#this post was inspired by her finally becoming playable

[kara-knuckles]

Based on my dorms history and some of the costumes, I like to think that at some point the Ursus girls were in charge of one of Rhodes cafeterias as a part of their rehabilitation. I headcanon that there is a bunch of small cafes all over the ship that are designed to have a therapeutic effect on its patrons, and this one in particular has lots of greenery in it.

The girls were obviously given some help and guidance, but they were encouraged to figure out what to do with this place by themselves. So they promptly renamed it The Big Dipper and decided on their roles. Gummy is the chef; she works with the main kitchen, but she also personally comes up with the menu for this specific cafe. Rosa is the accountant/manager/barista; she has the best know-how to run an establishment and chatting with visitors helps her with understanding different perspectives. Istina is the waitress; since this place is so small, she can both observe and connect with people without feeling overwhelmed. Zima is the bouncer. This cafe doesn't actually need one, but it was the best job she could come up with; other than occasional incidents, she mostly makes sure no one litters and checks the plants (she got very attached to them). She and Istina also arranged a shelf with various books you can read during your meal. Finally, Leto sometimes comes to play live music. I don't know enough about her to come up with a more pronounced role, please, check back in about half a year for that ToT

[anim-ttrpgs]

Thing From Beyond Player Character Rules in Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy

Eureka has six playable "monster" types, and about ten total supernatural character options all together. Each supernatural trait is taken basically as if it is a normal trait like the ones you have been seeing us post. You cannot give a character more than one supernatural trait--and from what you are about to read, you probably wouldn't want to. Playing monsters is recommended for "advanced" players only, people who like a lot of "crunch" in their games, as require you to keep track of a lot more mechanics than playing a normal human.

Here is the Thing from Beyond Trait. This is going under a Read More because it's long as hell but we really hope that you will check it out and comment. This is, like, the whole entire ruleset for playing a thing from beyond in Eureka. This one might be the longest, it definitely has the most sidebars, because it's a wholly original creature rather than something recognizable from western folklore or pop-culture.

Thing from Beyond (Monster Trait)

Despite being inspired by many horror concepts from around the 20th century, this is the most wholly original monster in Eureka’s lineup, and requires a lot more explanation up front. Throughout the rules text for the thing from beyond, they will be referred to as “TFBs” in the interest of page space.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] A thing from beyond is very unlikely to call themselves a “thing from beyond.” They don’t know where they’re from, it could be anywhere. 

[1.1. Off to the side in the final formatting] How lonely it must be to not even have a name for what you are. 

[Snoop: A regular snoop with the two shapes that make up his or her trench-coat opening up to reveal sharp teeth and tentacles.]

A TFB was never human, but maybe they are now. Their “true form” is a large, flat blanket of membranous flesh that is smooth and skin-like on one side, and ever-so-slightly damp and mouth-like on the other side. The skin side is capable of changing color and texture to a high degree of detail, not unlike that of a cuttlefish. The mouth side is also capable of color-changing but to a lesser degree. Their only bones are dozens and dozens of sharp teeth. Unlike any transformation of, say, the wolfman or a fairy or witch, a TFB is not actually changing in any “magical” way, rather just disguising the same body to superficially appear more like a human.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] This also presents certain challenges in writing the rules text for them.

Despite not arriving on flying saucers or having anything to do with little green men, a TFB is an alien beast, from places or dimensions entirely unknown to modern science.

They are highly adaptive mimics which typically lock on to a single prey species as their primary source of food from a young age, imitating either things the prey species finds non-threatening, or the prey species itself. Their metabolism is unique, capable of not only absorbing nutrients, but DNA and even intact neurological information which can be integrated into their own equivalent of a brain. They not only consume their prey, but their prey’s memories as well. In the wild, this helps them to better and more consciously mimic their prey species — on earth, when consuming humans, it has the unintended side effect of causing them to develop sapience.

TFBs start to think like their prey, and a TFB which has been eating humans will start to think much like a human. Their desires become human desires, their needs become human needs, such purpose, belonging, and love.

To this end, TFBs - or at least the ones who are valid to be investigators - will fold their flat body into a humanoid form, color and texture their outer skin appropriately, and attempt to participate in human society.

The consciousness and sapience of a TFB, alien neurology influenced by human neurology, can manifest in a number of different ways.[1][2] After the first few victims, these senses of self tend to be fixed, and a TFB will not experience a change from one to the other, absolutely not mid-adventure. Despite the frequent intake of new memories and DNA, their personalities are only marginally less fixed than human personalities.[3]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] These are not exhaustive or prescriptive options, just suggestions to help you in developing your TFB investigator.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] A TFB’s memories of their animal-like intelligence before developing sapience are often fuzzy at best.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] But how set in stone are human personalities?

Gestalt Composite:[2] After their first few human meals, their mind may form as a distinct and original personality, a gestalt composite of those minds that they have digested, which is not significantly influenced by the personality traits of their latest meal,[3] at least not much more than a regular personality is influenced by human interaction. TFBs who develop like this will truly be outsiders to society, learning what they can about how to exhibit normal human behavior through fragments of digested memories and asking lots of unusual questions.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] This conscious sapient mind will not fit the same template and mental framework of the average human mind, but neither do those of many natural-born humans.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] As the most common of the three, the majority of sidebars referring to the thought processes of TFBs in this section will be in reference to this kind of TFB consciousness.

[3 off to the side in the final formatting] “I’ve been thinking about Alan Rickman a lot all of the sudden.”

First Victim: They may “become” their first victim, the victim seeming to wake after a horrifying ambush in an unfamiliar, alien body that nevertheless they have some instinctual control of. Once devoured, they are now the TFB. Future victims will not override the base memories of their previous life. A TFB like this will obviously already have some grasp on societal conventions, their journey being more about adapting to what they are now than adapting to what they aren’t.

Both: They may develop something like a combination of the above two possibilities, with a gestalt composite personality formed out of multiple victims, but also a single early victim rising to the surface among them. These two minds share one body, and often communicate with each other by speaking out loud. In partnerships like these, each will be adapting to their new life and to each other.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] While having one player play both investigators sharing this body is perfectly easy, this opens up some other interesting options as well, such as two players sharing the character and character sheet, one for the human and one for the alien. One of these could also be an NPC handled by the Narrator. If “one” investigator is being played by two players, you may even represent this with two separate character sheets, and track Investigation Points and Eureka! Points separately, just so long as they share HP.

Unfurled State

The Unfurled state is the default, natural state of the TFB. A large, flat body that slithers along the ground.[1][2][3][4]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] They may be circular, oval-shaped, star-shaped, square-shaped with rounded corners, or none of the above.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Size ranges from around 7x9 square feet to around 12x14 square feet, sometimes larger if they eat a lot.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] Look up marine flatworms to get a sense of how they move when unfurled.

[4 off to the side in the final formatting] They are, thankfully, not slimy.

Suction Grip

While unfurled, a TFB can slither on walls and even on ceilings just about as easily as though they were floors.

Flat Body

While unfurled, a TFB can compress themselves enough to squeeze through any gap greater than about two inches wide.

No Hands

While unfurled, the TFB has no human hands, and thus cannot interface with complex devices such as firearms, vehicles, etc. The TFB does have two or more long, thin tendrils attached to their mouth side but these can only manipulate the most basic of devices such as simple tools. They cannot use weapons or make regular melee attacks at all in this form. For how a TFB can fight in this state, see p.xx “Homoiophage (Thing From Beyond True Nature)”.

No Speech

While unfurled, the TFB has no human mouth and cannot produce any human speech or in fact any vocal sound at all.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] However, since they can change the color of their skin at will, it is not out of the question that they could display images or even words on their skin to communicate with humans. If this is done with use of a Charm, Comfort, Manipulate, or Seduce roll, apply a -2 penalty to the roll, at least when it makes sense to do so. Rolls towards a character who knows and is comfortable with the TFB in this state may not include those penalties.

All Muscle

While unfurled, apply a +3 Base bonus to the TFB’s Athletics for anything except Speed calculation. They are, however, not considered to have Superhuman Strength in the same way many other supernatural creatures do.

Disguised

Despite this not being their default state, a TFB will likely spend most of their time during the investigation - and any social interaction[1] - disguised as a normal human. They do this by stretching, compressing, and origami-ing their flat bodies into the shape of a human, with their “mouth” side on the inside, and then coloring and texturing their outer skin to appear like human skin, clothing, and other features.[2][3] Going from Disguised to Unfurled is effortless, but going from Unfurled to Disguised takes one Movement if time is measured in Turns and also requires a non-skill supernatural ability Composure roll. Most TFBs will have a specific human persona whom they disguise as regularly, and it is this persona which has a social life, a job, a bank account, etc. [maybe that art by dame can go here?]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Unless their human friends are very cool about hanging out with a man-eating blanket of flesh.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Getting false clothing to appear to hang correctly off of their disguise takes a lot of practice. They could fold into the shape of a naked human and then put real clothes over that, but most TFBs find wearing more than the slightest amount of real fabric uncomfortable and restrictive.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] Human hair is another highly difficult element for a TFB to mimic. Some TFBs may opt to mimic the shape and texture of human hair with their own skin and rely on nobody looking too closely or being rude enough to point this out, others may wear wigs, embody exclusively bald personas, or put all that DNA they’ve absorbed to use and grow out real human hair.

[3.1   off to the side in the final formatting] Some TFBs have thick clusters of little feelers they can use to represent hair. 

[3.2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Elbows are particularly hard to get right as well.

While disguised, consider a TFB to be able to do anything a human could do, including speak and manipulate devices, however, this is quite a contortion act for the them, leading to mild discomfort and the outward appearance of a general lack of coordination.[1] Apply a -1 penalty to all Physical skills when a TFB is disguised.

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] For the TFB, moving a body meant for slithering around on imitation legs using their imitation hands for things would be sort of like a human using their feet to complete daily tasks while walking on their hands. It can be achieved with practice, but isn’t intuitive. This struggle will often manifest early on as difficulty just walking upright, and then comes the challenge of not applying too much or too little grip strength with their hands, and moving each finger independently without making it look obvious that there’s no bones or joints inside.

[1.1. Off to the side in the final formatting] TFBs may use humans’ bodies in their stomachs to practice. If a motion locks out or breaks a joint, they know what not to do.

When disguised as a human, the TFB’s mannerisms will always appear somewhat off, though it will be hard for anyone to put their finger on exactly how. Apply a -1 penalty to all Charm, Comfort, Manipulate, and Seduce rolls made in this form while the TFB is within sight of the target. This penalty can be ignored if the roll is directed towards someone who knows and trusts the TFB, and is aware that they are a TFB. 

A TFB can also disguise themselves as virtually anything of sufficient size, such as furniture or animals, not just humans, but this rulebook will not be statting out every object and animal in the world. If you feel unique stats are needed for a specific shape, then use your best judgment. Disguising as inanimate objects will typically be a Stealth check.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] An intoxicated TFB may “loosen up” and have trouble holding their disguise together, literally. They may also get the colors wrong.

Disguising as Specific People

TFB’s have endless practice taking on their specific human persona that most people know them by, and can disguise as random fake people with no distinct identity just as easily, but disguising as a specific individual other than their main persona is another story.

A TFB can disguise themselves to look like any particular human they have gotten a good up-close look at. When the TFB is attempting to study a person, roll Social Cues.[1] This attempt can be repeated once per Scene to aim for a higher degree of success, so long as the thing from beyond can get an up-close look at the person they want to imitate. Add +1 Base to this roll for each type of DNA sample from the target they have consumed. (See p.xx “DNA Sample Types”.) If they have consumed the whole person within the same adventure, this roll is automatically a Full Success. Unless the TFB is able to study the human in-person or look at full-body photographs or videos taken from multiple angles, they can at most achieve a Partial Success on this roll.[2][3]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] “You have such a lovely face. Do you mind if I borrow it for tonight?"

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] In some cases, it may be a good idea for the Narrator to make this roll hidden from the players, as the TFB will not be able to confirm the effectiveness of their mimicry without putting it to the test.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] A TFB may be very proud of how much detail they can replicate the human form with, but have no one to brag to.

Full Success: From this point on, the TFB can perfectly disguise themselves as the human they are studying, down to all the fine details. Not even the human’s friends and family could tell the difference. This does not mean, however, that no one will notice if they act out-of-character.

Partial Success: From this point on, the TFB can approximately disguise themselves as the human they are studying. The disguise may fool people from a distance, but upon examination, anyone who knows the human in question could easily realize that this is not them with a Full Success or a Partial Success on a Senses or Social Cues roll. They may also be noticed if they act out-of-character.

Failure: The TFB cannot seem to get anything right about the person they are disguising themselves as, and no one will buy the disguise. Best case, people will just think it is someone else who kinda looks like the person in question. 

Mimicking Specific Voices

A TFB can imitate human vocal cords and tongue on the inside of their human disguise, pushing air past them and through an opening in their folds they’ve made to look like a mouth, creating convincing human speech. Like with a visual disguise, making up a random voice is no issue. Typically, they will just use the voice they’ve decided on for their human persona for everything, but with a bit of effort they can alter these features to mimic any specific human voice and speech patterns that they have clearly heard and studied.

When the TFB is attempting to study a person’s voice, roll Senses.[2] This attempt can be repeated once per Scene to aim for a higher degree of success, so long as the TFB can listen to the voice they are attempting to learn to mimic. Add +1 Base to this roll for each type of DNA sample from the target they have consumed. (See p.xx “DNA Sample Types”.) If they have consumed the whole person within the same adventure, this roll is automatically a Full Success. Unless they are able to listen to the voice in-person or hear a very high-quality recording for at least 1 Tick and a large variety of different sentences, they can at most achieve a Partial Success on this roll.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Like with disguising, this can actually be done for virtually any sound, not just a human voice.

[2. off to the side in the final formatting] The Senses and Social Cues rolls are intended to be separate.

Full Success: From this point on, the TFB can perfectly mimic the voice of the human they are studying, down to all the fine details of their speech patterns. Not even the human’s friends and family could tell the difference. This does not mean, however, that no one will notice if they act out-of-character. 

Partial Success: From this point on, the TFB can approximately mimic the voice of the human they are studying. When making any Interpersonal roll that relies on mimicry of the voice in question, apply a -2 penalty to the roll. 

Failure: The TFB cannot seem to get anything right about the voice they are attempting to mimic. Best case, people will just think it is someone doing a bad impression of the voice in question. When making any interpersonal roll that relies on mimicry of the voice in question, apply a -4 penalty to the roll. 

Mimicry from DNA Sample Alone

A TFB can also attempt to mimic the look or voice of a particular person based only on consuming a sample of their DNA but never having seen or heard them. When doing so, the Narrator makes a hidden 2D6 roll with a -3 modifier, and does *not* add the TFB’s Skill modifier. Add a +1 to this roll for each separate type of sample of the target’s DNA the TFB consumes. See the above results for the possible outcomes. The Narrator will not reveal the result of the dice, so there will be no way to know how accurate the mimicry is.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] TFBs *are* what they eat. Over time, a TFB may come to conceptualize their tendrils as human fingers, their skin as human skin, their teeth as human teeth, their enormous mouth as a human mouth, they just have to remember not to yawn with it.

[maybe get the dame TFB tendril heart image to go here]

DNA Sample Types

For the purposes of this mechanic, the types of DNA samples a TFB can consume are considered blood, other bodily fluid, fingernails, hair, skin, bone, muscle, and organ.[1] Any sample must be more than a microscopic amount.

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] So, a severed finger would be considered muscle, skin, bone, nail, and possibly blood if it’s fresh enough, totaling to a +4 Base to the roll. It would not contain enough hair to count as a hair sample.

The Ancillary

A TFB has a body part referred to as an “ancillary.” The ancillary appears as a five-foot-long off-white worm-like creature with six other shorter worm-like tentacles splitting off from the core body. For all intents and purposes, the ancillary is the same “character” as the main body of the TFB, and uses the main body’s base stats and traits (with its own set of base bonuses and penalties explained below), though it is capable of acting entirely independently, and will have its own independent place in a turn order when time is measured in Turns. The ancillary cannot make any Interpersonal Skill checks. 

It is normally flatly embedded in the “mouth” side of the TFB, but can be ejected and taken back in at will.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The main purpose, evolutionarily, of the ancillary is to scout out and ensnare prey for the main body to then come and devour, but a TFB investigator isn’t exactly in their original evolutionary niche either, and probably had an app for that now.

The ancillary can squeeze through gaps as narrow as one inch wide, breathe in both air and water, and climb on sheer surfaces, but cannot change color, manipulate devices more complex than perhaps a button, use weapons, or make any sort of communication.

There is a mental connection between the ancillary and the main body, meaning the main body knows anything the ancillary knows, but the ancillary does not know much because its senses are extremely rudimentary. Apply a -2 penalty to all Investigative Rolls made by the ancillary, and all Senses rolls made by it. The mental connection cannot be maintained outside of a distance of 100 yards, and if the connection is broken, the ancillary will shrivel and die. The TFB may choose to terminate the connection deliberately and kill the ancillary at any time, such as to prevent its capture and study.

The Ancillary and Composure and Combat

The ancillary has 2 of each type of HP. For the purposes of Composure rolls, anything that happens to the ancillary happens to the main body. For example, the TFB must make a relevant Composure roll if the ancillary takes damage. If the ancillary dies, the TFB must make a Death Composure roll. If the ancillary’s death results from a severing of the mental connection, the Death Composure roll is made with a comforting factor because the TFB is not experiencing the death as clearly.

If the ancillary is destroyed or otherwise lost rather than being returned to the main body, the TFB will grow the ancillary back as if it were a missing body part.

The ancillary is powerful for its size, and fairly thin and hard to damage. Add a +1 Base bonus to all of its Athletics, Close Combat rolls, +2 Contextual to its Stealth rolls, and apply a -1 penalty to any attack directed towards it.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The +3 Base to Athletics that the Unfurled TFB gets does not apply to the ancillary, nor do any other bonuses or penalties from the main body. 

Attacking with the Ancillary

The only forms of attack available to the ancillary are Grab and Hold. This Hold may be escalated to Submission.

Provided that the TFB is not wearing body armor, the ancillary may be launched from the main body up to a range of 10 feet when ejected, hitting a target in range only on a Full Success with an Athletics roll. This counts as 1 Action. If the launched ancillary hits the target, it may immediately take its Turn. Otherwise, it acts at the end of the current Round’s turn order.

General Abilities

Beyond this point, these rules will apply to both the TFB’s unfurled state and disguised state, unless otherwise specified.

Invertebrate

TFBs are largely ambivalent about which way any part of their body bends. Apply a +3 Contextual bonus to any Escape attempts. If the TFB has a human occupying their stomach, they lose this bonus unless they first make a successful Crunching attempt (see p.xx “Crunching”). A TFB also will not take any damage from being put into a Submission Hold.

Blunt objects, as well as crushing weights, can only deal Superficial Damage to the TFB.[2] Additionally, damage from falls is halved.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The damage from falls is halved both by the Redundant Body Structure and by the rule above, meaning they take 25% damage from falling.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] Due to being flat and boneless, or flat, boneless, and hollow when in the shape of a human, TFBs are soft and squishy unless they have a human skeleton inside them. Enough pressure could flatten them whether folded or unfolded, only for them to spring right back!

All Eyes

The entire “skin” side of the TFB is covered in photoreceptors, making it impossible for them to be snuck up on from “behind.” They don’t even have an actual “behind,” they see in all directions at all times.[1] TFBs see entirely differently from humans with their whole body being one big photoreceptor.

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] A Disguised thing from beyond may also be able to see details of the environment that their human disguise’s “eyes” could not, such as an audio recorder stuck under a desk below eye-level. They see it from their disguise’s “feet.”

TFBs see entirely differently from humans with their whole body being one big photoreceptor. They cannot benefit from magnifying scopes attached to firearms, or anything of the sort such as binoculars. Additionally, there is no way for them to shield their photoreceptors from bright light unless they want to cover the entire body.

Natural Camouflage

The TFB’s “skin” side can alter its colors–and texture–down to the slightest detail, much like a cuttlefish. This is part of how they mimic human skin and clothing. This grants them a +4 Base bonus to Stealth when Disguised, a +5 Base bonus to Stealth when Unfurled, and a +10 Base bonus to Stealth when Unfurled and flattened against a surface, at least if they choose to change their color to blend into the environment. If time is being measured in Turns, this takes 1 Movement. The “mouth” side of the TFB is also capable of changing colors, but instead of being nearly instantaneous, changing the colors of this side takes at least 1 Action if time is being measured in Turns.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] Laying flat on a surface with the ‘mouth’ side up is extremely useful for lying in ambush for prey to walk over the thing from beyond and then snapping them up, though it would render them largely blind. 

[1.1. off to the side in the final formatting] Be wary of new carpets.

All-Purpose Gills

The TFB has the ability to absorb oxygen from both air and water. 

Prey Fear Response Suppression

Within a radius of about ten feet, the TFB influences the human mind through an energy field it produces. This field is tailored to the TFB’s preferred prey species, which in the case of any TFB investigator will be humans. This field exerts a calming effect over the human mind, suppressing the electrochemical signals that cause negative emotions such as fear and anger, intended to make them less likely to look for the small tells that could help give the predator away. Add a +1 Contextual bonus to all Comfort and Composure rolls made by anyone else within this field, and subtract a -1 penalty from all Reflexes, Senses, and Threaten rolls made by anyone else within this field. This ability is “on” by default, and can only be switched “off” on a per-Scene basis with use of a non-skill supernatural ability Composure roll.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] Many people may not appreciate this if they learn about it, but it is hard to stay mad when the signals which create “mad” in your brain are being blocked. 

