#or do i have to finish my extended zodiac project first?

[venaxle]

the things i do bc i like homestuck

[arcstral]

ooc; TOA Anniversary Munday!

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is. Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing! Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

Name: Soji

Pronouns: She/her

Birthday (no year): October 14

Where are you from? What is your time zone? United States. Both my parents are from South Korea. East coast resident (EST)

Roleplay experience: A little over 13 years of roleplay experience

Got any pets? One chinchilla affectionately dubbed Souji Man and a 'Shavanese' dog (short-haired Havanese) named Happy

Favorite time of year: Autumn

Some interests and things you like: The holy trinity of cosplaying, writing, and drawing

Some fun facts & trivia about you:

— I joined TOA during the peak of Covid quarantining in 2020 when there was a huge convention dry spell. The indie roleplay scene for Fire Emblem during this time was uneventful too. Having no productive outlet for cosplaying or writing, it lead me to join my first RP group which was (jazz hands) TOA

— My zodiac animal is a rabbit

— I have hundreds upon hundreds of hours clocked on Super Smash Bros from Brawl to Ultimate. You'll never guess who I main.

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? Final Fantasy XIV, Project Zomboid, Phasmophobia, Touken Ranbu, and Stardew Valley in order of frequency.

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: I like bug types; my favorite Pokemon is Scizor. While not Pokemon my favorite Digimon, Kabuterimon, is also a bug. Honorable mention goes to Greninja.

How did you get into Fire Emblem? Saw Shadow Dragon in my local Gamestop one day and didn't buy it even though it stuck out to me with its somber and less colorful boxart. Next time I saw a Fire Emblem game in the store, i.e., Awakening, I bought and played it. The rest is history.

What Fire Emblem games have you played? If we're talking start-to-end I've played and finished FE1, FE3, FE7, FE9, FE11, FE12, Awakening, SOV, 3H, and Engage. The remaining games in the series I've played to either early or mid game.

First Fire Emblem game: Awakening

Favorite Fire Emblem game: FE11 Shadow Dragon

Any Fire Emblem crushes? FE7 Rath was my first and only concrete FE crush. Marth was initially more of an aesthetic source of admiration though knowing his character better he likely exemplifies the ideal partner. Similar to Marth he's not really a crush, but right now I think a lot about Rafal, ironically less in the realm of looks or perfection and more at his attractive hot-and-cold personality.

If you’ve played the following games, who was your first S support? - Awakening: Chrom - Fates: Kaden was my forecast - Three Houses: Dimitri - Engage: Alfred

Favorite Fire Emblem class: Dracoknight

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class? Archer. My first class in FFXIV was an archer and my FE tastes will reflect that too.

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Blue Lions

If you were an Engage character, which Emblem would you Engage with? Marth. Need me a princely ghost boyfriend I mean advisor with a good head on his shoulders.

How did you find TOA? Through Fire Emblem roleplay related tags

Current TOA muses: Marth and Rafal

Who was your first TOA muse? If you don’t have them anymore, could you see yourself picking them up again? Marth is my ride or die Fire Emblem character and that extends to him as a muse.

Have you had any other TOA muses? Besides Marth and Rafal I've also written Xane. Though there isn't a lot of data, my second muse slot historically (and presently) being reserved for dragons tickles me a lot.

Do you think you have a type of character you gravitate towards? Not really. My tastes are unexplainably versatile. I can favor the sweet and friendly golden boy type characters, or the less pristine and morally ambiguous "bad boy" types, and everything in-between. This isn't just true for TOA but also for characters from different series. My friends have a lot of trouble forecasting possible favorites for me because of it.

What do you believe you enjoy writing the most? Emotions. Conflict with those emotions. Mwahahahaha

Favorite TOA-related memory: The first few months into my TOA debut when everything was bright, fresh, and new. Meeting new friends and forging bonds with other characters was super fun and I still remember who was around me during that time. Farina (written by Maxie) is the closest muse to Marth in terms of when they joined TOA and who has stayed to this day.

Got any delusions that didn’t see the light of day in TOA that you’d like to share? I tend to be very stable, loyal, and proactive in my delusions. If they're strong enough I pursue them, like Xane and Rafal. Rath would be among them if I ever replayed FE7 and if I determined having three muses wouldn't make my performance suffer over all.

[brrdhouse]

i am so overjoyed right now oh my god

like kicking my feet, squealing, calling my boyfriend to gush about it levels of overjoyed

all of my ranting and raving under the cut as usual (.. funeral and death and afterlife stuff, along with other things. i get really prose-y about his relationships with people because i got a little too inspired oops :[ ) :

i love your robbie so much. holy shit i love your robbie

him making baby gideon (as opposed to god gideon [godeon? ill workshop it]) into a star? because even if that's not his friend, it's a version of his friend that's facing an unfortunate fate? enamoured.

baby gideon's funeral was as big a funeral as his parents could manage. they were still a pretty well-off family despite the bad press, so they poured all they could into making sure their boy had a good send-off. the inmates he was so close with show up, a lot of the gleeful extended family, and of course, the zodiac.

its a nice affair. he's wearing some sparkly suit that he would've loved, and the valentino's even give him matching eyeshadow when prepping his body. matching, not complimenting, bud could practically hear his son demanding beyond the grave, and was very clear with what he wanted them to use.

it's really weird for a lot of the zodiac to cry over him, but they do. soos—and surprisingly but not at the same time, pacifica—the hardest, but all of them end up tearing up at some point during the crowded service. dipper's still trying so hard to hate him. he has a good reason to. not everyone deserves to be forgiven, not even in death, and he still doesn't like the guy as a person, but he can respect the dead. not let it all go, but not hold on so tightly to it. hope wherever gideon goes afterward, he can have a clean slate.

and he does. there isn't a lot of substance being a star, but it's better than being an exploited child celebrity, or a hated teenager, or a boy on a thousand-mile train ride to fight against the clock, or a man on the porch of a shitty museum nursing a beer realizing that he's fine losing against time.

i think soos found him first. melody could've if he'd spent a little longer in the kitchen, but soos walked out with another drink and laughed because of course the kid would fall asleep on the porch. and then gideon didn't move when he nudged him. or when he shook him. or when he called for melody. or...

suffice to say, he just wasn't there anymore.

back to the funeral,

mabel also has a hard time processing it all. twins always match, i guess, but she'd forgiven gideon a long time ago. call her too trusting, but it wasn't in her to hate anyone other than cipher—and herself sometimes, but this isn't the post for that—not even gideon. they all got older, and she looked back at their child selves and decided that she wouldn't hate children. if she saw gideon again and he was still an ass, she'd see him fit for a grudge, but he wasn't. snarky, yeah, maybe a little too loud-mouthed to stan because that was their nature, but not downright villainous like he was as a kid. so she deemed him alright. when he started texting in their groupchat, he'd send pictures of cute dogs or whatever coffee he was having that morning, usually with long rants about how cold it was in maine that time of year or how he'd seen a band the night before with some stupid name. she didn't like him how he wanted her to like him back then, but she considered him a friend, responding with flowers or a project she finished or a funny story about dipper that'd happened the week before.

she considered him a friend, and now he was dead.

they all knew it was going to happen, obviously, but every year that passed they all got a little more confident that he'd make it. the gleefuls were a charismatic bunch, it made sense that gideon could sweet talk even death itself into leaving him alone for a while.

he was buried in town, with a pretentious angel statue and as many flowers as the gleefuls could buy (or convince other people to buy), but a simple headstone with his name, date of birth, date of death, and a blurb about being a loving son and bright soul.

again, there isn't much substance being a star. mostly just endless warmth, and the knowledge that he might not have been a good person, but he was good enough to be in a place like this.

ermm sorry my evil god sent me a dark vision anywaysss

i'm so hooked on your robbie being like, "yes. this one. this one's mine and if life refuses to keep him, i'll at least hold him gently," i hate them, i love them, it's so fun to think about. i love you zodiac antagonists please don't die (except for right now)

teen gideon headcanons because i love him :] i am constantly thinking about him and how he's the only zodiac member (and honestly, only main-ish character because of the book of bill and the website) that doesn't get a sympathetic moment, other than POSSIBLY the finale but that barely counts

i think he deserves to have a SORT OF redemption, at least internally, because he took dipper's advice in weirdmageddon to heart. even if he gets over his crush on mabel (which i think he does. mom said its my canon now) theres still the truth of "people wont wanna be around you if youre a selfish prick"

anyways he makes me emotional so i'm giving him attention

im scared tumblr will kill the quality on my tiny handwriting so transcription under the cut:

after turning like 15, he just starts traveling, gets out of oregon and hits the ground running

uses my headcanon (?) that the amulet takes years from you, and gideon probably won't live past his 20s

he finds this out, has a total mid-life (literally) crisis at 14-15 and decides to do anything "normal" he can do because he doesn't have long to do it

ofc he still has anger issues and obsesses over people and everything else, but he's a lot better at managing it [than] when he was a kid

he doesn't care if he dies with people still hating him, but he wants it to be known that he tried

[ticktockstuck]

Year 7 Retrospective & Looking Forward into Year 8

Hello, everyone! TickTockStuck is officially eight years old today!

Our previous Looking Forward hoped that our 7th year of operations would’ve been a lucky year for us. Aside from how absolutely and completely wrong of a prediction that turned out to be for the world in general, TickTockStuck actually accomplished quite a bit! To wit:

The Flag Friday project finished up, and to those who have only come in recently and want to learn more about Tick-Tock Town itself, there’s a handy masterpost available for you [ right here ].

Can you believe the TTS Extended Zodiac hasn’t even been running for a year yet? That anniversary is coming up on the 29th and in the time since it started it’s gotten over 350 signs up! It’s coming back soon, and if you haven’t already checked it out it has a whole sideblog dedicated to it [ over here ].

We started up a new series of Biology Lessons to deep dive into some of the more notable biological quirks the citizens of the Verse have. So far there’s only two entries, for slimy Gels like Tyzias and Galekh and telepaths like Marsti and Chixie, but see below for future plans and see [ here ] to check our existing posts.

We started getting some new subpages for the blog up! Firstly was the [ Daemondex ], where information about the various types of haunt in the Verse is kept, and recently we got ourselves a new [ Aspect Catalog ] for all the aspects of the Verse. And they’re still updating! See below for future plans regarding both of these pages, and future ones.

Multiple updates to [ the Atlas ]! Multiple planets were added, some rearranged, and some just given more fleshed-out entries. New entries in the Atlas are for the Land of Tainted Elixir and Radiant Salt, the Land of Dunes and Darkness, the Land of Smoke and Mirrors, the Land of Vines and Masquerade, the Land of Fortune and Marble, and the Land of Ice and Towers.

In order to make sure some of these heftier updates could get out on a regular basis I had to put a more-or-less moratorium on some of our lighter content like the Fun Facts™ for a time, but we’ve slowly been rolling those back into our weekly posts. They’ll be back for the foreseeable future, and with them are some other heftier updates. Given the state of everything right now there’s definitely a lot up in the air, but my to-do list for now includes (amongst other points):

We’ve still got a few more updates in store for the Atlas, some planets left to provide entries for, plus the eventual visual update I have in mind for when it becomes a full subpage like the current Daemondex and Aspect Log. Speaking of which, both are due for further changes, and soon. 

