#the twins are giving me the biggest headaches on which characters they might get

[yeyayeya]

Okay but like does anyone know which characters will get which lords in Engage? Because some of them I’m positive on knowing which ones they get, while others definitely not.

So far, Alear gets Marth, Alfred gets Sigurd, and Celine gets Celica. That’s as far as we know.

• Purple sexy witch - 100% Micaiah (both are mages and I remember someone mentioning Micaiah instead had a fire tome or used fire magic instead of light in the trailer)

• Redhaired hotty who doesn’t have a name yet but I’m already simping for - Roy (I mean they both have fire and it makes the most sense. Also because he can then be with my son)

• Citrinne, who was the girl shown where you can switch up outfits - Leif (I rewatched the trailer and she looks like Nanna, so that was the first person I thought of)

• Etie, who was the girl shown attacking a flier unit on top of a building - Lucina (only because she’s shown on the thing to have a bow and Etie is an archer)

Honestly that all the guesses I have so far. I don’t think all the rings are like only locked to certain characters, but like the characters have unique dialogue with certain characters. I have no idea who the twins will get, or even Vander as well. I’m curious on who might have Ike. Most likely the armored knight we got shown today, or the other himbo looking one that got shown during the Alfred trailer. Also have no clue on who the dancer girl in the box art has.

[musicalmoritz]

TikTok shipping discourse is giving me a headache

So I’ve been super excited abt the recent revival of the Gravity Falls fandom because that show was a large part of my childhood. My sister and I watched it as it was coming out, I still vividly remember watching the first episode with her when it aired. It was one of my first big fandoms so I have a lot of fond memories with it (and some not-so-fond, my sister and I would always joke abt how we were just like the Pines twins so certain areas of the internet were…well, awkward to say the least)

Anyways super happy that the fandom is back but why am I seeing so much beef between Dipcifica and Mabcifica shippers??? I don’t remember there being this much discourse before, most people shipped Bill//Dip so that was the biggest rival to Dipcifica I recall seeing at the time, besides Wen//Dip. Oh and also. The other one. But usually ppl were pretty chill abt Mabcifica bcuz it went along well with the mega popular mlm pairing so like,,,even if ppl didn’t care abt them, they were content with that as a way to keep Pacifica out of the picture. There were the typical homophobes ofc but I don’t remember ppl going out of their way to hate on Mabcifica back when I was really into the fandom

This might come as a shock, but I was always Team Dipcifica. It was one of those ships I absolutely fell in love with, I read fics of them on FanFiction.Net and watched all the amvs and cosplays. I liked the idea of Dipper being the guy Pacifica could sort of run away with after escaping her toxic family because I loved her character sm and wanted good things for her. And, well, I related to Dipper a lot so there might have been some subconscious projecting going on there

So yeah, big time Dipcifica girlie but as we all know I’m also a massive multishipper and Femslash Enthusiast™️. It took me awhile to come around to Mabcifica bcuz as I was watching the show I was working through a lot of internalized homophobia, but nowadays I ship them nearly equally to Dipcifica. They are both interesting ships in their own rights with their own appeals. Pacifica was always a character in Mabel’s storylines so people shipping them romantically makes sense to me. I actually look at Mabcifica content more frequently than Dipcifica content now bcuz my main thing is sapphic ships. But if you were to ask me to pick one, I would still probably say Dipcifica

Alright now onto the current discourse. I keep seeing posts on TikTok of Dipcifica shippers explaining why they hate Mabcifica, or bashing the ship in their own edits. I also see a constant flood of comments on Mabcifica posts of ppl hating on the ship and saying Dipcifica is better. My dudes, what happened to “ship and let ship”?? Seeing all of this at the same time I’m seeing a flood of posts saying that ships don’t have to be canon or even make sense, and that ppl should let fandoms have fun, is crazy. And yes I’m gonna pull this card, it’s a little odd for people to specifically be targeting the most popular wlw ship in the fandom. “It’s toxic” mf you ship BILL//FORD

Hate whatever ships you want!! No one is forcing you to like Mabcifica. If they are then block them. But omg I thought we were trying to leave needless ship hate in the past. The ships can coexist, believe me I’m overjoyed that Dipcifica has so many canon implications but ppl are still well within their right to ship Mabcifica

I don’t even care that much abt Bill//Ford (love it and fully support it, have supported it since middle school, but I’m more of a Fidd//author girlie) but I’m glad that’s the fandom’s main focus rn, I couldn’t take it if the ONLY thing the shippers were yapping abt was which Pines sibling Pacifica should hold hands with. Another life saved by toxic yaoi

Mabcifica shippers get behind me

[dragonroyaly]

Alright, I'll bite. Tell me about your new MID AU.

WHY THANK YOU FOR ASKING ANON!

Quick heads up though: Death warning. I don’t usually make only fluffy AUs and this is not one of them. Proceed with caution.

Okay so like there’s a bunch of shit going on in this AU and I’m not exactly sure where the best point to start is so let’s start with Pierce.

I like the idea that the Daemos have little elements, so I decided to take a swing at that too. And I swung and Pierce ended up being like a grim reaper sort of dude, becuase who better for that role than the gentle giant.

He can see ghosts like they were actual people, and he can kinda sense when who he’s seeing is dead or not, but with the magic crisis and all the ‘Sense Death’ ability is dulling as the magic drains.

He tries to help ghosts move on to the afterlife the best he can while still doing his job, he really does care about this as the Grim type of Daemos are super rare and usually ghosts can’t really move on without help, but also being Asch’s guard or whatever he does interferes with that a great deal

So, cannon shit happens, y’all know the drill, and in comes Rileigh.

Rileigh is an OC, Ava’s twin brother, and very dead.

And in comes Ava’s part of the story. I keep giving characters tragic backstories becuase I’m That Bitch, I guess, and Ava’s Tragic Backstory is the kinda cliche ‘Dad was just Gone, mom never talked about him, mom was also highly abusive’ shit, y’all know the drill.

Cut to a couple years later, their mom either dies from like alcohol poisoning or she gets caught or something, I actually haven’t thought that part through, she just can’t take care of them anymore one way or another.

So, Andrew and Devon adopt them, both are really Really nervous because as previously mentioned their mom Was Not Nice and they hoped there was such thing as good parenting but also they were like eleven at the time and hadn’t been shown kindness by like Anyone before.

And Andrew and Devon were really great dads! They loved Ava and Rileigh so much! They knew their mom hadn’t been the best and they’d be wary of them one way or another but like the underestimated how bad that’d be.

A thing about their mom, she was usually all-around bad but sometimes thing got real good for a couple days, maybe a couple weeks, she would spoil Ava and Rileigh and be really nice but then things got really really REALLY bad and Ava and Rileigh decided next time that happens they’re just gonna end it.

So, using their not-too-smart and very traumatized eleven-year-old brains, they decided that Andrew and Devon would eventually turn out like their mom did and tried to kill themselves by overdosing on some pills they found.

And Rileigh did. But Ava didn’t. So Rileigh just decides he wants to see Ava safe and followed her around as a ghost, he’d move on when Ava died and he’d be with her in the afterlife.

Fast forward to cannon events, Rileigh’s still following Ava around, Pierce can still see ghosts, and eventually figured out Rileigh was a ghost.

So, Pierce does what he does, tries to see what Rileigh wants so he can peacefully move on. Rileigh isn’t having any of that, and Pierce can’t even meet his requests becuase he’s just like “I’ll move on when Ava moves on.” “But Ava’s still alive. I’m not going to kill her.” “Exactly.”.

Rileigh is happy that someone can see him, and Pierce doesn’t really have anything better to do, so sometimes they’ll just stay up and chat. Usually in the livingroom in the middle of the night when everyone else is asleep.

Anywho back to Ava for a bit.

I have trouble seeing a world with magic where people aren’t able to sense if others have magic or not, even if it’s more dulled than others are, so the Daemos would be able to tell Ava’s completely bullshitting it after a while.

So, I do the logical thing and I give Ava magic. Extremely powerful magic. And the Daemos know. Ava does not. She used to think she might have superpowers because in moments where she wasn’t completely there, like her being sick, or just waking up, or extremely zoned out, she swore she could levitate things or fly or freeze things, set them on fire, grow plants faster, stuff like that, but eventually chalked it up to her having an overactive imagination.

So, another thing, Ava has a lot of magic, easily enough to fuel Daemos for another century at least, but it’s all kinda just trapped inside her body and whatever the Daemos are sensing is a very dulled version of her true power. If Ava gets a scratch or something, more magic would come out.

