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r6shippingdelivery · 4 years ago

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headcannons for hobbies? Like what they do on their off time?

Hi nonnie! I actually did a Hobbies HC for “all” ops a long time ago. But seeing that was before the expanded bios, and it only reached up to Gridlock and Mozzie, I’d say it’s time for an updated version, don’t you say?

Some of the answers are unchanged from the old post, because I already nailed it or the new info didn’t disprove my ideas. But I had to revise a lot of the answers I gave the first time around! In order to find their hobbies and/or get a glimpse of their lives beyond Rainbow and what they might like, I read all the bios, and looked up concept art, and elites, and past battlepass content, etc. And when none of that was enough, I just went with my gut instinct 😂 Thank you to @grain-crain-drain, @dagoth-menthol & @todragonsart for bouncing ideas with me when I was stuck! 💕

Hobbies Headcanons for ALL ops (up to Neon Dawn)

FBI

- Ash: According to her savta, shooting things is not a hobby, but Ash disagrees. And since according to her expanded bio she knows Hebrew, Arabic, English, French and Greek, I’m willing to bet she enjoys learning languages as well. - Thermite: He grew up on a ranch and loves riding. He’s also taken an interest in improving gadgets it seems, so my old proposal that he dabbles in forging/smithing stuff seems plausible. And based on this concept art, demolition derbies attending and maybe even competing himself too? - Pulse: He’s interested in a variety of topics and goes through phases of intense, nearly obsessive focus, until something else captures his attention. He still has a lingering fondness for building muscle cars, since it was something he used to do with his father. And like Thermite and Hibana, it seems he might enjoy demolition derbies. - Castle: He’s a language nerd, studying/reading/practicing new languages is his hobby for sure. Since the expanded bio says he rescues abused dogs, I don’t think it would be far fetched he volunteered at animal shelters too.

SAS

- Thatcher: Aside from repairing his boat, The Iron Maggie, he also enjoys fishing. He used to do that with his dad & brothers, and tried to take the rest of the SAS fishing as a bonding experience. It didn’t go very well - Sledge: He plays rugby, and has an inexplicable fondness of trying the wildest ideas that tend to end with something broken, be it one of his bones or a structure or wall (just read his extended psychological profile and you’ll see, lmao) - Smoke: Boxing, it helps him focus all his chaotic energy. And chemistry in general, it’s not just a hobby but a passion of his. - Mute: he enjoys tinkering with stuff, taking it apart and then putting it back together in a different way, just to see if he can improve it or make it work in his own way. Flying drones plays perfectly into that, with the added bonus of being able to do the flying part just for fun too.

GIGN

- Montagne: His main passion is working with people, teaching and mentoring others, and therefore when he’s not on duty, his main passtime still is mingling with people and getting to know them. I could see him making overtures with Castle, interested in the American and fascinated by his knowledge of various languages, an area Monty feels insecure about due to only knowing French and English. - Twitch: Engineering, robotics and developing an empathic AI is her life.Twitch is a workaholic passionate about those topics. She also greatly enjoys traveling and, according to her expanded bio, people watching. - Doc: He surely had some hobby at one point, but he can’t remember it, or the last time he had free time for it. Doc is also a workaholic, although one that loves to complain about it. - Rook: Apparently he’s passionate about cycling, auto racing, and rock concerts. Mainly cycling though, since he dropped out of university to cycle around France.

Spetsnaz

- Tachanka: He collects and repairs old weapons. Mostly soviet, but he has some interesting pieces from other countries too. And he dances surprisingly well. - Kapkan: Aside from a certain interest in psychology, his main hobby is hunting, of course. But he also whittles and carves wooden figurines. - Glaz: Quite obviously, painting. He’s an artist, and quite a good one. He also likes playing cards, especially poker. - Fuze: He builds new weapon prototypes for fun. And tests them, if he can convince Six of it. He also likes to bake from time to time, a skill he learnt thanks to his grandma - and because he has a sweet tooth.

GSG9

- Jäger: Planes. Model planes, repairing old WWI & II planes, you name it. And watching copious amounts of documentaries. - Bandit: His bike is his main hobby, both taking care of it and riding it. He also likes playing pool; and, if pranking people counts as a hobby, that’s his oldest one, dating from when he was a kid. - Blitz: He was and still is an athlete at heart, and Blitz loves running. - IQ: In order to disconnect from engineering pursuits, she indulges in rock climbing, spelunking, and writing science fiction stories.

JTF2

- Buck: He crafts mechanical puzzles, and enjoys all kinds of physical activity that can take place outdoors. - Frost: She just loves being surrounded by nature, and often goes mountain climbing or diving.

SEAL

- Valkyrie: Swimming and diving, of course! She wanted to be a professional swimmer, but now it’s just a hobby. And apparently she enrolled for a helicopter pilot license, and language classes. - Blackbeard: According to the expanded bios, he likes sailing and even participated in a championship. And since he climbed Mount Everest, it’s safe to say he also likes mountain climbing.

BOPE

- Capitao: He loves football, playing or watching it, doesn’t matter, he’s all for it. - Caveira: Spends a lot of time practicing Jiu Jitsu, in the gym and also on unofficial tournaments.

SAT

- Hibana: For her it’s traditional Japanese archery (Kyūdō). And probably demolition derbies too accounting that concept art from before with Thermite and Pulse. - Echo: According to the expanded bio, he has few interests outside work, but I always imagined he’d be into gaming and e-sports. Hacking too, and that’s a direct influence from Dokkaebi.

GEO

- Jackal: He plays the acoustic guitar/spanish guitar, and sings too. And now we also know he volunteers with at-risk youth. - Mira: Fixing cars is second nature to her, and thanks to her expanded bio we know she also does metal sculptures that incorporate used mechanical parts.

SDU

- Ying: Extreme driving, which can sometimes trigger her PTSD, and traveling. Especially exploring cities by randomly jumping in public transport and just going anywhere. - Lesion: He is also one to volunteer in underprivileged areas (like Junk Bay, where he grew up), and clearing mines and other unexploded devices. I also imagine him with a certain gusto for playing blackjack.

GROM

- Zofia: If obsessing about her father’s supposed suicide and the oddities surrounding it, and desperately trying to reconnect with her sister count as hobbies, sure, she has those. - Ela: She’s also an artist, one with a very particular vision that some have called narcissistic. Apparently she also does some “freelance” volunteer work, roaming the streets at night and offering help/comfort, or a willing ear to the people she meets.

707SMB

- Vigil: He likes to take walks around the forest, just aimless exploring and marvelling at nature and any animals he might come across. Often listens to relaxing music while doing so, and he might pick a pretty rock here and there to bring home. - Dokkaebi: Hacking is her hobby, of course. She also has several social media profiles and is an active member in a couple of hacking forums. As per a previous battlepass, I believe she enjoys mountain trekking too. And dancing to electro beat, due to her elite.

CBRN

- Lion: His rebel years left him with an appreciation for rock music and a dream to be in a group. Lion still plays the electric guitar, when he’s not off volunteering at the local church. - Finka: Pushed by her parents from a young age to try different sports, just like her siblings, she eventually discovered a strong love for fencing and ice-skating.

GIS

- Maestro: Cooking, and boxing, an interest he shares with Smoke. But mostly cooking. - Alibi: She’s also a marksman, engages Ash in friendly shooting competitions.

GSUTR

- Clash: She’s very involved in different activist causes, mostly surrounding racial issues and inequality. - Maverick: Photography, mostly nature or candid shots of his fellow operators. I also think he likes horses and riding. And Buzkashi of course, but he hasn’t played since he left Kabul.

GIGR

- Kaid: Playing chess, he’s a good strategist and it shows. And while dozing off with a cat on his lap is not a hobby, he also loves that. - Nomad: Traveling to all sorts of remote locations, she’s an explorer with a thirst to prove herself. She also keeps a travel journal, which includes maps and some drawings of the places she’s seen.

SASR

- Mozzie: Dirt biking, of course. The more dangerous the jumps and stunts are, the more he likes it. He knows his limits and works to surpass them. - Gridlock: Robotics. She still wants to compete again in robot championships, just like she and Mozzie did so many years ago. She would consider that fixing cars and vehicles has become more part of her job than a hobby, but still loves it too.

Phantom Sight

- Nokk: Fencing, as evidenced by some of her concept art, she participated in fencing tournaments. - Warden: He knows appearances are important, and he cultivated a very specific image, so he likes to take care of that, be it by buying luxury or antique cars, or designer suits, etc.

Ember Rise

- Amaru: Archeology and exploring the Amazon jungle is her passion. It used to be her whole life and job, but since she joined Rainbow, she’s been busy with training and missions, yet she never lost her love for adventure, history and protecting her country’s cultural artifacts. - Goyo: He’s a really good chess player, and enjoys other games where he either has to think, or his usual poker face and calm demeanor can throw his opponents off.

Shifting Tides

- Kali: When she’s not writing reports about her underlings progress, or making lists about who should be ascended/rewarded, who needs to be punished or chastised, etc, she’ll be doing yoga, since it helps her focus. Or hardcore pilates when she needs to burn away some frustration first. - Wamai: Diving and being underwater in general, be it on his special immersion tanks or on the actual sea, it doesn’t matter. He finds it calming (and he’s addicted to the anoxia sensation)

Void Edge

- Iana: Space exploration fascinates her, and she’s always trying to learn everything she can about the cosmos, watching documentaries and conducting her own in-depth research. - Oryx: Wrestling helps him hone his physical prowess, and it’s also a measured outlet for his deep seated rage. He also greatly enjoys reading poetry.

Steel Wave

- Melusi: She’s committed to the conservation cause, which stems from both her love of wildlife and nature, and her protective instincts. She likes to explore too, although she’s not driven by a will to prove herself or reach certain goals, but simply for the joy of seeing natural spaces. - Ace: Social Media. He’s obsessed with his public image and popularity. While he travels quite a bit, it seems he does it more to share new and exciting selfies on Instagram than for the pleasure of visiting new places.

Shadow Legacy

- Zero: He knits and crochets, it’s an engaging hobby that helps him clear his mind, plus he enjoys making stuff too. Not many people know about this side of him though.

Neon Dawn

- Aruni: She and Hero, her giant pouched rat, volunteer on landmine detection and removal efforts. She also likes to travel extensively, and has done so in the company of Twitch and Nomad.

#rainbow 6 siege #r6s #rainbow six siege #rainbow 6 #headcanons #Anonymous

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citrusella-flugpucker · 5 months ago

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FWIW, none of the pictured shows have reading (love of reading OR science of reading) as a core learning objective, like the kind that they would get notes from PBS to include specific standards-aligned content on--only one I can bring to mind that gets close is actually one you slightly cut off (and Sesame Street, completely absent from screenshot):

Alma's Way is critical thinking

Arthur (which is no longer airing new episodes) is kind of a pro-social mishmosh. It's based on a book series but doesn't feature reading as a core curricular goal.

The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot about That (canceled awhile back, IIRC) has more to do with STEM and critical thinking. (Based on a book, reading not core objective)

Clifford IIRC is pro-social. (Book based, reading not core objective)

Curious George (ended) is scientific thinking (Book based, reading not core objective)

Cyberchase is The Math Show (with science sprinkled in more on later seasons)

Daniel Tiger is pro-social.

Design Squad (all versions, all of which are ended IIRC) is STEM (engineering, usually) for around 12 year olds.

Dinosaur Train (ended) is pro-social woven with some dinosaur facts

Donkey Hodie is pro-social, IIRC.

Elinor Wonders Why is scientific thinking and investigation

Hero Elementary is scientific thinking

...I have no idea about Jamming on the Job. Without looking up clips I have no idea if reading is a core goal or not.

Jelly, Ben, and Pogo is shorts that IIRC are pro-social but might be STEM?

Let's Go Luna (ended) is cultural differences and understanding (i.e. "here are some traditions some people in Mexico might do at certain times, isn't it cool we're all different and also kind of the same?")

Lyla in the Loop is problem solving and critical thinking

Molly of Denali (cut off in the picture) does feature information literacy as a core objective, which usually takes the form of "oh, we can look in the index to find where in a book to find info quickly" or "not everything on the internet is true" or "if I compile this information, other people will be able to refer to it later", that kind of thing. It's the first cartoon to feature an Alaskan Native protagonist so aspects of Alaska Native cultures and history also prominently feature.

(Most of these (if it's not their core conceit) also have pro-social aspects like apologizing when you hurt someone, solving conflict, that kind of thing)

What OP is referring to is a real thing that did start occurring around when the US DOE changed its focus in regards to the best way to teach kids to read. Stuff like Reading Rainbow, Wishbone, and BtL were mostly love-of-reading focused, i.e. more like "here's a story, kids, ain't it cool?" (though BtL featured quite a lot of science of reading type instruction, i.e. teaching certain letter sounds, language rules, etc.).

At some point it became easier to get funding for shows that were far more science-of-reading focused, like WordWorld or 2009 Electric Company. Some of these tried to be like "reading is cool and fun" but they didn't really seem to garner the same interest or longevity as the older shows. (WordWorld lasted 3 years, Electric Company 5.) WordGirl was a little more focused on vocabulary (and for slightly older kids) and stayed on a bit longer (and with a bigger following), from 2007 to 2015 (8 years).

There are currently no PBS Kids shows that are still in production (other than some aspects of Sesame Street, which does... a lot of things) that specifically focus on foundational reading (either love-of-reading or rules of reading). They have reran things like WordWorld or WordGirl on their 24 hour channel, but there's not really anything more recent.

This is a little of a side thing, but: If I try to search by concept for foundational reading aimed at K-2 on PBS Learning Media (a site for teachers), most of the content is from lower production value stuff that's not aired on TV (or even on the PBS Kids app, AFAICT) or it's from a show that's over, like BtL or Electric Company. (If I search for preschool ELA specifically I do get some Sesame Street relatively early but it also gives me the non-TV stuff (though more of it is "let's read a story" focused than the K-2 search was).)

By comparison, K-2 math and science favor the same not-for-TV content package but show TV series connected content (and more recent shows at that) sooner in the results. (Engineering in particular causes Lyla in the Loop to DOMINATE the K-2 results.)

There is apparently a literacy series in the pipeline but no announced air date, though.

TL;DR: No PBS Kids shows hate reading or anything, but shows that explicitly teach it are largely absent from the schedule. There's one known series soon to come, maybe, but the specific kind of show OP refers to is noticeably absent from current PBS Kids fare.

(...I'm worried this sounds like a callout. It's not a callout. I just really like PBS lol)

We need to bring back children’s programming that focuses on reading. I’m so serious

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murasaki-murasame · 4 years ago

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Thoughts on Higurashi Gou Ep8

I’ve been thinking for a while that this arc felt almost weirdly similar to the original Watanagashi arc, to the point that maybe the twist was just gonna be that there isn’t actually any major differences this time, but then this episode came around and took us in a whole new direction and now I really feel like we’re all experiencing the feeling of reading through the question arcs for the first time, lol.

Thoughts under the cut. [Also some spoilers about the background meta stuff in Umineko, but I’m trying to keep it vague]

I’ve kinda had a lot of mixed feelings about this arc since it started, since it felt like maybe it was going to just be Gou doing a 1:1 retread of the VN for the sake of giving new fans the necessary character intros and plot exposition to set up the mystery, but thankfully this episode really proved why this is a totally different arc to Watanagashi and Meakashi, even if it’s superficially similar.

It’s actually kinda funny how many elements of this episode were directly inspired by things that happen in the later parts of Watanagashi, but with more or less totally different contexts behind them. I feel like it’s designed to make the preview images for each episode super misleading, lol.

In terms of the storytelling and thematic stuff going on, one of the surprisingly big changes is how the Watanagashi arc really pushed the idea of supernatural possession and demons and whatnot by having Shion [disguised as Mion] going around torturing and killing people, plus the whole “Takano was officially already dead when Keiichi saw her at the festival” thing, but this time around it’s focusing more on the idea of the curse being an excuse that the villagers set up to justify killing enemies of the village each year. Which is closer to the truth, but still not entirely true.

I feel pretty good about most of my theories of what happened in Onidamashi, aside from Satoko and Rika dying, but with this arc I don’t really feel sure about anything. Which is a pretty fun feeling, after having already been aware of Higurashi’s whole mystery for so long.

One of the big things I’m assuming at the moment is that the Mion we see in this episode was really just Mion the whole time. I don’t really think it’s accurate to call her the ‘culprit’ this time around, but I think that for all intents and purposes this is more of a Mion arc than a Shion arc.

I think that it was someone like Shion who killed the family heads, and it just lead to Mion deciding to go ahead with putting an end to the whole tradition. I’m not entirely sure about this, but it’d make sense if Shion was doing her whole arc in the background, but she got killed by Mion before she could kill anyone else.

The whole idea of Mion ever being a killer or getting the syndrome is kinda controversial, but at least going by what we got told in this episode, I think it actually does a pretty good job at showing how this might happen. For one thing, she’s channeling her paranoia into trying to protect Keiichi, which at least feels more consistent with her personality than just snapping and killing anyone. And after how Rika seemed to be at the point of ominously telling people that everyone’s gonna die because she’s given up hope on this timeline, and Mion apparently being convinced that Rika’s behind everything, I can see how maybe she either overheard Rika’s talk with Keiichi, or some time before or after that scene she talked with Rika herself and heard all about how everyone’s gonna die, and how Tomitake and Takano’s bodies should be found soon. I think it’d be pretty understandable at that point for Mion to get pushed over the edge, lol.

I don’t think she’s actually the one who killed Rika, though. Her whole rant in the ladder scene came across more like she thinks Rika’s still around and needs to be stopped. Maybe Rika was killed by the Yamainu after they apparently talked about something, but I’m not sure. At the very least, I think Rika being found in a septic tank probably makes it way less likely that she killed herself, unless someone found her corpse and dumped it into the tank afterward. So someone probably murdered her, but I’m not sure who.