The Daemondex is due for a brand new section on Painful Demons and a requested entry to go in as soon as I can get the work in on them, and 

The Aspect Log still needs two aspects to round out the canon twelve but future updates are going to start covering the virtue/vice aspects of the Verse! As part of those updates, symbols and the associated color palettes for various aspects of the Verse will be forthcoming.

Any art-related assets are in Nebulous Release territory for reasons I won’t reiterate here but they are being worked on. The big holdups in that territory are the shipbeasts (of which we got a new request earlier this year), the aforementioned new demon, and the remaining Troll Call trolls.

The reworking of the Cast Page is still forthcoming; considering how many different characters there are running around the Verse the eventual broken-into-subpages are going to need a lot of art assets and I don’t have a solid ETA on how long it’s going to take to get all those together.

More Versal Biology Lessons are on the horizon, and I’m already drafting up entries for firebreathers (like Bronya and Polypa) and star-skinned folks like Kanaya and a certain Harley.

Our previous Looking Forward brought up the idea of finishing off the rest of the sprite edits (for the Felt, the dancestors, etc). That’s still a goal, but I’m adding a secondary goal on top of that to revamp some of the old sprites since some of them are still pretty rough and others could use a design uplifting.

On that last point: there’s a lot for us to get caught up with in Year 8...so why not start taking bullets off of this list right away? I’m actually already in the process of re-spriting some of the originals and making new sprites for characters that have gone far too long without them, and the Alphas are first up!

Stop back in an hour for a new-and-improved June and a brand new Jane!

[callboxkat]

(Un)Broken - part 3

Author’s note: I’m back! It’ll be at least a week before you guys get another part, but have this one for now. :)

Warnings: self deprecation, headache mention, doctor mention, injury mention, food mention

Word count: 1579

Masterpost in the notes!

...

Patton walked into his apartment and quietly shut the door behind him. He slid the lock into place, then leaned back against the door with a soft sigh. He didn’t know why he was upset. He should be happy, shouldn’t he? He’d spent the evening bowling with his friends, after all.

He just kept remembering that moment, when he’d cheered about Logan knocking down those two pins—because Logan had been having a really hard time, and it was the first time they’d hung out together having fun like they had before his injury, and Patton had just been so excited to see him finally hit some pins! Logan, though, had clearly not been nearly as excited. Patton had seen how he rolled his eyes. Probably thinking that Patton was making fun of him. But Patton would never do that—Logan was one of his favorite people in the world!

Patton traipsed over to his sofa and threw himself onto it heavily, facedown on the cushions.

He knew that it was dumb. It was just one little thing, one little eye roll. It just hurt him to think that Logan might have thought poorly of him, even for a second.

He was distracted from his wallowing when his phone chimed its text tone at him. Patton reluctantly rolled partway over, just enough to grab his phone from his pocket and bring it up to his face.

Oh! It was Logan! Patton quickly swiped to open the message. It was a group text, sent out to all of them.

Logan: I greatly enjoyed our excursion to the bowling alley this afternoon. I hope that everyone else had as pleasant of a time as I did.

A second message popped up a minute later.

Logan: My apologies if I somehow lessened anyone’s enjoyment of the evening. I understand that especially while I am still in recovery, I am not the most ‘fun’ person to be around. Thank you for inviting me along.

Patton started furiously typing, but a series of other messages were already flooding in from Joan, Virgil, and Roman, all telling Logan that they’d had fun too, and yelling at him for implying that he’d somehow made the evening any less fun. Patton sent off his own message anyway, and as soon as he did, the notification that Talyn was typing their own response came up. Good. Logan didn’t get to talk bad about himself! Not on their watch!

Several long minutes went by, and then Logan responded.

Logan: Perhaps I misread the situation. Thank you for your assurances. It will not be necessary to ‘march over to my house’, ‘physically fite’ me, or hug me so tight that you ‘wring out the nerdiness’

Logan: Additionally, Virgil, I feel the need to remind you that Patton may decide to physically fight you if you continue to insist that gloominess is your area of expertise.

Patton paused, then scrolled up. He must have missed that message in the barrage of notifications. He found it—Virgil didn’t get to be self-deprecating either!—then scrolled back down to reply.

Patton: I will! I’ll fite both of you if I have to!!!

Virgil: Ok Pat chill, no fighting necessary

Patton: Good!

Roman: We should go bowling again. You all only got a glimpse of my skills.

Roman: (Virgils dont interact)

Virgil’s and Logan’s replies came through simultaneously.

Logan: I do think I would enjoy another such outing.

Virgil: You can’t stop me

The chat devolved into banter after that, mostly between Virgil and Roman. Patton just read the messages as they came through, not replying, until the others had to leave.

…

Monday rolled around all too quickly for Patton’s taste. He didn’t particularly want to get up early today, to go to class—one of them was math, after all—but he supposed there were bright sides. He did also have an art class today, and he would get to see his friends at lunch! He just preferred Tuesdays and Thursdays to the other three days of the school week because he had his actual classes with his friends.

Patton struggled through his morning class, which felt like it was moving at a glacial pace. He felt like he’d been there for so long. But finally, the bell rang; and with immense relief, he traipsed down to the cafeteria to meet his friends.

“I don’t blame you,” Roman said when Patton had finished sharing today’s math class woes. They and Virgil were sitting together, eating lunch in the cafeteria. “When are you ever going to need to know how to calculate a third derivative?”

“Exactly,” Patton sighed, putting his head down on the cafeteria table. “But it’s required, for my major….”

“You—you could always ask Logan for help,” Virgil suggested after a moment. “He’s pretty good at math.”

“Uh, yeah, I sure hope he is,” Roman said, his tone of voice mimicking that of a certain well-known six-second-video. “He’s a math major.”

Patton shook his head, but he did so without lifting it off the table, so it was more like he just rolled it morosely from side to side. “I don’t wanna bother him. He’s still got his concussion thingy to deal with.”

“C’mon, Pat, it couldn’t hurt to ask,” Roman said. “Besides, he could do derivatives in his sleep. Concussion or not.”

Patton just let out a soft, extended whine. If he hadn’t still had his head down on the wooden table, he would have seen Virgil and Roman glance at each other.

He felt a gentle poke on the top of his head. “What’s up?” Virgil asked.

“He’s gonna think I’m dumb,” Patton mumbled.

“Why would he think that?” Roman sounded genuinely confused. Patton could hear Virgil’s chair creaking as he shifted.

“Because he already does,” he heard himself whine. He knew he should just stop talking, but… whoops.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Virgil argued.

At the same time, Roman said, “That’s preposterous!” He normally had a habit of pronouncing it like ‘perpostrous’, which annoyed Logan to no end. He was pretty sure Roman did it on purpose at this point, evidenced by the fact that he said it correctly this time, when Logan wasn’t there.

“Logan knows you’re not dumb,” Virgil continued. “And it’s not like he hasn’t helped you before. What’s up?”

Patton sighed, gathered his willpower, and lifted his head from the table, sitting up. “I… I guess you’re right,” he sighed. He forced his features into a meek smile. “Sorry, kiddos. I’m just tired.”

“That’s okay.” Roman said.

“I mean… I get it,” Virgil said quietly. “Logan’s got stuff to worry about already. But he’s getting better, isn’t he? He’s allowed to drive and use phones and everything again. And it’s—it’s like Ro said, the stuff you’re working on is easy for him. I’m not—I’m not saying it is easy,” he amended quickly, even though Patton hadn’t been offended. “Logan’s just….”

“A huge nerd?” Roman suggested.

“A huge nerd. In a good way. Not being like him doesn’t make someone dumb. And you—” he fixed Patton with such an intense stare that the sophomore actually shrank backwards a bit. “You. Are. Not. Dumb. Nobody thinks you are. Not me, not Roman, not Talyn or Joan… and Logan sure as heck doesn’t think you’re dumb either.”

“But….”

Virgil was clearly running out of steam (that still happened sometimes when he talked a lot, though he was getting better) so Roman jumped in.

“If we’re not allowed to talk bad about ourselves, neither are you.”

Patton looked at them both for a second. Virgil was chewing the corner of his bottom lip and Roman had half a piece of Crofter’s-covered toast forgotten in one hand, but both were looking at him intently.

“O-o-okay. You’re right. I just got a bit silly, I suppose. I don’t like not understanding things.”

“We know,” Roman said. “You could always get someone else to tutor you, but I’m sure Logan’ll help if you ask…. Where is he, anyway?” He frowned slightly, leaning away from the table to look around.

Patton searched the room for a moment too, then glanced at the Mickey Mouse watch on his wrist. Logan should definitely have been here by now, if he were coming.

Virgil briefly chewed his lip a bit more intensely than before, then stopped and opened his mouth. “He—could he be sick?”

Roman sighed. “Probably… I hope he’s okay. Logan never misses class.”

That was true. The first time any of them remembered Logan missing class had been when he’d gone to the hospital after his accident. Logan valued class attendance too highly, and he was religious about hygiene, so he rarely so much as caught a mild cold. Recently, though, things were different.

“Could be another doctor’s appointment,” Patton mused noncommittally.

“I thought he had one on Friday, though,” Virgil pointed out with a frown.

Roman shrugged. “He’s probably fine.” He set down the toast that he seemed to finally remember was in his hand. “I for one am just glad he’s taking care of himself.”

Virgil nodded in agreement. Patton took a sip from his drink and didn’t respond.

“Hey…uh, you’ve got an art class today, right?” Virgil asked, changing the subject.

Patton nodded, brightening. “I sure do!”

“What are you working on?”

Patton turned to grab a little sketchbook from his backpack and opened it up, showing Virgil a few sketches as he talked about his current project. He knew Virgil was trying to distract him. He let him do it.

...

Tag list: @patton-loves-coloring @starryfirefliesbloggo @purplesoul-at-hogwarts  @gaylotusthatexists @quoth-the-sparrow @awesomelissawho @amuthefunperson @faithfreedom @heck-im-lost @gayfandomsaremything @bunny222 @syndianites @astraastro @momolinia @captainswan618 @hamilin-manuel-miranda @goldenkiddos @afilhadehades-blog @virgeofselfdestruction @theresneverenoughfandoms @iris-sanders-athena @super-magical-wizard @rainbow-sides @thefallendog @fanficptsd @zodiac-awesome @lookitsthatquietgirl @nerd-in-space @pearls-of-patton @ab-artist @angered-turtle @im-so-infinitesimal @raygelkitty @dr-gloom @whats-going-on-kiddos @the-dumbster @oh-star-how-the-mighty-fall @fillyourteacup @kittiebrick @youtuberswithalex

[forfansbyfans]

Vastness of Art: A FFBF Artist Interview

FFBF Artist, Xissor, has recently released a whole series of Homestuck zodiac-themed designs. We sat down to discuss their art history with them and get to know them better as an artist.