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] When “on,” this strong field will be easily detected by an EMF reader.

Exposure to this field over a long period of time can alter the memories of humans. Technically, the humans are unconsciously altering the memories themselves, because long-term exposure causes a disproportionately strong feeling of familiarity with the TFB in question. This feeling may cause them to misremember past events, inserting the TFB into events they were not present for. Characters will feel like they have known the thing from beyond for twice as long as they really have; one year feels like two, five years feels like ten.[1]

[1. off to the side in the final formatting] Keep in mind the TFB will not know the content of these false memories themselves, as they are not consciously inserting them into peoples’ brains. The human brain is altering these memories itself to rationalize why it feels like the TFB has been around so long.

Learning by Example

TFBs gain an additional +1 Investigation Points from any Investigative Roll that involves inquiring about the motivations and emotions of human beings on an individual or societal level, and from any Full Successes on Social Cues, whether they are Investigative Rolls or not. However, they have a -2 penalty to Social Cues.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] Even TFBs that are their own first victim benefit from this, because they have to learn how to make their new body move and look like a natural human.

Redundant Body Structure

The TFB’s flesh is tough and their internal body structure is almost entirely redundant. With several exceptions (extreme heat, acid, nickel; see: Crawl Away from a Hot Needle for more detail.), TFBs take half-damage from all damage sources, the only exception being HP that results from loss of Composure. If a TFB wears armor that protects against whatever is dealing the damage, this damage is halved again, for one quarter damage, rounding up. Apply a -2 modifier to attacks against the TFB from 1-damage weapons.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] It may be smart for the TFB to use their shapeshifting and color-changing abilities to simulate more human-like wounds on their human disguise.

Healing

Regular first-aide will work on TFBs in most cases within reason, but their bodies are also capable of an incredible rate of natural healing and regeneration. TFBs automatically recover 1 point of Superficial and Penetrative HP at the beginning of every game session, and 1 point of Superficial HP at the end of each day. 

Additionally, if they took damage to either HP type during an instance of combat, they restore 1 HP of the same type as soon as the combat is resolved.

If a TFB’s Penetrative HP is full, instead of recovering Penetrative HP from any of the above rules, they recover from one Grievous Wound, permanent or not.

A TFB may spend 1 Eureka! Point to instantly recover all Superficial and Penetrative HP, and from all Grievous Wounds. This takes 1 action.

If a TFB is in their human disguise and has a “limb” severed, treat this mechanically the same way as if a normal human was missing that limb. Additionally, consider the TFB to have taken a Brain Injury Grievous Wound until they have recovered, no matter if they are Unfurled or Disguised.

Unkillable

Even when the TFB’s body appears to be torn to shreds, they are most likely just in a coma-like state while their cells gradually regenerate and their body self-repairs.[1] When reduced to 0 Penetrative HP, the TFB does “die” for all mechanics purposes and is out of the adventure same as a regular dead investigator, but may return and be played in any subsequent adventure. While in this state they cannot be healed by any kind of conventional first aid.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] This may take days, months, or years, and may result in a much smaller TFB overall upon recovery.

[Snoop: The decapitated head of a TFB snoop that has sprouted legs like the decapitated head from The Thing and is slithering away in the other direction, while another snoop incinerates its dead body with a flamethrower.]

Revival

A TFB that has been reduced to 0 Penetrative HP and “killed” for the adventure may spend 2 Eureka! Points to revive with 1 of both types of HP, but only once a minimum of 5 Scenes have passed. A TFB may instead spend 3 Eureka! Points to revive instantly, so long as they have been “dead” for at least 1 round.

Scent Tracking

A TFB’s sense of “smell” is actually their sense of taste, picked up when air runs over their “mouth” side, but mechanically this should still be treated as a sense of smell. All of that surface area gives them a very sensitive “nose,” and they can pick up on trace elements of scents that a human would not be able to. Additionally, when they are unfurled, apply a +2 Contextual[or base? Look at other monsters] bonus to Senses rolls for smell.

Additionally, TFBs are capable of Scent Tracking. See p.xx “Scent Tracking”.

Low-Oxygen Origins

A TFB requires much less oxygen than a human. In a low or zero-oxygen environment, multiply the amount of time they can last without oxygen by 10 before they must start making Athletics rolls. When they do make Athletics rolls, the results are as follows:

Full Success: No Damage

Partial Success: 1 Superficial Damage

Failure: 2 Superficial Damage

Homoiophage (Thing from Beyond True Nature)

The TFB regains no Composure from eating normal food, but does gain Composure from sleeping. They will lose Composure as normal from skipping meals or skipping sleep. 

Flat Composure Damage from Skipping Meals = Yes

Composure restoration from Three Meals a Day  = No

Flat Composure Damage from Skipping Sleep = Yes

Composure restoration from Full Night’s Sleep = Yes

The primary food source of a TFB is whatever species they have disguised themselves as, and whatever prey species of sufficient size they first consume several of is usually what that disguise becomes. Thus, all TFBs that are valid to be player-character investigators are ones that disguise as and consume humans. The “default” appearance of some TFBs will be that of the first person they devoured, but they may “personalize” this look to make it more unique over time, either out of preference, or because they were discovered and needed a new look that wasn’t attached to any of the victim’s friends or family. TFBs who were later at developing full sapience will usually make up a persona entirely from scratch. The TFB has little if any memory of their life before taking on a human mentality.

The TFB can eat “normal” food,[1] but does not regain Composure points from doing so. The only food that restores Composure points for them is humans, the fresher the better. They have a particular fondness for brains, and this is because they not only absorb nutrition from their victims, but information encoded in their brains and DNA as well.[2][3][4]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] When the TFB eats normal food in their human disguise, it doesn’t look terribly different from when a regular human eats food, except they may struggle with foods that must be torn off with the teeth, since their human teeth are fake and made of flesh.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] TFBs can live off of a vegetarian diet for their “normal” food, though they may struggle to digest it in large quantities, but most strongly dislike food that isn’t meat.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] Some TFBs avoid animal products like the plague unless they’re thoroughly cooked, and some avoid them altogether, fearing that if they eat too many rare steaks, they’ll start to become more like a cow and less like a human.

[4. Off to the side in the final formatting] Being alien creatures whose favorite food is human flesh, TFBs don’t always develop “normal” pallets in the first place, creating food combinations that would make others cringe, like putting BBQ sauce on pizza. These preferences may need to be ignored in favor of more “normal” food combinations if the TFB does not want to draw attention.

[4.1. Of course, “drawing attention” does not necessarily mean everyone will assume they’re an alien. How weird would somebody have to be before you’d question if they’re even human, and not think “what is wrong with me?”

[5. Off to the side in the final formatting] Whatever their hangups or lack thereof regarding “normal” food, a TFB can fake a more balanced diet by putting things in their mouths and spitting them out undigested later.

TFBs are built for digesting very large meals over the course of a very long time, not unlike a snake. They can subsist off of more “normal” quantities of food consumed several times daily like a human, but it is not as comfortable for them as one large meal. When eating humans, they will not restore Composure unless the human is consumed entirely at once.

TFBs also simply need more calories than humans daily. When eating normal food, a TFB can either eat three meals a day, each paid for with a -1 Wealth roll to represent the expense of a greater quantity of food, or eat all three daily meals worth of food at once with a -2 to the Wealth roll.[1][2]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] This is a -2 instead of -3 because eating it all at once is how their body is designed to handle it most efficiently.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] They cannot choke, and could effortlessly “stretch” their human disguise’s mouth to a size large enough to allow virtually any meal past their false lips. Really though they’re just widening the gap between the folds that make up their persona’s face.

Enveloping Victims

TFBs can make two types of Grab attacks. The first is the normal mundane Grab that they can do with their “hands” while disguised. The second is an Enveloping Grab.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Narrators should assume that when a TFB’s player says “Grab” they are talking about a mundane Grab and not an Enveloping Grab unless explicitly stated otherwise.

Enveloping Grab.

For the purposes of Enveloping Grab, always use the TFB’s Unfurled Athletics Modifier.

An Enveloping Grab can be done whether a TFB is Unfurled or Disguised,[1] but cannot be done while they are wearing body armor or a helmet, and a Throw cannot be made from an Enveloping Grab. For the purposes of an Enveloping Grab, always use the TFB’s Unfurled stat bonuses, regardless of whether they are starting from Unfurled or Disguised.[4] This works exactly like a regular Grab mechanically except with a few important differences. First, the Enveloping Grab can be done as a regular attack, or as a Counter-Attack. Additionally, an Enveloping Grab can be done to up to 14 targets so long as they are standing close enough together.[3] If targeting multiple targets, make only one roll for the TFB, based on the least favorable Weight Class.[2]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Though of course doing it while disguised will give away the disguise

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] What direction the TFB actually appears to be facing is irrelevant for this. TFBs have no front or back, and the whole concept is something they must get used to when assimilating into human society. An inexperienced Disguised TFB may not turn their head towards sounds or even most things they’re supposed to be looking at because they see out of their whole body, not just where their fake human eyes are.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] Beware, this could mean up to 14 Counter-Attacks coming back at the TFB too!

[4. Off to the side in the final formatting] Their tendrils are very useful for holding prey still while the main body moves over them.

With a successful Enveloping Grab, the TFB has begun to wrap themselves around the victim, the victim is essentially partially inside their “mouth.”[1][2][3] When a TFB has a target in an Enveloping Grab, they may either Inject Venom or progress to an Enveloping Hold.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The “mouth” side of the TFB is covered in many dozens of sharp teeth which help cling to the victim, and may be painful but do not do actual HP damage inherently. If for any reason the TFB wants to make their “mouth” more comfortable for the person they are wrapped around, these teeth can be made to lay completely flat.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] The teeth on the mouth side are scattered in many seemingly random patches, the pattern of which is actually unique to each TFB.

[3 off to the side in the final formatting] The “mouth” side of a TFB is surprisingly much less slimy than one might expect. It may be described as something in between the soft flesh at the roof of a human mouth, and the dry and scratchy feel of a cat’s tongue, leaning farther towards one or the other depending on the particular TFB in question. In addition to the teeth and venomous retractable spines, most of the interior of a TFB is covered in tiny prickles that assist in clinging to prey during the envelopment process. The interior may also be described as similar to–but slightly gentler than–shark skin. 

Inject Venom

For the purposes of injecting venom, always use the TFB’s Unfurled Athletics modifier.

The TFB possesses a row of sharp retractable spines running down the center of their “mouth” side.[2] When they have a victim in an Enveloping Grab or Enveloping Hold, they may attempt to inject the victim with digestive venom by making a Athletics roll.[1][3] This is considered an attack and takes an Action. If the victim is wearing body armor, apply a -3 modifier to this roll. 

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The TFB is completely immune to their own venom and that of other TFBs.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] These are not the same as their regular teeth.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] They digest like a spider, if a spider’s cocoon was also the spider’s mouth and its stomach, and could secrete its own acid.

There’s a whole lot of spines, and the TFB can inject as many targets as they have Enveloping Grabbed or Enveloping Held using one single dose. Make a single roll for all victims, unless some victims have armor and others don’t, in which case roll those separately.

Under normal circumstances, a TFB only produces one dose of digestive venom per 24 hour period, usually when they sleep, to a maximum of 1 dose stored. Restore a TFB’s dose of venom each time they gain Composure from a Full Night’s Rest.

Full Success: The victim is injected with a dose of venom that is not only exceptionally painful but is very likely to be lethal. Applies poison (Lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: per round). There is no antidote.

Partial Success: Only a few spines manage to penetrate and properly inject venom, resulting in a dose that is less likely to kill the victim. Applies poison (Non-lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: Per Round). There is no antidote.

Failure: The TFB does not manage to get any spines in deep enough to have any effect. The dose is still spent.

If the TFB takes Superficial, Penetrative, or Composure damage while holding a person in their “mouth”/“stomach”, they must make a Reflexes roll if they want to stop themselves from accidentally injecting the person inside with digestive venom. Add +3 to this Reflexes roll if the person inside is wearing armor. 

Full Success: The TFB is able to keep total control and prevent themselves from injecting venom.

Partial Success: The TFB is able to barely stop themselves from releasing all their spines, and the character inside takes a small dose of venom. Applies poison (Non-lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: Per Round).

Failure: The TFB is not able to hold back at all and releases their spines completely. The character inside takes a full dose of the digestive venom. Applies poison (Lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: per round).

Enveloping Hold

For the purposes of Enveloping Hold, always use the TFB’s Unfurled Athletics modifier.

An Enveloping Hold works exactly like a regular Hold, except the TFB does not suffer the regular penalties and caveats associated with using a Hold. They can still move around and act freely. (They have unique rules for that, see p.xx “Digestion”.) With a successful Enveloping Hold, the TFB wraps themselves completely around the target, essentially “swallowing” them. The TFB’s “mouth” is also their stomach. As long as there is only one victim inside them, they may choose to immediately return to the human disguise.[1] Doing so under these exact circumstances does not take a Movement and does not require the thing from beyond to make a +3 Composure roll for using a supernatural power, even though it normally would. It is part of the “swallowing” process. If there are multiple targets Enveloping Grabbed, the Enveloping Hold targets all of them. It takes only one roll and is made with the least favorable Weight Class for the TFB. A TFB cannot effectively Disguise as human at all if they are attempting to contain more than one victim. When a TFB is Disguised in this way, they are wrapped around their victim like a full-body suit. The victim’s arms are inside their “arms,” the victim’s legs are inside their “legs,” the victim’s head is inside their “head,” etc. A TFB wrapped around a person in this way can count as Armor, at least from things besides bullets.

When a Disguised TFB has a person in an Enveloping Hold it is nearly impossible to tell that a person is inside them just by looking, as if the victim is wearing the TFB as a skin-tight bodysuit.[1] However, if the victim is still alive, their screams for help will almost certainly be heard by anyone within about 10 feet that can make a Full Success on a Senses Roll. On a Partial Success, the listener may hear some kind of muffled sound, but not be able to pinpoint its source. If the thing from beyond opens the fake mouth of their human disguise, however, the victim inside will certainly be able to be heard by everyone around.[2]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The dimensions of the TFB’s Disguised form may appear slightly different than usual while holding a victim. They must at least somewhat mirror those of the victim inside.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] “Hm? Did you just say something?”

[2.1. Off to the side in the final formatting] “No, sorry, must’ve been something I ate.”

Escaping a Thing from Beyond

If the victim inside a TFB is actively resisting them and/or trying to escape, apply a -1 penalty to all the TFB’s rolls per struggling victim.

For the purposes of any Escape attempts by the victim, always use the TFB’s Unfurled Athletics skill and modifiers.

Being surrounded by the TFB’s many dozens of teeth all pressing into them essentially means that the victim inside “chews” themselves by struggling too hard, saving the TFB energy. If the teeth are not being made to lay flat by the TFB, a victim trying to Escape from inside them takes 1 Superficial Damage for each Escape attempt, regardless of success or failure, unless the victim is wearing armor which covers most of their body as well as a helmet.

Chewing

Instead of Submission, an Enveloping Hold has chewing, which, mechanically, works exactly like Submission.[2] When a TFB has a victim in an Enveloping Hold, they may choose to “chew” their victim by squeezing and crushing them inside while cutting off their supply of air, and secreting acid to begin the process of digestion.[1] If there are multiple victims in an Enveloping Hold, this counts for all of them. 

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Simply holding a person inside is not inherently lethal or otherwise damaging to the victim, unless the TFB starts chewing and digesting them.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Maintaining Chewing each Turn takes an Action, just like maintaining Submission.

Crunching

For the purposes of Crunching, always use the TFB’s Unfurled Athletics modifier.

A third option TFBs have for subduing tumultuous prey is to just squeeze them until their bones are crushed, or bend them in ways humans can’t stand to bend. If time is measured in Turns, this takes an Action. Make an Athletics roll with a -3 penalty, and apply Weight Class. If there are multiple targets, apply the least favorable Weight Class On a Full Success, anyone inside the TFB’s stomach takes 4 Penetrative Damage. On a Partial Success or Failure, the TFB fails to exert enough pressure, and cannot attempt this again on the same victim.

Digestion

It takes, on average, 7 days for a TFB to fully digest a human,[1] and digesting more than one at a time does not slow this process. By day 2, no skin will remain. By day 5, only bones remain. By the end of day 7, not even the skeleton will remain. The digestive system of the TFB is capable of absorbing and utilizing every bit of a human body, and produces virtually no solid waste, though they may spit out tattered, acid-washed clothing and other indigestibles at the end of this process. The body of the victim may also be spit out prematurely at any time for any reason.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] If the victim is an Unkillable monster, double the digestion timeframe. [stick this in the monster edge cases section later]

So long as the TFB is digesting a victim, they do not need to eat other food and will never count as having skipped meals. At the end of each day, as long as the TFB is digesting a victim, they regain 1 point of Composure as if they had eaten three meals that day.[1] This goes on at the end of each day until the victim is completely digested. If there are multiple victims being digested at once, the thing from beyond regains 1 point of Composure for each victim. Additionally, each time a TFB gains Composure from digesting a person, add +1 Composure each time for every 2 years the TFB has been friends with this person. A TFB can also completely skip the Composure roll for Death by immediately consuming the corpse of the deceased.[2][3][4][5][6][7][8][1. Off to the side in the final formatting The victim does not have to be dead 

*yet* for this Composure to be restored, as long as they have been chewed and/or dissolved by acid enough to be forced to make an Injury roll.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] For some TFBs, the closer they are to someone emotionally, the greater their desire to consume them may grow, to absorb that person’s thoughts, personality, memories, everything into their own body. This may show as frequent hugs in the human disguise, or even particularly “mouthy” “hugs” by the unfolded form, if the secret is already out. Most friends of a TFB would hope it never escalates beyond that.

[2.1. off to the side in the final formatting] A TFB whose true nature is already known to their edible friends may struggle to keep these thoughts to themselves if they lack the social skills to know better.

[2.2. off to the side in the final formatting] If they are respectful of their friends’ desire not to be digested alive, a TFB with these desires may instead settle for learning “what makes them tick” by more conventional means, studying their every move and closely watching their reaction to everything. Still, bodies may go missing after death.

[3 off to the side in the final formatting] Because things from beyond absorb information from their prey, they eventually do start to develop a good idea of what being digested alive is like. However, they will typically still consider the ends worth the means.

[4 off to the side in the final formatting] “I hate you, I might even spit you out once you’re dead because I don’t want you in me, depending on how hungry I feel.”

[5 off to the side in the final formatting] “Sorry, I’m just so hungry.”

[6 off to the side in the final formatting] “I’m sorry, I know this is really going to hurt, but when it’s done you’ll literally be a part of me forever.”

[6.1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Some TFBs may not conceptualize this as being the same thing as death for the human. A TFB may experience the want to merge with a particular human in a way a human simply cannot. This will not always translate into the desire to eat them, but it easily can, because a TFB may see no other way.

[7. Off to the side in the final formatting] Regardless of these attitudes, most of a TFB’s victims will still likely be people they have no relationship with.

[8 off to the side in the final formatting] TFBs have no natural sexual attraction to humans but may develop a desire for intimacy through relationships with humans and through learning this feeling through human DNA and memories they absorb. Their actual means of reproduction is entirely unknown, and may be entirely asexual–they at least do not possess sex organs in any way that a human may fully understand. How they go about achieving this intimacy, therefore, requires some creativity and experimentation, but no matter the conclusion, any human participant should always always wear protection.

Digestion and Investigation Points

As mentioned earlier, the TFB not only receives nourishment from their victims, but information from their brain matter and DNA as well.[1] To mechanically represent this, the TFB not only receives Composure points from digesting the victim, but Investigation Points as well.[2] The TFB also gains 1 Investigation Point from a digesting victim at the end of each day, so long as the victim has been chewed/dissolved enough to have to make an Injury roll.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] As a predator species, TFBs use information assimilated from their prey to adjust and alter their own equivalent-to-brains to think and act more like their preferred prey and thus better hunt them. When TFBs appear on Earth and start to consume humans, this has the unexpected side effect of causing them to develop sapience and a personality.

[1.1. off to the side in the final formatting] Over time, the default look to a TFB’s human disguise becomes more than just a lure, but a persona as well. 

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] These Investigation Points represent the jumble of random information a TFB starts to absorb from their meal almost as soon as the process is underway. Often, TFBs won’t be exactly sure where they learned something, whether it was something they heard, or something someone they ate heard.

Add 1 additional investigation point each time if the victim was alive when put in the Enveloping Hold.

Add 1 additional Investigation Point if the victim was somehow connected to the current investigation, no matter what “side” of it they were on.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The TFB can tell if a victim is related to the current investigation or not by their taste after digesting them for at least long enough to gain a Composure point. 

Add 1 Investigation Point if the victim was a fellow investigator, and additionally the TFB can take 1 Eureka! Point from an investigator victim each time a point of Composure is restored by digesting them. They also gain the ability to use a Eureka! Point on any previously failed Investigative Rolls written on an investigator victim’s character sheet. This means that a TFB can potentially gain up to 4 Investigation Points per victim per day.

Subtract -2 investigation points from this total, to gain a minimum of 0, for any victim that has been dead more than an hour before being “swallowed.”

