULE has reset itself. It is sprouting a new bud. Presumably something else will come out when it blooms again in about 400 years. Too bad you won't be around to find out what it is!

...aaaaaaand we go into sylladex shenanigans again.

I will say this for sylladex tomfoolery: It absolutely can break up tension and provide some lighter stretches in the plot. The problem is that these don’t always feel natural. I find them less annoying now and can appreciate the humour, but they really bugged me the first time around.

Still, Jade’s use of her sylladex does at least speak to her character.

Jade eventually settles on Pictionary modus, which means she has to draw a picture of whatever she wants to captchalogue. If she doesn’t have the drawn item to hand, her modus instead captures a “ghost image” of the item on a card, complete with alchemiter code. Handy! Unfortunately the modus has some trouble understanding Jade’s drawings, interpreting her picture of her eclectic bass as a regular electric bass.

Bec then catches up and teleports Jade back to her room. In a demonstration of unusual good sense, Jade promptly gets on with installing the Sburb Beta.

Back in the Land of Wind and Shade, John pesters Rose to ask if she’s here on the other side of the gate, in the “spooky glowy place with oily rivers and stuff”. She doesn’t respond. He does however get pestered by Jade, who is now awake and therefore fully aware of what Sburb is (much to John’s confusion). She tells him to go get his copy of the game so he can be her server player. John is convinced Jade is psychic, but she tells him that he has access to all the information she does, he just doesn’t know it yet.

Meanwhile, Dave is also trying to get in touch with Rose, also to no effect. Jade pesters him and they have a cute conversation in which Jade forgets how a reference goes, but Dave assures her she got it anyway. She tells him she’s setting up as his server player and shows him a picture of the meteor aimed at his house. There are no size comparison points available but Jade assures him that it’s really, really big.

TG: well as if like one the size of a bus wouldnt kill me anyway

FAILURE ARTIST: Dave describes his beating from his Guardian as “i got served like a dude on butler island” and Jade says it’s “(DRAMA DRAMA DRAMA)”. It’s hard to take the abuse seriously when none of the characters do.

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 14

BRIGHT: In the Medium, John is getting pestered by carcinoGeneticist again. We now have a picture icon for CG. Look familiar? Yup, it’s the guy from the end of the Intermission.

So I guess this is the first time in the main comic that we get confirmed, visual proof that the trolls are aliens? It’s hard to point to, since the trolls get introduced gradually.

I’ve no idea how this was received in fandom when it first happened, but by the time I got to Homestuck, the fact that the trolls were grey folks with horns was probably the most famous feature of the canon, so...not so much of an impact. Still pretty cool though.

FAILURE ARTIST: I wish I could remember how the fandom took it.

The trolls in these early acts make a big deal all the time about how they are alien and the kids are human. It’s an amusing parody of the way aliens act in fiction but it is weird when the trolls become actual characters and we find out their psychology is surprisingly human most of the time.

CHEL: Hence the WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM count. That’ll spike later.

BRIGHT: CG is unexpectedly friendly this time. Apparently he’s been trolling John backwards through time, which is frustrating as each earlier John knows less and less, so CG keeps having to repeat himself. (Which...doesn’t make much sense? He’d have to explain more obvious stuff, sure, but John would remember things he was told in later-from-CG’s-perspective conversations, so...ugh, time travel!) Despite this frustration, however, John’s relentless friendliness apparently wore the trolls down and now they’re friends. Or at least CG thinks they are. John is less than convinced.

CHEL:

John asks if the trolls are in his land, but CG berates him for self-centredness:

CG: WE HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH YOUR DUMB LITTLE WINDY PLANET OR YOUR PETTY LITTLE QUESTS. CG: OR FOR THAT MATTER YOUR ENTIRE GAME SESSION. CG: YOU AREN'T THE ONLY ONES PLAYING THE GAME. CG: EVERY GROUP OF PLAYERS GETS THEIR OWN DISTINCT, BLANK SLATE SESSION. CG: AS WILL BE EXPLAINED TO YOU MANY TIMES.

He instructs John to relay an apology for the trolling to Jade and to tell her to GET HER GROSS AND TOTALLY UNATTRACTIVE HUMAN BUTT OFF HER UGLY HUMAN HIGH HORSE AND ANSWER MY MESSAGES. John says he’s a bit focused on his own quest right now, and sets off to find his father’s car.

TIER: While that's happening, we cut back to the gaggle of aliens having a grand old time around a campfire with some good food. A familiar pair of squiddles, now old, is visible as well.

FAILURE ARTIST: AR/PM/WV was a popular OT3 back in the day but you never see it anymore.

CHEL: Pity. It’s adorable.

FAILURE ARTIST: We cut to Dave’s place, where Jade is setting things up for the game. The air conditioning unit helps with the process, but the birds everywhere don’t. Dave drops the r-slur.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 16

Rose also talks with Dave as this is going on. She says this to him.

TT: I've done nothing but wait for boys to play this game with me all day. TT: First John lollygagging with the client, and then you with the server, downright filibustering my existence with unending fraternal melee. TT: And yet a girl, one who didn't even own the game, was able to connect with you minutes after you connected with me.

I’ve seen this quoted as Rose/Jade Lesbian Power but I wish we had more scenes where the two actually talked to each other.

CHEL: Being happy that one of your friends is competent means you’re in love with them now? And yet if someone used that as evidence for a het ship they’d be run out of the fandom. Anyway, Jade removes Dave’s bed to make room.

TT: And there she goes. TT: She HAS the karma.

FAILURE ARTIST: Rose has been talking to a troll, but she doesn’t know the gender so uses “he/she/it”. Funny to think there was a time when we didn’t know the trolls’ gender. Particularly the gender of Rose’s favorite troll...

Jade tries to tidy up the apartment using “a woman’s touch” a.k.a. a towel drenched in toilet water. Which begs the question of how her home is spotless.

CHEL: Because Hussie is again not thinking through the implications of the living situations as presented, and/or trying to present things as simultaneously a joke and serious. To be fair, considering the dreambot, she could have a super hi-tech cleaning system, or Bec could teleport the dirt away, but if so, we ought to see that.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 10 ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 15

FAILURE ARTIST: In doing so, she accidentally rips the toilet out and drops an F-bomb.

CHEL: We now get a video of Rose’s location, the LAND OF LIGHT AND RAIN. Her house is now perched on a tiny island surrounded by glimmering pastel oil-slick-looking water, a waterfall pouring down out of nowhere beside it, with golden clouds scattered around pouring rain. It’s very pretty!

We again see the carapaces finding things in the ruins, and WV brings PM to see inside the bunker. The blast earlier formed an entry into the third room which had been locked, which contains further devices, this one with more spirographs and a frog picture on it; WV doesn’t know what this one does and the power’s too low to use it anyway. Back in the room with the monitors, PM is impressed by WV’s drawings and he offers her the pack of chalk. AR, meanwhile, cooks food.

PM recognises the monitor as similar to the one in her own station, though hers was watching a girl. Here, we get the static panels of the runaround game, from PM’s point of view.

Back in LoLaR, a mysterious textbox in cursive addresses Rose as Seer, suggesting she explore. Recall that the book mentioned the Heir of Breath, the Seer of Light, the Witch of Space, and the Knight of Time. Since Jade is the one who’s been doing the Seer-ing so far, I’ve seen readers assume she was the Seer and Rose the Witch, but it seems not; further explanations of what those titles really mean are forthcoming.

Sudden cut back to John’s land, where the village is under attack! Huts are aflame, and much bigger and more powerful monsters have arrived.

In Dave’s apartment, Jade opens the cruxtruder by dropping the displaced toilet on it, splashing water everywhere, much to Dave’s aggravation since all that juice was going to come back to haunt me. He’s relieved to see the countdown gives him four hours, but Jade doesn’t know till what, and he realises she’s sleep-messaging him again. He orders her not to watch him pee, and dont put anything weird in the seizure kernel.

TG: the last thing i need is for your weird brain webcam to be snapping shots of my dong TG: your grandpa was a sick fuck why would he build a voyeurbot for a little girl CALL CPA PLEASE: 8

Well, he is kinda right. Anyway, Dave spends a couple of pages elaborately planning misuse of the apple juice bottle and tricking John into drinking from the alchemised bottle, but he dismisses it as too much trouble and goes in the shower, kicking out the puppet. Good thing it was only his bladder that was the problem, if you get my drift. Some fans have speculated that this puppet also had a camera in it, but I can’t see evidence of that; I guess if you squint the eyes might look like a camera lens? I feel if that was the case it would have been shown. Hussie didn’t shy away from the weird shit with Dave’s living situation earlier.

Jade is upset to find the bisected bird from earlier, and decides to help the bird by putting it in the Kernelsprite, angering Dave again. He figures she’ll be more helpful when she’s awake, so he instructs her to slap the air to her side; the dreambot mimics her movements and whacks the real Jade in the face, waking her up.

BRIGHT: I burst out laughing the first time I saw that panel. It’s pretty clever of Dave. (Though obviously not kind, but of a variety that’s in keeping with the story.)

CHEL: Cut to the carapace camp, where they’re burning empty crates for a campfire. AR decides to use the Squiddles to Win over that fine carapace in grey, which seems to distress WV and Serenity. PM takes a Squiddle, but rather than being won over is vaguely reminded of something.

TIER: We then jump back into the past, where we find a totalled car and what looks like AR?

CHEL: Yep, though here he’s going by Authority Regulator instead of Aimless Renegade.

TIER: Whatever the case, this dude is not happy with this traffic violation. Another thing he's not happy with? Unauthorized parcels. Which brings us to the Parcel Mistress, who's been looking for this particular package for a while apparently. Now how to get it?

With that we jump back to John! Who's doing decent enough in his clobbering of game enemies. Just when things ain't looking too hot though, a mysterious stranger shoots and kills them with extreme prejudice. He looks familiar ain't he?

And even if he's not, that gigantic book under his arm can only be the work of the ol’ Colonel Sassacre, which John helpfully points out.

CHEL: Meanwhile in some other time period, PM suddenly remembers she must deliver a message to John. Back in the present, Parcel Mistress, for it is she, finds a tablet carved (badly) by John, depicting the SBurb envelope. The prompt suggests PM ready her sword, but she has none, and claims she would never resort to violence. Instead, she tries asking politely. Despite their lands’ enmity, AR finds her attractive and doffs his hat so furiously you are in danger of starting a HAT FIRE. His civility does not extend to handing over contraband, though. The tablet is sufficient evidence for him to give her the envelope, but to get the green parcel she must ask his bosses. PM puts the envelope in a pyxis, trusting the Breeze to move it, and follows AR.

John plans to follow the man, who he does not yet recognise as Jade’s Grandpa, to get his book back, but first he must help put out the fire in the salamander village. He flings the BARBASOL BOMB he made earlier into the volcano.

The cooling lather should work its magic in no time…

OH GOD HOW CAN SHAVING CREAM BE SO FLAMMABLE

Yeah, that doesn’t work so well. Fortunately, just as all seems lost, A big gust of wind conveniently comes along and blows out all the fire. The salamanders declare John a hero, though he’s just confused.

FAILURE ARTIST: A prompt (PM) asks John if he still has the tablet and if he wants to carve something on it. So, in another time loop, he does that.

Back at LOLAR, a very elegant and mysterious prompt ask Rose to find Jaspersprite. Rose cannot find him, but she does find footprints leading to the mausoleum. The mausoleum isn’t there anymore, but the underground passage is still there. Rose takes it down to a pier where someone has recently taken a boat and left a martini. The mysterious prompt says “A mother will do whatever is best for her children.” Nobody ever said “a brother will do whatever is best for his siblings”.

In the future, WV becomes the Mayor of Exile Town. The peace is disturbed when a “huge eggy looking thing” appears in the sky.

Cut to Jade giving the punch card of an “eggy loking thign (sic)”. Guess someone on the forum had bad spelling?

CHEL: It’s a callback to Rose describing the other unfinished GameFAQs entries, which were typed in haste. One described their entry item that way.

FAILURE ARTIST: Dave creates a huge red bird with a huge red egg. When he tries to use the egg, the crow sprite takes it and puts it in a nest made of smuppets, swords, and Lil Cal.

Dave doesn’t have enough grist to do anything. He fusses around building what he can. That done, he goes inside and installs gristTorrent to steal grist from John. Who exactly made that software?

Meanwhile, in LOLAR, Rose has set up shop on the pier. The mysterious prompter tells her to consult with the Heir and in the pesterlog we see she’s chatting with John. They catch up on the trolls and various things. Unfortunately, Rose is harassed by a gallowsCalibrator who tells her in 133t speak that her mother hates her and left her forever. Amazing that GC eventually becomes a beloved character since they are such a little shit right now. GC has synesthesia and jokes about their species communicating through “CLOUDS OF FR4GR4NT G4S3S”. They want to be helpful, but they deny wanting to be friends, though later they say they are becoming something called “H4T3FR13NDS”.

CHEL: Rose asks if I'm being courted or trolled here, which with further reveals about the trolls will become somewhat ironic. Other trolls are jumping around in time but GC is ST4Y1NG L1N34R [...] C4US3 W31RD T1M3 STUFF G1V3S ME A H34D4CHE, though will jump forward in the timeline so they don’t have to wait too long between conversations.

BRIGHT: GC isn’t the only one...

FAILURE ARTIST: GC explains the voices in the players’ heads are from the Exiles on Earth. The ultimate goal is to create a new civilization with them. With that important information, GC bids adieu for now.

TT: So the exiles are on Earth? Does that mean our goal is to get back there too? To resurrect it somehow? GC: NO NO NO GC: S33 1RON1C4LLY TH3Y G3T TO DO TH4T GC: 4FT3R TH3YR3 DON3 H3LP1NG YOU TH4T 1S GC: YOUR JOB 1S OF GR34T3R CONS3QU3NC3 TO S4Y TH3 L34ST GC: BUT P4RT OF TH31R JOB 1S TO R3BU1LD L1F3 4ND C1V1L1Z4T1ON TH3R3 GC: 4ND 1F TH3YR3 SUCC3SSFUL 1N THOUS4NDS OR M1LL1ONS OF Y34RS TH3 T3CHNOLOGY 1S UN34RTH3D 4ND TH3 PL4N3T 1S R1P3 FOR S33D1NG 4LL OV3R 4G41N TT: You never answered the question. Where were they exiled from? GC: FROM TH3 TWO K1NGDOMS 1N TH3 1NC1P1SPH3R3 GC: 3XP4TR14T3D DUR1NG TH3 R3CKON1NG

CHEL: We now know who and what the Exiles are, so let’s lop off a point for that:

WHAT IS HAPPENING??: 8

FAILURE ARTIST: Back in the past, when John went by ghostyTrickster, he tries to have a conversation with Jade but it’s interrupted by CG warning her that her robot will explode. After CG leaves, Jade and John talk about the trolls. Seems blocking does no good. John drops the r-slur.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 17

We cut to CG being gray and angry in some mysterious grey room.

Then, back to Jade. Her package from her pen-pal appears again.

Cut to ghostyTrickster John. GC trolls him, outs herself as female and blind, and threatens to cut his throat “4ND L1ST3N TO YOU BL33D WH1L3 1 SM3LL YOU D13”. John is naturally unnerved by this, but he also takes inspiration from her taunt that he’s bad at ectobiology.

