#reinforcements game

[benevolenterrancy]

redraw of that ds9 scene

LBH doesn't understand what's going on but wants to impress shizun; MBJ understands it even less but is optimistic about any sport involving a solid wooden bludgeon at least

[b0tster]

i really like how the enemies in the silent hill hospitals are not 'insane patients' and instead are the nurses

[a2zillustration]

After hating her for so long, Croissant (me) started to feel bad for her by the end.

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[arthursfuckinghat]

Nothing can describe the way my heart shattered when Arthur asked if Dutch was going to go look for him after he was kidnapped by Colm in chapter 3- all he got was a "Oh of course, son" in the most pitiful, unassured tone of voice I'd ever heard from Dutch.

The three of them had set up a meeting point at "the fork in the road" if the O'Driscoll parlay went south, Arthur seemingly disappeared and didn't return for another day or so until he was physically crawling trying to get back to camp, and still nobody questioned where he was?

Yes, it's typical for Arthur to wander and find his own way home after missions, but the key word is AFTER. Arthur disappeared DURING the meeting and didn't regroup at the designated rendezvous point AFTERWARDS.

Especially dealing with the likes of the O'Driscolls, wouldn't that ring some kind of alarm? If not from Dutch or Micah, then wouldn't anybody else at the camp question it?

I imagine an (exaggerated) conversation like this probably happened if anyone at camp asked:

"Hey Dutch how was the meeting with the O'Driscolls?"

"It went fine we talked a bit then they left suddenly so weird"

"Where's Arthur then?"

"Oh I don't know we didn't see him after we split up for the meeting haha probably wandered off again typical Arthur"

God, if you're going to treat Arthur like the gang's workhorse, then act like you care about him at least.

Arthur is strong, but he isn't invincible.

[mikichko]

141 x white reader recs? 👉🏻👈🏻

Hi nonnie 😊

I'm not going to lie, this ask bewildered me a bit! I wasn't sure if you were being serious or not since this fandom is basically 90% white. Going by those numbers I'd assume there's a plethora of white content for you to enjoy, love.

I can't imagine that an ask for recommendations of an demographic that isn't typically featured in reader inserts would stir you up so much. Right?

Regardless, I do truly love to talk about my favorite writers so here is a list of writers (in addition to the previously mentioned) whose work I absolutely adore.

In no particular order:

🍂 Early

Starting off strong with the individual that sucked me into this black hole of a fandom. I absolutely love Early's writing style and their focus on fat readers. I reread a ton of their works constantly! Currently The Space in Between is what I read at the gym when I'm doing my hot girl walk 🥰🥰 Ensnared me with this Current Fave: The Space In Between

🍂 PFHWrites

Following it up with the second cod blog I ever followed, give it up for P! I absolutely adore P's works and the thought that he puts into the creechurs 🐈 (P patented term) in his works. Writes incredible pieces for transmasc!readers that I absolutely adore Ensnared me with: No clue actually! I just think of P as this entity that one day appeared on my tumblr dash and whose work I've been in love with for ages (tbh it was probably porn but...) Current Fave: Binders and Boyfriends

🍂 glossysoap

Glossy, my beloved Soap worshiper in arms 💕 Glossy has an incredible knack for writing that's amplified by her vibrant personality and how much she uplifts other writers in the community. I adore her to death and am so glad we have such a great writer like her in the fandom Ensnared me with: Bloody Shame (kyle fuckers rejoice) Current fave: Pushing Boundaries

🍂 kyletogaz

Our wonderful beautiful Jess 🥰💕 Resident Kyle and F1 enthusiast I have suuuch a fun time reading Jess' works (even when she is emotionally destroying me ;-;) I have her post notifications on so I don't miss a single work :') Ensnared me with: Simon fixing your attitude Current fave: Sharing is Caring

🍂 swordsandholly

Holly's Cherry Bomb 🍒 series has me by the goddamn neck right now! I am actively choking as I type this out because of how fucking good it is. Her depictions of Simon in 'Double Date - Double Down' solidified me as a fan from the beginning Ensnared me with: Double Date - Double Down Current fave: Cherry Bomb