It might have been Shion, but if it wasn’t her at school that day impersonating Mion then that seems unlikely, and I still think it was just Mion the whole time this episode.

One of my main doubts about Mion and her whole story in this episode is that we know from the VN that she knows how the Sonozakis aren’t responsible for any of the curse killings, and are just making themselves look guilty. So her paranoia about the three families being behind everything seems more like something Shion would think. But it’s possible that she doesn’t actually think they’re directly responsible for everything, just that they’re *complicit* in continuing the whole curse narrative, and allowing the deaths to happen each year while sitting back and accepting blame for it. Which I think would make a lot of sense, and might not even require Mion to succumb to full on Hinamizawa Syndrome levels of paranoia.

Even in the VN, I think we see her being upset about the fact that her family knows what’s going on and have basically just been sitting back and letting it happen. So I think this is just an extension of that, and she’s mostly just angry at how the culture of positive communal protection has warped into a string of revenge killings that the three families are allowing to happen.

This is also why I’m not entirely sure whether or not she killed Kimiyoshi and Oryo. It might have just been Shion doing her whole thing from a place of straight up paranoia, but maybe during the whole family party after the festival she basically got pushed over the edge after seeing how those two talked about the idea of the curse and how the people who broke into the Saiguden should be punished.

I’m not sure exactly what Mion’s motive would be for killing Shion, though, if that’s even what happened in the first place. I think Mion would just see Shion as being a victim of the whole curse narrative in the first place, after what happened with Satoshi previously. Even if Shion was the one who killed Oryo and Kimiyoshi, I doubt Mion would kill her over it. It might have just been Shion accidentally falling into the well, since that kinda thing happens sometimes in the VN, but who knows.

Also on the note of Satoshi, he still hasn’t been directly mentioned at all thus far, which is kinda weird. I think Tataridamashi will probably prove whether it’s just a matter of them condensing all of the major references to him from the original question arcs into only one arc in Gou for the sake of avoiding repetition, or if there’s something weird going on. At the moment I’m just leaning toward it being a matter of narrative efficiency.

And even aside from that, there’s lots of reasons why I’m interested to see how Tataridamashi will play out. I’m becoming increasingly convinced at this point that, like most people are thinking, there’s something weird going on with Satoko, and the next arc should give us more evidence for that one way or another. I also think it might diverge more quickly from the VN than these first two arcs did, since Rika has a pretty good motive for trying to immediately avert the whole Teppei abuse situation.

I don’t really know if I think Satoko’s killed anyone yet, but there’s something weird going on with her. Especially after how she wound up dead at the Sonozaki estate along with Mion. I’m starting to lean toward the idea that maybe she’s looping along with Rika, and that she’s basically trying to figure out the mystery in her own way. Which seems a bit more likely to me than her being a criminal mastermind this time around.

Though honestly the question that I just keep going back to when it comes to this whole idea is just . . . what exactly would the point be of doing something like this with Satoko? There has to be something more logical and meaningful going on than just ‘Satoko’s evil this time for Reasons [tm]’. There’s also the fact that we don’t know why Rika herself is looping again, or why the fundamental rules of the game board seem to be at least slightly different this time around, and those questions might tie into whatever’s going on with Satoko.

I think this is ultimately gonna tie into the hints we’ve gotten that there’s something important going on with teenage Satoko in the whole time period where Rika’s a teenager, which seems to be when she got thrown back into the loop. I’m at least becoming more convinced as time goes on that the mysterious girl in the OP is teenage Satoko, since it’d fit what we can see of her hair-style. And since I think Takano is going to be largely irrelevant this time around, it seems more likely for it to be teenage Satoko than teenage Takano.

I’m maybe kinda biased in how I’m interpreting this since I just finished the Umineko Ep8 manga, and since I’m still viewing Gou from the perspective of really wanting it to be a lead-in to an Umineko remake because I just can’t help but get my hopes up, but I think this might connect to my theory of Gou’s game board being along the lines of a novel series that teenage Rika is making based on her memories of the original time loop, in which case Satoko’s role in the new loop might reflect how she feels about the idea of Rika doing this in the first place.

It’s also making me wonder if maybe Lambda’s decided to sponsor Satoko this time around, if she’s basically ditched Takano by this point. Maybe she gave Satoko the ability to go through these loops with Rika to accomplish some sort of goal of hers, which might be in opposition to Rika’s whole goal with all this.

At the very least, in terms of Umineko connections, we’ve already seen Featherine in the OP, so literally anything could happen at this point, lol. I don’t actually think Featherine is directly responsible for what’s going on at the moment, though. I think if anything she’s taking more of a backseat observer role. Which is basically what she was doing already, I guess.

I’m thinking that maybe the final arc of Gou will be at least somewhat about Rika and Satoko in high school, to explain whatever events lead to this new loop, although if we assume that we get a new OP and ED for the second half, Featherine and teenage Satoko being in this OP might imply that they’ll show up before Tataridamashi ends, which would imply that it’ll REALLY diverge from the VN. Which would be pretty fun.

I still really like the idea that this is effectively the origin story of the Bernkastel we see in Umineko. Mostly just because it’d be a cool way to set up for an Umineko remake, but still. I think if we get a look at what’s going on with Rika and Satoko as teenagers, we’re probably gonna find out that Rika ended up getting into contact with Ikuko after attending St Lucia’s, and decided to work with her to write a series of stories based on her memories of the loop. Then, at least on the real world plane, Rika probably just stopped working with her and went on with her life, but on the meta world plane, Bernkastel stuck around as Featherine’s miko and is more or less represented by Ikuko’s pet cat. The timeline on this would also be pretty interesting, since if the teenage Rika and Satoko time period is around 1986, then that lines up with when Umineko takes place.

Though at that point I guess my main question is just what Rika’s whole goal is with writing these new stories, and what Satoko’s goal is if she’s decided to enter the loop because of it. Considering how Umineko went, it might be an ideological conflict about whether the truth should be revealed to the public or not about what happened in Hinamizawa. Which reminds me of how it’d be very interesting if Gou doesn’t even end up explaining what’s going on with the behind the scenes politics, and the Great Hinamizawa Disaster. So maybe there’s some conflict going on about if that whole conspiracy should get revealed to everyone, or if it should be kept secret.

At the very least, if we assume that Gou’s just gonna be 24 episodes long with no second season, I don’t really think they have the time to properly explain all of that stuff, especially since Takano’s already had less of a role in the story thus far than in the VN. I think that, in a sense, Satoko has basically replaced Takano as the main turning point and obstacle of the story for Gou, and that whole concept might end up being relevant on multiple different levels.

Even if we completely ignore Takano and the whole political conspiracy stuff surrounding her that takes up a big chunk of the story, I feel like Gou’s already gonna be kinda short on time if it really wants to be a self-contained story with just 24 episodes. Which is the big reason why I think they’ve basically cut out most/all of the stuff to do with her and replaced it with some sort of new plot point that’ll take less time to deal with.

At the moment, my current theory for the final two arcs of Gou is that the fourth arc will basically be a version of Meakashi that focuses pretty much entirely on flashbacks, and basically ties the flashback half of Meakashi together with some of the flashbacks in Matsuribayashi that deal with the different curse incidents over the years, to set up a more cohesive and linear story arc about both Shion and Satoshi, and their experience with the curse over the years. Then I think the final arc will be a mix of whatever Gou’s original plot stuff will be, and a Matsuribayashi-style series of fragments showing a different perspective on Gou’s question arcs and what was happening behind the scenes in them. I think that’s one of the more realistic ways that they could actually compile all of the important plot points into this one season.

This could all get thrown out of whack if we do actually get a second season for Gou, but I doubt it, so at least for the time being I’m just trying to work out how it’ll all work out with just 24 episodes total.

Anyway, Gou continues to be extremely good, and I continue to be irrationally hyped about the prospect that maybe this is setting up for an Umineko remake, lol.

#murasaki rambles #higurashi #higurashi gou

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leam1983 · 3 years ago

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Felix the Reaper - Thoughts? Review?

Can't really go into too much detail, it's rather late as it is and the ol' bed is beckoning, but I also want to couch this down somewhere while it's still fresh...

So, Death as a concept - as a character - obviously permeates the whole of human civilization. You've got Anubis and Osiris, Humbaba the Undying, thousands of years of mythology surrounding the concept of life leaving you and your flesh-bits rotting, generation after generation of people processing grief in visual and abstract forms - and now, we're sort of living in a context where Death isn't really all that scary anymore. We understand it, we can push it back in some cases - and when we can't, then we can sort of map out its occurrence. What started as just this inexplicable force swiping at hunter-gatherers and that warranted Danse Macabre paintings across Medieval France is now something we can put an almost-precise date and time on. There's a bunch of "death clocks" online that project a potential DOD based on your age, gender, health status, habits and BMI; sort of turning the concept of memento mori into a shockingly literate manifestation.

You will die, one day. We're so aware of that that a bit of science and Web design wizardry can shit out a half-serious guesstimation of when it'll happen. Pre-Colonial aspects of Death survive in Mexican culture in the forms of both calaveras and the Santa Muerte cult, and the inevitability of death now even counts as a game mechanic in the SoulsBorne genre. You've got Terry Pratchett's extremely Humanist rendition of Death and, well, Hollywood faff à la Meet Joe Black. The short of it is we're far from the robe-wearing zombie we used to plop everywhere as a reminder of our own supposedly sinful urges or on the fleeting nature of youth.

Another item that's of interest is the notion of life and youth being represented as the Maiden - and of Death being in love with her. Sometimes, the affection isn't returned and disgust is shown. That's most of Holbein's death-related works, in this case. In others, the Maiden leans in, lets the skeletal figure push a hand underneath her skirt and against one of her thighs. They share a kiss, press against one another in the way honest lovers might. He's a dried-out corpse with a bloated midsection and she might've stepped out of some sixteenth-century church in the Netherlands, but their liplock is intense and genuine. In one statue, the Maiden looks like she might've just surrendered to the Reaper's arms, but her hands are also touching his scythe....

Eroticism, a commentary on suicide or plain acceptance - there's several ways to look at that duality, and it's even managed to worm its way over to cultures that don't natively have similar associations with human remains. The Japanese, for instance, do have their own Gashadokuro concept, but the locals of Nagasaki needed their initially-exclusive exposure to Portuguese traders to shrink down their massive skeletal eidolons of doom and to design woodblock prints where a Danse Macabre effectively meets the dress codes and habits of the locals under sakoku, or the Emperor-mandated closing-off of Japan to the outside world.

Death as a dancer. Death, especially, as a force that's quite lively, despite its attributes. A force that falls head-over-heels for Life in its own anthropomorphized form.

This is what Danish devs Kong Orange opted to work on in Felix the Reaper. Their Death has a human name, has a thing for the stuffier ends of Business Casual, is maybe eighty pounds overweight - and won't ever, ever, let the music die. He's also in love, obviously - and in love with Betty, the equally portly and nimble personification of Life. The pair look a bit like a Fernando Botero couple waiting to happen, with ample waists and sagging breasts held aloft by spindle-thin legs - but if Ghostbusters taught us not to cross the streams, then you can assume that Life and Death starting a tango in the same workspace could have severe coincidences on the biosphere. Not that Felix cares, he'd want nothing more than for Betty to notice him. His supervisor is voiced off-camera by Sir Patrick Stewart, who's as delightful as always, and who sort of plays the part of the well-meaning supervisor who eventually realizes his new employee's quirks don't diminish his potential.

And what is Felix's job, exactly? Well, he's Death. He's not getting paid to distribute hugs and kisses, obviously. He gets sent to the mortal plane to, well, kill people, and more specifically, to kill people in precise and pre-ordained ways. His "televator" takes him to an instant frozen in time, and he has to alter the surrounding scene so that once time resumes its course, the requisite accident or happenstance occurs. You do that by picking up items, flicking switches, and placing targets in the path of whatever it is that's set to kill them. You also move the sun around the world using a magical sundial doohickey, as Death can only move in shadows. You're basically Death in the same sense as in the Final Destination movies, except you really, really, really want to twerk and sashay your voluminous heinie through the small changes needed to turn a nothing-burger into a drunk huntsman getting his head stuck in the stump of a decapitated deer, so the dejected and near-sighted hunter you've been following mistakes him for a target and shoots his spear through his brain-case.

And yes, Felix does twerk and he certainly sashays. Dude dresses like a stuffy librarian, sure, but seemingly loses all inhibitions once his headphones come up - which allows the player to share in his personal soundtrack. This particular Reaper seems to have a thing for very bass-driven and samply EDM, with occasional forays into Ambient and Jazz. His many, many, many idle animations all sync with whatever it is that's playing, and so does the variety of prances, somersaults, grands jetés and twirls he goes through while moving from place to place. Comparatively, you get the sense that Felix's coworkers are more the dour and solemn type - with a few unsubtle cameos from Skeletor and Manny Calavera in the opening cinematic - and Felix, well...

Let's just say it's a wonder he has those hips and that paunch. If he twirls around for every little thing he does, then you'd assume he only sits down to hoover an Olympic athlete's worth of food once a day. Or maybe I'm overthinking things because, well, death.

And therein lies the problem, honestly. In thinking, I mean. Felix is a puzzle game through-and-through, and also ties into a Challenge system in order to really tickle those completionist nerves. The starting scenarios are braindead-easy, but the later ones left me stumped for fifteen minutes per screen. Add to that the notion that the game doesn't check off some of them as complete if you only do the bare essentials, and you're left with another would-be mobile offering that doesn't reach its endpoint until you exhaust every little bit it has to offer - even if you're effectively done with the main gameplay loop. It's a great game, but there's just not a whole lot to do in those six chapters, beyond repeating bits of drudgery until your noodle clicks or you give up and look up a solution online.

It's a shame, too. The isometric perspective is perfect, and the game could've been pitched as a hybrid between a puzzler and, say, XCOM: Enemy Unknown. You'd take cover to hide from moving targets or to escape daylight and instead of shooting at them, would emerge from cover to move items around or solve puzzle elements. You could've had Death evoke the illusion of a friendly face to inject some more concrete narrative delivery, for instance. Steal a friend's features, magically conceal yourself, and then have your target piece her own weaknesses together, leaving you to retreat and regroup before executing your plan of attack. But no, everything is out in the open and everything is spelled out for you. Kong Orange could've also stolen a page from Hitman Go and set multiple triggers in place to truly sandbox the experience.

What is there is fun - it oozes personality and charm - but there's just not enough of it to justify Steam's full asking price, IMO. Comparatively, the Switch's online store is currently running a sale for it (as of Sunday the 15th, at least) and lists it as being 2,15$. Two bucks for a few hours of harmless fun is a pretty good deal, as far as I'm concerned. It also underlines why the devs and Daedalic Entertainment alike consider it as having "bombed", as the marketing effectively targeted Devolver's usual stable. It's not crunchy enough, however, and not exactly irreverent enough to warrant that comparison. A more hefty Felix could've earned its full 20$ price point on PC - and Kong Orange's very design for Betty makes it obvious that if Felix ever returns, it'll be in a co-op setup with the love of his, well, unlife.

I'd be up for more of this cuddly, swinging skelly - assuming the devs mature a tad and put something together that's just a smidge more compelling.

#felix the reaper #pc #switch #ps4 #review #puzzle #game #indie #felix #the #reaper #fat #skeleton

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vanquishedvaliant · 4 years ago

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The sidedish is scrolling your blog and not finding you talking about new anime

I must not be hip enough to recognize precisely what you’re getting at by ‘sidedish’, but I just don’t usually post it much on tumblr unprompted anymore because writeups are a pain, they don’t usually get much traction, and I’m more than satisfied talking about it in discord with people that are actually going to listen and respond.

I DO have thoughts on new anime I can serve if it’s that in demand, though.

Here’s what I’m watching this season with some initial reaction ratings based on the first couple episodes

New this season;

Wonder Egg Priority 10/10

UraSekai Picnic 10/10

Kumo desu ga, nani ka 8/10

Kemono Jihen 9/10

Hortensia Saga 7/10

Soukou Musume Senki 7/10

Gekidol 6/10

Sequels;

Cells at Work 9/10

Cells at Work: Black! 9/10

Uma Musume Pretty Derby 10/10

Tensei Shitara Slime Datta Ken 8/10

Log Horizon 8/10

Dr Stone 10/10

Continuing from last season;

Higurashi ... Gou 10/10

Hanyou no Yashahime 6/10

Jujutsu Kaisen 10/10

I’m also watching the original Higurashi in between off days to catch up to where Gou is, since I’d never seen it before and it’s clear I’m not getting the full story in Gou anymore without it.

Deeper thoughts under the cut.

Wonder Egg Priority and Urasekai Picnic are the clear AOTS contenders. Both are at once extremely superficially similar but very different in practice, and both bring something unique and charming to the table.

Urasekai is extremely notable at being a well executed supernatural adventure anime that is also a yuri; as much as I love pure romances like Bloom into You or Adachi and Shimamura, it’s very rare that we get anime with lesbian main characters or WLW romance where the romance itself isn’t the focus, that includes a serious, intriguing plot alongside the elements of romance. You know, like straight people get without a question every single story ever.

It’s got this very classic cryptid / SCP / otherworld adventure feel and has the right comedic and tension beats to be quite good, though its long term impact will be determined by what kind of further message it has.

Wonder Egg Priority immediately comes off with extremely powerful vibes in the vein of things like Flip Flappers, which I mean in the highest compliment. A surreal, metaphor-filled story of dreams and desires and well laid subtext, with colourful, exotic action and a snappy pace. This one’s extremely interesting to me, and its first episode was masterfully efficient in setting up its premise both aesthetically and thematically.