CHEL: He takes for his new username a term that the trolls introduced him to, and is surprised when they immediately find him? Maybe we DID need a Too Dumb To Live count.

FAILURE ARTIST: We cut to a troll like CG, but with red glasses and a Libra sign on her shirt. This is our first look at gallowsCallibrator.

CHEL: Okay, does the death threat qualify for SEND THEM TO THE SLAMMER? It’s a bit extreme considering at this point in his timeline John has done nothing to offend her. Then again, maybe not; the narrative doesn’t present this as being the right and proper thing to do.

Back in the present, PM arrives in enemy territory, with the parking citation as a ready excuse for her presence. Imps and agents she passes now have features from Jaspersprite; cat faces, princess hats, and we see a DD-like figure wearing a cat-ear headband. PM follows a red carpet, only to be confronted at the end by this eldritch-looking majesty:

PM is naturally trembling, but is merely instructed to speak to the Archagent, who we’ve met before; Jack Noir. We see a ring with four pearl-like orbs on the monarch’s hand; this will become important later.

Rose’s Exile voice bids her farewell, telling her to Find your sprite. Realise your purpose. No longer guided, Rose decides to start making her own decisions, beginning with a sip of martini.

In the desert, A WINDSWEPT QUESTANT suddenly appears, this being a tall white carapace with a feminine figure and narrow eyes, from the eggy lokin thign, with the unsound effect EGG! WV and AR appear disconcerted, while PM is busy telling John to put the carved tablet in the pyxis.

Back in Jack Noir’s office, PM attempts to grab the green box and leave, but Jack appears suddenly behind her, making her jump, and tells her she’d better have the ticket payment or you are wasting valuable time he could otherwise spend shirking his clerical duties. PM nervously explains she’s actually here for the package, and Jack points out she doesn’t have the right courier forms.

In spite of how he's supposed to be dressed now but isn't, he ain't nobody's fool.

However, instead, she could always do an errand for him. Specifically, following his HIT LIST, which is two pictures of white crowns recognisable as the tops of the king and queen chess pieces. He also gives her the enormous black sword we saw her future self use. PM, terrified, departs, and Jack wonders if she’s actually stupid enough to try it.

You make a policy of handing out a REGISWORD and a HITLIST to just about everyone who enters your office.

Curious, he opens the package, and stares into it in surprise.

At Dave’s apartment, Jade has put the Punch Designix in the hallway, making it rather hard to navigate, but regardless Dave’s busy alchemising. He plays with a few add-ons which temporarily render the machines unusable, but eventually manages to use a jumper shunty thing to consolidate all the machines into one. Jade draws some components, gets the captcha codes of their ghost images, and sends the codes to Dave, who plugs them into the machine. Useful, but could probably be compressed into fewer pages, especially when he follows it up by playing with the new machinery. This is adding to my conviction that the machines should have been simplified severely in the first place.

GET ON WITH IT!: 15

John finds the wrecked car with no dad, package, or game, and gets trolled by GC again. She offers to help him, claiming she wants to H3LP YOU 4DV4NC3 MOR3 QU1CKLY because she’s bored watching his long adventure and wants to help him skip ahead. John points out she could just skip forward on the timeline as she has before, and she admits that she just wants to see if she can change the timeline, as her friends don’t believe they can. She offers him a map, which he accepts.

John complains, naturally, and she relents and offers to guide him directly to the pipe which will help him skip to the next Gate. Honestly, he has reason to complain; her smellovision allows her to read text on a screen, yet not to draw?

Rose, back in LOLAR, battles monsters, doing surprisingly well considering she only has knitting needles for a weapon, culminating in an epic sequence in which she stabs both needles into an ogre’s eyes, flips onto its back, and uses her knitting as reins to ride it down the waterfall. Dave informs her he’s out of grist, but she finds the idea of killing the ogre for supplies when it’s unconscious to be distasteful. He’s interrupted by grimAuxiliatrix, The Troll Who Talks Like This, asking about Rose. The conversation is awkward as GA seems unable to read Dave’s sarcasm.

GA: She Perhaps Even Regards You With Uh GA: Endearment TG: you have no idea dude she is so in my grill TG: like a stray hotdog that rolled down there TG: and now its too much trouble to fish out with the tongs TG: so you just watch it like crack and turn black GA: Um Is This GA: A Common Sort Of Practice In Human Courtship GA: Watching Oblong Meat Products Tumble Into Places They Dont Belong

adiosToreador, meanwhile, does the same to Rose about Dave, with a similar lack of comprehension of Rose’s loquaciousness. GA contacts Rose again, and a confusing conversation about temporal mechanics ensues. Afterwards, we see GA, who proves to be a short-haired troll girl with pronged horns, a Virgo shirt symbol (my troll!), and cute little vampire teeth.

FAILURE ARTIST: It’s been too long for me to remember the fandom reaction, but I feel like the reveal that GA is a girl was framed like a surprise. Surprise! This troll is a lesbian! But I might be mistaken. Still, this isn’t like Dave’s (mock?) offended reaction to AT. Hussie, like many straight men, is more comfortable with lesbians than gay men.

We’ll see more of Rose’s and GA’s relationship as the comic goes on. Some non-Homestucks here might already be spoiled due to the numerous fanart of the two.

CHEL: I wasn’t surprised by her being a girl; maybe I’m stereotyping, but the prissy nature of her dialogue and quirk sounded feminine to me from the start, not to mention the “trix” ending of her username is a feminine one - if she was male, it would be “auxiliator”. Not sure how many people paid attention to that though. I was surprised by the later information that (SPOILER) she actually was interested in Rose, because facetious declarations of romantic intention are kind of a thing for the human kids at this point and her flustered reaction could be taken either way here.

Dave, meanwhile, is trolled by AT, with the most cringe-inducing text-rap I’ve ever seen (and text-rapping is pretty cringy to begin with). I gotta praise Hussie, it takes skill to make something this awful.

AT: oK, lET ME, AT: oRGANIZE MY NOTES HERE, AT: oKAYYY, AT: (tURN ON SOME STRICT BEATS MAYBE, iT WILL HELP TO LISTEN TO THEM WHILE i DESTROY YOU,) AT: wHEN THE POLICE MAN BUSTS ME, aND POPS THE TRUNK, AT: hE'S ALL SUPRISED TO FIND I'M TOTING SICK BILLY, AT: wHOSE, AT: gOAT IS THAT, hE ASKS, wHILE HE STOPS TO THUNK AT: aBOUT IT, aND i'S JUST SAY IT'S DAVE'S, yOU SILLY AT: gOOSE,

Since we’ll later find out trolls don’t have the concept of police in the same way humans do, and nor do they call animals by the same names we do, I think this is worth some WSP points. Did he watch Dave’s life closely enough to pick up those concepts?

BRIGHT: I get the distinct impression none of the trolls watched anything like enough of the kids’ lives to pick up the concept of the police, particularly since as we’ll see later they missed a few things that are rather more obvious -- such as, say, parents.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 11

CHEL: He also namedrops Prospit and Derse, which I’m not really spoiling anything by saying are the names of the two warring chess kingdoms, though I don’t think those names have been applied to them yet. I don’t know why, it’s not like keeping them secret makes a big difference - did Hussie only just think of them? The quality of his rhymes aside, AT appears very proud of himself; he’s a troll with enormous bull-like horns, a mohawk, and a Taurus symbol. I thought he was really creepy-looking the first time I saw him, but he rather grew on me.

Back on LOWAS, John is squirted out of a pipe with a gush of oil. Ew. The Con Air bunny goes flying and lands in an oil river, and he catches it with the Ghost Gauntlets. An adult and child pair of salamanders happen to be standing nearby, prompting a movie re-enactment, much to the salamanders’ confusion.

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CG is unimpressed, though he agrees with John that Con Air sounds entertaining. CG claims to have been watching the whole of John’s life and Con Air is supposed to be one of John’s favourite movies; how come CG hasn’t seen any of it before, especially since he says he has seen a movie John hates?

CG: OK I DON'T SEE HOW WE'RE SUPPOSED TO BE BECOMING FRIENDS IF YOU RECOIL FROM MY OLIVE BRANCH LIKE I'M WIGGLING A GNARLED TREE MONSTER'S DICK IN YOUR DIRECTION.

Lovely. Though I gotta say the dialogue and ridiculous extended metaphors are one of the best parts of Homestuck. Wish I could pull those off. However, one point here; if they’re aliens, it seems odd that they would use human idioms such as “olive branch” with the same meaning we do. There is a possible explanation later on, but since they only ever use American/Western phrases like this and it’s clear from other things they say that they didn’t pick up anything much about human culture from watching the kids, I’m upping the count anyway.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 12

BRIGHT: We also discover that troll movies are titled very differently to human movies, such as the classic

CG: WHEREIN NUMEROUS VIGILANTES CONFRONT PERIL; ONE OF THEM BETRAYS THE OTHERS;(BUT IT TURNS OUT TO BE PART OF THE PLAN ALL ALONG); CG: SEVERAL ATTRACTIVE FEMALE LEADS PROVOKE ROMANTIC TENSION; FOUR MAJOR CHARACTERS WEAR UNUSUAL HATS; ONE HOLDS PLOT-CRITICAL SECRET; CG: 47 ON-SCREEN EXPLOSIONS, ONE RESULTING IN DEMISE OF KEY-ADVERSARY;6 TO 20 LINES THAT COULD BE CONSTRUED AS HUMOROUS; EB: wait... EB: this is the title? CG: IT GOES ON.

Apparently after thousands of years of film history, you start running out of movie titles.

Also, note that despite their being aliens, quite possibly with different gender roles, the romantic tension is explicitly provided by attractive female leads.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 13

CG thinks that Earth civilisation’s lack of maturity might explain why the players are (apparently) doing so badly. John retorts that GC is helping him, so they can’t be doing THAT badly. Apparently this wasn’t in the plan; CG goes to talk to GC about it, and she punches him. Seems she’s talking to a future John at the moment, and he asked her to. CG gives John a message to pass on to GC in reply.

CG: TELL HER TO POLISH MY HEAVING BONE BULGE AND SET A TABLE FOR FUCKING TWO ON IT. CG: IT’S FOR OUR CANDLELIT HATE DATE.

John comments that it’s like they’re trolling each other through him now, and asks if CG has talked to Jade. CG is surprised that he’d want to talk to her. John offers to paste the chatlog; CG refuses, and John heads off to talk to GC.

CHEL: Precisely what a bone bulge is is never explained. Context makes it clear it’s an unsavoury body part, and it sounds like a term for one’s dick, even though the boner does not in fact contain bones in humans. The assumption early in the fandom was that the trolls had primarily human anatomy, which seems odd to me considering Kanaya’s complete obliviousness to her Oblong Meat Products comment - most teenagers familiar with human penises would be on that instantly. Anyway, there soon came a phase of experimentation, and by now we seem to have settled on the “functional-hermaphrodites with tentacle dicks” theory. Which is weird, because a tentacle doesn’t sound like something which would be referred to with the word “bone”, does it?

GC’s laughing mouth is reflected in John’s glasses as they speak in what I desperately hope is a shoutout to the Corinthian. She calls John STUP1DLY 4DOR4BLE (minor typo on the comic’s part as the E in her quirk should be a 3) and laughs at CG’s frustration. John relays an approximation of CG’s message:

EB: he wants you to touch his bone lump or something. GC: WH4T!!! EB: and that he's pretty much basically in love with you.

GC asks him to copy-paste the convo for proof but John refuses, saying it was a private conversation, and informs GC that she’s going to punch CG soon. In other news, referring to these characters with only their handle initials when I know their actual names is hard.

On GC’s instructions, John turns around, to discover this hard-to-miss landmark:

This, according to GC, is the D3N1Z3NS P4L4C3, in which the Denizen sleeps on a grist hoard so big their alchemising could never make a dent in it.

GC: USU4LLY HOW 1TS SUPPOS3D TO GO 1S GC: OV3R TH3 COURS3 OF YOUR QU3ST GC: YOU W1LL W4K3 TH3 D3N1Z3N GC: 4ND TH3N F1N4LLY YOU GO THROUGH TH3 S3V3NTH G4T3 GC: WH1CH 1S TH3 ONLY W4Y 1NTO TH3 P4L4C3 GC: TH3N YOU GO DOWN 4ND F1GHT TH3 D3N1Z3N GC: 4ND K1LL 1T GC: R3L3AS1NG TH3 HO4RD EB: so what's my advantage? GC: YOU WONT BOTH3R W4K1NG 1T GC: W3 W1LL SK1P R1GHT TO TH3 S3V3NTH G4T3 GC: F1ND 1TS L41R GC: 4ND K1LL 1T 1N 1TS SL33P

The grist hoard, GC claims, is for the ULT1M4T3 4LCH3MY, but she won’t explain what this is yet, and she leads John to a R3TURN NOD3 which takes him back to his home to prepare.

In the desert, AR and WV hammer some metal to make a gift for the Windswept Questant, which proves to be a crown. PM is shocked to see this, and emerges from the bunker, sword in hand.

Meanwhile, in a long-discarded memory… A PARCEL MISTRESS seeks audience with royalty.

It seems Windswept Questant is in fact, of course, the White Queen.

PM explains recent events and seeks her queen’s advice, showing her the hit list requesting the white monarchs’ crowns. WQ is wearing a ring similar to that of the monarch we met earlier, the Black Queen. Four orbs are attached to it, two light and two dark. On removing it, WQ loses all her elaborate prototyping accoutrements and becomes the normal-looking carapace we saw in her Windswept Questant identity. WQ seems to have a plan; instead of requiring PM to kill her to finish her fetch quest, she simply hands over her crown and ring, and instructs PM to find the White King on the battlefield. Flashing forward to the desert, WQ places her new crown on PM’s head, much to the astonishment of their companions.

On LOLAR, beneath waterfalls pouring from hovering pink turtle shells, Rose frustratedly consults with Jaspersprite, who will apparently only meow. However, when asked a direct question, Jaspersprite is able to respond. He is attempting to fish with his tentacles, but there are no fish, because her Denizen ate everything in the ocean and got so full that it took a long nap. Being as cryptic as Nannasprite, he won’t, however, explain what the message he gave to young Rose meant, saying she’ll understand when she wakes up.

JASPERSPRITE: Rose im just a cat and i dont know much but i know that youre important and also you are what some people around here call the Seer of Light. JASPERSPRITE: And you dont know what that means but you will see its all tied together! JASPERSPRITE: All the life in the ocean and all the shiny rain and the songs in your head and the letters they make. JASPERSPRITE: A beam of light i think is like a drop of rain or a long piece of yarn that dances around when you play with it and make it look enticing! JASPERSPRITE: And the way that it shakes is the same as what makes notes in a song! JASPERSPRITE: And a song i think can be written down as letters. JASPERSPRITE: So if you play the right song and it makes all the right letters then those letters could be all the letters that make life possible. JASPERSPRITE: So all you have to do is wake up and learn to play the rain!

FAILURE ARTIST: Hussie is very good at writing the dialogue of a kitten turned into a game NPC, you’ve got to hand it to him.

CHEL: It’s also worth noting that his colours have stopped flashing pink and purple, and he’s settled on pink.