Tell us a little bit about your history with Homestuck! How long have you been reading it and how has it impacted your artwork?

I’d known about it for a long time I actually only got into it fairly recently! I first started reading it right after Anime Expo 2017 because my partner and I were doing matching cosplays each of the days and for one of the days we did homestuck because he had been into it for years! I went as Dave and he was Karkat. I thought it would be fun because we both kinda already looked like the characters, lol. After that I decided I was basically required by law to read the actual comic since I had cosplayed one of the characters.

But I kinda forgot about it for a couple months until Hiveswap came out! After we played that I remembered I was going to read Homestuck and actually got around to it! I started doing fanart for it after I finished it and it gave me quite a bit more drive to work on art! I specifically got very into it after the Extended Zodiac was released because I took it’s mere existence as a challenge for whether or not I could make a fantroll for every single sign. I could and did.  Drawing 288 different trolls certainly helped me improve my art quite a bit.

I also do remember I tried to read it waaaay back in middle school. But I’m pretty sure I didn’t know you were supposed to click the buttons that show the chat logs and read stuff so I basically just looked at the pictures, didn't really understand what was going on, got confused, and stopped.

What is your favorite method to share your artwork? Why do you prefer it over others?

I pretty much only use Tumblr for art. Mostly because its convenient! I have a main art blog and a second art blog for just homestuck. I only have the second art blog because I managed to somehow miraculously get a canon hiveswap url. I only post my art in one place generally because I am am very, very bad at remembering to post things in more than one place!

I see you take commissions pretty frequently - what advice would you offer to other artists who are hesitant about opening themselves up to taking commissions?

Please do not undercharge yourselves! I know lower prices might seem like you’ll get more commissions quicker but you deserve to be paid fairly for them! Also take commissions from furries.

Your bio says you prefer Paint Tool Sai and Sai2 when you work digitally - what about Sai do you like over other programs? Do you have any recommended brushes?

I mostly like Sai because its what I’ve been using for years and I tend to be a creature of habit. I started using Sai2 recently though and it's basically got all the old stuff but new features as well! It's still in beta but if you already have a Paint Tool Sai license you can download it from the website and use it for free! It's got a fantastic set of rulers that make drawing backgrounds in perspective way easier!

What is your artistic background? What helped you most grow as an artist?

I’m completely self taught! I’ve never taken a digital art or drawing class before. I actually first started drawing in middle school because I wanted to make L4D fanart. What’s helped me grow has mostly just been drawing whatever I’m interested in at the moment! Whether that be fanart or my own stories, characters, and ideas.

What are your artistic goals?

I hope to someday go to art school! I’ve been interested in art as a hobby for quite a while but recently I’ve found that it seems to be the thing I most enjoy and am capable of!

What other fandoms are you a part of? What would you love to design for but haven’t had the chance?

All sorts of things! I don’t think I could list everything if I tried but I’ve really been wanting to design something for Steven Universe or Bee and Puppycat!

Outside of art, what other types of hobbies do you have?

I absolutely love everything related to tech! I was the president of both the tech and robotics clubs in high school! Writing stories is another one, particularly writing characters and designing worlds. I’m also a huge fan of game design, mostly because its a combination of my love of tech, art, and storytelling. Have yet to actually finish a game though.... But, oh boy do I have a lot of started projects!

When you were little, what did you want be when you grew up? How has that changed (if it has!)?

For quite a while I wanted to be a Marine Biologist! I grew up by the ocean and have always really liked it here. I really liked the sense of vastness and how little we actually know about the ocean and all its inhabitants. As I got older I started to move towards computer science and technology. I really wanted to go into STEM! Particularly into game design or robotic engineering!

Sadly, after I was diagnosed with psychosis I don’t believe it's realistic that I’ll be able to go into any of those fields. But I don’t let it bother me because I’m very passionate about art and am certain that after I get to a better position with my health I’ll be able to work towards a career in that field! Plus, I’ll still be able to build robots and write games in my free time! :D

What kind of experience have you had working with For Fans By Fans? - we hope it’s been good!

It’s been awesome! There’s something just innately cool about the fact that my art is on official merchandise for content I enjoy!

What is the best way people can help support you and your work?

Probably by either buying my designs on FFBF or commissioning me! :D

Follow Xissor--->

Tumblr (main art blog) Tumblr (Homestuck art blog)

Xissor’s For Fans By Fans shop

Interview by Cassie Steensrud

@whatpumpkin @non-corporeal

[strangelydoctored]

50 Questions

tagged by @tonyrights​ sorry this is so late luv, ive been setting up for a new puppy!  xx

1. What takes up too much of your time? my other hobbies on tumblr and my service puppy, im getting ready for him to arrive, oh and school!

2. What makes your day better? my cat, my family, my friends. 

3. What’s the best thing to happen to you today? i finished a project i had been working on and it felt good to sit back and be proud of how it went

4. What fictional place would you like to go to? asgard or the USS ENTERPRISE

5. Are you good at giving advice? im not sure but some people ive grown up with always come to me or call me when theyre in a jam

6. Do you have any mental illness? i have clinical depression, and acute anxiety disorder

7. Have you ever experienced sleep paralysis? no i have not!

8. What musician inspired you the most? musicians dont inspire me im mostly inspired to do or create stuff from books or just when im daydreaming during a lesson

9. Have you ever fallen in love? nope thankgod, i thought i did once

10. What’s your dream date? i really dont like dates, at this point after the amount of people ive dated and the times ive bet met with people who act like imbeciles, children, and just overall horrible people with horrible life choices ive come to the conclusion dating is for people stupid enough to believe theres good in anyone. sorry i popped off but love is a made up concept.

11. What do others notice about you?

im entirely cynical and kinda frosty, but id give you the skin off my back if you needed it. your hearts not working? take mine!

12. What is an annoying habit you have? im forgettful 

13. Do you still talk to your first love? see 9

14. How many exes do you have? 4

15. How many songs are in your playlist? 1760

16. What instruments can you play? guitar, violin, keyboard

17. What do you have the most pictures of? my pets, loki and tony stark

18. Where would you like to go before you die? denmark

19. What is your zodiac? pig

20. Do you relate to it? no

21. What is happiness to you? hanging with my pets on a sunny day in winter with a good book, probably shakespeare if im real honest

22. Are you going through anything right now? im always depressed anxious or self loathing of my body soooooo yea like always

23. What’s the worst decision you ever made? being born

24. What’s your favorite store? hmmmmmmmmmmmm forever 21? idk i like their street wear

25. What’s your opinion on abortion? i am pro-choice! this is not up for debate.

26. Do you keep a bucket list? nope 

27. Do you have a favorite album? paulo santo - the years and years

28. What do you want for your birthday? anything snake, shark or marvel related idk. i pretty much buy whatever i want

29. What are most people’s first impression of you? my ex friends thought i didnt cre about them, that i was taxing and draining because i didnt hand hold them and coddle up their fucking arse *insert eye roll* so idk that i guess? im not going to blow smoke up peoples arse and im not going to baby you because your ego needs a soft touch. this is the real world not daycare.

30. What age do you seem according to most people?

looks 20-22 (im 24 this year) my online presence probably older, my friends refer to me as the “dad” or “uncle” 

31. Where do you keep your phone while you’re sleeping? on my wireless charger, i hate wires hanging around so i just place it on the disc and pass out

32. What word do you say the most? fucking seriously, is a term i use alot, or just really??? if im in public. humanity is still suprising which is a feat

33. What’s the oldest age you would date? god idk, how old is colin firth? i mean id maybe hit up william shatner if his twitter wasnt misoginistic, ....no wait fuck it id do it for the cash. i could help my parents pay off their house and like i mean if you close your eyes hes still young or if he says stupid shit gag him. 

34. What’s the youngest age you would date? 22-23

35. What job/career do most people say would suit you? vet, sales

36. What’s your favorite music genre? anything everything

37. If you could live in any country in the world, where would it be? denmark, sweden or japan

38. What is your current favorite song? Hallelujah by the years and years or maybe Tongue by MNEK

39. How long have you had this blog for? since 2019

40. What are you excited for? picking up my puppy parker.

41. Are you a better talker or listener? i can do either but i prefer to listen, im a bit too blunt.

42. What is the last productive thing you did? i finished a project yesterday

43. What do you want for christmas? thats too far away how about christmas goes away and takes its trashy music with it. can we extend halloween?

44. What class do you get the best grades in? i got the best grades in english and biology/chemistry. 

45. On a scale of 1-10, how are you feeling right now? -0.0/10

46. What can you see yourself doing in ten years?

throwing myself into the sun probably, burning down marvel headquarters idk. 

47. When did you get your first heartbreak? uhhhh 19 maybe?

48. What age do you want to get married? fuck off never, ill keep to myself thanks

49. What career did you want to have as a child? i wanted to be a doctor but as you can tell id have horrible bedside manner

50. What do you crave right now? tony, tom hardy, loki, angela basset, dinai.....idk maybe starbucks or maccas. this is too broad of a question.

tagged: @tonystark-mcu @marvelplease @gayspiderbaby @bckvbarnes @peterparkrrs @cloakofiron @couchpotaito @natrromanoff

[akysi]

Always wanted to do one of these, and now I have. :D 8 years of improvement, wow! I’m also really bad at picking things so I don’t know if I picked the ones that best represent my progress, but eh. I did some edits, but the original base for this can still be found here. Extended thoughts about each year below, it’s a lot! Here’s to bigger and better things in 2019 (please ;_;)