The real test for Wonder Egg will come with time; this is a story that trades heavily in meaning; so it’ll have to run longer and come to a conclusion to really test what kind of impact it’ll have. For now, I’m VERY interested and cautiously optimistic.

Spider Isekai is a charming twist on the typical flood of fantasy game / isekai stories placing our protagonist at the extreme low end of the power curve, and quite UNLIKE Slime Isekai or most others on the market like last season’s Kuma Bear, this one seems intent on keeping her there rather than immediately granting her insane godlike powers and thrusting her back above the curve.

The parts of the show that focus on the spider herself are lovely; there’s a real tension and sense of stakes in her struggle to adapt, slowly getting used to her new body and gaining levels and abilities, making even simple conflicts against frogs or lizards seem life threatening and serious, giving us a real reason to root for her.

On the other hand, the show frequently switches focus to... the entire other classroom of isekai’d children which is by far less interesting. There’s potential in there somewhere for a story about mass isekai’d kids adapting, but other than some details like one girl being gender swapped, and another being the class pet, there’s just really not much interesting about them at the moment and these sections just feel like a waste of time while waiting for the Spider to come back.

I don’t doubt that they’ll eventually meet up and have their stories intertwine... but at the moment, I don’t think I actually want that to happen. We’ll see where this one goes.

Kemono Jihen took me by surprise, and I wasn’t planning to watch this one unti l saw some screencaps. But the first two episodes have been outstanding, giving us a fantastic supernatural mystery detective agency plot and characters with real emotions, eye catching action scenes, and a compelling mystery.

Definitely looking forward to more of this one.

Hortensia Saga seems like a fairly typical fantasy war chronicle RPG story. It feels very in the vein of early to mid era fire emblems, and I happen to like anime like this that are solidly executed, like Grancrest Senki a while back. It’s doing a good enough job so far to keep my interest. Nothing game changing here, but a decent offering.

Soukou Musume Senki; this one also comes across in the standard seasonal fare of superpowered teenagers fighting aliens, this time with power armor and mild isekai elements. The monster designs are good this time, and the second episode brought us some nice moral / political dialogue showcasing some level of self awareness and depth. It’s fun so far.

Gekidol this show wants really badly to be compared favourably to Shoujo Kageki Starlight Revue. They’re hamming up the theatre tropes, putting out specials, sliding in secret background lore. First episode was fairly interesting, but the second seriously dropped the ball with its half assed Idol episode, and incredibly tone deaf play at a heartwarming moment.

I’m gonna keep watching this one for now, but it really needs to prove to me it has some meat and isn’t going to just keep borrowing tropes from other shows to lend it superficial “deep” merits.

For sequels,

Cells at Work is as cute, wholesome, and info-taining as ever. I think the OP this time is missing a little oomph, but the show itself is still going strong.

Cells at Work: Black! is offering a new take on it with a slightly darker and mature setting with a stressed out alcholic smoker at risk of contracting STDS, with a little bleaker tone and harsher stakes. It relies on the background of the original Cells at Work to work both tonally and narratively, but with that support it provides something quite interesting and unique.

The usual Cells at Work metaphors and humanization of bodily processes are just as excellent as always, and I’m giving special credit to the sketch about alcholic liver damage being compared to drunken abuse of host club employees, displaying a perhaps obvious if natural juxtaposition of the physical and emotional damage the substance abuse is causing to both the body itself and others around them.

Uma Musume; Horse girls! Racing! Just as surprisingly excellent as last season, giving us a fantastic sports story anime with charming characters and balanced stakes, with a good helping of humour. Easy recommend.

Slime Isekai: This one’s still going strong but has diverged from it’s original premise quite seriously. There’s nothing intriguing about this being an isekai about being reincarnated as a slime anymore; and he’s way too overpowered for any of the combat to have any stakes. What it DOES have however is a fascinating look at the birth of a fantasy nation of monsters, politics, science, and social development of a varied and multicultural monster nation. And THAT I’m still in for.

I will seriously never forgive them for making Bobcut Lizardgirl into a regular ass human though. It has a serious problem with de-monsterizing its character designs and seriously reducing their appeal.

Log Horizon the true king of MMO isekai is back after 7 long, long years, and it’s jumping STRAIGHT into the depth of its political intrigue and deep understanding and development of the socio political issues inherent to its setting. Somewhat dry as ever, but truly fascinating for those looking at a more serious exploration of what the concept of living in a game actually means.

Dr Stone: I don’t have to hype this up, do I? Mad science speedrunning the development of human culture from the stone age up! This time they’re going to war! They made cell phones and cup ramen out of rocks! It’s heartwarming, emotionally rich, entertaining and informative, and funny as all hell. A classic for sure.

Higurashi. Everyone knows higurashi. Thing is, I just never watched it. We thought Gou was going to be a remake, but then it ended up being Rebuild of Evangelion, so I stopped at episode 12 or so and went back to watch the original. Classic horror mystery.

Yashahime. Yikes. This one’s... well. I don’t have any especial nostalgia or affection for Inuyasha like many people, but Yashahime is clearly a very middling approximation of it. There’s things to like here, the main trio of characters are all great designs, Moroha standing even head and shoulders above them as a truly endearing goblin child, and it really does feel in ways like 90s toonami fare. But there’s some lack of depth going on here, and I just don’t even know what to say about the Sesshoumaru pedophilia thing. Extremely questionable plotting.

#Anonymous #TFWI #anime #anime recommendations #seasonal anime

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snugglyporos · 5 months ago

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Oh boy a great time to explain how the internet bringing people together has a bad tendency to turn everything into a giant grey blob!

I don't think it's possible to overstate how we're living in an age of flourishing geek/nerd culture, in the sense that everything that was considered part of a small subculture is now pop culture and accessible to everyone. There's lots of reasons for this, but I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that D&D experienced a huge boost in interest due to the pandemic. People being home and having time meant things like critical role could come into existence, and as a result, 5e has been shaped by this idea that experiences should almost be cookie cutter, almost in the same way that video games are. You should be able to go to a place, experience the same things, no matter who is running your game or who your players are. It's designed, almost entirely from the ground up, to have this kind of accessibility.

But as the op said, this isn't neutral. Games will tell you what they think is important based on how much time and effort they put into their systems. To give an example, D&D 3.5 was designed to be entirely modular; the game system was designed to work with everything and give players as much freedom as possible (and sell as many sourcebooks as possible). But this also made it overwhelming for lots of people who didn't want to deal with that. Conversely, 2e was seemingly designed to be as hard to understand as possible, appealing directly to it's niche audience and creating a sense that players were a part of an exclusive club for grasping the mechanics.

But 5e's accessibility had lead to lots of people mimicking what others are doing and the game designers trying to make it as universal as possible, which creates a kind of grey morass where all the character is stripped out of it. To give a kind of analogy, imagine if you took Call of Cthulhu and just stripped everything except the fear mechanic out (3.5 allowed you to do that actually since there was a d20 version). Yeah, the mechanics are there, but it won't feel like the same game.

And I think it's good for games to be accessible; there are hundreds of weird games with impossible mechanics that no one would ever want to really play. It's a lot of hard work to make a game functional. But this kind of mass accessibility means that people who are being introduced to it aren't being introduced to D&D the setting/game/culture, they're being introduced to D&D the grey blob that has been made for everyone. That means that what people think they can do, or what they think is possible, or what they think the appeal is is going to be different than people who came before. The kind of people who are looking for a more unique, customized experience are going to feel that D&D isn't their game, because it's not designed around that sort of experience.

This isn't a neutral viewpoint. All games, as I said, tell you what they think is important by virtue of what the mechanics focus on. In some ways, the popularity of the game, the ability to appeal to more people, is a virtue. But it's also made it so the people looking for that kind of unique experience are going to look elsewhere.

In some ways, it's no different than how people used to look at D&D and didn't get into it because everyone's perception (not entirely unfairly) was that it was a dense and difficult to grasp game for territorial nerds.

The question is never 'will some people feel excluded' but 'who is going to feel excluded' because you cannot be everything to everyone. D&D has decided to try and capitalize on it's popularity by trying to make more lifelong players, at the cost of jettisoning all of the uniqueness that you'd get from older style versions. In order to solve the problem of no one feeling competent enough to DM so no one DMs, they've made a game that anyone can DM, but because of this they've given it the character of going through video game encounters and manually doing all the things that the game does in the background.

Again, that's the nature of the beast. But we should never think that it's somehow a neutral, dispassionate decision.

I don't know how to say this other than that D&D 5e should not be taken as the template of what RPGs are supposed to be like and should not be allowed to set expectations for what to expect from RPGs in general. Like, D&D 5e making assumptions that an Adventuring Day will consist of Encounters which need to be overcome so the Adventure can progress and that those Encounters should be designed in such a way that the party can be expected to overcome them. That's not neutral! All of that is actually heavily opinionated and already encodes a lot of expectations.

#ooc

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danwhobrowses · 5 years ago

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One Piece - Void Century Theory Dump

So as promised I am ready to do a dump of theories that mainly involve the Void Century, so that’s the stuff involving the Great Kingdom, the Initial D, the ancient weapons etc. They will be like my other Theory dumps I’ve done on this page but possibly in more detail. Spoilers for Chapters leading up to Chapter 968

Right so the Void Century happened 900 years ago, it’s a Century which led to the World Government being formed of the 20 Kingdoms, the fall of Shandora and the Great Kingdom, Joy Boy failing to keep his promise to Fishman Island and leaving something of his in Laugh Tale, the Tontattas being oppressed in Dressrosa and the overall forbidding of reading Poneglyphs. There’s a lot there that can be digested and there are a lot of theories about it already, so sorry if some may sound familiar. Im the Immortal

We’ll start with the one who sits in the empty throne, Im or Imu, is a mysterious individual. Gentle to butterflies but knifey to sweet princesses who did nothing wrong. It is a common theory that Imu is an immortal being, someone who has lived since the Void Century, but I believe it goes a little deeper. Imu isn’t immortal ‘just because’, Imu is immortal because he has had the Perennial Youth Operation, what makes the Ope Ope no Mi one of Marejois’ most beloved treasure. It’d explain why the Gorosei answer to them despite being pretty old themselves and how they could keep to themselves so much that nobody really knows that they exist.

Eight Moons

It’s a combination of many theories I’ve seen, but I do believe that the One Piece world has 8 Satellites orbiting it. Of course there’s the standard moon otherwise known as Fairy Vearth, but Ohara’s globe showed at least 5 other satellites, including one with a satellite of its own, but we always see this kind of globe from the front, as if there’s a missing moon behind the planet. The idea that there are eight moons go beyond just the globes of Ohara, the Kozuki Crest and the Alabasta flag also have a symbol of a circle with eight dots around it. Right now I do believe that at one point Wano’s borders were very open, it’d explain why Toki was born in Wano yet never saw it - since her time jumps do not affect her geographical position. It’s also unusual how often the moon is a focal point around the planet, from the Minks’ ability to perform Su Long, the ancient city of Birka and the Wano Daimyo names all relating to moons. A Spaceman Came Travelling...

We already know that the Shandorians, Birkans and Skypeians all once inhabited the moon thanks to Enel’s cover story arc of him going to Fairy Vearth, whereby he entered the advanced and abandoned city of Birka. Given that there is potentially 8 Moons, why could there not be life on those moons. I speculate that this story runs much deeper, we know there are even Space Pirates from the cover story, but what if most of the races from these 8 moons all came down to the planet and they comprise of the 20 Kingdoms. Not only that but this could explain how some races could’ve come to be, the technological advancement of Birka and the fact that their automata match the invention of other automata Enel meets is proof of that but the Minks’ ancestral race may’ve also come from the moon, since they seem to react to a full moon’s radiation. This could also be why there are races such as longarms, longlegs, fishmen and merfolk. The Creator Race

So, through Enel’s cover story we can prove that there was a dude that happened to create 4 Automata that almost exactly matched the design of Automata in the Moon City of Birka, this robotist happened to live on one Karakuri Island as well, the birthplace of Dr. Vegapunk. Vegapunk has been a heavy mystery himself almost as much as Im, what we know of Vegapunk is mainly through their creations; Seastone manipulation, Cybrogs, Artificial DF, Lineage Factor, Artificial life etc. It seems that there’s only certain things that Vegapunk has failed to achieve; Climate Control and Gigantification which could be key to other parts of these theories. Now Vegapunk could simply be a born genius, or maybe he’s from a race that was the most advanced race out of the 8 moons, Oda did say in an SBS that Vegapunk may already know what Devil Fruits really are and thus how they work, and the World Government have him locked up so much that even the threat of Kaido has made CP0 only hesitate about handing Vegapunk over to Orochi - how Orochi would know of Vegapunk is another question, was Vegapunk from Wano? Digging deeper this could also explain how the races of moon people integrated themselves into the ‘Blue Star’ and even created some of the aforementioned races like Minks, Longarms and Longlegs, even maybe the Kuja and the Three-Eyed Tribes, all a product of Lineage Factor tampering or natural selection not unlike how humans created dogs out of wolves or oranges out of citron. A key point could also be the theme of Electricity, Enel was able to call himself God by virtue of having a lightning Devil Fruit, all Minks naturally have the ability of Electro, the city of Birka ran on electricity and like in the modern world electricity had been key to many advancements. Of Dwarves and Giants

One of the things I mentioned that Vegapunk failed at was Gigantification, it seems a little odd that he would need to research that. But imagine that normal humans were from the moon, a much smaller land space, and they come to the Blue Star where everything is either Huge or Tiny. We know that Giants can live for at least twice as long as a One Piece human would and that they have always been a sought after force, even Big Mom believes that with the Giants she would be unstoppable. So perhaps the Giants are the native race of the Blue Star, alongside the Tontotta dwarves. There is some evidence to this as well, Oda seems to lean on a lot of Norse myth (even Im’s name is based off of a Jotunn) and if Giant Jack is a part of Elbaf’s Yggdrasil tree that could further fan the flames. The interesting thing is that the Giants and the Dwarves seem to live in areas where flora thrive, often a sign that they are symbiotic with the ecosystem, there’s also the matter that there are various giants; Oars, Saul and the Yeti Cool brothers being different kinds and sizes of giants, even Kaido and his Numbers could be a form of Oni giant and attempting to obtain gigantification the ways they influenced other races led to smaller scale creatures like Ceasar and outliers like Magellan, Big Mom and Whitebeard, people who seem like they could be like giants. The Kingdom of the Dawn

This then leads to the ‘Great Kingdom’ that Clover was talking about in Ohara, a kingdom whose name Clover couldn’t even speak of before being shot. When you hear Kingdom though you think of one country or one island, but what if the Great Kingdom was actually an empire. I mean you’d think it excessive for 20 Kingdoms to need to take on one right? But what if the Great Kingdom was a combination of kingdoms that included Shandora and Wano, two countries who have been called the ‘City/Country of Gold’. It’s worth reminding that neither of these lands had a ‘King’, Shandora may’ve had a God and Wano has a Shogun (sans an Emperor) but not a king nor a queen. I definitely believe that Wano had ties with the Great Kingdom, the main reason being Poneglyphs: Wano is where the texts were made, where the language was written and taught how to translate, if the Kingdom ‘disappeared’ leaving their story on Pongelyphs then that implies a Wano connection, potentially from the Amatsuki clan - as demonstrated with Toki not being in Wano when we meet her properly - or the Kozuki clan given their blood bond with the Minks on Zou, their crest being placed under a Rio Poneglyph of a millenia-old City. A common thing is also the term of the ‘Dawn’, a symbol of an event in the future where dreams will come true and I believe like others that this is the core belief of the Great Kingdom, a kingdom of many races and cultures living freely and prosperously, the Kingdom of the Dawn. Though whether that was its actual name I’m not sure of, I feel like it’d have another name since Luffy was born on ‘Dawn Island’, so I feel like if the WG didn’t want that name out there so badly they wouldn’t allow one of their Affiliated Kingdoms to have that kind of name. I think it’d have a name similar to the pirate havens like Tortuga, Port Royal, Libertatia and New Providence. This Kingdom however was clearly something threatening to the other leaders of the world to the point that they were terrified of their skills and the creation of what they deemed ‘(Ancient) Weapons’, which led to a war that caused the fall of Shandora (but didn’t ravage their gold) and possibly the closing off of Wano. The Great Kingdom ‘Disappears’

Defeat is feasible yes, but it was rare even for the WG to eradicate even a single island, would they really be able to do that 900 years ago? Part of the reason CP9 wanted Pluton was for its destructive power. So how did the Great Kingdom ‘disappear’? The wording makes it out like it just vanished rather than dissolved. So what if the main country of the Great Kingdom did really disappear, just not in the way that the WG thought. Remember that the Pluton was said to be able to destroy an entire island and we know that Poseidon could command Sea Kings that were capable of carrying the Noah, so what if the Country itself was ‘blown up’ by the Pluton itself but secretly, the island was scattered across the world with the help of the Kingdom’s allies; the Sea Kings and the Giants. Oars is known as a ‘Continent Puller’ so it’s possible to have that strength, and if that is true then maybe islands such as Zou, Ohara and possibly even Dawn Island and more could actually be remnants of the Great Kingdom, hidden or assimilated into the world. The Nefertari Redemption

Alabasta is noted as being one of the 20 Kingdoms that made up the World Government, but the only ones that didn’t go to Marejois after the Void Century. Why seems to be the appropriate question and the appropriate answer could be because they regretted the outcome of the war. It’s possible that the Alabasta Kingdom was the Garp to the Great Kingdom’s Roger, there was emnity but also understanding, which could explain why Alabasta then held not only a Poneglyph but also the entire Pluton hidden within their kingdom. Perhaps Alabasta regretted the side they chose and instead decided to withhold the Ancient Weapon (remember Robin scoffed when Cobra said that the country was charged to ‘protect’ Pluton) from the newly established World Government, and sometime down the line after holding the Poneglyph explaining where. An answer Robin never found because she never read the First Poneglyph the Straw Hats first came across. There are other ‘Ancient Weapons’

As said in a Sherlock Episode “There’s always something so comforting about the number 3″, so far we are told of 3 Ancient Weapons; the ship Pluton that can destroy an Island, the Mermaid Poseidon who can command the Sea Kings and Uranus. Each of these weapons were named after Gods because of their incredible power, but what if there are other ‘weapons’. People speculate that Momonosuke is Uranus or Zunesha was Pluton, but do we consider that there are other things that could be tools of destruction? Take a Dragon for example, Kaido is considered the strongest creature but the WG doesn’t call him a Weapon, it’s gotta be odd as well that Oda mixed the namings up to have the common trifecta of Sea, Sky and the Underworld but gave two of them names of Roman Gods and one the name of a Greek God. It’s possible that there are other weapons out there but they’re not deemed weapons because the World Government have them, and thus don’t fear it being used against them. The Tequila Wolf Project

Tequila Wolf has been a World Government project for at least 700 years, a massive bridge with an unknown stopping point starting in the East Blue. We saw it with Robin and recently Oden so the question is why is Tequila Wolf important? If Kuma wanted Robin to meet the Revolutionary Army why not send her to Baltigo, the army’s HQ? There was something here that Kuma wanted Robin to see, something she needed to learn about it to better prepare herself for the New World. Its name may be a hint, Tequila is named after Santiago de Tequila (much like how Champagne is after the French Province or Stilton after the English Village), the village translating to ‘Place of Tribute’ so it’s possible that this bridge is a Tribute - though wolf does imply deception, like the Crane and the Wolf fable. I personally think this was the WG’s plan to lock in all the islands they deemed important and like most nobles we have seen, leave the outside to suffer, thus the trickery of the wolf, while in Japan once worshipped for protection the rest know it to be a trickster that deems itself superior. Joy Boy and the Initial D.