So, one day they’re all just kinda la-dee-da-ing around the apartment, the boys are hanging out in the livingroom, Ava’s in the kitchen making soup or something, chopping carrots, and she accidentally nicks her finger becuase she has the hand-eye cordiation of a blind goose.

Cue all of the boys kinda just freezing in shock because it doesn’t matter if you have hyper magic sensing (Rhys) or dull magic sensing (Noi), that’s more magic than they’ve felt in their lives.

All from a tiny scratch. And Ava’s just like ‘Ow yikes gotta go get a mcfricken band-aid’ and all the boys are just. Staring. Becuase they knew she was powerful but not to this degree.

Rileigh, still very ghostly, is kinda there, witnessing their shock like ‘??? What’s going on? Yo Pierce you wanna explain this shit? Is it the smell of blood, are y’all like vampires or something??’

Needless to say the Daemos are very careful around Ava from then on becuase she could probably blink at them and kill them instantly. Though she didn’t know that.

Rileigh learns what happens, laughs, continues to have a mini existential crisis becuase holy shit would he have had that much magic??

Fast forwards a couple months. The Boys have now been gone on Daemos for like two years and no one can get to them becuase there’s no longer enough magic left to open a portal to Earth. I am estimating on the time here go easy on me.

Pierce has gotten himself into a bit of a sticky situation. He has. The biggest fucking crush on Rileigh. Cue a couple internal crisises or whatever the plural of that word is, asking Ava what love felt like because all of the boys are stupid with emotions and Pierce is no different, Ava very loudly responding “BABY DON’T HURT ME” as a knee-jerk reaction to Pierce asking ‘What is love’ and a very quick run-down on memes.

This is also where my now commonly used line “I mean you do you but I have questions” comes from. “So how would y’all react if I said I had a crush on Ava’s dead brother” Pierce says. “I mean you do you but I have questions.” Asch says.

Ava is also aware she has magic now, and very strong magic at that. Still can’t use it for shit. Has made books go flying straight out the window when she tried to lift them with her telekinesis or whatever.

Fast forwards another little bit, Rileigh also has a crush on Pierce, tells him becuase he’s not a fucking coward and also knows emotions and shit.

Quick note, I know Daemos don’t do human shit but like kissing is a thing on Daemos becuase I fucking said so. They also tap horns together but like irrelevant.

So, Pierce, due to the nature of his magic and me being a cliche bitch, if he kisses someone they’ll straight-up die. He knows this from experience and swore off love after that.

So back to the scene, Rileigh and Pierce kiss, which would’ve looked hella weird if you couldn’t see ghosts but Pierce made sure that literally no one else was in the same room as them when he and Rileigh talked.

Pierce describes this as quite possibly the best thing that’s ever happened to him and kissing Rileigh feels like heaven.

And guess what happens next?

It takes a hot minute but eventually Pierce is like ‘Wait a sec Rileigh isn’t giving me dead people vibes anymore what’s up with that’ and both kinda freak out when they realize apparently that legit brought Rileigh back to life.

Cue Rileigh yelling becuase no one could hear him for the past like twelve odd years so he got a little used to just Shouting when he wanted to, and he woke Ava up.

Ava who was VERY surprised to see her previously dead brother (Who now looked her age because if one twin dies and the other doesn’t and the dead twin doesn’t move on they’ll continue to age like nothing happened), Pierce being caught in the middle of this kinda just stuck with the surprised Pikachu face, Rileigh who’s feeling Hella Hyper and Happy becuase he’s alive and also Pierce fucking kissed him.

There were tears. Ava cried and clung onto Rileigh. Rileigh also cried. Pierce was just sitting on the couch for all of it wondering what the hell he should do. At some point the other boys come out and are collectively like ‘WHO FUCK THE IS THIS BITCH??’ And Pierce has to explain the whole thing in detail becuase Ava and Rileigh are too caught up in their little ‘Holy shit you’re alive’ ‘HOLY SHIT I’M ALIVE’ thing.

Cut to like a week later, everything’s perfect, Rileigh’s alive, Pierce has gotten himself an entire boyfriend (That he can kiss and stuff without killing!), Ava finally got a mcfricken job. Andrew and Devon don’t know about any of this becuase that’d mean explaining even more stuff to them that Ava’s not sure she can do without getting a headache.

Asch suddenly realizes “WAIT SHIT WE’RE SUPPOSED TO GET MAGIC BACK TO DAEMOS SHIT” So after Ava gets home they have to do that.

And they fuckin do that, just open a portal in the middle of the livingroom and go through. They didn’t exactly have a plan, just take a bit of Ava’s magic, she has enough of it to fuel that entire dimension for ages, as previously mentioned, and with Rileigh in the mix, who does in fact have magic like Ava does, there should be a peaceful way to solve this, right?

They did not get to explain the plan fully before The Daemos are like “So like if we kill The Magic Princess we’ll never have to worry about magic and right? Right. Okay bye we’re gonna go publicly murder her now.” And dragged a very confused and panicked Ava away before any of them can react.

I should say during this whole thing Rileigh was not immediately present. He was out getting groceries or something, I don’t know.

The Boys forget they can like rebel against the kingdom or go after them and explain that you don’t need to kill her you idiots just take like a teaspoon of blood and we’ll be fine for decades but you know how Daemos are. Only using their Violence Brain and all.

It takes Rileigh getting home with Lorelai in tow, he ran into her at some point and she was like “Hey you look like Ava!!” and Rileigh being like “Oh yeah I’m her twin!!” an Lorelai being herself and he ends up bringing her home with him to hang out or something.

Rileigh finds the portal and all there and is frozen like “What the fuck??!?! THEY’RE GONNA KILL HER??? NO???” And the boys still don’t remember they can just save Ava and go fuck off to her apartment for like until they die.

Lorelai, understandably, completely snaps and goes rushing into the castle or whatever because portal landed like right outside of Asch’s room, grabs two swords off the wall, like, you know those displays?

So it’s just Elizabeth’s fight scene from Black Butler but Lorelai and Daemos guards and Lorelai just guessing off of where Ava’s screaming is coming from.

The Boys finally fucking remember this does not have to end with Ava dying, which was pointed out to them by Lorelai, who is completely human with absolutely no magic whatsoever, and not built for fighting whatsoever, her just rushing in without a second thought, and also Rileigh, who screamed at them and kicked Asch in the head.

So they follow the trail of dead bodies Lorelai’s leaving behind and Ava’s screaming and end up looking at where there’s already a crowd, Ava’s about to be killed, Lorelai’s not close enough to save her, Asch fireballs whoever was about to kill her the fuck away.

At this point, Ava had just about complete shut down, just zoned out due to panic, so she was just kinda sitting there in front of the shocked audience who by this point had been like ‘Wait we were running out of magic? Wait killing her will give us like unlimited magic? WAIT THE PRINCE JUST KILLED A FUCKING GUARD WHO IS THIS LADY??’

So after like five minutes the boys and Lorelai and Rileigh are all surrounding Ava and trying to protect her and then.

And then the goddamn king shows up.

The king, very feared, Asch’s father, Rhal’s too but like Rhal had been backed into a corner due to Lorelai being Angerey so he wasn’t present for any of this.

And everything just seems to freeze. The crowd, the guards, Asch and Co’, Ava was still zoned out, Rileigh was clinging onto Ava, and everyone was staring at the king.

He takes about the same stance as everyone else like ‘So spilling this lady’s blood will give us unlimited magic? Sounds good to me if y’all aren’t going to kill her I’ll do it myself.’ but like logically more threatening sounding than that but like before he can do anything Ava kinda half zones back and looks up at him.

Now, here’s why Ava and Rileigh have magic and Daemos doesn’t.

Daemos had gods, very powerful gods, but eventually they all got tired and fled to different dimensions. The gods were fueling everyone’s magic, the followers of certain gods got certain powers, y’all get it.

So, eventually, there was just this one god left, right, the main dude who was the only one fueling anyone’s magic anymore.

He got tired, and he got lonely, so he gave the rest of his followers magic power and fled to earth. The King, who was his most loyal follower, got the highest amount of magic. Please note that The King was a total nobody before this. Didn’t even have magic. Why is Asch like that then? His mother, obviously.

The God went on to fall in love with Ava and Rileigh’s mother, and, surprise surprise, is Ava and Rileigh’s father. And even before all the other gods just left and dumped their duties onto him, he was still the most powerful. So that’s why Ava and Rileigh are so damn jam-packed with magic, they’re demi-gods.

Ava, who is still mostly zoned out but some deep dark part of her definitely recognizes this dude’s magic is the same as hers.