2010: I started drawing digitally in 2006, though regrettably I didn’t save any of the art I did back then. 2010 was when I joined DeviantART, and thus when I started uploading art online. I had frequented DA well before that though (from about 2007 I think), and influence from the artists I followed are pretty evident. A few notable ones were ShaloneSK, Fourth-Star (now SeaSaltShrimp), and thazumi, all primarily dragon artists. Though none of my traditional art is showcased here, this was still a time when I did it often, usually via doodles in class when I was bored. The digital art you see here was made with my first tablet, a Wacom Graphire 3, and Photoshop Elements 3 that came with it. I had little knowledge of file quality, layering, colouring, and other mainstays in using Photoshop properly. Humble beginnings are these! My art education at this point was limited at best, but art was always something I did in my spare time. And like all of the art years leading up to 2010, I drew almost entirely dragons. Aside from practicing foxes for a story I had at the time, I wasn’t interested in drawing much else. I didn’t draw people at all until college, but we’ll get to that. 2011: Christmas 2010 / New Year’s 2011 marked the time I got Photoshop CS5, a version of PS I still use today. For a while I was obsessed with the idea of PS’s Pen Tool, as I saw it could give me much cleaner line art than what I could achieve on my own. I was finally able to test that when getting CS5, and while it worked well for the time, I soon learned the tenets of line weight and tapering, something I would have to practice myself. Up to this point all of my lines were either shaky or fabricated via the Pen Tool, and it shows. This was also a year of trying to mimic Fourth-Star’s dynamic perspective...without any knowledge of how it actually worked. Not a lot of improvement happened here outside of that. 2012: This was the year I bought my Bamboo Create tablet, something I still use with my laptop nowadays. I remember trying it out at my friend’s house before I bought my own, and really loving how I was able to do the line tapering without the pen tool. It still took a lot more practice, but looking back now it was easy to see I was on the way to making line art one of my art’s strongest qualities; something that stays true today. I find it ironic that line art used to be one of the weakest aspects of my digital art, but I suppose that speaks to how far I’ve come. I did more fanart this year, oddly enough. I’d always done it before but I guess I felt shy about sharing it. Notable fandoms were Danny Phantom and Sonic. I didn’t grow up with either, but ended up liking them both a lot, and would doodle them as much as my dragons. 2013: I graduated high school and started my first year of art college, specifically Art Fundamentals at Sheridan College. At this point, everyone I knew pointed to that school (and only that school) for anything related to what I wanted to do; if it wasn’t fine art, go to Sheridan. So I went into college with a bit of tunnel vision at first, but I knew from the start that I would be gunning for animation. Not to animate specifically, but to do character design / concept art for animation. I would learn later on what having this tunnel vision would mean for me, but we’ll get to that later too. This is about the point where more expansion of design and subject matter occurs, albeit slowly. The art featured here doesn’t include my schoolwork, but the much needed increase of anatomy, structure drawing and other college level art courses started me on a path to better things. I still had a long way to go though, and Fundies could only do so much. Unlike most people I actually got decent practice from it given my limited art background, but I still can’t say it was at peak efficiency. This was the first year I actually started drawing people, and it certainly didn’t come without its growing pains.

2014: Surprising no one, I didn’t get into Sheridan after my first year, though that didn’t stop me from being disappointed at the time. I took what was effectively the second year of Fundies, called Visual and Creative Arts (VCA). This was the year that sparked my interest in graphic / logo design, an interesting turn of events all things considered, and that would stick with me a lot more than I expected. This year also featured a few smatterings of character designs, or more specifically design sheets with multiple views, costumes, etc. Character design was a required segment of the animation portfolio, so this is likely what spurred my practice in it, aside from my pre-existing interest. That does not mean I knew how to rotate a character though, yikes! At this point I’d gotten pretty good at clean line art in Photoshop with my current tablet, as well as the merits of high quality imagery. There was a lot of purple in this year and 2015, though that’s nothing really new for me.

2015: This was easily the busiest (and most path altering) year. Second semester of VCA happened during this time, but also what would be new beginnings for me. If I didn’t get into Sheridan animation, I had a choice to make for a plan B: Either stay at Sheridan for VCA Year 3 and try again for animation, or try to get into animation at another school. My buddy Amelia then dropped Seneca’s name in one of my elective classes, and I had no idea how much of a fateful conversation that would be. She mentioned it was considered a second to or even better than Sheridan, and that at least provided a clearer answer for me. A lot of trepidation followed: I didn’t get into Sheridan animation for the third time, and thus applied to Seneca (and a few other places). I was pretty scared of being a first year again at a new school with new people, and while my art definitely reflected the time I spent at Sheridan, I had no confidence in it being good enough for a portfolio given my track record. But low and behold, I got in! I was on my way to a three year rollercoaster of all-nighters, amazing ride-or-die classmates, and relentless, rigorous training. The art from this year does reflect this, both in quantity and quality of uploads, though in more of a “transition period” kind of way. This was the year I really started to draw human characters, most notably with the creation of my first comic project: Starglass Zodiac. This was the first time I had a story idea with a primarily human cast, much less a comic idea, though the designs for them didn’t start appearing in my uploads until the following year. As you might expect I didn’t have a lot of confidence in drawing people. Ironically, my first year of animation taught me all the skills I initially needed for the portfolios!

2016: When I mentioned a path altering year for 2015, I was referring specifically to the path in my art education. 2016 was a path altering year for everything else, and a polarizing one at that. 2016 was a year that was kind to no one, and while the details of what happened to me are not really relevant to this post, there’s no denying what effect it had behind the scenes. This was the year that I fully realized I’d developed symptoms of depression, and with my increasing anxiety to match, this didn’t (and still doesn’t) go so well. I don’t think that’s really reflected in my art, however. Regardless of my mental state, the outside view of my art still features the colourful characters that they always had. By this point I was in my finishing first year / starting second year, and this was easily the best time for me. My time to shine, if you will, at least when it came to character design class. We had an overarching story project that was perfect for SGZ, so I used that time to develop the characters. The double-edged sword of troubled times is my escapism is cranked to 11, so this was probably the year that spurred the most story ideas out of me. This year (and part of the next) started both Id Pariah and Feather Knights. I got my iPad Pro for Christmas this year too, and that proved to be a game changer in the amount of art I could make. I was already used to the Cintiqs at my school, and I was lucky to finally have a screen tablet of my own. 2017: The end of my second year and the beginning of my third and final year of animation. Classes split, streams chosen and a world of missed opportunities began. I didn’t do a lot of art at the beginning of the year, aside from the beginning of my Feather Knights stuff. On top of that, my college had a 5-week long teacher’s strike that literally no one wanted to be a part of, effectively derailing all hope for a good semester. Attempting to do a short film project with this happening was a recipe for disaster. During this strike was the start of my first month long challenge though: Huevember. It was an uncertain time, and most of us were not compelled to get much school work done. Completing Huevember did feel like an accomplishment though, as I was actually able to keep up with it even when school started again. I’d say this art year focused a lot on colour for this reason. What art I was able to complete outside of my schoolwork saw a lot of expansion in that area. In all honesty 2016-2018 tends to blend together for me, for better or worse. 2018: My graduating year. The strike did its damage to my final semester too, but ultimately I survived. Despite completing 5 years of college, my path became the most unclear. Third year taught me a lot of things about myself and how I approach art, but most were not positive revelations. The expectations set out for me are ones that I cannot achieve. However, I have more time than ever to do art, making this year the most art I’ve made to date. I also participated in Inktober, which reminded me how far I’ve come as an artist, despite not doing traditional art for what felt like a century. My illustrative work for Inktober ended up being some of my best art this year, and the prompts made me get creative in more ways than one. The dark cloud hanging over my head has not disappeared since 2016 however, and the toll that has taken shows more everyday. As far as my art was concerned I did more of what I loved, mostly in the form of character sheets and designs. It’s all I can do, for now. 2019, I have one thing to say: Don’t you DARE.

[furrama]

*looks at my desk full of unused canvases and acrylic paints and paint pens and acrylic inks and watercolor paper, looks at all of the comics and art projects begun and abandoned, the clay bought and forgotten about until just this second that surely has turned into a big lumpy brick by now, several books and stories trapped in several hard drives*

I'm not sure if I have an undiagnosed something or it's just that I have young kids in these current times and have very little energy and brain to spare. Most of the work I get done is when children don't need a lot of my attention for an extended period and there's no holiday I have to perform extra for, so I suspect the latter but can't rule out the former entirely.

I also wonder if this is just the way of things. If an artist is lucky maybe a lucky project will squeak through the rest and actually make it out into the world. Maybe behind each finished project there are countless others only part done. Standing on the shoulders of scribbles.

Anyway I have an old newspaper style comic that I've wanted to start for years now, about a salamander that's like Peanuts crossed with Moomin comics. I have a bunch of the first comics thumbnailed, but I've been waiting for the right conditions to begin properly. Ultimately this comic is what I've always wanted to do. Anything else I've done recently is just what I can do when I have some energy and time to focus. But conditions have been bad, though I'm ever hopeful that they'll get better this year. (Then again I have said that the last couple of years.)

I have a whole book about a raccoon that I should really get around to cracking into pieces and putting back together as something sellable, but ugh. UGH. It's too hard to work on something so big and close to you with no guarantees that it will pay off. This project burned me pretty bad so it's hard to go back to. I think I'd need help that I can't afford.

I have a short story collection I really should continue working on. I have a book about a reverse werewolf (kinda) that I started and have outlined but it's still sitting there.

I have a digimon fan comic on pause, after only two comics, I have a zodiac illustration series that's been on the back burner for a decade, just several old comics that I've stalled on and later tried to revive. I've tried animating, 3D, printmaking,

In short, it's a mess over here. You're definitely not alone.

I’ve got a very, very long list of hobbies/skills/projects that I’m super interested in which I’ve either started and dropped or intended to start but never did. Little animation or illustration projects, soapstone carving, small-scale wood carving like netsuke, leather tooling, bonsai, aquascaping, cordage making, making natural dyes and pigments, woodblock printing and copperplate etching….. it’s a long list.

(How I never got diagnosed with ADHD until the age of 30 is a mystery).

But I would love to hear about your dropped or paused hobbies and projects! Tell me about them in the comments or a reblog or in the tags! Let me know I’m not alone!

[lovehaswonangelnumbers]

New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/full-moon-in-leo-a-rush-of-passion-courage-sacred-play-your-heart-is-the-ultimate-compass-2/

Full Moon in Leo- A Rush of Passion + Courage, Sacred Play, Your Heart is the Ultimate Compass

Full Moon in Leo- A Rush of Passion + Courage, Sacred Play, Your Heart is the Ultimate Compass

By Astromomma

On February 8/9th, the moon becomes full at 20 degrees of Leo. Full Moons are always highly emotional and charged. They represent: endings, culmination and harvest time. Leo, the 5th zodiac sign, is: passionate, creative,courageous, prideful and loving.

The Full Moon in Leo is here to bring a manifestation of pure fiery power and prowess into our lives. We will be all revved up to get out and express our deepest heart’s desires with La Luna full in the sign of the lion. This is an excellent time to put the finishing touches on a creative or artistic project. Leo energy wants to be fully expressed, seen and heard. Its one of the sign’s most endearing qualities but at the same time can be it’s downfall. Passion will be fun and encouraged, but we will have to watch for the tendency to be little drama queens and kings. A healthy sense of self is emerging but we will be reminded to still keep our intentions: humble, grounded and pure.

The other reason this Full Moon is so passionate and hot is the Full Moon’s positive, 120 degree trine to Mars in Sagittarius. Mars in astrology, represents: drive, ambition, aggression and sexual energy. The Full Moon in Leo in harmony with Mars in Sagittarius will provide a spark of incredible drive and ambition. We will be ready to accomplish with this combo. The one thing to watch out for will be the tendency to fly off the handle and be overly aggressive within our emotional reactions. Channeling this fiery passion into play, whether it be with an artistic pursuit or in the bedroom, will be a better use of this pair’s combined energies. Flames of passion and pleasure will certainly be our go to with this aspect.

