#probably going to have to edit this as more game details come out buuuut

[vixstarria]

hi! for the ask game: 💖🤔👾

Hi and thank you!

💖 What is your primary writing goal for this year?

[Copied from an earlier post]

So. I want to start writing original works in the coming year. Probably send some short stories out to wherever's willing to accept them, and publish some stuff via Kindle. The fanfiction has very much been practice for me.

Buuuut returning to the fanfiction: I am working on a multi-chapter winter-themed fic for an event. It will be published in February. And there will be art for it! Aahhh!! And I will continue writing Bloodbang Chronicles. Can't promise whether I'll wrap it up in the coming year, it's gone rogue in terms of plot and resembles a running sitcom more than anything now.

🤔 Are there any new characters you want to write about?

Want to and am! The winter fic is going to include Amanita Czarr and a few OCs which I'm becoming mildly obsessed with (even though I don't think I'll ever use them in anything but that particular fic, alas).

👾 Do you have any "bad" writing habits you want to break?

Hmm, I'm not sure whether the habits I have in place now are bad. They might be for others, but they work for me. For example:

I write completely out of order and hop around as I write

I edit as I go along, often re-reading and amending. I never have a defined "first draft", everything just snowballs until it eventually forms a finished piece.

I don't plan or outline extensively - some scenes will end up with detailed outlines from the get go, but often big chunks get left for 'future me' to figure out (she does great!)

There's probably more that's considered unorthodox, but eh. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Questions post

[lurkiestvoid]

So I haven't really said anything about this to anyone except my wife yet because I'm a notorious flake and 'tell ppl abt ur projects so u feel compelled to finish them' has the opposite effect on me and I didn't wanna jinx myself

But anyways, unimportant but still newsy: a Project of mine is shaping up into something kinda cool.

For the last two months I have been working on a tightly-knit series of Dragon Age fics that spans all my Heroes and companions over a minimum of 25 years, intricately weaving a custom world state, with prologues and drabbles and everything else I want in my personal canon, leading up to and including Veilguard (once I get my hands on it, anyway -- I have a decent outline for it already though) and beyond. I've been doing it for myself, but I'm having so much fun I wanna throw it up on AO3 when it's polished a bit.

I have never done anything like this before nor gotten so far into it so I'm really psyched about it! I've written fic, sure, and gotten decent reception, but it's been rare and tiny; I've written original fic, but usually got stuck a few chapters in and abandoned it. This shit is coming out sideways as one whole entire baby and it is as surprising as it is painfully life-changing.

More about The Project under the cut.

The Prologues fic will cover everyone pre-Origins, eventually, or later/younger characters before their official appearances. Then, there are four Main Fics, one for each O/2/I/V, I haven't yet decided if I'll split them up or run it as the massive interconnected beast it really is. ...I also have some derivative 'original' fic loosely planned for after a 100+yr time skip but that's separate There will certainly be plenty of smut in a variety of combinations and relationships, buuuut I think I'm going to post all that together as its own separate semi-canon drabbles fic just to keep things tidy and because I do have a kid who is soon to be unleashed on the internet who is already begging for AO3 i might post it under a secondary account

There will be many playlists.

General idea: The world of Thedas and both major and minor plotlines become massively but reasonably Changed by player choices, character deaths, character survivals, and by continual involvement of the Heroes and their companions and allies, in some form or fashion. 'Alternative' player-character Wardens/Inquisitors/Rooks survive the character creator screen, at least for a while. Chapters mostly explore the "in between" scenes of relationships, personal and interpersonal growth, shenanigans, minor events and conflicts, the intricacies of sociopolitics, processing the Horrors, and with major/familiar plot points told from interesting perspectives or other changes, or skimmed for brevity. No "party sizes" we adventure as a group, occasionally splitting into teams to delegate or pinch; this, too, changes some things. Filling in plot/lore holes and probably making new ones, but all for fun. And because Bioware is fucking terrified of children, apparently (I refuse to believe virtually zero children have any affect on half a century of history or really any lore at all, nor that 60%+ of all the Big Names aren't constantly fucking nasty style throughout the halls of power and the alley slums alike) there will be plenty of kids running around and mucking things up for everyone, adorably or otherwise, and explorations of tons of different family types. (Kieran matters again. So does Feynriel, and Connor, and the like 2-3 other kids we ever see across games. Now plus gaggles of baby OCs, sprinkled throughout)

Total rough-draft notes word count is currently sitting over 300k. My "notes" generally consist of bulleted list summaries and quick word-vomit snippets while sitting in traffic so I don't forget ideas, and a few 3k-12k rough draft chapters. I recently moved into my first major editing phase, which will take a few weeks, then I'll do a second writing phase to fill in gaps, straighten out details, rewrite scenes, etc, and a second editing phase where I repeatedly reread and hunt typos/dangling participles/whatever. And then I'll start feeding it chronologically to AO3, one chapter at a time, once a week for like a whole fucking year or three

It's... uh, big. Big project. Massive. Why am I doing it? I don't know but I am VISCERALLY COMPELLED to do this, I have not been in control of my actions for like two months and the consistent high rate at which this has poured out of me has been MIND-BOGGLING to experience. I have been possessed by whichever spirit of Inspiration finally gave up on George R R Martin, is my best guess. But hey, if it works, which is seems to be working VERY FUCKING WELL, I'm going to use this exact formula to plow through years of abandoned novel ideas.

OH AND I'm going to be doing fanart the whole time, both of canon and fanon characters. Dustin off the lil Wacom and getting back to work. I'm going to start taking commissions again also (not just yet) and maybe start a BlueSky for that I guess. So, uh. Yay productivity? But if anyone is interested in beta reading or has art requests, hit me up and I'll start putting out sometime probably after xmas lol

[carewyncromwell]

[HPHL] Jackson Knightly Moodboard

We can do what we're told, We can go where we're lead, But I learned from my father to see what's ahead! Nothing here to hold me, no one that I owe... Funny how a boy can grow! Funny how a city tells you when it's time to go!

~“My Petersburg,” from Anastasia the musical

Full profile under the cut! 💚

HOGWARTS LEGACY PROFILE (template inspired by @hogwartsmysterystory​)

Name: Jackson Lucas Knightly

Nicknames: Jack, Jackie, Jax, Jacko, Knightly

Blood Status: Half-Blood

House: Slytherin

Magical abilities: Wandless/wordless magic; (5th year on) Animagus (European adder with a white line on the left side of its lower jaw)

Wand: Ebony and Dragon Heartstring, 12 inches, temperamental

Personality: Witty, animated, sociable, curious, intelligent, resourceful, resilient, impractical, ambitious, rebellious, capricious, mercurial, flirtatious, overthinker, easily distracted, procrastinator

Myers Briggs Type: ENFP

Sexuality/Gender Identity: Gay / Cisgender Male

Birthday: May 29 (Gemini)

Appearance: Short wavy dark brown hair; bright "ocean blue” eyes with flecks of green, long-fingered hands; a rather youthful, boyish face; a small white scar on the left corner of his lower lip; a charming smile “so handsome it could belong to Lucifer himself, either before or after the fall”

History:

Jackson is the only child of disgraced witch Cassandra Knightly and her husband, a Muggle named John Eglinton. Cassandra was initially disowned by her family due to her becoming pregnant out of wedlock -- even her marrying John to try to protect her honor didn’t mend fences with her family, as the Knightlys never approved of Eglinton.

It seems they were right not to trust Eglinton, for when Cassandra felt the need to tell John that she and their son Jackson had magic (after Jackson at age nine had somehow managed to levitate himself completely off the ground after nearly falling out of a tree), Eglinton decided to try to capitalize on it. Knowing his wife wouldn’t approve and would probably try to stop him with her own magic, Eglinton kidnapped Jackson and fled the country so that he would be the sole person with control over Jackson’s life and activities.

Eglinton took Jackson to New York, where he used his son as a pawn in his scams as a supposed “spirit medium.” Eglinton got a lot of acclaim and money for his supposed “supernatural abilities,” which in truth were Jackson making things levitate or conjuring up things like flowers or fog with wandless and wordless magic.

Jackson was stuck marching to the rhythm of his father’s drum for several years before befriending a young Pureblood witch named Adelia Selwyn @that-ravenpuff-witch​, whose family lived in New York City. Adelia tipped her family off to young wizard Jackson being in the sole custody of his Muggle conman father, and the Selwyns (not being very keen on Muggles) tipped off the MACUSA. The MACUSA took Jackson into their custody and erased all memory of his magic from Eglinton’s memory, leaving him to try and fail to recreate the tricks he’d had his son do with magic and subsequently lose all credibility and fade into obscurity and poverty. Despite how amiable Jackson generally is, he feels no pity whatsoever for his father’s fate and if pressed would have to admit he doesn’t even care if Eglinton is still alive or not.

Jackson was subsequently returned to his mother Cassandra in England and the following year was allowed to finally start attending Hogwarts. He was delighted to find his friend from New York, Adelia, in his year and house, and the two soon became very close confidants.

When he arrived at school, his talent for wandless and wordless magic without training and marked affinity for ancient magics in particular got Jackson a lot of attention. Jackson doesn’t dislike the attention, but he’s of the opinion that there’s so much more he can learn and do, so no one should think he’s going to be satisfied just being where he’s at. Now that he has access to all of this knowledge and magic, he wants to take the Wizarding World by storm!

Other Facts:

Jackson fashion-wise would be considered a “dandy” in the vein of Oscar Wilde. Expect a lot of tailored jackets, embroidered vests, thin-legged trousers, and perfectly tied ascots.

Jackson’s best subjects tend to be “flashy” subjects like Defense Against the Dark Arts, Care of Magical Creatures, and Transfiguration, though because of his talent for ancient magics, he is actually rather capable at History of Magic as well. His worse subjects tend to be “quieter” subjects like Potions and Herbology.

Although Jackson’s a charmer, he’s actually very hard to woo as a lover given his tendency to overthink people’s intentions and growing up with a hyper-masculine and therefore rather homophobic father. Jackson’s very friendly and a total flirt, but he’s actually a lot more sensitive than his witty, rebellious, affable air would first suggest.

One of Jackson’s dreams is to one day own and tame a dragon, specifically a Hebridian Black. In the meantime he’s contented himself with adopting a black cat familiar, who he calls Lenore.

Jackson is very fond of poetry, especially the works of Edgar Allen Poe, Oscar Wilde, Lord Byron, and Robert Browning.

One of his loftiest ambitions is to become Minister for Magic, though he’s also quite fancied the thought of becoming an actor, Dragonologist, or Cursebreaker. No matter what, he wants to do things his way and ruffle a few feathers along the way. Because hey, f*** the system, right?

Jackson has undiagnosed ADHD -- he’s pretty much always moving and always thinking, and his brain never really turns off. It also makes it difficult for him to finish projects and causes him to procrastinate and forget important details and deadlines.

One of Jackson’s special talents is public speaking -- if you need someone to help you give a presentation or convince someone else of something, Jackson is your guy. He pretty quickly finds a comfortable position as a Quidditch commentator during Inter-House Quidditch matches.

Jackson is the sort of person to add monikers onto just about everyone’s names and/or give people affectionate “titles,” i.e. “my dear [name here]” or “my [adjective here] friend.” He also frequently sticks to ��Mr./Miss/Ms./Professor/whatever [surname]” until he considers you a friend, at which point he will definitely give you a nickname or two. (His best friend Adelia Selwyn’s are “Addy” and “Lia.” For male friends, he’ll sometimes just call them by their surnames, though he just as frequently will call them other nicknames too.)

Face Claim: James McAvoy (specifically in the film Becoming Jane)

[something-very-special]

Impressions

I know I’m way behind on progression through Replicant (insofar as anybody can be ‘way behind’ in the sense of playing a video game for personal entertainment), buuuut I figured I’d share a few thoughts.

Presently I’m doing sidequest mop-up post-Barren Temple, for reference:

So just to get this overall out of the way, I am legitimately fascinated by the differences between NIER and Replicant. This is something I picked up on when I played RepliCant to grab footage for my LP, but given my extremely limited understanding of Japanese all I could get was the tone between characters and to my unpracticed ear they sounded pretty different. I always assumed that Weiss was somehow even more condescending to Brother and hah hah, wow. Even kind of expecting the dialogue and delivery differences I was not prepared for some of the dialogue and delivery differences. Weiss just straight-up insulting BroNier on the regular, not even doing sarcastic eye-rolls like he does with Papa. I don’t remember the exact line that set me off but somewhere in the Barren Temple I was just laughing my ass off at how much of a dick Weiss is.

Thought the ‘miracles’ conversation in the Junk Heap was interesting, too. I remember Papa Nier telling Weiss to stuff it because ‘those kids need a miracle’ and Weiss kind of backs down-- obviously doesn’t believe it, but he knows better than to push. And Brother tries but Weiss is just not having this optimism bullshit. Little things, but the tenor of the relationship is definitely different.

