#these bosses aren't exactly solid.

[sohelish]

the Doonnarh have scientific mini-towns inside their cities. one can pursue scientific endeavours without the need of travel where big long-term specific projects are concerned. these mini-towns are meant to accommodate the scientists with comfortable living quarters for them and their families as well as various interconnected laboratories and research facilities.

there are mandatory "leave" rules in place, however. and mandatory vacations. so that the scientists don't hide away from reality for too long and don't lose perspective.

[hasnomoxxie]

So, if the Smile Dip Dog swaps with Bill, did he still destroy his own dimension? A dimension full of colorful talking animals? Because I’ve gotta say, that already sounds even sadder.

Right on the money boss!

Here's how I think it'd go!

First off the zodiac, this initially was the way that the beast was split and banished to the astral plane.

Now that this is here, I can list out all the main swaps hoho!

Dipper ⇆ Stan

Mabel ⇆ Ford

Wendy ⇆ Lazy Jane

Soos ⇆ Manly Dan

Abuelita ⇆ Tyler

Pacifica ⇆ Fiddleford

Gideon ⇆ Bud and mrs Gleeful (little villain couple to rival the stan duo)

Robbie ⇆ Preston

THE BEAST ⇆ BILL CYPHER

The pups are silly and playful in nature, opting to try and make things as brightly coloured and 'fun' as possible. Though this usually results in freakish abominations that do things that really shouldn't be done. Though they're not stupid, they know exactly what they're doing and how it effects others- It's mainly just for their own enjoyment.

After destroying their universe full to the brim of brightly coloured talking animals, 'The Beast' was split into halves and banished to the astral plane. This meant their reality warping abilities was whittled down to being intense illusions and hallucinations, however they typically tend to use it to try and restore their original look when they are seen by people- though that only works for a short time.

Pretty much anyone could theoretically see the dogs, either through extreme meditation or having a suspiciously high amount of sugar in your system. Safe to say, a food company having a suspicious amount of complaints from parents saying their kids are now 'unresponsive', 'babbling gibberish and mysteriously disappearing' or were 'seeing God and He's a Dog' was enough to get the entire line of candy shut down. Mabel was unlucky enough to stumble onto some smile dip during a late night work session and met the pups. They quickly bonded and the pups were leading Mabel to the weirdness left right and centre, with the end goal of opening a 'weirdness rift'.

A portal.

Safe to say, Mabel couldn't do this on her own. She's smart but not- dimensional science smart. So she called on the smartest person she knew, her twin brother Mason. At this time, Mason wasn't really doing as well as he could have, being attracted to the extraordinary he was prone to being the laughing stock of his university- but a solid breakthrough. Money wasn't an issue, especially when Mabel's old friend Pacifica was willing to help lend a hand and be on site (despite lying about her financial security in order to help her friends). So- the three of them set to building the portal.

Due to unknown circumstances, Pacifica leaves the project. When Mabel finally realises the true intention of the portal and tries to shut it down, Mason is reluctant to do this- fearing that it may be sabotaging his last chance at being recognised for his scientific works and being slightly jealous that Mabel found all of the weirdness instead of him. Either way, a small fight happens, ending with Mabels disappearance, leaving her scrapbooks behind.

The project failed and the pups still aren't free, but it's a matter of time before someone eventually sets them free

I'm litterally figuring out the timeline as I write but some things are set in stone. I'm just figuring out how to show it all off- I did get alot of outsite help for this too ^^

How would y'all feel about comics? or animations? What particular scenes? I feel like tackling this bit by bit would be the most effective way to go about it, especially for what the world is like in this flipped version.

I dunno this is my first time doing something like this umm, if this doesn't make sense lmk and I'll revise some stuff

umm

bazzinga, thanks for yer question ^^

[tobiasdrake]

Veilguard feels like the mission statement was, "What if we made Dragon Age: Origins but in a way that's more like Mass Effect 2?"

You've got the six different backgrounds alongside different races you can choose from that all influence your character's experience in NPC interactions.

But the story structure is more centered on companion-centric or faction-centric storylines for each character or faction. Davrin is a Grey Warden and he has a storyline going on for him and what he's about, but also the Grey Wardens have a separate Grey Warden faction questline for what's happening in their neck of the woods.

All of which runs alongside the main plot and ties into the main plot in certain ways, but are also distinctly separate bottle stories unto themselves. Bottles that become slightly more interesting if you happen to share your background with that particular faction or character.

Which I honestly think was a neat way to go about it. Bringing back the background origins is something the fandom's wanted for a while now, and there's worse games to take inspiration from than Mass Effect 2.

Veilguard has a lot of jank. It feels exactly like a game that took ten years to finish. It's unpolished, you can feel the influence of multiple different directions in it, and it shows its ass sometimes.

One of my "favorite" moments in the game is when you're faced with an authority figure in the seat of his power, surrounded by his loyal followers, who has been nothing but aggressively unreasonable towards you since you met him. And the game asks if you want to:

1 - Talk him down with reason and logic. 2 - Fucking beat his ass with violence.

If you choose #2, there's not. Like. A combat challenge to overcome. There's no big, difficult boss fight to face him in. You punch him one time, he goes right down, and now we're doing things your way. That's it. That's all it took.

If you choose #1, there's no labyrinthine maze of dialogue options you have to navigate in order to finally get through to this guy. Your character goes "Quit being a dick!" and he instantly sees reason and comes around.

This stands out because a separate portion of the game requires you to navigate a labyrinthine maze of dialogue options, and any mistake will result in a brutally punishing boss fight you're probably under-leveled for. That is a thing in the game.

But it's not a thing here. Whatever you pick, this man will be effortlessly solved. You're only being asked to choose which cutscene you want to watch. Does your character vanquish him violently or diplomatically? Which is better for your personal roleplay?

The people who designed that section of the game are clearly not the people who designed this section of the game. Veilguard shows its trouble development history.

But on the whole, I'd nonetheless say it's good. I wish it were better but I still enjoy what it does and have had a good time with it.

It doesn't do a very good job of meeting the expectations for a Bioware game; The player's opportunities to influence events and solve things the way they want them solved are reserved solely for the Big Meaningful Choice moments. The little choices, the small decisions you make in the sidequests or in a given conversation tree that add minor ripples to the fabric of the story, those aren't there for Veilguard.

Most of the quests are your basic, "Go to the place and kill the bad guys," tier stuff with none of the immersive elements that Bioware games usually employ.

But for what it is, Veilguard has a neat story, likable characters, and solid gameplay to carry through. I hope the team currently at Bioware can use it as a base to learn more about what works, what doesn't, and what the audience wants out of a Bioware entry.

[doberbutts]

That post of yours also makes me think of how much exclusionist rhetoric is centered around the assumption that, for example, only people who are gay or lesbian are ever impacted by homophobia. That kind of thinking is not only incorrect, but also gives way too much credit to homophobes who do not, it turns out, have a nuanced and informed view of sexuality and gender.

Homophobes don't think in terms of "we are cis and allo and straight, and this other group is made up of people who are gay, pan, bi, ace, aro, trans, nonbinary, intersex, and any other number of labels under the queer umbrella". They think in terms of "we are normal and good, and this other group is different and bad."

I recall that one incident about the parents who kicked their asexual teenage son out of their home because they thought he was gay, and tons of exclusionists were insisting, "No, no, this isn't aphobia, this isn't discriminating against asexual people, this is misdirected homophobia, gay people are still the only ones being oppressed." Like, okay buddy, call it whatever you want, but this asexual teenager is still homeless now.

The sort of people who commit these hate crimes think in such rigidly binary terms. That man is attracted to men? It doesn't matter that he's also attracted to women, he's gay. That man doesn't want to have sex with women? It doesn't matter that he doesn't want to have sex with men either, he's gay. Oh, that man IS dating and having sex exclusively with a woman, but that woman was assigned male at birth? Gay. They're all gay, and we must hate them all for it.

Exclusionists will claim that ace people or bi people or trans people who don't medically transition or who are non-dysphoric aren't queer enough to be in queer spaces, don't face the same level of oppression, and meanwhile homophobes are more than happy to hate crime anyone who doesn't fit their narrow definitions of what is acceptable. The people who are beating up a man for being gay aren't going to stop upon being informed he's actually polysexual. They'll say "close enough" and continue beating him up.

Exactly. But then again many of these people refuse to consider a different perspective than their own.

I have an ace friend who, due to her solid lack of interest in men [or anyone] was assumed to be a lesbian by her boss. Her boss who turned out to be a sexual predator and preyed on three different female coworkers about her age [read: significantly younger than him] and was eventually fired for it. Her boss that, when she revealed she was dating a man at the time, admitted he had considered pursuing her as well but was discouraged by her lack of attraction and if he had known she could be "turned" he would have struck while the iron was hot, so to speak.

Is that not a combination of lesbiphobia, misogyny, acephobia, toxic masculinity? That he wanted this girl young enough to be his grand daughter to the point that he thought he could bully his way into her bed after seeing that she was not interested in being pursued? It doesn't matter that he was wrong about her being a lesbian. It doesn't matter that she could have just as easily been with a woman instead of a man. It doesn't matter that he doesn't have any understanding of the concept of asexuality. Here was a young woman who *could potentially* be swayed by power dynamics and/or alcohol, and thus she was added to his list of potential conquests.

Her identity, her feelings, her emotions, her life doesn't matter. What matters is that he was a predator and she was highlighted as possible prey the second he thought he might be able to convince her to accept his magic Dick Of Turning.

How do I know all this? He was my boss too. And I saw firsthand some of the things he did. Thankfully, as said, he was eventually caught in the act and fired for it, but not before he terrorized multiple female employees.

[gear-project]

Annon-Guy: Feel free to disagree with me, but I feel StrIVe isn't exactly fair to single player content and I need to rant here

The CURSED Difficulty Scale system in Arcade Mode along with purposely unfair cheating bosses. I can respect you liking it, but I don't like forced difficulties in fighting games.

Limited World Dollars in Single Player. Beat arcade mode once with Sol: rewarded. Beat Arcade twice with Sol: NOTHING. Chump change for each win in Survival Mode.

Gallery unlocks stuck to a random number generator (Fishing) alongside unless Avatar junk instead of making them seperate items like with the funitrual and Digital Figure Content.