The Full Moon in Leo is here to warm your heart and inspire your soul. Leo actually rules the heart. This Full Moon will ask you to hold your deepest passions and yearnings in a space of sacred flow and honor. It doesn’t matter what others want or desire but it is your birthright to respect and hold space for your own wants and pursuits. It is time to step out of the mind and drop down to the 4th chakra. What could you accomplish if you took the time to listen to your heart? Are you truly honoring her song of love and encouragement? It is time to break free from complacency and step into a new space of courageous love and healing. This Leo Full Moon wants you to follow your bliss. She is here to bring: an awakening of your own divine love, play + fun and the courage and willpower to make EVERYTHING and ANYTHING a reality.

I have created extended horoscopes for this fiery and passionate full moon on my Patreon site: https://www.patreon.com/astromomma . These horoscopes will give you practical but purposeful guidance on how to best navigate this Full Moon’s energies.

******

LoveHasWon.org is a Non-Profit Charity, Heartfully Associated with the “World Blessing Church Trust” for the Benefit of Mother Earth

Share Our Messages with Love and Gratitude

LOVE US @ MeWe mewe.com/join/lovehaswon

Visit Our Online Store for Higher Consciousness Products and Tools: LoveHasWon Essentials

http://lovehaswonessentials.org/

Visit Our NEW Sister Site: LoveHasWon Angel Numbers

https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/

Commentary from The First Contact Ground Crew 5dSpiritual Healing Team:

Feel Blocked, Drained, Fatigued, Restless, Nausea, Achy, Ready to Give Up? We Can Help! We are preparing everyone for a Full Planetary Ascension, and provide you with the tools and techniques to assist you Home Into The Light. The First Contact Ground Crew Team, Will Help to Get You Ready For Ascension which is Underway. New Spiritual Sessions have now been created for an Entire Family, including the Crystal Children; Group Family Healing & Therapy. We have just began these and they are incredible. Highly recommend for any families struggling together in these times of intense changes. Email: motherofallcreation@lovehaswon.org for more information or to schedule an emergency spiritual session. We can Assist You into Awakening into 5d Reality, where your experience is one of Constant Joy, Wholeness of Being, Whole Health, Balanced, Happy and Abundant. Lets DO THIS! Schedule Your Session Below by following the Link! Visit:  http://www.lovehaswon.org/awaken-to-5d/

Introducing our New LoveHasWon Twin Flame Spiritual Intuitive Ascension Session. Visit the link below:

https://lovehaswon.org/lovehaswon-twin-flame-spiritual-intuitive-ascension-session/

Request an Astonishing Personal Ascension Assessment Report or Astrology Reading, visit the link below for more information:

https://lovehaswon.org/lovehaswon-ascension-assessment-report

https://lovehaswon.org/lovehaswon-astrology/

Experiencing DeAscension Symptoms, Energy Blockages, Disease and more? Book a Holistic Healing Session

https://lovehaswon.org/lovehaswon-holistic-healing-session/

To read our Testimonials you can follow this link: http://www.lovehaswon.org/testimonials

Connect with MotherGod~Mother of All Creation on Skype @ mothergoddess8

Request a copy of our Book: The Tree of Life ~ Light of The Immortals Book

Order a copy of Our LoveHasWon Ascension Guide: https://lovehaswon.org/lovehaswon-ascension-guide/

**If you do not have a Paypal account, click on the button below:

If you wish to donate and receive a Tax Receipt, click the button below:

Donate with Paypal

Use Cash App with Our code and we’ll each get $5! FKMPGLH

Cash App Tag: $lovehaswon1111

Cash App

Donate with Venmo

VENMO

Support Our cause in the creation of the Crystal Schools for Children. Visit our fundraising link below:

LoveHasWon Charity for Crystal Schools

Support Our Charity in Co~Creating the New Earth Together by Helping Mother of All Creation. Visit our fundraising link below:

Support Mother Earth!

Support Us on PATREON

PATREON

Support Us Through Our LoveHasWon Wish List

LoveHasWon Wish List

We also accept Western Unionand Moneygram. You may send an email to michaelsilver@lovehaswon.orgfor more information.

***If you wish to send Donations by mail or other methods, email us at motherofallcreation@lovehaswon.org or  michaelsilver@lovehaswon.org***

**** We Do Not Refund Donations****

MeWe ~ Youtube ~ Facebook~ Apple News ~ Linkedin ~ Twitter~ Tumblr ~ GAB ~ Minds ~ Google+~ Medium ~ StumbleUpon ~ Reddit~ Informed Planet~ Steemit~ SocialClub~ BlogLovin~ Flipboard ~ Pinterest ~ Instagram ~ Snapchat

[pandorareloaded]

Got tagged thingy

@hydrophilicturquoise​ and @naturesprings​ tagged me

I guess them and @iuliaolmeda​, @wibbly-wobbly-skawney​, @alter-egx​ will care about this so that’s why I’m doing it, feel free to sense you’ve been tagged if you wanna

Highlight the true statements in bold

I am 5'7 (1,70 m?) or taller   I wear glasses  I have at least one tattoo I have at least one piercing I have blonde hair My abs are somewhat defined I have or have had braces I love meeting new people People tell me I’m funny Helping people with their problems is a big priority to me I enjoy physical challenges I enjoy mental challenges I’m playfully rude to people I know well I started to say something ironically There is something I would change about my personality I can play an instrument I can sing well I can do 30 pushups without stopping I’m a fast runner I can draw well I have a good memory I’m good at doing maths in my head I can hold my breath underwater for over a minute I have beaten at least two people in an arm wrestle I know how to cook at least 3 meals from scratch I can throw a punch I enjoy sports I have learned a new song in the past week I’ve gone running at least one week in the summer I work out at least once a week I have drawn something in the last month I enjoy writing I have done martial arts I have had my first kiss I have watched an entire season of a TV show in one sitting I have had alcohol I have scored a winning goal in sports I have been to an overnight event I have been in a taxi I have been in hospital/er in the past year I have beaten a video game in one day I have visited another country I have been to one of my favourite band’s concerts I have at least one person I consider a best friend I live close to my school My parents are still together I have at least one sibling I live in the US There is snow right now where I live I have hung out with friends in the past month I have a smartphone I have at least 15 CD’s I share my room with someone I have a crush on a celebrity I have a crush on someone I know I have been in at least 3 relationships I have asked someone out or admitted my feelings to them I get crushes easily I have had a crush for over a year I have been in a relationship for over a year I have had feelings for a friend I have break danced I know a person called Jamie I have made a new friend in the past year I have had a teacher with a last name hard to pronounce I have dyed my hair I am listening to a song on repeat right now I have punched someone in the past week I have known someone who has gone to jail I have broken a bone I have eaten a waffle today I know what to do with my life (I wish...!) I speak at least two languages

Extended part by @hydrophilicturquoise​:

I have kissed/I’ve been kissed on the lips by a friend with their/my consent just because I am the tutor of at least one animal I take care of at least one plant I have this healing movie/s I have to watch at least once a year Rain makes me go gloomy I know my astrology zodiac, my chinese zodiac, my hogwarts house, my myersbriggs and at least one more personality test result. I like videogames, board games and/or role games I have beautiful - sexy lingerie I usually wear mismatching socks I have published my own novel/short narrative/poetry book I am the tutor of at least one human child I live in an apartment of my own I sometimes have this tingling feeling of magic/spiritual stuff/energy… *When I am by the sea/in a forest/on the top of a mountain, nature stuff *When I am in my own house *Ramdomly, but anywhere *When I am with a certain person I own a car/motorbike/bike/truck I love listening to podcasts I am organized and I don’t have to finish my projects the night before they’re due I like reading I have this/these animal/s I identify with

[pauperpedia]

Tuesday Brewsday 11: Year of the Rat

This weekend is the Zodiac Chinese New Year, celebrating the rat. There’s no better way to ring in the new zodiac year with a deck filled with a bunch of them. The Rat is the first of all zodiac animals. According to one myth, the Jade Emperor said the order would be decided by how the animals arrived to his party. The Rat tricked the Ox into giving him a ride. Then, just as they arrived at the finish line, Rat jumped down and landed ahead of Ox, becoming first. Just the like rat in this story, our rats play dirty as well by forcing our opponent’s to discard and have unfavorable blocks.

4 Typhoid Rats

1 Lab Rats

2 Burglar Rat

2 Ravenous Rats

8 Rat Colony

4 Chittering Rats

3 Okiba-Gang Shinobi

4 Defile

2 Chainer's Edict

1 Tendrils of Corruption

1 Snuff Out

2 Unearth

2 Sign in Blood

2 Foreboding Fruit

19 Swamp

2 Witch's Cottage

1 Bojuka Bog

Starting out with the one drops are the nastiest of all the rats, Typhoid Rats. As much as I would love to run Zodiac Rat for the theme and meme, I actually want to try to win a game and deathtouch > swampwalk. Typhoid Rats gives the opponent the difficult choice of whether or not to attack or block these disease ridden rodents. Our honorary one drop rat is Lab Rats. This is a less common known token generator that I’m banking you’ve never even heard of. For one black mana you create a 1/1 black rat creature token. What makes this cool, however, is the buyback clause for 4 mana. Depending on the situation, don’t be afraid to cast it without buyback though, the more rats on the field the better, and you might not want to wait.

You might be saying to yourself as you look over the list, why not run 23 copies of Rat Colony, throw in a playset of Dark Rituals, and call it a day? Well, for one Rat Colony is very susceptible to removal in the forms of Shrivel, Electrickery, Echoing Truth/Decay, Pestilence, Evincar’s Justice and the list goes on. This is why you’ll see a split of Burglar Rat and Ravenous Rats. They are essentially the same card forcing your opponent to discard a card when they enter the battlefield, but having different names helps minutely when facing the aforementioned echoing removal. I also feel like 8 copies of Rat Colony is sort of a sweet spot that I like. More often than not you’ll be getting a 3/1 for 2 out of it before you start seeing your rats die to removal.

Chittering Rats is one of the best rats available to you in my opinion. I mean years of it sticking around in Mono Black Devotion decks means it has to be good right? This plucky little rat comes down for one colorless & two black mana, and effectively time walks your opponent by forcing them to put a card from their hand on top of their library. This punishes opponent’s who missed early lands drops and can be back breaking if you’re able to play one a couple turns in a row or even replayed.

Okiba-Gang Shinobi is the rat that spells doom for your opponent’s if you’re able to ninjitsu it in and is left unchecked. Being able to bounce a Burglar/Ravenous Rats or Chittering Rats back to your hand to replay is pretty sweet as well. Forcing decks to go into top deck mode works well in your favor and is usually a path to victory.

The removal suite is something you’re probably familiar with if you’ve played Mono Black decks before. Defile is a great removal spell for one mana that becomes more powerful in relation to how many swamps you control. Chainer’s Edict is this deck’s way to squeeze out extra removal by being able to flash it back from your graveyard later in the game to remove another creature of your opponent’s choice. Snuff Out is there for pure tempo since for the most part you’ll probably be tapping out every turn to try and cast things pro actively. Being able to kill a creature when your opponent thinks you’re out of mana is a great feeling, albeit at the cost of four life. Lastly Tendrils of Corruption is there as a catch all removal spell that deals damage to target creature equal to the amount of swamps you control, in addition to also gaining you that amount of life.