So she’s like “You have my magic, that you don’t deserve. Give it back.” In like the Irene voice or whatever and she stands up and looks at The King and please be aware she is zoned-out during this entire thing.

The King, who can also sense the same magic he has in Ava but definitely stronger, but is an idiot, goes ‘No, you will give me, me and the rest of Daemos your magic.’

And Ava’s like ‘Then if you will not give me my magic back willingly, I will take it back by force’ and straight-up absorbs this dude’s magic leaving him completely powerless and then both The King and Ava pass the fuck out. Rileigh absorbs half the magic Ava absorbed from The King becuase she couldn’t take all of it on her own and still be stable since like he tainted it or whatever. Daemos were not meant to handle magic, humans were.

So like no one knows what’s going on becuase both The King and Ava are unconscious and everyone’s still trying to handle the shock of the whole event and Lorelai never really snapped back out of Fight Brain.

After a moment, Leif just scratches Ava’s arm enough to bleed a little bit which, as I’ve said, is enough to fuel the dimension for like a solid year or so human time, and then they all run back to Earth and close the portal before anyone can get mad at them.

Ava wakes up after a bit, has one hell of a fever since The King had tainted the magic she had just absorbed and that was Not Fun, but they explain everything to her after the whole sick event after now like once a year Ava has to give up a tiny bit of blood to keep Daemos running happily and The Boys live on Earth becuase they like it there and Pierce has Rileigh and they’re all happy.

There’s a whole other disaster when Andrew and Devon find out about all of this because Ava’s just decided it’s not worth lying about. She wasn’t even sure how she’d explain Rileigh.

“RILEIGH’S ALIVE??”

“Shit dude yeah he sure is. Hey he’s got a boyfriend too, did you know that?”

“RILEIGH’S ALIVE AND HE HAS A- WHAT?!”

“Yeah, Pierce brought him back to life through the power of love or some shit. Hey did y’all know me and Rileigh are demigods?”

And at that point they’re just kinda staring in complete shock.

Lorelai always goes back to Daemos for their yearly teaspoon of blood sacrifice as Ava’s personal guard. Ava did not ask for this. No one asked for this. Lorelai is feared throughout Daemos due to the whole Elizabeth Fight Scene stunt she pulled. She low-key enjoys seeing people this scared of her. She is aware this is a problem.

Anywho this AU was like a lot more detailed than I previously thought, but it’s fun being able to talk about this. If anyone has anymore questions like specifically or as like a suggestion for this AU let me know!

[essayofthoughts]

The twins!!

Send me a number and a character

Ok, so I’m going to do this as Wanda after CACW, and Pietro during AOU after they’re out of the castle. This means canon and it means pain.

Because of course.

1. What does their bedroom look like?

Wanda:��In Wakanda Wanda’s room has a balcony. On the bad days she likes to balance on the railing, holding herself from falling with her scarlet - it only comes out in response to personal risk after the trauma of the Raft. There’s a number of Wakandan weavings in the room, blankets and quilts in designs not entirely dissimilar to those of Lesotho. The ones in Wanda’s room are red and gold and brown, simple and geometric in patterns. There’s always one on the bed.

Pietro: Pietro’s room is Wanda’s. In the castle this meant once he was allowed out and had his blue under control he lived out of Wanda’s cell most of the time, often sleeping on the floor, or beside her if she had a nightmare. Once out of the castle they find a room in a partially destroyed house; this space is intended to be temporary and is never personalised.

2. Do they have any daily rituals?

Wanda: She’s never entirely got over the loss of Pietro. It is not uncommon for her to reach out for him only to remember he is no longer there.

Pietro: Checking on Wanda, double checking to see if the Avengers are in the area, seeing if there’s anything he can do for the people on the streets that Wanda won’t tell him off for (she doesn’t like it when he steals, even as she knows it’s the most that can be done, sometimes).

3. Do they exercise, and if so, what do they do? How often?

Wanda: Exercised as part of training but in Wakanda does not for a long time. First, she has to pull herself out of the trauma of the Raft, and that takes time. Afterwards she starts walking and hiking and occasionally sparring with the Dora Milaje. She’s nowhere near as good as they are, and never will be, but it’s a good challenge.

Pietro: Run. Constantly.

4. What would they do if they needed to make dinner but the kitchen was busy?

Wanda: At first, leave. Wanda isn’t good with people for a while after the Raft. As time goes on and Clint helps her get a better handle on things she lingers in the doorway instead and waits for space for her. She knows that if one of the others is making food they’ll often share with everyone else.

Pietro: N/A. Didn’t have a kitchen. Wasn’t great in a kitchen either. He could cook, to a point, but never had regular enough practice at it.

5. Cleanliness habits (personal, workspace, etc.)

Wanda: Ordered mess. She knows exactly where everything is, so long as no one messes with it.

Pietro: Surprisingly organised - when there’s nothing to do but wait he has to find something to do. Besides, he’s used to having very little, so it’s important to make sure what he does have is all in it’s proper places.

6. Eating habits and sample daily menu

Wanda: Fruit for breakfast, usually. It was something Clint did to help pull her out of her trauma, making a game of trying a new fruit, or an old fruit in a different form each morning. And when they got through that, trying each with different things. Lunch is ... often skipped. Wanda doesn’t do well in the heat and she often loses her appetite at lunch. Dinner, Wanda will eat whatever happens to be made that evening. Eventually she learns how to make African curry from one of the Dora Milaje who likes to cook in her time off, and she’ll make that or Paprikash on her own.

Pietro: Whatever he can grab, often stolen. Chocolate or protein bars, fruit from stalls. If he has enough money he’ll get pastries from the bakers, but usually he gives these to Wanda - he knows she loves them.

7. Favourite way to waste time and feelings surrounding wasting time

Wanda: Reading. After the Raft, wasting time is peaceful to her, weightless. It allows her to rest and drift and find herself again, and she finds it inordinately helpful in dealing with her trauma.

Pietro: Hates it. Often wastes time by not wasting time - he’ll always find something useful to do if he can, be it by sorting his and Wanda’s things, finding out where’s safe to go and where isn’t, trying to help people, one way or another, etc. etc..

8. Favourite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging

Wanda: Chocolate. Ever since she was small chocolate has been her favourite thing and in foster homes and on the streets it wasn’t always easy to get. It’s one thing she’ll indulge in. Since Pietro’s death, however, there’s a thick layer of guilt whenever she has some - he used to be the one to get her some whenever he thought she needed cheering up.

Pietro: Doing something nice for Wanda, or for other people for Wanda. He likes doing things that make Wanda happy.

9. Makeup?

Wanda: Eyeliner. Lots of eyeliner. She wore less when on ops, or when simply... exhausted, but if she has the time and the energy, eyeliner. It takes concentration and effort but for Wanda that makes it worthwhile, in a way - it proves that she can.

Pietro: Doesn’t go in for make up, personally. That said, he’s surprisingly skilled with an eyeliner pencil and is excellent at plaiting hair, having had a lot of practice helping Wanda.

10. Neuroses? Do they recognise them as such?

Wanda: Incredibly codependent with Pietro, with a deep sense of responsibility. She knows that Pietro relies on her to decide what they should do, so she must always take care to choose something that will keep him from harm. With the Battle of Novi Grad she felt a deep sense of guilt and with Pietro’s death she feels a deep sense of uncertainty, never entirely certain of her own decisions and a constant fear that she’s making the wrong one, not helped by the explosion, the Accords, the battle in Leipzig or the Raft. She does not recognise this as a psychological problem rooted in trauma, however. To her it seems perfectly logical. 

After all, it’s all she’s ever known since she was small.

Pietro: Incredibly reliant on Wanda for his mental well-being. He considers her well-being his personal responsibility and, when he fails, it is a crushing weight of guilt upon him until Wanda assures him that it’s ok, that she’s ok, or helps him find some task to distract himself. Otherwise he will blame himself and/or try to make amends by doing something reckless. Likewise, he does not recognise this for what it is, again because it’s all he’s ever known, but also because he’s just not that introspective. To him, he’s Wanda’s elder brother, therefore, with their parents gone, it’s his duty to ensure his sister is safe and well. He never quite realises the extent to which he is reliant upon her and even if he did he wouldn’t see anything odd in it.

11. Intellectual pursuits?

Wanda: Reading, when she can. Music and song. She won’t ever write - storytelling was more Pietro’s forte than hers - but Wanda always enjoyed learning; it’s part of why she insisted that she and Pietro must stay in school as long as they could, even when they left the foster system and moved to the streets.