Really now... it feels like Team Red doesn't care much about Single Player Content and wants to FORCE them to play Online to make World Dollars or to have fun, which is not good in my opinion. I get this is meant to be played with friends and for a time, I did enjoy online, but only because I wasn't eating dirt EVERY single time, getting punched into the corner with no breathing room until I got to the guys who love to make me eat dirt. Granted, when I do play online once in a blue moon, I don't always run into them, but it's not pleasant, especially when they guage my skills in the first round before turning me into pulp in the next round.

I'm not a casual player, but I'm no professional player either. While BBTAG lacked single player content, it says something when I had MORE enjoyment with it than StrIVe! At least Team Blue doesn't force people to play online to do stuff.

I still like StrIVe though, but it's sad when I consider Xrd SIGN the best between it, Revelator/Rev 2 and StrIVe.

I'm still looking forward to see if anything good comes from StrIVe, but I feel it's a giant slap to the Single Player crowd.

"YARE YARE DAZE..." as Sol tends to say.

I get what you're saying, but I think it's necessary to address your complaints to ARC System Works directly. You aren't the only one who feels that way.

They tend to focus on Online Gameplay for this game compared to solo play, so of course a lot of ideas were neglected.

As for the difficulty of bosses... they anticipated that casual players won't make perfect runs of Arcade Mode, which is why the "bosses" of the game are usually fought with an Ally to assist you in combat (though the reality is, obtaining those routes isn't optimal). Even in Guilty Gear Isuka, you had to have a second player to assist you as a teammate to play higher difficulties.

I'm a long-time gaming veteran, so most of my expectations are born from harsh experiences against one-sided battles against nearly unbeatable foes... so I totally get that it's hard to face these kinds of bosses the first time you experience a fighting game... in fact it's a heavy contrast to the idea of learning fighting games for the first time!

I first seriously cut my teeth on Guilty Gear XX's Mission Mode, and that was a dive in to some TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE, difficulty... but it also laid the foundation for learning how to play better on my own terms in terms of skill.

I'm not saying everyone will learn the game that way, but it couldn't hurt to do so. Establishing a solid foundation through learning how to play and upping your game is part of the experience, but it's not something you can learn in a day... it takes time, dedication, and patience. Sometimes you really do need to play Mission Mode for a while to comprehend the basics... even just spending hours upon hours in training mode is part of the deal too!

Part of the reason Team Red is so focused on Multiplayer right now has to do with their origins as producers of Arcade Games... making console features isn't something they are necessarily adapted to doing.

But, that doesn't mean they're entirely inflexible, since they've come up with good ideas in the past.

I think it boils down to addressing the issues as a community and making sure they hear our opinions firmly.

This is no longer just Ishiwatari we're talking about, this is a fresh generation of game developers who are cutting their teeth on something new.

Even if you yourself can't think of a way to talk to them about these issues... there are several of us in the community that ARE ADDRESSING THESE ISSUES TO THEM DIRECTLY... so you aren't alone. I want you to remember that in earnest.

[deltaruinedcoco37]

SplatoonMG4 CHAPTER 1: The Gays Meet for the First Time

(Third person)

It was currently…daytime.

Probably?

Well, that's all SMG3 could make of it. Wearing a watch just never really seemed too practical, considering that he would never need to know the time here. He just needed to go through his schedule. Was it a schedule, actually? No, more of…an instruction manual.

STRIKE MAP GUARDIAN 3 (Suction-Cup Lookout - Octoling Strike)

Always be on the lookout for members of the New Squidbeak Splatoon, especially their latest recruit, Agent Four.

If an NSS Agent is seen, immediately alert all Octoling soldiers around the map to guard the Mini Zapfish. Your map is Octoling Strike, a replica of the Inkling battle map "The Reef", and you should remain hidden in one of the many buildings around the map. Avoid engaging in battle at all costs.

If the map's soldiers are defeated, you must rush them to the nearest Respawn platforms as quickly as you can. Release at least ten Squee-Gs and evacuate until the map is cleared of all ink before sending the Octolings back in.

If confronted with no escape, we have supplied you with one weapon from our limited supply. Treat it with care, and do not break it.

DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, REMOVE YOUR HYPNOSHADES.

To be honest, sometimes SMG3 wasn't sure if the last instruction on the page was real. Maybe he was just imagining it. He did a double take, and-

-

-

-

What was he doing again?

Right, he was going to…check the Mini Zapfish capsules.

That was it.

Although, sometimes this job seemed a bit pointless. Why keep going? Why not just let them rest for a moment, why not just leave now? He had been so busy with this shit that he'd missed Octavio's concert. Oh wait, wasn't it 'Dj ZeR0' or something like that? Kinda cringy honestly.

So many people had left, yeah. Why not him? Why stay here? What was keeping him from-

-

-

-

What was he just thinking about…?

Suddenly, he heard a sound that was all too familiar to him…the sound of a certain Respawn platform linking to the soul of an Inkling.

Well.

Looks like it's time to start blasting some sweet Turquoise October in here.

~~~

"Octolings!"

Yeah, Four knew. Mario really didn't need to tell him that, but whatever. Not like he could just tell his boss to get off the line.

Agent Four, the newest NSS Agent, sighed. "I can't believe they're still trying to steal our power! Who are they even working for anyway?…I thought Zer0 was captured. Safely this time."

Luigi, the brother who originally recruited him, thought for a second. "W-well, we don't really know…since, m-most of them left, or we freed… It could be the ones that aren't free yet?"

That was kind of solid, Four thought, Maybe he's onto something. Hey, wait- is he right?… The blue-haired Inkling squinted at the Octolings. Are they still wearing Hypnoshades?

"Is it okay if I try something a little different?" he asked the brothers. They hesitated for a moment before Mario said yes, because they knew that even if he was splatted, he had a few lives left on this janky Respawn platform. Also, Mario liked dangerous stunts and chaos.

Four grinned. "Okay. Now let's see who's behind this all!"

First, he grabbed Belle's (Sheldon's) drone and turned off the Superjump target. Which was probably the most dangerous thing an Inkling can do, but that didn't matter, he had extra lives! Now it was time to launch himself at high speeds to a random spot in this place where he could end up anywhere from exactly where he needed to be to an Octarian dumpster in the city below.

C R A S H

Goddammit, that fucking hurt. Not really, since Inklings are strong, but yeah…who would've expected this? Who could've possibly expected that with infinite possibilities, one of them could be crashing through the side of a fucking building-

"AGENT 4! A-ARE YOU OKAY?!" Luigi was terrified, and for good reason. This was uncharted territory for the NSS…an Octarian city…

Wait, no. It was just one of those fake buildings the Octarians made to mimic The Reef. No wonder it was so empty.

What's that over there?

Was that…

A…

ZAPFISH?!

Whoa. Four didn't think he would find one of these little guys so unguarded…why was its capsule just sitting here?

"[Inkling.]"

He felt the uncomfortable sensation of ink that wasn't his own color touching him.

An Octobrush, and an Octarian…holding it to the side of his face. More specifically, an Octoling with violet tentacles, wielding a rather powerful-looking brush stained with magenta ink… definitely not a soldier, but what?

Carp. How would he even get out of this?

"[What's one of YOUR KIND doing here?]" the Octoling screeched. "[You've taken EVERYTHING. Our electricity, our king, our time, our LIVES. And you have the NERVE-]" he harshly glared at the Inkling- "[-to just BARGE INTO my workspace?! You…you absolute fucking dipshit!]"

Uh oh, that Octoling sounded…mad… Four thought.

Which was why it was horrible…that the Agent didn't understand a single word of the Runic that was being spoken.

"U-uuh, you're completely mistaken!" he exclaimed. "I-I'm one of you! Definitely! See, I…I knew the way here!" Four's eyes darted around the room for a second before he pointed at the hole in the wall. "Oh, wait…"

Yeah, he was not making it out of here alive. He just…uh…had to listen to this guy monologue for another minute before the sweet release of death- well, not really, since the whole Respawn platform thing. Wow…this guy will just not shut up. He must never get to monologue to anyone, that sounds…sad. :(

"[…And finally, after SO MANY defeats…we- no, I will strike you down, Agent Four!]" the Octoling yelled. "[Since I'm Strike Map Guardian 3, or SMG3, I've always felt like it has been my duty to…]"

Okay, this was actually kind of sad now. When will he stop…

Wait, 'SMG3'? That didn't sound like a word in Runic, Square, or Round…sure, maybe it was in Halfmoon, Bold, or Sign, but probably not since those were Inkling languages. Was that…his name?

He did hear about some Octarians from Beaker's Depot not having proper names.

"Uh- th-that's…cool! I'm sorry, but I have to get going…yeah…I'm totally one of you guys, so I have evil crap to do! My name is SMG4!" He weakly smiled. "Can I…"

SMG3 was not impressed. No one would be, though, the only thing really impressive about this was Agent Four's sheer stupidity. Lying to an Octoling. As an Inkling. About being an Octoling. While speaking in an Inkling language. Fucking idiot.

It wasn't a surprise when the Map Guardian finally smacked Agent Four to the ground with his Octobrush, leaving the Inkling with barely any HP… but he was still alive, and mildly annoyed now. "Hey! What was that for?! I listened to your villain monologue…"

At this point, Mario was done with just listening in silence. "Agent Four! You've gone coo-coo crazy if you think you can still get out of this! USE VIOLENCE!"

Unfortunately, it was loud enough for SMG3 to hear. Suddenly, his Hypnoshades flashed a bright red and he raised his Octobrush. "NO!" Mario screamed. "THOSE RESPAWN POINTS COST A FORTUNE IN POWER EGGS TO USE! YOU CAN'T DIE!"

Agent Four quickly shifted into his Squid form and began charging up an attack, deciding to try out that new Splatlandian technique. There was a flash of recognition on SMG3's face where he knew he'd seen that before, from other Octolings with experiences outside Octo Canyon. The people who were born on the surface, sometimes (mistakenly) captured and brought underground, had showed him…

Squid Surge. No no no- Four was going to- Three had to get out of the way!-

-

-

-

SEEK AND DESTROY

He swung his brush just a millisecond too late. He didn't want to. He had to. But why he did wasn't what mattered, the only thing that mattered now was that he would never be ordered around like this anymore. Blue ink stained his face, and he heard the Zapfish's capsule being shattered. The lights shut off in the building, leaving only the light coming in through the window from the screens that lined the Octoling Strike map's dome.

SMG3 heard the rush of ink that told him that Agent Four had launched himself out of the building, and probably the Octoling Strike map too. Everything was so much…clearer now, for some reason, the sights and sounds in reality.

A pair of Hypnoshades lay on the ground in front of him, cracked, flickering, broken.