Rose asks Jade for further information, and learns that all four of the kids have a dream self which must awaken; Rose deduces Jade’s has been awake as long as they’ve known each other. Jade is in fact asleep now, and can only message at the moment because of her robot. Rose’s dream self is dreaming troubled dreams, causing the real Rose to suffer nightmares all her life, and to stop this she must discover how to wake her dream self.

GG: maybe the stuff you wrote on your walls can give you a clue? TT: What stuff? GG: the.... GG: er GG: didnt dave tell you?

Utterly heartwarming moment; we see in John’s dream tower, and Jade has drawn over the LAME KID messages and creepy clown faces on John’s walls with a big bright yellow heart and the message wake up john!!! you can do it!!!

Rose wants to know what’s going on, but Dave is unavailable. The meteor is about to land and he’s scrambling his way up the tower to his kernelsprite’s nest to retrieve the entry egg.

Back at John’s house, he finds the useless rocket-pack-combined-with-junk he experimentally alchemised earlier; GC tells him that the trolls’ resident hacker, who we haven’t met yet, can use its code to create a usable jetpack. Said hacker doesn’t want to talk to them but WONT B3 4BL3 TO R3S1ST TH3 CH4LL3NG3.

John sends the mishmash code…

GC: OK B3 B4CK IN L3SS TH4N ON3 S3COND GC: PCHOOOOO EB: hello? GC: WH4T EB: it thought you said you'd be back in less than a second? GC: 1 W4S GC: 1 G4V3 YOU TH3 COD3 GC: 1TS PCHOOOOO

Hee. The misunderstanding leads into a brief argument, GC claiming that 3V3N YOU 4ND YOUR UND3RD3V3LOP3D BON3 NOOK W1LL B3 4BL3 TO F1GUR3 OUT WH4T TO DO. Once again, we don’t know what a bone nook is. Context could imply either an obscene body part or a brain-related one. Common fanon holds that it’s the vagina, others have objected and said it surely must mean anus; neither of those sound like a “bone” anything to me, and in fact bone would be horribly counterproductive for organs which have to perform peristalsis. Someone did point out to me that it could mean a place to put the metaphorical bone, but that wasn’t what I immediately thought.

FAILURE ARTIST: I don’t think the phrase “bone nook” ever comes up again, though the word “nook” by itself does and it can be replaced with the word “ass” in those cases. Basically, trolls aren’t a fictional species crafted with any care. Hussie wanted some annoying alien characters with a visual callback to “Little Monsters” and it somehow got out of control.

CHEL: Actually, I believe it does come up in Hiveswap Act 1! But we’ll get to that.

John answers a message from Dave, who now claims to be in the Medium, saying it took him four hours. He asks for advice, saying his sprite wants him to prototype it again, and Rose is randomly asleep.

TG: ok fine but TG: it seems to be suggesting something here TG: and TG: i guess im kinda weirded out by its suggestion EB: i don't know, just do what it says! EB: it knows stuff about the game, so it probably knows better than i do...

Not a good sign. John decides to Take dear, sweet Casey (the baby salamander) into protective custody by captchaloguing her, and blasts off for the gate.

Cut to an animated sequence in The Land of Heat and Clockwork, a nightmarish lava-scape covered in machinery (convection schmonvection), where Dave is being extremely badass and surprisingly successful for someone with only half a sword. In fact, multiple Daves appear to be present. We also see, unfortunately, exactly what he prototyped:

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Calsprite is even less helpful than the other two, providing a constant soundtrack of creepy laughter while Dave begs him to shut up. According to Dave’s ensuing convo with Rose, this has been going on for four months. That’s… pretty terrifying even before we hear everything that went wrong. John was unsurprisingly instantly slain by his Denizen, and thus couldn’t save Jade from her meteor. Dave, however, has now mastered the art of time travel via the magical turntables he’s created, and intends to go back and prevent all that from happening, now that they’ve spent four months gathering information their past selves can use. Rose is afraid of ceasing to exist; Dave assures her that their dream selves exist outside the standard passage of time, and this will help her dream self wake sooner.

FAILURE ARTIST: The trolls also stopped “trolling” Dave and Rose after John died. This isn’t the end of the trolls, of course.

Dave uses his turntables to go to the past. We cut to a conversation we just saw, where Dave has just entered the Medium and John is about to go pchooooo, except this time from Dave’s roof.

GET ON WITH IT!: 16

Except at the end, Dave tells John not to go. See, Dave from the future just arrived on Dave from the present’s roof. John refuses to believe that this is happening, thinking it’s just a prank. Not even putting future!Dave on the line convinces John. So, future!Dave unloads everything he has in a stack and flips back into the Crowsprite to become a new characters: Davesprite.

CHEL: Note that, instead of Dave’s theme colour of red, Davesprite is orange. I did wonder if this was potentially supposed to show that Bro (whose theme colour is orange) is overwriting/overshadowing Dave’s real self, but since the sprites of the others aren’t the theme colours of their respective kids (Nannasprite is teal to John’s dark blue and Jaspersprite pink to Rose’s purple) I don’t think this is really a reliable sign. Pin in the colours, though, that’ll come up later.

FAILURE ARTIST: Meanwhile, John blasts off with the words “THIS IS STUPID”.

Present!Rose tries to pester Dave, and we get another repeated conversation.

GET ON WITH IT!: 17

Present!Rose decides to nap, and at that moment, Future Dream Rose ceases to exist and becomes absorbed by Present!Rose. I think.

WHAT IS HAPPENING??: 9

Davesprite pesters GC to tell her not to talk to John anymore. GC first reacts by saying “YOU SM3LL L1K3 OR4NG3 CR34MS1CL3S” but then finds out she killed John. She had assumed since she could talk to John in the future, he hadn’t died, but she guessed there was a chance he could die. She’s a little put-out and wants to apologize, but she’s not as sad as you’d expect someone who accidentally killed someone to be. Davesprite asks who is in charge of timeline management.

GC: SH3 DO3SNT W4NT TO T4LK TO 4NY OF YOU GC: 4ND H4S M1SG1V1NGS 4BOUT TH1S WHOL3 TH1NG GC: NOT 4LL OF US 4R3 TH4T 3NTHUS1AST1C 4BOUT TROLL1NG YOU GUYS GC: 4ND TH3 ON3S WHO 4R3 SORT OF SUCK 4T 1T >:|

We do get to meet her, but not until the next act when we meet all the trolls.

Davesprite gives GC permission to talk to John if she cuts out her “coy bullshit antics”. GC mocks his threatening tone and points out she’s higher on the echeladder, from the future, and blind. Davesprite says his self-prototyping gave him great powers and GC says that was a bad idea. They then engage in some banter over GC posting screencaps of Wheeler from Captain Planet (which she calls a “soap opera”). Davesprite and GC end the conversation with mutual respect. Which is honestly really weird after all future!Dave had to go through because of GC.

CHEL: Does this count for SLAMMER points? I think it does. Here’s the first of our new count, then!

SEND THEM TO THE SLAMMER: 1

This will go up whenever a character does something awful and neither the narrative nor the other characters seem to care.

This also brings us into another point. We’ve seen only hints of it, but alternate timelines are a big theme of this comic. Davesprite in particular is a major focus of said theme, specifically the nature of his personhood separately from the focal or “alpha” Dave. However, as we see here, not even the Dave from the dead John’s timeline particularly seems to mind that John just died in an alternate timeline. At the moment, they appear to feel that because there is an alive John, everything is okay. Let’s see how that progresses.

FAILURE ARTIST: Davesprite and present!Dave (who I guess we can just call Dave at this point) talk. Davespite says as a sprite he has lots of knowledge but is obligated to put it in riddles. However, he says he doesn’t feel like it so he’ll answer Dave straight.

DAVE: alright DAVE: here goes DAVE: why are we so fucking awesome DAVESPRITE: thats the best fucking question anybody ever asked

After that best fucking question, Dave asks if John will be alright. Davesprite says that’s up to John, and if John doesn’t listen they’ll just bail him out again. Davesprite says the gear he piled up will help Dave get to the next gate. The two versions of Dave decide to collaborate on a SBaHJ comic and fist “bunp”.

Meanwhile, “hundreds of pages ago”, John gets his bunny from Dave. We see Dave’s note and it’s cool how each of the kids have their own style of handwriting. There’s a very prophetic sentence in this sweet note:

one day your gooberish ways are gonna land you in a jam and i know im going to have to get you off the hook but its cool i got your back bro.

We cut to the present, where John is blasting off. The human emotion of friendship causes him to reconsider his action. John pesters Dave and tells him he’s just flying around and not going to the gate. Crisis averted.

This might seem like a cul de sac, but it created a new character (Davesprite) and introduced many concepts, so it really isn’t.

CHEL: Primarily, it introduced the theme of jumping around in time in the literal sense as well as just hopping between apparently-disconnected scenes. The latter’s not a generally well-advised style of writing, but considering the time travel motif of the comic, I think it actually works fine here. Also, as a webcomic, if one spends too long on one group of characters then by the time you get back to the other ones the readers will probably not remember what happened, so shorter scenes for each group are probably more acceptable than in a novel or movie.

CG trolls John again, and after a discussion of their becoming reverse anti-mutual friends, John complains that CG hasn’t really answered his questions.

CG: SO GO AHEAD, ASK ME ANYTHING. EB: ok... EB: what's the point of the game. CG: ASK SOMETHING ELSE. CG: ALREADY TOLD YOU THAT.

John asks where they are now in their Medium, and CG explains they’re HIDING IN THE VEIL, a meteor belt between the two planets. To clarify the layout for our readers, Skaia the big ball of sky is in the centre, with Prospit the golden planet orbiting it closely enough for its moon to enter Skaia during the “eclipse” where Jade gets her visions. Then there are the players’ Lands, their little adventure planets where the consorts live, the consorts being the little NPC creatures (in John’s case, the salamanders). Every player has a Land of Something and Something. Beyond the Lands is the Veil, and beyond that is the Furthest Ring, the orbit of Derse, the dark planet.

CG: OK, THERE COMES A TIME WHEN BLACK INEVITABLY BEATS WHITE CG: ON THE BATTLEFIELD IN THE CENTER OF SKAIA CG: THE WHITE KING IS CAPTURED OR KILLED OR SOMETHING CG: THAT'S WHEN THE RECKONING STARTS. EB: ok... CG: THE RULERS OF DERSE CG: THE BLACK KING AND QUEEN CG: GET THE POWER TO SEND THE VEIL TOWARD SKAIA CG: TO DESTROY IT CG: THAT KIND OF STARTS YOUR BIG "COUNTDOWN" CG: WHEN SHIT GETS SERIOUS. EB: so then it's up to us to save it? CG: YEAH, YOU HAVE THAT LONG TO KILL THE BLACK QUEEN AND KING CG: AND SKAIA ITSELF SORT OF BUYS YOU SOME TIME CG: BY ACTIVATING ITS DEFENSE PORTALS CG: TO CATCH SOME OF THE METEORS

Ordinarily, the players would have plenty of time before this happens, but something done by the human players has caused things to go wrong, and now they’ve not only ruined their own chance of winning, but somehow affected the trolls’ game too. CG refuses to explain how, because he’s already told him again.

John asks if they’re hiding in a crater or something, but no, CG explains there are buildings in the Veil. It’s considered neutral ground, and both sides have laboratories there where they genetically engineer new soldiers and agents. John asks CG to tell GC “nice try”, but he refuses.

Now comes the mid-point animation of the act, “[S] Jack: Ascend”. I thought it was an ending animation, but no, there’s still more. If you don’t want to or can’t watch video I’ll explain the content, but I do recommend it.

Watch on YouTube

Pan over the Skaian system, from LOWAS to the Veil to the purple towers of Derse. Four towers are close together, topped by orbs. On three of them, we see the silhouettes of the sprites, while the fourth is dark. Jack Noir sits at his desk, doing paperwork, a pink princess dress on a stand next to it. He doodles on a parking ticket, declaring the Black Queen to be a HUGE BITCH. Closeup on BQ’s hips as she approaches, because we totally needed gratuitous sex appeal. She’s remarkably curvy for a probably-non-mammal. Still, we’ll forgive the standard scifi tropes. Jack watches on the Fenestrated Wall, until BQ appears and hacks it in half. She waves the dress and a pink pointed hat at him; apparently, now that the princess doll has been prototyped, the carapaces must represent it in their clothing as well as the jester. Jack is understandably displeased, and after a quick-fire montage of various outfits representing the sprites’ themes, he tears the final colourful tunic up.

Meanwhile, Rose’s dreamself has awoken, and discovers what she wrote on her walls; the word MEOW and other arrangements of the letters M, E, O, and W, over and over again, over every inch of the walls except the part covered by her bed. She finally remembers what Jaspers said to her, which was, of course, MEOW. This seems like nonsense, but as she looks, the letters switch to G, C, A, and T, the letters used to denote DNA nucleotides. It’s a genetic code.

The guardians, meanwhile, are battling enormous monsters; Mom and Dad respectively punch out a three-eyed spider-like giant and a rock cyclops, Dad pausing afterwards to carve a hat on a pyxis tablet, and Bro swordfights against a lava-dwelling tentacle beast.

Back to Jack, matters have got worse; not only are the carapaces required to dress like the sprites, but Davesprite still has the sword sticking through his torso, so now so must Jack. Considering what else we’ve seen carapaces survive, he’d probably be fine, but he’s still understandably hesitant. BQ offers him a sword, but he slices off her ring-bearing finger, which… causes her to explode? Jack puts on the ring, which causes Derse to glow white and him to sprout the features of the sprites; a sword grows from him without him having to fall on it, and wings and tentacles emerge. End scene.

So, approximately, human children have possibly caused the destruction of an alien civilisation’s last hope by putting a cat in a princess dress. Whatever else you think of Homestuck, you can’t say it’s not inventive.

BRIGHT: It is that, among other things.

COUNTS ALL THE LUCK: 0 ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 15 CALL CPA PLEASE: 8 CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 17 GET ON WITH IT!: 17 GORE GALORE: 9 HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 15 HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 6 IN HATE WITH MY CREATION: 0 RELATIONSHIP GOALS?: 1 SEND THEM TO THE SLAMMER: 1 SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS: 0 WHAT IS HAPPENING??: 9 WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 13 TOTAL: 111

#homestuck #homestuck review #homestuck meta #homestuck reread #let's read homestuck

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houseofvans · 6 years ago

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SKETCHY BEHAVIORS | INTERVIEW WITH LAUREN YS

From large scale murals to multi-layered works on canvas, LA based artist Lauren YS’s art captures everything from the female experience, addressing topics like sexuality, death, aliens, monsters, and the occult. Her works are complex much like her own experiences, so we’re super stoked to find out more about what drives her, who and what inspires her, and what challenges and advice she has for our readers in this awesome Sketchy Behaviors interview..

Take the leap!

Photographs courtesy of the artist.

Introduce yourself. Hey! I’m Lauren YS - Hmm, something you might not know … I used to play ice hockey and my favorite candy are Peach O’s. I am a really good listener, but that also means I hate being interrupted. I dream, often, about being underwater.

Tell folks a little about your artwork and what do you love to make works about? I make work about the female experience, sexuality, identity, space, aliens, heritage, death, monsters, nature, emotions, natural phenomena, the occult and whatever else I might be obsessing about. I like slimy creatures, kitsch, psychedelia, sex and Halloween, and mixing repulsion with attraction. I want the viewer to feel unsettled as much as engaged. I make things in an effort to try to process the beautiful shit rocket that is the world around me.

