#some lore fuckery later and they end up like this

[fidgetspringer-art]

Olath - Aberrant familiar

[slowlysoluminary]

after that wack-tastic piece of media i figured we could all!! use a break!!!!!!! so!!!!!!

(more) doodles below the cut. and some commentary! Hurray!

^^ Post game is interesting. Most of the timeloop is about figuring the deal with the memories, some of it is about sif comng to terms with the king, and the very very end of it is about everyone regaining their memories.

so i say it again post game is REALLY interesting!!! because everyone, collectively, is trying to balance their old memories and their new memories. everyone except siffrin. who is not 1:1 old siffrin but is the closest to it, considering how much loop's been through.

loop??? becomes corporeal at some point in the end.

it's very bittersweet! i think! the whole of the party does an "i want to remember!!!" sequence, fighting with their own minds to fill the gaping holes they'd always ignored.

-- loop, after realizing the extent to which they're familiar with the party, had tried desperately to get the party to remember them throughout the loops. in hopes that something would change. they never remembered.

at the same time, siffrin is talking to the king - they're fighting with eachother physically and verbally, desperately trying to get the other understand. resetfrin is not the siffrin the king hated so earnestly, not the siffrin he tried to snuff out.

over the course of many conversations with the king, siffrin caught on. the king is the major lore dump here and is who causes most of the narrative development because i say so !!!!!!!!!!!!

actually. about post game. do you know why their designs are like that

resetfrin hated the lack of autonomy he had over their own body so they decided to. cut their hair. it's a bit curlier now that there's not a lot weighing it down

they decided not to keep the star stuff the king gave them. yada yada character development or whatever.

they gave their cloak to loop!! who is. siffrin again. physically at least. both siffrins are siffrin but with clear differences! like hair length and hair texture! and ohhhhhhhh no what do you mean the universe gave them the wrong body?? what?????? how cruel!!! how blasphemous!!!!!!!

loop hated the idea of keeping her hair darkless (mirror pronouns for loop btw!!! remember that!!!). it reminded them of what it was like to be ghostloop. which they hated!!! but they couldn't have their hair be lightless because that was resetfrin's new thing, so... they just. kept dying the bottom parts of it lightless. it's a compromise

how does the party distinguish the two siffrins, name-wise? uhhhhhh. ask me that question later. idk.

if.... if i have pre-game planned out. and post-game planned out.

then the inly thing I don't have planned out is the ACTUAL time loop bit

it's quite daunting because? that's like the entire point of the original game? it feels like i hve to live up to so much and like fhe loops have to have such a packed, coherent story

though, to be fair, most of what I'm writing will just be. the time loop bit. so i guess I'm figuring it out as i go

anyway, actually talking about the two sketches above, ghostloop is for SIFFRIN'S EYES ONLY!!! she can hit things but things can't hit her and all that.

after figuring out, through past loops, that the King can't see them, they realized siffrin was their only connection to the physical world. The Last Piece Left of them, physically and metaphorically. the whole time they longed for something else to acknowledge their existence. acknowledge theyre real

they also realize they can do Fuckery

the king has a Sixth Sense for loop's Fuckery,,, flipping him The Bird resulted in a rather quick death for Siffrin. whoops!!!!!

this au is. more closely revolved around gloop than i thought. don't worry!! i have a lot of gloop content planned! but. but you need to understand the pain of resetfrin and the king. the misery snd desperation fhe king felt about his country. siffrin pleading with the king, countlessly, hoping to see some SEMBLANCE of the man he once knew. you need to know the missing pieces the party finds, a hollow feeling settling itself around their hearts. you need to know so bad.

so you'll get gloop content! i am a big fan of the little guy myself, really. but !!! this au is not ONLY about them, believe it or not! hehe. haha. giggles. ok ill stop

[darkartistyt]

lore time :] (the crossover arc)

Inspired by @/citrus-soda's au, this au (name pending) started out as just a combo between two ideas I had: what if the Bracelet of Tiamat had extra powers, and what if Katrielle and Raphael interacted? Of course, because I'm me, things got out of hand quick, and now there's a whole story and stuff

I also decided it was going to be one of my pl harpy aus specifically because I didn't know how else to get the ball rolling with the bracelet nonsense. All you really need to know about the harpy aus is that at one point in the main one, Luke has a vision (he's a seer) of some distant-ish future, and one person in his vision was somehow able to look back through it, which shouldn't be possible with the way visions work in this magic system. Magic fuckery ensues, creating a bunch of issues in alternate timelines which result in them diverging so much they become separate universes

In this world, the magic fuckery in question ends up creating a bunch of random space-time rifts for a minute, and Kat and Ernest just happen to fall through one that opened up on the floor in the midst of some investigation. So now they're in France in like. 2012 or whenever this game is set

Since it's post-game, I decided that how they meet Raphael is by crossing paths with him as he goes to return the Bracelet to the Louvre (as Phantom R, ofc). It senses their presence and the magic energy they carried --- it works kinda like how scents can be carried --- and activates, wrapping tightly around Phantom R's wrist so that he can't take it off

He dips after affirming that he's okay in order to avoid any potential questions of why he was trying to sneak into the museum, and he tries that night to pry it off his wrist, but to no avail. On top of that, he ends up crossing paths with them again while on a date with Marie and Charlie, and Kat recognizes him immediately and asks how he's doing

So now he has to explain not just the fact that he couldn't get it off but also how he met these two to his partners. He also makes Kat and Ernest swear not to ever reveal his identity as Phantom R, and they oblige on the condition that he help them with their predicament

The group plan to meet up at Raphael's apartment later that afternoon, which gives Kat and Ernest plenty of time to continue snooping around and seeing if they can find anything that will help them (spoiler: they don't)

When they all meet back up, Kat explains her and Ernest's situation. Marie and Raphael brief them on the admittedly weak powers they've seen from the Bracelet and Marie's violin before, but they all agree that there may be more that they have yet to unlock, which could hopefully help the duo return home. They decide to try and strengthen those powers while also still searching for other methods of opening portals and whatnot in the meantime

Given how small Raphael's apartment is, Charlie agrees to take in the two, even though Ernest wanted to find a hotel or something so as to not burden him. He reluctantly agrees only because Kat argued that it would be a lot easier (and cheaper) to accept Charlie's offer versus go through the process of converting the money they had, especially when taking into account the fact that they were from the past, if not an alternate universe entirely. Charlie does have to explain their predicament to his father, but Inspector Vergier ends up being surprisingly willing to help

Over the next few days, Raphael unlocks stronger and stronger powers, from animal whispering and heightened senses to stuff like teleportation and the ability to breath fire like a dragon. Speaking of dragons, he begins to undergo a physical transformation over the last three days they're all together, which slowly turns him into some weird dragon-like creature. All the while, they're trying to figure out how the Bracelet's power works and trying to see if they can at some point re-open that portal that sent Kat and Ernest to their world

On the fifth day after their initial meeting, they decide to go back to the place the portal was and see if there's any remaining magic there, since at that point Raphael might be able to sense that stuff. They set out rather late into the night, and even though he's exhausted, he hides it and tries to see if he can sense anything, and he manages to pick up on something very, very faint

While they're trying to determine if anything can be done, the Bracelet suddenly starts to loosen itself from his wrist. Its eyes glow, then its body. It begins to straighten out, moving strangely organically. Then, it spirals up his arm and shoots directly into his mouth, nearly choking him

Everyone's like "WHAT THE FUCK?!" and rush to ask Raphael if he's okay, to which he says he's fine, but they can all tell he's lying. He feels dizzy, like he could faint at any moment, and his vision's starting to distort, as if the world around him was glitching out (Kat can kinda detect a distortion too, but not as strongly, meaning though a lot of the Bracelet's magic fuckery was internal, it was strong enough to spill out into the outside world too). Before he knows it, he passes out

Marie, being the closest to him physically, is the first to check and make sure he's not a) dead or b) feverish, both of which thankfully end up being false. So she carries him home, the other three trailing behind her. They discuss what to do now and end up planning to meet up early in the morning, before Raphael wakes up, to at least make sure he's okay. Charlie also insists that if they need anything to call him --- that he'll have his phone on and nearby

The next morning is when the transformation is complete (which is what my first sketch was about). He has, in a way, fused with the Bracelet, and is now able to utilize its full power. It' starts raining as they're messing around's a rainy day, which works in their favor as there are not that many people out and about. They decide to head out and try to reopen the portal. But no matter how hard they try, and no matter what Raphael tries to do, it doesn't work. Eventually, Charlie asks if, instead of opening a portal, they try teleporting to their world instead, since the leftover magic is still there and Raphael is able to teleport, at least. They try that, and it works after a bit, but it leaves him completely drained

find themselves in some random part of town in the middle of the night. After a bit of wandering around, Kat and Ernest are finally able to recognize where they are, and they head towards the Detective Agency, letting the others crash there for the night. Given the fact that it was closer to midday in the Rhythm Thief world, no one (spare Raphael) is super tired, so they stay up for a bit trying to figure out how much time has elapsed in this world

They form a plan: Kat and Ernest will go to whoever they need to to show that they're safe and no longer missing, then Kat will go to Luke and/or Hershel (whoever she meets first) for help with the whole "Raphael's now a dragon" thing and in sending the quartet back home

The two set out kinda early the next morning, leaving the others to explain everything to Raphael (who fell asleep halfway through their conversation). They return with Hershel, who, after introductions and all that, agrees to help. Given that there isn't anything that Raphael wears all the time for her to enchant, he ends up manifesting a small armband which is enchanted to keep him in a continuous shapeshifting state and to help him control his powers better. Marie asks if they need to find where they arrived again, but he says there's no need and tells them he can transport them back home whenever they're ready

They give their thanks and say their goodbyes, and Hershel brings them back to their world, staying with them for a little while so that he can make sure his magic would be stable here (it is, so Raphael shouldn't have any issues with the armband in the future)

[seerofmike]

yo. not sure if ure the right person to ask but idk where else to go. i recently came back to apex and am trying to catch up w the lore except im a bit confused. i knew octane hated his dad and was working under him to fuck him over later but now he fell for his dads BS? or am i missing something? and i heard his dad isnt even his dad but his grandpa and im just confused.