One of the more interesting aspects early on is the way the Lunar Tear is treated. Obviously I don’t know if this was part of the original game or a script adjustment, but Brother talking about the Tear as a source of money as opposed to Father saying it can grant wishes was interesting. Maybe it was to justify that Kaine just has a whole necklace of the damn things and therefore it’s rare but not literally magic, but it always sounded like it was just meant to be taken as a myth to me anyway. Then again, it’s established in the Grimoire that Brother has a fixation specifically on making money so he can support himself and Yonah (versus Papa Nier, who has obviously already established himself as an adult rather than a kid still figuring things out and hoping that enough money will solve all their problems).

Where the dialogue doesn’t diverge is interesting, too. Mostly I’m talking about the scene after defeating Hook. I always found Papa Nier exclaiming “You’re going to live, Kaine!” and “Yes, we’re friends now!” to be obvious holdovers from a younger protagonist just goddamn hilarious when Papa Nier is saying them. They’re still really funny with Brother Nier but just remembering Papa Nier doing the exact same delivery in his deep, manly voice just re-elevated the whole scene into comedy gold.

All of that is really why I was interested in getting the game so already my money is well spent. But there’s some other stuff:

They butchered the OST! ...or so people keep telling me on Youtube. I admit I do think the re-orchestrations is largely inferior to the original (although there are some that are at least as good in a different way, and whatever they did to The Lost Forest -- which was one of my least favorite tracks in the original -- I really enjoy) but I wouldn’t call it a butchering and I highly suspect that if I didn’t have the eleven years of the original OST and its association within the game itself I wouldn’t bat an eye, it still all sounds great.

Also, a weird observation, but I found that the soundtrack sounds much better coming out of the TV speakers than through headphones. I’m not sure if somehow it was optimized for play through external speakers, or maybe just not hearing the added orchestration right up against my eardrums, but when I went to the Lost Shrine with headphones on I was admittedly disappointed, but going to it again and listening through the TV it worked significantly better.

(I’m not sure if this is necessarily a factor, but the booklet in the White Snow edition mentions that the new soundtrack was all studio mixed rather than having the individual tracks layered. While I don’t think that would have an impact on music quality it almost definitely makes a difference in the way it’s produced.)

I miss chest-thrusting to double jump Movement overall feels much more refined and polished. It’s not as slick as Automata, but it definitely feels like a natural evolution of the original game, and as an apologist for NIER’s combat I can appreciate that. A little more responsive, I appreciate being able to move while casting magic, and it still has a bit of a crunch behind weapon impact (although I wish it felt a bit heavier).

But goodness I miss the stupid animation for double-jumping. I mean sure, an aerial somersault is a classic indication of a double jump, but I just loved that Nier would chest-thrust so hard he would break the laws of physics and ascend higher.

It also feels a bit like the aerial dodge was nerfed for movement purposes? I really don’t feel as much horizontal thrust to get a running start after diving off the Library balcony.

Fully voiced? Fully voiced?! I knew this was happening but I totally forgot until the NPC villagers started talking to me! Some of the incidental deliveries are a bit awkward, but as somebody whose glasses prescription is a decade out of date I appreciate this immensely.

The item guy in Seafront just being from the goddamn Bronx is a thing of beauty.

BroNier does fit into the Village better. One of the little details I love in the game is that each bit of civilization has its own style. The maps aren’t large enough to really convey how long travel takes, but the different styles between the Village and Seafront just kind of helped to ‘place’ the characters in a really neat, subtle way (Emil’s sash identifies him as ‘belonging to’ Seafront, which is actually pertinent when you get that sidequest where you find the letter from his science-mom in town! I assume she always wore a kicky sash when she went to work in the underground child torture bunker.)

Facade obviously also has their own style, but it’s... hard not to appreciate.

Papa Nier’s dress doesn’t really ‘place’ him anywhere, which doesn’t feel weird for the main character, and I feel like it’s implied that he isn’t really from the Village in a meaningful way anyway and kind of drifted in at some point after Yonah had been born. But younger Brother Nier is actually wearing the local fashion and it’s a neat little detail that I didn’t appreciate back when I played PS3 RepliCant. (Probably because I didn’t bother talking to any NPCs what with not being able to read the dialogue, so I never really had him standing next to anybody for long enough to process.) Older Brother Nier takes on a very different outfit that winds up displacing him from the rest of the Village (and any other towns), which is a pretty nice visual metaphor, too.

I have a confession to make. I still enjoy fishing in this game.

Yeah I said it. I’ll say it again too-- I like the fishing minigame. I happily blitzed through the Fisherman’s available Gambits, and then just caught five sharks while I was hanging out, and then also caught the sandfish ahead of time, and also wound up with a half-ton giant catfish (??!?) trying to remember where the black bass are located.

Cart me away.

Related but I laughed far too hard when the fisherman says “the WESTERN beach”. I wonder why they changed that line. I just can’t imagine.

And those seals. Always a delight to go to early Seafront and just plant yourself between a couple of seals. Watch the ocean. Listen to the music and the waves. Watch the seals lazily roll around and make cute seal barks.

The most depressing thing about the timeskip is losing those seals.

My garden--! The gardening timeskip exploit was fixed due to a difference in PS4 architecture. :/ I know there’s still an exploit involving time zones but I didn’t go in knowing that and I was horrified when I adjusted the system clock only to find my crops weren’t growing. Is Legendary Gardener still a trophy? Fffffuuuuu

My BARREN TEMPLE. The Barren Temple is, to me, a legitimately funny dungeon, between Sechs getting himself abducted, Kaine getting herself abducted and Nier and Weiss just sighing in resignation, and the whole concept of the rules-based challenges. And the adjustment they made to the Prince’s dialogue before you meet him is so good-- the original felt a little disjointed and felt like it ended with the Prince being confused. It was still funny, but here Weiss just gives zero fucks about insulting the Prince (and presumably knows that’s exactly who he’s talking to) and it’s just great.

And I say all of that because I just died laughing when I got to the infamous Racing Wolf room and saw they outlawed evasion.

Evasion works differently in this game anyway so you wouldn’t have really been able to do the same trick before (dodge roll; in the original release you would dodge roll forward by tapping the button, but a default evasion has you backstep. Of course you could arrange BroNier to face away from the trap and then evade, but it would be significantly dicier, and I feel like the pattern on the shots was awkward enough that you wouldn’t have an opening in the second row (and probably would’ve have dodged your ass right into the bullets anyway). But just that they acknowledged the trick and then flipped you off with it was amazing. Aggravating? My amusement far outweighed my frustration since the Defend trick was still solid.

It also felt like more rooms outlawed jumping? That I can’t corroborate (I was really focusing on whether they did something to Racing Wolf, which is of course the most traumatic of the rooms) but I feel like it wasn’t as easy to cheese some of those rooms as it had been previously.

Dark Blast is amazing. Cheesed the shit out of the actual ‘Evasive Mouse’ room, though. I remember having some difficulties when the miniboss shows up since you can’t dodge out of the way of his lava pillar attack, but I just circle-strafed with Dark Blast and he died comically quickly.

This is actually more relevant to the magic as a whole, but in the time since I first played NIER (so... probably the time I fifth played NIER) I learned more about the little intracacies of the magic system. Like, really little intricacies, like how you can use magic with just a button tap and it actually has different effects... like Dark Blast dealing significantly more damage. It’s not as easy as just holding down the button and getting the multi-shot off the charge, but for a single enemy like that just rapid-fire tapping the button chews through the lifebar.

This tap strategy is really appreciated for Dark Hand (forward thrust punch) and Dark Lance (which is even better thanks to the game’s lock-assist-- a much appreciated quality-of-life adjustment), and I look forward to getting Dark Execution because of its fast activation feature (spreading the lances in a forward cone in front of you, extremely useful for crowd control when you can’t afford to wait for Execution to charge up).

Fragile Delivery still sucks. I don’t know why I had such a terrible time with the first Fragile Delivery but I broke that... Ming vase or whatever you’re delivering half a dozen times. Send that guy a steel rug instead, Guard #3, he is not worth whatever piece of art you had me destroy six times.

And the game still holds up. This is probably a ‘needless to say’ thing but yeah, this is still a great game. I always have a little bit of apprehension going back to something I loved just in case there’s a rose-colored effect going on. Not that I really expected that to happen with this game (I’ve played NIER recently enough that I didn’t think nostalgia would blind me) but, you know, always a possibility.

(That and that the remaster would be... perhaps of dubious quality. It happens.)

Nope! Still engaging. Still charming. I’m always impressed to go back to this game with all the knowledge of its inevitable misery and remember that it’s also just plain funny. NIER is one of those games that’s just like I remember it but better every time I go back to it.

I’m so glad that Automata did well enough to spur greater interest in this game. It really didn’t get the chance it deserved back in 2010 and now it’s topping some of the sales charts. That’s fantastic.

Just... fantastic.

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Bonus 4.2 - UTDP (Still Mostly Kaito Edition)

This is postgame content, so people shouldn’t be reading this without having already finished the main game anyway. But just to be safe: while this is non-canon character stuff, I will sometimes be mentioning events that happened in the main story, so there will be spoilers for the main game.

Last time in the first half of my Kaito-centric Ultimate Talent Development Plan coverage, it was all about Kaito helping people! Kaito encouraged Shuichi to use his detective skills to help out his schoolmates, and Shuichi passed some of Kaito’s advice about relying on people onto Kyoko. After some incredibly stubborn persistence to even get her to open up in the first place, Kaito nudged Maki into letting Kaede play piano at her orphanage, and Maki also bonded a little with Chihiro over keeping secrets and projecting their issues onto a dead bird. Then, after a brief sports festival interlude, Kaito helped Mondo be more positive about his future, and I lengthily compared Mondo and Chihiro’s relationship to Kaito and Shuichi’s one in canon, because both had similar issues and dynamics going on.

There’s still a bunch more Kaito-related stuff to cover in this mode, so let’s start off this second half on a high note, shall we?

Ryoma (featuring Kaito’s issues)

Another of Kaito’s friendly events is with Ryoma, so you can bet I’m interested in it. Remember, Kaito’s fondness for tennis meant he looked up to Ryoma as a hero, and as a result, all of Kaito’s unreasonably high standards for heroes that usually only apply to himself also apply to Ryoma. Ryoma therefore provides a delightful look into Kaito’s hero issues that can’t really be found anywhere else in this AU, since Kaito hasn’t been dying, and nor has Shuichi been saving everyone’s lives in class trials without seeming to need Kaito’s help.

This scene also features Usami – yes, she’s also here in this mode, as is Monomi, though never at the same time. I don’t even know, just go with it.

Usami:  “I just came to talk to Ryoma! I’m everyone’s teacher… so if you ever wanna talk to me about something, please feel free!”

Ryoma:  “Thanks, but there’s nothing to talk about. Don’t bother with me. Go back to your students. It feels… wrong for such a cheery mascot like you to be around someone like me.”

Kaito:  “Really? I think talking about stuff will help. Come on, just talk to her.”

Of course Ryoma talking about things will help! And it’s… actually rather surprising to see Kaito doing something that amounts to trying to help Ryoma get stronger, by encouraging him to do this. Kaito is usually so hung up on Ryoma being weak in the first place that he can’t even get as far as suggesting some kind of help for him. So I can only assume that the reason he manages to do so in this instance is because Usami was the one to suggest it first, which made Kaito actually briefly see Ryoma as someone in need of support for once, because she was treating him that way, and agree with her.

Ryoma:  “Hmph… is being nosy your talent or something?”

In my Kaito-isn’t-into-tennis AU, I wrote Ryoma’s POV describing Kaito as “nosy” for reasons I couldn’t quite place, but it seems I was subconsciously remembering that he does so here, even though I didn’t recall the details of this scene back then. Kind of like how Maki considers anyone worrying about her to be “gross”, “nosy” may well be Ryoma’s way to refer to people who are going out of their way to help him, as a way to try and brush off their help because he doesn’t consider himself worth it.

(In that sense, yes, being nosy practically is Kaito’s talent. Or at least it is with everyone except Ryoma.)

Kaito:  “What did you say?”

Usami:  “Hey! Fighting’s a no-no!”

Kaito:  “We’re not gonna fight. There’s no use butting heads with him anyway. Because this guy’s a total sad sack now. He used to be an amazing athlete before.”

Being called nosy probably wouldn’t normally rile Kaito up, not when he considers it a good thing to be invested in other people’s wellbeing. But apparently something about it coming from Ryoma in particular gets to him and causes him to snap right back to his Ryoma-specific mindset of “he’s not worth helping because he’s supposed to be a hero but he’s weak”. Specifically, I think it might be because the “nosy” comment was essentially Ryoma brushing off Kaito’s attempt to offer help. That refusal to even try and get stronger is another kind of weakness – and a more meaningful kind, one that it makes more sense to be upset at someone about, because it’s a choice.