Pietro: Sketching and storytelling. Pietro’s a surprisingly skilled artist and he has an incredible memory, allowing him to sketch people from only a moment’s glimpse.

12. Favourite book genre?

Wanda: Something with a happy ending. Something hopeful in the face of all else.

Pietro: Couldn’t give a toss. He’s not really one for books.

13. Sexual Orientation? And, regardless of own orientation, thoughts on sexual orientation in general?

Wanda: Biiiii as fuck. Or more: she’s always been aware on some level that she’s attracted to many people, and that sometimes she might lean more towards one gender than another. Due to her codependency with Pietro and the twin’s trust issues, however, she’s never really had a relationship - even what she shared with Vision she’d hesitate to term as such - and it would take a lot, after the Raft, for her to be willing to risk such vulnerability.

Pietro: Is also bi. Is also Ace. For him, relationships with others always come secondary to his bond with Wanda - anyone he might date would have to be willing to deal with the fact that they will most likely always come secondary to what he feels is his responsibility to his sister, and just about no one is. While he is ace, however, he may or may not have hooked up with people in the past, but mostly to blow off steam. He doesn’t really get sexual desire, and he’s never been entirely sure if it’s just how he is, or if he subsumed it along with everything else he didn’t want to have to deal with - jealousy, most notably - when he started to protect Wanda.

14. Physical abnormalities? (Both visible and not, including injuries/disabilities, long-term illnesses, food-intolerances, etc.)

Wanda: Frequently gets migraines if she’s using her mental powers extensively. Since the Battle of Novi Grad she’s barely used them at all, but this does not preclude the occasional migraine and frequent headaches. The joints of her hands and wrists are also prone to swelling if she over-uses her scarlet - it took a lot of training for her to get the point she could use it as much as she does without difficulty. 

Since the Raft she has some considerable trauma - claustrophobia is a massive trigger for her and being trapped in a cell in a straitjacket was very nearly something out of her nightmares, and now is a nightmare for her.

Pietro: Sometimes still suffers from vertigo and motion sickness when running. This is frustratingly irregular, so he’s never sure if he’s going to lose his lunch or not.

15. Biggest and smallest short term goal?

Wanda: Smallest goal varies from day to day, depending on how well she’s doing. Sometimes it’s finishing the huge book she’s on, or learning a new recipe. Sometimes the smallest short term goal is not freaking out when one of the other’s bumps against her in the corridor. Biggest short term goal is getting to a point that it’s safe for her to leave Wakanda - not just safe in terms of Accords and arrest, but also safe for other people. Her scarlet’s been rather volatile since the Raft.

Pietro: Biggest is to continue getting vengeance on Stark. He knows that whatever Wanda did to Stark’s head is going to do something, he just wants it to happen soon so they can finally have their vengeance done. Smallest short term goal is probably making sure they have food and shelter. Then they discover Ultron.

16. Biggest and smallest long term goal?

Wanda: Biggest goal is probably proving not just to everyone else but also to herself that she’s not a threat, that she just wants to live her life and do what she can to help - mitigate problems, not cause them. Smallest long term goal is probably working up to a point where she can apologise to Tony for destroying his facility and sitting down so they can both explain and resolve their issues with one another. Well. Her issues with him, and his issues with guilt.

Pietro: Biggest is obviously Wanda’s well-being, forever and ever and ever and ever and you get the idea. This will never not be his ultimate goal. Smallest is... well in comparison to that most things are small. Probably trying to rebuild Sokovia once they have their vengeance.

17. Preferred mode of dress and rituals surrounding dress

Wanda: One of the pieces of jewellery she wears is a piece Pietro gave her. Before the Battle of Novi Grad all but two pieces were ones Pietro gave her - the other two were from their parents. Afterwards, Vision and the Bartons would sometimes give her jewellery. The cross pendant in her room at base is something Steve gave her, before learning her family was Jewish. She never wears it, but she understood the spirit in which it was given, and leaves it by her desk. On bad days, she wears a lot of jewellery, and a lot of it is pieces Pietro gave her.

Pietro: “Is it quick to put on? Is it cheap? Yes? Good enough.” Pietro doesn’t care that much about his clothes, so long as they take minimal time out of his day.

18. Favourite beverage?

Wanda: Tea of some kind. Herbal, black, green, rooibos. So long as it’s warm and tea she doesn’t care.

Pietro: Orange juice - vitamins, sugar and fluid, all a growing superpowered Pietro needs. He had the record for chugging a carton at the castle.

19. What do they think about before falling asleep at night?

Wanda: How much she misses Pietro. Sometimes she can almost feel his presence nearby, and this always means she’s going to have nightmares in which she feels him die again.

Pietro: What they need to sort out in order to ensure Wanda’s well-being or whatever Wanda wants to get done. Where he can slot in things he wants to do between all of that - and he’s incredibly good at that after a lifetime of it.

20. Childhood illnesses? Any interesting stories behind them?

Wanda: Wanda once had a fever as a small child. This is part of where Pietro’s obsessive care for her comes from - their mother was ill at the same time, so their father took care of their mother while Pietro took care of Wanda. He found a sense of purpose in that responsibility and because Wanda never minded him staying near her, it remained afterwards, and is part of the reason he responded so quickly to protect her from the shell.

Pietro: Broke his arm playing. It was only a greenstick fracture but he remembers it very clearly. After they get their powers he has a deep fear of his legs being broken - or his knees being damaged - or of Wanda’s hands being broken.

21. Turn-ons? Turn-offs?

Wanda: Deep emotional intimacy is a turn on for Wanda. She’s used to a certain level of platonic closeness from Pietro, but this means she places a high value on emotional intimacy and trust - after all, it’s what the strongest and most important relationship in her life was founded on, and if people won’t put in even some of that then she doesn’t think it’s worth her time. Trust and emotional intimacy are very important to Wanda.

Turn offs are... many, to be honest, but also complicated. Something that may ordinarily be a turn-off for Wanda can be ignored (especially if it’s an aesthetic thing) if she finds the individual as a person to be interesting, engaging and important enough to her. Certain things are rules though, and racism and antisemitism are two big ones. Homophobia, biphobia and bringing up her codependency with Pietro (and insinuating it was incestuous) are three (four) more.

Pietro: Pietro may or may not be into biting. I will not say. It would embarrass him. Also, people who make him laugh.

Turn offs are much the same as Wanda’s, to be honest.

22. Given a blank piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, what would happen?

Wanda: Write down a nightmare. Or a dream. Or a memory of her childhood, something she did with Pietro. Write down facts and figures of things that have happened so she knows for certain they did happen.

Pietro: Draw. He would draw or he would maybe write. But most likely he would draw.

23. How organised are they? How does this organisation/disorganisation manifest in their everyday life?

Wanda: As I said above, Wanda has a kind of organised clutter. She knows where everything is and she’ll get to it when she gets to it.

Pietro: Very nearly meticulous. He almost never forgets anything and always knows where something they need is.

24. Is there one subject of study that they excel at? Or do they even care about intellectual pursuits at all?

Wanda: Wanda loves to learn just about anything. She’s not great at maths or science, but she is incredible at history and languages and literature. She’s also pretty good with music and singing, but after Novi Grad she barely ever sings, and after the Raft, never, except to herself. It’s always old lullabies she and Pietro would sing to each other.

Pietro: Pietro doesn’t particularly care about education but he will learn. Mostly he’s interested in learning things that allow him to keep himself and Wanda alive. That said, he’s inordinately proud of every pun he comes up with on his own, especially if it makes Wanda smile.

25. How do they see themselves 5 years from today?

Wanda: Hopefully free. Hopefully. She doubts it.

Pietro: With their vengeance completed and living safe in a new Sokovia, free from corruption and rebuilt without the aid of America’s meddling hands.

26. Do they have any plans for the future? Any contingency plans if things don’t workout?

Wanda: To try to get past her trauma and work through a lot of it. If it doesn’t work out... Wanda isn’t afraid of death, and she knows that with the threat she has the potential of being it may be better if she died. She won’t kill herself, even on the bad days when she considers it, because to do so would be a rejection of everything Pietro did for them both, but she’s not afraid of it. If it comes to it, she hopes Clint will be kind enough to be the one to do her in.

Pietro: Get Wanda someplace safe. Salvage what can be salvaged. Try again.

27. What is their biggest regret?

Wanda: That, for all her power, she couldn’t save Pietro. That she told him to get everyone off the rock before returning to her. That she put the urge to rush-build Ultron into Tony’s head. That she signed them both up to HYDRA for superpowers. That she never tried to redirect their shared desire for vengeance into something better. That she couldn’t contain Crossbones’ bomb. That she didn’t have the time to talk to Vision and explain her perspective on everything before she pushed him through the floor. That she wasn’t strong enough to handle the cell and the straitjacket.