The deck runs six card advantage spells, two Unearth, two Sign in Blood, and two Foreboding Fruit. Unearth puts a creature with three cmc or less from your graveyard directly onto the battlefield. Depending on the board state, you’re best creature to bring back is probably going to be Chittering Rats. Sign in Blood draws target player two cards at the cost of two life, just be mindful of the situation and remember it could be used to kill your opponent as well. Same goes for Foreboding Fruit, but the thing I love about this card is you’ll always cast it for its adamant cost creating a food token which nets you one life after losing the two to cast it.

These rats are very hungry for swamps, which is why I’m playing 19 basics. Since we have so many swamps, it’s also natural to play Witch’s Cottage alongside them. If it enters the battlefield untapped you can put a creature from your graveyard on top of your library. I find running two is a good number, plus they also count as swamps for Defile and Tendrils of Corruption. Bojuka Bog is a necessity in this metagame, especially when we’re relying on our opponent’s to discard hoping they won’t be able to use them again. It’s an uncounterable effect and punishes Mystic Sanctuary and Tron Decks. Unfortunately it comes into play tapped and there is no way to replay it.

3 Dark Dabbling

2 Pharika's Libation

2 Cower in Fear

3 Faerie Macabre

2 Grotesque Mutation

1 Chainer's Edict

1 Bojuka Bog

1 Distress

One way this deck loses, amongst many let’s be honest here, is through sweepers like Electrickery. To mitigate this I like to run Dark Dabbling. So long as you have 2 instant and/or sorceries in your graveyard you can regenerate all your rats. It still asks a lot to hold up three mana, so be mindful and don’t over extend. It’s one thing to lose a couple rats, quite another to lose three or more from one spell. This unfortunately doesn’t work against Shrivel, so you kind of just have to hope they don’t have it when they need it.

Pharika’s Libation is our only answer to annoying enchantments. Before the new set Theros Beyond Death, black had zero ways to deal with enchantments. This at least gives you the fighting chance, albeit still not a good one, against Pestilence decks. You can also bring this in alongside Chainer’s Edict against Hexproof.

Cower in Fear is our safe option to clear the battlefield without killing our own rats. Three mana is asking a lot though, so just hope you draw it early and are able to cast it in time against those pesky Elves.

Grotesque Mutation is there strictly for burn matchups, and depending on the matchups some aggro decks as well.

An extra copy of Bojuka Bog can be brought in when you’re up against decks that like to abuse their graveyard. If you’re facing a lot of Tron or just having a hard time beating other graveyard based decks, it’s not a bad idea to pack a couple of Faerie Macabre as well. Cool thing about the Faerie is that you can cast it for one mana if you have an Unearth in hand when you discard it.

Finally Distress is your catch all for any counterspell decks or Tron. I like this better than Duress if I’m dead set on only playing one in my sideboard, but if you prefer duress then by all means, go ahead.

We shall see if these rats can bring prosperity in numbers to this humble brewer. I don’t really expect to win, this was more of a fun casual deck project to celebrate the Zodiac Chinese New Year, but maybe I’ll get lucky and be surprised. If you have any brews you’d like me to write about, please email them to pauperpedia@gmail.com. As always, I play the decks in the free tournaments hosted by gatherling every Tuesday night, and do a quick report on how the deck fared the following day on my Pauperpedia Facebook page. Till next time folks, have a happy Brewsday!

[schnowydays]

Wowie!!! Thank you so much @let-me-be-your-light !!! asdfkhakljsdhf i’ve never been tagged in anything like this before, so this is really exciting haha

Nickname: Jules/Joules

Zodiac sign: Capricorn

Height: 5'6" (says a nurse when they eyed my height for crutches haha. I’m probably actually 5′5″ tho. I don’t really measure my height in feet)

Hogwarts house: Hufflepuff 

Last thing I googled: what should you do when requesting an extension on an assignment (I have an project deadline stuck between two very close together exams haha)

Song stuck in my head: nothing at the moment. I was really vibing to Sunkissed by Khai Dreams this morning tho

Following and followers: i literally just started using Tumblr in general like a couple weeks, so my follower count incredibly low haha. I’m following a lot of people tho! I follow 85 and I have 13 followers.

Amount I sleep: this really depends on what’s happening haha. On school days, usually like 6. However, nowadays? I still have school but having me stuck at home probably extended my sleep hours to like 8, sometimes even longer. 

Lucky Numbers: I’ve always liked the number 2. Or 20. I think I just liked the evenness of it, and how it’s like a pair. I also like the number 7. 

Dream Job: neuropsychologist or something in behavioural neuroscience

Favorite song right now: I’ve been adding so many new songs to my playlist lately so I don’t really have a solid one. When I first heard “she likes spring, I prefer winter” by slchld tho, I was repeating it nonstop for a few days

Favorite Instrument: Piano~

Random Fact: the reason I needed crutches was because, during the first level of the beep test (or the fitnessgram pacerr test, or whatever), the absolute EASIEST and SLOWEST level of the test, I got a little silly and decided that I would skip the entire way across the gym instead of semi speed walking like a normal human. I was just at the finish line when my shoe caught on the floor due to friction, and I rolled my ankle badly. I didn’t break it thankfully, but it was a really bad sprain that made my ankle swell up an alarming amount. It’s all better now tho :D

Favorite animal noise: I love the sound of chickadees. Makes me think of peaceful early mornings. Also puppies :D

Tagging: @gaalactea @haddersnoodles @alittlepawblog @drying-roses @elithewho

Only do it if you really want to :’)

thank u @catstrophysics for the tag omg i love these!!

rules: answer 17 questions and tag 17 people you want to get to know better!

nickname: mae!!!!

zodiac sign: gemini<3

height: 5'3"

hogwarts house: slytherin babey

last thing i googled: "misogynism" apparently

song stuck in my head: on constellation street by hadley fraser! (yes, this is because of you. you know who you are!)

following and followers: i follow 912 (yikes i know) and have 185 followers

amount i sleep: 6-7 hours during the week, 8-9 in the weekend <3

lucky numbers: 27!

dream job: actress, historian or air traffic controller me thinks

favorite song: right now it's mr kaizer, hans constanze og meg by kaizers orchestra (LISTEN TO IT its so good) and, of course, on constellation street. obviously.

favorite instrument: that i play? the guitar easily i love that bitch. i do play the drums and the glockenspiel as well but they aren't as fun so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ the best one to listen to in general is just. trombone. hands down.

random fact: my birthday was yesterday <3

favorite animal noises: i really love seagull cries and the little hurrs that pigeons make omg

tagging::::::

(anyone who wants to do it) and::

@honhonbaguettegofuckyourself @ghostlymaiden97 @electronicbehaviorcontrolsystem @gnome-boi @islifeevenreal @but-if-you-had-to-choose @asphodelnerd @villanellogy @threecheer and i can't think of anyone else it's almost midnight omg

[ticktockstuck]

The State of Things 5-28-19

This is a general update about upcoming plans and projects around here. Firstly a detailing of my future plans, divvied up by timeframe, and at the end an update regarding changes to how things are going to be run around here for the time being.

Short-Term Plans (June)

Bronya and Wanshi’s signs, Dorenix and Corvopena, are up on my immediate to-do list and I would expect these within the next week.

A backstory post for Polypa about how she picked up an interest in anime in the first place

A short series of Lynera-centered backstory posts about how she ended up in the state she’s in. I have a family vacation happening at the end of the month and these posts are likely going to up once-a-day while I’m out.

Medium-Term Plans (July, August)

As part of some changes I’ll be making to the Atlas (see below) I’ll be starting a series of posts detailing the eight districts of Tick-Tock Town, which will be once-per-week starting sometime in the near future. As part of this series, I’m making flags for each district that’ll head each post. I would like to start these in June if possible but if not they’ll be starting early July.

TickTockStuck’s 7th anniversary is coming up on July 12th, and you can expect a new shipbeast to come out then. Which one I’ll keep under wraps for now but my shipbeast to-do list has not drastically changed since the last time I posted about it.

The next TickTockStuck Troll Call has been a long time coming now and finishing Lanque’s art is a top priority right now. I would place it going live sometime after June, preferably in July.

The first part of the brainspawn series I’ve mentioned before will likely go up in July, but depending on how the upcoming months go it may get pushed back to make way for other pressing issues (see: Lanque).

The TickTockStuck Extended Zodiac sideblog is still in the works, put on hiatus primarily because the TTS aspect catalogue isn’t finished yet. Getting that finished is one of my top priorities right now, but in the event that it’s not complete by August (around the 5th): I’ll put some backup plans into motion so the blog’ll be able to work around the leftover gaps.

Longer-Term Projects (Winter)

The final TickTockStuck Troll Call, featuring TTS Marvus and Ardata, should go live before December assuming things go according to plan.

Once the first post goes live, the brainspawn exposé will continue in a regular fashion. At most it’ll be once-per-week but depending on how much progress I’m able to make on it in the next couple months I may have to make it once-every-other-week. In either case, it’s highly likely the series will be going on into next year.

I have a lot of upgrades in mind for the Atlas, though I’ll save some of the most extensive changes for when they’re closer to fruition. To wit:

I’m working on a rough map of Tick-Tock Town. This wouldn’t be something incredibly specific or detailed, but should be enough to give you all a rough idea of how the city is shaped and where everybody is in it. The aforementioned flag project is a preliminary step towards getting this map completed, and once the 8-week series is all done the town map should go live right after.

In the same vein, a map of the greater universe in the Verse. The main factor holding this back is that a handful of planets are undergoing “renovations”. Thankfully, only one planet is still seeing some heavy changes and once that matter is all settled I can get to work on the map.

The cast page will also likely see some drastic changes, but like the changes to the Atlas I’ll explain the biggest ones at a later date, when they’re closer to being a reality. What I can say now is that at some point in the future I’ll be splitting up the cast page into multiple pages with some more detailed blurbs for each character and making it less of a total linkstorm.

I want to get more shipbeasts out (especially the two requests I have at the moment), but given what’s on my plate at the moment I can’t say I can work on them in earnest until much later in the year.

I want to get back into the TTS classic catalogue and finish up some sprite edits that never got to be finished, namely the unreleased members of The Felt and the Alpha Kids. This definitely won’t be happening until late winter at the earliest but most likely will start next year.

Regarding Post Pace and Longer Projects

Things are likely to stay relatively slow around here, but deliberately this time and there’s two reasons why that’s going to be the case. Firstly, from here on out I’m going to be making a concentrated effort to have some post up on every Wednesday, and new posts are going to be queued on Wednesday initially and only posted earlier if there’s something set already. This does mean that in between post days it’s most likely going to be very quiet but I prefer the consistency this system offers.