🍂 stellewriites

Stelle's wonderful personality shines through so brightly that when I followed her I didn't even realize she wrote. When the cognizant part of my brain finally kicked in and I finally realized she was a writer I berated myself for not reading her work earlier. So happy that I stumbled upon her and her work 💞💖 Ensnared me with: Amazing personality <3 Current fave: Choices Made in Anger

🍂 syoddeye

Sy is another writer who I just cannot remember how I came across them! Honestly, someone else probably reblogged one of their works and I fell in love with their writing style. Whoever it was I am immensely thankful. Sy makes works that are so marvelous my brain gets more wrinkly every time I read something of theirs ❣ Ensnared me with: It's a black box I'm so sorry Current fave: The Lift (this is lowkey my motivator before the gym)

🍂 dragonnarrative-writes

Dragon's works have got me foaming at the mouth. Another creator who I have no clue how their works came onto my timeline but all I know is that I am so thankful. Every one of their works is a treat akin to indulging in something ridiculously delicious. 💘 Ensnared me with: Autumn Embers Current fave: Autumn Embers (particularly Part 3A ;))

🍂 indigosunsetao3

Indigo was actually recommended to me under a post lamenting the lack of Alex Keller works! And boy am I glad she was because the way she writes about Alex Keller makes me rattle at the bars of my enclosure for this white man. Absolutely amazing content that I am so happy to have been told about her! 💓 Ensnared me with: Older CIA Alex Keller Current fave: Move In Day (Alex Keller fuckers rejoice)

I am missing so so so many incredibly writers who I adore as well but because of time constraints I didn't have time to include them. Honestly, I'll probably just keep adding this list and using it as a rec list!

This fandom has been blessed with so many folks who create marvelous pieces for readers across the spectrum. We're fortunate that writers have cultivated such an accepting space 💕

[blueskittlesart]

at a certain point i think we need to acknowledge that art is very rarely created accidentally. if you can see a theme in a work than that theme was, more likely than not, at least somewhat intentional on behalf of the creator. you don't put a piece of yourself out into the world without thinking about what it means at least a little bit.

[eqt-95]

💖 rough kiss / hot and heavy / making out

please👉👈

oh anon, i am definitely the wrong person for this one, but here goes nothing:

- - - - - -

Lena has a secret. 

No, it isn't that she’s doubling as a superhero in her free time. That’s Kara.

And no, it isn't that she has an unquenchable crush on her best friend. They'd solved that eons ago.

And definitely no, it isn’t that her toy collection is extensive and well-stocked. Everyone at game night already knows about that.

The secret went like this: 

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” Lena replied with the innocence of a Luthor.

“So it just so happens that the bartender who has been making eyes at you all night is now being sized-up by my sister?”

“Correlation without causation. I thought you were a scientist,” Lena shrugged and tried her best to conceal a knowing smile.

“Uh-huh,” Alex replied with an arched eyebrow that said much more. “And that fact he grabbed your ass on the way to the bathroom?”

“Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Well I for one am not about to do a bunch of paperwork over an NDA because Kara can’t keep it together over this ass-hat groping you, so if you will excuse me-”

- - - -

And this: 

“Hey babe?”

“Hm?”

“What’s this?”

Lena looked up from her work and squinted at the letter gripped in Kara’s hand. 

“Oh, it’s nothing. Just some administrative stuff,” Lena hummed and returned to her work.

“Doesn’t look like ‘nothing’. It looks like you were served.”

The scowl that followed was one that could be seen from space which meant it was impossible to ignore from across their apartment. Lena rolled her eyes. 

“It’s just Morgan Edge playing bully again, darling.”

“Yea but,” Kara continued, eyes skimming the multi-page document that now had a few extra crinkles in it. “He’s suing for patent rights? Who does he think he is-”

“It’s nothing, really. I’ll handle it tomorrow.”

“You shouldn’t have to handle it in the first place.”

“It’s fine. Let’s just-”

But Kara was already gone through the terrace door and halfway across the city.