When did art become something you were aware you could do for a living or as a career you wanted to pursue? I have always been making art, but I never thought it was possible to support oneself as an artist: It seemed really out of reach or surreal. It wasn’t until I had already been fully freelance for a year before I realized I was actually doing it. I think it’s just something that comes out of necessity, it’s like – if I want to keep making art as much as possible at the rate I am living, then damn, I’m going to learn how to make money off of it.

What’s a typical studio day for you like? I tend to work nocturnally. I’ll paint through the night and sleep through the day and watch horror movies, listen to podcasts about art, serial killers and cults, and eat anywhere from 1-2 sacks of tangerines every day. I like to really plow through paintings as well, it’s hard for me to stop working on something once I start. After about three weeks in the studio like this, your mind starts to wander off into deep strange places, and that’s when the really good stuff comes out.

What’s your studio or creative space like? What do you keep around to constantly motivate or inspire you? I have always worked best in a bit of “artistic chaos”–I like to fill my space with odds and ends, knick-knacks, items from my travels, talismans. I believe in the power of objects. I love my lava lamp and need to buy seven more. I also have this drawing I made of an Asian grandma screaming “DRAW, MOTHERFUCKER” which I plan to make into a screen print and give to all my artist friends.

When working on a body of paintings and works for a show, what is your process like? How long does it typically take you to complete a painting from start to finish? Depending on the size of the gallery, it can take anywhere from 2-6-10 months to create a show, given that it is often punctuated by mural tours and big projects to pay the bills. I like to work on lots of pieces at the same time, so generally it’ll take a few days to a week or two to finish a piece. I am trying to get better at reworking pieces rather than just pushing through them one by one. Workflow is still sorting itself out. I also make a ton of pieces that end up being nixed from the final show. I am very prolific but also very psychotic.

Not only do you work on canvas, but you are also known for some of your amazing murals! When did you start going from painting on a regular scale to large scale works? What’s your process like for mapping out these large works? Well shucks, thank you! I started painting murals around 2013, which was a sort of natural transition because I wanted to work bigger and bigger, I wanted to travel and be in the sun and use giant machines to make my art. I actually started learning color from using spray paint. I freehand everything because I like to feel independent of projectors or machines, especially if I’m in a foreign country or don’t have time or resources.

It makes me feel empowered to be able to make big things on my own. Maybe that comes from growing up under the common experience girls have, especially asian girls, where you’re expected to be small and quiet and obedient. I have always worked in active aggression against that stereotype.

Is there a medium you’d love to get your hands on, but yet to have the chance too? And what are your go-to materials? I’d really love to learn how to use an airbrush, a la Sorayama. Outside of 2D I am dying to get back into stop motion animation. My favorite brand of spray paint is Montana Black (high pressure forever!), and I use a wide variety of acrylics and gouache in my paintings, specifically the Holbein gouaches from Japan.

What do you love about where you live, and what is the art community like in your area? I never thought I’d move to LA, but I’ve been really enjoying it here. I’m a communal living person (been in and out of communities for about 9 years) and I am lucky to have found somewhere that fits with my work ethic (intense) and social vibe (weird). I like to be able to work alone while still having people bustling around and making things all the time. It helps me to feel like I’m not dead or a total solipsist.

I’ve also found that the artists in LA–especially the female artists–have proven to be really kind, generous and welcoming. There’s a lot of room for weirdos here; it might take a while to find them, but they’re here. We also have a one-eyed cat, did I mention that?

Who are some artists you’re inspired by and have influenced you throughout the years? I’m a big fan of dark/psychedelic/erotic artists like Keiichi Tanaami, Suehiro Maruo, Sorayama and the whole Ero Guro movement. I also love Goya’s dark paintings and the sculpture work of Bernini. Some contemporary artists I’ve been into lately are Christian Rex Van Minnen, David Altmejd, Robin Francesca Williams and the fabric sculptures of Do Ho-Suh. Jamie Hewlett, Swoon, Andrew Hem, Aryz. I find that my taste changes constantly and I am always thirsty for different influences.

What’s been the most challenging part of your art career? What’s been the most rewarding? What do you do to keep the balance? Something really challenging has been learning how to trust myself while growing in the industry and balancing business, work and travel. It’s a really solid test: moving to a new city, providing for yourself, going on tour, shifting from place to place, managing gallery work and mural work, all while protecting and nurturing your own ambition and positivity, and not feed into the shitstorm of capitalism and social media past what is required of you.

The muralist life is not for the faint of heart. I would hardly say that I keep any type of “balance”–art is my life and there isn’t much room for anything else, and that’s how I like it. It is the most rewarding thing to look around and feel like you’ve created something new and good and powerful, all on your own terms. It is similarly rewarding to feel the need to level up - I enjoy feeling stressed arguably more than I enjoy feeling accomplished.

What would your dream collaboration be? What do you enjoy most about collaborations with other artists or clients? I would love to do something with Takashi Murakami and/or his gallery (Kaikai Kiki Gallery). There’s also this amazing Australian animator named Felix Colgrave whose work I’ve been obsessed with lately, I’d love to find a way to make an animated short with him! I love collaborating - especially on mural work - because it’s such a cool experience to be able to intermingle your visual world with someone else’s. Working with ONEQ in Hawaii this year was really great, she had so many suggestions and ideas from out of left field that made me rethink my own work as well. It also forces you to relinquish some control on the way you work, and reflect on the basic joys of making shit in the first place.

If you could paint a portrait of anyone living or dead, who would you choose and why? I really want to do a tripped out portrait of Yayoi Kusama or Bjork or maybe Steve Buscemi—all heroes of mine.

What’s your advice to folks who see what you do and want to pursue art as a career? I would say, go at it as hard as you possibly can! Make sure you really enjoy doing it! Not all parts of painting murals are glamorous (actually, few are) and it’s important to truly love every part of it if you’re going to commit your life to it.

This means: hustling walls, handling machinery, travel, people, logistics, finding somewhere to pee, dealing with unexpected bullshit, not complaining, being comfortable handling yourself in dangerous situations, being independent and resourceful, etc. I have reservations about artists who genuinely don’t seem to enjoy all the elements of mural painting going too deep into it. But if it’s something you love, there’s nothing better.

What are your FAVORITE Vans? I’ve been rocking the classic authentic Vans in black/burgundy as paint shoes for years now. But I also love the Sk8-Hi boys in burgundy… I never wear them because I’m too scared to get paint on them, haha!

What other artists would you love to see interviewed for Sketchy Behaviors? I’m currently really into Andrea Wan, Louise Zhang and Caratoes. It would also be really cool if you covered a GNC or trans artist, like Nomi Chi or Laughing Loone!

What’s next for you that you can share? My first book is coming out this year with Von Zos, and I’m also going to be designing a tarot deck with them. April is my first mural tour in several months; I’ll be hopping from Australia - Guam - Peru, and then moving around South America for a while, trying to practice my spanish. After that, I’ll be starting work on my next big show, scheduled for a city in Asia, which I’m really, really excited about - keep an eye out!

FOLLOW LAUREN YS | WEBSITE | INSTAGRAM | SHOP

#Art #Vans #Vans Girls #Vans Art #Sketchy Behaviors #Interview #Lauren YS

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parttimestorier · 6 years ago

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Interview with d Marie Licea

Recently, I had a chance to talk with d Marie Licea, developer of Us Lovely Corpses, about the creative process behind this fascinating “surreal-horror-romance” visual novel. Us Lovely Corpses is a VN I considered reviewing for this blog when I read it, but I struggled to write a review that would be interesting and accessible—explaining the parts that most impressed and resonated with me would mean spoiling it completely. But I encourage anyone who can handle some disturbing content in service of a great story and heartfelt message to try it out. This interview will start with some more general questions, and it includes a warning farther down before any spoilers for Us Lovely Corpses appear.

Question: Did you always plan for the story of Us Lovely Corpses to be a visual novel, or did you consider other mediums as well?

Answer: In its earliest stages, Us Lovely Corpses was actually planned as a comic! I came up with the original idea somewhere around 2014-2015—it was going to be about 10 pages, and would just cover the scene that ended up being the game's finale. Alex and Marisol (who weren't named yet) were very different—they were much younger, Alex wasn't really "a witch," and Marisol was originally a boy!

I sat on the idea a while, and the longer I did so the more I wanted to explore the history of these characters, which made for a longer and more unwieldy comic. Then in 2015, when I started learning about visual novels, it hit me that the concept could work really well in that format, especially when the "exploration" element came in.

Q: Were there any particular visual novels that influenced you?

A: Yes! The reason why I started getting into visual novels specifically in 2015 was that because that was the year We Know The Devil came out!

We Know The Devil totally shifted my viewpoint as to what a visual novel could be—no diss to dating sims, but before WKTD, I, like most people, just saw VNs as dating sims and occasionally something like the When They Cry series.

WKTD totally changed that for me—a short, incredibly contained story that also managed to be about so, so much, in a surreal, horror-inspired atmosphere . . . it really blew me away! Not only was it the game that got me into visual novels, but you can definitely see a lot of its influence on Us Lovely Corpses.

Besides WKTD, there was also Her Tears Were My Light, a fairly minimalist love story that used the "rewind" function in Ren’Py as part of the story. Utilizing mechanics as part of the narrative was a really cool idea to me that also ended up in ULC. (side note: I met and hired Alex Huang to do the music for Us Lovely Corpses because I loved the soundtrack for HTWML so much!)

Finally, I was really into the original Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney) trilogy when I was younger, and the evidence gathering segments were a big part of those games. I originally envisioned the "rose clipping" segments of ULC like those parts, where you'd have to select each rose before cutting it, but sadly that was a little too complex for me at the time, and I eventually decided to go for something more simple in order to complete the game. But that initial idea was a big part of what made me try Us Lovely Corpses as a game, so it ended up still being a big influence in the end!

Q: Besides technical things like those mechanics and the exploration element, do you find that you have a different style of writing in visual novels as opposed to the stories you've done in other formats, like twine and comics?

A: I'm not sure if this is always the case for visual novels, but I find I have to format my writing differently when writing for VNs—specifically, in length of sentences and paragraphs. I've found my writing worked a lot better in Us Lovely Corpses the more I broke everything up into smaller fragments—larger ones or paragraphs didn't work as well, which can be a problem for me because my writing can tend to get a bit wordy!

This has to do a lot with the pacing of visual novels and how the player/reader is a big part of that. Control over pacing is a big part of why visual novels appeal to me, but you also have to think differently to get the best result.

Technical stuff aside, I found that, at least for ULC, my actual writing style remained pretty much the same. I think this has the benefit of making the writing in Us Lovely Corpses seem unique, but has the disadvantage of posing a problem for a certain something I didn't see coming at all: Let’s Players!

A few people have made videos of their playthroughs of Us Lovely Corpses, which is incredibly exciting, but when I watch them, I can't help but feel bad for them because they always read everything out loud . . . which means, with my somewhat wordy style, they have to do a LOT of talking!

I haven't actually gotten complaints about this or anything, but I still hope people who make videos of their playthroughs of ULC keep some water nearby!

Note: the next part of the interview contains spoilers for Us Lovely Corpses, as well as discussion of mental illness.

Q: As the story progresses, it becomes explicitly clear that the “monster” is Marisol’s bipolar disorder. Did you ever think about leaving the metaphor more ambiguous, and if so, what made you decide to be so direct instead?

A: I'd say if the "monster" was one specific thing, it would her Ocular Rosaceae, as it's the one specific thing that gives a physical form to Marisol's thoughts and unhealthy behaviors. But even that, in a way, is not taking into account her bipolar disorder and depression, her jealousy towards Alex, her self-loathing and introversion . . . "the monster" is all of those things, because at its core, the monster is mental illness. And mental illness is never just one thing, but many things and factors interacting at once to create something much bigger than a single diagnosis.

All that said, it's not incorrect to say that Marisol's bipolar disorder is the monster; it's just more accurate to say it’s part of Marisol's monster. Back when ULC was still a comic, I wasn't going to talk about specific diagnoses, but as the story grew I realized I wanted to talk more explicitly about mental illness. I don't exactly remember where the idea came about, but early on in the writing process I got that idea in my head of Alex finding that fake corpse and finding that doctor's diagnosis. In retrospect, it was a really, really weird scene, especially as it comes right off the heels of realizing what you thought was a dead body was just a weird joke, but I do like what it represents—in the middle of this surreal trip into a house filled with talking flowers, the story suddenly halts as you soak in this very blunt reminder that, magic aside, this is a world that is representative of the real world. Marisol may have a magical disease and be best friends with a witch, but she's a very real girl, so to speak.

So that harsh reminder is part of why I wanted to be so direct. I guess the other part would be that I just wanted to make no bones about it. Some things you want to leave up to interpretation, and some things you don't. From the very, very beginning the story was always about mental illness, so it just felt right to me to be upfront about it.

Q: One thing I noticed that I thought showed a lot of attention to detail in ULC was that in one of the rooms you explore there are two famous paintings that both have connections to suicide (Millais’s Ophelia and van Gogh’s Wheatfield with Crows). Are there any other little symbolic details like that you added to the story that some readers might have missed?

A: Ah, I'm glad you caught that! If I had stuck with the more Ace Attorney style of gameplay I would have liked to put more small details like that in. As it stands, the big example is probably pretty obvious—Alex's notes about each rose are fairly close to the standard "flower language" of different rose colors in real life. The fact that yellow roses can mean "jealousy" or "friendship" depending on what source you use actually ended up working very well with the story.

The last names of Alex and Marisol are probably pretty obvious: de Rosa ("of the Rose") and Flores ("Flowers"). Something that's probably less apparent is Marisol, a name that originally comes from a contraction of "Maria de La Soledad" ("Our Lady Of Solitude"), one of the titles given to the Virgin Mary.

Q: Was the flower language the reason you used roses rather than any other flower, or were there other inspirations for that as well?

A: There were a number of reasons! One being that Revolutionary Girl Utena was a big influence on my style and particularly on several parts of the game. There's also the whole dichotomy with roses/thorns. And there's also the simple fact that I have fun drawing roses!

Q: For my last question, are you working on any other visual novels right now?

A: I am as a matter of fact! I'm working on a visual novel set in Japan about some high school kids who explore a strange house. It's still in fairly early stages, but I think if I give it my all I will actually have a demo ready in time for Halloween, which would be great!

I’m definitely looking forward to seeing that demo—even more so after learning about all of the serious thought d Marie Licea puts into the details and themes of her work. If you’re as excited as I am about updates on her upcoming projects, you can follow her on itch.io or twitter, and considering supporting her patreon. Thanks for reading!

#visual novel #visual novels #d marie licea #us lovely corpses #interview

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pride-vns-blog · 6 years ago

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LGBTQ VN Week: Day Two! (6/19)

Welcome back for my second day of LGBTQ visual novel recommendations! If you didn’t check out my first post, I recommend at least skimming the "One note before we get started” section to get a handle on what this series of posts is. (And especially, as the case may be, what it isn’t.)

Today’s topic is “crafty creative design”, so I’ve pulled out Marccus’s Eldet, Geek Remix and ChicMonster’s Pairanormal, and Team Rumblebee’s Love Is Strange to talk about their development teams’ ambition (and ability to deliver), followed by a discussion with Boys Laugh+ about their 2017 NaNoRenO entry, //TODO: today!

