#this post is about ted faro

[irkedisaac]

theres villains you wanna fight because they're the bad guy and their goals are inexcusable, and then there's villains you want to do blindfolded acupuncture on before drowning them in a lemon juice and salt water jacuzzi because they've made a whole new and disgusting kind of villainy conceivable to you

[justhijinx]

So.... about Ted Faro...

Shouting into the void because I feel a little crazy for saying it but... anyone else out there who thinks Ted Faro from HZD is a neat character because he's such a dumpster fire of a person?

He's a failboy. He's a hot mess. Absolute wreck of a man. I want to dissect him under a microscope.

Absolutely the worst person. Despicable pile of goop. Has committed atrocities and then warped his own thinking until he thought he was in the right to avoid ever feeling guilt about it. Destroyed the entire world through sheer stupidity, and after that managed to fuck it up even worse somehow.

I find it fascinating.

Anybody else out there with this same experience?

[grouchythefish]

One of the things I really love about horizon zero dawn is that, when you listen to the logs left behind by the 21st century people, they really were living in a post scarcity world. They had done it. You hear about project clawback reversing climate change and people having universal basic income. Like, there was still inequality and tragedy but losing a job didn't mean life and death, natural disasters had been reduced, climate change was no longer an imminent threat, but it wasn't enough. They still allowed billionaires and corporations to exist and hoard power. It wasn't global apathy and greed that ended the world, it was a singular man's ego and the resources he controlled that caused the world to end. Resources he controlled because despite dismantling many of the currently existential threats to humanity, there was still a military industrial complex and borders and countries still existed for wars to be fought over. It wasn't a perfect world but it was significantly better than the world we have now and that didn't matter when people like Ted Faro were still allowed to hold basically unlimited power.

Much to think about.

[teecupangel]

I am so sorry, I just now realized I sent my rant to you via an ask, I don't know if that is the correct way or if a dm would have been more appropriate. I don't know if I even made a whole lot of sense in the last 'ask' but I hope you will understand what I mean.

So that this one will be a ask/request, I wanted to ask you if you have still the ideas for the HZD AltDes Au? I scrolled through your notes ideas post and that one immediately catched my eyes. Like I can kind of imagine that either one would have a similar plot like Aloy? Maybe someone who worked either alongside Elisabeth Sobeck or would replace her(and therefore Aloy) and then it could follow a similar route like base HZD and Forbidden west. Maybe Desmond would be the genetical clone to the scientist working alongside Elisabeth like Aloy is to her but instead of just having the genetic necessary code he would retain the memory's or regain them to fight the rogue AI (I don't know the name anymore, I really have to play the games again, love them). If Desmond/Altaïr would replace Aloy or have similar plot like her, maybe the other one could either be like a childhood friend/stepbrother like in your fic Old Mentor or another 'clone' (with the explanation why there are two clones, so that it is guaranteed that at least one will see the light of day and potentially save the world from further destruction with the right genetic code (Hehe)). OR to connect it to the AC universe (and I kind of just got the idea from your Old Mentor fic) like, Desmond survives the solar flare, Altaïr is for whatever reason with him in the 21th century, helps him survive the eye etc. From some Isu crap or whatever they have a like a vision or something from the future (HZD, more like the war with the machines who absorb biomatter), they work on it to not really prevent it but like ensure that humanity will live through the catasrophe and put their DNA like Elisabeth Sobeck into the project for the future.

I just scrolled up and realized I might have just grabbed the plot bunny and ran like a mad man, ups

Nah, you’re good. I like reading rants hahahaha

I can’t find the HZD AltDes AU idea post so I’m not sure what I’ve already written and what I didn’t include in the post itself sooooo…

Let’s just make this a separate idea where AltDes happens during HZD lollol.

We’ll borrow a bit from my HFW x AC crossover oneshot Falconry for this one.

In this one, Altaïr would be Aloy’s twin although they look nothing alike. The real reason for this is that they were both born at the same time with Aloy being born from Sobek’s DNA but Altaïr is a bit of an anomaly.

The plan had been for Desmond to be cloned using Sample 17 but Sobek only had a small sample of an already small sample.

Not to mention, due to Ted Faro’s actions, the sample wasn’t in its best state but it did manage to create an imperfect clone unlike Aloy.

The two of them were raised together and Aloy acts more like an older sister to Altaïr who preferred to be quiet and seemed to see things that others cannot see.

Many things he’s weird and Aloy always try to beat them up because of this.

Aloy is pretty good with figuring how machines work while Altaïr likes to make new things based on the scraps and metal they get.

They were a constant headache to Rost, that was for sure.

The thing about Altaïr is… he has a friend.

A friend that only he could see.

Someone who grows with him and talks to him and play with him whenever Aloy was busy or Rost wasn’t looking.

The boy’s name is ‘Desmond Miles’.

Desmond thinks he’s a ghost. A person who had died and was now haunting Altaïr.

And he knows a lot of things. Not the machines but the much older tech.

Desmond likes to say that they were living in a distant future after humanity probably ‘fucked up so badly’.

It took years for Altaïr to understand everything that Desmond was saying.

To Desmond, his life ended when the world was just ‘starting’ to bring what he liked to call ‘sci-fi-esque’ technology to life.

The machines they hunt are part of that sci-fi-esque future that Desmond never saw.

But the really older artifacts that Desmond liked to call ‘technology’, those he knows or can guess what they do.

He’s ramblings are what give Altaïr an idea of how he can make new inventions using those parts.

At the very least, the parts that Rost didn’t take away because he didn’t want them messing with machines and stuff.

Altaïr knows that Desmond knows more than he’s letting on but it was fine if Desmond doesn’t want to share them yet.

Sooner or later, he will.

That was the kind of person Desmond was, after all.

.