Recently, the name “Joy Boy” returned to the limelight having been the writer of the Poneglyph in Fishman Island, then we discovered that Joy Boy was a key part of what lived in Laugh Tale, a gift he left behind being able to bring the Roger Pirates to tears of laughter as Roger muses that he wished he lived in his era. So who was Joy Boy? What was Joy Boy? I think the answer lies in the giant Straw Hat, Joy Boy was a giant, or at least partly giant, a leader of the Great Kingdom who constantly smiled and brought joy to people around him, was able to turn even his enemies to friends, someone of deadly strength that his allies are called ‘Ancient Weapons’. Joy Boy is the person I believe is the reason the World Government outlawed the use of D. the D stands for something that Joy Boy’s real name had, whether the D is his smile, Dawn, Dragon, Devil or something else, the D likely comes from Joy Boy and the people and friends that rode with him as Nakama thus adopted the name D to carry on his will. A small thing I want to note as well, I feel like each of these D holders initially named themselves after animals or parts of an island; Monkey, Jaguar, Rocks, Water, it’s possible other D holders over time married into other families or corrupted their names (imagine if Roger’s family were Gull then changed to Gol) while keeping the D a secret note to the will they carry. Inherited Will

Joy Boy may’ve been this charismatic figure, but there’s still the matter of Fishman Island, his failure to bring the Fishmen and Merfolk to the surface via Poseidon being a deep regret for the character. This could’ve been a human trait had it not been for Chapter 968 alluding to the fact that Joy Boy can ‘reappear’. I don’t think this is Joy Boy pulling a jesus though, I think Joy Boy’s particular race is capable of reincarnation the same way Poseidon is. Poseidon is reborn over time in a Mermaid Princess so maybe the timelines of reincarnation are iffy and the Poseidon of Joy Boy’s time died (or Joy Boy themselves were dying) thus rendering them unable to carry the Noah. If certain characters are able to reincarnate this can give a whole new dimension not only to the Will of D but Inherited Will as a whole. Luffy may’ve inherited Roger’s Will but what if Roger inherited Joy Boy’s Will first and thus Luffy is the reincarnation of Joy Boy that Roger was hoping his ‘son’ would be. This can be further evidenced by the fact that Luffy does intend to reopen Wano’s borders for Momonosuke, thus the point where Joy Boy has returned to Wano. The Devil Tree

Which leads to our finale part of the theory dump. It’s often considered that Devil Fruits were born from a moon, since as Enel noted the moon has no Water. However it cannot be Fairy Vearth, since Enel found a dried canal. So the Birkans, Shandorians and Skypeians did not have the Devil Fruits, instead I believe that the Devil Tree came from the same moon that brought Im and/or the founders of the Great Kingdom and with them they brought a seed for the Devil Tree. From what we know of SMILE, a Devil Fruit seems to take away a key property of its eater, usually their ability to swim, so it’s possible that the Devil Tree’s fruits were initially normal, but when eaten or exposed to a property reincarnated itself into the Devil Fruit we know today, leading to an endless cycle of gestation within a host and reincarnation through the lineage factor. The tree was likely also called the ‘Devil Tree’ not because of its properties but because the ones who planted it sported horns, which can explain why SMILE Gifters and Pleasures grow horns after consumption. I also believe that the Devil Tree isn’t the only tree brought by this race, like many things Trees seem to have properties unlike the simple tree would, there’s the Sabaody mangrove with its bubbles, the Boin Archipelago Venus Fly Trap islands, the Tree of Knowledge, Treasure Tree Adam sporting strong wood durability, Sunlight Tree Eve which can emit light (Like Dressrosa’s sunflowers), Hiriluk’s fabled healing Cherry Blossoms, Weather balls and Shandora’s trees of cultural significance. The Key note of the Devil Tree was its further cultivation, something I believe was the role of the Donquixote family. Doflamingo was key to the production of SMILE and he seemed to want to follow in the footsteps of his ancestor. So it’s possible that back in the Void Century, the dwarves were enslaved to use their botany skills to cultivate multiple Devil Fruits, a fate they’d then repeat with SMILE. Phew! That took a lot out of me, but that’s my Piece, whether it’s key to One Piece we’ll have to wait and see, but I’ll just wait by the phone, see if Oda gives it a ring.

#one piece #one piece theory #theory #void century #will of d #devil fruit #wano #tequila wolf #im #ancient weapons #world government one piece #joy boy

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drink-n-watch · 5 years ago

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Another week, another brand-new episode of Psycho Pass. I’m going to hold back and be all mysterious and stuff. Because that’s how I do. I definitely don’t blurt out exactly how I feel about a show in the very first line of every post and then there’s no point in reading the rest. Nuh-huh. No siree. I gots some restraint! Who do you take me for! So instead, Matt, how are you enjoying season 3 so far. It may just be 3 episodes in but as they are double length, it’s now longer than most movies!

Oh, so does that mean it’s my turn to blurt out my thoughts in a single sentence? Okay, um, err, this show is still as consistently excellent as I thought it was based on the previous two episodes! Oh no, I hope I’ll have something to write for the rest of the review now!

Is that so? Fascinating. I can see how you would think and/or feel that way! (I write my part first… I have no clue what Matt said at this point…

So let’s get right into it. First I just a few general comments on my part. I enjoy high stakes corruption stories and although that’s also what season 1 was, the fact that this allows us to look into the public face of Sybil a bit more, through the device of gubernatorial elections is a great angle in my opinion. Diving into what has to be extremely complex and unique politics of a Sybil controlled society has so much potential.

I had to look up what “gubernatorial” meant (we don’t have anything like that in Australia, so forgive my ignorance), but yes I think politics and the world of ‘Psycho Pass’ is a perfect fit.

I mean what powers do politicians even hold in such circumstances. Are elections largely a population suppression tactics. Something to keep the masses happy? If so, why are they so incredibly high stakes. Seems ridiculous to be going through all this for what amounts to a reality show (which might explain why both candidates are entertainers). So much potential!

What do you think?

I mean, if I know anything about politics and people its that ambitious people will always be ambitious and wanting to be ‘the best’ regardless of the world they live in–so even if politics amount to nothing more than a popularity contest without any real power or ability to change anything outside of Sybil’s system–people are still going to strive for that, people are going to kill for that even. We’ve seen time and time again in the real world that people do extreme things to get what they want, even if to ‘outsiders’ their goals seem ridiculous or pointless.

Yakusuji really surprised me as a character this week. For a second there I thought they were going with a “bad guy is bad” sort of characterization but then it all took a very sharp right turn! I still don’t know if his character is sincere or if it’s all a big act. Either way, I didn’t expect it and I like it! Maybe it’s my suspicious nature that leads me to think he’s less than sincere but Psycho Pass did teach me not to trust anyone!

He’s definitely an interesting character but the way his character ties into Enforcer Todoroki’s subplot makes for a compelling bit of character development. As for whether he’s ‘on the level’ I don’t buy it…

I did find the assault scene a bit blunt. Not as in too brutal (mind you I thought it was hilarious that someone could kick a skull in so hard as to actually make it explode!) but just a little too straight forward. At least that’s what I thought as I was watching it. In hindsight though, if this was a political machination and not just the random terrorist attack they are making it out to be on the surface, then this type of direct and flamboyant assault is exactly what would be the most effective!

Yeah I took it to be that they were being intentionally flashy, down to the attackers wearing the same clothes, I found it to be a very intimidating scene.

How does anyone in this universe manage to keep their hue clear? I was only watching those little holo assistant thingies pop up for a few minutes (like the old Clippy office assistant) and I already felt my urge to murder rise. I wouldn’t last a day if I had to deal with those things and keep my thoughts in check!

I loved the idea of someone being physically assaulted and then a little pop-up comes up warning them that they were receiving injuries in-line with someone being assaulted, it’s that kind of AI assistant mentality that makes me hate AI assistants like ‘Alexa’ and ‘Siri’ all the more (but that’s a rant for another day).

As our heroes were chasing the attackers down, we got some surprising bit of universe building and musing on the dual nature of justice and law. One of my very favourite lines from the first season was said in a similar context. As Akane was chasing down criminals she said something to the effect that there’s a misconception that laws are there to protect people but it’s really up to people to protect the laws. I love that idea. It really epitomized Akane’s character and the fact that that’s what’s going through her mind in a high-pressure situation was just perfect.

We got something similar this week with Arata capping off a chase explaining that even in a Sybil controlled society it is imperative to exercise human judgement “that’s why dominators have triggers”. It’s a great line! And one that solidifies Arata’s devotion to ideals rather than establishments.

I’m glad you brought it up, that line really stood out to me too, the importance of the human aspect in an (at times) inhumane system.

Matt, you mentioned last week that you felt the writers of Psycho Pass season 3 had gotten around to reading old US news, it seems that they’ve moved on to more recent fare as the general depiction of the mudslinging politics does seem very familiar to what has been happening not too far south from my own home in the past few years!

Immigration’s a tricky thing, ain’t it?

Although, aside from the winky topical references, it does make a lot of sense that a society as portrayed in Psycho Pass would be particularly xenophobic. To be honest, I was really surprised they even had large scale immigration. I figured the country would have been largely sealed off!

So far, the themes of racial/cultural tension are handled a little naively and way too simplified for my tastes. However, I do realize that with everything going on in this narrative, you got to take some shortcuts.

I suppose there’s still time for a more nuanced discussion on immigration from this show, I imagine someone like you Irina, an immigrant yourself, would have a lot more to say on the subject than most people?

What did you think of Haruki Enomyia? I’m asking cause I have no clue what to make of them.

Difficult to say, for a second I thought they might be setting them up as a bigger villain for this story but I think they’re probably going to end up just another pawn in the bigger game being played. I think they were more just here to give us an idea of what kind of life Kazumichi had in the slums before joining the force. Though I think him just walking around the town with Arata did that well enough.

Am I the only one who noticed all the food in this episode? Maybe I was just hungry, but everything looked delicious!

C’mon Irina, all anime food looks delicious!

Ok back to more serious stuff, we got some very decent character-building backstory for both Kei and Arata. Now normally, this would not be my thing. It was delivered in straight exposition and boy oh boy was it all tragic! Taken independently, both of their backgrounds would have had me gently rolling my eyes and moving on without a second thought. Oh my, an anime protag with a tragic backstory! But it’s in how these stories intertwine to create such a bizarre picture of their relationship that brings the whole thing to a higher level.

It’s kind of interesting that they chose to more or less have our entire supporting cast learn this complicated backstory at the same time via the expositional method you mentioned. On the one hand I guess it helps to have everyone on the same page with their history but it makes me wonder if it was done for a more specific reason. Like one of the Enforcers using this information against our dynamic duo or the opposite and it puts more faith in them and brings closer as a team–who can say for sure?

In fact, the peculiar dynamic between Kei and Arata is truly fascinating and so far, a strong point of the season for me.

Agreed.

A few little random thoughts:

I quite like both the OP and ED. I like the visuals in the OP better, in fact, I like them a lot, but I prefer the ED song!

The interiors are really beautiful this season. I’m not so taken by the architecture, but room designs consistently catch my eye.

Also, I didn’t know where to fit it in the review, but I liked the statement that acting weak releases cortisol making you feel more relaxed. The behavioural neuroscience angle is one I like a lot and I hope they develop it more as Psycho Pass is the perfect universe to explore this in.

I thought it was interesting–if briefly mentioned–but I have to wonder if it was just the writer showing off some fancy things he learned on wikipedia and wanting to put it into the show (okay that was a bit catty of me, apologies to the writer of Psycho Pass).

Oh I guess I should finally admit it. I really liked this episode. More than the last. So far, I think the writing may be a touch weaker than I had hoped. There’s a lot of slightly clumsy exposition. But I’m also starting to see the foundations of a potentially fascinating story with some very intriguing dynamics. I’m excited. When the episode ended I was both surprised by how quickly it had gone by and a little bummed I couldn’t watch the next one right away!

I have to agree (we seem to agreeing a lot this time!) our new characters feel like they’re living up to the potential of this show’s world while adding interesting things to it too. Political corruption, a shadow organisation called ‘Bifrost’ pulling the strings (cool name by the way) plus all the internal machinations at the various levels of law enforcement and interpersonal relationships too makes for a rich and compelling tapestry. If you’re a person who adheres to the 3 episode rule and you haven’t given this show a chance yet then 3 excellent episodes in a row should be proof enough that Psycho Pass is back and firing on all cylinders!

Psycho Pass s3 ep3 – Tensions Flare Another week, another brand-new episode of Psycho Pass. I’m going to hold back and be all mysterious and stuff.

#action #anime #Collab #crime #drama #Psycho Pass #sci fi

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jeshikawa · 5 years ago

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For my big summer trip, I traveled down to the island of Shikoku to visit one of the least visited prefectures in Japan, Kochi.

At my JET interview 3 years ago, I was asked if I enjoyed history (yes) and if I had a famous Japanese historical figure. I blanked on the spot and blurted out a safe and easy answer-- Sakamoto Ryouma. The Japanese woman at my interview nodded her head approvingly and wrote something down. The former JET asked me to do a demo lesson for elementary school students about him. I fumbled, started over once, and manage to throw something together on the spot. When I left the interview, I joked that if I made it to Japan, I’d go to where ever Ryouma came from as a sort of tribute.

Well, I made it and since then, I’ve been to Kyoto and Nagasaki, two places affiliated with Ryouma’s life. This year, I went to his home prefecture, Kochi for four days. I had a vague itinerary made up. Vague because I had things I definitely wanted to do but some of them depended on the weather (and a typhoon was coming!).

Anyway, below the cut is the details of my trip!

But the tl;dr version is:

1. Had local food! The specialty ramen is nabe ramen, served in a hot pot with a chicken broth based and sliced chikuwa. The most popular type of ice cream, aisukurin, is a traditional kind based on a recipe from the 1800s.

2. Katsurahama Beach is easily accessible with a lot of stuff to visit nearby like the Sakamoto Ryouma museum, a cute shrine on a cliff, an aquarium, and places to eat. The Sakamoto Ryouma Museum was A+ super informative and very English friendly.

3. Kochi is the home for some very famous Japanese figures. Sakamoto Ryouma is one of the most famous historical figures in Japan (second only to Nobunaga in some rankings!). The creator for Anpanman is from Kochi and I had the theme song stuck in my head the whole time. The founder for Mitsubishi is from Kochi, too.

4. Kochi is home to the first yosakoi festival in Japan. Naruko, one of the required elements for yosakoi, is traditionally from Kochi and you can make your own at the yosakoi museum.

5. Kochi loves chickens, especially a certain breed.

6. Kochi Castle was a struggle to climb up to in the summer but the view was amazing. If you go on Sunday, you can visit a 300 year old open market nearby. I saw an 800 yen whole watermelon.

7. Kitagawamura is home to “Monet’s Garden,” a garden inspired by Monet’s paintings and the only place outside France to be allowed to officially use the title.

8. You can get delicious food and eat next to locals at Hirome Market.

9. Not many people spoke much English if at all but oh my god the locals in Kochi were some of the friendliest people I have ever met in Japan and I was so touched by their kindness and willingness to make my trip the best it could be.

Every prefecture has their own style of ramen. Kochi’s is nabe ramen; ramen served in hot pots that simmer when you remove the top. Traditionally, the ramen has a chicken broth base and comes with sliced chikuwa and green onion. I went to one place that specialized on it and they also served the ramen with chicken skin and shredded chicken.

It was hot so at Katsurahama Beach and Kochi Castle, I had aisukurin. It's ice cream made from eggs, sugar, and powdered skim milk. It’s a little crunchier and lighter tasting than regular ice cream because there’s less fat. I don’t like having dairy in the summer because it feels so heavy in my stomach but I really liked this.