~~~

AAAND there we have the first chapter of SplatoonMG4! If you're new to this, check out the pinned post on my blog for SplatoonMG4!

See y'all soon!

- Coco

~~~

Next (Ch. 2)

[duckapus]

Curtain Call

So the fight against Showtime at the top of the tower isn't exactly going well given how powerful she is, but thanks to the war down on the ground the tides are about to turn, because a stray barrage of Missile Megs from Bowser misses Metal Overlord and hits the tower about halfway up instead, doing enough damage to make everything above start to fall. Everybody realizes that their only chance of maybe surviving is to jump out the window, and, well, Kamek and Cubot are the only ones who can fly and they're obviously not strong enough to carry everyone else, so all they can really do is hope for a miracle (or at least for Meme Energy to decide it'd be funnier for them to survive the fall).

And with a roar and a call of "YYYYEEEHHHHHAAAWWW!" a miracle does arrive, as they all land on something mostly solid far higher up than they expected.

"Need a lift, piss-ants?"

"Anti-Shroomy!?" The 4 then looks down at what exactly their savior rode in on, "you tamed Draco Piranha!?"

"Yep! Turns out he's not so bad once you show him who's boss."

It's at that point that Showtime reminds us that she can just ignore gravity, and she starts throwing attacks at them, prompting a chase down towards the ground.

...okay, I'll level with you, I've got a few small scenes figured out for all this but not a coherent story to stitch them together, and at this point I just want this done so bear with me. Eventually the fight reaches the ground, the group is still on the back foot, the chaos of the battle raging around them is messing with both sides, at some point Ice Melony and Mecha Desmond show up while fighting each other and Showtime gets caught in their crossfire and blasted elsewhere on the battlefield and the main group (plus the rest of the converted crew members who've managed to come over to either help or attack depending on which conversion they have).

At this point Metal Overlord seemingly manages to overpower Castle Bowser and tries to merge with him to become even more powerful...but it takes a lot more willpower than Metal has to overwrite Bowser's, so instead we get Heavy Metal Bowser.

(not my best work or even colored in but this is what you get. junior for scale)

The good new is that now the Robot converted characters are now under Bowser's control and helping the good guys. The bad news is that Showtime had a front row seat for this.

"Well now, there's an idea." she looks over the battlefield and spies a certain royal Siren fending off a frozen king and his army almost single-handedly, and in an outfit that's almost just her style to boot, "Jackpot."

She flies over, sending out a wave of energy that knocks away everyone besides Old King Winter and Sonata. Sonata levels her trident at the newcomer, "Your energy...you're the source of all this madness, aren't you."

She laughs haughtily, "Clever as always, kiddo. Now, both of you hold still." she raises her arms towards the two and they begin to feel something being torn out of them as painfully as possible.

Streams of colored energy pour out of them and into Showtime, gradually causing all three to glow. eventually it gets so bright that they can't be seen at all, and when it dies down only one titanic figure remains.

"Alright! Goodby Queen Cutie and he-llo Empress Sexy~!"

"Two down, five to go. Now, where's the mushroom girl?" She flies off towards Toadstool Tangle.

Meanwhile, the Ice and Undersea converted people start to undergo some rather horrific transformations, with Creep growing out of them at all angles. 4 unfortunately gets a front-row seat when it happens to 3. This continues with the Mushroom conversions (so really just Draco Piranha and the Tangle itself), then the Muppets and soon after the ghosts, and finally everyone gets to witness the battle between Heavy Metal Bowser and an even more powerful version of Fusion Showtime with features added from the other three trigger characters (I unfortunately did not draw the later Fusion Showtime stages. I might in the future but for now you'll just have to use your imaginations). It's a close match, but eventually even Bowser falls, and Wonder Showtime is born while the Group stands alone once again.

It seems as though all hope is lost, especially since most of them quickly get pinned down by the horribly mutated versions of literally everyone, but 4 gets an idea, "Wait, we still have the seeds, right?"

Mario manages to yeet Luigi away and pulls out a few of their collected Wonder Seeds, "Yeah, but they don't exactly do anything besides sit in your inventory."

"Not on their own, but they're part of a meme, right? And they're a new enough one that they've got way more Meme Energy than most things at that scale. Maybe I can turn them into something we can actually use!"

Meggy looks over from where she's trying to get what might be Saiko and Tari off of Ferb, "Can you even get a meme to that kind of power on your own?"

"..." he looks to a particular section of the battlefield, eyes full of determination, "No, No I can't." he runs in the direction he was looking, tackling the mutated Admiral 3 to the ground and pulling a tentacle that used to be an arm into a death grip.

"SMG4, what are you doing!?"

"My...job!" he's assaulted by the all-too-familiar sensation of the Creep burrowing into his body, his brain, along with the horrible memories that come with it, but he holds firm, "3, if there's anything left in there that can hear me, I need you!"

There's a long few seconds where 4 can't help but think he's just thrown his life away for nothing before the seven Wonder Seeds rise up and start to morph into raw Meme Energy spheres, "work...fast...ba...ka"

The two work in tandem to merge the energy into a single sphere, which then transforms into...

A Wonder Flower. Because what else could it possibly be? This one has the strange grey-with-yellow-accents color scheme of the Special World wonder flowers.

"You've got-erhf-one shot! Make it...count!"

Whoever's left of the group nods in understanding and rushes towards the flower in the hopes of reaching it before one of the mutants, and two hands grab its petals at the same time, one gloved, the other not...and something unexpected happens.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

YsOwUiRnEgAyKoIuDrYaOrUmRsEfArSoQmUsIiDdYeOtUoRsEiAdKeIcDoYmOeUoRnEiAtSsQtUiImDeYtOoUgRoE-

wYoAoHmOyOwYoAoHmOyOwYoAoHmOyOwYoAoHmOyO-

waitifyourehereandimherethenwhosflyingthepingaswhatthehellamwetalkingabout

A single figure sits on a rooftop, looking out at the sun setting over a city that no longer exists.

They are alone.

They are together.

A living monument to a bond forged in Ink and Fire.

An experience made flesh.

The moment seems to stretch on forever, as they revel in simply Being...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

But when they open their eyes, not even a second has passed.

"Holy shit."

They look down at the awestruck face (or, well, eyes) of Marcy, discovering that they're now significantly taller than either of them were before.

"I knew something crazy would happen but this..."

They grin, "I know, right? I...we?...Yeah, I feel amazing! Like I could do anything! Like-"

The earth shakes, and they look up to find that Showtime's definitely noticed the commotion, "-Liiike I'm wasting time. Let's-a go!"

They run towards the titanic villain, soon discovering that their fusion was only part of the Wonder Effect as an obstacle course of combined Super Mario and Splatoon elements springs up around them, forming a path up to their target. Obviously Showtime doesn't just sit and wait for them, attacking with everything she's got, but they tackle any challenge that comes their way with a combination of Meggy's athletics and skill and Mario's platforming prowess and Avatar powers, as well as some of the greatest reoccurring memes of both (of particular note is when they weaponize Meggy's poor cooking skills to turn an oven they found into a rocket to help them reach a higher level).

Soon enough, they reach the top of what's left of the Tower, nearly at eye level with Wonder Showtime. She leers down at them.

"And just what are you supposed to be, you little freak?"

"It's-a me, Marggy, and I'm not 'supposed' to be anything. But as long as we're both here, I guess I'll be the one to take you down."

She laughs at this, then gives them a sharklike grin, "Real cute, kids. But it's gonna take a lot more than two midgets in a trenchcoat to beat a goddess."

Marggy shrugs, "I dunno, eight on two seems like pretty good odds to me."

More laughter as she brings up her ice-covered arm, "Okay, okay. Now you die."

A blast of ice the width of an ocean liner barrels towards them, but rather than show any fear they simply activate a certain something they grabbed on their way up here: a Killer Wail Canned Special.

"NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINTENDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The beam of sound and ink cuts through the ice magic like it's nothing, badly cracking the ice arm and, after she moves it out of the way in pain, continuing on to blast a hole in the eye on her chest. They waste no time after that, continuing along the Wonder Effect's path towards the prone titan.

She can tell what they're doing, but at her size with her injuries doesn't have the speed or strength to get away in time. Instead, she directs every last one of her mutated minions, Creep tentacles, shadow arms, and whatever else she can muster at them, "JUST DIE ALREADY!!!"

Marggy continues to be able to outrun and outfight everything thrown at them, eventually diving into the hole they made and finding themselves in a massive chamber made of creep. And right in front of them is a face they've been hoping to see all day.

She's beat up, covered in Creep, her dress ripped to shreds and crown nowhere to be seen, and just barely conscious, but when she looks up at them her eyes are as bright as ever, and she doesn't look the least bit surprised to see them, "Hey honey. How was your trip?"

The bravado Marggy's been keeping up crumbles away, and they start to tear up, "Mom..." They run towards her, pulling her into a hug as best they can given her bindings.

They stay that way for a short while, then it's back to business, "Okay, Let's finish this." they look around the room, which seems to be slowly becoming active, for some kind of weak point, eventually spotting yet another massive eye directly above Emulator, "That looks about right."

They pull out Mario's Code Bow, which apparently merged with Meggy's Splattershot so become a futuristic Tri-Stringer, and aim it up at the eye. It's at this point that Showtime starts fighting back again, lashing out from the walls with more tendrils, but it's too late, and an inky, binary-covered arrow flies straight and true clean through the eye's pupil, and the entire room becomes enveloped in blinding blue light as Showtime screams in agony.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Back outside, Showtime's outer shell is glowing just as much as the rest of her, and a shockwave of Wonder Power blasts out from her, destroying any Creep it touches and transforming the Mushroom Kingdom and its people back into their original selves. Everyone present begins to celebrate the fact that it's finally, finally over.

In the meantime, the Crew and the airship group all do their best to get their bearings and start heading towards the now rapidly shrinking glow. Which, of course, leads them right back to the old castle grounds.

Before anyone gets there, a small shape falls out of the sky and lands with a comical squeaky toy sound in the grass, standing up to reveal that it's Old Man Hobo back to his usual self "Does anyone know where I li-"

*WHAM*

Suddenly, Bowser crashes shell-first on top of him, clutching Lily to his chest. When the trigger characters had reformed up in the air, he'd made sure to grab onto her so he could break her fall. Giant superpowered turtles can handle falling from the sky, human children usually can't.

Next to land is Kermit, who hits the ground with a splat before immediately standing up, "Well. That was traumatic. Goodbye everyone, don't bother inviting me to the next arc." With that, he walks off with that G-Mod "Move doll up and down" walk that most characters use.