Unorganized Notes:

Yes, in this one, Desmond is the ‘Bleed’ XD

To be more exact, because of the botched cloning, Altaïr is like Aloy, his own person who shared the DNA of their source (Sobek/Sample 17)

Unfortunately, because of both Sample 17’s current state when it was used and the genetic makeup of Desmond himself, Altaïr gets a ‘genetic ghost’ for the ride.

Desmond remembers everything. He does think that Altaïr is not really Altaïr but a person who just coincidentally got Altaïr’s name. He acts as a friend and companion to Altaïr growing up and he does see Aloy as a younger sister.

Which is funny because Aloy thinks she’s older than Altaïr and Altaïr never tried to complain about that and went along with it.

HZD and HFW plot go along with Altaïr for the ride as Aloy’s tagalong brother. Aloy gets a lot of sweet tools and weapons because the two of them together��� well… Desmond is just glad they don’t have the drive and time to try and figure out how to make nuclear weapons

Altaïr (and Desmond) learned the truth behind his birth at the same time as Aloy and it doesn’t change the fact that Aloy sees Altaïr as her brother and Altaïr sees her as his sister.

(Rost lives because I say so)

Towards the start of HFW, Altaïr (with GAIA’s help) managed to create a small eagle machine that can show Desmond as a hologram by staying connected to Altaïr’s focus so Aloy and the others can finally see him. Before that, towards the end of HZD, they can hear Desmond if they connect with Altaïr’s focus with their own focus

Now the twist of HFW connected to Beta and Far Zenith also happens but this is where we get a few more plot points from Falconry

Far Zenith has a puppet by the name of Seventeen

And after GAIA talked to Beta, she believed she can use Seventeen to give Desmond his own body

[swaps55]

🕯️🍬🍦

From this meme. Thank you!!

🕯️ ⇢ on a scale from 1 to 10, how much do you enjoy editing? why is that?

On a scale of 1-10 I’m at a 100. I love editing and revision. It’s my absolute favorite part of the process by a country mile. Revision is where everything starts to click, where the words really come alive and do something special. I tend to write in layers; an initial draft can be fairly bare bones, so revision is where the magic happens, and I really enjoy the subtle line edits of a final editing pass.

🍬 ⇢ post an unpopular opinion about a popular fandom character

Wooo boy. You won’t see me voice negative opinions on tumblr much, because I vehemently protect the positivity of my own dashboard and don’t want to cast negativity on the dashboards of others just because I don’t love a thing that they do.

I talked about my thoughts about Aria being a much weaker character in ME3 than she is in ME2 on discord the other day, so how about this one: I don’t find Astarion even a little appealing as a romance option in BG3. I think he’s a good character, just not one I am that interested in exploring on a deeper level. He is more or less a compilation of anti-Swaps traits in ways that aren’t really his fault, but even if that were not the case, the “midnight snack” automatically torpedoes any romance possibilities. I haven’t looked for much BG3 fic because he’s so pervasive it’s hard to find stories that focus on anyone else.

🍦 ⇢ name three good things about a character you hate

There are multiple ways to hate a character. You can hate them because they’re GREAT characters who are fun to hate, because they are poorly conceived characters who are NOT fun to hate and you roll your eyes whenever they make an appearance, because they’re a great idea poorly executed and it chafes, or because they are so two dimensional they don’t deserve the greatest renegade interrupt in Mass Effect.

We’ll go with the first one, which is fun to talk about. Ted Faro is the worst fictional person in the history of fictional people, because who else has fucked over the entire world not once, but TWICE? He’s awful and I hate his guts to an unholy degree, but hating him is so much fun. Because:

He’s the hero of his own story who has no idea he’s actually the villain, which is how you write great villains.

His critical flaws are directly tied to his strengths, which is just so  [chef's kiss]. 

He was on the cusp of redemption – or as close as he could get to it – when he succumbs to his own nature and doubles down, which I find SO compelling.

[that-one-i-think]

To explain Horizon Zero Dawn a bit more for possible posts about MCD x HZD Au, here is the overarching plot. (this is the first game)

It takes place post machine apocalypse. Essentially, Ted Faro built machines and an AI that essentially corrupted other machines and went rogue, killing everyone on the planet. Humanities only salvation was project Zero Dawn created by Elisabet Sobeck, which waited until the world was at inhabitable before rebuilding it with clones and terraforming machines. Unfortunately the system was corrupted so children left before the were able to learn more about proper civilization and were released to build their own civilization and tribes while hunting machines, machines that were tasked with rebuilding before being corrupted.

Aloy grew up an outcast from her matriarchal society after being found in the "holy" mountain. Since she had no mother other than the mountain she was sent to live with Rost, her adoptive father and another outcast. So, Aloy spent the first entire 18 years of her life trying to figure out who she is and gain answers, eventually leading her to join the proving, an event that if she were to pass would allow her not only to join the tribe (the Nora) but request answers to who her mother really is.

She was doing really well until the Shadow Carja, an evil tribe that worships HADES which is a corrupting and evil AI, attacks the proving killing various other Nora and her adoptive dad, Rost. They also have orders to kill her for a mysterious reason as the AI immediately clocked her because she is the only ginger (only half joking). Aloy is then given the special title of Seeker from the Matriarchs (religious leaders) and is allowed to travel outside of Nora lands.

Throughout her journey of killing various death machines she gains various allies from the different tribes. Oseram, a tribe with the culture of blacksmithing, inventing, and drinking, Carja a larger civilized tribe with castles and cities that worship the Sun and live under a King (The previous king committed genocide and is why there are Shadow Carja), Banuk which is an incredibly spiritual mountainous tribe that listens to spirits and tries to tame machines, and the Nora who hated her because they worship literal motherhood and she had no mother.