A TFB only gets the aforementioned Composure and Investigation Points if they have been digesting the victim or victims constantly since they were ingested. They cannot just leave a dead body in their apartment and return home to digest it for a few minutes at the end of each day, nor can they just lightly nibble on a friend for a few minutes at the end of the day to count as a “meal” and restore Composure. Doing this would give them no Composure points nor investigation points. They must keep wrapped around their prey overnight to digest overnight, but this does not mean that they must remain in human shape the entire time they are digesting.

Digestion and Exact Memories

Once a TFB has spent at least three days digesting a person that is somehow related to the current investigation, add “[Person’s Name]’s Mind” to their On-Person Inventory.[1] So long as they have this, at any point, they may spend a Eureka! Point to “use” the person’s mind to learn a single piece of useful information that the digested person would know, similar to how any investigator might use a Eureka! Point to learn from a previously Failed Investigative Roll.

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] TFBs do not absorb literally every piece of information held in a person’s brain, nor do they necessarily “keep” everything they do absorb. They aren’t hard drives. [Person’s Name]’s Mind will no-longer be in their inventory at the start of a new adventure under normal circumstances.

So long as they have this, add +1 to any Interpersonal roll targeting a person who knows the victim. They will also innately recognize people whom their victim knew, but may or may not know any details of their relationship, up to the Narrator. They also do not need to make a specific roll to be able to disguise their body and voice as this person’s.

Overclock Metabolism and Acid/Venom Spray

The TFB may spend 1 Eureka! Point to secrete an enormous amount of stomach acid from their “mouth” side in a very short time, regardless of whether they have a dose of digestive venom ready. If time is measured in Turns, this takes an Action, though it does not take an Action to keep this acid continuously coming until it runs out. If there are one or more living victims currently inside the TFB, each will immediately take 8 Superficial damage, and then take 8 Superficial damage on the TFB’s Turn each Round for 7 Rounds. Halve this damage if the target is only Enveloping Grabbed by the TFB and not Enveloping Held. This also advances the digestion process by 1 day on the TFB’s Turn each Round for 7 Rounds, including any Composure restoration, Investigation Point gain, and deterioration of the victim’s body that would entail. This, however, will not grant “[Person’s Name]’s Mind” until the victim is dead. Additionally, this allows for digestion of inorganic substances, though the taste and feeling of doing so are not at all pleasant to the TFB. This excess acid secretion may be ended early at any time, but another Eureka! Point must then be spent to start it back up again.

This excess secretion of acid may be used for other purposes too. If Unfurled, then the TFB may flatten themselves against a surface and dissolve a hole through it equal to their size and shape at a rate of about one half of an inch per Turn.[1] This does take an Action each Turn to continuously do.[2]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] The dissolution rate of different substances may actually vary up to the Narrator's discretion.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] The TFB will taste every moment of this.

In either form, 1 Round after the Eureka! Point was spent, the TFB is secreting enough stomach acid that they may pressurize it within their body and spray it up to 10 feet in any and all directions. Treat this mechanically as though a splash explosion had happened centered on the TFB, though they may instead choose any number of specific targets within range rather than hitting every potential target in range indiscriminately. Targets hit will take 2 Superficial damage each round until the acid can be washed away or wiped off.

A TFB is immune to its own acid, like its venom. They are of very similar chemical construction.

Inhuman Sleeping Patterns

Sections of a TFB’s body take “sleep” in shifts,[1] with their whole body only shutting down for a short period of time each day. Therefore, TFBs do not appear to require as much sleep as regular humans do. A TFB need only sleep for 2 Ticks to get a Full Night’s Rest. Treat 1 Tick of rest as equivalent to less than 8 hours of sleep, and 0 Ticks as staying up all night.[2][3][4]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] This has no other mechanical effect, except that when a TFB says “my leg fell asleep,” it could be a very literal statement.

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Though TFBs are neither nocturnal nor dinurial, they will mostly try to keep up the act of a human sleeping pattern.

[3. Off to the side in the final formatting] Speaking of “sleeping patterns,” their skin may go through elaborate changes of color when they dream.

[4. Off to the side in the final formatting] Most TFBs are capable of maintaining a folded shape even while asleep.

Whenever a TFB sleeps, their photoreceptors do not shut down entirely. They will be vaguely aware of their surroundings even while sleeping. If a threat approaches them in their sleep, they may make a Reflexes or Senses roll and wake up on a Partial Success or Full Success.

Whenever a TFB sleeps, and the result would matter in any way, roll 1D6. On a result of 1-3, the TFB will wake up in an entirely different color combination than they were when they went to sleep.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] Redoing their human persona’s tattoos and makeup on these mornings can be a hassle.

Crawl Away from a Hot Needle (Thing from Beyond Weakness)

TFBs are survivable, but not invincible. There are a number of substances and situations that their bodies do not react well to.

Regeneration Impediments

Damage from the following sources is not halved: Fire and extreme heat, acid, or nickel.[1]

[1. Off to the side in the final formatting] For example, a regular bullet would deal 2 Penetrative Damage to the TFB, but a nickel-plated bullet would deal the regular 4.

If any damage is caused to them by these substances during an instance of combat, they will not automatically regenerate 1 of both types of HP at the end of combat, nor at the end of the same session.[1] This damage may still be healed by other means.

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] They will continue to regenerate as normal from the next session and next instance of combat, as long as they don’t take any more damage from these substances.

Nickel Poisoning

Nickel is a highly toxic substance to TFBs, and if they start to digest it,[2] they must immediately expel the entire contents of their stomach, or make a Reflexes roll to more discriminately spit out only the source of nickel.[1]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] Jewelry, buttons, and other metal apparel are commonly nickel-plated or use nickel as a filler. TFBs who don’t pay attention to what their victims are wearing may soon regret it.

[2 off to the side in the final formatting] If the TFB is not actively digesting, the nickel will not dissolve into their bloodstream. 

Full Success: They can spit out only the source of nickel quickly enough to not suffer more than a very unpleasant taste.

Partial Success: They can spit out only the source of nickel, but not before becoming poisoned (Non-lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: per Tick).

Failure: They fail to spit out the nickel before it dissolves in their stomach, and they suffer from poison (Lethal, OT: Immediate, DF: per Tick).

Extreme Heat

TFBs must have “Extreme Heat” at some place on their Tiers of Fear. They make this Composure roll when exposed to temperatures greater than 100F/38C. Additionally, if they are Disguised, when exposed to temperatures greater than 130F/55C, they must make a Reflexes roll to maintain their disguise or else flop open violently.

Full Success: They do not allow their disguise to falter at all.

Partial Success: Their disguise falters slightly, gaps opening up and certain features slipping out of place for only a second or two.

Failure: They completely unravel into their unfurled state.

Alien Nightmares

TFBs have vivid dreams, and their nightmares are particularly distressing to the part of their mind that has developed human sensibilities.[1] If a TFB is at 3 Composure or below, roll 1D6 each time they sleep. On a 5 or 6, they will have a vivid nightmare. This means that they fail to gain any Composure points from this rest. On a 6, they will extend their venomous spines in panic, injecting or launching digestive venom into whatever their “mouth” side is touching.[2]

[1 off to the side in the final formatting] Is this from the last moments of their victims, or something long before that?

[2. Off to the side in the final formatting] Thimbles could be useful, maybe?

Misc. Tells

False Clothing

Many TFBs find any kind of human apparel uncomfortable and restrictive to wear. When the TFB disguises themselves as a human by folding into a human shape, their “clothes” are typically also part of the disguise, and are thus warm to the touch like skin, and may not hang exactly like actual fabric should.

Weight

While holding a person inside their human disguise, the TFB will of course be twice as heavy.

X-Ray

The TFB has no bones, but may pass an x-ray exam by holding another person in their body for its duration, if this would, like, ever come up. [maybe make this a sidebar in the Invertebrate section?]

Heartbeat

TFB do not have a centralized heart and thus do not have a proper heartbeat anywhere on their body.

All Stomach

Listening to any part of a TFB’s body while they are digesting a victim will sound like putting your ear to someone’s stomach.

False Mouth

Anyone into the “mouth” of a TFB’s human persona may see the TFB’s many rows of real teeth in the back of their “throat.”

How to Kill a Thing from Beyond

A TFB’s main body is capable of gradually regenerating so long as even a small scrap of flesh remains from it. In order to permanently kill a TFB, the damage that takes them to 0 Penetrative HP must be done with fire or an acidic substance, or all of their remains gathered and thoroughly burned or dissolved afterwards.

They will also die permanently if killed by nickel poisoning, though not if killed by a nickel weapon. 

[stormbreaker101]

Music(ology) headcanons! Part 2

My friend @klaraflamez and I have been writing a shared story based upon the wizard101 AUs we made independently. Things go somewhat off the rails, and so these headcanons that we made for Music absolutely do not work for canon, which is part of why I'm making this post separate.

An overview of our AUs:

In both Corrupted Spiral (my AU) and the Cleaved AU (Klara's), the Spiral learned so heavily on its dependency upon its Wizard that it led to the Wizards' demises. In CS, before Arc 4 could properly begin, Nora lashed out in fury, sick of being Nothing but a title and weapon, and abandons the Spiral. In Cleaved, Scarlet was killed in the final fight of Lemuria, a 1v8, abandoned and alone because the Spiral assumed she would have handled it.

The main characters of the next generation after the two Wizards (~0-5 years after Nora's departure and 25 years after Scarlet's death) each realize that even though they're not The Wizard, they still have a duty to serve the good of the Spiral.

Overall there's a major theme of destiny and responsibility not falling on just one person's shoulders. The Wizard is not the only Paradox, and the primordial magics of Light, Shadow, and Music are no longer reserved for the Wizard and the gods. They become proper schools, integrated with the other ten (7 playable schools + 3 Astrals).

I've written and come up with spells for the Music school, as one of the characters I'm writing ends up as the Scion of Music, while Klara's writing the revamped Shadow and Light schools because her OCs become the Scions for those.

More details on Music as its own school in CCSAU (both lorewise and mechanicswise because i am gamerpilled), and all the spells themselves plus their explanations (where I derived inspiration from) are under the cut!

Music is the magic of creation. 'Outgoing' mechanics are the name of the game. It is a major hitter like Fire and Storm, but also has access to heals like the more defensive Life magic that came from the Song of Creation. Music's greatest weakness is that it is a major glass cannon, with no spells in its repertoire able to mitigate incoming damage.

The reason Music is tied to Fire and Storm alongside Life lorewise is because the Scion of Music first studied Fire and Storm magic alongside Musicology, before Music was its own school. Our Scion shaped Music as much as Music shaped him.

Now onto the spells themselves!

MAINLINE (primarily ATTACKING) SPELLS:

1 pip - Lyrebird - 90-130 damage. Based on the lyre instrument, and also a nod to Lyra, the fanon Music school tree in the Cleaved AU.

2 pip - Trombun - 220-260 damage. A pun on trombone and bunny.

3 pip - Earworm - 500 damage over 3 turns. Colloquially, earworms are catchy bits of song that just stay in your head and WON'T GET OUT, which is the inspiration for making this spell a pesky overtime. Also, taken from the Earworm/Brainworm mobs in Empyrea.

4 pip - Melodeer -  465-525, + 20% heal OR damage blade to self. Melody + deer. Here we begin to see some utility and niche poke its way into spells so that they're not plain and pure damage. Also, just to balance Music against the other 'hitter' schools a little bit more, it doesn't get a 4-pip AoE.

5 pip - Volta Bracken - 400 damage AND 400 health to self. A reference to volta brackets (an element in musical notation), with language nodding at Storm and Life magic (volt as in electricity, bracken as in a kind of plant). Yes this spell is an objectively better version of Beary Surprise. I hate Beary Surprise so much why is the bear both anthro and nude. why does he fucking smile like that. why can i see the whites of his eyes. WHY THE HUG?

6 pip - Resonance - 525-610 damage + remove all blades on 1 target. A single-target version of Myth's dreaded Earthquake.

7 pip - Horschestra - 700 damage to all enemies. Your classic 7-pip AOE. Horse + Orchestra, taken from a song in the Homestuck OST because it made me laugh tbh.

8 pip - Revivace - 1200 Heal to all allies. Name derived from Revive (synonym of Rebirth) and Vivace (musical mood). Meant to be a parallel to Life’s Rebirth spell, since Bartleby is the closest thing to a Music school tree in CS. However Rebirth gives an absorb-shield, which counts as temporary HP even if the spell heals someone to full, while Revivace has no extra defense.

9 pip - Crescendo! -  100 damage turn 1, then a DoT for 200, 300, then 400 damage, to all enemies. Crescendo is a musical term for "get gradually louder"

10 pip (Azteca) - Ceramic Drake - 1000 damage to 1 target, then 625 damage to all enemies over 3 rounds. The first of Music's spells that take on aesthetics derived from the world they're learned in. It takes inspiration from the tlapitzalli, an Aztec flute-like instrument made of ceramic.

5 pip + Shadow (Darkmoor) - Rehubution - 810 damage + 25% Music trap to all enemies. The spell's name comes from the word Retribution and the rehu, an instrument made by the Māori of Aotearoa. All of the canon Darkmoor spells are actually Khrysalis themed, and @chrono101 (now deactivated) made a really cool post about how the Hoppers had Aotearoan references that I remembered while coming up with this post. The effect in combat is derived from Fire from Above before it was nerfed and then slaughtered.

6 pip + Shadow (Polaris) - Luphilymn - 1260 damage, +1 turn to Damage over Times (DoTs) on enemy and +1 turn to Heal over Times (HoTs) on self. Luphilim + Hymn.

4 pip + Shadow (Mirage) - Spirit of the Groove - 900 damage, divided between targets (like all other Mirage spells). This spell is less a reference to something Miragian, and more a nod to a character who had a major impact on the Scion of Music's development. Ceramic Drake, Luphilhymn, and the upcoming spells of Ramalong and Jungle Drum Jam also are nods to characters that the Scion of Music was greatly supported by.

X-pip + Shadow (Karamelle) - Ramalong - 220 damage per pip. A blend of sing-along and the candy rams. This spell is an X-pip because there are a handful of songs/lullabies about counting sheep. Count your pips up!

6 pip + Shadow (Lemuria) - Jungle Drum Jam - 850 damage to all enemies, +40% Music blade AND +40% heal blade to self. Taken from this once-off moment in Lemuria where Bantam says that he and the Koolakamba just casually use advanced musicology for the sake of boogieing.

The effect is taken DIRECTLY from the far superior path of the Life Lemuria spell, Lord of the Jungle, before KI nerfed it to bits. I am so fucking mad about the nerf. I fucking liked having a decent shadow AoE on my Life and now it's useless again. <- had to get my gamer rage out sorry.

1 pip + Fire pip + Storm pip (Novus) - Tempo Inferno - 800 damage, gambit 1 blade into a DoT for 500 over 4 turns, gambit 1 trap into a HoT for 500 HP over 4 turns. Tempo refers to the speed of a musical piece, and both pieces of this spell's name are nods to Storm and Fire as well (Temp- for tempest, Storm's most iconic spell, Inferno for fire). This spell would also hold visual reference to that one sidequest about how clocks don't work on Novus.

1 pip + Death pip + Myth pip (Wallaru) - Crab Grave - 575 damage to all enemies. A reference to the extinct Juggernaut crabs of Wallaru, the still living Tasmanian giant crab, and the legendary Crab Rave meme. Given that all of the Wallaru spells' archmastery pips are the ones backwards from the Novus spells' pips, it made sense to make Crab Grave's pips the roshambo opposite to Tempo Inferno's. Myth is the roshambo opposite of Storm, and Death is the roshambo opposite of Fire. Don't believe me on Death and Fire? Look at how Balance's Novus gear has 3 variants that pair Ice-Life, Storm-Myth, and Fire-Death as its archschools. No I don't know why the Balance Wallaru spell is Death-Storm instead of Death-Fire I don't get it <- gamer raging again.

UTILITY SPELLS:

There are some utility spells that every school gets access to, simply changed per school: the basic Blade and Trap and Shield are simply named Music Blade, Music Trap, and Music Shield, because they're standardized for all the schools (Except Ice Shield, which is actually Snow Shield, for whatever reason?). Though, to put a wrinkle into things and keep with Music's theming as hyper-outgoing, Music Trap is the only ward spell (a spell that affects incoming damage rather than outgoing) that Music gets permanent access to. Music Shield would be TC only. Traps get special treatment because of Maulwurf von Trap existing. I like the guy don't @ me.

Then there's the utility spells that are just about the same for each school but with unique names. These include:

the 2 pip damage bubble - Circle of Fifths, after an important element in music theory. +25% damage to all outgoing Music spells AND +25% to all outgoing Music heals (the boost to healing alongside damage is unique to Music. Life gets Circle of Thorns (+25% damage) and Sanctuary (+60% healing) as two different bubbles.)

the 4-pip critical and pierce bubble - Acoustic Arena, +15% Music critical and +20% Music pierce.

the dispel - Mute

the Taunt/Pacify - Soloist, Taunts the enemy for 2 turns, making you the only target they can hit. Yes, having a glass cannon school gain taunt is a bit poor in game design, typically you want your glass cannons to have some form of Pacify so that they're not killed as quickly, but thematically Music becoming a loud center of attention makes more sense to me.

the complementary triad shield - Eclipse Shield, -70% incoming Light and Shadow damage. The parallel to Storm's Thermic Shield (-70% Fire and Ice) or Death's Dream Shield (-70% Life and Myth). Like Music Shield, because this spell is both a staple piece of utility that every school should have access to and a defensive ward that goes against Music's school identity, it would only exist as a treasure card.

The level 75 minion from The Professor - Baronness Webberfeld - 5 pips, summon a minion of Music. She is a reference to Baronness Elberfeld, a minor character from the Sound of Music. Because I had to get a reference to that in. Because I am normal about Maulwurf von Trap and his source media.

And then we get to the unique utility spells, the gimmicks that gives Music its identity in-game or give it thematic support.

Tune Up - 0 pips, +20% accuracy to the next outgoing Music spell. A parallel to Storm's Lightning Strike (which back in my day only gave +10% accuracy, not +25%). Music spells have a base accuracy of 70% like Storm, so the accuracy buff would be greatly needed at lower levels.

Bangsnap! - 2 pips, Confuse or stun each enemy for 1 turn.

Gurdy-hurdy - 3 pips, Confuse or stun each enemy for 2 turns.

Bangsnap and Gurdyhurdy go together, I'm thinking of them being from the Grizzleheim and Wintertusk spell quests at level 35 and 55. Bang snaps are small explosives that only release a loud sound but do no damage. Gurdy-hurdy is a reference to another in-game moment.

(The hurdy-gurdy, un-reversed, is a kind of musical instrument.)

And, yep! Myth is no longer the only school with the Confusion mechanic! Yippee! (I can hear the gamerbro players scream.) This is because before Music became a standalone school in CCSAU, Klara had the idea that, the way some Wizard101 spells are musicological despite not being in the school of Music, some Pirate101 abilities are inherently musicological as well, namely Blast of Discord.

And this is an ability that our Scion of Music was able to learn before Music became an independent school, so rather than take that ability away from him, we decided to incorporate it into Music's entire repertoire.

Leitmotif - 2 pips, 305 HP to 1 target, then 305 more HP 3 turns later. A leitmotif is a snippet of a musical melody that comes back later in a piece or in another piece (Toby Fox, one of my favorite composers, uses leitmotifs to the MAX.)

Sonatyr - 4 pip, 650 Health + 30% Healing Blade to all. Satyr + Sonata. Does less health than Life's Satyr because I don't want to completely upstage Life, but giving an extra blade to everyone is useful. It buffs every healer, and would count for any blade-based gambits/secondary effects.

Adagio - 1 pip, +1 turn to a HoT on an ally or to a DoT on an enemy. Adagio means for a piece of music to slow down.

Allegro - 1 pip, -1 turn to a HoT on an enemy or to a DoT on an ally. Allegro means for a piece of music to speed up.

Adagio and Allegro are spells that go together. If they were to be implemented in-game, I'd have them be learned at the same time. Having a spell that does different things depending on whether it's on an ally or enemy is really interesting to me, though it would be a pain in the ass to code.

Encore - 5 pips, force your target to cast the same spell for the next 2 turns. Encore, of course, means "to play again". Taken directly from Pokemon because why not?

Baton Pass - X pips, give your blades to an ally, universal and at half-value, (1 pip per blade). Also derived from Pokemon because why not? The half-value gimmick comes from Bantam's cheat of "I'll be taking that, thanks!" Where he replaces a blade you cast on someone else with a universal blade of half value. The devs intended that cheat to be annoying and discourage buffing one player to the max, but it's actually a REALLY HANDY mechanic when used correctly. The half-value blade would count as a unique blade that therefore stacks with whatever other blades your ally has.

Perfect Pitch - 1 pip, +20% accuracy to all allies. Perfect pitch is defined as the ability to tell exactly what note(s) a sound is without any reference. This spell would be copy-pasted over from Life, and also derived from the Pirate101 abilities Call to Arms and Esprit de Corps, which both boost your team's accuracy. (Esprit also gives dodge, a stat that I cannot find any way to translate into Wizard101 that wouldn't be a defensive ward, which Music does not do). The animations for those two powers feature musical instruments (a drum and a trumpet), which makes it feel very musicological to me and therefore fitting for Music itself.

Fortissimo! - 2 pips, +15% Critical chance to all allies. Fortissimo is music speak for "BE FUCKING LOUD!" This spell is derived from the Pirate101 abilities Discipline and Enduring Discipline, which (are supposed to) give +5% and +10% critical chance to all allies. (I have heard that the abilities that purely increase critical chance rather than another stat simply don't work because Pirate101's code is made out of silly string, but that's besides the point). There are very few spells that affect critical, so it's a niche that Music could fill in if it wanted to.