also, before i took a break from apex i used to read ur cryptane fics a lot. i found u still into apex and still writing for it as well which is why im asking u. rly like ur fics, tyvm for them :) ty in advance if tumblr doesnt eat this ask.

im glad u like my fics thank you!!!

okay so, not entirely sure when you left or how much you know of the current storyline but quick recap, octane's abusive POS father does some terrorist shit and continuously ridicules him and disowns him in that one season 9 comic, then starts running for Syndicate Head Honcho in season 12 after some fuckery framing maggie for the destruction of olympus.

obviously concerned about his father who is uhhh an evil terrorist (not like maggie, the cool terrorist <3) octane tells lifeline he'll break into his father's safe to gather some info. duardo catches him, but basically like. bribes octane into 'working' for him and octane agrees because he's like teehee!!! i'm gonna screw him over!! che will be sooooooo impressed

then over the course of the quest duardo continuously praises octane and convinces him that he's doing good things by donating to the Frontier Corps. the climax of the quest is lifeline managing to break into duardo's safe while octane finds a video on his computer from a press conference where duardo seems to confess that he loves his family more than anything and that his son is very important to him.

the secret in duardo's safe is his own death certificate. lifeline wants to expose him. octane wants to wait it out and see what happens and might be a little emotionally vulnerable from the whole shebang (as is lifeline tbh cuz she likes to take the whole weight of the outlands on her shoulders), so some petty arguing ensues but it escalates until octane grabs the certificate from her and burns it. they break up as friends officially and both remark that their friendship has been dead for a long long time.

fast forward, octane apparently helps 'duardo' campaign but doesn't question him until the night of the election where he wins, and duardo announces he's taking over lifeline's organization and installing her mother as the new head. octane confronts him after the election, devastated and angry at the idea that duardo had played him. his 'father' insists he hasn't, so when octane demands to know his true identity he tells him: torres silva, his grandfather, and continues to gaslight octane into thinking he's doing it For The Family. in the epilogue, lifeline teams up with maggie to do some terrorist girl shit herself.

so the quest ends with lifeline and octane on opposite sides, and also the reveal that the video that made octane think his father actually cared about him was in fact his grandfather talking about his father LMAAAAAO

how eager / thrilled / willing he is to work with torres seems to fluctuate a little and hasn't really been explored since. on the one hand, he shows moments of anxiety about the whole situation like in this image in the newcastle teasers where the description explicitly says he's nervous about the whole thing;

and in the final chapter he seems genuinely upset and freaked out about the fact that lifeline's mom has taken over the frontier corps, who he thinks is 'not cool' (so true bestie)

he also seems to occasionally be suspicious of torres, right now when you drop in certain areas of the new map (Broken Moon), if he's alone (and notably, *only* if he's alone) he will ask himself what torres wants with the place.

on the other hand, he seems...Fine with engaging with torres still? and maybe even helps him do shitty things? it's implied in this interview between seer and lisa stone that torres paid her to pin the blame of boreas's turbulance on seer, and the way octane reacts after the interview seems to imply that either a.) he knew what torres was planning and is amused or b.) he didn't know, but regardless, was very amused by what torres did to him.

in a loading screen torres also says this (context: they are filming a PR video apologizing for the giant sea monster attacking the legends)

it's not outright confirmed octane still helps him do his political shit after campaigning with him, but it's likely. he also helped pitch boreas as a new apex map to torres with seer and still seems very engaged with him despite the bombs dropped at the end of s12. given that he helped seer pitch boreas, and questions (alone) on cleo about what torres wants with the moon, he seems to suspect something is up, but he isn't as open about it as others and seems kind of hesitant to say anything.

so. the verdict;

i get what apex was trying to do in the season 12 quest. torres DOES start love-bombing octane all of a sudden, which makes octane give literal pause like Twice because "what?? he called me son???? he's never done that before ??????" (<- transgender btw) and i think they were hoping to give the impression that octane is gaslit and manipulated into siding with torres. the narrative also acknowledges that octane's actions are Extremely selfish here and driven entirely by emotion and wanting to feel loved than any sort of logical reasoning or 'greater good' like he insists.

that being said, it really needed more time in the oven. he goes REALLY quickly from "i'm gonna trick him!! teehee!" to burning one of the very few bridges he has and possibly throwing the entire outlands into turmoil because daddy said he loved him once. then it goes very quickly again from "octane unconditionally supports his (grand)father because he is desperate for his approval" to now "octane may in fact regret this and be very suspicious of him" but the latter thing is kind of up in the air given that octane still actively works for him and seems to do a little bit of villainous shit himself.

right now, i think they are intentionally going with a rather messy narrative because like...abuse is messy. family is messy. being manipulated and gaslit and you yourself manipulating and gaslighting your friends and repeating this cycle of abuse because your abuser suddenly pretends he cares about you because he wants to USE you for political gain is a very messy story and it always would have been.

i don't think octane 100% is onboard with torres or fell entirely for his BS, but i don't think he hates him either or what he's doing. it seems like there *IS* a part of him that cares for people Other than himself, but octane's focus is kind of on Me Me Me and right now what matters to Me Me Me is the fact that HE feels loved and gets what HE wants, outlands be damned, and admitting he was wrong means that torres does not love him, and that che was right. and since he also happens to be very petty he doesn't want to admit she was right since they're fighting rn LMAO

i think the story suffers from the main problem with All of apex's storytelling which is just that there wasn't enough time to sit with what it presents but overall i think this is like. fine. almost good, even. one of the better characters arcs apex has going for it right now.

(sorry for how long this is btw i think i went off topic <////3)

(btw cryptane enjoyer. they have voicelines now. they're shite but by god do they have them)

[missrosiewolf]

Sooo I know you've been stewing about Sehanine :}c Since they're both moon gods, do you think that Sehanine could/had any sort of influence on her I guess niece Eilistraee?

haaaaaaaaaaa....I have a lot of thoughts about Sehanine and not a single one of them is positive. A rant is brewing and I have yet to decide if I want to scream about the fuckery that is Sehanine vs Araushnee/Lolth over Corellon (edit: I wanted to clarify that I do not hold Sehanine as the sole party to blame for that particular mess. All parties involved hold some kind of responsibility for it. Ultimately, however, I think the person with the most blame in that situation is Corellon) or how sus Sehanine was looking in Evermeet: Island of Elves.

You know...it's funny. One particular bit of 4e is like "And they’re sister goddesses" @ Sehanine and Lolth, but every other lore I find is like "Sehanine (or Angharradhin 3e/3.5e) is Corellon's main consort" so I guess technically Eilistraee is both her niece and her stepdaughter.

In regards to the rest of your ask: Do I think that Sehanine had or could have had influence on Eilistraee? Oooooh that's a toughie. I think Sehanine did have some kind of influence — not a lot but some — because at some point in the Dancer's youth, likely long before the whole Lolth-wants-to-murder-Corellon thing happened, "Sehanine had showed her how to travel the gossamer strands of its magic with no more than a thought." (its magic being moonlight). So maybe this is just a headcanon that has some support in canon, but I like to think Sehanine took on a mentor role for Eilistraee while the latter was a young goddess still figuring out what her portfolio would be and I think that mentor-mentee relationship is why Eilistraee later ends up taking on moonlight as part of her portfolio.

So yeah. I think Sehanine might have had some influence on Eilistraee wrt to the other's godly portfolio but I think that's about the extent of it. Because, and here's the thing, their relationship became strained and distant. Eilistraee's relationship with the Seldarine as a whole is strained. She calls them allies and yet they don't really do anything to help her in her mission. Not even through indirect aid. It's pretty much "You're on your fucking own, kid" on the Seldarine's end. Like, do the Seldarine only give a shit about drow when they've 'repented' or whatever?

She is a one-god army fighting to save her people from the evils of her mother and I'd like to say she's now a two-god army post-Second Sundering but MTOF fucked with Vhaeraun and made him out to be subservient to Lolth (fuck Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. The only thing I really liked about that book was the Blessing of Corellon).

Why do I always get sidetracked and go off on tangents...

ANYWAY! Like I said, I think Sehanine's influence was mostly in relation to her as a teacher for Eilistraee during Eilistraee's godling years. Outside of that, I think the only one who has/had any actual influence on Eilistraee at this point is Erevan Ilsere and I say that because the rest of the Seldarine's she polite towards, him though? They're actually close. They have, at least to me, what looks to be a genuine friendship.

[butchdykekondraki]

if it's okay can you explain the dsaf lore please?

ignore how long this took to answer i have normal time management skills (<- lying)

okay dsaf lore is long and complicated so. its under the cut lol

okay to explain dsaf lore i kind of have to lay down some general like foundational lore and its. well its A Lot. dsaf is super convoluted lore-wise and theres a lot of world-building in this stupid 3-part game series its kind of ridiculous. moral of the story if something happens dont question it its just a dsaf thing. if you dont want foundational lore thats fine its not rlly THAT important its just context. that being said heres foundational lore

>the real fredbear is the metaphysical entity representing childhood, he is Not god but he is very similar to a god

>dont ask about why the flipside is Like That its just Like That for lore purposes and theres no reasoning behind it (from what im aware of)

>dave millers name comes from henrys dead son david miller which is why its so specific and why dave has the same last name as henry, no theyre not related, dave stole his name and imprinted onto him, yes hes still william afton, no he does not have the same backstory as william afton, and no dave is not the father of michael afton or anyone in the afton family bc elizabeth is rebranded as dee kennedy and michael and cc are stevens children

>the phone guys are Like That because of henry and abel fucking with their brains and shit and to save time i will not get into Why but just know that theres some real fucked up shit with them and thats why theyre so fucking Weird

>unimportant characters (like matt) will not be mentioned bc they do not matter and dsaf lore is convoluted enough without mentioning them

>peter, dee, and jack are all siblings but peter had no idea about it until dsaf 3 bc he had no memory of them due to phone fuckery, this doesnt matter a lot but it is important to mention bc of some lore implications in dsaf 2

>yes dee is the puppet when shes also a stand-in for elizabeth afton its fine bc the sl guys dont matter at all theyre not important just pretend they dont fucking exist bc they basically dont

>dsaf is SUPER lore divergent if you cant tell already so dont be shocked if i mention something and its not canon to the actual fnaf timelines bc its probably just dsaf-specific lore

>dont ask why henrys Like That he just Is and you just have to deal with that ok???