Not that that’s a thing that usually stops Kaito from trying to help someone, of course! He openly called Maki a coward for running away from her issues at first, but that didn’t change the fact that he knew she had the potential to be brave enough to face them, if he just pestered her stubbornly enough to convince her. It usually takes a lot for Kaito to conclude that someone really is beyond help and isn’t ever going to decide to change, as we saw with Kokichi in canon. But not when it’s Ryoma, apparently. Even though Usami got Kaito to temporarily see past Ryoma’s initial weakness and try to help, refusing that help even once and not wanting to change is even more weak of Ryoma, and is therefore again disgraceful for a hero and sent Kaito’s opinion of him right back to square one.

Which seems quite relevant to how Kaito was in canon, considering how much he refused any help with his own weaknesses. Particularly in trial 4, where it was very apparent that he was struggling to face the truth and should have reached out for support, and he was only making himself look even more obviously weak by not doing that.

This moment here with Ryoma, thanks to Usami letting Kaito get as far as offering help at all, is essentially illustrating to Kaito that if a hero does do the unacceptable and be weak in the first place, then refusing help for it when people can already see that he needs it only looks even weaker and even less heroic of him, and he should at least cut his losses and accept help. I would say that if only a moment like this with Ryoma had happened in canon then it might have served as a lesson of How Not To Be A Worse Hero (When You’re Already A Bad One) and taught Kaito to actually accept the support he needed. Buuuut I still very much doubt that, because Kaito here definitely seems to have fallen too far back into his general frustration of “heroes shouldn’t be weak at all!!!” to be using this as any kind of example.

Ryoma:  “You knew about me?”

Kaito:  “A little, yeah…”

Ryoma:  “So you get it now. The Ultimate Tennis Pro… I’m not that guy anymore. That’s in the past.”

Kaito:  “Yeah, I guess not… The Ryoma I knew was invincible and would go up against any opponent.”

Oh, Kaito, why am I so right about you. Throughout all of the lengthy rambles I’ve written about Kaito’s unhealthily unrealistic standards for heroes, including the fact that he also applies these standards to Ryoma, I had basically forgotten about this scene and didn’t use it to help me figure any of that stuff out. And yet here Kaito is, describing the Ryoma that he looked up to as invincible. Of course he saw him that way. Kaito’s writers have always known exactly what they’re doing and I love it.

Usami:  “K-Kaito… Is everything okay!? Please calm down!”

Kaito:  “My bad… I’m gonna go cool off.”

[Kaito leaves the room]

I like how Usami managed to notice, even though it wasn’t showing that much in his face based on his sprites, that Kaito was beginning to get really worked up about this. And credit to Kaito for actually acknowledging this when it’s pointed out, apologising for it (a more worthwhile apology than like 90% of the ones he ever gives) and leaving to calm down. Kaito can often react to things that upset him with a cycle of getting more and more riled up until he snaps in some way. At least in this case, he realised that he doesn’t want to end up lashing out as that doesn’t help anyone, and that the best thing for him to do is to just step away from the situation before he reaches that point. This is Kaito actually showing decent self-care! That’s rare.

…It’s probably only because Usami pointed it out to him. I said it’s ridiculous that she’s even here in this AU, but… Usami actually subtly did a lot for Kaito in this scene. Maybe he ought to talk to her. (You know, because Kaito is so good at talking to people about his issues.)

Usami:  “The air feels so tense… It’s all my fault…  I shouldn’t have said anything at all…”

No, Usami, you did a good. If you hadn’t been here and it’d just been Kaito and Ryoma, Kaito wouldn’t have even vaguely acknowledged the possibility of helping Ryoma and might have actually lashed out at him. This is a scene about Kaito’s issues with Ryoma, but it seems the writers included Usami in it for a reason.

The scene ends with Ryoma acknowledging that Usami cares about him, but also saying that he’s still not planning on actually talking to her and accepting her support. Damn it, Ryoma, you aren’t helping yourself either. He needs someone a lot more stubborn than Usami to really get through to him, but… yeah, there’s an issue with that, isn’t there.

There’s also a final year seasonal event that somewhat follows up on this. Ryoma heads to the gym to help Himiko set up for her Christmas magic show and finds Kaito already there.

Kaito:  “Oh…”

This is Kaito’s evasive face. This particular kind of reaction rather reminds me of Kaito’s reactions to Shuichi’s presence in early chapter 5. Which is only appropriate, since this is a similar situation of him awkwardly not really wanting to talk to someone who sets off his issues, but not wanting to admit why either.

Ryoma:  “Did Himiko get you to help her out, too?”

Kaito:  “Well, something like that. You too?”

Ryoma:  “Yeah. I may not be as fit as I was back in my glory days, but it should be enough…”

Kaito:  “How pathetic… An athlete at your level should say stuff like, ‘I’ll take on any challenge!’”

Heroes like Ryoma are meant to be full throttle, larger than life, all the time, with no half measures. That’s what Kaito’s like when he’s setting an example for his sidekicks and anyone else he’s trying to inspire; Ryoma’s supposed be like that too!!

It’s not even acceptable that Ryoma is saying he’s still strong enough to get the job done and is going to do his best. Simply admitting to any kind of weakness in the first place isn’t allowed and will definitely prevent anything else he says from ever being inspiring. (Won’t it?)

Ryoma:  “Hmph… Don’t bring up such an old story now. Those days are long past.”

Kaito:  “I don’t care about your past!”

Kaito, you extremely care about his past. Not about the past of him being a murderer that led to all his self-loathing, because he doesn’t have to let that define him and can move on from it and do better in future. That’s a lot like Maki’s situation, and obviously Kaito doesn’t care about her past in that sense, so I can believe he also wouldn’t do so analogously with Ryoma. But here they were actually talking about Ryoma’s past before the murders, when he used to be a superstar athlete. Kaito very obviously still cares about that past, because that’s why he can’t deal with Ryoma properly. If Kaito was capable of seeing Ryoma as nothing but the person he is today, then he’d be able to help like can usually help anyone.

Kaito:  “There are plenty of tennis players that look up to you. They’re trying to surpass your memory. One of them might become the next Ultimate Tennis Pro! So quit it with that mopey face you’ve got on all the time! When you see a tennis fan, can’t you just smile at him and say, ‘Tennis is pretty great, huh?’”

Kaito is kind of giving some reasonable advice here, but only on the level on which he looks up to Ryoma as his tennis hero. He’s managing to encourage Ryoma to be a little better at being that hero to people who look up to him, even if he’s not necessarily ever going to pick up a racket again. That’s something, but it’s not remotely what Ryoma really needs; it’s really more just what Kaito wanted from him.

Kaito:  “That’s all… I just wanted to say that to you before we graduate.”

Apparently this really has been bothering Kaito on and off for the past three years such that he would have regretted not getting to say it in the end. But still, “you should be a better hero” is not remotely addressing the real problem here, Kaito. Three years and Kaito was still too hung up on Ryoma being a disappointment of a hero to actually be able to figure out how to help.

Ryoma:  “Were you… just waiting for a chance to talk to me about tennis?”

Ryoma, perceptive as he is, does seem to have picked up that this whole speech Kaito just gave him was really more for Kaito’s own benefit. He just did it because he wanted Ryoma to become someone willing to talk to him, or at least others like him, about tennis.

Ryoma:  “Well, even if I agreed to… do you really think you’re qualified to talk to me about tennis? Well… you’d probably say that something like that didn’t matter.”

Kaito:  “Heh, so you do get it after all!”

Kaito has a point here, though. Someone shouldn’t have to also be a superstar with ridiculous anime tennis superpowers to be able to have a conversation about tennis with Ryoma, and if Ryoma’s trying to claim that just to avoid talking to people genuinely interested in tennis, then he’s only making excuses. (And I like how Ryoma’s perceptiveness lets him realise Kaito would say that to him before he even said it.)

Apparently Ryoma and Kaito do then end up chatting about tennis with each other as they set up the stage, which is at least some level of progress for both of them. Ryoma would probably have refused to talk about tennis if this’d been earlier on, but by now it seems he’s mellowed out enough – for reasons that have nothing to do with Kaito, of course – to be up for it if pushed. On Kaito’s end, though, this is still only him interacting with Ryoma as a fan of his and a fellow tennis enthusiast. He hasn’t stopped being incapable of properly seeing and helping with Ryoma’s real problems because of his own messed-up standards for heroes.

But even though Kaito still wasn’t able or even really willing to help him, we don’t have to worry about Ryoma in this universe. We can see this most clearly in one of Mahiru’s third year winter scenes in which she’s giving him some photos that he asked her to take as keepsakes of his time here…

Ryoma:  “I won’t let it end so easily. During the three years we spent in this academy… I found something I don’t want to let go of. Something I thought I’d never find again… And your pictures… have captured their smiles so clearly. These pictures will always remind me that the time I spent here was worth every second.”

…so, Ryoma’s going to be okay. He’s found his new reason to live.

Year 2 seasonal events

Year 2’s seasonal event is the school festival in which a lot of the students are doing shows or exhibits displaying their talents. Kaito isn’t doing anything like that himself and only helped set up the stage, but then he can check out one of the shows afterwards.

-      Can’t miss Kaede’s recital

Kaito’s POV wording for this option is great. It’s not just that he’s checking out Kaede’s show because eh why not – he actively doesn’t want to miss it!

Kaede:  “Huh…? You came by yourself, Kaito?”

Kaito:  “Yeah, my bad. Shuichi’s not here yet, but he’s on his way.”

Kaito, why are you apologising just because you didn’t bring Shuichi when she didn’t even ask you to? The fact that Kaito apparently on some level feels like this counts as doing something wrong suggests that he assumes Kaede doesn’t think much of him on his own and only ever cares about seeing him if he has Shuichi with him.

(I’d be surprised that he doesn’t know Kaede better than that, but… maybe what other people think of him is another inherent blind spot in Kaito’s intuition. I never quite thought about it in that way before, but that really does make a lot of sense and is kind of heartbreaking to think about. Oh, Kaito, you idiot.)

Kaede:  “I-I didn’t mean it like that! It’s just… I’m a little surprised you came to listen to classical music.”

But of course Kaede didn’t mean her comment in the way Kaito assumed! Instead, however, it seems that she similarly assumes that Kaito doesn’t think much of her on her own and would only ever come to her recital if he was tagging along with Shuichi, rather than for his own enjoyment.

Kaito:  “Hey, of course I’d come. You’re the one playing, so there’s no way I’d miss it.”

Obviously, though! Kaito respects and admires Kaede a lot, so of course he’d want to see her doing the thing she’s best at and loves so much! Classical music may not be personally Kaito’s area of interest, but that doesn’t mean he can’t appreciate Kaede’s passion for it and get excited about it anyway!

Kaito:  “I know you’re gonna do great! As far as I’m concerned, you’re the best pianist out there!

Everyone is supposed to think Kaede is the best pianist out there; that’s literally the point of her being the Ultimate Pianist. So I love how Kaito doesn’t care about that, and instead he makes a point that her being so great at this is his opinion of her.

While it’s less prominent in this AU, Hope’s Peak tends to do the rather unhealthy thing of putting people’s talents first and acting like that’s the only thing about them that matters. If Kaede is the Ultimate Pianist, then that means that her being so great at the piano is just the baseline expectation for someone with that title and not really anything special at all. But Kaito doesn’t see her as an Ultimate who’s already destined to be good at her thing – he sees her as a fully-rounded person first and foremost who just happens to have an amazing talent that deserves to be praised and admired rather than expected of her. And he does this despite spending all day every day surrounded by Ultimates and being one himself to the point that someone being talented at a particular thing should be difficult to see as anything special any more. He’s so good.

Kaito:  “Be confident and knock their socks off. I’ll be watching from the seats!”

Kaede:  “Hahaha, thanks. That’s so Kaito of you.”

I love Kaede using “Kaito” as an adjective, much like I’ve done many times throughout this commentary. His personality is so impactful and distinctive that sometimes there’s no better way to encapsulate it than that. And the fact that Kaede does this goes to show that she also appreciates Kaito’s outlook a lot, because she wouldn’t describe it in this way that expresses just how uniquely him it is if she didn’t.

Both Kaede and Kaito assume that the other doesn’t think much of them or see them as anything more than another close friend of Shuichi’s, but they’re so wrong! You should be better friends with each other as well, you two! You have so much in common other than just being Shuichi’s friend!

Kaito’s other two options for the festival aren’t especially noteworthy. He can talk to Ibuki before her concert and see that she’s already plenty hyped up about it without his help, or he can check out a fashion show featuring the class 1 girls and have “Junko” (really Mukuro) accuse him of being a perv when he’s genuinely just interested in the show. (Why wouldn’t he be interested? There’s nothing unnecessary in this world!)

However, Kaito’s appearances in other people’s events for this school festival are all quite noteworthy in one way or another.