While at Katsurahama, I climbed up a small cliff (which is honestly a lot easier than it sounds!) to visit a small shrine that looked over the beach. The Sakamoto Ryouma museum nearby was extremely informative and very English friendly. When it comes to museums in Japan, I think this one was one of the most English friendly ones with very detailed and comprehensive translations for about 85% of the things on display if you got their audio guide. The only thing that didn’t really have English translations was the new special and temporary exhibit about the women in Ryouma’s life (which was honestly really cool to see). We visited the aquarium that was there and it was okay... I don’t really like a lot of aquariums and zoos and this one didn’t really impress me. But it was close to the shrine and the museum and next to the bus stop so it was convenient.

Kochi loves their boy, Ryouma. He’s on all of the omiyage, his statue is every where, there are photo op cut outs all over the place, and it’s honestly really cute. Kochi isn’t a very popular prefecture but when your local boy is one of the most famous figures in Japanese history (I’ve seen him ranked as #2 on some lists, second only to Nobunaga!), you run with it. Do you know what else is from Kochi? The creator of Anpanman is from Kochi! The artist designed characters for all of the stations on the train lines and they greet you on all of the signs. Whenever a train leaves Kochi station, you can hear a jingle from the show. In Kochi City, there are statues of the characters every where. The founder for Mitsubishi is also from Kochi and the Mitsubishi logo is based on the crest for the Tosa Clan.

Kochi is home to the first yosakoi festival in Japan. It’s one of the biggest festivals in the prefecture and one of the biggest yosakoi festivals in Japan. At the yosakoi museum in Kochi City, you can make naruko which are a requirement for yosakoi. Naruko originated from Kochi as a tool farmers used to scare off crows.

Kochi Castle was a work out in the summer because it’s up a hill... but the view from the top of the castle was amazing. It was also very informative with a lot of information in English. I learned a lot about Japanese castles. If you go to the castle on Sunday, you can also visit the open air Sunday Market which has been going strong for 300 years. I saw a whole watermelon there for 800 yen. A local told me Kochi is very small and agricultural so things are just cheaper, even in the city.

Near the castle, you can visit the Castle Museum and the Yosakoi Inari Shrine. The Yosakoi Inari Shrine has chickens and roosters running around. Imagine seeing chickens and roosters running around in the middle of a city! People often go to the shrine to pray for a successful Yosakoi festival and season.

Something that was on my Japan Bucket List was visiting Monet’s Garden in Japan. I didn’t realize it was in Kochi until I started planning my trip! It’s the only place outside of France allowed to use the title “Monet’s Garden” and it was designed with cooperation and support from Monet’s Garden in France. If you go in the summer, you can see the lilies on the pond and it really looks like some of Monet’s paintings come to life. It was about a 1.5 hour train ride one way so it was 3 hours all together... and we spent about 2 hours at the garden looking around and eating lunch so this was basically one whole day.

At night, we hit up Hirome Market which is a market place with a ton of food and drink stalls that you can enjoy with locals. You can try tons of delicious food there! Street food like okonomiyaki, karaage, and takoyaki but also full meals like ramen, nabe, sushi, and pizza. I had bonito tataki-- lightly seared bonito. It’s one of the signature dishes in Kochi.

Through out the trip, I hit up a few shrines and temples for goshuin. I didn’t actually do the 88 Temple Tour because those temples are scattered all across Shikoku but I hit up a few temples on the route that were easy to get to.

It was really a full 4 days! But something that really stuck out to me on the trip were the people. Like I said, Kochi is one of the least visited prefectures in Japan, especially among foreign tourists. While I was traveling with my friend, locals were usually very curious to find out why we were there, especially before the big yosakoi festival. They were always so excited and willing to give us recommendations for places to visit and foods to try. Even if their English wasn’t very good and my Japanese wasn’t great, they were always proud to try and explain things to us. I was in a small mom and pop convenience shop looking for a drink to by and the owner tried very hard to explain the regional juices, sodas, and alcohol for sale. On the train, I saw an interesting building on a mountain and an old man did his best to explain to me it was a temple after I snapped a photo of it. At Katsurahama beach, we ran into a local high school field trip and the teacher invited us to go to the Ryouma museum along with them. One hot day, I went to a restaurant and fanned myself while waiting for food... the restaurant owner gave me a fan. When I tried to return it after dinner, he told me to keep it so I could stay cool on my trip. Even on the plane ride into Kochi, a local woman asked us what we were going to do in Kochi and gave us a few recommendations. it’s really ridiculous how incredibly nice everyone in Kochi was when they spoke to us. It was honestly one of the nicest experiences I’ve ever had dealing with local people.

My trip honestly ended up being A LOT better than I thought it would go. It’s legit one of my favorite places I’ve visited and a big part of that is just how proud and kind the people were every where I went. It’s very obvious that there are people here proud of their history and culture and they genuinely want to share it with others. This was a great way to celebrate 3 years in Japan!

#jet program #jet programme #visit japan #travel #japan

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dysphoric-affect · 5 years ago

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The End Of The Console Wars And The Dawn Of Unity

Earlier this year, I watched in awe during the Video Game Awards as leaders from Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo took the stage at the same time and delivered a joint address to those attending and watching at home. The platitudes were what you would expect and not in themselves groundbreaking - about what a great time it is to be a gamer and how exciting the future is right now - though not unwelcome and undoubtedly true. What was more meaningful in my mind is who the presenters were, what they represented individually and what their cooperating together - considering their background - to make that address symbolically represented: that the age of console wars is coming to an end and something else, something better for gamers and for the industry, is taking its place.

The awe I felt stems from the fact that this is a far cry from the state of the industry not so long ago, when E3 press conferences, especially those of Microsoft and Sony, were not entirely dissimilar to war rooms. References to each other at that time were avoided at all cost, as if avoiding saying a vulgar word, with the competition only being invoked to point out how inferior what they offered was to the vastly superior console they had to offer. Hostility toward the competition was not only rife on their part, but felt encouraged to be had on the part of consumers loyal to their brand. And we took the bait.

I’m embarrassed now to admit that I fell for this trap myself. I was an Xbox loyalist primarily, though because I grew up with Nintendo originally I had a soft spot for them as well. This made Sony the source of my own derision. With the original price tag on the PS3 and the eventually redacted “boomerang” controller design that console was initially slated to have, there was no shortage of fodder I felt given by Sony at the time to condemn their console. The trick is, criticism of those aspects of the console did have some objective validity, but there’s a fine line between making well-founded criticism based on rational thinking and deliberation from essentially accidentally supporting a valid negative position, but based purely from irrational, emotion-based brand loyalty which would have demanded I see what Sony offered as inferior regardless of the specific facts surrounding it.

I feel especially embarrassed to have felt that way, because in life I have traditionally prided myself on being a rational thinker, but in that case, given my passion for the games industry I was easily led away from it. Thankfully that was as far as such sentiment ever got with me, but the capability was always there for that to spill over into applying such irrationality and emotion-based decision making in other areas of consideration about institutions in society. This was the great unspoken, and perhaps unidentified, insidious nature of what was going on at that time in the games industry: irrational hostility was being fostered, and once that’s been justified in one area of our life, it’s not difficult for such thinking to be applied and justified in other areas of our life, which in the longer term stands to have damaging repercussions for the society we impact. It wasn’t until I matured into an adult as well as gained a personal interest in philosophy that I became able to look back and realize the significance of the implications this toxic atmosphere stood to have.

Real change in the industry in relation to these attitudes only truly started to occur however once those in the industry matured and changed their approach, as was probably always destined to be the case. As the negative culture in the past was brought out by those within the game industry in the first place, for better or worse it means the responsibility in turn had to fall on them to undue that kind of thinking and replace it with new, more positive vision. Thankfully, the effort to do so now seems to be in full motion.

The advent of this finally began to occur with the advent of the concept of cross-play. We have taken if for granted for a long time that while we may be part of a fan base for game or series much larger than the player count of just those experiencing it on the same console we own, we can’t share in enjoyment of it with that larger community. Imagine, it was presented to us, those arbitrary barriers were now gone. Each fan could play with every single other fan of something they love, with community surrounding a game or series being built more within the actual games rather than without. It’s an extremely seductive concept, the seduction not due to any particular way the idea is presented, but simply intrinsic to the nature of the idea itself.

Making the prospect all the more tantalizing was it being pointed out that it wasn’t a goal that needed to be worked for...the opportunity is already here. The backend networking for multiplayer or co-op between different hardware presents its challenges and necessary effort, but is entirely doable. Developers can make it happen and want to. Gamers, in one of the few cases of near universal agreement they’ve had, want it to happen, too. It remains only for those behind the different console brands to want to. The deciding factor preventing us from having a more connected and happier gaming community is no technical challenge: it is a simple act of will.

Unfortunately, immediate consensus wasn’t to be, as Sony showed initial reluctance to the idea. The reasoning presented only served to exacerbate the general frustration at not making universal cross-play a reality: Sony was concerned about maintaining the integrity of the online experience of their brand. This explanation rang hollow to most, however. Microsoft has long been lauded for having the most solid and consistent online experience, though Sony has certainly improved dramatically in relation to their own, so the idea that connection to their service would be a liability rather than at least a non-concern and at most an asset even came across as fundamentally nonsensical.

This being an issue was also compounded by a series of well-publicized hacks of the PlayStation Network that have occurred in the past; while Xbox Live has seen its on issues, the number and severity of the attacks in Playstation’s case create greater alarm. With this being the case, it would seem if anyone had cause to be concerned about connecting themselves to another, it would be on the part of Microsoft and Nintendo toward Sony, not the other way around. For it to be the other way around in spite of this felt like petty standoffishness stemming from the old days of the console wars rather than having any basis in reality or the interests of gamers...including PlayStation fans.

That is one final point that rested against Sony’s philosophy of resistance, perhaps the strongest and arguably the only point that mattered: Sony’s own fans supported the change. It stands to reason there’s an impetus to make fans of the brand satisfied, so when the majority themselves are calling for that change, is it not worth considering its merits seriously rather than dismissing it out of hand? Add in the incident of the temporary cross-play enabling for Destiny, and the intensity of seeing that feature become a new norm in the industry became all the stronger.

While Sony was making their decision, we saw the beginning of a broader change toward cross-play support anyway. Fortnite, Minecraft and Rocket League presented three of the more noteworthy examples of the cross-play concept manifesting as a reality, given the runaway popularity of those titles, but numerous other examples sprang up as well. Minecraft’s case was a particularly interesting one in that it saw the achievement of a different milestone, with Nintendo and Microsoft co-backing the production of an ad about their two consoles being able to work together. I’m not ashamed to admit watching that ad made me a bit emotional. I don’t even play Minecraft myself, but what it represented - about the gaming community coming together more - is really powerful to my mind and extremely encouraging as a gamer who always wants to see the industry get better not just in what it makes for us to play, but in the ideals it represents and promotes.

Flash forward a bit, and we have the VGA’s mentioned at the start and a welcome change of tune from Sony, symbolically represented in the VGA presentation but more literally represented in a number of stories about them getting on board with the idea and even being in direct talks with Microsoft in relation to future ventures. Meanwhile, Microsoft has expressed an interest in expanding access to games that have traditionally been an Xbox experience beyond that console itself. They have candidly expressed their interest in making all future games of theirs available for PC simultaneously, which is certainly well within the realm of theoretical possibility given Microsoft’s ownership of the Windows OS most computers run on. And yet...even this isn’t the limit of where they’ve expressed interest in having their titles reach. Just recently, they’ve elaborated on this philosophy of expansion by emphasizing there is a more vested interest in people playing their games than in playing on the Xbox console specifically. For example, that interest goes so far as that they’ve expressed interest in bringing Halo: The Master Chief Collection to PlayStation.

This is, in many ways, the best example of this industry-wide change in philosophy I’ve been discussing. I’ll admit, in the spirit of full disclosure, to being a long-time and avid Halo fan, but when I make that statement it isn’t about complimenting that franchise or Microsoft. What I am directing attention to is the fact that Halo, which has always been Microsoft’s flagship franchise for Xbox and closely associated with its success, is something they are willing to pass access to to players on their competitors’ console. This idea was so beyond inconceivable during that period not long ago I alluded to, that if you had presented the idea as a serious possibility, you’d have been considered an idiot, or insane. But now, it’s an idea that’s had interest expressed by Microsoft at the executive level.

Those players on PlayStation are the key factor of note here, though. It isn’t about Microsoft and Sony becoming best friends, though they seem to be getting along better all the time, which is sure to be a boon for gamers in the future in as yet unknown ways. It is about simply letting players play the games they want. Gaming, like so many pastimes, can be an expensive one, and locking gamers out of access to numerous quality experiences deserving of being explored by all because they can’t reasonably justify - or literally can’t afford - the price tag of another console needed to access those experiences is a shame, and antithetical to the spirit of connectedness and community the gaming culture, at its best, strives to be about.

Destroying these arbitrary and artificial barriers and instead working collaboratively on ways to bring the global gaming community ever closer together, as a family, is the rightful course toward which the industry should be directing itself. And, who knows...maybe in the process of fostering this spirit of inclusion, the game industry can get some of that positive spirit to rub off on those who play games and get them in turn to be more inclusive of others in the world outside of the games. And the world beyond gaming isn’t so different from the world of gaming in that one respect: both are much richer for getting others in on our fun.

So keep it up, video game industry. We all came to play after all, so let’s ALL play. Cheers.

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comments-on-kai · 6 years ago

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[YouTube] Jongin's viral TEMPO showcase fancam hits 600K views

EXO KAI's fancam is a sensation among knetz; receiving rave reviews & praises for his outstanding stage & keeps impressing Muggles+ Non-fans; gaining even older male fans upon their new discovery + viewers keeps coming back for re-watch with the "1Day1Kai" syndrome

181102 EXO COMEBACK SHOWCASE - Tempo KAI (2 Angles Mixed) by Mr.Destiny

- On Facebook this video is Daebak among Muggles! I think the video on FB has like 490,000 views so if the views for FB and Youtube are combined it's already more than 1 million viewsㄷㄷㄷ If a genius works hard and even enjoys what he is doing the outcome is this incredible result everybody is praising him

- I only know the name "Kai" and his face but I'm so shocked after watching this video. Wow...it's as if he was possessed by a real God of Dance of the Universe...

- This is is not an Idol...isn't he an Artist;;

- Even from a 31-years old ahjussi point of view he is fvcking cool and his charms are amazing. If even I am like this, let alone the people of various age and gender

- The harmony between Kai's body and strength is so good...it's the best. He's not the main dancer for no reason

- Not even a fan but I feel like faintingㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ seriously how are the fans doingㅜㅜ how could such an amazing creature even exist

- I'm not an EXO-L but this appeared in the suggested video so I came to watch it and I'm in shock...this is Daebak.. the quality of the video and Kai's dancing is no joke

- I only know the name "EXO" and have no idea of who are the members and had no interest in them. Recently I really liked the song Tempo and searched for it and came to this point. But honestly this doesn't even make any sense..Of course the other members are all handsome and good at dancing, but Kai's visual, dance, his facial acting, his command of the stage...those are almost at National Treasure level??? I'm so very taken aback at the fact that there is a figure like him among currently active Idols...Of course he shines as a member of EXO but I think he could hit Daebak if he has separate promotions as a Solo

- As I am a guy with zero interest in male idols, I never thought I'd keep coming back to watch a male idol's fancam. How could someone dance with so much flavor? The dance itself is really awesome but in the meantime the facial expressions that was shown is also quite addictive..I have no idea of the other EXO members but as far as Kai goes I will definitely remember him even in the future

- Kai will become the meaning of "more than just an Idol"...although he already is wow it's crazy seriously overwhelming all the dance movements and expressions..Kai the perfect piece of art

- Wow honestly this has the qualities of an American advancement

- This is SO GOOD I've never seen a fancam like this my whole life..

- I'm here again I have to watch this 10 times a day

- Is Kai's smile insured...? If it's not please insure it right now and don't regret later...

- I'm a Muggle but this is crazy ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ his skills are one thing but his talent is unlike a regular human being it's like he's a monster ... not human

- 1 Day 1 Kai (T/n: an expression to describe watching the fancam at least once per day)

- I'm here again to watch this... this is seriously THE legend of legendary male idol fancams world ---->(Reply): EXO's turning even me into gay

- Wow seriously Kai dances as if his life depended on it and he jumps around so vividly on stage...seriously his expressions and details all of it is crazy

- He is playing around (feeling amusement) beyond the dance and the music, like smoothly flowing water. On Kai, not even one beat or tempo is wasted. An extraordinary state.

- Anyone here again to watch this for today?