OKAY ONTO THE LIKE. ACTUAL LORE. lol. lmfao. (also theres two timelines that are both canon at the same time. dont ask how that works it just does okay)

radical/aubergine/gnarly/bad ending timeline (yes it does really have that many names. these are all the same thing dont get confused with minor changes like how jack dies in dsaf 1 and etc)

>henry miller starts fazbears family diner with dave miller, only for scott cawthon to start fazbenders immediately afterwards to ride off their success. during this time henry is experimenting with cheating death and manipulates dave into killing children at the diner to (without daves knowledge) experiment on them(/their souls) >jack kennedy (guy you play as/the protag) is springlocked in the backroom and henry and dave use his death to get away with the murders, particularly the murder of a girl named dee kennedy, by labeling him as the murderer who then died, only for “the real fredbear” to show up and revive him on the condition that he promises to save childrens souls

>henry is murdered by blackjack (jacks soul <- THIS WILL COME IN LATER DONT FORGET ABOUT HIM) and the diner is promptly bought out by fazbender entertainment >dave meets jack at a colorado location of fazbenders and dave negotiates that since jack is a "clean slate" he should help him murder five children, jack agrees and they lure five kids to the backroom and kill them. following this, steven (phoney 1) gets suspicious and promptly tries to frame jack, however dave finds out and together her and jack kill steven and the police who tried to arrest them by burning down the colorado location (and then ditching to vegas)

>in dsaf 2 they basically rinse and repeat the same process but after peter (phoney 2) finds out jack straight up Beats Him (and the real fredbear) To Death. (and then they ditch to vegas but dave is terrified of him now)

>in dsaf 3 dave(trap) is found rotting away in a building by jack and goes on a monologue of how he "knew he wouldnt leave him alone" and jack takes him back to the freddys location that jack now owns, and afterwards jack and davetrap kill multiple children, all while phoney 3 gets more suspicious.afterwards, after phoney 3 finds out about the murders, they snap and storm out after cursing you out >davetrap springlocks jack to give him "immortality" and they go to vegas, where davetrap goes on a brief rant about how he realized he was never happy because jack never knew who he "really was" and confesses to being william afton

>davetrap takes jack to his "fazbunker" (note this is just the same place as we see in fnaf sister location) and shows him a chest containing a red scarf and other memorabilia from murders he’s committed, and thus jack has a realization that this is his dead sister dee's scarf and comes to the correct conclusion that dave/william killed his younger sister and framed him back during the diner days, leading him to murder dave

good end/saved end/”THE end”

>everything is the same as before but this time you decline everytime dave asks you to kill kids and instead work with dee/the puppet to save the children via the happiest day minigame

>jack finds davetrap rotting and declines taking him back to uncle jacks family diner and davetrap sobs and cries and yells about how he should've known he would do this to him and begins begging jack not to leave him alone, but of course jack does and then heads home

>jack goes into "the flipside" via an arcade machine in his home and sees dave , to which jack is reasonably caught off guard and they have a talk where dave explains the flipside is where souls come to chill and that this first layer is based around the 70s-80s fazbenders locations they scurry around in here for a while before a child’s ghost appears and they fight him before jack frees his soul (and dave comments on how it feels nice to free a soul)

>dave makes a portal (this is never explained btw.) and they head off to the second layer of the flipside to find more souls to free. they scurry around the second layer of the flipside for a bit before pressing a button to open a door for the prize corner where dee is, where it’s then revealed she’s the puppet

>dee engages jack and dave in battle because she doesnt believe dave is "truly sorry" and thinks jack is making some sick joke at her expense. jack explains to dave that dee is it’s sister and jack tells dee not to worry because dave’s changed. she does not believe this and so dave tells her his entire backstory to which dee decides he’s pathetic and that she’ll work with him to save the souls for the childrens sake

>jack fucks off back to the reality and does reality shenanigans like running his business

>he comes back and they go into a portal to the third floor which is designed around 80s-90s fazbenders locations. on the third floor we meet steven who’s just been there the entire time, and he INSTANTLY assumes they're there to kill him and makes them battle robots until they find him huddled in a corner. he rambles about how he’s unsaveable and they should just leave him and jack has to pull him from his spiral to tell him he’s still worth saving even if he was a bit of a dick to everyone >dave makes another portal and they head down to the last level of the flipside and jack and dee remark about it being peters house and how weird that is because only jack and dee would remember that place. they wander around for a while before finding peter sitting in a room, to which he remarks about being a trap and this confuses everyone

>blackjack, who is taking the form of jack’s dead dog sparky, appears. blackjack is enraged that jack even exists, believing himself to be “the real jack kennedy” to which they argue and blackjack mentions how he has henry sitting in a void for all eternity as torment, this INFURIATES everyone to which they all collectively go “?? dude no we need to Kill Him.” and blackjack is pissed about it but he decides that “ok fine they can kill henry” so long as he gets to join them >they fight henry and during it he takes down everyone by nitpicking their deepest insecurities, besides jack who then revives them all and they kill that bastard

>everyone leaves except for dave and jack and it’s revealed that since jack doesn’t have a soul inside him he cannot go with, so instead he gives blackjack off to dave so that he won’t be alone >jack burns down his diner with him and every freddys animatronic inside and the plot of land is turned into a gravesite for william/dave, jack, dee, peter, and steven

[bananahoard]

Writing rambling, it's just long so it's a readmore & only like 2 friends care about this anyway.

I kinda hate catching up on my work (writing) so to speak, because then I get into that "now what?" mode & it drives me bananas. I've forgotten a bit of where I wanted my Digimon junk to be headed to since I quit working on it for about a year while job hunting, & now I'm just... drawing a blank. DBZ fic has longterm plans since it's a lot of original junk, but also attached to canon events, so it can go on indefinitely depending on how much timeline fuckery I am willing to plan & pull (a fairly major amount, possibly to Cell Saga, tbf).

Digimon is 100% my own stuff in a universe based on lore of the setting, but otherwise original, so it's a bit harder to work with for longterm "why is this happening" narrative overall. There's also just the bumpy road of how long can you reasonably write for what is basically a group of antagonists (in both writings) for an extended period of time & not have much for them to rub against? Devimon/Neodevimon for all intents & purposes is our main character, & thus antihero... if ONLY on the grounds that he initially is not NEARLY as morally corrupt & fucked as everyone else around him & thus is in opposition by sheer technicality. However, that does NOT last with his character & he very quickly becomes just as bad, & does not directly oppose this in the setting, either. He doesn't know better, & doesn't have anyone now to tell him otherwise (prior to say, when he was Angemon). Older writings didn't have this 'issue', as he was dealing with a lot more other positive influences & wasn't barely leaning into what I would say is strong Lawful Evil until much later. Asshole, sure, but not actually active bad. Yet. Now it's like- well, he's pretty damn bad from the get-go & you're never rooting for him. I don't WANT readers to do so, no. However, for longterm writing, it's sort of a "well, what now" with that, I guess. We're sitting here just watching to see how bad he gets & that's about it now (not that I don't know a few of you actually love that about Neo).

Normally not too much of an issue for me, but... I've forgotten the major later plans I had for Digimon shit involving a planned Piedmon, who would be a foil & issue for Baalmon, the then-most-powerful guy of the territory in this setting, if not only due to his advanced programming language BS with magic being too hard to counter by most "basic" gen-1 Digimon (so to speak). Devimon is a weakling, I'll tell you that much. There's a reason why he, as what is usually a powerful & fairly 'unique' species in (canon lore) is being pushed around by higher up Dark types. So. Baalmon has to die, eventually. Spoilers, I mean, but it comes up very early in the writing with more than one character suggesting there is something deeply wrong with him & that he's been tinkering with his natural lifespan for some reason. Hmm. Baalmon also has stolen something very important.

What the FUCK was I planning with the dimensional clown, though. Gdi it's driving me bananas. Piedmon is a BIG DEAL in lore. I wouldn't have chosen this in my notes for no good reason. Yet, for some reason it seems like I just didn't save the end of this notes document at the time, which is unlike me. I guess I'll figure it out.

I gotta go to work.

[agirlnamednix]

Uh-oh! Nix is retconning her OC lore again!

One sentence:

ZENOS IS THE BEASTLY HALF OF ARTEMIS

This is going to be just my hour-after-waking off-the-cuff rambling. I'll refine it later when I have spoons for that. >:D

LONG POST WARNING

So the deal with my WolOC is that they're actually two people who share a soul. Artemis is the huntress, does her own thing, works to capture escaped creations from Pandemonium. Apollo is Azem, the one everyone knows, the hero who succeeded Venat in the Convocation.

My ORIGINAL head canon was that Mjrd, Mjrn/Maja, and Ardbert were all weird mixtures of Artemis and Apollo. Eventually, Mjrd becomes Kariudo, the dark reflection of Artemis. Whereas Maja becomes Taiyo, the embodiment of Apollo.

But with Artemis being the huntress...and Zenos being all about the hunt...and Zenos seeing SO MUCH OF HIMSELF in the Warrior of Light...

What if Zenos is literally the other half of Artemis that Kari doesn't have?

What if Artemis DIDN'T get sundered properly? What if her soul remained entirely on the Source? What if Athena had done some fuckery with her, knowing that she was "a singularly resolute soul"?

WHAT IF LAHABREA WAS IN POSSESSION OF ARTEMIS'S SOUL THE ENTIRE TIME AND DIDN'T KNOW IT?

He would've eventually given it to Emet-Selch, right? "You'd make better use of this than I." And then Emet-Selch would've been like "Well, I don't need an entire soul, so I'll just cleave it in half and make a baby with it." He's known to do shit like that (re: Vauthry) and we know that Zenos was particularly juiced so like...what if he fucked around with his grandson's soul? What if he implanted half of Artemis into Zenos, likely not even knowing who she was? And before all of that, he'd already discarded the rest, having prepared for a soul to be stronger after the Seventh Umbral Calamity. So he cleaved Artemis in two, dumped one half into the Aetherial Sea, then held onto the other half. When Zenos was born, he shoved the half he still had into him before he was born, creating a soul-roided baby.