This probably isn't even enough utility, Wizard101 has a SURPRISING amount of spells it throws at you. It's such an in-depth game. I love it. I am normal about Wizard101.

Also, Klara was absolutely AMAZING and drew some of the spells!

[arvale-artist]

✨]|I{•⤜⟶ ⚔️ARVALE⚔️ ⟵⤛•}I|[✨

ARVALE is an old Game Series series with 5 games:

[🌿🗡️] Journey of Illusion (RPG - FREE - PC)

From gardener to guardian, JOI follows the story of Duncan Forsythe, who has been chosen by 'destiny' to be the new Brave Hero of Legend... It seems like a cliche fantasy story at first, but there's much more than meets the eye.

You can watch a Let's Play of the game here!

[🏹⏳] Ocean of Time (RPG - FREE - PC)

Torn through time, OOT follows the story of John DeMenchev, who has been blackmailed into finding artifacts that allow time travel... and subsequently ends up fighting false gods and saving the world. You get to explore Arvale once more, but this time through different periods of time!

[☀️🌙] Short Tales (RPG - No longer playable)

AST tells the tale of 5 different characters!

Varju the Druid, who seeks to regain his memory and save mother nature. Tabys the Assassin, who embarks on a journey of revenge and to find his long lost brother. Koden the Warrior, on a quest to save his wife and uncovers secrets about her true past. Lotus the Mage, persuing to become a magician against all odds with a powerful Fortune Teller as her mentor.

Beylord the Vampire, trying to regain his reign through violent vengence, but is halted by an old friend...

Abandonware, only playable on Pocket PC.

[🫂🔮] Treasure of Memories (RPG - Paid - Steam - PC)

A direct sequel to JOI! Here we are met with many familiar faces, this time assembling together as a group to embark on a new (and sadly final) adventure to uncover the secrets of a strange and corrupting material, as well as exploring many new places to learn and discover more of the world of Arvale!

Unlike the other games it uses art reminiscent of classic RPG maker graphics, but the writing and music was done by by the original legend, Jaybot7!

The game can have lag issues, but there’s a way to solve it: Open game properties → Select Compatibility Mode: Windows XP (Service Pack 3) → 16-bit colour mode → Run this program as administrator → Launch game from the program folder, play in windowed mode.

[⛏️💎] Melonchi Minecarts (Puzzle Game - No longer playable)

Taking place mostly in Melonchi, home of the dwarves and gems! Here we meet Duncan and DeMenchev again. Duncan, who experiences the consequences of his actions in Melonchi from JOI, and DeMenchev trying to test his theory about the origin of dwarves. It also introduces Grwyth, who has to brave every dwarve's worst nightmare and become the new jewel master.

Abandonware, only playable on Pocket PC.

Arvale is very dear to my heart. It inspired me as an artist and it saddens me to see this world be forgotten and succumb to internet decay. Thus I post and make art about it, to shed some attention and to show my appreciation. I also make videos about it.

[hummingbird-games]

DEV DIARIES

March 1, 2023

If I rewrite this devlog one more time, I’ll never post it (this is like 2+ weeks late 💩)

Crushed news, basically what y’all are skimming this update for: THE DEMO IS OUT! 

Thank you to everyone who’s already rated and reviewed or just shared! (And please make sure to check out the other entries from the jam!)

Funny story, the plan was to have the full game out for said jam but I am so glad I came to my senses. (The energy reserves have been...depleted.)

Sometime between this post and the last devlog, I lost a lot of steam, so to even have a completed demo is an accomplishment in and of itself. I hope you guys like it and I hope you’ll stick around for the full version in a few months.

I know lots of writers tuck pieces of themselves into whatever they make, and I’m not special. But I feel a stark difference between HSD and Crushed.  Crushed is personal, and as I refine the script and look over the endings, I again hope that my game finds its target audience. It’s even more niche than my first game (set male Black playable character, male Black Love interest, the intentional use of AAVE, set in high school and not for the “adult gaze or consumption”). I’m already terrible at self-marketing, but how does one even advertise this type of story??? I don’t know. FIngers crossed I’ll have a game plan when the game is complete.

Anyhoo, you’re getting the first 7k-ish words, a cameo, a taste of the soundtrack (bless Louie Zong and Astronaut Troy LOL 🙏🏽) and the solved mystery of what the heck I meant by partial voice acting in the demo, so enjoy! 😂

Revisiting the HBG’s 2023 Timeline

I really wanted to participate in another game jam, (OjiJam + Blossom VN jams and the Amare Game festival are all tempting options!!!!!) but I’m also having war flashbacks to last year. I’ve got to slow up. I also considered volunteering to work on a group’s entry, but I’ll be extremely harsh on myself if I have to pull out, and I foresee me having to do so if I don’t chill out now. 

I’ll continue outlining and writing fun things, but anything outside of that is on the backburner while I focus my energy on Crushed. 

Community Shoutouts

I want to get back to doing this in my devlogs, so here we go!

Wraith of Purple Herring Games has a Kickstarter!!! I gushed about the game My Alien Roommate on this blog, but I think it’s best if you download and play the demo and then go support!

.owl of Jellyfish Parade is counting down to the release of Belle Automata!

Core Reviews is building up her brand and becoming an awesome resource for manga, anime, and gaming news!

And for my IF (Interactive Fiction) crowd, A Tale of Crowns got a chapter update!! (I lost my save file around chapter 6 and haven’t gotten around to replaying BUT it’s an amazing game and y’all should give it a chance if you haven’t already)

- Gemini 😁

Next time on Hummingbird Games Updates…

…Speaking of Crushed, ever wonder what the specific inspirations were for the project? Well wonder no more! You’ll soon find out.

…A return of Gem’s Game Gems?? Because just because you didn’t ask for recommendations doesn’t mean you won’t be getting them! (Will that blasted sideblog FINALLY be public???)

[protect-namine]

omg the new scaramouche lore is so good. long post ahead, genshin leaks content incoming:

the way he's described as someone who was deemed to be too fragile as both human and tool; that he desires a heart to the point that even though attaining THE heart (not just A heart, but the one he was made for, aka the electro archon's gnosis) only got him disappointment, he still can't wrench it away from himself because then he wouldn't feel anything at all;

that he resented his situation, is capable of revenge, but time has dulled that for him too; that he wanders for the sake of wandering, curious about the human condition; that he has a will to power, he enjoys schadenfreude, but he was also someone who cried in dreams;

that the raiden shogun was the successful puppet because she carried out directives and nothing more, while scaramouche, the prototype, the one who had emotions and longed for them, was the "weak" puppet that couldn't be put to use.

he has so many layers!!

I love the part in the lore that said: "he observed many a heart. good ones, upright ones, strong, gentle ones. the puppet, too, desired a heart." because it implies, to me, (and this is just my own interpretation), that despite everything, it's the good hearts that inspire him and still make him want one. that what he really wants is to feel and be alive. regardless of how he acts, how much he aspires to have power, those things don't necessarily mean he doesn't want to be a good person too.

also can we talk about this part:

I'm so intrigued by his dream... also "young man in the distant past, akin to a blank sheet of paper" is albedo right? does this mean: 1) they both saw the same dream; 2) albedo is older than scaramouche?

was it a "him" from the past who said this? or "him" from the future? is really interesting!! the rest of the lore implies that him getting the heart was a reference to him getting the electro archon's gnosis (in cn, "heart of god"). but why question who said those words to him? why was he able to even hear a story from a past/future self? why was he able to dream? who was the phantom dancing under the moonlight? how was he even able to wake up from his forever slumber in the first place (what was the "error that cannot be known" from pale flame surpassing cup lore)?

(interestingly, in the sands of eon artifact description, it says that the caliber has been removed so the hands no longer move. meaning time no longer moves. or maybe there is no "time")

and what was the "small crystal sphere" signora give him when they met in inazuma before he took over the delusion factory? a delusion?

another thing I'm confused about is why is the artifact lore talking about present-day events? is that allowed? aren't artifacts supposed to describe histories from long ago? at first, I actually thought the lore described past events from long ago and that when he "lifted [the crystal] up to the dying, bloodied sun" it was setting the timeline of the lore to be during the cataclysm (where bloodied sun = a red eclipse). but the rest of the lore doesn't seem to match up since it talks about him taking the gnosis back as his heart.

finally!! IF scaramouche does posess the gnosis now, does that mean he's the acting electro archon? and do you think the reason ei doesn't have the "dei" constellation to her name is because the writers reserved that for scaramouche in the future?

his lore just brings up so many more new questions!! I think I can see now how he's going to be playable/become an ally to the traveler. and I really do hope that his will to power, his desire to have power over the world, actually does have some plot relevance (like albedo's story) and it amounts to something later on.

[terrific-togekiss]

What if there was a Walt Disney Fighting Game? [Video Game Concept]

Note: I am well aware, that Disney would probably never say yes in a million years to this idea. Taking their beloved, child friendly characters and having them fight?!

OH THE HORROR?!

I am also aware there have been concepts for this in the past.

Final Fantasy Dissidia was supposed to be a Kingdom Hearts fighting game, but Nomura felt uncomfortable portraying Disney characters in such a violent atmosphere.

And there are sketches of what a Walt Disney fighting game could've been, inspired by Super Smash Bros, before it was canceled. It would've focused on more violent characters such as Gaston, Beast, Ursula, Captain Hook, Captain Silver and the Horned King. But the idea was dropped.

Here's the link.

This entire post is just building and putting together what a Disney fighting game would look like to me, if one came out in today's world. It's all merely speculation and ideas that's been in the back of my head for awhile.

(Special thanks to @mayflower-gal for helping me set this up. 😁)

Anyways, let's get started!

Part 1: The Plot

For the plot, I believe it would have to be something simple, since this an idea for a first game. It's the start of a potentially huge franchise, so I wanna keep it not only simple, but an aspect that helps kick off the potential series. And pull in many fans, old and new of Disney.

Let's take into account one thing: what's a recurring theme across various Disney movies (and overall media)?

Is it the lovable, comic relief sidekick that makes audiences laugh? Is it the songs that kids find themselves singing, long after the tale is done and the curtain has closed? Is it perhaps, the clever celebrity choices for important side characters?

No, It's the one defining aspect that draws in audiences, both new and old, bringing you to fall in love with the characters as the story is told:

Wishes.

Pinocchio wishes to be a real boy. Beast and all his servants wish to be human again. Tiana wishes to have her own restaurant. Ariel wishes to see the world beyond the sea.

Everyone wishes for something more in their life and have dreams that they wish come true.

What if all those wishes were counted? Collected?

Watched over. Much like a parent to their children. Or a teacher to their students.

Found engaging. Found entertaining. Found comforting. Found peaceful. Found introspective.

Looked at with childlike wonder and glee when accomplished.

But frowned on when those wish for selfish desires. And an even deeper disappointment at those very same inhuman desires, coming true.

Good and bad exists inside every person, it's just a matter of what one chooses to act on and stand by at the end of the day.

What someone wishes for is reflective of that.

Now imagine that same being coming to life and wrecking havoc across the Disney universe. Judging for themself, if any of these colorful, imaginative characters, truly deserve their...

Happily,

Ever

After.

Yep, the main plot of the story mode is all the various Disney characters literally fighting for wishes and dreams to come true...

against the LITERAL embodiment of wishing upon a star.

Each playable character having their own unique ending.

Some endings being repeats of your favorite Disney movies, with some minor changes to acknowledge the game's plot. While others are original due to the wide cast of characters that are available, besides your favorite Disney Heroes.

For example, you beat the story mode as say, Pinocchio, he wishes to be a real boy.

I know it sounds very redundant since a majority of these things already happen in the Disney movies, but I feel as though relieving them would be fun. In addition to some original ones that didn't happen with either the villains or less major characters.

It's only the hypothetical first game and I wanted start with something simple, that fans could easily get into. More complex plots, with more character interactions should be saved for any possible sequels.

Part 2: The Gameplay

The game would be your typical 2D fighting game. You have,

Combos exclusive to every character that requires practice.

Playstyles that make each character feel unique.

Special moves for each character to get the upper hand and the main focus in besting your opponent in 1 VS 1 matches.

Of course, there's dialogue before fights in the character intros. With so many to pick from, it had to be put in somewhere.

It resembles 2D fighting games that you've all no doubt heard of, such as Marvel VS Capcom or Street Fighter.

But what would a Disney fighting game have to offer on the table, in order to survive the overall video game market?

It would have to be something unique and a feature that not only gives it originality, but a chance to stand out with so much creativity and innovation. Practically begging fans for more.

Which is why I present to you: Disney Songs.

Or as this game prompt will call them: Musical Finales.

The highlight of many Disney movies and overall media, the music is what leaves a lasting impression on many audiences. Which is not surprising, since Disney is mostly a musical. At least in terms of most of their films.

With so many iconic songs from throughout the company's history, of course I'll be squeezing them somehow!

Each character has a music meter, that can only be filled up with how the player times and follows the beat of the character they play as. Follow the rhythm and beat of a character, and it will fill up quicker. Get cut off by the opponent and it doesn't fill up.

That beat being the music of the stage each player fights on, by attacking to the music and the same time. Think of it like the Sound Battles mechanic in Mother 3.

Every character has four different kinds of attacks: Neutral, Musical, Wonderful and Special.

Neutral Attacks are normal attacks that are mostly used to set up combos.

Musical Attacks are attacks that deal more impact, when timed with the music of the stage.

Wonderful Attacks can be seen as character oriented attacks, that embody the personality and charm of the character you play as. And can be used to entertain the audience. We'll get into that later.

Special Attacks are unique finisher moves that require a separate meter to be filled up, as with most fighting games.

Now what happens when the music meter is full? A Disney Song starts playing of course!

Say you filled up Cinderella's music meter for example, then "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo" starts playing, granting some unique abilities for Cinderella.

Each song would grant different outcomes and bonuses for the various characters. They're not Special Attacks, as that's already a separate mechanic already.

For example, "Part of Your World" starts playing if you're playing as Ariel, filling up the stage with water and slowing down the opponent, giving Ariel a chance to either take advantage of that, bump items into them or create big waves of water.

But what happens if BOTH characters trigger the music meter at the same time?!

Well, that's where this gimmick becomes a fight for which song keeps on playing!

Both songs would start playing, both at the same time and volume. Except, both characters have to compete to see which is stronger.

This is done by the two characters fighting, before triggering a rhythm game between the two. Once one is the victor, the other song fades, while the other stays playing. Doubling the duration of that character's Musical Finale.

Another mechanic is the Entertainment Meter. Every level you fight on has one, that determines which fighter the audience likes more. Via Wonderful attacks, you can charm the audience into supporting you more. This activates things like getting healing items or stat boosts in power and speed. Some of your favorite Disney sidekicks even provide aid from the audience!

It's almost like watching a Disney movie live and being able to interact with the story!

Or the battle system in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door.

I feel as though this is the best way of keeping the game interesting, giving it an identity of its own and still embodying that magic people will grow to love. It can also lead to some entertaining interactions in the background or foreground of a stage, as the music meter also brings in characters that would not be playable, but support playable characters nonetheless. Like Flounder and Sebastian.

Of course, either feature could be turned off if you're not a fan of that sort of thing, but that's a given.

Part 3: The Stages

With many Disney movies pick from, it's no wonder there's plenty of choices to pick from. Since this is the first game, I chose to focus more on the movies. Here's my take.

Steamboat (Mickey Mouse cartoons)

Duckberg (Ducktales)

Spoonerville (A Goofy Movie)

Dwarven Forest (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves)

Wonderland (Alice in Wonderland)

Monstro (Pinocchio)

The Prince's Ball (Cinderella)

Neverland (Peter Pan)

Forbidden Mountains (Sleeping Beauty)

The Coliseum (Hercules)

Andy's Room (Toy Story)

Elsa's Ice Castle (Frozen)

San Fransokyo Institute of Technology (Big Hero 6)

Atlantica (The Little Mermaid)

House of Mouse (House of Mouse)

The West Wing (Beauty and the Beast)

Cave of Wonders (Aladdin)

Pride Rock (The Lion King)

Ant Island (A Bug's Life)

Tamatoa's Trove (Moana)

Hawaii (Lilo and Stitch)

Headquarters (Inside Out)

Mor'du's Ruins (Brave)

Big Ben (The Great Mouse Detective)

Notre Dame (The Hunchback of Notre Dame)

Merlin's Cottage (Sword in the Stone)

Emperor's Palace (Mulan)

The Great Before (Soul)

Todayland (Meet The Robinsons)

Paradise Falls (Up)

Zootopia (Zootopia)

Monsters Inc (Monsters Inc)

Nomanisan Island (The Incredibles)

The Bayou (The Princess and the Frog)

Atlantis (Atlantis: The Lost Empire)

Halloweentown (The Nightmare Before Christmas)

Oakey Oaks (Chicken Little)

Spirit Mountain (Brother Bear)

Sherwood Forest (Robin Hood)

Treasure Planet (Treasure Planet)

Horned King's Castle (The Black Cauldron)

The Secret Lab (The Emperor's New Groove)

Bald Mountain (Fantasia)

The Grid (Tron)

World's End (Pirates of the Caribbean)

Radiator Springs (Cars)

Grandmother Willow's Forest (Pocahontas)

East High School (High School Musical)

The Axiom (WALL-E)

Regent's Park (101 Dalmatians)

New Mushroom Town High School (Onward)

Happily Ever After Castle (Walt Disney Opening)

Part 4: The Roster

The bread and butter of many fighting games, the roster is no doubt one I had a bit of trouble putting together. With so many characters from over the years, it's no surprise. But since this is the outline of a possible first game, here's my interpretation.

Also, the cast is big to avoid being too barren or dull.

And because I had a lot of fun putting it all together.

Mickey Mouse (Mickey Mouse): The all around character of the game, he mostly fights by a series of cartoonish tricks, magic tricks and his paintbrush from Epic Mickey. His Special Attack would have him break the fourth wall like and rewind the fight like an old film projector in reverse. Except he heals, while the opponent receives twice the damage. His Musical Finale "Sorcerer's Apprentice" has him use Yensid's Sorcerer hat to its fullest and give his overall moveset more flashes to distract the opponent and slow them down.

Donald Duck (Donald Duck): Everyone's favorite, greedy mallard and the world's angriest duck. Donald would fight mainly with toon force, his fists, his bad luck and his anger. The more damage he takes, the angrier he gets. His Special Attack would have him don the Duck Avenger persona from his PK days and use a series of superhero gadgets to finish the opponent. His Musical Finale "The Three Caballeros" trades his anger for Jose Carioca and Panchito Pistoles showing up, making him happy. As they hurt the opponent, each time they hit Donald, to keep him happy.

Goofy (Goofy): Everyone's favorite Disney dad, Goofy joins the fight as not the brightest but with the biggest heart. He has toon force to aid him in some unconventional ways. His Special Attack would have him become Super Goof from his older days. His Musical Finale "Eye To Eye" would restore health everytime he dodges an attack, with a dancing flair to it.

Snow White (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves): The first Disney Princess, Snow White makes her debut and she's not alone. The Seven Dwarves direct most of her attacks, such as tossing rocks, mining tools as weapons and even just grabbing the opponent and tossing them. Snow White herself can sing and command woodland animals to tie up opponents or just fight to defend her. Her Special Attack would have the Dwarves try to roll a boulder, only for lightning to strike on the opponent and the boulder as extra damage. Her Musical Finale "Whistle While You Work" will call on a huge number of forest animals, as they tidy up the stage and Snow White, slowly replenishing her health and slowing down the opponent.

Pinocchio (Pinocchio): Don't lie in his presence, as that nose is not only for show. Pinocchio fights mostly by using his nose as a staff, the Blue Fairy bringing other toys to life to aid him and Jiminy Cricket distracting the opponent with music. Pinocchio's Special Attack would have him wish upon a star and turn himself into a real boy, as the opponent is turned into a puppet and loses damage as a result. Pinocchio's Musical Finale "I've Got No Strings" would cover the stage in thin lines used for puppets: if the opponent touches one, their frozen briefly. If a projectile attack hits, the same happens.

Cinderella (Cinderella): The bell of the ball and someone whom never gives up on kindness, Cinderella will use the dance moves she showed off at the ball for her moveset, having a dancing and musical feel to how she plays and flashy dances to win against the the opponent. With her Fairy Godmother using her magic to help her, such as flashes of light. Her Special Attack would have the clock strike midnight and she leaves behind her glass slipper: once the opponent touches it they get weighed down by a giant magic dress. Cinderella's Musical Finale "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo" would have the Fairy Godmother cast a series of spells over the stage, as a new carriage pops up every time Cinderella pulls off a combo. The carriages run over the opponent and can even carry Cinderella to safety.

Peter Pan (Peter Pan): Leader of the Lost Boys and Captain Hook's second biggest pain in the butt, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell are here. Peter Pan has a pocket knife with him and Tinker Bell's pixie dust for aerial attacks. His Special Attack would have him toss a bunch of gold on the opponent, as the rest of the Lost Boys tackles them and beats them up for the treasures. His Musical Finale "You Can Fly" would create a trail of pixie dust behind him, that randomly causes the opponent to either jump too high or too low.