Peach, Floyd and Metal Sonic can all just float down, so they do so.

And finally, there's Marggy and Emulator, who use the last of the Wonder Flower's power to gently touch down right on the moat bridge, with her leaning on them once they're on solid ground and gravity takes effect.

After this there'd probably be an actual reunion scene and maybe an epilogue (plus the scene about Showtime's fate that I detailed in this post) but I am done with this arc. Duck is out, peace!

[girlballs]

oh also that cool solar beam laser redirect thing i showed off a while ago is unfortunately not being kept, since i've pared everything down to 5 unlockable beams + their alt fire upgrades, and the Cool Pink Laser didn't make the cut exactly

ion beam (starting weapon, no special functions)

missile (slow and mainly meant for combat but is also used for destroying environmental stuff) + remote bombs (used for hitting multiple targets/switches simultaneously)

arc driver (short range, directly charges electrical stuff like wires and batteries) + shock spike (fires a bunch of electrically linked metal spikes, for bridging circuits where there aren't existing connections)

phase beam (can interact with stuff that's only partially in the light/dark world, flip polarity on dark/light sensitive stuff, opens portals, etc) - the Light firing mode can also interact with laser mechanisms

ice beam (cools/freezes stuff. duh) + ice spike (creates big solid blocks of ice that can be used as platforms or to block moving mechanisms and such)

incinerator (opposite of the ice beam if you can believe it) + napalm launcher (lingers and melts otherwise indestructible stuff, keeps stuff heated even in extremely cold areas)

despite these all ostensibly being Weapons i'm still committed to not having a strong combat focus- enemies and bosses are gonna be more like "what beams do i need to use when" puzzle encounters than like. FPS Skill Check fights. things are mostly going to be exploration/puzzle focused

[ninepentz]

Narcissist attention seeking

Your toxic parents, friends, lovers, bosses etc.

With my own narcissistic parent I noticed that the way she seems to seek attention and validation is from me being affected by all the things she does.

Starting arguments, causing problems, making my life harder and doing all the things she knows I hate. It's her way of getting my attention, validating herself, and getting the last laugh/1 up on me. It's so weird how they act sometimes..but I realized this is their game, and for those of us who aren't narcissist or may be healing ourselves, our minds don't work like theirs.

So it's easy to miss the signs and fall right into their traps which they desperately want you to engage in. You have to be smart and know when they are plotting against you and whatever it is they want to gain from you. Narcissist feel validated when they successfully piss you off, bother you or make you uncomfortable.

A narcissist has no limits to what they do bc their logic is flawed, they aren't logical, fair, moral, mutual etc. So if they have to go to extreme lengths to piss you off or get a reaction they will, and it's the shock of it all to their victims that gets them going even more.

They expect you to not be able to predict their next move to basically be caught off guard by their behavior and they WILL do exactly what you think they won't do. Bc this is how they successfully get your/others attention on them, it's guaranteed to work.

The important part here is that you want to humble the narcissist by not validating them and any of their antics.

It's either they trick you and you feel shitty for falling for it or you protect yourself and mirror their behavior back to them, but in a way that you aren't involved or engaging with them.

In other words, you won't be really doing anything besides ignoring, grey rocking and living your life as you would regardless of what they try to do, or what reactions they try to pull out of you.

It's important to humble them bc this is what gets them closer and closer to becoming self aware and possibly healing themselves, which would require lots of inner work that they strongly avoid with every single interaction, abuse, attention seeking they do.

Narcissist especially the emotionally unstable ones, are often extremely moody, childish, unable to react in healthy ways and this is why they seek out to trigger the emotions in other people to feel a sense of stability. It's how they basically emotionally regulate by using other people's emotions in a way. This also means that if they don't have a solid foundation for their emotions, they tend to be unempathetic, cold, they are emotionally handicapped if that's the right word.

This is not to shame them but more so to just explain what's going on with them.

They don't have the tools to understand their own emotions or that of others, and sometimes they may think they do understand but it's always temporary/shaky.

And there's many other conditions in my opinion that are not narcissm that can experience this same feeling, like body dismorphia for example, they aren't able to see themselves as they are, it's always a dramaticized hellish version of themselves bc they aren't able to see themselves in a healthy way.

And to end this observation of mine, that shows you just how bad they have it. I hope this helped someone anyway. It most definitely helped me to organize my own thoughts as an overthinking introvert, writing helps a lot. Thank you for reading 💕

✨Nine of Pentacles✨

[masterjedilenawrites]

Hello, m'lady!

If you don't mind, here are some incoherent thoughts about some of the Bois that came to my mind after reading around in your brilliant writing. You said you wouldn't mind my incoherent thoughts, so I thought I'd share them! (I'm still working on my incoherent Bad Batch thoughts, btw)

I want to hug Jesse. Like, he's hot as hell no questions asked, but I also just want to hug him. Like, a long hug. And tell him that he's loved and that he's enough and wonderful exactly as he is.

Also, I want to cook for all the clones, but these vibes are the strongest with Wrecker, and, for some reason, Hardcase and Fives.

Also, my ideal date is going to one of those public strawberry picking fields where you can just... walk around and fill your basket with strawberries, and afterwards go home and bake strawberry cake, and I'm going to drop that in this context.

Also I find it so interesting how non-commitical Rex actually is; like, who would've guessed that a guy with such a spit-death-in-the-face attitude on the battlefield would be so scared to let someone into his heart.

Also, I low-key wanna call Cody Marshall Commander, Sir and see what happens >:3

I haven't even consumed any Delta Squad material, but solely the writing on this blog made me love them all and (idk, maybe they've met in canon XD) I think Boss and Cody would get along.

And someone should tell Fixer to go tf to sleep, I'm sensing that he doesn't do that *nearly* enough.

Someone should also tell Kix that always putting others first and neglecting his own needs is not what being a good, compassionate person is about, and that he's worth it.

I could go on and on, damn, but lemme just say that your depiction of the Bois really helped shape a more 3-dimensional and rich picture of them in my head and that is awesome :)

Also thank you sm for my date set-up again, I'd 100% ask the dear commander for a second date.

I've been thinking about these gems nonstop since you dropped them in my inbox! 💙 I love getting thoughts like this so keep them coming! I don't get to talk about these wonderful clone men IRL so this is my only outlet 😅

And just so you know, I did intend to respond like a normal person and just... piggyback on your thoughts, share a few of my own, call it a day... but then my hand slipped and now I have 8 whole one-shots to share instead 😳😳

So, in honor of May the Fourth, I've got my 8 stories queued up to post throughout today (5/4), all based on what you shared here! We've got hurt/comfort, we've got silliness, we've got slice-of-life, we've even got some spice.... I had so much fun writing these and I hope you all enjoy them! 

Thanks for the inspo, friend! Wishing everyone a fantastic Star Wars day! 🌟

JESSE

Jesse definitely needs a good, solid hug every once in a while. Be prepared for his reaction, though, it'll be quite an emotional moment for him...

WRECKER (+Fives and Hardcase)

They do say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach...

BLACKOUT

Why not go on this ideal date with your new beau, Blackout? 😃

REX

His fear of commitment is interesting, huh? But he does have many loved ones who will help him work through that fear...

CODY

Oh boy, you'd best be ready for a long night after a line like that...

BOSS & CODY

They're leaders with different styles, different responsibilities, different crews... and yet they're bonded together like two old men who just met in the power tools aisle...

FIXER TECH

Actually, I headcanon that Fixer is an early bird. It's more likely that someone would tell him to go back to sleep.

Tech on the other hand...

KIX

There aren't a lot of people Kix would listen to if they told him that. Thankfully you're one of them...

[bahamutgames]

AFTERTHOUGHTS - ROUNDUP ROUND 13

May - July 2024

Hello again! It was slow going for me with gaming for a little bit, but I've really started to pick up the ball again and have been playing a lot of stuff and really enjoying it too! And now I'm sitting here on a Summer Tuesday night, and I wanna talk about some of the stuff I was playing over the last few months!

And of course I gotta say it: These aren't reviews, just my thoughts, please play anything I talk about if it interests you!

Super Mario Land (April 21, 1989) - Gameboy

FINALLY Mario Land 1 is on the NSO. Not sure why this took so long, but it was nice to replay it cause I haven't touched Mario Land 1 in over 7 years now (god damn...) Mario Land 2 is one of my favorite 2D Marios ever so I was interested to see how Land 1 holds up. And honestly? It's not that amazing, it's a pretty clunky feeling game. But it's not like, offensive or anything. It's very creative with a lot of unique worlds and enemies similar to 2. But without any new power ups and the actual platforming feeling a little odd, it just isn't the most exciting old Mario to revisit. But, the game does have 2 particular strong points that I still love: Shmup sections which are super neat, and a surprisingly solid soundtrack! Pretty much every song in this game is a winner with my favorite probably being the credits theme. Neat!

Megaman: Dr. Wily's Revenge - Megaman V (July 26, 1991 - July 22, 1994) - Gameboy

Continuing with the Gameboy stuff, we have the Megaman Gameboy games! All 5 of them were recently made available on NSO and after having finished Legacy Collection 2 earlier this year, I jumped at the chance to play these games! And they are VERY interesting to say the least. Since they're all fairly similar I'll keep them all together in this afterthoughts.

So, yeah... These games are Megaman on Gameboy! That's exactly what it sounds like. They're Megaman... but smaller and more green. But what's so interesting about them is that they're not the same stories from the NES games. Instead they actually have their own plots while recycling robot masters and enemies and such. Because of that they're a little underwhelming I feel like, but it's very interesting to try these games out in such a shorter format.

Particularly what makes the format interesting is that you tend to only have 4 robot masters, then 4 robot masters acting as Wily Stages afterwards. As opposed to usual Megaman tradition of 8 masters and then a handful of Wily Stages removed from the masters. A big issue I have with Classic Megaman and X is that the games can feel a little long in the tooth, particularly when you get to the ending fortresses. By the end of the NES Era sometimes they were asking you to do 2 fortresses and it was just SO draining. And I always wondered how it would be if this format was shortened a bit. And these games answer that! But honestly I think they may be too short now. So maybe there's no pleasing me.