But unbeknownst to him, the other half of Artemis didn't dissipate like a normal soul. It immediately did what Artemis has always done: its own thing. And so about 50 years ago, Mjrd was born the bearer of the other half of Artemis's soul.

This removes a LOT of confusion regarding Artemis and Apollo. During the Seventh Rejoining, Kari would've gained a shard of Artemis, bringing her up to 8 of 14 on soul fragments. However, when she rejoined with Ardbert in Shadowbringers (putting her at 9 of 14 soulshards, Ardbert's being from Apollo) and then met Maja between Shadowbringers and Endwalker (Maja bearing 7 of 14 shards of Apollo), she passed on her extra soul shard to Maja, bringing them both to 8 of 14 soul shards of Artemis and Apollo respectively.

And so, moving into Endwalker, they worked together to prevent a new Final Days. But Maja (now going by Taiyo or just Tai) took center stage, being the one whom Elidibus remembered from Elpis, the one who went back in time without Kari, the one who set EVERYTHING IN MOTION. However, Kari is the one who kept fighting with Zenos, the one whose body he stole...and the reason he ended up traveling to Ultima Thule to fight alongside her and Tai. In my mind, Tai is the one who calls upon Azem's power, with Kari only being capable of that on The First because she's close enough to Azem's soul, while also carrying a piece of Apollo with her in the form of Ardbert.

"Light The Way" was for both Tai and Kari, with Taiyo being the one to protect them both. And then it was Kariudo who struck the killing blow.

However, after the battle...Zenos calls Kari out. And she's finally had enough of this dude. She knocks Tai unconscious and duels with Zenos. After all is said and done, Zenos lies still and Kari is barely hanging on. The teleporter remote thing lands next to Kari and she has just enough energy to knock it toward Taiyo. He teleports away, leaving Zenos and Kariudo, the entirety of Artemis's soul, stranded at the very bleeding edge of reality itself.

Maybe Artemis does her own thing and heads back. Maybe the two of them dying with no other aether around them but Artemis's soul causes her to reform into her pre-Sundering self. Maybe she just finally allows her aether to disperse into the universe.

It's utterly unknown.

And I ADORE the idea that I have that tiny sprig hanging off a clean cut stem...and have absolutely no reason to ever pursue it further. Having Kari's fate be completely ambiguous from the perspective of the other characters is just...OUGH IT'S TASTY. I LOVE that. The idea that Tai's last memory of his other half is turning around to get a fistful of fives. And then...he has no idea what happened to her. At all. Nobody does. Tai came back. Kari didn't.

And honestly? It doesn't need to be anything more. :D

[glassmarcus]

Not Another Triforce of the Gods

*Played in May 2023, Written in December 2023

Look, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is a big ass game. I spent an irresponsible amount of time on it. So it's just not in the cards for me to write about it to the extent I write about other stuff. There's too much to dissect, especially since it’s so attached to the preceding title, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which is also a gargantuan beast of a game. Yes, the Ultra Hand mechanic is insane and makes this the best Lego game ever made. Yes, that Master Sword Cutscene is the most gilded cutscene in the franchise. Yea dungeons aren't boring and have unique flavors again. Yes, the Fuse ability makes the economy of this game functional...for most of the game. There's a lot about it that I want to touch upon, the main thing I feel the need to dwell on is the fact this is also just A Link to the Past again.

Hear me out. I know it's a bit played out to compare other Zelda games to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past at this point. I've witnessed many claims that The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is essentially A Link to the Past with a 3rd dimension. Hell, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds was explicitly link to the past 2, as its Japanese title is just Triforce of the Gods 2 (Triforce of the Gods is the Japanese title of Link to the Past (Now the title of this write up makes a bit more sense huh?)). There are elements of Link to the Past which are strongly dispersed throughout the whole franchise. It’s sort of the default Zelda that all games from it until Breath of the Wild were built upon, so games having similarities makes sense. But there is a structural, mechanical, and narrative root to it that some Zelda games have more than others. And I think Tears of the Kingdom leans a bit harder towards Link to the Past than most. If Breath of the Wild was a modern take on the original Zelda, then it would be an interesting case study to view Tears of the Kingdom as a modern take on A Link to the Past. It makes sense that would be the next thing Nintendo would do if we ignore the existence of Zelda 2 like they usually do. I wanna find out if this hypothesis holds any water, and that's exactly what I'm gonna do.

The first thing that stood out to me as Triforce of the Gods vibes was the story. Not in terms of structure and themes, that came later. The primary moment of being reminded of Link to the Past was referencing the same lore as that game. When Zelda said the term "Imprisoning War" I lost my goddamned mind. My atrophied Zelda Lore Muscles finally got a work out for the first time in a decade. Breath of the Wild took place so far in the future that none of the Zelda timeline nonsense I dedicated myself to understanding mattered. It was a huge bummer. While I get the team doesn't want to be constrained by the world building of past games, I prefer franchises that have consistent world building between games so that concepts can be fleshed out further.

Now if there was never any attempt at this in the first place I wouldn't yearn for it. But Nintendo themselves are insistent on making their games connect and it honestly led to them applying some cool time theory concepts because of it. Seeing the consequences of Ocarina of Time lead to 3 timelines that all vary dramatically is one of the most interesting things about the franchise. So to see them basically throw it all away in Breath of the Wild was a huge coward move. Just make it a separate canon. As much as I hate Castlevania: Lords of Shadows, I can’t help but appreciate how it doesn't mess with the lore of the Castlevania games I do like by being in its own canon. Having everything converge at the end made the timeline fuckery in Ocarina of Time feel less meaningful. It all built towards nothing and it was the most xeric move they could have made.

Tears of the Kingdom acknowledging the Imprisoning War, also known as the events of Ocarina of Time, made me loregasm even harder than Zelda did in that opening cutscene. Neurons started firing as I drew conclusions about which timeline it canonically took place in, how it connected with events in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, whether or not this was adding context to previous titles. And then I found out that there is no possible way the Imprisoning War mentioned in A Link to the Past is the same one here. There were too many inconsistencies and before I knew it, my once rock hard lore boner soon became as flaccid as a korok leaf.

Ocarina of Time is about finding a group of sages who will aid you in defeating and sealing away the Demon King. Link to the Past is about finding the descendants of those sages who will aid you in defeating and sealing away the Demon King. Link between Worlds is about finding the descendants of those sages who will aid you in defeating and sealing away the Demon King. Tears of the Kingdom is yet again about finding a group of sage descendants who will aid you in defeating and sealing away the Demon King. Though to be fair, this time it’s more about awakening the descendants than it is finding them. These games all share a basic narrative thrust. The difference with Tears of the Kingdom is that it’s not a derivation of past events, but an entire reinterpretation. You learn about both the past incarnations of the sages along with the current ones. The story of the past is fleshed out as you proceed through the main quest until it all becomes clear that this isn't connected to Ocarina of Time or Skyward Sword at all really.

I have no huge issue with the story itself in Tears of the Kingdom or its similarities to A Link to the Past. Well I am annoyed how the end of each dungeon gives you identical cutscenes, but I digress. I only take offense with the terminology this game decides to use. Why call it the Imprisoning War again? If it's a different thing, call it a different thing. I get that the story is cyclical in nature, but it’s hack writing that a similar event happened and they called it the EXACT SAME NAME by complete coincidence. I'm also kind of ticked off that the reincarnation of Ganondorf is called Ganondorf again and has a completely congruent background. Zelda is named Zelda because of tradition and this is first link that’s canonically called link. Why the hell is Ganondorf still Ganondorf though? I feel that no matter what timeline you follow the name ‘Ganondorf’ has to have lost a bit of popularity. They pulled the same crap with Twinrova in the Oracle games and it was stupid there too. But I guess I can understand from a marketing stand point why they had to do that. But the Imprisoning War was made solely to bait suckers like me to latch on to an idea that was too on the nose and hallow. Just reboot it. If they aren't gonna attempt to actually link to the past in ways that aren't shallow, I see no value in stapling this duology to the end of the series.

But those are only my inane thoughts on how this game has a similar story to A link to the Past in a very hackneyed way. The similarities with Link to the Past which exude substance lies within the world design.

If I were to zero in on the most defining aspect of A Link to the Past that hasn't become a mandatory linchpin of the traditional Zelda formula, I would have to go with The Dark World. The Dark World acted as this messed up reflection of the Hyrule you knew. You spent the first act of the game exploring a colorful world that had its problems for sure. but was for the most part pleasant. Then you travel to the Dark World which is a corrupted reflection of everything you knew. Colors are darker, the geography is shifted, enemies are meaner. It creates an oppressive atmosphere and feels oppressive because you know what it should look like.

Ocarina of Time followed suit, but with a dark future instead of a dark world. In that game you travel to a future where Ganondorf has taken over and everything has been colossally fucked. It's not an alternate world as much as it's a glimpse into what your world will be if you don’t save the day. Characters age up from the period seven years prior, but they have fallen on hard times and it's up to you to make sure they don't get this bad ending. The future functionally acts as a Dark World where you swap between time periods similar to how you swap between realms. You're only required to return to the past a couple of time though after you reach Act 2, while you return to the light world quite a bit more on Link to the Past. But honestly neither game uses the interaction between worlds that much mechanically.

The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages doesn't have much in common with these two games in terms of plot and structure, but it does have the two similar worlds concept and attempts to utilize it to its fullest potential this time around. Time Travel is an event that only necessarily occurs only a few times in Ocarina of Time; Time Travel is something you are constantly doing in Oracle of Ages. It's an ability you have from the beginning and almost every overworld puzzle involves switching between two time periods. It's complex and pushes the idea in a way Link to the Past couldn’t have dreamed of. But while this made for a cleverer use of having two worlds, it loses a lot by taking this approach. For one, it's annoying to use because the animation for playing the Harp of Ages takes waaay to long and you use this item A LOT. But most importantly, you never get attached to a certain time period so the contrast between the two feels dulled and unmemorable. Because there is no familiarity, the two worlds meld together into one big puzzle.