During Aloys journey of defeating the Shadow Carja she finds out all about how and why the world went to ruin aand eventually found out her mother. Aloy was a fail safe procedure by Gaia, the AI incharge of restoring the world, because Aloy was a perfect clone of Elisabet Sobeck, down to her need to save the world. So the mountain did birth her, as it was one of the last working centers that had a viable cloning pod. Aloy does manage to defeat the Shadow Carja and Hades through her allies and just pure protagonist strength. Though HADES does live for a bit longer as one of her allies decides that the information he presents outweighs his murderous capabilities.

THIS IS WAY MORE SIMILAR THAN I THOUGHT! It is very obvious on who is where.

[foibles-fables]

tag game (Horizon)

stolen from @hellcheercaine!!! Thanks for the excuse to put off starting work for another few minutes.

1.ride or die ship (your otp): Aloy/Talanah. my rotten soldiers my sweet cheeses my good-time gals

2. most annoying ship: nah you know I don't play that game <3

3. second favourite ship: Aloy/Yarra

4. favourite platonic relationship: Aloy and Erend, Talanah and Milu, Aloy and Sylens

5. underrated ship: gonna say Aloy/Yarra here too. Also Fashav/Kotallo, Beta/Milu, Alva/Seyka (thoughts of an angsty Loyalist!Federa fic won't leave my brain ALONE)

6. overrated ship: see question 2 bls

7. one thing i would change in canon: Oh man. There are...many things, lmao. The clear and obvious one is having Talanah join the base (as we now know was the original intention [rolling_in_the_deep.mp3]). But since that one is a given--completely toss the Zeniths out of HFW. Ground the narrative conflict in gathering the subfunctions, the collapsing biosphere, and Regalla's rebellion instead. Bring GAIA back only at the very end. Save the Zeniths for the major H3 antagonist instead, negating the need for Nemesis as the Bigger Fish. How absolutely baller would it have been if the Beta reveal came as a post-credits stinger instead? (Gerard's voice: "Are you ready to finally make yourself useful, Beta?" and then a camera pan over the face of a Sobeck clone, GOD)

8. something canon did right: The entirety of "Deep Secrets of the Earth" in HZD was a masterclass in storytelling. Every part of exploring PZD HQ was remarkable. The datapoints, the juxtaposition of "The Bad News" with "The Good News," the latter of which as the culminating reveal of the mystery that's been building throughout the entire narrative--it's pretty much perfection.

9. a thing i'm proud of creating for the fandom PLEASE BRAG ABOUT YOURSELF I WANT TO SEE/READ YOUR ART: may I present to y'all my AO3 trashpile

10. a character who is perfect to me (wouldn't change a thing): ALVA. My personal shining star amongst the HFW companions. I'm also contractually obligated to say Talanah here, even if I want to shake her by the shoulders sometimes (affectionate)

11. the character i relate to the most and why: This is a tough one. I see pieces of myself in a number of the characters, but I'm not sure if there's one that I'm like, yes, that is ME. I could prrooobably say Alva again? But it's not a definitely one-to-one.

12. character(-s) i hate the most and why: All the homies hate Ted Faro, that's for sure. But that's low-hanging fruit. So I'll give Amadis as well, though not for the seemingly-obvious reason--I cannot stand the sole purpose for which he was written, from the comic all the way through his weird unsatisfying ending in HFW. He's a repeated character with a repeated conflict that was already handled much more compellingly through Nil and is rendered useless and storyless by the end of Need to Know. Bringing him back in H3 would be the sorest mistake the narrative could make aside from a sacrificial ending for Aloy. He's just unneeded character bloat in an already-admittedly-bloated cast.

13. something i've learned from the fandom: You will make some of your very best friends here. Everyone is creative and hilarious and so smart. We all connect to the Horizon universe in a different way, and sharing your enthusiasm with others is what just makes the world feel even richer than what you could have imagined.

14. three tags i seek out on ao3: I typically don't browse AO3 directly!

15. a song i strongly associate with my otp/favourite character: you're gonna make me pick ONE?? oh man, okay. so this changes by the day, and today I'll say Oceanator's "I Would Find You" is THEE Hawk and Thrush anthem.

tagging: since I stole this untagged, I challenge YOU to do the same! Choose your fandom and talk about it!

[pikapeppa]

re: your post about quen glyphs... it's possible that the old focuses they found in the delta were formatted to work w/ simplified chinese characters... after all, the focuses are pre-zero dawn and would have been formatted to whatever the local ppl used, right? its even possible that being able to write and speak simplified chinese in addition to any other languages that a focus could be formatted to might be something on the diviners examinations alva talks about... (also the fascinating implications that the quen might have had the only record of other languages existing pre-apollo)

I'M SO SORRY IT TOOK ME SO LONG TO REPLY TO THIS. But I wanted to do it when I had time and brainpower to fully think it through 😂

So this ask is in relation to my tags on this gorgeous photo, where I remarked that it's weird for this beautiful Quen person to be carrying a tablet with what look like nonsense glyphs, when we know canonically that the Quen read and write English in the Roman alphabet. This is in contrast with the Oseram, for instance, who read and write English in their own original glyph system (as evidenced by Erend having trouble learning to read the Old Ones' glyphs).

For the purposes of this reply, I'm going to focus on Mandarin and Cantonese as the spoken forms of "Chinese" since they're the most familiar Chinese languages, and since Mandarin is considered the "standard" Chinese language. Before I start, I should also point out that there is no such thing as spoken simplified Chinese; "simplified Chinese" refers to a variation of written Chinese that's usually used to transcribe the spoken language of Mandarin, whereas "traditional Chinese" refers to the written variation of Chinese that's usually used to transcribe Cantonese.