- seriously fvcking cool...somewhat a Hollywood feel to him

- This is seriously legendary

- Wow...his dancing is too fvcking good I searched all the Tempo dance covers but Kai's dance is engraved on my brain that everything else sucks. The "listen this will be enough" ddun ddun part his control of strength and facial acting FVCK just too cool and because of the outfit it's like Michael Jackson concept..perfect -->(Reply1) That's definitely a homage to MJ...I can see a few MJ's signature movesㅜㅡㅜ sobs...really crazy..the people who covered Kai's parts are really good but Kai is beyond the fourth wall ㅜㅡㅜ ------>{Reply2) Ah I thought I was the only one who thought of MJ and was thinking "Am I being over the top" but when I scrolled down I wasn'tㅋㅋㅋㅋ from 0:35 I went Oh? ㅋㅋㅋㅋYou can see the moving he did for controlling his strength it's based on MJ and his expressions made it even more so..I knew he's good at dancing but watching him through a fancam kind of video?this is a first time for me seriously he's no joke

- I'm thankful for the fact that I was born in a generation where I can see God's Masterpiece moving

- After watching Kai's fancam, fancam of other idols became just a DanceIdol1 (T/n: like a code name, means OP has no interest in knowing the Idol's name) video that feels common and boring. I can't find any other idol that danced from the beginning to end,with the perfect angle and lines from his head down to his feet as a true dancer would. If we consider perfection to be non-existent than he would be the closest thing to being perfection. Total 10 points for both Technique and Art

- I typed "Tempo" and this video was there so I watched it, he dances so well...no I don't think I could do it justice by saying "he danced well" I'm so surprised that there is a dancer like this coming out from idols. It's to the point that the thought of he is the best dancer among idols entered my mind

- Kai!!! This is beyond being cool,should I say it's Phenomenal? This young man is amazing how much effort did he put in...This person is the real deal

- He's similar to that statue in the Greek Temple..the concept this time is really Daebakㅠㅠ

- How is he THIS good...I'm shocked

- I never write comments when I watch but this is Daebak

- His physique is very beautiful

- I'm here to watch this again today..I've been getting my stamps (of attendance) for one whole week now. Kai-ssi you dance so amazingly

- I know he's good at dancing but rather than an idol's choreography it's like watching a modern dance piece

- I want Kai to go on a program that can show more of his dancing and be even more successful ㅠ ---->(Reply) I share the same opinion. Whether in the US or wherever Kai should be shown off more. It is such a waste of his talent (if that isn't done). I have only seen his dance for 1 week and already I have this kind of thought, I think it's even more for EXO fans right? ------->(Reply2) I really hope Kai could be exported worldwide too

- Ah I received such a SHOCK...let's designate Kai as a National Treasure

- Kai's dance seriously slays with the awesomeness I'm not even a fan but I keep looking this up...so cool

- Kai-nim today I'm reporting for duty again here...the song Tempo is so good and I'll keep reporting myself here every day until this fancam hits 1 million views

- Wow....this is simply.. art

- This is my first time seeing Kai dance...this is beyond dancing dilligently, it's because he is enjoying himself while dancing that makes him so much more natural, and with his own unique interpretation of the song, he could carefreely dances the part that he wants to be carefree while powerfully dances the parts that he wants to dance powerfully and it seems like through this he is making the song his own. Could tell how much he's enjoying himself through his expressions.

- The thing with Kim Jongin's dance is despite the intensity of the dance you can still feel his restraint and gracefulness. It's difference than randomly dancing on the streets and this is why critics of popular culture can't help but to acknowledge him

- his face is half-covered but his handsomeness could be felt just from his jaw also his expressions of enjoying the stage...I love itㅜ

- Wow... can't take my eyes off him...so very outstanding and superior...really...!

- No..what the heck is this...it's at the level where no words are needed this is not idol dance it's like artㄷㄷ

- Cra...zy...wow...my eyes are opened to a brand new world

- There might be people who never watched this for even once, but there will never be people who could watch this only once after they've watched it ㅠㅜㅠㅡㅠ I'm reporting for duty once again today

- A drug-like video

- SM you have someone of Jongin's caliber show us more of his dance!!! what are you doing ! give us the contents!

- Wow. At first the smirks are melting at then towards the middle the part he wasn't smiling ..seriously could feel his force of being focused on the dance and the music...I'm from another fandom but I keep coming here to watch this ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

- he's shooting a Musical all by himself,,, I'm speechless about his dancing lines,, seriously the details of his expressions are amazing,,it's too wow,, it's the level where you should pay money to watch this

- I have a different person as my bias but I just can't take my eyes off him in this video. He is really...the Real deal.

- I came here and he cuts me with his dancing lines... seriously how could he dance like that...too good at dancingㅠㅠ

- Wow what did I just see...I think he's best dancer I've ever seen...he's dancing that well but his face is so handsome and his body is good tooㅠ Isn't that unfair....

- seriously how hard did he work and practice in his own field. I had no idea I would look at a dance video and self-reflected on myself..ㅜ

-???? Are the stans still alive??? I'm not even into EXO and I'm like..dying seriously he's too sexy it's crazy

- They say if the word "sexy" transformed into human form it's EXO Kai..this is daebak

- Ah seriously he's in another class of his own...I'm going crazy

- Definitely the top among all idols I've seen. From the control of strength in his dancing to his facial expressions. Wow

- Can't help but moaned at the ending poseㅎㅎ His physique (thumbs up)

- Amazing...so cool..watching Jongin's fancams means the world to me his expressiveness and his facial expressions, there are no empty portions I don't know where to take a breath ㅠㅁㅠ really makes me want to scream "thank you for dancing"..

- he is totally in a different genre

- he captured art in his dancing

- Everybody knows he's a great dancer but how should I say this, seeing his happiness on stage makes even me feel happy? He is the very person who made someone like me who loves singing a lot realized how attractive a dance could be.

- Kai is a dance genius his overall control and expressions are daebak...;; everything from his head to his feet are moving it's incredible

- Ya...so this is talent! the dancing is art

- I have fallen for Kai

- Even from a man's point of view he's really cool

- Whoa... he dances in such a great way. first off the expressions are already different. wow.

- Wow (for me) as a man Kai is really cool it’s worthy to do a Cover (of this)

- How could every movement that came from his body looks so cool... as expected he dances the best among all the idols I've seen so far...it's not just the typical kind of "good dancing" he's somewhat different

- How many times have I watched this.........

- I could see he's enjoying himself while dancing...he looks happy

- so he's the type to feel the dance while enjoying it. This is the first time I look at a younger man and think that he's cool

- check out his dancing lines I'm reminded of Michael Jackson

- there's a huge joy in watching Kai's dance in nano-scale... his hand gestures, body movement and facial expressions...it makes time passes by so quickly while watching a 3-minute song(performance) that I don't feel bored

- Fvck his expressions are real solid...I felt Michael Jackson's vibesㄷㄷㄷ

- "There are a lot of people who dances but nobody dances like Kai" I really agree with these words a thousand hundred times

- I saw you for 1 second in the mixed-stage edit and came searching for this...wow I thought you danced really well but I had no idea I would fall for you in 1 second you are really sexyㅋㅋㅋ

- Fvck me...seriously this is a real person? Seriously I could empty my soul and life for this

- his facial acting is crazy seriously...is he a genius I keep coming for this I can't even praise his dancing anymore

- Okay so at this timing..how about releasing a solo...

- I'm not the type to comment (on Youtube) but this is a video with a magical spell. I would like to thank the person who took this video.

- as long as I have lived I've never been a fan of a singer ... is this what people say becoming a stan?

- Ah fvck I'm a BT* fan I think I'm gonna stan EXO ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ truly going crazy ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ fvck this doesnt make any sense but I think I'm gonna be a stan no I think I already am

- Personally I think he dances even better than Rain. I think when Kai comes out as a Solo it's gonna be no joke. He has the feels of Rain+Seven combined (T/n: Rain and Seven are two of South Korea's most loved male Dance Singers in mid-2000s era)

- not saying this simply because I'm a fan but I think his dancing is even more incredible because this is a dance of someone who spent 10,000 hours in his effort. He takes meticulous care for even one simple angle and you need more than talent to do that and Kai has now debuted for 7-8 years yet he could still accomplish that ㄷㄷ I think I know now how passionate he is about dancing

- His dance and facial expressions are fvcking incredible..seriously I do not compare just any dancer to this man but like what the person above mentioned, I saw a bit of Michael Jackson in him plus his outfit and the hat is seriously a miracle move;;

- really I'm not a fan (of EXO) but he's fvcking goodㄷㄷ

- Oh he kinda have the Yoo JunSun Choreographer-nim vibes both of them are really so cool ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ(T/n: Junsun Yoo of famed 1MILLION Dance Studio)

- Wow I had no idea he could dance this well...this is Daebak

-Ohmygod... the moment I saw this I'm reminded of Michael Jackson he's so amazing

- I'm just a Muggle passing by...please save me,,

- The representative of Michael Jackson's Kids who grew up well. The best in the history of South Korea's performers

- Watching Kai's stages, his expressions and overall control of the dance changes depending on the atmosphere of the stage. And for Tempo stage, Kai's expression at the stage for music shows and Kai's expression for the Tempo performance during showcase is different. It makes me think that he's a person who understand the circumstances and songs very well...he's more experienced and seasoned than his 7 years

- This is not a broadcasting station camera but personal fancam??? I'm so shocked at the dancing but what is this camerawork??

- Kai is seriously unrivalled

- Seriously he's the type who dances in the most ludicrous way...like every joint in his body is working organically, each and every part of his body is dancingㅠㅠㅠ his expressiveness is incredible and I think the Korean stage is too small for himㅠㅠ

- Really a dance that can't be described with words...no I think this is the first time I'm completely gobmacked just by watching a dance

- Is this the legendary fancam where even fans from other fandoms come to watch everyday?

- I'm fainting. The best among Idols. Too beautiful.

- This is crazy. Even from a man's point of view he's very sexy. I had no idea he's to the level that had me constantly overlapping him with Michael Jackson. Are you not going to release a solo!(T/n: this was written in formal speech...like respectfully lol)

- You can see how much he is enjoying himself on the stage and he doesn't do things lightly he always gives his all. Kai is forever the center of EXO nobody could argue with that

- I was going to see Kyungsoo but when I see Kai..Heok! This is the first time I've ever fallen for a male idol's dance..so sexy

- The way idols dance changed a lot before and after the appearance of Kai; especially after Kai appeared there were many dance idols who danced with that possessed scientist(?) vibes but Kai is really that sensational, you know just by looking at this fancam

- what is this...it's a level that doesnt need any words it's not Idol's dance but like a piece of artㄷㄷ.....

- he's so good,,,, watched this and kept thinking of the singer Rain during the height of his career and also Sevenㄷㄷㄷ if only Kai could come out as a Solo... I think he could be a male dancer singer that's worthy of anticipation after a long time

- his dancing is amazing but when he takes off the hat I was shocked at his handsomeness

- It's phenomenal I always feel this when I watch Kai dance but there is nothing lacking in either his dance or facial expressions it's like he was born to be an entertainer. He has this special thing that's incomparable to anyone else. Isn't it that specialty his key in successfully still pulling the public in even for a long run?

- I'm reminded of Michael Jackson...just that kind dignity of the dance and the feel of the dance

- to simply say that he dances well is very lacking... his dancing is TREMENDOUS his level is beyond that of an Idol

- This is a Kai-stanning entry video that surpassed The Eve fancam he's like the Devil and also an Angel

- Wow I keep coming here to watch this ㅋㅋ when watching it time passes by real quickly ㅋㅋㅋㅋ his expressions are sexy and because he's enjoying himself as he danced it makes him looks so much cooler. I think I know the reason why EXO is the best. It's because even after they reached the top, they're still presenting the perfect stage

- his strong pelvic bounce and the cute smiles in between, his sexy chest muscleㅠㅠㅠㅠㅜㅜ it's crazy he's so sexy why is his body so good,,, I see nothing but Kai

- Personally, the singer who I think has a very cool dancing line and dance so well to the point it made me think "this is how a dance should be done" was Uknow Yunho, seems like Kai quite formidable too...the feeling is like he is personally showing "this is how Tempo should be danced"

- Really to say that Kai dances the best among idols won't be an exaggeration...his dancing line is so beautiful

- His dance made my heart beat faster....the reason for the saying "Kai is God" is clearly verified in this video..Wow daebak WHAT IS THIS PERSON

- I think I've watched this 50 times just for today..at first I didn't like the song but after watching this video I liked it...he's so good at dancing it makes me keep watching

- I think it has been such a long time since I thought a male idol looks so cool..Awesome

- The fact that there are still so many people freshly shocked at Kai's dance...everybody as expected this is Kai~~

- His dancing is shocking...I don't think he's human

- The fact that he's good at dancing comes second, even his facial expressions are perfect;;

- Kai's dance is really amazing his facial acting is excellent and he knows how to enjoy dancing and is full of that feeling

- His completely free changing expressions from 0:43 - 0:48 ...God-given body movements and facial expressions

- Wow..I'm from another fandom and I know Kai is a good dancer but I had no idea it is to this level...It's like he's saying "Yo this is what a dance is!"... he's amazingㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ

- the kind of dance that SM wants...the ultimate feel..by having the eyes covered that's already half-giving up on expressing things through facial expressions and yet by looking at the comments, compliments of "his facial acting is daebak, his vibe is good" are hanging on it. This is (why he's) Kai.

- Seriously I had zero interest in EXO and don't even know their names ... and somehow I ended up seeing this,,,, I love you Kai

- I have heard of EXO Kai's name and have seen him once in a drama... but he was actually EXO's main dancer?ㄷㄷ he's a fvking good dancer...damn cool..whoever it was who made him wear that intricate outfit you shall be blessed.. at the end what's up with taking off the hat like that...seriously my heart was almost attacked wow... ------>(2 hours later) Ah I'm getting so angry? Why do I only know of him now... EXO debuted a fvcking long time ago what was I doing ㅋㅋㅋㅋ I totally had no interest in EXO ah I'm so mad ㅋㅋㅋㅋ ㅋㅋㅋㅋ seriously he's so cool it's crazy sdjhkfjls;

- So kids this is why y'all go so crazy for EXO huh? Just by chance I watched Music Bank after so many years to check out who are the recent singers of today and I saw Kai with his lunatic expressions on stage and I searched for this. Ha. I need to find more of his other stuffs. ----> Reply(same person who was angry about discovering Kai so late): That's what I'm saying yo kids seriouslyㅋㅋㅋㅋ so this is why you kids kept going around saying EXO EXO to death...I should have listened more attentively...I should've known sooner I'm pathe..

- the seriously fantastic thing about Kai is (the fact that) he IS the center of EXO

- he's fvcking fvcking good at dancing but even the face that was revealed at the end when the hat was taken off is perfect;;;

- I am a BIGBANG fan but honestly this is awesome

- If Kai releases a solo it will be daebak...also kinda similar to Taemin but anyways it's like Kai alone is playing on stage

- Just looking at his lips and I could feel his handsomeness and sexiness

- I had no idea I would feel so touched just by watching an Idol singer's dancing video...I know now why people are always saying Kai this and Kai that- I don't even like Idols but I'm doing this as 3 viewings per day. I have no words except you're the best

#kai #exo kai #jongin #tempo #exo tempo #don't mess up my tempo #kai fancam #commentsonKAI

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yasbxxgie · 6 years ago

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How One Man Is Using Hip-Hop to Diversify Architecture Armed with a master’s degree in architecture, decades of hip-hop fandom and rapper teachers, Mike Ford is quickly getting kids into building

On a recent Thursday, Grand Wizzard Theodore was busy DJing in his home borough of the Bronx. Theodore is widely acknowledged as the man who invented turntable scratching, so his presence behind the decks was not unusual. The venue, however, was unexpected: The Cornerstone Academy for Social Action – a middle school, where Theodore’s selections were soundtracking furious Lego-building.

While Theodore cued up hits, Mike Ford, founder and leader of Hip-Hop Architecture Camp, was guiding a group of sixth, seventh and eighth graders as they assembled Lego models based on rap lyrics. Students gathered around the table where one of their peers was working with lines from Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five’s “The Message:” “Broken glass everywhere/ People pissin’ on the stairs, you know they just don’t care/ I can’t take the smell, can’t take the noise/ Got no money to move out, I guess I got no choice.”

This student created a literal representation of the song’s image: a staircase, a sprinkle of green pieces for “broken glass everywhere” and scattered yellow pieces for “people pissin’ on the stairs.” “Good start,” said Ford. But he gently pushed the student towards a more constructive response to “The Message.” “Could there be a building made from all the broken glass?” Ford wondered. “Let’s start to think about how we can make it so that nobody has to say those words in their song again.”

Ford sees his teaching as a way to counter the troubled history of urban planning in America. “We’ve decimated cities that were built by the hands of African Americans – like Black Bottom in Detroit, or here in the Bronx, when they built the Cross Bronx Expressway through a community of color,” he says. “Those decisions are made by people outside of those communities. There are a limited amount of people at the table to advocate for our communities.”

Hip-h[H]op Architecture Camp attempts to correct that representational imbalance, using rap as a hook to introduce young minority students to a field they may not otherwise encounter. “I have been on this planet for several decades, and I have moved in some pretty radical circles, but personally, I cannot recall meeting a melanated architect in my whole life,” says Chino XL, a veteran rapper who attended the camp in the Bronx. “Just for these children to know it’s a thing, that’s important.”

“I’m letting kids know we have a history of building spaces and places,” Ford adds.

For more than a year, Ford, a longtime hip-hop fan with a master’s degree in architecture, has led sessions like this around the country. (Ford has planned nearly 20 sessions nationwide this year.) The idea for the camp came from a simple insight made while Ford was in graduate school at the University of Detroit: “Less than three percent of architects in America are African American,” he explains. “We’ve spent a ton of money trying to diversity the profession, but it’s always from the same perspective: Come learn this western culture. Come learn about the Greeks and the Romans. It’s not making it relevant.” The tendency to emphasize the importance of certain models – Greek but not Egyptian, for example – means “we’ve experienced the world through a limited lens,” Ford says.

He is also interested in the aesthetic connections between hip-hop and architecture. “Music is saturated with references to architecture,” Ford says. “Not just critiquing your environment, but in the songs, [rappers] express what they wish architecture was. KRS-One talks about hip-hop artists buying property to build a hip-hop city.”

It’s not a coincidence for Ford that Kanye West recently expressed interest in architecture and community planning “for like the third time.” (“He also said a lot of other stuff that I don’t agree with,” Ford notes.) Ice Cube studied architecture before co-founding N.W.A, and Pharrell Williams included discussions of architecture in his 2012 book Places and Spaces I’ve Been.

Ford aimed to strengthen the relationship between the hip-hop and architecture communities with a summit he organized earlier this year. Architects attended the event along with the lyricists Chino XL, Lupe Fiasco and Nikki Jean. “They talked about city skylines, if they can write bars that fit within those lines to see how each city sounds,” Ford says. “Is there a hidden sonic experience within these environments?”

Anyone who can tell the difference between Golden Age New York hip-hop and Los Angeles gangster rap knows intuitively that there are connections between music and place. Then the question becomes, if space impacts rap, what happens when you change the space? “How do we make architecture so that people stop saying, ‘I want to hear another track like “The Message”‘?” Ford says. “I want to stop the cycle, and stop the environment that’s influencing some of these songs that are very challenging.”