A Link Between Worlds, as per usual with this game, is the compromise between ideals. It's structurally the same as A Link to the Past, so you get the opportunity to become familiar with your home world of Hyrule. When entering the second act of the game and you gain access to the parallel world in which the kingdom of Lorule resides, the contrast between the two is powerful. It's mechanically more inline with Oracle of Ages though, with traversing between worlds having heavier emphasis. It doesn't go over board like Ages, as Hyrule is perfectly traversable without dimension hopping. It's only Lorule that requires this ability to explore. Lorule is not a sustainable healthy environment as its landscape is completely fractured and falling apart. In order for it to be a functioning map, it needs Hyrule’s help and the whole plot is kind of about that and it's a bit peak. Lorule has been my favorite take on the two worlds concept...Until possibly now.

Tears of the Kingdom has multiple worlds. This is no secret. It was marketed as having a traversable sky biome above Hyrule and it implied the game would focus on navigating between both land and sky. Kinda like Skyward Sword, but fleshed out and complete. Well the joke is on us because both games ended up having an incomplete Sky Realm. Regardless of the quality of the sky world, this approach to having multiple worlds is far different from the previous examples I brought up. It's not some alternate version of another plane, but a separate area located directly above it. The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons kind of had the same approach in the opposite direction, as they implement this idea with Subrosia, an under ground civilization that feels very separate from the surface world. Only the geographic landmarks between the two worlds matters, so it's not 1:1 in the size and general structure I've grown accustomed to. The sky in Tears of the Kingdom and Subrosia are much smaller than the base world map, so it fails to scratch that same itch.

But I still left Tears of the Kingdom with no skin discomfort to be found. Why is that? Well it didn't really hit me until I started viewing the game as what it truly was: A direct sequel with heavy asset reuse. There has been a lot of complaints about how similar Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild are. Complaints that it’s an extension or DLC, not a brand new game. I was resistant to this criticism at first, but now I accept it as less of a criticism and more of an objective fact. No other Zelda game has the asset reuse concentration that this one has. It very much feels like a continuation. You even keep your horses between games. I started the game and everything felt so familiar, yet so different as well. The geography was very similar, yet altered. The characters were back, but had gone through changes. Breath of the Wild was relaxed and open, while Tears has a dash of urgency and direction. Things feel dire in comparison. The feeling I got from Tears of the Kingdom, is the feeling I got from the 2nd act of Ocarina of Time. And barring the ability to travel back to past, they are essentially congruent. Tears by itself is not a Triforce of the Gods game, but the duology as a whole is.

Every Triforce of the Gods game, hell most 3D Zelda games in general follow a Three Act Structure. In Act 1 you are introduced to the world and have to surmount a set of easy dungeons before confronting the big bad of the game. Whether you get bodied in a cutscene or defeat the evil guy in a boss fight, the 2nd act starts and it's much more dire than the first with tougher enemies and dungeons to conquer. Then in the 3rd act, you confront the big bad and defeat them for real this time. Only the low profile Zelda games have escaped this structure. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask dodge it as well because it's just built different. I thought Breath of the Wild's open ended design philosophy made this structure impossible, and it does, but only when you view it as a single game.

I've lamented for years about how utterly disappointing the final boss of Breath of the Wild is. It's such a wet fart at the end of a great adventure. But while I don't excuse it, I don't hate it nearly as much as it's no longer the final boss. It's the Act 1 closer. The assault on Hyrule castle at the end of Breath of the Wild is analogous to the assault on Hyrule castle in A Link to the Past, and Calamity Ganon is the equivalent of Agahnim. The last two acts of the journey are in Tears of the Kingdom. I'm quite confident at this point if you focus and ignore the open aspects of both games as you marathon both back to back, you'll have a clear Triforce of the Gods experience. Sure it’s kinda weird how the Sheikah and Divine Beast tech dissipates into the ether without explanation between games, but other than that, it’s a pretty direct follow up. Even though there is no possible way they planned this from the beginning, the narrative structure and story content I’m looking for is present in this duology. But as I previously stated, your transition to the 2nd act is a 1 way street. There is no interaction between the future and past. So mechanically it might not feel the same. But Tears also has us covered on that end. If you want mechanical depth in world traversal, look no further than The Depths themselves.

I used to think the Tears of the Kingdom was a lame name. In a series of games with sick titles, Tears of the Kingdom couldn't really compete. But then I played the game and found out that this title was crafted by someone with a far higher IQ than my own. Now I would tier it higher than most. The pun is on an entirely different level. It's not just about the fall of the Hylian Kingdom, it's about how you explore multiple layers of it. There are 4 worlds to explore in this duology. The original Breath of the Wild Hyrule and the modified Post Time Skip Hyrule are the two main ones. The 3rd(or 2nd chronologically) that you experience is the sky above this Hyrule Shippuden. But underneath it is the best kept secret of this game: The Depths. An entire underground map that is 1:1 in size with the surface. It is a fully realized version of Subrosia. It shows the echoes of the past and future you'd see in Ocarina of Time and Oracle of Ages. It is every bit as intimidating as the Dark World and Lorule. The Depths is arguably the best version of a reflected realm these games have ever had.

With The Depths you'll find remnants of the kingdom's past. It's not as if you are literally traveling back in time, but instead getting the left overs. Faded cultures from millennia ago are present throughout the Depths. It's as if the old civilization the new one was built on top of didn't get destroyed, but was pushed down. This is why all the Easter Egg items you see in past games are located here this time, because that's logically where they should be.

The Depths are eerie and vast. When you first get down there it's so dark you can't see a thing. You use the materials to light up the area, but then you start to realize how futile it is. The Depths are not a series of caves, it is a second map entirely. One of the most gratifying things you can do in these games is get a good vantage point and note all the cool places you can go to. I remember at the beginning of the game when falling to the surface from the sky, immediately took out my ZonaiPad and started marking where I wanted to go.

You can't really do that in The Depths super easily. The only thing that stands out is the Light Roots you see in the distance, other wise you can't see jack without launching light fruit all over the place. It makes exploration absolutely terrifying, and at any point something new can pop out of the dark and attack you or you can accidentally wander into the wrong part of town and get stuck in a pile of HP decreasing sludge. The atmosphere cannot be understated. It felt like I didn't belong there. It was as if I was looting resources from a foreign planet. I got a ton on bombs on my first trip down there, but at the cost of a bit of my sanity. This makes figuring out how to light the dark a priority and one of the more satisfying things you do in this game despite me doing it 120 times.

The Depths are a reflection of the surface in ways other than theming. The underground logically has to be vaguely similar to the surface, with bodies of water and mountains acting as impassable walls while the plains are free to be what ever they want. The general grouping of areas is always identical because the underground is the foundation for the surface. When the game takes advantage of this relationship is when it's at its best. On the surface, the two main landmarks you gravitate towards are Towers and Shrines. Towers being ways to collect map data and Shrines to act as bountiful warp points. They act as sort of exploration checkpoints. Some of these Shrines and Towers are hard to find and access though. You can have a general idea of where a Shrine is, but a general idea might not be enough. A lot of Towers involve puzzles you need to solve before accessing. What does a player do if they get stumped by these landmarks? Go to The Depths.

The Light Roots act as both towers and Shrines in terms of map exploration. They are the only guaranteed source of light in The Depths and activating them lights up the whole area they reside in as well as filling out that map data AND acting as a fast travel point. Activating Light Roots is insanely valuable for further exploration of not only The Depths, but of the surface as well. Light Roots are exactly what they sound like. Bright roots that sprout from The Depths and through the surface where Shrines are blossomed. They are inverses of each other thus are always clearly linked together. Even their names are reversed anagrams of each other. Wherever there's a Light Root there has to be a Shrine directly above it. So if you know where a Light Root is, you have pretty much found a Shrine too. And because the maps for the surface and The Depths are so similar, you almost don't need the towers because you can figure out the geography from the map of The Depths you filled out by activating Light Roots.

And the best part is, this works both ways. If you have found a Shrine you have found a Light Root. If you have activated a tower, you figure out the geography of The Depths easier even without the Light Roots. This duality gives all three of these landmarks more value by how they interact with each other. It's a version of the Dark World that is perfect for an open game that focuses on exploration. The interplay between the worlds is the most fun I have with this game. Puzzles that require knowledge of not just The Depths and surface, but also the sky were the highlights of my playthrough. It's the most interesting this concept has been. But in the end, I don't think I clearly prefer it over the others.

I wish I could be completely positive in this aspect of the game, but like the Demon King Ganondorf, my inner hater will not be subdued. The major draw backs to this version of a parallel world is that it magnifies the existing issues with the game. While there are loads of fun areas to explore on the surface, the map is still plagued with repetition. There are more enemies than in Breath of the Wild, but still not nearly enough for how large this game is. There are caves now to increase the density of content, but most of those caves end up feeling the same halfway through the game. It's the same issue I had with Elden Ring. The amount of ideas the game has can't keep up with the size of the map. And because we have The Depths, the issue is multiplied by two. Exploring The Depths was fine in the beginning and early-mid game, but afterwards it became clear I've seen everything it had to offer yet there was so much left to do. Once I started running into boss rematches, I knew the game was at a loss for content.

I still hold that this the best thing they've done with this concept on a mechanical level. I only wish it was in smaller game. I've come to terms that the finely crafted 3D Zelda experiences that I prefer are dead and gone and have to be helmed by some spiritual successor. But do these games really need to be this fucking big? This is what it always comes down to. Now that we can make impressive huge games, we never stop to think if we should. While I enjoyed this bigger version of Triforce of the Gods that has a surprising dearth of Triforce, I don't think the size is worth it in the end. And I hate to keep complaining about this in everything I write that’s even tangentially related to Zelda, but it continues to be an issue for me and all open world games in general. Hopefully when they make Triforce of the Gods 5, they can reel in the size and make something truly amazing.