ALSO, STRAP IN, BECAUSE WE'RE GOING TO GET A LITTLE NERDY HERE. I'm a speech-language pathologist by day (smut writer by night! 👹) and my favourite class in undergrad was a course about writing systems of the world, so I'm just giving advance warning that YOU ASKED FOR THIS. 😂😂😂

Okay, diving in now! That's a really good point re: the Focuses in the Great Delta -- it would make sense for many of the Focuses there to be set to display in Mandarin and/or Cantonese, and thus for the "glyph system" to be simplified or traditional Chinese characters, respectively. But if we're sticking to canon lore, the Quen don't speak other languages. There is a datapoint from Alva about this where she expresses some (VERY ACCURATE AND ADORABLE) disgust at Ted Faro for the loss of all languages except the Zero Dawn "default" language of English. If we're taking this at face value (and I see no reason why Alva would lie about this in her notes), then even if the Focuses were formatted to display Chinese characters, the Quen wouldn't be able to read them. This would also explain why being a Diviner is a rare and highly-prized role: it would probably be rare for the Focuses they found to be set in English, and those English Focuses would be even more prized and revered since they're interpretable.

Now, we might wonder why the Quen wouldn't be able to learn to speak Mandarin or Cantonese by deciphering the glyphs on a Chinese-formatted Focus. The problem is that the Quen have no spoken language to map the Chinese characters onto. Chinese characters are not an alphabet, and thus there's no one-to-one correspondence between a character and a sound or a sequence of sounds; instead, Chinese characters are largely morphographic, meaning they represent a unit of meaning rather than a sound or a sequence of sounds. The Quen might be able to figure out what some Chinese characters represent by comparing a single piece of text that's written both in Chinese and English, but they would not be able to figure out what the Chinese characters sound like.

Ah, but you might be wondering if the Quen could have figured out how to speak Mandarin/Cantonese by listening to audiorecordings or holovids in Mandarin/Cantonese and mapping them to transcripts written in Chinese, then comparing those Chinese transcripts to English transcripts of the same text? (Wait, YOU'RE NOT WONDERING THAT? SERIOUSLY?? I'm teasing. I'm clearly overthinking this.) I mean, yes, they could, but that would require you to have a piece of text in both English and Chinese that also has a corresponding holovid/audiorecording in Mandarin/Cantonese for that text, which... I mean, maybe I'm wrong, but that seems like a pretty big ask. Then again, if the Focuses have like a library of C-dramas with subtitles, then that could work???

But this brings me back to Alva's datapoint again. If all of the Diviners learned Mandarin/Cantonese for their exams, either Alva is being secretive about this in her own notes (seems implausible to me, she is not a disingenuous person), OR there is a faction of Quen Diviners above Alva's proverbial "pay grade" who are working on that. So that could be an interesting avenue for someone to explore in fic! Actually, the more I think about it, the more plausible it seems that there is some "upper class" of Diviners who are secretly working on restoring old languages and who get extra perks from the Imperial family for interpreting the most valuable texts. Okay, you got me, you talked me into it LOL.

But let's return now to my original cheeky remark re: the Quen glyphs as pictured in the game. This is a more detailed image of some Quen glyphs in Burning Shores:

Now, we can't say whether this piece of text is meant to be read top to bottom or whether it was pinned to the post sideways, but it looks to me from the brackets and the red lines (likely underlines) that it's posted sideways and is meant to be read either right-to-left or left-to-right. This does not look like Chinese characters, either simplified or traditional. On a superficial inspection, it looks to me more like the Tibetan syllabary, or maybe the Hebrew abjad, without actually being either of those. In the image I referred to at the beginning of this post, the glyphs look more like the Arabic abjad as it would be used to transcribe Farsi. In other words, the Quen glyphs as pictured in the DLC alone are inconsistent.

To be perfectly honest, I think that these Quen glyphs are a "game-ism": one of those things that's a visual element in the game that actually doesn't match up with the lore, similar to how Grudda is canonically from the Desert Clan but has Lowland tattoos. (If you've never noticed this, I implore you to use tearblast arrows to blow off all his armour until he's naked down to his underoos the next time you play LOL. Drakka would greatly approve.)

In short, I still adhere to the idea that the general Quen population read and write in English using the Roman alphabet, and that the Quen glyphs pictured in these images are visual nonsense (NO OFFENSE). If there are any Quen who speak and read in other languages, it would most likely be a secret faction of Diviners that Alva doesn't know about.

I hope this answer was satisfying and not fucking boring as hell BAHAHAH. Thank you for making me think about this, though! It also reminds of a mini-rant I have about Hekarro wanting the Tenakth to learn Carja glyphs that I should find some time to write out!

If anyone has further thoughts about this, feel free to comment/reblob/send me an ask or a message or whatever! ❤ Also, forgive any typos, it's past 1AM when I'm writing this LMAO.

-- much love from your friendly neighbourhood Pika xoxo

[artekai]

tag game (Horizon)

Thanks @nerd-artist for tagging me!! I am flattered :3

1. ride or die ship (your otp): GAIA/Lis ❤️ I felt so validated when Sylens said the "two moms" thing, you have no idea.

2. most annoying ship: I plead the fifth

3. second favourite ship: Erevad! I never considered them until I read a really good fic about them and I was sold lol.

4. favourite platonic relationship: Hmm 🤔 I really enjoy Aloy & Sylens :D I missed him a lot in HFW (given he wasn't in our Focus any longer). mlm-wlw hostility real. Also, Aloy & Gildun and Aloy & Morlund are both very sweet but I suppose they have similar vibes lol.

5. underrated ship: Any of the ones I mentioned lol, I feel like they don't get as much love as others, haha. Which is understandable because it makes sense to gravitate more towards the GAIA gang! But other than that 🤔 I think Aloy/Zo and Aloy/Alva are pretty cute and underrated, even if I don't exactly ship them myself c:

6. overrated ship: I plead the fifth

7. one thing i would change in canon: *side eyes HFW hard*

Just one thing, though? I'd have to concur with most of the people I've seen do this tag game so far and say it's Varl's death. I'm pissed about that.