Keep on reading to hear about treasure hunts with hot guys, mysterious twists and turns, power in reimagined narratives, and why taking time to look for brand-new visual novels you’ve never heard of before can be worth your while!

ELDET (MARCCUS)

Kickstarter Tagline: "A medieval fantasy themed visual novel with emphasis on LGBT characters and people of color.” Genre(s): Historical fantasy. Release Date: July 1st, 2017(?) (updated demo); TBA (full version). Content Warnings: Fantasy violence.

When it comes to aiming for new heights with visual novel storytelling and art, Marccus’s Eldet is one of the most standout examples of ambition — if it’s a possibility or a feature you could potentially implement, you’ll probably be able to find a mention of it somewhere in Marccus’s Eldet development updates on Kickstarter. They’re jam-packed with information about ways he’s exploring different ideas for interlocking narratives, replay value, or using the absolutely gorgeous art to its full potential. If the final version lives up to even a tenth of what Marccus has demonstrated working to include over the past two years, that ambition and drive to see things through as much as possible will almost definitely provide one hell of a visual novel.

Strictly looking at the demo alone, though, still provides a uniquely detailed experience where focus on trying out new things that suit the story is crystal-clear. The writing is sharp and captivating, with an interesting plot and gorgeous scenery that’s complimented by a smart use of animated effects. There have been more and more visual novels that have branched into the use of things like Live2D or animated sprites, but for me as a player, it’s been interesting to see how far use of effects like that can go before they just plain old start to be distracting. Idle animations or things like blinking and breathing can be charming, but the uncanny valley is very real and very easy to dive headlong into if you’re trying to include as many of those as possible.

So Eldet’s demo is noteworthy to me not just for trying out all of the visual effects it can manage, but even moreso for knowing by and large where to place those effects and varying sprites for the best possible impact. Characters are integrated into different backgrounds for special conversational scenes, or specific parts of event graphics glow, and none of it — to my eyes, at least — felt overused or poorly-executed. In fact, it all seemed especially suited to the fantasy genre Eldet is fitting itself into, with all of the pieces working together to create a world that feels alive and breathing. And it’s a world that seems well worth waiting for a final version of!

Eldet’s demo is available now on Kickstarter; you can also keep up with the final version’s progress on its development blog, or follow Marccus on Twitter and Patreon (18+).

PAIRANORMAL (GEEK REMIX, CHICMONSTER)

Itchio Tagline: "Love is a mystery and so are ghosts.” Genre(s): Mystery, romance. Release Date: April 1st, 2018 (Chapter 1); TBA (Chapters 2+). Content Warnings: Glitches and static (can be turned off); jumpscares.

There have been a couple "real person dating sim" visual novels in the past few years, but I've never really been all that interested in actually playing any of them; I can see the connection back to all those elaborate magazine quizzes about which celebrity you'd date, so I think they're interesting conceptually, but none of them have really pulled me in. I'm equally wary of the trend of Western visual novels from first-time developers that want to "subvert genre conventions" because of how many have fallen woefully flat of even understanding what that means beyond a very limited scope — I'm talking "oh, I don't really like or play any visual novels, the whole medium isn’t for me" visual novel developer commentary, here — so if an EVN promises a twist on a genre, or even if its players do, it's unfortunately a lot harder to sell me on it.

To my pleasant surprise, Pairanormal's demo sold me on both its "real person-inspired characters" aspects and its departure from the dating-based focus I'd been expecting into sharing space with another genre! I don't want to spoil anything about the plot, but upfront, the turn in the demo alone was a genuinely interesting look at a “blank protagonist” and well-served by being placed where it was. That’s to say nothing of the charming art style! Mechanically and visually, it's also one of the most interesting visual novels I've played; the character movement, the individual soundfonts, and the pacing of the dialogue all come together to work consistently well. (I love smartly-used soundfonts! Please give me all your VNs with good soundfonts!)

Even as someone who's watched a handful of YouTube playthroughs by two of the YouTubers being shown here, Mari and Stacey of Geek Remix, the writing in Pairanormal was sharp and fast-paced enough to actually make my brain draw a pretty easy divide between the real Mari and Stacey versus "Mari Sashimi" and "Stacey Croft". I'm sure there's plenty of rewarding jokes for their primary audience of a Geek Remix fanbase, too — but one of the strongest merits of Pairanormal for me as a player was the experience of having so little personal familiarity with most of the people these characters were based on and still finding the characters enjoyable, well-defined, and interesting.

Chapter 1 of Pairanormal is available now for free; you can also follow development of the coming chapters on Chicmonster’s Patreon, Twitter, and Itchio.

LOVE IS STRANGE (TEAM RUMBLEBEE)

Blog Tagline: "A fanwork based off of Life is Strange.” Genre(s): Slice of life, romance. Release Date: April 1st, 2016. Content Warnings: Drug use; underage drinking; mentions of severe bullying.

Do those characters and that title look familiar? If you’ve paid attention to the gaming scene at large in the past three years, you probably recognize the acronym "LiS” or Max Caulfield’s character design — Team Rumblebee’s 2016 debut project, Love is Strange, came to life as a Life is Strange (DONTNOD Entertainment) fanmade visual novel! In Love is Strange, set a year later after the original game in a completely different timeline, protagonist Max never gained her canonical magical powers and many of the tragedies that gripped Arcadia Bay never came to pass. Instead, she’s given a week to team up with one of her four love interests — Chloe, Kate, Rachel, or Victoria — and win a photography contest together.

There’s a lot to love about it beyond any connection you may or may not have to Life is Strange itself — everything, from the art to the music to the writing, pulls together seamlessly. But the biggest strength of Love is Strange as a fanwork, in my opinion, is the way it’s not trying to totally remove itself from the original canon tonally or trying too hard to conform to that tone without it seeming natural. Max’s character arc is reflective of some anxieties she’d had in the original story, which goes doubly for the explorations of her love interests’ arcs, but it’s fundamentally a different story where her priorities are different. Love is Strange loses what isn’t necessary or what doesn’t help the story — including the teacher-turned-[spoilers] from the original series, Mr. Jefferson — then fills in a lot of the blanks with the same charm and same compelling characters that captivated fans in the first place.

My favorite example here is Rachel Amber, one of the four routes but the lone one who never appeared in the text of the original Life is Strange itself, and a route that felt as wholly comprehensive as the rest. Love is Strange takes the perpetually absent, long-since-departed Rachel and recreates her from whole cloth, giving her a distinctive speech pattern, a history, and a set of beliefs that all work together as a perfect answer for the void around her character in the original text. She feels as real and authentic as the rest of the pitch-perfect cast, a character it’s difficult to imagine the original Life is Strange without. So in both enhancing the original text’s characterizations without ever losing its charm and standing alone as its own thoughtful, genuine F/F dating sim that is just as enjoyable without any fondness for the canon, Love is Strange easily cemented itself as one of my favorite visual novels — so strongly, in fact, that I’m still planning to cheer on Team Rumblebee’s individual and collective outputs for years to come.

Love is Strange is available now for free on the development blog. You can also follow Team Rumblebee on Twitter, Tumblr, and Itch.io to be the first to know if they decide to release anything next!

//TODO: TODAY (BOYS LAUGH PLUS)

Itchio Tagline: "A visual novel about figuring out life with the help of an AI.” Genre(s): Modern sci-fi. Release Date: March 31st, 2017 (Part 1); August 2018 (Part 2). Content Warnings: Depictions of severe depression.

Player personalization is one of the more tricky things for developers, largely in part because there’s no way to write something every player will be happy with; while some people prefer being able to insert themselves entirely into a protagonist with minimal predefined personality and more vague actions, so they can headcanon more easily, other audiences would rather explore specific situations with a smaller number responses that each more clearly reflect the defined protagonist’s personality. It’d be nearly impossible to please both of those groups at once — and there’s dozens of other, more specific takes that other players can have on visual novel protagonists!

As someone in the latter camp out of just those two examples, I thought //TODO: today’s handling of their protagonist Teal (plus their love interests Joyce and Phoenix) was right up my alley, so I reached out to Felix and Rohan of Boys Laugh+ to talk about their work on its story!

IVAN: Pleasure to be talking to you both today! Can you give me the elevator pitch of //TODO: today that you might give to an interested attendee at a con? You're both free to answer this if you'd like, haha.

FELIX: Sure, thanks for having us! //TODO: today is a slice of life visual novel about the aspiring artist Teal who already struggles to make ends meet but things get a little more complicated when an AI suddenly appears in their computer, with the intention to help Teal get their life back in order.

Perfectly put! (I like the phrasing of "aspiring artist Teal", haha, I feel like I'm reading their Twitter bio.) The gender/sexuality/pronoun options (and what I've seen of the dialogue variations) for the protagonist plus the romanceable characters are comprehensive, but never in a way that feels insincere or bland. I really feel like Teal's character — and that of both love interests — shines through strongly no matter what! What went into designing the personalization system as it currently exists, and why did you choose to include it in the first place?

ROHAN: Haha, yeah, Teal is the type who's a bit insecure about their art. So it's easier to say "aspiring artist" even though Teal has been drawing for a while. :'D Although our protagonist has their quirks and own background story we wanted the player to be able to identify with Teal. The player can choose to change Teal's name in the beginning of the game too. And the gender and sexuality options are based on this idea. :3

Back when we were developing the concept for //TODO: today in 2017, we had a close look at other recent VNs. And Date Nighto's Hustle Cat got us thinking about using "they" pronouns then. Hustle Cat's protagonist "Avery" has a gender-neutral design too. That got the ball rolling for us to think how we could make the typical romance situation in //TODO: today inclusive and enjoyable for queer people as well!^u^

FELIX: We also tried to keep the additional work for this fairly small. For the three main characters all pronouns and their variations are stored in variables. That makes it pretty easy to use the same base dialogue regardless of the characters' gender. But in addition to that, we used conditional statements to add some custom dialogue whenever it made sense. The romantic preferences are pretty much the same. They mainly decide the gender of the romanceable characters but there are a few moments where dialogue varies depending on the preferences the player chooses.

That also means that there are some things that people will miss if they don't make a specific selection of gender or romantic preferences but we wanted to make sure that those choices are also part of the characters and the writing and not purely cosmetic. All in all we tried to make the game as inclusive of LGBTQ identities as we could without making the scope unrealistically big for a two person team.

I think you definitely struck a good balance there! If I'm not mistaken, the two of you work in Ren'Py, right? What kind of Ren'Py limits or perks do you take into consideration when working to augment a story with more complex pieces of code other than dialogue variables, like deciding what your upcoming project Defaction's cellphone (?) can do? Anything you've unfortunately had to give up on? (And are there any lines of dialogue or features you're especially proud of including in //TODO: today?)

FELIX: Yeah, we're working in Ren'Py. I can't really think of any limits aside from smaller issues where different systems and languages intersect but there have definitely been a lot of perks! I really like Ren'Py's screen system which is where at least 80% of the work for the phone in Defaction happens.

The python integration is also really nice. In //TODO: today I barely used any python aside from if-statements and variables but being able use custom code pretty much anywhere in the script makes the engine really flexible!

As for feature decisions, so far we mainly based them on what we wanted to include from a narrative design standpoint and then tried to figure out how or if we would be able to implement them. I can't think of anything we had to cut for technical reasons so I think it worked out pretty well so far :'D

//TODO: today was the first bigger visual novel I worked on and aside from the gender and preference options for the characters, something I'm pretty proud of are the optional work and gaming scenes. They are pretty much the first piece of non-linear writing I ever did and it was a fun challenge to make sure they make sense regardless of what in-game day the player sees them on.

ROHAN: I think the most obvious feature we're proud of are the preference options we included, haha. We really wanted to take a few steps aside of the otome or exclusively hetero male-oriented genres out there. And to make the experience feel tailored to the player there are the dialogue features Felix has described before in combination with the visual designs of Joyce, the AI, and Phoenix, Teal's bookstore co-worker.

It's integrated into the story that Joyce has been made just for the Teal. Other AIs in the world would look different depending on their owners. That's why you get a feminine or masculine looking Joyce that match the player's preferences.

Of course there are limitations, I mean, we can't read the players mind to know what they like. And we couldn't include too many unique character sprites due to the scope. But I'm very happy about how the different designs turned out in the end. It was generally fun to visually design the game. Cute colours everywhere! >u<

On another note I think what really went well, too, was how AI Joyce behaves. We took some liberties with sci-fi magic, but Joyce is a being with their own set of characteristics, goals and values. They were made to serve, yet they're on eye-level with Teal and you get some funny situations out of it.

That's right, I'd completely forgotten that the work and art contest scenes weren't confined to the story's timeline on any specific dates — they definitely always felt like they matched up. And I'm so glad you brought up the designs, Rohan, that was actually my next question! The overall world design and character stylization of //TODO: today clearly had a considerable amount of care put into making sure they all meshed well and looked good individually! Can you talk a little bit about why you settled on the design aesthetic you did and what influenced //TODO: today's style or character designs? (Also, who are each of your favorite characters out of the cast, visually or personality-wise?)

ROHAN: Ah, well. First and foremost we were under a good amount of time-pressure during the NaNoRenO '17. Thus I had to decide for an artstyle that I could pull off for the game's assets to be produced in time. There's no complicated shading, not too much intriciate line-work. It was also the first time for me to create art for a visual novel. I was mostly a concept artist before. So I wanted to play it safe. That's one part of the story at least.

The other thing was that by the end of 2016 a lot of artists have emerged online who experimented with reduced palettes, pastel tones and comic and anime inspired shading. I was really intrigued by the charm of this combination. I wanted to make myself feel okay that although I'm a guy I can express myself in shades of pink, haha. This kind of aesthetic also matches the overall cute but realistic story of //TODO: today. I wanted the reality of the game to feel like our world but with some intense photo filters on top, haha. And my favourite character(s)? As the artist who designed them, I'd say visually all of them! xD But character wise, I think it's a close head-to-head of Joyce and SuuJ. <3

FELIX: I think my favorite character is Snow. I also really like Zen's design and his relaxed personality, but Snow was really fun to write! They're reserved and don't show much about their insecurities or problems, but Snow is still fairly confident and mature for their age.

I think a lot of that personality was also inspired by the art. Snow's design really brings across how introverted they are and because Snow doesn't have a lot of facial expressions, this definitely influenced the way I wrote some of their dialogue.

As a big fan of pastels/pinks, I can definitely empathize with that desire to express it more in art regardless of gender, haha! If you could each add any one feature to your projects that's currently beyond of your technical/artistic capabilities, a "wildest dreams" kind of thing, what would those two features be?

FELIX: I'm really intrigued by the idea of procedural narrative. Not in the sense that a story is random, but rather that it's systemic and somewhat non-linear. That's not really something you can just add to any project though and it probably also involves a lot of trial and error before it works but maybe one day :'D

ROHAN: Oh, nice question! I think it would be super cool to have hand-drawn animated cutscenes in a game. But that's completely beyond our budget of...everything...right now. TuT

Haha, I would love to play a procedural visual novel with animated cutscenes! (Although those two things combined would add even more work to each other, huh? #gamedev!) One final question — do you two have any LGBTQ visual novel recommendations from any other teams or creators?

FELIX: Ladykiller In a Bind left a pretty strong impression on me. In general, Christine Love's visual novels are usually really interesting mechanically in addition to their LGBTQ themes.