- - - -

And most of all, this:

“Ms. Luthor, The Sun has accused you of covering up nearly a dozen fatalities since-”

“Lena Luthor, it has been alleged that Obsidian North’s stolen technology was found in L-Corp’s latest-”

“Ms. Luthor, how do you explain the recent deaths associated with-”

“How do you sleep at night when your maniac brother is still on the loose-”

“No comment,” Lena repeated for the eighteenth time. She pushed ahead, trying to find a path between L-Corp’s front door and the waiting car that would take her home. Unfortunately, the best path was also the longest. Worse, when she looked ahead, her car was nowhere to be found. What she did find was wall-to-wall traffic and no chance of freedom.

Great.

More questions were hurled, a flash sent blotches across her vision. Another came an inch away and sent her staggering. It felt like a garbage compactor except worse because garbage compactors weren’t sentient creatures known for shouting lies while doing its job.

She clambered through the crowd and found a gap. She glanced around for her security guard who was lost amidst a second offshoot of angry journalists and misinformed citizens. Now wasn’t the time for manners as three journalists and an oversized camera pivoted toward her, so instead of waiting, she booked it down the sidewalk.

They followed with vigor and ignorance and a stubbornness that would have made Lillian proud, shouting rather uncreative conspiracy theories and growing closer by the second. Lena turned a corner then, in a move she might have patted herself on the back for, slipped into an alley. She breathed a sigh of relief until-

“Ms. Luthor-”

“Lena Luthor-”

“-you can’t hide from the truth.” 

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Lena heaved, staggering backwards in the kind of stereotypical way she mocked television shows for.

The cameraman was fastest, breaking into her personal space and jamming the lens into her face.

“Ms. Luthor-”

“-is it true Supergirl won’t speak to you?”

“-how does it feel having National City’s Darling reject you?”

What happened next might have been comical if Lena weren’t breathless, irritated, and fuming that her anniversary dinner was being interrupted by a wave of wannabe reporters hanging onto the coattails of the marketing dollars that funded their tabloids. 

Be that as it was, she was not in her usual smirky-mood when the burst of air sent all of them turning on heel to find an equally irritated and equally fuming Supergirl towering over them with the kind of anger usually reserved for the extra-bad baddies.

“S-supergirl,” they all seemed to whimper in unison. 

The camera was fumbled then dropped. The lens splintered with a deserved crack. A few short seconds later, it was the only evidence anyone with a press badge had been there.

“Where’d you take them?” Lena asked when Kara whooshed down moments later. She pushed off the brick wall and closed the distance, raising her hands to fix Kara’s ruffled cape.

“I considered the middle of the Pacific-” Kara shrugged.

“Oh is that right?” Lena smirked, letting her hands climb to brush an errant strand of hair into place.

“But then I remembered the whole ‘hope, help, and compassion’ thing,” she continued, her own hands finding a home on Lena’s waist. “So I dropped them off just outside the city limits instead.”

And there it was: the secret. Somewhere between Kara, all beet-faced and rage hovering over the cowering reporters and then dragging said group of gaggling reporters to the edges of town, Lena felt it - that tiny pang of warmth and safety and appreciation that always came with her overprotective Kryptonian. It also usually sent a tiny pang of something else through her.

“Well that was very big of you,” Lena replied, the gap between lips narrowing. “But just so you know,” she continued, her breath ghosting across Kara’s lips, “I had it handled-”

Kara skipped her lines and closed the gap, pressing lips, hands, and body against Lena until her back found the brick wall again and nothing but the taste, touch, and smell of Kara consumed her. Lips dragged to Lena’s jawline then neck then exposed shoulder. Hands grabbed against the restrictions of fabric. Lena cursed (again) the constraints of a supersuit.

“I really need to design you a new suit,” Lena huffed.

“Probably for the best.” Kara replied, fingers venturing dangerously close to public indecency. “Alex says we need to leave before someone sees us anyway.”

“Tell Alex to stop committing voyeurism. There are websites for that.”

“Oh, she did not like that,” Kara snickered, lips pressing a final kiss to the crook of Lena’s neck. 

“Turn that thing off and take me home, Supergirl.”

“What about our reservations?”

“I have other dinner plans tonight.”

- - - - -

ask game

[alphamecha-mkii]

Star Wars: X-Wing (2nd Ed) - Hotshots and Aces II Reinforcements Pack Cover Art

[moeblob]

I love Chris so much you guys.