8. something canon did right: Other people have also mentioned it before me, but I think Horizon's writing excels at the datapoints. Just slowly having to figure out the past, putting the pieces together, getting glimpses of the tragedies (and the little joys) that once happened in those places, filling in the blanks... The environmental storytelling is amazing 👌. The intrigue, the curiosity, the mystery. It really scratches the urge to explore abandoned places and imagine what it was life was like for the people who once lived in them, so close yet so far away. HZD really did it well with the Zero Dawn facilities and I think HFW captured that magic again with Thebes. I crave more of that.

9. a thing i'm proud of creating for the fandom PLEASE BRAG ABOUT YOURSELF I WANT TO SEE/READ YOUR ART: I'm not sure I can say anything I make is "for the fandom" since I only make OC stuff 😭 Believe me, I want to be more integrated in the fandom, but not as much as I want to focus on the blorbos from my brain 😔

I guess I can mention To Err is Human, my vampire AU fic, since, if all goes according to plan, that should be relatively fairly split between my OCs and canon characters. Sorry that it's taken me so long to update tho :( As for art, please look at my man :) And here he is again with my favorite Aloy I've drawn lol. I also still really like this one! Also this. And this. And this. And

I've realized I could go on all day actually so I'll stop myself now lol.

10. a character who is perfect to me (wouldn't change a thing): Sylens. I love him, crimes and all.

11. the character I relate to the most and why: Beta. Something something about characters who have the same neuroses as you but in their world their neuroses are justified (sigh). And Gildun! His quest in Burning Shores really grabbed me by the throat, oof. In some ways I also relate to Aloy but not as much, I think.

12. character(-s) i hate the most and why: Well, I could just name the usuals, Ted Faro, the Ceo, Lansra, etc. But they're the characters we're meant to hate, so, ironically, it doesn't feel right to say I hate them, you know? I appreciate a well-crafted villain, and I definitely appreciate their role in the narrative. So, do I really hate them? Yes but actually no.

It's like that one post that goes "I don't care if a villain is redeemable or not but by god please make them interesting." I would be lying if I said I wasn't at least a little bit insane about the likes of Faro and the Ceo lol, so I'd say they did their job. I actually enjoy them being in the narrative.

As for the Zeniths... I used to just hate them straight up, not just for what we're meant to hate them, but for what they did to the narrative. I then started my quick descent into madness until I came to love to hate them lol. But I still think they deserve this spot more than anyone else given that they still make me see red half of the time.

13. something i've learned from the fandom: uhhhhh I'm not sure? Interesting to see the differences between the Persona fandom and the Horizon fandom I guess. In a lot of ways they have the same issues all fandoms have but idk, it's different. I'll leave it at that.

14. three tags i seek out on ao3: I don't really read as much fic as I would like to because of readers' block... But when I do, I feel like I tend to look for Beta-centric stuff. And Nemesis stuff hehe but there's very little of that. I feel like, at least in this fandom, I tend to gravitate more towards genfic instead of ship-heavy stuff. Those aren't three tags but still three things so fair enough.

15. a song i strongly associate with my otp/favourite character: I have a few playlists but I'm not sure any songs in particular jump out to me as much as Sad Machine by Porter Robinson, which has been my quintessential Horizon song from the moment I finished HZD. It still gives me the same chills that going through ELEUTHIA-9 gave me... God, I really wish I could go back to when I was first playing it and experience that feeling again. I might actually cry listening to it now.

Tagging: @banukaihelpme, @cicadaknight, @thatpunnyperson, @snorkeldays and @hartlesshart, but absolutely no pressure to do it! I guess this is more of a [insert your fandom here] thing, so, for any other mutuals who see this, if you wanna do it for your fandom, please tag me as your tagger, I would love to see it 🙏

[hellcheercaine]

tag game: (Horizon)

1.ride or die ship (your otp): Aloy/Seyka

2. most annoying ship: none

3. second favourite ship: Aloy/Erend + Aloy/Talanah (to be honest, I was struggling between this and Aloy/Talanah. Can we have both?)

4. favourite platonic relationship: Aloy/Kotallo

5. underrated ship: Aloy/Petra

6. overrated ship: none

7. one thing i would change in canon: I believe Rost should live, and join Aloy in the fight against Nemesis. As her guardian who holds the weight of living as an outcast (as he lost his biological daughter and mate), Rost is one hell of an amazing man.

8. something canon did right: The introduction of Beta (the clone of Aloy). It shows a great philosophical examination of nature versus nurture and how much Rost meant to Aloy (Rost’s hologram which was in her heart locket). In a nutshell, Beta is Aloy without Rost.

9. a thing i'm proud of creating for the fandom PLEASE BRAG ABOUT YOURSELF I WANT TO SEE/READ YOUR ART: None, but here are some of my text posts. I'll be considering picking up drawing for some of my fav ships besides Horizon.

10. a character who is perfect to me (wouldn't change a thing): Erend. Despite his recklessness, he's a ride-or-die homie you can count on.

11. the character i relate to the most and why: Aloy. As I was an outcast in high school, college and university, I can totally relate to her.

12. character(-s) i hate the most and why: Ted Faro. I find it stupid that his project would include a separate AI for destruction/extinction when they are already suffering from the result of "peace" robots gone rogue.

13. something i've learned from the fandom: This fandom helps you to connect with people you don't know who like the same things (Hellcheer from Stranger Things) as you do. Despite being new to the community, I’ve learnt a lot about the Horizon universe in quite a short while.

14. three tags i seek out on ao3: I don't really look at tags except for the ships that I'm interested in. So I'll pass.

15. a song i strongly associate with my otp/favourite character: Space Age Love Song by A Flock of Seagulls. This song perfectly encapsulates the brief time Aloy and Seyka had together that changed Aloy, in that she began falling in love with Seyka (which Seyka already did).

tagged by stolen from: no one (it was a fresh tag game that I had in mind after seeing other tag posts) tagging: anyone that wants to do this one for whatever fandom you want to do it for!