One of these festival events is with Byakuya. This is not someone you’d expect Kaito to go out of his way to talk to, because he’s empatically neither someone Kaito respects for being invested in helping others, nor someone who might benefit from Kaito’s support. But apparently there is one reason Kaito is interested in him, and therefore approaches him after a speech he was giving at the festival…

Kaito:  “I’ve got a question for you! The Togami Corporation funds all kinds of stuff, right? What about space exploration?”

…Which is, of course, SPACE.

Byakuya:  “That is within our power. The Togami group, and myself, can move mountains. We are obligated to spread our grasp into space. A loser like you wouldn’t understand.”

Byakuya, you asshole, you are talking to the Ultimate Astronaut; if you actually cared about a Togami space program then he’d be an incredible asset to that. Evidently Byakuya does not actually care about space travel itself and is only interested in doing this as a way to make his name seem even more big and important.

Kaito:  “I’m no loser! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

…At one point in the main commentary I mentioned that Kaito never actually responds to being called useless (which “loser” is pretty analogous to) in this overblown way. But that was because that kind of overblown response would have sounded like an obviously-desperate defence during the times when he actually was afraid he was useless. Here in this AU, though, Kaito has no such issues going on, so all that’s happening here is his genuine overblown confidence. Being called a loser just bounced right off him; he knows he’s not.

(Also look at how Kaito would rather inform Byakuya that he’s the Luminary of the Stars, even though him being the Ultimate Astronaut is pretty relevant to this conversation. His luminary title is so much more important to him.)

Kaito:  “But I see you understand how great outer space is.”

I am kind of surprised though that Kaito didn’t pick up on the fact that Byakuya doesn’t understand how great space is, at least not in any meaningful way.

Kaito:  “Alright! I’ll make you my sidekick!”

…Kaito? Clearly Byakuya is not a potential sidekick, what are you doing.

Kaito then apparently spends a while following Byakuya around and pestering him about space despite his protests. Given this, I can only assume that in this instance Kaito means a somewhat different kind of sidekick, one that only applies in the context of space travel. Obviously Kaito is the foremost authority on space around here, so he wants to teach Byakuya all about space exploration and how he can make the Togami corporation the best at space. Maybe Kaito does realise that Byakuya only “understands” how great space is in the sense that he superficially recognises it’s big and important, and so Kaito wants to teach him exactly why it’s so great so that Byakuya will definitely decide to throw all of his money at it.

Kaito, cut your losses, dude. You could do so, so much better than him for a space sidekick.

On a similar but much more interesting note, Kaito can also interact with Izuru Kamukura. (Yes, he’s in this mode like it’s no big deal. Hajime is also in this mode. They’re never both seen or mentioned in the same scene, so I guess we’re just running with two alternate universes here?)

Kaito:  “How about it? You wanna become my sidekick, too?”

And Kaito just casually offers this out of nowhere after they’ve done nothing but help set up the stage together.

Izuru:  “It wouldn’t make sense to have a sidekick who is better than you at everything, right?”

Oh, Izuru, you don’t get it at all. Kaito absolutely can have sidekicks that are better and more capable than him. The only thing required for them to be his sidekick is that there’s something standing in the way of them reaching their full potential, something that Kaito’s support can help with.

Kaito:  “Heh, Ultimate Hope? That’s nothin’! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

Heh, there’s another instance of him seeing his luminary title as far more meaningful than any of these Ultimate talents, even the most Ultimate one of them all.

Izuru:  “I can analyze everything about a future you would follow.”

Kaito:  “Analyze? You’re just talking about predictions. My destiny’s too big to be predicted! Plus… I’ve got Shuichi and Maki Roll as my sidekicks. If we include their strengths, the possibilities are endless.”

Silly Izuru, assuming Kaito has limits, that there are things that might just be impossible for him. That’s not how Kaito works! And I love that Kaito brings his sidekicks into it, too; he believes in their potential so much! More than that, he believes that when people work together, they have unlimited potential that could never be predicted!

Izuru:  “As I predicted, you are an idiot. How boring…”

Kaito:  “That’s a bad habit. If you keep saying that, you’ll start to think everything’s boring. Are you okay with that?”

…See, Kaito gets it. He knew exactly what he was doing in this instance when he asked Izuru to be his sidekick. It doesn’t matter that Izuru is infinitely more talented than him – he still has weakness that he needs help with. After nothing but a brief session of helping each other with some manual labour, Kaito managed to pick up on that. His intuition is incredible.

This weakness of Izuru’s – to see everything as boring because he’s such a super-genius that he can predict every possible outcome – is, as far as I understand it, ultimately the reason he ended up contributing to the apocalypse in his canon storyline, because Junko convinced him it was the least boring thing he could do. But it didn’t necessarily have to be that way. If he’d only had the right help, he could have ended up using his talents to do far more productive things than ending the world.

If anyone could teach Izuru how to have more passion for life, to see the value and excitement in things even if he already knows everything about them, surely it would be Kaito? If anyone could let him realise that people are inherently unpredictable and he’s never going to always know everything that will happen, surely it would also be a beautifully reckless doofus like Kaito?

Plus, Izuru was supposedly implanted with every single talent imaginable, but only insofar as he’s one person. He evidently doesn’t have Kaito’s talent, because that’s all about teamwork and co-operation. Izuru is already a super-genius, but he could be so much better than he is. If Kaito could convince him that this interpersonal kind of talent is worthwhile to have as well, then he could teach him that, and Izuru would learn to value other people’s strengths no matter how predictable they are! There’s just so much Kaito could do for him.

Unfortunately, Izuru brushes Kaito off as boring again and ignores continued attempts to sidekick him, so we can only assume that Kaito eventually backed down and decided it wasn’t worth it because Izuru wasn’t willing to try and change. Which I’m only begrudgingly accepting because if Kaito did succeed in making Izuru listen to him then that’d be the beginning of a whole storyline that this side mode just doesn’t have the capacity for. Otherwise, I really do believe Izuru had the potential to change, and that Kaito would believe that too and not give up so easily.

Just… man, imagine Kaito being a part of actual Hope’s Peak canon and just casually averting the apocalypse because he saw Izuru’s weakness and did his usual Kaito thing and it worked.

At some other point during the festival, Nagito approaches Kaito and is disappointed to hear that the Ultimate Astronaut isn’t putting on any kind of show about space today.

Kaito:  “Oh, are you interested in space, too?”

Nagito:  “Of course I am! The vastness of space… that’s the only stage suitable for your talent, right!? There’s no mistake that you’ll be able to bring hope to the world from outer space!”

Kaito:  “Hmm… something feels off.”

Nagito:  “Off? What do you mean?”

Kaito:  “You’re not interested in space… Or me. That’s how it feels. Like it’d be weird for you to cheer me on…”

Kaito’s intuition is so good. He barely knows Nagito, but he can sense well enough just from a few sentences that Nagito doesn’t actually care about Kaito himself or his interests at all and is only obsessed with the “hope” that he thinks Kaito represents. (Not that Nagito’s concept of it is anything close to the actual meaning of the word “hope”, but let’s not go into that again.) Kaito hasn’t seen enough of Nagito to know for sure that this is the kind of creep he is (like I imagine Nagito’s classmates are probably fully aware by now), but even without that, he can instinctively pick up on it straight away.

Kaito would probably have a lot of very interesting things to say to Nagito if he was exposed to him more and got to know his deal better, especially if it’d been in the context of an actual killing game. …But really, Kaito’s already had to do more than enough giving a piece of his mind to a selfish asshole who keeps making the killing game about himself and his own bullshit philosophy, and there’s so much more to Kaito’s character than just being stuck doing that all the time. Let’s give him a break.

Nagito:  “Hmm… did I get too excited? I’m sorry if my blabbering made you uncomfortable… But it’s true that I want to cheer you on, Kaito…”

Kaito:  “Well, I guess you’re not lying… My bad.”

No, Kaito, not your bad, because you were right! Just because he really isn’t lying about “wanting to cheer you on” doesn’t necessarily mean he cares about you.

This shows something neat about how Kaito treats his hunches that never really came up in the main storyline. If Kaito’s hunch about someone is negative, then he won’t act on it without further proof. Despite how much faith he puts in his intuition, he’ll give someone the benefit of the doubt if they deny whatever negative thing he suspects about them. (We saw this kind of thing very briefly in trial 2 when he picked up that Kirumi was trying to save an “everyone” who wasn’t here but then stopped pushing the subject when she denied it, even though she was lying and he probably still suspected that.) After all, it’s just a hunch. Kaito doesn’t want to form firm negative opinions of someone based only on that, because that’s not fair. That’s just being a dick to someone for what’s really no good reason, especially if it then turns out he was wrong about them and they didn’t deserve it.

Of course, Kaito is quite happy to act upon unfounded positive hunches about people, because why shouldn’t he? There’s nothing wrong with being nice to someone for no reason! Maybe it’ll turn out he was wrong about them and they didn’t really deserve his kindness, but then, still, no-one was hurt; he was just being a bit too reckless by believing in them is all. Kaito is so often recklessly kind like that – yet we can see here that he also tries not to be recklessly unkind. He’s so good.

Elsewhere in the school festival, Mikan is working as a receptionist for the haunted house exhibit. In an attempt to attract more guests, she tries inviting passers-by… one of whom happens to be Kaito. As you can imagine, this does not go down well.

After his initial freakout over the idea, which rather startles poor Mikan, Kaito tries to calm down and talk himself into it.

Kaito:  “Wait, wait… I’m not scared. Everything in there is just fake, right?”

Obviously he doesn’t want to be seen as a coward, but this could also be partly because he feels bad for freaking out at Mikan when she was genuinely just trying to be a good receptionist for the exhibit and doesn’t want to disappoint her.

Mikan:  “Yes… they’re all just props for the festival. So it’d make me happy if you tried it… sorta…”

Kaito:  [looking ill] “Sorry… I still can’t.”

But I’m glad he realises that he’s not going to be able to handle this and backs out before actually forcing himself through the exhibit and fucking up his health a lot more. Sometimes these things just can’t be helped, and that’s okay, Kaito. Looking after yourself is more important than saving face or preventing someone from being mildly disappointed. (And don’t apologise for it, you moron.)

Since Kaito already did make himself feel a little ill just thinking about it, at least he happens to be with Mikan, so she’s able to take care of him.

What interests me the most about this scene, though, is just the fact that it’s here at all. I went over at great length in the main commentary how I’m absolutely convinced that Kaito’s phobia only existed as something that Tsumugi deliberately wrote into him so that she could weaken him when she wanted to. It didn’t make sense for Kaito to have that phobia for any other reason – it was in-universe bad writing that was justified in an out-universe sense because Tsumugi was a lazy writer.

But in this AU, Kaito is not a fictional character written by Tsumugi and nobody is trying to nerf him.  There’s no in-story reason for Kaito to have the phobia in this AU – the only reason is that “he had it in canon”, but the reason he had it in canon does not apply here. Every other one of his character traits is here in this AU not only because he had them in canon, but because they’re all a part of what make him Kaito. But I think it could be argued that his phobia is not a part of what makes him Kaito – it sure as hell isn’t connected to anything else about his character at all – and therefore that it doesn’t need to be here.

So it honestly would have been entirely plausible to me to see Kaito not have the phobia in this AU. They could have instead had a scene of Kaito excitedly going into the haunted house exhibit with absolutely no explanation as to why he’s okay with this, because why should there be an explanation for something he’s never had a problem with in this universe? It would have been a delightful subtle hint as to the reason behind his phobia in canon. I’d have loved that. Alas.

Instead, it seems the writers just decided to take the in-universe bad writing that gave Kaito his phobia originally and make it a part of the out-universe writing for Kaito in this AU. Which I guess is acceptable if we consider that Gonta is also here at all.

Gonta had by far the most obviously-fictional backstory – raised by a race of creatures from a videogame? – and so that shouldn’t be a thing in this universe where he’s not made from fake memories. However, they also can’t just briefly edit it so that in this universe his forest family really were wolves, because wolves don’t have a proper language. Apparently, if a human child is isolated from any kind of language for a prolonged amount of time at the ages Gonta would have been at, it severely fucks up their ability to grasp language at all and they become basically non-functional. This is not an issue with fictional-Gonta, because Reptites are sapient and have a language that he’d have learned instead, so his backstory is perfectly consistent with the person he is. But if some kind of sapient non-human creature is not able to be part of his backstory… Gonta’s entire character falls apart and does not make sense. So Gonta existing as the Gonta we know in any non-fantasy universe in which he wasn’t made from fake memories is bad writing.

The writers had Gonta exist in this AU anyway, of course, because obviously they didn’t want to deprive us of our lovely gentleman friend in this mode, and if that means there’s technically some bad writing here, then so be it. So I guess with Kaito as well, they used that same philosophy of keeping him exactly as he is in canon, even including the parts that make a lot less sense when he’s not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story. Hence Kaito’s phobia still being a thing even when it kind of actually shouldn’t be.