[troofless]

update on how i wasted 5h on the new xbc3 dlc story, new grips come to light:

feels a whole lot of the story was hinging on nostalgia bait rather than solving the plot holes in the main story, which is just peachy

matthew is not an interesting protagonist and is only there to represent the family feud in n’s long bloodline of fuckery. i thought matthew and a would have more synergy since they are literally the two faces of the game but they are just surface level friends with banter. a continues holding herself at arms length like alvis does for obvious reasons but this means matthew feels so isolated

nice loredump on xbc1 and xbc2 tho, i like the throwbacks to past places like colony 9 and uraya and prison island

i almost laughed when i saw the joran-looking guy die the first 10 minutes in lmao

the sharla and pandora reincarnations/children were pretty neat ig

shulk’s design in particular looks ugly af come at me bro

was it ever stated what happened to pyra/mythra? did they just die or revert back to the core crystal form? idk i didn’t watch the community stuff. also ig there are multiple green core crystals on glimmer and the fists of the end which is not confusing at all :/

i liked the detail that malos/logos is now the sword of the end and mythra/pneuma is fists of the end which is later noah’s gauntlet thing

confirmed that ghondor is n’s son and no wonder ghondor (main game) was pissed at her name lmaooo

i also liked the throwback to the gem crafting lmao

no explanation for lucky seven because of course

no explanation for riku either

no explanation for how shulk and rex and the others are still unassimilated but some of the other people get sucked into the cycle of reincarnation (i guess z is clumsy ha ha)

some explanation for how the city people don’t get fucked over by the two world merging at the end of main story ig

i literally said ‘what the fuck’ out loud when a said n wasn’t matthew’s enemy. like what the fuck. no.

oh wow imagine trying to justify n’s biggest crime of massacring an entire city of people ha ha wouldn’t it be funny if he didn’t actually murder them, absolving him of all crimes (bruh)

the dlc tried to hard to make n look sympathetic but i ended up hating him more. same for z man. like who invited you to the dlc party gtfo you didn’t even do anything

idk man i think na’el/alpha made a lot of sense in going for the new world esp with what happened in the end of the main story

a: yo but you saw what happened to klaus’s world! they decided to split it up and destroy it like dumbasses! that’s why your plan is bad! she says, literally ignoring that a world of peace is much better than whatever the fuck was the stagnant world of xbc3

also can i question why did alvis. just not leave without matthew. he had to fuck it up by showing himself in his physical form so that everyone could beat him up ten times over. cmon alvis

i feel like nikol and discount mythra could have been taken out of the story and nothing would have changed. what did they do other than be fanservice bait for the xbc1 and xbc2 ppl and have some bullshit ‘i promise to rebuild the city and carry on your legacy, dads :(’ like lmaooo

literally the ending of the main story was them deciding the future for themselves and them not wanting to stay in a stagnant world, something that contradicts the ending of the dlc like wtf

they went all the way, fought the god, just for a conclusion that didn’t matter because the two worlds merged anyway at the end of the game :)

i went into the dlc in the hopes of being able to complain that they locked the best part and best lore of the game behind a paywall but now i’m just disappointed. torna dlc was better. it had better pacing, better protagonist duo with lora and jin, started off stronger, didn’t have stupid flashbacks every three seconds same problem with xbc3 main story, better characters and character-synergy and humour. 

tldr it’s a waste of time not worth it, just play fire emblem engage instead goty fr

[maximumcatfeels]

I don’t know enough Pokémon lore to really write anything, but I think it would be cool/funny if Ingo and Emmet reunited by Emmet stepping off a boat with other new people from other regions coming to Jubilife.

Everyone has been thinking that he’ll show up through a rift, a space-time distortion, or even some fuckery involving Zozoarks, but nah. Fucker just strolls off the boat, walks up to a guard and says “I am Emmet. Where is the man that looks like me?” While pointing at his face.

Of course, Emmet’s in full Cowboy Conductor drip, including a cowboy hat (that the emblem from his conductors hat is now affixed to), a serape in his white and red stripes, and a white bandanna over his ever smiling mouth (that he lowers when he needs to ask people where-is-Ingo??).

Turns out that Emmet has been in Unova or w/e Pokémon equivalent of the American Wild West is, helped his chosen over there get shit done super fast, and then somehow found out about Ingo in Hisui. So, being impatient, he sailed over.

Emmet had retained all of his memories (unlike Ingo), and Arceus/whatever Pokémon Demi-god that needed help over there promised to tell him where Ingo was once he was done helping the chosen one. Emmet was supposed to only be a guiding force (like Ingo) but Emmet was much more proactive and antsy to find his brother, he basically -encouraged- the chosen to speed run saving an entire region. Most of his time was spent on boats making long voyages to get to Kanto, then go up and up through regions until he got to Hisui.

I also think it would be hilarious if Emmet and his chosen one had been caught up in a train robbery whilst in Unova/Pokémon American Wild West (as in press ganged into helping a gang rob a train) and Emmet had only agreed to help because he didn’t trust the chucklefucks to do it safely. It ends up being a comedy of errors, but no injuries/deaths thankfully.

(Later, when they are both back in their proper time/region, Ingo is curious about Emmet’s adventures and decides to check out some history books from the local library. The resulting argument over why there are records of a smiling man in white who kept talking about safety protocols during a train robbery lasts for about a week.)

[aemiron-main]

You have absolutely 💯 sent me down a rabbit hole with your laundrygate and doorgate theories!!

This is such a ramble of thoughts so forgive the length. I apologize sincerely if someone already has shared a similar opinion but....what if our favorite unreliable narrator really was under an illusion during his kidnapping? What if Will does have powers which led to him being Vecna's first victim? And what if the weird time inconsistencies aren't due to time manipulation but rather space-time.

In the first episode, the Duffers give us the Xmen 134 reference. Most people quickly connected that to Brenner's manipulation of El and how she later defeats the demogorgan. The parallels are there for sure but if Will really was under an illusion and does have powers than there's a possible bigger parallel.

Without going to deeply into comic lore or nitty-gritty specifics of the Phoenix Force abilities, the villain Mastermind, in a bid to control Jean Grey and her powers, creates incredibly vivid illusions to awaken her true potential. This eventually gives rise to the Dark Phoenix. The Phoenix Force can manipulate space-time. Create and destroy universes. Edit timelines by changing both the past and the future. Be in two places at once.

What if the Mindflayer was already watching Will and was connected to him much like the Phoenix watched Jean since she was a child? Both making them targets for villains who see their potential and much like Mastermind, Vecna's vivid illusion triggered something far more powerful than he was prepared.

Space-time capabilities would explain why Will's vanishing is similar to teleportation. It would also explain why Barb's disappearance was similar if the mindflayer and Will already had a connection which allowed the demogorgan to simply move between worlds. And why Will and the Mindflayer can exist simultaneously in the UD and out. His communicating with Joyce and El while in the UD. The strange gaps in time could be editing from the part of his mind that was already connected to the Mindflayer. He is a spy after all.

What I personally find vexing is that Will's true sight ability simply disappeared after the end of his possession despite having had it prior to. Did the Mindflayer absorb some of the ability since Will and Flayed Billy were both able to communicate with El in the void? Or did Owens install Soteria in Will at the end of season 2 since season 4 revealed that he and Brenner knew about Vecna what he did to his victims? Owens knows vecna wants to destroy the world and if he suspected that Will could spy again, installing soteria would make sense because it would limit the connection. It also links up with his neck spidersense and could be why Will's expressions when discussing Owen look like he doesn't really trust him....because you know, he's a spy.

Here's to him being a successful double spy next season.

OMG PLS NO NEED TO APOLOGIZE BECAUSE THIS IS ABSOLUTELY GENIUS!!!! IM SO SORRY I TOOK SO LONG TO GET AROUND TO THIS ASK!! Everything you said about the xmen 134 really caught my eye, because  I had no clue about the lore behind it!! and i personally DEFINITELY think that will was under some sort of illusion/space time fuckery the night he disappeared, because theres way too many small, purposeful inconsistencies for them all to be production mistakes, including things like the gun still being on the rack in the shed AFTER will disappears, but then gone again when hopper goes in the shed the next day. And the fact that the xmen 134 comic + all of the genius parallels you’ve described here is mentioned in the same episode that will disappears in, right before he disappears?? There’s no way it’s a coincidence.  When you described “The Phoenix Force can manipulate space-time. Create and destroy universes. Edit timelines by changing both the past and the future. Be in two places at once,” I actually immediately thought of will’s season 2 episodes, considering that even dustin, lucas and mike say that it’s different from dnd true sight, considering that with dnd true sight, the person cannot be hard by the other world, but will IS able to be harmed by the mindflayer/the upside-down. So, will’s abilities definitely point towards being physically present in both the real world and the upside-down at the same time, and physically able to interact with both at the same time (ie, when will walks out of the arcade in the upside-down, he also physically walks out of it in the real world.)  ”Space-time capabilities would explain why Will's vanishing is similar to teleportation. It would also explain why Barb's disappearance was similar if the mindflayer and Will already had a connection which allowed the demogorgan to simply move between worlds. And why Will and the Mindflayer can exist simultaneously in the UD and out. His communicating with Joyce and El while in the UD. The strange gaps in time could be editing from the part of his mind that was already connected to the Mindflayer. He is a spy after all.” YES I LOVE THIS IT MAKES SENSE!!!  OKAY, SO: personally, i don’t think that it actually disappeared, especially since he had the ability prior to his possession/had his first episode in the show at the end of season 1- instead, I think that his powers/true sight possibility went “dormant,” in a similar way that El’s powers did + how she had to use nina to get them back. However, it’s also strange to me that will’s episodes seem to have ended as of season 3, but his neck tingles/connection to vecna still remains.  I think that everything you’ve mentioned here regarding will and flayed billy or owens and soteria are absolutely viable theories, and I’m honestly not sure what the answer is. And that’s also a very good point about linking up with the neck spidersense!!! And regarding flayed billy, when you mentioned that, it brought to mind the fact that billy sort of sees a “clone” of himself in the upside-down that talks to him, and like i’ve pointed out before, there’s that weird netflix still image on the pause screen that shows will looking into the shed at the EXACT moment that he would have disappeared: did we somehow have a weird will-clone situation going on???  It’s also interesting that during the scene where will is talking about owens with mike in s4, there’s that blooper of noah going “when i was the spy,” so that is another, albeit small, link between owens and spy imagery. It’s also interesting to me that owens was pre-emptively working on nina in the case of el losing her powers/needing them back again, so he’s definitely been thinking pretty far ahead with this sort of stuff, so i think there’s definitely a possibility that he was worried about will spying again.  My brain is total mush today so apologies if my reply is all over the place, but this is all absolutely brilliant and i love it, and im going to be thinking about it!! 