[horizonforbiddenwestdownload]

Horizon Forbidden West Download PC

Horizon Prohibited Western world Complete Model with regard to COMPUTER Belgium

Check out distant areas, deal with better plus much more awe-inspiring devices, and knowledge surprising brand new tribes while you resume the far-future, post-apocalyptic world involving Horizon. Welcome with a bright planet heavy while using the attractiveness of scenery – although occupied by simply awe-inspiring, highly advanced machines. So horizon forbidden west download pc a young machine seeker named Aloy, you need to solve the puzzle of that planet in order to find your fortune. Inside the consequences, Aloy delivers the many data by Londra's Focus to be able to Sylens, and also advantages the Quen in Fleet's Conclude make connection with Alva for them to coordinate upon reuniting his or her fleets.

Think about the breathtaking ordinary planet connected with Horizon Phone of the Mountain with 360 points along with have interaction with all your environment employing 2 PlayStation®VR2 Sense™ controllers. Daring Horizon Restricted Western with the entirety, containing extra information as well as the Melting away Coasts growth.

They regain proof of him getting back data using a job called "MSP" and also stick to his piste n . for the ruins of your Horus warfare appliance remaindering just about the Artist Sign. They encounter a Quen camp and therefore are alarmed to be able to identify that the forgetting Quen crew possess willingly enrolled in Londra, worshipping him like a god which agrees them "Ascension". They infiltrate Londra's Ascension Passageway then notice he lives working with the Horus to create a explode for taking Where i am able to Download Horizon Forbidden West him down our planet. On the other hand, to be able for getting the end he have to, Londra salvaged experimental nuclear booster powerplant from your Starlight Go up nevertheless the utilization of them would irradiate the whole Shed Shore and encircling home. Following eliminating Londra's henchman Zeth, they learn she has stood a tiny variety of the many faithful Quen, containing Seyka's brother, into a regional departed amusement car park with prep used for their journey.

Horizon Prohibited West obtained usually positive journals through critics, as well as gotten pushed over 8.4 thousands troops in May 2023. The overall game after that the Burning Banks development was gather collected along with re-released while Horizon Forbidden Western side - Full Book intended for PlayStation 5 on 6 April 2023, and may statement pertaining to Windows inside initial 2024.

Aloy heals AETHER soon after stopping Hekarro momentum inside the municipal crusade then accesses POSEIDON in the destroys involving Nevada. Journeying for you to California, your lover knowledges the Quen, a foreign group looking to clear up ecological turmoils of their homeland. With getting a high-level clearance from the private bunker-turned-tomb of any changed Ted Faro (Lloyd Owen) from the wrecks regarding Bay area, Aloy aids GAIA to be able to trap HEPHAESTUS bar stays confronted with the Zeniths. Erik kills Varl as well as evokes Beta while Gerard takes GAIA, but Tilda double-crosses them and facilitates Aloy break free.

Tilda reveals which the lady was real romantically included in Elisabet Sobeck as well as lamented leaving the woman; possessing become inspired through Aloy, she longs to halt Far Zenith. She more exposes which Sylens has become sustaining the Tenakth rebels to work with them in opposition to the Pinnacles. Aloy will not give up the Tenakth In which i am able to Download Horizon Prohibited Western as well as rather defeats Regalla herself when thwarting the latter's ultimate tackle about Hekarro. Aloy as well as her acquaintance Varl (Steve Macmillan) corner in to the western to get the concept Tenakth tribe amidst a civil confrontation involving Chief Hekarro (Geno Segers) furthermore the mutiny boss Regalla (Angela Bassett).

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Sylens shows to HADES cautioned him almost Nemesis plus plans to flee Earth, bar arranges a variation connected with cardiovascular system as well as opts to help relieve Aloy against Nemesis. Aloy's accomplices go away for you to unfold the advise regarding Doom while Aloy and Beta reactivate GAIA. Zo (Erica Luttrell), a organ of the close Utaru tribe, guidelines Aloy to a management pinpoint everywhere she answers GAIA with the girl subsystem MINERVA. Horizon Forbidden Western world is a 2022 steps role-playing video game produced by Guerrilla Activities then circulated before Sony Interactive Enjoyment. Inside the 24th millennium, a unhealthy contention between your extrasolar nests of Helghan and Vekta explodes in assault. Being a fellow member with the Interplanetary Strategic Connections, you’re deployed to quit the expanding Helghast crowd into their tracks. Helghast drives get bracketed a messing up counter-attack, provoking the ISA evacuation connected with planet Helghan. While another Helghast battalions appear, equipped to comprehend highly effective artilleries, you get yourself outmanned, outgunned and also encompassed.

Aloy likewise comes with a decision associated with gain a romantic link with Seyka previous to temporarily aspect technics. Nova describes that will Londra intends make use of the explode to look at himself with a pick out number of Quen and genetic catalogue collected via the Quen voters to help gotten the latest colony from the danger involving Fate. Nevertheless, to make certain their friends won't disclose him, Londra reactivated Horizon Forbidden West Download PC his Rebellion Reductions Project study, making use of that just before condition Quen into being his or her loyal voters. Nova next deactivates Londra's stability measures in exchange intended for Aloy rubbing out her and so the lady could ultimately live released from Londra's continual pulling of the woman's personality matrix. Seyka and then gets involved, driving Londra in order to take off back to his or her hollow below the Artist Indication.

It's revealed which Seyka gain access to a death Diviner's Focus in addition to attained a pointer to some staff in which had gone pass up become found by Starlight Increase. Admiral Gerrit permits Aloy and also Seyka in order to practice this cause as one of several skip team ends up being Seyka's sister afterward the fleet's last remaining navigator. A couple of times following your Helghast attack at Vekta, the ISA is detecting the hostility for the enemy's internal globe regarding Helghan. Being a battle-hardened Special Drives sergeant, a person need to manage the squad connected with highly educated gift using a objective for you to catch the Helghast head.