Another FASCINATING thing about these games are the Megaman Killers, who are new bosses you fight before Wily that all have their own lore and want to kill Megaman. I think they're all neat! But kind of wasted as concepts. I think this premise would've been stronger if they stuck with Enker (the killer from the first one) and had him getting stronger with new abilities each game instead of new bosses. And then have him sacrifice himself in the 4th one instead of the new killer. Idk, just would've been more impactful imo. But they were still neat and the payoff where you rematch them all in 5 was very cool!

And speaking of 5, I have to give that one serious props for not only having a fully original story, but fully original robot masters! Instead being the Stardroids, who are alien robots named after the planets! These guys rule (Mars is my favorite) and they are also hilariously ultimately poorly used lol. In the end despite making new villains, Wily is still the villain. Just so they can kill him off before the final boss anyway? SO WHY PUT WILY IN THE STORY JUST TO RUIN THE STARDROIDS IF YOU WEREN'T EVEN GONNA USE HIM??? Very odd.

I can't recall any specific complaints about each game now unfortunately just because it's been a hot minute since I finished them. But just general megaman stuff like the ones where you can't slide or charge aren't as fun. No fast weapon swap is lame. But it's gameboy so whatever. And I also wanted to give these games some serious props for having some pretty cool cutscenes which I certainly was not expecting on Gameboy of all things! And not just in game cutscenes, but full on hand drawn cutscenes (not animated, just still frames, but still.)

Super Mario Galaxy 2 (May 23, 2010) - Wii

SUPER FUCKIN' MARIO!? Here's another one I haven't played in... god I don't know, maybe over 10 years now somehow. I lent my copy out to someone and a bunch of stuff happened to them almost immediately so I just never got it back, until recently! So I jumped at the chance to FINALLY replay this one!

And ultimately? Yeah it's fine. I think in terms of gameplay it's VERY good. I probably still prefer Galaxy 1's levels but Galaxy 2 still feels great and plays great and has a lot of fantastic galaxies that are TONS of fun to play through. The addition of Yoshi is great, the new power ups are all super fun and creative (cloud being a personal favorite), a lot of the bosses are really cool, and even super gimmicky stages like the Fluzzard levels are really fun! And of course, I shouldn't have to tell you that the Galaxy games are still gorgeous and have some AMAZING soundtracks.

A particularly surprising thing to me was how much I found myself liking Lubba and Starship Mario. For some reason I really felt like I was just gonna hate them both because they're such a step down from Rosalina and the Observatory. And they certainly are, but Lubba is very funny and charming and a lot more like, gruff than I was remembering. And the Starship being a sort of marooned space ship that picks up other travelers as it goes across the galaxy is SO cute. I love the idea of an offshoot of Lumas who are just galaxy explorers, it's cute.

But yeah where this game truly fumbles is in the story, no surprise there. It's... So nothing. Like, actually just nothing. So it's not bad, sure. But it's actually NOTHING. Even if we Ignore Galaxy 1's story, this game's story is so nothing it's crazy. I actually feel like the plot weighs the game down, and Galaxy 2 would've REALLY benefitted from maybe just cutting it out entirely. You can really tell it was originally planned to be DLC I guess lol. But I understand they probably couldn't ship a $60 game with no story at that point. But still, I feel like they could've done something better. The only interesting part of the story is when the Luma takes Mario's hat at the end. But yeah over all I just feel like the story does more harm than good.

Any other notes? I thought some of the later levels were a little irritating, and some of the later bosses can be a bit of a pain. Like I remember Squizzard pissing me OFF when I was younger. And while I don't think the fight is that hard, it's just not a good feeling fight imo. Like it feels almost like it doesn't work right. But yeah (I'm sorry I keep saying but so much in this section) Galaxy 2 is very cute. While I still would have to say I prefer Galaxy 1 by a wide margin. It's more Galaxy, so it's a winner in my book!

Deadly Creatures (February 9, 2009) - Wii

Ah... Deadly Creatures... What an incredibly odd game. I've had this sitting on my shelf for YEARS but just never got around to playing it. However for some reason it kept calling to me, and I finally gave in. And I'm... Glad(?) I did???

For those of you not blessed with knowing WHAT this game is. It's a character action game where you play as a feral Turantula and Scorpion, each on their own story, just trying to survive. While in the background two humans (voiced by Billy Bob Thorton and Dennis Hopper) are having an actual plot happen that you can only listen into. It's FASCINATING! And honestly, doesn't feel real. It almost sounds like a joke, or an indie game, not something you'd get on the Nintendo Wii. But here we are.

So, for positives. This game is actually nuts. The concept in of itself is fascinating and a huge point towards it. It's all hyper realistic animals too, the only talking is EXCLUSIVELY from humans in the distance. Which is REALLY cool and is such an interesting way to tell a story. But the combat is insane and over-the-top despite having you play as photo realistic arachnids. You'll be doing spinning chops and slapping enemies around as the Turantula, or full on preforming brutal finishers as the Scorpion. Each have their own moveset and gain their own abilities throughout the course of their story, and they even crossover sometimes where you'll redo sections of an earlier level as the other character and access new paths, AND SOMETIMES THEY EVEN FIGHT EACHOTHER! It's so cool! All the enemies are other small animals and bugs, sometimes even letting you fight full on lizards. I think the graphics are surprisingly good for a hyper realistic Wii game, and crawling around these big human sized environments and even climbing on walls is really cool and ambitious. The music is atmospheric, again the game looks great, there's unlockable concept art and you can freely change the difficulty between levels which feels pretty progressive for a Wii era game.. It's all really neat and feels like it shouldn't be on the Wii!

But sadly... The game just can't really bring all these positives together in a meaningful way. The story isn't really that great, I saw someone say "the way it's told is better than the story itself" and I would kind of have to agree. Combat isn't really that fun the further you progress. It suffers from the Character Action game problem of giving you moves you execute by inputting shit like "XXYXBAABXAY" except Deadly Creatures ALSO has motion inputs for attacks. So you have to memories shit like "A+Forward on the control stick while waggling the wiimote left and right" it's actually insane and by the end of the game I barely used more than 2-3 moves. They start throwing so many enemies at you in later levels who all move so quickly that you'll only want to use your fastest moves anyway. And for some reason most of the combat in the late game is given to the Turtantula, who is objectively less fun in combat than the Scorpion, which was REALLY annoying. Ultimately I got so fed up that by stage 6 or 7 I had to turn it down to easy which was REALLY REALLY annoying. I thought a lot of the bosses were pretty damn underwhelming, navigating the overworld between battles could get pretty boring or even really annoying if you had to climb walls but fell off and died instantly. For every great idea the game has, it has something that it just doesn't do particularly well or exciting. Idk how to describe it.

I saw someone say this about the game online and I really have to agree: The game has everything it needs to be a shining success. Good graphics, killer and unique concept, a good gameplay idea, and Dennis Hopper. But it just fails to string it together in a satisfying way. Ultimately the game is so fascinating and bizarre that it exists at all, so I'm happy I played it, but it just wasn't the banger I was hoping for. I think this game would've been WAY better on PS3 or 360 without motion controls, and maybe it could do with a remake or a spiritual successor of some kind.

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (August 7, 2008) - DS

And last but not least: We have the first ever Fire Emblem game! Or at least the DS remake of it! So I'm no stranger to Fire Emblem, but I've only played 2 of the more recent ones. Awakening and Three Houses. But I'm not ashamed to admit that both of those games are AMAZING and Awakening specifically is one of the best RPGs I've ever played personally. So I certainly had high hopes for the game that started it all!

And... well... hmm... I don't want to say it's a bad game by any means, cause it's not. But it just really didn't hit the way I wanted it too. I think I had my expectations a little too high because, at the end of the day, this was an NES game. And I'm sure hardcore FE fans will execute me for saying this, but I just didn't like it as much as FEA or FE3H. It's so much more bleak, and sad, and not nearly as over the top and anime as those games were. Most of the first act is just Marth losing everyone he holds dear to him and it's sad! And it feels so sad and hopeless! And while the story is full of fantasy stuff and is a good story that works perfectly fine, it just didn't really captivate me or do anything where I was like "WOW!! This is happening!" And then even in gameplay, it's strategy RPG stuff. Yeah. But it just doesn't really feel as exciting as the later games. Which, sure, it's an NES RPG originally so I shouldn't expect anything mind blowing this early into the genre. But I think its problems are actually a little more unique and interesting than you'd think.

For starters, I did not play FEA or FE3H with permadeath. I know Permadeath is the big thing with these games. But I'll just come out and say it, it's less fun. Not just because losing teammates you like sucks, but because it makes me have to play so sheepishly and slow and careful in fear that anything I do will have 50 guys rain down on someone I moved 1 tile too far. Which is the point, yeah, but PERSONALLY I enjoyed using my units as distractions in FE3H to be so much more fun and rewarding. Does that make any sense?

And then the game is a little odd because other FE games will let you do a lot of things between battles. Grinding, shopping, preparing for fights. But in this one you can only buy the same basic starter weapons and there's no grinding between matches and that's IT! You want to grind? Go to the arenas ON THE MAP IN THE MIDDLE OF A BATTLE. You want to buy real items and real gear? Go to the stores ON THE MAP IN THE MIDDLE OF A BATTLE. Am I crazy or this WAY too much to ask of me in a game where leaving someone in the wrong tile means they're permanently dead? It's neat, but it's so weird especially compared to later games.

But, potentially my biggest issue with this game is that Marth, for as much as I like him. IS TOO MUCH OF A MAIN CHARACTER!! You can only beat a stage if Marth is there to get onto the end tile. You can only recruit a character if Marth goes into their city. Most of the teammates have 0 dialogue and the whole game is just Marth talking to the same handful of dudes. Again, this is almost certainly just growing pains of being an NES RPG. But still.

I have other issues, like it being nearly impossible to get teammates without a guide on who to bring to each fight. Or how annoying the enemy AI is. Or that the 3D graphics look a little ugly at times. Or the fact I basically never got a chance to use Tiki because by the time you get her your army is already so beefy. Or the fact I somehow missed the items I needed to get the ultimate weapon so the final boss was basically invincible and I had to use cheats to beat it. But I think I've flamed on this game enough. It's not all bad.