Most people probably already heard of Butterfly Soup but I really liked how heartfelt it is and the way the story is told!

And we already mentioned Hustle Cat, which is interesting in the way the main story and the romance routes are intertwined in addition to allowing you to romance all characters regardless of gender.

ROHAN: Hahaha, just imagine creating cutscenes for every generatable piece of story. That would be a killer xD And yes, I'd agree with what Felix wrote. The games by Christine Love, are really well written. Butterfly Soup is a fun ride and way too relatable for people growing up with Asian families. I also play The Arcana on my phone right now. I don't like the payment system too much but the story and characters are well-developed. And the artstyle is just gorgeous!

But one should also keep an eye on indie devs who aren't too well-known. Visual novels seem to generally be on the rise right now and we'll surely find some nice surprises if we keep looking! :3

Definitely agreed that people can find some really pleasant surprises by doing deep dives into places like Itchio's VN tag — or hopefully even from my list and these interviews, haha! Thank you both so much for talking to me, Rohan and Felix, it's been a pleasure.

The first half of //TODO: today is available now for free, or you can follow Boys Laugh + on their Twitter and Itchio accounts to find out more about their progress on the second half!

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douchebagbrainwaves · 3 years ago

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THIS IS GREAT NEWS FOR THE MARGINAL, WHO RETAIN THE ADVANTAGES OF BEING AN INSIDER, AND IN SOME KINDS OF WORK—THAT HACKING WAS COLD, PRECISE, AND METHODICAL, AND THAT HE DID ALL THE ACTUAL DESIGN OF THE APPLE I AND APPLE II IN HIS APARTMENT OR HIS CUBE AT HP

But gradually I realized it wasn't luck. We need a language that lets us scribble and smudge and smear, not a pen. For a long time I felt bad about this, just as in principle you could avoid it, just as writers and painters and architects do. But this mistake is less excusable than most. Boy, was I wrong. In hacking, like painting, work comes in cycles. So did Apple. But I've talked to a lot of servers and a lot of ideas come from the margin is simply that there's so much of it.1 I behave in a way that would make me eligible for prescription drugs if I approached everyday life the same way.

Over and over we see the same pattern. Maybe I'm excessively attached to conciseness.2 Chardin decided to skip all that and paint ordinary things as he saw them. But Cybercash was so bad and most stores' order volumes were so low that it was very remiss of me to have forgotten all that stuff within three weeks of the final exam.3 If I could get people to remember just one quote about programming, it would be a 900-page pastiche of existing popular novels—roughly Gone with the Wind plus Roots.4 In hacking, this can literally mean saving up bugs. It turns out there is, and the visual arts is the resistance of the medium. It's never so pure as it was when they were young.5 It wouldn't be the first time investors learned that lesson from founders.6 That phrase draws in most threads I've mentioned here.

Shakespeare appeared just as professional theater was being born, and pushed the medium so far that every playwright since has had to live in his shadow. The other problem with startups is that there are today. If I had only looked over at the other makers. But there are plenty of dumb people who are bad at empathy too.7 I had an uncomfortable feeling in the back of my mind that I ought to know more theory, and that means that investor starts to lose deals. So, if hacking works like painting and writing, is it as cool?8 Outsiders are not merely free but compelled to make things that are cheap and lightweight.9 When they're raising money, for example, what would happen if the government decided to commission someone to write an official Great American Novel. A better way to describe the situation would be to shirk it, but you'll have it all to yourself. Relentless. In particular, new things.10 This is already clear in cases like GPSes, music players, and cameras.

So it was literally IPO or bust. Imagine, for example. Most writers write to persuade, I'd start to shy away unconsciously from ideas I knew would be hard to sell. So that, I think. Inappropriate is the null criticism. It was like watching a car you're chasing turn down a street that you know has no outlet. Facebook did. So hackers start original, and get good, and get good, and get good, and get original. But in retrospect you're probably better off studying something moderately interesting with someone who isn't. There's nothing more than a slight stirring of discomfort. That's why oil paintings look so different from watercolors.

But I think the goal of an essay should be to discover surprising things.11 Some hackers are quite smart, but they can't have looked good on paper. You might as well open it. Particularly to young companies that are otherwise benevolent. Someone who doesn't know what these things are, either. Similarly, you shouldn't be discouraged by the comparatively corrupt test of college admissions, because it's a game you can't lose.12 And when you do it consciously you'll do it even better. How common is it for founders to keep control after an A round? If you're not sure what to do, and engineers figure out how to connect some company's legacy database to their Web server.13 Com of their name.

Considering how basic a red circle is, it seemed surprising to me when we started YC. There's a huge weight of tradition advising us to play it safe. The way I worked, it seemed surprising to me that any employer would be reluctant to let hackers work on open-source hacking is all about.14 But so do people who inherit money, and another for love. Give hackers an inch and they'll take you a mile. How long will it take to catch up with where you'd have been if you were extracting every penny?15 Not merely hardware, but software too. But this wasn't what made them eminent—it was more a flaw their eminence had allowed them to sink into. In hacking, like painting, work comes in cycles. This is what open-source projects. Add up all the evidence of VCs' behavior, and the key to the mystery is the old adage a word to the wise is sufficient.

The fact that you can change font sizes easily means the iPad effectively replaces reading glasses. Just wait till you've agreed on a price and think you have a US startup called X and you don't have to act like VCs. Programmers were seen as technicians who translated the visions if that is the word of product managers into code. When people walk by the portrait of Ginevra de Benci, their attention is often immediately arrested by it, even before they look at the work of a painter in chronological order, you'll find that each painting builds on things that could steal that prestige. That version 4. The puffed-up companies that went public during the Bubble didn't do it just because they were pulled into it by unscrupulous investment bankers. They ask whatever it is they're asking in such a roundabout way that the hosts often have to rephrase the question for them. Whereas hackers, from the start, are doing original work; it's just very bad. Since the custom is to write to persuade the actual reader, someone who doesn't will seem arrogant. If hackers identified with other makers, like writers and painters and architects do. I like debugging: it's the standard image.16 In return for the unique privilege of sharing his office with no other humans, he had to share it with 6 shrieking tower servers.

Notes

This is actually from the most, it's probably good grazing. One of the Daddy Model and reality is the last step in this evolution. I have a better education. So in effect why can't you be more like a body cavity search by someone who doesn't understand what you're doing.

Many of these companies substitute progress for revenue growth.

Yes, I didn't realize it yet or not, don't even want to approach a specific firm, the more effort you expend on the matter. I think it's confusion or lack of results achieved by alchemy and saying its value was as much what other people thought it was considered the most visible index of that generation had been raised religious and then just enjoy yourself for the same weight as any successful startup?

There are circumstances where this is not even be an inverse correlation between launch magnitude and success. It's hard for us, they have to say exactly what they're doing. Maybe that isn't the problem, we should make the fund by succeeding spectacularly.

That way most reach the stage where they're sufficiently convincing well before Demo Day. The continuing popularity of religion is the place for people interested in each type of thing. Though they were getting results.

We currently advise startups mostly to ignore what your GPA was. People and The CRM114 Discriminator.

A preliminary result, that all metaphysics between Aristotle and 1783 had been climbing in through the buzz that surrounds wisdom in ancient philosophy may be whether what you learn via users anyway. The University of Vermont, 1991. A round about the origins of the biggest discoveries in any field.

One VC who read this to realize that in fact they don't, but some do. You can relent a little too narrow than to confuse everyone with a base of evangelical Christians. On Bullshit, Princeton University Press, 1983. I called to check and in fact they don't have to.

When I was there when it was the ads they show first.

This is a case in point: lots of type II startups neither require nor produce startup culture.

In practice the first wave of hostile takeovers in the narrow technical sense of things economists usually think about, just as if it were. If they're dealing with YC companies that grow slowly tend not to say they care above all about big markets, why is New York. 0001. In a limited way, I should degenerate from words to their returns.

That's a valid point. Everyone's taught about it. 5 more I didn't.

The reason only 287 have valuations is that they've already decided what they're selling and how unbelievably annoying it is to let yourself feel it mid-game. So it's a collection itself. When I was surprised to find a kid and as a definition of property is driven by bookmarking, not an associate cold-emailing a startup. It would be to say yet how much you get nothing.

The main one was nothing special. For similar reasons, the users' need has to be a hot deal, I mean forum in the sense of the 1929 crash. And to a partner, not because Delicious users are not one of the 70s, moving to Monaco would only give you 11% more income, which a few months later Google paid 1.

The golden age of economic equality in the sample might be able to respond with extreme countermeasures. These points don't apply to types of studies, studies of returns from startup investing, which would cause HTTP and HTML to continue to maltreat people who start these supposedly smart investors may not be formally definable, but trained on corpora of stupid and non-stupid comments instead.

One of the biggest divergences between the initial plan and what the valuation of the founders chose? But becoming a police state. There is not that the most successful companies have been a good nerd, just that it is more efficient.

Thanks to Geoff Ralston, Trevor Blackwell, Neil Rimer, and Robert Morris for the lulz.

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otapleonehalf · 7 years ago

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Defining Anime

What is anime? Before we can define something we have to know what it is we’re defining.

The Entomology of Anime

Remember the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding and how he insisted that every word comes from Greek?

So no one is actually sure where the word “anime” (written in Japanese as: アニメ) actually came from, but there are two main theories.

The first, is that it’s effectively an abbreviation of the English word “animation”.

animation -> animeishiyon -> anime

This is the currently more popular theory. The second theory, which was more popular in the 80s, is that it’s derived from the French word “animé” meaning animated or lively.

animé -> anime

But it doesn’t matter which theory you like because both the English and the French are derived from the same Latin root “anima” meaning spirit. And the Latin is in turn derived from the Greek “anemos” meaning wind.

anemos -> anima -> animation -> animeishiyon -> anime

anemos -> anima -> animé -> anime

So there you go.

Defining Anime

Anime as it’s used in the Japanese language is simply the word for animation, any and all kinds.

But anime as it’s used in the English language is used to refer to animation that originates from Japan.

Look up “anime” in an English dictionary and we get this:

Dictionary definition an·i·me noun: a style of animation originating in Japan that is characterized by stark colorful graphics depicting vibrant characters in action-filled plots often with fantastic or futuristic themes. – Merriam Webster Dictionary (2017)

The dictionary definition is obviously just meant for someone who has never heard of anime and has no concept of what it could be. It gives a very generalized idea of what anime is, and isn’t useful to those who specialize in the niche interest.

As a result, English speaking anime fandom has been left to their own devices when it comes to defining the word that describes what it is they’re passionate about.

Defining by Nationality

I want to get this one out of the way. Monty Oum, the director of RWBY, puts it nicely in an interview from 2013:

“Some believe just like Scotch needs to be made in Scotland, an American company can’t make anime. I think that’s a narrow way of seeing it. Anime is an art form, and to say only one country can make this art is wrong.“

It’s not as if only Japanese people are allowed to write haiku or play the biwa. There’s no reason anime should be enforced as an art form that’s dependent on the artist’s citizenship status. So let’s move on to a different method.

Defining by Geography

Animation that was entirely made in Japan and then solely released in Japan may have once been a commonality but contemporary anime is a vaster art form that can’t be pinned to a single point on a map, thanks to globalization. After all as western fans, we’re proof that anime has crossed boarders and expanded beyond Japan.

Many anime are not even physically made in Japan anymore. In 2012, Jonathan Clements estimated a third of the labor for Japanese animation was outsourced outside of Japan and speculates that number has only risen since.

Hand animation for in-betweens and other parts of the animating process are outsourced primarily to South Korea, but also other places like China and India, for the sake of cutting costs. A simple solution many take is to simply insist that only the lead creatives of an animated project must reside in Japan in order for that project to be categorized as anime. Yet there are many examples where none of the projects staff reside in Japan, providing widely accepted exceptions to the idea that anime must be created in Japan.

South Korean animation is included in online anime databases such as MyAnimeList, Anime-Planet and Kitsu. Films that are entirely produced and debut in South Korea like Yobi the Five Tailed Fox, The House and Oseam are counted as anime by the aforementioned sites despite having no apparent connection to Japan.

Simply expanding Japan’s aura to neighboring countries doesn’t tidy things up as one of America’s largest anime conventions has yet to realize.

Otakon tries to take the geography route when defining anime, as in anime music video, for its annual event. Here’s an except from Otakon’s AMV Guidelines via its website in 2017:

“’Anime’ footage is loosely determined by the animation studio that produced the art for the show. If it is an Asian studio, then the footage will likely be allowed. If it is not, then your entry could be disqualified.

Sorry, but by this definition, ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ and ‘The Legend of Korra’ are not ‘anime’ and will be disqualified.

We have to draw the line somewhere.”

Otakon defines anime as animation produced by an Asian studio, ergo making Avatar footage disqualified from its AMV competitions.

But whoever came up with this policy clearly didn’t choose the best wording. The studios responsible for the art and animation of Avatar are DR Movie, JM Animation and MOI Animation which are all South Korean studios. South Korea is an Asian country, ergo Avatar actually fits Otakon’s definition of anime perfectly.

It doesn’t make sense to narrow anime down to animation that was made in Japan, debuts in Japan and intended solely for the Japanese market just so it can be tied down to one spot on the planet. This method isn’t useful when there are anime conceived to cater to overseas markets like Afro Samurai, Space Dandy, and The Big O II which were developed with the intention of airing on American TV. Nor does it provide clear guidelines for when Japanese studios collaborate with talent from around the world, like in the cases Oban Star Racers and Mysterious Cities of Gold which are both French co-productions. Is it really worth excluding such titles from the category of anime in the current global era? I think not.

Defining by Art Style

This is a fun one. Anime is anime because it looks like anime, right?

But what does anime look like?

When most people hear the word anime, certain visual qualities spring to mind. Big shiny eyes, crazy colored hair that stands on end, long bodies in elaborate costumes. Shows like Yu-Gi-Oh!, Sailor Moon, Code Geass, Tenchi Muyo!, and Lucky Star flash in our heads when we think about the art style associated with anime.

But if that’s what anime really looks like, then why would there be an discontent over shows like Avatar or RWBY being called anime?

We’ve already gone over why the country of origin of these shows isn’t the best measure, so what’s wrong with just judging an anime by its looks?

The issue with this approach is that it’s incredibly subjective. There’s no list a visual traits shared among all anime. Anime like Tekkonkinkreet and the Tatami Galaxy hardly resemble the same art style of shows like Sailor Moon.

They might not immediately come to mind when the medium of anime is mentioned but that doesn’t mean they don’t still exist within that medium.

And then there’s anime that imitate western animation and actively defy typical Japanese aesthetics, like FLCL or Panty and Stocking.

In the case of Panty and Stocking, not only is the whole show modeled after a western art style (as opposed to only a few seconds), but the content of the series is effectively a love letter to western media. Under the assumption that anime must have a certain look to it, a show like Panty and Stocking would have it’s anime status revoked.

So even if there is a supposive art style only anime can have, when did that art style come into being?

Classics that originate from the 1960s like Kimba the White Lion and Sazae-san pull heavy inspiration from western animation.

Astro Boy fits in much better with characters like Steamboat Willie and Betty Boop than he does with any of the characters from say, Akira or One Piece. So is it really okay to exclude works as important and influential as Astro Boy from anime because the art style is dated?