Pietro: That he couldn’t save their parents too.

28. Who do they see as their best friend? Their worst enemy?

Wanda: Pietro will always be her best friend. Even dead, no one can quite take that place for her. For a while, Vision was a close friend, as was Laura Barton. Wanda no longer trusts Vision, and Wanda believes that Laura hates her for taking Clint away from his family by joining the civil war.

Worst enemy... that was Tony. Now, Wanda doesn’t know who it might be. Herself, perhaps.

Pietro: Wanda. Obviously. Worst enemy is again obvious - Tony Stark.

29. Reaction to sudden extrapersonal disaster (eg The house is on fire! What do they do?)

Wanda: She’s already lived through this, when she was ten. When the building collapsed she and Pietro clung to each other.

Pietro: He’s already lived through this, when he was ten. When the building collapsed he and Wanda clung to each other.

30. Reaction to sudden intrapersonal disaster (eg close family member suddenly dies)

Wanda: Goes Nova. Her powers are so intrinsically tied to her emotions that when she feels her last remaining family member die she cannot help but loose her powers all at once.

Pietro: Would commit suicide. Wanda is all he has left, yes, but also is his responsibility. If she suddenly dies then its likely not illness. It’s likely something he could have stopped. He would blame himself, would stop eating and would likely commit suicide.

31. Most prized possession?

Wanda: The pieces of jewellery Pietro gave her.

Pietro: The photo of their parents.

32. Thoughts on material possessions in general?

Wanda: Get’s attached to very few things but is used to living with little. She likes having things though. It means she’s safe and secure somewhere, if she can have things of her own.

Pietro: Must remain minimal and not enough to burden them; being able to be mobile is essential.

33. Concept of home and family?

Wanda: Pietro. Pietro was home and family and with him gone she’d have a hard time considering what remains of Novi Grad or the whole of Sokovia home any more.

Pietro: Wanda. Wanda is home and family and Sokovia - but especially Novi Grad - is home too.

34. Thoughts on privacy? (Are they a private person, or are they prone to ‘TMI’?)

Wanda: This is complicated. Wanda is used to having no privacy to speak of with Pietro - they lived on the streets, they were twins, she’s used to having someone about whom she knows everything and who knows everything about her in turn. However Pietro is dead. Outside of Pietro, she’s a very private person, and without him she doesn’t know what to do with all of the bottled up knowledge of her brother’s behaviour (“He used to laugh like this if he thought I was being ridiculous and like this if he thought I had a point. He used to steal things for me if he thought I was worrying too much and he would plait my hair when I was fretting, even if I didn’t notice I was fretting”) or with her need to have someone with whom she can share things.

Pietro: Is used to having no privacy from Wanda - they shared just about everything so they know just about everything about each other. From everyone else they’re very private though.

35. What activities do they enjoy, but consider to be a waste of time?

Wanda: Making wool bootlaces. It’s a nice thing to do with her hands, but she rarely had the wool or thread required and it was an expense they couldn’t really afford. Afterwards it was something too tied up with living on the streets with Pietro.

Pietro: Storytelling. He’s really good at it, but he doesn’t have the time usually. He has to make sure Wanda’s ok and that they’re both safe.

36. What makes them feel guilty?

Wanda: That she’s still alive.

Pietro: If he fails to protect Wanda in some fashion.

37. Are they more analytical or more emotional in their decision-making?

Wanda: Wanda can be highly analytical and very practical, but there’s an emotional backbone to a lot of it. She wanted vengeance on Tony because of a deep emotional trauma, but she went through very logical processes to achieve it. She wanted to be free and to help those she cared about and knew must have a reason for what they were doing, but she also did it because she resented being imprisoned without being told and by someone she trusted hugely.

Pietro: Is the inverse of his sister. He tends to make a lot of decisions based on instinct and emotion, but there’s often a string of logic behind this, because of how he turned his emotions towards keeping Wanda safe and subsuming the ones which didn’t help (e.g. jealousy, desire).

38. Would they consider themselves a Type A or Type B personality?

Wanda: Wouldn’t know what either is for a long time. May learn about them when in Wakanda but I think she’d find it a far too simplistic look at people given her access to people's minds.

Pietro: Likewise wouldn’t know what that is for a long time, and would never get a chance to.

39. What recharges them when they’re feeling drained?

Wanda: Spending time with Pietro would do it. Now she sits on the balcony in the sun, or inside and watching the rain, or she reads.

Pietro: Doing something to take care of Wanda. He likes brushing out and plaiting her hair.

40. Would you say that they have a superiority-complex? Inferiority-complex? Neither?

Wanda: In Novi Grad, neither. Wanda has a well-evaluation herself then. She knows she can make mistakes and tries her best to guard against them (and ultimately fails). After Novi Grad, after Crossbones’ bomb, after Leipzig and that Raft... Wanda has a lot of doubts about her own abilities, both her scarlet and her decision-making skills. 

Pietro: ... kinda? He believes he comes secondarily to Wanda in all things and that Wanda comes before everyone and everything else. He doesn’t consider this to mean he’s inferior though, just that Wanda is the more important. He has a responsibility to protect her and besides, to his perspective, she’s the smart one. She’s the one who will find a way for them to achieve their vengeance. He could never do that on his own, so obviously Wanda is more important.

41. How misanthropic are they?

Wanda: Okay, this is a weird one. Wanda prefers to associate closely with very few but cares deeply about people in general. She can and will associate with many people, and enjoys it, even, but will need time and space to recharge after doing so. Wanda is used to looking inwards to herself and Pietro in order to ensure they are one cohesive unit to keep them safe against the world, while simultaneously wanting to keep people in general safe and well. After the Raft Wanda withdraws a lot into herself and sometimes wonders if it’s worthwhile fighting for people who’ll turn on her in a moment.

Pietro: Again, a weird one. Where Wanda looks inwards to ensure they can achieve their outwards goals, Pietro looks outwards to ensure their inward safety. Pietro keeps them safe from external threats so that Wanda can keep them both well, and so, in turn, they can both work towards their personal vengeance. He fights others and helps others so Wanda can focus on them both. He’s ok with people, but he isn’t particularly fussed about them one way or the other, for the most part.

42. Hobbies?

Wanda: Reading.

Pietro: Taking care of Wanda.

43. How far did they get in formal education? What are their views on formal education vs self-education?

Wanda: Insisted that they both stay in education as long as possible. Neither got to University - not that they could ever afford it - but they got as close as they could. Values learning considerably.

Pietro: Doesn’t care one way or the other about education but does care that Wanda values it. Remained in school because she asked him to and because she was going so he had to be there to keep her safe.

44. Religion?

Both of the twins were raised in their parent’s Judaism, but lapsed severely after the shell. They have a lot of issues with faith and the idea of a god, of any kind.

45. Superstitions or views on the occult?

Wanda: Wanda was a bit of a street witch to the street kids - they trusted her to have knowledge they did not and Wanda understands the way in which superstition and folklore work. To some extent she even believes it herself, and finds it comforting.

Pietro: Knows that Wanda has always been smarter, better, a witch in more ways than one. Scoffs at superstition for himself, but trusts in Wanda.

46. Do they express their thoughts through words or deeds?

Wanda: Both.

Pietro: Mostly deeds.

47. If they were to fall in love, who (or what) is their ideal?

Wanda: Someone with whom feels safe and can be emotionally vulnerable with. Someone who either understands her trauma or understands her empathy for others and, ideally, shares that empathy. She would not be opposed to a relationship with someone with similar traumas to her own (hence why I will write Bucky/Wanda) as she would find the similarities and understanding a comfort, of sorts.

Pietro: Someone he finds engaging and fun, and who shares his interests.

48. How do they express love?

Wanda: Physical affection, verbal affection. Doing small things for the ones she cares about.

Pietro: Stealing things for those he cares about, trying to keep them safe.

49. If this person were to get into a fist fight, what is their fighting style like?

Wanda: Wanda may have short fingernails but they are very sharp. She has no compunctions about using them. She goes for the eyes and the groin without shame or guilt, especially if Pietro is at risk.

Pietro: Quick and brutal and absolutely dirty.

50. Is this person afraid of dying? Why or why not?

Wanda: Of course she isn’t. Then she’d be with Pietro again.

Pietro: Not really. So long as in doing so he helps Wanda.