A final known see associated with Londra positions him for a place south dub the Burning off Shores, the earlier web page of Los Angeles. Seyka permits to show Aloy to help Londra's fort upon Starlight Climb (Griffith Observatory), inturn with regard to evading her Where by i Can Download Horizon Prohibited West disable a High point defense tower system. Seyka takes Aloy near the woman's town, Fleet's Stop, revealing that will her fleet ended up being withdrawn on the core Quen dispatch heading to help S . fransisco, shipwrecked within the Melting away Coasts, and have absolutely become featured considering that.

[hughjackmansbiceps]

Horizon Forbidden West spoiler

So we can all agree that Ted faros death was super unsatisfying right? Right? I've read that the writer didn't want to delve too much into horror territory but there's plenty of horror elements present anyway? The whole game centers around unstoppable man-eating robots but we don't want to do horror? And to top it off we don't even get to kill the man who ruined the planet. It didn't have to be some grand battle with mutant Ted. I'd have been more that happy to watch Aloy plant an arrow into his smug fucking forehead. (If he still had a forehead that is.) But instead he gets an off screen death by a nameless grunt.

[forbiddenwestern]

Kind of a weird username... Let’s see the contribution?

An explanation for Faro destroying APOLLO? Oh boy

[elivanto]

so.........ive been looking for a new star wars book and im thinking of starting the thrawn novels (purely bc of your thrawn posting). but the only thing i know about thrawn is from rebels and im havin a hard time convinving myself that i can get invested in a series about handsome squidward. but i figured if anyone can convince me to take the plunge it would be you<3. so in your own words.......why do u love the thrawn novels?

kinda suspicious of you nonnie (“handsome squidward”??? 😭) but i’m just gonna pretend i don’t feel like you’re making fun of me dihdjdhd ANYWAY.

thrawn novels. as in the 2017 canon trilogy, yeah?

well i can definitely tell you that i never would’ve thought in a million years i’d enjoy reading about thrawn—i knew him only from rebels, too, and i found him too scary, too calculating, too unemotional. i talked to at least two of my mutuals about sw novels and they were like ‘oh you gotta read the thrawn novels! so good!’ and i just thought ‘okay someone actually wrote a book about that guy and people enjoy it? don’t make me laugh’ and look at my dumb ass now lmao

the three things that ultimately made me start reading were 1) i, just like you, was out of sw books to read and looking for a new one, 2) the fact that there’s a couple mentions of anakin in the first book and a WHOLE anakin and a whole vader in the second, and 3) this fanart (caution: shippy & pda lmao).

convinced yet? no? okay. regarding the thrawntent content, the first novel especially deals with the recurring theme of xenophobia against thrawn as he rises through the ranks in the imperial navy. from fellow imps, government officials, uhhh his aide’s family (tiny little screech i’m not gonna bring out the big guns just yet) etc. it’s so interesting to see everything from a different perspective and how thrawn deals with it (he outsmarts everyone) and how the elite imps react to that (they hate it).

it’s also kind of hilarious that you know that the characters you read about—i’m talking about vanto, faro, hammerly etc. in particular here—are technically part of the big, bad, fascist empire but fuck if they don’t become great characters that you’d do anything for in the end.

and NOW i’m bringing out the big guns: eli vanto. i’m very biased here but, you know, you just gotta love him. he’s a tiny ball of barely restrained anger and yet he’s very polite, he’s relatable as FUCK, and thrawn sees him and thinks he’s a spy or some shit so he wants to keep an eye on him is like “i’m gonna keep this small, uncomfortable looking man with the funny accent” and they spend 10-ish years in the imperial navy together :) much to eli’s chagrin, at the beginning jfbdjdg

there’s some other stuff—arihnda pryce’s story in the first book, what REALLY happened at batonn (before thrawn was promoted to grand admiral), the whole [gestures vaguely] chiss situation, palpatine questioning thrawn’s loyalty, hilarious thrawn & vader shenanigans in which vader is always two seconds away from force-strangling thrawn etc. etc.—but i’ve really talked enough and if you’re not convinced to start reading the novels now i doubt you ever will be 😂

THANK YOU FOR COMING TO MY TED TALK

[kittleskittle]

I wanted to give everyone a quick heads up:

So, I run a closed, private 18 + ONLY general horizon shipping discord. We have almost 100 members and some pretty strict rules to keep the peace - namely forbidding ship and character hate(as always Ted Faro is exempt from this). There are channels for every popular ship, rarepairs, hfw spoiler channels, and several channels to share and ask for advice with creative works.

Why do I bring this up? Because on March 10th, I'm going to be opening up applications to the server. By "applications" I really mean DMing myself or @mythicaitt and answering a few quick questions about your ability to follow the rules, because we really want to maintain the chill vibe on the server.

I figured I'd give yinz a heads up about this to see if there's any interest. I'll be making a post on the 10th when we're officially ready!

[meggannn]

guerrilla does something interesting in HZD with aloy and her motivations and how they let her goals differ from the player's goals. most of the time when a main character's driving goals differ from the audience's, it means the writing has misfired and it feels jarring when you shine a spotlight on it. but it definitely works in HZD because guerilla knew what the player's immediate interests would be—they open their game with huge scenic shots of a pre-industrial community contrasted with these enormous robot dinosaurs! they want you to be sucked into the mystery of why things are the way they are—and they also knew going in that they had had to tie the player's interests to aloy's goals as a character (john gonzalez, the narrative director, talks about it a bit in this interview). and over time, the two start to bleed over as aloy starts to care about the old ones and we start to care more about her. i don't know if they'll continue this strategy in HFW, but they've set themselves up in a really unique situation with the contrast of aloy's focus on the present/future and the audience's interest (mostly) in the past.