Personally, I’m glad not everything in anime shares the same art style. I’m not sure the medium would have the same appeal if every thing looked like this.

(This is from Kamichama Karin by the way.)

The medium of anime clearly encompasses infinite art styles that don’t necessarily share key qualities with each other, rendering art style a useless means of defining anime as a whole.

So what methods of defining anime are even left at this point?

Defining by Intended Audience

This is my personal method of defining anime and it’s the most practical method I’ve encountered, and that is to define anime by intended audience. If an animated work is intended for a Japanese audience OR an audience of anime fans, then it’s anime.

Here’s a flowchart to help explain it:

Let’s run through some examples with this method:

Sailor Moon

Is it an animated work? Yes -> Was it originally made for a Japanese audience? Yes -> It’s an Anime

RWBY

Is it an animated work? Yes -> Was it originally made for a Japanese audience? No -> Does it resemble Japanese animation? Yes -> Was it made for fans of Japanese animation?

The creators of RWBY have been explicit about how they set out to create something that anime fans would enjoy, so the answer is Yes -> It’s an anime

Avatar: The Last Airbender

Is it an animated work? Yes -> Was it originally made for a Japanese audience? No -> Does it resemble Japanese animation? Yes -> Was it made for fans of Japanese animation?

Well, Avatar aired on Nickelodeon and was geared toward children who watch Nickelodeon, whether those kids knew about or liked anime wasn’t relevant. No -> It’s not an anime

But the creators of Avatar have talked about how they took inspiration from Japanese animation and Asian media and knew that what they made could appeal to anime fans and wanted those fans to be able to enjoy the show as well. Yes -> It’s an anime

So something like Avatar could be argued either way BUT AT LEAST YOU CAN ARGUE IT!

You can back up which ever conclusion you reach with this method using context that surrounds any title. No more debates that are baseless like:

“But Avatar looks like anime!” What does anime really look like? Style is subjective. There are plenty of anime Avatar doesn’t resemble at all.

“But Avatar isn’t from Japan!” Neither is a lot of anime. Anime is medium of art, one that can, has and will continue to expand beyond Japan’s borders.

This method gives one the ability to construct a logical argument on why something should or shouldn’t be considered anime.

That said, there is a hole in my method. That hole is a universal audience. What if an animated work is aimed at everybody?

There’s a few examples that I think fit this case.

Ghibli movies, specifically the more recent ones, are made while the staff is well aware that their work is going to be seen overseas and that their audience is not just confined to Japan. Ghibli films are popular all over the world, and not just with anime fans.

Pokemon is another example of an anime becoming a international phenomenon. It has effectively grown out of the label of anime and is something much bigger that’s meant for global audiences to consume.

So is it possible for something to expand beyond the label of anime and become something more universal? I consider the examples above to still be anime. I don’t think it matters, at least for now, but it is worth thinking about as our world and the media with it becomes more and more global.

So next time you’re debating what is and isn’t anime, try considering who was intended to consume the work. It could make navigating those grey areas of anime a little easier.

[This post was adapted from my panel “But That’s NOT Anime!”. The information in this post was last updated Aug. 2017]

OtapleOneHalf.com // OtapleOneHalf.tumblr.com

#avatar: the last airbender #rwby #anime #legend of korra

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theinternetinterviewed · 5 years ago

Text

Ben Harvey, An Architect Who Puts His Life On The Line

The most popular video game to come from Slovenia is Line Rider. The object of Line Rider is to design a track for a boy on a sled to ride. In doing this, players becomes architects. Released in 2006, there are thousands of Line Rider tracks and the longest ever is titled This Will Destroy You, 50 minutes long with 2.7 million views. Ben Harvey, its maker, is a man whose sense of sight is influenced by what he hears and he therefore is able to translate musical tracks into Line Rider tracks. To watch two minutes of the video is to see a series of satisfying, sight-to-sound synchronizations. To watch twenty minutes is to narrow your attention in such a way that the boy’s experience become your own and to watch the full thing it to live the definition of the word ‘journey.’

A: Is this Ben?

B: This is Ben. You’re two hours early. A: Am I really?

B: That’s okay though.

A: Are you sure?

B: Its 1. But that’s okay though.

A: You’re cool to jump into this early?

B: We can jump into it now.

A: Cool. My name is Austin. Nice to meet you.

B: Nice to meet you. My name is Ben.

A: Hi, Ben. I have a blog called The Internet, Interviewed. It’s where I interview people who do cool things and you are one of them.

B: That sounds very broad.

A: Oh, it’s the most broad thing. Have you been interviewed before?

B: I have been interviewed a couple of times. I don’t think any of them are going to take the format that you’re doing here.

A: As in, on the phone?

B: On the phone and *pause* most of the people who have interviewed me before were in the scene of Line Rider. You’re more on the outside, if that makes sense.

A: I just like the videos.

B: *laughs*

A: I’ve seen your essays and very little of them makes sense to me.

B: *laughs*

A: This will take about 60 minutes. I have a bunch of questions. Some are funny, some nostalgic, some serious. Answer however you like. I know you’re a thoughtful, articulate guy so if you digress or tell a story, that’s fine with me. This is an interview and you’re the subject.

B: Great.

A: My first question: how did you find Line Rider and how old are you?

B: I would have been, let me do the math, I would have been 14 and I was making computer games with Game Maker [software] and trying to find where I can put them on the Internet. I found Line Flyer which was a rip off and made something in it and sent it to one of my friends and he was, like, “That’s not the real Line Rider.” He sent me a link to LineRider.com. Then I was off to the races.

A: When did you become more serious?

B: It depends on what you mean by serious. I started working seriously on a large project a year after I discovered it. A year to two years. I don’t remember. It’s been a long time since like 2008. I was 15 at the time. The Line Rider Community was something I found early and got heavily involved in. I wrote a bunch of reviews for Line Rider tracks. I didn’t start treating it as an art medium until about 2015. I went to a liberal arts college and ended up creating my own major call Electronic Artistic Design. For my last year of college, I had not been thinking about Line Rider because I was focusing on my school work. When I came back, I had a slow, rolling epiphany about how Line Rider could be treated like an art medium and how a lot of the things that I studied, I could apply to Line Rider. I’m not sure I answered your question. What was it again?

A: That was on the nose. I wanted to know when you started to look at it seriously.

B: I started putting a lot of time and effort into Line Rider in 2008 and I started looking at it as a medium for art creation in 2015–2016.

A: It amazes me that at 14 you were interested in writing reviews.

B: *laughs*

A: The game must have struck you.

B: I’m trying to think …back 12 years ago now. Getting closer to 13. I just found myself wanting to watch all of the tracks and then I realized that a lot of people were spending a lot of time on these tracks and then they would get comments like, “Cool,” “8 out of 10,” [boring voice] and I wanted to give some real feedback.

A: That’s a noble response for a young person to have.

B: Another part of it was…I was also a little bit of an outsider in school and I found a community of peers in other people who were interested in Line Rider. A big part of it was that, finding a community of people who were interested in the things that I was. Also if you’re hearing purrs it’s because my cat has decided to sit on my chest.

A: If the cat says anything, I’ll make sure to include it.

B: *laughs* Excellent.

A: Can you remember the first track that wowed you?

B: There were lots that I really liked. The first that really impressed me was a track called Discarded by TechDawg. I saw it when it came out and it was sort of the first example of a Line Rider track that someone had made where they were using scenery lines to add texture and detail to the ground so it looked like this cool, rocky landscape. It was like he was painting a picture. Instead of, “Here is a rock shape,” it was, “Here is a rock-shaped drawing and a whole bunch of cracks and crags.” He would shade the rock. That was the first one that really impressed me.

A: Did you write a review about it?

B: I did. It’s not worth much but, yeah, I did. *laughs*

A: When someone sees your work for the first time, what do you hope they think?

B: My hope is that they’re not thinking about how I made it. My hope is that they’re letting the visuals wash over them and having an emotional response — whether that’s reflective or joyful or harrowing or trippy or whatever.

A: How big is your body of work?

B: It depends on what you include. Do you include the things that I've produced or directed? Within the things I’ve made, there are shitposts I made in an hour.

A: *laughs*

B: Those take as much time to watch as something that I worked two hundred hours on. There’s maybe 10 to 20 projects that I’ve poured a lot of time into and there are 10 to 20 projects that I remain proud of today and those overlap and there are tracks that fall into one or the other only. There are a couple dozen projects that I've directed or produced or facilitated in some way, even if I only made a small fraction or even none of the actual track. There is the writing I’ve done about Line Rider which ranges from crappy reviews I wrote when I was 14 to video essays about the nature Line Rider that I’ve done more recently. There is the Line Rider Archival Project which I can’t forget. It started ad hoc a long time ago but in the last few years I’ve formalized my attempt to archive as much of Line Rider on the internet that I can so it doesn’t get lost. On top of that, there are dozens of projects that were experimental or low effort or just memes or shitposts. I’ve had a lot of conversations with all sorts of people who are making Line Rider tracks and while that’s not really part of a body of work, it’s had a lot of impact on my work.

A: If you took the courses you made and the ones you produced and directed and played one after the next, how long would that be?

B: It would take a few hours depending on what you include.

A: More than six?

B: Six would be on the high end. Oh gosh. *laughs* There was an 18 hour marathon in which I watched a lot of Line Rider track and gave live commentary on them, so if you exclude all of that and focus on the raw footage of Line Rider then it would probably be like three hours?

A: Like an unabridged order of Lord of the Rings with all the extra scenes.

B: Something like that. If you add all the video, it would be a few days.

A: When having a conversation with someone, do you sometimes drift off and create Line Rider tracks in your head? Or when putting away dishes? Sometimes does Line Rider just happen?

B: It usually happens when I’m listening to music. Music is the spark. That wasn’t always the case. The first few years…excuse me if my voice sounds weird. I’m getting over a cold…. I was imagining these two dimensional spaces with three dimensional objects in them that the sledder was moving through. I thought about the projects I was making and how I wanted to make them look. Nowadays, I find myself daydreaming about Line Rider when I’m listening to music. I think, “Oh. I know how I would visualize this piece.” Most of them will never come to fruition because I lack the tools to create them without immense amounts of work.

A: Music predates the course? You have music that attracts you and then you create a course according to it?

B: As of the last, ten years that’s true. The first maybe three years it was not about the music but in the last decade it’s been about the music. Music creates the course. I hear a piece of music and I go, “Oh. I know what I can do with this.”

A: Are you a big music fan?

B: I am a big music fan. I’m super into post-rock. Which is how This Will Destroy You got created but lots of other types of music too.

A: When you have a Line Rider session and you’re going and everything is clicking, you’re inventing things spontaneously and they’re working out, what does that feel like?

B: I have two answers for that. One is, if you have heard of the concept of flow — it’s an artistic creation mode where you’re totally focused on what you’re making and everything else fades away. And another thing relates to my autism. I am autistic and so I have this thing where I hyper-focus. That means basically the same thing. But it’s something that I can control and sometimes I can’t. Sometimes I wind up hyper-focusing on things before I know it’s happening. Other times I want to hyper-focus when I want to make something but it’s difficult. But it’s a great feeling. Sometimes I make Line Rider tracks for eight hours in one sitting and other times it’s a struggle to work on it for an hour. It varies. What was that the question? I’m not sure if I answered it.

A: You absolutely illuminated it. I’ve never made a Line Rider so it’s interesting to know what it feels like to do so.

B: I can speak to that. Making a Line Rider track is a lot more like making pointillism then it is making a watercolor. *laughs*

A: How so?

B: It’s tedious and slow going. Generally, the lines are drawn one at a time and erased one at a time. They’ll get drawn and may be adjusted and erased if they’re not working. That’s been changing recently. There are new tools with copy and paste features. There are fill tools. There are all sorts of things that are new and changing that workflow. But, historically, lines are drawn one at a time, very slowly, one after the other.

A: Jeez.

B: Another thing is, you’re making a track and especially if it’s the track that’s focused less on the visuals and more on the the movement, you can’t go back and change part of the movement early on in the track because that would affect everything after it so you have to make every second of track in order one, after the other, and that can be a challenge.

A: You can’t skip around if you’re stuck on something. You have to go straight through.

B: *water drinking noises* Exactly.

A: Do you use a mouse or a drawing pad?

B: Sorry. I need to have a little more water. This cold as persistent. *water noises* I use the mouse for the entirety of the time I’ve made Line Rider tracks, so far. It’s a standard mouse. More recently sometimes I use a trackpad on my MacBook Pro. Going forward though, something I’ve been debating getting for a year now is a one of those touchscreen displays that hooks up to your computer.

A: Can you write your signature really well with a mouse?

B: *laugh* No. Not at all. You know those things where you have to sign your name on an iPad? I’m horrible.

A: Then how are you able to make courses that looks so great?

B: By drawing them one line at a time. I use the straight line tool. With the tool, you click and draw and release and that makes one line. I do that thousands of times.

A: When you plan to work on a project for the day, do you have a schedule? Do you work a certain amount of hours? Or do you throw yourself at it and get done whatever?

B: It can be a struggle to find time to work on Line Rider tracks because historically they’ve been more of a hobby than a profession. In the last year that I’ve been getting commissions, if I have a deadline that’s coming up, it’s easy for me to sit down and start working. I’m in the state of, “Ahh. I have to get this done.” If I don’t have a deadline, sometimes it’s just a matter of getting everything else in my life cleared off my plate so I’m like, “Alright. What’s left to do is the track.” Then I can sit down and not think about if there’s anything else I should be doing instead. That helps me focus.

A: What is there to be said about flying at high speeds to the sound of music? Do you have any insight into what that feeling is?

B: Yes. I’ve known for most of my life that I have synesthesia from music into visuals. Sometimes those are colors, sometimes shapes, and sometimes a movement and that can be more of an auditory-to-kinesthetic synesthesia. I get an actual sense of movement often times when I’m listening to music. It’s like the music is moving or I’m moving because of the music. Often times the most intense feelings are feelings of flying. I translate that into Line Rider. Maybe that’s what people are picking up on. I take for a lot of people it’s something that they don’t necessarily feel vividly but if you’re watching something where there is a figure flying through the air and it lines up with the music really perfectly it’s sort of this thing where people don’t get it at first and then they realize it’s lining up with the music and I feel, “Oh. I see it’s lining up with the music.” Some people react with “Oh. That’s it? That’s boring.” Other people start feeling it. It’s like they can feel the music physically. Which is really fun. It’s a thing I’ve noticed only some people experience. I thought all people experienced it until This Will Destroy You went viral and I got comments from some people who are like, “All it is is movement music synced up to music.”

A: *laughs*

B: And I’m like, “So fascinating!” There are people who don’t feel anything from that inherently.

A: Another thing I noticed was that I was watching one of your tracks and I started to do my grocery list in my head but I didn’t realize I had done it until afterwards. I realized I was thinking clearly. It put me in a zone where my mind was flexible.

B: That is interesting. Sometimes when I watch Line Rider synced to music it feels like a cleanse. It might be a vicarious experience of, like, the feeling of going on a rollercoaster, a little bit. I feel more free afterward. I’ve also noticed people experiencing that themselves. It’s good to know the feeling is widespread.

A: If Line Rider had not existed, would you have invented it?