[entergamingxp]

Deadly Premonition 2 review – shambling in the shadow of its predecessor • Eurogamer.net

Trying to talk about the original Deadly Premonition is complicated. On a fundamental level, it’s a mess – a groaning slab of technical shortcomings and design deficiencies that would usually be enough to sink a game without a trace – and it’s a game that’s often dismissed, unfairly I think, as bit of a joke, a so-bad-it’s-good experience worthy of a chuckle on YouTube and nothing more. Enough of us would argue though – unironically and with absolute earnestness – that it’s also brilliant, a masterpiece of form; bold, ambitious, fiercely heartfelt, and a game that aims so, so high, and succeeds not because of, but in spite of its flaws.

Deadly Premonition 2 review

Developer: Toybox Inc.

Publisher: Rising Star

Platform: Reviewed on Switch

Availability: Out now on Switch

Partly that’s due to the original’s wonderful sense of place; its small-town murder mystery might have borrowed liberally from Twin Peaks, but its open-world setting – the perpetually grey, pine-scented highways and byways of Greenvale, Washington – felt both distinctive and positively alive as its sprawling cast of wonderfully realised oddball inhabitants went about their daily schedules in real-time, revealing their secrets to anyone with the curiosity to follow and observe.

It was frequently ridiculous, yes, and not always intentionally, but also, ultimately, genuinely affecting as its engrossingly bizarre plot wrought havoc on this shonkily implemented microcosm of life, finding some oddly insightful truths along the way. And at the heart of it all was Agent Francis York Morgan, still one of gaming’s most endearing protagonists, a relentlessly upbeat, chain-smoking FBI investigator, with a penchant for monologuing about his favourite 80s movies and a mysterious invisible friend called Zach.

The eternally upbeat York is the heart of Deadly Premonition 2, and still one of gaming’s greatest protagonists.

Deadly Premonition 2: A Blessing in Disguise is, initially at least, just as waywardly wobbly and improbably engrossing as its predecessor; never one to let a seemingly minuscule budget rein in his ambition, designer Hidetaka “Swery” Suehiro this time serves up both a prequel and sequel to his cult classic hit (knowledge of the first game’s events is certainly helpful), and, as proceedings get underway in 2019, time has not been kind to Agent Morgan.

In a long opening sequence (one of several dialogue-heavy, loosely interactive modern-day interludes), a retired Morgan, now grey haired, wild-eyed, and ravaged by cancer, locks horns with Aaliyah Davis, a fearless, Nietzsche-quoting FBI Agent who arrives at his apartment on the trail of a drug called Saint Rouge – ultimately re-igniting memories of a fateful murder investigation that occurred 14 years prior in the Louisiana town of Le Carré.

Eventually, as we’re whisked back to 2005 to experience the case first-hand, Morgan’s former self is restored, and his earnest optimism is once again the biggest draw. He’s warm, witty, and insightful – discussing his favourite 80s movies in Patrick Batemen-esque detail in one breath, and a grisly murder with upbeat zest the next – and the unmistakable heart of it all. And it’s here that Deadly Premonition 2 settles into a pattern of eccentric open-world exploration and survival horror action that should be immediately familiar to fans of the first game, even if its sun-bleached southern atmosphere is more True Detective than Twin Peaks this time around.

Acknowledging it doesn’t make it any more tolerable.

Deadly Premonition 2’s intermittent survival horror interludes – which thrust York into a gloomy otherworld to roam a linear arrangement of indistinguishable corridors, mowing down a grand total of three AI-deficient enemy types – are no less clumsy and dully simplistic than those of its predecessor, but are considerably fewer in number this time around. Instead, the bulk of your time is spent out in the open-world, performing largely mundane tasks for Le Carré’s new cast of appealing oddballs – including a local sheriff who narrates his life like a movie voice over and a hotelier with a very dedicated work ethic – with the occasional quiz-like investigatory segment thrown in to further the mystery.

Thankfully, the painfully awkward, interminable driving sequences of the original are jettisoned in favour of something a little sprightlier here – York now roams town on his trusty skateboard, monologuing merrily (and infuriatingly repetitively) along the way – and there are presentational improvements too. Deadly Premonition 2’s comic-book art style is a delightfully fitting update to its rather drab precursor, bringing a greater sense of warmth and richness to the world, and the diverse soundtrack is fantastic, both wide-ranging and mercifully whistle-free.

This, though, is where we take pause; from a technical perspective, Deadly Premonition 2 is a disgrace. Indoors, its frame rate could charitably be described as inconsistent, but out in the open world, it’s a migraine-inducing single-digit slideshow compounded by stutters and seconds-long hitches. My play-through also graced me with unkillable enemies, suddenly unresponsive controls, disappearing weapons, endless looping sounds, missing textures, floating environmental objects – all requiring a reload to fix – and at least two crashes to the home screen. The original Deadly Premonition might not exactly be a bastion of technical competence but for publisher Rising Star to be releasing a game in this state, a decade on, as a full-price title is shameful, even if it has now made allusions to some non-specific improvements it might conceivably make at a later date.

An awful lot of your time is spent exploring Le Carré, so it’s a shame technical deficiencies make it such an intensely unpleasant experience.

There’ll be many, of course, who are willing to accept technical shortcomings as part and parcel of the Deadly Premonition experience, and A Blessing in Disguise is at least playable in a strictly literal sense, even if doing so is never particularly pleasant – given its overwhelming focus on open-world pursuits. For a while though, Deadly Premonition 2 is a real joy, riding on a wave of appealingly unpredictable Swery silliness, married to central mystery with a real sense of drive. Unfortunately though, while the first game’s strengths ultimately overshadowed its weaknesses, it’s increasingly difficult to tolerate Deadly Premonition 2’s failings the more it reveals itself to be a far less ambitious, and considerably less interesting sequel.

For all its diversions and deviations, the bulk of Deadly Premonition 2’s runtime consists of painfully circuitous open-world fetch quests, casting you out across a lifeless, largely forgettable map for lengthy bouts of headache-inducing mundanity that even York’s relentlessly upbeat observations can’t save. Act two, in particular, is a real nadir, offering an interminable procession of time-gated busywork that does nothing to drive the plot forward.

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Its biggest failing, though, is a muddled story that’s poorly told; while its predecessor deftly kept multiple plates aloft as its murder-mystery unfolded, making the town and its citizens feel central to proceedings, sometimes devastatingly so, neither Le Carré or its inhabitants make much of an impact at all. Most characters are peripheral to the scattershot plot, all but vanishing after the first act, and although there’s rudimentary time-based movement for Le Carré’s denizens, it’s nominal at best, and there’s no sense, this time, that any have lives off-screen.

It doesn’t help either that the characters the game does invest in only serve to highlight its well-meaning, but ultimately rather problematic world view. For all York’s spirited rejection of bigotry, Deadly Premonition 2’s reliance on outdated tropes around transgenderism and learning disabilities can give the otherwise cheerfully freewheeling adventure a rather bitter undercurrent.

That’s not to say it’s an experience without merit; as underserved as most characters are, Patricia, York’s temporary teenage sidekick, is a surprisingly likeable addition to the cast, and while the flashback offers a largely limp slog, only sporadically enlivened by dizzying plot beats, the present-day section is a whole other matter. These lengthy interrogation sequences, heavy on dialogue and light on interaction, are wonderfully atmospheric intermissions, positively crackling with tension as Agent Davis serves as Morgan’s fiercely pragmatic foil.

You’re technically required to stay on top of York’s hygiene and health as time passes but, as in the first game, it’s an easily ignorable flourish.

Ultimately, though, nothing is likely to disuade fans of the original Deadly Premonition eager for a second outing; technical shortcomings, wobbly game design, and questionable plot developments have been the accepted price of entry for over a decade now, but while the first game succeeded in spite of those flaws – serving up a meticulously implemented, and surprisingly emotional, murder-mystery that pulsed through its world and its citizens, seemingly in real-time – Deadly Premonition 2 often feels rote, lifeless, and rather hollow by comparison.

The inimitable Agent Morgan is undoubtedly Deadly Premonition 2’s saving grace, and, truthfully, I’d happily endure its frequent tedium all over again just to spend more time together; it’s just a shame that his long-awaited return couldn’t be marked by a more inspiring adventure.