A few more miscellaneous scenes

Kaito’s last friendly event isn’t nearly as interesting to me as the rest of them and I’m not covering it in full, especially because it features Leon and Teruteru and I refuse to quote a single word that comes out of Teruteru’s mouth. But it’s still at least a little worth talking about. The gist of it is that Leon and Teruteru begin to discuss going after girls and are shallow and gross, but they’re vague enough about it at first that it somehow spurs Kaito to start talking about “a man’s passion” and sound like he might be agreeing with them.

Kaito:  “I never said I wanted to peep! I’m talking about chasing after unknown worlds!”

But he was never agreeing with them; they were actually having two entirely different conversations at once without realising it. When Kaito said “a man’s passion”, he was talking about going to space, obviously, what the hell did they think he meant?

Kaito:  “Listen up! I’ll teach you what a man’s passion really is!”

Kaito’s concept of manliness does not and never did have anything to do with gross sexualising misogyny, and if anyone thinks that is what being a man is supposed to be about, then he’s going to set them straight, dammit!

…Okay, admittedly that is probably not what Kaito’s about to do – presumably he’s just going to try and tell them how great space is, incidentally sidestepping the actual problem with how they were behaving. Danganronpa’s occasionally-shitty writing is thankfully not so shitty as to directly include Kaito in it (except for the literally four single lines in the main story in which he is still nowhere near as bad as these idiots and which are out-of-character outliers that should be ignored). However, it’s unfortunately still bad enough to not go and actually have the dudes who are shitty be called out by another guy for being like this. But if Danganronpa’s writing wasn’t Danganronpa’s writing, I really feel like this is the kind of thing Kaito would absolutely do.

While the writing isn’t letting Kaito properly acknowledge how gross those two are being, it is otherwise at least having him be very Kaito about this. Even if the other two were being legit and non-gross about it, Kaito would still rather talk about going to space than getting a girlfriend, obviously; space is way more exciting! (…Which, actually, means that this scene is some actual evidence supporting that that one line in one of his Salmon Team hangouts about crushes on girls is likely to be out of character for Kaito. And the one about reading dirty books, for that matter. Ha! Take that, clueless intern!)

Anyway, thankfully this is the last piece of Danganronpa shittiness that goes anywhere near Kaito that I am ever going to have to defend him from being seen as a part of. Let’s move onto something better.

The final year’s seasonal event is less of a specific school event; it takes place in winter close to graduation (the Japanese school year ends in March) and generally involves characters reflecting on their time here over the past three years. I’ve already covered a bunch of the ones I find interesting in conjunction with friendly events they’re connected to, but here’s a few of interest that are a bit more standalone.

Shuichi happens to come across Maki and Himiko on the morning of the winter closing ceremony. This is an unusual trio to see together in this universe and definitely has no particular out-universe reason behind it at all.

Shuichi and Maki are both feeling rather sentimental about the fact that graduation is coming up soon, but Himiko is having none of it.

Himiko:  “Ugh, don’t make that face! It’s not like we’re graduating today!”

Shuichi:  “H-Himiko?”

Himiko:  “Besides, we can still see each other after we graduate! I’ll invite you all to my magic show! My magic can still improve. The next time I show it to you, it’ll be even more amazing! See? Why don’t you guys try to think of the future in a more fun way? Look forward to it!”

Look at her go! She’s been spending enough time with Tenko over the past three years to have reached basically the same point in her development that she reaches in canon in terms of how upbeat and optimistic she’s able to be. This is just the kind of thing that can help cheer Shuichi and Maki up when they’re feeling down, and also exactly the kind of role she’d be playing in this trio in canon as they’re trying to get by and deal with their trauma in the outside world. Since this scene rather pointedly has these three together (when they’re otherwise not seen together in any other scene in this mode), it’s got to be a deliberate nod to the canon ending, so it serves to show us that this is the kind of thing Himiko would have been doing for them there, too. In this universe she’s not been specifically inspired by trying to fill Kaito’s shoes or anything, but she’s doing this anyway simply because she’s a performer and this is what her magic is all about.

Shuichi:  “Hey… Kaede played a performance at Maki’s orphanage, right? Why not have Himiko do a show at the orphanage too?”

Himiko:  “A show for orphans, huh? Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Aww, that would be adorable! Both Kaede and Himiko perform to make people smile, and those kids definitely deserve to smile. Also it’s lovely to see confirmation that Kaede really did end up going to Maki’s orphanage and it went off without a hitch.

Himiko:  “I might even get an apprentice. How about it, Maki?”

Maki:  “…I can’t imagine you as a master. I think you’re moving too fast.”

Nah, Maki, I think Himiko would be great at that. She ended up greater than her own master despite seeming to be the apprentice on the surface, so I think that makes her plenty qualified to be a master herself and train her own apprentices now.

(Since Himiko’s master actually exists in this universe, I am Very Invested in her reuniting with him one day. She needs to help him realise that having messed up in front of her one time doesn’t mean he’s failed her because she still looks up to him and cares about him even if she’s become greater than him, and he was being an Idiot to ever feel like she’d be better off without him because they are not just master and apprentice but also friends.)

Meanwhile, for Kaito’s final year event, one of his choices is obviously the most correct and worthwhile, but I’ll save the best for last. If he instead chooses to go for a walk on his own, Kaito bumps into Kokichi and has a predictably infuriating conversation with him, most of which I’m not going to bother covering, but there’s one part of it that I find interesting enough to talk about.

Kaito:  “You haven’t changed a bit in these last 3 years…”

This seems at a glance just like a general way to express exasperation, but it is very like Kaito to focus on Kokichi not having changed. After all, Kaito’s watched his sidekicks grow and change so much and is generally invested in the idea of people changing as they meet and form friendships with others. But of course none of that happened to Kokichi over these three years, because, as ever, he refused to let himself change.

Kaito:  “You’re still like this at your age? Doesn’t it make your parents cry? Do you even visit?”

Some very good questions! What is going on with regards to Kokichi’s parents? Did he live with them? Does he visit? Are they in the picture at all?

All questions that like hell we’re ever going to get the answers to, of course, and I don’t have nearly enough basis to bother speculating. But I do love that Kaito has thought about this. He’s trying to make some sense of why Kokichi is this way, but he’s also thinking about what Kokichi being this way must be doing to the people out there who actually unconditionally care about him.

(At least, Kaito is automatically assuming that Kokichi’s parents care about him, even though them being assholes could potentially begin to explain a few things. Apparently Kaito considers parents being decent to be the norm, which is another indication that his own parents being assholes is not the answer to why they’re not around.)

Kokichi:  “Hey now, you don’t really ask the supreme leader of evil such normie questions. Also, if you wanna know my origin story, you’re gonna have to bet two lives for it.”

Kaito:  “Idiot, everyone’s only got one life and there’s no way I’d waste mine on your story!”

Kokichi:  “Aw maaan, how boring. If you’re not gonna bother learning the truth about me…”

Kokichi, of course, responds with some evasive insincere bullshit rather than actually be honest about himself for a second, and then acts like it’s Kaito’s fault for not caring enough to want to learn. It couldn’t possibly be that Kaito really does want to understand him better and Kokichi is just refusing to open up because of his trust issues, nope, not at all, nothing is ever Kokichi’s fault.

For the other obviously-not-correct option for his winter event, Kaito goes to the dining hall and comes across Hifumi, who just finished submitting some fan comics of his before the end of the year.

Hifumi:  “The crunch time for them was difficult for even my golden hand… But as you can see, I overcame it and triumphed! I’ve raised the bar for fanfic yet again!”

Kaito:  “In other words, you wanted to show your manliness, huh? Good for you!”

While I’m not entirely sure why he decided to bring it up now out of nowhere, Kaito’s concept of manliness is still not inherently gendered. He’s just talking about Hifumi giving it his all and wanting to show how good he is at what he does. It’s about being true to yourself!

Kaito:  “Alright! Then next you can make a manga about me, Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

Hifumi:  “Huh? A manga about you, Mr. Momota?”

Kaito:  “It’s gonna be a legendary manga! If you make it about me, it’s gonna be a global hit! Cuz it’s gonna be filled with manga-style adventure before it even gets to the space part!”

What an absolute dork. What I can only assume he means by this is that he’s going to have Hifumi manga-ify the ridiculous make-believe games he played as a kid. Obviously that’s the kind of story that everyone’s going to be able to appreciate, children and adults alike, right? And in his narration at the end of this scene, he calls this his biography, because it’s all definitely true. Oh, Kaito.

Hifumi:  “Well, that aside, if I’m gonna make it… It’ll definitely be a global hit! You’ve got a good eye for talent, Mr. Momota!”

Kaito:  “Of course! I’m a hero with many sidekicks!”

Kaito is citing his status as a hero with sidekicks not as part of why his story will obviously be a global hit, but as a separate thing, in terms of why he’s good at spotting talent. Because he is! His hero-and-sidekick thing is all about seeing the potential in people and bringing it out of them, and he’s so good at it!

Reflections with the sidekicks

But anyway, speaking of Kaito’s sidekicks, let’s get back to the obviously correct option for his final year event.

The stars are especially pretty tonight… What will you do?

-      Take a walk with my sidekicks

Kaito’s POV is again being wonderfully Kaito – of course he’d notice that the stars are pretty. He definitely goes for walks on clear nights all the time just so that he can look up at them. Space.

(How many times do you want to bet he’s tripped over something and made a doofus of himself because he was too busy looking up at the stars to watch where he was actually going? A lot. The answer is a lot, I will accept nothing lower.)

Kaito:  “You can see the stars pretty well tonight, yeah? Before long, I’ll be up there with ‘em!”

Maki:  “The stars are pretty, but… is this really the only reason why you called me out this late?”

Shuichi:  “He does this a lot…”

See, he does do this all the time! And what better way to enjoy the beauty of the night sky than by sharing it with his sidekicks? This isn’t even a training session; they’re just hanging out under the stars.

Shuichi:  “But isn’t it kind of fun?”

Maki:  “…I never said this wasn’t fun.”

And Shuichi and Maki have come to appreciate Kaito’s impromptu starlight walks too! They are friends.

Kaito:  “So many things happened in the last three years after I met you guys! We did some school stuff, went to Sonia’s country during the break and solved a case!”

This is indeed another thing that happened. One of Shuichi’s friendly events is with Sonia, in which she tells him about an unsolved conspiracy causing problems among the nobles of her country that ultimately boils down to a lot of missing pets. Since that’s his area of expertise, Shuichi offers to look into it for her, and Sonia takes him up on that. This is more of him trying to help people out using his detective skills, like Kaito was encouraging him to do near the beginning!

And while Shuichi didn’t mention his friends at all during that conversation with Sonia, apparently Kaito later heard about it and invited himself and Maki along. He probably just wanted the three of them to have an adventure together, didn’t he.

Maki:  “Hm, I still don’t know why I had to tag along, though.”

Kaito:  “You were great at wiping out all those assassins! That’s my sidekick for you!”

Maki:  “Correction. I protected us from danger and Shuichi solved the case…”

It sure sounds like they did have quite the adventure, too. Maki used her assassin skills to protect her friends! She even seems to realise this! (Kaito’s wording doeees kinda imply that, while he’s trying to gloss over it, she might have straight-up killed those enemy assassins, though. That’s a shame if so, but it was probably the only way to keep her friends safe.)

Maki:  “If anything, I don’t know why you’re tagging along, Kaito.”

Shuichi:  “If Kaito hadn’t invited you, Maki, then Sonia and I could have been in big trouble.”

Kaito:  “Issuing orders to sidekicks is the most important job a hero has!”

Maki:  “Then your job was over before we even left the country.”

Kaito was helping, you guys. His decision to bring Maki was a good call, but then he also came with them for, uh, you know, moral support! …Which probably genuinely did help them, at least a little, because Kaito is the actual best at moral support. If Maki did kill those enemy assassins, they could potentially have been the first people she’s killed since enrolling in Hope’s Peak, which might have caused a setback in her growth that Kaito would definitely have helped talk her through.

Kaito:  “After graduation, when I’m in space, I’ll look for you guys from up above!”

Maki:  “Huh? You’d never find us.”

Shuichi:  “Ah, well, he might be able to see the approximate area…”

It’s lovely how Kaito says this even though it’s extremely unrealistic to think he could actually see them from there. He wants his sidekicks to be able to feel, even while he’s gone, that he’s watching over them from space!

(This is also a sentiment that very much applies in canon when he really is gone. He died up there in space, which means he’s still up there and watching over them from among the stars, isn’t he?)

Kaito:  “And then I’ll take you guys into space one day. After all, I need my sidekicks to help me out.”

Kaito pulls this out of absolutely nowhere despite how clearly unfeasible it is. And the idea that it’s because he’d need them to help him is obviously an excuse, because that’s not what the word “sidekick” actually means to him.

Kaito just… doesn’t want to be without them for such a prolonged amount of time. He’s so positive-minded that he’d always have thought of only the good things about going to space, so his comment just a moment ago might have been the first time it’s properly occured to him that going to space does have its downsides, because he’s going to have to say goodbye to Shuichi and Maki and leave them behind for months at a time. There’ll be video chats and such, but it won’t be the same. Kaito wants to keep being with them all the time not just for their sake but for his sake, because even if he still isn’t calling them this in this AU either, they’re his best friends and he loves them to bits.