Captain Hook (Peter Pan): Keep all 'ticks' and 'tocks' away from this pirate! Captain Hook has a wide array of hooks to switch between, a flintlock pistol and his sword to win the battle. His Special Attack would have him run away from the Tick-Tock the Crocodile, as said crocodile attacks the opponent instead of Hook. His Musical Finale "A Pirate's Life/Elegant Captain Hook" would call his ship the Jolly Rodger onto the stage, as the pirates on the ship occasionally throw knives at the opponent and shoot at them, everytime Hook is caught in a combo and can't escape.

Aurora (Sleeping Beauty): Aurora, sleeping beauty herself, is doing anything but sleep and her guardians are making sure of that! Her attacks has the Good Fairies use their magic in numerous ways, such as moving objects, animating objects and even petrification. Her Special Attack has Prince Philip show up with the Sword of Truth and the Shield of Virtue, to deal heavy damage on the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Once Upon A Dream" boosts her stats everytime she's hit.

Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty): The Mistress of all Evil, Maleficent uses a wide array of magic powers from cursed, throny vines, to her iconic green fires, she's one tough fighter from a distance. Her Special Attack would have her turn into a dragon and breath fire down on the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Once Upon A Dream" would have her make the opponent more drowsy, each time they hit her, until falling asleep, unless they keep moving.

Robin Hood (Robin Hood): The sly fox of England and one talented theif, this fox focuses on disguises, archery, swordsmanship and woodsmanship to make his way. His Special Attack would have authorities show up to arrest him, as they rain down arrows on the opponent in the process. His Musical Finale "Running Through The Forest" would allow him to dodge all attacks, without needing to hit the controls or input buttons.

Basil of Baker Street (The Great Mouse Detective): World's greatest detective! At least in the mouse world that is. Basil would investigate the stage of the fight, much like a crime scene and even pick up clues that double as weapons, such as a propeller or a mouse trap. His Special Attack would have him investigate a crime scene that hurt the opponent, before pushing them aside as 'worthless' evidence. His Musical Finale "Let Me Be Good To You" would have him require no further evidence and counter each hit with a deduction on his opponent's crime and even stop them from performing combos. Doing damage in the process.

Professor Ratigan (The Great Mouse Detective): Never call him a rat. Ever. This crime boss of the miniature crime world be no stranger to fist fights and gleefully take a swing at your demise, whether it's his fists, cane or traps. If not him, then his minions are more than happy to drown some orphans! His Special Attack would have him call his pet cat, Felicia to devour the opponent. His Musical Finale "The World's Greatest Criminal Mind" would give him more durability to hits, more destruction to the stage and traps cover more range on the stage.

Ariel (The Little Mermaid): Princess of the Sea, everyone's favorite mermaid is ready to explore beyond the sea. Armed with her father's trident, some amazing swimming skills and various sea animals at her command, she's more than ready. Her Special Attack would have her conjure a giant wave, that also covers the opponent in sea creatures. Her Musical Finale "Part Of Your World" fills the stage with water and can have Ariel bump floating objects into the opponent.

Ursula (The Little Mermaid): The last sea witch you would want to cross paths with, Ursula has eels to do her biding, poisonous ink clouds and even thunderclouds. Her Special Attack would have her turn giant via King Triton's trident and use the added power to attack the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Poor Unfortunate Souls" has her disguise herself as the opponent and slowly regain health from all souls being eaten by her. As a bonus, if she's infront of a mirror that's on the stage, her reflection will be her true form.

Belle (Beauty and the Beast): My, quite an odd girl, reading books and getting on the field of battle?! Belle's entire moveset would revolve around books; not magic books, just books on the rest of the cast and fairytales overall. She would be able to switch between each of these books and use what she's learned from them. For Example, 'Romeo and Juliet' gives Belle immunity to stat changes and rose themed weapons that hurt the opponent, like throwing weapons. 'Aladdin' gives her a magic ring that can conjure up magic smoke, furniture on the foe and teleport her. 'Jack and the Beanstalk' plants vines that can raise her up or entangle the foe. There's more books at her disposal, but that's just the general idea. Her Special Attack has her father ride in on his invention, chopping up an entire forest until the opponent is covered and crushed by chopped up logs. Her Musical Finale "Tale As Old As Time" gives her the power to 'skip' a fairytale, turning each of her attacks into the endings from the books. For example, 'Aladdin' would trap the opponent in an oil lamp, leaving room for her to attack.

Beast (Beauty and the Beast): The poor and cruel prince, turned into a monster as evil as the one in his heart. Beast has his boost in strength from his beastly form and claws to defeat the opponent. The curse not only affected him: his servants are by his side. Lumiere can incinerate the opponent or plant fires on the ground, Cogsworth can distract them with timed clock sounds, Mrs. Potts can spill tea to slip up the opponent, Chip will knock over bookshelves and Wardrobe can block attacks. His Special Attack would turn the opponent into a piece of furniture, leaving them open for attacks: each opponent having a different transformation. His Musical Finale "Be Our Guest" would have every attack with one of his servants, also heal Beast in addition to hurting the opponent.

Gaston (Beauty and the Beast): Nooo oooone's slick as Gaston! Quick as Gaston! No one's neck is as incredibly thick as Gaston! He's especially good at combo breaking! Boy what a guy that Gaston! Gaston has his inconic blunderbass and his fists, along with a bow and quiver and a hunting knife to deal with an opponent, almost as if they were an animal he's hunting. His Special Attack would have an angry mob charge at the opponent and beat them up. His Musical Finale "Gaston" gives him a strength boost, everytime he pulls off a combo successfully.

Aladdin (Aladdin): Everyone's favorite street rat and theif, he's not alone on the field of battle as Abu and Genie are here to help him. Abu can cling to the opponent and hit them repeatedly, Magic Carpet can be used for aerial attacks, Aladdin has a sword that he 'borrowed' from a guard and Genie can shape-shift in a variety of ways to best the opponent. Aladdin's Special Attack would have Genie distract the opponent, as Aladdin steals something off them and uses it to beat them. Aladdin's Music Finale "Friend Like Me" would have Genie grant a wish, each time Aladdin gets a combo, such as a stat boosts and healing.

Jasmine (Aladdin): The sultan's own daughter that would rather be anything than a prize to be given away. She has learned self defense skills, her father's guards and her pet tiger Rajah in her moveset. Her Special Attack would have the guards arrest the opponent and toss them into prison, as they struggle to escape and take damage. Her Musical Finale "A Whole New World" has one the Seven Wonders of the world occasionally pop up in the background to hurt the opponent, as the fight goes on.

Jafar (Aladdin): The Sultan's Royal vizer of Agrabah and one whom believes he should rule Agrabah. Jafar has his magic staff to hypnotize and cast spells onto his foe. Occasionally tapping into the phenenomal, Cosmic power of his Genie form to do some real damage. And Iago is here as well... mostly to complain. His Special Attack would have him become an all powerful Genie and Iago wishing for ways to 'hurt' (not kill) the opponent. His Musical Finale "You're Only Second Rate" would boost all of his stats and attacks, except he can't KO the opponent until the Musical Finale is done.

Simba (The Lion King): King of the Pride Rock and son of Mufasa, the Lion King himself is more than prepared with his claws and iconic roar. His roar can even control the weather to strike lightning and cause windstorms. His Special Attack would have him call on the spirit of his father, Mufasa, as the two of them roar at the opponent. His Musical Finale "Circle Of Life" will have him remember, how we are all connected and draw on the life-force of nature, slowly healing him and giving his roars more range.

Scar (The Lion King): Mufasa's little brother and King after his timely demise, Scar has his claws and his hyenas to make short work of his foe as if their nothing more than a light snack. His Special Attack would toss the opponent of a cliff, into a Wildebeest stampede just like in the movie. As a bonus, he would say 'long live the king's son' if Simba is the opponent. His Musical Finale "Be Prepared" has him do damage without needing to attack the opponent and just walking into the opponent.

Pocahontas (Pocahontas): Daughter of Chief Powhatan, this Disney Princess has the skills necessary in order to survive and win. Her Special Attack would have her people come in to fight alongside her and best the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Colors Of The Wind" gives her attacks more launching power and each dodge she does generates winds that hurt the foe.

Governor John Ratcliffe (Pocahontas): The main villain of Pocahontas, this greedy scoundrel will do anything to claim what he believes is rightfully his. He has a sword and uses his position of power to call his men into the fray. His Special Attack would have his men charge like in the movie at the opponent. His Musical Finale "Mine, Mine, Mine" prevents the opponent from interrupting his attacks and tripping over any gold sticking out of the ground.

Quasimodo (The Hunchback Of Notre Dame): The hunchback of notre Dame himself and quite the sweetheart, he just wishes to see the outside world. His job as the ringer of the bells comes in handy to stun them, swing bells at them, his talented acrobatic skills and surprising strength. His Special Attack would have him reenact the Festival of Fools and have the opponent be caught up in all the chaos. His Musical Finale "Out There" turns all of his bell attacks, into soothing sounds, that heals him.

Esmeralda (The Hunchback Of Notre Dame): An outcasts, like many other outcasts of Notre Dame, she's picked up on a multitude of tricks to evade capture. Such as illusionary tricks to trick opponents and various circus acts from the Festival of Fools. Her Special Attack has Phoebus teleport out of a field of smoke and beat the opponent. Her Musical Finale "God Help The Outcasts" plants multiple pillars of light over the stage, that burn the opponent and heal Esmeralda.

Judge Claude Frollo (The Hunchback Of Notre Dame): Someone whom believes only he can purge the world of evil and that all he does is for the greater good. Frollo, due to his old age mostly uses his sword, his horse and his 'fears' to end the opponent. Those 'fears' being cloaked figures that defend Frollo and burn the sins of his opponent. His Special Attack burns the stage, with the opponent caught up in the flames being tied to a stake. His Musical Finale "Hellfire" burns the opponent every time they hit and touch Frollo.

Arthur (Sword in the Stone): The rightful king of England, proven by pulling the sword in the stone, Arthur is ready to be king. Merlin's apprentice is armed with the sword of legend: Excalibur and his mentor Merlin is there to provide some magic aid by turning Arthur into various animals and predict the opponents attacks with foresight. Arthur's Special Attack has Merlin turn into a germ to infect the opponent. Arthur's Musical Finale "Higitus Figitus" grants Arthur increased weight, almost as if he's the sword in the stone and making him harder to launch and knock away.

Hercules (Hercules): The son of the Greek God Zeus, Hercules goes to prove himself as a true hero and this brawl may be his greatest trial yet. With his power as a Greek God, granting him immeasurable strength, agility and endurance. And his pet Pegasus shows up for aerial attacks. His Special Attack has his father Zeus come in and hurl his thunderbolt at the opponent. His Musical Finale "Zero To Hero" increases his durability each time he pulls off a combo, making him immune to attacks at times.

Hades (Hercules): Greek God of the underworld and lord of the dead, Hades will claim victory. In addition to mastery of fire and smoke, Hades can shift between generally calm and collected, to angered and enraged, which affects the range and power of his attacks. Pain and Panic also shapeshift to provide some help. His Special Attack has the Titans show up and attack the opponent. His Musical Finale "My Town" floods the stage withdead souls that slowly deplete the health of the opponent.

Mr. Incredible (The Incredibles): One of the greatest superheroes whom ever lived, in spite of an unneeded early retirement from the government. Robert "Bob" Parr, known to the public as Mr. Incredible, has his moveset revolve around his superstrength and invulnerability, also being able to use the environment to his advantage like uprooting trees. His Special Attack calls in the rest of The Incredibles; Dash, Violet, Elastigirl and Jack-Jack to help take down the opponent as a family. His Musical Finale "The Incredibles" has his attacks all release shock waves that occasionally make debris hit the opponent, like it's the intensity of a comic book.

Syndrome (The Incredibles): You better catch him while be monologues as he does not play around! The wannabe superhero uses zero point energy to toss the opponent and send objects flying their way. His Special Attack calls in the Omnidroid to make short work of the opponent. His Musical Finale "Kronos Unveiled" forces the opponent to not stand still for too long or repeat the same attacks, or else the Omnidroid will fire lasers at them almost as if their being analyzed.

Mulan (Mulan): From lying to save her father's life, to saving all of China to joining other famous Disney heroes on the field of battle, Mulan has been through a lot. She has a sword, fireworks, a staff and a fan to best her foes. Mushu tags along, spitting fireballs at the opponent and tricking them into attacking smoke illusions that resemble Mulan. Her Special Attack has fireworks hit a snowy mountain, crushing the opponent under an avalanche. Her Musical Finale "Reflections" has Mulan disguise herself and blend in a crowd that slowly came onto the battlefield. The opponent attacking a random person will have them retaliate and hurt them.

Jack Skellington (The Nightmare Before Christmas): The pumpkin king and the patron of Halloween, his title comes with a wide array of pumpkin bombs, a flexible and detachable skeleton body. His Special Attack would have him trap the opponent in a series of giant pumpkin bombs, before his pet dog Zero lights them up. His Musical Finale "This Is Halloween" plants a series of tricks and treats all over the stage: treats for Jack that heals him and tricks that leave the opponent in a scared state. They take more damage while scared.

Oogie Boogie (The Nightmare Before Christmas): A literal burlap sack of nothing but bugs, Oogie Boogie has those very same bugs come out and harm the opponent. From spiders that tangle them up, to tarantulas that poison them to flies that hoist them up, he's as gross as sounds. His Special Attack would have him inhale the opponent and let his bugs do the work. His Musical Finale "Oogie Boogie's Song" increases his luck of landing higher damage, by also hitting a dice on the stage.

Tarzan (Tarzan): A man raised by apes, Tarzan has the strength to even keep up with apes and survive in the forest. In addition to his amazing strength, Tarzan can also swing from vines, use his impressive smell and hearing to counter attacks and a spear. His Special Attack has him command an army of apes to beat up the opponent. His Musical Finale "Son Of Man" puts fruits on the trees he swings from that he can heal himself with: since the opponent is not Tarzan the same fruits either poison them or make them dizzy.

Yzma and Kronk (The Emperor's New Groove): The former advisor of Emperor Kuzco and her most loyal henchman. Kronk does the fighting with his astounding strength and Yzma will be in the background, occasionally throwing potions on the opponent. Kronk will pull the lever, that will do a variety of things such as drop a bust of Yzma, a giant rock, a vase, etc. Their Special Attack has Yzma yell 'PULL THE LEVER KRONK!' sending the opponent and Yzma down a trap door to below the stage. Leaving it up to interpretation what happens, as Yzma casually walks back to the stage with a crocodile biting her leg. Their Musical Finale "Snuff Out The Light" replaces Yzma's potions with singing that prevents the health bar from going any lower.

Milo J. Thatch (Atlantis: The Lost Empire): An orphan that grew up to be quite the cartographer to even finding the lost city of Atlantis. Since he's not much of a fighter, the friends he made on the trip will do the fighting for him. Vinny plants explosions, Mole digs holes and attacks from the ground, Sweet heals Milo and boosts his durability, Audrey sends vehicles at the opponent and Cookie leaves food for people to trip over. He's even picked up on some Atlantean magic from Kida. His Special Attack has him pilot an Atlantean cruiser, shooting lasers at the opponent. His Musical Finale "Where The Dream Takes You" reverse the opponents controls, every time Milo lands a hit, almost as if their lost without a map.

Kida Nedakh (Atlantis: The Lost Empire): Princess of Atlantis and the current Queen, Kids is armed with a spear and a connection to the Heart of Atlantis, granting her forcefields and runes that dish out the ancient city's might. Her Special Attack summons a giant tsunami with the opponent being hit as Atlantis sinks. Her Musical Finale "Kida Returns" has the stage covered in runes, as the guardians of Atlantis will hit the opponent if they step on a rune.

Stitch (Lilo and Stitch): Experiment 626, also known as Stitch is an alien that befriended the kind-hearted Lilo Pelaki. Stitch is indestructible, has four plasma blasters, can roll up into a ball and lift up to 3000 times his own weight. His Special Attack calls in his cousins to each hit the opponent once, before Stitch himself smacks them with a car. His Musical Finale "Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride" doubles the strength of any attacks timed with the music.

Captain Jack Sparrow (Pirates of the Caribbean): Captain Jack Sparrow comes to the battle with his signature sword, musket and flintlock pistol. His Special Attack has the Black Pearl ram the opponent and shoot cannonballs at the opponent. His Musical Finale "He's A Pirate" makes him impossible to KO, he can still take damage though.

Sulley and Mike Wazowski (Monsters Inc): The dynamic duo and best friends, Sully and Mike fight with the former scaring the opponent and the latter being pulled from the background, used as a ball to hit opponents. The more combos they land, the more scare is generated as energy: this energy being used to power machines to attack the opponent. Their Special Attack has the stage be overloaded with scare energy, to the point of canisters bouncing all over the stage and hitting the opponent, much like in Monsters University. Their Musical Finale "If I Didn't Have You" makes the opponent laugh each time they hit Sulley, generating energy and leaving them open to attack.

Jim Hawkins (Treasure Planet): Jim Hawkins, someone with the 'makings of greatness' according to Captain Silver has a chance to prove that here. With his solar surfer to pull off some amazing tricks, a knife and a blaster, he can hold his own just fine. His Special Attack would simply be Treasure Planet blowing up, with the opponent caught in the explosion, as he flies away on a ship. His Musical Finale "I'm Still Here" gives him the markings of greatness, in the form of stat boosts everytime he pulls off a trick on his solar surfer.

Captain John Silver (Treasure Planet): The fearsome pirate cyborg and only real father figure to Jim Hawkins, Captain Silver is ready to use those pirate skills from over the years to claim his treasure. As a cyborg, he has a wide selection of tools and weapons, such as lasers, a cybernetic eye, guns, a sword, a cleaver, a battering ram, the list goes on. His Special Attack has the opponent fly into space, while he leaves on a pirate ship. His Musical Finale "I'm Still Here" fills the stage with comets that can freeze the opponent if they come into contact with them and increases the strength of Silver's lasers if they pass through.

Merida (Brave): The Scottish princess and daughter of Queen Elinor and King Fergus, enters the battle with her archery skills and swordsmanship to win the fight. Her Special Attack has her ride in on her horse Angus, delivering a series of arrows to finish off the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Touch The Sky" makes all her arrows hit the opponent, without fail.

Kenai and Koda (Brother Bear): The bear brothers, one born a bear and the other cursed to turn into a bear. Kenai and Koda fight as a team of bears from claws to wilderness skills they picked up. Even the Great Spirits watch over and protect them, by influencing nature to protect the brothers. Their Special Attack has the spirits of Sitka and Koda's mother come in to protect them and deal with the enemy. Their Musical Finale "On My Way" increases the range of their block, with the Great Spirits protecting them.

Tiana and Naveen (The Princess and the Frog): A hardworker that believes the only way you can make it in the world, is through hardwork. Even if that meant kissing a frog. Tiana has a wide assortment of cooking utensils to win. With Naveen distracting them with singing and dancing. They can switch to being frogs, where they use their tongues to tangle up the opponent and hop off lily pads. Their Special Attack has Mama Odie turn the opponent into a series of animals, before sending them away with her Voodoo magic. Their Musical Finale "Almost There" gives Tiana a golden glow that greatly increases the range of their attacks and distracts the opponent with golden glows.

Dr. Facilier (The Princess and the Frog): The Shadow Man himself and one whom turned Naveen into a frog, Dr. Facilier fights with his cane, Voodoo magic, shadows and spell casting. His Special Attack has him pull the opponent into a deal, as their dragged down by the Voodoo Spirits. His Musical Finale "Friends On The Other Side" let's him take a gaze into the opponent's future, turning all of his attacks into counters, if they hit the same time as the opponent's attacks.

Rapunzel (Tangled): The lost princess of the Kingdom of Corona, blessed with magic hair and has quite the efficient frying pan. Her hair can not only heal herself a bit, but can be swung from, tie up the opponent and makes for a surprising whip. Her Special Attack has Flynn and Maximus ride in, with Rapunzel hitching a ride, as the three take down the opponent. Her Musical Finale "I See The Light" fills up the stage with lanterns, that can blind the opponent if they touch any.

Hiro and Baymax (Big Hero 6): The child genius and the helper robot turned fighter have become quite the crime fighting duo, that honor Tadashi's wish of wanting to help people. Baymax does the fighting, with Hiro on his back, such as martial arts, rocket fist, an energy blade and sonic blaster. Their Special Attack calls in the rest of the Big Hero 6, as they teamup and take down the opponent. Their Musical Finale "Immortals" assuming they get the rights to the song has Baymax dodge every attack that comes, without needing to move the controller and slowly heal up.

Judy Hopps (Zootopia): A young bunny from Bunnyburrow that came to Zootopia to pursue her dreams of being cop and help people. Her bunny physiology grants her enhanced hearing, quick agility, high jumping and she has trained herself to take down foes much bigger than her. Her Special Attack has her do her job as a cop and arrest the opponent, with the entire police force joining in to help. Her Musical Finale "Try Everything" plants tourist attractions all over the stage, that can hurt the opponent and heal Judy.

Elsa (Frozen): The Queen of Arendelle and the Ice Queen herself, forced to conceal don't feel, don't let them know. But she'll be doing anything but that here! Elsa has ice powers to freeze the opponent, create pillars of ice, ice slides, ice skates etc. Her Special Attack calls in Marshmallow to deal with the opponent. Her Musical Finale "Let It Go" allows her ice powers to come to life and aid her in battle.