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/07/deadly-premonition-2-review-shambling-in-the-shadow-of-its-predecessor-%e2%80%a2-eurogamer-net/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=deadly-premonition-2-review-shambling-in-the-shadow-of-its-predecessor-%25e2%2580%25a2-eurogamer-net

[truemedian]

Kotaku Reacts To Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Screenshot: NintendoTwo weeks have passed since Animal Crossing: New Horizons came out, and almost everyone on the Kotaku staff has poured themselves into trying to make our new desert islands feel like home. It’s been...a process—full of blood, sweat, and a lot of broken axes—and we have some thoughts about it.Hopefully by now you’ve read fellow staff writer Ian Walker’s excellent review of the game, but in addition, we wanted to share the opinions, reactions, personal tribulations, and success stories of others on the staff as we survive Tom Nook’s fascinating new time share scheme together.

“My shitty house”—Maddy MyersScreenshot: Nintendo Maddy MyersI do not play simulation games. I spend no time at all on character creators. I’ve never played an Animal Crossing game before. And yet, Animal Crossing: New Horizons has become a game that I play almost every single day.I’m not sure if I’m even enjoying it. But I do know that it’s fulfilling a hyper-specific need for me right now. As an introverted person who already works from home, I don’t get a lot of social interaction in my daily life, outside of spending time with my equally introverted girlfriend. Before covid-19 happened, I would get a lot of low-impact socializing done in a typical week by chatting with the cashier at the grocery store, or making small talk with the other people at my gym. All of that is gone now.Instead, I make small talk with Timmy and Tommy. I discuss exercise with Flip, the jock monkey villager who lives in my Animal Crossing town. And, of course, I decorate my crappy Animal Crossing apartment and I invite my real-life friends over to (virtually) see it, and then I apologize to them, because it looks even worse than my actual real-life apartment. Animal Crossing allows me to perfectly recreate all the awkward but somehow fulfilling social interactions that I used to have when society still functioned.Will I keep logging in to Animal Crossing every day after the covid-19 pandemic has passed us over? Probably not. But until then, it’s given me a chance to see what it is that other people enjoy about this genre. It’s also made me realize that I need to seriously work on my interior decorating skills.

Ian WalkerI only own two pairs of jeans in real life, but I’m rapidly running out of room for all the clothes I buy in Animal Crossing. Here are some of my outfits:Mike FaheyOn the day Animal Crossing: New Horizons launched, the 512-gigabyte micro SD card in my Switch died. Four days later, after my wife had started playing, her Switch suddenly stopped charging. While trying to get her Switch to work, my system, purchased mere weeks before the game’s launch, stopped outputting video. As I normally play in TV mode, that’s not great. I have a Switch Lite, but I ran it over with my wheelchair and cracked the screen.Nintendo’s warranty repair is down, so I have to wait until the world returns to normal to get any of these consoles repaired. With Nintendo supply down, it’s nearly impossible to buy a new Switch right now. So my wife went on eBay and purchased a refurbished Switch tablet for $250. That’s how much fun we’re having bonding over Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

I can’t play when she can’t play. It’s just too sad. I feel bad sharing items I get, clothing I wear, and bugs I collect with her. For the several days we got to play together, by which I mean in the same room, it was much easier to forget pressing real-world concerns for a little while.We stayed up late to harvest bells. We got up early to see what occurred on our islands as we slept. The chores we must perform on our islands are much more entertaining than the ones we must perform in real life. They are still chores, but they pass the time and make us happy.Bklurbbbb...Natalie DegraffinriedI’ve spent 105 hours playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons over the span of a couple weeks. I suppose I kind of like Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Or my OCD is back with a vengeance. I keep going to celebrations for inclines and bridges even though I’m tired of them, so it’s probably the OCD.

I didn’t think I could take the fine art of min-maxing to higher heights, but here I am in an endless cycle of Nook tickets, tarantula grinding, and organizing my inventory by item valuation. It’s all to fund my Able Sisters shopping problem, ultimately. I look fly as hell, though.

Min-maxing in Animal Crossing is not for the faint of heart, nor is it always a great way to play. It might be even harder to do now that the seasons have changed. Will that stop me? No. I’ll keep getting upgrades and obsessively trying to pay them off in the same day. Do what gives you peace, I say.Just don’t be a fucking goober like my friend.

Riley MacLeodNew Horizons is my first Animal Crossing—our editor-in-chief Stephen talked the game up so much I got really curious about it. I only actually started playing this week, so everything feels very slow—when I get the itch to do something, I keep wanting to switch to Stardew Valley, but I’m really charmed by how happy the NPCs are when you do the simplest tasks and how often everyone claps for you. I also really like that your character runs around with their arms out. I put face paint on my guy and I can’t figure out how to get it off, so he just has face paint now I guess.

Ari NotisThe short version: This is the most annoying game I’ve ever played.And here’s how I really feel: At every turn, this stupid game presents a somehow brand-new hassle: how Blathers has to assess your fossils before you can donate them; how the Nook twins stop you to say thanks before you leave their shop, and how they say everything in not-quite-tandem (WTF is up with that); how you can only eat one fruit at a time; how your shovel is always breaking, your ax is always breaking, your net is always breaking; how two players can’t shop from the same person at the same time in co-op; how it’s impossible to dig a hole where you want; and how every damn day, that damn raccoon monster wastes my time to tell me there’s nothing new going on. I know there’s nothing new going on! This is Animal Crossing! Nothing new ever happens! This game is supposed to be an escape? Please. It’s at best a shoddy Xerox of life’s daily headaches.

Luke PlunkettEveryone says this is the game the world needs right now, but the last thing I need is a second mortgage hanging over my head. At least this one’s on the beach.Heather AlexandraI’ve never played an Animal Crossing game before now. In some ways, I missed out on many Nintendo games as my focus shifted off the Nintendo 64 in favor of the PlayStation and especially the modding scenes of PC games like Half-Life. When I needed a fix for homes away from home, I played Harvest Moon. That led to Stardew Valley and long hours on a co-op farm with a former partner. I enjoy the quiet of village sims and farming games. I also struggle to find the time for them.I haven’t taken the biggest plunge into ACNH. I had to focus on Nioh 2, then Doom Eternal, then Resident Evil 3. So 20-minute sojourns to my island every day were a rare and delicious treat. I can’t compare New Horizons to the others in the series, but I can say that it is an incredibly cozy game during a time when coziness seems rare. Sometimes, a good day means little more than some new wallpaper for your room. In other cases, it’s figuring out where to put that memorial statue you found. Animal Crossing is simple, but that simplicity is why you play it. Planting a new tree, inviting a new animal friend to your island. Small things that don’t feel small at all.Now, if only that freako rabbit would get off my island already...

Where every month is hoagie fest. Screenshot: Nintendo Ethan GachEvery night I shake all the trees, pick all the weeds, and smack objects with my axes until all of them break. In the morning I sell the stuff, and the cycle repeats. Conversations with other villagers scroll past as I smash the A button so I can get back to work. I buy everything I can from Tom Nook like I’m filling out a Sears Catalog Pokédex. I pay off all the loans thanks to the million bells I earned from New Horizons’ week-one infinite item glitch and subsequently invested in the Turnip market. I donate the wood and iron needed to build new homes for new residents. I capture new bugs and fish for the betterment of science. And all the while I wait like Vladimir and Estragon for an epiphany that will help contextualize each individual mundane task and help them culminate into a larger story I can derive some deeper sense of meaning and purpose from.Instead I’m left with a list of things that more closely resembles a CVS receipt. I suspect that’s a problem with me and not the game.Nathan GraysonFor the past week, I’ve been meaning to play through Doom Eternal and finally, properly dive into Control. Instead, I have mostly played Animal Crossing.I don’t really like it? I respect the relaxed pace it’s trying to establish, but by forcing players to step to its beat with fussy mechanics and NPCs who needlessly repeat themselves all the time, it’s managed to annoy me just as often as it’s lulled me into a state of balmy island bliss. Also, I’m bad at interior design, so right now my house looks like World of Warcraft’s Molten Core raid if Ragnaros was a disorganized college freshman who had no idea what to do with his dorm.Oh, and all my neighbors suck. In previous Animals Crossing (correct plural) , that didn’t matter so much, because I enjoyed doing little chores for them and feeling like I was creating a sense of community even among characters with whom I didn’t see eye to eye. In New Horizons, though, it’s all about land development, which feels less personal. I don’t want KK Slider to show up because I optimized my town. I want him to play some tunes for my villagers and me because he’s a chill, cool dude.All that said, this game has given me one of the coolest in-game moments I’ve experienced since we all got trapped inside our houses. I wrote about this at length in another piece, but the other night, DJ and streamer Clarke “Grimecraft” Nordhauser threw an in-game rave, and I attended. Surrounded by the avatars of people I did not know and dancing along with awkwardly improvised moves, I felt the same mixture of fear and exhilaration I’ve felt at countless shows in real life. After I shook my nerves (read: drank a glass of wine), it turned into a relaxing, nice time where everybody mostly talked about how good the music was and how much they appreciated the whole thing. Sometimes, a vacation can be 90 percent unpleasant, but then years later, all you remember is a soothing day on the beach or a perfect sunset. Animal Crossing has some really nice sunsets.