So obviously that just means that they’ve got to come to space with him too, yep, that’s definitely plausible and definitely something they’d both want, and Kaito’s not going to think about anything else.

Shuichi:  “You need us to save you, Kaito?”

Maki:  “Well, yeah… We’re the only ones who would do it.”

Kaito:  “Hey, Shuichi, what do you mean ‘save me’!? Maki Roll, what do you mean, ‘the only ones’!? Geez, what sassy sidekicks. I gotta teach you guys some manners.”

They are the best sassy sidekicks and I love the way they’re making such affectionate jabs at him like that. He’s an idiot in some ways, but he’s their idiot and they wouldn’t have it any other way. And they really would be there for him if he actually genuinely needed help, even though they’re making it sound like a joke on the surface and Kaito is bound to be assuming that they don’t mean it as anything more than that, goddammit Kaito.

Shuichi:  “…How did we end up agreeing to go into space with Kaito?”

Maki:  “There’s no way it would go that smoothly. You really are all talk, Kaito.”

Kaito:  “Shut it! The impossible is possible, all you gotta do is make it so! It’s already been decided!”

Bad sidekicks, stop telling Kaito it’s impossible! And, okay, technically it isn’t completely impossible for Shuichi and Maki to potentially become astronauts and go to space with Kaito if they both trained hard enough. But that’d require them to put in far more effort than they’d be willing to do just to be able to keep Kaito company in space, considering that space isn’t their passion and they have their own lives they want to lead. Of course Kaito knows this – he just doesn’t want to think about leaving them behind, and so he’s trying to use his own line to tell himself that bringing them to space with him is something he’s totally allowed to imagine happening.

Kaito:  “Both of you gotta keep up your training!”

Shuichi:  “I don’t know if we’ll ever end up in space, but… I’ll keep on training.”

Maki:  “…If I feel like it.”

But regardless of how unrealistic the space part is, they will definitely be keeping up their training, even while Kaito’s up in space without them! Including Maki, despite that she’s acting all dismissive about it here. (She’s smiling when she says that.)

You made a promise for the future with your sidekicks…

Kaito, no, that is not what you did. They did not actually promise to come to space with you. (It’ll be okay, though! You’ll be friends with the other astronauts too, because that’s what astronauts do! And you’ll get plenty of time to see Shuichi and Maki in between missions when you’re back on Earth, and plenty of video chats from space!)

Since this scene is only available while you’re playing as Kaito, it has more of a focus on Kaito’s perspective. Of course Shuichi and Maki also each have a third year seasonal event with Kaito that I’m about to get to, and theirs focus more on their perspective, namely what Kaito’s done for them. Because that gets covered in their scenes, Kaito’s scene is free to be about what Shuichi and Maki mean to him, beyond the purely selfless sense of him being proud of how much they’ve grown – and they’re his best friends that he wants to keep hanging out with and having adventures with forever! This scene isn’t really about them as his sidekicks. They’re more to Kaito than just that, even if he still won’t actually use the word “friend”, the big doofus.

Let’s move onto Maki’s scene, then, and talk about what he’s done for her. (Both Maki and Shuichi’s scenes with Kaito are only one-on-one, so Shuichi’s not here for this.)

Kaito:  “It was a lot of work taking care of you guys these past three years. You didn’t even try to talk to people in the beginning.”

Maki:  “Yeah. If you hadn’t annoyed me so much with your constant pestering… I probably would have never been able to talk to Shuichi and the others so casually.”

Kaito helped her relearn how to be friends! Here is confirmation that he very much did employ copious amounts of stubborn pestering to get through to her, not that that aspect of how it happened was ever in question. Kaito is even actually more or less admitting that it was pretty hard work getting through to her – he refers to both her and Shuichi when he says that, but let’s face it, he definitely had to put in a lot more effort in Maki’s case at first.

Kaito:  “You’re being pretty frank today. It seems you finally understand how great I am!”

It is unusual for Maki to be openly admitting things like this – which is also a big sign of her progress! And it’s very like Kaito to respond to her genuine expression of how much he’s done for her by being over the top about it rather than just directly, earnestly accepting it. In this instance it’s definitely not that he’s having any issues that make him not truly believe he deserves such thanks. So I guess it’s instead just due to him feeling kind of awkward when it comes to heartfelt, down-to-earth things like this, and he’s more comfortable putting on the super-awesome-hero fiction for it. (More on this in Shuichi’s scene.)

Kaito:  “Or… are you sad because graduation is getting closer?”

Maki:  “…Yes.”

Kaito:  “…That’s a bit too frank.”

It does seem that Kaito’s also kind of awkward just thinking about generally sentimental things at all. After all, we saw in his scene that he doesn’t like thinking about the fact that he won’t be seeing his sidekicks every day any more once they graduate.

Maki:  “Well, there’s no point being sentimental. It’s not like we won’t ever see each other again.”

Looks like Maki could tell that Kaito’s also feeling more sentimental than he wants to be. At least Maki is capable of being pragmatic about it even while she’s feeling sad. (Kaito would of course be capable of being as optimistic about it as he can, but for his part he doesn’t even really like to think about the sad bits in the first place if he can avoid it.)

Kaito:  “Yeah… you’re right. It’ll be hard for me to see you on a daily basis after this, but… it’s not goodbye forever.”

Maki:  “What do you mean, it’ll be hard?”

Kaito:  “Hm? Well, because I’ll be up in space, obviously.”

Maki:  “Oh, yeah… You still want to go there.”

Obviously! Keep up, Maki Roll! Don’t tell me you ever thought for a second that he wasn’t serious about going there, or that he’d change his mind one day! I’m going to instead put this reaction down her just having not quite properly thought about what that means in terms of the future of their friendship, in that he’s not going to be able to be around as much. Kind of like how Kaito himself in his scene apparently hadn’t thought about it properly until now.

Maki’s looking distant and a little sad in her last line there, and it seems like Kaito picks up on that.

Kaito:  “But you’re my sidekick! If something happened to you, I’d fly back here, right away! I look out for my sidekicks! Cuz I’m a hero!”

Therefore obviously it’ll totally be possible for him to do this if Maki needed him to! Aborting a space mission on short notice in the middle of it and zooming back to Earth for personal reasons is definitely something an astronaut can do, right? This is adorably like the previous scene in which Kaito insisted they could totally come to space with him. He really does not want to think about the fact that going to space will unavoidably separate him from his sidekicks for months at a time.

While the last scene was more from Kaito’s perspective and was therefore about what he’d want – his sidekicks in space with him! – this one is reversed. This scene has been about what Kaito’s done for Maki, and her talking about that has made him focus on what she’d want. So of course he would selflessly abandon space and come right back to help her if something serious happened and she really did need him! …If only he could. His reluctance at the idea of being separated from his sidekicks is, just as you’d expect, also partly out of selflessness for their sake, in terms of him not being there to support them like the hero he’s supposed to be. Kaito can’t bear the thought of Maki needing him and him being uselessly stuck out in space, not able to help her.

(She’d be okay, though, Kaito! Maki’s got other friends too who’d be able to help her in person. And if she really did need Kaito in particular, video chats would be enough, because Kaito always helps the most with just words.)

Maki:  “Huh… that again? Well… I’ll be waiting, but I won’t be expecting much…”

Maki is of course fully aware of how unfeasible these claims of Kaito’s are, but it seems, based on her wistful smile at the end, that she at least understands and appreciates how much he genuinely wants to be able to do that for her if she ever needs it. He is a hero who looks out for his sidekicks, after all, and Maki knows this, no matter how ridiculous she might think that way of wording it is.

Last but not least, Shuichi’s scene begins with him waking up early on the day of the winter closing ceremony. (This is remarkable in and of itself, considering how emphatically not a morning person Shuichi was in canon. Perhaps that was partly for mental health reasons, though, and after three years of being friends with Kaito and Kaede and working on his issues, he’s got better at waking up in the mornings.)

Thinking about only having a short time left at this academy makes you sad… And from that comes restlessness. What will you do?

-      Exercise is perfect at a time like this

It’s lovely how Shuichi thinks of this entirely by himself as something that’ll improve his mood. Kaito really has taught him well!

So Shuichi heads to the school field and finds that Kaito had the same idea as him.

Kaito:  “Oh, hey there bro! Are you training too?”

Shuichi:  “Yeah! It’s good to sweat some things out!”

Kaito:  “Right on! That’s the spirit! It’s all thanks to your training with me!”

Of course it’s all thanks to his training with Kaito! Shuichi would never have even considered doing this kind of thing to help himself if Kaito hadn’t been his friend.

Shuichi:  “…You’re right. You befriended me, and encouraged me, and gave me advice… You’ve… helped me so much, Kaito…”

Kaito:  “Hey, hey. What’s all that about? Don’t dampen the mood, bro.”

…But Kaito still can’t quite just earnestly accept such heartfelt gratitude. This is kind of a reverse of last scene with Maki, in which he responded to her acknowledgement of how much he’d done by being kind of flippantly over-the-top about it. This time, he started with the over-the-top “well, it’s because I’m awesome!”, but Shuichi responding with an earnest “no, you really are, thank you so much,” still managed to wrong-foot him. And again, this isn’t the canon storyline where Kaito had heaps of issues and ended up with a gaping hole in his sense of self-worth, so it’s not because he doesn’t feel like he deserves any kind of thanks at all.

It seems bizarre to be using this word for Kaito, but… he might actually be kind of modest? Sure, he’ll act over-the-top about his achievements, but it’s like he only really thinks of that as a fiction for the sake of keeping up his usual luminary image, an image that people might buy into and play along with because it’s fun and it helps encourage them, but not because they really think he’s that ridiculously amazing. If someone takes his overblown words at face value and seems to genuinely feel that they’re true, then he’ll back up and try to brush it off, because nah, he’s all right, but there’s no way he could really be quite that awesome. (You are that awesome, Kaito. At least when it comes to supporting your sidekicks.)

Shuichi:  “Ah, sorry… I was just thinking about what we’ve built over the years…”

Friendship! You built the best adorablest friendship, is what you did. (Also what are you doing apologising for this, Shuichi; there is absolutely nothing wrong in telling Kaito how amazing he’s been even if he’s too much of an awkward dork to properly accept it.)

Shuichi:  “If I ever find myself in trouble, I can look back at my time with you for inspiration, Kaito.”

Just like he’s also able to do in canon even though Kaito’s not there any more!

Kaito:  “That’s true, but… Graduation won’t be the end for us!”

But thankfully, in this universe, Kaito is always going to be there. (Just maybe sometimes only over video chats, from space.) He doesn’t ever want their friendship to end!

Kaito:  “Listen up! Even if things get tough in the future…”

Shuichi:  “Don’t bear it all by yourself, right?”

Kaito:  “Oh… well if you get it, then it’s all good.”

Pfft, I like how Kaito seems almost miffed that Shuichi stole his line. But it definitely is okay so long as he understands that, and evidently Kaito has told him this enough times over the years that Shuichi has that well and truly ingrained in his mind by now and already knew exactly how Kaito was going to finish his sentence.

Kaito:  “When things are bad, me, Maki Roll, or Kaede will help you carry your burdens. As long as you understand that, you can get stronger.”

And it’s good to see that Kaito isn’t just focusing things on himself as the sole figure of support (after all, he wouldn’t have any reason to in this AU where he hasn’t been having massive issues). He’s happy to remind Shuichi that he has other friends as well who’ll be there to help him.

Shuichi:  “The same goes for you, Kaito. If there’s anything I can help you with, just say so.”

Shuichi is also so very good. Every time Kaito says something along those lines to Shuichi, I’m always burning with the desperate urge to tell him that goes for you too, Kaito, you selfless idiot, you deserve it – so it’s really lovely and cathartic to see Shuichi actually telling him that. He’s such a caring friend and really would be more than happy to do anything for Kaito if he ever needed it.

Kaito:  “Heh, now we’re talking. Of course you’d help me! I’m the hero and you’re my sidekick!”

…

*tilts head almost 180 degrees*

Who are you and what have you done with Kaito.

This is not how Kaito works. He seems to be actually acknowledging that helping the hero is one of the roles of a sidekick, but no it isn’t, not in Kaito’s definition!

Okay, so. When I was starting to think about writing these UTDP bonus posts, I had one hell of a hot take in mind for this line. That take was that the reason Kaito says this here is because in this AU, he’s not “fictional”.