Moana (Moana): Moana of Motuni, whom has sailed the sea to return the Heart of Te Fiti with Maui. She has a harpoon and an oar, along with the ocean helping her and watching over her. Her Special Attack returns the Heart of Te Fiti to Te Fiti, whom fully heals Moana, temporarily boosting her attack. Moana's Musical Finale "How Far I'll Go" covers the stage in water that has boats to hit the opponent and granting Moana faster speed.

Maui (Moana): The Maori Demigod of the wind and sea, with quite the number of feats from over the years. With his magic fish hook, he can shapeshift into a number of animals, his most common being a hawk. His Special Attack being lassoing the sun into the opponent. His Musical Finale "You're Welcome" makes all damage to Maui, take longer to leave an impact.

And that's that. A LOT longer than I thought it would be. Now your probably thinking, what about all the other Disney media? It's an idea for the first game, so other characters (Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Scrooge McDuck, Goliath, Kim Possible, etc.) would appear in a potential sequel.

Or DLC, since every game these days has it.

Thanks so much for reading all this and taking the time to do! I would love to hear some thoughts and feedback! I had a blast making all this and would like to see if you're interested in hearing more video game ideas.

[fe-sekai]

Fire Emblem: Sekai - what ive got so far

this is in regards to my fire emblem/project sekai au that as of right now is some drawings and 1 chapter of a badly written fic, however that may change in time so i'll keep this specific post updated as i come up with stuff

i was inspired by this fic which im unsure if the author is on tumblr at all, but if i find their username i'll link it too

the basic premise is that Ichika is a lord, and Mafuyu is the antagonist you would see most often, and the rest of the groups are all playable units with different classes and roles in the story. From thar reference point i kept going. Im approaching this as if it were an actual fire emblem game, but not like a New Entry or anything, maybe like a hand-held inbetween the gba games and awakening. I'm mostly borrowing from sacred stones, awakening and fates, maybe with a little shadows of valentia sprinkled in, but i think you'll see a lot more of awakening in this whole thing bc its the one i played the most. Im not really familiar with 3 houses so i wont try to incorporate things from it unless its like a staple of the fe franchise

of course anyone is free to send me asks of things they feel might fit with what ive got going on, so the askbox is open¡¡

to give you an overview of what this is looking like, im gonna go character by character, starting with the bands, then secondary characters, and finally original characters, with a quick description of what i think their role is and their class. I'm skipping the virtual singers right now because its the group im the least sure about their role in the story, and i think they're a bit scattered, so im gonna try and make a follow-up later.

LEO/NEED

Ichika: The heir of her kingdom, the lord whose story you follow. The future of the land rests on her shoulders. She has a peculiar fighting style in which her evasiveness is pretty flawless, and she has a lot of stamina, but she overthinks the retaliation, and that gets her into trouble. She is orphaned in like the middle of the story when it all breaks down, and i think that'd be the catalyst for her to take a less defensive approach so you would see more of the continent after that. She tries her best to be very serious but still has a child-like side to her that comes out mostly with her childhood friends (saki, honami and shiho, ofc). Her stats would be quite balanced for the most part, but her speed and skill are pretty high.

Saki: the daughter of one of ichika's tutors, she lives in the castle with her family because of an arrangement her mother had with the king and queen, so Saki could be treated by the best healers of the land. At the time of the story, she just got healthy enough to be out on missions and such. She is training to be a mage, and has a lot of magic potential, but has very little hp and defense, but her resistance is a lot better

Honami: daughter of a noble, also frequents the castle, for education in her case. Ichika has more lessons than her, but they share most of them. She is a healer who has decent hp, and a very high skill so she is very accurate once she promotes to a more offensive class.

Shiho: daughter of an important general, trains with Ichika everyday and is her rival. She has never been able to beat Ichika when they train, and gets really frustrated with her when she is in full dodge mode. She is a fighter, and has a lot of strength and would be very good at hittting crits, but her defense is lacking.

MORE MORE JUMP!

Minori: a girl living in a small village in Ichika's country, with dreams of becoming a sword fighter and defending the weak, bringing smiles to everyone. She has a history of actually trying to defend her village but more often than not someone has to go rescue her. She's the Kliff archetype (like donnel from fe13 or mozu from fe14), so she would start with low stats but eventually would be a pretty powerful unit. For her promotion, i'm thinking swordsman and pegasus knight to be her possible branches, maybe even fighter or armor knight, but i think she would have low magic so i dont think she would have any magical branches.

Haruka: she is a former pegasus knight, that after an accident which led to her pegasus to be flightless, decided to quit the order. She then takes up mercenary work, being a sword fighter. She meets Minori while at work and Haruka kind of takes her under her wing after rescuing her. She's very balanced, and has a lot of hp so she would be a bit of a wall, one of those units that weakens the enemy for someone else to take the exp.

Airi: wyvern rider, was good friends with Haruka before she quit. Originally she wanted to be a pegasus knight, but it turns out wyverns are the only animals she isn't terribly allergic to. Her wyvern's name is Cherche. Her defense would be very high, but she would have bad luck.

Shizuku: the model pegasus knight. She's the best of the knights in training, and everyone there admires her. She is good friends with Airi, but has to be careful not to bring with her any stray feathers with her by accident, but sometimes she keeps them on purpose as a joke. Her speed would be pretty high up, and she would have a lot of magic potential.

VIVID BAD SQUAD

Kohane: her parents are usually very supportive, but she was only allowed to learn how to fight if she had the most protection available, so she is an armor knight! her head doesn't quite reach the helmet in the armor suit, so its very easy to knock it off, wich would turn into a rumour that Ichika's army has a headless knight, a creature that defies death. As a typical armor knight she has super high defense, and is very slow, but has an outstanding luck.

An: the daughter of a very famous mercenary, Ken, that finds herself living in the castle after her father suddenly retired to work in training new recruits for Ichika's army. She meets Kohane on a random spar they did, and instantly decided they had to train together from then on. An is a cavalier and wields a lance, and has pretty bad magic resistance. She is one half of the cain/able archetype.

Akito: a cavalier who is very excited to train under Ken. His origins are pretty unknown, but he has lived and worked in the castle since he was a kid. He is the other half of the cain/able archetype, and wields a sword. Has more magic resistance and magic potential than An.

Toya: the son of a very well respected mage. He does show talent for magic, probably more than his father, but thinks he is better suited for the fighter class. His father of course doesn't like it, but Toya goes on to train to be a fighter anyways, so their relationship is strained. He hangs out with Akito a lot in th castle. He has a remarkable magic resistance for a fighter and a higher mag than normal, so he'd be very good with a bolt axe (maybe he even promotes to a healer unit like a war monk from fe13)

WONDERLANDS X SHOWTIME

Tsukasa: a pegasus knight, like his father before him, determined to be the best knight of them all, known by all and written about so that his adventures prevail. In his very first solo mission he is hit by a storm and lands in a deserted island, and is rescued by a little pirate who annoys him a lot, but joins her noble cause. He's particularly strong for a pegasus knight, sacrificing a bit of his speed. He also has a talent for magic but not very much, however it does give him decent magic resistance.

Emu: a little pirate who escaped her evil pirate father once her nice pirate grandfather passed away. She was followed by 2 guards her grandfather had tasked with her safety before his death and is now roaming the seas, looking for more crew for her little ship so they can defend innocents! look I just really like pirates in fire emblem, i love that they look so goofy and that they swim so good they can fight in water. Emu would have decent defense and strength, but she wouldnt be very accurate, and i want her to have her own hammer, just for fun, and it would help her accuracy. She's the only one who can wield it because its very easy to disassemble it by accident.

Nene: an aspiring actress and songstress, the very first person Emu and Tsukasa rescue after their alliance. She joins them on the premise of "these guys are gonna die if i dont help them" but its mostly because she has so much fun with them and wants to help their cause. She is the dancer unit of the game, and she uses magic to attack. She would be very frail for the most part, but would be a very good magic tank if you trained her right.

Rui: wyvern rider from Mafuyu's country. He is recruited later in the game, about halfway, and you can only recruit him if Tsukasa, Nene and Emu talk to him. He is very inventive and is working with mixing magic and mechanical systems, with some small success so far, and is this ability that Mafuyu recruited him for. As for stats, he would be very phisically strong, and have very high mag for a wyvern rider, but not much in the defense or resistance. He would be very evasive however, and have very high crit chances.

NIGHTCORD AT 25:00

Kanade: she is a healer for the group who also uses magic. She lives in Mafuyu's country, and they have meetings to help Yuki, who they don't know is the princess of the country, develop some new tecnologies, mixing magic with mechanics, to help people in need, or so they all think. She was trained by Yuki but she has a natural talent for magic and healing. She would have low defense, she would be best used at a distance.

Mafuyu: as Mafuyu she is the princess of her country, but her parents are very secretive about her so the people don't really know what she looks like. As Yuki she brings a group together to help her innovate and invent things behind her parents back. She also has their group do skirmishes with the people of Ichika's country. She is trying to tap into the power of one dragon god using machines made with Rui's help, but she tells them all it's for the good of the country's less fortunate. She is a bow knight, with low-ish defense but very high speed and accuracy.

Ena: Akito's sister who got left behind when he ran away from the country when they were little. A dark mage, with a lot of potential, but is overshadowed by her family who is known to be very graceful and powerful group of dark mages. Yuki trains her to be more agressive in a way her family never would, it makes her magic all the more brutal. Very high magic, very high resistance, a bit higher strength than normal for a dark mage.

Mizuki: a wyvern rider who wields tomes and axes. They taught themself to wield the axe but Yuki taught them magic and attacking from a distance. They're the second most accurate of the group after Yuki, and they're the only one to take chances to attack upclose. They're the only one close to their family. They would be better with magic than with axes, and they have a better resistance than they do defense.

oof,,,, that was A Lot,,,, anyway

SECONDARY CHARACTERS

(what i mean by that is that they're secondary or mentioned in project sekai but would be playable/featured in the au)

Ken: in charge of training new recruits, retired from mercenary work because he sensed a war was coming, and he wanted to help the king and queen as much as he could. His class would be mercenary and he would be kind of a Jagen, but with a longer usefulness like Frederick from fe13.

Saki and Tsukasa's mom: she is Ichika's music and dance tutor, and honami's magic tutor, and an old friend of the king and queen. She is a talented mage, and a playable character later on. Well-rounded, defense stronger than normal.

Saki and Tsukasa's dad: a retired falcon knight, who works in the castle's stables and training recruits from time to time. He inspired Tsukasa to become a pegasus knight himself. NPC, but is featured in the plot at some points.

Mafuyu's mom: the queen of the country neighboring Ichika's. She is blind and wears a blindfold. Seemingly very sweet and loving but is quite ruthless in her rule, very strict and with a rigid class system. NPC, maybe final boss.

Ichika's mom: queen of the country, a warrior first and queen second. Not much of a diplomat, but is very honest. She would have her own class, and would wield a lance. At the beginning she seems like the most powerful unit so its shocking when she is killed.

Ichika's dad: king of the country, very soft spoken and kind, has a way of finding common ground with just about anyone. Has his own class, wields tomes and staffs. He has less defense so once his wife is killed he is pretty much done for.

(i kinda want ichika to be able to promote to either queen or king)

toya's dad: a bit of a magical jagen, but you get him on the later half of the game. super high magic stat, but not much growth rate.

Emu's dad: a minor boss in the first half of the game. You confiscate his ship to sail to another land and if Emu defeats him there is special dialogue.

Emu's siblings: they're all crew members and if Emu fights them, they all have special dialogue with her. Theyre mean to her ):

Kanade's dad: has some illness that Kanade is trying her best to train to cure while she works with Yuki and everyone else.

for now thats all i have, but as i play i might add some other secondary proseka characters.

now onto

ORIGINAL CHARACTERS

(these are characters that are not really mentioned in project sekai as far as i can tell, so i took the liberty to give them roles, because a cast of teens is not enough for a fire emblem game)

Kigu and Rumi: siblings who worked for Emu's grandfather in his ship, tasked with Emu's safety after his passing. They're both pirates and have pretty similar stats, only one has more strength and skill and the other more defense and hp. They practically raised Emu alongside her grandfather.

Nene's mom: a scholar and the closest thing to a doctor youre gonna find, doesn't use magic at all. Also very interested in mechanical and wind-up machinery. Her class would be mechanist, like in fe14, but it would be more western i think.

Nene's dad: a tailor and a mage, makes clothes for his beautiful wife who has trouble finding clothes that fit her body right, and also does it for himself, since he has the same problem. Well rounded, not much potential but can be promoted and branched out.

this is all i have for now, but im gonna look into siblings and such of other characters, since a lot of them, like minori and airi, have siblings that are only mentioned, so i could maybe do something with that, but thats gonna come later.

as i mentioned before, if you think of an idea id be happy to incorporate it or discuss it, and even if i end up thinking it wouldnt fit, id still like to read about it, and if you feel like im totally wrong, feel free to make your very own fire emblem project sekai au!! i'd love to see it :D

i dont know if anyone will actually read this far down, but if you did, thank you! I really appreciate it! i hope you have a nice day!

[aion-rsa]

Castlevania Season 4 Easter Eggs Explained

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This Castlevania article contains spoilers.

The endgame is finally here in Castlevania season 4, which sees Trevor Belmont, Sypha Belnades, and Alucard face off against the forces of evil that wish to wipe out humanity. While the story takes a few interesting turns you’re not expecting, fans of the long-running Konami series will likely notice quite a few connections to the original video games.

As you’d expect, that all means that there are quite a few easter eggs and references to the games as well as real-world history in Castlevania season 4. Here are all of the easter eggs we’ve found so far:

Varney

Although Varney seems like a two-bit vampire thirsty for glory at first, he turns out to be the main villain of the season. It’s a surprise twist worthy of Malcolm McDowell, the legendary actor who brings the character to life.

While Varney doesn’t appear in the games, the character does have a long history in vampire fiction. The vampire was first introduced in a series of penny dreadfuls titled Varney the Vampire; or, the Feast of Blood by James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett and published between 1845-1847. The series spanned 232 chapters and 876 pages, and while it isn’t remembered today as a must-read vampire story, it is responsible for many of the tropes later popularized by Bram Stoker’s Dracula and other horror classics.

Varney the Vampire was the first vampire story to establish that these creatures of the night had fangs which they used to puncture the neck of their victims. It was also the first story to establish many of the powers vampires are known for today, such as the ability to hypnotize their prey and enhanced strength. Like Dracula, Varney preys on sleeping women in the night.

Throughout Castlevania season 4, Varney is constantly complaining that he hasn’t received the recognition he deserves as the loyal soldier sent to conquer Targoviste for his master. This is a bit on the nose since the character he’s based is hardly a household name today despite the fact that he influenced the much more famous Count Dracula in a big way.

The Grim Reaper

By the end of the season, Castlevania has dropped its big twist: Varney is just a disguise for the Grim Reaper, a vampiric being who feeds on the souls of the dead. Also known simply as Death itself, the Grim Reaper has been a staple of the video game series since the very start.

Originally one of Dracula’s minions and a boss in 1986’s Castlevania for the NES, Death eventually became one of the main villains of the series. The Reaper’s plan to resurrect Dracula is also ripped right out of the games, especially 2005’s Curse of Darkness, which sees Death manipulate Hector and Isaac into resurrecting the Lord of Vampires.

Zead

Death using Varney is a disguise is also very reminiscent of another major plot point in Curse of Darkness. In the game, the Grim Reaper disguises himself as a priest named Zead, who aids Hector on his quest to kill Isaac. Secretly, the Reaper needs Hector to kill Isaac so that Dracula can posses the latter’s body and return to life.

Greta

While Greta is an original character for the animated series, her role in season 4 as the unofficial fourth member of the group of heroes who fight Death’s forces at the end will likely remind some fans of Grant Danasty, one of the four playable characters in Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse and a pirate who is very skilled with a knife. Greta also happens to be the head woman of the village of Danesti, an obvious nod to Danasty.

Christopher Belmont

In the original continuity, Trevor and Sypha have two children, one of which becomes the parent of Christopher Belmont, the protagonist of two Castlevania games for the Game Boy, 1989’s The Adventure and 1991’s Castlevania II: Belmont’s Revenge.

In the Lords of Shadow alternate timeline, Trevor and Sypha give birth to Simon Belmont, the protagonist of the 2013 Nintendo 3DS game Mirror of Fate. In the original timeline, Simon is also the protagonist of the very first games in the franchise, the 1986 original and 1987’s Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest for the Famicom and NES.

Okay, this is getting confusing. Moving on.

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Danesti

Look on a map and you’ll find that Danesti is a real place. In fact, there are several communes and villages named “Danesti” in modern Romania. Danesti may also be a reference to the House of Danesti, one of the two noble lineages of Wallachia. The other noble lineage? Draculesti, the line that bore Vlad the Impaler, the main inspiration for Count Dracula.

Targoviste

We also visit the city of Targoviste in season 4. The city is in ruins after countless battles with Dracula and his vampire horde. Fortunately, the city is in much better shape in 2021. It is located in the region of Muntenia, Romania. It was also the capital of Wallachia in the 15th and 16th centuries.

Rebis

The Grim Reaper’s plan is to transport Dracula and Lisa Tepes’ souls out of Hell and into the Rebis, also known as the divine hermaphrodite in ancient alchemy. The Rebis is a symbol of the “great work,” the ultimate goal of the alchemist, which involves “spiritual transformation, the shedding of impurities, the joining of opposites, and the refinement of materials,” according to Learn Religion. In ancient alchemy, the Rebis represents “a reconciliation of spirit and matter” and has “both male and female qualities.” The “great work” is also used to describe the alchemist’s mission to create the philosopher’s stone, a mythical substance that was said to turn base metals into gold or silver.

This is a bit outside my area of expertise, but as it relates to Castlevania season 4, it goes back to Count Saint Germain, who is an alchemist who has strayed from his path to find the love of his life in the Infinite Corridor. But when he meets a fellow alchemist in the corridor (actually Death is disguise), she tells him that the only way for him to find his love is achieve the great work, in this case creating a literal rebis that will act as a vessel for the souls of Dracula and Lisa Tepes.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Rosa

Rosa, a supporting character in Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness, doesn’t actually appear on the show, but Carmilla’s appearance in episode 6 –red dress with sword in hand — does remind me of the Rosa boss fight in those games. Carmilla’s chamber is also drenched in blood…just like Rosa’s flowers in the game.

Skeletons

One of the most basic enemy types in the Castlevania games makes an appearance in the first episode of the season. Trevor and Sypha fight these skeleton soldiers, which are armed with swords and shields, on their war to Targoviste. Throughout the years, Konami has introduced countless variations on the skeleton enemy, but Trevor and Sypha only really have to deal with the regular kind.

Hunchbacks

Super fast, hopping hunchbacks are constant thorns in Trevor, Sypha, and Alucard’s sides throughout the season. While one of these tiny enemies might not be a challenge, hunchbacks tend to attack in groups, making it harder to keep track of each blade-wielding baddie as they hop around you. Hunchbacks have been part of the series since 1986.

Golem

Mighty golems charge into Alucard’s castle during the final battle against Varney/Death and Dragan. They’re essentially giant man-made monsters made of rock and clay, formidable opponents for any Belmont. Golems have appeared in many of the games, either as bosses or regular enemies through out the levels.

Gergoth

Gergoth is one of the most gruesome monsters featured in season 4. Introduced as a boss character in 2005’s Dawn of Sorrow, Gergoth is basically a rotting dinosaur that shoot a laser beam out of its mouth. The half-dead beast is basically kept alive by magic, even as its flesh continues to fall off. The meaty red stump where its tail used to be is particularly grotesque.

Cross/Boomerang

Trevor finally acquires a cross-shaped boomerang weapon for his final fight with Death. The four-sided blade weapon is a callback to one of the Belmonts’ signature tools of the trade. Since the very first game, these vampire hunters have used the cross/boomerang (the name differs depending on the game) to vanquish monsters inside Dracula’s castle.

The Dagger

Belmont also finds a dagger that he later uses to finish off the Grim Reaper. This is another weapon you’ll find in most Castlevania games (sometimes simply referred to as “knife”). Like in the games, Trevor is able to “upgrade” the dagger in order to land a killing blow during the final fight.

Did I miss anything? Let me know in the comments!

The post Castlevania Season 4 Easter Eggs Explained appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[magpiejay1234]

Defeated the main storyline with Zeromus, now I got stuck at Lunar Ruins because I missed the save point. Oh well. Further thoughts on FF4 GBA

*Cave of Trials is definitely a later addition, not because it literally is an addiiton for this version of the game, but it is also antithetical to the Sakaguchi approach. Not the bosses for the ultimate-ish weapons of the additional player characters. Specifically, there are 7 levels of this dungeon. In all other dungeons in the original version of the game, you only have 5-6 at the very worst, except for the Lunar dungeons.

Nonetheless, it was very enjoyable, and I managed to grind better here than on Lunar surface, which was quite harsh. I still used the “canonical” party of Edge, Kain, Rydia, Cecil and Rosa because the IGN walkthrough recommeded it as such, though.

*Of all of the ultimate-ish weapons, the one that surprised me most was Triton’s Dagger. I didn’t know Palom could use daggers, though considering both FFI Ninjas and Edge can use Black Magic, it makes sense.

The Triton part of the dagger is also interesting since Palom cannot use water magic, but it is meant to reference his final scene with an unnamed girl (Leonora, according to the After Years). Of course the After Years made them a couple essentially, of course.