“Me and my partner hanging out last night in AC”—Paul TamayoScreenshot: Nintendo Paul Tamayo I’ve already talked about how Animal Crossing: New Horizons couldn’t have come at a better time, but the ways it’s helping me keep in touch with friends by sending gifts in-game, getting help from my podcast listeners, and hopping on calls to visit each other’s islands has taken this game to another level for me. It’s also giving me the space to put care into my own island like it’s my own adorable bonsai tree. I get to care for it and improve upon it in a million different ways. My partner actually made the beautiful observation yesterday that even after island hopping through our friends’ islands, it really does feel good to return home to your own space. Read More Read the full article

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #358

Top Ten Things That Look Cool in 2019

After last week’s trip down memory lane, stopping in all of 2018’s laybys for a wee, I'm turning my attention to the coming year. 2018 was, in a lot of ways, great; can 2019 top it? I mean, for a start, we might see the back of both Trump and Brexit, although I admit in both cases that’s probably a long shot; Brexit might even end up consuming the entire world like that little black hole thing they fire at Vulcan in Star Trek. But I remain an optimist, and I think even these twin evils can be vanquished. But, really, I'm meant to be talking about fun entertainment-y type stuff. Otherwise I'd fill these things with “aww, my little girl starts school” or “boy, I hope I don’t contract Ebola”.

So! What could be better than the year that brought us the end of IDW’s Transformers comics and the biggest Avengers movie of all time? How about a year that brings us the start of a new range of IDW Transformers comics and an even bigger Avengers movie, AND a Star War?

So. 2019. Ten things. Don’t disappoint me, you fickle time bastard.

Ends of an eras: look, in 2019, a Star Wars trilogy ends. Not only that, but it’s the end of a trilogy of trilogies; arguably the culmination of a story begun over forty years ago and which has changed cinema irrevocably, more than once. And that is not even the most exciting film released in 2019. Avengers: Endgame and Star Wars Episode IX are two of the biggest, most exciting-looking, most-anticipated films of my entire life, and they come out merely months apart. I can’t get over it. It's ridiculous. Literally nothing else comes close to generating the buzz I get from these two films. Disney owns my soul.

Animation showdown: if further proof were needed vis-a-vis Disney and soul-owning, there is also a battle of the animation superpowers when Pixar’s brightest goes up against Disney Animation’s biggest. Toy Story 4 and Frozen 2 both come out in 2019. Despite all three Toy Storys being better than Frozen, I'm probably more excited to return to Arendelle than to Bonnie’s toybox; we have three perfect Toy Story films already, and I just can’t believe that a fourth will be anything other than a disappointment, even if it’s really very good. A sequel to Frozen still has a North Mountain to climb, but I'm more comfortable with it being less of a masterpiece. As to which will make more money? I reckon if it’s good, if there’s a wind behind it, and if Star Wars doesn’t hoover up too much airspace, Frozen 2 could be not only the biggest animated movie of all time but maybe – just maybe – the first animation to hit $2 billion.

Next-gen now: well, not now exactly; more likely 2020. But all things being equal 2019 will see the first concrete details – maybe even names?! - of the successor consoles to the PS4 and Xbox One. I’m really interested in seeing where they go from here: game streaming? Integrated VR? 8k? Beyond the grunt and gimmicks, I'd like to see a next-gen that offered gameplay-improving abilities such as deformable scenery, vast crowds, destructible cities, water and flame physics, rather than just sexier graphics or even more Ds to make H. All the same, I'm really excited to see how it all pans out.

It never ends: as one door closes, so another transforms into a giant robotic dinosaur and breathes fire. Yes, coming soon to a comic store near you, is IDW’s revamped and rebooted Transformers universe. Streamlined, bereft of around 13 years of continuity, potentially excluded from the wider universe of Hasbro properties, we have (yet) another origin of everyone’s favourite robots in disguise (sorry, Go-Bots). The idea to set the story on Cybertron, pre-war, is a good one, and seeing newer characters like Windblade take their rightful place in Transformers lore is delightful (I hope we see other comics-originated characters like Nautica and Aileron before too long). My only reservation (other than, y’know, this series following my favourite series of all time) is that some of the best Transformers stories ever told were about pre-war Cybertron, and specifically Megatron’s ideology and subsequent formation of the Decepticons. I’m still really excited, but can this possibly come close to living up to what came before?

Discovering Picard: two Star Trek shows in one year? What is this, 1996?! But it’s (probably going to be) true: season 2 of Discovery starts very soon, bringing with it Pike, Spock, and the Enterprise. Truth be told, although I dug Disco, it didn’t feel quite as “Star Trek-y" as it could have, and trying to square its continuity circles gave me a headache. How its darker take on the Federation’s history will impinge on characters we already know gives me pause. I’m much more excited – although likewise much more nervous – about Patrick Stewart’s return to the franchise in the currently-untitled Picard spin-off. Next Generation is my favourite Trek flavour, so catching up with probably my favourite character and seeing how the universe has evolved beyond the ending of Nemesis is – wait for it – engaging. See what I did there?

Get ready, Agent: I’ve been looking forward to a new Crackdown for years. Not just since Crackdown 3’s announcement in (wow!) 2014; I’ve been hoping and wishing and praying since Crackdown 2 (which, weirdly, I never really got into). Off the top of my head, I can’t really think of another announced game in 2019 which I'm really excited for; just as well, as I’ve still got Mass Effect: Andromeda, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Gears of War 4 to complete. But I love the superheroic verticality of Crackdown, the tower-climbing, orb-collecting, minivan-throwing power you feel. The second-to-second gameplay in the first game is one of my top gaming experiences of all time, right up there with Halo in terms of sheer enjoyment rush. I’m disappointed the freeform destruction appears cordoned off in a multiplayer arena, and the game doesn’t appear to have evolved much since 2007, plus it’s had a protracted and apparently difficult development... but I love Crackdown, so I'm keeping everything crossed.

Strang3r: I missed Stranger Things this year. Whilst perhaps not quite reaching the heights of the first season, Stranger Things 2 was more consistent for me, building from episode to episode and feeling like a more complete package (the slightly dodgy Eleven-in-the-big-city story notwithstanding). So I'm really looking forward to Part 3. Moving out of its spooky Halloween comfort zone is a bold move, but perhaps allows for some delightful blockbuster thrills. It'll be interesting to see how the young cast fare as they get older, and hopefully they’ll continue to put David Harbour and Winona Ryder closer to the action.

Literate TV: there are a number of Capital-B-Big adaptations of books coming to the small screen this year: Good Omens (which I'm reading at the moment), His Dark Materials (which is one of my favourite books), and Catch-22 (which is also rather good). This is to say nothing of the Gatiss & Moffat Dracula adaptation, which may still sneak in at the end of the year. Although my TV backlog is ridiculous at the moment – including most of the Marvel Netflix stuff, the last couple Maniacs, Sabrina, Lost in Space, and fellow Gaiman adaptation American Gods – these all sound rather fantastic, and I can’t wait.

Livewood: speaking of classic TV... I can’t believe it’s actually happening, but the Deadwood movie is apparently coming out this year. Deadwood is phenomenal, one of my favourite shows of all time, cut down far too soon, and it’s so, so good that they’re finally being allowed to finish their story. I’m worried, naturally, as I often am when classics are revisited; but truth be told I'm more worried about how I'm going to watch it as it’s all HBO. Presumably it’ll be on Sky or something.

Gelflings-a-go-go: what’s this? More TV? Bloody hell, how on Earth am I going to finish writing my book?! To say nothing of completing Red Dead! Anyway, this is another Netflix biggie: a prequel/continuation/spin-off/whatever of beloved 80s puppet curio The Dark Crystal, the weirdest and creepiest kids’ movie ever made. I'm fascinated to see how they build upon what Jim Henson created, especially as I believe it was a very personal movie for him. Also: have you seen the cast list?! Blimey!

All that, and I still didn’t get round to the other superhero films (including two Captain Marvels – or Captains Marvel?), the return of Alan Partridge, the frankly-tragic-looking (in a good way) conclusion of the How to Train Your Dragon trilogy, DC’s young-reader-friendly Wonder Comics, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. There are an awful lot of things to look forward to this year, even if the rest of the world is getting all Children of Men on us.