[rhine-gold-archive]

Yo i don't know if anybody has discussed this yet - but i think somewhere i read "HoYo will eventually kill one of the playable characters" and like, this memory just randomly woke me up at 3 a.m. I wanted to ask if you might have an opinion about this topic? If any major, playable character - might die, for example near the end of the game? Like Dain (if they release him as playable) - but it might just as well be, like, the traveler, or Kaeya, or Lisa (if HoYo remembers she exsistes) - ???

well, it's a popular topic for speculation, but at this point its all we can do - speculate. but yeah, some characters have narrative death flags all over them, especially everyone associated with Khaenri'ah - like Dainsleif, travelers, Kaeya, Albedo.

Dain's entire story is about being in constant suffering for 500 years and he basically announced himself as a final boss in Teyvat chapter trailer.

Albedo not only has the ongoing shitshow with his doppelganger, but also, we have a storyline of Durin, the first creation of Gold, who also created Albedo. Durin is known as an evil black dragon, who attacked Mondstadt and had to be killed by Dvalin. But if we read lore of some items on Dragonspine, we can learn that Durin wasn’t actually evil, in fact, he had a very gentle and poetic soul and died, admiring Dvalin and wishing they could be friends instead. Re: Albedo, hoyo pushes very heavily that Traveler is Albedo’s only close friend, whom he admires and shares secrets. while at the same time, we have Albedo’s bombshell line “Will you stop me, if one day I lose control... destroy Mondstadt, destroy everything.” so it seems, they are heavily seeding the “at some point Albedo becomes corrupted, loses control and attacks Mondstadt, and has to be killed by the Traveler, his closest friend and confidant,” narrative, in parallel to Durin’s story.

both traveler and abyss sibling I’d say are at risk. especially after the lore drop about the inteyvat flowers (flowers that Lumine wears in her hair) from Dain in the chasm - how these flowers only grow in Khaenri'ah, but if you take them out, they will crystalize and never wilt, until you take them back to Khaenri'ah - then, they will crumble. And counting that abyss sibling keeps talking about restoring their homeland and they are both seemingly immortal and hundreds of years old, they can either be from Khaenri'ah (with some time fuckery) or from the previous civilization from the same place where later Khaenri'ah was built. Either way, motive of being immortal and then crumbling to dust when returning to homeland doesn’t bode well for both siblings.

Kaeya has I’d say several narrative death flags, the whole “last hope of Khaenri'ah” and allusions to being it’s prince, the whole eyepatch and “celestia’s needle stashed in a cave” i talked about recently, the choice Mona alleges he’ll have to make, the angsty standoff with Diluc. Though if they kill him just to get some Diluc angst, like “oh Diluc thought he was a betrayer, but Kaeya sacrificed himself to save Mondstadt, they reconcile and Kaeya dies,” I’m gonna be so mad, it’s such a tired cliche.  

Honorable mentions to Lisa (if they remember she exists) who had half of her life eaten by the cursed book and whose constellation is time sands, Venti, who has a tragic backstory with many dead friends and “ehehe” demeanor that positions him very well as a tear-jerker sacrifice, Tartag who just like... has the vibes, due to foul legacy eating his life, abyss association and the whole “corrupted into constantly seeking bloodlust and battles” thing. Maybe Zhongli? He has a storyline of slowly degrading and killing him off would be both a shocker moment to the audience, kinda taking the safety net away - now there’s really no Morax looking over from the shadows, and also loop back to how his entire storyline started with his funeral. 

[ac-liveblogs]

So in hindsight I'm now realizing that Mihoyo killing Signora was a dick move since she technically did the least amount of bad shit. Like, frfr. They retconned 1.1 Scaramouche to me misunderstood twitter twink #999 and there's the possibility of Dottore being playable. I don't care what they do. They can't retcon a man who literally kidnaps kids, experiments on them and then when they die he kidnaps more children to experiment on.

Eh, I disagree that that's why killing Signora was a bad move. I don't think you need to reach a certain Badness Threshold in order to deserve to die or that others can deserve it more, it just needs to be narratively satisfying. And Signora... her role was to show up at the end of an Archon Quest, stick her tongue out at you and your squad, then swan off with a Gnosis. She stuck out her tongue at Raiden and died for it, that's all. And her lore is condensed into artifacts instead of being used in any unique capacity in the storyline at all...

She was killed off before she even got to do anything unique or interesting. We didn't even get a real grudge match between her and Barbatos. What a waste of time.

Though regarding Scaramouche, I don't think he was retconned at all, because we only started learning about him in Inazuma. In 1.1, he tries to kill you and gets stopped by Mona, then shows up later, talks some very mild trash, does a monologue about the sky being fake that hasn't paid off yet, then fucked off and we didn't see him again for an IRL year or so.

It's not like we learnt anything about him Inazuma that actually contradicted the very little we learnt in 1.1? I think it's more that people just got an idea of what Scaramouche would be like that didn't match the reality. That's what happens when you have no information about a character for a solid year, I guess. I also don't think Scaramouche is... I mean, he very much still went on a murder spree. He just had a reason for it now, which doesn't really make it better.

Anyway, Scaramouche is currently just as bad as Signora in terms of narrative fuckery and waste-of-time-edness. Unless they throw us some serious curveballs in his character arc, if he never gets involved with Raiden/Inazuma again you can safely write him off as another complete waste of time. I expect he and Kazuha will at least meet... ...that would be the bare minimum.

lmao @ dottore. I don't think they have to retcon him into a good person to make him playable? I mean, I hope they wouldn't? Playing as a villain is fun...

[unnaturalbleu]

DSMP SCHOOL NEWS AU

Anchors: Dream, Sapnap, Tommy, Wilbur, Tubbo, Quackity, Schlatt

Camera: Eret, Tubbo, George

Teleprompter: George, Tubbo, Fundy

Editors: George, Fundy, Tubbo

Producers: Tubbo, Wilbur, Dream, Eret, Karl,

Notes: George is forced to only be a part of the behind the scenes because of some repetitive unspoken events.

Tubbo has the power and experience to produce his own one man news show (he’s done it once and he can do it again.)

1st class period of the day. The school news show only provides the limited amount of “school” related news and the rest is just fuckery produced by the students.

Dream and Sapnap are the favored anchor duo. George never arrives to school on time so he sticks to just helping draft segments.

On the rare days, in the middle of the show with no introduction whatsoever, students will see a fifteen second vertical formatted video of George doing whatever the fuck he does.

George has been banned from the editing booth multiple times. He is now just a cameo… (unless)

Wilbur only joined for the CTE credit and easy pass.

But for the passing grade, he actually needed to produce segments so with one 50 second video of him walking around the school proposing a revolution. No one knows what the revolution is for but with the mild subtext of drugs, he gained a following of freshman that trailed behind him like ducks during passing period.

Tommy switched into school news, naturally following Wilbur. He didn’t do much besides grabbing a camera and finding ways to push Dream’s buttons.

The dteam trio were on a school field trip for whatever reason one day. Wilbur, Tommy, Fundy, Tubbo, and Eret realized that ten minutes before the bell for second period was about to ring, they didn’t have a news show.

Nobody had access the script, (or so they thought, really in too much of a rush to check the class files,) Wilbur begins bullshitting his way out of every news section.

The College and Career time slot was just Wilbur talking about the politics among the student body.

Tommy brought on sports by talking about Minecraft, I mean why wouldn’t he?

Fundy straight up speed edited the show. He’s never done that before. He was only in that class cause the rest of the electives were full.

Wilbur being hella proud of the freshman somehow whipping together a show right before the bell rings, he adopts Fundy. Senior adopting freshman moment.

Tubbo even found an entire folder among the school computer dedicated to George’s cryptic short videos. He throws one in to keep the consistency of the show.

When it’s aired, the teachers are confused and the students are mildly entertained. It was a success.

When the dteam come to school the next day, Dream and Sapnap find out that they are pushed to anchor the shows every other day. The other days, Tommy and Wilbur fill that spot.

War had begun. And the student body was only a witness.

It was decided, Wilbur made shows for men

It had begun from adding difficult words to pronounce in the script to adding props in the background. Everyday a crew sabotaged the other. The student body actually caught on and tried to notice the little Easter eggs of the opposing crew.

The dteam somehow took Fundy hostage, and the freshman (who actually wasn’t a freshman, just somehow everyone assumed he was) edited their shows from time to time, but he’s still loyal to Wilbur.

Eret, however, was persuaded by Dream’s offering of getting them coffee everyday. A dramatic day it was when the segment of Eret’s betrayal was released.

Some kid from the graphic design class had actually printed out revolutionary posters for Wilburs crew.

Near the end of the semester, their teacher politely begged the students to just end the rivalry and produce a normal show. Dream and Wilbur had actually typed up a full on contract for their teacher and talked to the principle about how they were going to conclude their story on the very last day of class for that semester.

Tommy and Dream were anchoring together that day. The show ran longer than any other show before. Between each actual section of school news, there were segments. Tommy and Dream even had a debate and school approved duel (kahoot).

All the students were shocked. Did it really just end? The crews built that whole story for months and it ended.

But that was only first semester. Everyone had more cards to play.

NEXT SEMESTER (a mess/ my brain cant remember most of the election arc so its just a plain mess at this point)

Around the time when the whole school was electing their student body presidents, he didn't have any interest in it, but Wilbur decided to get political and worm his way into the student elections just for entertainments sake of the news segments.

Dream didn't have much time on his hands this semester so he only stuck to regular news.

Sapnap cried about it and tried to drag George with him to make a segment, but the man is still banned from the news. He makes a segment about finding a new partner to produce segments with. He got himself a fiancé instead.