The story, while exceptionally bleak, is neat for a Nintendo game. It's just a brutally honest story about how upsetting and awful war is. No glorification of it at all. Some of the teammates are genuinely really cool even if they don't get enough attention. Cain and Abel, all the axe weilding dudes, the old man wizard whose name I forgot. I liked them a lot! And I feel like this one has a lot of job classes that just aren't in future games. Like pirates who can walk on water. Or Ballista users who can't move far but can fire missiles over MASSIVE distances. These guys in particular where really fascinating to me. If there's an enemy with that class, odds are you can have a teammate of that class too. It's also got some surprisingly funny dialogue, and I like that there's no real romance in it until like the last possible second. And a lot of the flavor to the menus and cutscenes, particularly the chapter intros, was very cool!

It's not a bad game by any means. But I think it's painfully obvious this was an NES game originally. And as a DS remake it didn't do enough to maybe update some of the NES-isms it has? I know I just flamed on it for like 50 paragraphs but I do think it's interesting still. It's just not really what I was looking for after playing Awakening and Three Houses. But I'm glad I tried it! There's plenty more Fire Emblem to play and I know there's gonna be a lot more of them that blow me out of the water going forward.

[sohelish]

me@me gotta work on Hel's time travel headcanons more, but I've pretty much figured the general stuff and it's the tech realisation that I'm stuck at.

like I got the general principle going, the tachyons, the temporal bubbles, adjacent timelines and their influences on each other...

but the challenging part is to come up with the device system. I'm thinking, a belt, a tricorder-like device and the strategic use of temporal beacons. as well as an extraction system/plan bc I'm pretty set on doing it buddy system style.

[greaterbalrogcat]

UNIT REVIEW: ARMORED FIREFLY CAT

yeah this thing sucks lol

in order to justify this unit even slightly, we will be looking at its stats at level 50+10. this would require you to spend 25 catseyes, over a million XP, and get 10 dupes from the summer break event capsule and then use all of them. keep this in mind as we go over this.

armored firefly is an event cat from the june summer break event capsules (with the kabuto cats). it's an egg unit that costs 10 red and 10 purple gems to evolve. 24k health (48k vs weakened target, 40k vs unweakened behemoth, 80k vs weakened behemoth), 50% chance to weaken red and alien to 50% for three seconds, behemoth slayer (obv), 1056 dps with 2112 dph, two second tba (time between attacks), 210 range, 10 speed, slightly less than five second cooldown, 450 cost

now, just looking at this without any outside context, why is it that bad? while its 210 range and 50/50 weaken procs make it an awful CC option for general use outside of behemoths, 40k health vs behemoth with weaken vs traits relatively prevalent in behemoths (Casaurian Ahirujo (red duck), Crustaceous Scissorex (behemoth krabbe), Infernal Pegasus Deonil (red slepinir), Suidae Piggicus (behemoth alien pigge)) with a cooldown low enough to be fixed by research combos (three SM, one M one SM, or one L research combo is enough to make it effectively minimum cooldown, one more SM added makes it truly minimum cooldown) sounds pretty solid in theory. of course, the operative phrase there is "in theory".

450 cost hurts. that's the equivalent of spamming triple erasers and only slightly less than ramen and one eraser. this is averaging 225 out of your pocket every second if you're spamming it with max research combos. behemoth stages aren't exactly giving you that much usually, and you're gonna want that money.

at level 50+10 with full defense up talents, ramen cat has 40320 health (not just against behemoth). it has less cooldown, costs 135 less, and has resist angel, giving it 201600 effective health against angels with all cotc fruit treasures (rajakong comes to mind). firefly is stuck at a max level of 50+10, while ramen can be boosted WAY past that, with 59220 health at level 50+80 (296100 effective). max ramen can tank a 300% woge hit. firefly can't even dream of doing that. ramen also has almost six times the dps of firefly, which isn't that relevant on a meatshield but chip damage always helps.

so, what about its ability? weaken helps on a meatshield, right? well, first off, it's a coin flip as to whether or not it manages to work, and it's only 50% weaken. however, let's say it does work, and you get PERFECT rng. firefly's one second of foreswing still has a decent chance of not working before it gets pushed into and dies miserably, but if it does weaken, it gets 80k health vs a weakened behemoth, which stalls...ahirujo? the first and easiest behemoth "boss"? scissorex, which can just be meatshielded with anything? suidae, which has like 3k dps? can't even reach deonil cuz deonil outranges and freezes, and the wave is gonna freeze the fireflies behind the one in front too. firefly's compatibility with the enemies it could theoretically work against does exist, to be sure, but it's so unneeded, which brings us to:

powercreep. the killer of all units (not that firefly was that good to begin with)

the enemies that firefly works best against are undoubtedly woge and ahirujo. woge because it can tank a 200% woge hit, which is good for an anti-behemoth meatshield, and ahirujo because it can weaken it semi-reliably (ahirujo always appears at 100%, and 100% ahirujo attack is slightly less than half of firefly's effective behemoth hp. when weakened, it's slightly less than a quarter). guess who destroys both of those?

you know where this is going. courier famously MURDERS most reds and most behemoths. put them together, and a level 50 courier does 112050 damage per hit vs red behemoths (52523.4 dps). firefly's anti-red niche is irrelevant. what about alien?

oh goddammit

soap cat is a fucked up tanker with **495833 HP** vs alien behemoths. it also has weaken to 50% (30% chance but it will generally stay alive long enough to proc) for five seconds, giving it **991667 HP** when the alien behemoth is weakened. firefly is irrelevant. period.

tl;dr: firefly is a waste of 10 red and 10 purple stones, and needs to be fully boosted to be considered just bad and severely outclassed instead of a contender for the worst unit in the game. thank you for reading

[theforesteldritch]

I tried picking up honkai star rail again and fuck I miss the belobog arc and belobog, I genuinely feel like the way the game is structured rn is ruining the chances of a similarly great world and questline in the future. Nothing in the game since has made me feel like I did playing through belobog, I feel like it was the best the game's offered so far and idk if they'll do anything on its level again. I love the quest, the pacing is decent, though the story can be somewhat predictable it's still solid and really well executed and makes you feel, the worldbuilding is great, the characters are all complete and fleshed out and their motivations and personalities seem complete and well thought out, the areas in it are gorgeous and so well done and exactly hit the right vibe and the music is amazing, and the boss fight (and its music, Wildfire is a banger especially given context) was great because you were invested in it and the outcome and future of Belobog. The story makes sense and feels like a complete arc rather than a disjointed series of quests. Most importantly it was both engaging and fun.

Penacony and the Luofu just haven't delivered the same way and aren't nearly as compelling. The game's fallen into a cycle of monthly small updates and pumping out new shiny gacha characters as fast as they can without putting in the effort to give them what made the Belobog arc characters so good. And the worst part is you can't really go back and get that feeling again in Belobog because once you've cleared the content there's nothing to do in the area. No interactivity, no reason or incentive to revisit your favourite areas because there's nothing to do but run around and that gets stale.

The game's lost what made it charming and have heart to it in my opinion. I guess I should expect it at this point with shitty gacha games but I genuinely thought that the game was trying to be a game beyond that and continue with the beautifully high bar set by the Belobog arc and that just hasn't happened at all. It's dissapointing tbh, especially given how much I loved and still do love belobog and the astral express, but unless this gets better and the devs remember what made it so good at the start I don't think I can bring myself to keep playing.

[the-ouma-mansion]

Twinswap

Kokichi gets sick. Kimochi goes to school in his place.

[Kokichi & Kimochi, Kimochi & Dice, Kimochi & Ouma] [Hope's Peak Academy, Non Despair, Dice, Sickfic, Roleswap, Humor, Fluff]

Read their first fic here!

Kimochi knew his twin very well. Ever since they were little, they had a habit of mirroring each other. There were many times when they were younger that Kokichi would mirror him when he didn't know what to do or how he felt about something. In turn, Kimochi mimicked Kokichi when he needed to lead or lie. They weren't the same, but they were both very good at pretending to be the same.

To some extent, Kimochi was better at it. Komochi didn't hide his feelings and if Kokichi was pretending to be him, it often made his twin feel far too bare and exposed. As a result, Kokichi very rarely pretended to be him. Kimochi, however, didn't have that problem. He didn't lie often, but that didn't mean that he couldn't. It didn't mean that he wouldn't. He'd had far more times that he pretended to be Chichi than the other way around and the only thing that would hold him back was that Kimochi no longer went to school with his brother.

Among Dice Kimochi knew exactly how Kokichi would act. Among his classmates things were a bit more... uncertain. He had a general idea, of course. Kokichi had told him enough stories, Kimochi had taken enough notes, that he knew which students his brother was close to and which he was not. He could even make educated guesses in most cases. There would always be holes in that way of acting though. 

That was why, when Kokichi turned up sick, Kimochi had to spend a solid half hour debating the question of, "To pretend or not to pretend?"

Bishop had already put Kokichi to bed. Chichi was his cutest when he was sick. He was whiny and clingy and so honest that Kimochi almost didn't want anyone else to be allowed to see him. No one should see his brother when he was too vulnerable to protect himself. Even if the core group was trustworthy, he still only trusted half of them with an exposed Chichi.

Bishop was such a softie that Kimochi considered him more of a teddy bear for his brother than anything else. The big guy had been caught more than once picking Kokichi up like a baby and rocking him when he was really bad off, and you bet your ass that Kimchi had blackmail pictures of it that he never planned to really use. And Arisa would just pout and make sad noises at him if she wasn't allowed to crawl into bed with Kokichi, likely making herself sick in the process. It was a given that they were his brother's sick companions.

Karin was allowed, but she also had school and wasn't willing to skip on a dime like the rest of them were. So while she would be the best choice, she was out. That left either Disco or Jack. 

Kimchi marched into the room and slammed a hand on the table between them as he demanded, "Which of you will watch Chichi?"

They looked at each other, having a silent conversation through facial expressions. Kimochi knew that it was some combination of "which of us has more absences" and "Do you fear the wrath of the king?" Kimochi graciously allowed it to go on for several minutes. 

Jack was the one that spoke his soft objection. "Isn't Bishop with him?"

"You want to leave him alone with just Bishop?" he asked them.

They gave him various of the same confused look. "Aren't you going to look after Boss?"

Kimochi smiled, soft and serene. "Unfortunately, not. Kokichi has to be at school."

Pause for the silence. Pause for thought. Pause for realization. Queen would have tried to object immediately, but Kimochi outranked her. Dano would never and he just bowed his red haired head in concession. Jack, however, frowned.

"Did the boss say you could go to school for him?" 