B: I don’t think I would have invented Line Rider. I don’t know what I would have spent my free time on in 2007, 2008, and 2009 but I know I would still be doing some kind of auditory, music, or sound visualization. I was drawn to that in college and one of the big final projects I did was, I visualized a piece of music with these lights and colors in After Effects. I’d still be doing stuff like that, it just wouldn’t be with Line Rider.

A: For those of us who are not a part of the Line Rider community, can you summarize it?

B: Oh, boy.

A: What is it?

B: The simplest definition would be: a bunch of people, maybe a few dozen people, that hangout with each other on the internet and get really into discussing and creating extremely intricate Line Rider tracks. If you went into the Line Rider community, the average person would be totally confused about what people are talking about because, at least nowadays, which means in the last few years, they’ve been very very focused on the intricacies of the original physics engine and how it can be manipulated to get the sledder to do bizarre erratic movement. Sometimes these things are used to create things that can be impactful to the average person. But if you just walked into the Line Rider community and poked around you would think, “What are they talking about?” *laugh*

A: Can you rattle off a bunch of terms that I have no idea the definition of?

B: Some early ones are gravity wells. Then there ares flings of gravity wells. Then there are variation on flings. So flings can pull different parts of Bosh. Do you want me to come up with the most complex stuff I can?

A: Spit ‘em out.

B: You can make an inverted hand and tail ASDF which stands for an Alternating Single Direction Fling. We could do a Dual Alt Flanual. That would be fun.

A: *laugh*

B: You can have an all blue ten point cannon. Those are interesting.

A: *laugh*

B: Let’s see. Then you have an inverted cranual lock. How’s that?

A: I love those.

B: These are actual terms.

A: When did you make your Patreon? When did you wonder, “How can I make a living, if any?”

B: The shift turned when I was thinking about it as an art medium. Where I was like, “Oh. What if instead of playing this like an open-ended game, why don’t we try to make things that are going to appeal to people who might not even know what Line Rider is?” So, thinking about it as art that’s going to resonate with a general audience and then thinking about how I was going to do that corresponded with thinking about, well, maybe I could make this into a little hobby or a side hustle. It took off very suddenly, much faster than I expected.

A: Yes. How do you feel about your success so far?

B: I have a lot of feelings about success so far. It’s weird to have — sorry, kitty.

A: The cat jumped?

B: I got up to get water and then I was pacing around the room and I tripped over the cat.

A: Son of a gun.

B: Let’s see. How do I feel about my success so far? It’s complicated. I’m a bit estranged from the Line Rider community as of the last couple years. Three years or so. Prior, I was the administrator of the main Line Rider community and I had been running everything in the community so it’s complicated because when I retired from my administrative duties was when I went back to making more Line Rider tracks myself. When This Will Destroy You went viral, it created buzz around Line Rider and funneled people into the community that I had become estranged from. It was this awkward situation where I was reviving this community that I was no longer really as in as I used to be. I have mixed feelings around that. Those feelings standard in contrast to the feelings I have about the comments I’ve gotten on This Will Destroy You. It’s far and away the most wholesome Line Rider YouTube comment section I’ve ever seen. I’ve had people talk about all sorts of mental health issues and how the video has helped them. I’ve had people write basically a story of someone’s entire life to go along with the Line Rider track. I’ve had people being open about how it made them cry. It’s been wonderful to see how much of an impact that has had on people. It’s been great to be able to have an actual audience outside of the Line Rider community, a general audience of people who are interested in the stuff I’m making. So a lot of mixed feelings, but very positive. Is that the question that you are asking?

A: Yeah.

B: Cool.

A: You might have caught on by now that I’m asking broad questions that have no right answers. Feel comfortable as you are. These are some things you might be thinking about and putting into words for the first time ever so you’re doing great.

B: Yes, great.

A: How do you feel about your success on Patreon?

B: The Patreon started out small. And then it grew. It grew suddenly after This Will Destroy You went viral and it slowly but steadily has been growing since. I was surprised by the ratio of how many people were leaving glowing comments and how many people were sending me a dollar on Patreon. It seems like .01% percent of views and then .1% of positive comments got transferred to giving me money even though it’s just a small amount of money every time I release something. I was surprised that that didn’t translate. I think the thing is that on YouTube, people who make a lot of money on Patreon are talking to the camera a lot and so they’ll be talking and talking and talking and at the end they’ll be like, “You should pledge to my patreon.” And that brings people’s attention to it. People aren’t used to having to go look for it. They’re used to be told about it. I think it would be weird if my head popped up at the end of the Line Rider track and I was like, “Hey. Thanks for watching. Check out my patreon.” And they’re like, “Who are you?” I think that’s a big reason why it hasn’t been as successful as I would have hoped it would be with having a track going viral. It is at a point where it is starting to feel like real money and that is exciting. [$144 has been pledged to Ben by patrons per release.] Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons I haven’t been able to make something that I can release on Patreon. I took a break from Line Rider and then I had commissions and then I flew to Slovenia…anyways...

A: That’s a good segue.

B: Oh?

A: You gave a lecture in Slovenia about the history of Line Rider.

B: I did! I’m good friends with the current developer of the build of Line Rider that is on LineRider.com right now, David Lu. The original creator of Line Rider, Boštjan Čadež, (pronounced like Bastian Cah-dez) lives in Slovenia and was looking for people to curate Line Rider videos that would be included in an exhibit. He reached out to the community, got in touch with David, David sent him over to me, and I pulled together a list like, “Here’s a smattering of Line Rider tracks from across various styles and years, and a wide variety in content.” That’s how I got involved in the art exhibition. Then the curator of the art gallery reached out to me and invited me to come to the exhibit in Slovenia and said, if I can get myself there, they would provide me with lodging and give me a tour of the gallery. I managed to find a cheap plane ticket that fit with my schedule. After that was nailed down, he asked me, “Since you’re coming here, do you want to give a lecture?” He said I could choose the topic. I decided to use the opportunity to put together a lecture about the history. It got thrown together quickly though. I had about two weeks notice to know I was flying to Slovenia and giving a lecture. Given that small amount of time, it turned out well. It was good to get something about the 12 year history of Line Rider out into the world. A lot happened in 12 years and most of it was underground, obscure.

A: How did it feel to put it together? Was it easy to recall?

B: I had already done a fair amount of writing on all of the different aspects. I had already done the Line Rider archival project. I had lived a lot of the history. But I'd also done research into the various development builds. These were on the old internet forum that I used to administrate. I compiled lists of prominent Line Rider track releases, lists of different Line Rider builds and the features that they added and the people that developed them. It wasn't so much that I had to sit down and find out all this stuff. I had generally knew it. I just had to put together, “Did this happen first? Or did this happen after that?” And then package the important things to a general audience.

A: What was this exhibit for? What was the nature of it?

B: The exhibit was about Line Rider. The exhibit was titled Line Rider. The original creator of Line Rider put it together, an exhibit where there were different builds of Line Rider that people could play. There was a room with tracks projected on the walls playing on loop. There was a documentary that was created about the creator of Line Rider and and the history of how it was bought by the company InXile Entertainment. There was there was also a new virtual reality Line Rider that the original creator developed for the exhibit. There are some other things like the Game Developer Conference trophy and fun Line-Rider-themed sleds.

A: What was the cause of this exhibit?

B: The curator of the art gallery, Jani Pirnat, and Boštjan were on an artist retreat. Jani found out that Boštjan was the creator of Line Rider. Jani was like, “Oh, that's so cool.” Bosh was like, “I have a lot of negative memories about Line Rider because it got bought out by this company that was going to make a game and I was going to get a share and the game didn't do well financially so I never got any money. I don't have the rights anymore. They basically abandoned it. There are a lot of bad memories.” Jani was persistent and said, "No, no, we should look into getting the rights back. You should do this exhibit."

A: How did the creator feel about the exhibit when it finally happened?

B: He was really happy. He was also happy with the VR Line Rider that he developed, the videos on the documentary. I think he's really excited about continuing development of the VR Line Rider. I also think it's helped him work through the negative stuff that he had surrounding Line Rider. He's been active in the community since the exhibit. That's good to see.

A: What is the documentary called?

B: The documentary is called Line Rider: A Documentary. It's unreleased. In the exhibit, there was an excerpt of it shown. I might be involved in the full documentary release, which should be.... I don't know. I don't know what's going on with it right now.

A: That would be amazing.

B: I'm excited for it.

A: *pause* Who is the little boy on the sled?

B: *laughs* In the earliest builds, the sledder is referred to only as the sledder. He was given a name and personality and story in Line Rider 2 Unbound though if you watch The History of Line Rider lecture you know that Line Rider 2 Unbound has a question of… is it canon? It is officially Line Rider material but the community uses the old physics engine from before Line Rider 2 and up until recently used a modified version of the last version Boštjan developed. In Line Rider 2 Unbound, this sledder is named Bosh, after the creator. I like to think of the sledder as a universal stand-in for the viewer. I try not to focus on who is the sledder. There are people who do that in the community and it can be really fun. My favorite example is... Dangerous Cargo has a thing where, a story-focused Space Operetta, of the sledder on this little journey. But I like to think of him just as a stand-in. I want you to empathize with this sledder.

A: How many times have you dressed up as the sledder for Halloween?

B: Oh. I have never dressed up as the sledder. The most dressed up I've ever got is wearing my Line Rider t-shirt which is now signed. I actually have, through a series of events, ended up with a whole bunch of Line Rider t-shirts that I've been sending off to people who want them over the last few years. At one point, I had 16 t-shirts. But, no I've never dressed up as this letter. I don't have Bosh cosplay materials. I know the creator has dressed up as Bosh for the art gallery and some publicity material. It has him in the Line Rider hat and scarf. He also dressed up to get the Game Developers Conference award in California in 2007.

A: What are some of the funny or strange or memorable comments you’ve received on YouTube?

B: There are so many. When I scroll through my web portfolio there's a whole bunch of comments that I've just saved on there. Probably because then people can see all the nice things people have said about the track but mostly because I like to save them so I can look through them later. One that stands out to me most because it got me to reflect a lot on the impact This Will Destroy You has on the demographic that's most likely to be watching a Line Rider video is, “Is it okay to cry?” That was the whole comment. *laughs*

A: Did you not expect anyone to cry?

B: I did not. It had been years since I'd had a video that had gotten more than a few hundred views so I thought maybe a thousand people would see the video. Within a week from posting it, it went viral on Reddit, got a hundred thousand and that was more than almost any other Line Rider track I had ever made. I was over the moon at that. A couple months later, Mountain King was released by Doodle Chaos and that generated a ridiculous amount of traffic for Line Rider. My video was the one that was often recommended next by YouTube. That put it up to a million views in a very short amount of time. 100,000 was wild to begin with. *laughs*

A: How did that feel? That must have been amazing.

B: It was amazing. It was also unexpected. I found myself being overwhelmed with the comment section. It wasn't just people saying, “This is great. Nice job.” It was people reflecting on their lives. *laughs* That was really impactful. I was not expecting it to resonate that hard. I think part of the reason might have been that when making it I was in a reflective and somewhat depressed state of mind for the year and a half. I think it ended up coming through and people resonated with that.

A: It took you a year and a half to make?

B: It did. It sounds more impressive than it is. It took me about 250 hours, a little more. If you are working full time on a project, that's about two months. For me, it took 18 months. If I do the math, it averages to half an hour a day. There were days where I worked eight hours and there were months that went by when I didn't touch it at all. It varied a lot. The reason I got it done is because I kept coming back to it and being like, “Do I want to finish this? Yes I want to finish this."

A: Were people in the community expecting it or was it a secret?

B: Before This Will Destroy You was released, anything over 3 minutes was considered very long for a Line Rider track. Part of the reason I was able to make This Will Destroy You as long as it was was because of the newer builds that allowed you to scrub ahead in the timeline. They didn't used to be any timeline scrubbing so it was obnoxious to watch two minutes of track just so you can pause it and work work on the next bit. The new tools made it possible but also... I just forgot what the question was.

A: Whether it was a secret or if people knew it was coming.

B: Right. People knew I was working on a track and it was really really long. In the community, I updated people like, “I've made 5 minutes,” “I've made 10 minutes,” “I've made 15,” “I've made 20, 30.” I released a little trailer once I reached 35 minutes. But the Line Rider Community was very small. They were maybe 20 people who knew it was coming and were excited or at least curious. Most people were probably just like, “Why is this Line Rider track so long?”

A: Would you ever make another feature-length course?

B: Yes. But not soon. I have some ideas four things I would like to make eventually that are similarly long but I want to focus on some more experimental things that are shorter. I want to work on ideas I have before I tackle another long project. I could keep making projects like This Will Destroy You that are similar in structure and style but I feel like it wouldn't be as good if I tried to copy the formula.

A: Going back a bit, you said that you went to school and created your own major. For anyone else who is artistic, how would you say school has helped you?

B: The big thing was resources. I had access to software. And also physical things like lighting. I had the space where I could go to, a building and go to a room in that building and sit down and be like, “Okay. This is my space where I’m art making.” It's a little more difficult to get into that when it's my apartment. I sit at the same place to do my taxes as I do my art. It's a little more difficult to do that so it's nice to have studio spaces. Another big part of it was having deadlines. Like, “You have to make this project and it needs to be done by this day or else bad things will happen.” *laughs* That was helpful. It was also helpful to be around lots of other people that we're doing things that were somewhat similar. Someone to bounce off ideas. I could show people what I was making. All of those things are big parts of it. I also appreciated being able to take classes on the philosophy of art. I appreciated being able to work in collaboration with people. There are a lot of things. Amusingly, the classes we're probably one of the things lower down on the list.*laughs*

A: What will you be doing in five years?

B: Oh boy. Well, my day job is in technical theater. I imagine I'll still be doing that in five years. Even if Line Rider became a full-blown career and I didn't need to do it anymore, there are still things I would want to do in that.

A: What did you say the job was?

B: Technical theater. Lighting and sound and video for theatrical productions. I will still be doing Line Rider. I don't know what it'll look like in 5 years. There are things in flux right now in terms of the features being developed. I have no idea. That's all I can say. I don't want to plan too far into the future. I don't want to plan too much of my life. I want to see how things go.

A: Ben that was my last question for you.

B: Oh. That's not a question. *laughs* Alright, wonderful.

A: Thank you very much. That was awesome.

B: You are a wonderful interviewer.

A: Thank you. I'll type this up, transcribe it, make it look nice, and I'll send you a link shortly. Hopefully, within two weeks.

B: Sounds wonderful. Thank you so much.

A: Thank you.

B: Great talking to you.

A: Same. Talk soon.

There was Ben Harvey, in the midst of his life, the line he is riding. Lines tend to be everywhere. Lines are in plays, lines are in supermarkets. You have a line of work where you line your pockets. Some things are divided by a fine line, others by a dotted line. Occasionally, we draw lines in the sand. It’s difficult to keep track of them if someone’s blurred the lines. It can be fun to get out of line, feel the sensation of crossing the line, and of beating someone to the punchline. By the end of our life, we have lines on our face. And when we are online, it’s good if we can fill our empathy meter to the top line. This allows us to join the timeline of art history where many millions of people have stood in line in order to see further down the lines. When we see the end of the line, we have arrived at a point. That’s the whole point. To be pointed in a direction, ride the storyline to that point, and feel something poignant. Line Rider epitomizes this and shows us that even if you forget your lines, you’ll never forget how those lines made you feel. That’s the bottom line.

Interview conducted on 5/26/19

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