The second reason has to do with a change in how I post multi-part projects like the brainspawn posts or the city district detailing, namely that I won’t start posting them until I’ve already gotten a good chunk of them done already. With how off-the-rails the Troll Call ended up getting, I’m not keen to make certain mistakes again. It’s stressful for me and disappointing for you when I’m not able to keep my pace. This means that it’ll take longer for these projects to start, from your perspective, but once they do start you should be able to rest easy that there won’t be any major pauses in-between updates. The remaining two Troll Calls will be posted when they’re done, because you’ve all waited more than long enough for them, but this is the system I’ll be using for any of the more detailed plans listed above.

[kingofbluebell]

Video Game Forecast 2017

Due to some computer trouble and my lack of time to edit this week, I'm pushing the first anime review on this blog to next week. I want this review to be a good first impression for the greater anime community, and besides, if I rushed it out I'd be letting myself down. Instead, I'm going to ramble on at length about the upcoming games for 2017 that I'm excited to play because people sure love making lists on this topic. Yes, I touched on most of these games in post two weeks ago, but I didn't flesh out exactly why I was excited for them. As always this list reflects my personal taste which is sure to be different from anyone else who reads it. I'm trying to square away some other projects before the first load of games comes knocking at my door so let's finish this quickly. Just like with my other list posts I'll include a table of contents at the start for easier browsing.

Dragon Quest VIII

Gravity Rush 2

Yakuza 0

Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age

Persona 5

Nier Automata

Super Mario Odyssey

Yooka-Laylee/A Hat in Time

Etrian Odyssey V

Kingdom Hearts 3

Dragon Quest VIII 3DS: Unlike the feelings of disappointment that grew as I reached the end of Dragon Quest VII, there is a precedent for me to enjoy this game a whole lot more. Dragon Quest VIII is one of my favorite games of all time, and the ability to easily play it anywhere is always a boon in my book. Sure the lack of the orchestral score, decreased resolution, and a voice actress change are making me hesitant to play it, but at its core, it's still Dragon Quest VIII: the pinnacle of the classic JRPG.  I'll get used to the new voice for Jessica as I did for Chie and Teddie in Persona 4 when Golden came out and like that enhanced release, I'm excited to test out all the new features chief among them being the lack of random encounters. To me, this was the major thing holding back the original Dragon Quest VIII, even if the encounter rate was relatively unobtrusive, and with Akira Toriyama's iconic monster designs seeing those slimes scuttle across the world map is going to be a delight. I'm also curious to see how they've extended the story, especially with the inclusion of the two bonus characters. Plus I want to see what outfits I can put on my favorite guy Yangus.  Unless another game appearing later on this list gets localized this year, or I muster up the will to plow through the Shin Megami Tensei IV duology I can't see another game vying for time in my 3DS this year.

Gravity Rush 2: Sure the dream to have this sequel be another defining title for the PS Vita is long since dead, but the combination of this game existing at all and the befuddling presence of the Vita in 2017 is more than enough to satisfy me. The original Gravity Rush translated very well to the PS4, and demo proves the controls have been refined even further. Being built from the ground up for the PS4 has not only improved the controls, but the brief glimpse of the vistas we'll be able to float through are anything to go by the developers certainly know how to make use of the rest of the PS4's hardware. I hesitate to classify Gravity Rush as a sandbox series, but that's mainly due to my reticence to play many of them now. Most of these games are heavily padded with additional objectives and exist on a playfield so large they become overwhelming. Gravity Rush also contains the myriad of collectibles and repetitive side missions of increasing difficulty however it doesn't immediately hit me that I've done this all before. The series' unique movement options and that said movement options only improve with every digression from the main plot certainly aid in this feeling, yet there is clearly something more. The original Gravity Rush's world, possibly stemming from the fact it was originally a portable game, felt compact and that translated into a more focused experience. I can't wait to see how I can mess around with the sequel's settings, but I hope the developers give me more ways to interact rather than more ground to cover.

Yakuza 0: If there were any franchise that exemplified the tenets I mentioned above it's Yakuza. The way folks over at Sega have gone about expanding the fictional city of Kamurocho, not by expanding the map but instead increasing the number of locations the player can explore in the same space is nothing short of genius game design that reflects actual urban development. This cost saving measure has not only allowed longtime fans to become familiar with the city as they would their real-life neighborhoods but also for the developers to make it come alive by including dozens of unique side activities on top of the already expanding and satisfying combat mechanics. While I'm still relatively new to the Yakuza franchise, my time playing the PS2 entries of the franchise make me excited to play more. I have no reticence jumping into a game further down the development timeline because I don't mind going back to older eras of 3D action games with their relatively stiffer controls. From what little I remember Yakuza 3 is a large step up from the PS2 era titles, and besides the story, design and charm of the franchise are more than enough to get me going back to older games even after playing the most refined game the series has to offer (in English).  I'm just happy Sony and Sega are giving this franchise another chance outside of Japan. Even though prequels tend to get a bad rap in most media the Yakuza series storytelling pedigree has me excited to see how Kazuma and Majima turned into the men we've grown to love. In fact, the game being prequel has also given me the opportunity to sell the concept of this game to as many of my long-time GTA, martial arts, and crime-fiction loving friends as I can. The two-year localization wait for this game is almost at an end, and I can't wait to delve into the opulent world of 80's Japanese crime.

Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age: I've been a fan of the way Yasumi Matsuno crafts RPGs since before I could easily pronounce his name. His approach to story and characters are as nuanced as the game mechanics that encapsulate them. In my opinion, they're some of the few RPGs that have a real balance between their gameplay and narrative aspects which is saying a lot given the tendency for Japanese RPGs to rely more heavily on the latter for player engagement. The world(s) of Ivalice is one of the most intriguing fantasy settings ever created in any medium and while it saddens me to say we may never get another chapter in its story I'm more than happy to return to its grandest one. Final Fantasy XII was already a huge game within the constraints of a PS2 title, and I'm sure this PS4 upgrade will do its sweeping landscapes justice. More importantly, I'm excited to experience the Zodiac Job system after all these years. The original's license board being fully open for each character, while certainly gave multitudes of customization options, felt almost too broad to the point it became unwieldy to manage. Having a more focus skill set for each playable character will go a long way into making the fights more strategic. After playing Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir I'm curious if this collection will give us the opportunity to use either system for character progression though I'm doubtful it will. What I don't doubt is this title coming out in 2017. With news of more delays on Kingdom Hearts 3 and the Final Fantasy VII remake not to mention the impossibility of any localized version of Dragon Quest XI so soon, this HD remaster will be a solid stop-gap title for Square's RPG market.

Persona 5:  The changing tides of Japanese game development, as well as the maturation of my taste, has made the (Shin) Megami Tensei series overtaking such giants as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest my favorite JRPG meta-franchise. Even almost succumbing to "Persona 4 Fatigue" and being let-down by Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE are not enough to change my mind. Persona 5 has a lot to live up to and from what little I've allowed myself to hear and see it has certainly impressed those who've played it. I'm grateful to have not been spoiled on any of the major plot developments and even many of the finalized game mechanics in the extended wait between the Japanese and global localization. I'm not normally the type of person to care about spoilers, but I've managed to hold back my excitement this long so why throw it all away at the eleventh hour? I haven't seen a new trailer for the game in at least a year, and I've gone so far as to avoid the English VA introduction videos for fear some of their characters are introduced too far into the story. I expect to either set up a myriad of blacklist programs or just take a sabbatical from most online interaction until I beat the game once so as not to be "tainted" by even the most benign meme. Sure I might become a hermit for a few weeks once the game arrives, but it'll be worth it to finally get to enjoy another full-fledged JRPG from masters of the craft.

Nier Automata: Rather than a screenshot I'm starting off this section by showcasing a very telling tweet from Drakengard/Nier creator Taro Yoko. There seems to be an unexplainable amount of pressure for this game to be amazing, and I'm still trying to break down how exactly we got to this point when at E3 2015 there were so many people confused about "the weird guy in the creepy mask".  It's not like after the reveal of Nier Automata the rest of the franchise was made more readily available to a wider audience to get them acclimated to the franchise. The first two Drakengard games weren't released on the PS3 or PS4, and I don't believe Nier is eligible through streaming on PS Now or is backward-compatible with the Xbox One. You would think after the unfortunate state Drakengard 3 released in, being plagued with slowdown and having a third of the content locked away as DLC that cost as much as the base game, that the series would have stopped there. In fact, most fans were shocked Drakengard 3 came out at all. Despite the odds, it seems some folks at Square Enix must enjoy Taro's work and want let him continue to lead projects, which for people like myself is a delightful aberration in this industry. I wouldn't say I'm the most knowledgeable Drakengard/Nier fan, I haven't spent much time looking at the fan-translated supplementary materials, but Nier is still one of my favorite games of all time, so that's why I have high hopes for its sequel. Outside of folks like myself, I believe everyone else's hopes lie are with the developer of Nier Automata: Platinium Games. Despite some recent disappointments, which can partially be blamed on rushed development cycles for licensed products, Platinum Games have been responsible for some of the most mechanically complex and energetic games of all time. Their reputation certainly precedes them at this point, and I think a lot of people believe they'll bring a similar flair and finesse to the combat in Automata. However, after playing the demo it's clear that Nier Automata is going to play a lot closer to the original Nier than Bayonetta. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but that means that 2B isn't the next evolution of cyborg Raiden. Combat in the original Nier was a simple hack and slash with some interesting magic mechanics, and I believe Platinum's involvement with Automata will go a long way in smoothing out the combat in ways Taro's previous team at Cavia was just not capable of doing. From what the demo provided it's clear that Platinum succeeded at this without sapping a lot of the particular flavor people look to get from Taro's games. Personally, I'm ecstatic Taro gets to work with a team known for massive and intricate boss encounters because I can only imagine how much they'll be improved compared to those found in the original Nier.  My biggest wish for 2017 would be for Nier Automata to be a resounding critical and financial success not only for Taro but also for Platinum. After the cancellation of Scalebound and Activision pulling out of licensed game development it'll be a rough time for them to find another project so soon and they could certainly use a big win.

Super Mario Odyssey: While everyone else seems blown away by The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild the game that piqued my interest more at the Nintendo Switch presentation was Super Mario Odyssey. Seeing Mario in a more sandbox oriented platformer for the first time in over a decade immediately grabbed my attention, and the idea of Mario going on a globe-hopping adventure will aid in making the cliche level tropes you see in most platformers have some distinctive flair. I must admit seeing one of the areas called "New Donk City" made me giggle more than the realization that a lot of the elements in the trailer mimic the original Sonic Adventure. More important to my potential enjoyment of the game was seeing all the additional movement abilities Mario as acquired for this new title. Mario can now swing as if he's performing an uneven bar routine and his hat, that is somehow sentient, can be thrown to act as an additional platform to reach greater distances. I'm unsure if the fan favorite "long jump" has made the transition to this title but it would surprise me if it didn't. Despite all of this I don't think Super Mario Odyssey, despite coming after a collection of solid titles, will be enough for me to purchase a Switch. My infatuation with portable consoles will have me buying the console eventually, but I'll be waiting until I hear more about that new Shin Megami Tensei game.