*It feels weird to see King Giott and Luca in both the Mysidia Tower and the final celebration for Cecil’s wedding. Other NPCs, particularly those in Troia don’t show up. Granted, Luca will eventually become an actual playable character in The After Years, but it is interesting to see how SE decided to squeeze the ending for more creating more content. Again, very anti-Sakaguchi, but also very Pokémon/Digimon/Yu-Gi-Oh!.

*And Zemus, as many people pointed out, you either believe he is a Diablus ex Machina, or a moral anvil to hammer in the “Fascism is bad” theme. Granted, for a JRPG series, FF’s anti-fascistic streak is actually unique, since most other Japanese media tends to be very pro-fash (you can look around Tumblr to see why, or just read early AoT criticism).

I’m more weirded out by his design. He doesn’t have legs, and according to the Yoshitaka Amano artwork of Fusoya, neither does he. But in the DS version, Kluya clearly does. From what I can understand, the Lunarians in the original game were meant to be more like a mixture of Asian dragons and comets, and both Fusoya and Zemus fit the bill. But Kluya is just a dude with animé blue hair.

Speaking of Kluya, the original translation seems to imply Kluya has been on earth for at least a few centuries, and having many progeny. But in the DS version, it is implied he had a traditional marriage with Cecilia, and only two kids, after centuries of wandering. I’m not sure if I like this later reinterpretation, because it makes me feel Kluya only found value in humanity after finding a chick who looks like a Lunarian. IDK.

*Going with the crystal retcon in The After Years, the Lunar crystals have not only kept Zemus at bay for so long, but they also actively help your party. So yeah, I don’t think the retcon works as well as I previously thought it did.

*The game obviously has a lot of Judeo-Christian symbolism in addition to the Star Wars references. Some of these are clearly deliberate. Others are NGE-levels of visual and textual flair. I planned to do a deep dive ages ago, but there might be a lot missing stuff from the later versions I might miss. So if I do a post like that, it will be less of a compendium and more of an overview.

*For the endings of each character:

**Tellah surprisingly shows up at the final battle, which wasn’t something I expected. The final battle overall obviously inspired the final battle against Giygas with all characters praying for your success and recovering your party.

*Edward actually lives up to being a good king after his father’s death. Edge doesn’t, because he is very horny. 

*Yang being the King of Fabul after the king’s abdication feels weird, because I don’t think it was set up really well.

*Cid is still stuck at Baron. I thought he would be a bridge between Dwarves and regular people, but I guess the dwarves already have the village of Agart. I didn’t notice that he was the best man in Rosa and Cecil’s wedding, which is cute.

*Porom is the one that instigates people in Mysidia to pray for Cecil and the gang, which is interesting. I guess Sakaguchi and Takashi Togita (co-writer of the game) really liked the character. 

Palom, as mentioned above, becomes a chad at the age of 5 somehow (Leonora at the point of this game is apparently 7, even though her sprite is clearly shorter. Again, Palom is a chad.) With him, I always think of him as a Bumblebee-type character, a character designed for the younger children in the audience to relate to. Games after FFIV would keep this tradition, but it feels weird to see here since Palom would become an edgelord like Edge in The After Years (despite technically following on Tellah’s footsteps.)

*Rydia remains with her new adoptive family. But I feel weirded out by Leviathan’s comments regarding Rydia’s beauty. This wouldn’t pass by censors in this day and age.

*Of course, Cecil and Theodor’s(aka. Golbez) closures are meant to parallel Kluya and Fusoya. Theodor ultimately decides to go into cryogonic sleep with his uncle (The After Years would put a kibosh on that, though), and Cecil takes on his biological father’s morals while taking his adoptive father’s role as the King of Baron. Symbolism aside, I really like this. Cecil was a character in need of a cause, and Theodor was a character in need of a connection with his past. 

Not to mention, if he decides to return after the all the shit he done under Zemus’s influence, he will be crucified by at least 50 people. So there’s that as well.

*I’m still stuck at Lunar Ruins, but I really like the face on the moon joke. Speaking of the moon, I wonder if the humanoid enemies in the Lunar Subterrane inspired the Maenad in the After Years. Anyway, that’s for another time.

[fluffypeachwriting]

we finally got a Lanzhu-centric chapter so you know I have to make a post about it  (♡°▽°♡)

under cut for a whole lot of Lanzhu appreciation (and spoilers)

Her dreams were all about making friends and having fun!! They all inspired her to become a school idol!! If I hear any more Lanzhu slander after this chapter hands will have to be thrown  (；⌣̀_⌣́)

She wanted to be friends, not to change anyone or force them into a position they didn’t want to be in...

It’s interesting that she sets the difference in her talent and the difference in her friendships away from each other, instead of realising that they’re connected.

Ok so after looking back at these I realised that no-one even tells her to act differently or change how she interacts with people. Like, they just acknowledge that she has her own way of communicating her feelings, it was just different from most people.

See?

In the voice line she says cola so,,, we have another cola fanatic on our hands guys,,,

She tried to lift everyone up by getting them the best resources she could give them, and since that was her way of showing she wanted to be friends it’s no wonder that she got so upset when people rejected it.

SHES BABIE

I’m so happy that we got affirmations from all the girls that Lanzhu is a good person, and that she’s had good intentions the whole time.

What a sweetheart.... Lanzhu is so sentimental and affectionate (and dramatic)

And then they want her to be the centre! They don’t try to make her humble or anything! (I also like that they make you play Wonderful Rush after this scene in the airplane)

So here she’s... supporting them! It’s a small detail but it’s nice to see what their dynamic as a subunit will be from here on out  ♡ ～('▽^人)

I can’t wait for their album so we can get the full versions of their songs  (´• ω •`) ♡ I hope Lanzhu and Mia become playable after the next chapter, and they can get cards and MVs!

[rpgsandbox]

Working alongside Skydance Television and the incredible team behind the hit Netflix TV series, we’re excited to immerse you in the neon-drenched cyberpunk sandbox of Altered Carbon with our official tabletop RPG.

In this transhumanist vision of the future, the human mind is nothing more than digital code – Digital Human Freight – saved and stored in a Cortical Stack, advanced technology that allows you to “re-sleeve” your entire consciousness into a new body. You can wear any body you can afford, transmit your mind across the cosmos in an instant, and, if you’ve got the credits and political cachet, you can re-sleeve time and again for centuries, accumulating enough wealth and power over the millennia to become the societal equivalent of an immortal god.

“Reality is so flexible these days, it’s hard to tell who’s disconnected from it and who isn’t. You might even say it’s a pointless distinction.”

Whereas character death is a natural occurrence and ever-present threat in tabletop RPGs, Altered Carbon: The Role Playing Game offers a unique angle on the concept. As opposed to creating a brand new character, players will have the opportunity to transfer their character’s consciousness, memories, and experiences into new Sleeves post-death… but at a cost.

Mind you, immortality is not invincibility. Losing a Sleeve is a life-altering setback, and “Real Death” awaits anyone whose Stack is destroyed. That being said, Sleeves introduce their own refreshing challenges to players and storytellers alike. Augmentations can instantly upgrade your athleticism, but a world-class surgeon in an unadjusted Sleeve can botch a basic procedure. The possibilities for characters and campaigns may change from one Sleeve to the next… making long-term gameplay more versatile, while empowering the story to steer character advancement at its own pace.

Bay City is divided into three major territories – the Ground, the Twilight, and the Aerium – each a world of its own; ruled by different kinds of people, playing games for different kinds of stakes.

The Ground: The underclass — known as “grounders” due to their inability to inhabit the skyscrapers as residents or personnel — continues to soar in numbers. Grounders are satiated with automated dispensed foodstuffs, public housing, and a neon-soaked parade of carnal pleasures. On paper, the features of the city seem almost Utopian, but the majority serves only as cheap labor for the vast bureaucracies of the Protectorate and the Meths whose own lives are glittering paradises in comparison to the empty, endless grind of the greater population.

The Twilight: A razor thin middle class serves as administration, managers, and highly skilled technicians to service the various technological marvels of society and its endlessly expansive bureaucracies. These skilled individuals are said to inhabit The Twilight, somewhere between the darkness of grounder society and the dazzling brightness of the high life of meth aristocracy. Most aren’t far removed from some criminal element, either by choice, close relation, or the occasional contractor through one of their shell corporations. You’ll scarcely find a programmer who hasn’t moonlighted as a “Dipper” at some point. Most dabble with decadence or crime (often the white-collar variety), if only to search for some form of existential purpose... The extra money doesn’t hurt either.

The Aerium: This network of skyscrapers is the domain of the meths exclusively. Their towers pierce the sky by several times in height the normal skyscrapers of Bay City. Each tower has the luxury of supporting a multitude of sprawling estates, all free and far above the need to see the rabble below, the unseen underclasses toiling under permanent cloud cover. Only specifically registered air vehicles and police aircars are permitted to fly anywhere near this complex. The much vaunted Suntouch House is part of this complex.

The core edition of Altered Carbon: The Role Playing Game takes place on Sol (Earth) in the year 2384. With the help of a gamemaster (GM), you and your friends can create your own stories and Sleeves in Bay City, the futuristic Californian metropolis that serves as the main setting of the first book and Season 1 of the Netflix series.

The human eye is a wonderful device. With a little effort, it can fail to see even the most glaring injustice.

Take control of police, military, technicians, artificial intelligence (A.I.), special operatives (CTAC), and even the influential elite of high society (Meths) as the core neo-noir themes of Altered Carbon promise endless sci-fi adventures:

Mystery — Solve the unfolding mystery. The gamemaster themselves may not even know who the culprit is at the beginning of the story!

Intrigue — Augments and re-sleeving don’t come without their own costs. Story-driven mechanics challenge players to balance their personal egos and baggage, influencing how players interact with one another and how their characters develop over time.

Action — An original game engine uniquely designed for the RPG, delivering a strategic yet dynamic zone-based combat system with exotic high-tech weaponry and streamlined options for more action-oriented gameplay!

Drama — The twisted reality of transhumanity enables players to create challenging stories, complex characters, and century-spanning epics, all which explore the darkest aspects of human nature that the value of life and fear of death once held in check. When murder is little more than extreme property damage, transhumanity is the perfect playground for noir storytelling that delves into the moral depths of our own humanity.

Working in tandem with Skydance Entertainment, we're able to provide a deeper dive into the world of Altered Carbon. As a result, we're expanding on elements of lore, and the colonized worlds that previously we unexplored until now!

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Tee2_LgSiUPM4arGX6-IE5pIpre7Q0LF

                                     Click for a clean Character Sheet

The Core Rulebook contains everything gamemasters and players needs to play the game.

Building a Neo-Noir Narrative. Build an authentic noir experience with a multi-layered mystery that unravels over time. Plot twists, MacGuffins, red herrings, and informants all provide the ever-adjusting structure you need to bring mystery and intrigue to your players without the need to pre-plan every detail at the start.

Starting Adventures. Enjoy two complementary modules designed to teach you everything you need to know to run the game and teach players the Hazard System.

Creating a Character. Ready to jack in? Pick an archetype: Civilian, Socialite, Official, Criminal, Technician, or Soldier. Generate core attributes like Strength, Perception, Empathy, Willpower, Acuity, and Intelligence. Game elements like Stack Points, Health Points, Ego Points, and Influence Points help flesh out your characters and determine how they perform and progress through the story.

Baggage. Your time in Altered Carbon takes its toll, as damage to your ego builds up over the years… as do the ghosts of your past deeds from sleeve to sleeve.

Variant Characters. Explore a range of unique playable and non-playable characters such as artificial intelligence beings, envoy soldiers, and high-class meths.

Re-sleeving. The body is merely a shell, and death is not the final destination. Each Sleeve comes with its own strengths and shortcomings. An impossible task in one Sleeve may be child’s play in another. Meanwhile, your enemy could be wearing your friend’s sleeve, so use your intuition and ingenuity to observe the details, break through the obvious, seek out new solutions, and stay alive.

Tons of Traits. Tier-based Trait system allows you to easily build your own Archetypes or assign a set of unique abilities that complement one of our pre-set character builds, with plenty of crossover options so that no two Archetypes are really the same.

Wealth Level Based Economy. Rather than nickel & dime every transaction, players can acquire gear and supplies adjacent (or above — if they’re willing to risk greater consequences) to their Wealth Level in order to keep the focus on story momentum.

Technology & Equipment. Nemex, Shard Pistols, Portable AI Emitters, ONI Interfaces, Merge9; the Core Rulebook provides all the mechanics for purchasing, acquiring, and modifying a plethora of futuristic weapons, apparel, and gadgetry with an expansive list of customizations for nearly every item.

Expanding the Altered Carbon World. While the Core Rulebook focuses on Bay City and Season 1 of the series, we’ve got big plans with Skydance who is currently in production for Season 2, and we'll be working alongside them to discover more ways to explore the colonized worlds in future RPG supplements. In the meantime, fans can explore Osaka and other parts of Earth 2384 via our stretch goal modules listed below.

Altered Carbon: The Role Playing Game will employ the Hazard System – a brand new game system that finds inspiration in popular engines like the Cortex System, Savage Worlds, and Outbreak: Undead.. all while delivering unique gameplay specifically designed for this RPG.

SKILL DICE: Actions are done using an appropriate die type depending on your level of skill.

Which are rolled against a Target Result (TR) assigned by the GM or Scenario:

12+ - Trivial

10-11 - Easy

9-10 - Normal

7-8 - Tricky

5-6 - Challenging

3-4 - Complicated

0-2 - Nearly Impossible

With success determined by rolling EQUAL TO OR UNDER the Target Result. The difference between the result and the TR are the degrees of success/failure generated.

Natural (rolled) 1's are considered an “Ace” - and always succeed with a flourish.

Besides the basics of rolling equal to or under the Target Result, the Hazard System provides a list of easy-to-apply modifiers that will help to quickly and contextually flush out a scene.

Bonus Dice: Players can be awarded Bonus Dice, which can be of any Die Type. Bonus Die results can take the best results (serves as an advantage).

Luck Dice: When luck plays a factor on the outcome (for better or worse), Luck Dice of any Die Type may add to Skill Check Results. Even players with D4s as Skills may fail if luck turns against them. Luck can even displace Difficulty altogether in the right situation.

Example:

Christopher is trying going toe to toe with an off-world assassin in a synthetic Sleeve but decides the fight is a little outside of his league — so he wants to escape. He could simply dart away, in which the GM will ask him for an Athletics - 5 (challenging) roll. He has a D10 in athletics so its reasonable. Or he could use a chaff bomb, which will disrupt the synthetics sensors and maybe cover his tracks. That just requires a Throw - 10 (easy), and even with a D12 that shouldn't be a problem... shouldn't...

Since all dice can roll low, there is ALWAYS a chance of success.

=========================================================

Kickstarter campaign ends: Wed, March 4 2020 6:03 AM UTC +00:00

Website: [Hunters Books] [facebook] [twitter]

[cyberramblings]

Sonic & Tails: Ideas for a new Sonic Plot and Partner System

So, first off, there is a game called Sonic & Knuckles. It is basically just the second half of the overly ambitious Sonic 3. It is not Sonic 4, but it is a standalone game. Anyways, there isn’t a game called Sonic & Tails yet, so let’s make that happen.

Regardless of that, I wanted to talk about my vague conceptualizations of a Sonic game plot. I WANTED to continue my thoughts on other Sonic characters, but my stupid brain can’t stop thinking about “what if Sonic and Tails fought?” Again, this is getting into some borderline fanfiction territory, but I write the blog AND the rules.

Piggybacking off my previous post detailing my thoughts on Tails, I had said that I liked the idea of Tails taking over Robotnik’s lab after he is defeated once and for all (or temporarily, I don’t expect Sonic Team to kill off the main villain, as much as I’d pseudo-ironically love Sonic Adventure 3 to open with Eggman’s funeral while Sound of Silence plays like the overly edgy funeral scene from Watchmen 2009).

Now, this is also getting into some serious Marvel Civil War or Batman v. Superman territory, but stick with me. I feel like one of the most underutilized aspects of Sonic as a series is the cast of characters. Maybe it is just me, but I feel like Sonic fans want to see their favorite obscure character return or see as many characters as possible. Even the most trivial characters have a cult following in the weird Sonic fandom. It was really cool to see the obscure Sonic the Fighters characters return for a boss fight in Sonic Mania, even if they were just an illusion. I am proposing a Sonic game where nearly every characters returns to make up the boss fights.

Now, the first issue with this idea is that typically the “rival” battles in Sonic are a bit hit or miss. Fights against playable characters in the Adventure IMO felt pretty flat and uninteresting. Now, 2D Sonic has some better boss battles against the likes of Metal Sonic and Knuckles and the same goes for Generations, so maybe those could be emulated. Regardless of gameplay, I’d like to see all the weirdies like the playable cast of Sonic Heroes, The Fighters, Emerl, Blaze, Gamma E-102, etc. return at least as boss fights, if not as playable characters, even if they are just piloting the mechs that would typically be piloted by Eggman. I get zero excitement from fighting Eggman anymore, but just put Rouge’s model in the cockpit and suddenly its way cooler with more potential for unique boss dialogue.

So far I have proposed a Civil War-style plot where Tails goes a little bit off the deep end and a Sonic game where the boss fights are all the beloved recurring characters. It should be obvious how these two parts fit together. Perhaps the dual story structure of Adventure 2 is overplayed by this point, but obviously it would fit in with these ideas.

To get into the nitty gritty and provide an example of what I am imagining, consider Metal Sonic. I can easily see a plot that starts with Tails reconfiguring Metal Sonic to be “good”. This bring back a classic character in a new way and allows for a lot of angles for the plot to go, of course borrowing from various Iron Man plots and the Buffy-bot from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

One idea from Sonic Adventure that I would really like to see return is the ever-evolving nemesis concept. Even if Sega never really brings back Chaos, I’d love to see a rival that increases in power as the game goes along. This could totally tie in with my previous idea, with Metal Sonic becoming more powerful over the course of the game, possibly with the acquisition of the Chaos Emeralds like Chaos does. Metal Sonic already has been shown to take on a few different forms, such as at the end of Sonic Heroes.

Another story beat that I’d like to see replicated is the end of Adventure 2 where Sonic and Shadow have to team up. Now, in this hypothetical Sonic & Tails game, that would obviously be Sonic and Tails teaming up, but I’d also love to see them bust out Mecha Sonic as a kind of retconned prototype of Metal Sonic from Sonic 2/3 as a last resort too.

I also love the story beat of all the playable characters at the end of Sonic Adventure bringing the depleted Chaos Emeralds to Sonic for the final fight. I would love to see something like this but a little more weighty. I have a clear mental image of something like the Breath of the Wild loading screen that shows your level of progress though the game, but instead with Sonic endlessly walking towards the camera as the game loads, surrounded by more and more characters walking towards the screen as you rescue/recruit them.

Personally, it seems like Sonic games struggle to balance multiple playable characters, so I’d settle for something like Advance 3 where you pick a partner that enables new moves. I would prefer to find a way to include every possible character as playable, but I would settle for a 3D Sonic game where Sonic (and maybe characters that control near identically like Metal Sonic, Shadow, Silver, Blaze, etc.) is the only playable character, with characters like Tails, Knuckle, Amy, Big, etc. are relegated to the partner role, but swappable.

Playable Characters:

Sonic: Everything normal

Metal Sonic: Just make him control like he does in Adventure 2: Battle, so faster than Sonic but with less moves. I don’t think Metal Sonic has ever been canonically playabe, only appearing as a boss fight or playable in racing games or bonus modes, so that would be my biggest request.

Shadow: Just Sonic but slipperier and please give him a teleport instead of a homing attack

Silver: Again, just Sonic but make his double jump more offensive to represent his telekinetic abilities

Blaze: Her name is BLAZE and she has FIRE POWERS in Rush and Rush Adventure, so please just make her control like Sonic but with a fiery homing attack or her fire hover from Rush

Espio: Just give him some kind of limited invisibility or maybe the tornado attack as a reference to Heroes

Mighty: He could probably be thrown in with his moves from Mania, but this is reaching

Jet: Probably asking too much, but he’s never been playable in non-racing game, so even seeing him with his board in a main game as a kind of joke would be cool

Assist Characters:

Tails, Cream, Charmy: Obviously, limited flight with slightly different characteristics. Cream could alternatively have the Chao attack from Advance

Knuckles, Rouge, Tikal: Either a limited glide or the digging

Amy: Piko Piko Hammer as an attack or as a big jump. She could also maybe be a Sonic-like characters, but I feel like she was shoehorned into the speed role in Heroes

Big: I just like seeing this dumb idiot return. It seems like asking a lot for the fishing rod to be used as a grappling hook, so maybe he could just have a big area attack

Fang/Knack, Bark, Bean: I mean, maybe just show up and fistfight some enemies?

Vector: Something music based, realistically

Chaos: Again, this is reaching, but maybe this ties into Tails taking over Eggman’s research

E-1XX Alpha, Gamma, Omega, etc: It is asking a lot to have all the robots return, but I’d love to see them all as slight variants of “shoot a bunch of missiles” or limited hovering

Omochao: Personally I’d love to see this little guy as an assist who just never shuts up, maybe with some hidden secret-unlocking potential

Vanilla: She doesn’t have a lot of game appearances, I’d take anything

G.U.N. Commander: Again, I just think this would be kinda funny. He could summon robots or just fire missiles

Eggman Nega: Not sure why he would help the main characters, but I’m always rooting for weird stuff like this

Wave, Storm: They could function like Tails/Knuckles or grant a temporary board for tricks or whatnot, maybe like the skateboard powerup from Sonic Generations

Tails Doll: This is dumb, but it would be fun to see as a little throwaway easter egg

So, that was a bunch of random nonsense directly from my brain, but you probably get the idea: find a way to include a lot of characters in the plot and the gameplay. Do I expect any of this to ever happen? No. And honestly, I’d prefer to see another game where I can actually play as characters like Rouge, the robots, Amy, and Cream.