Kimchi leaned on the table more. "Chichi is sick." Which meant "no" and "I can do whatever I want" at the same time.

"You're not gonna--" Jack cut himself off, rethinking his words. Kimochi didn't care much for Jack. He was reasonable and useful, that was why he was so high ranked, but he was also a pain to Kimochi in particular. Oh well. This was the price for individuality. Some Dice members were simply not have his favorite. "I'll stay," Jack eventually said. "Just... be good."

"Hmm, I guess that means I shouldn't pretend to be Chichi after all."

Dano laughed. "Probably for the best."

"Okay! Guess I have to get ready for my first day at Hope's Peak!"

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Shuichi knew that they were in for a bad time as soon as Kokichi entered the classroom. 

To be fair, most people felt that way when Kokichi entered the classroom. Maki let out a deep sigh when she noticed him before returning to whatever she was doing, Miu loudly insulted him (as she did with most of their classmates), and Kiibo (Kokichi's favorite target) usually winced or sighed. On the whole though, no one paid very much attention to the arrival, but Shuichi realized something that they didn't. Kokichi had arrived wearing a hat and cape, and the only time that had happened was when they'd met Kimochi.

That wasn't the only evidence that he had. He smiled brightly, but it wasn't his usual teasing look or the one that preceded mischief, it was just... nice. It reminded him of the smile Kaede gave him when she greeted him most mornings. He also went straight to Gonta's desk, ignoring both Kiibo and Miu without even giving Miu's vulgar greeting a glance. So even if he was maybe overreacting, he was pretty sure his theory of Kimochi having returned was correct and he was also not looking forward to what that meant for them.

Shuichi slumped down in his seat a bit, Kaito and Kaede both noticing and turning to look at him. 

"Something wrong, sidekick?"

Shuichi shook his head, not wanting to say anything and bring attention to him in case Kimochi was still choosing a target.

"Good morning, Gonta!"

"Oh, good morning, Kokichi! You look different," Gonta said in greeting.

Kimochi laughed, holding out his cape with one hand and placing a hand on his hat with the other. "Do you like it?"

"Gonta think it look very nice."

Shuichi had noticed it before, but Kimochi didn't correct people when they called him Kokichi. It couldn't be that he was trying to pretend to be his twin since, despite looking exactly the same, he chose to dress differently. 

Then Kimochi noticed him looking and Shuichi could have kicked himself for staring. Damn him for getting caught up in a mystery. If this had been Kokichi, he would have immediately run over to mess with all of them. Which wouldn't be so bad, since Kokichi tended to be harsher to Kaito and Maki than him and Kaede (and they brought it on themselves sometimes.) Kimochi just smiled and waved at him. Shuichi was so confused that he found himself waving back. Kimochi looked genuinely pleased by this.

Kaito seemed to connect Shuichi's weird behavior to Kimochi's attention (which was correct, but not for whatever reason he thought) and called out to him. "Hey, are you picking on my sidekick?"

Sometimes Shuichi thought he and Kokichi would have ended up good friends if Kaito wasn't always inserting himself between them.

"Me?" Kimochi asked, pointing at himself with genuine confusion. "No, I was just saying hi. Shuichi was watching me, you know."

He slid further down in his seat, pulling his hat over his face. It was too early to have this much attention on himself.

"Don't lie!" Kaito yelled. 

Kimochi gave Kaito a blank look, identical to the one Kokichi sometimes wore. "So that's how you are, huh."

"What was that?"

Was Kaito looking for a fight or did he just not realize that Kimochi wasn't engaging him?

Kimochi looked at him again with a small smile. Oddly friendly looking. Then he skipped across the room, ignoring Kaito, to give more greetings. "Hello Rantaro and Kirumi. How are you both today?"

"Hey Kokichi," Rantaro greeted. 

"If you require a favor, we only have a few minutes before class is to begin, but if you are sincerely asking, then I am fine," Kirumi responded.

"Do I really ask you for favors so often that it's the first thing you say to me?" Kimochi questioned.

Kirumi looked at him oddly. "Perhaps not, but neither do you pay me a special greeting."

"Do you want a special greeting?"

"That is not necessary."

"Alrighty then!"

Was he trying to gauge how the class reacted to him? To Kokichi? Would that factor into his revenge? He skipped off to the next desk. "Good morning Himiko! How are you?"

"Nyeh."

"Good to hear!"

He smiled at Tenko who immediately narrowed her eyes. "Degenerate male."

"Degenerate female."

Tenko slammed her hands on the table as she stood. "What did you call me?"

"Is that not how you prefer to be greeted?" he asked. "I thought the rule was to treat others how you wish to be treated."

"That doesn't apply to degenerates!"

"Hmm... that's a pretty mean thing to say about Gonta."

"What?" Tenko looked taken aback.

"He's a male too. Are you saying you hate him? You don't think he deserves kindness?" Kimochi asked. It was the most Kokichi thing he'd done all day, but it didn't have the same leading tone to it. Almost as if he was genuinely asking.

Gonta stood up. "Ah, did Gonta do something wrong?"

Kimochi walked away from the conversation he'd sparked between the two. "Good morning, Angie!"

"Good morning, Kimochi," Angie replied with a smile.

The entire class became quiet at that.

"Oh, so you noticed? I thought only Shuichi had."

"Atua told Angie that she would see you again soon."

"Really? Were you looking forward to it?" he asked. "I bet nobody else was!"

Angie hummed a little. "Atua thinks that Kimochi and Angie can get along just fine."

"Really? We should be friends then! I'm already friends with Gonta and Himiko."

"Nyeh?"

"Kimochi want to be friends with Gonta?"

"Alright," Angie agreed. "Then we're friends."

Kaito got Shuichi's attention by dropping his arm heavily around on his shoulders and pulling him close. "What the hell, Shuichi? Why didn't you tell me that brat was here?"

"U-um..."

"Probably because he didn't want Kimochi to be mad," Kaede answered.

Kimochi popped up between them just then, causing Shuichi, Kaito, and Kaede to jump. Kimochi laughed. "Shuichi doesn't have to worry. He's on the good list. For now anyway."

"The good list?" Kaede questioned.

"There's a good list and a bad list," Kimochi answered. "A list for people that I like and a list for those I don't. These are all different lists by the way."

"Why aren't the bad list and the list of people you don't like just one list?" Kaito questioned.

Kimochi smiled at him. "Nuance must be an utter mystery to you."

"What was that?"

"Just because I don't like someone, doesn't make them bad. And liking someone doesn't make them good."

"What's the difference?" Kaito insisted, getting louder.

Kimochi sighed. "I don't like Miu--"

"Hey!"

"But she's on the good list."

"What puts her on that list?" Kaede asked.

Kimochi's face was blank as he answered. "She never hurt my brother."

The bell rang after that and Kimochi went off to Kokichi's seat without another word, leaving them a little stunned and Kaito fidgety with an uncomfortable expression on his face.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Class starts off as boring as Kimochi expected. The teacher talked, Kimchi realized that he already knew what she was talking about, and promptly took out a book and decided to read. When the teacher asked him to pay attention, he said a polite "No thank you" without looking up from his book and she eventually moved on.

He spent equal time actually reading as he did thinking of how he wanted to spend the rest of his class time. He knew these people, in a distant way, but they didn't know him. People got kinda weird about that sometimes. Kimchi didn't understand why, when he would happily just act like Kokichi if they wanted. There wasn't really a need to treat him differently. He hadn't insisted on being Kimochi or anything.

But as long as he was here, he wanted to make friends with them. The ones that he didn't already hate on behalf of his brother, at least. He was willing to give them all a chance. Just one. 

At first break, he skipped over to Rantaro's desk, smiling at him. "Is it true that you do nails?" he asked. He knew that it was, but it was polite to ask.

"I do," Ranataro nodded. He had an indulgent look to him, all soft edges and awkwardness and the inability to say no. Kimchi wanted to steal him or be friends with him. "Do you want your nails done?"

He nodded enthusiastically. "Would you please?"

"Sure. How about during lunch?" Rantaro offered.

Kimochi pulled a chair to the other side of Rantaro's desk. "What if we do it now?"

Rantaro's smile wavered, but it didn't drop. "We have class Kokichi." A blink. "I mean, Kimochi."

"I don't mind if you call me Kokichi," he told him. "It must be hard having to correct yourself, right?"

Now Rantaro frowned. It made him a little sad to see it there when it didn't need to be. Why were people so weird about this? He shook his head. "That would be rude."

He just shrugged, holding his hand out on Rantaro's desk and wiggling his fingers. "What colors do you have?"

For a moment, Rantaro looked like he was going to pull out his nail polish, but then he stopped. "Class, Kimochi."

"I'll take notes for you if you need them," he said with a smile. "Don't worry about that."

"How do you propose that you will take notes if your hands are occupied?" Korekiyo asked, looking up from his own book to ask.

"I went over all this last week. It's no big deal."

"What do you mean you went over this already?" Miu asked loudly. "You steal Cockichi's text books in your free time?"

Kimochi turned to look at her. He met her gaze, held it, and waited. Her loud laughter tapered off when she realized he was staring.

"Hey, what's your problem?"

He didn't stop.

"Cut it out!"

He didn't blink.

Miu whimpered. "S-sorry."

Kimochi gave her a smile and nodded, turning back to face Rantaro and Korekiyo. "I help Dice with their homework a lot," he told them. He wiggled his fingers again. "Do you have black and white?"

This time, Rantaro dug out the bottles without complaint. He was probably distracted by the conversation. Kimochi expected at least one more objection. 

Kirumi put her hand to her chin. "What school do you attend, Kimochi?"

"I don't."

The sound of confusion was echoed by more than just the three he was speaking to. 

"You do not attend school, yet you can not only keep up with our curriculum but surpass it?" Kirekiyo questioned.

He shrugged. When the teacher returned, she stared at Kimochi, waiting for him to return to his seat. He stared back. She cleared her throat. He raised an eyebrow. The class was silent as they waited. Finally, the teacher just sighed and got back to it.

He softly knocked his shoulder with Rantaro. "Come on, Ranran. My nails."

Ranataro gave him a bemused smile, repeating the nickname under his breath before shaking up one of the bottles. 

The teacher looked hard at Rantaro when he was bent over Kimochi's nails. 

"Mr. Ouma," the teacher said. "If you keep acting out in this manner, I'm afraid a detention will be in order."

"No, I don't think so," he told her. "I'm exercising my talent right now, quietly even. I don't think this is a punishable offense."

She narrowed her eyes. "And what is stopping me from punishing Mr. Amami?"

He tilted his head. "Do you want to punish Amami?" She was silent. "Would that be a reasonable or satisfactory way to deal with your frustration with me?" Again the teacher said nothing, just glared. "I can't stop you, of course, you're the teacher after all. If you want to run the class with the heavy hand of an unjust fist, that is your right."

She let out a breath. "You're in top form today, Mr Ouma. You must think you have me backed into a corner."

"It would be disingenuous to imply that either of us is powerless in this situation, don't you think?"

Then Rantaro said softly, "I'm done."

Kimochi blew on his nails to dry them faster. "Thank you."

"Are you... feeling alright, Mr. Ouma?" The teacher questioned. "You're unusually quiet today."