i've been trying to find a way to articulate the ideas in this post for a while, and i am really tired so forgive me if this gets redundant or some sentences don't make sense lol. spoilers for HZD obv

in HZD, aloy, the motherless outcast, is largely concentrated on finding out the mystery of her origins. i mean hopefully we, the player, are also interested in that because it's a pretty unique set up (it's not possible for someone to not have a birth mother... right?), but i'm willing to bet that most of the audience was overwhelmingly more interested in figuring out what the hell happened to the old ones of this world (us) and why robots are wandering around everywhere, than we were about figuring out what happened to aloy's mom. (i'm aware that is a large assumption, but i think it's a pretty safe one considering the reactions i see when people finish the game usually mention APOLLO in some way, or ask if it's still around or there's a way to bring it back.)

for aloy, the status quo of robots-that-nobody-really-understands wandering around is just a constant of her life, and discovering her mother is her pressing issue. for us, this world's major differences between our world (why did we die off and why are robots now the dominant species on earth) are more fascinating. so guerrilla ties the micro and macro mysteries together so that we are also interested in aloy's journey about her origins: by making the story of her birth and the history of the world woven into the same narrative fabric

aloy even directly says "it (finding out info on the past) isn't why i'm here" and sylens replies sarcastically "of course, what's the whole of human history compared to the search of one girl?" it isn't until after aloy realizes she's a clone, that she doesn't have a traditional birth mother, when she faces the nora and decides to stop HADES because GAIA asked her to, in a sign of extreme maturity and character growth (imo), does her goal of helping GAIA by beating HADES now start to align with the player's goals of trying to "set the world right" (by helping GAIA by beating HADES).

it's interesting because if anything, sylens, the anti-hero and arguable deuteragonist, is the character whose goals most match up with the audience's own throughout HZD: he's the one who is seeking out the knowledge of the old ones, he's the one who mourns losing APOLLO the way we do. aloy doesn't really react to what became of APOLLO at all (when it's revealed what happened to it, her immediate response is sorrow over the alphas' deaths, the more human element compared to sylens's laser focus on info-hunting). sylens is... also a total asshole and might be an anti-villain in the upcoming games (i hope not; i hope he's more of a rogue agent than an actual villain, personally) so it will be interesting if the audience eventually starts feeling torn between aloy's goals (save the world today) and sylens's (recover what can be saved the world of the old ones)

for aloy, APOLLO's absence is not a loss because she's never known a world without the knowledge of the old ones. why does she care about expending energy to hunt for info on our music and art and politics and wars? how does shifting through datapoints about things she doesn't understand and tools/tech she doesn't have access to help the planet today? after discovering GAIA's origins and purpose, i'm sure she'd probably be interested in recovering APOLLO if there is anything left of it to recover—even she's only interested in it to honor samina/elisabet's memory and the effort of PZD—but a lot of the fandom (myself included) keeps hoping and speculating and wondering if APOLLO is still around because APOLLO is the audience, or rather, it's the last scraps of what's left of us. we have an interest in APOLLO but aloy never shows any interest in or sorrow over it besides to vaguely wonder what happened to it. her interests are in the here and now.

when the audience looks at her world, we see what we've lost, and we know APOLLO is a way to get some of it back. for aloy, she's definitely engaged and interested in the old ones' technology and wants to make sure PZD's work is continued and restored and rebuild GAIA, so if APOLLO turns out to be around i'm sure she'd be interested in it, but for now, she's got too many things going on to consider it a priority. and even if she did, it would have to come after she's taken care of the immediate threats of the other chaotic subfunctions; and she would have to justify the time and energy spent on APOLLO to the value it gives her world (a world that doesn't utilize focuses as much as PZD had hoped, and a world whose language has likely changed enough that they might not even understand what they were being told) because she'd have to do it for her world. her world is already here, the old ones' world is gone, and her world the one that needs saving, not the possibility of bringing the old ones' back

so guerrilla has set themselves up with something very interesting here imo where the protag and the audience have mostly aligned but largely separate primary interests and i'm very curious to see how these interests will keep aligning, or not, in the future. personally i think they'll make the main focus of the series discovering and befriending the subfunctions and restoring GAIA, while also wrestling with modern-day politics in an effort to start preparing contemporary groups of people for a more holistic understanding of nature and machines, with the hopes of preparing them for GAIA's return and a future where they 1. take care of the planet and 2. stop attacking machines for parts lol. and i think they'll drag out the mystery of APOLLO possibly still being around until the end (assuming there will be 3 or more games).

personally, when i look at what we've been given so far (everything could change when HFW comes out), i could go either way on if APOLLO is still actually around or not. it would be an interesting (if expected) twist, but i wouldn't want it as wish fulfillment; i wouldn't want it to be used as a cheat that suddenly means ted faro's harm can be negated, or brought back as a HEA in a way that implies knowledge will suddenly be used and spread equally or even easily. also we should consider APOLLO is now an AI of its own! it will have opinions and things and the will to act on them!

discounting the overwhelmingly difficult logistics of introducing APOLLO to a new world that has evolved without its involvement from its inception, if APOLLO comes back in the way the we, the audience, want it to, then spreading several millennia's worth of knowledge to several diverse, warring peoples is full of difficult challenges that you are now suddenly introducing; aloy + GAIA + co. would now be in charge of not only taking care of humans on this spinning ball called earth, but also educating them equally and fairly. it's a huge task to introduce on aloy's already very busy schedule! so frankly i wouldn't be surprised if they wrote APOLLO off and went with an "it sucks but we have to make the most of the world the old ones left us" angle—or, alternatively, have aloy (or sylens!) dedicate the rest of her life traveling and hunting down and/or spreading what remains of APOLLO'S knowledge?

idk! there's a lot to dissect here about what guerrilla is doing and where APOLLO fits in as both a possible ally/villain and a narrative tool to keep us interested (it is a carrot on the stick for the audience)! and i find it all very interesting!!