During the five-day program held in New York in May, students used rap lyrics as a basis for Lego models, practice working with the three-dimensional design program Tinkercad, hone their own rap verses, often with help from professional MCs, and create a music video. Autodesk, the company behind Tinkercad, provides the software to Ford for free and helps fund the camps. “When you meet Mike and you hear what he’s doing, you can’t help but want to be involved,” Sarah O’Rourke, Autodesk’s youth audience strategist, tells Rolling Stone. “We’re looking to inspire kids, and what better way to do it than with music they’re already involved with?”

The Bronx students hunted for architectural connections in “The Message,” Nas’ “I Can” and Childish Gambino’s “This Is America.” They were focused, only breaking from their modeling efforts to perform an impromptu line-dance to Migos and Drake’s “Walk It Talk It” or to lobby the DJ: a sixth grader named Dirk politely asked Grand Wizzard Theodore to play a song from the rising Brooklyn rapper 6ix9ine. Theodore had misgivings about the track – “a lot of negativity in that record; our kids need better role models” – but he cued it up anyway.

Theodore started visiting schools in 2002 with his Scratch Academy before connecting with Ford’s architecture camp. “To be able to go to school and have some people talk to me about my life, I didn’t have anything like this,” he said. “I grew up in abandoned buildings, fires all over the place, people smokin’ dope and nodding in the corners. I want to be able to turn on the TV and see a kid from the Bronx – that grew up the same way I grew up – building buildings.”

Both Theodore and Ford hope that more hip-hop artists will participate in future Hip-Hop Architecture Camp sessions, raising the program’s profile and expanding its reach. “The artists that have the biggest voice – that these kids see on TV every day that they play their records on the radio every six minutes – those are the artists that should be doing these programs,” Theodore says.

“We need to have youth hear it right from the artist,” Ford adds. “[Artists] have been influenced by the environment. I want to give them the opportunity, in turn, to influence their environment.”

In addition to enlisting more rappers to participate in his camps, Ford ultimately hopes to train others to lead sessions so they can take place in multiple cities at once. “It’s cool to have Mike Ford going to every city,” Ford says. “But I ended my TED talk with, I want to create an army of architects that can right the wrongs of modernism in communities of color. It’s about the dissemination of this curriculum to as many people as possible.”

For now, Ford’s army remains small, but it’s growing. Chino XL’s visit to the Cornerstone Academy marked his first time participating in the camp. “I was overwhelmed at how many kids signed up for it on a Saturday and Sunday, and how completely focused they were on what the goal and the initiative was,” the rapper said.

Ford called his work “making advocates,” and many of his students in the Bronx quickly grasped his mission. Toward the end of the first day, Dirk, the sixth grader, presented a model he built based on a line from Slick Rick’s “Children’s Story”: “When laws were stern and justice stood.”

“When [Slick Rick] said, ‘when laws were stern … ,” I don’t really think that resonated with me,” Dirk told the class. “Now we’ve got a lot of people being arrested for no exact reason – like Kalief Browder, who the sixth grade is learning about now, who committed suicide because he went to Riker’s Island for three years for a crime he did not commit. He was given the opportunity to plead guilty, but he never did because he knew he didn’t do it.”

Dirk was imagining an alternative outcome. “This police station is supposed to represent a better future,” he said, “without false accusations.”

This episode drove home Ford’s words from earlier in the day. “These kids can have an immediate impact,” he asserted. “And they can create architecture we have not seen before.” [h/t]

Photograph:

The rapper Chino XL teaching students at Hip-Hop Architecture Camp (top)

#architecture #mike ford #hip-hop architecture camp #hip hop architecture camp #chino xl #education #music #black music #grand wizzard theodore #making advocates #slick rick #children’s story #when laws were stern and justice stood #kalief browder #rolling stone magazine #hip-hop #hip hop #black business #black businesses

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blessuswithblogs · 7 years ago

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The Forest, Subnautica, and Survival: The Wages of Building a Cool Tree Fort

Spoiler Warning for both games as the article goes on! Do exercise caution.

I love survival games. That's just kind of a part of how my taste in games has developed over the years. I adore Minecraft, Terraria, Starbound and any number of creatively inclined "build and explore" games. I could think of a couple of reasons for this, the most prominent being that this kind of game is extremely good at making incremental progress feel rewarding, and that I've always had a fascination with habitation in extreme environments like the deep sea, space, and Magical Block Land where the Cacti Explode. Lately, I've been playing an streaming both Subnautica and The Forest, two games that belong in a sort of subset of the genre: Survive and Escape.

Both games start out with a cataclysmic (space)plane crash that deposits you and a number of other doomed survivors in a hostile world that wants to eat you. With Subnautica, you crashland on planet 4546B, an ocean world in which something has gone terribly wrong with the ecosystem. The Forest instead pops you out on a vaguely Canadian peninsula out in the middle of nowhere and cannibals kidnapped your son. Subnautica, as it is in most respects, has the more solid premise of the two. The Forest can scratch a kind of The Hills Have Eyes itch if you have one, but the overall setup of the game is sssssslightly too racially charged for my tastes.

In deference to alphabetical order, let's discuss the Forest first. Of the two games, it has the more robust crafting system. While it has overall less moving parts than Subnautica, you can still build a cool houseboat and you have a great deal of freedom in the overall shape and function of your buildings. In fact, that's originally what sold me on the game - I found the idea of having to build a base not only capable of sustaining you but also withstanding attacks from monsters to be very appealing. Base building can take a long time on your own (2 player co-op is a definite point in favor of the Forest versus Subnautica if you're one of those people that has to quantify the better game) but there are some things that can speed it along and make you feel like a regular Swiss Family Robinson - with all of the cultural baggage that entails. Completing a fort and finally creating a safe haven from the mutant hordes is a rewarding feeling, but it is one that the game almost immediately undermines.

The Forest is a game working at cross purposes with itself. It gives you the tools to create elaborate custom buildings or entire complexes if you so choose to do so, but there is also The Narrative, and The Narrative is most insistent on Finding Timmy. Timmy, your son from the beginning of the game, is assumed to be the player's top priority, but in actuality it's really easy to just forget about him. The game gives you a checklist of things to do as a sort of compromise between total freedom and a more linear experience. Most of the items on this list are some variation of "explore this cave". Cave Exploration is kind of where The Forest fragments into two separate halves: the crafty buildy survivey game, and a different sort of first person metroid slash cannibal murder simulator. The minute you enter a cave you basically go completely blind and have to rely on a variety of deeply inadequate light sources just to fumble your way around. The gameplay loop is simple - go into a cave, kill all the mutants, find a point of interest, go as far as you can until you find an impassible barrier, then retreat back to the surface. The points of interest are often interesting, to their credit, vaguely telling a story about A Deep Secret Beneath the Peninsula as you find various photographs and torn magazine clippings to gawk at for a few seconds, but it is impossible to shake the feeling that these spelunking expeditions have nothing to actually do with any of the other things you've been doing. You can find a number of useful objects in the caves - a flashlight, a map, a compass, a fine piece of hanzo steel - that will make your life easier, but are primarily designed to let you go into the caves Better and Deadlier.

Here's where we get to this stark divide: you don't actually have to make a base in the first place. All of the fantastic tools The Forest gives you to make your own log cabin city are, beyond Basic Fire and Temporary Shelter, utterly superfluous to actually progressing in the game. The weird thing about the caves is that they are actually borderline overflowing with supplies. The Forest has you spend your first couple of hours thinking that you're gonna really to have to grapple with the land in a titanic struggle for survival but actually you can just go into a cave and find like six respawning boxes of Fun Drink! soda and Snack brand snacks which work just as well if not better than like. Hunting for food and purifying your own water. Sleeping is entirely optional, too, something that becomes readily apparent down in the caves where it's always pitch black regardless of the day night cycle. You can easily manage just by building the occasional temporary shelter to save your game or just find one of the many tents already in the game world. There's a whole complex system of substats and sanity meters that you can basically just ignore as you go careening through the depths.

Progress in the caves is gated by two things: environmental obstacles, and enemy mutants. You will occasionally find a novel map feature like a climbable wall or an underwater pool too deep and dark to go swimming through without some help that will keep you from moving forward. You can blow up walls occasionally too, but not often or clearly indicated enough to make that feel like a genuinely well implemented system. To overcome these obstacles, all you have to do is find the right items - the climbing axe and the rebreather will let you go basically anywhere, once you get your hands on them. The world of The Forest is big, and it plays a dirty trick on you - most of the stuff aboveground is useless bullshit for idiots. Basically everything you want or need is down below, and if it takes you a while to realize that, I imagine that it would be pretty frustrating to feel like you had basically accomplished nothing for the last however many hours of exploring the lush but ultimately very empty forest floor.

Speaking of the game playing dirty tricks on you, there is one more instance of needing an item to get to where you need to go. But instead of some neat piece of exploration gear or a Really Big Stick of Dynamite, it's a keycard. The door that requires a keycard is at the bottom of an incredibly long and grueling run through several cave systems that empty out into the bigass sinkhole that dominates the landscape and taunts you with secrets and mysteries from basically day one. The keycard, regrettably, is not nearby. It's halfway across the world hidden in one of the many Super Fucked Up and Scary mass graves the mutants like to keep in their cave systems, requiring either foreknowledge or impressive pixel hunting tendencies to find beforehand. The game gives you a clue where to find it in the form of an old photo - located right before the door itself. It is a slog and a half, to put it bluntly, and since this is a survival game, you're working on a constantly ticking timer of hunger and thirst, and this particular cave system is quite stingy with soda and snacks where the other caves were giving them out like it was an afterschool baseball game. It might have actually been faster to simply reload a save file from before I even attempted the journey and just go get the keycard first, but I didn't think of that at the time. I'm harping on this because it's a huge departure from the fairly natural flow of cave exploration that came before and also a HUGE waste of time. Like, why. Fuck you, that's why.

The endgame sequence is kind of a mess, basically the devs realizing that the game had been in alpha for like literally 3 years and they needed to have some kind of conclusion in place for the full release. While I have no doubt that through the game's development history they had been most diligent about slowly developing and uncovering secrets about what's really going on in The Forest, the actual part where they have to put their money where their mouths are and provide some answers it's just. Kind of. Ehhhhhhhh. Basically you tumble headfirst into a SeCrEt PhArMaCeUtIcAl LaBoRaToRy where they were toying with ancient alien artifacts to create anti-aging cream or some bullshit which, somehow, ended up creating a race of weird mutants without private parts except in certain individuals who have like. ALL of the private parts and probably more besides. The Sahara Labs company even had this fucking supervillain Relic Laser System that shot down passing planes so they could abduct more test subjects away from prying eyes and honestly its like if you want to be that evil and kill people just jacking up the price of insulin is way more efficient and easier on the PR department.

Basically it boils down to you finding Timmy inside some alien bullshit device, dead as fuck, and pantomiming being very distraught about it. However, it comes to light that actually the machine he was hooked up to can bring people back from the dead in exchange for a sacrifice, so you continue deeper into the facility with even more murder than usual on your mind. You eventually find Megan Cross, the girl that Timmy's life force was used to bring back from the dead. Unfortunately, because ancient alien technology never works right, probably by design because ancient aliens are fuckers, Megan mutates into this fucking Resident Evil limbs monster and you have a fucking final boss fight. I aallllmost put the game down there because like. Seriously? Seriously seriously this is what we're doing? I have to use this game's janky ass combat systems to kill an angry little girl monster that can kill you in like 5 seconds if you get within 5 feet? I stuck it out because the devs were kind enough to just kick you back outside the Big Final Boss room with a health and energy penalty whenever you died (which was frequently). Eventually the thing dies and you go rushing back to Timmy with the corpse in hand. But, alas! The machine requires a living subject! After that you just kind of shuffle through some more cave systems with spooky skeletons in them until you find the control tower for the Airplane Killing Laser Beam and you are presented with... a choice.

You can either shoot down a passing airplane to kidnap a viable sample to resurrect Timmy, dooming every single passenger to a gruesome, cannibal related death... or you can just shut the damn thing off, which is really the only reasonable thing to do. Like, who the fuck even is Timmy? I don't know Timmy. Timmy can fuck off. Timmy wants to guilt me for building a gazebo? He can stay dead. It's the Fallout 4 problem all over again - you can't just take it for granted that the player is going to care about someone because you screamed "THIS IS YOUR SON" in the first five minutes of the game and then immediately deprived you of any meaningful interactions with them. It is the unfortunate tendency of parents to believe that their children are things owned by them, brought to the logical extreme. You have no reason to feel particularly compelled to rescue either of these kids aside from the simple fact that they're Yours, whatever that means. So when Shawn is actually the sleazy, amoral director of science fascists, fuck him. When bringing Timmy back to life means putting somebody else through what I just went through, keycard bullshit and all, fuck him! Enough! Time to move on! So I turned off the machine and escaped through some more caves and then I burned my picture of Timmy and got the crafting blueprints to a Timmy effigy made of cloth and sticks which was, admittedly, kind of hilarious. You also get one for your dead wife, which is just labeled "Wife". That was less hilarious and more of another look into the mindset of the people who make these games and why they are a problem. Also you can find another alien obelisk in a boat and open up a door to find a god mode sphere or something but I did not have the patience to go do that.

So I've been down on this game quite a bit, but I actually enjoyed my time with it a lot because what it gets right, it gets very right. Plumbing the dark depths of the cave systems with nothing but a shitty lighter for illumination and an airplane axe for protection, straining your ears for any noises that might break the deafening silence of the underground, constantly scanning the edge of your vision range for the signs of movement in the shifting shadows - it's a fantastic horror experience that a lot of games could learn from. Similarly, the crafting and survival elements, superfluous as they are, are also a lot of fun. You can hunt game for meat and skins, find berries and learn to tell the difference between the poisonous ones and the edible ones, make a bunch of improvised weapons like a fishing spear and a shitty bow and arrow set, build fires to cook food and boil water to make it safe to drink - all of these systems are well thought out and fun to engage with. Like I mentioned earlier, base building is fun and The Forest gives the experience a very down to earth feel by having you chop down trees and transport the timber by hand. You can also build a wide variety of traps and defensive structures, but that brings us to another major sticking point. The Forest wields silence and darkness like an assassin's blade, but falters completely when it comes to actually fighting things.

Combat. Do you ever wish a game didn't have it? I do. A lot. The Forest is one of those games. Fighting the mutants that inhabit the peninsula is as tedious as it is distasteful. It's mostly just a bunch of wild flailing about with an axe or other bladed instrument in the general direction of the enemy. If you're feeling frisky you can use molotovs or poison arrows or even TNT, tactics that become necessary when fighting the game's Creepy Mutants (name not mine i swear). The Creepy Mutants are large, monstrous enemies usually comprised of several individuals fused together. They're big and tough and they have soooo much fucking health god christ ass. You can skin them and use their mutated hides as armor which is pretty metal but fighting them is just not fun. Which is the same for all the other enemies honestly. You just kind of get the enemy into a stunlock and try to finish them off before another mutant puts two and two together and stops running around in circles and actually tries to hit you. Your enemies are hindered by very curious AI and stunlock vulnerability, but to even things out you have to deal with some of the same vulnerabilities, as well as certain lighter related limitations when it comes to explosives and incendiaries that really makes using them a chore.

It feels odd to say this, but The Forest doesn't need its mutants. It's better off without them, to be frank. The dangers inherent in spelunking and surviving in a cold wilderness are more than sufficient to create a sense of vulnerability. Like if you really had to you could just put more crocodiles in the game and make them more aggressive, those fuckers hurt. The story wouldn't even have to change that much - the real movers and shakers of the plot aren't mutants at all. They serve very little purpose except to be the architects of a number of grisly tableaus we've already seen in other games with aspirations of environmental storytelling. There are no toilets in The Forest but if there were, by god would they just be filled to the brim with skulls. There's a severed head in a water cooler at one point. That's in the same spirit. And, of course, there's the elephant in the room: the mutants, as a concept, are deeply racist. Facing down a horde of hooting and hollering brown and black miscreants clad in tribal body paint and loincloths while brandishing various sticks adorned with skulls at you cannot be separated from our bloody colonial past and demonization of native peoples. It's just not happening. This game is about the White Man versus the Savage, whether or not the devs meant it that way. They probably didn't, trying to offer assurances that these aren't actually natives, they're mutant hell cannibals with no dicks. But like. Nah. Not buying it. The mutants will occasionally marshal a big attack on your base or settlement, bringing a big creepy mutant or two with them to try and knock down your shit. What should be one of the game's selling points is marred both by really unfortunate historical imagery and the fact that it's really hard to actually defend anything from getting broken because none of your weapons can actually hit straight down a wall without either lighting them on fire or blowing them up. If they really needed to have an enemy faction in the game, there are five million other angles of mutant they could have gone with - lizard men, tentacle monsters, psychic fuckers, zombies, a Mitch McConnel clone race - but the fact that they went with "tribals" instead of something even moderately less racially charged says a lot.

So that's The Forest! Promising game, fun for the most part, but intrinsically flawed in some very inescapable ways. What about Subnautica? Well, I have good news: Subnautica is much better. It starts the same way, with the spaceship the player is riding on suffering a catastrophic crash landing in an inhospitable world, with most of the other crewmen missing or just dead outright. You start with a life pod fabricator and a sassy corporate issue PDA to point you in the right direction, but aside from that, your only real goal is to survive. Crafting is much more hands off in Subnautica - it's handled almost entirely by way of fabrication stations where you input raw materials and it spits out a finished product in a very scifi way. The way you progress in Subnautica is quite organic: you find a recipe in your databanks you want to build, you go searching for the materials, and in doing so you uncover more of the world. You build an enhanced air tank to stay underwater for longer so you can go deeper and farther. You build a seaglide vehicle to go faster, you build a little underwater seabase to hold your growing collection of rare materials and creature eggs, and so on and so on. Unlike The Forest, where the survival aspects can be basically ignored, learning how to maximize and streamline your food, water, and power production is quite pivotal to getting anywhere.