As I explain in greater length in my post about Kaito’s entire character arc from my main blog, it seems reasonable to assume that Kaito’s childlike black-and-white view on heroes and sidekicks comes from the fact that he was in-universely written to be the perfect ideal hero to inspire Shuichi. It’s somewhat unrealistic to think that if Kaito had actually experienced growing up, he wouldn’t have gradually gained a more nuanced appreciation for fiction, as he started reading more complex stories containing more fallible heroes who were still capable of being inspiring not despite but because of that. So I was going to say that Kaito not being fictional in this AU and having actually grown up meant he’d been able to gain that greater understanding of what made a hero inspiring, which’d mean that Kaito’s usual double-standard about heroes simply doesn’t exist in this version of him, and therefore that he genuinely means it here when he says of course Shuichi can and should help him out too.

…Except that clearly doesn’t track with some of the other scenes in this AU, now, does it. Mostly I’m talking about the scenes with Ryoma, in which Kaito’s issues about heroes clearly still apply to Ryoma in the same way they did in canon. There’s also that one scene with Hifumi in which Kaito is quite happy to have his ridiculous childhood games made into a manga and doesn’t seem to be aware of the fact that mayyyybe a lot of people wouldn’t actually find them to be particularly compelling narratives.

And while the scene with Kaito’s phobia isn’t about the hero issue, the point I was trying to get at there is related to this. It doesn’t quite make sense that Kaito has his phobia if he’s not “fictional”, just like it maybe doesn’t quite make sense that he has this view of heroes either. But ultimately, when writing this AU, the writers just decided to keep the characters entirely as they were in V3 canon, even including the parts of them that don’t actually quite make sense if they’re not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story.

So never mind, scratch all that. I only brought it up because I found it an interesting concept to think about, but it’s definitely not what’s going on here. Kaito not being “fictional” in this AU is not actually why he’s willing to admit that of course Shuichi would help him out as his sidekick.

Instead, presumably the reason Kaito is saying this here is that… he doesn’t really mean it, the idiot. It is at least not quite as bad as in canon where he knows full well he already has problems and is consciously lying when he insists that he’d totally ask for help if he needed it. Here, it’s more just that he’s never expecting he will need help and so he’ll never have to actually think about whether or not this claim is really true. Ultimately, it’s easier for him to just casually claim this here, because the alternative is being all “oh but I won’t need your help!”, which’d just make him sound like he doesn’t even appreciate Shuichi’s willingness to be there for him.

I do like to believe, though, that whenever Kaito does run into some kind of trouble in future in this AU (and I say “when” not “if” because nobody can ever go through life without having at least some problems here and there), he’ll actually be able, with Shuichi and Maki’s prodding and reassurance, to admit it and ask for help. Without the stress of the killing game making Kaito tunnel-vision into the fact that he needs to keep supporting his sidekicks and that the only thing that matters is how much of a difference he can make to everyone’s survival, I think he’d be a lot less completely and utterly averse to acknowledging weakness. Plus, hopefully his astronaut training will drill it into him that part of good communication is telling your teammates when there’s something wrong with you, because holy crap is it only going to make things way worse not just for you but for everyone involved if you don’t, you moron. And the more Shuichi and Maki grow and the less obviously they need his help and support most of the time, the more Kaito will come to consciously see them not just as his sidekicks but as his friends, and friends can open up to each other about anything.

One way or another, Kaito is bound to eventually realise what an idiot he’s being and overcome these issues of his. He just needs to live for long enough to get that far.

Kaito:  “Alright then… wanna run for a while? Better hurry, or you’ll be eating my dust!”

Shuichi:  “Ah, hey! No fair, Kaito!”

Working up a good sweat, you chased Kaito all the way to homeroom.

Aaaaa look at them racing each other off into the sunrise. They are friends and they are going to live happily ever after. Kaito is going to go to space multiple times under normal circumstances and come back alive each time, and also one day learn not to be a hypocrite about asking people for support. Shuichi is going to start his own detective agency where he exclusively takes on jobs that involve helping people and continue to have confidence in his talent in between relying on his friends for help when he needs to.

And Maki… I refuse to accept that she’s just going to have to go back to killing people in this universe when she’s come so far; that is Not Okay. Either Hope’s Peak really is going to somehow absolve her of being an assassin as part of its “set for life” policy, or Kaito and Shuichi are going to do something about it. Maki may still try to claim that assassins are necessary and therefore that totally justifies her being an assassin – there’s no real evidence in this AU that she quite got over that part of her issues – but Kaito would be having none of that. So Shuichi’s first job as a full-fledged detective may have to be to find evidence of her assassin cult’s awful deeds and report it to some kind of authorities that can take it down and take custody of all the kids from the orphanages and give all the other child-slave assassins some goddamn therapy because the rest of them don’t have a Kaito. Then Maki can rid herself of her awful past forever and get a normal job, maybe as an actual child caregiver, where she never has to think about killing anyone ever again and can live a relatively happy life after everything she’s been through, because I say so.

I just love these three so so so much and want them to get to be happy and keep being adorable friends for the rest of their lives, because they’re the best and they deserve it. So I’m glad we have this AU where nothing particularly drastic goes wrong at all, everyone is fully real, and their adorable friendships are still there like in canon, so that there’s at least one world in which we can imagine that they really are going to be okay.

[neokad]

The Legend of Zelda - The Wind Waker! (HD Turbo Championship Edition)

Hi everybody!

As I plan to revisit many Zelda games I haven't played in years (or at all!) in the upcoming months, I finished what used to be one of the most controversial titles in the series for the second time, and the first in four years! And to my shock considering what I've heard about this adventure over time, I fell in love with it all over again 💗

I'd actually like to start this humble review with this analogy: What surprised me the most while replaying this game, is how its overall structure and world are. I feel like the best way to describe this game is like this: A perfectly balanced mix - as all things should be - between a classic Zelda quest, and the much more revolutionary Breath of the Wild. Now, I gotta say, it may be strange to some people to compare an older title to a newer one to describe it, but I promise it'll at least somewhat make sense at the end of this review... I hope O_O

But hey, we might as well review the plot early as usual! Well, there honestly isn't a lot to this story as usual for most Zelda games, but it is pretty solid regardless. Basically, as the ambient intro of the game teaches you, the ancient land of Hyrule got flooded by the gods, as Ganondorf tried to conquer the land with no Hero opposing him. And ever since that event, the world has been flooded with the Great Sea, only leaving many small islands and some people behind to rebuild the world. And so, many years after this happened, we find this game’s Link on his 12th birthday, wearing the “Hero of Time’’s clothes for the occasion as a longheld tradition. BUT, as this supposed happy day happens, his sister Aryll gets kidnapped by a giant flying bird to the Forsaken Fortress - as many other young girls. Naturally, Link tries to go save her with the help of Tetra - another young girl that escaped captivity thanks to her crew of pirates. With the help of her companions and their ship, Link sets out for the fortress, but as he is clearly underpowered, he gets demolished there by none other than Ganondorf, and washes up ashore, unconscious on Windfall Island, greeted by... a talking red boat! And this same boat tells him he must collect the Three Pearls of the Gods in order to gain access to the Master Sword, to finally save the kidnapped girls! This is not the whole plot of course, as I’m hiding some actual plot twists from you, the reader, buuuut I will say that while it’s not the most developed tale out there, it’s well done! But I feel like what drives this the most is certainly the art style and the characters themselves. See, I firmly believe this game has the best Link in the ENTIRE SERIES, no questions asked! He’s expressive, funny, endearing and he just looks so dang adorable! Part of his charm is definitively thanks to the situations he’s put in, but I think it’s mostly because of the game’s artstyle. IT’S BEAUTIFUL

Yes, granted, it’s not nearly as detailed as many games you’ve probably played, but the cartoony style they chose for Wind Waker really makes the locales pop out, and made the slapstick in the game that much more endearing! Plus, some of those shots just look, well, breathtaking really.

Speaking of character expressions and slapstick, I also believe Wind Waker possesses a very memorable set of NPCs as well! Be it the employee in the battleship game with his twofaced personality, or anyone involved in the many sidequests all over the islands, I’ve built lots of memories just traveling all around the sea, reading and delivering letters, just to get to know those people more! And it turned out that a good chunk of them gave me a good time!

Well, let’s talk about those travels, shall we? Wind Waker got (in?)famous over the years for having sailing. Lots of it. And especially in the original Gamecube version, it made travelling slow and boring to some as a result. Basically, you needed to constantly change the direction of the wind in order to travel as quickly as you could. Suffice to say, switching the wind’s directions this often got irksome pretty quickly : P Thankfully, the HD port on the Wii U does give you an optional Fast Sail in a side quest! As early as the second island in the game! Which means that those who found the sailing unbearable in the original will have a better experience ^^ But regardless, there’s a lot of sailing in this game, which is what replaces running/rolling around on the overworld. And instead of having different regions, they’re all replaced by 49 islands of different sizes and importance! And this is where my BOTW comparison will shine~ I think this game is pretty close in spirit to Breath of the Wild in some ways. Sure, unlike in that game, you’re locked to a certain sequence of items/dungeon/progression, just like a classic Zelda experience! BUT!  Wind Waker also allows you to explore 40+ non-important islands, and sailing between them in anticipation of what you might find there is suuuuch a good feeling! Plus, there’s many treasure chests to loot (both major and minor) while you’re travelling on the big blue. Due to how much you can find in your way off the main quest - while being far away from the suggested path the game wants you to do at the moment - gives this game a very open feeling despite still having a linear quest to it! And I think this element of discovery and exploration in a linear format - coupled with the great visuals and ambience the sailing offered - made this game so, so, so much fun to play <3

But what about the gameplay and dungeons themselves? Well thankfully, they’re both quite good as well! What I like most is how much of an improvement swordplay got compared to Ocarina of Time. Not only are the enemies generally more diversified in strategies and design, Link also received many new moves to his arsenal, and those made combat so much more intense and exciting! Though it did make the game very easy overall thanks to having so many options... alongside you not taking very much damage for most of the game :P Still, the dungeons made up for this! They’re quite fun and pretty well paced, and each offer some quite nice ambience as well!  Although I will say that the late part of the game has two dungeons with pretty similar concept, which while fun in their own right, did feel a little uninspired despite them having clever puzzles :/ On a semi unrelated note, the intro sequence at the Forsaken Fortress has you playing a stealth sequence, and you coming back to it later while able to defend yourself was a high point for me!

I do want to leave a quick note about the music, and honestly? It’s pretty great as well! Like I pointed out earlier, the dungeons create some very fitting atmosphere, but as soon as you’re outside them, many of the main islands have some very pretty, energetic music that is PERFECT for a Zelda game (especially Dragon Roost Island), and the Great Sea theme is very adventurous and grandiose, which motivates you even more to set out and explore! Though it’s somewhat strange that many smaller locations have no music at all, which makes sense to be fair, since those islands are usually pretty small from the outside ^^

Overall? I expected to only like this game, but I ended up adoring it! The Wind Waker is a marvelous journey that leaves a lot open to the player about how they approach the game, while still giving you enough of a compass to never be lost! And a competent story with charming characters and great music certainly help to make that adventure all the more memorable! Though I suggest you all should play the HD version if you can, since it has the fast sail and better looks. BUT, it also heavily tones down the infamous lategame Triforce fetch quest. (While it did not make much sense story-wise since you could just do spoiler without it before, I didn’t find it all that bad in the HD version since you can do some of it before having completed all other dungeons in the game ^^ But yes, HD or not, this is a grand adventure! Play it! 9/10

[medilea]

My thoughts on The Legend of Heroes games.

I love them. Sky SC and The 3rd are probably some of my favorite games of all time. After playing through every game (minus Cold Steel 4) in the span of 2 and a half months, I feel compelled to tell every I know that likes JRPGs that they have to play these games. Buuuut that doesn’t mean I think these games are flawless. There are some things I really hate about this series. And I want to talk about the things I love and hate about the series.

Let’s start off with the positives.

1.) First and foremost, this series has a world that feels like it is alive and will continue to live even if the protagonists do nothing. My favorite way this was portrayed was in the Crossbell and Cold Steel arcs. Events in Cold Steel 1/Cold Steel 2 and Ao no Kiseki happen simultaneously. In Cold Steel 2 you get to see what’s happening in Crossbell from Erebonia and vice versa, albeit a bit weaker in Ao until the very end.

Another one of the ways it does this is by having in game readings of news articles, fiction, non-fiction, and reports. I love reading. This game is meant for people who like reading. It doesn’t matter what you like to read, but just know that if you play these games, ya gonna have to read. These readings paint the picture of a much broader world than the area you inhabit.

The world also feels alive is on a smaller scale. And that’s how towns have npcs that don’t even matter that still have their own little arcs and lives to live. Sometimes these characters will have a sidequest that will be the culmination of their arc but if the player doesn’t interact with them, the payoff won’t be there. This felt strongest in the Cold Steel arc, especially since CS1/3 takes place in a military academy, so you get to experience the stories of other students.

2.) This series is great for what it is when it comes to things like imperialism, class struggle, and war. The politics of this series is insane. Things that happen in game have happened or are happening in real life. I don’t want to spoil anything so I (and this pains me) won’t explain in further detail. Please just play them to find out.