ONE LAST THING: There should really be a Sonic rhythm game. They have so much music, both the classic songs as well as the Crush 40 songs, with tons of remixes of both already existing and even more possible. It would fit perfectly with the gameplay of Sonic, you could just have the notes appear as obstacles or powerup boxes. There are a million different ways to slice it, but it just makes too much sense to ignore. I don’t have enough ideas to make a separate post, though. Maybe I’ll make a playlist sometimes of songs I’d like to see included, but the issue is that it would be way too many songs. As with the main point of this post, I would love to see many different playable characters with very slight changes to their properties.

ONE LAST LAST THING: Since Sega hates localizing Puyo Puyo games, they should just make a new Mean Bean Machine with HD graphics and all the various Sonic characters represented somehow and then release it internationally either as Mean Bean Machine or just Sonic Puyo Puyo. Again, I didn’t have enough ideas for a whole post.

FINAL FINAL FINAL RAMBLES: I kinda wanna play Sonic 06 since I actually just recently found out that Rouge, Omega, and Blaze are playable, but the disc is 20 bucks at gamestop for 360. I also kinda wanna play Unleashed, but not enough to buy it. I really get more excited when more characters are playable, which makes me wish I enjoyed playing Sonic Battle more. I also have my eye on Chronicles if I can ever get the patience to actually sit down and play it. At this point, I should just make my own dang original game or story inspired by the things I like about Sonic.

[kraztaco]

Smash Bros Move Set for Quote from Cave Story

Been a while since I posted here, huh?

Anyhoo, I made a Smash move set for Quote for a contest a while back, and I figured I’d share it here.

It’s long, so I’ll make a cut here.

Quote is a zoner with Curly Brace as an echo. The two characters being echo fighters rather than alternate costumes is more of a Peach/Daisy type of thing rather than any difference between the two play styles. Quote is a stoic, silent, protagonist, while Curly is far more outgoing and expressive. This would be reflected in their animations, idle poses, and one different move. Curly is playable in Cave Story, and plays identically to Quote after all. Any time Curly Brace has a different quality, I’ll be sure to say so.

Along with Cave Story, both Quote and Curly Brace appear in the fighting game Blade Strangers. While I will be using some moves from that game, Cave Story will be the primary source for the move set.

I’ll try to avoid spoilers as much as possible, but some things are unavoidable due to the nature of the set. Quote’s name isn’t revealed until late in the game, so that is a bit of a spoiler but, going from his guest appearances, I doubt they care much anymore.

I couldn’t come up with anything else for the logo. I considered the island, but it would look too much like Castlevania, and a star would just be KoF.

Stats:

Height - Below Average (most crossover media portrays them as on the shorter side) Weight - Average (Can’t be a lightweight, being a robot and all) Walk Speed - Average Run Speed - Average Jump Height - High Fall Speed - Slow Air Speed - High Jumps - 2 (Normal) No additional movement options Takes damage while in water.

The Gimmick -

In Cave Story, each weapon in the player’s inventory has EXP. Leveling up your weapon will change its effect slightly, making it more effective (there are exceptions, but that’s not too important here). Enemies drop EXP, and gathering it levels up the weapon the player is currently holding. Conversely, taking damage will decrease the EXP of the weapon the player is holding.

Things will be simplified a little here. In Smash, Quote will have one EXP meter which applies to his entire move set.

Quote’s EXP will be displayed above his portrait.

Quote will start each stock at Level 1 with 0 EXP.

Every time a fighter takes 10% of damage from Quote (cumulative), they will drop a bit of EXP, which is a yellow triangle.

If a fighter takes 20% of damage or more in a single hit, they will instead drop a larger EXP triangle.

The triangles will disappear after 5 seconds, and no fighters other than the Quote player whose damage spawned them can interact with them.

If Quote touches the EXP, it will be collected.

If Quote is damaged, he will lose some EXP, if he has any. (being at 0 EXP is punishment enough)

Gathering enough EXP will level Quote up to Level 2, then Level 3. Gathering more EXP at Level 3, will give Quote Level MAX. Just like in Cave Story, this is a small buffer that lets you take some damage without dropping to Level 2.

Level 1 - Level 2 - About 10 EXP

Level 2 - Level 3 - About 20 additional EXP

Level 3 - MAX - About 5 additional EXP

(these numbers can easily be adjusted)

Leveling up will make Quote’s moves deal more knockback, but no additional %. They will also alter Quote’s special moves.

TL:DR - Quote is playing Coin Smash.

Quote’s moves in general are long range without much knockback or KO power. He will need to level up if he wants to reliably take stocks, meaning he has no choice but to get close to enemies and become more vulnerable when EXP is on the stage.

A Moves-

Quote’s Jab is a 3 hit combo taken from Curly’s Blade Strangers move set. Since Quote doing this little butt bounce would be ridiculous, his Jab 3 is a simple punch, taken from his own Blade Strangers move set.

The knockback angle on each Jab 3 would be slightly different, with Quote sending at more of an upwards angle than Curly.

Dash Attack is taken from Blade Strangers, having them both perform Curly’s elbow dash.

Tilts are pretty simple. Drew little pictures for them. F tilt is the only one that has any real reference to the game, being a down angled version of Quote’s most basic attack.

Conversely, F Smash is his most powerful attack; The Spur. It’s a beam that has a bit of startup, and travels further the more the attack is charged.

Down Smash is a spin from the Whimsical Star. It’s a multihit that hits on both sides then launches.

Up Smash is a Missile Launcher shot upwards, which falls to the ground. You know, like Snake’s.

Neutral Air is a two hit kick.

Forward air is a downward angles shot. It’s more powerful than the forward tilt.

Up Air is two shots fired upwards. Drifting during it means the shots will land in different spots.

Back air drags the for up with it and launches them. I considered it going down, but that would be kinda OP.

Down Air is your standard delayed spike with the Missile Launcher.

Grabs-

Grab and Pummel

Forward Throw

Up Throw (has the highest knockback of them, so it would be a kill throw earliest.)

Down Throw

Back Throw

Specials... oh boy, this is where things get complicated.

Neutral Special - Fireball

Quote fires a shot from the Fireball gun. It could have some start up lag, but that would be up to balance. Its a basic projectile that can just be thrown out to take space, like Mario’s Fireball. It will bounce on the ground at a similar arc to Ridley’s fire. At level 1, the ball will move at a moderate speed, and there can only be one active at a time.

At Level 2, the fireball increases in speed, and there can be two active at a time.

Same for Level 3, except the fireballs are now blue and slightly larger. They travel faster, and there can be 3 active at once.

The speed increase isn’t that much, but Level 3 fireballs can be tricky to avoid. Also, this is less fireballs than you’re allowed in the actual game (2/3/4 opposed to 3/4/5), but balance.

Side Special - Blade

Spoiler territory here.

Quote throws King’s sword, goes spinning a good distance in front of him. Quote has plenty of Blade Strangers moves that use the sword which could work very well for his moves, but I wanted to capture the main game more. In the main game, he just chucks the dang thing. It also seemingly comes back to him once its done doing what it does.

The blade flies about 2 character lengths in the direction Quote throws it, then disappears. It doesn’t go very fast, but it has good launching power and not much start lag. There can only be 1 active Blade at a time, regardless of its level.

At Level 2, the Blade moves faster, but not as far, about half of the Level 1.

At Level 3, the attack becomes truly dangerous. Instead of throwing the sword, the spirit of King himself will emerge and fly forwards. If he comes into contact with anyone, he will stop, and become a multihit cutting attack.

The Blade is a powerful projectile, but is fairly easy to read, and can’t be spammed since it sticks around for a bit. It can always be reflected, even as King’s spirit.

Down Special - Bubbline

There were some choices here, but I went with the Bubbline, mainly because it changes the most between levels (and the Nemesis gets weaker with levels, defeating the purpose of this gimmick).

At Level 1, holding down special will have Quote fire a pathetic stream of bubbles forwards. They deal damage, but don’t flinch. Quote can move and jump around as long as he holds the special button, but the attack will end if any other attacks are used. This is a pretty bad move, but it comes out very fast, and the bubbles linger, so it might be good to throw out from time to time.

At Level 2, more bubbles are fired at once, making the attack deal flinching damage directly in front of Quote. The attack still deals poor shield damage, and can’t hold foes in place.

At Level 3, the bubbles will now circle around Quote for as long as the special button is held. They can block weak attacks, and damage opponents who touch them. When the special button is released, the bubbles will fly off in whichever direction is being held at the time.

The Bubbline is a useful tool for defense, but it’s sub-par damage and shield pressure mean it isn’t a get out of jail free card.

Up Special - Booster v2.0

Holding Up special lets Quote use his upgraded jetpack. It has a fuel meter, and will continue to go until the special button is released, or the fuel runs out. Quote can have a second meter by his portrait, displaying his fuel.

Using the move does not put Quote into special fall.

While holding the special button, Quote can change directions by holding up, left, right, and even straight down.

The jetpack is great for mobility, but isn’t too fast at Level 1. Each level increases the jetpack’s speed and improves its fuel consumption.

Fuel works just like R.O.B., refiling when on the ground.

Final Smash - Super Missile Launcher

Both Quote and Curly have cinematic Final Smashes which trigger in different ways. For Quote, Balrog drops down from slightly above Quote. His hitbox starts in front of, and above Quote, and falls to his level. Anyone who Balrog hits is dragged in. Kind of the opposite of how Banjo and Kazzoie’s Final Smash works. Quote rides on Balrogs head, and barrages the caught foes with the Super Missile Launcher, with Balrog’s signature HUZZAH! text box displayed at the bottom of the screen.

For Curly, her four Migima friends, the Colons, pop up in front of her, and anyone hit by them are dragged in. Their hitbox is on the shorter side, but it goes a fair bit in front of her.

The cinematic has the Migima beat the caught foes with sticks in a cartoonish manner, they then leave as Curly readies her own Super Missile Launcher and blasts the foes.

I didn’t have many ideas for the Final Smash. Sure, the Spur is the most powerful weapon in the game, but I figured the Super Missile Launcher has more oomph. Curly’s take is inspired by her super in Blade Strangers. Also, I just like Balrog.

And colors for both of them.

And that’s all, hope you enjoyed it. I don’t see Quote getting in realistically, which was why I was comfortable making this move set. Honestly, I’d be ecstatic if he got a Mii Gunner costume with the level of love Sans got.

Making this set got me worried I was making another Belmont. In the end, I realized, I made something much worse.

[tombraiderfan900]

Murti's notes, part IV

Image provided by @positivelyamazonian​ made by Murti Schofield. Previous notes can also be viewed here.

Tomb Raider Checkout

Check out:

Previous games files (5 folders).

Check out dialogue guides

Ruff ideas, todo lists.

Treasure locations (maps)

Character name list (Russian, French, Czech, Scandinavian, German, Turkish)

The 'greys' / the 'ancients', (Dark guild) 'the old ones', 'shadow watchers'

The checkout was needed to focus on the new game (Tomb Raider - Next Generation). What strikes me is that Russian & Scandanavian is in the name list. Maybe in the AOD2 / AOD3 games some of these names would be used.

The greys/the ancients/the old ones/shadow watchers are probably the Nephili race. "Shadow watchers" reminds me of the book The Shadow histories by Murti Schofield. "The ancients" reminds me of a level in AOD: The Tomb of the ancients, but that is a reference to the Lux Veritatis. It might not be a good idea to mix them together.

Post Egypt

Lara drawn to Paris, called by Jean-Yves in trouble. He is fallen in fear for the 'greys' , digging for things that should remain hidden.

The fact that Lara is drawn to Paris called by Jean-Yves is well known. Because of conflict with Jean-Yves Emperreur, Core Design changed his name to Werner Von Croy. Strange enough the French police officer who speak in the intro FMV of TRAOD has the same voice as Jean-Yves. It is still unknown who he is.

Possible titles for the game

"An occult legacy of the blood"

"The mysterium of Legend"

"The blood chalice"

"The legacy of Race"

"The legacy of Blood"

"The chalice of souls"

The "Blood" and "Chalice" has something to do with the Holy Grail and thus the Knights Templar. There are more titles for the game, these are published on the tomb of ash website.

Tomb Raider VI

Present day Paris (locations: Louvre, Excavations, Catacombs, Eiffel tower)

The one that didn't make into the final game is the Eiffel Tower. It would be a great location if you think "anything would be possible". It's the same time as Jugendstil/Art Nouveau style came in.

Extinct race of Nephilim (are they?)

No they are not. But that's the whole point of the game :-)

Lara takes on John Dee. Elizabethian alchemist and raiser of the dead.

John Dee is a real person and model for Eckhardt, see my previous analysis (part I).

'El Spectro' (the ghost),

Could that be Karel?

'El Hawa'.

"El Hawa" reminds me of Kiko's documents there is a file: "Lara of Arabia". I have downloaded it sometime. You can find it on the Tomb Raider Forums.

There is a time period between the events of TR4 and the events of AOD that Core Design named 'Lara of Arabia'. This period of time was never meant to be shown, explained or playable in AOD. You would only catch glimpses in cutscenes and things that link to it.

Somehow Lara had escaped the pyramid. A nomadic tribe called Bedouin was passing by and took her into their village. There she met a shaman, a woman called Putai. She was a healer, she had gifts and she would use them to heal Lara. She gave her an Amulet of healing powers. Lara would have traveled with them along the ancient routes of North Africa, she had become one of them despite her name remaining unknown to them. Then one day she disappeared somewhere in the coastal areas of the Mediterranean.

Von Croy actually followed the trail of this tribe when he was still looking for Lara in Egypt. While he didn't learn anything about the shaman, he did hear about the Legend of El Hawa (which means desert wind). It was the story of a mysterious woman that would appear in appropriate times to fight the aggressors and protect the nomadic tribes. Von Croy followed the traces of the legend and found himself in a desert oasis. There he found Lara. She appeared different, much stronger but she wasn't angry at him for leaving her. It seemed to Werner that Lara had been traumatized by her near-death experience.

The friendship she had found among the people of the desert gave her an insight that was missing in her life. In here she could use her skills for a greater purpose than her days of sporting for artifacts. Von Croy was unable to convince her to return to her former life. The Lara he once knew was dead. He gave her her backpack and left.

One day the tribe that saved her life was attacked and massacred. Lara left Africa and returned to England. Lara did not attempt to reconnect with old friends. She couldn't get over the fact that she had failed to protect the tribe and had lost the meaning in her life she once found in the desert. Then she received a call from Paris..

It is unsure if it really means the desert wind. "El Hawa" could also be inspired by the place "El Hawara" in Egypt, in the Fayoum. It has a pyramid of pharaoh Amenemhat III and more. But I think it is a nickname for Putai.

Young James Dean type 'stranger' - spin off hero. Occult abilities - gifts.

Also known as Kurtis Trent.

[out-of-this-dimension]

Future Star Fox Game Predictions

I could probably write an essay about what I’d like to see in a SF game but I ain’t got time for that, so here’s some predictions for what we might see because I like predictions/speculation.  A lot of this is built off of what we’ve already gotten and what feels like the natural progression from where we are at.  All of this is, of course, assuming Star Fox Grand Prix isn’t happening (I’m... very torn on how I feel about everything to do with that but that’s for another day):

I’m going to start this off with what feels semi obvious: Star Fox 2 will have its influence in this game. I definitely do not think it’s coincidence that they happened to release Star Fox 2 when they did.  Having recently replayed every route of the original Star Fox for the SNES, it’s become pretty obvious that while a lot of the game was a homage to Star Fox 64, arguably more of it was a homage to the original Star Fox.  I actually think that the reason Star Fox 2 came out is because they plan on making a game that would similarly follow Star Fox Zero in a way that Star Fox 2 was to follow the original Star Fox.  The only other reason I could see them releasing SF2 was to be like “Oh hey, this is where the Walker is from!” but... it feels a bit redundant because Zero had already been out for awhile.  

The game will have Miyu and Fay.  They’re fan favorites and with Star Fox 2 being formally released, I think this is just about as good of a time as any to reintroduce them to the modern games.

The Walker will stay in the game.  It would be kind of weird if it didn’t, tbh, as the function is built into the Arwings.

There will be different types of Arwings a la Command/Star Fox 2 style.  This seems to be the direction a lot of the older developers wanted to take with the series and I think it’s something that will come back because the concept is pretty neat and it adds gameplay diversity.  I don’t think these styles of Arwing will necessarily be tied to an individual character but you will have character stats and vehicle stats that interact together to make a variety of gameplay styles that can appeal to a broad spectrum of people.

Dash Bowman and/or Andross will be the main villain.  Many people will be annoyed but it’ll happen but will feature a different enough gameplay so there will be less complaining than when Zero got announced.  The primary scenario will be Venom vs Corneria.  Dash Bowman appeared in SSBU as a spirit that could be collected in World of Light-- which was very, very odd given that even Bill and Katt were not spirits and they’re much more well-known.  I think it was a subtle hint that they planned on using that character in the future.  Granted, in Star Fox Zero, you face off against a mechanized version of Andross and although the final chase in the tunnel afterwards is very similar to Star Fox 64′s final dash through the tunnel, I kind of question if Andross really died because it... didn’t really seem like it was actually Andross (my opinion, of course, I could be mistaken) that was chasing him so much as just a robot.  I think it’s possible we’ll see Andross again in this installation or possibly a vengeful Dash Bowman, since it feels somewhat likely that Nintendo was going to use him as a way to put the 64 timeline back on the course that they wanted, with Corneria fighting Venom.

Katt and Bill will be present.  They will function similar to how they did before but will be unlockable pilots in multiplayer.

Multiplayer will be a thing.  It will be similar to Assault’s with online functionality.  It will be fairly well-liked by fans but probably won’t have many resources built into it. (I’m not saying I want this, this is my predictions, remember.)

There will be a mix of corridor levels and all-ranged mode levels, mixed in with some vehicle hopping.  You will be able to choose various vehicles to fly on missions.  Sometimes you will have to progress through the main campaign and then go back after unlocking new vehicles.  Playing in different vehicles will award different types of medals and getting all the medals will unlock cosmetic stuff like sunglasses for Fox.  People will compare the game to a blend of Assault and SF64.  

Alternative to the one above: The gameplay will function very similarly to Star Fox 2. The only reason I’m thinking it might not is because of Starlink being so similar to that.  I think Nintendo would take one look at that and decide against it to avoid feeling repetitive.

There will be different characters to play as.  Another feature coming in from Star Fox 2 and Command.  You will have a select group of characters to pick from, with certain ones being available for certain missions (Fox will be playable at all times because he’s main character).  Choosing whatever character will give you dialogue alterations and different banter.

The game will feature the actual destruction of Andross and his Empire as well as Andrew and Pigma being booted from the Star Wolf team.  People really love to hate these two (for some reason, I don’t get it) and Nintendo is notorious for doing obvious bad things to their “obviously bad guy characters” so I see that happening probably at the end as some comic relief.  I actually think that they’ll bring Panther back at some point, but not in this game. This will set up for a similar scenario as Assault where Wolf and Leon are the only two remaining original members.  Panther will be brought back later on.  Andrew will probably be reduced back to meme status and made into a secondary villain, similar to Pigma.  I will be sad at the wasted character potential but will be happy because at least we got a new Star Fox game.  And I will probably make posts about it.

The game will have throwbacks galore, which will annoy some people and make others happy.  Said throwbacks will be mostly returning enemies.  I feel like Goras has a pretty high chance of coming back-- just a gut feeling.  I was pretty surprised when it didn’t make it into Zero and we got the Dune reference instead.

Krystal... will at least be referenced, if not make a minor appearance.  I’m actually kind of iffy on this and could see it going either way.  I could see her showing up as an easter egg or even as a side character for a level, just to get fans hyped because it’s pretty obvious she’s well known and well loved (even though she has all those haters, she has oodles and oodles of fans too).  I could also see them waiting to reintroduce her until later but I kind of question that at this point since it’s been ages since she’s been in an actual game (and she’s popular) and they don’t seem like they’re in a rush to make SF games.  

The game will take place fairly immediately after Star Fox Zero, with a gap to fill in where Starlink could’ve possibly happened.  I’m really torn if Nintendo will acknowledge Starlink as canon or not.  I’m leaning towards the idea that they will just “no comment” when asked about it and just wave it off as “if you want it to be, sure”.  There will then be another war about what even is canon anymore.  Nintendo will shrug and take our money because we’ll all buy the new SF game anyways.

We will see the standard planets along with some “new” planets.  I definitely see Corneria, Venom, Fichinia, Titania, and Fortuna making a return but I could also see them adding back in some SF64 planets like Aquas and Katina.  I wouldn’t be surprised if they threw in Eladard or even Papetoon, too, just to add a new location.  Sector X, Y, or Z also mysteriously comes back and we never talk about the random nebulae from Zero again and people get confused but it’s okay because what even is consistency lmao

Someone will inevitably change eye color again and my money is on Wolf.

That’s about all I have for predictions.  I got inspired to do this after listening to a few Youtubers try to predict Nintendo’s 2020 announcements.  I thought maybe a SF prediction list would be kind of fun?  If you have any predictions/theories, don’t hesitate to share!  I love hearing stuff like this.