He smiled at her, returning to his desk, and watching her avidly. She frowned, but continued with the lesson. He remained attentive the rest of the lesson and was pleased that his nails dried properly at the end of it.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Miu slammed her hand on his desk at the start of lunch. "Hey, why's that little twerp missing anyway?"

Kimochi stared at her until her aggressive demeanor began to waver. "You must believe that I am a creature of infinite forgiveness to keep speaking of my brother that way."

It was almost fascinating to watch the switch flip, to see her confidence crumble before his eyes into nothing. Even knowing that she was the type to fold under pressure, it was interesting to see in person. She shuffled in place, rubbing her legs together and fluttering her hands like she didn't know what to do with them. "Th-that's just the way that I speak," she countered in a much lower tone.

"Kindly do not do so to me," he told her. "Kokichi might enjoy you, but I do not."

"A-alright, sorry." She walked away with her tail between her legs. 

"Don't you think that was a little harsh?" Kaede asked.

He tiled his head at her. "Did I use any harsh words at her?"

"Well no..."

"Then I do not see what the problem is. I don't enjoy her speech, I told her so, using far kinder words than she has thus far directed at me." He leaned back, resting his elbows on his desk and placing his face in his hand. "Here's what I think. I think that you are all so caught up in how Kokichi treats her, and thus all of you, that you responded to her reaction rather than my words. Do you think that's true?"

Kaede seemed to become uncomfortable under the weight of his gaze, too. It was honestly fascinating. Kanade rarely reacted to him in such a manner. It made him want to pick apart the ways the two were different. To ripe open the seams and study their stuffing.

"I'll take your silence as a yes," he told her. "I think that is the greatest reason so many of you have a problem with Kokichi, in fact. You think of his past behavior and do not pay attention to his current. You look at the result and assume the cause."

"If he's always causing trouble, of course we're going to react that way," Kaito said. Always that one. Kimochi had already known that he had some hang ups with his brother, of course, but he didn't realize how exhausting he was likely to be. 

"Does he always cause trouble or are you always barging in where you do not belong?" Kimochi questioned. "You were not invited to my conversation with Kaede, which was not hostile by the way, and yet you are attacking mine and my brother's character anyway."

"Just because I speak my mind doesn't mean that I'm attacking you," Kaito grumbled, scratching the back of his head.

Kimochi rose from his desk, moving to stand right before Kaito's. He leaned in very close to him, speaking softly. "My patience is thin with you in particular, Space Man. Here is your warning if you continue to annoy me." Kimochi's voice dropped, his smile didn't. "I am going to find what you love and take it. I will find what you fear and use it."

Kaito recoiled with a frightened expression. "The hell? Are you threatening me?"

He leaned back, tilting his head. "Is that something you cannot figure out for yourself?" 

Kimochi skipped back to his desk to get his things. "Well, I'm off to lunch!"

OoOoOoOoOoOo

There were other Dice members at Hope' Peak. Kimochi and Kokichi both had all their members memorized, it would be easy enough to seek them out. He didn't though. Instead, Kimochi went to the roof, laid on the ground, and closed his eyes.

He'd almost forgotten why he stopped going to school and how much he wanted to punish his brother's class. He'd forgotten how easy it was to get his way when Kokichi wasn't around. He could get rid of all the people that hurt his brother, it wouldn't even be that hard. Kokichi wouldn't want him to, so he should at least give them a chance. Pulling the trigger too quickly wasn't good and he was supposed to be the more patient one between them.

"Angie found you!"

Kimochi opened his eyes, surprised to find Angie hovering over him. He smiled at her. "You did find me! You must be really good at hide and seek."

"Nya ha ha! Atua led Angie right to you!"

"Don't you think it's cheating to get help from a god?" he asked her.

"Would you consider it cheating to use Kokichi?" she asked with a smile.

Even if it was cheating, he would do it anyway. He nodded toward her, conceding that point. "So why were you looking for me?"

"Angie wanted to have lunch with you," she said as she sat on the grounds beside him, folding her legs. "Do you want to share?"

"Sure," he agreed. He remained in his same position, sprawled out on the ground, and Angie leaned over to feed him. After a few minutes of this, he spoke up. "You might make a good minion."

"Angie only follows Atua."

"What if I made Atua my minion?"

"Angie would like to know how you intend to enslave a god, Kimochi."

"Charisma."

She smiled at him, bright and amused. Funny, he thought that she might be upset with him speaking about her god so flippantly. "I doubt that you have that much charisma, but if you wanted to serve Atua yourself--"

He made a buzzing sound to cut her off. "Bzzt! No thanks."

She shrugged. "Atua will reach those he wishes to reach one way or the other. Perhaps it’s through friendship with Angie that you will find your way."

Kimochi pushed himself up onto his elbows, looking at her more shrewdly. She reminded him of Kokichi, which made her dangerous. And that made her fun. "Tell me all of the things you've ever liked," he demanded.

Angie, as expected, didn't even question him. She just began a long list of things that she liked and why. Kimochi nodded along, trying to commit some of them to memory and completely block others. Angie had... some interesting likes.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Kimochi went straight to Kokichi's room when he got home, dropping his hat and cloak on the floor as he pushed himself under the blanket. His brother was asleep, Arisa curled up on the bed behind him laying atop the covers. He was careful not to wake her, but Kokichi was another story. He was a light sleeper even when sick, so it didn't surprise Kimochi at all when he felt his brother's arms wrap around him and start stroking his hair.

"How was it?" Kokichi questioned tiredly.

Kimochi closed his eyes. "I think I made a friend today."

"That's good, Mochi."

They laid in silence after that and Kimochi let himself slowly drift off to sleep. It was nice to be home.

[hinugundam]

now that the dust has settled: my full thoughts on ff16. obvious spoilers ahead. writing this so i can stop having all these things pinball around in my brain

despite all marketing and me believing it'd be a good game in the end, i wasn't exactly faithful to 16. i didn't expect it to be perfect, and i believe that saved me from feeling deeply disappointed by it. before i even delve into specifics, i wanna say that i still think it's not a bad game and that it has strengths (though mainly in production value and its boss fights) so it's not a whole flop, but at the end of the day it didn't succeed in impressing me. it can shock, but it couldn't impress.

in the first playthrough, that whole beginning portion of the game is near perfect. id say that 1/3 to the whole first half of the game are very strong and had me thinking it'd be great all the way through, but once you make it past that point small issues in writing and pacing become larger and harder to look away from. the ambition and grand scale of everything gets so big that it feels like the game is locking you in a car and driving past it all way too fast. when they said the game was almost 2 disc's and that it was a "rollercoaster" of a ride, they were right. but not the way i thought. i think if it was stretched out and paced better, maybe even being a two part game or a trilogy like 13, the story could've been handled better with less hiccups. events and shit just kinda get away from you, and it doesn't help that side quests are timed weirdly and sometimes awfully, so much so to the point where i felt more engaged in side quests than the main story. at first it seemed to have a solid system: 2 to 3 main story beats, and then some side quests to slow it down a bit. after a certain point the story slows down and almost grinds to a halt and every like 2 main story beats you have oodles upon oodles of side quests go through, and these will all take you longer than the next few main story beats. rinse and repeat. it just kinda sucked ass and by the end i just became so detached from what was going on. the pacing struggles so bad. this isn't to say i didn't like the side quests as a whole; some aren't so great but some i felt touched me more than what was happening in the main story, and that was also kinda. weird.

when it comes to characters i feel like i have a lot of gripes. clive himself bothers me a lot because pre timeskip he's a very nuanced and troubled man, with layers to his character and lots of room for development and growth. you see his low lows and his grips on being a murderer, feeling guilty and alone, and pondering what it means to be a man or a monster, something that's very briefly shown in jill too, but it just kinda. goes away post timeskip. in fact, the feeling of being alone in his suffering and sudden martyrdom is very occasionally touched on by other characters who attempt to convince him it isn't so, but then the game just kinda..makes it obsolete? cause he's alright and he doesn't exactly think on that stuff anymore. he's the man and he can do it all. you don't see clive hit rock bottom again. you don't see him question himself or the things he's learning. at first i thought that maybe his hubris would lead him to make bad decisions, giving rise to more growth, but nah. story just goes on. this is all my own opinion obviously but the fact that it feels like clive changes off screen wasn't good. wanted to see more and feel closer to him. in the beginning you literally see him contemplating suicide..i know years pass between that but i was disappointed by his character the most. for a protag he felt okay, but nothing great. lots of other characters in game suffer from weird writing and being sidelined by plot yet he's the biggest issue for me personally.

my biggest gripe? the entire end of the game. no i don't just mean clive dying on the beach. i mean the entire final act. what the fuck was that. 86 sidequests into the final act that barely takes an hour, and it begins with a qte "fight", dion dies in the most lackluster way after being on the other side of the game the entire time and never even getting to be a party member, and then a 1 minute walking scene which felt so useless, into the final boss with the most cheesy shit. no final dungeon. no classic boss rush. you know what felt like the actual final dungeon? fuckin odin. and even that was super fast. there being no final dungeon straight up pissed me off so bad i don't think ill ever get over that lmao. not to mention ultima was honestly lame, and finding out his truth at literally the end where only clive and joshua are there to know felt shitty. hated it tbh! one of the most boring end sequences in a game ive played in a minute. that ending was clearly catered to a certain audience, and i respect that and the audience, but it wasn't for me and it only made me feel like the game couldn't hold onto its serious nature. having the main character say final fantasy and do a 9999 punch was too goofy for the source material. ff is known for its blend of both but that shit came out of nowhere and was huge whiplash. i wasn't a fan im afraid

there are many little things i could say. ive had a lot of time to sit and ruminate but i didn't walk away caring all that much. gameplay was fun, but even then it still lacked depth. once again feels like an almost great game. i don't hate the game and i don't exactly feel wholly negative about it, but it didn't impact me and didn't stick. after 2 months i was done and i haven't looked back. don't care to platinum and don't personally care for the dlcs but i will play them when they come out. it was a game! they tried hard but it had a lot of bumps and problems. didn't have to be perfect but could have been much better than the final result. would honestly give it a solid 7/10. cheers and onto the next