3.) As a game, the combat is really fun. I’m a sucker for turn based fights and I love turn based combat even more when it shows the turn order. Also there are no random encounters so you’re mostly in complete control when determining when you want to fight.

4.) While on the topic of it being a game, it has something that I think should be standard for most games and definitely all JRPGs. It has a fucking fast forward mode! I love that. Going back and forth between areas isn’t a hassle, easy fights end in literal seconds, and you can fast forward through camera pans.

5.) Most of the characters are really cool! And there are a lot of them. The protagonists are dope. The antagonists are dope. It’s great. Of course there were a few I didn’t quite care for (sorry Millium) but there were also some characters I cared a little bit too much for, like Renne. So when I got to Star Door 15 in The 3rd lemme tell you I was literally sobbing.

I think the Crossbell arc was great with characters because unlike the other games, the main 4 party members you have are the ones you keep.

My favorite characters in the series are Kevin Graham, Randy Orlando, Estelle Bright, Wazy Hemisphere, and Crow Armbrust. If you have any intentions of playing this series don’t google anyone, and honestly, just don’t look at the wiki at all. Even if you think you’re safe because you’re not.

6.) Journey before destination. I got spoiled on so many things yet it was never ruined for me. Honestly they make it pretty obvious too with some things too that I want to believe that they’re just messing with us, because even if we’re spoiled or if something is predictable, it’s still a great journey. That being said, I know I mentioned that I didn’t want to spoil some things in #2, I just don’t wanna be the one to do it to you. I just believe that this series is best enjoyed blind. If you’re curious and accidentally learn something however, that’s still fine.

EDIT:

7.) The music!! How could I forget the music! Falcom’s music team puts out some absolute bangers. Here’s one of my favorite battle themes they put out.

Bonus.) I just want to give a special shout out to Trails in the Sky FC. It’s the very first game that starts off this grand interconnected story and I’m so happy that the main character is Estelle. I think it’s huge because for a JRPG that came out in 2004, Falcom made their main character a loud, brash, rude, and strong ass young woman that grows into an incredible person (that is still loud, brash, and rude). I just love them for that. Estelle’s the best...elle.

And now about some of the things I hate. For some of these I understand that there are cultural and ideological differences, but they still made me, ah, uncomfortable.

1.) Homophobia. Right off the bat. While it’s never direct with its homophobia, LGBT characters’ sexuality is often responded to with a 😅 from all the characters. But that’s not the main issue. The issue is that two out of the (potential) three LGBT characters, (If there are more I’m sorry but I only caught the outright stated) Olivier and Angelica, are constantly portrayed as predatory and I think that’s just a bad look honestly.

I do have to give props however for their portrayal of some characters’ gender. It’s not outright stated but from context clues I was able to assume that a certain main character in Crossbell was non binary. Being non binary myself that could be me projecting but idk it seemed pretty clear.

2.) In the Cold Steel arc it feels like a lot of the women there are supposed to be part of the Rean’s harem. They’re all wonderfully written within their personal storyline but when it comes to romance it’s just kinda cringe. Especially when in CS3 where Rean is an adult, a lot of them are minors. Hell, while we’re at it, while infrequent, there’s also sexualization of minors in general. It mostly comes down to some temporary outfit designs and I would say there’s nothing inherently sexual about most of them, but that’s if they were real people able to make their own choices...which they’re not. Someone designed those.

Finally I just have to mention why the hell do the characters act like if Tita and Agate were to date that’d be fine. He’s 28 and she’s 16 (CS3). They’re not together thankfully because only she has a crush on him, but like I said, characters think it would be ok and that’s an issue for me.

Now on to topics about the game/story itself instead of shitty things like these

3.) Within the first bit of CS1 there’s one of those “oops we fell and accidentally ended up in a unique position” things and I just hate those. Stop that. It’s treated as an interpersonal and a communication issue that lasts for hours of game time.

4.) In some story battles you’ll do great only to see the cutscene afterward show you losing, only to be saved by a stronger ally. It kind of made me feel like what I did was useless. Sometimes you also are supposed to lose a fight but you don’t know it.

5.) Sometimes you could get swept up in a wave of exposition that lasts for half an hour or more. You don’t know when this will happen. This was no issue for me but that’s because I was unemployed when I played them so I had a lot of free time. Your time should be respected.

6.) Crossbell games haven’t been officially localized so if you’re impatient like myself then you have to make do with translations that are just ok.

I’ll have a final point that’s kind of a spoiler so as for now I’ll rate the games and show the recommended playing order with an explanation. Even the last place rank is a good game though. I’ll post the final point at the very end so if you’re reading this and wary of spoilers you can finish after the conclusion.

Ranking:

Sky SC > Sky the 3rd > CS3 > (Ao = CS1) > (Sky FC = CS2) > Zero

Play Order:

Release Order: Sky FC, SC, 3rd, Zero, Ao, CS1, CS2, CS3

How I played them: CS1, CS2, All of Sky, All of Crossbell, CS3

How I would replay them: Sky, CS1, CS2, Crossbell, CS3

Since the first 2 CS and 2 Crossbell games are happening simultaneously there are many things that overlap. In my opinion I think that the Crossbell games give away more things about the Cold Steel games than the other way around.

If you read this, thank you for taking the time to do so. These games are really incredible and I highly recommend them to anyone that enjoys JRPGs. If you do decide to play, enjoy. Please talk to me about them.

7.)

Character deaths aren’t impactful because no one in this damn series stays dead. It gets really annoying after a while.

[attackofthezee]

WIP meme

Pretty sure I’ve done this before but I was tagged by @bangyababy (and one other person I think??? But it either got lost in my activity notifications or was a weird fever dream??) so I’m doing it again cause I wanna. Also wow I have too many wips so this is under a cut cause it got long as hell. 

The Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous.

Grad School Bucky Cap Steve (There’s literally two lines in this document?? Idk what I’m doing with it and it might be shuffled into the fanfic mortuary file next time I sort through fics.) 

Barnes Home For Wayward Kids (Bucky keeps showing up at home with orphans and so he and Steve just end up with like a whole house of them. It’s also probably going into the fanfic mortuary cause it hasn’t been touched since uhhhh last year?) 

Werewolf Cap Merica F* Yeah (What it says on the tin! The serum is actually lycanthropy. Steve jumps out of things and gives Bucky heart attacks. It is exactly what people should expect from me tbh.) 

Found Baby AU (I WILL ONE DAY FINISH THIS ONE I SWEAR. It features Vet!Bucky who finds a baby in a dumpster and ends up in Pediatrician!Steve’s office at like 1 am and IT IS JUST A LOT OF SOFTNESS AND ONE DAY I WILL FINISH IT.) 

NEW DRAGON AU This Time Featuring More Fae (Steve is a dragon and Bucky is fae and they 110% use fae magic and accidentally blood bind themselves to each other at like 9 years old oops. Sarah and Winifred are NOT amused.) 

Party Goblin Sequel (One time, years ago, I wrote a fic called Adulthood Is Just A Myth -shameless plug!- and it didn’t do incredibly well despite my love for it at the time buuuut I’ve had a sequel planned for it since pretty much the moment I finished it. It involves Bucky losing his arm because I’m a terrible person, and like the exploration of disability and Steve being a disabled person dealing with the person he loves dealing with disability. It’s still funny, because I’m me, but it will also take forever and a day for me to ever finish it because I am Bad At writing things that are overly close to me.) 

Cap PSAs (Literally just a fic about Bucky getting a lot of joy at Steve’s expense from Steve’s really awful school PSAs) 

Practical Magic AU (Listen I have craved a Practical Magic AU for YEARS. So I started one a couple months back, but then wearing_tearing went and wrote one because they are a fic writing goddess so now I DON’T NEED TO. But it’s still sitting in my WIP folder so maybe one day I’ll actually finish it under the Two Cakes rule.) 

IW FIX IT (I had a lot of feelings after seeing Infinity War??? And I wanted to fix them??? But this is another one that’ll probably go into the fic mortuary because I have NO CLUE what I was planning to do with it.) 

MAJOR REWORK NEEDED great american roadtrip (Once upon a time, December 11th 2016 to be exact, at least according to the document details, I sat down to write an epic fanfic where two old assholes went on a road trip, saw the grand canyon, went camping, and also kept up with their therapy via phone appointments.) 

both fall of train au (you think both fall off the train aus mean they both get captured by HYDRA? THINK AGAIN. Because what is TRAGEDY? I CAN’T WRITE ANGST so this shit is just Steve and Bucky fall off the train together and both wake up in the 21st century and Have To Adjust. Idk where it’s going, idk anything beyond that basic premise but who knows, IT MIGHT BE GOOD ONE DAY?)

the sequel i'm not writing to where the heart is (the fact that I haven’t touched this since August means the title is technically correct. Basically it’s the story of how Where The Heart Is!Bucky and Steve go on vacation and end up taking down the leftover bits of HYDRA instead. Also Bucky’s instagram is featured a lot. This one actually has a lot written already so like, I wanna finish it eventually.) 

is it... a fake dating au???? (A one night stand turns into Steve fake dating Bucky for family events because I love tropes.) 

non recovery fic except it IS (Idk how to describe this one except that like it’s a recovery fic but it started based on the premise that not being okay is okay. It’s cute and sad and deals with recovery things.) 

Steve Rogers Meets His Irish History: c. 2016 (This one is literally just a document with a link to what inspired it and also will require a lot of research so who the hell knows what’ll happen with it.) 

A DIFFERENT FOUND BABY (THIS ONE GOT AWAY FROM ME GUYS. Like it started with Bucky Barnes coming home to Steve because he found A BABY AND I LOVE KIDFIC but then I veered into like How Steve Rogers Relates To Disability, His Body, His Gay Identity, And Gender All In Relation To His Past Disability so like, it’s a mess.) 

Angel Steve yo (This will one day be my magnum opus tbh. Steve’s an asshole angel who shows up to a Halloween party in booty shorts and devil horns. Bucky’s the confused millennial who wants to bone him. I don’t think I’ll ever love a premise more tbh.)  

ABO PREG STEVE WHAT (I am genuinely not shy about the fact that I like abo and mpreg and all that soft shit, so like, this is just the result of that enjoyment and features omega Steve going into the ice pregnant, waking up and having a baby because THAT PLOT HASN’T BEEN DONE A MILLION TIMES IN ABO FICS OR ANYTHING. whispering softly but with feeling: two cakes Elizabeth, TWO CAKES.) 

B99 Kinda (Steve Rogers is a cop in Brooklyn. Bucky Barnes is a firefighter who Steve’s kinda smitten with.) 

Jersey- Coda (Soft tummy edition) (someone commented on This Is Why People Don’t Go To Jersey saying they hope Steve’s tummy was soft after having a baby and my inner lizard brain went YES THIS IS GOOD, VERY GOOD. So it’s literally just a fic about Steve having a soft tummy and Bucky being very fond of it.) 

soulmate au f yeah (This is my CHILD and I will one day finish the motherfucker. It’s soulmate magical realism where soulmate’s hearts BEAT THE SAME and there is recovery and goodness and god I love the premise a lot, ngl.) 

FIRST LADY STEVE ROGERS (This is actually just the document that I have Making The Ride Count in, but it’s also got bits and pieces that will become other parts in the series.) 

Will an 80s winter soldier wear leg warmers? (Bucky breaks his programming in the 80s and he and Peggy pal around beating HYDRA and terrorizing people until Steve’s dug out of the ice again.) 

competitive assholes (the idea was given to me to have Steve and Bucky be neighbors competing over decorations and I NOW MUST WRITE IT.) 

Omega Rights Activist Steve (College abo with omega Steve and Alpha Bucky and like, lots of softness and Bucky just wanting to build Steve THE BEST NEST and Steve being like I AM A STRONG CAPABLE OMEGA but also ‘yes pls buy me seventeen pillows and twenty-five blankets and fluff them strategically for me.’) 

An Angel And A Demon Walk Into A Bar... (Angel Steve + Demon Bucky = BEST FRIENDS FOREVERRRRRR. Also lots of jokes about heaven having too much paperwork.)

holiday swap - finish by 12/21 (For the Marvel Holiday Swap. I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I’M DOING WITH THIS ONE DEAR LORD HELP ME.) 

 It All Comes Back Around (Chapter three! It’s coming along slow as hell but it IS coming along.) 

FOR LATER (a fic in which Steve wakes up from the ice and starts making mental lists of ‘things Bucky would like’ because he’s a sad, sad human being.)

Loyalty Devotion (For Happy Steve Bingo. There’s selkies??? and Steve is some sort of unspecified magic??? and it’s a little different than my norm writing style wise?? Idk we’ll see how it turns out. I might edit the first bits copiously so that it’s more my style, or i might embrace the flow of this one WE SHALL SEE.)

Aaaand I can’t think of anyone to tag right this moment because my brain is word soup soooo if you want to do this then please go forth and do it! There are no rules here, this is the wild west of meme games, BE FREE WRITER FRIENDS BE FREE