Yooka-Laylee/A Hat in Time: I'm putting both of these in the same paragraph because my thoughts on each of them are the same. Before Super Mario Odyssey got announced, these were the only 3D sandbox oriented platformers (have to find a better name for that before I take a deeper look at these games) on the horizon after the genre died out just at the start of the 7th console generation. I may not be the biggest fan of Banjo-Kazooie (certainly not its sequel), but I played and still replay on occasion the hell out of Insomniac developed Spyro the Dragon games. I adore the freedom you get roaming large levels and using your platforming prowess combined with your ever expanding move set and power-ups to tackle the various challenges put before you. I even like collecting a ridiculous amount of different collectibles, which is why I'm one of the few people who still emphatically enjoy Donkey Kong 64 outside of the memes. All these factors, as well as a majority of the original Banjo-Kazooie team involved with the project, convinced me and many others to heavily back Yooka-Laylee. The pedigree of the developers and constant updates have put a lot of our fears to rest after some rather large Kickstarter kerfuffles soured plenty on crowdfunding. I can't say I know as much about A Hat in Time though its smaller, inexperienced team and more meager funding explains its near four-year development cycle. Still, I've heard plenty of positive things from those who've backed the project and got to try out the demos. My fondness for the subgenre will have me giving this a shot as well if it reaches its promised release date this year.

Etrian Odyssey V: Last year I fell deeply in love with the plodding and challenging dungeons of the Etrian Odyssey franchise, completing two games. As arduous as they were I enjoyed (almost) every second of my hundred hour journeys, and I anxiously awaited the next title to be localized. I can understand Atlus wanting to make sure their global launch of Persona 5 to go smoothly before announcing any concrete release dates for games, but the wait for any news of Etrian Odyssey V's English localization is making me worry. Now with the Switch the next big thing from Nintendo resources from all companies, including Atlus, shifting to support it. It concerns me that a more niche title like Etriany Odyssey will be forgotten as we move to new hardware. Still the overwhelming success of Pokémon Sun & Moon, the lack of any announcement of a Switch Pokémon RPG, and the fact that Atlus USA tends to localize games for older hardware more often than other companies has me hopeful. Will we see Etrian Odyssey V in 2017? It's possible, and if it turns out to be true this year will be an even better year for games. Until then I should probably take the time to brave Etrian Odyssey Untold: The Millennium Girl to make sure I'm not too rusty.

Kingdom Hearts 3: I know anything can happen now than Final Fantasy XV, The Last Guardian and Owlboy came out last year, but I'm not holding my breath for Kingdom Hearts 3. I can guarantee to be there day one, but until then I'm not even touching 2.8 until the "third" entry in this franchise gets an actual release day. Just because I still harbor deep feelings for this hot mess of a series doesn't mean I need to be beholden to its whims. I'm not fifteen anymore.

So that's all the games I'm interested in checking out this year. I've chosen a lot of safe bets this year, but a lot of that has to do with me wanting to play a lot of highly rated Japanese games that have taken a while to localize. If any of the heavy hitters on other peoples' lists turn out to be great, I'll try to squeeze them in if I have the time and cash. In addition, every year there are a handful of smaller titles that blow everyone away that few initially knew about and when those inevitably rear their popularity onto the gaming landscape, I'll try to check them out too. I'd love to hear what games the people that read this post are looking forward to in 2017 so either leave a comment here or on my Twitter.

See you next week.

[mi4012annabodgal]

Creating a working storyline from a DADAism poem

Task: Create a storyline then later on a story board and mood boards based on your DADA poem as this is going to be your final project for the semester. 

Week: I lost my sense of time

For my biggest surprise applying the rule of chance resulted in a quite well structured poem... in terms of storyline. Don’t let any grammar freak read it because they would go mad but I personally find it quite beautiful what this gramatical chaos created. The poem is still readable, you can not say it doesn’t have a meaning, because it does, from the very beginning, the meaning fiercely steals itself into your mind and stubbornly stays until it is fully blossomed. You don’t need grammar for it, it just happens, we see nouns and verbs, tiny bits of informations, we associate, automatically add meaning and during the time of a blink we have a whole story. This ability is stunning. 

Of course it doesn’t always happen for the first reading. Or for the second. Nor for third. And it’s also possible that the words on the paper just scare the life out of you because you don’t seem like to get anything out of them. That’s why the exercise we did on class was a really handy one for everyone.

We were told to print out the poem then write down our ideas about it BUT we need to avoid cliches. And what are the cliches? Usually the first ideas. Now, we did’t have to write full sentences, that was the point, write words in relation to them, then write down the words in association to those. Brainstorming. 

After that we got sorted out into groups and did a group critic for each other. It was fascinating. Everyone had different for ideas each other’s poems and it was captivating to see how many different views could be blurred together into one. Or just the fact that one poem held as many different meanings as many people read it. 

My poem was made from a Virgo daily horoscope. 

“And Jupiter you capture idea

of good adventure may days

other may presence your for family 

Virgo sector communication of

the touch may hint that attention 

a in await get up that in 

or something Venus you’re a

in and caught getting is

friends few”

I decided that the characters of the story are going to be the subjects in with capital letters, and I also came to the conclusion that I want to make a love story. Not necessary with a happy ending.

I immediatley know that I want to do something with the fact that the name of the planets are also the name of the Roman gods, and it’s so interesting because when we think about ancient mythology everybody straight thinks about the Greek gods and poor roman gods are just the copies of them. Well I can’t say it’s not true, roman mythology was heavily influenced by the greek but there are differences. Some major ones too, so I did my research and collected facts about both Jupiter and Venus as gods and as planets too. 

Jupiter - The God

“In Roman myth, Jupiter was the god supreme. He could not be ousted by the other gods. He ruled heaven and earth and all life. Jupiter rarely left the heavens. He listened to his various advisors from his throne on high. The Fates had no power over him. He might assign one of the other gods to make a decision, but the final word was always his.

Zeus and Jupiter both had more power than any other god. They could shape shift, and look like any mortal or animal they chose. In both Greek and Roman mythology, they both threw lightening bolts. “

The planet

Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system.Its atmosphere resembles that of the sun, made up mostly of hydrogen and helium, and with four large moons and many smaller moons in orbit around it,

Jupiter by itself forms a kind of miniature solar system.

The colorful bands of Jupiter are arranged in dark belts and light zones created by strong east-west winds in the planet's upper atmosphere traveling more than 400 mph (640 km/h). The white clouds in the zones are made of crystals of frozen ammonia, while darker clouds of other chemicals are found in the belts. At the deepest visible levels are blue clouds. Far from being static, the stripes of clouds change over time. Inside the atmosphere, diamond rain may fill the skies.

Chemical composition: Jupiter has a dense core of uncertain composition, surrounded by a helium-rich layer of fluid metallic hydrogen, wrapped up in an atmosphere primarily made of molecular hydrogen.

Internal structure: A core less than 10 times Earth's mass surrounded by a layer of fluid metallic hydrogen extending out to 80 to 90 percent of the diameter of the planet, enclosed in an atmosphere mostly made of gaseous and liquid hydrogen.

Average distance from the sun: 483,682,810 miles (778,412,020 km). By comparison: 5.203 times that of Earth.

As the most massive body in the solar system after the Sun, the pull of Jupiter's gravity has helped shape the fate of our system. It may have violently hurled Neptune and Uranus outward, according to calculations published in the journal Nature. Jupiter, along with Saturn, may have slung a barrage of debris toward the inner planets early in the system's history, although some scientists debate how much of a role each planet played in moving the asteroids around.It may even nowadays help keep asteroids from bombarding Earth, and recent events certainly have shown that it can absorb potentially deadly impacts.

My thoughts:

After collecting these datas I made a mood board for the character as it was a task too, but with these I mostly established only the ‘feeling’ of the character, and how he will actually look like. I did the same with Venus and Virgo too.

I have many little additional thoughts for Jupiter, the other two characters and for my stories word which I will state later on after representing each characters.

Venus - The God

Venus is the Roman goddess of love, beauty, prosperity, fertility, and victory. She was so important to Romans that they claimed her as their ancestress. According to mythology, her son Aeneas fled from Troy to Italy. He became the ancestor of Remus and Romulus, who founded Rome.

In Latin orthography, her name is indistinguishable from the Latin noun venus ("sexual love" and "sexual desire"), from which it derives. It has connections to venerari ("to honour, to try to please") and venia("grace, favour") through a possible common root in an Indo-European *wenes- or *u̯enis ("friend"). Their common Proto-Indo-European root is assumed as *wen- or *u̯en- "to strive for, wish for, desire, love")

In myth, Venus-Aphrodite was born of sea-foam. Roman theology presents Venus as the yielding, watery female principle, essential to the generation and balance of life. Her male counterparts in the Roman pantheon, Vulcan and Mars, are active and fiery. Venus absorbs and tempers the male essence, uniting the opposites of male and female in mutual affection.

Venus was married to Vulcan, the god of fire and the forge. Vulcan was notoriously ugly – one of the ugliest of the gods. But he loved her so much that he created a golden carriage to pull her around. The carriage was drawn by doves to match Venus’s own beauty.

Venus was also the mother of CUPID, the god of love.

Venus was a native Roman goddess who was not adopted from anywhere

. Her name is exactly the same as a Roman word for a particular kind of love. That name can be traced all the way back to the language before Latin, to a word meaning “to desire or love”.

The planet

The planet is, indeed, name after the goddess. It was visible in the ancient night sky at certain times of the year and looked like a very bright star. Because it was so bright and beautiful, it was named Venus. Ironically, the planet Venus is covered with acid clouds, so the name is not very suitable for a goddess of love and fertility.

Venus is the second planet from the Sun.

It has the longest rotation period of any planet in the Solar System and rotates in the opposite direction to most other planets. It does not have any natural satellites.

It is the brightest object in the sky after Sun and Moon from the Earth.

Virgo 

The planet Mercury is the ruling planet of Virgo zodiac

According to the Roman legend, Mercury was the winged Messenger God, who represented adaptability and made the best possible use of the available resources. Individuals ruled by Mercury follow ideas and morals that resonate to what is popular at a given time.

I made many associations from the poem and created some rules for the word from them, because I let my fantasy run wild and love to think about every little detail in relation of the creation.You build a palace from bricks too. 

These ideas are not quite finished and fully established yet, all of them should be read starting with “What if...” as I am not quite sure of the storyline yet.

So what if...

We take the part of the poem something Venus you’re a in and as Venus is the goddess of love we create the expression “you are in Venus” which would mean that you are in love.

Venus is the second closest to the Sun it means it’s very warm and hot which are also the feelings we connect with love so the god/goddess’s planet is the closer to the Sun, the more capable of love the god is. Meaning also that Jupiter is pretty far away so he is not so much of a lovely guy.

I dearly love the idea of connecting the planets and the gods, not just by their names but physically too. Using them as a kind of a feeling expression tool. 

These were the beginning thoughts to my story.

Sources used:

https://www.space.com/7-jupiter-largest-planet-solar-system.html

https://greekgodsandgoddesses.net/goddesses/venus/