George gets unbanned from the show for like one day and he also, for some reason, also gets married to ninja... the teacher banned him very quickly.

When Dream actual out his focus back onto the news again, he found out everyone was getting married and he was very lost on whatever lore Wilbur's crew was producing.

Why was Wilbur filming inside of the janitors closet. Who was the new kid, (Schlatt), that was anchoring solo with Quackity. Fundy and Tubbo still stayed in the editors booth, seemingly oblivious to whatever's happened.

As one of those off days where everyone is just absent for some reason, Dream is half asleep, trying to get through reading the news. "And next in sports... Dream will you marry me, the basketball team won last nights game– Wait what?" he reads out, he looks over to the booth and it's just Fundy in there sitting at the teleprompter. "I'll bring you breakfast tomorrow if you say yes" Fundy types through the teleprompter. Fundy edits that part of the show out just so the teacher won't get mad.

The next day George walks into the booth to find Dream and Fundy sharing a whole ass buffet. He walks out.

Tommy was persistent to bring one of his friends onto the show just for a little cameo. Techno didn't understand anything that was happening but weeks later, he's still there and now has a cult following.

Towards the end of the school year, they make the last week of news very eventful. All school related news was speed ran and cut to one minute, the rest was just segments. Most was just a farewell for the seniors (/wilbur).

anyone please add onto this,,

[gingermintpepper]

After thinking it over for a bit, I've decided that I might as well do a proper underrated 3DS game rec list. I'm a bit of an ATLUS junkie and that's gonna be pretty disgustingly apparent in this list, but it's not my fault that they released hit after hit and all of them were duly ignored.

Due to tumblr's 10 image limit (and my struggle to keep motivated to do one thing for more than three hours) I'm definitely gonna have to break this up into parts and I'm fairly certain one of these lists is just gonna be MegaTen games lmao but I'd like to let people know about these excellent titles and see if I can't at least get people interested in them so they can get more traction.

So, without further ado:

Some 3DS Games that were criminally slept on (part 1)

Monster Hunter Stories

God, where do I begin with this game. Well, the basics: It's a JRPG spinoff title of the now widely successful and popular Monster Hunter series featuring a different take on interacting with the varied and intricate monsters populating the world: Riders.

Yep, instead of hunting the beasties, you play as a young rider who's completed their intiation ritual and can now bond with 'Monsties' as they've cutely labelled the usually ferocious monsters of the wilds. The great thing is that you still fight Monsters--tons of them in fact but this isn't a paid review and in my humble opinion, the most impressive thing about this game is the visual style. The landscapes, the armour, the way they redesigned and 3DS-ified the classically hyper realistic and monstrous beasts to not only be absolutely adorable but still capable of being intimidating when the time calls for it, the stellar animation of special moves and combination attacks--it's delicious, nutritious, stupendous, I can and will consume it like it's part of my recommended caloric intake.

It's very akin to Pokemon in the way its basic gameplay premise is set up, however, instead of catching--or even indeed befriending--the Monsties in the game, you rummage through their nests and steal their eggs, later hatching them and getting yourself a brand new lightly kidnapped monster pal!

Other general things about the game:

Pros:

The armour and weapon sets for both male and female characters slap along with the general character customisation options. They're incredibly diverse (though limited in body type) and you can switch around traits and features whenever you want from your house.

The POGS--these porkers are everywhere and they serve as tiny little achievements for exploring every odd and end of the world. Also they have little outfits. They're so cute. 🥺🥺

You can actually ride the Monsties. All of em. Or, at least the ones that you have available to be your buddies. They all have exploration skills and traits that not only make exploring much more interesting but encourage you to swap out your active Monstie and play around with your options a bit.

Y'all breeding Monsties is complicated and I live for just how intense and ridiculous you can get with optimal builds for these things.

The story is really competently put together! The characters, character designs and even the internal conflict with your starting trio of characters is really compelling along with the mystery of the blight that's infecting Monsters across the world. It's not anything worth awards but it's compelling and it makes you care about the characters if that's what you're in the market for.

Amazing sound design, expansive world, everything about the presentation of this game oozes that Monster Hunter charm even if the art is cutesier than usual. You'll never get bored of its stellar visual presentation!

Available for around twenty quid on the Google Play store, so if you want, you could actually get the full game on your smartphone or tablet. Note though that it would be a battery nuker.

Cons:

If you're on a regular 3DS, frame rate drops are a given. This game kinda pushes the visual capabilities of the 3DS to its absolute limit--a lot like Okamiden did back on the DS.

One save file :( It's pretty much for the same reason as above but still.

If you're playing as the girl, you can't get male armour and vice versa. Since there's only one save file, you'll never be able to have all of the armour sets in a single playthrough and that's criminal because both of the sets for the genders are absolutely breath-taking, thank you.

I 👏can't 👏make👏my👏 own 👏Palico👏

Multi-player for this game is pretty dead seeing as it's almost five years old by now and never got much press or traction. Usually this wouldn't be an issue - this game is 99% singleplayer and you don't really need to fuss about with multi-player to have fun, but if you want to collect all the Monsties, you'll need it since the only way to get Glavenus is through pvp achievements. :/

Final thoughts: Play it if you find yourself getting tired or disappointed with 3DS Pokemon games but still want something that feels as fantastical as Pokemon. It outshines the 3DS Pokemon games at every turn and I will never be over just how thoughtfully put together and fully realised these games are. Of course, if you've ever played Monster Hunter, then you know just how intensive these games are with the lore, biology, cultures and world of their Monsters but seeing that translated into JRPG format was just very sobering and it's a game that, to this day, continues to awe me with just how much love and attention went into it.

Last note: If you're still unsure about it, there's a demo available on the e-shop of the 3DS that allows you to play through the entire initial area of the game. Your data does carry through to the full release and to give you an idea of how much I've been able to squeeze out of it - my playtime for that demo is currently sitting at 22 hours. Make sure to get a hold of that Cyan-Kut-Ku!

7th Dragon III Code: VFD

The title may sound intimidating but the premise is not! A mysterious disease called Dragon Sickness spread by the Dragonsbane flowers that have cropped up all around the world. You and your team are recruited by the Nodens game company after you display extraordinary prowess in their hit virtual reality game 7th Encount. As you go through the adventure, you are tasked with finding out the truth behind the Dragon Sickness and asked to stop both it and the Dragons that are destroying the world.

This game is fun. It's another turn-based JRPG however, in this game you create all of your characters yourself from the myriad of classes available to you from the jump. Different classes of course have very different specialisations - Samurai focus on high powered cutting damage with their swords, Duelists are summoners who can influence the element of the battlefield as well as summon monsters from each element, Agents can hack into your enemies and inflict a barrage of nasty ailments, just to name a few - and you are given three teams of three characters each to experiment with different team comps and find the balance that works for you. There's also a wide variety of Dragons to hunt and kill in the game, which directly affects how infected your world is with the Dragon Sickness causing Dragonsbane. Along the way you will also come into contact with many interesting characters, concepts and confrontations that will make the task of saving the world all the more imperative.

Pros

1. The character creator and differing classes give way for tons of experimenting and playing around with your own unique approach to combat and carrying out your missions. Granted, 'character creation' is generous, it's little more than palatte swaps but the classes are really where VFD shines. Eight main classes may not sound like a lot, but the expaniveness of the character skills, their synergy with their fellow classes and the uniqueness of some of the classes in and of itself allows for so much flexibility and creativity in approaches to even tougher bosses. It also encourages the switching about of your party members to really finagle with the options available to you.

2. God this game is pretty. The locations, the character art, the creature design - all of it is gorgeous and this game capitalises on every bit of the 3DS's presentation limitations as it can.

3. You can romance anything and everyone - yes, you can even be gay/lesbian/poly in this game. In fact, one of the main characters - Julietta - is gnc and he's a constant source of joy as well one of my personal favourite characters, right behind Yuma.

4. Exploration is very very forgiving as the game has healing spots and teleport nodes all over the world to allow for quick, seamless travel between quest points without feeling like anything is too much of a hassle. There are also special enemies that allow for quick grinding as well as quick farming of money. In general, the game does a really good job of making sure that the grind is never unbearable or inconsiderate of your time.

Cons:

1. This is the fourth game in a series the West has never seen any other title for, and from the looks of it, will probably never see any other titles for. Because of that, there are some elements that may seem confusing or revelations in the plot that may seem to come out of nowhere.

2. While the visuals are great, the OST of this one is pretty short making for a lot of reused soundtracks that can get really annoying if you're like me and need your audio to be interesting or consistent so it doesn't distract you too much.

3. This one isn't really a con but it is divisive: This game gets pretty difficult at times. A few of the main dragon enemies including and especially the final boss can give you a serious run for your money in the annoy-o-meter in terms of the kind of absolute JRPG fuckery they can pull out of their magic bag of bullshit movesets and while I generally enjoy that kind of thing, I know it's not for everyone. Most regular combat shouldn't be too tricky once you have a team comp that works well together but you also need to pay attention since the same team that carries you to victory one time might be worth beans against another dragon.

Final thoughts: This is... a really good game. Interesting story, really interesting characters, pretty world and a battle system that really makes you sit down and think. There's also a demo for this available in the e-shop and while your data doesn't carry over - you do receive multiple perks for carrying over your demo data including some exclusive items that, while not game breaking, do help a ton in the early stages of the game.

This isn't a final list by any stretch of the word; I only have the energy to do these two right now, but the next games up for coverage are Ever Oasis and Stella Glow! If you're interested in my full plan of games I want to cover here then my current lineup includes: Theatrhythm: Curtain Call, Project Mirai: Deluxe, Culdecept Revolt, Alliance Alive, Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology, Etrian Odyssey V, Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker and Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse.

Finally, if anyone has played any of the games I mention, cover or plan to cover PLEASE REACH OUT TO ME, I AM SO LONELY IN MY FORTRESS OF SAND. On a serious note, I'd love to hear what other people who've played these games think!

Thanks for reading,

-Ginger

PS: @feralpeacock Because a million years ago, on my first underrated games post, you asked that I remember you. :D