[ara270904]

I hate King Charming without a reason apparently. He's evil (in my mind)

He's the worst father ever. He's probably very imperfect too but he hides it.

Because he hates himself for having imperfect children and forces them to be the perfection he can't be. But oh surprise! Only one of his children can appear perfect.

Like forget Snow White being a bad mother, King Charming is the real bad father. You want real angst and need a villain? King Charming is right there traumatizing his children trying to make them perfect and exactly how he wants them to be.

Putting the three Charming siblings into a mold but none of them fit the carefully planned mold. So King Charming forces them to be perfection, there is no room for error to have mistakes, the Charmings are prestigious and elegant, and above all perfect.

The entire Charming family are appearances so imperfections (cough Dexter cough) do not serve the family and are not as important as those who do know how to pretend.

But what King Charming doesn't know is that appearances can be easily broken and at some point it will be discovered that his children and especially him aren't the perfect family they claim to be.

Like probably King Charming got married to his "perfect" wife think that she she could fix his genes, fix their future children with better genetics. It seemed like everything was going to be okay but they soon realized it wasn't, but still King Charming tried hard to force his children to pretend and got angry when they wanted to have "personalities of their own".

Charmings don't have "personalities of their own" they are simply what a prince or princess is supposed to be and other than that they are perfect and that is all they should aspire to be.

King Charming probably hates Dexter because they're equally imperfect but King Charming did everything possible to hide it while he has never managed to make Dexter completely how he wants him to be and Dexter tries to be his own person by not having a destiny to which he aspires.

Darling is more secretive about her being a knight and hides her scars with makeup to appear better in front of her parents.

And Daring simply loves that his father is always happy with him because he learned well everything his father taught him. Daring tries to be the most perfect all the time so that his father is proud of him at all times.

Oh but what will happen to everything after Dragon Games :D. Everything is going to fall apart in the "perfect" family

(I made the post, @kang-yina)

[front-facing-pokemon]

[mollywog]

Boggs, who came to 2 when I did, told me that even with all the plotting, it was a little too easy to rescue Peeta. He believes if 13 hadn’t made the effort, Peeta would’ve been delivered to me anyway. Dropped off in an actively warring district or perhaps 13 itself. Tied up with ribbons and tagged with my name. Programmed to murder me.

Something about gifts within The Hunger Games series being double edged swords…

[shouts-into-the-void]

The more I think about it, the more I really want to know how Tetsuji managed to keep the fact that the Ravens are a cult under wraps, considering that even Neil was having trouble functioning normally after only 2 weeks.

Like, it isn't even the physical abuse that causes the biggest problem. It's the 16 hour days, inability to do anything other than exy, social isolation, and the dictated nutrition and choices. They learn none of the skills that a typical young adult learns in college- cooking, cleaning, time management, money management, networking, etc. Not all of the Ravens can be rich enough that that sort of thing just doesn't matter. They basically get dropped into the world after college with no idea how to get a place to live, feed themselves, pay bills, or anything required of an adult and with no support network to help.

And including the physical abuse, all of these athletes suddenly have to have a miriade of health problems due to over-exercise, lack of sleep, violent playing styles, and I'm assuming physical abuse from Tetsuji and/or Riko.

All of these athletes are apparently signing with pro teams and there can't be that many that they only have one or two athletes a piece. We know from Lucas that the drastic change to their personalities is very noticiable to anyone who did know them and they're mentally unstable enough to off themselves after being forced to leave the campus, so how has no one noticed that all of the players that get signed from this one college team are barely functional, incredibly mentally unhealthy, and insanely violent?

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Hello!! I'm back for: more whining about TotK Quest Design Philosophy

I can't reblog a really great post I just saw for some reason (tumblrrrr *shakes my fist*), but hmmmm yeah not only do I completely agree, but I think I might expand on why I feel so much annoyance towards TotK's quest design philosophy at some point, because it does extend past the fundamentally broken setup of trying to punch a pseudo-mystery game on top of BotW's bones, where the core objective was always explicit and centered and stapled the entire world together; or the convoluted and inefficient way it tells its story through the Tears, the somehow single linear exploration-driven quest in the entire game.