There are a number of ways that Subnautica arrests your progress, from hostile megafauna to severe radiation leaks to hiding important blueprint fragments behind laser cutter doors. The big one, however, is depth. Appropriate for a game about the sea, I think. At first, depth functions as a barrier of how deep you can go before running out of air - the seas are pretty deep, and after some changes from beta, you can only have so many air tanks equipped at once. Once you learn how to get around that by making some sweet submarines, depth becomes a matter of water pressure. Oxygen is no longer a problem, but crush depth certainly is - take your seamoth below 200 meters and you start to have problems real quick. This necessitates a search for ways to better withstand the pressure. Subnautica is a masterclass in making incremental progress feel rewarding. Instead of having your numbers go up slightly, you get extremely tangible benefits from the various gear upgrades you create or find in the world. The Seamoth is both extremely fast and convenient for getting around and your only practical way to bring an oxygen generator with you, and installing a depth module just increases your freedom and utility that much more. Finally putting a Cyclops together is actually just building an almost self-sufficient mobile base. Even something as mundane as learning how to make a planter represents a big boost to your food production and can expand your operational range by a great deal.

Subnautica is a game that delights in its own world. The vibrant underwater ecosystems you explore and uncover range from beautiful to the slightly terrifying, but there is a genuine love of nature - even scary nature - evident in Subnautica that's infectious. Subnautica does not really have combat, as such. You have a survival knife and a couple of space age tools like the Stasis Cannon which you can use to defend yourself in a pinch, but there is no mutant menace to contend with on 4546B. Hungry Reaper Leviathans and Crabsquids, maybe, but wild animals are wild animals. No moral judgment is cast upon the Stalker's tendency to try and take a bite out of your ass. In fact, you can learn to pacify and even play with them by bringing them fish to eat or scrap metal to sink their teeth into. There is only one entity on the planet that is actively and determinedly hostile to the player, and it's a real fucker, but there's a good reason for it.

The reason for your unexpected visit to the ocean planet is revealed to be the work of a planetary quarantine system installed by Ancient Aliens (again) a long time ago to prevent the spread of a particularly virulent and deadly variety of bacteria. You gradually find evidence of the Kharaa bacteria and the involvement of a precursor civilization as you explore: certain fauna will be covered in green pustules, the PDA will inform you of the presence of infectious agents in the water and how some biomes are curiously lacking in biodiversity, and you'll occasionally find vents and structures of an obviously alien design. A refreshing thing about Subnautica's Ancient Aliens is that they aren't depicted as magic space gods. They have advanced technology compared to that of Earth's, but ultimately they were just some dudes who got caught on the wrong side of a very nasty bacterial plague and didn't quite figure out how to cure it in time. At this point, you have two goals: get rid of the infection, and find some way to disable the giant quarantine laser gun and get off the planet. Finding a cure for the kharaa bacteria requires going deep into the depths with a heavily armored PRAWN suit designed to withstand crushing water pressure and even the most angry and enormous of predators, where you can find a number of alien facilities using the abundant geothermal energy of the planet's magma layer. Finding a way off world involves putting on a radiation suit and exploring the wreck of the Aurora to both fix the catastrophic radiation leak and to get in contact with the home office, who in between ordering ham and cheese sandwiches are gracious enough to send you the blueprints for your very own interplanetary rocket ship.

Throughout all of this, you'll get intermittent distress calls on your radio giving you the coordinates to various points of interest like other lifepods and bits of the Aurora that were unceremoniously scattered to the four winds upon impact. You can also find evidence of people who came to this planet before you and learn their story from PDA logs and the condition of the temporary shelters they left behind. I am not especially fond of the whole audio log method of storytelling, but in Subnautica it's framed less as "the entire population of earth compulsively records their thoughts on tape recorders" and more "corporate issue malware will obsessively observe and catalogue all interactions between you and your fellow employees." There is a definite undercurrent of anti-capitalist criticism in Subnautica, from the Alterra Corporation's insistence on framing interpersonal relationships as business transactions to your PDA's intermittent reminders that all of the things that you are building to survive and get off the planet with are steadily incurring a ridiculous amount of debt to your employers due to exploitative contracting. It can get a little on the nose, but more and more I am finding that even the most on the nose satire is leaps and bounds more subtle and nuanced than actual reality so I can't complain too much.

As the game goes on, a rescue attempt by the Sunbeam freighter ship goes terribly awry when the quarantine enforcement platform blows it the fuck up and your own level of infection steadily progresses. You start to receive periodic telepathic messages from a mysterious being, who claims that it wants to help you. When you finally make your way through the briny Lost River and into the dangerous Active Magma Zone, you find the alien's primary containment facility housing a remarkable organism: The Sea Emperor. The Sea Emperor is an enormous leviathan class entity, twice the size of the gigantic magma spitting Sea Dragons hanging out nearby. However, like the enormous cetaceans of Earth, the Sea Emperor is an intelligent, sapient being that feeds by filtering microorgansisms from the surrounding seawater. The story of the last remaining Sea Emperor is a sad one, contained by the precursor aliens for over a thousand years in order to study the mysterious Enzyme 42 that it produced. This enzyme was the only compound they had ever found with the ability to neutralize the Kharaa virus, but due to the Emperor's advanced age and their inability to communicate with it, they reached an impasse. The Emperor was no longer capable of producing large amounts of the enzyme, and its eggs were trapped in a sort of indefinite stasis due to the conditions of the holding tank not being optimal for their hatching. So its basically been waiting all alone for a good millenium or so for somebody to come and help hatch its eggs.

Fortunately, the survivor of the Aurora's crash is a determined and compassionate soul, and by working together with the Sea Emperor, manages to put together a vial of artificial hatching enzymes by gathering samples of flora from the outside ecosystem. The eggs hatch, giving both the Sea Emperor species and planet 4546B writ large a chance at a future. The adult Emperor dies of Being Over a Thousand Years Old shortly after. Most likely, it was only its determination to see its children grow and flourish and save the planet that kept it going this long, so once that purpose was fulfilled, it finally felt able to go to its final rest. The Emperor is a philosophical individual, with complex ideas about other minds and the potential of life after death and reincarnation, idly wondering as it dies if it might come back as an ocean current or a tiny being that fits between the grains of sand. It's an affecting sequence that taps into a lot of our hopes for maybe one day being able to truly communicate with and understand our own huge marine life. Once the young are released into the wild, you follow them and obtain a sample of Enzyme 42, which completely cures you of the Kharaa infection. All that's left after that is to disable the quarantine platform and build the neptune escape rocket.

After you complete the rocket - an impressively large construction, even bigger than the Cyclops submarine - you are prompted to create a time capsule before you take off. The time capsule includes space for a few items you can leave behind , a screenshot, and custom text note. The idea is that other players might discover it on their adventures and find what you left behind, another surprisingly emotional touch to the game. Admittedly it was slightly ruined for me because when I exited the cockpit to go and take a screenshot the entire launch platform was flung into the sky for no reason, me along with it. I did have the presence of mind to take a blurry screenshot of the several tons of plasteel sailing through the air as if by magic. We both eventually landed and I managed to climb back up and (properly) launch the rocket. As you leave the atmosphere, the spirit of the Sea Emperor contacts you one last time to thank you once again for giving its family a future. As the credits roll and you reenter Alterra space, your PDA happily congratulates you on making it back and assures you that you will be cleared to dock just as soon as your outstanding debt of several trillion credits is settled. As the music fades and you return to the main menu, you can't help but think: man, maybe I should have stayed.

It is this sentiment, I think, that truly separates the quality of the two games as experiences and statements on the human condition. The Forest presents you with a superficially beautiful peninsula swarming with Evil Tribal Cannibals that must be overmastered in order to rescue your darling son object, that exists to be exploited and despoiled in your quest to build a Sick Fort that isn't even really necessary. You can even get an achievement called "climate change" for cutting down 100 trees and like. Fuck off. Not funny. You can legitimately deforest huge swathes of the game world if you find the chainsaw and some fuel. In the Forest, you are an invading conqueror masquerading as a victim of circumstance. In Subnautica, you are an observer and survivor. The primary building material is titanium, which you get mostly from salvage from the Aurora, occasionally supplemented with some more exotic ores and corals found naturally on the seabed. The ecosystem of 4546B, even though it is devastated by plague, is bigger than you could ever hope to be. It's beautiful and fascinating and glorious, and the attempts that your predecessors made to exploit and subjugate it ended in abject failure. Your seabases are compact and efficient affairs, equipped with machinery for survival and research. The game specifically forbids you from building most kinds of weapons, citing a historical massacre that necessitated all weapon blueprints deadlier than the survival knife to be scrubbed from the database. Combat is fruitless and difficult, even in the PRAWN suit - it's better to just evade hostile fauna and slip by undetected with silent running. The only way to survive and escape is to work in concert with the indigenous life, not thoughtlessly destroy it.

I didn't expect, going in, to feel so compelled to compare and contrast these games, but when presented with the reality of the situation and how similar they really were, I didn't have much of a choice. They're almost dark mirrors of one another, the Forest presenting a Bad Future where the nazi sound designer from Subnautica was in charge of the entire project. I enjoyed the Forest, but there is a deep moral emptiness within it that I have trouble compartmentalizing, especially when Subnautica offers an alternative outcome that doesn't make me feel vaguely monstrous for playing it. Subnautica is, at its core, a more beautiful, more engaging, more thoughtful and even more frightening work than The Forest. The Forest comes close to offering a genuinely scary experience during the cave sections, but undermines its own premise by filling the haunting void beneath the earth with giggling naked canninbal men. The dark, trackless depths of the ocean, however, remain a fundamentally terrifying environment, populated by the strange and terrible lifeforms adapted to living deep beneath the crush depth of even the hardiest submarines. The Ghost Leviathans that lurk in the endgame areas and in the tremendously unsettling open ocean beyond the crater's edge are frightening to behold and terribly dangerous, but their presence is almost comforting, a reminder that other beings still exist in the lightless void. The hooting and hollering of The Forest's mutants simply cannot compare to the otherwordly cries of Subnautica's megafauna, and indeed, The Forest is at its most tense when all is silent.

I would be awfully interested in a game that took The Forest's robust crafting, building, and survival mechanics and transplanted them somewhere far away from the wretched peninsula and its ravening caricatures, perhaps a kind of Subnautica that took place in an alien jungle, or an earth jungle, for that matter. Anywhere less relentlessly ugly and hateful would be fine. Subnautica makes good on most of its lofty promises (except when it crashes. Stability is an area where The Forest has an unquestionable advantage) and presents a strong, unified experience. The Forest is a jumble of compelling systems mashed together in an unconvincing way with set dressing straight from the production of Birth of a Nation. A missed opportunity at best, an extremely questionable exercise in tone-deaf xenophobia at worst. I would be interested to know how the developers of the game justified their design decisions as not-racist, or if they even bothered. Subnautica is reflecting and uplifting, while The Forest, in all of its cynical attempts to push boundaries and put blood and titties on the screen, ironically only ends up feeling safe and derivative, contradicting itself and wasting the genuinely strong mechanics it developed. With certain statements from E3 about how certain developers try to distance themselves as much as possible from political statements while simultaneously creating deeply political games fresh in our minds, I think we should be more insistent than ever that this kind of cowardice is both ridiculous and transparently self-serving. All culture is political, because all human experience is political, inextricably intertwined with the struggles and conflicts between nations and groups that serve as the backdrops of eras. Subnautica knows this. The Forest either does not, or does not care.

#subnautica #the forest #games #survival games #games criticism

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pickfilms581 · 4 years ago

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Administrations of Video Production to Boost the we are living in an innovation based present day Businesses

World and the utilization of video is probably the greatest change that influence mass correspondence in the present occasions. It has been assessed that over 80% of the whole Internet traffic will be founded on recordings continuously 2020. As noticed, there are an expanding number of clients that are participating in items found in recordings. Watchers are like never before pulled in to a video which portrays an intriguing story and incorporates an enduring arrangement of symbolism. Recordings are the new innovative progression in the field of showcasing that help to grab the eye of clients and push forward of your opposition. Utilizing video creation for promoting is simple, all you require is an extraordinary video creation organization to deliver the possibility you had always wanted and transfer it on your site and web-based media channels.

Adding recordings that are expertly delivered to your substance that might be composed and photographic will help support your organizations business. In any case, before we comprehend which video creation administrations help in boosting the business; let us recognize a few benefits of why video creation is utilized in any case.

Benefits of Video Production for Marketing your Business:

1. Engaging Marketing Tool

One of the significant benefits for utilizing recordings delivered by Video Production Company In Mumbai as an advertising device is that they are an engaging method to outwardly show your business items and thoughts. It shouldn't be high pressing factor type of promoting or a multi goliath creation house. Indeed, recordings delivered for sites work best when they are more centered around items, its uses and the modern patterns than on deals or making publicity. Recordings that remind individuals about the qualities and convictions that your organization runs on are like their qualities and convictions greaterly affects the watchers.

2. Discloses to Your Story to the Customers

Recordings permit the organizations to share their story in an engaging and fascinating way. The motivation behind why video as a promoting instrument isn't one-sided dependent on the size of the organization is that, they can be successful in allowing the organization a chance to clarify the advantages of their items without business limitations. Not at all like TV and radio ads that are restricted to 30 and 60 second spots; the corporate video isn't dependent upon any of those impediments. Albeit, the video creation can be up to one prefers, it works best on the web in the event that it is under a time span of five minutes.

3. Web search tools Support Company Videos

A video can be enormously upheld via web indexes and bring about higher rankings if:

- The video methodology is appropriately archived and clean cut with powerful portrayal and labels

- If it gives the answers for what the online crowd is looking for.

For instance, consider a private venture dependent on a specialty establishment on YouTube, can likewise fabricate an unwavering web based after. YouTube is one of the top interpersonal interaction locales which fuses recordings and makes it simple to draw in with adherents. Another approach to utilize recordings as an advertising device for the development of business is to help the web crawler rankings of the recordings by utilizing records. Posting your substance in the video and text designs assists with building your organization's case as an industry master.

4. Visuals are simple on the Eyes

Watching recordings online is a simpler errand than to peruse the substance. This doesn't imply that perusing isn't significant; it just implies that recordings are basically more pleasant and permit the watchers to unwind. Individuals incline toward watching recordings since it is fascinating as well as it doesn't need a lot of exertion, while perusing requires more exertion. One thing recordings can do is give the crowd the control of the speed of engrossing substance which improves comprehension and helps in quicker learning.

5. Innovative method of Brand Awareness

Video creation has gotten unique as it is an imaginative method of spreading brand mindfulness which joins visuals with sound, consequently, mimicking a genuine encounter inside a couple of moments. Recordings help customers feel they have encountered an item even without really getting it. Aside from all the various devices to fabricate a brand, video has demonstrated to be the most remarkable in view of its creation strategies. Showcasing through recordings can help in rejuvenating a brand by partner its items with different pictures that stick in the watcher's memory for an extremely prolonged stretch of time. Another benefit with recordings is that they can consolidate music to help improve the disposition and power of the crowd.

6. Direct Opportunity for Call to Action

A viable video promoting effort should end the video with a solid assertion of source of inspiration. The video ought to be guiding the watcher to visit the site and to learn more data about the brand and result of the organization. In the event that your message is passed on appropriately, it can improve the change rate. Hard attempts to seal the deal don't function admirably on the online stage as numerous individuals utilize the Internet to do their own examination and are not exceptionally inspired by deals pitches.

In the wake of understanding the significance of video creation in advertising ones business, let us take a gander at a portion of the administrations given by video creation to help ones business.

Video Production Services to Boost Your Business

We have gathered a couple of administrations given by the top video creation organization that require the utilization of recordings to support the business:

• Services for corporate occasions:

Various corporate occasions are coordinated in every business association consistently. Video creation administrations for corporate occasions holds to be probably the best approaches to introduce one's organization in these occasions. There are different organizations who look to offer the support of creating a powerful and effective video however finding the correct organization who gives the top nature of these administrations can be extremely gainful for your corporate occasions.

The organizations should simply examine the thoughts and let the video creation house about the sort of occasion, be it a yearly occasion or a private occasion, they have everything covered for a wide range of occasions. It is constantly prescribed to recruit an expert specialist co-op for utilizing recordings to support your business in a corporate occasion.

• Video Services for Marketing:

Is your point is to get more Customers for your Business Organization?

Video creation administrations are an extraordinary type of administrations for showcasing your organization's items and administrations and in this way expanding the development of your business association. Video Production is quite possibly the most helpful and progressed showcasing procedures that are utilized by the most amazing aspect associations, just as the new companies. The video creation organization additionally give video creation answers for successful promoting of the organization.

• Video Solutions for Training:

Preparing is an inescapable capacity of any association and all the organizations need to prepare their workers for a more productive working of the cycles in one's organization. Be that as it may, here and there preparing for a bigger scope can be a troublesome errand. In such circumstances, one can get the administrations of the best Video Production Company In Mumbai, for example, The Visual House who is known to assist associations with dealing with their brands and interface with their intended interest groups in a successful manner. They mix the bits of knowledge of talking with the execution to give long haul correspondence answers for their customers. Their work goes from a wide assortment of sorts, customers and socio-culture issue and topics.

In this way, inferring that video creation administrations are amazingly helpful for the development of business organizations of different enterprises. In the event that you are looking to get video creation answers for your business association, it is important that you choose top proficient organizations. A decent expert video creation specialist co-op will assist you with finding the ideal arrangements, which will prompt speedy development of your business association.

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