Basically: I'm talking about the pointless back-and-forths. There were a lot of them, a lot that acted against the open world philosophy, and almost none of them ever recontextualized the environment through neither gameplay abilities nor worldbuilding nor character work.

I'll take two examples: the initial run to Hyrule Castle (before you get your paraglider), and then the billion back-and-forths in the Zora questline.

I think?? the goal of that initial quest to Hyrule Castle is to familiarize you with the landmark, introduce the notion that weapons rot, tell you about the gloom pits, and also tell you that Zelda sightings are a thing? But to force any of these ideas on you before giving you a paraglider is, in my opinion, pretty unnecessary. I think the reason it happens in that order is to prevent Link from simply pummeling down to the gloom pit under Hyrule Castle and fight Ganondorf immediately while still introducing ideas surrounding the location; but genuinely, the Zelda sighting makes the next events even more confusing? Why wouldn't you focus all your priorities in reaching the castle if you just saw her there? Why lose time investigating anything else? Genuinely: what is stopping you from getting your paraglider and immediately getting yourself back there, plunging into the depths to try and get to the literal bottom of this? (beyond player literacy assuming this is where the final boss would be, and so not to immediately spoil yourself --which, in an open world game, you should never be able to spoil yourself by engaging with the mechanics normally, and if you can that's a genuine failure of design)

I think, personally, that you should not have been pointed to go there at all. That anything it brings to the table, you could have learned more organically by investigating yourself, or by exploring in that direction on your own accord --or, maybe you think Zelda is up there in the castle, and then the region objectives become explicitely about helping you reaching that castle (maybe by building up troops to help you in a big assault, or through the Sages granting you abilities to move past level-design oriented hurdles in your way, etc). Either way: no need to actually make you walk the distance and back, because the tediousness doesn't teach you anything you haven't already learned about traversal in the (extremely long, btw, needlessly so I would say) tutorial area.

But to take another example, I'll nitpick at a very specific moment in the Zora Questline, that is honestly full of these back-and-forth paddings that recontextualize absolutely nothing and teach you nothing you didn't already know. The most egregious example, in my opinion, is the moment where you are trying to find the king, and you have to learn by listening in to the zora children who do not let you listening in.

So okay. I think Zelda is great when it does whimsy, and children doing children things guiding you is a staple of the series, and a great one at that. But here? It does not work for me on any level. Any tension that could arise from the situation flattens because nobody seems to care enough about their king disappearing in the middle of a major ecological crisis, except for children who are conveniently dumb enough not to graps the severity of the situation, but not stressed out enough that it could be construed as a way for them to cope about it and make anything feel more serious or pressing. It feels like a completely arbitrary blocker that isn't informed by the state of the world, doesn't do anything interesting gameplay-wise with this idea, doesn't build up the mood, and genuinely feels like busywork for its own sake.

This is especially tragic when the inherent concept of "the zora king has been wounded by what most zoras would believe to be Zelda and is hiding from his own people so the two factions do not go to war over it" has such tension and interest and spark that the game absolutely refuse to explore --instead having you collect carved stones who do not tell you anything new, splatter water in a floating island, thrud through mud who feel more like an inconvenience than a threat or, hey, listen to children playing about their missing king less than a couple of years after being freed from Calamity Ganon's menace. It feels like level designers/system designers having vague technical systems that are hard-coded in the game now, and we need to put them to use even if it's not that interesting, not that fun or not that compelling. It's the sort of attitude that a lot of western RPGs get eviscerated for; but here, for some reason, it's just a case of "gameplay before story", instead of, quite simply, a case of poorly thought-out gameplay.

Not every quest in the game is like this! I think the tone worked much better in the sidequests overall, that are self-contained and disconnected from the extremely messy main storyline, and so can tell a compelling little tale from start to finish without the budget to make you waddle in a puddle of nothing for hours at a time. It's the only place where you actually get character arcs that are allowed to feel anything that isn't a variation on "very determined" or "curious about the zonai/ruins", and where you get to feel life as it tries to blossom back into a new tomorrow for Hyrule.

But if I'm this harsh about the main storyline, it really is because I find it hard to accept that we do not criticize a structure that is at times so half-assed that you can almost taste employees' burnout seeping through the cracks --the lack of thematic ambition and self-reflection and ingeniosity outside of system design and, arguably at times, level design-- simply because it's Hyrule and we're happy to be there.

There's something in the industry that is called the "wow effect", which is their way to say "cool" without saying "cool". It's basically the money shots, but for games: it's what makes you go "ohhhh" when you play. And it's great! The ascension to the top of the Ark was one of them --breathtaking, just an absolute high point of systems working together to weave an epic tale. You plummeting from the skies to the absolute depths of hell is another one; most of the dungeons rely on that factor to keep your attention; the entire Zelda is a dragon storyline is nothing but "wow effect" (and yeah, the moment where you do remove the Master Sword did give me shivers, I'll admit to this willingly) and so is Ganondorf's presence and presentation in the game --he's here to be cool, non-specifically mean, hateable in a non-threatening way and to give us a good sexy time, do not think about it too hard. What bothers me is that TotK's world has basically nothing to offer but "wow effect"; that if you bother to dig at anything it presents you for more than a second, everything crumbles into incoherence --not only in story, but in mood, in themes, in identity. This is a wonderfully fun game with absolutely nothing to say, relying on the cultural osmosis and aura of excellency surrounding Zelda to pass itself off as meatier than it really is. This is what I say when I criticize it as self-referential to a fault; half of the story makes no sense if this is your first Zelda game, and what little of that world there is tends to be deeply unconcerned and uncurious about itself.

And no, Breath of the Wild wasn't like this. Breath of the Wild was deeply curious about itself; the entire game was built off curiosity and discovery, experimentation and challenge (and I say this while fully admitting I had more fun with the loop of TotK, which I found more forgiving overall). The traversal in Tears of the Kingdom is centered around: how do I skip those large expanses of land in the most efficient and fun way possible. How do I automate these fights. How do I find resources to automate both traversal and fights better. It's a game that asks questions (who are the zonais, who is Rauru and what is his deal, what is the Imprisoning War about, where is Zelda), and then kind of doesn't really care about the answers (yeah the zonais are like... guys, they did a cool kingdom, Rauru used to run it, the Imprisoning War is literally whatever all you have to care about is who to feel sad for and who to kill about it and you don't get a choice and certainly cannot feel any ambiguous feelings about any of that, and Zelda is a dragon but we will never expand on how it felt for her to make such a drastic and violent choice and also nobody cares that's a plot point you could *remove* from the game without changing the golden path at all).

I'm so aggravated by the argument "in Zelda, it's gameplay before story" because gameplay is story. That's the literal point of my work as a narrative designer: trying to breach the impossibly large gap between what the game designers want to do, and what the writers are thinking the game will be about (it's never the same game). And in TotK, the game systems are all about automation and fusion. It's about practicality and efficiency. It's also about disconnecting stuff from their original purpose as you optimize yourself out of danger, fear, or curiosity --except for the way you can become even more efficient. And sure, BotW was about this too; but you were rewarded because you had explored the world in the first place, experimented enough, put yourself in danger, went to find out the story of who you used to be and why you should care about Hyrule. I'm not here to argue BotW was a well-written game; I think it was pretty tropey at large to be honest, safe for a couple of moments of brilliance, but it had a coherent design vision that rewarded your curiosity while never getting in the way of the clarity of your objective. There is a convolutedness to TotK that, to me, reveals some extremely deep-seated issues with the direction the series is heading towards; one that, at its core, cares more about looking the part of a Zelda game than having any deeper conversation about what a Zelda game should be.

[mintharan]

one thing i love so so much about wyll is that he's an atheist, not in the sense that he doesn't believe in them, they are materially real in the DnD setting, but that he doesn't think they're worthy of worship "the only thing the gods have ever given me is a cold shoulder" it's so evocative, so poignant, it says so much about him as a character. and really, to me, encapsulates the essence of his character: there is no divine intervention, there are no miracles, there are only people, and for them he's willing to sacrifice more than any god ever would

[tubbytarchia]

If I send vote receipts showing I voted for smallidarity and not boat boys will I get an amoeba etho doodle? (/nf I just love ur art <3)

No no I believe you. but What the fuck is this thing